| Devotion to Our Lady |
|
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR THE EASTER SEASON
AND THE MARY MONTH OF MAY
AND THE MARY MONTH OF MAY
Article 8
Monday, May 5th
Mary Your Mother, Wants You to Suffer!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday, May 5th
Mary Your Mother, Wants You to Suffer!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
O Mother! Suffer Me Not to Suffer!
We look upon suffering as an evil! We don’t like or want to suffer! We hate suffering! We will go to great extremes to avoid suffering! We look upon those who make us suffer as being cruel and nasty! So how can it be said that Mary our Mother wants us to suffer? How can a Mother so kind, merciful and compassionate, actually and positively want us to suffer?
We look upon suffering as an evil! We don’t like or want to suffer! We hate suffering! We will go to great extremes to avoid suffering! We look upon those who make us suffer as being cruel and nasty! So how can it be said that Mary our Mother wants us to suffer? How can a Mother so kind, merciful and compassionate, actually and positively want us to suffer?
Article 7
Saturday & Sunday, May 3rd & 4th
Give Mary What She Deserves This May!
Saturday & Sunday, May 3rd & 4th
Give Mary What She Deserves This May!
A Neglected Mother
Who is there that gives Mary what she deserves? Nobody! Who is there who could give Mary much more than they actually give her? Everybody! Who is there that is more or less ignorant and ungrateful for what Mary does for them? Everybody!
If you attended the Good Friday ceremonies, you might remember the phrase: “What more could I have done for you?” which is a powerful rhetorical question from the Good Friday liturgy, in the section entitled “Reproaches.” The Reproaches are a set of prayers and reflections that explore the relationship between God and mankind―focusing on the themes of blessings, disobedience, and ultimately, the Sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross. The question, “What more could I have done for you?” is a central theme of the Reproaches and serves as a powerful reminder of God’s love for us and our failure to reciprocate. The Reproaches are intended to produce in us a sense of sorrow, reflection, and repentance, as well as to highlight the profound love and sacrifice that Jesus made for us and all of humanity: “I planted you as My fairest vine, but you have brought forth bitter fruit!” followed by the question, “What more could I have done for you?”
God Sends Us Everything Through Mary
The same question could just as well come from the lips of Our Lady ― “What more could I have done for you?” Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace ― each and every grace that we receive has been sent by God through the hands of Mary! As St. Louis de Montfort writes: “God has empowered her and commissioned her to fill, with saints, the empty thrones from which the apostate angels fell by pride. The will of the Most High is that Heaven, Earth and Hell bend, with good will or bad will, to the commandments of the humble Mary, whom He has made sovereign of Heaven and Earth―general of His armies, treasurer of His treasures, dispenser of His graces, worker of His greatest marvels, restorer of the human race, Mediatrix of men, the exterminator of the enemies of God, and the faithful companion of His grandeurs and triumphs.”
“GOD THE FATHER made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (Latin: “mare” pronounced “mah-ray”). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary. God the Father communicated to Mary His fruitfulness, inasmuch as a mere creature was capable of it, in order that He might give her the power to produce His Son and all the members of His Mystical Body … This great God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich.
“THE SON OF GOD became man for our salvation―but it was in Mary and by Mary. God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly. If we examine closely the rest of our Blessed Lord’s life, we shall see that it was His will to begin His miracles by Mary. He sanctified St. John in the womb of his mother, St. Elizabeth―but it was by Mary’s word. No sooner had she spoken, than John was sanctified―and this was His first miracle of grace. At the marriage of Cana He changed the water into wine, but it was at Mary’s humble prayer―and this was His first miracle of nature. He began and continued His miracles by Mary, and He will continue them to the end of ages by Mary.
“GOD THE HOLY GHOST formed Jesus Christ in Mary―but it was only after having asked her consent by one of the first ministers of His court. God the Holy Ghost, being barren in God—that is to say, not producing another Divine Person—is become fruitful by Mary, whom He has espoused. It was with her, in her, and of her that He produced His Masterpiece ― which is God made Man ― and that He goes on producing daily, to the end of the world, the predestinate and the members of the Body of that adorable Head. This is the reason why He, the Holy Ghost, the more He finds Mary in any soul, the more active and mighty He becomes in producing Jesus Christ in that soul, and that soul in Jesus Christ ... God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Words of Our Lady
► ST. BRIDGET OF SWEDEN was told by Our Lady: “As a mother who sees her son exposed to the sword of the enemy, makes every effort to save him, thus do I, and will I ever do for my children, sinful though they be, if they come to me for help! … I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
► OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1917) and AKITA (1973) echoes the above, when she says: “Jesus wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you! … I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (Our Lady of Fatima, 1917) … “I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this … Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much—very much! … Pray with fervor! … Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary! … I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!” (Our Lady of Akita, 1973).
Nevertheless, Our Lady of Fatima adds a tremendously important clause and condition to the “contract” of salvation that she offers―that clause is: “If my requests are heeded!” There is no such thing as “unconditional salvation” ― meaning that Our Lady will guarantee to save no matter how much we choose to sin and what kinds of sins we choose to commit. If we are not careful, the words of Our Lord shall apply to us: “You shall die in your sin!” (John 8:21) ― for Holy Scripture warns: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). We can easily fall into the sin of presumption, which refers to a condition of the soul where someone either trusts too much in their own abilities, or assumes God will grant them forgiveness without repentance or merit on their part. It involves hoping for salvation without deserving it, or seeking pardon for sins without genuine sorrow. Essentially, the sin of presumption is a form of pride that leads to overconfidence in oneself or overconfidence in God's mercy.
► OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1917) and AKITA (1973) speaks against this kind of presumption and points out that it will not work. If presumption did work, then why does Our Lady of Fatima point out that “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners?” (Our Lady of Fatima, 1917). In other words, presumption will not save them―but prayers and penances can save them if they cooperate with the graces of conversion that Our Lady will present to them.
At Akita, Our Lady echoes the same idea: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger! … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Our Lady of Akita, 1973). If God was the “all-forgiving and always forgiving” doormat that most people make Him out to be―why would He inflict such terrible punishments. It is not presumption, but it is punishments that could possibly save them―if they are accepted in a spirit of sorrow for sin and as just and rightful penance inflicted by God―then, like the Good Thief on the cross, they might possibly be saved at the last minute of their lives.
► SISTER LUCY OF FATIMA indicated in 1957 that we are not listening to Our Lady's Fatima requests―we are ignoring the clause “If my requests are heeded” in the “contract” of salvation that Our Lady offers. Sister Lucia explains: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, ignoring the message, keep following the road of evil, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
► OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846) had already indicated this lack of cooperation with her: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
Wake Up to Reality
It is both astounding and terrifying to see so many Catholics presumptuously plodding along in their worldly lives under the illusion and delusion that all is “fine-and-dandy” and they are on their way to Heaven―when, in reality, most Catholics end up in Hell. Who says so? Our Lord says so; Our Lady says so; many Saints say so [read more here].
► OUR LORD says: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven ... Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! … And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 7:13, 21; Luke 13:23-28). If that does not wake up Catholics from their deluded presumption, then nothing will!
► OUR LADY―the Mother of Mercy, the Mother of Fair Love, the Refuge of Sinners―who has a heart of gold and sweetness―also tells a similar story to Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies … How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation! … Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment!” Despite all this, the vast majority of Catholics remain unmoved in the deluded presumption.
► THE SAINTS tell us the same thing.
● Pope St. Gregory the Great (540-604) says: “There are many who arrive at the Faith, but few who are led into the heavenly Kingdom!”
● St. John Chrysostom (347-407), Doctor and Father of the Church says: “What do you think? How many of the inhabitants of this city may perhaps be saved? What I am about to tell you is very terrible, yet I will not conceal it from you. Out of this thickly populated city with its thousands of inhabitants not one hundred people will be saved. I even doubt whether there will be as many as that!”
● St. Anselm (1033-1109), Doctor of the Church, says: “If thou wouldst be certain of being in the number of the elect, strive to be one of the few, not of the many. And if thou wouldst be quite sure of thy salvation, strive to be among the fewest of the few! … Do not follow the great majority of mankind, but follow those who enter upon the narrow way, who renounce the world, who give themselves to prayer, and who never relax their efforts by day or by night, that they may attain everlasting blessedness!”
● St. Thomas Aquinas (1235-1274), Doctor of the Church says: “There are a select few who are saved! … Those who are saved are in the minority!”
● St. Louis Marie de Montfort (1673-1716): “Be one of the small number who find the way to life, and enter by the narrow gate into Heaven. Take care not to follow the majority and the common herd, so many of whom are lost.”
● St. Alphonsus Liguori (1696-1787), Doctor of the Church, says: “Everyone desires to be saved but the greater part is lost! … All persons desire to be saved, but the greater part, because they will not adopt the means of being saved, fall into sin and are lost! … The greater part of men choose to be damned rather than to love Almighty God! … He who abuses too much the mercy of God will be abandoned by Him! … The common opinion is that the greater part of adults is lost!”
● St. Benedict Joseph of Labre (1748-1783): “Yes, indeed, many will be damned; few will be saved… Meditate on the horrors of Hell which will last for eternity because of one easily-committed mortal sin. Try hard to be among the few who are chosen. Think of the eternal flames of Hell, and how few there are that are saved…I was watching souls falling down into the abyss like snowflakes falling thick and fast in the winter!”
● St. John Vianney (1786-1859): “The number of the saved is as few as the number of grapes left after the vineyard-pickers have passed! … Shall we all be saved? Shall we go to Heaven? Alas, my children, we do not know at all! But I tremble when I see so many souls lost these days. See, they fall into Hell as leaves fall from the trees at the approach of winter.”
Despite all those comments―and they are truly just the tip of a massive iceberg―Catholics remain deluded in the presumption that they are certainly going to Heaven. Ask most souls in Hell―and they will tell you that is how they thought and felt when they were still living on Earth! When will we wake up!!??!!! The devil has us heavily sedated with the fatally sweet drug of presumption―but those sedating, pain-killing effects will wear off when we find ourselves unexpectedly in Hell! Wake up before it too late!!!
Mary is Your Answer, Mary is Your Insurance Policy ― Start Making Payments!
Mary is the “Insurance Policy” against evil and damnation that God has chosen to offer us in our current era. It is God’s choice and God’s will―take it or leave it at your own peril. Many saints have stressed and attested to the power of this heavenly “Insurance Policy.”
● St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.”
● St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation.”
● St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.”
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
● St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.”
● St. Anselm (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost.”
● St. Antonine is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified.”
● St. John Damascene (a Doctor of the Church) says: “To be devout to you, O holy Virgin, is an arm of salvation which God gives to those whom He wishes to save.”
● St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church), in his book, The Glories of Mary, says: “The intercession of Mary is even necessary to salvation. We say ‘necessary’, not absolutely, but morally. This necessity proceeds from the will itself of God, that all graces that He dispenses should pass by the hands of Mary, according to the opinion of St. Bernard.”
● St. Bernardine of Sienna addresses these words to the Blessed Virgin Mary: “O Lady, thou art the dispenser of all graces, and since the grace of salvation can only come through thy hands, our salvation depends on thee!”
● St. Louis de Montfort adds: “Devotion to our Blessed Lady is necessary to salvation, and that it is an infallible mark of reprobation to have no esteem and love for the holy Virgin; while on the other hand, it is an infallible mark of predestination to be entirely and truly devoted to her.”
Mary Deserves Attention and Gratitude
In speaking of Mary, Louis de Montfort furthermore writes: “The saints have said admirable things of this holy city of God; and, as they themselves avow, they were never more eloquent and more content than when they spoke of her. Yet, after all they have said, they cry out that the height of her merits―which she has raised up to the throne of the Divinity―cannot be fully seen; that the breadth of her charity―which is broader than the Earth―is in truth immeasurable; that the length of her power―which she exercises even over God Himself―is incomprehensible; and finally, that the depth of her humility, and of all her virtues and graces, is an abyss which never can be sounded. O height incomprehensible! O breadth unspeakable! O length immeasurable! O abyss impenetrable! …
“The whole Earth is full of her glory, especially among Christians, by whom she is taken as the protectress of many kingdoms, provinces, dioceses and cities. Many cathedrals are consecrated to God under her name. There is not a church without an altar in her honor, not a country, nor a canton, where there are not some miraculous images where all sorts of evils are cured and all sorts of good gifts obtained. Who can count the confraternities and congregations in her honor? How many religious orders have been founded in her name and under her protection? How many members in these confraternities, and how many religious men and women in all these orders, who publish her praises and confess her mercies! There is not a little child who, as it lisps the Hail Mary, does not praise her. There is scarcely a sinner who, even in his obduracy, has not some spark of confidence in her. Nay, the very devils in Hell respect her while they fear her!
“After that, we must cry out with the saints: “De Maria numquam satis!”—“Of Mary there is never enough!” We have not yet praised, exalted, honored, loved and served Mary as we ought! She deserves still more praise, still more respect, still more love, and still more service!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Mary the Mother of Grace
We are so caught up in ourselves and other things, that we never stop to think what the Blessed Virgin is actually doing for all of us―whether we in a state of Sanctifying Grace or a state of Mortal Sin; whether we are friends of God or enemies of God! Mary is the Mediatrix of All Grace. Very few people truly grasp what grace is and do not know the distinctions between the different kinds of grace that exist. If Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace, then perhaps we should learn a little more, or refresh our knowledge on grace in general.
St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Everything is grace!” ― and you could add to that: “Grace is everything!” Our Lord Himself said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Most people fail to see and understand the universal and omnipresent aspect and need of God’s grace. We are, in a sense, constantly swimming in the sea of God’s grace. St. Louis de Montfort says: “God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (in Latin: “mare”). He made also an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (in Latin: “Maria”).” Thus we are swimming around in the grace of God in the sea of Mary. All the rivers of God’s graces flow into that sea of grace that is Mary. If Mary is the Mother of Jesus (Who is God), then she is also the Mother of God. If Jesus as God is the Author of All Grace, then it stands to reason that Mary is the Mother of Grace just as she is the Mother of Jesus and God. As Jesus came to us through Mary, so too does Jesus send to us all His graces through Mary. Hence we have the expressions such as: “To Jesus through Mary!”
There is nobody in Heaven without Sanctifying Grace in their soul―and there is nobody in Hell with Sanctifying Grace in their soul. Grace is everything―it is all that really matters. If you are the richest person in world, but do not have Sanctifying Grace in your soul, then you cannot enter Heaven, you cannot buy your way into Heaven, nor can you bribe your way into Heaven. You might be the most famous person in the world―but without Sanctifying Grace your fame will get you nowhere when it comes to Heaven. You might be the most powerful person in the world―but without Sanctifying Grace in your soul, you will be powerless in getting to Heaven.
You might be the poorest person on Earth―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you are richer than the richest person on Earth. You may be hated by everyone and have no friends―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you are loved by God and all the angels and saints in Heaven. You may have been the biggest sinner the world has ever seen―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you will avoid Hell and eventually get to Heaven. Yes―grace is everything. Grace is everything we need to get to Heaven.
Sanctifying Grace is our passport to Heaven, but another kind of grace, called Actual Grace, is constantly whirring and working around us to keep us on the right path to Heaven and to avoid the pitfalls that could make us fall into Hell. Those who are in a state Mortal Sin and have therefore kicked-out Sanctifying Grace from their souls, those sinners will still be mercifully given Actual Graces by God (through Mary) to prod and prompt them to convert and return to a state of Sanctifying Grace. Everyone in the world might not be in a state of Sanctifying Grace, but everyone in the world is mercifully given Actual Grace which is meant to lead them to God and conversion; sanctification and salvation.
Actual Grace refers to supernatural help from God that helps us to do good and to avoid evil. It can enlighten the mind, making us understand what is good, or move the will, inspiring us to choose the right path. It is a transient, passing, temporary intervention of grace in our lives, meaning it is offered by God at specific moments to assist us in spiritual growth and progress. Unlike Sanctifying Grace, which is a permanent dwelling of God’s love in our soul, Actual Grace is not a permanent grace, but a specific, temporary gift from God. Actual Grace lasts only for a while―sometimes more and sometimes less―and can be received and used at different times for countless needs and situations. You cannot store and save Actual Grace because it lasts only for the while that it tries to move you to think, say, or do something good; or not think, not say, and not do something evil. Actual Grace is an invitation to cooperate with God’s will in doing good and avoiding evil. We can either accept and respond to that Actual Grace, or we can ignore or resist it―it will not hang around forever. Thus we can either accept and respond to Our Lady’s attempts at bring us those graces, or we can ignore and resist her.
What does grace do? Grace does everything―everything that is not sinful. St. Thomas Aquinas, in his section on Grace, in his Summa Theologica and also Quaestiones Quodlibetales, writes:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For grace is given to many persons to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones Quodlibetales, 4, 6).
Let those words sink in deep! We cannot wish or do any good whatsoever without grace! Without grace we cannot think of good things, desire good things, love in a good way, or act in a good way! Without grace we can do no good whatsoever! We cannot know truth without grace! We cannot know what to do without grace! We can do nothing unless moved by God! We cannot avoid sinning without grace! We cannot rise from sin without grace! We cannot be contrite without grace! We cannot persevere without grace! Etc. Thus we can see―or should see―that grace is working constantly in our lives and we are most probably oblivious to the fact!
Thanklessly Overworked Mother of Grace
If grace is working constantly in our lives―then, quite logically, it means that Our Lady the Mediatrix of All Grace is also working constantly in our lives. You can be sure that most people―if not almost all people―fail to realize this, fail to acknowledge this, and fail to give thanks for this ceaseless work of Our Lady. Those words of Our Lady of La Salette come to mind: “I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
Our Lady said to St. Mechtilde: “The words ― ‘full of grace’ ― remind me that the Holy Ghost has showered so many graces upon me that I am able to give these graces in abundance to those who ask for them through my mediation.” She also said to Blessed Alan de la Roche: “I am the Mother of the King of Heaven, and He calls me full of grace. And, being filled with grace, I am able to dispense it freely to my dear children.” In his book, The Secret of the Rosary, St. Louis de Montfort adds: “Praise and honor the numberless graces with which God has filled the Blessed Virgin and say to her ― ‘Thou art full of grace and filled with all the gifts of the Holy Ghost!’ ― and she will give you some of these graces.” In his True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis further says: “Thank God for the incomparable graces He has given Mary! … Thank God for the graces He has given to Our Lady! … If any one of the faithful has Jesus Christ formed in his heart, he can say boldly: ‘All thanks be to Mary! What I possess is her effect and her fruit, and without her I should never have had it!’” (True Devotion to Mary).
There is no Heaven without holiness―it is only saints that go to Heaven―and it is only Sanctifying Grace in the soul that makes us progressively holy. As St. Louis de Montfort, in his The Secret of Mary, says: “It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God … Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person … It was Mary who gave existence and life to the Author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the Mother of Grace … God the Father, from Whom every grace comes down to us, gave her every grace when He gave her His Son … God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands … She keeps her Son from striking us; she prevents the devil from harming us; she preserves virtue in us; she prevents our merits from being lost and our graces from receding … The Saints tell us that when we have once found Mary—and through Mary, found Jesus, and through Jesus, found God the father—then we have discovered every good. When we say ‘every good,’ we exclude nothing. ‘Every good’ includes every grace; continuous friendship with God; every guarantee against the enemies of God; possession of truth to counter every falsehood; endless benefits and unfailing headway against the hazards we meet on the way to salvation; and finally every consolation and joy amid the bitter afflictions of life.”
Do Not Forget Your Mother!
St. Louis de Montfort writes: “Long ago, Moses was inspired by God to command the Jewish people never to forget the graces which had been showered upon them” (The Secret of the Rosary). Since God showers us with graces through Mary the Mediatrix of All Grace, then you could paraphrase the above quote to say: “God commands His people never to forget the graces which have been showered upon them through Mary!”
It is God’s love for us that makes Him shower graces upon us―whether we be good or evil: “Your Father in Heaven, who makes His sun rise and rain fall upon the good and bad, upon the just and the unjust!” (Matthew 5:45). It is Mary’s love for us that makes her be a Refuge of Sinners and a Mother of Mercy despite our sinfulness. Holy Scripture tells us that “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and the Church applies to Mary the words: “I am the Mother of fair love” (Ecclesiasticus 24:24) which is seen in several Readings in various Masses of Our Lady. Love is something that is reciprocal―which means it is a case of two-way giving―we are loved and we love in return. That is especially what we should be doing with God and Our Lady: “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God first, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins … Let us therefore love God, because God has first loved us!” (1 John 4:10, 19).
The love of Christ is clearly shown by the fact that He gave up His life through suffering and torture to save us from Hell. St. Louis de Montfort writes: “Jesus has given Himself to us without reserve―body and soul, virtues, graces and merits. Is it not then a simple matter of justice and of gratitude that we should give Him all that we can give Him? … We offer and consecrate all we are and all we have to the Blessed Virgin in order that Our Lord may receive through her mediation the glory and the gratitude which we owe Him … He finds His glory in receiving, through the hands of Mary, the gratitude, respect and love which we owe Him for His benefits … He has been the first to be generous toward us―let us, at least, be the second; and then, in life and death and throughout all eternity, we shall find Him still more generous. ‘With the generous He will be generous’ … As you have given yourself entirely to her―she, who is generous with the generous, and more generous even than the generous, will in return give herself to you in a marvelous but real manner! … The most holy Virgin, who is a Mother of sweetness and mercy, and who never lets herself be outdone in love and generosity, seeing that we give ourselves entirely to her, she also gives her whole self, and gives it in an unspeakable manner, to him who gives all to her … Hence, if a soul gives itself to her without reserve, she gives herself to that soul without reserve … She causes him to be engulfed in the abyss of her graces ... Mary, being the most gracious and generous of all pure creatures, never lets herself be outdone in love and generosity ... She adorns him with her merits; she supports him with her power; she illuminates him with her light; she inflames him with her love; she communicates to him her virtues: her humility, her Faith, her purity and the rest! … Our Blessed Lord and Our Lady will never let themselves be outdone in gratitude!” (True Devotion to Mary).
Actions Speak Louder Than Words
It is easy to say “I love you!” with our lips―it is much harder, but also much more impressive, to show our love by our actions. Actions usually are more expensive than words. Our Lord indicated this power of action in proving love when He said: “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13). Our Lady could say: “Don’t just say you love me―prove to me that you love me! I have proved that I love you by sending you countless graces each day from Almighty God! What return of love will you make to me?” Let us not be “all talk and no action” in our dealings with Mary. Love is more than mere talk! Love is also the greatest payment we can make for all that Our Lady has done, is doing, and will do for us by continually dispensing the graces of God in every moment of our daily lives. Just as “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends!” ― likewise, you could say: “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for Our Lady!” That is exactly what St. Louis de Montfort’s version of a true devotion to Mary does―it gives all to Our Lady; it makes a person not only a servant of Our Lady but a slave of Our Lady; it is a total giving and not just a partial selective giving. We give all for all―knowing that Our Lady will not let herself be outdone in generosity!
The Power of Love
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and God is all powerful: “With God all things are possible! … No word shall be impossible with God! … I am the Lord God―shall anything be hard for Me?” (Matthew 19:26; Luke 1:37; Jeremias 32:27). Nothing is impossible for the God of love―and, thus, as the Imitation of Christ says, nothing should be impossible for love:
“Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs with equanimity. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and estranged from all worldly affections, lest it be entangled in any temporal interest and overcome by adversity. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger, or higher, or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God.
“One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all. Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much, where he, who does not love, fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle.
“Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself, there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. It is mean and contemptible in its own eyes, devoted and thankful to God; always trusting and hoping in Him even when He is distasteful to it, for there is no living in love without sorrow. He who is not ready to suffer all things and stand resigned to the will of the Beloved, is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter, for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice.” (Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5: “The Wonderful Effect of Divine Love”).
Pay With Love
There are as many ways to return the love and care that Our Lady shows us, as there are grains of sand throughout the world. There is no one single way of showing love―for love is creative and is always new ways to manifest itself. Yet whatever ways we choose to repay Our Lady for her love towards us―those ways will be useless if they are performed without love. As Holy Scripture says: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
If we feel that our love is weak, then St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that one efficient and effective way to increase our love for someone is to start thanking that person for all they have done for us and are doing for us. Gratitude fuels the fires of love. Since Our Lady is constantly doing things for us ― distributing God’s graces; interceding and obtaining mercy for our sins; protecting us from evil; keeping us on the road to salvation; etc. ― then we should be constantly thanking Our Lady since she is constantly working on our behalf. It is pride, ignorance and spiritual blindness that prevent us from seeing and recognizing all that Our Lady does for us―nothing happens by chance, good-luck or bad-luck in our lives. We need to pay attention to what she is doing and then make sure we give thanks to her. It is not for nothing that the Preface of the Mass says: “It is truly meet and just, right and for our salvation, that we should, at all times and in all places, give thanks unto Thee!”
St. Louis’ Tip of the Iceberg
In his True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis de Montfort lists what might seem to be many ways of showing devotion to Our Lady―but, in reality, that seemingly long list is merely the tip of a gigantic iceberg of actions that we could take in showing our love towards Our Lady and in some degree repaying somewhat that enormous debt of gratitude that we should have towards her. Here is “tip of the iceberg” list―but you should be able to come up with 20 times, 50 times, 100 times more ideas!
There are several interior practices of true devotion to the Blessed Virgin. Here are the principal ones, stated compendiously:
(1) to honor her as the worthy Mother of God, with the worship of hyperdulia; that is to say, to esteem her and honor her above all the other saints, as the masterpiece of grace, and the first after Jesus Christ, true God and true Man;
(2) to meditate on her virtues, her privileges and her actions;
(3) to contemplate her grandeurs;
(4) to make acts of love, of praise, of gratitude to her;
(5) to invoke her cordially;
(6) to offer ourselves to her and unite ourselves with her;
(7) to do all our actions with the view of pleasing her;
(8) to begin, to continue and to finish all our actions by her, in her, with her and for her, in order that we may do them by Jesus Christ, in Jesus Christ, with Jesus Christ and for Jesus Christ, our Last End. We will presently explain this last practice.
True devotion to Our Lady also has several exterior practices, of which the following are the principal ones:
(1) to enroll ourselves in her confraternities and enter her congregations;
(2) to join the religious orders instituted in her honor;
(3) to proclaim her praises;
(4) to give alms, to fast and to undergo outward and inward mortifications in her honor;
(5) to wear her liveries, such as the Rosary, the Scapular or the little chain;
(6) to recite with attention, devotion and modesty the holy Rosary, composed of fifteen decades of Hail Mary’s in honor of the fifteen principal mysteries of Jesus Christ; or five decades, which is one third of the Rosary.
(7) to say a chaplet of six or seven decades in honor of the years which we believe Our Lady lived on Earth;
(8) to say the Little Crown of the Blessed Virgin, composed of three Our Fathers and twelve Hail Mary’s, in honor of her crown of twelve stars or privileges;
(9) to say the Office of Our Lady, so universally received and recited in the Church; or the little Psalter of the holy Virgin, which St. Bonaventure composed in her honor;
(10) to say fourteen Our Fathers and Hail Mary’s in honor of her fourteen joys;
(11) to say some other prayers, hymns and canticles of the Church, such as the Salve Regina, the Alma, the Ave Regina Coelorum, or the Regina Coeli, according to the different seasons; or the Ave Maris Stella, the O Gloriosa Domina, the Magnificat, or some other practices of devotion, of which books are full;
(12) to sing, or have sung, spiritual canticles in her honor;
(13) to make a number of genuflections or reverences, while saying, for example, every morning, sixty or a hundred times, Ave Maria, Virgo Fidelis (“Hail Mary, Faithful Virgin”), to obtain from God through her the grace to be faithful to the graces of God during the day; and then again in the evening, Ave Maria, Mater Misericordiae (“Hail Mary, Mother of Mercy”) to ask pardon of God through her for the sins that we have committed during the day;
(14) to take care of her confraternities, to adorn her altars, to crown and ornament her images;
(15) to carry her images, or to have them carried, in procession, and to carry a picture or an image of her about our own persons, as a mighty arm against the evil spirit;
(16) to have copies of her name or picture made and placed in churches, or in houses, or on the gates and entrances into cities, churches and houses;
(17) to special and solemn consecrate ourselves to her in manner.
There are numerous other practices of true devotion toward the Blessed Virgin which the Holy Ghost has inspired in saintly souls and which are very sanctifying, which the saints have practiced in honor of Our Lady—devotions which serve marvelously to sanctify our souls, provided they are performed as they ought to be, that is to say,
(1) with a good and pure intention to please God only, to unite ourselves to Jesus Christ as to our Last End, and to edify our neighbor;
(2) with attention and without voluntary distraction;
(3) with devotion, equally avoiding precipitation and negligence;
(4) with modesty, and a respectful and edifying posture of the body.
There is no better time than the Mary Month of May to stir ourselves up to a great love and devotion to Our Lady and start paying back Our Lady for all that she has done for us―at least as much we weak finite humans are capable of doing. The words of Our Lady of La Salette should drive us on: “I have suffered all of the time for all of you! I must take it upon myself to pray for you continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!” Sure―we will never be able to fully make up for the trouble Our Lady has gone to on our behalf―but we should at least give all that we possibly can towards that immense debt!
Who is there that gives Mary what she deserves? Nobody! Who is there who could give Mary much more than they actually give her? Everybody! Who is there that is more or less ignorant and ungrateful for what Mary does for them? Everybody!
If you attended the Good Friday ceremonies, you might remember the phrase: “What more could I have done for you?” which is a powerful rhetorical question from the Good Friday liturgy, in the section entitled “Reproaches.” The Reproaches are a set of prayers and reflections that explore the relationship between God and mankind―focusing on the themes of blessings, disobedience, and ultimately, the Sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross. The question, “What more could I have done for you?” is a central theme of the Reproaches and serves as a powerful reminder of God’s love for us and our failure to reciprocate. The Reproaches are intended to produce in us a sense of sorrow, reflection, and repentance, as well as to highlight the profound love and sacrifice that Jesus made for us and all of humanity: “I planted you as My fairest vine, but you have brought forth bitter fruit!” followed by the question, “What more could I have done for you?”
God Sends Us Everything Through Mary
The same question could just as well come from the lips of Our Lady ― “What more could I have done for you?” Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace ― each and every grace that we receive has been sent by God through the hands of Mary! As St. Louis de Montfort writes: “God has empowered her and commissioned her to fill, with saints, the empty thrones from which the apostate angels fell by pride. The will of the Most High is that Heaven, Earth and Hell bend, with good will or bad will, to the commandments of the humble Mary, whom He has made sovereign of Heaven and Earth―general of His armies, treasurer of His treasures, dispenser of His graces, worker of His greatest marvels, restorer of the human race, Mediatrix of men, the exterminator of the enemies of God, and the faithful companion of His grandeurs and triumphs.”
“GOD THE FATHER made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (Latin: “mare” pronounced “mah-ray”). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary. God the Father communicated to Mary His fruitfulness, inasmuch as a mere creature was capable of it, in order that He might give her the power to produce His Son and all the members of His Mystical Body … This great God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich.
“THE SON OF GOD became man for our salvation―but it was in Mary and by Mary. God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly. If we examine closely the rest of our Blessed Lord’s life, we shall see that it was His will to begin His miracles by Mary. He sanctified St. John in the womb of his mother, St. Elizabeth―but it was by Mary’s word. No sooner had she spoken, than John was sanctified―and this was His first miracle of grace. At the marriage of Cana He changed the water into wine, but it was at Mary’s humble prayer―and this was His first miracle of nature. He began and continued His miracles by Mary, and He will continue them to the end of ages by Mary.
“GOD THE HOLY GHOST formed Jesus Christ in Mary―but it was only after having asked her consent by one of the first ministers of His court. God the Holy Ghost, being barren in God—that is to say, not producing another Divine Person—is become fruitful by Mary, whom He has espoused. It was with her, in her, and of her that He produced His Masterpiece ― which is God made Man ― and that He goes on producing daily, to the end of the world, the predestinate and the members of the Body of that adorable Head. This is the reason why He, the Holy Ghost, the more He finds Mary in any soul, the more active and mighty He becomes in producing Jesus Christ in that soul, and that soul in Jesus Christ ... God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Words of Our Lady
► ST. BRIDGET OF SWEDEN was told by Our Lady: “As a mother who sees her son exposed to the sword of the enemy, makes every effort to save him, thus do I, and will I ever do for my children, sinful though they be, if they come to me for help! … I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
► OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1917) and AKITA (1973) echoes the above, when she says: “Jesus wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you! … I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (Our Lady of Fatima, 1917) … “I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this … Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much—very much! … Pray with fervor! … Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary! … I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!” (Our Lady of Akita, 1973).
Nevertheless, Our Lady of Fatima adds a tremendously important clause and condition to the “contract” of salvation that she offers―that clause is: “If my requests are heeded!” There is no such thing as “unconditional salvation” ― meaning that Our Lady will guarantee to save no matter how much we choose to sin and what kinds of sins we choose to commit. If we are not careful, the words of Our Lord shall apply to us: “You shall die in your sin!” (John 8:21) ― for Holy Scripture warns: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). We can easily fall into the sin of presumption, which refers to a condition of the soul where someone either trusts too much in their own abilities, or assumes God will grant them forgiveness without repentance or merit on their part. It involves hoping for salvation without deserving it, or seeking pardon for sins without genuine sorrow. Essentially, the sin of presumption is a form of pride that leads to overconfidence in oneself or overconfidence in God's mercy.
► OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1917) and AKITA (1973) speaks against this kind of presumption and points out that it will not work. If presumption did work, then why does Our Lady of Fatima point out that “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners?” (Our Lady of Fatima, 1917). In other words, presumption will not save them―but prayers and penances can save them if they cooperate with the graces of conversion that Our Lady will present to them.
At Akita, Our Lady echoes the same idea: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger! … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Our Lady of Akita, 1973). If God was the “all-forgiving and always forgiving” doormat that most people make Him out to be―why would He inflict such terrible punishments. It is not presumption, but it is punishments that could possibly save them―if they are accepted in a spirit of sorrow for sin and as just and rightful penance inflicted by God―then, like the Good Thief on the cross, they might possibly be saved at the last minute of their lives.
► SISTER LUCY OF FATIMA indicated in 1957 that we are not listening to Our Lady's Fatima requests―we are ignoring the clause “If my requests are heeded” in the “contract” of salvation that Our Lady offers. Sister Lucia explains: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, ignoring the message, keep following the road of evil, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
► OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846) had already indicated this lack of cooperation with her: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
Wake Up to Reality
It is both astounding and terrifying to see so many Catholics presumptuously plodding along in their worldly lives under the illusion and delusion that all is “fine-and-dandy” and they are on their way to Heaven―when, in reality, most Catholics end up in Hell. Who says so? Our Lord says so; Our Lady says so; many Saints say so [read more here].
► OUR LORD says: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven ... Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! … And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 7:13, 21; Luke 13:23-28). If that does not wake up Catholics from their deluded presumption, then nothing will!
► OUR LADY―the Mother of Mercy, the Mother of Fair Love, the Refuge of Sinners―who has a heart of gold and sweetness―also tells a similar story to Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies … How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation! … Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment!” Despite all this, the vast majority of Catholics remain unmoved in the deluded presumption.
► THE SAINTS tell us the same thing.
● Pope St. Gregory the Great (540-604) says: “There are many who arrive at the Faith, but few who are led into the heavenly Kingdom!”
● St. John Chrysostom (347-407), Doctor and Father of the Church says: “What do you think? How many of the inhabitants of this city may perhaps be saved? What I am about to tell you is very terrible, yet I will not conceal it from you. Out of this thickly populated city with its thousands of inhabitants not one hundred people will be saved. I even doubt whether there will be as many as that!”
● St. Anselm (1033-1109), Doctor of the Church, says: “If thou wouldst be certain of being in the number of the elect, strive to be one of the few, not of the many. And if thou wouldst be quite sure of thy salvation, strive to be among the fewest of the few! … Do not follow the great majority of mankind, but follow those who enter upon the narrow way, who renounce the world, who give themselves to prayer, and who never relax their efforts by day or by night, that they may attain everlasting blessedness!”
● St. Thomas Aquinas (1235-1274), Doctor of the Church says: “There are a select few who are saved! … Those who are saved are in the minority!”
● St. Louis Marie de Montfort (1673-1716): “Be one of the small number who find the way to life, and enter by the narrow gate into Heaven. Take care not to follow the majority and the common herd, so many of whom are lost.”
● St. Alphonsus Liguori (1696-1787), Doctor of the Church, says: “Everyone desires to be saved but the greater part is lost! … All persons desire to be saved, but the greater part, because they will not adopt the means of being saved, fall into sin and are lost! … The greater part of men choose to be damned rather than to love Almighty God! … He who abuses too much the mercy of God will be abandoned by Him! … The common opinion is that the greater part of adults is lost!”
● St. Benedict Joseph of Labre (1748-1783): “Yes, indeed, many will be damned; few will be saved… Meditate on the horrors of Hell which will last for eternity because of one easily-committed mortal sin. Try hard to be among the few who are chosen. Think of the eternal flames of Hell, and how few there are that are saved…I was watching souls falling down into the abyss like snowflakes falling thick and fast in the winter!”
● St. John Vianney (1786-1859): “The number of the saved is as few as the number of grapes left after the vineyard-pickers have passed! … Shall we all be saved? Shall we go to Heaven? Alas, my children, we do not know at all! But I tremble when I see so many souls lost these days. See, they fall into Hell as leaves fall from the trees at the approach of winter.”
Despite all those comments―and they are truly just the tip of a massive iceberg―Catholics remain deluded in the presumption that they are certainly going to Heaven. Ask most souls in Hell―and they will tell you that is how they thought and felt when they were still living on Earth! When will we wake up!!??!!! The devil has us heavily sedated with the fatally sweet drug of presumption―but those sedating, pain-killing effects will wear off when we find ourselves unexpectedly in Hell! Wake up before it too late!!!
Mary is Your Answer, Mary is Your Insurance Policy ― Start Making Payments!
Mary is the “Insurance Policy” against evil and damnation that God has chosen to offer us in our current era. It is God’s choice and God’s will―take it or leave it at your own peril. Many saints have stressed and attested to the power of this heavenly “Insurance Policy.”
● St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.”
● St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation.”
● St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.”
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
● St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.”
● St. Anselm (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost.”
● St. Antonine is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified.”
● St. John Damascene (a Doctor of the Church) says: “To be devout to you, O holy Virgin, is an arm of salvation which God gives to those whom He wishes to save.”
● St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church), in his book, The Glories of Mary, says: “The intercession of Mary is even necessary to salvation. We say ‘necessary’, not absolutely, but morally. This necessity proceeds from the will itself of God, that all graces that He dispenses should pass by the hands of Mary, according to the opinion of St. Bernard.”
● St. Bernardine of Sienna addresses these words to the Blessed Virgin Mary: “O Lady, thou art the dispenser of all graces, and since the grace of salvation can only come through thy hands, our salvation depends on thee!”
● St. Louis de Montfort adds: “Devotion to our Blessed Lady is necessary to salvation, and that it is an infallible mark of reprobation to have no esteem and love for the holy Virgin; while on the other hand, it is an infallible mark of predestination to be entirely and truly devoted to her.”
Mary Deserves Attention and Gratitude
In speaking of Mary, Louis de Montfort furthermore writes: “The saints have said admirable things of this holy city of God; and, as they themselves avow, they were never more eloquent and more content than when they spoke of her. Yet, after all they have said, they cry out that the height of her merits―which she has raised up to the throne of the Divinity―cannot be fully seen; that the breadth of her charity―which is broader than the Earth―is in truth immeasurable; that the length of her power―which she exercises even over God Himself―is incomprehensible; and finally, that the depth of her humility, and of all her virtues and graces, is an abyss which never can be sounded. O height incomprehensible! O breadth unspeakable! O length immeasurable! O abyss impenetrable! …
“The whole Earth is full of her glory, especially among Christians, by whom she is taken as the protectress of many kingdoms, provinces, dioceses and cities. Many cathedrals are consecrated to God under her name. There is not a church without an altar in her honor, not a country, nor a canton, where there are not some miraculous images where all sorts of evils are cured and all sorts of good gifts obtained. Who can count the confraternities and congregations in her honor? How many religious orders have been founded in her name and under her protection? How many members in these confraternities, and how many religious men and women in all these orders, who publish her praises and confess her mercies! There is not a little child who, as it lisps the Hail Mary, does not praise her. There is scarcely a sinner who, even in his obduracy, has not some spark of confidence in her. Nay, the very devils in Hell respect her while they fear her!
“After that, we must cry out with the saints: “De Maria numquam satis!”—“Of Mary there is never enough!” We have not yet praised, exalted, honored, loved and served Mary as we ought! She deserves still more praise, still more respect, still more love, and still more service!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Mary the Mother of Grace
We are so caught up in ourselves and other things, that we never stop to think what the Blessed Virgin is actually doing for all of us―whether we in a state of Sanctifying Grace or a state of Mortal Sin; whether we are friends of God or enemies of God! Mary is the Mediatrix of All Grace. Very few people truly grasp what grace is and do not know the distinctions between the different kinds of grace that exist. If Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace, then perhaps we should learn a little more, or refresh our knowledge on grace in general.
St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Everything is grace!” ― and you could add to that: “Grace is everything!” Our Lord Himself said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Most people fail to see and understand the universal and omnipresent aspect and need of God’s grace. We are, in a sense, constantly swimming in the sea of God’s grace. St. Louis de Montfort says: “God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (in Latin: “mare”). He made also an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (in Latin: “Maria”).” Thus we are swimming around in the grace of God in the sea of Mary. All the rivers of God’s graces flow into that sea of grace that is Mary. If Mary is the Mother of Jesus (Who is God), then she is also the Mother of God. If Jesus as God is the Author of All Grace, then it stands to reason that Mary is the Mother of Grace just as she is the Mother of Jesus and God. As Jesus came to us through Mary, so too does Jesus send to us all His graces through Mary. Hence we have the expressions such as: “To Jesus through Mary!”
There is nobody in Heaven without Sanctifying Grace in their soul―and there is nobody in Hell with Sanctifying Grace in their soul. Grace is everything―it is all that really matters. If you are the richest person in world, but do not have Sanctifying Grace in your soul, then you cannot enter Heaven, you cannot buy your way into Heaven, nor can you bribe your way into Heaven. You might be the most famous person in the world―but without Sanctifying Grace your fame will get you nowhere when it comes to Heaven. You might be the most powerful person in the world―but without Sanctifying Grace in your soul, you will be powerless in getting to Heaven.
You might be the poorest person on Earth―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you are richer than the richest person on Earth. You may be hated by everyone and have no friends―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you are loved by God and all the angels and saints in Heaven. You may have been the biggest sinner the world has ever seen―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you will avoid Hell and eventually get to Heaven. Yes―grace is everything. Grace is everything we need to get to Heaven.
Sanctifying Grace is our passport to Heaven, but another kind of grace, called Actual Grace, is constantly whirring and working around us to keep us on the right path to Heaven and to avoid the pitfalls that could make us fall into Hell. Those who are in a state Mortal Sin and have therefore kicked-out Sanctifying Grace from their souls, those sinners will still be mercifully given Actual Graces by God (through Mary) to prod and prompt them to convert and return to a state of Sanctifying Grace. Everyone in the world might not be in a state of Sanctifying Grace, but everyone in the world is mercifully given Actual Grace which is meant to lead them to God and conversion; sanctification and salvation.
Actual Grace refers to supernatural help from God that helps us to do good and to avoid evil. It can enlighten the mind, making us understand what is good, or move the will, inspiring us to choose the right path. It is a transient, passing, temporary intervention of grace in our lives, meaning it is offered by God at specific moments to assist us in spiritual growth and progress. Unlike Sanctifying Grace, which is a permanent dwelling of God’s love in our soul, Actual Grace is not a permanent grace, but a specific, temporary gift from God. Actual Grace lasts only for a while―sometimes more and sometimes less―and can be received and used at different times for countless needs and situations. You cannot store and save Actual Grace because it lasts only for the while that it tries to move you to think, say, or do something good; or not think, not say, and not do something evil. Actual Grace is an invitation to cooperate with God’s will in doing good and avoiding evil. We can either accept and respond to that Actual Grace, or we can ignore or resist it―it will not hang around forever. Thus we can either accept and respond to Our Lady’s attempts at bring us those graces, or we can ignore and resist her.
What does grace do? Grace does everything―everything that is not sinful. St. Thomas Aquinas, in his section on Grace, in his Summa Theologica and also Quaestiones Quodlibetales, writes:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For grace is given to many persons to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones Quodlibetales, 4, 6).
Let those words sink in deep! We cannot wish or do any good whatsoever without grace! Without grace we cannot think of good things, desire good things, love in a good way, or act in a good way! Without grace we can do no good whatsoever! We cannot know truth without grace! We cannot know what to do without grace! We can do nothing unless moved by God! We cannot avoid sinning without grace! We cannot rise from sin without grace! We cannot be contrite without grace! We cannot persevere without grace! Etc. Thus we can see―or should see―that grace is working constantly in our lives and we are most probably oblivious to the fact!
Thanklessly Overworked Mother of Grace
If grace is working constantly in our lives―then, quite logically, it means that Our Lady the Mediatrix of All Grace is also working constantly in our lives. You can be sure that most people―if not almost all people―fail to realize this, fail to acknowledge this, and fail to give thanks for this ceaseless work of Our Lady. Those words of Our Lady of La Salette come to mind: “I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
Our Lady said to St. Mechtilde: “The words ― ‘full of grace’ ― remind me that the Holy Ghost has showered so many graces upon me that I am able to give these graces in abundance to those who ask for them through my mediation.” She also said to Blessed Alan de la Roche: “I am the Mother of the King of Heaven, and He calls me full of grace. And, being filled with grace, I am able to dispense it freely to my dear children.” In his book, The Secret of the Rosary, St. Louis de Montfort adds: “Praise and honor the numberless graces with which God has filled the Blessed Virgin and say to her ― ‘Thou art full of grace and filled with all the gifts of the Holy Ghost!’ ― and she will give you some of these graces.” In his True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis further says: “Thank God for the incomparable graces He has given Mary! … Thank God for the graces He has given to Our Lady! … If any one of the faithful has Jesus Christ formed in his heart, he can say boldly: ‘All thanks be to Mary! What I possess is her effect and her fruit, and without her I should never have had it!’” (True Devotion to Mary).
There is no Heaven without holiness―it is only saints that go to Heaven―and it is only Sanctifying Grace in the soul that makes us progressively holy. As St. Louis de Montfort, in his The Secret of Mary, says: “It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God … Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person … It was Mary who gave existence and life to the Author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the Mother of Grace … God the Father, from Whom every grace comes down to us, gave her every grace when He gave her His Son … God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands … She keeps her Son from striking us; she prevents the devil from harming us; she preserves virtue in us; she prevents our merits from being lost and our graces from receding … The Saints tell us that when we have once found Mary—and through Mary, found Jesus, and through Jesus, found God the father—then we have discovered every good. When we say ‘every good,’ we exclude nothing. ‘Every good’ includes every grace; continuous friendship with God; every guarantee against the enemies of God; possession of truth to counter every falsehood; endless benefits and unfailing headway against the hazards we meet on the way to salvation; and finally every consolation and joy amid the bitter afflictions of life.”
Do Not Forget Your Mother!
St. Louis de Montfort writes: “Long ago, Moses was inspired by God to command the Jewish people never to forget the graces which had been showered upon them” (The Secret of the Rosary). Since God showers us with graces through Mary the Mediatrix of All Grace, then you could paraphrase the above quote to say: “God commands His people never to forget the graces which have been showered upon them through Mary!”
It is God’s love for us that makes Him shower graces upon us―whether we be good or evil: “Your Father in Heaven, who makes His sun rise and rain fall upon the good and bad, upon the just and the unjust!” (Matthew 5:45). It is Mary’s love for us that makes her be a Refuge of Sinners and a Mother of Mercy despite our sinfulness. Holy Scripture tells us that “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and the Church applies to Mary the words: “I am the Mother of fair love” (Ecclesiasticus 24:24) which is seen in several Readings in various Masses of Our Lady. Love is something that is reciprocal―which means it is a case of two-way giving―we are loved and we love in return. That is especially what we should be doing with God and Our Lady: “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God first, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins … Let us therefore love God, because God has first loved us!” (1 John 4:10, 19).
The love of Christ is clearly shown by the fact that He gave up His life through suffering and torture to save us from Hell. St. Louis de Montfort writes: “Jesus has given Himself to us without reserve―body and soul, virtues, graces and merits. Is it not then a simple matter of justice and of gratitude that we should give Him all that we can give Him? … We offer and consecrate all we are and all we have to the Blessed Virgin in order that Our Lord may receive through her mediation the glory and the gratitude which we owe Him … He finds His glory in receiving, through the hands of Mary, the gratitude, respect and love which we owe Him for His benefits … He has been the first to be generous toward us―let us, at least, be the second; and then, in life and death and throughout all eternity, we shall find Him still more generous. ‘With the generous He will be generous’ … As you have given yourself entirely to her―she, who is generous with the generous, and more generous even than the generous, will in return give herself to you in a marvelous but real manner! … The most holy Virgin, who is a Mother of sweetness and mercy, and who never lets herself be outdone in love and generosity, seeing that we give ourselves entirely to her, she also gives her whole self, and gives it in an unspeakable manner, to him who gives all to her … Hence, if a soul gives itself to her without reserve, she gives herself to that soul without reserve … She causes him to be engulfed in the abyss of her graces ... Mary, being the most gracious and generous of all pure creatures, never lets herself be outdone in love and generosity ... She adorns him with her merits; she supports him with her power; she illuminates him with her light; she inflames him with her love; she communicates to him her virtues: her humility, her Faith, her purity and the rest! … Our Blessed Lord and Our Lady will never let themselves be outdone in gratitude!” (True Devotion to Mary).
Actions Speak Louder Than Words
It is easy to say “I love you!” with our lips―it is much harder, but also much more impressive, to show our love by our actions. Actions usually are more expensive than words. Our Lord indicated this power of action in proving love when He said: “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13). Our Lady could say: “Don’t just say you love me―prove to me that you love me! I have proved that I love you by sending you countless graces each day from Almighty God! What return of love will you make to me?” Let us not be “all talk and no action” in our dealings with Mary. Love is more than mere talk! Love is also the greatest payment we can make for all that Our Lady has done, is doing, and will do for us by continually dispensing the graces of God in every moment of our daily lives. Just as “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends!” ― likewise, you could say: “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for Our Lady!” That is exactly what St. Louis de Montfort’s version of a true devotion to Mary does―it gives all to Our Lady; it makes a person not only a servant of Our Lady but a slave of Our Lady; it is a total giving and not just a partial selective giving. We give all for all―knowing that Our Lady will not let herself be outdone in generosity!
The Power of Love
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and God is all powerful: “With God all things are possible! … No word shall be impossible with God! … I am the Lord God―shall anything be hard for Me?” (Matthew 19:26; Luke 1:37; Jeremias 32:27). Nothing is impossible for the God of love―and, thus, as the Imitation of Christ says, nothing should be impossible for love:
“Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs with equanimity. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and estranged from all worldly affections, lest it be entangled in any temporal interest and overcome by adversity. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger, or higher, or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God.
“One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all. Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much, where he, who does not love, fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle.
“Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself, there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. It is mean and contemptible in its own eyes, devoted and thankful to God; always trusting and hoping in Him even when He is distasteful to it, for there is no living in love without sorrow. He who is not ready to suffer all things and stand resigned to the will of the Beloved, is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter, for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice.” (Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5: “The Wonderful Effect of Divine Love”).
Pay With Love
There are as many ways to return the love and care that Our Lady shows us, as there are grains of sand throughout the world. There is no one single way of showing love―for love is creative and is always new ways to manifest itself. Yet whatever ways we choose to repay Our Lady for her love towards us―those ways will be useless if they are performed without love. As Holy Scripture says: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
If we feel that our love is weak, then St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that one efficient and effective way to increase our love for someone is to start thanking that person for all they have done for us and are doing for us. Gratitude fuels the fires of love. Since Our Lady is constantly doing things for us ― distributing God’s graces; interceding and obtaining mercy for our sins; protecting us from evil; keeping us on the road to salvation; etc. ― then we should be constantly thanking Our Lady since she is constantly working on our behalf. It is pride, ignorance and spiritual blindness that prevent us from seeing and recognizing all that Our Lady does for us―nothing happens by chance, good-luck or bad-luck in our lives. We need to pay attention to what she is doing and then make sure we give thanks to her. It is not for nothing that the Preface of the Mass says: “It is truly meet and just, right and for our salvation, that we should, at all times and in all places, give thanks unto Thee!”
St. Louis’ Tip of the Iceberg
In his True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis de Montfort lists what might seem to be many ways of showing devotion to Our Lady―but, in reality, that seemingly long list is merely the tip of a gigantic iceberg of actions that we could take in showing our love towards Our Lady and in some degree repaying somewhat that enormous debt of gratitude that we should have towards her. Here is “tip of the iceberg” list―but you should be able to come up with 20 times, 50 times, 100 times more ideas!
There are several interior practices of true devotion to the Blessed Virgin. Here are the principal ones, stated compendiously:
(1) to honor her as the worthy Mother of God, with the worship of hyperdulia; that is to say, to esteem her and honor her above all the other saints, as the masterpiece of grace, and the first after Jesus Christ, true God and true Man;
(2) to meditate on her virtues, her privileges and her actions;
(3) to contemplate her grandeurs;
(4) to make acts of love, of praise, of gratitude to her;
(5) to invoke her cordially;
(6) to offer ourselves to her and unite ourselves with her;
(7) to do all our actions with the view of pleasing her;
(8) to begin, to continue and to finish all our actions by her, in her, with her and for her, in order that we may do them by Jesus Christ, in Jesus Christ, with Jesus Christ and for Jesus Christ, our Last End. We will presently explain this last practice.
True devotion to Our Lady also has several exterior practices, of which the following are the principal ones:
(1) to enroll ourselves in her confraternities and enter her congregations;
(2) to join the religious orders instituted in her honor;
(3) to proclaim her praises;
(4) to give alms, to fast and to undergo outward and inward mortifications in her honor;
(5) to wear her liveries, such as the Rosary, the Scapular or the little chain;
(6) to recite with attention, devotion and modesty the holy Rosary, composed of fifteen decades of Hail Mary’s in honor of the fifteen principal mysteries of Jesus Christ; or five decades, which is one third of the Rosary.
(7) to say a chaplet of six or seven decades in honor of the years which we believe Our Lady lived on Earth;
(8) to say the Little Crown of the Blessed Virgin, composed of three Our Fathers and twelve Hail Mary’s, in honor of her crown of twelve stars or privileges;
(9) to say the Office of Our Lady, so universally received and recited in the Church; or the little Psalter of the holy Virgin, which St. Bonaventure composed in her honor;
(10) to say fourteen Our Fathers and Hail Mary’s in honor of her fourteen joys;
(11) to say some other prayers, hymns and canticles of the Church, such as the Salve Regina, the Alma, the Ave Regina Coelorum, or the Regina Coeli, according to the different seasons; or the Ave Maris Stella, the O Gloriosa Domina, the Magnificat, or some other practices of devotion, of which books are full;
(12) to sing, or have sung, spiritual canticles in her honor;
(13) to make a number of genuflections or reverences, while saying, for example, every morning, sixty or a hundred times, Ave Maria, Virgo Fidelis (“Hail Mary, Faithful Virgin”), to obtain from God through her the grace to be faithful to the graces of God during the day; and then again in the evening, Ave Maria, Mater Misericordiae (“Hail Mary, Mother of Mercy”) to ask pardon of God through her for the sins that we have committed during the day;
(14) to take care of her confraternities, to adorn her altars, to crown and ornament her images;
(15) to carry her images, or to have them carried, in procession, and to carry a picture or an image of her about our own persons, as a mighty arm against the evil spirit;
(16) to have copies of her name or picture made and placed in churches, or in houses, or on the gates and entrances into cities, churches and houses;
(17) to special and solemn consecrate ourselves to her in manner.
There are numerous other practices of true devotion toward the Blessed Virgin which the Holy Ghost has inspired in saintly souls and which are very sanctifying, which the saints have practiced in honor of Our Lady—devotions which serve marvelously to sanctify our souls, provided they are performed as they ought to be, that is to say,
(1) with a good and pure intention to please God only, to unite ourselves to Jesus Christ as to our Last End, and to edify our neighbor;
(2) with attention and without voluntary distraction;
(3) with devotion, equally avoiding precipitation and negligence;
(4) with modesty, and a respectful and edifying posture of the body.
There is no better time than the Mary Month of May to stir ourselves up to a great love and devotion to Our Lady and start paying back Our Lady for all that she has done for us―at least as much we weak finite humans are capable of doing. The words of Our Lady of La Salette should drive us on: “I have suffered all of the time for all of you! I must take it upon myself to pray for you continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!” Sure―we will never be able to fully make up for the trouble Our Lady has gone to on our behalf―but we should at least give all that we possibly can towards that immense debt!
Article 6
Wednesday, Thursday & Friday, April 30th, May 1st & 2nd
Get Your Lifeboat Ready!
Wednesday, Thursday & Friday, April 30th, May 1st & 2nd
Get Your Lifeboat Ready!
Do You Have That Sinking Feeling?
Looking at both the Church and the world, one has to ask: “Do you have that sinking feeling? Do you feel things are sinking all around you? Do you think everything is going down, down, down?” That would have to be the opinion of any sane person! Everything is going down; everything is sinking―both in the world and in the Church―and it has been sinking for a long time! Will you drown with the majority? Can you survive? Will you survive? Do you have what it takes to survive? Those are very pertinent and timely questions as we draw to the close of the month of April―which was also the month in which the so-called “unsinkable” Titanic sank to the bottom of the ocean on its maiden voyage in 1912 [read more here]. Even though the vast majority of the Titanic sank ― the bow (front), stern (rear), hull (main body), decks (floors), and superstructure (structures above the deck) ― taking most passengers with to a watery grave with it; nevertheless some parts of the ship survived (namely, the lifeboats) and some passengers also survived (those who could get into a lifeboat). Of the 2,208 passengers and crew aboard, only 712 survived.
There were only 20 lifeboats on board the Titanic. The ship could have carried a total of 64 lifeboats, which would have been sufficient for all on board. The official inquiry into the disaster criticized the poor state of training of the crew and recommended routine and mandatory lifeboat drills, which has become standard practice ever since. In fact, the launching of boats was a total mess-up. It was ordered too late; inefficiently carried out by new crew members who were hired at the last minute; and it was inconsistently carried out. Passengers were totally unprepared for the eventuality of the Titanic sinking―after all, it was supposed to be unsinkable! The lifeboats had no provisions in them. Drain plugs were forgotten. The crew didn’t know where to go or what to do when they got there, and officers were more concerned with keeping male passengers out of the boats than with filling them. Boats were launched half-full, some even less than that. The lifeboats had been tested to ensure that they could be lowered from the davits at full capacity; yet the Titanic’s officers, inexcusably unaware of that fact, were afraid of fully loading the boats, fearing they couldn’t take the weight. It was a shameful display of professional incompetence.
The Sinking Church and the Sinking Faith
The parallels between the “unsinkable” Titanic and the “unsinkable” Catholic Church are quite striking. We speak of the Church being “unsinkable” in the sense of Our Lord promising that the gates of Hell would not prevail against His Church: “Thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it!” (Matthew 16:18) ... “I am with you all days, even unto the consummation of the world!” (Matthew, 28:20). However, this does not guarantee against a large part of the Church losing the Faith―for Our Lord Himself later says: “The Son of man, when He comes again, do you think He shall find Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8) ― which is echoed by Our Lady and many prophecies of the saints: “From the end of the 19th century and shortly after the middle of the 20th century… the Catholic spirit will rapidly decay; the precious light of the Faith will gradually be extinguished! … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom!” (Our Lady of Good Success, Ecuador & La Salette, France).
The prophecies of the saints also indicate the same:
► ST. ANTHONY OF THE DESERT warns: “Men will surrender to the spirit of the age. They will say that if they had lived in our day, Faith would be simple and easy. But in their day, they will say, things are complex; the Church must be brought up to date and made meaningful to the day’s problems. When the Church and the World are one, then those days are at hand!” (St. Anthony of the Desert, a.k.a. St. Anthony the Great, St. Anthony of Egypt, 251-356).
► ST. METHODIUS warns: “In the last period Christians will not appreciate the great grace of God … They will be very ungrateful, lead a sinful life―in pride, vanity, unchastity, frivolity, hatred, avarice, gluttony and many other vices―so that the sins of men will stink more than a pestilence before God. Many men will doubt whether the Catholic Faith is the true and only saving one and whether the Jews are perhaps correct when they still expect the Messias. Many will be the false teachings and resulting bewilderment. As a consequence of this, the just God will give Lucifer and all his devils power to come on Earth and tempt those godless creatures.” (St. Methodius, 4th century).
► ST. NICHOLAS VON FLUE states: “The Church will be punished because the majority of Her members, high and low, will become so perverted. The Church will sink deeper and deeper, until She will at last seem to be extinguished, and the succession of Peter and the other Apostles will seem to have expired. But, after this, She will be victoriously exalted in the sight of all doubters!” (St. Nicholas von Flue, 15th century).
► BLESSED ANNE CATHERINE EMMERICH was granted visions about the future of the Church. She says: “The Church is in great danger… I saw the Church of St. Peter in ruins, and the manner in which so many of the clergy were themselves busy at this work of destruction ― none of them wishing to do it openly in front of others … I see that in this place [Rome] the Catholic Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there will hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived. They all work for destruction, even the clergy. The great devastation is now at hand … It was also shown to me that there were almost no Christians left in the old acceptation of the word! … In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars!” (Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, 19th century).
► ST. JOHN BOSCO was often granted visions and dreams concerning the future. On May 30th, 1862, Don Bosco at his ‘Good Night’ talk told his boys and the young clerics that he was training, about a dream he had dreamt a few nights previously. Here is the account of his dream concerning the plight of the Church in our times:
St. John Bosco said: “Imagine yourself to be with me on the seashore, or better, on an isolated rock and not to see any patch of land other than that under your feet. On the whole of that vast sheet of water you see an innumerable fleet of ships in battle array. The prows of the ships are formed into sharp, spear-like points, so that wherever they are thrust, they pierce it and completely destroy it. These ships are heavily armed with cannons, with lots of rifles, with incendiary bombs, with other firearms of all kinds― even books ― and advance against a stately ship very much bigger, higher and mightier than themselves. As they try to close in, they try to ram it, set it afire, and cripple it as much as possible, or in some way to do it every possible harm.”
“This stately vessel is shielded by a flotilla escort. The winds and waves are in the favor of the enemy. In this midst of this endless sea, two solid columns, a short distance apart, soar high into the sky: one is surmounted by a statue of the Immaculate Virgin at whose feet a large inscription reads: Help of Christians; the other, far loftier and sturdier, supports a [Communion] Host of proportionate size and bears beneath it the inscription Salvation of believers.
“As escorts to shield that majestic fully equipped ship (the Church), there are many smaller ships, which receive commands by signal from it and carry out movements to defend themselves from the opposing fleet. In the midst of the immense expanse of sea, two mighty columns of great height arise―a little distance the one from the other. On the top of one column, there is the statue of the Immaculate Virgin, from whose feet hangs a large placard with this inscription: ‘Auxilium Christianorum’ ― ‘Help of Christians.’ On the other column, which is much higher and bigger, stands a Eucharistic Host of great size proportionate to the column and beneath is another placard with the words: ‘Salus Credentium’ ― ‘Salvation of the Faithful’ (Believers).
“The flagship commander ― the Roman Pontiff [the Pope] ― seeing the enemy’s fury and the very grave predicament threatening the auxiliary ships, summons his captains to a conference and decide what is to be done. However, as they discuss their strategy, a furious storm breaks out and they must return to their ships. When the storm subsides, the Pope again summons his captains as the flagship continues to keep on its course. But the frightful storm rises and rages again. Standing at the helm, the Pope directs all his energy, straining every muscle, to steer his ship in direction of the two columns, from whose summits hang many anchors and strong hooks linked to chains.
“The entire enemy fleet closes in to intercept, attack and sink the flagship at all costs―before it can reach the pillars. They try in every possible way to stop it and to sink it. They bombard it with everything they have―books, writings and pamphlets, bombs, firearms, cannons, inflammable materials, of which they are full. The battle rages ever more furiously and relentlessly. The enemy prows (battering rams on front of the ship) thrust violently and ram the flagship again and again, but to no avail, as their efforts and impact prove useless and the flagship, unscathed and undaunted, keeps on its course. At times a formidable ram succeeds in splintering a gaping hole into the flagship’s hull, but, but no sooner is the harm done, a breeze from the two columns immediately and instantly seals and closes the gashes and cracks in the hull.
“Meanwhile, the guns of the assailants are blown up, the rifles and other arms and prows are broken; many ships are shattered and sink into the sea. Then, the frenzied enemies, in blind fury, resorts to hand-to-hand combat, with fists, with blows, with blasphemy and with curses.
“Suddenly the Pope falls, seriously wounded. Immediately, those who are with him run to help him. He is instantly helped up but then the Pope is struck down a second time, he falls again and dies. A shout of victory rises from the enemy, from their ships an unspeakable mockery arises and wild rejoicing sweeps their ships. But no sooner is the Pope dead than another Pope takes his place. The captains of the auxiliary ships elected him so quickly that the news of the Pope’s death almost coincides with that of his successor’s election. The enemy’s self-confidence begins to collapse and they start to lose courage.
“Breaking through all resistance, putting the enemy to rout and overcoming every obstacle, the new Pope steers his ship safely between the two columns and chains it to the two columns. First he fastens the ship with a light chain that hangs from the front of the ship (the bow) to an anchor of the column on which stands the Eucharistic Host. Then he fastens the opposite end of the ship (the stern) to another anchor hanging from the column on which stands the Immaculate Virgin.
“At this point something unexpected happens. The enemy ships panic and disperse, colliding with and scuttling each other. Some auxiliary ships which had gallantly fought alongside their flagship are the first to tie up at the two columns.
“At this point something unexpected happens. The enemy ships panic and disperse, colliding with and scuttling each other. Some auxiliary ships, which had gallantly fought alongside their flagship, are the first to follow the flagship and chain themselves to the two columns. Many others, which had fearfully kept far away from the fight, stand still, cautiously waiting until the wrecked enemy ships vanish under the waves. Then, they too head for the two columns, tie up at the swinging hooks, and float safe and tranquil beside their flagship. A great calm now covers the sea.”
At this point Don Bosco asked one of the priests present for his views. The priest replied that he thought that the flagship symbolized the Church headed by the Pope; with the ships representing mankind; and the sea as an image of the world. The ships defending the flagship he equated with the laity; and the attackers he equated with those trying to destroy the Church; while the two columns represented devotion to Mary and the Eucharist. He did not mention the death of the Pope and neither did Don Bosco in his reply to the priest, in which he agreed with what the priest had said, while adding that the enemy ships symbolized persecutions:
“Very grave trials await the Church. What we have suffered so far is almost nothing compared to what is going to happen. The enemies of the Church are symbolized by the ships which strive their utmost to sink the flagship. Only two things can save us in such a grave hour: devotion to Mary and frequent Communion. Let us do our very best to use these two means and have others use them everywhere.”
► POPE BENEDICT XVI ― a Liberal and Modernist ― forecast the same thing, saying: forecast the same thing, saying: “In our days, in vast areas of the world, the Faith is in danger of dying out―like a flame which no longer has fuel! … The boat has taken on so much water as to be on the verge of capsizing! … From the crisis of today the Church of tomorrow will emerge ― a Church that has lost much. She will become small and will have to start afresh―more or less from the beginning ... It seems certain to me that the Church is facing very hard times. The real crisis has scarcely begun. We will have to count on terrific upheavals!”
► FR. CULLETON, in his 1941 book, The Prophets and Our Times, writes: “An important sign of the latter days is the prevalence of false teachings with the natural consequences―defections from religion, lack of Faith even among Catholics, and great moral degeneration … Among other things to happen, during these evil days, is the changing of God’s laws by unscrupulous leaders to suit their own convenience. This shall lead to universal sin and a gradual lack of obedience to all of God’s commandments ... There will also be those who will indulge in fruitless discussions of so-called learned things, and by so doing will miss the real truth and the real Faith―because the things which engage their attention are based on false knowledge instead of the truth. The reason for this, primarily, is the education without religion which will exist in those days, for this education will not really educate, but will have as its basis vain works and false ideals … When the zeal of the clergy fails, they will see the faithful leaving the churches and turning to the world. The House of God will be deserted, singing of hymns will cease, and the observance of festivals abandoned … It is true that many people will seem to honor God, but this will be chiefly lip service and not based on real Faith and love. They will be unwilling to recognize evil, because they will prefer to follow the easy path of pleasure. Truth will be deserted and in its stead false doctrines eagerly embraced, because it will seem the people even wish to be deluded … We will observe pride, greed, intemperance, immorality, hypocrisy, unjust laws, lack of natural affection and dissemination of false knowledge rampant in the world … There will not be many who will be really wise, the intelligent will be very few in number and even these will be in great part silent, because they know that they would be either not listened to, or laughed at.” (Fr. Culleton, The Prophets and Our Times).
Noe’s Ark
This makes us think of Noe’s Ark in the Old Testament―which you could call “Noe’s Lifeboat”―where God was greatly displeased with majority of the world and chose to save only a handful in an Ark that He commanded Noe to build: “And the Earth was corrupted before God, and was filled with iniquity. And when God had seen that the Earth was corrupted, He said to Noe: ‘The end of all flesh is come before me! The Earth is filled with iniquity through them! I will destroy them with the Earth! Make thyself an Ark of timber planks! … I will bring the waters of a great flood upon the Earth, to destroy all flesh under Heaven! … And Noe did all things which God commanded him. And the Lord said to him: ‘Go into the Ark! … For after seven days, I will make it rain upon the Earth forty days and forty nights―and I will destroy every substance that I have made, from the face of the Earth!’ And Noe did all things which the Lord had commanded him … And after the seven days were passed, the rain fell upon the Earth forty days and forty nights, and the waters of the flood overflowed the Earth … The waters increased, and lifted up the ark on high from the Earth, and the ark was carried upon the waters―for they overflowed exceedingly and filled all on the face of the Earth. And the waters prevailed beyond measure upon the Earth and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered. The water was fifteen cubits higher than the mountains which it covered. And all flesh was destroyed that moved upon the Earth―both of fowl and of cattle, and of beasts, and of all creeping things that creep upon the Earth, and all men. And all things wherein there is the breath of life on the Earth, died. And the Lord destroyed all the substance that was upon the Earth―from man even to beast, and the creeping things and fowls of the air―and they were destroyed from the Earth and only Noe remained, and they that were with him in the Ark. And the waters prevailed upon the Earth a hundred and fifty days” (Genesis 6:11-22; 7:1-24).
We drown ourselves in the waters of sin ― “dead, because of sin” (Romans 8:10) ― but by Christ’s Passion and Death we have a chance to resurface in the waters of His grace: “Dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus our Lord!” (Romans 6:11). The sinner “was dead and is come to life again; he was lost, and now is found!” (Luke 15:32). “For the wage of sin is death. But the grace of God is life everlasting in Christ Jesus our Lord!” (Romans 6:23). God’s “lifeboat”―the Ark―saved Noe and his family. Has God given us a similar lifeboat in our day and age?
Our Lord and Lifeboats
Our Lord said: “I am come that they may have life!” (John 10:10) … “I am the way, and the truth, and the life!” (John 14:6). “The water that I will give, shall become a fountain of water springing up into life everlasting!” (John 4:14). “How narrow is the gate and straight is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:14). “He that finds his life, shall lose it; and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:39). “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it!” (Luke 17:33). “For whosoever wants to save his life, shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35).
In the Gospels, we read of many instances when Our Lord was in boats and ships (Mark chapters 8, 9, 13, 14 & 15; Mark chapters 3, 4, 5, 6 & 8; Luke chapters 5 & 8; John chapter 6) ― either teaching, traveling or even saving from shipwreck!
On one occasion, “when Jesus entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him. And behold a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves, but He was asleep. And they came to Him, and awakened Him, saying: ‘Lord! Save us! We perish!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful, O ye of little Faith?’ Then rising up He commanded the winds, and the sea, and there came a great calm. But the men wondered, saying: ‘What manner of Man is this? For the winds and the sea obey Him!’” (Matthew 8:23-27). St. Mark similarly writes: “And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that the ship was filled with water. And Jesus was in the rear part of the ship, sleeping upon a pillow; and they awakened Him and said to Him: ‘Master! Does it not concern Thee that we perish!’ And rising up, Jesus rebuked the wind and said to the sea: ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased and there was made a great calm. And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful? Have you no Faith yet?’ And they feared exceedingly and they said one to another: ‘Who is this―that both wind and sea obey Him?’” (Mark 4:37-40).
On another occasion, “Jesus went alone into a mountain to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone. But the boat [of His disciples], in the midst of the sea, was tossed with the waves―for the wind was against them. And in the fourth watch of the night, Jesus came to them walking upon the sea. And they, seeing Him walk upon the sea, were troubled, saying: ‘It is an apparition!’ And they cried out in fear. And immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘Be of good heart! It is I! Fear ye not!’ And Peter, answering, said: ‘Lord, if it be Thou, bid me come to Thee upon the waters!’ And Jesus said: ‘Come!’ And Peter, going down out of the boat, walked upon the water to come to Jesus. But seeing the wind strong, he was afraid. And when he began to sink, he cried out, saying: ‘Lord, save me!’ And immediately Jesus, stretching forth His hand, took hold of him and said to him: ‘O thou of little Faith! Why didst thou doubt?’ And when they were come up into the boat, the wind ceased” (Matthew 14:23-32).
Our Lady and Lifeboats
► ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT (1673-1716), speaks of the power of Our Lady to save souls in these End Times: “It was through the most holy Virgin Mary that Jesus came into the world, and it is also through her that He has to reign in the world … O what grand and hidden things that mighty God has wrought in this admirable creature! … When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce! … Mary has received from God a great domination over the souls of the elect, to form, nourish and bring them forth to eternal life! … The devils in Hell respect her while they fear her! … Towards the end of the world the Most High, with His holy Mother, has to form for Himself great saints who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity! … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady―illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection―so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Mystical City of God, that is to say, the most holy Virgin. By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone … Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times! … And lastly, Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. The devil will raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others.”
► ST. BERNARD OF CLAIRVAUX (1090-1153), in speaking of the many storms that attack us during out life on Earth, says of Our Lady: “When the storm of temptation arises, when you are midst the reefs and shoals of tribulation, fix your gaze upon the Star of the Sea―call upon Mary! If tossed by the rising tide of pride and ambition, if lost upon the troubled waters of scandal and contention―look then at the Star, invoke her name! Do the billows of anger, of avarice, of lust batter against your soul―cast thy eyes upon Mary! Does the greatness of your crime fill your soul with terror? Does your wretched conscience beat you down in shame and the fear of judgment paralyze your heart?―then, when about to sink to the depths of despondency, to plunge headlong into despair, then think of Mary! In perils and in sorrows and in fears―think of her, call upon her name! Let her name be ever on your lips and the thought of her be ever in your heart! Follow her―so that the power of her intercession may attend to your needs! Imitate her―for in her footsteps you cannot go astray! Call upon her―and you will not despair! Think of her―and you cannot fail. If she holds you by the hand―how can you fall? Under her protection you shall know no fear! Under her guidance you shall not falter! Under her patronage you shall surely reach the goal!”
Devotion to Our Lady is a lifeboat for our day―that is what Our Lady of Good Success said at Quito, Ecuador; Our Lady of La Salette, France (1846); Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal (1917) and Our Lady of Akita, Japan (1793).
► At QUITO, ECUADOR (1600s), Our Lady stated: “I am Mary of Good Success! … Let men in the future realize how powerful I am in placating Divine Justice and obtaining mercy and pardon for every sinner, who comes to me with a contrite heart. For I am the Mother of Mercy! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed! … The spirit of impurity will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! In these unhappy times, impurity and luxury will ensnare into sin, and will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals! … This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration! … Have recourse to me under the invocation of Our Lady of Good Success! … My hour will arrive, when I, in an amazing manner, will overthrow proud Satan, crushing him under my feet, chaining him in the infernal abyss, leaving the Church and the land free of this cruel tyranny!”
► At LA SALETTE (1846), Our Lady said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you! … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … People will believe that all is lost. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy ... The righteous will suffer greatly! … God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will! … I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son, those whom I carry in my arms, so to speak, those who have lived on my spirit! … Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession … The children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers―they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me. I shall fight at their side! … Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days!”
► At FATIMA (1917), Our Lady revealed: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you! … I am the Lady of the Rosary! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: ‘O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.’ … I shall come to ask for the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, and the Communion of Reparation on the First Saturdays! … Look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console me, and say that I promise to assist at the hour of death, with all the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months go to confession and receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary and keep me company for a quarter of an hour while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me! … In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!”
► OUR LADY appeared several times to BLESSED SISTER ELENA AIELLO (1895-1961) in the 1950s―Elena Aiello was a mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lady said: “Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! See how the souls are falling into Hell! … I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls ... I wish prayers and penance, in order that I may again obtain mercy and salvation for many souls — otherwise they will be lost! … All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God! They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … In order to save souls, I wish that there be propagated in the world the consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Mediatrix of men! Advise men to return to God by prayers and penances, and to come with confidence to my Immaculate Heart. My intercession must be shown! Spread the devotion to my Immaculate Heart, in order that many souls maybe conquered by my love and that many sinners may return to my Maternal Heart. All those who accept my urgent warnings will be saved! … Through prayer and penance, my mercy will be able to hold back the hand of God’s justice! The hour of my triumph is close at hand. The victory will be accomplished through the love and mercy of the Heart of My Son, and of my Immaculate Heart, the Mediatrix! … My words are very clear, and you must transmit them to everyone!”
► OUR LADY OF AKITA (1973) stated: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before ... I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father ... who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger … Pray in reparation for the sins of men! … The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary! … Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary! I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
Mary’s Lifeboat ― Mary’s Mantle
Looking at both the Church and the world, one has to ask: “Do you have that sinking feeling? Do you feel things are sinking all around you? Do you think everything is going down, down, down?” That would have to be the opinion of any sane person! Everything is going down; everything is sinking―both in the world and in the Church―and it has been sinking for a long time! Will you drown with the majority? Can you survive? Will you survive? Do you have what it takes to survive? Those are very pertinent and timely questions as we draw to the close of the month of April―which was also the month in which the so-called “unsinkable” Titanic sank to the bottom of the ocean on its maiden voyage in 1912 [read more here]. Even though the vast majority of the Titanic sank ― the bow (front), stern (rear), hull (main body), decks (floors), and superstructure (structures above the deck) ― taking most passengers with to a watery grave with it; nevertheless some parts of the ship survived (namely, the lifeboats) and some passengers also survived (those who could get into a lifeboat). Of the 2,208 passengers and crew aboard, only 712 survived.
There were only 20 lifeboats on board the Titanic. The ship could have carried a total of 64 lifeboats, which would have been sufficient for all on board. The official inquiry into the disaster criticized the poor state of training of the crew and recommended routine and mandatory lifeboat drills, which has become standard practice ever since. In fact, the launching of boats was a total mess-up. It was ordered too late; inefficiently carried out by new crew members who were hired at the last minute; and it was inconsistently carried out. Passengers were totally unprepared for the eventuality of the Titanic sinking―after all, it was supposed to be unsinkable! The lifeboats had no provisions in them. Drain plugs were forgotten. The crew didn’t know where to go or what to do when they got there, and officers were more concerned with keeping male passengers out of the boats than with filling them. Boats were launched half-full, some even less than that. The lifeboats had been tested to ensure that they could be lowered from the davits at full capacity; yet the Titanic’s officers, inexcusably unaware of that fact, were afraid of fully loading the boats, fearing they couldn’t take the weight. It was a shameful display of professional incompetence.
The Sinking Church and the Sinking Faith
The parallels between the “unsinkable” Titanic and the “unsinkable” Catholic Church are quite striking. We speak of the Church being “unsinkable” in the sense of Our Lord promising that the gates of Hell would not prevail against His Church: “Thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it!” (Matthew 16:18) ... “I am with you all days, even unto the consummation of the world!” (Matthew, 28:20). However, this does not guarantee against a large part of the Church losing the Faith―for Our Lord Himself later says: “The Son of man, when He comes again, do you think He shall find Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8) ― which is echoed by Our Lady and many prophecies of the saints: “From the end of the 19th century and shortly after the middle of the 20th century… the Catholic spirit will rapidly decay; the precious light of the Faith will gradually be extinguished! … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom!” (Our Lady of Good Success, Ecuador & La Salette, France).
The prophecies of the saints also indicate the same:
► ST. ANTHONY OF THE DESERT warns: “Men will surrender to the spirit of the age. They will say that if they had lived in our day, Faith would be simple and easy. But in their day, they will say, things are complex; the Church must be brought up to date and made meaningful to the day’s problems. When the Church and the World are one, then those days are at hand!” (St. Anthony of the Desert, a.k.a. St. Anthony the Great, St. Anthony of Egypt, 251-356).
► ST. METHODIUS warns: “In the last period Christians will not appreciate the great grace of God … They will be very ungrateful, lead a sinful life―in pride, vanity, unchastity, frivolity, hatred, avarice, gluttony and many other vices―so that the sins of men will stink more than a pestilence before God. Many men will doubt whether the Catholic Faith is the true and only saving one and whether the Jews are perhaps correct when they still expect the Messias. Many will be the false teachings and resulting bewilderment. As a consequence of this, the just God will give Lucifer and all his devils power to come on Earth and tempt those godless creatures.” (St. Methodius, 4th century).
► ST. NICHOLAS VON FLUE states: “The Church will be punished because the majority of Her members, high and low, will become so perverted. The Church will sink deeper and deeper, until She will at last seem to be extinguished, and the succession of Peter and the other Apostles will seem to have expired. But, after this, She will be victoriously exalted in the sight of all doubters!” (St. Nicholas von Flue, 15th century).
► BLESSED ANNE CATHERINE EMMERICH was granted visions about the future of the Church. She says: “The Church is in great danger… I saw the Church of St. Peter in ruins, and the manner in which so many of the clergy were themselves busy at this work of destruction ― none of them wishing to do it openly in front of others … I see that in this place [Rome] the Catholic Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there will hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived. They all work for destruction, even the clergy. The great devastation is now at hand … It was also shown to me that there were almost no Christians left in the old acceptation of the word! … In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars!” (Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, 19th century).
► ST. JOHN BOSCO was often granted visions and dreams concerning the future. On May 30th, 1862, Don Bosco at his ‘Good Night’ talk told his boys and the young clerics that he was training, about a dream he had dreamt a few nights previously. Here is the account of his dream concerning the plight of the Church in our times:
St. John Bosco said: “Imagine yourself to be with me on the seashore, or better, on an isolated rock and not to see any patch of land other than that under your feet. On the whole of that vast sheet of water you see an innumerable fleet of ships in battle array. The prows of the ships are formed into sharp, spear-like points, so that wherever they are thrust, they pierce it and completely destroy it. These ships are heavily armed with cannons, with lots of rifles, with incendiary bombs, with other firearms of all kinds― even books ― and advance against a stately ship very much bigger, higher and mightier than themselves. As they try to close in, they try to ram it, set it afire, and cripple it as much as possible, or in some way to do it every possible harm.”
“This stately vessel is shielded by a flotilla escort. The winds and waves are in the favor of the enemy. In this midst of this endless sea, two solid columns, a short distance apart, soar high into the sky: one is surmounted by a statue of the Immaculate Virgin at whose feet a large inscription reads: Help of Christians; the other, far loftier and sturdier, supports a [Communion] Host of proportionate size and bears beneath it the inscription Salvation of believers.
“As escorts to shield that majestic fully equipped ship (the Church), there are many smaller ships, which receive commands by signal from it and carry out movements to defend themselves from the opposing fleet. In the midst of the immense expanse of sea, two mighty columns of great height arise―a little distance the one from the other. On the top of one column, there is the statue of the Immaculate Virgin, from whose feet hangs a large placard with this inscription: ‘Auxilium Christianorum’ ― ‘Help of Christians.’ On the other column, which is much higher and bigger, stands a Eucharistic Host of great size proportionate to the column and beneath is another placard with the words: ‘Salus Credentium’ ― ‘Salvation of the Faithful’ (Believers).
“The flagship commander ― the Roman Pontiff [the Pope] ― seeing the enemy’s fury and the very grave predicament threatening the auxiliary ships, summons his captains to a conference and decide what is to be done. However, as they discuss their strategy, a furious storm breaks out and they must return to their ships. When the storm subsides, the Pope again summons his captains as the flagship continues to keep on its course. But the frightful storm rises and rages again. Standing at the helm, the Pope directs all his energy, straining every muscle, to steer his ship in direction of the two columns, from whose summits hang many anchors and strong hooks linked to chains.
“The entire enemy fleet closes in to intercept, attack and sink the flagship at all costs―before it can reach the pillars. They try in every possible way to stop it and to sink it. They bombard it with everything they have―books, writings and pamphlets, bombs, firearms, cannons, inflammable materials, of which they are full. The battle rages ever more furiously and relentlessly. The enemy prows (battering rams on front of the ship) thrust violently and ram the flagship again and again, but to no avail, as their efforts and impact prove useless and the flagship, unscathed and undaunted, keeps on its course. At times a formidable ram succeeds in splintering a gaping hole into the flagship’s hull, but, but no sooner is the harm done, a breeze from the two columns immediately and instantly seals and closes the gashes and cracks in the hull.
“Meanwhile, the guns of the assailants are blown up, the rifles and other arms and prows are broken; many ships are shattered and sink into the sea. Then, the frenzied enemies, in blind fury, resorts to hand-to-hand combat, with fists, with blows, with blasphemy and with curses.
“Suddenly the Pope falls, seriously wounded. Immediately, those who are with him run to help him. He is instantly helped up but then the Pope is struck down a second time, he falls again and dies. A shout of victory rises from the enemy, from their ships an unspeakable mockery arises and wild rejoicing sweeps their ships. But no sooner is the Pope dead than another Pope takes his place. The captains of the auxiliary ships elected him so quickly that the news of the Pope’s death almost coincides with that of his successor’s election. The enemy’s self-confidence begins to collapse and they start to lose courage.
“Breaking through all resistance, putting the enemy to rout and overcoming every obstacle, the new Pope steers his ship safely between the two columns and chains it to the two columns. First he fastens the ship with a light chain that hangs from the front of the ship (the bow) to an anchor of the column on which stands the Eucharistic Host. Then he fastens the opposite end of the ship (the stern) to another anchor hanging from the column on which stands the Immaculate Virgin.
“At this point something unexpected happens. The enemy ships panic and disperse, colliding with and scuttling each other. Some auxiliary ships which had gallantly fought alongside their flagship are the first to tie up at the two columns.
“At this point something unexpected happens. The enemy ships panic and disperse, colliding with and scuttling each other. Some auxiliary ships, which had gallantly fought alongside their flagship, are the first to follow the flagship and chain themselves to the two columns. Many others, which had fearfully kept far away from the fight, stand still, cautiously waiting until the wrecked enemy ships vanish under the waves. Then, they too head for the two columns, tie up at the swinging hooks, and float safe and tranquil beside their flagship. A great calm now covers the sea.”
At this point Don Bosco asked one of the priests present for his views. The priest replied that he thought that the flagship symbolized the Church headed by the Pope; with the ships representing mankind; and the sea as an image of the world. The ships defending the flagship he equated with the laity; and the attackers he equated with those trying to destroy the Church; while the two columns represented devotion to Mary and the Eucharist. He did not mention the death of the Pope and neither did Don Bosco in his reply to the priest, in which he agreed with what the priest had said, while adding that the enemy ships symbolized persecutions:
“Very grave trials await the Church. What we have suffered so far is almost nothing compared to what is going to happen. The enemies of the Church are symbolized by the ships which strive their utmost to sink the flagship. Only two things can save us in such a grave hour: devotion to Mary and frequent Communion. Let us do our very best to use these two means and have others use them everywhere.”
► POPE BENEDICT XVI ― a Liberal and Modernist ― forecast the same thing, saying: forecast the same thing, saying: “In our days, in vast areas of the world, the Faith is in danger of dying out―like a flame which no longer has fuel! … The boat has taken on so much water as to be on the verge of capsizing! … From the crisis of today the Church of tomorrow will emerge ― a Church that has lost much. She will become small and will have to start afresh―more or less from the beginning ... It seems certain to me that the Church is facing very hard times. The real crisis has scarcely begun. We will have to count on terrific upheavals!”
► FR. CULLETON, in his 1941 book, The Prophets and Our Times, writes: “An important sign of the latter days is the prevalence of false teachings with the natural consequences―defections from religion, lack of Faith even among Catholics, and great moral degeneration … Among other things to happen, during these evil days, is the changing of God’s laws by unscrupulous leaders to suit their own convenience. This shall lead to universal sin and a gradual lack of obedience to all of God’s commandments ... There will also be those who will indulge in fruitless discussions of so-called learned things, and by so doing will miss the real truth and the real Faith―because the things which engage their attention are based on false knowledge instead of the truth. The reason for this, primarily, is the education without religion which will exist in those days, for this education will not really educate, but will have as its basis vain works and false ideals … When the zeal of the clergy fails, they will see the faithful leaving the churches and turning to the world. The House of God will be deserted, singing of hymns will cease, and the observance of festivals abandoned … It is true that many people will seem to honor God, but this will be chiefly lip service and not based on real Faith and love. They will be unwilling to recognize evil, because they will prefer to follow the easy path of pleasure. Truth will be deserted and in its stead false doctrines eagerly embraced, because it will seem the people even wish to be deluded … We will observe pride, greed, intemperance, immorality, hypocrisy, unjust laws, lack of natural affection and dissemination of false knowledge rampant in the world … There will not be many who will be really wise, the intelligent will be very few in number and even these will be in great part silent, because they know that they would be either not listened to, or laughed at.” (Fr. Culleton, The Prophets and Our Times).
Noe’s Ark
This makes us think of Noe’s Ark in the Old Testament―which you could call “Noe’s Lifeboat”―where God was greatly displeased with majority of the world and chose to save only a handful in an Ark that He commanded Noe to build: “And the Earth was corrupted before God, and was filled with iniquity. And when God had seen that the Earth was corrupted, He said to Noe: ‘The end of all flesh is come before me! The Earth is filled with iniquity through them! I will destroy them with the Earth! Make thyself an Ark of timber planks! … I will bring the waters of a great flood upon the Earth, to destroy all flesh under Heaven! … And Noe did all things which God commanded him. And the Lord said to him: ‘Go into the Ark! … For after seven days, I will make it rain upon the Earth forty days and forty nights―and I will destroy every substance that I have made, from the face of the Earth!’ And Noe did all things which the Lord had commanded him … And after the seven days were passed, the rain fell upon the Earth forty days and forty nights, and the waters of the flood overflowed the Earth … The waters increased, and lifted up the ark on high from the Earth, and the ark was carried upon the waters―for they overflowed exceedingly and filled all on the face of the Earth. And the waters prevailed beyond measure upon the Earth and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered. The water was fifteen cubits higher than the mountains which it covered. And all flesh was destroyed that moved upon the Earth―both of fowl and of cattle, and of beasts, and of all creeping things that creep upon the Earth, and all men. And all things wherein there is the breath of life on the Earth, died. And the Lord destroyed all the substance that was upon the Earth―from man even to beast, and the creeping things and fowls of the air―and they were destroyed from the Earth and only Noe remained, and they that were with him in the Ark. And the waters prevailed upon the Earth a hundred and fifty days” (Genesis 6:11-22; 7:1-24).
We drown ourselves in the waters of sin ― “dead, because of sin” (Romans 8:10) ― but by Christ’s Passion and Death we have a chance to resurface in the waters of His grace: “Dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus our Lord!” (Romans 6:11). The sinner “was dead and is come to life again; he was lost, and now is found!” (Luke 15:32). “For the wage of sin is death. But the grace of God is life everlasting in Christ Jesus our Lord!” (Romans 6:23). God’s “lifeboat”―the Ark―saved Noe and his family. Has God given us a similar lifeboat in our day and age?
Our Lord and Lifeboats
Our Lord said: “I am come that they may have life!” (John 10:10) … “I am the way, and the truth, and the life!” (John 14:6). “The water that I will give, shall become a fountain of water springing up into life everlasting!” (John 4:14). “How narrow is the gate and straight is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:14). “He that finds his life, shall lose it; and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:39). “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it!” (Luke 17:33). “For whosoever wants to save his life, shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35).
In the Gospels, we read of many instances when Our Lord was in boats and ships (Mark chapters 8, 9, 13, 14 & 15; Mark chapters 3, 4, 5, 6 & 8; Luke chapters 5 & 8; John chapter 6) ― either teaching, traveling or even saving from shipwreck!
On one occasion, “when Jesus entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him. And behold a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves, but He was asleep. And they came to Him, and awakened Him, saying: ‘Lord! Save us! We perish!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful, O ye of little Faith?’ Then rising up He commanded the winds, and the sea, and there came a great calm. But the men wondered, saying: ‘What manner of Man is this? For the winds and the sea obey Him!’” (Matthew 8:23-27). St. Mark similarly writes: “And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that the ship was filled with water. And Jesus was in the rear part of the ship, sleeping upon a pillow; and they awakened Him and said to Him: ‘Master! Does it not concern Thee that we perish!’ And rising up, Jesus rebuked the wind and said to the sea: ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased and there was made a great calm. And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful? Have you no Faith yet?’ And they feared exceedingly and they said one to another: ‘Who is this―that both wind and sea obey Him?’” (Mark 4:37-40).
On another occasion, “Jesus went alone into a mountain to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone. But the boat [of His disciples], in the midst of the sea, was tossed with the waves―for the wind was against them. And in the fourth watch of the night, Jesus came to them walking upon the sea. And they, seeing Him walk upon the sea, were troubled, saying: ‘It is an apparition!’ And they cried out in fear. And immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘Be of good heart! It is I! Fear ye not!’ And Peter, answering, said: ‘Lord, if it be Thou, bid me come to Thee upon the waters!’ And Jesus said: ‘Come!’ And Peter, going down out of the boat, walked upon the water to come to Jesus. But seeing the wind strong, he was afraid. And when he began to sink, he cried out, saying: ‘Lord, save me!’ And immediately Jesus, stretching forth His hand, took hold of him and said to him: ‘O thou of little Faith! Why didst thou doubt?’ And when they were come up into the boat, the wind ceased” (Matthew 14:23-32).
Our Lady and Lifeboats
► ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT (1673-1716), speaks of the power of Our Lady to save souls in these End Times: “It was through the most holy Virgin Mary that Jesus came into the world, and it is also through her that He has to reign in the world … O what grand and hidden things that mighty God has wrought in this admirable creature! … When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce! … Mary has received from God a great domination over the souls of the elect, to form, nourish and bring them forth to eternal life! … The devils in Hell respect her while they fear her! … Towards the end of the world the Most High, with His holy Mother, has to form for Himself great saints who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity! … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady―illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection―so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Mystical City of God, that is to say, the most holy Virgin. By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone … Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times! … And lastly, Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. The devil will raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others.”
► ST. BERNARD OF CLAIRVAUX (1090-1153), in speaking of the many storms that attack us during out life on Earth, says of Our Lady: “When the storm of temptation arises, when you are midst the reefs and shoals of tribulation, fix your gaze upon the Star of the Sea―call upon Mary! If tossed by the rising tide of pride and ambition, if lost upon the troubled waters of scandal and contention―look then at the Star, invoke her name! Do the billows of anger, of avarice, of lust batter against your soul―cast thy eyes upon Mary! Does the greatness of your crime fill your soul with terror? Does your wretched conscience beat you down in shame and the fear of judgment paralyze your heart?―then, when about to sink to the depths of despondency, to plunge headlong into despair, then think of Mary! In perils and in sorrows and in fears―think of her, call upon her name! Let her name be ever on your lips and the thought of her be ever in your heart! Follow her―so that the power of her intercession may attend to your needs! Imitate her―for in her footsteps you cannot go astray! Call upon her―and you will not despair! Think of her―and you cannot fail. If she holds you by the hand―how can you fall? Under her protection you shall know no fear! Under her guidance you shall not falter! Under her patronage you shall surely reach the goal!”
Devotion to Our Lady is a lifeboat for our day―that is what Our Lady of Good Success said at Quito, Ecuador; Our Lady of La Salette, France (1846); Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal (1917) and Our Lady of Akita, Japan (1793).
► At QUITO, ECUADOR (1600s), Our Lady stated: “I am Mary of Good Success! … Let men in the future realize how powerful I am in placating Divine Justice and obtaining mercy and pardon for every sinner, who comes to me with a contrite heart. For I am the Mother of Mercy! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed! … The spirit of impurity will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! In these unhappy times, impurity and luxury will ensnare into sin, and will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals! … This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration! … Have recourse to me under the invocation of Our Lady of Good Success! … My hour will arrive, when I, in an amazing manner, will overthrow proud Satan, crushing him under my feet, chaining him in the infernal abyss, leaving the Church and the land free of this cruel tyranny!”
► At LA SALETTE (1846), Our Lady said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you! … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … People will believe that all is lost. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy ... The righteous will suffer greatly! … God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will! … I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son, those whom I carry in my arms, so to speak, those who have lived on my spirit! … Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession … The children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers―they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me. I shall fight at their side! … Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days!”
► At FATIMA (1917), Our Lady revealed: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you! … I am the Lady of the Rosary! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: ‘O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.’ … I shall come to ask for the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, and the Communion of Reparation on the First Saturdays! … Look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console me, and say that I promise to assist at the hour of death, with all the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months go to confession and receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary and keep me company for a quarter of an hour while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me! … In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!”
► OUR LADY appeared several times to BLESSED SISTER ELENA AIELLO (1895-1961) in the 1950s―Elena Aiello was a mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lady said: “Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! See how the souls are falling into Hell! … I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls ... I wish prayers and penance, in order that I may again obtain mercy and salvation for many souls — otherwise they will be lost! … All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God! They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … In order to save souls, I wish that there be propagated in the world the consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Mediatrix of men! Advise men to return to God by prayers and penances, and to come with confidence to my Immaculate Heart. My intercession must be shown! Spread the devotion to my Immaculate Heart, in order that many souls maybe conquered by my love and that many sinners may return to my Maternal Heart. All those who accept my urgent warnings will be saved! … Through prayer and penance, my mercy will be able to hold back the hand of God’s justice! The hour of my triumph is close at hand. The victory will be accomplished through the love and mercy of the Heart of My Son, and of my Immaculate Heart, the Mediatrix! … My words are very clear, and you must transmit them to everyone!”
► OUR LADY OF AKITA (1973) stated: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before ... I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father ... who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger … Pray in reparation for the sins of men! … The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary! … Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary! I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
Mary’s Lifeboat ― Mary’s Mantle
|
|
|
|
You have probably heard of people speak of Mary’s Mantle or the Mantle of Mary. Literally speaking, a mantle is an article of clothing similar to a cape or a cloak, that was used in biblical times to keep a person warm and protect them from the elements. It can also be used symbolically, to indicate being wrapped in God's authority, or even being graced with the presence of the Holy Spirit.
In the Old Testament, the Ark of the Covenant was covered in blue (or “violet”) fabric for traveling (Numbers 4:5-6). God’s Presence would “rest” on the Ark as a king sits on his throne (Exodus 25:22). When Mary agreed to be the Mother of Jesus at the Annunciation, she became God’s living “resting place.” In art, Mary’s blue mantle signals she is the new Ark of the Covenant. Blue also indicates Mary’s royal status.
In Christian art, there are many paintings that show people sheltering under the mantle of the Our Lady. This wonderfully reassuring imagery―of being completely enveloped in a protective embrace from the Virgin Mary by being safely “wrapped in her mantle”―should give us great confidence in the power of her protection and assistance.
Jesus gave us the gift of His Holy Mother as He was dying on the cross, when He said “Behold, thy mother!” Mary, as our spiritual mother, looks after us in a special, intimate, powerful and perpetual way―but only if we accept her as our spiritual Mother and obey our spiritual Mother. We are welcome to stay under her protective mantle, but we can always leave that protective mantle in order to go and sin―the choice is ours, and the consequences will come from our choice. Just as Jesus said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24) ― Our Lady could well say the same. It is our obedience to her requests and commands that shows our love for her. The more we love her, the more she will love us and the more she will do for us. As we sow, so shall we reap.
St. Louis de Montfort continues: “One of the most infallible marks we can have of our being conducted by the good spirit is our being very devout to Mary, thinking often of her and speaking often of her. Be persuaded, then, that the more you look at Mary in your prayers, contemplations, actions and sufferings, then the more perfectly will you find Jesus Christ, Who is always, with Mary ... Listen to what St. Bernard says in order to encourage us to adopt this practice: ‘When Mary holds you up, you do not fall; when she protects you, you need not fear; when she leads you, you do not tire; when she is favorable to you, you arrive at the harbor of safety!’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
In the Old Testament, the Ark of the Covenant was covered in blue (or “violet”) fabric for traveling (Numbers 4:5-6). God’s Presence would “rest” on the Ark as a king sits on his throne (Exodus 25:22). When Mary agreed to be the Mother of Jesus at the Annunciation, she became God’s living “resting place.” In art, Mary’s blue mantle signals she is the new Ark of the Covenant. Blue also indicates Mary’s royal status.
In Christian art, there are many paintings that show people sheltering under the mantle of the Our Lady. This wonderfully reassuring imagery―of being completely enveloped in a protective embrace from the Virgin Mary by being safely “wrapped in her mantle”―should give us great confidence in the power of her protection and assistance.
Jesus gave us the gift of His Holy Mother as He was dying on the cross, when He said “Behold, thy mother!” Mary, as our spiritual mother, looks after us in a special, intimate, powerful and perpetual way―but only if we accept her as our spiritual Mother and obey our spiritual Mother. We are welcome to stay under her protective mantle, but we can always leave that protective mantle in order to go and sin―the choice is ours, and the consequences will come from our choice. Just as Jesus said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24) ― Our Lady could well say the same. It is our obedience to her requests and commands that shows our love for her. The more we love her, the more she will love us and the more she will do for us. As we sow, so shall we reap.
St. Louis de Montfort continues: “One of the most infallible marks we can have of our being conducted by the good spirit is our being very devout to Mary, thinking often of her and speaking often of her. Be persuaded, then, that the more you look at Mary in your prayers, contemplations, actions and sufferings, then the more perfectly will you find Jesus Christ, Who is always, with Mary ... Listen to what St. Bernard says in order to encourage us to adopt this practice: ‘When Mary holds you up, you do not fall; when she protects you, you need not fear; when she leads you, you do not tire; when she is favorable to you, you arrive at the harbor of safety!’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Article 5
Tuesday, April 29th
How Can You Sit There and Do Nothing?
Tuesday, April 29th
How Can You Sit There and Do Nothing?
Have You Ever Killed Anyone?
If someone were to call you a murderer―what would reaction be? You would, most likely, call that person a liar! But, in reality, is he a liar? Are you perhaps a murderer―and refuse to see it, recognize it, and admit it?
“He that loves not, abides in death. Whosoever hates his brother is a murderer―and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in himself. In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him? Let us not love in words, nor in tongue, but in deeds and in truth! … If any man says, ‘I love God!’ but hates his brother―then he is a liar. For he that does not love his brother, whom he sees, how can he love God, Whom he sees not?” (1 John 3:14-18; 4:20).
It is easy to profess a love of our neighbor in word only, for words come easily and words are cheap―but what are these “deeds” that show our love for our neighbor? Our Lady of Fatima clearly tells us: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!”
“Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is your brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I know not! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to Cain: ‘What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood cries to Me from the Earth! Now, therefore, cursed shall you be upon the Earth, which has opened her mouth and received the blood of your brother by your hand!’” (Genesis 4:8-11).
Doing and Not Doing
“That does not apply to me!” you will say, “I have never killed anyone!” Maybe you are not guilty of committing murder, but we can be guilty of sin in two ways―by COMMISSION and OMISSION. We can actively kill someone by doing it ourselves, or we can negatively kill someone by allowing others to do it while neglecting to stop them from doing it, or neglecting to call for help.
The Baltimore Catechism tell us that “We may commit sin in two ways: (1) either by doing what we should not do―and thus we have a sin of commission; or (2) by not doing what we should do―and thus we have a sin of omission, that is, a good act that is omitted.” A sin of omission can only be mortal where one omits to do something which is a very serious obligation. A mortal sin of omission is a serious sin that results from failing to do something that is required of one, with full knowledge and deliberate consent. It involves a failure to fulfill a duty or obligation, especially when there's a grave matter involved and the action is done freely and deliberately.
Sins of omission are sins that leave undone the good or duties that we are obliged to do. They vary in their gravity―some sins of omission can be mortal sins, others are venial sins. For example, we can commit a mortal sin of omission by neglecting to attend Mass and holy days of obligation; by neglecting to fast and abstain on the days appointed for fasting and abstinence; by neglecting to keep the appointed fast time before Holy Communion; by neglecting to confess all our mortal sins in Confession; by neglecting to instruct our children in the truths of the Faith; by neglecting our health in a serious way; neglecting to supply for the essential needs of the family; etc. Venial sins of neglect would include things like neglecting to keep the house tidy; neglecting to prepare for Holy Communion; neglecting minor duties at work; neglecting to do one’s school homework; etc. Nevertheless, each of these sins would be sins of omission. Holy Scripture tells us that anyone who knows the good that he ought to do, but doesn’t do it, such a person sins by his neglect: “Therefore, for him who knows to do good and does it not―to him it is sin!” (James 4:17). When people ignore doing things God expects them to do, they are committing the sin of omission.
Morality doesn’t just consist of avoiding evil, but also doing good: “Turn away from evil and do good!” (Psalm 33:15) … “Decline from evil and do good!” (Psalm 36:27). Hence St. Thomas Aquinas formulates the first principle of morality: “Good is to be done and pursued, and evil is to be avoided” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q. 94, art. 2). Thus we can sin―not just by doing what is evil, but also by not doing what is good. We could also add list of Spiritual and Corporal Works of Mercy as a list of potential sins of omission. Corporal Works of Mercy: (1) To feed the hungry; (2) To give drink to the thirsty; (3) To clothe the naked; (4) To visit the imprisoned; (5) To shelter the homeless; (6) To visit the sick; (7) To bury the dead. Spiritual Works of Mercy: (1) To admonish the sinner; (2) To instruct the ignorant; (3) To counsel the doubtful; (4) To comfort the sorrowful; (5) To bear wrongs patiently; (6) To forgive all injuries; (7) To pray for the living and the dead.
We see Our Lord refer to these: “And when the Son of man shall come in His majesty, and all the angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the seat of His majesty. And all nations shall be gathered together before Him, and He shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats! And He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on His left. Then shall the King say to them that shall be on His right hand: ‘Come, ye blessed of My Father, possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me in; naked, and you covered Me; sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me!’ Then shall the just answer Him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, and fed Thee? Thirsty, and gave Thee drink? And when did we see Thee a stranger and took Thee in? Or naked, and covered Thee? Or when did we see Thee sick or in prison, and came to Thee?’ And the King, answering, shall say to them: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!’
“Then He shall say to them also that shall be on His left hand: ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels! For I was hungry, and you gave Me not to eat! I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink! I was a stranger, and you took Me not in! Naked, and you covered Me not! Sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me!’ Then they also shall answer Him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to Thee?’ Then He shall answer them, saying: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!’ And these shall go into everlasting punishment: but the just, into life everlasting!” (Matthew 25:31-46).
Similarly, Our Lord relates the Parable of the Good Samaritan, and tells us to do likewise: “A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, who also stripped him, and having wounded him went away, leaving him half dead. And it chanced, that a certain priest went down the same way: and seeing him, passed by. In like manner also a Levite, when he was near the place and saw him, passed by. But a certain Samaritan being on his journey, came near him; and seeing him, was moved with compassion. And going up to him, bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine: and setting him upon his own beast, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And the next day he took out two pence, and gave to the host, and said: ‘Take care of him; and whatsoever thou shalt spend over and above, I, at my return, will repay thee!’ Which of these three, in thy opinion, was neighbor to him that fell among the robbers?’ But he said: ‘He that showed mercy to him.’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Go, and do thou in like manner!’” (Luke 10:30-37).
Greatest Law of the Church
The greater the law that we break―the greater is our sin. Our Lord tells us that the love of God and neighbor are the two greatest laws: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Furthermore, a true love of neighbor is a love that desires and works for the salvation of the neighbor, which is far more important than the mere material assistance and benefit of the neighbor―as Our Lord says: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Hence it is that the most important law of the Church is the salvation of souls. This is often expressed as “salus animarum suprema lex” ― meaning, “the supreme law is the salvation of souls.”
That is exactly what Our Lady of Fatima is talking about when she says: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” She is concerned with the supreme law of the Church―the salvation of souls. Likewise, Our Lord, when He says: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56) … “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). Scripture adds: “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:17). “The Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). It is all about the supreme law of the Church―the salvation of souls.
We are the members of the Mystical Body of Christ―and therefore the aims of Christ should be our aims. We are Soldiers of Christ―we do not fight for ourselves, but we fight for Christ; we do fight to get what we want, but we fight to obtain what Christ wants. What does Christ want? He wants the salvation of souls! Is that what we want? Is that what our life is focused upon? Is that what we are fighting for? Or are we fighting for the comforts of this world, for wealth, for more possessions, more entertainment, more fun?
Fighting for Souls
Scripture clearly tells us: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) … “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12) … “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” ― not just eternal life for yourself, but for others too! (1 Timothy 6:12) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). Yet that is what most Catholics are doing―they are just sitting there, like a soldier who is “absent without leave” (AWOL). Instead of fighting for the salvation of souls―their own soul included―they prefer to just sit there in front of the television; just sit there in front of the computer screen; just sit there with their smartphone; just sit there with their beer and snack; just sit there chatting and gossiping with family, friends and neighbors! To them, the Angel of Portugal would address the same words as he addressed to the three children at Fatima, whom he found playing and not praying. The Angel scolded and rebuked them: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers unceasingly and sacrifice yourselves to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners! Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
Notice that the Angel of Portugal is scolding and rebuking three very young children ― whose age at the time was: Lucia dos Santos (9-years-old), Francisco Marto (8-years-old), and Jacinta Marto (6-years-old). This shows that God expects even young children to fight for the salvation of souls! Is that what you were doing at that age? Is that what your children were or are doing at that age? Is that what YOU would expect from children? God does!
The response of the children to Our Lady’s requests, in order to save sinners from Hell, was truly remarkable. The children showed themselves to be true “troopers” and soldiers in many ways. The following accounts are the words of Lucia dos Santos, from the book Fatima in Lucia’s Own Words:
► DOING PENANCE & MAKING SACRIFICES: Jacinta would say: “Those people burning in Hell! … Poor sinners! We have to pray and make many sacrifices for them!” Jacinta took this matter of making sacrifices for the conversion of sinners so much to heart, that she never let a single opportunity escape her. One day the sun was blazing, and in that arid, stony wasteland, it seemed as though it would burn everything up. We were parched with thirst, and there wasn’t a single drop of water for us to drink! At first, we offered the sacrifice generously for the conversion of sinners, but after midday, we could hold out no longer. As there was a house quite near, I suggested to my companions that I should go and ask for a little water. They agreed to this, so I went and knocked on the door. A little old woman gave me not only a pitcher of water, but also some bread, which I accepted gratefully. I ran to share it with my little companions, and then offered the pitcher to Francisco, and told him to take a drink.
“I don’t want to!” he replied.
“Why?”
“I want to suffer for the conversion of sinners!”
“You have a drink, Jacinta!”
“But I want to offer this sacrifice for sinners too!”
Then I poured the water into a hollow in the rock, so that the sheep could drink it, and went to return the pitcher to its owner.
This was how Jacinta spent her days, until Our Lord sent the influenza that confined her to bed, and her brother Francisco as well (Jacinta fell ill in October, 1918, and Francisco soon after). The evening before she fell sick, she said:
“I’ve a terrible headache and I’m so thirsty! But I won’t take a drink, because I want to suffer for sinners.”
Whenever I visited her room first, she used to say: “Now go and see Francisco. I’ll make the sacrifice of staying here alone.”
On another occasion, her mother brought her a cup of milk and told her to take it.
“I don’t want it, mother!” she answered, pushing the cup away with her little hand.
My aunt insisted a little, and then left the room, saying: “I don’t know how to make her take anything; she has no appetite.”
As soon as we were alone, I asked her: “How can you disobey your mother like that, and not offer this sacrifice to Our Lord?”
When she heard this, she shed a few tears which I had the happiness of drying, and said: “I forgot this time!”
She called her mother, asked her forgiveness, and said she’d take whatever she wanted. Her mother brought back the cup of milk, and Jacinta drank it down without the slightest sign of repugnance.
Later, she told me: “If you only knew how hard it was to drink that!”
Another time, she said to me: “It’s becoming harder and harder for me to take milk and broth, but I don’t say anything. I drink it all for love of Our Lord and of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, our dear heavenly Mother.”
Again, I asked her: “Are you better?”
“You know I’m not getting better,” she replied, and added: “I’ve such pains in my chest! But I don’t say anything. I’m suffering for the conversion of sinners.”
The day came for Jacinta to go to hospital (She was taken there on July 1st and left it on August 31st, 1919). There indeed she was to suffer a great deal. When her mother went to see her, she asked if she wanted anything. She told her that she wanted to see me. This was no easy matter for my aunt, but she took me with her at the first opportunity. As soon as Jacinta saw me, she joyfully threw her arms around me, and asked her mother to leave me with her while she went to do her shopping. Then I asked her if she was suffering a lot.
“Yes, I am. But I offer everything for sinners, and in reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.” Then, filled with enthusiasm, she spoke of Our Lord and Our Lady: “Oh, how much I love to suffer for love of Them, just to give Them pleasure! They greatly love those who suffer for the conversion of sinners.”
► PRAYING MANY ROSARIES: Prior to the apparitions, when we were sent to pasture our sheep, we had been told to say the Rosary after our lunch, but as the whole day seemed too short for our play, we worked out a fine way of getting through the Rosary quickly. We simply passed the beads through our fingers, saying nothing but “Hail Mary, Amen! Hail Mary, Amen! Hail Mary, Amen!...” At the end of each mystery, we paused awhile, then simply said “Our Father, Amen!” and so, in the twinkling of an eye, as they say, we had our Rosary finished! With our prayer being finished, we started to play! After the apparitions, Jacinta said: “That Lady told us to say the Rosary and to make sacrifices for the conversion of sinners. So from now on, when we say the Rosary we must say the whole Hail Mary and the whole Our Father!
Our Lady said that Francisco would have to pray many Rosaries before he could go to Heaven. We told Francisco all that Our Lady had said. He was overjoyed and expressed the happiness he felt when he heard of the promise that he would go to Heaven. Crossing his hands on his breast, he exclaimed: “O, my dear Our Lady! I’ll say as many Rosaries as you want!” And from then on, he made a habit of moving away from us, as though going for a walk. When we called him and asked him what he was doing―he raised his hand and showed me his Rosary. If we told him to come and play, and say the Rosary with us afterwards, he replied: “I’ll pray then as well. Don’t you remember that Our Lady said I must pray many Rosaries?” When lunch time came, we missed him and went to call him: “Francisco, don’t you want to come for your lunch?”
“No, you eat!”
“And what about praying the Rosary with us?”
“That, yes―later on! Call me again!”
When I went to call him again, he said to me: “You come up here and pray with me!”
A poor woman and her son, went and knelt down in front of Francisco. They begged him to obtain from Our Lady the grace that the father of the family would be cured and that he would not have to go to the war. Francisco knelt down also, took off his cap and asked if they would like to pray the Rosary with him. They said they would, and began to pray. Very soon, all those people stopped asking curious questions, and also went down on their knees to pray. After that, they went with us to the Cova da Iria, reciting a Rosary along the way. Once there, we said another Rosary, and then they went away, quite happy.
► FASTING: One day, when we reached the pasture, Jacinta sat thoughtfully on a rock. “Jacinta, come and play!” I [Lucia] said. Jacinta replied: “I don’t want to play today!” I asked: “Why not?” She replied: “Because I’m thinking! The sacrifices―how are we going to make them?” Right away, Francisco thought of a good sacrifice: “Let’s give our lunch to the sheep, and make the sacrifice of doing without it!” In a couple of minutes, the contents of our lunch-bag had been divided among the sheep. So that day, we fasted as strictly as the most austere Carthusian!
“These were not the only times we fasted. We had agreed that whenever we met any poor children like these, we would give them our lunch. They were only too happy to receive such an alms, and they took good care to meet us; they used to wait for us along the road. We no sooner saw them than Jacinta ran to give them all the food we had for that day, as happy as if she had no need of it herself.
There were two families in Moita (at that time it was a small village to the north of the Cova da Iria about half-a-mile from the place of the Apparitions) whose children used to go round begging from door to door. We met them one day, as we were going along with our sheep. As soon as she saw them, Jacinta said to us: “Let’s give our lunch to those poor children, for the conversion of sinners!” And she ran to take it to them. That afternoon, she told me she was hungry. There were holm-oaks and oak trees nearby. The acorns were still quite green. However, I told her we could eat them. Francisco climbed up a holm-oak to fill his pockets, but Jacinta remembered that we could eat the ones on the oak trees instead, and thus make a sacrifice by eating the bitter kind. So it was there, that afternoon, that we enjoyed this delicious repast! Jacinta made this one of her usual sacrifices, and often picked the acorns off the oaks or the olives off the trees. One day I said to her: “Jacinta, don’t eat that! It’s too bitter!” She replied: “But it’s because it’s bitter that I’m eating it, for the conversion of sinners!”
On days like that, our only nourishment consisted of pine nuts, and little berries about the size of an olive which grow on the roots of yellow bell-flowers, as well as blackberries, mushrooms, and some other things we found on the roots of pine trees – I can’t remember now what these were called. If there was fruit available on the land belonging to our parents, we used to eat that. Jacinta’s thirst for making sacrifices seemed insatiable.
► ACCEPTING DAILY IRRITATIONS AND SUFFERINGS: Ever since the day Our Lady taught us to offer our sacrifices to Jesus, any time we had something to suffer, or agreed to make a sacrifice, Jacinta asked: “Did you already tell Jesus that it’s for love of Him?” If I said I hadn’t, she answered: “Then I’ll tell Him,” and joining her hands, she raised her eyes to Heaven and said: “Oh Jesus, it is for love of You, and for the conversion of sinners!”
One day, when shepherding the sheep, the heat was getting more and more intense. The shrill singing of the crickets and grasshoppers coupled with the croaking of the frogs in the neighboring pond made an uproar that was almost unbearable. Jacinta, frail as she was, and weakened still more by the lack of food and drink, said to me with that simplicity which was natural to her: “Tell the crickets and the frogs to keep quiet! I have such a terrible headache!” Then Francisco asked her: “Don’t you want to suffer this for sinners?” The poor child, clasping her head between her two little hands, replied: “Yes, I do! Let them sing!”
When, some time later, we were put in prison, what made Jacinta suffer most, was to feel that their parents had abandoned them. With tears streaming down her cheeks, she would say: “Neither your parents nor mine have come to see us. They don’t bother about us anymore!”
“Don’t cry!” said Francisco, “We can offer this to Jesus for sinners!” Then, raising his eyes and hands to Heaven, he made the offering: “O my Jesus, this is for love of You, and for the conversion of sinners!”
Jacinta added: “And also for the Holy Father, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary!”
► ACCEPTING BEATINGS: My [Lucia’s] mother became more and more upset at the way things were progressing. News of what had happened was spreading. My mother was getting worried, and wanted at all costs to make me deny what I had said. She was determined to make me confess that I was telling lies, and to this end she spared neither caresses, nor threats, nor even the broomstick. She warned me that she would force me to go to those people whom I had deceived, confess that I had lied and ask their pardon. I could see that my mother was deeply distressed, and that she wanted at all costs to compel me, as she put it, to admit that I had lied. To force me to tell the truth, as she said, my mother, more often than not, beat me soundly with the broom-handle or a stick from the woodpile near the fireplace. One day, Jacinta said to me: “lf only my parents were like yours, so that those people would beat me too, then I’d have more sacrifices to offer Our Lord!”
► ACCEPTING IMPRISONMENT: When, some time later, we were put in prison, what made Jacinta suffer most, was to feel that their parents had abandoned them. With tears streaming down her cheeks, she would say: “Neither your parents nor mine have come to see us! They don’t bother about us anymore!”
“Don’t cry!” said Francisco, “We can offer this to Jesus for sinners!”
Then, raising his eyes and hands to Heaven, he made the offering: “O my Jesus, this is for love of You, and for the conversion of sinners!”
Jacinta added: “And also for the Holy Father, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary!”
In prison, Francisco was quite courageous, and tried to cheer up Jacinta when she felt most homesick. While we were saying the Rosary in prison, he noticed that one of the prisoners was on his knees with his cap still on his head. Francisco went up to him and said: “If you wish to pray, you should take your cap off!” Right away, the poor man handed it to him and he went over and put it on the bench on top of his own.
During Jacinta’s prison interrogation, he confided to me with boundless joy and peace: “If they kill us as they say, we’ll soon be in Heaven! How wonderful! Nothing else matters!” Then after a moment’s silence he added: “God grant that Jacinta won’t be afraid. I’m going to say a Hail Mary for her!” He promptly removed his cap and prayed.
► ACCEPTING DEATH THREATS: After being separated for a while, we were reunited in one of the other rooms of the prison. When they told us they were coming soon to take us away to be fried alive, Jacinta went aside and stood by a window overlooking the cattle market. I thought at first that she was trying to distract her thoughts with the view, but I soon realized that she was crying.
I went over and drew her close to me, asking her why she was crying: “Because we are going to die,” she replied, “without ever seeing our parents again, not even our mothers!”
With tears running down her cheeks, she added: “I would like at least to see my mother!”
“Don’t you want, then, to offer this sacrifice for the conversion of sinners?”
“I do want to, I do!”
With her face bathed in tears, she joined her hands, raised her eyes to Heaven and made her offering: “O my Jesus! This is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, for the Holy Father, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary!”
If someone were to call you a murderer―what would reaction be? You would, most likely, call that person a liar! But, in reality, is he a liar? Are you perhaps a murderer―and refuse to see it, recognize it, and admit it?
“He that loves not, abides in death. Whosoever hates his brother is a murderer―and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in himself. In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him? Let us not love in words, nor in tongue, but in deeds and in truth! … If any man says, ‘I love God!’ but hates his brother―then he is a liar. For he that does not love his brother, whom he sees, how can he love God, Whom he sees not?” (1 John 3:14-18; 4:20).
It is easy to profess a love of our neighbor in word only, for words come easily and words are cheap―but what are these “deeds” that show our love for our neighbor? Our Lady of Fatima clearly tells us: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!”
“Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is your brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I know not! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to Cain: ‘What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood cries to Me from the Earth! Now, therefore, cursed shall you be upon the Earth, which has opened her mouth and received the blood of your brother by your hand!’” (Genesis 4:8-11).
Doing and Not Doing
“That does not apply to me!” you will say, “I have never killed anyone!” Maybe you are not guilty of committing murder, but we can be guilty of sin in two ways―by COMMISSION and OMISSION. We can actively kill someone by doing it ourselves, or we can negatively kill someone by allowing others to do it while neglecting to stop them from doing it, or neglecting to call for help.
The Baltimore Catechism tell us that “We may commit sin in two ways: (1) either by doing what we should not do―and thus we have a sin of commission; or (2) by not doing what we should do―and thus we have a sin of omission, that is, a good act that is omitted.” A sin of omission can only be mortal where one omits to do something which is a very serious obligation. A mortal sin of omission is a serious sin that results from failing to do something that is required of one, with full knowledge and deliberate consent. It involves a failure to fulfill a duty or obligation, especially when there's a grave matter involved and the action is done freely and deliberately.
Sins of omission are sins that leave undone the good or duties that we are obliged to do. They vary in their gravity―some sins of omission can be mortal sins, others are venial sins. For example, we can commit a mortal sin of omission by neglecting to attend Mass and holy days of obligation; by neglecting to fast and abstain on the days appointed for fasting and abstinence; by neglecting to keep the appointed fast time before Holy Communion; by neglecting to confess all our mortal sins in Confession; by neglecting to instruct our children in the truths of the Faith; by neglecting our health in a serious way; neglecting to supply for the essential needs of the family; etc. Venial sins of neglect would include things like neglecting to keep the house tidy; neglecting to prepare for Holy Communion; neglecting minor duties at work; neglecting to do one’s school homework; etc. Nevertheless, each of these sins would be sins of omission. Holy Scripture tells us that anyone who knows the good that he ought to do, but doesn’t do it, such a person sins by his neglect: “Therefore, for him who knows to do good and does it not―to him it is sin!” (James 4:17). When people ignore doing things God expects them to do, they are committing the sin of omission.
Morality doesn’t just consist of avoiding evil, but also doing good: “Turn away from evil and do good!” (Psalm 33:15) … “Decline from evil and do good!” (Psalm 36:27). Hence St. Thomas Aquinas formulates the first principle of morality: “Good is to be done and pursued, and evil is to be avoided” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q. 94, art. 2). Thus we can sin―not just by doing what is evil, but also by not doing what is good. We could also add list of Spiritual and Corporal Works of Mercy as a list of potential sins of omission. Corporal Works of Mercy: (1) To feed the hungry; (2) To give drink to the thirsty; (3) To clothe the naked; (4) To visit the imprisoned; (5) To shelter the homeless; (6) To visit the sick; (7) To bury the dead. Spiritual Works of Mercy: (1) To admonish the sinner; (2) To instruct the ignorant; (3) To counsel the doubtful; (4) To comfort the sorrowful; (5) To bear wrongs patiently; (6) To forgive all injuries; (7) To pray for the living and the dead.
We see Our Lord refer to these: “And when the Son of man shall come in His majesty, and all the angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the seat of His majesty. And all nations shall be gathered together before Him, and He shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats! And He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on His left. Then shall the King say to them that shall be on His right hand: ‘Come, ye blessed of My Father, possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me in; naked, and you covered Me; sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me!’ Then shall the just answer Him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, and fed Thee? Thirsty, and gave Thee drink? And when did we see Thee a stranger and took Thee in? Or naked, and covered Thee? Or when did we see Thee sick or in prison, and came to Thee?’ And the King, answering, shall say to them: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!’
“Then He shall say to them also that shall be on His left hand: ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels! For I was hungry, and you gave Me not to eat! I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink! I was a stranger, and you took Me not in! Naked, and you covered Me not! Sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me!’ Then they also shall answer Him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to Thee?’ Then He shall answer them, saying: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!’ And these shall go into everlasting punishment: but the just, into life everlasting!” (Matthew 25:31-46).
Similarly, Our Lord relates the Parable of the Good Samaritan, and tells us to do likewise: “A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, who also stripped him, and having wounded him went away, leaving him half dead. And it chanced, that a certain priest went down the same way: and seeing him, passed by. In like manner also a Levite, when he was near the place and saw him, passed by. But a certain Samaritan being on his journey, came near him; and seeing him, was moved with compassion. And going up to him, bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine: and setting him upon his own beast, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And the next day he took out two pence, and gave to the host, and said: ‘Take care of him; and whatsoever thou shalt spend over and above, I, at my return, will repay thee!’ Which of these three, in thy opinion, was neighbor to him that fell among the robbers?’ But he said: ‘He that showed mercy to him.’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Go, and do thou in like manner!’” (Luke 10:30-37).
Greatest Law of the Church
The greater the law that we break―the greater is our sin. Our Lord tells us that the love of God and neighbor are the two greatest laws: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Furthermore, a true love of neighbor is a love that desires and works for the salvation of the neighbor, which is far more important than the mere material assistance and benefit of the neighbor―as Our Lord says: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Hence it is that the most important law of the Church is the salvation of souls. This is often expressed as “salus animarum suprema lex” ― meaning, “the supreme law is the salvation of souls.”
That is exactly what Our Lady of Fatima is talking about when she says: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” She is concerned with the supreme law of the Church―the salvation of souls. Likewise, Our Lord, when He says: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56) … “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). Scripture adds: “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:17). “The Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). It is all about the supreme law of the Church―the salvation of souls.
We are the members of the Mystical Body of Christ―and therefore the aims of Christ should be our aims. We are Soldiers of Christ―we do not fight for ourselves, but we fight for Christ; we do fight to get what we want, but we fight to obtain what Christ wants. What does Christ want? He wants the salvation of souls! Is that what we want? Is that what our life is focused upon? Is that what we are fighting for? Or are we fighting for the comforts of this world, for wealth, for more possessions, more entertainment, more fun?
Fighting for Souls
Scripture clearly tells us: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) … “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12) … “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” ― not just eternal life for yourself, but for others too! (1 Timothy 6:12) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). Yet that is what most Catholics are doing―they are just sitting there, like a soldier who is “absent without leave” (AWOL). Instead of fighting for the salvation of souls―their own soul included―they prefer to just sit there in front of the television; just sit there in front of the computer screen; just sit there with their smartphone; just sit there with their beer and snack; just sit there chatting and gossiping with family, friends and neighbors! To them, the Angel of Portugal would address the same words as he addressed to the three children at Fatima, whom he found playing and not praying. The Angel scolded and rebuked them: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers unceasingly and sacrifice yourselves to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners! Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
Notice that the Angel of Portugal is scolding and rebuking three very young children ― whose age at the time was: Lucia dos Santos (9-years-old), Francisco Marto (8-years-old), and Jacinta Marto (6-years-old). This shows that God expects even young children to fight for the salvation of souls! Is that what you were doing at that age? Is that what your children were or are doing at that age? Is that what YOU would expect from children? God does!
The response of the children to Our Lady’s requests, in order to save sinners from Hell, was truly remarkable. The children showed themselves to be true “troopers” and soldiers in many ways. The following accounts are the words of Lucia dos Santos, from the book Fatima in Lucia’s Own Words:
► DOING PENANCE & MAKING SACRIFICES: Jacinta would say: “Those people burning in Hell! … Poor sinners! We have to pray and make many sacrifices for them!” Jacinta took this matter of making sacrifices for the conversion of sinners so much to heart, that she never let a single opportunity escape her. One day the sun was blazing, and in that arid, stony wasteland, it seemed as though it would burn everything up. We were parched with thirst, and there wasn’t a single drop of water for us to drink! At first, we offered the sacrifice generously for the conversion of sinners, but after midday, we could hold out no longer. As there was a house quite near, I suggested to my companions that I should go and ask for a little water. They agreed to this, so I went and knocked on the door. A little old woman gave me not only a pitcher of water, but also some bread, which I accepted gratefully. I ran to share it with my little companions, and then offered the pitcher to Francisco, and told him to take a drink.
“I don’t want to!” he replied.
“Why?”
“I want to suffer for the conversion of sinners!”
“You have a drink, Jacinta!”
“But I want to offer this sacrifice for sinners too!”
Then I poured the water into a hollow in the rock, so that the sheep could drink it, and went to return the pitcher to its owner.
This was how Jacinta spent her days, until Our Lord sent the influenza that confined her to bed, and her brother Francisco as well (Jacinta fell ill in October, 1918, and Francisco soon after). The evening before she fell sick, she said:
“I’ve a terrible headache and I’m so thirsty! But I won’t take a drink, because I want to suffer for sinners.”
Whenever I visited her room first, she used to say: “Now go and see Francisco. I’ll make the sacrifice of staying here alone.”
On another occasion, her mother brought her a cup of milk and told her to take it.
“I don’t want it, mother!” she answered, pushing the cup away with her little hand.
My aunt insisted a little, and then left the room, saying: “I don’t know how to make her take anything; she has no appetite.”
As soon as we were alone, I asked her: “How can you disobey your mother like that, and not offer this sacrifice to Our Lord?”
When she heard this, she shed a few tears which I had the happiness of drying, and said: “I forgot this time!”
She called her mother, asked her forgiveness, and said she’d take whatever she wanted. Her mother brought back the cup of milk, and Jacinta drank it down without the slightest sign of repugnance.
Later, she told me: “If you only knew how hard it was to drink that!”
Another time, she said to me: “It’s becoming harder and harder for me to take milk and broth, but I don’t say anything. I drink it all for love of Our Lord and of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, our dear heavenly Mother.”
Again, I asked her: “Are you better?”
“You know I’m not getting better,” she replied, and added: “I’ve such pains in my chest! But I don’t say anything. I’m suffering for the conversion of sinners.”
The day came for Jacinta to go to hospital (She was taken there on July 1st and left it on August 31st, 1919). There indeed she was to suffer a great deal. When her mother went to see her, she asked if she wanted anything. She told her that she wanted to see me. This was no easy matter for my aunt, but she took me with her at the first opportunity. As soon as Jacinta saw me, she joyfully threw her arms around me, and asked her mother to leave me with her while she went to do her shopping. Then I asked her if she was suffering a lot.
“Yes, I am. But I offer everything for sinners, and in reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.” Then, filled with enthusiasm, she spoke of Our Lord and Our Lady: “Oh, how much I love to suffer for love of Them, just to give Them pleasure! They greatly love those who suffer for the conversion of sinners.”
► PRAYING MANY ROSARIES: Prior to the apparitions, when we were sent to pasture our sheep, we had been told to say the Rosary after our lunch, but as the whole day seemed too short for our play, we worked out a fine way of getting through the Rosary quickly. We simply passed the beads through our fingers, saying nothing but “Hail Mary, Amen! Hail Mary, Amen! Hail Mary, Amen!...” At the end of each mystery, we paused awhile, then simply said “Our Father, Amen!” and so, in the twinkling of an eye, as they say, we had our Rosary finished! With our prayer being finished, we started to play! After the apparitions, Jacinta said: “That Lady told us to say the Rosary and to make sacrifices for the conversion of sinners. So from now on, when we say the Rosary we must say the whole Hail Mary and the whole Our Father!
Our Lady said that Francisco would have to pray many Rosaries before he could go to Heaven. We told Francisco all that Our Lady had said. He was overjoyed and expressed the happiness he felt when he heard of the promise that he would go to Heaven. Crossing his hands on his breast, he exclaimed: “O, my dear Our Lady! I’ll say as many Rosaries as you want!” And from then on, he made a habit of moving away from us, as though going for a walk. When we called him and asked him what he was doing―he raised his hand and showed me his Rosary. If we told him to come and play, and say the Rosary with us afterwards, he replied: “I’ll pray then as well. Don’t you remember that Our Lady said I must pray many Rosaries?” When lunch time came, we missed him and went to call him: “Francisco, don’t you want to come for your lunch?”
“No, you eat!”
“And what about praying the Rosary with us?”
“That, yes―later on! Call me again!”
When I went to call him again, he said to me: “You come up here and pray with me!”
A poor woman and her son, went and knelt down in front of Francisco. They begged him to obtain from Our Lady the grace that the father of the family would be cured and that he would not have to go to the war. Francisco knelt down also, took off his cap and asked if they would like to pray the Rosary with him. They said they would, and began to pray. Very soon, all those people stopped asking curious questions, and also went down on their knees to pray. After that, they went with us to the Cova da Iria, reciting a Rosary along the way. Once there, we said another Rosary, and then they went away, quite happy.
► FASTING: One day, when we reached the pasture, Jacinta sat thoughtfully on a rock. “Jacinta, come and play!” I [Lucia] said. Jacinta replied: “I don’t want to play today!” I asked: “Why not?” She replied: “Because I’m thinking! The sacrifices―how are we going to make them?” Right away, Francisco thought of a good sacrifice: “Let’s give our lunch to the sheep, and make the sacrifice of doing without it!” In a couple of minutes, the contents of our lunch-bag had been divided among the sheep. So that day, we fasted as strictly as the most austere Carthusian!
“These were not the only times we fasted. We had agreed that whenever we met any poor children like these, we would give them our lunch. They were only too happy to receive such an alms, and they took good care to meet us; they used to wait for us along the road. We no sooner saw them than Jacinta ran to give them all the food we had for that day, as happy as if she had no need of it herself.
There were two families in Moita (at that time it was a small village to the north of the Cova da Iria about half-a-mile from the place of the Apparitions) whose children used to go round begging from door to door. We met them one day, as we were going along with our sheep. As soon as she saw them, Jacinta said to us: “Let’s give our lunch to those poor children, for the conversion of sinners!” And she ran to take it to them. That afternoon, she told me she was hungry. There were holm-oaks and oak trees nearby. The acorns were still quite green. However, I told her we could eat them. Francisco climbed up a holm-oak to fill his pockets, but Jacinta remembered that we could eat the ones on the oak trees instead, and thus make a sacrifice by eating the bitter kind. So it was there, that afternoon, that we enjoyed this delicious repast! Jacinta made this one of her usual sacrifices, and often picked the acorns off the oaks or the olives off the trees. One day I said to her: “Jacinta, don’t eat that! It’s too bitter!” She replied: “But it’s because it’s bitter that I’m eating it, for the conversion of sinners!”
On days like that, our only nourishment consisted of pine nuts, and little berries about the size of an olive which grow on the roots of yellow bell-flowers, as well as blackberries, mushrooms, and some other things we found on the roots of pine trees – I can’t remember now what these were called. If there was fruit available on the land belonging to our parents, we used to eat that. Jacinta’s thirst for making sacrifices seemed insatiable.
► ACCEPTING DAILY IRRITATIONS AND SUFFERINGS: Ever since the day Our Lady taught us to offer our sacrifices to Jesus, any time we had something to suffer, or agreed to make a sacrifice, Jacinta asked: “Did you already tell Jesus that it’s for love of Him?” If I said I hadn’t, she answered: “Then I’ll tell Him,” and joining her hands, she raised her eyes to Heaven and said: “Oh Jesus, it is for love of You, and for the conversion of sinners!”
One day, when shepherding the sheep, the heat was getting more and more intense. The shrill singing of the crickets and grasshoppers coupled with the croaking of the frogs in the neighboring pond made an uproar that was almost unbearable. Jacinta, frail as she was, and weakened still more by the lack of food and drink, said to me with that simplicity which was natural to her: “Tell the crickets and the frogs to keep quiet! I have such a terrible headache!” Then Francisco asked her: “Don’t you want to suffer this for sinners?” The poor child, clasping her head between her two little hands, replied: “Yes, I do! Let them sing!”
When, some time later, we were put in prison, what made Jacinta suffer most, was to feel that their parents had abandoned them. With tears streaming down her cheeks, she would say: “Neither your parents nor mine have come to see us. They don’t bother about us anymore!”
“Don’t cry!” said Francisco, “We can offer this to Jesus for sinners!” Then, raising his eyes and hands to Heaven, he made the offering: “O my Jesus, this is for love of You, and for the conversion of sinners!”
Jacinta added: “And also for the Holy Father, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary!”
► ACCEPTING BEATINGS: My [Lucia’s] mother became more and more upset at the way things were progressing. News of what had happened was spreading. My mother was getting worried, and wanted at all costs to make me deny what I had said. She was determined to make me confess that I was telling lies, and to this end she spared neither caresses, nor threats, nor even the broomstick. She warned me that she would force me to go to those people whom I had deceived, confess that I had lied and ask their pardon. I could see that my mother was deeply distressed, and that she wanted at all costs to compel me, as she put it, to admit that I had lied. To force me to tell the truth, as she said, my mother, more often than not, beat me soundly with the broom-handle or a stick from the woodpile near the fireplace. One day, Jacinta said to me: “lf only my parents were like yours, so that those people would beat me too, then I’d have more sacrifices to offer Our Lord!”
► ACCEPTING IMPRISONMENT: When, some time later, we were put in prison, what made Jacinta suffer most, was to feel that their parents had abandoned them. With tears streaming down her cheeks, she would say: “Neither your parents nor mine have come to see us! They don’t bother about us anymore!”
“Don’t cry!” said Francisco, “We can offer this to Jesus for sinners!”
Then, raising his eyes and hands to Heaven, he made the offering: “O my Jesus, this is for love of You, and for the conversion of sinners!”
Jacinta added: “And also for the Holy Father, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary!”
In prison, Francisco was quite courageous, and tried to cheer up Jacinta when she felt most homesick. While we were saying the Rosary in prison, he noticed that one of the prisoners was on his knees with his cap still on his head. Francisco went up to him and said: “If you wish to pray, you should take your cap off!” Right away, the poor man handed it to him and he went over and put it on the bench on top of his own.
During Jacinta’s prison interrogation, he confided to me with boundless joy and peace: “If they kill us as they say, we’ll soon be in Heaven! How wonderful! Nothing else matters!” Then after a moment’s silence he added: “God grant that Jacinta won’t be afraid. I’m going to say a Hail Mary for her!” He promptly removed his cap and prayed.
► ACCEPTING DEATH THREATS: After being separated for a while, we were reunited in one of the other rooms of the prison. When they told us they were coming soon to take us away to be fried alive, Jacinta went aside and stood by a window overlooking the cattle market. I thought at first that she was trying to distract her thoughts with the view, but I soon realized that she was crying.
I went over and drew her close to me, asking her why she was crying: “Because we are going to die,” she replied, “without ever seeing our parents again, not even our mothers!”
With tears running down her cheeks, she added: “I would like at least to see my mother!”
“Don’t you want, then, to offer this sacrifice for the conversion of sinners?”
“I do want to, I do!”
With her face bathed in tears, she joined her hands, raised her eyes to Heaven and made her offering: “O my Jesus! This is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, for the Holy Father, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary!”
Article 4
Easter Thursday & Friday, April 24th & 25th
A Collapse of the Faith
Easter Thursday & Friday, April 24th & 25th
A Collapse of the Faith
A Massive Collapse
In most parts of the world―perhaps not so much in Africa―we see the Faith collapsing all around us! We know from Christ’s words that His Church will never be totally destroyed―but that does not mean that most of Church cannot be destroyed. Technically speaking, if there only remain only a handful of Catholics―or even only one Catholic―in the entire world, then the Church still exists. Our Lord implies something like that when He speaks about His Second Coming into this world: “The Son of man, when He comes again, do you think He shall find Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
Our Lady, in speaking our present times, says: “I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises! … Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals]. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
Pope Benedict XVI admitted that the Faith was dying throughout the world: “In our days, in vast areas of the world, the Faith is in danger of dying out―like a flame which no longer has fuel! … The boat has taken on so much water as to be on the verge of capsizing! … The future of the Church can and will issue from those whose roots are deep, and who live from the pure fullness of their Faith … It will not come from those who take the easier road, who sidestep the passion of Faith! … The future of the Church―once again as always―will be reshaped by saints, by men whose minds probe deeper than the slogans of the day; who see more than others see, because their lives embrace a wider reality … From the crisis of today the Church of tomorrow will emerge ― a Church that has lost much. She will become small and will have to start afresh―more or less from the beginning. She will no longer be able to inhabit many of the edifices [buildings] that she built in prosperity. As the number of her adherents diminishes, so will she loose many of her social privileges. In contrast to an earlier age, she will be seen much more as a voluntary society, entered only by free decision. As a small society, she will make much bigger demands on the initiative of her individual members … The Church will be a more spiritual Church, not presuming upon a political mandate, flirting as little with the Left as with the Right. It will be hard-going for the Church―for the process of crystallization and clarification will cost her much valuable energy. It will make her poor and cause her to become the Church of the meek … And so it seems certain to me that the Church is facing very hard times. The real crisis has scarcely begun. We will have to count on terrific upheavals. But I am equally certain about what will remain at the end―not the Church of the political cult, which is dead already, but the Church of Faith … But when the trial of this sifting is past, a great power will flow from a more spiritualized and simplified Church!”
Father Joaquin Alonso, the official archivist of Fatima for sixteen years, wrote a monumental work on the Fatima Message, entitled Fatima Texts and Critical Studies. This book, which consists of 24 volumes containing 5,396 documents, was withheld from publication by the Bishop of Leiria-Fatima, Msgr. Alberto Cosme do Amaral, at its completion in 1975. Since then, only two of the 24 volumes have been released for publication, and these were heavily edited. Before his death in 1981, Father Alonso stated the following important conclusions concerning the Third Secret:
“It is therefore completely probable that the text makes concrete references to the crisis of Faith within the Church and to the negligence of the pastors themselves [and the] internal struggles in the very bosom of the Church and of grave pastoral negligence by the upper hierarchy. In the period preceding the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, terrible things are to happen. These form the content of the third part of the Secret. What are they? If [Our Lady said that] ‘in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved’, … then it can be clearly deduced from this that in other parts of the Church these dogmas are going to become obscure or even lost altogether. Thus it is quite possible that in this intermediate period which is in question―after 1960 and before the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary―the text makes concrete references to the crisis of the Faith of the Church and to the negligence of the pastors themselves. Does the unpublished text speak of concrete circumstances? It is very possible that it speaks, not only of a real crisis of the Faith in the Church during this in-between period, but, like the secret of La Salette, for example, there are more concrete references to the internal struggles of Catholics, or to the fall of priests and religious. Perhaps it even refers to the failures of the upper hierarchy of the Church. For that matter, none of this is foreign to other communications Sister Lucy has had on this subject.”
Father Alonso also believed that the Third Secret concerned “internal struggles in the very bosom of the Church and of grave pastoral negligence by the upper hierarchy,” and of “deficiencies of the upper hierarchy of the Church.” Significantly, Sister Lucy never corrected these conclusions of Father Alonso, even though she had never hesitated to correct other statements by clerics and various authors concerning Fatima when they were in error. As the official Fatima archivist, Fr. Alonso had access to the documents and to Sister Lucy herself. Thus, his testimony is of capital importance.
The Strength and Need of Faith
“Without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6). Our success or failure in our spiritual warfare depends upon the degree of Faith that we possess. “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). When the Apostles failed to cast out a demon from a child, they asked Our Lord why they had failed. Our Lord replied: “Because of your unbelief!” (Matthew 19:19). We are told: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9) ... “In all things take the shield of Faith, with which you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:16).
Faith focuses upon the word of God and draws its strength and confidence from God’s word. “Man does not live by bread alone―but by every word of God!” (Luke 4:4). “Faith comes by hearing the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17). Faith and belief in the word of God also gives power and strength: “All things are possible to him that believes!” (Mark 9:22). As St. Paul writes: “Stand fast in the Faith and be strengthened!” (1 Corinthians 16:13). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross, and I live now, not I, but Christ lives in me ... I live in the Faith of the Son of God” (Galatians 2:19-20) … “I can do all these things in Him Who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13). “I am with thee! Turn not aside, for I am thy God! I have strengthened thee, and have helped thee, and the right hand of My just One has upheld thee!” (Isaias 41:10).
Faith is not Fun―Faith is a Fight!
We are not meant to merely know the truths of the Faith for the fun of it―we are meant to do something with that Faith: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself. But some man will say: ‘You have Faith, and I have works!’ Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! You believe that there is one God. You do well―but the devils also believe and tremble! Will you know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead? … Do you see that a man is justified by works, and not by Faith only? For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26). But before our Faith can have works, we need to really know our Faith―which is where most people fail. The level of knowledge of the Faith is truly abysmal in most cases. Personal experience has shown many times that most Catholics cannot even name all the Ten Commandments―never mind giving a deeper explanation of all of them as to all the subsections that each of them cover. It is true in whatever field of life you wish take as an example―the more you know, the more you can do; the less you know, the less you can do.
We are told to “fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Fighting for the Faith gives our Faith some ‘muscle’ ― simply knowing the Faith gives us no ‘muscle’ at all. Someone can know what to do―but that is not as good as actually doing or putting into practice what you know. “The just shall live in his Faith” (Habacuc 2:4). “For unto you it is given, not only to believe in Christ, but also to suffer for Him” (Philippians 1:29). “Greatly rejoice, if now you must be made sorrowful in divers temptations for a little time―so that the trial of your Faith―which is much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire―may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the appearing of Jesus Christ!” (1 Peter 1:6-7).
Collapsing Church Statistics
● Worldwide, while the Catholic population has almost tripled in the last 70 years, the number of priests has fallen. The worldwide Catholic population has nearly tripled, growing from approximately 552 million Catholics worldwide in 1957; to 653 million in 1970; to 1.2 billion in 2013; and to 1.4 billion in 2025.
● As for the number of priests in the world, in 1957, there were approximately 415,000 Catholic priests worldwide. By 1970 it had risen to 420,000 priests. However, once the changes of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) began to take hold, the number of priests fell to 419,000 by 1970. This number had decreased slightly to a total of 412,236 priests by 2013. In 2023, the Catholic Church reported 406,996 priests worldwide. While the total number of priests worldwide has therefore been gradually falling since the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council.
● The number of parishes with no resident priest pastor has grown from 39,431 in 1970 to 49,172 in 2013. The number of parishes without a priest does not include the thousands of parishes that have closed for lack of priests.
● The total worldwide number of Priests in 1970 was 419,728 ― in 2022 it was 407,730.
● The total worldwide number of Religious Sisters in 1970 was 1,004,304 ― by 2022 it had fallen to 599,228 (a drop of 40%).
● The total worldwide number of Religious Brothers in 1970 was 79,408 ― by 2022 it had fallen to 49,414 (also a drop of 40%).
● In 1965 there were 36,000 Jesuits worldwide. In 1977, the Jesuits had 28,038 members worldwide. In 2016, the Jesuits had 16,378 members. In 2025, the number of Jesuit members worldwide is 13,768. The average age of Jesuits worldwide is about 56. In Europe, it’s around 67, while in North America, the average age is around 65.
● The total number of seminarians from 1962 to 1974, for example, dropped by 32%. By 1983, the number of young Catholic men entering seminaries to become priests dropped from 48,000 in 1962 to 12,054 in 1983―with sizable number of those who entered in the 1960s dropping out along the way.
● Professor Richard Schoenherr, a University of Wisconsin sociologist, reported back in 1983, that among younger priests at that time, “20% leave the priesthood within the first five years, and 17% to 18% in the next five years. By the time they reach their 25th anniversary, almost half the ordination class has resigned.” By contrast, between 1940 and 1965, the annual resignation rate was “a minuscule one per thousand.”
● The average age of an American nun is approximately 80 years old.
● The average age of Catholic priests in the United States has risen from 35 in 1970, to 63 in 2009, to 70 in 2024.
● In 1970, fewer than 10% of priests were over the age of 65. By 2010 it was more than 40%.
● Baptisms of infants up to the age of 7 years were almost 15 million in 1970 ― but have fallen to 10 million by 2022. Which is quite catastrophic when you think that the numbers of Catholics in the world have almost tripled in that time, but Baptisms have fallen by around 30%.
False or deceptive use of statistical numbers. The modern-day Church likes to talk about increases in vocations, increases in baptisms, increases in this that the other. They generally refuse to mention the high numbers of pre-Second Vatican Council vocations, baptisms, etc. and only quote the low recent numbers―which can be “dressed-up” to make failure look like success. For example―they like to say vocations are increasing in great numbers, but they refuse to compare their current numbers of vocations to the 1950s and early 1960s―numbers which were far, far higher than what they are today. They will take some low modern day number that is lower than today’s number and then make things out to be rosy, fine and dandy by saying there is a 50% increase (or whatever it may be) in vocations! It is like a child coming home with its grade result from an exam that he has just taken―saying to his friends that it is doing 200% better than the last exam, which is true―but he does not tell everyone that in the previous exam he only scored 4% and in this exam he only scored 12% ― which is an abject failure in both cases!
Collapse in Weekly Attendance at Holy Mass
Sunday Mass attendance binds a Catholic under the pain of mortal sin. The largest Catholic country in the world is Brazil but it only has a regular Sunday Mass attendance rate of just 8%. In Italy over 90% of Italians formally belong to the Catholic Church, but the results of a recent survey reveal a different relation between Italian citizens and the Church. According to a survey conducted in 2020, over 60 percent of interviewees declared themselves either not to be practicing or not to be Catholic. France―known as “the Eldest Daughter of the Church” and once a Catholic fortress―today sees only 29% of France's population of 68 million identify themselves as Catholic, and only 8% of Catholics are regular Mass-goers. In the USA, 35% of Catholics never attend Mass; and similarly 35% only attend Mass very rarely. Once solid Catholic nations now have abysmal weekly attendance rates at Mass: Italy (10%) and France (8%). Here are some of the lowest ranges in weekly Mass attendance:
In most parts of the world―perhaps not so much in Africa―we see the Faith collapsing all around us! We know from Christ’s words that His Church will never be totally destroyed―but that does not mean that most of Church cannot be destroyed. Technically speaking, if there only remain only a handful of Catholics―or even only one Catholic―in the entire world, then the Church still exists. Our Lord implies something like that when He speaks about His Second Coming into this world: “The Son of man, when He comes again, do you think He shall find Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
Our Lady, in speaking our present times, says: “I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises! … Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals]. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
Pope Benedict XVI admitted that the Faith was dying throughout the world: “In our days, in vast areas of the world, the Faith is in danger of dying out―like a flame which no longer has fuel! … The boat has taken on so much water as to be on the verge of capsizing! … The future of the Church can and will issue from those whose roots are deep, and who live from the pure fullness of their Faith … It will not come from those who take the easier road, who sidestep the passion of Faith! … The future of the Church―once again as always―will be reshaped by saints, by men whose minds probe deeper than the slogans of the day; who see more than others see, because their lives embrace a wider reality … From the crisis of today the Church of tomorrow will emerge ― a Church that has lost much. She will become small and will have to start afresh―more or less from the beginning. She will no longer be able to inhabit many of the edifices [buildings] that she built in prosperity. As the number of her adherents diminishes, so will she loose many of her social privileges. In contrast to an earlier age, she will be seen much more as a voluntary society, entered only by free decision. As a small society, she will make much bigger demands on the initiative of her individual members … The Church will be a more spiritual Church, not presuming upon a political mandate, flirting as little with the Left as with the Right. It will be hard-going for the Church―for the process of crystallization and clarification will cost her much valuable energy. It will make her poor and cause her to become the Church of the meek … And so it seems certain to me that the Church is facing very hard times. The real crisis has scarcely begun. We will have to count on terrific upheavals. But I am equally certain about what will remain at the end―not the Church of the political cult, which is dead already, but the Church of Faith … But when the trial of this sifting is past, a great power will flow from a more spiritualized and simplified Church!”
Father Joaquin Alonso, the official archivist of Fatima for sixteen years, wrote a monumental work on the Fatima Message, entitled Fatima Texts and Critical Studies. This book, which consists of 24 volumes containing 5,396 documents, was withheld from publication by the Bishop of Leiria-Fatima, Msgr. Alberto Cosme do Amaral, at its completion in 1975. Since then, only two of the 24 volumes have been released for publication, and these were heavily edited. Before his death in 1981, Father Alonso stated the following important conclusions concerning the Third Secret:
“It is therefore completely probable that the text makes concrete references to the crisis of Faith within the Church and to the negligence of the pastors themselves [and the] internal struggles in the very bosom of the Church and of grave pastoral negligence by the upper hierarchy. In the period preceding the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, terrible things are to happen. These form the content of the third part of the Secret. What are they? If [Our Lady said that] ‘in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved’, … then it can be clearly deduced from this that in other parts of the Church these dogmas are going to become obscure or even lost altogether. Thus it is quite possible that in this intermediate period which is in question―after 1960 and before the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary―the text makes concrete references to the crisis of the Faith of the Church and to the negligence of the pastors themselves. Does the unpublished text speak of concrete circumstances? It is very possible that it speaks, not only of a real crisis of the Faith in the Church during this in-between period, but, like the secret of La Salette, for example, there are more concrete references to the internal struggles of Catholics, or to the fall of priests and religious. Perhaps it even refers to the failures of the upper hierarchy of the Church. For that matter, none of this is foreign to other communications Sister Lucy has had on this subject.”
Father Alonso also believed that the Third Secret concerned “internal struggles in the very bosom of the Church and of grave pastoral negligence by the upper hierarchy,” and of “deficiencies of the upper hierarchy of the Church.” Significantly, Sister Lucy never corrected these conclusions of Father Alonso, even though she had never hesitated to correct other statements by clerics and various authors concerning Fatima when they were in error. As the official Fatima archivist, Fr. Alonso had access to the documents and to Sister Lucy herself. Thus, his testimony is of capital importance.
The Strength and Need of Faith
“Without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6). Our success or failure in our spiritual warfare depends upon the degree of Faith that we possess. “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). When the Apostles failed to cast out a demon from a child, they asked Our Lord why they had failed. Our Lord replied: “Because of your unbelief!” (Matthew 19:19). We are told: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9) ... “In all things take the shield of Faith, with which you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:16).
Faith focuses upon the word of God and draws its strength and confidence from God’s word. “Man does not live by bread alone―but by every word of God!” (Luke 4:4). “Faith comes by hearing the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17). Faith and belief in the word of God also gives power and strength: “All things are possible to him that believes!” (Mark 9:22). As St. Paul writes: “Stand fast in the Faith and be strengthened!” (1 Corinthians 16:13). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross, and I live now, not I, but Christ lives in me ... I live in the Faith of the Son of God” (Galatians 2:19-20) … “I can do all these things in Him Who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13). “I am with thee! Turn not aside, for I am thy God! I have strengthened thee, and have helped thee, and the right hand of My just One has upheld thee!” (Isaias 41:10).
Faith is not Fun―Faith is a Fight!
We are not meant to merely know the truths of the Faith for the fun of it―we are meant to do something with that Faith: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself. But some man will say: ‘You have Faith, and I have works!’ Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! You believe that there is one God. You do well―but the devils also believe and tremble! Will you know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead? … Do you see that a man is justified by works, and not by Faith only? For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26). But before our Faith can have works, we need to really know our Faith―which is where most people fail. The level of knowledge of the Faith is truly abysmal in most cases. Personal experience has shown many times that most Catholics cannot even name all the Ten Commandments―never mind giving a deeper explanation of all of them as to all the subsections that each of them cover. It is true in whatever field of life you wish take as an example―the more you know, the more you can do; the less you know, the less you can do.
We are told to “fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Fighting for the Faith gives our Faith some ‘muscle’ ― simply knowing the Faith gives us no ‘muscle’ at all. Someone can know what to do―but that is not as good as actually doing or putting into practice what you know. “The just shall live in his Faith” (Habacuc 2:4). “For unto you it is given, not only to believe in Christ, but also to suffer for Him” (Philippians 1:29). “Greatly rejoice, if now you must be made sorrowful in divers temptations for a little time―so that the trial of your Faith―which is much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire―may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the appearing of Jesus Christ!” (1 Peter 1:6-7).
Collapsing Church Statistics
● Worldwide, while the Catholic population has almost tripled in the last 70 years, the number of priests has fallen. The worldwide Catholic population has nearly tripled, growing from approximately 552 million Catholics worldwide in 1957; to 653 million in 1970; to 1.2 billion in 2013; and to 1.4 billion in 2025.
● As for the number of priests in the world, in 1957, there were approximately 415,000 Catholic priests worldwide. By 1970 it had risen to 420,000 priests. However, once the changes of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) began to take hold, the number of priests fell to 419,000 by 1970. This number had decreased slightly to a total of 412,236 priests by 2013. In 2023, the Catholic Church reported 406,996 priests worldwide. While the total number of priests worldwide has therefore been gradually falling since the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council.
● The number of parishes with no resident priest pastor has grown from 39,431 in 1970 to 49,172 in 2013. The number of parishes without a priest does not include the thousands of parishes that have closed for lack of priests.
● The total worldwide number of Priests in 1970 was 419,728 ― in 2022 it was 407,730.
● The total worldwide number of Religious Sisters in 1970 was 1,004,304 ― by 2022 it had fallen to 599,228 (a drop of 40%).
● The total worldwide number of Religious Brothers in 1970 was 79,408 ― by 2022 it had fallen to 49,414 (also a drop of 40%).
● In 1965 there were 36,000 Jesuits worldwide. In 1977, the Jesuits had 28,038 members worldwide. In 2016, the Jesuits had 16,378 members. In 2025, the number of Jesuit members worldwide is 13,768. The average age of Jesuits worldwide is about 56. In Europe, it’s around 67, while in North America, the average age is around 65.
● The total number of seminarians from 1962 to 1974, for example, dropped by 32%. By 1983, the number of young Catholic men entering seminaries to become priests dropped from 48,000 in 1962 to 12,054 in 1983―with sizable number of those who entered in the 1960s dropping out along the way.
● Professor Richard Schoenherr, a University of Wisconsin sociologist, reported back in 1983, that among younger priests at that time, “20% leave the priesthood within the first five years, and 17% to 18% in the next five years. By the time they reach their 25th anniversary, almost half the ordination class has resigned.” By contrast, between 1940 and 1965, the annual resignation rate was “a minuscule one per thousand.”
● The average age of an American nun is approximately 80 years old.
● The average age of Catholic priests in the United States has risen from 35 in 1970, to 63 in 2009, to 70 in 2024.
● In 1970, fewer than 10% of priests were over the age of 65. By 2010 it was more than 40%.
● Baptisms of infants up to the age of 7 years were almost 15 million in 1970 ― but have fallen to 10 million by 2022. Which is quite catastrophic when you think that the numbers of Catholics in the world have almost tripled in that time, but Baptisms have fallen by around 30%.
False or deceptive use of statistical numbers. The modern-day Church likes to talk about increases in vocations, increases in baptisms, increases in this that the other. They generally refuse to mention the high numbers of pre-Second Vatican Council vocations, baptisms, etc. and only quote the low recent numbers―which can be “dressed-up” to make failure look like success. For example―they like to say vocations are increasing in great numbers, but they refuse to compare their current numbers of vocations to the 1950s and early 1960s―numbers which were far, far higher than what they are today. They will take some low modern day number that is lower than today’s number and then make things out to be rosy, fine and dandy by saying there is a 50% increase (or whatever it may be) in vocations! It is like a child coming home with its grade result from an exam that he has just taken―saying to his friends that it is doing 200% better than the last exam, which is true―but he does not tell everyone that in the previous exam he only scored 4% and in this exam he only scored 12% ― which is an abject failure in both cases!
Collapse in Weekly Attendance at Holy Mass
Sunday Mass attendance binds a Catholic under the pain of mortal sin. The largest Catholic country in the world is Brazil but it only has a regular Sunday Mass attendance rate of just 8%. In Italy over 90% of Italians formally belong to the Catholic Church, but the results of a recent survey reveal a different relation between Italian citizens and the Church. According to a survey conducted in 2020, over 60 percent of interviewees declared themselves either not to be practicing or not to be Catholic. France―known as “the Eldest Daughter of the Church” and once a Catholic fortress―today sees only 29% of France's population of 68 million identify themselves as Catholic, and only 8% of Catholics are regular Mass-goers. In the USA, 35% of Catholics never attend Mass; and similarly 35% only attend Mass very rarely. Once solid Catholic nations now have abysmal weekly attendance rates at Mass: Italy (10%) and France (8%). Here are some of the lowest ranges in weekly Mass attendance:
|
Spain: 27%
New Zealand: 25% United Kingdom: 25% Hungary: 24% Slovenia: 24% Uruguay: 23% Australia: 21% |
Argentina: 21%
Portugal: 20% Czech Republic: 20% United States: 17% Austria: 17% Lithuania: 16% Germany: 14% |
Canada: 14%
Latvia: 11% Switzerland: 11% Italy: 10% France: 8% Brazil: 8% Netherlands: 7% |
A Collapse in Attending the Sacrament of Confession
Recent popes―one after the other since Pope Pius XII―have lamented that the world has lost the sense of sin. This is clearly reflected in the progressive collapse in the number of Catholics going to the Sacrament of Confession. Back in the 1950s and 1960s, researchers say about 80% of American Catholics went to Confession at least once a year. And well over half of all Catholics said they went at least once a month. Today, a significant portion of Catholics―between 30% and 40%―report never going to Confession. A 2022 poll and a 2023 survey found that 35% of those surveyed said they never go to Confession; while only 7% go to Confession at least once a month. Additionally, some studies suggest a much higher percentage―with some researchers claiming that up to 90% of those who receive Holy Communion may not even confessing at least once a year!
A Collapse in Religious and Moral Views
Most Catholics worldwide disagree with Church teachings on divorce, abortion and contraception and are split on whether women and married men should become priests.
Almost two-thirds of U.S. Catholics (60%) think abortion should be legal in all or most cases―this number has been steadily increasing over the years: in 2020 it was 56%; in 2010 it was 53%. A Pew Research Center survey found that over 70% of U.S. Catholics say homosexuality should be accepted by society. Similarly, 70% of Catholics favor same-sex marriage in the new survey, which is up from 57% in 2014.
A 2015 Pew Research Center survey revealed that 62% of U.S. Catholics believe the Church should grant access to Holy Communion for Catholics who divorced and remarried without a Church marriage annulment. Additionally, the survey found that 21% of Catholics consider divorce a sin, while 61% view it as not sinful. About 25% of married American Catholic adults have been divorced or separated, and 10% are currently remarried. Among all U.S. Catholics who have ever been divorced, only about a quarter (26%) say they or their former spouse have sought an annulment from the Catholic Church. Only about three-in-ten (29%) Catholics, who are divorced and remarried without an annulment, or are cohabiting sinfully, say they never receive Communion, while an additional 5% say they never attend Mass.
As for the religious beliefs of Catholics today, a 2021 Pew Research Center study indicated that only 74% of Catholics believe in Hell―yet the existence of Hell is a dogma of the Catholic Church! Another dogma that is disbelieved is that of the existence of Heaven―with over 10% not believing that Heaven exists!
As for the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity―a 2019 Pew Research Center study found that only 31% of U.S. Catholics believed the bread and wine actually become the Body and Blood of Jesus. A later 2022 survey found that only 64% of self-identified Catholics believed in the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist. Other studies have reported varying figures, with some suggesting higher levels of belief among weekly Mass attenders and very low levels of belief in those who rarely attend Mass, with Catholic News Agency and OnePeterFive reporting 81% of practicing Catholics believing in the Real Presence (but only 17% of all Catholics practice their Faith, therefore it is 81% of 17%) ― but 81% is not the 100% that it should be! After all ― this teaching on the Real Presence is another dogma of the Church which allows for no negotiation! In the same survey, among those Catholics who said they “seldom” attend Mass, only 51% expressed belief in the Real Presence―the rest were of the opinion that the bread and wine are only symbols of Jesus’ actions at the Last Supper, meaning that Jesus is only symbolically present in the consecrated bread and wine. According to another survey―a Pew Research analysis―nearly seven-in-ten Catholics (69%) say they personally believe that during a Catholic Mass, the bread and wine used in Communion are symbols of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.
A 2017 BARNA survey painted a grim picture of the future of the Faith in Ireland (things are worse in 2025), saying: “The young adults and adolescents in Ireland are in a mess. As regards 19 to 25-year-old age group, 80% are non-Christian or non-practicing Christians. The remaining 20% merely represents those whose Faith is important to them and have been to church at least once in the last month! As for the 14 to 19-year old age group, 70% of that group identify as Christian but their traditional Catholic practice is in deep trouble – only 13% of 14 to 19-year-olds have prayed the Rosary at least once in the last 6 months, while only 14% have gone to Confession in the last 6 months. These numbers are even lower for the 19 to 25-year-olds. This represents virtual abandonment of Catholic piety. As for Holy Communion ― only 42% of 14 to 19-years-olds have received Communion are least once in the last 6 months. For many this will be have been in obligatory Masses at school, or at events like Easter or Christmas. For 19-25% the number is much lower. Since the vast majority of these figures are for Catholic youth, even Mass attendance, the core of Catholicism’s Sacramental theology, is in crisis.”
A 2009 survey found that only 6% of the British population, including a significant portion of Catholic youth, could name all ten of the Ten Commandments; and 25% of British children can’t name even one of the Ten Commandments ― according to The Christian Institute. The survey found that 28% of 11-year-olds to 16-year-olds could not come up with any of the Ten Commandments. This suggests that a large number of individuals, even within the Catholic Faith, may struggle to recall or fully understand the Ten Commandments. According to data from the Barna Research Group, 60% of Americans can’t name even five of the Ten Commandments! A Barna poll indicated that at least 12% of adults believed that Joan of Arc was Noe’s wife! Another survey of graduating high school seniors revealed that over 50% thought that Sodom and Gomorrha were husband and wife!
The Diocese of Baltimore reported the results of a quiz on the Ten Commandments and the ingredients in a Big Mac hamburger: “Name each of the Ten Commandments. OK. Now name the ingredients in a Big Mac hamburger sold at McDonald’s. According to a new survey, the Big Mac wins the memory contest. The survey of 1,000 Americans, by Kelton Research, was undertaken to help promote the animated movie “The Ten Commandments.” The vast majority of those surveyed could easily name the primary ingredients in a Big Mac: two all-beef patties (80% got it right), lettuce (76%), sesame-seed bun (75%), special sauce (66%), pickles (62%) and cheese (60%). By comparison, “You shall not kill” was known to fewer than six in 10 respondents (less than 60%). Less than half (45%) could recall the commandment to “Honor your father and mother.” Even those who said they go to church at least once a week, had trouble naming all of the Ten Commandments. Only 70% recalled “You shall not kill” and 69% remembered “You shall not steal” ― but the Big Mac’s contents of all-beef patties and lettuce were better remembered by the survey group (79% and 76%, respectively). Survey participants also had an easier time remembering the names of the kids from the old TV series “The Brady Bunch.” The least remembered of that sextet, Bobby and Peter, had a 43% recognition rate, better than the two least-remembered commandments to keep holy the Sabbath (34%) and to not have any gods besides God (29%).”
A survey conducted in 2007 (things are worse today) for the Iona Institute, the Evangelical Alliance of Ireland, and the Evangelical Alliance of Northern Ireland uncovered a lack of religious knowledge among both Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland. It found that Catholics in Northern Ireland show the same level of religious knowledge as those in the south. Overall, only 42% adults of the poll respondents (both Catholic and Protestant) knew that there are four Gospels, and just 54% could name the persons of the Trinity. The survey uncovered a striking decline in religious knowledge among younger respondents. Catholics youth scored substantially higher results than the Protestant youth, however, only 21% of those Catholics aged 16 to 24 knew the number of the Gospels, and only 33% could identify the persons of the Trinity. This indicates that the Christian Faith is becoming less meaningful to those under twenty-five years of age and the idea that Christianity is being transmitted through the culture from one generation to the next is invalid.
Leaving the Church
Catholicism has not lost its power to transform lives and save souls. Yet, people are abandoning Catholicism at an alarming rate in Europe and the United States―and this is not a new trend. A new 2024 survey shows that for every 100 new Catholics entering the Church, 840 Catholics leave the Church. No other religion has nearly as bad of a join/leave ratio. For example, for every 100 people that become Protestant, 180 Protestants leave their religion. That’s bad, but it’s not Catholic bad! On the other hand, for every 100 people who leave the religious “nones” (i.e., non-believers who join a religion), 590 believers become part of that irreligious non-believing band of “nones”.
● More than fifty million Catholics in the United States have stopped practicing their Faith over the past thirty years.
● More than half (52% percent) of all American adults who were raised Catholic have now left the Church. Only 8% say they perhaps might imagine returning to the Catholic Church some time in the future.
● The number of Catholics is increasing―almost tripling since 1965―but the numbers of baptisms has fallen by 30%.
● A Catholic parish has been closed in the United States every three days for the past thirty-five years.
● A Catholic school has been closed in the United States every four days for the past twenty-five years.
● Over 90% of Catholic youth and young adults stop attending Sunday Mass on a regular basis by the time they graduate from high-school or college.
Abuse, Misuse and Non-Use of the Sacraments
► THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM: For many modern Catholics―who believe everyone is going to Heaven and who even question the existence of sin― there is no need to work out our salvation, for we are automatically saved. Salvation is redundant and unnecessary, and therefore so too is Baptism. Other modern Catholics do not baptize their babies under the false argument that they want to allow their children to choose for themselves if they want to be baptized or not! This is a stupid and ignorant argument―for which parent avoids giving their sick infant medicine, or refuses to take the infant to the doctor, under the pretext that they want their child to choose for themselves if they want to take medicine or visit doctors once the child has grown-up and can decide for itself!
The Church has always recommended baptizing infants as soon as possible after birth―within a few days if possible. For prior to Baptism the child does not possess Sanctifying Grace and is therefore in the clutches of Satan―that is why exorcisms are part and parcel of the traditional rite of Baptism, for infants, children and adults. If you want to let the weeds of Satan getting a stranglehold on the child over the course of many years, and thus weaken or even destroy the child’s openness to God―then go ahead, put off baptism for 10, 12 or more years!
► THE SACRAMENT OF CONFESSION: One pope after another, since the time of Pope Pius XII, has complained about the loss of the sense of sin―in the world in general, and among Catholics in particular. If sin is devalued; if sins are rationalized away by false arguments; if sinful things are no longer seen as being sinful; if mortal sins are downgraded to venial sins; if venial sins are downgraded to mere bad habits or imperfections―then there is no need, or less need, to confess. This is reflected and seen to be the case through the confessional practice of most Catholics.
Back in the 1950s and 1960s, researchers say about 80% of American Catholics went to Confession at least once a year. And well over half of all Catholics said they went at least once a month. A 2022 poll and a 2023 survey found that 35% of those surveyed said they never go to Confession; while only 7% go to Confession at least once a month. Among 14 to 19-year-olds, only 14% have gone to Confession in the last 6 months―and 86% have not. These numbers are even worse for the 19 to 25-year-olds. For the few who still do go to Confession―how many of them are making bad confessions, that is to say invalid or sacrilegious confessions? St. Alphonsus Liguori (1696-1787), a Doctor of the Church and patron saint of moral theologians, was of the opinion that most Catholics made bad confessions―and that was over 250 years ago!
► THE SACRAMENT OF THE HOLY EUCHARIST (HOLY COMMUNION): The Holy Eucharist is the greatest of all the Sacraments and it is said that all the other Sacraments revolve around the Holy Eucharist as planets revolve around the sun. The other Sacraments give us the grace of God, but the Holy Eucharist gives us the Author of all grace―Jesus Christ Himself. The greater and more noble that something is, then the greater becomes the sin that offends against it. To receive Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist while in a state of Mortal Sin is a heinous sacrilege. St. Cyril of Alexandria explains further the gravity when he says: “They who make a sacrilegious Communion receive Satan and Jesus Christ into their heart. Satan, so that they may let him rule; and Jesus Christ that they may offer Him in sacrifice to Satan.” If that sounds too strong―then you must understand that sin places us under the control of Satan, this is especially true of Mortal Sin: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8) … “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do!” (John 8:44) … “He that eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Body of the Lord!” (1 Corinthians 11:29).
Fr. Franz Hunolt, writing in 1887, says: “Many flatter themselves when they go to Communion, imagining that they are in the state of grace―and yet they are mistaken. They imagine they have no Mortal Sin on their conscience, and yet they have enough of them, and that is through sheer culpable ignorance, because they do not want to know anything of the sinful lives they lead. They consist, first, of those who have become accustomed to a certain vice―such as drunkenness, detraction, cursing, swearing and other sins―which they confess each time, but never repent of. They think that it is enough for them to tell everything clearly in Confession, and that then they need give themselves no further trouble. They never think of the required sorrow and purpose of amendment, which, humanly speaking, it is impossible for them to have with sincerity―because the fact of their continued relapses into their former sins shows sufficiently that neither their Confessions nor their Communions have had any effect on their souls―for these two Sacraments, if received properly, frequently, and with good dispositions, must necessarily purify the soul, and sanctify it.”
► THE SACRAMENT OF CONFIRMATION: In a certain sense, the Sacrament of Confirmation could be looked at being the Sacrament of Graduation from being a Child of God to becoming a Soldier of Christ. The Sacraments are not meaningless symbolic ceremonies―they carry an obligation on our part. Confirmation brings with it the obligation to stand up for Christ and fight for Christ: “He that is not with Me, is against Me! And he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30) … “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loves father or mother more than Me―is not worthy of Me! And he that loves son or daughter more than Me―is not worthy of Me! And he that does not take up his cross and follows Me―is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:32-38). That Cross of Christ is traced upon our foreheads during the reception of the Sacrament of Confirmation. For a Soldier of Christ, it is Christ that must come first!
Hence Scripture warns: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Unfortunately and sadly, most Catholics do not end up fight FOR Christ, but fighting AGAINST Christ! They refuse to stand up for Christ against the world―which is the enemy of Christ: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” says Our Lord (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). If we fail to stand up FOR Christ against the world, then, by default, we are standing with the world AGAINST Christ.
The Cross which is traced upon the forehead of the person being confirmed is a powerful symbol if it is really understood and acted upon. I have only to ask myself: “Do I actually live as though there were a visible Cross branded on my forehead, marking me as Christ’s Soldier?” … “In my daily life, do I really bear witness to Christ? Do I stand up for Christ and His Laws?” … “By my example and attitude towards others, by my treatment of those around me, by my actions in general, do I proclaim: ‘This is what it means to be a Christian! This is what it means to live by the Gospel!’?”
The Cross which is traced upon the forehead of the person being confirmed is a powerful symbol if it is really understood and acted upon. I have only to ask myself: “Do I actually live as though there were a visible Cross branded on my forehead, marking me as Christ’s Soldier?” … “In my daily life, do I really bear witness to Christ? Do I stand up for Christ and His Laws?” … “By my example and attitude towards others, by my treatment of those around me, by my actions in general, do I proclaim: ‘This is what it means to be a Christian! This is what it means to live by the Gospel!’?”
Today’s youth―for the most part―are most certainly not going to be the Soldiers of Christ for tomorrow! They have enlisted to be soldiers of the world and are very happy in that role! You can see that by the weapons they hold―they are far more comfortable holding a smartphone, than a Rosary; they prefer to sit in front of their computer or television screens rather than sit in front of a tabernacle; they prefer to read emails and social media posts rather than read spiritual books or the Bible; they will ‘meditate’ on worldly things, but never spiritual things; they seek to become fitter and more beautiful in body, but not in soul; they worry what other people think about them, but not what God thinks about them. Those are not soldiers of Christ―they are soldiers of the world, which is the enemy of God and Christ. They receive the Sacrament of Confirmation and do nothing with it. The Christian, after receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation, should be a soldier for Christ and must endure suffering and the persecution that comes from conflict with the world. Yet today’s Christians have―for the most part―made peace with the world, they even like the world, and see nothing wrong in being worldly. That is clearly obvious by the way they think, talk, act and react; by the way they dress; by the music they listen to; by what they watch on TV and the internet; by where they go; the friends they have; the pastimes and hobbies they have―in short, they are more worldly than they are Catholic.
► THE SACRAMENT OF MATRIMONY: As of 2024, the U.S. divorce rate remains between 40% to 50% for first marriages. While the overall divorce rate among Catholics is lower than in the general population, a significant number of Catholics have experienced divorce. The Pew Research Center reports that about 29% of Catholics who have ever been married have also been divorced. According to a 2024 Georgetown Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) report, 28% of Catholic marriages end in divorce. This amount is below the declared national average of 40% to 50%. Additionally, 12% of adult Catholics, on average, said they were currently separated from their spouse in the 2020s, compared to an average of only 4% in the 1970s.
Furthermore, Catholic marriage rates dropped by over 70% between 1965 and 2022, according to data from Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA). In 1965, U.S. Catholic sacramental marriages reported from the previous year numbered 347,179. In 2022, the figure was 98,354 ― a fall of 72%. Total marriages overall in the Church are down because Catholics are increasingly choosing to marry outside the Church. Until the mid-1990s, about half of marriages involving Catholics were celebrated in the Church and the other half somewhere else—in another religious or secular setting (e.g., country clubs, beaches, banquet halls, hotels). From 2000 to 2022 this rose steadily to where three-quarters of marriages of Catholics occur outside of the Church.
Another problem is that of interfaith marriage, where a Catholic marries someone from another religion. The Catholic Church discourages Catholics from marrying non-Catholics, because of the danger of falling away from the Faith, but the Church is willing, on a case-by-case basis, to grant dispensations for mixed-faith couples. If a Catholic is seeking to marry a non-Catholic who is nevertheless a baptized Christian (for example, a Christian baptized in a Protestant denomination that uses a Trinitarian baptismal formula, such as an Anglican or Lutheran), in Canon Law this is called a “mixed marriage.” A Catholic would need permission from the bishop for a mixed marriage in order to marry licitly, even in a Catholic ceremony. Similarly, if a Catholic seeks to marry a non-baptized or invalidly baptized person, this situation is called a “disparity of cult.” A Catholic would need a dispensation from disparity of cult, once again from the local bishop, in order to marry a non-baptized person validly.
There has been a lot of change over time in the number of interfaith weddings celebrated in the Church. In 2022 there were just over 21,697 interfaith marriages celebrated in the Church which is around 20% of all marriages conducted by the Catholic Church. From 2015 to 2022 interfaith marriages averaged 21% of all marriages within the Church. In areas of the U.S. with proportionately fewer Catholics, as many as 40% of married Catholics may be in ecumenical or interfaith marriages. While specific divorce statistics for Catholic interfaith marriages in 2024 are not readily available, research indicates that interfaith marriages generally have lower survival rates than marriages between two Catholics. This trend suggests a potential higher likelihood of failure in interfaith Catholic marriages compared to marriages within the Catholic Faith alone.
Our Lady of Good Success Warned Us of This
From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century (note that the Second Vatican Council was announced by Pope John XXIII on January 25th, 1959, and took place from 1962-1965), there will be many who will not believe … Various heresies will be propagated. As these heresies spread and dominate, the precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of morals. For Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! It will be difficult to receive the Sacrament of Baptism, and also that of Confirmation.
“Making use of persons in positions of authority, the devil will assiduously try to destroy the Sacrament of Confession ... See and contemplate the grandeur of this restoring and life-giving Sacrament of Penance, so forgotten and even scorned by ungrateful men. In their foolish madness, they do not realize that it is the only sure means of salvation after one has lost his baptismal innocence. What is most grievous, is that even the ministers of my Most Holy Son do not give to this Sacrament the value that they should. Many view with cold indifference this valuable and precious treasure, which has been placed in their hands for the restoration of souls redeemed by the Blood of the Redeemer. There are those who consider hearing confession as a loss of time and a futile thing. Alas! If priests were given to see directly that which you are now contemplating and were enlightened with the light that now illuminates you, they would recognize this divine gift!
“The Sacrament of Extreme Unction will be little esteemed. Many people will die without receiving it — either because of the negligence of their families or their false sentimentality that tries to protect the sick from seeing the gravity of their situations, or because they will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil. Thus many souls will be deprived of innumerable graces, consolations and the strength they need to make that great leap from time to eternity.
“As for the Sacrament of Matrimony, which symbolizes the union of Christ with His Church, it will be attacked and profaned in the fullest sense of the word. Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective of doing away with this Sacrament, making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children born without the blessing of the Church.
“The Sacred Sacrament of Holy Orders will be ridiculed, oppressed and despised. ...The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor, with cruel and subtle astuteness, to make them deviate from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them. These corrupted priests, who will scandalize the Christian people, will incite the hatred of the bad Christians and the enemies of the Roman, Catholic and Apostolic Church to fall upon all priests. This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings to the good Pastors of the Church.
“The same will happen with Holy Communion. Alas! How deeply I grieve upon manifesting to you the many and horrible sacrileges — both public and also secret — that will occur from profanations of the Holy Eucharist! Often during this epoch, the enemies of Jesus Christ, instigated by the demon, will steal consecrated hosts from the churches, so that they might profane the Eucharistic Species. My Most Holy Son will see Himself cast upon the ground and trampled upon by irreverent feet.”
The Third Secret of Fatima
The so-called “Third Secret of Fatima” ― which consists of several revelations made by Our Lady concerning our times ― is thought to partially refer to a loss of Faith throughout the world.
► MSGR. EUGENIO PACELLI ― the future Pope Pius XII (1930s) ― The Secretary of State under Pius XI, Msgr. Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli, prior to his elevation to the papacy in 1939 as Pope Pius XII, made the following astonishing prophecy about a coming upheaval in the Church: “Suppose, dear friend, that Communism [one of “the errors of Russia” mentioned in the Message of Fatima] was only the most visible of the instruments of subversion to be used against the Church and the traditions of Divine Revelation… I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul. … I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject Her ornaments and make Her feel remorse for Her historical past. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’”
► FATHER JOSEPH SCHWEIGL (September 1952) ― In 1952 Father Joseph Schweigl was entrusted by Pope Pius XII with a secret mission to interview Sister Lucia about the Third Secret. He subsequently stated: “I cannot reveal anything of what I learned at Fatima concerning the Third Secret, but I can say that it has two parts―one concerns the Pope; the other logically (although I must say nothing) would have to be the continuation of the words: ‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved.’”
► CARDINAL ODDI (March 1990) ― On March 17th, 1990 Cardinal Oddi―who was a personal friend of Pope John XXIII and who had spoken to him regarding the Secret―gave the following testimony to Italian journalist, Lucio Brunelli, in the journal Il Sabato: “It [the Third Secret] has nothing to do with Gorbachev [the President of the Soviet Union]. The Blessed Virgin was alerting us against apostasy in the Church.”
► CARDINAL CIAPPI ― In a personal communication to a Professor Baumgartner in Salzburg, Cardinal Mario Luigi Ciappi―who was the personal papal theologian to Popes John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul I and John Paul II―revealed: “In the Third Secret it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.”
► FATHER MALACHI MARTIN (Summer 1998) ― In a four-hour interview on the Art Bell radio program, Father Malachi Martin stated that, in February 1960, while he was secretary to Cardinal Bea (who was one of the close advisors to Pope John XXIII), Father Malachi was given the Third of Fatima to read. Bound by oath not to reveal the Secret, he commented on different versions, which callers quoted to him on the program. He stated that Our Lady’s words were dry and specific. In response to a quotation that a pope would be under the control of Satan, he responded: “Yes, it sounds as if they were reading the text of the Third Secret.” He stated that the release of the Secret would provoke strong reactions. He stated that if the Secret were made public, the confessionals and churches would be filled with parishioners on their knees. He also stated that something very relevant to the United States is mentioned in the Secret. He stated that the central element of the Secret is awful, and that it concerns apostasy.
► FATHER JOSE VALINHO (2000 and 2003) ― Finally there is Sister Lucia’s nephew, Father Jose dos Santos Valinho. He related his opinion of the contents of the Third Secret in a book, by Renzo and Roberto Allegri, entitled Reportage su Fatima (Milan 2000), which was published — providentially enough — very shortly before the disclosure of the vision that was alleged to be the Third Secret and the publication of booklet entitled The Message of Fatima, by Cardinal Ratzinger and Archbishop Bertone. Father Valinho stated: “I believe that (the third) part of the secret concerns the Church from within, perhaps doctrinal difficulties, a crisis of unity, rebellion. The last sentence my aunt [Lucia] wrote, which precedes the part that is still unknown, says, ‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved!’ … Therefore, people elsewhere in the Church might waver on dogma. But this is just speculation.”
On February 14th, 2003 Father Valinho also spoke about the Third Secret on the program ENIGMA. It was transmitted prime time, nationwide on RAI, the national television network of Italy. Father Valinho stated on this occasion: “I believe that there is a connection between that which is announced in the first part of the Secret, which concerns wars and sufferings which would be everywhere, and the second part which concerns the persecutions and a type of breakdown of the Faith. Because where the ellipsis (the three dots, “…”) was placed, it means: ‘Here is the third part, which is not revealed’ and then the conclusion: ‘In Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved, etc.’ This suggests to me that there is a relationship between Faith and the third part of the Secret. Therefore, it is something that relates to the Church. It is some kind of universal crisis which affects the whole Church and all of humanity.”
Recent popes―one after the other since Pope Pius XII―have lamented that the world has lost the sense of sin. This is clearly reflected in the progressive collapse in the number of Catholics going to the Sacrament of Confession. Back in the 1950s and 1960s, researchers say about 80% of American Catholics went to Confession at least once a year. And well over half of all Catholics said they went at least once a month. Today, a significant portion of Catholics―between 30% and 40%―report never going to Confession. A 2022 poll and a 2023 survey found that 35% of those surveyed said they never go to Confession; while only 7% go to Confession at least once a month. Additionally, some studies suggest a much higher percentage―with some researchers claiming that up to 90% of those who receive Holy Communion may not even confessing at least once a year!
A Collapse in Religious and Moral Views
Most Catholics worldwide disagree with Church teachings on divorce, abortion and contraception and are split on whether women and married men should become priests.
Almost two-thirds of U.S. Catholics (60%) think abortion should be legal in all or most cases―this number has been steadily increasing over the years: in 2020 it was 56%; in 2010 it was 53%. A Pew Research Center survey found that over 70% of U.S. Catholics say homosexuality should be accepted by society. Similarly, 70% of Catholics favor same-sex marriage in the new survey, which is up from 57% in 2014.
A 2015 Pew Research Center survey revealed that 62% of U.S. Catholics believe the Church should grant access to Holy Communion for Catholics who divorced and remarried without a Church marriage annulment. Additionally, the survey found that 21% of Catholics consider divorce a sin, while 61% view it as not sinful. About 25% of married American Catholic adults have been divorced or separated, and 10% are currently remarried. Among all U.S. Catholics who have ever been divorced, only about a quarter (26%) say they or their former spouse have sought an annulment from the Catholic Church. Only about three-in-ten (29%) Catholics, who are divorced and remarried without an annulment, or are cohabiting sinfully, say they never receive Communion, while an additional 5% say they never attend Mass.
As for the religious beliefs of Catholics today, a 2021 Pew Research Center study indicated that only 74% of Catholics believe in Hell―yet the existence of Hell is a dogma of the Catholic Church! Another dogma that is disbelieved is that of the existence of Heaven―with over 10% not believing that Heaven exists!
As for the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity―a 2019 Pew Research Center study found that only 31% of U.S. Catholics believed the bread and wine actually become the Body and Blood of Jesus. A later 2022 survey found that only 64% of self-identified Catholics believed in the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist. Other studies have reported varying figures, with some suggesting higher levels of belief among weekly Mass attenders and very low levels of belief in those who rarely attend Mass, with Catholic News Agency and OnePeterFive reporting 81% of practicing Catholics believing in the Real Presence (but only 17% of all Catholics practice their Faith, therefore it is 81% of 17%) ― but 81% is not the 100% that it should be! After all ― this teaching on the Real Presence is another dogma of the Church which allows for no negotiation! In the same survey, among those Catholics who said they “seldom” attend Mass, only 51% expressed belief in the Real Presence―the rest were of the opinion that the bread and wine are only symbols of Jesus’ actions at the Last Supper, meaning that Jesus is only symbolically present in the consecrated bread and wine. According to another survey―a Pew Research analysis―nearly seven-in-ten Catholics (69%) say they personally believe that during a Catholic Mass, the bread and wine used in Communion are symbols of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.
A 2017 BARNA survey painted a grim picture of the future of the Faith in Ireland (things are worse in 2025), saying: “The young adults and adolescents in Ireland are in a mess. As regards 19 to 25-year-old age group, 80% are non-Christian or non-practicing Christians. The remaining 20% merely represents those whose Faith is important to them and have been to church at least once in the last month! As for the 14 to 19-year old age group, 70% of that group identify as Christian but their traditional Catholic practice is in deep trouble – only 13% of 14 to 19-year-olds have prayed the Rosary at least once in the last 6 months, while only 14% have gone to Confession in the last 6 months. These numbers are even lower for the 19 to 25-year-olds. This represents virtual abandonment of Catholic piety. As for Holy Communion ― only 42% of 14 to 19-years-olds have received Communion are least once in the last 6 months. For many this will be have been in obligatory Masses at school, or at events like Easter or Christmas. For 19-25% the number is much lower. Since the vast majority of these figures are for Catholic youth, even Mass attendance, the core of Catholicism’s Sacramental theology, is in crisis.”
A 2009 survey found that only 6% of the British population, including a significant portion of Catholic youth, could name all ten of the Ten Commandments; and 25% of British children can’t name even one of the Ten Commandments ― according to The Christian Institute. The survey found that 28% of 11-year-olds to 16-year-olds could not come up with any of the Ten Commandments. This suggests that a large number of individuals, even within the Catholic Faith, may struggle to recall or fully understand the Ten Commandments. According to data from the Barna Research Group, 60% of Americans can’t name even five of the Ten Commandments! A Barna poll indicated that at least 12% of adults believed that Joan of Arc was Noe’s wife! Another survey of graduating high school seniors revealed that over 50% thought that Sodom and Gomorrha were husband and wife!
The Diocese of Baltimore reported the results of a quiz on the Ten Commandments and the ingredients in a Big Mac hamburger: “Name each of the Ten Commandments. OK. Now name the ingredients in a Big Mac hamburger sold at McDonald’s. According to a new survey, the Big Mac wins the memory contest. The survey of 1,000 Americans, by Kelton Research, was undertaken to help promote the animated movie “The Ten Commandments.” The vast majority of those surveyed could easily name the primary ingredients in a Big Mac: two all-beef patties (80% got it right), lettuce (76%), sesame-seed bun (75%), special sauce (66%), pickles (62%) and cheese (60%). By comparison, “You shall not kill” was known to fewer than six in 10 respondents (less than 60%). Less than half (45%) could recall the commandment to “Honor your father and mother.” Even those who said they go to church at least once a week, had trouble naming all of the Ten Commandments. Only 70% recalled “You shall not kill” and 69% remembered “You shall not steal” ― but the Big Mac’s contents of all-beef patties and lettuce were better remembered by the survey group (79% and 76%, respectively). Survey participants also had an easier time remembering the names of the kids from the old TV series “The Brady Bunch.” The least remembered of that sextet, Bobby and Peter, had a 43% recognition rate, better than the two least-remembered commandments to keep holy the Sabbath (34%) and to not have any gods besides God (29%).”
A survey conducted in 2007 (things are worse today) for the Iona Institute, the Evangelical Alliance of Ireland, and the Evangelical Alliance of Northern Ireland uncovered a lack of religious knowledge among both Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland. It found that Catholics in Northern Ireland show the same level of religious knowledge as those in the south. Overall, only 42% adults of the poll respondents (both Catholic and Protestant) knew that there are four Gospels, and just 54% could name the persons of the Trinity. The survey uncovered a striking decline in religious knowledge among younger respondents. Catholics youth scored substantially higher results than the Protestant youth, however, only 21% of those Catholics aged 16 to 24 knew the number of the Gospels, and only 33% could identify the persons of the Trinity. This indicates that the Christian Faith is becoming less meaningful to those under twenty-five years of age and the idea that Christianity is being transmitted through the culture from one generation to the next is invalid.
Leaving the Church
Catholicism has not lost its power to transform lives and save souls. Yet, people are abandoning Catholicism at an alarming rate in Europe and the United States―and this is not a new trend. A new 2024 survey shows that for every 100 new Catholics entering the Church, 840 Catholics leave the Church. No other religion has nearly as bad of a join/leave ratio. For example, for every 100 people that become Protestant, 180 Protestants leave their religion. That’s bad, but it’s not Catholic bad! On the other hand, for every 100 people who leave the religious “nones” (i.e., non-believers who join a religion), 590 believers become part of that irreligious non-believing band of “nones”.
● More than fifty million Catholics in the United States have stopped practicing their Faith over the past thirty years.
● More than half (52% percent) of all American adults who were raised Catholic have now left the Church. Only 8% say they perhaps might imagine returning to the Catholic Church some time in the future.
● The number of Catholics is increasing―almost tripling since 1965―but the numbers of baptisms has fallen by 30%.
● A Catholic parish has been closed in the United States every three days for the past thirty-five years.
● A Catholic school has been closed in the United States every four days for the past twenty-five years.
● Over 90% of Catholic youth and young adults stop attending Sunday Mass on a regular basis by the time they graduate from high-school or college.
Abuse, Misuse and Non-Use of the Sacraments
► THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM: For many modern Catholics―who believe everyone is going to Heaven and who even question the existence of sin― there is no need to work out our salvation, for we are automatically saved. Salvation is redundant and unnecessary, and therefore so too is Baptism. Other modern Catholics do not baptize their babies under the false argument that they want to allow their children to choose for themselves if they want to be baptized or not! This is a stupid and ignorant argument―for which parent avoids giving their sick infant medicine, or refuses to take the infant to the doctor, under the pretext that they want their child to choose for themselves if they want to take medicine or visit doctors once the child has grown-up and can decide for itself!
The Church has always recommended baptizing infants as soon as possible after birth―within a few days if possible. For prior to Baptism the child does not possess Sanctifying Grace and is therefore in the clutches of Satan―that is why exorcisms are part and parcel of the traditional rite of Baptism, for infants, children and adults. If you want to let the weeds of Satan getting a stranglehold on the child over the course of many years, and thus weaken or even destroy the child’s openness to God―then go ahead, put off baptism for 10, 12 or more years!
► THE SACRAMENT OF CONFESSION: One pope after another, since the time of Pope Pius XII, has complained about the loss of the sense of sin―in the world in general, and among Catholics in particular. If sin is devalued; if sins are rationalized away by false arguments; if sinful things are no longer seen as being sinful; if mortal sins are downgraded to venial sins; if venial sins are downgraded to mere bad habits or imperfections―then there is no need, or less need, to confess. This is reflected and seen to be the case through the confessional practice of most Catholics.
Back in the 1950s and 1960s, researchers say about 80% of American Catholics went to Confession at least once a year. And well over half of all Catholics said they went at least once a month. A 2022 poll and a 2023 survey found that 35% of those surveyed said they never go to Confession; while only 7% go to Confession at least once a month. Among 14 to 19-year-olds, only 14% have gone to Confession in the last 6 months―and 86% have not. These numbers are even worse for the 19 to 25-year-olds. For the few who still do go to Confession―how many of them are making bad confessions, that is to say invalid or sacrilegious confessions? St. Alphonsus Liguori (1696-1787), a Doctor of the Church and patron saint of moral theologians, was of the opinion that most Catholics made bad confessions―and that was over 250 years ago!
► THE SACRAMENT OF THE HOLY EUCHARIST (HOLY COMMUNION): The Holy Eucharist is the greatest of all the Sacraments and it is said that all the other Sacraments revolve around the Holy Eucharist as planets revolve around the sun. The other Sacraments give us the grace of God, but the Holy Eucharist gives us the Author of all grace―Jesus Christ Himself. The greater and more noble that something is, then the greater becomes the sin that offends against it. To receive Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist while in a state of Mortal Sin is a heinous sacrilege. St. Cyril of Alexandria explains further the gravity when he says: “They who make a sacrilegious Communion receive Satan and Jesus Christ into their heart. Satan, so that they may let him rule; and Jesus Christ that they may offer Him in sacrifice to Satan.” If that sounds too strong―then you must understand that sin places us under the control of Satan, this is especially true of Mortal Sin: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8) … “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do!” (John 8:44) … “He that eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Body of the Lord!” (1 Corinthians 11:29).
Fr. Franz Hunolt, writing in 1887, says: “Many flatter themselves when they go to Communion, imagining that they are in the state of grace―and yet they are mistaken. They imagine they have no Mortal Sin on their conscience, and yet they have enough of them, and that is through sheer culpable ignorance, because they do not want to know anything of the sinful lives they lead. They consist, first, of those who have become accustomed to a certain vice―such as drunkenness, detraction, cursing, swearing and other sins―which they confess each time, but never repent of. They think that it is enough for them to tell everything clearly in Confession, and that then they need give themselves no further trouble. They never think of the required sorrow and purpose of amendment, which, humanly speaking, it is impossible for them to have with sincerity―because the fact of their continued relapses into their former sins shows sufficiently that neither their Confessions nor their Communions have had any effect on their souls―for these two Sacraments, if received properly, frequently, and with good dispositions, must necessarily purify the soul, and sanctify it.”
► THE SACRAMENT OF CONFIRMATION: In a certain sense, the Sacrament of Confirmation could be looked at being the Sacrament of Graduation from being a Child of God to becoming a Soldier of Christ. The Sacraments are not meaningless symbolic ceremonies―they carry an obligation on our part. Confirmation brings with it the obligation to stand up for Christ and fight for Christ: “He that is not with Me, is against Me! And he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30) … “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loves father or mother more than Me―is not worthy of Me! And he that loves son or daughter more than Me―is not worthy of Me! And he that does not take up his cross and follows Me―is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:32-38). That Cross of Christ is traced upon our foreheads during the reception of the Sacrament of Confirmation. For a Soldier of Christ, it is Christ that must come first!
Hence Scripture warns: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Unfortunately and sadly, most Catholics do not end up fight FOR Christ, but fighting AGAINST Christ! They refuse to stand up for Christ against the world―which is the enemy of Christ: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” says Our Lord (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). If we fail to stand up FOR Christ against the world, then, by default, we are standing with the world AGAINST Christ.
The Cross which is traced upon the forehead of the person being confirmed is a powerful symbol if it is really understood and acted upon. I have only to ask myself: “Do I actually live as though there were a visible Cross branded on my forehead, marking me as Christ’s Soldier?” … “In my daily life, do I really bear witness to Christ? Do I stand up for Christ and His Laws?” … “By my example and attitude towards others, by my treatment of those around me, by my actions in general, do I proclaim: ‘This is what it means to be a Christian! This is what it means to live by the Gospel!’?”
The Cross which is traced upon the forehead of the person being confirmed is a powerful symbol if it is really understood and acted upon. I have only to ask myself: “Do I actually live as though there were a visible Cross branded on my forehead, marking me as Christ’s Soldier?” … “In my daily life, do I really bear witness to Christ? Do I stand up for Christ and His Laws?” … “By my example and attitude towards others, by my treatment of those around me, by my actions in general, do I proclaim: ‘This is what it means to be a Christian! This is what it means to live by the Gospel!’?”
Today’s youth―for the most part―are most certainly not going to be the Soldiers of Christ for tomorrow! They have enlisted to be soldiers of the world and are very happy in that role! You can see that by the weapons they hold―they are far more comfortable holding a smartphone, than a Rosary; they prefer to sit in front of their computer or television screens rather than sit in front of a tabernacle; they prefer to read emails and social media posts rather than read spiritual books or the Bible; they will ‘meditate’ on worldly things, but never spiritual things; they seek to become fitter and more beautiful in body, but not in soul; they worry what other people think about them, but not what God thinks about them. Those are not soldiers of Christ―they are soldiers of the world, which is the enemy of God and Christ. They receive the Sacrament of Confirmation and do nothing with it. The Christian, after receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation, should be a soldier for Christ and must endure suffering and the persecution that comes from conflict with the world. Yet today’s Christians have―for the most part―made peace with the world, they even like the world, and see nothing wrong in being worldly. That is clearly obvious by the way they think, talk, act and react; by the way they dress; by the music they listen to; by what they watch on TV and the internet; by where they go; the friends they have; the pastimes and hobbies they have―in short, they are more worldly than they are Catholic.
► THE SACRAMENT OF MATRIMONY: As of 2024, the U.S. divorce rate remains between 40% to 50% for first marriages. While the overall divorce rate among Catholics is lower than in the general population, a significant number of Catholics have experienced divorce. The Pew Research Center reports that about 29% of Catholics who have ever been married have also been divorced. According to a 2024 Georgetown Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) report, 28% of Catholic marriages end in divorce. This amount is below the declared national average of 40% to 50%. Additionally, 12% of adult Catholics, on average, said they were currently separated from their spouse in the 2020s, compared to an average of only 4% in the 1970s.
Furthermore, Catholic marriage rates dropped by over 70% between 1965 and 2022, according to data from Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA). In 1965, U.S. Catholic sacramental marriages reported from the previous year numbered 347,179. In 2022, the figure was 98,354 ― a fall of 72%. Total marriages overall in the Church are down because Catholics are increasingly choosing to marry outside the Church. Until the mid-1990s, about half of marriages involving Catholics were celebrated in the Church and the other half somewhere else—in another religious or secular setting (e.g., country clubs, beaches, banquet halls, hotels). From 2000 to 2022 this rose steadily to where three-quarters of marriages of Catholics occur outside of the Church.
Another problem is that of interfaith marriage, where a Catholic marries someone from another religion. The Catholic Church discourages Catholics from marrying non-Catholics, because of the danger of falling away from the Faith, but the Church is willing, on a case-by-case basis, to grant dispensations for mixed-faith couples. If a Catholic is seeking to marry a non-Catholic who is nevertheless a baptized Christian (for example, a Christian baptized in a Protestant denomination that uses a Trinitarian baptismal formula, such as an Anglican or Lutheran), in Canon Law this is called a “mixed marriage.” A Catholic would need permission from the bishop for a mixed marriage in order to marry licitly, even in a Catholic ceremony. Similarly, if a Catholic seeks to marry a non-baptized or invalidly baptized person, this situation is called a “disparity of cult.” A Catholic would need a dispensation from disparity of cult, once again from the local bishop, in order to marry a non-baptized person validly.
There has been a lot of change over time in the number of interfaith weddings celebrated in the Church. In 2022 there were just over 21,697 interfaith marriages celebrated in the Church which is around 20% of all marriages conducted by the Catholic Church. From 2015 to 2022 interfaith marriages averaged 21% of all marriages within the Church. In areas of the U.S. with proportionately fewer Catholics, as many as 40% of married Catholics may be in ecumenical or interfaith marriages. While specific divorce statistics for Catholic interfaith marriages in 2024 are not readily available, research indicates that interfaith marriages generally have lower survival rates than marriages between two Catholics. This trend suggests a potential higher likelihood of failure in interfaith Catholic marriages compared to marriages within the Catholic Faith alone.
Our Lady of Good Success Warned Us of This
From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century (note that the Second Vatican Council was announced by Pope John XXIII on January 25th, 1959, and took place from 1962-1965), there will be many who will not believe … Various heresies will be propagated. As these heresies spread and dominate, the precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of morals. For Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! It will be difficult to receive the Sacrament of Baptism, and also that of Confirmation.
“Making use of persons in positions of authority, the devil will assiduously try to destroy the Sacrament of Confession ... See and contemplate the grandeur of this restoring and life-giving Sacrament of Penance, so forgotten and even scorned by ungrateful men. In their foolish madness, they do not realize that it is the only sure means of salvation after one has lost his baptismal innocence. What is most grievous, is that even the ministers of my Most Holy Son do not give to this Sacrament the value that they should. Many view with cold indifference this valuable and precious treasure, which has been placed in their hands for the restoration of souls redeemed by the Blood of the Redeemer. There are those who consider hearing confession as a loss of time and a futile thing. Alas! If priests were given to see directly that which you are now contemplating and were enlightened with the light that now illuminates you, they would recognize this divine gift!
“The Sacrament of Extreme Unction will be little esteemed. Many people will die without receiving it — either because of the negligence of their families or their false sentimentality that tries to protect the sick from seeing the gravity of their situations, or because they will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil. Thus many souls will be deprived of innumerable graces, consolations and the strength they need to make that great leap from time to eternity.
“As for the Sacrament of Matrimony, which symbolizes the union of Christ with His Church, it will be attacked and profaned in the fullest sense of the word. Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective of doing away with this Sacrament, making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children born without the blessing of the Church.
“The Sacred Sacrament of Holy Orders will be ridiculed, oppressed and despised. ...The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor, with cruel and subtle astuteness, to make them deviate from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them. These corrupted priests, who will scandalize the Christian people, will incite the hatred of the bad Christians and the enemies of the Roman, Catholic and Apostolic Church to fall upon all priests. This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings to the good Pastors of the Church.
“The same will happen with Holy Communion. Alas! How deeply I grieve upon manifesting to you the many and horrible sacrileges — both public and also secret — that will occur from profanations of the Holy Eucharist! Often during this epoch, the enemies of Jesus Christ, instigated by the demon, will steal consecrated hosts from the churches, so that they might profane the Eucharistic Species. My Most Holy Son will see Himself cast upon the ground and trampled upon by irreverent feet.”
The Third Secret of Fatima
The so-called “Third Secret of Fatima” ― which consists of several revelations made by Our Lady concerning our times ― is thought to partially refer to a loss of Faith throughout the world.
► MSGR. EUGENIO PACELLI ― the future Pope Pius XII (1930s) ― The Secretary of State under Pius XI, Msgr. Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli, prior to his elevation to the papacy in 1939 as Pope Pius XII, made the following astonishing prophecy about a coming upheaval in the Church: “Suppose, dear friend, that Communism [one of “the errors of Russia” mentioned in the Message of Fatima] was only the most visible of the instruments of subversion to be used against the Church and the traditions of Divine Revelation… I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul. … I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject Her ornaments and make Her feel remorse for Her historical past. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’”
► FATHER JOSEPH SCHWEIGL (September 1952) ― In 1952 Father Joseph Schweigl was entrusted by Pope Pius XII with a secret mission to interview Sister Lucia about the Third Secret. He subsequently stated: “I cannot reveal anything of what I learned at Fatima concerning the Third Secret, but I can say that it has two parts―one concerns the Pope; the other logically (although I must say nothing) would have to be the continuation of the words: ‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved.’”
► CARDINAL ODDI (March 1990) ― On March 17th, 1990 Cardinal Oddi―who was a personal friend of Pope John XXIII and who had spoken to him regarding the Secret―gave the following testimony to Italian journalist, Lucio Brunelli, in the journal Il Sabato: “It [the Third Secret] has nothing to do with Gorbachev [the President of the Soviet Union]. The Blessed Virgin was alerting us against apostasy in the Church.”
► CARDINAL CIAPPI ― In a personal communication to a Professor Baumgartner in Salzburg, Cardinal Mario Luigi Ciappi―who was the personal papal theologian to Popes John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul I and John Paul II―revealed: “In the Third Secret it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.”
► FATHER MALACHI MARTIN (Summer 1998) ― In a four-hour interview on the Art Bell radio program, Father Malachi Martin stated that, in February 1960, while he was secretary to Cardinal Bea (who was one of the close advisors to Pope John XXIII), Father Malachi was given the Third of Fatima to read. Bound by oath not to reveal the Secret, he commented on different versions, which callers quoted to him on the program. He stated that Our Lady’s words were dry and specific. In response to a quotation that a pope would be under the control of Satan, he responded: “Yes, it sounds as if they were reading the text of the Third Secret.” He stated that the release of the Secret would provoke strong reactions. He stated that if the Secret were made public, the confessionals and churches would be filled with parishioners on their knees. He also stated that something very relevant to the United States is mentioned in the Secret. He stated that the central element of the Secret is awful, and that it concerns apostasy.
► FATHER JOSE VALINHO (2000 and 2003) ― Finally there is Sister Lucia’s nephew, Father Jose dos Santos Valinho. He related his opinion of the contents of the Third Secret in a book, by Renzo and Roberto Allegri, entitled Reportage su Fatima (Milan 2000), which was published — providentially enough — very shortly before the disclosure of the vision that was alleged to be the Third Secret and the publication of booklet entitled The Message of Fatima, by Cardinal Ratzinger and Archbishop Bertone. Father Valinho stated: “I believe that (the third) part of the secret concerns the Church from within, perhaps doctrinal difficulties, a crisis of unity, rebellion. The last sentence my aunt [Lucia] wrote, which precedes the part that is still unknown, says, ‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved!’ … Therefore, people elsewhere in the Church might waver on dogma. But this is just speculation.”
On February 14th, 2003 Father Valinho also spoke about the Third Secret on the program ENIGMA. It was transmitted prime time, nationwide on RAI, the national television network of Italy. Father Valinho stated on this occasion: “I believe that there is a connection between that which is announced in the first part of the Secret, which concerns wars and sufferings which would be everywhere, and the second part which concerns the persecutions and a type of breakdown of the Faith. Because where the ellipsis (the three dots, “…”) was placed, it means: ‘Here is the third part, which is not revealed’ and then the conclusion: ‘In Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved, etc.’ This suggests to me that there is a relationship between Faith and the third part of the Secret. Therefore, it is something that relates to the Church. It is some kind of universal crisis which affects the whole Church and all of humanity.”
Article 3
Easter Tuesday & Wednesday, April 22nd & 23rd
Be Believing, Not Unbelieving!
Easter Tuesday & Wednesday, April 22nd & 23rd
Be Believing, Not Unbelieving!
A Time of Faith (and Lack of Faith)
Traditionally, Easter-time is a time of Faith―and also a lack of it! It is a time where Faith is tested. This is seen especially in the reactions to Our Lord’s resurrection from dead. Even the Faith of the Apostles was sorely tried and tested and found to be tottering―with St. Thomas being singled out by Our Lord for his failure to believe!
Mary Magdalen and the other women, who had gone to the tomb on Easter Sunday morning, encountered angels who told them that Christ had risen from the dead: “Mary Magdalen, and Joanna, and Mary of James, and the other women that were with them, who told these things to the Apostles. And these words seemed to them as idle tales; and they did not believe them” (Luke 24:10-11).
Jesus appeared twice to His Apostles—once in the absence of Thomas: “Jesus stood in the midst of them, and said to them: ‘Peace be to you! It is I―fear not!’ But they being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit … And He said to them: ‘Why are you troubled, and why do these thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet, that it is I Myself! Handle and see―for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have! And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet. But they yet believed not.” (Luke 24:36-41).
“At length He appeared to the eleven as they were at table and He upbraided them with their incredulity and hardness of heart, because they did not believe them who had seen Him after He was risen again” (Mark 16:14).
“Then He said to them: ‘O foolish and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken!’” (Luke 24:25).
“Now Thomas, one of the Twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Except I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe!’
“And after eight days again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in their midst, and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put your finger here and see My hands! And bring here your hand, and put it into My side―and be not faithless, but believing!’ Thomas answered, and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because you have seen Me, Thomas, you have believed! Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:24-29).
Even after Christ’s many apparitions after His resurrection, by the time His Ascension into Heaven came―40 days after His resurrection―there were still many who did not believe that He had resurrected from the dead: “And the Eleven disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them. And seeing Him they adored―but some doubted” (Matthew 28:16-17).
Believing with Divine Faith
“Without Faith it is impossible to please God. For he that comes to God, must believe that He exists, and is a rewarder to them that seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6). The theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity are the means by which we relate to God. St. Paul tells us that of these three, the greatest is Charity. Yes, it is more important to love God than to know Him―but we can’t love Him unless we know Him first. We must reach God first by knowledge, and only then by love. Faith gives us our knowledge of the God of Revelation: the Triune God, Who created us, redeemed us, and sanctifies us; Who has communicated to us a share in His Divine Life through the death of His Beloved Son. As St. Thomas Aquinas writes (Summa Theologica, III, q. 62, a. 6): “The power of Christ’s Passion is linked up with us through Faith and through the Sacraments. This, however, takes place in different ways―for the linking up which is by Faith takes place by an act of the soul; whereas the linking up which is by the Sacraments takes place through the use of external things.” Faith is our first link with God.
What is the Faith?
One of the best ways to understand the Faith is to take an official statement of the Church, break it down into its component elements, and analyze the elements one by one. The Church has given us a definition of the virtue of Faith, in the First Vatican Council, which was held at Rome in 1869-70:
“The Catholic Church holds that Faith, which is the beginning of human salvation, is a supernatural virtue by which, through the help and inspiration of God’s grace, we believe the things revealed by Him to be true, not on account of the intrinsic truth of these things, as perceived by the natural light of reason, but on account of the authority of God Himself revealing, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived!” (Denzinger #1789).
A Supernatural Virtue
First of all then, Faith is a Supernatural Virtue. This means that Faith is an “infused” virtue, given to us by God. We cannot acquire Faith through repeated acts, as we can acquire natural moral virtues—like courage for example. Faith is always a gift of God. Take, for example, a Mohammedan, or some other person, who does not possess the gift of Faith. He can make a thorough study of the Catechism, which contains all the truths of Faith; but he will get nothing out of his study except a lot of human knowledge, he will learn “what Catholics believe” about a great many things. But his knowledge will mean nothing to him personally nor affect him religiously, because he does not have the God-given supernatural habit of Faith.
When is ‘Faith’ not Faith?
Or consider a sincere inquirer, a person outside of the Church, who is looking for the truth. Suppose he becomes convinced, because of the overwhelming evidence that he sees in the things of creation, that God exists. Then he studies the Life of Our Lord in the Gospels, and again an inescapable conviction forces itself on his mind that Christ was really a “teacher sent from God”; that He taught truth, and proved the truth of His teachings through His miracles; and that He did indeed establish the One, Holy, Roman Catholic Church. Suppose our inquirer then takes instructions from a priest, learns the truths of Catholic Faith; and finally he decides (no two ways about it) he must become a Catholic, because there is no other way in which he can be saved. Despite all this, he still he does not have the Faith.
All this inquiry, study, understanding and intellectual conviction, lead up to the doorstep of Faith, but they are not Faith. At some moment, there has to come the “help and inspiration of God’s grace” which will bathe his soul in Divine light, and the person will begin to believe, with Divine Faith―not just human and natural faith. Divine Faith is always a gift from God, and a product of God’s Actual Grace. We do not know the exact moment when an adult convert’s conviction slips over into Faith; but one thing we do know is that the Faith with which he assents to God’s word, is God’s own work in his soul, and not the product merely of his own study and conviction.
Faith Infused at Baptism
The virtue of Divine Faith is infused by God into the soul at Baptism, along with the Divine Life of Sanctifying Gace, the other theological virtues, and the supernatural moral virtues. Of course, a newly baptized infant cannot make acts of Faith, but he has the habit of Faith; and, when he grows older and begins to make acts of Faith, then he is merely using the power that was in him since his Baptism. Thus Faith is the gateway to the Christian life. As the First Vatican Council says, it is “the beginning of human salvation” and Holy Scripture adds: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6).
Can the Faithless be Blamed?
Well, then, if Faith is a gift from God, can we blame anybody for not having Faith? These people who say, “I just can’t believe.” We simply cannot say, at any particular stage of their lives, whether it is their fault or not. But we do know that, at some time during life, God, by His grace, will reveal Himself to them, and they will have to cooperate with that grace. If they die without Faith, it will not be because they have never had the chance to know Him. God’s Providence rejects nobody―but we can reject God’s Providence.
Faith is a Virtue of our Intellect
Secondly, Faith is a virtue by which we believe. We all know the difference between wishing and believing. We wish we could learn this course without studying, but we don’t really believe we can. Faith is not a wish, or an emotion, or a sentiment, or some vague feeling that everything is going to turn out all right. Faith is a virtue of the Intelligence, of the highest power of a man. It is an assent of the intellect to a body of truths which have been revealed by God. You remember that every virtue affects some human power (either intellect, will, or emotions) and brings them to a high level of efficient operation. Well, Faith lifts up our intellect to its highest peak of operation this side of Heaven, to the knowledge of the Mysteries of God. Faith is a very special kind of knowledge. It does not come from human reason. It is not contrary to human reason. It is simply above human reason. Faith is God’s own knowledge of Himself communicated to us―some of which our human reason will not understand or grasp, but we will believe by Faith alone, because it is God who reveals it―and He cannot deceive nor be deceived.
Wrong Idea of Faith
Some people get Faith in God mixed up with confidence in God. We sometimes say that a person has “strong Faith” if he has utter confidence in the power of prayer to win from God every conceivable good thing, including heaven itself. What we really mean is that he has “strong Hope” in God. Trusting God, striving towards Him with all the power of our will, is a virtue and a theological virtue. But it is not Faith, because Faith is believing God, which is an act of the intellect. Do we treasure our Faith as it should be treasured? Do we protect our Faith as it should be protected? Do we feed our Faith as it should be fed? Do we live our Faith as it should be lived?
Today, in this modern era of high level science and technology, many put their faith in science more than God! Science is increasingly becoming the modern-day god. Knowledge of sciences replaces Faith in God. “Knowledge puffs up!” (1 Corinthians 8:1) ... “The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God” (1 Corinthians 3:19). If something “goes against science” then people will not believe it. Yet they have no problem in believing things that go against the teachings of God! As a culture we idolize knowledge. We live in the information age where many seek to know and know more and more―as if one’s level of knowledge was somehow akin to one’s level of holiness! Satan tempted Eve with the “apple” of greater knowledge, promising Eve an almost God-like status through increased knowledge: “God commanded: ‘Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat―but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” … Satan, on the other hand, said: “God knows that in what day soever you shall eat of the fruit, your eyes shall be opened: and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!” (Genesis 2:16-17; 3:5).
Faith in the God of Science
Often, when the topic of origins comes up, Christians are treated with pity for believing in the God of the Bible. According to many, intelligence and belief in God do not go together. For many folk, science has replaced God. Science, for them, seems to have all the answers―and even more so since the advent of AI or “Artificial Intelligence.” They pray to God and seem to get no answers―then they tap-in to Artificial Intelligence and get all the answers they want in a split second! “Wow!” they say, “God doesn’t do that for me!” So they turn to Artificial Intelligence more and more, and less and less to God.
You often hear the comment: “Science has proved there is no God.” Don’t let yourself be bullied by such a statement. Science is completely incapable of proving such a thing. Make that person show you, in principle, how science is capable of proving that any particular thing does not exist. He won’t be able to. All he’ll be able to show you is that science has proven certain things do exist, not that they don’t exist. There’s a difference. Scientists can only draw conclusions on what they find, not on what they can’t find. Science, by its very nature, is never capable of proving the non-existence of anything. One can never accurately claim that science has proven God doesn’t exist. That’s a misuse of the discipline of science. It is trying to, or pretending to, make science do what it cannot do.
Faith and Reason (therefore Faith and Science) should not be opposed but united―for God is the Creator of all things, and God is source of all truth. Everything that science studies has been made by God. All the principles that science seeks to discover and understand and formulate―have been placed by God in all the things He has created. It is when science seeks to prove God wrong; or when science seeks to use God’s creation in a way that God did not intend things to be used; or when science seeks to redefine God’s creation; or when science seeks to change God’s creation; or when science even seeks to deny that God exists and therefore created nothing―that is when we have a problem with science. For in doing these things, science performs acts of rebellion just like Satan did in rebelling against God. Just like Lucifer, science can destroy the Faith of people in God and redirect their focus onto science itself. The fact that science is often physical, visible, tangible, accessible and productive―makes it more appealing than God Who is spiritual and not physical; invisible and not visible; intangible and not tangible; inaccessible and not accessible; and seemingly not very productive. Science seeks to increase comfort and ease in the world―whereas the Faith speaks about the cross, penance, sacrifices and suffering.
Science Teaches Theories―God Teaches Facts
Everything we understand in science is presented as a theory. A scientific theory is an explanation of an aspect of the natural world that can be or that has been repeatedly tested and has corroborating evidence in accordance with the scientific method, using accepted protocols of observation, measurement, and evaluation of results. For any theory to be accepted within most academia there is usually one simple criterion. The essential criterion is that the theory must be observable and repeatable. Many scientists, including the atheist Stephen Hawking, are happy to say that a theory never becomes a fact. Even when a theory is accepted as ‘fact’, it remains a theory. A scientific theory, such as Isaac Newton’s theory of gravity, makes an infinite number of predictions, and it can only be verified by a finite number of observations, so it can never be seen as irrefutably correct. We gather information and try to invent theories that could explain what we see―but a lot of that depends upon our prejudices, predispositions, biases, personal opinions, leanings, preferences and also morality. Scientists can be biased, especially when it comes to an issue as contentious as religion. Scientists are human and can also be impacted by the larger trends of opinion around them. Furthermore, for those who want to sin or are addicted to sin―science is a useful weapon for denying the existing of God and, consequently, the moral laws of God―so that you can do whatever you want because you become the judge of what is good and bad, permissible and forbidden.
The following brief accounts of two contemporary English scientists, show the hallmarks of science being the new god that claims to pushed the true God over the cliff and into oblivion.
The English scientist and Oxford University graduate, Stephen Hawking (1942-2018) was an atheist and did not believe in God. He also believed that the brain is like a computer and will simply shut off when it dies, implying no afterlife or heaven. Hawking’s views on God and the afterlife were based on his scientific understanding of the universe and his belief that all phenomena can be explained by natural laws. He saw the concept of God as a historical way of explaining mysteries that science had not yet solved. He also believed that science had rendered the concept of God unnecessary. He famously stated that “there is no God” and called Heaven “a fairy story”. Sadly, after his death in 2018, Hawking will have discovered reality―the reality of God, the reality of Heaven, and the reality of Hell. He now realizes that his personal reality and scientific reality was far from being real! He can do his scientific experiments for eternity now!
Another English scientist and Oxford University graduate, Richard Dawkins (born 1941 and still living) is an atheist and does not believe in God. Dawkins is known for his outspoken atheism and his critiques of religious belief, particularly in his book The God Delusion, in which he wrote that a supernatural Creator almost certainly does not exist and called religious faith a delusion. Dawkins describes his childhood as a member of the Anglican church as “a normal Anglican upbringing.” He embraced Christianity until his teenage years, at which point he concluded that the theory of evolution alone was a better explanation for life’s complexity, and ceased believing in God. Dawkins is running out of time for his scientific experiments―at his age (84) he will soon conduct an experiment in death and will quickly see the stupidity of his atheistic beliefs as being just another scientific theory that eventually is proved to be wrong.
The atheistic statements by Hawking and Dawkins and other disbelieving scientists, catch many Christians off-guard. How should a Christian respond to such claims that there is a “vast amount” of evidence to support belief in evolution and the non-existence of God? The best way for a Christian to respond is to simply ask the question: “What evidence supports evolution?” or “What evidence has disproved the existence of God?” Put the burden of proof back in the lap of the person making the claim. Let them provide the evidence. They can’t! Their evidence is flawed and is a hotch-potch of half-truths, misconceptions, exaggerations, presumptions and assumptions―all of which fail to come together in order to logically prove their case. Besides―science, which is a study of observable and tangible and measurable things, cannot possibly do its experiments upon something that is invisible, intangible, and immeasurable! It would be like trying to measure the amount of oxygen in the air by using a 12-inch ruler.
However, a review of history shows that many great scientific minds recognized God’s existence through their study of different scientific fields. Dr. Henry M. Morris, founder of the Modern Creation Science Movement, lists many of the founders and primary developers of science: “Men such as Johann Kepler, Isaac Newton, Robert Boyle, David Brewster, John Dalton, Michael Faraday, Blaise Pascal, Clerk Maxwell, Louis Pasteur, William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), and a host of others of comparable stature, were men who firmly believed in special creation and the personal omnipotent God of creation, as well as believing in the Bible as the inspired Word of God and in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Their great contributions in science were made in implicit confidence that they were doing His will and glorifying His name in so doing. They certainly entertained no thoughts of conflict between science and the Bible.”
► A Time Magazine article states: “A number of recent books and articles would have you believe that—somehow—science has now disproved the existence of God. We know so much about how the universe works, their authors claim, that God is simply unnecessary: we can explain all the workings of the universe without the need for a Creator … But has modern science, from the beginning of the 20th century, proved that there is no God, as some commentators now claim? … Science has not revealed to us why the universe came into existence, nor what preceded its birth. Biological evolution has not brought us the slightest understanding of how the first living organisms emerged from inanimate matter on this planet; and how the advanced eukaryotic cells—the highly structured building blocks of advanced life forms—ever emerged from simpler organisms. Neither does science explain one of the greatest mysteries of science: how did consciousness arise in living things? Where do symbolic thinking and self-awareness come from? What is it that allows humans to understand the mysteries of biology, physics, mathematics, engineering and medicine? And what enables us to create great works of art, music, architecture and literature? Why did everything we need in order to exist come into being? How was all of this possible without some latent outside power to orchestrate the precise dance of elementary particles required for the creation of all the essentials of life? Science is nowhere near to explaining these deep mysteries …
“The scientific atheists have scrambled to explain this troubling mystery by suggesting the existence of a multiverse—an infinite set of universes, each with its own parameters. In some universes, the conditions are wrong for life; however, by the sheer size of this putative multiverse, there must be a universe where everything is right. But if it takes an immense power of nature to create one universe, then how much more powerful would that force have to be in order to create infinitely many universes? So the purely hypothetical multiverse does not solve the problem of God. The incredible fine-tuning of the universe presents the most powerful argument for the existence of an immanent creative entity we may well call God. Lacking convincing scientific evidence to the contrary, such a power may be necessary to force all the parameters we need for our existence—cosmological, physical, chemical, biological and cognitive—to be what they are … Science and religion are two sides of the same deep human impulse to understand the world, to know our place in it, and to marvel at the wonder of life and the infinite cosmos we are surrounded by. Let’s keep them that way, and not let one attempt to usurp the role of the other.” (A Time Magazine article: “Why Science Does Not Disprove God”).
► Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, in his book The Three Ages of the Interior Life, writes: “The interior life, which presupposes the state of grace, consists, is a generous tendency of the soul toward God, and becomes an intimate conversation of the soul with God. The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, more profound than artistic or literary life, more profound than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not. This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Traditionally, Easter-time is a time of Faith―and also a lack of it! It is a time where Faith is tested. This is seen especially in the reactions to Our Lord’s resurrection from dead. Even the Faith of the Apostles was sorely tried and tested and found to be tottering―with St. Thomas being singled out by Our Lord for his failure to believe!
Mary Magdalen and the other women, who had gone to the tomb on Easter Sunday morning, encountered angels who told them that Christ had risen from the dead: “Mary Magdalen, and Joanna, and Mary of James, and the other women that were with them, who told these things to the Apostles. And these words seemed to them as idle tales; and they did not believe them” (Luke 24:10-11).
Jesus appeared twice to His Apostles—once in the absence of Thomas: “Jesus stood in the midst of them, and said to them: ‘Peace be to you! It is I―fear not!’ But they being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit … And He said to them: ‘Why are you troubled, and why do these thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet, that it is I Myself! Handle and see―for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have! And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet. But they yet believed not.” (Luke 24:36-41).
“At length He appeared to the eleven as they were at table and He upbraided them with their incredulity and hardness of heart, because they did not believe them who had seen Him after He was risen again” (Mark 16:14).
“Then He said to them: ‘O foolish and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken!’” (Luke 24:25).
“Now Thomas, one of the Twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Except I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe!’
“And after eight days again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in their midst, and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put your finger here and see My hands! And bring here your hand, and put it into My side―and be not faithless, but believing!’ Thomas answered, and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because you have seen Me, Thomas, you have believed! Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:24-29).
Even after Christ’s many apparitions after His resurrection, by the time His Ascension into Heaven came―40 days after His resurrection―there were still many who did not believe that He had resurrected from the dead: “And the Eleven disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them. And seeing Him they adored―but some doubted” (Matthew 28:16-17).
Believing with Divine Faith
“Without Faith it is impossible to please God. For he that comes to God, must believe that He exists, and is a rewarder to them that seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6). The theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity are the means by which we relate to God. St. Paul tells us that of these three, the greatest is Charity. Yes, it is more important to love God than to know Him―but we can’t love Him unless we know Him first. We must reach God first by knowledge, and only then by love. Faith gives us our knowledge of the God of Revelation: the Triune God, Who created us, redeemed us, and sanctifies us; Who has communicated to us a share in His Divine Life through the death of His Beloved Son. As St. Thomas Aquinas writes (Summa Theologica, III, q. 62, a. 6): “The power of Christ’s Passion is linked up with us through Faith and through the Sacraments. This, however, takes place in different ways―for the linking up which is by Faith takes place by an act of the soul; whereas the linking up which is by the Sacraments takes place through the use of external things.” Faith is our first link with God.
What is the Faith?
One of the best ways to understand the Faith is to take an official statement of the Church, break it down into its component elements, and analyze the elements one by one. The Church has given us a definition of the virtue of Faith, in the First Vatican Council, which was held at Rome in 1869-70:
“The Catholic Church holds that Faith, which is the beginning of human salvation, is a supernatural virtue by which, through the help and inspiration of God’s grace, we believe the things revealed by Him to be true, not on account of the intrinsic truth of these things, as perceived by the natural light of reason, but on account of the authority of God Himself revealing, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived!” (Denzinger #1789).
A Supernatural Virtue
First of all then, Faith is a Supernatural Virtue. This means that Faith is an “infused” virtue, given to us by God. We cannot acquire Faith through repeated acts, as we can acquire natural moral virtues—like courage for example. Faith is always a gift of God. Take, for example, a Mohammedan, or some other person, who does not possess the gift of Faith. He can make a thorough study of the Catechism, which contains all the truths of Faith; but he will get nothing out of his study except a lot of human knowledge, he will learn “what Catholics believe” about a great many things. But his knowledge will mean nothing to him personally nor affect him religiously, because he does not have the God-given supernatural habit of Faith.
When is ‘Faith’ not Faith?
Or consider a sincere inquirer, a person outside of the Church, who is looking for the truth. Suppose he becomes convinced, because of the overwhelming evidence that he sees in the things of creation, that God exists. Then he studies the Life of Our Lord in the Gospels, and again an inescapable conviction forces itself on his mind that Christ was really a “teacher sent from God”; that He taught truth, and proved the truth of His teachings through His miracles; and that He did indeed establish the One, Holy, Roman Catholic Church. Suppose our inquirer then takes instructions from a priest, learns the truths of Catholic Faith; and finally he decides (no two ways about it) he must become a Catholic, because there is no other way in which he can be saved. Despite all this, he still he does not have the Faith.
All this inquiry, study, understanding and intellectual conviction, lead up to the doorstep of Faith, but they are not Faith. At some moment, there has to come the “help and inspiration of God’s grace” which will bathe his soul in Divine light, and the person will begin to believe, with Divine Faith―not just human and natural faith. Divine Faith is always a gift from God, and a product of God’s Actual Grace. We do not know the exact moment when an adult convert’s conviction slips over into Faith; but one thing we do know is that the Faith with which he assents to God’s word, is God’s own work in his soul, and not the product merely of his own study and conviction.
Faith Infused at Baptism
The virtue of Divine Faith is infused by God into the soul at Baptism, along with the Divine Life of Sanctifying Gace, the other theological virtues, and the supernatural moral virtues. Of course, a newly baptized infant cannot make acts of Faith, but he has the habit of Faith; and, when he grows older and begins to make acts of Faith, then he is merely using the power that was in him since his Baptism. Thus Faith is the gateway to the Christian life. As the First Vatican Council says, it is “the beginning of human salvation” and Holy Scripture adds: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6).
Can the Faithless be Blamed?
Well, then, if Faith is a gift from God, can we blame anybody for not having Faith? These people who say, “I just can’t believe.” We simply cannot say, at any particular stage of their lives, whether it is their fault or not. But we do know that, at some time during life, God, by His grace, will reveal Himself to them, and they will have to cooperate with that grace. If they die without Faith, it will not be because they have never had the chance to know Him. God’s Providence rejects nobody―but we can reject God’s Providence.
Faith is a Virtue of our Intellect
Secondly, Faith is a virtue by which we believe. We all know the difference between wishing and believing. We wish we could learn this course without studying, but we don’t really believe we can. Faith is not a wish, or an emotion, or a sentiment, or some vague feeling that everything is going to turn out all right. Faith is a virtue of the Intelligence, of the highest power of a man. It is an assent of the intellect to a body of truths which have been revealed by God. You remember that every virtue affects some human power (either intellect, will, or emotions) and brings them to a high level of efficient operation. Well, Faith lifts up our intellect to its highest peak of operation this side of Heaven, to the knowledge of the Mysteries of God. Faith is a very special kind of knowledge. It does not come from human reason. It is not contrary to human reason. It is simply above human reason. Faith is God’s own knowledge of Himself communicated to us―some of which our human reason will not understand or grasp, but we will believe by Faith alone, because it is God who reveals it―and He cannot deceive nor be deceived.
Wrong Idea of Faith
Some people get Faith in God mixed up with confidence in God. We sometimes say that a person has “strong Faith” if he has utter confidence in the power of prayer to win from God every conceivable good thing, including heaven itself. What we really mean is that he has “strong Hope” in God. Trusting God, striving towards Him with all the power of our will, is a virtue and a theological virtue. But it is not Faith, because Faith is believing God, which is an act of the intellect. Do we treasure our Faith as it should be treasured? Do we protect our Faith as it should be protected? Do we feed our Faith as it should be fed? Do we live our Faith as it should be lived?
Today, in this modern era of high level science and technology, many put their faith in science more than God! Science is increasingly becoming the modern-day god. Knowledge of sciences replaces Faith in God. “Knowledge puffs up!” (1 Corinthians 8:1) ... “The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God” (1 Corinthians 3:19). If something “goes against science” then people will not believe it. Yet they have no problem in believing things that go against the teachings of God! As a culture we idolize knowledge. We live in the information age where many seek to know and know more and more―as if one’s level of knowledge was somehow akin to one’s level of holiness! Satan tempted Eve with the “apple” of greater knowledge, promising Eve an almost God-like status through increased knowledge: “God commanded: ‘Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat―but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” … Satan, on the other hand, said: “God knows that in what day soever you shall eat of the fruit, your eyes shall be opened: and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!” (Genesis 2:16-17; 3:5).
Faith in the God of Science
Often, when the topic of origins comes up, Christians are treated with pity for believing in the God of the Bible. According to many, intelligence and belief in God do not go together. For many folk, science has replaced God. Science, for them, seems to have all the answers―and even more so since the advent of AI or “Artificial Intelligence.” They pray to God and seem to get no answers―then they tap-in to Artificial Intelligence and get all the answers they want in a split second! “Wow!” they say, “God doesn’t do that for me!” So they turn to Artificial Intelligence more and more, and less and less to God.
You often hear the comment: “Science has proved there is no God.” Don’t let yourself be bullied by such a statement. Science is completely incapable of proving such a thing. Make that person show you, in principle, how science is capable of proving that any particular thing does not exist. He won’t be able to. All he’ll be able to show you is that science has proven certain things do exist, not that they don’t exist. There’s a difference. Scientists can only draw conclusions on what they find, not on what they can’t find. Science, by its very nature, is never capable of proving the non-existence of anything. One can never accurately claim that science has proven God doesn’t exist. That’s a misuse of the discipline of science. It is trying to, or pretending to, make science do what it cannot do.
Faith and Reason (therefore Faith and Science) should not be opposed but united―for God is the Creator of all things, and God is source of all truth. Everything that science studies has been made by God. All the principles that science seeks to discover and understand and formulate―have been placed by God in all the things He has created. It is when science seeks to prove God wrong; or when science seeks to use God’s creation in a way that God did not intend things to be used; or when science seeks to redefine God’s creation; or when science seeks to change God’s creation; or when science even seeks to deny that God exists and therefore created nothing―that is when we have a problem with science. For in doing these things, science performs acts of rebellion just like Satan did in rebelling against God. Just like Lucifer, science can destroy the Faith of people in God and redirect their focus onto science itself. The fact that science is often physical, visible, tangible, accessible and productive―makes it more appealing than God Who is spiritual and not physical; invisible and not visible; intangible and not tangible; inaccessible and not accessible; and seemingly not very productive. Science seeks to increase comfort and ease in the world―whereas the Faith speaks about the cross, penance, sacrifices and suffering.
Science Teaches Theories―God Teaches Facts
Everything we understand in science is presented as a theory. A scientific theory is an explanation of an aspect of the natural world that can be or that has been repeatedly tested and has corroborating evidence in accordance with the scientific method, using accepted protocols of observation, measurement, and evaluation of results. For any theory to be accepted within most academia there is usually one simple criterion. The essential criterion is that the theory must be observable and repeatable. Many scientists, including the atheist Stephen Hawking, are happy to say that a theory never becomes a fact. Even when a theory is accepted as ‘fact’, it remains a theory. A scientific theory, such as Isaac Newton’s theory of gravity, makes an infinite number of predictions, and it can only be verified by a finite number of observations, so it can never be seen as irrefutably correct. We gather information and try to invent theories that could explain what we see―but a lot of that depends upon our prejudices, predispositions, biases, personal opinions, leanings, preferences and also morality. Scientists can be biased, especially when it comes to an issue as contentious as religion. Scientists are human and can also be impacted by the larger trends of opinion around them. Furthermore, for those who want to sin or are addicted to sin―science is a useful weapon for denying the existing of God and, consequently, the moral laws of God―so that you can do whatever you want because you become the judge of what is good and bad, permissible and forbidden.
The following brief accounts of two contemporary English scientists, show the hallmarks of science being the new god that claims to pushed the true God over the cliff and into oblivion.
The English scientist and Oxford University graduate, Stephen Hawking (1942-2018) was an atheist and did not believe in God. He also believed that the brain is like a computer and will simply shut off when it dies, implying no afterlife or heaven. Hawking’s views on God and the afterlife were based on his scientific understanding of the universe and his belief that all phenomena can be explained by natural laws. He saw the concept of God as a historical way of explaining mysteries that science had not yet solved. He also believed that science had rendered the concept of God unnecessary. He famously stated that “there is no God” and called Heaven “a fairy story”. Sadly, after his death in 2018, Hawking will have discovered reality―the reality of God, the reality of Heaven, and the reality of Hell. He now realizes that his personal reality and scientific reality was far from being real! He can do his scientific experiments for eternity now!
Another English scientist and Oxford University graduate, Richard Dawkins (born 1941 and still living) is an atheist and does not believe in God. Dawkins is known for his outspoken atheism and his critiques of religious belief, particularly in his book The God Delusion, in which he wrote that a supernatural Creator almost certainly does not exist and called religious faith a delusion. Dawkins describes his childhood as a member of the Anglican church as “a normal Anglican upbringing.” He embraced Christianity until his teenage years, at which point he concluded that the theory of evolution alone was a better explanation for life’s complexity, and ceased believing in God. Dawkins is running out of time for his scientific experiments―at his age (84) he will soon conduct an experiment in death and will quickly see the stupidity of his atheistic beliefs as being just another scientific theory that eventually is proved to be wrong.
The atheistic statements by Hawking and Dawkins and other disbelieving scientists, catch many Christians off-guard. How should a Christian respond to such claims that there is a “vast amount” of evidence to support belief in evolution and the non-existence of God? The best way for a Christian to respond is to simply ask the question: “What evidence supports evolution?” or “What evidence has disproved the existence of God?” Put the burden of proof back in the lap of the person making the claim. Let them provide the evidence. They can’t! Their evidence is flawed and is a hotch-potch of half-truths, misconceptions, exaggerations, presumptions and assumptions―all of which fail to come together in order to logically prove their case. Besides―science, which is a study of observable and tangible and measurable things, cannot possibly do its experiments upon something that is invisible, intangible, and immeasurable! It would be like trying to measure the amount of oxygen in the air by using a 12-inch ruler.
However, a review of history shows that many great scientific minds recognized God’s existence through their study of different scientific fields. Dr. Henry M. Morris, founder of the Modern Creation Science Movement, lists many of the founders and primary developers of science: “Men such as Johann Kepler, Isaac Newton, Robert Boyle, David Brewster, John Dalton, Michael Faraday, Blaise Pascal, Clerk Maxwell, Louis Pasteur, William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), and a host of others of comparable stature, were men who firmly believed in special creation and the personal omnipotent God of creation, as well as believing in the Bible as the inspired Word of God and in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Their great contributions in science were made in implicit confidence that they were doing His will and glorifying His name in so doing. They certainly entertained no thoughts of conflict between science and the Bible.”
► A Time Magazine article states: “A number of recent books and articles would have you believe that—somehow—science has now disproved the existence of God. We know so much about how the universe works, their authors claim, that God is simply unnecessary: we can explain all the workings of the universe without the need for a Creator … But has modern science, from the beginning of the 20th century, proved that there is no God, as some commentators now claim? … Science has not revealed to us why the universe came into existence, nor what preceded its birth. Biological evolution has not brought us the slightest understanding of how the first living organisms emerged from inanimate matter on this planet; and how the advanced eukaryotic cells—the highly structured building blocks of advanced life forms—ever emerged from simpler organisms. Neither does science explain one of the greatest mysteries of science: how did consciousness arise in living things? Where do symbolic thinking and self-awareness come from? What is it that allows humans to understand the mysteries of biology, physics, mathematics, engineering and medicine? And what enables us to create great works of art, music, architecture and literature? Why did everything we need in order to exist come into being? How was all of this possible without some latent outside power to orchestrate the precise dance of elementary particles required for the creation of all the essentials of life? Science is nowhere near to explaining these deep mysteries …
“The scientific atheists have scrambled to explain this troubling mystery by suggesting the existence of a multiverse—an infinite set of universes, each with its own parameters. In some universes, the conditions are wrong for life; however, by the sheer size of this putative multiverse, there must be a universe where everything is right. But if it takes an immense power of nature to create one universe, then how much more powerful would that force have to be in order to create infinitely many universes? So the purely hypothetical multiverse does not solve the problem of God. The incredible fine-tuning of the universe presents the most powerful argument for the existence of an immanent creative entity we may well call God. Lacking convincing scientific evidence to the contrary, such a power may be necessary to force all the parameters we need for our existence—cosmological, physical, chemical, biological and cognitive—to be what they are … Science and religion are two sides of the same deep human impulse to understand the world, to know our place in it, and to marvel at the wonder of life and the infinite cosmos we are surrounded by. Let’s keep them that way, and not let one attempt to usurp the role of the other.” (A Time Magazine article: “Why Science Does Not Disprove God”).
► Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, in his book The Three Ages of the Interior Life, writes: “The interior life, which presupposes the state of grace, consists, is a generous tendency of the soul toward God, and becomes an intimate conversation of the soul with God. The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, more profound than artistic or literary life, more profound than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not. This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Article 2
Easter Monday, April 21st
Christ Resurrected at Easter Unrecognizable! What About You?
Easter Monday, April 21st
Christ Resurrected at Easter Unrecognizable! What About You?
Who Is This Man?
From the moment Jesus rose from the dead He was unrecognizable! Even His nearest and dearest failed to recognize Him, or at least had a very hard time recognizing Him. Mary Magdalen fails to recognize Him; the Apostles fail to recognize Him; the two disciples on the road to Emmaus fail to recognize Him. Let us take a look at this puzzling factor by first looking at the Scriptural accounts of this problem.
Mary Magdalen Does Not Recognize Him
The first recorded encounter with the resurrected Jesus is that concerning Mary Magdalen: “But Mary stood at the outside the sepulcher, weeping. Now as she was weeping, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulcher, and she saw two angels in white, sitting, one at the head and one at the feet, where the Body of Jesus had been laid. They said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them: ‘Because they have taken away my Lord; and I know not where they have laid Him!’ When she had said this, she turned herself around and saw Jesus standing―but she knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ Whom do you seek?’ She, thinking it was the gardener, said to Him: ‘Sir, if You have taken him from here, tell me where You have laid Him, and I will take Him away!’ Jesus said to her:‘Mary!’ She turning, said to Him: ‘Rabboni!’ ― which is to say, ‘Master’” (John 20:11-16).
The Emmaus Bound Disciples Do Not Recognize Him
The next recorded account is that of two disciples of Jesus on the road to Emmaus. They were disconsolate and saddened at the apparent failure of Jesus’ mission, which had been ended by His death.
“Behold, two of them went, the same day, to a town which was sixty furlongs from Jerusalem, named Emmaus. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass, that while they talked and reasoned with themselves, Jesus Himself also drawing near, went with them. But their eyes were held, that they should not know Him.
“And He said to them: ‘What are these discourses that you hold one with another as you walk, and are sad?’ And the one of them, whose name was Cleophas, answering, said to Him: ‘Are You only a stranger to Jerusalem, and have not known the things that have been done there in these days?’ To whom He said: ‘What things?’
“And they said: ‘Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, Who was a prophet, mighty in work and word before God and all the people; and how our chief priests and princes delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him. But we hoped, that it was He that should have redeemed Israel! And now besides all this, today is the third day since these things were done. And certain women, also of our company, frightened us, who, before it was light, were at the sepulcher, and not finding His Body, came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, who say that He is alive. And some of our people went to the sepulcher, and found it so as the women had said, but Him they found not!’
“Then He said to them: ‘O foolish, and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken! Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into His glory?’ And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures, the things that were concerning Him.
“And they drew near to the town, where they were going: and He made as though He would go farther. But they constrained Him; saying: ‘Stay with us, because it is towards evening, and the day is now far spent!’ And He went in with them. And it came to pass, whilst He was at table with them, He took bread, and blessed, and broke, and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they recognized Him―and He vanished out of their sight” (Luke 24:13-31).
Our Lord Appears to Peter
The two disciples, in their excitement, high-tailed back to Jerusalem, to tell all the other followers of Jesus that they had seen Jesus alive—only to have their balloon burst by being told that Jesus had already appeared to St. Peter—though in this case we do not know whether or not Peter recognized Him: “They went back to Jerusalem and they found the Eleven gathered together, and those that were staying with them, saying: ‘The Lord is risen indeed! And He has appeared to Simon!’” (Luke 24:33-34).
Who is This ‘Gate-Crasher’?
While they were busy exchanging stories of how Our Lord had appeared to (Simon) Peter and then to the two disciples, Our Lord suddenly appears in their midst! “Now whilst they were speaking these things, Jesus stood in the midst of them, and said to them: ‘Peace be to you! It is I―fear not!’ But they being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit … And He said to them: ‘Why are you troubled, and why do these thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet, that it is I Myself! Handle and see―for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have! And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet. But they yet believed not, and wondered for joy” (Luke 24:36-41).
Jesus and Doubting Thomas
While they were still in Jerusalem, Jesus appeared twice to His Apostles—once in the absence of Thomas (see above paragraph), and the second time in the presence of Thomas. “Now Thomas, one of the Twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Except I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe!’
“And after eight days again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in their midst, and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put your finger here and see My hands! And bring here your hand, and put it into My side―and be not faithless, but believing!’ Thomas answered, and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because you have seen Me, Thomas, you have believed! Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:24-29).
Jesus at the Sea of Tiberias
The third time that Jesus appeared to a group of His disciples was in Galilee. Again, they did not recognize Jesus, though some sensed that the person that they saw could possibly be Jesus. It is John, the beloved Apostle of Love, who first senses it might be Jesus. Love somehow knows these things!
“Jesus showed Himself again to the disciples at the sea of Tiberias. And He showed Himself after this manner. There were together Simon Peter, and Thomas, who is called Didymus, and Nathanael, who was of Cana of Galilee, and the sons of Zebedee, and two others of His disciples. Simon Peter said to them: ‘I am going fishing!’ They said to him: ‘We are also coming with you!’ And they went forth, and entered into the ship: and that night they caught nothing. But when the morning was come, Jesus stood on the shore: yet the disciples knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus therefore said to them: ‘Children, have you any meat?’ They answered Him: ‘No!’ He said to them: ‘Cast the net on the right side of the ship, and you shall find some!’ They cast their nets and now they were not able to draw them in, because of the multitude of fishes.
“That disciple therefore whom Jesus loved, said to Peter: ‘It is the Lord!’ Simon Peter, when he heard that it was the Lord, girt his coat about him (for he was naked) and cast himself into the sea. But the other disciples came in the ship―for they were not far from the land, but as it were two hundred cubits―dragging the net with fishes. As soon then as they came to land, they saw hot coals lying, and a fish laid thereon, and bread. Jesus said to them: ‘Bring here some of the fishes which you have now caught!’ Simon Peter went up, and drew the net to land, full of great fishes, one hundred and fifty-three. And although there were so many, the net was not broken. Jesus said to them: ‘Come and eat!’ And none of them who were at meat, dared ask Him: ‘Who are You?’ knowing that it was the Lord” (John 21:1-12).
A Mountain in Galilee
While they were in Galilee, Jesus also appeared to them upon a mountain. However, not all His disciples believed that what they were seeing was truly Jesus: “And the Eleven disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them. And seeing Him they adored ― but some doubted” (Matthew 28:16-17). Once again, in some way, Jesus is unrecognizable.
Why does Jesus make Himself unrecognizable? Why doesn't He appear to His followers in a way that they can easily recognize Him? What is the point of all this?
Failure to See Christ
Why on earth did Jesus appear to be different after His Resurrection? We know that He had changed because everyone whom He encountered or appeared to after the Resurrection, failed to recognize Him, even among His nearest and dearest—the Apostles, Mary Magdalen, the two disciples on the road to Emmaus and many others. Prior to His Passion and Death, Our Lord had conformed Himself largely to our way of doing things—after His Resurrection He seems to expect that we should now conform more to His way of doing things. The apprenticeship is over, now we have to really get down to work! So far there has been more watching than doing. Now there has to be more doing than watching. “Learn of Me!” (Matthew 11:29). “But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves” (James 1:22).
How Was Jesus Different?
After the Resurrection, Jesus was somehow different. As God He cannot change: “The Father of lights, with Whom there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (James 1:17). If God could change, then He wouldn’t be all-perfect—He would either be changing for the better (which means He wasn’t yet perfect in the first place) or He would be changing for the worse (which means He is not all-perfect, nor all-powerful after all). Yet as God-Man, Jesus did change.
As God-Man, He changed physically—growing from a childhood, through adolescence to manhood. We even see Holy Scripture testifying to His intellectual and spiritual growth: “The Child grew, and waxed strong, full of wisdom; and the grace of God was in Him” (Luke 2:40). “And Jesus advanced in wisdom, and age, and grace with God and men” (Luke 2:52). This is how we should change also—advancing in wisdom, age and grace with God and men.
Our Lord Comes to Change Us
As one saint put it: “Jesus became like man, in order to make us like unto God.” In other words, He became human that He might lead humans to something superhuman. He entered our natural world so that He might elevate it to a supernatural level. He came to change us for the better. Our Lord Himself said: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). The mountain is a symbol of God and the mountain was intimately woven into the life of Jesus. We see Him give sermons on the mount; He goes alone to pray on the mount; He is transfigured on a mountain; He suffers His agony on the Mount of Olives; He dies on Mount Calvary; He ascends to Heaven from a mountain.
As we ascend a mountain, the air becomes rarefied. The air in high elevations has less oxygen. This rarefied air can be challenging to mountain climbers. It's difficult to breathe in the rarefied air near the mountain's peak. High mountain air is dry and may be drier in the winter. Cold air has a reduced capacity to hold water vapor. The dry air requires increased consumption of water (water being a symbol of grace). Due to the cold, most persons do not consume enough water (grace) and must be encouraged to consciously increase their fluid intake.
As you climb the mountain, you have to change your approach and methods at different heights and levels. Refusal to change and adapt to the increasingly difficult terrain can lead to failure or death.
Changes in Life
In the Preface used for the Mass of the Dead, the Church speaks of life being “changed” not ended. Likewise, even here on Earth, our life is in a process of constantly changing—either for the better or for the worse. As the spiritual masters say, "He who is not making progress, is really going backwards." The development of the interior life has often been compared to the three periods or stages of physical life: childhood, youth, and adulthood. St. Thomas Aquinas himself uses this analogy: and it is an analogy which is worth pursuing.
It is generally admitted that childhood lasts until the age of puberty, about fourteen. Youth, or adolescence, lasts from the age of fourteen to around twenty. Then follows adulthood, in which we may distinguish the period which precedes full maturity, about the age of thirty-five, and that which follows it, before the decline of old age sets in.
A person’s mentality changes with the development of the body: the activity of the child, it has been said, is not that of a adult in miniature form, or of a fatigued adult; the dominant element in childhood is different. The child has as yet no discernment, it is unable to organize in a rational manner; it follows the lead of the imagination and the impulses of sense. And even when the child’s reason begins to awaken, it still remains to a great extent dependent upon the senses.
Then there is the transition from childhood to adolescence and from youth to adulthood. The period of puberty, which is the end of childhood, about the age of fourteen, is characterized by a transformation which is not only physical, but also psychological, intellectual and moral. The adolescents, or youths, are no longer content to follow their imagination, as the child was; they begins to reflect on the things of life, on the need to prepare himself for some career or occupation in the future. They no longer have a child’s attitude towards family, social and religious matters; their moral personality begins to take shape, and they acquire the sense of honor and of good repute. Or else, on the contrary, if they pass unsuccessfully through this difficult period, the adolescents change for the worse and follows evil paths.
The law of nature dictates that the transition from childhood to adolescence or youth, must follow a normal development; otherwise the person will remain a half-wit, perhaps even a complete idiot, for the rest of his life. As the saying goes: “He who makes no progress loses ground.” St. Paul writes: “When that which is perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child” (1 Corinthians 13:10-11).
It is at this point that the analogy becomes enlightening for the spiritual life. We shall see that the beginner who fails to become a proficient (make progress), either turns to sin, or else presents an example of arrested spiritual development. Here, too, it is true that “he who makes no progress loses ground,” as the Fathers of the Church have so often pointed out. Spiritual change is a strict necessity.
Spiritual Changes
The first level of change is that of bringing us out of mortal sin: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came to call sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32). “All iniquity is sin. And there is a sin unto death” (1 John 5:17)—namely, mortal sin. This kind of sin must be avoided if we are to love God with our whole, heart, mind, soul and strength. The membership cost for this basic level is that of keeping the Commandments and paying for past sin through penance: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). In this level, the soul is still very naturalistic, materially orientated, tending more to the physical than the spiritual. Analogically speaking, let us pluck an imaginary ratio from the sky and say that the soul might be anywhere from 10% to 30% spiritual, but 90% to 70% naturalistic.
This first level of change, changes us from enemies of God into servants of God.
The second level of change, after leaving mortal sin behind, is that of bringing us out of deliberate venial sin. Whereas mortal sin leads to death of grace in the soul, venial sin does not lead to the death of grace in the soul, but increasingly weakens the soul and paves the way for mortal sin. Venial sin is “a sin which is not to death” (1 John 5:16). Nevertheless, it is an attack upon God and it, too, must be eliminated. Once mortal sin is eradicated, venial sin must follow suit—otherwise we cannot truly claim to love God if we are attacking Him through venial sin.
Analogically speaking, let us once again put an imaginary ratio forward and say that the soul, at this level, could be anywhere from 30% to 70% spiritual, and 70% to 30% naturalistic. In other words, the soul has become less materialistic and more spiritual, without being able to relinquish materialism and naturalism altogether. They are in the continued process of change, becoming less human in tendencies and more divine. They are starting to become unrecognizable to what they once were.
This second level of change, changes us from servants of God into friends of God. Our Lord says this to His Apostles at the Last Supper: “I will not now call you servants―for the servant knows not what his lord does. But I have called you friends!” (John 15:15). It is natural for friends to talk and communicate—this is why souls in this second level of change, begin to communicate with God more and more. Prayer is the usual way we communicate with God and these souls now begin to pray more and more—not just saying more prayers, but saying them with more quality too. They begin to fulfill the Scriptural commands of: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) and Our Lord’s command “that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). They start to become increasingly unrecognizable to the worldlings that surround them, who will make comments like: “What’s come over you? You’re not the person I used to know!”
The third level of change, after relinquishing mortal and venial sin, is the elimination of imperfections.
The third level of change takes us from a spiritual friendship with God, to a total union to God (as much as that is possible here below), much like a marriage. So that we have now passed from being servants, to being friends and now to being a spouse of sorts. Though this is a goal that God sets for everybody, very few souls are generous enough to achieve this kind of union here below—and of the few souls that go to Heaven, most have to reach that level of unity in Purgatory, where nothing else matters but God and His Divine Will.
“The Apostles were prepared for their third level of change, or transformation, by the fact that from the time of the Ascension they were deprived of the perceptible presence of Jesus Himself. When Our Lord forever deprived His Apostles of the sight of His sacred Humanity, they must have suffered a distress which we do not perhaps sufficiently realize. When we consider that Our Lord had become their very life—as St. Paul says: “For to me, to live is Christ” (Philippians 1:21)—and that they had become daily more and more intimate with Him, they must have had a feeling of the greatest loneliness, like a feeling of desolation, even of death. And their desolation must have been the more intense since Our Lord Himself had foretold all the sufferings that were in store. We experience something of the same dismay when, after having lived on a higher plane during the time of retreat, under the guidance of a priestly soul full of the spirit of God, we are plunged once again into our everyday life which seems to deprive us suddenly of this fullness” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
It was at the coming of the Holy Ghost—the Spirit of Love—that the Apostles rose to an even higher spiritual level. Thereby they entered into the Way of Perfection, of Mystical Union with God, the Unitive Way. Gone were mortal and venial sin, perfection in all things was now rooting-out any and all imperfections. As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The Holy Ghost already dwelt in the souls of the Apostles, but, by this visible mission, He came into them to increase the treasures of His grace, of the virtues and the gifts, giving them light and strength in order that they might be capable of witnessing to Christ even to the ends of the Earth, and at the peril of their lives. The tongues of fire are a sign that the Holy Spirit enkindled in their souls that living flame of Love of which St. John of the Cross speaks” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
Unrecognizable Apostles
“Such was their third conversion; it was a complete transformation of their souls. Their first conversion had made them disciples of the Master, attracted by the sublime beauty of His teaching; the second, at the end of the Passion, had enabled them to divine the fecundity of the mystery of the Cross, enlightened as it was by the Resurrection which followed it; the third conversion fills them with the profound conviction of this mystery, a mystery which they will constantly live until their martyrdom” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
“The transformation, which the Apostles had undergone, is shown also in their sanctifying influence, in the transport of intense fervor which they communicated to the first Christians. As the Acts of Apostles show, the life of the infant Church was a life of marvelous sanctity; ‘the multitude of the believers had but one heart and one soul’; they had all things in common, they sold their goods and brought the price of them to the Apostles that they might distribute to each according to his needs. They met together every day to pray, to hear the preaching of the Apostles, and to celebrate the Eucharist. They were often seen assembled together in prayer, and men wondered to see the charity that reigned among them. ‘By this,’ Our Lord had said, ‘shall all men know that you are My disciples.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
Bossuet has given an admirable description of the fervor of the first Christians, in his third sermon for the feast of Pentecost: “They are strong in the face of peril, but they are tender in the love of their brethren; the almighty Spirit who guides them well knows the secret of reconciling the most opposite tensions.... He gives them a heart of flesh... made tender by charity... and He makes them hard as iron or steel in the face of peril.... He strengthens and He softens, but in a manner all His own. For these are the same hearts of the disciples, which seem as diamonds in their invincible firmness, and which yet become human hearts and hearts of flesh by brotherly love. This is the effect of the heavenly fire that rests upon them this day. It has softened the hearts of the faithful, it has, so to speak, melted them into one....
“The Apostles of the Son of God had once disputed concerning who was the greatest among them; but now, that the Holy Ghost has made them of one heart and one soul, they are no longer jealous or quarrelsome. It seems to them that through Peter they all speak, that with him they all preside, and if his shadow heals the sick the whole Church has its part in this gift and praises our Lord for it” (Bossuet).
Unrecognizable Christians
Our Lord and the Holy Ghost, Faith and grace, drastically changed so many of the early Christians that they were unrecognizable when compared to their earlier selves. This is also God’s plan for us—if we would only accept it and cooperate with it! Jesus rose from death to a new life, a better life, a higher life—and was thereby unrecognizable, even to His own.
God is prepared to give us a new heart—“And I will give them one heart, and will put a new spirit in their bowels: and I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 11:19) … “Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit: and why will you die, O house of Israel?” (Ezechiel 18:31) …“And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26).
The Changing Mechanism of Grace
Grace does not make us like God in the strict sense, by changing our human nature into a divine nature, but it perfects our human nature, raising it above the mere natural to the supernatural. Grace does not make us the equals of God, but it changes us into Godlike beings, it makes us more like God. It only changes our nature by perfecting our human nature.
“Full of Grace”?
In Holy Scripture, the Angel Gabriel says to Our Lady: “Hail, full of grace!” (Luke 1:28) and Holy Scripture says of St. Stephen, the first martyr: “And Stephen, full of grace…” (Acts 6:8). We see both Our Lady and St. Stephen being called “full of grace”―yet we know that there is a massive difference between Our Lady and St. Stephen. The idea of being “full of grace” can be applied to each stage of spiritual development as well the different capacities of each person. By analogy, we can say that, in the realm of small containers, a male hiker, a female hiker and a child hiker are all carrying a full load if their backpacks are filled to the brim. All the backpacks are full. Yet the male hiker may be carrying 80 lbs; the female is carrying only 40 lbs; while the child hiker is carrying only 25 lbs—nevertheless all have full loads.
Likewise, a student may attain 100% in their math exam in every grade—from Kindergarten to 12th Grade—yet the level of math and the difficulty of the exam changes with each year and becomes harder and harder. An athlete may win his local school’s annual cross-country race—but each year he cuts more and more minutes off the winning-time for the previous year.
We can be full of grace here on Earth just as we can be full of grace in Heaven. The capacity of each person is different, some are designed to contain more grace, others to contain less grace—but everyone's capacity can be filled to the brim, and everyone can be fully satisfied, even though others may have more.
Post-Resurrection Appearances
Following the classification of St. Ignatius of Loyola, as listed in his Spiritual Exercises, we see that Our Lord’s first three apparitions were to three classes of women—then He appears to three classes of disciples.
He first appears to Our Lady, then the women who had come to the tomb, then Mary Magdalen. Our Lady represents the pinnacle of the spiritual life—the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way. The women represent the stage below this perfection—namely, the Way of Progress or the Illuminative Way. Mary Magdalen represents the lowest stage—the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way.
Similarly for the men. Our Lord appears to (1) Simon-Peter, (2) to the Apostles (minus Thomas) and (3) the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. St. Peter could be said to represent the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way; the Apostles could be said to represent those making progress. The disciples (who were not as close to Our Lord and beneath the Apostles) could be said to represent the Beginners.
To get to Heaven, we have to go through all three stages—just like a person has to go through all the stages of childhood, adolescence and adulthood. In other words, to get to Heaven, we must become unrecognizable to what we once were!
Don’t Just Get Yourself a Life! Get Yourself a NEW Life!
Our Easter should see, likewise, a resurrection in ourselves. We should not go back to our old ways, like the dog goes back to his vomit: “As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). There are too many Catholics, who, now that Lent is over, will go back to a life of self-indulgence and over-indulgence.
“Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened: for Christ our Pasch is sacrificed. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (Epistle from Midnight Mass: 1 Corinthians 5:7-8).
“Brethren: If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth! For you are dead [to the world and sin], and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ shall appear, Who is your life, then you also shall appear with Him in glory” (Epistle from the Day Mass: Colossians 3:1-4).
“For Heaven’s sake! Will you change?”
God doesn’t need to change—for He is already perfect. “For I am the Lord, and I change not!” (Malachias 3:6). “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (James 1:17).
Change has to come from us―who are far from being perfect―yet we have to be perfect if we wish to save our souls: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). “Thou shalt be perfect, and without spot before the Lord thy God!” (Deuteronomy 18:13). If you are already perfect, then there is no need to change, for Heaven’s sake! Just flag down the next bus that is going to Heaven and climb aboard! For the rest of us, CHANGE IS NECESSARY.
Change and Find Mercy
Sadly, however, there is little or change in our required change. God says we must be perfect in order to enter Heaven; we persist in hoping that our mediocrity will get us there—or, worse still, we live in a presumption that we will still get there while wantonly pursuing a life of sin here below!
“Be converted therefore, ye sinners, and do justice before God, believing that He will show His mercy to you!” (Tobias 13:8). “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unjust man his thoughts, and let him return to the Lord, and He will have mercy on him, and to our God: for He is bountiful to forgive” (Isaias 55:7). “Therefore He never withdraws His mercy from us―but though He chastises His people with adversity, He forsakes them not” (2 Machabees 6:16).
Therefore, “put away strange gods from among you, and incline your hearts to the Lord!” (Josue 24:23) … “Put away from thee the iniquity that is in thy hand!” (Job 11:14) … “Remove anger from thy heart, and put away evil from thy flesh!” (Ecclesiastes 11:10) … “Let all bitterness, and anger, and indignation, and clamor, and blasphemy, be put away from you!” (Ephesians 4:31). “And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 36:26).
No Change, No Mercy
“He that hides his sins, shall not prosper―but he that shall confess, and forsake them, shall obtain mercy!” (Proverbs 28:13). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5) “And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:6). “For the Highest hates sinners, and has mercy on the penitent” (Ecclesiasticus 12:3). “But as to the wicked, even to the end there came upon them wrath without mercy!” (Wisdom 19:1) and “judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy” (James 2:13).
Time for a Change?
Perhaps we need to take a leaf our of Jacob’s book: “And Jacob having called together all his household, said: ‘Cast away the strange gods that are among you, and be cleansed and change your garments’” (Genesis 35:2). “For He says: ‘In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2).
Dying King Changes Attitude
We see King Ezechias on his deathbed, being told by God that he would die. Ezechias was not such a bad king, yet he wasn’t perfect—we could say of him what Scripture says of Amasias: “He did what was good in the sight of the Lord―but yet not with a perfect heart” (2 Paralipomenon 25:2).
However, bad news can sometimes change a person, and in Ezechias it provoked a deeper humility in him and pushed him to pray intensely before God—thus God provoked a change in Ezechias, which would not have happened without a serious threat. Here is the Scriptural account:
“In those days Ezechias was sick unto death; and Isaias, the son of Amos the prophet, came and said to him: ‘Thus says the Lord God: “Give charge concerning thy house, for thou shalt die, and not live!”’ And he turned his face to the wall, and prayed to the Lord, saying: ‘I beseech Thee, O Lord, remember how I have walked before Thee in truth, and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is pleasing before Thee!’ And Ezechias wept with much weeping.
“And before Isaias was gone out of the middle of the court, the word of the Lord came to him, saying: ‘Go back, and tell Ezechias the captain of My people: “Thus says the Lord the God of David thy father: ‘I have heard thy prayer, and I have seen thy tears: and behold I have healed thee! On the third day thou shalt go up to the Temple of the Lord. And I will add to thy days fifteen years: and I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the king of the Assyrians, and I will protect this city for My own sake, and for David My servant’s sake!’” ” (4 Kings 20:1-6).
God Wants Change
Switching our focus from Ezechias to Ezechiel, we find in the Book of Ezechiel, God painting a clearer picture of the changes that we must necessarily make if we wish to be saved. God is inflexible in His Truth and Justice, yet His Mercy and Peace are ever ready to be given if we change our lives: “The soul that sins, the same shall die … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments and does justice―then living he shall live and shall not di! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live! Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:20-23).
Yet God gives a warning to the good folk who may be tempted to be not so good: “But if the just man turns himself away from his justice, and does iniquity according to all the abominations which the wicked man uses to work―shall he live? All his justices which he has done, shall not be remembered! In the prevarication, by which he has prevaricated, and in his sin which he has committed―in them he shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:24). “God shall humble them! For there is no change with them, and they have not feared God!” (Psalms 54:20). “They sinned against Me! I will change their glory into shame!” (Osee 4:7).
The Choice is Ours—We Reap What We Sow
“For when the just man turns himself away from his justice, and commits iniquity―he shall die therein! In the injustice that he has wrought, he shall die! And when the wicked man turns himself away from his wickedness, which he has wrought, and does judgment and justice―then he shall save his soul alive! Because he considers and turns away himself from all his iniquities which he has wrought―he shall surely live, and not die! … Therefore will I judge every man according to his ways!” (Ezechiel 18:26-30).
Therefore Change Your Life
“Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit―and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dies, says the Lord God, return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:30-32).
The City of Ninive Changes Its Ways
We see this change of life brought about in the city of Ninive through the prophecy of Jonas, who told them that God would destroy them after forty days, due to their sinfulness: “And Jonas began to enter into the city one day’s journey and he cried and said: ‘Yet forty more days and Ninive shall be destroyed!’ And the men of Ninive believed in God and they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest to the least. And the word came to the King of Ninive―and he rose up out of his throne, and cast away his robe from him, and was clothed with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published in Ninive, from the mouth of the king and of his princes, saying: ‘Let neither men nor beasts, oxen nor sheep, taste anything! Let them not feed, nor drink water! And let men and beasts be covered with sackcloth, and cry to the Lord with all their strength, and let them turn, everyone from his evil way, and from the iniquity that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn, and forgive: and will turn away from his fierce anger, and we shall not perish?’ And God saw their works, that they were turned from their evil way. And God had mercy with regard to the evil which He had said that He would do to them, and He did it not” (Jonas 3:4-10).
Our Lady Looking to Change Things
The Ninivites averted disaster by changing. Sodom and Gomorrha would have been spared if only a few good men could have been found. At Akita, Our Lady said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord! I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair by their suffering and their poverty for the sinners! ... I have prevented the coming of calamities by offering Him the sufferings of the Son on the Cross, His Precious Blood, and beloved souls who console Him, forming a cohort of victim souls. Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger! ... Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men!”
Is that what we are doing? Or is what Sister Lucia said to Fr. Fuentes still the norm amongst us: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message―neither the good nor the bad! The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them!”
What seems to be happening is what Our Lady foretold would happen: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals! ... The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God! ... Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth! … People will think of nothing but amusement!” (Our Lady of Good Success & La Salette).
From the moment Jesus rose from the dead He was unrecognizable! Even His nearest and dearest failed to recognize Him, or at least had a very hard time recognizing Him. Mary Magdalen fails to recognize Him; the Apostles fail to recognize Him; the two disciples on the road to Emmaus fail to recognize Him. Let us take a look at this puzzling factor by first looking at the Scriptural accounts of this problem.
Mary Magdalen Does Not Recognize Him
The first recorded encounter with the resurrected Jesus is that concerning Mary Magdalen: “But Mary stood at the outside the sepulcher, weeping. Now as she was weeping, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulcher, and she saw two angels in white, sitting, one at the head and one at the feet, where the Body of Jesus had been laid. They said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them: ‘Because they have taken away my Lord; and I know not where they have laid Him!’ When she had said this, she turned herself around and saw Jesus standing―but she knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ Whom do you seek?’ She, thinking it was the gardener, said to Him: ‘Sir, if You have taken him from here, tell me where You have laid Him, and I will take Him away!’ Jesus said to her:‘Mary!’ She turning, said to Him: ‘Rabboni!’ ― which is to say, ‘Master’” (John 20:11-16).
The Emmaus Bound Disciples Do Not Recognize Him
The next recorded account is that of two disciples of Jesus on the road to Emmaus. They were disconsolate and saddened at the apparent failure of Jesus’ mission, which had been ended by His death.
“Behold, two of them went, the same day, to a town which was sixty furlongs from Jerusalem, named Emmaus. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass, that while they talked and reasoned with themselves, Jesus Himself also drawing near, went with them. But their eyes were held, that they should not know Him.
“And He said to them: ‘What are these discourses that you hold one with another as you walk, and are sad?’ And the one of them, whose name was Cleophas, answering, said to Him: ‘Are You only a stranger to Jerusalem, and have not known the things that have been done there in these days?’ To whom He said: ‘What things?’
“And they said: ‘Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, Who was a prophet, mighty in work and word before God and all the people; and how our chief priests and princes delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him. But we hoped, that it was He that should have redeemed Israel! And now besides all this, today is the third day since these things were done. And certain women, also of our company, frightened us, who, before it was light, were at the sepulcher, and not finding His Body, came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, who say that He is alive. And some of our people went to the sepulcher, and found it so as the women had said, but Him they found not!’
“Then He said to them: ‘O foolish, and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken! Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into His glory?’ And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures, the things that were concerning Him.
“And they drew near to the town, where they were going: and He made as though He would go farther. But they constrained Him; saying: ‘Stay with us, because it is towards evening, and the day is now far spent!’ And He went in with them. And it came to pass, whilst He was at table with them, He took bread, and blessed, and broke, and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they recognized Him―and He vanished out of their sight” (Luke 24:13-31).
Our Lord Appears to Peter
The two disciples, in their excitement, high-tailed back to Jerusalem, to tell all the other followers of Jesus that they had seen Jesus alive—only to have their balloon burst by being told that Jesus had already appeared to St. Peter—though in this case we do not know whether or not Peter recognized Him: “They went back to Jerusalem and they found the Eleven gathered together, and those that were staying with them, saying: ‘The Lord is risen indeed! And He has appeared to Simon!’” (Luke 24:33-34).
Who is This ‘Gate-Crasher’?
While they were busy exchanging stories of how Our Lord had appeared to (Simon) Peter and then to the two disciples, Our Lord suddenly appears in their midst! “Now whilst they were speaking these things, Jesus stood in the midst of them, and said to them: ‘Peace be to you! It is I―fear not!’ But they being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit … And He said to them: ‘Why are you troubled, and why do these thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet, that it is I Myself! Handle and see―for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have! And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet. But they yet believed not, and wondered for joy” (Luke 24:36-41).
Jesus and Doubting Thomas
While they were still in Jerusalem, Jesus appeared twice to His Apostles—once in the absence of Thomas (see above paragraph), and the second time in the presence of Thomas. “Now Thomas, one of the Twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Except I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe!’
“And after eight days again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in their midst, and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put your finger here and see My hands! And bring here your hand, and put it into My side―and be not faithless, but believing!’ Thomas answered, and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because you have seen Me, Thomas, you have believed! Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:24-29).
Jesus at the Sea of Tiberias
The third time that Jesus appeared to a group of His disciples was in Galilee. Again, they did not recognize Jesus, though some sensed that the person that they saw could possibly be Jesus. It is John, the beloved Apostle of Love, who first senses it might be Jesus. Love somehow knows these things!
“Jesus showed Himself again to the disciples at the sea of Tiberias. And He showed Himself after this manner. There were together Simon Peter, and Thomas, who is called Didymus, and Nathanael, who was of Cana of Galilee, and the sons of Zebedee, and two others of His disciples. Simon Peter said to them: ‘I am going fishing!’ They said to him: ‘We are also coming with you!’ And they went forth, and entered into the ship: and that night they caught nothing. But when the morning was come, Jesus stood on the shore: yet the disciples knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus therefore said to them: ‘Children, have you any meat?’ They answered Him: ‘No!’ He said to them: ‘Cast the net on the right side of the ship, and you shall find some!’ They cast their nets and now they were not able to draw them in, because of the multitude of fishes.
“That disciple therefore whom Jesus loved, said to Peter: ‘It is the Lord!’ Simon Peter, when he heard that it was the Lord, girt his coat about him (for he was naked) and cast himself into the sea. But the other disciples came in the ship―for they were not far from the land, but as it were two hundred cubits―dragging the net with fishes. As soon then as they came to land, they saw hot coals lying, and a fish laid thereon, and bread. Jesus said to them: ‘Bring here some of the fishes which you have now caught!’ Simon Peter went up, and drew the net to land, full of great fishes, one hundred and fifty-three. And although there were so many, the net was not broken. Jesus said to them: ‘Come and eat!’ And none of them who were at meat, dared ask Him: ‘Who are You?’ knowing that it was the Lord” (John 21:1-12).
A Mountain in Galilee
While they were in Galilee, Jesus also appeared to them upon a mountain. However, not all His disciples believed that what they were seeing was truly Jesus: “And the Eleven disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them. And seeing Him they adored ― but some doubted” (Matthew 28:16-17). Once again, in some way, Jesus is unrecognizable.
Why does Jesus make Himself unrecognizable? Why doesn't He appear to His followers in a way that they can easily recognize Him? What is the point of all this?
Failure to See Christ
Why on earth did Jesus appear to be different after His Resurrection? We know that He had changed because everyone whom He encountered or appeared to after the Resurrection, failed to recognize Him, even among His nearest and dearest—the Apostles, Mary Magdalen, the two disciples on the road to Emmaus and many others. Prior to His Passion and Death, Our Lord had conformed Himself largely to our way of doing things—after His Resurrection He seems to expect that we should now conform more to His way of doing things. The apprenticeship is over, now we have to really get down to work! So far there has been more watching than doing. Now there has to be more doing than watching. “Learn of Me!” (Matthew 11:29). “But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves” (James 1:22).
How Was Jesus Different?
After the Resurrection, Jesus was somehow different. As God He cannot change: “The Father of lights, with Whom there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (James 1:17). If God could change, then He wouldn’t be all-perfect—He would either be changing for the better (which means He wasn’t yet perfect in the first place) or He would be changing for the worse (which means He is not all-perfect, nor all-powerful after all). Yet as God-Man, Jesus did change.
As God-Man, He changed physically—growing from a childhood, through adolescence to manhood. We even see Holy Scripture testifying to His intellectual and spiritual growth: “The Child grew, and waxed strong, full of wisdom; and the grace of God was in Him” (Luke 2:40). “And Jesus advanced in wisdom, and age, and grace with God and men” (Luke 2:52). This is how we should change also—advancing in wisdom, age and grace with God and men.
Our Lord Comes to Change Us
As one saint put it: “Jesus became like man, in order to make us like unto God.” In other words, He became human that He might lead humans to something superhuman. He entered our natural world so that He might elevate it to a supernatural level. He came to change us for the better. Our Lord Himself said: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). The mountain is a symbol of God and the mountain was intimately woven into the life of Jesus. We see Him give sermons on the mount; He goes alone to pray on the mount; He is transfigured on a mountain; He suffers His agony on the Mount of Olives; He dies on Mount Calvary; He ascends to Heaven from a mountain.
As we ascend a mountain, the air becomes rarefied. The air in high elevations has less oxygen. This rarefied air can be challenging to mountain climbers. It's difficult to breathe in the rarefied air near the mountain's peak. High mountain air is dry and may be drier in the winter. Cold air has a reduced capacity to hold water vapor. The dry air requires increased consumption of water (water being a symbol of grace). Due to the cold, most persons do not consume enough water (grace) and must be encouraged to consciously increase their fluid intake.
As you climb the mountain, you have to change your approach and methods at different heights and levels. Refusal to change and adapt to the increasingly difficult terrain can lead to failure or death.
Changes in Life
In the Preface used for the Mass of the Dead, the Church speaks of life being “changed” not ended. Likewise, even here on Earth, our life is in a process of constantly changing—either for the better or for the worse. As the spiritual masters say, "He who is not making progress, is really going backwards." The development of the interior life has often been compared to the three periods or stages of physical life: childhood, youth, and adulthood. St. Thomas Aquinas himself uses this analogy: and it is an analogy which is worth pursuing.
It is generally admitted that childhood lasts until the age of puberty, about fourteen. Youth, or adolescence, lasts from the age of fourteen to around twenty. Then follows adulthood, in which we may distinguish the period which precedes full maturity, about the age of thirty-five, and that which follows it, before the decline of old age sets in.
A person’s mentality changes with the development of the body: the activity of the child, it has been said, is not that of a adult in miniature form, or of a fatigued adult; the dominant element in childhood is different. The child has as yet no discernment, it is unable to organize in a rational manner; it follows the lead of the imagination and the impulses of sense. And even when the child’s reason begins to awaken, it still remains to a great extent dependent upon the senses.
Then there is the transition from childhood to adolescence and from youth to adulthood. The period of puberty, which is the end of childhood, about the age of fourteen, is characterized by a transformation which is not only physical, but also psychological, intellectual and moral. The adolescents, or youths, are no longer content to follow their imagination, as the child was; they begins to reflect on the things of life, on the need to prepare himself for some career or occupation in the future. They no longer have a child’s attitude towards family, social and religious matters; their moral personality begins to take shape, and they acquire the sense of honor and of good repute. Or else, on the contrary, if they pass unsuccessfully through this difficult period, the adolescents change for the worse and follows evil paths.
The law of nature dictates that the transition from childhood to adolescence or youth, must follow a normal development; otherwise the person will remain a half-wit, perhaps even a complete idiot, for the rest of his life. As the saying goes: “He who makes no progress loses ground.” St. Paul writes: “When that which is perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child” (1 Corinthians 13:10-11).
It is at this point that the analogy becomes enlightening for the spiritual life. We shall see that the beginner who fails to become a proficient (make progress), either turns to sin, or else presents an example of arrested spiritual development. Here, too, it is true that “he who makes no progress loses ground,” as the Fathers of the Church have so often pointed out. Spiritual change is a strict necessity.
Spiritual Changes
The first level of change is that of bringing us out of mortal sin: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came to call sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32). “All iniquity is sin. And there is a sin unto death” (1 John 5:17)—namely, mortal sin. This kind of sin must be avoided if we are to love God with our whole, heart, mind, soul and strength. The membership cost for this basic level is that of keeping the Commandments and paying for past sin through penance: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). In this level, the soul is still very naturalistic, materially orientated, tending more to the physical than the spiritual. Analogically speaking, let us pluck an imaginary ratio from the sky and say that the soul might be anywhere from 10% to 30% spiritual, but 90% to 70% naturalistic.
This first level of change, changes us from enemies of God into servants of God.
The second level of change, after leaving mortal sin behind, is that of bringing us out of deliberate venial sin. Whereas mortal sin leads to death of grace in the soul, venial sin does not lead to the death of grace in the soul, but increasingly weakens the soul and paves the way for mortal sin. Venial sin is “a sin which is not to death” (1 John 5:16). Nevertheless, it is an attack upon God and it, too, must be eliminated. Once mortal sin is eradicated, venial sin must follow suit—otherwise we cannot truly claim to love God if we are attacking Him through venial sin.
Analogically speaking, let us once again put an imaginary ratio forward and say that the soul, at this level, could be anywhere from 30% to 70% spiritual, and 70% to 30% naturalistic. In other words, the soul has become less materialistic and more spiritual, without being able to relinquish materialism and naturalism altogether. They are in the continued process of change, becoming less human in tendencies and more divine. They are starting to become unrecognizable to what they once were.
This second level of change, changes us from servants of God into friends of God. Our Lord says this to His Apostles at the Last Supper: “I will not now call you servants―for the servant knows not what his lord does. But I have called you friends!” (John 15:15). It is natural for friends to talk and communicate—this is why souls in this second level of change, begin to communicate with God more and more. Prayer is the usual way we communicate with God and these souls now begin to pray more and more—not just saying more prayers, but saying them with more quality too. They begin to fulfill the Scriptural commands of: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) and Our Lord’s command “that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). They start to become increasingly unrecognizable to the worldlings that surround them, who will make comments like: “What’s come over you? You’re not the person I used to know!”
The third level of change, after relinquishing mortal and venial sin, is the elimination of imperfections.
The third level of change takes us from a spiritual friendship with God, to a total union to God (as much as that is possible here below), much like a marriage. So that we have now passed from being servants, to being friends and now to being a spouse of sorts. Though this is a goal that God sets for everybody, very few souls are generous enough to achieve this kind of union here below—and of the few souls that go to Heaven, most have to reach that level of unity in Purgatory, where nothing else matters but God and His Divine Will.
“The Apostles were prepared for their third level of change, or transformation, by the fact that from the time of the Ascension they were deprived of the perceptible presence of Jesus Himself. When Our Lord forever deprived His Apostles of the sight of His sacred Humanity, they must have suffered a distress which we do not perhaps sufficiently realize. When we consider that Our Lord had become their very life—as St. Paul says: “For to me, to live is Christ” (Philippians 1:21)—and that they had become daily more and more intimate with Him, they must have had a feeling of the greatest loneliness, like a feeling of desolation, even of death. And their desolation must have been the more intense since Our Lord Himself had foretold all the sufferings that were in store. We experience something of the same dismay when, after having lived on a higher plane during the time of retreat, under the guidance of a priestly soul full of the spirit of God, we are plunged once again into our everyday life which seems to deprive us suddenly of this fullness” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
It was at the coming of the Holy Ghost—the Spirit of Love—that the Apostles rose to an even higher spiritual level. Thereby they entered into the Way of Perfection, of Mystical Union with God, the Unitive Way. Gone were mortal and venial sin, perfection in all things was now rooting-out any and all imperfections. As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The Holy Ghost already dwelt in the souls of the Apostles, but, by this visible mission, He came into them to increase the treasures of His grace, of the virtues and the gifts, giving them light and strength in order that they might be capable of witnessing to Christ even to the ends of the Earth, and at the peril of their lives. The tongues of fire are a sign that the Holy Spirit enkindled in their souls that living flame of Love of which St. John of the Cross speaks” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
Unrecognizable Apostles
“Such was their third conversion; it was a complete transformation of their souls. Their first conversion had made them disciples of the Master, attracted by the sublime beauty of His teaching; the second, at the end of the Passion, had enabled them to divine the fecundity of the mystery of the Cross, enlightened as it was by the Resurrection which followed it; the third conversion fills them with the profound conviction of this mystery, a mystery which they will constantly live until their martyrdom” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
“The transformation, which the Apostles had undergone, is shown also in their sanctifying influence, in the transport of intense fervor which they communicated to the first Christians. As the Acts of Apostles show, the life of the infant Church was a life of marvelous sanctity; ‘the multitude of the believers had but one heart and one soul’; they had all things in common, they sold their goods and brought the price of them to the Apostles that they might distribute to each according to his needs. They met together every day to pray, to hear the preaching of the Apostles, and to celebrate the Eucharist. They were often seen assembled together in prayer, and men wondered to see the charity that reigned among them. ‘By this,’ Our Lord had said, ‘shall all men know that you are My disciples.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
Bossuet has given an admirable description of the fervor of the first Christians, in his third sermon for the feast of Pentecost: “They are strong in the face of peril, but they are tender in the love of their brethren; the almighty Spirit who guides them well knows the secret of reconciling the most opposite tensions.... He gives them a heart of flesh... made tender by charity... and He makes them hard as iron or steel in the face of peril.... He strengthens and He softens, but in a manner all His own. For these are the same hearts of the disciples, which seem as diamonds in their invincible firmness, and which yet become human hearts and hearts of flesh by brotherly love. This is the effect of the heavenly fire that rests upon them this day. It has softened the hearts of the faithful, it has, so to speak, melted them into one....
“The Apostles of the Son of God had once disputed concerning who was the greatest among them; but now, that the Holy Ghost has made them of one heart and one soul, they are no longer jealous or quarrelsome. It seems to them that through Peter they all speak, that with him they all preside, and if his shadow heals the sick the whole Church has its part in this gift and praises our Lord for it” (Bossuet).
Unrecognizable Christians
Our Lord and the Holy Ghost, Faith and grace, drastically changed so many of the early Christians that they were unrecognizable when compared to their earlier selves. This is also God’s plan for us—if we would only accept it and cooperate with it! Jesus rose from death to a new life, a better life, a higher life—and was thereby unrecognizable, even to His own.
God is prepared to give us a new heart—“And I will give them one heart, and will put a new spirit in their bowels: and I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 11:19) … “Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit: and why will you die, O house of Israel?” (Ezechiel 18:31) …“And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26).
The Changing Mechanism of Grace
Grace does not make us like God in the strict sense, by changing our human nature into a divine nature, but it perfects our human nature, raising it above the mere natural to the supernatural. Grace does not make us the equals of God, but it changes us into Godlike beings, it makes us more like God. It only changes our nature by perfecting our human nature.
“Full of Grace”?
In Holy Scripture, the Angel Gabriel says to Our Lady: “Hail, full of grace!” (Luke 1:28) and Holy Scripture says of St. Stephen, the first martyr: “And Stephen, full of grace…” (Acts 6:8). We see both Our Lady and St. Stephen being called “full of grace”―yet we know that there is a massive difference between Our Lady and St. Stephen. The idea of being “full of grace” can be applied to each stage of spiritual development as well the different capacities of each person. By analogy, we can say that, in the realm of small containers, a male hiker, a female hiker and a child hiker are all carrying a full load if their backpacks are filled to the brim. All the backpacks are full. Yet the male hiker may be carrying 80 lbs; the female is carrying only 40 lbs; while the child hiker is carrying only 25 lbs—nevertheless all have full loads.
Likewise, a student may attain 100% in their math exam in every grade—from Kindergarten to 12th Grade—yet the level of math and the difficulty of the exam changes with each year and becomes harder and harder. An athlete may win his local school’s annual cross-country race—but each year he cuts more and more minutes off the winning-time for the previous year.
We can be full of grace here on Earth just as we can be full of grace in Heaven. The capacity of each person is different, some are designed to contain more grace, others to contain less grace—but everyone's capacity can be filled to the brim, and everyone can be fully satisfied, even though others may have more.
Post-Resurrection Appearances
Following the classification of St. Ignatius of Loyola, as listed in his Spiritual Exercises, we see that Our Lord’s first three apparitions were to three classes of women—then He appears to three classes of disciples.
He first appears to Our Lady, then the women who had come to the tomb, then Mary Magdalen. Our Lady represents the pinnacle of the spiritual life—the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way. The women represent the stage below this perfection—namely, the Way of Progress or the Illuminative Way. Mary Magdalen represents the lowest stage—the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way.
Similarly for the men. Our Lord appears to (1) Simon-Peter, (2) to the Apostles (minus Thomas) and (3) the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. St. Peter could be said to represent the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way; the Apostles could be said to represent those making progress. The disciples (who were not as close to Our Lord and beneath the Apostles) could be said to represent the Beginners.
To get to Heaven, we have to go through all three stages—just like a person has to go through all the stages of childhood, adolescence and adulthood. In other words, to get to Heaven, we must become unrecognizable to what we once were!
Don’t Just Get Yourself a Life! Get Yourself a NEW Life!
Our Easter should see, likewise, a resurrection in ourselves. We should not go back to our old ways, like the dog goes back to his vomit: “As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). There are too many Catholics, who, now that Lent is over, will go back to a life of self-indulgence and over-indulgence.
“Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened: for Christ our Pasch is sacrificed. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (Epistle from Midnight Mass: 1 Corinthians 5:7-8).
“Brethren: If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth! For you are dead [to the world and sin], and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ shall appear, Who is your life, then you also shall appear with Him in glory” (Epistle from the Day Mass: Colossians 3:1-4).
“For Heaven’s sake! Will you change?”
God doesn’t need to change—for He is already perfect. “For I am the Lord, and I change not!” (Malachias 3:6). “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (James 1:17).
Change has to come from us―who are far from being perfect―yet we have to be perfect if we wish to save our souls: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). “Thou shalt be perfect, and without spot before the Lord thy God!” (Deuteronomy 18:13). If you are already perfect, then there is no need to change, for Heaven’s sake! Just flag down the next bus that is going to Heaven and climb aboard! For the rest of us, CHANGE IS NECESSARY.
Change and Find Mercy
Sadly, however, there is little or change in our required change. God says we must be perfect in order to enter Heaven; we persist in hoping that our mediocrity will get us there—or, worse still, we live in a presumption that we will still get there while wantonly pursuing a life of sin here below!
“Be converted therefore, ye sinners, and do justice before God, believing that He will show His mercy to you!” (Tobias 13:8). “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unjust man his thoughts, and let him return to the Lord, and He will have mercy on him, and to our God: for He is bountiful to forgive” (Isaias 55:7). “Therefore He never withdraws His mercy from us―but though He chastises His people with adversity, He forsakes them not” (2 Machabees 6:16).
Therefore, “put away strange gods from among you, and incline your hearts to the Lord!” (Josue 24:23) … “Put away from thee the iniquity that is in thy hand!” (Job 11:14) … “Remove anger from thy heart, and put away evil from thy flesh!” (Ecclesiastes 11:10) … “Let all bitterness, and anger, and indignation, and clamor, and blasphemy, be put away from you!” (Ephesians 4:31). “And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 36:26).
No Change, No Mercy
“He that hides his sins, shall not prosper―but he that shall confess, and forsake them, shall obtain mercy!” (Proverbs 28:13). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5) “And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:6). “For the Highest hates sinners, and has mercy on the penitent” (Ecclesiasticus 12:3). “But as to the wicked, even to the end there came upon them wrath without mercy!” (Wisdom 19:1) and “judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy” (James 2:13).
Time for a Change?
Perhaps we need to take a leaf our of Jacob’s book: “And Jacob having called together all his household, said: ‘Cast away the strange gods that are among you, and be cleansed and change your garments’” (Genesis 35:2). “For He says: ‘In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2).
Dying King Changes Attitude
We see King Ezechias on his deathbed, being told by God that he would die. Ezechias was not such a bad king, yet he wasn’t perfect—we could say of him what Scripture says of Amasias: “He did what was good in the sight of the Lord―but yet not with a perfect heart” (2 Paralipomenon 25:2).
However, bad news can sometimes change a person, and in Ezechias it provoked a deeper humility in him and pushed him to pray intensely before God—thus God provoked a change in Ezechias, which would not have happened without a serious threat. Here is the Scriptural account:
“In those days Ezechias was sick unto death; and Isaias, the son of Amos the prophet, came and said to him: ‘Thus says the Lord God: “Give charge concerning thy house, for thou shalt die, and not live!”’ And he turned his face to the wall, and prayed to the Lord, saying: ‘I beseech Thee, O Lord, remember how I have walked before Thee in truth, and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is pleasing before Thee!’ And Ezechias wept with much weeping.
“And before Isaias was gone out of the middle of the court, the word of the Lord came to him, saying: ‘Go back, and tell Ezechias the captain of My people: “Thus says the Lord the God of David thy father: ‘I have heard thy prayer, and I have seen thy tears: and behold I have healed thee! On the third day thou shalt go up to the Temple of the Lord. And I will add to thy days fifteen years: and I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the king of the Assyrians, and I will protect this city for My own sake, and for David My servant’s sake!’” ” (4 Kings 20:1-6).
God Wants Change
Switching our focus from Ezechias to Ezechiel, we find in the Book of Ezechiel, God painting a clearer picture of the changes that we must necessarily make if we wish to be saved. God is inflexible in His Truth and Justice, yet His Mercy and Peace are ever ready to be given if we change our lives: “The soul that sins, the same shall die … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments and does justice―then living he shall live and shall not di! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live! Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:20-23).
Yet God gives a warning to the good folk who may be tempted to be not so good: “But if the just man turns himself away from his justice, and does iniquity according to all the abominations which the wicked man uses to work―shall he live? All his justices which he has done, shall not be remembered! In the prevarication, by which he has prevaricated, and in his sin which he has committed―in them he shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:24). “God shall humble them! For there is no change with them, and they have not feared God!” (Psalms 54:20). “They sinned against Me! I will change their glory into shame!” (Osee 4:7).
The Choice is Ours—We Reap What We Sow
“For when the just man turns himself away from his justice, and commits iniquity―he shall die therein! In the injustice that he has wrought, he shall die! And when the wicked man turns himself away from his wickedness, which he has wrought, and does judgment and justice―then he shall save his soul alive! Because he considers and turns away himself from all his iniquities which he has wrought―he shall surely live, and not die! … Therefore will I judge every man according to his ways!” (Ezechiel 18:26-30).
Therefore Change Your Life
“Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit―and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dies, says the Lord God, return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:30-32).
The City of Ninive Changes Its Ways
We see this change of life brought about in the city of Ninive through the prophecy of Jonas, who told them that God would destroy them after forty days, due to their sinfulness: “And Jonas began to enter into the city one day’s journey and he cried and said: ‘Yet forty more days and Ninive shall be destroyed!’ And the men of Ninive believed in God and they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest to the least. And the word came to the King of Ninive―and he rose up out of his throne, and cast away his robe from him, and was clothed with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published in Ninive, from the mouth of the king and of his princes, saying: ‘Let neither men nor beasts, oxen nor sheep, taste anything! Let them not feed, nor drink water! And let men and beasts be covered with sackcloth, and cry to the Lord with all their strength, and let them turn, everyone from his evil way, and from the iniquity that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn, and forgive: and will turn away from his fierce anger, and we shall not perish?’ And God saw their works, that they were turned from their evil way. And God had mercy with regard to the evil which He had said that He would do to them, and He did it not” (Jonas 3:4-10).
Our Lady Looking to Change Things
The Ninivites averted disaster by changing. Sodom and Gomorrha would have been spared if only a few good men could have been found. At Akita, Our Lady said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord! I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair by their suffering and their poverty for the sinners! ... I have prevented the coming of calamities by offering Him the sufferings of the Son on the Cross, His Precious Blood, and beloved souls who console Him, forming a cohort of victim souls. Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger! ... Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men!”
Is that what we are doing? Or is what Sister Lucia said to Fr. Fuentes still the norm amongst us: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message―neither the good nor the bad! The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them!”
What seems to be happening is what Our Lady foretold would happen: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals! ... The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God! ... Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth! … People will think of nothing but amusement!” (Our Lady of Good Success & La Salette).
Article 1
Easter Sunday, April 20th
Christ Won! Now It's Your Turn!
Easter Sunday, April 20th
Christ Won! Now It's Your Turn!
The Joy of Victory!
Victory brings joy! We even see that on a flimsy, superficial, worldly level—such as a sports team winning a trophy, or person winning a race or some other competition, or in winning the lottery! The exuberance, emotion, exhilaration and joy often “shoots through the roof!” How much more joy is there in victory over death?!! Imagine the joy of Martha and Mary in seeing their beloved dead brother, Lazarus, being raised to back to life by Jesus! (John 11:1-45). Imagine the joy of widow of Naim, whose only son had died and was being carried to his tomb, when Jesus ‘chanced’ to pass by and brought him back to life (Luke 7:11-17). Imagine the joy of the ruler of the synagogue who had his daughter brought back to life (Matthew 9:23-26; Mark 5:38-43; Luke 8:49-56). Therefore, you can imagine the eventual joy (for at first many did not believe) of the Apostles and followers of Jesus when they realized that He had actually risen from the dead!
The Multiform Victory of Christ
Attacked from all sides—by the Sadducees (priests); the Scribes and Pharisees; by the mob or heartless cowardly crowd; by Pilate, Herod, Annas, Caiphas, the Roman soldiers; betrayed by Judas; abandoned by most of His Apostles; and last of all attacked by the devils themselves—the irrepressible Jesus, after His horrendous beating, emerges victorious!
Jesus Looked a Failure and a Loser as He Died on the Cross
Today the world looks upon those who are religious, as being losers. They mock us, like they mocked Christ. Our Lord said that if they have hated Me then they will also hate you. Let us not become cowards just because we are mocked and laughed at. He who laughs last, laughs longest. Those who laugh now at religion, will gnash and grind their teeth as they howl and wail for eternity.
Victory Over His Murderers
“Be not afraid of them who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do!” (Luke 12:4) He was afraid, but He chose to walk into the jaws of death, so as to come out alive. “For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life, for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it” (Mark 8:35). Don’t waste your life things that don’t matter―you might lose your eternal life over those things. Do not seek a long life―but rather a good one. Do not be afraid of martyrdom if it may come your way. “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13).
Victory Over the Doubters and Unbelievers
“Let Christ, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross, so that we may see and believe!” Yet, as Jesus had once said: “Which is easier, to say to the sick of the palsy: ‘Thy sins are forgiven thee!’ or to say: ‘Arise, take up thy bed, and walk?’” (Mark 2:9). Now, dying on Calvary, He could say: “Which is easier? To come down from this cross while I am still alive, or to rise from the dead once I have died?” As always, Our Lord chose the most difficult option.
He did much more than come down from the Cross whilst alive! He came out of the tomb when He was dead! Let us beg Him to conquer our unbelief ― for example, our unbelief, or doubts about the Holy Eucharist; our unbelief or doubts about eternal life; our unbelief or doubts in the power of prayer; our unbelief or doubts about the devil; our unbelief or doubts about the existence of Hell; or whatever unbelief or doubts that we may be guilty of.
Victory Over Death
Say what you will, but most people fear death! Some will even renounce the Faith if threatened with death. Death is the penultimate punishment, which the punishment of Hell still manages to trump. The wage for sin is death. Yet Our Lord came to remove our fears over death.
“O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?” (1 Corinthians 15:55). Through the old Adam, death came into the world, because he ate a forbidden fruit from a tree. Now the new Adam, bore a new fruit on the tree of the Cross and through partaking of that fruit we have life eternal. Look at the lacerated, bruised, beaten, wounded Body of Christi that hung on the cross and now is unrecognizable in His resurrection. Do not fear or flee your sufferings, for they will be your source of grace and glory. He had raised three persons from the dead while He was alive, now He raised Himself from the dead as He had predicted and when He had predicted. So too will He raise you and your loved ones from the dead on the last day. Do not fear so much as the death of mortal sin. Yet there too He raises from the dead of the tomb of confessional in which we bury ourselves. We enter spiritually dead to God and come out spiritual alive. We enter the tomb of the confessional having lost eternal life-giving grace, and we come forth out of that tomb having regained eternal life-giving grace.
Victory Over the Devil
The devil was not sure who He was! His holiness enraged the devil so much that he plotted and waged war against Christ—as he will wage war against you the holier you try to become, stirring all manner of things against you. Yet, by His humble acceptance and meekness in face of this onslaught, Christ bore the victory. He used the weight of His enemy’s attack against His enemy. The greater the rage, the greater the defeat. Let us learn from Our Lord not to fear the devil, and above all not to love him and his allurements. The devil can do nothing without the permission and agreement of God.
Victory Over the World
Jesus did not rise from the dead in order to live in the world. After His resurrection, He could have lived in the world till the end of time―but He did not rise to live here forever. He rose from the dead to go to Heaven. He died for this world, but He also died to this world. He took nothing of this world with Him, nor shall we when we die. Let us not live as though it was only this world that matters. Especially the young ones, who have not yet tasted the poison that Satan offers under the glitter and charm of the world around us. Do not compromise your soul and your salvation for a cheap sin. What a way to repay your God, Who died for you in order to help you stay clean.
A Bunch of Disbelievers in His Victory!
The varying degrees of sadness, sorrow, discouragement, disillusionment and depression―that hit the Apostles and disciples at the news and sight of Christ’s crucifixion and death―was not wanted, intended, nor sent by God. Such negative reactions were purely the work of Satan and/or a too naturalistic and human spirit. Our Lord would point-out that very thing to two of His disciples, to whom He appeared to on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus after His resurrection from the dead.
“And behold, two of them [the disciples of Jesus] went, the same day, to a town which was sixty furlongs from Jerusalem, named Emmaus. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass, that while they talked and reasoned with themselves, Jesus Himself also drawing near, went with them. But their eyes were held, that they should not know Him. And He said to them: ‘What are these discourses that you hold one with another as you walk, and are sad?’ And the one of them, whose name was Cleophas, answering, said to Him: ‘Art Thou only a stranger to Jerusalem, and hast not known the things that have been done there in these days?’ To whom Jesus said: ‘What things?’ And they said: ‘Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, Who was a prophet, mighty in work and word before God and all the people; and how our chief priests and princes delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him. But we hoped that it was He that should have redeemed Israel! And now, besides all this, today is the third day since these things were done! And certain women, also of our company, frightened us―who, before it was light, were at the sepulcher, and, not finding His Body, came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, who say that He is alive! And some of our people went to the sepulcher and found it so as the women had said―but Him they found not!’ Then Jesus said to them: ‘O foolish and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken! Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into His glory?’ And, beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded to them all the things in the Scriptures that were concerning Him” (Luke 24:13-27).
We all know how St. Thomas was in disbelief about the Resurrection―but so too were all the Apostles and disciples! To them, Jesus was dead and buried―and all His plans with Him! The Gospels account of Our Lord apparitions after His resurrection designate Mary Magdalen as being the first person to whom Jesus appeared (though tradition tells us that Our Lady was the first person He appeared to). For Mary Magdalen, too, Jesus was “dead and buried” and this had made her disconsolate. “Mary Magdalen stood outside the sepulcher, weeping. Now, as she was weeping, she stooped down and looked into the sepulcher. And she saw two angels in white, sitting―one at the head and one at the feet―where the body of Jesus had been laid. They said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them: ‘Because they have taken away my Lord―and I know not where they have laid Him!’ When she had said this, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing―and she knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ Whom do you seek?’ She, thinking it was the gardener, said to Him: ‘Sir! If you have taken Him from here, tell me where you have laid Him, and I will take Him away!’ Jesus said to her: ‘Mary!’ She turning, said to Him: ‘Rabboni!’ (which is to say, ‘Master!’). Jesus said to her: ‘Do not touch Me―for I am not yet ascended to My Father! But go to My brethren and tell them that I ascend to My Father and to your Father, to My God and your God!’” (John 20:11-17).
Yet when Mary ran back and told the Apostles and other disciples that Jesus has appeared to her, they did not believe her! That led to Our Lord appearing to them in person! “Jesus stood in the midst of them and said to them: ‘Peace be to you! It is I―fear not!’ But they, being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit. And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you troubled? And why do these thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet―and know that it is I Myself! Touch and see―for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have!’ And, when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet―yet they believed not” (Luke 24:36-41).
As regards the “Doubting Thomas”, Holy Scripture tells us that “Thomas, one of the Twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Unless I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side―I will not believe!’ And after eight days, again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in their midst, and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put your finger in here and see My hands! And bring here your hand and put it into My side! And be not faithless―but believing!’ Thomas answered and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because you have seen Me, Thomas, you have believed! Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:29).
Which Turning Will You Take at the Easter Crossroads?
Now that Lent is over and Easter is here―what road will you take? Will you, like the two disciples on the road to Emmaus after the crucifixion, walk away from Jerusalem? Or will you stay where you are? In other words, there are those who walk away from the progress they may have made during Lent, and walk back into their old habits. Whereas there are some―admittedly few―who not only maintain the progress that they have made, but also build upon it. “Jesus said: ‘No man putting his hand to the plough and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God!’” (Luke 9:62).
All Change!
The resurrection of Our Lord sees Him come back much changed and much different to what He was before. So much so, that He is not even recognized by His nearest and dearest! Mary Magdalen does not recognize Him. The two disciples on the road to Emmaus do not recognize Him. His own Apostles do not recognize Him. Something similar is seen in the apparition of St. Dominic Savio after his death, when he came to St. John Bosco—his teacher and confessor―while Bosco was still on Earth. St. John Bosco did not recognize him and had to ask: “Is that you Dominic?”
New Life!
Our Lord had passed through the barrier of suffering and death and emerged on the other side in His new life, His glorious life, a life in His glorified body. This should teach us that, after the suffering and attempts to kill sin, during the season of Lent, we should be emerging from Lent as ‘new-beings’ with a new attitude and a new life-style.
“Put off the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error―and be renewed in the spirit of your mind―and put on the new man, who, according to God, is created in justice and holiness of truth!” (Ephesians 4:22-24). “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above; where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth! For you are dead and your life is hidden with Christ in God! When Christ shall appear―Who is your life―then you also shall appear with Him in glory!” (Colossians 3:1-4).
Saul Resurrects as Paul
St. Paul, too, went through his ‘three-days-of death’ or, rather, ‘three-days-of-darkness’ when he was struck blind by Jesus on the road to Damascus. He then went through his own ‘Lent’ by praying and not eating or drinking for three days: “And he was there three days, without sight, and he did neither eat nor drink” (Acts 9:9).
In the meantime, God was preparing Saul for a new life. Saul would be given a new name—Paul; just like Simon was renamed Peter. He would be given a new mission—instead of rounding up Christians to arrest them; he would now round up people and make them into Christians.
“And the Lord said to Ananias: ‘Arise, and go into the street that is called Strait, and seek in the house of Judas, one named Saul of Tarsus. For behold he prays!’ And meanwhile, Saul saw a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hands upon him, so that he might receive his sight. But Ananias answered: ‘Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he has done to Thy saints in Jerusalem. And here he has authority, from the chief priests, to bind all that invoke Thy Name!’ And the Lord said to him: ‘Go thy way! For this man is to Me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!’” (Acts 9:1-16).
I was blind! Now I see!
This should also be the case for ourselves, who have been blind and, like Saul, by our sins, have persecuted Christ. Our Lord could well say to us the words He addressed to Saul (Paul): “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?” (Acts 9:4). Yet the mercy of Christ transformed the soul of Saul into the pillar of Paul, but not without pain and suffering.
Suffering After His Resurrection
The new Paul was destined to pay for his past sins by suffering throughout his new ‘risen’ or ‘resurrected’ life. Paul himself lists some of the many sufferings that he had endured in the short time since his ‘resurrection’:
“In many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods; once I was stoned; thrice I suffered shipwreck; a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often; in perils of waters; in perils of robbers; in perils from my own nation; in perils from the Gentiles; in perils in the city; in perils in the wilderness; in perils in the sea; in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness; in much watchings; in hunger and thirst; in fastings often; in cold and nakedness. Besides those things which are without―my daily instance, the solicitude for all the churches.
“Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is scandalized, and I am not on fire? If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity. My daily instance. The labors that come in, and press upon me every day. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is blessed for ever, knows that I lie not. At Damascus, the governor of the nation under Aretas the king, guarded the city of the Damascenes, to apprehend me. And through a window I was let down by the wall in a basket, and so escaped his hands …
“But for myself I will glory nothing, but in my infirmities! For though I should have a mind to glory, I shall not be foolish; for I will say the truth. But I forbear, lest any man should think of me above that which he sees in me, or anything he hears from me. And lest the greatness of the revelations should exalt me, there was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me. For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me. And He said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee―for power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may dwell in me. For which cause I please myself in my infirmities; in reproaches; in necessities; in persecutions; in distresses for Christ. For when I am weak, then am I powerful” (2 Corinthians 11:23-33; 12:1-10).
Don’t Go Back!
Our Easter should see, likewise, a resurrection in ourselves. We should not go back to our old ways, like the dog goes back to his vomit: “As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). There are too many Catholics, who, now that Lent is over, will go back to a life of self-indulgence and over-indulgence. They just don’t get it! They do not understand! “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and who have ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21).
In very first readings of the first two Masses of Easter (the Midnight Mass and the Day Mass), the Church clearly tells us that we have to change! This is the very first message of Easter! That the old ways have to be cast far away from us, so that we live a new, resurrected, better and more holy life:
The Church’s Easter Message
“Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened―for Christ our Pasch is sacrificed! Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness―but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth!” (Epistle from Midnight Mass: 1 Corinthians 5:7-8).
“Brethren: If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God: mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth. For you are dead [to the world and sin], and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ shall appear―Who is your life―then you also shall appear with Him in glory!” (Epistle from the Day Mass: Colossians 3:1-4).
Christ Rises With His Wounds
The second point that is worth mentioning and imprinting upon our minds and hearts, is the fact that Our Lord rises from the dead WITH his wounds still visible. He could have healed Himself totally, but He chose to keep His wounds like a stigmata.
He also leaves His shroud to us as a relic and a reminder of His Passion. He doesn’t want to be remembered so much for His resurrection, as He wants to be remembered for His Passion and Death. It was the latter that redeemed us and brought about the defeat of the devil, sin and death.
We have arrived at the crossroads of Lent and Easter―yet that does not mean that we must now cast the cross off at the side of the road! Just because Lent is over, it does not mean an end to penance and sacrifice. Penance and sacrifice are the bread and butter of the Christian life. It should be the staple diet of any and every Christian. Our Lady calls for penance at Lourdes and sacrifice at Fatima. Our Lord clearly told us: “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross DAILY, and follow me” (Luke 9:23). “Daily” means every day of the year and not just Lent. Our Lord and Our Lady suffered every single day of their lives—not just during the Passion, or just Seven isolated Sorrows! And Our Lord told us: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Delighting the Devil
If we go back to our pre-Lenten attitudes and lifestyle, then we are insanely going backwards when we should going forwards—to the devil’s delight! Celebrating Easter does not mean over-indulging or, even less, going back to the venial or even mortal sins of the past! Otherwise, we end up caressing Our Lord with our extra prayers and sacrifices during Lent, and then go back to slapping Him around after Lent is over!
Maintain your Higher Spiritual Levels Gained During Lent
Though we may not be required to fast outside of Lent (though it is not forbidden to do so, for fasting is a wonderful weapon against the devil—who does not just work during Lent, but all-year-round!), we can and still should ‘fast’ from sin; the occasions of sin; worldliness and frivolity. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) … For the word of God cannot survive in a worldly atmosphere, “the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things entering in choke the word, and it is made fruitless!” (Mark 4:19).
God Wants to Save; But Many Don’t Want His Terms
Even though “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17), “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not! He came unto His own, and His own received Him not! ... In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shined in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it!” (John 1:4-11).
St. Paul was in darkness, which got worse and ended up with him being blinded, as a means of driving home to him the extent of his spiritual blindness. Let the scales fall from our eyes as they fell from his eyes―so that we can see the new life that God has mapped out for us, beginning with this Easter season! How many Catholics and how many times have they rejected God’s invitation to come to the spiritual banquet of a new life at Easter? God may well say one day: “The marriage indeed is ready; but they that were invited were not worthy!’ And he said to his servants: ‘Go ye therefore into the highways; and as many as you shall find, call to the marriage!’” (Matthew 22:8-9).
Listen to Your Mother!
Let us not ignore God’s invitation, nor test His patience: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked!” (Galatians 6:7). Let us take the advice of Holy Mother Church, as given at the very start of this Easter season: “Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth … If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth! For you are dead [to the world and sin], and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Epistles from the Midnight Mass and the Day Mass: 1 Corinthians 5:7-8; Colossians 3:1-4).
Celebrate we must, but our celebration is more spiritual (to satisfy the soul) than it is carnal (to satisfy the body). We do not see Our Lord ‘living-it-up’ after His resurrection by indulging in joys of the body, but we see Him giving much spiritual joy to His disciples. Let us imitate Our Lord! A happy, holy and joyous Easter to all!
Victory brings joy! We even see that on a flimsy, superficial, worldly level—such as a sports team winning a trophy, or person winning a race or some other competition, or in winning the lottery! The exuberance, emotion, exhilaration and joy often “shoots through the roof!” How much more joy is there in victory over death?!! Imagine the joy of Martha and Mary in seeing their beloved dead brother, Lazarus, being raised to back to life by Jesus! (John 11:1-45). Imagine the joy of widow of Naim, whose only son had died and was being carried to his tomb, when Jesus ‘chanced’ to pass by and brought him back to life (Luke 7:11-17). Imagine the joy of the ruler of the synagogue who had his daughter brought back to life (Matthew 9:23-26; Mark 5:38-43; Luke 8:49-56). Therefore, you can imagine the eventual joy (for at first many did not believe) of the Apostles and followers of Jesus when they realized that He had actually risen from the dead!
The Multiform Victory of Christ
Attacked from all sides—by the Sadducees (priests); the Scribes and Pharisees; by the mob or heartless cowardly crowd; by Pilate, Herod, Annas, Caiphas, the Roman soldiers; betrayed by Judas; abandoned by most of His Apostles; and last of all attacked by the devils themselves—the irrepressible Jesus, after His horrendous beating, emerges victorious!
Jesus Looked a Failure and a Loser as He Died on the Cross
Today the world looks upon those who are religious, as being losers. They mock us, like they mocked Christ. Our Lord said that if they have hated Me then they will also hate you. Let us not become cowards just because we are mocked and laughed at. He who laughs last, laughs longest. Those who laugh now at religion, will gnash and grind their teeth as they howl and wail for eternity.
Victory Over His Murderers
“Be not afraid of them who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do!” (Luke 12:4) He was afraid, but He chose to walk into the jaws of death, so as to come out alive. “For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life, for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it” (Mark 8:35). Don’t waste your life things that don’t matter―you might lose your eternal life over those things. Do not seek a long life―but rather a good one. Do not be afraid of martyrdom if it may come your way. “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13).
Victory Over the Doubters and Unbelievers
“Let Christ, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross, so that we may see and believe!” Yet, as Jesus had once said: “Which is easier, to say to the sick of the palsy: ‘Thy sins are forgiven thee!’ or to say: ‘Arise, take up thy bed, and walk?’” (Mark 2:9). Now, dying on Calvary, He could say: “Which is easier? To come down from this cross while I am still alive, or to rise from the dead once I have died?” As always, Our Lord chose the most difficult option.
He did much more than come down from the Cross whilst alive! He came out of the tomb when He was dead! Let us beg Him to conquer our unbelief ― for example, our unbelief, or doubts about the Holy Eucharist; our unbelief or doubts about eternal life; our unbelief or doubts in the power of prayer; our unbelief or doubts about the devil; our unbelief or doubts about the existence of Hell; or whatever unbelief or doubts that we may be guilty of.
Victory Over Death
Say what you will, but most people fear death! Some will even renounce the Faith if threatened with death. Death is the penultimate punishment, which the punishment of Hell still manages to trump. The wage for sin is death. Yet Our Lord came to remove our fears over death.
“O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?” (1 Corinthians 15:55). Through the old Adam, death came into the world, because he ate a forbidden fruit from a tree. Now the new Adam, bore a new fruit on the tree of the Cross and through partaking of that fruit we have life eternal. Look at the lacerated, bruised, beaten, wounded Body of Christi that hung on the cross and now is unrecognizable in His resurrection. Do not fear or flee your sufferings, for they will be your source of grace and glory. He had raised three persons from the dead while He was alive, now He raised Himself from the dead as He had predicted and when He had predicted. So too will He raise you and your loved ones from the dead on the last day. Do not fear so much as the death of mortal sin. Yet there too He raises from the dead of the tomb of confessional in which we bury ourselves. We enter spiritually dead to God and come out spiritual alive. We enter the tomb of the confessional having lost eternal life-giving grace, and we come forth out of that tomb having regained eternal life-giving grace.
Victory Over the Devil
The devil was not sure who He was! His holiness enraged the devil so much that he plotted and waged war against Christ—as he will wage war against you the holier you try to become, stirring all manner of things against you. Yet, by His humble acceptance and meekness in face of this onslaught, Christ bore the victory. He used the weight of His enemy’s attack against His enemy. The greater the rage, the greater the defeat. Let us learn from Our Lord not to fear the devil, and above all not to love him and his allurements. The devil can do nothing without the permission and agreement of God.
Victory Over the World
Jesus did not rise from the dead in order to live in the world. After His resurrection, He could have lived in the world till the end of time―but He did not rise to live here forever. He rose from the dead to go to Heaven. He died for this world, but He also died to this world. He took nothing of this world with Him, nor shall we when we die. Let us not live as though it was only this world that matters. Especially the young ones, who have not yet tasted the poison that Satan offers under the glitter and charm of the world around us. Do not compromise your soul and your salvation for a cheap sin. What a way to repay your God, Who died for you in order to help you stay clean.
A Bunch of Disbelievers in His Victory!
The varying degrees of sadness, sorrow, discouragement, disillusionment and depression―that hit the Apostles and disciples at the news and sight of Christ’s crucifixion and death―was not wanted, intended, nor sent by God. Such negative reactions were purely the work of Satan and/or a too naturalistic and human spirit. Our Lord would point-out that very thing to two of His disciples, to whom He appeared to on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus after His resurrection from the dead.
“And behold, two of them [the disciples of Jesus] went, the same day, to a town which was sixty furlongs from Jerusalem, named Emmaus. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass, that while they talked and reasoned with themselves, Jesus Himself also drawing near, went with them. But their eyes were held, that they should not know Him. And He said to them: ‘What are these discourses that you hold one with another as you walk, and are sad?’ And the one of them, whose name was Cleophas, answering, said to Him: ‘Art Thou only a stranger to Jerusalem, and hast not known the things that have been done there in these days?’ To whom Jesus said: ‘What things?’ And they said: ‘Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, Who was a prophet, mighty in work and word before God and all the people; and how our chief priests and princes delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him. But we hoped that it was He that should have redeemed Israel! And now, besides all this, today is the third day since these things were done! And certain women, also of our company, frightened us―who, before it was light, were at the sepulcher, and, not finding His Body, came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, who say that He is alive! And some of our people went to the sepulcher and found it so as the women had said―but Him they found not!’ Then Jesus said to them: ‘O foolish and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken! Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into His glory?’ And, beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded to them all the things in the Scriptures that were concerning Him” (Luke 24:13-27).
We all know how St. Thomas was in disbelief about the Resurrection―but so too were all the Apostles and disciples! To them, Jesus was dead and buried―and all His plans with Him! The Gospels account of Our Lord apparitions after His resurrection designate Mary Magdalen as being the first person to whom Jesus appeared (though tradition tells us that Our Lady was the first person He appeared to). For Mary Magdalen, too, Jesus was “dead and buried” and this had made her disconsolate. “Mary Magdalen stood outside the sepulcher, weeping. Now, as she was weeping, she stooped down and looked into the sepulcher. And she saw two angels in white, sitting―one at the head and one at the feet―where the body of Jesus had been laid. They said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them: ‘Because they have taken away my Lord―and I know not where they have laid Him!’ When she had said this, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing―and she knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ Whom do you seek?’ She, thinking it was the gardener, said to Him: ‘Sir! If you have taken Him from here, tell me where you have laid Him, and I will take Him away!’ Jesus said to her: ‘Mary!’ She turning, said to Him: ‘Rabboni!’ (which is to say, ‘Master!’). Jesus said to her: ‘Do not touch Me―for I am not yet ascended to My Father! But go to My brethren and tell them that I ascend to My Father and to your Father, to My God and your God!’” (John 20:11-17).
Yet when Mary ran back and told the Apostles and other disciples that Jesus has appeared to her, they did not believe her! That led to Our Lord appearing to them in person! “Jesus stood in the midst of them and said to them: ‘Peace be to you! It is I―fear not!’ But they, being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit. And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you troubled? And why do these thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet―and know that it is I Myself! Touch and see―for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have!’ And, when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet―yet they believed not” (Luke 24:36-41).
As regards the “Doubting Thomas”, Holy Scripture tells us that “Thomas, one of the Twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Unless I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side―I will not believe!’ And after eight days, again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in their midst, and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put your finger in here and see My hands! And bring here your hand and put it into My side! And be not faithless―but believing!’ Thomas answered and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because you have seen Me, Thomas, you have believed! Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:29).
Which Turning Will You Take at the Easter Crossroads?
Now that Lent is over and Easter is here―what road will you take? Will you, like the two disciples on the road to Emmaus after the crucifixion, walk away from Jerusalem? Or will you stay where you are? In other words, there are those who walk away from the progress they may have made during Lent, and walk back into their old habits. Whereas there are some―admittedly few―who not only maintain the progress that they have made, but also build upon it. “Jesus said: ‘No man putting his hand to the plough and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God!’” (Luke 9:62).
All Change!
The resurrection of Our Lord sees Him come back much changed and much different to what He was before. So much so, that He is not even recognized by His nearest and dearest! Mary Magdalen does not recognize Him. The two disciples on the road to Emmaus do not recognize Him. His own Apostles do not recognize Him. Something similar is seen in the apparition of St. Dominic Savio after his death, when he came to St. John Bosco—his teacher and confessor―while Bosco was still on Earth. St. John Bosco did not recognize him and had to ask: “Is that you Dominic?”
New Life!
Our Lord had passed through the barrier of suffering and death and emerged on the other side in His new life, His glorious life, a life in His glorified body. This should teach us that, after the suffering and attempts to kill sin, during the season of Lent, we should be emerging from Lent as ‘new-beings’ with a new attitude and a new life-style.
“Put off the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error―and be renewed in the spirit of your mind―and put on the new man, who, according to God, is created in justice and holiness of truth!” (Ephesians 4:22-24). “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above; where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth! For you are dead and your life is hidden with Christ in God! When Christ shall appear―Who is your life―then you also shall appear with Him in glory!” (Colossians 3:1-4).
Saul Resurrects as Paul
St. Paul, too, went through his ‘three-days-of death’ or, rather, ‘three-days-of-darkness’ when he was struck blind by Jesus on the road to Damascus. He then went through his own ‘Lent’ by praying and not eating or drinking for three days: “And he was there three days, without sight, and he did neither eat nor drink” (Acts 9:9).
In the meantime, God was preparing Saul for a new life. Saul would be given a new name—Paul; just like Simon was renamed Peter. He would be given a new mission—instead of rounding up Christians to arrest them; he would now round up people and make them into Christians.
“And the Lord said to Ananias: ‘Arise, and go into the street that is called Strait, and seek in the house of Judas, one named Saul of Tarsus. For behold he prays!’ And meanwhile, Saul saw a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hands upon him, so that he might receive his sight. But Ananias answered: ‘Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he has done to Thy saints in Jerusalem. And here he has authority, from the chief priests, to bind all that invoke Thy Name!’ And the Lord said to him: ‘Go thy way! For this man is to Me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!’” (Acts 9:1-16).
I was blind! Now I see!
This should also be the case for ourselves, who have been blind and, like Saul, by our sins, have persecuted Christ. Our Lord could well say to us the words He addressed to Saul (Paul): “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?” (Acts 9:4). Yet the mercy of Christ transformed the soul of Saul into the pillar of Paul, but not without pain and suffering.
Suffering After His Resurrection
The new Paul was destined to pay for his past sins by suffering throughout his new ‘risen’ or ‘resurrected’ life. Paul himself lists some of the many sufferings that he had endured in the short time since his ‘resurrection’:
“In many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods; once I was stoned; thrice I suffered shipwreck; a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often; in perils of waters; in perils of robbers; in perils from my own nation; in perils from the Gentiles; in perils in the city; in perils in the wilderness; in perils in the sea; in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness; in much watchings; in hunger and thirst; in fastings often; in cold and nakedness. Besides those things which are without―my daily instance, the solicitude for all the churches.
“Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is scandalized, and I am not on fire? If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity. My daily instance. The labors that come in, and press upon me every day. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is blessed for ever, knows that I lie not. At Damascus, the governor of the nation under Aretas the king, guarded the city of the Damascenes, to apprehend me. And through a window I was let down by the wall in a basket, and so escaped his hands …
“But for myself I will glory nothing, but in my infirmities! For though I should have a mind to glory, I shall not be foolish; for I will say the truth. But I forbear, lest any man should think of me above that which he sees in me, or anything he hears from me. And lest the greatness of the revelations should exalt me, there was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me. For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me. And He said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee―for power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may dwell in me. For which cause I please myself in my infirmities; in reproaches; in necessities; in persecutions; in distresses for Christ. For when I am weak, then am I powerful” (2 Corinthians 11:23-33; 12:1-10).
Don’t Go Back!
Our Easter should see, likewise, a resurrection in ourselves. We should not go back to our old ways, like the dog goes back to his vomit: “As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). There are too many Catholics, who, now that Lent is over, will go back to a life of self-indulgence and over-indulgence. They just don’t get it! They do not understand! “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and who have ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21).
In very first readings of the first two Masses of Easter (the Midnight Mass and the Day Mass), the Church clearly tells us that we have to change! This is the very first message of Easter! That the old ways have to be cast far away from us, so that we live a new, resurrected, better and more holy life:
The Church’s Easter Message
“Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened―for Christ our Pasch is sacrificed! Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness―but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth!” (Epistle from Midnight Mass: 1 Corinthians 5:7-8).
“Brethren: If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God: mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth. For you are dead [to the world and sin], and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ shall appear―Who is your life―then you also shall appear with Him in glory!” (Epistle from the Day Mass: Colossians 3:1-4).
Christ Rises With His Wounds
The second point that is worth mentioning and imprinting upon our minds and hearts, is the fact that Our Lord rises from the dead WITH his wounds still visible. He could have healed Himself totally, but He chose to keep His wounds like a stigmata.
He also leaves His shroud to us as a relic and a reminder of His Passion. He doesn’t want to be remembered so much for His resurrection, as He wants to be remembered for His Passion and Death. It was the latter that redeemed us and brought about the defeat of the devil, sin and death.
We have arrived at the crossroads of Lent and Easter―yet that does not mean that we must now cast the cross off at the side of the road! Just because Lent is over, it does not mean an end to penance and sacrifice. Penance and sacrifice are the bread and butter of the Christian life. It should be the staple diet of any and every Christian. Our Lady calls for penance at Lourdes and sacrifice at Fatima. Our Lord clearly told us: “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross DAILY, and follow me” (Luke 9:23). “Daily” means every day of the year and not just Lent. Our Lord and Our Lady suffered every single day of their lives—not just during the Passion, or just Seven isolated Sorrows! And Our Lord told us: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Delighting the Devil
If we go back to our pre-Lenten attitudes and lifestyle, then we are insanely going backwards when we should going forwards—to the devil’s delight! Celebrating Easter does not mean over-indulging or, even less, going back to the venial or even mortal sins of the past! Otherwise, we end up caressing Our Lord with our extra prayers and sacrifices during Lent, and then go back to slapping Him around after Lent is over!
Maintain your Higher Spiritual Levels Gained During Lent
Though we may not be required to fast outside of Lent (though it is not forbidden to do so, for fasting is a wonderful weapon against the devil—who does not just work during Lent, but all-year-round!), we can and still should ‘fast’ from sin; the occasions of sin; worldliness and frivolity. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) … For the word of God cannot survive in a worldly atmosphere, “the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things entering in choke the word, and it is made fruitless!” (Mark 4:19).
God Wants to Save; But Many Don’t Want His Terms
Even though “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17), “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not! He came unto His own, and His own received Him not! ... In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shined in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it!” (John 1:4-11).
St. Paul was in darkness, which got worse and ended up with him being blinded, as a means of driving home to him the extent of his spiritual blindness. Let the scales fall from our eyes as they fell from his eyes―so that we can see the new life that God has mapped out for us, beginning with this Easter season! How many Catholics and how many times have they rejected God’s invitation to come to the spiritual banquet of a new life at Easter? God may well say one day: “The marriage indeed is ready; but they that were invited were not worthy!’ And he said to his servants: ‘Go ye therefore into the highways; and as many as you shall find, call to the marriage!’” (Matthew 22:8-9).
Listen to Your Mother!
Let us not ignore God’s invitation, nor test His patience: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked!” (Galatians 6:7). Let us take the advice of Holy Mother Church, as given at the very start of this Easter season: “Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth … If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth! For you are dead [to the world and sin], and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Epistles from the Midnight Mass and the Day Mass: 1 Corinthians 5:7-8; Colossians 3:1-4).
Celebrate we must, but our celebration is more spiritual (to satisfy the soul) than it is carnal (to satisfy the body). We do not see Our Lord ‘living-it-up’ after His resurrection by indulging in joys of the body, but we see Him giving much spiritual joy to His disciples. Let us imitate Our Lord! A happy, holy and joyous Easter to all!
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR THE QUADRAGESIMA SEASON
Article 40
Holy Saturday, April 19th
From Good Friday to Lousy Saturday
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Holy Saturday, April 19th
From Good Friday to Lousy Saturday
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Where’s He Gone? They’ve Taken Him Away! No Mass, No Communion Today!
Yesterday, on Good Friday, there was no Sacrifice of the Mass offered anywhere. If you love your Mass, then that was not a good Good Friday feeling! However, every cloud has a silver lining―and the silver lining was that Holy Communion was still available in the Solemn Afternoon Liturgy! Today, however, could be termed “Lousy” Saturday―because, not only is there no Holy Sacrifice of the Mass available, but neither is Holy Communion available!
All throughout Lent, the Church encouraged fasting and abstinence with regard to food and other things too. Yet, all throughout Lent, Mass and Holy Communion was available at least once a day―if you had several priests in your parish, then you could even go to several Masses each day! Today, on Holy Saturday, the Church obliges, or you could say “forces” you to fast and abstain from both Mass and Holy Communion!
This, of course, replicates what happened to Christ’s disciples following the crucifixion. Prior to the crucifixion, Christ was present and accessible every single day―but after His crucifixion and death He was no longer accessible and available. The sacrifice of the cross was over and finished and, additionally, they could no longer communicate with Him. You could look at this as being symbolic of several different scenarios.
(1) The absence of Christ (God) is clearly manifest when we ‘crucify’ and ‘kill’ Him (His grace) in our souls through mortal sin―“mortal” implies death, and through mortal sin we put to death the life of grace in souls, we drive it out, we reject it―after which we are left ‘Christless’ and loveless―apart for our love of sin.
(2) The absence of Christ (God) is also one of the torments of Hell, where that absence of God gives the damned far more pain than the horrendous fires of Hell and all its other tortures.
(3) The absence of God is also one of the punishments of Purgatory, which also pains the soul more that the fires of Purgatory.
(4) The absence of God is also a trait or condition that we have to pass through in our spiritual life―not just in mortal sin―but also when start to get much closer to God and begin to love Him more and more. At some point God will withdraw Himself and leave us “high and dry” in order to test us, to see if we only follow Him and love Him as long as He gives us consolations; or whether we will still follow Him and love Him when He withdraws all consolations.
(5) The absence of God on this Holy Saturday can also be seen as day of reckoning for ourselves―where we can mull over in our minds the preceding days of Lent; evaluate how well or badly we have passed through Lent; a time to humble ourselves by admitting that could have done much better; and begging God not to deprive of too many graces in the forthcoming Resurrection Day and Easter Season―for, usually, we will only reap what we have sown! Yet, just as Christ repeatedly fell and rose again on the Way of the Cross―let us humble ourselves and rise again with sorrow for our negligence, lukewarmness, half-heartedness and failures―resolving to do better in the future while not making excuses for the present.
Jesus is Buried, But Cross Isn’t
On Holy Saturday—an incredibly ‘silent’ day in the Church’s Liturgy, apart from the Divine Office or Liturgy of the Hours—there is a sense of an absence of Christ. Walk into a church and what do you see? The tabernacle is open and empty. The altar is almost bare. All candles—especially the sanctuary light—are dead and extinguished. The statues buried beneath purple coverings. What can you see? There are some things that visible! What are they?
For one, there is the crucifix above the empty tabernacle—just as the cross of Christ remained on Calvary after Christ was taken away. Also, if you look around, you will still see the Stations of the Cross uncovered—as they have been throughout Lent, and also throughout Passiontide when the other statues and pictures were buried beneath purple ‘burial’ cloths, and they will remain uncovered throughout the whole year! The Cross of Christ and the Way or Stations of the Cross are not meant for Lent only, but it for the whole Liturgical Year and for every single day of our lives, in every circumstance of life. For without that Cross of Christ there is no salvation—hence the liturgy gives us phrases such as: “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”).
Don’t Bury Your Cross!
You may not have the Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion available to you because it has been “taken away”‘—but the cross is always available to you and always will be available to you until the day you die (whether you want that cross or not). If you ‘bury’ your cross—like the man who buried his talent in the ground (Matthew 25:14-30)—and your salvation is dead and buried! Like that man who buried the talent, we risk hearing the words: “And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant, you knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewn! You Therefore, you ought to have committed my money to the bankers, so that at my coming I should have received back my own money with additional interest [usury]. Therefore take away the talent from him, and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has, there shall be given more, and he shall abound―but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have, shall be taken away. And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:26-30). Our crosses are far more precious than any talents (money) that we have. We cannot buy our way into Heaven with money (except by giving alms), but we can buy Heaven with the cross.
This is why Our Lord says emphatically: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). There is absolutely no “wiggle-room” in those words—no loophole, no escape clause, no compromise—it is a “non-negotiable” fact. There is no salvation outside Christ and He is to be found on the cross—that is why we have the crucifix overlooking every altar and the Stations of the Cross peering down upon us from all sides—in season and out of season, during Lent and outside of Lent, before Good Friday, during Good Friday and after Good Friday! “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”) ― those words are not only applicable, valid and redeemable on Good Friday only, but every day of the year―in season and out of season; during Lent and outside of Lent.
The Sacrifice of the Mass is the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross
The extreme importance of the cross in our lives is manifested by the Sacrifice of the Mass―which is nothing other than the continuation of Christ’s Sacrifice on Calvary, but in a non-bloody manner. The Sacrifice of the Mass is ever present in our lives―it is not offered on just a few days of the year, but on every day of the year by every priest. In effect, to go to Mass is to go to Calvary. This is an attitude that is rarely found among Catholics―for, as they say: “Familiarity breeds contempt!” The longer we do something, the more familiar we are with it, and it starts to become automatic. The same is true for the Sacrifice of the Mass, and for prayer in general―so to for the Sacrament of Confession.
St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676–1751), in his book The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass, writes: “It requires great patience to endure the language of careless livers, ruinous to devotion, saying for instance: ‘A Mass more or less counts for little!’ … ‘It is no small thing to hear Mass on festivals!’ … ‘The Mass of this or that priest is for length like one in Holy Week; when he appears at the altar, I generally get out of church right away!’ He who talks in this way, lets it be seen that he has little or no esteem for the thrice-Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. That Sacrifice is the sun of Christianity, the soul of Faith, the center of the Catholic religion, wherein are beheld all her rites, all her ceremonies, and all her Sacraments; in short, it is the compendium of all the good and beautiful to be found in the Church of God … The principal excellence of the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass consists in being essentially identical with that which was offered on the Cross of Calvary―with this sole difference, that the Sacrifice on the Cross was bloody, and made once for all, while the Sacrifice of the Altar is an unbloody Sacrifice.”
“At every hour, then, in various parts of the world, this most perfectly Holy Priest [Jesus Christ] offers to the Father His Blood, His Soul, and His whole self for us―and all this He does as many times as there are Masses celebrated in the whole world. O boundless treasure thus possessed by us in the Church of God! O happy we if we could but assist at all these Masses! What a store of reward would be thus acquired! What a heaping up of graces in this life, what a fund of glory in the other, would be the fruit of so loving an attendance! … Thus without that thrice-holy Victim, Jesus Christ, first of all bloodily sacrificed for us upon the Cross, and daily sacrificed unbloodily upon our altars, it would be all at an end with us; each might say to the other: ‘We part to meet in Hell!’ Yes, in Hell! But in possessing this treasure of the Holy Mass, hope breathes again; and, if we but throw it not away by our own mismanagement, we have holy Paradise within our grasp!”
“Now, tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, you thoroughly well consider that you are going up as it were to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer. If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued, with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers, what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball? But what shall be said if you profane those functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time, and in any place; but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God!”
Would not this season of the Resurrection of Christ be an ideal time to beg from God the grace to resurrect our devotion and appreciation of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―as well the Holy Eucharist that we receive in Holy Communion?
Yesterday, on Good Friday, there was no Sacrifice of the Mass offered anywhere. If you love your Mass, then that was not a good Good Friday feeling! However, every cloud has a silver lining―and the silver lining was that Holy Communion was still available in the Solemn Afternoon Liturgy! Today, however, could be termed “Lousy” Saturday―because, not only is there no Holy Sacrifice of the Mass available, but neither is Holy Communion available!
All throughout Lent, the Church encouraged fasting and abstinence with regard to food and other things too. Yet, all throughout Lent, Mass and Holy Communion was available at least once a day―if you had several priests in your parish, then you could even go to several Masses each day! Today, on Holy Saturday, the Church obliges, or you could say “forces” you to fast and abstain from both Mass and Holy Communion!
This, of course, replicates what happened to Christ’s disciples following the crucifixion. Prior to the crucifixion, Christ was present and accessible every single day―but after His crucifixion and death He was no longer accessible and available. The sacrifice of the cross was over and finished and, additionally, they could no longer communicate with Him. You could look at this as being symbolic of several different scenarios.
(1) The absence of Christ (God) is clearly manifest when we ‘crucify’ and ‘kill’ Him (His grace) in our souls through mortal sin―“mortal” implies death, and through mortal sin we put to death the life of grace in souls, we drive it out, we reject it―after which we are left ‘Christless’ and loveless―apart for our love of sin.
(2) The absence of Christ (God) is also one of the torments of Hell, where that absence of God gives the damned far more pain than the horrendous fires of Hell and all its other tortures.
(3) The absence of God is also one of the punishments of Purgatory, which also pains the soul more that the fires of Purgatory.
(4) The absence of God is also a trait or condition that we have to pass through in our spiritual life―not just in mortal sin―but also when start to get much closer to God and begin to love Him more and more. At some point God will withdraw Himself and leave us “high and dry” in order to test us, to see if we only follow Him and love Him as long as He gives us consolations; or whether we will still follow Him and love Him when He withdraws all consolations.
(5) The absence of God on this Holy Saturday can also be seen as day of reckoning for ourselves―where we can mull over in our minds the preceding days of Lent; evaluate how well or badly we have passed through Lent; a time to humble ourselves by admitting that could have done much better; and begging God not to deprive of too many graces in the forthcoming Resurrection Day and Easter Season―for, usually, we will only reap what we have sown! Yet, just as Christ repeatedly fell and rose again on the Way of the Cross―let us humble ourselves and rise again with sorrow for our negligence, lukewarmness, half-heartedness and failures―resolving to do better in the future while not making excuses for the present.
Jesus is Buried, But Cross Isn’t
On Holy Saturday—an incredibly ‘silent’ day in the Church’s Liturgy, apart from the Divine Office or Liturgy of the Hours—there is a sense of an absence of Christ. Walk into a church and what do you see? The tabernacle is open and empty. The altar is almost bare. All candles—especially the sanctuary light—are dead and extinguished. The statues buried beneath purple coverings. What can you see? There are some things that visible! What are they?
For one, there is the crucifix above the empty tabernacle—just as the cross of Christ remained on Calvary after Christ was taken away. Also, if you look around, you will still see the Stations of the Cross uncovered—as they have been throughout Lent, and also throughout Passiontide when the other statues and pictures were buried beneath purple ‘burial’ cloths, and they will remain uncovered throughout the whole year! The Cross of Christ and the Way or Stations of the Cross are not meant for Lent only, but it for the whole Liturgical Year and for every single day of our lives, in every circumstance of life. For without that Cross of Christ there is no salvation—hence the liturgy gives us phrases such as: “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”).
Don’t Bury Your Cross!
You may not have the Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion available to you because it has been “taken away”‘—but the cross is always available to you and always will be available to you until the day you die (whether you want that cross or not). If you ‘bury’ your cross—like the man who buried his talent in the ground (Matthew 25:14-30)—and your salvation is dead and buried! Like that man who buried the talent, we risk hearing the words: “And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant, you knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewn! You Therefore, you ought to have committed my money to the bankers, so that at my coming I should have received back my own money with additional interest [usury]. Therefore take away the talent from him, and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has, there shall be given more, and he shall abound―but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have, shall be taken away. And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:26-30). Our crosses are far more precious than any talents (money) that we have. We cannot buy our way into Heaven with money (except by giving alms), but we can buy Heaven with the cross.
This is why Our Lord says emphatically: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). There is absolutely no “wiggle-room” in those words—no loophole, no escape clause, no compromise—it is a “non-negotiable” fact. There is no salvation outside Christ and He is to be found on the cross—that is why we have the crucifix overlooking every altar and the Stations of the Cross peering down upon us from all sides—in season and out of season, during Lent and outside of Lent, before Good Friday, during Good Friday and after Good Friday! “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”) ― those words are not only applicable, valid and redeemable on Good Friday only, but every day of the year―in season and out of season; during Lent and outside of Lent.
The Sacrifice of the Mass is the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross
The extreme importance of the cross in our lives is manifested by the Sacrifice of the Mass―which is nothing other than the continuation of Christ’s Sacrifice on Calvary, but in a non-bloody manner. The Sacrifice of the Mass is ever present in our lives―it is not offered on just a few days of the year, but on every day of the year by every priest. In effect, to go to Mass is to go to Calvary. This is an attitude that is rarely found among Catholics―for, as they say: “Familiarity breeds contempt!” The longer we do something, the more familiar we are with it, and it starts to become automatic. The same is true for the Sacrifice of the Mass, and for prayer in general―so to for the Sacrament of Confession.
St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676–1751), in his book The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass, writes: “It requires great patience to endure the language of careless livers, ruinous to devotion, saying for instance: ‘A Mass more or less counts for little!’ … ‘It is no small thing to hear Mass on festivals!’ … ‘The Mass of this or that priest is for length like one in Holy Week; when he appears at the altar, I generally get out of church right away!’ He who talks in this way, lets it be seen that he has little or no esteem for the thrice-Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. That Sacrifice is the sun of Christianity, the soul of Faith, the center of the Catholic religion, wherein are beheld all her rites, all her ceremonies, and all her Sacraments; in short, it is the compendium of all the good and beautiful to be found in the Church of God … The principal excellence of the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass consists in being essentially identical with that which was offered on the Cross of Calvary―with this sole difference, that the Sacrifice on the Cross was bloody, and made once for all, while the Sacrifice of the Altar is an unbloody Sacrifice.”
“At every hour, then, in various parts of the world, this most perfectly Holy Priest [Jesus Christ] offers to the Father His Blood, His Soul, and His whole self for us―and all this He does as many times as there are Masses celebrated in the whole world. O boundless treasure thus possessed by us in the Church of God! O happy we if we could but assist at all these Masses! What a store of reward would be thus acquired! What a heaping up of graces in this life, what a fund of glory in the other, would be the fruit of so loving an attendance! … Thus without that thrice-holy Victim, Jesus Christ, first of all bloodily sacrificed for us upon the Cross, and daily sacrificed unbloodily upon our altars, it would be all at an end with us; each might say to the other: ‘We part to meet in Hell!’ Yes, in Hell! But in possessing this treasure of the Holy Mass, hope breathes again; and, if we but throw it not away by our own mismanagement, we have holy Paradise within our grasp!”
“Now, tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, you thoroughly well consider that you are going up as it were to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer. If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued, with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers, what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball? But what shall be said if you profane those functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time, and in any place; but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God!”
Would not this season of the Resurrection of Christ be an ideal time to beg from God the grace to resurrect our devotion and appreciation of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―as well the Holy Eucharist that we receive in Holy Communion?
Article 39
Good Friday, April 18th
Good Friday―As Good As It Gets!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Good Friday, April 18th
Good Friday―As Good As It Gets!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Good Friday? Good Grief!
How is Good Friday good? Should it not be called something like Grief Friday instead of Good Friday―or Grim Friday, Gruesome Friday, or something similar? How can condemning an innocent Christ to death; ramming long thorns into Christ’s head; scourging an innocent Christ for around 45 minutes (which was the custom); making a brutally battered and bruised Christ carry a heavy cross; nailing His hands and feet to that cross; finally piercing His side with a lance―how can all this fall into the category of being good? Is it not the exact opposite?
Death is not Good
In our eyes and minds, death is not something good! Objectively speaking, that is true―death is not good. God did not intend or desire death. Adam and Eve―and every single human being afterwards―would not have died were it not for that fatal Original Sin, which infected not only Adam and Eve, but every member of the human family that Adam and Eve started. “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15). “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56). “By one man sin entered into this world [like a virus―the virus of Original Sin], and, by sin, death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned!” (Romans 5:12). “Death reigned from Adam” (Romans 5:14).
Sentenced to Death
The bottom line is that we have all been sentenced to death! We have not only been sentenced to a physical or bodily death―we have also been sentenced to an eternal ‘death’ or spiritual ‘death’ for eternity in Hell! Why? Because we have all sinned―and death is the wage for sin. “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). Yet, like fools, we do not take sin very seriously―or we might even laugh at sin: “A fool will laugh at sin!” (Proverbs 14:9) … “A fool works mischief, as it were, for sport!” (Proverbs 10:23). Foolishly, we fail to really understand the gravity of sin. Sin is truly the greatest evil in world―something that many find hard to believe. Yet our Catechisms tell us so: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Death Row
Even Christ―in His humanity―was afraid of death. Hence He repeatedly pleaded with His Father in the Garden of Gethsemane to take away that bitter chalice from Him. Christ―being sinless―did not merit death. He did not merit the tortures that He clearly saw and knew that awaited Him, so He begged His Father to “let Him off the hook”, saying: “My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from Me! Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt! … Again the second time, He went and prayed, saying: ‘My Father, if this chalice may not pass away, but I must drink it, Thy will be done!’ … He went again and He prayed the third time, saying the selfsame words” (Matthew 26:39-44). “He fell flat on the ground and He prayed that, if it might be, the hour might pass from Him. And He said: ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible to Thee! Remove this chalice from Me! But not what I will, but what Thou wilt. And again, He prayed, saying the same words” (Mark 14:35-39).
One can imagine the anguish of many criminals who find themselves on death row. Death row inmates in the US typically spend over a decade awaiting execution, but, for many, it is much longer. According to some psychiatrists, the results of being confined to death row for an extended period of time, including the effects of knowing one will be killed and the living conditions, can fuel delusions and suicidal tendencies in an individual and can cause insanity. The unique psychological impact on prisoners of long periods under the harsh conditions of death row, with the ever-present shadow of execution hanging over them, is known as death row phenomenon. This bleak isolation and years of torturous uncertainty can result in a sharp deterioration in a prisoner’s mental and physical state, often making inmates suicidal. Many have attempted suicide in the weeks and days leading up to their executions.
The Good Thief on Death Row
Can you imagine the joy of someone who is granted a reprieve on death row (temporary suspension of the death sentence) or even better, by being acquitted (which means a formal judgment by a court, either by a judge or a jury, stating that the defendant is not guilty of the crime charged). The Good Thief on Calvary found himself in another position―he did not receive a reprieve (for the death sentence was carried out), nor was he granted an acquittal (for he truly was guilty of his crimes)―but he did receive the mercy of Christ by avoiding the sentence of eternal damnation which he had justly deserved.
The situation of the Good Thief is our situation―we are guilty of many sins, there is no doubt about that. We cannot claim that we have been falsely sentenced as being guilty of sin―we did it and we know it. The best we can hope for is not a declaration of innocence, but mercy shown towards our guilt. We have committed many sins―definitely many venial sins, and more than likely many mortal sins―and regardless of whether they have been venial or mortal, they are the greatest evils in the world. What price, what punishment, what consequences do you think any legal system in this world would administer to someone who has committed the greatest crime? Remember, as already stated above, “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!”
Infinite Sin, Infinite Debt
Furthermore, since all sin is ultimately a sin against God (“Whatever you do to the least of My brethren, you do unto Me!” said Christ in Matthew 25:40), regardless of whether the object of our sin was God or neighbor, then, since God is infinite, our sins against God become infinite sins and they contract an infinite debt! We, being only finite beings, cannot repay an infinite debt―it requires an infinite being to repay an infinite debt, but also a human being to repay a human debt. Christ is that infinite being and that human being―because He is both God and Man. By His Passion and Death, He has potentially paid all our debts―but we have to “plug-in” to that redemptive action in order to profit from it. Christ, generously and mercifully died for everyone, but everyone will not be saved―not because of some fault on the side of Christ, but because of some fault on their side.
Do we fully realize and appreciate what Christ has done for us? Or have we lost the sense of sin so much that we trivialize our sins―reducing them, in our minds, from the greatest evil in the world to being “no big thing.” If sin is no longer a “big thing”, then what Our Lord did was “no big deal.” If sin is “no big thing” and Our Lord’s redemptive actions are “no big deal” then we are not going to do little or no penance for our sins and we will not accept God’s just punishments in this life for our sins―rather, we are going to moan and groan, complain and criticize all that He sends our way. Thus we quickly fall into the category of person whom Our Lord warns, saying: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). You can ask yourself the question: “If Christ came to save everyone―then why are most souls damned?” For damned they are―as the same Christ also said: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:5) … “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Our Lady essentially says the same thing to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Fear the danger of not paying attention to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls! ... How many have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification [penance] cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss! I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular! Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation! … My Son and Lord could have redeemed the human race without suffering so much! … It was not necessary to suffer so much! … Yet He wished to increase His sufferings only on account of the immensity of His love for souls! … But the worldlings, in their lethargy, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should hate suffering, especially after all that my most holy Son suffered for them!”
Neglectful, Thankless, Contemptuous & Insane
Our Lady sums up quite well the attitudes that lead most souls to Hell―neglect, thanklessness, contempt and insanity! Are we among them in one degree or another? Are we neglectful of our spiritual life and its duties? Are we ungrateful to God, Christ and the Church for many incredible things that have been done for us or given to us? Do we show contempt for the teachings of Christ and His Church, and the many messages of Our Lady that seek to help us in saving our souls? Do we live in an insane manner whereby we foolishly and stupidly ignore those things that could lead to our salvation? How highly do we rate our salvation to be? What price do we put on our salvation? Have we lost all sense of the value of salvation? What are we prepared to pay for salvation? What efforts are we prepared to make in order to attain our salvation? Do we have a cheap view of salvation? Do we presume that we will be saved? Do we expect to be saved regardless of how much we sin? Our Lord’s words should serve as a warning to us: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Our Lord suffered great violence on Good Friday in order to open the gates of Heaven to undeserving sinners―but are those undeserving sinners prepared to suffer violence from God’s enemies (the devil and the world) and also do violence to the enemies within themselves (their passions and sinful inclinations)? “Is this the return you make to the Lord, O foolish and senseless people?” (Deuteronomy 32:6).
Good Friday or Foolish Friday
God sent His Son into this world to try and save all: “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting!” (John 3:16). “God will [“to will” means “to want”] have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth!” (1 Timothy 2:4). “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men … that He might redeem us!” (Titus 2:11-14). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9). “God declares unto men, that all should everywhere do penance!” (Acts 17:30). “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but so that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “The Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). What could be clearer than that? What more could we want than that? Or as God says: “What is there that I ought to do more to My vineyard, that I have not done to it?” (Isaias 5:4).
Nevertheless, “The kings of the Earth stood up and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, saying: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!” (Psalm 2:2-3). Likewise, fools that we are, we do not pay attention to what God has said to us, nor recognize what God has done for us, nor do we show gratitude for all those things! Christ allowed Himself to be taken for a fool; to be treated like a fool; to de despised like a fool―yet the foolish world will not listen to His salvific words: “Doctrine to a fool is as fetters on the feet, and like manacles on the right hand!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:22). “Fools despise wisdom and instruction!” (Proverbs 1:7). “Understand, ye senseless among the people―and you fools, be wise at last!” (Psalm 93:8). “The sensual man perceives not those things that are of the Spirit of God―for it is foolishness to him, and he cannot understand” (1 Corinthians 2:14). “The senseless man shall not know, nor will the fool understand these things!” (Psalm 91:7). “Weep for the fool, for his understanding fails!” (Ecclesiasticus 22:10). “The fool walks in darkness!” (Ecclesiastes 2:14). “The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’” (Psalm 13:1). “The heart of fools is where there is mirth!” (Ecclesiastes 7:5). “A fool lifts up his voice in laughter” (Ecclesiasticus 21:23). “A fool will laugh at sin!” (Proverbs 14:9). “Fools cannot love but such things as please them!” (Ecclesiasticus 8:20). “A fool shall be filled with his own ways” (Proverbs 14:14). “The way of a fool is right in his own eyes!” (Proverbs 12:15). “A fool trusts in his own folly!” (Proverbs 17:12). “He that trusts in his own heart, is a fool!” (Proverbs 28:26). “Folly is joy to the fool!” (Proverbs 15:21). “The thought of a fool is sin!” (Proverbs 24:9). “The lips of a fool shall throw him down headlong!” (Ecclesiastes 10:12). “The tongue of the fool is his ruin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:15). “The mouth of a fool is his destruction, and his lips are the ruin of his soul!” (Proverbs 18:7). “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). “The senseless and the fool shall perish together!” (Psalm 48:11).
Nothing Better Than God―Nothing Better Than Salvation! What More Do You Want?
Just like we have weird ideas about the devil―evil looking face with horns, evil grin, long tail, pitchfork, etc.― likewise we can have weird ideas about Heaven and God―wings and halos; robes and harps; sitting on clouds; streets paved with gold; being greeted by St. Peter at the pearly gates, meeting a very old, long-bearded, white-haired, white-robed, genial God, etc. We get these ideas from children’s stories, movies, TV, cartoons, etc.
Yet, truth be told, we have little idea of what God and Heaven and really like―we can only clutch at straws of information, like tidbits thrown to us from the pages of Holy Scripture―such as: “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9). What would we not give to hear Our Lord say to us those words which he addressed to the Good Thief on Calvary: “Amen I say to thee, this day you shall be with Me in Paradise!” (Luke 23:43). Some seek and place their Paradise on Earth, finding pleasure and delight in perishable things―but is all that they are: perishable! No matter how beautiful, expensive, useful, desirable anything might be―it is finite, it is limited, it has it time span and that time must come to an end sooner or later. Only eternity is eternal and everlasting.
This month of April makes us think of the so-called “unsinkable” Titanic―which actually sank on its maiden voyage, on the night of April 14th, 1912 [read more here]. That year, 1912, Good Friday had fallen on April 5th and Easter Sunday on April 7th. On Easter Wednesday, April 10th, the Titanic set out on its maiden voyage. By Sunday, April 14th, the first Sunday after Easter, also known as Low Sunday, the Titanic was as low as you can get―at the bottom of the ocean! You could secularize the above quote about what God has prepared for us and foolishly apply it to the Titanic, which, in effect, most people did in a round about way: “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things the Titanic shipbuilders have prepared for them that love sailing!” The Titanic was massive and extravagant; having luxurious cabins; dance-halls; orchestra; theater; restaurants; swimming pools; saunas; Turkish baths; gyms; library; reading and writing rooms; it was richly decorated, comfort loaded, outfitted with top-of the line technology, including electricity, elevators, internal telephones, and Marconi radios, etc. It was the greatest and finest ship of its time―and it became the greatest disaster of its time! What was supposed to be a heavenly voyage on Earth, became Hell on Earth within days!
It turned being an expensive death for most people on board. Titanic ticket prices in 1912 ranged from $15 to $4350, equivalent to $450 to $125,000 today. First-class tickets could cost from $150 to $4350 (or about $4,300 to $125,000 today), offering the most luxurious accommodations. Second Class ticket prices ranged between $60 to $70 (or about $1,700 to $2,000 today). Third Class tickets, the most affordable option with the least amount of luxury, ranged from $15 to $30 (or about $450 to $900 today). For the luxury seekers, all of that money spent went down the drain, so to speak―a waste of money for a few days on “paradise on Earth” that left them with a sinking feeling!
Tickets to Heaven are not Cheap―but Worth It
Heaven is not cheap because sin is not cheap. We have all collided with the ‘iceberg’ of sin many times, sinking into mortal sin many times, contracting a massive debt over the entire voyage of our lives. Just the Titanic tickets were titanic in price, so too are the tickets to Heaven! But Heaven is an eternal, never-ending, unsinkable voyage with “bells-and-whistles” unimaginably greater than the Titanic could offer, or anything else that is in this world can offer. We would be fools not buy tickets for this eternal heavenly voyage of endless joy―the only other alternative is to buy tickets to Hell down below, which are easily obtainable, but end up being far more expensive in the long run. There is no other option.
The Titanic disaster can poignantly be linked to Our Lord’s words as to where we should look for our treasures and pleasures: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither the rust nor moth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures, treasures, teachings and spirit of the world, whose prince is the devil (Matthew 6:19-24).
Our Lord’s Passion and Death clearly showed the expense of sin and the cost of Heaven. You are not going to Heaven for a pittance. As with the first, second and third class tickets on the Titanic, you get what you pay for: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). Shed tears for you sins, for “They that sow in tears shall reap in joy!” (Psalm 125:5). Our happiness is not meant to be found in the boat of this life, but in that of the next life―as Our Lady said to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!” Our Lord said the same thing at the Last Supper: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice and you shall be made sorrowful―but your sorrow shall be turned into joy!” (John 16:2). At the end of the voyage of this life, “God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and death shall be no more; nor mourning; nor crying; nor sorrow shall be any more―for the former things are passed away!” (Apocalypse 21:4).
How is Good Friday good? Should it not be called something like Grief Friday instead of Good Friday―or Grim Friday, Gruesome Friday, or something similar? How can condemning an innocent Christ to death; ramming long thorns into Christ’s head; scourging an innocent Christ for around 45 minutes (which was the custom); making a brutally battered and bruised Christ carry a heavy cross; nailing His hands and feet to that cross; finally piercing His side with a lance―how can all this fall into the category of being good? Is it not the exact opposite?
Death is not Good
In our eyes and minds, death is not something good! Objectively speaking, that is true―death is not good. God did not intend or desire death. Adam and Eve―and every single human being afterwards―would not have died were it not for that fatal Original Sin, which infected not only Adam and Eve, but every member of the human family that Adam and Eve started. “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15). “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56). “By one man sin entered into this world [like a virus―the virus of Original Sin], and, by sin, death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned!” (Romans 5:12). “Death reigned from Adam” (Romans 5:14).
Sentenced to Death
The bottom line is that we have all been sentenced to death! We have not only been sentenced to a physical or bodily death―we have also been sentenced to an eternal ‘death’ or spiritual ‘death’ for eternity in Hell! Why? Because we have all sinned―and death is the wage for sin. “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). Yet, like fools, we do not take sin very seriously―or we might even laugh at sin: “A fool will laugh at sin!” (Proverbs 14:9) … “A fool works mischief, as it were, for sport!” (Proverbs 10:23). Foolishly, we fail to really understand the gravity of sin. Sin is truly the greatest evil in world―something that many find hard to believe. Yet our Catechisms tell us so: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Death Row
Even Christ―in His humanity―was afraid of death. Hence He repeatedly pleaded with His Father in the Garden of Gethsemane to take away that bitter chalice from Him. Christ―being sinless―did not merit death. He did not merit the tortures that He clearly saw and knew that awaited Him, so He begged His Father to “let Him off the hook”, saying: “My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from Me! Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt! … Again the second time, He went and prayed, saying: ‘My Father, if this chalice may not pass away, but I must drink it, Thy will be done!’ … He went again and He prayed the third time, saying the selfsame words” (Matthew 26:39-44). “He fell flat on the ground and He prayed that, if it might be, the hour might pass from Him. And He said: ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible to Thee! Remove this chalice from Me! But not what I will, but what Thou wilt. And again, He prayed, saying the same words” (Mark 14:35-39).
One can imagine the anguish of many criminals who find themselves on death row. Death row inmates in the US typically spend over a decade awaiting execution, but, for many, it is much longer. According to some psychiatrists, the results of being confined to death row for an extended period of time, including the effects of knowing one will be killed and the living conditions, can fuel delusions and suicidal tendencies in an individual and can cause insanity. The unique psychological impact on prisoners of long periods under the harsh conditions of death row, with the ever-present shadow of execution hanging over them, is known as death row phenomenon. This bleak isolation and years of torturous uncertainty can result in a sharp deterioration in a prisoner’s mental and physical state, often making inmates suicidal. Many have attempted suicide in the weeks and days leading up to their executions.
The Good Thief on Death Row
Can you imagine the joy of someone who is granted a reprieve on death row (temporary suspension of the death sentence) or even better, by being acquitted (which means a formal judgment by a court, either by a judge or a jury, stating that the defendant is not guilty of the crime charged). The Good Thief on Calvary found himself in another position―he did not receive a reprieve (for the death sentence was carried out), nor was he granted an acquittal (for he truly was guilty of his crimes)―but he did receive the mercy of Christ by avoiding the sentence of eternal damnation which he had justly deserved.
The situation of the Good Thief is our situation―we are guilty of many sins, there is no doubt about that. We cannot claim that we have been falsely sentenced as being guilty of sin―we did it and we know it. The best we can hope for is not a declaration of innocence, but mercy shown towards our guilt. We have committed many sins―definitely many venial sins, and more than likely many mortal sins―and regardless of whether they have been venial or mortal, they are the greatest evils in the world. What price, what punishment, what consequences do you think any legal system in this world would administer to someone who has committed the greatest crime? Remember, as already stated above, “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!”
Infinite Sin, Infinite Debt
Furthermore, since all sin is ultimately a sin against God (“Whatever you do to the least of My brethren, you do unto Me!” said Christ in Matthew 25:40), regardless of whether the object of our sin was God or neighbor, then, since God is infinite, our sins against God become infinite sins and they contract an infinite debt! We, being only finite beings, cannot repay an infinite debt―it requires an infinite being to repay an infinite debt, but also a human being to repay a human debt. Christ is that infinite being and that human being―because He is both God and Man. By His Passion and Death, He has potentially paid all our debts―but we have to “plug-in” to that redemptive action in order to profit from it. Christ, generously and mercifully died for everyone, but everyone will not be saved―not because of some fault on the side of Christ, but because of some fault on their side.
Do we fully realize and appreciate what Christ has done for us? Or have we lost the sense of sin so much that we trivialize our sins―reducing them, in our minds, from the greatest evil in the world to being “no big thing.” If sin is no longer a “big thing”, then what Our Lord did was “no big deal.” If sin is “no big thing” and Our Lord’s redemptive actions are “no big deal” then we are not going to do little or no penance for our sins and we will not accept God’s just punishments in this life for our sins―rather, we are going to moan and groan, complain and criticize all that He sends our way. Thus we quickly fall into the category of person whom Our Lord warns, saying: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). You can ask yourself the question: “If Christ came to save everyone―then why are most souls damned?” For damned they are―as the same Christ also said: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:5) … “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Our Lady essentially says the same thing to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Fear the danger of not paying attention to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls! ... How many have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification [penance] cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss! I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular! Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation! … My Son and Lord could have redeemed the human race without suffering so much! … It was not necessary to suffer so much! … Yet He wished to increase His sufferings only on account of the immensity of His love for souls! … But the worldlings, in their lethargy, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should hate suffering, especially after all that my most holy Son suffered for them!”
Neglectful, Thankless, Contemptuous & Insane
Our Lady sums up quite well the attitudes that lead most souls to Hell―neglect, thanklessness, contempt and insanity! Are we among them in one degree or another? Are we neglectful of our spiritual life and its duties? Are we ungrateful to God, Christ and the Church for many incredible things that have been done for us or given to us? Do we show contempt for the teachings of Christ and His Church, and the many messages of Our Lady that seek to help us in saving our souls? Do we live in an insane manner whereby we foolishly and stupidly ignore those things that could lead to our salvation? How highly do we rate our salvation to be? What price do we put on our salvation? Have we lost all sense of the value of salvation? What are we prepared to pay for salvation? What efforts are we prepared to make in order to attain our salvation? Do we have a cheap view of salvation? Do we presume that we will be saved? Do we expect to be saved regardless of how much we sin? Our Lord’s words should serve as a warning to us: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Our Lord suffered great violence on Good Friday in order to open the gates of Heaven to undeserving sinners―but are those undeserving sinners prepared to suffer violence from God’s enemies (the devil and the world) and also do violence to the enemies within themselves (their passions and sinful inclinations)? “Is this the return you make to the Lord, O foolish and senseless people?” (Deuteronomy 32:6).
Good Friday or Foolish Friday
God sent His Son into this world to try and save all: “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting!” (John 3:16). “God will [“to will” means “to want”] have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth!” (1 Timothy 2:4). “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men … that He might redeem us!” (Titus 2:11-14). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9). “God declares unto men, that all should everywhere do penance!” (Acts 17:30). “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but so that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “The Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). What could be clearer than that? What more could we want than that? Or as God says: “What is there that I ought to do more to My vineyard, that I have not done to it?” (Isaias 5:4).
Nevertheless, “The kings of the Earth stood up and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, saying: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!” (Psalm 2:2-3). Likewise, fools that we are, we do not pay attention to what God has said to us, nor recognize what God has done for us, nor do we show gratitude for all those things! Christ allowed Himself to be taken for a fool; to be treated like a fool; to de despised like a fool―yet the foolish world will not listen to His salvific words: “Doctrine to a fool is as fetters on the feet, and like manacles on the right hand!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:22). “Fools despise wisdom and instruction!” (Proverbs 1:7). “Understand, ye senseless among the people―and you fools, be wise at last!” (Psalm 93:8). “The sensual man perceives not those things that are of the Spirit of God―for it is foolishness to him, and he cannot understand” (1 Corinthians 2:14). “The senseless man shall not know, nor will the fool understand these things!” (Psalm 91:7). “Weep for the fool, for his understanding fails!” (Ecclesiasticus 22:10). “The fool walks in darkness!” (Ecclesiastes 2:14). “The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’” (Psalm 13:1). “The heart of fools is where there is mirth!” (Ecclesiastes 7:5). “A fool lifts up his voice in laughter” (Ecclesiasticus 21:23). “A fool will laugh at sin!” (Proverbs 14:9). “Fools cannot love but such things as please them!” (Ecclesiasticus 8:20). “A fool shall be filled with his own ways” (Proverbs 14:14). “The way of a fool is right in his own eyes!” (Proverbs 12:15). “A fool trusts in his own folly!” (Proverbs 17:12). “He that trusts in his own heart, is a fool!” (Proverbs 28:26). “Folly is joy to the fool!” (Proverbs 15:21). “The thought of a fool is sin!” (Proverbs 24:9). “The lips of a fool shall throw him down headlong!” (Ecclesiastes 10:12). “The tongue of the fool is his ruin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:15). “The mouth of a fool is his destruction, and his lips are the ruin of his soul!” (Proverbs 18:7). “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). “The senseless and the fool shall perish together!” (Psalm 48:11).
Nothing Better Than God―Nothing Better Than Salvation! What More Do You Want?
Just like we have weird ideas about the devil―evil looking face with horns, evil grin, long tail, pitchfork, etc.― likewise we can have weird ideas about Heaven and God―wings and halos; robes and harps; sitting on clouds; streets paved with gold; being greeted by St. Peter at the pearly gates, meeting a very old, long-bearded, white-haired, white-robed, genial God, etc. We get these ideas from children’s stories, movies, TV, cartoons, etc.
Yet, truth be told, we have little idea of what God and Heaven and really like―we can only clutch at straws of information, like tidbits thrown to us from the pages of Holy Scripture―such as: “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9). What would we not give to hear Our Lord say to us those words which he addressed to the Good Thief on Calvary: “Amen I say to thee, this day you shall be with Me in Paradise!” (Luke 23:43). Some seek and place their Paradise on Earth, finding pleasure and delight in perishable things―but is all that they are: perishable! No matter how beautiful, expensive, useful, desirable anything might be―it is finite, it is limited, it has it time span and that time must come to an end sooner or later. Only eternity is eternal and everlasting.
This month of April makes us think of the so-called “unsinkable” Titanic―which actually sank on its maiden voyage, on the night of April 14th, 1912 [read more here]. That year, 1912, Good Friday had fallen on April 5th and Easter Sunday on April 7th. On Easter Wednesday, April 10th, the Titanic set out on its maiden voyage. By Sunday, April 14th, the first Sunday after Easter, also known as Low Sunday, the Titanic was as low as you can get―at the bottom of the ocean! You could secularize the above quote about what God has prepared for us and foolishly apply it to the Titanic, which, in effect, most people did in a round about way: “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things the Titanic shipbuilders have prepared for them that love sailing!” The Titanic was massive and extravagant; having luxurious cabins; dance-halls; orchestra; theater; restaurants; swimming pools; saunas; Turkish baths; gyms; library; reading and writing rooms; it was richly decorated, comfort loaded, outfitted with top-of the line technology, including electricity, elevators, internal telephones, and Marconi radios, etc. It was the greatest and finest ship of its time―and it became the greatest disaster of its time! What was supposed to be a heavenly voyage on Earth, became Hell on Earth within days!
It turned being an expensive death for most people on board. Titanic ticket prices in 1912 ranged from $15 to $4350, equivalent to $450 to $125,000 today. First-class tickets could cost from $150 to $4350 (or about $4,300 to $125,000 today), offering the most luxurious accommodations. Second Class ticket prices ranged between $60 to $70 (or about $1,700 to $2,000 today). Third Class tickets, the most affordable option with the least amount of luxury, ranged from $15 to $30 (or about $450 to $900 today). For the luxury seekers, all of that money spent went down the drain, so to speak―a waste of money for a few days on “paradise on Earth” that left them with a sinking feeling!
Tickets to Heaven are not Cheap―but Worth It
Heaven is not cheap because sin is not cheap. We have all collided with the ‘iceberg’ of sin many times, sinking into mortal sin many times, contracting a massive debt over the entire voyage of our lives. Just the Titanic tickets were titanic in price, so too are the tickets to Heaven! But Heaven is an eternal, never-ending, unsinkable voyage with “bells-and-whistles” unimaginably greater than the Titanic could offer, or anything else that is in this world can offer. We would be fools not buy tickets for this eternal heavenly voyage of endless joy―the only other alternative is to buy tickets to Hell down below, which are easily obtainable, but end up being far more expensive in the long run. There is no other option.
The Titanic disaster can poignantly be linked to Our Lord’s words as to where we should look for our treasures and pleasures: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither the rust nor moth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures, treasures, teachings and spirit of the world, whose prince is the devil (Matthew 6:19-24).
Our Lord’s Passion and Death clearly showed the expense of sin and the cost of Heaven. You are not going to Heaven for a pittance. As with the first, second and third class tickets on the Titanic, you get what you pay for: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). Shed tears for you sins, for “They that sow in tears shall reap in joy!” (Psalm 125:5). Our happiness is not meant to be found in the boat of this life, but in that of the next life―as Our Lady said to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!” Our Lord said the same thing at the Last Supper: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice and you shall be made sorrowful―but your sorrow shall be turned into joy!” (John 16:2). At the end of the voyage of this life, “God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and death shall be no more; nor mourning; nor crying; nor sorrow shall be any more―for the former things are passed away!” (Apocalypse 21:4).
Article 38
Holy Thursday, April 17th
The Greatest Gift on Earth!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Holy Thursday, April 17th
The Greatest Gift on Earth!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Greatest Treasure
Today of all days―Holy Thursday, the day of the Last Supper―would be a perfect time to read through some of the wonderful ‘Faith-strengthening’ Eucharistic miracles that God has allowed to happen throughout the world in all centuries. Through such wondrous signs God calls souls to belief and conversion. Sadly, today, there are large numbers of Catholics who need converting and their Faith needs strengthening in the Greatest Gift on Earth, left to us by Our Lord!
There are increasing numbers of Catholics who are refusing to believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. Many think of the Eucharist as a mere symbol of Christ, and look upon the Mass as a mere commemoration of the Last Supper, and not the Sacrifice that it really and truly is! What an offense this must be to Our Lord! If already, in the more believing day of St. Margaret Mary (in the 1600s) Our Lord appeared to her and complained about the lack of love and devotion shown to Him—what would He have to say about our times?
Greatest Neglect
The Holy Eucharist is our “Greatest Treasure” and at the same time it is the modern era’s “Greatest Neglect.” It is impossible to identify the Holy Eucharist too closely with Jesus Christ. We should remember He is in the Holy Eucharist not merely with His substance. Some may say: “Transubstantiation means that the substance of bread and wine become the substance of Jesus Christ.”
No, it is not just an academic definition or philosophical explanation that is relegated to the memory banks of our mind—a cerebral thing, an academic thing, a theoretical thing. Transubstantiation means the substance of bread and wine are no longer there. The substance of bread and wine is replaced not only by the substance of Christ’s Body and Blood―what replaces the substance of bread and wine is Jesus Christ Himself, whole and entire! Everything that makes Him Christ, replaces what had been the substance of bread and wine. The substance of bread and wine become the whole Christ—that is what we mean by “Body, Soul, Blood and Divinity”—the whole Christ.
Living Heart
Therefore, Christ in the Holy Eucharist is here with His human heart and His Sacred Heart. Is it a living heart? Yes! This is seen in the Miracles of Lanciano and Buenos Aires. This is also why the revelations Our Lord made to St. Margaret Mary about promoting devotion to the Sacred Heart were all made from the Holy Eucharist.
Why do we equate the Sacred Heart with the Holy Eucharist? Because the Holy Eucharist is the whole Christ with His human heart. According to St. Margaret Mary, the Sacred Heart is the Holy Eucharist. So it follows that devotion to the Sacred Heart is devotion to the Holy Eucharist―the Church, in her liturgy, even has a votive Mass dedicated to the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus, assigning the date of its recommended celebration to the Thursday following the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The Holy Eucharist is infinite Love Incarnate―living in our midst in the Blessed Sacrament. When we receive the Holy Eucharist, we receive the living Christ—total, entire, living!
If Jesus causes the Host to become what science has identified as a human heart (by examining the Sacred Host remains from the Miracle of Lanciano, read more here)—and especially identifying the Host as a muscle of the heart that is responsible for the contraction of a human heart, a heart that suffers like that of someone who has been beaten severely about the chest—if He does such things, then it is in order to arouse and enliven our Faith in His Real Presence in the Holy Eucharist. He thus enables us to see that Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a re-presentation (i.e. making present once again) of the entire drama of our salvation―namely, Christ’s Passion and Death on Calvary, but now in an unbloody manner in the Sacrifice of the Mass.
Signs-a-Plenty
Jesus criticizes His listeners: “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will not believe!” (John 4:48). There is no need to actively seek out wondrous signs. But if Jesus chooses to give them to us, then we ought to accept them with meekness and humility in Faith, seeking to understand what He desires to tell us by them. Thanks to these signs, many people have discovered Faith in God—the One God in the Holy Trinity, Who reveals His Son to us: Jesus Christ, Who abides in the tabernacles of the world, Who worked through the Sacraments and Who teaches us through Holy Scripture, Tradition and the Magisterium of the Catholic Church—the triple cord of our Faith, of which Scripture says: “a threefold cord is not easily broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:12).
Miracles Seekers Are Often Blind
We have the “Greatest Treasure” staring us in the face―yet we run around trying to fill our minds and hearts with lesser spiritual treasures. We run after apparitions; we study prophecies; re read about private revelations; we delight over relics; we travel to holy sites where Our Lady or Our Lord might have appeared once, twice or a few times—but the place where Our Lord appears every day, which is the Altar upon which Mass is offered, we often leave neglected and we place it way down in our rankings of holy places and things to see and visit. The Imitation of Christ puts it thus:
“Many people travel far to honor the relics of the saints, marveling at their wonderful deeds and at the building of magnificent shrines. They gaze upon and kiss the sacred relics encased in silk and gold; and behold, You are here present before me on the Altar, my God, Saint of saints, Creator of men, and Lord of angels! Often in looking at such things, men are moved by curiosity, by the novelty of the unseen, and they bear away little fruit for the amendment of their lives, especially when they go from place to place lightly and without true contrition. But here in the Sacrament of the Altar You are wholly present, my God, the man Christ Jesus, from Whom is obtained the full realization of eternal salvation, as often as You are worthily and devoutly received.”
A Mystery that Surpasses our Understanding
The Holy Eucharist—the actual presence of the risen person of Jesus under the appearances of bread and wine—is one of the most important and most difficult truths, revealed to us by Christ. Eucharistic miracles are merely visible confirmations of what He tells us about Himself―namely, that He really does give us His glorified Body and Blood as spiritual food and drink.
Jesus established the Eucharist on the eve of His Passion and Death. During the Last Supper, “Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke: and gave to His disciples, and said: ‘Take ye, and eat! This is My Body!’ And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying: ‘Drink ye all of this! For this is My Blood of the New Testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!’” (Matthew 26:26-28). When Jesus took and gave the Apostles the bread and wine, He said: “This is My Body! …. This is My Blood!” by which He clearly meant that the bread and wine―which He gave them to eat and drink―really was His Body and Blood, and not some sort of symbol.
Jesus’ Eucharistic Sermon Shocks
Earlier, in the famous Eucharistic sermon recorded by St. John the Evangelist, Jesus said to the Jews: “Amen, amen I say unto you! Unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you! He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, has everlasting life and I will raise him up in the last day! For My Flesh is meat indeed and My Blood is drink indeed! He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, abides in Me, and I in him’” (John 6:54-57).
Shocked by Jesus’ words, the Jews said, “How can this Man give us His flesh to eat?” (John 6:53). Many of Jesus’ disciples were also scandalized. “This saying is hard, and who can hear it?” they objected. Knowing that the truth of the Eucharist was a shock and a scandal to many of His listeners, Jesus responded, not by retracting His words, but by raising the stakes: “Does this scandalize you? The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life!” (John 6: 62-63). Many refused to believe Him: “After this many of His disciples went back and walked no more with Him” (John 6:67).
Today, we see a repeat of both the incredulity and disbelief in the Real Presence—with anywhere from 65% to 85% of Catholics (depending upon where you live) no longer believing that Jesus is present in the Holy Eucharist—as well as a repeat of “many walked no more with Him”—as less than 20% come to Mass regularly on Sundays―for the rest it ends up being a “Sinday”.
One Good Communion Worth 1,000’s of Lukewarm Ones
As St. Louis de Montfort writes: “It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches his heart. A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly” (The Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-First Rose”). If that is true of the Hail Mary, how much more true is it not of Holy Communions? The devil knows this too, and, so, it is in his best interests to make sure that our Holy Communions are not made well. This is an endless battle that everyone has to face—whether it be pope, bishop or priest, or man, woman and child—and it will remain so until our dying day.
Real Communions of Fake Communions?
Our Lord’s words beg the question: “These people honor Me with their lips―but their hearts are far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). Would He say the same of our Holy Communions? Unfortunately, in our modern-day existence, quantity and speed have replaced the ancient values placed on quality and thoroughness. Not that quality is totally disregarded, but it often comes second to quantity. A bottom-line principle, that can be seen in the lives of many people, is that they want to pay less for things, so that they can afford to buy lots of different things. Now of course, one’s income obviously plays a large part in this, but many of the rich even play the same game. Manufacturers are often more focused on the quantity they can produce, more so than on the quality. If they can make something “look real” then there is no point spending extra money making the real thing. So we have fake stone or fake brick faҫades for houses; we have fake furs; fake foods; fake wood; fake gold; fake marble; fake candles; fake glass, fake teeth, fake hair, fake body implants, etc., etc. We are living in a fake world!
The sad part is that all this over-spills into our intellectual, moral and spiritual lives. We fake knowledge, we fake behavior, and we fake piety. We learn superficially—just enough to be able to make it look like we know a lot. Trivia becomes more popular than in-depth knowledge. We become a race of “Tips-and-Tricks”—but we are only tricking ourselves. Morally, the world has never been as sinful as it is today, yet we put on a kind of ‘moral-make-up’ to hide the sinfulness and focus on the sins of others in order to make us feel better in our own miserable state. Spiritually, we cover the faҫade of our Temple of the Holy Ghost (which St Paul says we are), with pseudo-gold bricks. Financially, we are prepared to borrow lots of money and fall into serious debt, in order to appear, to the world around us, as something that we are not, but simply want to be. I guess that would make us “fake wannabees”!
Pharisees, Judas and Magdalen
Three sinners—two losers—one winner! Why is that Mary Magdalen, an adulteress who was also possessed by seven devils, hits the jackpot, while the Pharisees and Judas end up as losers? A four-letter word is the answer! L-O-V-E! Mary Magdalen loved Our Lord—the Pharisees and Judas did not love Him. Jesus said of her: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much!” (Luke 7:47). Whereas He addressed the Pharisees with the following words: “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees―hypocrites! … Woe to you blind guides! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees―hypocrites! Because you are like whitened sepulchers, which outwardly appear to be beautiful to men, but within are full of dead men’s bones, and of all filthiness!” (Matthew 23).
Wasn’t Mary Magdalen a “hypocrite”? Wasn’t she a “whitened sepulcher”? Being possessed of seven devils, she was worse in a sense—yet it was her sincere love of Christ and sincere acceptance and admission of her guilt, and sorrow for her sins, permeated with a deep love and gratitude to God (Christ), which justified and saved her.
Concerning Judas, Our Lord said: “Woe to that man by whom the Son of man shall be betrayed―it were better for him if that man had not been born!” (Matthew 26:24). A loveless Judas became a faithless Judas―which led him to a hopeless end!
Our Lord’s Anger About Eucharistic Neglect
It was to both St. Margaret Mary Alacoque and to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame) that Our Lord complained about being neglected in the Eucharist due to lukewarmness, indifference, coldness or outright sacrileges. To St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, Our Lord often appeared in relation to the Holy Eucharist—either while she was adoring the Holy Eucharist, or around times of feasts associated with the Holy Eucharist—such as during the Corpus Christi Octave. The third apparition of the Sacred Heart took place in July of 1674, and of this St. Margaret Mary relates the following:
“One day, as I knelt before the Blessed Sacrament exposed on the altar… Jesus presented Himself to me … Then He revealed to me all the unspeakable marvels of His pure love, and the excess of love He had conceived for men from whom He had received nothing but ingratitude and contempt. ‘My Divine Heart is so passionately inflamed with love for men … that, not being able any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its ardent charity, It must spread them and manifest Itself to men … and … hold them back from the abyss of ruin … Behold this Heart which has so loved men that It spared nothing, even going so far as to exhaust and consume Itself, to prove to them Its love. And in return I receive from the greater part of men nothing but ingratitude, by the contempt, irreverence, sacrileges and coldness with which they treat Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what is still more painful to Me is that even souls consecrated to Me are acting in this way ... If they would only give Me some return of love! … This is more grievous to Me than all that I endured in My Passion! … But they have only coldness and contempt for all My endeavors to do them good! … You are to receive Me in the Blessed Sacrament as often as obedience will allow, no matter what mortification or humiliation it may entail. Moreover, you are to receive Holy Communion on the First Friday of each month, and every night between Thursday and Friday I will make you partaker of that sorrow unto death which it was My will to suffer in the Garden of Olives. This sorrow will reduce you, without your understanding how, to a kind of agony more bitter than death.’”
To Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame), Our Lord said: “Alas! If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
Don’t Be Fooled By Mass Attendance Alone!
It would be foolish and naïve to imagine that mere regular Mass attendance alone is a sign of good spiritual health. It is not! Far from it! Even in days when Mass attendance was extremely high, this was no guarantee of spiritual health, nor a guarantee of salvation. St. Alphonsus Liguori (1696-1787)—the patron saint of moral theologians—was of the opinion that many souls were in the habit of making bad confessions already back in his day. Fr. Frederick Faber (1814-1863) was of the opinion that most souls were lukewarm, yet most souls attended Sunday Mass regularly. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange (1877-1964) was of the opinion that most Catholic souls were not even beginners in the spiritual life—which means that they are either lukewarm or in the revolving door of mortal sin/confession/mortal sin.
Today, we can see almost all Sunday Mass goers line-up for Holy Communion, but barely anybody lines-up for Confession. Is mortal sin a rare thing today? Definitely not! How many sacrilegious Holy Communions are being made by the 17% of Catholics who can be bothered to attend Sunday Mass regularly? God only knows! But we can guess that the number is not small. Surveys show that among regular Sunday Mass attendees, only 60% believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist! The ultimate con of the devil is to have you—through lukewarmness and spiritual blindness—committing mortal sins which you should know to be mortal sins, but which through laziness in study and rationalization you happily dismiss as being mere venial sins!
A Dominican website points out: “Many sacrilegious Confessions and Communions may be traced to the fact that a soul confides too much in self, and not in the help of God. Men and women come into the confessional without the least preparation, after having been engaged in useless conversation on the street up to the moment of entering the Church. Others spend their time idly gazing around the church. This should never happen; and those who do so, show that they do not realize the sanctity of the action, which they are about to perform.
“It is a sacrilege to make a bad Confession. To receive absolution after having made an unworthy Confession, and consequently without having the right dispositions, is to incur the guilt of sacrilege; that is, the violation of a sacred thing. A bad Confession hinders and frustrates the instrumental action of the Sacrament of Penance, and he who is guilty of it may be said thus to destroy the efficacy of the Blood of Jesus Christ; for it is in the Precious Blood of Our Lord, shed long ago, that souls are cleansed from sin.
“Our Lord, instituted the Sacraments as so many channels through which His Precious Blood may be applied to souls, quickening them with and sustaining them in, a new and higher life. In the sacred tribunal of Penance, when the penitent comes properly disposed, as soon as the priest raises his hand over him and pronounces the words of absolution, through the Divine agency of the Blood of Our Lord, the soul is washed and purified of all its sins, no matter how great they may be; for Christ has said, ‘Whose sins ye shall forgive, they are forgiven.’ But if the penitent has not the proper disposition there is a sacrilege, for the Blood of Our Lord is, in a manner, destroyed – rendered ineffectual in that case. And, what is worse, a bad Confession is generally followed by a bad Communion. How great a crime is committed by unworthily receiving our Lord in Communion! They who do so, as St. Paul says, are guilty of the Body and Blood of the Lord. You have heard, perhaps of the unnatural mother who took her lovely smiling babe and buried it alive. Oh, how much greater is the crime of the bad Catholic who will bury the living Son of God in a heart foul with every crime, worse than any grave, however horrible! How will such a wretch one day answer an enraged Father for what may be called the murder of His adorable Son?
“What has been said was not to terrify or keep you away from the Sacraments. God forbid! The priest does not desire to frighten people away from the table of the Lord, but to press them to come to the Feast. You know, that if you do not approach and receive Holy Communion, you cannot have life in you; that is, the life of the soul, the life of the children of God. Yes, go to Communion – go frequently! It will nourish and strengthen your soul. Our Lord will dwell in you; He will support you. He will sustain you in your conflicts with the devil. Remember that what has been said was only to guard you against that carelessness with which too many, alas, approach the Sacraments.”
Words of Our Lord Himself
Fr. Robert Gottemuller complied a book called Words of Love, wherein he takes quotes of Our Lord made to three victim souls in the 20th century: Sister Josefa Menendez (1890-1923); Sister Mary of the Trinity (1901-1942); Sister Consolata Betrone (1903-1946). The book clearly points out the supremacy of love and the immense desire Our Lord has for our love. Here are only a few such quotes:
“Tell all souls that I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift which they may offer Me! Yes, an act of love is better than the discipline, for I thirst for love! Poor souls! They think that in order to reach Me it is necessary to live an austere, penitential life! ... See how they misrepresent Me! They make Me out as one to be feared, whereas I am kindness itself! See how they forget the precept which I have given them, the very essence of the entire Law: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, with thy whole soul ... I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift! ... I thirst for love! … I desire to be loved; I crave the love of My creatures! When they will come to love Me, they will no longer offend Me!” (Our Lord to Sr. Consolata Betrone).
“I am not known, and because I am not known, people do not know how to love Me―I who have so loved men! ... The more you know and love Me, the closer will you be united to all those who love Me! … Each one of you, in your own sphere, however obscure, can give Me nobly, heroically, love for love!” (Our Lord to Sr. Mary of the Trinity).
“Love gives Itself as food to Its own and this food is the substance which gives them their life and sustains them! Love humbles Itself before Its own ... and in so doing raises them to the highest dignity! Love surrenders Itself in totality, It gives in profusion and without reserve! With enthusiasm, with vehemence It is sacrificed, It is immolated, It is given for those It loves! ... The Holy Eucharist is love to the extreme of folly!” (Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez).
Fr. Anthony J. Paone, S.J., in his little gem of a pocket book, My Daily Bread, a Summary of the Spiritual Life, has the following beautiful passage with which these thoughts shall finish:
“Jesus says to us: ‘My Child, if My True Presence on the altar were limited to one place alone, many people from all parts of the world would try to visit that place at some time or other in their lives. Yet, now that I have made it easy for all to come to Me, see how many visit Me only when they are obliged!
“Many people are so cold toward Me. Like children they are impressed only by what they can touch and see. I have given them their Greatest Treasure in the Blessed Sacrament! Through My Apostles and their successors, I have promised to be personally present wherever the Blessed Sacrament is! Make EVERY effort to be deeply impressed by this greatest of all earthly gifts!
“It is not enough for you to believe in My Real Presence upon the altar. I placed Myself there for love of you. I wanted to be near you in some visible way, so that you might visit Me as often as you wished. You should wish it as often as possible.
“People come to Me for different reasons. Some come only on Sundays and holy days, through a sense of obligation. Either they do not want to lose Heaven, or they desire My help in their daily life. Then there are those who come to Me through mere habit. They act automatically, without any particular devotion to Me. There are, however, a certain number who come to Me for the best reason. They come because they are glad to be near Me. These people please Me best of all. They receive many extra graces which are not granted to the others.
“Consider how devoted My saints were to Me. They seized every opportunity to visit Me and stay with Me. They desired to abandon all useless interests so that they might have more time with Me. In return for this generosity with Me, they received a clearer understanding of My boundless goodness and a deeper appreciation of My infinite love.
“You, too, have the opportunity to give Me more of your time and attention. Make a greater effort to come closer to Me in friendship. You have the privilege of kneeling before Me like the simple, wonderful shepherds; the tired, admiring Magi; the suffering, begging leper; the penitent, hopeful Magdalene; the convinced, converted Thomas. How are you taking advantage of this privilege?
“How much easier it will be for you to face Me in your judgment if you have loved to face Me often during your earthly life. Each visit to Me is an act of Faith, of Love, and of self-purification. Come to Me often, so that I may shower more of My gifts upon your soul!”
Today of all days―Holy Thursday, the day of the Last Supper―would be a perfect time to read through some of the wonderful ‘Faith-strengthening’ Eucharistic miracles that God has allowed to happen throughout the world in all centuries. Through such wondrous signs God calls souls to belief and conversion. Sadly, today, there are large numbers of Catholics who need converting and their Faith needs strengthening in the Greatest Gift on Earth, left to us by Our Lord!
There are increasing numbers of Catholics who are refusing to believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. Many think of the Eucharist as a mere symbol of Christ, and look upon the Mass as a mere commemoration of the Last Supper, and not the Sacrifice that it really and truly is! What an offense this must be to Our Lord! If already, in the more believing day of St. Margaret Mary (in the 1600s) Our Lord appeared to her and complained about the lack of love and devotion shown to Him—what would He have to say about our times?
Greatest Neglect
The Holy Eucharist is our “Greatest Treasure” and at the same time it is the modern era’s “Greatest Neglect.” It is impossible to identify the Holy Eucharist too closely with Jesus Christ. We should remember He is in the Holy Eucharist not merely with His substance. Some may say: “Transubstantiation means that the substance of bread and wine become the substance of Jesus Christ.”
No, it is not just an academic definition or philosophical explanation that is relegated to the memory banks of our mind—a cerebral thing, an academic thing, a theoretical thing. Transubstantiation means the substance of bread and wine are no longer there. The substance of bread and wine is replaced not only by the substance of Christ’s Body and Blood―what replaces the substance of bread and wine is Jesus Christ Himself, whole and entire! Everything that makes Him Christ, replaces what had been the substance of bread and wine. The substance of bread and wine become the whole Christ—that is what we mean by “Body, Soul, Blood and Divinity”—the whole Christ.
Living Heart
Therefore, Christ in the Holy Eucharist is here with His human heart and His Sacred Heart. Is it a living heart? Yes! This is seen in the Miracles of Lanciano and Buenos Aires. This is also why the revelations Our Lord made to St. Margaret Mary about promoting devotion to the Sacred Heart were all made from the Holy Eucharist.
Why do we equate the Sacred Heart with the Holy Eucharist? Because the Holy Eucharist is the whole Christ with His human heart. According to St. Margaret Mary, the Sacred Heart is the Holy Eucharist. So it follows that devotion to the Sacred Heart is devotion to the Holy Eucharist―the Church, in her liturgy, even has a votive Mass dedicated to the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus, assigning the date of its recommended celebration to the Thursday following the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The Holy Eucharist is infinite Love Incarnate―living in our midst in the Blessed Sacrament. When we receive the Holy Eucharist, we receive the living Christ—total, entire, living!
If Jesus causes the Host to become what science has identified as a human heart (by examining the Sacred Host remains from the Miracle of Lanciano, read more here)—and especially identifying the Host as a muscle of the heart that is responsible for the contraction of a human heart, a heart that suffers like that of someone who has been beaten severely about the chest—if He does such things, then it is in order to arouse and enliven our Faith in His Real Presence in the Holy Eucharist. He thus enables us to see that Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a re-presentation (i.e. making present once again) of the entire drama of our salvation―namely, Christ’s Passion and Death on Calvary, but now in an unbloody manner in the Sacrifice of the Mass.
Signs-a-Plenty
Jesus criticizes His listeners: “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will not believe!” (John 4:48). There is no need to actively seek out wondrous signs. But if Jesus chooses to give them to us, then we ought to accept them with meekness and humility in Faith, seeking to understand what He desires to tell us by them. Thanks to these signs, many people have discovered Faith in God—the One God in the Holy Trinity, Who reveals His Son to us: Jesus Christ, Who abides in the tabernacles of the world, Who worked through the Sacraments and Who teaches us through Holy Scripture, Tradition and the Magisterium of the Catholic Church—the triple cord of our Faith, of which Scripture says: “a threefold cord is not easily broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:12).
Miracles Seekers Are Often Blind
We have the “Greatest Treasure” staring us in the face―yet we run around trying to fill our minds and hearts with lesser spiritual treasures. We run after apparitions; we study prophecies; re read about private revelations; we delight over relics; we travel to holy sites where Our Lady or Our Lord might have appeared once, twice or a few times—but the place where Our Lord appears every day, which is the Altar upon which Mass is offered, we often leave neglected and we place it way down in our rankings of holy places and things to see and visit. The Imitation of Christ puts it thus:
“Many people travel far to honor the relics of the saints, marveling at their wonderful deeds and at the building of magnificent shrines. They gaze upon and kiss the sacred relics encased in silk and gold; and behold, You are here present before me on the Altar, my God, Saint of saints, Creator of men, and Lord of angels! Often in looking at such things, men are moved by curiosity, by the novelty of the unseen, and they bear away little fruit for the amendment of their lives, especially when they go from place to place lightly and without true contrition. But here in the Sacrament of the Altar You are wholly present, my God, the man Christ Jesus, from Whom is obtained the full realization of eternal salvation, as often as You are worthily and devoutly received.”
A Mystery that Surpasses our Understanding
The Holy Eucharist—the actual presence of the risen person of Jesus under the appearances of bread and wine—is one of the most important and most difficult truths, revealed to us by Christ. Eucharistic miracles are merely visible confirmations of what He tells us about Himself―namely, that He really does give us His glorified Body and Blood as spiritual food and drink.
Jesus established the Eucharist on the eve of His Passion and Death. During the Last Supper, “Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke: and gave to His disciples, and said: ‘Take ye, and eat! This is My Body!’ And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying: ‘Drink ye all of this! For this is My Blood of the New Testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!’” (Matthew 26:26-28). When Jesus took and gave the Apostles the bread and wine, He said: “This is My Body! …. This is My Blood!” by which He clearly meant that the bread and wine―which He gave them to eat and drink―really was His Body and Blood, and not some sort of symbol.
Jesus’ Eucharistic Sermon Shocks
Earlier, in the famous Eucharistic sermon recorded by St. John the Evangelist, Jesus said to the Jews: “Amen, amen I say unto you! Unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you! He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, has everlasting life and I will raise him up in the last day! For My Flesh is meat indeed and My Blood is drink indeed! He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, abides in Me, and I in him’” (John 6:54-57).
Shocked by Jesus’ words, the Jews said, “How can this Man give us His flesh to eat?” (John 6:53). Many of Jesus’ disciples were also scandalized. “This saying is hard, and who can hear it?” they objected. Knowing that the truth of the Eucharist was a shock and a scandal to many of His listeners, Jesus responded, not by retracting His words, but by raising the stakes: “Does this scandalize you? The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life!” (John 6: 62-63). Many refused to believe Him: “After this many of His disciples went back and walked no more with Him” (John 6:67).
Today, we see a repeat of both the incredulity and disbelief in the Real Presence—with anywhere from 65% to 85% of Catholics (depending upon where you live) no longer believing that Jesus is present in the Holy Eucharist—as well as a repeat of “many walked no more with Him”—as less than 20% come to Mass regularly on Sundays―for the rest it ends up being a “Sinday”.
One Good Communion Worth 1,000’s of Lukewarm Ones
As St. Louis de Montfort writes: “It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches his heart. A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly” (The Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-First Rose”). If that is true of the Hail Mary, how much more true is it not of Holy Communions? The devil knows this too, and, so, it is in his best interests to make sure that our Holy Communions are not made well. This is an endless battle that everyone has to face—whether it be pope, bishop or priest, or man, woman and child—and it will remain so until our dying day.
Real Communions of Fake Communions?
Our Lord’s words beg the question: “These people honor Me with their lips―but their hearts are far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). Would He say the same of our Holy Communions? Unfortunately, in our modern-day existence, quantity and speed have replaced the ancient values placed on quality and thoroughness. Not that quality is totally disregarded, but it often comes second to quantity. A bottom-line principle, that can be seen in the lives of many people, is that they want to pay less for things, so that they can afford to buy lots of different things. Now of course, one’s income obviously plays a large part in this, but many of the rich even play the same game. Manufacturers are often more focused on the quantity they can produce, more so than on the quality. If they can make something “look real” then there is no point spending extra money making the real thing. So we have fake stone or fake brick faҫades for houses; we have fake furs; fake foods; fake wood; fake gold; fake marble; fake candles; fake glass, fake teeth, fake hair, fake body implants, etc., etc. We are living in a fake world!
The sad part is that all this over-spills into our intellectual, moral and spiritual lives. We fake knowledge, we fake behavior, and we fake piety. We learn superficially—just enough to be able to make it look like we know a lot. Trivia becomes more popular than in-depth knowledge. We become a race of “Tips-and-Tricks”—but we are only tricking ourselves. Morally, the world has never been as sinful as it is today, yet we put on a kind of ‘moral-make-up’ to hide the sinfulness and focus on the sins of others in order to make us feel better in our own miserable state. Spiritually, we cover the faҫade of our Temple of the Holy Ghost (which St Paul says we are), with pseudo-gold bricks. Financially, we are prepared to borrow lots of money and fall into serious debt, in order to appear, to the world around us, as something that we are not, but simply want to be. I guess that would make us “fake wannabees”!
Pharisees, Judas and Magdalen
Three sinners—two losers—one winner! Why is that Mary Magdalen, an adulteress who was also possessed by seven devils, hits the jackpot, while the Pharisees and Judas end up as losers? A four-letter word is the answer! L-O-V-E! Mary Magdalen loved Our Lord—the Pharisees and Judas did not love Him. Jesus said of her: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much!” (Luke 7:47). Whereas He addressed the Pharisees with the following words: “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees―hypocrites! … Woe to you blind guides! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees―hypocrites! Because you are like whitened sepulchers, which outwardly appear to be beautiful to men, but within are full of dead men’s bones, and of all filthiness!” (Matthew 23).
Wasn’t Mary Magdalen a “hypocrite”? Wasn’t she a “whitened sepulcher”? Being possessed of seven devils, she was worse in a sense—yet it was her sincere love of Christ and sincere acceptance and admission of her guilt, and sorrow for her sins, permeated with a deep love and gratitude to God (Christ), which justified and saved her.
Concerning Judas, Our Lord said: “Woe to that man by whom the Son of man shall be betrayed―it were better for him if that man had not been born!” (Matthew 26:24). A loveless Judas became a faithless Judas―which led him to a hopeless end!
Our Lord’s Anger About Eucharistic Neglect
It was to both St. Margaret Mary Alacoque and to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame) that Our Lord complained about being neglected in the Eucharist due to lukewarmness, indifference, coldness or outright sacrileges. To St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, Our Lord often appeared in relation to the Holy Eucharist—either while she was adoring the Holy Eucharist, or around times of feasts associated with the Holy Eucharist—such as during the Corpus Christi Octave. The third apparition of the Sacred Heart took place in July of 1674, and of this St. Margaret Mary relates the following:
“One day, as I knelt before the Blessed Sacrament exposed on the altar… Jesus presented Himself to me … Then He revealed to me all the unspeakable marvels of His pure love, and the excess of love He had conceived for men from whom He had received nothing but ingratitude and contempt. ‘My Divine Heart is so passionately inflamed with love for men … that, not being able any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its ardent charity, It must spread them and manifest Itself to men … and … hold them back from the abyss of ruin … Behold this Heart which has so loved men that It spared nothing, even going so far as to exhaust and consume Itself, to prove to them Its love. And in return I receive from the greater part of men nothing but ingratitude, by the contempt, irreverence, sacrileges and coldness with which they treat Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what is still more painful to Me is that even souls consecrated to Me are acting in this way ... If they would only give Me some return of love! … This is more grievous to Me than all that I endured in My Passion! … But they have only coldness and contempt for all My endeavors to do them good! … You are to receive Me in the Blessed Sacrament as often as obedience will allow, no matter what mortification or humiliation it may entail. Moreover, you are to receive Holy Communion on the First Friday of each month, and every night between Thursday and Friday I will make you partaker of that sorrow unto death which it was My will to suffer in the Garden of Olives. This sorrow will reduce you, without your understanding how, to a kind of agony more bitter than death.’”
To Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame), Our Lord said: “Alas! If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
Don’t Be Fooled By Mass Attendance Alone!
It would be foolish and naïve to imagine that mere regular Mass attendance alone is a sign of good spiritual health. It is not! Far from it! Even in days when Mass attendance was extremely high, this was no guarantee of spiritual health, nor a guarantee of salvation. St. Alphonsus Liguori (1696-1787)—the patron saint of moral theologians—was of the opinion that many souls were in the habit of making bad confessions already back in his day. Fr. Frederick Faber (1814-1863) was of the opinion that most souls were lukewarm, yet most souls attended Sunday Mass regularly. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange (1877-1964) was of the opinion that most Catholic souls were not even beginners in the spiritual life—which means that they are either lukewarm or in the revolving door of mortal sin/confession/mortal sin.
Today, we can see almost all Sunday Mass goers line-up for Holy Communion, but barely anybody lines-up for Confession. Is mortal sin a rare thing today? Definitely not! How many sacrilegious Holy Communions are being made by the 17% of Catholics who can be bothered to attend Sunday Mass regularly? God only knows! But we can guess that the number is not small. Surveys show that among regular Sunday Mass attendees, only 60% believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist! The ultimate con of the devil is to have you—through lukewarmness and spiritual blindness—committing mortal sins which you should know to be mortal sins, but which through laziness in study and rationalization you happily dismiss as being mere venial sins!
A Dominican website points out: “Many sacrilegious Confessions and Communions may be traced to the fact that a soul confides too much in self, and not in the help of God. Men and women come into the confessional without the least preparation, after having been engaged in useless conversation on the street up to the moment of entering the Church. Others spend their time idly gazing around the church. This should never happen; and those who do so, show that they do not realize the sanctity of the action, which they are about to perform.
“It is a sacrilege to make a bad Confession. To receive absolution after having made an unworthy Confession, and consequently without having the right dispositions, is to incur the guilt of sacrilege; that is, the violation of a sacred thing. A bad Confession hinders and frustrates the instrumental action of the Sacrament of Penance, and he who is guilty of it may be said thus to destroy the efficacy of the Blood of Jesus Christ; for it is in the Precious Blood of Our Lord, shed long ago, that souls are cleansed from sin.
“Our Lord, instituted the Sacraments as so many channels through which His Precious Blood may be applied to souls, quickening them with and sustaining them in, a new and higher life. In the sacred tribunal of Penance, when the penitent comes properly disposed, as soon as the priest raises his hand over him and pronounces the words of absolution, through the Divine agency of the Blood of Our Lord, the soul is washed and purified of all its sins, no matter how great they may be; for Christ has said, ‘Whose sins ye shall forgive, they are forgiven.’ But if the penitent has not the proper disposition there is a sacrilege, for the Blood of Our Lord is, in a manner, destroyed – rendered ineffectual in that case. And, what is worse, a bad Confession is generally followed by a bad Communion. How great a crime is committed by unworthily receiving our Lord in Communion! They who do so, as St. Paul says, are guilty of the Body and Blood of the Lord. You have heard, perhaps of the unnatural mother who took her lovely smiling babe and buried it alive. Oh, how much greater is the crime of the bad Catholic who will bury the living Son of God in a heart foul with every crime, worse than any grave, however horrible! How will such a wretch one day answer an enraged Father for what may be called the murder of His adorable Son?
“What has been said was not to terrify or keep you away from the Sacraments. God forbid! The priest does not desire to frighten people away from the table of the Lord, but to press them to come to the Feast. You know, that if you do not approach and receive Holy Communion, you cannot have life in you; that is, the life of the soul, the life of the children of God. Yes, go to Communion – go frequently! It will nourish and strengthen your soul. Our Lord will dwell in you; He will support you. He will sustain you in your conflicts with the devil. Remember that what has been said was only to guard you against that carelessness with which too many, alas, approach the Sacraments.”
Words of Our Lord Himself
Fr. Robert Gottemuller complied a book called Words of Love, wherein he takes quotes of Our Lord made to three victim souls in the 20th century: Sister Josefa Menendez (1890-1923); Sister Mary of the Trinity (1901-1942); Sister Consolata Betrone (1903-1946). The book clearly points out the supremacy of love and the immense desire Our Lord has for our love. Here are only a few such quotes:
“Tell all souls that I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift which they may offer Me! Yes, an act of love is better than the discipline, for I thirst for love! Poor souls! They think that in order to reach Me it is necessary to live an austere, penitential life! ... See how they misrepresent Me! They make Me out as one to be feared, whereas I am kindness itself! See how they forget the precept which I have given them, the very essence of the entire Law: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, with thy whole soul ... I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift! ... I thirst for love! … I desire to be loved; I crave the love of My creatures! When they will come to love Me, they will no longer offend Me!” (Our Lord to Sr. Consolata Betrone).
“I am not known, and because I am not known, people do not know how to love Me―I who have so loved men! ... The more you know and love Me, the closer will you be united to all those who love Me! … Each one of you, in your own sphere, however obscure, can give Me nobly, heroically, love for love!” (Our Lord to Sr. Mary of the Trinity).
“Love gives Itself as food to Its own and this food is the substance which gives them their life and sustains them! Love humbles Itself before Its own ... and in so doing raises them to the highest dignity! Love surrenders Itself in totality, It gives in profusion and without reserve! With enthusiasm, with vehemence It is sacrificed, It is immolated, It is given for those It loves! ... The Holy Eucharist is love to the extreme of folly!” (Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez).
Fr. Anthony J. Paone, S.J., in his little gem of a pocket book, My Daily Bread, a Summary of the Spiritual Life, has the following beautiful passage with which these thoughts shall finish:
“Jesus says to us: ‘My Child, if My True Presence on the altar were limited to one place alone, many people from all parts of the world would try to visit that place at some time or other in their lives. Yet, now that I have made it easy for all to come to Me, see how many visit Me only when they are obliged!
“Many people are so cold toward Me. Like children they are impressed only by what they can touch and see. I have given them their Greatest Treasure in the Blessed Sacrament! Through My Apostles and their successors, I have promised to be personally present wherever the Blessed Sacrament is! Make EVERY effort to be deeply impressed by this greatest of all earthly gifts!
“It is not enough for you to believe in My Real Presence upon the altar. I placed Myself there for love of you. I wanted to be near you in some visible way, so that you might visit Me as often as you wished. You should wish it as often as possible.
“People come to Me for different reasons. Some come only on Sundays and holy days, through a sense of obligation. Either they do not want to lose Heaven, or they desire My help in their daily life. Then there are those who come to Me through mere habit. They act automatically, without any particular devotion to Me. There are, however, a certain number who come to Me for the best reason. They come because they are glad to be near Me. These people please Me best of all. They receive many extra graces which are not granted to the others.
“Consider how devoted My saints were to Me. They seized every opportunity to visit Me and stay with Me. They desired to abandon all useless interests so that they might have more time with Me. In return for this generosity with Me, they received a clearer understanding of My boundless goodness and a deeper appreciation of My infinite love.
“You, too, have the opportunity to give Me more of your time and attention. Make a greater effort to come closer to Me in friendship. You have the privilege of kneeling before Me like the simple, wonderful shepherds; the tired, admiring Magi; the suffering, begging leper; the penitent, hopeful Magdalene; the convinced, converted Thomas. How are you taking advantage of this privilege?
“How much easier it will be for you to face Me in your judgment if you have loved to face Me often during your earthly life. Each visit to Me is an act of Faith, of Love, and of self-purification. Come to Me often, so that I may shower more of My gifts upon your soul!”
Article 37
Tuesday & Wednesday in Holy Week, April 15th & 16th
You Are at the Crossroads! Which Road will You Take?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Tuesday & Wednesday in Holy Week, April 15th & 16th
You Are at the Crossroads! Which Road will You Take?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Crossroads of Life
We sometimes speak of “The Crossroads of Life” which are pivotal moments in life where significant decisions must be made, often leading to different paths and outcomes. These crossroads represent turning points where individuals may choose to change their direction, choose a different road or path, thus making choices that can have a profound impact on their lives. We might come to a point when we have to choose between several different jobs; or choose a spouse from among several persons whom we like; or choose to move to another city or even country; or choose which college or university to attend; or choose whether or not to pursue a healthier lifestyle by eating correctly, sensibly and exercising more, etc. Sometimes these crossroads or decisions can have a mammoth effect or consequence in our lives―for better or for worse―depending upon how good or bad our choice was.
The Crossroads of the Spiritual Life
Similarly, there are many crossroads that we encounter in the spiritual life. We might be considering which religion to follow. Some Catholics might be considering leaving the Catholic Faith―which is a rapidly increasing trend―and are mulling over in their minds as to which religion they could go to, if any. Or it may be that some non-Catholics are attracted to the Faith but are likely to face opposition from other non-Catholic family members or relatives. Or it might be a choice between following Traditional or Conservative Catholicism as opposed to Liberal or Modernist Catholicism―or vice-versa. Or it could be thinking as whether or not to try to ramp-up and increase the lukewarm spirituality of the home to a higher level of commitment to the Faith and its demands. Or it might be a choice on whether or not to finally give up an habitual mortal sin, confess it correctly and validly, and then return to a state of Sanctifying Grace. Or it could be a case of whether or not to take your spiritual life more seriously, eliminate certain elements of worldliness and other temptations, and make a serious effort to live the spiritual life as it is intended to be lived.
The Crossroads of Christ
Christ Himself speaks of “crossroads” various kinds. He speaks of the roads that lead to Heaven and to Hell, saying: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). St. Louis de Montfort echoes this in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, wherein he writes:
“Friends of the Cross, you are a group of crusaders united to fight against the world. Bind yourselves together in that strong union of heart and mind which is far superior, far more terrifying to the world and Hell than the armed forces of a well-organized kingdom are to its enemies. Demons are united for your destruction, but you, be united for their overthrow; the avaricious are united to barter and hoard up gold and silver, combine your efforts in the pursuit of the eternal treasures hidden in the Cross; reprobates unite to make merry, but you, be united to suffer. A Friend of the Cross is one chosen by God from among ten thousand who have reason and sense for their only guide. A Friend of the Cross is a holy man, separated from visible things. His heart is lifted high above all that is frail and perishable. He is truly divine, raised above reason and thoroughly opposed to the things of sense, for he lives in the light of true faith and burns with love for the Cross.
“Do you really know the voice of God and grace from the voice of the world and human nature? Do you distinctly hear the voice of God, our kind Father, pronouncing His threefold curse upon everyone who follows the world in its concupiscence: ‘Woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the Earth’ (Apocalypse 8:13) and then appealing to you with outstretched arms: ‘Be separated, My chosen people!’ (Isaias 48:20; 52:11; Jeremias 50:8; 51:6), ‘Beloved Friends of the Cross of My Son, be separated from those worldlings, for they are accursed by My Majesty, repudiated by My Son!’ (John 17:9) ‘and condemned by My Holy Spirit’ (John 16:8-12). ‘Do not sit in their chair of pestilence, take no part in their gatherings; do not even step along their highways!’ (Psalm 1:1). ‘Hurry away from this great and infamous Babylon!’ (Isaias 48:20; Jeremias 51:6); ‘Listen only to the voice of My Beloved Son; follow only in His footprints; for He is the One I have given to be your Way, Truth, Life’ (John 14:6) and Model: ‘Hear ye Him!’ (Matthew 17:5; Luke 9:35; Mark 9:6; 2 Peter 1:17).”
Christ also speaks of a literal “cross-road” ― meaning the carrying of a cross: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and comes after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
St. Louis de Montfort echoes this in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, painting a picture of the “Two groups that appear before you each day―the followers of Christ and the followers of the world. Our loving Savior’s group is to the right―scaling a narrow path that is made all the narrower by the world’s corruption―they speak only of tears, penance, prayer and contempt for worldly things. To the left is the world’s group, the devil’s in fact, which is far superior in number, and seemingly far more colorful and splendid in array. Fashionable folk are all in a hurry to enlist, the highways are overcrowded, although they are broad and ever broadening with the crowds that flow through in a torrent. These roads are strewn with flowers, bordered with all kinds of amusements and attractions and paved with gold and silver (Matthew 7:13-14). They rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. “Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!” they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat! Let us drink! Let us sing! Let us dance! Let us play! God is good! He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!’ And so they continue!”
The Crossroads of Holy Week
It is a principle of the Church that great feasts also bring with them great graces―or should it be said, more correctly, that great graces are on offer but not guaranteed at the times of great feasts. God is not going to ram His great graces down our throats! What we sow is what we reap: “What things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:8) … “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
Great feasts can potentially be times of great changes―which is the result of those great graces―but we have to work with grace and not expect grace to do everything while we sit as spectators in our comfortable armchairs sipping our favorite drink and nibbling upon our favorite snacks. You are supposed to “work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12), for “the Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Therefore, “labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3). Do not become like those in the Parable of the Vineyard Workers, where the owner of vineyard, “about the eleventh hour, went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why are you standing here all the day idle?” (Matthew 20:6). Now is the “eleventh hour” of Lent, so to speak―are you standing about relatively idle, or are you hard at work―your spiritual work?
What Work Must You Do in the Lord’s Vineyard?
Just as we have two eyes, two lips, two ears, two arms, two hands, two legs, two feet, two lungs, two kidneys, etc. ― so too do we have two main jobs to do in the Lord’s vineyard. One is to give glory to God; the other is be holy.
Holy Scripture speaks again and again about the need to give glory to God: “Give ye glory to God!” (Psalm 67:35) … “Glory to God in the highest!” (Luke 2:14) … “You shall give glory to God!” (1 Kings 6:5) … “Give glory to the God of Heaven!” (Psalm 135:26) ― this is commanded so many times it would be a waste of space to try and list all of them! Obviously, this giving glory to God includes loving God: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
The Crossroads of Holiness
God also commands us through Holy Scripture to be holy: “I am the Lord your God! Be holy because I am holy! … You shall be holy, because I am holy! … You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy!” (Leviticus 11:44-46; 20:26) … “It is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy!’” (1 Peter 1:16) … “According to Him that has called you, Who is holy, be you also holy!” (1 Peter 1:15) … “And he that is holy, let him be sanctified still!” (Apocalypse 22:11) … “For this is the will of God―your sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:3) … “God has not called us unto uncleanness, but unto sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:7).
Along these lines, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.”
St. Louis de Montfort in his Secret of Mary, said the following: “It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say ‘not in the same measure’ because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (St. Louis de Montfort The Secret of Mary)
The Crossroads of Lies and Exaggerations
For most people, “holiness” and “holy” sound a little “corny”! They probably think that being “holy” and having “holiness” is perhaps applicable to someone somewhere―but most certainly not to them! They have enough things “on their plate” that need to be attended to without being distracted with all this “holy” and “holiness” stuff! Besides, they will tell you, Our Lord said that in His Father’s House there are many mansions! So they are perfectly okay with a room in the basement of His Father’s House―they don’t need a penthouse on the higher floors for the really holy ones! They look upon holiness as though it was membership to a select group and the rest of Heaven is populated with mediocre people! They imagine that wanting to be holy is something that only big-headed proud people desire! They would prefer to be ‘humbly’ mediocre and leave such prideful aspirations to sanctity to those big-heads!
The devil―of whom Our Lord says: “He stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar and the father of lies!” (John 8:44)―the devil is always on our shoulder, whispering his lies, half-truths, and exaggerations into our ears. His lies are endless―each one is tailor-made for every single human being. They are far too many to list or give examples of them. You are lied to by the devil as many as hundreds of times a day―in trivial things, not so trivial things and in important things. For the devils, it is like a basketball game―they know that you are going to score some points against them―but as long as they win in the end, it doesn’t really matter, they don’t really care. Whether they win 148-98 or win 148-146 in overtime―it’s all the same, as long as they win. They might even give you a false sense of security by deliberately allowing to score more points than you should be scoring, just to make you feel you are doing okay and imagine that you will most likely win in the end! Such people look around and see that they are like most people―even better than most people―but far from sanctity. The devil then makes them falsely believe that God would not possibly send most people to Hell―after all, He is a God of love, isn’t He?
The devils are masters of the “lesser good.” When they see that they cannot stop you from doing something good, then they will put all their efforts into making you choose the lesser of two or more goods. So, if they sense you want to start attending more daily Masses―they will try to make you do something else that is good but not as good as attending more Masses. It might be the visiting of a sick person; saying more prayers at home; or some other good thing. Or if they sense that you want to begin meditating seriously and properly―they might suggest simply doing more spiritual reading, the effects of which will not be as powerful as that of a properly made meditation. If they sense you want to start meditating the Rosary properly―they may suggest the path of quantity over quality, and suggest you simply say a few more Rosaries instead. The devils care little for the amount of gains they make―whether they gain a millimeter, an inch, a yard or a mile―as long they are gaining something all the time.
The devils fear holiness―for they know that they are powerless against true holiness, no matter how hard they try to defeat it. For true holiness will always have an incredible depth of humility and height of charity―both of which overthrow the pride and hatred of the devils. St. Augustine said: “Humility is the foundation of all the other virtues, hence, in the soul in which this virtue does not exist there cannot be any other virtue except in mere appearance.” If humility is the foundation of all virtues, then charity is the soul that gives life to all virtues―that is Scripture says: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
When you think about it, humility and charity are actually very closely linked―for charity is first and foremost a love of God, and then, secondarily a love of neighbor for the sake of God (because God created your neighbor). Pride is first and foremost of love of self, which, as it grows, has less and less love of God and neighbor. Humility is the opposite of pride and therefore eliminates this excessive love of self and thus allows love to be channeled to God and neighbor. By pride we enthrone ourselves, by humility we give first place to God. Both humility and charity point to and focus upon God. By humility we realize that all the good that is in us; all the good that comes our way (even the good of suffering); all that we have in this world―is all down to God and not ourselves: “He made us, and not we ourselves!” (Psalm 99:3) … “The Lord has made all things for Himself!” (Proverbs 16:4). Whatever position of power you may have been given by God’s Providence, you must remember that you are only a mere steward of God’s gift to you and that you will have answer to Him on how well (or badly) you exercised your God-given stewardship. Whether you be a pope, a bishop, a priest, a president of a country or a business, a professor or teacher, father or mother―you have to exercise your position with humility and with charity, both of which should show others that you are focusing and pointing all things in the direction of God. That, in itself, will lead you to holiness―as all the other virtues will have both a foundation (humility) and a guide (charity).
Holy Week and Holiness
The title itself―“Holy Week”―says it all, doesn’t it? It is like the main scene in a play; or the star performer at a concert; or the main lecturer at a conference; or the chief celebrity on a talk show; etc. There is no other week of the year that bears a title as grand as “Holy Week.” It focuses upon the culmination of Our Lord’s life on Earth―this is the scene that Heaven and Earth have been waiting for! This is the moment of mankind’s redemption by the all-conquering Christ! Yet His “game-plan” is not what people expected! Even those who knew Him best―the Apostles―thought that Palm Sunday would be the beginning of the all-conquering Christ’s conquest and expulsion of the Roman occupation and the restoration of the Kingdom of Israel by some act of power and force―whether miraculous, natural, or both. Christ’s triumphant entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday seemed to prefigure and indicate such a dream―and it was only a dream. “For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9).
The tactics of Christ and His adversaries were total opposites―His adversaries came at Him with pride and hatred; Christ countered their attacks with humility and charity. He gives us a master-class on how to combat your enemies. He had already preached the theory―now He put the theory into practice. He had already taught: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ ― but I say to you: Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! Pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!” (Matthew 5:43-44) … “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven! Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice―for your reward is very great in Heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you!” (Matthew 5:10-12).
Now that the hour of His Passion had arrived, Christ put into practice what He had taught in theory―He did not just “talk the talk”, He now would “walk the walk” ― all the way up the hill to Calvary, death and triumph. “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross!” (Philippians 2:8). “Death is swallowed up in victory! O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting? … Thanks be to God, Who has given us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!” (1 Corinthians 15:54-57). Our Lord had said: “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) ― here He was, not just laying down His life for His friends, but also His enemies, for, as He was dying on the cross, He begged: “Father, forgive them―for they know not what they do!” (Luke 23:34). He converts by His grace, the enemies of God―the Good Thief repents, and the pagan centurion acknowledges Him to be the Son of God: “The centurion watching Jesus, having seen the earthquake and the things that were done, said: ‘Indeed this was the Son of God!’” (Matthew 27:54). The Good Thief became St. Dismas and the Roman centurion became St. Longinus. “And all the multitude that were come together to that sight [of Christ’s death on the cross], and saw the things that were done, returned striking their breasts” (Luke 23:48).
We sometimes speak of “The Crossroads of Life” which are pivotal moments in life where significant decisions must be made, often leading to different paths and outcomes. These crossroads represent turning points where individuals may choose to change their direction, choose a different road or path, thus making choices that can have a profound impact on their lives. We might come to a point when we have to choose between several different jobs; or choose a spouse from among several persons whom we like; or choose to move to another city or even country; or choose which college or university to attend; or choose whether or not to pursue a healthier lifestyle by eating correctly, sensibly and exercising more, etc. Sometimes these crossroads or decisions can have a mammoth effect or consequence in our lives―for better or for worse―depending upon how good or bad our choice was.
The Crossroads of the Spiritual Life
Similarly, there are many crossroads that we encounter in the spiritual life. We might be considering which religion to follow. Some Catholics might be considering leaving the Catholic Faith―which is a rapidly increasing trend―and are mulling over in their minds as to which religion they could go to, if any. Or it may be that some non-Catholics are attracted to the Faith but are likely to face opposition from other non-Catholic family members or relatives. Or it might be a choice between following Traditional or Conservative Catholicism as opposed to Liberal or Modernist Catholicism―or vice-versa. Or it could be thinking as whether or not to try to ramp-up and increase the lukewarm spirituality of the home to a higher level of commitment to the Faith and its demands. Or it might be a choice on whether or not to finally give up an habitual mortal sin, confess it correctly and validly, and then return to a state of Sanctifying Grace. Or it could be a case of whether or not to take your spiritual life more seriously, eliminate certain elements of worldliness and other temptations, and make a serious effort to live the spiritual life as it is intended to be lived.
The Crossroads of Christ
Christ Himself speaks of “crossroads” various kinds. He speaks of the roads that lead to Heaven and to Hell, saying: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). St. Louis de Montfort echoes this in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, wherein he writes:
“Friends of the Cross, you are a group of crusaders united to fight against the world. Bind yourselves together in that strong union of heart and mind which is far superior, far more terrifying to the world and Hell than the armed forces of a well-organized kingdom are to its enemies. Demons are united for your destruction, but you, be united for their overthrow; the avaricious are united to barter and hoard up gold and silver, combine your efforts in the pursuit of the eternal treasures hidden in the Cross; reprobates unite to make merry, but you, be united to suffer. A Friend of the Cross is one chosen by God from among ten thousand who have reason and sense for their only guide. A Friend of the Cross is a holy man, separated from visible things. His heart is lifted high above all that is frail and perishable. He is truly divine, raised above reason and thoroughly opposed to the things of sense, for he lives in the light of true faith and burns with love for the Cross.
“Do you really know the voice of God and grace from the voice of the world and human nature? Do you distinctly hear the voice of God, our kind Father, pronouncing His threefold curse upon everyone who follows the world in its concupiscence: ‘Woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the Earth’ (Apocalypse 8:13) and then appealing to you with outstretched arms: ‘Be separated, My chosen people!’ (Isaias 48:20; 52:11; Jeremias 50:8; 51:6), ‘Beloved Friends of the Cross of My Son, be separated from those worldlings, for they are accursed by My Majesty, repudiated by My Son!’ (John 17:9) ‘and condemned by My Holy Spirit’ (John 16:8-12). ‘Do not sit in their chair of pestilence, take no part in their gatherings; do not even step along their highways!’ (Psalm 1:1). ‘Hurry away from this great and infamous Babylon!’ (Isaias 48:20; Jeremias 51:6); ‘Listen only to the voice of My Beloved Son; follow only in His footprints; for He is the One I have given to be your Way, Truth, Life’ (John 14:6) and Model: ‘Hear ye Him!’ (Matthew 17:5; Luke 9:35; Mark 9:6; 2 Peter 1:17).”
Christ also speaks of a literal “cross-road” ― meaning the carrying of a cross: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and comes after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
St. Louis de Montfort echoes this in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, painting a picture of the “Two groups that appear before you each day―the followers of Christ and the followers of the world. Our loving Savior’s group is to the right―scaling a narrow path that is made all the narrower by the world’s corruption―they speak only of tears, penance, prayer and contempt for worldly things. To the left is the world’s group, the devil’s in fact, which is far superior in number, and seemingly far more colorful and splendid in array. Fashionable folk are all in a hurry to enlist, the highways are overcrowded, although they are broad and ever broadening with the crowds that flow through in a torrent. These roads are strewn with flowers, bordered with all kinds of amusements and attractions and paved with gold and silver (Matthew 7:13-14). They rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. “Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!” they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat! Let us drink! Let us sing! Let us dance! Let us play! God is good! He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!’ And so they continue!”
The Crossroads of Holy Week
It is a principle of the Church that great feasts also bring with them great graces―or should it be said, more correctly, that great graces are on offer but not guaranteed at the times of great feasts. God is not going to ram His great graces down our throats! What we sow is what we reap: “What things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:8) … “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
Great feasts can potentially be times of great changes―which is the result of those great graces―but we have to work with grace and not expect grace to do everything while we sit as spectators in our comfortable armchairs sipping our favorite drink and nibbling upon our favorite snacks. You are supposed to “work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12), for “the Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Therefore, “labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3). Do not become like those in the Parable of the Vineyard Workers, where the owner of vineyard, “about the eleventh hour, went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why are you standing here all the day idle?” (Matthew 20:6). Now is the “eleventh hour” of Lent, so to speak―are you standing about relatively idle, or are you hard at work―your spiritual work?
What Work Must You Do in the Lord’s Vineyard?
Just as we have two eyes, two lips, two ears, two arms, two hands, two legs, two feet, two lungs, two kidneys, etc. ― so too do we have two main jobs to do in the Lord’s vineyard. One is to give glory to God; the other is be holy.
Holy Scripture speaks again and again about the need to give glory to God: “Give ye glory to God!” (Psalm 67:35) … “Glory to God in the highest!” (Luke 2:14) … “You shall give glory to God!” (1 Kings 6:5) … “Give glory to the God of Heaven!” (Psalm 135:26) ― this is commanded so many times it would be a waste of space to try and list all of them! Obviously, this giving glory to God includes loving God: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
The Crossroads of Holiness
God also commands us through Holy Scripture to be holy: “I am the Lord your God! Be holy because I am holy! … You shall be holy, because I am holy! … You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy!” (Leviticus 11:44-46; 20:26) … “It is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy!’” (1 Peter 1:16) … “According to Him that has called you, Who is holy, be you also holy!” (1 Peter 1:15) … “And he that is holy, let him be sanctified still!” (Apocalypse 22:11) … “For this is the will of God―your sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:3) … “God has not called us unto uncleanness, but unto sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:7).
Along these lines, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.”
St. Louis de Montfort in his Secret of Mary, said the following: “It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say ‘not in the same measure’ because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (St. Louis de Montfort The Secret of Mary)
The Crossroads of Lies and Exaggerations
For most people, “holiness” and “holy” sound a little “corny”! They probably think that being “holy” and having “holiness” is perhaps applicable to someone somewhere―but most certainly not to them! They have enough things “on their plate” that need to be attended to without being distracted with all this “holy” and “holiness” stuff! Besides, they will tell you, Our Lord said that in His Father’s House there are many mansions! So they are perfectly okay with a room in the basement of His Father’s House―they don’t need a penthouse on the higher floors for the really holy ones! They look upon holiness as though it was membership to a select group and the rest of Heaven is populated with mediocre people! They imagine that wanting to be holy is something that only big-headed proud people desire! They would prefer to be ‘humbly’ mediocre and leave such prideful aspirations to sanctity to those big-heads!
The devil―of whom Our Lord says: “He stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar and the father of lies!” (John 8:44)―the devil is always on our shoulder, whispering his lies, half-truths, and exaggerations into our ears. His lies are endless―each one is tailor-made for every single human being. They are far too many to list or give examples of them. You are lied to by the devil as many as hundreds of times a day―in trivial things, not so trivial things and in important things. For the devils, it is like a basketball game―they know that you are going to score some points against them―but as long as they win in the end, it doesn’t really matter, they don’t really care. Whether they win 148-98 or win 148-146 in overtime―it’s all the same, as long as they win. They might even give you a false sense of security by deliberately allowing to score more points than you should be scoring, just to make you feel you are doing okay and imagine that you will most likely win in the end! Such people look around and see that they are like most people―even better than most people―but far from sanctity. The devil then makes them falsely believe that God would not possibly send most people to Hell―after all, He is a God of love, isn’t He?
The devils are masters of the “lesser good.” When they see that they cannot stop you from doing something good, then they will put all their efforts into making you choose the lesser of two or more goods. So, if they sense you want to start attending more daily Masses―they will try to make you do something else that is good but not as good as attending more Masses. It might be the visiting of a sick person; saying more prayers at home; or some other good thing. Or if they sense that you want to begin meditating seriously and properly―they might suggest simply doing more spiritual reading, the effects of which will not be as powerful as that of a properly made meditation. If they sense you want to start meditating the Rosary properly―they may suggest the path of quantity over quality, and suggest you simply say a few more Rosaries instead. The devils care little for the amount of gains they make―whether they gain a millimeter, an inch, a yard or a mile―as long they are gaining something all the time.
The devils fear holiness―for they know that they are powerless against true holiness, no matter how hard they try to defeat it. For true holiness will always have an incredible depth of humility and height of charity―both of which overthrow the pride and hatred of the devils. St. Augustine said: “Humility is the foundation of all the other virtues, hence, in the soul in which this virtue does not exist there cannot be any other virtue except in mere appearance.” If humility is the foundation of all virtues, then charity is the soul that gives life to all virtues―that is Scripture says: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
When you think about it, humility and charity are actually very closely linked―for charity is first and foremost a love of God, and then, secondarily a love of neighbor for the sake of God (because God created your neighbor). Pride is first and foremost of love of self, which, as it grows, has less and less love of God and neighbor. Humility is the opposite of pride and therefore eliminates this excessive love of self and thus allows love to be channeled to God and neighbor. By pride we enthrone ourselves, by humility we give first place to God. Both humility and charity point to and focus upon God. By humility we realize that all the good that is in us; all the good that comes our way (even the good of suffering); all that we have in this world―is all down to God and not ourselves: “He made us, and not we ourselves!” (Psalm 99:3) … “The Lord has made all things for Himself!” (Proverbs 16:4). Whatever position of power you may have been given by God’s Providence, you must remember that you are only a mere steward of God’s gift to you and that you will have answer to Him on how well (or badly) you exercised your God-given stewardship. Whether you be a pope, a bishop, a priest, a president of a country or a business, a professor or teacher, father or mother―you have to exercise your position with humility and with charity, both of which should show others that you are focusing and pointing all things in the direction of God. That, in itself, will lead you to holiness―as all the other virtues will have both a foundation (humility) and a guide (charity).
Holy Week and Holiness
The title itself―“Holy Week”―says it all, doesn’t it? It is like the main scene in a play; or the star performer at a concert; or the main lecturer at a conference; or the chief celebrity on a talk show; etc. There is no other week of the year that bears a title as grand as “Holy Week.” It focuses upon the culmination of Our Lord’s life on Earth―this is the scene that Heaven and Earth have been waiting for! This is the moment of mankind’s redemption by the all-conquering Christ! Yet His “game-plan” is not what people expected! Even those who knew Him best―the Apostles―thought that Palm Sunday would be the beginning of the all-conquering Christ’s conquest and expulsion of the Roman occupation and the restoration of the Kingdom of Israel by some act of power and force―whether miraculous, natural, or both. Christ’s triumphant entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday seemed to prefigure and indicate such a dream―and it was only a dream. “For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9).
The tactics of Christ and His adversaries were total opposites―His adversaries came at Him with pride and hatred; Christ countered their attacks with humility and charity. He gives us a master-class on how to combat your enemies. He had already preached the theory―now He put the theory into practice. He had already taught: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ ― but I say to you: Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! Pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!” (Matthew 5:43-44) … “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven! Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice―for your reward is very great in Heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you!” (Matthew 5:10-12).
Now that the hour of His Passion had arrived, Christ put into practice what He had taught in theory―He did not just “talk the talk”, He now would “walk the walk” ― all the way up the hill to Calvary, death and triumph. “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross!” (Philippians 2:8). “Death is swallowed up in victory! O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting? … Thanks be to God, Who has given us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!” (1 Corinthians 15:54-57). Our Lord had said: “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) ― here He was, not just laying down His life for His friends, but also His enemies, for, as He was dying on the cross, He begged: “Father, forgive them―for they know not what they do!” (Luke 23:34). He converts by His grace, the enemies of God―the Good Thief repents, and the pagan centurion acknowledges Him to be the Son of God: “The centurion watching Jesus, having seen the earthquake and the things that were done, said: ‘Indeed this was the Son of God!’” (Matthew 27:54). The Good Thief became St. Dismas and the Roman centurion became St. Longinus. “And all the multitude that were come together to that sight [of Christ’s death on the cross], and saw the things that were done, returned striking their breasts” (Luke 23:48).
Article 36
Monday in Holy Week, April 14th
There is Hope for You at His Feet!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday in Holy Week, April 14th
There is Hope for You at His Feet!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Look Who’s Here!
In the Gospel reading from the Mass for the Monday in Holy Week is all about the sinner woman who unexpectedly, to the surprise of all the guests, bursts into a banquet and begins to wash the feet of Jesus anoint them with expensive ointment. Who is this woman? It is Mary Magdalen! If ever there was a sinner that could and should give hope to all other sinners, then it is Mary Magdalen―a great sinner who became a great saint! Let us first of all take a look at the Gospel reading from today’s Mass―Monday in Holy Week.
“Jesus therefore―six days before the Pasch―came to Bethania, where Lazarus had been dead, whom Jesus raised to life. And they made Him a supper there and Martha served―but Lazarus was one of them that were at table with him. Mary therefore took a pound of ointment of right spikenard, of great price, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped His feet with her hair; and the house was filled with the perfumed smell of the ointment. Then one of His disciples, Judas Iscariot―he that was about to betray Him―said: ‘Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor?’ Now he said this, not because he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and, having the purse, carried the things that were put therein. Jesus therefore said: ‘Leave her alone, that she may keep it for the day of My burial! For the poor you have always with you―but me you have not always!’ A great multitude therefore of the Jews knew that he was there; and they came, not for Jesus’ sake only, but that they might see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead” (taken from John 12:1-9).
Who is this Mary?
Pope St. Gregory the Great says: “Thinking upon the repentance of Mary Magdalen, I am more ready to weep than to say anything. For what heart of stone would not be softened to a like repentance by the tears of this sinner? She considered what she had done, and would not be moderate in what she was then doing. She broke in upon the guests, she came uninvited, she brought her tears to the banquet. You may understand with what sorrow she burns, in that she is not ashamed to weep even at a feast.
“But this woman, whom Luke calls a woman who was a sinner, is named by John—it is Mary; and we believe she was that Mary from whom, as Mark bears witness, seven devils were cast forth. And what is typified by seven devils, if not all the vices? For since all time is counted by periods of seven days, by the number seven completeness is rightly represented. Mary then had seven devils, because she was full of all the vices.
“But, behold, when she saw the stains of her foulness, she ran to wash herself at the fountain of mercy, and had no shame before the guests. Indeed, since she felt so much shame in herself, she counted it as nothing to be outwardly disgraced. At what, then, do we marvel, my brethren? That Mary came, or that the Lord received her? “Received her,” shall I say, or not rather, “drew her?” But it is better to say: “both drew her and received her.” For, in His mercy, He drew her inwardly, and, in His meekness, He received her outwardly.” (Pope St. Gregory the Great, Homily 33 on the Gospels)
ANOTHER TRANSLATION
“Whenever I ponder the penitential spirit of Mary Magdalen, I feel more like weeping than like speaking. For the tears of this sinful woman will soften even a heart of stone, towards the idea of doing penance. Having reflected on what she had done, she did not wish to set bounds to what she should do. She came in, uninvited, after the meal had begun, and brought her tears to the banquet. See with what grief she must burn, when she is not ashamed to weep even at a banquet.
“This woman, whom Luke calls “a sinful woman,” is called Mary by John. We think she is that Mary from whom, according to Mark’s testimony, seven devils were driven. What would be designated by seven devils but the totality of vice? The number seven is a fitting figure for a totality. For example, all time is perceived in terms of the seven days. And so Mary had seven devils, because she abounded in all the vices.
“But note that she looked at the stains of her sinfulness and then ran to be washed at the fountain of mercy. The dinner guests did not embarrass her. For since she was, inwardly, so deeply ashamed of herself, she considered the outward embarrassment as nothing. What should we admire, brothers: Mary’s coming or the Lord’s receiving her? “Receiving”, or should I say, or “drawing her” to Himself? I should rather say: “drawing her to Himself and receiving her.” For there is no doubt that He, who in His gentleness received her outwardly, was, in His mercy, drawing her inwardly” (Pope St. Gregory the Great, Homily 33 on the Gospels).
Three Marys? Two Marys? Or One Mary?
The Greek Fathers, as a whole, and today’s modern scholars, distinguish three persons:
• Mary the “sinner” of Luke 7:36-50;
• Mary the sister of Martha and Lazarus, Luke 10:38-42 and John 11; and
• Mary Magdalen, from whom seven devils were cast out.
On the other hand most of the Latins (Roman or Western Church) and traditional scholars and exegetes of Scripture, hold that these three were one and the same. It is conceivable that St. John, just because he is writing so long after the event, and at a time when Mary was dead, wishes to point out to us that she was really the same as the “sinner.” In the same way St. Luke may have veiled her identity, precisely because he did not wish to defame someone who was still living; Luke does something similar in the case of St. Matthew, whom he refrains from identifying as Levi the Publican (5:7), and conceals the fact.
If this argument of the traditional Western Church holds good, then “Mary of Bethany” and the “sinner” are one and the same. Furthermore, an examination of St. John’s Gospel makes it almost impossible to deny the identity of “Mary of Bethany” with “Mary Magdalen”. From St. John we learn the name of the “woman” who anointed Christ’s feet some time prior to the Last Supper, when Christ came to Bethany several days before the Passover. At that supper, then, Mary received the glorious praise of Christ, “she hath wrought a good work upon Me ... in pouring this ointment upon My body she hath done it for My burial ... wheresoever this Gospel shall be preached ... that also which she hath done shall be told for a memory of her.” Can we believe, in view of all this, that this Mary should have no place at the foot of the cross, nor at the tomb of Our Lord? Yet it is Mary Magdalen who, according to all the Evangelists, stood at the foot of the cross and assisted at the burial of Our Lord and was the first recorded witness of the Resurrection. And while St. John calls her “Mary Magdalen” in 19:25, 20:1, and 20:18, he calls her simply “Mary” in 20:11 and 20:16.
In the view we have advocated the series of events forms a consistent whole; the “sinner” comes early in the ministry to seek for pardon; she is described immediately afterwards as Mary Magdalen “out of whom seven devils were gone forth”; shortly after, we find her “sitting at the Lord’s feet and hearing His words.” To the Catholic mind it all seems fitting and natural. At a later period Mary and Martha turn to “the Christ, the Son of the Living God”, and He restores to them their brother Lazarus; a short time afterwards they make Him a supper and Mary once more repeats the act she had performed when a penitent. At the Passion she stands nearby; she sees Him laid in the tomb; and she is the first witness of His Resurrection—except for His Mother, to whom He must have appeared first, though the New Testament is silent on this point.
In the view of many Catholic commentators, there were two anointings of Christ’s feet—it should surely be no difficulty that St. Matthew and St. Mark speak of Jesus’ head being anointed by the woman and then later, at another time, the anointing of Jesus’ feet—the first anointing (Luke 7) took place at a comparatively early date; the second, two days before the last Passover. But it was one and the same woman who performed this pious act on each occasion.
The First Anointing (Luke 7:36-50)
“And one of the Pharisees [i.e. Simon the Pharisee] desired to eat with Jesus. And Jesus went into the house of the Pharisee, and sat down to meat. And behold a woman that was in the city, a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster box of ointment; and, standing behind at His feet, she began to wash His feet with tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head, and kissed His feet, and anointed them with the ointment. And the Pharisee, who had invited Him, seeing it, spoke within himself, saying: ‘This man, if He were a prophet, would know surely who and what manner of woman this is that touches Him―that she is a sinner!’ And Jesus answering, said to him: ‘Simon, I have something to say to you!’ But he said: ‘Master, say it!’
“Jesus continued: ‘A certain creditor had two debtors, the one who owed five hundred pence, and the other fifty. And whereas they had not wherewith to pay, he forgave them both. Which therefore of the two loved him most?’ Simon answering, said: ‘I suppose that he to whom he forgave most!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘You have judged rightly!’ And turning to the woman, Jesus said unto Simon: ‘Do you see this woman? I entered into your house and you gave Me no water for My feet―but she with tears has washed My feet, and with her hair has wiped them. You gave Me no kiss―but she, since she came in, has not ceased to kiss My feet. My head with oil you did not anoint―but she has anointed My feet with ointment. Wherefore I say to thee: Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much. But to whom less is forgiven, he loves less!’ And Jesus said to her: ‘Your sins are forgiven!’ And they, that sat at meat with Him, began to say within themselves: ‘Who is this that forgives sins also?’ And Jesus said to the woman: ‘Your faith has made you safe, go in peace!’” (Luke 7:36-50).
The Second Anointing (Matthew 26:6-11; Mark 14:1-9)
St. Matthew gives the following account: “And when Jesus was in Bethania, in the house of Simon the Leper [again], there came to Him a woman having an alabaster box of precious ointment, and poured it on His head as He was at table. And the disciples seeing it, had indignation, saying: ‘To what purpose is this waste? For this might have been sold for much, and given to the poor!’ And Jesus knowing it, said to them: ‘Why do you trouble this woman? For she has wrought a good work upon Me. For the poor you have always with you―but Me you have not always. For she, in pouring this ointment upon My body, has done it for My burial. Amen I say to you, wheresoever this Gospel shall be preached in the whole world, that also which she has done, shall be told for a memory of her!’” (Matthew 26:6-11).
Here is St. Mark’s account: “Now the feast of the Pasch, and of the Azymes was after two days; and the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might, by some wile, lay a hold on Him and kill Him. But they said: ‘Not on the festival day, lest there should be a tumult among the people!’ And when He was in Bethania, in the house of Simon the Leper, and was at meat, there came a woman having an alabaster box of ointment of precious spikenard; and, breaking the alabaster box, she poured it out upon His head. Now there were some that had indignation within themselves, and said: ‘Why was this waste of the ointment made? For this ointment might have been sold for more than three hundred pence, and given to the poor!’ And they murmured against her. But Jesus said: ‘Leave her alone! Why do you molest her? She has wrought a good work upon Me! For the poor you have always with you; and whensoever you will, you may do them good―but Me you will not have always. She has done what she could! She is come beforehand to anoint My body for burial. Amen, I say to you, wheresoever this Gospel shall be preached in the whole world, that also which she has done, shall be told for a memorial of her!’” (Mark 14:1-9).
Mary of the Seven Devils
In the New Testament she is mentioned among the women who accompanied Christ and ministered to Him (Luke 8:2-3), where it is also said that seven devils had been cast out of her (Mark 16:9). “And it came to pass afterwards, that Jesus traveled through the cities and towns, preaching and evangelizing the kingdom of God; and the twelve were with Him; and certain women, who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities; and Mary, who is called Magdalen, out of whom seven devils were gone forth; … and many others who ministered unto Him of their substance.” (Luke 8:1-2). St. Mark mentions her after the Resurrection of Jesus, saying: “Jesus, rising early the first day of the week, appeared first to Mary Magdalen, out of whom He had cast seven devils” (Mark 16:9).
The seven devils, removed from her by Jesus, gradually came to symbolize the Seven Capital Sins (also known as the Seven Deadly Sins), and Mary Magdalen began to be condemned, not only for lust, but for pride, covetousness, and all the remaining Capital Sins as well.
Mary Passionate for the Word of God
We also see Mary mesmerized by the Word of God, in that she is sitting at the feet of Christ listening to His every word, while her sister, Martha, is left to prepare the meal for Our Lord. We could be tempted to think that Mary is lazy, but not in the opinion of Our Lord. Martha does a good thing in feeding Our Lord, but Mary does even better by letting Our Lord feed her: “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).
“Now it came to pass as they went, that Jesus entered into a certain town. And a certain woman, named Martha, received Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who, sitting at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy with much serving. Martha stood and said: ‘Lord, hast Thou no care that my sister has left me alone to serve? Speak to her therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha, Martha, thou art careful, and art troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary! Mary has chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42).
Mary the Passionate Woman
We sense from all these accounts that Mary was a passionate woman―passionate in sin; passionate in her repentance; passionate in hearing the Word of God. There is nothing wrong with being passionate, provided the passion is channeled into morally correct areas. Initially, Mary’s passions were misguided and sinful in their goals; after her conversion, the passions remained, but were correctly guided. The natural passion becomes elevated into a supernatural domain. God wants us to be passionate, but in the right way. What else but passionate love is demanded is this statement made by Christ: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength” (Mark 12:30). We see a similar passion to Mary Magdalen’s in St. Peter, who is always making an outward show of his love for the Lord. Likewise in St. Paul, whose misguided passions made him a persecutor of Christians, but, after his conversion, the passions remain, but are now harnessed to working for Christ, rather than opposing Him.
Our relationship with God, here below, rests upon the three theological virtues: Faith, Hope and Charity. In this incident with Mary Magdalen, we see all three combine together to create this beautiful scene and wonderful result. Here we see that many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much. Yet that love followed on the heels of Mary’s Faith (in knowing who Jesus was and what He was capable of doing) and Mary’s Hope (whereby she had confidence that Jesus might use His power to show her mercy). In the Scripture account an effect sometimes seems attributed to one only cause, when there are divers other concurring dispositions; for the sins of this woman, in this verse, are said to be forgiven “because she has loved much”, but Christ also tells her: “Thy faith has made thee safe.” Here “faith” can be seen in a twofold way: Faith in the form of belief in Christ’s Power and Faith in the form of confidence that He will use that power upon her. She would not have entered the banquet if she had no hope of receiving what she wanted from Jesus. Hence in a true conversion, as we see in this case, there are joined together Faith, Hope, Love, sorrow for sin, and other virtuous dispositions.
Mary at the Foot of the Cross
Mary Magdalen is next named as standing at the foot of the cross (Mark 15:40; Matthew 27:56; John 19:25; Luke 23:49). She saw Christ laid in the tomb, and she was the first recorded witness of the Resurrection. “Now there stood by the cross of Jesus, His mother, and His mother’s sister, Mary of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalen” (John 19:25). “And there were there many women afar off, who had followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto Him―among whom was Mary Magdalen; and Mary the mother of James and Joseph; and the mother of the sons of Zebedee” (Matthew 27:55-56). “And there were also women looking on afar off―among whom was Mary Magdalen; and Mary the mother of James the less and of Joseph; and Salome, who also, when He was in Galilee followed Him, and ministered to Him; and many other women that came up with Him to Jerusalem” (Mark 15:40-41). “And all His acquaintances, and the women that had followed Him from Galilee, stood afar off, beholding these things” (Luke 23:49).
Mary and the Risen Christ
“And the women that were come with Him from Galilee, following after, saw the sepulcher, and how His body was laid. And on the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came to the sepulcher, bringing the spices which they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled back from the sepulcher. And going in, they found not the body of the Lord Jesus. And it came to pass, as they were astonished in their mind at this, behold, two men stood by them, in shining apparel. And as they were afraid, and bowed down their countenance towards the ground, they said unto them: ‘Why seek you the living with the dead? He is not here, but is risen!’ And going back from the sepulcher, they told all these things to the Eleven, and to all the rest. And it was Mary Magdalen, and Joanna, and Mary of James, and the other women that were with them, who told these things to the Apostles. And these words seemed to them as idle tales; and they did not believe them” (Luke 23:55; 24:1-11)
“And on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalen cometh early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulcher; and she saw the stone taken away from the sepulcher. She ran, therefore, and cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and saith to them: ‘They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulcher, and we know not where they have laid him!’ Peter and that other disciple both ran together, and that other disciple did outrun Peter, and came first to the sepulcher. Simon Peter went into the sepulcher, then that other disciple also went in and he saw, and believed. The disciples therefore departed again to their home. But Mary stood at the sepulcher without, weeping. Now as she was weeping, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulcher, and she saw two angels in white, sitting, one at the head, and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus had been laid. They say to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them: ‘Because they have taken away my Lord; and I know not where they have laid Him.’ When she had said this, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing―and she knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping? Whom do you seek?’ She, thinking it was the gardener, said to Him: ‘Sir, if you have taken Him from here, tell me where you have laid Him, and I will take Him away!’ Jesus said to her: ‘Mary!’ She turning, said to Him: ‘Rabboni!’ (which is to say, Master). Jesus said to her: ‘Do not touch Me, for I am not yet ascended to My Father. But go to My brethren, and say to them: “I ascend to My Father and to your Father, to My God and your God.”’ Mary Magdalen went and told the Disciples: ‘I have seen the Lord, and these things He said to me!’” (John 21:1-18).
Subsequent history of Mary Magdalen
The Greek Church maintains that the Mary Magdalen retired to Ephesus, with the Blessed Virgin, and there died, that her relics were transferred to Constantinople in 886 and are there preserved. St. Gregory of Tours (De miraculis, I, xxx) supports the statement that she went to Ephesus. However, according to a French tradition, Mary, Lazarus, and some companions came to Marseilles (on the southern coast of France) and converted the whole of Provence. Mary Magdalen is said to have retired to a nearby hill, La Sainte-Baume, where she gave herself up to a life of penance for thirty years. When the time of her death arrived, she was carried by angels to the town of Aix and into the oratory of St. Maximinus, where she received the viaticum; her body was then laid in an oratory constructed by St. Maximinus at Villa Lata, afterwards called St. Maximin. History is silent about these relics till 745, when according to the chronicler Sigebert, they were removed to Vézelay through fear of the Saracens. No record is preserved of their return, but in 1279, when Charles II, King of Naples, erected a convent at La Sainte-Baume for the Dominicans, the shrine was found intact, with an inscription stating why they were hidden. In 1600 the relics were placed in a sarcophagus, that had been sent by Clement VIII to house the relics; her head, however, was placed in a separate vessel. In 1814, the church of La Sainte-Baume, wrecked during the French Revolution (began 1789), was restored, and, in 1822, the grotto was consecrated afresh. The head of the saint now lies there, where it has lain so long, and where it has been the center of so many pilgrimages.
Learning from Mary Magdalen
There are several simple, yet beautiful, lessons that we can learn from Mary Magdalen.
• Firstly, the fact that God loves the sinner, but hates the sin.
• Secondly, that love is a powerful penance.
• Thirdly, the ever-present humility that wins God’s favor.
God Loves the Sinner, but Hates the Sin
We would find it difficult to find a greater sinner than Mary Magdalen. She was possessed by seven devils and her life of sin was no secret, but well-known by the community. Yet after all that, Holy Scripture tells us: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). It does not say: “Jesus loved Martha and Lazarus, and only tolerated or put up with Mary.” No! St. John says “Jesus loved … Mary!” The New Testament God is no different from the Old Testament God: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “Go then and learn what this means: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). “They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill” (Matthew 9:12).
Love is a Powerful Penance
Our Lord said of Mary Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). Again, this is nothing different or new to what God had pronounced in the Old Testament: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). In New Testament times, St. Peter, having witnessed Our Lord’s mercy and words concerning Mary Magdalen, says: “Before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves: for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). For God is charity itself: “God is charity: and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him … He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:16; 4:8). Ultimately, love brings pain! Ultimately, it means laying down the world for Christ, or even our lives for Christ. “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lays down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Ever-Present Humility Wins God’s Favor
Mary Magdalen always seems to be at Our Lord’s feet—a clear symbol of humility. She is weeping over His feet at the banquet; she is sitting at His feet listening to His words; she is standing before His bloody feet at the foot of the Cross; she weeps at His feet as they lay Him in His tomb; she prostrates herself at the feet of the risen Christ; she is at His feet as He ascends into Heaven.
Our Lord had said: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29). “Therefore let us humble our souls before Him, and continuing in a humble spirit, in His service … and He will humble all the nations that shall rise up against us, and bring them to disgrace!” (Judith 8:16), for “the Lord is near to them that are of a contrite heart: and He will save the humble of spirit!” (Psalm 33:19).
As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange says, the two key virtues of the spiritual life are humility and charity. Humility is the foundation upon which all must be built. Charity is like the roof that covers everything. St. Mary Magdalen shows us both of these key virtues.
In the Gospel reading from the Mass for the Monday in Holy Week is all about the sinner woman who unexpectedly, to the surprise of all the guests, bursts into a banquet and begins to wash the feet of Jesus anoint them with expensive ointment. Who is this woman? It is Mary Magdalen! If ever there was a sinner that could and should give hope to all other sinners, then it is Mary Magdalen―a great sinner who became a great saint! Let us first of all take a look at the Gospel reading from today’s Mass―Monday in Holy Week.
“Jesus therefore―six days before the Pasch―came to Bethania, where Lazarus had been dead, whom Jesus raised to life. And they made Him a supper there and Martha served―but Lazarus was one of them that were at table with him. Mary therefore took a pound of ointment of right spikenard, of great price, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped His feet with her hair; and the house was filled with the perfumed smell of the ointment. Then one of His disciples, Judas Iscariot―he that was about to betray Him―said: ‘Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor?’ Now he said this, not because he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and, having the purse, carried the things that were put therein. Jesus therefore said: ‘Leave her alone, that she may keep it for the day of My burial! For the poor you have always with you―but me you have not always!’ A great multitude therefore of the Jews knew that he was there; and they came, not for Jesus’ sake only, but that they might see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead” (taken from John 12:1-9).
Who is this Mary?
Pope St. Gregory the Great says: “Thinking upon the repentance of Mary Magdalen, I am more ready to weep than to say anything. For what heart of stone would not be softened to a like repentance by the tears of this sinner? She considered what she had done, and would not be moderate in what she was then doing. She broke in upon the guests, she came uninvited, she brought her tears to the banquet. You may understand with what sorrow she burns, in that she is not ashamed to weep even at a feast.
“But this woman, whom Luke calls a woman who was a sinner, is named by John—it is Mary; and we believe she was that Mary from whom, as Mark bears witness, seven devils were cast forth. And what is typified by seven devils, if not all the vices? For since all time is counted by periods of seven days, by the number seven completeness is rightly represented. Mary then had seven devils, because she was full of all the vices.
“But, behold, when she saw the stains of her foulness, she ran to wash herself at the fountain of mercy, and had no shame before the guests. Indeed, since she felt so much shame in herself, she counted it as nothing to be outwardly disgraced. At what, then, do we marvel, my brethren? That Mary came, or that the Lord received her? “Received her,” shall I say, or not rather, “drew her?” But it is better to say: “both drew her and received her.” For, in His mercy, He drew her inwardly, and, in His meekness, He received her outwardly.” (Pope St. Gregory the Great, Homily 33 on the Gospels)
ANOTHER TRANSLATION
“Whenever I ponder the penitential spirit of Mary Magdalen, I feel more like weeping than like speaking. For the tears of this sinful woman will soften even a heart of stone, towards the idea of doing penance. Having reflected on what she had done, she did not wish to set bounds to what she should do. She came in, uninvited, after the meal had begun, and brought her tears to the banquet. See with what grief she must burn, when she is not ashamed to weep even at a banquet.
“This woman, whom Luke calls “a sinful woman,” is called Mary by John. We think she is that Mary from whom, according to Mark’s testimony, seven devils were driven. What would be designated by seven devils but the totality of vice? The number seven is a fitting figure for a totality. For example, all time is perceived in terms of the seven days. And so Mary had seven devils, because she abounded in all the vices.
“But note that she looked at the stains of her sinfulness and then ran to be washed at the fountain of mercy. The dinner guests did not embarrass her. For since she was, inwardly, so deeply ashamed of herself, she considered the outward embarrassment as nothing. What should we admire, brothers: Mary’s coming or the Lord’s receiving her? “Receiving”, or should I say, or “drawing her” to Himself? I should rather say: “drawing her to Himself and receiving her.” For there is no doubt that He, who in His gentleness received her outwardly, was, in His mercy, drawing her inwardly” (Pope St. Gregory the Great, Homily 33 on the Gospels).
Three Marys? Two Marys? Or One Mary?
The Greek Fathers, as a whole, and today’s modern scholars, distinguish three persons:
• Mary the “sinner” of Luke 7:36-50;
• Mary the sister of Martha and Lazarus, Luke 10:38-42 and John 11; and
• Mary Magdalen, from whom seven devils were cast out.
On the other hand most of the Latins (Roman or Western Church) and traditional scholars and exegetes of Scripture, hold that these three were one and the same. It is conceivable that St. John, just because he is writing so long after the event, and at a time when Mary was dead, wishes to point out to us that she was really the same as the “sinner.” In the same way St. Luke may have veiled her identity, precisely because he did not wish to defame someone who was still living; Luke does something similar in the case of St. Matthew, whom he refrains from identifying as Levi the Publican (5:7), and conceals the fact.
If this argument of the traditional Western Church holds good, then “Mary of Bethany” and the “sinner” are one and the same. Furthermore, an examination of St. John’s Gospel makes it almost impossible to deny the identity of “Mary of Bethany” with “Mary Magdalen”. From St. John we learn the name of the “woman” who anointed Christ’s feet some time prior to the Last Supper, when Christ came to Bethany several days before the Passover. At that supper, then, Mary received the glorious praise of Christ, “she hath wrought a good work upon Me ... in pouring this ointment upon My body she hath done it for My burial ... wheresoever this Gospel shall be preached ... that also which she hath done shall be told for a memory of her.” Can we believe, in view of all this, that this Mary should have no place at the foot of the cross, nor at the tomb of Our Lord? Yet it is Mary Magdalen who, according to all the Evangelists, stood at the foot of the cross and assisted at the burial of Our Lord and was the first recorded witness of the Resurrection. And while St. John calls her “Mary Magdalen” in 19:25, 20:1, and 20:18, he calls her simply “Mary” in 20:11 and 20:16.
In the view we have advocated the series of events forms a consistent whole; the “sinner” comes early in the ministry to seek for pardon; she is described immediately afterwards as Mary Magdalen “out of whom seven devils were gone forth”; shortly after, we find her “sitting at the Lord’s feet and hearing His words.” To the Catholic mind it all seems fitting and natural. At a later period Mary and Martha turn to “the Christ, the Son of the Living God”, and He restores to them their brother Lazarus; a short time afterwards they make Him a supper and Mary once more repeats the act she had performed when a penitent. At the Passion she stands nearby; she sees Him laid in the tomb; and she is the first witness of His Resurrection—except for His Mother, to whom He must have appeared first, though the New Testament is silent on this point.
In the view of many Catholic commentators, there were two anointings of Christ’s feet—it should surely be no difficulty that St. Matthew and St. Mark speak of Jesus’ head being anointed by the woman and then later, at another time, the anointing of Jesus’ feet—the first anointing (Luke 7) took place at a comparatively early date; the second, two days before the last Passover. But it was one and the same woman who performed this pious act on each occasion.
The First Anointing (Luke 7:36-50)
“And one of the Pharisees [i.e. Simon the Pharisee] desired to eat with Jesus. And Jesus went into the house of the Pharisee, and sat down to meat. And behold a woman that was in the city, a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster box of ointment; and, standing behind at His feet, she began to wash His feet with tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head, and kissed His feet, and anointed them with the ointment. And the Pharisee, who had invited Him, seeing it, spoke within himself, saying: ‘This man, if He were a prophet, would know surely who and what manner of woman this is that touches Him―that she is a sinner!’ And Jesus answering, said to him: ‘Simon, I have something to say to you!’ But he said: ‘Master, say it!’
“Jesus continued: ‘A certain creditor had two debtors, the one who owed five hundred pence, and the other fifty. And whereas they had not wherewith to pay, he forgave them both. Which therefore of the two loved him most?’ Simon answering, said: ‘I suppose that he to whom he forgave most!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘You have judged rightly!’ And turning to the woman, Jesus said unto Simon: ‘Do you see this woman? I entered into your house and you gave Me no water for My feet―but she with tears has washed My feet, and with her hair has wiped them. You gave Me no kiss―but she, since she came in, has not ceased to kiss My feet. My head with oil you did not anoint―but she has anointed My feet with ointment. Wherefore I say to thee: Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much. But to whom less is forgiven, he loves less!’ And Jesus said to her: ‘Your sins are forgiven!’ And they, that sat at meat with Him, began to say within themselves: ‘Who is this that forgives sins also?’ And Jesus said to the woman: ‘Your faith has made you safe, go in peace!’” (Luke 7:36-50).
The Second Anointing (Matthew 26:6-11; Mark 14:1-9)
St. Matthew gives the following account: “And when Jesus was in Bethania, in the house of Simon the Leper [again], there came to Him a woman having an alabaster box of precious ointment, and poured it on His head as He was at table. And the disciples seeing it, had indignation, saying: ‘To what purpose is this waste? For this might have been sold for much, and given to the poor!’ And Jesus knowing it, said to them: ‘Why do you trouble this woman? For she has wrought a good work upon Me. For the poor you have always with you―but Me you have not always. For she, in pouring this ointment upon My body, has done it for My burial. Amen I say to you, wheresoever this Gospel shall be preached in the whole world, that also which she has done, shall be told for a memory of her!’” (Matthew 26:6-11).
Here is St. Mark’s account: “Now the feast of the Pasch, and of the Azymes was after two days; and the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might, by some wile, lay a hold on Him and kill Him. But they said: ‘Not on the festival day, lest there should be a tumult among the people!’ And when He was in Bethania, in the house of Simon the Leper, and was at meat, there came a woman having an alabaster box of ointment of precious spikenard; and, breaking the alabaster box, she poured it out upon His head. Now there were some that had indignation within themselves, and said: ‘Why was this waste of the ointment made? For this ointment might have been sold for more than three hundred pence, and given to the poor!’ And they murmured against her. But Jesus said: ‘Leave her alone! Why do you molest her? She has wrought a good work upon Me! For the poor you have always with you; and whensoever you will, you may do them good―but Me you will not have always. She has done what she could! She is come beforehand to anoint My body for burial. Amen, I say to you, wheresoever this Gospel shall be preached in the whole world, that also which she has done, shall be told for a memorial of her!’” (Mark 14:1-9).
Mary of the Seven Devils
In the New Testament she is mentioned among the women who accompanied Christ and ministered to Him (Luke 8:2-3), where it is also said that seven devils had been cast out of her (Mark 16:9). “And it came to pass afterwards, that Jesus traveled through the cities and towns, preaching and evangelizing the kingdom of God; and the twelve were with Him; and certain women, who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities; and Mary, who is called Magdalen, out of whom seven devils were gone forth; … and many others who ministered unto Him of their substance.” (Luke 8:1-2). St. Mark mentions her after the Resurrection of Jesus, saying: “Jesus, rising early the first day of the week, appeared first to Mary Magdalen, out of whom He had cast seven devils” (Mark 16:9).
The seven devils, removed from her by Jesus, gradually came to symbolize the Seven Capital Sins (also known as the Seven Deadly Sins), and Mary Magdalen began to be condemned, not only for lust, but for pride, covetousness, and all the remaining Capital Sins as well.
Mary Passionate for the Word of God
We also see Mary mesmerized by the Word of God, in that she is sitting at the feet of Christ listening to His every word, while her sister, Martha, is left to prepare the meal for Our Lord. We could be tempted to think that Mary is lazy, but not in the opinion of Our Lord. Martha does a good thing in feeding Our Lord, but Mary does even better by letting Our Lord feed her: “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).
“Now it came to pass as they went, that Jesus entered into a certain town. And a certain woman, named Martha, received Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who, sitting at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy with much serving. Martha stood and said: ‘Lord, hast Thou no care that my sister has left me alone to serve? Speak to her therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha, Martha, thou art careful, and art troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary! Mary has chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42).
Mary the Passionate Woman
We sense from all these accounts that Mary was a passionate woman―passionate in sin; passionate in her repentance; passionate in hearing the Word of God. There is nothing wrong with being passionate, provided the passion is channeled into morally correct areas. Initially, Mary’s passions were misguided and sinful in their goals; after her conversion, the passions remained, but were correctly guided. The natural passion becomes elevated into a supernatural domain. God wants us to be passionate, but in the right way. What else but passionate love is demanded is this statement made by Christ: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength” (Mark 12:30). We see a similar passion to Mary Magdalen’s in St. Peter, who is always making an outward show of his love for the Lord. Likewise in St. Paul, whose misguided passions made him a persecutor of Christians, but, after his conversion, the passions remain, but are now harnessed to working for Christ, rather than opposing Him.
Our relationship with God, here below, rests upon the three theological virtues: Faith, Hope and Charity. In this incident with Mary Magdalen, we see all three combine together to create this beautiful scene and wonderful result. Here we see that many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much. Yet that love followed on the heels of Mary’s Faith (in knowing who Jesus was and what He was capable of doing) and Mary’s Hope (whereby she had confidence that Jesus might use His power to show her mercy). In the Scripture account an effect sometimes seems attributed to one only cause, when there are divers other concurring dispositions; for the sins of this woman, in this verse, are said to be forgiven “because she has loved much”, but Christ also tells her: “Thy faith has made thee safe.” Here “faith” can be seen in a twofold way: Faith in the form of belief in Christ’s Power and Faith in the form of confidence that He will use that power upon her. She would not have entered the banquet if she had no hope of receiving what she wanted from Jesus. Hence in a true conversion, as we see in this case, there are joined together Faith, Hope, Love, sorrow for sin, and other virtuous dispositions.
Mary at the Foot of the Cross
Mary Magdalen is next named as standing at the foot of the cross (Mark 15:40; Matthew 27:56; John 19:25; Luke 23:49). She saw Christ laid in the tomb, and she was the first recorded witness of the Resurrection. “Now there stood by the cross of Jesus, His mother, and His mother’s sister, Mary of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalen” (John 19:25). “And there were there many women afar off, who had followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto Him―among whom was Mary Magdalen; and Mary the mother of James and Joseph; and the mother of the sons of Zebedee” (Matthew 27:55-56). “And there were also women looking on afar off―among whom was Mary Magdalen; and Mary the mother of James the less and of Joseph; and Salome, who also, when He was in Galilee followed Him, and ministered to Him; and many other women that came up with Him to Jerusalem” (Mark 15:40-41). “And all His acquaintances, and the women that had followed Him from Galilee, stood afar off, beholding these things” (Luke 23:49).
Mary and the Risen Christ
“And the women that were come with Him from Galilee, following after, saw the sepulcher, and how His body was laid. And on the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came to the sepulcher, bringing the spices which they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled back from the sepulcher. And going in, they found not the body of the Lord Jesus. And it came to pass, as they were astonished in their mind at this, behold, two men stood by them, in shining apparel. And as they were afraid, and bowed down their countenance towards the ground, they said unto them: ‘Why seek you the living with the dead? He is not here, but is risen!’ And going back from the sepulcher, they told all these things to the Eleven, and to all the rest. And it was Mary Magdalen, and Joanna, and Mary of James, and the other women that were with them, who told these things to the Apostles. And these words seemed to them as idle tales; and they did not believe them” (Luke 23:55; 24:1-11)
“And on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalen cometh early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulcher; and she saw the stone taken away from the sepulcher. She ran, therefore, and cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and saith to them: ‘They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulcher, and we know not where they have laid him!’ Peter and that other disciple both ran together, and that other disciple did outrun Peter, and came first to the sepulcher. Simon Peter went into the sepulcher, then that other disciple also went in and he saw, and believed. The disciples therefore departed again to their home. But Mary stood at the sepulcher without, weeping. Now as she was weeping, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulcher, and she saw two angels in white, sitting, one at the head, and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus had been laid. They say to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them: ‘Because they have taken away my Lord; and I know not where they have laid Him.’ When she had said this, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing―and she knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping? Whom do you seek?’ She, thinking it was the gardener, said to Him: ‘Sir, if you have taken Him from here, tell me where you have laid Him, and I will take Him away!’ Jesus said to her: ‘Mary!’ She turning, said to Him: ‘Rabboni!’ (which is to say, Master). Jesus said to her: ‘Do not touch Me, for I am not yet ascended to My Father. But go to My brethren, and say to them: “I ascend to My Father and to your Father, to My God and your God.”’ Mary Magdalen went and told the Disciples: ‘I have seen the Lord, and these things He said to me!’” (John 21:1-18).
Subsequent history of Mary Magdalen
The Greek Church maintains that the Mary Magdalen retired to Ephesus, with the Blessed Virgin, and there died, that her relics were transferred to Constantinople in 886 and are there preserved. St. Gregory of Tours (De miraculis, I, xxx) supports the statement that she went to Ephesus. However, according to a French tradition, Mary, Lazarus, and some companions came to Marseilles (on the southern coast of France) and converted the whole of Provence. Mary Magdalen is said to have retired to a nearby hill, La Sainte-Baume, where she gave herself up to a life of penance for thirty years. When the time of her death arrived, she was carried by angels to the town of Aix and into the oratory of St. Maximinus, where she received the viaticum; her body was then laid in an oratory constructed by St. Maximinus at Villa Lata, afterwards called St. Maximin. History is silent about these relics till 745, when according to the chronicler Sigebert, they were removed to Vézelay through fear of the Saracens. No record is preserved of their return, but in 1279, when Charles II, King of Naples, erected a convent at La Sainte-Baume for the Dominicans, the shrine was found intact, with an inscription stating why they were hidden. In 1600 the relics were placed in a sarcophagus, that had been sent by Clement VIII to house the relics; her head, however, was placed in a separate vessel. In 1814, the church of La Sainte-Baume, wrecked during the French Revolution (began 1789), was restored, and, in 1822, the grotto was consecrated afresh. The head of the saint now lies there, where it has lain so long, and where it has been the center of so many pilgrimages.
Learning from Mary Magdalen
There are several simple, yet beautiful, lessons that we can learn from Mary Magdalen.
• Firstly, the fact that God loves the sinner, but hates the sin.
• Secondly, that love is a powerful penance.
• Thirdly, the ever-present humility that wins God’s favor.
God Loves the Sinner, but Hates the Sin
We would find it difficult to find a greater sinner than Mary Magdalen. She was possessed by seven devils and her life of sin was no secret, but well-known by the community. Yet after all that, Holy Scripture tells us: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). It does not say: “Jesus loved Martha and Lazarus, and only tolerated or put up with Mary.” No! St. John says “Jesus loved … Mary!” The New Testament God is no different from the Old Testament God: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “Go then and learn what this means: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). “They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill” (Matthew 9:12).
Love is a Powerful Penance
Our Lord said of Mary Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). Again, this is nothing different or new to what God had pronounced in the Old Testament: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). In New Testament times, St. Peter, having witnessed Our Lord’s mercy and words concerning Mary Magdalen, says: “Before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves: for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). For God is charity itself: “God is charity: and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him … He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:16; 4:8). Ultimately, love brings pain! Ultimately, it means laying down the world for Christ, or even our lives for Christ. “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lays down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Ever-Present Humility Wins God’s Favor
Mary Magdalen always seems to be at Our Lord’s feet—a clear symbol of humility. She is weeping over His feet at the banquet; she is sitting at His feet listening to His words; she is standing before His bloody feet at the foot of the Cross; she weeps at His feet as they lay Him in His tomb; she prostrates herself at the feet of the risen Christ; she is at His feet as He ascends into Heaven.
Our Lord had said: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29). “Therefore let us humble our souls before Him, and continuing in a humble spirit, in His service … and He will humble all the nations that shall rise up against us, and bring them to disgrace!” (Judith 8:16), for “the Lord is near to them that are of a contrite heart: and He will save the humble of spirit!” (Psalm 33:19).
As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange says, the two key virtues of the spiritual life are humility and charity. Humility is the foundation upon which all must be built. Charity is like the roof that covers everything. St. Mary Magdalen shows us both of these key virtues.
Article 35
Palm Sunday, the 2nd Sunday of Passiontide, April 13th
Do Some Palm Reading―the Answer Lays in the Palm in Your Hand!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Palm Sunday, the 2nd Sunday of Passiontide, April 13th
Do Some Palm Reading―the Answer Lays in the Palm in Your Hand!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
A Palm in Your Palm!
There are many idioms which use the word “palm” ― each with a different meaning. For example: to “have someone in the palm of one’s hand” means to have complete control over them. To “grease someone’s palm” or “cross someone’s palm with silver” means to bribe someone. To “bear the palm” or “carry off the palm” means to be the winner or take the prize―as in “the palm of victory”. To have an “itching palm” describes a greedy or avaricious person. To “know something like the palm of your hand” means to have a very thorough knowledge of something. To “palm something off” means to try and pass something off onto others, to persuade someone to accept something that you do not want or something that has no value, or to persuade someone to accept something by deception. There is even the superstitious and seriously sinful practice that is called “palm-reading” also known as palmistry and chiromancy, which seeks to find out things about the future, how long he will live, his personality traits, habits, and even his fortune. Palm reading is a form of divination and is condemned in Scripture.
Today―on Palm Sunday―Holy Mother Church places in our palms the holy palms that have been blessed before Mass. There is a wealth of information that can be read and gleaned from this apparently simple action. This article will cover many of those insights. The main one to bear in mind, however, revolves around the fact the unblessed palms (therefore unholy palms) are blessed (and thus made holy), which is an indication to us that God wants us to abandon unholy ways and become holy. For nothing unholy will enter Heaven, nothing unholy will receive “the palm of victory.” As Scripture says: “The just shall flourish like the palm tree!” (Psalm 91:13). The palm branch, or palm frond, is a symbol of victory, triumph, peace, and eternal life. Early Christians used the palm branch to symbolize the victory of the faithful over enemies of the soul, as in the Palm Sunday festival celebrating the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem.
We are given palms on Palm Sunday, with which we then march in procession to the church, as a symbol of our obligation to march through life on Earth on our pilgrimage to Heaven, carrying with us the palm of victory that will give us victory over the enemies of our soul―which are the devil, the world and our own sinful inclinations. In Western Christian art, martyrs were often shown holding a palm frond, representing the victory of the soul over the flesh. It was widely believed that a picture of a palm on a tomb meant that a martyr was buried there―hence you will frequently find in the Acts of the Martyrs expressions like “he received the palm of martyrdom.” On April 10th, 1688, the Congregation of Rites decided that the palm, when found depicted on catacomb tombs, was to be regarded as a proof that a martyr had been buried there.
Will Your Holy Week Be Wholly Holy?
If there ever was a week to strengthen our weak love of God, then this is that week—Holy Week. We all know the greatest Commandment that we have the greatest difficulty in fulfilling--“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30). We do love God—it is true—but not with our WHOLE heart, soul, mind and strength! We often fall into the category of those of whom Our Lord says: “These people honor Me with their lips―but their hearts are far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). We are—at times, or even often—spiritual automatons, religious robots, going through our spiritual life on ‘auto-pilot’ uttering memorized prayers with more or less half-a-heart, half-focused, half-minded. The other half is focused on our daily life, our home and work life, our studies, our hobbies and our socializing.
This approach is—though we strenuously banish this truth from our half-focused minds—seriously condemned in Holy Scripture: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21). “And why do you call Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
What Does God Will? Holiness!
And what is His will? “This is the will of God―your sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:3). “Think on the things of the Lord! … Be holy both in body and in spirit!” (1 Corinthians 7:34). “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God!” (Romans 12:1). “Because it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy!’” (1 Peter 1:16)—St. Peter here quotes the Old Testament: “For I am the Lord your God! Be holy because I am holy! Defile not your souls! … You shall be holy, because I am holy! … You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 11:44-46; 20:26). St. Paul adds: “He chose us before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight!” (Ephesians 1:4). There is no better time for trying to be holy than Holy Week―the holiest week of the Church’s liturgical year!
What Union Can There Be Between the Holy and Unholy?
This is why St. Paul commands that we separate ourselves from certain kinds of people: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! For what participation has justice with injustice? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God says: ‘I will dwell in them and walk among them; and I will be their God and they shall be my people!’ Wherefore: ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
You Are A Holy Temple!―Or Should Be!
“Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? But if any man violates the temple of God, him shall God destroy! For the temple of God is holy―which you are! [or should be] Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and that you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16-17; 6:19).
Knock Down Your Worldly Temple, Build a Holy One!
Speaking of destroying temples, this is what Jesus predicted He would do—destroy and rebuild the Temple. This is what we should ask Him to do to our worldly, earthly or at best hybrid temple—knock it down and rebuild it as a truly spiritual and holy temple!
Get Outta Here!
“And the Pasch of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And He found in the Temple them that sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the changers of money sitting. And when He had made, as it were, a scourge of little cords, He drove them all out of the Temple, the sheep also and the oxen, and the money of the changers He poured out, and the tables He overthrew. And to them that sold doves He said: ‘Take these things out of here! And make not the house of my Father a house of traffic!’ And His disciples remembered, that it was written: ‘The zeal of Thy house has eaten me up!’ The Jews, therefore, answered, and said to Him: ‘What sign do You show unto us, seeing You do these things?” Jesus answered, and said to them: ‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up!’ The Jews then said: ‘Six and forty years was this Temple in building; and will You raise it up in three days?” But He spoke of the temple of His body” (John 2:13-21)—and we should ask Him to do the same to the temple of our soul!
The above incident happened earlier in Our Lord’s ministry—it was repeated on Palm Sunday, after His triumphal entry into Jerusalem—which is reported by St. Matthew and St. Mark. So it is twice that Our Lord drove people out of the Temple for misusing it, or for having a worldly attitude.
“And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves. And He said to them: ‘It is written, “My house shall be called the house of prayer!” but you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Matthew 21:12-13). St. Mark echoes the account: “And they came to Jerusalem. And when Jesus entered into the Temple, He began to cast out them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the chairs of them that sold doves. And He suffered not that any man should carry a vessel through the Temple; and He taught them, saying: ‘Is it not written, “My house shall be called the house of prayer to all nations”? But you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Mark 11:15-17).
Rebuilding the Temple of Our Soul
The false witnesses, at Jesus’ trial before the Chief Priests, testified of Jesus destroying and rebuilding the Temple: “And they said: ‘This man said, “I am able to destroy the Temple of God, and, after three days, rebuild it!”‘ ” (Matthew 26:61). “We heard Him say, ‘I will destroy this temple made with hands, and within three days I will build another not made with hands!’” (Mark 14:58). We have remade the temple of our soul with ‘human hands’—we need to restore the temple of our soul to its pristine, holy state, which was given to it at Baptism by Divine hands. We have ruined or soiled the temple of our soul with our human approach—we need Our Lord to cleanse and restore the temple of our soul to a holy state! Holy Week is the best time to have Him whip out the human and restore the Divine!
In speaking to one of His mystics, Our Lord said: “With ruins, on ruins, I can build magnificently! It gives Me joy to use that which has humbled itself before Me, because My action is free! … It is with coal that I make diamonds! What would I not do with a soul, however black she might be, who would give herself to Me!” (Our Lord to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, Words of Love, by Fr. Gottemoller). Holy Week is the time to give yourself to Him—to build on your ruins and make diamonds from the black coal of your sins!
A Lesson in the Palm in Your Hand
Today—Palm Sunday—blessed palms were distributed. “Blessed” means “made holy”—a blessed medal becomes a “holy medal”; a blessed picture card becomes a “holy card”.
We would do well to reflect a little more deeply upon the words with which our palms were blessed today: “Bless, we beseech Thee, O Lord, these branches of palm and grant that what Thy people today bodily perform for Thy honor, they may perfect spiritually with the utmost devotion, by gaining the victory over the enemy, and ardently loving every work of mercy.”
You―like the palm that was blessed and made holy—are meant to be holy! You are meant to fight against the world and receive the palm of victory in Heaven for your brave and painful efforts! Just as Our Lady was told: “Blessed art thou among women!”—we should be blessed and holy in the unholy world in which we live.
Lessons from the Palm Tree
God made all things—down to their tiniest details—and God therefore made palm trees. As Holy Scripture says: “All men are vain, in whom there is not the knowledge of God: and who by these good things that are seen, could not understand Him that is, neither, by attending to the works of Him, have acknowledged Who was the Workman” (Wisdom 13:1). Let us, then, look at the visible palm tree, and see what invisible things of the heavenly Workman we can find therein!
To begin with, it must be noted that of the many thousands of trees that God did create—the palm tree found its way into Holy Scripture: “The just shall flourish like the palm tree” (Psalm 91:13). The palm tree goes even further, and makes up part of the ancient Tabernacle: “Go forth to the mount, and fetch branches of olive, and branches of beautiful wood, branches of myrtle, and branches of palm, and branches of thick trees, to make tabernacles, as it is written” (2 Esdras 8:15).
The date-palm tree is characteristic of Palestine. It is described as “flourishing” (Psalm 91:13), “tall” (Canticles 7:7), “upright” (Jeremias 10:5). Its branches are a symbol of victory (Apocalypse 7:9). Rising with slender stem 40 or 50, at times even 80 feet aloft, its only branches, the feathery, snow-like, pale-green fronds from 6 to 12 feet long, bending from its top, the palm attracts the eye wherever it is seen. The whole land of Palestine was called by the Greeks and Romans―“Phoenicia”, which means “the land of palms.”
The Upright Palm—The Upright Man
Most palms are a straight, unbranched stem, but sometimes they can have a branching stem (two faced Catholics), or even a creeping vine (hypocritical and evil Catholics). Some trees are irregular, they are twisted and tortuous in their growth; some hug the ground before they rise; but the palm rises straight toward Heaven, it stands upright among the trees. The good man is well symbolized in this―he is the man who does not stoop or cling to the Earth, who does not bend and bow earthward, who stands erect, who moves in one heavenward direction, who is governed constantly by true and abiding principles. And these he gains from God and from his teachings. Through them, he is sustained in his principles, is reminded of them, gains fresh inspiration to illustrate and practice them.
Catholics should be ‘straight’ souls following the straight and narrow path upwards to Heaven. We see this ‘straightness’ reflected in the palm leaves, which are all straight: “The crooked shall become straight” (Isaias 40:4). “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight His paths!” (Mark 1:3). “How narrow is the gate, and straight is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:14). “Let thy eyes look straight on, and let thy eyelids go before thy steps. Make straight the path for thy feet. Decline not to the right hand, nor to the left [like the branched palm or creeping palm]: turn away thy foot from evil. For the Lord knows the ways that are on the right hand; but those are perverse which are on the left hand. But He will make thy courses straight, He will bring forward thy ways in peace … The wise man makes straight his steps” (Proverbs 4:25-27; 15:21).
Tough Palm Trees—Tough Catholics
Palm trees are from a family of perennial lianas, shrubs, and trees and grow best in hot and humid climates. Most palm trees grow in the tropical and subtropical regions of the world. They occur from about 44° northern latitude to about 44° southern latitude. However—as with Catholics—there are also hardy palm trees that can withstand coldness and grow in much harsher and colder environments. Palm Trees―with proper care, planting, moisture and climate―are grown all over the world, even in locations with freezing cold winters. Canada serves a Northern reference point and many types of Palm Trees can grow there. The main factors affecting hardiness are the minimum winter temperature, the number of hours of cold every winter, the amount of heat every summer, and the relative wetness or dryness of the climate. In general, Palms are not particularly hardy. Many are actually injured by a single freezing night. Others Palms withstand 0° F (zero degrees Fahrenheit) for short periods without damage.
Community Life or Desert Father Hermits?
They have large evergreen leaves that are either “palmate” which is fan-leaved like a hand or “pinnate” which feather-leaved where the palms do not blend together at the base, but are separate leaves arranged in a spiral at the top of the trunk. If you liken that to religious life, you could say, broadly speaking, that the “palmate” palms are those that are joined together and live in community, whereas the “pinnate” palms are those who live like hermits or Desert Fathers.
Evergreen—Ever Humble
Being evergreens, reminds us of the virtue of humility (which is represented by the color green—as in green grass that walked upon and trodden on and squashed down). This humility should be present in us all year round—evergreen—and is required by Our Lord, Who said: "Learn of Me, for I am humble of heart!" (Matthew 11:29). “God has made the roots of proud nations to wither, and has planted the humble of these nations” (Ecclesiasticus 10:18). “And he shall be like a tree which is planted near the running waters, which shall bring forth its fruit, in due season. And his leaf shall not fall off; and all whatsoever he shall do shall prosper!” (Psalm 1:3). There can be no fruit without humility—just as no tree can survive without humus (Latin for the word “soil”).
The Fruit of the Palm Tree
As Holy Scripture says: “I will go up into the palm tree, and will take hold of the fruit thereof” (Canticles 7:8). So what is the fruit of the palm tree? Surprisingly, from the various species of palm trees, we get a wide variety of fruit. Among the many species of palm tree there are many different fruits. The most common fruits that grow from palm trees are coconuts and dates. Other fruits from palm trees include the acai berry, jubaea, peach palm fruit and betel nut.
Similarly with Catholics—or saints (which each Catholic should be)—there is a wide variety of species of Catholic, each bearing different fruits (virtues). Some saints were mainly known for shedding their blood, others were known for their learning, others for their missionary zeal, others for suffering persecution, others for carrying a variety of burdens―but all of them had humility and charity in common.
The Coconut Palm Tree
The coconut, that you see in your store, does not look anything like the coconut on the tree. The coconut has three layers and in the store you only the final inner layer—with the other two layers having been removed. In technical botanical jargon, a coconut is “a fibrous one-seeded drupe, also known as a dry drupe.” However, when using loose definitions, the coconut can be all three: a fruit, a nut, and a seed. Eh? Drupe? Okay! Classification of plants can be a complicated matter for the average person. A drupe is a fruit with a hard stony covering enclosing the seed and comes from the word drupa meaning “overripe olive”.
A untouched coconut, and all drupes, have three layers: (1) the exocarp (outer layer), which is typically smooth with a greenish color, (2) the mesocarp (fleshy middle layer), the fibrous husk, which ultimately surrounds (3) the endocarp (the furry hard woody shell with the seed inside of it). Generally speaking, when you buy a coconut at the supermarket, the exocarp (green exterior) and the mesocarp (middle layer of husk) are removed and what you see is the endocarp (the furry hard woody shell with the seed inside of it). If you look at one end of the coconut, you’ll see three pores (also called eyes). The coconut seed―inside of the furry or hairy hard woody shell―germinates and a shoot emerges from one of the pores. In addition to the “baby” plant in the seed, there is the food to kick off its life called the endosperm. The endosperm is what makes up most of the seed and, in the coconut’s case, is the yummy white stuff we eat.
The Coconut Palm of Milk, Cream and Water!
Also, inside that furry or hairy hard woody shell is coconut water—which is drinkable and not to be confused with coconut milk. Coconut water is the liquid that can be poured out from pierced coconuts. Coconut milk and coconut cream are both made from the white grated coconut meat that is macerated (soaked) in a measured quantity of water. When the resulting liquid is squeezed out, the first squeezing produces coconut cream, which is thick like dairy cream. Coconut milk has the liquid consistency of cow’s milk and is made from simmering one part shredded coconut meat in one part water.
What do we learn from all of this? Well, first of all, in order to get to the good, edible and enjoyable part of the coconut—which you could call the ‘soul of the coconut’ or ‘coconut heaven’—you have to go through three states or stages: the smooth exterior of a greenish color, called the exocarp. Then the fibrous husk, or mesocarp. Finally the very hard woody layer that we see and buy in the store which is called the endocarp. So, in a sense, it gets harder the closer you get to the white yummy tasty stuff in the center. The same is true for the spiritual life—we have three stages to pass through before God will allow us to get to Heaven—and nobody is exempt from any of those stages. The stages are those of the Beginner (the easiest), the Proficient (getting harder) and the Perfect (extremely hard). We either pass through these on Earth (which is preferable and easier) or in the fires of Purgatory (which is not preferable and incredibly more painful).
The water is the coconut is symbolic of grace in soul—for water has always been a symbol of grace for the Fathers of the Church. It is what keeps the coconut ‘alive’—just as grace keeps the soul ‘alive’ to God. The coconut milk and cream are produced by the white flesh being mixed with water and then either boiled (simmered), or squeezed to produce milk and cream respectively. This is symbolic of the pure soul (white flesh), working with grace (the water), under the pressure of the cross (simmered or squeezed) to produce virtues (milk or cream). This is symbolized by the way some Catholics like to fold the palm in order to make it into a Palm Cross—look it up online in you don’t know how to do that!
More Than Just a Palm!
Thus you can see that the simple palm that you were given on Palm Sunday has far more meaning than we superficially find it! And this is just “the tip of the iceberg” to what could be found if one looked deeper and researched more. It proves the point that you can find the DNA of God and the Faith in everything that God has made. Just as, proverbially, “all roads lead to Rome”—so too does all of creation point and lead to God, if we would only stop long enough to examine deeply enough all those things, or signposts, that God has placed before us!
Therefore, DO NOT WASTE YOUR HOLY WEEK! Just as with the palms of Palm Sunday, there is myriad or plethora of material present in Holy Week that shows the DNA of God and the Faith. But you need to free yourself from other things in order to have the time seek, dig, study, compare, connect and enjoy what God and His Church places before us in this holiest of weeks. Superficiality not only gets you nowhere, it is also as dissatisfying and unfulfilling for the spiritual appetite as cotton-candy (candy floss) is to a hungry man!
There are many idioms which use the word “palm” ― each with a different meaning. For example: to “have someone in the palm of one’s hand” means to have complete control over them. To “grease someone’s palm” or “cross someone’s palm with silver” means to bribe someone. To “bear the palm” or “carry off the palm” means to be the winner or take the prize―as in “the palm of victory”. To have an “itching palm” describes a greedy or avaricious person. To “know something like the palm of your hand” means to have a very thorough knowledge of something. To “palm something off” means to try and pass something off onto others, to persuade someone to accept something that you do not want or something that has no value, or to persuade someone to accept something by deception. There is even the superstitious and seriously sinful practice that is called “palm-reading” also known as palmistry and chiromancy, which seeks to find out things about the future, how long he will live, his personality traits, habits, and even his fortune. Palm reading is a form of divination and is condemned in Scripture.
Today―on Palm Sunday―Holy Mother Church places in our palms the holy palms that have been blessed before Mass. There is a wealth of information that can be read and gleaned from this apparently simple action. This article will cover many of those insights. The main one to bear in mind, however, revolves around the fact the unblessed palms (therefore unholy palms) are blessed (and thus made holy), which is an indication to us that God wants us to abandon unholy ways and become holy. For nothing unholy will enter Heaven, nothing unholy will receive “the palm of victory.” As Scripture says: “The just shall flourish like the palm tree!” (Psalm 91:13). The palm branch, or palm frond, is a symbol of victory, triumph, peace, and eternal life. Early Christians used the palm branch to symbolize the victory of the faithful over enemies of the soul, as in the Palm Sunday festival celebrating the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem.
We are given palms on Palm Sunday, with which we then march in procession to the church, as a symbol of our obligation to march through life on Earth on our pilgrimage to Heaven, carrying with us the palm of victory that will give us victory over the enemies of our soul―which are the devil, the world and our own sinful inclinations. In Western Christian art, martyrs were often shown holding a palm frond, representing the victory of the soul over the flesh. It was widely believed that a picture of a palm on a tomb meant that a martyr was buried there―hence you will frequently find in the Acts of the Martyrs expressions like “he received the palm of martyrdom.” On April 10th, 1688, the Congregation of Rites decided that the palm, when found depicted on catacomb tombs, was to be regarded as a proof that a martyr had been buried there.
Will Your Holy Week Be Wholly Holy?
If there ever was a week to strengthen our weak love of God, then this is that week—Holy Week. We all know the greatest Commandment that we have the greatest difficulty in fulfilling--“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30). We do love God—it is true—but not with our WHOLE heart, soul, mind and strength! We often fall into the category of those of whom Our Lord says: “These people honor Me with their lips―but their hearts are far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). We are—at times, or even often—spiritual automatons, religious robots, going through our spiritual life on ‘auto-pilot’ uttering memorized prayers with more or less half-a-heart, half-focused, half-minded. The other half is focused on our daily life, our home and work life, our studies, our hobbies and our socializing.
This approach is—though we strenuously banish this truth from our half-focused minds—seriously condemned in Holy Scripture: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21). “And why do you call Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
What Does God Will? Holiness!
And what is His will? “This is the will of God―your sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:3). “Think on the things of the Lord! … Be holy both in body and in spirit!” (1 Corinthians 7:34). “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God!” (Romans 12:1). “Because it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy!’” (1 Peter 1:16)—St. Peter here quotes the Old Testament: “For I am the Lord your God! Be holy because I am holy! Defile not your souls! … You shall be holy, because I am holy! … You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 11:44-46; 20:26). St. Paul adds: “He chose us before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight!” (Ephesians 1:4). There is no better time for trying to be holy than Holy Week―the holiest week of the Church’s liturgical year!
What Union Can There Be Between the Holy and Unholy?
This is why St. Paul commands that we separate ourselves from certain kinds of people: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! For what participation has justice with injustice? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God says: ‘I will dwell in them and walk among them; and I will be their God and they shall be my people!’ Wherefore: ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
You Are A Holy Temple!―Or Should Be!
“Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? But if any man violates the temple of God, him shall God destroy! For the temple of God is holy―which you are! [or should be] Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and that you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16-17; 6:19).
Knock Down Your Worldly Temple, Build a Holy One!
Speaking of destroying temples, this is what Jesus predicted He would do—destroy and rebuild the Temple. This is what we should ask Him to do to our worldly, earthly or at best hybrid temple—knock it down and rebuild it as a truly spiritual and holy temple!
Get Outta Here!
“And the Pasch of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And He found in the Temple them that sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the changers of money sitting. And when He had made, as it were, a scourge of little cords, He drove them all out of the Temple, the sheep also and the oxen, and the money of the changers He poured out, and the tables He overthrew. And to them that sold doves He said: ‘Take these things out of here! And make not the house of my Father a house of traffic!’ And His disciples remembered, that it was written: ‘The zeal of Thy house has eaten me up!’ The Jews, therefore, answered, and said to Him: ‘What sign do You show unto us, seeing You do these things?” Jesus answered, and said to them: ‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up!’ The Jews then said: ‘Six and forty years was this Temple in building; and will You raise it up in three days?” But He spoke of the temple of His body” (John 2:13-21)—and we should ask Him to do the same to the temple of our soul!
The above incident happened earlier in Our Lord’s ministry—it was repeated on Palm Sunday, after His triumphal entry into Jerusalem—which is reported by St. Matthew and St. Mark. So it is twice that Our Lord drove people out of the Temple for misusing it, or for having a worldly attitude.
“And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves. And He said to them: ‘It is written, “My house shall be called the house of prayer!” but you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Matthew 21:12-13). St. Mark echoes the account: “And they came to Jerusalem. And when Jesus entered into the Temple, He began to cast out them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the chairs of them that sold doves. And He suffered not that any man should carry a vessel through the Temple; and He taught them, saying: ‘Is it not written, “My house shall be called the house of prayer to all nations”? But you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Mark 11:15-17).
Rebuilding the Temple of Our Soul
The false witnesses, at Jesus’ trial before the Chief Priests, testified of Jesus destroying and rebuilding the Temple: “And they said: ‘This man said, “I am able to destroy the Temple of God, and, after three days, rebuild it!”‘ ” (Matthew 26:61). “We heard Him say, ‘I will destroy this temple made with hands, and within three days I will build another not made with hands!’” (Mark 14:58). We have remade the temple of our soul with ‘human hands’—we need to restore the temple of our soul to its pristine, holy state, which was given to it at Baptism by Divine hands. We have ruined or soiled the temple of our soul with our human approach—we need Our Lord to cleanse and restore the temple of our soul to a holy state! Holy Week is the best time to have Him whip out the human and restore the Divine!
In speaking to one of His mystics, Our Lord said: “With ruins, on ruins, I can build magnificently! It gives Me joy to use that which has humbled itself before Me, because My action is free! … It is with coal that I make diamonds! What would I not do with a soul, however black she might be, who would give herself to Me!” (Our Lord to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, Words of Love, by Fr. Gottemoller). Holy Week is the time to give yourself to Him—to build on your ruins and make diamonds from the black coal of your sins!
A Lesson in the Palm in Your Hand
Today—Palm Sunday—blessed palms were distributed. “Blessed” means “made holy”—a blessed medal becomes a “holy medal”; a blessed picture card becomes a “holy card”.
We would do well to reflect a little more deeply upon the words with which our palms were blessed today: “Bless, we beseech Thee, O Lord, these branches of palm and grant that what Thy people today bodily perform for Thy honor, they may perfect spiritually with the utmost devotion, by gaining the victory over the enemy, and ardently loving every work of mercy.”
You―like the palm that was blessed and made holy—are meant to be holy! You are meant to fight against the world and receive the palm of victory in Heaven for your brave and painful efforts! Just as Our Lady was told: “Blessed art thou among women!”—we should be blessed and holy in the unholy world in which we live.
Lessons from the Palm Tree
God made all things—down to their tiniest details—and God therefore made palm trees. As Holy Scripture says: “All men are vain, in whom there is not the knowledge of God: and who by these good things that are seen, could not understand Him that is, neither, by attending to the works of Him, have acknowledged Who was the Workman” (Wisdom 13:1). Let us, then, look at the visible palm tree, and see what invisible things of the heavenly Workman we can find therein!
To begin with, it must be noted that of the many thousands of trees that God did create—the palm tree found its way into Holy Scripture: “The just shall flourish like the palm tree” (Psalm 91:13). The palm tree goes even further, and makes up part of the ancient Tabernacle: “Go forth to the mount, and fetch branches of olive, and branches of beautiful wood, branches of myrtle, and branches of palm, and branches of thick trees, to make tabernacles, as it is written” (2 Esdras 8:15).
The date-palm tree is characteristic of Palestine. It is described as “flourishing” (Psalm 91:13), “tall” (Canticles 7:7), “upright” (Jeremias 10:5). Its branches are a symbol of victory (Apocalypse 7:9). Rising with slender stem 40 or 50, at times even 80 feet aloft, its only branches, the feathery, snow-like, pale-green fronds from 6 to 12 feet long, bending from its top, the palm attracts the eye wherever it is seen. The whole land of Palestine was called by the Greeks and Romans―“Phoenicia”, which means “the land of palms.”
The Upright Palm—The Upright Man
Most palms are a straight, unbranched stem, but sometimes they can have a branching stem (two faced Catholics), or even a creeping vine (hypocritical and evil Catholics). Some trees are irregular, they are twisted and tortuous in their growth; some hug the ground before they rise; but the palm rises straight toward Heaven, it stands upright among the trees. The good man is well symbolized in this―he is the man who does not stoop or cling to the Earth, who does not bend and bow earthward, who stands erect, who moves in one heavenward direction, who is governed constantly by true and abiding principles. And these he gains from God and from his teachings. Through them, he is sustained in his principles, is reminded of them, gains fresh inspiration to illustrate and practice them.
Catholics should be ‘straight’ souls following the straight and narrow path upwards to Heaven. We see this ‘straightness’ reflected in the palm leaves, which are all straight: “The crooked shall become straight” (Isaias 40:4). “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight His paths!” (Mark 1:3). “How narrow is the gate, and straight is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:14). “Let thy eyes look straight on, and let thy eyelids go before thy steps. Make straight the path for thy feet. Decline not to the right hand, nor to the left [like the branched palm or creeping palm]: turn away thy foot from evil. For the Lord knows the ways that are on the right hand; but those are perverse which are on the left hand. But He will make thy courses straight, He will bring forward thy ways in peace … The wise man makes straight his steps” (Proverbs 4:25-27; 15:21).
Tough Palm Trees—Tough Catholics
Palm trees are from a family of perennial lianas, shrubs, and trees and grow best in hot and humid climates. Most palm trees grow in the tropical and subtropical regions of the world. They occur from about 44° northern latitude to about 44° southern latitude. However—as with Catholics—there are also hardy palm trees that can withstand coldness and grow in much harsher and colder environments. Palm Trees―with proper care, planting, moisture and climate―are grown all over the world, even in locations with freezing cold winters. Canada serves a Northern reference point and many types of Palm Trees can grow there. The main factors affecting hardiness are the minimum winter temperature, the number of hours of cold every winter, the amount of heat every summer, and the relative wetness or dryness of the climate. In general, Palms are not particularly hardy. Many are actually injured by a single freezing night. Others Palms withstand 0° F (zero degrees Fahrenheit) for short periods without damage.
Community Life or Desert Father Hermits?
They have large evergreen leaves that are either “palmate” which is fan-leaved like a hand or “pinnate” which feather-leaved where the palms do not blend together at the base, but are separate leaves arranged in a spiral at the top of the trunk. If you liken that to religious life, you could say, broadly speaking, that the “palmate” palms are those that are joined together and live in community, whereas the “pinnate” palms are those who live like hermits or Desert Fathers.
Evergreen—Ever Humble
Being evergreens, reminds us of the virtue of humility (which is represented by the color green—as in green grass that walked upon and trodden on and squashed down). This humility should be present in us all year round—evergreen—and is required by Our Lord, Who said: "Learn of Me, for I am humble of heart!" (Matthew 11:29). “God has made the roots of proud nations to wither, and has planted the humble of these nations” (Ecclesiasticus 10:18). “And he shall be like a tree which is planted near the running waters, which shall bring forth its fruit, in due season. And his leaf shall not fall off; and all whatsoever he shall do shall prosper!” (Psalm 1:3). There can be no fruit without humility—just as no tree can survive without humus (Latin for the word “soil”).
The Fruit of the Palm Tree
As Holy Scripture says: “I will go up into the palm tree, and will take hold of the fruit thereof” (Canticles 7:8). So what is the fruit of the palm tree? Surprisingly, from the various species of palm trees, we get a wide variety of fruit. Among the many species of palm tree there are many different fruits. The most common fruits that grow from palm trees are coconuts and dates. Other fruits from palm trees include the acai berry, jubaea, peach palm fruit and betel nut.
Similarly with Catholics—or saints (which each Catholic should be)—there is a wide variety of species of Catholic, each bearing different fruits (virtues). Some saints were mainly known for shedding their blood, others were known for their learning, others for their missionary zeal, others for suffering persecution, others for carrying a variety of burdens―but all of them had humility and charity in common.
The Coconut Palm Tree
The coconut, that you see in your store, does not look anything like the coconut on the tree. The coconut has three layers and in the store you only the final inner layer—with the other two layers having been removed. In technical botanical jargon, a coconut is “a fibrous one-seeded drupe, also known as a dry drupe.” However, when using loose definitions, the coconut can be all three: a fruit, a nut, and a seed. Eh? Drupe? Okay! Classification of plants can be a complicated matter for the average person. A drupe is a fruit with a hard stony covering enclosing the seed and comes from the word drupa meaning “overripe olive”.
A untouched coconut, and all drupes, have three layers: (1) the exocarp (outer layer), which is typically smooth with a greenish color, (2) the mesocarp (fleshy middle layer), the fibrous husk, which ultimately surrounds (3) the endocarp (the furry hard woody shell with the seed inside of it). Generally speaking, when you buy a coconut at the supermarket, the exocarp (green exterior) and the mesocarp (middle layer of husk) are removed and what you see is the endocarp (the furry hard woody shell with the seed inside of it). If you look at one end of the coconut, you’ll see three pores (also called eyes). The coconut seed―inside of the furry or hairy hard woody shell―germinates and a shoot emerges from one of the pores. In addition to the “baby” plant in the seed, there is the food to kick off its life called the endosperm. The endosperm is what makes up most of the seed and, in the coconut’s case, is the yummy white stuff we eat.
The Coconut Palm of Milk, Cream and Water!
Also, inside that furry or hairy hard woody shell is coconut water—which is drinkable and not to be confused with coconut milk. Coconut water is the liquid that can be poured out from pierced coconuts. Coconut milk and coconut cream are both made from the white grated coconut meat that is macerated (soaked) in a measured quantity of water. When the resulting liquid is squeezed out, the first squeezing produces coconut cream, which is thick like dairy cream. Coconut milk has the liquid consistency of cow’s milk and is made from simmering one part shredded coconut meat in one part water.
What do we learn from all of this? Well, first of all, in order to get to the good, edible and enjoyable part of the coconut—which you could call the ‘soul of the coconut’ or ‘coconut heaven’—you have to go through three states or stages: the smooth exterior of a greenish color, called the exocarp. Then the fibrous husk, or mesocarp. Finally the very hard woody layer that we see and buy in the store which is called the endocarp. So, in a sense, it gets harder the closer you get to the white yummy tasty stuff in the center. The same is true for the spiritual life—we have three stages to pass through before God will allow us to get to Heaven—and nobody is exempt from any of those stages. The stages are those of the Beginner (the easiest), the Proficient (getting harder) and the Perfect (extremely hard). We either pass through these on Earth (which is preferable and easier) or in the fires of Purgatory (which is not preferable and incredibly more painful).
The water is the coconut is symbolic of grace in soul—for water has always been a symbol of grace for the Fathers of the Church. It is what keeps the coconut ‘alive’—just as grace keeps the soul ‘alive’ to God. The coconut milk and cream are produced by the white flesh being mixed with water and then either boiled (simmered), or squeezed to produce milk and cream respectively. This is symbolic of the pure soul (white flesh), working with grace (the water), under the pressure of the cross (simmered or squeezed) to produce virtues (milk or cream). This is symbolized by the way some Catholics like to fold the palm in order to make it into a Palm Cross—look it up online in you don’t know how to do that!
More Than Just a Palm!
Thus you can see that the simple palm that you were given on Palm Sunday has far more meaning than we superficially find it! And this is just “the tip of the iceberg” to what could be found if one looked deeper and researched more. It proves the point that you can find the DNA of God and the Faith in everything that God has made. Just as, proverbially, “all roads lead to Rome”—so too does all of creation point and lead to God, if we would only stop long enough to examine deeply enough all those things, or signposts, that God has placed before us!
Therefore, DO NOT WASTE YOUR HOLY WEEK! Just as with the palms of Palm Sunday, there is myriad or plethora of material present in Holy Week that shows the DNA of God and the Faith. But you need to free yourself from other things in order to have the time seek, dig, study, compare, connect and enjoy what God and His Church places before us in this holiest of weeks. Superficiality not only gets you nowhere, it is also as dissatisfying and unfulfilling for the spiritual appetite as cotton-candy (candy floss) is to a hungry man!
Article 34
Friday after the 1st Sunday of Passiontide, the feast of the Sorrowful Mother, April 11th and Saturday April 12th
Your Mother is Sorrowful!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Friday after the 1st Sunday of Passiontide, the feast of the Sorrowful Mother, April 11th and Saturday April 12th
Your Mother is Sorrowful!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Your Mother is Sad! Why?
Given the choice, most of us would opt for imagining Our Lady as happy rather than sad. That is true in a certain sense―for in Heaven there is no sadness, or any other kind of negativity. However, in order to influence us and impress upon us the dangers of sin in relation to our salvation, Our Lady has at times taken on the appearance of a “sad” Mother for our benefit―just like angels do not have bodies, but they appear with bodies for our benefit so that they can better communicate with us.
In most of her modern-day apparitions we do see Our Lady as being happy and smiling―perhaps occasionally, but rarely. At Quito, La Salette, Lourdes, Fatima and Akita ― her predominant display of emotion is one of sadness. The cause of that sadness is threefold ― (1) sadness over sin; (2) sadness over the overwhelming damnation of most souls; and (3) sadness over the punishments that these sins will draw down from God.
► OUR LADY OF FATIMA said that many souls go to Hell: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners” (Our Lady of Fatima).
► To the VENERABLE MARY OF AGREDA (1602-1665), OUR LADY said: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls―for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls! ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss! I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation!”
► To MOTHER MARIANA DE JESUS TORRES (1563-1635), OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS said: “The sins that lead more souls to Hell are the sins of the flesh … In the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals! … Every type of vice will enter, calling down, in turn, every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy, the cause of the perdition of so many souls! … Depraved priests will scandalize the Christian people! … Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective of making it easy for everyone to live in sin! ... The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing freedom! … In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … There will be almost no virgin souls in the world!”
► OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846): “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! … God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell―they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence! … Many will abandon the Faith! … A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned! … The true Faith to the Lord will be forgotten … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin … and men will become more and more perverted, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth! … Te devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders. In convents, the flowers of the Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts! convents are no longer houses of God, but the grazing-grounds of Asmodeas [the devil of impurity] and his like!”
► OUR LADY made a series of apparitions to BLESSED ELENA AIELLO (1895-1961). Elena says: “The Blessed Mother was lovely and majestic, but with tears on her cheeks!” Our Lady said: “Look upon my Heart pierced by the thorns of so many sins; my face, disfigured by sorrow; my eyes, filled with tears! The cause of such great sadness is the sight of so many souls going to Hell, and because the Church is wounded – inwardly and outwardly! Men — as at the time of the Great Deluge — have lost God’s way, and are ruled by the spirit of Satan! … The world has become as a flooded valley, overflowing with filth and mud! … Once there was the chastisement by water, but if there is not a returning to God, there will come the chastisement by fire, which will cover the streets of the world with blood! … Men are offending God too much! If I were to show you the number of sins committed in a single day, you would die of horror and sorrow! … Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! See how the souls are falling into Hell! See how high the flames are, and the souls who fall into them like flakes of snow, looking like transparent embers! How many sparks! How many cries of hate, and of despair! How much pain! See how many priestly souls! What torture in my maternal Heart! Great is my sorrow to see that men do not change! The justice of the Father requires reparation — otherwise many will be lost! Behold and see to what ends the sins of man have reduced me!
► OUR LADY OF AKITA manifested her sorrow by having her statue weep tears of real blood on over 100 occasions. She herself said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead.
Telling Times! Time for What? What Time is It?
We live in telling times! Sister Lucia of Fatima said that Our Lady had indicated to her that we have entered the period of the so-called “Last Times” ― which no one can really say how long that time will last. Our Lord says: “Take ye heed, watch and pray! For ye know not when the time is!” (Mark 13:33). “Of that day and hour no one knows―not the angels of Heaven, but the Father alone!” (Matthew 24:36). “The lord of that servant shall come in a day that he hopes not, and at an hour that he knows not!” (Matthew 24:50). “Wherefore be you also ready, because at what hour you know not the Son of man will come!” (Matthew 24:44). “Watch ye therefore, because you know not the day nor the hour!” (Matthew 25:13).
The Book of Ecclesiastes is not a bad a book for “telling-the-time”―in its third chapter, it says: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal. A time to destroy, and a time to build. A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather. A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces. A time to get, and a time to lose. A time to keep, and a time to cast away. A time to rend, and a time to sew. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8). What time is it in your house?
If, as Ecclesiastes says, “all things have their season”, then what season is it now? We can look at the current season in relation to one single year, and we can also look at the current season in relation to all time. Of course, the season of the current year is one of winter passing into spring (northern hemisphere), and liturgically we are in the season of Lent (a spiritual winter) that will soon pass into the season of Easter (a spiritual springtime).
From another perspective, we can look at our present age (season) in relation to all the ages that have passed and to those which are yet to come. In this sense, we also find ourselves in a winter―which is from being finished―and before we can enter into a future spring-time, some very heavy storms have to be weathered.
Weather Forecast
Talking of weather―putting aside the proverbial joke that when weather forecasters get their forecasts right, then it will be a sign that the end of world is fast approaching―there is a “forecast” that is a more reliable “weather forecast” than any earthly agency can provide. The “weather forecast” or “climate prediction” that is being referred to, is not focused on natural weather conditions, but on the spiritual and moral climate of the world and the resulting “supernatural weather” that these will provoke. This “spiritual and moral weather forecast” comes, of course, from Heaven―and Our Lady is God’s chosen “weathercaster” or weather forecaster.
Usually, people do not plan on organizing a parish picnic on a day when tornados and torrential rain has been forecast. When a hurricane hits the east coast of America, the advice is to stay indoors or even leave the area―rather than be a fatal victim of the hurricane. When the winter snow storms bring multiple feet of snow, nobody ventures outdoors wearing a t-shirt, shorts and sandals. When it is multiple degrees below freezing and the biting winter winds are howling, we don’t go swimming in the back-yard swimming pool. When flood waters invade our house, we do not put on knee-high rubber boots and continue watching TV, or browsing the internet and munching on our snacks and sipping beer or wine. All of this is patently obvious and pure common sense. Yet, we fail to apply this earthly or worldly wisdom to our spiritual life! We act like a person who is insane when we are faced with some blatant spiritual realities and “weather forecasts”.
Mary is No Cheery Weathercaster
The TV channel weathercasters are usually upbeat, cheery and smiling. Our Lady is far from falling into that stereotype. When the weather is going to be extraordinarily severe, then the weather updates are very frequent. This is equally true of Our Lady’s “weather forecasts” for our age. Unless you have your head buried in the sand (or the screen of some electronic device), then you cannot fail to see that Our Lady’s forecast is one of an impending catastrophe―so much so, that you might well want to bury your head in something, and switch over to a state of denial.
At Quito, there is NO RECORD OF OUR LADY BEING CHEERY AND SMILING―if some evidence turns up, it is likely to be minimal, for the whole tone of Our Lady’s message is somber, sad and depressing.
At La Salette (1846), Our Lady NEVER SMILES, BUT WEEPS! One of the seers, Melanie, reports: “I saw a most beautiful Lady sitting on top of our Paradise, with her head in her hands. This beautiful Lady stood up, she calmly crossed her arms while watching us. When I was up close to the beautiful Lady, she began to speak and, from her beautiful eyes, tears also started to flow.”
At Lourdes (1858), though Our Lady smiles at times, it is merely to calm the suspicious and frightened Bernadette. Otherwise, we read that Our Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears.
At Fatima (1917), Sr. Lucia of Fatima reveals: “The Blessed Virgin was very sad in all her apparitions. She never smiled at us. This anguish that we saw in her, caused by offenses to God and the chastisements that threaten sinners, penetrated our souls” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
At Akita in Japan (1973), the statue of Our Lady does not miraculously smile, but miraculously WEEPS, and it weeps tears of blood!
All of this sets the general tone of Our Lady’s appearance, emotions, and messages as being of a grave, tragic, sad and unhappy disposition―not a happy-go-lucky, cheerful, upbeat, smiling demeanor.
Mary's Frequent Weather Warnings
It may not seem that Our Lady’s forecasts are very frequent―if we are to take Quito in basically the first part of the 1600s (1594-1635), La Salette (1846), Lourdes (1858), Fatima (1917) and Akita (1973) as being the main “weather updates”. Yet, it must be remembered that, with God, “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Peter 3:8) and “a thousand years in Thy sight are as yesterday, which is past” (Psalm 89:4). Therefore, arguably and artificially, we could translate years into hours, and the dates of Our Lady’s apparitions at Quito (early 1660s), La Salette (1846), Lourdes (1858), Fatima (1917) and Akita (1973), as well as our present day―could all be looked at in the context of one single day. The year 1600 would become 16:00 hours; 1846 would become 18:46 hours; 18:58 would be 18:58 hours; 1917 would be 19:17 hours and 1973 (doesn’t quite work, for there are only 60 minutes in an hour) could be said to be almost 20:00 hours, while our present year, 2019, would translate into 20:19 hours. In this sense, following the principle that “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day”, we have Our Lady’s weather forecasts rapidly following one upon the other in one single “day”―as the darkness grows and night approaches―at 18:46 or 6:46 p.m., then at 18:58 or 6:58 p.m., again at 19:17 or 7:17 p.m. and again at 19:53(73) or 7:53 p.m. While now, in our present age and time, we have arrived at 20:19 or 8:19 p.m. Thus the weather warnings are flowing thick and fast between 4:00 p.m. and 8:19 p.m.
Our Lady is Sad and Sorrowful
What is our response? Ignore them and keep enjoying life! What is Our Lady’s response? The seer, Melanie, at La Salette reports: “I saw a most beautiful Lady sitting on top of our Paradise, with her head in her hands ... She began to speak and, from her beautiful eyes, tears also started to flow.” Bernadette at Lourdes reports that the Immaculate Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears. Sister Lucia of Fatima puts it in a nutshell when she says: “Our Lady never smiled. She was always very sad … The Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one has paid attention to her Message, neither the good nor the bad. The good, because they continue on the road of virtue, goodness and personal apostolates, but without paying attention and uniting their lives to this Message. The bad―the sinners―keep following the road of evil”―so much so that in the 1950’s (nowhere near a sinful time as 2019), Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello: “People are offending God too much! Were I to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief. These are grave times. The world is in total turmoil because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread. When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs. All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
Our Lady is so Sorrowful, She Sweats Blood and Weeps in Tears
Hence, in 1973, at Akita in Japan, at the time of Our Lady’s messages to Agnes Katsuko Sasagawa, her statue was seen to be ‘sweating’ tears of blood from her eyes on many occasions for over two months, as well as a having a stigmata miraculously appear on one of the statues hands. Sister Agnes also received the stigmata in one of her hands, that lasted for around one month―from June 28th to July 27th of 1973. Blood began to flow out of the statue's hand the very next day, from a stigmata wound that looked identical to Sister Agnes' wound. One of Sister Agnes’s fellow nuns, who observed the statue’s wound up close, stated: “It seemed to be truly cut into flesh. The edge of the cross had the aspect of human flesh and one even saw the grain of the skin like a fingerprint.” The statue sometimes bled simultaneously with Sister Agnes. A guardian angel told Sister Agnes: “The wounds of Mary are much deeper and more sorrowful than yours!” After that, the statue began to sweat beads of perspiration. More than a year later, on January 4th, 1975, the statue began to weep—crying three times on that first day. The weeping statue drew so much attention, that its crying was broadcast on national television throughout Japan, on December 8th, 1979―the feast of the Immaculate Conception. By the time the statue cried for the last time―which was on the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows (September 15th) in 1981—it was recorded that it had wept for a total of 101 times.
Blood, sweat and tears―all of which were combined in this miraculous occurrence―are invariably symbols of suffering, toil, agony and mourning. Samples of blood, sweat, and tears from the Akita statue were all scientifically tested by people who weren't told where the samples came from. The results: all of the fluids were identified as human. The blood was found to be Type B, the sweat Type AB, and the tears Type AB. Investigators came to the conclusion that a supernatural miracle had somehow caused a non-human object — the statue — to exude human bodily fluids because that would be impossible naturally.
To us, all these apparitions, all these words of Our Lady, all these solemn and grave warnings, are much like the proverbial “water flowing off the duck’s back”―we read them, we nod and then we file them away in our “been there, seen it, done it” folder―and then refocus once again on what really concerns us: our daily grind and the material preoccupations of our life. Somehow―we convince ourselves―these “weather advisories” or “storm warnings” do not apply to us, but to someone else, they are for some other part of the world, or for some future age.
Weather Psychologists Reveal Typical Human Reactions to Warnings
What is true on natural level, is often true on the spiritual level. Our reactions to severe weather alerts, storm warnings and even evacuation orders are similar to the way we react to Heaven's storm warnings and chastisement alerts. Dr. Laura Myers, the director and senior research scientist at the Center for Advanced Public Safety, has researched how people react to warnings. She reveals that most folk stubbornly do not want to change their plans or their behavior on account of weather warnings, unless they are convinced that storm will really affect them. Dr. Myers pointed out that people become desensitized to alerts and warnings (like “water flowing off the duck’s back”), and after a while, not having seen disasters in their neighborhood, tend to ignore the warnings and alerts. She added: “When people hear what the weather impacts are, such as damage and destruction to well-built homes, they start to pay attention. When they are told they need to take shelter now because their location is going to take a direct impact, they usually act.” Dr. Myers explained that the moment in time, when a warning is issued to the public, can also produce various reactions and responses. Given too much advance notice, people can fall into a complacency, become tired of waiting and go back to their usual daily occupations. Regardless of the warning, some people wait until they see their life is in danger.
AccuWeather Meteorologist, Dan Kottlowski, revealed that “a lot of social media research was done and people said they have to see [a tornado] before they do something.” Mike Smith, Senior Vice President of AccuWeather, revealed several reasons why people wait to react to severe weather alerts: “There is considerable inertia in people. They are busy or their attention is on some project. There is also sociological evidence that people feel silly for taking shelter; that it somehow reflects poorly on their courage.” Mike Smith further added that for many people it sometimes takes a push-and-a-shove from someone they really trust and whose opinions they really value, to get them to take shelter or evacuate. He added that repeated warnings from various different sources can also tip the balance from inertia to action.
Julie Demuth, a scientist who studies risk communication and weather, at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, looks for patterns in the behavior of people when faced with severe weather alerts. She says: “A lot of the research we look at is about the factors that influence people’s perceptions of the hurricane risks and the decisions they make. We’ve found that most people don’t outright ignore any kind of weather warning. People refer to their past experiences … Maybe it wasn’t as bad as they had anticipated and now they’re trying to apply that. Unfortunately every event is different.” Speaking of elements that prevent people from reacting as they should, Demuth said: “It could be limitations to transportation, so that they can’t evacuate even if they wanted to. They might not have the financial resources to evacuate. We sometimes encourage people to stock up on food, or have medications on hand, but for some people, if they had the money to buy a week’s worth of food, they would do that, but they don’t necessarily have that ability. There can also be medical limitations that influence whether or not people can evacuate ... After Hurricane Katrina, we started to understand the role of how important people’s pets are to them. People wouldn’t evacuate and leave their pets behind. Another factor is people’s relationships. People don’t necessarily make individual decisions. Often we make them at a household level. We consult with our spouse or our friends and we look to see what they’re doing, and that can influence what we do.”
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Weather Service analyzes forecasting performance and public response during the second deadliest tornado outbreak in U.S. history―the “Super Tuesday Tornado Outbreak” of February, 2008, when 82 tornadoes raked nine states throughout the South, killing 57 people, injuring 350 others and causing $400 million in property damage. NOAA’s key area of concern was: “Why do some people take cover while others ride out severe weather?” In reviewing the public response, the research team found that two-thirds of the victims were in mobile homes, and 60 percent did not have access to safe shelter (i.e., a basement or storm cellar). Some indicated they thought the threat was minimal because February is not within traditional tornado season. Several of those interviewed said they spent time seeking confirmation and went to a safe location only after they saw a tornado. Many people minimized the threat of personal risk through “optimism bias,” the belief that such bad things only happen to other people.
Lots of varying reasons are behind the phenomenon of why some people don’t pay attention to severe weather evacuation notices—some think they can ride out the winds and surging waters; while others basically have nowhere to go and or have means by which to evacuate. Others recall or perhaps have experienced previous unnecessary evacuations that resulted from forecasts “not coming true” and so they now react to such forecasts with a “boy who cried ‘wolf’” mentality. Rebecca Morss of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, says: “Some people just don't perceive the risk to be that high.”
Dr. Irwin Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness, says: “Following Hurricane Katrina, there is a level of awareness around the potential danger of large-scale coastal storms and hurricanes and it has been a wake-up call … Many, many people electively choose not to comply with official orders of mandatory evacuation and intend to stay in place no matter what the warnings are. Many of these people are putting themselves at an extreme level of risk … What we've found is that being hesitant about the communication messages, or using softer language doesn't work ... The message is being forcefully delivered in an attempt to absolutely minimize the number of people that stay behind … When a public official determines that the hardest possible language is going to be used, he or she is hoping that strongest message will get the most people to safety. On the other hand, there is the “crying wolf” phenomenon. They are taking a chance that if the conditions are not as dire as anticipated, that the next time there will be a great reluctance to heed those warnings …
“Theoretically, they could physically remove someone, especially if their remaining would endanger anyone else's safety and especially [the life of] first responders. But the strategy that officials may use, rather than arresting the recalcitrant citizen, is to make it very clear--absolutely clear—that rescue and response services may not be available. In essence, if you don't comply with evacuation orders, you are in effect waiving your right to get rescue and response if you need it … We just did a study on evacuations under scenarios of disasters without warnings. We are very concerned about disasters that occur without warning when we have to do evacuations in real-time—in essence, immediate—for example, an earthquake or a terrorist nuclear attack. We found about two thirds of people with children would not comply with official orders to evacuate, until and unless they were able to retrieve their children from school or day care. If we have two thirds of the population with children that would not comply, what we would have is evacuation chaos and an absolute breakdown of disaster response in circumstances that provided no warning.”
Research by the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) unearthed several factors that lead people to ignore warnings of severe or devastating weather alerts. The most common factor is OPTIMISM, because as human beings we prefer to think that, for us, things will go right rather than wrong, and that we will be among the lucky ones to escape. The next most common factor is UNCERTAINTY―people are told to prepare and evacuate and many just do not know how to go about doing it. So you sit back and keep thinking and saying: “What should I do? What should I do?” and this makes you increasingly uncertain, with the result that most people, when uncertain, keep doing the things they were doing before. The third factor is HERD THINKING―whereby we are very influenced by what our friends and neighbors do, so we look to see what they are doing―and if they are not “stocking-up” or not evacuating, then we assume they know what they are doing and we do likewise, not realizing (or denying) that they are as uncertain as we are.
Typical Reactions to Heaven’s Warnings
You have no doubt heard the saying “Like father, like son; like mother, like daughter”―which actually can be traced to Holy Scripture: “Behold every one that uses a common proverb, shall use this against thee, saying: ‘As the mother was, so also is her daughter!’” (Ezechiel 16:44). Similarly, we could say―”As we are naturally, so we shall be spiritually!” Our natural, physical, bodily, material, earthly habits and attitudes seep into our supernatural and spiritual habits and attitudes. If a person is lazy in work, they are more likely to also be lazy about spiritual duties. If they are careless about material things, they will tend to be careless about spiritual things. Hence the above quoted research on people ignoring severe weather advisories, alerts and warnings, is just as applicable to the reaction of people to Heaven’s severe climate or chastisement advisories, alerts and warnings.
Therefore, most Catholics view Our Lady’s dire warnings as a case of “The boy crying: ‘Wolf!’” when there is no wolf to be found! Their mentality is one of: “It doesn’t apply to me, so why bother?” They have heard the warnings time and time again―but nothing happens. So they “switch-off” their minds to the warnings and just go about their daily life as though nothing was wrong. Just as the above quoted recipients of severe weather warnings, their “knee-jerk” response is one of false OPTIMISM―based upon one of many differing complacent rationalizations. “I’m not such a bad person! I'm not like most people! I go to church! I say my Rosary! etc.” Yet just as a natural storm makes no distinction between good people and bad people when it claims lives or inflicts serious injuries, likewise will Heaven do when it begins to chastise us for our sins and the sins of others―as Our Lady of Akita warned: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful.”
We are fools to ignore and do nothing about Our Lady's incessant and increasingly severe warnings: “Fools despise wisdom and instruction! … Fools covet those things which are hurtful to themselves! … The eyes of fools are on the ends of the Earth … The prosperity of fools shall destroy them! … And the number of fools is infinite!” (Proverbs 1:7; 1:22; 17:24; 1:32; Ecclesiastes 1:15). Holy Mother Church puts the following words of Scripture into the mouth of Mary, as part of the readings for the Masses on the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (December 8th) and also the Immaculate Heart of Mary (August 22nd): “Now therefore, ye children, hear me! Blessed are they that keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise―and refuse it not! Blessed is the man that heareth me, and that watcheth daily at my gates, and waiteth at the posts of my doors! He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord! But he that shall sin against me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate me love death … He who obeys me will not be put to shame, they who serve me will never fail. They who explain me shall have life everlasting!” (Proverbs 8:32-36; Ecclesiasticus 34:30-31). In other words, listen to her “weather warnings and advisories”, take them to heart, obey the instructions and pass them on to others.
From Year to Hour
Coming back to the concept of “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Peter 3:8), let us look at Our Lady’s “weather alerts” or spiritual storm advisories from the perspective of not being separated by hundreds of years―as in the case of Our Lady of Good Success giving her first warning in 1594, with the others following in the 379 years up to her messages at Akita in Japan in 1973―but look upon them as being given in one single day―by taking numbers of the year and making them into the numbers for the hours and minutes of the day. Thus the 1600s would become 16:00 hours or 4:00 p.m. and 1635 would become 16:35 p.m. or 4:35 p.m., etc. Thus Quito would translate to approximately 4:00 p.m. onwards; La Salette would translate to 6:46 p.m.; Lourdes would be 6:58 p.m.; Fatima would be 7:17 p.m. and Akita would be just before 8:00 p.m. So four major alerts, advisories and warnings in a ‘four hour’ period.
The Quito Weather Forecast (from 1594 to 1635)
Our Lady of Good Success appeared in Quito, Ecuador between 1594 and 1635. These centuries and years would translate to the period between 15:54(94) hours and 16:35 hours, on the 24-hour clock, or roughly between 3:54 p.m. and 4:35 p.m. In this “severe weather” 90-second warning, Our Lady says:
“At the end of the 19th century and throughout the 20th century, various heresies will be propagated ... As these heresies spread and dominate, the precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of morals. During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private. The small number of souls who, hidden, will preserve the treasure of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom. Many of them will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings … From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! … During these unfortunate times, evil will invade childhood innocence … Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world … Without virginity, it will be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon those lands in order to purify them … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith … In this way, vocations to the priesthood will be lost, resulting in a true calamity. Many authentic vocations will perish!”
The La Salette Weather Forecast (1846)
The year 1846 would translate to 18:46 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 6:46 p.m. Here is the two-minute weather warning (it is a brief warning and takes 2 minutes to read):
“If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it. I have suffered all of the time for the rest of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually. And the rest of you think little of this. In vain you will pray, in vain you will act, you will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for the rest of you … Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! … Woe to the inhabitants of the earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family. Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other ... The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God … Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls. Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God …
“All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. A general war will follow which will be appalling … The wicked will make use of all their evil ways. Men will kill each other, massacre each other even in their homes. Then, at the first blow of God’s thundering sword, the mountains and all Nature will tremble in terror, for the disorders and crimes of men have pierced the vault of the Heavens. Paris will burn and Marseilles will be engulfed. Several cities will be shaken down and swallowed up by earthquakes. People will believe that all is lost. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of arms and blasphemy. The righteous will suffer greatly.”
The Lourdes Weather Forecast (1858)
The year 1858 would translate to 18:58 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 6:58 p.m. The spiritual climate at Lourdes could be described as sunny, but changing to overcast skies and threatening storm clouds.
At her first apparition at Lourdes, on February 11th, 1858, Our Lady appeared as a beautiful young woman, dressed in white and holding a Rosary, and smiling most graciously toward the frightened little visionary―which indicates she was not smiling beforehand.
At her third apparition, on February 14th, Bernadette, thinking perhaps all this might be trick of the devil, sprinkles Our Lady with holy water, asking her to remain if she came from God, otherwise go away. The Lady smiles―which again indicates she was not smiling beforehand.
At her second apparition, on February 18th, Our Lady seems to be a “kill-joy” because she tells Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world but only in the other!” But we want to be happy in this world as well as the other, don’t we? We want to keep our cake and we want to eat it!
At her sixth apparition on Sunday, February 21st, the Immaculate Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears. Just as with Simeon’s prophecy, the Immaculate Heart of Mary seems to be pierced even now with the sword of sorrow caused by the sins of men, sins that crucify her Son, making Him a sign of contradiction.
The Fatima Weather Forecast (1917)
The year 1917 would translate to 19:17 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 7:17 p.m.
The Akita Weather Forecast (1973)
This is where the year/clock analogy fails somewhat―since there are only 60 minutes in an hour and you cannot have a time of 7:73 pm. Nevertheless we could say, by transforming the year into hours, that is almost 8:00 pm.
What’s the Forecast for 2025?
The year 2025 would translate to 20:25 or 8:25 pm on the 24-hour clock.
Given the choice, most of us would opt for imagining Our Lady as happy rather than sad. That is true in a certain sense―for in Heaven there is no sadness, or any other kind of negativity. However, in order to influence us and impress upon us the dangers of sin in relation to our salvation, Our Lady has at times taken on the appearance of a “sad” Mother for our benefit―just like angels do not have bodies, but they appear with bodies for our benefit so that they can better communicate with us.
In most of her modern-day apparitions we do see Our Lady as being happy and smiling―perhaps occasionally, but rarely. At Quito, La Salette, Lourdes, Fatima and Akita ― her predominant display of emotion is one of sadness. The cause of that sadness is threefold ― (1) sadness over sin; (2) sadness over the overwhelming damnation of most souls; and (3) sadness over the punishments that these sins will draw down from God.
► OUR LADY OF FATIMA said that many souls go to Hell: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners” (Our Lady of Fatima).
► To the VENERABLE MARY OF AGREDA (1602-1665), OUR LADY said: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls―for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls! ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss! I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation!”
► To MOTHER MARIANA DE JESUS TORRES (1563-1635), OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS said: “The sins that lead more souls to Hell are the sins of the flesh … In the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals! … Every type of vice will enter, calling down, in turn, every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy, the cause of the perdition of so many souls! … Depraved priests will scandalize the Christian people! … Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective of making it easy for everyone to live in sin! ... The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing freedom! … In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … There will be almost no virgin souls in the world!”
► OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846): “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! … God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell―they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence! … Many will abandon the Faith! … A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned! … The true Faith to the Lord will be forgotten … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin … and men will become more and more perverted, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth! … Te devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders. In convents, the flowers of the Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts! convents are no longer houses of God, but the grazing-grounds of Asmodeas [the devil of impurity] and his like!”
► OUR LADY made a series of apparitions to BLESSED ELENA AIELLO (1895-1961). Elena says: “The Blessed Mother was lovely and majestic, but with tears on her cheeks!” Our Lady said: “Look upon my Heart pierced by the thorns of so many sins; my face, disfigured by sorrow; my eyes, filled with tears! The cause of such great sadness is the sight of so many souls going to Hell, and because the Church is wounded – inwardly and outwardly! Men — as at the time of the Great Deluge — have lost God’s way, and are ruled by the spirit of Satan! … The world has become as a flooded valley, overflowing with filth and mud! … Once there was the chastisement by water, but if there is not a returning to God, there will come the chastisement by fire, which will cover the streets of the world with blood! … Men are offending God too much! If I were to show you the number of sins committed in a single day, you would die of horror and sorrow! … Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! See how the souls are falling into Hell! See how high the flames are, and the souls who fall into them like flakes of snow, looking like transparent embers! How many sparks! How many cries of hate, and of despair! How much pain! See how many priestly souls! What torture in my maternal Heart! Great is my sorrow to see that men do not change! The justice of the Father requires reparation — otherwise many will be lost! Behold and see to what ends the sins of man have reduced me!
► OUR LADY OF AKITA manifested her sorrow by having her statue weep tears of real blood on over 100 occasions. She herself said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead.
Telling Times! Time for What? What Time is It?
We live in telling times! Sister Lucia of Fatima said that Our Lady had indicated to her that we have entered the period of the so-called “Last Times” ― which no one can really say how long that time will last. Our Lord says: “Take ye heed, watch and pray! For ye know not when the time is!” (Mark 13:33). “Of that day and hour no one knows―not the angels of Heaven, but the Father alone!” (Matthew 24:36). “The lord of that servant shall come in a day that he hopes not, and at an hour that he knows not!” (Matthew 24:50). “Wherefore be you also ready, because at what hour you know not the Son of man will come!” (Matthew 24:44). “Watch ye therefore, because you know not the day nor the hour!” (Matthew 25:13).
The Book of Ecclesiastes is not a bad a book for “telling-the-time”―in its third chapter, it says: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal. A time to destroy, and a time to build. A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather. A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces. A time to get, and a time to lose. A time to keep, and a time to cast away. A time to rend, and a time to sew. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8). What time is it in your house?
If, as Ecclesiastes says, “all things have their season”, then what season is it now? We can look at the current season in relation to one single year, and we can also look at the current season in relation to all time. Of course, the season of the current year is one of winter passing into spring (northern hemisphere), and liturgically we are in the season of Lent (a spiritual winter) that will soon pass into the season of Easter (a spiritual springtime).
From another perspective, we can look at our present age (season) in relation to all the ages that have passed and to those which are yet to come. In this sense, we also find ourselves in a winter―which is from being finished―and before we can enter into a future spring-time, some very heavy storms have to be weathered.
Weather Forecast
Talking of weather―putting aside the proverbial joke that when weather forecasters get their forecasts right, then it will be a sign that the end of world is fast approaching―there is a “forecast” that is a more reliable “weather forecast” than any earthly agency can provide. The “weather forecast” or “climate prediction” that is being referred to, is not focused on natural weather conditions, but on the spiritual and moral climate of the world and the resulting “supernatural weather” that these will provoke. This “spiritual and moral weather forecast” comes, of course, from Heaven―and Our Lady is God’s chosen “weathercaster” or weather forecaster.
Usually, people do not plan on organizing a parish picnic on a day when tornados and torrential rain has been forecast. When a hurricane hits the east coast of America, the advice is to stay indoors or even leave the area―rather than be a fatal victim of the hurricane. When the winter snow storms bring multiple feet of snow, nobody ventures outdoors wearing a t-shirt, shorts and sandals. When it is multiple degrees below freezing and the biting winter winds are howling, we don’t go swimming in the back-yard swimming pool. When flood waters invade our house, we do not put on knee-high rubber boots and continue watching TV, or browsing the internet and munching on our snacks and sipping beer or wine. All of this is patently obvious and pure common sense. Yet, we fail to apply this earthly or worldly wisdom to our spiritual life! We act like a person who is insane when we are faced with some blatant spiritual realities and “weather forecasts”.
Mary is No Cheery Weathercaster
The TV channel weathercasters are usually upbeat, cheery and smiling. Our Lady is far from falling into that stereotype. When the weather is going to be extraordinarily severe, then the weather updates are very frequent. This is equally true of Our Lady’s “weather forecasts” for our age. Unless you have your head buried in the sand (or the screen of some electronic device), then you cannot fail to see that Our Lady’s forecast is one of an impending catastrophe―so much so, that you might well want to bury your head in something, and switch over to a state of denial.
At Quito, there is NO RECORD OF OUR LADY BEING CHEERY AND SMILING―if some evidence turns up, it is likely to be minimal, for the whole tone of Our Lady’s message is somber, sad and depressing.
At La Salette (1846), Our Lady NEVER SMILES, BUT WEEPS! One of the seers, Melanie, reports: “I saw a most beautiful Lady sitting on top of our Paradise, with her head in her hands. This beautiful Lady stood up, she calmly crossed her arms while watching us. When I was up close to the beautiful Lady, she began to speak and, from her beautiful eyes, tears also started to flow.”
At Lourdes (1858), though Our Lady smiles at times, it is merely to calm the suspicious and frightened Bernadette. Otherwise, we read that Our Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears.
At Fatima (1917), Sr. Lucia of Fatima reveals: “The Blessed Virgin was very sad in all her apparitions. She never smiled at us. This anguish that we saw in her, caused by offenses to God and the chastisements that threaten sinners, penetrated our souls” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
At Akita in Japan (1973), the statue of Our Lady does not miraculously smile, but miraculously WEEPS, and it weeps tears of blood!
All of this sets the general tone of Our Lady’s appearance, emotions, and messages as being of a grave, tragic, sad and unhappy disposition―not a happy-go-lucky, cheerful, upbeat, smiling demeanor.
Mary's Frequent Weather Warnings
It may not seem that Our Lady’s forecasts are very frequent―if we are to take Quito in basically the first part of the 1600s (1594-1635), La Salette (1846), Lourdes (1858), Fatima (1917) and Akita (1973) as being the main “weather updates”. Yet, it must be remembered that, with God, “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Peter 3:8) and “a thousand years in Thy sight are as yesterday, which is past” (Psalm 89:4). Therefore, arguably and artificially, we could translate years into hours, and the dates of Our Lady’s apparitions at Quito (early 1660s), La Salette (1846), Lourdes (1858), Fatima (1917) and Akita (1973), as well as our present day―could all be looked at in the context of one single day. The year 1600 would become 16:00 hours; 1846 would become 18:46 hours; 18:58 would be 18:58 hours; 1917 would be 19:17 hours and 1973 (doesn’t quite work, for there are only 60 minutes in an hour) could be said to be almost 20:00 hours, while our present year, 2019, would translate into 20:19 hours. In this sense, following the principle that “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day”, we have Our Lady’s weather forecasts rapidly following one upon the other in one single “day”―as the darkness grows and night approaches―at 18:46 or 6:46 p.m., then at 18:58 or 6:58 p.m., again at 19:17 or 7:17 p.m. and again at 19:53(73) or 7:53 p.m. While now, in our present age and time, we have arrived at 20:19 or 8:19 p.m. Thus the weather warnings are flowing thick and fast between 4:00 p.m. and 8:19 p.m.
Our Lady is Sad and Sorrowful
What is our response? Ignore them and keep enjoying life! What is Our Lady’s response? The seer, Melanie, at La Salette reports: “I saw a most beautiful Lady sitting on top of our Paradise, with her head in her hands ... She began to speak and, from her beautiful eyes, tears also started to flow.” Bernadette at Lourdes reports that the Immaculate Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears. Sister Lucia of Fatima puts it in a nutshell when she says: “Our Lady never smiled. She was always very sad … The Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one has paid attention to her Message, neither the good nor the bad. The good, because they continue on the road of virtue, goodness and personal apostolates, but without paying attention and uniting their lives to this Message. The bad―the sinners―keep following the road of evil”―so much so that in the 1950’s (nowhere near a sinful time as 2019), Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello: “People are offending God too much! Were I to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief. These are grave times. The world is in total turmoil because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread. When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs. All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
Our Lady is so Sorrowful, She Sweats Blood and Weeps in Tears
Hence, in 1973, at Akita in Japan, at the time of Our Lady’s messages to Agnes Katsuko Sasagawa, her statue was seen to be ‘sweating’ tears of blood from her eyes on many occasions for over two months, as well as a having a stigmata miraculously appear on one of the statues hands. Sister Agnes also received the stigmata in one of her hands, that lasted for around one month―from June 28th to July 27th of 1973. Blood began to flow out of the statue's hand the very next day, from a stigmata wound that looked identical to Sister Agnes' wound. One of Sister Agnes’s fellow nuns, who observed the statue’s wound up close, stated: “It seemed to be truly cut into flesh. The edge of the cross had the aspect of human flesh and one even saw the grain of the skin like a fingerprint.” The statue sometimes bled simultaneously with Sister Agnes. A guardian angel told Sister Agnes: “The wounds of Mary are much deeper and more sorrowful than yours!” After that, the statue began to sweat beads of perspiration. More than a year later, on January 4th, 1975, the statue began to weep—crying three times on that first day. The weeping statue drew so much attention, that its crying was broadcast on national television throughout Japan, on December 8th, 1979―the feast of the Immaculate Conception. By the time the statue cried for the last time―which was on the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows (September 15th) in 1981—it was recorded that it had wept for a total of 101 times.
Blood, sweat and tears―all of which were combined in this miraculous occurrence―are invariably symbols of suffering, toil, agony and mourning. Samples of blood, sweat, and tears from the Akita statue were all scientifically tested by people who weren't told where the samples came from. The results: all of the fluids were identified as human. The blood was found to be Type B, the sweat Type AB, and the tears Type AB. Investigators came to the conclusion that a supernatural miracle had somehow caused a non-human object — the statue — to exude human bodily fluids because that would be impossible naturally.
To us, all these apparitions, all these words of Our Lady, all these solemn and grave warnings, are much like the proverbial “water flowing off the duck’s back”―we read them, we nod and then we file them away in our “been there, seen it, done it” folder―and then refocus once again on what really concerns us: our daily grind and the material preoccupations of our life. Somehow―we convince ourselves―these “weather advisories” or “storm warnings” do not apply to us, but to someone else, they are for some other part of the world, or for some future age.
Weather Psychologists Reveal Typical Human Reactions to Warnings
What is true on natural level, is often true on the spiritual level. Our reactions to severe weather alerts, storm warnings and even evacuation orders are similar to the way we react to Heaven's storm warnings and chastisement alerts. Dr. Laura Myers, the director and senior research scientist at the Center for Advanced Public Safety, has researched how people react to warnings. She reveals that most folk stubbornly do not want to change their plans or their behavior on account of weather warnings, unless they are convinced that storm will really affect them. Dr. Myers pointed out that people become desensitized to alerts and warnings (like “water flowing off the duck’s back”), and after a while, not having seen disasters in their neighborhood, tend to ignore the warnings and alerts. She added: “When people hear what the weather impacts are, such as damage and destruction to well-built homes, they start to pay attention. When they are told they need to take shelter now because their location is going to take a direct impact, they usually act.” Dr. Myers explained that the moment in time, when a warning is issued to the public, can also produce various reactions and responses. Given too much advance notice, people can fall into a complacency, become tired of waiting and go back to their usual daily occupations. Regardless of the warning, some people wait until they see their life is in danger.
AccuWeather Meteorologist, Dan Kottlowski, revealed that “a lot of social media research was done and people said they have to see [a tornado] before they do something.” Mike Smith, Senior Vice President of AccuWeather, revealed several reasons why people wait to react to severe weather alerts: “There is considerable inertia in people. They are busy or their attention is on some project. There is also sociological evidence that people feel silly for taking shelter; that it somehow reflects poorly on their courage.” Mike Smith further added that for many people it sometimes takes a push-and-a-shove from someone they really trust and whose opinions they really value, to get them to take shelter or evacuate. He added that repeated warnings from various different sources can also tip the balance from inertia to action.
Julie Demuth, a scientist who studies risk communication and weather, at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, looks for patterns in the behavior of people when faced with severe weather alerts. She says: “A lot of the research we look at is about the factors that influence people’s perceptions of the hurricane risks and the decisions they make. We’ve found that most people don’t outright ignore any kind of weather warning. People refer to their past experiences … Maybe it wasn’t as bad as they had anticipated and now they’re trying to apply that. Unfortunately every event is different.” Speaking of elements that prevent people from reacting as they should, Demuth said: “It could be limitations to transportation, so that they can’t evacuate even if they wanted to. They might not have the financial resources to evacuate. We sometimes encourage people to stock up on food, or have medications on hand, but for some people, if they had the money to buy a week’s worth of food, they would do that, but they don’t necessarily have that ability. There can also be medical limitations that influence whether or not people can evacuate ... After Hurricane Katrina, we started to understand the role of how important people’s pets are to them. People wouldn’t evacuate and leave their pets behind. Another factor is people’s relationships. People don’t necessarily make individual decisions. Often we make them at a household level. We consult with our spouse or our friends and we look to see what they’re doing, and that can influence what we do.”
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Weather Service analyzes forecasting performance and public response during the second deadliest tornado outbreak in U.S. history―the “Super Tuesday Tornado Outbreak” of February, 2008, when 82 tornadoes raked nine states throughout the South, killing 57 people, injuring 350 others and causing $400 million in property damage. NOAA’s key area of concern was: “Why do some people take cover while others ride out severe weather?” In reviewing the public response, the research team found that two-thirds of the victims were in mobile homes, and 60 percent did not have access to safe shelter (i.e., a basement or storm cellar). Some indicated they thought the threat was minimal because February is not within traditional tornado season. Several of those interviewed said they spent time seeking confirmation and went to a safe location only after they saw a tornado. Many people minimized the threat of personal risk through “optimism bias,” the belief that such bad things only happen to other people.
Lots of varying reasons are behind the phenomenon of why some people don’t pay attention to severe weather evacuation notices—some think they can ride out the winds and surging waters; while others basically have nowhere to go and or have means by which to evacuate. Others recall or perhaps have experienced previous unnecessary evacuations that resulted from forecasts “not coming true” and so they now react to such forecasts with a “boy who cried ‘wolf’” mentality. Rebecca Morss of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, says: “Some people just don't perceive the risk to be that high.”
Dr. Irwin Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness, says: “Following Hurricane Katrina, there is a level of awareness around the potential danger of large-scale coastal storms and hurricanes and it has been a wake-up call … Many, many people electively choose not to comply with official orders of mandatory evacuation and intend to stay in place no matter what the warnings are. Many of these people are putting themselves at an extreme level of risk … What we've found is that being hesitant about the communication messages, or using softer language doesn't work ... The message is being forcefully delivered in an attempt to absolutely minimize the number of people that stay behind … When a public official determines that the hardest possible language is going to be used, he or she is hoping that strongest message will get the most people to safety. On the other hand, there is the “crying wolf” phenomenon. They are taking a chance that if the conditions are not as dire as anticipated, that the next time there will be a great reluctance to heed those warnings …
“Theoretically, they could physically remove someone, especially if their remaining would endanger anyone else's safety and especially [the life of] first responders. But the strategy that officials may use, rather than arresting the recalcitrant citizen, is to make it very clear--absolutely clear—that rescue and response services may not be available. In essence, if you don't comply with evacuation orders, you are in effect waiving your right to get rescue and response if you need it … We just did a study on evacuations under scenarios of disasters without warnings. We are very concerned about disasters that occur without warning when we have to do evacuations in real-time—in essence, immediate—for example, an earthquake or a terrorist nuclear attack. We found about two thirds of people with children would not comply with official orders to evacuate, until and unless they were able to retrieve their children from school or day care. If we have two thirds of the population with children that would not comply, what we would have is evacuation chaos and an absolute breakdown of disaster response in circumstances that provided no warning.”
Research by the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) unearthed several factors that lead people to ignore warnings of severe or devastating weather alerts. The most common factor is OPTIMISM, because as human beings we prefer to think that, for us, things will go right rather than wrong, and that we will be among the lucky ones to escape. The next most common factor is UNCERTAINTY―people are told to prepare and evacuate and many just do not know how to go about doing it. So you sit back and keep thinking and saying: “What should I do? What should I do?” and this makes you increasingly uncertain, with the result that most people, when uncertain, keep doing the things they were doing before. The third factor is HERD THINKING―whereby we are very influenced by what our friends and neighbors do, so we look to see what they are doing―and if they are not “stocking-up” or not evacuating, then we assume they know what they are doing and we do likewise, not realizing (or denying) that they are as uncertain as we are.
Typical Reactions to Heaven’s Warnings
You have no doubt heard the saying “Like father, like son; like mother, like daughter”―which actually can be traced to Holy Scripture: “Behold every one that uses a common proverb, shall use this against thee, saying: ‘As the mother was, so also is her daughter!’” (Ezechiel 16:44). Similarly, we could say―”As we are naturally, so we shall be spiritually!” Our natural, physical, bodily, material, earthly habits and attitudes seep into our supernatural and spiritual habits and attitudes. If a person is lazy in work, they are more likely to also be lazy about spiritual duties. If they are careless about material things, they will tend to be careless about spiritual things. Hence the above quoted research on people ignoring severe weather advisories, alerts and warnings, is just as applicable to the reaction of people to Heaven’s severe climate or chastisement advisories, alerts and warnings.
Therefore, most Catholics view Our Lady’s dire warnings as a case of “The boy crying: ‘Wolf!’” when there is no wolf to be found! Their mentality is one of: “It doesn’t apply to me, so why bother?” They have heard the warnings time and time again―but nothing happens. So they “switch-off” their minds to the warnings and just go about their daily life as though nothing was wrong. Just as the above quoted recipients of severe weather warnings, their “knee-jerk” response is one of false OPTIMISM―based upon one of many differing complacent rationalizations. “I’m not such a bad person! I'm not like most people! I go to church! I say my Rosary! etc.” Yet just as a natural storm makes no distinction between good people and bad people when it claims lives or inflicts serious injuries, likewise will Heaven do when it begins to chastise us for our sins and the sins of others―as Our Lady of Akita warned: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful.”
We are fools to ignore and do nothing about Our Lady's incessant and increasingly severe warnings: “Fools despise wisdom and instruction! … Fools covet those things which are hurtful to themselves! … The eyes of fools are on the ends of the Earth … The prosperity of fools shall destroy them! … And the number of fools is infinite!” (Proverbs 1:7; 1:22; 17:24; 1:32; Ecclesiastes 1:15). Holy Mother Church puts the following words of Scripture into the mouth of Mary, as part of the readings for the Masses on the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (December 8th) and also the Immaculate Heart of Mary (August 22nd): “Now therefore, ye children, hear me! Blessed are they that keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise―and refuse it not! Blessed is the man that heareth me, and that watcheth daily at my gates, and waiteth at the posts of my doors! He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord! But he that shall sin against me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate me love death … He who obeys me will not be put to shame, they who serve me will never fail. They who explain me shall have life everlasting!” (Proverbs 8:32-36; Ecclesiasticus 34:30-31). In other words, listen to her “weather warnings and advisories”, take them to heart, obey the instructions and pass them on to others.
From Year to Hour
Coming back to the concept of “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Peter 3:8), let us look at Our Lady’s “weather alerts” or spiritual storm advisories from the perspective of not being separated by hundreds of years―as in the case of Our Lady of Good Success giving her first warning in 1594, with the others following in the 379 years up to her messages at Akita in Japan in 1973―but look upon them as being given in one single day―by taking numbers of the year and making them into the numbers for the hours and minutes of the day. Thus the 1600s would become 16:00 hours or 4:00 p.m. and 1635 would become 16:35 p.m. or 4:35 p.m., etc. Thus Quito would translate to approximately 4:00 p.m. onwards; La Salette would translate to 6:46 p.m.; Lourdes would be 6:58 p.m.; Fatima would be 7:17 p.m. and Akita would be just before 8:00 p.m. So four major alerts, advisories and warnings in a ‘four hour’ period.
The Quito Weather Forecast (from 1594 to 1635)
Our Lady of Good Success appeared in Quito, Ecuador between 1594 and 1635. These centuries and years would translate to the period between 15:54(94) hours and 16:35 hours, on the 24-hour clock, or roughly between 3:54 p.m. and 4:35 p.m. In this “severe weather” 90-second warning, Our Lady says:
“At the end of the 19th century and throughout the 20th century, various heresies will be propagated ... As these heresies spread and dominate, the precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of morals. During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private. The small number of souls who, hidden, will preserve the treasure of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom. Many of them will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings … From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! … During these unfortunate times, evil will invade childhood innocence … Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world … Without virginity, it will be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon those lands in order to purify them … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith … In this way, vocations to the priesthood will be lost, resulting in a true calamity. Many authentic vocations will perish!”
The La Salette Weather Forecast (1846)
The year 1846 would translate to 18:46 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 6:46 p.m. Here is the two-minute weather warning (it is a brief warning and takes 2 minutes to read):
“If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it. I have suffered all of the time for the rest of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually. And the rest of you think little of this. In vain you will pray, in vain you will act, you will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for the rest of you … Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! … Woe to the inhabitants of the earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family. Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other ... The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God … Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls. Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God …
“All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. A general war will follow which will be appalling … The wicked will make use of all their evil ways. Men will kill each other, massacre each other even in their homes. Then, at the first blow of God’s thundering sword, the mountains and all Nature will tremble in terror, for the disorders and crimes of men have pierced the vault of the Heavens. Paris will burn and Marseilles will be engulfed. Several cities will be shaken down and swallowed up by earthquakes. People will believe that all is lost. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of arms and blasphemy. The righteous will suffer greatly.”
The Lourdes Weather Forecast (1858)
The year 1858 would translate to 18:58 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 6:58 p.m. The spiritual climate at Lourdes could be described as sunny, but changing to overcast skies and threatening storm clouds.
At her first apparition at Lourdes, on February 11th, 1858, Our Lady appeared as a beautiful young woman, dressed in white and holding a Rosary, and smiling most graciously toward the frightened little visionary―which indicates she was not smiling beforehand.
At her third apparition, on February 14th, Bernadette, thinking perhaps all this might be trick of the devil, sprinkles Our Lady with holy water, asking her to remain if she came from God, otherwise go away. The Lady smiles―which again indicates she was not smiling beforehand.
At her second apparition, on February 18th, Our Lady seems to be a “kill-joy” because she tells Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world but only in the other!” But we want to be happy in this world as well as the other, don’t we? We want to keep our cake and we want to eat it!
At her sixth apparition on Sunday, February 21st, the Immaculate Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears. Just as with Simeon’s prophecy, the Immaculate Heart of Mary seems to be pierced even now with the sword of sorrow caused by the sins of men, sins that crucify her Son, making Him a sign of contradiction.
The Fatima Weather Forecast (1917)
The year 1917 would translate to 19:17 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 7:17 p.m.
The Akita Weather Forecast (1973)
This is where the year/clock analogy fails somewhat―since there are only 60 minutes in an hour and you cannot have a time of 7:73 pm. Nevertheless we could say, by transforming the year into hours, that is almost 8:00 pm.
What’s the Forecast for 2025?
The year 2025 would translate to 20:25 or 8:25 pm on the 24-hour clock.
Article 33
Wednesday & Thursday after the 1st Sunday of Passiontide, April 9th & 10th
Salvation Check List!
Wednesday & Thursday after the 1st Sunday of Passiontide, April 9th & 10th
Salvation Check List!
Are You Saved?
The Protestants are often heard to say: “I’m saved!” and “Believe in Jesus and you are saved!” A core tenet of many Protestant denominations is that salvation is achieved through Faith in Jesus Christ― not through of their own good works or actions, or merits, or adherence to religious rituals. This principle emphasizes that individuals are justified (declared righteous) before God solely through Faith in Christ’s sacrifice. Many Protestants believe that salvation is a gift from God received through Faith in Jesus Christ, and that once a person is saved, they cannot lose that salvation―regardless of their actions or subsequent faithlessness and sinfulness. They believe that once a person has genuine Faith in Christ, then they are eternally secure in their salvation and cannot lose it. This belief is sometimes referred to as “eternal security” or “once saved, always saved.” The apostate Catholic priest who became a leader of the Protestant Reformation (Deformation??) once wrote to one of his closest associates, Philip Melanchthon: “As long as we are here [in this world] we have to sin. This life is not the dwelling place of righteousness … Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly! … No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day!”
This theological tradition, which includes Calvinist, Presbyterian, Reformed churches, as well as a good number of Baptist churches believe in the “once saved, always saved” theological principle. This tradition often emphasizes the concept of “perseverance of the saints,” which aligns with the idea that those chosen by God will persevere in Faith until the end. While some Protestant denominations believe in “once saved, always saved”, not all Protestants hold this view, and other denominations have different interpretations of salvation. Some believe that Christians can lose their salvation through apostasy or a lack of Faith, while others emphasize the importance of ongoing spiritual growth and obedience. The Assemblies of God church disapproves of the doctrines of double predestination and the unconditional security of the believer, which holds that once saved it is impossible for a person to be lost. And, of course, the Catholic Church does not endorse the doctrine of “once saved, always saved.”
Yet, even though the Catholic Church does not endorse the “once saved, always saved” theory, it is amazing to see so many Catholics live their lives in a way that almost makes you think that they believe the “once saved, always saved” theory! Everyone wants to go to Heaven―you would have be either a Satanist or insane not to―yet over 90% of Catholic youth cease practicing the Faith once they graduate from High School; most Catholics no longer go to Sacrament of Confession; over 50% of Catholics accept abortion, contraception, divorce and remarriage, the LGBTQ+ values, cohabitation without marriage, etc. Yet they will tell you that they are going to Heaven! Almost 70% of Catholics say that people who do not believe in God can still go to Heaven! 30% of Catholics do not believe that there is a Hell!
Never Mind Luther! What Does God Say?
Never mind what Martin Luther says! Never mind what many Protestants say! Never mind what many Catholics say! What does God say? What does Our Lord say? God and Our Lord say this: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9) … “God wants all men to be saved” ([1 Timothy 2:4) … “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:17). Christ says: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56) ... “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10) … But He also says: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
As for Martin Luther’s statement: “Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly!” ― Holy Scripture, Our Lord, Our Lady and many saints say the contrary: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “Hast thou sinned? Do so no more! But for thy former sins also pray that they may be forgiven thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). God WILL show mercy, but we must turn away from sin: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? If the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, then living he shall live, and shall not die! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done!” (Ezechiel 18:21-23).
Our Lord says to the man whom He cured of 38-year-long illness: “Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more―lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14). To the woman caught in adultery, He said: “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:10-11) ― He did not say, as Luther would say: “Go and don’t worry if you keep on sinning―I will still forgive you!”
Our Lady also speaks out against this “Be a sinner and sin boldly” heresy: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Fatima). “If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them!” (Akita). This is echoed by St. Alphonsus Liguori, a Doctor of the Church and patron saint of moral theologians: “God has fixed for each person the number of the days of his life, and the degrees of health and talent which He will give him, so He has also determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more!” (Sunday Sermons, #15).
Holy Scripture adds: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the Kingdom of God? Do not err! Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor the effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor railers [using verbally abusive language], nor extortioners, shall possess the Kingdom of God!” (1 Corinthians 6:9-10). Elsewhere Jesus says: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but only he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23). Scripture adds: “There shall not enter into [the Kingdom of Heaven] anything defiled, or that works abomination, or makes a lie” (Apocalypse 21:27) … “The fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, they shall have their portion in the pool burning with fire and brimstone!” (Apocalypse 21:8). “Those who know not God, and who obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ … shall suffer eternal punishment in destruction!” (2 Thessalonians 1:8-9).
Are You a Lutheran Catholic?
What is a “Lutheran Catholic”? You could say that a “Lutheran Catholic” is a Catholic who thinks and acts like a Lutheran in certain areas of the Faith. It is especially a Catholic who has Martin Luther’s approach to sin: “Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly! … No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day!” Believe it or not, there are many Catholics who sin boldly and tell themselves that all they have to do is go to Confession and everything will be fine and dandy all over again! They treat the Sacrament like a weekly or monthly car wash―just drive through the confessional and the Blood of Christ will wash you clean … again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, etc. They comfort themselves like Luther comforted himself with the thought that Jesus died for our sins and so He will always “pick-up-the-tab” or pay the bill for our sins … again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, etc. They have gradually developed a vicious circle of vicious habits ― sin and confess; sin and confess; sin and confess; sin and confess, etc.
These people no longer see―or never have seen―sin as being the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127). These people have lost the sense of sin―something which most of the recent popes (whether Traditional, Conservative, Liberal or Modernist) have complained about.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Salvation Checklist #1: THE FAITH
Yes―the Catholic Faith is certainly crumbling! As Our Lord said of the Last Times: “The Son of man, when He comes again, do you think He shall find Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). The Faith is foundation and springboard for our attempted jump into Heaven: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God. For he that comes to God, must believe that He exists, and is a rewarder to them that seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6). Faith is a supernatural gift of God―much higher than mere human faith―that we receive in Baptism. Faith is about believing―it has to have something to believe. Faith is a theological virtue―which is a compound of two words: “theos” meaning God, and “logos” meaning “word”. Thus, Faith focuses on the word of God; Faith concerns itself with the teachings of God. This supernatural gift of Faith through Baptism with its resulting requirement to focus on God and His teachings, is summed up by the words of Our Lord: “Learn from Me!” (Matthew 11:29). “All power is given to Me in Heaven and in Earth. Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:18-20). Baptism gives Faith, and Faith must learn about God, and this learning must lead to the service of God by keeping all His commandments and teachings. Faith is not just some intellectual state of being that focuses on knowledge alone―Faith must lead to the service of God: “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20). “Learn and fear the Lord your God, and keep and fulfill all the words of His Law!” (Deuteronomy 31:12).
Since the Second Vatican Council, the Faith has plummeted throughout the world. Whereas in the 1950s, around 75% American Catholics would regularly fulfill their moral obligation of attending Mass on every Sunday of the year which binds under the pain of mortal sin. By the end of the Second Vatican Council (1965) that number had fallen to around 50%; today that number is below 20%. In Italy it is 15%; in England it is 14%; in Spain it is 13%; France it is 12%; in Germany it is 6%. Statistics show that over 90% of youth stop attending Mass regularly after they graduate from high-school, college or university―it is the “oldsters” who keep the USA Mass attendance percentage at below 20%, not the young adults. In the USA, a 2024 survey found that for every 100 people who join the Catholic Church, 840 people leave the Catholic Church. No other religion has nearly as bad of a join/leave ratio. For every 100 people that become Protestant, 180 leave. Of all the former Catholics who have left the Church, 56% become religious “nones” (no religious affiliation) and 32% become Protestant.
The consequences are fatal―one can estimate the vast majority of Catholics (80% or more) are living in a state of mortal sin due their negligence in fulfilling their obligation of attending Mass every Sunday. Among the few that still do attend regularly, there are quite a few who accept contraception, even abortion, same-sex marriages, homosexuality, etc. ― all of which places them in a state of mortal sin; others accept and believe that you can attain salvation in other religions; many believe you can be a good Catholic without attending Sunday Mass; most have ceased to go or very rarely go to Confession. All these practices and viewpoints are against the Faith as taught by the Catholic Church. It comes to a point where you have to say: “They have lost or are in the process of losing their Faith!” Without Faith they have no Hope―for Hope is a natural outcome or progression of Faith ― and “without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6).
Salvation Checklist #2: KNOW YOUR FAITH
If “without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6), then the knowledge of the Faith is of great importance. There is such a thing as grave neglect. Even though you need not know very much about medical procedures―it is grave neglect for a doctor to be ignorant of medical procedures. One is expected to learn and master those things that belong to one’s profession or job in life. Your profession is that of being a Catholic whose job it is to save your soul―therefore you are guilty of grave neglect if you fail to acquire the necessary and essential knowledge that will help you save your soul―God does not “download” that knowledge with the gift of Faith, but we must use the gift of Faith to acquire that knowledge. Neglecting the Sacraments and neglecting our Faith education and formation ― and that of our children ― is a serious sin. Religious education is not an obligation for children alone. As adults, it is our responsibility to continue learning our Faith in order to live it and spread it. It is more important to spread the Faith than it is to spread gossip! Our Lady’s apparition to Adele Brise, in Champion, Wisconsin, in 1859, affirms the need to learn the about the Faith. Under the title of Our Lady of Good Help, the Blessed Virgin said to Adele: “Gather the children in this wild country and teach them what they should know for salvation. Teach them their Catechism, how to sign themselves with the Sign of the Cross, and how to approach the Sacraments; that is what I wish you to do. Go and fear nothing. I will help you.”
Pope St. Pius X, in his 1905 papal encyclical Acerbo Nimis, on the subject of ignorance of the Faith, writes: “The chief cause of the present indifference and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of things divine. As God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘There is no knowledge of God in the land!’ … Large numbers of Christians, in our own time [he writes in 1905―how much worse is it today?] are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation! … It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there. They rarely give thought to God! … The greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things―the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments by which we obtain grace―are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it! … A great number of those who are condemned to eternal punishment suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of Faith which must be known and believed in order to be numbered among the elect!” (Pope St. Pius X, encyclical Acerbo Nimis, 1905). We neglect learning about the Faith at our own peril! We cannot love what we do not know; and we will not serve what do not love! Knowledge of God leads to the love of God; and the love of God leads to the service of God; and the faithful service of God leads to salvation and eternal life in Heaven.
Salvation Checklist #3: KEEP THE COMMANDMENTS OF GOD AND HIS CHURCH
Our Lord clearly said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24). The love of God is more than merely saying: “Lord, I love you!” If we love our parents, then we obey their commands―providing they are not sinful commands. If we love God, then we must obey His commands―as Our Lady said: “Whatsoever He shall say to you, do it!” (John 2:5). Our Lord Himself said: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
As with Faith, so too with the commandments―you cannot keep what you do not know; you cannot follow instructions unless you first of all read them. The Ten Commandments are more than just the ten sentences that describe them―those are mere “chapter headings” and there is a lot more beneath the surface. A superficial knowledge is not enough―we should study the commandments in depth. The more we know about them, the better we will be able to keep them. A catechism will help you get started―but how many people still study the catechism? Most Catholics could not even recite all the Ten Commandments―personal experience proves that to be absolutely true (even among good, practicing Traditional or Conservative Catholics!!!).
Salvation Checklist #4: LOVE GOD AND NEIGHBOR
Of all the commandments, Our Lord says that love of God and love of neighbor are the two greatest: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Those commandments are very demanding! To love God with your whole heart, mind, soul and strength is nothing else than what we would call a “fanatical” love! Fanatical comes from the word “fanatic”, which itself came from the Latin “fanaticus”, which can mean “mad” (we speak of being “madly in love” don’t we) or, more to the point, “inspired by a deity or god.” The root word is “fanum” which means “temple.” The original English meanings of both fanatic and fanatical implied that the person being described was insane or mad with enthusiasm ― as we might say “madly in love” or “he is mad about football”.
Love is not just about words, but love is also about actions―as they say: “Actions speak louder than words!” And if “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20), the you could also say: “Love without works or actions is dead!” For, as Scripture says: “Faith works by charity” (Galatians 5:6) and “He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him? Let us not love in word, nor in tongue, but in deeds!” (1 John 3:17-18). “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13).
But Our Lord’s command to love goes beyond just loving friends! Jesus said: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you: ‘Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And to him that strikes thee on the one cheek, offer also the other! And him that takes away your cloak from you―forbid him not to take your coat also! Give to everyone that asks you, and of him that takes away your goods, do not ask for them again! Bless them that curse you, and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!’ so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and makes His rain to fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you only do good to them who do good to you―what thanks are due to you? For sinners also do this! If you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? For sinners also love those that love them! And if you only salute your brethren, what do you do that is more? Do not the heathens also do this? Therefore be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect! Love your enemies! Do good and lend, hoping for nothing thereby―and your reward shall be great, and you shall be the sons of the Highest; for He is kind to the unthankful, and to the evil. Therefore, be merciful, as your Father also is merciful!’” (Matthew 5:43-48; Luke 6:27-36).
Salvation Checklist #5: SHOWING MERCY AND FORGIVENESS
We cannot attain salvation without God’s mercy and forgiveness for the sins we have committed. Yet Our Lord also says that if we wish to obtain God’s mercy and forgiveness, then we have to show mercy and forgiveness to others. “If you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will also forgive you your offences! But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). “Then came Peter unto him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times!’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say not to thee, till seven times―but till seventy times seven times!’” (Matthew 18:21-22). “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). “Judge not, and you shall not be judged! Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned! Forgive, and you shall be forgiven!” (Luke 6:37). Hence Holy Scripture adds: “Judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy!” (James 2:13).
Our Lord elaborates on the need for showing mercy in his parable about the Unjust Steward: “‘The Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 an ounce, one talent would be worth $22,500―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $225 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“‘But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 per ounce, the penny would be worth $3.75―and a hundred pence would be $375); and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: “Pay what you owe me!” And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“‘Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: “You wicked servant! I forgave you all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?” And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!’” (Matthew 18:23-35).
Salvation Checklist #6: DO PENANCE
No penance, no salvation! Why? Because we are all sinners and we have therefore contracted a debt for our sins. “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “The Lord delays not His promise [of punishment], as some imagine, but He deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9) ... “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). Let it not be said of us: “God has given him place for penance, but he pridefully abuses it!” (Job 24:23).
Sin is the most expensive thing in this world because it is the greatest evil in this world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127). The greatest evil deserves the greatest fine or penalty―it is only logical, fair and just. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:7-8). Sadly and disastrously, we have lost the sense of the gravity of sin and that automatically leads to a loss of the sense of the great debt we owe to God for our sins―which results in little or no penance, but, as Our Lord said: “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Another thing we forget in our required payment for sin is that charity can pay for many, or even all, of our sins: “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). A perfect act of contrition―which is more than just words―has the potential of not only removing the guilt of sins, but also paying for all the temporal punishment that would have to be imposed for those sins―but at true act of contrition does not come from the lips, but from the heart. Words come easy―true sorrow from the heart, based on the love of God and not the fear of God’s punishments, is not so easy.
Salvation Checklist #7: PRAY WITHOUT CEASING
You won’t save your soul without prayer. Prayer is a raising of the mind and heart to God. Prayer is a conversation with God. We talk to the ones that we love. The more we love them, the more we want to talk to them. Your prayer life is a litmus test on the degree of your love of God―how much you pray and the manner in which you pray. Some saints say that praying is like breathing―and just as we need to breathe all the time, so too must we pray all the time: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). “Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times!” (Luke 21:36). “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). “We give thanks to God always in our prayers without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 1:2). “I desire therefore that men pray in every place” (1 Timothy 2:8). “I will praise Thy Name continually” (Ecclesiasticus 51:15). “We will give ourselves continually to prayer” (Acts 6:4). “Prayer was made without ceasing” (Acts 12:5). “By all prayer and supplication praying at all time” (Ephesians 6:18). “The continual prayer of a just man avails much” (James 5:16).
St. Augustine says: “What more excellent than prayer? What more useful and profitable? What sweeter and more delicious? What higher and more exalted in the whole scheme of our Christian religion?”
St. Bernard says that the angels receive our prayers and present them before God—as the angel said to Tobias: “When thou didst pray with tears, I offered thy prayer to God” (Tobias 12:12). St. Hilary says the same: “The angels preside over the prayers of the saints and offer them each day to God.”
When we pray, we enter into the presence of the majesty of God. St. John Chrysostom warns us: “Consider the height, dignity and glory to which the Lord has raised you.”
Pope Celestine, in a decree dealing with prayer says: “I know nothing better to say to you than what my predecessor Zozimus said: ‘What time is there in which we have no need of God?’ None. Therefore at all times, and in all cases, in all affairs we need to have recourse to Him by prayer and crave His favor. For it is a great pride for a weak and miserable man to presume anything by himself.”
St. Thomas, writing of prayer, says that what God decided from all eternity to grant us by His Divine Providence, He will give it to us by means of prayer, and on this depends the deliverance, salvation, conversion and cure of many souls and the progress and perfection of others. God has ruled that Matrimony begets children. Plowing and sowing brings an abundance of crops. Prayer brings abundant gifts and graces to the world.
“Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and it shall be opened to you. For everyone that asks receives, and he that seeks finds, and the door shall be opened to him that knocked” (Matthew 7:7).
St. Augustine says that prayer is the key of Heaven that fits all the gates of Heaven and all the treasure chests of God. Elsewhere he says that what bread is to the body, prayer is to the soul. And “He knows how to live well, who knows how to pray well.”
St. Alphonsus Liguori says that “He who prays most receives most.”
Salvation Checklist #8: KEEPING YOURSELF IN A STATE OF SANCTIFYING GRACE
This is the ultimate deciding factor whether you merit salvation or damnation; whether you go to Heaven or go to Hell. There is not one single soul in Hell that is in a state of Sanctifying Grace, and there not one single soul in Heaven that lacks Sanctifying Grace. In short, Sanctifying Grace is God dwelling in your soul through His grace. Sanctifying Grace is a habitual grace―meaning it habitually dwells in your soul after receiving the Sacrament of Baptism and it can only be driven out of your soul by mortal sin. If you die in a state of Sanctifying Grace, then you will either go to Heaven immediately, or, more likely than not, you will go to the fires of Purgatory to pay your remaining debts for sins that have been forgiven but sufficiently paid for by penance. If you die in a state of mortal sin, then you are eternally damned and consigned to the fires of Hell. There is no third option! That is how it is.
How precious is Sanctifying Grace to you? More precious than your bank account? More precious than your family? More precious than your job? If you had to choose between one of those (or something similar) and Sanctifying Grace―which would choose and which would you be prepared to lose? Sanctifying Grace is God dwelling in your soul! Those other things just cannot compare! Are you prepared to drive out God for the sake of those worldly loves, comforts, attachments and advantages?
Our Lord said: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26) … “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:37) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither the rust nor moth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures, treasures, teachings and spirit of the world, whose prince is the devil (Matthew 6:19-24).
Our Lord says: “I am the vine―you the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing! If anyone does not abide in me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he burns! … Abide in My love! If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love!” (John 15:5-10). Our Lord tells us to abide in His love―which could be said to be same as abiding in Sanctifying Grace―for if we lose Sanctifying Grace through mortal sin, then we automatically lose Charity (for “God is charity” 1 John 4:8), for Sanctifying Grace and Charity go hand-in-hand, and you cannot truly have one without the other. Scripture tells us: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Just as it says: “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3), you could rephrase that to say: “If I … have not Sanctifying Grace―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Sanctifying Grace―then I am nothing. If I … have not Sanctifying Grace―then it profits me nothing!”
Salvation Checklist #9: LOSING THE SENSE OF SIN
As already stated, mortal sin kicks Sanctifying Grace out of the soul―but the stage for mortal sin is often prepared by becoming used to habitual venial sins. The devil likes to advance little by little and undetected. He can first of all create an addiction to venial―which we falsely and stupidly dismiss as being of little or no consequence! Once he has accustomed us to habitually commit lots of venial sins of all kinds―he then has a stable and almost permanent platform upon which to work to take us to the next stage, which will be some mortal sin that does not shock us, a mortal sin that is “just-over-the-border” from venial sins, a mortal sin that he will somehow make it appear like a “serious venial sin.” Once we cross that border, then his next step is to accustom us and make habitual that “teeny-weeny” mortal sin, as though it does little or no damage! No mortal sin is truly little―for any and all mortal sin has power to condemn us to Hell.
All of this can be summed-up as being a progressive, gradual, almost imperceptible loss of the sense of sin―which is Satan’s masterstroke. His temptations to make us commit sin are often psychological masterpieces of deceit and false reasoning―see how he tempted Eve and gradually made her believe that it would not be a sin to eat the forbidden fruit. It is through sin that we gradually give ourselves over―little-by-little―into the clutches of Satan. “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “You that love the Lord, hate evil!” (Psalm 96:10) … “Hate evil and love good!” (Amos 5:15). “Flee from sins as from the face of a serpent! For if you come near them, they will take hold of you!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:2). “And from his infancy he taught him to fear God, and to abstain from all sin” (Tobias 1:10). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “Sin no more―lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14). “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:10-11).
The Protestants are often heard to say: “I’m saved!” and “Believe in Jesus and you are saved!” A core tenet of many Protestant denominations is that salvation is achieved through Faith in Jesus Christ― not through of their own good works or actions, or merits, or adherence to religious rituals. This principle emphasizes that individuals are justified (declared righteous) before God solely through Faith in Christ’s sacrifice. Many Protestants believe that salvation is a gift from God received through Faith in Jesus Christ, and that once a person is saved, they cannot lose that salvation―regardless of their actions or subsequent faithlessness and sinfulness. They believe that once a person has genuine Faith in Christ, then they are eternally secure in their salvation and cannot lose it. This belief is sometimes referred to as “eternal security” or “once saved, always saved.” The apostate Catholic priest who became a leader of the Protestant Reformation (Deformation??) once wrote to one of his closest associates, Philip Melanchthon: “As long as we are here [in this world] we have to sin. This life is not the dwelling place of righteousness … Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly! … No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day!”
This theological tradition, which includes Calvinist, Presbyterian, Reformed churches, as well as a good number of Baptist churches believe in the “once saved, always saved” theological principle. This tradition often emphasizes the concept of “perseverance of the saints,” which aligns with the idea that those chosen by God will persevere in Faith until the end. While some Protestant denominations believe in “once saved, always saved”, not all Protestants hold this view, and other denominations have different interpretations of salvation. Some believe that Christians can lose their salvation through apostasy or a lack of Faith, while others emphasize the importance of ongoing spiritual growth and obedience. The Assemblies of God church disapproves of the doctrines of double predestination and the unconditional security of the believer, which holds that once saved it is impossible for a person to be lost. And, of course, the Catholic Church does not endorse the doctrine of “once saved, always saved.”
Yet, even though the Catholic Church does not endorse the “once saved, always saved” theory, it is amazing to see so many Catholics live their lives in a way that almost makes you think that they believe the “once saved, always saved” theory! Everyone wants to go to Heaven―you would have be either a Satanist or insane not to―yet over 90% of Catholic youth cease practicing the Faith once they graduate from High School; most Catholics no longer go to Sacrament of Confession; over 50% of Catholics accept abortion, contraception, divorce and remarriage, the LGBTQ+ values, cohabitation without marriage, etc. Yet they will tell you that they are going to Heaven! Almost 70% of Catholics say that people who do not believe in God can still go to Heaven! 30% of Catholics do not believe that there is a Hell!
Never Mind Luther! What Does God Say?
Never mind what Martin Luther says! Never mind what many Protestants say! Never mind what many Catholics say! What does God say? What does Our Lord say? God and Our Lord say this: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9) … “God wants all men to be saved” ([1 Timothy 2:4) … “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:17). Christ says: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56) ... “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10) … But He also says: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
As for Martin Luther’s statement: “Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly!” ― Holy Scripture, Our Lord, Our Lady and many saints say the contrary: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “Hast thou sinned? Do so no more! But for thy former sins also pray that they may be forgiven thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). God WILL show mercy, but we must turn away from sin: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? If the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, then living he shall live, and shall not die! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done!” (Ezechiel 18:21-23).
Our Lord says to the man whom He cured of 38-year-long illness: “Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more―lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14). To the woman caught in adultery, He said: “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:10-11) ― He did not say, as Luther would say: “Go and don’t worry if you keep on sinning―I will still forgive you!”
Our Lady also speaks out against this “Be a sinner and sin boldly” heresy: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Fatima). “If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them!” (Akita). This is echoed by St. Alphonsus Liguori, a Doctor of the Church and patron saint of moral theologians: “God has fixed for each person the number of the days of his life, and the degrees of health and talent which He will give him, so He has also determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more!” (Sunday Sermons, #15).
Holy Scripture adds: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the Kingdom of God? Do not err! Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor the effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor railers [using verbally abusive language], nor extortioners, shall possess the Kingdom of God!” (1 Corinthians 6:9-10). Elsewhere Jesus says: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but only he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23). Scripture adds: “There shall not enter into [the Kingdom of Heaven] anything defiled, or that works abomination, or makes a lie” (Apocalypse 21:27) … “The fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, they shall have their portion in the pool burning with fire and brimstone!” (Apocalypse 21:8). “Those who know not God, and who obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ … shall suffer eternal punishment in destruction!” (2 Thessalonians 1:8-9).
Are You a Lutheran Catholic?
What is a “Lutheran Catholic”? You could say that a “Lutheran Catholic” is a Catholic who thinks and acts like a Lutheran in certain areas of the Faith. It is especially a Catholic who has Martin Luther’s approach to sin: “Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly! … No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day!” Believe it or not, there are many Catholics who sin boldly and tell themselves that all they have to do is go to Confession and everything will be fine and dandy all over again! They treat the Sacrament like a weekly or monthly car wash―just drive through the confessional and the Blood of Christ will wash you clean … again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, etc. They comfort themselves like Luther comforted himself with the thought that Jesus died for our sins and so He will always “pick-up-the-tab” or pay the bill for our sins … again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, etc. They have gradually developed a vicious circle of vicious habits ― sin and confess; sin and confess; sin and confess; sin and confess, etc.
These people no longer see―or never have seen―sin as being the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127). These people have lost the sense of sin―something which most of the recent popes (whether Traditional, Conservative, Liberal or Modernist) have complained about.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Salvation Checklist #1: THE FAITH
Yes―the Catholic Faith is certainly crumbling! As Our Lord said of the Last Times: “The Son of man, when He comes again, do you think He shall find Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). The Faith is foundation and springboard for our attempted jump into Heaven: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God. For he that comes to God, must believe that He exists, and is a rewarder to them that seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6). Faith is a supernatural gift of God―much higher than mere human faith―that we receive in Baptism. Faith is about believing―it has to have something to believe. Faith is a theological virtue―which is a compound of two words: “theos” meaning God, and “logos” meaning “word”. Thus, Faith focuses on the word of God; Faith concerns itself with the teachings of God. This supernatural gift of Faith through Baptism with its resulting requirement to focus on God and His teachings, is summed up by the words of Our Lord: “Learn from Me!” (Matthew 11:29). “All power is given to Me in Heaven and in Earth. Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:18-20). Baptism gives Faith, and Faith must learn about God, and this learning must lead to the service of God by keeping all His commandments and teachings. Faith is not just some intellectual state of being that focuses on knowledge alone―Faith must lead to the service of God: “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20). “Learn and fear the Lord your God, and keep and fulfill all the words of His Law!” (Deuteronomy 31:12).
Since the Second Vatican Council, the Faith has plummeted throughout the world. Whereas in the 1950s, around 75% American Catholics would regularly fulfill their moral obligation of attending Mass on every Sunday of the year which binds under the pain of mortal sin. By the end of the Second Vatican Council (1965) that number had fallen to around 50%; today that number is below 20%. In Italy it is 15%; in England it is 14%; in Spain it is 13%; France it is 12%; in Germany it is 6%. Statistics show that over 90% of youth stop attending Mass regularly after they graduate from high-school, college or university―it is the “oldsters” who keep the USA Mass attendance percentage at below 20%, not the young adults. In the USA, a 2024 survey found that for every 100 people who join the Catholic Church, 840 people leave the Catholic Church. No other religion has nearly as bad of a join/leave ratio. For every 100 people that become Protestant, 180 leave. Of all the former Catholics who have left the Church, 56% become religious “nones” (no religious affiliation) and 32% become Protestant.
The consequences are fatal―one can estimate the vast majority of Catholics (80% or more) are living in a state of mortal sin due their negligence in fulfilling their obligation of attending Mass every Sunday. Among the few that still do attend regularly, there are quite a few who accept contraception, even abortion, same-sex marriages, homosexuality, etc. ― all of which places them in a state of mortal sin; others accept and believe that you can attain salvation in other religions; many believe you can be a good Catholic without attending Sunday Mass; most have ceased to go or very rarely go to Confession. All these practices and viewpoints are against the Faith as taught by the Catholic Church. It comes to a point where you have to say: “They have lost or are in the process of losing their Faith!” Without Faith they have no Hope―for Hope is a natural outcome or progression of Faith ― and “without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6).
Salvation Checklist #2: KNOW YOUR FAITH
If “without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6), then the knowledge of the Faith is of great importance. There is such a thing as grave neglect. Even though you need not know very much about medical procedures―it is grave neglect for a doctor to be ignorant of medical procedures. One is expected to learn and master those things that belong to one’s profession or job in life. Your profession is that of being a Catholic whose job it is to save your soul―therefore you are guilty of grave neglect if you fail to acquire the necessary and essential knowledge that will help you save your soul―God does not “download” that knowledge with the gift of Faith, but we must use the gift of Faith to acquire that knowledge. Neglecting the Sacraments and neglecting our Faith education and formation ― and that of our children ― is a serious sin. Religious education is not an obligation for children alone. As adults, it is our responsibility to continue learning our Faith in order to live it and spread it. It is more important to spread the Faith than it is to spread gossip! Our Lady’s apparition to Adele Brise, in Champion, Wisconsin, in 1859, affirms the need to learn the about the Faith. Under the title of Our Lady of Good Help, the Blessed Virgin said to Adele: “Gather the children in this wild country and teach them what they should know for salvation. Teach them their Catechism, how to sign themselves with the Sign of the Cross, and how to approach the Sacraments; that is what I wish you to do. Go and fear nothing. I will help you.”
Pope St. Pius X, in his 1905 papal encyclical Acerbo Nimis, on the subject of ignorance of the Faith, writes: “The chief cause of the present indifference and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of things divine. As God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘There is no knowledge of God in the land!’ … Large numbers of Christians, in our own time [he writes in 1905―how much worse is it today?] are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation! … It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there. They rarely give thought to God! … The greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things―the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments by which we obtain grace―are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it! … A great number of those who are condemned to eternal punishment suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of Faith which must be known and believed in order to be numbered among the elect!” (Pope St. Pius X, encyclical Acerbo Nimis, 1905). We neglect learning about the Faith at our own peril! We cannot love what we do not know; and we will not serve what do not love! Knowledge of God leads to the love of God; and the love of God leads to the service of God; and the faithful service of God leads to salvation and eternal life in Heaven.
Salvation Checklist #3: KEEP THE COMMANDMENTS OF GOD AND HIS CHURCH
Our Lord clearly said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24). The love of God is more than merely saying: “Lord, I love you!” If we love our parents, then we obey their commands―providing they are not sinful commands. If we love God, then we must obey His commands―as Our Lady said: “Whatsoever He shall say to you, do it!” (John 2:5). Our Lord Himself said: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
As with Faith, so too with the commandments―you cannot keep what you do not know; you cannot follow instructions unless you first of all read them. The Ten Commandments are more than just the ten sentences that describe them―those are mere “chapter headings” and there is a lot more beneath the surface. A superficial knowledge is not enough―we should study the commandments in depth. The more we know about them, the better we will be able to keep them. A catechism will help you get started―but how many people still study the catechism? Most Catholics could not even recite all the Ten Commandments―personal experience proves that to be absolutely true (even among good, practicing Traditional or Conservative Catholics!!!).
Salvation Checklist #4: LOVE GOD AND NEIGHBOR
Of all the commandments, Our Lord says that love of God and love of neighbor are the two greatest: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Those commandments are very demanding! To love God with your whole heart, mind, soul and strength is nothing else than what we would call a “fanatical” love! Fanatical comes from the word “fanatic”, which itself came from the Latin “fanaticus”, which can mean “mad” (we speak of being “madly in love” don’t we) or, more to the point, “inspired by a deity or god.” The root word is “fanum” which means “temple.” The original English meanings of both fanatic and fanatical implied that the person being described was insane or mad with enthusiasm ― as we might say “madly in love” or “he is mad about football”.
Love is not just about words, but love is also about actions―as they say: “Actions speak louder than words!” And if “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20), the you could also say: “Love without works or actions is dead!” For, as Scripture says: “Faith works by charity” (Galatians 5:6) and “He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him? Let us not love in word, nor in tongue, but in deeds!” (1 John 3:17-18). “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13).
But Our Lord’s command to love goes beyond just loving friends! Jesus said: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you: ‘Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And to him that strikes thee on the one cheek, offer also the other! And him that takes away your cloak from you―forbid him not to take your coat also! Give to everyone that asks you, and of him that takes away your goods, do not ask for them again! Bless them that curse you, and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!’ so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and makes His rain to fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you only do good to them who do good to you―what thanks are due to you? For sinners also do this! If you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? For sinners also love those that love them! And if you only salute your brethren, what do you do that is more? Do not the heathens also do this? Therefore be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect! Love your enemies! Do good and lend, hoping for nothing thereby―and your reward shall be great, and you shall be the sons of the Highest; for He is kind to the unthankful, and to the evil. Therefore, be merciful, as your Father also is merciful!’” (Matthew 5:43-48; Luke 6:27-36).
Salvation Checklist #5: SHOWING MERCY AND FORGIVENESS
We cannot attain salvation without God’s mercy and forgiveness for the sins we have committed. Yet Our Lord also says that if we wish to obtain God’s mercy and forgiveness, then we have to show mercy and forgiveness to others. “If you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will also forgive you your offences! But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). “Then came Peter unto him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times!’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say not to thee, till seven times―but till seventy times seven times!’” (Matthew 18:21-22). “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). “Judge not, and you shall not be judged! Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned! Forgive, and you shall be forgiven!” (Luke 6:37). Hence Holy Scripture adds: “Judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy!” (James 2:13).
Our Lord elaborates on the need for showing mercy in his parable about the Unjust Steward: “‘The Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 an ounce, one talent would be worth $22,500―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $225 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“‘But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 per ounce, the penny would be worth $3.75―and a hundred pence would be $375); and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: “Pay what you owe me!” And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“‘Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: “You wicked servant! I forgave you all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?” And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!’” (Matthew 18:23-35).
Salvation Checklist #6: DO PENANCE
No penance, no salvation! Why? Because we are all sinners and we have therefore contracted a debt for our sins. “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “The Lord delays not His promise [of punishment], as some imagine, but He deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9) ... “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). Let it not be said of us: “God has given him place for penance, but he pridefully abuses it!” (Job 24:23).
Sin is the most expensive thing in this world because it is the greatest evil in this world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127). The greatest evil deserves the greatest fine or penalty―it is only logical, fair and just. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:7-8). Sadly and disastrously, we have lost the sense of the gravity of sin and that automatically leads to a loss of the sense of the great debt we owe to God for our sins―which results in little or no penance, but, as Our Lord said: “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Another thing we forget in our required payment for sin is that charity can pay for many, or even all, of our sins: “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). A perfect act of contrition―which is more than just words―has the potential of not only removing the guilt of sins, but also paying for all the temporal punishment that would have to be imposed for those sins―but at true act of contrition does not come from the lips, but from the heart. Words come easy―true sorrow from the heart, based on the love of God and not the fear of God’s punishments, is not so easy.
Salvation Checklist #7: PRAY WITHOUT CEASING
You won’t save your soul without prayer. Prayer is a raising of the mind and heart to God. Prayer is a conversation with God. We talk to the ones that we love. The more we love them, the more we want to talk to them. Your prayer life is a litmus test on the degree of your love of God―how much you pray and the manner in which you pray. Some saints say that praying is like breathing―and just as we need to breathe all the time, so too must we pray all the time: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). “Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times!” (Luke 21:36). “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). “We give thanks to God always in our prayers without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 1:2). “I desire therefore that men pray in every place” (1 Timothy 2:8). “I will praise Thy Name continually” (Ecclesiasticus 51:15). “We will give ourselves continually to prayer” (Acts 6:4). “Prayer was made without ceasing” (Acts 12:5). “By all prayer and supplication praying at all time” (Ephesians 6:18). “The continual prayer of a just man avails much” (James 5:16).
St. Augustine says: “What more excellent than prayer? What more useful and profitable? What sweeter and more delicious? What higher and more exalted in the whole scheme of our Christian religion?”
St. Bernard says that the angels receive our prayers and present them before God—as the angel said to Tobias: “When thou didst pray with tears, I offered thy prayer to God” (Tobias 12:12). St. Hilary says the same: “The angels preside over the prayers of the saints and offer them each day to God.”
When we pray, we enter into the presence of the majesty of God. St. John Chrysostom warns us: “Consider the height, dignity and glory to which the Lord has raised you.”
Pope Celestine, in a decree dealing with prayer says: “I know nothing better to say to you than what my predecessor Zozimus said: ‘What time is there in which we have no need of God?’ None. Therefore at all times, and in all cases, in all affairs we need to have recourse to Him by prayer and crave His favor. For it is a great pride for a weak and miserable man to presume anything by himself.”
St. Thomas, writing of prayer, says that what God decided from all eternity to grant us by His Divine Providence, He will give it to us by means of prayer, and on this depends the deliverance, salvation, conversion and cure of many souls and the progress and perfection of others. God has ruled that Matrimony begets children. Plowing and sowing brings an abundance of crops. Prayer brings abundant gifts and graces to the world.
“Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and it shall be opened to you. For everyone that asks receives, and he that seeks finds, and the door shall be opened to him that knocked” (Matthew 7:7).
St. Augustine says that prayer is the key of Heaven that fits all the gates of Heaven and all the treasure chests of God. Elsewhere he says that what bread is to the body, prayer is to the soul. And “He knows how to live well, who knows how to pray well.”
St. Alphonsus Liguori says that “He who prays most receives most.”
Salvation Checklist #8: KEEPING YOURSELF IN A STATE OF SANCTIFYING GRACE
This is the ultimate deciding factor whether you merit salvation or damnation; whether you go to Heaven or go to Hell. There is not one single soul in Hell that is in a state of Sanctifying Grace, and there not one single soul in Heaven that lacks Sanctifying Grace. In short, Sanctifying Grace is God dwelling in your soul through His grace. Sanctifying Grace is a habitual grace―meaning it habitually dwells in your soul after receiving the Sacrament of Baptism and it can only be driven out of your soul by mortal sin. If you die in a state of Sanctifying Grace, then you will either go to Heaven immediately, or, more likely than not, you will go to the fires of Purgatory to pay your remaining debts for sins that have been forgiven but sufficiently paid for by penance. If you die in a state of mortal sin, then you are eternally damned and consigned to the fires of Hell. There is no third option! That is how it is.
How precious is Sanctifying Grace to you? More precious than your bank account? More precious than your family? More precious than your job? If you had to choose between one of those (or something similar) and Sanctifying Grace―which would choose and which would you be prepared to lose? Sanctifying Grace is God dwelling in your soul! Those other things just cannot compare! Are you prepared to drive out God for the sake of those worldly loves, comforts, attachments and advantages?
Our Lord said: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26) … “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:37) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither the rust nor moth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures, treasures, teachings and spirit of the world, whose prince is the devil (Matthew 6:19-24).
Our Lord says: “I am the vine―you the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing! If anyone does not abide in me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he burns! … Abide in My love! If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love!” (John 15:5-10). Our Lord tells us to abide in His love―which could be said to be same as abiding in Sanctifying Grace―for if we lose Sanctifying Grace through mortal sin, then we automatically lose Charity (for “God is charity” 1 John 4:8), for Sanctifying Grace and Charity go hand-in-hand, and you cannot truly have one without the other. Scripture tells us: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Just as it says: “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3), you could rephrase that to say: “If I … have not Sanctifying Grace―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Sanctifying Grace―then I am nothing. If I … have not Sanctifying Grace―then it profits me nothing!”
Salvation Checklist #9: LOSING THE SENSE OF SIN
As already stated, mortal sin kicks Sanctifying Grace out of the soul―but the stage for mortal sin is often prepared by becoming used to habitual venial sins. The devil likes to advance little by little and undetected. He can first of all create an addiction to venial―which we falsely and stupidly dismiss as being of little or no consequence! Once he has accustomed us to habitually commit lots of venial sins of all kinds―he then has a stable and almost permanent platform upon which to work to take us to the next stage, which will be some mortal sin that does not shock us, a mortal sin that is “just-over-the-border” from venial sins, a mortal sin that he will somehow make it appear like a “serious venial sin.” Once we cross that border, then his next step is to accustom us and make habitual that “teeny-weeny” mortal sin, as though it does little or no damage! No mortal sin is truly little―for any and all mortal sin has power to condemn us to Hell.
All of this can be summed-up as being a progressive, gradual, almost imperceptible loss of the sense of sin―which is Satan’s masterstroke. His temptations to make us commit sin are often psychological masterpieces of deceit and false reasoning―see how he tempted Eve and gradually made her believe that it would not be a sin to eat the forbidden fruit. It is through sin that we gradually give ourselves over―little-by-little―into the clutches of Satan. “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “You that love the Lord, hate evil!” (Psalm 96:10) … “Hate evil and love good!” (Amos 5:15). “Flee from sins as from the face of a serpent! For if you come near them, they will take hold of you!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:2). “And from his infancy he taught him to fear God, and to abstain from all sin” (Tobias 1:10). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “Sin no more―lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14). “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:10-11).
Article 32
Monday & Tuesday after the 1st Sunday of Passiontide, April 7th & 8th
Sodom, Gomorrha, Ninive & You!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday & Tuesday after the 1st Sunday of Passiontide, April 7th & 8th
Sodom, Gomorrha, Ninive & You!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
What Has This Got to Do with Me?
“What has Sodom, Gomorrha and Ninive got to do with me?” you may well ask. Some might even be totally clueless as to what Sodom, Gomorrha and Ninive are! How we relate to something if we don’t even know what that something is in the first place? We can’t! So let us briefly look at those three mysterious “somethings.”
The reason for even bringing them up is because Holy Mother Church brings up one of three in the Epistle reading for in the Mass for the Monday after the Sunday of Passiontide: “In those days, the word of the Lord came to Jonas a second time: Set out for the great city of Ninive, and announce to it the message that I will tell you. So Jonas made ready and went to Ninive, according to the Lord’s bidding. Now Ninive was an enormously large city; it took three days to go through it. Jonas began his journey through the city, and had gone but a single day’s walk announcing: ‘Forty days more and Ninive shall be destroyed!’ When the people of Ninive believed God; they proclaimed a fast and all of them, great and small, put on sackcloth. When the news reached the King of Ninive, he rose from his throne, laid aside his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in the ashes. Then he had this proclaimed throughout Ninive, by decree of the king and his nobles: ‘Neither man nor beast, neither cattle nor sheep, shall taste anything; they shall not eat, nor shall they drink water. Man and beast shall be covered with sackcloth and call loudly to God; every man shall turn from his evil way and from violence he has in hand. Who knows, God may relent and forgive, and withhold His blazing wrath, so that we shall not perish!’ And God saw by their actions how they turned from their evil way; and the Lord, our God, had mercy upon His people” (Jonas 3:1-10).
What about Sodom and Gomorrha? Sodom and Gomorrha were two cities destroyed by God for their wickedness (Genesis 18:16-33; 19:1-28). Their story parallels the Genesis Great Flood narrative in the time of Noe, where God’s anger provoked by man’s sin (see Genesis chapters 6, 7 & 8). Sodom and Gomorrha are mentioned frequently in the prophets and the New Testament as symbols of human wickedness requiring divine retribution.
The Story of Sodom and Gomorrha
“And the Lord said: ‘The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied, and their sin is become exceedingly grievous! I will go down and see whether they have done according to the cry that is come to Me―whether it be not so, that I may know!’ … Abraham stood before the Lord and, drawing near he said: ‘Will You destroy the just with the wicked? If there be fifty just and righteous men in the city, shall they perish with all the others? Will You not spare that place for the sake of the fifty just and righteous men, if they be therein? Far be it from You to do this thing, and to slay the just with the wicked, and for the just to be treated as the wicked! This is not becoming of You! You, Who judge all the Earth, will not make this judgment!’ And the Lord said to Abraham: ‘If I find in Sodom fifty just and righteous men within the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake!’ And Abraham answered, and said: ‘Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord, even though I am but dust and ashes! What if there be five less than fifty just persons? Will You, for those forty-five, destroy the whole city?’ And He said: ‘I will not destroy it, if I find forty-five just men!’ And again Abraham said to Him: ‘But if forty just and righteous men be found there―what will You do?’ The Lord said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of forty just men!’ Abraham said: ‘Lord! Be not angry, I beseech You, if I speak again! What if thirty just men shall be found there?’ The Lord answered: ‘I will not do it if I find thirty just men there!’ Abraham said: ‘Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord! What if twenty just men be found there?’ The Lord said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of twenty just men!’ Abraham said: ‘I beseech You Lord, be not angry if I speak yet once more! What if ten just men should be found there?’ And the Lord said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of ten just men!’ And the Lord departed after He had left speaking to Abraham―and Abraham returned to his place.” (Genesis 18:22-33) …
“Two angels came to Sodom in the evening, and Lot [Abraham’s nephew) was sitting at the gate of the city … And they said to Lot: ‘Have you any sons, son- in-laws, or daughters here? All that are yours, bring them out of this city! For we will destroy this place, because their cry is grown loud before the Lord, Who has sent us to destroy them!’ So Lot went out, and spoke to his son-in-laws, that were to have his daughters, and said: ‘Arise! Get out of this place, because the Lord will destroy this city!’ And they thought he was speaking as it were in jest ... When it was morning, the angels pressed Lot, saying: ‘Arise, take your wife, and the two daughters which you have! Lest you also perish in the wickedness of the city!’ … And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from the Lord out of Heaven. And He destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the earth … And Abraham got up early in the morning and in the place where he had stood before with the Lord, Abraham looked towards Sodom and Gomorrha, and the whole land of that country―and he saw the ashes rise up from the earth as the smoke of a furnace!” (Genesis 19:1-27).
Our Lord makes mention of Sodom in the New Testament: “Then Jesus began to upbraid the cities wherein were done the most of His miracles, because they had not done penance. ‘Woe to thee, Corozain! Woe to thee, Bethsaida! For if in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the miracles that have been wrought in you―they would have long ago done penance in sackcloth and ashes! But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the Day of Judgment, than for you! And you Capharnaum―shall you be exalted up to Heaven? You shall go down even unto Hell! For if in Sodom had been wrought the miracles that have been wrought in you, perhaps it would have remained unto this day! But I say unto you, that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the Day of Judgment, than for you!’” (Matthew 11:20-24).
Those words of Our Lord as echoed and reinforced elsewhere when He says: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5). Likewise, Scripture adds: “Let him do penance for his sin!” (Leviticus 5:5). “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23).
Tyre and Sidon were ancient Phoenician cities on the Mediterranean coast, known for their wealth and maritime trade. Both Tyre and Sidon were historical Gentile enemies of Israel. Old Testament prophets often denounced them for their pride and wickedness (Ezechiel 26-28, Isaias 23).
Cornelius à Lapide, a Flemish Catholic priest of the Jesuit Order, and exegete of Sacred Scripture, commentates on the verses “Truly, I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable...etc.” that the citizens of Tyre and Sidon will be punished because of their wickedness, but that the Galileans will be punished more severely: “Because they had greater knowledge of God’s law, and virtue. Because they have often heard Jesus preaching and exhorting to repentance, and have beheld Him doing many miracles―none of which things the Tyrians have either seen or heard.” Cornelius à Lapide draws the further moral point that Christians will be punished more severely in the Day of Judgment than Jews; the Roman citizens more than Indians; priests, nuns and monks, more than laymen; if the former lived sinful lives, because “they have received greater degrees of grace and knowledge from God, and would not make use of them, but abused them to their own greater damnation.”
Presumptions and Assumptions
No doubt you know that presumption can be a sin―the opposite extreme to despair. We are told: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12) ― which clearly means, do not despair of you salvation and do not presume that you will automatically be saved. We read in the Bible that many Jews assumed that they were righteous simply because of their Jewish heritage and birth, presuming themselves to be already saved on the basis of their identity. St. John the Baptist “seeing many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, said to them: ‘Ye brood of vipers! Who has shown you to flee from the wrath to come! Bring forth fruit worthy of penance! And think not to say within yourselves: “We have Abraham for our father!” For I tell you that God is able of these stones to raise up children to Abraham!’” (Matthew 3:7-9). The Pharisees proudly boasted to Jesus: “‘Abraham is our father!’ Jesus said to them: ‘I know that you are the children of Abraham … If you be the children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham!’” (John 8:37-39).
You see the same presumptions and assumptions among the Protestants. They say that all you have to do to be saved in to believe in Jesus. That presumptuous idea actually comes from Holy Scripture: “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and thou shalt be saved!” (Acts 16:31). However, believing is only the tip of the iceberg of salvation―which involves a whole lot more that merely believing. As Scripture points out elsewhere: “Faith (believing) without works is dead!” (James 2:20) and “Faith works by charity” (Galatians 5:6). That charity is not just a “feeling” or an “emotion” but something that is also proved by works: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” says Our Lord (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
We also encounter these presumptions and assumptions concerning salvation among Catholics of all kinds―Traditional, Conservative and Liberal. Just like the Jews, many imagine that by simply belonging to their religion is a guarantee of salvation―and that they will automatically go to Heaven while everyone else will be damned. Both the rigorists and laxists can be guilty of this presumption and assumption.
The rigorists are much like the Pharisee in Our Lord’s parable: “Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus within himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men―extortioners, unjust, adulterers―as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!’” (Luke 18:10-12). The Pharisees were legalistic by being overly strict about the law, while the Sadducees were overly lax about the law. The Pharisees focused on adhering to the law and maintaining their religious standing, rather than having a personal loving relationship with God. Their faith in salvation was more focused on their own actions and lineage than upon the grace of God. So too do many Catholics focus on the “legalism” of their Faith or “the letter of the law” and not the “spirit” of their Faith. These words St. Paul apply not only to those who lived in Christ’s day, but also to many “legalistic” Catholics today: “God has made us fit ministers of the New Testament, not in the letter, but in the spirit. For the letter kills, but the spirit gives life” (2 Corinthians 3:6). The letter of the law and the spirit of the law are two possible ways to regard rules or laws. To obey the letter of the law is to follow the literal reading of the words of the law, whereas following the spirit of the law is to follow the intention of why the law was enforced.
The laxists are always insisting that God is love, love, love and nothing but love! True― “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) ― but haven’t they read the rest of the Bible that speaks of the God of justice? “For Thou, O Lord, wilt render to every man according to his works!” (Psalm 61:13). “The Lord will reward me according to my justice; and according to the cleanness of my hands before his eyes. With the holy, Thou wilt be holy; and with the innocent man Thou wilt be innocent; and with the elect Thou wilt be elect; and with the perverse thou wilt be perverted!” (Psalm 17:25-27).
Sure―if we live virtuously we will experience the love of God, but if we decide to live sinfully under the presumption that the God of love will always turn a blind eye to our sins―then we are kidding ourselves. Holy Scripture says: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “The wrath of God is revealed from Heaven against all ungodliness and injustice! … For it is written: ‘Revenge is Mine! I will repay!’ says the Lord” (Romans 1:18; 12:19). As Our Lord says: “Fear Him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell!” (Matthew 10:28). Sure―Our Lord said: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32) ― but He also added: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). There is no room for laxity―which is a type of lukewarmness―with God, for as God says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot! But, because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
We Forget or Ignore this Truth!
Most of us are probably like the smug Pharisee in Our Lord’s parable, who praises himself and thanks God that he is not like everyone else! “The Pharisee standing, prayed thus within himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men―extortioners, unjust, adulterers―as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!’” (Luke 18:10-12). Yes―it was true that he was doing a lot. According to Jewish practice, he was only obliged to tithe on two of his possessions―but he paying taxes to the Temple on EVERYTHING he owned. Yes―he was giving thanks to God for making him a good man―but he despised the sinners, and put himself way above them. He forget that God wishes to save―not only righteous, just and good people, but also evil people and sinners. As Our Lord said: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32).
Furthermore, the Pharisee is probably ignoring the fact that whom God gives more, then from that person God also expects more: “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). Additionally, in our complacency, assumption and presumption, we often fall into the trap of thinking that WE are doing good; that WE are the source of good thoughts, words and actions―forgetting or ignoring the fact the Jesus said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). It is the GRACE OF GOD that is behind any and all good that we might do―as St. Thomas Aquinas clearly puts it in the following compilation of very humbling extracts from his writings:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever! … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For grace is given to many persons to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
The above statements on grace by St. Thomas Aquinas are succinctly summed up by Our Lord when He says: “Does the Lord thank his servant for doing the things which he commanded him to do? I think not. So you also, when you shall have done all these things that are commanded to you [by grace], say: ‘We are unprofitable servants! We have done that which we ought to do!’” (Luke 17:10).
What Have You Been Commanded to Do?
Believe it or not, you have been commanded to do many things by God! Are you doing those things? You have been commanded to love God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). How close are you to fulfilling those two commands?
You might well ask―like the lawyer asked Jesus―as to who is your neighbor: “A certain lawyer … wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus: ‘And who is my neighbor?’” (Luke 10:29). Jesus replied with the parable about the Good Samaritan (the Samaritans were intense enemies of the Jews) ― thereby indicating that even our enemies, even sinners, are our neighbors.
You have been commanded to pray and make sacrifices. For what? For the conversion of sinners―for the conversion of a modern-day worldwide Sodom and Gomorrha! As Our Lady of Fatima said: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
You have not been asked to primarily pray and makes sacrifices for your own pet projects, your wealth, your job, your happiness, your health, etc. There is nothing wrong in praying for these things―but priorities should be observed. Canon Law states that supreme law of the Church is the salvation of souls. Our Lord did not come on Earth to have a fun time, to invent things like electricity, airplanes, cars, televisions, radio, phones, the internet (though He could have done all those things and more besides). He did not primarily come to cure the sick―even though He did cure enormous numbers of sick people. He came for the salvation of souls: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). That was His main preoccupation and that should be our main preoccupation―everything else takes second place. As they say: “The common good comes before the individual or personal good.”
Our neglect in these matters is not without consequences: “That servant who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes! But he that knew not, and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with fewer stripes [but beaten nevertheless]. And unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:47-48). You have been given the Catholic Faith―most of the world has not been given the Faith! You have a privilege that only 1 in 8 persons has been given! What are you doing with your Faith? Have you buried it like the man who buried the talent that his master gave him, and failed to use it and make a profit with it? “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20). How many souls are firmly planted in a Sodom and Gomorrha lifestyle because of our neglect to work for their salvation? How many souls are there in Hell because of our neglect to pray much and offer many sacrifices for their conversion before their damnation? Shall we use Cain’s lame excuse when God asked Cain about the whereabouts of his brother Abel―whom Cain had killed: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). As Scripture says: “He that has the substance of this world [the Faith, for example], and shall see his brother in need [of the Faith, or the grace of God], and shall shut up his bowels from him―how then does the charity of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:17).
The entire quote is: “This is the declaration, which you have heard from the beginning―that you should love one another! Not as Cain, who was of the wicked one [the devil], and killed his brother. And why did he kill him? Because his own works were wicked and his brother’s works were just! … Whosoever hates his brother is a murderer. And you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in himself. In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us―and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how then does the charity of God abide in him? Let us not love in word, nor in tongue―but by deeds and in truth!” (1 John 3:11-18).
We Are Living in Sodom and Gomorrha
Has it ever crossed your mind that the world that we are currently living in is far worse than Sodom and Gomorrha were? Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello in the 1950s that the current state of the world is worse than it was at the time of Noe and the Great Flood: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [the Great Flood in Noe’s time]. All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished! The world has become as a flooded valley, overflowing with filth and mud. Some of the most difficult trials of Divine Justice are yet to come, before the deluge of fire!”
Our Lady of Akita adds: “As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead. The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the Rosary, pray for the pope, the bishops, and the priests.”
You cannot compare two cities to the whole world. It is obvious that the world will commit more sins than just two cities. The sinners of Sodom and Gomorrha are like a few drops of water in the ocean compared to deluge of sin throughout the world today! Yet Our Lady also says above that the sinful world today is worse than the sinful world in Noe’s time, when God punished it with the Great Flood! God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrha by fire and brimstone―and Our Lady says that our punishment will also be one of fire: “the deluge of fire! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity!”
The Math of Sodom and Gomorrha and Catholics
Some interpretations and commentators suggest a population of around 1.5 million for both cities―which is an extremely large population and an extravagant number for cities around 4,000 years ago when the world population was estimated to be around 30 million. On the other end of the scale, others have estimated the regional population of Sodom and Gomorrha to have been around 40,000 to 65,000 people―which is more likely to be closer to the truth. In any case, those cities were extremely sinful, to the point that God was ready to destroy the cities and their inhabitants. Abraham tried to intercede with God and obtained from God an initial promise that God would spare them in 50 just and righteous men could be found therein. Abraham then managed to negotiate that number down to a mere 10 just and righteous men.
Now, bear in mind this―when the Bible speaks of numbers of persons, it only refers to men―and not the women and children. So, for example, Our Lord’s miraculous feeding of 4,000 men on one occasion and 5,000 men on another occasion, refers only to men―and does not include the additional women and children that must have been present: “And the number of them that did eat, was five thousand men―besides women and children” (Matthew 14:2). In 2000 BC―the time of Abraham and the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrha―biblical Hebrew families were estimated to have an average of 5 to 8 children, with some families possibly having even more. This gives an approximate male adult (husband or single) population of anywhere So when Abraham is speaking of finding 50 just men―and then by stages whittling it down to only 10 just men―then you are talking about an estimated male adult population of anywhere from 4,000 to 9,000 men out of a total population of 40,000 to 65,000 people. Therefore, 50 just men would constitute anywhere from 1 out of every 80 men (50 out of 4,000) to 1 out of 180 men (50 out of 9,000), or 1 out of 400 men (10 out of 4,000) to 1 out of 900 men (10 out of 9,000).
How does that relate to our present day, where there are around 1.4 billion Catholics in a total world population of 8.2 billion people? Those numbers mean that Catholics roughly constitute 1 out every 6 people. The ratio of men to women is almost an even split―with one man/boy for every woman/girl. The number of children in the world under the age of reason (the age of reason is 7-years-old, give or take a year) is hard to ascertain, but it is estimated at being around 800 million ― therefore around 10% of the total world population or 1 in 10 persons. That means that there are approximately 7.4 billion (7,400 million persons over the age of reason―half of which are male (3,700 million).
If Catholics constitute roughly 1 out of every 6 persons, that means that there are around 616 million Catholic males who are over the age of reason. Now we have to further reduce the numbers in view of the fact that many or most Catholics are living in a state of mortal sin. Less than 20% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday Mass―an obligation which binds under the pain of mortal sin―and very few of those Catholics still go to Confession. Therefore, your 616 million Catholic males over the age of reason drops down to around 123 million.
If you look at those 616 million Catholic males from the perspective of who still prays the Rosary, though precise numbers are not available, the research that has been done by way of surveys, puts the number of Catholics who pray the Rosary daily at somewhere between 2% and 3%. So from the Rosary perspective, out of the 616 Catholic males over the age of reason, there are only between 12 million and 18 million who pray the Rosary daily.
What is the point of all this confusing and complicated math? Well, the point is that, considering the number of Catholics in the world, we are (or should be) in a much better position to fulfill “Abraham’s Bargaining Terms” in asking God to spare Sodom and Gomorrha. Catholics are roughly 1 out 6 persons―and God was prepared to spare Sodom and Gomorrha if anywhere from 1 in 180 men were just and righteous to as high as 1 in 900 men! Are we just and righteous? Are we bargaining with God to have Him show mercy to this cesspool of a sinful world?
Our Lady’s Commands Not Being Fulfilled
You get what you pay for! You reap what you sow! Mercy is not something that is owed to mankind. God wants to show mercy―but mercy is not cheap! Mercy requires some cooperation and sweat on our part! In her many different apparitions, Our Lady has sufficiently laid forth the details of “God’s Mercy Contract” and what we must do to fulfill our side of the contract:
► At LA SALETTE (1846) she lamented: “The thought of the loss of so many souls is the cause of my sadness … If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! … There are no more generous souls … There is no one to be found to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people … The heads, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance … by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures! … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement!”
► At LOURDES (1858), Our Lady simply yet powerfully insisted upon the cross in the form of “Penance! Penance! Penance!” and commanded St. Bernadette: “Kiss the ground as a penance for sinners.” She also commanded her to eat grass and drink muddy water as a penance for sinners.
► At FATIMA (1917)―even before Our Lady appeared―we have the Angel of Portugal addressing the three children who were playing: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
When Our Lady of Fatima later appeared, she said: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
► In 1957, SISTER LUCIA OF FATIMA later said in an interview with Fr. Fuentes: “It is my mission not just to speak about the material punishments, that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to also tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin. We should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No―Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed! So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway!”
Yet Sister Lucia sadly added: the Blessed Virgin is very sad, BECAUSE NO ONE HEEDS HER MESSAGE; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
We cannot pretend―like the murderous Cain who killed his brother Abel―that we are not our brother’s keeper: “Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is your brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I do not know! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to Cain: ‘What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth! Now, therefore, your shall be cursed upon the Earth, which has opened her mouth and received the blood of your brother at your hand!’” (Genesis 4:8-11).
Yes―we are the keepers of our fellow men! Our Lord said: “You are the salt of the Earth! But if the salt loses its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing any more but to be cast out, and to be trodden on by men! You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid! Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bucket, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:13-16).
The following words could be addressed to every Catholic―who is supposed to be the salt of the Earth and the light of the world: “I have made you a watchman! And you shall hear the word out of My mouth, and shall tell it to them from Me! If, when I say to the wicked: ‘You shall surely die!’ ― and you do not declare it to him, nor speak to him, so that he might be converted from his wicked ways and live, then the same wicked man shall certainly die in his iniquity, but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you give warning to the wicked, and he does not convert from his wickedness and from his evil ways―then he indeed shall die in his iniquity, but you will have saved your soul! Moreover, if the just man shall turn away from his justice, and shall commit iniquity―then I will lay a stumbling-block before him and he shall die―because you have not warned him! He shall die in his sin, and all his justices which he has done beforehand, shall not be remembered―but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you warn the just man, so that the just may not sin, and he does not sin―then living he shall live, because you have warned him, and you will have saved your soul!” (Ezechiel 3:17-21).
“What has Sodom, Gomorrha and Ninive got to do with me?” you may well ask. Some might even be totally clueless as to what Sodom, Gomorrha and Ninive are! How we relate to something if we don’t even know what that something is in the first place? We can’t! So let us briefly look at those three mysterious “somethings.”
The reason for even bringing them up is because Holy Mother Church brings up one of three in the Epistle reading for in the Mass for the Monday after the Sunday of Passiontide: “In those days, the word of the Lord came to Jonas a second time: Set out for the great city of Ninive, and announce to it the message that I will tell you. So Jonas made ready and went to Ninive, according to the Lord’s bidding. Now Ninive was an enormously large city; it took three days to go through it. Jonas began his journey through the city, and had gone but a single day’s walk announcing: ‘Forty days more and Ninive shall be destroyed!’ When the people of Ninive believed God; they proclaimed a fast and all of them, great and small, put on sackcloth. When the news reached the King of Ninive, he rose from his throne, laid aside his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in the ashes. Then he had this proclaimed throughout Ninive, by decree of the king and his nobles: ‘Neither man nor beast, neither cattle nor sheep, shall taste anything; they shall not eat, nor shall they drink water. Man and beast shall be covered with sackcloth and call loudly to God; every man shall turn from his evil way and from violence he has in hand. Who knows, God may relent and forgive, and withhold His blazing wrath, so that we shall not perish!’ And God saw by their actions how they turned from their evil way; and the Lord, our God, had mercy upon His people” (Jonas 3:1-10).
What about Sodom and Gomorrha? Sodom and Gomorrha were two cities destroyed by God for their wickedness (Genesis 18:16-33; 19:1-28). Their story parallels the Genesis Great Flood narrative in the time of Noe, where God’s anger provoked by man’s sin (see Genesis chapters 6, 7 & 8). Sodom and Gomorrha are mentioned frequently in the prophets and the New Testament as symbols of human wickedness requiring divine retribution.
The Story of Sodom and Gomorrha
“And the Lord said: ‘The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied, and their sin is become exceedingly grievous! I will go down and see whether they have done according to the cry that is come to Me―whether it be not so, that I may know!’ … Abraham stood before the Lord and, drawing near he said: ‘Will You destroy the just with the wicked? If there be fifty just and righteous men in the city, shall they perish with all the others? Will You not spare that place for the sake of the fifty just and righteous men, if they be therein? Far be it from You to do this thing, and to slay the just with the wicked, and for the just to be treated as the wicked! This is not becoming of You! You, Who judge all the Earth, will not make this judgment!’ And the Lord said to Abraham: ‘If I find in Sodom fifty just and righteous men within the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake!’ And Abraham answered, and said: ‘Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord, even though I am but dust and ashes! What if there be five less than fifty just persons? Will You, for those forty-five, destroy the whole city?’ And He said: ‘I will not destroy it, if I find forty-five just men!’ And again Abraham said to Him: ‘But if forty just and righteous men be found there―what will You do?’ The Lord said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of forty just men!’ Abraham said: ‘Lord! Be not angry, I beseech You, if I speak again! What if thirty just men shall be found there?’ The Lord answered: ‘I will not do it if I find thirty just men there!’ Abraham said: ‘Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord! What if twenty just men be found there?’ The Lord said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of twenty just men!’ Abraham said: ‘I beseech You Lord, be not angry if I speak yet once more! What if ten just men should be found there?’ And the Lord said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of ten just men!’ And the Lord departed after He had left speaking to Abraham―and Abraham returned to his place.” (Genesis 18:22-33) …
“Two angels came to Sodom in the evening, and Lot [Abraham’s nephew) was sitting at the gate of the city … And they said to Lot: ‘Have you any sons, son- in-laws, or daughters here? All that are yours, bring them out of this city! For we will destroy this place, because their cry is grown loud before the Lord, Who has sent us to destroy them!’ So Lot went out, and spoke to his son-in-laws, that were to have his daughters, and said: ‘Arise! Get out of this place, because the Lord will destroy this city!’ And they thought he was speaking as it were in jest ... When it was morning, the angels pressed Lot, saying: ‘Arise, take your wife, and the two daughters which you have! Lest you also perish in the wickedness of the city!’ … And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from the Lord out of Heaven. And He destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the earth … And Abraham got up early in the morning and in the place where he had stood before with the Lord, Abraham looked towards Sodom and Gomorrha, and the whole land of that country―and he saw the ashes rise up from the earth as the smoke of a furnace!” (Genesis 19:1-27).
Our Lord makes mention of Sodom in the New Testament: “Then Jesus began to upbraid the cities wherein were done the most of His miracles, because they had not done penance. ‘Woe to thee, Corozain! Woe to thee, Bethsaida! For if in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the miracles that have been wrought in you―they would have long ago done penance in sackcloth and ashes! But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the Day of Judgment, than for you! And you Capharnaum―shall you be exalted up to Heaven? You shall go down even unto Hell! For if in Sodom had been wrought the miracles that have been wrought in you, perhaps it would have remained unto this day! But I say unto you, that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the Day of Judgment, than for you!’” (Matthew 11:20-24).
Those words of Our Lord as echoed and reinforced elsewhere when He says: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5). Likewise, Scripture adds: “Let him do penance for his sin!” (Leviticus 5:5). “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23).
Tyre and Sidon were ancient Phoenician cities on the Mediterranean coast, known for their wealth and maritime trade. Both Tyre and Sidon were historical Gentile enemies of Israel. Old Testament prophets often denounced them for their pride and wickedness (Ezechiel 26-28, Isaias 23).
Cornelius à Lapide, a Flemish Catholic priest of the Jesuit Order, and exegete of Sacred Scripture, commentates on the verses “Truly, I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable...etc.” that the citizens of Tyre and Sidon will be punished because of their wickedness, but that the Galileans will be punished more severely: “Because they had greater knowledge of God’s law, and virtue. Because they have often heard Jesus preaching and exhorting to repentance, and have beheld Him doing many miracles―none of which things the Tyrians have either seen or heard.” Cornelius à Lapide draws the further moral point that Christians will be punished more severely in the Day of Judgment than Jews; the Roman citizens more than Indians; priests, nuns and monks, more than laymen; if the former lived sinful lives, because “they have received greater degrees of grace and knowledge from God, and would not make use of them, but abused them to their own greater damnation.”
Presumptions and Assumptions
No doubt you know that presumption can be a sin―the opposite extreme to despair. We are told: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12) ― which clearly means, do not despair of you salvation and do not presume that you will automatically be saved. We read in the Bible that many Jews assumed that they were righteous simply because of their Jewish heritage and birth, presuming themselves to be already saved on the basis of their identity. St. John the Baptist “seeing many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, said to them: ‘Ye brood of vipers! Who has shown you to flee from the wrath to come! Bring forth fruit worthy of penance! And think not to say within yourselves: “We have Abraham for our father!” For I tell you that God is able of these stones to raise up children to Abraham!’” (Matthew 3:7-9). The Pharisees proudly boasted to Jesus: “‘Abraham is our father!’ Jesus said to them: ‘I know that you are the children of Abraham … If you be the children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham!’” (John 8:37-39).
You see the same presumptions and assumptions among the Protestants. They say that all you have to do to be saved in to believe in Jesus. That presumptuous idea actually comes from Holy Scripture: “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and thou shalt be saved!” (Acts 16:31). However, believing is only the tip of the iceberg of salvation―which involves a whole lot more that merely believing. As Scripture points out elsewhere: “Faith (believing) without works is dead!” (James 2:20) and “Faith works by charity” (Galatians 5:6). That charity is not just a “feeling” or an “emotion” but something that is also proved by works: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” says Our Lord (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
We also encounter these presumptions and assumptions concerning salvation among Catholics of all kinds―Traditional, Conservative and Liberal. Just like the Jews, many imagine that by simply belonging to their religion is a guarantee of salvation―and that they will automatically go to Heaven while everyone else will be damned. Both the rigorists and laxists can be guilty of this presumption and assumption.
The rigorists are much like the Pharisee in Our Lord’s parable: “Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus within himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men―extortioners, unjust, adulterers―as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!’” (Luke 18:10-12). The Pharisees were legalistic by being overly strict about the law, while the Sadducees were overly lax about the law. The Pharisees focused on adhering to the law and maintaining their religious standing, rather than having a personal loving relationship with God. Their faith in salvation was more focused on their own actions and lineage than upon the grace of God. So too do many Catholics focus on the “legalism” of their Faith or “the letter of the law” and not the “spirit” of their Faith. These words St. Paul apply not only to those who lived in Christ’s day, but also to many “legalistic” Catholics today: “God has made us fit ministers of the New Testament, not in the letter, but in the spirit. For the letter kills, but the spirit gives life” (2 Corinthians 3:6). The letter of the law and the spirit of the law are two possible ways to regard rules or laws. To obey the letter of the law is to follow the literal reading of the words of the law, whereas following the spirit of the law is to follow the intention of why the law was enforced.
The laxists are always insisting that God is love, love, love and nothing but love! True― “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) ― but haven’t they read the rest of the Bible that speaks of the God of justice? “For Thou, O Lord, wilt render to every man according to his works!” (Psalm 61:13). “The Lord will reward me according to my justice; and according to the cleanness of my hands before his eyes. With the holy, Thou wilt be holy; and with the innocent man Thou wilt be innocent; and with the elect Thou wilt be elect; and with the perverse thou wilt be perverted!” (Psalm 17:25-27).
Sure―if we live virtuously we will experience the love of God, but if we decide to live sinfully under the presumption that the God of love will always turn a blind eye to our sins―then we are kidding ourselves. Holy Scripture says: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “The wrath of God is revealed from Heaven against all ungodliness and injustice! … For it is written: ‘Revenge is Mine! I will repay!’ says the Lord” (Romans 1:18; 12:19). As Our Lord says: “Fear Him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell!” (Matthew 10:28). Sure―Our Lord said: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32) ― but He also added: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). There is no room for laxity―which is a type of lukewarmness―with God, for as God says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot! But, because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
We Forget or Ignore this Truth!
Most of us are probably like the smug Pharisee in Our Lord’s parable, who praises himself and thanks God that he is not like everyone else! “The Pharisee standing, prayed thus within himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men―extortioners, unjust, adulterers―as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!’” (Luke 18:10-12). Yes―it was true that he was doing a lot. According to Jewish practice, he was only obliged to tithe on two of his possessions―but he paying taxes to the Temple on EVERYTHING he owned. Yes―he was giving thanks to God for making him a good man―but he despised the sinners, and put himself way above them. He forget that God wishes to save―not only righteous, just and good people, but also evil people and sinners. As Our Lord said: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32).
Furthermore, the Pharisee is probably ignoring the fact that whom God gives more, then from that person God also expects more: “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). Additionally, in our complacency, assumption and presumption, we often fall into the trap of thinking that WE are doing good; that WE are the source of good thoughts, words and actions―forgetting or ignoring the fact the Jesus said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). It is the GRACE OF GOD that is behind any and all good that we might do―as St. Thomas Aquinas clearly puts it in the following compilation of very humbling extracts from his writings:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever! … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For grace is given to many persons to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
The above statements on grace by St. Thomas Aquinas are succinctly summed up by Our Lord when He says: “Does the Lord thank his servant for doing the things which he commanded him to do? I think not. So you also, when you shall have done all these things that are commanded to you [by grace], say: ‘We are unprofitable servants! We have done that which we ought to do!’” (Luke 17:10).
What Have You Been Commanded to Do?
Believe it or not, you have been commanded to do many things by God! Are you doing those things? You have been commanded to love God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). How close are you to fulfilling those two commands?
You might well ask―like the lawyer asked Jesus―as to who is your neighbor: “A certain lawyer … wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus: ‘And who is my neighbor?’” (Luke 10:29). Jesus replied with the parable about the Good Samaritan (the Samaritans were intense enemies of the Jews) ― thereby indicating that even our enemies, even sinners, are our neighbors.
You have been commanded to pray and make sacrifices. For what? For the conversion of sinners―for the conversion of a modern-day worldwide Sodom and Gomorrha! As Our Lady of Fatima said: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
You have not been asked to primarily pray and makes sacrifices for your own pet projects, your wealth, your job, your happiness, your health, etc. There is nothing wrong in praying for these things―but priorities should be observed. Canon Law states that supreme law of the Church is the salvation of souls. Our Lord did not come on Earth to have a fun time, to invent things like electricity, airplanes, cars, televisions, radio, phones, the internet (though He could have done all those things and more besides). He did not primarily come to cure the sick―even though He did cure enormous numbers of sick people. He came for the salvation of souls: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). That was His main preoccupation and that should be our main preoccupation―everything else takes second place. As they say: “The common good comes before the individual or personal good.”
Our neglect in these matters is not without consequences: “That servant who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes! But he that knew not, and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with fewer stripes [but beaten nevertheless]. And unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:47-48). You have been given the Catholic Faith―most of the world has not been given the Faith! You have a privilege that only 1 in 8 persons has been given! What are you doing with your Faith? Have you buried it like the man who buried the talent that his master gave him, and failed to use it and make a profit with it? “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20). How many souls are firmly planted in a Sodom and Gomorrha lifestyle because of our neglect to work for their salvation? How many souls are there in Hell because of our neglect to pray much and offer many sacrifices for their conversion before their damnation? Shall we use Cain’s lame excuse when God asked Cain about the whereabouts of his brother Abel―whom Cain had killed: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). As Scripture says: “He that has the substance of this world [the Faith, for example], and shall see his brother in need [of the Faith, or the grace of God], and shall shut up his bowels from him―how then does the charity of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:17).
The entire quote is: “This is the declaration, which you have heard from the beginning―that you should love one another! Not as Cain, who was of the wicked one [the devil], and killed his brother. And why did he kill him? Because his own works were wicked and his brother’s works were just! … Whosoever hates his brother is a murderer. And you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in himself. In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us―and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how then does the charity of God abide in him? Let us not love in word, nor in tongue―but by deeds and in truth!” (1 John 3:11-18).
We Are Living in Sodom and Gomorrha
Has it ever crossed your mind that the world that we are currently living in is far worse than Sodom and Gomorrha were? Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello in the 1950s that the current state of the world is worse than it was at the time of Noe and the Great Flood: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [the Great Flood in Noe’s time]. All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished! The world has become as a flooded valley, overflowing with filth and mud. Some of the most difficult trials of Divine Justice are yet to come, before the deluge of fire!”
Our Lady of Akita adds: “As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead. The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the Rosary, pray for the pope, the bishops, and the priests.”
You cannot compare two cities to the whole world. It is obvious that the world will commit more sins than just two cities. The sinners of Sodom and Gomorrha are like a few drops of water in the ocean compared to deluge of sin throughout the world today! Yet Our Lady also says above that the sinful world today is worse than the sinful world in Noe’s time, when God punished it with the Great Flood! God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrha by fire and brimstone―and Our Lady says that our punishment will also be one of fire: “the deluge of fire! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity!”
The Math of Sodom and Gomorrha and Catholics
Some interpretations and commentators suggest a population of around 1.5 million for both cities―which is an extremely large population and an extravagant number for cities around 4,000 years ago when the world population was estimated to be around 30 million. On the other end of the scale, others have estimated the regional population of Sodom and Gomorrha to have been around 40,000 to 65,000 people―which is more likely to be closer to the truth. In any case, those cities were extremely sinful, to the point that God was ready to destroy the cities and their inhabitants. Abraham tried to intercede with God and obtained from God an initial promise that God would spare them in 50 just and righteous men could be found therein. Abraham then managed to negotiate that number down to a mere 10 just and righteous men.
Now, bear in mind this―when the Bible speaks of numbers of persons, it only refers to men―and not the women and children. So, for example, Our Lord’s miraculous feeding of 4,000 men on one occasion and 5,000 men on another occasion, refers only to men―and does not include the additional women and children that must have been present: “And the number of them that did eat, was five thousand men―besides women and children” (Matthew 14:2). In 2000 BC―the time of Abraham and the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrha―biblical Hebrew families were estimated to have an average of 5 to 8 children, with some families possibly having even more. This gives an approximate male adult (husband or single) population of anywhere So when Abraham is speaking of finding 50 just men―and then by stages whittling it down to only 10 just men―then you are talking about an estimated male adult population of anywhere from 4,000 to 9,000 men out of a total population of 40,000 to 65,000 people. Therefore, 50 just men would constitute anywhere from 1 out of every 80 men (50 out of 4,000) to 1 out of 180 men (50 out of 9,000), or 1 out of 400 men (10 out of 4,000) to 1 out of 900 men (10 out of 9,000).
How does that relate to our present day, where there are around 1.4 billion Catholics in a total world population of 8.2 billion people? Those numbers mean that Catholics roughly constitute 1 out every 6 people. The ratio of men to women is almost an even split―with one man/boy for every woman/girl. The number of children in the world under the age of reason (the age of reason is 7-years-old, give or take a year) is hard to ascertain, but it is estimated at being around 800 million ― therefore around 10% of the total world population or 1 in 10 persons. That means that there are approximately 7.4 billion (7,400 million persons over the age of reason―half of which are male (3,700 million).
If Catholics constitute roughly 1 out of every 6 persons, that means that there are around 616 million Catholic males who are over the age of reason. Now we have to further reduce the numbers in view of the fact that many or most Catholics are living in a state of mortal sin. Less than 20% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday Mass―an obligation which binds under the pain of mortal sin―and very few of those Catholics still go to Confession. Therefore, your 616 million Catholic males over the age of reason drops down to around 123 million.
If you look at those 616 million Catholic males from the perspective of who still prays the Rosary, though precise numbers are not available, the research that has been done by way of surveys, puts the number of Catholics who pray the Rosary daily at somewhere between 2% and 3%. So from the Rosary perspective, out of the 616 Catholic males over the age of reason, there are only between 12 million and 18 million who pray the Rosary daily.
What is the point of all this confusing and complicated math? Well, the point is that, considering the number of Catholics in the world, we are (or should be) in a much better position to fulfill “Abraham’s Bargaining Terms” in asking God to spare Sodom and Gomorrha. Catholics are roughly 1 out 6 persons―and God was prepared to spare Sodom and Gomorrha if anywhere from 1 in 180 men were just and righteous to as high as 1 in 900 men! Are we just and righteous? Are we bargaining with God to have Him show mercy to this cesspool of a sinful world?
Our Lady’s Commands Not Being Fulfilled
You get what you pay for! You reap what you sow! Mercy is not something that is owed to mankind. God wants to show mercy―but mercy is not cheap! Mercy requires some cooperation and sweat on our part! In her many different apparitions, Our Lady has sufficiently laid forth the details of “God’s Mercy Contract” and what we must do to fulfill our side of the contract:
► At LA SALETTE (1846) she lamented: “The thought of the loss of so many souls is the cause of my sadness … If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! … There are no more generous souls … There is no one to be found to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people … The heads, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance … by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures! … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement!”
► At LOURDES (1858), Our Lady simply yet powerfully insisted upon the cross in the form of “Penance! Penance! Penance!” and commanded St. Bernadette: “Kiss the ground as a penance for sinners.” She also commanded her to eat grass and drink muddy water as a penance for sinners.
► At FATIMA (1917)―even before Our Lady appeared―we have the Angel of Portugal addressing the three children who were playing: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
When Our Lady of Fatima later appeared, she said: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
► In 1957, SISTER LUCIA OF FATIMA later said in an interview with Fr. Fuentes: “It is my mission not just to speak about the material punishments, that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to also tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin. We should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No―Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed! So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway!”
Yet Sister Lucia sadly added: the Blessed Virgin is very sad, BECAUSE NO ONE HEEDS HER MESSAGE; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
We cannot pretend―like the murderous Cain who killed his brother Abel―that we are not our brother’s keeper: “Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is your brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I do not know! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to Cain: ‘What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth! Now, therefore, your shall be cursed upon the Earth, which has opened her mouth and received the blood of your brother at your hand!’” (Genesis 4:8-11).
Yes―we are the keepers of our fellow men! Our Lord said: “You are the salt of the Earth! But if the salt loses its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing any more but to be cast out, and to be trodden on by men! You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid! Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bucket, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:13-16).
The following words could be addressed to every Catholic―who is supposed to be the salt of the Earth and the light of the world: “I have made you a watchman! And you shall hear the word out of My mouth, and shall tell it to them from Me! If, when I say to the wicked: ‘You shall surely die!’ ― and you do not declare it to him, nor speak to him, so that he might be converted from his wicked ways and live, then the same wicked man shall certainly die in his iniquity, but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you give warning to the wicked, and he does not convert from his wickedness and from his evil ways―then he indeed shall die in his iniquity, but you will have saved your soul! Moreover, if the just man shall turn away from his justice, and shall commit iniquity―then I will lay a stumbling-block before him and he shall die―because you have not warned him! He shall die in his sin, and all his justices which he has done beforehand, shall not be remembered―but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you warn the just man, so that the just may not sin, and he does not sin―then living he shall live, because you have warned him, and you will have saved your soul!” (Ezechiel 3:17-21).
Article 31
The First Sunday of Passiontide, April 6th
Passiontide! Nowhere to Hide!
The First Sunday of Passiontide, April 6th
Passiontide! Nowhere to Hide!
Beneath the Surface of Passiontide
As we enter the glorious season of Passiontide, it is well worth looking beyond the surface of what is the most important time of the entire liturgical year of Holy Mother Church. One of greatest liturgists of modern times, Dom Guéranger, states:
“After having proposed the forty-days’ fast of Jesus in the desert for the meditation of the faithful during the first four weeks of Lent, the Holy Church gives the two weeks, which still remain before Easter, to the commemoration of the Passion. She would not have her children come to that great day of the immolation of the Lamb, without having prepared for it by compassionating with Him in the sufferings He endured in their stead. The most ancient sacramentaries and antiphonaries of the several Churches attest, by the prayers, the lessons, and the whole liturgy of these two weeks, that the Passion of our Lord is now the one sole thought of the Christian world. During Passion-Week, a saint’s feast, if it occur, will be kept; but the holy images [traditionally covered by purple cloth] are not allowed to be uncovered. The severity of the Lenten fast is increased during these its last days; the whole energy of the spirit of penance is now brought out.”
Notice the Liturgy
The ancient tradition of the Church speaks to us through the ancient liturgy of the Church and manifests to us the ancient wisdom of the Church. One of requirements of prudence is to seek the advice of our elders—those who have more experience than we have.
The Church—in her liturgy—has century upon century of experience. It is only the fool who consults only the most recent or latest in any particular field. It is not for nothing that we have the saying: “Learn your history, or you will be doomed to repeat it!” By failing to consult and take heed of the ancient traditions of the Church, we too will doom ourselves to many mistakes and perhaps doom ourselves to Hell too!
At the start of Passiontide, it is the ancient custom of the Church to veil the statues, images and crucifixes in the Church with a purple veil, in order to hide them from view until Easter—when they will seem to ‘resurrect’ from their tombs of purple. However, the Fourteen Stations of the Cross are NOT veiled with purple—but remain plainly in view throughout the entire fourteen day Passiontide period! Perhaps we should throw a veil over the worldly and unnecessary activities and things that we are accustomed to!
What’s It All About?
The actual name “Passiontide” tells us what it is all about—it is about the Passion and Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ. That is the focus of these last two weeks or the last two laps of the race which St. Paul spoke of at the start of Lent: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24).
Our Lord Himself warns: For “not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). And what is the will of the Father? “For this is the will of God―your sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:3) … “You shall be holy, because I am holy!” (Leviticus 11:46) … “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48).
And what is it that makes us perfect? It is self-denial and the Cross that makes us perfect—as Jesus said to the rich young man and others too: “Jesus said to him: ‘If you will be perfect, then go sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have a treasure in Heaven; and then come follow Me!’” (Matthew 19:21) … “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). Yet not many want to do this: “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!” (Luke 13:24) … “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
The Focus on the Cross
The Eight Beatitudes are like Eight Steps to Happiness, which show us that the pinnacle of joy is to be able to suffer for God. Our Lord Himself tells us: “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice! For your reward is very great in Heaven! For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you!” (Matthew 5:10-12) On the eve of His own Passion and Death, He said at the Last Supper: “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13). All of this is summed-up in one word—the “Cross”. The liturgy for Passiontide is clearly, unashamedly and unapologetically focused on the Cross.
Fourteen Days & Fourteen Stations
Beginning with this Passion Sunday, we have fourteen days to go before Easter Sunday. Since Passiontide is all about the Passion and Death of Jesus, in which the Cross receives the place of primacy, it is well for us to reflect upon the events that immediately lead up to Calvary and flow form Calvary.
The fourteen Stations of the Cross can providentially fill those fourteen days of Passiontide for us. It is not for nothing that the Stations of the Cross are traditionally left uncovered during these fourteen days of Passiontide, whereas all other statues and images in the church are traditionally covered with a purple cloth. It is so that we can focus on the essential, and the essential is the Passion.
We shall, therefore, in the DAILY LENTEN PLANNER webpage [click here] or alternatively in a whole series of pages on the Stations of the Cross [click here for the mainpage] take a Station of the Cross per day, and reflect upon its modern day application to our lives today and the circumstances that we find ourselves in.
The Focal Point of History, Life, Lent, and the Liturgy
Passiontide! Or Passion-hide? There are times when we have to make a choice! Times when we can no longer pretend and insist on being neutral spectators. Times of an “either, or”! Our Lord puts it this way: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). “No servant can serve two masters―for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will hold to the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [the world, pleasures, treasures, etc.]” (Luke 16:13). “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23). “Whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). “He that takes not up his cross and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). Which is why St. Paul writes: “God forbid that I should glory in anything except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world! … With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 6:14; 2:19).
Passiontide is the time of the cross. Passiontide is the time where “the rubber meets the road” or the cross meets shoulder, or reality stares you in the face. The reality is that we have all sinned―and the basic way to pay for sin is to carry the cross of our rebellion against God. The penalty of the cross can be a direct consequence of our sin―for example, you get drunk, drive your car, have an accident and must suffer the crosses that come from that accident while driving under the influence of alcohol―you may lose your driver’s license, be sued by the person you knocked over, face a prison sentence, or perhaps you were left paralyzed by the accident. All of these are direct consequences, or direct crosses, coming from your sinfulness in getting drunk and driving while drunk. Other crosses are indirect consequences for your sinfulness, which are usually events arranged by Divine Providence, to make you pay, or help you pay for your sins if you have not done sufficient penance for them, or are not sufficiently sorry for them.
Glorious Passiontide or Hideous Passiontide?
Some see Passiontide as being glorious as they embrace the glory of the cross. Others see Passiontide as being hideous as they seek to avoid and hide from the cross. A few see the benefits of the cross, but most see benefits in the absence of a cross. For most souls, the cross makes them cross and they reject it―yet for a few, the cross crosses out their debt for sin and they accept it. We either have a love for the cross, or a dislike (or even hatred) of the cross. Some accept the need for the cross in theory, but then complain, moan and groan when God’s Providence imposes some crosses upon them―even tiny ones! Of such Our Lord says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
In the same vein, The Imitation of Christ tells us: “Jesus has always many who love His heavenly kingdom, but few who bear His cross. He has many who desire consolation, but few who care for trial. He finds many to share His table, but few to take part in His fasting. All desire to be happy with Him; few wish to suffer anything for Him. Many follow Him to the breaking of Bread, but few to the drinking of the Chalice of His Passion. Many revere His miracles; few approach the shame of the Cross. Many love Him as long as they encounter no hardship; many praise and bless Him as long as they receive some comfort from Him. But if Jesus hides Himself and leaves them for a while, they fall either into complaints or into deep dejection. Those, on the contrary, who love Him for His own sake and not for any comfort of their own, bless Him in all trials and anguish of heart as well as in the bliss of consolation. Even if He should never give them consolation, yet they would continue to praise Him and wish always to give Him thanks. What power there is in pure love for Jesus — love that is free from all self-interest and self-love!” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 2, Chapter 11: “Few Love The Cross Of Jesus”).
Our Lady Glorifies the Cross
Our Lady, in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: “Estimate then, and weigh within your soul, how important is the eternal predestination or reprobation of the souls―since my most holy Son looked upon it with such great anxiety, that the difficulty or impossibility of saving all men added such immense bitterness to the death which He was about to suffer for all. What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation, when my divine Son and I have desired and sought to procure it for them with such sacrifices and untiring watchfulness? None of the mortals will have any excuse for their foolish negligence! Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16). Fear this sentence and renew in your heart the care and zeal for your salvation! You draw upon yourself (and upon mortals) a severe judgment, if you do not overcome your pusillanimity, ingratitude and baseness by meditating day and night on the Passion and Death of Jesus crucified. This is the great science of the saints, so little heeded by the worldly and the lack of which starves the lovers of this proud world! In this science I wish thee to be studious and wise. My Son and Lord taught us this science. Tell me then, if my Lord and Master has made Himself the life and the way for men through His Passion and Death―is it not evident that, in order to go that way and live up to this truth, they must follow Christ crucified, afflicted, scourged and affronted? To abhor earthly vanities, to desire being despised by creatures, to suffering joyfully, to love the cross and have an earnest and generous acceptation of it.
“Consider the ignorance of men who wish to come to the Father without following Christ, since they expect to reign with God without suffering or imitating his Passion, yea without even a thought of accepting any part of his suffering and Death, or of thanking Him for it. They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as of eternal life, while Christ their Creator has suffered the most bitter pains and torments in order to enter Heaven and to show them by his example how they are to find the way of light. All abhor poverty and thirst after riches, none of them being willing to recognize their emptiness. Infinite is the number of those who are carried away by their anger and vengeance, despising meekness. Few deplore their real miseries and struggle merely for terrestrial consolations; scarcely any love justice, or loyally pursue it in their dealings with the neighbors. Mercy is almost extinct; purity of heart is sullied and infringed upon; peace is constrained. None grant pardon; none wish to suffer for the sake of justice―not even the least of the many torments and pains, which they have so justly merited!
“Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment! He is not a true son of his father, who does not imitate him; nor is he a good disciple, who does not follow his Master; nor is he a good servant, who does not accompany his lord; nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. But Our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us―when they are forgetful of this truth and so adverse to suffering―to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation. And yet even all this is insufficient, since their inclinations and their blind love of visible things detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart; they rob them of remembrance and affection toward these higher things, which might raise them above themselves and above created things. Hence it comes, that men do not find joy in their tribulations; nor rest in their labors; nor consolation in their sorrows; nor any peace in adversities. For―altogether different from the saints who glory in tribulation as the fulfillment of their most earnest desires―they desire none of it and abhor all that is painful.
“My most holy Son and myself are trying to find among those, who have arrived at the way of the cross, some soul whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If thou wish to be our disciple, then enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights. The lesson containing the greatest wisdom for souls consists in the knowledge of the cross, in the love of sufferings, and in putting this knowledge into practice by bearing afflictions with patience. With this wisdom, the earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the blear-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors, and so full of ignorant admiration for costly worldly grandeur. The followers of this world and its vain pleasures deprive themselves of assistance and protection―since they hate the way of the Cross. Therefore embrace the Cross and do not admit any consolation outside of it in this mortal life. By contemplating and feeling within yourself the sacred Passion, you will attain the summit of perfection. You must acquire the precious gem of suffering and thus become pleasing to your Lord. I exhort you to select the sufferings of His Cross, in preference to His favors and gifts; and to rather embrace afflictions, than to desire to be visited with caresses! When the occasion of tasting the chalice and the cross of suffering is at hand, you must not turn away in sorrow and affliction from the sufferings. For you cannot follow Christ if you refuse to embrace the cross and rejoice in it!” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
The Season of the Cross
Even though we could rightly say Passiontide is the “season of the cross”, it would be wrong to label Passiontide (or even Lent for that matter) as the only season of the cross―for, in reality, the “season of the cross” spans all the four seasons of the year. There is never a day that goes by without many crosses coming our way. The cross is like the Barahmasia Mango Tree, which can be counted on to on to bear fruit throughout the year. The specialty of the tree is that its branches bear the fruits in different stages from flowering to ripening at the same time. While one branch has flowers, the others have matured mangoes. So, too, with the “tree of the cross” that God plants in our lives―the fruit of the “tree of the cross” is found on the tree all year round and we can harvest the fruit of the cross daily, every day, all throughout the year. Some crosses are in fully ripe, while others are merely beginning to bloom. This reminds of the biblical “tree of life” ― “In the midst … was the tree of life, bearing twelve fruits, yielding its fruits every month” (Apocalypse 22:2). Our Lord Himself speaks of this DAILY cross: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his CROSS DAILY, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23).
In some parts of the world, mango is called the “king of fruits.” It is a “drupe”, or stone fruit, which means that it has a large seed in the middle. However, the mango fruit can be difficult to cut―due to its tough skin and large pit (seed, kernel)―which speaks volumes symbolically, for Catholics should have a “tough skin” to face the “cuts” of persecution and a large heart (kernel, seed, pit). Mango is low in calories (worldliness) but full of nutrients (grace and virtues)―particularly vitamin C, which aids immunity, iron absorption and growth and repair. However, the health benefits are not just limited to the fruit―there numerous benefits from its seed, flower and the bark of the mango tree. Studies indicate that, overall, mangoes possesses the following properties―they are anti-inflammatory, anti-diabetic, anti-oxidant, anti-viral, anti-bacterial, anti-microbial, anti-fungal, anti-parasitic, anti-tumor, anti-spasmodic, anti-diarrheal, cardiotonic, immuno-modulating, and gastro-protective. Mango seeds help eliminate dandruff, reduces the risk of diarrhea, keeps cardiovascular disease at bay, ensures a healthy skin, is good for diabetics, etc. Mango stem bark, leaves and flowers have been used in traditional medicine to treat anemia, cutaneous infections, diabetes, diarrhea, scabies, syphilis, and malignant tumors and many, many other ailments. It is well worth researching―this article is not meant to be a full exposure of the benefits. The point of briefly mentioning the benefits is to create an analogy to the many benefits of the cross.
Tree-Talk
The liturgy for Passiontide is clearly, unashamedly and unapologetically focused on the “Tree of the Cross”, the life-giving tree, the “Tree of Life”. The Preface of the Holy Cross, that is said during Passiontide, says: “We give thanks unto Thee, O holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God; Who didst establish the salvation of mankind on the tree of the Cross; that whence death came, thence also life might arise again, and that he (the devil), who overcame (Adam and Eve) by the tree, by the tree (of the Cross) also might be overcome!” That is the theme throughout Passiontide―the redemption of mankind upon the “Tree of the Cross”. Here are just a few extracts from two of the liturgical hymns for Passiontide―the Pange Lingua and Vexilla Regis:
PANGE LINGUA
Sing, my tongue, the glorious battle
Sing the last, the dread affray;
O’er the cross, the victor’s trophy,
Sound the high triumphal lay:
Tell how Christ, the world’s Redeemer,
As a victim won the day.
Eating of the tree forbidden,
Man had sunk in Satan’s snare,
When our pitying Creator did
This second tree prepare;
Destined, many ages later,
That first evil to repair.
Faithful cross! Above all other,
One and only noble tree!
None in foliage, none in blossom,
None in fruit thy peers may be;
Sweetest wood and sweetest iron!
Sweetest weight is hung on thee.
Bend thy boughs, O tree of glory!
Thy relaxing sinews bend;
For awhile the ancient rigor,
That thy birth bestowed, suspend;
And the King of heavenly beauty
On thy bosom gently tend!
Thou alone wast counted worthy
This world’s Ransom to uphold;
For a shipwrecked race preparing
Harbor, like the ark of old;
With the sacred blood anointed
From the smitten Lamb that rolled.
VEXILLA REGIS
Abroad the regal banners fly,
Now shines the cross’s mystery;
Upon it Life did death endure,
And yet by death did life procure.
That which the prophet-king of old
Hath in mysterious verse foretold,
Is now accomplished, whilst we see
God ruling nations from a tree.
O lovely and refulgent tree,
Adorned with purpled majesty;
Culled from a worthy stock, to bear
Those limbs which sanctifièd were.
Blest tree, whose happy branches bore
The Wealth that did the world restore;
The beam that did that Body weigh
Which raised up Hell’s expected prey.
The Apostles engage in “tree-talk” as they speak of Our Lord dying on a tree―the tree of the Cross: “We are witnesses of all things that Jesus did in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem, Whom they killed, hanging Him upon a tree!” (Acts 10:39) … “Who, His own self, bore our sins in His Body upon the tree―so that we, being dead to sins, should live to justice―and by Whose stripes you were healed!” (1 Peter 2:24) … “And when they had fulfilled all things that were written of Him, taking him down from the tree, they laid him in a sepulcher” (Acts 13:29) … “The God of our fathers hath raised up Jesus, whom you put to death, hanging him upon a tree” (Acts of Apostles 5:30).
Our Lord Himself was full of “tree talk” while He walked this Earth. Here are just some of His teachings that we would do well do ponder and plant in the garden of our soul: “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33). “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). “For there is no good tree that brings forth evil fruit; nor an evil tree that brings forth good fruit. For every tree is known by its fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns; nor from a bramble bush do they gather the grape!” (Luke 6:43-44). “And seeing a certain fig tree by the wayside, Jesus came to it, and found nothing on it but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19).
“He spoke also this parable: A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why does it encumber the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it! And perhaps, happily, it bears fruit―but if not, then after that you shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-9). To which Scripture adds: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees! Every tree therefore that does not yield good fruit, shall be cut down and cast into the fire!” (Matthew 3:10).
“To what is the kingdom of God like, and whereunto shall I resemble it? The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but, when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs and becomes a great tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof” (Matthew 13:31-32; Luke 13:18-19).
Our Lord even compares Himself to a tree of sorts when He says: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. And every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit! … Abide in Me, and I in you! As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me! I am the vine and you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing! If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:1-6).
We even engage in “tree-talk” ourselves with our idiomatic expressions. We say someone is “planted in good soil”, or that someone is “shaking like a leaf”, or is “branching-out”, or “holding out an olive branch to someone”, or referring to family traits when we say “the apple never falls far from the tree”, or someone being “at the top of the tree” or “barking up the wrong tree”, or that someone “cannot see the forest because of the tree”, or that “money doesn’t grow on trees”, or someone being “dressed-up like a Christmas Tree”, etc.
Sun and Rain for the Cross
The cross is synonymous with the tree―the Tree of Life―which is Our Lord’s Death on Calvary, and which is perpetuated in each and every Sacrifice of the Mass, whose fruit is the Holy Eucharist, which we receive in Holy Communion. To receive Holy Communion, we need to be in a state of grace (symbolized by water) and the Holy Eucharist―the fire of love, for “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), and God is in the Holy Eucharist, hence you could just as well say: “The Holy Eucharist is charity.” Without sanctifying grace―whatever we might do or suffer―is supernaturally useless. The same is true of charity―as Holy Scripture points out: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Charity and Sanctifying Grace are the “sun” and “rain” of our entire spiritual life―that includes the carrying of our crosses.
Understanding this, we can read the following passages with a clearer insight as to their meaning: “He shall be like a tree, which is planted near the running waters [symbol of grace], which shall bring forth its fruit [symbol of virtues], in due season. And his leaf shall not fall off; and all whatsoever he shall do, shall prosper” (Psalms 1:3). “The fruit of the just man is a tree of life” (Proverbs 11:30). “And he shall be as a tree that is planted by the waters, that spreads out its roots towards moisture―and it shall not fear when the heat comes. And the leaf thereof shall be green, and in the time of drought it shall not be solicitous, neither shall it cease at any time to bring forth fruit” (Jeremias 17:8).
Just as each year a tree grows bigger, carries a heavier load of fruit and produces more fruit―likewise, the “tree of the cross”, that each of us has to be, must carry a “heavier load” with each successive year, and by carrying that load, “produce more and more fruit” with each successive year, by exercising all the various virtues needed to carry the cross with love for God. Anything that will increase the rainfall of grace and sunlight and heat of charity, must be actively sought by us―and we will essentially find that “rain” and “sunlight” in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and in the Holy Eucharist. We must frequently place ourselves in the grace-full downpour of sanctifying grace by planting ourselves daily (if possible) in the “garden” of the Holy Mass―for one hour’s “rain” only once a week, on Sundays, is barely enough “water” for our tree to survive. Additionally, we need to expose ourselves to the “Sun” of God, the Son of God, in the Holy Eucharist, in order to make our “tree” grow―as Our Lord said: “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me!” (John 15:4).
The Royal Road of the Cross
The Imitation of Christ has a most beautiful, yet hard-hitting passage, entitled: The Royal Road of the Cross, in which it lays down the need for carrying the cross if we wish to arrive at salvation and avoid damnation. Here is the entire passage―which is most suitable as we enter Passiontide, the “season of the cross”―or, more correctly, since the “season of the cross” is an all-year-round season, we could call Passiontide, the time when the cross matures, ripens and bears it fruit.
We will end with Book 2, Chapter 12 of The Imitation of Christ, “The Royal Road of the Holy Cross”, which states:
To many the saying, “Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow Me,” seems hard, but it will be much harder to hear that final word: “Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire.” Those who hear the word of the cross and follow it willingly now, need not fear that they will hear of eternal damnation on the Day of Judgment. This sign of the cross will be in the heavens when the Lord comes to judge. Then all the servants of the cross―who, during life, made themselves one with the Crucified―will draw near with great trust to Christ, the judge.
Why, then, do you fear to take up the cross when through it you can win a kingdom? In the cross is salvation, in the cross is life, in the cross is protection from enemies, in the cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness, in the cross is strength of mind, in the cross is joy of spirit, in the cross is highest virtue, in the cross is perfect holiness. There is no salvation of soul, nor hope of everlasting life, except in the cross.
Therefore, take up your cross and follow Jesus, and you shall enter eternal life. He Himself opened the way before you in carrying His cross, and upon it He died for you, so that you, too, might take up your cross and long to die upon it. If you die with Him, you shall also live with Him, and if you share His suffering, you shall also share His glory.
Behold, in the cross is everything, and upon your dying on the cross everything depends. There is no other way to life and to true inward peace than the way of the holy cross and daily mortification. Go where you will, seek what you will, you will not find a higher way, nor a less exalted but safer way, than the way of the holy cross. Arrange and order everything to suit your will and judgment, and still you will find that some suffering must always be borne, willingly or unwillingly, and thus you will always find the cross.
Either you will experience bodily pain or you will undergo tribulation of spirit in your soul. At times you will be forsaken by God, at times troubled by those about you and, what is worse, you will often grow weary of yourself. You cannot escape, you cannot be relieved by any remedy or comfort but must bear with it as long as God wills. For He wishes you to learn to bear trial without consolation, to submit yourself wholly to Him that you may become more humble through suffering. No one understands the passion of Christ so thoroughly or heartily, as the man whose lot it is to suffer the like himself.
The cross, therefore, is always ready; it awaits you everywhere. No matter where you may go, you cannot escape it, for wherever you go you take yourself with you and shall always find yourself. Turn where you will — above, below, without, or within — you will find a cross in everything, and everywhere you must have patience if you would have peace within and merit an eternal crown.
If you carry the cross willingly, it will carry and lead you to the desired goal where indeed there shall be no more suffering, but here there shall be. If you carry it unwillingly, you create a burden for yourself and increase the load, though still you have to bear it. If you cast away one cross, you will find another and perhaps a heavier one. Do you expect to escape what no mortal man can ever avoid? Which of the saints was without a cross or trial on this Earth? Not even Jesus Christ, our Lord, Whose every hour on Earth knew the pain of His passion. “Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into his glory?” (Luke 24:26). How is it that you look for another way than this, the royal way of the holy cross?
The whole life of Christ was a cross and a martyrdom, and do you seek rest and enjoyment for yourself? You deceive yourself, you are mistaken if you seek anything but to suffer, for this mortal life is full of miseries and marked with crosses on all sides. Indeed, the more spiritual progress a person makes, so much heavier will he frequently find the cross, because as his love increases, the pain of his exile also increases.
Yet such a man, though afflicted in many ways, is not without hope of consolation, because he knows that great reward is coming to him for bearing his cross. And when he carries it willingly, every pang of tribulation is changed into hope of solace from God. Besides, the more the flesh is distressed by affliction, so much the more is the spirit strengthened by inward grace. Not infrequently a man is so strengthened by his love of trials and hardship in his desire to conform to the cross of Christ, that he does not wish to be without sorrow or pain, since he believes he will be the more acceptable to God if he is able to endure more and more grievous things for His sake.
It is the grace of Christ, and not the virtue of man, which can and does bring it about that through fervor of spirit frail flesh learns to love and to gain what it naturally hates and shuns.
To carry the cross, to love the cross, to chastise the body and bring it to subjection, to flee honors, to endure contempt gladly, to despise self and wish to be despised, to suffer any adversity and loss, to desire no prosperous days on Earth — this is not man’s way. If you rely upon yourself, you can do none of these things, but if you trust in the Lord, strength will be given you from Heaven and the world and the flesh will be made subject to your word. You will not even fear your enemy, the devil, if you are armed with faith and signed with the cross of Christ.
Set yourself, then, like a good and faithful servant of Christ, to bear bravely the cross of your Lord, Who out of love was crucified for you. Be ready to suffer many adversities and many kinds of trouble in this miserable life, for troublesome and miserable life will always be, no matter where you are; and so you will find it wherever you may hide. Thus it must be; and there is no way to evade the trials and sorrows of life but to bear them.
Drink the chalice of the Lord with affection it you wish to be His friend and to have part with Him. Leave consolation to God; let Him do as most pleases Him. On your part, be ready to bear sufferings and consider them the greatest consolation, for even though you alone were to undergo them all, the sufferings of this life are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come.
When you shall have come to the point where suffering is sweet and acceptable for the sake of Christ, then consider yourself fortunate, for you have found paradise on Earth. But as long as suffering irks you and you seek to escape, so long will you be unfortunate, and the tribulation you seek to evade will follow you everywhere. If you put your mind to the things you ought to consider, that is, to suffering and death, you would soon be in a better state and would find peace.
Although you were taken to the third Heaven with Paul, you were not thereby insured against suffering. Jesus said: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake.” To suffer, then, remains your lot, if you mean to love Jesus and serve Him forever.
If you were but worthy to suffer something for the name of Jesus, what great glory would be in store for you, what great joy to all the saints of God, what great edification to those about you! For all men praise patience though there are few who wish to practice it. With good reason, then, ought you to be willing to suffer a little for Christ since many suffer much more for the world. Realize that you must lead a dying life; the more a man dies to himself, the more he begins to live unto God.
No man is fit to enjoy Heaven unless he has resigned himself to suffer hardship for Christ. Nothing is more acceptable to God, nothing more helpful for you on this Earth than to suffer willingly for Christ. If you had to make a choice, you ought to wish rather to suffer for Christ than to enjoy many consolations, for thus you would be more like Christ and more like all the saints. Our merit and progress consist not in many pleasures and comforts but rather in enduring great afflictions and sufferings.
If, indeed, there were anything better or more useful for man’s salvation than suffering, Christ would have shown it by word and example. But He clearly exhorts the disciples who follow Him and all who wish to follow Him to carry the cross, saying: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.” When, therefore, we have read and searched all that has been written, let this be the final conclusion — that through much suffering we must enter into the kingdom of God. (Here ends the passage from Book 2, Chapter 12 of The Imitation of Christ, “The Royal Road of the Holy Cross”).
Passiontide is a time to reset and re-adjust our approach to suffering. Passiontide is not a time to hide! Passiontide is a time grow in appreciation and love of the Cross―first and foremost the Cross of Christ that led to our potential salvation; and secondly the crosses that we will perpetually and inescapably find in our own personal lives―for the Cross is the key to the door of Heaven. That is why Christ said: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his CROSS DAILY, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23).
As we enter the glorious season of Passiontide, it is well worth looking beyond the surface of what is the most important time of the entire liturgical year of Holy Mother Church. One of greatest liturgists of modern times, Dom Guéranger, states:
“After having proposed the forty-days’ fast of Jesus in the desert for the meditation of the faithful during the first four weeks of Lent, the Holy Church gives the two weeks, which still remain before Easter, to the commemoration of the Passion. She would not have her children come to that great day of the immolation of the Lamb, without having prepared for it by compassionating with Him in the sufferings He endured in their stead. The most ancient sacramentaries and antiphonaries of the several Churches attest, by the prayers, the lessons, and the whole liturgy of these two weeks, that the Passion of our Lord is now the one sole thought of the Christian world. During Passion-Week, a saint’s feast, if it occur, will be kept; but the holy images [traditionally covered by purple cloth] are not allowed to be uncovered. The severity of the Lenten fast is increased during these its last days; the whole energy of the spirit of penance is now brought out.”
Notice the Liturgy
The ancient tradition of the Church speaks to us through the ancient liturgy of the Church and manifests to us the ancient wisdom of the Church. One of requirements of prudence is to seek the advice of our elders—those who have more experience than we have.
The Church—in her liturgy—has century upon century of experience. It is only the fool who consults only the most recent or latest in any particular field. It is not for nothing that we have the saying: “Learn your history, or you will be doomed to repeat it!” By failing to consult and take heed of the ancient traditions of the Church, we too will doom ourselves to many mistakes and perhaps doom ourselves to Hell too!
At the start of Passiontide, it is the ancient custom of the Church to veil the statues, images and crucifixes in the Church with a purple veil, in order to hide them from view until Easter—when they will seem to ‘resurrect’ from their tombs of purple. However, the Fourteen Stations of the Cross are NOT veiled with purple—but remain plainly in view throughout the entire fourteen day Passiontide period! Perhaps we should throw a veil over the worldly and unnecessary activities and things that we are accustomed to!
What’s It All About?
The actual name “Passiontide” tells us what it is all about—it is about the Passion and Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ. That is the focus of these last two weeks or the last two laps of the race which St. Paul spoke of at the start of Lent: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24).
Our Lord Himself warns: For “not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). And what is the will of the Father? “For this is the will of God―your sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:3) … “You shall be holy, because I am holy!” (Leviticus 11:46) … “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48).
And what is it that makes us perfect? It is self-denial and the Cross that makes us perfect—as Jesus said to the rich young man and others too: “Jesus said to him: ‘If you will be perfect, then go sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have a treasure in Heaven; and then come follow Me!’” (Matthew 19:21) … “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). Yet not many want to do this: “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!” (Luke 13:24) … “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
The Focus on the Cross
The Eight Beatitudes are like Eight Steps to Happiness, which show us that the pinnacle of joy is to be able to suffer for God. Our Lord Himself tells us: “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice! For your reward is very great in Heaven! For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you!” (Matthew 5:10-12) On the eve of His own Passion and Death, He said at the Last Supper: “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13). All of this is summed-up in one word—the “Cross”. The liturgy for Passiontide is clearly, unashamedly and unapologetically focused on the Cross.
Fourteen Days & Fourteen Stations
Beginning with this Passion Sunday, we have fourteen days to go before Easter Sunday. Since Passiontide is all about the Passion and Death of Jesus, in which the Cross receives the place of primacy, it is well for us to reflect upon the events that immediately lead up to Calvary and flow form Calvary.
The fourteen Stations of the Cross can providentially fill those fourteen days of Passiontide for us. It is not for nothing that the Stations of the Cross are traditionally left uncovered during these fourteen days of Passiontide, whereas all other statues and images in the church are traditionally covered with a purple cloth. It is so that we can focus on the essential, and the essential is the Passion.
We shall, therefore, in the DAILY LENTEN PLANNER webpage [click here] or alternatively in a whole series of pages on the Stations of the Cross [click here for the mainpage] take a Station of the Cross per day, and reflect upon its modern day application to our lives today and the circumstances that we find ourselves in.
The Focal Point of History, Life, Lent, and the Liturgy
Passiontide! Or Passion-hide? There are times when we have to make a choice! Times when we can no longer pretend and insist on being neutral spectators. Times of an “either, or”! Our Lord puts it this way: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). “No servant can serve two masters―for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will hold to the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [the world, pleasures, treasures, etc.]” (Luke 16:13). “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23). “Whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). “He that takes not up his cross and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). Which is why St. Paul writes: “God forbid that I should glory in anything except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world! … With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 6:14; 2:19).
Passiontide is the time of the cross. Passiontide is the time where “the rubber meets the road” or the cross meets shoulder, or reality stares you in the face. The reality is that we have all sinned―and the basic way to pay for sin is to carry the cross of our rebellion against God. The penalty of the cross can be a direct consequence of our sin―for example, you get drunk, drive your car, have an accident and must suffer the crosses that come from that accident while driving under the influence of alcohol―you may lose your driver’s license, be sued by the person you knocked over, face a prison sentence, or perhaps you were left paralyzed by the accident. All of these are direct consequences, or direct crosses, coming from your sinfulness in getting drunk and driving while drunk. Other crosses are indirect consequences for your sinfulness, which are usually events arranged by Divine Providence, to make you pay, or help you pay for your sins if you have not done sufficient penance for them, or are not sufficiently sorry for them.
Glorious Passiontide or Hideous Passiontide?
Some see Passiontide as being glorious as they embrace the glory of the cross. Others see Passiontide as being hideous as they seek to avoid and hide from the cross. A few see the benefits of the cross, but most see benefits in the absence of a cross. For most souls, the cross makes them cross and they reject it―yet for a few, the cross crosses out their debt for sin and they accept it. We either have a love for the cross, or a dislike (or even hatred) of the cross. Some accept the need for the cross in theory, but then complain, moan and groan when God’s Providence imposes some crosses upon them―even tiny ones! Of such Our Lord says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
In the same vein, The Imitation of Christ tells us: “Jesus has always many who love His heavenly kingdom, but few who bear His cross. He has many who desire consolation, but few who care for trial. He finds many to share His table, but few to take part in His fasting. All desire to be happy with Him; few wish to suffer anything for Him. Many follow Him to the breaking of Bread, but few to the drinking of the Chalice of His Passion. Many revere His miracles; few approach the shame of the Cross. Many love Him as long as they encounter no hardship; many praise and bless Him as long as they receive some comfort from Him. But if Jesus hides Himself and leaves them for a while, they fall either into complaints or into deep dejection. Those, on the contrary, who love Him for His own sake and not for any comfort of their own, bless Him in all trials and anguish of heart as well as in the bliss of consolation. Even if He should never give them consolation, yet they would continue to praise Him and wish always to give Him thanks. What power there is in pure love for Jesus — love that is free from all self-interest and self-love!” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 2, Chapter 11: “Few Love The Cross Of Jesus”).
Our Lady Glorifies the Cross
Our Lady, in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: “Estimate then, and weigh within your soul, how important is the eternal predestination or reprobation of the souls―since my most holy Son looked upon it with such great anxiety, that the difficulty or impossibility of saving all men added such immense bitterness to the death which He was about to suffer for all. What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation, when my divine Son and I have desired and sought to procure it for them with such sacrifices and untiring watchfulness? None of the mortals will have any excuse for their foolish negligence! Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16). Fear this sentence and renew in your heart the care and zeal for your salvation! You draw upon yourself (and upon mortals) a severe judgment, if you do not overcome your pusillanimity, ingratitude and baseness by meditating day and night on the Passion and Death of Jesus crucified. This is the great science of the saints, so little heeded by the worldly and the lack of which starves the lovers of this proud world! In this science I wish thee to be studious and wise. My Son and Lord taught us this science. Tell me then, if my Lord and Master has made Himself the life and the way for men through His Passion and Death―is it not evident that, in order to go that way and live up to this truth, they must follow Christ crucified, afflicted, scourged and affronted? To abhor earthly vanities, to desire being despised by creatures, to suffering joyfully, to love the cross and have an earnest and generous acceptation of it.
“Consider the ignorance of men who wish to come to the Father without following Christ, since they expect to reign with God without suffering or imitating his Passion, yea without even a thought of accepting any part of his suffering and Death, or of thanking Him for it. They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as of eternal life, while Christ their Creator has suffered the most bitter pains and torments in order to enter Heaven and to show them by his example how they are to find the way of light. All abhor poverty and thirst after riches, none of them being willing to recognize their emptiness. Infinite is the number of those who are carried away by their anger and vengeance, despising meekness. Few deplore their real miseries and struggle merely for terrestrial consolations; scarcely any love justice, or loyally pursue it in their dealings with the neighbors. Mercy is almost extinct; purity of heart is sullied and infringed upon; peace is constrained. None grant pardon; none wish to suffer for the sake of justice―not even the least of the many torments and pains, which they have so justly merited!
“Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment! He is not a true son of his father, who does not imitate him; nor is he a good disciple, who does not follow his Master; nor is he a good servant, who does not accompany his lord; nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. But Our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us―when they are forgetful of this truth and so adverse to suffering―to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation. And yet even all this is insufficient, since their inclinations and their blind love of visible things detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart; they rob them of remembrance and affection toward these higher things, which might raise them above themselves and above created things. Hence it comes, that men do not find joy in their tribulations; nor rest in their labors; nor consolation in their sorrows; nor any peace in adversities. For―altogether different from the saints who glory in tribulation as the fulfillment of their most earnest desires―they desire none of it and abhor all that is painful.
“My most holy Son and myself are trying to find among those, who have arrived at the way of the cross, some soul whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If thou wish to be our disciple, then enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights. The lesson containing the greatest wisdom for souls consists in the knowledge of the cross, in the love of sufferings, and in putting this knowledge into practice by bearing afflictions with patience. With this wisdom, the earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the blear-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors, and so full of ignorant admiration for costly worldly grandeur. The followers of this world and its vain pleasures deprive themselves of assistance and protection―since they hate the way of the Cross. Therefore embrace the Cross and do not admit any consolation outside of it in this mortal life. By contemplating and feeling within yourself the sacred Passion, you will attain the summit of perfection. You must acquire the precious gem of suffering and thus become pleasing to your Lord. I exhort you to select the sufferings of His Cross, in preference to His favors and gifts; and to rather embrace afflictions, than to desire to be visited with caresses! When the occasion of tasting the chalice and the cross of suffering is at hand, you must not turn away in sorrow and affliction from the sufferings. For you cannot follow Christ if you refuse to embrace the cross and rejoice in it!” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
The Season of the Cross
Even though we could rightly say Passiontide is the “season of the cross”, it would be wrong to label Passiontide (or even Lent for that matter) as the only season of the cross―for, in reality, the “season of the cross” spans all the four seasons of the year. There is never a day that goes by without many crosses coming our way. The cross is like the Barahmasia Mango Tree, which can be counted on to on to bear fruit throughout the year. The specialty of the tree is that its branches bear the fruits in different stages from flowering to ripening at the same time. While one branch has flowers, the others have matured mangoes. So, too, with the “tree of the cross” that God plants in our lives―the fruit of the “tree of the cross” is found on the tree all year round and we can harvest the fruit of the cross daily, every day, all throughout the year. Some crosses are in fully ripe, while others are merely beginning to bloom. This reminds of the biblical “tree of life” ― “In the midst … was the tree of life, bearing twelve fruits, yielding its fruits every month” (Apocalypse 22:2). Our Lord Himself speaks of this DAILY cross: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his CROSS DAILY, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23).
In some parts of the world, mango is called the “king of fruits.” It is a “drupe”, or stone fruit, which means that it has a large seed in the middle. However, the mango fruit can be difficult to cut―due to its tough skin and large pit (seed, kernel)―which speaks volumes symbolically, for Catholics should have a “tough skin” to face the “cuts” of persecution and a large heart (kernel, seed, pit). Mango is low in calories (worldliness) but full of nutrients (grace and virtues)―particularly vitamin C, which aids immunity, iron absorption and growth and repair. However, the health benefits are not just limited to the fruit―there numerous benefits from its seed, flower and the bark of the mango tree. Studies indicate that, overall, mangoes possesses the following properties―they are anti-inflammatory, anti-diabetic, anti-oxidant, anti-viral, anti-bacterial, anti-microbial, anti-fungal, anti-parasitic, anti-tumor, anti-spasmodic, anti-diarrheal, cardiotonic, immuno-modulating, and gastro-protective. Mango seeds help eliminate dandruff, reduces the risk of diarrhea, keeps cardiovascular disease at bay, ensures a healthy skin, is good for diabetics, etc. Mango stem bark, leaves and flowers have been used in traditional medicine to treat anemia, cutaneous infections, diabetes, diarrhea, scabies, syphilis, and malignant tumors and many, many other ailments. It is well worth researching―this article is not meant to be a full exposure of the benefits. The point of briefly mentioning the benefits is to create an analogy to the many benefits of the cross.
Tree-Talk
The liturgy for Passiontide is clearly, unashamedly and unapologetically focused on the “Tree of the Cross”, the life-giving tree, the “Tree of Life”. The Preface of the Holy Cross, that is said during Passiontide, says: “We give thanks unto Thee, O holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God; Who didst establish the salvation of mankind on the tree of the Cross; that whence death came, thence also life might arise again, and that he (the devil), who overcame (Adam and Eve) by the tree, by the tree (of the Cross) also might be overcome!” That is the theme throughout Passiontide―the redemption of mankind upon the “Tree of the Cross”. Here are just a few extracts from two of the liturgical hymns for Passiontide―the Pange Lingua and Vexilla Regis:
PANGE LINGUA
Sing, my tongue, the glorious battle
Sing the last, the dread affray;
O’er the cross, the victor’s trophy,
Sound the high triumphal lay:
Tell how Christ, the world’s Redeemer,
As a victim won the day.
Eating of the tree forbidden,
Man had sunk in Satan’s snare,
When our pitying Creator did
This second tree prepare;
Destined, many ages later,
That first evil to repair.
Faithful cross! Above all other,
One and only noble tree!
None in foliage, none in blossom,
None in fruit thy peers may be;
Sweetest wood and sweetest iron!
Sweetest weight is hung on thee.
Bend thy boughs, O tree of glory!
Thy relaxing sinews bend;
For awhile the ancient rigor,
That thy birth bestowed, suspend;
And the King of heavenly beauty
On thy bosom gently tend!
Thou alone wast counted worthy
This world’s Ransom to uphold;
For a shipwrecked race preparing
Harbor, like the ark of old;
With the sacred blood anointed
From the smitten Lamb that rolled.
VEXILLA REGIS
Abroad the regal banners fly,
Now shines the cross’s mystery;
Upon it Life did death endure,
And yet by death did life procure.
That which the prophet-king of old
Hath in mysterious verse foretold,
Is now accomplished, whilst we see
God ruling nations from a tree.
O lovely and refulgent tree,
Adorned with purpled majesty;
Culled from a worthy stock, to bear
Those limbs which sanctifièd were.
Blest tree, whose happy branches bore
The Wealth that did the world restore;
The beam that did that Body weigh
Which raised up Hell’s expected prey.
The Apostles engage in “tree-talk” as they speak of Our Lord dying on a tree―the tree of the Cross: “We are witnesses of all things that Jesus did in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem, Whom they killed, hanging Him upon a tree!” (Acts 10:39) … “Who, His own self, bore our sins in His Body upon the tree―so that we, being dead to sins, should live to justice―and by Whose stripes you were healed!” (1 Peter 2:24) … “And when they had fulfilled all things that were written of Him, taking him down from the tree, they laid him in a sepulcher” (Acts 13:29) … “The God of our fathers hath raised up Jesus, whom you put to death, hanging him upon a tree” (Acts of Apostles 5:30).
Our Lord Himself was full of “tree talk” while He walked this Earth. Here are just some of His teachings that we would do well do ponder and plant in the garden of our soul: “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33). “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). “For there is no good tree that brings forth evil fruit; nor an evil tree that brings forth good fruit. For every tree is known by its fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns; nor from a bramble bush do they gather the grape!” (Luke 6:43-44). “And seeing a certain fig tree by the wayside, Jesus came to it, and found nothing on it but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19).
“He spoke also this parable: A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why does it encumber the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it! And perhaps, happily, it bears fruit―but if not, then after that you shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-9). To which Scripture adds: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees! Every tree therefore that does not yield good fruit, shall be cut down and cast into the fire!” (Matthew 3:10).
“To what is the kingdom of God like, and whereunto shall I resemble it? The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but, when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs and becomes a great tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof” (Matthew 13:31-32; Luke 13:18-19).
Our Lord even compares Himself to a tree of sorts when He says: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. And every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit! … Abide in Me, and I in you! As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me! I am the vine and you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing! If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:1-6).
We even engage in “tree-talk” ourselves with our idiomatic expressions. We say someone is “planted in good soil”, or that someone is “shaking like a leaf”, or is “branching-out”, or “holding out an olive branch to someone”, or referring to family traits when we say “the apple never falls far from the tree”, or someone being “at the top of the tree” or “barking up the wrong tree”, or that someone “cannot see the forest because of the tree”, or that “money doesn’t grow on trees”, or someone being “dressed-up like a Christmas Tree”, etc.
Sun and Rain for the Cross
The cross is synonymous with the tree―the Tree of Life―which is Our Lord’s Death on Calvary, and which is perpetuated in each and every Sacrifice of the Mass, whose fruit is the Holy Eucharist, which we receive in Holy Communion. To receive Holy Communion, we need to be in a state of grace (symbolized by water) and the Holy Eucharist―the fire of love, for “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), and God is in the Holy Eucharist, hence you could just as well say: “The Holy Eucharist is charity.” Without sanctifying grace―whatever we might do or suffer―is supernaturally useless. The same is true of charity―as Holy Scripture points out: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Charity and Sanctifying Grace are the “sun” and “rain” of our entire spiritual life―that includes the carrying of our crosses.
Understanding this, we can read the following passages with a clearer insight as to their meaning: “He shall be like a tree, which is planted near the running waters [symbol of grace], which shall bring forth its fruit [symbol of virtues], in due season. And his leaf shall not fall off; and all whatsoever he shall do, shall prosper” (Psalms 1:3). “The fruit of the just man is a tree of life” (Proverbs 11:30). “And he shall be as a tree that is planted by the waters, that spreads out its roots towards moisture―and it shall not fear when the heat comes. And the leaf thereof shall be green, and in the time of drought it shall not be solicitous, neither shall it cease at any time to bring forth fruit” (Jeremias 17:8).
Just as each year a tree grows bigger, carries a heavier load of fruit and produces more fruit―likewise, the “tree of the cross”, that each of us has to be, must carry a “heavier load” with each successive year, and by carrying that load, “produce more and more fruit” with each successive year, by exercising all the various virtues needed to carry the cross with love for God. Anything that will increase the rainfall of grace and sunlight and heat of charity, must be actively sought by us―and we will essentially find that “rain” and “sunlight” in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and in the Holy Eucharist. We must frequently place ourselves in the grace-full downpour of sanctifying grace by planting ourselves daily (if possible) in the “garden” of the Holy Mass―for one hour’s “rain” only once a week, on Sundays, is barely enough “water” for our tree to survive. Additionally, we need to expose ourselves to the “Sun” of God, the Son of God, in the Holy Eucharist, in order to make our “tree” grow―as Our Lord said: “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me!” (John 15:4).
The Royal Road of the Cross
The Imitation of Christ has a most beautiful, yet hard-hitting passage, entitled: The Royal Road of the Cross, in which it lays down the need for carrying the cross if we wish to arrive at salvation and avoid damnation. Here is the entire passage―which is most suitable as we enter Passiontide, the “season of the cross”―or, more correctly, since the “season of the cross” is an all-year-round season, we could call Passiontide, the time when the cross matures, ripens and bears it fruit.
We will end with Book 2, Chapter 12 of The Imitation of Christ, “The Royal Road of the Holy Cross”, which states:
To many the saying, “Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow Me,” seems hard, but it will be much harder to hear that final word: “Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire.” Those who hear the word of the cross and follow it willingly now, need not fear that they will hear of eternal damnation on the Day of Judgment. This sign of the cross will be in the heavens when the Lord comes to judge. Then all the servants of the cross―who, during life, made themselves one with the Crucified―will draw near with great trust to Christ, the judge.
Why, then, do you fear to take up the cross when through it you can win a kingdom? In the cross is salvation, in the cross is life, in the cross is protection from enemies, in the cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness, in the cross is strength of mind, in the cross is joy of spirit, in the cross is highest virtue, in the cross is perfect holiness. There is no salvation of soul, nor hope of everlasting life, except in the cross.
Therefore, take up your cross and follow Jesus, and you shall enter eternal life. He Himself opened the way before you in carrying His cross, and upon it He died for you, so that you, too, might take up your cross and long to die upon it. If you die with Him, you shall also live with Him, and if you share His suffering, you shall also share His glory.
Behold, in the cross is everything, and upon your dying on the cross everything depends. There is no other way to life and to true inward peace than the way of the holy cross and daily mortification. Go where you will, seek what you will, you will not find a higher way, nor a less exalted but safer way, than the way of the holy cross. Arrange and order everything to suit your will and judgment, and still you will find that some suffering must always be borne, willingly or unwillingly, and thus you will always find the cross.
Either you will experience bodily pain or you will undergo tribulation of spirit in your soul. At times you will be forsaken by God, at times troubled by those about you and, what is worse, you will often grow weary of yourself. You cannot escape, you cannot be relieved by any remedy or comfort but must bear with it as long as God wills. For He wishes you to learn to bear trial without consolation, to submit yourself wholly to Him that you may become more humble through suffering. No one understands the passion of Christ so thoroughly or heartily, as the man whose lot it is to suffer the like himself.
The cross, therefore, is always ready; it awaits you everywhere. No matter where you may go, you cannot escape it, for wherever you go you take yourself with you and shall always find yourself. Turn where you will — above, below, without, or within — you will find a cross in everything, and everywhere you must have patience if you would have peace within and merit an eternal crown.
If you carry the cross willingly, it will carry and lead you to the desired goal where indeed there shall be no more suffering, but here there shall be. If you carry it unwillingly, you create a burden for yourself and increase the load, though still you have to bear it. If you cast away one cross, you will find another and perhaps a heavier one. Do you expect to escape what no mortal man can ever avoid? Which of the saints was without a cross or trial on this Earth? Not even Jesus Christ, our Lord, Whose every hour on Earth knew the pain of His passion. “Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into his glory?” (Luke 24:26). How is it that you look for another way than this, the royal way of the holy cross?
The whole life of Christ was a cross and a martyrdom, and do you seek rest and enjoyment for yourself? You deceive yourself, you are mistaken if you seek anything but to suffer, for this mortal life is full of miseries and marked with crosses on all sides. Indeed, the more spiritual progress a person makes, so much heavier will he frequently find the cross, because as his love increases, the pain of his exile also increases.
Yet such a man, though afflicted in many ways, is not without hope of consolation, because he knows that great reward is coming to him for bearing his cross. And when he carries it willingly, every pang of tribulation is changed into hope of solace from God. Besides, the more the flesh is distressed by affliction, so much the more is the spirit strengthened by inward grace. Not infrequently a man is so strengthened by his love of trials and hardship in his desire to conform to the cross of Christ, that he does not wish to be without sorrow or pain, since he believes he will be the more acceptable to God if he is able to endure more and more grievous things for His sake.
It is the grace of Christ, and not the virtue of man, which can and does bring it about that through fervor of spirit frail flesh learns to love and to gain what it naturally hates and shuns.
To carry the cross, to love the cross, to chastise the body and bring it to subjection, to flee honors, to endure contempt gladly, to despise self and wish to be despised, to suffer any adversity and loss, to desire no prosperous days on Earth — this is not man’s way. If you rely upon yourself, you can do none of these things, but if you trust in the Lord, strength will be given you from Heaven and the world and the flesh will be made subject to your word. You will not even fear your enemy, the devil, if you are armed with faith and signed with the cross of Christ.
Set yourself, then, like a good and faithful servant of Christ, to bear bravely the cross of your Lord, Who out of love was crucified for you. Be ready to suffer many adversities and many kinds of trouble in this miserable life, for troublesome and miserable life will always be, no matter where you are; and so you will find it wherever you may hide. Thus it must be; and there is no way to evade the trials and sorrows of life but to bear them.
Drink the chalice of the Lord with affection it you wish to be His friend and to have part with Him. Leave consolation to God; let Him do as most pleases Him. On your part, be ready to bear sufferings and consider them the greatest consolation, for even though you alone were to undergo them all, the sufferings of this life are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come.
When you shall have come to the point where suffering is sweet and acceptable for the sake of Christ, then consider yourself fortunate, for you have found paradise on Earth. But as long as suffering irks you and you seek to escape, so long will you be unfortunate, and the tribulation you seek to evade will follow you everywhere. If you put your mind to the things you ought to consider, that is, to suffering and death, you would soon be in a better state and would find peace.
Although you were taken to the third Heaven with Paul, you were not thereby insured against suffering. Jesus said: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake.” To suffer, then, remains your lot, if you mean to love Jesus and serve Him forever.
If you were but worthy to suffer something for the name of Jesus, what great glory would be in store for you, what great joy to all the saints of God, what great edification to those about you! For all men praise patience though there are few who wish to practice it. With good reason, then, ought you to be willing to suffer a little for Christ since many suffer much more for the world. Realize that you must lead a dying life; the more a man dies to himself, the more he begins to live unto God.
No man is fit to enjoy Heaven unless he has resigned himself to suffer hardship for Christ. Nothing is more acceptable to God, nothing more helpful for you on this Earth than to suffer willingly for Christ. If you had to make a choice, you ought to wish rather to suffer for Christ than to enjoy many consolations, for thus you would be more like Christ and more like all the saints. Our merit and progress consist not in many pleasures and comforts but rather in enduring great afflictions and sufferings.
If, indeed, there were anything better or more useful for man’s salvation than suffering, Christ would have shown it by word and example. But He clearly exhorts the disciples who follow Him and all who wish to follow Him to carry the cross, saying: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.” When, therefore, we have read and searched all that has been written, let this be the final conclusion — that through much suffering we must enter into the kingdom of God. (Here ends the passage from Book 2, Chapter 12 of The Imitation of Christ, “The Royal Road of the Holy Cross”).
Passiontide is a time to reset and re-adjust our approach to suffering. Passiontide is not a time to hide! Passiontide is a time grow in appreciation and love of the Cross―first and foremost the Cross of Christ that led to our potential salvation; and secondly the crosses that we will perpetually and inescapably find in our own personal lives―for the Cross is the key to the door of Heaven. That is why Christ said: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his CROSS DAILY, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23).
Article 30
Thursday & Friday & Saturday after the 4th Sunday of Lent, April 3rd, 4th & 5th
Are You Losing It?
Thursday & Friday & Saturday after the 4th Sunday of Lent, April 3rd, 4th & 5th
Are You Losing It?
Losing and Losers
Nobody likes losing what they have! Nobody likes being called and known as “a loser”! Losing is usually seen as being something negative, something detrimental, something painful, etc. In such regard we speak of losing money, losing our health, losing our mind, losing a limb, losing our job, losing friends, losing a loved one, losing our life, losing our reputation, etc. On a spiritual level, we can also be “losers” by losing God, losing Sanctifying Grace, losing Hope, losing the Faith, losing our soul, losing Heaven, etc.
Some losses are greater than others. Some losses can be put right. Other losses are irreversible. Some losses are isolated. Other losses start a domino effect of one loss after another. Some losses can be extremely costly, other losses can cost us little or nothing. Some losses are caused by others, but some losses are our own fault. Some losses are highly visible, other losses are practically invisible. Some losses are known to ourselves and others. Some losses remain unknown to ourselves and others.
As an idiom of speech, the term “losing it” ― as in “That person must be losing it!” or “He or she completely lost it!” ― is an informal way of saying that someone is losing control of their emotions; losing their composure; acting strangely; unable to cope with a situation; suddenly starting to shout, cry, or laugh; becoming explosively angry; acting wildly; going berserk; going mad; or going crazy.
Even Holy Scripture speaks of losses―though mainly on the spiritual level. We are warned against losing eternal life due to obsession with earthly life: “He that loves his life, shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal.” (John 12:25) … For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26) ... “For what is a man advantaged, if he gains the whole world, and lose himself, and cast away himself?” (Luke 9:25).
The fact that all the Evangelists report the following words of Our Lord, show how important they are: “He that finds his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:39). Matthew reports another occasion in a later chapter: “For he that will save his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:25-26). St. Mark writes: “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35). St. Luke writes: “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it.” (Luke 9:24). St. Luke also reports another instance where Our Lord again says: “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it.” (Luke 17:33). All of this powerfully speaks of the dangers of putting our eggs in the basket of this world and not in the basket of Heaven.
The Biggest Loser of All Time
You could say that everyone is a loser! Everyone is losing something or has lost something. The biggest loser of all is Satan. Saint Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica (Ia, qq. 63-64), speaks of Satan (Lucifer) being the highest of all angels, saying: “The chief angel who sinned (Satan/Lucifer), being set over all the hosts of angels, surpassed them in brightness, and was by comparison the most illustrious among them.” In other words, Satan had everything going for him―he was the number one angel―and he lost it! He lost it through pride and a lack of humility. It is said that when Satan learned that the Son of God would become man through a human mother; Satan, the highest of all creatures, demanded the honor of becoming the Theotokos (God-bearer or the one who gives birth to God). He wanted the hypostatic union to occur through him. This is another reason why there is perfect enmity between Satan and Mary (see Genesis 3:15). It is also why Mary now has the highest place in Heaven. Lucifer and one third of the angels fell on account of pride and envy. St. Thomas explains that the devil wanted to be God and he cites Isaias 14:13-14: “I will ascend into Heaven! … I will be like the Most High!” Saint Augustine also confirms that Satan “wished to be called God.” (see his Concerning the Old Testament, 113).
Michael, a lower angel, led the charge against Lucifer and his fallen angels by calling out: “Who is like God?” Holy Scripture describes the consequences: “And there was a great battle in heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels―and they prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in heaven. And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; and he was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him!” (Apocalypse 12:7-9). In the Book of Ezechiel, we read of God’s sentence to Lucifer: “Thou, a cherub, stretched out and protecting … Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day of thy creation, until iniquity was found in thee … Thy inner parts were filled with iniquity, and thou hast sinned! And I cast thee out from the mountain of God, O covering cherub! Thy heart was lifted up with thy beauty―thou hast lost thy wisdom in thy beauty! I have cast thee to the ground!” (Ezechiel 28:14-17).
Satan now despises and hates Mary, for she became what he wanted to be―the one who brought God the Son into the world. St. Louis de Montfort writes:
“God has never made and formed but one enmity; but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end. It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer … The celebrated prediction and curse of God, pronounced in the terrestrial paradise, against the serpent, is for the glory of the most holy Virgin, for the salvation of her children and for the confusion of the devil: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!” (Genesis 3:15).
“The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel―that he fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself―because Satan, being proud, suffers infinitely more from being beaten and punished by a little and humble handmaid of God, and her humility humbles him more than the divine power; and secondly, because God has given Mary such great power against the devils that—as they have often been obliged to confess, in spite of themselves, by the mouths of the possessed—they fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints, and one of her threats against them more than all other torments.
“What Lucifer has lost by pride, Mary has gained by humility. What Eve has damned and lost by disobedience, Mary has saved by obedience. Eve, in obeying the serpent, has destroyed all her children together with herself, and has delivered them to him; Mary, in being perfectly faithful to God, has saved all her children and servants together with herself, and has consecrated them to His Majesty.
“God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other.
“Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others. These cruel persecutions of the devil, shall go on increasing daily till the reign of Antichrist.
“The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always, up to this time, persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will, in the future, persecute them more than ever; just as Cain, of old, persecuted his brother Abel, and Esau his brother Jacob―who are the figures of the reprobate and the predestinate. But the humble Mary will always have the victory over that proud spirit, and so great a victory that she will go so far as to crush his head, where his pride dwells. She will always discover the malice of the serpent. She will always lay bare his infernal plots and dissipate his diabolical councils, and even to the end of time will guard her faithful servants from his cruel claw.
“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But, in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.” (St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary, §51-§54).
Big Loser Virus
Satan was creating in a state of Sanctifying Grace―and he lost it! He could have gone to Heaven―but he lost it! God created him and placed him as the highest angel of all angels―and he lost it! This “Big Loser” also contaminated many other angels, who rebelled with him―and they lost it too! Now, those “losers” are united to spread their virus to you and make you lose it, also! The devils absolutely hate mankind―because inferior humans can now attain what the superior angels lost―that is to say, Heaven. The only way Satan and devils can try to hurt God is by seeking and achieving the destruction and damnation of mankind, or as many as possible. Thus Hell launches uncountable spiritual viruses (temptations to sin) on the human race, knowing full well that “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Sin is the only thing that can make anyone lose God, lose Heaven and lose their soul to Hell. There is no other way to Hell apart from Mortal Sin―which is what Satan and his devils committed against God in their pride: “I will not serve!” (Jeremias 2:20). As the Catechism says, we were made to know, love and serve God―but Satan does not want us to know God, nor love God, nor serve God―and sin is what breaks that bond with God: “Whosoever commits sin, is the servant of sin!” (John 8:34) and “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8).
Sadly, Satan is extremely successful with his temptations to sin―largely because mankind is so neglectful in fighting sin: “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4). “Watch and pray that you enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak!” (Matthew 26:41). “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7).
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, laments the success of Satan and the neglect of human beings that leads to them losing their souls to Hell: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation.”
What truly beggars belief is the fact that so many Catholics are seemingly indifferent to the state of their soul―they are more concerned with their earthly preoccupations with family, physical fitness and health, their beauty and appearance, their finances, job, friends, socials, sports, entertainment, projects, hobbies, the news and gossip, and of course―their smartphone, the internet and social media! Every Catholic SHOULD know―but they don’t―that most Catholics do not end up Heaven, but end up losing their souls to Hell. That truth has been consistently taught in Holy Scripture, by the Church Fathers and Saints [read more here]. Why on earth, then, are they losing so much time on things that will―little-by-little―lead to their damnation and the ultimate loss, which is the losing one’s soul to Hell? Pure stupidity and foolishness! Yet as Scripture says: “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). What on earth are pastors, parents and teachers teaching to the children who are under their care? “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26)
Are You Losing It? What Are You Losing?
We are more concerned about our life in this world than we are about life in the next world. Our Lord repeatedly warns against that: “For what is a man advantaged, if he gains the whole world, and lose himself, and cast away himself?” (Luke 9:25) … “For he that will save his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it! For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:25-26) … “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where your treasure is, there is your heart also! No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures, treasures, teachings and spirit of the world, whose prince is the devil (Matthew 6:19-24).
As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Who is so dull-minded and insipid as not to know the dangers of the worldly life, which is hampered by all the abominable and most wicked laws and customs introduced by the astuteness of the devil and the perversity of men? … The wisdom of the flesh has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God, because it is of the devil, deceitful, earthly and rebellious to the divine laws. The more that men exert themselves to reach the evil objects of their carnal and animal passions, and to attain the means of indulging them, so much the more will they fall into ignorance of divine things. Men are ignorant precisely because they are lovers of earthly riches. Let the countless numbers that have fallen into Hell with their burden, proclaim it! Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error! What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation? Weep over the ruin of so many souls absorbed in the darkness of their passions and depraved inclinations, forgetful of the danger, and unmoved by their losses. Instead of fearing and avoiding the occasions of evil, they encounter and seek for them in blind ignorance. They follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and care not where they walk―even if to the most dangerous precipices. They are surrounded by innumerable enemies, who pursue them with diabolical treachery, unceasing vigilance, unquenchable wrath and restless diligence. What wonder then, that so many irreparable defeats should arise among the mortals? And that, since the number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate should also be uncountable, and that the demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men!”
Losing It Little-by-Little
You have no doubt heard of the saying: “Little-by-little one goes far!” That is exactly how Satan and his devils work upon us. Rare is the person who suddenly jumps straight into mortal sin―usually mortal sin has been prefaced by increasing venial sins or slightly increasing gravity. It is much like the proverbial frog being boiled to death in a pot of water whose temperature was gradually increased, little-by-little, so that the frog never felt uncomfortable or afraid―until it finally boils to death. Satan usually follows that path―he does not want to frighten us and have us run away from him. Therefore he presents things that he assumes we will be more or less comfortable with and which will not shock or alert us. What makes matters worse is the fact that the devils know how to tempt us in a way that we simply think that we are having a conversation with ourselves in the silence of the mind! In a certain sense, the devil impersonates you! If anyone can imitate your mental voice―then it is the devils! The devils don’t typically come in a clear, overt manner―banging drums and cymbals. Instead, they work through small, seemingly insignificant actions or thoughts that, over time, can erode a person’s values, beliefs, or moral character. Lies or negative thoughts can start small and gradually take root, leading to a person's distress or unhappiness. Small, seemingly harmless temptations can lead to a pattern of negative or sinful behavior on the level of venial sins. Subtle acts of negativity or criticism can chip away at a person's confidence and sense of purpose. Their goal is “to destroy them little by little” (Wisdom 12:8). “He that shows contempt for small things, shall fall by little and little” (Ecclesiasticus 19:1).
The devils do not have knock down the entire wall of grace that surrounds you soul―they are content to take away one brick at a time, and, little-by-little, they will get to the point where your “brick wall of grace” will be so weak and wobbly that it will inevitably fall. “Little-by-little one goes far!” As Holy Scripture says: “The ambushes began little by little to come forth” (Judges 20:33) … “See that you be not negligent, lest by little and little the evil grow” (1 Esdras 4:22) ... “Waters wear away the stones; and with flooding the ground is little by little washed away: so in like manner thou shalt destroy man!” (Job 14:19) “… little by little and by degrees” (Deuteronomy 7:22) “… little by little every day” (2 Paralipomenon 21:15).
Our Lady revealed to the Venerable Mary of Agreda the following: “Little do mortals heed this mystery of the Cross! None of the mortals will have any excuse for their foolish negligence―and much less will the children of the Holy Church have an excuse, since they have received the Faith and yet show in their lives little difference from that of infidels and pagans. The devils are invisible and unperceived by any of the senses and since men neither touch, nor feel, nor see them―the result is that they forget the fear of them. But invisible enemies are more cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery. The demon always seeks to prepare the way for his deceits, especially in souls which he fears will resist his entrance, unless he can thus facilitate his approach. He is accustomed to begin little by little, by causing sorrow or dejection of heart, or he makes use of other trickery or snares, by which he diverts or withdraws the soul from the love of the Lord; then gradually he comes with his poison concealed in a golden cup [today it would be the television, smartphone, computer, internet, social media, etc.], in order to diminish the horror of the soul. Although the demon cannot take away man’s liberty, nor ever completely sway his free will, yet, by leading them into so many and grievous sins, little-by-little he obtains such an influence over man’s free-will, that he is enabled to use it as an instrument of the evil that he proposes. The demons seek to induce them to swallow these little poisonous gnats, in order that, little by little, after being accustomed to those sins that seem insignificant, they may arrive at swallowing the camels of the more serious sins. O insanity, so little considered by mortals! All their life they labor and exert themselves to become more and more entangled in the snares of their passions, to be consumed in deceitful vanities and to deliver themselves, little-by-little, over to an inextinguishable fire, death and everlasting perdition in Hell, as if all were a mere joke! They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as of eternal life, while Christ their Creator has suffered the most bitter pains and torments in order to enter Heaven and to show them by His example how they are to find the way to Heaven!”
Little-by-Little Losing the Sense of Sin
The devils have done an efficient job in making us lose the sense of sin―losing all sense of the gravity of sin; making sin seem like something insignificant; or at least easily forgiven. For instance, a Pew Research survey finds that U.S. Catholics are divided on homosexual behavior, with 44% saying it is sinful and 39% saying it is not ― a figure that rises to 51% saying it is not sinful among Catholic adults under age 30. And majorities of Catholics say that living with a romantic partner outside marriage (54%) and getting a divorce (61%) are not sinful. About half (49%) say remarrying after a divorce without first obtaining an annulment is not a sin. In addition, fully two-thirds of U.S. Catholics (66%) say using artificial birth control is not a sin. Even 57% of the most devout Catholics – those who report attending Mass at least weekly – say using contraceptives is not wrong. Those who attend Mass weekly or more are divided over the sinfulness of cohabitation (46% say it is sinful, 45% say it is not).
One pope after another―whether Traditional, Conservative, Liberal or Modernist―has lamented the modern-day phenomena of people losing the sense of sin.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
This is backed-up by the appalling falling-way from going to Confession by Catholics. In the USA, only 7% of Catholics go to Confession monthly; only 14% go several times a year; 21% only go once a year; 23% go less than once a year; and 35% no longer go to Confession. In Europe, it is even worse― in Italy, for example, 60% to 80% are not even confessing once a year. Sin seems to no big deal―certainly not the greatest evil in the world, as we are told by the Catechism: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
Just a Little Opening
The effects of Original Sin have seen to it that we are all among the “walking wounded” and consequently weak. We might have different weaknesses, but weak we are. The devils look for that weakness and will focus their attacks upon those weaknesses. Fr. Gabriel Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, says: “Satan hates God and that is why he seeks to convince people to commit sins and thus drag them down to Hell ... His ordinary activity is to tempt man toward evil, to lead him to temptation, to sin, to push him to break divine law … The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed and, by inducing man to sin, he takes man little-by-little away from the love of God, weakens the consciences of men and women … Satan seduces with suggestions like ― ‘Everything is lawful!’ ‘There’s nothing wrong with that!’ ‘Everyone does it!’ … He makes us doubt the existence of sin and Hell and Paradise and of their eternity; or, for example, as in our times, where euthanasia and abortion are passed off as signs of humanity’s progress. The second subterfuge is to make evil appear good, a gain rather than a loss. The devil also makes evil appear interesting, positive, and beautiful … Although a spiritual creature, the demon does not understand what is in our mind and in our heart; he can only surmise it through observing our behavior. It is not a complicated operation for him, having an extremely fine intelligence … The devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and works on it … The most frequent weak points in man are, from time to time, always the same: pride, money, and lust … The evil one can cause unrestrained animosities, especially toward those who love us the most ... Satan also ruins friendships; through his intervention, the victim feels unwelcome everywhere, avoided by everyone, ending in a desire for isolation. Every time that a friendly relationship grows and blossoms, it suddenly ends, without reason … He destroys marriages, breaks up engagements; he fosters screaming fights in families where everyone truly loves one another, and always for futile reasons. Then there follows a conviction of total lack of love and understanding, a complete affective void that makes marriage an impossibility.”
“I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. Many times I have dealt with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. With time, little-by-little, the person is hardened in sin and evil takes root.” (Fr. Gabriel Amorth).
Nobody likes losing what they have! Nobody likes being called and known as “a loser”! Losing is usually seen as being something negative, something detrimental, something painful, etc. In such regard we speak of losing money, losing our health, losing our mind, losing a limb, losing our job, losing friends, losing a loved one, losing our life, losing our reputation, etc. On a spiritual level, we can also be “losers” by losing God, losing Sanctifying Grace, losing Hope, losing the Faith, losing our soul, losing Heaven, etc.
Some losses are greater than others. Some losses can be put right. Other losses are irreversible. Some losses are isolated. Other losses start a domino effect of one loss after another. Some losses can be extremely costly, other losses can cost us little or nothing. Some losses are caused by others, but some losses are our own fault. Some losses are highly visible, other losses are practically invisible. Some losses are known to ourselves and others. Some losses remain unknown to ourselves and others.
As an idiom of speech, the term “losing it” ― as in “That person must be losing it!” or “He or she completely lost it!” ― is an informal way of saying that someone is losing control of their emotions; losing their composure; acting strangely; unable to cope with a situation; suddenly starting to shout, cry, or laugh; becoming explosively angry; acting wildly; going berserk; going mad; or going crazy.
Even Holy Scripture speaks of losses―though mainly on the spiritual level. We are warned against losing eternal life due to obsession with earthly life: “He that loves his life, shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal.” (John 12:25) … For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26) ... “For what is a man advantaged, if he gains the whole world, and lose himself, and cast away himself?” (Luke 9:25).
The fact that all the Evangelists report the following words of Our Lord, show how important they are: “He that finds his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:39). Matthew reports another occasion in a later chapter: “For he that will save his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:25-26). St. Mark writes: “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35). St. Luke writes: “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it.” (Luke 9:24). St. Luke also reports another instance where Our Lord again says: “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it.” (Luke 17:33). All of this powerfully speaks of the dangers of putting our eggs in the basket of this world and not in the basket of Heaven.
The Biggest Loser of All Time
You could say that everyone is a loser! Everyone is losing something or has lost something. The biggest loser of all is Satan. Saint Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica (Ia, qq. 63-64), speaks of Satan (Lucifer) being the highest of all angels, saying: “The chief angel who sinned (Satan/Lucifer), being set over all the hosts of angels, surpassed them in brightness, and was by comparison the most illustrious among them.” In other words, Satan had everything going for him―he was the number one angel―and he lost it! He lost it through pride and a lack of humility. It is said that when Satan learned that the Son of God would become man through a human mother; Satan, the highest of all creatures, demanded the honor of becoming the Theotokos (God-bearer or the one who gives birth to God). He wanted the hypostatic union to occur through him. This is another reason why there is perfect enmity between Satan and Mary (see Genesis 3:15). It is also why Mary now has the highest place in Heaven. Lucifer and one third of the angels fell on account of pride and envy. St. Thomas explains that the devil wanted to be God and he cites Isaias 14:13-14: “I will ascend into Heaven! … I will be like the Most High!” Saint Augustine also confirms that Satan “wished to be called God.” (see his Concerning the Old Testament, 113).
Michael, a lower angel, led the charge against Lucifer and his fallen angels by calling out: “Who is like God?” Holy Scripture describes the consequences: “And there was a great battle in heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels―and they prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in heaven. And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; and he was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him!” (Apocalypse 12:7-9). In the Book of Ezechiel, we read of God’s sentence to Lucifer: “Thou, a cherub, stretched out and protecting … Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day of thy creation, until iniquity was found in thee … Thy inner parts were filled with iniquity, and thou hast sinned! And I cast thee out from the mountain of God, O covering cherub! Thy heart was lifted up with thy beauty―thou hast lost thy wisdom in thy beauty! I have cast thee to the ground!” (Ezechiel 28:14-17).
Satan now despises and hates Mary, for she became what he wanted to be―the one who brought God the Son into the world. St. Louis de Montfort writes:
“God has never made and formed but one enmity; but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end. It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer … The celebrated prediction and curse of God, pronounced in the terrestrial paradise, against the serpent, is for the glory of the most holy Virgin, for the salvation of her children and for the confusion of the devil: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!” (Genesis 3:15).
“The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel―that he fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself―because Satan, being proud, suffers infinitely more from being beaten and punished by a little and humble handmaid of God, and her humility humbles him more than the divine power; and secondly, because God has given Mary such great power against the devils that—as they have often been obliged to confess, in spite of themselves, by the mouths of the possessed—they fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints, and one of her threats against them more than all other torments.
“What Lucifer has lost by pride, Mary has gained by humility. What Eve has damned and lost by disobedience, Mary has saved by obedience. Eve, in obeying the serpent, has destroyed all her children together with herself, and has delivered them to him; Mary, in being perfectly faithful to God, has saved all her children and servants together with herself, and has consecrated them to His Majesty.
“God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other.
“Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others. These cruel persecutions of the devil, shall go on increasing daily till the reign of Antichrist.
“The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always, up to this time, persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will, in the future, persecute them more than ever; just as Cain, of old, persecuted his brother Abel, and Esau his brother Jacob―who are the figures of the reprobate and the predestinate. But the humble Mary will always have the victory over that proud spirit, and so great a victory that she will go so far as to crush his head, where his pride dwells. She will always discover the malice of the serpent. She will always lay bare his infernal plots and dissipate his diabolical councils, and even to the end of time will guard her faithful servants from his cruel claw.
“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But, in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.” (St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary, §51-§54).
Big Loser Virus
Satan was creating in a state of Sanctifying Grace―and he lost it! He could have gone to Heaven―but he lost it! God created him and placed him as the highest angel of all angels―and he lost it! This “Big Loser” also contaminated many other angels, who rebelled with him―and they lost it too! Now, those “losers” are united to spread their virus to you and make you lose it, also! The devils absolutely hate mankind―because inferior humans can now attain what the superior angels lost―that is to say, Heaven. The only way Satan and devils can try to hurt God is by seeking and achieving the destruction and damnation of mankind, or as many as possible. Thus Hell launches uncountable spiritual viruses (temptations to sin) on the human race, knowing full well that “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Sin is the only thing that can make anyone lose God, lose Heaven and lose their soul to Hell. There is no other way to Hell apart from Mortal Sin―which is what Satan and his devils committed against God in their pride: “I will not serve!” (Jeremias 2:20). As the Catechism says, we were made to know, love and serve God―but Satan does not want us to know God, nor love God, nor serve God―and sin is what breaks that bond with God: “Whosoever commits sin, is the servant of sin!” (John 8:34) and “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8).
Sadly, Satan is extremely successful with his temptations to sin―largely because mankind is so neglectful in fighting sin: “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4). “Watch and pray that you enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak!” (Matthew 26:41). “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7).
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, laments the success of Satan and the neglect of human beings that leads to them losing their souls to Hell: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation.”
What truly beggars belief is the fact that so many Catholics are seemingly indifferent to the state of their soul―they are more concerned with their earthly preoccupations with family, physical fitness and health, their beauty and appearance, their finances, job, friends, socials, sports, entertainment, projects, hobbies, the news and gossip, and of course―their smartphone, the internet and social media! Every Catholic SHOULD know―but they don’t―that most Catholics do not end up Heaven, but end up losing their souls to Hell. That truth has been consistently taught in Holy Scripture, by the Church Fathers and Saints [read more here]. Why on earth, then, are they losing so much time on things that will―little-by-little―lead to their damnation and the ultimate loss, which is the losing one’s soul to Hell? Pure stupidity and foolishness! Yet as Scripture says: “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). What on earth are pastors, parents and teachers teaching to the children who are under their care? “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26)
Are You Losing It? What Are You Losing?
We are more concerned about our life in this world than we are about life in the next world. Our Lord repeatedly warns against that: “For what is a man advantaged, if he gains the whole world, and lose himself, and cast away himself?” (Luke 9:25) … “For he that will save his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it! For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:25-26) … “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where your treasure is, there is your heart also! No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures, treasures, teachings and spirit of the world, whose prince is the devil (Matthew 6:19-24).
As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Who is so dull-minded and insipid as not to know the dangers of the worldly life, which is hampered by all the abominable and most wicked laws and customs introduced by the astuteness of the devil and the perversity of men? … The wisdom of the flesh has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God, because it is of the devil, deceitful, earthly and rebellious to the divine laws. The more that men exert themselves to reach the evil objects of their carnal and animal passions, and to attain the means of indulging them, so much the more will they fall into ignorance of divine things. Men are ignorant precisely because they are lovers of earthly riches. Let the countless numbers that have fallen into Hell with their burden, proclaim it! Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error! What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation? Weep over the ruin of so many souls absorbed in the darkness of their passions and depraved inclinations, forgetful of the danger, and unmoved by their losses. Instead of fearing and avoiding the occasions of evil, they encounter and seek for them in blind ignorance. They follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and care not where they walk―even if to the most dangerous precipices. They are surrounded by innumerable enemies, who pursue them with diabolical treachery, unceasing vigilance, unquenchable wrath and restless diligence. What wonder then, that so many irreparable defeats should arise among the mortals? And that, since the number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate should also be uncountable, and that the demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men!”
Losing It Little-by-Little
You have no doubt heard of the saying: “Little-by-little one goes far!” That is exactly how Satan and his devils work upon us. Rare is the person who suddenly jumps straight into mortal sin―usually mortal sin has been prefaced by increasing venial sins or slightly increasing gravity. It is much like the proverbial frog being boiled to death in a pot of water whose temperature was gradually increased, little-by-little, so that the frog never felt uncomfortable or afraid―until it finally boils to death. Satan usually follows that path―he does not want to frighten us and have us run away from him. Therefore he presents things that he assumes we will be more or less comfortable with and which will not shock or alert us. What makes matters worse is the fact that the devils know how to tempt us in a way that we simply think that we are having a conversation with ourselves in the silence of the mind! In a certain sense, the devil impersonates you! If anyone can imitate your mental voice―then it is the devils! The devils don’t typically come in a clear, overt manner―banging drums and cymbals. Instead, they work through small, seemingly insignificant actions or thoughts that, over time, can erode a person’s values, beliefs, or moral character. Lies or negative thoughts can start small and gradually take root, leading to a person's distress or unhappiness. Small, seemingly harmless temptations can lead to a pattern of negative or sinful behavior on the level of venial sins. Subtle acts of negativity or criticism can chip away at a person's confidence and sense of purpose. Their goal is “to destroy them little by little” (Wisdom 12:8). “He that shows contempt for small things, shall fall by little and little” (Ecclesiasticus 19:1).
The devils do not have knock down the entire wall of grace that surrounds you soul―they are content to take away one brick at a time, and, little-by-little, they will get to the point where your “brick wall of grace” will be so weak and wobbly that it will inevitably fall. “Little-by-little one goes far!” As Holy Scripture says: “The ambushes began little by little to come forth” (Judges 20:33) … “See that you be not negligent, lest by little and little the evil grow” (1 Esdras 4:22) ... “Waters wear away the stones; and with flooding the ground is little by little washed away: so in like manner thou shalt destroy man!” (Job 14:19) “… little by little and by degrees” (Deuteronomy 7:22) “… little by little every day” (2 Paralipomenon 21:15).
Our Lady revealed to the Venerable Mary of Agreda the following: “Little do mortals heed this mystery of the Cross! None of the mortals will have any excuse for their foolish negligence―and much less will the children of the Holy Church have an excuse, since they have received the Faith and yet show in their lives little difference from that of infidels and pagans. The devils are invisible and unperceived by any of the senses and since men neither touch, nor feel, nor see them―the result is that they forget the fear of them. But invisible enemies are more cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery. The demon always seeks to prepare the way for his deceits, especially in souls which he fears will resist his entrance, unless he can thus facilitate his approach. He is accustomed to begin little by little, by causing sorrow or dejection of heart, or he makes use of other trickery or snares, by which he diverts or withdraws the soul from the love of the Lord; then gradually he comes with his poison concealed in a golden cup [today it would be the television, smartphone, computer, internet, social media, etc.], in order to diminish the horror of the soul. Although the demon cannot take away man’s liberty, nor ever completely sway his free will, yet, by leading them into so many and grievous sins, little-by-little he obtains such an influence over man’s free-will, that he is enabled to use it as an instrument of the evil that he proposes. The demons seek to induce them to swallow these little poisonous gnats, in order that, little by little, after being accustomed to those sins that seem insignificant, they may arrive at swallowing the camels of the more serious sins. O insanity, so little considered by mortals! All their life they labor and exert themselves to become more and more entangled in the snares of their passions, to be consumed in deceitful vanities and to deliver themselves, little-by-little, over to an inextinguishable fire, death and everlasting perdition in Hell, as if all were a mere joke! They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as of eternal life, while Christ their Creator has suffered the most bitter pains and torments in order to enter Heaven and to show them by His example how they are to find the way to Heaven!”
Little-by-Little Losing the Sense of Sin
The devils have done an efficient job in making us lose the sense of sin―losing all sense of the gravity of sin; making sin seem like something insignificant; or at least easily forgiven. For instance, a Pew Research survey finds that U.S. Catholics are divided on homosexual behavior, with 44% saying it is sinful and 39% saying it is not ― a figure that rises to 51% saying it is not sinful among Catholic adults under age 30. And majorities of Catholics say that living with a romantic partner outside marriage (54%) and getting a divorce (61%) are not sinful. About half (49%) say remarrying after a divorce without first obtaining an annulment is not a sin. In addition, fully two-thirds of U.S. Catholics (66%) say using artificial birth control is not a sin. Even 57% of the most devout Catholics – those who report attending Mass at least weekly – say using contraceptives is not wrong. Those who attend Mass weekly or more are divided over the sinfulness of cohabitation (46% say it is sinful, 45% say it is not).
One pope after another―whether Traditional, Conservative, Liberal or Modernist―has lamented the modern-day phenomena of people losing the sense of sin.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
This is backed-up by the appalling falling-way from going to Confession by Catholics. In the USA, only 7% of Catholics go to Confession monthly; only 14% go several times a year; 21% only go once a year; 23% go less than once a year; and 35% no longer go to Confession. In Europe, it is even worse― in Italy, for example, 60% to 80% are not even confessing once a year. Sin seems to no big deal―certainly not the greatest evil in the world, as we are told by the Catechism: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
Just a Little Opening
The effects of Original Sin have seen to it that we are all among the “walking wounded” and consequently weak. We might have different weaknesses, but weak we are. The devils look for that weakness and will focus their attacks upon those weaknesses. Fr. Gabriel Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, says: “Satan hates God and that is why he seeks to convince people to commit sins and thus drag them down to Hell ... His ordinary activity is to tempt man toward evil, to lead him to temptation, to sin, to push him to break divine law … The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed and, by inducing man to sin, he takes man little-by-little away from the love of God, weakens the consciences of men and women … Satan seduces with suggestions like ― ‘Everything is lawful!’ ‘There’s nothing wrong with that!’ ‘Everyone does it!’ … He makes us doubt the existence of sin and Hell and Paradise and of their eternity; or, for example, as in our times, where euthanasia and abortion are passed off as signs of humanity’s progress. The second subterfuge is to make evil appear good, a gain rather than a loss. The devil also makes evil appear interesting, positive, and beautiful … Although a spiritual creature, the demon does not understand what is in our mind and in our heart; he can only surmise it through observing our behavior. It is not a complicated operation for him, having an extremely fine intelligence … The devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and works on it … The most frequent weak points in man are, from time to time, always the same: pride, money, and lust … The evil one can cause unrestrained animosities, especially toward those who love us the most ... Satan also ruins friendships; through his intervention, the victim feels unwelcome everywhere, avoided by everyone, ending in a desire for isolation. Every time that a friendly relationship grows and blossoms, it suddenly ends, without reason … He destroys marriages, breaks up engagements; he fosters screaming fights in families where everyone truly loves one another, and always for futile reasons. Then there follows a conviction of total lack of love and understanding, a complete affective void that makes marriage an impossibility.”
“I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. Many times I have dealt with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. With time, little-by-little, the person is hardened in sin and evil takes root.” (Fr. Gabriel Amorth).
Article 29
Tuesday & Wednesday after the 4th Sunday of Lent, April 1st & 2nd
How Do You Find Joy and Happiness?
Tuesday & Wednesday after the 4th Sunday of Lent, April 1st & 2nd
How Do You Find Joy and Happiness?
Get This Straight!
Many people use the words “joy” and “happiness” interchangeably―to them, the two words mean the same thing. Yet that is not true―both Scripturally and grammatically. If you look at the earlier Latin translations of Holy Scripture, they usually denote our English “happy” and “happiness” with the word “beatus” meaning “blessed” or “happy.” As for our English “joy” or “joyful”, the Latin words are usually “gaudium” or “laetitia” meaning “joy” ― which you might notice are also used by the Church in the Liturgy, with “Gaudete Sunday” (3rd Sunday in Advent) and “Laetare Sunday” (4th Sunday in Lent). The Introit of the Mass on Gaudete Sunday begins with the words “Gaudete in Domino!” meaning “Rejoice in the Lord!” The Introit of the Mass on Laetare Sunday begins with the words “Laetare Jerusalem!” meaning “Rejoice Jerusalem!” The word “Rejoice” is linked with the word “joy” and is essentially a command to be joyful again “re-joy-ce.” We get a double-barreled version of joy in the Easter prayer to Our Lady, which says: “Gaude et Laetare Virgo Maria, Alleluia! Quia surrexit Dominus vere, Alleluia!” ― there is nothing like a resurrection from the dead to produce joy!
Mind & Heart ― Happiness & Joy ― Wisdom and Love
They say that happiness is in the mind and joy is in the heart. We see this to be the case in Holy Scripture: “Happy is he that has had no sadness of his mind” (Ecclesiasticus 14:2) … “They are a joy to my heart” (Psalm 118:111). You will not find the word “joy” being expressly joined to the word “mind” ― joy is reserved for the heart, and happiness for the mind ― which makes sense, since the two powers of our soul are the mind (a.k.a. the intellect) and the heart (a.k.a. the will). Happiness is the pinnacle for the mind and joy is the pinnacle for the heart: “There is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:16).
For St. Thomas Aquinas, while both happiness and joy are related to the attainment of good―joy is the conscious attainment of some good; while happiness is the ultimate, perfect, and lasting contemplation of God by the mind. The mind seeks what is true and heart seeks what is good―and only God can truly fulfill the mind’s desire for truth and the heart’s desire for what is good. Everything else is imperfect, insufficient, finite and therefore unsatisfying to both mind and heart.
It is said that wisdom is the pinnacle of the mind, and love is the pinnacle of the heart. Of all forms of knowledge by the mind, wisdom is said to be the pinnacle of knowledge. For St. Thomas Aquinas, wisdom is “the most perfect of the intellectual virtues”, the pinnacle of speculative knowledge, the queen of the sciences. But then he points out that “charity is the form of all the virtues” including wisdom, and that wisdom itself is ordered by charity, for “charity directs wisdom to its proper end.” Charity (the love of God and neighbor) is superior because it unites the soul to God in a way that surpasses intellectual knowledge. St. Thomas Aquinas says: “To love God is something greater than to know Him” and he emphasizes that “charity surpasses all other virtues in dignity” as it unites and conforms the human person to God, Who is love itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). “If, then, we possess charity, we possess God, for ‘God is Charity’ (1 John 4:8).” says St. Albert the Great.
Another element that indicates and emphasizes the superiority of love over knowledge is the simple response to the Catechism question: “Why did God make you?” The answer is: “God made to know Him, love Him, serve Him in this life, so that I can be happy with Him in the next life in Heaven.” The answer contains far more than you would think at first glance. Notice that knowledge comes before love―this does not mean it is more important than love, it means that we must first know something before we can love that thing. If you do not know that something exists, you cannot say that you love it! So before we can love God, we have to know God, learn about God. Similarly with love―love is not just words, saying: “I love you!” Our Lord says: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord, Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). Love has to proved―and we do that by serving God: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” said Our Lord (John 14:15, 14:21-24). “Seek to do the things that please Him!” (Tobias 14:10). “Seek His commandments!” (Psalm 77:7). “I will seek Thy commandments with my whole heart!” (Psalm 118:69).
True joy―everlasting joy―comes from God: “Behold the joy that comes to thee from God!” (Baruch 4:36). How can expect to find joy from God if we are not keeping His commandments? How can we expect Him to give us the greatest pleasure ― “There is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:16) ― if we do not give Him the pleasure of keeping His commandments? How can we say we love God if we break His commandments?
If “there is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:16) and if charity is the greatest virtue: “…the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13), and if charity is associated with the heart: “love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart” (Mark 12:30), then we have this clear picture of a ‘trinitarian’, or triumvirate, or threesome, or triangle of love, joy and heart. To love with the heart is the greatest commandment (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31) and joy is “the greatest pleasure of the heart” (1 Corinthians 13:13), therefore you shall find true joy by exercising a true love―and the more you love, the more joy you will experience. Hence Our Lord tells you to love “with your whole heart, and with your whole soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind” (Luke 10:27). It is from that love that we will get joy. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that “Joy is not numbered among the theological virtues, nor among the moral, nor among the intellectual virtues … Joy is not a virtue distinct from charity, but an effect of charity.”
God Alone
St. Francis of Assisi and St. John of the Cross were wholly centered on and fully joyful in God. Though St. Francis was born in 1181 in Assisi, Italy, and St. John in 1542 in Fontiveros, Spain―they have a common message: Joy in God alone. St. Francis says: “Let nothing else please us and cause us delight except our Creator, Redeemer and Savior, the only true God!” John says of God outright: “He alone is my joy!” Both men were wholly centered on and fully joyful in God. They weren’t self-preoccupied, but God-occupied because each one followed Jesus’ command to deny self. Francis called it poverty. John called it the path of nothingness. Either way it is a simple path. They make living the Gospel simple and real, because all one needs to do is to rejoice in God and forget self. Both saints place our focus on the Greatest Commandment―which is to love God and neighbor: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
We love neighbor by first loving God, which necessitates a surrendering of every other addictive love to be addicted to God alone! What else can loving something or someone with your whole heart, mind, soul and strength mean―other than addiction. It is that loving addiction to God that brings joy―regardless of what it brings, regardless of what might happen―whether it be pleasant or unpleasant. When someone is madly in love, nothing seems to perturb or disturb them―for the power of love overrides everything and the effect of that powerful love is deep joy.
Shopping for Joy and Happiness?
Is there a Supermarket of Joy? Is Joy on the shelves? Is Happiness on the shelves? Can you afford it? What does it cost? What is the best brand? How long is the shelf-life? What is the expiry date? Is it organic or does it have man-made additives? Is it the real thing? How can you tell?
Christianity is a religion of joy. Real joy comes from God, Who has created us, conquered us, and liberated us from the eternal death and sadness of sin. Joy comes from God, not from within. When we look within ourselves, we either become proud or sad―both of which are bad. We have joy only when we look outside ourselves to Christ. Without Christ, true joy is not only hard to find, it is impossible to find. The world desperately seeks joy, but in all the wrong places. However, our joy comes because Christ sought us, found us, saved us, keeps us and loves us. We cannot have joy apart from Christ, because it doesn’t exist. Joy is not something we can conjure up. True joy is a by-product of true love―a by-product of God’s love.
Love and joy are closely linked. Joy is a natural outcome of living a life rooted in love. Joy can be seen as a response to experiencing love―whether it is God’s love, the love from others, or the love we have for others. The idea that joy comes from love is also reflected in the belief that God’s love is the source of all true joy and true happiness. Joy flows from the realization that we are loved by God and by our family and friends.
Joy isn’t the absence of sadness—it’s the presence of the Holy Spirit―and joy is one of the Twelve Fruits of the Holy Spirit: “The fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, etc” (Galatians 5:22) and “the charity of God is poured forth in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost, Who is given to us” (Romans 5:5) ― and joy is an effect of that charity, a reaction to that charity, a consequence of that charity. And although the Holy Ghost (Holy Spirit) produces joy within us, He often does so by humbling us―so that we would take our eyes off ourselves and fix our eyes on Christ. Real joy doesn’t always mean there’s a smile on our faces―real joy exists even amid real sadness and great suffering.
The Joys of Suffering
St. Pachomius (292-348) says: “How can you wish to be freed from your sufferings? Do you not yet know that no mortification is so pleasing to God as the joyful, or at least patient acceptance of the crosses He imposes?” St. Vincent de Paul (1580-1660) adds: “Our joy depends upon the Cross!” St. Francis of Assisi (1181-1226) further adds: “If we endure all things patiently and with gladness, thinking on the sufferings of our Blessed Lord, and bearing all for the love of Him―herein is perfect joy.” St. Francis Borgia (1510-1572) says the same thing: “Those who have not altogether lost their fervor for the spiritual life, can find true happiness nowhere but in the Cross of Christ. All the pleasures of the world seem heavy and wearisome to them, once they have experienced the sweetness of the Savior’s Cross, so that it seems to them a grievous thing if they have no cross to carry and are left to live without trials and sufferings.” St. Paul rejoices in his sufferings when he writes: “With Christ I am nailed to the cross! … God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 2:19; 6:14).
Now why on earth does God expect us to find joy in suffering? Isn’t that an oxymoron (a combination of contradictory words)? Somehow “joy” and “suffering” don’t seem to ‘jive’ together―a bit like “freezing heat” or “a bird swimming underwater” or “solid gas.” Isn’t it contradictory to pair “joy” with “suffering”? It’s a bit like laughing and gnashing your teeth! The reason we fail to see the connection is because we are spiritually myopic, nearsighted or even blind! We fail to connect the “spiritual dots” and see the bigger picture. There is no pay-day without having worked for the money. What you put into something is what you get out of something. “What things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:8).
The Misery and Pain of Sin
Sin begets death: “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). Sin places us into the hands of Satan: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). We are all sinners: “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). Sin deserves Hell: “Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the Kingdom of God? Do not err! Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor the effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor railers [using verbally abusive language], nor extortioners, shall possess the Kingdom of God!” (1 Corinthians 6:9-10).
God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrha because of sin: “The men of Sodom were very wicked, and sinners before the face of the Lord, beyond measure … And the Lord said: ‘The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied, and their sin is become exceedingly grievous!’ … And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from the Lord out of Heaven, and He destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the earth … Abraham looked towards Sodom and Gomorrha and the whole land of that country―and he saw the ashes rise up from the Earth like the smoke of a furnace” (Genesis 13:13; 18:20; 19:24-28).
Heck―even before that―God destroyed the world with the Great Flood because of sin, sparing only Noe and his family: “And the Earth was corrupted before God, and was filled with iniquity. And when God had seen that the Earth was corrupted, He said to Noe: ‘The end of all flesh is come before Me, the Earth is filled with iniquity through them, and I will destroy them with the Earth! … I will make it rain upon the Earth forty days and forty nights; and I will destroy every substance that I have made from the face of the Earth!’ … And the flood gates of Heaven were opened, and the rain fell upon the Earth forty days and forty nights.
“And the flood was forty days upon the Earth, and the waters increased―they overflowed exceedingly and filled all on the face of the Earth. And the waters prevailed beyond measure upon the Earth―and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered. The water was fifteen cubits (15 yards or 45 feet) higher than the mountains which it covered. And all flesh was destroyed that moved upon the Earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beasts, and all men. And God destroyed all the substance that was upon the Earth, from man even to beast, and the creeping things and fowls of the air: and they were destroyed from the Earth―and Noe only remained, and they that were with him in the ark. And the waters prevailed upon the earth a hundred and fifty days” (Genesis 6:11-13; 7:4, 12; 7:17-24).
From the above, we can more easily understand and accept what the Catechism teaches about the sins that we commit all to easily and all too often: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
Sin Requires Punishment
Most people want to sin but don’t want to pay for sin. Penance―which is a form of suffering―pays for sin. The vast majority of people crazily imagine that by merely confessing their sins to the priest and doing the penance that he imposes (usually something like “Three Hail Marys” or “Five Our Fathers” etc., is enough to pay for their sins. Nothing could be further from the truth. Those “Three Hail Marys” or “Five Our Fathers” are merely the tip of the iceberg of penance that must be done in order to pay for the damage of sin―it is like the first payment on 100-year mortgage! Sin is serious―the greatest evil in the world―and sin must be punished. We either punish ourselves by doing penance, or, if we fail to do that, then God’s Providence will arrange punishments for us. We fail to see how great a mercy it is to be punished for sin in this life rather than the next life! Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, in his book Life Everlasting, writes:
“Suffering in Purgatory is greater than all suffering on Earth. Such is the doctrine of tradition, supported by theological reasoning. Tradition is expressed by St. Augustine: ‘That fire will be more painful than anything man can suffer in the present life!’ St. Bonaventure says: ‘In the next life, the purifying purgatorial suffering will be more severe than the greatest trials on Earth!’ According to these testimonies and others similar to them, the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest sufferings of the present life. We must understand that for one and the same sin, the smallest suffering in Purgatory is greater than any corresponding suffering on Earth. The absence of God is without doubt a very great suffering, but it is sweetened and consoled by the assured hope of once possessing Him. From this hope there arises an incredible joy, which grows in measure as the soul approaches the end of its exile. Many theologians rightly remark that the sufferings in Purgatory are of a higher order than our terrestrial sufferings, and in this sense we may say that the smallest suffering in Purgatory is more severe than the greatest suffering on Earth. The joy they have in the hope of deliverance cannot diminish the suffering they feel from being deprived of the beatific vision. St. Catherine of Genoa speaks thus: ‘Souls in Purgatory unite great joy with great suffering. One does not diminish the other. No peace is comparable to that of the souls in Purgatory, except that of the saints in Heaven. On the other hand, the souls in Purgatory endure torments which no tongue can describe and no intelligence comprehend, without special revelation. The least vision they can have of God, overbalances all woes and all joys that can be conceived. Yet their joy in God does not by any means lessen their pain.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, Life Everlasting).
Positive Outlook & Negative Outlook
Some people are always optimistic; others are always pessimistic. For some the glass is seen as half-full; others see the glass as being half-empty. The same is true of our view of God’s Providence―especially the “tough” side of His Providence―some see all tough things as being good and acceptable because God has ordained those things to happen; others see those tough things as being bad and unacceptable, and cannot stop moaning, groaning, grumbling and complaining about them.
This reminds us of the two thieves who were crucified alongside Christ on Calvary―we popularly call them “The Good Thief” and “The Bad Thief” ― not because one was good at stealing and the other was bad at stealing ― but because of their attitude to the sufferings that they were enduring. The “Bad Thief” wasn’t sorry for his sins and wanted Christ to get them out of that mess of being crucified. The “Good Thief” accepted his crucifixion as a fair and just price for his sins, and was willing to be killed for his sins, while asking Jesus to have mercy on him after death:
“And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, they crucified Jesus there; and the robbers, one on the right hand, and the other on the left … And one of those robbers who were hanging, blasphemed Jesus, saying: ‘If You are Christ, then save Yourself and us!’ But the other robber answering, rebuked him, saying: ‘Do you not fear God, seeing that you are condemned under the same condemnation? And we indeed are justly condemned, for we receive the due reward for our deeds; but this Man [Jesus] has done no evil!’ And he said to Jesus: ‘Lord, remember me when You shall come into Your Kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to you, this day you shall be with Me in Paradise!’” (Luke 23:33-43).
Which of two sinners on Calvary do we resemble? Do we complain about things when they do not go our way? Or do we accept all the difficulties and pains of life as a just reward for our many sins? There is no doubt that we are all sinners―but there is a doubt as to if we want to pay for those sins! Penance is the usual currency. “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). Our Lord adds: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5). The Cross of Christ is the backbone of that penance―and without it, we cannot enter Heaven: “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). The cross is an unavoidable staple diet of our Faith and life. The cross is part of God’s payment plan for us to pay off our debt for sins. We can accept the payment plan or refuse it―much like the two thieves hanging on their crosses on Calvary. This led St. Augustine to say: “The same cross will lead some souls to Heaven and other souls to Hell!”
The Joy of the Cross
Along the same lines, Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Embrace the Cross and bear it with joy in imitation of my Son! … Bear the Cross with joyful resignation and give praise to the Lord, because His will is being fulfilled in your regard! … Humiliate yourself under the mighty hand of the Lord! … The divine influence will urge and draw you on to the desire of being despised by creatures, to joyful suffering, to a love of the Cross and an earnest and generous acceptation of it! … You cannot follow Christ if you refuse to embrace the Cross and rejoice in it! … Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity! … Let the will of the Lord be your only delight and joy! ... If labors and sufferings are accepted with joy and with serenity of heart, they spiritualize the creature, they elevate it and furnish it with a divine insight; by which the soul begins to esteem affliction at its proper value and soon finds consolation and the blessings of mortification and of freedom from disorderly passions. In my life, I forgot the bitterness and labors I had suffered; for the great joy drove out pain, though I never lost from view what my Son had suffered for the human race.
“Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. He is not a true devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. But our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us―who see them forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation. And yet even all this is insufficient, since their inclinations and their blind love of visible things detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart; they rob them of remembrance and affection toward these higher things, which might raise them above themselves and above created things. Hence it comes, that men do not find joy in their tribulations, nor rest in their labors, nor consolation in their sorrows, nor any peace in adversities.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
If the Cross of Christ pays for sin―which it does―then why on earth are we not more joyful about the Cross? Have we not sinned? Have we not committed the greatest evil in the world―perhaps thousands, or hundreds of thousands of times? “For our iniquities are multiplied over our heads, and our sins are grown up even unto Heaven!” (1 Esdras 9:6). If “the wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). If “the soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:20). Do we then not deserve multiple death sentences? Do we not deserve a thousand Hells? Yet God is prepared to accept a pittance of a payment for those atrocities against His Divine Majesty―that pittance of a payment comes in the form of the Cross, which God expects us to carry: “Whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
What could be clearer than that? What could be more joyful than that? It is like a criminal being sentenced to multiple life sentences in prison―and then being allowed to pay it all off with one month’s hard labor! Would he not jump at the chance? Would he not be filled with joy and delight? Of course he would! Yet we find no joy in that massive discount on our death sentence that we have justly deserved by our sins! Or if we had a debt of several billion dollars and we were allowed to pay it off by one year’s hard labor! Would we not joyfully accept that deal? Of course we would―even though it would a year of grueling toil and hard labor. When we look at the gravity and the evil of sin―even “teeny-weeny” venial sin―and weigh-up the debt it has caused us―is not the carrying of the Cross of Christ a massive, undeserved, discount on what we really should be paying or carrying? The problem is that we are so “cheap” that we have made sin seem to be cheap as well!
The Pain of Debt
More than 8 in 10 Americans, or around 85%, have some form of consumer debt, including credit card debt, mortgages, medical debt, auto loans, student loans, legal debt, etc. Every country in the world has some level of debt. The same is true on the spiritual level―every single person has a debt for sin, because everyone has sinned: “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46) … “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). That debt has to be paid either here on Earth or in Purgatory, with Our Lord saying: “I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from there, until thou pay the very last penny!” (Luke 12:59).
On the financial level, carrying debt can lead to significant stress, anxiety, and even physical and mental health problems. The weight of debt can be a constant source of worry and negativity. Paying off debt can alleviate this stress, bring a sense of relief, leading to improved mental and physical well-being, as well as improved mental health, leading to increased self-confidence and a more positive outlook on life. Debt can strain relationships. Paying off debt can improve those relationships. Paying off debt means you're no longer paying interest, which can save you a significant amount of money over time. Paying off debt can improve your credit score, making it easier to get loans and credit in the future.
The same is true on the spiritual level―the debt for sin can also lead to significant stress, anxiety, discouragement, depression and even despair! The following extracts from the Penitential Psalms show this: “I know my iniquity and my sin is always before me! … My iniquities are gone over my head, and as a heavy burden are become heavy upon me! … Day and night Thy hand was heavy upon me! … There is no health in my flesh, because of Thy wrath! … My sores are putrefied and corrupted, because of my foolishness! … There is no health in my flesh! … My bones are troubled! My bones burn away like a fire! … I am turned in my anguish, whilst the thorn is fastened! … My days are vanishing like smoke! … My soul is troubled exceedingly! … My heart is troubled! … My heart is withered like the grass! … I roared with the groaning of my heart! … My strength has left me! … I am become miserable and am bowed down! I walk sorrowful all the day long! … I forget to eat my bread! … For there is no one in death, Lord, that is mindful of Thee! And who shall confess to Thee in Hell! I have labored in my groaning, every night I will water my bed with my tears! … There is no peace for my bones, because of my sins! … I have acknowledged my sin and my injustice I have not concealed!” (combined extracts from Psalms 6:3-7; 31:4-5; 37:4-19; 50:5; 101:4-5; 142:4-7).
The Joy of Paying
We should be overjoyed at being given the possibility of paying for our sins―our many thousands, or hundreds-of-thousands, or even millions of sins that we will have committed by the end of our lives! A sin-a-minute results in almost 1,000 sins (960 sins) in an 18 hour day. That would give you over 350,000 sins per year. Let’s say you live to be 60 years after reaching the age of reason (since you cannot fulfill the requirements for a deliberate sin under the age of reason)―that means you could be committing over 21 million sins in your lifetime! Let’s pretend that you are very righteous and just person, who sins very little―perhaps only 10 times a day (wishful thinking!). That would give you 3,650 sins per year and around 220,000 sins in the above stated lifetime. Considering that the Catechism teaches that even venial is greatest evil in the world after mortal sin―even for a just and righteous person that is one heck of a debt! If God is prepared to make a generous and very lenient payment plan for all those sins―should you not be overjoyed at being given the chance to pay it all off?
No Desire to Pay
Unfortunately, once we lose the sense of the gravity of sin, then we automatically lose the sense of the great debt that sin incurs, and therefore we are not prepared to pay very much for having sinned. Since the Second World War, one pope after another―across the whole spectrum from Traditional, to Conservative, to Liberal pope, to Modernist―have all lamented modern man’s loss of the sense of sin.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
The valid complaints of these popes are corroborated and verified by the unbelievable falling-away from the Sacrament of Confession. As one modern mainstream Catholic priest wrote in 2021: “In Catholic circles in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, patterns of regular confession that were once in abundance began to fade. While frequent confession became a thing of the past, Catholics continued to receive Communion.” Surveys show that to be true. Between 1965 and 1975, according to the National Opinion Research Council, the proportion of Catholics who confessed monthly fell from 38% to 17%. A University of Notre Dame study in the 1980s showed the decline continuing. In a 1997 poll by the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research at the University of Connecticut, only 10% of Catholics surveyed said that they confessed at least once a month; another 10% said they never went to confession at all. By 2015, a Pew Research Center survey showed that only 7% of Catholics went to Confession monthly; only 14% went several times a year; 21% only went once a year; 23% went less than once a year; and 35% no longer went to Confession. More recent statistics indicate that 45% of Catholics in the USA have never confessed since making the first Confession after coming of age. Almost 90% of those who line up to commune in the United States every Sunday [but take note that only around 15% of all Catholics go to Mass regularly each Sunday―so 90% of those 15%], and 95% of regular communicants in certain areas of Northern Europe and 60 to 80% in Italy are not even confessing once a year.
Joy in Purgatory
Purgatory is a state of temporary punishment for those who die in God’s grace (in a state of sanctifying grace), but are not yet fully purified from their venial sins, or have not fully atoned or paid the debt for their sins―both mortal and venial sins. Souls in Purgatory experience joy in knowing they are saved and will eventually enter Heaven―and this is a joy that surpasses earthly pleasures. As they are purified, the souls in Purgatory experience a growing union with God, which is a source of great joy to them.
Purgatory is a marvelous interaction of love between God and the soul. God, the One Who purifies the soul with suffering, purifies the soul out of love. Therefore, He looks for all ways to soften, as much as possible, the suffering that purifies the soul. The soul, that is being purified, suffers greatly―but the love that ties the soul to God Who purifies it, makes the suffering more acceptable. The surgeon who treats a patient looks in every way to alleviate the pain, and the patient who suffers finds relief in the thought that, although he is in pain, he will be cured. Knowing this, he suffers with patience.
It is no surprise, then, to recognize that, in Purgatory, there are joys, comforts, and relief. In this we see the love of God toward those souls who are being purified, and the love of the souls who, longing to be purified, contemplate with love the harmony between Divine Justice and Divine Mercy. The souls want to suffer―for it is a need of their own love that drives them toward God. In their pains, they feel the comfort of God, and cannot refuse their purification because of the happiness they will receive in their eternal glory.
► The first joy of the souls in Purgatory is to feel confirmed in Sanctifying Grace. Now they are sure of their eternal salvation and their happy incapacity to sin; they consider all the horror of sins they have committed, feel an immense sorrow in the pains they suffer now, and repent of these sins sincerely. It is a joy that we cannot easily comprehend because we live carelessly in the uncertainty of our eternal salvation. It is a fact, confirmed by many revelations and historical accounts, that the souls in Purgatory prefer to remain in the pains they suffer there, with the assurance of being saved and without sin, rather than to return to earth with no assurance of being saved. Those who were returned to life by miracles of the saints always chose to go back to death and return to Purgatory.
► The second joy that the souls in Purgatory feel is their very own expiation. Because they love God in a perfect way and long for Him, they are heartily sorry for having offended Him and desire to expiate and make amends. There are souls on earth who, truly repenting of their sins, feel the need to add to the sacramental penance other severe penances: the hair shirt, scourges, fasting, and discomforts of all kinds. In these, they rejoice in their inner spirit because they suffer for love. The souls in Purgatory, having a perfect knowledge even of their smallest sins, rejoice in expiating them.
► The third joy of the souls in Purgatory is the comfort of love, because love makes everything easier. “Where there is
love, there is no labor, or, if there is labor, the labor is loved,” says St. Augustine. The souls in Purgatory are in an ocean of love, because Purgatory is a contest of love. It is love that gives pain to the souls, but the pain is mitigated by love, much more than the suffering of St. Laurence, who was martyred, roasted alive on a burning grill. “The coals,” he exclaimed, “are for me like roses” ― and yet they were so hot that he also told the tyrant: “I am already cooked on this side; turn me over to cook the other side!”
Dead Man Prefers Fires of Purgatory to Life on Earth
In confirmation of what has just been said, there is a famous event that happened in the year 1070 to St. Stanislaus, Bishop of Krakow. The wicked Prince Boleslaw was persecuting St. Stanislaus. Among the many persecutions leveled against the saint, he succeeded in exciting against him the rage of the heirs of a certain Peter Miles, who had died three years before. The dead man had left some of his land to the Church. The heirs―being sure of the protection of Prince Boleslaw, sued St. Stanislaus, and, subordinating or intimidating a number of witnesses, obtained a verdict that the saint be obliged to return the lands.
When he saw that the court would not issue a just sentence, St. Stanislaus appealed with trust to the Justice of God. He had the hearing and the sentence suspended and promised to bring as witness the very deceased maker of the will, Peter Miles, who was already three years in the tomb. His proposal was received and accepted, in the midst of sharp ridicule for its seeming absurdity.
After three days of fasting and prayer, the holy bishop went with some clergymen and people to the tomb of Peter Miles and ordered it to be opened. Of course, they found there were only a few bones among the dust. The enemies of the saint exulted―certain of their victory. The saint, however, ordered those bones to rise again in the Name of Jesus, Who is life and resurrection. At this command, those bones, under the eyes of all the people present, miraculously gathered and joined together and filled out with flesh. The dead man came out of the tomb. Peter Miles gave his hand to the St. Stanislaus and went with him, followed by the clergymen and the flabbergasted people, to Prince Boleslaw. Peter Miles attested to Boleslaw the truth of the donation of land that he had given to St. Stanislaus.
After that, St. Stanislaus asked Peter Miles whether he wished to go back to the tomb or to live a few more years on Earth. The resurrected man answered that, even though he was still in Purgatory in the midst of excruciating pains for the many sins he had committed, he would rather go back to the fires and pains of Purgatory, rather than to live on Earth without having the guarantee of being saved. He only implored St. Stanislaus to pray and offer sacrifices for him, so that he might soon be freed from all his suffering. He was then taken back to the tomb in a great procession and the St. Stanislaus blessed him. He lay down inside the tomb and quickly decomposed to the state of mere bones whence he had come. This reported fact is historical and witnessed by over a thousand people.
Now They Understand God
St. Catherine of Genoa received special revelations about the joys of Purgatory. She writes: “I see the souls to be eager in suffering the pains of Purgatory for two reasons. Firstly, because they consider the mercy of God. They understand that if God’s goodness would not soften justice with mercy, satisfying it with the most Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, then even a single sin would merit a thousand Hells. The souls in Purgatory, in fact, perceive with a special light the greatness and the sanctity of God. They suffer, but, at the same time, they rejoice in adoring His greatness and recognizing His sanctity. Their joy is similar to that of the martyrs who suffered in adoration of and witness to the living God and Jesus the Savior; however, for the souls in Purgatory, this joy is felt to a much higher degree.”
Another reason for the souls in Purgatory to rejoice, says St. Catherine of Genoa, is expiation. The souls in Purgatory see themselves doing the will of God, and they delight in what the love and mercy of God are creating in them. God impresses these two attributes on their minds in an instant, and, because they are in a state of Sanctifying Grace, they hear and understand it according to their own capacity, with great joy. This joy increases with their degree of closeness to God. The smallest knowledge that it is possible to have of God is, in fact, much greater than any pain or happiness of which man can conceive on earth. This is why the souls in Purgatory accept with joy the pains which, purifying them, make them closer to God. Little by little, they see the diminishment of the obstacles that hinder them from possessing and delighting in Him.
The Joy of a Good Conscience and the Joy of Suffering
As already stated earlier, Joy is linked to Love and the Heart (a.k.a. the “Will”)―whereas Happiness is linked to Wisdom and the Mind (a.k.a. the “Intellect”). JOY, LOVE and HEART and like a Trinitarian connection. Joy is an effect or byproduct of LOVE―for JOY does not exist by itself, it is a result or a child of LOVE. We can apply this to what is called “The JOY of a Good Conscience”. A “good conscience” is one that has not sinned (or has properly confessed its sins)―therefore, a “good conscience” is one that keeps the commandments of God. This “JOY of Good Conscience” is linked to keeping the commandments out of LOVE of God―as Jesus said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
The keeping of the commandments of God is a proof of love―and it is the very basic, or initial kind of true love that we have for God. It is the kind of love that is associated with Beginners in the Spiritual Life. The joy of a good conscience is the joy that comes from having this very basic, introductory, first-rung-of-the-ladder, kindergarten, or lower-school kind of love―whereby the soul stops committing Mortal Sin and keeps the soul in a state of Sanctifying Grace. This joy of a good conscience should, however, not stop there―nobody should quit their education after just attending lower-school, they should progress through both middle-school and high-school. The next two hurdles of love and joy, that follow on after the Way of Beginners, are the Way of the Proficient and then the Way of the Perfect. After tackling and overcoming Mortal Sin before being able to enter into the Way of Beginners, the soul has now to tackle and overcome Venial Sin to enter the Way of the Proficient; and finally, the soul advances to loving and finding joy in suffering for God in the Way of the Perfect. We cannot enter Heaven unless we are Perfect―that is why so many souls who die in the state of being Beginners or in the state of being Proficient, have to go to Purgatory and lovingly and joyously suffer there until they reach Perfection.
So, hopefully, you can see that JOY is not some kind of “Candy-Floss” Joy that is ever-so-sweet and just melts in your mouth; nor some kind of funny joy that loves telling jokes and laughing all the time; nor some kind of joy where you do little or nothing and are spoon-fed dollops of joy by God. True joy is much more robust and much more involved than that! Joy is an effect of love―and love is something that has to be shown to God with our whole heart, mind, soul and strength―even to the point of sacrificing your life out of love: “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). That is why Christ tells everyone to enroll in the School of Love―which is Way of the Cross, which is a way upon which we can test and prove our love. “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). Ultimately, the greater our love is, then the greater our joy will be―and the greatest love of all is laying down your life for God (as Christ did for us)―and that involves great suffering―but that great suffering brings great joy afterwards, and eternally in Heaven. Is that not what we want and are seeking?
Joy in Love
Finding joy in love seems pretty obvious, doesn’t it? We all love to be loved and enjoy it! Love is in the heart and joy is in the heart and “there is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:16). But what version of love are we talking about―your version of love or God’s version of love? We envisage, want and pursue a love without suffering―but true love, God’s version of love, is allied to suffering. “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son” (John 3:16) … “He spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all!” (Romans 8:32) … “God loved us and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins!” (1 John 4:10) … “Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present wicked world” (Galatians 1:4) … “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross!” (Philippians 2:8). Yes―God’s love sent His Son to die for our sins in order to save us! To die for His enemies―because that is what we are if commit sin, are worldly, and love the world: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
Yes―through sin and worldliness―we are God’s enemies. Yet His love leads God to put His own Son to death so that we might be rescued from sin and have eternal life. That is why the Son of God commands: “This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you!” (John 15:12). To love as Christ loved means suffering―for Christ said: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor, and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you: Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you! ― so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and the bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even sinners [publicans] do this? And if you only salute your brethren, what do you do that is more? Do not the heathens and pagans also do this? Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:43-48).
For most people, a true love of their enemies brings with it, not joy, but sadness and even revulsion! Somehow we cannot bring ourselves to truly love our enemies―and that means all our enemies, not just those who are only “teeny-weeny” enemies! It includes our worst enemies―those who we love to complain about, put down, expose, berate, denigrate and plainly hate! That is the ultimate test and proof of love―as Our Lord said: “If you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even sinners [publicans] do this? And if you only salute your brethren, what do you do that is more? Do not the heathens and pagans also do this? … Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! Pray for them!” That is what Our Lord did (and still does) for us―His enemies through sin and worldliness! That is what we should to our own enemies. “Father, forgive them! They know not what they do!” To do that sincerely and truthfully must be a truly liberating experience―and it must bring about joy of enormous proportions.
For those who cannot let go of their spirit of vengeance and revenge―perhaps the following words are worth meditating upon: “If your enemy be hungry, give him to eat! If he is thirsty, give him to drink! For, doing this, you shall heap coals of fire upon his head!” (Romans 12:20).
Many people use the words “joy” and “happiness” interchangeably―to them, the two words mean the same thing. Yet that is not true―both Scripturally and grammatically. If you look at the earlier Latin translations of Holy Scripture, they usually denote our English “happy” and “happiness” with the word “beatus” meaning “blessed” or “happy.” As for our English “joy” or “joyful”, the Latin words are usually “gaudium” or “laetitia” meaning “joy” ― which you might notice are also used by the Church in the Liturgy, with “Gaudete Sunday” (3rd Sunday in Advent) and “Laetare Sunday” (4th Sunday in Lent). The Introit of the Mass on Gaudete Sunday begins with the words “Gaudete in Domino!” meaning “Rejoice in the Lord!” The Introit of the Mass on Laetare Sunday begins with the words “Laetare Jerusalem!” meaning “Rejoice Jerusalem!” The word “Rejoice” is linked with the word “joy” and is essentially a command to be joyful again “re-joy-ce.” We get a double-barreled version of joy in the Easter prayer to Our Lady, which says: “Gaude et Laetare Virgo Maria, Alleluia! Quia surrexit Dominus vere, Alleluia!” ― there is nothing like a resurrection from the dead to produce joy!
Mind & Heart ― Happiness & Joy ― Wisdom and Love
They say that happiness is in the mind and joy is in the heart. We see this to be the case in Holy Scripture: “Happy is he that has had no sadness of his mind” (Ecclesiasticus 14:2) … “They are a joy to my heart” (Psalm 118:111). You will not find the word “joy” being expressly joined to the word “mind” ― joy is reserved for the heart, and happiness for the mind ― which makes sense, since the two powers of our soul are the mind (a.k.a. the intellect) and the heart (a.k.a. the will). Happiness is the pinnacle for the mind and joy is the pinnacle for the heart: “There is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:16).
For St. Thomas Aquinas, while both happiness and joy are related to the attainment of good―joy is the conscious attainment of some good; while happiness is the ultimate, perfect, and lasting contemplation of God by the mind. The mind seeks what is true and heart seeks what is good―and only God can truly fulfill the mind’s desire for truth and the heart’s desire for what is good. Everything else is imperfect, insufficient, finite and therefore unsatisfying to both mind and heart.
It is said that wisdom is the pinnacle of the mind, and love is the pinnacle of the heart. Of all forms of knowledge by the mind, wisdom is said to be the pinnacle of knowledge. For St. Thomas Aquinas, wisdom is “the most perfect of the intellectual virtues”, the pinnacle of speculative knowledge, the queen of the sciences. But then he points out that “charity is the form of all the virtues” including wisdom, and that wisdom itself is ordered by charity, for “charity directs wisdom to its proper end.” Charity (the love of God and neighbor) is superior because it unites the soul to God in a way that surpasses intellectual knowledge. St. Thomas Aquinas says: “To love God is something greater than to know Him” and he emphasizes that “charity surpasses all other virtues in dignity” as it unites and conforms the human person to God, Who is love itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). “If, then, we possess charity, we possess God, for ‘God is Charity’ (1 John 4:8).” says St. Albert the Great.
Another element that indicates and emphasizes the superiority of love over knowledge is the simple response to the Catechism question: “Why did God make you?” The answer is: “God made to know Him, love Him, serve Him in this life, so that I can be happy with Him in the next life in Heaven.” The answer contains far more than you would think at first glance. Notice that knowledge comes before love―this does not mean it is more important than love, it means that we must first know something before we can love that thing. If you do not know that something exists, you cannot say that you love it! So before we can love God, we have to know God, learn about God. Similarly with love―love is not just words, saying: “I love you!” Our Lord says: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord, Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). Love has to proved―and we do that by serving God: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” said Our Lord (John 14:15, 14:21-24). “Seek to do the things that please Him!” (Tobias 14:10). “Seek His commandments!” (Psalm 77:7). “I will seek Thy commandments with my whole heart!” (Psalm 118:69).
True joy―everlasting joy―comes from God: “Behold the joy that comes to thee from God!” (Baruch 4:36). How can expect to find joy from God if we are not keeping His commandments? How can we expect Him to give us the greatest pleasure ― “There is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:16) ― if we do not give Him the pleasure of keeping His commandments? How can we say we love God if we break His commandments?
If “there is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:16) and if charity is the greatest virtue: “…the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13), and if charity is associated with the heart: “love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart” (Mark 12:30), then we have this clear picture of a ‘trinitarian’, or triumvirate, or threesome, or triangle of love, joy and heart. To love with the heart is the greatest commandment (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31) and joy is “the greatest pleasure of the heart” (1 Corinthians 13:13), therefore you shall find true joy by exercising a true love―and the more you love, the more joy you will experience. Hence Our Lord tells you to love “with your whole heart, and with your whole soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind” (Luke 10:27). It is from that love that we will get joy. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that “Joy is not numbered among the theological virtues, nor among the moral, nor among the intellectual virtues … Joy is not a virtue distinct from charity, but an effect of charity.”
God Alone
St. Francis of Assisi and St. John of the Cross were wholly centered on and fully joyful in God. Though St. Francis was born in 1181 in Assisi, Italy, and St. John in 1542 in Fontiveros, Spain―they have a common message: Joy in God alone. St. Francis says: “Let nothing else please us and cause us delight except our Creator, Redeemer and Savior, the only true God!” John says of God outright: “He alone is my joy!” Both men were wholly centered on and fully joyful in God. They weren’t self-preoccupied, but God-occupied because each one followed Jesus’ command to deny self. Francis called it poverty. John called it the path of nothingness. Either way it is a simple path. They make living the Gospel simple and real, because all one needs to do is to rejoice in God and forget self. Both saints place our focus on the Greatest Commandment―which is to love God and neighbor: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
We love neighbor by first loving God, which necessitates a surrendering of every other addictive love to be addicted to God alone! What else can loving something or someone with your whole heart, mind, soul and strength mean―other than addiction. It is that loving addiction to God that brings joy―regardless of what it brings, regardless of what might happen―whether it be pleasant or unpleasant. When someone is madly in love, nothing seems to perturb or disturb them―for the power of love overrides everything and the effect of that powerful love is deep joy.
Shopping for Joy and Happiness?
Is there a Supermarket of Joy? Is Joy on the shelves? Is Happiness on the shelves? Can you afford it? What does it cost? What is the best brand? How long is the shelf-life? What is the expiry date? Is it organic or does it have man-made additives? Is it the real thing? How can you tell?
Christianity is a religion of joy. Real joy comes from God, Who has created us, conquered us, and liberated us from the eternal death and sadness of sin. Joy comes from God, not from within. When we look within ourselves, we either become proud or sad―both of which are bad. We have joy only when we look outside ourselves to Christ. Without Christ, true joy is not only hard to find, it is impossible to find. The world desperately seeks joy, but in all the wrong places. However, our joy comes because Christ sought us, found us, saved us, keeps us and loves us. We cannot have joy apart from Christ, because it doesn’t exist. Joy is not something we can conjure up. True joy is a by-product of true love―a by-product of God’s love.
Love and joy are closely linked. Joy is a natural outcome of living a life rooted in love. Joy can be seen as a response to experiencing love―whether it is God’s love, the love from others, or the love we have for others. The idea that joy comes from love is also reflected in the belief that God’s love is the source of all true joy and true happiness. Joy flows from the realization that we are loved by God and by our family and friends.
Joy isn’t the absence of sadness—it’s the presence of the Holy Spirit―and joy is one of the Twelve Fruits of the Holy Spirit: “The fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, etc” (Galatians 5:22) and “the charity of God is poured forth in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost, Who is given to us” (Romans 5:5) ― and joy is an effect of that charity, a reaction to that charity, a consequence of that charity. And although the Holy Ghost (Holy Spirit) produces joy within us, He often does so by humbling us―so that we would take our eyes off ourselves and fix our eyes on Christ. Real joy doesn’t always mean there’s a smile on our faces―real joy exists even amid real sadness and great suffering.
The Joys of Suffering
St. Pachomius (292-348) says: “How can you wish to be freed from your sufferings? Do you not yet know that no mortification is so pleasing to God as the joyful, or at least patient acceptance of the crosses He imposes?” St. Vincent de Paul (1580-1660) adds: “Our joy depends upon the Cross!” St. Francis of Assisi (1181-1226) further adds: “If we endure all things patiently and with gladness, thinking on the sufferings of our Blessed Lord, and bearing all for the love of Him―herein is perfect joy.” St. Francis Borgia (1510-1572) says the same thing: “Those who have not altogether lost their fervor for the spiritual life, can find true happiness nowhere but in the Cross of Christ. All the pleasures of the world seem heavy and wearisome to them, once they have experienced the sweetness of the Savior’s Cross, so that it seems to them a grievous thing if they have no cross to carry and are left to live without trials and sufferings.” St. Paul rejoices in his sufferings when he writes: “With Christ I am nailed to the cross! … God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 2:19; 6:14).
Now why on earth does God expect us to find joy in suffering? Isn’t that an oxymoron (a combination of contradictory words)? Somehow “joy” and “suffering” don’t seem to ‘jive’ together―a bit like “freezing heat” or “a bird swimming underwater” or “solid gas.” Isn’t it contradictory to pair “joy” with “suffering”? It’s a bit like laughing and gnashing your teeth! The reason we fail to see the connection is because we are spiritually myopic, nearsighted or even blind! We fail to connect the “spiritual dots” and see the bigger picture. There is no pay-day without having worked for the money. What you put into something is what you get out of something. “What things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:8).
The Misery and Pain of Sin
Sin begets death: “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). Sin places us into the hands of Satan: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). We are all sinners: “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). Sin deserves Hell: “Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the Kingdom of God? Do not err! Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor the effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor railers [using verbally abusive language], nor extortioners, shall possess the Kingdom of God!” (1 Corinthians 6:9-10).
God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrha because of sin: “The men of Sodom were very wicked, and sinners before the face of the Lord, beyond measure … And the Lord said: ‘The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied, and their sin is become exceedingly grievous!’ … And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from the Lord out of Heaven, and He destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the earth … Abraham looked towards Sodom and Gomorrha and the whole land of that country―and he saw the ashes rise up from the Earth like the smoke of a furnace” (Genesis 13:13; 18:20; 19:24-28).
Heck―even before that―God destroyed the world with the Great Flood because of sin, sparing only Noe and his family: “And the Earth was corrupted before God, and was filled with iniquity. And when God had seen that the Earth was corrupted, He said to Noe: ‘The end of all flesh is come before Me, the Earth is filled with iniquity through them, and I will destroy them with the Earth! … I will make it rain upon the Earth forty days and forty nights; and I will destroy every substance that I have made from the face of the Earth!’ … And the flood gates of Heaven were opened, and the rain fell upon the Earth forty days and forty nights.
“And the flood was forty days upon the Earth, and the waters increased―they overflowed exceedingly and filled all on the face of the Earth. And the waters prevailed beyond measure upon the Earth―and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered. The water was fifteen cubits (15 yards or 45 feet) higher than the mountains which it covered. And all flesh was destroyed that moved upon the Earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beasts, and all men. And God destroyed all the substance that was upon the Earth, from man even to beast, and the creeping things and fowls of the air: and they were destroyed from the Earth―and Noe only remained, and they that were with him in the ark. And the waters prevailed upon the earth a hundred and fifty days” (Genesis 6:11-13; 7:4, 12; 7:17-24).
From the above, we can more easily understand and accept what the Catechism teaches about the sins that we commit all to easily and all too often: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
Sin Requires Punishment
Most people want to sin but don’t want to pay for sin. Penance―which is a form of suffering―pays for sin. The vast majority of people crazily imagine that by merely confessing their sins to the priest and doing the penance that he imposes (usually something like “Three Hail Marys” or “Five Our Fathers” etc., is enough to pay for their sins. Nothing could be further from the truth. Those “Three Hail Marys” or “Five Our Fathers” are merely the tip of the iceberg of penance that must be done in order to pay for the damage of sin―it is like the first payment on 100-year mortgage! Sin is serious―the greatest evil in the world―and sin must be punished. We either punish ourselves by doing penance, or, if we fail to do that, then God’s Providence will arrange punishments for us. We fail to see how great a mercy it is to be punished for sin in this life rather than the next life! Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, in his book Life Everlasting, writes:
“Suffering in Purgatory is greater than all suffering on Earth. Such is the doctrine of tradition, supported by theological reasoning. Tradition is expressed by St. Augustine: ‘That fire will be more painful than anything man can suffer in the present life!’ St. Bonaventure says: ‘In the next life, the purifying purgatorial suffering will be more severe than the greatest trials on Earth!’ According to these testimonies and others similar to them, the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest sufferings of the present life. We must understand that for one and the same sin, the smallest suffering in Purgatory is greater than any corresponding suffering on Earth. The absence of God is without doubt a very great suffering, but it is sweetened and consoled by the assured hope of once possessing Him. From this hope there arises an incredible joy, which grows in measure as the soul approaches the end of its exile. Many theologians rightly remark that the sufferings in Purgatory are of a higher order than our terrestrial sufferings, and in this sense we may say that the smallest suffering in Purgatory is more severe than the greatest suffering on Earth. The joy they have in the hope of deliverance cannot diminish the suffering they feel from being deprived of the beatific vision. St. Catherine of Genoa speaks thus: ‘Souls in Purgatory unite great joy with great suffering. One does not diminish the other. No peace is comparable to that of the souls in Purgatory, except that of the saints in Heaven. On the other hand, the souls in Purgatory endure torments which no tongue can describe and no intelligence comprehend, without special revelation. The least vision they can have of God, overbalances all woes and all joys that can be conceived. Yet their joy in God does not by any means lessen their pain.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, Life Everlasting).
Positive Outlook & Negative Outlook
Some people are always optimistic; others are always pessimistic. For some the glass is seen as half-full; others see the glass as being half-empty. The same is true of our view of God’s Providence―especially the “tough” side of His Providence―some see all tough things as being good and acceptable because God has ordained those things to happen; others see those tough things as being bad and unacceptable, and cannot stop moaning, groaning, grumbling and complaining about them.
This reminds us of the two thieves who were crucified alongside Christ on Calvary―we popularly call them “The Good Thief” and “The Bad Thief” ― not because one was good at stealing and the other was bad at stealing ― but because of their attitude to the sufferings that they were enduring. The “Bad Thief” wasn’t sorry for his sins and wanted Christ to get them out of that mess of being crucified. The “Good Thief” accepted his crucifixion as a fair and just price for his sins, and was willing to be killed for his sins, while asking Jesus to have mercy on him after death:
“And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, they crucified Jesus there; and the robbers, one on the right hand, and the other on the left … And one of those robbers who were hanging, blasphemed Jesus, saying: ‘If You are Christ, then save Yourself and us!’ But the other robber answering, rebuked him, saying: ‘Do you not fear God, seeing that you are condemned under the same condemnation? And we indeed are justly condemned, for we receive the due reward for our deeds; but this Man [Jesus] has done no evil!’ And he said to Jesus: ‘Lord, remember me when You shall come into Your Kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to you, this day you shall be with Me in Paradise!’” (Luke 23:33-43).
Which of two sinners on Calvary do we resemble? Do we complain about things when they do not go our way? Or do we accept all the difficulties and pains of life as a just reward for our many sins? There is no doubt that we are all sinners―but there is a doubt as to if we want to pay for those sins! Penance is the usual currency. “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). Our Lord adds: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5). The Cross of Christ is the backbone of that penance―and without it, we cannot enter Heaven: “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). The cross is an unavoidable staple diet of our Faith and life. The cross is part of God’s payment plan for us to pay off our debt for sins. We can accept the payment plan or refuse it―much like the two thieves hanging on their crosses on Calvary. This led St. Augustine to say: “The same cross will lead some souls to Heaven and other souls to Hell!”
The Joy of the Cross
Along the same lines, Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Embrace the Cross and bear it with joy in imitation of my Son! … Bear the Cross with joyful resignation and give praise to the Lord, because His will is being fulfilled in your regard! … Humiliate yourself under the mighty hand of the Lord! … The divine influence will urge and draw you on to the desire of being despised by creatures, to joyful suffering, to a love of the Cross and an earnest and generous acceptation of it! … You cannot follow Christ if you refuse to embrace the Cross and rejoice in it! … Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity! … Let the will of the Lord be your only delight and joy! ... If labors and sufferings are accepted with joy and with serenity of heart, they spiritualize the creature, they elevate it and furnish it with a divine insight; by which the soul begins to esteem affliction at its proper value and soon finds consolation and the blessings of mortification and of freedom from disorderly passions. In my life, I forgot the bitterness and labors I had suffered; for the great joy drove out pain, though I never lost from view what my Son had suffered for the human race.
“Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. He is not a true devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. But our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us―who see them forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation. And yet even all this is insufficient, since their inclinations and their blind love of visible things detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart; they rob them of remembrance and affection toward these higher things, which might raise them above themselves and above created things. Hence it comes, that men do not find joy in their tribulations, nor rest in their labors, nor consolation in their sorrows, nor any peace in adversities.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
If the Cross of Christ pays for sin―which it does―then why on earth are we not more joyful about the Cross? Have we not sinned? Have we not committed the greatest evil in the world―perhaps thousands, or hundreds of thousands of times? “For our iniquities are multiplied over our heads, and our sins are grown up even unto Heaven!” (1 Esdras 9:6). If “the wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). If “the soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:20). Do we then not deserve multiple death sentences? Do we not deserve a thousand Hells? Yet God is prepared to accept a pittance of a payment for those atrocities against His Divine Majesty―that pittance of a payment comes in the form of the Cross, which God expects us to carry: “Whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
What could be clearer than that? What could be more joyful than that? It is like a criminal being sentenced to multiple life sentences in prison―and then being allowed to pay it all off with one month’s hard labor! Would he not jump at the chance? Would he not be filled with joy and delight? Of course he would! Yet we find no joy in that massive discount on our death sentence that we have justly deserved by our sins! Or if we had a debt of several billion dollars and we were allowed to pay it off by one year’s hard labor! Would we not joyfully accept that deal? Of course we would―even though it would a year of grueling toil and hard labor. When we look at the gravity and the evil of sin―even “teeny-weeny” venial sin―and weigh-up the debt it has caused us―is not the carrying of the Cross of Christ a massive, undeserved, discount on what we really should be paying or carrying? The problem is that we are so “cheap” that we have made sin seem to be cheap as well!
The Pain of Debt
More than 8 in 10 Americans, or around 85%, have some form of consumer debt, including credit card debt, mortgages, medical debt, auto loans, student loans, legal debt, etc. Every country in the world has some level of debt. The same is true on the spiritual level―every single person has a debt for sin, because everyone has sinned: “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46) … “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). That debt has to be paid either here on Earth or in Purgatory, with Our Lord saying: “I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from there, until thou pay the very last penny!” (Luke 12:59).
On the financial level, carrying debt can lead to significant stress, anxiety, and even physical and mental health problems. The weight of debt can be a constant source of worry and negativity. Paying off debt can alleviate this stress, bring a sense of relief, leading to improved mental and physical well-being, as well as improved mental health, leading to increased self-confidence and a more positive outlook on life. Debt can strain relationships. Paying off debt can improve those relationships. Paying off debt means you're no longer paying interest, which can save you a significant amount of money over time. Paying off debt can improve your credit score, making it easier to get loans and credit in the future.
The same is true on the spiritual level―the debt for sin can also lead to significant stress, anxiety, discouragement, depression and even despair! The following extracts from the Penitential Psalms show this: “I know my iniquity and my sin is always before me! … My iniquities are gone over my head, and as a heavy burden are become heavy upon me! … Day and night Thy hand was heavy upon me! … There is no health in my flesh, because of Thy wrath! … My sores are putrefied and corrupted, because of my foolishness! … There is no health in my flesh! … My bones are troubled! My bones burn away like a fire! … I am turned in my anguish, whilst the thorn is fastened! … My days are vanishing like smoke! … My soul is troubled exceedingly! … My heart is troubled! … My heart is withered like the grass! … I roared with the groaning of my heart! … My strength has left me! … I am become miserable and am bowed down! I walk sorrowful all the day long! … I forget to eat my bread! … For there is no one in death, Lord, that is mindful of Thee! And who shall confess to Thee in Hell! I have labored in my groaning, every night I will water my bed with my tears! … There is no peace for my bones, because of my sins! … I have acknowledged my sin and my injustice I have not concealed!” (combined extracts from Psalms 6:3-7; 31:4-5; 37:4-19; 50:5; 101:4-5; 142:4-7).
The Joy of Paying
We should be overjoyed at being given the possibility of paying for our sins―our many thousands, or hundreds-of-thousands, or even millions of sins that we will have committed by the end of our lives! A sin-a-minute results in almost 1,000 sins (960 sins) in an 18 hour day. That would give you over 350,000 sins per year. Let’s say you live to be 60 years after reaching the age of reason (since you cannot fulfill the requirements for a deliberate sin under the age of reason)―that means you could be committing over 21 million sins in your lifetime! Let’s pretend that you are very righteous and just person, who sins very little―perhaps only 10 times a day (wishful thinking!). That would give you 3,650 sins per year and around 220,000 sins in the above stated lifetime. Considering that the Catechism teaches that even venial is greatest evil in the world after mortal sin―even for a just and righteous person that is one heck of a debt! If God is prepared to make a generous and very lenient payment plan for all those sins―should you not be overjoyed at being given the chance to pay it all off?
No Desire to Pay
Unfortunately, once we lose the sense of the gravity of sin, then we automatically lose the sense of the great debt that sin incurs, and therefore we are not prepared to pay very much for having sinned. Since the Second World War, one pope after another―across the whole spectrum from Traditional, to Conservative, to Liberal pope, to Modernist―have all lamented modern man’s loss of the sense of sin.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
The valid complaints of these popes are corroborated and verified by the unbelievable falling-away from the Sacrament of Confession. As one modern mainstream Catholic priest wrote in 2021: “In Catholic circles in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, patterns of regular confession that were once in abundance began to fade. While frequent confession became a thing of the past, Catholics continued to receive Communion.” Surveys show that to be true. Between 1965 and 1975, according to the National Opinion Research Council, the proportion of Catholics who confessed monthly fell from 38% to 17%. A University of Notre Dame study in the 1980s showed the decline continuing. In a 1997 poll by the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research at the University of Connecticut, only 10% of Catholics surveyed said that they confessed at least once a month; another 10% said they never went to confession at all. By 2015, a Pew Research Center survey showed that only 7% of Catholics went to Confession monthly; only 14% went several times a year; 21% only went once a year; 23% went less than once a year; and 35% no longer went to Confession. More recent statistics indicate that 45% of Catholics in the USA have never confessed since making the first Confession after coming of age. Almost 90% of those who line up to commune in the United States every Sunday [but take note that only around 15% of all Catholics go to Mass regularly each Sunday―so 90% of those 15%], and 95% of regular communicants in certain areas of Northern Europe and 60 to 80% in Italy are not even confessing once a year.
Joy in Purgatory
Purgatory is a state of temporary punishment for those who die in God’s grace (in a state of sanctifying grace), but are not yet fully purified from their venial sins, or have not fully atoned or paid the debt for their sins―both mortal and venial sins. Souls in Purgatory experience joy in knowing they are saved and will eventually enter Heaven―and this is a joy that surpasses earthly pleasures. As they are purified, the souls in Purgatory experience a growing union with God, which is a source of great joy to them.
Purgatory is a marvelous interaction of love between God and the soul. God, the One Who purifies the soul with suffering, purifies the soul out of love. Therefore, He looks for all ways to soften, as much as possible, the suffering that purifies the soul. The soul, that is being purified, suffers greatly―but the love that ties the soul to God Who purifies it, makes the suffering more acceptable. The surgeon who treats a patient looks in every way to alleviate the pain, and the patient who suffers finds relief in the thought that, although he is in pain, he will be cured. Knowing this, he suffers with patience.
It is no surprise, then, to recognize that, in Purgatory, there are joys, comforts, and relief. In this we see the love of God toward those souls who are being purified, and the love of the souls who, longing to be purified, contemplate with love the harmony between Divine Justice and Divine Mercy. The souls want to suffer―for it is a need of their own love that drives them toward God. In their pains, they feel the comfort of God, and cannot refuse their purification because of the happiness they will receive in their eternal glory.
► The first joy of the souls in Purgatory is to feel confirmed in Sanctifying Grace. Now they are sure of their eternal salvation and their happy incapacity to sin; they consider all the horror of sins they have committed, feel an immense sorrow in the pains they suffer now, and repent of these sins sincerely. It is a joy that we cannot easily comprehend because we live carelessly in the uncertainty of our eternal salvation. It is a fact, confirmed by many revelations and historical accounts, that the souls in Purgatory prefer to remain in the pains they suffer there, with the assurance of being saved and without sin, rather than to return to earth with no assurance of being saved. Those who were returned to life by miracles of the saints always chose to go back to death and return to Purgatory.
► The second joy that the souls in Purgatory feel is their very own expiation. Because they love God in a perfect way and long for Him, they are heartily sorry for having offended Him and desire to expiate and make amends. There are souls on earth who, truly repenting of their sins, feel the need to add to the sacramental penance other severe penances: the hair shirt, scourges, fasting, and discomforts of all kinds. In these, they rejoice in their inner spirit because they suffer for love. The souls in Purgatory, having a perfect knowledge even of their smallest sins, rejoice in expiating them.
► The third joy of the souls in Purgatory is the comfort of love, because love makes everything easier. “Where there is
love, there is no labor, or, if there is labor, the labor is loved,” says St. Augustine. The souls in Purgatory are in an ocean of love, because Purgatory is a contest of love. It is love that gives pain to the souls, but the pain is mitigated by love, much more than the suffering of St. Laurence, who was martyred, roasted alive on a burning grill. “The coals,” he exclaimed, “are for me like roses” ― and yet they were so hot that he also told the tyrant: “I am already cooked on this side; turn me over to cook the other side!”
Dead Man Prefers Fires of Purgatory to Life on Earth
In confirmation of what has just been said, there is a famous event that happened in the year 1070 to St. Stanislaus, Bishop of Krakow. The wicked Prince Boleslaw was persecuting St. Stanislaus. Among the many persecutions leveled against the saint, he succeeded in exciting against him the rage of the heirs of a certain Peter Miles, who had died three years before. The dead man had left some of his land to the Church. The heirs―being sure of the protection of Prince Boleslaw, sued St. Stanislaus, and, subordinating or intimidating a number of witnesses, obtained a verdict that the saint be obliged to return the lands.
When he saw that the court would not issue a just sentence, St. Stanislaus appealed with trust to the Justice of God. He had the hearing and the sentence suspended and promised to bring as witness the very deceased maker of the will, Peter Miles, who was already three years in the tomb. His proposal was received and accepted, in the midst of sharp ridicule for its seeming absurdity.
After three days of fasting and prayer, the holy bishop went with some clergymen and people to the tomb of Peter Miles and ordered it to be opened. Of course, they found there were only a few bones among the dust. The enemies of the saint exulted―certain of their victory. The saint, however, ordered those bones to rise again in the Name of Jesus, Who is life and resurrection. At this command, those bones, under the eyes of all the people present, miraculously gathered and joined together and filled out with flesh. The dead man came out of the tomb. Peter Miles gave his hand to the St. Stanislaus and went with him, followed by the clergymen and the flabbergasted people, to Prince Boleslaw. Peter Miles attested to Boleslaw the truth of the donation of land that he had given to St. Stanislaus.
After that, St. Stanislaus asked Peter Miles whether he wished to go back to the tomb or to live a few more years on Earth. The resurrected man answered that, even though he was still in Purgatory in the midst of excruciating pains for the many sins he had committed, he would rather go back to the fires and pains of Purgatory, rather than to live on Earth without having the guarantee of being saved. He only implored St. Stanislaus to pray and offer sacrifices for him, so that he might soon be freed from all his suffering. He was then taken back to the tomb in a great procession and the St. Stanislaus blessed him. He lay down inside the tomb and quickly decomposed to the state of mere bones whence he had come. This reported fact is historical and witnessed by over a thousand people.
Now They Understand God
St. Catherine of Genoa received special revelations about the joys of Purgatory. She writes: “I see the souls to be eager in suffering the pains of Purgatory for two reasons. Firstly, because they consider the mercy of God. They understand that if God’s goodness would not soften justice with mercy, satisfying it with the most Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, then even a single sin would merit a thousand Hells. The souls in Purgatory, in fact, perceive with a special light the greatness and the sanctity of God. They suffer, but, at the same time, they rejoice in adoring His greatness and recognizing His sanctity. Their joy is similar to that of the martyrs who suffered in adoration of and witness to the living God and Jesus the Savior; however, for the souls in Purgatory, this joy is felt to a much higher degree.”
Another reason for the souls in Purgatory to rejoice, says St. Catherine of Genoa, is expiation. The souls in Purgatory see themselves doing the will of God, and they delight in what the love and mercy of God are creating in them. God impresses these two attributes on their minds in an instant, and, because they are in a state of Sanctifying Grace, they hear and understand it according to their own capacity, with great joy. This joy increases with their degree of closeness to God. The smallest knowledge that it is possible to have of God is, in fact, much greater than any pain or happiness of which man can conceive on earth. This is why the souls in Purgatory accept with joy the pains which, purifying them, make them closer to God. Little by little, they see the diminishment of the obstacles that hinder them from possessing and delighting in Him.
The Joy of a Good Conscience and the Joy of Suffering
As already stated earlier, Joy is linked to Love and the Heart (a.k.a. the “Will”)―whereas Happiness is linked to Wisdom and the Mind (a.k.a. the “Intellect”). JOY, LOVE and HEART and like a Trinitarian connection. Joy is an effect or byproduct of LOVE―for JOY does not exist by itself, it is a result or a child of LOVE. We can apply this to what is called “The JOY of a Good Conscience”. A “good conscience” is one that has not sinned (or has properly confessed its sins)―therefore, a “good conscience” is one that keeps the commandments of God. This “JOY of Good Conscience” is linked to keeping the commandments out of LOVE of God―as Jesus said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
The keeping of the commandments of God is a proof of love―and it is the very basic, or initial kind of true love that we have for God. It is the kind of love that is associated with Beginners in the Spiritual Life. The joy of a good conscience is the joy that comes from having this very basic, introductory, first-rung-of-the-ladder, kindergarten, or lower-school kind of love―whereby the soul stops committing Mortal Sin and keeps the soul in a state of Sanctifying Grace. This joy of a good conscience should, however, not stop there―nobody should quit their education after just attending lower-school, they should progress through both middle-school and high-school. The next two hurdles of love and joy, that follow on after the Way of Beginners, are the Way of the Proficient and then the Way of the Perfect. After tackling and overcoming Mortal Sin before being able to enter into the Way of Beginners, the soul has now to tackle and overcome Venial Sin to enter the Way of the Proficient; and finally, the soul advances to loving and finding joy in suffering for God in the Way of the Perfect. We cannot enter Heaven unless we are Perfect―that is why so many souls who die in the state of being Beginners or in the state of being Proficient, have to go to Purgatory and lovingly and joyously suffer there until they reach Perfection.
So, hopefully, you can see that JOY is not some kind of “Candy-Floss” Joy that is ever-so-sweet and just melts in your mouth; nor some kind of funny joy that loves telling jokes and laughing all the time; nor some kind of joy where you do little or nothing and are spoon-fed dollops of joy by God. True joy is much more robust and much more involved than that! Joy is an effect of love―and love is something that has to be shown to God with our whole heart, mind, soul and strength―even to the point of sacrificing your life out of love: “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). That is why Christ tells everyone to enroll in the School of Love―which is Way of the Cross, which is a way upon which we can test and prove our love. “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). Ultimately, the greater our love is, then the greater our joy will be―and the greatest love of all is laying down your life for God (as Christ did for us)―and that involves great suffering―but that great suffering brings great joy afterwards, and eternally in Heaven. Is that not what we want and are seeking?
Joy in Love
Finding joy in love seems pretty obvious, doesn’t it? We all love to be loved and enjoy it! Love is in the heart and joy is in the heart and “there is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:16). But what version of love are we talking about―your version of love or God’s version of love? We envisage, want and pursue a love without suffering―but true love, God’s version of love, is allied to suffering. “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son” (John 3:16) … “He spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all!” (Romans 8:32) … “God loved us and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins!” (1 John 4:10) … “Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present wicked world” (Galatians 1:4) … “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross!” (Philippians 2:8). Yes―God’s love sent His Son to die for our sins in order to save us! To die for His enemies―because that is what we are if commit sin, are worldly, and love the world: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
Yes―through sin and worldliness―we are God’s enemies. Yet His love leads God to put His own Son to death so that we might be rescued from sin and have eternal life. That is why the Son of God commands: “This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you!” (John 15:12). To love as Christ loved means suffering―for Christ said: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor, and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you: Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you! ― so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and the bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even sinners [publicans] do this? And if you only salute your brethren, what do you do that is more? Do not the heathens and pagans also do this? Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:43-48).
For most people, a true love of their enemies brings with it, not joy, but sadness and even revulsion! Somehow we cannot bring ourselves to truly love our enemies―and that means all our enemies, not just those who are only “teeny-weeny” enemies! It includes our worst enemies―those who we love to complain about, put down, expose, berate, denigrate and plainly hate! That is the ultimate test and proof of love―as Our Lord said: “If you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even sinners [publicans] do this? And if you only salute your brethren, what do you do that is more? Do not the heathens and pagans also do this? … Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! Pray for them!” That is what Our Lord did (and still does) for us―His enemies through sin and worldliness! That is what we should to our own enemies. “Father, forgive them! They know not what they do!” To do that sincerely and truthfully must be a truly liberating experience―and it must bring about joy of enormous proportions.
For those who cannot let go of their spirit of vengeance and revenge―perhaps the following words are worth meditating upon: “If your enemy be hungry, give him to eat! If he is thirsty, give him to drink! For, doing this, you shall heap coals of fire upon his head!” (Romans 12:20).
Article 28
"Laetare Sunday" & Monday after the 4th Sunday of Lent, March 30th & 31st
Are You Happy?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
"Laetare Sunday" & Monday after the 4th Sunday of Lent, March 30th & 31st
Are You Happy?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Laetare” Sunday
Today, the Fourth Sunday of Lent, is traditionally called “Laetare Sunday”—meaning “A Sunday to Rejoice”. This particular title owes its origins to the opening words of the Introit or Entrance Hymn for today’s Mass, which say: “Rejoice, O Jerusalem, and come together, all you who love her: rejoice with joy, you who have been in sorrow: that you may exult…”
Dom Guéranger, in his masterful multi-volume work, The Liturgical Year, states: “This Sunday, called, from the first word of the Introit, Laetare Sunday, is one of the most solemn of the year. The Church interrupts her Lenten mournfulness; the chants of the Mass speak of nothing but joy and consolation; the organ, which has been silent during the preceding three Sundays, now gives forth its melodious voice; the deacon resumes his dalmatic, and the subdeacon his tunic; and instead of purple, rose-colored vestments are allowed to be used.
“These same rites were practiced in Advent, on the third Sunday, called “Gaudete”. The Church’s motive for introducing this expression of joy into today’s liturgy is to encourage her children to persevere fervently to the end of this holy season. The real mid-Lent was last Thursday, but the Church, fearing lest the joy might lead to some infringement on the spirit of penance, has deferred her own notice of it to this Sunday, when she not only permits, but even bids, her children to rejoice!”
Pleasure―Happiness―Joy
Man is preoccupied with pleasure, happiness and joy. Every decision we make—even the really stupid ones, even the sinful ones—are typically driven by the idea that whatever we decide to do will give us pleasure, lead us to happiness and bring us joy. Pleasure, Happiness and Joy! Is that a trinity of experiences? Are they three words for one and same thing? While often used interchangeably, pleasure, happiness, and joy are distinct things, with pleasure being a fleeting, external sensation; happiness a more sustained state of well-being; and joy a deeper, intrinsic feeling of contentment. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that joy is more than happiness, just as happiness is more than pleasure. Pleasure is in the body. Happiness is in the mind and feelings. Joy is deep in the heart, the spirit, the center of the self. The way to legitimate pleasure is having power and prudence. The way to true happiness is moral goodness. The way to true and everlasting joy is sanctity―loving God with your whole heart and your neighbor as yourself. Everyone wants pleasure. More deeply, everyone wants happiness. Most deeply, everyone wants joy. We desire pleasures. We pine for happiness. But we were made for joy. Though very few people can recognize and tell the difference between these three things―pleasure, happiness and joy. Most mistake having pleasure for being happy and having joy. “There is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:16). “Joyfulness of the heart is the life of a man, and a never failing treasure of holiness!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:23).
More often than not, our false idea of happiness is all about me, me, me, me, me! Also―more often than not―our false idea of happiness is focused upon earthly things, earthly circumstances or other human beings. Earthly things and circumstances can change quickly―and very quickly, what made us find a false pleasure or happiness in them, also changes and so they no longer make us happy. The same is true for ourselves and other people―our thoughts, attitudes, preferences, way of living, way of speaking, way of acting can also change quickly―and so, what was once a source of our ‘happiness’ makes us happy no longer! “The joy of the Lord is our strength!” (2 Esdras 8:10). The only thing that is good and always will be good is God! God never changes. God’s love for you never changes. God’s caring for you never changes. God’s desire for your salvation never changes. It only something that never changes that can be a source of true joy. “Behold the joy that comes to thee from God!” (Baruch 4:36). “The joy of the hypocrite lasts only for a moment” (Job 20:5). As for the true and sincere lovers of God, “everlasting joy shall be given to them!” (Isaias 61:7). As Jesus said: “May My joy be in you, and may your joy be filled!” (John 15:11).
Many people entered into a marriage with the hope and expectation of find pleasure, happiness and joy―but were later left with nothing but displeasure, unhappiness and sorrow. Something happened to that once hopeful love and the married couple fell out of love―something changed that once euphoric love in bitter dislike and even hatred―perhaps it was adultery on someone’s part, or some form of abuse, or just an over-familiarity that bred indifference or contempt. The result being that pleasure, happiness and joy died and were buried. Similar things could be said about seeking pleasure, happiness and joy is begetting and raising children; or in entering a certain career or profession; or in making friends with others, etc. Circumstances can change―and those changes risk turning the initial pleasure, happiness and joy into displeasure, unhappiness and sorrow.
Everyone Seeks Something!
“What do you seek?” said Jesus (John 1:38). Though people might be befuddled about the differences―everyone seeks pleasure, happiness and joy. Some clump all three into one big ball―others see the differences between all three. Nevertheless, everyone is chasing after one or all of them. St. Thomas Aquinas says that everyone naturally wants to be happy ― but perfect happiness cannot be found in this world ― which is what Our Lady of Lourdes said to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next world!” Here is a summary of the arguments of St. Thomas Aquinas:
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN WEALTH: Man’s happiness is not to be found in wealth, whether this be natural wealth which serves his normal needs (such as food, clothing, housing), or artificial wealth which can provide the items of natural wealth, that is, money. Wealth of any kind is a means for acquiring something else; it is a thing that serves; it does not fulfill. Hence it cannot be the true last end of man and the object that will render him enduringly and completely happy.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN HONOR: Nor can man’s full happiness consist in honors bestowed because of some excellence in him. Any excellence in a man is in him by reason of some good already possessed; it means that he already has some degree of happiness. Honors come to him because of this happiness, and therefore honors cannot themselves be the constituting elements of perfect happiness.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN FAME AND GLORY: Nor can man’s happiness be found in fame and glory. These, like honors bestowed, presuppose some degree of happiness already attained, and this they publicize and praise. Fame and glory are consequent upon an imperfect happiness, and are, in some sense, the product of it. They cannot, therefore, be the essential elements of perfect happiness.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN POWER: Man’s perfect happiness cannot consist in the possession of power, for power is not a complete end, but a means; power is valuable according to the use to which it may be put. In a word, power looks on to something further; it cannot itself be the ultimate goal.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN THE GOODS OF THE BODY: Man’s ultimate happiness does not consist in goods of the body ― life, health, strength, beauty, agility, etc. ― for these goods preserve the body and its perfections. Merely to preserve life cannot be the end of life. Goods of the body are to be used by reason (intellect and will) somewhat as a ship is used by its master; the master does not use the ship merely to preserve the ship, but to carry profitable cargoes to desired ports. Thus it appears that the goods of the body are means, not complete ends. Besides, man is a rational being as well as a bodily being; he can never be completely fulfilled and satisfied by bodily goods.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN BODILY OR INTELLECTUAL PLEASURES: Pleasures, whether bodily or intellectual, cannot bring a man ultimate happiness. We have just seen that bodily things cannot be man’s perfect fulfillment. And mental enjoyments presuppose the end already attained; enjoyment follows upon possession of some good or end; what is consequent upon the end cannot itself be the end.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN GOODS OF THE SOUL: The goods of the soul ― its essence, faculties, acts, habits, perfections ― cannot constitute man’s ultimate end. Happiness is for the soul, and to be attained by the soul. The objective ultimate happiness is something outside the soul, which the soul seeks to bring into itself and possess subjectively. Hence this ultimate end is not the soul itself, nor the goods belonging to the soul.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN CREATED GOODS: Indeed, no created good can give man perfect happiness. Only the essential, universal, and boundless good can bring man complete and unfading fulfillment. No created good is universal, essential, and boundless; only the uncreated good can be the ultimate end of man. And this uncreated good is God.
What About You?
Where do you stand? Where do you seek your pleasures, happiness and joy? “What do you seek? … Whom do you seek?” said Jesus (John 1:38; 20:15). “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that seek God” (Psalm 13:2). There is no true happiness outside of God; no true happiness outside of Heaven! Do you “seek first the Kingdom of God and His justice”? (Luke 12:31). Are you “seeking for Jesus”? (John 6:24). Are you “seeking God, desirous to find Him”? (Wisdom 13:6). Are you of “the generation of them that seek Him, of them that seek the face of the God”? (Psalm 23:6). “Seek the Lord! Seek His face evermore!” (1 Paralipomenon 16:11). “Let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord!” (Psalm 104:3). “Blessed are they that seek Him with their whole heart!” (Psalm 118:2).
“When you shall seek the Lord God, you shall find Him―if you seek Him with all your heart, and all the affliction of your soul!” (Deuteronomy 4:29). “Seek to do the things that please Him!” (Tobias 14:10). “Seek His commandments!” (Psalm 77:7). “Keep My commandments and do them!” (Leviticus 26:3). “I will seek Him Whom my soul loves!” (Canticles 3:2). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). “I will seek Thy commandments with my whole heart!” (Psalm 118:69).
True Joy for True Christians
If you want true joy, everlasting joy, then seek Christ―for He is the path and the door to that joy! G.K. Chesterton (1874–1936) an English author and philosopher, who converted to Catholicism in 1922, wrote: “Joy is the gigantic secret of the Christian!” Why? How? Because―as already stated above―true joy can only be found in the one true God―and that one true God can only be found in Heaven―and it is only the true Christian who will get to Heaven if he follows the one true narrow straight path that leads to Heaven―and Jesus is that path or way to Heaven: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life! No man comes to the Father, except by Me! … I am the door! By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved!” (John 14:6; 10:7-9). “Until now you have not asked anything in My Name. Ask, and you shall receive―so that your joy may be full!” said Jesus (John 16:24). True joy has to be an everlasting joy, a joy that does not change―and it is only God Who is eternal and unchangeable: “O eternal God!” (Daniel 13:42) … “The eternal God” (Romans 16:26) … “the Father of lights, with whom there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (James 1:17). “God has given to us eternal life. And this life is in His Son!” (1 John 5:11) … “Jesus Christ, yesterday, and today, and the same for ever!” (Hebrews 13:8).
Many, who have been baptized as Christians, have long since lost Christ. They have strayed from the straight and narrow path, shown to us by Christ, that leads to Heaven. Mary and Joseph lost the Child Jesus for three days: “Not finding Him, they returned into Jerusalem, seeking Him!” (Luke 2:45)―that is what has to be done today―go back to the true and ever faithful Church (not the Liberal Modernist Church full of wolves in the clothing of sheep). Many Christians today have walked away from the Church on the broad road that leads to the wicked world and the wide gate of destruction: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat!” (Matthew 7:13). This broad road of the world is loaded with false and fatal pleasures, false happiness and fake joys―and it invariably leads to true pain, unimaginable unhappiness, and eternal sorrows in Hell. They have “erred from the Faith, and have entangled themselves in many sorrows!” (1 Timothy 6:10) … “the sorrows of Hell” (Acts 2:24). Whereas, to His faithful followers Our Lord says: “You shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy! … And your joy no man shall take from you!” (John 16:20-22). “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes―and death shall be no more; nor mourning; nor crying; nor sorrow shall be any more―for the former things are passed away!” (Apocalypse 21:4).
Sadly, most Catholics ignore the warnings of God in Holy Scripture: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” said Jesus (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). Unless we are truly stupid, we should realize and gather from these quotes the underlying fact that we cannot find true joy in this world and in the things of this world! There can be no joy in being “an enemy of God”; there can be no joy in a “world seated in wickedness”; there can be joy in being “condemned with this world”, etc. Our Lord calls Satan “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) and there can be no joy in Satan and no joy living in Satan’s princedom.
Yet, for some insane reason, most Catholics seek their pleasure, happiness and joy from this world and not from God! Are you happy with this world? Are you happy in this world? Are you happy with the fashions, customs, attitudes and spirit of this world? “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). “We have not received the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God―so that we may know the things that are given us from God!” (1 Corinthians 2:12). Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures, treasures, teachings and spirit of the world, whose prince is the devil (Matthew 6:19-24). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
High and Deep
True joy is often described as a calm and peaceful state of being, a sense of contentment and satisfaction, rather than a fleeting, exciting emotion. Many descriptions of true joy emphasize a sense of tranquility and inner peace, where worries and anxieties are less impactful. Unlike happiness, which can be a temporary emotion sparked by a specific event, true joy is a more long-lasting state of contentment and satisfaction with life overall. True joy can be found even amidst difficult circumstances, providing a sense of peace and strength. We can liken this to flying high in sky, or sinking deep into the ocean. Air turbulence doesn't cease at a specific height, but generally becomes less frequent and severe at higher altitudes above 30,000 feet. Some studies suggest that turbulence is both less frequent and less severe at altitudes above 50,000 feet. You could say the same for the spiritual life, the higher you rise the less you feel the turbulence. Similarly, the surface of the ocean is constantly affected by wind, waves, and storms, which create turbulence and movement. As you descend into the ocean, the influence of these surface disturbances decreases significantly. The deeper you go, the less affected you are by surface disturbances, leading to calmer conditions. Oceans become calmer the deeper you go, because wave action and surface disturbances diminish with depth. Descending deeper and deeper into ocean can be likened to a deeper and deeper humility―the more humble we are, the less agitated we become and more accepting of what God’s Providence is sending our way.
In Catholic theology, joy and humility are interconnected virtues, with humility being seen as the foundation for experiencing true joy, as it allows us to recognize our dependence on God and embrace His grace. The spiritual masters tell us that the higher a building is to be built, then all the deeper must be the foundations of that high building. The higher we climb and advance in the spiritual life, the deeper needs to be our humility. Humility fosters joy. Humility often involves recognizing that joy and happiness come from sources beyond ourselves. Humility encourages a shift in perspective, moving away from self-centeredness and towards a greater awareness of others and the world around us―so that we stop living in the “me, me, me, mine, mine, mine” delusion and illusion. Through humility we are less focused on our own needs and desires and take those of others into our reckoning. Humility can lead to a deeper connection with God by a recognition of our absolute need of His grace and love―and this grace and love from God brings with it a profound joy and peace.
Humility means recognizing reality―and the reality of our lives is that we all have gifts. All of those gifts come from God: “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17) … “What have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). If you are good at something, it is because God gave you the aptitude. If you have worked to hone whatever skills you have, it is because God gave you the opportunity to do so. It is all from God. Take joy in God and not a false joy in yourself―God is the giver, you are merely the recipient.
What Joy and Happiness Are You Seeking? Whose Joy and Happiness Are You Seeking?
By now it should be abundantly clear that there are essentially two different camps, each of them claiming to be the manufacturers and vendors of happiness and joy. In one camp we have the manufacturers and vendors of fake joys and happiness―which might at first be very sweet, but they don’t last very long and leave a bitter taste behind. In the other camp we have the manufacturers and vendors of true joys and happiness―which might at first taste bitter, but eventually turn into an incredible sweetness that never ends. It is world and its prince, Satan, that tries to sell us the fake joys and happiness. It is God, His heavenly court and His Church on Earth that try to sell us true joy and happiness. Where are doing your shopping? Who are buying from?
Those who buy earthly joys and happiness, sooner or later, lose any joy or happiness they initially felt―it is like buying an appliance that breaks down not very long afterwards. As they say: “Nothing is made to last!” ― apart from things with the label, “Made in Heaven.”
What people tend to forget or ignore, is the fact that God is the manufacturer of all that is good and holy―and that includes joy. God is the manufacturer and He does not have a policy that says: “The customer is always right.” God is always right! “And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore―Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse?” (Ezechiel 18:25) … “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways! says the Lord, For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9). As an extension of that, you could have God say: “For My thoughts about joy are not your thoughts about joy, nor are your joys My joys! For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My joys exalted above your joys, and My thoughts about joy above your thoughts about joy!” So who has the true idea of joy? You or God? Should God adapt to your ideas of joy? Or should you adapt to God’s ideas of joy? Should God be doing things that make you happy? Or should you be doing things that make God happy? Who will dictate what kind of joy there is to be in Heaven? You or God? If you can’t get your ‘joyful’ way in Heaven, what will you do? Will you be eternally miserable in Heaven?
In the next article, we shall look at how to obtain the joy that really matters, the true joy, the heavenly joy ― the joy that is “Made in Heaven” and is sold by God alone!
Today, the Fourth Sunday of Lent, is traditionally called “Laetare Sunday”—meaning “A Sunday to Rejoice”. This particular title owes its origins to the opening words of the Introit or Entrance Hymn for today’s Mass, which say: “Rejoice, O Jerusalem, and come together, all you who love her: rejoice with joy, you who have been in sorrow: that you may exult…”
Dom Guéranger, in his masterful multi-volume work, The Liturgical Year, states: “This Sunday, called, from the first word of the Introit, Laetare Sunday, is one of the most solemn of the year. The Church interrupts her Lenten mournfulness; the chants of the Mass speak of nothing but joy and consolation; the organ, which has been silent during the preceding three Sundays, now gives forth its melodious voice; the deacon resumes his dalmatic, and the subdeacon his tunic; and instead of purple, rose-colored vestments are allowed to be used.
“These same rites were practiced in Advent, on the third Sunday, called “Gaudete”. The Church’s motive for introducing this expression of joy into today’s liturgy is to encourage her children to persevere fervently to the end of this holy season. The real mid-Lent was last Thursday, but the Church, fearing lest the joy might lead to some infringement on the spirit of penance, has deferred her own notice of it to this Sunday, when she not only permits, but even bids, her children to rejoice!”
Pleasure―Happiness―Joy
Man is preoccupied with pleasure, happiness and joy. Every decision we make—even the really stupid ones, even the sinful ones—are typically driven by the idea that whatever we decide to do will give us pleasure, lead us to happiness and bring us joy. Pleasure, Happiness and Joy! Is that a trinity of experiences? Are they three words for one and same thing? While often used interchangeably, pleasure, happiness, and joy are distinct things, with pleasure being a fleeting, external sensation; happiness a more sustained state of well-being; and joy a deeper, intrinsic feeling of contentment. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that joy is more than happiness, just as happiness is more than pleasure. Pleasure is in the body. Happiness is in the mind and feelings. Joy is deep in the heart, the spirit, the center of the self. The way to legitimate pleasure is having power and prudence. The way to true happiness is moral goodness. The way to true and everlasting joy is sanctity―loving God with your whole heart and your neighbor as yourself. Everyone wants pleasure. More deeply, everyone wants happiness. Most deeply, everyone wants joy. We desire pleasures. We pine for happiness. But we were made for joy. Though very few people can recognize and tell the difference between these three things―pleasure, happiness and joy. Most mistake having pleasure for being happy and having joy. “There is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:16). “Joyfulness of the heart is the life of a man, and a never failing treasure of holiness!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:23).
More often than not, our false idea of happiness is all about me, me, me, me, me! Also―more often than not―our false idea of happiness is focused upon earthly things, earthly circumstances or other human beings. Earthly things and circumstances can change quickly―and very quickly, what made us find a false pleasure or happiness in them, also changes and so they no longer make us happy. The same is true for ourselves and other people―our thoughts, attitudes, preferences, way of living, way of speaking, way of acting can also change quickly―and so, what was once a source of our ‘happiness’ makes us happy no longer! “The joy of the Lord is our strength!” (2 Esdras 8:10). The only thing that is good and always will be good is God! God never changes. God’s love for you never changes. God’s caring for you never changes. God’s desire for your salvation never changes. It only something that never changes that can be a source of true joy. “Behold the joy that comes to thee from God!” (Baruch 4:36). “The joy of the hypocrite lasts only for a moment” (Job 20:5). As for the true and sincere lovers of God, “everlasting joy shall be given to them!” (Isaias 61:7). As Jesus said: “May My joy be in you, and may your joy be filled!” (John 15:11).
Many people entered into a marriage with the hope and expectation of find pleasure, happiness and joy―but were later left with nothing but displeasure, unhappiness and sorrow. Something happened to that once hopeful love and the married couple fell out of love―something changed that once euphoric love in bitter dislike and even hatred―perhaps it was adultery on someone’s part, or some form of abuse, or just an over-familiarity that bred indifference or contempt. The result being that pleasure, happiness and joy died and were buried. Similar things could be said about seeking pleasure, happiness and joy is begetting and raising children; or in entering a certain career or profession; or in making friends with others, etc. Circumstances can change―and those changes risk turning the initial pleasure, happiness and joy into displeasure, unhappiness and sorrow.
Everyone Seeks Something!
“What do you seek?” said Jesus (John 1:38). Though people might be befuddled about the differences―everyone seeks pleasure, happiness and joy. Some clump all three into one big ball―others see the differences between all three. Nevertheless, everyone is chasing after one or all of them. St. Thomas Aquinas says that everyone naturally wants to be happy ― but perfect happiness cannot be found in this world ― which is what Our Lady of Lourdes said to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next world!” Here is a summary of the arguments of St. Thomas Aquinas:
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN WEALTH: Man’s happiness is not to be found in wealth, whether this be natural wealth which serves his normal needs (such as food, clothing, housing), or artificial wealth which can provide the items of natural wealth, that is, money. Wealth of any kind is a means for acquiring something else; it is a thing that serves; it does not fulfill. Hence it cannot be the true last end of man and the object that will render him enduringly and completely happy.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN HONOR: Nor can man’s full happiness consist in honors bestowed because of some excellence in him. Any excellence in a man is in him by reason of some good already possessed; it means that he already has some degree of happiness. Honors come to him because of this happiness, and therefore honors cannot themselves be the constituting elements of perfect happiness.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN FAME AND GLORY: Nor can man’s happiness be found in fame and glory. These, like honors bestowed, presuppose some degree of happiness already attained, and this they publicize and praise. Fame and glory are consequent upon an imperfect happiness, and are, in some sense, the product of it. They cannot, therefore, be the essential elements of perfect happiness.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN POWER: Man’s perfect happiness cannot consist in the possession of power, for power is not a complete end, but a means; power is valuable according to the use to which it may be put. In a word, power looks on to something further; it cannot itself be the ultimate goal.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN THE GOODS OF THE BODY: Man’s ultimate happiness does not consist in goods of the body ― life, health, strength, beauty, agility, etc. ― for these goods preserve the body and its perfections. Merely to preserve life cannot be the end of life. Goods of the body are to be used by reason (intellect and will) somewhat as a ship is used by its master; the master does not use the ship merely to preserve the ship, but to carry profitable cargoes to desired ports. Thus it appears that the goods of the body are means, not complete ends. Besides, man is a rational being as well as a bodily being; he can never be completely fulfilled and satisfied by bodily goods.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN BODILY OR INTELLECTUAL PLEASURES: Pleasures, whether bodily or intellectual, cannot bring a man ultimate happiness. We have just seen that bodily things cannot be man’s perfect fulfillment. And mental enjoyments presuppose the end already attained; enjoyment follows upon possession of some good or end; what is consequent upon the end cannot itself be the end.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN GOODS OF THE SOUL: The goods of the soul ― its essence, faculties, acts, habits, perfections ― cannot constitute man’s ultimate end. Happiness is for the soul, and to be attained by the soul. The objective ultimate happiness is something outside the soul, which the soul seeks to bring into itself and possess subjectively. Hence this ultimate end is not the soul itself, nor the goods belonging to the soul.
► SEEKING HAPPINESS IN CREATED GOODS: Indeed, no created good can give man perfect happiness. Only the essential, universal, and boundless good can bring man complete and unfading fulfillment. No created good is universal, essential, and boundless; only the uncreated good can be the ultimate end of man. And this uncreated good is God.
What About You?
Where do you stand? Where do you seek your pleasures, happiness and joy? “What do you seek? … Whom do you seek?” said Jesus (John 1:38; 20:15). “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that seek God” (Psalm 13:2). There is no true happiness outside of God; no true happiness outside of Heaven! Do you “seek first the Kingdom of God and His justice”? (Luke 12:31). Are you “seeking for Jesus”? (John 6:24). Are you “seeking God, desirous to find Him”? (Wisdom 13:6). Are you of “the generation of them that seek Him, of them that seek the face of the God”? (Psalm 23:6). “Seek the Lord! Seek His face evermore!” (1 Paralipomenon 16:11). “Let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord!” (Psalm 104:3). “Blessed are they that seek Him with their whole heart!” (Psalm 118:2).
“When you shall seek the Lord God, you shall find Him―if you seek Him with all your heart, and all the affliction of your soul!” (Deuteronomy 4:29). “Seek to do the things that please Him!” (Tobias 14:10). “Seek His commandments!” (Psalm 77:7). “Keep My commandments and do them!” (Leviticus 26:3). “I will seek Him Whom my soul loves!” (Canticles 3:2). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). “I will seek Thy commandments with my whole heart!” (Psalm 118:69).
True Joy for True Christians
If you want true joy, everlasting joy, then seek Christ―for He is the path and the door to that joy! G.K. Chesterton (1874–1936) an English author and philosopher, who converted to Catholicism in 1922, wrote: “Joy is the gigantic secret of the Christian!” Why? How? Because―as already stated above―true joy can only be found in the one true God―and that one true God can only be found in Heaven―and it is only the true Christian who will get to Heaven if he follows the one true narrow straight path that leads to Heaven―and Jesus is that path or way to Heaven: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life! No man comes to the Father, except by Me! … I am the door! By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved!” (John 14:6; 10:7-9). “Until now you have not asked anything in My Name. Ask, and you shall receive―so that your joy may be full!” said Jesus (John 16:24). True joy has to be an everlasting joy, a joy that does not change―and it is only God Who is eternal and unchangeable: “O eternal God!” (Daniel 13:42) … “The eternal God” (Romans 16:26) … “the Father of lights, with whom there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (James 1:17). “God has given to us eternal life. And this life is in His Son!” (1 John 5:11) … “Jesus Christ, yesterday, and today, and the same for ever!” (Hebrews 13:8).
Many, who have been baptized as Christians, have long since lost Christ. They have strayed from the straight and narrow path, shown to us by Christ, that leads to Heaven. Mary and Joseph lost the Child Jesus for three days: “Not finding Him, they returned into Jerusalem, seeking Him!” (Luke 2:45)―that is what has to be done today―go back to the true and ever faithful Church (not the Liberal Modernist Church full of wolves in the clothing of sheep). Many Christians today have walked away from the Church on the broad road that leads to the wicked world and the wide gate of destruction: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat!” (Matthew 7:13). This broad road of the world is loaded with false and fatal pleasures, false happiness and fake joys―and it invariably leads to true pain, unimaginable unhappiness, and eternal sorrows in Hell. They have “erred from the Faith, and have entangled themselves in many sorrows!” (1 Timothy 6:10) … “the sorrows of Hell” (Acts 2:24). Whereas, to His faithful followers Our Lord says: “You shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy! … And your joy no man shall take from you!” (John 16:20-22). “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes―and death shall be no more; nor mourning; nor crying; nor sorrow shall be any more―for the former things are passed away!” (Apocalypse 21:4).
Sadly, most Catholics ignore the warnings of God in Holy Scripture: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” said Jesus (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). Unless we are truly stupid, we should realize and gather from these quotes the underlying fact that we cannot find true joy in this world and in the things of this world! There can be no joy in being “an enemy of God”; there can be no joy in a “world seated in wickedness”; there can be joy in being “condemned with this world”, etc. Our Lord calls Satan “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) and there can be no joy in Satan and no joy living in Satan’s princedom.
Yet, for some insane reason, most Catholics seek their pleasure, happiness and joy from this world and not from God! Are you happy with this world? Are you happy in this world? Are you happy with the fashions, customs, attitudes and spirit of this world? “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). “We have not received the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God―so that we may know the things that are given us from God!” (1 Corinthians 2:12). Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures, treasures, teachings and spirit of the world, whose prince is the devil (Matthew 6:19-24). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
High and Deep
True joy is often described as a calm and peaceful state of being, a sense of contentment and satisfaction, rather than a fleeting, exciting emotion. Many descriptions of true joy emphasize a sense of tranquility and inner peace, where worries and anxieties are less impactful. Unlike happiness, which can be a temporary emotion sparked by a specific event, true joy is a more long-lasting state of contentment and satisfaction with life overall. True joy can be found even amidst difficult circumstances, providing a sense of peace and strength. We can liken this to flying high in sky, or sinking deep into the ocean. Air turbulence doesn't cease at a specific height, but generally becomes less frequent and severe at higher altitudes above 30,000 feet. Some studies suggest that turbulence is both less frequent and less severe at altitudes above 50,000 feet. You could say the same for the spiritual life, the higher you rise the less you feel the turbulence. Similarly, the surface of the ocean is constantly affected by wind, waves, and storms, which create turbulence and movement. As you descend into the ocean, the influence of these surface disturbances decreases significantly. The deeper you go, the less affected you are by surface disturbances, leading to calmer conditions. Oceans become calmer the deeper you go, because wave action and surface disturbances diminish with depth. Descending deeper and deeper into ocean can be likened to a deeper and deeper humility―the more humble we are, the less agitated we become and more accepting of what God’s Providence is sending our way.
In Catholic theology, joy and humility are interconnected virtues, with humility being seen as the foundation for experiencing true joy, as it allows us to recognize our dependence on God and embrace His grace. The spiritual masters tell us that the higher a building is to be built, then all the deeper must be the foundations of that high building. The higher we climb and advance in the spiritual life, the deeper needs to be our humility. Humility fosters joy. Humility often involves recognizing that joy and happiness come from sources beyond ourselves. Humility encourages a shift in perspective, moving away from self-centeredness and towards a greater awareness of others and the world around us―so that we stop living in the “me, me, me, mine, mine, mine” delusion and illusion. Through humility we are less focused on our own needs and desires and take those of others into our reckoning. Humility can lead to a deeper connection with God by a recognition of our absolute need of His grace and love―and this grace and love from God brings with it a profound joy and peace.
Humility means recognizing reality―and the reality of our lives is that we all have gifts. All of those gifts come from God: “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17) … “What have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). If you are good at something, it is because God gave you the aptitude. If you have worked to hone whatever skills you have, it is because God gave you the opportunity to do so. It is all from God. Take joy in God and not a false joy in yourself―God is the giver, you are merely the recipient.
What Joy and Happiness Are You Seeking? Whose Joy and Happiness Are You Seeking?
By now it should be abundantly clear that there are essentially two different camps, each of them claiming to be the manufacturers and vendors of happiness and joy. In one camp we have the manufacturers and vendors of fake joys and happiness―which might at first be very sweet, but they don’t last very long and leave a bitter taste behind. In the other camp we have the manufacturers and vendors of true joys and happiness―which might at first taste bitter, but eventually turn into an incredible sweetness that never ends. It is world and its prince, Satan, that tries to sell us the fake joys and happiness. It is God, His heavenly court and His Church on Earth that try to sell us true joy and happiness. Where are doing your shopping? Who are buying from?
Those who buy earthly joys and happiness, sooner or later, lose any joy or happiness they initially felt―it is like buying an appliance that breaks down not very long afterwards. As they say: “Nothing is made to last!” ― apart from things with the label, “Made in Heaven.”
What people tend to forget or ignore, is the fact that God is the manufacturer of all that is good and holy―and that includes joy. God is the manufacturer and He does not have a policy that says: “The customer is always right.” God is always right! “And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore―Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse?” (Ezechiel 18:25) … “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways! says the Lord, For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9). As an extension of that, you could have God say: “For My thoughts about joy are not your thoughts about joy, nor are your joys My joys! For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My joys exalted above your joys, and My thoughts about joy above your thoughts about joy!” So who has the true idea of joy? You or God? Should God adapt to your ideas of joy? Or should you adapt to God’s ideas of joy? Should God be doing things that make you happy? Or should you be doing things that make God happy? Who will dictate what kind of joy there is to be in Heaven? You or God? If you can’t get your ‘joyful’ way in Heaven, what will you do? Will you be eternally miserable in Heaven?
In the next article, we shall look at how to obtain the joy that really matters, the true joy, the heavenly joy ― the joy that is “Made in Heaven” and is sold by God alone!
Article 27
Friday & Saturday after the 3rd Sunday of Lent, March 28th & 29th
Do This and Become Strong!
Friday & Saturday after the 3rd Sunday of Lent, March 28th & 29th
Do This and Become Strong!
How Strong Are You?
We live in an age which prides itself on strength―whether it be physical strength, intellectual strength, emotional or mental strength! How’s your strength? How strong are you? Holy Scripture tells us to be strong: “Take courage and be strong!” (Josue 1:6) … “Fear not! Take courage and be strong!” (Daniel 10:19) … “Take courage and be strong!” (Josue 1:9) … “Be strong!” (2 Timothy 2:1).
Yet the danger about strength is that can lead to pride! Most people pride themselves in their own strength! Pride can be summarized as an attitude of self-sufficiency, self-importance, and self-exaltation in relation to God. Our Lady refers to this in her celebrated canticle, the Magnificat, saying: “He that is mighty … has shown might in His arm! He has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart! He has put down the mighty from their seat, and has exalted the humble! And the rich He has sent empty away!” (Luke 1:49-53).
Holy Scripture warns: “Let not the strong man glory in his strength!” (Jeremias 9:23). “Lest you should say in your heart: ‘My own might, and the strength of my own hand have achieved all these things for me!’ Remember the Lord your God, that He has given you strength!” (Deuteronomy 8:17-18). “When he was made strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction, and he neglected the Lord his God!” (2 Paralipomenon 26:16). When Gedeon had managed to raise 32,000 soldiers to fight against the 135,000 enemy Madianite soldiers, “the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘The people that are with thee are many, and Madian shall not be delivered into their hands―lest Israel should glory against Me, and say: ‘I was delivered by my own strength!’” (Judges 7:2)
“No man shall prevail by his own strength!” (1 Kings 2:9). As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “If you think that battles consist in the strength of the army, then God will make you to be overcome by your enemies―for it belongs to God both to help and to put to flight!” (2 Paralipomenon 25:8). “The Lord is strong and mighty―the Lord is mighty in battle!” (Psalm 23:8). “He shall not delight in the strength of the horse; nor take pleasure in the strong legs of a man!” (Psalm 146:10). “For Thy power, O Lord, is not in a multitude, nor is Thy pleasure in the strength of horses!” (Judith 9:16). “The king is not saved by a great army, nor shall the giant be saved by his own great strength. Vain is the horse for safety; neither shall he be saved by the abundance of his strength!” (Psalm 32:16-17). “The success of war is not in the multitude of the army, but strength comes from Heaven!” (1 Machabees 3:19).
God is the Strong One
As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Strength comes from God, Who is strength itself. “The Lord thy God, He is a strong and faithful God!” (Deuteronomy 7:9). “O Lord God, Thou rulest over all the kingdoms and nations, in Thy hand is strength and power, and no one can resist Thee!” (2 Paralipomenon 20:6). “The Lord God will take away, before your eyes, nations that are great and very strong!” (Josue 23:9). “God is strong!” (Psalm 7:12). “Who is like to Thee, among the strong, O Lord?” (Exodus 15:11). “Who is strong but our God?” (2 Kings 22:32). “There is none strong like our God!” (1 Kings 2:2). “God is strong in power!” (Ecclesiasticus 15:19). “Our God―great, strong and terrible!” (2 Esdras 9:32). “The Lord is mighty and strong!” (Isaias 28:2). “Thou art a strong helper!” (Psalm 70:7). “God is my strong One―in Him will I trust! He is my shield and the horn of my salvation! He lifts me up and is my refuge! He will deliver me from iniquity!” (2 Kings 22:3). “He delivered me from my most mighty enemy, and from them that hated me―for they were too strong for me!” (2 Kings 22:18). “Thou hast been a tower of strength against the face of the enemy!” (Psalm 60:4).
The Strength that Really Matters
God created all things―therefore, God created strength. Strength does not exist by itself―it is a property of some other existing thing. We see strength to be present in all domains―the inanimate domain, the vegetal domain, the animal domain, the human domain, the angelic domain. Strength can be a physical thing or a spiritual thing. Since our Catechism teaches us that we are a combination of body (physical) and soul (spiritual), and that the soul is more important than the body―then it stands to reason that spiritual strength is more important than physical strength. Often, strength of mind or mental strength, can indirectly strength of body (or lack of bodily strength) by giving the body a spirit of endurance and perseverance.
Our Lord and Holy Scripture point out this superiority of the spiritual over the physical: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, but suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26) … “Wisdom is better than all the most precious things” (Proverbs 8:11) … “Wisdom is better than weapons of war” (Ecclesiastes 9:18) … “Wisdom is better than strength, and a wise man is better than a strong man!” (Wisdom 6:1) … “Wisdom keeps one safe from enemies; wisdom defends from seducers; wisdom gives strength in conflict to overcome enemies; wisdom is mightier than all!” (Wisdom 10:12) ― wisdom resides in the soul, and the strength referred to here is strength of the body.
We speak of the power of “mind over matter” ― meaning that the body will obey the mind, and that your beliefs shape your reality. The phrase is often used to describe situations in which a person seems to be able to control events, physical objects, or the condition of their own body by using their strength of mind. Our Lord alludes to this when He speaks of the power of Faith in the mind over things in material and physical world: “Amen, I say to you, if you shall have faith and stagger not, not only this [miracle] of the fig tree shall you do, but also if you shall say to this mountain: ‘Take up and cast thyself into the sea!’ it shall be done” (Matthew 21:21).
It is this context that we should understand the quote: “By the greatness of thy wisdom, thou hast increased thy strength―and thy heart is lifted up with thy strength!” (Ezechiel 28:5) ― which speaks of the mastery of the spiritual over the physical, with wisdom being a spiritual strength that can ultimately increase physical strength if the dictates of wisdom are followed. Nevertheless, “Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, and let not the strong man glory in his strength!” (Jeremias 9:23) ― because the reality is that “God has given me wisdom and strength!” (Daniel 2:23) … God has “filled him with the spirit of God, with wisdom and understanding, and knowledge!” (Exodus 31:3). “The Lord gave wisdom and understanding” (Exodus 36:1). “The Lord gives wisdom” (Proverbs 2:6). The proud man “has said: ‘By the strength of my own hand I have done it, and by my own wisdom I have understood!’” (Isaias 10:13). But Scripture rebukes such a proud attitude: “What do you have that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “Every best gift and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights!” (James 1:17). St. Louis de Montfort, in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, warns: “As soon as the mind, thus vitiated, takes delight in poring over some gift received from God, then the gift itself―or the act or the grace―is tarnished and vitiated and God no longer favors it with His Divine regard.”
Back to Strength
Let us now come back to main purpose of this article―STRENGTH. We have established the accompanying danger and temptation of strength―which is PRIDE. Nevertheless, despite the dangers, we still are commanded to be STRONG: “Take courage and be strong!” (Josue 1:6) … “Fear not! Take courage and be strong!” (Daniel 10:19) … “Take courage and be strong!” (Josue 1:9) … “Be strong!” (2 Timothy 2:1). What kind of strength does Scripture mean? Physical strength? No! Intellectual strength? No! Scripture is referring to SPIRITUAL STRENGTH―which supersedes the physical and intellectual. You could compare it to work―St. Thomas Aquinas says that there are three chief kinds of work: (1) physical work; (2) intellectual work; and (3) spiritual work. St. Thomas says that the easiest kind of work is physical work―next comes intellectual work―but the hardest of all is spiritual work. There is nothing wrong in being physically and intellectually strong―but the pinnacle of strength, the most precious strength, is spiritual strength.
It is not physical strength, nor intellectual strength, that will help us overcome temptation; persevere in virtue; accept sufferings; practice forgiveness; pray for enemies; have sorrow for sin; grow in the love of God, etc. Yes―physical and intellectual strength can play as secondary part in some of those things―but it is spiritual strength that is the driving force in all of those things. Spiritual strength does not require, nor does it depend, upon physical and intellectual strength―for we have examples of saints who were neither physically strong, nor intellectually strong.
Strength of Love
One thing that is often overlooked in talking about spiritual strength is the importance of charity. Charity, first and foremost, is a love of God―only secondarily is it a love of neighbor (and then it has to be a love of neighbor based upon a love of God―we love our neighbor because God created our neighbor; our neighbor is a creature of God just as we are―hence, the command: “Love your neighbor as yourself!”). Charity―a love of God―is in itself strength. It is a driving force―so much so that without charity, everything we do or say is useless: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
This strength of charity is wonderfully described in The Imitation of Christ, which speaks of the effects of Divine Love: “Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed! The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds. Love often knows no limits. Love attempts more than it is able and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. Like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way unharmed through every obstacle. It makes every difficulty easy and bears all wrongs with calmness and evenness of temper. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself, there he falls from love. Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, and long-suffering. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger, or higher, or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved, is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter, for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities. Anyone who loves, will know the sound of this voice!” (Book 3, Chapter 5).
Thus we see the enormous power of love―which should not be surprising, since God is love and God is all powerful: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) … “I am the Almighty God” (Genesis 17:1) … “He called upon the Lord the Almighty, and the Lord gave strength” (Ecclesiasticus 47:6). “Trust in the Almighty Lord, Who, at a beck, can utterly destroy both them that come against us, and the whole world!” (2 Machabees 8:18). “They relied upon the help of the Almighty God, that He sent to them” (2 Machabees 11:13). It was the power and strength of love that produced countless martyrs for Holy Mother Church―and, as Our Lord says: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13). Laying down one’s life for others requires great strength―and it is love that is the driving force behind that strength.
Additionally, the power and strength of charity―which, as already stated, is primarily a love of God―can also remove, not only the guilt of all mortal sin and venial sin, but it can also remove all the temporal punishment due to sin: meaning that the soul would go straight to Heaven without having to pass through Purgatory. This level of charity has to be truly sincere and of a certain high level―merely saying the words of an Act of Perfect Contrition does not guarantee that the level of love is what it needs to be―for, as Our Lord said of the Scribes and Pharisees: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Words from the lips are not always the sentiment of the heart! Words come easy―true love is not as easy!
Strength in Action, Not Just Words
Everything in the spiritual life is linked one way or another―it much like the human body―nothing is totally independent and nothing works by itself. The human body’s systems are interconnected and interdependent, meaning each system relies on others for proper functioning, and a disruption in one can affect the entire body.
In the spiritual life the same is true―as the following few quotes will indicate: “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20) … “Faith works by charity” (Galatians 5:6) … “Charity is patient; kind; envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7) … “The fruit of humility is the fear of the Lord” (Proverbs 22:4) … “The root of wisdom is to fear the Lord!” (Ecclesiasticus 1:25) … “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 110:10) … etc.
In Catholic teaching, virtues are not isolated but are interconnected and form a whole―working together to form a complete and harmonious life, a life that is pleasing to God. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Moral virtues (Prudence, Justice, Temperance and Fortitude) are connected … A virtue cannot be perfect as a virtue, if isolated from the others―for there can be no true prudence without temperance, justice and fortitude … The moral virtues cannot be without charity … Other moral virtues cannot be without prudence; and prudence cannot be without the moral virtues … and prudence depends on charity … It is therefore clear that the infused moral virtues are connected, not only through prudence, but also on account of charity.” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, Question 65: “The connection of Virtues”).
Hence it is that by practicing any one virtue to a heroic degree, automatically entails practicing the other virtues in one degree or another (even without realizing it)―because they are all linked in some way or another.
Virtue = Strength ― Vice = Weakness
What most people do not know is the word “virtue” essentially means “strength”. The origins of the English words “virtue” and “virtues” can be traced back to the Latin word “vir” meaning “man”. The extension of “vir” into “virtus” carried connotations of masculinity, strength, valor, excellence, courage, and strong character―all perceived as masculine strengths. Originally the Latin “virtus” described specifically soldierly courage or a brave warrior―“virtus” was primarily attributed to a full grown man who had served in the military. The use of the word grew and shifted to fit evolving ideas of what manliness meant and eventually grew to be used to describe a range of Roman virtues, describing a person as a good man, someone who did the right thing. It was often divided into different qualities including prudentia (practical wisdom), justitia (justice), temperantia (temperance, self-control), and fortitudo (courage).
Virtues are not simply isolated actions. You cannot say you have the virtue of charity if you only show charity on a few occasions. You cannot claim to have the virtue of humility if you do not regularly practice it. A virtue, strictly speaking, is a habit―and a habit means “a settled or regular tendency or usual practice, especially one that is hard to give up.” Aristotle argued that we become virtuous by repeatedly practicing good actions, much like we learn a skill through practice. A person becomes courageous not by a single act of bravery, but by repeatedly facing fears and challenges. A person becomes generous not by one act of giving, but by habitually being kind and sharing with others. Similarly, a person becomes honest not by one act of truthfulness, but by habitually speaking truthfully and acting with integrity.
St. Thomas Aquinas described the two sides of virtue: power and habit. “There are two kinds of virtue―some we call intellectual, some moral … Virtues are habits … Virtue, from the very nature of the word, implies some perfection of power … No one can doubt that virtue makes the soul good.” We don’t become better or worse primarily by thinking about it; we become better or worse according to the way we act. Good deeds beget good habits, which beget further good deeds; bad deeds beget bad habits, which beget further bad deeds. We might be born as a work in progress, but that progress can go for better or worse, depending on whether that human life is fulfilled by virtue, or hampered by vice.
We live in an age which prides itself on strength―whether it be physical strength, intellectual strength, emotional or mental strength! How’s your strength? How strong are you? Holy Scripture tells us to be strong: “Take courage and be strong!” (Josue 1:6) … “Fear not! Take courage and be strong!” (Daniel 10:19) … “Take courage and be strong!” (Josue 1:9) … “Be strong!” (2 Timothy 2:1).
Yet the danger about strength is that can lead to pride! Most people pride themselves in their own strength! Pride can be summarized as an attitude of self-sufficiency, self-importance, and self-exaltation in relation to God. Our Lady refers to this in her celebrated canticle, the Magnificat, saying: “He that is mighty … has shown might in His arm! He has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart! He has put down the mighty from their seat, and has exalted the humble! And the rich He has sent empty away!” (Luke 1:49-53).
Holy Scripture warns: “Let not the strong man glory in his strength!” (Jeremias 9:23). “Lest you should say in your heart: ‘My own might, and the strength of my own hand have achieved all these things for me!’ Remember the Lord your God, that He has given you strength!” (Deuteronomy 8:17-18). “When he was made strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction, and he neglected the Lord his God!” (2 Paralipomenon 26:16). When Gedeon had managed to raise 32,000 soldiers to fight against the 135,000 enemy Madianite soldiers, “the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘The people that are with thee are many, and Madian shall not be delivered into their hands―lest Israel should glory against Me, and say: ‘I was delivered by my own strength!’” (Judges 7:2)
“No man shall prevail by his own strength!” (1 Kings 2:9). As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “If you think that battles consist in the strength of the army, then God will make you to be overcome by your enemies―for it belongs to God both to help and to put to flight!” (2 Paralipomenon 25:8). “The Lord is strong and mighty―the Lord is mighty in battle!” (Psalm 23:8). “He shall not delight in the strength of the horse; nor take pleasure in the strong legs of a man!” (Psalm 146:10). “For Thy power, O Lord, is not in a multitude, nor is Thy pleasure in the strength of horses!” (Judith 9:16). “The king is not saved by a great army, nor shall the giant be saved by his own great strength. Vain is the horse for safety; neither shall he be saved by the abundance of his strength!” (Psalm 32:16-17). “The success of war is not in the multitude of the army, but strength comes from Heaven!” (1 Machabees 3:19).
God is the Strong One
As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Strength comes from God, Who is strength itself. “The Lord thy God, He is a strong and faithful God!” (Deuteronomy 7:9). “O Lord God, Thou rulest over all the kingdoms and nations, in Thy hand is strength and power, and no one can resist Thee!” (2 Paralipomenon 20:6). “The Lord God will take away, before your eyes, nations that are great and very strong!” (Josue 23:9). “God is strong!” (Psalm 7:12). “Who is like to Thee, among the strong, O Lord?” (Exodus 15:11). “Who is strong but our God?” (2 Kings 22:32). “There is none strong like our God!” (1 Kings 2:2). “God is strong in power!” (Ecclesiasticus 15:19). “Our God―great, strong and terrible!” (2 Esdras 9:32). “The Lord is mighty and strong!” (Isaias 28:2). “Thou art a strong helper!” (Psalm 70:7). “God is my strong One―in Him will I trust! He is my shield and the horn of my salvation! He lifts me up and is my refuge! He will deliver me from iniquity!” (2 Kings 22:3). “He delivered me from my most mighty enemy, and from them that hated me―for they were too strong for me!” (2 Kings 22:18). “Thou hast been a tower of strength against the face of the enemy!” (Psalm 60:4).
The Strength that Really Matters
God created all things―therefore, God created strength. Strength does not exist by itself―it is a property of some other existing thing. We see strength to be present in all domains―the inanimate domain, the vegetal domain, the animal domain, the human domain, the angelic domain. Strength can be a physical thing or a spiritual thing. Since our Catechism teaches us that we are a combination of body (physical) and soul (spiritual), and that the soul is more important than the body―then it stands to reason that spiritual strength is more important than physical strength. Often, strength of mind or mental strength, can indirectly strength of body (or lack of bodily strength) by giving the body a spirit of endurance and perseverance.
Our Lord and Holy Scripture point out this superiority of the spiritual over the physical: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, but suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26) … “Wisdom is better than all the most precious things” (Proverbs 8:11) … “Wisdom is better than weapons of war” (Ecclesiastes 9:18) … “Wisdom is better than strength, and a wise man is better than a strong man!” (Wisdom 6:1) … “Wisdom keeps one safe from enemies; wisdom defends from seducers; wisdom gives strength in conflict to overcome enemies; wisdom is mightier than all!” (Wisdom 10:12) ― wisdom resides in the soul, and the strength referred to here is strength of the body.
We speak of the power of “mind over matter” ― meaning that the body will obey the mind, and that your beliefs shape your reality. The phrase is often used to describe situations in which a person seems to be able to control events, physical objects, or the condition of their own body by using their strength of mind. Our Lord alludes to this when He speaks of the power of Faith in the mind over things in material and physical world: “Amen, I say to you, if you shall have faith and stagger not, not only this [miracle] of the fig tree shall you do, but also if you shall say to this mountain: ‘Take up and cast thyself into the sea!’ it shall be done” (Matthew 21:21).
It is this context that we should understand the quote: “By the greatness of thy wisdom, thou hast increased thy strength―and thy heart is lifted up with thy strength!” (Ezechiel 28:5) ― which speaks of the mastery of the spiritual over the physical, with wisdom being a spiritual strength that can ultimately increase physical strength if the dictates of wisdom are followed. Nevertheless, “Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, and let not the strong man glory in his strength!” (Jeremias 9:23) ― because the reality is that “God has given me wisdom and strength!” (Daniel 2:23) … God has “filled him with the spirit of God, with wisdom and understanding, and knowledge!” (Exodus 31:3). “The Lord gave wisdom and understanding” (Exodus 36:1). “The Lord gives wisdom” (Proverbs 2:6). The proud man “has said: ‘By the strength of my own hand I have done it, and by my own wisdom I have understood!’” (Isaias 10:13). But Scripture rebukes such a proud attitude: “What do you have that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “Every best gift and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights!” (James 1:17). St. Louis de Montfort, in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, warns: “As soon as the mind, thus vitiated, takes delight in poring over some gift received from God, then the gift itself―or the act or the grace―is tarnished and vitiated and God no longer favors it with His Divine regard.”
Back to Strength
Let us now come back to main purpose of this article―STRENGTH. We have established the accompanying danger and temptation of strength―which is PRIDE. Nevertheless, despite the dangers, we still are commanded to be STRONG: “Take courage and be strong!” (Josue 1:6) … “Fear not! Take courage and be strong!” (Daniel 10:19) … “Take courage and be strong!” (Josue 1:9) … “Be strong!” (2 Timothy 2:1). What kind of strength does Scripture mean? Physical strength? No! Intellectual strength? No! Scripture is referring to SPIRITUAL STRENGTH―which supersedes the physical and intellectual. You could compare it to work―St. Thomas Aquinas says that there are three chief kinds of work: (1) physical work; (2) intellectual work; and (3) spiritual work. St. Thomas says that the easiest kind of work is physical work―next comes intellectual work―but the hardest of all is spiritual work. There is nothing wrong in being physically and intellectually strong―but the pinnacle of strength, the most precious strength, is spiritual strength.
It is not physical strength, nor intellectual strength, that will help us overcome temptation; persevere in virtue; accept sufferings; practice forgiveness; pray for enemies; have sorrow for sin; grow in the love of God, etc. Yes―physical and intellectual strength can play as secondary part in some of those things―but it is spiritual strength that is the driving force in all of those things. Spiritual strength does not require, nor does it depend, upon physical and intellectual strength―for we have examples of saints who were neither physically strong, nor intellectually strong.
Strength of Love
One thing that is often overlooked in talking about spiritual strength is the importance of charity. Charity, first and foremost, is a love of God―only secondarily is it a love of neighbor (and then it has to be a love of neighbor based upon a love of God―we love our neighbor because God created our neighbor; our neighbor is a creature of God just as we are―hence, the command: “Love your neighbor as yourself!”). Charity―a love of God―is in itself strength. It is a driving force―so much so that without charity, everything we do or say is useless: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
This strength of charity is wonderfully described in The Imitation of Christ, which speaks of the effects of Divine Love: “Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed! The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds. Love often knows no limits. Love attempts more than it is able and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. Like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way unharmed through every obstacle. It makes every difficulty easy and bears all wrongs with calmness and evenness of temper. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself, there he falls from love. Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, and long-suffering. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger, or higher, or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved, is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter, for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities. Anyone who loves, will know the sound of this voice!” (Book 3, Chapter 5).
Thus we see the enormous power of love―which should not be surprising, since God is love and God is all powerful: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) … “I am the Almighty God” (Genesis 17:1) … “He called upon the Lord the Almighty, and the Lord gave strength” (Ecclesiasticus 47:6). “Trust in the Almighty Lord, Who, at a beck, can utterly destroy both them that come against us, and the whole world!” (2 Machabees 8:18). “They relied upon the help of the Almighty God, that He sent to them” (2 Machabees 11:13). It was the power and strength of love that produced countless martyrs for Holy Mother Church―and, as Our Lord says: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13). Laying down one’s life for others requires great strength―and it is love that is the driving force behind that strength.
Additionally, the power and strength of charity―which, as already stated, is primarily a love of God―can also remove, not only the guilt of all mortal sin and venial sin, but it can also remove all the temporal punishment due to sin: meaning that the soul would go straight to Heaven without having to pass through Purgatory. This level of charity has to be truly sincere and of a certain high level―merely saying the words of an Act of Perfect Contrition does not guarantee that the level of love is what it needs to be―for, as Our Lord said of the Scribes and Pharisees: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Words from the lips are not always the sentiment of the heart! Words come easy―true love is not as easy!
Strength in Action, Not Just Words
Everything in the spiritual life is linked one way or another―it much like the human body―nothing is totally independent and nothing works by itself. The human body’s systems are interconnected and interdependent, meaning each system relies on others for proper functioning, and a disruption in one can affect the entire body.
In the spiritual life the same is true―as the following few quotes will indicate: “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20) … “Faith works by charity” (Galatians 5:6) … “Charity is patient; kind; envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7) … “The fruit of humility is the fear of the Lord” (Proverbs 22:4) … “The root of wisdom is to fear the Lord!” (Ecclesiasticus 1:25) … “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 110:10) … etc.
In Catholic teaching, virtues are not isolated but are interconnected and form a whole―working together to form a complete and harmonious life, a life that is pleasing to God. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Moral virtues (Prudence, Justice, Temperance and Fortitude) are connected … A virtue cannot be perfect as a virtue, if isolated from the others―for there can be no true prudence without temperance, justice and fortitude … The moral virtues cannot be without charity … Other moral virtues cannot be without prudence; and prudence cannot be without the moral virtues … and prudence depends on charity … It is therefore clear that the infused moral virtues are connected, not only through prudence, but also on account of charity.” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, Question 65: “The connection of Virtues”).
Hence it is that by practicing any one virtue to a heroic degree, automatically entails practicing the other virtues in one degree or another (even without realizing it)―because they are all linked in some way or another.
Virtue = Strength ― Vice = Weakness
What most people do not know is the word “virtue” essentially means “strength”. The origins of the English words “virtue” and “virtues” can be traced back to the Latin word “vir” meaning “man”. The extension of “vir” into “virtus” carried connotations of masculinity, strength, valor, excellence, courage, and strong character―all perceived as masculine strengths. Originally the Latin “virtus” described specifically soldierly courage or a brave warrior―“virtus” was primarily attributed to a full grown man who had served in the military. The use of the word grew and shifted to fit evolving ideas of what manliness meant and eventually grew to be used to describe a range of Roman virtues, describing a person as a good man, someone who did the right thing. It was often divided into different qualities including prudentia (practical wisdom), justitia (justice), temperantia (temperance, self-control), and fortitudo (courage).
Virtues are not simply isolated actions. You cannot say you have the virtue of charity if you only show charity on a few occasions. You cannot claim to have the virtue of humility if you do not regularly practice it. A virtue, strictly speaking, is a habit―and a habit means “a settled or regular tendency or usual practice, especially one that is hard to give up.” Aristotle argued that we become virtuous by repeatedly practicing good actions, much like we learn a skill through practice. A person becomes courageous not by a single act of bravery, but by repeatedly facing fears and challenges. A person becomes generous not by one act of giving, but by habitually being kind and sharing with others. Similarly, a person becomes honest not by one act of truthfulness, but by habitually speaking truthfully and acting with integrity.
St. Thomas Aquinas described the two sides of virtue: power and habit. “There are two kinds of virtue―some we call intellectual, some moral … Virtues are habits … Virtue, from the very nature of the word, implies some perfection of power … No one can doubt that virtue makes the soul good.” We don’t become better or worse primarily by thinking about it; we become better or worse according to the way we act. Good deeds beget good habits, which beget further good deeds; bad deeds beget bad habits, which beget further bad deeds. We might be born as a work in progress, but that progress can go for better or worse, depending on whether that human life is fulfilled by virtue, or hampered by vice.
Article 26
Wednesday & Thursday after the 3rd Sunday of Lent, March 26th & 27th
Learn to Live with the Devil
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Wednesday & Thursday after the 3rd Sunday of Lent, March 26th & 27th
Learn to Live with the Devil
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Are You Nuts?
No doubt you are thinking: “Are you insane? What the hell is this? Learn to live with the devil? You should be locked-up! You must be possessed, something!” Calm down! Calm down! Just think about this for a moment! We have all learnt to live among crime and sin―we are surrounded by it! It does not mean that we agree with it, or make peace with it―but it is an inescapable reality that we see daily, hear about daily, or read about daily. Our Lord tells us that Satan is “the prince of this world” (John 14:30), being cast down here after his rebellion: “Satan, who seduces the whole world, was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him” (Apocalypse 12:9). So what do you expect? If Satan was cast down onto this Earth with devils; if Satan is the prince of this world; then it is only logical that Satan and his devils are an inescapable part of our life on Earth! There is no escape from Satan and his devils while we live on this Earth! So we had better get used to that truth and make the best we can of that cross.
Our Lord, Our Lady and the Saints were not exempt from the continual plots, plans, harassments, machinations and persecutions of Satan and devils―so why do you expect to be exempt from them? Satan and the devils are a major source of temptation―and temptation is meant to test and prove our worthiness or unworthiness for Heaven: “When you enter the service of God, prepare your soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove you!” (Tobias 12:13). “Was not Abraham found faithful in temptation?” (1 Machabees 2:52). “In temptation he was found faithful!” (Ecclesiasticus 44:21). “No evils shall happen to him that fears the Lord, but in temptation God will keep him, and deliver him from evils!” (Ecclesiasticus 33:1). Since a majority of temptations find their source with Satan and the devils, then you could rephrase those quotes to read as follows: “When you enter the service of God, prepare your soul for battle with the devil!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that the devil should prove you!” (Tobias 12:13). “Was not Abraham found faithful in fighting the devil?” (1 Machabees 2:52). “In fighting the devil he was found faithful!” (Ecclesiasticus 44:21). “No evils shall happen to him that fears the Lord, but in the attacks of the devil God will keep him, and deliver him from evils!” (Ecclesiasticus 33:1).
No Escape!
Of course you would like to avoid the influence of Satan and his devils―but that isn’t going to happen; it is not an option; having to deal with them is an inescapable reality whether you want it or not; like it or not; accept it or not! Listen to what Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, says: “Jesus works through His Church, Satan through his empire of evil ... The influence of Satan is immense! The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one! … Today Satan rules the world! … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour! … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan! I want to make absolutely clear that nothing happens without God’s permission. It is also absolutely clear that God does not wish evil for anyone, but He allows it and He can use everything, even evil, for our own good!” Our immune system is strengthened by having to battle disease―likewise, our spiritual immune system is strengthened by having to battle Satan and his devils.
No Escaping Natural Danger
Similarly, we are surrounded by many natural dangers that could seriously injure us. Natural disasters include all types of severe weather, which have the potential to pose a significant threat to human health and safety, property, critical infrastructure, and security. Natural disasters occur both seasonally and without warning, subjecting regions to frequent periods of insecurity, disruption, and economic loss. We are threatened by extreme heat and extreme cold, droughts, severe floods, tsunamis, forest fires, cyclones, hurricanes, tornados, hailstorms, thunderstorms, lightning strikes, dust storms, firestorms, earthquakes, avalanches, landslides, sinkholes, volcanic eruptions, etc.
Lives are often at risk due to dangerous driving conditions created by snow blizzards, ice, heavy rain, dense fog, etc. Power-failures can cause anything from loss of perishable refrigerated foods, to loss of refrigerated medical supplies, and even to loss of life when combined with severe weather conditions. Additionally, there are innumerable health hazards that surround us, including chemical, physical, biological, environmental, ergonomic, and psychosocial hazards, as well as those related to hazardous drugs, food toxicity, gases, metal toxicity. We are exposed to radiation and electro-magnetic frequencies (EMFs) from our computers, smartphones, routers, modems, etc.
On the side of plants and vegetation―plants may be poisonous to the touch (such as poison ivy and poison sumac) or toxic if swallowed (such as deadly amanita or poison hemlock). Many poisonous plants are so common and seemingly innocuous you do not suspect their toxic qualities. While it is difficult to give an exact number, it is estimated that one-third of the world’s plants contain some toxic components, and over 700 species in the United States and Canada are known to cause illness. Each year over 100,000 exposures to toxic plants are reported to poison centers throughout the United States.
Then we have diseases! The exact number of diseases in the world is unknown, as new diseases are constantly being discovered and old ones evolve. However, according to the Malacards database, there are over 18,000 known diseases. It is important to note that this number only includes diseases that have been formally identified and documented. The actual number of diseases may be significantly higher. As for infectious diseases, one medical database has over 500 listed. On top of all that―accidents do happen! We have all had many accidents in our lifetime―sometimes no more than a finger-cut or a mild burn; sometimes more serious accidents. As regards those serious accidents, the top three leading causes of preventable injury-related death in 2023—poisoning, falls, and motor vehicle—account for 86% of all preventable deaths. Among serious accidents, no other preventable cause of death (including suffocation, drowning, fires and burns, and natural or environmental disasters) accounts for more than 3% of the total.
Add to this the potential dangers that come from animals, rodents, reptiles and insects! Animals can pose various dangers to humans, including bites, scratches, disease transmission, and even attacks, depending on the species and circumstances. Many people are bitten or scratched by dogs and cats―potentially causing injuries that can become infected. A viral disease transmitted through the saliva of infected animals, such as rabies, can be fatal if not treated promptly. Animals can carry parasites like fleas, ticks, and intestinal worms, which can easily transfer to humans.
Rodents pose significant dangers, both to health and property, as they can transmit diseases, contaminate food, and cause structural damage through chewing and nesting. Rodents carry diseases like hantavirus, leptospirosis, lymphocytic choriomeningitis (LCMV), tularemia, and salmonellosis. Diseases can spread through direct contact with rodent droppings, urine, saliva, or bites. As regards indirect contact, rodents can carry ticks, fleas, and mites, which can transmit diseases to humans. Rodents can chew through wires, pipes, insulation, and other materials, causing structural damage and potentially leading to fires. They can create a fire hazard by chewing through wires which can cause short circuits and electrical fires.
Insects and bugs can pose various dangers. Mosquitoes transmit diseases like malaria, Zika, West Nile virus, and dengue fever. Ticks transmit diseases like Lyme disease and other tick-borne illnesses. Wasps and bees can cause painful stings and allergic reactions― bee stings can in rare cases be fatal. Tsetse flies carry a deadly disease called sleeping sickness. Like malaria, it is transmitted by a bite and caused by a single-celled parasite. Symptoms involve fever, severe headaches, seizures, and disruption of the sleep cycle (hence the name), and without treatment, it is often fatal.
Now You See!
Hopefully, you can now see that the statement: “Learning to live with the devil” is not something heretical, evil or nasty―but merely an inescapable fact of life for each every person who inhabits this Earth from the time of Adam and Eve onward! St. John Vianney used to joke about the devil being present in his life so much so that the Saint said that they were almost like “friends” ― not that the devil was his friend, but that he was around as much as friends are around. As the chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriel Amorth, said: “The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour!” The devil and evil will always be around us―that cannot be changed. What we have to do is to find a way of living amongst that evil without allowing it to harm us and damn our souls.
We need to see the devil―or at least sense and recognize his presence―if we are going to be able to fight against it, resist it and nullify. That is exactly what the devil does not want―he does not want us to be cognizant of his presence in our lives, so that he can then act freely and undetected. As Fr. Amorth says: “The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … The devil prefers this way!”
Devilish Disguises
One of the first contacts that St. Padre Pio (1887-1968) had with the prince of evil occurred in 1906, when aged around 19. One night, Padre had returned to the convent of Saint Elia of Pianisi. He couldn’t fall asleep that night because of the enormous summer heat. He heard the footsteps of someone coming from a nearby room. Padre Pio thought: “Apparently, Friar Anastasio couldn’t sleep either.” He wanted to call out to him so that they could visit and speak for a while. He went to the window and tried calling to his companion, but he was unable to speak. On the ledge of a nearby window, he saw a monstrous dog. Padre Pio, with terror in his voice, said: “I saw the big dog enter through the window and there was smoke coming from his mouth. I fell on the bed and I heard a voice from the dog that said: ‘Him it is! It is him!’ While I was still on the bed, the animal jumped to the ledge of the window, then to the roof and disappeared.”
Learning to Live with the Devil
The devil attacked Padre Pio with numerous types of temptations. Fr. Augustino, Padre Pio’s spiritual director, also confirmed that the devil appeared to him under many different forms. “The devil appeared as young girls that danced naked; as a young friend of the monks; as Padre Pio's spiritual director, or as the Provincial Father; as Pope Pius X; as a Guardian Angel; as St. Francis and as Our Lady.” The devil has also appeared in his horrible forms with an army of infernal spirits. There were other times when Padre Pio was approached by the devil, but without any apparition. He was troubled with deafening noises and covered with spittle, etc. Padre Pio succeeded in freeing himself from these attacks of the devil by invoking the Name of Jesus.
Satanic Struggles
The struggle between Padre Pio and Satan became more difficult when Padre Pio freed the souls possessed by the devil. Father Tarcisio of Cervinara said, “More than once, before leaving the body of a possessed person, the devil has shouted: ‘Padre Pio, you give us more trouble than St. Michael!’ also, ‘Father Pio don’t snatch souls from us and we won’t bother you!’”
In one of the letters to Fr. Agostino, dated January 18th, 1912, St. Padre Pio stated: “The devil does not want to lose this battle. He takes on many different forms. For several days now, he has appeared with his brothers who are armed with batons and pieces of iron. One of the difficulties is that they appear in many disguises. There were several times when they threw me out of my bed and dragged me out of my bedroom. I am patient, however, and I know Jesus, Our Lady, my Guardian Angel, St. Joseph and St. Francis are always with me!”
Early one morning, after everyone had fallen asleep, Padre Pio heard a knock on his door. It seemed to be Fr. Agostino (his spiritual director) asking to come in. Padre Pio said, “Come in! Why have you come? How did you get here?” Padre Agostino said: “God sent me. He is displeased with you!” Padre Pio was stunned: “What?” said Padre Pio as he swung his legs over the bed and began to get out of bed. “No, no, no need to rise! I only came to say God does not approve of your practice of penance!” Padre Pio said: “If you are truly here at God’s request, you must give me a sign. I ask you to say the Name of Jesus!” At that moment Agostino’s lips parted and he started to laugh; his voice changed. Padre Pio tried to reach out and touch his brown robe. The apparition vanished, leaving behind a strong smell of sulfur. Speaking about this event in a letter on July 28th, 1914, Padre Pio, then aged 27, said: “The devil, as you know, is a great artificer of evil ― he could deceive you by some diabolical illusion or apparition disguised as an angel of light! This unhappy apostate even knows how to disguise himself as a Capuchin and to act the part quite well. I beg you to believe one who has undergone an experience of this nature.”
One time, Fr. Francesco was about to leave Padre Pio’s cell. “Don’t leave, for the devils will come!” He left, but, after a few steps away, he heard a terrible noise and came back. Padre Pio had already been assaulted.
Padre Pio was in his room mainly at night. Loud thuds were heard that scared the friars. When they would go to Padre Pio’s room they would discover him “drenched in sweat, and his clothes had to be changed from head to foot.”
Certain people who came to the friary did not believe the reports of such strange occurrences; they laughed at it as the product of a monk’s imagination. One time Bishop Andrea D’Agostino was a guest at the monastery. He looked at Padre Pio’s story as a fabulous, medieval tale. However, while he was eating with the friars, he was startled by a great rumbling noise above in the ceiling. He turned pale and trembled. The bishop’s assistant, who was eating in the guest room, ran into the refectory filled with fear. The bishop was so scared that he did not want to sleep alone that night. The next morning he left the monastery and never came back.
Padre Pio revealed more of the incredible sufferings the devil put him through: “Who knows how many times he has thrown me out of the bed and dragged me around the room? . . . The other night was one of the worst. From ten o’clock when I went to bed until five o’clock in the morning, that evil one did not stop beating me . . . I really thought that it was the last night of my life; or, if I did not die, I would go insane! At five o’clock in the morning, when the evil one left, my whole being was enveloped in such cold, that I was shivering from head to foot. It lasted a few hours. I was bleeding from the mouth!”
Towards the end of Padre Pio’s life (at the age of 80) he was not able to even turn over by himself in bed. Padre Pio had to be lifted into and out of his chair. At times when he would be in his chair, praying the Rosary, he would suddenly be thrown out of the chair and onto the ground by the devil.
Don’t Play with the Devil
Padre Pio also explained that the devil cannot harm us spiritually unless we let him in: “The devil is like a mad dog tied by a chain. Beyond the length of the chain he cannot catch hold of anyone. And you, therefore, keep your distance. If you get too close you will be caught. Remember, the devil has only one door with which to enter into our soul: our will. There are no secret or hidden doors. No sin is a true sin if we have not willfully consented.”
As Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, in his booklet The Discernment of Spirits, writes: “One does not play with the devil. Playing with the devil means tarrying with a thought that one knows to be not good, and thus, from the devil―while reassuring oneself, with a firm will, not to consent to it. Woe to him who consents to dialogue with the devil―who is much stronger than we are. Eve succumbed to temptation because she played with the devil.”
Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle continues: “God permits the devil to tempt us, in order to help us advance rapidly in holiness. ‘Because you were agreeable to God, it is necessary that you be tried by temptation!’ said the Archangel Raphael to Tobias, and St. James writes in his letter: ‘Blessed is he that endures temptation―for when he has been tested and tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which God has promised to them that love Him!’ and St. Peter says to us: ‘Brethren, be sober and watch! Because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour Whom resist ye, strong in the Faith!’”
Sr. Josefa Menendez Learns to Live with the Devil
One of the many victim souls who had to undergo horrific attacks from the evil spirits was the Spanish born mystic, Josefa Menendez (1890-1923), who became a nun in France. The devil often appeared to her in the form of a terrifying black dog, a black snake, or in the form of a “shadow” man.
On December 4th, 1921, Josefa was violently pulled from her bed and she was thrown to the ground, and then pummeled by a barrage of demonic blows she was made to listen to abominable blasphemies against Our Lord and Our Lady. Long hours were so spent, and the torture renewed on the two following nights. After one such terrible night, she wrote on the morning of Tuesday, 6th December: “Unable to bear any more, I knelt beside my bed, endeavoring to forget the horror of that malevolent voice insulting Our Lord and Our Lady. Suddenly I heard gnashing of teeth and a yell of rage. Then all vanished and before me stood Our Lady, all loveliness. ‘Do not fear, my daughter―I am here!’ I told her how terrified I was of the devil, who made me suffer so much. ‘He may torment you, but he has no power to harm you. His fury is very great on account of the souls that escape him! Souls are of such great worth! If you only knew the value of a single soul!’ Giving me her blessing, she said: ‘Do not fear!’ I kissed her hand and she went away.”
Later Jesus appeared to Josefa, and she immediately told Him of her greatest concern―the fear that in those hellish torments that her soul had lost something of its purity, or at any rate of its former innocence. “Because I never know anything about all those things with which the devil torments me.” Jesus replied to her: “Do not be afraid; your soul is steeped in My Blood, and none of that can stain it.” Then alluding to a specific word which more than once in the preceding days had given her strength: “Your Mothers have found the word―Abandonment! The devil has no power apart from what is given him from Heaven. Tell your Mothers that I am supreme!” [The “mothers” in the quote of Jesus given to Josefa refer to the Mother Superior of her convent and also the Mother Master of Novices who was personally responsible for Josefa during that time period].
Nevertheless, the demons sought to discourage her from her mission of sacrificing and suffering for souls, and they endeavored by all means to drive her to despair, and she overheard them saying such things as: “You will be one of us! ... We shall tire you out! ... We shall overcome you! ...Don’t let go of her; be on your guard to plague her in any way you can! ... She must not escape!...We must induce her to despair!”
In the life of Josefa Menendez, there occurred an even greater phenomenon that is very rare, even in the lives of the Saints―God permitted the devil to take her down to Hell. There, in Hell, she spent long hours―sometimes a whole night―in unspeakable agonies. Though she was dragged down into the bottomless pit more than a hundred times, each time seemed to her to be the first, and appeared to last countless ages. She endured all the tortures of Hell, with the one exception―that of the hatred of God. For Josefa, the most painful of these torments was to hear the horrid confessions of the damned, their cries of hatred, of pain and of despair.
Under the eyes of those in her convent, Josefa would suddenly disappear, and after long search she would be found thrown into some loft, or beneath heavy furniture, or in some unfrequented spot. In their presence she was burnt, and, without seeing the devil, they saw her clothes consumed and on her body there were unmistakable traces of fire, which caused wounds that took very long to heal. Likewise the effects of fire which burned her, were also seen on her garments and flesh; fragments of scorched linen are still preserved to this day. Ten times in all Josefa was thus set on fire. She saw the devil vomit on her flames of which visible traces were seen not on her clothes only, but on her person. Painful wounds which took long to heal left on her body scars―which she carried to the grave. The evil one suggested despairing thoughts, blasphemies, and wicked temptations that continued for days and nights, during which God hid Himself, and Josefa, bewildered, felt as if abandoned and at the mercy of the most ignoble and infamous of tormentors.
Yet, when at long last she came back to life, completely worn out and spent, her body agonized with pain, she looked upon no suffering, however severe it may be, as too much to bear, “...if by it I should save a soul from that dreaded abode of torment.”
Josefa wrote: “In the night of March 16th, towards ten o’clock, I became aware, as on the preceding days, of a confused noise of cries and chains. I rose quickly and dressed, and, trembling with fright, knelt down near my bed. The uproar was approaching and, not knowing what to do, I left the dormitory, and went to our Mother Superior’s cell―then I came back to the dormitory. The same terrifying sounds were all round me―then, all of a sudden, I saw in front of me the devil himself. He cried out: ‘Tie her feet and bind her hands!’ Instantly I lost sight of where I was, and felt myself tightly bound and being dragged away. Other voices screamed: ‘It is no good to bind her feet―it is her heart that you must bind!’ The devil answered: ‘It does not belong to me!’
“Then I was dragged along a very dark and lengthy passage, and on all sides resounded terrible cries. On opposite sides of the walls of this narrow corridor were niches out of which poured smoke, though with very little flame, and which emitted an intolerable stench. From these recesses came blaspheming voices, uttering impure words. Some cursed their bodies, others their parents. Others, again reproached themselves with having refused grace, and not avoided what they knew to be sinful. It was a medley of confused screams of rage and despair. I was dragged through that kind of corridor, which seemed endless. Then I received a violent punch which doubled me in two, and forced me into one of the niches. I felt as if I were being pressed between two burning planks and pierced through and through with scorching needle points. Opposite and beside me souls were blaspheming and cursing me. What caused me most suffering, and with which no torture can be compared, was the anguish of my soul to find myself separated from God.
“It seemed to me that I spent long years in that Hell, yet it lasted only six or seven hours. Suddenly I was violently pulled out of the niche, and I found myself in a dark place; after striking me, the devil disappeared and left me free. How can I describe my feelings on realizing that I was still alive, and could still love God! I do not know what I am not ready to endure to avoid Hell, in spite of my fear of pain. I see clearly that all the sufferings of Earth are nothing in comparison with the horror of no longer being able to love, for in that place all breathes hatred and thirst to damn other souls.” (Taken primarily from “Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love”; TAN Books and Publishers, Inc, 1981)
The Devil and You!
Now, you may not be put through the “Satanic-Wringer” to a high degree like the saints and mystics mentioned above―but you will be put through the “wringer” nonetheless. Heaven is about choices―we either choose to go to Heaven (and then do what it takes), or, by default, we choose to go to Hell (by not doing what it takes to get to Heaven). The choice is clear―Christ or Satan. As Our Lord said: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30) and he who sins is with the devil: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Most people―either directly or indirectly, knowingly or unknowingly, willingly or unwillingly―side with Satan because of the sheer quantity and regularity of their sins. “Many are called―few are chosen!” said Our Lord (Matthew 22:14), telling us to “Enter in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
If you are not prepared to fight for Heaven, then you will not get to Heaven! “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4).
The chief enemies of God are Satan and his devils―but Satan is also “the prince of the world” (John 12:31)―therefore, the world is also our enemy: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). “That great dragon―that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan―was cast out and he was cast unto the Earth, and he seduces the whole world” (Apocalypse 12:9). That is why the chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriel Amorth, used to say: “Satan continually tries to dominate the world―the whole world is in the power of the evil one! … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Today Satan rules the world!”
In a war, you have to live with the fact that you are at war―you cannot bury your head in the sand and pretend there is no war. You have to live with the fact that the enemy has perhaps surrounded you and even lives among you―it is not a negotiable thing, it is a harsh reality. In a war, it is often a case of “kill or be killed” ― and the same is true of spiritual warfare: “Your adversary, the devil, like a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye!” (1 Peter 5:8-9) ... “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7). Satan and his devils (and his princedom, the world) are the hurdles and tests that you have to overcome if you want to go to Heaven―there is no “free-pass” or “easy-street” to Heaven.
Holy Scripture tells us to arm ourselves for the inevitable battles: “Be strengthened in the Lord and in the might of His power! Put on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil! For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places! Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect! Stand, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the Gospel of peace! In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. Take unto you the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:10-17).
No doubt you are thinking: “Are you insane? What the hell is this? Learn to live with the devil? You should be locked-up! You must be possessed, something!” Calm down! Calm down! Just think about this for a moment! We have all learnt to live among crime and sin―we are surrounded by it! It does not mean that we agree with it, or make peace with it―but it is an inescapable reality that we see daily, hear about daily, or read about daily. Our Lord tells us that Satan is “the prince of this world” (John 14:30), being cast down here after his rebellion: “Satan, who seduces the whole world, was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him” (Apocalypse 12:9). So what do you expect? If Satan was cast down onto this Earth with devils; if Satan is the prince of this world; then it is only logical that Satan and his devils are an inescapable part of our life on Earth! There is no escape from Satan and his devils while we live on this Earth! So we had better get used to that truth and make the best we can of that cross.
Our Lord, Our Lady and the Saints were not exempt from the continual plots, plans, harassments, machinations and persecutions of Satan and devils―so why do you expect to be exempt from them? Satan and the devils are a major source of temptation―and temptation is meant to test and prove our worthiness or unworthiness for Heaven: “When you enter the service of God, prepare your soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove you!” (Tobias 12:13). “Was not Abraham found faithful in temptation?” (1 Machabees 2:52). “In temptation he was found faithful!” (Ecclesiasticus 44:21). “No evils shall happen to him that fears the Lord, but in temptation God will keep him, and deliver him from evils!” (Ecclesiasticus 33:1). Since a majority of temptations find their source with Satan and the devils, then you could rephrase those quotes to read as follows: “When you enter the service of God, prepare your soul for battle with the devil!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that the devil should prove you!” (Tobias 12:13). “Was not Abraham found faithful in fighting the devil?” (1 Machabees 2:52). “In fighting the devil he was found faithful!” (Ecclesiasticus 44:21). “No evils shall happen to him that fears the Lord, but in the attacks of the devil God will keep him, and deliver him from evils!” (Ecclesiasticus 33:1).
No Escape!
Of course you would like to avoid the influence of Satan and his devils―but that isn’t going to happen; it is not an option; having to deal with them is an inescapable reality whether you want it or not; like it or not; accept it or not! Listen to what Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, says: “Jesus works through His Church, Satan through his empire of evil ... The influence of Satan is immense! The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one! … Today Satan rules the world! … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour! … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan! I want to make absolutely clear that nothing happens without God’s permission. It is also absolutely clear that God does not wish evil for anyone, but He allows it and He can use everything, even evil, for our own good!” Our immune system is strengthened by having to battle disease―likewise, our spiritual immune system is strengthened by having to battle Satan and his devils.
No Escaping Natural Danger
Similarly, we are surrounded by many natural dangers that could seriously injure us. Natural disasters include all types of severe weather, which have the potential to pose a significant threat to human health and safety, property, critical infrastructure, and security. Natural disasters occur both seasonally and without warning, subjecting regions to frequent periods of insecurity, disruption, and economic loss. We are threatened by extreme heat and extreme cold, droughts, severe floods, tsunamis, forest fires, cyclones, hurricanes, tornados, hailstorms, thunderstorms, lightning strikes, dust storms, firestorms, earthquakes, avalanches, landslides, sinkholes, volcanic eruptions, etc.
Lives are often at risk due to dangerous driving conditions created by snow blizzards, ice, heavy rain, dense fog, etc. Power-failures can cause anything from loss of perishable refrigerated foods, to loss of refrigerated medical supplies, and even to loss of life when combined with severe weather conditions. Additionally, there are innumerable health hazards that surround us, including chemical, physical, biological, environmental, ergonomic, and psychosocial hazards, as well as those related to hazardous drugs, food toxicity, gases, metal toxicity. We are exposed to radiation and electro-magnetic frequencies (EMFs) from our computers, smartphones, routers, modems, etc.
On the side of plants and vegetation―plants may be poisonous to the touch (such as poison ivy and poison sumac) or toxic if swallowed (such as deadly amanita or poison hemlock). Many poisonous plants are so common and seemingly innocuous you do not suspect their toxic qualities. While it is difficult to give an exact number, it is estimated that one-third of the world’s plants contain some toxic components, and over 700 species in the United States and Canada are known to cause illness. Each year over 100,000 exposures to toxic plants are reported to poison centers throughout the United States.
Then we have diseases! The exact number of diseases in the world is unknown, as new diseases are constantly being discovered and old ones evolve. However, according to the Malacards database, there are over 18,000 known diseases. It is important to note that this number only includes diseases that have been formally identified and documented. The actual number of diseases may be significantly higher. As for infectious diseases, one medical database has over 500 listed. On top of all that―accidents do happen! We have all had many accidents in our lifetime―sometimes no more than a finger-cut or a mild burn; sometimes more serious accidents. As regards those serious accidents, the top three leading causes of preventable injury-related death in 2023—poisoning, falls, and motor vehicle—account for 86% of all preventable deaths. Among serious accidents, no other preventable cause of death (including suffocation, drowning, fires and burns, and natural or environmental disasters) accounts for more than 3% of the total.
Add to this the potential dangers that come from animals, rodents, reptiles and insects! Animals can pose various dangers to humans, including bites, scratches, disease transmission, and even attacks, depending on the species and circumstances. Many people are bitten or scratched by dogs and cats―potentially causing injuries that can become infected. A viral disease transmitted through the saliva of infected animals, such as rabies, can be fatal if not treated promptly. Animals can carry parasites like fleas, ticks, and intestinal worms, which can easily transfer to humans.
Rodents pose significant dangers, both to health and property, as they can transmit diseases, contaminate food, and cause structural damage through chewing and nesting. Rodents carry diseases like hantavirus, leptospirosis, lymphocytic choriomeningitis (LCMV), tularemia, and salmonellosis. Diseases can spread through direct contact with rodent droppings, urine, saliva, or bites. As regards indirect contact, rodents can carry ticks, fleas, and mites, which can transmit diseases to humans. Rodents can chew through wires, pipes, insulation, and other materials, causing structural damage and potentially leading to fires. They can create a fire hazard by chewing through wires which can cause short circuits and electrical fires.
Insects and bugs can pose various dangers. Mosquitoes transmit diseases like malaria, Zika, West Nile virus, and dengue fever. Ticks transmit diseases like Lyme disease and other tick-borne illnesses. Wasps and bees can cause painful stings and allergic reactions― bee stings can in rare cases be fatal. Tsetse flies carry a deadly disease called sleeping sickness. Like malaria, it is transmitted by a bite and caused by a single-celled parasite. Symptoms involve fever, severe headaches, seizures, and disruption of the sleep cycle (hence the name), and without treatment, it is often fatal.
Now You See!
Hopefully, you can now see that the statement: “Learning to live with the devil” is not something heretical, evil or nasty―but merely an inescapable fact of life for each every person who inhabits this Earth from the time of Adam and Eve onward! St. John Vianney used to joke about the devil being present in his life so much so that the Saint said that they were almost like “friends” ― not that the devil was his friend, but that he was around as much as friends are around. As the chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriel Amorth, said: “The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour!” The devil and evil will always be around us―that cannot be changed. What we have to do is to find a way of living amongst that evil without allowing it to harm us and damn our souls.
We need to see the devil―or at least sense and recognize his presence―if we are going to be able to fight against it, resist it and nullify. That is exactly what the devil does not want―he does not want us to be cognizant of his presence in our lives, so that he can then act freely and undetected. As Fr. Amorth says: “The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … The devil prefers this way!”
Devilish Disguises
One of the first contacts that St. Padre Pio (1887-1968) had with the prince of evil occurred in 1906, when aged around 19. One night, Padre had returned to the convent of Saint Elia of Pianisi. He couldn’t fall asleep that night because of the enormous summer heat. He heard the footsteps of someone coming from a nearby room. Padre Pio thought: “Apparently, Friar Anastasio couldn’t sleep either.” He wanted to call out to him so that they could visit and speak for a while. He went to the window and tried calling to his companion, but he was unable to speak. On the ledge of a nearby window, he saw a monstrous dog. Padre Pio, with terror in his voice, said: “I saw the big dog enter through the window and there was smoke coming from his mouth. I fell on the bed and I heard a voice from the dog that said: ‘Him it is! It is him!’ While I was still on the bed, the animal jumped to the ledge of the window, then to the roof and disappeared.”
Learning to Live with the Devil
The devil attacked Padre Pio with numerous types of temptations. Fr. Augustino, Padre Pio’s spiritual director, also confirmed that the devil appeared to him under many different forms. “The devil appeared as young girls that danced naked; as a young friend of the monks; as Padre Pio's spiritual director, or as the Provincial Father; as Pope Pius X; as a Guardian Angel; as St. Francis and as Our Lady.” The devil has also appeared in his horrible forms with an army of infernal spirits. There were other times when Padre Pio was approached by the devil, but without any apparition. He was troubled with deafening noises and covered with spittle, etc. Padre Pio succeeded in freeing himself from these attacks of the devil by invoking the Name of Jesus.
Satanic Struggles
The struggle between Padre Pio and Satan became more difficult when Padre Pio freed the souls possessed by the devil. Father Tarcisio of Cervinara said, “More than once, before leaving the body of a possessed person, the devil has shouted: ‘Padre Pio, you give us more trouble than St. Michael!’ also, ‘Father Pio don’t snatch souls from us and we won’t bother you!’”
In one of the letters to Fr. Agostino, dated January 18th, 1912, St. Padre Pio stated: “The devil does not want to lose this battle. He takes on many different forms. For several days now, he has appeared with his brothers who are armed with batons and pieces of iron. One of the difficulties is that they appear in many disguises. There were several times when they threw me out of my bed and dragged me out of my bedroom. I am patient, however, and I know Jesus, Our Lady, my Guardian Angel, St. Joseph and St. Francis are always with me!”
Early one morning, after everyone had fallen asleep, Padre Pio heard a knock on his door. It seemed to be Fr. Agostino (his spiritual director) asking to come in. Padre Pio said, “Come in! Why have you come? How did you get here?” Padre Agostino said: “God sent me. He is displeased with you!” Padre Pio was stunned: “What?” said Padre Pio as he swung his legs over the bed and began to get out of bed. “No, no, no need to rise! I only came to say God does not approve of your practice of penance!” Padre Pio said: “If you are truly here at God’s request, you must give me a sign. I ask you to say the Name of Jesus!” At that moment Agostino’s lips parted and he started to laugh; his voice changed. Padre Pio tried to reach out and touch his brown robe. The apparition vanished, leaving behind a strong smell of sulfur. Speaking about this event in a letter on July 28th, 1914, Padre Pio, then aged 27, said: “The devil, as you know, is a great artificer of evil ― he could deceive you by some diabolical illusion or apparition disguised as an angel of light! This unhappy apostate even knows how to disguise himself as a Capuchin and to act the part quite well. I beg you to believe one who has undergone an experience of this nature.”
One time, Fr. Francesco was about to leave Padre Pio’s cell. “Don’t leave, for the devils will come!” He left, but, after a few steps away, he heard a terrible noise and came back. Padre Pio had already been assaulted.
Padre Pio was in his room mainly at night. Loud thuds were heard that scared the friars. When they would go to Padre Pio’s room they would discover him “drenched in sweat, and his clothes had to be changed from head to foot.”
Certain people who came to the friary did not believe the reports of such strange occurrences; they laughed at it as the product of a monk’s imagination. One time Bishop Andrea D’Agostino was a guest at the monastery. He looked at Padre Pio’s story as a fabulous, medieval tale. However, while he was eating with the friars, he was startled by a great rumbling noise above in the ceiling. He turned pale and trembled. The bishop’s assistant, who was eating in the guest room, ran into the refectory filled with fear. The bishop was so scared that he did not want to sleep alone that night. The next morning he left the monastery and never came back.
Padre Pio revealed more of the incredible sufferings the devil put him through: “Who knows how many times he has thrown me out of the bed and dragged me around the room? . . . The other night was one of the worst. From ten o’clock when I went to bed until five o’clock in the morning, that evil one did not stop beating me . . . I really thought that it was the last night of my life; or, if I did not die, I would go insane! At five o’clock in the morning, when the evil one left, my whole being was enveloped in such cold, that I was shivering from head to foot. It lasted a few hours. I was bleeding from the mouth!”
Towards the end of Padre Pio’s life (at the age of 80) he was not able to even turn over by himself in bed. Padre Pio had to be lifted into and out of his chair. At times when he would be in his chair, praying the Rosary, he would suddenly be thrown out of the chair and onto the ground by the devil.
Don’t Play with the Devil
Padre Pio also explained that the devil cannot harm us spiritually unless we let him in: “The devil is like a mad dog tied by a chain. Beyond the length of the chain he cannot catch hold of anyone. And you, therefore, keep your distance. If you get too close you will be caught. Remember, the devil has only one door with which to enter into our soul: our will. There are no secret or hidden doors. No sin is a true sin if we have not willfully consented.”
As Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, in his booklet The Discernment of Spirits, writes: “One does not play with the devil. Playing with the devil means tarrying with a thought that one knows to be not good, and thus, from the devil―while reassuring oneself, with a firm will, not to consent to it. Woe to him who consents to dialogue with the devil―who is much stronger than we are. Eve succumbed to temptation because she played with the devil.”
Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle continues: “God permits the devil to tempt us, in order to help us advance rapidly in holiness. ‘Because you were agreeable to God, it is necessary that you be tried by temptation!’ said the Archangel Raphael to Tobias, and St. James writes in his letter: ‘Blessed is he that endures temptation―for when he has been tested and tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which God has promised to them that love Him!’ and St. Peter says to us: ‘Brethren, be sober and watch! Because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour Whom resist ye, strong in the Faith!’”
Sr. Josefa Menendez Learns to Live with the Devil
One of the many victim souls who had to undergo horrific attacks from the evil spirits was the Spanish born mystic, Josefa Menendez (1890-1923), who became a nun in France. The devil often appeared to her in the form of a terrifying black dog, a black snake, or in the form of a “shadow” man.
On December 4th, 1921, Josefa was violently pulled from her bed and she was thrown to the ground, and then pummeled by a barrage of demonic blows she was made to listen to abominable blasphemies against Our Lord and Our Lady. Long hours were so spent, and the torture renewed on the two following nights. After one such terrible night, she wrote on the morning of Tuesday, 6th December: “Unable to bear any more, I knelt beside my bed, endeavoring to forget the horror of that malevolent voice insulting Our Lord and Our Lady. Suddenly I heard gnashing of teeth and a yell of rage. Then all vanished and before me stood Our Lady, all loveliness. ‘Do not fear, my daughter―I am here!’ I told her how terrified I was of the devil, who made me suffer so much. ‘He may torment you, but he has no power to harm you. His fury is very great on account of the souls that escape him! Souls are of such great worth! If you only knew the value of a single soul!’ Giving me her blessing, she said: ‘Do not fear!’ I kissed her hand and she went away.”
Later Jesus appeared to Josefa, and she immediately told Him of her greatest concern―the fear that in those hellish torments that her soul had lost something of its purity, or at any rate of its former innocence. “Because I never know anything about all those things with which the devil torments me.” Jesus replied to her: “Do not be afraid; your soul is steeped in My Blood, and none of that can stain it.” Then alluding to a specific word which more than once in the preceding days had given her strength: “Your Mothers have found the word―Abandonment! The devil has no power apart from what is given him from Heaven. Tell your Mothers that I am supreme!” [The “mothers” in the quote of Jesus given to Josefa refer to the Mother Superior of her convent and also the Mother Master of Novices who was personally responsible for Josefa during that time period].
Nevertheless, the demons sought to discourage her from her mission of sacrificing and suffering for souls, and they endeavored by all means to drive her to despair, and she overheard them saying such things as: “You will be one of us! ... We shall tire you out! ... We shall overcome you! ...Don’t let go of her; be on your guard to plague her in any way you can! ... She must not escape!...We must induce her to despair!”
In the life of Josefa Menendez, there occurred an even greater phenomenon that is very rare, even in the lives of the Saints―God permitted the devil to take her down to Hell. There, in Hell, she spent long hours―sometimes a whole night―in unspeakable agonies. Though she was dragged down into the bottomless pit more than a hundred times, each time seemed to her to be the first, and appeared to last countless ages. She endured all the tortures of Hell, with the one exception―that of the hatred of God. For Josefa, the most painful of these torments was to hear the horrid confessions of the damned, their cries of hatred, of pain and of despair.
Under the eyes of those in her convent, Josefa would suddenly disappear, and after long search she would be found thrown into some loft, or beneath heavy furniture, or in some unfrequented spot. In their presence she was burnt, and, without seeing the devil, they saw her clothes consumed and on her body there were unmistakable traces of fire, which caused wounds that took very long to heal. Likewise the effects of fire which burned her, were also seen on her garments and flesh; fragments of scorched linen are still preserved to this day. Ten times in all Josefa was thus set on fire. She saw the devil vomit on her flames of which visible traces were seen not on her clothes only, but on her person. Painful wounds which took long to heal left on her body scars―which she carried to the grave. The evil one suggested despairing thoughts, blasphemies, and wicked temptations that continued for days and nights, during which God hid Himself, and Josefa, bewildered, felt as if abandoned and at the mercy of the most ignoble and infamous of tormentors.
Yet, when at long last she came back to life, completely worn out and spent, her body agonized with pain, she looked upon no suffering, however severe it may be, as too much to bear, “...if by it I should save a soul from that dreaded abode of torment.”
Josefa wrote: “In the night of March 16th, towards ten o’clock, I became aware, as on the preceding days, of a confused noise of cries and chains. I rose quickly and dressed, and, trembling with fright, knelt down near my bed. The uproar was approaching and, not knowing what to do, I left the dormitory, and went to our Mother Superior’s cell―then I came back to the dormitory. The same terrifying sounds were all round me―then, all of a sudden, I saw in front of me the devil himself. He cried out: ‘Tie her feet and bind her hands!’ Instantly I lost sight of where I was, and felt myself tightly bound and being dragged away. Other voices screamed: ‘It is no good to bind her feet―it is her heart that you must bind!’ The devil answered: ‘It does not belong to me!’
“Then I was dragged along a very dark and lengthy passage, and on all sides resounded terrible cries. On opposite sides of the walls of this narrow corridor were niches out of which poured smoke, though with very little flame, and which emitted an intolerable stench. From these recesses came blaspheming voices, uttering impure words. Some cursed their bodies, others their parents. Others, again reproached themselves with having refused grace, and not avoided what they knew to be sinful. It was a medley of confused screams of rage and despair. I was dragged through that kind of corridor, which seemed endless. Then I received a violent punch which doubled me in two, and forced me into one of the niches. I felt as if I were being pressed between two burning planks and pierced through and through with scorching needle points. Opposite and beside me souls were blaspheming and cursing me. What caused me most suffering, and with which no torture can be compared, was the anguish of my soul to find myself separated from God.
“It seemed to me that I spent long years in that Hell, yet it lasted only six or seven hours. Suddenly I was violently pulled out of the niche, and I found myself in a dark place; after striking me, the devil disappeared and left me free. How can I describe my feelings on realizing that I was still alive, and could still love God! I do not know what I am not ready to endure to avoid Hell, in spite of my fear of pain. I see clearly that all the sufferings of Earth are nothing in comparison with the horror of no longer being able to love, for in that place all breathes hatred and thirst to damn other souls.” (Taken primarily from “Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love”; TAN Books and Publishers, Inc, 1981)
The Devil and You!
Now, you may not be put through the “Satanic-Wringer” to a high degree like the saints and mystics mentioned above―but you will be put through the “wringer” nonetheless. Heaven is about choices―we either choose to go to Heaven (and then do what it takes), or, by default, we choose to go to Hell (by not doing what it takes to get to Heaven). The choice is clear―Christ or Satan. As Our Lord said: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30) and he who sins is with the devil: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Most people―either directly or indirectly, knowingly or unknowingly, willingly or unwillingly―side with Satan because of the sheer quantity and regularity of their sins. “Many are called―few are chosen!” said Our Lord (Matthew 22:14), telling us to “Enter in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
If you are not prepared to fight for Heaven, then you will not get to Heaven! “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4).
The chief enemies of God are Satan and his devils―but Satan is also “the prince of the world” (John 12:31)―therefore, the world is also our enemy: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). “That great dragon―that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan―was cast out and he was cast unto the Earth, and he seduces the whole world” (Apocalypse 12:9). That is why the chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriel Amorth, used to say: “Satan continually tries to dominate the world―the whole world is in the power of the evil one! … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Today Satan rules the world!”
In a war, you have to live with the fact that you are at war―you cannot bury your head in the sand and pretend there is no war. You have to live with the fact that the enemy has perhaps surrounded you and even lives among you―it is not a negotiable thing, it is a harsh reality. In a war, it is often a case of “kill or be killed” ― and the same is true of spiritual warfare: “Your adversary, the devil, like a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye!” (1 Peter 5:8-9) ... “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7). Satan and his devils (and his princedom, the world) are the hurdles and tests that you have to overcome if you want to go to Heaven―there is no “free-pass” or “easy-street” to Heaven.
Holy Scripture tells us to arm ourselves for the inevitable battles: “Be strengthened in the Lord and in the might of His power! Put on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil! For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places! Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect! Stand, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the Gospel of peace! In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. Take unto you the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:10-17).
Article 25
Monday & Tuesday after the 3rd Sunday of Lent, March 24th & March 25th
Spotting Satan Your Life
Monday & Tuesday after the 3rd Sunday of Lent, March 24th & March 25th
Spotting Satan Your Life
See Your Enemy! Know Your Enemy!
The classic quote about knowing your enemy comes from SUN TZU’S BOOK, “THE ART OF WAR”, where it states: “Know thy enemy and know thyself―in a hundred battles thou shall never be in peril.” This emphasizes the importance of understanding both your own strengths and weaknesses, as well as those of your opponent, so that with a thorough knowledge of yourself and your enemy, you will be able to navigate any situation with confidence and avoid defeat.
HOLY SCRIPTURE similarly says: “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). The difficulty or problem is that “Satan transforms himself into an angel of light!” (2 Corinthians 11:14) … “insomuch as to deceive―if possible―even the elect!” (Matthew 24:24). “Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits if they be of God!” (1 John 4:1).
FR. GABRIELE AMORTH, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, with over 30 of experience in the field of exorcism, said: “How can we fall prey to extraordinary satanic activity? By this I mean other than the ordinary activity—temptation—which applies to everyone. We can do so through our own fault, or by being completely unaware ... The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one, than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin ... The devil does not like to be seen … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … The devil prefers this way and we are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … Satan’s biggest triumph is mankind’s conviction that he doesn’t exist ... He makes people believe that Hell does not exist, that sin does not exist, and that he is nothing but one more experience to try out ... When we jeer at the devil and tell ourselves that he does not exist, that is when he is happiest … Our contemporary religious culture―while not entirely negating the existence of Satan and the other devils―is inclined to diminish their involvement and influence over people. Discrediting this satanic influence has become almost compulsory and is considered a sign of ‘wisdom’.”
24 Hours a Day
Whether you know it or not; like it or not; want it or not―there is nobody on Earth who spends more time with you than Satan. You might sleep―Satan never does. He constantly plots and plans your damnation! He gets involved in the most trivial things of your life. When the devil cannot gain much from us, he is in the beginning content with the little; by many trifling victories he will make a great conquest. He will use the tiniest things or opportunities to his advantage―for he knows that little-by-little he can go very far. He, or one devil or another, is always at your side―24 hours a day, 7 days a week, all year round, and every year of your life. There is nobody on Earth who knows you better than Satan. From the viewpoint of Heaven, only the Blessed Trinity, Our Lady and your Guardian Angel spend equal amounts of time with you.
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI writes: “The devil regards the whole of our life as very short, and therefore he loses not a moment of time, but tempts us day and night. ‘The devil is come down unto you having great wrath, knowing that he hath but a short time!’ (Apocalypse 12:12). The enemy, then, never loses time in seeking to bring us to Hell!”
Detecting the Devil
FR. LUDOVIC-MARIE BARRIELLE, in his excellent booklet, Rules for Discerning the Spirits, writes: “The devil does all in his power to make us believe that he does not exist or to think not of him. It is then that he is able to act with all freedom … We do not see those who attack us, because the devils are pure spirits. This is the reason for all these attempts to deny the existence of the angels that we hear repeated sometimes even in the sacristies: because if there were no angels there would not be any devils, and yet, the angels, both the good and the bad, are found in Holy Scripture from the first chapter to the last. This, however, is not sufficient for them to believe in the existence of angels and devils. One has to wake up! A Spanish proverb says: ‘When someone knocks at the door, one does not only hear the knocking, but also, one must realize WHO is knocking!’
“Do you not know that the devil uses everything when coming to tempt you? He will use advantageously the bad weather, as a disposition. You just are not aware of the fact that if you are feeling sad, the devil is hovering about you. Beware! One must above all distinguish well that which is from God, let us say from the Good Spirit and that which comes from the evil spirit. There are rules for distinguishing between different spiritual influences, so that the good ones may be admitted and the evil ones rejected.
“We have there a general rule which is capital―as soon as one knows that it comes from the devil, it must be rejected without any discussion. My master of novices, Fr. Terradas said: ‘One does not play with the devil!’ He calls playing with the devil the fact of tarrying with a thought that one knows to be not good, and thus, from the devil―while at the same time reassuring oneself, with a firm will, not to consent to it. Woe to him who consents to dialogue with the devil―who is much stronger that we are. Eve succumbed because she played with the devil. Instead of cutting him short, she started to discuss with him. We sometimes hear of priests falling, of great, exemplary Christians falling, etc. Know that it has not happened all of a sudden. For a long time, they have played with the devil.
“How do I know that an inspiration that I feel comes from God or from the devil? There are rules. These rules differ for those who are living in the state of sin and for those who are making progress in virtue. Those who go from mortal sin to mortal sin are usually influenced in the following way. This rule can also be applied to those who, without being in the state of mortal sin, are well entrenched in lukewarmness. The enemy proposes certain illusory delights, causing them to imagine sensual pleasures and enjoyments, the more effectively to keep them under the sway of their vicious and sinful course. The good spirit deals with these same people in the opposite way, working on their consciences in order to induce compunction and remorse. The devil reassures souls in mortal sin or lukewarmness. The good angel sends them grave warnings that is very dangerous for their salvation. Woe to those who pay no attention! It is in this way that laxity is introduced into many convents and even into Christian families.
“So it is, with those who live in mortal sin: the evil spirit reassures the sinner and pushes him further and further into sin. He presents to the sinner more vivid pleasures, and sensible delectation. He represents to him the objects of sin as the greatest happiness, so that he will plunge deeper and deeper into it with all the more security and joy, just as if it were something normal and indispensable: ‘The whole world is doing it!’ The good angel, on the contrary, sends a sting. He stirs one’s conscience, this prevents the sinner from being complacent. The good angel uses rational reproaches. He shows him the consequences of sin. The sinner is in the state of damnation. If his car should hit a lamp post or a milestone, he risks passing from his steering wheel to the judgment of God, and Hell. It is the devil that reassures the sinner in his sins. BEWARE! The good angel gives rational reproaches. He says clearly who he is―he does not beat around the bush.
How does the evil spirit proceed? How does the good angel behave with those who work courageously at correcting their sins?
The devils, as well as the good angels, are pure spirits. We do not see them. God did not want the devils, our enemies, to come and attack us without us having something like a rule by which to detect them. This is why the examination of conscience is so important. ‘Vigilate et orate!’ said Jesus in the Gospels: ‘Watch and pray!’ Woe to the Christian that is not on his guard! The devil will do with his soul as he pleases if he is not alert. But to watch is not sufficient ... we must also recognize the signs which discern the good angel from the bad one. (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Fr. Barrielle continues: St. Ignatius gives us six signs by which to recognize the evil spirit who seeks to tempt those who progress in virtue. In these cases it is typical of the evil spirit to cause regret and sadness, using fallse arguments to disturb them and to impede their progress. We have thus six characteristics, like six odors, that detect and betray the presence of evil spirit:
Sign #1 ― Sadness
“‘A saint sad is a sad saint,’ said St. Francis de Sales. The devil is eternally sad ... he cannot get rid of his sadness. As soon as he comes near you he communicates his sadness without even so much as wanting to do so. This is so much the case, that in the rules for discerning the spirits of the second week, when the devil attempts to tempt a fervent soul, under the appearance of good, one of the signs for recognizing that it is the devil is this sadness that we feel overcoming us. Such is one who, leaving the confessional content, is suddenly struck by sadness. Recognize him who comes near with his sadness! Behold a sad young man―I do not say that he has sinned, but I know that the devil is hovering about him. Beware of these melancholic dreams! One may not realize, but the devil is not far off!” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Sign #2 ― Regret (The "What if..?" Syndrome)
“Fr. Louis Lallamant, the famous Jesuit said: ‘All conditional propositions that disturb one’s soul, come from the devil.’
“Behold, your wife arrives one Saturday evening: ‘Who knows, Francis, if I have made a good confession? Who knows if tomorrow I will be able to go to Communion?’
“‘Why? ... Have you intentionally hidden a mortal sin in confession?’ And you know that for nothing in the world would she commit a venial sin, let alone a mortal sin.
“‘Oh no! But the sacristan was noisy, and the children were making a fuss, Father was sneezing, I was confused. Who knows if I made a good confession?’
“Reply to her: ‘Be assured, you have made a good confession; you can go to Communion in peace!’ How do you know that? It’s the second rule! It is the devil that is confusing you, and the devil is a liar! If you had made a sacrilegious confession, the devil would have reassured you that everything is okay, while the good angel would tell you why and in what way you would have made a sacrilegious confession. Thus be assured that you have not made a sacrilegious confession.
“Behold a seminarian who ponders within himself whether or not he has a vocation. These thoughts, in themselves, come from the devil. The good angel would tell him clearly why he does not have a vocation.” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Sign #3 ― Obstacles and DIfficulties
“The devil excels in making the practice of virtue seem too difficult; he blows out of proportion all the difficulties. How many people think that a really Christian life is impossible, that there are insurmountable difficulties in saving oneself, in practicing chastity according to one’s state of life, in living as a Christian in marriage! Think of the horror at the thought of not appearing like the rest of the world, which has persuaded so many great Christians to dishonor themselves by impure fashions.
“How many times has a panic pregnancy persuaded an allegedly Catholic woman to commit an infanticide and have an abortionCa crime which cries to Heaven for vengeance before God!C to be deprived of that eternal treasure, that unequalled joy for the whole family, which a newly‑born baby brings, and which, as we know, provides also the health and happiness of the woman. The devil inflates all the difficulties and at the same time hides that which renders the Christian life easy: flight from occasions of sin, prayer, the Sacraments, the profound joys of a Christian family, the eternal bliss, etc.” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Sign #4 ― Disturbance
“‘All trouble comes from the devil,’ said St. John Berchmans, including moody temperaments and vivid emotions. Sometimes in the family, there is tension in the air. The wife loses her temper, the children are particularly unbearable, the father is boxing every one’s ears. Know that the devil is present! There, he wins every time! Foolish things are said and done, sin is committed more or less gravely, and more or less numerously. Watch! Pray! We will explain further on, the means to counter-attack the devil’s impact. One must warn the children against certain dissipations or feelings of anger or pride which the devil makes use of.” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Sign #5 ― False Reasoning
“False reasoning is an unmistakable sign of the devil. One must be very skeptical of certain false theories, of certain slogans which engender many sins, and often grave sins against the Faith, against justice or charity. For example: ‘They can choose their own religion when they grow up.’
“Excuse me! Do you know whether they will live until then? Do they not have a right to know now that they have a Father in Heaven? To know that they have an eternal destiny? Do they not have already a little heart that is capable of practicing virtue? To love the good God? It is not an act of justice that you are advocating―rather, it is the most horrible and criminal of injustices. FALSE REASONINGS!
“Some also say: ‘Father we will only have one child; that way, we will bring him up better!’ Do not be deceived! One does not bring up a single child better than one does twelve. As for me, some of the whippings that I received did not come from my father or my mother, but from brothers and sisters, who also play an important part in an education!
“Others say: ‘I did not ask God to come into the world!’ or, what comes to the same thing: ‘I did not ask my parents to bring me into the world!’ Besides it being foolishness and insuperable pride, one may reply: ‘At which moment, sir, should they have asked your permission? Before your conception? ... When you were in the womb of your mother? ... When you were sucking your thumb? ... Or would they have had to wait until you were twenty years old?’”
“This is assuredly a serious blasphemy against God, the Father of all good. Life is good. Your eternal destiny is a good above all other goods. Consider all the means that God has prepared for you, from all eternity, in order that you save your soul! And your parents, also, did nothing but follow God’s plan ... And you, being so full of pride, say such things! Do you not make use of all these gifts of God? How dare you not even thank Him? They are inexcusable says St. Paul (Romans 1:20), talking about those who do not want to say thank you to the good God and who, all the same, use His gifts, starting with their morning coffee through to the night. They breathe the good God’s air, drink His milk, His wine, His water, they eat His bread, smoke His cigarettes, etc.” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Sign #6 ― Discouragement
“Discouragement is the work of the devil. You have begun well ... all of a sudden your courage dries up: the devil has passed by. What about the good angel? He provides courage, peace, joy and makes all things easy! Remember the temptations of St. Augustine! He was in the garden. He was 32 years old and not even baptized. He had led a dissolute life and became a Manichean. He had a very holy mother [St. Monica] who prayed for him during these 32 years. She followed him to Milan, where the emperor appointed him as director of the imperial school. There, he came into contact with St. Ambrose, who had no difficulties in showing the young director (who was very intelligent and loved to hear St. Ambrose speak), that if he wanted to save his soul he would, at all costs, have to become a Christian, to quit his evil ways, to get baptized, etc. He was enrolled as a catechumen and was supposed to be baptized at Easter.
“Do you honestly believe, from this, that it all went so smoothly? St. Augustine, in his CONFESSIONS (Book 8) tells us how it actually happened. He was in his garden, when all of a sudden he became sad: ‘You are not stupid; have you reflected enough?’ He cried crocodile tears and was even obliged to walk around so that he could breathe. ‘This is impossible!’ All his old friendships flooded his memory: ‘How could you live without us? Augustine! Oh, dear Augustine! It is impossible!’
“The temptation was so great that he was on the point of refusing baptism and of sending word to the archbishop: ‘Excellency, I am not ready, I underestimated my strength!’ What a pity! But the good angel does not abandon his own, and while he was walking in the garden, he received an idea: ‘After all, what all these Christians can do ... why could I not do it too? Well, just like them, I will flee from the occasions of sin, I will pray; and if I fall, I will go to confession; I will go to Communion ... how fortunate I am!’ This thought gave him peace and joy: ‘For Easter I will be like my mother [St. Monica]!’
“Note well, in the first part, the six signs of the devil: sadness, regret, impediments, disturbance, false reasonings, discouragement. Do you see that it was not by chance, nor by his own strength, that St. Augustine kept his resolution? He kept it only because the good angel intervened.” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
The classic quote about knowing your enemy comes from SUN TZU’S BOOK, “THE ART OF WAR”, where it states: “Know thy enemy and know thyself―in a hundred battles thou shall never be in peril.” This emphasizes the importance of understanding both your own strengths and weaknesses, as well as those of your opponent, so that with a thorough knowledge of yourself and your enemy, you will be able to navigate any situation with confidence and avoid defeat.
HOLY SCRIPTURE similarly says: “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). The difficulty or problem is that “Satan transforms himself into an angel of light!” (2 Corinthians 11:14) … “insomuch as to deceive―if possible―even the elect!” (Matthew 24:24). “Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits if they be of God!” (1 John 4:1).
FR. GABRIELE AMORTH, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, with over 30 of experience in the field of exorcism, said: “How can we fall prey to extraordinary satanic activity? By this I mean other than the ordinary activity—temptation—which applies to everyone. We can do so through our own fault, or by being completely unaware ... The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one, than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin ... The devil does not like to be seen … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … The devil prefers this way and we are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … Satan’s biggest triumph is mankind’s conviction that he doesn’t exist ... He makes people believe that Hell does not exist, that sin does not exist, and that he is nothing but one more experience to try out ... When we jeer at the devil and tell ourselves that he does not exist, that is when he is happiest … Our contemporary religious culture―while not entirely negating the existence of Satan and the other devils―is inclined to diminish their involvement and influence over people. Discrediting this satanic influence has become almost compulsory and is considered a sign of ‘wisdom’.”
24 Hours a Day
Whether you know it or not; like it or not; want it or not―there is nobody on Earth who spends more time with you than Satan. You might sleep―Satan never does. He constantly plots and plans your damnation! He gets involved in the most trivial things of your life. When the devil cannot gain much from us, he is in the beginning content with the little; by many trifling victories he will make a great conquest. He will use the tiniest things or opportunities to his advantage―for he knows that little-by-little he can go very far. He, or one devil or another, is always at your side―24 hours a day, 7 days a week, all year round, and every year of your life. There is nobody on Earth who knows you better than Satan. From the viewpoint of Heaven, only the Blessed Trinity, Our Lady and your Guardian Angel spend equal amounts of time with you.
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI writes: “The devil regards the whole of our life as very short, and therefore he loses not a moment of time, but tempts us day and night. ‘The devil is come down unto you having great wrath, knowing that he hath but a short time!’ (Apocalypse 12:12). The enemy, then, never loses time in seeking to bring us to Hell!”
Detecting the Devil
FR. LUDOVIC-MARIE BARRIELLE, in his excellent booklet, Rules for Discerning the Spirits, writes: “The devil does all in his power to make us believe that he does not exist or to think not of him. It is then that he is able to act with all freedom … We do not see those who attack us, because the devils are pure spirits. This is the reason for all these attempts to deny the existence of the angels that we hear repeated sometimes even in the sacristies: because if there were no angels there would not be any devils, and yet, the angels, both the good and the bad, are found in Holy Scripture from the first chapter to the last. This, however, is not sufficient for them to believe in the existence of angels and devils. One has to wake up! A Spanish proverb says: ‘When someone knocks at the door, one does not only hear the knocking, but also, one must realize WHO is knocking!’
“Do you not know that the devil uses everything when coming to tempt you? He will use advantageously the bad weather, as a disposition. You just are not aware of the fact that if you are feeling sad, the devil is hovering about you. Beware! One must above all distinguish well that which is from God, let us say from the Good Spirit and that which comes from the evil spirit. There are rules for distinguishing between different spiritual influences, so that the good ones may be admitted and the evil ones rejected.
“We have there a general rule which is capital―as soon as one knows that it comes from the devil, it must be rejected without any discussion. My master of novices, Fr. Terradas said: ‘One does not play with the devil!’ He calls playing with the devil the fact of tarrying with a thought that one knows to be not good, and thus, from the devil―while at the same time reassuring oneself, with a firm will, not to consent to it. Woe to him who consents to dialogue with the devil―who is much stronger that we are. Eve succumbed because she played with the devil. Instead of cutting him short, she started to discuss with him. We sometimes hear of priests falling, of great, exemplary Christians falling, etc. Know that it has not happened all of a sudden. For a long time, they have played with the devil.
“How do I know that an inspiration that I feel comes from God or from the devil? There are rules. These rules differ for those who are living in the state of sin and for those who are making progress in virtue. Those who go from mortal sin to mortal sin are usually influenced in the following way. This rule can also be applied to those who, without being in the state of mortal sin, are well entrenched in lukewarmness. The enemy proposes certain illusory delights, causing them to imagine sensual pleasures and enjoyments, the more effectively to keep them under the sway of their vicious and sinful course. The good spirit deals with these same people in the opposite way, working on their consciences in order to induce compunction and remorse. The devil reassures souls in mortal sin or lukewarmness. The good angel sends them grave warnings that is very dangerous for their salvation. Woe to those who pay no attention! It is in this way that laxity is introduced into many convents and even into Christian families.
“So it is, with those who live in mortal sin: the evil spirit reassures the sinner and pushes him further and further into sin. He presents to the sinner more vivid pleasures, and sensible delectation. He represents to him the objects of sin as the greatest happiness, so that he will plunge deeper and deeper into it with all the more security and joy, just as if it were something normal and indispensable: ‘The whole world is doing it!’ The good angel, on the contrary, sends a sting. He stirs one’s conscience, this prevents the sinner from being complacent. The good angel uses rational reproaches. He shows him the consequences of sin. The sinner is in the state of damnation. If his car should hit a lamp post or a milestone, he risks passing from his steering wheel to the judgment of God, and Hell. It is the devil that reassures the sinner in his sins. BEWARE! The good angel gives rational reproaches. He says clearly who he is―he does not beat around the bush.
How does the evil spirit proceed? How does the good angel behave with those who work courageously at correcting their sins?
The devils, as well as the good angels, are pure spirits. We do not see them. God did not want the devils, our enemies, to come and attack us without us having something like a rule by which to detect them. This is why the examination of conscience is so important. ‘Vigilate et orate!’ said Jesus in the Gospels: ‘Watch and pray!’ Woe to the Christian that is not on his guard! The devil will do with his soul as he pleases if he is not alert. But to watch is not sufficient ... we must also recognize the signs which discern the good angel from the bad one. (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Fr. Barrielle continues: St. Ignatius gives us six signs by which to recognize the evil spirit who seeks to tempt those who progress in virtue. In these cases it is typical of the evil spirit to cause regret and sadness, using fallse arguments to disturb them and to impede their progress. We have thus six characteristics, like six odors, that detect and betray the presence of evil spirit:
Sign #1 ― Sadness
“‘A saint sad is a sad saint,’ said St. Francis de Sales. The devil is eternally sad ... he cannot get rid of his sadness. As soon as he comes near you he communicates his sadness without even so much as wanting to do so. This is so much the case, that in the rules for discerning the spirits of the second week, when the devil attempts to tempt a fervent soul, under the appearance of good, one of the signs for recognizing that it is the devil is this sadness that we feel overcoming us. Such is one who, leaving the confessional content, is suddenly struck by sadness. Recognize him who comes near with his sadness! Behold a sad young man―I do not say that he has sinned, but I know that the devil is hovering about him. Beware of these melancholic dreams! One may not realize, but the devil is not far off!” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Sign #2 ― Regret (The "What if..?" Syndrome)
“Fr. Louis Lallamant, the famous Jesuit said: ‘All conditional propositions that disturb one’s soul, come from the devil.’
“Behold, your wife arrives one Saturday evening: ‘Who knows, Francis, if I have made a good confession? Who knows if tomorrow I will be able to go to Communion?’
“‘Why? ... Have you intentionally hidden a mortal sin in confession?’ And you know that for nothing in the world would she commit a venial sin, let alone a mortal sin.
“‘Oh no! But the sacristan was noisy, and the children were making a fuss, Father was sneezing, I was confused. Who knows if I made a good confession?’
“Reply to her: ‘Be assured, you have made a good confession; you can go to Communion in peace!’ How do you know that? It’s the second rule! It is the devil that is confusing you, and the devil is a liar! If you had made a sacrilegious confession, the devil would have reassured you that everything is okay, while the good angel would tell you why and in what way you would have made a sacrilegious confession. Thus be assured that you have not made a sacrilegious confession.
“Behold a seminarian who ponders within himself whether or not he has a vocation. These thoughts, in themselves, come from the devil. The good angel would tell him clearly why he does not have a vocation.” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Sign #3 ― Obstacles and DIfficulties
“The devil excels in making the practice of virtue seem too difficult; he blows out of proportion all the difficulties. How many people think that a really Christian life is impossible, that there are insurmountable difficulties in saving oneself, in practicing chastity according to one’s state of life, in living as a Christian in marriage! Think of the horror at the thought of not appearing like the rest of the world, which has persuaded so many great Christians to dishonor themselves by impure fashions.
“How many times has a panic pregnancy persuaded an allegedly Catholic woman to commit an infanticide and have an abortionCa crime which cries to Heaven for vengeance before God!C to be deprived of that eternal treasure, that unequalled joy for the whole family, which a newly‑born baby brings, and which, as we know, provides also the health and happiness of the woman. The devil inflates all the difficulties and at the same time hides that which renders the Christian life easy: flight from occasions of sin, prayer, the Sacraments, the profound joys of a Christian family, the eternal bliss, etc.” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Sign #4 ― Disturbance
“‘All trouble comes from the devil,’ said St. John Berchmans, including moody temperaments and vivid emotions. Sometimes in the family, there is tension in the air. The wife loses her temper, the children are particularly unbearable, the father is boxing every one’s ears. Know that the devil is present! There, he wins every time! Foolish things are said and done, sin is committed more or less gravely, and more or less numerously. Watch! Pray! We will explain further on, the means to counter-attack the devil’s impact. One must warn the children against certain dissipations or feelings of anger or pride which the devil makes use of.” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Sign #5 ― False Reasoning
“False reasoning is an unmistakable sign of the devil. One must be very skeptical of certain false theories, of certain slogans which engender many sins, and often grave sins against the Faith, against justice or charity. For example: ‘They can choose their own religion when they grow up.’
“Excuse me! Do you know whether they will live until then? Do they not have a right to know now that they have a Father in Heaven? To know that they have an eternal destiny? Do they not have already a little heart that is capable of practicing virtue? To love the good God? It is not an act of justice that you are advocating―rather, it is the most horrible and criminal of injustices. FALSE REASONINGS!
“Some also say: ‘Father we will only have one child; that way, we will bring him up better!’ Do not be deceived! One does not bring up a single child better than one does twelve. As for me, some of the whippings that I received did not come from my father or my mother, but from brothers and sisters, who also play an important part in an education!
“Others say: ‘I did not ask God to come into the world!’ or, what comes to the same thing: ‘I did not ask my parents to bring me into the world!’ Besides it being foolishness and insuperable pride, one may reply: ‘At which moment, sir, should they have asked your permission? Before your conception? ... When you were in the womb of your mother? ... When you were sucking your thumb? ... Or would they have had to wait until you were twenty years old?’”
“This is assuredly a serious blasphemy against God, the Father of all good. Life is good. Your eternal destiny is a good above all other goods. Consider all the means that God has prepared for you, from all eternity, in order that you save your soul! And your parents, also, did nothing but follow God’s plan ... And you, being so full of pride, say such things! Do you not make use of all these gifts of God? How dare you not even thank Him? They are inexcusable says St. Paul (Romans 1:20), talking about those who do not want to say thank you to the good God and who, all the same, use His gifts, starting with their morning coffee through to the night. They breathe the good God’s air, drink His milk, His wine, His water, they eat His bread, smoke His cigarettes, etc.” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Sign #6 ― Discouragement
“Discouragement is the work of the devil. You have begun well ... all of a sudden your courage dries up: the devil has passed by. What about the good angel? He provides courage, peace, joy and makes all things easy! Remember the temptations of St. Augustine! He was in the garden. He was 32 years old and not even baptized. He had led a dissolute life and became a Manichean. He had a very holy mother [St. Monica] who prayed for him during these 32 years. She followed him to Milan, where the emperor appointed him as director of the imperial school. There, he came into contact with St. Ambrose, who had no difficulties in showing the young director (who was very intelligent and loved to hear St. Ambrose speak), that if he wanted to save his soul he would, at all costs, have to become a Christian, to quit his evil ways, to get baptized, etc. He was enrolled as a catechumen and was supposed to be baptized at Easter.
“Do you honestly believe, from this, that it all went so smoothly? St. Augustine, in his CONFESSIONS (Book 8) tells us how it actually happened. He was in his garden, when all of a sudden he became sad: ‘You are not stupid; have you reflected enough?’ He cried crocodile tears and was even obliged to walk around so that he could breathe. ‘This is impossible!’ All his old friendships flooded his memory: ‘How could you live without us? Augustine! Oh, dear Augustine! It is impossible!’
“The temptation was so great that he was on the point of refusing baptism and of sending word to the archbishop: ‘Excellency, I am not ready, I underestimated my strength!’ What a pity! But the good angel does not abandon his own, and while he was walking in the garden, he received an idea: ‘After all, what all these Christians can do ... why could I not do it too? Well, just like them, I will flee from the occasions of sin, I will pray; and if I fall, I will go to confession; I will go to Communion ... how fortunate I am!’ This thought gave him peace and joy: ‘For Easter I will be like my mother [St. Monica]!’
“Note well, in the first part, the six signs of the devil: sadness, regret, impediments, disturbance, false reasonings, discouragement. Do you see that it was not by chance, nor by his own strength, that St. Augustine kept his resolution? He kept it only because the good angel intervened.” (Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits).
Article 24
The 3rd Sunday of Lent, March 23rd
The Devil and You
The 3rd Sunday of Lent, March 23rd
The Devil and You
What the Hell!?!
You might be tempted to exclaim: “What the Hell are you talking about? The devil and me? I have nothing to do with the devil!” Perhaps so! But the devil has plenty to do with you! “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8).
Anyway―today’s Gospel, for the 3rd Sunday of Advent, speaks of the devil. As they say: “Speak of the devil and he is bound to appear!” So, since Holy Mother Church speaks of the devil in today’s Gospel reading, then he is bound to appear in this article on that same 3rd Sunday of Advent! Like it not―the devil is reality we all have to contend with!
The devilish part of the Gospel for the 3rd Sunday of Lent reads as follows: “At that time, Jesus was casting out a devil, and the same was dumb―and when He had cast out the devil, the dumb man spoke. And the crowds marveled. But some of them said: ‘By Beelzebub, the prince of devils, He casts out devils!’ And others, to test Him, demanded from Him a sign from Heaven. But He, seeing their thoughts, said to them: ‘Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and house will fall upon house! If, then, Satan also is divided against himself, how shall his kingdom stand? ― because you say that I cast out devils by Beelzebub. Now, if I cast out devils by Beelzebub―then by whom do your children cast them out? Therefore they shall be your judges! But if I cast out devils by the finger of God, then the Kingdom of God has come upon you! When the strong man, fully armed, guards his courtyard, his property is undisturbed. But if someone stronger than he attacks and overcomes him, then he will take away all his weapons that he relied upon, and will divide his spoils! He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me scatters! When the unclean spirit has gone out of a man, he roams through waterless places in search of rest―and finding none, he says: ‘I will return to my house which I left!’ And when he has come to it, he finds the place swept clean. Then he goes and takes seven other spirits more evil than himself, and they enter in and dwell there―and the last state of that man becomes worse that the first!’” (Luke 11:14-26).
Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, after 30 years of experience in exorcising the devil, would often say: ““The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one! … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere! Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world! Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The Devil does not like to be seen―that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways! … The devil prefers this way! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour.’ That word―‘where’―is important: the devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and ‘works’ on it … The most frequent weak points in man are, from time to time, always the same: pride, money, and lust … Satan weakens the consciences of men and women and leads them toward egoism, closing their hearts, lack of forgiveness!
“Satan’s power over the world includes physical and mental obsession … The evil one can cause unrestrained animosities, especially toward those who love us the most ... Satan also ruins friendships; through his intervention, the victim feels unwelcome everywhere, avoided by everyone, ending in a desire for isolation. Every time that a friendly relationship grows and blossoms, it suddenly ends, without reason … He destroys marriages, breaks up engagements; he fosters screaming fights in families where everyone truly loves one another, and always for futile reasons. Then there follows a conviction of total lack of love and understanding, a complete affective void that makes marriage an impossibility … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan!” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, former chief exorcist of Rome).
No Escape!
We would like to avoid the devil and escape temptation―but that is like trying to graduate without taking any exams! As Holy Scripture says: “Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should test and prove you!” (Tobias 12:13) … “When you come into the service of God, stand in fear and prepare your soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). Not even Our Lord, nor Our Lady, were exempted from having to struggle with the devil and temptation! The Imitation of Christ offers these wise words that are truly worth pondering:
“So long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and temptation. Whence it is written in Job: ‘The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!’ (Job 7:1). Everyone, therefore, must guard against temptation and must watch in prayer lest the devil―who never sleeps but goes about seeking whom he may devour―find occasion to deceive him. No one is so perfect or so holy but he is sometimes tempted; man cannot be altogether free from temptation.
“Yet temptations―though troublesome and severe―are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many temptations and trials to profit by them, while those who could not resist became reprobate and fell away. There is no state so holy, no place so secret that temptations and trials will not come. Man is never safe from them as long as he lives, for they come from within us—in sin we were born. When one temptation or trial passes, another comes. We shall always have something to suffer, because we have lost the state of original blessedness.
“Many people try to escape temptations, only to fall more deeply. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but, by patience and true humility, we become stronger than all our enemies. The man who only shuns temptations outwardly and does not uproot them will make little progress; indeed they will quickly return, more violent than before. Little by little, in patience and long-suffering you will overcome them, by the help of God rather than by severity and your own rash ways. Often take counsel when tempted; and do not be harsh with others who are tempted, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled.
“The beginning of all temptation lies in a wavering mind and little trust in God, for as a rudderless ship is driven hither and yon by waves, so a careless and irresolute man is tempted in many ways. Fire tempers iron and temptation steels the just. Often we do not know what we can stand, but temptation shows us what we are.
“Above all, we must be especially alert against the beginnings of temptation, for the enemy is more easily conquered if he is refused admittance to the mind and is met beyond the threshold when he knocks. Someone has said very aptly: ‘Resist the beginnings―remedies come too late when, by long delay, the evil has gained strength!’ First, a mere thought comes to mind, then strong imagination, followed by pleasure, evil delight, and consent. Thus, because he is not resisted in the beginning, Satan gains full entry. And the longer a man delays in resisting, so much the weaker does he become each day, while the strength of the enemy grows against him.
“Some suffer great temptations in the beginning of their conversion, others toward the end, while some are troubled almost constantly throughout their life. Others, again, are tempted but lightly according to the wisdom and justice of Divine Providence Who weighs the status and merit of each and prepares all for the salvation of His elect.
“We should not despair, therefore, when we are tempted, but pray to God the more fervently that He may see fit to help us, for according to the word of Paul, He will make issue with temptation that we may be able to bear it. Let us humble our souls under the hand of God in every trial and temptation for He will save and exalt the humble in spirit.
“In temptations and trials the progress of a man is measured; in them opportunity for merit and virtue is made more manifest. When a man is not troubled it is not hard for him to be fervent and devout, but if he bears up patiently in time of adversity, there is hope for great progress. Some, guarded against great temptations, are frequently overcome by small ones in order that, humbled by their weakness in small trials, they may not presume on their own strength in great ones” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 13: “Resisting Temptation”).
Satan is Here to Stay!
The devil will not go away just because you don’t want to fight! In fact, the devil would prefer total surrender on your part without a fight! Yet Holy Scripture tells you that you must fight: “The devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8) … “Resist the devil and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7). St. Teresa of Avila, in her autobiography, recounts experiences where, after increasing in holiness, she found that the devil―who had once been a source of torment to her―was now fearful of her, even fleeing in her presence, as she became closer to God.
St. John of the Cross says that the devil accomplishes more by doing a little harm to an advanced soul, than by doing great damage to many others. This is because a holy soul leads many others to Heaven and does the devil much harm. Such a holy soul’s special love of God is sufficient to make the devil do his utmost to bring about the perdition of that holy soul. The conflict, then, is tougher for such a soul, than it is for one who is less holy.
St. Teresa of Avila and the Devil
We see this in the case of St. Teresa of Avila. As soon as the devil began to notice Teresa, she endured the terrible and subtle temptations of despair, false humility, false presumption, and false fears as well as the temptation to abandon mental prayer. These temptations put her soul's peace and love of God at risk. In her autobiography, St. Teresa describes some of her many encounters with the devil―here are some extracts:
“I was once in an oratory, when Satan, in an abominable shape, appeared on my left hand. A huge flame seemed to issue out of his body. He spoke in a fearful way, and said to me that, even though I had escaped out of his hands, he would still lay hold of me again. I was in great terror, made the Sign of the Cross as well as I could, and then the form vanished―but it re-appeared instantly. This occurred twice. I did not know what to do. There was some Holy Water at hand―I took some and threw it in the direction of the figure, and then Satan never returned.
“On another occasion I was tortured for five hours with such terrible pains, such inward and outward sufferings, that it seemed to me as if I could not bear them. Those who were with me were frightened―they knew not what to do and I could not help myself. When these pains and my bodily suffering are most unendurable, I am in the habit of making interior acts as well as I can, imploring Our Lord, if it be His will, to give me patience, and then to let me suffer on―even to the end of the world. So, when I found myself suffering so cruelly, I relieved myself by making those acts and resolutions, in order that I might be able to endure the pain. It pleased Our Lord to let me understand that it was the work of Satan―for I saw close beside me a most frightful figure, gnashing his teeth in despair at losing what he attempted to seize. When I saw him, I laughed, and had no fear. My body, head, and arms were violently shaken―I could not help myself. But the worst of all was the interior pain, for I could find no ease in any way. Nor did I dare to ask for Holy Water, lest those who were with me should be afraid and find out what the matter really was.
“I know by frequent experience that there is nothing which puts the devils to flight like Holy Water. They run away when confronted with the Sign of the Cross also, but they return immediately. Great, then, must be the power of Holy Water! As for me, my soul is conscious of a special and most distinct consolation whenever I take Holy Water. Indeed, I feel almost always a certain refreshing, which I cannot describe, together with an inward joy, which comforts my whole soul. I may compare what I feel with that which happens to a person in great heat, and very thirsty, drinking a cup of cold water―his whole being is refreshed. I have a joy that the words of the Church are so mighty, that they endow water with power―so that there shall be so great a difference between Holy Water and water that has never been blessed. Then, as my pains did not cease, I told them, if they would not laugh, I would ask for some Holy Water. They brought me some, and sprinkled me with it―but I was no better. I then threw some Holy Water in the direction of the ugly figure, and he fled in a moment. All my sufferings ceased, just as if someone had taken them from me with his hand―only I was wearied as if I had been beaten with many blows. It was of great service to me to learn that if, by Our Lord’s permission, Satan can do so much evil to a soul and body not in his power, he can do much more when he has them in his possession. It gave me a renewed desire to be delivered from something so dangerous.
“Another time, and not long ago, the same thing happened to me, though it did not last so long, and I was alone at the moment. I asked for Holy Water, and they who came in after the devil had gone away―they were two nuns, worthy of all credit, and would not tell a lie for anything―perceived a most offensive smell, like that of brimstone. I smelt nothing myself―but the odor lasted long enough to become sensible to the two nuns.
“On another occasion there came to me a priest who, for two-and-a-half-years, had been living in mortal sin of the most abominable nature that I ever heard. During the whole of that time he neither confessed it, nor ceased from committing it; and yet he said Mass. He confessed his other sins; but of this one he used to say: ‘How can I confess so foul a sin?’ He wished to give it up, but he could not prevail on himself to do so. I was very sorry for him, and it was a great grief to me to see God offended in such a way. I promised him that I would pray to God for his amendment, and get others who were better than I to do the same. I wrote to one person, and the priest undertook to get the letter delivered. It came to pass that he made a full confession at the first opportunity―for Our Lord was pleased, on account of the prayers of those most holy persons to whom I had recommended him, to have pity on this soul. I, too, wretched as I am, did all I could for the same end.
“He wrote to me, and said that he was so far improved that he had not for some days repeated his sin; but he was so tormented by the temptation that it seemed to him as if he were in Hell already, so great were his sufferings. He asked me to pray to God for him. I recommended him to my sisters, through whose prayers I must have obtained this mercy from Our Lord―for they took the matter greatly to heart; and he was a person whom no one could find out. I implored His Majesty to put an end to these torments and temptations, and to let the evil spirits torment me instead, provided I did not offend Our Lord. Thus it was that for one month I was most grievously tormented; and then it was that these two assaults of Satan, of which I have just spoken above, took place.
“I was informed that Our Lord was pleased to deliver him out of this temptation―for I told him what happened to myself that month. His soul gained strength, and he continued to be free from that mortal sin. He could never give thanks enough to Our Lord and to me―as if I had been of any service, unless it be that the belief that Our Lord granted me such graces was of some advantage to him. He said that, when he saw himself in great straits, he would read my letters, and then the temptation left him. He was very much astonished at my sufferings, and at the manner of his own deliverance―even I myself am astonished, and I would suffer as much for many years for the deliverance of that soul. May Our Lord be praised for ever―for the prayers of those who serve Him can do great things! The devils must have been more angry with me only because I asked my religious sisters to pray, and because Our Lord permitted it on account of my sins. At that time, too, I thought the evil spirits would have suffocated me one night, and, when the sisters threw much Holy Water about, I saw a great troop of devils rush away, as if tumbling over a precipice. These cursed spirits have tormented me so often, and I am now so little afraid of them―because I see they cannot stir without Our Lord's permission!
“May this I have written be of use to every true servant of God, who ought to despise these terrors, which Satan sends only to make him afraid! Let him understand that each time we despise these terrors, their force is lessened, and the soul gains power over them. There is always some great good obtained―but I will not speak of it, that I may not be too diffuse. I will speak, however, of what happened to me once on the night of All Souls. I was in an oratory, and, having prayed one Nocturn of the Divine Office, I was saying some very devotional prayers at the end of our Breviary, when Satan put himself on the book before me, to prevent my finishing my prayer. I made the sign of the cross, and he went away. I then returned to my prayer, and he, too, came back. He did so, I believe, three times―and I was not able to finish the prayer without throwing Holy Water at him. I saw certain souls, at that moment, come forth out of Purgatory―they must have been near their deliverance, and I thought that Satan might in this way have been trying to hinder their release. It is very rarely that I saw Satan assume a bodily form; I know of his presence through the vision I have spoken of before, the vision wherein no form is seen.
“I wish also to relate what follows, for I was greatly alarmed at it: on Trinity Sunday, in the choir of a certain monastery, and in a trance, I saw a great fight between evil spirits and the angels. I could not make out what the vision meant. In less than a fortnight it was explained clearly enough by the dispute that took place between persons given to prayer and many who were not, which did great harm to that house; for it was a dispute that lasted long and caused much trouble. On another occasion I saw a great multitude of evil spirits round about me, and, at the same time, a great light, in which I was enveloped, which kept them from coming near me. I understood it to mean that God was watching over me, that they might not approach me so as to make me offend Him. I knew the vision was real by what I saw occasionally in myself. The fact is, I know now how little power the evil spirits have, provided I am not out of the grace of God; I have scarcely any fear of them at all, for their strength is as nothing, if they do not find the souls they assail give up the contest and become cowards; it is in this case that they show their power.” (St. Teresa of Avila, in her Autobiography).
St. Francis of Assisi and the Devil
St. Francis of Assisi and all his religious were gathered on an open plain, where they had built little huts of rushes. Seeing the extraordinary penances which were being practiced, St. Francis ordered that all instruments of penance should be brought out, whereupon his religious produced them in bundles. At this moment there was one young man to whom God gave the grace to see his Guardian Angel. On the one side he saw all of these good religious, who could not satisfy their hunger for penance, and, on the other, his Guardian Angel allowed him to see a gathering of eighteen thousand devils, who were holding counsel to see in what way they could subvert these religious by temptation. One of the devils said: “You do not understand this at all! These religious are so humble! Ah, what wonderful virtue, so detached from themselves, so attached to God! They have a superior who leads them so well that it is impossible to succeed in winning them over! Let us wait until their superior is dead, and then we shall try to introduce among them young people without real vocations, who will bring about a certain slackening of spirit, and in this way we shall gain them!”
A little further on, as St. Francis entered the town, he saw a devil, whose task was to tempt all of those who were inside, sitting by himself beside the gate into the town. Francis asked his Guardian Angel why it was that, in order to tempt his group of religious, there had been so many thousands of devils, while for a whole town there was only one devil ― and that one was sitting down doing nothing. His Guardian Angel told him that the people of the town did not need to be tempted much, because they had enough badness in themselves and were therefore doing the devil’s work for him, whereas the religious were doing much good, despite all the traps which the devils could lay for them.
You and the Devil
So how do you relate to the devil in your life? Are you doing the devil’s work for him? Or are you fighting hard against him? Has he weakened you so much that he no longer needs to tempt you to commit sin―since you have developed a habit of sin? Or is he gnashing his teeth because he has less and less success with you? Are you aware of his antics, disguises and schemes? Or are you oblivious and blind to his activity in your life? Are you moving towards holiness? Or are you drifting into worldliness?
You might be tempted to exclaim: “What the Hell are you talking about? The devil and me? I have nothing to do with the devil!” Perhaps so! But the devil has plenty to do with you! “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8).
Anyway―today’s Gospel, for the 3rd Sunday of Advent, speaks of the devil. As they say: “Speak of the devil and he is bound to appear!” So, since Holy Mother Church speaks of the devil in today’s Gospel reading, then he is bound to appear in this article on that same 3rd Sunday of Advent! Like it not―the devil is reality we all have to contend with!
The devilish part of the Gospel for the 3rd Sunday of Lent reads as follows: “At that time, Jesus was casting out a devil, and the same was dumb―and when He had cast out the devil, the dumb man spoke. And the crowds marveled. But some of them said: ‘By Beelzebub, the prince of devils, He casts out devils!’ And others, to test Him, demanded from Him a sign from Heaven. But He, seeing their thoughts, said to them: ‘Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and house will fall upon house! If, then, Satan also is divided against himself, how shall his kingdom stand? ― because you say that I cast out devils by Beelzebub. Now, if I cast out devils by Beelzebub―then by whom do your children cast them out? Therefore they shall be your judges! But if I cast out devils by the finger of God, then the Kingdom of God has come upon you! When the strong man, fully armed, guards his courtyard, his property is undisturbed. But if someone stronger than he attacks and overcomes him, then he will take away all his weapons that he relied upon, and will divide his spoils! He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me scatters! When the unclean spirit has gone out of a man, he roams through waterless places in search of rest―and finding none, he says: ‘I will return to my house which I left!’ And when he has come to it, he finds the place swept clean. Then he goes and takes seven other spirits more evil than himself, and they enter in and dwell there―and the last state of that man becomes worse that the first!’” (Luke 11:14-26).
Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, after 30 years of experience in exorcising the devil, would often say: ““The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one! … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere! Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world! Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The Devil does not like to be seen―that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways! … The devil prefers this way! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour.’ That word―‘where’―is important: the devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and ‘works’ on it … The most frequent weak points in man are, from time to time, always the same: pride, money, and lust … Satan weakens the consciences of men and women and leads them toward egoism, closing their hearts, lack of forgiveness!
“Satan’s power over the world includes physical and mental obsession … The evil one can cause unrestrained animosities, especially toward those who love us the most ... Satan also ruins friendships; through his intervention, the victim feels unwelcome everywhere, avoided by everyone, ending in a desire for isolation. Every time that a friendly relationship grows and blossoms, it suddenly ends, without reason … He destroys marriages, breaks up engagements; he fosters screaming fights in families where everyone truly loves one another, and always for futile reasons. Then there follows a conviction of total lack of love and understanding, a complete affective void that makes marriage an impossibility … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan!” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, former chief exorcist of Rome).
No Escape!
We would like to avoid the devil and escape temptation―but that is like trying to graduate without taking any exams! As Holy Scripture says: “Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should test and prove you!” (Tobias 12:13) … “When you come into the service of God, stand in fear and prepare your soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). Not even Our Lord, nor Our Lady, were exempted from having to struggle with the devil and temptation! The Imitation of Christ offers these wise words that are truly worth pondering:
“So long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and temptation. Whence it is written in Job: ‘The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!’ (Job 7:1). Everyone, therefore, must guard against temptation and must watch in prayer lest the devil―who never sleeps but goes about seeking whom he may devour―find occasion to deceive him. No one is so perfect or so holy but he is sometimes tempted; man cannot be altogether free from temptation.
“Yet temptations―though troublesome and severe―are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many temptations and trials to profit by them, while those who could not resist became reprobate and fell away. There is no state so holy, no place so secret that temptations and trials will not come. Man is never safe from them as long as he lives, for they come from within us—in sin we were born. When one temptation or trial passes, another comes. We shall always have something to suffer, because we have lost the state of original blessedness.
“Many people try to escape temptations, only to fall more deeply. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but, by patience and true humility, we become stronger than all our enemies. The man who only shuns temptations outwardly and does not uproot them will make little progress; indeed they will quickly return, more violent than before. Little by little, in patience and long-suffering you will overcome them, by the help of God rather than by severity and your own rash ways. Often take counsel when tempted; and do not be harsh with others who are tempted, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled.
“The beginning of all temptation lies in a wavering mind and little trust in God, for as a rudderless ship is driven hither and yon by waves, so a careless and irresolute man is tempted in many ways. Fire tempers iron and temptation steels the just. Often we do not know what we can stand, but temptation shows us what we are.
“Above all, we must be especially alert against the beginnings of temptation, for the enemy is more easily conquered if he is refused admittance to the mind and is met beyond the threshold when he knocks. Someone has said very aptly: ‘Resist the beginnings―remedies come too late when, by long delay, the evil has gained strength!’ First, a mere thought comes to mind, then strong imagination, followed by pleasure, evil delight, and consent. Thus, because he is not resisted in the beginning, Satan gains full entry. And the longer a man delays in resisting, so much the weaker does he become each day, while the strength of the enemy grows against him.
“Some suffer great temptations in the beginning of their conversion, others toward the end, while some are troubled almost constantly throughout their life. Others, again, are tempted but lightly according to the wisdom and justice of Divine Providence Who weighs the status and merit of each and prepares all for the salvation of His elect.
“We should not despair, therefore, when we are tempted, but pray to God the more fervently that He may see fit to help us, for according to the word of Paul, He will make issue with temptation that we may be able to bear it. Let us humble our souls under the hand of God in every trial and temptation for He will save and exalt the humble in spirit.
“In temptations and trials the progress of a man is measured; in them opportunity for merit and virtue is made more manifest. When a man is not troubled it is not hard for him to be fervent and devout, but if he bears up patiently in time of adversity, there is hope for great progress. Some, guarded against great temptations, are frequently overcome by small ones in order that, humbled by their weakness in small trials, they may not presume on their own strength in great ones” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 13: “Resisting Temptation”).
Satan is Here to Stay!
The devil will not go away just because you don’t want to fight! In fact, the devil would prefer total surrender on your part without a fight! Yet Holy Scripture tells you that you must fight: “The devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8) … “Resist the devil and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7). St. Teresa of Avila, in her autobiography, recounts experiences where, after increasing in holiness, she found that the devil―who had once been a source of torment to her―was now fearful of her, even fleeing in her presence, as she became closer to God.
St. John of the Cross says that the devil accomplishes more by doing a little harm to an advanced soul, than by doing great damage to many others. This is because a holy soul leads many others to Heaven and does the devil much harm. Such a holy soul’s special love of God is sufficient to make the devil do his utmost to bring about the perdition of that holy soul. The conflict, then, is tougher for such a soul, than it is for one who is less holy.
St. Teresa of Avila and the Devil
We see this in the case of St. Teresa of Avila. As soon as the devil began to notice Teresa, she endured the terrible and subtle temptations of despair, false humility, false presumption, and false fears as well as the temptation to abandon mental prayer. These temptations put her soul's peace and love of God at risk. In her autobiography, St. Teresa describes some of her many encounters with the devil―here are some extracts:
“I was once in an oratory, when Satan, in an abominable shape, appeared on my left hand. A huge flame seemed to issue out of his body. He spoke in a fearful way, and said to me that, even though I had escaped out of his hands, he would still lay hold of me again. I was in great terror, made the Sign of the Cross as well as I could, and then the form vanished―but it re-appeared instantly. This occurred twice. I did not know what to do. There was some Holy Water at hand―I took some and threw it in the direction of the figure, and then Satan never returned.
“On another occasion I was tortured for five hours with such terrible pains, such inward and outward sufferings, that it seemed to me as if I could not bear them. Those who were with me were frightened―they knew not what to do and I could not help myself. When these pains and my bodily suffering are most unendurable, I am in the habit of making interior acts as well as I can, imploring Our Lord, if it be His will, to give me patience, and then to let me suffer on―even to the end of the world. So, when I found myself suffering so cruelly, I relieved myself by making those acts and resolutions, in order that I might be able to endure the pain. It pleased Our Lord to let me understand that it was the work of Satan―for I saw close beside me a most frightful figure, gnashing his teeth in despair at losing what he attempted to seize. When I saw him, I laughed, and had no fear. My body, head, and arms were violently shaken―I could not help myself. But the worst of all was the interior pain, for I could find no ease in any way. Nor did I dare to ask for Holy Water, lest those who were with me should be afraid and find out what the matter really was.
“I know by frequent experience that there is nothing which puts the devils to flight like Holy Water. They run away when confronted with the Sign of the Cross also, but they return immediately. Great, then, must be the power of Holy Water! As for me, my soul is conscious of a special and most distinct consolation whenever I take Holy Water. Indeed, I feel almost always a certain refreshing, which I cannot describe, together with an inward joy, which comforts my whole soul. I may compare what I feel with that which happens to a person in great heat, and very thirsty, drinking a cup of cold water―his whole being is refreshed. I have a joy that the words of the Church are so mighty, that they endow water with power―so that there shall be so great a difference between Holy Water and water that has never been blessed. Then, as my pains did not cease, I told them, if they would not laugh, I would ask for some Holy Water. They brought me some, and sprinkled me with it―but I was no better. I then threw some Holy Water in the direction of the ugly figure, and he fled in a moment. All my sufferings ceased, just as if someone had taken them from me with his hand―only I was wearied as if I had been beaten with many blows. It was of great service to me to learn that if, by Our Lord’s permission, Satan can do so much evil to a soul and body not in his power, he can do much more when he has them in his possession. It gave me a renewed desire to be delivered from something so dangerous.
“Another time, and not long ago, the same thing happened to me, though it did not last so long, and I was alone at the moment. I asked for Holy Water, and they who came in after the devil had gone away―they were two nuns, worthy of all credit, and would not tell a lie for anything―perceived a most offensive smell, like that of brimstone. I smelt nothing myself―but the odor lasted long enough to become sensible to the two nuns.
“On another occasion there came to me a priest who, for two-and-a-half-years, had been living in mortal sin of the most abominable nature that I ever heard. During the whole of that time he neither confessed it, nor ceased from committing it; and yet he said Mass. He confessed his other sins; but of this one he used to say: ‘How can I confess so foul a sin?’ He wished to give it up, but he could not prevail on himself to do so. I was very sorry for him, and it was a great grief to me to see God offended in such a way. I promised him that I would pray to God for his amendment, and get others who were better than I to do the same. I wrote to one person, and the priest undertook to get the letter delivered. It came to pass that he made a full confession at the first opportunity―for Our Lord was pleased, on account of the prayers of those most holy persons to whom I had recommended him, to have pity on this soul. I, too, wretched as I am, did all I could for the same end.
“He wrote to me, and said that he was so far improved that he had not for some days repeated his sin; but he was so tormented by the temptation that it seemed to him as if he were in Hell already, so great were his sufferings. He asked me to pray to God for him. I recommended him to my sisters, through whose prayers I must have obtained this mercy from Our Lord―for they took the matter greatly to heart; and he was a person whom no one could find out. I implored His Majesty to put an end to these torments and temptations, and to let the evil spirits torment me instead, provided I did not offend Our Lord. Thus it was that for one month I was most grievously tormented; and then it was that these two assaults of Satan, of which I have just spoken above, took place.
“I was informed that Our Lord was pleased to deliver him out of this temptation―for I told him what happened to myself that month. His soul gained strength, and he continued to be free from that mortal sin. He could never give thanks enough to Our Lord and to me―as if I had been of any service, unless it be that the belief that Our Lord granted me such graces was of some advantage to him. He said that, when he saw himself in great straits, he would read my letters, and then the temptation left him. He was very much astonished at my sufferings, and at the manner of his own deliverance―even I myself am astonished, and I would suffer as much for many years for the deliverance of that soul. May Our Lord be praised for ever―for the prayers of those who serve Him can do great things! The devils must have been more angry with me only because I asked my religious sisters to pray, and because Our Lord permitted it on account of my sins. At that time, too, I thought the evil spirits would have suffocated me one night, and, when the sisters threw much Holy Water about, I saw a great troop of devils rush away, as if tumbling over a precipice. These cursed spirits have tormented me so often, and I am now so little afraid of them―because I see they cannot stir without Our Lord's permission!
“May this I have written be of use to every true servant of God, who ought to despise these terrors, which Satan sends only to make him afraid! Let him understand that each time we despise these terrors, their force is lessened, and the soul gains power over them. There is always some great good obtained―but I will not speak of it, that I may not be too diffuse. I will speak, however, of what happened to me once on the night of All Souls. I was in an oratory, and, having prayed one Nocturn of the Divine Office, I was saying some very devotional prayers at the end of our Breviary, when Satan put himself on the book before me, to prevent my finishing my prayer. I made the sign of the cross, and he went away. I then returned to my prayer, and he, too, came back. He did so, I believe, three times―and I was not able to finish the prayer without throwing Holy Water at him. I saw certain souls, at that moment, come forth out of Purgatory―they must have been near their deliverance, and I thought that Satan might in this way have been trying to hinder their release. It is very rarely that I saw Satan assume a bodily form; I know of his presence through the vision I have spoken of before, the vision wherein no form is seen.
“I wish also to relate what follows, for I was greatly alarmed at it: on Trinity Sunday, in the choir of a certain monastery, and in a trance, I saw a great fight between evil spirits and the angels. I could not make out what the vision meant. In less than a fortnight it was explained clearly enough by the dispute that took place between persons given to prayer and many who were not, which did great harm to that house; for it was a dispute that lasted long and caused much trouble. On another occasion I saw a great multitude of evil spirits round about me, and, at the same time, a great light, in which I was enveloped, which kept them from coming near me. I understood it to mean that God was watching over me, that they might not approach me so as to make me offend Him. I knew the vision was real by what I saw occasionally in myself. The fact is, I know now how little power the evil spirits have, provided I am not out of the grace of God; I have scarcely any fear of them at all, for their strength is as nothing, if they do not find the souls they assail give up the contest and become cowards; it is in this case that they show their power.” (St. Teresa of Avila, in her Autobiography).
St. Francis of Assisi and the Devil
St. Francis of Assisi and all his religious were gathered on an open plain, where they had built little huts of rushes. Seeing the extraordinary penances which were being practiced, St. Francis ordered that all instruments of penance should be brought out, whereupon his religious produced them in bundles. At this moment there was one young man to whom God gave the grace to see his Guardian Angel. On the one side he saw all of these good religious, who could not satisfy their hunger for penance, and, on the other, his Guardian Angel allowed him to see a gathering of eighteen thousand devils, who were holding counsel to see in what way they could subvert these religious by temptation. One of the devils said: “You do not understand this at all! These religious are so humble! Ah, what wonderful virtue, so detached from themselves, so attached to God! They have a superior who leads them so well that it is impossible to succeed in winning them over! Let us wait until their superior is dead, and then we shall try to introduce among them young people without real vocations, who will bring about a certain slackening of spirit, and in this way we shall gain them!”
A little further on, as St. Francis entered the town, he saw a devil, whose task was to tempt all of those who were inside, sitting by himself beside the gate into the town. Francis asked his Guardian Angel why it was that, in order to tempt his group of religious, there had been so many thousands of devils, while for a whole town there was only one devil ― and that one was sitting down doing nothing. His Guardian Angel told him that the people of the town did not need to be tempted much, because they had enough badness in themselves and were therefore doing the devil’s work for him, whereas the religious were doing much good, despite all the traps which the devils could lay for them.
You and the Devil
So how do you relate to the devil in your life? Are you doing the devil’s work for him? Or are you fighting hard against him? Has he weakened you so much that he no longer needs to tempt you to commit sin―since you have developed a habit of sin? Or is he gnashing his teeth because he has less and less success with you? Are you aware of his antics, disguises and schemes? Or are you oblivious and blind to his activity in your life? Are you moving towards holiness? Or are you drifting into worldliness?
Article 23
Saturday after the 2nd Sunday of Lent, March 22nd
Don't You Just Love It?
Saturday after the 2nd Sunday of Lent, March 22nd
Don't You Just Love It?
Don’t You Just Love It?
The world is going to pot; every country is deep in debt; inflation continues to rise; crime and corruption are increasing; liberties are being increasingly curtailed; certain medical procedures and vaccines are made obligatory; governmental control continues to tighten its grip on the people; surveillance is on the rise; mass media propaganda has brainwashed most people; education has dumbed down one generation after another―don’t you just love it?
Sin has become an ever-increasing rampant moral cancer; more and more marriages fail; adultery is increasing; contraception is almost universal; abortion is secretly increasing through the availability of DIY abortion pills; alcoholism and drug addiction are growing problems; homosexuality and transgenderism is ever increasing; pornography is at pandemic levels―don’t you just love it?
Anti-Christian forces are gaining ground and power; the Church is becoming increasingly powerless; the modern Church is becoming increasingly Liberal and Modernist; Catholics are leaving the Church in increasing numbers; the numbers of those who regularly attend the obligatory Sunday Mass continue to fall; Catholics have also been dumbed-down in their knowledge of the Faith; immoral views are taught in schools; many hold heretical views; Catholics are wallowing in worldliness; according to Our Lady’s warnings we are seemingly headed for Hell on Earth; and besides all that, most souls are finding themselves damned in Hell after death―don’t you just love it?
Then there are all the terrifying prophecies for our times―of which Our Lady says: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God! … There will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family! … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church! … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times making it easy for everyone to live in sin! … Unbridled luxury and impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … This, in turn, will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy! … Nature is asking for vengeance on account of men, and she trembles, with dread, at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime! ... Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … God will strike in an unprecedented way. God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! … The Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before! ... Physical and moral agonies will be suffered! ... Men will kill and massacre each other, even in their homes! … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war! Blood will flow in the streets! Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian! Then a general war will follow which will be appalling! Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy! ... Blood will flow on all sides! ... There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. People will believe that all is lost! … Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains, cities, etc ... Nations will be annihilated! … Paris will be burned and Marseilles will be swallowed-up! A number of large cities will be shaken down, shattered and swallowed up by earthquakes!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan) ―don’t you just love it?
What Is There to Love?
You will say: “Are you crazy? How can you love those things mentioned above? They are evils! How can we love what is evil?” Well, yes―they are evils, but at the same time they are acts of God, they are chastisements of God that this world has earned and deserves. Those chastisements―that we see as being evil―are actually acts of love and mercy by God. The chastisements that God gives―OUT OF LOVE AND MERCY―in this life, are nothing compared to the chastisements that we will get in Purgatory or Hell for not having accepted and profited from the chastisements in this life.
God’s Providence is behind everything that happens in this world. That wonderful little book, Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, puts it this way:
Nothing happens in the universe without God willing and allowing it. This statement must be taken absolutely of everything―with the exception of sin. “Nothing occurs by chance in the whole course of our lives” is the unanimous teaching of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, “and God intervenes everywhere.”
“I am the Lord,” He tells us Himself by the mouth of the prophet Isaias, “and there is none else! I form light and create darkness; I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things!” (Isaias 45:6-7). “It is I who bring both death and life; I who inflict wounds and heal them!” He said to Moses (Deuteronomy 32:39). “The Lord kills and makes alive,” it is written in the Canticle of Anna, the mother of Samuel, “He brings down to the tomb and He brings back again; the Lord makes poor and makes rich, He humbles and He exalts.” (1 Kings 2:6-7). “Shall there be evil (disaster, affliction) in a city which the Lord has not done?” (Amos 3:6) asks the prophet Amos. “Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches are from God,” Solomon proclaims (Ecclesiasticus 11:14). And so on in numerous other passages of Scripture.
Perhaps you will say that while this is true of certain necessary effects―like sickness, death, cold and heat, and other accidents due to natural causes which have no liberty of action―the same cannot be said in the case of things that result from the free will of man. For if―you will object―someone slanders me, robs me, strikes me, persecutes me―how can I attribute his conduct to the will of God Who, far from wishing me to be treated in such a manner, expressly forbids it? So the blame―you will conclude―can only be laid on the will of man, on his ignorance or malice. This is the defense behind which we try to shelter from God and excuse our lack of courage and submission.
It is quite useless for us to try and take advantage of this way of reasoning as an excuse for not surrendering to Providence. God Himself has refuted it and we must believe on His word, that, in events of this kind as in all others, nothing occurs except by His order and permission. Let us see what the Scriptures say:
He wishes to punish the murder and adultery committed by David and He expresses Himself as follows by the mouth of the prophet Nathan: “Why therefore have you despised the word of the Lord, to do evil in My sight? You have killed Urias the Hittite with the sword, and have taken his wife to be your wife, and have slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon. Therefore the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised Me, and have taken the wife of Urias the Hittite to be your wife. Thus saith the Lord: Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house, and I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun. For you did it secretly, but I will do this thing in the sight of all Israel, and in the sight of the sun.” (2 Kings 12:9-12).
Later, when the Jews by their iniquities had grievously offended Him and provoked His wrath, He says: “The Assyrian is the rod and the staff of My anger, and My indignation is in his hands. I will send him to the deceitful nation, and I will give him charge against the people of My wrath, to take away the spoils, and to lay hold on the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets!” (Isaias 10:5-6).
Could God more openly declare Himself to be responsible for the evils that Absalom caused his father and the King of Assyria the Jews? It would be easy to find other instances, but these are enough. Let us conclude, then, with St. Augustine: “All that happens to us in this world, against our will (whether due to men or to other causes), happens to us only by the will of God, by the disposal of Providence, by His orders and under His guidance; and if, from the frailty of our understanding, we cannot grasp the reason for some event, let us attribute it to divine Providence, show Him respect by accepting it from His hand, believe firmly that He does not send it us without cause.”
Replying to the murmurs and complaints of the Jews, who attributed their captivity and sufferings to misfortune and causes other than the will of God, the prophet Jeremias says to them: “Who is he that has commanded a thing to be done, when the Lord commands it not? Do not both evil and good proceed out of the mouth of the Highest? Why does a living man murmur, a man suffering for his sins? Let us search our ways, and seek, and return to the Lord! Let us lift up our hearts with our hands to the Lord in the heavens, saying: ‘We have done wickedly and provoked Thee to wrath! Therefore Thou art inexorable!’” (Lamentations 3:37-42). Are not these words clear enough? We should take them to heart for our own good. Let us be careful to attribute everything to the will of God and believe that all is guided by His paternal hand. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, Chapter 1: “The Will Of God Made And Governs All Things”, Section 1: “God Controls All Events, Whether Good Or Bad”).
How Can God Will or Allow Evil?
Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence continues: However, you will perhaps now say, there is sinfulness in all these actions. How, then, can God will them and take part in them, if He is all‑holy and can have nothing in common with sin? God, indeed, is not and cannot be the author of sin. But it must be remembered that in every sin there are two parts to be distinguished―one natural and the other moral. Thus, in the action of the man you think you have a grievance against, there is, for example, (1) the movement of the arm that strikes you, or the tongue that offends you, and (2) the movement of the will that turns aside from right reason and the law of God. The physical action of the arm or the tongue, like all natural things, is quite good in itself, and there is nothing to prevent its being produced with and by God’s cooperation. What is evil, what God could not cooperate with, is the sinful intention which the will of man contributes to the act.
When a man walks with a crippled leg, the movement he makes comes both from the soul and the leg, but the defect, which causes him to walk badly, is only in the leg. In the same way all evil actions must be attributed to God and to man, in so far as they are natural, physical acts―but they can be attributed only to the will of man in so far as they are sinful and blameworthy.
If, then, someone strikes you, or slanders you―as the movement of the arm or tongue is in no way a sin, God can very well be, and actually is, the author of it; for existence and movement in man not less than in any other creature proceed not from himself, but from God, Who acts in him and by him. “For in Him” says St. Paul, “we live and move and have our being.” (Acts 17:28). As for the malice of the intention, it proceeds entirely from man, and in it alone is the sinfulness in which God has no share, but which He yet permits in order not to interfere with our freedom of will.
Moreover, when God cooperates with the person who attacks or robs you, He doubtlessly intends to deprive you of health or goods, because you are making a wrong use of them and they will be harmful to your soul. But He does not intend that the attacker or robber should take them from you by a sin. That is the part of human malice, not God’s design.
An example may make the matter clearer. A criminal is condemned to death by fair trial. But the executioner happens to be a personal enemy of his, and, instead of carrying out the judge’s sentence as a duty, he does so in a spirit of hate and revenge. Obviously the judge has no share in the executioner’s sin. The will and intention of the judge is not that this sin of hatred and revenge should be committed, but that justice should take its course and the criminal be punished.
In the same way, God has no share at all in the wickedness of the man who strikes or robs you. That is something particular to the man himself. God, as we have said, wishes to make you see your own faults, to humble you, deprive you of what you possess, in order to free you from vice and lead you to virtue; but this good and merciful design―which He could carry out in numerous other ways without any sin being involved―has nothing in common with the sin of the man, who acts as His instrument. And, in fact, it is not this man’s evil intention or sin that causes you to suffer, humiliates or impoverishes you, but the loss of your well-being, your good name or your possessions. The sin harms only the person who is guilty of it. This is the way we ought to separate the good from the evil in events of this kind, and distinguish what God operates through men, from what men add to the act by their own will. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, Chapter 1: “The Will Of God Made And Governs All Things”, Section 1: “God Controls All Events, Whether Good Or Bad”).
Practical Examples
Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence continues: St. Gregory sets the same truth before us in another light. A doctor, he says, orders leeches to be applied. While these small creatures are drawing blood from the patient, their only aim is to gorge themselves and suck up as much of it as they can. The doctor’s only intention is to have the impure blood drawn from the patient and to cure him in this manner. There is, therefore, no relation between the insatiable greed of the leeches and the intelligent purpose of the doctor in using them. The patient himself does not protest at their use. He does not regard the leeches as evildoers. Rather, he tries to overcome the repugnance the sight of their ugliness causes and help them in their action, in the knowledge that the doctor has judged it useful for his health. God makes use of men as the doctor does of leeches. Neither should we then stop to consider the evilness of those to whom God gives power to act on us, or be grieved at their wicked intentions, and we should keep ourselves from feelings of aversion towards them. Whatever their particular views may be in regard to us, they are only instruments of well-being, guided by the hand of an all-good, all-wise, all-powerful God, Who will allow them to act on us only in so far as it is of use to us. It is in our interest to welcome, instead of trying to repel, their assaults, as, in very truth, they come from God. And it is the same with all creatures of whatever kind. Not one of them could act upon us unless the power were given it from above.
This truth has always been familiar to the minds of those truly enlightened by God. We have a celebrated example in Job. He loses his children and his possessions; he falls from the height of fortune to the depths of poverty―and he says: “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away! As it has pleased the Lord, so is it done! Blessed be the Name of the Lord!” (Job 1:21). “Note” observes St. Augustine, “Job does not say: ‘The Lord gave and the devil has taken away’ but says, wise that he is: ‘The Lord gave me my children and my possessions, and it is He who has taken them away―it has been done as it has pleased the Lord!’”
The example of Joseph is no less instructive. His brothers had sold him into slavery from malice and for a wicked purpose, and, nevertheless, the holy patriarch insists on attributing all to God’s providence. “God sent me,” he says, “before you into Egypt to save life” ... “God sent me before you, to preserve a remnant for you in the land, and to deliver you in a striking way! Not you, but God sent me here, and made me a father to Pharaoh, lord of all his house, and ruler over all the land of Egypt!” (Genesis 45:5-8).
Let us now listen to Our Savior Himself, Who came down from Heaven to teach us by His word and example. In an excess of zeal Peter tries to turn Him aside from His purpose of submitting to His passion and prevent the soldiers laying their hands on Him. But Jesus said to him: “Shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given Me?” (John 18:11). In fact, He attributed the suffering and ignominy of His passion―not to the Jews who accused Him, not to Judas who betrayed Him, nor to Pilate who condemned Him, nor to the soldiers who ill-treated and crucified Him, nor to the devil who incited them all, though they were the immediate causes of His sufferings―but to God, and to God, not considered as a strict judge, but as a loving and beloved Father.
Let us never, then, attribute our losses, our disappointments, our afflictions, our humiliations to the devil or to men―but to God as their real source. “To act otherwise” says St. Dorothy, “would be to do the same as a dog, who vents his anger on the stone, instead of putting the blame on the hand that threw it at him.” So let us be careful not to say “So-and-so is the cause of my misfortune.” Your misfortunes are the work not of this or that person, but of God. And what should give you reassurance is that God, the sovereign good, is guided in all His actions by His most profound wisdom for holy and supernatural purposes. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, Chapter 1: “The Will Of God Made And Governs All Things”, Section 1: “God Controls All Events, Whether Good Or Bad”).
We Are Reaping What We Have Sown
There is a lot of moaning and groaning going on with regard to the state of the Church and the world today! A lot of accusations and finger-pointing are everywhere to be seen. Yet it would not be a bad idea to go stand in front of a mirror, pointing your finger at your image in the mirror, and letting rip with accusations! Why? Because―believe it or not, like it or not, accept it or not―we are largely to blame for the state of the world today!
God will not do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices. God will not perform miracles when things could be achieved through God’s instruments in this world. YOU―yes YOU―are an instrument of God. Are you letting God use you as He intends? Or are you doing your own thing, doing your will, following your own wishes, desires and inclinations? “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! ... He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly! … For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! [chastisements, suffering, diseases and death]. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8; 2 Corinthians 9:6).
Christians Must Have the Spirit and Mind of Christ
We are Christians―and that means that we are followers of Christ, having the mind and spirit of Christ. What is the mind and spirit of Christ? He Himself tells us: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). Christ did not come to have a “fun-time” and party with us―Christ came to fight and die for the souls He wished to save! Likewise, for the Christian, life on Earth is not about having fun, growing rich and taking things easy! “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with worldly things; so that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself” ― namely Christ (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Our Lord complains: “Not everyone that says to Me: “Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “You are the salt of the Earth! But if the salt loses its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing any more but to be cast out, and to be trodden on by men! You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid! Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bucket, but upon a candlestick, so that it may shine to all that are in the house! So let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:13-16). “Therefore, go teach all nations; baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost! Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:19-20).
Soldiers carry-out commands. Soldiers are trained to fight―not lounge around in armchairs. By having received the Sacrament of Confession, we are Soldiers of Christ. We are meant to fight for Christ against His enemies and to fight in order to conquer and extend the Kingdom of Christ― “Teach all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost!” In any army there are soldiers who fight on the actual front-line of battle and engage the enemy face to face; and there are those whose role it is to supply the weapons and ammunition and artillery support from a distance. To win a war, all factors need to be involved―makers of weapons and ammunition; supply chains bring the weapons and ammunition to the soldiers; and soldiers to use the weapons and ammunition on the battle-front.
You might not be called to be a soldier who fights on the battle-front, but you are most certainly called to produce the weapons and ammunitions by your prayers and sacrifices, which will draw down from Heaven the graces needed to win the battle. Just as a munitions factory cannot produce weapons and ammunition out of thin air, but need materials to use in their production―likewise God’s Providence gives you an abundance of materials for you to produce much spiritual ammunition. God sends countless adverse, difficult, painful circumstances―both great and small―that we can use to produce little bullets of grace; or larger shells or bombs of grace; or even missiles of grace by our acceptance of those circumstances. Hence Our Lady of Fatima and the Angel of Fatima said: “Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!” (The Angel of Fatima). “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners” (Our Lady of Fatima).
Active and Contemplative
Even among the Religious Orders of the Church―Carmelites, Dominicans, Franciscans, Jesuits, etc.―there some Religious Orders that go out into the world and seek converts, and there are other Religious Orders that remain cloistered and do not step outside of their monastery or convent. We call these the “Active” Religious Orders and the “Contemplative” Religious Orders. The Contemplatives, by the deep interior life of prayers, penances and sacrifices, obtain the graces for the Actives to successfully fight on the front-line of battle. Contemplative Orders prioritize prayer, meditation, and direct communion with God, which some theologians believe is the ultimate goal of religious life. Contemplative Orders are seen as drawing down graces and blessings from heaven for the world through their prayer and penance. Some theologians argue that contemplative orders more closely emulate Christ's own focus on prayer and self-sacrifice, His direct communion with the Father.
You could compare the Contemplative and Active Religious Orders with the sisters Mary (contemplative) and Martha (active), with Jesus saying that Mary had chosen the better part. “Jesus entered into a certain town and a certain woman, named Martha, received Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who, sitting at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Martha stood and said: ‘Lord! Hast Thou no care that my sister has left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! Thou art careful and art troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary! Mary has chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42).
Our Lady of Good Success said: “Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils ... No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents. Oh, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!”
Unfortunately, in our times, we have a massive demise and collapse among Religious Orders. Many religious orders are shrinking, both in the number of new entrants and in the total number of members. The number of Catholic sisters in the United States has declined significantly, from a peak of over 180,000 in 1965 to fewer than 45,000 today. In Canada, the number of religious has dropped over 80% since the 1960s. Religious orders in Western Europe have also experienced similar declines. The few remaining members are often older, with the median age of sisters in some places reaching the mid to late 70s. More than half of the women in Religious Orders, numbering 13,621 out of 24,965, are aged 80 or above. Furthermore, there are more women aged 95 or older in these orders than those under the age of 40. There has been a severe decline or an extreme decline, in all large institutes such as Jesuits, Franciscans, Salesians, Benedictines, and Dominicans. By 2014, the Jesuits and Franciscans were reduced to about half of their 1966 numbers, and the decline continues. Graphs released by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) on July 25th, 2023, projected a steep decline in the number of religious in the United States over the next decade. The number of religious is expected to fall from 33,000 in 2023 to 17,000 in 2033. During this period, most male and female religious are expected to remain over the age of 75.
Seek to Save, Not Destroy
If you had the true spirit of Christ, then you would be primarily concerned with saving as many as possible of the foolish souls who are currently living in a state of damnation and who will inevitably fall into Hell unless souls are found who will pray and sacrifice to earn the graces necessary for their conversion. “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56).
Our Lady―of whom the Church says: “Who is she that cometh forth, terrifying as army in battle dress?” (Canticles 6:9)―has repeatedly asked for us to enter the fight with weapons of prayer and sacrifice―while complaining of the massive loss of souls in the battlefield, who end up in Hell: “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Our Lady of Fatima).
Why are there none (or too few) who pray and offer sacrifices for the conversion of sinners? Because pointing the finger at sinners, exposing sinners, berating and castigating sinners, scourging sinners with our tongues (or keyboards) is far easier and exciting that quietly, silently and, most of all, perseveringly praying for their conversion―which can often take a long time! Why spend a long time praying for them, when in a short time you can point the finger at them, berate them, castigate them and verbally (or electronically) scourge them?
This should remind of the incident in the Gospels where the Apostles James and John were in favor of praying for fire from Heaven to fall down and destroy a Samaritan town that had just rejected Jesus: “Jesus sent messengers before His face; and going, they entered into a city of the Samaritans, to prepare for Him. And they received Him not, because His face was of one going to Jerusalem [to the ‘enemy’ city’] ... And when His disciples James and John had seen this, they said: ‘Lord, wilt Thou that we command fire to come down from Heaven, and consume them?’ And turning, He rebuked them, saying: ‘You know not of what spirit you are! The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!’” (Luke 9:52-56).
Neglect and Indifference
Despite what Holy Scripture says; despite what Our Lady says―there is very little preaching and encouragement being given by those who are in charge of souls. Bishops and priests are like generals and officers in charge of troops. They are not encouraging their troops―the Soldiers of Christ―to fight! As Our Lady of Good Success and Our Lady of La Salette complained: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish! … The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain! … Many convents are no longer houses of God, but the grazing-grounds of Asmodeas [the devil of impurity] and his like ... In convents, the flowers of the Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts. May those in charge of religious communities be on their guard concerning the persons they are to receive, for the devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth! … The effects of secular education will increase, which will be one reason for the lack of priestly and religious vocations!”
Building Monasteries and Convents in the Home
St. Augustine, the bishop of Hippo (in what is now Algeria), coined the celebrated phrase “domestic Church.” St. John Chrysostom calls the home a “miniature church” [micra-ecclessia], and says it the duty and glory of fathers and mothers to establish in their homes the reign and grace of Christ. Our model or exemplar of a “miniature church” or a “domestic church” within the family is, of course, the Holy Family―Jesus, Mary and Joseph. What a power-house of prayer and sacrifice it must have been! The three persons of the Holy Family also reflects the holiest of all families―the three Persons of the Holy Trinity. The family participates in the mission of the Universal Church. The family is, in reality, the Church in the home, or as St. Augustine said, the domestic church. What the Church is on a large scale, the family is on a small scale. That is to say―the life, nature, and mission of the Church is contained in miniature form in the family. The family is not only the basic cell of society, it is also the basic cell of the Church. The family, therefore, exists at the heart of each and every society. To see the family as the Church “in miniature,” and to call the Church itself the “family of God,” are ideas that have been present from the early centuries of Christianity.
The church is a place of adoration and worship―and that is what each Catholic “domestic church” or “miniature church” should be―a place where God is adored and worshiped. Our Lord stated: “Where there are two or three gathered together in My Name, there am I in the midst of them!” (Matthew 18:20). Is your home a place of adoration and worship? Maybe the wrong things are being adored and worshiped―the television, the computer, the internet, the smartphone, etc. How much praying is done in the home? Do the family members meditate on spiritual things? How much religious conversation takes place in the home? Do you study the Catechism at home? How much Bible reading? How much spiritual reading? Do you ever sing hymns at home? Do you have religious music playing at home? Do you listen to sermons or conferences together at home―and then discuss them? Do you ever pray additional Rosaries together whilst cooking a meal, or doing the dishes? Do you pray together while you are driving to various places in the car? Do you say morning and night prayers together? Do you encourage penances and sacrifices at home? Just imagine what a “power-house”, what a “holy family”, what a “magnet for grace”, what a “mini-monastery” or “mini-convent” such a home and family would be!!!
Do you think God does not want that? Our Lord and Holy Scripture clearly tell us: “Be you, therefore, perfect―as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48) … “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice!” (Luke 12:31) … “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31) … “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) … “We ought always to pray, and not to faint!” (Luke 18:1) … “Could you not watch one hour with Me? Watch ye, and pray that ye enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak!” (Matthew 26:40-41) … “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3) … “Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14) … “Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit!” (Ezechiel 18:31) … “Put off the old man, who is corrupted, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind! And put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness!” (Ephesians 4:22-24).
The world is going to pot; every country is deep in debt; inflation continues to rise; crime and corruption are increasing; liberties are being increasingly curtailed; certain medical procedures and vaccines are made obligatory; governmental control continues to tighten its grip on the people; surveillance is on the rise; mass media propaganda has brainwashed most people; education has dumbed down one generation after another―don’t you just love it?
Sin has become an ever-increasing rampant moral cancer; more and more marriages fail; adultery is increasing; contraception is almost universal; abortion is secretly increasing through the availability of DIY abortion pills; alcoholism and drug addiction are growing problems; homosexuality and transgenderism is ever increasing; pornography is at pandemic levels―don’t you just love it?
Anti-Christian forces are gaining ground and power; the Church is becoming increasingly powerless; the modern Church is becoming increasingly Liberal and Modernist; Catholics are leaving the Church in increasing numbers; the numbers of those who regularly attend the obligatory Sunday Mass continue to fall; Catholics have also been dumbed-down in their knowledge of the Faith; immoral views are taught in schools; many hold heretical views; Catholics are wallowing in worldliness; according to Our Lady’s warnings we are seemingly headed for Hell on Earth; and besides all that, most souls are finding themselves damned in Hell after death―don’t you just love it?
Then there are all the terrifying prophecies for our times―of which Our Lady says: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God! … There will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family! … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church! … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times making it easy for everyone to live in sin! … Unbridled luxury and impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … This, in turn, will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy! … Nature is asking for vengeance on account of men, and she trembles, with dread, at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime! ... Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … God will strike in an unprecedented way. God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! … The Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before! ... Physical and moral agonies will be suffered! ... Men will kill and massacre each other, even in their homes! … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war! Blood will flow in the streets! Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian! Then a general war will follow which will be appalling! Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy! ... Blood will flow on all sides! ... There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. People will believe that all is lost! … Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains, cities, etc ... Nations will be annihilated! … Paris will be burned and Marseilles will be swallowed-up! A number of large cities will be shaken down, shattered and swallowed up by earthquakes!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan) ―don’t you just love it?
What Is There to Love?
You will say: “Are you crazy? How can you love those things mentioned above? They are evils! How can we love what is evil?” Well, yes―they are evils, but at the same time they are acts of God, they are chastisements of God that this world has earned and deserves. Those chastisements―that we see as being evil―are actually acts of love and mercy by God. The chastisements that God gives―OUT OF LOVE AND MERCY―in this life, are nothing compared to the chastisements that we will get in Purgatory or Hell for not having accepted and profited from the chastisements in this life.
God’s Providence is behind everything that happens in this world. That wonderful little book, Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, puts it this way:
Nothing happens in the universe without God willing and allowing it. This statement must be taken absolutely of everything―with the exception of sin. “Nothing occurs by chance in the whole course of our lives” is the unanimous teaching of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, “and God intervenes everywhere.”
“I am the Lord,” He tells us Himself by the mouth of the prophet Isaias, “and there is none else! I form light and create darkness; I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things!” (Isaias 45:6-7). “It is I who bring both death and life; I who inflict wounds and heal them!” He said to Moses (Deuteronomy 32:39). “The Lord kills and makes alive,” it is written in the Canticle of Anna, the mother of Samuel, “He brings down to the tomb and He brings back again; the Lord makes poor and makes rich, He humbles and He exalts.” (1 Kings 2:6-7). “Shall there be evil (disaster, affliction) in a city which the Lord has not done?” (Amos 3:6) asks the prophet Amos. “Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches are from God,” Solomon proclaims (Ecclesiasticus 11:14). And so on in numerous other passages of Scripture.
Perhaps you will say that while this is true of certain necessary effects―like sickness, death, cold and heat, and other accidents due to natural causes which have no liberty of action―the same cannot be said in the case of things that result from the free will of man. For if―you will object―someone slanders me, robs me, strikes me, persecutes me―how can I attribute his conduct to the will of God Who, far from wishing me to be treated in such a manner, expressly forbids it? So the blame―you will conclude―can only be laid on the will of man, on his ignorance or malice. This is the defense behind which we try to shelter from God and excuse our lack of courage and submission.
It is quite useless for us to try and take advantage of this way of reasoning as an excuse for not surrendering to Providence. God Himself has refuted it and we must believe on His word, that, in events of this kind as in all others, nothing occurs except by His order and permission. Let us see what the Scriptures say:
He wishes to punish the murder and adultery committed by David and He expresses Himself as follows by the mouth of the prophet Nathan: “Why therefore have you despised the word of the Lord, to do evil in My sight? You have killed Urias the Hittite with the sword, and have taken his wife to be your wife, and have slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon. Therefore the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised Me, and have taken the wife of Urias the Hittite to be your wife. Thus saith the Lord: Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house, and I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun. For you did it secretly, but I will do this thing in the sight of all Israel, and in the sight of the sun.” (2 Kings 12:9-12).
Later, when the Jews by their iniquities had grievously offended Him and provoked His wrath, He says: “The Assyrian is the rod and the staff of My anger, and My indignation is in his hands. I will send him to the deceitful nation, and I will give him charge against the people of My wrath, to take away the spoils, and to lay hold on the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets!” (Isaias 10:5-6).
Could God more openly declare Himself to be responsible for the evils that Absalom caused his father and the King of Assyria the Jews? It would be easy to find other instances, but these are enough. Let us conclude, then, with St. Augustine: “All that happens to us in this world, against our will (whether due to men or to other causes), happens to us only by the will of God, by the disposal of Providence, by His orders and under His guidance; and if, from the frailty of our understanding, we cannot grasp the reason for some event, let us attribute it to divine Providence, show Him respect by accepting it from His hand, believe firmly that He does not send it us without cause.”
Replying to the murmurs and complaints of the Jews, who attributed their captivity and sufferings to misfortune and causes other than the will of God, the prophet Jeremias says to them: “Who is he that has commanded a thing to be done, when the Lord commands it not? Do not both evil and good proceed out of the mouth of the Highest? Why does a living man murmur, a man suffering for his sins? Let us search our ways, and seek, and return to the Lord! Let us lift up our hearts with our hands to the Lord in the heavens, saying: ‘We have done wickedly and provoked Thee to wrath! Therefore Thou art inexorable!’” (Lamentations 3:37-42). Are not these words clear enough? We should take them to heart for our own good. Let us be careful to attribute everything to the will of God and believe that all is guided by His paternal hand. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, Chapter 1: “The Will Of God Made And Governs All Things”, Section 1: “God Controls All Events, Whether Good Or Bad”).
How Can God Will or Allow Evil?
Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence continues: However, you will perhaps now say, there is sinfulness in all these actions. How, then, can God will them and take part in them, if He is all‑holy and can have nothing in common with sin? God, indeed, is not and cannot be the author of sin. But it must be remembered that in every sin there are two parts to be distinguished―one natural and the other moral. Thus, in the action of the man you think you have a grievance against, there is, for example, (1) the movement of the arm that strikes you, or the tongue that offends you, and (2) the movement of the will that turns aside from right reason and the law of God. The physical action of the arm or the tongue, like all natural things, is quite good in itself, and there is nothing to prevent its being produced with and by God’s cooperation. What is evil, what God could not cooperate with, is the sinful intention which the will of man contributes to the act.
When a man walks with a crippled leg, the movement he makes comes both from the soul and the leg, but the defect, which causes him to walk badly, is only in the leg. In the same way all evil actions must be attributed to God and to man, in so far as they are natural, physical acts―but they can be attributed only to the will of man in so far as they are sinful and blameworthy.
If, then, someone strikes you, or slanders you―as the movement of the arm or tongue is in no way a sin, God can very well be, and actually is, the author of it; for existence and movement in man not less than in any other creature proceed not from himself, but from God, Who acts in him and by him. “For in Him” says St. Paul, “we live and move and have our being.” (Acts 17:28). As for the malice of the intention, it proceeds entirely from man, and in it alone is the sinfulness in which God has no share, but which He yet permits in order not to interfere with our freedom of will.
Moreover, when God cooperates with the person who attacks or robs you, He doubtlessly intends to deprive you of health or goods, because you are making a wrong use of them and they will be harmful to your soul. But He does not intend that the attacker or robber should take them from you by a sin. That is the part of human malice, not God’s design.
An example may make the matter clearer. A criminal is condemned to death by fair trial. But the executioner happens to be a personal enemy of his, and, instead of carrying out the judge’s sentence as a duty, he does so in a spirit of hate and revenge. Obviously the judge has no share in the executioner’s sin. The will and intention of the judge is not that this sin of hatred and revenge should be committed, but that justice should take its course and the criminal be punished.
In the same way, God has no share at all in the wickedness of the man who strikes or robs you. That is something particular to the man himself. God, as we have said, wishes to make you see your own faults, to humble you, deprive you of what you possess, in order to free you from vice and lead you to virtue; but this good and merciful design―which He could carry out in numerous other ways without any sin being involved―has nothing in common with the sin of the man, who acts as His instrument. And, in fact, it is not this man’s evil intention or sin that causes you to suffer, humiliates or impoverishes you, but the loss of your well-being, your good name or your possessions. The sin harms only the person who is guilty of it. This is the way we ought to separate the good from the evil in events of this kind, and distinguish what God operates through men, from what men add to the act by their own will. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, Chapter 1: “The Will Of God Made And Governs All Things”, Section 1: “God Controls All Events, Whether Good Or Bad”).
Practical Examples
Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence continues: St. Gregory sets the same truth before us in another light. A doctor, he says, orders leeches to be applied. While these small creatures are drawing blood from the patient, their only aim is to gorge themselves and suck up as much of it as they can. The doctor’s only intention is to have the impure blood drawn from the patient and to cure him in this manner. There is, therefore, no relation between the insatiable greed of the leeches and the intelligent purpose of the doctor in using them. The patient himself does not protest at their use. He does not regard the leeches as evildoers. Rather, he tries to overcome the repugnance the sight of their ugliness causes and help them in their action, in the knowledge that the doctor has judged it useful for his health. God makes use of men as the doctor does of leeches. Neither should we then stop to consider the evilness of those to whom God gives power to act on us, or be grieved at their wicked intentions, and we should keep ourselves from feelings of aversion towards them. Whatever their particular views may be in regard to us, they are only instruments of well-being, guided by the hand of an all-good, all-wise, all-powerful God, Who will allow them to act on us only in so far as it is of use to us. It is in our interest to welcome, instead of trying to repel, their assaults, as, in very truth, they come from God. And it is the same with all creatures of whatever kind. Not one of them could act upon us unless the power were given it from above.
This truth has always been familiar to the minds of those truly enlightened by God. We have a celebrated example in Job. He loses his children and his possessions; he falls from the height of fortune to the depths of poverty―and he says: “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away! As it has pleased the Lord, so is it done! Blessed be the Name of the Lord!” (Job 1:21). “Note” observes St. Augustine, “Job does not say: ‘The Lord gave and the devil has taken away’ but says, wise that he is: ‘The Lord gave me my children and my possessions, and it is He who has taken them away―it has been done as it has pleased the Lord!’”
The example of Joseph is no less instructive. His brothers had sold him into slavery from malice and for a wicked purpose, and, nevertheless, the holy patriarch insists on attributing all to God’s providence. “God sent me,” he says, “before you into Egypt to save life” ... “God sent me before you, to preserve a remnant for you in the land, and to deliver you in a striking way! Not you, but God sent me here, and made me a father to Pharaoh, lord of all his house, and ruler over all the land of Egypt!” (Genesis 45:5-8).
Let us now listen to Our Savior Himself, Who came down from Heaven to teach us by His word and example. In an excess of zeal Peter tries to turn Him aside from His purpose of submitting to His passion and prevent the soldiers laying their hands on Him. But Jesus said to him: “Shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given Me?” (John 18:11). In fact, He attributed the suffering and ignominy of His passion―not to the Jews who accused Him, not to Judas who betrayed Him, nor to Pilate who condemned Him, nor to the soldiers who ill-treated and crucified Him, nor to the devil who incited them all, though they were the immediate causes of His sufferings―but to God, and to God, not considered as a strict judge, but as a loving and beloved Father.
Let us never, then, attribute our losses, our disappointments, our afflictions, our humiliations to the devil or to men―but to God as their real source. “To act otherwise” says St. Dorothy, “would be to do the same as a dog, who vents his anger on the stone, instead of putting the blame on the hand that threw it at him.” So let us be careful not to say “So-and-so is the cause of my misfortune.” Your misfortunes are the work not of this or that person, but of God. And what should give you reassurance is that God, the sovereign good, is guided in all His actions by His most profound wisdom for holy and supernatural purposes. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, Chapter 1: “The Will Of God Made And Governs All Things”, Section 1: “God Controls All Events, Whether Good Or Bad”).
We Are Reaping What We Have Sown
There is a lot of moaning and groaning going on with regard to the state of the Church and the world today! A lot of accusations and finger-pointing are everywhere to be seen. Yet it would not be a bad idea to go stand in front of a mirror, pointing your finger at your image in the mirror, and letting rip with accusations! Why? Because―believe it or not, like it or not, accept it or not―we are largely to blame for the state of the world today!
God will not do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices. God will not perform miracles when things could be achieved through God’s instruments in this world. YOU―yes YOU―are an instrument of God. Are you letting God use you as He intends? Or are you doing your own thing, doing your will, following your own wishes, desires and inclinations? “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! ... He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly! … For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! [chastisements, suffering, diseases and death]. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8; 2 Corinthians 9:6).
Christians Must Have the Spirit and Mind of Christ
We are Christians―and that means that we are followers of Christ, having the mind and spirit of Christ. What is the mind and spirit of Christ? He Himself tells us: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). Christ did not come to have a “fun-time” and party with us―Christ came to fight and die for the souls He wished to save! Likewise, for the Christian, life on Earth is not about having fun, growing rich and taking things easy! “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with worldly things; so that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself” ― namely Christ (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Our Lord complains: “Not everyone that says to Me: “Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “You are the salt of the Earth! But if the salt loses its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing any more but to be cast out, and to be trodden on by men! You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid! Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bucket, but upon a candlestick, so that it may shine to all that are in the house! So let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:13-16). “Therefore, go teach all nations; baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost! Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:19-20).
Soldiers carry-out commands. Soldiers are trained to fight―not lounge around in armchairs. By having received the Sacrament of Confession, we are Soldiers of Christ. We are meant to fight for Christ against His enemies and to fight in order to conquer and extend the Kingdom of Christ― “Teach all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost!” In any army there are soldiers who fight on the actual front-line of battle and engage the enemy face to face; and there are those whose role it is to supply the weapons and ammunition and artillery support from a distance. To win a war, all factors need to be involved―makers of weapons and ammunition; supply chains bring the weapons and ammunition to the soldiers; and soldiers to use the weapons and ammunition on the battle-front.
You might not be called to be a soldier who fights on the battle-front, but you are most certainly called to produce the weapons and ammunitions by your prayers and sacrifices, which will draw down from Heaven the graces needed to win the battle. Just as a munitions factory cannot produce weapons and ammunition out of thin air, but need materials to use in their production―likewise God’s Providence gives you an abundance of materials for you to produce much spiritual ammunition. God sends countless adverse, difficult, painful circumstances―both great and small―that we can use to produce little bullets of grace; or larger shells or bombs of grace; or even missiles of grace by our acceptance of those circumstances. Hence Our Lady of Fatima and the Angel of Fatima said: “Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!” (The Angel of Fatima). “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners” (Our Lady of Fatima).
Active and Contemplative
Even among the Religious Orders of the Church―Carmelites, Dominicans, Franciscans, Jesuits, etc.―there some Religious Orders that go out into the world and seek converts, and there are other Religious Orders that remain cloistered and do not step outside of their monastery or convent. We call these the “Active” Religious Orders and the “Contemplative” Religious Orders. The Contemplatives, by the deep interior life of prayers, penances and sacrifices, obtain the graces for the Actives to successfully fight on the front-line of battle. Contemplative Orders prioritize prayer, meditation, and direct communion with God, which some theologians believe is the ultimate goal of religious life. Contemplative Orders are seen as drawing down graces and blessings from heaven for the world through their prayer and penance. Some theologians argue that contemplative orders more closely emulate Christ's own focus on prayer and self-sacrifice, His direct communion with the Father.
You could compare the Contemplative and Active Religious Orders with the sisters Mary (contemplative) and Martha (active), with Jesus saying that Mary had chosen the better part. “Jesus entered into a certain town and a certain woman, named Martha, received Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who, sitting at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Martha stood and said: ‘Lord! Hast Thou no care that my sister has left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! Thou art careful and art troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary! Mary has chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42).
Our Lady of Good Success said: “Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils ... No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents. Oh, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!”
Unfortunately, in our times, we have a massive demise and collapse among Religious Orders. Many religious orders are shrinking, both in the number of new entrants and in the total number of members. The number of Catholic sisters in the United States has declined significantly, from a peak of over 180,000 in 1965 to fewer than 45,000 today. In Canada, the number of religious has dropped over 80% since the 1960s. Religious orders in Western Europe have also experienced similar declines. The few remaining members are often older, with the median age of sisters in some places reaching the mid to late 70s. More than half of the women in Religious Orders, numbering 13,621 out of 24,965, are aged 80 or above. Furthermore, there are more women aged 95 or older in these orders than those under the age of 40. There has been a severe decline or an extreme decline, in all large institutes such as Jesuits, Franciscans, Salesians, Benedictines, and Dominicans. By 2014, the Jesuits and Franciscans were reduced to about half of their 1966 numbers, and the decline continues. Graphs released by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) on July 25th, 2023, projected a steep decline in the number of religious in the United States over the next decade. The number of religious is expected to fall from 33,000 in 2023 to 17,000 in 2033. During this period, most male and female religious are expected to remain over the age of 75.
Seek to Save, Not Destroy
If you had the true spirit of Christ, then you would be primarily concerned with saving as many as possible of the foolish souls who are currently living in a state of damnation and who will inevitably fall into Hell unless souls are found who will pray and sacrifice to earn the graces necessary for their conversion. “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56).
Our Lady―of whom the Church says: “Who is she that cometh forth, terrifying as army in battle dress?” (Canticles 6:9)―has repeatedly asked for us to enter the fight with weapons of prayer and sacrifice―while complaining of the massive loss of souls in the battlefield, who end up in Hell: “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Our Lady of Fatima).
Why are there none (or too few) who pray and offer sacrifices for the conversion of sinners? Because pointing the finger at sinners, exposing sinners, berating and castigating sinners, scourging sinners with our tongues (or keyboards) is far easier and exciting that quietly, silently and, most of all, perseveringly praying for their conversion―which can often take a long time! Why spend a long time praying for them, when in a short time you can point the finger at them, berate them, castigate them and verbally (or electronically) scourge them?
This should remind of the incident in the Gospels where the Apostles James and John were in favor of praying for fire from Heaven to fall down and destroy a Samaritan town that had just rejected Jesus: “Jesus sent messengers before His face; and going, they entered into a city of the Samaritans, to prepare for Him. And they received Him not, because His face was of one going to Jerusalem [to the ‘enemy’ city’] ... And when His disciples James and John had seen this, they said: ‘Lord, wilt Thou that we command fire to come down from Heaven, and consume them?’ And turning, He rebuked them, saying: ‘You know not of what spirit you are! The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!’” (Luke 9:52-56).
Neglect and Indifference
Despite what Holy Scripture says; despite what Our Lady says―there is very little preaching and encouragement being given by those who are in charge of souls. Bishops and priests are like generals and officers in charge of troops. They are not encouraging their troops―the Soldiers of Christ―to fight! As Our Lady of Good Success and Our Lady of La Salette complained: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish! … The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain! … Many convents are no longer houses of God, but the grazing-grounds of Asmodeas [the devil of impurity] and his like ... In convents, the flowers of the Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts. May those in charge of religious communities be on their guard concerning the persons they are to receive, for the devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth! … The effects of secular education will increase, which will be one reason for the lack of priestly and religious vocations!”
Building Monasteries and Convents in the Home
St. Augustine, the bishop of Hippo (in what is now Algeria), coined the celebrated phrase “domestic Church.” St. John Chrysostom calls the home a “miniature church” [micra-ecclessia], and says it the duty and glory of fathers and mothers to establish in their homes the reign and grace of Christ. Our model or exemplar of a “miniature church” or a “domestic church” within the family is, of course, the Holy Family―Jesus, Mary and Joseph. What a power-house of prayer and sacrifice it must have been! The three persons of the Holy Family also reflects the holiest of all families―the three Persons of the Holy Trinity. The family participates in the mission of the Universal Church. The family is, in reality, the Church in the home, or as St. Augustine said, the domestic church. What the Church is on a large scale, the family is on a small scale. That is to say―the life, nature, and mission of the Church is contained in miniature form in the family. The family is not only the basic cell of society, it is also the basic cell of the Church. The family, therefore, exists at the heart of each and every society. To see the family as the Church “in miniature,” and to call the Church itself the “family of God,” are ideas that have been present from the early centuries of Christianity.
The church is a place of adoration and worship―and that is what each Catholic “domestic church” or “miniature church” should be―a place where God is adored and worshiped. Our Lord stated: “Where there are two or three gathered together in My Name, there am I in the midst of them!” (Matthew 18:20). Is your home a place of adoration and worship? Maybe the wrong things are being adored and worshiped―the television, the computer, the internet, the smartphone, etc. How much praying is done in the home? Do the family members meditate on spiritual things? How much religious conversation takes place in the home? Do you study the Catechism at home? How much Bible reading? How much spiritual reading? Do you ever sing hymns at home? Do you have religious music playing at home? Do you listen to sermons or conferences together at home―and then discuss them? Do you ever pray additional Rosaries together whilst cooking a meal, or doing the dishes? Do you pray together while you are driving to various places in the car? Do you say morning and night prayers together? Do you encourage penances and sacrifices at home? Just imagine what a “power-house”, what a “holy family”, what a “magnet for grace”, what a “mini-monastery” or “mini-convent” such a home and family would be!!!
Do you think God does not want that? Our Lord and Holy Scripture clearly tell us: “Be you, therefore, perfect―as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48) … “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice!” (Luke 12:31) … “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31) … “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) … “We ought always to pray, and not to faint!” (Luke 18:1) … “Could you not watch one hour with Me? Watch ye, and pray that ye enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak!” (Matthew 26:40-41) … “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3) … “Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14) … “Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit!” (Ezechiel 18:31) … “Put off the old man, who is corrupted, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind! And put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness!” (Ephesians 4:22-24).
Article 22
Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday after the 2nd Sunday of Lent, March 18th, 19th & 20th
Love & Hatred! You Will Recieve Both! You Will Give Both!
Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday after the 2nd Sunday of Lent, March 18th, 19th & 20th
Love & Hatred! You Will Recieve Both! You Will Give Both!
Love and Hatred
Holy Scripture says: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under Heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal. A time to destroy, and a time to build. A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather. A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces. A time to get, and a time to lose. A time to keep, and a time to cast away. A time to rend, and a time to sew. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace.” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8).
We all love being loved―and we hate being hated! “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and God is good―God loves what is good. Unfortunately, our love is not always a good love―we can love what is good and we can love what is evil. We can hate what is good and we can hate what is evil. Holy Scripture deals with this several times: “You that love the Lord, hate evil!” (Psalm 96:10) … “Hate evil, and love good!” (Amos 5:15) … “You hate good, and love evil!” (Micheas 3:2) … “He that loves iniquity hates his own soul!” (Psalm 10:6) … “He that loves his life shall lose it―and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:2) … “All that hate Me, love death!” (Proverbs 8:36) … “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24) … “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you―Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you!” (Matthew 5:43-44).
We speak of loving the sinner while hating his sin. Some people hate work, but love the pay. We speak of “love-hate relationships.” Sometimes we love what others hate, or hate what others love! People can be blinded by hatred and carried away by love!
Passion Power
We have within ourselves the power to love and the power to hate. God has created human beings with a series of complementary or opposite passions. There are 11 primary passions—five passions in the face of difficulties and trials―six passions in the face of desires and temptations.
The five passions that deal with difficulties and trials are hope, despair, daring, fear, and anger. When something good is difficult or arduous to attain—you have hope if you believe you can attain it, despair if you don’t. Then, when faced with a trial, obstacle, or evil while pursuing the good—you have daring if you believe you can overcome it, fear if you don’t. Finally, if the good is attained—you are at peace; if not, you have anger (noting, anger here does not refer to the vice of anger, but rather, the disdain of what is evil or unfitting).
The six passions that deal with desires and temptations are love, hatred, desire, aversion, joy, and sadness. When something good presents itself—you have love; when not good or evil—you have hatred (noting, love and hatred here simply mean the animal-like attraction for what is fitting and repulse for what is not). You are then moved to attain what is good—which is desire, or to avoid what is not—which is aversion. Finally, if what is good is attained—you have joy; if not—you have sadness.
We love what is good―and we hate what is opposed to the good that we love. We desire the good that is absent―and we hate and avoid the evil that is absent. We experience joy when we have the good that we love―and we are sad when we don’t have the good that we love.
When it comes to the passions, know this—disordered passions are drawn toward what is evil and away from what is good; well-ordered passions are drawn toward what is good and away from what is evil. Passions are like children―they are not meant to be in charge, they are meant to be guided by their parents, teachers and elders. It our human reason and our human will-power that are meant to be the “parents” or “teachers” of our passions. Our reason and will (mind and heart) are to be in charge of our passions and are meant to guide our passions. Our passions―like children―can be impulsive and unreasonable. Therefore, they need to be enlightened, instructed and commanded―so that they, like children, can be helpful and productive, rather than being rebellious, destructive and a nuisance. Passions can be incredibly helpful or they can be terribly destructive. Just like children, passions have a lot of energy―but, like a river, that energy has to be channeled and used in a positive beneficial way. The river can supply water for drinking; it can be used for washing and cleaning; it can be used for transportation; it can irrigate our crops; it can be used to make electricity, etc. Yet the river can also be dangerous and destructive―we can drown in the river; boats can sink in the river; crops and residences can be damaged or destroyed by a flooding river, etc.
For St. Thomas Aquinas, passions are not obstacles to be overcome, subjugated and imprisoned―he sees them as being integral to human flourishing, serving as a natural and necessary part of human life, helping us to pursue good and avoid evil. Passions are meant to be helpers, not rulers. If we do not keep them in their proper place and make correct use of them, then they will take over and rule us.
Passions Gone Wild
Some people imagine love to be always good and hatred to always evil―which then leads to a dangerous attitude of being good and loving to everyone, even when they are blatantly sinning, rebelling, causing damage and destruction. The modern world has labeled speaking out against sin as being guilty of a “hate crime” ― whereas, in reality, we should be accusing them of being guilty of “love crimes”, in the sense that they are loving sin and indulging in sin. Hence sinful lifestyles are allowed (and even encouraged) ― LGBTQ+, abortion, contraception, divorce, drug abuse, etc. It has degenerated into a heretical “love the sinner and turn a blind eye to his sin”! Even in school―from the earliest years―correction is becoming less and less and used. Instead we make children feel good about their ignorance and stupidity and even sinfulness―everything is swept under the carpet! We are indoctrinated to think that “anything goes” and “everyone is right” and that “everyone can have his own truth” ― what is true for you might not be true for someone else, but, hey, who cares? Just follow your own subjective mind and subjective truth!
This eventually leads to a twisted, degenerate, irrational and sinful use of passions. Sometimes we love to hate; at other times we hate to love―it all depends upon the object and circumstances. Everyone one naturally loves what they think is good for them; and they naturally hate what they imagine is bad for them―but our thinking is not always correct! It can be heavily influenced from within by our passions and preferences―and our thinking can be influenced from outside of ourselves by the world and the devil.
Passions, of themselves, are blind―they need the guidance of right reason and the firm hand of a strong will. Each of our passions blindly wants all that it can get―unless that passion is enlightened and instructed by right reason, and held in check by a strong will. You could apply the words of Our Lord to the blindness of passions: “They are blind and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). There are countless numbers who have fallen into the pit of their passions―and from there they have fallen into the pit of Hell!
Most of the time, that surrender to the passions can be traced back to childhood and a neglect on the side of the parents in restraining the passions of their children and then teaching the children how to restrain their own passions. As Holy Scripture warns: “A young man according to his way, even when he is old he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6). Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, adds: “The demons instill into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and they incite the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition. If the fathers and mothers would be solicitous to prevent these vanities and perverted habits of their children, and would instruct them from their infancy in the knowledge of their God and Creator, then they would afterwards easily accustom them to know and adore Him. Parents must learn to love their children, help them, nourish them, exhort them, correct them and lead them on in the way of salvation without remissness or carelessness!”
Evil Love and Good Hatred
It is important to have a reasonable and balanced idea about love and hatred. Not all love is good and not all hatred is evil. They are like two sides to one coin―we have to have both aspects in our life and use them correctly. This means aligning our love and hatred in the way in which God intended them to be used. We cannot love what is evil and we cannot hate what is good―but we must love what is good and hate what is evil. Who decides what is good and evil? Not us! It is God who decides―and God has given us a mind and a conscience that must be aligned to His Will and His teachings.
We often want to change God’s plan―and so we see certain evils or sins as being good and desirable. God warns: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20). “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9). Hence Scripture says: “You hate good, and love evil!” (Micheas 3:2) … “Hate evil, and love good!” (Amos 5:15) … “You that love the Lord, hate evil!” (Psalm 96:10). Hatred is a part of life―and it is a good part of life if it used correctly and if it focuses on hating what is objectively evil, and not hating what is objectively good.
Losing Our Minds and Intelligence!
The problem is that most people have lost all sense of objectivity and now rely on their own subjectivity―meaning that nobody outside of themselves will tell them what is good and what is evil. They themselves are the judges of what is good and evil. If you think about it, doesn’t that sound a lot like Satan’s temptation for Eve: “And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No, you shall not die the death! For God knows that in what day soever you shall eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’” (Genesis 3:4-5).
Talking of swallowing fruit―it can be said that truth is often hard to swallow, so we prefer comfortable lies, illusions and delusions―and the modern world is only to pleased and ready to supply us with them, and most people will “Drink the Kool-Aid” unquestioningly! This lack of objectivity (failing to see things as they really are) and increasing subjectivity (seeing things according to personal bias and preferences) owes a lot to the massive “dumbing-down” of people over the last 50 or 60 years. A recent Financial Times article reports a widespread fall in the reasoning ability of people; weak cognitive skills and critical thinking skills; trouble with problem-solving and information processing skills; struggles with attention spans and concentration, etc.
Too many people are opting for instant gratification via smart phone interactions. Analysis of complex topics through reading is disappearing. Intellectual laziness is prevailing with people just absorbing whatever occurs in short digital bursts on social media and by perpetually sharing trivia with others. The smart phone has become an addiction; it must now be viewed at every waking moment! You could almost call it a “Modern-Day Secular Bible” or a “False God” to which you could attribute Christ’s words: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” and that is what many people think of their smart phone―without it, they feel as though they can do nothing! To make up for this lack of intellectual ability and impaired intelligence, we have now been given the intellectual crutches of “Artificial Intelligence” that will gradually do all our thinking, judging and decision making for us!
On the belief that “information is power” and “money is power” the last thing the Elite and the Money Men want is for people to be informed about their plots and plans for the world. Hence we are “dumbed-down” and “up to our necks” in debt! In 2023, 77% of American households carried some form of debt, with the average household debt being around $105,000 ― with the chief areas being Mortgage Debt; Credit Card Debt; Auto Loans and Student Loans. As Holy Scripture says: “The rich rule over the poor; and the borrower is servant to him that lends!” (Proverbs 22:7). Mayer Amschel Rothschild (1743–1812) said: “Give me control over a nation’s currency, and I care not who makes its laws!” As Henry Kissinger said: “Whoever controls the food supply controls the people; whoever controls the energy can control whole continents; whoever controls money can control the world!” Kissinger, United States Secretary of State from 1973 to 1977, and National Security Advisor from 1969 to 1975, and political adviser to various US Presidents, was also a member of the following Elitist serving groups: Aspen Institute; Atlantic Council; Bilderberg Group; Bohemian Club; Council on Foreign Relations; Center for Strategic and International Studies; Le Cercle, and more besides!
All of these Elite-serving organizations, governments and media outlets have succeeded in brainwashing the minds that they have dumbed-down into craving the material instead of the spiritual; craving money and pleasure more than God and grace; craving what the world offers rather than what God offers. “They are of the world—therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3). They have seduced people into loving the world very much and God very little. Then little wonder that Scripture warns us: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32) … “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). But most people are totally ignorant of those Scriptural quotes in particular and of the Bible in general―they are too absorbed by the world and the gospel of the world!
Should We Hate the World?
If Scripture says: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ― should we then hate the world? We are told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). If we are told not to love the world, does that mean that we must hate the world? If “God hates iniquity” (Judith 5:21) ― then should we not hate this sinful world? If “the whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19); and if sin makes us belong to the devil: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8); and if Satan is “the prince of this world” (John 14:30) ― then should we not hate the world and all that it offers? Even Our Lord said to His Father in Heaven: “I pray not for the world, but for them whom Thou hast given Me―because they are Thine!” (John 17:9) ― should we not, therefore, hate the world? We are told: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? … Go out from among them, and be ye separate!” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17) ― therefore should we not hate them?
Here we should make a distinction about what is to be loved and what is to be hated. “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “God did not send His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). Our Lord Himself said: “I came not to judge the world, but to save the world! … The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save! … I came to call sinners to penance!” (John 12:47; Luke 9:56; 5:32). Hence Scripture says of God: “You love all things that are, and hate none of the things which You have made!” (Wisdom 11:25). God Himself says: “Is it My will that a sinner should die and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? … Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin. Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit―and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dies, says the Lord God. Return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:23-32).
God loves the sinner―for He created his soul for sanctity―but God hates his sins, because his sins have robbed him of any and all sanctity; his sins attack and offend God; his sins have placed him under the power of the devil and have condemned him Hell―all of this God hates, and rightly so. “God hates iniquity” (Judith 5:21). “The Lord thy God hates all injustice” (Deuteronomy 25:16). “There are six things which the Lord hates, and the seventh his soul detests: (1) haughty eyes; (2) a lying tongue; (3) hands that shed innocent blood; (4) a heart that devises wicked plots; (5) feet that are swift to run into mischief; (6) a deceitful witness that utters lies, and (7) him that sows discord among brethren!” (Proverbs 6:16-19).
Our approach to this sinful world, which Our Lord says “is seated in wickedness”, should be approach that a person has to their gangrenous limb―they will try to cure the gangrene and save the limb, but if it cannot be cured, it must be amputated. We love the limb and hate the disease―and, if necessary, we will sacrifice the limb to remove the disease.
No Making Peace with the World and the Worldly
As Holy Scripture says: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? … Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). We will not find true peace here on Earth―as Our Lord says: “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give unto you―not as the world gives, do I give unto you!” (John 14:27). Outside the peace of Christ there is no true peace. Our Lord said:
“Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! ... Many shall betray one another and shall hate one another! … You shall be brought before governors and before kings for My sake! They will deliver you up in councils and they will scourge you in their synagogues. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted and shall put you to death! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death; and the father the son; and the children shall rise up against their parents and shall put them to death! But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:17-22, 34-36; 24:9-10; Luke 12:51-53).
Our life on Earth is a life of warfare, not peace: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12)―that means getting out of the cozy comfortable Catholic armchair, and not just talking the talk, but walking the walk―as Christ did. Holy Scripture adds: “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12)―are you wrestling against the world, or are you more or less at peace with the world? “Resist the devil, and he will fly from you!” (James 4:7). Our Lord calls the Satan “the prince of this world” (John 14:30), and to the worldly, Our Lord says: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do!” (John 8:44)―would Our Lord have to say the same to you? Have you become a friend of the enemy of God? “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Too many Catholics are friends with the world and its worldliness! “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15).
Litmus Love Test
It was in the 14th century that scientists discovered that litmus, a mixture of colored organic compounds obtained from lichen, turns red in acid solutions and blue in alkaline solutions and, thus, can be used as an acid-base indicator. Six centuries later, people began using the term “litmus test” is figurative way―“litmus test” can now refer to any single factor that establishes the true character of something, or causes it to be assigned to one category or another. With regard to religion, you could say there is a “litmus test” that establishes whether you are on the side God, the Faith and Heaven, or if you are on the side of Satan, the world and Hell. You could say that the acidity which is turns the litmus paper into a red color, is symbolic of Hell and Satan; whereas the alkalinity that turns the litmus paper into a blue color is symbolic of Heaven and Our Lady. Disease thrives in an acidic environment, but cannot exist and grow in an alkaline environment. Likewise, you could say that sin thrives in a worldly environment, but cannot exist for long in spiritual environment.
You could say that Our Lord implies this when He says: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures, treasures, teachings and spirit of the world, whose prince is the devil (Matthew 6:19-24). “The field is the world. And the good seed are the children of the kingdom. And the cockle, are the children of the wicked one!” (Matthew 13:38). Elsewhere, Our Lord speaks along the same lines: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). “If God were your Father, you would indeed love Me. You are of your father―the devil―and the desires of your father you will do! He that is of God, hears the words of God. Therefore you hear them not, because you are not of God!” (John 8:42-47). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15) … “He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me” (John 14:21) … “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word,” (John 14:23) … “He that loves Me not, keeps not My words” (John 14:24) ... “You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 15:14) … “If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love” (John 15:10).
Mutually Opposed
We cannot pretend to love God if we do not keep His commandments. We cannot pretend to love God if we follow the gospel of the world rather than the Gospel of Christ. “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). We cannot love both God and world―for they are mutually opposed to each other. “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 8:23; 18:36).
Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His Father in Heaven, Jesus says: “I have manifested Thy Name, Father, to the men whom Thou hast given Me out of the world! ... Thine they were, and to Me Thou gave them! … I am not of the world, and these are in the world … I pray for them … I pray not for the world, but for them whom Thou hast given Me … I have given them Thy word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world; as I also am not of the world” (John 17:6-14).
To His followers He says: “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (Matthew 10:22; 24:9; John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
Hence Holy Scripture adds: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
“Thus says the Lord God: ‘Cursed is the man who trusts in man, who seeks his strength in flesh, whose heart turns away from the Lord! … Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose hope is the Lord!’” (Jeremias 17:5-7).
Love being Hated and Hate being Loved
There are many who seek to be loved by world; they seek the attention of the world and the approval of the world. They think that it is a good thing to approved and loved by world. Nothing could be further from the truth. The words of Our Lord testify to this: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). If we were true and sincere Catholics, we would look upon being hated by the world as a badge of honor, and not a badge of shame. Unfortunately, there are very few who think and react like this―in fact, there are very few Catholics who deserve hatred by the world, because they do not live truly Catholic lives, for their Catholicism has become a worldly Catholicism!
Rejoice if the world hates you! Our Lord tells us: “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven! Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in Heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you!” (Matthew 5:10-12).
True and sincere Catholics should have no trouble in being able to experience and say the following: “For Thy sake, O Lord, I have borne reproach; shame has covered my face! I am become a stranger to my brethren, and an alien to the sons of my mother! For the zeal of Thy house has eaten me up, and the reproaches of them that reproached Thee are fallen upon me! And I covered my soul in fasting―and it was made a reproach to me! And I made haircloth my garment―and I became a byword to them! They that sat in the gate spoke against me!” (Psalm 68:8-13). True, sincere and zealous Catholicism will always be hated by most people―not just by non-Catholics, but also the hoards of lukewarm Catholics who are in no shortage. As Our Lord so rightly and prophetically said: “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!”! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (Matthew 10:22; 24:9; John 15:19).
Children of Mary and Children of Satan
In his book, True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis de Montfort writes: “The greatest saints, the souls richest in graces and virtues, shall be the most assiduous in praying to our Blessed Lady … I have said that this would come to pass, particularly at the end of the world and, indeed, presently, because the Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints, who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady … They shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Solomon and the Mystical City of God― that is to say, the most holy Virgin, called by the Fathers the Temple of Solomon and the City of God. By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone.
“Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times―in mercy, to bring back and lovingly receive the poor strayed sinners, who shall be converted and shall return to the Catholic Church; in might, against the enemies of God, idolaters, schismatics, Mahometans, Jews and souls hardened in impiety, who shall rise in terrible revolt against God to seduce all those who shall oppose them and to make them fall by promises and threats; and, finally, she must shine forth in grace, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ, who shall battle for His interests. And lastly, Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others.
“It is principally of these last and cruel persecutions of the devil, which shall go on increasing daily till the reign of Antichrist, that we ought to understand that first and celebrated prediction and curse of God, pronounced in the terrestrial paradise, against the serpent. It is to our purpose to explain this here―for the glory of the most holy Virgin, for the salvation of her children and for the confusion of the devil: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!” (Genesis 3:15).
“God has never made and formed but one enmity; but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end. It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her, even since the days of the earthly paradise—though she existed then only in His idea—with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel, that he fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself. Not that the anger, the hatred and the power of God are not infinitely greater than those of the Blessed Virgin―for the perfections of Mary are limited―but first, because Satan, being proud, suffers infinitely more from being beaten and punished by a little and humble handmaid of God, and her humility humbles him more than the divine power; and secondly, because God has given Mary such great power against the devils that—as they have often been obliged to confess, in spite of themselves, by the mouths of the possessed—they fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints, and one of her threats against them more than all other torments.
“What Lucifer has lost by pride, Mary has gained by humility. What Eve has damned and lost by disobedience, Mary has saved by obedience. Eve, in obeying the serpent, has destroyed all her children together with herself, and has delivered them to him; Mary, in being perfectly faithful to God, has saved all her children and servants together with herself, and has consecrated them to His Majesty. God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always, up to this time, persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will, in the future, persecute them more than ever” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
In a similar vein, in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, St. Louis de Montfort again paints a picture of the opposition between the followers of Christ and the followers of the world: “Friends of the Cross, you are a group of crusaders united to fight against the world … like brave, intrepid warriors on the battlefront, refusing to retreat or even to yield an inch. Be brave. Fight with all your might! Bind yourselves together in that strong union of heart and mind which is far superior, far more terrifying to the world and Hell than the armed forces of a well-organized kingdom are to its enemies. Demons are united for your destruction, but you, be united for their overthrow! Reprobates unite to make merry, but you, be united to suffer! … A Friend of the Cross is a mighty king, a hero who triumphs over the devil, the world and the flesh and their threefold concupiscence. He overthrows the pride of Satan by his love for humiliation, he triumphs over the world’s greed by his love for poverty and he restrains the sensuality of the flesh by his love for suffering. A Friend of the Cross is a holy man, separated from visible things. He journeys here below like a stranger and pilgrim. He keeps his heart free from the world, and disdainfully tramples it under foot. Is the way you follow the one that leads to this goal? Is it the true way of life, the narrow way, the thorn-strewn way to Calvary? Or are you unconsciously traveling the world’s broad road, the road to perdition? Do you really know the voice of God and grace from the voice of the world and human nature?
“The world’s group, the devil’s in fact, is far superior in number, and seemingly far more colorful and splendid in array. Fashionable folk are all in a hurry to enlist, the highways are overcrowded, although they are broad and ever broadening with the crowds that flow through in a torrent. These roads are strewn with flowers, bordered with all kinds of amusements and attractions and paved with gold and silver … Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!’ they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat! Let us drink! Let us sing! Let us dance! Let us play! God is good! He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die! ’ And so they continue.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
Defeat Hatred with Love
Love is stronger than hatred. “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and Satan is hatred―God is more powerful than Satan; and so love is more powerful than hatred. It was love for mankind that drove God the Father to send His Only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, into this world to save sinners and lead them to Heaven. It is hatred for mankind that drives Satan in trying damn sinners by leading them to Hell.
Holy Scripture commands us to conquer hate through the power of love: “Bless them that persecute you―bless, and curse not! … Revenge not yourselves, but give place unto wrath, for it is written: ‘Revenge is mine, I will repay!’ says the Lord. But if your enemy is hungry, give him to eat; if he is thirsty, give him to drink! For, doing this, you shalt heap coals of fire upon his head!” (Romans 12:14-20). Many people wouldn’t mind heaping coals of fire on the heads of their enemies if they were real coals of fire! Yet Scripture speaks of the fiery coals of charity! As Our Lord said: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you―Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! Pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!” (Matthew 5:43-44).
Holy Scripture says: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under Heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal. A time to destroy, and a time to build. A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather. A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces. A time to get, and a time to lose. A time to keep, and a time to cast away. A time to rend, and a time to sew. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace.” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8).
We all love being loved―and we hate being hated! “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and God is good―God loves what is good. Unfortunately, our love is not always a good love―we can love what is good and we can love what is evil. We can hate what is good and we can hate what is evil. Holy Scripture deals with this several times: “You that love the Lord, hate evil!” (Psalm 96:10) … “Hate evil, and love good!” (Amos 5:15) … “You hate good, and love evil!” (Micheas 3:2) … “He that loves iniquity hates his own soul!” (Psalm 10:6) … “He that loves his life shall lose it―and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:2) … “All that hate Me, love death!” (Proverbs 8:36) … “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24) … “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you―Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you!” (Matthew 5:43-44).
We speak of loving the sinner while hating his sin. Some people hate work, but love the pay. We speak of “love-hate relationships.” Sometimes we love what others hate, or hate what others love! People can be blinded by hatred and carried away by love!
Passion Power
We have within ourselves the power to love and the power to hate. God has created human beings with a series of complementary or opposite passions. There are 11 primary passions—five passions in the face of difficulties and trials―six passions in the face of desires and temptations.
The five passions that deal with difficulties and trials are hope, despair, daring, fear, and anger. When something good is difficult or arduous to attain—you have hope if you believe you can attain it, despair if you don’t. Then, when faced with a trial, obstacle, or evil while pursuing the good—you have daring if you believe you can overcome it, fear if you don’t. Finally, if the good is attained—you are at peace; if not, you have anger (noting, anger here does not refer to the vice of anger, but rather, the disdain of what is evil or unfitting).
The six passions that deal with desires and temptations are love, hatred, desire, aversion, joy, and sadness. When something good presents itself—you have love; when not good or evil—you have hatred (noting, love and hatred here simply mean the animal-like attraction for what is fitting and repulse for what is not). You are then moved to attain what is good—which is desire, or to avoid what is not—which is aversion. Finally, if what is good is attained—you have joy; if not—you have sadness.
We love what is good―and we hate what is opposed to the good that we love. We desire the good that is absent―and we hate and avoid the evil that is absent. We experience joy when we have the good that we love―and we are sad when we don’t have the good that we love.
When it comes to the passions, know this—disordered passions are drawn toward what is evil and away from what is good; well-ordered passions are drawn toward what is good and away from what is evil. Passions are like children―they are not meant to be in charge, they are meant to be guided by their parents, teachers and elders. It our human reason and our human will-power that are meant to be the “parents” or “teachers” of our passions. Our reason and will (mind and heart) are to be in charge of our passions and are meant to guide our passions. Our passions―like children―can be impulsive and unreasonable. Therefore, they need to be enlightened, instructed and commanded―so that they, like children, can be helpful and productive, rather than being rebellious, destructive and a nuisance. Passions can be incredibly helpful or they can be terribly destructive. Just like children, passions have a lot of energy―but, like a river, that energy has to be channeled and used in a positive beneficial way. The river can supply water for drinking; it can be used for washing and cleaning; it can be used for transportation; it can irrigate our crops; it can be used to make electricity, etc. Yet the river can also be dangerous and destructive―we can drown in the river; boats can sink in the river; crops and residences can be damaged or destroyed by a flooding river, etc.
For St. Thomas Aquinas, passions are not obstacles to be overcome, subjugated and imprisoned―he sees them as being integral to human flourishing, serving as a natural and necessary part of human life, helping us to pursue good and avoid evil. Passions are meant to be helpers, not rulers. If we do not keep them in their proper place and make correct use of them, then they will take over and rule us.
Passions Gone Wild
Some people imagine love to be always good and hatred to always evil―which then leads to a dangerous attitude of being good and loving to everyone, even when they are blatantly sinning, rebelling, causing damage and destruction. The modern world has labeled speaking out against sin as being guilty of a “hate crime” ― whereas, in reality, we should be accusing them of being guilty of “love crimes”, in the sense that they are loving sin and indulging in sin. Hence sinful lifestyles are allowed (and even encouraged) ― LGBTQ+, abortion, contraception, divorce, drug abuse, etc. It has degenerated into a heretical “love the sinner and turn a blind eye to his sin”! Even in school―from the earliest years―correction is becoming less and less and used. Instead we make children feel good about their ignorance and stupidity and even sinfulness―everything is swept under the carpet! We are indoctrinated to think that “anything goes” and “everyone is right” and that “everyone can have his own truth” ― what is true for you might not be true for someone else, but, hey, who cares? Just follow your own subjective mind and subjective truth!
This eventually leads to a twisted, degenerate, irrational and sinful use of passions. Sometimes we love to hate; at other times we hate to love―it all depends upon the object and circumstances. Everyone one naturally loves what they think is good for them; and they naturally hate what they imagine is bad for them―but our thinking is not always correct! It can be heavily influenced from within by our passions and preferences―and our thinking can be influenced from outside of ourselves by the world and the devil.
Passions, of themselves, are blind―they need the guidance of right reason and the firm hand of a strong will. Each of our passions blindly wants all that it can get―unless that passion is enlightened and instructed by right reason, and held in check by a strong will. You could apply the words of Our Lord to the blindness of passions: “They are blind and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). There are countless numbers who have fallen into the pit of their passions―and from there they have fallen into the pit of Hell!
Most of the time, that surrender to the passions can be traced back to childhood and a neglect on the side of the parents in restraining the passions of their children and then teaching the children how to restrain their own passions. As Holy Scripture warns: “A young man according to his way, even when he is old he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6). Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, adds: “The demons instill into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and they incite the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition. If the fathers and mothers would be solicitous to prevent these vanities and perverted habits of their children, and would instruct them from their infancy in the knowledge of their God and Creator, then they would afterwards easily accustom them to know and adore Him. Parents must learn to love their children, help them, nourish them, exhort them, correct them and lead them on in the way of salvation without remissness or carelessness!”
Evil Love and Good Hatred
It is important to have a reasonable and balanced idea about love and hatred. Not all love is good and not all hatred is evil. They are like two sides to one coin―we have to have both aspects in our life and use them correctly. This means aligning our love and hatred in the way in which God intended them to be used. We cannot love what is evil and we cannot hate what is good―but we must love what is good and hate what is evil. Who decides what is good and evil? Not us! It is God who decides―and God has given us a mind and a conscience that must be aligned to His Will and His teachings.
We often want to change God’s plan―and so we see certain evils or sins as being good and desirable. God warns: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20). “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9). Hence Scripture says: “You hate good, and love evil!” (Micheas 3:2) … “Hate evil, and love good!” (Amos 5:15) … “You that love the Lord, hate evil!” (Psalm 96:10). Hatred is a part of life―and it is a good part of life if it used correctly and if it focuses on hating what is objectively evil, and not hating what is objectively good.
Losing Our Minds and Intelligence!
The problem is that most people have lost all sense of objectivity and now rely on their own subjectivity―meaning that nobody outside of themselves will tell them what is good and what is evil. They themselves are the judges of what is good and evil. If you think about it, doesn’t that sound a lot like Satan’s temptation for Eve: “And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No, you shall not die the death! For God knows that in what day soever you shall eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’” (Genesis 3:4-5).
Talking of swallowing fruit―it can be said that truth is often hard to swallow, so we prefer comfortable lies, illusions and delusions―and the modern world is only to pleased and ready to supply us with them, and most people will “Drink the Kool-Aid” unquestioningly! This lack of objectivity (failing to see things as they really are) and increasing subjectivity (seeing things according to personal bias and preferences) owes a lot to the massive “dumbing-down” of people over the last 50 or 60 years. A recent Financial Times article reports a widespread fall in the reasoning ability of people; weak cognitive skills and critical thinking skills; trouble with problem-solving and information processing skills; struggles with attention spans and concentration, etc.
Too many people are opting for instant gratification via smart phone interactions. Analysis of complex topics through reading is disappearing. Intellectual laziness is prevailing with people just absorbing whatever occurs in short digital bursts on social media and by perpetually sharing trivia with others. The smart phone has become an addiction; it must now be viewed at every waking moment! You could almost call it a “Modern-Day Secular Bible” or a “False God” to which you could attribute Christ’s words: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” and that is what many people think of their smart phone―without it, they feel as though they can do nothing! To make up for this lack of intellectual ability and impaired intelligence, we have now been given the intellectual crutches of “Artificial Intelligence” that will gradually do all our thinking, judging and decision making for us!
On the belief that “information is power” and “money is power” the last thing the Elite and the Money Men want is for people to be informed about their plots and plans for the world. Hence we are “dumbed-down” and “up to our necks” in debt! In 2023, 77% of American households carried some form of debt, with the average household debt being around $105,000 ― with the chief areas being Mortgage Debt; Credit Card Debt; Auto Loans and Student Loans. As Holy Scripture says: “The rich rule over the poor; and the borrower is servant to him that lends!” (Proverbs 22:7). Mayer Amschel Rothschild (1743–1812) said: “Give me control over a nation’s currency, and I care not who makes its laws!” As Henry Kissinger said: “Whoever controls the food supply controls the people; whoever controls the energy can control whole continents; whoever controls money can control the world!” Kissinger, United States Secretary of State from 1973 to 1977, and National Security Advisor from 1969 to 1975, and political adviser to various US Presidents, was also a member of the following Elitist serving groups: Aspen Institute; Atlantic Council; Bilderberg Group; Bohemian Club; Council on Foreign Relations; Center for Strategic and International Studies; Le Cercle, and more besides!
All of these Elite-serving organizations, governments and media outlets have succeeded in brainwashing the minds that they have dumbed-down into craving the material instead of the spiritual; craving money and pleasure more than God and grace; craving what the world offers rather than what God offers. “They are of the world—therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3). They have seduced people into loving the world very much and God very little. Then little wonder that Scripture warns us: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32) … “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). But most people are totally ignorant of those Scriptural quotes in particular and of the Bible in general―they are too absorbed by the world and the gospel of the world!
Should We Hate the World?
If Scripture says: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ― should we then hate the world? We are told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). If we are told not to love the world, does that mean that we must hate the world? If “God hates iniquity” (Judith 5:21) ― then should we not hate this sinful world? If “the whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19); and if sin makes us belong to the devil: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8); and if Satan is “the prince of this world” (John 14:30) ― then should we not hate the world and all that it offers? Even Our Lord said to His Father in Heaven: “I pray not for the world, but for them whom Thou hast given Me―because they are Thine!” (John 17:9) ― should we not, therefore, hate the world? We are told: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? … Go out from among them, and be ye separate!” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17) ― therefore should we not hate them?
Here we should make a distinction about what is to be loved and what is to be hated. “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “God did not send His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). Our Lord Himself said: “I came not to judge the world, but to save the world! … The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save! … I came to call sinners to penance!” (John 12:47; Luke 9:56; 5:32). Hence Scripture says of God: “You love all things that are, and hate none of the things which You have made!” (Wisdom 11:25). God Himself says: “Is it My will that a sinner should die and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? … Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin. Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit―and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dies, says the Lord God. Return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:23-32).
God loves the sinner―for He created his soul for sanctity―but God hates his sins, because his sins have robbed him of any and all sanctity; his sins attack and offend God; his sins have placed him under the power of the devil and have condemned him Hell―all of this God hates, and rightly so. “God hates iniquity” (Judith 5:21). “The Lord thy God hates all injustice” (Deuteronomy 25:16). “There are six things which the Lord hates, and the seventh his soul detests: (1) haughty eyes; (2) a lying tongue; (3) hands that shed innocent blood; (4) a heart that devises wicked plots; (5) feet that are swift to run into mischief; (6) a deceitful witness that utters lies, and (7) him that sows discord among brethren!” (Proverbs 6:16-19).
Our approach to this sinful world, which Our Lord says “is seated in wickedness”, should be approach that a person has to their gangrenous limb―they will try to cure the gangrene and save the limb, but if it cannot be cured, it must be amputated. We love the limb and hate the disease―and, if necessary, we will sacrifice the limb to remove the disease.
No Making Peace with the World and the Worldly
As Holy Scripture says: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? … Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). We will not find true peace here on Earth―as Our Lord says: “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give unto you―not as the world gives, do I give unto you!” (John 14:27). Outside the peace of Christ there is no true peace. Our Lord said:
“Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! ... Many shall betray one another and shall hate one another! … You shall be brought before governors and before kings for My sake! They will deliver you up in councils and they will scourge you in their synagogues. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted and shall put you to death! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death; and the father the son; and the children shall rise up against their parents and shall put them to death! But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:17-22, 34-36; 24:9-10; Luke 12:51-53).
Our life on Earth is a life of warfare, not peace: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12)―that means getting out of the cozy comfortable Catholic armchair, and not just talking the talk, but walking the walk―as Christ did. Holy Scripture adds: “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12)―are you wrestling against the world, or are you more or less at peace with the world? “Resist the devil, and he will fly from you!” (James 4:7). Our Lord calls the Satan “the prince of this world” (John 14:30), and to the worldly, Our Lord says: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do!” (John 8:44)―would Our Lord have to say the same to you? Have you become a friend of the enemy of God? “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Too many Catholics are friends with the world and its worldliness! “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15).
Litmus Love Test
It was in the 14th century that scientists discovered that litmus, a mixture of colored organic compounds obtained from lichen, turns red in acid solutions and blue in alkaline solutions and, thus, can be used as an acid-base indicator. Six centuries later, people began using the term “litmus test” is figurative way―“litmus test” can now refer to any single factor that establishes the true character of something, or causes it to be assigned to one category or another. With regard to religion, you could say there is a “litmus test” that establishes whether you are on the side God, the Faith and Heaven, or if you are on the side of Satan, the world and Hell. You could say that the acidity which is turns the litmus paper into a red color, is symbolic of Hell and Satan; whereas the alkalinity that turns the litmus paper into a blue color is symbolic of Heaven and Our Lady. Disease thrives in an acidic environment, but cannot exist and grow in an alkaline environment. Likewise, you could say that sin thrives in a worldly environment, but cannot exist for long in spiritual environment.
You could say that Our Lord implies this when He says: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures, treasures, teachings and spirit of the world, whose prince is the devil (Matthew 6:19-24). “The field is the world. And the good seed are the children of the kingdom. And the cockle, are the children of the wicked one!” (Matthew 13:38). Elsewhere, Our Lord speaks along the same lines: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). “If God were your Father, you would indeed love Me. You are of your father―the devil―and the desires of your father you will do! He that is of God, hears the words of God. Therefore you hear them not, because you are not of God!” (John 8:42-47). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15) … “He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me” (John 14:21) … “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word,” (John 14:23) … “He that loves Me not, keeps not My words” (John 14:24) ... “You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 15:14) … “If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love” (John 15:10).
Mutually Opposed
We cannot pretend to love God if we do not keep His commandments. We cannot pretend to love God if we follow the gospel of the world rather than the Gospel of Christ. “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). We cannot love both God and world―for they are mutually opposed to each other. “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 8:23; 18:36).
Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His Father in Heaven, Jesus says: “I have manifested Thy Name, Father, to the men whom Thou hast given Me out of the world! ... Thine they were, and to Me Thou gave them! … I am not of the world, and these are in the world … I pray for them … I pray not for the world, but for them whom Thou hast given Me … I have given them Thy word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world; as I also am not of the world” (John 17:6-14).
To His followers He says: “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (Matthew 10:22; 24:9; John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
Hence Holy Scripture adds: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
“Thus says the Lord God: ‘Cursed is the man who trusts in man, who seeks his strength in flesh, whose heart turns away from the Lord! … Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose hope is the Lord!’” (Jeremias 17:5-7).
Love being Hated and Hate being Loved
There are many who seek to be loved by world; they seek the attention of the world and the approval of the world. They think that it is a good thing to approved and loved by world. Nothing could be further from the truth. The words of Our Lord testify to this: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). If we were true and sincere Catholics, we would look upon being hated by the world as a badge of honor, and not a badge of shame. Unfortunately, there are very few who think and react like this―in fact, there are very few Catholics who deserve hatred by the world, because they do not live truly Catholic lives, for their Catholicism has become a worldly Catholicism!
Rejoice if the world hates you! Our Lord tells us: “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven! Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in Heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you!” (Matthew 5:10-12).
True and sincere Catholics should have no trouble in being able to experience and say the following: “For Thy sake, O Lord, I have borne reproach; shame has covered my face! I am become a stranger to my brethren, and an alien to the sons of my mother! For the zeal of Thy house has eaten me up, and the reproaches of them that reproached Thee are fallen upon me! And I covered my soul in fasting―and it was made a reproach to me! And I made haircloth my garment―and I became a byword to them! They that sat in the gate spoke against me!” (Psalm 68:8-13). True, sincere and zealous Catholicism will always be hated by most people―not just by non-Catholics, but also the hoards of lukewarm Catholics who are in no shortage. As Our Lord so rightly and prophetically said: “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!”! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (Matthew 10:22; 24:9; John 15:19).
Children of Mary and Children of Satan
In his book, True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis de Montfort writes: “The greatest saints, the souls richest in graces and virtues, shall be the most assiduous in praying to our Blessed Lady … I have said that this would come to pass, particularly at the end of the world and, indeed, presently, because the Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints, who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady … They shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Solomon and the Mystical City of God― that is to say, the most holy Virgin, called by the Fathers the Temple of Solomon and the City of God. By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone.
“Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times―in mercy, to bring back and lovingly receive the poor strayed sinners, who shall be converted and shall return to the Catholic Church; in might, against the enemies of God, idolaters, schismatics, Mahometans, Jews and souls hardened in impiety, who shall rise in terrible revolt against God to seduce all those who shall oppose them and to make them fall by promises and threats; and, finally, she must shine forth in grace, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ, who shall battle for His interests. And lastly, Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others.
“It is principally of these last and cruel persecutions of the devil, which shall go on increasing daily till the reign of Antichrist, that we ought to understand that first and celebrated prediction and curse of God, pronounced in the terrestrial paradise, against the serpent. It is to our purpose to explain this here―for the glory of the most holy Virgin, for the salvation of her children and for the confusion of the devil: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!” (Genesis 3:15).
“God has never made and formed but one enmity; but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end. It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her, even since the days of the earthly paradise—though she existed then only in His idea—with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel, that he fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself. Not that the anger, the hatred and the power of God are not infinitely greater than those of the Blessed Virgin―for the perfections of Mary are limited―but first, because Satan, being proud, suffers infinitely more from being beaten and punished by a little and humble handmaid of God, and her humility humbles him more than the divine power; and secondly, because God has given Mary such great power against the devils that—as they have often been obliged to confess, in spite of themselves, by the mouths of the possessed—they fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints, and one of her threats against them more than all other torments.
“What Lucifer has lost by pride, Mary has gained by humility. What Eve has damned and lost by disobedience, Mary has saved by obedience. Eve, in obeying the serpent, has destroyed all her children together with herself, and has delivered them to him; Mary, in being perfectly faithful to God, has saved all her children and servants together with herself, and has consecrated them to His Majesty. God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always, up to this time, persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will, in the future, persecute them more than ever” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
In a similar vein, in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, St. Louis de Montfort again paints a picture of the opposition between the followers of Christ and the followers of the world: “Friends of the Cross, you are a group of crusaders united to fight against the world … like brave, intrepid warriors on the battlefront, refusing to retreat or even to yield an inch. Be brave. Fight with all your might! Bind yourselves together in that strong union of heart and mind which is far superior, far more terrifying to the world and Hell than the armed forces of a well-organized kingdom are to its enemies. Demons are united for your destruction, but you, be united for their overthrow! Reprobates unite to make merry, but you, be united to suffer! … A Friend of the Cross is a mighty king, a hero who triumphs over the devil, the world and the flesh and their threefold concupiscence. He overthrows the pride of Satan by his love for humiliation, he triumphs over the world’s greed by his love for poverty and he restrains the sensuality of the flesh by his love for suffering. A Friend of the Cross is a holy man, separated from visible things. He journeys here below like a stranger and pilgrim. He keeps his heart free from the world, and disdainfully tramples it under foot. Is the way you follow the one that leads to this goal? Is it the true way of life, the narrow way, the thorn-strewn way to Calvary? Or are you unconsciously traveling the world’s broad road, the road to perdition? Do you really know the voice of God and grace from the voice of the world and human nature?
“The world’s group, the devil’s in fact, is far superior in number, and seemingly far more colorful and splendid in array. Fashionable folk are all in a hurry to enlist, the highways are overcrowded, although they are broad and ever broadening with the crowds that flow through in a torrent. These roads are strewn with flowers, bordered with all kinds of amusements and attractions and paved with gold and silver … Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!’ they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat! Let us drink! Let us sing! Let us dance! Let us play! God is good! He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die! ’ And so they continue.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
Defeat Hatred with Love
Love is stronger than hatred. “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and Satan is hatred―God is more powerful than Satan; and so love is more powerful than hatred. It was love for mankind that drove God the Father to send His Only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, into this world to save sinners and lead them to Heaven. It is hatred for mankind that drives Satan in trying damn sinners by leading them to Hell.
Holy Scripture commands us to conquer hate through the power of love: “Bless them that persecute you―bless, and curse not! … Revenge not yourselves, but give place unto wrath, for it is written: ‘Revenge is mine, I will repay!’ says the Lord. But if your enemy is hungry, give him to eat; if he is thirsty, give him to drink! For, doing this, you shalt heap coals of fire upon his head!” (Romans 12:14-20). Many people wouldn’t mind heaping coals of fire on the heads of their enemies if they were real coals of fire! Yet Scripture speaks of the fiery coals of charity! As Our Lord said: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you―Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! Pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!” (Matthew 5:43-44).
Article 21
2nd Sunday of Lent & Monday, March 16th & 17th
Temptations of the Saints and How They Overcame Them
PART TWO
2nd Sunday of Lent & Monday, March 16th & 17th
Temptations of the Saints and How They Overcame Them
PART TWO
Tribulations and Temptations bring Transfigurations
As already stated at the start of the previous article, the Mass for the Ember Saturday of Lent, and the following day, the Second Sunday of Lent, both use the same Gospel reading from St. Matthew―which describes the Transfiguration of Christ on Mount Tabor. The Transfiguration confirmed for the disciples the divine identity of Jesus and the future glory that awaited Him. Since we are, by Baptism, members of the Mystical Body of Christ―His Transfiguration also represents our own ‘transfiguration’ or transformation from our sinfulness into His holiness. As St. Augustine said―no doubt drawing upon his own personal experience―“There is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future!” In other words, every saint (except Our Lady) was guilty of committing sins in his or her past life―while every sinner is given hope for future glory if they abandon sin and follow the path to holiness. “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “But if the wicked man does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live and shall not die! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live! Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:20-23).
Christ came to seek and save those who were lost and chained to sin: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). Saints are converted sinners. Sinners are called to sanctity. There is no sinner so great that he or she cannot become a saint―but it requires that we roll-up our sleeves, take a deep breathe, and carry our cross of sanctification up the steep mountain of God! “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Luke 13:24; Matthew 7:13-14). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). The saints are sinners who stopped doing their own will, and started doing the will of God―gradually, perseveringly and eventually to a heroic degree. They took to heart the words of Holy Scripture that said: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). The saints were sinners who exhibited a violence against their own sinful inclinations and temptations, as well as those that came from the devil and the world.
So, in view of the two-day Gospel of the Transfiguration, let us continue with our two-article examination of the transformations that God’s grace brought into the lives of sinners who became saints―for such is the requirement for us also, since it is only saints that get into Heaven!
SAINT ANGELA OF FOLIGNO (1248-1309)
Wealthy and Worldly
At Foligno, in Umbria―not too far from Assisi―in the year 1248, Angela was born into a wealthy Italian family and, at an early age, married a wealthy man of high social standing. She had several children but was more interested in acquiring wealth and status then caring for her family. Angela was beautiful, wealthy and vain. She loved the world and its pleasures and, worse still, forgetful of her dignity and duties as wife and mother, fell into sin and led a disorderly life. As a rich man’s wife she wallowed in luxury. Her passions were expensive clothes and flashy jewels, extravagant meals and rare wines. She dressed and acted in ways that would provoke envy among women and sexual desire among men. When she was not indulging herself, she spent hours gossiping with her friends and maligning her neighbors.
Conversion
In 1288, around the age of 40, Angela experienced a conversion and realized how empty and shallow her life had become. As a result of this private revelation, Angela then saw her lifestyle in its true light. Those aimless pursuits which she thought harmless and normal, she now recognized as evil. Hence, she developed a craving for repentance for the sins she then easily recognized as sinful and so offensive to God. In her autobiography Angela discloses that in 1285 she did something so bad that for the first time in her life she began to live in fear of Hell. Her biographers speculate that Angela committed adultery, and―given the intensity of her guilt and shame―that seems likely. Near despair, she prayed to St. Francis of Assisi to help her. As Angela prayed the saint appeared to her. “Sister,” St. Francis said, “if you would have asked me sooner I would have complied with your request sooner. Nonetheless, your request is granted.” That same day Angela offered a sincere confession to a priest.
Angela Admits…
Angela herself writes: “I realized my sinfulness! I was seized with a great fear of being damned, and I shed a flood of tears! I went to confession to be relieved of my sins, but, through shame, I concealed the most grievous sins, but still I went to Holy Communion. Now my conscience tortured me day and night. I called upon St. Francis for help, and, moved by an inner impulse, I went into a church where a Franciscan Father was then preaching. I gathered courage to confess all my sins to him, and I did this immediately after the sermon. With zeal and perseverance I performed the penance he imposed, but my heart continued to be full of bitterness and shame. I recognized that the divine mercy has saved me from hell, hence I resolved to do rigorous penance; nothing seemed too difficult for me, because I felt I belonged in Hell. I called upon the saints, and especially upon the Blessed Virgin, to intercede with God for me. It appeared to me now as if they had compassion on me, and I felt the fire of divine love enkindled within me so that I could pray as I never prayed before. I had also received a special grace to contemplate the cross in which Christ had suffered so much for my sins. Sorrow, love, and the desire to sacrifice everything for Him filled my soul.”
As she stepped from the shadowy interior of the church into the bright sunlight of the piazza, Angela resolved to begin a new life. She sold her fine clothes and jewels to relieve the suffering of Foligno’s poor.
New Life, New Direction
Some time after her conversion Angela placed herself under the direction of the Franciscan Father Arnold of Foligno, and took the habit of the Third Order of St. Francis. God―having in His mercy inspired her with a deep sorrow for her sins―led her little by little to the height of perfection and to the understanding of the deepest mysteries. Angela has herself recorded the history of her conversion in her admirable “Book of Visions and Instructions”, which contains seventy chapters, and which was written from Angela’s dictation by her Franciscan confessor, Father Arnold of Foligno.
God Takes Away Her Family
Around the year 1290, around two or three years after her conversion, God tested the earnest desires of the penitent Angela and took away from her those whom she loved dearly. First of all, she lost her mother who died shortly after her vision. Though her mother was worldly, Angela loved her dearly. Secondly, not long after the death of her mother, she lost her husband. Her depth of loss continued as she also lost her children to death as well. Although she was blessed with the grace of repentance and a longing for suffering, it did not make it any easier to lose her family. These tragic events were very painful to her; but she made the sacrifice with resignation to the will of God. It was also a way of making reparation for her earlier sinful life. Her only consolation was in loving God as is the way of the Franciscans. All suffering and all joy are a part of one unity of life in Christ. She gave herself up completely to God.
Angela Forms a New Family
At this time, Father Arnold of Foligno, a Franciscan friar, became her spiritual director. Being freed from these family ties, and consistent with a life dedicated to penance, she dispossessed herself of all her temporal goods with the consent of her confessor, and donated all her possessions to the poor and lived only on the charity of others―so that, being poor herself, she might walk in the footsteps of her poor Savior. She joined a secular Franciscan order. In the course of time, a number of Tertiaries―men and women― gathered around her, who wanted to advance in holiness under her direction. Later she established at Foligno a community of sisters, who, in addition to the Rule of the Franciscan Third Order, added the three vows of religion, without, however, binding themselves to enclosure, so that they might devote their time to works of charity.
Learning from Angela
Angela was no angel! Yet―by the grace of God―she was transformed into an ‘angel’ who repaid God for a life of sin by a new life of undergoing many trials, tribulations and temptations. We learn from Angela that there is hope for sinners and that sinners can become saints―it is Satan who says the contrary. Yet our path from sinner to saint will not happen as long we live in the illusion and delusion that the proverbial “Three Hail Marys” assigned to us in Confession, is somehow going to magically pay for all our confessed sins! Those “Three Hail Marys” are merely the first payment―the tip of the iceberg―for our massive debt for sin. Like Angela, we need to come to the realization that we have led sinful lives―sometimes very sinful lives―and that the way back is not a seat in the first class cabin on a direct flight to Heaven!
ST. BENEDICT OF NURSIA (480-547)
It seems that even the best of us—namely, the saints—are not free from sexual temptation. There are numerous ways to avoid temptation, but sometimes we forget the most obvious one―fleeing from it, or, when it won’t leave, forcefully driving it away. St. Benedict is best known for his strict rules governing the lives of monks who became part of the order he founded―the Benedictines. In his Life of St. Benedict, Pope Gregory the Great recounts how St. Benedict was attacked with such a terrible temptation of the flesh, greater than anything he had experienced in all his life. Suddenly, Benedict’s mind was filled with the memory of a certain woman whom he had seen some time ago. So vehemently did her image inflame his mind and heart with lustful desires, that almost overcome by pleasure, he was determining to leave the wilderness and his vocation. Pope Gregory writes that the mere memory of her “mightily inflamed” Benedict with desire for her. Then, just as soon as he had been nearly overcome with passion, God intervened. Here is how Pope Gregory describes it:
“But, suddenly assisted with God’s grace, he came to himself; and seeing many thick briers [thorn bushes] and nettle bushes to grow nearby. He cast off his clothing, and threw himself into the midst of them, and there wallowed so long that, when he rose up, all his flesh was pitifully torn―and so by the wounds of his body, he cured the wounds of his soul, in that he turned pleasure into pain, and by the outward burning of extreme bodily paint, he quenched that fire which, being nourished before with the fuel of impure thoughts, did inwardly burn in his soul―and by this means he overcame the sin, by exchanging these two fires.”
In other words, Benedict resisted temptation by stripping off his clothes and thrashing around in a thorny brier patch, until his skin was torn off. A while after this event, St. Benedict told his disciples that, “by exchanging these two fires,” he was never tempted by lust again.
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS (1225-1274)
St. Thomas Aquinas was born in 1226 and was the son of a noble family in Italy. His parents wanted him to become a Benedictine monk in the hopes that he might one day become the abbot, or leader, of a monastery. St. Thomas became very interested in Dominican life and joined the order against the wishes of his parents. His parents so opposed his decision to become a Dominican friar that, in order to dissuade him from this choice, his family locked him in seclusion. They had him arrested and jailed in one of the family castles. They would not release him until he relented. The family attempted many times to persuade him to change his mind. For a full year, he refused to change his mind. He adapted to the situation by using it as an opportunity for writing and reflection, and quietly studied the Bible and grew in wisdom and knowledge.
Finally, after becoming tired of waiting, they resorted to more extreme measures. The brothers of St. Thomas conceived one last plan. They were certain that physical temptation would drive him to break his vow of chastity, after which he would surely abandon his religious vocation. So one night, his brothers hired a prostitute and brought a prostitute into the room where St. Thomas was being held, presuming he would be tempted out of both lust and loneliness to indulge in impurity with her. The plan did not work as intended. Immediately, St. Thomas reached into the fire and snatched a burning branch from the fireplace, with which he drove the prostitute out of the room, slammed the door behind her, and burned the Sign of the Cross on the wooden door with the red-hot branch. He then fell to his knees with tears of thanksgiving and prayed to be preserved in his chastity, purity, and intention to live the religious life.
According to the records of his canonization, St. Thomas fell at once into a mystical sleep and had a vision. Two angels came to him from heaven and bound a cord around his waist, saying, “On God’s behalf, we gird you with the cord of chastity, a girdle which no attack will ever destroy!” The two angels, who placed an angelic girdle around his waist to protect him from lust for the remainder of his mortal days. Over his lifetime, St. Thomas’ conduct revealed that he had indeed received a special grace of chastity and purity. In the records of his canonization, many different witnesses who knew St. Thomas at different points in his life remarked about his evidently high degree of purity and chastity. The angels’ gift preserved St. Thomas from sexual temptation and bestowed upon him an enduring purity that elevated all his thoughts and actions. Pope Pius XI wrote: “If St. Thomas had not been victorious when his chastity was in peril, it is very probable that the Church would never have had her Angelic Doctor!”
Both stories―St. Benedict and St. Thomas Aquinas―are compelling because of the profound simplicity with which each saint confronted sexual temptation. The response of each saint was direct and immediate—and, in both cases, neither one spent much time hand-wringing over how terrible it was that they were sensing sexual temptation in the first place. Both saints instead show how it pays to respond physically to a physical or even spiritual problem―that is why Christ and His Church recommend penances. St. Benedict, no doubt, must have been fiercely praying for relief from temptation, but he didn’t hesitate to fight temptations of the flesh with flesh―by throwing himself into the thorn bushes. He wounded himself physically, but healed himself spiritually. As for Aquinas: he didn’t pray away the prostitute—although he certainly must have prayed over the incident—but he drove her away with a firebrand (a piece of burning wood). With both men, grace was certainly at work, but it was followed by physical action—and that is the important lesson from both stories to keep in mind. As Holy Scripture says: “Resist the devil and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7).
ST. CATHERINE OF SIENA (1347–1380)
Unlike St. Mary of Egypt, St. Catherine pursued a pious way of life from her earliest years. She was born into a large, well-to-do family in Siena, Italy. Her parents sought a good match for their favorite child, but Catherine decided otherwise. She made a personal vow to give her life to God and became a lay Dominican. She lived in her parent’s home as a hermit until the age of twenty-one, when she experienced a “mystical marriage” with Christ. Afterward, she started to live a more out-going life, by serving the impoverished and ill. She vexed her family by giving large amounts of food to poor persons. Her work gained followers, and when political events in Italy worsened, she intervened by her prayers and persuasive personality. She was particularly instrumental in bringing the Pope back from Avignon.
Fierce Temptations
One day, Catherine conceived a great yearning for the virtue of fortitude. She had a spiritual encounter with Christ, Who explained that she would gain this virtue through certain trials that would soon visit her. The trials were temptations to lust that beset her night and day. Vivid images filled her mind, as devils pestered her continually. She responded by incessant prayer and penances such as fasting, vigils, and scourging her body. The apparent absence of Christ compounded her struggles.
Victory
After several days of struggle, a ray of the Holy Spirit entered her soul as she returned from church. Her thoughts reminded her of what she originally hoped to receive―namely, the virtue of fortitude. She marveled that her endurance of strong temptations was the very means by which she acquired fortitude. She subsequently fought more earnestly to repel the demons that afflicted her. When a devil came to tempt her once more, she said she was willing to endure all pains. In view of her boldness, the devil fled and her temptations against chastity ceased. In view of her victory, Jesus visited her to bestow rich blessings on her soul.
She complained to Him: “Lord, where were You when my heart was so tormented?” Jesus responded: “I was in the center of your heart.” Catherine wondered how it could be, as impure thoughts engulfed her mind. Jesus asked if the thoughts gave her pleasure or pain. She told Him that the thoughts caused her pain and sadness. Jesus then explained to her that it was because He was in her heart, that these thoughts were painful and not pleasurable. He told her that He protected her throughout the ordeal.
It is noteworthy that temptations enriched St. Catherine immensely. Her victory in the time of battle gained for her purity, fortitude, and God’s abundant blessings, such that by simply reciting the Lord’s Prayer, she went into ecstasy. By her example, St. Catherine offers three helpful lessons for the tempted: (1) remember God’s presence, (2) live austerely, such as by fasting from excessive food, and finally, (3) blessings will come after the storm, so be patient.
ST. ALOYSIUS GONZAGA (1568–1591)
St. Aloysius was the eldest son of the Marquisate of Castiglione and heir apparent to great riches and power. At the age of seven, he fell sick with quartan ague (a type of malaria). His thoughts ran deep like a river, as he understood the vanity of worldly success. Thus, after regaining his health, he decided that he would devote his life to God. At the age of nine, he made a vow of virginity. What can such an innocent soul teach those who are more flammable?
In fact, St. Aloysius confessed that he had strong sexual desires as he matured. He may not have had modern-day seductions like the internet, yet he lived in a palace lurking with temptations. Knowing his weakness, he followed the example of the saints in subduing his passions. There are essentially three ways that he gained self-mastery.
1. Custody of the Eyes
Living amid many allurements caused St. Aloysius to take a radical step. He practiced the ancient discipline of custody of the eyes. He kept his eyes lowered in the company of females and controlled his curiosity. While this may appear overly prudent, his intention was pure. He took Jesus’ words to heart, “But I say to you, everyone who looks at a woman with lust, has already committed adultery with her in his heart!” (Matthew 5:19)
2. Prayer
One spark on dry grass can cause a wildfire. St. Aloysius understood the necessity to keep his soul moistened with the waters of divine grace. When the soul is bedewed with grace, sparks have little chance. By prayer, he obtained grace from God. He daily prayed the Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the seven Penitential Psalms. He rose at midnight and prayed on a stone floor, regardless of the weather. He took St. Paul’s advice to heart and filled his head with divine meditations: “Whatever is good, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely … think about these things!” (Philippians 4:8)
3. Austerity of Life
St. Aloysius took up a life of self-discipline from the age of thirteen. Rather than dine sumptuously with his family, he fasted three days a week on bread and water. Furthermore, he scourged himself with a dog leash until the blood flowed. Though harsh sounding, his discipline calmed and subdued his hot-blooded nature so that he could be in command of his passions.
ST. JOHN VIANNEY (1786-1859)
St. John Vianney lived in France in the early 19th century. He is so respected for his holy work as a priest that he is the patron saint of priests. And apparently he regularly did battle with the evil one. Similarly to St. Padre Pio, St. John Vianney could read souls and would spend hours in the confessional. He was bringing many souls back to God and obviously the Devil was not happy about this.
St. John Vianney would be tormented nightly with attacks from Satan and his demons. They would cause him to be exhausted throughout the day with the lack of sleep he was getting. Satan’s goal was to try to have St. John Vianney quit his ministry so he could no longer save people through the confessionals. One night, Satan was so desperate that he even caught St. John Vianney’s bed on fire!
Once, his sister spent the night at his home attached to his parish church. She was awakened by a strange rapping sound on her wall and table. She went to St. John Vianney, who was hearing confessions late at night, and he explained: “Oh, my child, you should not have been frightened: It is only the Grappin [“gripper” or “grabber”; his nickname for Satan]. He cannot hurt you. As for me, he torments me in sundry ways. At times he seizes me by the feet and drags me about the room. It is because I convert souls to the good God.”
In another instance, St. John Vianney was in his parish church hearing confessions when someone reported to him that his bedroom had caught on fire. His response? “The Grappin is very angry. He couldn’t catch the bird, so he has burned the cage. It is a good sign! We will have many sinners come to confession this day!”
The devil apparently felt threatened by this Saint of God so much, he exclaimed to St. John Vianney, “If there were three priests like you, my entire kingdom would be ruined!” It is unfortunate that St. John Vianney could not tri-locate because Satan would have then cried in fear!
“We must take great care never to do anything before having said our morning prayers … The Devil once declared that if he could have the first moment of the day, he was sure of all the rest.” –St. John Vianney
ST. PADRE PIO (1887-1968)
Born in the late 19th century, St. Padre Pio lived and died in Italy – but was known and revered throughout the world when he died in 1968. When a person thinks of St. Padre Pio, a lot of different attributes of him come to mind―the stigmata that he had; the various healing miracles he performed; the hours he spent in his confessionals; the fact St. Padre Pio could read your soul; but what most people fail to realize is that demons regularly and tirelessly attacked him. Even in his youth, St. Padre Pio would enjoy incredible celestial visions, but would also suffer demonic attacks.
Satan once appeared to him as a big Hellhound with a smoke filled mouth uttering the words: “It is him! It is him!” The reason for this is because the Evil One was so frustrated with how many souls he was losing to God through Padre Pio, especially in the confessionals. Satan was immensely desperate to stop Padre Pio that he appeared to the Saint in many frightening forms and even as apparitions of Jesus, Mary, and his guardian angel to try and trick him and give him false advice.
Satan would even sometimes attack St. Padre Pio physically. He describes this in one letter he wrote to a priest confidant: “These devils don’t stop striking me, even making me fall down from the bed. They even tear off my shirt to beat me! But now they do not frighten me anymore. Jesus loves me―He often lifts me up and places me back on the bed.”
Satan tried so hard but, in the end, he and his demons failed to have Padre Pio quit his ministry and were so frustrated they screamed: “Padre Pio, you give us more trouble than St. Michael!” This statement, coming from Satan none the less, means you are probably doing something right with your life. Padre Pio would say: “It does not bother me when Satan is active, what concerns me is when he is at peace!”
According to Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist in Rome, who would often visit Padre Pio, “Padre Pio’s real enemies were the demons who besieged him. […] The great and constant struggle of Padre Pio’s life was with those enemies of God and human souls, the devils who tried to capture his soul.”
Fr. Amorth explains: “The devil would appear to him as an ugly black cat, or in the shape of a truly repugnant animal. The obvious intent was to fill him with terror. Other times demons came as young girls, nude and provocative, performing obscene dances, to test the young priest’s chastity. But Padre Pio sensed his greatest danger when the devil tried to deceive him by taking on the form of one of his superiors (his provincial superior or his spiritual director) or in a sacred form (the Lord, the Virgin, or St. Francis).”
This last tactic – of the devil appearing as someone good and holy – was a particular problem. Fr. Amorth reveals how St. Padre Pio would discern a vision: “He noticed a certain timidity when the Virgin or the Lord first appeared, followed by a sense of peace when the vision departed. On the other hand, a devil in sacred form provoked an immediate feeling of joy and attraction, replaced afterwards by remorse and sadness.”
ST. GEMMA GALGANI (1878-1903)
St. Gemma Galgani was a late 19th century Italian mystic who had incredible spiritual experiences. Her spiritual director, Venerable Father Germanus Ruoppolo, C.P., recounts much of her experiences, trials, tribulations and temptations in his biography of Gemma, entitled The Life of St. Gemma Galgani, from which much was taken for what you will read below. by Venerable Father Germanus Ruoppolo, C.P.
God, in order to purify His elect and render them victims of expiation for themselves and for others, makes use even of the demons, who because of their hatred of souls and their increased intelligence become very profitable instruments to the attainment of His ends. “To keep me from being too elated by the abundance of revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, an Angel of Satan to beat me, to keep me from being too exalted!” (2 Corinthians 12:7). Thus our Lord, when He made known to our holy founder, St. Paul of the Cross (founder of the Passionists) that He willed to raise Him to a high degree of sanctity, spoke thus: “I will have thee trampled underfoot by the devils!” And, similarly, Jesus said to His servant, Gemma: “Be prepared My child. The devil, at my bidding, will be the one who, by the war he will rage against you, will give the last touch to the work that I will accomplish in you.”
In an early letter to Father Germanus Ruoppolo, Gemma writes: “During the last two days Jesus has been telling me after Holy Communion: ‘My daughter, the devil will soon wage a great war against you.’ These words I hear in my heart continuously. Please pray for me! .... Who will win this battle―the devil or my soul? How sad this thing makes me! Where will the war come from? I am for ever thinking about it, instead of praying Jesus to give me strength and help! Now I have told you, and I leave this matter to you, that you may help me!”
Gemma soon learned that the best way to defend herself against the demons and to reach God’s ends is through prayer, which she practiced with all the ardor of her soul. What then did not the enemy do to prevent it? To weary her he would try to upset her temperament; he caused her violent headaches so that she might be obliged to go to bed, rather than remain in prayer and strove in numerous other ways to distract her from this holy exercise. “Oh!” she once said to Father Germanus Ruoppolo, “What torment this gives me―not to be able to pray! What fatigue it costs me! How many efforts does not that wretch make to make it impossible for me to pray! Yesterday evening he tried to kill me, and would have succeeded if Jesus had not come quickly to my aid. I was terrified and kept the image of Jesus in my mind, but I could not pronounce His Name.”
At other times, he attacked her differently “What are you doing?” he said, blaspheming, “How stupid you are to pray to that Malefactor! [The devil is referring to Jesus]. Look at the harm He does to you, keeping you nailed to the Cross with Himself. How then can you care for Him―for Him whom you don’t even know, who makes all who love Him suffer?” But these and all his other evil suggestions were as dust before the wind, and only served to afflict her at hearing her Jesus outraged by such blasphemies.
In the midst of so much suffering, the servant of God found comfort in the direction and advice of her spiritual director, Father Germanus Ruoppolo. This the wicked enemy could not bear, and tried to turn her away from her spiritual guide. He depicted her spiritual director as an ignorant, fanatical, deluded man and with so many arguments strove to convince and terrify her that Gemma thought herself all but lost. Hence on one occasion she wrote “For some days, Chiappino (a name she called the devil, which means “burglar” or “hostile intruder”) has pursued me in every guise and way, and has done all in his power against me. This monster keeps on redoubling all his efforts to ruin me and tries to deprive me of whomever directs or advises me. But even should this happen, I am not afraid!”
Seeing that with all his efforts he could not succeed in shaking her confidence in her spiritual director, he resorted to acts of violence, and, assaulting her while she persevered in writing, he snatched the pen from her hand and tore up the paper then dragged her from the table, seizing her by the hair with such violence that some of it was torn off in his brutal claws. Then withdrawing in fury he shouted: “War! War against thy Father (her spiritual director)! War as long as he lives!” “Believe me Father” she said to me “to hear this despicable wretch one would say that his fury was against you more than against me!”
He carried this audacity so far as to feign to be Father Germanus Ruoppolo, to whom Gemma used to make her confession. She had gone one day to Church, and while preparing herself to make her confession, she saw that the priest was already in the confessional, at which she momentarily wondered, not having seen him pass and enter. At the same time she felt very much disturbed in spirit, as generally happened when in the presence of the evil one. She entered the confessional however, and began her confession as usual. The voice and ways were indeed those of the confessor, but his talk was foul and scandalous, accompanied by improper gestures. “My God!” she exclaimed, “What has happened?” At such a sight and at such words the angelic child trembled, and her presence of mind returning, she hurriedly left the confessional, and saw as she did so that the pretended “confessor” had disappeared. It was the devil, who by his coarse and fiendish ways had sought to deceive her, or at least make her lose all confidence in the minister of God.
Failing in this attempt, the enemy made another. He appeared to Gemma in the form of an angel, resplendent with light, insinuating himself with the most subtle cunning, so as to throw her off her guard. Then as with Eve in the Garden of Eden, he depicted things in the falsest colors “Look!” he said, “I can make you happy if only you will swear to obey me!” Gemma, who this time did not feel in her soul the usual disturbance indicating the presence of the demon, stood listening in her simplicity. But God came to her aid. After the first wicked proposal, her eyes were opened. She stood up exclaiming: “My God! Mary Immaculate! Make me die rather than this!” and with these words she rushed to the feigned “angel” and spat in his face. At the same moment she saw him vanish in the form of fire.
She quickly realized that prayer was the best defense. In response, Satan gave her violent headaches in order to make sleeping difficult for her. Her fatigue then made sleeping more difficult ― but she persevered: “How many efforts does not that wretch make to make it impossible for me to pray! Yesterday evening he tried to kill me, and would have succeeded if Jesus had not come quickly to my aid. I was terrified and kept the image of Jesus in my mind!”
She describes another attack in one of her writings: “Once more I have passed a bad night. The demon came before me as a giant of great height and kept saying to me: ‘For you there is no more hope of salvation. You are in my hands!’ I replied that God is merciful and therefore I fear nothing. Then, giving me a hard blow on the head in a rage he shouted: ‘May you be accursed!’ and then he disappeared. I then went to my room to rest, and there I found him again. He began again to strike me with a knotted rope, and wanted me to listen to him while he suggested wickedness. I said no, and he struck me even harder, knocking my head violently against the ground. At a certain point, it came to my mind to invoke Jesus’ Father. I cried: ‘Eternal Father, through the most precious Blood of Jesus, free me!’ I don’t quite know what happened then. That contemptible beast dragged me from my bed and threw me, hitting my head against the floor with such force that it pains me still. I became senseless and remained lying there until I came to myself a long time afterwards. Jesus be thanked!”
Another time Gemma writes: “Today I thought I was to be entirely free from that nauseous animal, and instead he has knocked me about greatly. I had gone to bed with the full intention of sleeping, but it turned out otherwise. He began to beat me with such blows that I feared I would die. He was in the shape of a big black dog, and he put his paws on my shoulders, hurting me greatly. I felt it so much in all my bones that I thought that they were broken. Also, when I was taking holy water, he wrenched my arm so violently that I fell to the floor from the pain. The bone was dislocated, but went back into place because Jesus touched it for me, and all was remedied!” Knowing her mission as soul victim, the devil once said to her: “You can pray for yourself, but if you pray for others, I will make you pay dearly for it!”
In her Diary Gemma writes: “The devil, in the form of a great black dog, put his paws upon my shoulders, making every bone in my body ache. At times I believed that he would mangle me; then one time, when I was taking holy water, he twisted my arm so cruelly that I fell to the earth in great pain. After a while I remembered that I had around my neck the relic of the Holy Cross. Making the Sign of the Cross, I became calm. Jesus let me see Himself, but only for a short time, and He strengthened me anew to suffer and struggle.”
Another time in her Diary she writes: “This evening I felt I could not collect myself; I said a few evening prayers and went to bed. To tell the truth, I foresaw a bit of a storm because Jesus had warned me a few days ago, saying: ‘The enemy will try you with one final battle, but it will be the last one, because now that is enough!’ I could not help but thank Him for the strength He had always given me, and I prayed that He would want to give me strength for this final test as well, that is to say last night. I went to bed, as you know well, with the intention of sleeping; slumber was not long in coming when almost instantly a tiny, tiny man appeared, all covered in black hair. What a fright! He put his hands on my bed and I thought he wanted to hit me: ‘No, no,’ he said, ‘I am not able to hit you, don’t be afraid!’ and as he said this he lay down on the bed. I called Jesus to help me, but He did not come, but this doesn’t mean He abandoned me. As soon as I called His Name I felt liberated, but it was sudden. Other times I had called Jesus, but He had never been ready like last night.
“You should have seen the demon afterward, how angry he was! He rolled around on the floor, cursing! He made one last effort to take away the cross that I had with me, but then he instantly fell backward. How good Jesus was with me last night. The devil, after that last effort, turned toward me and said that since he had not been able to do anything, he wished to torment me the rest of the night. ‘No,’ I told him and I called my guardian Angel, who opened his wings and alighted next to me. He then blessed me and the devil ran away. Jesus be thanked! This morning I learned that at the very moment the devil was rising in fury, the Scapular of Our Lady of Sorrows had been placed on me [by Cecilia Giannini] and I realized that when the devil was trying to take something off of me, it could be nothing but that. My Mother, Our Lady of Sorrows, also be thanked!”
Again, in her Diary she writes: “It happened today as usual. I had gone to bed, in fact I was asleep, but the devil did not wish this. He presented himself in a disgusting manner; he tempted me but I was strong. I commended myself to Jesus asking that He take my life rather than have me offend Him. What horrible temptations those were! All of them displease me, but those against holy purity make me most wretched. Afterwards he left me in peace and my Guardian Angel came and assured me that I had not done anything wrong. I complained somewhat, because I wished his help at such times, and he said that whether I saw him or not, he would be always above my head.”
In his biography on Saint Gemma, Father Germanus Ruoppolo writes: “With a view to protect her from these Satanic attacks and apparitions, I enjoined on her, under whatever form the persons of the other world might appear to her, to at once repeat the words: ‘Viva Gesu!’ (‘Long live Jesus!’). I was unaware that Our Lord Himself had given her a similar remedy in the words: ‘Benedetto sio Dio e Maria!’ (‘Blessed be God and Mary!’) And the docile child, in order to obey both, used to repeat the double exclamation: ‘Viva Gesu! Benedetto sio Dio e Maria!’ (‘Blessed be Jesus! Blessed be God and Mary!’) The good spirits always repeated her words, whereas the malignant ones either did not reply, or else pronounced only a few words, such as ‘Viva’ or ‘Benedetto’, without adding any name. By this means Gemma recognized them and scorned them accordingly.”
Regarding the attacks from the devil, at times she would find comfort in her sense of humor. She once wrote to Father Germanus Ruoppolo stating: “If you would have seen him, Father, when he fled making faces, you would have burst out laughing! He is so ugly! .... But Jesus told me not to be afraid of him.”
Certainly Satan must have growled with rage at the zeal of this holy girl, finding how she snatched his choicest victims from him. He often appeared to her with eyes of fire and in threatening tones said: “While acting for yourself, do as you please, but listen well, do nothing for the conversion of sinners! If you attempt it, I shall make you pay dearly for it!”
At other times deceitfully assuming the role of a prudent counselor he would say: “How and where comes such presumption? You are laden with sins, and all the years of thy life would not suffice to bewail and expiate them, and yet you lose time about the sins of others? Do you not see that your own soul is in danger? A strange gain, that of thinking for others and neglecting thyself!” And on another occasion the infernal demon said: “Don’t you see that Jesus no longer hears you and that He will no longer have anything to do with you?” But through the grace of God, and the will of Gemma, all the devils temptations were made in vain.
As already stated at the start of the previous article, the Mass for the Ember Saturday of Lent, and the following day, the Second Sunday of Lent, both use the same Gospel reading from St. Matthew―which describes the Transfiguration of Christ on Mount Tabor. The Transfiguration confirmed for the disciples the divine identity of Jesus and the future glory that awaited Him. Since we are, by Baptism, members of the Mystical Body of Christ―His Transfiguration also represents our own ‘transfiguration’ or transformation from our sinfulness into His holiness. As St. Augustine said―no doubt drawing upon his own personal experience―“There is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future!” In other words, every saint (except Our Lady) was guilty of committing sins in his or her past life―while every sinner is given hope for future glory if they abandon sin and follow the path to holiness. “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “But if the wicked man does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live and shall not die! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live! Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:20-23).
Christ came to seek and save those who were lost and chained to sin: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). Saints are converted sinners. Sinners are called to sanctity. There is no sinner so great that he or she cannot become a saint―but it requires that we roll-up our sleeves, take a deep breathe, and carry our cross of sanctification up the steep mountain of God! “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Luke 13:24; Matthew 7:13-14). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). The saints are sinners who stopped doing their own will, and started doing the will of God―gradually, perseveringly and eventually to a heroic degree. They took to heart the words of Holy Scripture that said: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). The saints were sinners who exhibited a violence against their own sinful inclinations and temptations, as well as those that came from the devil and the world.
So, in view of the two-day Gospel of the Transfiguration, let us continue with our two-article examination of the transformations that God’s grace brought into the lives of sinners who became saints―for such is the requirement for us also, since it is only saints that get into Heaven!
SAINT ANGELA OF FOLIGNO (1248-1309)
Wealthy and Worldly
At Foligno, in Umbria―not too far from Assisi―in the year 1248, Angela was born into a wealthy Italian family and, at an early age, married a wealthy man of high social standing. She had several children but was more interested in acquiring wealth and status then caring for her family. Angela was beautiful, wealthy and vain. She loved the world and its pleasures and, worse still, forgetful of her dignity and duties as wife and mother, fell into sin and led a disorderly life. As a rich man’s wife she wallowed in luxury. Her passions were expensive clothes and flashy jewels, extravagant meals and rare wines. She dressed and acted in ways that would provoke envy among women and sexual desire among men. When she was not indulging herself, she spent hours gossiping with her friends and maligning her neighbors.
Conversion
In 1288, around the age of 40, Angela experienced a conversion and realized how empty and shallow her life had become. As a result of this private revelation, Angela then saw her lifestyle in its true light. Those aimless pursuits which she thought harmless and normal, she now recognized as evil. Hence, she developed a craving for repentance for the sins she then easily recognized as sinful and so offensive to God. In her autobiography Angela discloses that in 1285 she did something so bad that for the first time in her life she began to live in fear of Hell. Her biographers speculate that Angela committed adultery, and―given the intensity of her guilt and shame―that seems likely. Near despair, she prayed to St. Francis of Assisi to help her. As Angela prayed the saint appeared to her. “Sister,” St. Francis said, “if you would have asked me sooner I would have complied with your request sooner. Nonetheless, your request is granted.” That same day Angela offered a sincere confession to a priest.
Angela Admits…
Angela herself writes: “I realized my sinfulness! I was seized with a great fear of being damned, and I shed a flood of tears! I went to confession to be relieved of my sins, but, through shame, I concealed the most grievous sins, but still I went to Holy Communion. Now my conscience tortured me day and night. I called upon St. Francis for help, and, moved by an inner impulse, I went into a church where a Franciscan Father was then preaching. I gathered courage to confess all my sins to him, and I did this immediately after the sermon. With zeal and perseverance I performed the penance he imposed, but my heart continued to be full of bitterness and shame. I recognized that the divine mercy has saved me from hell, hence I resolved to do rigorous penance; nothing seemed too difficult for me, because I felt I belonged in Hell. I called upon the saints, and especially upon the Blessed Virgin, to intercede with God for me. It appeared to me now as if they had compassion on me, and I felt the fire of divine love enkindled within me so that I could pray as I never prayed before. I had also received a special grace to contemplate the cross in which Christ had suffered so much for my sins. Sorrow, love, and the desire to sacrifice everything for Him filled my soul.”
As she stepped from the shadowy interior of the church into the bright sunlight of the piazza, Angela resolved to begin a new life. She sold her fine clothes and jewels to relieve the suffering of Foligno’s poor.
New Life, New Direction
Some time after her conversion Angela placed herself under the direction of the Franciscan Father Arnold of Foligno, and took the habit of the Third Order of St. Francis. God―having in His mercy inspired her with a deep sorrow for her sins―led her little by little to the height of perfection and to the understanding of the deepest mysteries. Angela has herself recorded the history of her conversion in her admirable “Book of Visions and Instructions”, which contains seventy chapters, and which was written from Angela’s dictation by her Franciscan confessor, Father Arnold of Foligno.
God Takes Away Her Family
Around the year 1290, around two or three years after her conversion, God tested the earnest desires of the penitent Angela and took away from her those whom she loved dearly. First of all, she lost her mother who died shortly after her vision. Though her mother was worldly, Angela loved her dearly. Secondly, not long after the death of her mother, she lost her husband. Her depth of loss continued as she also lost her children to death as well. Although she was blessed with the grace of repentance and a longing for suffering, it did not make it any easier to lose her family. These tragic events were very painful to her; but she made the sacrifice with resignation to the will of God. It was also a way of making reparation for her earlier sinful life. Her only consolation was in loving God as is the way of the Franciscans. All suffering and all joy are a part of one unity of life in Christ. She gave herself up completely to God.
Angela Forms a New Family
At this time, Father Arnold of Foligno, a Franciscan friar, became her spiritual director. Being freed from these family ties, and consistent with a life dedicated to penance, she dispossessed herself of all her temporal goods with the consent of her confessor, and donated all her possessions to the poor and lived only on the charity of others―so that, being poor herself, she might walk in the footsteps of her poor Savior. She joined a secular Franciscan order. In the course of time, a number of Tertiaries―men and women― gathered around her, who wanted to advance in holiness under her direction. Later she established at Foligno a community of sisters, who, in addition to the Rule of the Franciscan Third Order, added the three vows of religion, without, however, binding themselves to enclosure, so that they might devote their time to works of charity.
Learning from Angela
Angela was no angel! Yet―by the grace of God―she was transformed into an ‘angel’ who repaid God for a life of sin by a new life of undergoing many trials, tribulations and temptations. We learn from Angela that there is hope for sinners and that sinners can become saints―it is Satan who says the contrary. Yet our path from sinner to saint will not happen as long we live in the illusion and delusion that the proverbial “Three Hail Marys” assigned to us in Confession, is somehow going to magically pay for all our confessed sins! Those “Three Hail Marys” are merely the first payment―the tip of the iceberg―for our massive debt for sin. Like Angela, we need to come to the realization that we have led sinful lives―sometimes very sinful lives―and that the way back is not a seat in the first class cabin on a direct flight to Heaven!
ST. BENEDICT OF NURSIA (480-547)
It seems that even the best of us—namely, the saints—are not free from sexual temptation. There are numerous ways to avoid temptation, but sometimes we forget the most obvious one―fleeing from it, or, when it won’t leave, forcefully driving it away. St. Benedict is best known for his strict rules governing the lives of monks who became part of the order he founded―the Benedictines. In his Life of St. Benedict, Pope Gregory the Great recounts how St. Benedict was attacked with such a terrible temptation of the flesh, greater than anything he had experienced in all his life. Suddenly, Benedict’s mind was filled with the memory of a certain woman whom he had seen some time ago. So vehemently did her image inflame his mind and heart with lustful desires, that almost overcome by pleasure, he was determining to leave the wilderness and his vocation. Pope Gregory writes that the mere memory of her “mightily inflamed” Benedict with desire for her. Then, just as soon as he had been nearly overcome with passion, God intervened. Here is how Pope Gregory describes it:
“But, suddenly assisted with God’s grace, he came to himself; and seeing many thick briers [thorn bushes] and nettle bushes to grow nearby. He cast off his clothing, and threw himself into the midst of them, and there wallowed so long that, when he rose up, all his flesh was pitifully torn―and so by the wounds of his body, he cured the wounds of his soul, in that he turned pleasure into pain, and by the outward burning of extreme bodily paint, he quenched that fire which, being nourished before with the fuel of impure thoughts, did inwardly burn in his soul―and by this means he overcame the sin, by exchanging these two fires.”
In other words, Benedict resisted temptation by stripping off his clothes and thrashing around in a thorny brier patch, until his skin was torn off. A while after this event, St. Benedict told his disciples that, “by exchanging these two fires,” he was never tempted by lust again.
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS (1225-1274)
St. Thomas Aquinas was born in 1226 and was the son of a noble family in Italy. His parents wanted him to become a Benedictine monk in the hopes that he might one day become the abbot, or leader, of a monastery. St. Thomas became very interested in Dominican life and joined the order against the wishes of his parents. His parents so opposed his decision to become a Dominican friar that, in order to dissuade him from this choice, his family locked him in seclusion. They had him arrested and jailed in one of the family castles. They would not release him until he relented. The family attempted many times to persuade him to change his mind. For a full year, he refused to change his mind. He adapted to the situation by using it as an opportunity for writing and reflection, and quietly studied the Bible and grew in wisdom and knowledge.
Finally, after becoming tired of waiting, they resorted to more extreme measures. The brothers of St. Thomas conceived one last plan. They were certain that physical temptation would drive him to break his vow of chastity, after which he would surely abandon his religious vocation. So one night, his brothers hired a prostitute and brought a prostitute into the room where St. Thomas was being held, presuming he would be tempted out of both lust and loneliness to indulge in impurity with her. The plan did not work as intended. Immediately, St. Thomas reached into the fire and snatched a burning branch from the fireplace, with which he drove the prostitute out of the room, slammed the door behind her, and burned the Sign of the Cross on the wooden door with the red-hot branch. He then fell to his knees with tears of thanksgiving and prayed to be preserved in his chastity, purity, and intention to live the religious life.
According to the records of his canonization, St. Thomas fell at once into a mystical sleep and had a vision. Two angels came to him from heaven and bound a cord around his waist, saying, “On God’s behalf, we gird you with the cord of chastity, a girdle which no attack will ever destroy!” The two angels, who placed an angelic girdle around his waist to protect him from lust for the remainder of his mortal days. Over his lifetime, St. Thomas’ conduct revealed that he had indeed received a special grace of chastity and purity. In the records of his canonization, many different witnesses who knew St. Thomas at different points in his life remarked about his evidently high degree of purity and chastity. The angels’ gift preserved St. Thomas from sexual temptation and bestowed upon him an enduring purity that elevated all his thoughts and actions. Pope Pius XI wrote: “If St. Thomas had not been victorious when his chastity was in peril, it is very probable that the Church would never have had her Angelic Doctor!”
Both stories―St. Benedict and St. Thomas Aquinas―are compelling because of the profound simplicity with which each saint confronted sexual temptation. The response of each saint was direct and immediate—and, in both cases, neither one spent much time hand-wringing over how terrible it was that they were sensing sexual temptation in the first place. Both saints instead show how it pays to respond physically to a physical or even spiritual problem―that is why Christ and His Church recommend penances. St. Benedict, no doubt, must have been fiercely praying for relief from temptation, but he didn’t hesitate to fight temptations of the flesh with flesh―by throwing himself into the thorn bushes. He wounded himself physically, but healed himself spiritually. As for Aquinas: he didn’t pray away the prostitute—although he certainly must have prayed over the incident—but he drove her away with a firebrand (a piece of burning wood). With both men, grace was certainly at work, but it was followed by physical action—and that is the important lesson from both stories to keep in mind. As Holy Scripture says: “Resist the devil and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7).
ST. CATHERINE OF SIENA (1347–1380)
Unlike St. Mary of Egypt, St. Catherine pursued a pious way of life from her earliest years. She was born into a large, well-to-do family in Siena, Italy. Her parents sought a good match for their favorite child, but Catherine decided otherwise. She made a personal vow to give her life to God and became a lay Dominican. She lived in her parent’s home as a hermit until the age of twenty-one, when she experienced a “mystical marriage” with Christ. Afterward, she started to live a more out-going life, by serving the impoverished and ill. She vexed her family by giving large amounts of food to poor persons. Her work gained followers, and when political events in Italy worsened, she intervened by her prayers and persuasive personality. She was particularly instrumental in bringing the Pope back from Avignon.
Fierce Temptations
One day, Catherine conceived a great yearning for the virtue of fortitude. She had a spiritual encounter with Christ, Who explained that she would gain this virtue through certain trials that would soon visit her. The trials were temptations to lust that beset her night and day. Vivid images filled her mind, as devils pestered her continually. She responded by incessant prayer and penances such as fasting, vigils, and scourging her body. The apparent absence of Christ compounded her struggles.
Victory
After several days of struggle, a ray of the Holy Spirit entered her soul as she returned from church. Her thoughts reminded her of what she originally hoped to receive―namely, the virtue of fortitude. She marveled that her endurance of strong temptations was the very means by which she acquired fortitude. She subsequently fought more earnestly to repel the demons that afflicted her. When a devil came to tempt her once more, she said she was willing to endure all pains. In view of her boldness, the devil fled and her temptations against chastity ceased. In view of her victory, Jesus visited her to bestow rich blessings on her soul.
She complained to Him: “Lord, where were You when my heart was so tormented?” Jesus responded: “I was in the center of your heart.” Catherine wondered how it could be, as impure thoughts engulfed her mind. Jesus asked if the thoughts gave her pleasure or pain. She told Him that the thoughts caused her pain and sadness. Jesus then explained to her that it was because He was in her heart, that these thoughts were painful and not pleasurable. He told her that He protected her throughout the ordeal.
It is noteworthy that temptations enriched St. Catherine immensely. Her victory in the time of battle gained for her purity, fortitude, and God’s abundant blessings, such that by simply reciting the Lord’s Prayer, she went into ecstasy. By her example, St. Catherine offers three helpful lessons for the tempted: (1) remember God’s presence, (2) live austerely, such as by fasting from excessive food, and finally, (3) blessings will come after the storm, so be patient.
ST. ALOYSIUS GONZAGA (1568–1591)
St. Aloysius was the eldest son of the Marquisate of Castiglione and heir apparent to great riches and power. At the age of seven, he fell sick with quartan ague (a type of malaria). His thoughts ran deep like a river, as he understood the vanity of worldly success. Thus, after regaining his health, he decided that he would devote his life to God. At the age of nine, he made a vow of virginity. What can such an innocent soul teach those who are more flammable?
In fact, St. Aloysius confessed that he had strong sexual desires as he matured. He may not have had modern-day seductions like the internet, yet he lived in a palace lurking with temptations. Knowing his weakness, he followed the example of the saints in subduing his passions. There are essentially three ways that he gained self-mastery.
1. Custody of the Eyes
Living amid many allurements caused St. Aloysius to take a radical step. He practiced the ancient discipline of custody of the eyes. He kept his eyes lowered in the company of females and controlled his curiosity. While this may appear overly prudent, his intention was pure. He took Jesus’ words to heart, “But I say to you, everyone who looks at a woman with lust, has already committed adultery with her in his heart!” (Matthew 5:19)
2. Prayer
One spark on dry grass can cause a wildfire. St. Aloysius understood the necessity to keep his soul moistened with the waters of divine grace. When the soul is bedewed with grace, sparks have little chance. By prayer, he obtained grace from God. He daily prayed the Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the seven Penitential Psalms. He rose at midnight and prayed on a stone floor, regardless of the weather. He took St. Paul’s advice to heart and filled his head with divine meditations: “Whatever is good, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely … think about these things!” (Philippians 4:8)
3. Austerity of Life
St. Aloysius took up a life of self-discipline from the age of thirteen. Rather than dine sumptuously with his family, he fasted three days a week on bread and water. Furthermore, he scourged himself with a dog leash until the blood flowed. Though harsh sounding, his discipline calmed and subdued his hot-blooded nature so that he could be in command of his passions.
ST. JOHN VIANNEY (1786-1859)
St. John Vianney lived in France in the early 19th century. He is so respected for his holy work as a priest that he is the patron saint of priests. And apparently he regularly did battle with the evil one. Similarly to St. Padre Pio, St. John Vianney could read souls and would spend hours in the confessional. He was bringing many souls back to God and obviously the Devil was not happy about this.
St. John Vianney would be tormented nightly with attacks from Satan and his demons. They would cause him to be exhausted throughout the day with the lack of sleep he was getting. Satan’s goal was to try to have St. John Vianney quit his ministry so he could no longer save people through the confessionals. One night, Satan was so desperate that he even caught St. John Vianney’s bed on fire!
Once, his sister spent the night at his home attached to his parish church. She was awakened by a strange rapping sound on her wall and table. She went to St. John Vianney, who was hearing confessions late at night, and he explained: “Oh, my child, you should not have been frightened: It is only the Grappin [“gripper” or “grabber”; his nickname for Satan]. He cannot hurt you. As for me, he torments me in sundry ways. At times he seizes me by the feet and drags me about the room. It is because I convert souls to the good God.”
In another instance, St. John Vianney was in his parish church hearing confessions when someone reported to him that his bedroom had caught on fire. His response? “The Grappin is very angry. He couldn’t catch the bird, so he has burned the cage. It is a good sign! We will have many sinners come to confession this day!”
The devil apparently felt threatened by this Saint of God so much, he exclaimed to St. John Vianney, “If there were three priests like you, my entire kingdom would be ruined!” It is unfortunate that St. John Vianney could not tri-locate because Satan would have then cried in fear!
“We must take great care never to do anything before having said our morning prayers … The Devil once declared that if he could have the first moment of the day, he was sure of all the rest.” –St. John Vianney
ST. PADRE PIO (1887-1968)
Born in the late 19th century, St. Padre Pio lived and died in Italy – but was known and revered throughout the world when he died in 1968. When a person thinks of St. Padre Pio, a lot of different attributes of him come to mind―the stigmata that he had; the various healing miracles he performed; the hours he spent in his confessionals; the fact St. Padre Pio could read your soul; but what most people fail to realize is that demons regularly and tirelessly attacked him. Even in his youth, St. Padre Pio would enjoy incredible celestial visions, but would also suffer demonic attacks.
Satan once appeared to him as a big Hellhound with a smoke filled mouth uttering the words: “It is him! It is him!” The reason for this is because the Evil One was so frustrated with how many souls he was losing to God through Padre Pio, especially in the confessionals. Satan was immensely desperate to stop Padre Pio that he appeared to the Saint in many frightening forms and even as apparitions of Jesus, Mary, and his guardian angel to try and trick him and give him false advice.
Satan would even sometimes attack St. Padre Pio physically. He describes this in one letter he wrote to a priest confidant: “These devils don’t stop striking me, even making me fall down from the bed. They even tear off my shirt to beat me! But now they do not frighten me anymore. Jesus loves me―He often lifts me up and places me back on the bed.”
Satan tried so hard but, in the end, he and his demons failed to have Padre Pio quit his ministry and were so frustrated they screamed: “Padre Pio, you give us more trouble than St. Michael!” This statement, coming from Satan none the less, means you are probably doing something right with your life. Padre Pio would say: “It does not bother me when Satan is active, what concerns me is when he is at peace!”
According to Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist in Rome, who would often visit Padre Pio, “Padre Pio’s real enemies were the demons who besieged him. […] The great and constant struggle of Padre Pio’s life was with those enemies of God and human souls, the devils who tried to capture his soul.”
Fr. Amorth explains: “The devil would appear to him as an ugly black cat, or in the shape of a truly repugnant animal. The obvious intent was to fill him with terror. Other times demons came as young girls, nude and provocative, performing obscene dances, to test the young priest’s chastity. But Padre Pio sensed his greatest danger when the devil tried to deceive him by taking on the form of one of his superiors (his provincial superior or his spiritual director) or in a sacred form (the Lord, the Virgin, or St. Francis).”
This last tactic – of the devil appearing as someone good and holy – was a particular problem. Fr. Amorth reveals how St. Padre Pio would discern a vision: “He noticed a certain timidity when the Virgin or the Lord first appeared, followed by a sense of peace when the vision departed. On the other hand, a devil in sacred form provoked an immediate feeling of joy and attraction, replaced afterwards by remorse and sadness.”
ST. GEMMA GALGANI (1878-1903)
St. Gemma Galgani was a late 19th century Italian mystic who had incredible spiritual experiences. Her spiritual director, Venerable Father Germanus Ruoppolo, C.P., recounts much of her experiences, trials, tribulations and temptations in his biography of Gemma, entitled The Life of St. Gemma Galgani, from which much was taken for what you will read below. by Venerable Father Germanus Ruoppolo, C.P.
God, in order to purify His elect and render them victims of expiation for themselves and for others, makes use even of the demons, who because of their hatred of souls and their increased intelligence become very profitable instruments to the attainment of His ends. “To keep me from being too elated by the abundance of revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, an Angel of Satan to beat me, to keep me from being too exalted!” (2 Corinthians 12:7). Thus our Lord, when He made known to our holy founder, St. Paul of the Cross (founder of the Passionists) that He willed to raise Him to a high degree of sanctity, spoke thus: “I will have thee trampled underfoot by the devils!” And, similarly, Jesus said to His servant, Gemma: “Be prepared My child. The devil, at my bidding, will be the one who, by the war he will rage against you, will give the last touch to the work that I will accomplish in you.”
In an early letter to Father Germanus Ruoppolo, Gemma writes: “During the last two days Jesus has been telling me after Holy Communion: ‘My daughter, the devil will soon wage a great war against you.’ These words I hear in my heart continuously. Please pray for me! .... Who will win this battle―the devil or my soul? How sad this thing makes me! Where will the war come from? I am for ever thinking about it, instead of praying Jesus to give me strength and help! Now I have told you, and I leave this matter to you, that you may help me!”
Gemma soon learned that the best way to defend herself against the demons and to reach God’s ends is through prayer, which she practiced with all the ardor of her soul. What then did not the enemy do to prevent it? To weary her he would try to upset her temperament; he caused her violent headaches so that she might be obliged to go to bed, rather than remain in prayer and strove in numerous other ways to distract her from this holy exercise. “Oh!” she once said to Father Germanus Ruoppolo, “What torment this gives me―not to be able to pray! What fatigue it costs me! How many efforts does not that wretch make to make it impossible for me to pray! Yesterday evening he tried to kill me, and would have succeeded if Jesus had not come quickly to my aid. I was terrified and kept the image of Jesus in my mind, but I could not pronounce His Name.”
At other times, he attacked her differently “What are you doing?” he said, blaspheming, “How stupid you are to pray to that Malefactor! [The devil is referring to Jesus]. Look at the harm He does to you, keeping you nailed to the Cross with Himself. How then can you care for Him―for Him whom you don’t even know, who makes all who love Him suffer?” But these and all his other evil suggestions were as dust before the wind, and only served to afflict her at hearing her Jesus outraged by such blasphemies.
In the midst of so much suffering, the servant of God found comfort in the direction and advice of her spiritual director, Father Germanus Ruoppolo. This the wicked enemy could not bear, and tried to turn her away from her spiritual guide. He depicted her spiritual director as an ignorant, fanatical, deluded man and with so many arguments strove to convince and terrify her that Gemma thought herself all but lost. Hence on one occasion she wrote “For some days, Chiappino (a name she called the devil, which means “burglar” or “hostile intruder”) has pursued me in every guise and way, and has done all in his power against me. This monster keeps on redoubling all his efforts to ruin me and tries to deprive me of whomever directs or advises me. But even should this happen, I am not afraid!”
Seeing that with all his efforts he could not succeed in shaking her confidence in her spiritual director, he resorted to acts of violence, and, assaulting her while she persevered in writing, he snatched the pen from her hand and tore up the paper then dragged her from the table, seizing her by the hair with such violence that some of it was torn off in his brutal claws. Then withdrawing in fury he shouted: “War! War against thy Father (her spiritual director)! War as long as he lives!” “Believe me Father” she said to me “to hear this despicable wretch one would say that his fury was against you more than against me!”
He carried this audacity so far as to feign to be Father Germanus Ruoppolo, to whom Gemma used to make her confession. She had gone one day to Church, and while preparing herself to make her confession, she saw that the priest was already in the confessional, at which she momentarily wondered, not having seen him pass and enter. At the same time she felt very much disturbed in spirit, as generally happened when in the presence of the evil one. She entered the confessional however, and began her confession as usual. The voice and ways were indeed those of the confessor, but his talk was foul and scandalous, accompanied by improper gestures. “My God!” she exclaimed, “What has happened?” At such a sight and at such words the angelic child trembled, and her presence of mind returning, she hurriedly left the confessional, and saw as she did so that the pretended “confessor” had disappeared. It was the devil, who by his coarse and fiendish ways had sought to deceive her, or at least make her lose all confidence in the minister of God.
Failing in this attempt, the enemy made another. He appeared to Gemma in the form of an angel, resplendent with light, insinuating himself with the most subtle cunning, so as to throw her off her guard. Then as with Eve in the Garden of Eden, he depicted things in the falsest colors “Look!” he said, “I can make you happy if only you will swear to obey me!” Gemma, who this time did not feel in her soul the usual disturbance indicating the presence of the demon, stood listening in her simplicity. But God came to her aid. After the first wicked proposal, her eyes were opened. She stood up exclaiming: “My God! Mary Immaculate! Make me die rather than this!” and with these words she rushed to the feigned “angel” and spat in his face. At the same moment she saw him vanish in the form of fire.
She quickly realized that prayer was the best defense. In response, Satan gave her violent headaches in order to make sleeping difficult for her. Her fatigue then made sleeping more difficult ― but she persevered: “How many efforts does not that wretch make to make it impossible for me to pray! Yesterday evening he tried to kill me, and would have succeeded if Jesus had not come quickly to my aid. I was terrified and kept the image of Jesus in my mind!”
She describes another attack in one of her writings: “Once more I have passed a bad night. The demon came before me as a giant of great height and kept saying to me: ‘For you there is no more hope of salvation. You are in my hands!’ I replied that God is merciful and therefore I fear nothing. Then, giving me a hard blow on the head in a rage he shouted: ‘May you be accursed!’ and then he disappeared. I then went to my room to rest, and there I found him again. He began again to strike me with a knotted rope, and wanted me to listen to him while he suggested wickedness. I said no, and he struck me even harder, knocking my head violently against the ground. At a certain point, it came to my mind to invoke Jesus’ Father. I cried: ‘Eternal Father, through the most precious Blood of Jesus, free me!’ I don’t quite know what happened then. That contemptible beast dragged me from my bed and threw me, hitting my head against the floor with such force that it pains me still. I became senseless and remained lying there until I came to myself a long time afterwards. Jesus be thanked!”
Another time Gemma writes: “Today I thought I was to be entirely free from that nauseous animal, and instead he has knocked me about greatly. I had gone to bed with the full intention of sleeping, but it turned out otherwise. He began to beat me with such blows that I feared I would die. He was in the shape of a big black dog, and he put his paws on my shoulders, hurting me greatly. I felt it so much in all my bones that I thought that they were broken. Also, when I was taking holy water, he wrenched my arm so violently that I fell to the floor from the pain. The bone was dislocated, but went back into place because Jesus touched it for me, and all was remedied!” Knowing her mission as soul victim, the devil once said to her: “You can pray for yourself, but if you pray for others, I will make you pay dearly for it!”
In her Diary Gemma writes: “The devil, in the form of a great black dog, put his paws upon my shoulders, making every bone in my body ache. At times I believed that he would mangle me; then one time, when I was taking holy water, he twisted my arm so cruelly that I fell to the earth in great pain. After a while I remembered that I had around my neck the relic of the Holy Cross. Making the Sign of the Cross, I became calm. Jesus let me see Himself, but only for a short time, and He strengthened me anew to suffer and struggle.”
Another time in her Diary she writes: “This evening I felt I could not collect myself; I said a few evening prayers and went to bed. To tell the truth, I foresaw a bit of a storm because Jesus had warned me a few days ago, saying: ‘The enemy will try you with one final battle, but it will be the last one, because now that is enough!’ I could not help but thank Him for the strength He had always given me, and I prayed that He would want to give me strength for this final test as well, that is to say last night. I went to bed, as you know well, with the intention of sleeping; slumber was not long in coming when almost instantly a tiny, tiny man appeared, all covered in black hair. What a fright! He put his hands on my bed and I thought he wanted to hit me: ‘No, no,’ he said, ‘I am not able to hit you, don’t be afraid!’ and as he said this he lay down on the bed. I called Jesus to help me, but He did not come, but this doesn’t mean He abandoned me. As soon as I called His Name I felt liberated, but it was sudden. Other times I had called Jesus, but He had never been ready like last night.
“You should have seen the demon afterward, how angry he was! He rolled around on the floor, cursing! He made one last effort to take away the cross that I had with me, but then he instantly fell backward. How good Jesus was with me last night. The devil, after that last effort, turned toward me and said that since he had not been able to do anything, he wished to torment me the rest of the night. ‘No,’ I told him and I called my guardian Angel, who opened his wings and alighted next to me. He then blessed me and the devil ran away. Jesus be thanked! This morning I learned that at the very moment the devil was rising in fury, the Scapular of Our Lady of Sorrows had been placed on me [by Cecilia Giannini] and I realized that when the devil was trying to take something off of me, it could be nothing but that. My Mother, Our Lady of Sorrows, also be thanked!”
Again, in her Diary she writes: “It happened today as usual. I had gone to bed, in fact I was asleep, but the devil did not wish this. He presented himself in a disgusting manner; he tempted me but I was strong. I commended myself to Jesus asking that He take my life rather than have me offend Him. What horrible temptations those were! All of them displease me, but those against holy purity make me most wretched. Afterwards he left me in peace and my Guardian Angel came and assured me that I had not done anything wrong. I complained somewhat, because I wished his help at such times, and he said that whether I saw him or not, he would be always above my head.”
In his biography on Saint Gemma, Father Germanus Ruoppolo writes: “With a view to protect her from these Satanic attacks and apparitions, I enjoined on her, under whatever form the persons of the other world might appear to her, to at once repeat the words: ‘Viva Gesu!’ (‘Long live Jesus!’). I was unaware that Our Lord Himself had given her a similar remedy in the words: ‘Benedetto sio Dio e Maria!’ (‘Blessed be God and Mary!’) And the docile child, in order to obey both, used to repeat the double exclamation: ‘Viva Gesu! Benedetto sio Dio e Maria!’ (‘Blessed be Jesus! Blessed be God and Mary!’) The good spirits always repeated her words, whereas the malignant ones either did not reply, or else pronounced only a few words, such as ‘Viva’ or ‘Benedetto’, without adding any name. By this means Gemma recognized them and scorned them accordingly.”
Regarding the attacks from the devil, at times she would find comfort in her sense of humor. She once wrote to Father Germanus Ruoppolo stating: “If you would have seen him, Father, when he fled making faces, you would have burst out laughing! He is so ugly! .... But Jesus told me not to be afraid of him.”
Certainly Satan must have growled with rage at the zeal of this holy girl, finding how she snatched his choicest victims from him. He often appeared to her with eyes of fire and in threatening tones said: “While acting for yourself, do as you please, but listen well, do nothing for the conversion of sinners! If you attempt it, I shall make you pay dearly for it!”
At other times deceitfully assuming the role of a prudent counselor he would say: “How and where comes such presumption? You are laden with sins, and all the years of thy life would not suffice to bewail and expiate them, and yet you lose time about the sins of others? Do you not see that your own soul is in danger? A strange gain, that of thinking for others and neglecting thyself!” And on another occasion the infernal demon said: “Don’t you see that Jesus no longer hears you and that He will no longer have anything to do with you?” But through the grace of God, and the will of Gemma, all the devils temptations were made in vain.
Article 20
Friday & Saturday after the 1st Sunday of Lent, March 14th & 15th
Temptations of the Saints and How They Overcame Them
PART ONE
Friday & Saturday after the 1st Sunday of Lent, March 14th & 15th
Temptations of the Saints and How They Overcame Them
PART ONE
Tribulation and Temptation ― Salvation and Damnation
As we encounter the Ember Saturday of Lent, with the following day being the Second Sunday of Lent, we see something unusual in the Church’s liturgical readings! For these consecutive days―Saturday and Sunday―the Church presents us with the same event. That event is the Transfiguration of Our Lord on Mount Tabor―as reported in the Gospel of St. Matthew (17:1-9), in which we read: “At that time, Jesus took Peter, James and his brother John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves, and was transfigured before them. And His face shone as the sun, and His garments became white as snow.”
This transfiguration of Our Lord should provoke thoughts about our own ‘transfiguration’ or transformation from the sinners that we are, into saints that we should be! Being transformed from the blackness of sin to the white of sanctity. Holy Scripture alludes to this in various other passages apart from the Transfiguration of Our Lord: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). “At all times let thy garments be white!” (Ecclesiastes 9:8). “Many shall be chosen and made white!” (Daniel 12:10). “They shall walk with Me in white, because they are worthy!” (Apocalypse 3:4). “He that shall overcome, shall be clothed in white garments” (Apocalypse 3:5). Let us then look at the lives of some saints and see how they overcome sinfulness and temptations in order to make their souls “white as snow.”
All the saints have passed through many tribulations and temptations, and have profited by them. We might not naturally link tribulations together with temptations―we most likely only link pleasure with temptation―but tribulations can be the cause of temptations to the negative side of things, such as anger, cowardice, capitulation, despondency, discouragement and even despair. The saints have had their fair share of both temptations based on pleasure and temptations based on tribulations. The difficulties, pain and heat of temptations make whatever is inside a person, come to the surface. They say that under stress, the true face of a person emerges. The tests of tribulation and temptation reveal a person as he or she really is. St. Augustine said that the very same crosses lead some persons to Heaven and other persons to Hell―we could likewise say that the very same tribulations and temptations also lead some souls to Heaven and other souls to Hell. The difference being, of course, how each person handles and deals with the tribulation or temptation. The saints give us much inspiration and advice on how to handle tribulation and temptation. Let us then look at the lives of some of those saints who were sorely tried and tested by tribulations and temptations.
We will look at the temptations experienced and endured by St. Paul, St. Augustine, St. Anthony of Egypt, St. Mary of Egypt, St. Moses the Black Ethiopian, St. Benedict, St. Bernard, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Francis of Assisi, St. Angela of Foligno, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Margaret of Cortona, St. John Vianney, Saint John the Long-Suffering, St. Gemma Galgani, St. Joseph of Cupertino, St. Aloysius Gonzaga, St. Damien of Molokai, Venerable Matt Talbot, St. Padre Pio, and more.
SAINT PAUL OF TARSUS (4 BC to around 64 to 68 AD)
St. Paul―originally named Saul―was a Jewish Pharisee who persecuted early Christians, and then experienced a dramatic conversion on the road to Damascus, encountering Jesus, Who said to him: “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?” (Acts of Apostles 9:4). After being chastised with blindness for three days, Jesus changed his life and led him to become a key figure in the spread of Christianity. He then began to preach about Jesus, and his Hebrew name, Saul, was replaced with his Roman name, Paul.
Great sinners should become the great―in order to make up for the harm they have to done to God and fellow men. That is exactly what the great sinner Saul did―Our Lord said of him: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:16). St. Paul, after his conversion, lists some of those great tribulations (which will have been accompanied by different kinds of temptations) when he writes his epistle to the Corinthians:
“They are Hebrews―so am I. They are Israelites―so am I. They are the seed of Abraham―so am I. They are the ministers of Christ (I speak as one less wise) ―I am more! In many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often; from the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, less one! Thrice was I beaten with rods; once I was stoned; thrice I suffered shipwreck; a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often; in perils of waters; in perils of robbers; in perils from my own nation; in perils from the Gentiles; in perils in the city; in perils in the wilderness; in perils in the sea; in perils from false brethren! In labor and painfulness, in much watchings; in hunger and thirst; in fastings often; in cold and nakedness!” (2 Corinthians 11:22-27). “We would not have you ignorant, brethren, of our tribulation, which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure above our strength, so that we were weary even of life! But we had in ourselves the answer of death, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead; Who has delivered and does deliver us out of so great dangers―in whom we trust that he will yet also deliver us!” (2 Corinthians 1:8-10).
The Debts of Paul
Through his many grievous sins in persecuting Christians, St. Paul had contracted a very large debt with God―therefore it was only fair and just that Paul be made to repay that great debt by undergoing many tribulations and temptations. His list of sufferings (above) shows something of the payment plan that God had arranged for him in order to be transformed from a sinner into a saint―for only saints go to Heaven. Rather than rebel against God’s payment plan, Paul humbly accepts the terms. In his epistles he writes:
“I am the least of the Apostles, who am not worthy to be called an Apostle, because I persecuted the church of God!” (1 Corinthians 15:9). “For you have heard how that, beyond measure, I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it!” (Galatians 1:13). “But, by the grace of God, I am what I am; and His grace in me has not been void!” (1 Corinthians 15:10). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 2:19). “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14) … “In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed! We are straitened, but are not destitute! We suffer persecution, but are not forsaken! We are cast down, but we perish not! … We faint not! … For that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, works for us an eternal glory!” (2 Corinthians 4:8-9). “We glory in tribulations!” (Romans 5:3). “I rejoice in my sufferings!” (Colossians 1:24). “Furthermore I count all things to be but a loss for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord―for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ!” (Philippians 3:8). “For Christ, it is given unto you, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for Him―having the same conflict as that which you have seen in me, and now have heard of me!” (Philippians 1:29-30).
“And lest the greatness of the revelations should exalt me, there was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me! For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me―and He said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee! For power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly, therefore, will I glory in my infirmities, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me! For which reason I please myself in my infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ. For when I am weak, then am I powerful!” (2 Corinthians 12:7-10).
Just Imagine!
Can you imagine the incredible number of temptations that St. Paul must have been assaulted with by the devils! Temptations to pride and arrogance due to the revelations and graces granted to him and through him―or temptations to discouragement, despondency or even despair! Just think about it―Paul could be killed any day in living out the choice he had made to follow Christ. He was going to a city, and he thought: “Now what will they do to me in this city? Will they beat me with rods? Will they stone me? Will they put me in jail? Will they lacerate my back again?” Remember―in the above list of sufferings that the Paul gave in 2 Corinthians 11―what he said about his beatings and his 39 lashes? He said he was beaten with rods three times, lashed by the Jews five times with 40-less-one lashes (2 Corinthians 11:24–25).
Has that ever sunk into you? Has it ever hit you what that means? You take long strips of leather, sometimes they have shells or bone attached to them, sometimes not. There’s a man who’s especially good at this so that it snaps. Do you know why flags pop when they unfurl? It’s because they are breaking the speed of sound. The tip of a whip can move at speeds exceeding the speed of sound (around 768 mph), creating a sonic boom known as a whip-crack. If you can get a whip to pop exactly right, it’s moving at over 700 miles an hour when it hits the skin. If that hits your back 39 times, especially if shells or bones are attached to the whip, then your back is like jelly when you’re done! Then they throw you on the ground and dirt gets into the cuts and you get infected and you have a fever. And it takes months to heal. And then it happens a second time, maybe a year later. Paul didn’t tell us. And again it takes months to heal. And then it happened a third time and it took months to heal. And it happened a fourth time on the same back. Now, wouldn’t you, if you were following Jesus in obedience, say to Him at that point: “Is this the way you treat your servants? I don’t understand. This is the only back I’ve got. There’s not anything left back there to be torn off!” And then it happens again. Imagine the many different kinds of temptations that would run through your mind!
St. Paul Accepts Providence's Painful Path
St. Paul accepted everything that Divine Providence threw at him―as Jesus had said: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:16) ― not only for the Name of Jesus, but also for his own sins. For St. Paul writes: “Christ Jesus came into this world to save sinners, of whom I am the chief!” (1 Timothy 1:15) … “I am the least of the Apostles, who am not worthy to be called an Apostle, because I persecuted the church of God!” (1 Corinthians 15:9). St. Paul knew that the road to Heaven, from the pit of sin into which he had fallen, was to be a road of suffering, the way of the cross, but a road with glorious destination―eternal joy in Heaven. “If we suffer with Him, it is that we may be also glorified with Him!” (Romans 8:17). “If we suffer, we shall also reign with him!” (2 Timothy 2:12). “If we be dead with Him, we shall live also with Him!” (2 Timothy 2:11). “If we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection! … If we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall live also together with Christ!” (Romans 6:5-8). “Through many tribulations we must enter into the kingdom of God!” (Acts 14:21).
Such are the thoughts that should guide us through our own tribulations and temptations! We should remind ourselves that there is no other path that leads to Heaven. Furthermore, we are all sinners ― “Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). Through our sins we contract a debt to Almighty God that has to be paid―either here on Earth, or in Purgatory, or in Hell. Paying now, here on Earth, sees a massive discount. Paying in Purgatory or in Hell incurs massive interest rates! Remember that sin is the greatest evil on Earth―and you want to pay for it by merely saying three Hail Marys? “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Of course, perfect charity and perfect contrition are capable of removing not only the guilt of sin, but also the debt of punishment due to sin―but are you really capable of perfect charity and perfect contrition? Sure―you can say the words that might indicate perfect contrition, but are those words coming from your heart or your lips? As Jesus said: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). If perfect contrition is so easy―then why are most souls in Hell (as Our Lord, Our Lady and the saints tell us); and why do most souls, of the few number that are saved, have to pass through Purgatory before entering Heaven (as St. Padre Pio tells us)? It seems like they are not hitting the heights of perfect contrition that is required for a full pardon of the debt of punishment that is owed in justice! Our Lord’s words concerning St. Paul are equally applicable to us: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:16). As regards us, Jesus puts the same message in another way: “And He [Jesus] said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). There is no crossless Christ and there is no painless path ― especially for sinful souls! Comfortable, carefree, cozy Catholicism has fatal side-effects! Yet that is the cozy temptation that has ensnared millions of souls today―a toothless Catholicism that has lost its bite; an armchair Catholicism that just talks the talk, but rarely walks the walk!
SAINT AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO (354–430)
The young Augustine gives an example of unrestrained passion. He gave into one temptation after another. Because Augustine excelled in his studies in his hometown, his proud father decided to send him to the thriving nearby city of Carthage to continue his education, once he could find someone to pay for it. This took several months, and Augustine’s idleness during that time only led him into greater mischief. His father died that year, but a wealthy citizen of Tagaste offered to sponsor Augustine’s education. By the time he arrived in Carthage, he was ripe for a life of sin. Many of the other students lived immorally, the theaters stirred up his passions, and he became intoxicated by his literary successes.
“I went to Carthage,” he says, “where I found myself in the midst of a hissing cauldron of lust.” He discovered plenty of fuel for his fire of lust in Carthage. Unfortunately, after plunging into it recklessly, he soon found himself “a slave to lust.” This had the effect of clouding his mind and bringing him down the cliff: “The mists of passion steamed up out of the bubbling concupiscence of the flesh, and the hot imagination of puberty, so clouded over and obscured my heart that I was unable to distinguish the pure light of true love from the murk of lust. Both boiled confusedly within me, and dragged my unstable youth down over the cliffs of unchaste desires and plunged me into a gulf of infamy.” His brilliant mind became so fogged that the murk of lust was indistinguishable from the pure light of love. Shortly after his arrival in Carthage, he moved in with a young woman and fathered a child out of wedlock. Augustine lived in sin with this same woman for fifteen years.
Searching
One day while studying philosophy in Carthage, he came upon this passage in Cicero’s writings: “If man has a soul, as the greatest philosophers maintain, and if that soul is immortal and divine, then it must necessarily be that the more it has been steeped in reason, and true love, and the pursuit of truth, and the less it has been stained by vice and passion, so much the more surely it will rise above this Earth and ascend into the Heavens.”
These words struck deeply into Augustine’s soul. On the one hand, he understood that the soul is capable of taking flight through noble aspirations; on the other hand, he realized that his sex addiction kept him chained like an animal. How could he free his soul? He sought for an answer in various sects, which led him eventually to become a Manichean. This group appealed to Augustine because they claimed to have a solution for all problems without requiring strict self-denial among the so-called Hearers. They believed that since an evil body imprisoned a person’s soul, the passions were impossible to control. In Augustine’s mind, this gave him the green light to live licentiously. He remained with the sect for nine years, but it ultimately left him frustrated. He could not harmonize the yearning for flight with unrestrained lust. Where was he to turn now?
An Armor of Light
“Make me chaste O God, but not yet!” So goes Augustine’s lamentable prayer. Having the heart of an eagle, but chained to the ground, he finally implored Heaven’s help. At the height of the crisis, a dramatic change occurred. One day, he heard about two men who had suddenly been converted on reading the life of St. Anthony of the Desert, and he felt terribly ashamed of himself. “What are we doing?” he cried to his friend Alipius, “Unlearned people are taking Heaven by force, while we, with all our knowledge, are so cowardly that we keep rolling around in the mud of our sins!” Full of bitter sorrow, Augustine flung himself out into the garden and cried out to God, “How much longer, O Lord? Why does not this hour put an end to my sins?” Just then he heard a child singing, “Take up and read!” Thinking that God intended him to hear those words, he picked up the book of the Letters of St. Paul, opened the Scriptures at random and read the first passage his gaze fell on. It was just what Augustine needed, for in it, St. Paul says to put away all impurity and to live in imitation of Jesus. He and read these words, “The night is far spent, the day draws near! So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light! Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in licentiousness and lust, not in quarreling and jealousy! Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its lusts!” (Romans 13:13-14). Just as the words of Cicero had struck him deep within, so the words St. Paul finally set him free.
Freedom to Fly
Did Augustine’s conversion end all of his struggles? While this remains unknown, he did progress very rapidly in the way of virtue and prayer. Two practices helped to keep his soul aloft. In the first place, he recognized that “laziness is the devil’s workshop,” and so kept himself busy. Notwithstanding his episcopal duties, a cascade of books, homilies, and letters flowed out of his study. This was not a novel way to conquer the passions. St. Jerome, St. Augustine’s contemporary, followed a similar course. He dived into learning Hebrew precisely because his “mind was burning with desire and the fires of lust.” Engaging the mind and keeping busy is an effective means to snuff out the first sparks of lust. St. Augustine would later write: “There is no remedy so powerful against the heat of concupiscence as the remembrance of our Savior’s Passion. In all my difficulties I never found anything so efficacious as the wounds of Christ: In them I sleep secure; from them I derive new life!”
Secondly, Augustine transformed unruly passion into a holy passion through prayer. Like a sprightly stallion, his nature was unquestionably passionate; when he held the reins, he galloped toward the Heavens: “Late have I loved you, O Beauty ever ancient, ever new! Late have I loved you! You were within me, but I was outside, and it was there that I searched for you! In my unloveliness, I plunged into the lovely things which you created. You were with me, but I was not with you! ... You called, you shouted, and you broke through my deafness! You flashed, you shone, and you dispelled my blindness! You breathed your fragrance on me; I drew in breath and now I pant for you. I have tasted you, now I hunger and thirst for more. You touched me, and I burned for your peace.”
SAINT MARY OF EGYPT (344-421)
The primary source of information on Saint Mary of Egypt is the Vita written of her by Sophronius, Patriarch of Jerusalem (634–638). St. Mary of Egypt (344-421) lived around the same time as St. Augustine (354-430).
Sexual Addiction
Mary, the child of an Egyptian Christian family, was only 12-years-old when she ran away from home to live in Alexandria―which at that time was the most exciting city in the Roman Empire. One of the greatest, most populous of the cities of Rome’s eastern empire, Alexandria also offered something Mary longed for―sexual adventure. She gave up her virginity soon after she arrived in the great city, and began a 17-year-long career of unbridled promiscuity. She became an accomplished seductress, who took special pleasure in corrupting innocent young men. Contrary to what some biographies of St. Mary of Egypt say, she was not strictly speaking a prostitute―for she did not charge money for her services, but enjoyed the challenge of seducing young men. As she told her biographer, Fr. Zosimas of Palestine, she did “free of charge what gave me pleasure.” She often refused the money offered for her sexual favors, as she was driven by an insatiable and an irrepressible passion. She was enthralled with sexual adventure and was led by her passions. Mary later confessed: “There is no mentionable or unmentionable depravity of which I was not their teacher.”
Sexual Seduction of Pilgrims
One day she saw a crowd of men waiting to board a ship in the harbor. A bystander told her the men were pilgrims about to sail for the Holy Land, for the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. Felling compelled to tag along with a group of pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem, together with the appealing thought of seducing the crew and passengers, Mary, on a whim, joined the pilgrimage to the Holy Land―intending to seduce as many as possible during the voyage. She paid for her passage by offering sexual favors to other pilgrims and crew members. By the time the ship reached its destination, Mary―as she later revealed―had seduced the entire crew and all of the pilgrims.
Restrained by God
In Jerusalem, Mary joined a crowd heading to the Church of Holy Sepulcher. But as the throng entered the church, Mary felt an invisible force keeping her out and preventing her from entering into the church of the Holy Sepulcher. All at once, by the invisible grace of God, it occurred to Mary that the powers of Heaven were keeping her away from the tomb of Christ.
Repentance
It was this miraculous event that caused her to realize her sins and become sorry for her sinful sexual lifestyle. As the full realization of everything she had done broke upon her, she was filled with shame and self-loathing―again, by the grace of God. Through her tears she saw an icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary above the entrance of the church. “Help me,” she prayed to the Mother of God, “for I have no other help!” Her prayer was answered. The force that had barred her way into the church, now released her. She tried to gain entrance to the Church again, and was now able to enter. Inside the church, she prayed for forgiveness in front of a statue of the Blessed Mother and promised to give up her sinful lifestyle. Mary realized the enormity of her sins, repented of her sins.
Life of Penitence as a Desert Hermit
After venerating the relic of the True Cross, she returned to the icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary, above the entrance of the church, to give thanks, and heard a voice telling her: “If you cross the River Jordan, you will find glorious rest!” She immediately went to the monastery of Saint John the Baptist on the banks of the River Jordan, where she received absolution and afterwards Holy Communion. The next morning, she crossed the Jordan eastwards and retired to the desert to live the rest of her life as a hermit in penitence. She took with her only three loaves of bread she had bought, and once she had eaten these, lived only on what she could find in the wilderness. There she spent the rest of her life as a hermit in the desert―fasting, praying and living alone for 47 years, while continually fighting temptations to turn back to her depravity until God granted her peace of soul. For many years she endured powerful temptations to return to her old life.
Death in the Desert
Approximately one year before her death, she recounted her life to the priest, Zosimas of Palestine, who encountered her in the desert. When he unexpectedly met her in the desert, she was completely naked and almost unrecognizable as human. She asked Zosimas to toss her his mantle to cover herself with, and then she narrated her life's story to him. She asked him to meet her at the banks of the Jordan on Holy Thursday of the following year, and to bring her Holy Communion. When he fulfilled her wish, she crossed the river to get to him by walking on the water, and received Holy Communion, telling him to meet her again in the desert the following Lent.
The next year, Zosimas went to the same spot where he first met her, a journey of around twenty days from his monastery. There, he found her lying dead. An inscription written in the sand next to her head, stated that she had died the very night he had given her Communion, her incorrupt body miraculously transported to that spot. He buried her body with the assistance of a passing lion. On returning to his monastery, he related her life story to the other brethren, and it was preserved among them as oral tradition until it was written down by Sophronius.
SAINT MOSES THE ETHIOPIAN, also known as SAINT MOSES THE BLACK (330-405)
St. Moses (330-405) also lived around the same time as St. Mary of Egypt (344-421) and St. Augustine (354-430).
Gang Leader
Moses was a slave of a government official in Egypt until he was dismissed for theft and suspected murder. Moses soon found himself involved with a gang of robbers. Moses was a man of huge physical stature, strength and courage, and eventually became leader of this gang of 75 robbers that became a social menace and living terror to the communities where they roamed. Moses was a lustful, vengeful, and violent man. Moses and his brigands became the terror of the Egyptian desert, raiding villages and robbing and killing travelers who made the mistake of trying to cross the gang’s territory. The governor of the province sent out troops to wipe out Moses and his men, but the bandits drove off every squad sent against them. The day came at last when the governor sent a force strong enough to destroy the brigands. Faced with such a large body of troops, the robbers scattered.
Monastic Hideout
Moses traveled alone through the desert until he reached the monastery of Petra in Skete―one of Egypt’s most renowned monastic communities. Moses thought that this would be the perfect hideout. He would hole up with the monks until the situation settled down, then go back and round up whatever remained of his band. One look at this crude giant of man and the monks must have known he was not the garden-variety pilgrim. Nevertheless, they gave Moses a cell, fed him, treated him kindly, and asked him no questions. The dedication of their lives, as well as their peace and contentment, influenced Moses deeply.
A Time of Change
As time passed, however, something unexpected began to happen to Moses. The monks’ goodness transformed him. He no longer wanted to return to his life as a robber and murderer; he wanted to start a new life at Petra. It wasn’t easy. Moses found abstaining from wine hard, and chastity proved especially difficult. The temptations he felt were so strong he almost abandoned the life of a monk. Guided by the abbot, St. Isidore, Moses learned to overcome his sinful impulses.
Conversion
Eventually, Moses not only converted to the Christian Faith, but, through dedication and effort, he was to become a leader in his monastic community. He went from a life of violence and crime, to a life of making peace―not only for himself, but for others as he encouraged them to imitate him in his peace-making activities.
We might imagine that he had great will-power, making the conversion process easy, as if he just stopped doing what he did and found it easy to engage monastic discipline. Nonetheless, the reality was much different. Initially, he found it very difficult. Moses had a rather difficult time adjusting to regular monastic discipline. He struggled greatly with himself and his desires. It took several years for him to find the peace which he wanted. Indeed, he almost gave up, as Palladius was told when he met with Moses: “Then demons attacked this Moses, trying to draw him back into his old ways of intemperance and impurity. He was tempted to such an extent, so he told us, that he nearly failed in his resolution.”
His flair for adventure remained with him. Attacked in his desert cell by four of the robbers of his former band, Moses fought back, overpowered the intruders. Mose had lost none of his great physical strength, and so he tied them all up and dragged them to the monastery chapel, where the other monks were at prayer. Moses asked the Elders what to do with them―saying that he did not think it was Christian to hurt the robbers. The Elders ordered that they be set free. The robbers, learning that they had chanced upon their former ringleader, and that he had dealt kindly with them, followed his example―they repented, joined the community and later became monks. When the rest of the band of robbers heard about the repentance of St. Moses, then they also gave up their thievery and became fervent monks.
Moses was zealous in all he did, but became discouraged when he concluded he was not perfect enough. Feeling overcome by despair and once again tempted by his former passions, early one morning, St. Isidore, abbot of the monastery, took Moses to the roof. Together they watched the first rays of dawn come over the horizon, and Isidore said to Moses, “See how long it takes for the light to drive away the darkness of night? It is the same with the soul! Only slowly do the rays of the sun drive away the night and usher in a new day, and thus, only slowly does one become a perfect contemplative!”
Not a Quitter in Temptation
Great saints, like Moses the Ethiopian, were great―not because they faced no temptations, not because they never gave in to temptation when faced with it, nor because they never did any great wrongs in their lives, but because, once converted to the Faith, they never quit trying to do what was right. Saints really are like all of us. They were sinners who needed God’s grace. Some, at least in one point of their life, were great sinners. Moses himself would be the first to have said that was true to him.
We can only imagine the kind of life Moses had while he was a brigand. We can imagine the harm he had done to others. We can imagine the selfishness and the pursuit of pleasure which he was focused on during those years. Nonetheless, when great sinners see through their sins and repent, they receive great mercy and grace from God. In return, they often felt even greater love, greater devotion to God than those who did not have such sins in their life. Moses was to become a man of great love because he knew what he had done. He also grew in love and devotion to God throughout his life as he saw God continuously at work with him, helping him whenever he needed such help.
When he struggled with inordinate desires, with passions which he had developed from the time when he was on the run, God was at work with him, giving him even more grace than before; he did not realize this at first, which is why, when he thought his passions were getting the best of him, his reaction was to embrace stricter forms of ascetic behavior, hoping that by doing so he could repay God for the grace which he had already received. He went back then, and from that hour he practiced asceticism more zealously, and especially in regard to food. He partook nothing but dry bread, meanwhile carrying a full burden and saying fifty prayers daily. He mortified his poor body, but continued to be consumed by fire and troubled by dreams.
Mortifying himself, as a desert monk, did not solve his problem. For years, he tried to save himself by engaging stricter forms of monastic discipline. None of them could override his base desires. Finally, after many years of questioning himself and what he was doing, God’s grace suddenly took it all away. His struggles were ended. His bad habits were broken. The imprint they left on his mind was overridden. The struggles he faced did not cure him of his passions, but without those struggles, he would not have looked for such a cure and so would not have received it either. He had to fight the spiritual battle for himself, to confront his inner demons, to realize their strengths and weaknesses, to show that he wanted to be set free. And then, when the time was right, Moses found the grace given to him was able to coordinate and work with his efforts to fight against his own base desires and be victorious. It was not the struggle which set him free, but he would not have been set free without them either.
Lessons Learned
Thanks to his experiences, thanks to the struggles he had to go through in order to find peace with God and with himself, Moses would be able to understand the plights of others; he showed compassion and mercy to others because it was what he had received and set him free. He knew if others had not been there for him first, if he had not found a holy man of God willing to teach him and guide him in the faith, he would have perished a criminal. Thus, he knew others could not succeed, could not find the peace they need, if all they received was condemnation. He taught mercy and forgiveness. He was unwilling to judge others for their faults so long as he knew they were honestly struggling to do what was good. He knew that he deserved condemnation for all he had done, not just before his conversion to the Christian faith, but also after, and so he thought he had no businesses judging others.
When a brother committed a fault and Moses was invited to a meeting to discuss an appropriate penance, Moses refused to attend. When he was again called to the meeting, Moses took a leaking jug filled with water and carried it on his shoulder. Another version of the story has him carrying a basket filled with sand. When he arrived at the meeting place, the others asked why he was carrying the jug. He replied: “My sins run out behind me and I do not see them, but today I am coming to judge the errors of another!” On hearing this, the assembled brothers forgave the erring monk.
From Robber to Deacon to Priest to Saint
After many years of monastic exploits, St. Moses was ordained deacon. The bishop clothed him in white vestments and said: “Now Abba Moses is entirely white!” The saint replied: “Only outwardly―for God knows that I am still black within!” Through humility, the saint believed himself unworthy of the office of deacon. Once, the bishop decided to test him and he bade the clergy to drive him out of the altar, reviling him as an unworthy Ethiopian. In all humility, the monk accepted the abuse. Having put him to the test, the bishop then ordained St. Moses to be presbyter. St. Moses labored for fifteen years in this rank, and gathered around himself 75 disciples.
Moses Pays for His Past Life
When the saint reached age 75, Moses went with some elders to visit St. Macarius the Great, who said to them: “I see among you one to whom belongs the crown of martyrdom.” St. Moses answered him: “Probably it is me―for it is written: ‘For all they that take with the sword, shall perish with the sword!’ (Matthew 26:52).” After they returned to the monastery, Moses warned his monks that soon brigands (the Berbers) would descend upon the Skete and murder all that were there. It did not take long until the Berbers attacked the monastery. The saint blessed his monks and told them to leave, in order to avoid violent death: “Whoever wants to escape, let him escape!” His disciples began to beseech Moses to leave with them. They asked him: “And you, O father, why do you not also escape?” He replied that he had waited for this day for long time: “For many years already I have awaited the time when the words which my Master, the Lord Jesus Christ, should be fulfilled: ‘All who take up the sword, shall perish by the sword!’ (Matthew 26:52)” ― Moses was here implying that he deserved to die by the sword because he himself, in his sinful years, had also killed others by the sword. After this, seven of the monks remained with Moses, and one of them hid nearby during the attack of the robbers. The robbers killed St. Moses and the six monks who remained with him. Their death occurred in about the year 400 to 405.
Moses’ reform held true to the very end. He became well-loved because he loved much. He went from a life of violence to a life of non-violence. Even though he had overcome his base passions, that is, he had held them in check, they still tested him throughout his life. His final temptation was had at the time of his death. When his monastery was under attack by Berbers, instead of fleeing, he, and seven other companion stayed at the monastery. They were there, not to defend the monastery from attack, but rather to serve as witnesses of God’s mercy and compassion, even to those who would attack them in the place of their spiritual refuge. Moses felt it was the price he had to pay for the life he used to live. Jesus once said that those who lived by the sword shall die by the sword and Moses thought, because he had lived a life of violence before becoming a Christian, he should not flee from the sword when it was brought against him. He wanted to show how much he had changed. Though he was killed, he would also live on, glorified in Christ.
Moses fascinates us because of the great changes which took place in his life. But we must not forget those changes took time, and he had many great struggles in his life, struggles which almost led him to despair and give up. We, too, often feel the same in our lives. We struggle, often feeling things are not getting better. What is important is that we honestly struggle. When the time is right, the struggle will resolve itself. Then, we will realize what Moses also realized, that the struggle was important, for there is no holiness without temptation and no salvation without such struggle. Like Moses, our struggles help shape us and guide us. We must be patient with ourselves and not give up. Once we truly understand this, we will be patient, not only with ourselves, but with others, and then we will see the true fruit of our struggles being revealed.
As we encounter the Ember Saturday of Lent, with the following day being the Second Sunday of Lent, we see something unusual in the Church’s liturgical readings! For these consecutive days―Saturday and Sunday―the Church presents us with the same event. That event is the Transfiguration of Our Lord on Mount Tabor―as reported in the Gospel of St. Matthew (17:1-9), in which we read: “At that time, Jesus took Peter, James and his brother John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves, and was transfigured before them. And His face shone as the sun, and His garments became white as snow.”
This transfiguration of Our Lord should provoke thoughts about our own ‘transfiguration’ or transformation from the sinners that we are, into saints that we should be! Being transformed from the blackness of sin to the white of sanctity. Holy Scripture alludes to this in various other passages apart from the Transfiguration of Our Lord: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). “At all times let thy garments be white!” (Ecclesiastes 9:8). “Many shall be chosen and made white!” (Daniel 12:10). “They shall walk with Me in white, because they are worthy!” (Apocalypse 3:4). “He that shall overcome, shall be clothed in white garments” (Apocalypse 3:5). Let us then look at the lives of some saints and see how they overcome sinfulness and temptations in order to make their souls “white as snow.”
All the saints have passed through many tribulations and temptations, and have profited by them. We might not naturally link tribulations together with temptations―we most likely only link pleasure with temptation―but tribulations can be the cause of temptations to the negative side of things, such as anger, cowardice, capitulation, despondency, discouragement and even despair. The saints have had their fair share of both temptations based on pleasure and temptations based on tribulations. The difficulties, pain and heat of temptations make whatever is inside a person, come to the surface. They say that under stress, the true face of a person emerges. The tests of tribulation and temptation reveal a person as he or she really is. St. Augustine said that the very same crosses lead some persons to Heaven and other persons to Hell―we could likewise say that the very same tribulations and temptations also lead some souls to Heaven and other souls to Hell. The difference being, of course, how each person handles and deals with the tribulation or temptation. The saints give us much inspiration and advice on how to handle tribulation and temptation. Let us then look at the lives of some of those saints who were sorely tried and tested by tribulations and temptations.
We will look at the temptations experienced and endured by St. Paul, St. Augustine, St. Anthony of Egypt, St. Mary of Egypt, St. Moses the Black Ethiopian, St. Benedict, St. Bernard, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Francis of Assisi, St. Angela of Foligno, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Margaret of Cortona, St. John Vianney, Saint John the Long-Suffering, St. Gemma Galgani, St. Joseph of Cupertino, St. Aloysius Gonzaga, St. Damien of Molokai, Venerable Matt Talbot, St. Padre Pio, and more.
SAINT PAUL OF TARSUS (4 BC to around 64 to 68 AD)
St. Paul―originally named Saul―was a Jewish Pharisee who persecuted early Christians, and then experienced a dramatic conversion on the road to Damascus, encountering Jesus, Who said to him: “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?” (Acts of Apostles 9:4). After being chastised with blindness for three days, Jesus changed his life and led him to become a key figure in the spread of Christianity. He then began to preach about Jesus, and his Hebrew name, Saul, was replaced with his Roman name, Paul.
Great sinners should become the great―in order to make up for the harm they have to done to God and fellow men. That is exactly what the great sinner Saul did―Our Lord said of him: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:16). St. Paul, after his conversion, lists some of those great tribulations (which will have been accompanied by different kinds of temptations) when he writes his epistle to the Corinthians:
“They are Hebrews―so am I. They are Israelites―so am I. They are the seed of Abraham―so am I. They are the ministers of Christ (I speak as one less wise) ―I am more! In many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often; from the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, less one! Thrice was I beaten with rods; once I was stoned; thrice I suffered shipwreck; a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often; in perils of waters; in perils of robbers; in perils from my own nation; in perils from the Gentiles; in perils in the city; in perils in the wilderness; in perils in the sea; in perils from false brethren! In labor and painfulness, in much watchings; in hunger and thirst; in fastings often; in cold and nakedness!” (2 Corinthians 11:22-27). “We would not have you ignorant, brethren, of our tribulation, which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure above our strength, so that we were weary even of life! But we had in ourselves the answer of death, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead; Who has delivered and does deliver us out of so great dangers―in whom we trust that he will yet also deliver us!” (2 Corinthians 1:8-10).
The Debts of Paul
Through his many grievous sins in persecuting Christians, St. Paul had contracted a very large debt with God―therefore it was only fair and just that Paul be made to repay that great debt by undergoing many tribulations and temptations. His list of sufferings (above) shows something of the payment plan that God had arranged for him in order to be transformed from a sinner into a saint―for only saints go to Heaven. Rather than rebel against God’s payment plan, Paul humbly accepts the terms. In his epistles he writes:
“I am the least of the Apostles, who am not worthy to be called an Apostle, because I persecuted the church of God!” (1 Corinthians 15:9). “For you have heard how that, beyond measure, I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it!” (Galatians 1:13). “But, by the grace of God, I am what I am; and His grace in me has not been void!” (1 Corinthians 15:10). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 2:19). “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14) … “In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed! We are straitened, but are not destitute! We suffer persecution, but are not forsaken! We are cast down, but we perish not! … We faint not! … For that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, works for us an eternal glory!” (2 Corinthians 4:8-9). “We glory in tribulations!” (Romans 5:3). “I rejoice in my sufferings!” (Colossians 1:24). “Furthermore I count all things to be but a loss for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord―for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ!” (Philippians 3:8). “For Christ, it is given unto you, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for Him―having the same conflict as that which you have seen in me, and now have heard of me!” (Philippians 1:29-30).
“And lest the greatness of the revelations should exalt me, there was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me! For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me―and He said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee! For power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly, therefore, will I glory in my infirmities, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me! For which reason I please myself in my infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ. For when I am weak, then am I powerful!” (2 Corinthians 12:7-10).
Just Imagine!
Can you imagine the incredible number of temptations that St. Paul must have been assaulted with by the devils! Temptations to pride and arrogance due to the revelations and graces granted to him and through him―or temptations to discouragement, despondency or even despair! Just think about it―Paul could be killed any day in living out the choice he had made to follow Christ. He was going to a city, and he thought: “Now what will they do to me in this city? Will they beat me with rods? Will they stone me? Will they put me in jail? Will they lacerate my back again?” Remember―in the above list of sufferings that the Paul gave in 2 Corinthians 11―what he said about his beatings and his 39 lashes? He said he was beaten with rods three times, lashed by the Jews five times with 40-less-one lashes (2 Corinthians 11:24–25).
Has that ever sunk into you? Has it ever hit you what that means? You take long strips of leather, sometimes they have shells or bone attached to them, sometimes not. There’s a man who’s especially good at this so that it snaps. Do you know why flags pop when they unfurl? It’s because they are breaking the speed of sound. The tip of a whip can move at speeds exceeding the speed of sound (around 768 mph), creating a sonic boom known as a whip-crack. If you can get a whip to pop exactly right, it’s moving at over 700 miles an hour when it hits the skin. If that hits your back 39 times, especially if shells or bones are attached to the whip, then your back is like jelly when you’re done! Then they throw you on the ground and dirt gets into the cuts and you get infected and you have a fever. And it takes months to heal. And then it happens a second time, maybe a year later. Paul didn’t tell us. And again it takes months to heal. And then it happened a third time and it took months to heal. And it happened a fourth time on the same back. Now, wouldn’t you, if you were following Jesus in obedience, say to Him at that point: “Is this the way you treat your servants? I don’t understand. This is the only back I’ve got. There’s not anything left back there to be torn off!” And then it happens again. Imagine the many different kinds of temptations that would run through your mind!
St. Paul Accepts Providence's Painful Path
St. Paul accepted everything that Divine Providence threw at him―as Jesus had said: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:16) ― not only for the Name of Jesus, but also for his own sins. For St. Paul writes: “Christ Jesus came into this world to save sinners, of whom I am the chief!” (1 Timothy 1:15) … “I am the least of the Apostles, who am not worthy to be called an Apostle, because I persecuted the church of God!” (1 Corinthians 15:9). St. Paul knew that the road to Heaven, from the pit of sin into which he had fallen, was to be a road of suffering, the way of the cross, but a road with glorious destination―eternal joy in Heaven. “If we suffer with Him, it is that we may be also glorified with Him!” (Romans 8:17). “If we suffer, we shall also reign with him!” (2 Timothy 2:12). “If we be dead with Him, we shall live also with Him!” (2 Timothy 2:11). “If we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection! … If we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall live also together with Christ!” (Romans 6:5-8). “Through many tribulations we must enter into the kingdom of God!” (Acts 14:21).
Such are the thoughts that should guide us through our own tribulations and temptations! We should remind ourselves that there is no other path that leads to Heaven. Furthermore, we are all sinners ― “Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). Through our sins we contract a debt to Almighty God that has to be paid―either here on Earth, or in Purgatory, or in Hell. Paying now, here on Earth, sees a massive discount. Paying in Purgatory or in Hell incurs massive interest rates! Remember that sin is the greatest evil on Earth―and you want to pay for it by merely saying three Hail Marys? “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Of course, perfect charity and perfect contrition are capable of removing not only the guilt of sin, but also the debt of punishment due to sin―but are you really capable of perfect charity and perfect contrition? Sure―you can say the words that might indicate perfect contrition, but are those words coming from your heart or your lips? As Jesus said: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). If perfect contrition is so easy―then why are most souls in Hell (as Our Lord, Our Lady and the saints tell us); and why do most souls, of the few number that are saved, have to pass through Purgatory before entering Heaven (as St. Padre Pio tells us)? It seems like they are not hitting the heights of perfect contrition that is required for a full pardon of the debt of punishment that is owed in justice! Our Lord’s words concerning St. Paul are equally applicable to us: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:16). As regards us, Jesus puts the same message in another way: “And He [Jesus] said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). There is no crossless Christ and there is no painless path ― especially for sinful souls! Comfortable, carefree, cozy Catholicism has fatal side-effects! Yet that is the cozy temptation that has ensnared millions of souls today―a toothless Catholicism that has lost its bite; an armchair Catholicism that just talks the talk, but rarely walks the walk!
SAINT AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO (354–430)
The young Augustine gives an example of unrestrained passion. He gave into one temptation after another. Because Augustine excelled in his studies in his hometown, his proud father decided to send him to the thriving nearby city of Carthage to continue his education, once he could find someone to pay for it. This took several months, and Augustine’s idleness during that time only led him into greater mischief. His father died that year, but a wealthy citizen of Tagaste offered to sponsor Augustine’s education. By the time he arrived in Carthage, he was ripe for a life of sin. Many of the other students lived immorally, the theaters stirred up his passions, and he became intoxicated by his literary successes.
“I went to Carthage,” he says, “where I found myself in the midst of a hissing cauldron of lust.” He discovered plenty of fuel for his fire of lust in Carthage. Unfortunately, after plunging into it recklessly, he soon found himself “a slave to lust.” This had the effect of clouding his mind and bringing him down the cliff: “The mists of passion steamed up out of the bubbling concupiscence of the flesh, and the hot imagination of puberty, so clouded over and obscured my heart that I was unable to distinguish the pure light of true love from the murk of lust. Both boiled confusedly within me, and dragged my unstable youth down over the cliffs of unchaste desires and plunged me into a gulf of infamy.” His brilliant mind became so fogged that the murk of lust was indistinguishable from the pure light of love. Shortly after his arrival in Carthage, he moved in with a young woman and fathered a child out of wedlock. Augustine lived in sin with this same woman for fifteen years.
Searching
One day while studying philosophy in Carthage, he came upon this passage in Cicero’s writings: “If man has a soul, as the greatest philosophers maintain, and if that soul is immortal and divine, then it must necessarily be that the more it has been steeped in reason, and true love, and the pursuit of truth, and the less it has been stained by vice and passion, so much the more surely it will rise above this Earth and ascend into the Heavens.”
These words struck deeply into Augustine’s soul. On the one hand, he understood that the soul is capable of taking flight through noble aspirations; on the other hand, he realized that his sex addiction kept him chained like an animal. How could he free his soul? He sought for an answer in various sects, which led him eventually to become a Manichean. This group appealed to Augustine because they claimed to have a solution for all problems without requiring strict self-denial among the so-called Hearers. They believed that since an evil body imprisoned a person’s soul, the passions were impossible to control. In Augustine’s mind, this gave him the green light to live licentiously. He remained with the sect for nine years, but it ultimately left him frustrated. He could not harmonize the yearning for flight with unrestrained lust. Where was he to turn now?
An Armor of Light
“Make me chaste O God, but not yet!” So goes Augustine’s lamentable prayer. Having the heart of an eagle, but chained to the ground, he finally implored Heaven’s help. At the height of the crisis, a dramatic change occurred. One day, he heard about two men who had suddenly been converted on reading the life of St. Anthony of the Desert, and he felt terribly ashamed of himself. “What are we doing?” he cried to his friend Alipius, “Unlearned people are taking Heaven by force, while we, with all our knowledge, are so cowardly that we keep rolling around in the mud of our sins!” Full of bitter sorrow, Augustine flung himself out into the garden and cried out to God, “How much longer, O Lord? Why does not this hour put an end to my sins?” Just then he heard a child singing, “Take up and read!” Thinking that God intended him to hear those words, he picked up the book of the Letters of St. Paul, opened the Scriptures at random and read the first passage his gaze fell on. It was just what Augustine needed, for in it, St. Paul says to put away all impurity and to live in imitation of Jesus. He and read these words, “The night is far spent, the day draws near! So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light! Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in licentiousness and lust, not in quarreling and jealousy! Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its lusts!” (Romans 13:13-14). Just as the words of Cicero had struck him deep within, so the words St. Paul finally set him free.
Freedom to Fly
Did Augustine’s conversion end all of his struggles? While this remains unknown, he did progress very rapidly in the way of virtue and prayer. Two practices helped to keep his soul aloft. In the first place, he recognized that “laziness is the devil’s workshop,” and so kept himself busy. Notwithstanding his episcopal duties, a cascade of books, homilies, and letters flowed out of his study. This was not a novel way to conquer the passions. St. Jerome, St. Augustine’s contemporary, followed a similar course. He dived into learning Hebrew precisely because his “mind was burning with desire and the fires of lust.” Engaging the mind and keeping busy is an effective means to snuff out the first sparks of lust. St. Augustine would later write: “There is no remedy so powerful against the heat of concupiscence as the remembrance of our Savior’s Passion. In all my difficulties I never found anything so efficacious as the wounds of Christ: In them I sleep secure; from them I derive new life!”
Secondly, Augustine transformed unruly passion into a holy passion through prayer. Like a sprightly stallion, his nature was unquestionably passionate; when he held the reins, he galloped toward the Heavens: “Late have I loved you, O Beauty ever ancient, ever new! Late have I loved you! You were within me, but I was outside, and it was there that I searched for you! In my unloveliness, I plunged into the lovely things which you created. You were with me, but I was not with you! ... You called, you shouted, and you broke through my deafness! You flashed, you shone, and you dispelled my blindness! You breathed your fragrance on me; I drew in breath and now I pant for you. I have tasted you, now I hunger and thirst for more. You touched me, and I burned for your peace.”
SAINT MARY OF EGYPT (344-421)
The primary source of information on Saint Mary of Egypt is the Vita written of her by Sophronius, Patriarch of Jerusalem (634–638). St. Mary of Egypt (344-421) lived around the same time as St. Augustine (354-430).
Sexual Addiction
Mary, the child of an Egyptian Christian family, was only 12-years-old when she ran away from home to live in Alexandria―which at that time was the most exciting city in the Roman Empire. One of the greatest, most populous of the cities of Rome’s eastern empire, Alexandria also offered something Mary longed for―sexual adventure. She gave up her virginity soon after she arrived in the great city, and began a 17-year-long career of unbridled promiscuity. She became an accomplished seductress, who took special pleasure in corrupting innocent young men. Contrary to what some biographies of St. Mary of Egypt say, she was not strictly speaking a prostitute―for she did not charge money for her services, but enjoyed the challenge of seducing young men. As she told her biographer, Fr. Zosimas of Palestine, she did “free of charge what gave me pleasure.” She often refused the money offered for her sexual favors, as she was driven by an insatiable and an irrepressible passion. She was enthralled with sexual adventure and was led by her passions. Mary later confessed: “There is no mentionable or unmentionable depravity of which I was not their teacher.”
Sexual Seduction of Pilgrims
One day she saw a crowd of men waiting to board a ship in the harbor. A bystander told her the men were pilgrims about to sail for the Holy Land, for the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. Felling compelled to tag along with a group of pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem, together with the appealing thought of seducing the crew and passengers, Mary, on a whim, joined the pilgrimage to the Holy Land―intending to seduce as many as possible during the voyage. She paid for her passage by offering sexual favors to other pilgrims and crew members. By the time the ship reached its destination, Mary―as she later revealed―had seduced the entire crew and all of the pilgrims.
Restrained by God
In Jerusalem, Mary joined a crowd heading to the Church of Holy Sepulcher. But as the throng entered the church, Mary felt an invisible force keeping her out and preventing her from entering into the church of the Holy Sepulcher. All at once, by the invisible grace of God, it occurred to Mary that the powers of Heaven were keeping her away from the tomb of Christ.
Repentance
It was this miraculous event that caused her to realize her sins and become sorry for her sinful sexual lifestyle. As the full realization of everything she had done broke upon her, she was filled with shame and self-loathing―again, by the grace of God. Through her tears she saw an icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary above the entrance of the church. “Help me,” she prayed to the Mother of God, “for I have no other help!” Her prayer was answered. The force that had barred her way into the church, now released her. She tried to gain entrance to the Church again, and was now able to enter. Inside the church, she prayed for forgiveness in front of a statue of the Blessed Mother and promised to give up her sinful lifestyle. Mary realized the enormity of her sins, repented of her sins.
Life of Penitence as a Desert Hermit
After venerating the relic of the True Cross, she returned to the icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary, above the entrance of the church, to give thanks, and heard a voice telling her: “If you cross the River Jordan, you will find glorious rest!” She immediately went to the monastery of Saint John the Baptist on the banks of the River Jordan, where she received absolution and afterwards Holy Communion. The next morning, she crossed the Jordan eastwards and retired to the desert to live the rest of her life as a hermit in penitence. She took with her only three loaves of bread she had bought, and once she had eaten these, lived only on what she could find in the wilderness. There she spent the rest of her life as a hermit in the desert―fasting, praying and living alone for 47 years, while continually fighting temptations to turn back to her depravity until God granted her peace of soul. For many years she endured powerful temptations to return to her old life.
Death in the Desert
Approximately one year before her death, she recounted her life to the priest, Zosimas of Palestine, who encountered her in the desert. When he unexpectedly met her in the desert, she was completely naked and almost unrecognizable as human. She asked Zosimas to toss her his mantle to cover herself with, and then she narrated her life's story to him. She asked him to meet her at the banks of the Jordan on Holy Thursday of the following year, and to bring her Holy Communion. When he fulfilled her wish, she crossed the river to get to him by walking on the water, and received Holy Communion, telling him to meet her again in the desert the following Lent.
The next year, Zosimas went to the same spot where he first met her, a journey of around twenty days from his monastery. There, he found her lying dead. An inscription written in the sand next to her head, stated that she had died the very night he had given her Communion, her incorrupt body miraculously transported to that spot. He buried her body with the assistance of a passing lion. On returning to his monastery, he related her life story to the other brethren, and it was preserved among them as oral tradition until it was written down by Sophronius.
SAINT MOSES THE ETHIOPIAN, also known as SAINT MOSES THE BLACK (330-405)
St. Moses (330-405) also lived around the same time as St. Mary of Egypt (344-421) and St. Augustine (354-430).
Gang Leader
Moses was a slave of a government official in Egypt until he was dismissed for theft and suspected murder. Moses soon found himself involved with a gang of robbers. Moses was a man of huge physical stature, strength and courage, and eventually became leader of this gang of 75 robbers that became a social menace and living terror to the communities where they roamed. Moses was a lustful, vengeful, and violent man. Moses and his brigands became the terror of the Egyptian desert, raiding villages and robbing and killing travelers who made the mistake of trying to cross the gang’s territory. The governor of the province sent out troops to wipe out Moses and his men, but the bandits drove off every squad sent against them. The day came at last when the governor sent a force strong enough to destroy the brigands. Faced with such a large body of troops, the robbers scattered.
Monastic Hideout
Moses traveled alone through the desert until he reached the monastery of Petra in Skete―one of Egypt’s most renowned monastic communities. Moses thought that this would be the perfect hideout. He would hole up with the monks until the situation settled down, then go back and round up whatever remained of his band. One look at this crude giant of man and the monks must have known he was not the garden-variety pilgrim. Nevertheless, they gave Moses a cell, fed him, treated him kindly, and asked him no questions. The dedication of their lives, as well as their peace and contentment, influenced Moses deeply.
A Time of Change
As time passed, however, something unexpected began to happen to Moses. The monks’ goodness transformed him. He no longer wanted to return to his life as a robber and murderer; he wanted to start a new life at Petra. It wasn’t easy. Moses found abstaining from wine hard, and chastity proved especially difficult. The temptations he felt were so strong he almost abandoned the life of a monk. Guided by the abbot, St. Isidore, Moses learned to overcome his sinful impulses.
Conversion
Eventually, Moses not only converted to the Christian Faith, but, through dedication and effort, he was to become a leader in his monastic community. He went from a life of violence and crime, to a life of making peace―not only for himself, but for others as he encouraged them to imitate him in his peace-making activities.
We might imagine that he had great will-power, making the conversion process easy, as if he just stopped doing what he did and found it easy to engage monastic discipline. Nonetheless, the reality was much different. Initially, he found it very difficult. Moses had a rather difficult time adjusting to regular monastic discipline. He struggled greatly with himself and his desires. It took several years for him to find the peace which he wanted. Indeed, he almost gave up, as Palladius was told when he met with Moses: “Then demons attacked this Moses, trying to draw him back into his old ways of intemperance and impurity. He was tempted to such an extent, so he told us, that he nearly failed in his resolution.”
His flair for adventure remained with him. Attacked in his desert cell by four of the robbers of his former band, Moses fought back, overpowered the intruders. Mose had lost none of his great physical strength, and so he tied them all up and dragged them to the monastery chapel, where the other monks were at prayer. Moses asked the Elders what to do with them―saying that he did not think it was Christian to hurt the robbers. The Elders ordered that they be set free. The robbers, learning that they had chanced upon their former ringleader, and that he had dealt kindly with them, followed his example―they repented, joined the community and later became monks. When the rest of the band of robbers heard about the repentance of St. Moses, then they also gave up their thievery and became fervent monks.
Moses was zealous in all he did, but became discouraged when he concluded he was not perfect enough. Feeling overcome by despair and once again tempted by his former passions, early one morning, St. Isidore, abbot of the monastery, took Moses to the roof. Together they watched the first rays of dawn come over the horizon, and Isidore said to Moses, “See how long it takes for the light to drive away the darkness of night? It is the same with the soul! Only slowly do the rays of the sun drive away the night and usher in a new day, and thus, only slowly does one become a perfect contemplative!”
Not a Quitter in Temptation
Great saints, like Moses the Ethiopian, were great―not because they faced no temptations, not because they never gave in to temptation when faced with it, nor because they never did any great wrongs in their lives, but because, once converted to the Faith, they never quit trying to do what was right. Saints really are like all of us. They were sinners who needed God’s grace. Some, at least in one point of their life, were great sinners. Moses himself would be the first to have said that was true to him.
We can only imagine the kind of life Moses had while he was a brigand. We can imagine the harm he had done to others. We can imagine the selfishness and the pursuit of pleasure which he was focused on during those years. Nonetheless, when great sinners see through their sins and repent, they receive great mercy and grace from God. In return, they often felt even greater love, greater devotion to God than those who did not have such sins in their life. Moses was to become a man of great love because he knew what he had done. He also grew in love and devotion to God throughout his life as he saw God continuously at work with him, helping him whenever he needed such help.
When he struggled with inordinate desires, with passions which he had developed from the time when he was on the run, God was at work with him, giving him even more grace than before; he did not realize this at first, which is why, when he thought his passions were getting the best of him, his reaction was to embrace stricter forms of ascetic behavior, hoping that by doing so he could repay God for the grace which he had already received. He went back then, and from that hour he practiced asceticism more zealously, and especially in regard to food. He partook nothing but dry bread, meanwhile carrying a full burden and saying fifty prayers daily. He mortified his poor body, but continued to be consumed by fire and troubled by dreams.
Mortifying himself, as a desert monk, did not solve his problem. For years, he tried to save himself by engaging stricter forms of monastic discipline. None of them could override his base desires. Finally, after many years of questioning himself and what he was doing, God’s grace suddenly took it all away. His struggles were ended. His bad habits were broken. The imprint they left on his mind was overridden. The struggles he faced did not cure him of his passions, but without those struggles, he would not have looked for such a cure and so would not have received it either. He had to fight the spiritual battle for himself, to confront his inner demons, to realize their strengths and weaknesses, to show that he wanted to be set free. And then, when the time was right, Moses found the grace given to him was able to coordinate and work with his efforts to fight against his own base desires and be victorious. It was not the struggle which set him free, but he would not have been set free without them either.
Lessons Learned
Thanks to his experiences, thanks to the struggles he had to go through in order to find peace with God and with himself, Moses would be able to understand the plights of others; he showed compassion and mercy to others because it was what he had received and set him free. He knew if others had not been there for him first, if he had not found a holy man of God willing to teach him and guide him in the faith, he would have perished a criminal. Thus, he knew others could not succeed, could not find the peace they need, if all they received was condemnation. He taught mercy and forgiveness. He was unwilling to judge others for their faults so long as he knew they were honestly struggling to do what was good. He knew that he deserved condemnation for all he had done, not just before his conversion to the Christian faith, but also after, and so he thought he had no businesses judging others.
When a brother committed a fault and Moses was invited to a meeting to discuss an appropriate penance, Moses refused to attend. When he was again called to the meeting, Moses took a leaking jug filled with water and carried it on his shoulder. Another version of the story has him carrying a basket filled with sand. When he arrived at the meeting place, the others asked why he was carrying the jug. He replied: “My sins run out behind me and I do not see them, but today I am coming to judge the errors of another!” On hearing this, the assembled brothers forgave the erring monk.
From Robber to Deacon to Priest to Saint
After many years of monastic exploits, St. Moses was ordained deacon. The bishop clothed him in white vestments and said: “Now Abba Moses is entirely white!” The saint replied: “Only outwardly―for God knows that I am still black within!” Through humility, the saint believed himself unworthy of the office of deacon. Once, the bishop decided to test him and he bade the clergy to drive him out of the altar, reviling him as an unworthy Ethiopian. In all humility, the monk accepted the abuse. Having put him to the test, the bishop then ordained St. Moses to be presbyter. St. Moses labored for fifteen years in this rank, and gathered around himself 75 disciples.
Moses Pays for His Past Life
When the saint reached age 75, Moses went with some elders to visit St. Macarius the Great, who said to them: “I see among you one to whom belongs the crown of martyrdom.” St. Moses answered him: “Probably it is me―for it is written: ‘For all they that take with the sword, shall perish with the sword!’ (Matthew 26:52).” After they returned to the monastery, Moses warned his monks that soon brigands (the Berbers) would descend upon the Skete and murder all that were there. It did not take long until the Berbers attacked the monastery. The saint blessed his monks and told them to leave, in order to avoid violent death: “Whoever wants to escape, let him escape!” His disciples began to beseech Moses to leave with them. They asked him: “And you, O father, why do you not also escape?” He replied that he had waited for this day for long time: “For many years already I have awaited the time when the words which my Master, the Lord Jesus Christ, should be fulfilled: ‘All who take up the sword, shall perish by the sword!’ (Matthew 26:52)” ― Moses was here implying that he deserved to die by the sword because he himself, in his sinful years, had also killed others by the sword. After this, seven of the monks remained with Moses, and one of them hid nearby during the attack of the robbers. The robbers killed St. Moses and the six monks who remained with him. Their death occurred in about the year 400 to 405.
Moses’ reform held true to the very end. He became well-loved because he loved much. He went from a life of violence to a life of non-violence. Even though he had overcome his base passions, that is, he had held them in check, they still tested him throughout his life. His final temptation was had at the time of his death. When his monastery was under attack by Berbers, instead of fleeing, he, and seven other companion stayed at the monastery. They were there, not to defend the monastery from attack, but rather to serve as witnesses of God’s mercy and compassion, even to those who would attack them in the place of their spiritual refuge. Moses felt it was the price he had to pay for the life he used to live. Jesus once said that those who lived by the sword shall die by the sword and Moses thought, because he had lived a life of violence before becoming a Christian, he should not flee from the sword when it was brought against him. He wanted to show how much he had changed. Though he was killed, he would also live on, glorified in Christ.
Moses fascinates us because of the great changes which took place in his life. But we must not forget those changes took time, and he had many great struggles in his life, struggles which almost led him to despair and give up. We, too, often feel the same in our lives. We struggle, often feeling things are not getting better. What is important is that we honestly struggle. When the time is right, the struggle will resolve itself. Then, we will realize what Moses also realized, that the struggle was important, for there is no holiness without temptation and no salvation without such struggle. Like Moses, our struggles help shape us and guide us. We must be patient with ourselves and not give up. Once we truly understand this, we will be patient, not only with ourselves, but with others, and then we will see the true fruit of our struggles being revealed.
Article 19
Wednesday & Thursday after the 1st Sunday of Lent, March 12th & 13th
Temptation Leads to Heaven!
Wednesday & Thursday after the 1st Sunday of Lent, March 12th & 13th
Temptation Leads to Heaven!
The School and Test of Temptation
There can be no salvation and no entry to Heaven without passing through temptation. Our Lord was tempted. Our Lady was tempted. We must be tempted. Temptation there must be--“Son, when thou comest to the service of God, stand in justice and in fear, and prepare thy soul for temptation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove thee” (Tobias 12:13).
The Imitation of Christ gives us a lengthy lesson on dealing with temptation: “As long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and temptation. Whence it is written in Job: ‘The life of man upon Earth is a warfare.’ Everyone, therefore, must guard against temptation and must watch in prayer lest the devil, who never sleeps, but goes about seeking whom he may devour, find occasion to deceive him. No one is so perfect or so holy, but he is sometimes tempted; man cannot be altogether free from temptation.
“Yet temptations, though troublesome and severe, are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many temptations and trials to profit by them, while those who could not resist became reprobate and fell away. There is no state so holy, no place so secret, that temptations and trials will not come. Man is never safe from them as long as he lives, for they come from within us — in sin we were born. When one temptation or trial passes, another comes; we shall always have something to suffer because we have lost the state of original blessedness.
“Many people try to escape temptations, only to fall more deeply. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but by patience and true humility we become stronger than all our enemies. The man who only shuns temptations outwardly and does not uproot them will make little progress; indeed they will quickly return, more violent than before. Little by little, in patience and long-suffering you will overcome them, by the help of God rather than by severity and your own rash ways. Often take counsel when tempted; and do not be harsh with others who are tempted, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled.
“The beginning of all temptation lies in a wavering mind and little trust in God, for as a rudderless ship is driven hither and yon by waves, so a careless and irresolute man is tempted in many ways. Fire tempers iron and temptation steels the just. Often we do not know what we can stand, but temptation shows us what we are. Above all, we must be especially alert against the beginnings of temptation, for the enemy is more easily conquered if he is refused admittance to the mind and is met beyond the threshold when he knocks.
“Someone has said very aptly: “Resist the beginnings; remedies come too late, when by long delay the evil has gained strength.” First, a mere thought comes to mind, then strong imagination, followed by pleasure, evil delight, and consent. Thus, because he is not resisted in the beginning, Satan gains full entry. And the longer a man delays in resisting, so much the weaker does he become each day, while the strength of the enemy grows against him.
“Some suffer great temptations in the beginning of their conversion, others toward the end, while some are troubled almost constantly throughout their life. Others, again, are tempted but lightly according to the wisdom and justice of Divine Providence Who weighs the status and merit of each and prepares all for the salvation of His elect.
“We should not despair, therefore, when we are tempted, but pray to God the more fervently that He may see fit to help us, for according to the word of Paul, He will make issue with temptation that we may be able to bear it. Let us humble our souls under the hand of God in every trial and temptation for He will save and exalt the humble in spirit.
“In temptations and trials the progress of a man is measured; in them opportunity for merit and virtue is made more manifest. When a man is not troubled it is not hard for him to be fervent and devout, but if he bears up patiently in time of adversity, there is hope for great progress. Some, guarded against great temptations, are frequently overcome by small ones in order that, humbled by their weakness in small trials, they may not presume on their own strength in great ones” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1; ch. 13).
“An unmortified man is quickly tempted and overcome in small, trifling evils; his spirit is weak, in a measure carnal and inclined to sensual things; he can hardly abstain from earthly desires. Hence it makes him sad to forego them; he is quick to anger if reproved. Yet if he satisfies his desires, remorse of conscience overwhelms him because he followed his passions and they did not lead to the peace he sought. True peace of heart, then, is found in resisting passions, not in satisfying them. There is no peace in the carnal man, in the man given to vain attractions, but there is peace in the fervent and spiritual man” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1; ch. 6).
“If you do not overcome small, trifling things, how will you overcome the more difficult? Resist temptations in the beginning, and unlearn the evil habit lest perhaps, little by little, it lead to a more evil one” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1; ch. 11).
No Temptations—No Chance of Heaven
“If you have no temptations,” St. Gregory tells us, “it is because the devils are your friends, your leaders, and your shepherds. And by allowing you to pass your poor life tranquilly, to the end of your days, they will drag you down into the depths.” St. John Vianney explains: “If Our Lord was tempted, it was in order to show us that we must be also tempted. It follows, therefore, that we must expect temptation” (St. John Vianney).
In the spiritual life, there are difficulties and there are also dangers: occasions of sin and obstacles to good. Job said that human life is temptation. History also shows that any civilization, whenever it gave into the temptation of sinking itself into the arms of comfort, softness and ease, finally ended up collapsing. Man needs a certain dose of a ‘Spartan’ existence in order to maintain an upright and solid backbone to his spiritual, material, physical existence. The devil is behind many temptations and spiritual diseases, but, ultimately, it is our cooperation with the devil’s temptations and lack of cooperation with God’s suggestions, that makes us sin or become lukewarm. So let us be perfectly honest and admit our lukewarmness. If you go to a doctor, but will admit to no illness and say nothing of your symptoms, or perhaps lie about them—then don’t expect to be given the correct remedy or even any remedy.
Temptations Are the Raw Material of Glory
Fr. Faber tells us that “Temptations are the raw material of glory.” That is why St. James says: “My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations!” (James 1:2), to which St. Peter will add: “You shall greatly rejoice, if now you must be for a little time made sorrowful in divers temptations: so that the trial of your faith—much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire—may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:6-7). While the Imitation of Christ chimes in, saying: “Yet temptations, though troublesome and severe, are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed.” (Book 1, chapter 13).
Same Temptation—Different Destination
St. Augustine tells us that the same crosses lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. Likewise, the same temptations will lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. It depends upon whether the temptation is powerfully rejected or gladly accepted.
Temptations Are Necessary
That classic book, The Imitation of Christ, tells us that “It is good for us to have trials and troubles at times, for they often remind us that we are on probation and ought not to hope in any worldly thing. It is good for us sometimes to suffer contradiction, to be misjudged by men even though we do well and mean well. These things help us to be humble and shield us from vainglory. When to all outward appearances men give us no credit, when they do not think well of us, then we are more inclined to seek God, Who sees our hearts.
"Therefore, a man ought to root himself so firmly in God that he will not need the consolations of men. When a man of good will is afflicted, tempted, and tormented by evil thoughts, he realizes clearly that his greatest need is God, without Whom he can do no good. Saddened by his miseries and sufferings, he laments and prays. He wearies of living longer and wishes for death that he might be dissolved and be with Christ. Then he understands fully that perfect security and complete peace cannot be found on earth” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 12).
“Many people try to escape temptations, only to fall more deeply. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but by patience and true humility we become stronger than all our enemies. The man who only shuns temptations outwardly and does not uproot them will make little progress; indeed they will quickly return, more violent than before” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 13).
Why Are We Tempted?
“Temptation” comes from the Latin verb “tentare”, which means “to try” or “to test”. Who can get to Heaven without a test? Nobody! Who can graduate without passing exams? Nobody! Thus, temptation is a heavenly test, whereby souls are tried in order that the quality of their love for God and their devotion to Him may become known and proved. Probation is a time of testing and proof. A person is put on probation during which time he or she has to prove their worth or integrity. The word “probation” finds it root in the Latin verb “probare” which means “to examine, to test, to try or to prove.”
Prove What?
The outcome of our being tempted will prove on which side of the fence our loyalties are to be found. On the side of God and Heaven, or on the side of the devil and the world. We have be clearly told that we cannot be on both sides of the fence—we have to make a choice, as the following words of Our Lord prove: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24).
Christ vs Devil, Heaven vs World
This idea is taken up by Our Lord’s Apostles. St. John says: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, then the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). St. James labels those, who try serve the world and God, as adulterers, saying: “Adulterers, know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). St. Pauls adds: “Be not conformed to this world!” (Romans 12:2). Our Himself said: “My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36).
Our Temptation is to Mix the World with Heaven
Why then do we try reconcile the world with God? St. Paul is emphatic about the impossibility of this: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation has justice with injustice? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God, as God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
The world is the bait of the devil, for, as Our Lord says, the devil is the prince of this world: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not any thing!” (John 14:30), and the devil used the world to tempt Our Lord at the triple temptation of Our Lord in the desert: “The devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’” (Matthew 4:8-9).
THE MECHANICS OF TEMPTATION
The Three Phases of Temptation.
According to the traditional doctrine, as expounded by St. Augustine, there are three different phases in temptation: suggestion, pleasure and consent.
(a) SUGGESTION consists in the proposal of some evil. Our imagination or our mind represent to us in a more or less vivid manner the attraction of the forbidden fruit; at times this representation is most alluring, holds its ground tenaciously and becomes a sort of obsession. No matter how dangerous such a suggestion may be, it does not constitute a sin, provided that we have not provoked it ourselves, and do not consent to it. There is sin only when the will yields consent.
(b) PLEASURE follows the suggestion. Instinctively our lower tendencies are drawn towards the suggested evil and a certain pleasure is experienced. "Many a time it happens," says St. Francis de Sales "that the inferior part of the soul takes pleasure in the temptation, without there having been consent, nay against the soul's superior part. This is the warfare which the Apostle St. Paul describes when he says his flesh wars against his spirit."
This pleasure does not, as long as the will refuses to consent to it, constitute a sin; yet it is a danger, since the will finds itself thus solicited to yield consent. The question then is: will it yield or not?
(c) If THE WILL WITHHOLDS ACQUIESCENCE, combats the temptation, and repels it, it has scored a success and performed a highly meritorious act. If, on the contrary, THE WILL DELIGHTS IN THE PLEASURE, willingly enjoys it and consents to it, the sin is committed.
The Signs of Consent
The better to explain this important point, let us see what are the signs of lack of consent, imperfect consent, and perfect consent.
(a) NO SIN AT ALL: We may judge that THERE HAS BEEN NO CONSENT, if in spite of the suggestion and the instinctive pleasure accompanying it, we experience disgust, chagrin at seeing ourselves thus tempted; if we struggle so as not to be overcome; if we hold the proposed evil in horror; especially if we turn to God in prayer.
(b) VENIAL SIN OR PERHAPS MORTAL SIN: We may be CULPABLY ACCOUNTABLE FOR THE TEMPTATION IN ITS CAUSE, when we perform an action which we could avoid, foreseeing that it will be to us a source of temptation:
"If I know," says St. Francis de Sales, "some certain conversation leads me to temptation and to a fall, and I do voluntarily indulge therein, I am, doubtless, culpable of all the temptations that shall arise."
Yet, one is guilty only to the extent of one's prevision, and if this is but vague and indistinct, the guilt is lessened in proportion. If the temptation is to mortal sin, then our guilt is greater. If the temptation is to venial sin, then our guilt is venial.
(c) VENIAL SIN: One may consider CONSENT TO BE IMPERFECT:
(i) When one does not repulse the temptation as soon as its dangerous character is perceived. There is then a fault against prudence, which without being grave puts us in the danger of consenting to the temptation.
(ii) When one momentarily hesitates. One would fain relish somewhat the forbidden pleasure, but one is loath to offend God, that is, after a moment's hesitation, one repels the temptation. Here again there is a venial fault of imprudence.
(iii) If temptation is resisted in a half‑hearted way. One does resist, but in a feeble, indolent manner, a half‑resistance which implies a half‑consent, hence a venial fault.
(d) MORTAL or VENIAL SIN: It is said that CONSENT IS FULL AND ENTIRE, when the will, weakened by first concessions, lets itself be drawn to taste willingly the sinful pleasure, despite the protests of conscience, which recognizes the evil. In such case, if the matter be grievous, the sin is mortal; it is a sin of thought or "morose delectation," as theologians call it. If to the thought is added desire, the fault is graver still. Lastly, if from desire one passes on to the act, or at least to the quest and pursuit of means adapted to the execution of one's designs, then there is a sin of action.
In the different cases we have explained, doubts arise at times regarding the consent or half‑consent given. Then we must make a distinction between the delicate and the lax conscience; when it is question of the former, one may rule out consent, for the person is not in the habit of yielding consent, and if he had consented in this particular case he would know it. When it is question of the latter, the presumption is that the person has given full consent, for if he had not, his soul would not be troubled.
The Providential Design Behind Temptations
Fr. Tanquerey, in his book The Spiritual Life, explains the providential reason and use that God makes of temptations: God Himself does not tempt us directly: “Let no man, when he is tempted, say that he is tempted by God. For God is not a tempter of evils and He tempts no man!” (James 1:13). But He allows us to be tempted by our spiritual enemies, at the same time giving us the graces necessary to resist: “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able: but will make also with temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13). And this for excellent reasons of His own.
1. He wants to make us merit heaven.
Undoubtedly He could have bestowed upon us eternal life as a pure gift, but in His wisdom He has willed that we merit it as a reward. He even wills that the recompense be in proportion to the merit and hence in proportion to the obstacle overcome. Temptation, which imperils our frail virtue, is certainly one of the most trying hardships; to struggle courageously against it is one of the most meritorious acts we can perform; and once we have triumphed with God’s grace, we can repeat with St. Paul, that we have fought the good fight, and that it only remains for us to receive the crown of justice which God has prepared for us. The more we have done in order to merit that crown, the greater shall be our honor and our joy.
2. Temptation is likewise a means of purification.
(a) It reminds us that through lack of vigilance and of effort in the past we have fallen, and it becomes thus an occasion for new acts of contrition, shame, and humiliation, which make for the purification of the soul.
(b) It obliges us at the same time to put forth earnest and sustained efforts lest we fall; it makes us atone for our negligences and for our surrenders by the performance of contrary acts which further purify the soul. This is why when God wants to purify a soul more perfectly in order to raise it to contemplation, He allows it to undergo horrible temptations, as we shall see when treating of the unitive way.
3. Lastly, temptation is an instrument of spiritual progress.
(a) It is like a stripe of the lash that awakens us at the moment we would lull ourselves to sleep and relax. It makes us realize the necessity of forging ahead, of not halting midway, but of ever aiming higher, the more surely to remove the danger.
(b) It is a school of humility, of distrust of self. When tempted we realize more fully our weakness, our powerlessness; we feel more keenly the need of grace, and we pray with greater earnestness. We see all the better the necessity of mortifying in us the love of pleasure, the source of our temptations, and we embrace more eagerly the little crosses of every day in order to weaken the power of concupiscence.
(c) It is a school of love of God; for to insure our power of resistance, we throw ourselves into God’s arms there to seek for strength and shelter; we are more grateful to Him for His unfailing grace; we act towards Him as children of a most loving Father to Whom we have recourse in all our trials.
God’s Friends Will Be Tempted
Hence, temptation possesses manifold advantages and it is on this account that God allows His friends to be tempted: “Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove you” (Tobias 12:13). Which is why Fr. Faber says “Temptations are the raw material of glory” and St. James commands: “My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations!” (James 1:2).
There can be no salvation and no entry to Heaven without passing through temptation. Our Lord was tempted. Our Lady was tempted. We must be tempted. Temptation there must be--“Son, when thou comest to the service of God, stand in justice and in fear, and prepare thy soul for temptation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove thee” (Tobias 12:13).
The Imitation of Christ gives us a lengthy lesson on dealing with temptation: “As long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and temptation. Whence it is written in Job: ‘The life of man upon Earth is a warfare.’ Everyone, therefore, must guard against temptation and must watch in prayer lest the devil, who never sleeps, but goes about seeking whom he may devour, find occasion to deceive him. No one is so perfect or so holy, but he is sometimes tempted; man cannot be altogether free from temptation.
“Yet temptations, though troublesome and severe, are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many temptations and trials to profit by them, while those who could not resist became reprobate and fell away. There is no state so holy, no place so secret, that temptations and trials will not come. Man is never safe from them as long as he lives, for they come from within us — in sin we were born. When one temptation or trial passes, another comes; we shall always have something to suffer because we have lost the state of original blessedness.
“Many people try to escape temptations, only to fall more deeply. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but by patience and true humility we become stronger than all our enemies. The man who only shuns temptations outwardly and does not uproot them will make little progress; indeed they will quickly return, more violent than before. Little by little, in patience and long-suffering you will overcome them, by the help of God rather than by severity and your own rash ways. Often take counsel when tempted; and do not be harsh with others who are tempted, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled.
“The beginning of all temptation lies in a wavering mind and little trust in God, for as a rudderless ship is driven hither and yon by waves, so a careless and irresolute man is tempted in many ways. Fire tempers iron and temptation steels the just. Often we do not know what we can stand, but temptation shows us what we are. Above all, we must be especially alert against the beginnings of temptation, for the enemy is more easily conquered if he is refused admittance to the mind and is met beyond the threshold when he knocks.
“Someone has said very aptly: “Resist the beginnings; remedies come too late, when by long delay the evil has gained strength.” First, a mere thought comes to mind, then strong imagination, followed by pleasure, evil delight, and consent. Thus, because he is not resisted in the beginning, Satan gains full entry. And the longer a man delays in resisting, so much the weaker does he become each day, while the strength of the enemy grows against him.
“Some suffer great temptations in the beginning of their conversion, others toward the end, while some are troubled almost constantly throughout their life. Others, again, are tempted but lightly according to the wisdom and justice of Divine Providence Who weighs the status and merit of each and prepares all for the salvation of His elect.
“We should not despair, therefore, when we are tempted, but pray to God the more fervently that He may see fit to help us, for according to the word of Paul, He will make issue with temptation that we may be able to bear it. Let us humble our souls under the hand of God in every trial and temptation for He will save and exalt the humble in spirit.
“In temptations and trials the progress of a man is measured; in them opportunity for merit and virtue is made more manifest. When a man is not troubled it is not hard for him to be fervent and devout, but if he bears up patiently in time of adversity, there is hope for great progress. Some, guarded against great temptations, are frequently overcome by small ones in order that, humbled by their weakness in small trials, they may not presume on their own strength in great ones” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1; ch. 13).
“An unmortified man is quickly tempted and overcome in small, trifling evils; his spirit is weak, in a measure carnal and inclined to sensual things; he can hardly abstain from earthly desires. Hence it makes him sad to forego them; he is quick to anger if reproved. Yet if he satisfies his desires, remorse of conscience overwhelms him because he followed his passions and they did not lead to the peace he sought. True peace of heart, then, is found in resisting passions, not in satisfying them. There is no peace in the carnal man, in the man given to vain attractions, but there is peace in the fervent and spiritual man” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1; ch. 6).
“If you do not overcome small, trifling things, how will you overcome the more difficult? Resist temptations in the beginning, and unlearn the evil habit lest perhaps, little by little, it lead to a more evil one” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1; ch. 11).
No Temptations—No Chance of Heaven
“If you have no temptations,” St. Gregory tells us, “it is because the devils are your friends, your leaders, and your shepherds. And by allowing you to pass your poor life tranquilly, to the end of your days, they will drag you down into the depths.” St. John Vianney explains: “If Our Lord was tempted, it was in order to show us that we must be also tempted. It follows, therefore, that we must expect temptation” (St. John Vianney).
In the spiritual life, there are difficulties and there are also dangers: occasions of sin and obstacles to good. Job said that human life is temptation. History also shows that any civilization, whenever it gave into the temptation of sinking itself into the arms of comfort, softness and ease, finally ended up collapsing. Man needs a certain dose of a ‘Spartan’ existence in order to maintain an upright and solid backbone to his spiritual, material, physical existence. The devil is behind many temptations and spiritual diseases, but, ultimately, it is our cooperation with the devil’s temptations and lack of cooperation with God’s suggestions, that makes us sin or become lukewarm. So let us be perfectly honest and admit our lukewarmness. If you go to a doctor, but will admit to no illness and say nothing of your symptoms, or perhaps lie about them—then don’t expect to be given the correct remedy or even any remedy.
Temptations Are the Raw Material of Glory
Fr. Faber tells us that “Temptations are the raw material of glory.” That is why St. James says: “My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations!” (James 1:2), to which St. Peter will add: “You shall greatly rejoice, if now you must be for a little time made sorrowful in divers temptations: so that the trial of your faith—much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire—may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:6-7). While the Imitation of Christ chimes in, saying: “Yet temptations, though troublesome and severe, are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed.” (Book 1, chapter 13).
Same Temptation—Different Destination
St. Augustine tells us that the same crosses lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. Likewise, the same temptations will lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. It depends upon whether the temptation is powerfully rejected or gladly accepted.
Temptations Are Necessary
That classic book, The Imitation of Christ, tells us that “It is good for us to have trials and troubles at times, for they often remind us that we are on probation and ought not to hope in any worldly thing. It is good for us sometimes to suffer contradiction, to be misjudged by men even though we do well and mean well. These things help us to be humble and shield us from vainglory. When to all outward appearances men give us no credit, when they do not think well of us, then we are more inclined to seek God, Who sees our hearts.
"Therefore, a man ought to root himself so firmly in God that he will not need the consolations of men. When a man of good will is afflicted, tempted, and tormented by evil thoughts, he realizes clearly that his greatest need is God, without Whom he can do no good. Saddened by his miseries and sufferings, he laments and prays. He wearies of living longer and wishes for death that he might be dissolved and be with Christ. Then he understands fully that perfect security and complete peace cannot be found on earth” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 12).
“Many people try to escape temptations, only to fall more deeply. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but by patience and true humility we become stronger than all our enemies. The man who only shuns temptations outwardly and does not uproot them will make little progress; indeed they will quickly return, more violent than before” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 13).
Why Are We Tempted?
“Temptation” comes from the Latin verb “tentare”, which means “to try” or “to test”. Who can get to Heaven without a test? Nobody! Who can graduate without passing exams? Nobody! Thus, temptation is a heavenly test, whereby souls are tried in order that the quality of their love for God and their devotion to Him may become known and proved. Probation is a time of testing and proof. A person is put on probation during which time he or she has to prove their worth or integrity. The word “probation” finds it root in the Latin verb “probare” which means “to examine, to test, to try or to prove.”
Prove What?
The outcome of our being tempted will prove on which side of the fence our loyalties are to be found. On the side of God and Heaven, or on the side of the devil and the world. We have be clearly told that we cannot be on both sides of the fence—we have to make a choice, as the following words of Our Lord prove: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24).
Christ vs Devil, Heaven vs World
This idea is taken up by Our Lord’s Apostles. St. John says: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, then the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). St. James labels those, who try serve the world and God, as adulterers, saying: “Adulterers, know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). St. Pauls adds: “Be not conformed to this world!” (Romans 12:2). Our Himself said: “My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36).
Our Temptation is to Mix the World with Heaven
Why then do we try reconcile the world with God? St. Paul is emphatic about the impossibility of this: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation has justice with injustice? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God, as God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
The world is the bait of the devil, for, as Our Lord says, the devil is the prince of this world: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not any thing!” (John 14:30), and the devil used the world to tempt Our Lord at the triple temptation of Our Lord in the desert: “The devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’” (Matthew 4:8-9).
THE MECHANICS OF TEMPTATION
The Three Phases of Temptation.
According to the traditional doctrine, as expounded by St. Augustine, there are three different phases in temptation: suggestion, pleasure and consent.
(a) SUGGESTION consists in the proposal of some evil. Our imagination or our mind represent to us in a more or less vivid manner the attraction of the forbidden fruit; at times this representation is most alluring, holds its ground tenaciously and becomes a sort of obsession. No matter how dangerous such a suggestion may be, it does not constitute a sin, provided that we have not provoked it ourselves, and do not consent to it. There is sin only when the will yields consent.
(b) PLEASURE follows the suggestion. Instinctively our lower tendencies are drawn towards the suggested evil and a certain pleasure is experienced. "Many a time it happens," says St. Francis de Sales "that the inferior part of the soul takes pleasure in the temptation, without there having been consent, nay against the soul's superior part. This is the warfare which the Apostle St. Paul describes when he says his flesh wars against his spirit."
This pleasure does not, as long as the will refuses to consent to it, constitute a sin; yet it is a danger, since the will finds itself thus solicited to yield consent. The question then is: will it yield or not?
(c) If THE WILL WITHHOLDS ACQUIESCENCE, combats the temptation, and repels it, it has scored a success and performed a highly meritorious act. If, on the contrary, THE WILL DELIGHTS IN THE PLEASURE, willingly enjoys it and consents to it, the sin is committed.
The Signs of Consent
The better to explain this important point, let us see what are the signs of lack of consent, imperfect consent, and perfect consent.
(a) NO SIN AT ALL: We may judge that THERE HAS BEEN NO CONSENT, if in spite of the suggestion and the instinctive pleasure accompanying it, we experience disgust, chagrin at seeing ourselves thus tempted; if we struggle so as not to be overcome; if we hold the proposed evil in horror; especially if we turn to God in prayer.
(b) VENIAL SIN OR PERHAPS MORTAL SIN: We may be CULPABLY ACCOUNTABLE FOR THE TEMPTATION IN ITS CAUSE, when we perform an action which we could avoid, foreseeing that it will be to us a source of temptation:
"If I know," says St. Francis de Sales, "some certain conversation leads me to temptation and to a fall, and I do voluntarily indulge therein, I am, doubtless, culpable of all the temptations that shall arise."
Yet, one is guilty only to the extent of one's prevision, and if this is but vague and indistinct, the guilt is lessened in proportion. If the temptation is to mortal sin, then our guilt is greater. If the temptation is to venial sin, then our guilt is venial.
(c) VENIAL SIN: One may consider CONSENT TO BE IMPERFECT:
(i) When one does not repulse the temptation as soon as its dangerous character is perceived. There is then a fault against prudence, which without being grave puts us in the danger of consenting to the temptation.
(ii) When one momentarily hesitates. One would fain relish somewhat the forbidden pleasure, but one is loath to offend God, that is, after a moment's hesitation, one repels the temptation. Here again there is a venial fault of imprudence.
(iii) If temptation is resisted in a half‑hearted way. One does resist, but in a feeble, indolent manner, a half‑resistance which implies a half‑consent, hence a venial fault.
(d) MORTAL or VENIAL SIN: It is said that CONSENT IS FULL AND ENTIRE, when the will, weakened by first concessions, lets itself be drawn to taste willingly the sinful pleasure, despite the protests of conscience, which recognizes the evil. In such case, if the matter be grievous, the sin is mortal; it is a sin of thought or "morose delectation," as theologians call it. If to the thought is added desire, the fault is graver still. Lastly, if from desire one passes on to the act, or at least to the quest and pursuit of means adapted to the execution of one's designs, then there is a sin of action.
In the different cases we have explained, doubts arise at times regarding the consent or half‑consent given. Then we must make a distinction between the delicate and the lax conscience; when it is question of the former, one may rule out consent, for the person is not in the habit of yielding consent, and if he had consented in this particular case he would know it. When it is question of the latter, the presumption is that the person has given full consent, for if he had not, his soul would not be troubled.
The Providential Design Behind Temptations
Fr. Tanquerey, in his book The Spiritual Life, explains the providential reason and use that God makes of temptations: God Himself does not tempt us directly: “Let no man, when he is tempted, say that he is tempted by God. For God is not a tempter of evils and He tempts no man!” (James 1:13). But He allows us to be tempted by our spiritual enemies, at the same time giving us the graces necessary to resist: “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able: but will make also with temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13). And this for excellent reasons of His own.
1. He wants to make us merit heaven.
Undoubtedly He could have bestowed upon us eternal life as a pure gift, but in His wisdom He has willed that we merit it as a reward. He even wills that the recompense be in proportion to the merit and hence in proportion to the obstacle overcome. Temptation, which imperils our frail virtue, is certainly one of the most trying hardships; to struggle courageously against it is one of the most meritorious acts we can perform; and once we have triumphed with God’s grace, we can repeat with St. Paul, that we have fought the good fight, and that it only remains for us to receive the crown of justice which God has prepared for us. The more we have done in order to merit that crown, the greater shall be our honor and our joy.
2. Temptation is likewise a means of purification.
(a) It reminds us that through lack of vigilance and of effort in the past we have fallen, and it becomes thus an occasion for new acts of contrition, shame, and humiliation, which make for the purification of the soul.
(b) It obliges us at the same time to put forth earnest and sustained efforts lest we fall; it makes us atone for our negligences and for our surrenders by the performance of contrary acts which further purify the soul. This is why when God wants to purify a soul more perfectly in order to raise it to contemplation, He allows it to undergo horrible temptations, as we shall see when treating of the unitive way.
3. Lastly, temptation is an instrument of spiritual progress.
(a) It is like a stripe of the lash that awakens us at the moment we would lull ourselves to sleep and relax. It makes us realize the necessity of forging ahead, of not halting midway, but of ever aiming higher, the more surely to remove the danger.
(b) It is a school of humility, of distrust of self. When tempted we realize more fully our weakness, our powerlessness; we feel more keenly the need of grace, and we pray with greater earnestness. We see all the better the necessity of mortifying in us the love of pleasure, the source of our temptations, and we embrace more eagerly the little crosses of every day in order to weaken the power of concupiscence.
(c) It is a school of love of God; for to insure our power of resistance, we throw ourselves into God’s arms there to seek for strength and shelter; we are more grateful to Him for His unfailing grace; we act towards Him as children of a most loving Father to Whom we have recourse in all our trials.
God’s Friends Will Be Tempted
Hence, temptation possesses manifold advantages and it is on this account that God allows His friends to be tempted: “Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove you” (Tobias 12:13). Which is why Fr. Faber says “Temptations are the raw material of glory” and St. James commands: “My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations!” (James 1:2).
Article 18
Monday & Tuesday after the 1st Sunday of Lent, March 10th & 11th
Temptation Week! Temptation Makes Weak!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday & Tuesday after the 1st Sunday of Lent, March 10th & 11th
Temptation Week! Temptation Makes Weak!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Christ vs. Satan
We have entered the first full week of Lent―a week that could well be called “Temptation Week”, which aptly summarizes what all of us will undergo, in one way or another, for the rest of Lent! Sunday’s Gospel saw the temptation of Christ by Satan. If Christ was tempted, how on earth can we expect not to be tempted? Experience shows all of us that we are surrounded by temptations on a daily basis―and experience show us all that we given in to those temptations many times!
In Holy Scripture we see the account of Our Lord’s battle with Satan in the desert, after He had fasted and prayed for forty days and nights (Matthew 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-13). In this triple temptation, Our Lord comes out on top against the wiles and temptations of Satan. It would seem that the prayer and fasting was the key to His victory. He Himself would later say, speaking of the devil: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20). Which is something He would essentially repeat during His Agony in the Garden, when He said to Peter, James and John: “Watch ye, and pray that ye enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak!” (Matthew 26:41; Mark 14:38).
The Story of the Battle by Matthew
“Then Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterwards He was hungry. And the tempter coming said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread!’ Who answered and said: ‘It is written, “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, and set Him upon the pinnacle of the Temple, and said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down, for it is written: “That He has given His angels charge over Thee, and in their hands shall they bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash thy foot against a stone!”’ Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!”’ Again the devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus saith to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him; and behold angels came and ministered to Him” (Matthew 4:1-11).
The Story of the Battle by Luke
“And Jesus, being full of the Holy Ghost, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the desert, for the space of forty days; and was tempted by the devil. And He ate nothing in those days; and when they were ended, He was hungry. And the devil said to Him: ‘If thou be the Son of God, say to this stone that it be made bread!’ And Jesus answered him: ‘It is written, that Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word of God!’ And the devil led Him into a high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time; and he said to Him: ‘To Thee will I give all this power, and the glory of them; for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them. If Thou therefore wilt adore before me, all shall be Thine!’ And Jesus answering said to him: ‘It is written: “Thou shalt adore the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ And he brought Him to Jerusalem, and set him on a pinnacle of the Temple, and he said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast thyself from hence. For it is written, that He hath given his angels charge over thee, that they keep thee! And that in their hands they shall bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash thy foot against a stone!’ And Jesus answering, said to him: ‘It is said: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!”’ And all the temptation being ended, the devil departed from Him for a time” (Luke 4:1-13).
Satan Leaves Only For a Time
Even though he was defeated by Christ in the desert, Satan would return to fight another day and in another way. Our life is meant to be one long struggle, one long war. Holy Scripture is very adamant on this: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) … “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8) … St. Paul says: “What concord hath Christ with Belial?” (2 Corinthians 6:15) ... “Fight the good fight of Faith: lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “And the Lord said: ‘Simon, Simon, behold Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy Faith fail not!” (Luke 22:31-32).
Satan’s Major Weapon—Temptation
The chief weapon of Satan is temptation—it is like a universal tool. It can be applied to any subject and to any person at any time. It was the weapon that was first successfully used against Adam and Eve, and it has stood the test of time. From Satan’s point of view, it is a very successful weapon, since, as most Saints and Father of the Church tell us, most souls end up being damned—yet that damnation is not inevitable and could have easily been avoided, if only they would have perseveringly taken the precautions that Christ has given us through His Church.
Just as temptation could be said to be the universal tool, the remedy or defense against temptation is also simple and universal—in that it works against each and every kind of temptation—it is quite simply prayer and fasting, fasting in the broadest sense of the word: not just keeping away from food, but many other things too. This is proved by Our Lord both in theory and in practice. He personally prayed and fasted in the desert for forty days and nights, after which He was able to overcome Satan’s temptations; and He also told us of the power of prayer and fasting against the devil: “But this kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20).
The plush and comfortable Titanic sailed into the graveyard of death; the uncomfortable and harsh conditions of the lifeboats saved the lives of a few on the desert of the sea. Do we want the Titanic or its lifeboat? The city or the desert? Pleasure or penance? Fun or fasting?
The Benefits of Temptation
The Imitation of Christ has some very sound advice and encouragement on temptations:
“So long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and temptation. Whence it is written in Job: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). Everyone, therefore, must guard against temptation and must watch in prayer lest the devil, who never sleeps but goes about seeking whom he may devour, find occasion to deceive him. No one is so perfect or so holy but he is sometimes tempted; man cannot be altogether free from temptation.
“Yet temptations, though troublesome and severe, are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many temptations and trials to profit by them, while those who could not resist became reprobate and fell away. There is no state so holy, no place so secret that temptations and trials will not come. Man is never safe from them as long as he lives, for they come from within us — in sin we were born. When one temptation or trial passes, another comes; we shall always have something to suffer because we have lost the state of original blessedness.
“Many people try to escape temptations, only to fall more deeply. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but by patience and true humility we become stronger than all our enemies. The man who only shuns temptations outwardly and does not uproot them will make little progress; indeed they will quickly return, more violent than before.
“Little by little, in patience and long-suffering you will overcome them, by the help of God rather than by severity and your own rash ways. Often take counsel when tempted; and do not be harsh with others who are tempted, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled.
“The beginning of all temptation lies in a wavering mind and little trust in God, for as a rudderless ship is driven hither and yon by waves, so a careless and irresolute man is tempted in many ways. Fire tempers iron and temptation steels the just. Often we do not know what we can stand, but temptation shows us what we are. Above all, we must be especially alert against the beginnings of temptation, for the enemy is more easily conquered if he is refused admittance to the mind and is met beyond the threshold when he knocks.
“Someone has said very aptly: ‘Resist the beginnings; remedies come too late, when, by long delay, the evil has gained strength.’ First, a mere thought comes to mind, then strong imagination, followed by pleasure, evil delight, and consent. Thus, because he is not resisted in the beginning, Satan gains full entry. And the longer a man delays in resisting, so much the weaker does he become each day, while the strength of the enemy grows against him.
“Some suffer great temptations in the beginning of their conversion, others toward the end, while some are troubled almost constantly throughout their life. Others, again, are tempted but lightly according to the wisdom and justice of Divine Providence Who weighs the status and merit of each and prepares all for the salvation of His elect.
“We should not despair, therefore, when we are tempted, but pray to God the more fervently that He may see fit to help us, for according to the word of Paul, He will make issue with temptation that we may be able to bear it. Let us humble our souls under the hand of God in every trial and temptation for He will save and exalt the humble in spirit.
“In temptations and trials the progress of a man is measured; in them opportunity for merit and virtue is made more manifest. When a man is not troubled it is not hard for him to be fervent and devout, but if he bears up patiently in time of adversity, there is hope for great progress. Some, guarded against great temptations, are frequently overcome by small ones in order that, humbled by their weakness in small trials, they may not presume on their own strength in great ones” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 13).
As the Imitation of Christ says (Book 1, chapter 13 “Of Resisting Temptations”): “Whence a certain one has said: ‘Resist beginnings; all too late is the cure, when ills have gathered strength by long delay.’ For first there comes into the mind a simple thought; then a strong imagination; afterwards delight, and then the evil motion and consent. And so, by little and little, the malignant foe gains full entrance when he is not resisted in the beginning. And the longer anyone has been slothful in resisting, so much the weaker he daily becomes in himself, and the enemy so much the stronger against him.” Our secular saying ― “A stitch in time saves nine” — paints a similar picture.
The following paragraphs are solely taken from the Sunday Sermons of St. Alphonsus Liguori. They are a compilation and arrangement of quotes that have been taken from many different sermons and welded together to form a united whole. Let this Doctor of Church be given center stage to give us his saintly and sound warnings and advice.
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI ON TEMPTATIONS & SIN
“Man in this life is encompassed with perils arising from the temptations of Hell, from the occasions of sin, from the scandals or bad counsels of men, from human respect, and, above all, and from the bad passions of corrupt nature, which are represented by the winds that agitate the sea and expose the ship to great danger of being lost. All would wish to be saved and to enjoy the glory of Paradise―but, to gain Heaven, it is necessary to walk in the straight road that leads to eternal bliss. This road is the observance of the divine commands. Hence, in his preaching, St. John the Baptist exclaimed: ‘Make straight the way of the Lord!’ In order to be able to walk always in the way of the Lord, without turning to the right or to the left, it is necessary to adopt the proper means. These means are, first, diffidence in ourselves; secondly, confidence in God; thirdly, resistance to temptations. Love is that golden link which binds the soul to God, and makes it faithful in repelling temptation and practicing virtue.
“To holy souls, the most severe afflictions are the temptations by which the devil impels them to offend God: but they who bear these temptations with patience, and banish them by turning to God for help, shall acquire great merit. St. Paul says: ‘God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able, but will also make issue with the temptation that you may be able to bear it!’ (1 Corinthians 10:13). God permits us to be molested by temptations, that, by banishing them, we may gain greater merit. Our Lord says: ‘Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted!’ (Matthew 5:5). They are blessed, because, according to the Apostle, our tribulations are momentary and very light, compared with the greatness of the glory which they shall obtain for us for eternity in Heaven. ‘For that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, works for us above measure exceedingly an eternal weight of glory’ (1 Corinthians 4:17).
“Since, then, brethren, you have resolved to give yourselves to God, listen to the admonition of the Holy Ghost: “Son, when you come into the service of God, prepare thyself for temptation.” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). Do not imagine that you shall have no more temptations, but prepare yourself for the combat, and guard against a relapse into the sins you have confessed; for, if you lose the grace of God again, you shall find it difficult to recover it. When we are tempted to relapse into sin, we must put our whole trust in the assistance of God, who infallibly hears all who invoke His aid. ‘He that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed, lest he fall!’ (1 Corinthians 10:12). They who are in the state of grace should, according to St. Paul, be careful not to fall into sin, particularly if they have been ever guilty of mortal sins; for a relapse into sin brings greater evil on the soul. If a wound be inflicted on any member of the body, that member certainly loses its original vigor. But, if it receives a second wound, it shall lose all strength and motion, without hope of recovery. Every sin, though pardoned, always leaves a wound on the soul. When, to this wound, a new one is added, the soul becomes so weak that, without a special and extraordinary grace from God, it is impossible for her to conquer temptations. The great evil, of a relapse into sin, is that it renders the soul so weak that she has but little strength to resist temptation. After relapsing into sin, a Christian loses the strength necessary to resist temptations, because ‘the Lord departs from him.’ He abandons him by withholding the efficacious aid necessary to overcome temptations; and the miserable man remains blind and abandoned in his sin.
Satanic Tempter
“The first enemy of the salvation of every Christian is his own corruption. ‘But every man is tempted by his own concupiscence, being drawn away and allured.’ (James 1:14). Along with the corrupt inclinations which live within us, and drag us to evil, we have many enemies from without that fight against us. We have the devils who tempt us, with whom the contest is very difficult, because they are stronger than we are. Hence, because we have to contend with powerful enemies, St. Paul exhorts us to arm ourselves with the divine aid: ‘Put you on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in high places.’ (Ephesians 6:11-12). The devil, according to St. Peter, is a lion who is continually going about roaring, through the rage and hunger which impel him to devour our souls. ‘Your adversary, the devil, like a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!’ (1 Peter 5:8). St. Cyprian says that Satan is continually lying in wait for us, in order to make us his slaves. God is faithful, He will never permit us to be tempted above our strength.
“When the devil tempts you, remember Hell, the thought of Hell will preserve you from that land of misery. I say, remember Hell and have recourse to Jesus Christ and to most holy Mary, and they will deliver you from sin, which is the gate of Hell. Have recourse to God and to the Blessed Virgin in the time of temptation, by repeating oftentimes the name of Jesus and Mary, and continuing to invoke their aid until the temptation ceases. In all temptations have immediate recourse to her, saying: ‘Mary, help me!’ To resist every temptation, it is sufficient to pronounce the names of Jesus and Mary; and if the temptation continues, let us continue to invoke Jesus and Mary, and the devil shall never be able to conquer us.
Temptation and Eternity
“Let us keep in mind the words of the Gospel: ‘How narrow is the gate and straight is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!’ (Matthew 7:14). The way to Heaven is straight and narrow: they who wish to arrive at that place of bliss by walking in the paths of pleasure, shall be disappointed―and therefore few reach it, because few are willing to use violence to themselves in resisting temptations: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!’ (Matthew 11:12). It must be sought and obtained by violence―he who wishes to obtain it without inconvenience, or by leading a soft and irregular life, shall not acquire it, but he shall be excluded from it.
“St. James teaches that every man has within himself a powerful enemy, that is, his own evil inclinations, which tempt him to sin. ‘Every man is tempted by his own concupiscence, drawn away, and allured!’ (James 1:14). If, then, we do not fly from the external occasions of sin, how can we resist temptation and avoid sin? Let us, therefore, place before our eyes the general remedy which Jesus has prescribed for conquering temptations and saving our souls. ‘If thy right eye scandalize thee, pluck it out and cast it from thee!’ (Matthew 5:29). If you find that your right eye is to you a cause of damnation, you must pull it out and cast it far from you; that is, when there is danger of losing your soul, you must fly from all evil occasions.
A Matter of Salvation or Damnation!
“St. John Chrysostom, says that this is not a question of losing some earthly good which we must one day relinquish―but there is question of losing Paradise, and of going to suffer forever in Hell. We must fear and tremble; it is thus we shall be able to secure eternal happiness. ‘With fear and trembling work out your salvation.’ (Philippians 2:12). Hence, if we wish to save our souls, we must labor strenuously to avoid dangerous occasions, to resist temptations, and to frequent the sacraments. Without labor we cannot obtain Heaven. ‘The violent bear it away.’ The saints tremble at the thought of eternity. St. Andrew Avellino exclaimed with tears: ‘Who knows whether I shall be saved or damned?’ St. Louis Bertrand said with trembling: ‘What shall be my lot in the other world?’ And shall we not tremble? Let us pray to Jesus Christ and his most holy Mother to help us to save our souls. This is for us the most important of all affairs: if we succeed in it, we shall be eternally happy; if we fail, we must be forever miserable.
“Let us stop to consider the remorse of the damned. Each of the damned souls will say for eternity: ‘If I had only abstained from such a gratification; if in certain circumstances I had only overcame human respect; if I had only avoided such an occasion of sin, or such a companion, I should not now be damned; if I had frequented some pious sodality; if I had gone to confession every week; if in temptations I had recommended myself to God, I would not have relapsed into sin. I have so often proposed to do these things, but I have not done them. I began to practice these means of salvation, but afterwards gave them up―and thus I am lost!’
“To save their souls, some of the saints have retired into the cloister; some have confined themselves in a cave; others have embraced torments and death. ‘The violent bear it away.’ Some complain of their lack of confidence in God; but they do not perceive that their diffidence arises from the weakness of their resolution to serve God. St. Teresa used to say: ‘Of irresolute souls the devil has no fear.’ And Scripture has declared, that ‘desires kill the slothful!’ (Proverbs 21:25). Some would wish to be saved and to become saints, but they never resolve to adopt the means of salvation, such as meditation, the frequentation of the sacraments, detachment from creatures; or, if they adopt these means, they soon give them up. In a word, they are satisfied with fruitless desires, and thus continue to live in enmity with God, or at least in tepidity, which in the end leads them to the loss of God. Thus in them are verified the words of the Holy Ghost: ‘desires kill the slothful!’ If, then, we wish to save our souls, and to become saints, we must make a strong resolution not only in general to give ourselves to God, but also in particular to adopt the proper means, and never to abandon them after having once taken them up. Hence we must never cease to pray to Jesus Christ, and to His holy Mother for holy perseverance.
Do Not Tempt God!
“In the Sacred Scriptures it is written: ‘Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!’ The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations―or without at least asking God’s help to conquer them and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice―tempts God to work miracles, or rather expects God to show to him an extraordinary mercy that is not extended to the generality of Christians. Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. But God does not forget them. He numbers the graces which He dispenses, as well as the sins which we commit. Hence, when the time which He has fixed arrives, God deprives us of His graces, and begins to inflict chastisement. When sins reach a certain number, God pardons no more! Be attentive! When the devil tempts you again to yield to sin, say to yourself: ‘If God pardons me no more, then what shall become of me for all eternity?’
“Give glory to God, and confusion to the devil. A certain penitent was tempted by Satan to conceal a sin through shame; but she was resolved to confess it; and while she was going to her confessor, the devil came forward and asked her where she was going. She courageously answered: ‘I am going to cover myself and you with confusion!’ Act you in a similar manner; if you have ever concealed a mortal sin, confess it candidly to your director, and confound the devil. Remember that the greater the violence you do yourself in confessing your sins, the greater will be the love with which Jesus Christ will embrace you. Go as soon as possible in search of a confessor. Do not give the devil time to continue to tempt you and to make you put off your confession: go immediately: for Jesus Christ is waiting for you.”
The Dangerous Temptation of Venial Sin
► LITTLE SINS LEAD TO BIG SINS: “The fall of many souls into mortal sin follows from habitual venial sins; for these render the soul so weak that, when a strong temptation assails her, she has not strength to resist it, and she falls. With the ordinary assistance of God, we cannot avoid falling into some mortal sin: a special aid is necessary. But this special aid God will justly withhold from tepid souls who are regardless of committing, with full deliberation, many venial sins. Thus these unhappy souls shall not persevere in grace. They who are ungenerous to God well deserve that God should not be generous to them. ‘He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!’ (2 Corinthians 9:6). To such souls the Lord will give the graces common to all, but will probably withhold his special assistance; and without this, as we have seen, they cannot persevere without falling into mortal sin. Hence the soul, that finds no more nourishment and consolation in her devout exercises, in her prayers, Communions, or visits to the Blessed Sacrament, will soon neglect them, and thus neglecting the means of eternal salvation, she shall be in great danger of being lost.
► SAINTS WARN OF VENIAL SINS: “God himself revealed to Blessed Henry Suso, that, for tepid souls who are content with leading a life exempt from mortal sin, and continue to commit many deliberate venial sins, it is very difficult to preserve themselves in the state of grace. St. Bernard teaches that, as long as a person who is guilty of defects detests his faults, there is reason to hope that he will one day correct them and amend his life: but when he commits faults without endeavoring to amend, he will continually go from bad to worse, till he loses the grace of God. St. Gregory says, that the man, who struggled for a time before he fell into the habit of sin, as soon as he contracts the habit, yields and yields again to every temptation, with as much facility as a straw is moved by the slightest blast of wind. Habitual sinners, according to St. John Chrysostom, become so weak in resisting the attacks of the devil, that, dragged to sin by their evil habit, they are sometimes driven to sin against their inclination.
“St. Augustine says that, like a certain disease of the skin which makes the body an object of disgust, habitual faults, when committed without any effort of amendment, render the soul so disgusting to God, that he deprives her of his embraces. This danger will be still greater for those who commit many venial sins through attachment to any passion, such as pride, ambition, aversion to a neighbor, or an inordinate affection for any person. St. Francis of Assisi says that, in endeavoring to draw to sin a soul that is afraid of being in enmity with God, the devil does not seek in the beginning to bind her with the chain of a slave, by tempting her to commit mortal sin, because she would have a horror of yielding to mortal sin, and would guard herself against it. He first endeavors to bind her by a single hair; then by a slender thread; next by a cord; afterwards by a rope; and in the end by a chain of Hell that is, by mortal sin; and thus he makes her his slave.
“Miserable the soul that allows herself to be the slave of any passion. ‘Behold, how small a fire, what a great forest it kindles!’ (James 3:5). A small spark, if it be not extinguished, will set fire to an entire forest; that is, an unmodified passion shall bring the soul to ruin. Passion blinds us; and the blind often fall into an abyss when they least expect it. According to St. Ambrose, the devil is constantly endeavoring to find out the passion which rules in our heart, and the pleasures which have the greatest attraction for us. When he discovers them, he presents occasions of indulging them: he then excites concupiscence, and prepares a chain to make us the slaves of Hell.”
► AT PEACE WITH VENIAL SIN: “Many are unwilling to be separated from God by mortal sins; they wish to follow Him, but at a distance, and regardless of venial sins. But to them shall probably happen what befell St. Peter. When Jesus Christ was seized in the garden, St. Peter was unwilling to abandon the Lord, but ‘followed Him afar off’ (Matthew 26:58). After entering the house of Caiphas, he was charged with being a disciple of Jesus Christ. He was instantly seized with fear, and three times denied his Master. The Holy Ghost says: ‘He that despises small things shall fall by little and little’ (Ecclesiasticus 19:1). They who despise small falls will probably one day fall into an abyss; for, being in the habit of committing light offences against God, they will feel but little repugnance to offer to him some grievous insult.
“The Lord says: ‘Catch us the little foxes that destroy the vines’ (Canticles 2:15). He does not tell us to catch the lions or the bears, but the little foxes. Lions and bears strike terror, and therefore everyone is careful to keep at a distance from them, through fear of being devoured by them; but the little foxes, though they do not excite dismay, destroy the vine by drying up its roots. Mortal sin terrifies the timorous soul; but, if she accustoms herself to committing many venial sins with full deliberation, and without endeavoring to correct them, they, like the little foxes, shall destroy the roots that is, the remorse of conscience, the fear of offending God, and the holy desires of advancing in divine love; and thus, being in a state of tepidity, and impelled to sin by some passion, the soul will easily abandon God and lose the divine grace.
“Moreover, deliberate and habitual venial sins, not only deprive us of strength to resist temptations, but also of the special helps without which we fall into grievous sins. St. John Chrysostom asserts, that he himself knew many persons who were gifted with great virtues, and who, because they disregarded light faults, fell into an abyss of crime. When the devil cannot gain much from us, he is, in the beginning, content with little gains―by many trifling victories he will make a great conquest. No one, says St. Bernard, suddenly falls from the state of grace into the abyss of wickedness. They who rush into the most grievous irregularities, begin by committing light faults.”
Praying Against Temptation
“Be attentive, brethren; for this is a point of great importance. It is certain, that of ourselves we have not sufficient strength to resist the temptations of the devil, of the flesh, and of the world. It is God that prevents our enemies from assailing us with temptations by which we would be conquered. Hence Jesus Christ has taught us the following prayer: ‘And lead us not into temptation!’ He teaches us to pray that God may deliver us from the temptations to which we would yield, and thus lose His grace. Now, venial sins, when they are deliberate and habitual, deprive us of the special helps of God which are necessary for preservation in his grace.”
The Lies and False Reasoning of the Devil in Temptations
► FALSE REASONING #1: “Place before your eyes the delusion by which the devil tempts men to sin and to persevere in sin, so that you may know how to guard yourselves against his deceitful artifices. To understand these delusions better, let us imagine the case of a young man who, seized by some passion, lives in sin and is thus the slave of Satan, and never thinks of his eternal salvation. My son, I say to him, what sort of life do you lead? If you continue to live in this manner, how will you be able to save your soul? But, behold, the devil, on the other hand, says to him: ‘Why should you be afraid of being lost? Indulge your passions for the present: you will afterwards confess your sins, and thus all shall be remedied!’ Behold the net by which the devil drags so many souls into Hell.”
► FALSE REASONING #2: “The devil says: ‘Indulge your passions: you will hereafter make a good confession!’ But, in reply, I say, that in the meantime you lose your soul. Tell me: if you had a jewel worth a thousand pounds, would you throw it into a river with the hope of afterwards finding it again? What if all your efforts to find it were fruitless? My God! You hold in your hand the invaluable jewel of your soul, which Jesus Christ has purchased with His own Blood, and you cast it into Hell! Yes; you cast it into Hell; because according to the present order of providence, for every mortal sin you commit, your name is written among the number of the damned.”
► FALSE REASONING #3: “But you say: ‘I hope to recover God’s grace by making a good confession.’ And if you should not recover it, what shall be the consequences? To make a good confession, a true sorrow for sin is necessary, and this sorrow is the gift of God: if He does not give it, will you not be lost forever?”
► FALSE REASONING #4: “You answer: ‘I am young; God is compassionate to my youth! I will hereafter give myself to God!’ Behold another delusion! You are young; but do you not know that God counts, not the years, but the sins of each individual? You are young; but how many sins have you committed? Perhaps there are many persons of a very advanced age, who have not been guilty of the fourth part of the sins which you have committed. And do you not know that God has fixed for each of us the number of sins which He will pardon? ‘The Lord patiently expects that, when the Day of Judgment shall come, He may punish them in the fullness of their sins’ (2 Machabees 6:14). God has patience, and waits for a while; but, when the measure of the sins, which He has determined to pardon, is filled up, He pardons no more, but chastises the sinner, by suddenly depriving him of life in the miserable state of sin, or by abandoning him in his sin, and executing His threats.”
► FALSE REASONING #5: “You say: ‘I cannot, at the present time, resist this passion!’ Behold the third delusion of the devil, by which he makes you believe that, at present, you have not strength to overcome certain temptations. But St. Paul tells us that God is faithful, and that He never permits us to be tempted above our strength. ‘And God is faithful, who will not permit you to be tempted above that which you are able’ (1 Corinthians 10:13). I ask―if you are not now able to resist the temptation, how can you expect to resist it hereafter? If you yield to it, the devil will become stronger, and you shall become weaker; and if you be not now able to extinguish this flame of passion, how can you hope to be able to extinguish it when it shall have grown more violent?”
► FALSE REASONING #6: “You say: ‘God will give me his aid!’ But this aid God is ready to give at present if you ask it. Why then do you not implore his assistance? Perhaps you expect that, without now taking the trouble of invoking his aid, you will receive from him increased helps and graces, after you shall have multiplied the number of your sins? Perhaps you doubt the veracity of God, who has promised to give whatever we ask of him? ‘Ask,’ he says, ‘and it shall be given you!’ (Matthew 7:7). God cannot violate his promises. Have recourse to Him, and He will give you the strength necessary to resist the temptation. God commands you to resist it, and you say: ‘I have not strength.’ Does God, then, command impossibilities? No; the Council of Trent has declared that ‘God does not command impossibilities; but, by His commands, He admonishes you to do what you can, and to ask for what you cannot do; and He assists, that you may be able to do it.’ (Session 6; canon xiii).
“When you see that you have not sufficient strength to resist temptation with the ordinary assistance of God, ask of Him the additional help which you require, and He will give it to you; and thus you shall be able to conquer all temptations, however violent they may be. But you will not pray; and you say that at present you will commit this sin, and will afterwards confess it. But, I ask, how do you know that God will give you time to confess it?”
► FALSE REASONING #7: “You say: ‘I will go to confession before the week is over!’ And who has promised you this week? Well, then you say: ‘I will go to confession tomorrow!’, you say. And who promises you tomorrow? St. Augustine says: ‘God has not promised you tomorrow. Perhaps he will give it, and perhaps he will refuse it to you!’ — as he has to so many others. How many have gone to bed in good health, and have been found dead in the morning! How many, in the very act of sin, has the Lord struck dead and sent to Hell! Should this happen to you, how will you repair your eternal ruin?”
► FALSE REASONING #8: “The devil tells you: ‘Commit this sin, and confess it afterwards.’ Behold the deceitful artifice by which the devil has brought so many thousands of Christians to Hell. We scarcely ever find a Christian so sunk in despair as to intend to damn himself. All the wicked sin with the hope of afterwards going to confession. But, by this illusion, how many have brought themselves to perdition! For them there is now no time for confession, no remedy for their damnation. They fell, but failed to rise. They fell once too often.”
► FALSE REASONING #9: “You say: ‘But God is merciful!’ Behold another common delusion by which the devil encourages sinners to persevere in a life of sin! A certain author has said, that more souls have been sent to Hell by the mercy of God than by His justice. This is indeed the case; for men are induced by the deceits of the devil to persevere in sin, through confidence in God’s mercy; and thus they are lost. God is merciful. Who denies it? But, great as His mercy, how many does He every day send to Hell? God is merciful, but He is also just, and is, therefore, obliged to punish those who offend Him. “And His mercy,” says the divine Mother, ‘is to them that fear Him!’ (Luke 1:50). But with regard to those who abuse His mercy and despise Him, He exercises justice. The Lord pardons sins, but He cannot pardon the determination to commit sin. St. Augustine says, that he who sins, with the intention of repenting after his sins, is not a penitent but a scoffer. The Apostle St. Paul tells us that God will not be mocked. ‘Be not deceived! God is not mocked!’ (Galatians 6:7). It would be a mockery of God to insult Him as often and as much as you pleased, and afterwards to expect eternal glory.”
► FALSE REASONING #10: “You say: ‘Since God has shown me so many mercies until now, I am hopeful that He will continue to do so for the future!’ Behold another delusion! Then, because God has not as yet chastised your sins, He will never punish them! On the contrary, the greater have been His mercies, the more you should tremble, lest, if you offend Him again, He should pardon you no more, and should take vengeance on your sins. Behold the advice of the Holy Ghost: ‘Say not: “I have sinned, and what harm hath befallen me?” For the Most High is a patient rewarder.’ (Ecclesiasticus 5:4). Do not say: ‘I have sinned, and no chastisement has fallen upon me!’ God bears for a time, but not forever. He waits for a certain time; but when that arrives, He then chastises the sinner for all His past iniquities: and the longer He has waited for repentance, the more severe the chastisement. Therefore, my brother, since you know that you have frequently offended God, and that he has not sent you to Hell, you should exclaim: ‘O the mercies of the Lord that we are not consumed!’ (Lamentations 3:22), ‘Lord, I thank You for not having sent me to Hell, which I have so often deserved!’
“And therefore you ought to give yourself entirely to God, at least through gratitude, and should consider that, for less sins than you have committed, many are now in that pit of fire, without the smallest hope of being ever released from it. The patience of God in bearing with you, should teach you not to despise him still more, but to love and serve him with greater fervor, and to atone, by penitential austerities and by other holy works, for the insults you have offered to him. You know that he has shown mercies to you, which he has not shown to others. ‘He has not done in like manner to every nation’ (Psalm 147:20). Hence you should tremble, lest, if you commit a single additional mortal sin, God should abandon you, and cast you into Hell.”
► FALSE REASONING #11: “Let us come to the next illusion. “It is true that, by this sin, I lose the grace of God! But, even after committing this sin, I may be saved!” You may, indeed, be saved―but it cannot be denied that if, after having committed so many sins, and after having received so many graces from God, you again offend him, there is great reason to fear that you shall be lost. Attend to the words of the sacred Scripture: ‘A hard heart shall fare evil at the last!’ (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). The obstinate sinner shall die an unhappy death. ‘Evildoers shall be cut off! (Psalm 36:9). The wicked shall be cut off by the divine justice. ‘For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!’ (Galatians 6:8). He that sows in sin, shall reap eternal torments. ‘Because I called and you refused, I also will laugh in your destruction and will mock when that shall come to you which you feared!’ (Proverbs 1:24, 26). I called, says the Lord, and you mocked me; but I will mock you at the hour of death. ‘Revenge is mine, and I will repay them in due time!’ (Deuteronomy 32:35). The chastisement of sins belongs to me, and I will execute vengeance on them when the time of vengeance shall arrive. ‘The man that with a stiff neck, that despises whoever reproves him, shall suddenly be destroyed, and health shall not follow him!’ (Proverbs 29:1). The man who obstinately despises those who correct him, shall be punished with a sudden death, and for him there shall be no hope of salvation. Now, brethren, what think you of these divine threats against sinners? Is it easy, or is it not very difficult, to save your souls, if, after so many divine calls, and after so many mercies, you continue to offend God?”
► FALSE REASONING #12: “You say: ‘But after all, it may happen that I will save my soul.’ I answer: “What folly is it to trust your salvation to a perhaps?” How many, having said ‘perhaps I may be saved,” are now in Hell? Do you wish to be one of their unhappy companions? Dearly beloved Christians, enter into yourselves, and tremble; for this sermon may be the last of Gods mercies to you!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon on the Temptation to Delusion and Illusion).
Tribulation a Medicine Against Temptation
“They who live in prosperity are molested by many temptations of pride, of vain-glory; of desires of acquiring greater wealth, great honors, and greater pleasures. Tribulations free us from these temptations, and make us humble and content in the state in which the Lord has placed us. Hence the Apostle says: ‘We are chastised by the Lord so that we may not be condemned with this world!’ (1 Corinthians 11:32). The man whom the Lord afflicts in this life has a certain proof that he is dear to God. The angel said to Tobias, ‘Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptations should prove thee!’ (Tobias 12:13). Hence, St. James pronounces blessed the man who is afflicted: ‘because after he shall have been proved by tribulation, he will receive the crown of life!’ (James 1:12).
God’s Help in Temptations
“It is true that when we have recourse to God with confidence in dangerous temptations, He assists us; but, in certain very urgent occasions, the Lord sometimes wishes that we cooperate, and do violence to ourselves, to resist temptations. On such occasions, it will not be enough to have recourse to God once or twice; it will be necessary to multiply prayers, and frequently to prostrate ourselves and send up our sighs before the image of the Blessed Virgin and the crucifix, crying out with tears: ‘Mary, my mother, help me! Jesus, my Savior, save me! For thy mercy’s sake do not abandon me, do not permit me to lose Thee!’
We have entered the first full week of Lent―a week that could well be called “Temptation Week”, which aptly summarizes what all of us will undergo, in one way or another, for the rest of Lent! Sunday’s Gospel saw the temptation of Christ by Satan. If Christ was tempted, how on earth can we expect not to be tempted? Experience shows all of us that we are surrounded by temptations on a daily basis―and experience show us all that we given in to those temptations many times!
In Holy Scripture we see the account of Our Lord’s battle with Satan in the desert, after He had fasted and prayed for forty days and nights (Matthew 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-13). In this triple temptation, Our Lord comes out on top against the wiles and temptations of Satan. It would seem that the prayer and fasting was the key to His victory. He Himself would later say, speaking of the devil: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20). Which is something He would essentially repeat during His Agony in the Garden, when He said to Peter, James and John: “Watch ye, and pray that ye enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak!” (Matthew 26:41; Mark 14:38).
The Story of the Battle by Matthew
“Then Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterwards He was hungry. And the tempter coming said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread!’ Who answered and said: ‘It is written, “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, and set Him upon the pinnacle of the Temple, and said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down, for it is written: “That He has given His angels charge over Thee, and in their hands shall they bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash thy foot against a stone!”’ Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!”’ Again the devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus saith to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him; and behold angels came and ministered to Him” (Matthew 4:1-11).
The Story of the Battle by Luke
“And Jesus, being full of the Holy Ghost, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the desert, for the space of forty days; and was tempted by the devil. And He ate nothing in those days; and when they were ended, He was hungry. And the devil said to Him: ‘If thou be the Son of God, say to this stone that it be made bread!’ And Jesus answered him: ‘It is written, that Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word of God!’ And the devil led Him into a high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time; and he said to Him: ‘To Thee will I give all this power, and the glory of them; for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them. If Thou therefore wilt adore before me, all shall be Thine!’ And Jesus answering said to him: ‘It is written: “Thou shalt adore the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ And he brought Him to Jerusalem, and set him on a pinnacle of the Temple, and he said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast thyself from hence. For it is written, that He hath given his angels charge over thee, that they keep thee! And that in their hands they shall bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash thy foot against a stone!’ And Jesus answering, said to him: ‘It is said: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!”’ And all the temptation being ended, the devil departed from Him for a time” (Luke 4:1-13).
Satan Leaves Only For a Time
Even though he was defeated by Christ in the desert, Satan would return to fight another day and in another way. Our life is meant to be one long struggle, one long war. Holy Scripture is very adamant on this: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) … “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8) … St. Paul says: “What concord hath Christ with Belial?” (2 Corinthians 6:15) ... “Fight the good fight of Faith: lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “And the Lord said: ‘Simon, Simon, behold Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy Faith fail not!” (Luke 22:31-32).
Satan’s Major Weapon—Temptation
The chief weapon of Satan is temptation—it is like a universal tool. It can be applied to any subject and to any person at any time. It was the weapon that was first successfully used against Adam and Eve, and it has stood the test of time. From Satan’s point of view, it is a very successful weapon, since, as most Saints and Father of the Church tell us, most souls end up being damned—yet that damnation is not inevitable and could have easily been avoided, if only they would have perseveringly taken the precautions that Christ has given us through His Church.
Just as temptation could be said to be the universal tool, the remedy or defense against temptation is also simple and universal—in that it works against each and every kind of temptation—it is quite simply prayer and fasting, fasting in the broadest sense of the word: not just keeping away from food, but many other things too. This is proved by Our Lord both in theory and in practice. He personally prayed and fasted in the desert for forty days and nights, after which He was able to overcome Satan’s temptations; and He also told us of the power of prayer and fasting against the devil: “But this kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20).
The plush and comfortable Titanic sailed into the graveyard of death; the uncomfortable and harsh conditions of the lifeboats saved the lives of a few on the desert of the sea. Do we want the Titanic or its lifeboat? The city or the desert? Pleasure or penance? Fun or fasting?
The Benefits of Temptation
The Imitation of Christ has some very sound advice and encouragement on temptations:
“So long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and temptation. Whence it is written in Job: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). Everyone, therefore, must guard against temptation and must watch in prayer lest the devil, who never sleeps but goes about seeking whom he may devour, find occasion to deceive him. No one is so perfect or so holy but he is sometimes tempted; man cannot be altogether free from temptation.
“Yet temptations, though troublesome and severe, are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many temptations and trials to profit by them, while those who could not resist became reprobate and fell away. There is no state so holy, no place so secret that temptations and trials will not come. Man is never safe from them as long as he lives, for they come from within us — in sin we were born. When one temptation or trial passes, another comes; we shall always have something to suffer because we have lost the state of original blessedness.
“Many people try to escape temptations, only to fall more deeply. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but by patience and true humility we become stronger than all our enemies. The man who only shuns temptations outwardly and does not uproot them will make little progress; indeed they will quickly return, more violent than before.
“Little by little, in patience and long-suffering you will overcome them, by the help of God rather than by severity and your own rash ways. Often take counsel when tempted; and do not be harsh with others who are tempted, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled.
“The beginning of all temptation lies in a wavering mind and little trust in God, for as a rudderless ship is driven hither and yon by waves, so a careless and irresolute man is tempted in many ways. Fire tempers iron and temptation steels the just. Often we do not know what we can stand, but temptation shows us what we are. Above all, we must be especially alert against the beginnings of temptation, for the enemy is more easily conquered if he is refused admittance to the mind and is met beyond the threshold when he knocks.
“Someone has said very aptly: ‘Resist the beginnings; remedies come too late, when, by long delay, the evil has gained strength.’ First, a mere thought comes to mind, then strong imagination, followed by pleasure, evil delight, and consent. Thus, because he is not resisted in the beginning, Satan gains full entry. And the longer a man delays in resisting, so much the weaker does he become each day, while the strength of the enemy grows against him.
“Some suffer great temptations in the beginning of their conversion, others toward the end, while some are troubled almost constantly throughout their life. Others, again, are tempted but lightly according to the wisdom and justice of Divine Providence Who weighs the status and merit of each and prepares all for the salvation of His elect.
“We should not despair, therefore, when we are tempted, but pray to God the more fervently that He may see fit to help us, for according to the word of Paul, He will make issue with temptation that we may be able to bear it. Let us humble our souls under the hand of God in every trial and temptation for He will save and exalt the humble in spirit.
“In temptations and trials the progress of a man is measured; in them opportunity for merit and virtue is made more manifest. When a man is not troubled it is not hard for him to be fervent and devout, but if he bears up patiently in time of adversity, there is hope for great progress. Some, guarded against great temptations, are frequently overcome by small ones in order that, humbled by their weakness in small trials, they may not presume on their own strength in great ones” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 13).
As the Imitation of Christ says (Book 1, chapter 13 “Of Resisting Temptations”): “Whence a certain one has said: ‘Resist beginnings; all too late is the cure, when ills have gathered strength by long delay.’ For first there comes into the mind a simple thought; then a strong imagination; afterwards delight, and then the evil motion and consent. And so, by little and little, the malignant foe gains full entrance when he is not resisted in the beginning. And the longer anyone has been slothful in resisting, so much the weaker he daily becomes in himself, and the enemy so much the stronger against him.” Our secular saying ― “A stitch in time saves nine” — paints a similar picture.
The following paragraphs are solely taken from the Sunday Sermons of St. Alphonsus Liguori. They are a compilation and arrangement of quotes that have been taken from many different sermons and welded together to form a united whole. Let this Doctor of Church be given center stage to give us his saintly and sound warnings and advice.
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI ON TEMPTATIONS & SIN
“Man in this life is encompassed with perils arising from the temptations of Hell, from the occasions of sin, from the scandals or bad counsels of men, from human respect, and, above all, and from the bad passions of corrupt nature, which are represented by the winds that agitate the sea and expose the ship to great danger of being lost. All would wish to be saved and to enjoy the glory of Paradise―but, to gain Heaven, it is necessary to walk in the straight road that leads to eternal bliss. This road is the observance of the divine commands. Hence, in his preaching, St. John the Baptist exclaimed: ‘Make straight the way of the Lord!’ In order to be able to walk always in the way of the Lord, without turning to the right or to the left, it is necessary to adopt the proper means. These means are, first, diffidence in ourselves; secondly, confidence in God; thirdly, resistance to temptations. Love is that golden link which binds the soul to God, and makes it faithful in repelling temptation and practicing virtue.
“To holy souls, the most severe afflictions are the temptations by which the devil impels them to offend God: but they who bear these temptations with patience, and banish them by turning to God for help, shall acquire great merit. St. Paul says: ‘God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able, but will also make issue with the temptation that you may be able to bear it!’ (1 Corinthians 10:13). God permits us to be molested by temptations, that, by banishing them, we may gain greater merit. Our Lord says: ‘Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted!’ (Matthew 5:5). They are blessed, because, according to the Apostle, our tribulations are momentary and very light, compared with the greatness of the glory which they shall obtain for us for eternity in Heaven. ‘For that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, works for us above measure exceedingly an eternal weight of glory’ (1 Corinthians 4:17).
“Since, then, brethren, you have resolved to give yourselves to God, listen to the admonition of the Holy Ghost: “Son, when you come into the service of God, prepare thyself for temptation.” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). Do not imagine that you shall have no more temptations, but prepare yourself for the combat, and guard against a relapse into the sins you have confessed; for, if you lose the grace of God again, you shall find it difficult to recover it. When we are tempted to relapse into sin, we must put our whole trust in the assistance of God, who infallibly hears all who invoke His aid. ‘He that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed, lest he fall!’ (1 Corinthians 10:12). They who are in the state of grace should, according to St. Paul, be careful not to fall into sin, particularly if they have been ever guilty of mortal sins; for a relapse into sin brings greater evil on the soul. If a wound be inflicted on any member of the body, that member certainly loses its original vigor. But, if it receives a second wound, it shall lose all strength and motion, without hope of recovery. Every sin, though pardoned, always leaves a wound on the soul. When, to this wound, a new one is added, the soul becomes so weak that, without a special and extraordinary grace from God, it is impossible for her to conquer temptations. The great evil, of a relapse into sin, is that it renders the soul so weak that she has but little strength to resist temptation. After relapsing into sin, a Christian loses the strength necessary to resist temptations, because ‘the Lord departs from him.’ He abandons him by withholding the efficacious aid necessary to overcome temptations; and the miserable man remains blind and abandoned in his sin.
Satanic Tempter
“The first enemy of the salvation of every Christian is his own corruption. ‘But every man is tempted by his own concupiscence, being drawn away and allured.’ (James 1:14). Along with the corrupt inclinations which live within us, and drag us to evil, we have many enemies from without that fight against us. We have the devils who tempt us, with whom the contest is very difficult, because they are stronger than we are. Hence, because we have to contend with powerful enemies, St. Paul exhorts us to arm ourselves with the divine aid: ‘Put you on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in high places.’ (Ephesians 6:11-12). The devil, according to St. Peter, is a lion who is continually going about roaring, through the rage and hunger which impel him to devour our souls. ‘Your adversary, the devil, like a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!’ (1 Peter 5:8). St. Cyprian says that Satan is continually lying in wait for us, in order to make us his slaves. God is faithful, He will never permit us to be tempted above our strength.
“When the devil tempts you, remember Hell, the thought of Hell will preserve you from that land of misery. I say, remember Hell and have recourse to Jesus Christ and to most holy Mary, and they will deliver you from sin, which is the gate of Hell. Have recourse to God and to the Blessed Virgin in the time of temptation, by repeating oftentimes the name of Jesus and Mary, and continuing to invoke their aid until the temptation ceases. In all temptations have immediate recourse to her, saying: ‘Mary, help me!’ To resist every temptation, it is sufficient to pronounce the names of Jesus and Mary; and if the temptation continues, let us continue to invoke Jesus and Mary, and the devil shall never be able to conquer us.
Temptation and Eternity
“Let us keep in mind the words of the Gospel: ‘How narrow is the gate and straight is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!’ (Matthew 7:14). The way to Heaven is straight and narrow: they who wish to arrive at that place of bliss by walking in the paths of pleasure, shall be disappointed―and therefore few reach it, because few are willing to use violence to themselves in resisting temptations: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!’ (Matthew 11:12). It must be sought and obtained by violence―he who wishes to obtain it without inconvenience, or by leading a soft and irregular life, shall not acquire it, but he shall be excluded from it.
“St. James teaches that every man has within himself a powerful enemy, that is, his own evil inclinations, which tempt him to sin. ‘Every man is tempted by his own concupiscence, drawn away, and allured!’ (James 1:14). If, then, we do not fly from the external occasions of sin, how can we resist temptation and avoid sin? Let us, therefore, place before our eyes the general remedy which Jesus has prescribed for conquering temptations and saving our souls. ‘If thy right eye scandalize thee, pluck it out and cast it from thee!’ (Matthew 5:29). If you find that your right eye is to you a cause of damnation, you must pull it out and cast it far from you; that is, when there is danger of losing your soul, you must fly from all evil occasions.
A Matter of Salvation or Damnation!
“St. John Chrysostom, says that this is not a question of losing some earthly good which we must one day relinquish―but there is question of losing Paradise, and of going to suffer forever in Hell. We must fear and tremble; it is thus we shall be able to secure eternal happiness. ‘With fear and trembling work out your salvation.’ (Philippians 2:12). Hence, if we wish to save our souls, we must labor strenuously to avoid dangerous occasions, to resist temptations, and to frequent the sacraments. Without labor we cannot obtain Heaven. ‘The violent bear it away.’ The saints tremble at the thought of eternity. St. Andrew Avellino exclaimed with tears: ‘Who knows whether I shall be saved or damned?’ St. Louis Bertrand said with trembling: ‘What shall be my lot in the other world?’ And shall we not tremble? Let us pray to Jesus Christ and his most holy Mother to help us to save our souls. This is for us the most important of all affairs: if we succeed in it, we shall be eternally happy; if we fail, we must be forever miserable.
“Let us stop to consider the remorse of the damned. Each of the damned souls will say for eternity: ‘If I had only abstained from such a gratification; if in certain circumstances I had only overcame human respect; if I had only avoided such an occasion of sin, or such a companion, I should not now be damned; if I had frequented some pious sodality; if I had gone to confession every week; if in temptations I had recommended myself to God, I would not have relapsed into sin. I have so often proposed to do these things, but I have not done them. I began to practice these means of salvation, but afterwards gave them up―and thus I am lost!’
“To save their souls, some of the saints have retired into the cloister; some have confined themselves in a cave; others have embraced torments and death. ‘The violent bear it away.’ Some complain of their lack of confidence in God; but they do not perceive that their diffidence arises from the weakness of their resolution to serve God. St. Teresa used to say: ‘Of irresolute souls the devil has no fear.’ And Scripture has declared, that ‘desires kill the slothful!’ (Proverbs 21:25). Some would wish to be saved and to become saints, but they never resolve to adopt the means of salvation, such as meditation, the frequentation of the sacraments, detachment from creatures; or, if they adopt these means, they soon give them up. In a word, they are satisfied with fruitless desires, and thus continue to live in enmity with God, or at least in tepidity, which in the end leads them to the loss of God. Thus in them are verified the words of the Holy Ghost: ‘desires kill the slothful!’ If, then, we wish to save our souls, and to become saints, we must make a strong resolution not only in general to give ourselves to God, but also in particular to adopt the proper means, and never to abandon them after having once taken them up. Hence we must never cease to pray to Jesus Christ, and to His holy Mother for holy perseverance.
Do Not Tempt God!
“In the Sacred Scriptures it is written: ‘Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!’ The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations―or without at least asking God’s help to conquer them and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice―tempts God to work miracles, or rather expects God to show to him an extraordinary mercy that is not extended to the generality of Christians. Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. But God does not forget them. He numbers the graces which He dispenses, as well as the sins which we commit. Hence, when the time which He has fixed arrives, God deprives us of His graces, and begins to inflict chastisement. When sins reach a certain number, God pardons no more! Be attentive! When the devil tempts you again to yield to sin, say to yourself: ‘If God pardons me no more, then what shall become of me for all eternity?’
“Give glory to God, and confusion to the devil. A certain penitent was tempted by Satan to conceal a sin through shame; but she was resolved to confess it; and while she was going to her confessor, the devil came forward and asked her where she was going. She courageously answered: ‘I am going to cover myself and you with confusion!’ Act you in a similar manner; if you have ever concealed a mortal sin, confess it candidly to your director, and confound the devil. Remember that the greater the violence you do yourself in confessing your sins, the greater will be the love with which Jesus Christ will embrace you. Go as soon as possible in search of a confessor. Do not give the devil time to continue to tempt you and to make you put off your confession: go immediately: for Jesus Christ is waiting for you.”
The Dangerous Temptation of Venial Sin
► LITTLE SINS LEAD TO BIG SINS: “The fall of many souls into mortal sin follows from habitual venial sins; for these render the soul so weak that, when a strong temptation assails her, she has not strength to resist it, and she falls. With the ordinary assistance of God, we cannot avoid falling into some mortal sin: a special aid is necessary. But this special aid God will justly withhold from tepid souls who are regardless of committing, with full deliberation, many venial sins. Thus these unhappy souls shall not persevere in grace. They who are ungenerous to God well deserve that God should not be generous to them. ‘He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!’ (2 Corinthians 9:6). To such souls the Lord will give the graces common to all, but will probably withhold his special assistance; and without this, as we have seen, they cannot persevere without falling into mortal sin. Hence the soul, that finds no more nourishment and consolation in her devout exercises, in her prayers, Communions, or visits to the Blessed Sacrament, will soon neglect them, and thus neglecting the means of eternal salvation, she shall be in great danger of being lost.
► SAINTS WARN OF VENIAL SINS: “God himself revealed to Blessed Henry Suso, that, for tepid souls who are content with leading a life exempt from mortal sin, and continue to commit many deliberate venial sins, it is very difficult to preserve themselves in the state of grace. St. Bernard teaches that, as long as a person who is guilty of defects detests his faults, there is reason to hope that he will one day correct them and amend his life: but when he commits faults without endeavoring to amend, he will continually go from bad to worse, till he loses the grace of God. St. Gregory says, that the man, who struggled for a time before he fell into the habit of sin, as soon as he contracts the habit, yields and yields again to every temptation, with as much facility as a straw is moved by the slightest blast of wind. Habitual sinners, according to St. John Chrysostom, become so weak in resisting the attacks of the devil, that, dragged to sin by their evil habit, they are sometimes driven to sin against their inclination.
“St. Augustine says that, like a certain disease of the skin which makes the body an object of disgust, habitual faults, when committed without any effort of amendment, render the soul so disgusting to God, that he deprives her of his embraces. This danger will be still greater for those who commit many venial sins through attachment to any passion, such as pride, ambition, aversion to a neighbor, or an inordinate affection for any person. St. Francis of Assisi says that, in endeavoring to draw to sin a soul that is afraid of being in enmity with God, the devil does not seek in the beginning to bind her with the chain of a slave, by tempting her to commit mortal sin, because she would have a horror of yielding to mortal sin, and would guard herself against it. He first endeavors to bind her by a single hair; then by a slender thread; next by a cord; afterwards by a rope; and in the end by a chain of Hell that is, by mortal sin; and thus he makes her his slave.
“Miserable the soul that allows herself to be the slave of any passion. ‘Behold, how small a fire, what a great forest it kindles!’ (James 3:5). A small spark, if it be not extinguished, will set fire to an entire forest; that is, an unmodified passion shall bring the soul to ruin. Passion blinds us; and the blind often fall into an abyss when they least expect it. According to St. Ambrose, the devil is constantly endeavoring to find out the passion which rules in our heart, and the pleasures which have the greatest attraction for us. When he discovers them, he presents occasions of indulging them: he then excites concupiscence, and prepares a chain to make us the slaves of Hell.”
► AT PEACE WITH VENIAL SIN: “Many are unwilling to be separated from God by mortal sins; they wish to follow Him, but at a distance, and regardless of venial sins. But to them shall probably happen what befell St. Peter. When Jesus Christ was seized in the garden, St. Peter was unwilling to abandon the Lord, but ‘followed Him afar off’ (Matthew 26:58). After entering the house of Caiphas, he was charged with being a disciple of Jesus Christ. He was instantly seized with fear, and three times denied his Master. The Holy Ghost says: ‘He that despises small things shall fall by little and little’ (Ecclesiasticus 19:1). They who despise small falls will probably one day fall into an abyss; for, being in the habit of committing light offences against God, they will feel but little repugnance to offer to him some grievous insult.
“The Lord says: ‘Catch us the little foxes that destroy the vines’ (Canticles 2:15). He does not tell us to catch the lions or the bears, but the little foxes. Lions and bears strike terror, and therefore everyone is careful to keep at a distance from them, through fear of being devoured by them; but the little foxes, though they do not excite dismay, destroy the vine by drying up its roots. Mortal sin terrifies the timorous soul; but, if she accustoms herself to committing many venial sins with full deliberation, and without endeavoring to correct them, they, like the little foxes, shall destroy the roots that is, the remorse of conscience, the fear of offending God, and the holy desires of advancing in divine love; and thus, being in a state of tepidity, and impelled to sin by some passion, the soul will easily abandon God and lose the divine grace.
“Moreover, deliberate and habitual venial sins, not only deprive us of strength to resist temptations, but also of the special helps without which we fall into grievous sins. St. John Chrysostom asserts, that he himself knew many persons who were gifted with great virtues, and who, because they disregarded light faults, fell into an abyss of crime. When the devil cannot gain much from us, he is, in the beginning, content with little gains―by many trifling victories he will make a great conquest. No one, says St. Bernard, suddenly falls from the state of grace into the abyss of wickedness. They who rush into the most grievous irregularities, begin by committing light faults.”
Praying Against Temptation
“Be attentive, brethren; for this is a point of great importance. It is certain, that of ourselves we have not sufficient strength to resist the temptations of the devil, of the flesh, and of the world. It is God that prevents our enemies from assailing us with temptations by which we would be conquered. Hence Jesus Christ has taught us the following prayer: ‘And lead us not into temptation!’ He teaches us to pray that God may deliver us from the temptations to which we would yield, and thus lose His grace. Now, venial sins, when they are deliberate and habitual, deprive us of the special helps of God which are necessary for preservation in his grace.”
The Lies and False Reasoning of the Devil in Temptations
► FALSE REASONING #1: “Place before your eyes the delusion by which the devil tempts men to sin and to persevere in sin, so that you may know how to guard yourselves against his deceitful artifices. To understand these delusions better, let us imagine the case of a young man who, seized by some passion, lives in sin and is thus the slave of Satan, and never thinks of his eternal salvation. My son, I say to him, what sort of life do you lead? If you continue to live in this manner, how will you be able to save your soul? But, behold, the devil, on the other hand, says to him: ‘Why should you be afraid of being lost? Indulge your passions for the present: you will afterwards confess your sins, and thus all shall be remedied!’ Behold the net by which the devil drags so many souls into Hell.”
► FALSE REASONING #2: “The devil says: ‘Indulge your passions: you will hereafter make a good confession!’ But, in reply, I say, that in the meantime you lose your soul. Tell me: if you had a jewel worth a thousand pounds, would you throw it into a river with the hope of afterwards finding it again? What if all your efforts to find it were fruitless? My God! You hold in your hand the invaluable jewel of your soul, which Jesus Christ has purchased with His own Blood, and you cast it into Hell! Yes; you cast it into Hell; because according to the present order of providence, for every mortal sin you commit, your name is written among the number of the damned.”
► FALSE REASONING #3: “But you say: ‘I hope to recover God’s grace by making a good confession.’ And if you should not recover it, what shall be the consequences? To make a good confession, a true sorrow for sin is necessary, and this sorrow is the gift of God: if He does not give it, will you not be lost forever?”
► FALSE REASONING #4: “You answer: ‘I am young; God is compassionate to my youth! I will hereafter give myself to God!’ Behold another delusion! You are young; but do you not know that God counts, not the years, but the sins of each individual? You are young; but how many sins have you committed? Perhaps there are many persons of a very advanced age, who have not been guilty of the fourth part of the sins which you have committed. And do you not know that God has fixed for each of us the number of sins which He will pardon? ‘The Lord patiently expects that, when the Day of Judgment shall come, He may punish them in the fullness of their sins’ (2 Machabees 6:14). God has patience, and waits for a while; but, when the measure of the sins, which He has determined to pardon, is filled up, He pardons no more, but chastises the sinner, by suddenly depriving him of life in the miserable state of sin, or by abandoning him in his sin, and executing His threats.”
► FALSE REASONING #5: “You say: ‘I cannot, at the present time, resist this passion!’ Behold the third delusion of the devil, by which he makes you believe that, at present, you have not strength to overcome certain temptations. But St. Paul tells us that God is faithful, and that He never permits us to be tempted above our strength. ‘And God is faithful, who will not permit you to be tempted above that which you are able’ (1 Corinthians 10:13). I ask―if you are not now able to resist the temptation, how can you expect to resist it hereafter? If you yield to it, the devil will become stronger, and you shall become weaker; and if you be not now able to extinguish this flame of passion, how can you hope to be able to extinguish it when it shall have grown more violent?”
► FALSE REASONING #6: “You say: ‘God will give me his aid!’ But this aid God is ready to give at present if you ask it. Why then do you not implore his assistance? Perhaps you expect that, without now taking the trouble of invoking his aid, you will receive from him increased helps and graces, after you shall have multiplied the number of your sins? Perhaps you doubt the veracity of God, who has promised to give whatever we ask of him? ‘Ask,’ he says, ‘and it shall be given you!’ (Matthew 7:7). God cannot violate his promises. Have recourse to Him, and He will give you the strength necessary to resist the temptation. God commands you to resist it, and you say: ‘I have not strength.’ Does God, then, command impossibilities? No; the Council of Trent has declared that ‘God does not command impossibilities; but, by His commands, He admonishes you to do what you can, and to ask for what you cannot do; and He assists, that you may be able to do it.’ (Session 6; canon xiii).
“When you see that you have not sufficient strength to resist temptation with the ordinary assistance of God, ask of Him the additional help which you require, and He will give it to you; and thus you shall be able to conquer all temptations, however violent they may be. But you will not pray; and you say that at present you will commit this sin, and will afterwards confess it. But, I ask, how do you know that God will give you time to confess it?”
► FALSE REASONING #7: “You say: ‘I will go to confession before the week is over!’ And who has promised you this week? Well, then you say: ‘I will go to confession tomorrow!’, you say. And who promises you tomorrow? St. Augustine says: ‘God has not promised you tomorrow. Perhaps he will give it, and perhaps he will refuse it to you!’ — as he has to so many others. How many have gone to bed in good health, and have been found dead in the morning! How many, in the very act of sin, has the Lord struck dead and sent to Hell! Should this happen to you, how will you repair your eternal ruin?”
► FALSE REASONING #8: “The devil tells you: ‘Commit this sin, and confess it afterwards.’ Behold the deceitful artifice by which the devil has brought so many thousands of Christians to Hell. We scarcely ever find a Christian so sunk in despair as to intend to damn himself. All the wicked sin with the hope of afterwards going to confession. But, by this illusion, how many have brought themselves to perdition! For them there is now no time for confession, no remedy for their damnation. They fell, but failed to rise. They fell once too often.”
► FALSE REASONING #9: “You say: ‘But God is merciful!’ Behold another common delusion by which the devil encourages sinners to persevere in a life of sin! A certain author has said, that more souls have been sent to Hell by the mercy of God than by His justice. This is indeed the case; for men are induced by the deceits of the devil to persevere in sin, through confidence in God’s mercy; and thus they are lost. God is merciful. Who denies it? But, great as His mercy, how many does He every day send to Hell? God is merciful, but He is also just, and is, therefore, obliged to punish those who offend Him. “And His mercy,” says the divine Mother, ‘is to them that fear Him!’ (Luke 1:50). But with regard to those who abuse His mercy and despise Him, He exercises justice. The Lord pardons sins, but He cannot pardon the determination to commit sin. St. Augustine says, that he who sins, with the intention of repenting after his sins, is not a penitent but a scoffer. The Apostle St. Paul tells us that God will not be mocked. ‘Be not deceived! God is not mocked!’ (Galatians 6:7). It would be a mockery of God to insult Him as often and as much as you pleased, and afterwards to expect eternal glory.”
► FALSE REASONING #10: “You say: ‘Since God has shown me so many mercies until now, I am hopeful that He will continue to do so for the future!’ Behold another delusion! Then, because God has not as yet chastised your sins, He will never punish them! On the contrary, the greater have been His mercies, the more you should tremble, lest, if you offend Him again, He should pardon you no more, and should take vengeance on your sins. Behold the advice of the Holy Ghost: ‘Say not: “I have sinned, and what harm hath befallen me?” For the Most High is a patient rewarder.’ (Ecclesiasticus 5:4). Do not say: ‘I have sinned, and no chastisement has fallen upon me!’ God bears for a time, but not forever. He waits for a certain time; but when that arrives, He then chastises the sinner for all His past iniquities: and the longer He has waited for repentance, the more severe the chastisement. Therefore, my brother, since you know that you have frequently offended God, and that he has not sent you to Hell, you should exclaim: ‘O the mercies of the Lord that we are not consumed!’ (Lamentations 3:22), ‘Lord, I thank You for not having sent me to Hell, which I have so often deserved!’
“And therefore you ought to give yourself entirely to God, at least through gratitude, and should consider that, for less sins than you have committed, many are now in that pit of fire, without the smallest hope of being ever released from it. The patience of God in bearing with you, should teach you not to despise him still more, but to love and serve him with greater fervor, and to atone, by penitential austerities and by other holy works, for the insults you have offered to him. You know that he has shown mercies to you, which he has not shown to others. ‘He has not done in like manner to every nation’ (Psalm 147:20). Hence you should tremble, lest, if you commit a single additional mortal sin, God should abandon you, and cast you into Hell.”
► FALSE REASONING #11: “Let us come to the next illusion. “It is true that, by this sin, I lose the grace of God! But, even after committing this sin, I may be saved!” You may, indeed, be saved―but it cannot be denied that if, after having committed so many sins, and after having received so many graces from God, you again offend him, there is great reason to fear that you shall be lost. Attend to the words of the sacred Scripture: ‘A hard heart shall fare evil at the last!’ (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). The obstinate sinner shall die an unhappy death. ‘Evildoers shall be cut off! (Psalm 36:9). The wicked shall be cut off by the divine justice. ‘For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!’ (Galatians 6:8). He that sows in sin, shall reap eternal torments. ‘Because I called and you refused, I also will laugh in your destruction and will mock when that shall come to you which you feared!’ (Proverbs 1:24, 26). I called, says the Lord, and you mocked me; but I will mock you at the hour of death. ‘Revenge is mine, and I will repay them in due time!’ (Deuteronomy 32:35). The chastisement of sins belongs to me, and I will execute vengeance on them when the time of vengeance shall arrive. ‘The man that with a stiff neck, that despises whoever reproves him, shall suddenly be destroyed, and health shall not follow him!’ (Proverbs 29:1). The man who obstinately despises those who correct him, shall be punished with a sudden death, and for him there shall be no hope of salvation. Now, brethren, what think you of these divine threats against sinners? Is it easy, or is it not very difficult, to save your souls, if, after so many divine calls, and after so many mercies, you continue to offend God?”
► FALSE REASONING #12: “You say: ‘But after all, it may happen that I will save my soul.’ I answer: “What folly is it to trust your salvation to a perhaps?” How many, having said ‘perhaps I may be saved,” are now in Hell? Do you wish to be one of their unhappy companions? Dearly beloved Christians, enter into yourselves, and tremble; for this sermon may be the last of Gods mercies to you!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon on the Temptation to Delusion and Illusion).
Tribulation a Medicine Against Temptation
“They who live in prosperity are molested by many temptations of pride, of vain-glory; of desires of acquiring greater wealth, great honors, and greater pleasures. Tribulations free us from these temptations, and make us humble and content in the state in which the Lord has placed us. Hence the Apostle says: ‘We are chastised by the Lord so that we may not be condemned with this world!’ (1 Corinthians 11:32). The man whom the Lord afflicts in this life has a certain proof that he is dear to God. The angel said to Tobias, ‘Because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptations should prove thee!’ (Tobias 12:13). Hence, St. James pronounces blessed the man who is afflicted: ‘because after he shall have been proved by tribulation, he will receive the crown of life!’ (James 1:12).
God’s Help in Temptations
“It is true that when we have recourse to God with confidence in dangerous temptations, He assists us; but, in certain very urgent occasions, the Lord sometimes wishes that we cooperate, and do violence to ourselves, to resist temptations. On such occasions, it will not be enough to have recourse to God once or twice; it will be necessary to multiply prayers, and frequently to prostrate ourselves and send up our sighs before the image of the Blessed Virgin and the crucifix, crying out with tears: ‘Mary, my mother, help me! Jesus, my Savior, save me! For thy mercy’s sake do not abandon me, do not permit me to lose Thee!’
Article 17
First Sunday of Lent, March 9th
The Time is NOW!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
First Sunday of Lent, March 9th
The Time is NOW!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
It’s Time!
The word “time” is another one of those “four-letter” words that we don’t like―such as “Lent”, “fast”, “pray”, “alms”, etc. “Time” is an ambiguous word which at times (pardon the pun) we can both like and hate. We like having time for fun, games, parties, socials, sports, shopping, watching TV, browsing the internet and social media, etc. But we hate it when it’s time for Lent, time for prayer, time for penance, time for fasting, time for Mass, time for Confession, time for spiritual reading, time for meditation, etc. That is why the vast majority of time in families is spent on worldly and material things rather than spending time on spiritual and religious things.
Holy Mother Church, on this First Sunday of Lent, tells us in her readings at Mass: “Receive not the grace of God in vain! For the Lord says: ‘In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time! Behold, now is the day of salvation!” (Epistle reading from the Second Letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians, 6:1-2).
Holy Scripture tells us that there is time for everything: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under Heaven! A time to be born and a time to die! A time to plant, and a time to uproot that which is planted! A time to kill and a time to heal! A time to destroy, and a time to build! A time to weep and a time to laugh! A time to mourn and a time to dance! A time to scatter and a time to gather! A time to embrace and a time to be far from embraces! A time to get and a time to lose! A time to keep and a time to cast away! A time to tear and a time to sew! A time to keep silence and a time to speak! A time of love and a time of hatred! A time of war and a time of peace!” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8).
It’s Time for Penance!
Right now, it is a time to do penance; a time to weep for sin; a time to change our lives; a time to repair the damage our sins have caused; a time to pay our debt for sin; a time to pull away from the world; a time to draw closer to God! “God has given him time for penance, but he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). “Of this one thing be not ignorant, my beloved, that one day with the Lord is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like one day. The Lord delays not His promise [to chastise], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that anyone should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:8-9). St. Paul warns us to make the best use of the time, because the days are evil (Ephesians 5:16). “You know not what shall be tomorrow! For what is your life? It is like a vapor which appears for a little while, and afterwards shall vanish away!” (James 4:14-15). “Man born of a woman, living for a short time, is filled with many miseries” (Job 14:1). “Time passes like a shadow” (Ecclesiastes 7:1). “Our time is as the passing of a shadow” (Wisdom 2:5). We need to use well what little time we have! That is why Holy Mother Church presents to us―in the Gospel reading on this First Sunday of Lent―the example of Our Lord fasting for forty days and nights in the desert and fighting-off the temptations of the devil.
“At that time, Jesus was led into the desert by the Spirit, to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting forty days and forty nights, He was hungry. And the tempter came and said to Him: ‘If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become loaves of bread!’ But He answered and said: ‘It is written, “Not by bread alone does man live, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him into the holy city and set Him on the pinnacle of the Temple, and said to Him: ‘If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down! For it is written, “He has given His angels charge concerning You; and upon their hands they shall bear You up, lest You dash Your foot against a stone.”’ Jesus said to him: ‘It is written further, “You shall not tempt the Lord your God!”’ Again, the devil took Him to a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them. And he said to Him: ‘All these things will I give You, if You will fall down and worship me!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord your God shall you worship and Him only shall you serve!”’ Then the devil left Him and, behold, angels came and ministered to Him” (Matthew 4:1-11). We read a little further in the same chapter that “from that time Jesus began to preach, and to say: ‘Do penance! For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!’” (Matthew 4:17).
► ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (in his Sunday Sermons) says: “In this day’s Gospel, for the First Sunday of Lent, we read that, having gone into the desert, Jesus Christ permitted the devil to ‘set Him upon the pinnacle of the Temple,’ and say to Him: ‘If thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down’―for the angels shall preserve Thee from all injury. But the Lord answered that, in the Sacred Scriptures it is written: ‘Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!’ The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations―or without at least asking God’s help to conquer them and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice―tempts God to work miracles, or rather to show to him an extraordinary mercy that is not extended to the generality of Christians. God, as the Apostle says, ‘wants all men to be saved,’ (1 Timothy 2:4); but He also wishes us all to labor for our own salvation, at least by adopting the means of overcoming our enemies, and of obeying Him when he calls us to repentance.
“Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. As often as you sinned you banished Him from your souls. And, instead of abandoning you, what has the Lord done? He has placed Himself at the door of your ungrateful hearts, and, by His knocking, has made you feel that He was outside, and seeking for admission: ‘Behold I stand at the gate and knock!’ (Apocalypse 3:20). ‘My jaws are become hoarse!’ (Psalm 48:4). ‘My son,’ says the Lord, ‘I have almost lost my voice in calling you to repentance!’ ‘I am weary of entreating thee!’ (Jeremias 15:5). ‘I have become weary in imploring you to offend Me no more!’”
It’s an Acceptable Time! A Time of Salvation!
In view of this, we repeat the earlier quote from today’s Epistle: “Receive not the grace of God in vain! For the Lord says: ‘In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time! Behold, now is the day of salvation!” To which can be added: “It is time to have mercy, for the time is come!” (Psalm 101:14). “The time of salvation” (Ecclesiasticus 4:28). “A time of healing” (Jeremias 8:15). “The time to seek the Lord” (Osee 10:12). “Observe the time and flee from evil!” (Ecclesiasticus 4:23).
Holy Scripture speaks of “the time of the expiation” (Leviticus 25:9) and that is what Lent is―a time of expiation. But―just as Scripture says―we are reluctant to pay the debt for our sins, we want more time, we want to put off the time of payment, we complain about having to pay: “When they should repay, they will ask for time, and will return tedious and murmuring words, and will complain of the time!” (Ecclesiasticus 29:6).
Time for St. Alphonsus Liguori’s Words on Time
Let us pay heed to the words of ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (taken from his Sunday Sermons) on the subject of time and its importance. St. Alphonsus says: “There is nothing shorter than time, but there is nothing more valuable. There is nothing shorter than time―because the past is no more, the future is uncertain, and the present is only but a moment. This is what Jesus Christ meant when He said: ‘A little while, and now you shall not see Me!’ We may say the same of our life, which, according to St. James, is but a vapor, which is soon scattered forever: ‘For what is your life? It is a vapor which appears for a little while!’ (James 4:14). But the time of this life is as precious as it is short; for, in every moment, if we spend it well, we can acquire treasures of merits for Heaven; but, if we employ time badly, we may in each moment commit sin, and merit Hell.”
“In Scripture we read: ‘Thus says the Lord: “In an acceptable time I have heard thee, and in the day of salvation I have helped thee!”’ (Isaias 49:8). St. Paul explains this passage, and says, that the ‘acceptable time’ is the time in which God has determined to confer his favors upon us. He then adds: ‘Behold, now is the acceptable time! Behold, now is the day of salvation!’ (2 Corinthians 6:2). The Apostle exhorts us not to spend the present time unprofitably―which he calls the day of salvation―because, perhaps, after this day of salvation, there shall be no salvation for us. Since, then, the time which we have to remain on this Earth is short, the Apostle tells those who weep, that they ought not to weep, because their sorrows shall soon pass away; and those who rejoice, not to fix their affections on their enjoyments, because they shall soon have an end. Hence he concludes, that we should use this world, not to enjoy its transitory goods, but to merit eternal life.
“The Holy Ghost says: ‘Son, observe the time!’ (Ecclesiasticus 4:2-3). Son, learn to preserve time, which is the most precious and the greatest gift that God can bestow upon you. St. Bernardine of Sienna teaches that time is of as much value as God; because in every moment of time well spent the possession of God is merited. He adds that in every instant of this life a man may obtain the pardon of his sins, the grace of God, and the glory of Paradise. Hence St. Bonaventure says that ‘no loss is of greater moment than the loss of time’ (Sermon 37 in Septuagesima). But, in another place, St. Bernardine says that, ‘though there is nothing more precious than time, there is nothing less valuable in the estimation of men.’ (Sermon 2, ad Schol). You will see some persons spending four or five hours in play. If you ask them why they lose so much time, they answer: ‘To amuse ourselves!’ Others remain half the day standing in the street, or looking out from a window. If you ask them what they are doing, they shall say in reply, that they are passing the time. And why says the same saint, do you lose this time? Why should you lose even a single hour, which the mercy of God gives you to weep for your sins, and to acquire the divine grace?
“O time―despised by men during life―how much shall you be desired at the hour of death, and particularly in the other world! Time is a blessing which we enjoy only in this life; it is not enjoyed in the next; time is not found in Heaven, nor in Hell. In Hell, the damned exclaim with tears: “Oh if only another hour would be given to us!” They would pay any price for an hour, or for a minute, in which they might repair their eternal ruin. But this hour, or minute, they never shall have. In Heaven there is no weeping; but, if the saints were capable of sorrow, all their wailing should arise from the thought of having lost, in this life, the time in which they could have acquired greater glory, and from the conviction that this time shall never more be given to them.
“A deceased Benedictine nun appeared in glory to a certain person, and said that she was in Heaven, and in the enjoyment of perfect happiness; but that, if she could desire anything, it would be to return to life, and to suffer affliction, in order to merit an increase of glory. And she added that, to acquire the glory which corresponded to a single Ave Maria, she would be content to suffer till the Day of Judgment the long and painful sickness which brought on her death. Hence, St. Francis Borgia was careful to employ every moment time for God. When others spoke of useless things; he conversed with God by holy affections; and so recollected was he that, when asked his opinion on the subject of conversation, he knew not what answer to make. Being corrected for this, he said: ‘I am content to be considered stupid, rather than lose my time in vanities!’
“Is it not, I ask, an evil to spend your time in plays, in conversations, and useless occupations, which are unprofitable to the soul? Does God give you this time to lose it? On the Day of Judgment, Jesus Christ shall demand an account, not only of every month and day that has been lost, but even of every idle word. “Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it on the Day of Judgment” (Matthew 12:36). He shall likewise demand an account of every moment of the time which you shall lose. According to St. Bernard, all time which is not spent for God is lost time. What you can do today defer not till tomorrow; for on tomorrow you may be dead, and may be gone into another world, where you shall have no more time to do good, and where you shall only enjoy the reward of your virtues, or suffer the punishment due to your sins. God calls you to confess your sins, to restore ill-gotten goods, to be reconciled with your enemies. Obey His call today; for it may happen that on tomorrow time may be no more for you, or that God will call you no more. All our salvation depends on corresponding with the divine calls, and at the time that God calls us. ‘Delay not to be converted to the Lord, and defer it not from day to day; for His wrath shall come on a sudden” (Ecclesiasticus 5:8-9).
“If you find your soul in the state of sin, delay not your repentance nor your confession; do not put them off even till tomorrow; for, if you do not obey the voice of God calling you today to confess your sins, death may this day overtake you in sin, and tomorrow there may be no hope of salvation for you. The devil regards the whole of our life as very short, and therefore he loses not a moment of time, but tempts us day and night. “The devil is come down unto you having great wrath, knowing that he has but a short time!” (Apocalypse 12:12). The enemy, then, never loses time in seeking to bring us to Hell: and shall we squander the time which God has given us to save our souls?
“St. Bernardine weeps over the blindness of those negligent Christians who ‘squander the days of salvation, and never consider that a day once lost shall never return.’ At the hour of death they shall wish for another year, or for another day; but they shall not have it―they shall then be told that ‘Time shall be no more!’ What price would they not then give for another week, for a day, or even for an hour, to prepare the account which they must then render to God? St. Lawrence Justinian says, that ‘for a single hour they would give all their property, all their honors, and all their delights.’ (Vit. Solit., cap. x). But this hour shall not be granted to them. The priest, who attends them, shall say: “Depart, depart immediately from this Earth―for your time is no more! Go forth, Christian soul, from this world!”
“What will it profit the sinner who has led an irregular life, to exclaim at death: ‘Oh if I had only led a life of sanctity! Oh, if I had only spent my years in loving God!’ How great is the anguish of a traveler, who, when the night has fallen, perceives that he has missed the way, and that there is no more time to correct his mistake! Such shall be the anguish at death of those who have lived many years in the world, but have not spent them for God. Hence the Redeemer says to all: ‘Walk whilst you have light, that the darkness overtake you not!’ (John 12:35). Walk in the way of salvation, now that you have the light, before you are surprised by the darkness of death, in which you can do nothing. You can then only weep over the time which you have lost.
In Holy Scripture we read: ‘He has called against me the time!’ (Lamentations 1:15). At the hour of death, conscience will remind us of all the time which we have had to become saints, and which we have employed in multiplying our debts to God. It will remind us of all the calls and of all the graces which he has given us to make us love him, and which we have abused. At that awful moment we shall also see that the way of salvation is closed forever. In the midst of these remorses, and of the torturing darkness of death, the dying sinner shall say: ‘O fool that I have been! Life misspent! Lost years, in which I could have gained treasures of merits, and have become a saint! But I have neglected both, and now the time of saving my soul is gone forever!’ But of what use shall these wailings and lamentations be, when the scene of this world is about to close, the lamp is on the point of being extinguished, and when the dying Christian has arrived at that great moment on which eternity depends?
“Our Lord said: ‘Be you then also ready ― for at what hour you think not, the Son of Man will come” (Luke 12:40). The Lord says: ‘Be prepared!’ He does not tell us to prepare ourselves when death approaches, but to be ready for His coming; because when we think least of death, the Son of Man shall come and demand an account of our whole life. In the confusion of death, it will be most difficult to adjust our accounts, so as to appear guiltless before the tribunal of Jesus Christ. Perhaps death may not come upon us for twenty or thirty years; but it may also come very soon, perhaps in a year, or in a month. If anyone had reason to fear that a trial should take place, on which his life depended, he certainly would not wait for the day of the trial, but would as soon as possible employ an advocate to plead his cause. And what do we do? We know for certain that we must one day be judged, and that on the result of that judgment our eternal, not our temporal, life depends. We also know that that day may be very near at hand―and still we lose our time, and, instead of adjusting our accounts, we go on daily multiplying the crimes which will merit for us the sentence of eternal death.
“If, then, we have hitherto employed our time in offending God, let us henceforth endeavor to bewail our misfortune for the remainder of our life, and say continually with the penitent King Ezechias: ‘I will recount to thee all my years in the bitterness of my soul’ (Isaias 38:15). The Lord gives us the remaining days of life, so that we may compensate the time that has been badly spent. ‘Whilst we have time, let us work good!’ (Galatians 6:10). Let us not provoke the Lord to punish us by an unhappy death; and if, during the years that are passed, we have been foolish, and have offended him, let us now attend to the Apostle exhorting us to be wise for the future, and to redeem the time we have lost. ‘See, therefore, brethren, that you now walk circumspectly, not as unwise, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil ... understanding what is the will of God’ (Ephesians 5:15-17). ‘The days are evil!’ According to St. Anselm, the meaning of these words is, that the days of this life are evil, because in them we are exposed to a thousand temptations and dangers of eternal misery; and therefore, to escape perdition, all possible care is necessary. ‘What,’ says St. Augustine, ‘is meant by redeeming the time, unless, when necessary, to submit to temporal loss in order to gain eternal goods?’ (de Hom. 50, Hom, i).
“We should live only to fulfill with all diligence the divine will; and, should it be necessary, it is better to suffer in temporal things, than to neglect our eternal interests. Oh, how well did St. Paul redeem the time which he had lost! St. Jerome says, that though the last of the Apostles, he was, on account of his great labors, the first in merits: ‘Paul, the last in order, but the first in merits, because he labored more than all.’ Let us consider that, in each moment, we may lay up greater treasures of eternal goods. If the possession of all the land round which you could walk, or of all the money which you could count in a day, were promised you, would you lose time? Or would you not instantly begin to walk over the ground, or to count the money? You now have it in your power to acquire, in each moment, eternal treasures; and will you, notwithstanding, misspend your time? Do not say, that what you can do today, you can also do tomorrow; because this day shall be then lost to you, and shall never return. You have this day; but perhaps tomorrow will not be given you!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church, taken from his Sunday Sermons).
The word “time” is another one of those “four-letter” words that we don’t like―such as “Lent”, “fast”, “pray”, “alms”, etc. “Time” is an ambiguous word which at times (pardon the pun) we can both like and hate. We like having time for fun, games, parties, socials, sports, shopping, watching TV, browsing the internet and social media, etc. But we hate it when it’s time for Lent, time for prayer, time for penance, time for fasting, time for Mass, time for Confession, time for spiritual reading, time for meditation, etc. That is why the vast majority of time in families is spent on worldly and material things rather than spending time on spiritual and religious things.
Holy Mother Church, on this First Sunday of Lent, tells us in her readings at Mass: “Receive not the grace of God in vain! For the Lord says: ‘In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time! Behold, now is the day of salvation!” (Epistle reading from the Second Letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians, 6:1-2).
Holy Scripture tells us that there is time for everything: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under Heaven! A time to be born and a time to die! A time to plant, and a time to uproot that which is planted! A time to kill and a time to heal! A time to destroy, and a time to build! A time to weep and a time to laugh! A time to mourn and a time to dance! A time to scatter and a time to gather! A time to embrace and a time to be far from embraces! A time to get and a time to lose! A time to keep and a time to cast away! A time to tear and a time to sew! A time to keep silence and a time to speak! A time of love and a time of hatred! A time of war and a time of peace!” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8).
It’s Time for Penance!
Right now, it is a time to do penance; a time to weep for sin; a time to change our lives; a time to repair the damage our sins have caused; a time to pay our debt for sin; a time to pull away from the world; a time to draw closer to God! “God has given him time for penance, but he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). “Of this one thing be not ignorant, my beloved, that one day with the Lord is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like one day. The Lord delays not His promise [to chastise], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that anyone should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:8-9). St. Paul warns us to make the best use of the time, because the days are evil (Ephesians 5:16). “You know not what shall be tomorrow! For what is your life? It is like a vapor which appears for a little while, and afterwards shall vanish away!” (James 4:14-15). “Man born of a woman, living for a short time, is filled with many miseries” (Job 14:1). “Time passes like a shadow” (Ecclesiastes 7:1). “Our time is as the passing of a shadow” (Wisdom 2:5). We need to use well what little time we have! That is why Holy Mother Church presents to us―in the Gospel reading on this First Sunday of Lent―the example of Our Lord fasting for forty days and nights in the desert and fighting-off the temptations of the devil.
“At that time, Jesus was led into the desert by the Spirit, to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting forty days and forty nights, He was hungry. And the tempter came and said to Him: ‘If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become loaves of bread!’ But He answered and said: ‘It is written, “Not by bread alone does man live, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him into the holy city and set Him on the pinnacle of the Temple, and said to Him: ‘If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down! For it is written, “He has given His angels charge concerning You; and upon their hands they shall bear You up, lest You dash Your foot against a stone.”’ Jesus said to him: ‘It is written further, “You shall not tempt the Lord your God!”’ Again, the devil took Him to a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them. And he said to Him: ‘All these things will I give You, if You will fall down and worship me!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord your God shall you worship and Him only shall you serve!”’ Then the devil left Him and, behold, angels came and ministered to Him” (Matthew 4:1-11). We read a little further in the same chapter that “from that time Jesus began to preach, and to say: ‘Do penance! For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!’” (Matthew 4:17).
► ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (in his Sunday Sermons) says: “In this day’s Gospel, for the First Sunday of Lent, we read that, having gone into the desert, Jesus Christ permitted the devil to ‘set Him upon the pinnacle of the Temple,’ and say to Him: ‘If thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down’―for the angels shall preserve Thee from all injury. But the Lord answered that, in the Sacred Scriptures it is written: ‘Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!’ The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations―or without at least asking God’s help to conquer them and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice―tempts God to work miracles, or rather to show to him an extraordinary mercy that is not extended to the generality of Christians. God, as the Apostle says, ‘wants all men to be saved,’ (1 Timothy 2:4); but He also wishes us all to labor for our own salvation, at least by adopting the means of overcoming our enemies, and of obeying Him when he calls us to repentance.
“Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. As often as you sinned you banished Him from your souls. And, instead of abandoning you, what has the Lord done? He has placed Himself at the door of your ungrateful hearts, and, by His knocking, has made you feel that He was outside, and seeking for admission: ‘Behold I stand at the gate and knock!’ (Apocalypse 3:20). ‘My jaws are become hoarse!’ (Psalm 48:4). ‘My son,’ says the Lord, ‘I have almost lost my voice in calling you to repentance!’ ‘I am weary of entreating thee!’ (Jeremias 15:5). ‘I have become weary in imploring you to offend Me no more!’”
It’s an Acceptable Time! A Time of Salvation!
In view of this, we repeat the earlier quote from today’s Epistle: “Receive not the grace of God in vain! For the Lord says: ‘In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time! Behold, now is the day of salvation!” To which can be added: “It is time to have mercy, for the time is come!” (Psalm 101:14). “The time of salvation” (Ecclesiasticus 4:28). “A time of healing” (Jeremias 8:15). “The time to seek the Lord” (Osee 10:12). “Observe the time and flee from evil!” (Ecclesiasticus 4:23).
Holy Scripture speaks of “the time of the expiation” (Leviticus 25:9) and that is what Lent is―a time of expiation. But―just as Scripture says―we are reluctant to pay the debt for our sins, we want more time, we want to put off the time of payment, we complain about having to pay: “When they should repay, they will ask for time, and will return tedious and murmuring words, and will complain of the time!” (Ecclesiasticus 29:6).
Time for St. Alphonsus Liguori’s Words on Time
Let us pay heed to the words of ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (taken from his Sunday Sermons) on the subject of time and its importance. St. Alphonsus says: “There is nothing shorter than time, but there is nothing more valuable. There is nothing shorter than time―because the past is no more, the future is uncertain, and the present is only but a moment. This is what Jesus Christ meant when He said: ‘A little while, and now you shall not see Me!’ We may say the same of our life, which, according to St. James, is but a vapor, which is soon scattered forever: ‘For what is your life? It is a vapor which appears for a little while!’ (James 4:14). But the time of this life is as precious as it is short; for, in every moment, if we spend it well, we can acquire treasures of merits for Heaven; but, if we employ time badly, we may in each moment commit sin, and merit Hell.”
“In Scripture we read: ‘Thus says the Lord: “In an acceptable time I have heard thee, and in the day of salvation I have helped thee!”’ (Isaias 49:8). St. Paul explains this passage, and says, that the ‘acceptable time’ is the time in which God has determined to confer his favors upon us. He then adds: ‘Behold, now is the acceptable time! Behold, now is the day of salvation!’ (2 Corinthians 6:2). The Apostle exhorts us not to spend the present time unprofitably―which he calls the day of salvation―because, perhaps, after this day of salvation, there shall be no salvation for us. Since, then, the time which we have to remain on this Earth is short, the Apostle tells those who weep, that they ought not to weep, because their sorrows shall soon pass away; and those who rejoice, not to fix their affections on their enjoyments, because they shall soon have an end. Hence he concludes, that we should use this world, not to enjoy its transitory goods, but to merit eternal life.
“The Holy Ghost says: ‘Son, observe the time!’ (Ecclesiasticus 4:2-3). Son, learn to preserve time, which is the most precious and the greatest gift that God can bestow upon you. St. Bernardine of Sienna teaches that time is of as much value as God; because in every moment of time well spent the possession of God is merited. He adds that in every instant of this life a man may obtain the pardon of his sins, the grace of God, and the glory of Paradise. Hence St. Bonaventure says that ‘no loss is of greater moment than the loss of time’ (Sermon 37 in Septuagesima). But, in another place, St. Bernardine says that, ‘though there is nothing more precious than time, there is nothing less valuable in the estimation of men.’ (Sermon 2, ad Schol). You will see some persons spending four or five hours in play. If you ask them why they lose so much time, they answer: ‘To amuse ourselves!’ Others remain half the day standing in the street, or looking out from a window. If you ask them what they are doing, they shall say in reply, that they are passing the time. And why says the same saint, do you lose this time? Why should you lose even a single hour, which the mercy of God gives you to weep for your sins, and to acquire the divine grace?
“O time―despised by men during life―how much shall you be desired at the hour of death, and particularly in the other world! Time is a blessing which we enjoy only in this life; it is not enjoyed in the next; time is not found in Heaven, nor in Hell. In Hell, the damned exclaim with tears: “Oh if only another hour would be given to us!” They would pay any price for an hour, or for a minute, in which they might repair their eternal ruin. But this hour, or minute, they never shall have. In Heaven there is no weeping; but, if the saints were capable of sorrow, all their wailing should arise from the thought of having lost, in this life, the time in which they could have acquired greater glory, and from the conviction that this time shall never more be given to them.
“A deceased Benedictine nun appeared in glory to a certain person, and said that she was in Heaven, and in the enjoyment of perfect happiness; but that, if she could desire anything, it would be to return to life, and to suffer affliction, in order to merit an increase of glory. And she added that, to acquire the glory which corresponded to a single Ave Maria, she would be content to suffer till the Day of Judgment the long and painful sickness which brought on her death. Hence, St. Francis Borgia was careful to employ every moment time for God. When others spoke of useless things; he conversed with God by holy affections; and so recollected was he that, when asked his opinion on the subject of conversation, he knew not what answer to make. Being corrected for this, he said: ‘I am content to be considered stupid, rather than lose my time in vanities!’
“Is it not, I ask, an evil to spend your time in plays, in conversations, and useless occupations, which are unprofitable to the soul? Does God give you this time to lose it? On the Day of Judgment, Jesus Christ shall demand an account, not only of every month and day that has been lost, but even of every idle word. “Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it on the Day of Judgment” (Matthew 12:36). He shall likewise demand an account of every moment of the time which you shall lose. According to St. Bernard, all time which is not spent for God is lost time. What you can do today defer not till tomorrow; for on tomorrow you may be dead, and may be gone into another world, where you shall have no more time to do good, and where you shall only enjoy the reward of your virtues, or suffer the punishment due to your sins. God calls you to confess your sins, to restore ill-gotten goods, to be reconciled with your enemies. Obey His call today; for it may happen that on tomorrow time may be no more for you, or that God will call you no more. All our salvation depends on corresponding with the divine calls, and at the time that God calls us. ‘Delay not to be converted to the Lord, and defer it not from day to day; for His wrath shall come on a sudden” (Ecclesiasticus 5:8-9).
“If you find your soul in the state of sin, delay not your repentance nor your confession; do not put them off even till tomorrow; for, if you do not obey the voice of God calling you today to confess your sins, death may this day overtake you in sin, and tomorrow there may be no hope of salvation for you. The devil regards the whole of our life as very short, and therefore he loses not a moment of time, but tempts us day and night. “The devil is come down unto you having great wrath, knowing that he has but a short time!” (Apocalypse 12:12). The enemy, then, never loses time in seeking to bring us to Hell: and shall we squander the time which God has given us to save our souls?
“St. Bernardine weeps over the blindness of those negligent Christians who ‘squander the days of salvation, and never consider that a day once lost shall never return.’ At the hour of death they shall wish for another year, or for another day; but they shall not have it―they shall then be told that ‘Time shall be no more!’ What price would they not then give for another week, for a day, or even for an hour, to prepare the account which they must then render to God? St. Lawrence Justinian says, that ‘for a single hour they would give all their property, all their honors, and all their delights.’ (Vit. Solit., cap. x). But this hour shall not be granted to them. The priest, who attends them, shall say: “Depart, depart immediately from this Earth―for your time is no more! Go forth, Christian soul, from this world!”
“What will it profit the sinner who has led an irregular life, to exclaim at death: ‘Oh if I had only led a life of sanctity! Oh, if I had only spent my years in loving God!’ How great is the anguish of a traveler, who, when the night has fallen, perceives that he has missed the way, and that there is no more time to correct his mistake! Such shall be the anguish at death of those who have lived many years in the world, but have not spent them for God. Hence the Redeemer says to all: ‘Walk whilst you have light, that the darkness overtake you not!’ (John 12:35). Walk in the way of salvation, now that you have the light, before you are surprised by the darkness of death, in which you can do nothing. You can then only weep over the time which you have lost.
In Holy Scripture we read: ‘He has called against me the time!’ (Lamentations 1:15). At the hour of death, conscience will remind us of all the time which we have had to become saints, and which we have employed in multiplying our debts to God. It will remind us of all the calls and of all the graces which he has given us to make us love him, and which we have abused. At that awful moment we shall also see that the way of salvation is closed forever. In the midst of these remorses, and of the torturing darkness of death, the dying sinner shall say: ‘O fool that I have been! Life misspent! Lost years, in which I could have gained treasures of merits, and have become a saint! But I have neglected both, and now the time of saving my soul is gone forever!’ But of what use shall these wailings and lamentations be, when the scene of this world is about to close, the lamp is on the point of being extinguished, and when the dying Christian has arrived at that great moment on which eternity depends?
“Our Lord said: ‘Be you then also ready ― for at what hour you think not, the Son of Man will come” (Luke 12:40). The Lord says: ‘Be prepared!’ He does not tell us to prepare ourselves when death approaches, but to be ready for His coming; because when we think least of death, the Son of Man shall come and demand an account of our whole life. In the confusion of death, it will be most difficult to adjust our accounts, so as to appear guiltless before the tribunal of Jesus Christ. Perhaps death may not come upon us for twenty or thirty years; but it may also come very soon, perhaps in a year, or in a month. If anyone had reason to fear that a trial should take place, on which his life depended, he certainly would not wait for the day of the trial, but would as soon as possible employ an advocate to plead his cause. And what do we do? We know for certain that we must one day be judged, and that on the result of that judgment our eternal, not our temporal, life depends. We also know that that day may be very near at hand―and still we lose our time, and, instead of adjusting our accounts, we go on daily multiplying the crimes which will merit for us the sentence of eternal death.
“If, then, we have hitherto employed our time in offending God, let us henceforth endeavor to bewail our misfortune for the remainder of our life, and say continually with the penitent King Ezechias: ‘I will recount to thee all my years in the bitterness of my soul’ (Isaias 38:15). The Lord gives us the remaining days of life, so that we may compensate the time that has been badly spent. ‘Whilst we have time, let us work good!’ (Galatians 6:10). Let us not provoke the Lord to punish us by an unhappy death; and if, during the years that are passed, we have been foolish, and have offended him, let us now attend to the Apostle exhorting us to be wise for the future, and to redeem the time we have lost. ‘See, therefore, brethren, that you now walk circumspectly, not as unwise, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil ... understanding what is the will of God’ (Ephesians 5:15-17). ‘The days are evil!’ According to St. Anselm, the meaning of these words is, that the days of this life are evil, because in them we are exposed to a thousand temptations and dangers of eternal misery; and therefore, to escape perdition, all possible care is necessary. ‘What,’ says St. Augustine, ‘is meant by redeeming the time, unless, when necessary, to submit to temporal loss in order to gain eternal goods?’ (de Hom. 50, Hom, i).
“We should live only to fulfill with all diligence the divine will; and, should it be necessary, it is better to suffer in temporal things, than to neglect our eternal interests. Oh, how well did St. Paul redeem the time which he had lost! St. Jerome says, that though the last of the Apostles, he was, on account of his great labors, the first in merits: ‘Paul, the last in order, but the first in merits, because he labored more than all.’ Let us consider that, in each moment, we may lay up greater treasures of eternal goods. If the possession of all the land round which you could walk, or of all the money which you could count in a day, were promised you, would you lose time? Or would you not instantly begin to walk over the ground, or to count the money? You now have it in your power to acquire, in each moment, eternal treasures; and will you, notwithstanding, misspend your time? Do not say, that what you can do today, you can also do tomorrow; because this day shall be then lost to you, and shall never return. You have this day; but perhaps tomorrow will not be given you!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church, taken from his Sunday Sermons).
Article 16
Friday & Saturday after Ash Wednesday, March 7th & 8th
Jesus Said: "Penance or Perish!"
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Friday & Saturday after Ash Wednesday, March 7th & 8th
Jesus Said: "Penance or Perish!"
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Scary, Huh?
Who wants to go to Hell? Hopefully nobody! Yet that is where most people end up! Scary, huh? Why do they end up in Hell? Jesus put it quite simply, clearly, unambiguously and irrevocably: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). He knows that we are all sinners and, in His mercy He is willing to forgive us―but we must pay the debt of our sins. That is what penance does―it pays the debt for sin. If you will not pay, you will not go to Heaven: “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!”
We might be tempted to say: “Hey, Jesus! Can we talk about this? I mean―isn’t this a little harsh? Can we come to some kind of compromise? I thought You were supposed to be a God of love! Where is there love in saying ‘Penance or perish’? That sounds a little heavy-handed to me! The Bible says: ‘If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow; and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool!’ And what about that verse that says: ‘For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life!’ This ‘Penance or Perish’ stuff sounds too harsh! The Bible says: ‘God is love!’ ― a loving God would not act harshly like that!”
Bargaining for Mercy
Abraham bargained with God to save the extremely sinful Sodom and Gomorrha from perishing―can we do the same?
“And the Lord said: ‘The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied and their sin is become exceedingly grievous!’ … But Abraham stood before the Lord, and said: ‘Will You destroy the righteous men together with the wicked? If there be fifty righteous men in the city, shall they perish with all the others? Will You not spare that place for the sake of the fifty righteous men, if they be therein? Far be it from You to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from You! You, Who judge all the Earth, will not make this judgment!’ And the Lord said to Abraham: ‘If I find in Sodom fifty righteous men within the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake!’ And Abraham answered and said: ‘Seeing that I have begun, I will speak to my Lord, whereas I am dust and ashes! What if there be forty-five righteous persons? Will You, for forty-five, destroy the whole city?’ And God said: ‘I will not destroy it if I find forty-five righteous men!’ And again Abraham said to the Lord: ‘But if only forty righteous men be found there―what will You do? God said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of forty righteous men!’ Abraham said: ‘Lord, be not angry, I beseech You, if I speak! What if thirty righteous men shall be found there?’ The Lord answered: ‘I will not do it if I find thirty righteous men there!’ Abraham said: ‘Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord! What if twenty righteous men be found there?’ The Lord said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of twenty righteous men!’ Abraham continued: ‘I beseech You, be not angry, Lord, if I speak yet once more! What if ten righteous men should be found there?’ And the Lord said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of ten righteous men!’ And the Lord departed after he had left speaking to Abraham, and Abraham returned to his place” (Genesis 18:20-33).
Yet not even ten righteous men could be found and therefore “the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from the Lord out of Heaven, and He destroyed these cities, and all the country roundabout, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the earth. And Abraham got up early in the morning and in the place where he had stood before with the Lord, he looked towards Sodom and Gomorrha, and the whole land of that country―and he saw the ashes rise up from the earth as the smoke of a furnace” (Genesis 19:24).
God Loves Mercy, but …
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “He delights in mercy!” (Micheas 7:18). Mercy, according to St. Thomas Aquinas, is one of the rooms (sub-virtues) in the mansion of charity―the best and greatest of all rooms: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy! The Lord is sweet to all, and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). Mercy is not something that is owed―it is something that is freely given out of charity. Hence, in the Old Testament, God says: “I desired mercy and not sacrifice!” (Osee 6:6) ― which Jesus echoes in the New Testament, saying: “Go then and learn what this means: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Matthew 9:13; Luke 5:32) ― further adding: “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting! For God sent not His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:16-17). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save! … For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 9:56; 19:10). To which Scripture adds: “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins! … The Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world!” (1 John 4:10-14). All of this indicates the overwhelming mercy of a holy God towards sinful mankind.
Nevertheless, God is not a charitable doormat upon which we can trample over endlessly with muddy sinful feet! Yes―God is infinitely patient within Himself, but God will not show infinite patience to sinful mankind: “The Lord is patient and plenteous in mercy!” (Psalm 144:8), but “the Lord delays not His promise [to punish], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9) … “Be not deceived―God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also he shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Payment for Sin
God owes nobody mercy! Nobody can merit the mercy of God by themselves. The gravity of sin is proportional to the greatness of the being offended. Since sin is the greatest evil in the world, and since God is an infinite Being, therefore it stands to reason that sins against God are an infinite offense meriting infinite punishment! Human beings are merely finite beings―not infinite beings―and therefore a finite being is incapable of paying an infinite debt. That is where the love of God and the sacrifice of Christ come into play. An infinite offense contracts an infinite debt that can only be paid by an infinite being. Yet the debt of sin is a human offense requiring that a human pay that debt. Hence Christ (the infinite God) became man (human) so that has a human being, Christ could pay a human debt; and, as an infinite Being (God), Christ could pay the infinite debt. Nevertheless, we need to “co-pay” in certain sense, to show that we are guilty of sin and ready to pay what little we can of the debt that our sins have incurred.
God owes nobody mercy! Nobody can merit the mercy of God by themselves. The gravity of sin is proportional to the greatness of the being offended. Since sin is the greatest evil in the world, and since God is an infinite Being, therefore it stands to reason that sins against God are an infinite offense meriting infinite punishment! Human beings are merely finite beings―not infinite beings―and therefore a finite being is incapable of paying an infinite debt. That is where the love of God and the sacrifice of Christ come into play. An infinite offense contracts an infinite debt that can only be paid by an infinite being. Yet the debt of sin is a human offense requiring that a human pay that debt. Hence Christ (the infinite God) became man (human) so that has a human being, Christ could pay a human debt; and, as an infinite Being (God), Christ could pay the infinite debt.
Nevertheless, we need to “co-pay” in certain sense, to show that we are guilty of sin and ready to pay what little we can of the debt that our sins have incurred. Every sin incurs a double debt―the debt of guilt and the debt of punishment due to that sin. When we go to the Sacrament of Confession to confess our sins, the Sacrament removes the guilt for sin, but does not necessarily remove the punishment for sin. This punishment is called “temporal punishment” ― meaning that punishment for sin has to be undergone either in this life on Earth, or after this life on Earth in the fires of Purgatory. While the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross atoned for the eternal punishment of sin, temporal punishments and consequences can remain, and the Church encourages practices like penance, prayer, and good works to remove those temporal punishments that are due to us.
The Balance Between Love and Justice
Yes, “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), but “God is a just judge” (Psalm 7:12) … “God is just in all His works” (Daniel 9:14). “Mercy and justice come from Him” (Baruch 5:9). That is why the Fathers of the Church, the saints and theologians tell us that God is never just without being merciful at the same time―and that God is never merciful without also being just at the same time. Mercy and justice go together: “Mercy and truth have met each other, justice and peace have kissed” (Psalm 84:11). “‘I am the Lord that exercises mercy and judgment, and justice in the Earth―for these things please Me!’ says the Lord” (Jeremias 9:24). “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives!” (Hebrews 12:6). God would prefer to act lovingly in all things and in all ways with us―but, if we fail to listen and do what He commands, requests and suggests, then―as every parent, teacher and disciplinarian knows only too well―then we force Him to be more heavy-handed than He would like to be! The fault is ours, not His!
We see these two approaches mentioned by God in the Book of Leviticus: “If you walk in My precepts, and keep My commandments, and do them, then I will give you rain in due seasons; the ground shall bring forth its increase; the trees shall be filled with fruit. I will give peace in your coasts―you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid and you shall dwell in your land without fear. The sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people. But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws, and contemn My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, and to make void My covenant, then …” (Leviticus 26:3-14) … then, for not “paying the price” and not obeying all is commanded, God says:
“I will quickly visit you with poverty and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes and consume your lives! You shall sow your seed in vain! Your labor shall be spent in vain ― the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit. I will break the pride of your stubbornness! I will destroy and break your idols and My soul shall abhor you! I will bring plagues upon you for your sins! I will send beasts to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number! I will bring your cities to be a wilderness! I will send pestilence in the midst of you! I will set My face against you, I will bring in upon you the sword and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you! I will destroy your land ― your land shall be desert and your cities destroyed! You shall perish among the Gentiles! If some of them still remain, they shall pine away in their iniquities in the land of their enemies, and they shall be afflicted for the sins of their fathers, and their own―until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, by which they have sinned against Me, and walked contrary unto Me. Then shall they pray for their sins!” (Leviticus 26:16-41).
Holy Scripture sums it up as follows: “Be not deceived! God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
This lack of cooperation with God and lack of obedience to God is the reason why Our Lady has to threaten severe chastisements for the world: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before! ... Nations will be annihilated! … The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima, Our Lady of Akita). Those are the strong words of the Mother of Mercy, the Refuge of Sinners, the Mother of Fair Love!
In the 1950s, Our Lady said more or less the same thing to Blessed Sister Elena Aiello (1895-1961)―a mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lady said: “The justice of our Father is most offended. Men live in their obstinacy of sin! … All nations will be punished, because sin has spread all over the world! Tremendous will be the punishments, because man has arrived at an insupportable contest with his God! … The justice of the Father requires reparation—otherwise many will be lost! … If men do not return to God with prayers and penances, the world will be overturned in a new and more terrible war. Arms most deadly will destroy peoples and nations! … My words are very clear, and you must transmit them to everyone! … The only valid means for placating Divine Justice is to pray and do penance!”
Who wants to go to Hell? Hopefully nobody! Yet that is where most people end up! Scary, huh? Why do they end up in Hell? Jesus put it quite simply, clearly, unambiguously and irrevocably: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). He knows that we are all sinners and, in His mercy He is willing to forgive us―but we must pay the debt of our sins. That is what penance does―it pays the debt for sin. If you will not pay, you will not go to Heaven: “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!”
We might be tempted to say: “Hey, Jesus! Can we talk about this? I mean―isn’t this a little harsh? Can we come to some kind of compromise? I thought You were supposed to be a God of love! Where is there love in saying ‘Penance or perish’? That sounds a little heavy-handed to me! The Bible says: ‘If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow; and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool!’ And what about that verse that says: ‘For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life!’ This ‘Penance or Perish’ stuff sounds too harsh! The Bible says: ‘God is love!’ ― a loving God would not act harshly like that!”
Bargaining for Mercy
Abraham bargained with God to save the extremely sinful Sodom and Gomorrha from perishing―can we do the same?
“And the Lord said: ‘The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied and their sin is become exceedingly grievous!’ … But Abraham stood before the Lord, and said: ‘Will You destroy the righteous men together with the wicked? If there be fifty righteous men in the city, shall they perish with all the others? Will You not spare that place for the sake of the fifty righteous men, if they be therein? Far be it from You to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from You! You, Who judge all the Earth, will not make this judgment!’ And the Lord said to Abraham: ‘If I find in Sodom fifty righteous men within the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake!’ And Abraham answered and said: ‘Seeing that I have begun, I will speak to my Lord, whereas I am dust and ashes! What if there be forty-five righteous persons? Will You, for forty-five, destroy the whole city?’ And God said: ‘I will not destroy it if I find forty-five righteous men!’ And again Abraham said to the Lord: ‘But if only forty righteous men be found there―what will You do? God said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of forty righteous men!’ Abraham said: ‘Lord, be not angry, I beseech You, if I speak! What if thirty righteous men shall be found there?’ The Lord answered: ‘I will not do it if I find thirty righteous men there!’ Abraham said: ‘Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord! What if twenty righteous men be found there?’ The Lord said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of twenty righteous men!’ Abraham continued: ‘I beseech You, be not angry, Lord, if I speak yet once more! What if ten righteous men should be found there?’ And the Lord said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of ten righteous men!’ And the Lord departed after he had left speaking to Abraham, and Abraham returned to his place” (Genesis 18:20-33).
Yet not even ten righteous men could be found and therefore “the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from the Lord out of Heaven, and He destroyed these cities, and all the country roundabout, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the earth. And Abraham got up early in the morning and in the place where he had stood before with the Lord, he looked towards Sodom and Gomorrha, and the whole land of that country―and he saw the ashes rise up from the earth as the smoke of a furnace” (Genesis 19:24).
God Loves Mercy, but …
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “He delights in mercy!” (Micheas 7:18). Mercy, according to St. Thomas Aquinas, is one of the rooms (sub-virtues) in the mansion of charity―the best and greatest of all rooms: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy! The Lord is sweet to all, and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). Mercy is not something that is owed―it is something that is freely given out of charity. Hence, in the Old Testament, God says: “I desired mercy and not sacrifice!” (Osee 6:6) ― which Jesus echoes in the New Testament, saying: “Go then and learn what this means: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Matthew 9:13; Luke 5:32) ― further adding: “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting! For God sent not His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:16-17). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save! … For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 9:56; 19:10). To which Scripture adds: “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins! … The Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world!” (1 John 4:10-14). All of this indicates the overwhelming mercy of a holy God towards sinful mankind.
Nevertheless, God is not a charitable doormat upon which we can trample over endlessly with muddy sinful feet! Yes―God is infinitely patient within Himself, but God will not show infinite patience to sinful mankind: “The Lord is patient and plenteous in mercy!” (Psalm 144:8), but “the Lord delays not His promise [to punish], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9) … “Be not deceived―God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also he shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Payment for Sin
God owes nobody mercy! Nobody can merit the mercy of God by themselves. The gravity of sin is proportional to the greatness of the being offended. Since sin is the greatest evil in the world, and since God is an infinite Being, therefore it stands to reason that sins against God are an infinite offense meriting infinite punishment! Human beings are merely finite beings―not infinite beings―and therefore a finite being is incapable of paying an infinite debt. That is where the love of God and the sacrifice of Christ come into play. An infinite offense contracts an infinite debt that can only be paid by an infinite being. Yet the debt of sin is a human offense requiring that a human pay that debt. Hence Christ (the infinite God) became man (human) so that has a human being, Christ could pay a human debt; and, as an infinite Being (God), Christ could pay the infinite debt. Nevertheless, we need to “co-pay” in certain sense, to show that we are guilty of sin and ready to pay what little we can of the debt that our sins have incurred.
God owes nobody mercy! Nobody can merit the mercy of God by themselves. The gravity of sin is proportional to the greatness of the being offended. Since sin is the greatest evil in the world, and since God is an infinite Being, therefore it stands to reason that sins against God are an infinite offense meriting infinite punishment! Human beings are merely finite beings―not infinite beings―and therefore a finite being is incapable of paying an infinite debt. That is where the love of God and the sacrifice of Christ come into play. An infinite offense contracts an infinite debt that can only be paid by an infinite being. Yet the debt of sin is a human offense requiring that a human pay that debt. Hence Christ (the infinite God) became man (human) so that has a human being, Christ could pay a human debt; and, as an infinite Being (God), Christ could pay the infinite debt.
Nevertheless, we need to “co-pay” in certain sense, to show that we are guilty of sin and ready to pay what little we can of the debt that our sins have incurred. Every sin incurs a double debt―the debt of guilt and the debt of punishment due to that sin. When we go to the Sacrament of Confession to confess our sins, the Sacrament removes the guilt for sin, but does not necessarily remove the punishment for sin. This punishment is called “temporal punishment” ― meaning that punishment for sin has to be undergone either in this life on Earth, or after this life on Earth in the fires of Purgatory. While the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross atoned for the eternal punishment of sin, temporal punishments and consequences can remain, and the Church encourages practices like penance, prayer, and good works to remove those temporal punishments that are due to us.
The Balance Between Love and Justice
Yes, “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), but “God is a just judge” (Psalm 7:12) … “God is just in all His works” (Daniel 9:14). “Mercy and justice come from Him” (Baruch 5:9). That is why the Fathers of the Church, the saints and theologians tell us that God is never just without being merciful at the same time―and that God is never merciful without also being just at the same time. Mercy and justice go together: “Mercy and truth have met each other, justice and peace have kissed” (Psalm 84:11). “‘I am the Lord that exercises mercy and judgment, and justice in the Earth―for these things please Me!’ says the Lord” (Jeremias 9:24). “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives!” (Hebrews 12:6). God would prefer to act lovingly in all things and in all ways with us―but, if we fail to listen and do what He commands, requests and suggests, then―as every parent, teacher and disciplinarian knows only too well―then we force Him to be more heavy-handed than He would like to be! The fault is ours, not His!
We see these two approaches mentioned by God in the Book of Leviticus: “If you walk in My precepts, and keep My commandments, and do them, then I will give you rain in due seasons; the ground shall bring forth its increase; the trees shall be filled with fruit. I will give peace in your coasts―you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid and you shall dwell in your land without fear. The sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people. But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws, and contemn My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, and to make void My covenant, then …” (Leviticus 26:3-14) … then, for not “paying the price” and not obeying all is commanded, God says:
“I will quickly visit you with poverty and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes and consume your lives! You shall sow your seed in vain! Your labor shall be spent in vain ― the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit. I will break the pride of your stubbornness! I will destroy and break your idols and My soul shall abhor you! I will bring plagues upon you for your sins! I will send beasts to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number! I will bring your cities to be a wilderness! I will send pestilence in the midst of you! I will set My face against you, I will bring in upon you the sword and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you! I will destroy your land ― your land shall be desert and your cities destroyed! You shall perish among the Gentiles! If some of them still remain, they shall pine away in their iniquities in the land of their enemies, and they shall be afflicted for the sins of their fathers, and their own―until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, by which they have sinned against Me, and walked contrary unto Me. Then shall they pray for their sins!” (Leviticus 26:16-41).
Holy Scripture sums it up as follows: “Be not deceived! God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
This lack of cooperation with God and lack of obedience to God is the reason why Our Lady has to threaten severe chastisements for the world: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before! ... Nations will be annihilated! … The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima, Our Lady of Akita). Those are the strong words of the Mother of Mercy, the Refuge of Sinners, the Mother of Fair Love!
In the 1950s, Our Lady said more or less the same thing to Blessed Sister Elena Aiello (1895-1961)―a mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lady said: “The justice of our Father is most offended. Men live in their obstinacy of sin! … All nations will be punished, because sin has spread all over the world! Tremendous will be the punishments, because man has arrived at an insupportable contest with his God! … The justice of the Father requires reparation—otherwise many will be lost! … If men do not return to God with prayers and penances, the world will be overturned in a new and more terrible war. Arms most deadly will destroy peoples and nations! … My words are very clear, and you must transmit them to everyone! … The only valid means for placating Divine Justice is to pray and do penance!”
Article 15
Ash Wednesday, March 5th & Thursday March 6th
Get Yourself Dusted Down for Lent!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Ash Wednesday, March 5th & Thursday March 6th
Get Yourself Dusted Down for Lent!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
A Dusty Day!
The words from the liturgy for Ash Wednesday could be said to classify the day as a “dusty day” ― for as the priest marks your forehead with the Sign of the Cross, he traces a cross with ashes upon your forehead, while saying the words: “Remember that you are dust―and to dust you shall return!” We have become accustomed to the liturgical action and think little of it―but if someone were to say those same words at some social gathering, then they would most likely be seen as being an insult! Is Holy Mother Church insulting us on this Ash Wednesday? No! She is merely telling us the truth―a truth that many have forgotten because they think little of the next world and too much of this world. Such pride needs humbling; such an error needs rectifying with the truth―and that is exactly what Holy Mother Church tells us: the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
This forgetfulness of the fact that we will all die and turn to dust reminds us of the parable of Our Lord about the rich man: “And Jesus spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns and will build bigger ones; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and all my goods! And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years! Take thy rest―eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “You fool! This very night do they require thy soul from you! And whose shall those things be which you have provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’” (Luke 12:16-21).
Living Like There Is No Death
Almost all persons live as though there was not death, no final judgment, no Purgatory and no Hell! They seek as many pleasures as treasures as they can get―and seek avoid all sufferings and pain. Of such, St. Paul writes: “Many walk, of whom I have told you often―and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). To such persons, Our Lord says: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38) ― and Holy Mother Church, as if to confirm all this, in one fell swoop, plants the signature of the Cross on everyone’s foreheads on Ash Wednesday!
Why Suffer? Why Die?
When God created Adam and Eve, He created them with a POSSIBILITY of never having to die. It was not God’s intention that they die, but that they live without dying―and, after a period of probation on Earth, be taken into Heaven with body and soul alive and intact. However, God also warned Adam and Eve about the POSSIBILITY of death, which He said would occur if they disobeyed His commandment: “Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!” (Genesis 2:16-17). Eve, who was the first to break the commandment, could not plead ignorance―for she even said to the serpent (devil): “Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat! But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God has commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!” (Genesis 3:2-3). As we all know―she ate, she gave the fruit to Adam and he also ate. Death would come as God had warned and promised―not immediately and on the spot, but with time.
Thus Holy Scripture instructs us: “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) … “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56) … “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21) … “From the woman came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die!” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33) ... “Death reigned from Adam” (Romans 5:14) ... “By one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned!” (Romans 5:12) ... “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15) ... “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4) ... “Everyone shall die for his own sin!” (Deuteronomy 24:16).
Is There Any Hope?
God Himself stretches out a hand of hope: “Is it my will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? If the wicked man does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice―then living he shall live, and shall not die! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live! Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit―and why will you die, O house of Israel? For I desire not the death of him that dies, says the Lord God, return ye and live! Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities!” (Ezechiel, chapter 18).
Jesus extends that same hand of hope: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance!” (Luke 15:7). “From that time, Jesus began to preach, and to say: ‘Do penance, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 4:17). “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity” (1 John 1:9).
We are as Big as Dust
Ash Wednesday is the beginning of the season of deep humility. Ash Wednesday is the time to accept the fact that we are, at the end of the day, nothing but dust and ashes. It is a time to dust-off from ourselves the gathering dust of sin and to burn our sins to ashes by a fiery, fervent love of God―especially in the furnace of the confessional. There were some very important men in the Old Testament, key figures chosen by God to lead or teach His Chosen people: Adam, Abraham, Job, etc. These men were among the favorites of God. Yet of Adam, God says: “Dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!” (Genesis 3:19); Abraham, in speaking to God says of himself: “I am dust and ashes!” (Genesis 18:27); and Job echoes a similar sentiment saying of himself: “I am compared to dirt, and am likened to embers and ashes!” (Job 30:19), adding, “Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes!” (Job 42:6). This is a reminder of death, with the same words that God pronounced Adam’s fate: “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the Earth, out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return” (Genesis 3:19).
Penitential Purgation from the Dust of Death
This Lenten season is granted to us to penitentially purge ourselves from the dust of death―which is sin and its consequences. “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Our Lady appeared to Jacinta several times between December 1919 and February 1920. Our Lady told her many things including: “The sins of the world are very great ... If men only knew what eternity is, they would do everything in their power to change their lives.” … “Fly from riches and luxury; love poverty and silence; have charity, even for bad people!” … “More souls go to Hell because of sins of the flesh than for any other reason” … “The Mother of God wants more virgin souls bound by the vow of chastity” … “Confession is a Sacrament of mercy and we must confess with joy and trust” … “Our Lady can no longer uphold the arm of Her Divine Son which will strike the world. If people amend their lives, Our Lord will even now save the world, but if they do not, punishment will come” … “People must renounce sin and not persist in it, as has been done until now. It is essential to repent greatly.”
The Liturgy of Ash Wednesday Speaks Loud and Clear
We need to dust-off our sins, pay our debts and cleanse our souls. The liturgy of Ash Wednesday makes that abundantly loud and clear. From the four prayers used in blessing the ashes, we get a clear message that cannot be misunderstood: “Almighty, everlasting God, spare those who are repentant, be merciful to those who pray to Thee ... who weep for their evil deeds … acknowledging their sins! … Grant to all, who are sprinkled with these ashes, the forgiveness of their sins, health for their bodies and salvation for their souls!” (1st prayer) … Look graciously upon the weakness of our human nature … We know that we are but ashes, and because of our wickedness must return to dust! Bless these ashes which are to be placed upon our heads as a sign of humility and a pledge of Thy forgiveness. May we obtain mercy, the pardon of all our sins, and the rewards promised to those who repent!” (2nd prayer). “O God, Who art moved by our acts of humility and appeased by our works of penance, hear our prayers and, by the ashes sprinkled upon the heads of Thy servants, mercifully … fill them with the spirit of repentance!” (3rd prayer). “God, Who bestowed Thy mercy upon the people of Ninive who repented in sackcloth and ashes―grant that we may imitate their outward behavior and obtain Thy forgiveness!” (4th prayer). Then, during the imposition of the ashes, the Antiphons sung say: “Let us change our garment for ashes and sackcloth! Let us fast and lament before the Lord! For our God is plenteous in mercy to forgive sins!” (Joel 2:13). The Responsorial adds: “Let us amend for the better, in those things in which we have sinned through ignorance―lest suddenly overtaken by the day of death, we seek time for penance, and are not able to find it. Hear O Lord, and have mercy―for we have sinned against Thee!” (taken from Esther, chapter 13; Joel, chapter 2). The Final Prayer adds: “Grant us, O Lord, to take up our duty as soldiers of Christ by holy fasting, that we, who are going to struggle with the evil spirits, may be protected by the help of self-restraint!”
Fight or Fail
Most Catholics will not fight (unless it is among themselves). For them it is a case of “Fight or Flee!” ― and they flee the fight. In reality, it is a case of “Fight or Fail” ― for we, through the Sacrament of Confirmation, are Soldiers of Christ and soldiers are made to fight, not flee. Yet to most of these Soldiers of Christ, you could apply these words of Scripture: “What?!? Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12) ... “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4).
Most Catholics will not fight what is called our “triple enemy” ― which is the devil, the world and our own flesh. Our chief weapons are prayers, sacrifices, mortification and penance―but those weapons are rusting in the garage, or gathering dust in the house. Most Catholics no longer have the strength to pick-up and use those weapons! They simply don’t want to fight! What they fail to realize is that just because THEY don’t want to fight, this does not mean that devil, the world and their own flesh will cease to fight against them! Below, you will find Scriptural quotes that elaborate upon this fight against the devil, the world and the flesh.
► FIGHTING THE DEVIL: “That old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, seduces the whole world” (Apocalypse 12:9). There is no person and no place that is entirely free from temptation by the devil―even “Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil” (Matthew 4:1). Even those who accept the word of God are prey to the devil―for “the devil cometh, and taketh the word out of their heart, lest believing they should be saved!” (Luke 8:12). To the disbelieving Jews, Our Lord said: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do! He stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar and the father of lies!” (John 8:44). Hence Scripture warns: “Put on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil!” (Ephesians 6:11). “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers; against the rulers of the world of this darkness; against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). “Give not place to the devil!” (Ephesians 4:27). “They that want to become rich, fall into temptation and into the snare of the devil and perdition” (1 Timothy 6:9). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8).
► FIGHTING THE WORLD: “All that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “Many seducers are gone out into the world! Whoever confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh―this is a seducer and an antichrist!” (2 John 1:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
► FIGHTING THE FLESH: Those who “shut out God from themselves and from their mind, and to give themselves to their lust, and over them the devil has power!” (Tobias 6:17). “I chastise my body and bring it into subjection―lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:27). “For the wisdom of the flesh is death; but the wisdom of the spirit is life and peace!” (Romans 8:6). “They that are Christ’s, have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences! If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit!” (Galatians 5:24-25). “I say then, walk in the spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh! For the flesh lusts against the spirit: and the spirit fights against the flesh―for these are contrary one to another. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are fornication, uncleanness, immodesty, luxury, idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects, envies, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and such like. Of the which I foretell you, as I have foretold to you, that they who do such things shall not obtain the Kingdom of God! But the fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity!” (Galatians 5:16-22). “Mortify therefore whatever belongs to your earthly nature―fornication, uncleanness, lust, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is the service of idols!” (Colossians 3:5). “They who are in the flesh, cannot please God! But you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, then he belongs not to Him. And if Christ be in you, the body indeed is dead because of sin; but the spirit lives because of justification!” (Romans 8:8-10). “For this is the will of God―your sanctification; that you should abstain from fornication. That everyone of you should know how to possess his body in sanctification and honor! Not in the passion of lust, like the Gentiles that know not God!” (1 Thessalonians 4:3-5).
“What shall we say, then? Shall we continue in sin? God forbid! Know you not that all we, who are baptized in Christ Jesus, are baptized in His death? For we are buried together with Him by Baptism into death―so that as Christ is risen from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also may walk in newness of life. For we that are dead to sin, how shall we live any longer therein? For our old man is crucified with Him, so that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer. So reckon that you are dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus our Lord. Let no sin therefore reign in your mortal body, so as to obey the lusts thereof. Neither yield your members as instruments of sin; but present yourselves to God. For sin shall not have dominion over you―for you are under grace. For as you have formerly yielded your body to serve uncleanness and iniquity, unto iniquity; so now yield your body to serve justice, unto sanctification. For what fruit had you then in those things, of which you are now ashamed? For the end of them is death! But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, you have your fruit unto sanctification, and the end life everlasting. For the wages of sin is death! But the grace of God, life everlasting, in Christ Jesus our Lord!” (Romans 6:1-23).
Why Are So Many Souls Lost?
Why do most souls go to Hell? The simple and perhaps simplistic answer is―mortal sin. Anyone who dies in a state of mortal sin inescapably goes to Hell―that is the simple answer. Yet there is more involved to it than just that! Sin follows temptation and “temptation shall come upon the whole world to try them that dwell upon the Earth” (Apocalypse 3:10). Mortal sin is a choice―we can either commit it or avoid it. Mortal sin comes about by having given in to the temptation to commit mortal sin. Giving in to sin is a sign of spiritual weakness―a lack of strength in resisting sin. “There many infirm and weak among you!” (1 Corinthians 11:30). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4). Temptation requires a fight to overcome it. “When you come into the service of God, prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour! Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “Watch and pray that you enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak!” says Our Lord (Matthew 26:41) … for many “believe for a while, and in time of temptation, they fall away!” (Luke 8:13).
We Need Grace and Strength to Overcome Temptation and Sin
Strength is temptation is necessary and God will give that strength if we use the weapons He offers us: “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able―but will make also with temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13). “The Lord knows how to deliver the godly from temptation” (2 Peter 2:9). “Blessed is the man that endures temptation―for when he has been tested and proved, he shall receive a crown of life, which God has promised to them that love Him!” (James 1:12).
It is prayer and penance that obtain for us the graces and give us the strength to overcome temptation and sin, to overcome the devil, the world and our own sinful flesh with its passions that incline us to sin. As Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5).
Our Lady also indicated the same to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Bodily penances are so appropriate and fitted to mortal creatures, that the ignorance of this truth and the neglect and contempt of bodily mortification is the cause of the damnation of many souls and brings many more into the danger of eternal loss. Some expect to be pardoned without penance! … Among all these dangers and difficulties, those of the flesh are not the least―for human weakness, always present and always active, withdraws many from grace. The shortest and the most secure course to follow, both for thee and for all men, is to welcome bitterness and sorrow and put aside ease and pleasure of the senses, and to resolve not to allow them to become dissipated or enjoy greater freedom than the strict rule of reason permits.”
“Separate thyself from all earthly things; withdraw thyself from what is visible, forsake all the creatures, deny thyself, close thy senses to the deceits and fables of the world! Force thy body to make up the losses which it has caused to the soul through its passions and earthly affections. With this object in view, seek to always keep your body in strict subjection, allowing it to partake only of those comforts which serve to keep it in proper condition for the activity of the soul, and do not pander to the body’s passions and appetites. Mortify and crush it―until it is dead to all that is delightful to the senses, so that even the common actions necessary for life shall appear to thee more painful than agreeable, taste more of bitterness than of dangerous enjoyment.”
“The first reason why men should afflict their body and mortify their flesh is their having been conceived in sin. By this Original Sin human nature is depraved, filled with passions, rebellious to reason, inclined to evil and adverse to the spirit. If the soul allows itself to be carried away by them, it will be precipitated by the first vice into many others. But if this beastly flesh is curbed by mortification and penance, it loses its strength and acknowledges the authority of the spirit and the light of truth.”
“The second reason is that none of the mortals have altogether avoided sinning against God; and the punishment and retribution must inevitably correspond to the guilt―either in this life or the next―therefore, as the soul commits sin in union with the body, it follows that both of them must be punished. The interior sorrow is not sufficient for atonement, if the body seeks to escape the punishment that corresponds to the guilt. Moreover, the debt is so great and the satisfaction that can be given by the creature so limited and scanty that there remains continual uncertainty whether the Judge is satisfied even after the exertions of a whole lifetime: hence, the soul should find no rest to the end of life.”
“The third reason for bodily mortification, and the most urgent one, is the duty of Christians to imitate their divine Teacher and Master. Moreover, my divine Son and I―without being guilty of any faults, or bad inclinations―devoted ourselves to labors and made our lives a continual practice of penance and mortification of the flesh. If We then pursued such a course of life because it was reasonable, what must be thought of mortals that seek nothing but sweetness and delight, and abhor all penances, affronts, ignominies, fasting and mortification? Shall only Christ, our Lord, and I suffer all these hardships―while the guilt laden debtors and deservers of all these punishments throw themselves head over heels into the filth of their carnal inclinations? Shall they employ their faculties―given to them for the service of Christ, my Lord, and for His following―merely in listening to their lusts and the devil, who has introduced evil into the world? This absurd position―which is maintained by the children of Adam―is the cause of great indignation in the just Judge.” (words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
The words from the liturgy for Ash Wednesday could be said to classify the day as a “dusty day” ― for as the priest marks your forehead with the Sign of the Cross, he traces a cross with ashes upon your forehead, while saying the words: “Remember that you are dust―and to dust you shall return!” We have become accustomed to the liturgical action and think little of it―but if someone were to say those same words at some social gathering, then they would most likely be seen as being an insult! Is Holy Mother Church insulting us on this Ash Wednesday? No! She is merely telling us the truth―a truth that many have forgotten because they think little of the next world and too much of this world. Such pride needs humbling; such an error needs rectifying with the truth―and that is exactly what Holy Mother Church tells us: the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
This forgetfulness of the fact that we will all die and turn to dust reminds us of the parable of Our Lord about the rich man: “And Jesus spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns and will build bigger ones; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and all my goods! And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years! Take thy rest―eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “You fool! This very night do they require thy soul from you! And whose shall those things be which you have provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’” (Luke 12:16-21).
Living Like There Is No Death
Almost all persons live as though there was not death, no final judgment, no Purgatory and no Hell! They seek as many pleasures as treasures as they can get―and seek avoid all sufferings and pain. Of such, St. Paul writes: “Many walk, of whom I have told you often―and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). To such persons, Our Lord says: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38) ― and Holy Mother Church, as if to confirm all this, in one fell swoop, plants the signature of the Cross on everyone’s foreheads on Ash Wednesday!
Why Suffer? Why Die?
When God created Adam and Eve, He created them with a POSSIBILITY of never having to die. It was not God’s intention that they die, but that they live without dying―and, after a period of probation on Earth, be taken into Heaven with body and soul alive and intact. However, God also warned Adam and Eve about the POSSIBILITY of death, which He said would occur if they disobeyed His commandment: “Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!” (Genesis 2:16-17). Eve, who was the first to break the commandment, could not plead ignorance―for she even said to the serpent (devil): “Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat! But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God has commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!” (Genesis 3:2-3). As we all know―she ate, she gave the fruit to Adam and he also ate. Death would come as God had warned and promised―not immediately and on the spot, but with time.
Thus Holy Scripture instructs us: “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) … “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56) … “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21) … “From the woman came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die!” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33) ... “Death reigned from Adam” (Romans 5:14) ... “By one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned!” (Romans 5:12) ... “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15) ... “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4) ... “Everyone shall die for his own sin!” (Deuteronomy 24:16).
Is There Any Hope?
God Himself stretches out a hand of hope: “Is it my will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? If the wicked man does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice―then living he shall live, and shall not die! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live! Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit―and why will you die, O house of Israel? For I desire not the death of him that dies, says the Lord God, return ye and live! Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities!” (Ezechiel, chapter 18).
Jesus extends that same hand of hope: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance!” (Luke 15:7). “From that time, Jesus began to preach, and to say: ‘Do penance, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 4:17). “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity” (1 John 1:9).
We are as Big as Dust
Ash Wednesday is the beginning of the season of deep humility. Ash Wednesday is the time to accept the fact that we are, at the end of the day, nothing but dust and ashes. It is a time to dust-off from ourselves the gathering dust of sin and to burn our sins to ashes by a fiery, fervent love of God―especially in the furnace of the confessional. There were some very important men in the Old Testament, key figures chosen by God to lead or teach His Chosen people: Adam, Abraham, Job, etc. These men were among the favorites of God. Yet of Adam, God says: “Dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!” (Genesis 3:19); Abraham, in speaking to God says of himself: “I am dust and ashes!” (Genesis 18:27); and Job echoes a similar sentiment saying of himself: “I am compared to dirt, and am likened to embers and ashes!” (Job 30:19), adding, “Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes!” (Job 42:6). This is a reminder of death, with the same words that God pronounced Adam’s fate: “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the Earth, out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return” (Genesis 3:19).
Penitential Purgation from the Dust of Death
This Lenten season is granted to us to penitentially purge ourselves from the dust of death―which is sin and its consequences. “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Our Lady appeared to Jacinta several times between December 1919 and February 1920. Our Lady told her many things including: “The sins of the world are very great ... If men only knew what eternity is, they would do everything in their power to change their lives.” … “Fly from riches and luxury; love poverty and silence; have charity, even for bad people!” … “More souls go to Hell because of sins of the flesh than for any other reason” … “The Mother of God wants more virgin souls bound by the vow of chastity” … “Confession is a Sacrament of mercy and we must confess with joy and trust” … “Our Lady can no longer uphold the arm of Her Divine Son which will strike the world. If people amend their lives, Our Lord will even now save the world, but if they do not, punishment will come” … “People must renounce sin and not persist in it, as has been done until now. It is essential to repent greatly.”
The Liturgy of Ash Wednesday Speaks Loud and Clear
We need to dust-off our sins, pay our debts and cleanse our souls. The liturgy of Ash Wednesday makes that abundantly loud and clear. From the four prayers used in blessing the ashes, we get a clear message that cannot be misunderstood: “Almighty, everlasting God, spare those who are repentant, be merciful to those who pray to Thee ... who weep for their evil deeds … acknowledging their sins! … Grant to all, who are sprinkled with these ashes, the forgiveness of their sins, health for their bodies and salvation for their souls!” (1st prayer) … Look graciously upon the weakness of our human nature … We know that we are but ashes, and because of our wickedness must return to dust! Bless these ashes which are to be placed upon our heads as a sign of humility and a pledge of Thy forgiveness. May we obtain mercy, the pardon of all our sins, and the rewards promised to those who repent!” (2nd prayer). “O God, Who art moved by our acts of humility and appeased by our works of penance, hear our prayers and, by the ashes sprinkled upon the heads of Thy servants, mercifully … fill them with the spirit of repentance!” (3rd prayer). “God, Who bestowed Thy mercy upon the people of Ninive who repented in sackcloth and ashes―grant that we may imitate their outward behavior and obtain Thy forgiveness!” (4th prayer). Then, during the imposition of the ashes, the Antiphons sung say: “Let us change our garment for ashes and sackcloth! Let us fast and lament before the Lord! For our God is plenteous in mercy to forgive sins!” (Joel 2:13). The Responsorial adds: “Let us amend for the better, in those things in which we have sinned through ignorance―lest suddenly overtaken by the day of death, we seek time for penance, and are not able to find it. Hear O Lord, and have mercy―for we have sinned against Thee!” (taken from Esther, chapter 13; Joel, chapter 2). The Final Prayer adds: “Grant us, O Lord, to take up our duty as soldiers of Christ by holy fasting, that we, who are going to struggle with the evil spirits, may be protected by the help of self-restraint!”
Fight or Fail
Most Catholics will not fight (unless it is among themselves). For them it is a case of “Fight or Flee!” ― and they flee the fight. In reality, it is a case of “Fight or Fail” ― for we, through the Sacrament of Confirmation, are Soldiers of Christ and soldiers are made to fight, not flee. Yet to most of these Soldiers of Christ, you could apply these words of Scripture: “What?!? Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12) ... “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4).
Most Catholics will not fight what is called our “triple enemy” ― which is the devil, the world and our own flesh. Our chief weapons are prayers, sacrifices, mortification and penance―but those weapons are rusting in the garage, or gathering dust in the house. Most Catholics no longer have the strength to pick-up and use those weapons! They simply don’t want to fight! What they fail to realize is that just because THEY don’t want to fight, this does not mean that devil, the world and their own flesh will cease to fight against them! Below, you will find Scriptural quotes that elaborate upon this fight against the devil, the world and the flesh.
► FIGHTING THE DEVIL: “That old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, seduces the whole world” (Apocalypse 12:9). There is no person and no place that is entirely free from temptation by the devil―even “Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil” (Matthew 4:1). Even those who accept the word of God are prey to the devil―for “the devil cometh, and taketh the word out of their heart, lest believing they should be saved!” (Luke 8:12). To the disbelieving Jews, Our Lord said: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do! He stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar and the father of lies!” (John 8:44). Hence Scripture warns: “Put on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil!” (Ephesians 6:11). “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers; against the rulers of the world of this darkness; against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). “Give not place to the devil!” (Ephesians 4:27). “They that want to become rich, fall into temptation and into the snare of the devil and perdition” (1 Timothy 6:9). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8).
► FIGHTING THE WORLD: “All that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “Many seducers are gone out into the world! Whoever confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh―this is a seducer and an antichrist!” (2 John 1:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
► FIGHTING THE FLESH: Those who “shut out God from themselves and from their mind, and to give themselves to their lust, and over them the devil has power!” (Tobias 6:17). “I chastise my body and bring it into subjection―lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:27). “For the wisdom of the flesh is death; but the wisdom of the spirit is life and peace!” (Romans 8:6). “They that are Christ’s, have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences! If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit!” (Galatians 5:24-25). “I say then, walk in the spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh! For the flesh lusts against the spirit: and the spirit fights against the flesh―for these are contrary one to another. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are fornication, uncleanness, immodesty, luxury, idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects, envies, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and such like. Of the which I foretell you, as I have foretold to you, that they who do such things shall not obtain the Kingdom of God! But the fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity!” (Galatians 5:16-22). “Mortify therefore whatever belongs to your earthly nature―fornication, uncleanness, lust, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is the service of idols!” (Colossians 3:5). “They who are in the flesh, cannot please God! But you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, then he belongs not to Him. And if Christ be in you, the body indeed is dead because of sin; but the spirit lives because of justification!” (Romans 8:8-10). “For this is the will of God―your sanctification; that you should abstain from fornication. That everyone of you should know how to possess his body in sanctification and honor! Not in the passion of lust, like the Gentiles that know not God!” (1 Thessalonians 4:3-5).
“What shall we say, then? Shall we continue in sin? God forbid! Know you not that all we, who are baptized in Christ Jesus, are baptized in His death? For we are buried together with Him by Baptism into death―so that as Christ is risen from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also may walk in newness of life. For we that are dead to sin, how shall we live any longer therein? For our old man is crucified with Him, so that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer. So reckon that you are dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus our Lord. Let no sin therefore reign in your mortal body, so as to obey the lusts thereof. Neither yield your members as instruments of sin; but present yourselves to God. For sin shall not have dominion over you―for you are under grace. For as you have formerly yielded your body to serve uncleanness and iniquity, unto iniquity; so now yield your body to serve justice, unto sanctification. For what fruit had you then in those things, of which you are now ashamed? For the end of them is death! But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, you have your fruit unto sanctification, and the end life everlasting. For the wages of sin is death! But the grace of God, life everlasting, in Christ Jesus our Lord!” (Romans 6:1-23).
Why Are So Many Souls Lost?
Why do most souls go to Hell? The simple and perhaps simplistic answer is―mortal sin. Anyone who dies in a state of mortal sin inescapably goes to Hell―that is the simple answer. Yet there is more involved to it than just that! Sin follows temptation and “temptation shall come upon the whole world to try them that dwell upon the Earth” (Apocalypse 3:10). Mortal sin is a choice―we can either commit it or avoid it. Mortal sin comes about by having given in to the temptation to commit mortal sin. Giving in to sin is a sign of spiritual weakness―a lack of strength in resisting sin. “There many infirm and weak among you!” (1 Corinthians 11:30). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4). Temptation requires a fight to overcome it. “When you come into the service of God, prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour! Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “Watch and pray that you enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak!” says Our Lord (Matthew 26:41) … for many “believe for a while, and in time of temptation, they fall away!” (Luke 8:13).
We Need Grace and Strength to Overcome Temptation and Sin
Strength is temptation is necessary and God will give that strength if we use the weapons He offers us: “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able―but will make also with temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13). “The Lord knows how to deliver the godly from temptation” (2 Peter 2:9). “Blessed is the man that endures temptation―for when he has been tested and proved, he shall receive a crown of life, which God has promised to them that love Him!” (James 1:12).
It is prayer and penance that obtain for us the graces and give us the strength to overcome temptation and sin, to overcome the devil, the world and our own sinful flesh with its passions that incline us to sin. As Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5).
Our Lady also indicated the same to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Bodily penances are so appropriate and fitted to mortal creatures, that the ignorance of this truth and the neglect and contempt of bodily mortification is the cause of the damnation of many souls and brings many more into the danger of eternal loss. Some expect to be pardoned without penance! … Among all these dangers and difficulties, those of the flesh are not the least―for human weakness, always present and always active, withdraws many from grace. The shortest and the most secure course to follow, both for thee and for all men, is to welcome bitterness and sorrow and put aside ease and pleasure of the senses, and to resolve not to allow them to become dissipated or enjoy greater freedom than the strict rule of reason permits.”
“Separate thyself from all earthly things; withdraw thyself from what is visible, forsake all the creatures, deny thyself, close thy senses to the deceits and fables of the world! Force thy body to make up the losses which it has caused to the soul through its passions and earthly affections. With this object in view, seek to always keep your body in strict subjection, allowing it to partake only of those comforts which serve to keep it in proper condition for the activity of the soul, and do not pander to the body’s passions and appetites. Mortify and crush it―until it is dead to all that is delightful to the senses, so that even the common actions necessary for life shall appear to thee more painful than agreeable, taste more of bitterness than of dangerous enjoyment.”
“The first reason why men should afflict their body and mortify their flesh is their having been conceived in sin. By this Original Sin human nature is depraved, filled with passions, rebellious to reason, inclined to evil and adverse to the spirit. If the soul allows itself to be carried away by them, it will be precipitated by the first vice into many others. But if this beastly flesh is curbed by mortification and penance, it loses its strength and acknowledges the authority of the spirit and the light of truth.”
“The second reason is that none of the mortals have altogether avoided sinning against God; and the punishment and retribution must inevitably correspond to the guilt―either in this life or the next―therefore, as the soul commits sin in union with the body, it follows that both of them must be punished. The interior sorrow is not sufficient for atonement, if the body seeks to escape the punishment that corresponds to the guilt. Moreover, the debt is so great and the satisfaction that can be given by the creature so limited and scanty that there remains continual uncertainty whether the Judge is satisfied even after the exertions of a whole lifetime: hence, the soul should find no rest to the end of life.”
“The third reason for bodily mortification, and the most urgent one, is the duty of Christians to imitate their divine Teacher and Master. Moreover, my divine Son and I―without being guilty of any faults, or bad inclinations―devoted ourselves to labors and made our lives a continual practice of penance and mortification of the flesh. If We then pursued such a course of life because it was reasonable, what must be thought of mortals that seek nothing but sweetness and delight, and abhor all penances, affronts, ignominies, fasting and mortification? Shall only Christ, our Lord, and I suffer all these hardships―while the guilt laden debtors and deservers of all these punishments throw themselves head over heels into the filth of their carnal inclinations? Shall they employ their faculties―given to them for the service of Christ, my Lord, and for His following―merely in listening to their lusts and the devil, who has introduced evil into the world? This absurd position―which is maintained by the children of Adam―is the cause of great indignation in the just Judge.” (words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Article 14
Tuesday after Quinquagesima Sunday, March 4th
Will Your Lent be Just a Pile of Ashes?
Tuesday after Quinquagesima Sunday, March 4th
Will Your Lent be Just a Pile of Ashes?
Another Lent! Another Failure?
They say it only takes one Holy Communion to make a saint! How many times have we received and where are we on the road to sanctity? Most Catholics have received Holy Communion thousands of times―if not tens of thousands of times―and they are long way from sanctity; a long way from Heaven; more likely with one foot in Purgatory and the other foot perilously close to Hell! They have failed to profit from what God has given them!
The same can be said for the season of Lent. One Lent should be enough to turn our whole life around from worldliness and sinfulness, and redirect it towards virtue and sanctity. Yet―just as it is with Holy Communion―for most Catholics Lent has been misspent; it has often been doomed from the beginning; ended before it began; a mere flash in the pan; a bird that failed to fly!
Limping Through Lent
Most Lents could be compared to the attempts of the sick man by the Pool of Bethsaida: “Now there is at Jerusalem a pond, called Probatica, which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida, having five porches. In these porches lay a great multitude of sick, of blind, of lame, of withered―waiting for the moving of the water. And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under. And there was a certain man there, that had been under his infirmity for thirty-eight years. When Jesus had seen him lying there, and knowing that he had been there a long time, He said to him: ‘Do you want to be made whole?’ The infirm man answered Him: ‘Sir, I have no man―when the water is moved―to put me into the pond. For whilst I am coming, another goes down before me!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Arise, take up thy bed and walk!’ And immediately the man was made whole―and he took up his bed and walked” (John 5:2-9).
How many times have we not found ourselves in a similar situation? When Lent comes―just as “an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved” ― and the waters of grace are moved, we find ourselves paralyzed or lame; we barely limp through Lent and fail to profit from the ‘waters’ of grace that are on offer! Like the lame man, you might say: “I have no man―when the water is moved―to put me into the pond. For whilst I am coming, another goes down before me!” Lent is over before we really get going! In fact, we ourselves are like water―for “water seeks the path of least resistance”―meaning that water will naturally flow along the easiest route available to it, always moving downhill and taking the path with the least obstruction and the lowest level available to it. Water, like any liquid, will move to find the lowest possible point, taking the easiest path to get there.
Paralysis of the Proud
For many souls it is a case of: “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). Such souls see nothing really wrong in how they live their lives. Much like the Pharisee―in Our Lord’s parable about the Pharisee and the Publican―they think they are good folk, and not like the rest of men! “And Jesus spoke this parable to certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up into the Temple to pray―the one, a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself: “God! I thank you, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this Publican! I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes to Heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying: “God! Be merciful to me a sinner!” I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other―for every one that exalts himself shall be abased; and he that humbles himself shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
Likewise, we can be tempted to think that we are not like the rest of men―we are CATHOLICS, they are not; we go to Mass often, they do not; we pray the Rosary, they do not! We fatally forget that much more is expected from us because of our being given the tremendous grace of finding and being baptized in the Catholic Faith―most people have not received that grace―for out of every 8 people in the world, only around 1 is Catholic (1.3 billion Catholics out of a world population of 8.3 billion). We have been given more―especially if we are Conservative or Traditional Catholics―and therefore much more is expected of us: “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required; and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). We might think that what we do is a lot―but, when you factor into the equation the great graces we have been given, then that “lot” soon becomes “little” by comparison to what is really expected of us!
Looking for Lenten Loopholes
There are some who are always looking for the cheapest Lent available. They rejoice in knowing that the modern-Church has given a 95% discount on Lenten fasting ― reducing it from 40 days of fasting to just 2 days: Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. You can make Lent easy or you can make it tough―the choice is yours and the consequences are yours also. Our Lord was not born in this world to live a life of comfort―but a life of poverty and toil, even though He was the sinless God, who created all things. His mode of life was meant to be an example to us―who, because of Original Sin, are always ready for and always searching for the “easy-way-out” in most things. As Holy Scripture warns: “Be not deceived! God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Our Lord praised St. John the Baptist for not being “soft” and not “taking-it-easy”: “Amen I say to you, there has not risen, among them that are born of women, a greater than John the Baptist!” (Matthew 11:11). Speaking further of John the Baptist, Our Lord points out and stresses that this greatest of the great was no “softie” who sought the “easy life”, but a wonderful example of sacrifice, mortification and penance: “And when the messengers of John were departed, Jesus began to speak to the multitudes concerning John: ‘What went ye out into the desert to see? A reed shaken by the wind? But what went you out to see? A man clothed in soft garments? Behold they that are in costly garments and live delicately, are in the houses of kings. But what went you out to see? A prophet? Yes, I say to you―and more than a prophet! This is he of whom it is written: “Behold I send My angel before Thy face, who shall prepare Thy way before Thee!” For I say to you: Amongst those that are born of women, there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist!’” (Luke 7:24-28). “And the same John had his garment of camel hair, and a leather girdle about his loins; and he ate locusts and wild honey” (Matthew 3:4; Mark 1:6).
No “Easy-Street” to Heaven
The way to Heaven and salvation is no “easy-street” or “cakewalk” ― Heaven is something priceless that needs to paid for. Those who show no effort, have no chance! Our Lord Himself says: “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Heaven is not an “Open House” where anyone can wander-in regardless―Our Lord’s parable of the wedding-feast, which is a symbol of our eternal marriage to God in Heaven, has people cast-out:
“Jesus answering, spoke again in parables to them, saying: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a king, who made a marriage for his son. And he sent his servants, to call them that were invited to the marriage; and they would not come. Again he sent other servants, saying: “Tell them that were invited: ‘Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my calves and fatlings are killed, and all things are ready―come ye to the marriage!’” But they neglected, and went their own ways―one to his farm, and another to his merchandise; and the rest laid hands on his servants, and, having treated them contumeliously, put them to death. But when the king had heard of it, he was angry, and sending his armies, he destroyed those murderers, and burnt their city. Then he said to his servants: “The marriage indeed is ready―but they that were invited were not worthy! Go ye therefore into the highways; and as many as you shall find, call to the marriage!” And his servants going forth into the ways, gathered together all that they found, both bad and good―and the marriage was filled with guests. And the king went in to see the guests, and he saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment. And he said to him: “Friend! How did you come in here not having a wedding garment?” But he was silent. Then the king said to the waiters: “Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth! For many are called, but few are chosen!”’” (Matthew 22:1-14).
Many Are Called―Few Are Chosen
Yes, many are called―in fact all are called―but few are chosen because few want to make the ‘violent’ efforts required to attain Heaven. This provoked one man to nervously ask Our Lord about the number of those who are saved: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside, and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28).
The Violence of Love Wins Heaven
“The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Here Our Lord implicitly speaks of the violence of love and, therefore, the high degree of love what we should have. In her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady speaks of this violence of love, saying:
“In this violence of love the creature begins to withdraw from and die to all earthly things―and that is why love is called strong as death. From this ‘death’ [to worldliness and sin] arises a new spiritual life, which makes the soul capable of receiving new participations of the blessed and their gifts; for it enjoys more frequently the overshadowing of the Most High and the fruits of the highest Good, which it loves. These mysterious influences cause a sort of overflow into the interior and animal parts of the creature, producing a certain transparency and purifying it from the effects of the spiritual darknesses. It makes it courageous and, as it were, indifferent to suffering, ready to meet and endure all that is adverse to the inclinations of the flesh. With a certain subtle thirst, it begins to seek after all the difficulty and violence that is incident to the attainment of the Kingdom of Heaven (Matthew 11:12); it becomes alert and unhindered by earthly grossness, so that many times the body itself begins to feel this lightness in regard to its own self; the labors, which before seemed burdensome, now become easy.”
Same Plight―Different Attitudes
As we find ourselves on the cusp or brink of Lent, we find differing attitudes among Catholics. Lent is inescapable―though many would like to escape it―just like our Day of Judgment is inescapable and many would like to escape that too! We can either, proverbially, see the glass as being half-empty or half-full, it depends upon whether we have a negative attitude to Lent, or a positive attitude to Lent. Some can’t wait for Lent to end―others can’t wait for Lent to get started! What we do with Lent will largely affect our levels of holiness and the outcome of our Day of Judgment. We could compare Lent and the graces that God offers us, to Our Lord’s parable about the Talents:
“A man going into a far country, called his servants, and delivered to them his goods. To one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―to everyone according to his proper ability―and then immediately he took his journey. And he that had received the five talents, went his way, and traded with the same, and gained another five. And in like manner he that had received the two, gained another two. But he that had received the one, going his way dug a hole into the earth and hid his lord’s money. But after a long time, the lord of those servants came, and reckoned with them. And he that had received the five talents coming, brought the other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you delivered to me five talents, behold I have gained another five over and above!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place you over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’ And he also, that had received the two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you delivered two talents to me! Behold, I have gained another two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’
“But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man―you reap where you have not sown, and gather where you have not strewn. And, being afraid, I went and hid your talent in the ground! Behold here it is―you can take back that which is yours!’ And his lord, answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewn! Therefore you ought to have committed my money to the bankers, so that, at my coming, I should have received my own money back with usury [additional interest]!’ Take away, therefore, the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has, shall be given, and he shall abound! But from him that has not, that also which he seems to have shall be taken away! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
How will we use the graces that God will give during Lent? Will we profit from them? Or will we bury them and have no profit to show for them? Will Our Lord say to us: “Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!” Or will Our Lord say to us: “Wicked and slothful servant! Take away, therefore, the talent from him and cast out the unprofitable servant into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!”
Why Pay if You Have No Debts
The bottom line of Lent is doing penance for sin. Yet today, most people have lost the sense of sin―so why pay for something you don’t believe in, or something you don’t believe you are guilty of? Sin-Penance-Lent form a trinity of sorts. We are all sinners―all sin must be paid for by penance―and Lent is the appointed time to do obligatory penance and pay for sin (for those who refuse to pay at other times of the year). One pope after another―from the Traditional Pope Pius XII to the Modernist Pope Francis―has lamented the loss of the sense of sin in the world.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin ... The meaning of sin ― which is a different thing from ‘guilt feelings’ as understood in psychology ― is only grasped in discovering the meaning of God!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Today, we can clearly see the Kingdom of God crumbling before our own eyes! Sin is downplayed, ignored, refuted and rejected under the modern fallacy of independence with its “Nobody will tell me what is a sin! I decide for myself what is right and wrong!” The result is clear to see: LGBTQ+, Transgenderism, Adultery, Divorce, Remarried divorcees, Cohabitation, Contraception, Abortion, etc.
They say it only takes one Holy Communion to make a saint! How many times have we received and where are we on the road to sanctity? Most Catholics have received Holy Communion thousands of times―if not tens of thousands of times―and they are long way from sanctity; a long way from Heaven; more likely with one foot in Purgatory and the other foot perilously close to Hell! They have failed to profit from what God has given them!
The same can be said for the season of Lent. One Lent should be enough to turn our whole life around from worldliness and sinfulness, and redirect it towards virtue and sanctity. Yet―just as it is with Holy Communion―for most Catholics Lent has been misspent; it has often been doomed from the beginning; ended before it began; a mere flash in the pan; a bird that failed to fly!
Limping Through Lent
Most Lents could be compared to the attempts of the sick man by the Pool of Bethsaida: “Now there is at Jerusalem a pond, called Probatica, which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida, having five porches. In these porches lay a great multitude of sick, of blind, of lame, of withered―waiting for the moving of the water. And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under. And there was a certain man there, that had been under his infirmity for thirty-eight years. When Jesus had seen him lying there, and knowing that he had been there a long time, He said to him: ‘Do you want to be made whole?’ The infirm man answered Him: ‘Sir, I have no man―when the water is moved―to put me into the pond. For whilst I am coming, another goes down before me!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Arise, take up thy bed and walk!’ And immediately the man was made whole―and he took up his bed and walked” (John 5:2-9).
How many times have we not found ourselves in a similar situation? When Lent comes―just as “an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved” ― and the waters of grace are moved, we find ourselves paralyzed or lame; we barely limp through Lent and fail to profit from the ‘waters’ of grace that are on offer! Like the lame man, you might say: “I have no man―when the water is moved―to put me into the pond. For whilst I am coming, another goes down before me!” Lent is over before we really get going! In fact, we ourselves are like water―for “water seeks the path of least resistance”―meaning that water will naturally flow along the easiest route available to it, always moving downhill and taking the path with the least obstruction and the lowest level available to it. Water, like any liquid, will move to find the lowest possible point, taking the easiest path to get there.
Paralysis of the Proud
For many souls it is a case of: “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). Such souls see nothing really wrong in how they live their lives. Much like the Pharisee―in Our Lord’s parable about the Pharisee and the Publican―they think they are good folk, and not like the rest of men! “And Jesus spoke this parable to certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up into the Temple to pray―the one, a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself: “God! I thank you, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this Publican! I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes to Heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying: “God! Be merciful to me a sinner!” I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other―for every one that exalts himself shall be abased; and he that humbles himself shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
Likewise, we can be tempted to think that we are not like the rest of men―we are CATHOLICS, they are not; we go to Mass often, they do not; we pray the Rosary, they do not! We fatally forget that much more is expected from us because of our being given the tremendous grace of finding and being baptized in the Catholic Faith―most people have not received that grace―for out of every 8 people in the world, only around 1 is Catholic (1.3 billion Catholics out of a world population of 8.3 billion). We have been given more―especially if we are Conservative or Traditional Catholics―and therefore much more is expected of us: “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required; and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). We might think that what we do is a lot―but, when you factor into the equation the great graces we have been given, then that “lot” soon becomes “little” by comparison to what is really expected of us!
Looking for Lenten Loopholes
There are some who are always looking for the cheapest Lent available. They rejoice in knowing that the modern-Church has given a 95% discount on Lenten fasting ― reducing it from 40 days of fasting to just 2 days: Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. You can make Lent easy or you can make it tough―the choice is yours and the consequences are yours also. Our Lord was not born in this world to live a life of comfort―but a life of poverty and toil, even though He was the sinless God, who created all things. His mode of life was meant to be an example to us―who, because of Original Sin, are always ready for and always searching for the “easy-way-out” in most things. As Holy Scripture warns: “Be not deceived! God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Our Lord praised St. John the Baptist for not being “soft” and not “taking-it-easy”: “Amen I say to you, there has not risen, among them that are born of women, a greater than John the Baptist!” (Matthew 11:11). Speaking further of John the Baptist, Our Lord points out and stresses that this greatest of the great was no “softie” who sought the “easy life”, but a wonderful example of sacrifice, mortification and penance: “And when the messengers of John were departed, Jesus began to speak to the multitudes concerning John: ‘What went ye out into the desert to see? A reed shaken by the wind? But what went you out to see? A man clothed in soft garments? Behold they that are in costly garments and live delicately, are in the houses of kings. But what went you out to see? A prophet? Yes, I say to you―and more than a prophet! This is he of whom it is written: “Behold I send My angel before Thy face, who shall prepare Thy way before Thee!” For I say to you: Amongst those that are born of women, there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist!’” (Luke 7:24-28). “And the same John had his garment of camel hair, and a leather girdle about his loins; and he ate locusts and wild honey” (Matthew 3:4; Mark 1:6).
No “Easy-Street” to Heaven
The way to Heaven and salvation is no “easy-street” or “cakewalk” ― Heaven is something priceless that needs to paid for. Those who show no effort, have no chance! Our Lord Himself says: “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Heaven is not an “Open House” where anyone can wander-in regardless―Our Lord’s parable of the wedding-feast, which is a symbol of our eternal marriage to God in Heaven, has people cast-out:
“Jesus answering, spoke again in parables to them, saying: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a king, who made a marriage for his son. And he sent his servants, to call them that were invited to the marriage; and they would not come. Again he sent other servants, saying: “Tell them that were invited: ‘Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my calves and fatlings are killed, and all things are ready―come ye to the marriage!’” But they neglected, and went their own ways―one to his farm, and another to his merchandise; and the rest laid hands on his servants, and, having treated them contumeliously, put them to death. But when the king had heard of it, he was angry, and sending his armies, he destroyed those murderers, and burnt their city. Then he said to his servants: “The marriage indeed is ready―but they that were invited were not worthy! Go ye therefore into the highways; and as many as you shall find, call to the marriage!” And his servants going forth into the ways, gathered together all that they found, both bad and good―and the marriage was filled with guests. And the king went in to see the guests, and he saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment. And he said to him: “Friend! How did you come in here not having a wedding garment?” But he was silent. Then the king said to the waiters: “Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth! For many are called, but few are chosen!”’” (Matthew 22:1-14).
Many Are Called―Few Are Chosen
Yes, many are called―in fact all are called―but few are chosen because few want to make the ‘violent’ efforts required to attain Heaven. This provoked one man to nervously ask Our Lord about the number of those who are saved: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside, and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28).
The Violence of Love Wins Heaven
“The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Here Our Lord implicitly speaks of the violence of love and, therefore, the high degree of love what we should have. In her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady speaks of this violence of love, saying:
“In this violence of love the creature begins to withdraw from and die to all earthly things―and that is why love is called strong as death. From this ‘death’ [to worldliness and sin] arises a new spiritual life, which makes the soul capable of receiving new participations of the blessed and their gifts; for it enjoys more frequently the overshadowing of the Most High and the fruits of the highest Good, which it loves. These mysterious influences cause a sort of overflow into the interior and animal parts of the creature, producing a certain transparency and purifying it from the effects of the spiritual darknesses. It makes it courageous and, as it were, indifferent to suffering, ready to meet and endure all that is adverse to the inclinations of the flesh. With a certain subtle thirst, it begins to seek after all the difficulty and violence that is incident to the attainment of the Kingdom of Heaven (Matthew 11:12); it becomes alert and unhindered by earthly grossness, so that many times the body itself begins to feel this lightness in regard to its own self; the labors, which before seemed burdensome, now become easy.”
Same Plight―Different Attitudes
As we find ourselves on the cusp or brink of Lent, we find differing attitudes among Catholics. Lent is inescapable―though many would like to escape it―just like our Day of Judgment is inescapable and many would like to escape that too! We can either, proverbially, see the glass as being half-empty or half-full, it depends upon whether we have a negative attitude to Lent, or a positive attitude to Lent. Some can’t wait for Lent to end―others can’t wait for Lent to get started! What we do with Lent will largely affect our levels of holiness and the outcome of our Day of Judgment. We could compare Lent and the graces that God offers us, to Our Lord’s parable about the Talents:
“A man going into a far country, called his servants, and delivered to them his goods. To one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―to everyone according to his proper ability―and then immediately he took his journey. And he that had received the five talents, went his way, and traded with the same, and gained another five. And in like manner he that had received the two, gained another two. But he that had received the one, going his way dug a hole into the earth and hid his lord’s money. But after a long time, the lord of those servants came, and reckoned with them. And he that had received the five talents coming, brought the other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you delivered to me five talents, behold I have gained another five over and above!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place you over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’ And he also, that had received the two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you delivered two talents to me! Behold, I have gained another two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’
“But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man―you reap where you have not sown, and gather where you have not strewn. And, being afraid, I went and hid your talent in the ground! Behold here it is―you can take back that which is yours!’ And his lord, answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewn! Therefore you ought to have committed my money to the bankers, so that, at my coming, I should have received my own money back with usury [additional interest]!’ Take away, therefore, the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has, shall be given, and he shall abound! But from him that has not, that also which he seems to have shall be taken away! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
How will we use the graces that God will give during Lent? Will we profit from them? Or will we bury them and have no profit to show for them? Will Our Lord say to us: “Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!” Or will Our Lord say to us: “Wicked and slothful servant! Take away, therefore, the talent from him and cast out the unprofitable servant into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!”
Why Pay if You Have No Debts
The bottom line of Lent is doing penance for sin. Yet today, most people have lost the sense of sin―so why pay for something you don’t believe in, or something you don’t believe you are guilty of? Sin-Penance-Lent form a trinity of sorts. We are all sinners―all sin must be paid for by penance―and Lent is the appointed time to do obligatory penance and pay for sin (for those who refuse to pay at other times of the year). One pope after another―from the Traditional Pope Pius XII to the Modernist Pope Francis―has lamented the loss of the sense of sin in the world.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin ... The meaning of sin ― which is a different thing from ‘guilt feelings’ as understood in psychology ― is only grasped in discovering the meaning of God!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Today, we can clearly see the Kingdom of God crumbling before our own eyes! Sin is downplayed, ignored, refuted and rejected under the modern fallacy of independence with its “Nobody will tell me what is a sin! I decide for myself what is right and wrong!” The result is clear to see: LGBTQ+, Transgenderism, Adultery, Divorce, Remarried divorcees, Cohabitation, Contraception, Abortion, etc.
Article 13
Quinquagesima Sunday & Monday, March 2nd & 3rd
No Charity―No Hope―No Chance!
Quinquagesima Sunday & Monday, March 2nd & 3rd
No Charity―No Hope―No Chance!
Lenten Fuel―Lenten Power
As we approach Lent, this final Sunday of Lenten preparation―Quinquagesima Sunday―presents to us the fuel and power that will be required, not only for a successful Lent, but also for a successful life. That powerful fuel is CHARITY. You could call Quinquagesima Sunday by the name of “Charity Sunday” ― in view of the Epistle reading that Holy Mother Church puts before us as we prepare to embark on another Lent. Here, then, is that Epistle reading before we comment upon it and explain its incredibly deep value.
Lesson from the first letter of St. Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians: “Brethren! If I should speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have charity―then I have become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. And if I have prophecy and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains, yet do not have charity―then I am nothing. And if I distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I deliver my body to be burned, yet do not have charity―then it profits me nothing. Charity is patient, is kind; charity does not envy, is not pretentious, is not puffed up, is not ambitious, is not self-seeking, is not provoked; thinks no evil, does not rejoice over wickedness, but rejoices with the truth; bears with all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never fails, whereas prophecies will disappear, and tongues will cease, and knowledge will be destroyed. For we know in part and we prophesy in part; but when that which is perfect has come, that which is imperfect will be done away with. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I felt as a child, I thought as a child. Now that I have become a man, I have put away the things of a child. We see now through a mirror in an obscure manner, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know even as I have been known. So there abide faith, hope and charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-13).
The Primacy of Charity
We speak of “the primacy of charity” ― what does this mean? It means that charity is the greatest of all virtues. Why is it the greatest of all virtues? It is the greatest of all virtues because “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and God is the greatest being, God holds primacy over all His creation, there is none greater than God. Therefore, if God is charity, then it stands to reason that charity is the greatest of all virtues because it epitomizes God.
Theology teaches that there are three chief virtues that we must have in our relationship and communication with God―those virtues are Faith, Hope and Charity―as St. Paul stated above: “There abide Faith, Hope and Charity, these three; but the greatest of these is Charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-13). That is why, in the words of St. Paul, without this greatest of virtues―Charity―we are “nothing” a mere “tinkling cymbal” and “it profits us nothing.”
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Charity is love … Love is proved by deeds … The precept of love is said to be a general command, because all other precepts are reduced to charity as to their end, according to 1 Timothy 1:5: ‘The end of the commandment is charity.’ Charity is included in the definition of every virtue, not as being essentially every virtue, but because every virtue depends on it in a way ... No true virtue is possible without charity … Charity is the form of the virtues … Charity is compared to the foundation or root―in so far as all other virtues draw their sustenance and nourishment from charity … Charity directs the acts of all other virtues to the last end.”
Tough Charity
St. Augustine elaborates on this point by pointing out that actions that might seem harsh to others―are nonetheless acceptable if they are truly done out of charity: “We find people made fierce by love; and by wickedness made seductively gentle. A father beats a boy, while a kidnapper caresses him. Offered a choice between blows and caresses, who would not choose the caresses and avoid the blows? But when you consider the people who give them you realize that it is love that beats, wickedness that caresses. This is what I insist upon―human actions can only be understood by their root in love. All kinds of actions might appear good without proceeding from the root of love. Remember, thorns also have flowers: some actions seem truly savage, but are done for the sake of discipline motivated by love. Once and for all, I give you this one short command―love, and do what you will. If you hold your peace, hold your peace out of love. If you cry out, cry out in love. If you correct someone, correct them out of love. If you spare them, spare them out of love. Let the root of love be in you: nothing can spring from it but good.” (St. Augustine, Father and Doctor of the Church, Sermon #110: On Charity).
Hence the seemingly harsh words of Holy Scripture should be seen and interpreted according to the above rule of charity: “He that loves his son, frequently chastises him!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:1). “He that spares the rod, hates his son―but he that loves his son, corrects him in good time” (Proverbs 13:24). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:13-14). That is why: “Whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives!” (Hebrews 12:6) ― and remember: “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8).
Hence Holy Scripture further states: “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14). All that we think, say or do; all that we avoid saying, thinking or doing; all of this should be motivated by charity, namely our charity for God, that is to say our love for God. If we think, act or speak out of any other motive, then it is an inferior motive or even a sinful motive. God wants our love because He showed His love towards us by sending His Son to redeem from our sins and Hell: “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). That is why we should love God in return with all our heart, mind, soul and strength: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Negligence in Loving God
Can you put a price on Redemption and Salvation? Could you possibly pay for your Redemption and Salvation? Are you owed Redemption and Salvation? The answer to all of those questions is “No!” You have not deserved Redemption and Salvation and yet you have been given a chance of Redemption and Salvation―but only if you love God. “You are saved … not of yourselves―for it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8). The grace of God―which is inextricably linked to our Redemption and Salvation―is also a gift of God. Nobody has grace owed to them. Nothing good can be done without the grace of God. The very word “grace” means a gift. By its nature, grace can’t be earned. Love can’t be earned. We did not earn God’s love, mercy and grace! They are gifts. A gift is not something that is owed―it is something that freely given out of charity. We should give thanks to God for His gift and His charity! “Let us therefore love God, because God first has loved us!” (1 John 4:19) ― love is meant to be reciprocal, that is to say, it is meant to be give and take, a “two-way-street” rather than a “one-way-street” whereby we eagerly “take” but reluctantly “give”.
Unfortunately―and to our own loss―we do not give sufficient thanks to God! We are like most of the ten lepers whom Christ cured―only one of which came back to give thanks: “And as Jesus entered into a certain town, there met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off, and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus! Master! Have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before the feet of Jesus, giving thanks―and this was a Samaritan! And Jesus answering, said: ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the nine? There is no one found to return and give glory to God, except this stranger!’” (Luke 17:12-18).
God Does Not Force Us
God does not force us to love Him. He has not programmed us to robotically love Him. He wants us to freely love Him out of our own free-will. That is true love is―it is not a forced love, but a freely given love. That is what makes it so beautiful and so treasured. The benefits of such a free-love cannot be imagined: “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9). We are free to accept God’s love and to give Him our love in return―or we can choose to reject God’s love and love something or someone else more than God, or in place of God. The choice is ours―and we shall reap what we choose. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Proof of Love
Love is more than mere words! Actions speak louder than words! If “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20), than all the more so we can say that charity without works is also dead. Our Lord calls for concrete proof of our love: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words … He that does not love Me, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
The keeping of the commandments of God and Church is the very basic measuring stick of our love for God―it is the minimal level of love for God. Avoiding mortal sin on an habitual basis is minimal love of God. Climbing up the ladder a little, the avoidance of all venial sin (as well as mortal sin, of course) is seen as being an indication that our love of God is growing from the bare minimum. An indication of a further increase in the love of God is the acceptance (perhaps reluctantly) of any and all sufferings that come our way. A higher love of God is shown by a desire to suffer for God and a love of suffering for God.
In his book, The Soul of the Apostolate, Dom Chautard (1858-1935), a French Trappist abbot, gives us an ascending scale of spirituality and love from mortal sin to sanctity. Here it is:
1. HARDENED IN SIN
MORTAL SIN: Stubborn persistence in sin, either out of ignorance or because of a maliciously warped conscience.
PRAYER: Deliberate refusal to have any recourse to God.
2. SURFACE CHRISTIANITY
MORTAL SIN: Considered as a trifling evil, easily forgiven. The soul easily gives way and commits mortal sin at almost every possible occasion or temptation. Confession almost without contrition.
PRAYER: Mechanical; either inattention, or always dictated by temporal interest—such souls enter into themselves rarely and superficially.
3. MEDIOCRE PIETY
MORTAL SIN: Weak resistance. Hardly ever avoids occasions but seriously regrets having sinned and makes good confessions.
VENIAL SIN: Complete acceptance of this sin, which is considered as insignificant. Hence tepidity or lukewarmness of the will. Does nothing whatever to prevent venial sin, or to extirpate it, or to find it out, when it is concealed.
PRAYER: From time to time, prays well.—Momentary fits of fervor.
4. INTERMITTENT PIETY
MORTAL SIN: Loyal resistance. Habitually avoids occasions. Deep regrets if there is a fall into mortal sin. Does penance to make reparation.
VENIAL SIN: Sometimes deliberate. Puts up weak fight. Sorrow only superficial. Makes particular examination of conscience, but without any method or coherence.
PRAYER: Not firmly resolved to remain faithful to meditation. Gives it up as soon as dryness is felt or as soon as there is business to attend to.
5. SUSTAINED PIETY
MORTAL SIN: Never. At most, very rare, when taken suddenly and violently by surprise. And then, often it is to be doubted if the sin is mortal. It is followed by ardent compunction and penance.
VENIAL SIN: Vigilant in avoiding and fighting it. Rarely deliberate. Keen sorrow, but does little by way of reparation. Consistent particular examination, but aiming only at avoidance of deliberate venial sin.
IMPERFECTIONS: The soul either avoids uncovering them so as not to have to fight them, or else easily excuses them. Approves the thought of renouncing them, and would like to do so, but makes little effort in that direction.
PRAYER: Always faithful to prayer, no matter what happens. Often affective. Alternating consolations and dryness, the latter endured with considerable hardship.
6. FERVOR
MORTAL SIN: Never.
VENIAL SIN: Never deliberate. By surprise, sometimes, or with imperfect advertence. Keenly regretted, and serious reparation made.
IMPERFECTIONS: Wants nothing to do with them. Watches over them, fights them with courage, in order to be more pleasing to God. Sometimes accepted, however, but regretted at once. Frequent acts of renunciation. Particular examen aims at perfection in a given virtue.
PRAYER: Mental prayer gladly prolonged. Prayer on the affective side, or even prayer of simplicity. Alternation between powerful consolations and fierce trials.
7. RELATIVE PERFECTION
MORTAL SIN: Never.
VENIAL SIN: Very rare. Never deliberate. Deeply regretted with serious reparation being made.
IMPERFECTIONS: Guards against them energetically and with much love of God. They only happen with half-advertence.
PRAYER: Habitual life of prayer even when occupied in external works. Thirst for self-renunciation, annihilation, detachment, and divine love. Hunger for the Eucharist, and for heaven. Graces of infused prayer, of different degrees. Often, passive purification.
8. HEROIC PERFECTION
MORTAL SIN: Never.
VENIAL SIN: Never.
IMPERFECTIONS: Nothing but the first impulse.
PRAYER: Supernatural graces of contemplation, sometimes accompanied by extraordinary phenomena. Pronounced passive purifications. Contempt of self to the point of complete self-forgetfulness. Prefers suffering to joys.
9. COMPLETE SANCTITY
MORTAL SIN: Never.
VENIAL SIN: Never.
IMPERFECTIONS: Hardly apparent.
PRAYER: Usually, transforming union. Spiritual marriage. Purifications by love. Ardent thirst for sufferings and humiliations. (Few and far between are the souls that belong to the last two, even to the last three categories.)
Only Saints Enter Heaven
Don’t fool yourself―or don’t let the devil fool you―by false reasoning! It is only saints who go to Heaven. We would like to imagine Heaven as being a place of saints and mediocre persons (ourselves), where we are saved and spend our time admiring the hallowed sanctity of the saints―from our lower level of mediocrity! Mediocrity is nothing else than lukewarmness―and God has this to say about lukewarmness: “I know your works, that you are neither cold, nor hot. I wish you were cold, or hot! But, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange has this to say on sanctity: “The interior life, which presupposes the state of grace, consists, is a generous tendency of the soul toward God, in which, little by little, each one is transformed to an intimate conversation of the soul with God. Therefore, the interior life is―in a soul that is in the state of grace―especially a life of humility, abnegation, Faith, Hope, and Charity, with the peace that comes from the progressive subordination of our feelings and wishes to the love of God … The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, more profound than artistic or literary life, more profound than social or political life.
“Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Largrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Love of the World
Incompatible with the love of God. Our Lord said that we cannot love both God and the world―for the world is an enemy of God. “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!”― mammon being the riches, pleasures and treasures of the world (Matthew 6:19-24). Our Lord’s encounter with the rich young man was a perfect example of someone trying to serve God and mammon:
“And behold, a certain rich young man, a ruler, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
Hence Holy Scripture warns: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Modern Idolatry
Unfortunately, most Catholic families―even Conservative and Traditional families―are filled with “mammonizers” of one kind or another, to one degree or another. The modern world, modern technology, and modern living has succeeded in seducing most Catholics―whether they admit it or not. The love of the world is of a far higher degree than the love of God. That is easily seen by analyzing what most people talk about, read about, what they do, where they go and the many hours they spend on a whole variety of worldly things! The smartphone alone is enough of an idol to indict most Catholics and pronounce them as being guilty of loving their phone more than God, spending more time on their phone than with God! “They consult their idols” (Isaias 19:3). There are many, many other areas that are the same in competing for the love God―and sadly winning!
Today, Catholics want to serve God while keeping possession of their idols. “These nations feared the Lord, but nevertheless also served their idols―their children also and grandchildren, as their fathers did, so do they unto this day!” (4 Kings 17:41). Holy Scripture speaks out vehemently against idols that take the place of God: “You have seen their idols―wood and stone, silver and gold, which they worshiped!” (Deuteronomy 29:17). “They trust in idols, which are without life” (Wisdom 14:29). “The idols of the Gentiles are silver and gold, the works of the hands of men!” (Psalm 113:12). “Their land is full of idols! They have adored the work of their own hands, which their own fingers have made!” (Isaias 2:8). “Their eyes went a fornicating after their idols” (Ezechiel 6:9). “The beginning of fornication is the devising of idols; and the invention of them is the corruption of life!” (Wisdom 14:12). “They have committed fornication with their gods, and have adored their idols” (Exodus 34:15). “Their idols became a stumbling-block to them!” (Psalm 105:36). “The makers of idols are all of them nothing, and their best beloved things shall not profit them!” (Isaias 44:9). “They have departed from Me through all their idols!” (Ezechiel 14:5). “I will destroy break your idols. You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you!” (Leviticus 26:30). “Turn ye not to idols! I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 19:4). “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘Be converted and depart from your idols!’” (Ezechiel 14:6).
No Charity? No Hope! No Chance!
St. John of the Cross writes: “At the evening of life, we shall be judged on our love!” St. Robert Bellarmine adds: “Charity is that with which no man is lost, and without which no man is saved!” St. Paul wrote: “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). St. Francis de Sales states: “Faith points out the way to the land of promise as a pillar of fire; hope feeds us with its manna of sweetness, but charity actually introduces us into the Promised Land.”
St. Thérèse of Lisieux tells us: “You ask me for a method of attaining perfection. I know of love—and only love! Love can do all things!” To which St. Francis de Sales adds: “Perfection of life is the perfection of love. For love is the life of the soul. Man is the perfection of the Universe. The spirit is the perfection of man. Love is the perfection of the spirit, and charity that of love. Therefore, the love of God is the end, the perfection of the Universe.”
St. Aelred of Rievaulx says: “Charity may be a very short word, but with its tremendous meaning of pure love, it sums up man’s entire relation to God and to his neighbor. As Our Lord explained: ‘It is on charity that all the Law and the prophets depend.’” To which St. John Vianney adds: “All our religion is but a false religion, and all our virtues are mere illusions and we ourselves are only hypocrites in the sight of God, if we have not that universal charity for everyone―for the good, and for the bad; for the poor and for the rich; and for all those who do us harm, as much as for those who do us good.”
“Charity is that with which no man is lost, and without which no man is saved!” (St. Robert Bellarmine). The Church teaches that sanctifying grace and charity are never separable; they are always together, either both are present in the soul or both are absent from soul. The theological virtue of charity, though not identical to sanctifying grace, nevertheless is inseparably connected with sanctifying grace, and it is clear that both must stand or fall together, hence the expressions “to fall from grace” and “to lose charity” are equivalent. When we sin mortally, we not only lose sanctifying grace, but we also lose charity. “At the end of our life, we shall all be judged by charity!” (St. John of the Cross).
As we approach Lent, this final Sunday of Lenten preparation―Quinquagesima Sunday―presents to us the fuel and power that will be required, not only for a successful Lent, but also for a successful life. That powerful fuel is CHARITY. You could call Quinquagesima Sunday by the name of “Charity Sunday” ― in view of the Epistle reading that Holy Mother Church puts before us as we prepare to embark on another Lent. Here, then, is that Epistle reading before we comment upon it and explain its incredibly deep value.
Lesson from the first letter of St. Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians: “Brethren! If I should speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have charity―then I have become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. And if I have prophecy and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains, yet do not have charity―then I am nothing. And if I distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I deliver my body to be burned, yet do not have charity―then it profits me nothing. Charity is patient, is kind; charity does not envy, is not pretentious, is not puffed up, is not ambitious, is not self-seeking, is not provoked; thinks no evil, does not rejoice over wickedness, but rejoices with the truth; bears with all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never fails, whereas prophecies will disappear, and tongues will cease, and knowledge will be destroyed. For we know in part and we prophesy in part; but when that which is perfect has come, that which is imperfect will be done away with. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I felt as a child, I thought as a child. Now that I have become a man, I have put away the things of a child. We see now through a mirror in an obscure manner, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know even as I have been known. So there abide faith, hope and charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-13).
The Primacy of Charity
We speak of “the primacy of charity” ― what does this mean? It means that charity is the greatest of all virtues. Why is it the greatest of all virtues? It is the greatest of all virtues because “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and God is the greatest being, God holds primacy over all His creation, there is none greater than God. Therefore, if God is charity, then it stands to reason that charity is the greatest of all virtues because it epitomizes God.
Theology teaches that there are three chief virtues that we must have in our relationship and communication with God―those virtues are Faith, Hope and Charity―as St. Paul stated above: “There abide Faith, Hope and Charity, these three; but the greatest of these is Charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-13). That is why, in the words of St. Paul, without this greatest of virtues―Charity―we are “nothing” a mere “tinkling cymbal” and “it profits us nothing.”
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Charity is love … Love is proved by deeds … The precept of love is said to be a general command, because all other precepts are reduced to charity as to their end, according to 1 Timothy 1:5: ‘The end of the commandment is charity.’ Charity is included in the definition of every virtue, not as being essentially every virtue, but because every virtue depends on it in a way ... No true virtue is possible without charity … Charity is the form of the virtues … Charity is compared to the foundation or root―in so far as all other virtues draw their sustenance and nourishment from charity … Charity directs the acts of all other virtues to the last end.”
Tough Charity
St. Augustine elaborates on this point by pointing out that actions that might seem harsh to others―are nonetheless acceptable if they are truly done out of charity: “We find people made fierce by love; and by wickedness made seductively gentle. A father beats a boy, while a kidnapper caresses him. Offered a choice between blows and caresses, who would not choose the caresses and avoid the blows? But when you consider the people who give them you realize that it is love that beats, wickedness that caresses. This is what I insist upon―human actions can only be understood by their root in love. All kinds of actions might appear good without proceeding from the root of love. Remember, thorns also have flowers: some actions seem truly savage, but are done for the sake of discipline motivated by love. Once and for all, I give you this one short command―love, and do what you will. If you hold your peace, hold your peace out of love. If you cry out, cry out in love. If you correct someone, correct them out of love. If you spare them, spare them out of love. Let the root of love be in you: nothing can spring from it but good.” (St. Augustine, Father and Doctor of the Church, Sermon #110: On Charity).
Hence the seemingly harsh words of Holy Scripture should be seen and interpreted according to the above rule of charity: “He that loves his son, frequently chastises him!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:1). “He that spares the rod, hates his son―but he that loves his son, corrects him in good time” (Proverbs 13:24). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:13-14). That is why: “Whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives!” (Hebrews 12:6) ― and remember: “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8).
Hence Holy Scripture further states: “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14). All that we think, say or do; all that we avoid saying, thinking or doing; all of this should be motivated by charity, namely our charity for God, that is to say our love for God. If we think, act or speak out of any other motive, then it is an inferior motive or even a sinful motive. God wants our love because He showed His love towards us by sending His Son to redeem from our sins and Hell: “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). That is why we should love God in return with all our heart, mind, soul and strength: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Negligence in Loving God
Can you put a price on Redemption and Salvation? Could you possibly pay for your Redemption and Salvation? Are you owed Redemption and Salvation? The answer to all of those questions is “No!” You have not deserved Redemption and Salvation and yet you have been given a chance of Redemption and Salvation―but only if you love God. “You are saved … not of yourselves―for it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8). The grace of God―which is inextricably linked to our Redemption and Salvation―is also a gift of God. Nobody has grace owed to them. Nothing good can be done without the grace of God. The very word “grace” means a gift. By its nature, grace can’t be earned. Love can’t be earned. We did not earn God’s love, mercy and grace! They are gifts. A gift is not something that is owed―it is something that freely given out of charity. We should give thanks to God for His gift and His charity! “Let us therefore love God, because God first has loved us!” (1 John 4:19) ― love is meant to be reciprocal, that is to say, it is meant to be give and take, a “two-way-street” rather than a “one-way-street” whereby we eagerly “take” but reluctantly “give”.
Unfortunately―and to our own loss―we do not give sufficient thanks to God! We are like most of the ten lepers whom Christ cured―only one of which came back to give thanks: “And as Jesus entered into a certain town, there met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off, and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus! Master! Have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before the feet of Jesus, giving thanks―and this was a Samaritan! And Jesus answering, said: ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the nine? There is no one found to return and give glory to God, except this stranger!’” (Luke 17:12-18).
God Does Not Force Us
God does not force us to love Him. He has not programmed us to robotically love Him. He wants us to freely love Him out of our own free-will. That is true love is―it is not a forced love, but a freely given love. That is what makes it so beautiful and so treasured. The benefits of such a free-love cannot be imagined: “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9). We are free to accept God’s love and to give Him our love in return―or we can choose to reject God’s love and love something or someone else more than God, or in place of God. The choice is ours―and we shall reap what we choose. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Proof of Love
Love is more than mere words! Actions speak louder than words! If “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20), than all the more so we can say that charity without works is also dead. Our Lord calls for concrete proof of our love: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words … He that does not love Me, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
The keeping of the commandments of God and Church is the very basic measuring stick of our love for God―it is the minimal level of love for God. Avoiding mortal sin on an habitual basis is minimal love of God. Climbing up the ladder a little, the avoidance of all venial sin (as well as mortal sin, of course) is seen as being an indication that our love of God is growing from the bare minimum. An indication of a further increase in the love of God is the acceptance (perhaps reluctantly) of any and all sufferings that come our way. A higher love of God is shown by a desire to suffer for God and a love of suffering for God.
In his book, The Soul of the Apostolate, Dom Chautard (1858-1935), a French Trappist abbot, gives us an ascending scale of spirituality and love from mortal sin to sanctity. Here it is:
1. HARDENED IN SIN
MORTAL SIN: Stubborn persistence in sin, either out of ignorance or because of a maliciously warped conscience.
PRAYER: Deliberate refusal to have any recourse to God.
2. SURFACE CHRISTIANITY
MORTAL SIN: Considered as a trifling evil, easily forgiven. The soul easily gives way and commits mortal sin at almost every possible occasion or temptation. Confession almost without contrition.
PRAYER: Mechanical; either inattention, or always dictated by temporal interest—such souls enter into themselves rarely and superficially.
3. MEDIOCRE PIETY
MORTAL SIN: Weak resistance. Hardly ever avoids occasions but seriously regrets having sinned and makes good confessions.
VENIAL SIN: Complete acceptance of this sin, which is considered as insignificant. Hence tepidity or lukewarmness of the will. Does nothing whatever to prevent venial sin, or to extirpate it, or to find it out, when it is concealed.
PRAYER: From time to time, prays well.—Momentary fits of fervor.
4. INTERMITTENT PIETY
MORTAL SIN: Loyal resistance. Habitually avoids occasions. Deep regrets if there is a fall into mortal sin. Does penance to make reparation.
VENIAL SIN: Sometimes deliberate. Puts up weak fight. Sorrow only superficial. Makes particular examination of conscience, but without any method or coherence.
PRAYER: Not firmly resolved to remain faithful to meditation. Gives it up as soon as dryness is felt or as soon as there is business to attend to.
5. SUSTAINED PIETY
MORTAL SIN: Never. At most, very rare, when taken suddenly and violently by surprise. And then, often it is to be doubted if the sin is mortal. It is followed by ardent compunction and penance.
VENIAL SIN: Vigilant in avoiding and fighting it. Rarely deliberate. Keen sorrow, but does little by way of reparation. Consistent particular examination, but aiming only at avoidance of deliberate venial sin.
IMPERFECTIONS: The soul either avoids uncovering them so as not to have to fight them, or else easily excuses them. Approves the thought of renouncing them, and would like to do so, but makes little effort in that direction.
PRAYER: Always faithful to prayer, no matter what happens. Often affective. Alternating consolations and dryness, the latter endured with considerable hardship.
6. FERVOR
MORTAL SIN: Never.
VENIAL SIN: Never deliberate. By surprise, sometimes, or with imperfect advertence. Keenly regretted, and serious reparation made.
IMPERFECTIONS: Wants nothing to do with them. Watches over them, fights them with courage, in order to be more pleasing to God. Sometimes accepted, however, but regretted at once. Frequent acts of renunciation. Particular examen aims at perfection in a given virtue.
PRAYER: Mental prayer gladly prolonged. Prayer on the affective side, or even prayer of simplicity. Alternation between powerful consolations and fierce trials.
7. RELATIVE PERFECTION
MORTAL SIN: Never.
VENIAL SIN: Very rare. Never deliberate. Deeply regretted with serious reparation being made.
IMPERFECTIONS: Guards against them energetically and with much love of God. They only happen with half-advertence.
PRAYER: Habitual life of prayer even when occupied in external works. Thirst for self-renunciation, annihilation, detachment, and divine love. Hunger for the Eucharist, and for heaven. Graces of infused prayer, of different degrees. Often, passive purification.
8. HEROIC PERFECTION
MORTAL SIN: Never.
VENIAL SIN: Never.
IMPERFECTIONS: Nothing but the first impulse.
PRAYER: Supernatural graces of contemplation, sometimes accompanied by extraordinary phenomena. Pronounced passive purifications. Contempt of self to the point of complete self-forgetfulness. Prefers suffering to joys.
9. COMPLETE SANCTITY
MORTAL SIN: Never.
VENIAL SIN: Never.
IMPERFECTIONS: Hardly apparent.
PRAYER: Usually, transforming union. Spiritual marriage. Purifications by love. Ardent thirst for sufferings and humiliations. (Few and far between are the souls that belong to the last two, even to the last three categories.)
Only Saints Enter Heaven
Don’t fool yourself―or don’t let the devil fool you―by false reasoning! It is only saints who go to Heaven. We would like to imagine Heaven as being a place of saints and mediocre persons (ourselves), where we are saved and spend our time admiring the hallowed sanctity of the saints―from our lower level of mediocrity! Mediocrity is nothing else than lukewarmness―and God has this to say about lukewarmness: “I know your works, that you are neither cold, nor hot. I wish you were cold, or hot! But, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange has this to say on sanctity: “The interior life, which presupposes the state of grace, consists, is a generous tendency of the soul toward God, in which, little by little, each one is transformed to an intimate conversation of the soul with God. Therefore, the interior life is―in a soul that is in the state of grace―especially a life of humility, abnegation, Faith, Hope, and Charity, with the peace that comes from the progressive subordination of our feelings and wishes to the love of God … The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, more profound than artistic or literary life, more profound than social or political life.
“Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Largrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Love of the World
Incompatible with the love of God. Our Lord said that we cannot love both God and the world―for the world is an enemy of God. “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!”― mammon being the riches, pleasures and treasures of the world (Matthew 6:19-24). Our Lord’s encounter with the rich young man was a perfect example of someone trying to serve God and mammon:
“And behold, a certain rich young man, a ruler, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
Hence Holy Scripture warns: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Modern Idolatry
Unfortunately, most Catholic families―even Conservative and Traditional families―are filled with “mammonizers” of one kind or another, to one degree or another. The modern world, modern technology, and modern living has succeeded in seducing most Catholics―whether they admit it or not. The love of the world is of a far higher degree than the love of God. That is easily seen by analyzing what most people talk about, read about, what they do, where they go and the many hours they spend on a whole variety of worldly things! The smartphone alone is enough of an idol to indict most Catholics and pronounce them as being guilty of loving their phone more than God, spending more time on their phone than with God! “They consult their idols” (Isaias 19:3). There are many, many other areas that are the same in competing for the love God―and sadly winning!
Today, Catholics want to serve God while keeping possession of their idols. “These nations feared the Lord, but nevertheless also served their idols―their children also and grandchildren, as their fathers did, so do they unto this day!” (4 Kings 17:41). Holy Scripture speaks out vehemently against idols that take the place of God: “You have seen their idols―wood and stone, silver and gold, which they worshiped!” (Deuteronomy 29:17). “They trust in idols, which are without life” (Wisdom 14:29). “The idols of the Gentiles are silver and gold, the works of the hands of men!” (Psalm 113:12). “Their land is full of idols! They have adored the work of their own hands, which their own fingers have made!” (Isaias 2:8). “Their eyes went a fornicating after their idols” (Ezechiel 6:9). “The beginning of fornication is the devising of idols; and the invention of them is the corruption of life!” (Wisdom 14:12). “They have committed fornication with their gods, and have adored their idols” (Exodus 34:15). “Their idols became a stumbling-block to them!” (Psalm 105:36). “The makers of idols are all of them nothing, and their best beloved things shall not profit them!” (Isaias 44:9). “They have departed from Me through all their idols!” (Ezechiel 14:5). “I will destroy break your idols. You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you!” (Leviticus 26:30). “Turn ye not to idols! I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 19:4). “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘Be converted and depart from your idols!’” (Ezechiel 14:6).
No Charity? No Hope! No Chance!
St. John of the Cross writes: “At the evening of life, we shall be judged on our love!” St. Robert Bellarmine adds: “Charity is that with which no man is lost, and without which no man is saved!” St. Paul wrote: “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). St. Francis de Sales states: “Faith points out the way to the land of promise as a pillar of fire; hope feeds us with its manna of sweetness, but charity actually introduces us into the Promised Land.”
St. Thérèse of Lisieux tells us: “You ask me for a method of attaining perfection. I know of love—and only love! Love can do all things!” To which St. Francis de Sales adds: “Perfection of life is the perfection of love. For love is the life of the soul. Man is the perfection of the Universe. The spirit is the perfection of man. Love is the perfection of the spirit, and charity that of love. Therefore, the love of God is the end, the perfection of the Universe.”
St. Aelred of Rievaulx says: “Charity may be a very short word, but with its tremendous meaning of pure love, it sums up man’s entire relation to God and to his neighbor. As Our Lord explained: ‘It is on charity that all the Law and the prophets depend.’” To which St. John Vianney adds: “All our religion is but a false religion, and all our virtues are mere illusions and we ourselves are only hypocrites in the sight of God, if we have not that universal charity for everyone―for the good, and for the bad; for the poor and for the rich; and for all those who do us harm, as much as for those who do us good.”
“Charity is that with which no man is lost, and without which no man is saved!” (St. Robert Bellarmine). The Church teaches that sanctifying grace and charity are never separable; they are always together, either both are present in the soul or both are absent from soul. The theological virtue of charity, though not identical to sanctifying grace, nevertheless is inseparably connected with sanctifying grace, and it is clear that both must stand or fall together, hence the expressions “to fall from grace” and “to lose charity” are equivalent. When we sin mortally, we not only lose sanctifying grace, but we also lose charity. “At the end of our life, we shall all be judged by charity!” (St. John of the Cross).
Article 12
Friday & Saturday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 28th & March 1st
Families in Schism Over Lent!
Friday & Saturday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 28th & March 1st
Families in Schism Over Lent!
Lenten Split―Family Schism
Some like it―some hate it! Some will embrace it―some will flee from it! Some will profit from it―some will lose from it! Lent is a four-letter word that conjures up mixed feelings, opposite reactions, and family division. The following words of Our Lord as particularly applicable to the season of Lent:
“Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! ... But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:17-22, 34-36; 24:9-10; Luke 12:51-53).
Does Our Lord WANT disunity and separation? No―for He also said: “Father, keep them in Thy Name whom Thou has given Me; so that they may be one, as We also are! … That they all may be one, as Thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee; that they also may be one in Us!” (John 17:11, 21). Our Lord wants unity and has said that disunity leads to disaster: “If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand! … Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand!” (Mark 3:24; Matthew 12:25). Hence it is that the Apostles write in Holy Scripture: “I beseech you, by the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no schisms among you; but that you be perfect in the same mind and in the same judgment!” (1 Corinthians 1:10) … “Be ye all of one mind!” (1 Peter 3:8) … “Be careful to keep the unity of the Spirit ― one body and one Spirit; one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism!” (Ephesians 4:3-5).
Disunity is not from God
God is unity―just like God is charity. “The Lord thy God is one God!” (Mark 12:29) ― three Persons in one God; three Persons united in one God ― there is no disunity in God and God does not desire disunity, nor does He create disunity. “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) ― and charity implies a union of wills. The phrase “charity is a union of wills” is a concept derived from the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas, where he defines charity as a form of “friendship with God” that essentially involves aligning our will with the will of God. Charity is a unity, a bond: “above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14). “You are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). “For as the body is one, and has many members; and all the members of the body, whereas they are many, yet are one body―so also is Christ. For in one Spirit were we all baptized into one body and in one Spirit … so that there might be no schism in the body” (1 Corinthians 12:12-13, 25). Charity unites ― a lack of charity disunites and causes division. “Charity is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14).
No doubt you have heard of the phrase “Divide and Conquer!” Ever since his fall from Heaven Satan seeks to divide the world. His first action was to divide the angels, which was followed-up by tempting Adam and Eve in the garden, driving a wedge between the first humans and God. Division is the devil’s playground and it shouldn’t be surprising. The word “devil,” comes from the Greek word “diabolos”, which in Latin is “diabolus” ― it can be translated as, “to divide,” “to separate,” or more literally, “to throw against.” It also means “prone to slander, slanderous, accusing falsely” ― therefore, dividing others from the truth, opposing the truth; lying against the truth; in reference to a person it means “a calumniator, false accuser, slanderer, a liar.” The French name for the “diabolo” is “diable”, which means “devil”. Our Lord said of Satan: “The devil stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44).
God Does Create Division―Sin Causes Division
God does not create division against Himself―it the devil, the world and our own sinful flesh that creates division and divides us from God. God wishes to save ALL persons: “God wants all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4) ― but ALL WILL NOT BE SAVED because they prefer sin and darkness rather than God and the light of truth: “The light shone in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … The light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil!” (John 1:5; 3:19).
“And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen! … Not everyone that says to Me: “Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: “Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name!” And then will I profess unto them: “I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!” ... When the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying: “Lord! Open to us!” And He, answering, shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are!” Then you shall begin to say: “We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!” There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:22-23; 22:14).
God Wants Division―Division from Sin
If there is a kind of division that God wants, it is a division from sin; a division from those things that lead to sin―namely, the devil, the world and the flesh. “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). “The prince of this world [Satan] is coming and in Me he has not anything! … The prince of this world is already judged! ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). “The devil, Satan, seduces the whole world” (Apocalypse 12:9). “All that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16).
Hence we are told: “Walk in the spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the spirit: and the spirit against the flesh―for these are contrary one to another―so that you do not the things that you would like. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are fornication, uncleanness, immodesty, luxury, idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects, envies, murders, drunkenness, reveling, and such like―of the which I foretell you, as I have foretold to you, that they who do such things shall not obtain the Kingdom of God” (Galatians 5:16-21). “Be dead with Christ from the elements of this world” (Colossians 2:20). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him.” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
“Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation has justice with injustice? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘GO OUT FROM AMONG THEM, AND BE YE SEPARATE!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
We cannot make peace with the world―and we cannot make peace with sin. Holy Scripture says: “You that love the Lord―hate evil!” (Psalm 96:10). “The fear of the Lord hates evil!” (Proverbs 8:13). “Hate evil, and love good!” (Amos 5:15). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Sin is the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Families Make Peace with Sin
Do not fool yourself! To make peace with sin and to be at peace with the sins of your family―is to be at war with God! Sin is rebellious alignment with Satan. “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Those who make a practice of sinning are aligning themselves with the devil, who has been sinning and rebelling against God from the beginning. The best way for our enemy, Satan, to draw us into sin is to camouflage it to look like it’s alright in God’s eyes. We are tricked into accepting more and more of Satan’s diversions and bypassing the God’s disciplines. Many have made peace with sin and by doing so have placed themselves in a glass house. They deceive themselves into believing that it really doesn’t matter to God what we wear, where we go, how we act, how we spend our money or what words we speak. But glass houses eventually break, and as our glass house cracks and shatters around us, we will find that making peace with sin will actually give us no peace at all.
We should also reflect upon how we can become guilty of the sins of others―and this is especially important in families. We should not be at peace with the sins of our family members. We should not fall into Satan’s trap of not wanting to “rock the boat” by pointing out and correcting the sinfulness of our family members. There are nine chief ways in which we can guilty of the sins of others: (1) by consent; (2) by concealment; (3) by command; (4) by counsel; (5) by partaking; (6) by provocation; (7) by praise or flattery; (8) by silence; (9) by defense of the ill done.
Correction of Sin in Family
God expects parents to instruct, command and correct their children in the ways and commandments of God. Holy Scripture states: “The imagination and thought of man’s heart are prone to evil from his youth” (Genesis 8:21). “Instruct thy son!” (Proverbs 29:17). “He will command his children and his household to keep the way of the Lord, and do judgment and justice” (Genesis 18:19). “From his infancy he taught him to fear God, and to abstain from all sin” (Tobias 1:10). “He that loves his son, frequently chastises him!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:1). “He that spares the rod hates his son―but he that loves his son corrects him in good time” (Proverbs 13:24). “Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, and the rod of correction shall drive it away” (Proverbs 22:15). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:13-14). “The rod and reproof give wisdom―but the child that is left to his own, will bring his mother to shame … Instruct thy son, and he shall refresh thee, and shall give delight to thy soul” (Proverbs 29:15, 17). “In the present moment all chastisement seems not to bring with it joy, but only sorrow―but afterwards it will yield the peaceful fruit of justice to them that are exercised by it” (Hebrews 12:11). “A young man according to his way, even when he is old he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6).
Parents are Watchmen
God says: “I have made you a watchman to the house of Israel (the Church/the Family)! And you shall hear the word out of My mouth, and shall tell it to them from Me! If, when I say to the wicked: ‘You shall surely die!’ ― and you do not declare it to him, nor speak to him, so that he might be converted from his wicked ways and live, then the same wicked man shall certainly die in his iniquity, but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you give warning to the wicked, and he does not convert from his wickedness and from his evil ways―then he indeed shall die in his iniquity, but you will have saved your soul! Moreover, if the just man shall turn away from his justice, and shall commit iniquity―then I will lay a stumbling-block before him and he shall die―because you have not warned him! He shall die in his sin, and all his justices which he has done beforehand, shall not be remembered―but I will require his blood at your hands! But if you warn the just man, so that the just man may not sin, and he does not sin―then living he shall live, because you have warned him, and you will have saved your soul!” (Ezechiel 3:17-21).
Unfortunately, most of those watchmen are afraid to correct: “His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant! Dumb dogs, not able to bark! Seeing vain things, sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10).
Lack of Correction is Punished
A very instructive story is that of the high priest Heli and his two sons, Ophni and Phinees (Hophni and Phinehas). Heli’s sons did not submit to their father’s supervision. Like their father, Ophni and Phinees were also priests at the tabernacle (1 Kings 1:3). “The sons of Heli were children of Belial, not knowing the Lord” (1 Samuel 2:12). “Now Heli was very old, and he heard all that his sons lay with the women that waited at the door of the tabernacle. And he said to them: ‘Why do ye these kinds of things, which I hear, very wicked things, from all the people? Do not so, my sons! For it is no good report that I hear, that you make the people of the Lord to transgress!’ And they listened not to the voice of their father” (1 Kings 2:22-25).
After the sins of Ophni and Phinees, a man of God delivered the message to Heli in the Name of the Lord, saying that Heli was guilty of honoring his sons more than the Lord (1 Kings 2:27–34). Although Heli chastised Ophni and Phinees, he apparently had not done everything he could to correct their bad behavior. Heli was guilty of neglecting his parental duties toward his sons because “he knew that his sons did wickedly, and did not chastise them” (1 Kings 3:13). As a result of Heli’s neglect, the Lord said that Heli and his house would be cut-off from His favor and that, as a sign of the truth of the Lord’s words, both sons would die on the same day (1 Kings 2:30–34).
God Comes Before Family
It might sound cruel and heartless―but God comes before family. We cannot put anything or anyone above God―no matter how much we might love them. The greatest commandment is the one which commands the love of God: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Love of others comes second: “And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!” (Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31).
Our Lord further hammers the point home when He says: “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:37). Another quote by Jesus causes problems for some persons―it is: “If any man comes to Me, and does not hate his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:26). The word “hate” in the original Greek was “miseo”, which means “to love less”. Jesus is not telling us to literally hate our parents―but not love them more than we love Him. He would not contradict what He said elsewhere: “Honor thy father and thy mother and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!” (Matthew 19:19) … “Love thy neighbor as thyself!” (Matthew 22:39) … “Love one another, as I have loved you! By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another” (John 13:34-35) … “These things I command you, that you love one another!” (John 15:17).
We Cannot Accept Sin
However, we cannot love sin in those around us. We must make a distinction between the sinner and the sin―we cannot love sin even though, like Christ, we might love the sinner: “When we were sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8-9). Yet Christ did not say: “I died for you―so keep on sinning without fear!” No! Christ said to the woman caught in adultery: “Go and sin no more!” (John 8:11). Holy Scripture adds: “Have you sinned? Do so no more! But pray for your former sins so that they may be forgiven!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). We love the sinner as a child of God―created by God for eternal life―but who has fallen away from God and fallen into sin. We must hate the sin as being something that separates man from God―for through sin we place ourselves into the hands of the devil: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). If we love sin, then we love the devil―it is as logical as that! Hence, we have to change the way that we look at sin in our family and its members. Sin has poisoned too many families―in that they have made peace with sin in the family and its members―it is no longer a “big deal”. Therefore, it is “no big deal” to offend God; it is “no big deal” to commit the gravest evil on Earth (which is what sin is according to our Catechisms).
Holy Scripture says: “He that commits sin is of the devil―for the devil sinned from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God appeared, so that He might destroy the works of the devil. Whosoever is of God, does not commit sin ― and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. In this the children of God and the children of the devil are manifest! … Whosoever abides in God, does not sin; and whosoever sins, has not seen Him, nor known Him!” (1 John 3:6-10).
Speak Against Sin―Act Against Sin
Instead of remaining passively silent in face of the sins of family members, one should do all that one can in order to prevent sin before it is committed and to make reparation for sins already committed. The biggest mistake in doing this is neglecting the grace of God in such an enterprise―as Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). The grace of God is absolutely necessary in all that we do―even the most trivial things! Without the assistance of the grace of God, all our attempts at the prevention of sin and the correction of sin will come little or nothing! Just as an aside, here is a compilation of quotes by St. Thomas Aquinas on the necessity and power of grace:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life ― for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will ― but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For grace is given to many persons to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
You will NOT bring about any lasting change in your family without the grace of God―it is of paramount importance that you drill that truth into your mind and heart! Your words, your actions, your methods will bring no lasting success without God’s grace ruling over everything. We often turn to God last of all―when our own efforts are not working and not bringing success. Yet turning to God is very FIRST THING we should be doing and NOT THE LAST THING. If you wish to change your family for the better, then you must FIRST USE THE SOURCES OF GRACE that are available to all of us.
Sources of Grace
Let us first of all clarify what we mean by “grace”. There are two chief kinds of grace―Sanctifying Grace (which has the capability of permanently residing in our soul unless expelled by mortal sin); and Actual Grace (which is not a permanent grace, but a passing, temporary, transient grace that moves us to think, say or do the things that God wants from us; as well as not thinking, not saying and not doing those things that God does not want in our lives). Everyone in the world―Catholic, Protestant, pagan―whether they be good or evil―receives a certain amount of Actual Grace daily by which God seeks to move them to do what will ensure their eventual salvation.
Nevertheless, we can influence God by our prayers, penances, sacrifices, sufferings, almsdeeds, acts of charity, etc. asking God to give them more powerful Actual Graces. Hence it is that Our Lady of Fatima asked that we pray and offer sacrifices for the conversion of sinners. It is God’s grace that converts, but God expects us to take an interest in the conversion of sinners and to ‘pay’ for their conversion. “The prayer of Faith shall save the sick man [whether spiritually sick or physically sick] and the Lord shall raise him up; and, if he be in sins, they shall be forgiven him! … Pray one for another that you may be saved! For the continual prayer of a just man avails much!” (James 5:15-16).
We read in The Life of John Marie Vianney, how St. John Vianney totally relied upon God’s grace for the conversion of souls in his parish and paid for it by his prayers, fasting, charity and other penances: “Father Vianney in truth looked to God alone for success in his undertakings. He realized that he was engaged with the evil spirit in a conflict for the souls of his people and he had read in Holy Writ these words of Jesus Christ: ‘But this kind (of evil spirit) is not cast out except by prayer and fasting!’ (Matthew 17:20). Upon one occasion he recalled these words to a fellow priest who was lamenting that he could obtain no results in his parish, although he had done all in his power to rouse his people from their indifference. Father Vianney said to him: “Have you done all that is in your power? Are you so sure of it? Did you fast and give alms? Did you pray?’ By these questions Father Vianney indicated what were the practices of his own life, which enabled him to obtain results little short of miraculous. His charity was boundless. The food, clothing and other supplies, which the generous Mademoiselle d’Ars sent for the rectory, as a rule, promptly found their way to the poor and needy. Father Vianney actually kept for himself only what was barely sufficient to ward off starvation. Even this modicum was frequently given away, when a poor man came and asked for food. One evening when Mr. Mandy, the Mayor of Ars, came to visit the Curé, he found him pale as death and apparently exhausted. Greatly alarmed, he exclaimed: ‘Are you ill, Father Vianney?’ ‘Oh, my good friend,’ the latter replied, ‘you are just in time, I have nothing left to eat!’ For three days Father Vianney had had no provisions whatever in the house, having bestowed the last of his potatoes upon a poor mendicant. He partook daily of but one meal and that consisted generally of boiled potatoes, which he was accustomed to cook in a quantity sufficient to last through the week, so that oftentimes by Friday or Saturday what remained had become moldy.”
Some like it―some hate it! Some will embrace it―some will flee from it! Some will profit from it―some will lose from it! Lent is a four-letter word that conjures up mixed feelings, opposite reactions, and family division. The following words of Our Lord as particularly applicable to the season of Lent:
“Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! ... But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:17-22, 34-36; 24:9-10; Luke 12:51-53).
Does Our Lord WANT disunity and separation? No―for He also said: “Father, keep them in Thy Name whom Thou has given Me; so that they may be one, as We also are! … That they all may be one, as Thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee; that they also may be one in Us!” (John 17:11, 21). Our Lord wants unity and has said that disunity leads to disaster: “If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand! … Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand!” (Mark 3:24; Matthew 12:25). Hence it is that the Apostles write in Holy Scripture: “I beseech you, by the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no schisms among you; but that you be perfect in the same mind and in the same judgment!” (1 Corinthians 1:10) … “Be ye all of one mind!” (1 Peter 3:8) … “Be careful to keep the unity of the Spirit ― one body and one Spirit; one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism!” (Ephesians 4:3-5).
Disunity is not from God
God is unity―just like God is charity. “The Lord thy God is one God!” (Mark 12:29) ― three Persons in one God; three Persons united in one God ― there is no disunity in God and God does not desire disunity, nor does He create disunity. “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) ― and charity implies a union of wills. The phrase “charity is a union of wills” is a concept derived from the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas, where he defines charity as a form of “friendship with God” that essentially involves aligning our will with the will of God. Charity is a unity, a bond: “above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14). “You are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). “For as the body is one, and has many members; and all the members of the body, whereas they are many, yet are one body―so also is Christ. For in one Spirit were we all baptized into one body and in one Spirit … so that there might be no schism in the body” (1 Corinthians 12:12-13, 25). Charity unites ― a lack of charity disunites and causes division. “Charity is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14).
No doubt you have heard of the phrase “Divide and Conquer!” Ever since his fall from Heaven Satan seeks to divide the world. His first action was to divide the angels, which was followed-up by tempting Adam and Eve in the garden, driving a wedge between the first humans and God. Division is the devil’s playground and it shouldn’t be surprising. The word “devil,” comes from the Greek word “diabolos”, which in Latin is “diabolus” ― it can be translated as, “to divide,” “to separate,” or more literally, “to throw against.” It also means “prone to slander, slanderous, accusing falsely” ― therefore, dividing others from the truth, opposing the truth; lying against the truth; in reference to a person it means “a calumniator, false accuser, slanderer, a liar.” The French name for the “diabolo” is “diable”, which means “devil”. Our Lord said of Satan: “The devil stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44).
God Does Create Division―Sin Causes Division
God does not create division against Himself―it the devil, the world and our own sinful flesh that creates division and divides us from God. God wishes to save ALL persons: “God wants all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4) ― but ALL WILL NOT BE SAVED because they prefer sin and darkness rather than God and the light of truth: “The light shone in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … The light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil!” (John 1:5; 3:19).
“And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen! … Not everyone that says to Me: “Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: “Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name!” And then will I profess unto them: “I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!” ... When the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying: “Lord! Open to us!” And He, answering, shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are!” Then you shall begin to say: “We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!” There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:22-23; 22:14).
God Wants Division―Division from Sin
If there is a kind of division that God wants, it is a division from sin; a division from those things that lead to sin―namely, the devil, the world and the flesh. “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). “The prince of this world [Satan] is coming and in Me he has not anything! … The prince of this world is already judged! ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). “The devil, Satan, seduces the whole world” (Apocalypse 12:9). “All that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16).
Hence we are told: “Walk in the spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the spirit: and the spirit against the flesh―for these are contrary one to another―so that you do not the things that you would like. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are fornication, uncleanness, immodesty, luxury, idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects, envies, murders, drunkenness, reveling, and such like―of the which I foretell you, as I have foretold to you, that they who do such things shall not obtain the Kingdom of God” (Galatians 5:16-21). “Be dead with Christ from the elements of this world” (Colossians 2:20). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him.” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
“Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation has justice with injustice? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘GO OUT FROM AMONG THEM, AND BE YE SEPARATE!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
We cannot make peace with the world―and we cannot make peace with sin. Holy Scripture says: “You that love the Lord―hate evil!” (Psalm 96:10). “The fear of the Lord hates evil!” (Proverbs 8:13). “Hate evil, and love good!” (Amos 5:15). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Sin is the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils―far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Families Make Peace with Sin
Do not fool yourself! To make peace with sin and to be at peace with the sins of your family―is to be at war with God! Sin is rebellious alignment with Satan. “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Those who make a practice of sinning are aligning themselves with the devil, who has been sinning and rebelling against God from the beginning. The best way for our enemy, Satan, to draw us into sin is to camouflage it to look like it’s alright in God’s eyes. We are tricked into accepting more and more of Satan’s diversions and bypassing the God’s disciplines. Many have made peace with sin and by doing so have placed themselves in a glass house. They deceive themselves into believing that it really doesn’t matter to God what we wear, where we go, how we act, how we spend our money or what words we speak. But glass houses eventually break, and as our glass house cracks and shatters around us, we will find that making peace with sin will actually give us no peace at all.
We should also reflect upon how we can become guilty of the sins of others―and this is especially important in families. We should not be at peace with the sins of our family members. We should not fall into Satan’s trap of not wanting to “rock the boat” by pointing out and correcting the sinfulness of our family members. There are nine chief ways in which we can guilty of the sins of others: (1) by consent; (2) by concealment; (3) by command; (4) by counsel; (5) by partaking; (6) by provocation; (7) by praise or flattery; (8) by silence; (9) by defense of the ill done.
Correction of Sin in Family
God expects parents to instruct, command and correct their children in the ways and commandments of God. Holy Scripture states: “The imagination and thought of man’s heart are prone to evil from his youth” (Genesis 8:21). “Instruct thy son!” (Proverbs 29:17). “He will command his children and his household to keep the way of the Lord, and do judgment and justice” (Genesis 18:19). “From his infancy he taught him to fear God, and to abstain from all sin” (Tobias 1:10). “He that loves his son, frequently chastises him!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:1). “He that spares the rod hates his son―but he that loves his son corrects him in good time” (Proverbs 13:24). “Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, and the rod of correction shall drive it away” (Proverbs 22:15). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:13-14). “The rod and reproof give wisdom―but the child that is left to his own, will bring his mother to shame … Instruct thy son, and he shall refresh thee, and shall give delight to thy soul” (Proverbs 29:15, 17). “In the present moment all chastisement seems not to bring with it joy, but only sorrow―but afterwards it will yield the peaceful fruit of justice to them that are exercised by it” (Hebrews 12:11). “A young man according to his way, even when he is old he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6).
Parents are Watchmen
God says: “I have made you a watchman to the house of Israel (the Church/the Family)! And you shall hear the word out of My mouth, and shall tell it to them from Me! If, when I say to the wicked: ‘You shall surely die!’ ― and you do not declare it to him, nor speak to him, so that he might be converted from his wicked ways and live, then the same wicked man shall certainly die in his iniquity, but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you give warning to the wicked, and he does not convert from his wickedness and from his evil ways―then he indeed shall die in his iniquity, but you will have saved your soul! Moreover, if the just man shall turn away from his justice, and shall commit iniquity―then I will lay a stumbling-block before him and he shall die―because you have not warned him! He shall die in his sin, and all his justices which he has done beforehand, shall not be remembered―but I will require his blood at your hands! But if you warn the just man, so that the just man may not sin, and he does not sin―then living he shall live, because you have warned him, and you will have saved your soul!” (Ezechiel 3:17-21).
Unfortunately, most of those watchmen are afraid to correct: “His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant! Dumb dogs, not able to bark! Seeing vain things, sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10).
Lack of Correction is Punished
A very instructive story is that of the high priest Heli and his two sons, Ophni and Phinees (Hophni and Phinehas). Heli’s sons did not submit to their father’s supervision. Like their father, Ophni and Phinees were also priests at the tabernacle (1 Kings 1:3). “The sons of Heli were children of Belial, not knowing the Lord” (1 Samuel 2:12). “Now Heli was very old, and he heard all that his sons lay with the women that waited at the door of the tabernacle. And he said to them: ‘Why do ye these kinds of things, which I hear, very wicked things, from all the people? Do not so, my sons! For it is no good report that I hear, that you make the people of the Lord to transgress!’ And they listened not to the voice of their father” (1 Kings 2:22-25).
After the sins of Ophni and Phinees, a man of God delivered the message to Heli in the Name of the Lord, saying that Heli was guilty of honoring his sons more than the Lord (1 Kings 2:27–34). Although Heli chastised Ophni and Phinees, he apparently had not done everything he could to correct their bad behavior. Heli was guilty of neglecting his parental duties toward his sons because “he knew that his sons did wickedly, and did not chastise them” (1 Kings 3:13). As a result of Heli’s neglect, the Lord said that Heli and his house would be cut-off from His favor and that, as a sign of the truth of the Lord’s words, both sons would die on the same day (1 Kings 2:30–34).
God Comes Before Family
It might sound cruel and heartless―but God comes before family. We cannot put anything or anyone above God―no matter how much we might love them. The greatest commandment is the one which commands the love of God: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Love of others comes second: “And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!” (Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31).
Our Lord further hammers the point home when He says: “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:37). Another quote by Jesus causes problems for some persons―it is: “If any man comes to Me, and does not hate his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:26). The word “hate” in the original Greek was “miseo”, which means “to love less”. Jesus is not telling us to literally hate our parents―but not love them more than we love Him. He would not contradict what He said elsewhere: “Honor thy father and thy mother and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!” (Matthew 19:19) … “Love thy neighbor as thyself!” (Matthew 22:39) … “Love one another, as I have loved you! By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another” (John 13:34-35) … “These things I command you, that you love one another!” (John 15:17).
We Cannot Accept Sin
However, we cannot love sin in those around us. We must make a distinction between the sinner and the sin―we cannot love sin even though, like Christ, we might love the sinner: “When we were sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8-9). Yet Christ did not say: “I died for you―so keep on sinning without fear!” No! Christ said to the woman caught in adultery: “Go and sin no more!” (John 8:11). Holy Scripture adds: “Have you sinned? Do so no more! But pray for your former sins so that they may be forgiven!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). We love the sinner as a child of God―created by God for eternal life―but who has fallen away from God and fallen into sin. We must hate the sin as being something that separates man from God―for through sin we place ourselves into the hands of the devil: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). If we love sin, then we love the devil―it is as logical as that! Hence, we have to change the way that we look at sin in our family and its members. Sin has poisoned too many families―in that they have made peace with sin in the family and its members―it is no longer a “big deal”. Therefore, it is “no big deal” to offend God; it is “no big deal” to commit the gravest evil on Earth (which is what sin is according to our Catechisms).
Holy Scripture says: “He that commits sin is of the devil―for the devil sinned from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God appeared, so that He might destroy the works of the devil. Whosoever is of God, does not commit sin ― and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. In this the children of God and the children of the devil are manifest! … Whosoever abides in God, does not sin; and whosoever sins, has not seen Him, nor known Him!” (1 John 3:6-10).
Speak Against Sin―Act Against Sin
Instead of remaining passively silent in face of the sins of family members, one should do all that one can in order to prevent sin before it is committed and to make reparation for sins already committed. The biggest mistake in doing this is neglecting the grace of God in such an enterprise―as Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). The grace of God is absolutely necessary in all that we do―even the most trivial things! Without the assistance of the grace of God, all our attempts at the prevention of sin and the correction of sin will come little or nothing! Just as an aside, here is a compilation of quotes by St. Thomas Aquinas on the necessity and power of grace:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life ― for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will ― but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For grace is given to many persons to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
You will NOT bring about any lasting change in your family without the grace of God―it is of paramount importance that you drill that truth into your mind and heart! Your words, your actions, your methods will bring no lasting success without God’s grace ruling over everything. We often turn to God last of all―when our own efforts are not working and not bringing success. Yet turning to God is very FIRST THING we should be doing and NOT THE LAST THING. If you wish to change your family for the better, then you must FIRST USE THE SOURCES OF GRACE that are available to all of us.
Sources of Grace
Let us first of all clarify what we mean by “grace”. There are two chief kinds of grace―Sanctifying Grace (which has the capability of permanently residing in our soul unless expelled by mortal sin); and Actual Grace (which is not a permanent grace, but a passing, temporary, transient grace that moves us to think, say or do the things that God wants from us; as well as not thinking, not saying and not doing those things that God does not want in our lives). Everyone in the world―Catholic, Protestant, pagan―whether they be good or evil―receives a certain amount of Actual Grace daily by which God seeks to move them to do what will ensure their eventual salvation.
Nevertheless, we can influence God by our prayers, penances, sacrifices, sufferings, almsdeeds, acts of charity, etc. asking God to give them more powerful Actual Graces. Hence it is that Our Lady of Fatima asked that we pray and offer sacrifices for the conversion of sinners. It is God’s grace that converts, but God expects us to take an interest in the conversion of sinners and to ‘pay’ for their conversion. “The prayer of Faith shall save the sick man [whether spiritually sick or physically sick] and the Lord shall raise him up; and, if he be in sins, they shall be forgiven him! … Pray one for another that you may be saved! For the continual prayer of a just man avails much!” (James 5:15-16).
We read in The Life of John Marie Vianney, how St. John Vianney totally relied upon God’s grace for the conversion of souls in his parish and paid for it by his prayers, fasting, charity and other penances: “Father Vianney in truth looked to God alone for success in his undertakings. He realized that he was engaged with the evil spirit in a conflict for the souls of his people and he had read in Holy Writ these words of Jesus Christ: ‘But this kind (of evil spirit) is not cast out except by prayer and fasting!’ (Matthew 17:20). Upon one occasion he recalled these words to a fellow priest who was lamenting that he could obtain no results in his parish, although he had done all in his power to rouse his people from their indifference. Father Vianney said to him: “Have you done all that is in your power? Are you so sure of it? Did you fast and give alms? Did you pray?’ By these questions Father Vianney indicated what were the practices of his own life, which enabled him to obtain results little short of miraculous. His charity was boundless. The food, clothing and other supplies, which the generous Mademoiselle d’Ars sent for the rectory, as a rule, promptly found their way to the poor and needy. Father Vianney actually kept for himself only what was barely sufficient to ward off starvation. Even this modicum was frequently given away, when a poor man came and asked for food. One evening when Mr. Mandy, the Mayor of Ars, came to visit the Curé, he found him pale as death and apparently exhausted. Greatly alarmed, he exclaimed: ‘Are you ill, Father Vianney?’ ‘Oh, my good friend,’ the latter replied, ‘you are just in time, I have nothing left to eat!’ For three days Father Vianney had had no provisions whatever in the house, having bestowed the last of his potatoes upon a poor mendicant. He partook daily of but one meal and that consisted generally of boiled potatoes, which he was accustomed to cook in a quantity sufficient to last through the week, so that oftentimes by Friday or Saturday what remained had become moldy.”
Article 11
Wednesday & Thursday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 26th & 27th
Lent is Not Sent to be Misspent!
Neither Refuse It, Nor Abuse It, But Use It!
Wednesday & Thursday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 26th & 27th
Lent is Not Sent to be Misspent!
Neither Refuse It, Nor Abuse It, But Use It!
Haunting Words!
If there is one quote from Holy Scripture that should haunt us as we approach Lent, it is the following: “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). How many times, for how many years have we abused the God-given time of Lent? What should be a time of paying for past sins, often ends up being an occasion for committing even more sins! To the above haunting quote we can add another: “I gave her a time that she might do penance, and she will not repent!” (Apocalypse 2:21). If you want to be haunted some more―then listen to Our Lord’s solemn proclamation, which He says not just once, but immediately repeats the same words: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you ― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you ― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5).
On Ash Wednesday―just one week from now―we shall enter the Arena of Lent, the Area of Penance, the Arena of Salvation―where we are expected to do battle with the devil, the world and our own flesh! If we fail to fight, then either the fires of Purgatory or the fires of Hell await us. Do we really love the idea of burning in a fire? Just put your hand over the flame of your gas stove, or over a candle, for just a few seconds―painful, huh? Well, imagine burning―not just for a second or two―but for years, or decades, or centuries in Purgatory; or forever in Hell! Only a fool would prefer such a choice―but, as Holy Scripture says: “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15), words which Our Lady echoes: “The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, and turns them away from God! … They only lose what they strive so much to attain, since they become known as foolish! ... Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness! … Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become so measureless, there are those who think that also the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!” (words of Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Paying for Sin
You sin―but you do not really want to pay for sin. Or you want the cheapest possible payment plan you think you can get. Hence it is that most Catholics wrongly imagine that simply confessing their sins in the confessional and saying the penance that the priest gives them―usually something like 5 Our Fathers and 5 Hail Marys (or similar)―pays their debt for sin! The priest is bound―under pain of mortal sin―to give a serious penance for the mortal sins confessed by a penitent. A serious penance would be, for example, praying the Rosary, or making the Stations of the Cross, or something similar. Furthermore, most Catholics are ignorant of the fact that the penance that is given to them is MERELY A DOWN-PAYMENT on what could be said to be “mortgage payments for mortal sin” ― meaning that the penance given to you is merely one payment out of many payments you will have to make! Remember what was stated in the previous article―both mortal sin and venial sin are the greatest evils in the world! And you want to pay that debt with 5 Our Fathers and 5 Hail Marys? Insane!
Insane Reduction of Penance
This same insanity is reflected in the modern-Church’s decision to reduce Lenten penance by 95% ― by reducing obligatory fasting from 40 days to just 2 days (Ash Wednesday and Good Friday). In 1966―just after the Second Vatican Council ended (1962-1965), Pope Paul VI, in an Apostolic Constitution entitled Poenitemini, reduced obligatory Lenten fasting by 95%, from 40 days to 2 days. When you read the Apostolic Constitution, Poenitemini, you are assured of the importance of penance by various traditional phrases that make you open and receptive to the document. However, at the end of the document, the rug is pulled out from under the feet of penance and the 95% discount is applied! It is a little baffling that, at time a time when sin is exponentially on the increase, that the Church should wish for traditional penance to decrease! Of course, such a move is Satanic ploy to remove those things that are extremely powerful in fighting Satan―as Our Lord Himself said: “This kind [of devil] is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20) … “And He said to them: ‘This kind [of devil] can go out by nothing, but by prayer and fasting!’” (Mark 9:28).
Pope Paul VI’s Apostolic Constitution, Poenitemini, is a perfect example of a piece of Modernism as described by Pope St. Pius X in 1907: “In their books you find some things which might well be expressed by a Catholic, but in the next page you find other things which might have been dictated by a rationalist! They lay the axe―not to the branches and shoots―but to the very root, that is, to the Faith and its deepest fibers. And having struck at this root, they proceed to disseminate poison through the whole tree, so that there is no part of Catholic truth from which they hold their hand, none that they do not strive to corrupt. None is more skillful, none more astute than they, in the employment of a thousand noxious arts―for they take on the double part of rationalist and Catholic―and this they do so craftily!”
The Catholic parts and pieces of Paul VI’s Poenitemini sound great and traditional. He says that he wants to “remind our sons—and all religious men of our times—of the significance and importance of the divine precept of penitence” adding that “almost everywhere and at all times penitence has held a place of great importance.” He insists upon a “continuous need of conversion and renewal, a renewal which must be implemented not only interiorly and individually but also externally and socially.” Paul VI points out that “The Divine Master openly condemned—and so have the Apostles, Fathers and supreme pontiffs—any form of penitence which is purely external. External penitential practices must be accompanied by an inner attitude of conversion, that is to say of condemnation of and detachment from sin and of striving toward God” and that “one fasts or applies physical discipline to chastise one’s own soul … The necessity of the mortification of the flesh also stands clearly revealed if we consider the fragility of our nature, in which, since Adam’s sin, flesh and spirit have contrasting desires ... Man often finds himself, because of concupiscence, almost chained by his own senses. Through corporal fasting, man regains strength and the wound, inflicted on the dignity of our nature by intemperance, is cured by the medicine of a salutary abstinence.”
Paul VI then cites the example of Christ in doing penance: “The duty of doing penance and the necessity of an asceticism, which chastises the body and brings it into subjection, is motivated above all by participation in the sufferings of Christ, and is affirmed with special insistence by the example of Christ Himself. Christ, who always practiced in His life what He preached, before beginning His ministry spent 40 days and 40 nights in prayer and fasting … Therefore, following the Master, every Christian must renounce himself, take up his own cross and participate in the sufferings of Christ.” He further adds that “Penance was represented even before Christ as a means and a sign of perfection and sanctity. Judith, Daniel, the prophetess Anna and many other elect souls served God day and night with fasting and prayers.”
Great, huh? A traditional summary of what penance should be and the importance of fasting and prayer! But then, towards the end of his document, Poenitemini, Paul VI drops his Modernist bombshell that blows up and destroys the penitential practice of the Church. He states:
“The Church—always attentive to the signs of the times—seeks, beyond fasting and abstinence, new expressions more suitable for the realization, according to the character of various ages in time, of the precise goal of penitence … The Apostolic See intends to reorganize penitential discipline with practices more suited to our times ... Therefore, the Church, while preserving—where it can be more readily observed—the custom of practicing penitence through abstinence from meat and fasting, intends to ratify with its prescriptions other forms of penitence as well, provided that it seems opportune to episcopal [bishops’] conferences to replace the observance of fast and abstinence with exercises of prayer and works of charity … The days of penitence to be observed under obligation throughout the Church are all Fridays and Ash Wednesday … Abstinence is to be observed on every Friday which does not fall on a day of obligation, while abstinence and fast is to be observed on Ash Wednesday and on Good Friday … It is the task of episcopal conferences to substitute abstinence and fast, wholly or in part, with other forms of penitence and especially works of charity and the exercises of piety … Pastors also, for just cause and in accordance with the prescriptions of the local Ordinary [bishop], may grant to the individual faithful, as well as individual families, a dispensation or commutation of abstinence and fast into some other pious practices.”
Demonic Doctors, Crazy Clergy & Hell's Healthcare
We are slow to fast, and very fast in satisfying our sensual cravings. We want to get any fast over as fast as possible―hence the appeal and the pleasure of Pope Paul VI’s 95% reduction in Lenten fasting! Since when did sane medicine prescribe LESS medicine when the disease was progressing MORE and MORE? That is exactly what Pope Paul VI’s 1966 Apostolic Constitution, Poenitemini, does! Insane! Only 10 years earlier, Our Lady, in an apparition on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th, 1956, said to Blessed Sister Elena Aiello (1895-1961)―mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
Please point out the miraculous conversion of the world between 1956 and 1966―that went from “a worse condition than at the time of the deluge” to a state where a 95% reduction in the Lenten penance of fasting and abstinence was warranted? To reduce penance in such gigantic proportions is a result of blindness and spiritual insanity! Of such leaders Our Lord said: “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). Our Lady of La Salette similarly said: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence! They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish!”
FR. GABRIELE AMORTH (1925–2016), the former chief exorcist of Rome of 30 years experience in the field of exorcism, said: “Satan’s power is felt more keenly in periods of history when the sinfulness of the community is more evident … The problem is getting worse. The Devil is gaining ground. We are living in an age when Faith is diminishing ... Today we live in a period of little Faith ... Young people receive everything from their parents―except the Faith ... It is purely mathematical―when Faith declines, when we abandon God, we open the door to Satan. Satanism is spreading enormously! … Whoever lives in indifference, in absent-mindedness, far from God―that person is open to an easy satanic conquest ... The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed.
“The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican ... Legions of demons have lodged there! In the Vatican there are members of Satanic cults―there are priests, monsignors and even cardinals! I know from people who reported to me how they got to know this directly. It is also something, that has been “confessed” several times by the Devil, himself, under obedience during the exorcisms … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. One day Padre Pio said to me very sorrowfully: ‘You know what, Gabriele? It is Satan who has been introduced into the bosom of the Church and within a very short time he will come to rule a false Church!’ Nothing mattered to him, however terrifying, except for the great apostasy within the Church.
“The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin … The devil is more tranquil if he does not have to live with prayer, fasting, the Eucharist, and the other Sacramental practices ... Our Lady speaks often about prayer and fasting! ... According to Our Lady’s words in Fatima, if we had prayed and fasted, there would not have been World War II. We have not listened to her and therefore there was a war ... Our Lady insists so much on fasting, then why does the Church not speak? … The Gospel of Mark says: ‘This kind [of demon] cannot be driven out by anything but prayer and fasting! (Mark 9:29). Who ought to pray and fast? Everyone! I recommend three tips that Jesus gives to heal the ills of evil, even without the need for exorcisms: (1) much Faith (2) much prayer and (3) fasting. I remember the advice that Jesus gave to nine Apostles who failed to release a young man from demons. ‘Why do not you have Faith? It takes prayer and fasting to banish some demons!’”
We Need Less Penance! Really?
► As FR. AMORTH would repeatedly say: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican!” In view of this, we are being told that we need less and less fasting―when Our Lord said that fasting is necessary to cast out demons! Why is it that exorcists fast before embarking upon an exorcism? Is it because they want to lose a few pounds in weight so that the devil cannot accuse them of being fat? Or is it because fasting gives them additional power over the devil: “When Jesus was come into the house, His disciples secretly asked Him: ‘Why could not we cast him [the devil] out?’ And Jesus said to them: ‘This kind can go out by nothing, except by prayer and fasting!’” (Mark 9:16-28).
► HOLY SCRIPTURE warns of this rule of Satan: “Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go forth, and seduce the nations, which are over the four quarters of the Earth” (Apocalypse 20:7).
► OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS, OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE AND OUR LADY OF AKITA had already forewarned us of this universal reign of Satan: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects … During this time the Church will find herself attacked by terrible assaults from the Masonic sect … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church … This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings … The evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds!”
► In 2004, FR. AMORTH said: “Spiritualist séances in which the dead are called up to answer certain questions are very widespread. People are now being taught to perform spiritualist séances through the computer, the telephone, the television, the video recorder, but above all through automatic writing. No longer is there a need for a medium―this is a spiritualism that each can practice by himself. According to polls, 37% of students have on at least one occasion played the game with letters and a glass, which is a veritable spiritualist séance. In a school where I had been invited to speak, the students told me that they used to play this game during the religion lesson, under the obliging eyes of the teacher.”
► In 2007, FR. AMORTH said: “We have so many young people and people not so young who have done sessions of spiritism, Satanism and magic. Just one fact: in Italy we have thirteen million Italians who frequently go to fortune tellers and magicians.”
► In 2012, FR. AMORTH said: “Here in Rome, during one of the first years I was an exorcist, I was invited by a religion teacher to a high school, one of Rome’s most famous schools. I said to the children: ‘The Bible says: “He who speaks with the dead is an abomination to God!” It is true Satanism!’ I then asked the children: ‘Dear children, I want to know how many of you are playing a game where you speak with the dead.’ More than half raised their hands. And I asked them again. A large number of hands went up again. Present was the religion teacher who had invited me!”
► Also in 2012, FR. AMORTH said: “I was flabbergasted when, on the occasion of the referendum on divorce, I saw many Catholics vote for divorce. Many Catholics voted for divorce, and then, even worse, many Catholics voted for abortion. Abortion is against the 5th commandment ― ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ I have seen many Catholics vote for abortion, and those who practice abortion are murderers, who have a patron: King Herod, the author of the Massacre of the Innocents.”
► ST. BASIL THE GREAT, one of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, states that bodily fasting is meaningless unless it is joined with a spiritual fast from sin. St. Basil gives the following exhortation regarding fasting: “Let us fast an acceptable and very pleasing fast to the Lord. True fast is the estrangement from evil, temperance of tongue, abstinence from anger, separation from desires, slander, falsehood and perjury. Privation of these is true fasting.”
► ST. FRANCIS DE SALES, one of the Doctors of the Church, gives some good advice in this regard: “If you are able to fast, you will do well to observe some days beyond what are ordered by the Church―for besides the ordinary effect of fasting in raising the mind, subduing the flesh, confirming goodness, and obtaining a heavenly reward, it is also a great matter to be able to control greediness, and to keep the sensual appetites and the whole body subject to the law of the Spirit; and although we may be able to do but little, the enemy nevertheless stands more in awe of those whom he knows can fast.”
Fasting from the World and Worldliness
Fasting from food and drink is merely a means and tool that helps us fast from sin. The world in which we live is a world of sin. Our Lord Himself said: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). Hence we are told: “Do not love the world, or the things that are in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him; because all that is in the world is the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life―which is not from the Father, but from the world!” (1 John 2:14-17).
► ST. PAUL warns: “Many walk, of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ―whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19) … “Such, serve not Christ our Lord, but their own belly” (Romans 16:18). “Take from me the greediness of the belly, and let not the lusts of the flesh take hold of me!” (Ecclesiasticus 23:6). “If you live according to the flesh, you shall die: but if by the Spirit you mortify the deeds of the flesh, then you shall live!” (Romans 8:13). “They that are Christ’s, have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences” (Galatians 5:24).
► ST. BASIL OF CAESAREA (ST. BASIL THE GREAT), one of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, gives the following exhortation regarding fasting: “Let us fast an acceptable and very pleasing fast to the Lord. True fasting is the estrangement from evil, temperance of tongue, abstinence from anger, separation from desires, slander, falsehood and perjury. The privation of these is true fasting. The fast is the weapon of protection against demons. Our Guardian Angels more really stay with those who have cleansed our souls through fasting.”
This is also the constant doctrine of the holy Fathers of the Church. TERTULLIAN says, “As we refrain from the use of food, so our fasting satisfies God.” ST. CYPRIAN: “Let us appease the anger of an offended God by fasting and weeping, as He admonishes us.” ST. AMBROSE also says, “Fasting is the death of sin, the destruction of our crimes, and the remedy of our salvation.” ST. JEROME remarks, “Fasting and sackcloth are the arms of penance, the help of sinners.” ST. AUGUSTINE likewise says, “No one fasts for human praise, but for the pardon of his sins.”
► THE BALTIMORE CATECHISM echoes these sentiments: “The Church commands us to fast and abstain, in order that we may mortify our passions and satisfy for our sins” (Baltimore Catechism #2 Q. 395). Concerning this rationale, Fr. Thomas Kinkead in “An Explanation Of The Baltimore Catechism of Christian Doctrine” published in 1891 writes, “Remember it is our bodies that generally lead us into sin; if therefore we punish the body by fasting and mortification, we atone for the sin, and thus God wipes out a part of the temporal punishment due to it.”
If there is one quote from Holy Scripture that should haunt us as we approach Lent, it is the following: “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). How many times, for how many years have we abused the God-given time of Lent? What should be a time of paying for past sins, often ends up being an occasion for committing even more sins! To the above haunting quote we can add another: “I gave her a time that she might do penance, and she will not repent!” (Apocalypse 2:21). If you want to be haunted some more―then listen to Our Lord’s solemn proclamation, which He says not just once, but immediately repeats the same words: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you ― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you ― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5).
On Ash Wednesday―just one week from now―we shall enter the Arena of Lent, the Area of Penance, the Arena of Salvation―where we are expected to do battle with the devil, the world and our own flesh! If we fail to fight, then either the fires of Purgatory or the fires of Hell await us. Do we really love the idea of burning in a fire? Just put your hand over the flame of your gas stove, or over a candle, for just a few seconds―painful, huh? Well, imagine burning―not just for a second or two―but for years, or decades, or centuries in Purgatory; or forever in Hell! Only a fool would prefer such a choice―but, as Holy Scripture says: “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15), words which Our Lady echoes: “The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, and turns them away from God! … They only lose what they strive so much to attain, since they become known as foolish! ... Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness! … Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become so measureless, there are those who think that also the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!” (words of Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Paying for Sin
You sin―but you do not really want to pay for sin. Or you want the cheapest possible payment plan you think you can get. Hence it is that most Catholics wrongly imagine that simply confessing their sins in the confessional and saying the penance that the priest gives them―usually something like 5 Our Fathers and 5 Hail Marys (or similar)―pays their debt for sin! The priest is bound―under pain of mortal sin―to give a serious penance for the mortal sins confessed by a penitent. A serious penance would be, for example, praying the Rosary, or making the Stations of the Cross, or something similar. Furthermore, most Catholics are ignorant of the fact that the penance that is given to them is MERELY A DOWN-PAYMENT on what could be said to be “mortgage payments for mortal sin” ― meaning that the penance given to you is merely one payment out of many payments you will have to make! Remember what was stated in the previous article―both mortal sin and venial sin are the greatest evils in the world! And you want to pay that debt with 5 Our Fathers and 5 Hail Marys? Insane!
Insane Reduction of Penance
This same insanity is reflected in the modern-Church’s decision to reduce Lenten penance by 95% ― by reducing obligatory fasting from 40 days to just 2 days (Ash Wednesday and Good Friday). In 1966―just after the Second Vatican Council ended (1962-1965), Pope Paul VI, in an Apostolic Constitution entitled Poenitemini, reduced obligatory Lenten fasting by 95%, from 40 days to 2 days. When you read the Apostolic Constitution, Poenitemini, you are assured of the importance of penance by various traditional phrases that make you open and receptive to the document. However, at the end of the document, the rug is pulled out from under the feet of penance and the 95% discount is applied! It is a little baffling that, at time a time when sin is exponentially on the increase, that the Church should wish for traditional penance to decrease! Of course, such a move is Satanic ploy to remove those things that are extremely powerful in fighting Satan―as Our Lord Himself said: “This kind [of devil] is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20) … “And He said to them: ‘This kind [of devil] can go out by nothing, but by prayer and fasting!’” (Mark 9:28).
Pope Paul VI’s Apostolic Constitution, Poenitemini, is a perfect example of a piece of Modernism as described by Pope St. Pius X in 1907: “In their books you find some things which might well be expressed by a Catholic, but in the next page you find other things which might have been dictated by a rationalist! They lay the axe―not to the branches and shoots―but to the very root, that is, to the Faith and its deepest fibers. And having struck at this root, they proceed to disseminate poison through the whole tree, so that there is no part of Catholic truth from which they hold their hand, none that they do not strive to corrupt. None is more skillful, none more astute than they, in the employment of a thousand noxious arts―for they take on the double part of rationalist and Catholic―and this they do so craftily!”
The Catholic parts and pieces of Paul VI’s Poenitemini sound great and traditional. He says that he wants to “remind our sons—and all religious men of our times—of the significance and importance of the divine precept of penitence” adding that “almost everywhere and at all times penitence has held a place of great importance.” He insists upon a “continuous need of conversion and renewal, a renewal which must be implemented not only interiorly and individually but also externally and socially.” Paul VI points out that “The Divine Master openly condemned—and so have the Apostles, Fathers and supreme pontiffs—any form of penitence which is purely external. External penitential practices must be accompanied by an inner attitude of conversion, that is to say of condemnation of and detachment from sin and of striving toward God” and that “one fasts or applies physical discipline to chastise one’s own soul … The necessity of the mortification of the flesh also stands clearly revealed if we consider the fragility of our nature, in which, since Adam’s sin, flesh and spirit have contrasting desires ... Man often finds himself, because of concupiscence, almost chained by his own senses. Through corporal fasting, man regains strength and the wound, inflicted on the dignity of our nature by intemperance, is cured by the medicine of a salutary abstinence.”
Paul VI then cites the example of Christ in doing penance: “The duty of doing penance and the necessity of an asceticism, which chastises the body and brings it into subjection, is motivated above all by participation in the sufferings of Christ, and is affirmed with special insistence by the example of Christ Himself. Christ, who always practiced in His life what He preached, before beginning His ministry spent 40 days and 40 nights in prayer and fasting … Therefore, following the Master, every Christian must renounce himself, take up his own cross and participate in the sufferings of Christ.” He further adds that “Penance was represented even before Christ as a means and a sign of perfection and sanctity. Judith, Daniel, the prophetess Anna and many other elect souls served God day and night with fasting and prayers.”
Great, huh? A traditional summary of what penance should be and the importance of fasting and prayer! But then, towards the end of his document, Poenitemini, Paul VI drops his Modernist bombshell that blows up and destroys the penitential practice of the Church. He states:
“The Church—always attentive to the signs of the times—seeks, beyond fasting and abstinence, new expressions more suitable for the realization, according to the character of various ages in time, of the precise goal of penitence … The Apostolic See intends to reorganize penitential discipline with practices more suited to our times ... Therefore, the Church, while preserving—where it can be more readily observed—the custom of practicing penitence through abstinence from meat and fasting, intends to ratify with its prescriptions other forms of penitence as well, provided that it seems opportune to episcopal [bishops’] conferences to replace the observance of fast and abstinence with exercises of prayer and works of charity … The days of penitence to be observed under obligation throughout the Church are all Fridays and Ash Wednesday … Abstinence is to be observed on every Friday which does not fall on a day of obligation, while abstinence and fast is to be observed on Ash Wednesday and on Good Friday … It is the task of episcopal conferences to substitute abstinence and fast, wholly or in part, with other forms of penitence and especially works of charity and the exercises of piety … Pastors also, for just cause and in accordance with the prescriptions of the local Ordinary [bishop], may grant to the individual faithful, as well as individual families, a dispensation or commutation of abstinence and fast into some other pious practices.”
Demonic Doctors, Crazy Clergy & Hell's Healthcare
We are slow to fast, and very fast in satisfying our sensual cravings. We want to get any fast over as fast as possible―hence the appeal and the pleasure of Pope Paul VI’s 95% reduction in Lenten fasting! Since when did sane medicine prescribe LESS medicine when the disease was progressing MORE and MORE? That is exactly what Pope Paul VI’s 1966 Apostolic Constitution, Poenitemini, does! Insane! Only 10 years earlier, Our Lady, in an apparition on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th, 1956, said to Blessed Sister Elena Aiello (1895-1961)―mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
Please point out the miraculous conversion of the world between 1956 and 1966―that went from “a worse condition than at the time of the deluge” to a state where a 95% reduction in the Lenten penance of fasting and abstinence was warranted? To reduce penance in such gigantic proportions is a result of blindness and spiritual insanity! Of such leaders Our Lord said: “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). Our Lady of La Salette similarly said: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence! They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish!”
FR. GABRIELE AMORTH (1925–2016), the former chief exorcist of Rome of 30 years experience in the field of exorcism, said: “Satan’s power is felt more keenly in periods of history when the sinfulness of the community is more evident … The problem is getting worse. The Devil is gaining ground. We are living in an age when Faith is diminishing ... Today we live in a period of little Faith ... Young people receive everything from their parents―except the Faith ... It is purely mathematical―when Faith declines, when we abandon God, we open the door to Satan. Satanism is spreading enormously! … Whoever lives in indifference, in absent-mindedness, far from God―that person is open to an easy satanic conquest ... The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed.
“The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican ... Legions of demons have lodged there! In the Vatican there are members of Satanic cults―there are priests, monsignors and even cardinals! I know from people who reported to me how they got to know this directly. It is also something, that has been “confessed” several times by the Devil, himself, under obedience during the exorcisms … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. One day Padre Pio said to me very sorrowfully: ‘You know what, Gabriele? It is Satan who has been introduced into the bosom of the Church and within a very short time he will come to rule a false Church!’ Nothing mattered to him, however terrifying, except for the great apostasy within the Church.
“The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin … The devil is more tranquil if he does not have to live with prayer, fasting, the Eucharist, and the other Sacramental practices ... Our Lady speaks often about prayer and fasting! ... According to Our Lady’s words in Fatima, if we had prayed and fasted, there would not have been World War II. We have not listened to her and therefore there was a war ... Our Lady insists so much on fasting, then why does the Church not speak? … The Gospel of Mark says: ‘This kind [of demon] cannot be driven out by anything but prayer and fasting! (Mark 9:29). Who ought to pray and fast? Everyone! I recommend three tips that Jesus gives to heal the ills of evil, even without the need for exorcisms: (1) much Faith (2) much prayer and (3) fasting. I remember the advice that Jesus gave to nine Apostles who failed to release a young man from demons. ‘Why do not you have Faith? It takes prayer and fasting to banish some demons!’”
We Need Less Penance! Really?
► As FR. AMORTH would repeatedly say: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican!” In view of this, we are being told that we need less and less fasting―when Our Lord said that fasting is necessary to cast out demons! Why is it that exorcists fast before embarking upon an exorcism? Is it because they want to lose a few pounds in weight so that the devil cannot accuse them of being fat? Or is it because fasting gives them additional power over the devil: “When Jesus was come into the house, His disciples secretly asked Him: ‘Why could not we cast him [the devil] out?’ And Jesus said to them: ‘This kind can go out by nothing, except by prayer and fasting!’” (Mark 9:16-28).
► HOLY SCRIPTURE warns of this rule of Satan: “Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go forth, and seduce the nations, which are over the four quarters of the Earth” (Apocalypse 20:7).
► OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS, OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE AND OUR LADY OF AKITA had already forewarned us of this universal reign of Satan: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects … During this time the Church will find herself attacked by terrible assaults from the Masonic sect … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church … This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings … The evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds!”
► In 2004, FR. AMORTH said: “Spiritualist séances in which the dead are called up to answer certain questions are very widespread. People are now being taught to perform spiritualist séances through the computer, the telephone, the television, the video recorder, but above all through automatic writing. No longer is there a need for a medium―this is a spiritualism that each can practice by himself. According to polls, 37% of students have on at least one occasion played the game with letters and a glass, which is a veritable spiritualist séance. In a school where I had been invited to speak, the students told me that they used to play this game during the religion lesson, under the obliging eyes of the teacher.”
► In 2007, FR. AMORTH said: “We have so many young people and people not so young who have done sessions of spiritism, Satanism and magic. Just one fact: in Italy we have thirteen million Italians who frequently go to fortune tellers and magicians.”
► In 2012, FR. AMORTH said: “Here in Rome, during one of the first years I was an exorcist, I was invited by a religion teacher to a high school, one of Rome’s most famous schools. I said to the children: ‘The Bible says: “He who speaks with the dead is an abomination to God!” It is true Satanism!’ I then asked the children: ‘Dear children, I want to know how many of you are playing a game where you speak with the dead.’ More than half raised their hands. And I asked them again. A large number of hands went up again. Present was the religion teacher who had invited me!”
► Also in 2012, FR. AMORTH said: “I was flabbergasted when, on the occasion of the referendum on divorce, I saw many Catholics vote for divorce. Many Catholics voted for divorce, and then, even worse, many Catholics voted for abortion. Abortion is against the 5th commandment ― ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ I have seen many Catholics vote for abortion, and those who practice abortion are murderers, who have a patron: King Herod, the author of the Massacre of the Innocents.”
► ST. BASIL THE GREAT, one of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, states that bodily fasting is meaningless unless it is joined with a spiritual fast from sin. St. Basil gives the following exhortation regarding fasting: “Let us fast an acceptable and very pleasing fast to the Lord. True fast is the estrangement from evil, temperance of tongue, abstinence from anger, separation from desires, slander, falsehood and perjury. Privation of these is true fasting.”
► ST. FRANCIS DE SALES, one of the Doctors of the Church, gives some good advice in this regard: “If you are able to fast, you will do well to observe some days beyond what are ordered by the Church―for besides the ordinary effect of fasting in raising the mind, subduing the flesh, confirming goodness, and obtaining a heavenly reward, it is also a great matter to be able to control greediness, and to keep the sensual appetites and the whole body subject to the law of the Spirit; and although we may be able to do but little, the enemy nevertheless stands more in awe of those whom he knows can fast.”
Fasting from the World and Worldliness
Fasting from food and drink is merely a means and tool that helps us fast from sin. The world in which we live is a world of sin. Our Lord Himself said: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). Hence we are told: “Do not love the world, or the things that are in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him; because all that is in the world is the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life―which is not from the Father, but from the world!” (1 John 2:14-17).
► ST. PAUL warns: “Many walk, of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ―whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19) … “Such, serve not Christ our Lord, but their own belly” (Romans 16:18). “Take from me the greediness of the belly, and let not the lusts of the flesh take hold of me!” (Ecclesiasticus 23:6). “If you live according to the flesh, you shall die: but if by the Spirit you mortify the deeds of the flesh, then you shall live!” (Romans 8:13). “They that are Christ’s, have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences” (Galatians 5:24).
► ST. BASIL OF CAESAREA (ST. BASIL THE GREAT), one of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, gives the following exhortation regarding fasting: “Let us fast an acceptable and very pleasing fast to the Lord. True fasting is the estrangement from evil, temperance of tongue, abstinence from anger, separation from desires, slander, falsehood and perjury. The privation of these is true fasting. The fast is the weapon of protection against demons. Our Guardian Angels more really stay with those who have cleansed our souls through fasting.”
This is also the constant doctrine of the holy Fathers of the Church. TERTULLIAN says, “As we refrain from the use of food, so our fasting satisfies God.” ST. CYPRIAN: “Let us appease the anger of an offended God by fasting and weeping, as He admonishes us.” ST. AMBROSE also says, “Fasting is the death of sin, the destruction of our crimes, and the remedy of our salvation.” ST. JEROME remarks, “Fasting and sackcloth are the arms of penance, the help of sinners.” ST. AUGUSTINE likewise says, “No one fasts for human praise, but for the pardon of his sins.”
► THE BALTIMORE CATECHISM echoes these sentiments: “The Church commands us to fast and abstain, in order that we may mortify our passions and satisfy for our sins” (Baltimore Catechism #2 Q. 395). Concerning this rationale, Fr. Thomas Kinkead in “An Explanation Of The Baltimore Catechism of Christian Doctrine” published in 1891 writes, “Remember it is our bodies that generally lead us into sin; if therefore we punish the body by fasting and mortification, we atone for the sin, and thus God wipes out a part of the temporal punishment due to it.”
Article 10
Monday & Tuesday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 24th & 25th
God's Tough Love of St. Paul and Ourselves
Monday & Tuesday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 24th & 25th
God's Tough Love of St. Paul and Ourselves
Rich Readings Require Reflection
As was the case with Septuagesima Sunday, so too is the case with Sexagesima Sunday―the liturgical readings are so rich that they cannot be adequately absorbed and assimilated in one day or one article. It is like going to the supermarket for your weekly shopping―there is so much in your basket that you cannot eat it all in one day, you have to spread it out over the entire week!
Yesterday’s article dealt with Gospel reading from Sexagesima Sunday―which was about the Sower of the Seed and the different scenarios of what that seed produced―from fruitlessness to fruitfulness. Today, let us look at the Epistle reading for Sexagesima Sunday. To start with, it is a very long reading―much longer than the usual Epistle―at least twice as long, if not three times as long than what you usually find. Let us first of all look at the Epistle as it stands―then we will dissect it, examine it, explain it and draw fruit from it.
The Epistle of St. Paul
Lesson from the second letter of St. Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians (2 Corinthians 11:19-33; 12:1-9):
“Brethren! You gladly put up with fools, because you are wise yourselves! For you suffer it if a man enslaves you, if a man devours you, if a man takes from you, if a man is arrogant, if a man slaps your face! I speak to my own shame, as though we had been weak! But wherein any man is bold ― I am speaking foolishly ― I also am bold! Are they Hebrews? So am I! Are they Israelites? So am I! Are they offspring of Abraham? So am I! Are they ministers of Christ? I ― to speak as a fool ― am more: in many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in lashes above measure, often exposed to death. From the Jews five times I received forty lashes, less one. Thrice I was scourged; once I was stoned; thrice I suffered shipwreck; a night and a day I was adrift on the sea; in journeyings often; in perils from floods; in perils from robbers; in perils from my own nation; in perils from the Gentiles; in perils in the city; in perils in the wilderness; in perils in the sea; in perils from false brethren; in labor and hardships; in many sleepless nights; in hunger and thirst; in fastings often; in cold and nakedness.
“Besides those outer things, there is my daily pressing anxiety, the care of all the churches! Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to stumble, and I am not inflamed? If I must boast, I will boast of the things that concern my weakness! The God and Father of the Lord Jesus, Who is blessed forevermore, knows that I do not lie! In Damascus, the governor, under King Aretas, was guarding the city of the Damascenes in order to arrest me―but I was lowered in a basket through a window in the wall, and escaped his hands. If I must boast ― it is not indeed expedient to do so ― but I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. I know a man in Christ, who fourteen years ago ― whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body I do not know, God knows ― such a one was caught up to the third heaven. And I know such a man ― whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows ― that he was caught up into paradise and heard secret words that man may not repeat. Of such a man I will boast; but of myself I will glory in nothing save in my infirmities! For if I do wish to boast, I shall not be foolish―for I shall be speaking the truth. But I forbear, lest any man should reckon me beyond what he sees in me or hears from me! And, lest the greatness of the revelations should puff me up, there was given me a thorn for the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to buffet me. Concerning this, I thrice besought the Lord that it might leave me. And He has said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for you―for strength is made perfect in weakness!’ Gladly, therefore I will glory in my infirmities, so that the strength of Christ may dwell in me!”
Suffering, Glory and Boasting
In the above reading there are many things to absorb and dissect. Loosely speaking, you could say that the first part is about tremendous suffering that Paul is forced to undergo under the providential hand of God. The second part is about the glory that God shows and bestows upon Paul. The thread linking the two parts is a kind of ‘boasting’ with which Paul presents it all.
What Paul undergoes, we all have to undergo. The sufferings of Paul are the source of his glory. There can be no glory without the cross―and the cross means having to suffer. Our Lord put it this way: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and comes after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
This is why St. Paul writes: “Many walk―of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ! Whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “We preach Christ crucified … For I judged not myself to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:23; 2:2). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 2:19). “And they that are Christ’s, have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences” (Galatians 5:24). “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer” (Romans 6:6).
Lent is the time par excellence in which the cross, suffering, penance, and destruction of sin is exemplified. Lent is a time when we can and should be imitating the sufferings that Paul mentions above in order to make ourselves more Christ-like by likening ourselves to the cross carrying Christ and trying to like that cross that will lead us to salvation. As the liturgy of the Church states: “In cruce salus!” ― “In the cross is salvation!” “Ave crux, spes unica!” ― Hail cross, our sole hope!” This focus on the cross will be heightened especially during Passiontide and particularly on Good Friday―but we are already called in this build-up to Lent, to reflect upon it; learn from it; test it; undergo our apprenticeship to it; before mastering it and being nailed to it! By being nailed to the cross, we will ‘nail’ our salvation!
The cross is not an appetizing thing―for many it is a revolting and disgusting thing―but of such St. Paul speaks when he says: “Many walk―of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ! Whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). Salvation is not “a piece of cake” nor “a walk in the park” ― it is walking in the footsteps of the cross-carrying Christ to our own personal Calvary. Hence Our Lord and Holy Scripture say things like: “Whosoever does not carry his cross after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). “For the word of the cross, to them indeed that perish, is foolishness―but to them that are saved, that is to us, it is the power of God!” (1 Corinthians 1:18).
The cross with its accompaniment of suffering is a veritable penance―and Our Lord says: “I came to call sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10). Do we find joy in penance? Do we find joy in the cross? Or is the cross our enemy and are we enemies of the cross?
The Imitation of Christ
If anyone truly loves Christ, then he or she will also love His cross. Our Lord said: “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!” (Mark 8:34) ― which is the same as saying: “If any man truly loves Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!” There can be no real imitation of Christ without the cross. Talking of the imitation of Christ, the famous spiritual work, The Imitation of Christ, has some beautiful passages concerning the cross of Christ―here are some of them:
“Jesus has always many who love His heavenly kingdom, but few who bear His cross. He has many who desire consolation, but few who care for trial. He finds many to share His table, but few to take part in His fasting. All desire to be happy with Him; few wish to suffer anything for Him. Many follow Him to the breaking of bread, but few to the drinking of the chalice of His passion. Many revere His miracles; few approach the shame of the Cross. Many love Him as long as they encounter no hardship; many praise and bless Him as long as they receive some comfort from Him. But if Jesus hides Himself and leaves them for a while, they fall either into complaints or into deep dejection. Those, on the contrary, who love Him for His own sake and not for any comfort of their own, bless Him in all trial and anguish of heart as well as in the bliss of consolation. Even if He should never give them consolation, yet they would continue to praise Him and wish always to give Him thanks. What power there is in pure love for Jesus — love that is free from all self-interest and self-love!
“To many the saying, ‘Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow Me!’ seems hard, but it will be much harder to hear that final word: ‘Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire!’ Those who hear the word of the cross and follow it willingly now, need not fear that they will hear of eternal damnation on the Day of Judgment. This sign of the cross will be in the heavens when the Lord comes to judge. Then all the servants of the cross, who during life made themselves one with the Crucified, will draw near with great trust to Christ, the judge.
“Why, then, do you fear to take up the cross when through it you can win a kingdom? In the cross is salvation, in the cross is life, in the cross is protection from enemies, in the cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness, in the cross is strength of mind, in the cross is joy of spirit, in the cross is highest virtue, in the cross is perfect holiness. There is no salvation of soul, nor hope of everlasting life, except in the cross. Take up your cross, therefore, and follow Jesus, and you shall enter eternal life. He Himself opened the way before you in carrying His cross, and upon it He died for you, that you, too, might take up your cross and long to die upon it. If you die with Him, you shall also live with Him, and if you share His suffering, you shall also share His glory.
“Behold, in the cross is everything, and upon your dying on the cross everything depends. There is no other way to life and to true inward peace than the way of the holy cross and daily mortification. Go where you will, seek what you will, you will not find a higher way, nor a less exalted but safer way, than the way of the holy cross. Arrange and order everything to suit your will and judgment, and still you will find that some suffering must always be borne, willingly or unwillingly, and thus you will always find the cross.
“Either you will experience bodily pain or you will undergo tribulation of spirit in your soul. At times you will be forsaken by God, at times troubled by those about you and, what is worse, you will often grow weary of yourself. You cannot escape, you cannot be relieved by any remedy or comfort but must bear with it as long as God wills. For He wishes you to learn to bear trial without consolation, to submit yourself wholly to Him that you may become more humble through suffering. No one understands the passion of Christ so thoroughly or heartily as the man whose lot it is to suffer the like himself.
“The cross, therefore, is always ready; it awaits you everywhere. No matter where you may go, you cannot escape it, for wherever you go you take yourself with you and shall always find yourself. Turn where you will — above, below, without, or within — you will find a cross in everything, and everywhere you must have patience if you would have peace within and merit an eternal crown. If you carry the cross willingly, it will carry and lead you to the desired goal where indeed there shall be no more suffering, but here there shall be. If you carry it unwillingly, you create a burden for yourself and increase the load, though still you have to bear it. If you cast away one cross, you will find another and perhaps a heavier one. Do you expect to escape what no mortal man can ever avoid? Which of the saints was without a cross or trial on this Earth? How is it that you look for another way than this, the royal way of the holy cross?
“The whole life of Christ was a cross and a martyrdom―and do you seek rest and enjoyment for yourself? You deceive yourself, you are mistaken if you seek anything but to suffer, for this mortal life is full of miseries and marked with crosses on all sides. Indeed, the more spiritual progress a person makes, so much heavier will he frequently find the cross, because as his love increases, the pain of his exile also increases.
“Yet such a man, though afflicted in many ways, is not without hope of consolation, because he knows that great reward is coming to him for bearing his cross. And when he carries it willingly, every pang of tribulation is changed into hope of solace from God. Besides, the more the flesh is distressed by affliction, so much the more is the spirit strengthened by inward grace. Not infrequently a man is so strengthened by his love of trials and hardship in his desire to conform to the cross of Christ, that he does not wish to be without sorrow or pain, since he believes he will be the more acceptable to God if he is able to endure more and more grievous things for His sake. It is the grace of Christ, and not the virtue of man, which can and does bring it about that through fervor of spirit frail flesh learns to love and to gain what it naturally hates and shuns.
“To carry the cross, to love the cross, to chastise the body and bring it to subjection, to flee honors, to endure contempt gladly, to despise self and wish to be despised, to suffer any adversity and loss, to desire no prosperous days on Earth — this is not man’s way. If you rely upon yourself, you can do none of these things, but if you trust in the Lord, strength will be given you from Heaven and the world and the flesh will be made subject to your word. You will not even fear your enemy, the devil, if you are armed with Faith and signed with the cross of Christ.
“Set yourself, then, like a good and faithful servant of Christ, to bear bravely the cross of your Lord, Who out of love was crucified for you. Be ready to suffer many adversities and many kinds of trouble in this miserable life, for troublesome and miserable life will always be, no matter where you are; and so you will find it wherever you may hide. Thus it must be; and there is no way to evade the trials and sorrows of life except to bear them.
“Drink the chalice of the Lord with affection it you wish to be His friend and to have part with Him. Leave consolation to God; let Him do as most pleases Him. On your part, be ready to bear sufferings and consider them the greatest consolation, for even though you alone were to undergo them all, the sufferings of this life are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come. When you shall have come to the point where suffering is sweet and acceptable for the sake of Christ, then consider yourself fortunate, for you have found paradise on Earth. But as long as suffering irks you and you seek to escape, so long will you be unfortunate, and the tribulation you seek to evade will follow you everywhere. If you put your mind to the things you ought to consider, that is, to suffering and death, you would soon be in a better state and would find peace.
“Although you were taken to the third Heaven with Paul, you were not thereby insured against suffering. Jesus said: ‘I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!’ To suffer, then, remains your lot, if you mean to love Jesus and serve Him forever. If you were but worthy to suffer something for the Name of Jesus, what great glory would be in store for you, what great joy to all the saints of God, what great edification to those about you! For all men praise patience though there are few who wish to practice it. With good reason, then, ought you to be willing to suffer a little for Christ since many suffer much more for the world. Realize that you must lead a dying life; the more a man dies to himself, the more he begins to live unto God.
“No man is fit to enjoy Heaven unless he has resigned himself to suffer hardship for Christ. Nothing is more acceptable to God, nothing more helpful for you on this Earth than to suffer willingly for Christ. If you had to make a choice, you ought to wish rather to suffer for Christ than to enjoy many consolations, for thus you would be more like Christ and more like all the saints. Our merit and progress consist not in many pleasures and comforts but rather in enduring great afflictions and sufferings.
“If, indeed, there were anything better or more useful for man’s salvation than suffering, Christ would have shown it by word and example. But He clearly exhorts the disciples who follow Him and all who wish to follow Him to carry the cross, saying: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’ When, therefore, we have read and searched all that has been written, let this be the final conclusion — that through much suffering we must enter into the kingdom of God!” (extracts from The Imitation of Christ, Book 2: Chapters 11 & 12; “Few Love the Cross of Jesus” & “The Royal Road of the Cross”)
Our Lady Says the Same
If―like most people―we search for a loophole to having to the cross and suffering, then we will not find one! Our Lady has repeatedly insisted upon this same truth in a variety of ways and expressions―prayer, penance, suffering, sacrifice, etc. ― all of which fall under the category of being a cross to us.
► At LA SALETTE (1846) she lamented: “There are no more generous souls … There is no one to be found to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people … The heads, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance … by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures! … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement!”
► At LOURDES (1858), Our Lady simply yet powerfully insisted upon the cross in the form of “Penance! Penance! Penance!” and commanded St. Bernadette: “Kiss the ground as a penance for sinners.” She also commanded her to eat grass and drink muddy water as a penance for sinners.
► At FATIMA (1917)―even before Our Lady appeared―we have the Angel of Portugal addressing the three children who were playing: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
When Our Lady of Fatima later appeared, she said: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
► In 1957, SISTER LUCIA OF FATIMA later said in an interview with Fr. Fuentes: “It is my mission not just to speak about the material punishments, that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to also tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin. We should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No―Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed! So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway!”
► In the 1950s OUR LADY appeared several times to BLESSED SISTER ELENA AIELLO (1895-1961)―a mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lady said: “Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! See how the souls are falling into Hell! … The justice of our Father is most offended. Men live in their obstinacy of sin … The justice of the Father requires reparation — otherwise many will be lost! … The only valid means for placating Divine Justice is to pray and do penance! … Therefore I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls ... I wish prayers and penance, in order that I may again obtain mercy and salvation for many souls — otherwise they will be lost … Prayers and penances are necessary! … The rulers of the people do not understand this, because they do not have the Christian spirit … All nations will be punished, because sin has spread all over the world! Tremendous will be the punishments, because man has arrived at an insupportable contest with his God … If men do not return to God with prayers and penances, the world will be overturned in a new and more terrible war. Arms most deadly will destroy peoples and nations! … My words are very clear, and you must transmit them to everyone!”
► In 1973, OUR LADY OF AKITA stated: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before ... I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father ... who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
Abandoned by God?
St. John Eudes says: “The most evident mark of God’s anger, and the most terrible castigation He can inflict upon the world, is manifest when He permits His people to fall into the hands of a clergy who are more religious in name than in deeds, priests who practice the cruelty of ravening wolves rather than the charity and affection of devoted shepherds. They abandon the things of God to devote themselves to the things of the world and, despite their saintly calling of holiness, they spend their time in profane and worldly pursuits. When God permits such things, it is a very positive proof that He is thoroughly angry with His people and is visiting His most dreadful wrath upon them.”
Holy Scripture reinforces this: “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. God has scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God has despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6).
Our Lord adds: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
They say that the worst thing that God can do us is to abandon us to ourselves! “God gave them up to the desires of their hearts―unto impurity, to dishonor their own bodies among themselves!” (Romans 1:24). God is not mean and nasty in doing so―it is simply the result of our having abandoned God in the first place. “Has not this been done to thee, because thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God at that time when He led thee by the way?” (Jeremias 2:17). What we sow is what we reap (Galatians 6:7-8). If we fail to sow God in our souls, then we certainly not reap God in our souls. “The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. Some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down by men, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And some seed fell upon stony ground, where it had not much depth of earth, and the seed sprouted and shot up immediately, because there was no deepness of earth. But when the sun was risen, the sprouted seed was scorched, because it had no root and no moisture. And other seed fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up with it and choked it and it yielded no fruit.
“They by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil, Satan, comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
God is Love―God can also be Tough Love
Holy Scripture tells us that God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) ― yet that charity can also be tough to take at times! God―just like any parent―wants to rule His children as amicably as possible. However, when the amicable approach is abused, ignored and disobeyed by the children, then both God and parents have to take a sterner and tougher approach. Just like a doctor would like to avoid amputating a patient’s limb and therefore prescribes certain medications for the patient to take regularly―but if the patient neglects to take them, then amputation becomes necessary if the life of the patient is to be saved. Similarly, if we refuse to take the “medication” of God’s advice on how to live our lives, then an “amputation” of sorts becomes necessary in order to save our souls from Hell. “My iniquities are gone over my head and, as a heavy burden, are become heavy upon me … because of my sins and foolishness! … Rebuke me not, O Lord, in Thy indignation, nor chastise me in Thy wrath! For Thy arrows are fastened in me, and Thy hand hath been strong upon me!” (Psalm 37:2-6). Ultimately, we get the love that our thoughts, words and actions deserve ― “gentle love” or “tough love” ― but at the end of the day it is always love. For even the chastisements of God are act of mercy and love that seek to turn us back from falling into the much greater and eternal chastisement of Hell.
We see the same approach from Our Lady―she tries to change our behavior with words alone. Yet if we ignore those words and refuse to comply with what she requests or commands―then we force her to use “tough love” on us. As OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it!” OUR LADY OF FATIMA said: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father! … If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace. If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace … But if people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out … Russia will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, various nations will be annihilated!” OUR LADY OF AKITA said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before!”
Losing the Sense of Sin
C.S. Lewis wrote to a friend who had lost his wife and was questioning the love of God. He said that his friend was experiencing “a severe mercy”. When thinking about the love of God it is absolutely vital that we keep this in mind. God’s love is unconditional and everlasting, but it is also a tough love. We are wayward sinful children, who are slow in obeying God and quick to sin. We fail to see the full consequences of our sins and thus we downplay sin and look upon it as something trivial that can quickly be forgiven and paid for in the Sacrament of Confession. There are very few priests and even fewer laity who have an objective view and understanding of the gravity of sin! Even recent Liberal and Modernist popes have agreed with earlier Conservative and Traditional popes on the point that most of world (and most Catholics also) have LOST THE SENSE OF SIN.
► POPE PIUS XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
► POPE JOHN PAUL II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
► POPE BENEDICT XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin ... The meaning of sin ― which is a different thing from ‘guilt feelings’ as understood in psychology ― is only grasped in discovering the meaning of God!”
► POPE FRANCIS, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Our Catechisms paint a true picture of the gravity of sin when they say: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Mortal sin must be a most terrible thing indeed to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the everlasting punishment of the rebellious angels and of sinners who die with even only one mortal sin … Venial sin is a less serious offense against the law of God … We are prone to look upon venial sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that it is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin. In Holy Scripture we see from many examples how God regards venial sin; even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished [by death on the borders of the Promised Land and] ― he was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD).
“Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us” (The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Punishing Evil
The greatest evils deserve the greatest punishments―that is quite logical. Now sin―both mortal and venial sins―are the greatest evils. Therefore they deserve the greatest punishments. Adam and Eve could have lived without having to die. However, since they sinned, they incurred the penalty of death―as God had warned them: “Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!” (Genesis 2:16-17). Eve was fully aware of this when she was being tempted by Satan: “Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why has God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat! But of the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of paradise, God has commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No, you shall not die the death! For God knows that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened and you shall be as Gods―knowing good and evil!’” (Genesis 3:1-5).
Holy Scripture warns: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15). “From the woman came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die!” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33). “By one man sin entered into this world, and, by sin, death―and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned! … Death reigned from Adam!” (Romans 5:12-14). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56). “Everyone shall die for his own sin!” (Deuteronomy 24:16). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2).
Nevertheless, God―while allowing the just punishment for sin as being a physical death in this life―God does not desire the ‘eternal death’ of the sinner by having to further condemn him to Hell. God Himself tell us: “The soul that sins, the same shall die … But if the wicked do penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keep all My commandments, and do judgment, and justice, living he shall live, and shall not die … Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? … And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore! Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse? … For when the just turns himself away from being just and commits iniquity, he shall die therein! In the injustice that he has wrought he shall die! And when the wicked turns himself away from his wickedness and does judgment and justice―he shall save his soul alive! … Therefore will I judge every man according to his ways, says the Lord God. Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions by which you have transgressed, and make unto yourselves a new heart and a new spirit―and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dies, says the Lord God, return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:20-32).
If we refuse to convert, if we continue to sin―then God’s TOUGH LOVE will step in to try and make us change our minds before it is too late and we find ourselves at Hell’s gate. “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives!” (Hebrews 12:6). God says: “If you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws and contemn My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, then I will do these things to you: I will quickly visit you with poverty, and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes, and consume your lives! You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies! I will set My face against you and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you! I will chastise you seven times more for your sins! I will break the pride of your stubbornness! If you walk contrary to Me and will not listen to Me, then I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins! And if you will not amend, but will walk contrary to Me, then I will also walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins! I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge My covenant. And when you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies! But if you will not for all this listen to Me, but will walk against Me, then I will also go against you with opposite fury, and I will chastise you with seven plagues for your sins! I will bring your cities to be a wilderness! I will destroy your land, and your enemies shall be astonished at it! I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed! And as to them that shall remain of you, I will send fear in their hearts in the countries of their enemies! You shall perish among the Gentiles! And if some of them remain, they shall pine away in their iniquities, in the land of their enemies, and they shall be afflicted for the sins of their fathers, and their own ― until they confess their iniquities whereby they have transgressed against Me, and walked contrary to Me. Then shall they pray for their sins!” (Leviticus 26:14-41).
As was the case with Septuagesima Sunday, so too is the case with Sexagesima Sunday―the liturgical readings are so rich that they cannot be adequately absorbed and assimilated in one day or one article. It is like going to the supermarket for your weekly shopping―there is so much in your basket that you cannot eat it all in one day, you have to spread it out over the entire week!
Yesterday’s article dealt with Gospel reading from Sexagesima Sunday―which was about the Sower of the Seed and the different scenarios of what that seed produced―from fruitlessness to fruitfulness. Today, let us look at the Epistle reading for Sexagesima Sunday. To start with, it is a very long reading―much longer than the usual Epistle―at least twice as long, if not three times as long than what you usually find. Let us first of all look at the Epistle as it stands―then we will dissect it, examine it, explain it and draw fruit from it.
The Epistle of St. Paul
Lesson from the second letter of St. Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians (2 Corinthians 11:19-33; 12:1-9):
“Brethren! You gladly put up with fools, because you are wise yourselves! For you suffer it if a man enslaves you, if a man devours you, if a man takes from you, if a man is arrogant, if a man slaps your face! I speak to my own shame, as though we had been weak! But wherein any man is bold ― I am speaking foolishly ― I also am bold! Are they Hebrews? So am I! Are they Israelites? So am I! Are they offspring of Abraham? So am I! Are they ministers of Christ? I ― to speak as a fool ― am more: in many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in lashes above measure, often exposed to death. From the Jews five times I received forty lashes, less one. Thrice I was scourged; once I was stoned; thrice I suffered shipwreck; a night and a day I was adrift on the sea; in journeyings often; in perils from floods; in perils from robbers; in perils from my own nation; in perils from the Gentiles; in perils in the city; in perils in the wilderness; in perils in the sea; in perils from false brethren; in labor and hardships; in many sleepless nights; in hunger and thirst; in fastings often; in cold and nakedness.
“Besides those outer things, there is my daily pressing anxiety, the care of all the churches! Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to stumble, and I am not inflamed? If I must boast, I will boast of the things that concern my weakness! The God and Father of the Lord Jesus, Who is blessed forevermore, knows that I do not lie! In Damascus, the governor, under King Aretas, was guarding the city of the Damascenes in order to arrest me―but I was lowered in a basket through a window in the wall, and escaped his hands. If I must boast ― it is not indeed expedient to do so ― but I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. I know a man in Christ, who fourteen years ago ― whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body I do not know, God knows ― such a one was caught up to the third heaven. And I know such a man ― whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows ― that he was caught up into paradise and heard secret words that man may not repeat. Of such a man I will boast; but of myself I will glory in nothing save in my infirmities! For if I do wish to boast, I shall not be foolish―for I shall be speaking the truth. But I forbear, lest any man should reckon me beyond what he sees in me or hears from me! And, lest the greatness of the revelations should puff me up, there was given me a thorn for the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to buffet me. Concerning this, I thrice besought the Lord that it might leave me. And He has said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for you―for strength is made perfect in weakness!’ Gladly, therefore I will glory in my infirmities, so that the strength of Christ may dwell in me!”
Suffering, Glory and Boasting
In the above reading there are many things to absorb and dissect. Loosely speaking, you could say that the first part is about tremendous suffering that Paul is forced to undergo under the providential hand of God. The second part is about the glory that God shows and bestows upon Paul. The thread linking the two parts is a kind of ‘boasting’ with which Paul presents it all.
What Paul undergoes, we all have to undergo. The sufferings of Paul are the source of his glory. There can be no glory without the cross―and the cross means having to suffer. Our Lord put it this way: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and comes after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
This is why St. Paul writes: “Many walk―of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ! Whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “We preach Christ crucified … For I judged not myself to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:23; 2:2). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 2:19). “And they that are Christ’s, have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences” (Galatians 5:24). “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer” (Romans 6:6).
Lent is the time par excellence in which the cross, suffering, penance, and destruction of sin is exemplified. Lent is a time when we can and should be imitating the sufferings that Paul mentions above in order to make ourselves more Christ-like by likening ourselves to the cross carrying Christ and trying to like that cross that will lead us to salvation. As the liturgy of the Church states: “In cruce salus!” ― “In the cross is salvation!” “Ave crux, spes unica!” ― Hail cross, our sole hope!” This focus on the cross will be heightened especially during Passiontide and particularly on Good Friday―but we are already called in this build-up to Lent, to reflect upon it; learn from it; test it; undergo our apprenticeship to it; before mastering it and being nailed to it! By being nailed to the cross, we will ‘nail’ our salvation!
The cross is not an appetizing thing―for many it is a revolting and disgusting thing―but of such St. Paul speaks when he says: “Many walk―of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ! Whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). Salvation is not “a piece of cake” nor “a walk in the park” ― it is walking in the footsteps of the cross-carrying Christ to our own personal Calvary. Hence Our Lord and Holy Scripture say things like: “Whosoever does not carry his cross after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). “For the word of the cross, to them indeed that perish, is foolishness―but to them that are saved, that is to us, it is the power of God!” (1 Corinthians 1:18).
The cross with its accompaniment of suffering is a veritable penance―and Our Lord says: “I came to call sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10). Do we find joy in penance? Do we find joy in the cross? Or is the cross our enemy and are we enemies of the cross?
The Imitation of Christ
If anyone truly loves Christ, then he or she will also love His cross. Our Lord said: “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!” (Mark 8:34) ― which is the same as saying: “If any man truly loves Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!” There can be no real imitation of Christ without the cross. Talking of the imitation of Christ, the famous spiritual work, The Imitation of Christ, has some beautiful passages concerning the cross of Christ―here are some of them:
“Jesus has always many who love His heavenly kingdom, but few who bear His cross. He has many who desire consolation, but few who care for trial. He finds many to share His table, but few to take part in His fasting. All desire to be happy with Him; few wish to suffer anything for Him. Many follow Him to the breaking of bread, but few to the drinking of the chalice of His passion. Many revere His miracles; few approach the shame of the Cross. Many love Him as long as they encounter no hardship; many praise and bless Him as long as they receive some comfort from Him. But if Jesus hides Himself and leaves them for a while, they fall either into complaints or into deep dejection. Those, on the contrary, who love Him for His own sake and not for any comfort of their own, bless Him in all trial and anguish of heart as well as in the bliss of consolation. Even if He should never give them consolation, yet they would continue to praise Him and wish always to give Him thanks. What power there is in pure love for Jesus — love that is free from all self-interest and self-love!
“To many the saying, ‘Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow Me!’ seems hard, but it will be much harder to hear that final word: ‘Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire!’ Those who hear the word of the cross and follow it willingly now, need not fear that they will hear of eternal damnation on the Day of Judgment. This sign of the cross will be in the heavens when the Lord comes to judge. Then all the servants of the cross, who during life made themselves one with the Crucified, will draw near with great trust to Christ, the judge.
“Why, then, do you fear to take up the cross when through it you can win a kingdom? In the cross is salvation, in the cross is life, in the cross is protection from enemies, in the cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness, in the cross is strength of mind, in the cross is joy of spirit, in the cross is highest virtue, in the cross is perfect holiness. There is no salvation of soul, nor hope of everlasting life, except in the cross. Take up your cross, therefore, and follow Jesus, and you shall enter eternal life. He Himself opened the way before you in carrying His cross, and upon it He died for you, that you, too, might take up your cross and long to die upon it. If you die with Him, you shall also live with Him, and if you share His suffering, you shall also share His glory.
“Behold, in the cross is everything, and upon your dying on the cross everything depends. There is no other way to life and to true inward peace than the way of the holy cross and daily mortification. Go where you will, seek what you will, you will not find a higher way, nor a less exalted but safer way, than the way of the holy cross. Arrange and order everything to suit your will and judgment, and still you will find that some suffering must always be borne, willingly or unwillingly, and thus you will always find the cross.
“Either you will experience bodily pain or you will undergo tribulation of spirit in your soul. At times you will be forsaken by God, at times troubled by those about you and, what is worse, you will often grow weary of yourself. You cannot escape, you cannot be relieved by any remedy or comfort but must bear with it as long as God wills. For He wishes you to learn to bear trial without consolation, to submit yourself wholly to Him that you may become more humble through suffering. No one understands the passion of Christ so thoroughly or heartily as the man whose lot it is to suffer the like himself.
“The cross, therefore, is always ready; it awaits you everywhere. No matter where you may go, you cannot escape it, for wherever you go you take yourself with you and shall always find yourself. Turn where you will — above, below, without, or within — you will find a cross in everything, and everywhere you must have patience if you would have peace within and merit an eternal crown. If you carry the cross willingly, it will carry and lead you to the desired goal where indeed there shall be no more suffering, but here there shall be. If you carry it unwillingly, you create a burden for yourself and increase the load, though still you have to bear it. If you cast away one cross, you will find another and perhaps a heavier one. Do you expect to escape what no mortal man can ever avoid? Which of the saints was without a cross or trial on this Earth? How is it that you look for another way than this, the royal way of the holy cross?
“The whole life of Christ was a cross and a martyrdom―and do you seek rest and enjoyment for yourself? You deceive yourself, you are mistaken if you seek anything but to suffer, for this mortal life is full of miseries and marked with crosses on all sides. Indeed, the more spiritual progress a person makes, so much heavier will he frequently find the cross, because as his love increases, the pain of his exile also increases.
“Yet such a man, though afflicted in many ways, is not without hope of consolation, because he knows that great reward is coming to him for bearing his cross. And when he carries it willingly, every pang of tribulation is changed into hope of solace from God. Besides, the more the flesh is distressed by affliction, so much the more is the spirit strengthened by inward grace. Not infrequently a man is so strengthened by his love of trials and hardship in his desire to conform to the cross of Christ, that he does not wish to be without sorrow or pain, since he believes he will be the more acceptable to God if he is able to endure more and more grievous things for His sake. It is the grace of Christ, and not the virtue of man, which can and does bring it about that through fervor of spirit frail flesh learns to love and to gain what it naturally hates and shuns.
“To carry the cross, to love the cross, to chastise the body and bring it to subjection, to flee honors, to endure contempt gladly, to despise self and wish to be despised, to suffer any adversity and loss, to desire no prosperous days on Earth — this is not man’s way. If you rely upon yourself, you can do none of these things, but if you trust in the Lord, strength will be given you from Heaven and the world and the flesh will be made subject to your word. You will not even fear your enemy, the devil, if you are armed with Faith and signed with the cross of Christ.
“Set yourself, then, like a good and faithful servant of Christ, to bear bravely the cross of your Lord, Who out of love was crucified for you. Be ready to suffer many adversities and many kinds of trouble in this miserable life, for troublesome and miserable life will always be, no matter where you are; and so you will find it wherever you may hide. Thus it must be; and there is no way to evade the trials and sorrows of life except to bear them.
“Drink the chalice of the Lord with affection it you wish to be His friend and to have part with Him. Leave consolation to God; let Him do as most pleases Him. On your part, be ready to bear sufferings and consider them the greatest consolation, for even though you alone were to undergo them all, the sufferings of this life are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come. When you shall have come to the point where suffering is sweet and acceptable for the sake of Christ, then consider yourself fortunate, for you have found paradise on Earth. But as long as suffering irks you and you seek to escape, so long will you be unfortunate, and the tribulation you seek to evade will follow you everywhere. If you put your mind to the things you ought to consider, that is, to suffering and death, you would soon be in a better state and would find peace.
“Although you were taken to the third Heaven with Paul, you were not thereby insured against suffering. Jesus said: ‘I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!’ To suffer, then, remains your lot, if you mean to love Jesus and serve Him forever. If you were but worthy to suffer something for the Name of Jesus, what great glory would be in store for you, what great joy to all the saints of God, what great edification to those about you! For all men praise patience though there are few who wish to practice it. With good reason, then, ought you to be willing to suffer a little for Christ since many suffer much more for the world. Realize that you must lead a dying life; the more a man dies to himself, the more he begins to live unto God.
“No man is fit to enjoy Heaven unless he has resigned himself to suffer hardship for Christ. Nothing is more acceptable to God, nothing more helpful for you on this Earth than to suffer willingly for Christ. If you had to make a choice, you ought to wish rather to suffer for Christ than to enjoy many consolations, for thus you would be more like Christ and more like all the saints. Our merit and progress consist not in many pleasures and comforts but rather in enduring great afflictions and sufferings.
“If, indeed, there were anything better or more useful for man’s salvation than suffering, Christ would have shown it by word and example. But He clearly exhorts the disciples who follow Him and all who wish to follow Him to carry the cross, saying: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’ When, therefore, we have read and searched all that has been written, let this be the final conclusion — that through much suffering we must enter into the kingdom of God!” (extracts from The Imitation of Christ, Book 2: Chapters 11 & 12; “Few Love the Cross of Jesus” & “The Royal Road of the Cross”)
Our Lady Says the Same
If―like most people―we search for a loophole to having to the cross and suffering, then we will not find one! Our Lady has repeatedly insisted upon this same truth in a variety of ways and expressions―prayer, penance, suffering, sacrifice, etc. ― all of which fall under the category of being a cross to us.
► At LA SALETTE (1846) she lamented: “There are no more generous souls … There is no one to be found to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people … The heads, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance … by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures! … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement!”
► At LOURDES (1858), Our Lady simply yet powerfully insisted upon the cross in the form of “Penance! Penance! Penance!” and commanded St. Bernadette: “Kiss the ground as a penance for sinners.” She also commanded her to eat grass and drink muddy water as a penance for sinners.
► At FATIMA (1917)―even before Our Lady appeared―we have the Angel of Portugal addressing the three children who were playing: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
When Our Lady of Fatima later appeared, she said: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
► In 1957, SISTER LUCIA OF FATIMA later said in an interview with Fr. Fuentes: “It is my mission not just to speak about the material punishments, that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to also tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin. We should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No―Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed! So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway!”
► In the 1950s OUR LADY appeared several times to BLESSED SISTER ELENA AIELLO (1895-1961)―a mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lady said: “Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! See how the souls are falling into Hell! … The justice of our Father is most offended. Men live in their obstinacy of sin … The justice of the Father requires reparation — otherwise many will be lost! … The only valid means for placating Divine Justice is to pray and do penance! … Therefore I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls ... I wish prayers and penance, in order that I may again obtain mercy and salvation for many souls — otherwise they will be lost … Prayers and penances are necessary! … The rulers of the people do not understand this, because they do not have the Christian spirit … All nations will be punished, because sin has spread all over the world! Tremendous will be the punishments, because man has arrived at an insupportable contest with his God … If men do not return to God with prayers and penances, the world will be overturned in a new and more terrible war. Arms most deadly will destroy peoples and nations! … My words are very clear, and you must transmit them to everyone!”
► In 1973, OUR LADY OF AKITA stated: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before ... I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father ... who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
Abandoned by God?
St. John Eudes says: “The most evident mark of God’s anger, and the most terrible castigation He can inflict upon the world, is manifest when He permits His people to fall into the hands of a clergy who are more religious in name than in deeds, priests who practice the cruelty of ravening wolves rather than the charity and affection of devoted shepherds. They abandon the things of God to devote themselves to the things of the world and, despite their saintly calling of holiness, they spend their time in profane and worldly pursuits. When God permits such things, it is a very positive proof that He is thoroughly angry with His people and is visiting His most dreadful wrath upon them.”
Holy Scripture reinforces this: “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. God has scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God has despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6).
Our Lord adds: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
They say that the worst thing that God can do us is to abandon us to ourselves! “God gave them up to the desires of their hearts―unto impurity, to dishonor their own bodies among themselves!” (Romans 1:24). God is not mean and nasty in doing so―it is simply the result of our having abandoned God in the first place. “Has not this been done to thee, because thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God at that time when He led thee by the way?” (Jeremias 2:17). What we sow is what we reap (Galatians 6:7-8). If we fail to sow God in our souls, then we certainly not reap God in our souls. “The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. Some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down by men, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And some seed fell upon stony ground, where it had not much depth of earth, and the seed sprouted and shot up immediately, because there was no deepness of earth. But when the sun was risen, the sprouted seed was scorched, because it had no root and no moisture. And other seed fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up with it and choked it and it yielded no fruit.
“They by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil, Satan, comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
God is Love―God can also be Tough Love
Holy Scripture tells us that God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) ― yet that charity can also be tough to take at times! God―just like any parent―wants to rule His children as amicably as possible. However, when the amicable approach is abused, ignored and disobeyed by the children, then both God and parents have to take a sterner and tougher approach. Just like a doctor would like to avoid amputating a patient’s limb and therefore prescribes certain medications for the patient to take regularly―but if the patient neglects to take them, then amputation becomes necessary if the life of the patient is to be saved. Similarly, if we refuse to take the “medication” of God’s advice on how to live our lives, then an “amputation” of sorts becomes necessary in order to save our souls from Hell. “My iniquities are gone over my head and, as a heavy burden, are become heavy upon me … because of my sins and foolishness! … Rebuke me not, O Lord, in Thy indignation, nor chastise me in Thy wrath! For Thy arrows are fastened in me, and Thy hand hath been strong upon me!” (Psalm 37:2-6). Ultimately, we get the love that our thoughts, words and actions deserve ― “gentle love” or “tough love” ― but at the end of the day it is always love. For even the chastisements of God are act of mercy and love that seek to turn us back from falling into the much greater and eternal chastisement of Hell.
We see the same approach from Our Lady―she tries to change our behavior with words alone. Yet if we ignore those words and refuse to comply with what she requests or commands―then we force her to use “tough love” on us. As OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it!” OUR LADY OF FATIMA said: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father! … If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace. If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace … But if people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out … Russia will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, various nations will be annihilated!” OUR LADY OF AKITA said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before!”
Losing the Sense of Sin
C.S. Lewis wrote to a friend who had lost his wife and was questioning the love of God. He said that his friend was experiencing “a severe mercy”. When thinking about the love of God it is absolutely vital that we keep this in mind. God’s love is unconditional and everlasting, but it is also a tough love. We are wayward sinful children, who are slow in obeying God and quick to sin. We fail to see the full consequences of our sins and thus we downplay sin and look upon it as something trivial that can quickly be forgiven and paid for in the Sacrament of Confession. There are very few priests and even fewer laity who have an objective view and understanding of the gravity of sin! Even recent Liberal and Modernist popes have agreed with earlier Conservative and Traditional popes on the point that most of world (and most Catholics also) have LOST THE SENSE OF SIN.
► POPE PIUS XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
► POPE JOHN PAUL II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
► POPE BENEDICT XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin ... The meaning of sin ― which is a different thing from ‘guilt feelings’ as understood in psychology ― is only grasped in discovering the meaning of God!”
► POPE FRANCIS, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Our Catechisms paint a true picture of the gravity of sin when they say: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Mortal sin must be a most terrible thing indeed to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the everlasting punishment of the rebellious angels and of sinners who die with even only one mortal sin … Venial sin is a less serious offense against the law of God … We are prone to look upon venial sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that it is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin. In Holy Scripture we see from many examples how God regards venial sin; even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished [by death on the borders of the Promised Land and] ― he was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD).
“Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us” (The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Punishing Evil
The greatest evils deserve the greatest punishments―that is quite logical. Now sin―both mortal and venial sins―are the greatest evils. Therefore they deserve the greatest punishments. Adam and Eve could have lived without having to die. However, since they sinned, they incurred the penalty of death―as God had warned them: “Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!” (Genesis 2:16-17). Eve was fully aware of this when she was being tempted by Satan: “Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why has God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat! But of the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of paradise, God has commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No, you shall not die the death! For God knows that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened and you shall be as Gods―knowing good and evil!’” (Genesis 3:1-5).
Holy Scripture warns: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15). “From the woman came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die!” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33). “By one man sin entered into this world, and, by sin, death―and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned! … Death reigned from Adam!” (Romans 5:12-14). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56). “Everyone shall die for his own sin!” (Deuteronomy 24:16). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2).
Nevertheless, God―while allowing the just punishment for sin as being a physical death in this life―God does not desire the ‘eternal death’ of the sinner by having to further condemn him to Hell. God Himself tell us: “The soul that sins, the same shall die … But if the wicked do penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keep all My commandments, and do judgment, and justice, living he shall live, and shall not die … Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? … And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore! Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse? … For when the just turns himself away from being just and commits iniquity, he shall die therein! In the injustice that he has wrought he shall die! And when the wicked turns himself away from his wickedness and does judgment and justice―he shall save his soul alive! … Therefore will I judge every man according to his ways, says the Lord God. Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions by which you have transgressed, and make unto yourselves a new heart and a new spirit―and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dies, says the Lord God, return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:20-32).
If we refuse to convert, if we continue to sin―then God’s TOUGH LOVE will step in to try and make us change our minds before it is too late and we find ourselves at Hell’s gate. “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives!” (Hebrews 12:6). God says: “If you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws and contemn My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, then I will do these things to you: I will quickly visit you with poverty, and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes, and consume your lives! You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies! I will set My face against you and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you! I will chastise you seven times more for your sins! I will break the pride of your stubbornness! If you walk contrary to Me and will not listen to Me, then I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins! And if you will not amend, but will walk contrary to Me, then I will also walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins! I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge My covenant. And when you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies! But if you will not for all this listen to Me, but will walk against Me, then I will also go against you with opposite fury, and I will chastise you with seven plagues for your sins! I will bring your cities to be a wilderness! I will destroy your land, and your enemies shall be astonished at it! I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed! And as to them that shall remain of you, I will send fear in their hearts in the countries of their enemies! You shall perish among the Gentiles! And if some of them remain, they shall pine away in their iniquities, in the land of their enemies, and they shall be afflicted for the sins of their fathers, and their own ― until they confess their iniquities whereby they have transgressed against Me, and walked contrary to Me. Then shall they pray for their sins!” (Leviticus 26:14-41).
Article 9
Sexagesima Sunday, February 23rd
A Seedy Story? Fruitful or Fruitless?
Sexagesima Sunday, February 23rd
A Seedy Story? Fruitful or Fruitless?
Worldly Weeds, Hellish Herbs and Paradisical Plants
You would imagine that God is a Green-Fingered Gardener! The Holy Ghost—the inspirer and author behind Holy Scripture—has made sure that the Bible is full of ‘agricultural’ and ‘gardening’ elements from beginning to end! (Incidentally, beginning with Septuagesima Sunday—which was last Sunday—the Church, in her Divine Office (Breviary), starts with first chapter of the Bible for the readings at the Divine Office of Matins. Therefore, this dovetails with what is about to be said). The opening books of the Bible could be said to be—tongue-in-cheek—a “Gardening Book” of sorts.
We read, in the very first book of the Bible, in its very first chapter: “And God said: ‘Let the Earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the Earth!’ And it was so done. And the Earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that bears fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:11-12).
A little further on, in the same fist chapter, we read: “And God created man to His own image―to the image of God He created him―male and female He created them. And God blessed them, saying: ‘Increase and multiply, and fill the Earth, and subdue it! … Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed upon the Earth, and all trees that have in themselves seed of their own kind, to be your meat [food]!” (Genesis 1:27-29).
Then, in the second chapter of Genesis, we again read: “And the Lord God had planted a paradise of pleasure from the beginning―wherein He placed man whom He had formed. And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of―the tree of life also, in the midst of paradise, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil ... And the Lord God took man and put him into the paradise of pleasure, to dress it and to keep it. And Lord God commanded Adam, saying: ‘Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” (Genesis 2:8-17).
They say “it comes in threes” and so with these ‘gardening’ references in the opening books of the Bible, you could say: “It comes in trees”! In the third book of Genesis, we come to dramatic scene of the story, the grand finale! “Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why has God commanded you that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat! But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God has commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No! You shall not die the death! For God knows that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’ And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold: and she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband who did eat. And the eyes of them both were opened―and when they perceived themselves to be naked, they sewed together fig leaves, and made themselves aprons. And when they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in paradise at the afternoon air, Adam and his wife hid themselves from the face of the Lord God, amidst the trees of paradise” (Genesis 3:1-8).
From Fruit to Thistles! From Life to Death!
In agriculture and gardening, there are certain rules that you must obey, or else ‘Mother Nature’ will punish you with failure. The same was true for Adam and, as we shall see, the same is true for ourselves in the spiritual garden of our soul. Adam and Eve failed to follow the rules and Adam and Eve were punished severely—in fact, they were sentenced to death!
“And the Lord God called Adam, and said to him: ‘Where art thou?’ And Adam said: ‘I heard Thy voice in paradise and I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid myself!’ And the Lord God said to Adam: ‘And who has told thee that thou wast naked, unless thou hast eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat?’ And Adam said: ‘The woman, whom thou gavest me to be my companion, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat!’ And the Lord God said to the woman: ‘Why hast thou done this?’ And she answered: ‘The serpent deceived me, and I did eat!’” (Genesis 3:9-11).
Adam and Eve are Cast-Out from the Garden of Eden
Excuses! Excuses! We are always full of excuses—a tendency we have all inherited from the Original Sin of Adam and Eve! It is never our fault—we will always “point the finger” at someone or something else! One would imagine that we are the only faultless, blameless people walking on the face of this Earth! The sinners will always blame everyone else, the saints will always blame themselves! St. Peter says to Our Lord: “Peter fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying: ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!’” (Luke 5:8), while the Pharisee says: “The Pharisee standing, prayed thus within himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican!’” (Luke 18:11). We should take note of what the Holy Ghost says through the Psalmist in Holy Scripture: “Incline not my heart to make excuses in sins!” (Psalm 140:4).
God refuses the excuses of Adam and Eve and “To the woman God said: ‘I will multiply thy sorrows and thy conceptions: in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children, and thou shalt be under thy husband’s power, and he shall have dominion over thee!’ And to Adam He said: ‘Because thou hast listened to the voice of thy wife and hast eaten of the tree―of which I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat―cursed is the earth in thy work; with labor and toil shalt thou eat thereof all the days of thy life! Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth! In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth, out of which thou wast taken! For dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!’” (Genesis 3:16-19).
Here we see, very clearly, the truth of what the Holy Ghost would later say in Holy Scripture, through the mouth and pen of St. Paul in the New Testament: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Not All Gardeners Are Made Equal
Some gardeners succeed, some gardeners fail! Likewise, in the garden of the soul, some gardeners succeed while others fail. At the end of His parable about the “Workers in the Vineyard” ― another agricultural or gardening reference―Our Lord closes with the words: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 20:16). In a similar vein, speaking of the end times, Our Lord says: “But of that day and hour no one knoweth, not the angels of Heaven, but the Father alone … Then two shall be in the field: one shall be taken, and one shall be left” (Matthew 24:36-40). So work in the garden of our soul we must, but not all will work in a way that will lead to salvation. “Because of the cold, the sluggard would not plough: he shall beg therefore in the summer, and it shall not be given him!” (Proverbs 20:4) … “The thoughts of the industrious always bring forth abundance: but every sluggard is always in want” (Proverbs 21:5).
We see that Adam and Eve’s first born—Cain—was a farmer or gardener, while his brother Abel looked after the animals, yet things turned out badly for Cain and well for Abel—and it was in the fields that Cain murdered Abel: “And Cain said to Abel his brother: ‘Let us go forth outside!’ And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him” (Genesis 4:8). On the contrary, we see that Jacob was the farmer or gardener, and his brother Esau hunted animals—yet things turned out badly for Esau, but well for Jacob. However, in the case of the first two kings of Israel—Saul and then David—Saul was the farmer that God chose to be the first king, but things went sour for Saul when he disobeyed God’s commands through the prophet Samuel, and God chose David, a shepherd of animals, to replace Saul. There are other examples that can be given, but let us stop there. Suffice it to say that not all gardeners are made equal—some succeed, some don’t, which is why St. Paul says: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Agriculturalists, Farmers, Gardeners Galore!
Today’s Gospel reading, at the Mass of Sexagesima Sunday, sees Our Lord speak of the “Sower of the Seed”, yet before we dig into that Gospel, you will be amazed by the numerous Scriptural references that, in a precise or general way, speak of agriculture, farming and gardening—in both the Old and New Testaments. So much so, that it is not a mere coincidence, but a deliberate ‘game-plan’ by God in mentioning these connected themes so many times.
After the Great Flood that destroyed most of the world, God addresses Noe in words similar to those spoken to Adam—for, in essence, God is going to “start the world” all over again through Noe. “God blessed Noe and his sons. And He said to them: ‘Increase and multiply, and fill the Earth! All that moves upon the Earth is delivered into your hand. And everything that moves and lives, shall be meat for you―even as the green herbs―have I delivered them all to you! …
And Noe, a husbandman [= gardener and farmer], began to till the ground and planted a vineyard” (Genesis 9:1-2, 20).
Abraham was a successful farmer and shepherd. Abraham’s son, Isaac, was a successful farmer and shepherd: “And Isaac sowed in that land, and he found that same year a hundredfold: and the Lord blessed him. And the man was enriched, and he went on prospering and increasing, till he became exceedingly great” (Genesis 26:12-13). Isaac’s son, Jacob, was a farmer and a shepherd. Jacob’s favorite son, Joseph, tells of a dream he had: “Hear my dream which I dreamed. I thought we were binding sheaves in the field―and my sheaf arose, as it were, and stood; and your sheaves, standing round about, bowed down before my sheaf!” (Genesis 37:6-7).
Likewise in the time of Moses: “And the Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying: ‘Speak to the children of Israel, and thou shalt say to them: “When you shall have entered into the land which I will give you, observe the rest of the Sabbath to the Lord. Six years thou shalt sow thy field and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and shalt gather the fruits thereof. But in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath to the land, of the resting of the Lord: thou shalt not sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard … for it is a year of rest to the land!”’” (Leviticus 25:1-4).
Firmly Planted in the New Testament!
Okay, let us “give it a rest” as regards Old Testament quotes—though you will find many, many more explicit and implicit references to agriculture, farming and gardening that can be liked analogically and symbolically to the spiritual gardening that has to take place in the soul.
The New Testament is even more striking in this respect. Our Lord Himself frequently uses agricultural references as part of His teaching—for it is a common way of life and Our Lord teaches by referring to things that the people understand well and can easily relate to—there were no media entertainment outlets in those days: no TV, computers, videos, sports, cars, movies, malls, supermarkets, etc. Our Lord speaks ‘agriculturally’ on many occasions:
“Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as one of these. And if the grass of the field―which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven―God does so clothe, then how much more you, O ye of little faith?” (Matthew 6:28-30).
“By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20).
“I am the true vine; and my Father is the farmer [gardener]. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing! If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:1-6).
“Another parable He proposed to them, saying: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, and had brought forth fruit, then appeared also the cockle. And the servants of the good man of the house coming said to him: ‘Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? Whence then has it cockle?’ And he said to them: ‘An enemy has done this!’ And the servants said to him: ‘Wilt thou that we go and gather it up?’ And he said: ‘No, lest perhaps gathering up the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it! Suffer both to grow until the harvest, and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers: “Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn!”‘ [Jesus then explained the parable to His disciples] … ‘He that sows the good seed, is the Son of man. And the field is the world. And the good seed are the children of the kingdom. And the cockle are the children of the wicked one. And the enemy that sowed them, is the devil. But the harvest is the end of the world. And the reapers are the angels. Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire―so shall it be at the end of the world!’” (Matthew 13:24-30, 13:37-40).
Sexagesima Sunday’s Gospel of the Sower of the Seed
This leads us into the Gospel for Sexagesima Sunday—which is that of the parable of “The Sower of the Seed”—related by three of the Evangelists: St. Matthew, St. Mark and St. Luke—the Church choosing to use the account given by St. Luke. Here is a combined version from the texts of all three Evangelists:
“The sower went out to sow his seed. And whilst he sowed, some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down by men, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And some seed fell upon stony ground, where it had not much depth of earth, and the seed sprouted and shot up immediately, because there was no deepness of earth. But when the sun was risen, the sprouted seed was scorched, because it had no root and no moisture. And other seed fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up with it and choked it and it yielded no fruit. And others fell upon good ground: and this seed brought forth fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold.
“And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom Jesus said: ‘The parable is this! Hear therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, and immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
Of course, to receive the Word fruitfully, means not allowing oneself to be sucked into the whirlpool of worldly cares. The Imitation of Christ warns us against this:
“Do you think that men of the world have no suffering, or perhaps but little? Ask even those who enjoy the most delights and you will learn otherwise. ‘But,’ you will say, ‘they enjoy many pleasures and follow their own wishes; therefore they do not feel their troubles very much.’ Granted that they do have whatever they wish, how long do you think it will last? Behold, they, who prosper in the world, shall perish as smoke, and there shall be no memory of their past joys. Even in this life they do not find rest in these pleasures without bitterness, weariness, and fear. For they often receive the penalty of sorrow from the very thing from which they believe their happiness comes. And it is just. Since they seek and follow after pleasures without reason, they should not enjoy them without shame and bitterness. How brief, how false, how unreasonable and shameful all these pleasures are! Yet, in their drunken blindness, men do not understand this, but, like brute beasts, incur death of soul for the miserly enjoyment of a corruptible life. Therefore, my child, do not pursue your lusts, but turn away from your own will. Seek thy pleasure in the Lord and He will give thee thy heart’s desires” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 12).
The Dangers of Fruitlessness
Elsewhere in Holy Scripture, we are clearly shown the danger of not being fruitful.
“Jesus went out of the city of Jerusalem into Bethania, and remained there. And in the morning, returning into Jerusalem, He was hungry. And seeing a certain fig tree, afar off, by the way side, He came to it, if perhaps He might find anything on it. And He found nothing on it, but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward and may no man hereafter eat fruit of thee anymore, forever!’ And His disciples heard it. And immediately the fig tree withered away. And they went on to Jerusalem … when evening was come, Jesus went forth out of the city. And when they passed by the fig tree they saw it dried up from the roots. And Peter remembering, said to him: Master! Behold the fig tree, which Thou didst curse, is withered away!’ And the disciples, seeing it, wondered, saying: ‘How is it presently withered away?” (Matthew 21:17-19; Mark 11:11-21).
We see a similar “fruitless” incident, this time in a parable of Our Lord: “He spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why is it encumbering the ground?” But he answering, said to him: “Lord, leave it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And, perhaps happily it bears fruit, but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”’” (Luke 13:6-9).
St. John the Baptist says: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down and cast into the fire!” (Luke 3:9). Likewise, Our Lord says: “Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:19).
We can link this to what Our Lord said a few days later, at the Last Supper: “I am the true vine; and my Father is the farmer [gardener]. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:1-6).
God Wants More Gardeners for His Garden!
Our Lord tells us that God seeks more laborers for His harvest of souls, more gardeners laboring in the garden of the soul. “Then Jesus said to His disciples: “The harvest indeed is great, but the laborers are few! Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he send forth laborers into his harvest!” (Matthew 9:37-38).
“The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a householder, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And, having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing there, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They say to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:1-7).
Our Lord points out: “Do you not say: ‘There are yet four months and then the harvest cometh’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes, and see the countries; for they are white already to harvest. And he that reaps receiveth wages, and gathers fruit unto life everlasting: that both he that sows, and he that reaps, may rejoice together. For in this is the saying true: ‘That it is one man that sows, and it is another that reaps!’ I have sent you to reap that in which you did not labor―others have labored, and you have entered into their labors” (John 4:35-38). Which is why St. Paul writes: “I have planted, Apollo watered, but God gave the increase!” (1 Corinthians 3:6).
God Wants Fruitful Gardens and Diligent Gardeners
It is clear from what Our Lord says that God wants us to be fruitful in our spiritual gardening—whether gardening in the garden of our own souls, or helping other souls to grow spiritually. “Hear ye another parable. There was a man an householder, who planted a vineyard, and made a hedge round about it, and dug in it a press, and built a tower, and let it out to farmers; and went into a strange country. And when the time of the fruits drew nigh, he sent his servants to the farmers that they might receive the fruits thereof” (Matthew 21:33-34).
Nor is God satisfied with just some fruit, God wants you to produce more and more fruit―“Everyone that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit!” (John 15:2). As Dom Hubert Van Zeller writes in his book, Holiness, A Guide For Beginners, there is no point in our life when we can say: “Okay! I’ve done it! I’ve no more to do!” The only “finishing-line” that ends our race is death! “One great lesson you are meant to learn is that sanctity is not a matter of reaching a particular milestone on the road to God. It is not a case of being an ordinary person until you come to the milestone, and a saint when you have got beyond it. It is a case of using your powers as perfectly as you can. There is no fixed milestone. The only thing that is fixed is the destination — God” (Dom Hubert Van Zeller, Holiness—A Guide For Beginners).
Why is it that we have much energy for amassing earthly fruits, but little energy for amassing heavenly fruits? Another parable of Our Lord’s should make us seriously reflect on this anomaly: “And He spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and will build greater; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods. And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thy rest; eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee: and whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God! … But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!’” (Luke 12:16-21, 31). “Labor not for the meat which perishes, but for that which endures unto life everlasting, which the Son of man will give you!” (John 6:27). “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26). "Let Thy children, O Lord, whom Thou lovest, know that it is not the growing of fruits that nourishes men, but Thy word preserves them that believe in thee!” (Wisdom 16:26).
The Fruit of Life is Death—The Fruit of Death is Life!
The fruit of life is death and the fruit of death is life? Sounds like an oxymoron (a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory or paradoxical terms appear in conjunction with each other). At first glance, yes! Yet that is exactly what Our Lord says in the Gospels:
► “He that finds his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:39).
► Still in Matthew’s Gospel, but six chapters later, Our Lord is again seen to repeat the same idea: “For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:25).
All the other three Evangelists also report Our Lord as saying this—and St. Luke also reports it twice:
► “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35).
► “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it!” (Luke 9:24).
► “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it!” (Luke 17:33).
► “Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, then itself it remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit. He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:24-25).
Out of all those last six references, quoted above just now, in four of them Our Lord links the “saving” and “losing” of life to the obligation to carry the cross. Of the other two, one refers to the tribulations that will come in the end times and the last one, from St. John’s Gospel, refers to the need for the seed to die unto itself before it can bear fruit.
Out of all those last six references, quoted above just now, in four of them Our Lord links the “saving” and “losing” of life to the obligation to carry the cross. Of the other two, one refers to the tribulations that will come in the end times and the last one, from St. John’s Gospel, refers to the need for the seed to die unto itself before it can bear fruit.
► “He that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me! He that finds his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:38-39).
► “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me! For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:24-25).
► “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:34-35).
► “And he said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it! For what is a man advantaged, if he gains the whole world, and loses himself, and casts away himself?’” (Luke 9:23-25).
► “As it came to pass in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat and drink, they married wives, and were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark―and the flood came and destroyed them all! Likewise as it came to pass, in the days of Lot―they did eat and drink, they bought and sold, they planted and built. And in the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from Heaven, and destroyed them all! Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man shall be revealed. In that hour, he that shall be on the housetop, and his goods in the house, let him not go down to take them away: and he that shall be in the field, in like manner, let him not return back! Remember Lot’s wife! Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it. I say to you: in that night there shall be two men in one bed―the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left! Two women shall be grinding together―the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left! Two men shall be in the field―the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left!” (Luke 17:26-35).
We look upon the cross wrongly and mistakenly. We see the cross as “cramping our style” and “dampening our fun”. We see the Cross as a “killjoy” and as something “negative” in our lives. Yet the Cross is the seed of life that can grow into a tree of life. If we just stop to think and reflect upon it—then it all makes sense.
The Ultimate Seed of Life is the Seed of the Cross
Nowhere is the Church as eloquent in her liturgy as she is during Passiontide—the last two weeks before Easter Sunday, within which we have “Holy Week”, and within that “Holy Week” we have “Good Friday”. The focus of Passiontide is the Cross—the torturous Cross, the Cross that kills, the Cross that brings death, but through that death the Cross brings eternal life. The “fruit” of Mary’s womb—Jesus—is also the “fruit” of the Cross! The following verses are a mere excerpts or a mere “tip of the iceberg” of the beauty that can found in the liturgy of those last two weeks of Lent. We could, by analogy, say that the Septuagesima Season is the “planting season” (the Sower of the Seed), then Lent can be seen as the “growing season”, with Passiontide being the “season of harvest”! Here are some verses from the “harvest season” of Passiontide, when Christ “matures” and “ripens” as our “fruit of eternal life” on the “Tree of the Cross”:
The Hymn: Pange Lingua
Sing, my tongue,
The Savior’s glory;
Tell His triumph far and wide;
Tell aloud the famous story
Of His body crucified;
How upon the cross a victim,
Vanquishing in death, He died.
Eating of the tree forbidden,
Man had sunk in Satan’s snare,
When our pitying Creator did
This second tree prepare;
Destined, many ages later,
That first evil to repair.
Lofty tree, bend down thy branches,
To embrace thy sacred load;
Oh, relax the native tension
Of that all too rigid wood;
Gently, gently bear the members
Of thy dying King and God.
Tree, which solely wast found worthy
The world’s Victim to sustain.
Harbor from the raging tempest!
Ark, that saved the world again!
Tree, with sacred blood anointed
Of the Lamb for sinners slain.
The Hymn: Vexilla Regis
The Royal Banner forward goes,
The mystic Cross refulgent glows:
Where He, in Flesh, flesh who made,
Upon the Tree of pain is laid.
That which the Prophet-King of old
Hath in mysterious verse foretold,
Is now accomplished, whilst we see
God ruling nations from a Tree.
O lovely and refulgent Tree,
Adorned with purpled majesty;
Culled from a worthy stock, to bear
Those limbs which sanctified were.
Blest Tree, whose happy branches bore
The wealth that did the world restore;
The beam that did that Body weigh
Which raised up Hell’s expected prey.
Then in thy hymn from the Divine Office of Lauds for the morning of Passion Sunday, we have the following beautiful references to the Cross of Christ being a Tree of Life:
Faithful cross! Above all other,
One and only noble tree!
None in foliage, none in blossom,
None in fruit thy peers may be;
Sweetest wood and sweetest iron!
Sweetest weight is hung on thee.
Bend thy boughs, O tree of glory!
Thy relaxing sinews bend;
For awhile the ancient rigor,
That thy birth bestowed, suspend;
And the King of heavenly beauty
On thy bosom gently tend!
Thou alone wast counted worthy
This world’s ransom to uphold;
For a shipwrecked race preparing
Harbor, like the ark of old;
With the sacred blood anointed
From the smitten Lamb that rolled.
Friend or Foe?
We ought to love the Cross—but we rarely do! St. Paul speaks of the enemies of the Cross—are we among them? “For many walk, of whom I have told you often (and now tell you weeping), that they are enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Philippians 3:18-19).
In his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, St. Louis de Montfort writes: “A Friend of the Cross is one chosen by God from among ten thousand who have reason and sense for their only guide. He is truly divine, raised above reason and thoroughly opposed to the things of sense, for he lives in the light of true faith and burns with love for the Cross … A Friend of the Cross is a holy man, separated from visible things. His heart is lifted high above all that is frail and perishable; he journeys here below like a stranger and pilgrim. He keeps his heart free from the world, looks upon it with an unconcerned glance of his left eye and disdainfully tramples it under foot.
“Is the way you follow the one that leads to this goal? Is it the true way of life, the narrow way, the thorn-strewn way to Calvary? Or are you unconsciously traveling the world’s broad road, the road to perdition? Do you realize that there is a highroad which to all appearances is straight and safe for man to travel, but which in reality leads to death? … Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!’ they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat, let us drink, let us sing, let us dance, let us play! God is good, He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!’ And so they continue.
“The elect who are willing to be made conformable to the crucified Christ by carrying their cross are few in number. It would cause us to faint away from grief to learn how surprisingly small is their number! It is so small that among ten thousand people there is scarcely one to be found, as was revealed to several Saints … In fact, only a privileged number of men receive this practical knowledge of the mystery of the Cross. For that man who climbs up to Calvary and lets himself be nailed on the Cross with Jesus, must be a brave man, a hero, a resolute man, one who is lifted up in God, who treats as muck both the world and Hell, as well as his very body and his own will. He must be resolved to relinquish all things, to undertake anything and to suffer everything for Jesus. Understand this, dear Friends of the Cross, should there be anyone among you who has not this firm resolve, he is just limping along on one foot, flying with one wing, and undeserving of your company, since he is not worthy to be called a Friend of the Cross!” (St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
Essential Tree!
St. Louis de Montfort, in his poem/hymn The Triumph of the Cross, found in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, penned the following beautiful stanza:
“Essential is the Tree,
And we who know its cost
Must mount to Calvary
Or languish and be lost.
As Saint Augustine states
With outcry ominous,
We all are reprobates
Unless God chastens us.”
That “essential tree” must be planted in our souls. St. Louis continues: “The Holy Ghost compares us to (1) trees planted along the waters of grace, in the field of the Church, who ought to bring forth their fruit in their seasons; (2) to the branches of a vine of which Jesus Christ is the stock, and which must yield good grapes; (3) to a flock of which Jesus Christ is the Shepherd, and which is to multiply and give milk; (4) to a good land of which God is the Farmer, in which the seed multiplies itself and brings forth thirtyfold, sixtyfold and a hundredfold. Jesus Christ cursed the unfruitful fig tree, and pronounced sentence against the useless servant who had not made any profit on his talent” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Plant the Seed of the Tree of Life in Your Soul
St. Louis de Montfort refers to Mary being the Tree of Life: “Mary is everywhere the veritable tree who bears the Fruit of life, and the true Mother who produces it … One reason why so few souls come to the fullness of the age of Jesus Christ is that Mary, who is as much as ever the fruitful spouse of the Holy Ghost, is not sufficiently formed in their hearts. He who wishes to have the fruit well-ripened and well-formed must have the tree that produces it; he who wishes to have the fruit of life, Jesus Christ, must have the tree of life, which is Mary, who makes Him fertile and fruit-bearing … If Mary, who is the tree of life, is well cultivated in our soul by fidelity to the practices of this devotion, she will bear her fruit in her own time, and her fruit is none other than Jesus Christ …
“Know that Our Blessed Lady is the true terrestrial paradise of the New Adam, Jesus Christ … It is in this earthly paradise that there is the true tree of life, which has borne Jesus Christ, the Fruit of Life … There are in this divine place trees planted by the hand of God, and watered by His divine unction, which have borne and daily bear fruits of a divine taste. There are flowerbeds adorned with beautiful and varied blossoms of virtues diffusing odors which delight the very angels. There are meadows green with hope, impregnable towers of strength!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
In a similar vein, in his booklet The Secret of Mary, St. Louis adds: “This does not mean that one who has discovered Mary, through a genuine devotion, is exempt from crosses and sufferings. Far from it! One is tried even more than others, because Mary, as Mother of the living, gives to all her children splinters of the tree of life, which is the Cross of Jesus. But while giving out crosses to them, she gives the grace to bear them with patience, and even with joy. In this way, the crosses she sends to those who trust themselves to her are rather like sweetmeats, i.e., “sweetened” crosses rather than “bitter” ones. If, from time to time, they do taste the bitterness of the chalice from which, we must drink to become proven friends of God, the consolation and joy which their Mother sends in the wake of their sorrows creates, in them, a strong desire to carry even heavier and still more bitter crosses” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Hey! This is Septuagesima, Not Passiontide! Aren't We Jumping the Gun?
Isn’t all this talk of the Cross a bit premature and running ahead of things? We are only in Septuagesima season—it’s not even Lent yet! Well, yes, but as St. Thomas Aquinas says, the “end” or “goal” is the very last thing that is attained in practice, but the “end” or “goal” or “target” must be the very first thing that is attained in theory. When we build a house, a whole lot of other things must happen before we can finally walk into our newly built house—but the very first thing that must happen is that we have to have a “blueprint” for the house, we need to have architectural drawings before we even start digging the foundations. Before the house can sit on the land, it must first “sit” in our mind. Thus, we need to understand what Lent is all about and plan in our minds how we are going to approach it. Without the Cross, there can be no Lent. Penance is a cross and we must prepare ourselves for our own Lenten Way of the Cross before the “race” starts!
You would imagine that God is a Green-Fingered Gardener! The Holy Ghost—the inspirer and author behind Holy Scripture—has made sure that the Bible is full of ‘agricultural’ and ‘gardening’ elements from beginning to end! (Incidentally, beginning with Septuagesima Sunday—which was last Sunday—the Church, in her Divine Office (Breviary), starts with first chapter of the Bible for the readings at the Divine Office of Matins. Therefore, this dovetails with what is about to be said). The opening books of the Bible could be said to be—tongue-in-cheek—a “Gardening Book” of sorts.
We read, in the very first book of the Bible, in its very first chapter: “And God said: ‘Let the Earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the Earth!’ And it was so done. And the Earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that bears fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:11-12).
A little further on, in the same fist chapter, we read: “And God created man to His own image―to the image of God He created him―male and female He created them. And God blessed them, saying: ‘Increase and multiply, and fill the Earth, and subdue it! … Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed upon the Earth, and all trees that have in themselves seed of their own kind, to be your meat [food]!” (Genesis 1:27-29).
Then, in the second chapter of Genesis, we again read: “And the Lord God had planted a paradise of pleasure from the beginning―wherein He placed man whom He had formed. And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of―the tree of life also, in the midst of paradise, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil ... And the Lord God took man and put him into the paradise of pleasure, to dress it and to keep it. And Lord God commanded Adam, saying: ‘Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” (Genesis 2:8-17).
They say “it comes in threes” and so with these ‘gardening’ references in the opening books of the Bible, you could say: “It comes in trees”! In the third book of Genesis, we come to dramatic scene of the story, the grand finale! “Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why has God commanded you that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat! But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God has commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No! You shall not die the death! For God knows that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’ And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold: and she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband who did eat. And the eyes of them both were opened―and when they perceived themselves to be naked, they sewed together fig leaves, and made themselves aprons. And when they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in paradise at the afternoon air, Adam and his wife hid themselves from the face of the Lord God, amidst the trees of paradise” (Genesis 3:1-8).
From Fruit to Thistles! From Life to Death!
In agriculture and gardening, there are certain rules that you must obey, or else ‘Mother Nature’ will punish you with failure. The same was true for Adam and, as we shall see, the same is true for ourselves in the spiritual garden of our soul. Adam and Eve failed to follow the rules and Adam and Eve were punished severely—in fact, they were sentenced to death!
“And the Lord God called Adam, and said to him: ‘Where art thou?’ And Adam said: ‘I heard Thy voice in paradise and I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid myself!’ And the Lord God said to Adam: ‘And who has told thee that thou wast naked, unless thou hast eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat?’ And Adam said: ‘The woman, whom thou gavest me to be my companion, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat!’ And the Lord God said to the woman: ‘Why hast thou done this?’ And she answered: ‘The serpent deceived me, and I did eat!’” (Genesis 3:9-11).
Adam and Eve are Cast-Out from the Garden of Eden
Excuses! Excuses! We are always full of excuses—a tendency we have all inherited from the Original Sin of Adam and Eve! It is never our fault—we will always “point the finger” at someone or something else! One would imagine that we are the only faultless, blameless people walking on the face of this Earth! The sinners will always blame everyone else, the saints will always blame themselves! St. Peter says to Our Lord: “Peter fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying: ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!’” (Luke 5:8), while the Pharisee says: “The Pharisee standing, prayed thus within himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican!’” (Luke 18:11). We should take note of what the Holy Ghost says through the Psalmist in Holy Scripture: “Incline not my heart to make excuses in sins!” (Psalm 140:4).
God refuses the excuses of Adam and Eve and “To the woman God said: ‘I will multiply thy sorrows and thy conceptions: in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children, and thou shalt be under thy husband’s power, and he shall have dominion over thee!’ And to Adam He said: ‘Because thou hast listened to the voice of thy wife and hast eaten of the tree―of which I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat―cursed is the earth in thy work; with labor and toil shalt thou eat thereof all the days of thy life! Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth! In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth, out of which thou wast taken! For dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!’” (Genesis 3:16-19).
Here we see, very clearly, the truth of what the Holy Ghost would later say in Holy Scripture, through the mouth and pen of St. Paul in the New Testament: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Not All Gardeners Are Made Equal
Some gardeners succeed, some gardeners fail! Likewise, in the garden of the soul, some gardeners succeed while others fail. At the end of His parable about the “Workers in the Vineyard” ― another agricultural or gardening reference―Our Lord closes with the words: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 20:16). In a similar vein, speaking of the end times, Our Lord says: “But of that day and hour no one knoweth, not the angels of Heaven, but the Father alone … Then two shall be in the field: one shall be taken, and one shall be left” (Matthew 24:36-40). So work in the garden of our soul we must, but not all will work in a way that will lead to salvation. “Because of the cold, the sluggard would not plough: he shall beg therefore in the summer, and it shall not be given him!” (Proverbs 20:4) … “The thoughts of the industrious always bring forth abundance: but every sluggard is always in want” (Proverbs 21:5).
We see that Adam and Eve’s first born—Cain—was a farmer or gardener, while his brother Abel looked after the animals, yet things turned out badly for Cain and well for Abel—and it was in the fields that Cain murdered Abel: “And Cain said to Abel his brother: ‘Let us go forth outside!’ And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him” (Genesis 4:8). On the contrary, we see that Jacob was the farmer or gardener, and his brother Esau hunted animals—yet things turned out badly for Esau, but well for Jacob. However, in the case of the first two kings of Israel—Saul and then David—Saul was the farmer that God chose to be the first king, but things went sour for Saul when he disobeyed God’s commands through the prophet Samuel, and God chose David, a shepherd of animals, to replace Saul. There are other examples that can be given, but let us stop there. Suffice it to say that not all gardeners are made equal—some succeed, some don’t, which is why St. Paul says: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Agriculturalists, Farmers, Gardeners Galore!
Today’s Gospel reading, at the Mass of Sexagesima Sunday, sees Our Lord speak of the “Sower of the Seed”, yet before we dig into that Gospel, you will be amazed by the numerous Scriptural references that, in a precise or general way, speak of agriculture, farming and gardening—in both the Old and New Testaments. So much so, that it is not a mere coincidence, but a deliberate ‘game-plan’ by God in mentioning these connected themes so many times.
After the Great Flood that destroyed most of the world, God addresses Noe in words similar to those spoken to Adam—for, in essence, God is going to “start the world” all over again through Noe. “God blessed Noe and his sons. And He said to them: ‘Increase and multiply, and fill the Earth! All that moves upon the Earth is delivered into your hand. And everything that moves and lives, shall be meat for you―even as the green herbs―have I delivered them all to you! …
And Noe, a husbandman [= gardener and farmer], began to till the ground and planted a vineyard” (Genesis 9:1-2, 20).
Abraham was a successful farmer and shepherd. Abraham’s son, Isaac, was a successful farmer and shepherd: “And Isaac sowed in that land, and he found that same year a hundredfold: and the Lord blessed him. And the man was enriched, and he went on prospering and increasing, till he became exceedingly great” (Genesis 26:12-13). Isaac’s son, Jacob, was a farmer and a shepherd. Jacob’s favorite son, Joseph, tells of a dream he had: “Hear my dream which I dreamed. I thought we were binding sheaves in the field―and my sheaf arose, as it were, and stood; and your sheaves, standing round about, bowed down before my sheaf!” (Genesis 37:6-7).
Likewise in the time of Moses: “And the Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying: ‘Speak to the children of Israel, and thou shalt say to them: “When you shall have entered into the land which I will give you, observe the rest of the Sabbath to the Lord. Six years thou shalt sow thy field and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and shalt gather the fruits thereof. But in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath to the land, of the resting of the Lord: thou shalt not sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard … for it is a year of rest to the land!”’” (Leviticus 25:1-4).
Firmly Planted in the New Testament!
Okay, let us “give it a rest” as regards Old Testament quotes—though you will find many, many more explicit and implicit references to agriculture, farming and gardening that can be liked analogically and symbolically to the spiritual gardening that has to take place in the soul.
The New Testament is even more striking in this respect. Our Lord Himself frequently uses agricultural references as part of His teaching—for it is a common way of life and Our Lord teaches by referring to things that the people understand well and can easily relate to—there were no media entertainment outlets in those days: no TV, computers, videos, sports, cars, movies, malls, supermarkets, etc. Our Lord speaks ‘agriculturally’ on many occasions:
“Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as one of these. And if the grass of the field―which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven―God does so clothe, then how much more you, O ye of little faith?” (Matthew 6:28-30).
“By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20).
“I am the true vine; and my Father is the farmer [gardener]. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing! If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:1-6).
“Another parable He proposed to them, saying: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, and had brought forth fruit, then appeared also the cockle. And the servants of the good man of the house coming said to him: ‘Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? Whence then has it cockle?’ And he said to them: ‘An enemy has done this!’ And the servants said to him: ‘Wilt thou that we go and gather it up?’ And he said: ‘No, lest perhaps gathering up the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it! Suffer both to grow until the harvest, and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers: “Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn!”‘ [Jesus then explained the parable to His disciples] … ‘He that sows the good seed, is the Son of man. And the field is the world. And the good seed are the children of the kingdom. And the cockle are the children of the wicked one. And the enemy that sowed them, is the devil. But the harvest is the end of the world. And the reapers are the angels. Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire―so shall it be at the end of the world!’” (Matthew 13:24-30, 13:37-40).
Sexagesima Sunday’s Gospel of the Sower of the Seed
This leads us into the Gospel for Sexagesima Sunday—which is that of the parable of “The Sower of the Seed”—related by three of the Evangelists: St. Matthew, St. Mark and St. Luke—the Church choosing to use the account given by St. Luke. Here is a combined version from the texts of all three Evangelists:
“The sower went out to sow his seed. And whilst he sowed, some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down by men, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And some seed fell upon stony ground, where it had not much depth of earth, and the seed sprouted and shot up immediately, because there was no deepness of earth. But when the sun was risen, the sprouted seed was scorched, because it had no root and no moisture. And other seed fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up with it and choked it and it yielded no fruit. And others fell upon good ground: and this seed brought forth fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold.
“And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom Jesus said: ‘The parable is this! Hear therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, and immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
Of course, to receive the Word fruitfully, means not allowing oneself to be sucked into the whirlpool of worldly cares. The Imitation of Christ warns us against this:
“Do you think that men of the world have no suffering, or perhaps but little? Ask even those who enjoy the most delights and you will learn otherwise. ‘But,’ you will say, ‘they enjoy many pleasures and follow their own wishes; therefore they do not feel their troubles very much.’ Granted that they do have whatever they wish, how long do you think it will last? Behold, they, who prosper in the world, shall perish as smoke, and there shall be no memory of their past joys. Even in this life they do not find rest in these pleasures without bitterness, weariness, and fear. For they often receive the penalty of sorrow from the very thing from which they believe their happiness comes. And it is just. Since they seek and follow after pleasures without reason, they should not enjoy them without shame and bitterness. How brief, how false, how unreasonable and shameful all these pleasures are! Yet, in their drunken blindness, men do not understand this, but, like brute beasts, incur death of soul for the miserly enjoyment of a corruptible life. Therefore, my child, do not pursue your lusts, but turn away from your own will. Seek thy pleasure in the Lord and He will give thee thy heart’s desires” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 12).
The Dangers of Fruitlessness
Elsewhere in Holy Scripture, we are clearly shown the danger of not being fruitful.
“Jesus went out of the city of Jerusalem into Bethania, and remained there. And in the morning, returning into Jerusalem, He was hungry. And seeing a certain fig tree, afar off, by the way side, He came to it, if perhaps He might find anything on it. And He found nothing on it, but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward and may no man hereafter eat fruit of thee anymore, forever!’ And His disciples heard it. And immediately the fig tree withered away. And they went on to Jerusalem … when evening was come, Jesus went forth out of the city. And when they passed by the fig tree they saw it dried up from the roots. And Peter remembering, said to him: Master! Behold the fig tree, which Thou didst curse, is withered away!’ And the disciples, seeing it, wondered, saying: ‘How is it presently withered away?” (Matthew 21:17-19; Mark 11:11-21).
We see a similar “fruitless” incident, this time in a parable of Our Lord: “He spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why is it encumbering the ground?” But he answering, said to him: “Lord, leave it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And, perhaps happily it bears fruit, but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”’” (Luke 13:6-9).
St. John the Baptist says: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down and cast into the fire!” (Luke 3:9). Likewise, Our Lord says: “Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:19).
We can link this to what Our Lord said a few days later, at the Last Supper: “I am the true vine; and my Father is the farmer [gardener]. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:1-6).
God Wants More Gardeners for His Garden!
Our Lord tells us that God seeks more laborers for His harvest of souls, more gardeners laboring in the garden of the soul. “Then Jesus said to His disciples: “The harvest indeed is great, but the laborers are few! Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he send forth laborers into his harvest!” (Matthew 9:37-38).
“The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a householder, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And, having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing there, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They say to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:1-7).
Our Lord points out: “Do you not say: ‘There are yet four months and then the harvest cometh’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes, and see the countries; for they are white already to harvest. And he that reaps receiveth wages, and gathers fruit unto life everlasting: that both he that sows, and he that reaps, may rejoice together. For in this is the saying true: ‘That it is one man that sows, and it is another that reaps!’ I have sent you to reap that in which you did not labor―others have labored, and you have entered into their labors” (John 4:35-38). Which is why St. Paul writes: “I have planted, Apollo watered, but God gave the increase!” (1 Corinthians 3:6).
God Wants Fruitful Gardens and Diligent Gardeners
It is clear from what Our Lord says that God wants us to be fruitful in our spiritual gardening—whether gardening in the garden of our own souls, or helping other souls to grow spiritually. “Hear ye another parable. There was a man an householder, who planted a vineyard, and made a hedge round about it, and dug in it a press, and built a tower, and let it out to farmers; and went into a strange country. And when the time of the fruits drew nigh, he sent his servants to the farmers that they might receive the fruits thereof” (Matthew 21:33-34).
Nor is God satisfied with just some fruit, God wants you to produce more and more fruit―“Everyone that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit!” (John 15:2). As Dom Hubert Van Zeller writes in his book, Holiness, A Guide For Beginners, there is no point in our life when we can say: “Okay! I’ve done it! I’ve no more to do!” The only “finishing-line” that ends our race is death! “One great lesson you are meant to learn is that sanctity is not a matter of reaching a particular milestone on the road to God. It is not a case of being an ordinary person until you come to the milestone, and a saint when you have got beyond it. It is a case of using your powers as perfectly as you can. There is no fixed milestone. The only thing that is fixed is the destination — God” (Dom Hubert Van Zeller, Holiness—A Guide For Beginners).
Why is it that we have much energy for amassing earthly fruits, but little energy for amassing heavenly fruits? Another parable of Our Lord’s should make us seriously reflect on this anomaly: “And He spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and will build greater; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods. And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thy rest; eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee: and whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God! … But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!’” (Luke 12:16-21, 31). “Labor not for the meat which perishes, but for that which endures unto life everlasting, which the Son of man will give you!” (John 6:27). “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26). "Let Thy children, O Lord, whom Thou lovest, know that it is not the growing of fruits that nourishes men, but Thy word preserves them that believe in thee!” (Wisdom 16:26).
The Fruit of Life is Death—The Fruit of Death is Life!
The fruit of life is death and the fruit of death is life? Sounds like an oxymoron (a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory or paradoxical terms appear in conjunction with each other). At first glance, yes! Yet that is exactly what Our Lord says in the Gospels:
► “He that finds his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:39).
► Still in Matthew’s Gospel, but six chapters later, Our Lord is again seen to repeat the same idea: “For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:25).
All the other three Evangelists also report Our Lord as saying this—and St. Luke also reports it twice:
► “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35).
► “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it!” (Luke 9:24).
► “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it!” (Luke 17:33).
► “Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, then itself it remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit. He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:24-25).
Out of all those last six references, quoted above just now, in four of them Our Lord links the “saving” and “losing” of life to the obligation to carry the cross. Of the other two, one refers to the tribulations that will come in the end times and the last one, from St. John’s Gospel, refers to the need for the seed to die unto itself before it can bear fruit.
Out of all those last six references, quoted above just now, in four of them Our Lord links the “saving” and “losing” of life to the obligation to carry the cross. Of the other two, one refers to the tribulations that will come in the end times and the last one, from St. John’s Gospel, refers to the need for the seed to die unto itself before it can bear fruit.
► “He that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me! He that finds his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:38-39).
► “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me! For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:24-25).
► “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:34-35).
► “And he said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it! For what is a man advantaged, if he gains the whole world, and loses himself, and casts away himself?’” (Luke 9:23-25).
► “As it came to pass in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat and drink, they married wives, and were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark―and the flood came and destroyed them all! Likewise as it came to pass, in the days of Lot―they did eat and drink, they bought and sold, they planted and built. And in the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from Heaven, and destroyed them all! Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man shall be revealed. In that hour, he that shall be on the housetop, and his goods in the house, let him not go down to take them away: and he that shall be in the field, in like manner, let him not return back! Remember Lot’s wife! Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it. I say to you: in that night there shall be two men in one bed―the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left! Two women shall be grinding together―the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left! Two men shall be in the field―the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left!” (Luke 17:26-35).
We look upon the cross wrongly and mistakenly. We see the cross as “cramping our style” and “dampening our fun”. We see the Cross as a “killjoy” and as something “negative” in our lives. Yet the Cross is the seed of life that can grow into a tree of life. If we just stop to think and reflect upon it—then it all makes sense.
The Ultimate Seed of Life is the Seed of the Cross
Nowhere is the Church as eloquent in her liturgy as she is during Passiontide—the last two weeks before Easter Sunday, within which we have “Holy Week”, and within that “Holy Week” we have “Good Friday”. The focus of Passiontide is the Cross—the torturous Cross, the Cross that kills, the Cross that brings death, but through that death the Cross brings eternal life. The “fruit” of Mary’s womb—Jesus—is also the “fruit” of the Cross! The following verses are a mere excerpts or a mere “tip of the iceberg” of the beauty that can found in the liturgy of those last two weeks of Lent. We could, by analogy, say that the Septuagesima Season is the “planting season” (the Sower of the Seed), then Lent can be seen as the “growing season”, with Passiontide being the “season of harvest”! Here are some verses from the “harvest season” of Passiontide, when Christ “matures” and “ripens” as our “fruit of eternal life” on the “Tree of the Cross”:
The Hymn: Pange Lingua
Sing, my tongue,
The Savior’s glory;
Tell His triumph far and wide;
Tell aloud the famous story
Of His body crucified;
How upon the cross a victim,
Vanquishing in death, He died.
Eating of the tree forbidden,
Man had sunk in Satan’s snare,
When our pitying Creator did
This second tree prepare;
Destined, many ages later,
That first evil to repair.
Lofty tree, bend down thy branches,
To embrace thy sacred load;
Oh, relax the native tension
Of that all too rigid wood;
Gently, gently bear the members
Of thy dying King and God.
Tree, which solely wast found worthy
The world’s Victim to sustain.
Harbor from the raging tempest!
Ark, that saved the world again!
Tree, with sacred blood anointed
Of the Lamb for sinners slain.
The Hymn: Vexilla Regis
The Royal Banner forward goes,
The mystic Cross refulgent glows:
Where He, in Flesh, flesh who made,
Upon the Tree of pain is laid.
That which the Prophet-King of old
Hath in mysterious verse foretold,
Is now accomplished, whilst we see
God ruling nations from a Tree.
O lovely and refulgent Tree,
Adorned with purpled majesty;
Culled from a worthy stock, to bear
Those limbs which sanctified were.
Blest Tree, whose happy branches bore
The wealth that did the world restore;
The beam that did that Body weigh
Which raised up Hell’s expected prey.
Then in thy hymn from the Divine Office of Lauds for the morning of Passion Sunday, we have the following beautiful references to the Cross of Christ being a Tree of Life:
Faithful cross! Above all other,
One and only noble tree!
None in foliage, none in blossom,
None in fruit thy peers may be;
Sweetest wood and sweetest iron!
Sweetest weight is hung on thee.
Bend thy boughs, O tree of glory!
Thy relaxing sinews bend;
For awhile the ancient rigor,
That thy birth bestowed, suspend;
And the King of heavenly beauty
On thy bosom gently tend!
Thou alone wast counted worthy
This world’s ransom to uphold;
For a shipwrecked race preparing
Harbor, like the ark of old;
With the sacred blood anointed
From the smitten Lamb that rolled.
Friend or Foe?
We ought to love the Cross—but we rarely do! St. Paul speaks of the enemies of the Cross—are we among them? “For many walk, of whom I have told you often (and now tell you weeping), that they are enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Philippians 3:18-19).
In his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, St. Louis de Montfort writes: “A Friend of the Cross is one chosen by God from among ten thousand who have reason and sense for their only guide. He is truly divine, raised above reason and thoroughly opposed to the things of sense, for he lives in the light of true faith and burns with love for the Cross … A Friend of the Cross is a holy man, separated from visible things. His heart is lifted high above all that is frail and perishable; he journeys here below like a stranger and pilgrim. He keeps his heart free from the world, looks upon it with an unconcerned glance of his left eye and disdainfully tramples it under foot.
“Is the way you follow the one that leads to this goal? Is it the true way of life, the narrow way, the thorn-strewn way to Calvary? Or are you unconsciously traveling the world’s broad road, the road to perdition? Do you realize that there is a highroad which to all appearances is straight and safe for man to travel, but which in reality leads to death? … Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!’ they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat, let us drink, let us sing, let us dance, let us play! God is good, He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!’ And so they continue.
“The elect who are willing to be made conformable to the crucified Christ by carrying their cross are few in number. It would cause us to faint away from grief to learn how surprisingly small is their number! It is so small that among ten thousand people there is scarcely one to be found, as was revealed to several Saints … In fact, only a privileged number of men receive this practical knowledge of the mystery of the Cross. For that man who climbs up to Calvary and lets himself be nailed on the Cross with Jesus, must be a brave man, a hero, a resolute man, one who is lifted up in God, who treats as muck both the world and Hell, as well as his very body and his own will. He must be resolved to relinquish all things, to undertake anything and to suffer everything for Jesus. Understand this, dear Friends of the Cross, should there be anyone among you who has not this firm resolve, he is just limping along on one foot, flying with one wing, and undeserving of your company, since he is not worthy to be called a Friend of the Cross!” (St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
Essential Tree!
St. Louis de Montfort, in his poem/hymn The Triumph of the Cross, found in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, penned the following beautiful stanza:
“Essential is the Tree,
And we who know its cost
Must mount to Calvary
Or languish and be lost.
As Saint Augustine states
With outcry ominous,
We all are reprobates
Unless God chastens us.”
That “essential tree” must be planted in our souls. St. Louis continues: “The Holy Ghost compares us to (1) trees planted along the waters of grace, in the field of the Church, who ought to bring forth their fruit in their seasons; (2) to the branches of a vine of which Jesus Christ is the stock, and which must yield good grapes; (3) to a flock of which Jesus Christ is the Shepherd, and which is to multiply and give milk; (4) to a good land of which God is the Farmer, in which the seed multiplies itself and brings forth thirtyfold, sixtyfold and a hundredfold. Jesus Christ cursed the unfruitful fig tree, and pronounced sentence against the useless servant who had not made any profit on his talent” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Plant the Seed of the Tree of Life in Your Soul
St. Louis de Montfort refers to Mary being the Tree of Life: “Mary is everywhere the veritable tree who bears the Fruit of life, and the true Mother who produces it … One reason why so few souls come to the fullness of the age of Jesus Christ is that Mary, who is as much as ever the fruitful spouse of the Holy Ghost, is not sufficiently formed in their hearts. He who wishes to have the fruit well-ripened and well-formed must have the tree that produces it; he who wishes to have the fruit of life, Jesus Christ, must have the tree of life, which is Mary, who makes Him fertile and fruit-bearing … If Mary, who is the tree of life, is well cultivated in our soul by fidelity to the practices of this devotion, she will bear her fruit in her own time, and her fruit is none other than Jesus Christ …
“Know that Our Blessed Lady is the true terrestrial paradise of the New Adam, Jesus Christ … It is in this earthly paradise that there is the true tree of life, which has borne Jesus Christ, the Fruit of Life … There are in this divine place trees planted by the hand of God, and watered by His divine unction, which have borne and daily bear fruits of a divine taste. There are flowerbeds adorned with beautiful and varied blossoms of virtues diffusing odors which delight the very angels. There are meadows green with hope, impregnable towers of strength!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
In a similar vein, in his booklet The Secret of Mary, St. Louis adds: “This does not mean that one who has discovered Mary, through a genuine devotion, is exempt from crosses and sufferings. Far from it! One is tried even more than others, because Mary, as Mother of the living, gives to all her children splinters of the tree of life, which is the Cross of Jesus. But while giving out crosses to them, she gives the grace to bear them with patience, and even with joy. In this way, the crosses she sends to those who trust themselves to her are rather like sweetmeats, i.e., “sweetened” crosses rather than “bitter” ones. If, from time to time, they do taste the bitterness of the chalice from which, we must drink to become proven friends of God, the consolation and joy which their Mother sends in the wake of their sorrows creates, in them, a strong desire to carry even heavier and still more bitter crosses” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Hey! This is Septuagesima, Not Passiontide! Aren't We Jumping the Gun?
Isn’t all this talk of the Cross a bit premature and running ahead of things? We are only in Septuagesima season—it’s not even Lent yet! Well, yes, but as St. Thomas Aquinas says, the “end” or “goal” is the very last thing that is attained in practice, but the “end” or “goal” or “target” must be the very first thing that is attained in theory. When we build a house, a whole lot of other things must happen before we can finally walk into our newly built house—but the very first thing that must happen is that we have to have a “blueprint” for the house, we need to have architectural drawings before we even start digging the foundations. Before the house can sit on the land, it must first “sit” in our mind. Thus, we need to understand what Lent is all about and plan in our minds how we are going to approach it. Without the Cross, there can be no Lent. Penance is a cross and we must prepare ourselves for our own Lenten Way of the Cross before the “race” starts!
Article 8
Saturday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 22nd
Do You Have the Legs for It?
Saturday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 22nd
Do You Have the Legs for It?
The Two Legs to Win the Race
In the Epistle of Septuagesima Sunday, we heard St. Paul speak of our spiritual life as a race for a crown of Heaven: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain!” How, then, must we run? By using our two legs, the leg of prayer and the leg of penance! We can even superimpose that notion onto the two Sacraments that are sometimes called the two legs by which we go to Heaven—the Holy Eucharist and Confession (Holy Communion and Penance).
Leg of Communion means Communication
Holy Communion is our union with Christ. The root of the word “Communion” is also found to be the root of the word “communicate.” Holy Communion is essentially a “holy communication” with Christ—we even talk of “communicating” at Mass, don’t we? What is “communication”? It is talking with someone. That is exactly what prayer is—talking with God or the saints. So the ‘leg of prayer’ can also be said to be the ‘leg of communion.’ If that leg is weakened, injured, wounded, paralyzed or crippled, then we are not going to win any races with it.
Leg of Penance
The other ‘leg’ is penance. This is also closely linked with the other sacramental leg that we mentioned, in tandem with Holy Communion. This is the Sacrament of Confession—sometimes even called the Sacrament of Penance, because the end product of confession is the receiving and doing of penance. “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). Unless we use that leg, we will win no races, but become mere ‘losers.’ “But if the wicked man does penance for all his sins which he has committed … then living he shall live and shall not die” (Ezechiel 18:21).
You Can Be A Winner!
Today, let us look at the first of those two legs—the leg of prayer. Get one thing absolutely straight in your mind—God wants you to win this race―God wants you to go to Heaven. He is your coach and mentor, and He has invested more than you realize, and has been more patient than you realize in coaching and coaxing you to enter and win that race. For that race, He has given you the two legs needed to win, but you must exercise those legs, and exercise them in a wise way, in the way He is coaching you to do. If you would only listen and do what He tells you, there is nothing that stop you from winning that race—except yourself and your laziness or procrastination in training.
Learn from Paul and Athletes
That is why St. Paul, in the Septuagesima Sunday Epistle says: “I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty: I so fight, not as one beating the air: but I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection: lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway” (1 Corinthians 9:26-27). All athletes like winning, but not all athletes like training—but there is often an inseparable link between the glory of the win with the monotony and daily grind of training. You can loosely apply the same principles to anything else you like: music, art, cooking, driving, etc.— “practice makes perfect.”
“Prayer,” says St. Cyprian, “is omnipotent; it is one; it can do all things!” We read in the Book of Ecclesiasticus that God has never refused to hear anyone who invoked His aid. “Who has called upon Him, and He has despised him?” (Ecclesiasticus 2:12). This He never can do; for He has promised to hear all who pray to Him. “Ask, and ye shall receive.” But this promise extends only to prayer which has the necessary conditions. Many pray―but because they pray negligently, they do not obtain the graces they want and need. “You ask and receive not―because you ask amiss!” (James 4:3). To pray as we ought, we must pray, first, with humility; secondly, with confidence; and thirdly, with perseverance.
We must Pray with Humility
St. James tells us, that God rejects the prayers of the proud: “God resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble” (4:6). He cannot bear the proud; He rejects their petitions, and refuses to hear them. Let those proud Christians who trust in their own strength, and think themselves better than others, attend to this, and let them remember that their prayers shall be rejected by the Lord.
But He always hears the prayers of the humble: “The prayer of him that humbles himself pierces the clouds; and he will not depart till the Most High behold” (Ecclesiasticus 35:21). David says, that “The Lord has had regard to the prayer of the humble” (Psalm 101:18). The cry of the humble man penetrates the heavens, and he will not depart till God hears his prayer. “You humble yourself,” says St. Augustine, “and God comes to you! You exalt yourself, and He flees from you!” If you humble yourself, God himself comes, of His own accord, to embrace you; but, if you exalt yourself, and boast of your wisdom and of your actions, He withdraws from you, and abandons you to your own nothingness.
The Lord cannot despise even the most obdurate sinners, when they repent from their hearts, and humble themselves before Him, acknowledging that they are unworthy to receive any favor from Him. “A contrite and humble heart, God, thou wilt not despise.” (Psalm 50:19). Let us pass to the other points, in which there is a great deal to be said.
We must Pray with Confidence
“No one has hoped in the Lord, and has been confounded” (Ecclesiasticus 2:11). O how encouraging to sinners are these words! Though they may have committed the most enormous crimes, they are told by the Holy Ghost, that “no man has hoped in the Lord, and has been confounded.” No man hath ever placed his trust in God, and has been abandoned. He that prays with confidence, obtains whatever he asks. “All things whatsoever you ask when you pray, believe that you shall receive, and they shall come unto you” (Mark 11:24). When we pray for spiritual favors, let us have a secure confidence of receiving them, and we shall infallibly obtain them. Hence the Savior has taught us to call God, in our petitions for His graces, by no other name than that of Father (Our Father), that we may have recourse to Him with the confidence with which a child seeks assistance from an affectionate parent.
Promises are Promises
Who, says St. Augustine, can fear that Jesus Christ, who is truth itself, can violate His promise to all who pray to Him? “Who shall fear deception when truth promises?” Is God like men, who promise, and do not afterwards fulfill their promise, either because in making it they intend to deceive, or because, after having made it, they change their intention? “God is not as a man, that He should lie, nor as the son of man, that He should be changed. Hath He told, then, and will He not do?” (Numbers 23:19). Our God cannot tell a lie―because He is truth itself. He is not liable to change, because all His arrangements are just and holy.
And because He ardently desires our welfare, He earnestly exhausts and commands us to ask the graces we stand in need of: “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you.” (Matthew 7:7). Why, says St. Augustine, should the Lord exhort us so strongly to ask His graces, if He did not wish to give them to us? He has even bound Himself by His promise to hear our prayers, and to bestow upon us all the graces which we ask with a confidence of obtaining them. “By His promises He has made himself a debtor.” (St. Augustine., ibid., sermon ii).
Do Not Be Pessimistic
But some will say: “I have but little confidence in God, because I am a sinner! I have been too ungrateful to Him, and therefore I see that I do not deserve to be heard!” But St. Thomas tells us, that the efficacy of our prayers in obtaining graces from God, does not depend on our merits, but on the divine mercy (2a-2ae, q. 178, art. 2, ad. 1). As often as we ask with confidence favors which are conducive to our eternal salvation, God hears our prayer. Note well the words “favors conducive to our salvation” ― for, if what we seek be injurious to the soul, God does not, and cannot hear us. For example: if a person asked help from God to be revenged of an enemy, or to accomplish what would be offensive to God, the Lord will not hear his prayers; because, says St. John Chrysostom, “such a person offends God in the very act of prayer; he does not pray, but, in a certain manner mocks God” (Homily xi., in Matt, vi).
First Remove the Obstacles
Moreover, if you wish to receive from God the aid which you ask, you must remove every obstacle which may render you unworthy of being heard. For example: if you ask of God strength to preserve you from relapsing into a certain sin, but will not avoid the occasions of the sin, nor keep at a distance from the house, from the object, or the bad company, which led to your fall, then God will not hear your prayer. And why? Because “thou hast set a cloud before thee, that prayer may not pass through!” (Lamentations 3: 44). Should you fall back into sin, do not complain of God, nor say: “I have besought the Lord to preserve me from falling into sin, but He has not heard me.” Do you not see that, by not taking away the occasions of sin, you have created a thick cloud, which has prevented your prayers from passing through to the throne of divine mercy?
Pray for the Right Things
It is also necessary to remark that the promise of Jesus Christ to hear those who pray to Him does not extend to all the temporal favors which we ask―such as a plentiful harvest; a victory in a law-suit; or a deliverance from sickness; or from certain persecutions. These favors God grants to those who pray for them―but only when they are conducive to their spiritual welfare. Otherwise He refuses them; and He refuses them because He loves us, and because He knows that they would be injurious to our souls. “A physician,” says St. Augustine, “knows better than his patient what is useful for him” (Hom. 3, cap. ccxii). The saint adds that God refuses to some, through mercy, what He grants to others as a chastisement.
Hence St. John Damascene says that sometimes, when we do not obtain the graces which we ask, we receive, by not receiving them; because it is better for us not to receive than to receive them (Paral, lib. 3, cap. xv). We often ask poison which would cause our death. How many are there who, had they died in the sickness or poverty with which they had been afflicted, should be saved? But because they recovered their health, or because they were raised to wealth and honors, they became proud and forgot God, and thus have been damned. Hence St. John Chrysostom exhorts us to ask in our prayers what He knows to be expedient for us. We should, then, always ask from God temporal favors on the condition that they will be useful to the soul.
God is Kinder than Man
But spiritual favors, such as the pardon of our sins, perseverance in virtue, the gift of divine love, and resignation to the divine will, ought to be asked of God absolutely, and with a firm confidence of obtaining them. “If you, then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father from Heaven give the good Spirit to them that ask Him?” (Luke 11:13). If you, says Jesus Christ, who are so much attached to earthly goods, cannot refuse your children the blessings which you have received from God, how much more will your Heavenly Father (Who is in Himself infinitely good, and Who desires to give you His graces more ardently than you desire to receive them) give the good spirit that is, a sincere contrition for their sins, the gift of divine love, and resignation to the will of God to those who ask them?
How can God refuse graces conducive to salvation to those who seek them, when He exhorts even those who do not pray to ask them? Nor does God inquire whether the person who prays to Him is a just man or a sinner; for He has declared that “everyone that asks, receives.” (Luke 11:10). “Everyone,” says the author of the Imperfect Work, “whether he be a just man or a sinner.” (Hom. xviii). And, to encourage us to pray and to ask with confidence for spiritual favors, He has said: “Amen, amen, I say to you: If you ask the Father anything in My Name, He will give it you.” (John 16:23). As if He said: “Sinners, though you do not deserve to receive the divine graces, I have merited them for you from My Father: ask, then, in My Name that is, through My merits and I promise that you shall obtain whatsoever you demand.”
We must Pray with Perseverance
It is, above all, necessary to persevere in prayer till death, and never to cease to pray. This is what is inculcated by the following passages of Scripture: “We ought always to pray!” (Luke 18: 1). “Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times!” (Luke 21:36). “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). Hence the Holy Ghost says: “Let nothing hinder thee from praying always.” (Ecclesiasticus 18: 22). These words imply, not only that we should pray always, but also that we should endeavor to remove every occasion which may prevent us from praying; for, if we cease to pray, we shall be deprived of the divine aid, and shall be overcome by temptations. Perseverance in grace is a gratuitous gift, which, as the Council of Trent has declared, we cannot merit (Session 6, chapter xiii); but St. Augustine says, that we may obtain it by prayer. Hence Cardinal Bellarmine teaches that “we must ask it daily, in order to obtain it every day.” If we neglect to ask it on any day, we may fall into sin on that day.
Chains of Grace
If, then, we wish to persevere and to be saved―for no one can be saved without perseverance―then we must pray continually. Our perseverance depends, not on one grace, but on a thousand helps which we hope to obtain from God during our whole lives, that we may be preserved in His grace. Now, to this chain of graces there must correspond a chain of prayers on our part―without these prayers, God ordinarily does not grant His graces. If we neglect to pray, and thus break the chain of prayers, then the chain of graces shall also be broken, and we shall lose the grace of perseverance.
God is More than a Friend
If, says Jesus Christ to His disciples, one of you goes, during the night to a friend, and say to him: “Lend me three loaves; an acquaintance has come to my house, and I have no refreshment for him.” The friend will answer: “I am in bed; the door is locked; I cannot get up.” But, if the other continue to knock at the door, and will not depart, the friend will rise, and give him as many loaves as he wishes, not through friendship, but to be freed from his persistence. “Although he will not rise and give him because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise, and give him as many as he needs!” (Luke 11: 8). Now, if a man will give his loaves to a friend because of his persistence, “how much more,” says St. Augustine, “will God give, who exhorts us to ask, and is displeased if we do not ask ?” How much more will the Lord bestow on us His graces, if we persevere in praying for them, when He exhorts us to ask for them, and is offended if we do not ask for them?
Be Brash and Bold!
Men feel annoyed at being frequently and importunately asked for a favor. But God exhorts us to pray frequently; and, instead of being dissatisfied, he is pleased with those who repeatedly ask his graces. Cornelius à Lapide says, that “God wishes us to persevere in prayer, even to importunity.” (Commentary on Luke., chap. 11). St. Jerome says: “This importunity with the Lord is seasonable.” That God is pleased with frequent and persevering prayer, may be inferred from the words of Jesus Christ: “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you!” (Luke 11: 9). It was not enough to have said ask but He added, seek, knock; in order to show, that, during our whole lives, we should be as importunate in supplicating the divine graces as beggars are in asking alms. Though they should be refused, they do not cease to cry out, or to knock at the door; they persist in asking relief till they obtain it.
If, then, we wish to obtain from God the gift of perseverance, we must ask it from Him continually and with importunity. We must ask it when we rise in the morning, in our meditations, in hearing Mass, in our visits to the Blessed Sacrament, in going to bed at night, and particularly when we are tempted by the devil to commit any sin. Thus, we must always have our mouths open praying to God, and saying: “Lord, assist me! Give me light! Give me strength! Keep Thy hand upon me, and do not abandon me!” We must do violence to the Lord. “Such violence,” says Tertullian, “is agreeable to God.”
Only the Violent will take Heaven
The violence which we offer to God by repeated prayers does not offend him: on the contrary, it is pleasing and acceptable in his sight. “Prayer,” according to St. John Climacus, “piously offers violence to God.” Our supplications compel Him, but in a manner grateful to Him. He takes great complacency in seeing His mother honored, and therefore wishes, as St. Bernard says, that all the graces we receive should pass through her hands. Hence the holy doctor exhorts us “to seek grace, and to seek it through Mary, because she is a mother, and her prayer cannot be fruitless.” (de Aquæd.). When we ask her to obtain any grace for us, she graciously hears our petitions and prays for us: and the prayers of Mary are never rejected.
In the Epistle of Septuagesima Sunday, we heard St. Paul speak of our spiritual life as a race for a crown of Heaven: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain!” How, then, must we run? By using our two legs, the leg of prayer and the leg of penance! We can even superimpose that notion onto the two Sacraments that are sometimes called the two legs by which we go to Heaven—the Holy Eucharist and Confession (Holy Communion and Penance).
Leg of Communion means Communication
Holy Communion is our union with Christ. The root of the word “Communion” is also found to be the root of the word “communicate.” Holy Communion is essentially a “holy communication” with Christ—we even talk of “communicating” at Mass, don’t we? What is “communication”? It is talking with someone. That is exactly what prayer is—talking with God or the saints. So the ‘leg of prayer’ can also be said to be the ‘leg of communion.’ If that leg is weakened, injured, wounded, paralyzed or crippled, then we are not going to win any races with it.
Leg of Penance
The other ‘leg’ is penance. This is also closely linked with the other sacramental leg that we mentioned, in tandem with Holy Communion. This is the Sacrament of Confession—sometimes even called the Sacrament of Penance, because the end product of confession is the receiving and doing of penance. “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). Unless we use that leg, we will win no races, but become mere ‘losers.’ “But if the wicked man does penance for all his sins which he has committed … then living he shall live and shall not die” (Ezechiel 18:21).
You Can Be A Winner!
Today, let us look at the first of those two legs—the leg of prayer. Get one thing absolutely straight in your mind—God wants you to win this race―God wants you to go to Heaven. He is your coach and mentor, and He has invested more than you realize, and has been more patient than you realize in coaching and coaxing you to enter and win that race. For that race, He has given you the two legs needed to win, but you must exercise those legs, and exercise them in a wise way, in the way He is coaching you to do. If you would only listen and do what He tells you, there is nothing that stop you from winning that race—except yourself and your laziness or procrastination in training.
Learn from Paul and Athletes
That is why St. Paul, in the Septuagesima Sunday Epistle says: “I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty: I so fight, not as one beating the air: but I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection: lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway” (1 Corinthians 9:26-27). All athletes like winning, but not all athletes like training—but there is often an inseparable link between the glory of the win with the monotony and daily grind of training. You can loosely apply the same principles to anything else you like: music, art, cooking, driving, etc.— “practice makes perfect.”
“Prayer,” says St. Cyprian, “is omnipotent; it is one; it can do all things!” We read in the Book of Ecclesiasticus that God has never refused to hear anyone who invoked His aid. “Who has called upon Him, and He has despised him?” (Ecclesiasticus 2:12). This He never can do; for He has promised to hear all who pray to Him. “Ask, and ye shall receive.” But this promise extends only to prayer which has the necessary conditions. Many pray―but because they pray negligently, they do not obtain the graces they want and need. “You ask and receive not―because you ask amiss!” (James 4:3). To pray as we ought, we must pray, first, with humility; secondly, with confidence; and thirdly, with perseverance.
We must Pray with Humility
St. James tells us, that God rejects the prayers of the proud: “God resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble” (4:6). He cannot bear the proud; He rejects their petitions, and refuses to hear them. Let those proud Christians who trust in their own strength, and think themselves better than others, attend to this, and let them remember that their prayers shall be rejected by the Lord.
But He always hears the prayers of the humble: “The prayer of him that humbles himself pierces the clouds; and he will not depart till the Most High behold” (Ecclesiasticus 35:21). David says, that “The Lord has had regard to the prayer of the humble” (Psalm 101:18). The cry of the humble man penetrates the heavens, and he will not depart till God hears his prayer. “You humble yourself,” says St. Augustine, “and God comes to you! You exalt yourself, and He flees from you!” If you humble yourself, God himself comes, of His own accord, to embrace you; but, if you exalt yourself, and boast of your wisdom and of your actions, He withdraws from you, and abandons you to your own nothingness.
The Lord cannot despise even the most obdurate sinners, when they repent from their hearts, and humble themselves before Him, acknowledging that they are unworthy to receive any favor from Him. “A contrite and humble heart, God, thou wilt not despise.” (Psalm 50:19). Let us pass to the other points, in which there is a great deal to be said.
We must Pray with Confidence
“No one has hoped in the Lord, and has been confounded” (Ecclesiasticus 2:11). O how encouraging to sinners are these words! Though they may have committed the most enormous crimes, they are told by the Holy Ghost, that “no man has hoped in the Lord, and has been confounded.” No man hath ever placed his trust in God, and has been abandoned. He that prays with confidence, obtains whatever he asks. “All things whatsoever you ask when you pray, believe that you shall receive, and they shall come unto you” (Mark 11:24). When we pray for spiritual favors, let us have a secure confidence of receiving them, and we shall infallibly obtain them. Hence the Savior has taught us to call God, in our petitions for His graces, by no other name than that of Father (Our Father), that we may have recourse to Him with the confidence with which a child seeks assistance from an affectionate parent.
Promises are Promises
Who, says St. Augustine, can fear that Jesus Christ, who is truth itself, can violate His promise to all who pray to Him? “Who shall fear deception when truth promises?” Is God like men, who promise, and do not afterwards fulfill their promise, either because in making it they intend to deceive, or because, after having made it, they change their intention? “God is not as a man, that He should lie, nor as the son of man, that He should be changed. Hath He told, then, and will He not do?” (Numbers 23:19). Our God cannot tell a lie―because He is truth itself. He is not liable to change, because all His arrangements are just and holy.
And because He ardently desires our welfare, He earnestly exhausts and commands us to ask the graces we stand in need of: “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you.” (Matthew 7:7). Why, says St. Augustine, should the Lord exhort us so strongly to ask His graces, if He did not wish to give them to us? He has even bound Himself by His promise to hear our prayers, and to bestow upon us all the graces which we ask with a confidence of obtaining them. “By His promises He has made himself a debtor.” (St. Augustine., ibid., sermon ii).
Do Not Be Pessimistic
But some will say: “I have but little confidence in God, because I am a sinner! I have been too ungrateful to Him, and therefore I see that I do not deserve to be heard!” But St. Thomas tells us, that the efficacy of our prayers in obtaining graces from God, does not depend on our merits, but on the divine mercy (2a-2ae, q. 178, art. 2, ad. 1). As often as we ask with confidence favors which are conducive to our eternal salvation, God hears our prayer. Note well the words “favors conducive to our salvation” ― for, if what we seek be injurious to the soul, God does not, and cannot hear us. For example: if a person asked help from God to be revenged of an enemy, or to accomplish what would be offensive to God, the Lord will not hear his prayers; because, says St. John Chrysostom, “such a person offends God in the very act of prayer; he does not pray, but, in a certain manner mocks God” (Homily xi., in Matt, vi).
First Remove the Obstacles
Moreover, if you wish to receive from God the aid which you ask, you must remove every obstacle which may render you unworthy of being heard. For example: if you ask of God strength to preserve you from relapsing into a certain sin, but will not avoid the occasions of the sin, nor keep at a distance from the house, from the object, or the bad company, which led to your fall, then God will not hear your prayer. And why? Because “thou hast set a cloud before thee, that prayer may not pass through!” (Lamentations 3: 44). Should you fall back into sin, do not complain of God, nor say: “I have besought the Lord to preserve me from falling into sin, but He has not heard me.” Do you not see that, by not taking away the occasions of sin, you have created a thick cloud, which has prevented your prayers from passing through to the throne of divine mercy?
Pray for the Right Things
It is also necessary to remark that the promise of Jesus Christ to hear those who pray to Him does not extend to all the temporal favors which we ask―such as a plentiful harvest; a victory in a law-suit; or a deliverance from sickness; or from certain persecutions. These favors God grants to those who pray for them―but only when they are conducive to their spiritual welfare. Otherwise He refuses them; and He refuses them because He loves us, and because He knows that they would be injurious to our souls. “A physician,” says St. Augustine, “knows better than his patient what is useful for him” (Hom. 3, cap. ccxii). The saint adds that God refuses to some, through mercy, what He grants to others as a chastisement.
Hence St. John Damascene says that sometimes, when we do not obtain the graces which we ask, we receive, by not receiving them; because it is better for us not to receive than to receive them (Paral, lib. 3, cap. xv). We often ask poison which would cause our death. How many are there who, had they died in the sickness or poverty with which they had been afflicted, should be saved? But because they recovered their health, or because they were raised to wealth and honors, they became proud and forgot God, and thus have been damned. Hence St. John Chrysostom exhorts us to ask in our prayers what He knows to be expedient for us. We should, then, always ask from God temporal favors on the condition that they will be useful to the soul.
God is Kinder than Man
But spiritual favors, such as the pardon of our sins, perseverance in virtue, the gift of divine love, and resignation to the divine will, ought to be asked of God absolutely, and with a firm confidence of obtaining them. “If you, then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father from Heaven give the good Spirit to them that ask Him?” (Luke 11:13). If you, says Jesus Christ, who are so much attached to earthly goods, cannot refuse your children the blessings which you have received from God, how much more will your Heavenly Father (Who is in Himself infinitely good, and Who desires to give you His graces more ardently than you desire to receive them) give the good spirit that is, a sincere contrition for their sins, the gift of divine love, and resignation to the will of God to those who ask them?
How can God refuse graces conducive to salvation to those who seek them, when He exhorts even those who do not pray to ask them? Nor does God inquire whether the person who prays to Him is a just man or a sinner; for He has declared that “everyone that asks, receives.” (Luke 11:10). “Everyone,” says the author of the Imperfect Work, “whether he be a just man or a sinner.” (Hom. xviii). And, to encourage us to pray and to ask with confidence for spiritual favors, He has said: “Amen, amen, I say to you: If you ask the Father anything in My Name, He will give it you.” (John 16:23). As if He said: “Sinners, though you do not deserve to receive the divine graces, I have merited them for you from My Father: ask, then, in My Name that is, through My merits and I promise that you shall obtain whatsoever you demand.”
We must Pray with Perseverance
It is, above all, necessary to persevere in prayer till death, and never to cease to pray. This is what is inculcated by the following passages of Scripture: “We ought always to pray!” (Luke 18: 1). “Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times!” (Luke 21:36). “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). Hence the Holy Ghost says: “Let nothing hinder thee from praying always.” (Ecclesiasticus 18: 22). These words imply, not only that we should pray always, but also that we should endeavor to remove every occasion which may prevent us from praying; for, if we cease to pray, we shall be deprived of the divine aid, and shall be overcome by temptations. Perseverance in grace is a gratuitous gift, which, as the Council of Trent has declared, we cannot merit (Session 6, chapter xiii); but St. Augustine says, that we may obtain it by prayer. Hence Cardinal Bellarmine teaches that “we must ask it daily, in order to obtain it every day.” If we neglect to ask it on any day, we may fall into sin on that day.
Chains of Grace
If, then, we wish to persevere and to be saved―for no one can be saved without perseverance―then we must pray continually. Our perseverance depends, not on one grace, but on a thousand helps which we hope to obtain from God during our whole lives, that we may be preserved in His grace. Now, to this chain of graces there must correspond a chain of prayers on our part―without these prayers, God ordinarily does not grant His graces. If we neglect to pray, and thus break the chain of prayers, then the chain of graces shall also be broken, and we shall lose the grace of perseverance.
God is More than a Friend
If, says Jesus Christ to His disciples, one of you goes, during the night to a friend, and say to him: “Lend me three loaves; an acquaintance has come to my house, and I have no refreshment for him.” The friend will answer: “I am in bed; the door is locked; I cannot get up.” But, if the other continue to knock at the door, and will not depart, the friend will rise, and give him as many loaves as he wishes, not through friendship, but to be freed from his persistence. “Although he will not rise and give him because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise, and give him as many as he needs!” (Luke 11: 8). Now, if a man will give his loaves to a friend because of his persistence, “how much more,” says St. Augustine, “will God give, who exhorts us to ask, and is displeased if we do not ask ?” How much more will the Lord bestow on us His graces, if we persevere in praying for them, when He exhorts us to ask for them, and is offended if we do not ask for them?
Be Brash and Bold!
Men feel annoyed at being frequently and importunately asked for a favor. But God exhorts us to pray frequently; and, instead of being dissatisfied, he is pleased with those who repeatedly ask his graces. Cornelius à Lapide says, that “God wishes us to persevere in prayer, even to importunity.” (Commentary on Luke., chap. 11). St. Jerome says: “This importunity with the Lord is seasonable.” That God is pleased with frequent and persevering prayer, may be inferred from the words of Jesus Christ: “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you!” (Luke 11: 9). It was not enough to have said ask but He added, seek, knock; in order to show, that, during our whole lives, we should be as importunate in supplicating the divine graces as beggars are in asking alms. Though they should be refused, they do not cease to cry out, or to knock at the door; they persist in asking relief till they obtain it.
If, then, we wish to obtain from God the gift of perseverance, we must ask it from Him continually and with importunity. We must ask it when we rise in the morning, in our meditations, in hearing Mass, in our visits to the Blessed Sacrament, in going to bed at night, and particularly when we are tempted by the devil to commit any sin. Thus, we must always have our mouths open praying to God, and saying: “Lord, assist me! Give me light! Give me strength! Keep Thy hand upon me, and do not abandon me!” We must do violence to the Lord. “Such violence,” says Tertullian, “is agreeable to God.”
Only the Violent will take Heaven
The violence which we offer to God by repeated prayers does not offend him: on the contrary, it is pleasing and acceptable in his sight. “Prayer,” according to St. John Climacus, “piously offers violence to God.” Our supplications compel Him, but in a manner grateful to Him. He takes great complacency in seeing His mother honored, and therefore wishes, as St. Bernard says, that all the graces we receive should pass through her hands. Hence the holy doctor exhorts us “to seek grace, and to seek it through Mary, because she is a mother, and her prayer cannot be fruitless.” (de Aquæd.). When we ask her to obtain any grace for us, she graciously hears our petitions and prays for us: and the prayers of Mary are never rejected.
Article 7
Friday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 21st
Fighting with Yourself! Fighting over Love!
Friday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 21st
Fighting with Yourself! Fighting over Love!
We continue with our prolonged look at the key readings from the Mass of Septuagesima Sunday. Today, we take as a foundation for our thoughts the words of St. Paul in his Epistle to the Corinthians from the Epistle of Septuagesima Sunday: “I so fight as not beating the air; but I chastise my body and bring it into subjection, lest perhaps after preaching to others I myself should be rejected.” Whether we like it or not, we are all in fight―a fight for salvation and a fight to avoid damnation.
The Interior Battlefield
As the start of Lent draws ever nearer, so too does the start of the fight draw ever nearer! Looking for a fight? You don’t have to go anywhere! There is battlefield right in the middle of your soul! Holy Scripture tells us: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and St. Paul tells us we must fight: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto you are called!” (1 Timothy 6:12), adding that this fight is not only against the devil―“Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12)—but that our fight is also against ourselves, as he himself experiences and testifies:
“For that which I do, I understand not. For I do not that good which I want to do; but the evil which I hate, that I do! … For a desire to want to do good, is present with me; but to accomplish that which is good, I find not. For the good which I want to do, I do not do; but the evil which I do not want to do, that I do. Now, if I do that which I do not want to do, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find, then, a law, that when I have a desire to do good, evil is present with me. For I am delighted with the law of God, according to the inward [spiritual] man, but I see another law in my body, fighting against the law of my mind [soul], and captivating me in the law of sin, that is in my body [passions]. Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Romans 7:15-24).
The Traitors Within
Our Lord said: “The kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21)—God lives in our soul by His sanctifying grace. The attacks of the devil and the world—directly and indirectly—seek to weaken and destroy this wall of sanctifying grace, battering against it with one temptation after another, all life long. Yet, in every war, there are traitors on each side. We have those traitors or betrayers within our own camp—it was Original Sin that made them traitors and now they rebel against our soul. Who are those rebels and traitors? They are our passions—or, as the Church calls them, our concupiscences, that is to say our passions and their instinctive pursuit of their own particular goals: comfort, ease, wealth, possessions, pleasure, power, fame, honor, advantage, etc., etc.
A Passionate Fight
Each passion has its in-built goal that it pursues blindly and recklessly. Our soul—with its powers of reasoning and will-power—is supposed to control and keep in check the blind and frenzied activities of the passions, but since Original Sin has wounded and weakened our soul, we now find that our minds tend towards ignorance and our wills are weak. The only thing that can come to the aid of the ignorant mind and the weak will is the grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the grace of God—and it is this that St. Paul says, after painting the woeful state of his interior battles within and between his body and his soul: “Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God, by Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:24-25).
Only Love Can Bring Victory
In the Epistle from the upcoming Mass of Quinquagesima Sunday—an Epistle that we can call “A Letter of Love”—God points out to us that the only thing that can bring victory and success is Charity (a.k.a. Love of God). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing! … Charity never falls away: whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed … And now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3, 13).
The War Against Your Charity
Holy Scripture tells us that God is love: “God is charity: and he that abides in Charity, abides in God, and God in him … He that loveth not, knows not God―for God is Charity!” (1 John 4:8; 4:16). Our Lord—Who is the Incarnate Charity of God, or the Love of God in human form—tells us: “A new commandment I give unto you: ‘That you love one another, as I have loved you!’ By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another! … This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you. Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 13:34-35; 15:12).
Holy Scripture develops or describes this Charity, by which we love our neighbor because of our love for God (which is the only true way to love our neighbor—for the sake of God and not for any personal profit, advantage or benefit): “Charity is patient; is kind; charity envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious, seeks not her own [advantage]; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things!” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7).
Satan and all devils—being opposed to the one true God—are opposed to true Charity. The devils are hatred personified and Hell is a place of universal hatred, just as Heaven is a place of universal love—in Hell each devil and each damned soul hates everyone else in Hell, even those whom they once loved on Earth, whereas, in Heaven, each saved soul loves everyone else in Heaven, even those whom they have at one time hated here on Earth, or those who have them great harm.
A Hatred of Love and a Love of Hatred
The devil hates Charity and he despises to see Charity in a soul and Charity growing in a soul. Thus, he will pull all the strings he can to destroy Charity in such a soul, or at least to slow down or stop any further growth of that heavenly virtue in a soul. Thus he will have you do anything that is good and holy―if that thing will not directly make you grow in Charity. If the devil sees you contemplating to do something that will make you grow in Charity, then he will suggest that you do some other good action that is “less-loaded” with Charity—for him it is a case of “the lesser of two ‘evils.’” He knows that it is not what we do that matters, but the love of God that we do it with—thus he seeks to destroy, debilitate, deform, demean or damage any and all trace of true supernatural Charity in the soul, and he will gladly con you, make you “buy into” and sell you a fake naturalistic, philanthropic, humanized, inferior version of Charity to replace that precious soul-saving version.
The devil hates to see God loved and he hates to see us grow in the love of God, for there are two virtues that hit him and weaken him more than any others—those two virtues are Humility and Charity. Hence Our Lord insists: “Learn of Me, because I am meek, and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29) and “thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Mark 12:30-31) and then, after God, “Love one another as I have loved you!” (John 13:34).
Pride Chokes Love
If we are not humble, then we are proud—and pride is an excessive love of self. If we love ourselves excessively, then we cannot love God totally, or with our “whole soul, whole mind, whole heart and whole strength!” Thus the importance of Humility—it is the foundation for Charity. Hence, St. John the Baptist says of Christ: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30). St. John the Baptist also stated: “A man cannot receive any thing, unless it be given him from Heaven!” (John 3:27), and Jesus confirms this, saying: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), while to Pontius Pilate, Jesus says: “Thou should not have any power against Me, unless it were given thee from above!” (John 19:11), while St. James reminds us that: “Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17), to which St. Paul adds: “For who distinguishes you? Or what have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7), which is why St. Paul goes on to say: “If I must glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity!” (2 Corinthians 11:30)—for our weaknesses, sins and failings are entirely our own work and sufficient proof and reason enough for us to be greatly humbled.
Of course, we know all this in THEORY, but IN PRACTICE we ignore it! We pride ourselves on what we know, on what we can do, on what we have achieved, on what we have, on our intelligence, our experience, our strength, our beauty, our possessions, etc. All of this betrays a lack of a true love of God, because of the presence of the weeds of self-love that choke and prevent the tree of a love of God from growing within us. We have to weed-out that self-love, that pride (for that is what pride essentially is: self-love) so that we can grow in a love of God: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30), or He will only increase if I make myself decrease.
No Love or Charity Without Humility
In his excellent book on the spiritual life, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange speaks of Humility as being the foundation for Charity and all other virtues. This passage shows the tremendous battle that we must fight within our naturally proud nature in order to acquire Humility and thus prepare the way for Charity:
“Humility is considered in all Christian tradition as the foundation of the spiritual life, since it removes pride, which is, says Holy Scripture, the beginning of every sin because it separates us from God. Thus humility has often been compared to the excavation which must be dug for the erection of a building, an excavation which should be so much the deeper in proportion as the building is to be higher. From this point of view, as we have seen, the two principal pillars of the temple to be built are Faith and Hope, and its dome is Charity.
“The act proper to humility consists in bowing toward the earth, called ‘humus’ in Latin, from which the name of this virtue is derived. To speak without metaphor, its essential act consists in abasing ourselves before God and adore what is of God in every creature. To abase ourselves before the Most High is to recognize our inferiority, littleness, and indigence, even though we are innocent, and, once we have sinned, it consists in recognizing our wretchedness. Humility is based on truth―especially on the truth that there is an infinite distance between the Creator and the creature … and it is expressed in these words of the Savior: ‘Without Me―you can do nothing’ (John 15:5).
“From this principle spring four consequences:
“First of all, in relation to God the Creator, we should recognize that of ourselves we are nothing … We were created out of nothing by God, Who preserves us in existence, without Whom we would be immediately annihilated. We should recognize practically that without God―the Creator and Preserver of all things―we are nothing.
“Secondly, in regard to Providence, without God the supreme Ordainer, without His providence which directs all things, our life completely lacks direction. We should, therefore, humbly receive from Him the general direction and the particular direction that the Most High has chosen from all eternity for each one of us. Consequently we should humbly accept the place which God has willed from all eternity for each one of us. Christ in His sorrowful life humbly wished the last place, that in which Barabbas was preferred to Him, the opprobrium of the cross.
“Thirdly, in this special direction chosen by God for us, we cannot take the slightest step forward, or perform the least salutary and meritorious act, without the help of an actual grace. We need this grace particularly to persevere to the end and should, consequently, humbly ask for it.
Finally, while humility, which recognizes our indigence [poverty], should be found in all the just and should be in the innocent man―it is after we commit sin that we should recognize practically not only our indigence, but our wretchedness: the baseness of our selfish, narrow hearts, of our inconstant wills, of our vacillating, whimsical, ungovernable characters; the wretched weaknesses of our minds, guilty of unpardonable forgetfulness and contradictions that they could and should avoid; the wretchedness of pride, of concupiscence, which leads to indifference to the glory of God and the salvation of souls. This wretchedness is beneath nothingness itself, since it is a disorder, and it occasionally plunges our souls into a contemptible state of abjection.
“Practically, what must we do to reach the perfection of humility, without which we cannot have that of charity? Our attitude toward praise and reproach is of great importance. In regard to praise, we must not praise ourselves; by so doing we would soil ourselves, as the Italian proverb says: ‘Chi si loda, s’imbroda’ (‘He who praises himself befouls himself’). Men praise themselves when they think they are not sufficiently praised by others. Furthermore, we must not seek praise―should we do this, we would render ourselves ridiculous and lose the merit of our good acts. Lastly, we should not take pleasure in praise when it comes―to do so would be to lose, if not the merit of our good actions, at least the flower of merit.
“We must, however, mount still higher by acting as we should in regard to reproaches. We must patiently accept deserved reproaches, especially when they come from superiors who have the right and the duty to make them. If we pout, we lose the benefit of these just observations. It is also fitting that we accept patiently, at times, a reproach that is only slightly deserved or undeserved. Thus, while still a novice, St. Thomas was unjustly reproved for a so-called mistake in Latin while reading in the refectory. He corrected himself as he had been told to do. Later, at recreation, his brethren were astonished and said to him: ‘You were right! Why did you correct yourself?’ ‘It is better in the eyes of God,’ answered the saint, ‘to make a mistake in grammar than to fail in obedience and humility.’ Lastly, we would do well to ask for a love of contempt, keeping in mind the examples of the saints.
“When Our Lord asked St: John of the Cross: ‘What do you wish for a reward?’ the saint replied: ‘To be scorned and to suffer for love of Thee!’ His prayer was granted a few days later in the most painful manner; he was treated like an unworthy religious in a scarcely credible fashion. Likewise St. Francis of Assisi said to Brother Leo: ‘If, when we arrive this evening at the door of the convent, the brother porter [doorkeeper] does not wish to open the door for us, if he takes us for thieves and receives us with blows and leaves us outside all night in the rain and cold, then we must say: “Santa Letizia!”, that is, ‘What holy joy, O Lord, to suffer for Thee and to become a little like Thee!’ The saints reached even this height.
“St. Anselm admirably described the degrees of humility: ‘(1) to acknowledge ourselves contemptible; (2) to grieve on account of this; (3) to admit that we are so; (4) to wish our neighbor to believe it; (5) patiently to endure people’s saying it; (6) willingly to be treated as a person worthy of contempt; (7) to love to be treated in this fashion.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, On Humility).
Our Lord Wants Humility and Love
In that wonderful book, Words of Love by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Our Lord is quoted as saying to SR. JOSEFA MENENDEZ: “Yes, I love all souls―but with very special affection those who are the most weak and little! … Always remember that if I love you it is because you are little, not because you are good! … Do not forget that it is your nothingness and littleness that act as magnets to attract Me to you! … You must not be troubled, Josefa. I want you to be nothing, that I may be all! … I want you to be very little and very humble, and always joyful! … The more you disappear, the more shall I be your life! … Do not worry, Josefa, about what you can and what you cannot do. You know very well that you can do nothing. But I am He who can and will do all! ... Little still implies some being, but, Josefa, you are less than that, you are nothingness personified! … Let the sight of your nothingness never lessen your trust, but only confirm you in humility! …
“Do you not know, Josefa, that the more wretched souls are, the more I love them? … Even your falls comfort Me! Do not be discouraged, for this act of humility, which your fault drew from you, has consoled Me more than if you had not fallen … A soul will profit even after the greatest sins, if she humbles herself … When you commit a fault, repair it at once. I wish your soul to be as pure as crystal. Do not let your falls, however many, trouble you. It is trouble and worry that keep a soul from God … That soul may and will fall often again, but if she humbles herself, if she recognizes her nothingness, if she tries to repair her faults by little acts of generosity and love, if she confides and surrenders herself once more to My Heart, she gives Me more glory and can do more good to other souls than if she had never fallen … He who never needs forgiveness is not the most happy, but rather he who has humbled himself many times … Miseries and weaknesses are of no consequence; what I do ask of them is love … I will raise up the humble, and make little of their frailties, and even of their falls, provided they have humility and love … It does not matter that it [your heart] is small! I will expand it, but let it be all Mine!” On one occasion the devil appeared to Sr. Josefa Menendez and screamed in admission: “There is no doubt about it―all those, who reach highest sanctity, have sunk deepest in humility!” (Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love).
To SR. CONSOLATE BETRONE, Our Lord says: “Poor Consolata, you have no virtue, you have no merits, you have nothing! You would have your sins, but they exist no more, for I have forgotten them for all eternity! ... You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! … I delight to work in a soul. You see, I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me … If a creature of good will desires to love Me and, to make of her life, one single act of love, from the moment of her rising until she falls asleep at night―from the heart, be it well understood—then I will perform incredible things for that soul. Write that down! Write ‘The Gentle Heart of Jesus’; for everyone knows that I am holy, but not all know that I am gentle! … Do not make Me out a God of rigor, whereas I am nothing but a God of love! … Love Me, and you will be happy; and the more you love Me, the happier you will be! Oh, if people would only love Me―what happiness would reign in this unhappy world! Love Me alone! I will attend to maintaining you in humility!” (Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love).
Then, what Our Lord says to SR. MARY OF THE TRINITY, reminds us the above words of St. John the Baptist concerning Christ: “He must increase and I must decrease!”―for to Sr. Mary of the Trinity He says: “Do you understand that you are nothing? Apart from Me you are nothing but rebellion, refusal, negation! … Yes, pride leads to a crashing fall, and humility leads to light and glory! … It is not sins that injure your purity, it is your pride, which, so often, does not wish to acknowledge those sins … With ruins, on ruins, I can build magnificently! It gives Me joy to use that which has humbled itself before Me! … It is with coal that I make diamonds! What would I not do with a soul―however black she might be―who would give herself to Me! … Leave all. Let there no longer be anything else in the world for you, but the love between you and Me! … I ask only for love. Ah! What are you doing about it?” (Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love).
What Am I Doing About It?
Holy Scripture tells us that we are a temple of God: “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Know you not, that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19).
Unfortunately, most Catholics are PAC Catholics―“Pick-and-Choose” Catholics. They pick-and-choose what they want to believe and do with regard to the Catholic Faith, and ignore or neglect the rest. Whether or not they know it, or admit it, or deny it―they have built of Catholic religion of their own choosing according to their personal preferences, likes and dislikes. Sadly, we have all constructed OUR OWN RELIGION to a certain extent and to such an extent, that it is hard for us to admit that we have built badly and that we must knock-down our badly built personal version of the Faith in order to rebuild the temple of our soul according to Christ’s specifications and style!
It is by our love of comfort and hatred for mortification, it is by our taste for the earthly and distaste for the heavenly, it is by our desire to play and not to pray, it is by our zeal to know about the things of the world and our sloth in learning much more about our Faith—through all these deviations, discrepancies and dysfunctions, we have modified the design of the Faith and the specifications given by Christ as to how the temple of our soul should be designed and built and used. We are living in a weak, wobbly and rickety self-made temple, built on the foundations of shifting sands, that only partially resembles God’s design and it is one that could fall down with the advent of any serious storm, tribulation or persecution. We are like the man who built his house on sand and not on rock:
“Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone, therefore, that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these My words, and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27).
We have altered the design of the temple of God that we are supposed to be—and God will not take kindly to those alterations in design! “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells within you? … Know you not, that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19) … “The temple of God is holy, which you are [or are you?] … If any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy!” (1 Corinthians 3:17). Already in Our Lord’s own day did He rebuke the misuse of the Temple of God, when He cast out the money-changers and merchants from the Temple in Jerusalem: “And Jesus went into the Temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves: and He said to them: ‘It is written, “My House shall be called the House of prayer” but you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Matthew 21:12-13).
We Destroy Our Charity By Our Pride
If we do not set a guard and seal our soul with Humility, then the traitorous weed of pride―that we have inherited through Original Sin―will secretly open the doors and windows of our soul to the pride of the devil and the pride of the world: “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16) and the originator of that worldly pride is the proud “prince of this world” (John 12:31), who cried out to God: “Non serviam!” “I will not serve!” ― “And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; and he was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him!” (Apocalypse 12:9).
The Destructive Tactics of Satan
There are the five chief areas of your life where Satan wants to enter and seduce you away from God and godliness:
(1) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Heart – So It Is Not God’s Alone
Holy Scripture warns us: “With all watchfulness keep thy heart!” (Proverbs 4:23) … “Be sober and watch! Because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). Satan knows he has an entry point into our life if God is not first in our hearts―“Seek ye first the Kingdom of God!” (Matthew 6:33), meaning the Kingdom of Heaven and no other kingdom, great or small. “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). God’s first commandment, set forth under the Old Covenant, was: “Thou shalt not have strange gods before Me!” (Exodus 20:3). And Jesus restated that in the New Testament when He was asked what is the greatest commandment and He responded by saying: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Luke 10:27).
Satan’s greatest desire is to prevent you from giving God all of your heart so he will constantly dangle people, things, and desires in front of you ― anything to distract you, so he can erect a false god or idol in front of you, that you don’t even realize you have―“for Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14) and will cloak evil with apparent good. He will try to lure you with a false god―like your career; a spouse or love interest; a dream or goal; a hobby or lifestyle; wealth or possessions, etc. For many modern men and women, their first love is their body, so they spend more time in the gym working-out; dieting (not fasting to beautify their souls for God, but fasting for themselves in order to lose weight and get a more beautiful body); buying clothing, cosmetics and other externals for the body, rather than letting God work within their soul. This love of self is a subtle way of starting to love other things more than God. Some of us love food, money, recreation, entertainment, sports, hobbies, our children, alcohol, a drug or substance, or a “feeling” (like being in love, or feeling energetic) more than God, Himself.
Guard your heart by keeping Christ on the throne of your heart and soul, so that Satan doesn’t try to sneak anything else in there. Satan cannot enter the soul—even in cases of possession—the body is the limit that God has set him. Yet someone outside your home, who cannot get into your house, can still communicate with you by shouting through the door, or making phone calls, or sending messages, e-mails or letters—and can thus influence you and your thoughts, emotions, and moods. Satan, likewise will use all the items of this world—which is his princedom—and will influence your family and friends, neighbors and work colleagues, to infiltrate and affect the way you think, speak and act. All these sources of communication Satan will use to distract you from God and attach you to lesser things.
(2) Satan Seeks to Cause Worries―To Make You Doubt God’s Love and Providence
Satan wants you worrying and stressing, because then you are failing to truest in God’s ability to care for you. Women tend to stress over temporal things ― bills that must be paid; the house that must be maintained; the well-being of the children; whether or not their husband still loves them, or prefers somebody else,; or, if single, whether a man will come into their lives; if they will be able to have a child,; or what someone is saying about them; how their body, face, hair looks; and so on. Men tend to stress about their jobs and money; about providing for their families; and whether or not they are “making the cut” in several areas of life; they worry superficially about their ‘image’ and how they come across; they are vain like women, but more subtly so—worrying about their appearance, their body, their attractiveness. Then there are combined worries for both men and women about their health; their wealth; their reputation; fears about our aging parents; family problems; social issues and other situations that can crowd out God’s peace in our lives and even cause us to begin to blame God for our circumstances.
Satan is a master at this game! St. Ignatius of Loyola, in his Spiritual Exercises, tells us that there are six chief ways in which Satan causes worries and stress. These are (1) False reasoning—whereby he makes us reason illogically and have unfounded fears; (2) Disturbance—interior of mind and emotions, or exterior by disturbing events; (3) Creating Obstacles—which he makes out to be insurmountable; (4) Sadness—whereby he drains us all joy in following a Christian life by making us feel as though we are missing out on a lot of fun; (5) Regret—whereby he makes us start to regret the fact that we are Christians and that it would be better not being a Christian; (6) Discouragement—which is his crowning trick or trump card, which takes away the courage that we need to persevere on the straight and narrow path to God.
Don’t let Satan in this door through his tantalizing “What if?” questions and the doubts he weaves through your mind. God instructs us to “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6-7). Keep praying about your concerns and keep thanking God ahead of time for what He’s about to do for you, so Satan doesn’t get a stranglehold and a stronghold in your mind through your worries and fears.
(3) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Everyday Thinking―So You Think Just Like the World
It’s amazing how many people profess to know God and follow Him, yet their thinking patterns are just like those of anyone else in the world. Satan loves that. He wants you to be so absorbed with the ways of the world that you are clueless about what God’s Word says. He will do this through the media—TV, internet, radio, movies; by subtle messages in the lyrics of songs; by commercials and advertisements; by statements and actions from your favorite celebrities or sports stars; by the opinions and words of advice from friends, neighbors and work colleagues. Scripture commands us: “Be not conformed to this world; but be reformed in the newness of your mind, that you may prove what is the good, and the acceptable, and the perfect will of God” (Romans 12:2). Furthermore, God’s Word warns that “the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke up the Word of God, and the person become fruitless” (Matthew 13:22).
That is why we are told: “The cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the Word of God, and the Word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit” (Mark 4:19; Luke 8:14). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). “Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?” (1 Corinthians 1:20). “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them! We are of God. He that knows God, hears us. He that is not of God, hears us not. By this we know the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error!” (1 John 4:5-6). But Satan would rather have us in mental anguish by listening to the world, rather than the word of God. Guard your everyday thinking by soaking it in Holy Scripture―which is the Word of God. It’s the only way to keep Satan and his worldly philosophies from entering in.
(4) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Speech – So You Tear Others Apart
God wants us to be holy mouthpieces for Him ― He wants us to be people who heal and help with our words: “Let the word of Christ dwell in you abundantly, in all wisdom: teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual canticles, singing in grace in your hearts to God” (Colossians 3:16). “Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth; but that which is good, to the edification of faith, that it may administer grace to the hearers” (Ephesians 4:29).”He that hears you, hears Me; and he that despises you, despises Me; and he that despises Me, despises Him that sent Me!” (Luke 10:16).
But Satan would rather have us “blowing it big time” with our mouths. A few critical words here, a few complaints there, some profanity mixed in with a little gossip on the side―and we enlisted in his army of those who have given him permission to train them into devilish people, who tear others apart, and sound no different (and sometimes worse) than unbelievers. Satan knows we can cause much damage with our mouths if we do not bring them under God’s control.
St. James warns us of this: “We all offend in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say, is perfect and able to keep their whole body in check. When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by Hell. All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be!” (James 3:2-10).
Whether it is gossip, lies, revealing the sins of others, criticism or unkind remarks―our mouths can be instruments of God or the devil. Close that door to Satan, altogether, by applying God’s instructions: “Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth―but only that which is good, to the edification of Faith” (Ephesians 4:29). And Scripture also tells us: “See that none render evil for evil to any man―but ever follow that which is good towards each other, and towards all men” (1 Thessalonians 5:15). “Put ye on therefore, as the elect of God, holy, and beloved, the bowels of mercy, benignity, humility, modesty, patience, bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another. Even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also. But above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:12-14). Be a verbally positive person, who speaks only to lift others up, not tear them down. That will diminish and destroy a critical and complaining spirit that gives Satan a stronghold in our lives.
(5) Satan Seeks to Enter Our Bodies ― So They No Longer Glorify God
Why is it that when people get depressed they overeat or drink excessively or turn to alcohol or substances? Why is it that young boys and girls will cut their bodies, or starve themselves when they are dealing with emotional pain, or, worse still, commit suicide? Or look at the increasing numbers of people who have tattoos all over their bodies, or have pierced their bodies with all kinds of needles, rings, chains, etc. To a large degree this mutilation is down to the influence of Satan, who wants to turn us against our bodies, because they are meant to be—together with our souls—temples of God, and thus, if he can, Satan sees it as a way of “getting back at God.” Our bodies are precious to God. Scripture commands: “Therefore, I beseech you, brethren, by the mercy of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God” (Romans 12:1).
Satan knows that God considers our bodies as His temple and therefore God wants us to keep our bodies holy, healthy and honoring Him: “Know you not, that the members of your body are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own? For you are bought with a great price! Glorify and bear God in your body!” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). Scripture says that keeping our bodies holy is our spiritual act of worship (Romans 12:1). So, since our bodies are holy to God, Satan would love to have us harm them, mutilate them, deface them, starve them, and destroy them with substances, or destroy them altogether. Don’t let him in. Not in how you dress. Not in the jewelry, ornaments, trinkets or even more grotesque items you put on or pierce yourself with. Not in how you see yourself or carry yourself. Not in sensual body movements. Not in how you treat yourself. Ask God for the grace to treat your body holily and a desire to protect your body from all physical and moral evil, so you can serve Him on this Earth in the temple He has placed you in, for as long as possible.
So...What Will You Do? Will You Fight? Or Lay Down Your Arms?
So what is your strategy going to be, now that you know the chief areas where Satan wants to enter your life? God gives us a great defense through St. Paul’s instructions to the saints: “Be strengthened in the Lord, and in the might of His power. Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect! Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace! In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit (which is the word of God). By all prayer and supplication praying at all times in the spirit; and in the same watching with all instance and supplication for all the saints!” (Ephesians 6:10-18). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto you are called!” (1 Timothy 6:12).
The Interior Battlefield
As the start of Lent draws ever nearer, so too does the start of the fight draw ever nearer! Looking for a fight? You don’t have to go anywhere! There is battlefield right in the middle of your soul! Holy Scripture tells us: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and St. Paul tells us we must fight: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto you are called!” (1 Timothy 6:12), adding that this fight is not only against the devil―“Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12)—but that our fight is also against ourselves, as he himself experiences and testifies:
“For that which I do, I understand not. For I do not that good which I want to do; but the evil which I hate, that I do! … For a desire to want to do good, is present with me; but to accomplish that which is good, I find not. For the good which I want to do, I do not do; but the evil which I do not want to do, that I do. Now, if I do that which I do not want to do, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find, then, a law, that when I have a desire to do good, evil is present with me. For I am delighted with the law of God, according to the inward [spiritual] man, but I see another law in my body, fighting against the law of my mind [soul], and captivating me in the law of sin, that is in my body [passions]. Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Romans 7:15-24).
The Traitors Within
Our Lord said: “The kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21)—God lives in our soul by His sanctifying grace. The attacks of the devil and the world—directly and indirectly—seek to weaken and destroy this wall of sanctifying grace, battering against it with one temptation after another, all life long. Yet, in every war, there are traitors on each side. We have those traitors or betrayers within our own camp—it was Original Sin that made them traitors and now they rebel against our soul. Who are those rebels and traitors? They are our passions—or, as the Church calls them, our concupiscences, that is to say our passions and their instinctive pursuit of their own particular goals: comfort, ease, wealth, possessions, pleasure, power, fame, honor, advantage, etc., etc.
A Passionate Fight
Each passion has its in-built goal that it pursues blindly and recklessly. Our soul—with its powers of reasoning and will-power—is supposed to control and keep in check the blind and frenzied activities of the passions, but since Original Sin has wounded and weakened our soul, we now find that our minds tend towards ignorance and our wills are weak. The only thing that can come to the aid of the ignorant mind and the weak will is the grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the grace of God—and it is this that St. Paul says, after painting the woeful state of his interior battles within and between his body and his soul: “Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God, by Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:24-25).
Only Love Can Bring Victory
In the Epistle from the upcoming Mass of Quinquagesima Sunday—an Epistle that we can call “A Letter of Love”—God points out to us that the only thing that can bring victory and success is Charity (a.k.a. Love of God). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing! … Charity never falls away: whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed … And now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3, 13).
The War Against Your Charity
Holy Scripture tells us that God is love: “God is charity: and he that abides in Charity, abides in God, and God in him … He that loveth not, knows not God―for God is Charity!” (1 John 4:8; 4:16). Our Lord—Who is the Incarnate Charity of God, or the Love of God in human form—tells us: “A new commandment I give unto you: ‘That you love one another, as I have loved you!’ By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another! … This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you. Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 13:34-35; 15:12).
Holy Scripture develops or describes this Charity, by which we love our neighbor because of our love for God (which is the only true way to love our neighbor—for the sake of God and not for any personal profit, advantage or benefit): “Charity is patient; is kind; charity envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious, seeks not her own [advantage]; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things!” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7).
Satan and all devils—being opposed to the one true God—are opposed to true Charity. The devils are hatred personified and Hell is a place of universal hatred, just as Heaven is a place of universal love—in Hell each devil and each damned soul hates everyone else in Hell, even those whom they once loved on Earth, whereas, in Heaven, each saved soul loves everyone else in Heaven, even those whom they have at one time hated here on Earth, or those who have them great harm.
A Hatred of Love and a Love of Hatred
The devil hates Charity and he despises to see Charity in a soul and Charity growing in a soul. Thus, he will pull all the strings he can to destroy Charity in such a soul, or at least to slow down or stop any further growth of that heavenly virtue in a soul. Thus he will have you do anything that is good and holy―if that thing will not directly make you grow in Charity. If the devil sees you contemplating to do something that will make you grow in Charity, then he will suggest that you do some other good action that is “less-loaded” with Charity—for him it is a case of “the lesser of two ‘evils.’” He knows that it is not what we do that matters, but the love of God that we do it with—thus he seeks to destroy, debilitate, deform, demean or damage any and all trace of true supernatural Charity in the soul, and he will gladly con you, make you “buy into” and sell you a fake naturalistic, philanthropic, humanized, inferior version of Charity to replace that precious soul-saving version.
The devil hates to see God loved and he hates to see us grow in the love of God, for there are two virtues that hit him and weaken him more than any others—those two virtues are Humility and Charity. Hence Our Lord insists: “Learn of Me, because I am meek, and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29) and “thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Mark 12:30-31) and then, after God, “Love one another as I have loved you!” (John 13:34).
Pride Chokes Love
If we are not humble, then we are proud—and pride is an excessive love of self. If we love ourselves excessively, then we cannot love God totally, or with our “whole soul, whole mind, whole heart and whole strength!” Thus the importance of Humility—it is the foundation for Charity. Hence, St. John the Baptist says of Christ: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30). St. John the Baptist also stated: “A man cannot receive any thing, unless it be given him from Heaven!” (John 3:27), and Jesus confirms this, saying: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), while to Pontius Pilate, Jesus says: “Thou should not have any power against Me, unless it were given thee from above!” (John 19:11), while St. James reminds us that: “Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17), to which St. Paul adds: “For who distinguishes you? Or what have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7), which is why St. Paul goes on to say: “If I must glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity!” (2 Corinthians 11:30)—for our weaknesses, sins and failings are entirely our own work and sufficient proof and reason enough for us to be greatly humbled.
Of course, we know all this in THEORY, but IN PRACTICE we ignore it! We pride ourselves on what we know, on what we can do, on what we have achieved, on what we have, on our intelligence, our experience, our strength, our beauty, our possessions, etc. All of this betrays a lack of a true love of God, because of the presence of the weeds of self-love that choke and prevent the tree of a love of God from growing within us. We have to weed-out that self-love, that pride (for that is what pride essentially is: self-love) so that we can grow in a love of God: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30), or He will only increase if I make myself decrease.
No Love or Charity Without Humility
In his excellent book on the spiritual life, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange speaks of Humility as being the foundation for Charity and all other virtues. This passage shows the tremendous battle that we must fight within our naturally proud nature in order to acquire Humility and thus prepare the way for Charity:
“Humility is considered in all Christian tradition as the foundation of the spiritual life, since it removes pride, which is, says Holy Scripture, the beginning of every sin because it separates us from God. Thus humility has often been compared to the excavation which must be dug for the erection of a building, an excavation which should be so much the deeper in proportion as the building is to be higher. From this point of view, as we have seen, the two principal pillars of the temple to be built are Faith and Hope, and its dome is Charity.
“The act proper to humility consists in bowing toward the earth, called ‘humus’ in Latin, from which the name of this virtue is derived. To speak without metaphor, its essential act consists in abasing ourselves before God and adore what is of God in every creature. To abase ourselves before the Most High is to recognize our inferiority, littleness, and indigence, even though we are innocent, and, once we have sinned, it consists in recognizing our wretchedness. Humility is based on truth―especially on the truth that there is an infinite distance between the Creator and the creature … and it is expressed in these words of the Savior: ‘Without Me―you can do nothing’ (John 15:5).
“From this principle spring four consequences:
“First of all, in relation to God the Creator, we should recognize that of ourselves we are nothing … We were created out of nothing by God, Who preserves us in existence, without Whom we would be immediately annihilated. We should recognize practically that without God―the Creator and Preserver of all things―we are nothing.
“Secondly, in regard to Providence, without God the supreme Ordainer, without His providence which directs all things, our life completely lacks direction. We should, therefore, humbly receive from Him the general direction and the particular direction that the Most High has chosen from all eternity for each one of us. Consequently we should humbly accept the place which God has willed from all eternity for each one of us. Christ in His sorrowful life humbly wished the last place, that in which Barabbas was preferred to Him, the opprobrium of the cross.
“Thirdly, in this special direction chosen by God for us, we cannot take the slightest step forward, or perform the least salutary and meritorious act, without the help of an actual grace. We need this grace particularly to persevere to the end and should, consequently, humbly ask for it.
Finally, while humility, which recognizes our indigence [poverty], should be found in all the just and should be in the innocent man―it is after we commit sin that we should recognize practically not only our indigence, but our wretchedness: the baseness of our selfish, narrow hearts, of our inconstant wills, of our vacillating, whimsical, ungovernable characters; the wretched weaknesses of our minds, guilty of unpardonable forgetfulness and contradictions that they could and should avoid; the wretchedness of pride, of concupiscence, which leads to indifference to the glory of God and the salvation of souls. This wretchedness is beneath nothingness itself, since it is a disorder, and it occasionally plunges our souls into a contemptible state of abjection.
“Practically, what must we do to reach the perfection of humility, without which we cannot have that of charity? Our attitude toward praise and reproach is of great importance. In regard to praise, we must not praise ourselves; by so doing we would soil ourselves, as the Italian proverb says: ‘Chi si loda, s’imbroda’ (‘He who praises himself befouls himself’). Men praise themselves when they think they are not sufficiently praised by others. Furthermore, we must not seek praise―should we do this, we would render ourselves ridiculous and lose the merit of our good acts. Lastly, we should not take pleasure in praise when it comes―to do so would be to lose, if not the merit of our good actions, at least the flower of merit.
“We must, however, mount still higher by acting as we should in regard to reproaches. We must patiently accept deserved reproaches, especially when they come from superiors who have the right and the duty to make them. If we pout, we lose the benefit of these just observations. It is also fitting that we accept patiently, at times, a reproach that is only slightly deserved or undeserved. Thus, while still a novice, St. Thomas was unjustly reproved for a so-called mistake in Latin while reading in the refectory. He corrected himself as he had been told to do. Later, at recreation, his brethren were astonished and said to him: ‘You were right! Why did you correct yourself?’ ‘It is better in the eyes of God,’ answered the saint, ‘to make a mistake in grammar than to fail in obedience and humility.’ Lastly, we would do well to ask for a love of contempt, keeping in mind the examples of the saints.
“When Our Lord asked St: John of the Cross: ‘What do you wish for a reward?’ the saint replied: ‘To be scorned and to suffer for love of Thee!’ His prayer was granted a few days later in the most painful manner; he was treated like an unworthy religious in a scarcely credible fashion. Likewise St. Francis of Assisi said to Brother Leo: ‘If, when we arrive this evening at the door of the convent, the brother porter [doorkeeper] does not wish to open the door for us, if he takes us for thieves and receives us with blows and leaves us outside all night in the rain and cold, then we must say: “Santa Letizia!”, that is, ‘What holy joy, O Lord, to suffer for Thee and to become a little like Thee!’ The saints reached even this height.
“St. Anselm admirably described the degrees of humility: ‘(1) to acknowledge ourselves contemptible; (2) to grieve on account of this; (3) to admit that we are so; (4) to wish our neighbor to believe it; (5) patiently to endure people’s saying it; (6) willingly to be treated as a person worthy of contempt; (7) to love to be treated in this fashion.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, On Humility).
Our Lord Wants Humility and Love
In that wonderful book, Words of Love by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Our Lord is quoted as saying to SR. JOSEFA MENENDEZ: “Yes, I love all souls―but with very special affection those who are the most weak and little! … Always remember that if I love you it is because you are little, not because you are good! … Do not forget that it is your nothingness and littleness that act as magnets to attract Me to you! … You must not be troubled, Josefa. I want you to be nothing, that I may be all! … I want you to be very little and very humble, and always joyful! … The more you disappear, the more shall I be your life! … Do not worry, Josefa, about what you can and what you cannot do. You know very well that you can do nothing. But I am He who can and will do all! ... Little still implies some being, but, Josefa, you are less than that, you are nothingness personified! … Let the sight of your nothingness never lessen your trust, but only confirm you in humility! …
“Do you not know, Josefa, that the more wretched souls are, the more I love them? … Even your falls comfort Me! Do not be discouraged, for this act of humility, which your fault drew from you, has consoled Me more than if you had not fallen … A soul will profit even after the greatest sins, if she humbles herself … When you commit a fault, repair it at once. I wish your soul to be as pure as crystal. Do not let your falls, however many, trouble you. It is trouble and worry that keep a soul from God … That soul may and will fall often again, but if she humbles herself, if she recognizes her nothingness, if she tries to repair her faults by little acts of generosity and love, if she confides and surrenders herself once more to My Heart, she gives Me more glory and can do more good to other souls than if she had never fallen … He who never needs forgiveness is not the most happy, but rather he who has humbled himself many times … Miseries and weaknesses are of no consequence; what I do ask of them is love … I will raise up the humble, and make little of their frailties, and even of their falls, provided they have humility and love … It does not matter that it [your heart] is small! I will expand it, but let it be all Mine!” On one occasion the devil appeared to Sr. Josefa Menendez and screamed in admission: “There is no doubt about it―all those, who reach highest sanctity, have sunk deepest in humility!” (Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love).
To SR. CONSOLATE BETRONE, Our Lord says: “Poor Consolata, you have no virtue, you have no merits, you have nothing! You would have your sins, but they exist no more, for I have forgotten them for all eternity! ... You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! … I delight to work in a soul. You see, I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me … If a creature of good will desires to love Me and, to make of her life, one single act of love, from the moment of her rising until she falls asleep at night―from the heart, be it well understood—then I will perform incredible things for that soul. Write that down! Write ‘The Gentle Heart of Jesus’; for everyone knows that I am holy, but not all know that I am gentle! … Do not make Me out a God of rigor, whereas I am nothing but a God of love! … Love Me, and you will be happy; and the more you love Me, the happier you will be! Oh, if people would only love Me―what happiness would reign in this unhappy world! Love Me alone! I will attend to maintaining you in humility!” (Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love).
Then, what Our Lord says to SR. MARY OF THE TRINITY, reminds us the above words of St. John the Baptist concerning Christ: “He must increase and I must decrease!”―for to Sr. Mary of the Trinity He says: “Do you understand that you are nothing? Apart from Me you are nothing but rebellion, refusal, negation! … Yes, pride leads to a crashing fall, and humility leads to light and glory! … It is not sins that injure your purity, it is your pride, which, so often, does not wish to acknowledge those sins … With ruins, on ruins, I can build magnificently! It gives Me joy to use that which has humbled itself before Me! … It is with coal that I make diamonds! What would I not do with a soul―however black she might be―who would give herself to Me! … Leave all. Let there no longer be anything else in the world for you, but the love between you and Me! … I ask only for love. Ah! What are you doing about it?” (Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love).
What Am I Doing About It?
Holy Scripture tells us that we are a temple of God: “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Know you not, that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19).
Unfortunately, most Catholics are PAC Catholics―“Pick-and-Choose” Catholics. They pick-and-choose what they want to believe and do with regard to the Catholic Faith, and ignore or neglect the rest. Whether or not they know it, or admit it, or deny it―they have built of Catholic religion of their own choosing according to their personal preferences, likes and dislikes. Sadly, we have all constructed OUR OWN RELIGION to a certain extent and to such an extent, that it is hard for us to admit that we have built badly and that we must knock-down our badly built personal version of the Faith in order to rebuild the temple of our soul according to Christ’s specifications and style!
It is by our love of comfort and hatred for mortification, it is by our taste for the earthly and distaste for the heavenly, it is by our desire to play and not to pray, it is by our zeal to know about the things of the world and our sloth in learning much more about our Faith—through all these deviations, discrepancies and dysfunctions, we have modified the design of the Faith and the specifications given by Christ as to how the temple of our soul should be designed and built and used. We are living in a weak, wobbly and rickety self-made temple, built on the foundations of shifting sands, that only partially resembles God’s design and it is one that could fall down with the advent of any serious storm, tribulation or persecution. We are like the man who built his house on sand and not on rock:
“Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone, therefore, that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these My words, and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27).
We have altered the design of the temple of God that we are supposed to be—and God will not take kindly to those alterations in design! “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells within you? … Know you not, that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19) … “The temple of God is holy, which you are [or are you?] … If any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy!” (1 Corinthians 3:17). Already in Our Lord’s own day did He rebuke the misuse of the Temple of God, when He cast out the money-changers and merchants from the Temple in Jerusalem: “And Jesus went into the Temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves: and He said to them: ‘It is written, “My House shall be called the House of prayer” but you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Matthew 21:12-13).
We Destroy Our Charity By Our Pride
If we do not set a guard and seal our soul with Humility, then the traitorous weed of pride―that we have inherited through Original Sin―will secretly open the doors and windows of our soul to the pride of the devil and the pride of the world: “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16) and the originator of that worldly pride is the proud “prince of this world” (John 12:31), who cried out to God: “Non serviam!” “I will not serve!” ― “And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; and he was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him!” (Apocalypse 12:9).
The Destructive Tactics of Satan
There are the five chief areas of your life where Satan wants to enter and seduce you away from God and godliness:
(1) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Heart – So It Is Not God’s Alone
Holy Scripture warns us: “With all watchfulness keep thy heart!” (Proverbs 4:23) … “Be sober and watch! Because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). Satan knows he has an entry point into our life if God is not first in our hearts―“Seek ye first the Kingdom of God!” (Matthew 6:33), meaning the Kingdom of Heaven and no other kingdom, great or small. “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). God’s first commandment, set forth under the Old Covenant, was: “Thou shalt not have strange gods before Me!” (Exodus 20:3). And Jesus restated that in the New Testament when He was asked what is the greatest commandment and He responded by saying: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Luke 10:27).
Satan’s greatest desire is to prevent you from giving God all of your heart so he will constantly dangle people, things, and desires in front of you ― anything to distract you, so he can erect a false god or idol in front of you, that you don’t even realize you have―“for Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14) and will cloak evil with apparent good. He will try to lure you with a false god―like your career; a spouse or love interest; a dream or goal; a hobby or lifestyle; wealth or possessions, etc. For many modern men and women, their first love is their body, so they spend more time in the gym working-out; dieting (not fasting to beautify their souls for God, but fasting for themselves in order to lose weight and get a more beautiful body); buying clothing, cosmetics and other externals for the body, rather than letting God work within their soul. This love of self is a subtle way of starting to love other things more than God. Some of us love food, money, recreation, entertainment, sports, hobbies, our children, alcohol, a drug or substance, or a “feeling” (like being in love, or feeling energetic) more than God, Himself.
Guard your heart by keeping Christ on the throne of your heart and soul, so that Satan doesn’t try to sneak anything else in there. Satan cannot enter the soul—even in cases of possession—the body is the limit that God has set him. Yet someone outside your home, who cannot get into your house, can still communicate with you by shouting through the door, or making phone calls, or sending messages, e-mails or letters—and can thus influence you and your thoughts, emotions, and moods. Satan, likewise will use all the items of this world—which is his princedom—and will influence your family and friends, neighbors and work colleagues, to infiltrate and affect the way you think, speak and act. All these sources of communication Satan will use to distract you from God and attach you to lesser things.
(2) Satan Seeks to Cause Worries―To Make You Doubt God’s Love and Providence
Satan wants you worrying and stressing, because then you are failing to truest in God’s ability to care for you. Women tend to stress over temporal things ― bills that must be paid; the house that must be maintained; the well-being of the children; whether or not their husband still loves them, or prefers somebody else,; or, if single, whether a man will come into their lives; if they will be able to have a child,; or what someone is saying about them; how their body, face, hair looks; and so on. Men tend to stress about their jobs and money; about providing for their families; and whether or not they are “making the cut” in several areas of life; they worry superficially about their ‘image’ and how they come across; they are vain like women, but more subtly so—worrying about their appearance, their body, their attractiveness. Then there are combined worries for both men and women about their health; their wealth; their reputation; fears about our aging parents; family problems; social issues and other situations that can crowd out God’s peace in our lives and even cause us to begin to blame God for our circumstances.
Satan is a master at this game! St. Ignatius of Loyola, in his Spiritual Exercises, tells us that there are six chief ways in which Satan causes worries and stress. These are (1) False reasoning—whereby he makes us reason illogically and have unfounded fears; (2) Disturbance—interior of mind and emotions, or exterior by disturbing events; (3) Creating Obstacles—which he makes out to be insurmountable; (4) Sadness—whereby he drains us all joy in following a Christian life by making us feel as though we are missing out on a lot of fun; (5) Regret—whereby he makes us start to regret the fact that we are Christians and that it would be better not being a Christian; (6) Discouragement—which is his crowning trick or trump card, which takes away the courage that we need to persevere on the straight and narrow path to God.
Don’t let Satan in this door through his tantalizing “What if?” questions and the doubts he weaves through your mind. God instructs us to “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6-7). Keep praying about your concerns and keep thanking God ahead of time for what He’s about to do for you, so Satan doesn’t get a stranglehold and a stronghold in your mind through your worries and fears.
(3) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Everyday Thinking―So You Think Just Like the World
It’s amazing how many people profess to know God and follow Him, yet their thinking patterns are just like those of anyone else in the world. Satan loves that. He wants you to be so absorbed with the ways of the world that you are clueless about what God’s Word says. He will do this through the media—TV, internet, radio, movies; by subtle messages in the lyrics of songs; by commercials and advertisements; by statements and actions from your favorite celebrities or sports stars; by the opinions and words of advice from friends, neighbors and work colleagues. Scripture commands us: “Be not conformed to this world; but be reformed in the newness of your mind, that you may prove what is the good, and the acceptable, and the perfect will of God” (Romans 12:2). Furthermore, God’s Word warns that “the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke up the Word of God, and the person become fruitless” (Matthew 13:22).
That is why we are told: “The cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the Word of God, and the Word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit” (Mark 4:19; Luke 8:14). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). “Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?” (1 Corinthians 1:20). “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them! We are of God. He that knows God, hears us. He that is not of God, hears us not. By this we know the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error!” (1 John 4:5-6). But Satan would rather have us in mental anguish by listening to the world, rather than the word of God. Guard your everyday thinking by soaking it in Holy Scripture―which is the Word of God. It’s the only way to keep Satan and his worldly philosophies from entering in.
(4) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Speech – So You Tear Others Apart
God wants us to be holy mouthpieces for Him ― He wants us to be people who heal and help with our words: “Let the word of Christ dwell in you abundantly, in all wisdom: teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual canticles, singing in grace in your hearts to God” (Colossians 3:16). “Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth; but that which is good, to the edification of faith, that it may administer grace to the hearers” (Ephesians 4:29).”He that hears you, hears Me; and he that despises you, despises Me; and he that despises Me, despises Him that sent Me!” (Luke 10:16).
But Satan would rather have us “blowing it big time” with our mouths. A few critical words here, a few complaints there, some profanity mixed in with a little gossip on the side―and we enlisted in his army of those who have given him permission to train them into devilish people, who tear others apart, and sound no different (and sometimes worse) than unbelievers. Satan knows we can cause much damage with our mouths if we do not bring them under God’s control.
St. James warns us of this: “We all offend in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say, is perfect and able to keep their whole body in check. When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by Hell. All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be!” (James 3:2-10).
Whether it is gossip, lies, revealing the sins of others, criticism or unkind remarks―our mouths can be instruments of God or the devil. Close that door to Satan, altogether, by applying God’s instructions: “Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth―but only that which is good, to the edification of Faith” (Ephesians 4:29). And Scripture also tells us: “See that none render evil for evil to any man―but ever follow that which is good towards each other, and towards all men” (1 Thessalonians 5:15). “Put ye on therefore, as the elect of God, holy, and beloved, the bowels of mercy, benignity, humility, modesty, patience, bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another. Even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also. But above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:12-14). Be a verbally positive person, who speaks only to lift others up, not tear them down. That will diminish and destroy a critical and complaining spirit that gives Satan a stronghold in our lives.
(5) Satan Seeks to Enter Our Bodies ― So They No Longer Glorify God
Why is it that when people get depressed they overeat or drink excessively or turn to alcohol or substances? Why is it that young boys and girls will cut their bodies, or starve themselves when they are dealing with emotional pain, or, worse still, commit suicide? Or look at the increasing numbers of people who have tattoos all over their bodies, or have pierced their bodies with all kinds of needles, rings, chains, etc. To a large degree this mutilation is down to the influence of Satan, who wants to turn us against our bodies, because they are meant to be—together with our souls—temples of God, and thus, if he can, Satan sees it as a way of “getting back at God.” Our bodies are precious to God. Scripture commands: “Therefore, I beseech you, brethren, by the mercy of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God” (Romans 12:1).
Satan knows that God considers our bodies as His temple and therefore God wants us to keep our bodies holy, healthy and honoring Him: “Know you not, that the members of your body are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own? For you are bought with a great price! Glorify and bear God in your body!” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). Scripture says that keeping our bodies holy is our spiritual act of worship (Romans 12:1). So, since our bodies are holy to God, Satan would love to have us harm them, mutilate them, deface them, starve them, and destroy them with substances, or destroy them altogether. Don’t let him in. Not in how you dress. Not in the jewelry, ornaments, trinkets or even more grotesque items you put on or pierce yourself with. Not in how you see yourself or carry yourself. Not in sensual body movements. Not in how you treat yourself. Ask God for the grace to treat your body holily and a desire to protect your body from all physical and moral evil, so you can serve Him on this Earth in the temple He has placed you in, for as long as possible.
So...What Will You Do? Will You Fight? Or Lay Down Your Arms?
So what is your strategy going to be, now that you know the chief areas where Satan wants to enter your life? God gives us a great defense through St. Paul’s instructions to the saints: “Be strengthened in the Lord, and in the might of His power. Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect! Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace! In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit (which is the word of God). By all prayer and supplication praying at all times in the spirit; and in the same watching with all instance and supplication for all the saints!” (Ephesians 6:10-18). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto you are called!” (1 Timothy 6:12).
Article 6
Thursday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 20th
How Sick Are You? Sick to Death?
Thursday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 20th
How Sick Are You? Sick to Death?
Sickness and Sin Lead to Death
Sometimes―and wrongly so―we separate sicknesses of the body from sicknesses of the soul. However, they are often closely related. The body can affect the soul―and the soul can affect the body. Some bodily sicknesses are life-threatening and can lead to death; other sickness do not lead to death. Similarly, some sins threaten our eternal life and can lead to eternal ‘death’ in Hell. Holy Scripture says that there is “a sin which is not to death, and there is a sin unto death” (1 John 5:16) ― we refer to these as Venial Sin and Mortal Sin. “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) … “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56) … “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21) … “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15).
In the Old Testament, God speaks of giving punishments of physical sickness to those who sin and refuse to obey His commandments: “But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you walk contrary to Me, and will not listen to Me, I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins … I will send the pestilence in the midst of you … I will chastise you with seven plagues for your sins! (Leviticus 26:14-28). In the New Testament, we see “a certain man, a magician, a false prophet, a Jew, whose name was Bar-jesu, who was with the proconsul Sergius Paulus, a prudent man. He sending for Barnabas and Saul, desired to hear the word of God. But Elymas the magician (for so his name is interpreted) withstood them, seeking to turn away the proconsul from the Faith. Then Saul, otherwise Paul, filled with the Holy Ghost, looking upon him said: ‘O child of the devil, full of all guile, and of all deceit, enemy of all justice! You cease not to pervert the right ways of the Lord! And now behold, the hand of the Lord is upon thee, and you shall be blind, not seeing the sun for a time!’ And immediately there fell a mist and darkness upon him, and going about, he sought someone to lead him by the hand” (Acts 13:7-11).
We see Our Lord connect ill-health with sin when He cures the man who had been sick for 38 years―afterwards warning him: “Behold you are made whole! Sin no more! Lest some worse thing happen to you!” (John 5:1-14). We see St. Zachary―the father of St. John the Baptist―being struck dumb for having disbelieved St. Gabriel the Archangel’s message from God that Zachary’s wife, Elizabeth, would conceive a child (John the Baptist) despite her old age: “And the angel said to him: ‘I am Gabriel, who stands before God: and I am sent to speak to thee, and to bring thee these good tidings! And behold, thou shalt be dumb, and shalt not be able to speak until the day wherein these things shall come to pass, because thou hast not believed my words, which shall be fulfilled in their time!’” (Luke 1:19-20). Holy Scripture tells us: “By one man [Adam] sin entered into this world, and by sin death!” (Romans 5:12) ― and the greatest sickness, the ultimate sickness of the body is nothing other than death.
He Came to Heal
Our Lord came to heal the sick—both the physically sick and more importantly the spiritually sick: “I am come that they may have life!” (John 10:10) … “I am the Way and the Life” (John 14:6) … “And answering, Jesus said to them: ‘Go and relate to John what you have heard and seen―the blind see; the lame walk; the lepers are made clean; the deaf hear; the dead rise again; and the Gospel is preached to the poor!’” (Luke 7:22).
“Jesus said to them: ‘They that are healthy have no need of a physician, but they that are sick. For I came not to call the just, but sinners!’” (Mark 2:17). Yet there is a connection between the diseases of the body and the diseases of the soul. Is this merely symbolic, or is there a real connection between the two? Actually, it both symbolic and real.
Symbolism of Sickness and Sin
Fr. Faber, in his book Growth in Holiness, clearly relates sin with sickness in a symbolic way: “The diseases and evils of the body are in a great degree typical of the miseries and misfortunes of the soul. If we seek the correlative of lukewarmness, we shall find it in blindness. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself. It is a judicial blindness, because it once saw better itself, and now does not remember either what it saw, or that it ever saw at all” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, ch. 25).
Our Lord Relates Sickness to Sin
“Jesus entered into Capharnaum … and it was heard that He was in the house. … And they came to Him, bringing one sick of the palsy, who was carried by four men. And when they could not offer him unto Him, because of the multitude, they then uncovered the roof where Jesus was, and, opening it, they let down the bed wherein the man sick of the palsy lay. And when Jesus had seen their faith, He said to the sick of the palsy: ‘Son, thy sins are forgiven thee!’ And there were some of the Scribes sitting there, and thinking in their hearts: ‘Why does this man speak thus? He blasphemes! Who can forgive sins, but God only?’ Which Jesus presently knowing in his spirit, that they so thought within themselves, said to them: ‘Why do you think these things in your hearts? Which is easier to say to the sick of the palsy: “Thy sins are forgiven thee!” or to say: “Arise, take up thy bed, and walk!”? But so that you may know that the Son of man has power on Earth to forgive sins, (He said to the sick of the palsy,) I say to thee: “Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house!”’ And immediately he arose; and taking up his bed, went his way in the sight of all―so that all wondered and glorified God” (Mark 2:1-12).
Here we see an implied association between sin and sickness. A sick man was to be physically cured of his palsy, yet Our Lord cures a greater sickness, the sickness of sin, by telling the sick man: “Son, thy sins are forgiven thee!” He actually gives the sick man something greater than a physical cure—He gives him a spiritual cure. Yet the two things are tantalizingly tied together. Was this mere chance? No, for we see this connection elsewhere in Scripture.
Poolside Cure with a Warning
“Now there is at Jerusalem a pond, called Probatica, which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of sick, of blind, of lame, of withered; waiting for the moving of the water. And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under. And there was a certain man there that had been under his infirmity for thirty-eight years. When Jesus had seen him lying there, and knew that he had been there a long time, He said to him: ‘Do you want to be made whole?’ The infirm man answered him: ‘Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pond. For whilst I am coming, another goes down before me!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Arise, take up thy bed, and walk!’ And immediately the man was made whole, and he took up his bed, and walked. And it was the Sabbath that day. The Jews therefore said to him that was healed: ‘It is the Sabbath! It is not lawful for thee to take up thy bed!’ He answered them: ‘He that made me whole, He said to me, “Take up thy bed, and walk!”’ They asked him therefore: ‘Who is that man who said to thee, “Take up thy bed, and walk?”’ But he who was healed, knew not who it was―for Jesus went aside from the multitude standing in the place. Afterwards, Jesus found him in the Temple, and said to him: ‘Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!’” (John 5:1-14).
Sin No More, Or Else….
Here, Our Lord is clearly telling the healed man that the many years of sickness were due to his sickness of soul—the sickness of sin. Our Lord heals him—both in body and soul—but warns him that worse things will befall him if he does not cease to sin. For as St. Paul warns us: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked!” (Galatians 6:7) … “For the wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) ... “The sting of death is sin!” (1 Corinthians 15:56). Even the Pharao of Egypt knew this, as he said to Moses and Aaron: “Forgive me my sin this time also, and pray to the Lord your God, that He take away from me this death” (Exodus 10:17). The ‘disease’ of death is a result of the ‘disease’ of sin, as St. Paul says, speaking of Adam: “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). “The soul that sins, the same shall die” (Ezechiel 18:20) “Everyone shall die for his own sin” (Deuteronomy 24:16).
However…
“Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? … If the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live, and shall not die! … When the wicked turns himself away from his wickedness, which he has wrought, and does judgment and justice, then he shall save his soul alive! ... Because he considers and turns away himself from all his iniquities which he has wrought, then he shall surely live and not die” (Ezechiel 18:21-28).
God, through His Church, has given man time to “do penance for all his sins which he has committed.” Let us profit from this time—as the Church will say a little later in her liturgy: “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). These words are at the core of the Lenten season. Let it not be said of us, on the Day of Judgment: “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in pride” (Job 24:23). Let us not stand proudly, like the Pharisee in the Temple, extolling ourselves and the things that have done, whilst saying: “O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers―as also is this publican!” (Luke 18:11). Instead, let us be like the Publican, who was behind the Pharisee, and “would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner!’” (Luke 18:13).
Too Much Complacency
It is amazing how we can live and shut-out all thoughts of death—as though the ‘disease’ of death will not strike us! St. Alphonsus Liguori, the great Doctor of the Church, says: “‘It is appointed unto men once to die’ (Hebrews 9:27). The decree has been passed for each of us―we must all die! St. Cyprian says that we are all born with the halter on the neck! Hence, every step we make brings us nearer to the gibbet. For each of us the gibbet shall be the last sickness, which will end in death. As your name, brethren, has then been inserted in the registry of Baptism, so it shall be one day written in the record of the dead. As, in speaking of your ancestors, you say: ‘God be merciful to my father, to my uncle, or to my brother!’, so others shall say the same of you when you shall be in the other world; and as you have often heard the death-bell toll for many, so others shall hear it toll for you” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost).
Neglect in Repenting
In another of his memorable sermons, St. Alphonsus Liguori, warns against neglect in putting things right with God: “Miserable the sick man who takes to his bed in the state of mortal sin! He that lives in sin till death shall die in sin! ‘You shall die in your sin!’ (John 8:21). It is true that, in whatsoever hour the sinner is converted, God promises to pardon him; but to no sinner has God promised the grace of conversion at the hour of death. ‘Seek the Lord while He may be found!’ (Isaias 4:6). Then, there is for some sinners a time when they shall seek God and shall not find him. ‘You shall seek Me, and shall not find Me!’ (John 7:34). The unhappy beings will go to confession at the hour of death; they will promise and weep, and ask mercy of God, but without knowing what they do. A man who sees himself under the feet of a foe pointing a dagger to his throat, will shed tears, ask pardon, and promise to serve his enemy as a slave during the remainder of his life. But, will the enemy believe him? No―he will feel convinced that his words are not sincere that his object is to escape from his hands, and that, should he be pardoned, he will become more hostile than ever. In like manner, how can God pardon the dying sinner, when He sees that all his acts of sorrow, and all his promises, proceed not from the heart, but from a dread of death and of approaching damnation” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Ninth Sunday after Pentecost).
Keep Away From the ‘Diseased’
In another sermon, St. Alphonsus warns us against the dangers mixing with ‘spiritually diseased’ or sinful people: “The Gospel relates that ten lepers of a certain town met Jesus Christ, and begged Him to heal the leprosy under which they labored. The Lord told them go and present themselves to the priests of the Temple; but before they reached the Temple they were cured. Now it may be asked why our Savior, who could heal them in an instant, wished them to go to the priests, and healed them on the way. A certain author (Anthony of Lisbon) says that Jesus Christ foresaw that, had He cured them on the spot, they, by remaining in the place and conversing with the other lepers, from whom they took the leprosy, should easily relapse into the same disease. Therefore, He first wished them to depart from the place and then healed them. Whatever may be thought of this reason, let us come to the moral sense which may be deduced from it. The leprosy resembles sin. As the leprosy is a contagious disease, so the bad habits of the wicked infect others who associate with them. Hence, the leper who wishes to be cured shall never be healed unless he separates from bad companions. He that keeps company with robbers soon becomes a thief. In this discourse I shall show, that, to lead a good life, it is necessary to avoid bad companions” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost).
Our Lord Comes to Separate from Sin and the World
Holy Scripture echoes this in many passages—here are only several: Jesus said: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided―three against two, and two against three!” (Luke 12:51-52). “Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14). “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:11). “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, so that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer!” (Romans 6:6).
“As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). “A hard heart shall fear evil at the last―and he that loves danger shall perish in it” (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). “Know also this, that in the last days shall come dangerous times! Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God: having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5) ― for sin, just like disease, can be highly contagious!
“It is also necessary to remark that the promise of Jesus Christ, to hear those who pray to Him, does not extend to all the temporal favors which we ask—such as a plentiful harvest, a victory in a law-suit, or a deliverance from sickness, or from certain persecutions. These favors God grants to those who pray for them; but only when they are conducive to their spiritual welfare. Otherwise He refuses them; and He refuses them because He loves us, and because He knows that they would be injurious to our souls. ‘A physician,’ says St. Augustine, ‘knows better than his patient what is useful for him.’ The saint adds that God refuses to some, through mercy, what He grants to others as a chastisement. Hence St. John Damascene says that sometimes, when we do not obtain the graces which we ask, we receive, by not receiving them; because it is better for us not to receive than to receive them. We often ask poison which would cause our death. How many are there who, had they died in the sickness or poverty with which they had been afflicted, should be saved? But because they recovered their health, or because they were raised to wealth and honors, they became proud and forgot God, and thus have been damned!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Easter).
“What is foolish in the eyes of the world—that is, crosses, sickness, contempt and ignominies—Jesus Christ holds in great estimation!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost).
“But notwithstanding the refusal of sinners to return to God, he does not cease to continue to call them by so many interior inspirations, remorse of conscience, and terrors of chastisements. Thus, beloved Christians, God has spoken to you, and, seeing that you disregarded His words, He has had recourse to scourges; He has called you to repentance by such a persecution, by temporal losses, by the death of a relative, by sickness which has brought you to the brink of the grave.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Sixth Sunday after Pentecost).
Arguing With the ‘Doctor’
“Some penitents argue with their confessor, and endeavor to make him adopt their own opinion. This is the cause of grief to spiritual directors. But the Apostle Paul says, ‘this is not expedient for you’ because, when the confessor finds that you do not obey him, and that it is only with difficulty he can get you to walk in the straight path, he will give up the direction of your soul. How deplorable the condition of a vessel which a pilot refuses to steer! How miserable the state of a sick man who is abandoned by his physician! When a patient refuses to obey, or to take the medicine which has been prescribed, when he eats and drinks what he pleases, then the physician abandons him, and allows him to follow his own caprice. But, what hope can be entertained of the recovery of such a patient?” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Easter).
Sin Leads to Death
“By the envy of the devil, death came into the world!” (Wisdom 2:24). “For the wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) ... “The sting of death is sin!” (1 Corinthians 15:56). Even the Pharao of Egypt knew this, as he said to Moses and Aaron: “Forgive me my sin this time also, and pray to the Lord your God, that He take away from me this death!” (Exodus 10:17). The ‘disease’ of death is a result of the ‘disease’ of sin, as St. Paul says, speaking of Adam: “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned!” (Romans 5:12). “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:20). “Everyone shall die for his own sin!” (Deuteronomy 24:16).
When Will We Die?
We have no problems admitting and accepting that we will one day die—but it hardly the predominant preoccupation of our daily life! Yet it should be—for this is the recommendation of so many spiritual writers: that we should always have our final end before our eyes. Each passing day is a step closer to death. We distract ourselves, from this inevitable trip to the Judgment Seat of God, by filling our minds with so much secondary trivia—to which we falsely or superficially attach so much importance.
Don’t Be Presumptuous!
Yet Our Lord chides us, as He chided Martha, saying: “But one thing is necessary!” So many souls would beg to differ, and might say to Him: “And they began all at once to make excuse. The first said to him: ‘I have bought a farm, and I must needs go out and see it! I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to try them! I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come!’” (Luke 14:18-20). Yet Our Lord warns us in this parable: “The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: ‘What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?’ And he said: ‘This will I do―I will pull down my barns, and will build greater; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods! And I will say to my soul: “Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years! Take thy rest! Eat, drink, make good cheer!”’ But God said to him: ‘Thou fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee: and whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?’” (Luke 12:16-20).
Time to Prepare While There is Still Time
On average, since 1950, around 55 million to 60 million people die each year―which translates to 1 in every 145 persons on average. The forecasted death rate per 1,000 people varies from country to country. It is estimated that almost 18 people per 1,000 (1 out 55) will die in South Africa, whereas the figure is almost 9 people per 1,000 (1 out of 110) in the USA. Ultimately, everyone dies. Some expect to die this year—others do not! Let us therefore prepare for this Lent as if knowing it to be our last—for many it will be, as let us begin this time of conversion to God as if we were sure that another would never be granted to us. “Bring forth, therefore, fruits worthy of penance―for now the axe is laid to the root of the tree! Every tree, therefore, that brings not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire” (Matthew 3:8-10).
Our Lady warns that if sin increases and penance is not done, then the death rate will “shoot through the roof”! “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity! It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! ... If men do not return to God, purifying fire will fall from the Heavens on all peoples, and a great part of humanity will be destroyed! … Nations will be annihilated!”
Diseased Trees
A tree that cannot bring forth good fruit is a tree that is weak, undernourished or diseased. If we are not bringing forth the fruit that God expects of us, then we too are weak, undernourished or diseased in the spiritual life. Our Lord tells us that a tree is known by its fruits--“Either make the tree good and its fruit good; or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil! For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33). How much bad fruit are we producing?
How is it That we Produce Bad Fruit?
If we are speaking of trees and fruit, then we must also go to the root of things! Both the tree and its fruits are preceded by the seed and its roots. Children are sometimes born with a genetic disorder that comes from their parents—the bad fruits that we produce can also be traced to our parents: our first parents, Adam and Eve. Coincidentally, there were trees involved in their lives! Adam and Even were told that they could eat of the fruit of all the trees in the Paradise of Pleasure: “And the Lord God had planted a paradise of pleasure from the beginning: wherein he placed man whom he had formed. And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of: the tree of life also in the midst of paradise: and the tree of knowledge of good and evil … And the Lord God took man, and put him into the paradise of pleasure, to dress it, and to keep it. And He commanded him, saying: ‘Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat: but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” (Genesis 2:8-9; 2:15-17).
Original Bad Fruit
We all know what happened next! Adam and Eve produced bad fruit by eating the wrong fruit—they fruit they had been expressly commanded not to eat. This was a grievous sin—it is what we call Original Sin. This sin is passed onto us like a genetic disorder. Every person enters life with the handicap of Original Sin—which is not a positive thing, like a stain, but it is a negative thing, meaning the absence of something. Original Sin is the absence of sanctifying grace (which perfects human nature) and the absence of the gift of integrity—which is equivalent to exemption from concupiscence. It is called “integrity” because it effected a harmonious relation between flesh and spirit by completely subordinating man’s lower passions to his reason, and reason, in turn, is subordinated to Divine grace.
Pride and Disobedience
The sin of Adam and Eve is a sin of pride and disobedience—pride is the root of disobedience. Our first parents consciously placed themselves in opposition to God by violating his explicit precept. However, even before they committed the external sin of disobedience they had already sinned in their hearts by giving in to the devil’s suggestions. All sin begins inside. All sin begins with pride. Pride is the root of all sin. “Because his heart is departed from Him that made him: for pride is the beginning of all sin” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). “The beginning of the pride of man, is to fall off from God” (Ecclesiasticus 10:14). They wished to be as the devil promised them, “To be like gods knowing both good and evil.” In other words, so the demon promised them, they wanted to displace God in deciding between good and evil. Their external eating of the forbidden fruit was only a manifestation of an interior refusal of dependence on God. And in this way they reversed the true relationship between man and the source of his being.
Is God “short-changing”?
Holy Scripture describes the relationship between God and man, as, not only one of dependence on God, but of true friendship with God. Adam and Eve had received everything from the Lord. He wanted them to be happy. Yet, by sinning, they gave into the doubt of questioning God’s goodness. Inspired by the evil one they actually wondered if maybe, just maybe, God was withholding something from them. Perhaps the devil suggested that God was afraid that they would be happy like Himself. That was the point of the devil’s temptation. “No”, he told Eve, “you shall not die the death. For God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened: and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:4-5). Thus the devil perverted the very concept of God and depicted God as jealous, self-interested and concerned only with protecting Himself from His creatures. This is common to all sin—untruth or the twisting of truth. The devil, whom Our Lord calls the “father of lies”, is forever trying to make evil look like something good, and portrays good as something evil. “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
Sin Changes Everything
Once they had sinned, Adam and Eve radically changed. Even before they were driven out of Paradise, or suffered the death, with which they had been threatened, they shrank away from familiarity with God. We are told, “Adam and his wife hid themselves from the face of the Lord God, amidst the trees of Paradise” (Genesis 3:8). The sinner is afraid of God. He had better be! It is not for nothing that the Catechism calls sin the greatest evil in the world! “Mortal Sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, and a greater evil than disease, or war ... Mortal Sin must be a most terrible thing indeed, to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the eternal punishment of sinners who die with even only one Mortal Sin” (The Catechism: My Catholic Faith, chapter 22, “Mortal Sin”).
As for Venial Sin, the same catechism says: “Although Venial Sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is, nevertheless, a great moral evil, next alone to Mortal Sin. We are prone to look upon Venial Sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that IT IS SECOND ONLY IN EVIL CONSEQUENCE TO MORTAL SIN. In Holy Scripture we see, from many examples, how God regards Venial Sin. Even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished. He was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land [and died at its borders]” (The Catechism: My Catholic Faith, chapter 23, “Venial Sin”).
Tit-For-Tat
As you sow, so shall you reap! Once Adam and Eve rebelled against God, Who was above them, then God allowed those things beneath Adam and Eve to rebel against them also. So it was that war was declared by the lowly concupiscences upon the superior reason and will; so it was that nature and its creatures rebelled against Adam and Eve. They even rebelled against each other! No sooner had he sinned than Adam withdrew and began to accuse the woman whom God has given as companion. All sinners blame others for their misdeeds. Sin also induced a rupture in human society. Not only in the larger family of the human race, but also in the “grass-roots” of each individual family on Earth. The disorder that Adam and Eve had introduced into the world, through their sin, would now spread like wildfire throughout the world. Cain soon murders Abel, and the tone is set for the future, until the end of the world.
The Sins of the Chosen People of God
We are still of course in the Old Testament. As early as the sixth chapter of Genesis the Bible declares that: “God seeing that the wickedness of men was great on the Earth, and that all the thought of their heart was bent upon evil at all times” (Genesis 6:5). These quotations by the way, took years to select. They are carefully chosen. In punishing the evil doing of the offspring of Adam and Eve the Lord decided: “I will destroy man, whom I have created, from the face of the Earth, from man even to beasts, from the creeping thing even to the fowls of the air, for it repents Me that I have made them!” ( Genesis 6:7). Why would God want to destroy His creation? This shows to us the gravity of sin—it is, as already stated above, the greatest evil in the world. We find it hard to get our minds around that idea and we refuse to let that truth penetrate our thick skulls. Yet if we examine the doctrine of Purgatory and look at some of the revelations made by the poor suffering souls in Purgatory, then perhaps we may begin to change our minds.
Sin Doesn’t Pay—Neither Now, Nor Later!
Very early in biblical revelation only, we are told that very few remained faithful to God and His commandments—it was only Noe and his family that remained faithful to the Lord. Consequently, as would happen later with Sodom and Gomorrha, God punished the entire world. There came the massive flood, by which God “destroyed all the substance that was upon the Earth, from man even to beast, and the creeping things and fowls of the air: and they were destroyed from the Earth: and Noe only remained, and they that were with him in the ark” (Genesis 7:23). God washed the world clean with water! With only Noe and his family surviving, God made a covenant with Noe, long before He made a covenant with Abraham. He made an agreement with Noe promising never again to destroy life on Earth by a flood. In the future chastisement, He will cleanse the world with fire.
Hence Our Lady warned at La Salette and Akita: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity! It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! ... Once there was the chastisement by water, but if there is not a returning to God, there will come the chastisement by fire, which will cover the streets of the world with blood! … If men do not return to God, purifying fire will fall from the Heavens on all peoples, and a great part of humanity will be destroyed! … Nations will be annihilated! … It will be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down in order to purify them! … The world is no longer worthy of pardon, but only of fire, destruction and death! … This fire is not that which will fall from the hands of men, but will be hurled directly from the Angels! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful! … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume cities! ... Water and fire will purge and purify the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride! … Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains, cities, etc … Paris will be burned and Marseilles will be swallowed-up!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan). Sister Lucia adds: “The final triumph of Mary’s Heart is certain, and it will be definitive. But it will take place ‘in the end’ ― that is to say, after a terrible purification of sinful mankind in a baptism of fire!”
God Chooses His Chosen People
Finally centuries later, one of Noe’s descendents, Abraham, was called by the Lord to found a great nation, it would become the “Chosen People”, Abraham was followed by Isaac, Isaac by Jacob. And the book of Genesis closes with the death of Jacob, who was renamed Israel, meaning “God is strong”. Jacob’s descendants, the Israelites, were miraculously delivered from the slavery of Egypt by Moses. The Lord multiplied His wonders to set His chosen people free. On their way to the Promised Land, however, these chosen children of God, time and again proved unfaithful to their God.
Forty Years of Manna
The Israelites grumble against Moses and Aaron for bringing them out of the land of Egypt. First they complained that they did not have the fleshpots of Egypt: “as we sat by our fleshpots and ate our fill of bread.” Then the Lord works miracles for them—by His Providence He feeds MILLIONS (it was estimated that around 2.5 to 3.5 million Israelites had left Egypt with Moses; some even estimate that it was a high as 6 million). God sends them manna every day—free food—and they complain, “Our soul is dry, our eyes behold nothing else but manna” (Numbers 11:6). In His anger at these complaints, the Lord, we are told, “the wrath of the Lord being provoked against the people, struck them with an exceeding great plague” (Numbers 11:33). “And the children of Israel ate manna forty years, till they came to a habitable land” (Exodus 16:35).
Sinful Lack of Trust in God
After leaving Egypt the Israelites had passed through the Red Sea, they given manna to eat and water to drink; they were reminded of the Laws of God at Mount Sinai, and had seen many other manifestations proving that it was God who was leading them, but when they finally arrived at the Land of Canaan they still did not trust God. Because of their distrust they were forced to spend 40 years (total) in the wilderness—which received the name of “The Wilderness of Sin”—before they were ready to follow the instructions of God.
The Anger of God
After the spies of the Israelites had spied out the Promised Land, many did not like the reports that the spies brought back: “And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron, saying: ‘Would to God that we had died in Egypt and would to God we may die in this vast wilderness, and that the Lord may not bring us into this land, lest we fall by the sword, and our wives and children be led away captives. Is it not better to return into Egypt?’ And they said one to another: ‘Let us appoint a captain, and let us return into Egypt!’ And when Moses and Aaron heard this, they fell down flat upon the ground before the multitude of the children of Israel.
“But Josue the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephone, who themselves also had viewed the land, rent their garments, and said to all the multitude of the children of Israel: ‘The land which we have gone round is very good! If the Lord be favorable, He will bring us into it, and give us a land flowing with milk and honey. Be not rebellious against the Lord: and fear ye not the people of this land, for we are able to eat them up as bread! All aid is gone from them: the Lord is with us, fear ye not!’
“And when all the multitude cried out, and would have stoned them, the glory of the Lord appeared over the tabernacle of the covenant to all the children of Israel and the Lord said to Moses: ‘How long will this people detract Me? How long will they not believe Me for all the signs that I have wrought before them? I will strike them therefore with pestilence, and will consume them! But thee I will make a ruler over a great nation, and a mightier one than this is!’” (Numbers 14:1-12).
My Way or the Highway
Moses pleads for mercy and eventually gets it—but at a price, for sin always has a price. God tells him that they will punished for their dislike of the Promised Land and would wander in the wilderness until almost all of them will have died—only a few and the descendants that will be born in this time will get to finally enter the Promised Land. God says to Moses: “But yet all the men that have seen my majesty, and the signs that I have done in Egypt, and in the wilderness, and have tempted me now ten times, and have not obeyed my voice, shall not see the land for which I aware to their fathers, neither shall any one of them that hath detracted me behold it. My servant Caleb, who being full of another spirit hath followed Me, I will bring into this land, which he hath gone round: and his seed shall possess it. Tomorrow remove the camp, and return into the wilderness by the way of the Red Sea” (Number 14:22-25).
“And the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying: ‘How long doth this wicked multitude murmur against Me? I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel. Say therefore to them: “As I live, saith the Lord: According as you have spoken in My hearing, so will I do to you. In the wilderness shall your carcasses lie. All you that were numbered from twenty years old and upward, and have murmured against Me, shall not enter into the land, over which I lifted up My hand to make you dwell therein, except Caleb the son of Jephone, and Josue the son of Nun. But your children, of whom you said, that they should be a prey to the enemies, will I bring in: that they may see the land which you have despised. Your carcasses shall lie in the wilderness. Your children shall wander in the desert forty years, and shall bear your fornication, until the carcasses of their fathers be consumed ill the desert, according to the number of the forty days, wherein you viewed the land: a year shall be counted for a day. And forty years you shall receive your iniquities, and shall know My revenge: for as I have spoken, so will I do to all this wicked multitude, that hath risen up together against Me: in this wilderness shall it faint away and die.”’” (Number 14:26-352).
Nothing Changes in the New Testament
There are many more accounts in the Old Testament, showing the gravity of sin by the severe punishments that God inflicts upon sinners—for even though the mercies of God are above all His works (Psalm 144), this does not mean that He trashes His justice, as though the two of them could live together in perfect harmony. However, space does permit us to deal with all those instances. So we move to the New Testament.
The Sin of Rejection of Christ
The most striking incident to befall the Jews, which echoes God’s large scale manner of dealing with them in the Old Testament, occurs with regard to their rejection of the Son of God, Jesus Christ. Our Lord Himself gives the fatal prophecy of where this rejection of Him will lead to: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you that kill the prophets, and stone them that are sent unto you! How often would I have gathered together your children, as the hen gathers her chickens under her wings―and you would not! Behold, your house shall be left to you, desolate. For I say to you, you shall not see Me henceforth till you say: ‘Blessed is He that comes in the Name of the Lord!’” (Matthew 23:37-39). “And as Jesus was going out of the Temple, one of His disciples said to Him: ‘Master, behold what manner of stones and what buildings are here!’ And Jesus answering, said to him: ‘Do you see all these great buildings? There shall not be left a stone upon a stone, that shall not be thrown down!’” (Mark 13:1-2). “For the days shall come upon you, and your enemies shall cast a trench around you, and encompass you all around, and straiten you on every side, and beat you flat to the ground, and your children who are in you! And they shall not leave in you a stone upon a stone―because you have not known the time of your visitation!” (Luke 19:43-44).
God’s Providence Punishes as Christ Prophesied
In the year 66 AD the Jews of Judea rebelled against their Roman masters. In response, the Emperor Nero dispatched an army under the generalship of Vespasian to restore order. By the year 68, resistance in the northern part of the province had been destroyed and the Romans turned their full attention to the conquest of Jerusalem. That same year, the Emperor Nero died by his own hand, creating a power vacuum in Rome. In the resultant chaos, Vespasian was declared Emperor and returned to the Imperial City. It fell to his son, Titus, to lead the remaining army in the assault on Jerusalem. The Roman legions surrounded the city and began to slowly squeeze the life out of the Jewish stronghold. By the year 70, the attackers had breached Jerusalem’s outer walls and began a systematic ransacking of the city. The assault culminated in the burning and destruction of the Temple that served as the center of Judaism. In victory, the Romans slaughtered around a million Jews. Of those sparred from death: thousands more were enslaved and sent to toil in the mines of Egypt, others were dispersed to arenas throughout the Empire to be butchered for the amusement of the public. The Temple’s sacred relics were taken to Rome where they were displayed in celebration of the victory.
God Threatens to Chastise to Save Us from Chastisement
We will finish with a large section from a conference of St. Alphonsus Liguori, where points out that God threatens to chastise in order to save us from chastisement. He quotes Isaias, “Ah, I will comfort Myself over My adversaries: and I will be revenged of My enemies” (Isaias 1.24), and then says: “Such is the language of God, when speaking of punishment and vengeance: He says that He is constrained by His justice to take vengeance on His enemies. But, mark you, He begins with the word “Ah”—this word is an exclamation of grief, by which He would give us to understand, that if He were capable of weeping when about to punish, He would weep bitterly at being compelled to afflict us, His creatures, whom He has loved so dearly as to give up His life through love for us.”
St. Alphonsus continues: “The great Biblical commentator, Cornelius a Lapidé, says: ‘The word “Alas” ‘is uttered by one who is lamenting and not insulting; God signifies by this word that He is grieving, and that He is unwilling to punish sinners’—’But Thou hast mercy upon all, because Thou canst do all things, and overlookest the sins of men for the sake of repentance’ (Wisdom 11:24). No, this God, Who is the Father of mercies, and so much loves us, is not of a disposition to punish and afflict, but rather to pardon and console us. ‘For I know the thoughts that I think towards you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of affliction’ (Jeremias 29.11). But someone will say, since such is His character, why does He now punish us? Or, at least, appear as if He meant to punish us? Why so? Because He wishes to be merciful towards us: this anger which He now displays is all mercy and patience” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
The Love Behind the Threat
“Let us then, my brethren, understand how the Lord at present appears in wrath, not with a view to our punishment, but in order that we may cleanse ourselves of our sins, and thus enable Him to pardon us. The threats of men ordinarily proceed from their pride and weakness; and so, if they have it in their power to take vengeance, then they will not threaten anything, in case they should thereby give their enemies an opportunity of escape. It is only when they lack the power to inflict their vengeance that they resort to using threats, in order to gratify their passion, by awakening at least the fears of their enemies. Not so the threats of which God makes use; on the contrary, their nature is quite different. His threats do not arise from His inability to chastise, because He can be avenged when He wills; but He bears with us in order to see us repentant, and thus exempt from punishment. ‘Thou hast mercy upon all, because Thou canst do all things, and overlookest the sins of men for the sake of repentance’ (Wisdom 11:24)” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
“Neither does He threaten from hatred, in order to torment us with fear; God threatens from love, in order that we may be converted to Him, and thereby escape chastisement: He threatens, because He does not wish to see us lost: He threatens, in sum, because He loves our souls. ‘But Thou sparest all: because they are Thine, O Lord, Who lovest souls’ (Wisdom 11:27). He threatens; but, in spite of this, He bears with us and delays in punishing, because He wishes to see us converted, not lost. ‘The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance’ (2 Peter 3:9). Thus the threats of God are all acts of tenderness, and loving calls of His goodness, by which He means to save us from the punishment which we deserve” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
God Threatens Ninive
“‘Yet forty days,’ exclaimed Jonas, ‘and Ninive shall be destroyed!’ (Jonas 3:4). ‘Wretched Ninivites,’ he cries, ‘the day of your chastisement has come! I announce it to you on the part of God! Know that within forty days Ninive shall be destroyed, and cease to exist!’ But how was it that Ninive did penance and was not destroyed? ‘And God saw their works, that they were turned from their evil way―and God had mercy with regard to the evil which He had said that He would do to them, and He did it not’ (Jonas 3:10). For this Jonas was grieved, and, making lamentation before the Lord, said to Him: ‘I beseech thee, O Lord, is not this what I said, when I was yet in my own country? Therefore I went before to flee into Tharsis! For I know that Thou art a gracious and merciful God, patient, and of much compassion, and easy to forgive evil’ (Jonas 4:2). He then left Ninive, and was screened from the rays of the burning sun by an ivy which God caused to overshadow his head. But how did the Lord next act? He withered the ivy, so that Jonas was so much afflicted that he wished for death. God then said to him, ‘Thou art grieved for the ivy, for which thou hast not labored, nor made it to grow, which in one night came up, and in one night perished ... and shall not I spare Ninive?’ (Jonas 4:10), shall not I pardon the men who are the work of My hands?’” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God).
The Saints Explain
“The destruction which the Lord caused to be held out against Ninive was, according to the explanation of St. Basil, not an actual prophecy, but a simple threat, by which He meant to bring about the conversion of that city. The saint says, that God often appears in wrath because He wishes to deal mercifully with us; and threatens, not with the intention of chastising, but of delivering us from chastisement. St. Augustine adds, that when any one cries out to you “Take care!” it is a sign he does not mean to injure you. And thus exactly does God act in our regard: he threatens us with chastisement, says St. Jerome, not that he means to inflict it, but to spare us if we profit by the warning. You, O Lord, says St. Augustine, are severe, but then most so when You wish to save us; You threaten, but in so threatening You have no other object than to bring us to repentance. The Lord could chastise sinners without warning by a sudden death, which would not leave them time for repentance; but no, He displays His wrath, He brandishes His scourge, in order that He may see them reformed, not punished. The Lord said to Jeremias: ‘You shall say to them: “It may be, that they will hearken and be converted everyone from his evil way: that I may repent of the evil which I think to do to them.” Go, He says, and tell the sinners if they wish to hear you, that if they cease from their sins, I shall spare them the chastisements which I intended to have inflicted on them (Jeremias 26:2-3).” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
You Make the Choice—You Pay the Price
“And now, my brethren, mark my words. The Lord addresses you in a similar way out of my mouth. If you amend, He will revoke the sentence of punishment. St. Jerome says: ‘God is angry, not with us, but with our sins’ and St. John Chrysostom adds, that if we remember our sins God will forget them. He desires that we being humbled should reform, and crave pardon of Him. ‘Because they are humbled I will not destroy them’ (2 Paralipomenon 12:7).” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
“But, in order to amend, we must be led to it by fear of punishment, otherwise, we never would be brought to change our lives. True it is, God protects him who places hope in His mercy. He is the protector of all who trust in Him (Psalm 17:31). But he who hopes in the mercy of the Lord is always the man who fears His justice. They that fear the Lord have hoped in the Lord: He is their protector and their helper (Psalm 13:11). The Lord often speaks of the rigor of His judgments, and of Hell, and of the great number who go there. ‘Be not afraid of them who kill the body ... but fear Him who, after He has killed, has power to cast into Hell’ (Luke 12:5). ‘Broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who enter that way’ (Matthew 7:13). And why does the Lord so often speak thus? In order that fear may keep us from vice, and from the passions, and from occasions of sin; and that thus we may reasonably hope for salvation, which is only for the innocent, or the penitent, who hope and fear” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
Summary
Thus we see the terrible threats that God makes—but He makes them in order to bring about a change of life and a repentance of soul, which is proved by acts of penance. Yet these threats are not idle threats that He does not carry out—the opening part of articles showed just a few of the many times God HAS carried out His threats. Therefore, it comes down to us—will we listen and change, or will we ignore His threats and be chastised. The ultimate result is in our hands. Let it not be said of us: “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in pride!” (Job 24:23). Remember, sin is the greatest evil in the world, that is why the chastisements are so great. Unless we drill that into our skulls and minds, we will fool ourselves into thinking sin to be of little or no consequence. Hell is full of such persons. Purgatory too!
Sometimes―and wrongly so―we separate sicknesses of the body from sicknesses of the soul. However, they are often closely related. The body can affect the soul―and the soul can affect the body. Some bodily sicknesses are life-threatening and can lead to death; other sickness do not lead to death. Similarly, some sins threaten our eternal life and can lead to eternal ‘death’ in Hell. Holy Scripture says that there is “a sin which is not to death, and there is a sin unto death” (1 John 5:16) ― we refer to these as Venial Sin and Mortal Sin. “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) … “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56) … “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21) … “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15).
In the Old Testament, God speaks of giving punishments of physical sickness to those who sin and refuse to obey His commandments: “But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you walk contrary to Me, and will not listen to Me, I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins … I will send the pestilence in the midst of you … I will chastise you with seven plagues for your sins! (Leviticus 26:14-28). In the New Testament, we see “a certain man, a magician, a false prophet, a Jew, whose name was Bar-jesu, who was with the proconsul Sergius Paulus, a prudent man. He sending for Barnabas and Saul, desired to hear the word of God. But Elymas the magician (for so his name is interpreted) withstood them, seeking to turn away the proconsul from the Faith. Then Saul, otherwise Paul, filled with the Holy Ghost, looking upon him said: ‘O child of the devil, full of all guile, and of all deceit, enemy of all justice! You cease not to pervert the right ways of the Lord! And now behold, the hand of the Lord is upon thee, and you shall be blind, not seeing the sun for a time!’ And immediately there fell a mist and darkness upon him, and going about, he sought someone to lead him by the hand” (Acts 13:7-11).
We see Our Lord connect ill-health with sin when He cures the man who had been sick for 38 years―afterwards warning him: “Behold you are made whole! Sin no more! Lest some worse thing happen to you!” (John 5:1-14). We see St. Zachary―the father of St. John the Baptist―being struck dumb for having disbelieved St. Gabriel the Archangel’s message from God that Zachary’s wife, Elizabeth, would conceive a child (John the Baptist) despite her old age: “And the angel said to him: ‘I am Gabriel, who stands before God: and I am sent to speak to thee, and to bring thee these good tidings! And behold, thou shalt be dumb, and shalt not be able to speak until the day wherein these things shall come to pass, because thou hast not believed my words, which shall be fulfilled in their time!’” (Luke 1:19-20). Holy Scripture tells us: “By one man [Adam] sin entered into this world, and by sin death!” (Romans 5:12) ― and the greatest sickness, the ultimate sickness of the body is nothing other than death.
He Came to Heal
Our Lord came to heal the sick—both the physically sick and more importantly the spiritually sick: “I am come that they may have life!” (John 10:10) … “I am the Way and the Life” (John 14:6) … “And answering, Jesus said to them: ‘Go and relate to John what you have heard and seen―the blind see; the lame walk; the lepers are made clean; the deaf hear; the dead rise again; and the Gospel is preached to the poor!’” (Luke 7:22).
“Jesus said to them: ‘They that are healthy have no need of a physician, but they that are sick. For I came not to call the just, but sinners!’” (Mark 2:17). Yet there is a connection between the diseases of the body and the diseases of the soul. Is this merely symbolic, or is there a real connection between the two? Actually, it both symbolic and real.
Symbolism of Sickness and Sin
Fr. Faber, in his book Growth in Holiness, clearly relates sin with sickness in a symbolic way: “The diseases and evils of the body are in a great degree typical of the miseries and misfortunes of the soul. If we seek the correlative of lukewarmness, we shall find it in blindness. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself. It is a judicial blindness, because it once saw better itself, and now does not remember either what it saw, or that it ever saw at all” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, ch. 25).
Our Lord Relates Sickness to Sin
“Jesus entered into Capharnaum … and it was heard that He was in the house. … And they came to Him, bringing one sick of the palsy, who was carried by four men. And when they could not offer him unto Him, because of the multitude, they then uncovered the roof where Jesus was, and, opening it, they let down the bed wherein the man sick of the palsy lay. And when Jesus had seen their faith, He said to the sick of the palsy: ‘Son, thy sins are forgiven thee!’ And there were some of the Scribes sitting there, and thinking in their hearts: ‘Why does this man speak thus? He blasphemes! Who can forgive sins, but God only?’ Which Jesus presently knowing in his spirit, that they so thought within themselves, said to them: ‘Why do you think these things in your hearts? Which is easier to say to the sick of the palsy: “Thy sins are forgiven thee!” or to say: “Arise, take up thy bed, and walk!”? But so that you may know that the Son of man has power on Earth to forgive sins, (He said to the sick of the palsy,) I say to thee: “Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house!”’ And immediately he arose; and taking up his bed, went his way in the sight of all―so that all wondered and glorified God” (Mark 2:1-12).
Here we see an implied association between sin and sickness. A sick man was to be physically cured of his palsy, yet Our Lord cures a greater sickness, the sickness of sin, by telling the sick man: “Son, thy sins are forgiven thee!” He actually gives the sick man something greater than a physical cure—He gives him a spiritual cure. Yet the two things are tantalizingly tied together. Was this mere chance? No, for we see this connection elsewhere in Scripture.
Poolside Cure with a Warning
“Now there is at Jerusalem a pond, called Probatica, which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of sick, of blind, of lame, of withered; waiting for the moving of the water. And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under. And there was a certain man there that had been under his infirmity for thirty-eight years. When Jesus had seen him lying there, and knew that he had been there a long time, He said to him: ‘Do you want to be made whole?’ The infirm man answered him: ‘Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pond. For whilst I am coming, another goes down before me!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Arise, take up thy bed, and walk!’ And immediately the man was made whole, and he took up his bed, and walked. And it was the Sabbath that day. The Jews therefore said to him that was healed: ‘It is the Sabbath! It is not lawful for thee to take up thy bed!’ He answered them: ‘He that made me whole, He said to me, “Take up thy bed, and walk!”’ They asked him therefore: ‘Who is that man who said to thee, “Take up thy bed, and walk?”’ But he who was healed, knew not who it was―for Jesus went aside from the multitude standing in the place. Afterwards, Jesus found him in the Temple, and said to him: ‘Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!’” (John 5:1-14).
Sin No More, Or Else….
Here, Our Lord is clearly telling the healed man that the many years of sickness were due to his sickness of soul—the sickness of sin. Our Lord heals him—both in body and soul—but warns him that worse things will befall him if he does not cease to sin. For as St. Paul warns us: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked!” (Galatians 6:7) … “For the wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) ... “The sting of death is sin!” (1 Corinthians 15:56). Even the Pharao of Egypt knew this, as he said to Moses and Aaron: “Forgive me my sin this time also, and pray to the Lord your God, that He take away from me this death” (Exodus 10:17). The ‘disease’ of death is a result of the ‘disease’ of sin, as St. Paul says, speaking of Adam: “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). “The soul that sins, the same shall die” (Ezechiel 18:20) “Everyone shall die for his own sin” (Deuteronomy 24:16).
However…
“Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? … If the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live, and shall not die! … When the wicked turns himself away from his wickedness, which he has wrought, and does judgment and justice, then he shall save his soul alive! ... Because he considers and turns away himself from all his iniquities which he has wrought, then he shall surely live and not die” (Ezechiel 18:21-28).
God, through His Church, has given man time to “do penance for all his sins which he has committed.” Let us profit from this time—as the Church will say a little later in her liturgy: “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). These words are at the core of the Lenten season. Let it not be said of us, on the Day of Judgment: “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in pride” (Job 24:23). Let us not stand proudly, like the Pharisee in the Temple, extolling ourselves and the things that have done, whilst saying: “O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers―as also is this publican!” (Luke 18:11). Instead, let us be like the Publican, who was behind the Pharisee, and “would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner!’” (Luke 18:13).
Too Much Complacency
It is amazing how we can live and shut-out all thoughts of death—as though the ‘disease’ of death will not strike us! St. Alphonsus Liguori, the great Doctor of the Church, says: “‘It is appointed unto men once to die’ (Hebrews 9:27). The decree has been passed for each of us―we must all die! St. Cyprian says that we are all born with the halter on the neck! Hence, every step we make brings us nearer to the gibbet. For each of us the gibbet shall be the last sickness, which will end in death. As your name, brethren, has then been inserted in the registry of Baptism, so it shall be one day written in the record of the dead. As, in speaking of your ancestors, you say: ‘God be merciful to my father, to my uncle, or to my brother!’, so others shall say the same of you when you shall be in the other world; and as you have often heard the death-bell toll for many, so others shall hear it toll for you” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost).
Neglect in Repenting
In another of his memorable sermons, St. Alphonsus Liguori, warns against neglect in putting things right with God: “Miserable the sick man who takes to his bed in the state of mortal sin! He that lives in sin till death shall die in sin! ‘You shall die in your sin!’ (John 8:21). It is true that, in whatsoever hour the sinner is converted, God promises to pardon him; but to no sinner has God promised the grace of conversion at the hour of death. ‘Seek the Lord while He may be found!’ (Isaias 4:6). Then, there is for some sinners a time when they shall seek God and shall not find him. ‘You shall seek Me, and shall not find Me!’ (John 7:34). The unhappy beings will go to confession at the hour of death; they will promise and weep, and ask mercy of God, but without knowing what they do. A man who sees himself under the feet of a foe pointing a dagger to his throat, will shed tears, ask pardon, and promise to serve his enemy as a slave during the remainder of his life. But, will the enemy believe him? No―he will feel convinced that his words are not sincere that his object is to escape from his hands, and that, should he be pardoned, he will become more hostile than ever. In like manner, how can God pardon the dying sinner, when He sees that all his acts of sorrow, and all his promises, proceed not from the heart, but from a dread of death and of approaching damnation” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Ninth Sunday after Pentecost).
Keep Away From the ‘Diseased’
In another sermon, St. Alphonsus warns us against the dangers mixing with ‘spiritually diseased’ or sinful people: “The Gospel relates that ten lepers of a certain town met Jesus Christ, and begged Him to heal the leprosy under which they labored. The Lord told them go and present themselves to the priests of the Temple; but before they reached the Temple they were cured. Now it may be asked why our Savior, who could heal them in an instant, wished them to go to the priests, and healed them on the way. A certain author (Anthony of Lisbon) says that Jesus Christ foresaw that, had He cured them on the spot, they, by remaining in the place and conversing with the other lepers, from whom they took the leprosy, should easily relapse into the same disease. Therefore, He first wished them to depart from the place and then healed them. Whatever may be thought of this reason, let us come to the moral sense which may be deduced from it. The leprosy resembles sin. As the leprosy is a contagious disease, so the bad habits of the wicked infect others who associate with them. Hence, the leper who wishes to be cured shall never be healed unless he separates from bad companions. He that keeps company with robbers soon becomes a thief. In this discourse I shall show, that, to lead a good life, it is necessary to avoid bad companions” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost).
Our Lord Comes to Separate from Sin and the World
Holy Scripture echoes this in many passages—here are only several: Jesus said: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided―three against two, and two against three!” (Luke 12:51-52). “Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14). “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:11). “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, so that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer!” (Romans 6:6).
“As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). “A hard heart shall fear evil at the last―and he that loves danger shall perish in it” (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). “Know also this, that in the last days shall come dangerous times! Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God: having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5) ― for sin, just like disease, can be highly contagious!
“It is also necessary to remark that the promise of Jesus Christ, to hear those who pray to Him, does not extend to all the temporal favors which we ask—such as a plentiful harvest, a victory in a law-suit, or a deliverance from sickness, or from certain persecutions. These favors God grants to those who pray for them; but only when they are conducive to their spiritual welfare. Otherwise He refuses them; and He refuses them because He loves us, and because He knows that they would be injurious to our souls. ‘A physician,’ says St. Augustine, ‘knows better than his patient what is useful for him.’ The saint adds that God refuses to some, through mercy, what He grants to others as a chastisement. Hence St. John Damascene says that sometimes, when we do not obtain the graces which we ask, we receive, by not receiving them; because it is better for us not to receive than to receive them. We often ask poison which would cause our death. How many are there who, had they died in the sickness or poverty with which they had been afflicted, should be saved? But because they recovered their health, or because they were raised to wealth and honors, they became proud and forgot God, and thus have been damned!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Easter).
“What is foolish in the eyes of the world—that is, crosses, sickness, contempt and ignominies—Jesus Christ holds in great estimation!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost).
“But notwithstanding the refusal of sinners to return to God, he does not cease to continue to call them by so many interior inspirations, remorse of conscience, and terrors of chastisements. Thus, beloved Christians, God has spoken to you, and, seeing that you disregarded His words, He has had recourse to scourges; He has called you to repentance by such a persecution, by temporal losses, by the death of a relative, by sickness which has brought you to the brink of the grave.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Sixth Sunday after Pentecost).
Arguing With the ‘Doctor’
“Some penitents argue with their confessor, and endeavor to make him adopt their own opinion. This is the cause of grief to spiritual directors. But the Apostle Paul says, ‘this is not expedient for you’ because, when the confessor finds that you do not obey him, and that it is only with difficulty he can get you to walk in the straight path, he will give up the direction of your soul. How deplorable the condition of a vessel which a pilot refuses to steer! How miserable the state of a sick man who is abandoned by his physician! When a patient refuses to obey, or to take the medicine which has been prescribed, when he eats and drinks what he pleases, then the physician abandons him, and allows him to follow his own caprice. But, what hope can be entertained of the recovery of such a patient?” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Easter).
Sin Leads to Death
“By the envy of the devil, death came into the world!” (Wisdom 2:24). “For the wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) ... “The sting of death is sin!” (1 Corinthians 15:56). Even the Pharao of Egypt knew this, as he said to Moses and Aaron: “Forgive me my sin this time also, and pray to the Lord your God, that He take away from me this death!” (Exodus 10:17). The ‘disease’ of death is a result of the ‘disease’ of sin, as St. Paul says, speaking of Adam: “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned!” (Romans 5:12). “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:20). “Everyone shall die for his own sin!” (Deuteronomy 24:16).
When Will We Die?
We have no problems admitting and accepting that we will one day die—but it hardly the predominant preoccupation of our daily life! Yet it should be—for this is the recommendation of so many spiritual writers: that we should always have our final end before our eyes. Each passing day is a step closer to death. We distract ourselves, from this inevitable trip to the Judgment Seat of God, by filling our minds with so much secondary trivia—to which we falsely or superficially attach so much importance.
Don’t Be Presumptuous!
Yet Our Lord chides us, as He chided Martha, saying: “But one thing is necessary!” So many souls would beg to differ, and might say to Him: “And they began all at once to make excuse. The first said to him: ‘I have bought a farm, and I must needs go out and see it! I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to try them! I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come!’” (Luke 14:18-20). Yet Our Lord warns us in this parable: “The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: ‘What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?’ And he said: ‘This will I do―I will pull down my barns, and will build greater; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods! And I will say to my soul: “Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years! Take thy rest! Eat, drink, make good cheer!”’ But God said to him: ‘Thou fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee: and whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?’” (Luke 12:16-20).
Time to Prepare While There is Still Time
On average, since 1950, around 55 million to 60 million people die each year―which translates to 1 in every 145 persons on average. The forecasted death rate per 1,000 people varies from country to country. It is estimated that almost 18 people per 1,000 (1 out 55) will die in South Africa, whereas the figure is almost 9 people per 1,000 (1 out of 110) in the USA. Ultimately, everyone dies. Some expect to die this year—others do not! Let us therefore prepare for this Lent as if knowing it to be our last—for many it will be, as let us begin this time of conversion to God as if we were sure that another would never be granted to us. “Bring forth, therefore, fruits worthy of penance―for now the axe is laid to the root of the tree! Every tree, therefore, that brings not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire” (Matthew 3:8-10).
Our Lady warns that if sin increases and penance is not done, then the death rate will “shoot through the roof”! “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity! It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! ... If men do not return to God, purifying fire will fall from the Heavens on all peoples, and a great part of humanity will be destroyed! … Nations will be annihilated!”
Diseased Trees
A tree that cannot bring forth good fruit is a tree that is weak, undernourished or diseased. If we are not bringing forth the fruit that God expects of us, then we too are weak, undernourished or diseased in the spiritual life. Our Lord tells us that a tree is known by its fruits--“Either make the tree good and its fruit good; or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil! For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33). How much bad fruit are we producing?
How is it That we Produce Bad Fruit?
If we are speaking of trees and fruit, then we must also go to the root of things! Both the tree and its fruits are preceded by the seed and its roots. Children are sometimes born with a genetic disorder that comes from their parents—the bad fruits that we produce can also be traced to our parents: our first parents, Adam and Eve. Coincidentally, there were trees involved in their lives! Adam and Even were told that they could eat of the fruit of all the trees in the Paradise of Pleasure: “And the Lord God had planted a paradise of pleasure from the beginning: wherein he placed man whom he had formed. And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of: the tree of life also in the midst of paradise: and the tree of knowledge of good and evil … And the Lord God took man, and put him into the paradise of pleasure, to dress it, and to keep it. And He commanded him, saying: ‘Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat: but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” (Genesis 2:8-9; 2:15-17).
Original Bad Fruit
We all know what happened next! Adam and Eve produced bad fruit by eating the wrong fruit—they fruit they had been expressly commanded not to eat. This was a grievous sin—it is what we call Original Sin. This sin is passed onto us like a genetic disorder. Every person enters life with the handicap of Original Sin—which is not a positive thing, like a stain, but it is a negative thing, meaning the absence of something. Original Sin is the absence of sanctifying grace (which perfects human nature) and the absence of the gift of integrity—which is equivalent to exemption from concupiscence. It is called “integrity” because it effected a harmonious relation between flesh and spirit by completely subordinating man’s lower passions to his reason, and reason, in turn, is subordinated to Divine grace.
Pride and Disobedience
The sin of Adam and Eve is a sin of pride and disobedience—pride is the root of disobedience. Our first parents consciously placed themselves in opposition to God by violating his explicit precept. However, even before they committed the external sin of disobedience they had already sinned in their hearts by giving in to the devil’s suggestions. All sin begins inside. All sin begins with pride. Pride is the root of all sin. “Because his heart is departed from Him that made him: for pride is the beginning of all sin” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). “The beginning of the pride of man, is to fall off from God” (Ecclesiasticus 10:14). They wished to be as the devil promised them, “To be like gods knowing both good and evil.” In other words, so the demon promised them, they wanted to displace God in deciding between good and evil. Their external eating of the forbidden fruit was only a manifestation of an interior refusal of dependence on God. And in this way they reversed the true relationship between man and the source of his being.
Is God “short-changing”?
Holy Scripture describes the relationship between God and man, as, not only one of dependence on God, but of true friendship with God. Adam and Eve had received everything from the Lord. He wanted them to be happy. Yet, by sinning, they gave into the doubt of questioning God’s goodness. Inspired by the evil one they actually wondered if maybe, just maybe, God was withholding something from them. Perhaps the devil suggested that God was afraid that they would be happy like Himself. That was the point of the devil’s temptation. “No”, he told Eve, “you shall not die the death. For God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened: and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:4-5). Thus the devil perverted the very concept of God and depicted God as jealous, self-interested and concerned only with protecting Himself from His creatures. This is common to all sin—untruth or the twisting of truth. The devil, whom Our Lord calls the “father of lies”, is forever trying to make evil look like something good, and portrays good as something evil. “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
Sin Changes Everything
Once they had sinned, Adam and Eve radically changed. Even before they were driven out of Paradise, or suffered the death, with which they had been threatened, they shrank away from familiarity with God. We are told, “Adam and his wife hid themselves from the face of the Lord God, amidst the trees of Paradise” (Genesis 3:8). The sinner is afraid of God. He had better be! It is not for nothing that the Catechism calls sin the greatest evil in the world! “Mortal Sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, and a greater evil than disease, or war ... Mortal Sin must be a most terrible thing indeed, to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the eternal punishment of sinners who die with even only one Mortal Sin” (The Catechism: My Catholic Faith, chapter 22, “Mortal Sin”).
As for Venial Sin, the same catechism says: “Although Venial Sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is, nevertheless, a great moral evil, next alone to Mortal Sin. We are prone to look upon Venial Sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that IT IS SECOND ONLY IN EVIL CONSEQUENCE TO MORTAL SIN. In Holy Scripture we see, from many examples, how God regards Venial Sin. Even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished. He was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land [and died at its borders]” (The Catechism: My Catholic Faith, chapter 23, “Venial Sin”).
Tit-For-Tat
As you sow, so shall you reap! Once Adam and Eve rebelled against God, Who was above them, then God allowed those things beneath Adam and Eve to rebel against them also. So it was that war was declared by the lowly concupiscences upon the superior reason and will; so it was that nature and its creatures rebelled against Adam and Eve. They even rebelled against each other! No sooner had he sinned than Adam withdrew and began to accuse the woman whom God has given as companion. All sinners blame others for their misdeeds. Sin also induced a rupture in human society. Not only in the larger family of the human race, but also in the “grass-roots” of each individual family on Earth. The disorder that Adam and Eve had introduced into the world, through their sin, would now spread like wildfire throughout the world. Cain soon murders Abel, and the tone is set for the future, until the end of the world.
The Sins of the Chosen People of God
We are still of course in the Old Testament. As early as the sixth chapter of Genesis the Bible declares that: “God seeing that the wickedness of men was great on the Earth, and that all the thought of their heart was bent upon evil at all times” (Genesis 6:5). These quotations by the way, took years to select. They are carefully chosen. In punishing the evil doing of the offspring of Adam and Eve the Lord decided: “I will destroy man, whom I have created, from the face of the Earth, from man even to beasts, from the creeping thing even to the fowls of the air, for it repents Me that I have made them!” ( Genesis 6:7). Why would God want to destroy His creation? This shows to us the gravity of sin—it is, as already stated above, the greatest evil in the world. We find it hard to get our minds around that idea and we refuse to let that truth penetrate our thick skulls. Yet if we examine the doctrine of Purgatory and look at some of the revelations made by the poor suffering souls in Purgatory, then perhaps we may begin to change our minds.
Sin Doesn’t Pay—Neither Now, Nor Later!
Very early in biblical revelation only, we are told that very few remained faithful to God and His commandments—it was only Noe and his family that remained faithful to the Lord. Consequently, as would happen later with Sodom and Gomorrha, God punished the entire world. There came the massive flood, by which God “destroyed all the substance that was upon the Earth, from man even to beast, and the creeping things and fowls of the air: and they were destroyed from the Earth: and Noe only remained, and they that were with him in the ark” (Genesis 7:23). God washed the world clean with water! With only Noe and his family surviving, God made a covenant with Noe, long before He made a covenant with Abraham. He made an agreement with Noe promising never again to destroy life on Earth by a flood. In the future chastisement, He will cleanse the world with fire.
Hence Our Lady warned at La Salette and Akita: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity! It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! ... Once there was the chastisement by water, but if there is not a returning to God, there will come the chastisement by fire, which will cover the streets of the world with blood! … If men do not return to God, purifying fire will fall from the Heavens on all peoples, and a great part of humanity will be destroyed! … Nations will be annihilated! … It will be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down in order to purify them! … The world is no longer worthy of pardon, but only of fire, destruction and death! … This fire is not that which will fall from the hands of men, but will be hurled directly from the Angels! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful! … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume cities! ... Water and fire will purge and purify the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride! … Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains, cities, etc … Paris will be burned and Marseilles will be swallowed-up!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan). Sister Lucia adds: “The final triumph of Mary’s Heart is certain, and it will be definitive. But it will take place ‘in the end’ ― that is to say, after a terrible purification of sinful mankind in a baptism of fire!”
God Chooses His Chosen People
Finally centuries later, one of Noe’s descendents, Abraham, was called by the Lord to found a great nation, it would become the “Chosen People”, Abraham was followed by Isaac, Isaac by Jacob. And the book of Genesis closes with the death of Jacob, who was renamed Israel, meaning “God is strong”. Jacob’s descendants, the Israelites, were miraculously delivered from the slavery of Egypt by Moses. The Lord multiplied His wonders to set His chosen people free. On their way to the Promised Land, however, these chosen children of God, time and again proved unfaithful to their God.
Forty Years of Manna
The Israelites grumble against Moses and Aaron for bringing them out of the land of Egypt. First they complained that they did not have the fleshpots of Egypt: “as we sat by our fleshpots and ate our fill of bread.” Then the Lord works miracles for them—by His Providence He feeds MILLIONS (it was estimated that around 2.5 to 3.5 million Israelites had left Egypt with Moses; some even estimate that it was a high as 6 million). God sends them manna every day—free food—and they complain, “Our soul is dry, our eyes behold nothing else but manna” (Numbers 11:6). In His anger at these complaints, the Lord, we are told, “the wrath of the Lord being provoked against the people, struck them with an exceeding great plague” (Numbers 11:33). “And the children of Israel ate manna forty years, till they came to a habitable land” (Exodus 16:35).
Sinful Lack of Trust in God
After leaving Egypt the Israelites had passed through the Red Sea, they given manna to eat and water to drink; they were reminded of the Laws of God at Mount Sinai, and had seen many other manifestations proving that it was God who was leading them, but when they finally arrived at the Land of Canaan they still did not trust God. Because of their distrust they were forced to spend 40 years (total) in the wilderness—which received the name of “The Wilderness of Sin”—before they were ready to follow the instructions of God.
The Anger of God
After the spies of the Israelites had spied out the Promised Land, many did not like the reports that the spies brought back: “And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron, saying: ‘Would to God that we had died in Egypt and would to God we may die in this vast wilderness, and that the Lord may not bring us into this land, lest we fall by the sword, and our wives and children be led away captives. Is it not better to return into Egypt?’ And they said one to another: ‘Let us appoint a captain, and let us return into Egypt!’ And when Moses and Aaron heard this, they fell down flat upon the ground before the multitude of the children of Israel.
“But Josue the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephone, who themselves also had viewed the land, rent their garments, and said to all the multitude of the children of Israel: ‘The land which we have gone round is very good! If the Lord be favorable, He will bring us into it, and give us a land flowing with milk and honey. Be not rebellious against the Lord: and fear ye not the people of this land, for we are able to eat them up as bread! All aid is gone from them: the Lord is with us, fear ye not!’
“And when all the multitude cried out, and would have stoned them, the glory of the Lord appeared over the tabernacle of the covenant to all the children of Israel and the Lord said to Moses: ‘How long will this people detract Me? How long will they not believe Me for all the signs that I have wrought before them? I will strike them therefore with pestilence, and will consume them! But thee I will make a ruler over a great nation, and a mightier one than this is!’” (Numbers 14:1-12).
My Way or the Highway
Moses pleads for mercy and eventually gets it—but at a price, for sin always has a price. God tells him that they will punished for their dislike of the Promised Land and would wander in the wilderness until almost all of them will have died—only a few and the descendants that will be born in this time will get to finally enter the Promised Land. God says to Moses: “But yet all the men that have seen my majesty, and the signs that I have done in Egypt, and in the wilderness, and have tempted me now ten times, and have not obeyed my voice, shall not see the land for which I aware to their fathers, neither shall any one of them that hath detracted me behold it. My servant Caleb, who being full of another spirit hath followed Me, I will bring into this land, which he hath gone round: and his seed shall possess it. Tomorrow remove the camp, and return into the wilderness by the way of the Red Sea” (Number 14:22-25).
“And the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying: ‘How long doth this wicked multitude murmur against Me? I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel. Say therefore to them: “As I live, saith the Lord: According as you have spoken in My hearing, so will I do to you. In the wilderness shall your carcasses lie. All you that were numbered from twenty years old and upward, and have murmured against Me, shall not enter into the land, over which I lifted up My hand to make you dwell therein, except Caleb the son of Jephone, and Josue the son of Nun. But your children, of whom you said, that they should be a prey to the enemies, will I bring in: that they may see the land which you have despised. Your carcasses shall lie in the wilderness. Your children shall wander in the desert forty years, and shall bear your fornication, until the carcasses of their fathers be consumed ill the desert, according to the number of the forty days, wherein you viewed the land: a year shall be counted for a day. And forty years you shall receive your iniquities, and shall know My revenge: for as I have spoken, so will I do to all this wicked multitude, that hath risen up together against Me: in this wilderness shall it faint away and die.”’” (Number 14:26-352).
Nothing Changes in the New Testament
There are many more accounts in the Old Testament, showing the gravity of sin by the severe punishments that God inflicts upon sinners—for even though the mercies of God are above all His works (Psalm 144), this does not mean that He trashes His justice, as though the two of them could live together in perfect harmony. However, space does permit us to deal with all those instances. So we move to the New Testament.
The Sin of Rejection of Christ
The most striking incident to befall the Jews, which echoes God’s large scale manner of dealing with them in the Old Testament, occurs with regard to their rejection of the Son of God, Jesus Christ. Our Lord Himself gives the fatal prophecy of where this rejection of Him will lead to: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you that kill the prophets, and stone them that are sent unto you! How often would I have gathered together your children, as the hen gathers her chickens under her wings―and you would not! Behold, your house shall be left to you, desolate. For I say to you, you shall not see Me henceforth till you say: ‘Blessed is He that comes in the Name of the Lord!’” (Matthew 23:37-39). “And as Jesus was going out of the Temple, one of His disciples said to Him: ‘Master, behold what manner of stones and what buildings are here!’ And Jesus answering, said to him: ‘Do you see all these great buildings? There shall not be left a stone upon a stone, that shall not be thrown down!’” (Mark 13:1-2). “For the days shall come upon you, and your enemies shall cast a trench around you, and encompass you all around, and straiten you on every side, and beat you flat to the ground, and your children who are in you! And they shall not leave in you a stone upon a stone―because you have not known the time of your visitation!” (Luke 19:43-44).
God’s Providence Punishes as Christ Prophesied
In the year 66 AD the Jews of Judea rebelled against their Roman masters. In response, the Emperor Nero dispatched an army under the generalship of Vespasian to restore order. By the year 68, resistance in the northern part of the province had been destroyed and the Romans turned their full attention to the conquest of Jerusalem. That same year, the Emperor Nero died by his own hand, creating a power vacuum in Rome. In the resultant chaos, Vespasian was declared Emperor and returned to the Imperial City. It fell to his son, Titus, to lead the remaining army in the assault on Jerusalem. The Roman legions surrounded the city and began to slowly squeeze the life out of the Jewish stronghold. By the year 70, the attackers had breached Jerusalem’s outer walls and began a systematic ransacking of the city. The assault culminated in the burning and destruction of the Temple that served as the center of Judaism. In victory, the Romans slaughtered around a million Jews. Of those sparred from death: thousands more were enslaved and sent to toil in the mines of Egypt, others were dispersed to arenas throughout the Empire to be butchered for the amusement of the public. The Temple’s sacred relics were taken to Rome where they were displayed in celebration of the victory.
God Threatens to Chastise to Save Us from Chastisement
We will finish with a large section from a conference of St. Alphonsus Liguori, where points out that God threatens to chastise in order to save us from chastisement. He quotes Isaias, “Ah, I will comfort Myself over My adversaries: and I will be revenged of My enemies” (Isaias 1.24), and then says: “Such is the language of God, when speaking of punishment and vengeance: He says that He is constrained by His justice to take vengeance on His enemies. But, mark you, He begins with the word “Ah”—this word is an exclamation of grief, by which He would give us to understand, that if He were capable of weeping when about to punish, He would weep bitterly at being compelled to afflict us, His creatures, whom He has loved so dearly as to give up His life through love for us.”
St. Alphonsus continues: “The great Biblical commentator, Cornelius a Lapidé, says: ‘The word “Alas” ‘is uttered by one who is lamenting and not insulting; God signifies by this word that He is grieving, and that He is unwilling to punish sinners’—’But Thou hast mercy upon all, because Thou canst do all things, and overlookest the sins of men for the sake of repentance’ (Wisdom 11:24). No, this God, Who is the Father of mercies, and so much loves us, is not of a disposition to punish and afflict, but rather to pardon and console us. ‘For I know the thoughts that I think towards you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of affliction’ (Jeremias 29.11). But someone will say, since such is His character, why does He now punish us? Or, at least, appear as if He meant to punish us? Why so? Because He wishes to be merciful towards us: this anger which He now displays is all mercy and patience” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
The Love Behind the Threat
“Let us then, my brethren, understand how the Lord at present appears in wrath, not with a view to our punishment, but in order that we may cleanse ourselves of our sins, and thus enable Him to pardon us. The threats of men ordinarily proceed from their pride and weakness; and so, if they have it in their power to take vengeance, then they will not threaten anything, in case they should thereby give their enemies an opportunity of escape. It is only when they lack the power to inflict their vengeance that they resort to using threats, in order to gratify their passion, by awakening at least the fears of their enemies. Not so the threats of which God makes use; on the contrary, their nature is quite different. His threats do not arise from His inability to chastise, because He can be avenged when He wills; but He bears with us in order to see us repentant, and thus exempt from punishment. ‘Thou hast mercy upon all, because Thou canst do all things, and overlookest the sins of men for the sake of repentance’ (Wisdom 11:24)” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
“Neither does He threaten from hatred, in order to torment us with fear; God threatens from love, in order that we may be converted to Him, and thereby escape chastisement: He threatens, because He does not wish to see us lost: He threatens, in sum, because He loves our souls. ‘But Thou sparest all: because they are Thine, O Lord, Who lovest souls’ (Wisdom 11:27). He threatens; but, in spite of this, He bears with us and delays in punishing, because He wishes to see us converted, not lost. ‘The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance’ (2 Peter 3:9). Thus the threats of God are all acts of tenderness, and loving calls of His goodness, by which He means to save us from the punishment which we deserve” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
God Threatens Ninive
“‘Yet forty days,’ exclaimed Jonas, ‘and Ninive shall be destroyed!’ (Jonas 3:4). ‘Wretched Ninivites,’ he cries, ‘the day of your chastisement has come! I announce it to you on the part of God! Know that within forty days Ninive shall be destroyed, and cease to exist!’ But how was it that Ninive did penance and was not destroyed? ‘And God saw their works, that they were turned from their evil way―and God had mercy with regard to the evil which He had said that He would do to them, and He did it not’ (Jonas 3:10). For this Jonas was grieved, and, making lamentation before the Lord, said to Him: ‘I beseech thee, O Lord, is not this what I said, when I was yet in my own country? Therefore I went before to flee into Tharsis! For I know that Thou art a gracious and merciful God, patient, and of much compassion, and easy to forgive evil’ (Jonas 4:2). He then left Ninive, and was screened from the rays of the burning sun by an ivy which God caused to overshadow his head. But how did the Lord next act? He withered the ivy, so that Jonas was so much afflicted that he wished for death. God then said to him, ‘Thou art grieved for the ivy, for which thou hast not labored, nor made it to grow, which in one night came up, and in one night perished ... and shall not I spare Ninive?’ (Jonas 4:10), shall not I pardon the men who are the work of My hands?’” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God).
The Saints Explain
“The destruction which the Lord caused to be held out against Ninive was, according to the explanation of St. Basil, not an actual prophecy, but a simple threat, by which He meant to bring about the conversion of that city. The saint says, that God often appears in wrath because He wishes to deal mercifully with us; and threatens, not with the intention of chastising, but of delivering us from chastisement. St. Augustine adds, that when any one cries out to you “Take care!” it is a sign he does not mean to injure you. And thus exactly does God act in our regard: he threatens us with chastisement, says St. Jerome, not that he means to inflict it, but to spare us if we profit by the warning. You, O Lord, says St. Augustine, are severe, but then most so when You wish to save us; You threaten, but in so threatening You have no other object than to bring us to repentance. The Lord could chastise sinners without warning by a sudden death, which would not leave them time for repentance; but no, He displays His wrath, He brandishes His scourge, in order that He may see them reformed, not punished. The Lord said to Jeremias: ‘You shall say to them: “It may be, that they will hearken and be converted everyone from his evil way: that I may repent of the evil which I think to do to them.” Go, He says, and tell the sinners if they wish to hear you, that if they cease from their sins, I shall spare them the chastisements which I intended to have inflicted on them (Jeremias 26:2-3).” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
You Make the Choice—You Pay the Price
“And now, my brethren, mark my words. The Lord addresses you in a similar way out of my mouth. If you amend, He will revoke the sentence of punishment. St. Jerome says: ‘God is angry, not with us, but with our sins’ and St. John Chrysostom adds, that if we remember our sins God will forget them. He desires that we being humbled should reform, and crave pardon of Him. ‘Because they are humbled I will not destroy them’ (2 Paralipomenon 12:7).” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
“But, in order to amend, we must be led to it by fear of punishment, otherwise, we never would be brought to change our lives. True it is, God protects him who places hope in His mercy. He is the protector of all who trust in Him (Psalm 17:31). But he who hopes in the mercy of the Lord is always the man who fears His justice. They that fear the Lord have hoped in the Lord: He is their protector and their helper (Psalm 13:11). The Lord often speaks of the rigor of His judgments, and of Hell, and of the great number who go there. ‘Be not afraid of them who kill the body ... but fear Him who, after He has killed, has power to cast into Hell’ (Luke 12:5). ‘Broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who enter that way’ (Matthew 7:13). And why does the Lord so often speak thus? In order that fear may keep us from vice, and from the passions, and from occasions of sin; and that thus we may reasonably hope for salvation, which is only for the innocent, or the penitent, who hope and fear” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Calamities, Chastisement, and the Love of God ).
Summary
Thus we see the terrible threats that God makes—but He makes them in order to bring about a change of life and a repentance of soul, which is proved by acts of penance. Yet these threats are not idle threats that He does not carry out—the opening part of articles showed just a few of the many times God HAS carried out His threats. Therefore, it comes down to us—will we listen and change, or will we ignore His threats and be chastised. The ultimate result is in our hands. Let it not be said of us: “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in pride!” (Job 24:23). Remember, sin is the greatest evil in the world, that is why the chastisements are so great. Unless we drill that into our skulls and minds, we will fool ourselves into thinking sin to be of little or no consequence. Hell is full of such persons. Purgatory too!
Article 5
Wednesday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 19th
Fit for the Fight? Or Scared and Put to Flight?
Wednesday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 19th
Fit for the Fight? Or Scared and Put to Flight?
Fit, Fat, Fight, Flee
Heaven requires a certain fitness―not so much a physical fitness as a spiritual fitness. Yet some of the attributes that go into achieving physical fitness, are also necessary for spiritual fitness. Our Lord and Holy Scripture are very clear on that matter. Heaven is no place for “push-overs”, but more a place of “push-ups”―not a place for the “flighty” but the “feisty”―not a place for the “halfhearted” but the “wholehearted”―not a place for the “talkers” but the “walkers”! It takes a certain amount of grit―gritting your teeth through the many tribulations to be encountered―in order to successfully get to Heaven. Here are some of the many unmistakably uncompromising fitness statements that Our Lord and Holy Scripture state―they almost paint a “boot-camp” image that any prospective Soldier for Christ must pass through in order to qualify:
“Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Jesus adds: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death: and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake! And then shall many be scandalized: and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another!” (Matthew 24:9-10). “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation For there shall be, from henceforth, five in one house divided―three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law” (Luke 12:51-53). “The brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved! … And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me. He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it.” (Matthew 10:21-22; 10:36-39).
If You Want to be Fit for Heaven ...
“And behold, a certain rich young man, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus again answering, said to them: ‘Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God!’ Who wondered the more, saying among themselves: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus looking on them, said: ‘With men it is impossible; but not with God! For all things are possible with God!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-29; Mark 10:17-31; Luke 18:18-25).
Christ’s “Boot Camp”
That sounds a little harsh, doesn’t it? “Christ’s Boot-Camp”! The image brought to mind by a “boot-camp” is one of rigor, discipline, harshness, yelling, insults, hatred, rough treatment, excessive exercise, exhaustion, etc. How could our sweet, gentle, compassionate, kind, loving, merciful Jesus be associated with such behavior and treatment? That would be the initial, instinctive, impassioned plea of a modern-day Catholic who has lost all contact with truth and reality, and, instead, has made-up his or her own sweet and sugar-coated, soft-centered, milk and honey chocolate version of the Faith. Without any doubt Jesus is sweet, gentle, compassionate, kind, loving and merciful―but we must not forget that Jesus has also created a Hell and a Purgatory―which are a zillion, trillion, billion times more excruciating than any earthly boot-camp―and which probably house the vast majority of mankind! Does that pop the balloon of self-imagined and man-made ideas of what the Faith is all about? It should do! Once again, those words of Jesus need to be digested: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12).
How Christ Treats His Recruits
Never mind Hell and Purgatory―even on Earth the true followers of Christ are put through a “Christian Boot Camp” of ever-increasing intensity. Not many like that! Many more refuse that! That is why Our Lord says of His recruits: “Many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14)―words that we also read in Sunday’s Gospel for Septuagesima Sunday―which, in certain sense, we could say is the arrival of the bus at “Christ’s Boot Camp”―which could be said to last from Septuagesima Sunday through to Easter Sunday. In the Marine Boot Camp there are more than 70 training days (“Septuagesima” refers to the number “Seventy”) in a period that is a little longer than 12 weeks, almost 13 weeks, whereas the Catholic has potentially 64 days of training from Septuagesima Sunday to Easter Sunday―though the really grueling part of that training begins with Ash Wednesday.
Our Lord did his own “boot-camp” in the desert―for 40 days and 40 nights―fasting, praying and doing battle with the devil. God had His Chosen People do a “boot-camp” of 40 years in the desert wilderness―during which the vast majority failed to graduate and died in the desert! Once the elite Chosen People (like the Marines are said to be an elite fighting force) reached the Promised Land, they had to do another 70 year “boot-camp” (cf. Marine 70 day boot-camp and Septuagesima [meaning 70] connection) as exiles in Babylon due to their infidelity to God. Notice too, that in the year 70 AD, Jerusalem was made to undergo a “boot-camp” in the form of the Roman siege of Jerusalem, which lasted around 7 months. The length of our “boot-camp” life on Earth, according to Holy Scripture, is an average of 70 years: “The days of our years in them are threescore and ten years” (Psalm 89:10)―a “score” is twenty years, thus “three score and ten” equals seventy (Septuagesima).
Boot Camp of Saints
There is no saint in Heaven who has not passed through Christ’s Boot Camp! You most certainly remember the story where St. Teresa of Avila―in trying to reform and open Carmelite convents of the strict observance―met with one setback after another, whether from humans or from nature. On one occasion, on the way to visit one of her religious houses, she lost her footing in trying to navigate a road that had disappeared under a flooding river, and was almost carried away. Exasperated, she lovingly yet frustratingly complained to Our Lord, asking why on earth He was allowing all this to happen to her, when she was merely trying to do something good and fulfill His will. Our Lord basically said that He treated all His friends in that harsh manner―to which Teresa retorted that, if that was the case, then she was not surprised that Our Lord had so few friends! Here is the account from a French biography of St. Teresa of Avila, entitled The Life of St. Teresa, a 1912 translation by Alice Lady Lovat “taken from the French of ‘A Carmelite’ Nun,” which gives the following story on page 548.
In January of the last year of her life, 1582, she left Ávila to establish convents in Burgos and Grenada, and this befell her along the way:
Teresa describes the journey thus: “We had to run many dangers. At no part of the road were the risks greater than within a few leagues of Burgos, at a place called Los Pontes. The rivers were so high that the water in places covered everything, neither road nor the smallest footpath could be seen, only water everywhere, and two abysses on each side. It seemed foolhardiness to advance, especially in a carriage, for if one strayed ever so little off the road (then invisible), one must have perished.” The saint is silent on her share of the adventure, but her companions relate that, seeing their alarm, she turned to them and encouraged them, saying that “as they were engaged in doing God’s work, how could they die in a better cause?” She then led the way on foot. The current was so strong that she lost her footing, and was on the point of being carried away when our Lord sustained her. “Oh, my Lord!” she exclaimed, with her usual loving familiarity, “when wilt Thou cease from scattering obstacles in our path?” “Do not complain, daughter,” the Divine Master answered, “for it is ever thus that I treat My friends!” “Ah, Lord, it is also on that account that Thou hast so few!” was her reply.
Boot Camp of the Early Christians
We see, too, how the sweet, gentle, loving, merciful, kindly Christ―and He really is all of those things to the highest degree imaginable, but He is also more than that― treated the early Christians of the Church by His Divine Providence. The early Christians were God’s new “Chosen People”, His newly beloved children―but He chose to treat them, not in the way that the world would treat its chosen ones and beloved ones, but more in line with the words of Holy Scripture, where, in both the Old and New Testaments, God says: “For whom the Lord loveth, He chastises: and, as a father in the son, He pleases Himself!” (Proverbs 3:12). “For whom the Lord loveth, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives!” (Hebrews 12:6). “When thou comest to the service of God, stand in justice and in fear, and prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “They shall deliver you up to councils, and in the synagogues you shall be beaten, and you shall stand before governors and kings for My sake! … The brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death! And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake! But he that shall endure unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Mark 13:9-14).
Prior to Saul’s (Paul’s) conversion, Our Lord told Ananias that Paul would have to suffer much for the Lord’s Name’s sake: “And the Lord said to him: ‘Go thy way! For this man [Saul/Paul] is to me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!’” (Acts 9:15-16). Hence, St. Paul speaks of being “in tribulation, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in prisons, in seditions, in labors, in watchings, in fastings, … in longsuffering, … by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report; as deceivers, and yet true; … as dying, and behold we live; as chastised, and not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as needy, yet enriching many; as having nothing, and possessing all things” (2 Corinthians 6:4-10).
St. Paul gives a litany of sufferings that he had to endure for being a follower of Christ: “They are the ministers of Christ―(I speak as one less wise) I am more! In many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, less one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness!” (2 Corinthians 11:23-27).
We Want a Holiday Camp, Not Boot Camp
With God being so powerful, merciful and sweet―one would expect a “Holiday Camp” rather than a “Boot Camp” for his followers. Yet, as God Himself says: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9) … “And the children of Israel say: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Are not My ways right, O house of Israel, and are not rather your ways perverse?” (Ezechiel 18:29). “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are ye when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for my sake! Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in Heaven! For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you!” (Matthew 5:10-12). “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints” (Psalm 115:16). “Be you humbled therefore under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in the time of visitation!” (1 Peter 5:6).
Adversity and tribulation often provokes repentance―and it us thus that God speaks to His Chosen People during their seventy year Babylonian Captivity, on account of their infidelities to God: “For thus saith the Lord: When the seventy years shall begin to be accomplished in Babylon, I will visit you: and I will perform my good word in your favor, to bring you again to this place. For I know the thoughts that I think towards you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of affliction, to give you an end and patience. And you shall call upon Me, and you shall go and you shall pray to Me―and I will hear you. You shall seek Me, and shall find Me when you shall seek Me with all your heart. And I will be found by you, saith the Lord: and I will bring back your captivity, and I will gather you out of all nations, and from all the places to which I have driven you out, saith the Lord, and I will bring you back from the place to which I caused you to be carried away captive!” (Jeremias 29:10-14).
Boot Camp of the Desert Fathers
Look at the “Boot-Camp” of the Desert Fathers, who personally and willingly chose to leave the comforts of the world (with their sinful temptations) and went into the desert wilderness―not for a mere 70 days training (like the US Marine boot camp), but for the rest of their lives! St. Paul of Thebes, commonly known as St. Paul, the First Hermit or St. Paul the Anchorite, lived alone in the desert from the age of sixteen to one hundred and thirteen years of age―97 years in the desert wilderness, living on next to nothing! Paul fled to the Theban desert as a young man during the persecution of the Roman Emperors Decius and Valerianus, around 250 AD. He lived in the mountains of this desert in a cave, near a clear spring and a palm tree, the leaves of which provided him with clothing and the fruit of which provided him with his only source of food, until he was 43 years old, when a raven started bringing him half a loaf of bread daily. He would remain in that cave for the rest of his life―almost a hundred years. He is now in Heaven reaping the plentiful rewards FOR ALL ETERNITY for those mere 97 years of “boot camp”.
The Desert Fathers (along with Desert Mothers) were early Christian hermits, ascetics, and monks who lived mainly in the Scetes desert of Egypt, beginning around the third century AD. The desert monastic communities that grew out of the informal gathering of hermit monks became the model for Christian monasticism. Paul of Thebes is often credited with being the first hermit monk to go to the desert, but it was Anthony the Great who launched the movement that became the Desert Fathers. Sometime around 270 AD, Anthony heard a Sunday sermon stating that perfection could be achieved by selling all of one’s possessions, giving the proceeds to the poor, and following Christ (Matthew 19:21). He insisted on selling all his material possessions—he left his younger sister a small amount of money to live her life in a convent, donated the rest to the poor, and left for the desert wilderness.
Anthony was not alone in his sentiments. The legalization of Christianity by the Roman Empire in 313 gave many Christians a desire to retire from the world. Some, nostalgic for the tradition of martyrdom that had been the lot of many Christians throughout almost 300 years of persecution, saw withdrawal and asceticism as an alternative to martyrdom. When members of the Church began to look for ways in which they could work with the Roman state, the Desert Fathers saw that as a compromise between “the things of God and the things of Caesar.” The monastic communities were essentially an alternative Christian society―an uncompromising Christian society. The hermits doubted that religion and politics could ever produce a truly Christian society. For them, the only Christian society was spiritual and not worldly.
Anthony lived in a time of transition for Christianity—the persecution of Christians, by the Roman Emperor Diocletian, in the years following 303 AD, was the last great formal persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire. Only ten years later, Christianity was made legal in Egypt by Diocletian’s successor Constantine I. Those who left for the desert formed an alternative Christian society, at a time when it was no longer a risk to be a Christian. The solitude, austerity, and sacrifice of the desert was seen by Anthony as an alternative to martyrdom, which was formerly seen by many Christians as the highest form of sacrifice. Anthony quickly gained followers eager to live their lives in accordance with this solidarity and separation from material goods. From these prohibitions it is recorded by Athanasius that Anthony received special privileges from God, such as the ability to heal the sick, inspire others to have faith in healing through God, and even converse with God on occasion. Around this time, desert monasticism appeared nearly simultaneously in several areas, including Egypt and Syria.
Over time, the model of Anthony and other hermits attracted many followers, who lived alone in the desert or in small groups. They chose a life of extreme asceticism, renouncing all the pleasures of the senses, rich food, baths, rest, and anything that made them comfortable. They instead focused their energies on praying, singing psalms, fasting, giving alms to the needy, and preserving love and harmony with one another while keeping their thoughts and desires for God alone. Thousands joined them in the desert, mostly men, but also a handful of women. Religious seekers also began going to the desert seeking advice and counsel from the early Desert Fathers. By the time of Anthony’s death, there were so many men and women living in the desert that it was described as “a city” by Anthony’s biographer.
Boot Camp of Christian Martyrs Throughout Centuries
Beheading, stoning, crucifixion, burning at the stake and a host of other gruesome manner of deaths―were fairly common methods of disposing of Catholic saints, who were a nuisance and thorn in the side of the pagans and the worldly. There have been an estimated 70 million martyrdoms for the Faith, from the time of Christ to this present day.
● St. Stephen was stoned to death. His success in converting Jews drew the ire of the Sanhedrin (the supreme rabbinic court). His punishment for speaking against “this holy place and the law” was to be stoned to death.
● St. Sebastian, a Praetorian Guard under Diocletian (a committed persecutor of Christians), ‘died’ twice. The first martyrdom was being shot through with arrows and he was left for dead, after it was found out that he was a Christian who had been converting his fellow soldiers. He was found by a woman (later St. Irene) who nursed him back to health. Sebastian later again appeared before Diocletian; the emperor then had him clubbed to death, a punishment that did, in fact, kill Sebastian this time, and his body was dumped into a Roman sewer.
● St. Lawrence was grilled to death over a fire. He was a victim of persecution by the Roman emperor Valerian in 258. St. Lawrence’s martyrology states that he was grilled alive—as in, on an actual red-hot gridiron. It was recorded that he bore his slow torture stoically, even quipping: “Turn me over! I’m cooked on this side!”
● St. Margaret Clitherow was pressed to death. These days, we talk of being under pressure. Well, Margaret Clitherow, the Catholic-convert wife of a Protestant butcher in York, England, allowed Masses to be offered in her home secretly, and she also harbored priests there. When this was discovered, Margaret fell foul of a law instituted, in 1583, that imposed the death penalty for such crimes, and her sentence was to be pressed to death. Pressed, lying on her back with a sharp stone under her and with a door on top of her, which was topped with an 800-pound weight. It took 15 minutes for her to die.
● St. Cassian was hacked to death by children. Formerly the Bishop of Brescia, he became a schoolmaster after his banishment from that place. By refusing to make sacrifice to the pagan gods, he angered the local officials, who sentenced him to death and turned him over to his students as his executioners. Cassian’s death was torturous because of it: the only instruments the students had at their disposal were small and non-lethal. The boys employed their tablets to bash Cassian and their styluses (pointed iron instruments for writing) and penknives to make a multitude of cuts and punctures all over his body for an agonizingly extended time. Conscious through the long process.
● St. Dymphna was beheaded by her father. It is not so much the manner of St. Dymphna’s death―beheading―but the reason for it and the person behind it that is especially awful. Born in Ireland to a 13th century pagan king, Dymphna became a Christian convert. After the death of her mother, her deranged father demanded to marry his daughter Dymphna, a beautiful young woman who resembled his late wife. She refused and fled. Her father eventually found her. He reiterated his demand to marry her; she again refused. He had his servants kill the priest, but he himself cut off his daughter’s head.
● St. Bartholomew was skinned alive. The date is not known, but it is traditionally said that he died in Albanopolis, Armenia. There is evidence that he was a missionary to what are now Iran and Turkey as well as Armenia, Ethiopia, and Mesopotamia, and that the Armenian king Astyages called for his death after Bartholomew converted the king’s brother. Bartholomew’s death was especially grotesque―flaying. That is, his skin was fully removed from his body, in strips, while he was still alive. Then he was beheaded for good measure.
The Boot Camp of Being “Hung, Drawn and Quartered”
The form of execution referred to as being Hung, Drawn and Quartered was described by a chronicler called William Harrison:
“The greatest and most grievous punishment used in England, for such as offend against the State, is the drawing from the prison to the place of execution upon an hurdle or sled, where they are hanged till they be half-dead, and then taken down, and quartered alive; after that, their members and bowels are cut from their bodies, and thrown into a fire, provided near hand and within their own sight, even for the same purpose.” The Quarters of the body were then hung in prescribed locations in the City of London as a deterrent to all English citizens.
If, after a trial in court, a person was found guilty and convicted of treason (and Catholics were looked upon as being guilty of treason), then they were sentenced to be hung, drawn and quartered. On the day of execution, they were first attached to the back of a horse and then dragged along the ground, over cobbles, stones, or whatever else was found on the road, to the place of their execution. Sometimes it was as simple as tying their hands and ankles with ropes. Other times, they were dragged with their bodies on a wooden frame called a hurdle. While the latter seems somewhat more compassionate, the real purpose was to keep the prisoners alive, so they could properly endure their punishment. By this point, fear would flood the victim’s body with adrenaline, causing their heart rate and blood pressure to rapidly increase.
Traitors (Catholics) would often be subjected to the torture of crowds upon arriving at their execution place. These people came specifically to watch the barbaric display of retribution. However, just watching the execution wasn’t enough: crowds would usually be waiting for their own opportunity to abuse the traitor. These vicious preliminary attacks could easily result in blunt force trauma, causing a variety of injuries from abrasions and lacerations to hemorrhaging and ruptured organs.
The execution would then begin with a hanging. Traitors (Catholics) were hanged until they are almost dead. Once semi-conscious, the victim’s body would exhibit spasms and all bowel and bladder control would be gone. After being hanged for a while, the condemned person would be pulled down from the scaffold. If the rope had compressed his neck arteries for too long, asphyxia would have led to the complete loss of consciousness. The compression could also have essentially brought the heart to a standstill. Regardless, if the traitor wasn’t conscious, he was vigorously splashed with water to wake him back up for what was coming next.
If they were lucky, at this point they would already be dead―since hanging is the least brutal aspect of the entire punishment. More often than not, the traitor would experience extra punishment outside of the outlined execution program. This involved everything from chopping off his extremities and cauterizing the stumps in hot sulfur, to creating lacerations with burning hot tools and then pouring molten lead into the wounds.
If the traitor’s body was not already in shock from asphyxiation, it would definitely be in shock by now. These types of injuries would cause immense pain, as burns can affect nerves, blood vessels, muscles, and bones. The burned portions of the body would experience instant cell death, an immense loss of fluids, and edema, or extreme swelling. In the term “drawn and quartered,” the word “drawn” was used to refer to disembowelment. A cut would be made down the traitor’s torso and his intestines pulled out, sometimes along with other major organs.
Tearing the mesentery (a fold in the lining of the abdomen that holds the digestive organs in place) from the inner wall of the body, would cause massive amounts of bleeding. This would trigger hypovolemic shock, as the severe blood loss would hinder the heart from pumping blood throughout the body. This type of shock would shut down the organs―if most of the traitor’s insides weren’t already out. You may ask yourself, what could be worse than disembowelment? How about being disemboweled and being castrated? In addition to watching their entrails being pulled out, traitors also had to witness their genitals being sliced off. This act symbolically took away the victim’s masculinity, permanently ending the traitor’s bloodline and name.
If the traitor had not yet bled to death, then this horrific mutilation (in tandem with hypovolemic shock) usually resulted in his death. Once the traitor’s abdominal cavity was emptied and his manhood detached, his genitals and entrails were burned before his eyes. Sometimes, if the charges were particularly heinous, the executioner would go the extra mile to dig out the contents of the traitor’s chest cavity and burn them, as well.
By this point in the harrowing process, the traitor would most likely already be dead from shock, as there would be no substantial blood pressure and no vital organs to sustain the remnants of the body. If they happened to be unlucky enough to survive to this point, they would barely be hanging on to any essence of life. In a final act of punishment within the traitor’s last hypothetical moments of life, his head would be cut from his body. Immediately after decapitation, the head was held in the air by the executioner. This was ritualized in order to show the head its own body, as well as the faces of the crowd.
If the condemned was somehow still alive after decapitation, he may have actually caught a glimpse of this view, as consciousness can remain for a few short seconds after beheading. After this, the complete lack of oxygen would quickly lead to death. Following all of the agony, the traitor’s corpse would be quartered. In this act the body was divided into four parts, or quarters. Sometimes this was entirely done by hand, but it has been more notably achieved by scoring the body before tying the limbs (or remaining limbs) to four horses. The horses would then be booted to trot away in four different directions, tearing the body apart.
If the combined effort of the horses failed to properly break the portions away, the executioner assisted by making hatchet cuts on the joints. Sometimes the decision was made to simply burn the quarters of the body. More often than not, though, the four parts and head were preserved for display. The traitor’s head was parboiled in a brine mixture to maintain its appearance while ensuring that the rotting flesh wouldn’t fall victim to circling birds.
The quarters were sometimes parboiled, as well. However, in more serious cases of treason, the quarters were coated in tar to create longer-lasting displays. The preserved quarters were sometimes hung on a gibbet, but typically the crime of treason required that the parts be put on display in various public places. Each limb would often receive an inscription stating the reason(s) for its exposure before being placed atop town gates.
Sometimes the limbs would be scattered in towns in completely different parts of the country. The head would always be displayed in large public places, such as the London Bridge. It would be shoved on a stake and affixed to the bridge as the ultimate deterrent to other traitors.
Catholics Who Were Hung Drawn and Quartered
Here is a list of some Catholic martyrs (there are many more), who died for their Faith by being hung, drawn and quartered in England during the 16th and 17th centuries. Not all of anniversaries of their martyrdoms are on the Church calendar, but several Catholic martyrs from the English recusant (meaning those who “refused”) era, from the time of Elizabeth I to Charles II, are honored with feast days. These martyrs provide us examples of those who paid the ultimate price for adhering to the true Faith, when England was in process of tweaking, changing and eventually rejecting the true Faith.
● St. John Fisher (1469-1535) was an English Catholic bishop and cardinal who was executed by order of Henry VIII during the English Reformation for refusing to accept the King as Supreme Head of the Church of England and for upholding the Roman Catholic Church’s doctrine of papal supremacy. He was condemned to be hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn, London.
● St. Thomas More (1478-1535) was an English lawyer, a councilor to King Henry VIII, and Lord High Chancellor of England. He opposed the Protestant Reformation and the king’s separation from the Catholic Church, refusing to acknowledge Henry as Supreme Head of the Church of England and rejected to uphold the annulment of Hnery’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon. After refusing to take the Oath of Supremacy of Henry being the Head of the Catholic Church in England, he was convicted of treason and condemned to be hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn, London― but the King later changed this to execution by decapitation.
● St. John Rigby, a layman, was hung, drawn and quartered in 1600, for having converted to Catholicism and neglected to attend Church of England services.
● St. Thomas Garnet, SJ (1575-1608) was hung, drawn, and quartered* during the reign of James I after the Gunpowder Plot discovery. He denied any involvement in it and would not swear James’ Oath of Allegiance denying the Pope’s authority. On June 23, 1608, he proclaimed himself the happiest man alive before his execution.
● St. John Southworth (1592-1654) had already been arrested and exiled once before, but then he had returned to England to serve the Catholic laity as a newly ordained priest. In 1585, a law had been passed branding as treasonable any priest who dared to come back to England. He was sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered.
● Blessed Philip Powell, OSB, (1594-1646) was a lawyer who became a Benedictine monk and priest, serving as a missionary in England during the English Civil War. He was condemned to death under the Elizabethan statute that designated his priesthood in England as an act of treason. He was hung, drawn and quartered on June 30th, 1646.
● St. Oliver Plunkett (1625-1681), the Archbishop of Armagh in Ireland, was executed at Tyburn in London. Plunkett was the last Catholic priest to be hung, drawn and quartered there.
● Blessed Thomas Maxfield (1590-1616) was condemned solely for being a priest and hung, drawn and quartered.
● Blesseds George Beesley and Montford Scott were hung, drawn and quartered on Fleet Street, in 1591, after suffering torture by Richard Topcliffe, Elizabeth I’s official priest catcher. Two groups of Catholic martyrs in Elizabethan England — in 1594 in Dorchester and in 1597 in York — comprised of priests and the laymen who protected them, were also hung, drawn and quartered. In Dorchester, Blessed John Cornelius, priest, and Blesseds Thomas Bosgrave, John Carey, and Patrick Salmon, all laymen. Father Cornelius was tortured to reveal more lay contacts. In the town of York, Blessed William Andleby, priest, and Blesseds Henry Abbot, Thomas Warcop, and Edward Fulthorp, again laymen.
God could have prevented this torture of His saints―but He didn’t. God knows that the those ‘terrible’ sufferings during that torture were the duration of a mere blink of an eye when compared to eternity. God also knows that the most terrible, horrendous, cruel, sadisitic, prolonged, intense sufferings that you could possibly imagine, are like a mere tickle compared to the sufferings of Purgatory, never mind those of Hell! Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: ”Suffering in Purgatory is greater than all suffering on Earth. Such is the doctrine of tradition, supported by theological reasoning. Tradition is expressed by St. Augustine: ‘That fire will be more painful than anything man can suffer in the present life.’ St. Isidore speaks in the same sense. According to these testimonies and others similar to them, the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest sufferings of the present life. St. Bonaventure speaks somewhat differently: ‘In the next life, by reason of the state of the souls there retained, the purifying purgatorial suffering will be, in its kind, more severe than the greatest trials on Earth.’ We must understand him thus: For one and the same sin, the smallest suffering in Purgatory is greater than any corresponding suffering on Earth. But it does not follow that the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest terrestrial suffering” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange. Life Everlasting) [read more here]
These eighteen martyrs represent the hundreds beatified, canonized or not, who suffered in England for their Faith from the 1570s to the 1690s, not to mention those many others who were imprisoned, fined, and exiled. They inspire us with their courage and willingness to sacrifice their lives in fighting for the Faith―something that is sorely lacking in Catholics today.
We Are Headed For a 21st Century Universal Boot-Camp
After Our Lord, there is nobody who is kinder, sweeter, more gentle, more loving, more merciful and more generous than Our Lady. Yet this sweet, gentle, kind, loving, merciful and generous Mother of God tells us that we are on the verge of the most terrible “Boot Camp” the world has even seen―while the modern Church lives in a complacency resembling the inhabitants of the world just before the Great Flood, which was survived by only a handful of people―Noe and Company, who opened and shipbuilding company and eventually “floated their shares”.
Heaven requires a certain fitness―not so much a physical fitness as a spiritual fitness. Yet some of the attributes that go into achieving physical fitness, are also necessary for spiritual fitness. Our Lord and Holy Scripture are very clear on that matter. Heaven is no place for “push-overs”, but more a place of “push-ups”―not a place for the “flighty” but the “feisty”―not a place for the “halfhearted” but the “wholehearted”―not a place for the “talkers” but the “walkers”! It takes a certain amount of grit―gritting your teeth through the many tribulations to be encountered―in order to successfully get to Heaven. Here are some of the many unmistakably uncompromising fitness statements that Our Lord and Holy Scripture state―they almost paint a “boot-camp” image that any prospective Soldier for Christ must pass through in order to qualify:
“Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Jesus adds: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death: and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake! And then shall many be scandalized: and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another!” (Matthew 24:9-10). “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation For there shall be, from henceforth, five in one house divided―three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law” (Luke 12:51-53). “The brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved! … And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me. He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it.” (Matthew 10:21-22; 10:36-39).
If You Want to be Fit for Heaven ...
“And behold, a certain rich young man, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus again answering, said to them: ‘Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God!’ Who wondered the more, saying among themselves: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus looking on them, said: ‘With men it is impossible; but not with God! For all things are possible with God!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-29; Mark 10:17-31; Luke 18:18-25).
Christ’s “Boot Camp”
That sounds a little harsh, doesn’t it? “Christ’s Boot-Camp”! The image brought to mind by a “boot-camp” is one of rigor, discipline, harshness, yelling, insults, hatred, rough treatment, excessive exercise, exhaustion, etc. How could our sweet, gentle, compassionate, kind, loving, merciful Jesus be associated with such behavior and treatment? That would be the initial, instinctive, impassioned plea of a modern-day Catholic who has lost all contact with truth and reality, and, instead, has made-up his or her own sweet and sugar-coated, soft-centered, milk and honey chocolate version of the Faith. Without any doubt Jesus is sweet, gentle, compassionate, kind, loving and merciful―but we must not forget that Jesus has also created a Hell and a Purgatory―which are a zillion, trillion, billion times more excruciating than any earthly boot-camp―and which probably house the vast majority of mankind! Does that pop the balloon of self-imagined and man-made ideas of what the Faith is all about? It should do! Once again, those words of Jesus need to be digested: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12).
How Christ Treats His Recruits
Never mind Hell and Purgatory―even on Earth the true followers of Christ are put through a “Christian Boot Camp” of ever-increasing intensity. Not many like that! Many more refuse that! That is why Our Lord says of His recruits: “Many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14)―words that we also read in Sunday’s Gospel for Septuagesima Sunday―which, in certain sense, we could say is the arrival of the bus at “Christ’s Boot Camp”―which could be said to last from Septuagesima Sunday through to Easter Sunday. In the Marine Boot Camp there are more than 70 training days (“Septuagesima” refers to the number “Seventy”) in a period that is a little longer than 12 weeks, almost 13 weeks, whereas the Catholic has potentially 64 days of training from Septuagesima Sunday to Easter Sunday―though the really grueling part of that training begins with Ash Wednesday.
Our Lord did his own “boot-camp” in the desert―for 40 days and 40 nights―fasting, praying and doing battle with the devil. God had His Chosen People do a “boot-camp” of 40 years in the desert wilderness―during which the vast majority failed to graduate and died in the desert! Once the elite Chosen People (like the Marines are said to be an elite fighting force) reached the Promised Land, they had to do another 70 year “boot-camp” (cf. Marine 70 day boot-camp and Septuagesima [meaning 70] connection) as exiles in Babylon due to their infidelity to God. Notice too, that in the year 70 AD, Jerusalem was made to undergo a “boot-camp” in the form of the Roman siege of Jerusalem, which lasted around 7 months. The length of our “boot-camp” life on Earth, according to Holy Scripture, is an average of 70 years: “The days of our years in them are threescore and ten years” (Psalm 89:10)―a “score” is twenty years, thus “three score and ten” equals seventy (Septuagesima).
Boot Camp of Saints
There is no saint in Heaven who has not passed through Christ’s Boot Camp! You most certainly remember the story where St. Teresa of Avila―in trying to reform and open Carmelite convents of the strict observance―met with one setback after another, whether from humans or from nature. On one occasion, on the way to visit one of her religious houses, she lost her footing in trying to navigate a road that had disappeared under a flooding river, and was almost carried away. Exasperated, she lovingly yet frustratingly complained to Our Lord, asking why on earth He was allowing all this to happen to her, when she was merely trying to do something good and fulfill His will. Our Lord basically said that He treated all His friends in that harsh manner―to which Teresa retorted that, if that was the case, then she was not surprised that Our Lord had so few friends! Here is the account from a French biography of St. Teresa of Avila, entitled The Life of St. Teresa, a 1912 translation by Alice Lady Lovat “taken from the French of ‘A Carmelite’ Nun,” which gives the following story on page 548.
In January of the last year of her life, 1582, she left Ávila to establish convents in Burgos and Grenada, and this befell her along the way:
Teresa describes the journey thus: “We had to run many dangers. At no part of the road were the risks greater than within a few leagues of Burgos, at a place called Los Pontes. The rivers were so high that the water in places covered everything, neither road nor the smallest footpath could be seen, only water everywhere, and two abysses on each side. It seemed foolhardiness to advance, especially in a carriage, for if one strayed ever so little off the road (then invisible), one must have perished.” The saint is silent on her share of the adventure, but her companions relate that, seeing their alarm, she turned to them and encouraged them, saying that “as they were engaged in doing God’s work, how could they die in a better cause?” She then led the way on foot. The current was so strong that she lost her footing, and was on the point of being carried away when our Lord sustained her. “Oh, my Lord!” she exclaimed, with her usual loving familiarity, “when wilt Thou cease from scattering obstacles in our path?” “Do not complain, daughter,” the Divine Master answered, “for it is ever thus that I treat My friends!” “Ah, Lord, it is also on that account that Thou hast so few!” was her reply.
Boot Camp of the Early Christians
We see, too, how the sweet, gentle, loving, merciful, kindly Christ―and He really is all of those things to the highest degree imaginable, but He is also more than that― treated the early Christians of the Church by His Divine Providence. The early Christians were God’s new “Chosen People”, His newly beloved children―but He chose to treat them, not in the way that the world would treat its chosen ones and beloved ones, but more in line with the words of Holy Scripture, where, in both the Old and New Testaments, God says: “For whom the Lord loveth, He chastises: and, as a father in the son, He pleases Himself!” (Proverbs 3:12). “For whom the Lord loveth, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives!” (Hebrews 12:6). “When thou comest to the service of God, stand in justice and in fear, and prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “They shall deliver you up to councils, and in the synagogues you shall be beaten, and you shall stand before governors and kings for My sake! … The brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death! And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake! But he that shall endure unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Mark 13:9-14).
Prior to Saul’s (Paul’s) conversion, Our Lord told Ananias that Paul would have to suffer much for the Lord’s Name’s sake: “And the Lord said to him: ‘Go thy way! For this man [Saul/Paul] is to me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!’” (Acts 9:15-16). Hence, St. Paul speaks of being “in tribulation, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in prisons, in seditions, in labors, in watchings, in fastings, … in longsuffering, … by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report; as deceivers, and yet true; … as dying, and behold we live; as chastised, and not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as needy, yet enriching many; as having nothing, and possessing all things” (2 Corinthians 6:4-10).
St. Paul gives a litany of sufferings that he had to endure for being a follower of Christ: “They are the ministers of Christ―(I speak as one less wise) I am more! In many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, less one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness!” (2 Corinthians 11:23-27).
We Want a Holiday Camp, Not Boot Camp
With God being so powerful, merciful and sweet―one would expect a “Holiday Camp” rather than a “Boot Camp” for his followers. Yet, as God Himself says: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9) … “And the children of Israel say: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Are not My ways right, O house of Israel, and are not rather your ways perverse?” (Ezechiel 18:29). “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are ye when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for my sake! Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in Heaven! For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you!” (Matthew 5:10-12). “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints” (Psalm 115:16). “Be you humbled therefore under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in the time of visitation!” (1 Peter 5:6).
Adversity and tribulation often provokes repentance―and it us thus that God speaks to His Chosen People during their seventy year Babylonian Captivity, on account of their infidelities to God: “For thus saith the Lord: When the seventy years shall begin to be accomplished in Babylon, I will visit you: and I will perform my good word in your favor, to bring you again to this place. For I know the thoughts that I think towards you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of affliction, to give you an end and patience. And you shall call upon Me, and you shall go and you shall pray to Me―and I will hear you. You shall seek Me, and shall find Me when you shall seek Me with all your heart. And I will be found by you, saith the Lord: and I will bring back your captivity, and I will gather you out of all nations, and from all the places to which I have driven you out, saith the Lord, and I will bring you back from the place to which I caused you to be carried away captive!” (Jeremias 29:10-14).
Boot Camp of the Desert Fathers
Look at the “Boot-Camp” of the Desert Fathers, who personally and willingly chose to leave the comforts of the world (with their sinful temptations) and went into the desert wilderness―not for a mere 70 days training (like the US Marine boot camp), but for the rest of their lives! St. Paul of Thebes, commonly known as St. Paul, the First Hermit or St. Paul the Anchorite, lived alone in the desert from the age of sixteen to one hundred and thirteen years of age―97 years in the desert wilderness, living on next to nothing! Paul fled to the Theban desert as a young man during the persecution of the Roman Emperors Decius and Valerianus, around 250 AD. He lived in the mountains of this desert in a cave, near a clear spring and a palm tree, the leaves of which provided him with clothing and the fruit of which provided him with his only source of food, until he was 43 years old, when a raven started bringing him half a loaf of bread daily. He would remain in that cave for the rest of his life―almost a hundred years. He is now in Heaven reaping the plentiful rewards FOR ALL ETERNITY for those mere 97 years of “boot camp”.
The Desert Fathers (along with Desert Mothers) were early Christian hermits, ascetics, and monks who lived mainly in the Scetes desert of Egypt, beginning around the third century AD. The desert monastic communities that grew out of the informal gathering of hermit monks became the model for Christian monasticism. Paul of Thebes is often credited with being the first hermit monk to go to the desert, but it was Anthony the Great who launched the movement that became the Desert Fathers. Sometime around 270 AD, Anthony heard a Sunday sermon stating that perfection could be achieved by selling all of one’s possessions, giving the proceeds to the poor, and following Christ (Matthew 19:21). He insisted on selling all his material possessions—he left his younger sister a small amount of money to live her life in a convent, donated the rest to the poor, and left for the desert wilderness.
Anthony was not alone in his sentiments. The legalization of Christianity by the Roman Empire in 313 gave many Christians a desire to retire from the world. Some, nostalgic for the tradition of martyrdom that had been the lot of many Christians throughout almost 300 years of persecution, saw withdrawal and asceticism as an alternative to martyrdom. When members of the Church began to look for ways in which they could work with the Roman state, the Desert Fathers saw that as a compromise between “the things of God and the things of Caesar.” The monastic communities were essentially an alternative Christian society―an uncompromising Christian society. The hermits doubted that religion and politics could ever produce a truly Christian society. For them, the only Christian society was spiritual and not worldly.
Anthony lived in a time of transition for Christianity—the persecution of Christians, by the Roman Emperor Diocletian, in the years following 303 AD, was the last great formal persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire. Only ten years later, Christianity was made legal in Egypt by Diocletian’s successor Constantine I. Those who left for the desert formed an alternative Christian society, at a time when it was no longer a risk to be a Christian. The solitude, austerity, and sacrifice of the desert was seen by Anthony as an alternative to martyrdom, which was formerly seen by many Christians as the highest form of sacrifice. Anthony quickly gained followers eager to live their lives in accordance with this solidarity and separation from material goods. From these prohibitions it is recorded by Athanasius that Anthony received special privileges from God, such as the ability to heal the sick, inspire others to have faith in healing through God, and even converse with God on occasion. Around this time, desert monasticism appeared nearly simultaneously in several areas, including Egypt and Syria.
Over time, the model of Anthony and other hermits attracted many followers, who lived alone in the desert or in small groups. They chose a life of extreme asceticism, renouncing all the pleasures of the senses, rich food, baths, rest, and anything that made them comfortable. They instead focused their energies on praying, singing psalms, fasting, giving alms to the needy, and preserving love and harmony with one another while keeping their thoughts and desires for God alone. Thousands joined them in the desert, mostly men, but also a handful of women. Religious seekers also began going to the desert seeking advice and counsel from the early Desert Fathers. By the time of Anthony’s death, there were so many men and women living in the desert that it was described as “a city” by Anthony’s biographer.
Boot Camp of Christian Martyrs Throughout Centuries
Beheading, stoning, crucifixion, burning at the stake and a host of other gruesome manner of deaths―were fairly common methods of disposing of Catholic saints, who were a nuisance and thorn in the side of the pagans and the worldly. There have been an estimated 70 million martyrdoms for the Faith, from the time of Christ to this present day.
● St. Stephen was stoned to death. His success in converting Jews drew the ire of the Sanhedrin (the supreme rabbinic court). His punishment for speaking against “this holy place and the law” was to be stoned to death.
● St. Sebastian, a Praetorian Guard under Diocletian (a committed persecutor of Christians), ‘died’ twice. The first martyrdom was being shot through with arrows and he was left for dead, after it was found out that he was a Christian who had been converting his fellow soldiers. He was found by a woman (later St. Irene) who nursed him back to health. Sebastian later again appeared before Diocletian; the emperor then had him clubbed to death, a punishment that did, in fact, kill Sebastian this time, and his body was dumped into a Roman sewer.
● St. Lawrence was grilled to death over a fire. He was a victim of persecution by the Roman emperor Valerian in 258. St. Lawrence’s martyrology states that he was grilled alive—as in, on an actual red-hot gridiron. It was recorded that he bore his slow torture stoically, even quipping: “Turn me over! I’m cooked on this side!”
● St. Margaret Clitherow was pressed to death. These days, we talk of being under pressure. Well, Margaret Clitherow, the Catholic-convert wife of a Protestant butcher in York, England, allowed Masses to be offered in her home secretly, and she also harbored priests there. When this was discovered, Margaret fell foul of a law instituted, in 1583, that imposed the death penalty for such crimes, and her sentence was to be pressed to death. Pressed, lying on her back with a sharp stone under her and with a door on top of her, which was topped with an 800-pound weight. It took 15 minutes for her to die.
● St. Cassian was hacked to death by children. Formerly the Bishop of Brescia, he became a schoolmaster after his banishment from that place. By refusing to make sacrifice to the pagan gods, he angered the local officials, who sentenced him to death and turned him over to his students as his executioners. Cassian’s death was torturous because of it: the only instruments the students had at their disposal were small and non-lethal. The boys employed their tablets to bash Cassian and their styluses (pointed iron instruments for writing) and penknives to make a multitude of cuts and punctures all over his body for an agonizingly extended time. Conscious through the long process.
● St. Dymphna was beheaded by her father. It is not so much the manner of St. Dymphna’s death―beheading―but the reason for it and the person behind it that is especially awful. Born in Ireland to a 13th century pagan king, Dymphna became a Christian convert. After the death of her mother, her deranged father demanded to marry his daughter Dymphna, a beautiful young woman who resembled his late wife. She refused and fled. Her father eventually found her. He reiterated his demand to marry her; she again refused. He had his servants kill the priest, but he himself cut off his daughter’s head.
● St. Bartholomew was skinned alive. The date is not known, but it is traditionally said that he died in Albanopolis, Armenia. There is evidence that he was a missionary to what are now Iran and Turkey as well as Armenia, Ethiopia, and Mesopotamia, and that the Armenian king Astyages called for his death after Bartholomew converted the king’s brother. Bartholomew’s death was especially grotesque―flaying. That is, his skin was fully removed from his body, in strips, while he was still alive. Then he was beheaded for good measure.
The Boot Camp of Being “Hung, Drawn and Quartered”
The form of execution referred to as being Hung, Drawn and Quartered was described by a chronicler called William Harrison:
“The greatest and most grievous punishment used in England, for such as offend against the State, is the drawing from the prison to the place of execution upon an hurdle or sled, where they are hanged till they be half-dead, and then taken down, and quartered alive; after that, their members and bowels are cut from their bodies, and thrown into a fire, provided near hand and within their own sight, even for the same purpose.” The Quarters of the body were then hung in prescribed locations in the City of London as a deterrent to all English citizens.
If, after a trial in court, a person was found guilty and convicted of treason (and Catholics were looked upon as being guilty of treason), then they were sentenced to be hung, drawn and quartered. On the day of execution, they were first attached to the back of a horse and then dragged along the ground, over cobbles, stones, or whatever else was found on the road, to the place of their execution. Sometimes it was as simple as tying their hands and ankles with ropes. Other times, they were dragged with their bodies on a wooden frame called a hurdle. While the latter seems somewhat more compassionate, the real purpose was to keep the prisoners alive, so they could properly endure their punishment. By this point, fear would flood the victim’s body with adrenaline, causing their heart rate and blood pressure to rapidly increase.
Traitors (Catholics) would often be subjected to the torture of crowds upon arriving at their execution place. These people came specifically to watch the barbaric display of retribution. However, just watching the execution wasn’t enough: crowds would usually be waiting for their own opportunity to abuse the traitor. These vicious preliminary attacks could easily result in blunt force trauma, causing a variety of injuries from abrasions and lacerations to hemorrhaging and ruptured organs.
The execution would then begin with a hanging. Traitors (Catholics) were hanged until they are almost dead. Once semi-conscious, the victim’s body would exhibit spasms and all bowel and bladder control would be gone. After being hanged for a while, the condemned person would be pulled down from the scaffold. If the rope had compressed his neck arteries for too long, asphyxia would have led to the complete loss of consciousness. The compression could also have essentially brought the heart to a standstill. Regardless, if the traitor wasn’t conscious, he was vigorously splashed with water to wake him back up for what was coming next.
If they were lucky, at this point they would already be dead―since hanging is the least brutal aspect of the entire punishment. More often than not, the traitor would experience extra punishment outside of the outlined execution program. This involved everything from chopping off his extremities and cauterizing the stumps in hot sulfur, to creating lacerations with burning hot tools and then pouring molten lead into the wounds.
If the traitor’s body was not already in shock from asphyxiation, it would definitely be in shock by now. These types of injuries would cause immense pain, as burns can affect nerves, blood vessels, muscles, and bones. The burned portions of the body would experience instant cell death, an immense loss of fluids, and edema, or extreme swelling. In the term “drawn and quartered,” the word “drawn” was used to refer to disembowelment. A cut would be made down the traitor’s torso and his intestines pulled out, sometimes along with other major organs.
Tearing the mesentery (a fold in the lining of the abdomen that holds the digestive organs in place) from the inner wall of the body, would cause massive amounts of bleeding. This would trigger hypovolemic shock, as the severe blood loss would hinder the heart from pumping blood throughout the body. This type of shock would shut down the organs―if most of the traitor’s insides weren’t already out. You may ask yourself, what could be worse than disembowelment? How about being disemboweled and being castrated? In addition to watching their entrails being pulled out, traitors also had to witness their genitals being sliced off. This act symbolically took away the victim’s masculinity, permanently ending the traitor’s bloodline and name.
If the traitor had not yet bled to death, then this horrific mutilation (in tandem with hypovolemic shock) usually resulted in his death. Once the traitor’s abdominal cavity was emptied and his manhood detached, his genitals and entrails were burned before his eyes. Sometimes, if the charges were particularly heinous, the executioner would go the extra mile to dig out the contents of the traitor’s chest cavity and burn them, as well.
By this point in the harrowing process, the traitor would most likely already be dead from shock, as there would be no substantial blood pressure and no vital organs to sustain the remnants of the body. If they happened to be unlucky enough to survive to this point, they would barely be hanging on to any essence of life. In a final act of punishment within the traitor’s last hypothetical moments of life, his head would be cut from his body. Immediately after decapitation, the head was held in the air by the executioner. This was ritualized in order to show the head its own body, as well as the faces of the crowd.
If the condemned was somehow still alive after decapitation, he may have actually caught a glimpse of this view, as consciousness can remain for a few short seconds after beheading. After this, the complete lack of oxygen would quickly lead to death. Following all of the agony, the traitor’s corpse would be quartered. In this act the body was divided into four parts, or quarters. Sometimes this was entirely done by hand, but it has been more notably achieved by scoring the body before tying the limbs (or remaining limbs) to four horses. The horses would then be booted to trot away in four different directions, tearing the body apart.
If the combined effort of the horses failed to properly break the portions away, the executioner assisted by making hatchet cuts on the joints. Sometimes the decision was made to simply burn the quarters of the body. More often than not, though, the four parts and head were preserved for display. The traitor’s head was parboiled in a brine mixture to maintain its appearance while ensuring that the rotting flesh wouldn’t fall victim to circling birds.
The quarters were sometimes parboiled, as well. However, in more serious cases of treason, the quarters were coated in tar to create longer-lasting displays. The preserved quarters were sometimes hung on a gibbet, but typically the crime of treason required that the parts be put on display in various public places. Each limb would often receive an inscription stating the reason(s) for its exposure before being placed atop town gates.
Sometimes the limbs would be scattered in towns in completely different parts of the country. The head would always be displayed in large public places, such as the London Bridge. It would be shoved on a stake and affixed to the bridge as the ultimate deterrent to other traitors.
Catholics Who Were Hung Drawn and Quartered
Here is a list of some Catholic martyrs (there are many more), who died for their Faith by being hung, drawn and quartered in England during the 16th and 17th centuries. Not all of anniversaries of their martyrdoms are on the Church calendar, but several Catholic martyrs from the English recusant (meaning those who “refused”) era, from the time of Elizabeth I to Charles II, are honored with feast days. These martyrs provide us examples of those who paid the ultimate price for adhering to the true Faith, when England was in process of tweaking, changing and eventually rejecting the true Faith.
● St. John Fisher (1469-1535) was an English Catholic bishop and cardinal who was executed by order of Henry VIII during the English Reformation for refusing to accept the King as Supreme Head of the Church of England and for upholding the Roman Catholic Church’s doctrine of papal supremacy. He was condemned to be hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn, London.
● St. Thomas More (1478-1535) was an English lawyer, a councilor to King Henry VIII, and Lord High Chancellor of England. He opposed the Protestant Reformation and the king’s separation from the Catholic Church, refusing to acknowledge Henry as Supreme Head of the Church of England and rejected to uphold the annulment of Hnery’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon. After refusing to take the Oath of Supremacy of Henry being the Head of the Catholic Church in England, he was convicted of treason and condemned to be hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn, London― but the King later changed this to execution by decapitation.
● St. John Rigby, a layman, was hung, drawn and quartered in 1600, for having converted to Catholicism and neglected to attend Church of England services.
● St. Thomas Garnet, SJ (1575-1608) was hung, drawn, and quartered* during the reign of James I after the Gunpowder Plot discovery. He denied any involvement in it and would not swear James’ Oath of Allegiance denying the Pope’s authority. On June 23, 1608, he proclaimed himself the happiest man alive before his execution.
● St. John Southworth (1592-1654) had already been arrested and exiled once before, but then he had returned to England to serve the Catholic laity as a newly ordained priest. In 1585, a law had been passed branding as treasonable any priest who dared to come back to England. He was sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered.
● Blessed Philip Powell, OSB, (1594-1646) was a lawyer who became a Benedictine monk and priest, serving as a missionary in England during the English Civil War. He was condemned to death under the Elizabethan statute that designated his priesthood in England as an act of treason. He was hung, drawn and quartered on June 30th, 1646.
● St. Oliver Plunkett (1625-1681), the Archbishop of Armagh in Ireland, was executed at Tyburn in London. Plunkett was the last Catholic priest to be hung, drawn and quartered there.
● Blessed Thomas Maxfield (1590-1616) was condemned solely for being a priest and hung, drawn and quartered.
● Blesseds George Beesley and Montford Scott were hung, drawn and quartered on Fleet Street, in 1591, after suffering torture by Richard Topcliffe, Elizabeth I’s official priest catcher. Two groups of Catholic martyrs in Elizabethan England — in 1594 in Dorchester and in 1597 in York — comprised of priests and the laymen who protected them, were also hung, drawn and quartered. In Dorchester, Blessed John Cornelius, priest, and Blesseds Thomas Bosgrave, John Carey, and Patrick Salmon, all laymen. Father Cornelius was tortured to reveal more lay contacts. In the town of York, Blessed William Andleby, priest, and Blesseds Henry Abbot, Thomas Warcop, and Edward Fulthorp, again laymen.
God could have prevented this torture of His saints―but He didn’t. God knows that the those ‘terrible’ sufferings during that torture were the duration of a mere blink of an eye when compared to eternity. God also knows that the most terrible, horrendous, cruel, sadisitic, prolonged, intense sufferings that you could possibly imagine, are like a mere tickle compared to the sufferings of Purgatory, never mind those of Hell! Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: ”Suffering in Purgatory is greater than all suffering on Earth. Such is the doctrine of tradition, supported by theological reasoning. Tradition is expressed by St. Augustine: ‘That fire will be more painful than anything man can suffer in the present life.’ St. Isidore speaks in the same sense. According to these testimonies and others similar to them, the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest sufferings of the present life. St. Bonaventure speaks somewhat differently: ‘In the next life, by reason of the state of the souls there retained, the purifying purgatorial suffering will be, in its kind, more severe than the greatest trials on Earth.’ We must understand him thus: For one and the same sin, the smallest suffering in Purgatory is greater than any corresponding suffering on Earth. But it does not follow that the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest terrestrial suffering” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange. Life Everlasting) [read more here]
These eighteen martyrs represent the hundreds beatified, canonized or not, who suffered in England for their Faith from the 1570s to the 1690s, not to mention those many others who were imprisoned, fined, and exiled. They inspire us with their courage and willingness to sacrifice their lives in fighting for the Faith―something that is sorely lacking in Catholics today.
We Are Headed For a 21st Century Universal Boot-Camp
After Our Lord, there is nobody who is kinder, sweeter, more gentle, more loving, more merciful and more generous than Our Lady. Yet this sweet, gentle, kind, loving, merciful and generous Mother of God tells us that we are on the verge of the most terrible “Boot Camp” the world has even seen―while the modern Church lives in a complacency resembling the inhabitants of the world just before the Great Flood, which was survived by only a handful of people―Noe and Company, who opened and shipbuilding company and eventually “floated their shares”.
Article 4
Tuesday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 18th
Septuagesima Seasoning
Tuesday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 18th
Septuagesima Seasoning
Beauty, But Only Skin Deep!
For those lucky enough to be following the Septuagesima Season, there is therein a rich vein of spiritual teaching and thought, presented to us by a wise Mother—Holy Mother Church—to nourish our souls with what is most profitable to our salvation. Yet even those who are fortunate to have attended a Mass that celebrated Septuagesima Sunday, are unlikely to benefit from the fruits that Holy Mother Church offered them—because we have become a very superficial race of people living in a very superficial world, where superficial news is given in little, easy to understand, 30-second or 1-minute servings, that has very little depth to it. The attention span of man has grown shorter and shorter over the last few decades—with the blame to be largely placed at the feet of modern electronic communications such as radio, TV, internet, and even newspapers—all of whom give you information as short and as succinct as possible. Thinking has been replaced by mere watching. Images have increasingly replaced words. Feelings count for more than truth.
Vocabulary Dried-Up
Vocabulary has also had the juice of its words squeezed out if it and we look at the carcass or bones of vocabulary in phrases and abbreviations such as: “Wassup?” replaces “What is the matter?” “Bro” … replaces “brother”. “?4U” replaces “I have a question for you”. “2EZ” replaces “Too easy”. “2M2H” replaces “Too much to handle”. “2MORO” replaces “Tomorrow”. “2NITE” replaces “Tonight”. “GRATZ” replaces “Congratulations”. etc., etc.
All of this is synonymous with “the fast life”—“fast food” restaurants, “fast-track” or “express-lanes” in stores and airports, “speed-dialing” and “faster computers”, etc. Researchers note that this push for speed is changing the way people think. The need to be efficient and instant leads to a dumbing down of information intake so that people become scanners and “decoders” of information, cruising horizontally across the screen to pick up bytes, rather than delving towards a deeper understanding.
Intellectual Decline Brings Spiritual Decline
It is this turning away from a deeper understanding and being satisfied with superficial knowledge, that causes havoc within the spiritual life and makes salvation less and less likely, as people can no longer (and no longer want to) get to grips with the nuts and bolts of the spiritual life. For the spiritual life and spiritual knowledge is much more difficult and much more demanding than the physical life or the intellectual life. In fact, St. Thomas Aquinas states that in comparing the three levels of possible work—physical work, intellectual work and spiritual work—it is physical work which is less demanding for the soul; intellectual work is much harder for the soul; while spiritual work is the hardest of all for the soul.
Our mind (intellect) has already been weakened by Original Sin, and we are born in a state of ignorance which finds learning hard. Add to this natural state the modern “dumbing-down” that the world has brought about upon the intellectual levels of people worldwide, then you have a mind that shrinks and shirks anything that is spiritual demanding to understand.
Baby Language—Baby Spirituality
A baby or an infant can only understand so much before its mind is “frazzled” by its inability to understand more complex or difficult words or concepts. To communicate with a child at that infantile level, you have use infantile language or “baby talk”—gradually raising the levels of vocabulary and concepts as the child grows older. The problem is that, today, most Catholics cannot get past or cannot grasp anything beyond “infantile Catholicism” because the world, in many respects, is becoming more and more infantile, banal, superficial and pretentious as it goes along on the broad wide to the gates of you know where. If the child will not learn, ultimately the teacher or parent will use severe punishment—physical or psychological—to remedy the situation. Even the State does that with fines, imprisonment and capital punishment for criminals who “will not learn” and remedy their criminal behavior.
God will do the same, at some point in the future, with His “Great Chastisement” which the world will think is “not so great”—when He will unleash a physical and psychological punishment of the kind that has never been seen before in the history of mankind. Then, suddenly—as is often the case with a punished child or student—seriousness, behavioral rectitude, effort and results will improve—and prophecies foretell that the level of spirituality and holiness in the world, after the chastisement, will be of a level never before seen in the history of the world! Amazing what punishment can do for incorrigible folk!
Anyway, back to “baby Catholicism” or “infantile Catholicism”! So many Catholics never really “grow-up” spiritually. The little bit of Catechism (a survival ration), that they were once taught at school, has not been built upon in the years since leaving school, but has been largely forgotten. Put any Catholic on the spot with an impromptu Catechism test, and they will fail miserably—and we are talking about a First Communion Catechism, or at best, a Confirmation Catechism—thus for ages around 7 to 11 years old. Let us not forget that this level of Catechism is mostly “parrot-fashion” repetition of answers with only a minimal amount of thinking and understanding taking place. For example, a 6 or 7 year old will tell you: “God is a spirit!”—but after that, there is nothing much more that they can tell you, except perhaps that “a spirit has no body”!
Most Catholics could not tell you how many books there are in the Bible, let alone even name them, and definitely not name them in their correct order—but even if they could, that is nothing more than a work of mere memorization that is devoid of understanding and deeper knowledge. It is handily forgotten that back in colonial America, many fathers of families were comfortable with debating the finer points of theology! And that entrance exams to the top universities, in the early 1900s, required the high-school graduate to debate with his future professors in either Greek or Latin! O how far have we fallen intellectually since those days. We may possess a greater and broader intelligence in technology, but we have become too specialized and lack breadth of knowledge. Search online for the “copy of the eighth-grade exam used in schools in Bullitt County, Kentucky, in 1912” and present it to an eighth-grader today, and you will see the difference in results.
The Spiritual Babies of 1905
Yet even back at that time—in 1905—Pope St. Pius X wrote a papal encyclical on the dangers of religious ignorance! Yes, over 100 years ago! What would he say today? A few lines from the encyclical will give you the idea (the encyclical can be read here).
“We are forced to agree with those who hold that the chief cause of the present indifference and, as it were, infirmity of soul, and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of things divine. This is fully in accord with what God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘And there is no knowledge of God in the land! Cursing and lying and killing and theft and adultery have overflowed, and blood has touched blood! Thereafter shall the land mourn, and everyone that dwells in it shall languish!’
“It is a common complaint―unfortunately too well founded―that there are large numbers of Christians in our own time [the Pope is writing in 1905] who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation. And when we mention Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life ― for these find some excuse for their ignorance in the fact that the demands of their harsh employers hardly leave them time to take care of themselves or of their dear ones — but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there.
“They rarely give thought to God, the Supreme Author and Ruler of all things, or to the teachings of the Faith of Christ. They know nothing of the Incarnation of the Word of God; nothing of the perfect restoration of the human race which He accomplished. Grace―the greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things, the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments by which we obtain grace―are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it. And so they arrive at life’s end in such a condition … Our Predecessor, Pope Benedict XIV, had just cause to write: ‘We declare that a great number of those, who are condemned to eternal punishment, suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of Faith which must be known and believed in order to be numbered among the elect.’” (Pope St. Pius X, encyclical Acerbo Nimis, April 1905).
What Has This to Do With Septuagesima?
Good question! Well, it is like this. You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink. You can a Catholic to the Catechism or Bible, but you cannot make them think! And if they just look at the surface of the content, they will not really understand the Faith, and thus won’t really live the Faith. To understand, you need to see what stand under the thing—you need to dig below the surface. You can live on an oil-field yet die of poverty and starvation if you are not prepared to dig. As St. Thomas Aquinas says, in effect, physical digging is easier than intellectual digging, but spiritual digging is harder than either physical or intellectual digging. Most people do not want to dig spiritually—so they will die of spiritual poverty and starved of grace!
Septuagesima Sunday—and the ensuing Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays—are a rich oil-field or rich storehouse of theological and spiritual wealth. Yet they remain untapped sources for most Catholics. They have no time, no inclination and no desire to venture therein. For the few that do follow the liturgical rite that still celebrates the Septuagesima season, many of those ‘fortunate’ Catholics unfortunately let the texts of the liturgy go in one ear and out the other. Their spiritual stomachs are hungry as they enter church and they come away with equally empty stomachs after Mass—the sad (and most dangerous) thing is that they DO NOT FEEL HUNGRY! Perhaps it because they are “Compromised Catholics”, who live for both the world and for God—a marriage that Christ said cannot happen: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). Being eagerly fed by the junk food of mammon, they have no real appetite for the word of God, yet, as Christ also said: “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4).
The child who is raised on junk food and fast food, loaded with sugar—will have revulsion for the very healthy bitter foods, such as garlic, onions, lemons, limes, and a host of other herbs and spices—which, though they do not form the main part of the meal, they are often the most healthiest part of the meal—as research and studies have shown. There is a general axiom that says: “Bitter is better!”
Septuagesima Seasoning
The texts for the Mass of Septuagesima Sunday could be said to be like seasoning—they are somewhat bitter! Here is an extract for those who did not have the benefit or privilege of attending a Septuagesima Sunday Mass. You can well imagine many people wincing and whining at the spiciness of the Septuagesima Sunday seasoning! The Entrance Hymn (Introit) and the Prayer (collect) are pretty sharp and spicy: “The terrors of death surged round me, the cords of the nether world enmeshed me. In my distress I called upon the Lord … Hear the prayers of Thy people, that we, who are justly punished for our sins, may be mercifully delivered!” St. Paul adds some more spice to the food in the Epistle: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers … did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink … But with most of them God was not well pleased!” Immediately after the Epistle, the Gradual chimes in with another “not-too-sweet” verse: “Out of the depths I cry to Thee, O Lord! Lord, hear my voice! If Thou, O Lord, mark iniquities, Lord, who can stand it?” Then the Gospel asks: “Why do stand here all day idle?” and ends with the haunting and harrowing words of Our Lord: “Many are called, but few chosen!” While the Communion prayer pleads: “O Lord, let me not be put to shame, for I call upon Thee!”
Just like spice with a meal—there is not a predominance of it, but enough to make the eyes water and the nose to run as the sinuses are cleared out. Likewise, the Septuagesima Season seasoning or spice, should sting our consciences and make our eyes water with tears for our sins, clearing-out the sinuses of our consciences by making us run to confession and performing penance.
A “Baby Lent” or a “Serious Lent”?
Usually, words and actions come forth from thoughts. We think of something first and then we say it or do it. Serious things require serious thought and reflection—everybody will agree on that. The more expensive the thing that we intend to buy, the more we think about it. Tell, me—what is more expensive than sin? We treat sin lightly—not so with God! Sin, in God’s eyes, is so evil that He created Hell for its punishment, and sent the rebellious angels there without a second thought. He placed the penalty of death over Adam, Eve and mankind because of sin, warning Adam and Eve: “Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat: but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death” (Genesis 2:16-17). In the Old Testament, God said: “He that hath sinned against me, him will I strike out of my book” (Exodus 32:33) and nothing has changed since, for God never changes. That is why St. Paul, in the New Testament, tells us: “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Our catechisms tell us that: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, Spirago-Clarke; My Catholic Faith, Bishop Morrow, STD).
I Disagree!
Just because we do not think this way, does not make it false. Sin is the greatest evil in the world. At a pinch, we might persuade ourselves of that in the case of SOME mortal sins…but ALL MORTAL SINS?? We say, no way!! But God says: “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways,’ says the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). In God’s eyes, “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Adam and Eve found that out after committing JUST ONE SIN! Did God over-react? It would be blasphemy to think so!
Let It Sink In
Now let those phrases sink-in: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin.” Let us think of and list some evils that we can imagine (that is to say, evils that have nothing to do with sin). An earthquake destroys buildings in a city—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! An earthquake kills thousands of people in a city—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that. Think back to the tsunamis of recent times and the devastation that they caused and the lives they took—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! A forest fire destroys thousands of acres of cultivated orchards and hundreds of homes—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! It’s not the way WE think, or this may not be acceptable to OUR sense of values—but it is God’s way of thinking and God’s way of evaluating things.
It is with that mentality and sentiment that we should be preparing for Lent. For we have all sinned, as Holy Scripture tells us: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:8-10).
Measuring and Weighing by Sin
If we had a true notion of the gravity, seriousness, heinousness and evil of sin, then any suffering, or any penance, or any sacrifice would fade away in relation to the suffering due to sin. If we look at the fires of Purgatory and the fires of Hell (which the saints, like St. Thomas Aquinas, tell us are one and the same fire), then we start to get an idea or a feel for sin’s gravity. If God can have a soul burn in Purgatory for centuries on end, then that must tell us something about God’s value system. If God can send a soul to Hell for eternity, just for one single unrepented mortal sin, then that value system becomes even clearer. Read some of the extracts from Fr. Schouppe’s renowned book Purgatory Explained, and you will start to get the picture.
Extreme Justice, Yet Extreme Mercy
The fires of Purgatory and Hell are one side of the coin—the negative side, the side of Justice. Yet there is another side of the coin—the positive side, the side of Mercy. God is extremely perfect; therefore all of His virtues go to the extreme. Our puny minds cannot possibly grasp the notion of extreme Justice blending with extreme Mercy. To us it seems like a contradiction, total opposites. God is extreme in everything, for He is perfect in everything, He is all perfect, therefore He is all-extreme. The souls in Purgatory and Hell can perhaps grasp that better than we grasp it here below. They know that they deserve what they are getting and they see the price of sin quite clearly. Yet they also know that what they are suffering is nowhere near to what they deserve to get—for God’s mercy has softened the punishment enormously. In this way, even the souls in Hell know that God is being merciful to them, and since they have rejected God, they hate His Mercy, for, in a way, it rubs salt into their wounds. I guess St. Paul’s words are most applicable here: “But if thy enemy be hungry, give him to eat; if he thirsts, give him to drink. For, doing this, thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head!” (Romans 12:20).
What About Me?
Now let us get to the Mercy bit for ourselves! If such is the punishment of sin in Purgatory and Hell, and if that punishment can last for even centuries, then what an incredible act of Mercy is it by God, to offer sinners (whether mortal or venial or both) the chance to forego all that burning and go straight from death in this world to the joys of Heaven, without as much as one second being spent in those burning, purging, cleansing fires! It almost seems like cheating to be able to avoid all that burning! Yet it is possible and it made possible by the grace of martyrdom. Ouch! That is a nasty gruesome word! Okay then! Well what about love? Is that a nasty gruesome word? We can pay by pain (martyrdom) or we can pay by love (which ends up being a kind of martyrdom anyway). The Good Thief paid for his ticket to Paradise by willingly accepting the pain that the crucifixion justly inflicted on him, whereas St. Mary Magdalen paid my much love: Our Lord, referring to the previously sinful woman, that was weeping over His feet at the banquet of Simon the Leper, and wiping His feet with her hair, thought by many to St. Mary Magdalen, said to Simon: “Wherefore, I say to thee: Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47).
“He that loves God and wishes to save his soul, must despise the world and all human respect; and to do this, everyone must offer violence to himself. St. Mary Magdalene had to do great violence to herself; in order to overcome human respect and the murmurings and scoffs of the world, when in the presence of so many persons, she cast herself at the feet of Jesus Christ to wash them with her tears, and dry them with her hair. But she thus became a saint, and merited from Jesus Christ pardon of her sins and praise for her great love―her great love of Him, not her great love of the world.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori).
Our Lord ate with sinners, preached to sinners, forgave sinners, but accepted no practicing sinner into His inner-circle of friends—Mary Magdalen converted and paid heed to Our Lord’s command of “Go and sin no more” before she was accepted.
St. Peter learned a powerful lesson at that banquet where St. Mary Magdalen washed Our Lord’s feet with her tears for her sins, and St. Peter later wrote: “But before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). Yet this is nothing new, for the Old Testament Scriptures had already stated “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12).
St. James shows us an example of a great act of charity: “He must know that he who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20).
“In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us―and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. He that has the substance of this world and shall see his brother in need and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word nor in tongue, but by deeds and in truth” (1 John 3:15-18).
Time to Warm-Up
Nobody likes to eat food that has gone cold! Not even God! Just as we find lukewarm food repulsive, so too does God find lukewarm souls repulsive, hence He says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou wert cold, or hot! But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16). Perhaps we need to heat up and spice up a little before Lent starts! Now is the time to do it. Septuagesima is like a planning and rehearsing period given to us—just like an athlete does not go into the race “cold”, but warms-up and stretches his muscles before the race begins, we too should be planning, stretching, rehearsing and getting our Lenten “race” tactics worked out before the race begins. The same is true for sports teams―especially those that play more or less once a week. They do not start talking tactics and developing a game-plan five minutes before the game—but they spend many days planning and training for the game.
For those lucky enough to be following the Septuagesima Season, there is therein a rich vein of spiritual teaching and thought, presented to us by a wise Mother—Holy Mother Church—to nourish our souls with what is most profitable to our salvation. Yet even those who are fortunate to have attended a Mass that celebrated Septuagesima Sunday, are unlikely to benefit from the fruits that Holy Mother Church offered them—because we have become a very superficial race of people living in a very superficial world, where superficial news is given in little, easy to understand, 30-second or 1-minute servings, that has very little depth to it. The attention span of man has grown shorter and shorter over the last few decades—with the blame to be largely placed at the feet of modern electronic communications such as radio, TV, internet, and even newspapers—all of whom give you information as short and as succinct as possible. Thinking has been replaced by mere watching. Images have increasingly replaced words. Feelings count for more than truth.
Vocabulary Dried-Up
Vocabulary has also had the juice of its words squeezed out if it and we look at the carcass or bones of vocabulary in phrases and abbreviations such as: “Wassup?” replaces “What is the matter?” “Bro” … replaces “brother”. “?4U” replaces “I have a question for you”. “2EZ” replaces “Too easy”. “2M2H” replaces “Too much to handle”. “2MORO” replaces “Tomorrow”. “2NITE” replaces “Tonight”. “GRATZ” replaces “Congratulations”. etc., etc.
All of this is synonymous with “the fast life”—“fast food” restaurants, “fast-track” or “express-lanes” in stores and airports, “speed-dialing” and “faster computers”, etc. Researchers note that this push for speed is changing the way people think. The need to be efficient and instant leads to a dumbing down of information intake so that people become scanners and “decoders” of information, cruising horizontally across the screen to pick up bytes, rather than delving towards a deeper understanding.
Intellectual Decline Brings Spiritual Decline
It is this turning away from a deeper understanding and being satisfied with superficial knowledge, that causes havoc within the spiritual life and makes salvation less and less likely, as people can no longer (and no longer want to) get to grips with the nuts and bolts of the spiritual life. For the spiritual life and spiritual knowledge is much more difficult and much more demanding than the physical life or the intellectual life. In fact, St. Thomas Aquinas states that in comparing the three levels of possible work—physical work, intellectual work and spiritual work—it is physical work which is less demanding for the soul; intellectual work is much harder for the soul; while spiritual work is the hardest of all for the soul.
Our mind (intellect) has already been weakened by Original Sin, and we are born in a state of ignorance which finds learning hard. Add to this natural state the modern “dumbing-down” that the world has brought about upon the intellectual levels of people worldwide, then you have a mind that shrinks and shirks anything that is spiritual demanding to understand.
Baby Language—Baby Spirituality
A baby or an infant can only understand so much before its mind is “frazzled” by its inability to understand more complex or difficult words or concepts. To communicate with a child at that infantile level, you have use infantile language or “baby talk”—gradually raising the levels of vocabulary and concepts as the child grows older. The problem is that, today, most Catholics cannot get past or cannot grasp anything beyond “infantile Catholicism” because the world, in many respects, is becoming more and more infantile, banal, superficial and pretentious as it goes along on the broad wide to the gates of you know where. If the child will not learn, ultimately the teacher or parent will use severe punishment—physical or psychological—to remedy the situation. Even the State does that with fines, imprisonment and capital punishment for criminals who “will not learn” and remedy their criminal behavior.
God will do the same, at some point in the future, with His “Great Chastisement” which the world will think is “not so great”—when He will unleash a physical and psychological punishment of the kind that has never been seen before in the history of mankind. Then, suddenly—as is often the case with a punished child or student—seriousness, behavioral rectitude, effort and results will improve—and prophecies foretell that the level of spirituality and holiness in the world, after the chastisement, will be of a level never before seen in the history of the world! Amazing what punishment can do for incorrigible folk!
Anyway, back to “baby Catholicism” or “infantile Catholicism”! So many Catholics never really “grow-up” spiritually. The little bit of Catechism (a survival ration), that they were once taught at school, has not been built upon in the years since leaving school, but has been largely forgotten. Put any Catholic on the spot with an impromptu Catechism test, and they will fail miserably—and we are talking about a First Communion Catechism, or at best, a Confirmation Catechism—thus for ages around 7 to 11 years old. Let us not forget that this level of Catechism is mostly “parrot-fashion” repetition of answers with only a minimal amount of thinking and understanding taking place. For example, a 6 or 7 year old will tell you: “God is a spirit!”—but after that, there is nothing much more that they can tell you, except perhaps that “a spirit has no body”!
Most Catholics could not tell you how many books there are in the Bible, let alone even name them, and definitely not name them in their correct order—but even if they could, that is nothing more than a work of mere memorization that is devoid of understanding and deeper knowledge. It is handily forgotten that back in colonial America, many fathers of families were comfortable with debating the finer points of theology! And that entrance exams to the top universities, in the early 1900s, required the high-school graduate to debate with his future professors in either Greek or Latin! O how far have we fallen intellectually since those days. We may possess a greater and broader intelligence in technology, but we have become too specialized and lack breadth of knowledge. Search online for the “copy of the eighth-grade exam used in schools in Bullitt County, Kentucky, in 1912” and present it to an eighth-grader today, and you will see the difference in results.
The Spiritual Babies of 1905
Yet even back at that time—in 1905—Pope St. Pius X wrote a papal encyclical on the dangers of religious ignorance! Yes, over 100 years ago! What would he say today? A few lines from the encyclical will give you the idea (the encyclical can be read here).
“We are forced to agree with those who hold that the chief cause of the present indifference and, as it were, infirmity of soul, and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of things divine. This is fully in accord with what God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘And there is no knowledge of God in the land! Cursing and lying and killing and theft and adultery have overflowed, and blood has touched blood! Thereafter shall the land mourn, and everyone that dwells in it shall languish!’
“It is a common complaint―unfortunately too well founded―that there are large numbers of Christians in our own time [the Pope is writing in 1905] who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation. And when we mention Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life ― for these find some excuse for their ignorance in the fact that the demands of their harsh employers hardly leave them time to take care of themselves or of their dear ones — but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there.
“They rarely give thought to God, the Supreme Author and Ruler of all things, or to the teachings of the Faith of Christ. They know nothing of the Incarnation of the Word of God; nothing of the perfect restoration of the human race which He accomplished. Grace―the greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things, the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments by which we obtain grace―are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it. And so they arrive at life’s end in such a condition … Our Predecessor, Pope Benedict XIV, had just cause to write: ‘We declare that a great number of those, who are condemned to eternal punishment, suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of Faith which must be known and believed in order to be numbered among the elect.’” (Pope St. Pius X, encyclical Acerbo Nimis, April 1905).
What Has This to Do With Septuagesima?
Good question! Well, it is like this. You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink. You can a Catholic to the Catechism or Bible, but you cannot make them think! And if they just look at the surface of the content, they will not really understand the Faith, and thus won’t really live the Faith. To understand, you need to see what stand under the thing—you need to dig below the surface. You can live on an oil-field yet die of poverty and starvation if you are not prepared to dig. As St. Thomas Aquinas says, in effect, physical digging is easier than intellectual digging, but spiritual digging is harder than either physical or intellectual digging. Most people do not want to dig spiritually—so they will die of spiritual poverty and starved of grace!
Septuagesima Sunday—and the ensuing Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays—are a rich oil-field or rich storehouse of theological and spiritual wealth. Yet they remain untapped sources for most Catholics. They have no time, no inclination and no desire to venture therein. For the few that do follow the liturgical rite that still celebrates the Septuagesima season, many of those ‘fortunate’ Catholics unfortunately let the texts of the liturgy go in one ear and out the other. Their spiritual stomachs are hungry as they enter church and they come away with equally empty stomachs after Mass—the sad (and most dangerous) thing is that they DO NOT FEEL HUNGRY! Perhaps it because they are “Compromised Catholics”, who live for both the world and for God—a marriage that Christ said cannot happen: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). Being eagerly fed by the junk food of mammon, they have no real appetite for the word of God, yet, as Christ also said: “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4).
The child who is raised on junk food and fast food, loaded with sugar—will have revulsion for the very healthy bitter foods, such as garlic, onions, lemons, limes, and a host of other herbs and spices—which, though they do not form the main part of the meal, they are often the most healthiest part of the meal—as research and studies have shown. There is a general axiom that says: “Bitter is better!”
Septuagesima Seasoning
The texts for the Mass of Septuagesima Sunday could be said to be like seasoning—they are somewhat bitter! Here is an extract for those who did not have the benefit or privilege of attending a Septuagesima Sunday Mass. You can well imagine many people wincing and whining at the spiciness of the Septuagesima Sunday seasoning! The Entrance Hymn (Introit) and the Prayer (collect) are pretty sharp and spicy: “The terrors of death surged round me, the cords of the nether world enmeshed me. In my distress I called upon the Lord … Hear the prayers of Thy people, that we, who are justly punished for our sins, may be mercifully delivered!” St. Paul adds some more spice to the food in the Epistle: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers … did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink … But with most of them God was not well pleased!” Immediately after the Epistle, the Gradual chimes in with another “not-too-sweet” verse: “Out of the depths I cry to Thee, O Lord! Lord, hear my voice! If Thou, O Lord, mark iniquities, Lord, who can stand it?” Then the Gospel asks: “Why do stand here all day idle?” and ends with the haunting and harrowing words of Our Lord: “Many are called, but few chosen!” While the Communion prayer pleads: “O Lord, let me not be put to shame, for I call upon Thee!”
Just like spice with a meal—there is not a predominance of it, but enough to make the eyes water and the nose to run as the sinuses are cleared out. Likewise, the Septuagesima Season seasoning or spice, should sting our consciences and make our eyes water with tears for our sins, clearing-out the sinuses of our consciences by making us run to confession and performing penance.
A “Baby Lent” or a “Serious Lent”?
Usually, words and actions come forth from thoughts. We think of something first and then we say it or do it. Serious things require serious thought and reflection—everybody will agree on that. The more expensive the thing that we intend to buy, the more we think about it. Tell, me—what is more expensive than sin? We treat sin lightly—not so with God! Sin, in God’s eyes, is so evil that He created Hell for its punishment, and sent the rebellious angels there without a second thought. He placed the penalty of death over Adam, Eve and mankind because of sin, warning Adam and Eve: “Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat: but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death” (Genesis 2:16-17). In the Old Testament, God said: “He that hath sinned against me, him will I strike out of my book” (Exodus 32:33) and nothing has changed since, for God never changes. That is why St. Paul, in the New Testament, tells us: “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Our catechisms tell us that: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, Spirago-Clarke; My Catholic Faith, Bishop Morrow, STD).
I Disagree!
Just because we do not think this way, does not make it false. Sin is the greatest evil in the world. At a pinch, we might persuade ourselves of that in the case of SOME mortal sins…but ALL MORTAL SINS?? We say, no way!! But God says: “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways,’ says the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). In God’s eyes, “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Adam and Eve found that out after committing JUST ONE SIN! Did God over-react? It would be blasphemy to think so!
Let It Sink In
Now let those phrases sink-in: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin.” Let us think of and list some evils that we can imagine (that is to say, evils that have nothing to do with sin). An earthquake destroys buildings in a city—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! An earthquake kills thousands of people in a city—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that. Think back to the tsunamis of recent times and the devastation that they caused and the lives they took—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! A forest fire destroys thousands of acres of cultivated orchards and hundreds of homes—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! It’s not the way WE think, or this may not be acceptable to OUR sense of values—but it is God’s way of thinking and God’s way of evaluating things.
It is with that mentality and sentiment that we should be preparing for Lent. For we have all sinned, as Holy Scripture tells us: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:8-10).
Measuring and Weighing by Sin
If we had a true notion of the gravity, seriousness, heinousness and evil of sin, then any suffering, or any penance, or any sacrifice would fade away in relation to the suffering due to sin. If we look at the fires of Purgatory and the fires of Hell (which the saints, like St. Thomas Aquinas, tell us are one and the same fire), then we start to get an idea or a feel for sin’s gravity. If God can have a soul burn in Purgatory for centuries on end, then that must tell us something about God’s value system. If God can send a soul to Hell for eternity, just for one single unrepented mortal sin, then that value system becomes even clearer. Read some of the extracts from Fr. Schouppe’s renowned book Purgatory Explained, and you will start to get the picture.
Extreme Justice, Yet Extreme Mercy
The fires of Purgatory and Hell are one side of the coin—the negative side, the side of Justice. Yet there is another side of the coin—the positive side, the side of Mercy. God is extremely perfect; therefore all of His virtues go to the extreme. Our puny minds cannot possibly grasp the notion of extreme Justice blending with extreme Mercy. To us it seems like a contradiction, total opposites. God is extreme in everything, for He is perfect in everything, He is all perfect, therefore He is all-extreme. The souls in Purgatory and Hell can perhaps grasp that better than we grasp it here below. They know that they deserve what they are getting and they see the price of sin quite clearly. Yet they also know that what they are suffering is nowhere near to what they deserve to get—for God’s mercy has softened the punishment enormously. In this way, even the souls in Hell know that God is being merciful to them, and since they have rejected God, they hate His Mercy, for, in a way, it rubs salt into their wounds. I guess St. Paul’s words are most applicable here: “But if thy enemy be hungry, give him to eat; if he thirsts, give him to drink. For, doing this, thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head!” (Romans 12:20).
What About Me?
Now let us get to the Mercy bit for ourselves! If such is the punishment of sin in Purgatory and Hell, and if that punishment can last for even centuries, then what an incredible act of Mercy is it by God, to offer sinners (whether mortal or venial or both) the chance to forego all that burning and go straight from death in this world to the joys of Heaven, without as much as one second being spent in those burning, purging, cleansing fires! It almost seems like cheating to be able to avoid all that burning! Yet it is possible and it made possible by the grace of martyrdom. Ouch! That is a nasty gruesome word! Okay then! Well what about love? Is that a nasty gruesome word? We can pay by pain (martyrdom) or we can pay by love (which ends up being a kind of martyrdom anyway). The Good Thief paid for his ticket to Paradise by willingly accepting the pain that the crucifixion justly inflicted on him, whereas St. Mary Magdalen paid my much love: Our Lord, referring to the previously sinful woman, that was weeping over His feet at the banquet of Simon the Leper, and wiping His feet with her hair, thought by many to St. Mary Magdalen, said to Simon: “Wherefore, I say to thee: Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47).
“He that loves God and wishes to save his soul, must despise the world and all human respect; and to do this, everyone must offer violence to himself. St. Mary Magdalene had to do great violence to herself; in order to overcome human respect and the murmurings and scoffs of the world, when in the presence of so many persons, she cast herself at the feet of Jesus Christ to wash them with her tears, and dry them with her hair. But she thus became a saint, and merited from Jesus Christ pardon of her sins and praise for her great love―her great love of Him, not her great love of the world.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori).
Our Lord ate with sinners, preached to sinners, forgave sinners, but accepted no practicing sinner into His inner-circle of friends—Mary Magdalen converted and paid heed to Our Lord’s command of “Go and sin no more” before she was accepted.
St. Peter learned a powerful lesson at that banquet where St. Mary Magdalen washed Our Lord’s feet with her tears for her sins, and St. Peter later wrote: “But before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). Yet this is nothing new, for the Old Testament Scriptures had already stated “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12).
St. James shows us an example of a great act of charity: “He must know that he who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20).
“In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us―and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. He that has the substance of this world and shall see his brother in need and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word nor in tongue, but by deeds and in truth” (1 John 3:15-18).
Time to Warm-Up
Nobody likes to eat food that has gone cold! Not even God! Just as we find lukewarm food repulsive, so too does God find lukewarm souls repulsive, hence He says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou wert cold, or hot! But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16). Perhaps we need to heat up and spice up a little before Lent starts! Now is the time to do it. Septuagesima is like a planning and rehearsing period given to us—just like an athlete does not go into the race “cold”, but warms-up and stretches his muscles before the race begins, we too should be planning, stretching, rehearsing and getting our Lenten “race” tactics worked out before the race begins. The same is true for sports teams―especially those that play more or less once a week. They do not start talking tactics and developing a game-plan five minutes before the game—but they spend many days planning and training for the game.
Article 3
Monday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 17th
I Heard on the Grapevine that ...
Monday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 17th
I Heard on the Grapevine that ...
Lent is a Spiritual Vineyard
We always run the danger of running away from the rich readings presented to us at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―namely, the Epistle and the Gospel. There is the risk of them “going in one ear and out of the other ear.” It does no harm―and, in fact, it is very profitable―to reflect upon those readings during the rest of the week. In this way we can uncover and discover their spiritual riches and treasures. This is especially true of the two treasure-laden readings from the Mass of Septuagesima Sunday. While the Epistle for Septuagesima Sunday speaks of running a race; the Gospel of Septuagesima Sunday speaks of working in the vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16). Just as the householder calls men to come and work in his vineyard, so too does God us to come and work in the vineyard of Lent:
“And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just.’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:3-7).
Roll Up Those Sleeves
You could look upon Lent as being the eleventh hour, where God almost forces us into the vineyard through the laws of the Church, that require penance to be done during Lent. In the parable, some were called in at dawn and worked all day—which symbolizes those souls who make many sacrifices for God and do penance all year round. If we have been more or less idle so far, let us go into the Lenten Vineyard and work.
Salvation has been lost by most souls because they “stood idle all day in the market place”—or could we say stood idle all their life in shopping mall, engrossed in material things and idle talk and entertainment—neglecting what Our Lord calls the “one thing necessary” (Luke 10:42), which is the spiritual life and working towards the salvation of the soul.
The Gates of Heaven’s Vineyard Call for Work
Heaven has its gates open to those who are willing to work--“Work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). “Jesus answered them: ‘My Father works until now; and I work!” (John 5:17). “For He will render to a man his work, and, according to the ways of every one, He will reward them!” (Job 34:11). “Every man’s work shall be manifest; for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work, of what sort it is!” (1 Corinthians 3:13). “Therefore, be ye steadfast and unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord!” (1 Corinthians 15:58). “Therefore, whilst we have time, let us work good to all men, but especially to those who are of the household of the faith” (Galatians 6:10). “Walk worthy of God, in all things pleasing; being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God … All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 1:10; 3:17). “So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:16).
Let Us Not Be Idle in Spiritual Work
Would that we were able to say to God the same words Jesus addressed to Him: “I have glorified Thee on the Earth; I have finished the work which Thou gave Me to do!” (John 17:4). Or will we find ourselves addressed by these terrible words: “And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewn! Therefore you should have committed my money to the bankers, so that at my coming I should have received my own with usury! Take away, therefore, the talent from him, and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has shall be given, and he shall abound: but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have shall be taken away. And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:26-30).
Let Us Not Pride Ourselves in Our Earthly Works
“Extol not thyself in doing thy work” (Ecclesiasticus 10:29). “Their land is full of idols: they have adored the work of their own hands, which their own fingers have made” (Isaias 2:8). “They are vain things and a ridiculous work: in the time of their visitation they shall perish” (Jeremias 10:15). “Can those things then that are made by them be gods? How then can they be thought to be gods, that can neither deliver themselves from war, nor save themselves from evils? For seeing they are but of wood, and laid over with gold, and with silver, it shall be known hereafter that they are false things, and it shall be manifest that they are no gods, but the work of men’s hands, and that there is no work of God in them” (Baruch 6:46-50).
“Every work that is corruptible shall fail in the end: and the worker thereof shall go with it. And every excellent work shall be justified: and the worker thereof shall be honored therein” (Ecclesiasticus 14:20-21). “The work of the just is unto life; but the fruit of the wicked, unto sin” (Proverbs 10:16).
Good Fruit and Bad Fruit
However, in the vineyard of the Lord, as well as the vineyard of the world, there are good and bad trees, or as another parable states, Wheat and Cockle. God has planted, but the enemy has corrupted: “I planted thee a chosen vineyard, all true seed: how then art thou turned unto Me into that which is good for nothing!” (Jeremias 2:21). How does God view your family? St. Paul tells us that, regarding the Chosen People, “with most of them God was not well pleased” (1 Corinthians 10:5). What does God see when He looks down upon your family? Would the following verses apply? “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that doth good, no not one!” (Psalm 52:3-4).
Does your family belong to the stereotype of the modern worldly family that forms the majority of families in the world today? If so, it is a bad sign according to the words of Our Lord: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it! Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so, every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:13-20).
We Know Not the Day Nor the Hour
Prophecy speaks of two apostasies in the End Times—the “Minor Apostasy”, which really is far from being minor in the sense of trivial, and then, in the time of the Antichrist, there will the “Great Apostasy”, which precedes the Second Coming of Christ, of which Our Lord says: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). We can be sure that we have entered the time of the “Minor Apostasy” because of Our Lady’s warning at Fatima, where she implies that most of the Catholic world will lose the Faith, for she says “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved” to which can be added the words of Fr. Malachi Martin, who had read the Third Secret of Fatima: “The apostasy in the Church forms the backdrop or the context of the Third Secret. The apostasy is just beginning now. But the chastisements foretold in the Secret are very real, physical chastisements, and they are terrible!”
Thanks to the words of Our Lady and many other prophets throughout the annals of time, we have a good idea of what lies in store for us! What we do not know is the exact time that it will happen. As Our Lord says: “But of that day and hour no one knows―not the angels of Heaven, but the Father alone!” (Matthew 24:36). “Watch ye therefore, because you know not the day nor the hour!” (Matthew 25:13). “Watch ye therefore, because ye know not what hour your Lord will come! Wherefore be you also ready, because at what hour you know not the Son of man will come. The lord of that servant shall come in a day that he hopes not, and at an hour that he knows not!” (Matthew 24:42-50). Therefore, “Take ye heed, watch and pray! For ye know not when the time is!” (Mark 13:33).
Cultivate a Strong Faith
How strong is your family in the Faith—the question is not about being strong in theory, but strong in practice. Yet it is unlikely that the Faith of anyone is strong in the practice of the Faith, if it is not also proportionately strong in its knowledge of the Faith. It is a string Faith that overcomes the world: “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith” (1 John 5:4). Yet today’s weak Faith has been overcome by the world, Lent is the time to turn the tables onto the world, a time to push back the worldly tide, a time to recover a strong Faith once again. Yet there cannot be too many Lents left, we seem to be living on borrowed time. Will this another unplanned, insipid, lukewarm Lent, or will we truly get to work at reforming ourselves and the family around us? Will this Lent be a blaster or a disaster?
Work is a Cross
Work, usually, is more of a cross than it is a pleasure—and the work of reform is even less of a pleasure and even more of a cross. This is the result of Original Sin, whereby God punished Adam and Eve by making work difficult, whereas before it had been a pleasure: “And to Adam he said: ‘Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat, cursed is the earth in thy work; with labor and toil shalt thou eat thereof all the days of thy life. Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth, out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!’” (Genesis 3:17-19). We are reminded of these words of God to Adam on Ash Wednesday, as we enter the toil and labor of Lent, when our forehead is marked with dust (ashes) and we are told: “Remember, man, that you are dust and to dust you shall return!”
Penance is for Sin and Sinners
Because we have such a warped and cheap idea of sin—failing to see its true gravity—we therefore feel little or no need to do penance. If we hear the term “the sinners of this world” used, we do not really include ourselves among that group. Faced with the adulteress and the crowd of stone-throwers, Jesus said: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her” (John 8:7) for “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us” (1 John 1:10). The Pharisees were quick to see and tackle sins in others, but blind and reticent about tackling their own faults and failings. There can be no arguing with Holy Scripture when it says: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:8-10).
“There is no one that does good. God looked down from Heaven on the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that does good, no, not one!” (Psalm 52:2-4).
The problem today is that many things, that are evil, are instead looked upon as good—or at least not too bad!
The prophet Malachias could well address these words to us as did to the Chosen People of old: “You have wearied the Lord with your words, and you said: ‘Wherein have we wearied Him?’ In that you say: ‘Everyone that does evil, is good in the sight of the Lord, and such please Him!’ or ‘Where is the God of justice?’” (Malachias 2:17). The prophet Isaias has a condemning response to such a complacent attitude: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
We All Need Penance! Your Family Needs Penance!
We are all in need of penance; whether we think we are good or bad. For God judges differently to man. We judge merely on the surface, but God, Who notices the loss of one single hair from our head and takes note of every idle word we utter (Matthew 10:30; 12:36), also takes into account everything that contributes to our sins. “They have no excuse for their sin” (John 15:22).
Some are tempted more frequently, others less frequently; some are tempted with great vehemence, others lightly; some have many souls praying for them, others have few praying for them; some may have a natural temperament that will open them up to more temptation, others have a naturally strong blend of temperaments that help them resist temptation; some are hated more by the devil, others hated less; some are trying hard to be spiritual and will thus attract the devil’s attention and temptations, others are lukewarm, and so they are partially doing the devil’s work for him.
The list of possibilities is endless. That is why the ex-Pharisee, St. Paul, writes: “It is a very small thing to be judged by you, or by man’s day; but neither do I judge my own self” (1 Corinthians 4:3). The important thing is that do not try to play the “Adam and Eve Game” by pointing the finger at others and blaming them for OUR SINS! “And they began all at once to make excuse” (Luke 14:18)—which provoked the answer of “I say unto you, that none of those men that were invited, shall taste of my supper!” (Luke 14:24).
Christ Came Looking For Sinners!
Why do we downplay our sinfulness and our guilt when Christ came to seek and save sinners. But we will not be found and saved if we deny our sinfulness. A sick man cannot be cured unless he recognizes himself as sick and seeks out a doctor and takes the remedy the doctor gives him. The same is true for a sinner—who happens to spiritually sick. Christ does not come to condemn the sinner (at least not now, but He will at the end of time, or at the sinner’s death), but He comes to seek, find, reform and cure the sinner.
“For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting … God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him” (John 3:16; 1 John 4:9). “For the Son of man has come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32). “No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). “The light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light: for their works were evil” (John 3:19). “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23).
We Work Hard, But at the Wrong Things
Most people can work hard and do work hard at some things. Yet, invariably, it is the wrong thing! Not necessarily a sinful thing—but they are piling efforts into a project, hobby or area which will do little or nothing towards their salvation—thus triggering the truth of Our Lord’s words when He said: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Which is why The Imitation of Christ opens with the following words: “This is the greatest wisdom — to seek the Kingdom of Heaven through contempt of the world. It is vanity, therefore, to seek and trust in riches that perish. It is vanity also to court honor and to be puffed up with pride. It is vanity to follow the lusts of the body and to desire things for which severe punishment later must come. It is vanity to wish for long life and to care little about a well-spent life. It is vanity to be concerned with the present only and not to make provision for things to come. It is vanity to love what passes quickly and not to look ahead where eternal joy abides” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 1).
The World Crisis is due to a Reversal of Values
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange comments: “God is now showing men what a great mistake they make when they try to do without Him, when they regard earthly enjoyment as their highest good, and thus reverse the whole scale of values … As though in the hope of compensating for the poor quality of earthly goods, men are striving to increase their quantity; they are trying to produce as much as possible in the order of material enjoyment ... The present state of the world is called a crisis. But in fact it is more than a crisis; it is a condition of affairs which, if men only had eyes to see, ought to be revealing, it ought to show men that they have sought their last end where it is not to be found, in earthly enjoyment—instead of God. They are seeking happiness in an abundance of material possessions which are incapable of giving it … for, so long as earthly possessions retain their nature and man retains the nature which is his, he will never find his happiness in them. The remedy is this, and this only: to consider the one thing necessary, and to ask God to give us saints who live only on this thought, saints who will give the world the spirit that it needs. God has always sent us saints in troubled times. We need them especially today” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
Clever People Showing What Fools They Are
The above quote comes from Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange’s summary of his two-volumed The Three Ages of the Interior Life, wherein he speaks of this misguided effort, placed on secondary things, while neglecting the one thing necessary: “Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be in certain respects the search for the true and the good in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation. There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Sowing the Wrong Seeds
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange shows how we have planted the wrong seeds and now we are bearing the bad fruit. What he says for the world as a whole, is equally true of families, parishes and schools. They have all become far too materialistic and more world orientated than Heaven orientated. As Our Lord says: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:16-19).
What kinds of seeds have been mainly planted in your family, parish or school? Spiritual seeds or worldly seeds? Of course there will be both. But what is the predominant kind of fruit tree? Good or bad? What preoccupies most of everyone’s time? What is the topic of conversations? What are the activities? How much religion enters into all of this? Is it superficial or profound. Rare or frequent?
Which is why Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “What we have just said is true at all times; but the question of the interior life is being more sharply raised today than in several periods less troubled than ours. The explanation of this interest lies in the fact that many men have separated themselves from God and tried to organize intellectual and social life without Him … To wish to get along without God, leads to an abyss; not only to nothingness, but also to physical and moral wretchedness that is worse than nothingness. Likewise, great problems grow exasperatingly serious, and man must finally perceive that all these problems ultimately lead to the fundamental religious problem; in other words, he will finally have to declare himself entirely for God or against Him. This is in its essence the problem of the interior life. Christ Himself says: ‘He that is not with Me is against Me.’
“The great modern scientific and social tendencies … converge, whether one wills it or not, toward the fundamental question of the intimate relations of man with God. When man will no longer fulfill his great religious duties toward God who created him and who is his last End, he makes a religion for himself―since he absolutely cannot get along without religion. Man may, for example, place his religion in science, or in the cult of social justice, or in some human ideal, which finally he considers in a religious manner and even in a mystical manner. Thus he turns away from supreme reality, and there arises a vast number of problems that will be solved only if he returns to the fundamental problem of the intimate relations of the soul with God.
“It has often been remarked that today science pretends to be a religion. Likewise Socialism and Communism claim to be a code of ethics, thereby trying to captivate hearts and minds. As a matter of fact, the modern scholar seems to have a scrupulous devotion to the scientific method. He cultivates it to such a degree that he often seems to prefer the method of research to the truth. If he bestowed equally serious care on his interior life, he would quickly reach sanctity.
“This is simply a reiteration of the statement that the religious problem of the relations of man with God is at the basis of every great problem. We must declare ourselves for or against Him; indifference is no longer possible, as our times show in a striking manner. The present world-wide economic crisis demonstrates what men can do when they seek to get along without God. Without God, the seriousness of life gets out of focus. If religion is no longer a grave matter, but something to smile at, then the serious element in life must be sought elsewhere. Some place it, or pretend to place it, in science, or in social activity … If the serious element in life is out of focus, if it no longer is concerned with our duties toward God, but with the scientific and social activities of man. If man continually seeks himself, instead of God, then events are not slow in showing him that he has taken an impossible way, which leads not only to nothingness, but to unbearable disorder and misery. We must again and again revert to Christ's words: ‘He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters.’ The facts confirm this declaration.
“We conclude logically that religion can give an efficacious and truly realistic answer to the great modern problems, only if it is a religion that is PROFOUNDLY LIVED, not simply a superficial and cheap religion made up of some vocal prayers and some ceremonies, in which religious art has more place than true piety. As a matter of fact, no religion that is profoundly lived is without an interior life ... The logical conclusion to be drawn is that religion, the interior life, must be profound, must be a true life of union with God if it is to keep the pre-eminence it should have over scientific and social activities. This is a manifest necessity!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Creating Our Own Seeds of Religion
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange hit the nail on the head when he said: “When man will no longer fulfill his great religious duties toward God Who created him and Who is his last End, he makes a religion for himself―since he absolutely cannot get along without religion.” Many a Catholic would be shocked and scandalized if you accused them of having made a religion of their own—yet that, very sadly, is the case with a great number of Catholics.
They do not like God’s ‘very demanding’ version of religion, so they pick and choose, ignore and discard what they want. They replace dogmas and Church teaching with their own ‘dogmas’ whose authority is merely their own twisted imagination. This attitude has almost as many degrees as there are Catholics. Everyone has his or her own version. It ranges from everybody goes to Heaven to very few go to Heaven; from Hell is empty to Hell is full. Sin is only sin when I think it is wrong—to hell with what the Church teaches! God is given a ‘makeover’ whereby He is stripped of His garments of justice (which are all thrown into the trash can) and is made to put on layers and layers of clothing of mercy.
This is how and why most Catholics practice contraception; this is how and why only 2 out of 100 pray the Rosary daily; this is how and why most Catholics no longer go to Mass regularly on Sundays; why barely anyone goes to Confession anymore but almost everyone goes to Communion—all the while thinking that they are good Catholics. But the words of St. Paul are more likely to be true: “With most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:5).
Time to Reseed the Garden of Your Soul & Family
If we are going to be humbly truthful, then we have to admit that we as individuals and our families, parishes and schools, are far from being what God wants us to be! We are the complacent children of the modern Church’s 95% Lenten penance discount. We do 10 times more for ourselves than we do for God—and then we pretend that we are fulfilling the command to love God with our whole heart, with our whole mind, with our whole soul and our whole strength—while our nose grows longer each time we utter that lie.
It is time to admit that the majority of the seeds that have been sown in our own lives and our families, parishes and schools have been material, earthly, worldly seeds and that the fruits are not the fruits of God, but fruits of the world. As Our Lord says, those trees need to be cut down and thrown into the fire—and new spiritual seeds need to be sown—before we end up in the fire ourselves! God is not a merciful doormat upon Whom we can wipe our worldly or even sinful feet time and time again without there ever being any repercussions or consequences.
Our Lady has warned us for the last 170 years of those terrible and awful consequences, which, when they come, will prove the truth of the Holy Scripture when it says: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “The Lord delays not His promise [of chastisement], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Now is the time to work on your family, parish and school to cultivate and prepare the right attitude of mind for the start of Lent. That right attitude of mind is the not the mindset of the “95% Lenten Penance Discount”—for Our Lady already foretold, warned and condemned that attitude at La Salette, saying that prayer and penance would be neglected with the consequence that many souls would be lost. Much prayer and much penance is needed—you need to convince yourself and those around you of that truth. If not, then we have all read and know the terrible penance that God is preparing to impose on the world. Better pay now, which is mere cents on the dollar, than pay then, which will see an interest rate that goes through the roof!
We always run the danger of running away from the rich readings presented to us at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―namely, the Epistle and the Gospel. There is the risk of them “going in one ear and out of the other ear.” It does no harm―and, in fact, it is very profitable―to reflect upon those readings during the rest of the week. In this way we can uncover and discover their spiritual riches and treasures. This is especially true of the two treasure-laden readings from the Mass of Septuagesima Sunday. While the Epistle for Septuagesima Sunday speaks of running a race; the Gospel of Septuagesima Sunday speaks of working in the vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16). Just as the householder calls men to come and work in his vineyard, so too does God us to come and work in the vineyard of Lent:
“And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just.’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:3-7).
Roll Up Those Sleeves
You could look upon Lent as being the eleventh hour, where God almost forces us into the vineyard through the laws of the Church, that require penance to be done during Lent. In the parable, some were called in at dawn and worked all day—which symbolizes those souls who make many sacrifices for God and do penance all year round. If we have been more or less idle so far, let us go into the Lenten Vineyard and work.
Salvation has been lost by most souls because they “stood idle all day in the market place”—or could we say stood idle all their life in shopping mall, engrossed in material things and idle talk and entertainment—neglecting what Our Lord calls the “one thing necessary” (Luke 10:42), which is the spiritual life and working towards the salvation of the soul.
The Gates of Heaven’s Vineyard Call for Work
Heaven has its gates open to those who are willing to work--“Work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). “Jesus answered them: ‘My Father works until now; and I work!” (John 5:17). “For He will render to a man his work, and, according to the ways of every one, He will reward them!” (Job 34:11). “Every man’s work shall be manifest; for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work, of what sort it is!” (1 Corinthians 3:13). “Therefore, be ye steadfast and unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord!” (1 Corinthians 15:58). “Therefore, whilst we have time, let us work good to all men, but especially to those who are of the household of the faith” (Galatians 6:10). “Walk worthy of God, in all things pleasing; being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God … All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 1:10; 3:17). “So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:16).
Let Us Not Be Idle in Spiritual Work
Would that we were able to say to God the same words Jesus addressed to Him: “I have glorified Thee on the Earth; I have finished the work which Thou gave Me to do!” (John 17:4). Or will we find ourselves addressed by these terrible words: “And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewn! Therefore you should have committed my money to the bankers, so that at my coming I should have received my own with usury! Take away, therefore, the talent from him, and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has shall be given, and he shall abound: but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have shall be taken away. And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:26-30).
Let Us Not Pride Ourselves in Our Earthly Works
“Extol not thyself in doing thy work” (Ecclesiasticus 10:29). “Their land is full of idols: they have adored the work of their own hands, which their own fingers have made” (Isaias 2:8). “They are vain things and a ridiculous work: in the time of their visitation they shall perish” (Jeremias 10:15). “Can those things then that are made by them be gods? How then can they be thought to be gods, that can neither deliver themselves from war, nor save themselves from evils? For seeing they are but of wood, and laid over with gold, and with silver, it shall be known hereafter that they are false things, and it shall be manifest that they are no gods, but the work of men’s hands, and that there is no work of God in them” (Baruch 6:46-50).
“Every work that is corruptible shall fail in the end: and the worker thereof shall go with it. And every excellent work shall be justified: and the worker thereof shall be honored therein” (Ecclesiasticus 14:20-21). “The work of the just is unto life; but the fruit of the wicked, unto sin” (Proverbs 10:16).
Good Fruit and Bad Fruit
However, in the vineyard of the Lord, as well as the vineyard of the world, there are good and bad trees, or as another parable states, Wheat and Cockle. God has planted, but the enemy has corrupted: “I planted thee a chosen vineyard, all true seed: how then art thou turned unto Me into that which is good for nothing!” (Jeremias 2:21). How does God view your family? St. Paul tells us that, regarding the Chosen People, “with most of them God was not well pleased” (1 Corinthians 10:5). What does God see when He looks down upon your family? Would the following verses apply? “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that doth good, no not one!” (Psalm 52:3-4).
Does your family belong to the stereotype of the modern worldly family that forms the majority of families in the world today? If so, it is a bad sign according to the words of Our Lord: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it! Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so, every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:13-20).
We Know Not the Day Nor the Hour
Prophecy speaks of two apostasies in the End Times—the “Minor Apostasy”, which really is far from being minor in the sense of trivial, and then, in the time of the Antichrist, there will the “Great Apostasy”, which precedes the Second Coming of Christ, of which Our Lord says: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). We can be sure that we have entered the time of the “Minor Apostasy” because of Our Lady’s warning at Fatima, where she implies that most of the Catholic world will lose the Faith, for she says “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved” to which can be added the words of Fr. Malachi Martin, who had read the Third Secret of Fatima: “The apostasy in the Church forms the backdrop or the context of the Third Secret. The apostasy is just beginning now. But the chastisements foretold in the Secret are very real, physical chastisements, and they are terrible!”
Thanks to the words of Our Lady and many other prophets throughout the annals of time, we have a good idea of what lies in store for us! What we do not know is the exact time that it will happen. As Our Lord says: “But of that day and hour no one knows―not the angels of Heaven, but the Father alone!” (Matthew 24:36). “Watch ye therefore, because you know not the day nor the hour!” (Matthew 25:13). “Watch ye therefore, because ye know not what hour your Lord will come! Wherefore be you also ready, because at what hour you know not the Son of man will come. The lord of that servant shall come in a day that he hopes not, and at an hour that he knows not!” (Matthew 24:42-50). Therefore, “Take ye heed, watch and pray! For ye know not when the time is!” (Mark 13:33).
Cultivate a Strong Faith
How strong is your family in the Faith—the question is not about being strong in theory, but strong in practice. Yet it is unlikely that the Faith of anyone is strong in the practice of the Faith, if it is not also proportionately strong in its knowledge of the Faith. It is a string Faith that overcomes the world: “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith” (1 John 5:4). Yet today’s weak Faith has been overcome by the world, Lent is the time to turn the tables onto the world, a time to push back the worldly tide, a time to recover a strong Faith once again. Yet there cannot be too many Lents left, we seem to be living on borrowed time. Will this another unplanned, insipid, lukewarm Lent, or will we truly get to work at reforming ourselves and the family around us? Will this Lent be a blaster or a disaster?
Work is a Cross
Work, usually, is more of a cross than it is a pleasure—and the work of reform is even less of a pleasure and even more of a cross. This is the result of Original Sin, whereby God punished Adam and Eve by making work difficult, whereas before it had been a pleasure: “And to Adam he said: ‘Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat, cursed is the earth in thy work; with labor and toil shalt thou eat thereof all the days of thy life. Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth, out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!’” (Genesis 3:17-19). We are reminded of these words of God to Adam on Ash Wednesday, as we enter the toil and labor of Lent, when our forehead is marked with dust (ashes) and we are told: “Remember, man, that you are dust and to dust you shall return!”
Penance is for Sin and Sinners
Because we have such a warped and cheap idea of sin—failing to see its true gravity—we therefore feel little or no need to do penance. If we hear the term “the sinners of this world” used, we do not really include ourselves among that group. Faced with the adulteress and the crowd of stone-throwers, Jesus said: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her” (John 8:7) for “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us” (1 John 1:10). The Pharisees were quick to see and tackle sins in others, but blind and reticent about tackling their own faults and failings. There can be no arguing with Holy Scripture when it says: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:8-10).
“There is no one that does good. God looked down from Heaven on the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that does good, no, not one!” (Psalm 52:2-4).
The problem today is that many things, that are evil, are instead looked upon as good—or at least not too bad!
The prophet Malachias could well address these words to us as did to the Chosen People of old: “You have wearied the Lord with your words, and you said: ‘Wherein have we wearied Him?’ In that you say: ‘Everyone that does evil, is good in the sight of the Lord, and such please Him!’ or ‘Where is the God of justice?’” (Malachias 2:17). The prophet Isaias has a condemning response to such a complacent attitude: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
We All Need Penance! Your Family Needs Penance!
We are all in need of penance; whether we think we are good or bad. For God judges differently to man. We judge merely on the surface, but God, Who notices the loss of one single hair from our head and takes note of every idle word we utter (Matthew 10:30; 12:36), also takes into account everything that contributes to our sins. “They have no excuse for their sin” (John 15:22).
Some are tempted more frequently, others less frequently; some are tempted with great vehemence, others lightly; some have many souls praying for them, others have few praying for them; some may have a natural temperament that will open them up to more temptation, others have a naturally strong blend of temperaments that help them resist temptation; some are hated more by the devil, others hated less; some are trying hard to be spiritual and will thus attract the devil’s attention and temptations, others are lukewarm, and so they are partially doing the devil’s work for him.
The list of possibilities is endless. That is why the ex-Pharisee, St. Paul, writes: “It is a very small thing to be judged by you, or by man’s day; but neither do I judge my own self” (1 Corinthians 4:3). The important thing is that do not try to play the “Adam and Eve Game” by pointing the finger at others and blaming them for OUR SINS! “And they began all at once to make excuse” (Luke 14:18)—which provoked the answer of “I say unto you, that none of those men that were invited, shall taste of my supper!” (Luke 14:24).
Christ Came Looking For Sinners!
Why do we downplay our sinfulness and our guilt when Christ came to seek and save sinners. But we will not be found and saved if we deny our sinfulness. A sick man cannot be cured unless he recognizes himself as sick and seeks out a doctor and takes the remedy the doctor gives him. The same is true for a sinner—who happens to spiritually sick. Christ does not come to condemn the sinner (at least not now, but He will at the end of time, or at the sinner’s death), but He comes to seek, find, reform and cure the sinner.
“For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting … God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him” (John 3:16; 1 John 4:9). “For the Son of man has come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32). “No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). “The light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light: for their works were evil” (John 3:19). “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23).
We Work Hard, But at the Wrong Things
Most people can work hard and do work hard at some things. Yet, invariably, it is the wrong thing! Not necessarily a sinful thing—but they are piling efforts into a project, hobby or area which will do little or nothing towards their salvation—thus triggering the truth of Our Lord’s words when He said: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Which is why The Imitation of Christ opens with the following words: “This is the greatest wisdom — to seek the Kingdom of Heaven through contempt of the world. It is vanity, therefore, to seek and trust in riches that perish. It is vanity also to court honor and to be puffed up with pride. It is vanity to follow the lusts of the body and to desire things for which severe punishment later must come. It is vanity to wish for long life and to care little about a well-spent life. It is vanity to be concerned with the present only and not to make provision for things to come. It is vanity to love what passes quickly and not to look ahead where eternal joy abides” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 1).
The World Crisis is due to a Reversal of Values
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange comments: “God is now showing men what a great mistake they make when they try to do without Him, when they regard earthly enjoyment as their highest good, and thus reverse the whole scale of values … As though in the hope of compensating for the poor quality of earthly goods, men are striving to increase their quantity; they are trying to produce as much as possible in the order of material enjoyment ... The present state of the world is called a crisis. But in fact it is more than a crisis; it is a condition of affairs which, if men only had eyes to see, ought to be revealing, it ought to show men that they have sought their last end where it is not to be found, in earthly enjoyment—instead of God. They are seeking happiness in an abundance of material possessions which are incapable of giving it … for, so long as earthly possessions retain their nature and man retains the nature which is his, he will never find his happiness in them. The remedy is this, and this only: to consider the one thing necessary, and to ask God to give us saints who live only on this thought, saints who will give the world the spirit that it needs. God has always sent us saints in troubled times. We need them especially today” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
Clever People Showing What Fools They Are
The above quote comes from Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange’s summary of his two-volumed The Three Ages of the Interior Life, wherein he speaks of this misguided effort, placed on secondary things, while neglecting the one thing necessary: “Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be in certain respects the search for the true and the good in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation. There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Sowing the Wrong Seeds
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange shows how we have planted the wrong seeds and now we are bearing the bad fruit. What he says for the world as a whole, is equally true of families, parishes and schools. They have all become far too materialistic and more world orientated than Heaven orientated. As Our Lord says: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:16-19).
What kinds of seeds have been mainly planted in your family, parish or school? Spiritual seeds or worldly seeds? Of course there will be both. But what is the predominant kind of fruit tree? Good or bad? What preoccupies most of everyone’s time? What is the topic of conversations? What are the activities? How much religion enters into all of this? Is it superficial or profound. Rare or frequent?
Which is why Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “What we have just said is true at all times; but the question of the interior life is being more sharply raised today than in several periods less troubled than ours. The explanation of this interest lies in the fact that many men have separated themselves from God and tried to organize intellectual and social life without Him … To wish to get along without God, leads to an abyss; not only to nothingness, but also to physical and moral wretchedness that is worse than nothingness. Likewise, great problems grow exasperatingly serious, and man must finally perceive that all these problems ultimately lead to the fundamental religious problem; in other words, he will finally have to declare himself entirely for God or against Him. This is in its essence the problem of the interior life. Christ Himself says: ‘He that is not with Me is against Me.’
“The great modern scientific and social tendencies … converge, whether one wills it or not, toward the fundamental question of the intimate relations of man with God. When man will no longer fulfill his great religious duties toward God who created him and who is his last End, he makes a religion for himself―since he absolutely cannot get along without religion. Man may, for example, place his religion in science, or in the cult of social justice, or in some human ideal, which finally he considers in a religious manner and even in a mystical manner. Thus he turns away from supreme reality, and there arises a vast number of problems that will be solved only if he returns to the fundamental problem of the intimate relations of the soul with God.
“It has often been remarked that today science pretends to be a religion. Likewise Socialism and Communism claim to be a code of ethics, thereby trying to captivate hearts and minds. As a matter of fact, the modern scholar seems to have a scrupulous devotion to the scientific method. He cultivates it to such a degree that he often seems to prefer the method of research to the truth. If he bestowed equally serious care on his interior life, he would quickly reach sanctity.
“This is simply a reiteration of the statement that the religious problem of the relations of man with God is at the basis of every great problem. We must declare ourselves for or against Him; indifference is no longer possible, as our times show in a striking manner. The present world-wide economic crisis demonstrates what men can do when they seek to get along without God. Without God, the seriousness of life gets out of focus. If religion is no longer a grave matter, but something to smile at, then the serious element in life must be sought elsewhere. Some place it, or pretend to place it, in science, or in social activity … If the serious element in life is out of focus, if it no longer is concerned with our duties toward God, but with the scientific and social activities of man. If man continually seeks himself, instead of God, then events are not slow in showing him that he has taken an impossible way, which leads not only to nothingness, but to unbearable disorder and misery. We must again and again revert to Christ's words: ‘He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters.’ The facts confirm this declaration.
“We conclude logically that religion can give an efficacious and truly realistic answer to the great modern problems, only if it is a religion that is PROFOUNDLY LIVED, not simply a superficial and cheap religion made up of some vocal prayers and some ceremonies, in which religious art has more place than true piety. As a matter of fact, no religion that is profoundly lived is without an interior life ... The logical conclusion to be drawn is that religion, the interior life, must be profound, must be a true life of union with God if it is to keep the pre-eminence it should have over scientific and social activities. This is a manifest necessity!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Creating Our Own Seeds of Religion
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange hit the nail on the head when he said: “When man will no longer fulfill his great religious duties toward God Who created him and Who is his last End, he makes a religion for himself―since he absolutely cannot get along without religion.” Many a Catholic would be shocked and scandalized if you accused them of having made a religion of their own—yet that, very sadly, is the case with a great number of Catholics.
They do not like God’s ‘very demanding’ version of religion, so they pick and choose, ignore and discard what they want. They replace dogmas and Church teaching with their own ‘dogmas’ whose authority is merely their own twisted imagination. This attitude has almost as many degrees as there are Catholics. Everyone has his or her own version. It ranges from everybody goes to Heaven to very few go to Heaven; from Hell is empty to Hell is full. Sin is only sin when I think it is wrong—to hell with what the Church teaches! God is given a ‘makeover’ whereby He is stripped of His garments of justice (which are all thrown into the trash can) and is made to put on layers and layers of clothing of mercy.
This is how and why most Catholics practice contraception; this is how and why only 2 out of 100 pray the Rosary daily; this is how and why most Catholics no longer go to Mass regularly on Sundays; why barely anyone goes to Confession anymore but almost everyone goes to Communion—all the while thinking that they are good Catholics. But the words of St. Paul are more likely to be true: “With most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:5).
Time to Reseed the Garden of Your Soul & Family
If we are going to be humbly truthful, then we have to admit that we as individuals and our families, parishes and schools, are far from being what God wants us to be! We are the complacent children of the modern Church’s 95% Lenten penance discount. We do 10 times more for ourselves than we do for God—and then we pretend that we are fulfilling the command to love God with our whole heart, with our whole mind, with our whole soul and our whole strength—while our nose grows longer each time we utter that lie.
It is time to admit that the majority of the seeds that have been sown in our own lives and our families, parishes and schools have been material, earthly, worldly seeds and that the fruits are not the fruits of God, but fruits of the world. As Our Lord says, those trees need to be cut down and thrown into the fire—and new spiritual seeds need to be sown—before we end up in the fire ourselves! God is not a merciful doormat upon Whom we can wipe our worldly or even sinful feet time and time again without there ever being any repercussions or consequences.
Our Lady has warned us for the last 170 years of those terrible and awful consequences, which, when they come, will prove the truth of the Holy Scripture when it says: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “The Lord delays not His promise [of chastisement], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Now is the time to work on your family, parish and school to cultivate and prepare the right attitude of mind for the start of Lent. That right attitude of mind is the not the mindset of the “95% Lenten Penance Discount”—for Our Lady already foretold, warned and condemned that attitude at La Salette, saying that prayer and penance would be neglected with the consequence that many souls would be lost. Much prayer and much penance is needed—you need to convince yourself and those around you of that truth. If not, then we have all read and know the terrible penance that God is preparing to impose on the world. Better pay now, which is mere cents on the dollar, than pay then, which will see an interest rate that goes through the roof!
Article 2
Septuagesima Sunday, February 16th
We All Run in the Race! Will You be a Winner or a Loser?
Septuagesima Sunday, February 16th
We All Run in the Race! Will You be a Winner or a Loser?
The Many and the Few―The Idlers and the Workers―The Losers and Winners
The Gospel for Septuagesima Sunday ends with those ominous words: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 20:16). Equally disconcerting to the modern-day “Catholic-Couch-Potato” are the words of the Epistle for Septuagesima Sunday, in which St. Paul warns all slackers that everyone must run in the race to Heaven―there are no exceptions, there are no spectators, only runners, and not everyone who runs (or walks or waddles) will get the prize: “Know you not that … all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24). The race to Heaven seems to be more like a marathon than a short race! We are more likely and more ready to run to the fridge, or run to the store, than to run to Heaven! Yes, “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 20:16)―many are called to run, but few choose to run!
Life is full of “the many and the few” syndrome―many want to be rich, only a few get to be rich; many want to be successful in the chosen field of work, but only few are successful; many are the teams in each sports league, but only one gets to be champion; many want to be top of the class, but only one is; many are the prayers we say, few are the prayers that get answered the way we want; many are the times we have made resolutions and wished we could change―become more virtuous, more skillful, more slender, more liked, etc.―but few are times we have succeeded; many are the souls that wish to be saved, but few are those who are saved.
“And a certain man said to him: Lord, are they few that are saved? But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: “Lord! Open to us!” And he answering, shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are!” Then you shall begin to say: “We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets!” And he shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are! Depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity!” There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out! And there shall come from the east and the west, and the north and the south; and shall sit down in the kingdom of God. And behold, they are last that shall be first; and they are first that shall be last!’” (Luke 13:23-30).
This is by no means the only reference to the number of souls that are saved or damned. Our Lord also speaks of this on another occasion—during His Sermon on the Mount: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!”(Matthew 7:13-14). “Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into exterior darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:13-14).
Wise and Foolish Virgins
Another parable told by Our Lord, which is very appropriate for this Septuagesima Season, was that of the Five Wise and Five Foolish Virgins: “Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be like to ten virgins, who taking their lamps went out to meet the bridegroom and the bride. And five of them were foolish, and five wise. But the five foolish, having taken their lamps, did not take oil with them: but the wise took oil in their vessels with the lamps. And the bridegroom tarrying, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made: ‘Behold the bridegroom cometh! Go ye forth to meet him!’ Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said to the wise: ‘Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out!’ The wise answered, saying: ‘Lest perhaps there be not enough for us and for you, go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves!’ Now whilst they went to buy, the bridegroom came: and they that were ready, went in with him to the marriage, and the door was shut. But at last come also the other virgins, saying: ‘Lord! Lord! Open to us!’ But he answering said: ‘Amen I say to you, I know you not!’” (Matthew 25:1-12).
They found themselves locked-out because they had not prepared sufficiently―let us not waste this Septuagesima Season of preparation by foolishly remaining indifferent to it and idle throughout it!
Two Shall Be In The Field…
Notice the numbers in the parable of the wise and foolish virgins—five and five. Not all get to go to the banquet—which symbolizes Heaven. Though we should place absolute value and credence on the numbers mentioned, they do match another statement by Our Lord, concerning the last days, where He speaks of the numbers who will be taken up by the angels and the numbers left behind: “But of that day and hour no one knows, not the angels of heaven, but the Father alone. And as in the days of Noe, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, even till that day in which Noe entered into the ark, and they knew not till the flood came, and took them all away; so also shall the coming of the Son of man be. Then two shall be in the field: one shall be taken, and one shall be left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill: one shall be taken, and one shall be left. Watch ye therefore, because ye know not what hour your Lord will come!” (Matthew 24:36-42).
The 'Unchosen Ones' Among the Chosen People
Our Lord mentioned the time of Noe and the Ark, reminded us of how few were saved―“the flood came, and took them all away.” God had no qualms about eliminating most of the human race because of sin and wiped them off the face of the Earth—“It repented Him that He had made man on the Earth. And being touched inwardly with sorrow of heart, He said: ‘I will destroy man, whom I have created, from the face of the Earth!’” (Genesis 6:6-7).
We see the same anger in God during the Exodus from Egypt on the journey to the Promised Land: “And again the Lord said to Moses: ‘See that this people is stiff-necked! Let Me alone, that My wrath may be kindled against them, and that I may destroy them, and I will make of thee a great nation!’”(Exodus 32:9-10).
St. Paul reminds us of this in the New Testament: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea! And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud, and in the sea! And did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ! But with most of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the desert!” (1 Corinthians 10:1-5).
God was not well pleased with most of them! What a horrifying thought! They were His Chosen People—were they not? Yet He was ready to destroy them, He made them wander in the desert―until all who had murmured, complained, rebelled and disobeyed God had died―so that only two (Josue and Caleb) of the original millions of adults, who had left Egypt with Moses, actually entered the Promised Land—the rest were a new generation that had been born in the desert during those forty years! With most of them God was not well pleased! What, then, would God think of our ultra-sinful world today? We shiver to think!
Get the Spiritual Engine Serviced Before Lent
Before we know it, Lent will be upon us! This Sunday, Septuagesima Sunday, the Church places before us the words of St. Paul, about running in a race in such a manner that we may win. “Know ye not that they which run in a race, run all, but one receives the prize? So run, that ye may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9: 24). In our lazy modern times, the car has replaced the two feet as the chief means of running around; but whether it is the athlete with his feet, or the driver with his car, the bottom line is that, to win a race, the athlete or the car has to be in peak condition.
Secondly, no athlete will win a competitive race without training beforehand. The car has to be tried out beforehand also, to see if all is running smoothly and well. This is what the Septuagesima season, with its three countdown Sundays (Septuagesima, Sexagesima and Quinquagesima) is for―a serious time of preparation for the even more serious time of Lent. In the previous article we spoke about the example furnished by St. Bernadette for our prayer life. Prayer is of the utmost importance to our ‘spiritual engine’; it is what drives our ‘spiritual body’ forwards and it is what gives it power.
“Do we believe in the power of prayer? We know the common teaching of theologians: that true prayer—by which we ask something for ourselves with humility, confidence and perseverance, the graces necessary for salvation—is infallibly efficacious (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa IIae, Q.83, Art.15, ad 2). We know this doctrine, and yet it seems to us, at times, that we have truly prayed without being heard. We believe in, or rather we see, the power of a machine, of an army, of money and of knowledge; but we do not believe strongly enough in the efficacy of prayer” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23).
The Gasoline of Grace comes through Prayer
“The modern world cannot do without God. This is the root of its ills. The great truth is that we have an absolute need of God…He normally bestows His grace only in response to prayer. Since our need exists at all times .... ‘We ought always to pray and not to faint” (Luke 18:1) .... The true nature of Christian prayer is perfectly expressed in the following definition given by St. John Damascene and St. Thomas Aquinas: prayer is ‘a raising of the mind and heart towards God’ to offer Him our homage and to ask Him for all those things of which we stand in need” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Spinning Wheels and Going Nowhere
People often pray without realizing what it is that they are doing, or Whom they are addressing! God so rightly complains in Scripture saying: “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me” (Matthew 15:7).
“It happens to some souls that, when they have recited many formulas, they realize that they have said nothing to God from the bottom of their hearts. Our mind may be far distant from the words that fall from our lips .... In our prayer, we must give up to God our whole heart and our whole mind .... Just as the sanctuary light burns itself up without reserving anything, so our soul, in its conversation with God, must be entirely dedicated to the Almighty. We must free ourselves from preoccupations and from vain thoughts, which tie the soul down to Earth and prevent it from being entirely given over to the Lord” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Winning Races Requires Intensity
Many find prayer difficult. That is only natural, since we are trying to communicate with the supernatural world.
“Prayer always requires a certain effort, even from those who find in it their delight, because a certain strain is involved in the concentration necessary to speak to God; it is always more or less difficult to maintain the soul in an atmosphere which is above its usual level. That is why prayer can serve as a sacramental penance. We must not be surprised at this difficulty in applying ourselves to prayer: for to raise ourselves towards God, even in the smallest degree, is to exceed our natural powers” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Focus on the Race, the Whole Race and Nothing but the Race
Too many people limit prayer to an isolated part of the day—first thing in the morning or last thing at night. Yet God should be part of our whole day, not just a mere ten minutes.
“Prayer in our life, must not be limited to a number of isolated, passing incidents. We must cultivate a spirit of prayer. What must we understand by this? A spirit of prayer is an habitual disposition of soul whereby, in our troubles and discouragements, as well as in our joys and successes, our hearts turn towards Our Lady and Our Lord, as to our best friends and most intimate confidants of our feelings. And it is not only in the morning and in the evening that the soul should be raised heavenwards, but always: ‘My eyes are ever towards the Lord’ (Psalm 24:15)” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
All Enter the Race, Not All Finish the Race
Prayer is actually a bending of our will towards the will of God. He wishes the salvation of all, but all will not be saved—and one of the contributory causes of failing to make it to Heaven is a lack of prayer; a lack of prayer by those who will be damned (the driver) and a lack of prayer on the part of others for the conversion of those unfortunate souls (the mechanics and maintenance crew).
“For material harvests, God prepared the seed, the rain that must help it germinate, the sun that will ripen the fruits of the Earth. Likewise, for spiritual harvest, He has prepared spiritual seeds, the divine graces necessary for sanctification and salvation. Prayer is one of the causes meant to produce that sanctification and salvation” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23). We can add to this the Biblical axiom of we reap what we sow: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8). Prayer is sowing in the spirit. Playing is sowing in the flesh. The Angel said to the children at Fatima: “Don’t play, but pray!”―which is essentially the same thing as we see in the Gospel for Septuagesima Sunday, where the Lord of the vineyard says to those men who were idly standing around in the market place: “But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he saith to them: ‘Why stand you here all the day idle?’” (Matthew 20:6). No race was ever won, nor was work ever done, by merely standing around or playing!
“St. Gregory the Great says: ‘Men ought, by prayer, to dispose themselves to receive what Almighty God, from eternity, has decided to give them’ (Dialogues, Book 1, chapter 8). Thus, Christ, wishing to convert the Samaritan woman, led her to pray by saying to her: “If thou didst know the gift of God!” In the same way, He granted Mary Magdalen a strong and gentle actual grace, which inclined her to repentance and to prayer. He acted in the same way to Zacheus and the Good Thief. It is, therefore, as necessary to pray in order to obtain the help of God, as it is necessary to sow seed in order to have wheat. To those who say that, what was to happen would happen, whether they prayed or not, is as foolish as to maintain that, whether or not we sowed seed, wheat would still appear once summer came! Therefore, prayer is necessary to obtain the help of God, as seed is necessary for the harvest” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23).
The problems we face, arise from the fact that God is prepared to give far more than we are prepared to ask for—we are so lazy and negligent, lacking in confidence and perseverance, that we receive only a fraction of what God is prepared to give. The efficacy of prayer, correctly made, is infallibly assured by Christ:
“Ask, and it shall be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you....And which of you, if he ask his father bread, will he give him a stone? Or a fish, will he give him a serpent?...If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father from Heaven give the good Spirit to them that ask Him?” (Luke 11:9-13). The problem does not lie with the Giver, but with us.
Some Racing Tips
Many of us become discouraged with prayer because our prayers are rarely, if ever heard. It is like entering the race just to make up numbers—but we never win! Yet, there are ways in which we can, almost infallibly, get our prayers answered and win that race! The spiritual writers or racers list the following chief tactics as “infallible” or guaranteed means of having our prayers favorably heard and answered:
1. PRAY FOR WHAT IS GOOD AND NOT SINFUL OR HARMFUL TO OUR SALVATION—We should always remember that what we want is not always what we need. At times, adversity is a better route to Heaven than prosperity. St. Augustine says: “We ought to be persuaded that what God refuses to our prayer, He grants to our salvation.”
2. OUR PRAYER MUST BE HUMBLE—Remember the prayer of the Pharisee and the Publican. Remember, too, Our Lady’s prayer, the Magnificat, wherein she says that God has “regarded the humility of His handmaid…He hath put down the mighty from their seat and hath exalted the humble.” The Old Testament says: “...nor from the beginning have the proud been acceptable to Thee―but the prayer of the humble and the meek hath always pleased Thee” (Judith 9:16). “May the Lord destroy all deceitful lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things” (Psalm 11:4). “Thou hast rebuked the proud” (Psalm 118:21). “Every proud man is an abomination to the Lord” (Proverbs 16:5).
3. OUR PRAYER MUST BE FERVENT—Too often our prayers are said listlessly, routinely, mechanically; our heart is not in them. Of such Our Lord said: “This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:7). Our prayers should be like grains of incense, placed on the hot coals of our hearts.
4. WE SHOULD AMEND OUR LIFE — If we persist in leading a life of sin, even venial sin, then we greatly handicap the chances of having our prayers heard. “He who turns his ears from hearing the law, his prayer is an abomination” (Proverbs 28:9).
5. WE SHOULD FORGIVE THOSE WHO HAVE INJURED US — This was the example of Christ dying on the cross: “Father, forgive them...” “If, therefore, thou offer thy gift at the altar, and there thou remember that thy brother hath anything against thee—Leave there thy offering before the altar, and go first to be reconciled to thy brother: and then, coming, thou shalt offer thy gift” (Matthew 5:23-24). “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). “Forgive thy neighbor if he hath hurt thee, and then shall thy sins be forgiven to thee, when thou prayest” (Ecclesiasticus. 28:2).
6. OUR PRAYER SHOULD BE UNITED TO GOOD WORKS OR SACRIFICES — “Prayer is good with fasting and alms” (Tobias 12:8). That is why penance is so crucial in strengthening our prayer. Our Lady asks not only for prayer at Fatima, but prayer and sacrifices. The power of this is expressed in Scripture, where the Apostles failed to cast out a demon from one particular person, and asked Our Lord why they had failed. Our Lord replied: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20).
7. WE SHOULD PRAY WITH CONFIDENCE — Our Lord praised the Faith and confidence of persons on many occasions, saying: “Go, thy Faith has made thee whole!” (Matthew 9:22; Mark 5:34; 10:52; Luke 17:19; 18:42). He also told us that “all things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive” (Matthew 21:22). Do we have that confidence in prayer?
8. WE SHOULD PRAY WITH PERSEVERANCE — “He defers the granting to increase our desire and appreciation” says St. Augustine. Our Lord Himself said: “Yet if he shall continue knocking, I say to you, although he will not rise and give him because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise and give him as many as he needeth. And I say to you: Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you” (Luke 11:8-9).
If we would only pray in the above manner, we would be amazed at the response our prayers would bring from Heaven! Keep in mind the words of St. Augustine: “The man who knows how to pray well, is the one who knows how to live well.” Which, for our purposes, translates into “Drive well, and you’ll win the race! Pray well, and you’ll get the grace!”
But Above All … Have Charity
To this, we could well add, “The man who loves well, is one who prays well!”―which is basically the flip side of the coin of what Our Lord expresses when he says: “These people honor Me with their lips: but their hearts are far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). When our heart is not in our prayer, then our prayer is not as well prayed as it should be―our prayers may be “said”, but they are not “prayed”―because they mainly come from the lips and not from the heart.
Therefore, to make a successful Lent, you need to rectify, improve, overhaul and repair the way and manner in which you love God and show your love to God―otherwise, no matter how many other things you may do, they will be of little or no supernatural benefit and profit. It is our love of God, our charity towards God, that is the measure of our actions. The profit we get, or the rewards we receive, are directly proportionate to the love with which perform them. Hence, Holy Scripture says: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). St. Teresa of Ávila writes: “It is love alone that gives worth to all things!” That is why St. Paul adds: “But above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:14).
Just as Our Lord would say: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26), you can likewise say: “What does it profit a man if he performs all the possible penances but has no charity?”―charity being, above all else, a love of God. Sure, we can pray to God, we can say: “Lord! Lord! I love you!”―but actions speak louder than words, and love is proved by its actions and not its words, as Jesus Himself said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15) … “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Keeping the commandments of God is the very basic, beginners or novices level of charity―it includes, first of all, the elimination of all habitual mortal sin and then the elimination of all deliberate venial sin. The next level of charity manifests a great desire to be in the presence of God as much as possible, especially by prayer―sincere, heartfelt prayer and not mere automatic, repetitive, mechanical lip-service. The next and ultimate level of charity is a great desire to suffer more and more for God’s sake, out of a love for Him.
The Engine and Engine Room of Charity
To win our race for Heaven, we have to have enough “fuel in the gas tank”―because the race is not a 100 yard sprint, but a lifelong marathon. “He that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:22). Charity is that premium fuel that gives us maximum mileage and maximum results―as so beautifully explained by the following passage from the Imitation of Christ:
“Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs with equanimity. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and estranged from all worldly affections, lest its inward sight be obstructed, lest it be entangled in any temporal interest and overcome by adversity.
“Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger or higher or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in the one sovereign Good, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver.
“Love often knows no limits but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much where he who does not love fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle.
“If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice. For this warm affection of soul is a loud voice crying in the ears of God, and it says: “My God, my love, You are all mine and I am all Yours. Give me an increase of love, that I may learn to taste with the inward lips of my heart how sweet it is to love, how sweet to be dissolved in love and bathe in it. Let me be rapt in love. Let me rise above self in great fervor and wonder. Let me sing the hymn of love, and let me follow You, my Love, to the heights. Let my soul exhaust itself in praising You, rejoicing out of love. Let me love You more than myself, and let me not love myself except for Your sake. In You let me love all those who truly love You, as the law of love, which shines forth from You, commands.”
“Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. It is mean and contemptible in its own eyes, devoted and thankful to God; always trusting and hoping in Him even when He is distasteful to it, for there is no living in love without sorrow. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5: “The Wonderful Effect of Divine Love”).
Read and re-read that beautiful passage―each day leading up to Lent and each day throughout Lent! It is the foundation of all that we do or might do―without which all we do is insignificant or even useless. Read it and meditate it throughout the rest of your life―for if you can increase the level of your love just a fraction (actually, you can’t―God has to do it for you, but you have to pay for it, earn it), then the tiniest action or word or thought at that slightly higher level of charity, blows away, outstrips, leaves standing, surpasses THE COMBINED TOTAL OF ALL ACTIONS, WORDS AND THOUGHTS PERFORMED THROUGHOUT YOUR WHOLE LIFE AT A LOWER LEVEL OF CHARITY. That is like one grain of sand weighing more than a mountain! Charity can do that! That is why charity (a love of God) should be the “Number One” item on you Septuagesima Shopping List for Lent! Get that right and so many other things will rectify themselves as a side-effect―as St. Thomas Aquinas says, that if we practice one virtue to a heroic degree, then without realizing it we are practicing all the other virtues as consequence, at one time or another.
The Gospel for Septuagesima Sunday ends with those ominous words: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 20:16). Equally disconcerting to the modern-day “Catholic-Couch-Potato” are the words of the Epistle for Septuagesima Sunday, in which St. Paul warns all slackers that everyone must run in the race to Heaven―there are no exceptions, there are no spectators, only runners, and not everyone who runs (or walks or waddles) will get the prize: “Know you not that … all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24). The race to Heaven seems to be more like a marathon than a short race! We are more likely and more ready to run to the fridge, or run to the store, than to run to Heaven! Yes, “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 20:16)―many are called to run, but few choose to run!
Life is full of “the many and the few” syndrome―many want to be rich, only a few get to be rich; many want to be successful in the chosen field of work, but only few are successful; many are the teams in each sports league, but only one gets to be champion; many want to be top of the class, but only one is; many are the prayers we say, few are the prayers that get answered the way we want; many are the times we have made resolutions and wished we could change―become more virtuous, more skillful, more slender, more liked, etc.―but few are times we have succeeded; many are the souls that wish to be saved, but few are those who are saved.
“And a certain man said to him: Lord, are they few that are saved? But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: “Lord! Open to us!” And he answering, shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are!” Then you shall begin to say: “We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets!” And he shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are! Depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity!” There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out! And there shall come from the east and the west, and the north and the south; and shall sit down in the kingdom of God. And behold, they are last that shall be first; and they are first that shall be last!’” (Luke 13:23-30).
This is by no means the only reference to the number of souls that are saved or damned. Our Lord also speaks of this on another occasion—during His Sermon on the Mount: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!”(Matthew 7:13-14). “Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into exterior darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:13-14).
Wise and Foolish Virgins
Another parable told by Our Lord, which is very appropriate for this Septuagesima Season, was that of the Five Wise and Five Foolish Virgins: “Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be like to ten virgins, who taking their lamps went out to meet the bridegroom and the bride. And five of them were foolish, and five wise. But the five foolish, having taken their lamps, did not take oil with them: but the wise took oil in their vessels with the lamps. And the bridegroom tarrying, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made: ‘Behold the bridegroom cometh! Go ye forth to meet him!’ Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said to the wise: ‘Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out!’ The wise answered, saying: ‘Lest perhaps there be not enough for us and for you, go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves!’ Now whilst they went to buy, the bridegroom came: and they that were ready, went in with him to the marriage, and the door was shut. But at last come also the other virgins, saying: ‘Lord! Lord! Open to us!’ But he answering said: ‘Amen I say to you, I know you not!’” (Matthew 25:1-12).
They found themselves locked-out because they had not prepared sufficiently―let us not waste this Septuagesima Season of preparation by foolishly remaining indifferent to it and idle throughout it!
Two Shall Be In The Field…
Notice the numbers in the parable of the wise and foolish virgins—five and five. Not all get to go to the banquet—which symbolizes Heaven. Though we should place absolute value and credence on the numbers mentioned, they do match another statement by Our Lord, concerning the last days, where He speaks of the numbers who will be taken up by the angels and the numbers left behind: “But of that day and hour no one knows, not the angels of heaven, but the Father alone. And as in the days of Noe, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, even till that day in which Noe entered into the ark, and they knew not till the flood came, and took them all away; so also shall the coming of the Son of man be. Then two shall be in the field: one shall be taken, and one shall be left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill: one shall be taken, and one shall be left. Watch ye therefore, because ye know not what hour your Lord will come!” (Matthew 24:36-42).
The 'Unchosen Ones' Among the Chosen People
Our Lord mentioned the time of Noe and the Ark, reminded us of how few were saved―“the flood came, and took them all away.” God had no qualms about eliminating most of the human race because of sin and wiped them off the face of the Earth—“It repented Him that He had made man on the Earth. And being touched inwardly with sorrow of heart, He said: ‘I will destroy man, whom I have created, from the face of the Earth!’” (Genesis 6:6-7).
We see the same anger in God during the Exodus from Egypt on the journey to the Promised Land: “And again the Lord said to Moses: ‘See that this people is stiff-necked! Let Me alone, that My wrath may be kindled against them, and that I may destroy them, and I will make of thee a great nation!’”(Exodus 32:9-10).
St. Paul reminds us of this in the New Testament: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea! And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud, and in the sea! And did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ! But with most of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the desert!” (1 Corinthians 10:1-5).
God was not well pleased with most of them! What a horrifying thought! They were His Chosen People—were they not? Yet He was ready to destroy them, He made them wander in the desert―until all who had murmured, complained, rebelled and disobeyed God had died―so that only two (Josue and Caleb) of the original millions of adults, who had left Egypt with Moses, actually entered the Promised Land—the rest were a new generation that had been born in the desert during those forty years! With most of them God was not well pleased! What, then, would God think of our ultra-sinful world today? We shiver to think!
Get the Spiritual Engine Serviced Before Lent
Before we know it, Lent will be upon us! This Sunday, Septuagesima Sunday, the Church places before us the words of St. Paul, about running in a race in such a manner that we may win. “Know ye not that they which run in a race, run all, but one receives the prize? So run, that ye may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9: 24). In our lazy modern times, the car has replaced the two feet as the chief means of running around; but whether it is the athlete with his feet, or the driver with his car, the bottom line is that, to win a race, the athlete or the car has to be in peak condition.
Secondly, no athlete will win a competitive race without training beforehand. The car has to be tried out beforehand also, to see if all is running smoothly and well. This is what the Septuagesima season, with its three countdown Sundays (Septuagesima, Sexagesima and Quinquagesima) is for―a serious time of preparation for the even more serious time of Lent. In the previous article we spoke about the example furnished by St. Bernadette for our prayer life. Prayer is of the utmost importance to our ‘spiritual engine’; it is what drives our ‘spiritual body’ forwards and it is what gives it power.
“Do we believe in the power of prayer? We know the common teaching of theologians: that true prayer—by which we ask something for ourselves with humility, confidence and perseverance, the graces necessary for salvation—is infallibly efficacious (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa IIae, Q.83, Art.15, ad 2). We know this doctrine, and yet it seems to us, at times, that we have truly prayed without being heard. We believe in, or rather we see, the power of a machine, of an army, of money and of knowledge; but we do not believe strongly enough in the efficacy of prayer” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23).
The Gasoline of Grace comes through Prayer
“The modern world cannot do without God. This is the root of its ills. The great truth is that we have an absolute need of God…He normally bestows His grace only in response to prayer. Since our need exists at all times .... ‘We ought always to pray and not to faint” (Luke 18:1) .... The true nature of Christian prayer is perfectly expressed in the following definition given by St. John Damascene and St. Thomas Aquinas: prayer is ‘a raising of the mind and heart towards God’ to offer Him our homage and to ask Him for all those things of which we stand in need” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Spinning Wheels and Going Nowhere
People often pray without realizing what it is that they are doing, or Whom they are addressing! God so rightly complains in Scripture saying: “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me” (Matthew 15:7).
“It happens to some souls that, when they have recited many formulas, they realize that they have said nothing to God from the bottom of their hearts. Our mind may be far distant from the words that fall from our lips .... In our prayer, we must give up to God our whole heart and our whole mind .... Just as the sanctuary light burns itself up without reserving anything, so our soul, in its conversation with God, must be entirely dedicated to the Almighty. We must free ourselves from preoccupations and from vain thoughts, which tie the soul down to Earth and prevent it from being entirely given over to the Lord” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Winning Races Requires Intensity
Many find prayer difficult. That is only natural, since we are trying to communicate with the supernatural world.
“Prayer always requires a certain effort, even from those who find in it their delight, because a certain strain is involved in the concentration necessary to speak to God; it is always more or less difficult to maintain the soul in an atmosphere which is above its usual level. That is why prayer can serve as a sacramental penance. We must not be surprised at this difficulty in applying ourselves to prayer: for to raise ourselves towards God, even in the smallest degree, is to exceed our natural powers” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Focus on the Race, the Whole Race and Nothing but the Race
Too many people limit prayer to an isolated part of the day—first thing in the morning or last thing at night. Yet God should be part of our whole day, not just a mere ten minutes.
“Prayer in our life, must not be limited to a number of isolated, passing incidents. We must cultivate a spirit of prayer. What must we understand by this? A spirit of prayer is an habitual disposition of soul whereby, in our troubles and discouragements, as well as in our joys and successes, our hearts turn towards Our Lady and Our Lord, as to our best friends and most intimate confidants of our feelings. And it is not only in the morning and in the evening that the soul should be raised heavenwards, but always: ‘My eyes are ever towards the Lord’ (Psalm 24:15)” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
All Enter the Race, Not All Finish the Race
Prayer is actually a bending of our will towards the will of God. He wishes the salvation of all, but all will not be saved—and one of the contributory causes of failing to make it to Heaven is a lack of prayer; a lack of prayer by those who will be damned (the driver) and a lack of prayer on the part of others for the conversion of those unfortunate souls (the mechanics and maintenance crew).
“For material harvests, God prepared the seed, the rain that must help it germinate, the sun that will ripen the fruits of the Earth. Likewise, for spiritual harvest, He has prepared spiritual seeds, the divine graces necessary for sanctification and salvation. Prayer is one of the causes meant to produce that sanctification and salvation” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23). We can add to this the Biblical axiom of we reap what we sow: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8). Prayer is sowing in the spirit. Playing is sowing in the flesh. The Angel said to the children at Fatima: “Don’t play, but pray!”―which is essentially the same thing as we see in the Gospel for Septuagesima Sunday, where the Lord of the vineyard says to those men who were idly standing around in the market place: “But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he saith to them: ‘Why stand you here all the day idle?’” (Matthew 20:6). No race was ever won, nor was work ever done, by merely standing around or playing!
“St. Gregory the Great says: ‘Men ought, by prayer, to dispose themselves to receive what Almighty God, from eternity, has decided to give them’ (Dialogues, Book 1, chapter 8). Thus, Christ, wishing to convert the Samaritan woman, led her to pray by saying to her: “If thou didst know the gift of God!” In the same way, He granted Mary Magdalen a strong and gentle actual grace, which inclined her to repentance and to prayer. He acted in the same way to Zacheus and the Good Thief. It is, therefore, as necessary to pray in order to obtain the help of God, as it is necessary to sow seed in order to have wheat. To those who say that, what was to happen would happen, whether they prayed or not, is as foolish as to maintain that, whether or not we sowed seed, wheat would still appear once summer came! Therefore, prayer is necessary to obtain the help of God, as seed is necessary for the harvest” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23).
The problems we face, arise from the fact that God is prepared to give far more than we are prepared to ask for—we are so lazy and negligent, lacking in confidence and perseverance, that we receive only a fraction of what God is prepared to give. The efficacy of prayer, correctly made, is infallibly assured by Christ:
“Ask, and it shall be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you....And which of you, if he ask his father bread, will he give him a stone? Or a fish, will he give him a serpent?...If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father from Heaven give the good Spirit to them that ask Him?” (Luke 11:9-13). The problem does not lie with the Giver, but with us.
Some Racing Tips
Many of us become discouraged with prayer because our prayers are rarely, if ever heard. It is like entering the race just to make up numbers—but we never win! Yet, there are ways in which we can, almost infallibly, get our prayers answered and win that race! The spiritual writers or racers list the following chief tactics as “infallible” or guaranteed means of having our prayers favorably heard and answered:
1. PRAY FOR WHAT IS GOOD AND NOT SINFUL OR HARMFUL TO OUR SALVATION—We should always remember that what we want is not always what we need. At times, adversity is a better route to Heaven than prosperity. St. Augustine says: “We ought to be persuaded that what God refuses to our prayer, He grants to our salvation.”
2. OUR PRAYER MUST BE HUMBLE—Remember the prayer of the Pharisee and the Publican. Remember, too, Our Lady’s prayer, the Magnificat, wherein she says that God has “regarded the humility of His handmaid…He hath put down the mighty from their seat and hath exalted the humble.” The Old Testament says: “...nor from the beginning have the proud been acceptable to Thee―but the prayer of the humble and the meek hath always pleased Thee” (Judith 9:16). “May the Lord destroy all deceitful lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things” (Psalm 11:4). “Thou hast rebuked the proud” (Psalm 118:21). “Every proud man is an abomination to the Lord” (Proverbs 16:5).
3. OUR PRAYER MUST BE FERVENT—Too often our prayers are said listlessly, routinely, mechanically; our heart is not in them. Of such Our Lord said: “This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:7). Our prayers should be like grains of incense, placed on the hot coals of our hearts.
4. WE SHOULD AMEND OUR LIFE — If we persist in leading a life of sin, even venial sin, then we greatly handicap the chances of having our prayers heard. “He who turns his ears from hearing the law, his prayer is an abomination” (Proverbs 28:9).
5. WE SHOULD FORGIVE THOSE WHO HAVE INJURED US — This was the example of Christ dying on the cross: “Father, forgive them...” “If, therefore, thou offer thy gift at the altar, and there thou remember that thy brother hath anything against thee—Leave there thy offering before the altar, and go first to be reconciled to thy brother: and then, coming, thou shalt offer thy gift” (Matthew 5:23-24). “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). “Forgive thy neighbor if he hath hurt thee, and then shall thy sins be forgiven to thee, when thou prayest” (Ecclesiasticus. 28:2).
6. OUR PRAYER SHOULD BE UNITED TO GOOD WORKS OR SACRIFICES — “Prayer is good with fasting and alms” (Tobias 12:8). That is why penance is so crucial in strengthening our prayer. Our Lady asks not only for prayer at Fatima, but prayer and sacrifices. The power of this is expressed in Scripture, where the Apostles failed to cast out a demon from one particular person, and asked Our Lord why they had failed. Our Lord replied: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20).
7. WE SHOULD PRAY WITH CONFIDENCE — Our Lord praised the Faith and confidence of persons on many occasions, saying: “Go, thy Faith has made thee whole!” (Matthew 9:22; Mark 5:34; 10:52; Luke 17:19; 18:42). He also told us that “all things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive” (Matthew 21:22). Do we have that confidence in prayer?
8. WE SHOULD PRAY WITH PERSEVERANCE — “He defers the granting to increase our desire and appreciation” says St. Augustine. Our Lord Himself said: “Yet if he shall continue knocking, I say to you, although he will not rise and give him because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise and give him as many as he needeth. And I say to you: Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you” (Luke 11:8-9).
If we would only pray in the above manner, we would be amazed at the response our prayers would bring from Heaven! Keep in mind the words of St. Augustine: “The man who knows how to pray well, is the one who knows how to live well.” Which, for our purposes, translates into “Drive well, and you’ll win the race! Pray well, and you’ll get the grace!”
But Above All … Have Charity
To this, we could well add, “The man who loves well, is one who prays well!”―which is basically the flip side of the coin of what Our Lord expresses when he says: “These people honor Me with their lips: but their hearts are far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). When our heart is not in our prayer, then our prayer is not as well prayed as it should be―our prayers may be “said”, but they are not “prayed”―because they mainly come from the lips and not from the heart.
Therefore, to make a successful Lent, you need to rectify, improve, overhaul and repair the way and manner in which you love God and show your love to God―otherwise, no matter how many other things you may do, they will be of little or no supernatural benefit and profit. It is our love of God, our charity towards God, that is the measure of our actions. The profit we get, or the rewards we receive, are directly proportionate to the love with which perform them. Hence, Holy Scripture says: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). St. Teresa of Ávila writes: “It is love alone that gives worth to all things!” That is why St. Paul adds: “But above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:14).
Just as Our Lord would say: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26), you can likewise say: “What does it profit a man if he performs all the possible penances but has no charity?”―charity being, above all else, a love of God. Sure, we can pray to God, we can say: “Lord! Lord! I love you!”―but actions speak louder than words, and love is proved by its actions and not its words, as Jesus Himself said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15) … “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Keeping the commandments of God is the very basic, beginners or novices level of charity―it includes, first of all, the elimination of all habitual mortal sin and then the elimination of all deliberate venial sin. The next level of charity manifests a great desire to be in the presence of God as much as possible, especially by prayer―sincere, heartfelt prayer and not mere automatic, repetitive, mechanical lip-service. The next and ultimate level of charity is a great desire to suffer more and more for God’s sake, out of a love for Him.
The Engine and Engine Room of Charity
To win our race for Heaven, we have to have enough “fuel in the gas tank”―because the race is not a 100 yard sprint, but a lifelong marathon. “He that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:22). Charity is that premium fuel that gives us maximum mileage and maximum results―as so beautifully explained by the following passage from the Imitation of Christ:
“Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs with equanimity. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and estranged from all worldly affections, lest its inward sight be obstructed, lest it be entangled in any temporal interest and overcome by adversity.
“Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger or higher or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in the one sovereign Good, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver.
“Love often knows no limits but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much where he who does not love fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle.
“If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice. For this warm affection of soul is a loud voice crying in the ears of God, and it says: “My God, my love, You are all mine and I am all Yours. Give me an increase of love, that I may learn to taste with the inward lips of my heart how sweet it is to love, how sweet to be dissolved in love and bathe in it. Let me be rapt in love. Let me rise above self in great fervor and wonder. Let me sing the hymn of love, and let me follow You, my Love, to the heights. Let my soul exhaust itself in praising You, rejoicing out of love. Let me love You more than myself, and let me not love myself except for Your sake. In You let me love all those who truly love You, as the law of love, which shines forth from You, commands.”
“Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. It is mean and contemptible in its own eyes, devoted and thankful to God; always trusting and hoping in Him even when He is distasteful to it, for there is no living in love without sorrow. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5: “The Wonderful Effect of Divine Love”).
Read and re-read that beautiful passage―each day leading up to Lent and each day throughout Lent! It is the foundation of all that we do or might do―without which all we do is insignificant or even useless. Read it and meditate it throughout the rest of your life―for if you can increase the level of your love just a fraction (actually, you can’t―God has to do it for you, but you have to pay for it, earn it), then the tiniest action or word or thought at that slightly higher level of charity, blows away, outstrips, leaves standing, surpasses THE COMBINED TOTAL OF ALL ACTIONS, WORDS AND THOUGHTS PERFORMED THROUGHOUT YOUR WHOLE LIFE AT A LOWER LEVEL OF CHARITY. That is like one grain of sand weighing more than a mountain! Charity can do that! That is why charity (a love of God) should be the “Number One” item on you Septuagesima Shopping List for Lent! Get that right and so many other things will rectify themselves as a side-effect―as St. Thomas Aquinas says, that if we practice one virtue to a heroic degree, then without realizing it we are practicing all the other virtues as consequence, at one time or another.
Article 1
Saturday, February 15th
O No! Not Again!
Saturday, February 15th
O No! Not Again!
Septua … What?
Septuagesima Sunday―now discarded and thrown into the trash can by most of the modern-day Church―designates the ninth Sunday before Easter and also the third Sunday before Ash Wednesday. It is the introduction to the solemn penitential season of Lent. The word Septuagesima comes from the Latin for “seventieth.” The three Sundays which precede Ash Wednesday were called Septuagesima, Sexagesima, and Quinquagesima respectively, or, the seventieth, sixtieth, and fiftieth days (approximately) before the highest solemnity of Easter.
Septuagesima, the seventeen day period starting on Septuagesima Sunday was intended to be observed as a preparation for Lent. In many countries, however, Septuagesima Sunday marked and still marks the traditional start of the carnival season, culminating on Shrove Tuesday, sometimes known as Mardi Gras. Although the current Church calendar does not formally recognize this prelude to Lent; we need Septuagesima now more than ever.
O No! Not Again! It’s that Four-Letter-Word Again!
The 17-day period beginning on Septuagesima Sunday is intended to be observed as a preparation for the season of LENT ― that dreaded four-letter-word. The Septuagesima season is like a shadow that is cast ahead of the fast approaching Lenten season ― it is like a precursor of Lent, and many are no doubt cursing the coming of Lent. That four-letter word, LENT, is married to another four-letter word―FAST. For many, fasting is a pain and Lent cannot go by fast enough!
In the pre-1970 Roman Rite liturgy, the Alleluia ceases to be said during the liturgy. At first Vespers of Septuagesima Sunday, two alleluias are added to the closing verse of Benedicamus Domino and its response, Deo gratias, as during the Easter Octave, and, starting at Compline, it is no longer used until Easter. Likewise, violet vestments are worn, except on feasts, from Septuagesima Sunday until Holy Thursday. As during Advent and Lent, the Gloria and Te Deum are no longer said on Sundays.
The readings at Matins for this week are the first few chapters of Genesis, telling of the creation of the world, of Adam and Eve, the fall of man and resulting expulsion from the Garden of Eden, and the story of Cain and Abel. In the following weeks before and during Lent, the readings continue to Noe, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses. The Gospel reading for Septuagesima week is the parable of the Workers in the Vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16).
Catholic usage after 1969
The liturgical books revised after the Second Vatican Council no longer celebrate or keep Septuagesima, Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays, which are found in the earlier versions, and treat this period as part of Ordinary Time, so that the use of violet vestments and the omission of “Alleluia” in the liturgy begin only on Ash Wednesday.
Polish National Catholic Church Usage
However, in 2014, the Polish National Catholic Church officially reinstated the Septuagesima, Sexagesima, and Quinquagesima Sundays throughout the Poland. The celebration of this season as a preparation for Holy Lent is now highlighted as a part of the Liturgical Year.
In addition to Poland, there are still many religious communities that still keep the traditional Septuagesima, Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays, which is a good thing—for it shows a healthy respect for the ancient traditions of the Church, which were in place for century after century. It is perhaps no small coincidence, that, since the throwing out of most of the traditional customs, they found that they had “thrown-out-the-baby-with-the-bathwater.” The unprecedented collapse in numbers of practicing Catholics over the last 50 years is not a chance phenomenon, but, like every disease, has to have its own causes. Our Lady’s apparitions and warnings have quite a few things to say on that matter.
The Math of Septuagesima
The season of Septuagesima comprises the three weeks immediately preceding Lent. It forms one of the principal divisions of the liturgical year, and is itself divided into three parts, each part corresponding to a week: the first is called Septuagesima; the second, Sexagesima; the third, Quinquagesima.
Countdown Sundays
All three are named from their numerical reference to Lent, which, in the language of the Church, is called Quadragesima, that is, Forty, because the great feast of Easter is prepared for by the holy exercises of forty days. The words Quinquagesima, Sexagesima, and Septuagesima, tell us of the same great solemnity as looming in the distance, and as being the great object towards which the Church would have us now begin to turn all our thoughts, and desires, and devotion. Septuagesima comes from the Latin word for “seventieth.” Likewise, Sexagesima, Quinquagesima, and Quadragesima mean “sixtieth,” “fiftieth,” and “fortieth” respectively.
Ah, but…!!
But if you look at a calendar, and start counting the days from Septuagesima Sunday to Easter Sunday, then you will notice that Septuagesima Sunday is NOT the “seventieth” day from Easter Sunday—it is 64th day from Easter Sunday (including both days in the count). Why then call it the 70th day? The significance of this naming is as follows:
Like Century, Like Decade
The Sundays were not named according the ordinal placement, but as to the decade (like century, for example) in which they happened to fall. So instead of saying “I arrived in Rome one summer’s day in 1749”—we say instead, “I arrived in Rome one summer’s day in the 18th century. So we classify 1749, not by the year, but by the century in which it is found and we say that 1749 was in the 18th century; 1821 was in the 19th century; 1935 was in the 20th century; and 2015 is in the 21st century. This is how the Sundays came to get their names, it depended upon which “decade” (like century) they were placed.
► 1 to 10 = 1st decade
► 11 to 20 = 2nd decade
► 21 to 30 = 3rd decade
► 31 to 40 = 4th decade or Quadragesima Sunday = 43rd day
► 41 to 50 = 5th decade or Quinquagesima Sunday 50th day
► 51 to 60 = 6th decade or Sexagesima Sunday = 57th day
► 61 to 70 = 7th decade and Septuagesima Sunday = 64th day
► Septuagesima Sunday (the 64th day from Easter) falls with the decade of 70 to 61 days from Easter Sunday.
► Sexagesima Sunday (the 57th day from Easter) falls with the decade of 60 to 51 days from Easter Sunday.
► Quinquagesima Sunday (the 50th day from Easter) falls with the decade of 50 to 51 days from Easter Sunday.
► Quadragesima Sunday (the 43rd day from Easter) falls with the decade of 40 to 31 days from Easter Sunday.
Whew!! Hopefully it all makes sense after all these years! Who said the Catholic Faith had to be simple?!
The Joy of Christmas is in the Past! The Thought of Lent has us Aghast!
Woe! Woe! Woe!
The Season of Christmas has gone away!
The Season of Lent is now on its way!
The season in which we did laugh and play,
Gives way to the season where we pray and pay!
After a joyful season when we did sing and sway,
Comes a mournful season of regret and dismay!
Both seasons are expensive, but in a different way,
For it’s through money and penance that we pay!
Yet money buys joys that soon go away,
But penance buys joys that will never decay!
The joys of this world lead astray and betray,
While the joys of Heaven eternal happiness convey!
So forget the vain joys of yesterday,
And into Lent make a joyful headway!
Stop walking down the broad highway,
That leads to damnation on doomsday!
On the narrow path to Heaven stay,
And yourselves with prayer and penance array!
Then when your penances your sins outweigh,
You’ll skip joyfully through Heaven’s gateway!
Whoa to Woe!
For many, Lent is a time of woe! Lent is a killjoy! Lent restricts and cramps their preferred way of living. They would prefer to get by without Lent if possible. In fact, the modern Church caters to their style—for in 1966 Pope Paul VI reduced the 40 days of obligatory Lenten fasting to merely 2 day of obligatory Lenten fasting—Ash Wednesday and Good Friday—with plenty of time in between for those poor souls to recover from Ash Wednesday before Good Friday smacks them once more in the face (or the belly). Yet is this “Easy-Street” Lent really helping souls in the long-run? Is not this “Easy-Street” Lent actually a parallel road to the broad road that leads to perdition? Don’t fool yourself and hide behind the vestments of the Church, saying: “Well, that’s what the Church says! Why should I do more penance than what the Church asks?”
Listen to what the “Mother of the Church”—Our Lady—says: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops” (Our Lady of La Salette). Have they forgotten Our Lord’s own words: “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). In view of those words of Our Lord and Our Lady, do you think that they are happy with the fact that the modern Church has given a 95% discount on Lenten penance, reducing it from 40 days of fasting to a mere 2 days? At a time when sin is on the increase, why do we get a decrease in penance? When a disease becomes more aggressive, do you give the patient less medicine? That is what the modern Church has done—and the ‘patient’ is very happy with it! Not logical! Not safe! Not wise to follow! “Many false prophets shall rise, and shall seduce many … There shall arise false Christs and false prophets … to deceive (if possible) even the elect!” (Matthew 24:11; 24). Prophecies seem to indicate that we have entered that period of time. We would be foolish to “buy-into” the euphoria of the 95% Lenten discount, for the 5%, that we pay, might only be enough to buy a ticket to Hell (or Purgatory at best) and not be enough to purchase the ticket to Heaven that they falsely told us it would.
An Article by a Modern 'Conservative' Catholic Who Hates Lent (Sort-of)
Here is an article that pretty much dovetails with the attitude of most modern Catholics today—which betrays a heavy dose of naturalism or worldliness, mixed with some spirituality. It conveys a mainly “unspiritual” attitude that is mixed in with a slightly spiritual attitude. What is unsettling—though not surprising—about this “Modern 'Conservative' Catholic” authors article is that she is speaking about the 95% discounted Lent and is even unhappy with that! Anyway, here it is, read it for yourself:
She starts out: “I’ll say it bluntly―I hate Lent. It’s my least favorite time of the year. It’s a big gray Ash Wednesday forehead smudge on the calendar that wrecks March, and sometimes extends its sooty smear well into April. Lent always casts a funeral pall over St. Patrick’s Day ― ‘Shouldn’t your fist be clutching the Rosary beads, boyo, instead of that pint of Guinness?’ And sometimes Lent falls so early that it ruins Valentine’s Day as well―two holidays in a row! The weather in Lent is always chilly and dismal: late, unwelcome, quickly dirtied, I’m-so-sick-of snow if you live on the East Coast, and even in southern California, where I grew up, Lent coincides with the annual rainy season, when it pours in sheets for days on end. Lent is an Ash Wednesday smudge on the sky, too.
“If you’re a Catholic, you traditionally give up something for Lent. That usually means comfort food, just at the time of year when you need comfort most, especially from food. So it’s goodbye, chocolate, goodbye, Cheez Whiz nachos. Me, I give up meat, and also cream in my coffee. That means that I spend the entire 40 days of Lent (and, hey―it’s actually longer than 40 days, because Sundays aren’t counted) starving and thinking about steaks and latte. As the weeks pass, the steaks get thicker, the latte more foamy. I can always slip inside a church for distraction. That’s great. No flowers, a bare altar, dirges for hymns. It’s the season of penance. The priest wears depressing dark-purple vestments. He says a prayer that thanks God for “this season of joy.” What joy? There are only two fun things about Lent. One is Mardi Gras. The other is checking out the foreheads of people at your job on Ash Wednesday to see whether they got ashes at the church that morning (“I didn’t know you were a Catholic!”).
“Lent is bad now, but it was even worse when I was a child. Every year my parents decided that we should all, as a family, give up sweets for Lent. That was easy for them, as they weren’t dessert people, and they had no intention of giving up their own Fifties-adult equivalent of the Snickers bar, the 6 p.m. martini. The Lenten days crawled along minute by minute, and my sisters and I writhed in misery. In our bureau drawers we hoarded stale cookies and candies and doughnuts that friends or neighbors might give us as we waited for the witching hour: 12 noon on Holy Saturday, the day before Easter, which, back in those pre-Vatican II says, was when Lent officially ended. At our Catholic parochial school, Lenten observances were even grimmer than at home. We had to go to Mass every day, not just on Sunday. That meant hundreds of squirming, uniform-clad girls in beanies crammed into the front rows of our parish church every Lenten weekday, as nuns stalked the aisles making sure that no child rested her elbows on the pew ahead while kneeling.
“At my Catholic girls’ high school, the nuns ratcheted up the Lenten misery even higher, with the annual three-day Lenten retreat. Classes were suspended, and we had to observe complete silence, praying, meditating, and listening to harangues about our virtue from an uncomfortable-looking local priest who had clearly been dragooned into the operation against his will. We had to do “spiritual reading,” checking out an appropriate book from the school library. I usually managed to do my reading in the form of a pious novel: Cardinal Wiseman’s “Fabiola,” about early Christian virgins in Rome, and one year, a book called “The Reluctant Vestal,” which wasn’t about early Christians but which I managed to sneak past the school librarian because it was about virgins in Rome. I found a quiet spot on campus to read about the gorgeous vestal and her senator-boyfriend who was faithfully waiting it out for her years of “vestal-dom” to be up.
“Now, of course, I don’t have to go on a three-day silent retreat or do without doughnuts during Lent unless I want to. I could go on a three-day screaming orgy during Lent if that were my choice. But I don’t―and that’s because if there weren’t a Lent every year, I’d miss it. I would miss the strictures of a season of penance that reminds me, not just that life is not all merriment, but that I actually have things for which to do penance. And during Lent, at its very end, is Holy Week, with its solemn and beautiful liturgy that reenacts the time when Christ did penance, too, for us, and for our sins. After that is Easter, when we live again in Christ’s resurrection, in the flowers of warm spring and the white light. I hate Lent―it’s perfectly awful―but it always brings joy.” [End of article].
Digging Beneath the Surface
The immediate clues that jumped out from the above article were as follows:
(1) The author was obviously a woman―for she writes: “At my Catholic girls’ high school … ”
(2) She was an elderly woman, because she speaks of being a child at home in the 1950s and also since she states she was in parochial school and also high school before the Second Vatican Council (which took place between 1962 to 1965)—therefore, if she was in 9th Grade in 1962, then she would have been born around 1947, and if she was in 9th Grade in 1965, it would mean that her latest date of birth would have been around 1950. That would have placed her on the verge of her early teens at the time of the Second Vatican Council, being anywhere from 12 years old and above in 1962. Thus, today, she would be aged anywhere from 78 and older. Elsewhere, her birth date is listed as being in April of 1943―which would make her 81 years old as of today.
Though the article did not name the author, Google listed the author as Charlotte Allen, a writer and journalist. Further research shows that she is a conservative Catholic, born in April of 1943 (thus currently aged 81) in California—therefore she would have been 19 years old when the Second Vatican Council began in October 1962. She has been writing for more than four decades (as of 2025) about cultural, political and religious issues for a variety of publications. She currently lives in Washington DC, blogs for the Los Angeles Times and has written frequently for the Weekly Standard, Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal.
Researching a little further, a rightfully scathing article of Charlotte Allen was found on Martin Luther, but which she ends with the words: “At this point, my Protestant and evangelical readers might be thinking that I’m simply a latter-day Father Feeney, railing indiscriminately against “our separated brethren,” as we Catholics call them nowadays. Not so. My husband is a Prot! And my hat is off to the Wesley brothers, William Wilberforce, C.S. Lewis, Billy Graham, evangelical Anglican biblical scholar N.T. Wright, and many, many other witnesses to vibrant Christian faith outside the Catholic Church.”
A Charlotte’s Catholicism a Charlatan Catholicism
First of all, let it be made clear that this is not meant as a slight to the Conservative religious beliefs of Charlotte Allen—for if every Catholic would be as active as she is in the field of the Faith, then the Faith would be in a far better state than it is today. Yet, at the same time, Charlotte Allen can be taken as an example of the typical Catholic in the world today—a mixture of the “old” and the “new”—which is, though not all are prepared to admit it, a hybrid Faith of the kind which Blessed Anne Catherine speaks of from what God revealed to her in visions pertaining to our days. The Catholic Church is rapidly developing into the Charlatan Church.
The dictionary defines a “charlatan” as (1) someone who fraudulently peddles fake remedies; (2) a pretender to medical knowledge; (3) someone making a showy pretense to knowledge or ability; (4) someone without adequate learning. In this sense, we could say that much of the Catholicism in the world today is “Charlatan Catholicism”—which fits in with the prophecies that speak of our times. Our Lord speaks of false ‘Christs’ who will many astray, even the elect. Our Lady of Akita says: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops … The Church will be full of those who accept compromises.”
Whereas Our Lady of La Salette warns: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish … A large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … The devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin.”
If you cannot see that this is actually happening in our day, then you are spiritually blind and spiritually deceived—of such Our Lord says: “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). Those words were addressed to the Scribes and the Pharisees—who were the well-educated, well-intentioned, well-respected “Conservatives” and preservers of the Jewish Religion and the Law in Christ’s time.
Though Charlotte Allen is a ‘Conservative Catholic’, we should remind ourselves that the Scribes and Pharisees―the religious elite of the day―who were also ‘Conservatives’ in the time of Jesus—yet Jesus hurled repeated woe after woe upon them in an unprecedented aggressive manner (see Matthew 23). The Scribes and Pharisees sought to preserve the Jewish Law and religion from being contaminated by the world and even imposed strict rules and measures for that intended goal. The Scribes and Pharisees were supposed to know God and help others know Him and follow His ways. Instead, these religious leaders added to God’s Law and so twisted and changed God’s original Law. In the same way, since the Second Vatican Council, the Liberals and Modernists in the Church have slowly and subtly twisted and transformed the Catholic Faith from what God wants into what they want.
These men (and increasingly women too) are like those false Christs and false prophets mentioned by Our Lord: “Many false prophets shall rise, and shall seduce many” (Matthew 24:11) … “For there will rise up false Christs and false prophets to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect” (Mark 13:22)—which is linked to what Our Lady of Akita said: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops … The Church will be full of those who accept compromises.”
The Typical Mixed-Up Catholic of Our Days
So we see in the author of the above article, a typical—though very intelligent—modern-day Catholic with traditional roots—putting forth a hybrid or mixed Catholicism of the “old” and the “new”, as well a mixture of “Catholic” and “non-Catholic”. This is reinforced in the practical field by Charlotte Allen’s statement that she married a Protestant and by her acclamation and praise of the above list of Protestant clergy or ministers (just as Pope Francis and a multitude of bishops tend to do)―but there is ONLY ONE true Church, and that is the Catholic Church, outside of which there is no salvation. She is, on the whole, an intelligent but typical example of the ‘mixed-up’ kind of Catholic that forms the weak backbone or spine of the Church today—the danger being that she is very intelligent and thus holding a greater credibility than most. Her attitude to Lent—though some of what she writes may perhaps be “tongue-in-cheek”—is also typical of the attitude of Catholics today―she and they “hate” Lent, even the ‘cheaper’ or ‘discounted’ Lent that came immediately after the Second Vatican Council in 1966.
The ‘cheaper’ you make something, the less respect there will be for it. A 95% Lenten discount on fasting is in no way conducive to creating an attitude that sees the need for Lenten fasting—for if you can do away with 95% of it, then it cannot have been very important in the first place!—or so the false reasoning goes. Nor is a 95% discounted Lenten fast indicative of the increasing or escalating amount of sin that is being committed throughout the world—by Catholics and non-Catholics alike. Our Lady of Akita warned: “In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before … The thought of the loss of so many souls is the cause of my sadness. If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
An “Easy-Street” to Where?
There is no doubt that today’s Catholic Faith, and its discipline, is an “Easy-Street”—but an “Easy-Street” to where? If the path to Heaven was an “Easy-Street”, then why would Our Lord say: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). If it was “Easy-Street”, then why would He say: “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). If Heaven was so easy to attain, then why does Jesus say: “Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 19:23-24)?
If the path to Heaven was “Easy-Street”, why would Our Lord say: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it! … Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14)? If it was easy to get to Heaven, why would St. Peter write: “And if the just man shall scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?” (1 Peter 4:18)? If the attainment of Heaven was “Easy-Street”, why would St. Paul write: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain!” (1 Corinthians 9:24) … “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
All of this incompatible with the spirit of the 95% discount in Lenten fasting granted to Catholics after the Second Vatican Council. As Sister Lucia of Fatima said just a few years before the 95% Penitential Discount—in an interview with Fr. Fuentes in December of 1957--“Father, we should not wait for an appeal to the world to come from Rome on the part of the Holy Father, to do penance. Nor should we wait for the call from our bishops in our dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No! Our Lord has already, very often, used these means and the world has not paid attention. That is why now it is necessary for each one of us to begin to reform ourselves spiritually. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also the souls that God has placed on our path.”
Of course, it is tempting to buy your spiritual ‘gasoline’ where you can get a 95% discount—but is that ‘cheap’ gasoline good for your engine (soul)? Will it get you to your final destination, or will it slow you down, or will it even cause you to break down? Do not take Lent lightly! Do not try get through it “on the cheap”—for, as Scripture warns: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). As the Church says, in the Epistle on the First Sunday of Lent: “We entreat you not to receive the grace of God in vain. For He says, In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you. Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:1-2).
If we were to read that chapter of Corinthians to end, we would find the following words, which apply very much to modern-day Catholics who carelessly mix with anyone and everyone in a spirit of false ecumenism: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
As always, you need to look at all this in the light of the fact that most souls are not saved, but lost (read here). If you find that you are like most people in the world today—then that is unquestionably a bad sign. Keep asking yourself the question: “Why are most souls lost? What is it that they are doing—or NOT doing—that makes them lose their souls?” Of course, that truth can unquestionably lead to discouragement or even despair—but those feelings do not come from God, but the devil. Everyone CAN be saved—for God never asks us to do what is impossible. Yet not everyone WILL be saved—because they refuse, for one reason or another, to what it takes to be saved. It is not a case of being “pre-programmed” for Hell―for God has “programmed” you for Heaven—it is more a case of “re-programming” yourself to do what you want and not what God wants.
Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Corporal penances are so appropriate and fitted to mortal creatures, that the ignorance of this truth and the neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss!”
Whereas Our Lord said: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!” (Matthew 7:21-23).
Septuagesima Sunday―now discarded and thrown into the trash can by most of the modern-day Church―designates the ninth Sunday before Easter and also the third Sunday before Ash Wednesday. It is the introduction to the solemn penitential season of Lent. The word Septuagesima comes from the Latin for “seventieth.” The three Sundays which precede Ash Wednesday were called Septuagesima, Sexagesima, and Quinquagesima respectively, or, the seventieth, sixtieth, and fiftieth days (approximately) before the highest solemnity of Easter.
Septuagesima, the seventeen day period starting on Septuagesima Sunday was intended to be observed as a preparation for Lent. In many countries, however, Septuagesima Sunday marked and still marks the traditional start of the carnival season, culminating on Shrove Tuesday, sometimes known as Mardi Gras. Although the current Church calendar does not formally recognize this prelude to Lent; we need Septuagesima now more than ever.
O No! Not Again! It’s that Four-Letter-Word Again!
The 17-day period beginning on Septuagesima Sunday is intended to be observed as a preparation for the season of LENT ― that dreaded four-letter-word. The Septuagesima season is like a shadow that is cast ahead of the fast approaching Lenten season ― it is like a precursor of Lent, and many are no doubt cursing the coming of Lent. That four-letter word, LENT, is married to another four-letter word―FAST. For many, fasting is a pain and Lent cannot go by fast enough!
In the pre-1970 Roman Rite liturgy, the Alleluia ceases to be said during the liturgy. At first Vespers of Septuagesima Sunday, two alleluias are added to the closing verse of Benedicamus Domino and its response, Deo gratias, as during the Easter Octave, and, starting at Compline, it is no longer used until Easter. Likewise, violet vestments are worn, except on feasts, from Septuagesima Sunday until Holy Thursday. As during Advent and Lent, the Gloria and Te Deum are no longer said on Sundays.
The readings at Matins for this week are the first few chapters of Genesis, telling of the creation of the world, of Adam and Eve, the fall of man and resulting expulsion from the Garden of Eden, and the story of Cain and Abel. In the following weeks before and during Lent, the readings continue to Noe, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses. The Gospel reading for Septuagesima week is the parable of the Workers in the Vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16).
Catholic usage after 1969
The liturgical books revised after the Second Vatican Council no longer celebrate or keep Septuagesima, Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays, which are found in the earlier versions, and treat this period as part of Ordinary Time, so that the use of violet vestments and the omission of “Alleluia” in the liturgy begin only on Ash Wednesday.
Polish National Catholic Church Usage
However, in 2014, the Polish National Catholic Church officially reinstated the Septuagesima, Sexagesima, and Quinquagesima Sundays throughout the Poland. The celebration of this season as a preparation for Holy Lent is now highlighted as a part of the Liturgical Year.
In addition to Poland, there are still many religious communities that still keep the traditional Septuagesima, Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays, which is a good thing—for it shows a healthy respect for the ancient traditions of the Church, which were in place for century after century. It is perhaps no small coincidence, that, since the throwing out of most of the traditional customs, they found that they had “thrown-out-the-baby-with-the-bathwater.” The unprecedented collapse in numbers of practicing Catholics over the last 50 years is not a chance phenomenon, but, like every disease, has to have its own causes. Our Lady’s apparitions and warnings have quite a few things to say on that matter.
The Math of Septuagesima
The season of Septuagesima comprises the three weeks immediately preceding Lent. It forms one of the principal divisions of the liturgical year, and is itself divided into three parts, each part corresponding to a week: the first is called Septuagesima; the second, Sexagesima; the third, Quinquagesima.
Countdown Sundays
All three are named from their numerical reference to Lent, which, in the language of the Church, is called Quadragesima, that is, Forty, because the great feast of Easter is prepared for by the holy exercises of forty days. The words Quinquagesima, Sexagesima, and Septuagesima, tell us of the same great solemnity as looming in the distance, and as being the great object towards which the Church would have us now begin to turn all our thoughts, and desires, and devotion. Septuagesima comes from the Latin word for “seventieth.” Likewise, Sexagesima, Quinquagesima, and Quadragesima mean “sixtieth,” “fiftieth,” and “fortieth” respectively.
Ah, but…!!
But if you look at a calendar, and start counting the days from Septuagesima Sunday to Easter Sunday, then you will notice that Septuagesima Sunday is NOT the “seventieth” day from Easter Sunday—it is 64th day from Easter Sunday (including both days in the count). Why then call it the 70th day? The significance of this naming is as follows:
Like Century, Like Decade
The Sundays were not named according the ordinal placement, but as to the decade (like century, for example) in which they happened to fall. So instead of saying “I arrived in Rome one summer’s day in 1749”—we say instead, “I arrived in Rome one summer’s day in the 18th century. So we classify 1749, not by the year, but by the century in which it is found and we say that 1749 was in the 18th century; 1821 was in the 19th century; 1935 was in the 20th century; and 2015 is in the 21st century. This is how the Sundays came to get their names, it depended upon which “decade” (like century) they were placed.
► 1 to 10 = 1st decade
► 11 to 20 = 2nd decade
► 21 to 30 = 3rd decade
► 31 to 40 = 4th decade or Quadragesima Sunday = 43rd day
► 41 to 50 = 5th decade or Quinquagesima Sunday 50th day
► 51 to 60 = 6th decade or Sexagesima Sunday = 57th day
► 61 to 70 = 7th decade and Septuagesima Sunday = 64th day
► Septuagesima Sunday (the 64th day from Easter) falls with the decade of 70 to 61 days from Easter Sunday.
► Sexagesima Sunday (the 57th day from Easter) falls with the decade of 60 to 51 days from Easter Sunday.
► Quinquagesima Sunday (the 50th day from Easter) falls with the decade of 50 to 51 days from Easter Sunday.
► Quadragesima Sunday (the 43rd day from Easter) falls with the decade of 40 to 31 days from Easter Sunday.
Whew!! Hopefully it all makes sense after all these years! Who said the Catholic Faith had to be simple?!
The Joy of Christmas is in the Past! The Thought of Lent has us Aghast!
Woe! Woe! Woe!
The Season of Christmas has gone away!
The Season of Lent is now on its way!
The season in which we did laugh and play,
Gives way to the season where we pray and pay!
After a joyful season when we did sing and sway,
Comes a mournful season of regret and dismay!
Both seasons are expensive, but in a different way,
For it’s through money and penance that we pay!
Yet money buys joys that soon go away,
But penance buys joys that will never decay!
The joys of this world lead astray and betray,
While the joys of Heaven eternal happiness convey!
So forget the vain joys of yesterday,
And into Lent make a joyful headway!
Stop walking down the broad highway,
That leads to damnation on doomsday!
On the narrow path to Heaven stay,
And yourselves with prayer and penance array!
Then when your penances your sins outweigh,
You’ll skip joyfully through Heaven’s gateway!
Whoa to Woe!
For many, Lent is a time of woe! Lent is a killjoy! Lent restricts and cramps their preferred way of living. They would prefer to get by without Lent if possible. In fact, the modern Church caters to their style—for in 1966 Pope Paul VI reduced the 40 days of obligatory Lenten fasting to merely 2 day of obligatory Lenten fasting—Ash Wednesday and Good Friday—with plenty of time in between for those poor souls to recover from Ash Wednesday before Good Friday smacks them once more in the face (or the belly). Yet is this “Easy-Street” Lent really helping souls in the long-run? Is not this “Easy-Street” Lent actually a parallel road to the broad road that leads to perdition? Don’t fool yourself and hide behind the vestments of the Church, saying: “Well, that’s what the Church says! Why should I do more penance than what the Church asks?”
Listen to what the “Mother of the Church”—Our Lady—says: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops” (Our Lady of La Salette). Have they forgotten Our Lord’s own words: “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). In view of those words of Our Lord and Our Lady, do you think that they are happy with the fact that the modern Church has given a 95% discount on Lenten penance, reducing it from 40 days of fasting to a mere 2 days? At a time when sin is on the increase, why do we get a decrease in penance? When a disease becomes more aggressive, do you give the patient less medicine? That is what the modern Church has done—and the ‘patient’ is very happy with it! Not logical! Not safe! Not wise to follow! “Many false prophets shall rise, and shall seduce many … There shall arise false Christs and false prophets … to deceive (if possible) even the elect!” (Matthew 24:11; 24). Prophecies seem to indicate that we have entered that period of time. We would be foolish to “buy-into” the euphoria of the 95% Lenten discount, for the 5%, that we pay, might only be enough to buy a ticket to Hell (or Purgatory at best) and not be enough to purchase the ticket to Heaven that they falsely told us it would.
An Article by a Modern 'Conservative' Catholic Who Hates Lent (Sort-of)
Here is an article that pretty much dovetails with the attitude of most modern Catholics today—which betrays a heavy dose of naturalism or worldliness, mixed with some spirituality. It conveys a mainly “unspiritual” attitude that is mixed in with a slightly spiritual attitude. What is unsettling—though not surprising—about this “Modern 'Conservative' Catholic” authors article is that she is speaking about the 95% discounted Lent and is even unhappy with that! Anyway, here it is, read it for yourself:
She starts out: “I’ll say it bluntly―I hate Lent. It’s my least favorite time of the year. It’s a big gray Ash Wednesday forehead smudge on the calendar that wrecks March, and sometimes extends its sooty smear well into April. Lent always casts a funeral pall over St. Patrick’s Day ― ‘Shouldn’t your fist be clutching the Rosary beads, boyo, instead of that pint of Guinness?’ And sometimes Lent falls so early that it ruins Valentine’s Day as well―two holidays in a row! The weather in Lent is always chilly and dismal: late, unwelcome, quickly dirtied, I’m-so-sick-of snow if you live on the East Coast, and even in southern California, where I grew up, Lent coincides with the annual rainy season, when it pours in sheets for days on end. Lent is an Ash Wednesday smudge on the sky, too.
“If you’re a Catholic, you traditionally give up something for Lent. That usually means comfort food, just at the time of year when you need comfort most, especially from food. So it’s goodbye, chocolate, goodbye, Cheez Whiz nachos. Me, I give up meat, and also cream in my coffee. That means that I spend the entire 40 days of Lent (and, hey―it’s actually longer than 40 days, because Sundays aren’t counted) starving and thinking about steaks and latte. As the weeks pass, the steaks get thicker, the latte more foamy. I can always slip inside a church for distraction. That’s great. No flowers, a bare altar, dirges for hymns. It’s the season of penance. The priest wears depressing dark-purple vestments. He says a prayer that thanks God for “this season of joy.” What joy? There are only two fun things about Lent. One is Mardi Gras. The other is checking out the foreheads of people at your job on Ash Wednesday to see whether they got ashes at the church that morning (“I didn’t know you were a Catholic!”).
“Lent is bad now, but it was even worse when I was a child. Every year my parents decided that we should all, as a family, give up sweets for Lent. That was easy for them, as they weren’t dessert people, and they had no intention of giving up their own Fifties-adult equivalent of the Snickers bar, the 6 p.m. martini. The Lenten days crawled along minute by minute, and my sisters and I writhed in misery. In our bureau drawers we hoarded stale cookies and candies and doughnuts that friends or neighbors might give us as we waited for the witching hour: 12 noon on Holy Saturday, the day before Easter, which, back in those pre-Vatican II says, was when Lent officially ended. At our Catholic parochial school, Lenten observances were even grimmer than at home. We had to go to Mass every day, not just on Sunday. That meant hundreds of squirming, uniform-clad girls in beanies crammed into the front rows of our parish church every Lenten weekday, as nuns stalked the aisles making sure that no child rested her elbows on the pew ahead while kneeling.
“At my Catholic girls’ high school, the nuns ratcheted up the Lenten misery even higher, with the annual three-day Lenten retreat. Classes were suspended, and we had to observe complete silence, praying, meditating, and listening to harangues about our virtue from an uncomfortable-looking local priest who had clearly been dragooned into the operation against his will. We had to do “spiritual reading,” checking out an appropriate book from the school library. I usually managed to do my reading in the form of a pious novel: Cardinal Wiseman’s “Fabiola,” about early Christian virgins in Rome, and one year, a book called “The Reluctant Vestal,” which wasn’t about early Christians but which I managed to sneak past the school librarian because it was about virgins in Rome. I found a quiet spot on campus to read about the gorgeous vestal and her senator-boyfriend who was faithfully waiting it out for her years of “vestal-dom” to be up.
“Now, of course, I don’t have to go on a three-day silent retreat or do without doughnuts during Lent unless I want to. I could go on a three-day screaming orgy during Lent if that were my choice. But I don’t―and that’s because if there weren’t a Lent every year, I’d miss it. I would miss the strictures of a season of penance that reminds me, not just that life is not all merriment, but that I actually have things for which to do penance. And during Lent, at its very end, is Holy Week, with its solemn and beautiful liturgy that reenacts the time when Christ did penance, too, for us, and for our sins. After that is Easter, when we live again in Christ’s resurrection, in the flowers of warm spring and the white light. I hate Lent―it’s perfectly awful―but it always brings joy.” [End of article].
Digging Beneath the Surface
The immediate clues that jumped out from the above article were as follows:
(1) The author was obviously a woman―for she writes: “At my Catholic girls’ high school … ”
(2) She was an elderly woman, because she speaks of being a child at home in the 1950s and also since she states she was in parochial school and also high school before the Second Vatican Council (which took place between 1962 to 1965)—therefore, if she was in 9th Grade in 1962, then she would have been born around 1947, and if she was in 9th Grade in 1965, it would mean that her latest date of birth would have been around 1950. That would have placed her on the verge of her early teens at the time of the Second Vatican Council, being anywhere from 12 years old and above in 1962. Thus, today, she would be aged anywhere from 78 and older. Elsewhere, her birth date is listed as being in April of 1943―which would make her 81 years old as of today.
Though the article did not name the author, Google listed the author as Charlotte Allen, a writer and journalist. Further research shows that she is a conservative Catholic, born in April of 1943 (thus currently aged 81) in California—therefore she would have been 19 years old when the Second Vatican Council began in October 1962. She has been writing for more than four decades (as of 2025) about cultural, political and religious issues for a variety of publications. She currently lives in Washington DC, blogs for the Los Angeles Times and has written frequently for the Weekly Standard, Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal.
Researching a little further, a rightfully scathing article of Charlotte Allen was found on Martin Luther, but which she ends with the words: “At this point, my Protestant and evangelical readers might be thinking that I’m simply a latter-day Father Feeney, railing indiscriminately against “our separated brethren,” as we Catholics call them nowadays. Not so. My husband is a Prot! And my hat is off to the Wesley brothers, William Wilberforce, C.S. Lewis, Billy Graham, evangelical Anglican biblical scholar N.T. Wright, and many, many other witnesses to vibrant Christian faith outside the Catholic Church.”
A Charlotte’s Catholicism a Charlatan Catholicism
First of all, let it be made clear that this is not meant as a slight to the Conservative religious beliefs of Charlotte Allen—for if every Catholic would be as active as she is in the field of the Faith, then the Faith would be in a far better state than it is today. Yet, at the same time, Charlotte Allen can be taken as an example of the typical Catholic in the world today—a mixture of the “old” and the “new”—which is, though not all are prepared to admit it, a hybrid Faith of the kind which Blessed Anne Catherine speaks of from what God revealed to her in visions pertaining to our days. The Catholic Church is rapidly developing into the Charlatan Church.
The dictionary defines a “charlatan” as (1) someone who fraudulently peddles fake remedies; (2) a pretender to medical knowledge; (3) someone making a showy pretense to knowledge or ability; (4) someone without adequate learning. In this sense, we could say that much of the Catholicism in the world today is “Charlatan Catholicism”—which fits in with the prophecies that speak of our times. Our Lord speaks of false ‘Christs’ who will many astray, even the elect. Our Lady of Akita says: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops … The Church will be full of those who accept compromises.”
Whereas Our Lady of La Salette warns: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish … A large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … The devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin.”
If you cannot see that this is actually happening in our day, then you are spiritually blind and spiritually deceived—of such Our Lord says: “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). Those words were addressed to the Scribes and the Pharisees—who were the well-educated, well-intentioned, well-respected “Conservatives” and preservers of the Jewish Religion and the Law in Christ’s time.
Though Charlotte Allen is a ‘Conservative Catholic’, we should remind ourselves that the Scribes and Pharisees―the religious elite of the day―who were also ‘Conservatives’ in the time of Jesus—yet Jesus hurled repeated woe after woe upon them in an unprecedented aggressive manner (see Matthew 23). The Scribes and Pharisees sought to preserve the Jewish Law and religion from being contaminated by the world and even imposed strict rules and measures for that intended goal. The Scribes and Pharisees were supposed to know God and help others know Him and follow His ways. Instead, these religious leaders added to God’s Law and so twisted and changed God’s original Law. In the same way, since the Second Vatican Council, the Liberals and Modernists in the Church have slowly and subtly twisted and transformed the Catholic Faith from what God wants into what they want.
These men (and increasingly women too) are like those false Christs and false prophets mentioned by Our Lord: “Many false prophets shall rise, and shall seduce many” (Matthew 24:11) … “For there will rise up false Christs and false prophets to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect” (Mark 13:22)—which is linked to what Our Lady of Akita said: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops … The Church will be full of those who accept compromises.”
The Typical Mixed-Up Catholic of Our Days
So we see in the author of the above article, a typical—though very intelligent—modern-day Catholic with traditional roots—putting forth a hybrid or mixed Catholicism of the “old” and the “new”, as well a mixture of “Catholic” and “non-Catholic”. This is reinforced in the practical field by Charlotte Allen’s statement that she married a Protestant and by her acclamation and praise of the above list of Protestant clergy or ministers (just as Pope Francis and a multitude of bishops tend to do)―but there is ONLY ONE true Church, and that is the Catholic Church, outside of which there is no salvation. She is, on the whole, an intelligent but typical example of the ‘mixed-up’ kind of Catholic that forms the weak backbone or spine of the Church today—the danger being that she is very intelligent and thus holding a greater credibility than most. Her attitude to Lent—though some of what she writes may perhaps be “tongue-in-cheek”—is also typical of the attitude of Catholics today―she and they “hate” Lent, even the ‘cheaper’ or ‘discounted’ Lent that came immediately after the Second Vatican Council in 1966.
The ‘cheaper’ you make something, the less respect there will be for it. A 95% Lenten discount on fasting is in no way conducive to creating an attitude that sees the need for Lenten fasting—for if you can do away with 95% of it, then it cannot have been very important in the first place!—or so the false reasoning goes. Nor is a 95% discounted Lenten fast indicative of the increasing or escalating amount of sin that is being committed throughout the world—by Catholics and non-Catholics alike. Our Lady of Akita warned: “In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before … The thought of the loss of so many souls is the cause of my sadness. If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
An “Easy-Street” to Where?
There is no doubt that today’s Catholic Faith, and its discipline, is an “Easy-Street”—but an “Easy-Street” to where? If the path to Heaven was an “Easy-Street”, then why would Our Lord say: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). If it was “Easy-Street”, then why would He say: “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). If Heaven was so easy to attain, then why does Jesus say: “Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 19:23-24)?
If the path to Heaven was “Easy-Street”, why would Our Lord say: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it! … Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14)? If it was easy to get to Heaven, why would St. Peter write: “And if the just man shall scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?” (1 Peter 4:18)? If the attainment of Heaven was “Easy-Street”, why would St. Paul write: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain!” (1 Corinthians 9:24) … “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
All of this incompatible with the spirit of the 95% discount in Lenten fasting granted to Catholics after the Second Vatican Council. As Sister Lucia of Fatima said just a few years before the 95% Penitential Discount—in an interview with Fr. Fuentes in December of 1957--“Father, we should not wait for an appeal to the world to come from Rome on the part of the Holy Father, to do penance. Nor should we wait for the call from our bishops in our dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No! Our Lord has already, very often, used these means and the world has not paid attention. That is why now it is necessary for each one of us to begin to reform ourselves spiritually. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also the souls that God has placed on our path.”
Of course, it is tempting to buy your spiritual ‘gasoline’ where you can get a 95% discount—but is that ‘cheap’ gasoline good for your engine (soul)? Will it get you to your final destination, or will it slow you down, or will it even cause you to break down? Do not take Lent lightly! Do not try get through it “on the cheap”—for, as Scripture warns: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). As the Church says, in the Epistle on the First Sunday of Lent: “We entreat you not to receive the grace of God in vain. For He says, In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you. Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:1-2).
If we were to read that chapter of Corinthians to end, we would find the following words, which apply very much to modern-day Catholics who carelessly mix with anyone and everyone in a spirit of false ecumenism: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
As always, you need to look at all this in the light of the fact that most souls are not saved, but lost (read here). If you find that you are like most people in the world today—then that is unquestionably a bad sign. Keep asking yourself the question: “Why are most souls lost? What is it that they are doing—or NOT doing—that makes them lose their souls?” Of course, that truth can unquestionably lead to discouragement or even despair—but those feelings do not come from God, but the devil. Everyone CAN be saved—for God never asks us to do what is impossible. Yet not everyone WILL be saved—because they refuse, for one reason or another, to what it takes to be saved. It is not a case of being “pre-programmed” for Hell―for God has “programmed” you for Heaven—it is more a case of “re-programming” yourself to do what you want and not what God wants.
Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Corporal penances are so appropriate and fitted to mortal creatures, that the ignorance of this truth and the neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss!”
Whereas Our Lord said: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!” (Matthew 7:21-23).
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR FEBRUARY
Article 6
Thursday & Friday, February 13th & 14th
Heavenly Valentines or Earthly Valentines?
Thursday & Friday, February 13th & 14th
Heavenly Valentines or Earthly Valentines?
Saint or No Saint?
We are on the cusp of another “Valentine’s Day” ― or should it be “St. Valentine’s Day”? The modern world ― the secular and increasingly pagan world ― has no time and no room for saints, so “Valentine’s Day” will do just fine for the modern world. Saints are no fun ― sin is fun! So take out the “a-t” from “Saint” and you are left with “Sin”. The modern world happily cries out: “To hell with the Saints! Sin is heavenly!” Take out the “i” from “Saint” and replace it with an “a” and you have the letters needed to spell “Satan” ― Satan is only too ready to help sin replace sanctity by removing the letters “a-c-t-t-y” from “Sanctity” which leaves you with all letters you need to spell “Sin.”
What is “sin”? Sin―like Hell―is an absence of God. Sin is all about “self” and not about “God.” Sinners love themselves more than God―they put their own interests before the interests of God. “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Sin is about hating God, sanctity is about loving God: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24). Sin rejects the commandment to love God above all things: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). We cannot love our neighbor more than we love God―for that would mean we are breaking the first commandment: “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:37).
Charity is the Soul of Holiness
“Charity is of God―and every one that loves is born of God and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity! In this is charity―not as though we had first loved God, but because He has first loved us and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins! If God has so loved us; then we also ought to love one another! If we love one another, then God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us. God is charity―and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him. Therefore, let us love God, because God has first loved us! If any man say: ‘I love God!’ but hates his brother―then he is a liar. For he that does not love his brother whom he sees, how can he love God Whom he sees not? This commandment we have from God―that he who loves God, must also love his brother” (1 John 4:7-21).
God is love itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). As some of the Church Fathers tell us―at our Final Judgment, we shall be judged on our charity. Hence Holy Scripture warns: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
We all love and we all want to be loved. The problem is―what do we love and by whom do we want to be loved? Love is like the air that we breathe―we cannot do without it. Some people will even sacrifice their eternal salvation for love―the wrong kind of love from the wrong kind of people. You have no doubt heard the one or other quote from the multiple versions of the saying: “Tell me what you [eat, love, or walk with] and I will tell you what you are!” We are what love, we are defined by who or what we love―if we love evil, then we are evil; if we love what is good, then we are good. Our Lord puts it this way: “By their fruits [what they love] you shall know them! Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit! A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). “Either make the tree good and its fruit good; or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33) and through what or whom we love we are also known.
What Kind of Love?
They say: “Love makes the world go around!” ― which is more true than most people would imagine ― for “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and God (love) makes the world go around! Unfortunately, not only does “Love make the world go around”, but, sadly, “a love of the world also goes around” ! God and His Kingdom (the Church), as well as Satan and his princedom (the world), are fighting it out for our love. Salvation and damnation depend upon the outcome of that fight for our love.
The Legion of Mary Official Handbook puts it this way: “The materialistic systems profess the love and service of man. They have preached a hollow gospel of fraternity. Millions have believed that gospel. In its name, they deserted a religion which they thought to be inert, and they submitted enthusiastically to despotisms. They were convinced that their new leaders loved them best; so they followed them, and now they are trying ardently to induce all mankind to join them. They seem to be in the ascendancy. And yet the position is not a hopeless one. There is a way of bringing back to Faith those determined millions, and of saving countless other millions. That hope lies in the application of a great principle which rules the world, and which the Saint of Ars [St. John Vianney] has stated thus: ‘The world belongs to him who loves it most, and who proves that love!’ Those millions will never listen to the enunciation [teachings] of the truths of Faith. But they cannot help seeing, and being moved by a real Faith which operates through a real heroic love for all men. Convince them that the Church loves them most, and they will turn their back on those who rule them now. They will return to Faith in spite of everything. They will even lay down their lives for that Faith. No common love can conquer men thus. Neither will it be accomplished by a mediocre Catholicism which can hardly preserve itself. It can be done by a Catholicism which loves Christ its Lord with all its heart, and then sees Him and loves Him in all men of whatsoever description. But this supreme charity of Christ must be practiced on such a scale that they who look on are driven to admit that it is indeed a characteristic of the Church, and not merely the acts of sublime members of the Church. Therefore, it must be exhibited in the lives of the general body of the laity.”
Unfortunately, Catholics have fallen for the lie that world loves them―and so they love the world in return. Yet Our Lord pointed out: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the riches, pleasures and treasures of this world (Matthew 6:19-24). Most Catholics put “mammon” before and above God ― they love the world more than God; they spend more time on the world than God; they think more about the world than God. God is certainly not their “Valentine”! Holy Scripture warns against this: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). If the world is your “Valentine” then God is your enemy!
Repentance and Penance are the Foundations of Holiness
God must be the motive and reason behind our love for our neighbor―for God created all our neighbors, even those who are sinners. We must love the sinner, but hate his sin―just as we must love ourselves but hate our sins. We must love the sinner―just as Christ loved sinners―and call them back to God, repentance and penance just as Christ did: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost … I came to call sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 19:10; 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10). As for sin, Christ said to man whom He healed by Pool of Bethsaida: “Sin no more―lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14) and the woman caught in adultery, Christ said: “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:10-11).
Christ did not come to call us to fun―He came to call us to penance! Our Lady of Lourdes said to St. Bernadette: “I will not make you happy in this life, but in the next life!” Our Lady of Lourdes did not say: “Have fun! Have fun! Have lots of fun!” ― on the contrary, she commanded: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” Why? Because “there is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56). “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21). “The soul that sins, the same shall die … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live, and shall not die” (Ezechiel 18:20-21). The keeping of the Commandments is the proof of love, it is the soul of love, it is what keeps love alive―as Christ said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
Sin Kills Love―Love Forgives Sins
We cannot pretend to love God if we sin against God―because “he that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Mortal sin drives sanctifying grace and charity out of our souls. Venial sin weakens charity and eventually leads to mortal sin. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “He that sins venially seems to contemn small things. Therefore by little and little he is disposed to fall away together into mortal sin” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q. 88, art. 3). Unconfessed and unrepented mortal sin leads to Hell―and there is no love in Hell. Unconfessed, unrepented and unpaid venial sin does not gain entrance into Heaven until it pays it debts in the fires of Purgatory. Whether mortal or venial―any sin is an offence to God.
Loosely speaking, you could compare mortal sin to gunshot wounds or knife wounds; whereas venial sin could be compared to punches and kicks. Regardless of whether someone shoots you or stabs you; or whether they punch you or kick you―the end result is that your love and friendship towards such a person will be weakened with each wound, punch or kick. Insincere or hypocritical sorrow just makes matter worse―for example, someone sticks a knife in you and then says: “O, I’m sorry!” and then pulls the knife out and sticks in into you again, and then once more says: “O, I’m sorry!” and repeats the procedure again and again and again. That is how we are with God when we use the confessional as a weekly or monthly “car wash” whereby we seek to wash ourselves from our sins, but then go back to committing the selfsame sins afterwards. Similarly, we might go to Mass on Sunday and put on our “Catholic face” and then put on our “worldly face” for the remainder of the week. God is not pleased with this “two-faced” Catholicism―it is not a proof of love towards God―it is more like a married person cheating on the other spouse by regularly committing adultery.
Such a fake and hypocritical ‘love’ does not lead us away from sin, but merely cements in our sins with a false complacency that thinks: “God is love! So God will forgive me everything!” That is not love―it is sinful presumption! If God forgives everyone everything, then why are most souls in Hell? Holy Scripture warns against such complacency and presumption: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
It true love that brings about the forgiveness of sin―as Christ and Holy Scripture testify: “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). However, charity must be joined to contrition for sin―without which there can be no pardon for sin.
Contrition may be either perfect or imperfect. When contrition arises from a love by which God is loved above all else, contrition is called “perfect contrition” (a contrition of charity). Perfect contrition is sorrow for one’s sins based upon love for God, which includes the firm resolution not to commit them any more. While perfect contrition forgives all sins, it does not relieve us of the obligation to go to confession. Perfect contrition remits venial sins; it also obtains forgiveness of mortal sins if it includes the firm resolution to have recourse to sacramental confession as soon as possible.
The contrition called “imperfect contrition” (or “attrition”) is also a gift of God, a prompting of the Holy Spirit. It is born of the consideration of sin’s ugliness or the fear of eternal damnation and the other penalties threatening the sinner―and is basically a contrition of fear. This imperfect contrition (contrition of fear) is not enough to forgive mortal sins. Such a fearful stirring of conscience is an imperfect contrition, but it can initiate an interior process that, under the prompting of grace, will be brought to completion by Sacramental absolution in the Sacrament of Confession. By itself, however, imperfect contrition cannot obtain the forgiveness of grave sins, but it disposes one to obtain forgiveness in the Sacrament of Penance.
We are on the cusp of another “Valentine’s Day” ― or should it be “St. Valentine’s Day”? The modern world ― the secular and increasingly pagan world ― has no time and no room for saints, so “Valentine’s Day” will do just fine for the modern world. Saints are no fun ― sin is fun! So take out the “a-t” from “Saint” and you are left with “Sin”. The modern world happily cries out: “To hell with the Saints! Sin is heavenly!” Take out the “i” from “Saint” and replace it with an “a” and you have the letters needed to spell “Satan” ― Satan is only too ready to help sin replace sanctity by removing the letters “a-c-t-t-y” from “Sanctity” which leaves you with all letters you need to spell “Sin.”
What is “sin”? Sin―like Hell―is an absence of God. Sin is all about “self” and not about “God.” Sinners love themselves more than God―they put their own interests before the interests of God. “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Sin is about hating God, sanctity is about loving God: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24). Sin rejects the commandment to love God above all things: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). We cannot love our neighbor more than we love God―for that would mean we are breaking the first commandment: “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:37).
Charity is the Soul of Holiness
“Charity is of God―and every one that loves is born of God and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity! In this is charity―not as though we had first loved God, but because He has first loved us and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins! If God has so loved us; then we also ought to love one another! If we love one another, then God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us. God is charity―and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him. Therefore, let us love God, because God has first loved us! If any man say: ‘I love God!’ but hates his brother―then he is a liar. For he that does not love his brother whom he sees, how can he love God Whom he sees not? This commandment we have from God―that he who loves God, must also love his brother” (1 John 4:7-21).
God is love itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). As some of the Church Fathers tell us―at our Final Judgment, we shall be judged on our charity. Hence Holy Scripture warns: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
We all love and we all want to be loved. The problem is―what do we love and by whom do we want to be loved? Love is like the air that we breathe―we cannot do without it. Some people will even sacrifice their eternal salvation for love―the wrong kind of love from the wrong kind of people. You have no doubt heard the one or other quote from the multiple versions of the saying: “Tell me what you [eat, love, or walk with] and I will tell you what you are!” We are what love, we are defined by who or what we love―if we love evil, then we are evil; if we love what is good, then we are good. Our Lord puts it this way: “By their fruits [what they love] you shall know them! Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit! A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). “Either make the tree good and its fruit good; or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33) and through what or whom we love we are also known.
What Kind of Love?
They say: “Love makes the world go around!” ― which is more true than most people would imagine ― for “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and God (love) makes the world go around! Unfortunately, not only does “Love make the world go around”, but, sadly, “a love of the world also goes around” ! God and His Kingdom (the Church), as well as Satan and his princedom (the world), are fighting it out for our love. Salvation and damnation depend upon the outcome of that fight for our love.
The Legion of Mary Official Handbook puts it this way: “The materialistic systems profess the love and service of man. They have preached a hollow gospel of fraternity. Millions have believed that gospel. In its name, they deserted a religion which they thought to be inert, and they submitted enthusiastically to despotisms. They were convinced that their new leaders loved them best; so they followed them, and now they are trying ardently to induce all mankind to join them. They seem to be in the ascendancy. And yet the position is not a hopeless one. There is a way of bringing back to Faith those determined millions, and of saving countless other millions. That hope lies in the application of a great principle which rules the world, and which the Saint of Ars [St. John Vianney] has stated thus: ‘The world belongs to him who loves it most, and who proves that love!’ Those millions will never listen to the enunciation [teachings] of the truths of Faith. But they cannot help seeing, and being moved by a real Faith which operates through a real heroic love for all men. Convince them that the Church loves them most, and they will turn their back on those who rule them now. They will return to Faith in spite of everything. They will even lay down their lives for that Faith. No common love can conquer men thus. Neither will it be accomplished by a mediocre Catholicism which can hardly preserve itself. It can be done by a Catholicism which loves Christ its Lord with all its heart, and then sees Him and loves Him in all men of whatsoever description. But this supreme charity of Christ must be practiced on such a scale that they who look on are driven to admit that it is indeed a characteristic of the Church, and not merely the acts of sublime members of the Church. Therefore, it must be exhibited in the lives of the general body of the laity.”
Unfortunately, Catholics have fallen for the lie that world loves them―and so they love the world in return. Yet Our Lord pointed out: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the riches, pleasures and treasures of this world (Matthew 6:19-24). Most Catholics put “mammon” before and above God ― they love the world more than God; they spend more time on the world than God; they think more about the world than God. God is certainly not their “Valentine”! Holy Scripture warns against this: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). If the world is your “Valentine” then God is your enemy!
Repentance and Penance are the Foundations of Holiness
God must be the motive and reason behind our love for our neighbor―for God created all our neighbors, even those who are sinners. We must love the sinner, but hate his sin―just as we must love ourselves but hate our sins. We must love the sinner―just as Christ loved sinners―and call them back to God, repentance and penance just as Christ did: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost … I came to call sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 19:10; 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10). As for sin, Christ said to man whom He healed by Pool of Bethsaida: “Sin no more―lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14) and the woman caught in adultery, Christ said: “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:10-11).
Christ did not come to call us to fun―He came to call us to penance! Our Lady of Lourdes said to St. Bernadette: “I will not make you happy in this life, but in the next life!” Our Lady of Lourdes did not say: “Have fun! Have fun! Have lots of fun!” ― on the contrary, she commanded: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” Why? Because “there is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56). “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21). “The soul that sins, the same shall die … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live, and shall not die” (Ezechiel 18:20-21). The keeping of the Commandments is the proof of love, it is the soul of love, it is what keeps love alive―as Christ said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
Sin Kills Love―Love Forgives Sins
We cannot pretend to love God if we sin against God―because “he that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Mortal sin drives sanctifying grace and charity out of our souls. Venial sin weakens charity and eventually leads to mortal sin. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “He that sins venially seems to contemn small things. Therefore by little and little he is disposed to fall away together into mortal sin” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q. 88, art. 3). Unconfessed and unrepented mortal sin leads to Hell―and there is no love in Hell. Unconfessed, unrepented and unpaid venial sin does not gain entrance into Heaven until it pays it debts in the fires of Purgatory. Whether mortal or venial―any sin is an offence to God.
Loosely speaking, you could compare mortal sin to gunshot wounds or knife wounds; whereas venial sin could be compared to punches and kicks. Regardless of whether someone shoots you or stabs you; or whether they punch you or kick you―the end result is that your love and friendship towards such a person will be weakened with each wound, punch or kick. Insincere or hypocritical sorrow just makes matter worse―for example, someone sticks a knife in you and then says: “O, I’m sorry!” and then pulls the knife out and sticks in into you again, and then once more says: “O, I’m sorry!” and repeats the procedure again and again and again. That is how we are with God when we use the confessional as a weekly or monthly “car wash” whereby we seek to wash ourselves from our sins, but then go back to committing the selfsame sins afterwards. Similarly, we might go to Mass on Sunday and put on our “Catholic face” and then put on our “worldly face” for the remainder of the week. God is not pleased with this “two-faced” Catholicism―it is not a proof of love towards God―it is more like a married person cheating on the other spouse by regularly committing adultery.
Such a fake and hypocritical ‘love’ does not lead us away from sin, but merely cements in our sins with a false complacency that thinks: “God is love! So God will forgive me everything!” That is not love―it is sinful presumption! If God forgives everyone everything, then why are most souls in Hell? Holy Scripture warns against such complacency and presumption: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
It true love that brings about the forgiveness of sin―as Christ and Holy Scripture testify: “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). However, charity must be joined to contrition for sin―without which there can be no pardon for sin.
Contrition may be either perfect or imperfect. When contrition arises from a love by which God is loved above all else, contrition is called “perfect contrition” (a contrition of charity). Perfect contrition is sorrow for one’s sins based upon love for God, which includes the firm resolution not to commit them any more. While perfect contrition forgives all sins, it does not relieve us of the obligation to go to confession. Perfect contrition remits venial sins; it also obtains forgiveness of mortal sins if it includes the firm resolution to have recourse to sacramental confession as soon as possible.
The contrition called “imperfect contrition” (or “attrition”) is also a gift of God, a prompting of the Holy Spirit. It is born of the consideration of sin’s ugliness or the fear of eternal damnation and the other penalties threatening the sinner―and is basically a contrition of fear. This imperfect contrition (contrition of fear) is not enough to forgive mortal sins. Such a fearful stirring of conscience is an imperfect contrition, but it can initiate an interior process that, under the prompting of grace, will be brought to completion by Sacramental absolution in the Sacrament of Confession. By itself, however, imperfect contrition cannot obtain the forgiveness of grave sins, but it disposes one to obtain forgiveness in the Sacrament of Penance.
Article 5
Wednesday, February 12th
St. Bernadette's Own Book on Lourdes (Part 2)
Wednesday, February 12th
St. Bernadette's Own Book on Lourdes (Part 2)
“Immaculate Conception”
On March 25th, I was roused from sleep by an inner insistence to go to the grotto. It was still dark when I reached Massabielle. The Lady was there and waiting for me.
I apologized for keeping her waiting, for I had caught a cold. She smiled, I knelt down, and we said the Rosary together. Then the Lady came very close to me. I told her how I loved her, and how happy I was to see her again.
“Mademoiselle,” I said, “would you be so kind as to tell me who you are, if you please?” Instead of replying, she only smiled.
I said again: “Would you be so kind as to tell me who you are?” I said this four times altogether.
The Lady extended her hands towards the ground, swept them upwards to join them on her heart, raised her eyes, but not her head to Heaven, leaned tenderly towards me and said: “Que soy era Immaculada Conceptiou.” She smiled at me. She disappeared. I was alone.
I did not understand the words, but I knew the Priest would. I knew also the Lady loved the Priest. Leaving my candle at the grotto, I went straight to Fr. Peyramale, saying the Lady’s name to myself along the way. Father was waiting for me. I bowed and said: “I am the Immaculate Conception.” Seeing his surprise, I explained: “Aquero (Our Lady) said, ‘I am the Immaculate Conception’.”
The good Priest stood there stunned. Suddenly he stammered: “Do you know what that means?”
I shook my head, I said: “No.”
“Then how can you say the words if you do not understand them?”
“I repeated them all along the way,” I replied, then added: “She still wants the chapel.”
The Priest by now was deathly pale, but he pulled himself together, saying: “Go home now, child. I will see you another day.”
Years later I learned that Father wrote to the Bishop that night, and as he wrote, his heart filled up with emotion, and his eyes filled up with tears.
Mary’s Magnificence
What my Lady meant by “I am the Immaculate Conception,” I had no idea. I decided to ask Mademoiselle Estrade. She had a serene sense of the supernatural.
“Mademoiselle, what does it mean, Immaculate Conception?” Mademoiselle explained how Pope Pius IX had applied the words to Our Blessed Lady four years ago on December 8th.
It was then I realized I could speak what was unspoken in my soul for seven silent weeks—that Aquero was the Immaculate Virgin Mary. She was the Mother of God, and she had been stepping out of Heaven to share her soul with me. She had taught me prayers no soul on Earth had prayed. She had promised me happiness, not in this world, but in the next.
Through all her visits, she had spoken, not the flawless French of the town officials, but the homely words of my Lourdes patois. Holiness and prayer are simple. God’s Mother taught me so.
The majority of people sensed it was Our Blessed Lady who was hallowing Lourdes. When they knew for certain, they could scarce contain their joy. Throughout her visits, not a single crime was committed in the district, the confessionals in the church were besieged, and the Priests were well-nigh exhausted.
The Lady told me always to bring a blessed candle to the grotto, then bring it home with me. On March 25th, she asked me to leave it lighted at the grotto, and to this day candles have always been burning at Massabielle.
I noticed that Our Blessed Lady would often look over my head to single out individuals in the crowd. She would then smile on them as though they were old familiar friends.
Nor did she forget the town officials who caused my parents such distress. All finally believed in the Apparitions, and died with the crucifix pressed to their lips. Jacomet admitted: “Our opposition was in vain. Bernadette had the Immaculate Virgin Mary on her side.”
The Lighted Candle
Three eminent doctors came to Lourdes to examine me. A politician came with them to question me. “The Blessed Virgin could not have spoken in patois,” he stated, “God and the Blessed Virgin don’t know that language.”
“How do we know it, if they don’t?” I had to remind him.
The three doctors declared I was mentally and emotionally stable, but that I suffered from asthma. My mother could have told them that, and saved them the trouble. The trump card of the officials was always: “We will put you in jail.” That was supposed to make me quail. They forgot I was living in a disused police lockup, with the entire family in the one room.
To have a cell to oneself, to have hours of solitude would be a precious retreat in preparation for my First Holy Communion.
On Easter Wednesday, April 7th, the call came clear in my soul to meet God’s Mother at the grotto. Hundreds of people were praying there when I arrived, and they had kept my place for me. I prayed with the Lady in a world of prayer, which I knew now was part of the world of Heaven.
When Our Lady left, I noticed Doctor Dozous beside me. He took my lighted candle and placed it under my left hand. I snatched my hand away. “Sir, you are burning me!” I cried.
Only later did I learn that during Mary’s visit, the flame of my candle had engulfed the fingers and palm of my left hand. To the doctor’s amazement, neither fingers nor palm had burned.
The explanation is simple. When ones soul is enraptured by the Mother of God, the fire of Earth is cold compared to the warmth of Heaven.
First Holy Communion
On May 4th, Monsieur Jacomet removed all the candles from the grotto. He announced that the owners could claim them at the police station. The people collected their candles, lit them, and walked prayerfully back to Massabielle. Unwittingly, Jacomet had organized the first candle-lit procession to the grotto.
That same day, Monsieur Dutour and the Mayor paid a visit to Fr. Peyramale. They had decided to detain me in the mental hospital in Tarbes, but to act without the support of the Parish Priest would be disastrous. They suggested he join with them in putting the little trouble-maker away.
“I know my duty,” Father blazed, “as pastor of my parish and protector of my flock. Your own doctors find no abnormality in Bernadette. You will have to fell me to the ground, pass over my dead body, and trample it underfoot, before you touch a hair of the child’s head.”
Sunday, June 3rd was the day of my First Holy Communion. It was the Feast of Corpus Christi—the Body and Blood of Christ. The Mass, begun by God’s Priest on the altar on the Sisters’ chapel, ended on the altar of my soul. My soul had been prepared for Jesus by his Mother, and my Faith became enlightened in communion with my God.
There are secrets of one’s soul which forever should be shrouded by a veil of reticence. My First Holy Communion is such. Mademoiselle Estrade asked: “What made you happier, Bernadette, First Holy Communion or the Apparitions?”
I could only answer: “The two go together. They cannot be compared. I only know I was very happy on both occasions.”
Years later I would write in my prayer-book in Nevers: “I was nothing, and of this nothing God made something great. In Holy Communion I am heart to heart with Jesus. How sublime is my destiny.”
The Lady says Goodbye
On July 16th, I was kneeling in the quiet of the parish church, thanking God for my third Holy Communion. My soul stirred suddenly with an impulse now familiar—the Mother of God was calling me.
The grotto had been barricaded off by Jacomet and a notice erected: “Entrance to this property forbidden.” The notice was in French. The Mother of God always spoke to me in my patois dialect!
I hastened to the meadow near the River Gave. I knelt and lit my candle. I began my Rosary and my Lady stood in the grotto smiling at me. It was the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. She looked more beautiful than I had ever seen her.
This would be the last time I would see her on this Earth. I knew, because my Lady had prepared my soul for Jesus, and she would give me now to Him with whom I had communed. I knew, because of the way she held her head as she said goodbye. She left Heaven in my heart and it has been there ever since.
Twelve days later a commission was formed to investigate the Apparitions. The Bishop wrote: “To deny the possibility of supernatural happenings would be to plod along in the rut worn by the skepticism of the last century.”
Doctor Dozous listed the cures he had witnessed through use of water from the spring. He was accused of being obstinate, but he simply stated the facts and admitted they were beyond medical explanation. Facts are the most obstinate things in the world. They cannot be denied, and they will not go away.
He was vindicated from a most unexpected source. Napoleon III who treated the Church so shabbily, suppressing Catholic papers and the Vincent de Paul Society, ordered Jacomet’s notice to be taken down, the barricade to be demolished, and the grotto restored to the people. Jacomet he transferred to Arles.
Workmen rushed to remove the barricades, and the people flocked to the grotto. The Lady had won again. That evening the grotto was ablaze with candles in her honor.
Prayer and Penance
To protect me from the town officials, Fr. Peyramale boarded me with the Sisters in the hospice. Slowly I learned to write, to speak French, to sew and embroider. Though I was now sixteen, my size enabled me to fit in easily with the eleven and twelve year olds.
One Sister was shocked when I started everybody sneezing by passing snuff around while she droned away in French. Another was upset when I threw my shoe out the classroom window, telling Julie Garros to bring it back full of strawberries from the garden. Fr. Peyramale allowed me to receive Holy Communion every Sunday as well as twice a month.
In January 1862, the Bishop’s commission gave its verdict; “We hold that the Mother of God appeared to Bernadette Soubirous on February 11th, 1858, and on subsequent days. We propose to build a chapel by the grotto which is now the property of the Diocese of Tarbes.”
Photography had recently arrived in Lourdes, and I was asked to pose as though in ecstasy. “I can’t,” I said, “the Lady isn’t there.” Another photographer wanted me to change my dress for every photo. I did not have the dresses. The photos eventually sold in Lourdes for five cents!
I was called to the Sisters’ parlor ten to twenty times a day to be grilled with questions. “Courage”, Sister Victoirine would say when she saw the tears “the Apparitions were for others as well as for yourself.”
In April 1862, I collapsed and was anointed. The hospice doctor prescribed medicine, but I requested some water from the grotto. A moment after sipping it, I felt as though a mountain were lifted off my chest.
“My medicine worked well,” the doctor beamed.
“I did not take it,” I replied.
“Well,” he answered, “you weren’t as sick as you thought you were.”
Leaving Lourdes Forever
About this time, Our Lady’s statue was placed in the grotto by the sculptor Fabisch, who attempted to portray in marble the living sacredness of God’s Mother. No marble however can contain such sacredness, and I had to admit: “It is not she.” The sculptor made Our Lady smile too little and look too big. He was not to blame. In Heaven he will understand.
Next came the blessing of the crypt of the chapel. My father’s joy was complete that day. For months he had worked on the crypt as a laborer. My mother remained in the background, quietly thanking God for everything.
Then early in 1865, my little brother died. Justin never saw his tenth birthday. He was the fourth child my parents had seen die. That made four of our family in Heaven to keep our places ready till we meet again in the Communion of Saints.
Soon after Justin’s death, the Bishop visited Lourdes. I was seated on a block of wood, scraping carrots for the Sisters’ dinner, when he entered the kitchen. He spoke to me of getting married.
“Oh, that is not for me,” I answered.
“The Convent then―have you thought of it?”
“I don’t know anything, and I’m no good at anything,” I answered.
“You are good at scraping carrots,” he said. “Think it over, and if your heart says yes, I will see to the rest.”
I prayed. I asked my parents’ opinion. I consulted Fr. Peyramale. My heart said yes. I chose the Sisters of Nevers because they never tried to entice me there.
On July 3rd 1866, I went to the grotto for the last time. I said goodbye. I turned away. I did not look back. Two other postulants and myself arrived at Nevers on July 7th. Superiors did not meet postulants who arrived at night, so we groped through the dark dormitory to our beds. We cried that night, to be told next morning—small comfort—that tears were a sign of a true vocation.
Assignment Nowhere
Next day the Sisters assembled—three hundred in all—and in my Lourdes dress and white hood, I was told to speak of the Apparitions. I was also told it would be the first and the last time I would speak of them.
Homesick for Lourdes, I struggled on till August, when choking bouts of coughing laid me low. The Sisters called the Bishop to anoint me.
“You are going to die,” he said, “and I have come to receive your Religious Profession—you need only say: ‘Amen!’” He then departed, leaving the Superior General to close my eyes when I breathed my last. When I did not oblige, she was angry.
“You are nothing but a little fool,” she said. “If you are not dead by morning, I will remove your Profession veil, and send you back to the Novitiate.”
No sooner was I back in the Novitiate, than I received word of my mother’s death. She died peacefully in Lourdes on December 8th. Her death at forty-one convinced me that life is merely Heaven’s waiting-room.
On October 30th, 1867, with forty-three other novices, I made my Religious Profession. Heavenly happiness and human humiliation mingled in my soul. “Monseigneur,” said Mother General, “we are at the end of our wits to know where to assign Sister Marie-Bernard. She is a little stupid, and is good for nothing!”
In front of the community, the Bishop replied: “Sister Marie-Bernard―assignment nowhere!” Then: “If it is true you are good for nothing, what was the use of your entering the Congregation?”
“That is what I said to you at Lourdes,” I replied, “and you said it did not matter.”
Mother General spoke again: “If you wish, Monseigneur, out of charity, we could keep her here and use her in the infirmary. To start with, she could help with the cleaning.”
The Bishop looked at me kneeling before him and said: “I give you the assignment of praying.”
Bernadette as a Nun
After Profession I was left in the Novitiate “to help with the cleaning.” The Novice Mistress demanded total revelation of my soul and complete submission to her ways.
The second I could manage, the first was beyond me. Having opened ones soul to the Queen of Heaven, how futile to open it to anyone on Earth. Yet it was good for me. When one is espoused to Jesus Christ, one should say yes in physical and emotional pain, without any ifs or buts. The Sisters used to say: “It is good not to be Bernadette!” and they were wondrous in their encouragement
Antoinette Dalias, a postulant, said: “I’ve been in Nevers for three days, and no one has shown me Bernadette.”
“That’s Bernadette beside you,” said a Sister.
“Not that?” exclaimed Antoinette.
I took her hand and said: “Yes, Mademoiselle, just that!” ― and we were friends for life.
A liturgy expert assured me that Our Lady would never wear a blue sash—blue was not liturgical.
“I don’t know anything about liturgy,” I answered, “but I do know the Lady’s sash was blue.” Patience with such people was given me in prayer, and prayer was my assignment now.
Children never put me off. A tiny tot of four said: “You have seen the Blessed Virgin, Sister. Was she beautiful?”
“So beautiful,” I replied, “that once you have seen her, you would willingly die to see her again!”
The Rosary became my way of prayer, indeed my way of life. To hold it in ones hands brought serenity and peace. The Rosary I used during the Apparitions disappeared one day without a trace. Toinette had given it to me in 1856. A Priest boasted that he had it, but my answer was: “If anyone claims to have my beads, he must have stolen them, for I would never have given them to anyone.”
Towards Eternity
On March 4th, 1871, my father died at the age of 64. He died as he lived, in deep Faith, and with a quiet longing to be with God.
On September 8th, 1877, Fr. Peyramale died in Lourdes. He began the processions I could never organize, he built the chapel I could never build. Our Lady had requested but a chapel. He gave her a basilica. Surely, when he died on her birthday, she gave him Heaven.
What madness, their deaths seemed to say, to attach oneself too deeply to anything on Earth, when one must leave it all too soon for Heaven. “Why don’t you ask Our Lady to cure you?” a pilgrim asked me once in Lourdes.
“It’s no use,” I answered, “Our Lady told me I would die young.”
In September 1877, I said to the Sisters: “I will not last long now,” and soon I became a patient in the infirmary I had helped to manage. My bed became “my little white chapel.” Then it became my cross. Eventually it became a crucifix, when I could only lie on it and suffer.
A Sister apologized for the pain as she pulled a poultice off some blisters. “Pull away,” I managed to say, “I’m as tough as a cat!” Sister smiled—she knew I was reflecting the way of sacrifice and repentance pointed out at Lourdes.
My weapons, I decided, would be prayer and sacrifice, which I would hold onto till my last breath. Then only would the weapon of sacrifice fall from my hand, but the weapon of prayer would follow me to Heaven.
My mission was ending. The Lady who shared with her Priest and myself her name in the Trinity before time began, would see her child, as she had seen her Priest, serenely through to Eternity.
Poor Sinner, Poor Sinner
Bernadette Soubirous died on Easter Wednesday, April 16th, 1879. On Easter Sunday she said: “This morning after Holy Communion, I asked Our Lord for a respite to talk to Him in comfort. He would not give it. My sufferings will last till death.”
On Easter Monday, Bernadette said goodbye to her dear friend, Sister Bernard Dalias. “Not that!” Sister Bernard had remarked twelve years ago.
“Just that” said Bernadette as she took her hand. Bernadette took her hand again and said: “Goodbye, Bernard, this time it is the last.”
On Easter Tuesday, the chaplain suggested she make the sacrifice of her life. “What sacrifice?” Bernadette answered, “it is no sacrifice to leave this life, where it is so difficult to belong to God.”
On Easter Wednesday, she requested her crucifix to be tied to her, lest her weakening fingers be unable to hold it.
She gazed at the statue of Our Blessed Lady and said: “I have seen her! How beautiful she is, and how I long to go to her!”
Sister Nathalie Portat came in about three o’clock, and Bernadette requested: “Help me to thank to the end.” Taking the crucifix, she prayed: “My God I love You, with all my heart, with all my soul, with all my strength.” Sister Nathalie began the Hail Mary. Bernadette answered clearly: “Mother of God, pray for me, poor sinner, poor sinner.”
Now was the hour of her death, and like Jesus on the cross, she said: “I am thirsty.” The Sisters brought some water. Bernadette for the last time made the Sign of the Cross as her Lady that taught her in the grotto. Silently she sipped a little water. Peacefully she bowed her head. Gently she surrendered her soul.
A Sister put the crucifix in her hands and the Rosary through her fingers. Bernadette Soubirous, after thirty-five years on Earth, had gone to her God.
Saint Bernadette Soubirous
The moment Bernadette’s death was announced, people flocked to pay their respects. Their sense of the sacred told them a Saint had died. They began to clamor for her canonization, but there was one insurmountable obstacle—Bernadette’s novice—mistress, Mother Vazou.
Within two years of Bernadette’s death, this formidable lady had become Superior General. She had failed to fit Bernadette into her own mould of Jansenistic piety. Now she failed to hear the whispering of God in the voices of God’s people. Where once she forbade all mention of Bernadette’s Apparitions, now she forbade all mention of her canonization.
“Spare me that humiliation,” she would snap, “wait till I am dead!” The Sisters would wait a quarter of a century for her demise, which occurred—ironically in Lourdes—in 1907.
Two years later, Mother Josephine Forrestier inaugurated Bernadette’s cause for canonization.
As part of the formal proceedings, Bernadette’s coffin was opened after thirty years in the grave. Her Rosary had rusted, her habit had frayed, but Bernadette was perfectly and beautifully incorrupt. It was as though she had just fallen asleep.
On December 8th 1933, Pope Pius XI declared Bernadette Soubirous a Saint of the Catholic Church. Her feast-day was fixed for February 18th, the day her Lady promised to make her happy, not in this life, but in the next. The Faithful however give her two more feast-days—April 16th, the day of her death, and February 11th—the day her Lady stepped from Heaven into her heart.
The miraculous spring still flows in Lourdes. People still come in procession to Lourdes. Miracles still grace the grotto of Lourdes. But the grotto’s greatest miracle is the girl Our Lady asked to “come closer” to her that February day in Lourdes—and her name is Bernadette.
Footnotes, sources and references are omitted in this work. Educated people will not need them, uneducated people will not read them—(St. Francis de Sales)
On March 25th, I was roused from sleep by an inner insistence to go to the grotto. It was still dark when I reached Massabielle. The Lady was there and waiting for me.
I apologized for keeping her waiting, for I had caught a cold. She smiled, I knelt down, and we said the Rosary together. Then the Lady came very close to me. I told her how I loved her, and how happy I was to see her again.
“Mademoiselle,” I said, “would you be so kind as to tell me who you are, if you please?” Instead of replying, she only smiled.
I said again: “Would you be so kind as to tell me who you are?” I said this four times altogether.
The Lady extended her hands towards the ground, swept them upwards to join them on her heart, raised her eyes, but not her head to Heaven, leaned tenderly towards me and said: “Que soy era Immaculada Conceptiou.” She smiled at me. She disappeared. I was alone.
I did not understand the words, but I knew the Priest would. I knew also the Lady loved the Priest. Leaving my candle at the grotto, I went straight to Fr. Peyramale, saying the Lady’s name to myself along the way. Father was waiting for me. I bowed and said: “I am the Immaculate Conception.” Seeing his surprise, I explained: “Aquero (Our Lady) said, ‘I am the Immaculate Conception’.”
The good Priest stood there stunned. Suddenly he stammered: “Do you know what that means?”
I shook my head, I said: “No.”
“Then how can you say the words if you do not understand them?”
“I repeated them all along the way,” I replied, then added: “She still wants the chapel.”
The Priest by now was deathly pale, but he pulled himself together, saying: “Go home now, child. I will see you another day.”
Years later I learned that Father wrote to the Bishop that night, and as he wrote, his heart filled up with emotion, and his eyes filled up with tears.
Mary’s Magnificence
What my Lady meant by “I am the Immaculate Conception,” I had no idea. I decided to ask Mademoiselle Estrade. She had a serene sense of the supernatural.
“Mademoiselle, what does it mean, Immaculate Conception?” Mademoiselle explained how Pope Pius IX had applied the words to Our Blessed Lady four years ago on December 8th.
It was then I realized I could speak what was unspoken in my soul for seven silent weeks—that Aquero was the Immaculate Virgin Mary. She was the Mother of God, and she had been stepping out of Heaven to share her soul with me. She had taught me prayers no soul on Earth had prayed. She had promised me happiness, not in this world, but in the next.
Through all her visits, she had spoken, not the flawless French of the town officials, but the homely words of my Lourdes patois. Holiness and prayer are simple. God’s Mother taught me so.
The majority of people sensed it was Our Blessed Lady who was hallowing Lourdes. When they knew for certain, they could scarce contain their joy. Throughout her visits, not a single crime was committed in the district, the confessionals in the church were besieged, and the Priests were well-nigh exhausted.
The Lady told me always to bring a blessed candle to the grotto, then bring it home with me. On March 25th, she asked me to leave it lighted at the grotto, and to this day candles have always been burning at Massabielle.
I noticed that Our Blessed Lady would often look over my head to single out individuals in the crowd. She would then smile on them as though they were old familiar friends.
Nor did she forget the town officials who caused my parents such distress. All finally believed in the Apparitions, and died with the crucifix pressed to their lips. Jacomet admitted: “Our opposition was in vain. Bernadette had the Immaculate Virgin Mary on her side.”
The Lighted Candle
Three eminent doctors came to Lourdes to examine me. A politician came with them to question me. “The Blessed Virgin could not have spoken in patois,” he stated, “God and the Blessed Virgin don’t know that language.”
“How do we know it, if they don’t?” I had to remind him.
The three doctors declared I was mentally and emotionally stable, but that I suffered from asthma. My mother could have told them that, and saved them the trouble. The trump card of the officials was always: “We will put you in jail.” That was supposed to make me quail. They forgot I was living in a disused police lockup, with the entire family in the one room.
To have a cell to oneself, to have hours of solitude would be a precious retreat in preparation for my First Holy Communion.
On Easter Wednesday, April 7th, the call came clear in my soul to meet God’s Mother at the grotto. Hundreds of people were praying there when I arrived, and they had kept my place for me. I prayed with the Lady in a world of prayer, which I knew now was part of the world of Heaven.
When Our Lady left, I noticed Doctor Dozous beside me. He took my lighted candle and placed it under my left hand. I snatched my hand away. “Sir, you are burning me!” I cried.
Only later did I learn that during Mary’s visit, the flame of my candle had engulfed the fingers and palm of my left hand. To the doctor’s amazement, neither fingers nor palm had burned.
The explanation is simple. When ones soul is enraptured by the Mother of God, the fire of Earth is cold compared to the warmth of Heaven.
First Holy Communion
On May 4th, Monsieur Jacomet removed all the candles from the grotto. He announced that the owners could claim them at the police station. The people collected their candles, lit them, and walked prayerfully back to Massabielle. Unwittingly, Jacomet had organized the first candle-lit procession to the grotto.
That same day, Monsieur Dutour and the Mayor paid a visit to Fr. Peyramale. They had decided to detain me in the mental hospital in Tarbes, but to act without the support of the Parish Priest would be disastrous. They suggested he join with them in putting the little trouble-maker away.
“I know my duty,” Father blazed, “as pastor of my parish and protector of my flock. Your own doctors find no abnormality in Bernadette. You will have to fell me to the ground, pass over my dead body, and trample it underfoot, before you touch a hair of the child’s head.”
Sunday, June 3rd was the day of my First Holy Communion. It was the Feast of Corpus Christi—the Body and Blood of Christ. The Mass, begun by God’s Priest on the altar on the Sisters’ chapel, ended on the altar of my soul. My soul had been prepared for Jesus by his Mother, and my Faith became enlightened in communion with my God.
There are secrets of one’s soul which forever should be shrouded by a veil of reticence. My First Holy Communion is such. Mademoiselle Estrade asked: “What made you happier, Bernadette, First Holy Communion or the Apparitions?”
I could only answer: “The two go together. They cannot be compared. I only know I was very happy on both occasions.”
Years later I would write in my prayer-book in Nevers: “I was nothing, and of this nothing God made something great. In Holy Communion I am heart to heart with Jesus. How sublime is my destiny.”
The Lady says Goodbye
On July 16th, I was kneeling in the quiet of the parish church, thanking God for my third Holy Communion. My soul stirred suddenly with an impulse now familiar—the Mother of God was calling me.
The grotto had been barricaded off by Jacomet and a notice erected: “Entrance to this property forbidden.” The notice was in French. The Mother of God always spoke to me in my patois dialect!
I hastened to the meadow near the River Gave. I knelt and lit my candle. I began my Rosary and my Lady stood in the grotto smiling at me. It was the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. She looked more beautiful than I had ever seen her.
This would be the last time I would see her on this Earth. I knew, because my Lady had prepared my soul for Jesus, and she would give me now to Him with whom I had communed. I knew, because of the way she held her head as she said goodbye. She left Heaven in my heart and it has been there ever since.
Twelve days later a commission was formed to investigate the Apparitions. The Bishop wrote: “To deny the possibility of supernatural happenings would be to plod along in the rut worn by the skepticism of the last century.”
Doctor Dozous listed the cures he had witnessed through use of water from the spring. He was accused of being obstinate, but he simply stated the facts and admitted they were beyond medical explanation. Facts are the most obstinate things in the world. They cannot be denied, and they will not go away.
He was vindicated from a most unexpected source. Napoleon III who treated the Church so shabbily, suppressing Catholic papers and the Vincent de Paul Society, ordered Jacomet’s notice to be taken down, the barricade to be demolished, and the grotto restored to the people. Jacomet he transferred to Arles.
Workmen rushed to remove the barricades, and the people flocked to the grotto. The Lady had won again. That evening the grotto was ablaze with candles in her honor.
Prayer and Penance
To protect me from the town officials, Fr. Peyramale boarded me with the Sisters in the hospice. Slowly I learned to write, to speak French, to sew and embroider. Though I was now sixteen, my size enabled me to fit in easily with the eleven and twelve year olds.
One Sister was shocked when I started everybody sneezing by passing snuff around while she droned away in French. Another was upset when I threw my shoe out the classroom window, telling Julie Garros to bring it back full of strawberries from the garden. Fr. Peyramale allowed me to receive Holy Communion every Sunday as well as twice a month.
In January 1862, the Bishop’s commission gave its verdict; “We hold that the Mother of God appeared to Bernadette Soubirous on February 11th, 1858, and on subsequent days. We propose to build a chapel by the grotto which is now the property of the Diocese of Tarbes.”
Photography had recently arrived in Lourdes, and I was asked to pose as though in ecstasy. “I can’t,” I said, “the Lady isn’t there.” Another photographer wanted me to change my dress for every photo. I did not have the dresses. The photos eventually sold in Lourdes for five cents!
I was called to the Sisters’ parlor ten to twenty times a day to be grilled with questions. “Courage”, Sister Victoirine would say when she saw the tears “the Apparitions were for others as well as for yourself.”
In April 1862, I collapsed and was anointed. The hospice doctor prescribed medicine, but I requested some water from the grotto. A moment after sipping it, I felt as though a mountain were lifted off my chest.
“My medicine worked well,” the doctor beamed.
“I did not take it,” I replied.
“Well,” he answered, “you weren’t as sick as you thought you were.”
Leaving Lourdes Forever
About this time, Our Lady’s statue was placed in the grotto by the sculptor Fabisch, who attempted to portray in marble the living sacredness of God’s Mother. No marble however can contain such sacredness, and I had to admit: “It is not she.” The sculptor made Our Lady smile too little and look too big. He was not to blame. In Heaven he will understand.
Next came the blessing of the crypt of the chapel. My father’s joy was complete that day. For months he had worked on the crypt as a laborer. My mother remained in the background, quietly thanking God for everything.
Then early in 1865, my little brother died. Justin never saw his tenth birthday. He was the fourth child my parents had seen die. That made four of our family in Heaven to keep our places ready till we meet again in the Communion of Saints.
Soon after Justin’s death, the Bishop visited Lourdes. I was seated on a block of wood, scraping carrots for the Sisters’ dinner, when he entered the kitchen. He spoke to me of getting married.
“Oh, that is not for me,” I answered.
“The Convent then―have you thought of it?”
“I don’t know anything, and I’m no good at anything,” I answered.
“You are good at scraping carrots,” he said. “Think it over, and if your heart says yes, I will see to the rest.”
I prayed. I asked my parents’ opinion. I consulted Fr. Peyramale. My heart said yes. I chose the Sisters of Nevers because they never tried to entice me there.
On July 3rd 1866, I went to the grotto for the last time. I said goodbye. I turned away. I did not look back. Two other postulants and myself arrived at Nevers on July 7th. Superiors did not meet postulants who arrived at night, so we groped through the dark dormitory to our beds. We cried that night, to be told next morning—small comfort—that tears were a sign of a true vocation.
Assignment Nowhere
Next day the Sisters assembled—three hundred in all—and in my Lourdes dress and white hood, I was told to speak of the Apparitions. I was also told it would be the first and the last time I would speak of them.
Homesick for Lourdes, I struggled on till August, when choking bouts of coughing laid me low. The Sisters called the Bishop to anoint me.
“You are going to die,” he said, “and I have come to receive your Religious Profession—you need only say: ‘Amen!’” He then departed, leaving the Superior General to close my eyes when I breathed my last. When I did not oblige, she was angry.
“You are nothing but a little fool,” she said. “If you are not dead by morning, I will remove your Profession veil, and send you back to the Novitiate.”
No sooner was I back in the Novitiate, than I received word of my mother’s death. She died peacefully in Lourdes on December 8th. Her death at forty-one convinced me that life is merely Heaven’s waiting-room.
On October 30th, 1867, with forty-three other novices, I made my Religious Profession. Heavenly happiness and human humiliation mingled in my soul. “Monseigneur,” said Mother General, “we are at the end of our wits to know where to assign Sister Marie-Bernard. She is a little stupid, and is good for nothing!”
In front of the community, the Bishop replied: “Sister Marie-Bernard―assignment nowhere!” Then: “If it is true you are good for nothing, what was the use of your entering the Congregation?”
“That is what I said to you at Lourdes,” I replied, “and you said it did not matter.”
Mother General spoke again: “If you wish, Monseigneur, out of charity, we could keep her here and use her in the infirmary. To start with, she could help with the cleaning.”
The Bishop looked at me kneeling before him and said: “I give you the assignment of praying.”
Bernadette as a Nun
After Profession I was left in the Novitiate “to help with the cleaning.” The Novice Mistress demanded total revelation of my soul and complete submission to her ways.
The second I could manage, the first was beyond me. Having opened ones soul to the Queen of Heaven, how futile to open it to anyone on Earth. Yet it was good for me. When one is espoused to Jesus Christ, one should say yes in physical and emotional pain, without any ifs or buts. The Sisters used to say: “It is good not to be Bernadette!” and they were wondrous in their encouragement
Antoinette Dalias, a postulant, said: “I’ve been in Nevers for three days, and no one has shown me Bernadette.”
“That’s Bernadette beside you,” said a Sister.
“Not that?” exclaimed Antoinette.
I took her hand and said: “Yes, Mademoiselle, just that!” ― and we were friends for life.
A liturgy expert assured me that Our Lady would never wear a blue sash—blue was not liturgical.
“I don’t know anything about liturgy,” I answered, “but I do know the Lady’s sash was blue.” Patience with such people was given me in prayer, and prayer was my assignment now.
Children never put me off. A tiny tot of four said: “You have seen the Blessed Virgin, Sister. Was she beautiful?”
“So beautiful,” I replied, “that once you have seen her, you would willingly die to see her again!”
The Rosary became my way of prayer, indeed my way of life. To hold it in ones hands brought serenity and peace. The Rosary I used during the Apparitions disappeared one day without a trace. Toinette had given it to me in 1856. A Priest boasted that he had it, but my answer was: “If anyone claims to have my beads, he must have stolen them, for I would never have given them to anyone.”
Towards Eternity
On March 4th, 1871, my father died at the age of 64. He died as he lived, in deep Faith, and with a quiet longing to be with God.
On September 8th, 1877, Fr. Peyramale died in Lourdes. He began the processions I could never organize, he built the chapel I could never build. Our Lady had requested but a chapel. He gave her a basilica. Surely, when he died on her birthday, she gave him Heaven.
What madness, their deaths seemed to say, to attach oneself too deeply to anything on Earth, when one must leave it all too soon for Heaven. “Why don’t you ask Our Lady to cure you?” a pilgrim asked me once in Lourdes.
“It’s no use,” I answered, “Our Lady told me I would die young.”
In September 1877, I said to the Sisters: “I will not last long now,” and soon I became a patient in the infirmary I had helped to manage. My bed became “my little white chapel.” Then it became my cross. Eventually it became a crucifix, when I could only lie on it and suffer.
A Sister apologized for the pain as she pulled a poultice off some blisters. “Pull away,” I managed to say, “I’m as tough as a cat!” Sister smiled—she knew I was reflecting the way of sacrifice and repentance pointed out at Lourdes.
My weapons, I decided, would be prayer and sacrifice, which I would hold onto till my last breath. Then only would the weapon of sacrifice fall from my hand, but the weapon of prayer would follow me to Heaven.
My mission was ending. The Lady who shared with her Priest and myself her name in the Trinity before time began, would see her child, as she had seen her Priest, serenely through to Eternity.
Poor Sinner, Poor Sinner
Bernadette Soubirous died on Easter Wednesday, April 16th, 1879. On Easter Sunday she said: “This morning after Holy Communion, I asked Our Lord for a respite to talk to Him in comfort. He would not give it. My sufferings will last till death.”
On Easter Monday, Bernadette said goodbye to her dear friend, Sister Bernard Dalias. “Not that!” Sister Bernard had remarked twelve years ago.
“Just that” said Bernadette as she took her hand. Bernadette took her hand again and said: “Goodbye, Bernard, this time it is the last.”
On Easter Tuesday, the chaplain suggested she make the sacrifice of her life. “What sacrifice?” Bernadette answered, “it is no sacrifice to leave this life, where it is so difficult to belong to God.”
On Easter Wednesday, she requested her crucifix to be tied to her, lest her weakening fingers be unable to hold it.
She gazed at the statue of Our Blessed Lady and said: “I have seen her! How beautiful she is, and how I long to go to her!”
Sister Nathalie Portat came in about three o’clock, and Bernadette requested: “Help me to thank to the end.” Taking the crucifix, she prayed: “My God I love You, with all my heart, with all my soul, with all my strength.” Sister Nathalie began the Hail Mary. Bernadette answered clearly: “Mother of God, pray for me, poor sinner, poor sinner.”
Now was the hour of her death, and like Jesus on the cross, she said: “I am thirsty.” The Sisters brought some water. Bernadette for the last time made the Sign of the Cross as her Lady that taught her in the grotto. Silently she sipped a little water. Peacefully she bowed her head. Gently she surrendered her soul.
A Sister put the crucifix in her hands and the Rosary through her fingers. Bernadette Soubirous, after thirty-five years on Earth, had gone to her God.
Saint Bernadette Soubirous
The moment Bernadette’s death was announced, people flocked to pay their respects. Their sense of the sacred told them a Saint had died. They began to clamor for her canonization, but there was one insurmountable obstacle—Bernadette’s novice—mistress, Mother Vazou.
Within two years of Bernadette’s death, this formidable lady had become Superior General. She had failed to fit Bernadette into her own mould of Jansenistic piety. Now she failed to hear the whispering of God in the voices of God’s people. Where once she forbade all mention of Bernadette’s Apparitions, now she forbade all mention of her canonization.
“Spare me that humiliation,” she would snap, “wait till I am dead!” The Sisters would wait a quarter of a century for her demise, which occurred—ironically in Lourdes—in 1907.
Two years later, Mother Josephine Forrestier inaugurated Bernadette’s cause for canonization.
As part of the formal proceedings, Bernadette’s coffin was opened after thirty years in the grave. Her Rosary had rusted, her habit had frayed, but Bernadette was perfectly and beautifully incorrupt. It was as though she had just fallen asleep.
On December 8th 1933, Pope Pius XI declared Bernadette Soubirous a Saint of the Catholic Church. Her feast-day was fixed for February 18th, the day her Lady promised to make her happy, not in this life, but in the next. The Faithful however give her two more feast-days—April 16th, the day of her death, and February 11th—the day her Lady stepped from Heaven into her heart.
The miraculous spring still flows in Lourdes. People still come in procession to Lourdes. Miracles still grace the grotto of Lourdes. But the grotto’s greatest miracle is the girl Our Lady asked to “come closer” to her that February day in Lourdes—and her name is Bernadette.
Footnotes, sources and references are omitted in this work. Educated people will not need them, uneducated people will not read them—(St. Francis de Sales)
Article 4
Tuesday, February 11th
Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes
St. Bernadette's Own Book on Lourdes (Part 1)
Tuesday, February 11th
Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes
St. Bernadette's Own Book on Lourdes (Part 1)
On a June day in 1858, Fr. Peyramale noticed a girl’s head encircled by a halo as he gave her Holy Communion. When she raised her head, he recognized her as Bernadette Soubirous. What follows are words, either spoken or written, by Bernadette herself.
My father was Francois Soubirous, my mother Louise Casterot. I was their first child, born on Monday, January 7th, 1844. Next day, I was baptized by Fr. Dominique Forgue in the parish church of Lourdes.
Eventually six brothers and two sisters arrived as gifts from God. Only three lived beyond the age of ten. Justin died when he was nine, four others died as infants. Such comings and goings from Heaven to Earth, and Earth to Heaven welded our family together in fortitude and love. I never heard my parents quarrel. They were always at peace.
My childhood was carefree, for my father was a miller. He ran the Boly Mill beside a limpid stream that flowed into the River Gave. Famine, bad times and poverty reduced us to living in a one-room dwelling called the Cachot. It was an unused police lock-up cell. It can still be seen in Lourdes today.
When I was ten, cholera scourged Lourdes, bringing me to death’s door, and leaving me with asthma and palpitations of the heart. The following year, famine gripped the countryside, and we all but starved.
When I was thirteen, my parents sent me to Bartres, five kilometers (3 miles) from home. Marie Lagues my foster mother lived there, and she promised to prepare me for my First Holy Communion. Marie could scarcely read or write, I could not read or write at all. I spoke only patois, and the catechism was in French. After all day in the fields minding sheep, I was too tired to understand a word.
Fr. Pomian promised that if I returned to Lourdes he would prepare me for my First Holy Communion. So three weeks after my fourteenth birthday, I walked back to Lourdes on my own, and I never went back to Bartres.
Early on February 11th, 1858, my sister Toinette, aged eleven, and my friend Jeanne Abadie, aged twelve, set off with me to gather firewood for my mother. Jeanne and Toinette crossed the millstream by the River Gave, while I sat down to take off my shoes. I was taking off my stocking when I heard a noise like the sound of a storm. I looked at the trees near the river, but nothing was moving. I was frightened, and I stood up straight.
Bewildered, I looked across the mill-stream to a niche above a cave in the rock of Massabielle. A rosebush on the edge of the niche was swaying in the wind. It was all that moved. All else was still.
A golden cloud came out of the cave and flooded the niche with radiance. Then a lady, young and beautiful, exceedingly beautiful, the like of whom I had never seen, stood on the edge of the niche. She smiled and smiled at me, beckoning me to come closer as though she were my mother, and she gave me to understand in my soul that I was not mistaken.
The Lady was dressed in white, with a white veil on her head, and a blue sash at her waist. A Rosary of white beads on a golden chain was on her right arm. On that cold winter’s day, her feet were bare, but on each foot was a golden rose radiant with the warmth of summer.
I went upon my knees and took my Rosary from my pocket. The Lady took the Rosary from her arm and I began to cross myself. My arm could not move until the Lady herself made a beautiful Sign of the Cross.
The Lady let me pray the Rosary on my own. She passed the beads through her fingers, she did not say the words. She signed for me to come closer―but I did not dare. She smiled at me, she bowed to me. She disappeared into the niche, the golden cloud faded, and I was all alone.
I told Toinette what happened, and at evening prayer my eyes filled up with tears. “Is anything wrong?” my mother asked. Toinette answered for me, and my mother said: “It was a white stone you saw.” My father thought it better for me not to return to Massabielle.
An Invitation and a Promise
On Sunday I asked my father’s permission to return. He said: “A lady with a Rosary can’t be evil!” and he gave permission.
A group of us went, I began my Rosary, and the Lady appeared in the niche and smiled at me. I sprinkled some Holy Water, saying: “If you come from God―stay. If you don’t―go away.” The more I sprinkled, the more she smiled. I knelt and gazed at her lovingly.
Some of the group ran frightened to Madame Nicolau nearby. Madame returned with Antoine her son, who used all his strength to carry me to his mother’s home. Along the way, the Lady kept in front of me and slightly above me. Only when Antoine carried me into his home, did the Lady disappear and did I return to Earth.
My mother had come to Antoine’s house, and she was crying. “You are making everyone run after you!” she said. Antoine’s wife reassured my mother, and from that moment my mother stood by me, and never doubted me.
On Thursday morning, Madame Millet and Antoinette Peyret took me to the grotto. They brought a pen and ink with them. I began the Rosary, and the Lady appeared, surrounded with light. I went into the grotto, and the Lady came down from the niche and stood beside me. “If you are from God”, I said, “please tell me what you want; or else go away.”
At “are from God,” she smiled. At “else go away,” she shook her head. I asked “Would you be so kind as to write down your name?”
“There is no need to write what I have to say,” she answered, and she laughed. Then she spoke again: “Would you have the graciousness to come here for fifteen days?”
“Aoue era gracia” were her exact words, and I was astonished she should speak to me in patois and in a manner so gracious. “I will ask my parents’ permission,” I replied, “and I will come.”
She responded: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next.” Then: “Go and tell the Priests that a chapel must be built here.” Her eyes rested on Antoinette for a moment, she smiled on her, and then she disappeared.
For Fifteen Days
On Friday, my parents gave permission and my heart was full of joy. The Lady came, and when my mother saw me smile so sacredly, she prayed: “O God, do not take my child away from me!” She thought I might die.
I was not afraid to die, but I was terrified by the voices coming from the back of the grotto. They were evil voices clashing in a guttural, angry way. “Save yourself, get out of here!” they shrieked. The Lady raised her eyes, frowned at where the voices were—and there was peace.
The Lady vanished as gently as she came, and I flung myself into my mother’s arms, saying: “The Lady thanked me for coming, she told me she would have some revelations to make to me.”
Early next morning, my mother and I returned to the grotto, where the Lady taught me, word for word, a prayer for myself alone. I have never revealed it to anyone, not even to my mother.
Sunday was the Lady’s sixth visit to me. Hundreds of people were kneeling by the grotto, but I scarcely noticed them. The light around the Lady was brighter, yet softer than the sun. The roses on her feet were brighter than gold.
For a moment she looked out over my head, and sorrow overshadowed her. I asked her why? She answered: “Pray for sinners!” She was surrounded by light as she disappeared, the glow faded, but its warmth lingered in my soul.
Two other people came into my life today. One was our Lourdes doctor, the other was the police commissioner. Unknown to me, as I was talking to the Lady, Doctor Dozous had taken my arm and placed his fingers on an artery to feel the pulse.
“It was calm and regular,” he wrote later. “Nothing suggested Bernadette was under undue nervous excitement.” Doctor Dozous eventually became a man of deep Faith. He was the first doctor to care for the sick when they came on pilgrimage to the grotto.
Cross Questioning
Dominique Jacomet the police commissioner! He was suspicious of everyone. He took hold of my hood as I left the church and said: “Qu’em bas sequi—Follow me.” He took me to his office and the questioning began. “My name is Bernadette”, I said.
I could not say if I was thirteen or fourteen, as I had never learned to count He tried to suggest I was seeing Our Blessed Lady. I insisted I saw only “Aquero.” Jacomet knew that “Aquero” means “reverence in the presence of a sacred reality.”
He wrote down with a goose-quill every word I said. Then he read it back to me—twisted, untruthful, incorrect. “Sir,” I protested: “you are altering everything I say.”
“Brazen hussy,” he blazed, and the tassel on his cap shook as he ranted in anger. At that moment the door opened, and my father stood there saying: “I am the father of this little one.”
Next day at catechism class, the girls shunned me as a criminal, and the Sister Superior thanked God I had been arrested for my misbehavior. One woman called me a brat, another slapped my face, but Sister Damien was kind to me.
I was returning to class after lunch, when an invisible barrier prevented me from going forward and an inner force propelled me to the grotto. At the same time, a policeman shadowed me, making barbed remarks about Religion in these advance days of nineteenth century science.
I knelt at the grotto and said my Rosary, but Aquero (Our Lady) did not come. People scoffed and said the Lady was afraid of the police. That evening I told Fr. Pomian about the commissioner and the policeman. “They cannot stop you from going to the grotto,” he said.
When I told my father what happened, he said he would never again let anyone prevent me from visiting Massabielle.
Three Secrets and Repentance
On Tuesday, I felt my soul called to the grotto, and I told my mother. She came along with me. About one hundred and fifty people were there, including Doctor Dozous.
Aquero (Our Lady) came and prayed with me for an hour. The anguish of yesterday vanished in the warmth of her presence. She told me three secrets for myself alone. I am never to tell anyone. They concern only myself, and they keep me prayerful, grateful, humble. When she said goodbye, my one consolation was my mother kneeling beside me.
Today I was surprised that people could not hear Aquero (Our Lady) and myself talking. Aquero (Our Lady) talked loud enough to be heard, I raised my voice to enable her to hear, yet no one heard a word.
Next day, Wednesday, my parents and my Aunt Lucille brought me to the grotto.
My Lady appeared for the eighth time. Again for an hour she spoke with me and prayed with me. I could not take my eyes off her radiant presence.
Today the people did hear something I said while I was talking with the Lady. She spoke one word only. She spoke it slowly, sadly. She spoke it three times. “Penance! Penance! Penance!” and my eyes filled up with tears.
I spoke it as the Lady spoke it—slowly. I said it a she said it—three times. The people nearby hear me say it, and they repeated it to the others. When the Lady left, my Aunt Lucille was crying. She could not understand why I bent down several times and kissed the ground.
“Auntie,” I explained, “Aquero (Our Lady) told me to pray to God for the conversion of sinners, and she asked me to kiss the ground in humility for their pride.”
“Drink at the Spring”
On Thursday, February 25th, Aquero (Our Lady) came peacefully, prayerfully. Gently she said: “Go, drink | at the spring, and wash in it.”
I saw no spring, so I went towards the River Gave. Aquero (Our Lady) called me back and pointed to a spot beneath the rock. I found some moisture there, but it was mud. Three times I threw it away, even though the Lady said to drink it. Then I washed in it, only to have my face besmeared with mud.
When the Lady left, my Aunt Bernarde slapped my face. “Stop your nonsense!” she said, as she sent me home to the jeers of the people. That afternoon, Eleanore Perard returned with me to the grotto. Water was bubbling from the hollow I had scraped in the mud. Eleanore stirred the water with a stick. The more she stirred, the more it flowed. The more it flowed, the purer it became. Soon it was water crystal clear.
The people who laughed this morning when all they saw was mud, now saw the water as a gift from God. They obeyed the Lady’s request: “Go, drink at the spring and wash in it!”
Louis Bouriette asked his daughter to bring him some of the water. Years before in the quarries Louis had injured his right eye, and his vision was steadily deteriorating.
He bathed his eye with the water, and next day he said to Doctor Dozous: “I am cured.” Doctor Dozous wrote a sentence on some paper, placed his hand over Louis’ good eye, and said: “Read this.” Louis read aloud: “This patient is suffering from an incurable amaurosis.”
The Gospel at Mass that morning told of the pool in Jerusalem where so many of “the sick, the blind and the lame were healed.” The people who scoffed when I washed in the spring, eventually treasured its water as a grace from Heaven.
Questioning, Healing, Rosary
That evening a policeman came to take my mother and myself to the Imperial Prosecutor. For two hours we were made to stand before a picture of Napoleon III, while the Prosecutor sat beneath the picture and questioned us.
For two hours we stood there, questioned, mortified, till he threatened to throw us into prison. My mother burst into tears at this, and the Prosecutor took fright. He said: “There are chairs, you can sit down!”
My mother took a chair, but the little man in the big uniform had treated her so rudely that I said: “No thank you―I might dirty it” and I sat on the floor, like the tailors do in Lourdes.
He still kept trying to trap me by reading out answers I had not given, till my cousin, Andrew Sajous, banged on the shutters. Monsieur Dutour gave in then, and we walked home.
On Monday, March 1st, the Lady gave a grace to a friend and a lesson to myself Catherine Latapie had two fingers paralyzed since an accident in 1856. She had two small children and was expecting a third.
After the Lady left me on Monday, Catherine knelt by the spring and plunged her hand into the water. Her useless fingers suddenly regained their suppleness. Catherine said a prayer of thanksgiving then walked nine kilometers (over 5 miles) to her home in Loubajac. That evening, little Jean-Baptiste was born. He was special. He would become a Priest.
The Lady’s lesson to me! Pauline Sans asked me to use her Rosary at the grotto today. When I prayed on it, the Lady interrupted me. “You have made a mistake,” she smiled, “that Rosary is not yours.”
People climbed all over the grotto today, disturbing the rosebush where the Lady stood. I was afraid she might fall, but she kept on smiling at the people. She loved them, and she always seemed sorry to leave them.
The Parish Priest
The Lady had said on her third visit: “Go and tell the Priests that a chapel must be built here.” I knew in my soul she meant Fr. Peyramale. He was a man whose heart belonged to the poor. For years he paid the rents of 35 families in Lourdes to save them from eviction. I saw him in his garden, and decided to approach him.
“What do you want, and why have you come?” he asked.
“Father, I have come from the Lady.”
“Oh yes, you say you see visions, and you upset the whole countryside with your stories. Do you know the Lady’s name?”
“No, Father, I do not, but I see her as clearly as I see you, and she talks to me as clearly as you talk to me. She is surrounded with light, and wants a chapel built at Massabielle.”
Father said he would not deal with a nameless vision. He called me an imposter and a show-off. Gruff though he was, he never humiliated me or my mother as did Monsieur Dutour. Eventually he became my greatest friend.
I thought I had failed the Lady when Father said “Since you stick to your story, find out who this Lady is, and if she thinks she has a right to the chapel, ask her to make the rosebush at the grotto blossom immediately.” That the Priest knew rosebush grew where the Lady stood, was surprise to me.
On Tuesday, March 2nd, the Lady again requested me to tell the Priests to build a chapel, and to ask the people to come to the grotto in procession. Her requests were more like pleas than orders, and she, gave me tenacity tempered with tenderness for the, mission she entrusted to me.
I needed tenacity. Father paced up and down saying: “A chapel! A chapel! Who will pay for it? And if your Lady wants processions, she should send you to the Bishop―not to me. You don’t even know her name! Ridiculous!”
He took a broom that was standing in the hallway and made as if to sweep me away with it. I left quickly!
The Fifteenth Day
The Lady did not come till evening time on Wednesday. Standing effortlessly on the little wild rosebush, she greeted me, she bowed to me, she made her wondrous Sign of the Cross. She asked for the chapel, the procession, and she disappeared. When she left, I was amazed to find myself still in this world.
It brought me down to earth to have to visit Father Peyramale again. “Did you ask her name?”
“Yes, but she only smiled.”
“Well, if she wants her chapel, let her tell her name, and let her make the rosebush blossom. Then I will build the chapel, and if I build it, I tell you,” he said softly, “it will not be a small one.”
Thursday, March 4th was the last of the fifteen days. It was market day. Eight thousand people gathered around the grotto. It seemed the Lady had got her procession already.
We started the Rosary, and at the second decade the Lady came and lifted me into a world where the language is prayer, and the environment is Heaven.
I went in under the roof of the grotto, and we spoke and prayed together for an hour. My cousin, Jeann Videre, was with me as I prayed, and the Lady came so close to her, that had Jeanne put out her hand she could have touched her.
When the lady left, I extinguished my candle and set off to give her message again to Fr. Peyramale He greeted me with: “What did the Lady say?”
“I asked her name,” I answered, “but she on smiled. When I asked her to make the rosebush blossom, she smiled the more. She still wants the chapel.”
“She must tell her name,” said Father. Then in a tone so soft it surprised me: “If I knew it was the Blessed Virgin, I would do all she desires.”
Enemies, Friends, Miracles
Three weeks went by without a visit from the Lady. Yet I knew she would come again. It was not her way to leave without saying goodbye.
Meanwhile, the people pestered me, the police watched me, and the public prosecutor almost crushed me. What my parents suffered from the town officials, only Eternity will reveal.
A judge and a lawyer in Lourdes were Heaven-sent supporters. Judge Pougat assured me that Monsieur Dutour was overstepping the mark in threatening me and harassing my parents. Monsieur Dufo the lawyer saved me from the traps the officials were setting for me.
Despite the plotting and intrigues, wondrous things happened to affirm the people in their Faith. Croisine Bouhohort’s child of two was dying. His little coffin was already in the making. Croisine took her dying child to Massabielle, and for fifteen minutes immersed him in the cold spring water. Next day, little Louis was walking around full of life. Doctor Vergez examined the child along with Doctor Dozous. Both doctors admitted the child’s cure could not be explained by medical science.
As a result, the Mayor and the police accused me of curing people, and threatened me with jail. I stated simply: “I have not cured anyone.” They then raved on about never going back to the grotto, and they tried to overawe me with their impeccable French and their sophisticated attitude. They seemed incapable of realizing I had knelt in the presence of a Lady who could only be of Heaven, and their words flew past my ears.
Each day after First Holy Communion class, I would go quietly to Massabielle. I would kneel down. I would say my prayers. I would make the Sign of the Cross as my Lady had taught me. Then I would go home.
My father was Francois Soubirous, my mother Louise Casterot. I was their first child, born on Monday, January 7th, 1844. Next day, I was baptized by Fr. Dominique Forgue in the parish church of Lourdes.
Eventually six brothers and two sisters arrived as gifts from God. Only three lived beyond the age of ten. Justin died when he was nine, four others died as infants. Such comings and goings from Heaven to Earth, and Earth to Heaven welded our family together in fortitude and love. I never heard my parents quarrel. They were always at peace.
My childhood was carefree, for my father was a miller. He ran the Boly Mill beside a limpid stream that flowed into the River Gave. Famine, bad times and poverty reduced us to living in a one-room dwelling called the Cachot. It was an unused police lock-up cell. It can still be seen in Lourdes today.
When I was ten, cholera scourged Lourdes, bringing me to death’s door, and leaving me with asthma and palpitations of the heart. The following year, famine gripped the countryside, and we all but starved.
When I was thirteen, my parents sent me to Bartres, five kilometers (3 miles) from home. Marie Lagues my foster mother lived there, and she promised to prepare me for my First Holy Communion. Marie could scarcely read or write, I could not read or write at all. I spoke only patois, and the catechism was in French. After all day in the fields minding sheep, I was too tired to understand a word.
Fr. Pomian promised that if I returned to Lourdes he would prepare me for my First Holy Communion. So three weeks after my fourteenth birthday, I walked back to Lourdes on my own, and I never went back to Bartres.
Early on February 11th, 1858, my sister Toinette, aged eleven, and my friend Jeanne Abadie, aged twelve, set off with me to gather firewood for my mother. Jeanne and Toinette crossed the millstream by the River Gave, while I sat down to take off my shoes. I was taking off my stocking when I heard a noise like the sound of a storm. I looked at the trees near the river, but nothing was moving. I was frightened, and I stood up straight.
Bewildered, I looked across the mill-stream to a niche above a cave in the rock of Massabielle. A rosebush on the edge of the niche was swaying in the wind. It was all that moved. All else was still.
A golden cloud came out of the cave and flooded the niche with radiance. Then a lady, young and beautiful, exceedingly beautiful, the like of whom I had never seen, stood on the edge of the niche. She smiled and smiled at me, beckoning me to come closer as though she were my mother, and she gave me to understand in my soul that I was not mistaken.
The Lady was dressed in white, with a white veil on her head, and a blue sash at her waist. A Rosary of white beads on a golden chain was on her right arm. On that cold winter’s day, her feet were bare, but on each foot was a golden rose radiant with the warmth of summer.
I went upon my knees and took my Rosary from my pocket. The Lady took the Rosary from her arm and I began to cross myself. My arm could not move until the Lady herself made a beautiful Sign of the Cross.
The Lady let me pray the Rosary on my own. She passed the beads through her fingers, she did not say the words. She signed for me to come closer―but I did not dare. She smiled at me, she bowed to me. She disappeared into the niche, the golden cloud faded, and I was all alone.
I told Toinette what happened, and at evening prayer my eyes filled up with tears. “Is anything wrong?” my mother asked. Toinette answered for me, and my mother said: “It was a white stone you saw.” My father thought it better for me not to return to Massabielle.
An Invitation and a Promise
On Sunday I asked my father’s permission to return. He said: “A lady with a Rosary can’t be evil!” and he gave permission.
A group of us went, I began my Rosary, and the Lady appeared in the niche and smiled at me. I sprinkled some Holy Water, saying: “If you come from God―stay. If you don’t―go away.” The more I sprinkled, the more she smiled. I knelt and gazed at her lovingly.
Some of the group ran frightened to Madame Nicolau nearby. Madame returned with Antoine her son, who used all his strength to carry me to his mother’s home. Along the way, the Lady kept in front of me and slightly above me. Only when Antoine carried me into his home, did the Lady disappear and did I return to Earth.
My mother had come to Antoine’s house, and she was crying. “You are making everyone run after you!” she said. Antoine’s wife reassured my mother, and from that moment my mother stood by me, and never doubted me.
On Thursday morning, Madame Millet and Antoinette Peyret took me to the grotto. They brought a pen and ink with them. I began the Rosary, and the Lady appeared, surrounded with light. I went into the grotto, and the Lady came down from the niche and stood beside me. “If you are from God”, I said, “please tell me what you want; or else go away.”
At “are from God,” she smiled. At “else go away,” she shook her head. I asked “Would you be so kind as to write down your name?”
“There is no need to write what I have to say,” she answered, and she laughed. Then she spoke again: “Would you have the graciousness to come here for fifteen days?”
“Aoue era gracia” were her exact words, and I was astonished she should speak to me in patois and in a manner so gracious. “I will ask my parents’ permission,” I replied, “and I will come.”
She responded: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next.” Then: “Go and tell the Priests that a chapel must be built here.” Her eyes rested on Antoinette for a moment, she smiled on her, and then she disappeared.
For Fifteen Days
On Friday, my parents gave permission and my heart was full of joy. The Lady came, and when my mother saw me smile so sacredly, she prayed: “O God, do not take my child away from me!” She thought I might die.
I was not afraid to die, but I was terrified by the voices coming from the back of the grotto. They were evil voices clashing in a guttural, angry way. “Save yourself, get out of here!” they shrieked. The Lady raised her eyes, frowned at where the voices were—and there was peace.
The Lady vanished as gently as she came, and I flung myself into my mother’s arms, saying: “The Lady thanked me for coming, she told me she would have some revelations to make to me.”
Early next morning, my mother and I returned to the grotto, where the Lady taught me, word for word, a prayer for myself alone. I have never revealed it to anyone, not even to my mother.
Sunday was the Lady’s sixth visit to me. Hundreds of people were kneeling by the grotto, but I scarcely noticed them. The light around the Lady was brighter, yet softer than the sun. The roses on her feet were brighter than gold.
For a moment she looked out over my head, and sorrow overshadowed her. I asked her why? She answered: “Pray for sinners!” She was surrounded by light as she disappeared, the glow faded, but its warmth lingered in my soul.
Two other people came into my life today. One was our Lourdes doctor, the other was the police commissioner. Unknown to me, as I was talking to the Lady, Doctor Dozous had taken my arm and placed his fingers on an artery to feel the pulse.
“It was calm and regular,” he wrote later. “Nothing suggested Bernadette was under undue nervous excitement.” Doctor Dozous eventually became a man of deep Faith. He was the first doctor to care for the sick when they came on pilgrimage to the grotto.
Cross Questioning
Dominique Jacomet the police commissioner! He was suspicious of everyone. He took hold of my hood as I left the church and said: “Qu’em bas sequi—Follow me.” He took me to his office and the questioning began. “My name is Bernadette”, I said.
I could not say if I was thirteen or fourteen, as I had never learned to count He tried to suggest I was seeing Our Blessed Lady. I insisted I saw only “Aquero.” Jacomet knew that “Aquero” means “reverence in the presence of a sacred reality.”
He wrote down with a goose-quill every word I said. Then he read it back to me—twisted, untruthful, incorrect. “Sir,” I protested: “you are altering everything I say.”
“Brazen hussy,” he blazed, and the tassel on his cap shook as he ranted in anger. At that moment the door opened, and my father stood there saying: “I am the father of this little one.”
Next day at catechism class, the girls shunned me as a criminal, and the Sister Superior thanked God I had been arrested for my misbehavior. One woman called me a brat, another slapped my face, but Sister Damien was kind to me.
I was returning to class after lunch, when an invisible barrier prevented me from going forward and an inner force propelled me to the grotto. At the same time, a policeman shadowed me, making barbed remarks about Religion in these advance days of nineteenth century science.
I knelt at the grotto and said my Rosary, but Aquero (Our Lady) did not come. People scoffed and said the Lady was afraid of the police. That evening I told Fr. Pomian about the commissioner and the policeman. “They cannot stop you from going to the grotto,” he said.
When I told my father what happened, he said he would never again let anyone prevent me from visiting Massabielle.
Three Secrets and Repentance
On Tuesday, I felt my soul called to the grotto, and I told my mother. She came along with me. About one hundred and fifty people were there, including Doctor Dozous.
Aquero (Our Lady) came and prayed with me for an hour. The anguish of yesterday vanished in the warmth of her presence. She told me three secrets for myself alone. I am never to tell anyone. They concern only myself, and they keep me prayerful, grateful, humble. When she said goodbye, my one consolation was my mother kneeling beside me.
Today I was surprised that people could not hear Aquero (Our Lady) and myself talking. Aquero (Our Lady) talked loud enough to be heard, I raised my voice to enable her to hear, yet no one heard a word.
Next day, Wednesday, my parents and my Aunt Lucille brought me to the grotto.
My Lady appeared for the eighth time. Again for an hour she spoke with me and prayed with me. I could not take my eyes off her radiant presence.
Today the people did hear something I said while I was talking with the Lady. She spoke one word only. She spoke it slowly, sadly. She spoke it three times. “Penance! Penance! Penance!” and my eyes filled up with tears.
I spoke it as the Lady spoke it—slowly. I said it a she said it—three times. The people nearby hear me say it, and they repeated it to the others. When the Lady left, my Aunt Lucille was crying. She could not understand why I bent down several times and kissed the ground.
“Auntie,” I explained, “Aquero (Our Lady) told me to pray to God for the conversion of sinners, and she asked me to kiss the ground in humility for their pride.”
“Drink at the Spring”
On Thursday, February 25th, Aquero (Our Lady) came peacefully, prayerfully. Gently she said: “Go, drink | at the spring, and wash in it.”
I saw no spring, so I went towards the River Gave. Aquero (Our Lady) called me back and pointed to a spot beneath the rock. I found some moisture there, but it was mud. Three times I threw it away, even though the Lady said to drink it. Then I washed in it, only to have my face besmeared with mud.
When the Lady left, my Aunt Bernarde slapped my face. “Stop your nonsense!” she said, as she sent me home to the jeers of the people. That afternoon, Eleanore Perard returned with me to the grotto. Water was bubbling from the hollow I had scraped in the mud. Eleanore stirred the water with a stick. The more she stirred, the more it flowed. The more it flowed, the purer it became. Soon it was water crystal clear.
The people who laughed this morning when all they saw was mud, now saw the water as a gift from God. They obeyed the Lady’s request: “Go, drink at the spring and wash in it!”
Louis Bouriette asked his daughter to bring him some of the water. Years before in the quarries Louis had injured his right eye, and his vision was steadily deteriorating.
He bathed his eye with the water, and next day he said to Doctor Dozous: “I am cured.” Doctor Dozous wrote a sentence on some paper, placed his hand over Louis’ good eye, and said: “Read this.” Louis read aloud: “This patient is suffering from an incurable amaurosis.”
The Gospel at Mass that morning told of the pool in Jerusalem where so many of “the sick, the blind and the lame were healed.” The people who scoffed when I washed in the spring, eventually treasured its water as a grace from Heaven.
Questioning, Healing, Rosary
That evening a policeman came to take my mother and myself to the Imperial Prosecutor. For two hours we were made to stand before a picture of Napoleon III, while the Prosecutor sat beneath the picture and questioned us.
For two hours we stood there, questioned, mortified, till he threatened to throw us into prison. My mother burst into tears at this, and the Prosecutor took fright. He said: “There are chairs, you can sit down!”
My mother took a chair, but the little man in the big uniform had treated her so rudely that I said: “No thank you―I might dirty it” and I sat on the floor, like the tailors do in Lourdes.
He still kept trying to trap me by reading out answers I had not given, till my cousin, Andrew Sajous, banged on the shutters. Monsieur Dutour gave in then, and we walked home.
On Monday, March 1st, the Lady gave a grace to a friend and a lesson to myself Catherine Latapie had two fingers paralyzed since an accident in 1856. She had two small children and was expecting a third.
After the Lady left me on Monday, Catherine knelt by the spring and plunged her hand into the water. Her useless fingers suddenly regained their suppleness. Catherine said a prayer of thanksgiving then walked nine kilometers (over 5 miles) to her home in Loubajac. That evening, little Jean-Baptiste was born. He was special. He would become a Priest.
The Lady’s lesson to me! Pauline Sans asked me to use her Rosary at the grotto today. When I prayed on it, the Lady interrupted me. “You have made a mistake,” she smiled, “that Rosary is not yours.”
People climbed all over the grotto today, disturbing the rosebush where the Lady stood. I was afraid she might fall, but she kept on smiling at the people. She loved them, and she always seemed sorry to leave them.
The Parish Priest
The Lady had said on her third visit: “Go and tell the Priests that a chapel must be built here.” I knew in my soul she meant Fr. Peyramale. He was a man whose heart belonged to the poor. For years he paid the rents of 35 families in Lourdes to save them from eviction. I saw him in his garden, and decided to approach him.
“What do you want, and why have you come?” he asked.
“Father, I have come from the Lady.”
“Oh yes, you say you see visions, and you upset the whole countryside with your stories. Do you know the Lady’s name?”
“No, Father, I do not, but I see her as clearly as I see you, and she talks to me as clearly as you talk to me. She is surrounded with light, and wants a chapel built at Massabielle.”
Father said he would not deal with a nameless vision. He called me an imposter and a show-off. Gruff though he was, he never humiliated me or my mother as did Monsieur Dutour. Eventually he became my greatest friend.
I thought I had failed the Lady when Father said “Since you stick to your story, find out who this Lady is, and if she thinks she has a right to the chapel, ask her to make the rosebush at the grotto blossom immediately.” That the Priest knew rosebush grew where the Lady stood, was surprise to me.
On Tuesday, March 2nd, the Lady again requested me to tell the Priests to build a chapel, and to ask the people to come to the grotto in procession. Her requests were more like pleas than orders, and she, gave me tenacity tempered with tenderness for the, mission she entrusted to me.
I needed tenacity. Father paced up and down saying: “A chapel! A chapel! Who will pay for it? And if your Lady wants processions, she should send you to the Bishop―not to me. You don’t even know her name! Ridiculous!”
He took a broom that was standing in the hallway and made as if to sweep me away with it. I left quickly!
The Fifteenth Day
The Lady did not come till evening time on Wednesday. Standing effortlessly on the little wild rosebush, she greeted me, she bowed to me, she made her wondrous Sign of the Cross. She asked for the chapel, the procession, and she disappeared. When she left, I was amazed to find myself still in this world.
It brought me down to earth to have to visit Father Peyramale again. “Did you ask her name?”
“Yes, but she only smiled.”
“Well, if she wants her chapel, let her tell her name, and let her make the rosebush blossom. Then I will build the chapel, and if I build it, I tell you,” he said softly, “it will not be a small one.”
Thursday, March 4th was the last of the fifteen days. It was market day. Eight thousand people gathered around the grotto. It seemed the Lady had got her procession already.
We started the Rosary, and at the second decade the Lady came and lifted me into a world where the language is prayer, and the environment is Heaven.
I went in under the roof of the grotto, and we spoke and prayed together for an hour. My cousin, Jeann Videre, was with me as I prayed, and the Lady came so close to her, that had Jeanne put out her hand she could have touched her.
When the lady left, I extinguished my candle and set off to give her message again to Fr. Peyramale He greeted me with: “What did the Lady say?”
“I asked her name,” I answered, “but she on smiled. When I asked her to make the rosebush blossom, she smiled the more. She still wants the chapel.”
“She must tell her name,” said Father. Then in a tone so soft it surprised me: “If I knew it was the Blessed Virgin, I would do all she desires.”
Enemies, Friends, Miracles
Three weeks went by without a visit from the Lady. Yet I knew she would come again. It was not her way to leave without saying goodbye.
Meanwhile, the people pestered me, the police watched me, and the public prosecutor almost crushed me. What my parents suffered from the town officials, only Eternity will reveal.
A judge and a lawyer in Lourdes were Heaven-sent supporters. Judge Pougat assured me that Monsieur Dutour was overstepping the mark in threatening me and harassing my parents. Monsieur Dufo the lawyer saved me from the traps the officials were setting for me.
Despite the plotting and intrigues, wondrous things happened to affirm the people in their Faith. Croisine Bouhohort’s child of two was dying. His little coffin was already in the making. Croisine took her dying child to Massabielle, and for fifteen minutes immersed him in the cold spring water. Next day, little Louis was walking around full of life. Doctor Vergez examined the child along with Doctor Dozous. Both doctors admitted the child’s cure could not be explained by medical science.
As a result, the Mayor and the police accused me of curing people, and threatened me with jail. I stated simply: “I have not cured anyone.” They then raved on about never going back to the grotto, and they tried to overawe me with their impeccable French and their sophisticated attitude. They seemed incapable of realizing I had knelt in the presence of a Lady who could only be of Heaven, and their words flew past my ears.
Each day after First Holy Communion class, I would go quietly to Massabielle. I would kneel down. I would say my prayers. I would make the Sign of the Cross as my Lady had taught me. Then I would go home.
Article 3
Saturday, Sunday & Monday, February 8th, 9th & 10th
Learning the Lourdes Lesson
Saturday, Sunday & Monday, February 8th, 9th & 10th
Learning the Lourdes Lesson
Like Water Off A Duck’s Back
Is your perception of Lourdes like water that flows off a duck’s back? In other words, are you completely unaffected by the apparitions of Our Lady at Lourdes? Do they have little or no meaning in your life? Do her messages flow over you without penetrating you? Are you impervious or “waterproofed” to her messages? You could take the words of Sister Lucia of Fatima regarding Our Lady of Fatima’s messages and just as easily apply them to Our Lady of Lourdes: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message and uniting their lives to the Message of Fatima. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil while ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
It is a little disheartening to think that the greatest person outside of the three Persons of the Holy Trinity―namely, Our Lady―gets ignored when she deigns to come from Heaven to communicate things to us for the benefit of our salvation! We could put in mouth of Our Lady the words of Our Lord: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ [Lady! Lady!] and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). At La Salette, Our Lady says along the same lines: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
There are many lessons to learned from Our Lady’s apparitions at Lourdes―lessons that would save souls―but those lessons are left unlearned because of most Our Lady’s children choose to play truant or hooky! We will look at some of chief lessons that Our Lady taught us at Lourdes. Some lessons stand out clearly―because Our Lady speaks of them directly. Other lessons are implied by the circumstances, events and repercussions of her apparitions―these could be termed as being “silent lessons.” Sometimes silence speaks louder than words!
Lourdes Lesson of Humility
Humility is the foundation of all virtues just as charity is the soul or driving force of all virtues. “Humility goes before glory” (Proverbs 15:33). Without humility we cannot please God. Hence Jesus said: “Learn of Me, because I am meek, and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29). Our Lady, in her Magnificat, said: “He has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart! He has put down the mighty from their seat, and has exalted the humble!” (Luke 1:51-52). Holy Scripture adds: “God resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6). “The greater thou art, the more humble thyself in all things, and thou shalt find grace before God!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:20). “Therefore, let us humble our souls before Him, and continue in a humble spirit in His service!” (Judith 8:16).
St. Bernadette Soubirous was born on January 7th, 1844 in a small humble town of Lourdes, in the most beautiful French Pyrenées mountains. Her father, Francisco was an honest man, but not very capable in business. He worked as a miller for the Casterots, an affluent family, and lived with his family at the mill of Boly. Because of their debts, the Soubirous family had to leave the mill and find shelter in a disused cell of a former prison―the property of the cousin of Francisco Soubirous. The entire Soubirous family of six lived in one room―the father, mother, and four children.
When Bernadette was born the family still had some resources. This is proven by the fact that the child was given to a wet nurse the first six months. The wet nurse’s name was Marie Lagues. She breast-fed Bernadette for 15 months. The economic difficulties of the Soubirous family gave opportunity for Marie to ask to care for Bernadette. The given reason by Marie was that Bernadette could help take care of Marie’s other children, but in reality Marie wanted her to tend the sheep. Bernadette became a contracted shepherdess without pay.
Bernadette was further humbled by her poor health. She was a frail and sickly child―she had cholera when she was a toddler and asthma throughout her life. She was often in bed with high fevers and experienced many critical days with painful attacks of asthma. Her frequent bouts of illness resulted in her not growing in height as much as she should―at the age of 14, she was only 4 feet and 7 inches tall (or short!). Humility had also made it way into her life with a humble stature!
Bernadette’s intelligence had also been questioned. Many believe she was not very intelligent. It is true she learned with difficulty and she herself said she had “a bad head” ― meaning little memory. Bernadette at 13 years of age did not know how to read or write. Nevertheless, neither ignorance nor poverty, not even the sickly aspect of Bernadette prevented the appreciation of her virtues of simplicity and piety. The Priest on one occasion said: “Look at this small child! When the Blessed Virgin wants to appear on Earth she chooses children like her.” His words were prophetic, for in a few months the Blessed Virgin started to appear to Bernadette in the grotto of Massabielle, near Lourdes.
Bernadette returned to Lourdes from the Marie Lagues household on January 28th, 1858 only 14 days before the first apparition of the Virgin. The Blessed Mother appeared from February 11th, 1858 to July 16th of the same year. Our Lady chose to appear to Bernadette, a very poor, sick, and uneducated girl, but also a happy and deeply devoted girl. Our Lady appeared in a cold, damp, dirty, grotto―one that pigs often used as a shelter. In a visually symbolic move Mary asked Bernadette to kiss the ground and eat grass as a humble sacrifice for the conversion of sinners―a humiliating thing to ask, but it by humiliations that we grow in humility. Bernadette’s story about the apparition caused a sensation with the townspeople, who were divided in their opinions on whether or not Bernadette was telling the truth. Some believed her to have a mental illness and demanded she be put in an asylum. All of this was very humiliating for the 14-year-old Bernadette.
She never made the apparitions about herself ― she never had the prideful presumption to bless the Rosaries that were thrust on her, even though people begged her to bless them; she did nothing for profit or fame ― she simply did as she was asked of the Blessed Virgin and gave precise accounts of her experiences. When asked if she was proud of being chosen by Our Lady, she replied: “Who do you think I am? The Blessed Mother picked me because I was the most ignorant one. Had she found someone more ignorant than me she would certainly have chosen her.” It has been reported that when she was asked about the apparitions she replied: “The Virgin used me as a broom to remove the dust. When the work is done, the broom is put behind the door again.” She regarded herself as a tool and she knew when her mission in Lourdes was finished. She hid herself from the world to keep the focus on our Blessed Mother and her message.
At the age of twenty-two, Bernadette traveled to the motherhouse of the convent that she was going to enter. Her novitiate was full of trials and sorrows. Acting under the quite unfounded notion that Bernadette’s visions and all the attendant publicity might have made the young woman vain or self-important, Sister Marie Therese Vauzous, now novice-mistress at Nevers, was very severe with her former pupil, Bernadette. Although she made life difficult for Bernadette, the little novice met all tests with perfect humility. After she finally made her Religious Profession, her humility was increased by the way she was treated in the convent. The Mother General complained to the bishop: “Your Excellency, we are at the end of our wits to know where to assign Sister Marie-Bernard [Bernadette]. She is a little stupid, and is good for nothing! If you desire, Your Excellency, we can try to use her as a helper in the infirmary?” The Bishop agreed. Sister Marie Bernard received the pain of this humiliation in her heart without any complaints or tears, she simply accepted the chalice. She had to go through many tribulations; big and small humiliations bombarded her. Her last months were very difficult. She went through the dark night of the soul. She lost her confidence, her peace of heart and the certitude of Heaven. She was tempted with discouragement and desperation, thinking she was not worthy of salvation. This was her most bitter chalice and the greatest suffering.
Lourdes Lesson of Faith
What would your reaction be if you had vision or apparition of Our Lady? Holy Scripture warns us: “Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits if they be of God!” (1 John 4:1) … “For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light!” (2 Corinthians 11:14). In fact, during the time that Our Lady was appearing at Lourdes, Satan tried to distract attention from Lourdes by aping Our Lady’s apparitions in many other places in the area and trying to discredit the real apparitions of Lourdes.
Though Bernadette was convinced of the heavenly origins of the first apparition, she was persuaded to take holy water with her for the next apparition. Bernadette can now put this vision to the test―this is why she took the holy water along. If what her elders said was true, then she might need the holy water to ward off malign influences. Bernadette explains that when Our Lady appeared for the second time: “I started throwing holy water saying to her that if she came from God she was to stay, and if not to go. She started smiling and bowing her head. The more I threw the holy water, the more she smiled and bowed her head, and so seized with terror, I sprinkled her until the bottle ran out.”
This is reminiscent of the eleven-year-old Maximin Giraud―one of the two children to whom Our Lady appeared to at La Salette in 1946―who was suspicious of the apparition and threw stones at Our Lady! Once Bernadette’s holy water experiment was done, her Faith in the apparition and “The Lady” was unshakeable. She would endure great sufferings at the hands of skeptics from that time onward. She would endure great sufferings, mockeries, insults and hatred at the hands of skeptics from that time onward. People would treat and speak to her as though she was insane! She even heard―what is thought to be devils screaming at her from the grotto―as she herself writes: “I was not afraid to die, but I was terrified by the voices coming from the back of the grotto. They were evil voices clashing in a guttural, angry way. ‘Save yourself! Get out of here!’ they shrieked.”
When Bernadette first saw Our Lady of Lourdes, she did not realize that it was the Blessed Virgin that she was seeing. Yet her immediate response, out of Faith, was to begin praying the Rosary, right there and then with the vision before her. She trusted, through Faith, that the experience was coming from God. In response to her claims of having seen a vision, the local authorities put her under intense scrutiny, and the public flocked to the grotto at Lourdes, many of whom ridiculed her and thought she was insane. In the face of all this pressure, which was very unpleasant for her, Bernadette held fast to the truth with a resolute―though severely tested―Faith.
Even after she became a religious, she herself said that she did not know how to pray―yet she would remain long hours in prayer. Her prayer was not mechanical―she would speak to God and the Blessed Virgin just as we speak to a person face to face. It was a prayer from the heart―intense, honest and effective. She loved prayer. She knew very well how to pray the Holy Rosary, which she always carried in her pocket. She had the Rosary in her hands when Our Lady appeared. Her first response in times of difficulties or trials was to take out the Rosary and start praying.
Lourdes Lesson of Obedience
Obedience is much easier when things are going well. However, when things are attacked against you, then obedience becomes much harder. In sports, following the coach’s game plan when you are constantly winning, is something that is willingly done―but if the team is continually losing, then following the coach’s game plan feels like a bad idea. Despite all her physical ailments, despite being a frail and sickly child (she had cholera when she was a toddler and asthma throughout her life), and despite becoming a public spectacle with its accompanying pendulum swings between praise and ridicule, acceptance and rejection; pampering and persecution―Bernadette followed the instructions of our Blessed Mother throughout the period of the apparitions. She said “Yes” when the Blessed Virgin asked her to go to the Grotto for fifteen days, but on condition that she received the permission of her parents, for Bernadette did not want to disobey them; she obediently said the Rosary with her; she obediently kissed the soil publicly as an act of penance for sinners and told others to follow her example; she showed obedience when told to drink from the spring despite finding only a little muddy water and was only able to drink it on her fourth attempt; she obediently washed her face in that wet mud; and she obediently ate the bitter grass herbs near the spring; she obediently gave the Blessed Mother’s instructions for the people to go there in procession; and she obediently relayed to her parish priest the demand for a chapel to be built there.
Many of these things must have seemed illogical to Bernadette―but she obediently complied, knowing that it would probably bring ridicule and anger upon her from various different sources. People who witnessed it thought she was crazy for doing such things. But because of her obedience to the Virgin Mary’s requests, a healing spring now exists. St. Bernadette ordered her life by being obedient to all of God’s promptings and to all whom God put over her. Obedience did not come easily to Bernadette―because of her quick temper, strong will, and exuberant personality. She found it hard to adjust to the strict and confining life of the convent. She would get discouraged, but this only caused her to depend more totally on God’s grace. “How I need the help of God!” she would exclaim. Perhaps the hardest test of Bernadette’s obedience was the strict order of her superiors at Nevers not to speak to her fellow nuns about the visions of Lourdes. She naturally would have longed to share something of her extraordinary experience, and the other sisters were bursting with curiosity. Yet, with unflinching obedience, she kept silent about it. Bernadette’s biographer, Fr. René Laurentin, writes: “Above all, the depth of her obedience was dependent on its relationship to God. He is the one whom she obeyed in all things.
It is our obedience to God and His laws that is a test and a proof of our love for Him―as Jesus said: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 15:14) “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
Lourdes Lesson of Tough Love
We tend to indulge and spoil those whom we love; we seek to remove sufferings from their lives and shower them with what is pleasant. God is much more balanced than that! God gives us sunny days and rainy days. He gives us the warmth of summer and bitter cold of winter. He gives us health and sickness. He gives us successes and failures. He gives us acclaim and ridicule. He has us liked and disliked by others, loved and hated. “For whomever the Lord loves, He chastises!” (Proverbs 3:12). “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives―for what son is there, whom the father does not correct?” (Hebrews 12:6).
True love is tough love―as God tells parents: “He that spares the rod hates his son―but he that loves his son corrects him in good time” (Proverbs 13:24). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:13-14). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:13-14). God Himself practices what He preaches to parents. We see one of many such instances in the life of St. Teresa of Avila, who, in trying to reform the Carmelite Order, was met with one setback after another. After one such event, she indignantly questioned Our Lord as to why He was letting such things happen to her―because she was trying to do good and nothing evil. Our Lord replied: “This is how I treat my friends!” to which she replied: “If this is how You treat your friends, then it is no surprise that You have so few friends!”
Our Lady of La Salette ― appearing 12 years prior to her Lourdes apparitions ― describes thus the ways in which God will deal with sinners who refuse to repent and obey Him: “God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other. The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God.”
Lourdes Lesson of Penance
There is a lot of meaning packed into this word “penance”. It is considered a virtue that motivates us to resist sin and to undo the harm of sin. Over time this word has also acquired the meaning of “conversion.” It basically implies a manifestation of sorrow for our sins and the effort to atone for our sins by making some kind of payment for the damage our sins have caused. It involves self-purification and sacrifice or mortification for the forgiveness of our sins and the sins of others. This is not very popular in our pleasure-filled world, but in most Marian apparitions Mary urges us to do penance. In Lourdes she asked Bernadette to pray for sinners and exclaimed three times: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” She asked Bernadette to go up and down the grotto on her knees and to eat bitter grass. We need to do penance always―not just during Lent―to atone for our sins and the sins of the world.
Our Lord Himself had said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
Lourdes Lesson of Suffering
Suffering is the so-called “touchstone” of love. Suffering tests love and proves love. We will quickly abandon things that make us suffer if we do not love them. The cross is another word for suffering. Our Lord tells us of the absolute need for the cross or suffering: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). If we refuse to suffer for our sins on Earth, then Purgatory or Hell awaits us ― each with their different degrees and lengths of suffering ― Purgatory temporarily, Hell perpetually.
Just in case we falsely imagine that we are not sinners and therefore have no need to undergo expiatory suffering, Holy Scripture rectifies our false reasoning: “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Perhaps the biggest lesson we can learn from Bernadette is to accept our suffering gracefully, as she so bravely did. Bernadette’s entire life was one of suffering and pain. Sickly and feeble as a child, Bernadette suffered from ill health throughout her life. When asked why she didn’t seek healing from Our Lady for herself, Bernadette answered: “You see, my business is to be ill!” ― and she went on to explain: “Why must we suffer? Because here below, pure love cannot exist without suffering. O Jesus, Jesus, I no longer feel my cross when I think of Yours!”
Bernadette endured her suffering graciously by placing it alongside Christ’s pain. She was willing to share in Jesus’ suffering, strongly believing that, by doing so, love would grow. Strong in her resolve to place love at the center of her life, Bernadette viewed her suffering as an opportunity to express her love for Christ and lighten His cross. Through prayer, contemplation, and selfless service to others, Bernadette put her own needs aside and was willing to make sacrifices. Within her own suffering, she found the solace of the love of Christ and, thus, triumphed over pain.
Undoubtedly, few of us possess Bernadette’s holy grace, patience, and acceptance; most of us try to escape our own suffering rather than embrace it, like Bernadette. While God keeps us safe in his care, he often has us experience pain we would rather not feel. The question of why God allows suffering all over the world has never been fully answered, and it continuous to challenge our Faith―but we can safely say that suffering is a test and proof of love; and that suffering is also a consequence for sin. If we love, we are prepared to pay for sin―and that payment means suffering of one kind or another.
Particularly, the suffering of innocent people, the seemingly needless suffering of many, and the anguish visited upon some through the cruelty of others often do not make sense. We fail to understand, and we are unwilling to accept such pain. Perhaps we ought to do both: ask for healing and support, while also graciously accepting our fate. Bernadette considered her own pain as an opportunity to get closer to Christ, to show her love, and to offer support. We all have learned lessons during difficult times, and we need to remain strong in our faith, even when we hurt and don’t understand. The lesson we can learn from Bernadette is to pray and focus on the love of God and embrace our own cross for the sake of Christ.
Lourdes Lesson of Human Respect
What is human respect? There is good and virtuous kind of human respect―but there is also a bad and sinful kind of human respect. On one level “human respect” seems like a good thing. After all, we ought to respect, honor and appreciate one another. The good and virtuous human respect is a respect of other human beings as creatures having been created by God―in this sense all humans area due respect as creatures of God. That is the reason we are told to love our enemies―not because we are meant to love the evil they do us, but we are to respect them as being God’s creatures. Sometimes the evil that they do to us is allowed by God as just punishment for our sins.
What then is meant by the “sin of human respect”? It is that sin wherein we fear man more than God; we are more concerned with what people think of us than what God thinks of us. As a consequence, we are afraid to point out and correct the faults of others in fear of some kind of reprisal or rejection, or out of a fear of what they may think of us or say to us. This is an unholy, sinful fear, and is at the root of many of our sins, both of commission and of omission.
The bad or evil kind of human respect is seen in keeping quiet when others commit sins―just because of their rank or position in society, or due their authority over us, or simply because we fear what other people might think or say if we were to speak out against the wrongdoing or evil being committed by them. One of the ways in which we can become guilty of another person’s sin is by SILENCE due to bad kind of human respect. Our Lady of Good Success complains of this bad and evil kind of human respect: “O cursed human respect, which makes one ask: ‘What will others say about this?’”
St. Bernadette was never taught to be reserved or discreet. What she thought, she would come right out and say―but it would be said with respect for the person she was addressing. During the whole time, she was completely and naturally herself before everyone. When called by the police to speak about the revelations, she behaved with extraordinary fearlessness and ease. Toward her parents, the parish priest and other upright people with whom she dealt, and later with her religious superiors, she was a model of respect and obedience. When it came to legitimate authorities, her attitude was different. She took great care to show extreme obedience and respect. This is because there was a supernatural principle that was involved and not merely the human factor of herself. She did not care about the ways of the world, but she showed all due care and respect to things with a religious root, which came from God. St. Bernadette impressed many by her conduct during the apparitions.
Questions, instead of embarrassing her, seemed to make her more at her ease. But it was when any one attempted to argue the point with her, and raised all kinds of objections to what she said, that Bernadette showed to the best advantage. That passionless, matter-of-fact child seemed to be no longer the same person when she had to defend the truth of her story, or when the honor of Our Lady of Lourdes seemed to her to be at stake. Contradiction roused her: she always had plenty to answer, and the readiness and justice of her replies were most remarkable. In spite of her mediocre intelligence, she often astonished and put to silence clever men who cross-questioned her.
Holy Scripture tells us that “there is no respect of persons with God” (Romans 2:11). This does not mean that God has no favorites―for we read in the Gospels that Peter, James and John were the favored Apostles of Our Lord. What it means is that God will not allow favoritism, rank or religion prevent Him from making corrections and punishing wrongdoing. Our Lord does not hesitate in correcting one His favorites―Peter―by saying to him: “Go behind Me, Satan! You are a scandal unto Me―because you savor not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!” (Matthew 16:23). St. Peter―having learnt the lesson―would later himself say: “In very deed I perceive that God is not a respecter of persons!” (Acts 10:34). In fact, those who receive the most from God will be judged all the more severely: “That servant who knew the will of his lord, but did not according to his will―he shall be beaten with many stripes! But he that knew not the will of the lord, and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with fewer stripes. Unto whom much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand all the more!” (Luke 12:47-48).
Lourdes Lesson of Mockery
Mockery can be very painful―and can be especially painful to children, who often have great difficulty in dealing with mockery. Bernadette was only 14-years-old at the time of the apparitions and she was hit by increasing mockery due to the apparitions of Our Lady. Bernadette had very little to offer in many respects. She was uneducated and could not read nor write until she reached adulthood. Although she was 14-years-old, she had not yet made her First Communion. Her foster mother had tried half-heartedly to prepare her, but after one or two sessions had impatiently given it up, saying that Bernadette was too dull to learn. She was told she was stupid because she was unable to learn her Catechism.
She was no doubt mocked with regard to her social status. By the time of the events at the grotto, after moving from one poor location to another, her family’s financial and social status had declined to the point where they lived in a single room of a dilapidated basement, in the rue des Petits Fosses; this damp, unwholesome place which was part of an old abandoned jail, called “Le Cachot”, “The Dungeon,” where they were housed for free by her mother’s cousin, André Sajoux.
At the start of the apparitions, when she told her confessor of the apparition, Fr. Pomian made light of it, thinking the girl suffered from hallucinations. In a short time the number of persons that had joined Bernadette on the river-banks, had grown to around 100 persons―and those numbers would grow into thousands. Along with those numbers came the tendency peculiar to all such gatherings―some suspecting a trick of the devil in so sensational an even; others inclined to see in it only some selfish trickery; or maybe morbid hallucination. The public officials accused Bernadette of being an attention seeker, a religious fanatic, and a trickster. The common folk manifested skepticism and ridicule. Some cried out: “Superstition, illusion, folly!” “This little girl is insane,” they said, “She must be shut up!” Others spoke of impostures, fraudulent tricks. “It is a cheat! All will end with money! This child is playing a disgraceful farce! Justice should interfere!” More moderate persons said it was probably a natural phenomenon, which comes within the range of medicine. Science knows perfectly the strange effects of catalepsy, hysteria, and hallucination. Their suggestion was that a physician should examine the thing closely, and as a result the so-called visions will melt away like snow in the sun. The town of Lourdes was literally turned upside down. The pressure was now mounting on Bernadette.
Lourdes Lesson of Persecution
After the 6th Apparition, she was hauled off to the police station to be grilled and threatened; her father, under intimidation, had taken the side of the police, which resulted in both the police and her father forbidding her to go back to the grotto again. She was threatened with prison if she were to disobey. This decision caused the local parish priest to intervene angrily. “This child is innocent!” cried the priest, indignantly, when the police chief and the mayor of Lourdes came to announce the decision. “This child is innocent! You could find no pretext upon which to prosecute her. Such a measure will be the most odious persecution, the more odious that it strikes a poor defenseless creature. The prefect cannot, by any law, have Bernadette arrested! As a priest, as pastor of this parish, I owe a duty to all, and especially to the weakest I know my duty as a pastor. Go, then, and tell the Prefect that his officers will find me at the threshold of this poor family, and that they shall have to pass over my body, before they touch a hair of this poor little girl’s head.”
St. Bernadette recounts these painful moments in her own words thus: “Dominique Jacomet the police commissioner! He was suspicious of everyone! He took hold of my hood as I left the church and said: “Follow me!” He took me to his office and the questioning began. ‘My name is Bernadette’, I said. I could not say if I was thirteen or fourteen, as I had never learned to count. He tried to suggest I was seeing Our Blessed Lady. I insisted I saw only ‘Aquero.’ Jacomet knew that ‘Aquero’ means ‘reverence in the presence of a sacred reality.’ He wrote down with a goose-quill every word I said. Then he read it back to me— all twisted, untruthful, incorrect. ‘Sir,’ I protested, ‘you are altering everything I say. ‘You Brazen hussy!’ he blazed, and the tassel on his cap shook as he ranted in anger. At that moment the door opened, and my father stood there saying, ‘I am the father of this little one.’ Next day, at catechism class, the girls shunned me as a criminal, and the Sister Superior thanked God had been arrested for my misbehavior. One woman called me a brat, another slapped my face.”
At the 7th apparition, the Blessed Virgin told Bernadette: “Go and tell the priests that a shrine must be erected here, and that they must come here in procession.” After the apparition, Bernadette immediately went to the pastor’s house to speak with Father Peyramale. The latter had as yet never spoken to her ― only her confessor, Father Pomian, one of the other priests in the parish, had spoken to Bernadette about the apparition.
“Are you not Bernadette?” Father Peyramale, who had a reputation of having a bad temper, asked gravely and almost sternly, as soon as he saw her coming towards him.
“Yes, it is I, sir!” quietly answered the humble messenger of the Blessed Virgin.
“Well, Bernadette, what do you want of me? What brought you here?”
“I came, Father, on the part of the Lady, who appears to me in the grotto of Massabielle!”
The priest seemed to treat the matter very lightly and not to believe it.
“And you do not know this Lady’s name?” asked the pastor.
“No!” answered Bernadette. “She did not tell me who she was.”
“Those who believe you, imagine that it is the Blessed Virgin Mary. But take care―you alone say you see her! If you falsely pretend to see her in the grotto, you are taking the way never to see her in Heaven!”
“I do not know if it is the Blessed Virgin, Father”; answered the child; “but I see the vision as I see you, and she speaks to me as truly as you speak to me. And I come to tell you, from her, that she wants a shrine to be raised to her at the Rocks of Massabielle, where she appears to me.”
Much agitated, the good Father Peyramale made her repeat the very words used by the Lady at the grotto. Bernadette said: “After having confided to me the secret which concerns me and which I can not reveal to anyone. The Lady added: ‘And now, go and tell the priest that a shrine must be erected here, and that people come in procession to it.’“
After a moment’s reflection, the pastor replied: “I cannot take your word for this―you understand! Tell this Lady that she must make herself known. If she is the Blessed Virgin, let her show it by some miracle. She appears to you―you tell me―on a wild rose-bush? It is now February―tell her, from me, that if she wishes a shrine built, she must make the rose-bush bloom.” And he dismissed her. What had passed between the child and the priest was soon known in the town. Curiosity and excitement were general; and several free-thinkers of the neighborhood resolved to go henceforth to the grotto, in order to assist at the exposure of the “superstition.”
Lourdes Lesson of True Happiness
Our Lady said to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!” How sad most of us would be upon first hearing such words, because, let’s face it, we want to find happiness in this world, don’t we? Now, let us be clear about one thing―there is nothing wrong in seeking happiness, even in this life—but it all depends by what you mean by the word “happiness” doesn’t it. There is the happiness of the sinner and the happiness of the saint; the happiness of the worldly people and the happiness of the spiritual folk; the happiness of selfish, greedy people and the happiness of humble, generous people. We can apply to this the much bandied and varied phrase of “Tell me who your friends are, and I’ll tell you what you are” or “Tell me what you like, and I’ll tell you what you are.”
Tell an athlete and a lazy-slob that there will no physical education class today, and the former will be sad and the latter will be overjoyed. Tell a spiritual person and a worldly person that we cannot go to Mass today, because a winter storm might have made the roads too dangerous to drive upon, and the former will be disappointed and the latter will be rejoicing. Everyone acts according to their nature, and some persons fail to rise above the natural to appreciate the supernatural.
Is your perception of Lourdes like water that flows off a duck’s back? In other words, are you completely unaffected by the apparitions of Our Lady at Lourdes? Do they have little or no meaning in your life? Do her messages flow over you without penetrating you? Are you impervious or “waterproofed” to her messages? You could take the words of Sister Lucia of Fatima regarding Our Lady of Fatima’s messages and just as easily apply them to Our Lady of Lourdes: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message and uniting their lives to the Message of Fatima. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil while ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
It is a little disheartening to think that the greatest person outside of the three Persons of the Holy Trinity―namely, Our Lady―gets ignored when she deigns to come from Heaven to communicate things to us for the benefit of our salvation! We could put in mouth of Our Lady the words of Our Lord: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ [Lady! Lady!] and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). At La Salette, Our Lady says along the same lines: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
There are many lessons to learned from Our Lady’s apparitions at Lourdes―lessons that would save souls―but those lessons are left unlearned because of most Our Lady’s children choose to play truant or hooky! We will look at some of chief lessons that Our Lady taught us at Lourdes. Some lessons stand out clearly―because Our Lady speaks of them directly. Other lessons are implied by the circumstances, events and repercussions of her apparitions―these could be termed as being “silent lessons.” Sometimes silence speaks louder than words!
Lourdes Lesson of Humility
Humility is the foundation of all virtues just as charity is the soul or driving force of all virtues. “Humility goes before glory” (Proverbs 15:33). Without humility we cannot please God. Hence Jesus said: “Learn of Me, because I am meek, and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29). Our Lady, in her Magnificat, said: “He has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart! He has put down the mighty from their seat, and has exalted the humble!” (Luke 1:51-52). Holy Scripture adds: “God resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6). “The greater thou art, the more humble thyself in all things, and thou shalt find grace before God!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:20). “Therefore, let us humble our souls before Him, and continue in a humble spirit in His service!” (Judith 8:16).
St. Bernadette Soubirous was born on January 7th, 1844 in a small humble town of Lourdes, in the most beautiful French Pyrenées mountains. Her father, Francisco was an honest man, but not very capable in business. He worked as a miller for the Casterots, an affluent family, and lived with his family at the mill of Boly. Because of their debts, the Soubirous family had to leave the mill and find shelter in a disused cell of a former prison―the property of the cousin of Francisco Soubirous. The entire Soubirous family of six lived in one room―the father, mother, and four children.
When Bernadette was born the family still had some resources. This is proven by the fact that the child was given to a wet nurse the first six months. The wet nurse’s name was Marie Lagues. She breast-fed Bernadette for 15 months. The economic difficulties of the Soubirous family gave opportunity for Marie to ask to care for Bernadette. The given reason by Marie was that Bernadette could help take care of Marie’s other children, but in reality Marie wanted her to tend the sheep. Bernadette became a contracted shepherdess without pay.
Bernadette was further humbled by her poor health. She was a frail and sickly child―she had cholera when she was a toddler and asthma throughout her life. She was often in bed with high fevers and experienced many critical days with painful attacks of asthma. Her frequent bouts of illness resulted in her not growing in height as much as she should―at the age of 14, she was only 4 feet and 7 inches tall (or short!). Humility had also made it way into her life with a humble stature!
Bernadette’s intelligence had also been questioned. Many believe she was not very intelligent. It is true she learned with difficulty and she herself said she had “a bad head” ― meaning little memory. Bernadette at 13 years of age did not know how to read or write. Nevertheless, neither ignorance nor poverty, not even the sickly aspect of Bernadette prevented the appreciation of her virtues of simplicity and piety. The Priest on one occasion said: “Look at this small child! When the Blessed Virgin wants to appear on Earth she chooses children like her.” His words were prophetic, for in a few months the Blessed Virgin started to appear to Bernadette in the grotto of Massabielle, near Lourdes.
Bernadette returned to Lourdes from the Marie Lagues household on January 28th, 1858 only 14 days before the first apparition of the Virgin. The Blessed Mother appeared from February 11th, 1858 to July 16th of the same year. Our Lady chose to appear to Bernadette, a very poor, sick, and uneducated girl, but also a happy and deeply devoted girl. Our Lady appeared in a cold, damp, dirty, grotto―one that pigs often used as a shelter. In a visually symbolic move Mary asked Bernadette to kiss the ground and eat grass as a humble sacrifice for the conversion of sinners―a humiliating thing to ask, but it by humiliations that we grow in humility. Bernadette’s story about the apparition caused a sensation with the townspeople, who were divided in their opinions on whether or not Bernadette was telling the truth. Some believed her to have a mental illness and demanded she be put in an asylum. All of this was very humiliating for the 14-year-old Bernadette.
She never made the apparitions about herself ― she never had the prideful presumption to bless the Rosaries that were thrust on her, even though people begged her to bless them; she did nothing for profit or fame ― she simply did as she was asked of the Blessed Virgin and gave precise accounts of her experiences. When asked if she was proud of being chosen by Our Lady, she replied: “Who do you think I am? The Blessed Mother picked me because I was the most ignorant one. Had she found someone more ignorant than me she would certainly have chosen her.” It has been reported that when she was asked about the apparitions she replied: “The Virgin used me as a broom to remove the dust. When the work is done, the broom is put behind the door again.” She regarded herself as a tool and she knew when her mission in Lourdes was finished. She hid herself from the world to keep the focus on our Blessed Mother and her message.
At the age of twenty-two, Bernadette traveled to the motherhouse of the convent that she was going to enter. Her novitiate was full of trials and sorrows. Acting under the quite unfounded notion that Bernadette’s visions and all the attendant publicity might have made the young woman vain or self-important, Sister Marie Therese Vauzous, now novice-mistress at Nevers, was very severe with her former pupil, Bernadette. Although she made life difficult for Bernadette, the little novice met all tests with perfect humility. After she finally made her Religious Profession, her humility was increased by the way she was treated in the convent. The Mother General complained to the bishop: “Your Excellency, we are at the end of our wits to know where to assign Sister Marie-Bernard [Bernadette]. She is a little stupid, and is good for nothing! If you desire, Your Excellency, we can try to use her as a helper in the infirmary?” The Bishop agreed. Sister Marie Bernard received the pain of this humiliation in her heart without any complaints or tears, she simply accepted the chalice. She had to go through many tribulations; big and small humiliations bombarded her. Her last months were very difficult. She went through the dark night of the soul. She lost her confidence, her peace of heart and the certitude of Heaven. She was tempted with discouragement and desperation, thinking she was not worthy of salvation. This was her most bitter chalice and the greatest suffering.
Lourdes Lesson of Faith
What would your reaction be if you had vision or apparition of Our Lady? Holy Scripture warns us: “Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits if they be of God!” (1 John 4:1) … “For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light!” (2 Corinthians 11:14). In fact, during the time that Our Lady was appearing at Lourdes, Satan tried to distract attention from Lourdes by aping Our Lady’s apparitions in many other places in the area and trying to discredit the real apparitions of Lourdes.
Though Bernadette was convinced of the heavenly origins of the first apparition, she was persuaded to take holy water with her for the next apparition. Bernadette can now put this vision to the test―this is why she took the holy water along. If what her elders said was true, then she might need the holy water to ward off malign influences. Bernadette explains that when Our Lady appeared for the second time: “I started throwing holy water saying to her that if she came from God she was to stay, and if not to go. She started smiling and bowing her head. The more I threw the holy water, the more she smiled and bowed her head, and so seized with terror, I sprinkled her until the bottle ran out.”
This is reminiscent of the eleven-year-old Maximin Giraud―one of the two children to whom Our Lady appeared to at La Salette in 1946―who was suspicious of the apparition and threw stones at Our Lady! Once Bernadette’s holy water experiment was done, her Faith in the apparition and “The Lady” was unshakeable. She would endure great sufferings at the hands of skeptics from that time onward. She would endure great sufferings, mockeries, insults and hatred at the hands of skeptics from that time onward. People would treat and speak to her as though she was insane! She even heard―what is thought to be devils screaming at her from the grotto―as she herself writes: “I was not afraid to die, but I was terrified by the voices coming from the back of the grotto. They were evil voices clashing in a guttural, angry way. ‘Save yourself! Get out of here!’ they shrieked.”
When Bernadette first saw Our Lady of Lourdes, she did not realize that it was the Blessed Virgin that she was seeing. Yet her immediate response, out of Faith, was to begin praying the Rosary, right there and then with the vision before her. She trusted, through Faith, that the experience was coming from God. In response to her claims of having seen a vision, the local authorities put her under intense scrutiny, and the public flocked to the grotto at Lourdes, many of whom ridiculed her and thought she was insane. In the face of all this pressure, which was very unpleasant for her, Bernadette held fast to the truth with a resolute―though severely tested―Faith.
Even after she became a religious, she herself said that she did not know how to pray―yet she would remain long hours in prayer. Her prayer was not mechanical―she would speak to God and the Blessed Virgin just as we speak to a person face to face. It was a prayer from the heart―intense, honest and effective. She loved prayer. She knew very well how to pray the Holy Rosary, which she always carried in her pocket. She had the Rosary in her hands when Our Lady appeared. Her first response in times of difficulties or trials was to take out the Rosary and start praying.
Lourdes Lesson of Obedience
Obedience is much easier when things are going well. However, when things are attacked against you, then obedience becomes much harder. In sports, following the coach’s game plan when you are constantly winning, is something that is willingly done―but if the team is continually losing, then following the coach’s game plan feels like a bad idea. Despite all her physical ailments, despite being a frail and sickly child (she had cholera when she was a toddler and asthma throughout her life), and despite becoming a public spectacle with its accompanying pendulum swings between praise and ridicule, acceptance and rejection; pampering and persecution―Bernadette followed the instructions of our Blessed Mother throughout the period of the apparitions. She said “Yes” when the Blessed Virgin asked her to go to the Grotto for fifteen days, but on condition that she received the permission of her parents, for Bernadette did not want to disobey them; she obediently said the Rosary with her; she obediently kissed the soil publicly as an act of penance for sinners and told others to follow her example; she showed obedience when told to drink from the spring despite finding only a little muddy water and was only able to drink it on her fourth attempt; she obediently washed her face in that wet mud; and she obediently ate the bitter grass herbs near the spring; she obediently gave the Blessed Mother’s instructions for the people to go there in procession; and she obediently relayed to her parish priest the demand for a chapel to be built there.
Many of these things must have seemed illogical to Bernadette―but she obediently complied, knowing that it would probably bring ridicule and anger upon her from various different sources. People who witnessed it thought she was crazy for doing such things. But because of her obedience to the Virgin Mary’s requests, a healing spring now exists. St. Bernadette ordered her life by being obedient to all of God’s promptings and to all whom God put over her. Obedience did not come easily to Bernadette―because of her quick temper, strong will, and exuberant personality. She found it hard to adjust to the strict and confining life of the convent. She would get discouraged, but this only caused her to depend more totally on God’s grace. “How I need the help of God!” she would exclaim. Perhaps the hardest test of Bernadette’s obedience was the strict order of her superiors at Nevers not to speak to her fellow nuns about the visions of Lourdes. She naturally would have longed to share something of her extraordinary experience, and the other sisters were bursting with curiosity. Yet, with unflinching obedience, she kept silent about it. Bernadette’s biographer, Fr. René Laurentin, writes: “Above all, the depth of her obedience was dependent on its relationship to God. He is the one whom she obeyed in all things.
It is our obedience to God and His laws that is a test and a proof of our love for Him―as Jesus said: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 15:14) “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
Lourdes Lesson of Tough Love
We tend to indulge and spoil those whom we love; we seek to remove sufferings from their lives and shower them with what is pleasant. God is much more balanced than that! God gives us sunny days and rainy days. He gives us the warmth of summer and bitter cold of winter. He gives us health and sickness. He gives us successes and failures. He gives us acclaim and ridicule. He has us liked and disliked by others, loved and hated. “For whomever the Lord loves, He chastises!” (Proverbs 3:12). “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives―for what son is there, whom the father does not correct?” (Hebrews 12:6).
True love is tough love―as God tells parents: “He that spares the rod hates his son―but he that loves his son corrects him in good time” (Proverbs 13:24). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:13-14). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:13-14). God Himself practices what He preaches to parents. We see one of many such instances in the life of St. Teresa of Avila, who, in trying to reform the Carmelite Order, was met with one setback after another. After one such event, she indignantly questioned Our Lord as to why He was letting such things happen to her―because she was trying to do good and nothing evil. Our Lord replied: “This is how I treat my friends!” to which she replied: “If this is how You treat your friends, then it is no surprise that You have so few friends!”
Our Lady of La Salette ― appearing 12 years prior to her Lourdes apparitions ― describes thus the ways in which God will deal with sinners who refuse to repent and obey Him: “God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other. The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God.”
Lourdes Lesson of Penance
There is a lot of meaning packed into this word “penance”. It is considered a virtue that motivates us to resist sin and to undo the harm of sin. Over time this word has also acquired the meaning of “conversion.” It basically implies a manifestation of sorrow for our sins and the effort to atone for our sins by making some kind of payment for the damage our sins have caused. It involves self-purification and sacrifice or mortification for the forgiveness of our sins and the sins of others. This is not very popular in our pleasure-filled world, but in most Marian apparitions Mary urges us to do penance. In Lourdes she asked Bernadette to pray for sinners and exclaimed three times: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” She asked Bernadette to go up and down the grotto on her knees and to eat bitter grass. We need to do penance always―not just during Lent―to atone for our sins and the sins of the world.
Our Lord Himself had said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
Lourdes Lesson of Suffering
Suffering is the so-called “touchstone” of love. Suffering tests love and proves love. We will quickly abandon things that make us suffer if we do not love them. The cross is another word for suffering. Our Lord tells us of the absolute need for the cross or suffering: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). If we refuse to suffer for our sins on Earth, then Purgatory or Hell awaits us ― each with their different degrees and lengths of suffering ― Purgatory temporarily, Hell perpetually.
Just in case we falsely imagine that we are not sinners and therefore have no need to undergo expiatory suffering, Holy Scripture rectifies our false reasoning: “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Perhaps the biggest lesson we can learn from Bernadette is to accept our suffering gracefully, as she so bravely did. Bernadette’s entire life was one of suffering and pain. Sickly and feeble as a child, Bernadette suffered from ill health throughout her life. When asked why she didn’t seek healing from Our Lady for herself, Bernadette answered: “You see, my business is to be ill!” ― and she went on to explain: “Why must we suffer? Because here below, pure love cannot exist without suffering. O Jesus, Jesus, I no longer feel my cross when I think of Yours!”
Bernadette endured her suffering graciously by placing it alongside Christ’s pain. She was willing to share in Jesus’ suffering, strongly believing that, by doing so, love would grow. Strong in her resolve to place love at the center of her life, Bernadette viewed her suffering as an opportunity to express her love for Christ and lighten His cross. Through prayer, contemplation, and selfless service to others, Bernadette put her own needs aside and was willing to make sacrifices. Within her own suffering, she found the solace of the love of Christ and, thus, triumphed over pain.
Undoubtedly, few of us possess Bernadette’s holy grace, patience, and acceptance; most of us try to escape our own suffering rather than embrace it, like Bernadette. While God keeps us safe in his care, he often has us experience pain we would rather not feel. The question of why God allows suffering all over the world has never been fully answered, and it continuous to challenge our Faith―but we can safely say that suffering is a test and proof of love; and that suffering is also a consequence for sin. If we love, we are prepared to pay for sin―and that payment means suffering of one kind or another.
Particularly, the suffering of innocent people, the seemingly needless suffering of many, and the anguish visited upon some through the cruelty of others often do not make sense. We fail to understand, and we are unwilling to accept such pain. Perhaps we ought to do both: ask for healing and support, while also graciously accepting our fate. Bernadette considered her own pain as an opportunity to get closer to Christ, to show her love, and to offer support. We all have learned lessons during difficult times, and we need to remain strong in our faith, even when we hurt and don’t understand. The lesson we can learn from Bernadette is to pray and focus on the love of God and embrace our own cross for the sake of Christ.
Lourdes Lesson of Human Respect
What is human respect? There is good and virtuous kind of human respect―but there is also a bad and sinful kind of human respect. On one level “human respect” seems like a good thing. After all, we ought to respect, honor and appreciate one another. The good and virtuous human respect is a respect of other human beings as creatures having been created by God―in this sense all humans area due respect as creatures of God. That is the reason we are told to love our enemies―not because we are meant to love the evil they do us, but we are to respect them as being God’s creatures. Sometimes the evil that they do to us is allowed by God as just punishment for our sins.
What then is meant by the “sin of human respect”? It is that sin wherein we fear man more than God; we are more concerned with what people think of us than what God thinks of us. As a consequence, we are afraid to point out and correct the faults of others in fear of some kind of reprisal or rejection, or out of a fear of what they may think of us or say to us. This is an unholy, sinful fear, and is at the root of many of our sins, both of commission and of omission.
The bad or evil kind of human respect is seen in keeping quiet when others commit sins―just because of their rank or position in society, or due their authority over us, or simply because we fear what other people might think or say if we were to speak out against the wrongdoing or evil being committed by them. One of the ways in which we can become guilty of another person’s sin is by SILENCE due to bad kind of human respect. Our Lady of Good Success complains of this bad and evil kind of human respect: “O cursed human respect, which makes one ask: ‘What will others say about this?’”
St. Bernadette was never taught to be reserved or discreet. What she thought, she would come right out and say―but it would be said with respect for the person she was addressing. During the whole time, she was completely and naturally herself before everyone. When called by the police to speak about the revelations, she behaved with extraordinary fearlessness and ease. Toward her parents, the parish priest and other upright people with whom she dealt, and later with her religious superiors, she was a model of respect and obedience. When it came to legitimate authorities, her attitude was different. She took great care to show extreme obedience and respect. This is because there was a supernatural principle that was involved and not merely the human factor of herself. She did not care about the ways of the world, but she showed all due care and respect to things with a religious root, which came from God. St. Bernadette impressed many by her conduct during the apparitions.
Questions, instead of embarrassing her, seemed to make her more at her ease. But it was when any one attempted to argue the point with her, and raised all kinds of objections to what she said, that Bernadette showed to the best advantage. That passionless, matter-of-fact child seemed to be no longer the same person when she had to defend the truth of her story, or when the honor of Our Lady of Lourdes seemed to her to be at stake. Contradiction roused her: she always had plenty to answer, and the readiness and justice of her replies were most remarkable. In spite of her mediocre intelligence, she often astonished and put to silence clever men who cross-questioned her.
Holy Scripture tells us that “there is no respect of persons with God” (Romans 2:11). This does not mean that God has no favorites―for we read in the Gospels that Peter, James and John were the favored Apostles of Our Lord. What it means is that God will not allow favoritism, rank or religion prevent Him from making corrections and punishing wrongdoing. Our Lord does not hesitate in correcting one His favorites―Peter―by saying to him: “Go behind Me, Satan! You are a scandal unto Me―because you savor not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!” (Matthew 16:23). St. Peter―having learnt the lesson―would later himself say: “In very deed I perceive that God is not a respecter of persons!” (Acts 10:34). In fact, those who receive the most from God will be judged all the more severely: “That servant who knew the will of his lord, but did not according to his will―he shall be beaten with many stripes! But he that knew not the will of the lord, and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with fewer stripes. Unto whom much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand all the more!” (Luke 12:47-48).
Lourdes Lesson of Mockery
Mockery can be very painful―and can be especially painful to children, who often have great difficulty in dealing with mockery. Bernadette was only 14-years-old at the time of the apparitions and she was hit by increasing mockery due to the apparitions of Our Lady. Bernadette had very little to offer in many respects. She was uneducated and could not read nor write until she reached adulthood. Although she was 14-years-old, she had not yet made her First Communion. Her foster mother had tried half-heartedly to prepare her, but after one or two sessions had impatiently given it up, saying that Bernadette was too dull to learn. She was told she was stupid because she was unable to learn her Catechism.
She was no doubt mocked with regard to her social status. By the time of the events at the grotto, after moving from one poor location to another, her family’s financial and social status had declined to the point where they lived in a single room of a dilapidated basement, in the rue des Petits Fosses; this damp, unwholesome place which was part of an old abandoned jail, called “Le Cachot”, “The Dungeon,” where they were housed for free by her mother’s cousin, André Sajoux.
At the start of the apparitions, when she told her confessor of the apparition, Fr. Pomian made light of it, thinking the girl suffered from hallucinations. In a short time the number of persons that had joined Bernadette on the river-banks, had grown to around 100 persons―and those numbers would grow into thousands. Along with those numbers came the tendency peculiar to all such gatherings―some suspecting a trick of the devil in so sensational an even; others inclined to see in it only some selfish trickery; or maybe morbid hallucination. The public officials accused Bernadette of being an attention seeker, a religious fanatic, and a trickster. The common folk manifested skepticism and ridicule. Some cried out: “Superstition, illusion, folly!” “This little girl is insane,” they said, “She must be shut up!” Others spoke of impostures, fraudulent tricks. “It is a cheat! All will end with money! This child is playing a disgraceful farce! Justice should interfere!” More moderate persons said it was probably a natural phenomenon, which comes within the range of medicine. Science knows perfectly the strange effects of catalepsy, hysteria, and hallucination. Their suggestion was that a physician should examine the thing closely, and as a result the so-called visions will melt away like snow in the sun. The town of Lourdes was literally turned upside down. The pressure was now mounting on Bernadette.
Lourdes Lesson of Persecution
After the 6th Apparition, she was hauled off to the police station to be grilled and threatened; her father, under intimidation, had taken the side of the police, which resulted in both the police and her father forbidding her to go back to the grotto again. She was threatened with prison if she were to disobey. This decision caused the local parish priest to intervene angrily. “This child is innocent!” cried the priest, indignantly, when the police chief and the mayor of Lourdes came to announce the decision. “This child is innocent! You could find no pretext upon which to prosecute her. Such a measure will be the most odious persecution, the more odious that it strikes a poor defenseless creature. The prefect cannot, by any law, have Bernadette arrested! As a priest, as pastor of this parish, I owe a duty to all, and especially to the weakest I know my duty as a pastor. Go, then, and tell the Prefect that his officers will find me at the threshold of this poor family, and that they shall have to pass over my body, before they touch a hair of this poor little girl’s head.”
St. Bernadette recounts these painful moments in her own words thus: “Dominique Jacomet the police commissioner! He was suspicious of everyone! He took hold of my hood as I left the church and said: “Follow me!” He took me to his office and the questioning began. ‘My name is Bernadette’, I said. I could not say if I was thirteen or fourteen, as I had never learned to count. He tried to suggest I was seeing Our Blessed Lady. I insisted I saw only ‘Aquero.’ Jacomet knew that ‘Aquero’ means ‘reverence in the presence of a sacred reality.’ He wrote down with a goose-quill every word I said. Then he read it back to me— all twisted, untruthful, incorrect. ‘Sir,’ I protested, ‘you are altering everything I say. ‘You Brazen hussy!’ he blazed, and the tassel on his cap shook as he ranted in anger. At that moment the door opened, and my father stood there saying, ‘I am the father of this little one.’ Next day, at catechism class, the girls shunned me as a criminal, and the Sister Superior thanked God had been arrested for my misbehavior. One woman called me a brat, another slapped my face.”
At the 7th apparition, the Blessed Virgin told Bernadette: “Go and tell the priests that a shrine must be erected here, and that they must come here in procession.” After the apparition, Bernadette immediately went to the pastor’s house to speak with Father Peyramale. The latter had as yet never spoken to her ― only her confessor, Father Pomian, one of the other priests in the parish, had spoken to Bernadette about the apparition.
“Are you not Bernadette?” Father Peyramale, who had a reputation of having a bad temper, asked gravely and almost sternly, as soon as he saw her coming towards him.
“Yes, it is I, sir!” quietly answered the humble messenger of the Blessed Virgin.
“Well, Bernadette, what do you want of me? What brought you here?”
“I came, Father, on the part of the Lady, who appears to me in the grotto of Massabielle!”
The priest seemed to treat the matter very lightly and not to believe it.
“And you do not know this Lady’s name?” asked the pastor.
“No!” answered Bernadette. “She did not tell me who she was.”
“Those who believe you, imagine that it is the Blessed Virgin Mary. But take care―you alone say you see her! If you falsely pretend to see her in the grotto, you are taking the way never to see her in Heaven!”
“I do not know if it is the Blessed Virgin, Father”; answered the child; “but I see the vision as I see you, and she speaks to me as truly as you speak to me. And I come to tell you, from her, that she wants a shrine to be raised to her at the Rocks of Massabielle, where she appears to me.”
Much agitated, the good Father Peyramale made her repeat the very words used by the Lady at the grotto. Bernadette said: “After having confided to me the secret which concerns me and which I can not reveal to anyone. The Lady added: ‘And now, go and tell the priest that a shrine must be erected here, and that people come in procession to it.’“
After a moment’s reflection, the pastor replied: “I cannot take your word for this―you understand! Tell this Lady that she must make herself known. If she is the Blessed Virgin, let her show it by some miracle. She appears to you―you tell me―on a wild rose-bush? It is now February―tell her, from me, that if she wishes a shrine built, she must make the rose-bush bloom.” And he dismissed her. What had passed between the child and the priest was soon known in the town. Curiosity and excitement were general; and several free-thinkers of the neighborhood resolved to go henceforth to the grotto, in order to assist at the exposure of the “superstition.”
Lourdes Lesson of True Happiness
Our Lady said to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!” How sad most of us would be upon first hearing such words, because, let’s face it, we want to find happiness in this world, don’t we? Now, let us be clear about one thing―there is nothing wrong in seeking happiness, even in this life—but it all depends by what you mean by the word “happiness” doesn’t it. There is the happiness of the sinner and the happiness of the saint; the happiness of the worldly people and the happiness of the spiritual folk; the happiness of selfish, greedy people and the happiness of humble, generous people. We can apply to this the much bandied and varied phrase of “Tell me who your friends are, and I’ll tell you what you are” or “Tell me what you like, and I’ll tell you what you are.”
Tell an athlete and a lazy-slob that there will no physical education class today, and the former will be sad and the latter will be overjoyed. Tell a spiritual person and a worldly person that we cannot go to Mass today, because a winter storm might have made the roads too dangerous to drive upon, and the former will be disappointed and the latter will be rejoicing. Everyone acts according to their nature, and some persons fail to rise above the natural to appreciate the supernatural.
Article 2
Wednesday, Thursday & Friday, February 5th, 6th & 7th
Three Days of Darkness Instruction Sheet
Wednesday, Thursday & Friday, February 5th, 6th & 7th
Three Days of Darkness Instruction Sheet
Foreword
What follows is a compendium of recommendations gleaned from the visions and prophecies granted to various Saints, Blesseds, and Venerables over the course of the centuries. It has been assembled into a series of chief instructions on what to do when the so-called “Three Days of Darkness” eventually hit the Earth. The recommendations are obviously not-binding and you can look upon them as you wish, and you can do with them as you wish―stash it or trash it!
They will be first of all listed in abbreviated form, and then explained in more detail afterwards. As you will see, there is nothing among them that is not a standard Catholic practice in one form or another.
PART ONE
Instructions
(1) THREE DAYS OF DARKNESS (May 27th, 1880)
● ONLY BLESSED WAX CANDLES will give light. One such candle will suffice for each household during the three days of darkness. They will not give light in the homes of the impious and blasphemers. “He, who out of curiosity, opens his window to look out, or leaves his home, will fall dead on the spot. During these three days, people should remain in their homes, pray the Rosary and beg God for mercy.” … “As soon as you notice these signs, go indoors, lock all doors and windows, pull down the blinds, stick adhesive paper on vents and around windows and doors. Do not answer calls from outside, do not look at the windows, or you will die on the spot―keep your eyes down to make sure you do not see the windows; the Wrath of God is mighty and no one should attempt to behold it. Light blessed wax candles; nothing else will burn, but the candles will not be extinguished once lit. Nothing will put them out in the houses of the faithful, but they will not burn in the houses of the godless. Sprinkle holy water about the house and especially in the vicinity of doors and windows―the devils fear holy water. Bless yourself with it and anoint your five senses with it―eyes, ears, nose, mouth, hands, feet, and forehead. Keep on hand a sufficient supply of drinking water and, if possible, food also. Kneel down and pray incessantly with outstretched arms, or prostrate on the floor. Make Acts of Contrition, Faith, Hope, and Charity. Above all say the Rosary and meditate on the Sorrowful Mysteries.”
It is easy to be skeptical about such power being attributed to candles―but such is the way of God, for “the foolish things of the world has God chosen, that He may confound the wise; and the weak things of the world has God chosen, that He may confound the strong” (1 Corinthians 1:27). We see this empowerment of “weak things” and “foolish things” in one of the longer blessings of candles (that is now sadly no longer, or rarely, used): “O candles, I exorcize you in the Name of God ☩ the Father Almighty, in the Name of Jesus ☩ Christ His Son, Our Lord, and in the Name of the Holy ☩ Spirit. May God uproot and cast out from these objects, all power of the devil; all attacks of the unclean spirit; and all deceptions of Satan; so that they may bring health of mind and body to all who use them. We ask this through the power of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire. Amen.
“Let us pray. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, light of everlasting life, Thou hast given us candles to dispel the darkness. We humbly implore Thee to now bless ☩ these candles at our lowly request, and sanctify ☩ them by the light of Thy grace. By the power of the Holy ☩ Cross, endow them with a heavenly blessing. May the blessing they receive be so powerful that, wherever they are placed or lighted, the princes of darkness shall flee in fear, along with all their legions, and never more dare to disturb those who serve Thee, the almighty God. Let the entire building in which these candles are kept, be free from the power of the adversary, and be defended from the snares of the enemy. Grant, we pray, that those who will use these candles may be protected from every assault of the evil spirit, and be safeguarded from all danger. Through Christ Our Lord. Amen.”
(2) FATAL PLAGUES
● The one and only remedy to protect oneself: swallow a piece of very thin paper on which will be written: O JESUS, CONQUEROR OF DEATH, SAVE US. O CRUX, AVE! (HAIL O CROSS!). Medical authorities say that swallowing a small piece of paper is harmless. However, you can also make you own edible paper by using white rice flour and water with a pinch of salt. For ink, you can make your own edible ink from beet juice and mashed beets. Look it up online for detailed instructions on how to make them.
We underestimate the power of the Cross! Yet our whole Faith is focused on the redemptive Cross of Christ upon which He died to redeem us and obtain for us all graces necessary to save our souls! Pope St. Leo the Great, in his homily on the Passion of Christ, says: “How wonderful is the power of the Cross! … The Cross is a well of blessings for all!” It is not for nothing that Holy Mother Church says: “In cruce salus!” ― meaning, “In the cross is salvation!” Our road to salvation relies on the Cross of Christ. We start our journey to salvation in Baptism, where the holy waters of Baptism are poured upon us in the form of a Cross. The Baptismal exorcisms make several Signs of the Cross over us. In Confession our sins are absolved by the priest making a Sign of Cross over us while he says the words of absolution. In Holy Communion, it is a traditional practice for the priest to make a Sign of the Cross over us with Sacred Host before placing it on our tongue. Communion hosts often have a small cross indented upon them. We receive the Sacrament of Confirmation when the bishop anoints us with the holy oil in the form of a Sign of the Cross. The Sacrament of Matrimony sees the married couple blessed by the priest with a Sign of the Cross. In the Sacrament of Holy Orders, the candidate to the priesthood has a Sign of the Cross made on his hands with holy oil. In the Sacrament of Extreme Unction (Sacrament of the Sick) the priest anoints the eyes, ears, nose, mouth, hands and feet of the sick person with holy oil in the form of a Sign of the Cross. The altars of churches are required to have a cross upon them. The Stations of the Cross surround the nave of the church. During the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Sign of the Cross is made at least 50 times. All blessings of objects are done with the Sign of the Cross. In exorcisms, the Sign of the Cross is made many times over the possessed person. Bishops wear their pectoral cross visibly on top of their clothing. Churches used to be built in the form of a cross. We start and finish our prayers with the Sign of the Cross. All of this is just a mere fraction of the examples that could be given! The Sign of the Cross is no insignificant part of the Faith. As Pope St. Leo the Great said: “How wonderful is the power of the Cross! … The Cross is a well of blessings for all!”
(3) FOR ANIMALS
● One must put around their necks a St. Benedict Medal. Our Lady also warned all people to wear St. Benedict Medal. Tradition holds that a blessed St. Benedict Medal protects on a spiritual level from curses, temptations, evil and vice; and on a physical level it protects against diseases and protects good health. Catering for the well-being of animals during a chastisement can be seen as far back as the time of Noe, who was told by God to build an ark sufficiently large so that some animals could be spared from the coming Great Flood.
Are you shocked about the idea of putting medals around the necks of animals? In her traditional Roman Ritual, the Church has several blessings for animals: for flocks of sheep and cattle, for horses and other animals, for gravely sick animals, for birds, for bees, and for silkworms. Each year, in Rome, there is a well-attended blessing of animals on the feast of St. Anthony of Egypt, January 17th. This blessing has a long tradition, going back to the Middle-Ages. In fact, St. Anthony is regarded as a patron of livestock and animals generally, especially pigs. He blessed a sick piglet who had been left at his feet by a distraught mother sow, which was healed instantly and from then on became his constant companion, what we would call today a “pet.” Thus it was that the great monastic ascetic of the desert became the patron of domesticated animals, and his feast day is a particular occasion for their blessing.
As for the St. Benedict Medal and its power, here are some extracts from Roman Ritual’s long blessing of the medal: “I purge you medals of evil by God the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth and of the sea and of all that they contain. O every power of the adversary, every cohort of the devil, every attack and appearance of Satan ― get thee out of these medals and fly afar! And may they become for all who will use them a help for body and soul … Almighty God, pour out Thy blessing on these sacred medals. Let all who will wear them escape every onslaught and fraud of the devil, and drive afar all snares and deceits of the devil.”
(4) DURING THE PERIOD OF THE GREAT CALAMITIES: Earthquakes, wars, floods, etc.
● Recite the following prayer to the Holy Cross:
I hail thee, I adore thee, I embrace thee, O, Adorable Cross of my Savior, protect us, keep us, save us. Jesus loved thee so much, by His example I love thee. By thy holy image calm my fears, I only feel peace and confidence.
Once again we see the importance of the Holy Cross―as already described above. Christ said: “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!” (Mark 8:34). “Whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). St. Paul elaborates: “Many walk―of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ! Whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). St. Paul adds: “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “We preach Christ crucified … For I judged not myself to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:23; 2:2). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 2:19).
(5) GREAT STORMS
● The following prayer to the Cross, revealed by Our Lord, to be recited:
O Crux Ave, spes unica! (Hail O Cross, our sole hope!) … Et Verbum caro factum est! (And the Word was made flesh!) … O Jesus, Conqueror of death, save us!
Yet again we are told to turn to the Cross―the reasons for which have already been sufficiently described above (see #2 and #4). The importance of the Holy Cross can be seen in the fact that Church has assigned feast days to the Holy Cross. The Armenian Church marks four feasts dedicated to the Holy Cross. The Coptic Church celebrates two feasts dedicated to the Holy Cross. Traditionally, in Roman Catholic Church, there were also two feasts of the Holy Cross―(1) the Finding of the Holy Cross by St. Helena which is traditionally celebrated on May 3rd, and (2) the Exaltation of the Holy Cross celebrated on September 14th. Pope John XXIII removed merged these two feasts in 1960, so that the General Roman Calendar now celebrates both the Finding and the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on September 14th, although some Latin American countries and Mexico still celebrate the feast of the finding on May 3rd. The fact that we celebrate the Holy Cross on two separate feast days should speak volumes about the importance of the Holy Cross. Saints usually have only one feast day―apart from two of the greatest saints: St. Joseph and St. John the Baptist. On March 19th, we celebrate St. Joseph, husband of Mary. On May 1st, we celebrate St. Joseph the Worker. As for St. John the Baptist, the Church honors his nativity on June 24th, and his martyrdom on August 29th. This underlines the exalted company that the Holy Cross keeps in being allocated two feast days in the Church’s calendar.
(6) WARS AND REVOLUTIONS
● Our Lord revealed during an ecstasy:
“To dispel all fear and terror, you will touch your forehead with a holy picture or a medal of Mary Immaculate. Your spirit will remain calm. Your heart will not fear the approach of the terror of men. Your spirit will not experience the effects of My Great Justice.”
A “holy picture” is a blessed picture. A blessed picture is a Sacramental of the Church. Sacramentals of the Church have spiritual effects and also physical effects upon us. It is not superstitious to touch blessed objects to the forehead or any other part of the body. One example of “touching” a Sacramental to the forehead is the imposition of the blessed ashes on the forehead on Ash Wednesday. We touch the Sacramental of Holy Water to our foreheads when making the Sign of the Cross upon entering a church. In the Book of Apocalypse we read of one angel crying out “with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea, saying: ‘Hurt not the Earth, nor the sea, nor the trees, till we sign the servants of our God in their foreheads!’ … And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, nor any green thing, nor any tree―but only the men who have not the sign of God on their foreheads … And I saw a Lamb stood upon Mount Sion, and with Him an hundred forty-four thousand, having His Name, and the Name of His Father, written on their foreheads.” (Apocalypse 7:2-3; 9:4; 14:1).
(7) UNKNOWN DISEASES
Our Lord said:
● “A medal of My Divine Heart, and a medal upon which is traced the Adorable Cross. You will steep into a glass of water the two images ― whether they be made of cardboard or metal. You will drink this water that is twice blessed and twice purified. One drop only in your food, one little drop, will suffice to drive away not the scourge, but the scourges of My justice. (The Miraculous Medal, alone, fulfills the conditions required―since it has on it both the Sacred Heart and the Sign of the Cross). You will give a drop of this water to the poor souls touched by the scourge of unknown diseases ― those which attack the heart, the spirit, the word.”
Once again the Holy Cross plays it part in curing these unknown diseases. Much has been written about the Cross in the above sections (#2, #4 and #5) which need not be repeated again. However, we will mention some instances where the Cross has cured diseases or prevented dangers of disease or poisoning.
St. Benedict was asked to govern a monastery where discipline was badly observed. For a long time he resisted the clamoring of the monks to govern their monastery, but being finally persuaded to undertake the charge, he did his best to introduce into the monastery the strict observance of the rule, but only succeeded in exciting against himself the hatred of certain wicked monks, who formed a plot to take away his life. They accordingly mixed poison with his drink, and brought it to him as he sat at the table with the rest of the community. St. Benedict, according to his custom, extended his hand to make over the glass cup the Sign of the Cross, and at the very moment when he made the holy Sign, the glass, which was being held at a little distance from him, was shattered to pieces, as if it had received a sudden blow from a stone, and a serpent came forth from it.
(8) DIVERSE ILLNESSES
● You will use by means of infusion (steeping, brewing):
ST. JOHN’S WORT (Hypericum perforatum) and GROUND-IVY (Glechoma hederacea) to be used especially in critical conditions and for the pains of the chest and violent headaches.
HAWTHORN LEAVES (Craetagus oxyacantha), for use in cholera (which will be frequent and widespread) See below for the precise method to be applied as indicated by the Holy Virgin.
VIOLET FLOWERS (Viola odorata), the perfume and virtue of humility, will be effective for unknown fevers.
Modern medicine and homeopathy confirms the power of the above items. St. John’s Wort has been used for centuries in traditional European medicine. It has antibacterial, antioxidant, and antiviral properties. Ground Ivy is used in herbal medicine in modern times, for its astringent, diuretic and stimulant properties. It is used for treating innumerable medical conditions. European herbalists use it to treat disorders of the bladder, kidneys, lungs, digestive tract and skin issues, gout, arthritis, coughs, colds, ringing in the ears, eye disorders, jaundice, persistent headache, etc. Hawthorn Leaves have antioxidant properties; anti-inflammatory effects; and boost the immune system. They increase coronary artery blood flow; improve circulation; lower blood pressure; improve blood flow to the heart; reduce chest pain (angina); protect against heart damage; and are a respiratory remedy. Violet flowers and leaves contain very high amounts of vitamin C ― some say higher than any other plant. The leaves are also high in vitamin A. Violets are anti-inflammatory; a powerful lymphagogue that can relieve congestion and swollen lymph glands; dissolves cysts, lumps, and fibrotic tissue of the breast. A fresh violet poultice can be used externally for a variety of conditions: abscesses, acne, arthritis, minor skin irritations, sores, and swollen glands.
(9) EPIDEMICS [HUMANS] or EPIZOOTICS [ANIMALS] (May 14th, 1880)
● The Lord gives to the great St. Benedict the power to alleviate the great calamity. A respectful procession of the statue, made without any fear or dread, may arrest this calamity.
St. Benedict is the patron saint of Europe and protector from evil. St. Benedict is also a patron saint of monasticism―he is known as the “Father of Western Monasticism” for having established a Rule that would become the norm for innumerable Christian monks and nuns. Our Lady of Good Success spoke of monasticism in the following terms: “No one on the face of the Earth is aware from where comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents … Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils!”
The St. Benedict statue has been traditionally used to invoke protection and security from spiritual and physical dangers. Why not combine the St. Benedict Medal with a St. Benedict statue―by attaching the blessed medal to the blessed statue? Or hanging the medal around the neck of the statue? According to the Benedictine Order: “The purpose of using the medal is to call down God’s blessing and protection on us, wherever we are, and upon our homes and possessions, especially through the intercession of St. Benedict. The medal is a prayer of exorcism against Satan, a prayer in time of temptation, a prayer for peace among ourselves and among the nations of the world, a prayer that the cross of Christ be our light and guide, a prayer of firm rejection of all that is evil, a prayer of petition that we may with Christian courage walk in God’s ways, with the Gospel as our guide.”
(10) EARTHLY AND CELESTIAL FIRE (February 23rd, 1938)
● The Sacred Heart of Jesus said:
“The heat will be terrible ... making a sign of the Cross with Holy Water will diminish the heat and drive away the sparks. You will kiss five times small indulgenced crosses ... small crosses applied to the five wounds of Jesus Crucified on a holy image. For such protection may benefit souls, poor sinners, invoking My Immaculate Mother, Mother of Salvation, Refuge and Reconciliation of sinners.”
Yet again―for the fifth time (in addition to #2, #4, #5 and # 7 above)―the Holy Cross is cited as a protective remedy for the evils that will befall mankind during the “Three Days of Darkness”. Yet again―for the fifth time (in addition to #2, #4, #5 and # 7 above)―the Holy Cross is cited as a protective remedy for the evils that will befall mankind during the “Three Days of Darkness”. The reason why the Holy Cross receives so much attention and focus is because it is the chief Sacramental of the Church―as the Baltimore Catechism #4 states: “The chief Sacramental used in the Church is the Sign of the Cross.” (Question 294). However, we must use the Sign of the Cross with great reverence, great confidence and great Faith in order to make that Sacramental work to its fullest and highest degree. Sacramentals do not give grace automatically, but they depend upon the dispositions of the person using the Sacramental and give grace in proportion to those dispositions.
(11) OBJECTS OF PROTECTION
● Our Lady said:
“Always have ready and at hand your objects of protection: your blessed wax candles, your medals, your pictures and holy objects from which flow all blessings.”
● Our Lady further said (April 15th, 1900):
“My little children, it is Faith, it is confidence, the most beautiful of all prayer which obtains the most.”
Our Lady speaks of Sacramentals of the Church―blessed wax candles, medals, pictures and other blessed objects. These blessed items not only have an effect upon the soul by grace, but sometimes they also produce a physical effect such as a cure or some kind of protection from harm. In November of 1955 a plane carrying 27 passengers crashed. All died except one young lady. When this girl saw that the plane was going down, she took hold of her Brown Scapular (which is one of many Sacramentals), and called on Mary for help. She suffered burns, her clothing was reduced to ashes, but the flames did not touch her Scapular.
In the same year of 1955, a similar miracle occurred in the US Midwest. A 3rd-grader stopped in a gasoline station to put air in his bicycle tires, and at the very moment an explosion occurred. The boy’s clothing was burned off, but his Brown Scapular remained unaffected: a symbol of Mary’s protection. Although he carried a few scars from the explosion into adulthood, this man has special reason to remember our Blessed Mother’s protection in time of danger.
(12) PLACES OF REFUGE
● Revelation of the Divine Heart of Jesus to the mystic and stigmatic Marie-Julie Jahenny:
“My loved ones, there are three places of refuge (for the time of tribulations): My Divine Heart, My Divine Cross, and My Beloved Immaculate Mother.”
● St. Anne, the mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary, said the same things to the mystic and stigmatic Marie-Julie Jahenny on July 26th, 1923:
“You have several places of refuge at the moment of chastisement: that of the Cross, the Adorable Divine Heart, and the Virginal Heart of my Immaculate Daughter.”
The above mentioned “places of refuge” we can find incorporated in the First Friday devotions to the Sacred Heart of Jesus; the First Saturday devotions to the Immaculate Heart of Mary; and in “Divine Cross” of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass which is a perpetuation throughout time of Christ’s crucifixion on His Cross on Calvary. In addition to Christ’s Cross in the Mass, we need to bring our own God-given crosses to Mass in order to offer them up alongside Christ’s offering―as the Angel of Fatima said to Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta: “Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
(13) THE MODE OF USING THE HAWTHORN AS GIVEN BY OUR BLESSED MOTHER on August 5th, 1880:
● “There will be a grave illness which human science will not be able to alleviate. This illness will attack firstly the heart, then the spirit, and at the same time, the tongue. It will be horrible. The heat accompanying it will be a devouring fire insupportable and so intense that the members of the body affected will be red ― an unendurable fiery red. At the end of seven days this disease, sown like a seed in the field (incubation period) will spread everywhere rapidly and make great progress.”
● “My children, here is the ONLY remedy which could save you. You are familiar with the Hawthorn which grows practically in all hedges. The leaves of the Hawthorn, not the wood, can arrest the progress of this disease.”
● “You will gather the leaves, not the wood. Even dry, they will keep their efficacy. You will put them into boiling water and leave them there for 14 minutes, covering the receptacle so that the steam remains therein. At the onset of this disease, one must use this remedy three times a day.”
● “This disease will produce a continual vomiting and nausea. If the remedy is taken too late, the part of the body affected will become black and in the black there will be seen a sort of pale, yellow streak.”
You might think that Our Lady’s stipulations such as: “You will put them into boiling water and leave them there for 14 minutes, covering the receptacle so that the steam remains therein” are perhaps a little “over-the-top” ― but that is exactly what modern herbalists have discovered as being the optimal way to use Hawthorn Leaves: let them steep in boiled water for 14 minutes!! Others say 15 minutes!
PART TWO
A Deeper Look and Explanation
So what are we to make of the above recommended measures for the “Three Days of Darkness?” What is our opinion or judgment of them? Fake? Fraudulent? Fallacious? Fictitious? Fabricated? Fanciful? Foolish? Futile? Farsighted? Factual? Formidable? Fortifying? Fabulous?
Some will argue that it is all merely Private Revelation and that this does not oblige us to believe it. Yet, we should not ignore the fact that the Holy Rosary is a result of Private Revelation to St. Dominic; the Brown Scapular is the result of a Private Revelation to St. Simon Stock; the Sacred Heart devotion and First Friday devotion are a result of Private Revelation to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque; the Miraculous Medal is a result of a Private Revelation to St. Catherine Labouré; the First Saturday devotions in honor of the Immaculate Heart of Mary are a result of a Private Revelation to Sister Lucia of Fatima. The two most popular Catholic shrines in the world ― Guadalupe, Lourdes, Fatima ― are the result of Private Revelations. If we follow the (false) argument that Private Revelations are not to be believed―then we should throw our Rosaries, Scapulars, Medals into the trash can; no longer practice the First Friday and First Saturday devotions and stop pilgrimages to those shrines.
The Two Kinds of Divine Revelation―Public and Private
Divine Public Revelation ended with the death of the last of the Apostles—St. John the Evangelist. From that time there can be no new additions to the deposit of Faith. Divine Private Revelation cannot add one iota of a new teaching or dogma, but it can provide deeper insights into existing teachings and dogmas of Divine Public Revelation, or provide guidance as regards action to be taken at any particular point in time, or reminds us of crucial aspects of Divine Public Revelation that we are neglecting or have forgotten.
Thus, at Lourdes, for example, Our Lady asks for more penance—but the need for penance is contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). At Fatima, Our Lady asks for more prayer and sacrifices—yet those too are contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). At La Salette, she issues many warnings regarding neglect of prayer and penance, the dangers of being worldly, the chastisements to come upon the world—but those too can be found in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture).
The essence, or nutshell, or “bottom line” of the prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” are already contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). What are these essential elements?
(1) God punishes evil—this patently obvious. Holy Scripture is full of proof of this incontestable truth. God has always punished evil and always will: “Evil pursues sinners―and to the just, good shall be repaid!” (Proverbs 13:21). In Old Testament times, in New Testament times and in our times. The fire and brimstone that rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha, or the Great Flood are some of the more striking punishments. The punishment of evil is whole point of the “Three Days of Darkness”.
(2) God is not averse to wiping-out or destroying most of the world, as He did with the Great Flood in the days of Noe. The prophecies of the “Three Days of Darkness” state that something similar and just as widespread will be coming in our days. Therefore, there is nothing new with regards to God’s ways of acting.
(3) God protects the just—the instances of this are too numerous to mention, it is patently obvious to anyone who has a basic knowledge of Holy Scripture. Just a few examples would include the Israelites during the Exodus; Daniel in the den of lions (Daniel chapter 6); the three young men in the fire (Daniel chapter 3); and angel of God destroys the army of the Assyrians (4 Kings, chapter 19), etc. The events of the “Three Days of Darkness”, besides being a punishment upon evil people, are also protection for those who are just.
(4) God uses natural elements or materials as part of His “protection plan”—like the smearing of the blood of the Paschal Lamb on the doorposts of the homes of the Israelites in the time of Moses, prior to their Exodus from Egypt, in order to protect them from the avenging angel of God that would pass throughout Egypt, slaughtering the first born humans and animals: “Dip a bunch of hyssop in the blood that is at the door, and sprinkle the transom [crosspiece] of the door therewith, and both the door cheeks: let none of you go out of the door of his house till morning. For the Lord will pass through striking the Egyptians: and when he shall see the blood on the transom, and on both the posts, he will pass over the door of the house, and not suffer the destroyer to come into your houses and to hurt you” (Exodus 12:22-23). Or the use of water (Red Sea) to overcome and drown the Egyptian soldiers who were pursuing the Israelites during the Exodus. The use of candles during the “Three Days of Darkness” fall into a similar category.
(5) The Power of Prayers and Words over Devils and Nature. We have many instances where mere words or prayers have a profound and almost miraculous effect over demons and the elements of nature. Words can have a significant impact on the world, including the ability to create or destroy things. It is by words (and water) that a person is baptized, Original Sin is removed and Sanctifying Grace is planted in that person’s soul. It is by words that demons are driven out of a person during an exorcism. It is by words that mortal and venial sins are forgiven and removed from a person’s soul in the Sacrament of Confession and Sanctifying Grace is restored. It is by words that bread and wine become the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ during the Consecration at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is by words that water is exorcised and empowered during the rite of blessing water. It is by words that Rosaries, Scapulars, pictures and statues are made holy when blessed by a priest. The power of words is indeed very powerful!
Christ Himself is also called “The Word of God” ― and by His words many miracles were performed.
● By His words He miraculously calmed a storm: “And when Jesus entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him. And a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves―but He was asleep. And they came to Him and awakened Him, saying: ‘Lord, save us, we perish!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful, O ye of little faith?’ Then rising up He commanded the winds, and the sea, and there came a great calm. But the men wondered, saying: ‘What manner of Man is this―for the winds and the sea obey Him?’” (Matthew 8:23-27).
● The Roman centurion said to Him: “Say the word, and my servant shall be healed!” (Luke 7:7) … “Only say the word, and my servant shall be healed!” (Matthew 8:8). Jesus also cured the nobleman’s son by the mere use of words: “The ruler said to Him: ‘Lord, come down before that my son die!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way! Thy son lives!’ The man believed the word which Jesus said to him, and went his way. And as he was going down, his servants met him, and they brought word, saying that his son lived.” (John 4:49-51).
● By His words Jesus cast out demons: “They brought to Him many that were possessed with devils―and He cast out the spirits with His word” (Matthew 8:16). “There was a man with an unclean spirit, and he cried out, saying: ‘What have we to do with thee, Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou come to destroy us? I know who thou art―the Holy One of God!’ And Jesus threatened him, saying: ‘Speak no more and go out of the man!’ And the unclean spirit tearing him, and crying out with a loud voice, went out of him. And they were all amazed, insomuch that they questioned among themselves, saying: ‘What thing is this? What is this new doctrine? For with power He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey Him!’” (Mark 1:23-28).
● By His words alone He cured a leper: “A man with leprosy came to Him and begged Him on his knees: ‘If you are willing, you can make me clean!’ Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. ‘I am willing!’ he said. ‘Be clean!’ Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cleansed.” (Mark 1:40-45).
● By His words He raised people from the dead: “He went into a city that is called Naim … and a dead man was carried out, the only son of his mother … Jesus said to her: ‘Weep not!’ And He said: ‘Young man, I say to thee, arise!’ And he that was dead, sat up, and began to speak. And Jesus gave him to his mother” (Luke 7:11-17). He also raised Lazarus from the dead by mere words: “Jesus cried with a loud voice: ‘Lazarus, come forth!’ And he that had been dead came forth, bound feet and hands with winding bands, and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus said to them: ‘Loosen them and let him go!’” (John 11:1-44).
● Our Lord spoke of the power of words of prayer: “Ask―and it shall be given you! Seek―and you shall find! Knock―and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7). “In all things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive!” (Matthew 21:22). “If you abide in Me and My words abide in you―then you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you!” (John 15:7).
● Our Lord said that we could move mountains by our words alone: “If you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, then you shall say to this mountain: ‘Remove from here to there!’― and it shall move; and nothing shall be impossible to you!” (Matthew 17:19). “Jesus answering, said to them: Amen, I say to you, if you shall have Faith and stagger not, then you shall say to this mountain, Take up and cast thyself into the sea!’― and it shall be done!” (Matthew 21:21).
● We see the Apostles cure people by words alone: “A certain man was lame from his mother’s womb. When he had seen Peter and John about to go into the Temple, he asked to receive an alms. But Peter fastening his eyes upon him, said: ‘Silver and gold I have none―but what I have, I give thee! In the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, arise and walk!’ And forthwith his feet and soles received strength. And he leaping up, stood, and walked, and went in with them into the Temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God” (Acts 3:2-8).
(6) God is always seeking to bring good out of evil—This is part of the mercy of God. If God was not merciful, He would wipe everything out because of our sins and “call it a day.” Thankfully He is not like that! He seeks to restore things and bring some good out of the fall of Adam and Eve. He brings good out of the evil done to Joseph by his many brothers, when they sold him as a slave. He brings good out of Saul and converts the persecutor of Christians into the new St. Paul and makes him a pillar of the Church. The list is almost endless—every person can find many such situations in their own life. The “Three Days of Darkness” will being good out of the evil that brought about the punishment of the “Three Days of Darkness”.
What follows is a compendium of recommendations gleaned from the visions and prophecies granted to various Saints, Blesseds, and Venerables over the course of the centuries. It has been assembled into a series of chief instructions on what to do when the so-called “Three Days of Darkness” eventually hit the Earth. The recommendations are obviously not-binding and you can look upon them as you wish, and you can do with them as you wish―stash it or trash it!
They will be first of all listed in abbreviated form, and then explained in more detail afterwards. As you will see, there is nothing among them that is not a standard Catholic practice in one form or another.
PART ONE
Instructions
(1) THREE DAYS OF DARKNESS (May 27th, 1880)
● ONLY BLESSED WAX CANDLES will give light. One such candle will suffice for each household during the three days of darkness. They will not give light in the homes of the impious and blasphemers. “He, who out of curiosity, opens his window to look out, or leaves his home, will fall dead on the spot. During these three days, people should remain in their homes, pray the Rosary and beg God for mercy.” … “As soon as you notice these signs, go indoors, lock all doors and windows, pull down the blinds, stick adhesive paper on vents and around windows and doors. Do not answer calls from outside, do not look at the windows, or you will die on the spot―keep your eyes down to make sure you do not see the windows; the Wrath of God is mighty and no one should attempt to behold it. Light blessed wax candles; nothing else will burn, but the candles will not be extinguished once lit. Nothing will put them out in the houses of the faithful, but they will not burn in the houses of the godless. Sprinkle holy water about the house and especially in the vicinity of doors and windows―the devils fear holy water. Bless yourself with it and anoint your five senses with it―eyes, ears, nose, mouth, hands, feet, and forehead. Keep on hand a sufficient supply of drinking water and, if possible, food also. Kneel down and pray incessantly with outstretched arms, or prostrate on the floor. Make Acts of Contrition, Faith, Hope, and Charity. Above all say the Rosary and meditate on the Sorrowful Mysteries.”
It is easy to be skeptical about such power being attributed to candles―but such is the way of God, for “the foolish things of the world has God chosen, that He may confound the wise; and the weak things of the world has God chosen, that He may confound the strong” (1 Corinthians 1:27). We see this empowerment of “weak things” and “foolish things” in one of the longer blessings of candles (that is now sadly no longer, or rarely, used): “O candles, I exorcize you in the Name of God ☩ the Father Almighty, in the Name of Jesus ☩ Christ His Son, Our Lord, and in the Name of the Holy ☩ Spirit. May God uproot and cast out from these objects, all power of the devil; all attacks of the unclean spirit; and all deceptions of Satan; so that they may bring health of mind and body to all who use them. We ask this through the power of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire. Amen.
“Let us pray. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, light of everlasting life, Thou hast given us candles to dispel the darkness. We humbly implore Thee to now bless ☩ these candles at our lowly request, and sanctify ☩ them by the light of Thy grace. By the power of the Holy ☩ Cross, endow them with a heavenly blessing. May the blessing they receive be so powerful that, wherever they are placed or lighted, the princes of darkness shall flee in fear, along with all their legions, and never more dare to disturb those who serve Thee, the almighty God. Let the entire building in which these candles are kept, be free from the power of the adversary, and be defended from the snares of the enemy. Grant, we pray, that those who will use these candles may be protected from every assault of the evil spirit, and be safeguarded from all danger. Through Christ Our Lord. Amen.”
(2) FATAL PLAGUES
● The one and only remedy to protect oneself: swallow a piece of very thin paper on which will be written: O JESUS, CONQUEROR OF DEATH, SAVE US. O CRUX, AVE! (HAIL O CROSS!). Medical authorities say that swallowing a small piece of paper is harmless. However, you can also make you own edible paper by using white rice flour and water with a pinch of salt. For ink, you can make your own edible ink from beet juice and mashed beets. Look it up online for detailed instructions on how to make them.
We underestimate the power of the Cross! Yet our whole Faith is focused on the redemptive Cross of Christ upon which He died to redeem us and obtain for us all graces necessary to save our souls! Pope St. Leo the Great, in his homily on the Passion of Christ, says: “How wonderful is the power of the Cross! … The Cross is a well of blessings for all!” It is not for nothing that Holy Mother Church says: “In cruce salus!” ― meaning, “In the cross is salvation!” Our road to salvation relies on the Cross of Christ. We start our journey to salvation in Baptism, where the holy waters of Baptism are poured upon us in the form of a Cross. The Baptismal exorcisms make several Signs of the Cross over us. In Confession our sins are absolved by the priest making a Sign of Cross over us while he says the words of absolution. In Holy Communion, it is a traditional practice for the priest to make a Sign of the Cross over us with Sacred Host before placing it on our tongue. Communion hosts often have a small cross indented upon them. We receive the Sacrament of Confirmation when the bishop anoints us with the holy oil in the form of a Sign of the Cross. The Sacrament of Matrimony sees the married couple blessed by the priest with a Sign of the Cross. In the Sacrament of Holy Orders, the candidate to the priesthood has a Sign of the Cross made on his hands with holy oil. In the Sacrament of Extreme Unction (Sacrament of the Sick) the priest anoints the eyes, ears, nose, mouth, hands and feet of the sick person with holy oil in the form of a Sign of the Cross. The altars of churches are required to have a cross upon them. The Stations of the Cross surround the nave of the church. During the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Sign of the Cross is made at least 50 times. All blessings of objects are done with the Sign of the Cross. In exorcisms, the Sign of the Cross is made many times over the possessed person. Bishops wear their pectoral cross visibly on top of their clothing. Churches used to be built in the form of a cross. We start and finish our prayers with the Sign of the Cross. All of this is just a mere fraction of the examples that could be given! The Sign of the Cross is no insignificant part of the Faith. As Pope St. Leo the Great said: “How wonderful is the power of the Cross! … The Cross is a well of blessings for all!”
(3) FOR ANIMALS
● One must put around their necks a St. Benedict Medal. Our Lady also warned all people to wear St. Benedict Medal. Tradition holds that a blessed St. Benedict Medal protects on a spiritual level from curses, temptations, evil and vice; and on a physical level it protects against diseases and protects good health. Catering for the well-being of animals during a chastisement can be seen as far back as the time of Noe, who was told by God to build an ark sufficiently large so that some animals could be spared from the coming Great Flood.
Are you shocked about the idea of putting medals around the necks of animals? In her traditional Roman Ritual, the Church has several blessings for animals: for flocks of sheep and cattle, for horses and other animals, for gravely sick animals, for birds, for bees, and for silkworms. Each year, in Rome, there is a well-attended blessing of animals on the feast of St. Anthony of Egypt, January 17th. This blessing has a long tradition, going back to the Middle-Ages. In fact, St. Anthony is regarded as a patron of livestock and animals generally, especially pigs. He blessed a sick piglet who had been left at his feet by a distraught mother sow, which was healed instantly and from then on became his constant companion, what we would call today a “pet.” Thus it was that the great monastic ascetic of the desert became the patron of domesticated animals, and his feast day is a particular occasion for their blessing.
As for the St. Benedict Medal and its power, here are some extracts from Roman Ritual’s long blessing of the medal: “I purge you medals of evil by God the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth and of the sea and of all that they contain. O every power of the adversary, every cohort of the devil, every attack and appearance of Satan ― get thee out of these medals and fly afar! And may they become for all who will use them a help for body and soul … Almighty God, pour out Thy blessing on these sacred medals. Let all who will wear them escape every onslaught and fraud of the devil, and drive afar all snares and deceits of the devil.”
(4) DURING THE PERIOD OF THE GREAT CALAMITIES: Earthquakes, wars, floods, etc.
● Recite the following prayer to the Holy Cross:
I hail thee, I adore thee, I embrace thee, O, Adorable Cross of my Savior, protect us, keep us, save us. Jesus loved thee so much, by His example I love thee. By thy holy image calm my fears, I only feel peace and confidence.
Once again we see the importance of the Holy Cross―as already described above. Christ said: “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!” (Mark 8:34). “Whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). St. Paul elaborates: “Many walk―of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ! Whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). St. Paul adds: “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “We preach Christ crucified … For I judged not myself to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:23; 2:2). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 2:19).
(5) GREAT STORMS
● The following prayer to the Cross, revealed by Our Lord, to be recited:
O Crux Ave, spes unica! (Hail O Cross, our sole hope!) … Et Verbum caro factum est! (And the Word was made flesh!) … O Jesus, Conqueror of death, save us!
Yet again we are told to turn to the Cross―the reasons for which have already been sufficiently described above (see #2 and #4). The importance of the Holy Cross can be seen in the fact that Church has assigned feast days to the Holy Cross. The Armenian Church marks four feasts dedicated to the Holy Cross. The Coptic Church celebrates two feasts dedicated to the Holy Cross. Traditionally, in Roman Catholic Church, there were also two feasts of the Holy Cross―(1) the Finding of the Holy Cross by St. Helena which is traditionally celebrated on May 3rd, and (2) the Exaltation of the Holy Cross celebrated on September 14th. Pope John XXIII removed merged these two feasts in 1960, so that the General Roman Calendar now celebrates both the Finding and the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on September 14th, although some Latin American countries and Mexico still celebrate the feast of the finding on May 3rd. The fact that we celebrate the Holy Cross on two separate feast days should speak volumes about the importance of the Holy Cross. Saints usually have only one feast day―apart from two of the greatest saints: St. Joseph and St. John the Baptist. On March 19th, we celebrate St. Joseph, husband of Mary. On May 1st, we celebrate St. Joseph the Worker. As for St. John the Baptist, the Church honors his nativity on June 24th, and his martyrdom on August 29th. This underlines the exalted company that the Holy Cross keeps in being allocated two feast days in the Church’s calendar.
(6) WARS AND REVOLUTIONS
● Our Lord revealed during an ecstasy:
“To dispel all fear and terror, you will touch your forehead with a holy picture or a medal of Mary Immaculate. Your spirit will remain calm. Your heart will not fear the approach of the terror of men. Your spirit will not experience the effects of My Great Justice.”
A “holy picture” is a blessed picture. A blessed picture is a Sacramental of the Church. Sacramentals of the Church have spiritual effects and also physical effects upon us. It is not superstitious to touch blessed objects to the forehead or any other part of the body. One example of “touching” a Sacramental to the forehead is the imposition of the blessed ashes on the forehead on Ash Wednesday. We touch the Sacramental of Holy Water to our foreheads when making the Sign of the Cross upon entering a church. In the Book of Apocalypse we read of one angel crying out “with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea, saying: ‘Hurt not the Earth, nor the sea, nor the trees, till we sign the servants of our God in their foreheads!’ … And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, nor any green thing, nor any tree―but only the men who have not the sign of God on their foreheads … And I saw a Lamb stood upon Mount Sion, and with Him an hundred forty-four thousand, having His Name, and the Name of His Father, written on their foreheads.” (Apocalypse 7:2-3; 9:4; 14:1).
(7) UNKNOWN DISEASES
Our Lord said:
● “A medal of My Divine Heart, and a medal upon which is traced the Adorable Cross. You will steep into a glass of water the two images ― whether they be made of cardboard or metal. You will drink this water that is twice blessed and twice purified. One drop only in your food, one little drop, will suffice to drive away not the scourge, but the scourges of My justice. (The Miraculous Medal, alone, fulfills the conditions required―since it has on it both the Sacred Heart and the Sign of the Cross). You will give a drop of this water to the poor souls touched by the scourge of unknown diseases ― those which attack the heart, the spirit, the word.”
Once again the Holy Cross plays it part in curing these unknown diseases. Much has been written about the Cross in the above sections (#2, #4 and #5) which need not be repeated again. However, we will mention some instances where the Cross has cured diseases or prevented dangers of disease or poisoning.
St. Benedict was asked to govern a monastery where discipline was badly observed. For a long time he resisted the clamoring of the monks to govern their monastery, but being finally persuaded to undertake the charge, he did his best to introduce into the monastery the strict observance of the rule, but only succeeded in exciting against himself the hatred of certain wicked monks, who formed a plot to take away his life. They accordingly mixed poison with his drink, and brought it to him as he sat at the table with the rest of the community. St. Benedict, according to his custom, extended his hand to make over the glass cup the Sign of the Cross, and at the very moment when he made the holy Sign, the glass, which was being held at a little distance from him, was shattered to pieces, as if it had received a sudden blow from a stone, and a serpent came forth from it.
(8) DIVERSE ILLNESSES
● You will use by means of infusion (steeping, brewing):
ST. JOHN’S WORT (Hypericum perforatum) and GROUND-IVY (Glechoma hederacea) to be used especially in critical conditions and for the pains of the chest and violent headaches.
HAWTHORN LEAVES (Craetagus oxyacantha), for use in cholera (which will be frequent and widespread) See below for the precise method to be applied as indicated by the Holy Virgin.
VIOLET FLOWERS (Viola odorata), the perfume and virtue of humility, will be effective for unknown fevers.
Modern medicine and homeopathy confirms the power of the above items. St. John’s Wort has been used for centuries in traditional European medicine. It has antibacterial, antioxidant, and antiviral properties. Ground Ivy is used in herbal medicine in modern times, for its astringent, diuretic and stimulant properties. It is used for treating innumerable medical conditions. European herbalists use it to treat disorders of the bladder, kidneys, lungs, digestive tract and skin issues, gout, arthritis, coughs, colds, ringing in the ears, eye disorders, jaundice, persistent headache, etc. Hawthorn Leaves have antioxidant properties; anti-inflammatory effects; and boost the immune system. They increase coronary artery blood flow; improve circulation; lower blood pressure; improve blood flow to the heart; reduce chest pain (angina); protect against heart damage; and are a respiratory remedy. Violet flowers and leaves contain very high amounts of vitamin C ― some say higher than any other plant. The leaves are also high in vitamin A. Violets are anti-inflammatory; a powerful lymphagogue that can relieve congestion and swollen lymph glands; dissolves cysts, lumps, and fibrotic tissue of the breast. A fresh violet poultice can be used externally for a variety of conditions: abscesses, acne, arthritis, minor skin irritations, sores, and swollen glands.
(9) EPIDEMICS [HUMANS] or EPIZOOTICS [ANIMALS] (May 14th, 1880)
● The Lord gives to the great St. Benedict the power to alleviate the great calamity. A respectful procession of the statue, made without any fear or dread, may arrest this calamity.
St. Benedict is the patron saint of Europe and protector from evil. St. Benedict is also a patron saint of monasticism―he is known as the “Father of Western Monasticism” for having established a Rule that would become the norm for innumerable Christian monks and nuns. Our Lady of Good Success spoke of monasticism in the following terms: “No one on the face of the Earth is aware from where comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents … Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils!”
The St. Benedict statue has been traditionally used to invoke protection and security from spiritual and physical dangers. Why not combine the St. Benedict Medal with a St. Benedict statue―by attaching the blessed medal to the blessed statue? Or hanging the medal around the neck of the statue? According to the Benedictine Order: “The purpose of using the medal is to call down God’s blessing and protection on us, wherever we are, and upon our homes and possessions, especially through the intercession of St. Benedict. The medal is a prayer of exorcism against Satan, a prayer in time of temptation, a prayer for peace among ourselves and among the nations of the world, a prayer that the cross of Christ be our light and guide, a prayer of firm rejection of all that is evil, a prayer of petition that we may with Christian courage walk in God’s ways, with the Gospel as our guide.”
(10) EARTHLY AND CELESTIAL FIRE (February 23rd, 1938)
● The Sacred Heart of Jesus said:
“The heat will be terrible ... making a sign of the Cross with Holy Water will diminish the heat and drive away the sparks. You will kiss five times small indulgenced crosses ... small crosses applied to the five wounds of Jesus Crucified on a holy image. For such protection may benefit souls, poor sinners, invoking My Immaculate Mother, Mother of Salvation, Refuge and Reconciliation of sinners.”
Yet again―for the fifth time (in addition to #2, #4, #5 and # 7 above)―the Holy Cross is cited as a protective remedy for the evils that will befall mankind during the “Three Days of Darkness”. Yet again―for the fifth time (in addition to #2, #4, #5 and # 7 above)―the Holy Cross is cited as a protective remedy for the evils that will befall mankind during the “Three Days of Darkness”. The reason why the Holy Cross receives so much attention and focus is because it is the chief Sacramental of the Church―as the Baltimore Catechism #4 states: “The chief Sacramental used in the Church is the Sign of the Cross.” (Question 294). However, we must use the Sign of the Cross with great reverence, great confidence and great Faith in order to make that Sacramental work to its fullest and highest degree. Sacramentals do not give grace automatically, but they depend upon the dispositions of the person using the Sacramental and give grace in proportion to those dispositions.
(11) OBJECTS OF PROTECTION
● Our Lady said:
“Always have ready and at hand your objects of protection: your blessed wax candles, your medals, your pictures and holy objects from which flow all blessings.”
● Our Lady further said (April 15th, 1900):
“My little children, it is Faith, it is confidence, the most beautiful of all prayer which obtains the most.”
Our Lady speaks of Sacramentals of the Church―blessed wax candles, medals, pictures and other blessed objects. These blessed items not only have an effect upon the soul by grace, but sometimes they also produce a physical effect such as a cure or some kind of protection from harm. In November of 1955 a plane carrying 27 passengers crashed. All died except one young lady. When this girl saw that the plane was going down, she took hold of her Brown Scapular (which is one of many Sacramentals), and called on Mary for help. She suffered burns, her clothing was reduced to ashes, but the flames did not touch her Scapular.
In the same year of 1955, a similar miracle occurred in the US Midwest. A 3rd-grader stopped in a gasoline station to put air in his bicycle tires, and at the very moment an explosion occurred. The boy’s clothing was burned off, but his Brown Scapular remained unaffected: a symbol of Mary’s protection. Although he carried a few scars from the explosion into adulthood, this man has special reason to remember our Blessed Mother’s protection in time of danger.
(12) PLACES OF REFUGE
● Revelation of the Divine Heart of Jesus to the mystic and stigmatic Marie-Julie Jahenny:
“My loved ones, there are three places of refuge (for the time of tribulations): My Divine Heart, My Divine Cross, and My Beloved Immaculate Mother.”
● St. Anne, the mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary, said the same things to the mystic and stigmatic Marie-Julie Jahenny on July 26th, 1923:
“You have several places of refuge at the moment of chastisement: that of the Cross, the Adorable Divine Heart, and the Virginal Heart of my Immaculate Daughter.”
The above mentioned “places of refuge” we can find incorporated in the First Friday devotions to the Sacred Heart of Jesus; the First Saturday devotions to the Immaculate Heart of Mary; and in “Divine Cross” of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass which is a perpetuation throughout time of Christ’s crucifixion on His Cross on Calvary. In addition to Christ’s Cross in the Mass, we need to bring our own God-given crosses to Mass in order to offer them up alongside Christ’s offering―as the Angel of Fatima said to Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta: “Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
(13) THE MODE OF USING THE HAWTHORN AS GIVEN BY OUR BLESSED MOTHER on August 5th, 1880:
● “There will be a grave illness which human science will not be able to alleviate. This illness will attack firstly the heart, then the spirit, and at the same time, the tongue. It will be horrible. The heat accompanying it will be a devouring fire insupportable and so intense that the members of the body affected will be red ― an unendurable fiery red. At the end of seven days this disease, sown like a seed in the field (incubation period) will spread everywhere rapidly and make great progress.”
● “My children, here is the ONLY remedy which could save you. You are familiar with the Hawthorn which grows practically in all hedges. The leaves of the Hawthorn, not the wood, can arrest the progress of this disease.”
● “You will gather the leaves, not the wood. Even dry, they will keep their efficacy. You will put them into boiling water and leave them there for 14 minutes, covering the receptacle so that the steam remains therein. At the onset of this disease, one must use this remedy three times a day.”
● “This disease will produce a continual vomiting and nausea. If the remedy is taken too late, the part of the body affected will become black and in the black there will be seen a sort of pale, yellow streak.”
You might think that Our Lady’s stipulations such as: “You will put them into boiling water and leave them there for 14 minutes, covering the receptacle so that the steam remains therein” are perhaps a little “over-the-top” ― but that is exactly what modern herbalists have discovered as being the optimal way to use Hawthorn Leaves: let them steep in boiled water for 14 minutes!! Others say 15 minutes!
PART TWO
A Deeper Look and Explanation
So what are we to make of the above recommended measures for the “Three Days of Darkness?” What is our opinion or judgment of them? Fake? Fraudulent? Fallacious? Fictitious? Fabricated? Fanciful? Foolish? Futile? Farsighted? Factual? Formidable? Fortifying? Fabulous?
Some will argue that it is all merely Private Revelation and that this does not oblige us to believe it. Yet, we should not ignore the fact that the Holy Rosary is a result of Private Revelation to St. Dominic; the Brown Scapular is the result of a Private Revelation to St. Simon Stock; the Sacred Heart devotion and First Friday devotion are a result of Private Revelation to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque; the Miraculous Medal is a result of a Private Revelation to St. Catherine Labouré; the First Saturday devotions in honor of the Immaculate Heart of Mary are a result of a Private Revelation to Sister Lucia of Fatima. The two most popular Catholic shrines in the world ― Guadalupe, Lourdes, Fatima ― are the result of Private Revelations. If we follow the (false) argument that Private Revelations are not to be believed―then we should throw our Rosaries, Scapulars, Medals into the trash can; no longer practice the First Friday and First Saturday devotions and stop pilgrimages to those shrines.
The Two Kinds of Divine Revelation―Public and Private
Divine Public Revelation ended with the death of the last of the Apostles—St. John the Evangelist. From that time there can be no new additions to the deposit of Faith. Divine Private Revelation cannot add one iota of a new teaching or dogma, but it can provide deeper insights into existing teachings and dogmas of Divine Public Revelation, or provide guidance as regards action to be taken at any particular point in time, or reminds us of crucial aspects of Divine Public Revelation that we are neglecting or have forgotten.
Thus, at Lourdes, for example, Our Lady asks for more penance—but the need for penance is contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). At Fatima, Our Lady asks for more prayer and sacrifices—yet those too are contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). At La Salette, she issues many warnings regarding neglect of prayer and penance, the dangers of being worldly, the chastisements to come upon the world—but those too can be found in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture).
The essence, or nutshell, or “bottom line” of the prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” are already contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). What are these essential elements?
(1) God punishes evil—this patently obvious. Holy Scripture is full of proof of this incontestable truth. God has always punished evil and always will: “Evil pursues sinners―and to the just, good shall be repaid!” (Proverbs 13:21). In Old Testament times, in New Testament times and in our times. The fire and brimstone that rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha, or the Great Flood are some of the more striking punishments. The punishment of evil is whole point of the “Three Days of Darkness”.
(2) God is not averse to wiping-out or destroying most of the world, as He did with the Great Flood in the days of Noe. The prophecies of the “Three Days of Darkness” state that something similar and just as widespread will be coming in our days. Therefore, there is nothing new with regards to God’s ways of acting.
(3) God protects the just—the instances of this are too numerous to mention, it is patently obvious to anyone who has a basic knowledge of Holy Scripture. Just a few examples would include the Israelites during the Exodus; Daniel in the den of lions (Daniel chapter 6); the three young men in the fire (Daniel chapter 3); and angel of God destroys the army of the Assyrians (4 Kings, chapter 19), etc. The events of the “Three Days of Darkness”, besides being a punishment upon evil people, are also protection for those who are just.
(4) God uses natural elements or materials as part of His “protection plan”—like the smearing of the blood of the Paschal Lamb on the doorposts of the homes of the Israelites in the time of Moses, prior to their Exodus from Egypt, in order to protect them from the avenging angel of God that would pass throughout Egypt, slaughtering the first born humans and animals: “Dip a bunch of hyssop in the blood that is at the door, and sprinkle the transom [crosspiece] of the door therewith, and both the door cheeks: let none of you go out of the door of his house till morning. For the Lord will pass through striking the Egyptians: and when he shall see the blood on the transom, and on both the posts, he will pass over the door of the house, and not suffer the destroyer to come into your houses and to hurt you” (Exodus 12:22-23). Or the use of water (Red Sea) to overcome and drown the Egyptian soldiers who were pursuing the Israelites during the Exodus. The use of candles during the “Three Days of Darkness” fall into a similar category.
(5) The Power of Prayers and Words over Devils and Nature. We have many instances where mere words or prayers have a profound and almost miraculous effect over demons and the elements of nature. Words can have a significant impact on the world, including the ability to create or destroy things. It is by words (and water) that a person is baptized, Original Sin is removed and Sanctifying Grace is planted in that person’s soul. It is by words that demons are driven out of a person during an exorcism. It is by words that mortal and venial sins are forgiven and removed from a person’s soul in the Sacrament of Confession and Sanctifying Grace is restored. It is by words that bread and wine become the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ during the Consecration at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is by words that water is exorcised and empowered during the rite of blessing water. It is by words that Rosaries, Scapulars, pictures and statues are made holy when blessed by a priest. The power of words is indeed very powerful!
Christ Himself is also called “The Word of God” ― and by His words many miracles were performed.
● By His words He miraculously calmed a storm: “And when Jesus entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him. And a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves―but He was asleep. And they came to Him and awakened Him, saying: ‘Lord, save us, we perish!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful, O ye of little faith?’ Then rising up He commanded the winds, and the sea, and there came a great calm. But the men wondered, saying: ‘What manner of Man is this―for the winds and the sea obey Him?’” (Matthew 8:23-27).
● The Roman centurion said to Him: “Say the word, and my servant shall be healed!” (Luke 7:7) … “Only say the word, and my servant shall be healed!” (Matthew 8:8). Jesus also cured the nobleman’s son by the mere use of words: “The ruler said to Him: ‘Lord, come down before that my son die!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way! Thy son lives!’ The man believed the word which Jesus said to him, and went his way. And as he was going down, his servants met him, and they brought word, saying that his son lived.” (John 4:49-51).
● By His words Jesus cast out demons: “They brought to Him many that were possessed with devils―and He cast out the spirits with His word” (Matthew 8:16). “There was a man with an unclean spirit, and he cried out, saying: ‘What have we to do with thee, Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou come to destroy us? I know who thou art―the Holy One of God!’ And Jesus threatened him, saying: ‘Speak no more and go out of the man!’ And the unclean spirit tearing him, and crying out with a loud voice, went out of him. And they were all amazed, insomuch that they questioned among themselves, saying: ‘What thing is this? What is this new doctrine? For with power He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey Him!’” (Mark 1:23-28).
● By His words alone He cured a leper: “A man with leprosy came to Him and begged Him on his knees: ‘If you are willing, you can make me clean!’ Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. ‘I am willing!’ he said. ‘Be clean!’ Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cleansed.” (Mark 1:40-45).
● By His words He raised people from the dead: “He went into a city that is called Naim … and a dead man was carried out, the only son of his mother … Jesus said to her: ‘Weep not!’ And He said: ‘Young man, I say to thee, arise!’ And he that was dead, sat up, and began to speak. And Jesus gave him to his mother” (Luke 7:11-17). He also raised Lazarus from the dead by mere words: “Jesus cried with a loud voice: ‘Lazarus, come forth!’ And he that had been dead came forth, bound feet and hands with winding bands, and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus said to them: ‘Loosen them and let him go!’” (John 11:1-44).
● Our Lord spoke of the power of words of prayer: “Ask―and it shall be given you! Seek―and you shall find! Knock―and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7). “In all things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive!” (Matthew 21:22). “If you abide in Me and My words abide in you―then you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you!” (John 15:7).
● Our Lord said that we could move mountains by our words alone: “If you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, then you shall say to this mountain: ‘Remove from here to there!’― and it shall move; and nothing shall be impossible to you!” (Matthew 17:19). “Jesus answering, said to them: Amen, I say to you, if you shall have Faith and stagger not, then you shall say to this mountain, Take up and cast thyself into the sea!’― and it shall be done!” (Matthew 21:21).
● We see the Apostles cure people by words alone: “A certain man was lame from his mother’s womb. When he had seen Peter and John about to go into the Temple, he asked to receive an alms. But Peter fastening his eyes upon him, said: ‘Silver and gold I have none―but what I have, I give thee! In the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, arise and walk!’ And forthwith his feet and soles received strength. And he leaping up, stood, and walked, and went in with them into the Temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God” (Acts 3:2-8).
(6) God is always seeking to bring good out of evil—This is part of the mercy of God. If God was not merciful, He would wipe everything out because of our sins and “call it a day.” Thankfully He is not like that! He seeks to restore things and bring some good out of the fall of Adam and Eve. He brings good out of the evil done to Joseph by his many brothers, when they sold him as a slave. He brings good out of Saul and converts the persecutor of Christians into the new St. Paul and makes him a pillar of the Church. The list is almost endless—every person can find many such situations in their own life. The “Three Days of Darkness” will being good out of the evil that brought about the punishment of the “Three Days of Darkness”.
Article 1
Monday & Tuesday, February 3rd & 4th
More Information on the Three Days of Darkness
Monday & Tuesday, February 3rd & 4th
More Information on the Three Days of Darkness
What are the Chief Prophecies Concerning the Three Days of Darkness?
“God will send two punishments: one will be in the form of wars, revolutions and other evils; it shall originate on Earth. The other will be sent from Heaven. There shall come over the whole Earth an intense darkness lasting three days and three nights. Nothing can be seen, and the air will be laden with pestilence which will claim mainly, but not only, the enemies of religion. It will be impossible to use any man-made lighting during this darkness, except blessed candles. He, who out of curiosity, opens his window to look out, or leaves his home, will fall dead on the spot. During these three days, people should remain in their homes, pray the Rosary and beg God for mercy. All the enemies of the Church, whether known or unknown, will perish over the whole Earth during that universal darkness, with the exception of a few whom God will soon convert. The air shall be infected by demons, who will appear under all sorts of hideous forms. Religion shall be persecuted, and priests massacred Churches shall be closed, but only for a short time. The Holy Father shall be obliged to leave Rome.” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
“The avenging arm of God will strike the wicked, and in his mighty power he will punish their pride and presumption. God will employ the powers of Hell for the extermination of these impious and heretical persons who desire to overthrow the Church and destroy its foundation. ....Innumerable legions of demons shall overrun the Earth and shall execute the orders of Divine Justice... Nothing on the Earth shall be spared ... All nature went into convulsions, the world lost its normal order and was filled with the most terrible calamity imaginable. This will be something so deplorable and atrocious that it will reduce the world to the ultimate depths of desolation.” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
“The death of the impenitent persecutors of the Church will take place during the Three Days of Darkness. He who outlives the darkness and the fear of these three days, will think that he is alone on Earth, because the whole world will be covered with cadavers (corpses).” (St. Caspar del Bufalo, 1786-1836).
“There shall be Three Days of Darkness. Not one demon shall be left in Hell … The atmosphere will be infected by innumerable devils, who shall cause the death of large multitudes of unbelievers and wicked men … They shall all come out—either to excite the wicked, or to dishearten the just. This shall be frightful! Frightful! But a grand cross shall appear and the triumph of the Church will make people quickly forget all evils. Supernatural prodigies shall appear in the heavens. There is to be a short but furious war, during which the enemies of religion and of mankind shall be universally destroyed. A general purification of the world, and the universal triumph of the Church are to follow.” (Palma Maria, born 1825; date of death unknown).
“Clouds with lightning rays of fire and a tempest of fire will pass over the whole world, and the punishment will be the most terrible ever known in the history of mankind. It will last 70 hours [three days]. The wicked will be crushed and eliminated. Many will be lost because they will have stubbornly remained in their sins. Then they will feel the force of light over darkness. The hours of darkness are near” (Blessed Elena Aiello, 1895-1961).
“I forewarn you that a day will be found and it is already appointed when there will be little sun, few stars, and no light to take a step outside of your homes, the refuges of My people. The days will be beginning to increase. It will not be at the height of summer, nor during the longer days of the year, but when the days are still short. It will not be at the end of the year, but during the first months that I shall give My clear warnings. That [single] day of darkness and lightning will be the first that I shall send to convert the impious, and to see if a great number will return to Me, before the Great Storm which will closely follow … From one night to the next, the thunder will not cease to rumble. The fire from the lightning will do a lot of damage, even in the closed homes where someone will be living in sin … Every Demon, every evil spirit will be released from Hell and allowed to roam the Earth. Terrifying apparitions will take place. Many will die from sheer fright. Fire will rain forth from the sky, all large cities will be destroyed, poisonous gases will fill the air, cries and lamentations everywhere. The unbelievers will burn in the open like withered grass. … The crisis will explode suddenly; the punishments will be shared by all and will succeed one another without interruption … The entire Earth will be afflicted; it will look like a huge graveyard” (Jesus said to Marie-Julie Jahenny, 1850-1941).
“During a darkness, lasting three days, the people given to evil will perish so that only one-fourth of mankind will survive.” (Sr. Mary of Jesus Crucified, died 1878).
“Know that with the sins of the world, increasing in horror as this age wears on, great punishments from God will come down on the world and no continent will be spared by the Wrath of God. France being guilty of apostasy and denying its vocation will be severely chastised. East of a line stretching from Bordeaux in the south-west to Lille in the north-east, everything will be laid waste and set on fire by peoples invading from the east, and also by great flaming meteorites falling in a rain of fire upon all the Earth and upon these regions especially. Revolution, war, epidemics, plagues, chemical poison gases, violent earthquakes and the re-awakening of France’s extinct volcanoes will destroy everything ... Thick darkness caused by the war, gigantic fires and fragments of burning stars, falling for three days and nights, will cause the sun to disappear, and only candles blessed on Candlemas (February 2) will give light in the hands of believers, but the godless will not see this miraculous light, because they have darkness in their souls. In this way, my son, three quarters of mankind will be destroyed, and in certain parts of France survivors will have to go 60 miles to find another live human being . . . . Several nations will disappear off the face of the map” (Father Constant Louis Marie Pel, 1876-1966).
“When the great time will come, in which mankind will face its last, hard trial, it will be foreshadowed by striking changes in nature; the alteration between cold and heat will become more intensive, storms will have more catastrophic effects, Earthquakes will destroy greater regions and the seas will overflow many lowlands. Not all of it will be the result of natural causes, but man will penetrate into the bowels of the Earth and will reach into the clouds, gambling with its own existence. Before the powers of destruction will succeed in their design, the universe will be thrown into disorder … The nebula of the Greater Bear will arrive in the vicinity of Earth ... and will fill the space of five hundred suns at the horizon. It will more and more cover up the light of the sun until the days will be like nights at full moon ... By this time mankind will be stricken with terror. Birds will be like reptiles and will not use their wings. Animals of the ground, in fear and alarm, will raise such a clamor that it will make human hearts tremble. Men will flee their homes, in order not to see the weird occurrence. Finally, complete darkness will set in and last for three days and three nights. During this time, men, deprived of the power of light, will fall into a slumber-like sleep, from which many will not awaken, especially those who have no spark of spiritual life. When the sun will again rise and emerge, the Earth will be covered with a blanket of ashes like snow in winter, except that the ashes will have the color of sulfur. Damp fog will ascend from the ground, illuminated by igneous gases. Of mankind there will be more dead than there have been casualties in all wars. In the homes of the children of light, the Book of the Apocalypse will be read, and, in the palaces of the Church, they will await the arrival of the great comet. On the seventh day after the return of light, Earth will have absorbed the ashes and formed such a fertility as has not been experienced ever before.” (Johann Friede, 1204-1257).
What to Make of the “Three Days of Darkness”?
Now that we have had an in-depth look at the prophecies themselves, what are we to make of them? How are we to look upon them? How are we to react to them? Should we act upon them? If so, what should we do?
Prophetical Purpose
Divine Public Revelation ended with the death of the last of the Apostles—St. John the Evangelist. From that time there can be no new additions to the deposit of Faith. Divine Private Revelation cannot add one iota of a new teaching or dogma, but it can provide deeper insights into existing teachings and dogmas of Divine Public Revelation, or provide guidance as regards action to be taken at any particular point in time, or reminds us of crucial aspects of Divine Public Revelation that we are neglecting or have forgotten.
Thus, at Lourdes, for example, Our Lady asks for more penance—but the need for penance is contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). At Fatima, Our Lady asks for more prayer and sacrifices—yet those too are contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). At La Salette, she issues many warnings regarding neglect of prayer and penance, the dangers of being worldly, the chastisements to come upon the world—but those too can be found in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture).
The Essence of the Prophecies of the “Three Days of Darkness”
The essence, or nutshell, or “bottom line” of the prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” are already contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). What are these essential elements?
(1) God punishes evil—this patently obvious. Holy Scripture is full of proof of this incontestable truth. God has always punished evil and always will. In Old Testament times, in New Testament times and in our times. The fire and brimstone that rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha, or the Great Flood are some of the more striking punishments. The punishment of evil is whole point of the “Three Days of Darkness”.
(2) God is not averse to wiping-out or destroying most of the world, as He did with the Great Flood in the days of Noe. The prophecies of the “Three Days of Darkness” state that something similar and just as widespread will be coming in our days. Therefore, there is nothing new with regards to God’s ways of acting.
(3) God protects the just—the instances of this are too numerous to mention, it is patently obvious to anyone who has a basic knowledge of Holy Scripture. Just a few examples would include the Israelites during the Exodus; Daniel in the den of lions (Daniel chapter 6); the three young men in the fire (Daniel chapter 3); and angel of God destroys the army of the Assyrians (4 Kings, chapter 19), etc. The events of the “Three Days of Darkness”, besides being a punishment upon evil people, are also protection for those who are just.
(4) God uses natural elements or materials as part of His “protection plan”—like the smearing of the blood of the Paschal Lamb on the doorposts of the homes of the Israelites in the time of Moses, prior to their Exodus from Egypt, in order to protect them from the avenging angel of God that would pass throughout Egypt, slaughtering the first born humans and animals. Or the use of water (Red Sea) to overcome and drown the Egyptian soldiers who were pursuing the Israelites during the Exodus. The use of candles during the “Three Days of Darkness” fall into a similar category.
(5) God is always seeking to bring good out of evil—This is part of the mercy of God. If God was not merciful, He would wipe everything out because of our sins and “call it a day”. Thankfully He is not like that! He seeks to restore things and bring some good out of the fall of Adam and Eve. He brings good out of the evil done to Joseph by his many brothers, when they sold him as a slave. He brings good out of Saul and converts the persecutor of Christians into the new St. Paul and makes him a pillar of the Church. The list is almost endless—every person can find many such situations in their own life. The “Three Days of Darkness” will being good out of the evil that brought about the punishment of the “Three Days of Darkness”.
Our Lady and Three Days of Darkness
Though Our Lady does not explicitly mention the “Three Days of Darkness” by name, she certainly speaks of them implicitly, by describing the very same events, catastrophes, and punishments as are described in the prophecies of the “Three Days of Darkness”. We will take the similar predictions that ‘dovetail’ from the various “Three Days of Darkness” prophecies quoted in the previous article, group them all together and then compare them to Our Lady’s prophecies.
The Sinfulness of the World
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “They will have stubbornly remained in their sins” (Blessed Elena Aiello, 1895-1961).
Our Lady Says:
► Our Lady constantly speaks of this sinfulness and the dangers of stubbornness in sin: “The precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of morals … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world” (Quito).
► “The sins of those dedicated to God cry out towards Heaven and call for vengeance, and now vengeance is at their door … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth” (La Salette).
► “Many men in this world afflict the Lord … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity” (Akita).
The Devils Will Infest and Rule the World
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “The air shall be infected by demons, who will appear under all sorts of hideous forms” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
● “God will employ the powers of Hell for the extermination of these impious and heretical persons who desire to overthrow the Church and destroy its foundation. ....Innumerable legions of demons shall overrun the Earth and shall execute the orders of Divine Justice” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
● “There shall be Three Days of Darkness. Not one demon shall be left in Hell … The atmosphere will be infected by innumerable devils … They shall all come out—either to excite the wicked, or to dishearten the just. This shall be frightful! Frightful!” (Palma Maria, born 1825; date of death unknown).
● “Every Demon, every evil spirit will be released from Hell and allowed to roam the Earth. Terrifying apparitions will take place. Many will die from sheer fright. Fire will rain forth from the sky, all large cities will be destroyed, poisonous gases will fill the air, cries and lamentations everywhere. The unbelievers will burn in the open like withered grass. … The crisis will explode suddenly; the punishments will be shared by all and will succeed one another without interruption … The entire Earth will be afflicted; it will look like a huge graveyard” (Words of Jesus said to Marie-Julie Jahenny, 1850-1941).
Our Lady Says:
► “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell … The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God ... They will have great power over Nature: there will be churches built to serve these spirits. People will be transported from one place to another by these evil spirits … On occasions, the dead and the righteous will be brought back to life. That is to say that these dead will take on the form of righteous souls which had lived on Earth, in order to lead men further astray; these so-called resurrected dead—who will be nothing but the devil in this form—will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus, denying the existence of Heaven; that is also to say, the souls of the damned. All these souls will appear as if fixed to their bodies. Everywhere there will be extraordinary wonders, as true Faith has faded and false light brightens the people.” (La Salette).
► “Others, impelled by the malice of the devil, will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church” (Quito).
► “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres...churches and altars sacked” (Akita).
The Persecution of the Church
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “Religion shall be persecuted, and priests massacred Churches shall be closed” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
● “Impious and heretical persons [will] desire to overthrow the Church and destroy its foundation” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
● “The death of the impenitent persecutors of the Church will take place during the Three Days of Darkness” (St. Caspar del Bufalo, 1786-1836).
Our Lady Says:
► “Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death” (La Salette).
► “The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer” (Fatima).
► “For a while the Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... The Holy Father will suffer a great deal. I will be with him until the end and receive his sacrifice” (La Salette).
► “All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds … They will abolish civil rights as well as ecclesiastical. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family” (La Salette).
God Will Punish the World
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “God will send two punishments: one will be in the form of wars, revolutions and other evils; it shall originate on Earth. The other will be sent from Heaven” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
● “Revolution, war, epidemics, plagues, chemical poison gases will destroy everything” (Father Constant Louis Marie Pel, 1876-1966).
● “When the great time will come, in which mankind will face its last, hard trial, it will be foreshadowed by striking changes in nature. The alteration between cold and heat will become more intensive. Storms will have more catastrophic effects. Earthquakes will destroy greater regions and the seas will overflow many lowlands. Not all of it will be the result of natural causes, but man will penetrate into the bowels of the Earth and will reach into the clouds, gambling with its own existence. Before the powers of destruction will succeed in their design, the universe will be thrown into disorder” (Johann Friede).
Our Lady Says:
► Our Lady speaks of the same: “The impious will rage a cruel war” (Quito).
► “Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! There will be bloody wars and famines, plagues and infectious diseases!” (La Salette).
► “In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before” (Akita).
► “Various nations will be annihilated” (Fatima).
Punishment Shared by Good and Bad Alike
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “The punishments will be shared by all and will succeed one another without interruption … The entire Earth will be afflicted” (Words Jesus said to Marie-Julie Jahenny, 1850-1941).
● “God will send two punishments: one will be in the form of wars, revolutions and other evils; it shall originate on Earth. The other will be sent from Heaven ... The air will be laden with pestilence which will claim mainly, but not only, the enemies of religion” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
● “Nothing on the Earth shall be spared ... All nature went into convulsions, the world lost its normal order and was filled with the most terrible calamity imaginable. This will be something so deplorable and atrocious that it will reduce the world to the ultimate depths of desolation.” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
● “The punishment will be the most terrible ever known in the history of mankind” (Blessed Elena Aiello, 1895-1961).
Our Lady Says:
► “God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family. “ (La Salette).
► “The good will be martyred” (Fatima).
► “Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful” (Akita).
Calamities Throughout the World
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “At that time there shall be such a terrible crisis that people, frightened by events, shall believe that the end of the world is come. Blood shall flow in several large cities. The very elements shall be convulsed. It will be like a little general judgment” (Fr. Nectou, died 1777).
● “All nature went into convulsions, the world lost its normal order and was filled with the most terrible calamity imaginable” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
● “God will send two punishments: one will be in the form of wars, revolutions and other evils; it shall originate on Earth. The other will be sent from Heaven” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
Our Lady Says:
► “During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private” (Quito).
► “The Earth will be struck by calamities of all kinds—in addition to plague and famine which will be widespread ... Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other” (La Salette).
► “The seasons will be altered, the Earth will produce nothing but bad fruit, the stars will lose their regular motion, the moon will only reflect a faint reddish glow. Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains and cities” (La Salette).
► “Various nations will be annihilated” (Fatima).
All Will Seem Lost
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “Nothing on the Earth shall be spared ... All nature went into convulsions, the world lost its normal order and was filled with the most terrible calamity imaginable. This will be something so deplorable and atrocious that it will reduce the world to the ultimate depths of desolation.” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
Our Lady Says:
► “There will be occasions when all will seem to be lost and paralyzed … Native and foreign blood will flow, including that of secular and regular priests as well as that of other religious. This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph!” (Quito).
► “The world will be in dismay … People will believe that all is lost!” (La Salette).
The World Will Be Like A Graveyard
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “The entire Earth will … look like a huge graveyard” (Jesus said to Marie-Julie Jahenny, 1850-1941).
● “Only one-fourth of mankind will survive” (Sr. Mary of Jesus Crucified, died 1878).
● “Three quarters of mankind will be destroyed, and in certain parts of France survivors will have to go 60 miles to find another live human being . . . . Several nations will disappear off the face of the map” (Father Constant Louis Marie Pel, 1876-1966).
● “This will be something so deplorable and atrocious that it will reduce the world to the ultimate depths of desolation.” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
● “All the enemies of the Church, whether known or unknown, will perish over the whole Earth during that universal darkness, with the exception of a few whom God will soon convert. Religion shall be persecuted and priests massacred. Churches shall be closed” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
● “When the sun will again rise and emerge, the Earth will be covered with a blanket of ashes like snow in winter, except that the ashes will have the color of sulfur. Damp fog will ascend from the ground, illuminated by igneous gases. Of mankind there will be more dead than there have been casualties in all wars” (Johann Friede, 1204-1257).
● “He who outlives the darkness and the fear of these three days, will think that he is alone on Earth, because the whole world will be covered with cadavers (corpses).” (St. Caspar del Bufalo, 1786-1836).
Our Lady Says:
► “And then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like” (La Salette).
► “Various nations will be annihilated” (Fatima).
► “Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad … The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” (Akita).
Summary
Of course, all this is just Divine Private Revelation—yet, let us beware of rejecting all Divine Private Revelation as being inconsequential. Holy Scripture warns: “Despise not prophecies” (1 Thessalonians 5:20). What would be the point of Our Lady coming from Heaven with warnings if we were to ignore or even despise them? What an insult to God to pridefully ignore Our Lady or even the saints and mystics to whom God went to the trouble of passing on messages for our benefit!
Not that this means that we have to naively and gullibly accept all that SEEMS to come from Heaven. Holy Scripture tells us that the devil can and will try to fool us. St. Paul speaks of the devil as appearing as an angel of light―“Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14).
Satan has mimicked or aped true apparitions many a time—He tried to appear in the form of Our Lady in vicinity of Lourdes, to draw way attention from the true apparition. The devil appeared as Our Lord to St. John of the Cross and as the spiritual director of St. Padre Pio.
Holy Scripture tells us be wary: “Believe not every spirit, but test the spirits if they be of God--because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1). Nevertheless, it is folly to reject all Divine Private Revelations because some of them are false. Careful discernment and judgment is required, as well as avoiding a pride that rushes to pronounce things before the Church has even spoken on the matter!
Finally, it must be remembered that no matter how terrifying the “Three Days of Darkness” may seem, they are a merciful intervention of God in order to destroy the evildoers, who will have almost wrecked the world before God justly steps in. The “Three Days of Darkness” are to be feared more by evildoers than feared by the just.
We have seen how the “Three Days of Darkness” dovetail with Holy Scripture and God’s ways of acting, as well as dovetailing with Our Lady’s warnings and prophecies at the chief Church approved apparitions of Our Lady. Let us remember that all such prophecies are CONDITIONAL and their ultimate arrival or their severity depends upon mankind’s response the warnings given. As we sow, so shall we reap!
However, Pope John Paul II said in 1980, at Fulda, in Germany, that we can no longer avoid what is coming—we can only mitigate or soften the blow. We remind you of the relevant text of the conference of Pope John Paul II, in Fulda, Germany, as reported by the German Catholic journal and magazine, Stimme des Glaubens, in 1981. The Holy Father was asked: “What about the Third Secret of Fatima? Should it not have already been published by 1960?”
Pope John Paul II replied: “Given the seriousness of the contents, my predecessors in the Petrine office diplomatically preferred to postpone publication so as not to encourage the world power of Communism to make certain moves. On the other hand, it should be sufficient for all Christians to know this: if there is a message in which it is written that the oceans will flood whole areas of the Earth, and that from one moment to the next millions of people will perish, truly the publication of such a message is no longer something to be so much desired. Many wish to know simply from curiosity and a taste for the sensational, but they forget that knowledge also implies responsibility. They only seek the satisfaction of their curiosity, and that is dangerous if at the same time they are not disposed to do something, and if they are convinced that it is impossible to do anything against evil.” At this point the Pope grasped a Rosary and said: “Here is the remedy against this evil. Pray, pray, and ask for nothing more. Leave everything else to the Mother of God.”
The Holy Father was then asked: “What is going to happen to the Church?” He answered: “We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ … With your and my prayer it is possible to mitigate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectively renewed. How many times has the renewal of the Church sprung from blood! This time, too, it will not be otherwise. We must be strong and prepared, and trust in Christ and His Mother, and be very, very assiduous in praying the Rosary.”
“God will send two punishments: one will be in the form of wars, revolutions and other evils; it shall originate on Earth. The other will be sent from Heaven. There shall come over the whole Earth an intense darkness lasting three days and three nights. Nothing can be seen, and the air will be laden with pestilence which will claim mainly, but not only, the enemies of religion. It will be impossible to use any man-made lighting during this darkness, except blessed candles. He, who out of curiosity, opens his window to look out, or leaves his home, will fall dead on the spot. During these three days, people should remain in their homes, pray the Rosary and beg God for mercy. All the enemies of the Church, whether known or unknown, will perish over the whole Earth during that universal darkness, with the exception of a few whom God will soon convert. The air shall be infected by demons, who will appear under all sorts of hideous forms. Religion shall be persecuted, and priests massacred Churches shall be closed, but only for a short time. The Holy Father shall be obliged to leave Rome.” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
“The avenging arm of God will strike the wicked, and in his mighty power he will punish their pride and presumption. God will employ the powers of Hell for the extermination of these impious and heretical persons who desire to overthrow the Church and destroy its foundation. ....Innumerable legions of demons shall overrun the Earth and shall execute the orders of Divine Justice... Nothing on the Earth shall be spared ... All nature went into convulsions, the world lost its normal order and was filled with the most terrible calamity imaginable. This will be something so deplorable and atrocious that it will reduce the world to the ultimate depths of desolation.” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
“The death of the impenitent persecutors of the Church will take place during the Three Days of Darkness. He who outlives the darkness and the fear of these three days, will think that he is alone on Earth, because the whole world will be covered with cadavers (corpses).” (St. Caspar del Bufalo, 1786-1836).
“There shall be Three Days of Darkness. Not one demon shall be left in Hell … The atmosphere will be infected by innumerable devils, who shall cause the death of large multitudes of unbelievers and wicked men … They shall all come out—either to excite the wicked, or to dishearten the just. This shall be frightful! Frightful! But a grand cross shall appear and the triumph of the Church will make people quickly forget all evils. Supernatural prodigies shall appear in the heavens. There is to be a short but furious war, during which the enemies of religion and of mankind shall be universally destroyed. A general purification of the world, and the universal triumph of the Church are to follow.” (Palma Maria, born 1825; date of death unknown).
“Clouds with lightning rays of fire and a tempest of fire will pass over the whole world, and the punishment will be the most terrible ever known in the history of mankind. It will last 70 hours [three days]. The wicked will be crushed and eliminated. Many will be lost because they will have stubbornly remained in their sins. Then they will feel the force of light over darkness. The hours of darkness are near” (Blessed Elena Aiello, 1895-1961).
“I forewarn you that a day will be found and it is already appointed when there will be little sun, few stars, and no light to take a step outside of your homes, the refuges of My people. The days will be beginning to increase. It will not be at the height of summer, nor during the longer days of the year, but when the days are still short. It will not be at the end of the year, but during the first months that I shall give My clear warnings. That [single] day of darkness and lightning will be the first that I shall send to convert the impious, and to see if a great number will return to Me, before the Great Storm which will closely follow … From one night to the next, the thunder will not cease to rumble. The fire from the lightning will do a lot of damage, even in the closed homes where someone will be living in sin … Every Demon, every evil spirit will be released from Hell and allowed to roam the Earth. Terrifying apparitions will take place. Many will die from sheer fright. Fire will rain forth from the sky, all large cities will be destroyed, poisonous gases will fill the air, cries and lamentations everywhere. The unbelievers will burn in the open like withered grass. … The crisis will explode suddenly; the punishments will be shared by all and will succeed one another without interruption … The entire Earth will be afflicted; it will look like a huge graveyard” (Jesus said to Marie-Julie Jahenny, 1850-1941).
“During a darkness, lasting three days, the people given to evil will perish so that only one-fourth of mankind will survive.” (Sr. Mary of Jesus Crucified, died 1878).
“Know that with the sins of the world, increasing in horror as this age wears on, great punishments from God will come down on the world and no continent will be spared by the Wrath of God. France being guilty of apostasy and denying its vocation will be severely chastised. East of a line stretching from Bordeaux in the south-west to Lille in the north-east, everything will be laid waste and set on fire by peoples invading from the east, and also by great flaming meteorites falling in a rain of fire upon all the Earth and upon these regions especially. Revolution, war, epidemics, plagues, chemical poison gases, violent earthquakes and the re-awakening of France’s extinct volcanoes will destroy everything ... Thick darkness caused by the war, gigantic fires and fragments of burning stars, falling for three days and nights, will cause the sun to disappear, and only candles blessed on Candlemas (February 2) will give light in the hands of believers, but the godless will not see this miraculous light, because they have darkness in their souls. In this way, my son, three quarters of mankind will be destroyed, and in certain parts of France survivors will have to go 60 miles to find another live human being . . . . Several nations will disappear off the face of the map” (Father Constant Louis Marie Pel, 1876-1966).
“When the great time will come, in which mankind will face its last, hard trial, it will be foreshadowed by striking changes in nature; the alteration between cold and heat will become more intensive, storms will have more catastrophic effects, Earthquakes will destroy greater regions and the seas will overflow many lowlands. Not all of it will be the result of natural causes, but man will penetrate into the bowels of the Earth and will reach into the clouds, gambling with its own existence. Before the powers of destruction will succeed in their design, the universe will be thrown into disorder … The nebula of the Greater Bear will arrive in the vicinity of Earth ... and will fill the space of five hundred suns at the horizon. It will more and more cover up the light of the sun until the days will be like nights at full moon ... By this time mankind will be stricken with terror. Birds will be like reptiles and will not use their wings. Animals of the ground, in fear and alarm, will raise such a clamor that it will make human hearts tremble. Men will flee their homes, in order not to see the weird occurrence. Finally, complete darkness will set in and last for three days and three nights. During this time, men, deprived of the power of light, will fall into a slumber-like sleep, from which many will not awaken, especially those who have no spark of spiritual life. When the sun will again rise and emerge, the Earth will be covered with a blanket of ashes like snow in winter, except that the ashes will have the color of sulfur. Damp fog will ascend from the ground, illuminated by igneous gases. Of mankind there will be more dead than there have been casualties in all wars. In the homes of the children of light, the Book of the Apocalypse will be read, and, in the palaces of the Church, they will await the arrival of the great comet. On the seventh day after the return of light, Earth will have absorbed the ashes and formed such a fertility as has not been experienced ever before.” (Johann Friede, 1204-1257).
What to Make of the “Three Days of Darkness”?
Now that we have had an in-depth look at the prophecies themselves, what are we to make of them? How are we to look upon them? How are we to react to them? Should we act upon them? If so, what should we do?
Prophetical Purpose
Divine Public Revelation ended with the death of the last of the Apostles—St. John the Evangelist. From that time there can be no new additions to the deposit of Faith. Divine Private Revelation cannot add one iota of a new teaching or dogma, but it can provide deeper insights into existing teachings and dogmas of Divine Public Revelation, or provide guidance as regards action to be taken at any particular point in time, or reminds us of crucial aspects of Divine Public Revelation that we are neglecting or have forgotten.
Thus, at Lourdes, for example, Our Lady asks for more penance—but the need for penance is contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). At Fatima, Our Lady asks for more prayer and sacrifices—yet those too are contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). At La Salette, she issues many warnings regarding neglect of prayer and penance, the dangers of being worldly, the chastisements to come upon the world—but those too can be found in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture).
The Essence of the Prophecies of the “Three Days of Darkness”
The essence, or nutshell, or “bottom line” of the prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” are already contained in Divine Public Revelation (Holy Scripture). What are these essential elements?
(1) God punishes evil—this patently obvious. Holy Scripture is full of proof of this incontestable truth. God has always punished evil and always will. In Old Testament times, in New Testament times and in our times. The fire and brimstone that rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha, or the Great Flood are some of the more striking punishments. The punishment of evil is whole point of the “Three Days of Darkness”.
(2) God is not averse to wiping-out or destroying most of the world, as He did with the Great Flood in the days of Noe. The prophecies of the “Three Days of Darkness” state that something similar and just as widespread will be coming in our days. Therefore, there is nothing new with regards to God’s ways of acting.
(3) God protects the just—the instances of this are too numerous to mention, it is patently obvious to anyone who has a basic knowledge of Holy Scripture. Just a few examples would include the Israelites during the Exodus; Daniel in the den of lions (Daniel chapter 6); the three young men in the fire (Daniel chapter 3); and angel of God destroys the army of the Assyrians (4 Kings, chapter 19), etc. The events of the “Three Days of Darkness”, besides being a punishment upon evil people, are also protection for those who are just.
(4) God uses natural elements or materials as part of His “protection plan”—like the smearing of the blood of the Paschal Lamb on the doorposts of the homes of the Israelites in the time of Moses, prior to their Exodus from Egypt, in order to protect them from the avenging angel of God that would pass throughout Egypt, slaughtering the first born humans and animals. Or the use of water (Red Sea) to overcome and drown the Egyptian soldiers who were pursuing the Israelites during the Exodus. The use of candles during the “Three Days of Darkness” fall into a similar category.
(5) God is always seeking to bring good out of evil—This is part of the mercy of God. If God was not merciful, He would wipe everything out because of our sins and “call it a day”. Thankfully He is not like that! He seeks to restore things and bring some good out of the fall of Adam and Eve. He brings good out of the evil done to Joseph by his many brothers, when they sold him as a slave. He brings good out of Saul and converts the persecutor of Christians into the new St. Paul and makes him a pillar of the Church. The list is almost endless—every person can find many such situations in their own life. The “Three Days of Darkness” will being good out of the evil that brought about the punishment of the “Three Days of Darkness”.
Our Lady and Three Days of Darkness
Though Our Lady does not explicitly mention the “Three Days of Darkness” by name, she certainly speaks of them implicitly, by describing the very same events, catastrophes, and punishments as are described in the prophecies of the “Three Days of Darkness”. We will take the similar predictions that ‘dovetail’ from the various “Three Days of Darkness” prophecies quoted in the previous article, group them all together and then compare them to Our Lady’s prophecies.
The Sinfulness of the World
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “They will have stubbornly remained in their sins” (Blessed Elena Aiello, 1895-1961).
Our Lady Says:
► Our Lady constantly speaks of this sinfulness and the dangers of stubbornness in sin: “The precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of morals … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world” (Quito).
► “The sins of those dedicated to God cry out towards Heaven and call for vengeance, and now vengeance is at their door … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth” (La Salette).
► “Many men in this world afflict the Lord … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity” (Akita).
The Devils Will Infest and Rule the World
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “The air shall be infected by demons, who will appear under all sorts of hideous forms” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
● “God will employ the powers of Hell for the extermination of these impious and heretical persons who desire to overthrow the Church and destroy its foundation. ....Innumerable legions of demons shall overrun the Earth and shall execute the orders of Divine Justice” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
● “There shall be Three Days of Darkness. Not one demon shall be left in Hell … The atmosphere will be infected by innumerable devils … They shall all come out—either to excite the wicked, or to dishearten the just. This shall be frightful! Frightful!” (Palma Maria, born 1825; date of death unknown).
● “Every Demon, every evil spirit will be released from Hell and allowed to roam the Earth. Terrifying apparitions will take place. Many will die from sheer fright. Fire will rain forth from the sky, all large cities will be destroyed, poisonous gases will fill the air, cries and lamentations everywhere. The unbelievers will burn in the open like withered grass. … The crisis will explode suddenly; the punishments will be shared by all and will succeed one another without interruption … The entire Earth will be afflicted; it will look like a huge graveyard” (Words of Jesus said to Marie-Julie Jahenny, 1850-1941).
Our Lady Says:
► “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell … The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God ... They will have great power over Nature: there will be churches built to serve these spirits. People will be transported from one place to another by these evil spirits … On occasions, the dead and the righteous will be brought back to life. That is to say that these dead will take on the form of righteous souls which had lived on Earth, in order to lead men further astray; these so-called resurrected dead—who will be nothing but the devil in this form—will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus, denying the existence of Heaven; that is also to say, the souls of the damned. All these souls will appear as if fixed to their bodies. Everywhere there will be extraordinary wonders, as true Faith has faded and false light brightens the people.” (La Salette).
► “Others, impelled by the malice of the devil, will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church” (Quito).
► “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres...churches and altars sacked” (Akita).
The Persecution of the Church
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “Religion shall be persecuted, and priests massacred Churches shall be closed” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
● “Impious and heretical persons [will] desire to overthrow the Church and destroy its foundation” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
● “The death of the impenitent persecutors of the Church will take place during the Three Days of Darkness” (St. Caspar del Bufalo, 1786-1836).
Our Lady Says:
► “Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death” (La Salette).
► “The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer” (Fatima).
► “For a while the Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... The Holy Father will suffer a great deal. I will be with him until the end and receive his sacrifice” (La Salette).
► “All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds … They will abolish civil rights as well as ecclesiastical. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family” (La Salette).
God Will Punish the World
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “God will send two punishments: one will be in the form of wars, revolutions and other evils; it shall originate on Earth. The other will be sent from Heaven” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
● “Revolution, war, epidemics, plagues, chemical poison gases will destroy everything” (Father Constant Louis Marie Pel, 1876-1966).
● “When the great time will come, in which mankind will face its last, hard trial, it will be foreshadowed by striking changes in nature. The alteration between cold and heat will become more intensive. Storms will have more catastrophic effects. Earthquakes will destroy greater regions and the seas will overflow many lowlands. Not all of it will be the result of natural causes, but man will penetrate into the bowels of the Earth and will reach into the clouds, gambling with its own existence. Before the powers of destruction will succeed in their design, the universe will be thrown into disorder” (Johann Friede).
Our Lady Says:
► Our Lady speaks of the same: “The impious will rage a cruel war” (Quito).
► “Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! There will be bloody wars and famines, plagues and infectious diseases!” (La Salette).
► “In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before” (Akita).
► “Various nations will be annihilated” (Fatima).
Punishment Shared by Good and Bad Alike
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “The punishments will be shared by all and will succeed one another without interruption … The entire Earth will be afflicted” (Words Jesus said to Marie-Julie Jahenny, 1850-1941).
● “God will send two punishments: one will be in the form of wars, revolutions and other evils; it shall originate on Earth. The other will be sent from Heaven ... The air will be laden with pestilence which will claim mainly, but not only, the enemies of religion” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
● “Nothing on the Earth shall be spared ... All nature went into convulsions, the world lost its normal order and was filled with the most terrible calamity imaginable. This will be something so deplorable and atrocious that it will reduce the world to the ultimate depths of desolation.” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
● “The punishment will be the most terrible ever known in the history of mankind” (Blessed Elena Aiello, 1895-1961).
Our Lady Says:
► “God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family. “ (La Salette).
► “The good will be martyred” (Fatima).
► “Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful” (Akita).
Calamities Throughout the World
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “At that time there shall be such a terrible crisis that people, frightened by events, shall believe that the end of the world is come. Blood shall flow in several large cities. The very elements shall be convulsed. It will be like a little general judgment” (Fr. Nectou, died 1777).
● “All nature went into convulsions, the world lost its normal order and was filled with the most terrible calamity imaginable” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
● “God will send two punishments: one will be in the form of wars, revolutions and other evils; it shall originate on Earth. The other will be sent from Heaven” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
Our Lady Says:
► “During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private” (Quito).
► “The Earth will be struck by calamities of all kinds—in addition to plague and famine which will be widespread ... Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other” (La Salette).
► “The seasons will be altered, the Earth will produce nothing but bad fruit, the stars will lose their regular motion, the moon will only reflect a faint reddish glow. Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains and cities” (La Salette).
► “Various nations will be annihilated” (Fatima).
All Will Seem Lost
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “Nothing on the Earth shall be spared ... All nature went into convulsions, the world lost its normal order and was filled with the most terrible calamity imaginable. This will be something so deplorable and atrocious that it will reduce the world to the ultimate depths of desolation.” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
Our Lady Says:
► “There will be occasions when all will seem to be lost and paralyzed … Native and foreign blood will flow, including that of secular and regular priests as well as that of other religious. This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph!” (Quito).
► “The world will be in dismay … People will believe that all is lost!” (La Salette).
The World Will Be Like A Graveyard
Prophecies on the “Three Days of Darkness” say:
● “The entire Earth will … look like a huge graveyard” (Jesus said to Marie-Julie Jahenny, 1850-1941).
● “Only one-fourth of mankind will survive” (Sr. Mary of Jesus Crucified, died 1878).
● “Three quarters of mankind will be destroyed, and in certain parts of France survivors will have to go 60 miles to find another live human being . . . . Several nations will disappear off the face of the map” (Father Constant Louis Marie Pel, 1876-1966).
● “This will be something so deplorable and atrocious that it will reduce the world to the ultimate depths of desolation.” (Blessed Elizabeth Canori-Mora, 1774–1825).
● “All the enemies of the Church, whether known or unknown, will perish over the whole Earth during that universal darkness, with the exception of a few whom God will soon convert. Religion shall be persecuted and priests massacred. Churches shall be closed” (Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, 1769-1837).
● “When the sun will again rise and emerge, the Earth will be covered with a blanket of ashes like snow in winter, except that the ashes will have the color of sulfur. Damp fog will ascend from the ground, illuminated by igneous gases. Of mankind there will be more dead than there have been casualties in all wars” (Johann Friede, 1204-1257).
● “He who outlives the darkness and the fear of these three days, will think that he is alone on Earth, because the whole world will be covered with cadavers (corpses).” (St. Caspar del Bufalo, 1786-1836).
Our Lady Says:
► “And then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like” (La Salette).
► “Various nations will be annihilated” (Fatima).
► “Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad … The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” (Akita).
Summary
Of course, all this is just Divine Private Revelation—yet, let us beware of rejecting all Divine Private Revelation as being inconsequential. Holy Scripture warns: “Despise not prophecies” (1 Thessalonians 5:20). What would be the point of Our Lady coming from Heaven with warnings if we were to ignore or even despise them? What an insult to God to pridefully ignore Our Lady or even the saints and mystics to whom God went to the trouble of passing on messages for our benefit!
Not that this means that we have to naively and gullibly accept all that SEEMS to come from Heaven. Holy Scripture tells us that the devil can and will try to fool us. St. Paul speaks of the devil as appearing as an angel of light―“Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14).
Satan has mimicked or aped true apparitions many a time—He tried to appear in the form of Our Lady in vicinity of Lourdes, to draw way attention from the true apparition. The devil appeared as Our Lord to St. John of the Cross and as the spiritual director of St. Padre Pio.
Holy Scripture tells us be wary: “Believe not every spirit, but test the spirits if they be of God--because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1). Nevertheless, it is folly to reject all Divine Private Revelations because some of them are false. Careful discernment and judgment is required, as well as avoiding a pride that rushes to pronounce things before the Church has even spoken on the matter!
Finally, it must be remembered that no matter how terrifying the “Three Days of Darkness” may seem, they are a merciful intervention of God in order to destroy the evildoers, who will have almost wrecked the world before God justly steps in. The “Three Days of Darkness” are to be feared more by evildoers than feared by the just.
We have seen how the “Three Days of Darkness” dovetail with Holy Scripture and God’s ways of acting, as well as dovetailing with Our Lady’s warnings and prophecies at the chief Church approved apparitions of Our Lady. Let us remember that all such prophecies are CONDITIONAL and their ultimate arrival or their severity depends upon mankind’s response the warnings given. As we sow, so shall we reap!
However, Pope John Paul II said in 1980, at Fulda, in Germany, that we can no longer avoid what is coming—we can only mitigate or soften the blow. We remind you of the relevant text of the conference of Pope John Paul II, in Fulda, Germany, as reported by the German Catholic journal and magazine, Stimme des Glaubens, in 1981. The Holy Father was asked: “What about the Third Secret of Fatima? Should it not have already been published by 1960?”
Pope John Paul II replied: “Given the seriousness of the contents, my predecessors in the Petrine office diplomatically preferred to postpone publication so as not to encourage the world power of Communism to make certain moves. On the other hand, it should be sufficient for all Christians to know this: if there is a message in which it is written that the oceans will flood whole areas of the Earth, and that from one moment to the next millions of people will perish, truly the publication of such a message is no longer something to be so much desired. Many wish to know simply from curiosity and a taste for the sensational, but they forget that knowledge also implies responsibility. They only seek the satisfaction of their curiosity, and that is dangerous if at the same time they are not disposed to do something, and if they are convinced that it is impossible to do anything against evil.” At this point the Pope grasped a Rosary and said: “Here is the remedy against this evil. Pray, pray, and ask for nothing more. Leave everything else to the Mother of God.”
The Holy Father was then asked: “What is going to happen to the Church?” He answered: “We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ … With your and my prayer it is possible to mitigate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectively renewed. How many times has the renewal of the Church sprung from blood! This time, too, it will not be otherwise. We must be strong and prepared, and trust in Christ and His Mother, and be very, very assiduous in praying the Rosary.”
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR CHRISTMAS 2024-2025
Article 32
Sunday, February 2nd
Candlemas & the Three Days of Darkness
Sunday, February 2nd
Candlemas & the Three Days of Darkness
Everything has a positive and negative. Heat and cold; wet and dry; rough and smooth; night and day; light and darkness; health and sickness; good and evil; Heaven and Hell; God and Satan; etc. In this article, we will focus on light and darkness; good and evil―especially in referral to the so-called “Three Days of Darkness” and the blessed candles that are supposed to be lit during that time in order to protect the true followers of Christ. God always seeks to bring good out of evil, just as He brought light out of darkness in the creation of the universe.
In the Beginning … was Darkness
“In the beginning God created Heaven, and Earth. And the Earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the spirit of God moved over the waters. And God said: ‘Be light made!’ And light was made. And God saw the light that it was good; and he divided the light from the darkness. And he called the light Day, and the darkness Night; and there was evening and morning one day” (Genesis 1:1-5).
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was made nothing that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men ... That was the true Light, which enlightens every man that cometh into this world! ... And the light shone in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it!” (John 1:1-9).
“And when His parents brought in the Child Jesus, to do for Him according to the custom of the law, Simeon also took Him into his arms, and blessed God, and said: ‘Now Thou dost dismiss Thy servant, O Lord, according to Thy word in peace―because my eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of all peoples―a light to the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people Israel’” (Luke 2:27-32).
“I am the light of the world―he that follows Me, walks not in darkness, but shall have the light of life!” (John 8:12). “As long as I am in the world, I am the Light of the world!” (John 9:5).
“You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid! Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:14-16).
Living in Darkness
Holy Scripture speaks of the world sitting and living in darkness at the time of Our Lord’s first coming to this Earth at Bethlehem: “The people that sat in darkness, hath seen great light: and to them that sat in the region of the shadow of death, light is sprung up” (Matthew 4:16). Our Lord came to enlighten that darkness, but that people preferred the darkness of this world to light of Our Lord: “He was the light of men. And the light shone in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. He was the true light, which enlightens every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not” (John 1:4, 10).
The same is true for those in the “counterfeit church” of darkness today. They do not want the light, they do not want to see the light, they prefer their own dark creation and its darkness.
Candles, Candlemas and the Three Days of Darkness?
What on Earth could be the connection between candles, the feast of Candlemas (February 2nd) and the so-called “Three Days of Darkness”? I believe in candles. I believe in Candlemas. Do I believe in the “Three Days of Darkness”? Much like St. Thomas Aquinas would do—which is what we all should do—let us look at the objections first and not try to run or hide from them. Let us look at the sources and then make some necessary distinctions as we try come to a conclusion.
Three Groups Sitting in Darkness
First of all, there are rabid objectors to the Catholic Faith who are not worth listening to and not worth wasting our breathe upon—these are outright enemies of the Church who will denigrate, ridicule, slander, question, dispute and cast doubt over as many teachings of the Catholic Faith and her actions as they can get away with. The fact that most Catholic today are grossly “dumbed-down” and know very little of their Faith, let alone having and understanding of it, makes their work very easy indeed.
Secondly, there are rational objectors—some of them Catholic, others non-Catholic—who also question, dispute and cast doubt over many teachings and actions of the Church, but they are less likely to be sensationalist, nor rabid, nor illogical in their doubts, disputes or attacks. Some may be in good faith, others in bad faith. The current day Rationalists, Modernists and Liberals in the Church fall into this category. They have grown to place more and more faith in science and human reason rather than in God. This Rationalism makes oneself the authority in judging truth—which leads to subjectivism and subjective truth. Truth becomes what I think it is, what I would like it to be, what favors my position, what brings me most advantage, etc.
Thirdly, there are those who are neither Rationalists, Modernists, nor Liberals, but sincere faithful members of the Catholic Church, who want to believe and do what is right—but who do not always know what is true and what ought to be done. Often this is due to a negligence on their part, in not studying the Faith sufficiently—which, had they done so, would eliminate many of the dilemmas they face.
All of these people—given any teaching or aspect of the Catholic Church and its actions, customs and practices, will have questions, incertitude, doubts, gaps in knowledge, misconceptions, etc., that should be addressed. The rabid objectors need to be put down and dismissed. The Rationalists, Modernists and Liberals need to be answered and proven wrong (in cases where they are wrong, for rarely is someone wrong in absolutely everything—just as nobody is right in absolutely everything). While the sincere Catholics needs to be enlightened—both as to the dangers of the two previous groups, as well as in their ignorance, doubt and misconceptions.
An Example of Mental Darkness and Misconception
Before proceeding to the “Three Days of Darkness”, let us look how the mind can be darkened by misconceptions, misinterpretations and misrepresentations. Take for example the subject of Hell. There are some who hold that Hell does not exist. Others say that it exists, but that it is not permanent. While some say that it exists and that it is permanent.
The Church teaches, as a dogma of Faith, that Hell exists and that it is permanent. “The souls of those who die in the condition of personal grievous sin enter Hell. (De fide) … The punishment of Hell lasts for all eternity. (De fide). The Council of Lyons I stated: ’If anyone without repentance dies in mortal sin, without a doubt he is tortured forever by the flames of eternal Hell’ [Denzinger §457] (Denzinger, Sources of Catholic Dogma).
Yet reputable theologians also teach that the fires of Purgatory are the same fires as those of Hell. St. Thomas Aquinas, quoting Pope St. Gregory the Great and St. Augustine, writes: “Gregory says [The quotation is from St. Augustine (The City of God, 1:8)]: ‘Even as in the same fire gold glistens and straw smokes, so in the same fire the sinner burns and the elect is cleansed.’ Therefore the fire of Purgatory is the same as the fire of Hell” (Summa Theologica, Supplement, Appendix 2, art. 2).
That it is the same fire that burns in Purgatory as in Hell is also testified to by Private Revelation—yes, we all know that Private Revelation is not dogma and does not hold the same obligations of belief, but I dare anyone to appear before God and reject the private revelations He has permitted and made! We shall not go into any detail here—a cursory glance at Fr. Schouppe’s two books on Hell and Purgatory will give you more than a clear insight into the private revelations of souls that have been allowed by God to appear and attest to the fires that burn them in both Purgatory and Hell.
Some of those revelations state—as many theologians also believe—that the fires of Purgatory are the same as the fires of Hell (that is to say in lowest, deepest parts of Purgatory). From this it is easy to see how some misinformed, irrational, superficial souls could come up with the idea that Hell is only temporary—because they look only at the aspect of fire and not place. To them being in the lowest, deepest confines of Purgatory is like being in Hell, only that this ‘Hell’ ends sooner or later. The truth is that the fires of Hell cease to burn them in Purgatory because they are in Purgatory and not Hell.
These misconceptions, misinterpretations and misrepresentations can come forth from both a weak-minded but well-intentioned soul, or they can emanate from a string-minded but evil-intentioned soul. From this digression, let us proceed to the “Three Days of Darkness” to see if we can find some light at the end of the tunnel.
Wikipedia in the Dark?
Let us first of all, in order to deal with objections, take the opinion given by Wikipedia, which is a non-Catholic source, which quite often (though not always) will show a bias against solid and ancient Catholic teaching, favoring more rational, Liberal or Modernistic interpretations. Its article on the subject reads thus:
“The Three Days of Darkness is an eschatological prophecy (based on private revelation) within Roman Catholicism which parallels the Ten Plagues against Egypt in the Book of Exodus.
“Just as God punished the Egyptians with plagues including the “three days of darkness”, the theory states that God will chastise the world with darkness at the end of time. The Earth will be enveloped by darkness lasting three days and three nights, the only light source that can be seen being blessed candles. Various Catholic visionaries agree that the faithful should stay within their homes during this period as most of the Earth’s inhabitants shall die.
Advocates
“Many Catholic seers and mystics such as Saints Hildegard of Bingen, Gaspar del Bufalo, Padre Pio, Anna Maria Taigi, Elisabeth Canori Mora, Mariam Baouardi (Mary of Jesus Crucified), Rosa-Colomba Asdente, Palma d’Oria, Père Lamy, Marie Martel, and Marie Julie Jahenny, have prophesied the Three Days of Darkness. However it is not endorsed by the Holy See.
“Blessed Anna Maria Taigi (1769–1837) is the most known seer of the Three Days of Darkness and describes the event in this way: “There shall come over the whole Earth an intense darkness lasting three days and three nights. Nothing can be seen, and the air will be laden with pestilence which will claim mainly, but not only, the enemies of religion. It will be impossible to use any man-made lighting during this darkness, except blessed candles. He, who out of curiosity, opens his window to look out, or leaves his home, will fall dead on the spot. During these three days, people should remain in their homes, pray the Rosary and beg God for mercy. All the enemies of the Church, whether known or unknown, will perish over the whole Earth during that universal darkness, with the exception of a few whom God will soon convert. The air shall be infected by demons who will appear under all sorts of hideous forms.”
“Marie-Julie Jahenny (1850-1941), known as the “Breton Stigmatist”, expanded upon the story of the Three Days of Darkness, saying that it will occur on a Thursday, Friday and Saturday when all of Hell will be let loose to strike at those outside their homes and those without a lit blessed candle of 100% pure wax.
Controversy
Adherents of the Three Days of Darkness are usually traditionalist Catholics or sedevacantists. The latter group hopes that a “true pope” will be miraculously designated by an apparition of Saint Peter and Saint Paul; this tangential belief assumes that the most recent pontiffs of the Church are in fact “antipopes”. There is also controversy over whether the twentieth-century saint and stigmatist, Saint [Padre] Pio [of Pietrelcina], endorsed and taught on the future Three Days of Darkness as the authenticity of the alleged words of Saint Pio are disputed.” (End of Wikipedia article).
The “Three Ways of Darkness” by Wikipedia
The Wikipedia article very subtly denigrates and casts doubt upon the prophecies about the “Three Day of Darkness”. It must be said that whoever wrote the article has the honesty to state some of the facts (but an article that would lie about the facts would lose its credibility), but then casts doubt upon the veracity of the matter―”The Three Days of Darkness is an eschatological prophecy (based on private revelation) within Roman Catholicism … This belief is not endorsed by the Holy See … There is also controversy over whether the twentieth-century saint and stigmatist, Saint [Padre] Pio [of Pietrelcina], endorsed and taught on the future Three Days of Darkness as the authenticity of the alleged words of Saint Pio are disputed ... Adherents of the Three Days of Darkness are usually traditionalist Catholics or sedevacantists.”
1. First of all it pits the “Three Days of Darkness” against the approbation of the Church, saying: This belief is not endorsed by the Holy See.” Yet it fails to mention that neither does the Church condemn the “Three Days of Darkness.” It is much like canonizing a saint—the Church may judge it too early to canonize somebody, but neither does it say the opposite. Or, for example, speaking of the fires of Purgatory, the Church does not make it a dogma, but it does forbid theologians of speaking of the fires of Purgatory—for the Church holds the teaching to be probably true, though not dogmatically true. To say that the Church does not endorse the “Three Days of Darkness”, does not mean the Church rejects the “Three Days of Darkness”. Subtle and clever sowing of doubt here!
2. Another way the article discredits “Three Days of Darkness” is the very crafty way it resorts to discreditation or guilt by association with ‘undesirables’—in this case “traditionalist Catholics or sedevacantists [those who think there is no current valid pope]”—which implies that you are like them by implication in believing in the “Three Days of Darkness”. However, this ignores all the generations before today’s “traditional Catholics” (which fails to mention that all Catholics of bygone years were traditional Catholics for centuries before our current Modernism came around) and fails to mention that thousands of Catholics, way before the current problem sedevacantism, also adhered to the “Three Days of Darkness” – saints and theologians included.
3. Then the article goes on to cast doubt upon the authenticity of St. Padre Pio positively endorsing the “Three Days of Darkness” and stops there—without referring to the authenticity of many of other saints and blessed who DO ENDORSE the “Three Days of Darkness”. Though the authenticity of St. Padre Pio may be in question, that is not the case for the other saints and blesseds—but following this line of reasoning, it is tantamount to saying: “If St. Padre Pio did not endorse the ‘Three Days of Darkness’—even though many think he did—then automatically you must doubt all the other saints and blessed too!” This is like saying, because one person is wrong, everyone must be wrong; or if a person is wrong once, they must automatically be always wrong; or if one person did not say something, nobody must have said it. Ridiculous!
Another Objection
On a website named ‘Brother Priests”, run by a Catholic priest, Fr. Joel Sember, who studied at St. John Vianney Seminary, Mundelein Seminary and the North American College. He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Green Bay (WI), United States on June 30th, 2007. Fr. Joel Sember has a License degree in Moral Theology from the Pontifical University Santa Croce in Rome. He is pastor of three parishes in the Diocese of Green Bay, WI.
There is an article on his website that also denigrates and casts doubt over the “Three Days of Darkness”—and rhetorically asks “What should Catholics think?” before putting down and ridiculing any such belief in the “Three Days of Darkness.” Here are some key objections which we will proceed to answer immediately within the text (in red print):
“An end-times prophecy about three days of darkness is making the rounds of Catholic circles. This prophecy states that God’s last act of judgment on Earth will be three days and three nights of total darkness. No light will shine during this time except blessed wax candles, and the enemies of the Church will die.
[COMMENT: Wrong! The prophecy DOES NOT state that it will be “God’s last act of judgment on Earth” but that it will bring to an end the Minor Tribulation or Minor Apostasy, after which God will triumph and there will be peace on Earth with God being wonderfully served and worshiped. If the writer cannot get his facts write in the opening paragraph, then where else is erring?]
“According to some web searches I did, this same prophecy also makes the rounds in New Age circles—although without the references to the Church of course. On the internet you can find a purported Mayan legend about a time when the sun did not rise and there were three days of darkness until the people’s prayers brought the sun back.
[COMMENT: Here again there is an attempt to denigrate using the “guilt by association” method—linking to New Age and pagan Mayan sources. In that case we can cast doubt on many aspects and teachings of the Catholic Faith just because Protestants or other religions believe the same thing—for example worshiping on Sundays rather than the Sabbath (nowhere in the Bible does it say we have to worship on Sunday). ].
“The Catholic version is far more terrifying than the New-Age version. The prophecy is attributed to Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi. I have not done any research to establish whether she really wrote this [COMMENT: Again subtle doubt casting. Have you done any research to see if Christ really existed, that Our Lady really existed, etc.], but here is the passage that you can find on the internet:
“God will send two punishments: one will be in the form of wars, revolutions and other evils; it shall originate on Earth. The other will be sent from Heaven. There shall come over the whole Earth an intense darkness lasting three days and three nights. Nothing can be seen, and the air will be laden with pestilence which will claim mainly, but not only, the enemies of religion. It will be impossible to use any man-made lighting during this darkness, except blessed wax candles. He, who out of curiosity, opens his window to look out, or leaves his home, will fall dead on the spot. During these three days, people should remain in their homes, pray the Rosary and beg God for mercy.
“All the enemies of the Church, whether known or unknown, will perish over the whole Earth during that universal darkness, with the exception of a few whom God will soon convert. The air shall be infected by demons who will appear under all sorts of hideous forms.”
This is the mild version of the prophecy. More serious versions tell you that all Hell will roam the Earth during those three days, and just looking out a window will be fatal. You are warned to buy thick drapes or black plastic to cover all your windows. Also, it is said that during the three days you will hear people banging on your door and you will think that people you love are out in the darkness, but do not open the door because it will really be the demons trying to get you.
[COMMENT: Here again we have a subtle form of ridicule and denigration that seeks to make the reader disbelieve that God could be brutal. If you do not believe that, then simply read the Old Testament and look at the ‘brutality’ God commanded in retribution for sin! Oh, that is the Old Testament, you may say! Well look at the New Testament and see how God destroyed Jerusalem in 70 AD, which was prophesied by Christ, where the city was razed to the ground and over a million Jews were slaughtered (men, women and children), and where some of the Jews were eating their own babies during the long siege, due to a lack of food. Pretty brutal, eh? And prophesied by Christ! So the brutality of the forthcoming chastisement should not surprise us!]
“What should Catholics think about this prophecy? They should think that it is probably wrong. There is no scriptural support for the idea that darkness will be the last punishment of mankind [COMMENT: Again, who says it is last punishment of mankind? Only you! Facts wrong again!]. Although there are several scriptures which talk about the sun being darkened in the last days, the darkness is never the last and final judgment but it is only a sign of the judgment that is coming. This is true in the references in Matthew, Revelation, and the prophets. In Exodus 10:21-29, the only passage in the Bible that refers to three days of darkness, the darkness is the penultimate plague unleashed against Egypt. The last and final plague was the death of the firstborn.
[COMMENT: Again, wrong assumption and insinuation—the “Three Days of Darkness” will not be “the last and final” punishment. This is a good example of how to build castles on sand. As St. Thomas Aquinas says, if you are little off course in the beginning of your journey, then after many hours you will be a long way from your intended destination.].
The clearest reference in Scripture to the final judgment of the Earth [the “Three Days of Darkness is not the final judgment] says that this judgment will happen by fire. Revelation 20:7-10 says this:
“When the thousand years are over, Satan will be released from his prison and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the Earth—Gog and Magog—and to gather them for battle. In number they are like the sand on the seashore. They marched across the breadth of the Earth and surrounded the camp of God’s people, the city he loves. But fire came down from Heaven and devoured them.”
“Someone could claim that the fire that comes down from Heaven is really an intense darkness laden with pestilence and swarming with demons, but that does not make any sense. [COMMENT: If you reject the notion of true fire coming down from Heaven, then is Our Lady in error or lying when she says: “Without virginity, it would be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon these lands in order to purify them” (Quito) … “Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume three cities ... Water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride” (La Salette) … “Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity” (Akita).].
Second, the more you think about the prophecy, the less sense it makes. This is supposed to be God’s final act of punishment [No! It is not!] against evildoers and enemies of the Church, but many evil people are going to be spared [COMMENT: where do you get “many”? Some perhaps, but not many, and certainly not the majority], so that they can be converted by the Church after the great chastisement. Also, many good and holy persons will be among the dead, according to this prophecy.
“In Exodus, the Israelites were spared the darkness and the death of their firstborn, and these plagues only fell on Egyptians. This time God must be a lot more angry, because only the just people who stay in their homes, do not look out the windows, and light blessed candles will be spared.
[COMMENT: Here the author is being sarcastic—but God is more angry, as stated by Our Lady of Akita: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before.”].
“This prophecy – and particularly the swarms of demons in the sky – seems to reflect the devil’s way of thinking and doing things much more than God’s way of doing things.
[COMMENT: If you reject the “swarms of demons”, then please explain Our Lady’s words at Quito, La Salette—or are those bogus too? “The passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely … This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph … This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings” (Quito) … “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God … the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … They will have great power over nature: there will be churches built to serve these spirits. People will be transported from one place to another by these evil spirits, even priests” (La Salette).].
Endnote: you should be careful to read the fine print. Most of the internet sites promoting this prophecy are connected to individuals and groups which believe that the Catholic Church is in apostasy right now and most Masses are not valid. [COMMENT: Here again there is an attempt to denigrate using the “guilt by association” method]. Apostasy in the Catholic Church is the devil’s favorite end-time prophecy [COMMENT: Then you are condemning some of the greatest saints and mystics of the Church. Furthermore, you condemn Cardinal Manning, who wrote: “The writers of the Church tell us that in the latter days the city of Rome will probably become apostate from the Church and Vicar of Jesus Christ; and that Rome will again be punished, for he will depart from it; and the judgment of God will fall on the place from which he once reigned over the nations of the world …. Rome shall apostatize from the Faith and drive away the Vicar of Christ, and return to its ancient paganism.” And what of the current day cardinals who say that apostasy will start at the top?], something he has been dreaming about since 33 AD (the devil, like many politicians, believes that if you repeat something often enough it becomes true). During the Protestant Reformation he was telling everyone that the Pope in Rome was the Antichrist. The “alternate” version of the Third Secret of Fatima, the one supposedly hidden by the Vatican, proclaims that the papacy will be in apostasy and the true Faith will not be preserved in Rome, but only in Portugal. Whenever you find people believing that the Catholic Church has become or will become unfaithful to Christ, the devil is not far away
[COMMENT: Was Our Lord the devil in disguise when He said: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Was St. Paul the devil in disguise when he wrote that with most of the 2 to 3 million Israelites in the desert during the time of the Exodus, God was not well pleased? During the Arian heresy, most of the Church was unfaithful to the dogma of Christ being true God, denying that the Son is of one essence, nature, or substance with God. Hence the famous quote of St. Jerome, who complained that nearly all the world had become Arian!]
This is the typical denigrating and ridiculing attack that comes from the pens of many Modernists, Rationalists and Liberals within the Church itself. This requires vigilance and repudiation when encountered. For, as Our Lord said: “They are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
Sifting the Prophecies
A lot has been written about the “Three Days of Darkness”—some of it exaggerated and sensational, some not—so one needs to sift through the material carefully for fear of falling into serious doctrinal errors. This separation of the chaff from the wheat is a difficult task.
The Catholic Church & Prophecies
The “Three Days of Darkness” is a prophecy—not from one single source, but from several sources from different time spheres. So it is first of all necessary to look at the principles of judgment concerning prophecies. Therefore, let us consult the Catholic Encyclopedia for some guidelines regarding prophecies—for this summarizes and presents these principles in a succinct manner. The Catholic Encyclopedia, as shown on the New Advent website, states:
● As the term is used in mystical theology, it applies both to the prophecies of canonical Scripture and to private prophecies.
● Understood in its strict sense, it means the foreknowledge of future events, though it may sometimes apply to past events, of which there is no memory, and to present hidden things, which cannot be known by the natural light of reason.
● St. Paul, speaking of prophecy in 1 Corinthians 14, does not confine its meaning to predictions of future events, but includes under it Divine inspirations, concerning what is secret, whether future or not.
● As, however, the manifestation of hidden present mysteries, or past events comes under revelation, we have here to understand by prophecy what is in its strict and proper sense, namely the revelation of future events.
● The knowledge must be supernatural and infused by God, because it concerns things beyond the natural power of created intelligence; and the knowledge must be manifested either by words or signs, because the gift of prophecy is given primarily for the good of others, and hence needs to be manifested.
● It is a Divine light by which God reveals things concerning the unknown future and by which these things are in some way represented to the mind of the prophet, whose duty it is to manifest them to others.
Prudent Discernment Needed
The Church considers the Book of Apocalypse as Divinely inspired and remains to be the last prophetic work that the Church acknowledges as such. Though the prophetic spirit has continued through the centuries, the Church has never promoted any other prophetic work—even if the Church proclaimed countless persons as saints who were gifted with prophesy. Thus the Church shows prudence—by neither absolutely accepting or absolutely denying the prophecies made by those saints. She will simply say that there is nothing in them that can be judged to be against Faith or Morals.
The Church prudently gives ample latitude as to the acceptance or rejection of particular or private prophecies based on evidence for or against them. The Catholic faithful’s attitude should be that of prudence and balance always being careful and slow in accepting or rejecting them—especially when they come from trustworthy sources and do not contradict Catholic doctrine and morals. Unfortunately there are many who are lovers and followers of the sensational, and bite the fruit before testing it.
How Can Prophecy Be Verified?
The only real way a prophecy can be absolutely verified as true is when it is fulfilled. It is much like the police holding a person in suspicion of criminal behavior—they cannot be sure or they cannot arrest the person until their suspicion (or ‘prophecy’) is fulfilled and the person is caught “red-handed” committing the crime. Veracity or accuracy of their fulfillment remains to be the litmus test to which all prophecies are to be judged.
The character of these prophecies covers a wide gamut ranging from pious anticipations of Providence; to events in the lives of saints; to the fate of nations; to the popes and the papacy; and to apocalyptic catastrophes leading to the end of the world. They may sometimes be realized in part and in part may even run contrary to events. Due to the conditional nature of some of them, they may or may not be fulfilled.
For example, Our Lady says at Fatima—if her demands are fulfilled then a certain thing will not happen, but if her demands are not fulfilled, then it will happen. So if we pray and do much penance, the terrible things she foretold at Fatima and also at La Salette and Akita would not happen. Because they would not happen, we cannot say the prophecy of a chastisement was false—it is simply that we took heed of her warnings and put into practice what would stop the prophecy coming true. In this way many prophecies are said to be “conditional”.
“End Time” Prophecies
First of all we must ask ourselves: “Are we in the end times?” Though we are most certainly not on the verge of the actual end of the world, we can almost certainly say that we are within a period that could well be called “The End Times” or “The Latter Days”.
Sr. Lucia of Fatima, in December 1957, speaking to Fr. Fuentes, said: “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that the devil is about to wage a decisive battle with the Virgin, and a decisive battle is a final battle, in which one side wins, the other side loses.”
Only months after Bishop Ito approved the Akita apparitions of Our Lady, Cardinal Ratzinger (the future Pope Benedict XVI) was interviewed on November 11th, 1984 by Jesus magazine. Within this 1984 interview (titled “Here is Why the Faith is in Crisis”), Cardinal Ratzinger acknowledged that he had read the Third Secret and that it speaks of “The dangers threatening the Faith and the life of the Christian, and therefore the world, and also the importance of the last times.”
In the build-up to Christmas 2015, Pope Francis just recently told crowds in St. Peter’s Square that this Christmas might be the last one for humanity. In a grim speech, the Pope said that the current chaotic state of the world marks the beginning of the “end times”, and that this time next year the world is likely to be unrecognizable.
The common and outstanding character among latter day prophecies seems to be the foreboding of a terrible destruction of the world due to an unrepentant mankind, the resurgence of the Church, and the conversion of the world. E.H. Thompson keenly pointed out in his “Life of Anna Maria Taigi” (chapter 18) that the revelations have the following features: “First they all point to some terrible convulsion, to a revolution springing from most deep-rooted impiety, consisting in a formal opposition to God and His truth, and resulting in the most formidable persecution to which the Church has ever been subject. Secondly, they all promise for the Church a victory more splendid than she has ever achieved here below.”
The Fatima prophecies fit exactly into this category when Our Lady spoke of a terrible chastisement if men do not repent and amend their lives—but she also gave hope by promising that in the end Her Immaculate Heart will triumph.
The Three Days of Darkness
The idea or fact of “days of darkness” is nothing new. Holy Scripture has many references to “days of darkness”—therefore this whole idea is not the invention of someone’s feverish imagination!
Firstly, at the very beginning of time, the whole world was enshrouded in darkness: “And the Earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep … And God said: Be light made. And light was made. And God saw the light that it was good; and he divided the light from the darkness. And he called the light Day, and the darkness Night” (Genesis 1:2-4).
Secondly, an event which could be said to resemble most the circumstances of the prophecy about the “Three days of Darkness, is found in the time of Moses and the ten plagues that God sends upon Pharaoh and Egypt, especially the ninth plague—which actually was three days of darkness: “And the Lord said to Moses: ‘Stretch out they hand towards Heaven: and may there be darkness upon the land of Egypt, so thick that it may be felt!’ And Moses stretch forth his hand towards Heaven: and there came horrible darkness in all the land of Egypt for three days. No man saw his brother, nor moved himself out of the place where he was: but wheresoever the children of Israel dwelt there was light” (Exodus 10:21-23). This shows a precedent for the “Three Days of Darkness”.
Once the Israelites left Egypt and were being pursued by the Egyptian soldiers, God again used darkness as weapon before destroying His enemies: “And the children of Israel cried to the Lord: and He put darkness between you and the Egyptians, and brought the sea upon them, and covered them” (Josue 24:7).
In another Old Testament instance, Isaias the prophet also spoke of a day of darkness: “Behold, the day of the Lord shall come, a cruel day, and full of indignation, and of wrath, and fury, to lay the land desolate, and to destroy the sinners thereof out of it. For the stars of Heaven, and their brightness shall not display their light: the sun shall be darkened in his rising, and the moon shall not shine with her light. And I will visit the evils of the world, and against the wicked for their iniquity: and I will make the pride of infidels to cease, and will bring down the arrogancy of the mighty … I form the light, and create darkness, I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord that do all these things” (Isaias 13: 9-11; 45:7).
The Book of Job speaks of day being turned into darkness and death: “Let that day be turned into darkness and let not the light shine upon it. Let darkness, and the shadow of death cover it, let a mist overspread it, and let it be wrapped up in bitterness … He shall drive him out of light into darkness, and shall remove him out of the world” (Job 3:4-5; 18:18).
Coming to the New Testament, we have the “Three Hours of Darkness” that enveloped the whole world at the moment Our Lord died on the cross on Mount Calvary. Three of the Gospel writers mention this fact: “Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over the whole Earth, until the ninth hour” (Matthew 27:45) … “And when the sixth hour was come, there was darkness over the whole Earth until the ninth hour” (Mark 15:33) … “And it was almost the sixth hour; and there was darkness over all the Earth until the ninth hour” (Luke 23:44). Again, a precedent for the “Three Days of Darkness”, showing that God is liable to operate in this way and that it is nothing new.
These and even more Scriptural references, provide a platform of reality and not mere fancy for the prophecies and revelations about days of darkness that would be made—by the saints, the blessed, the venerables, and mystics—after New Testament times and relating to our times.
In the Beginning … was Darkness
“In the beginning God created Heaven, and Earth. And the Earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the spirit of God moved over the waters. And God said: ‘Be light made!’ And light was made. And God saw the light that it was good; and he divided the light from the darkness. And he called the light Day, and the darkness Night; and there was evening and morning one day” (Genesis 1:1-5).
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was made nothing that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men ... That was the true Light, which enlightens every man that cometh into this world! ... And the light shone in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it!” (John 1:1-9).
“And when His parents brought in the Child Jesus, to do for Him according to the custom of the law, Simeon also took Him into his arms, and blessed God, and said: ‘Now Thou dost dismiss Thy servant, O Lord, according to Thy word in peace―because my eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of all peoples―a light to the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people Israel’” (Luke 2:27-32).
“I am the light of the world―he that follows Me, walks not in darkness, but shall have the light of life!” (John 8:12). “As long as I am in the world, I am the Light of the world!” (John 9:5).
“You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid! Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:14-16).
Living in Darkness
Holy Scripture speaks of the world sitting and living in darkness at the time of Our Lord’s first coming to this Earth at Bethlehem: “The people that sat in darkness, hath seen great light: and to them that sat in the region of the shadow of death, light is sprung up” (Matthew 4:16). Our Lord came to enlighten that darkness, but that people preferred the darkness of this world to light of Our Lord: “He was the light of men. And the light shone in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. He was the true light, which enlightens every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not” (John 1:4, 10).
The same is true for those in the “counterfeit church” of darkness today. They do not want the light, they do not want to see the light, they prefer their own dark creation and its darkness.
Candles, Candlemas and the Three Days of Darkness?
What on Earth could be the connection between candles, the feast of Candlemas (February 2nd) and the so-called “Three Days of Darkness”? I believe in candles. I believe in Candlemas. Do I believe in the “Three Days of Darkness”? Much like St. Thomas Aquinas would do—which is what we all should do—let us look at the objections first and not try to run or hide from them. Let us look at the sources and then make some necessary distinctions as we try come to a conclusion.
Three Groups Sitting in Darkness
First of all, there are rabid objectors to the Catholic Faith who are not worth listening to and not worth wasting our breathe upon—these are outright enemies of the Church who will denigrate, ridicule, slander, question, dispute and cast doubt over as many teachings of the Catholic Faith and her actions as they can get away with. The fact that most Catholic today are grossly “dumbed-down” and know very little of their Faith, let alone having and understanding of it, makes their work very easy indeed.
Secondly, there are rational objectors—some of them Catholic, others non-Catholic—who also question, dispute and cast doubt over many teachings and actions of the Church, but they are less likely to be sensationalist, nor rabid, nor illogical in their doubts, disputes or attacks. Some may be in good faith, others in bad faith. The current day Rationalists, Modernists and Liberals in the Church fall into this category. They have grown to place more and more faith in science and human reason rather than in God. This Rationalism makes oneself the authority in judging truth—which leads to subjectivism and subjective truth. Truth becomes what I think it is, what I would like it to be, what favors my position, what brings me most advantage, etc.
Thirdly, there are those who are neither Rationalists, Modernists, nor Liberals, but sincere faithful members of the Catholic Church, who want to believe and do what is right—but who do not always know what is true and what ought to be done. Often this is due to a negligence on their part, in not studying the Faith sufficiently—which, had they done so, would eliminate many of the dilemmas they face.
All of these people—given any teaching or aspect of the Catholic Church and its actions, customs and practices, will have questions, incertitude, doubts, gaps in knowledge, misconceptions, etc., that should be addressed. The rabid objectors need to be put down and dismissed. The Rationalists, Modernists and Liberals need to be answered and proven wrong (in cases where they are wrong, for rarely is someone wrong in absolutely everything—just as nobody is right in absolutely everything). While the sincere Catholics needs to be enlightened—both as to the dangers of the two previous groups, as well as in their ignorance, doubt and misconceptions.
An Example of Mental Darkness and Misconception
Before proceeding to the “Three Days of Darkness”, let us look how the mind can be darkened by misconceptions, misinterpretations and misrepresentations. Take for example the subject of Hell. There are some who hold that Hell does not exist. Others say that it exists, but that it is not permanent. While some say that it exists and that it is permanent.
The Church teaches, as a dogma of Faith, that Hell exists and that it is permanent. “The souls of those who die in the condition of personal grievous sin enter Hell. (De fide) … The punishment of Hell lasts for all eternity. (De fide). The Council of Lyons I stated: ’If anyone without repentance dies in mortal sin, without a doubt he is tortured forever by the flames of eternal Hell’ [Denzinger §457] (Denzinger, Sources of Catholic Dogma).
Yet reputable theologians also teach that the fires of Purgatory are the same fires as those of Hell. St. Thomas Aquinas, quoting Pope St. Gregory the Great and St. Augustine, writes: “Gregory says [The quotation is from St. Augustine (The City of God, 1:8)]: ‘Even as in the same fire gold glistens and straw smokes, so in the same fire the sinner burns and the elect is cleansed.’ Therefore the fire of Purgatory is the same as the fire of Hell” (Summa Theologica, Supplement, Appendix 2, art. 2).
That it is the same fire that burns in Purgatory as in Hell is also testified to by Private Revelation—yes, we all know that Private Revelation is not dogma and does not hold the same obligations of belief, but I dare anyone to appear before God and reject the private revelations He has permitted and made! We shall not go into any detail here—a cursory glance at Fr. Schouppe’s two books on Hell and Purgatory will give you more than a clear insight into the private revelations of souls that have been allowed by God to appear and attest to the fires that burn them in both Purgatory and Hell.
Some of those revelations state—as many theologians also believe—that the fires of Purgatory are the same as the fires of Hell (that is to say in lowest, deepest parts of Purgatory). From this it is easy to see how some misinformed, irrational, superficial souls could come up with the idea that Hell is only temporary—because they look only at the aspect of fire and not place. To them being in the lowest, deepest confines of Purgatory is like being in Hell, only that this ‘Hell’ ends sooner or later. The truth is that the fires of Hell cease to burn them in Purgatory because they are in Purgatory and not Hell.
These misconceptions, misinterpretations and misrepresentations can come forth from both a weak-minded but well-intentioned soul, or they can emanate from a string-minded but evil-intentioned soul. From this digression, let us proceed to the “Three Days of Darkness” to see if we can find some light at the end of the tunnel.
Wikipedia in the Dark?
Let us first of all, in order to deal with objections, take the opinion given by Wikipedia, which is a non-Catholic source, which quite often (though not always) will show a bias against solid and ancient Catholic teaching, favoring more rational, Liberal or Modernistic interpretations. Its article on the subject reads thus:
“The Three Days of Darkness is an eschatological prophecy (based on private revelation) within Roman Catholicism which parallels the Ten Plagues against Egypt in the Book of Exodus.
“Just as God punished the Egyptians with plagues including the “three days of darkness”, the theory states that God will chastise the world with darkness at the end of time. The Earth will be enveloped by darkness lasting three days and three nights, the only light source that can be seen being blessed candles. Various Catholic visionaries agree that the faithful should stay within their homes during this period as most of the Earth’s inhabitants shall die.
Advocates
“Many Catholic seers and mystics such as Saints Hildegard of Bingen, Gaspar del Bufalo, Padre Pio, Anna Maria Taigi, Elisabeth Canori Mora, Mariam Baouardi (Mary of Jesus Crucified), Rosa-Colomba Asdente, Palma d’Oria, Père Lamy, Marie Martel, and Marie Julie Jahenny, have prophesied the Three Days of Darkness. However it is not endorsed by the Holy See.
“Blessed Anna Maria Taigi (1769–1837) is the most known seer of the Three Days of Darkness and describes the event in this way: “There shall come over the whole Earth an intense darkness lasting three days and three nights. Nothing can be seen, and the air will be laden with pestilence which will claim mainly, but not only, the enemies of religion. It will be impossible to use any man-made lighting during this darkness, except blessed candles. He, who out of curiosity, opens his window to look out, or leaves his home, will fall dead on the spot. During these three days, people should remain in their homes, pray the Rosary and beg God for mercy. All the enemies of the Church, whether known or unknown, will perish over the whole Earth during that universal darkness, with the exception of a few whom God will soon convert. The air shall be infected by demons who will appear under all sorts of hideous forms.”
“Marie-Julie Jahenny (1850-1941), known as the “Breton Stigmatist”, expanded upon the story of the Three Days of Darkness, saying that it will occur on a Thursday, Friday and Saturday when all of Hell will be let loose to strike at those outside their homes and those without a lit blessed candle of 100% pure wax.
Controversy
Adherents of the Three Days of Darkness are usually traditionalist Catholics or sedevacantists. The latter group hopes that a “true pope” will be miraculously designated by an apparition of Saint Peter and Saint Paul; this tangential belief assumes that the most recent pontiffs of the Church are in fact “antipopes”. There is also controversy over whether the twentieth-century saint and stigmatist, Saint [Padre] Pio [of Pietrelcina], endorsed and taught on the future Three Days of Darkness as the authenticity of the alleged words of Saint Pio are disputed.” (End of Wikipedia article).
The “Three Ways of Darkness” by Wikipedia
The Wikipedia article very subtly denigrates and casts doubt upon the prophecies about the “Three Day of Darkness”. It must be said that whoever wrote the article has the honesty to state some of the facts (but an article that would lie about the facts would lose its credibility), but then casts doubt upon the veracity of the matter―”The Three Days of Darkness is an eschatological prophecy (based on private revelation) within Roman Catholicism … This belief is not endorsed by the Holy See … There is also controversy over whether the twentieth-century saint and stigmatist, Saint [Padre] Pio [of Pietrelcina], endorsed and taught on the future Three Days of Darkness as the authenticity of the alleged words of Saint Pio are disputed ... Adherents of the Three Days of Darkness are usually traditionalist Catholics or sedevacantists.”
1. First of all it pits the “Three Days of Darkness” against the approbation of the Church, saying: This belief is not endorsed by the Holy See.” Yet it fails to mention that neither does the Church condemn the “Three Days of Darkness.” It is much like canonizing a saint—the Church may judge it too early to canonize somebody, but neither does it say the opposite. Or, for example, speaking of the fires of Purgatory, the Church does not make it a dogma, but it does forbid theologians of speaking of the fires of Purgatory—for the Church holds the teaching to be probably true, though not dogmatically true. To say that the Church does not endorse the “Three Days of Darkness”, does not mean the Church rejects the “Three Days of Darkness”. Subtle and clever sowing of doubt here!
2. Another way the article discredits “Three Days of Darkness” is the very crafty way it resorts to discreditation or guilt by association with ‘undesirables’—in this case “traditionalist Catholics or sedevacantists [those who think there is no current valid pope]”—which implies that you are like them by implication in believing in the “Three Days of Darkness”. However, this ignores all the generations before today’s “traditional Catholics” (which fails to mention that all Catholics of bygone years were traditional Catholics for centuries before our current Modernism came around) and fails to mention that thousands of Catholics, way before the current problem sedevacantism, also adhered to the “Three Days of Darkness” – saints and theologians included.
3. Then the article goes on to cast doubt upon the authenticity of St. Padre Pio positively endorsing the “Three Days of Darkness” and stops there—without referring to the authenticity of many of other saints and blessed who DO ENDORSE the “Three Days of Darkness”. Though the authenticity of St. Padre Pio may be in question, that is not the case for the other saints and blesseds—but following this line of reasoning, it is tantamount to saying: “If St. Padre Pio did not endorse the ‘Three Days of Darkness’—even though many think he did—then automatically you must doubt all the other saints and blessed too!” This is like saying, because one person is wrong, everyone must be wrong; or if a person is wrong once, they must automatically be always wrong; or if one person did not say something, nobody must have said it. Ridiculous!
Another Objection
On a website named ‘Brother Priests”, run by a Catholic priest, Fr. Joel Sember, who studied at St. John Vianney Seminary, Mundelein Seminary and the North American College. He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Green Bay (WI), United States on June 30th, 2007. Fr. Joel Sember has a License degree in Moral Theology from the Pontifical University Santa Croce in Rome. He is pastor of three parishes in the Diocese of Green Bay, WI.
There is an article on his website that also denigrates and casts doubt over the “Three Days of Darkness”—and rhetorically asks “What should Catholics think?” before putting down and ridiculing any such belief in the “Three Days of Darkness.” Here are some key objections which we will proceed to answer immediately within the text (in red print):
“An end-times prophecy about three days of darkness is making the rounds of Catholic circles. This prophecy states that God’s last act of judgment on Earth will be three days and three nights of total darkness. No light will shine during this time except blessed wax candles, and the enemies of the Church will die.
[COMMENT: Wrong! The prophecy DOES NOT state that it will be “God’s last act of judgment on Earth” but that it will bring to an end the Minor Tribulation or Minor Apostasy, after which God will triumph and there will be peace on Earth with God being wonderfully served and worshiped. If the writer cannot get his facts write in the opening paragraph, then where else is erring?]
“According to some web searches I did, this same prophecy also makes the rounds in New Age circles—although without the references to the Church of course. On the internet you can find a purported Mayan legend about a time when the sun did not rise and there were three days of darkness until the people’s prayers brought the sun back.
[COMMENT: Here again there is an attempt to denigrate using the “guilt by association” method—linking to New Age and pagan Mayan sources. In that case we can cast doubt on many aspects and teachings of the Catholic Faith just because Protestants or other religions believe the same thing—for example worshiping on Sundays rather than the Sabbath (nowhere in the Bible does it say we have to worship on Sunday). ].
“The Catholic version is far more terrifying than the New-Age version. The prophecy is attributed to Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi. I have not done any research to establish whether she really wrote this [COMMENT: Again subtle doubt casting. Have you done any research to see if Christ really existed, that Our Lady really existed, etc.], but here is the passage that you can find on the internet:
“God will send two punishments: one will be in the form of wars, revolutions and other evils; it shall originate on Earth. The other will be sent from Heaven. There shall come over the whole Earth an intense darkness lasting three days and three nights. Nothing can be seen, and the air will be laden with pestilence which will claim mainly, but not only, the enemies of religion. It will be impossible to use any man-made lighting during this darkness, except blessed wax candles. He, who out of curiosity, opens his window to look out, or leaves his home, will fall dead on the spot. During these three days, people should remain in their homes, pray the Rosary and beg God for mercy.
“All the enemies of the Church, whether known or unknown, will perish over the whole Earth during that universal darkness, with the exception of a few whom God will soon convert. The air shall be infected by demons who will appear under all sorts of hideous forms.”
This is the mild version of the prophecy. More serious versions tell you that all Hell will roam the Earth during those three days, and just looking out a window will be fatal. You are warned to buy thick drapes or black plastic to cover all your windows. Also, it is said that during the three days you will hear people banging on your door and you will think that people you love are out in the darkness, but do not open the door because it will really be the demons trying to get you.
[COMMENT: Here again we have a subtle form of ridicule and denigration that seeks to make the reader disbelieve that God could be brutal. If you do not believe that, then simply read the Old Testament and look at the ‘brutality’ God commanded in retribution for sin! Oh, that is the Old Testament, you may say! Well look at the New Testament and see how God destroyed Jerusalem in 70 AD, which was prophesied by Christ, where the city was razed to the ground and over a million Jews were slaughtered (men, women and children), and where some of the Jews were eating their own babies during the long siege, due to a lack of food. Pretty brutal, eh? And prophesied by Christ! So the brutality of the forthcoming chastisement should not surprise us!]
“What should Catholics think about this prophecy? They should think that it is probably wrong. There is no scriptural support for the idea that darkness will be the last punishment of mankind [COMMENT: Again, who says it is last punishment of mankind? Only you! Facts wrong again!]. Although there are several scriptures which talk about the sun being darkened in the last days, the darkness is never the last and final judgment but it is only a sign of the judgment that is coming. This is true in the references in Matthew, Revelation, and the prophets. In Exodus 10:21-29, the only passage in the Bible that refers to three days of darkness, the darkness is the penultimate plague unleashed against Egypt. The last and final plague was the death of the firstborn.
[COMMENT: Again, wrong assumption and insinuation—the “Three Days of Darkness” will not be “the last and final” punishment. This is a good example of how to build castles on sand. As St. Thomas Aquinas says, if you are little off course in the beginning of your journey, then after many hours you will be a long way from your intended destination.].
The clearest reference in Scripture to the final judgment of the Earth [the “Three Days of Darkness is not the final judgment] says that this judgment will happen by fire. Revelation 20:7-10 says this:
“When the thousand years are over, Satan will be released from his prison and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the Earth—Gog and Magog—and to gather them for battle. In number they are like the sand on the seashore. They marched across the breadth of the Earth and surrounded the camp of God’s people, the city he loves. But fire came down from Heaven and devoured them.”
“Someone could claim that the fire that comes down from Heaven is really an intense darkness laden with pestilence and swarming with demons, but that does not make any sense. [COMMENT: If you reject the notion of true fire coming down from Heaven, then is Our Lady in error or lying when she says: “Without virginity, it would be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon these lands in order to purify them” (Quito) … “Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume three cities ... Water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride” (La Salette) … “Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity” (Akita).].
Second, the more you think about the prophecy, the less sense it makes. This is supposed to be God’s final act of punishment [No! It is not!] against evildoers and enemies of the Church, but many evil people are going to be spared [COMMENT: where do you get “many”? Some perhaps, but not many, and certainly not the majority], so that they can be converted by the Church after the great chastisement. Also, many good and holy persons will be among the dead, according to this prophecy.
“In Exodus, the Israelites were spared the darkness and the death of their firstborn, and these plagues only fell on Egyptians. This time God must be a lot more angry, because only the just people who stay in their homes, do not look out the windows, and light blessed candles will be spared.
[COMMENT: Here the author is being sarcastic—but God is more angry, as stated by Our Lady of Akita: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before.”].
“This prophecy – and particularly the swarms of demons in the sky – seems to reflect the devil’s way of thinking and doing things much more than God’s way of doing things.
[COMMENT: If you reject the “swarms of demons”, then please explain Our Lady’s words at Quito, La Salette—or are those bogus too? “The passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely … This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph … This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings” (Quito) … “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God … the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … They will have great power over nature: there will be churches built to serve these spirits. People will be transported from one place to another by these evil spirits, even priests” (La Salette).].
Endnote: you should be careful to read the fine print. Most of the internet sites promoting this prophecy are connected to individuals and groups which believe that the Catholic Church is in apostasy right now and most Masses are not valid. [COMMENT: Here again there is an attempt to denigrate using the “guilt by association” method]. Apostasy in the Catholic Church is the devil’s favorite end-time prophecy [COMMENT: Then you are condemning some of the greatest saints and mystics of the Church. Furthermore, you condemn Cardinal Manning, who wrote: “The writers of the Church tell us that in the latter days the city of Rome will probably become apostate from the Church and Vicar of Jesus Christ; and that Rome will again be punished, for he will depart from it; and the judgment of God will fall on the place from which he once reigned over the nations of the world …. Rome shall apostatize from the Faith and drive away the Vicar of Christ, and return to its ancient paganism.” And what of the current day cardinals who say that apostasy will start at the top?], something he has been dreaming about since 33 AD (the devil, like many politicians, believes that if you repeat something often enough it becomes true). During the Protestant Reformation he was telling everyone that the Pope in Rome was the Antichrist. The “alternate” version of the Third Secret of Fatima, the one supposedly hidden by the Vatican, proclaims that the papacy will be in apostasy and the true Faith will not be preserved in Rome, but only in Portugal. Whenever you find people believing that the Catholic Church has become or will become unfaithful to Christ, the devil is not far away
[COMMENT: Was Our Lord the devil in disguise when He said: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Was St. Paul the devil in disguise when he wrote that with most of the 2 to 3 million Israelites in the desert during the time of the Exodus, God was not well pleased? During the Arian heresy, most of the Church was unfaithful to the dogma of Christ being true God, denying that the Son is of one essence, nature, or substance with God. Hence the famous quote of St. Jerome, who complained that nearly all the world had become Arian!]
This is the typical denigrating and ridiculing attack that comes from the pens of many Modernists, Rationalists and Liberals within the Church itself. This requires vigilance and repudiation when encountered. For, as Our Lord said: “They are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
Sifting the Prophecies
A lot has been written about the “Three Days of Darkness”—some of it exaggerated and sensational, some not—so one needs to sift through the material carefully for fear of falling into serious doctrinal errors. This separation of the chaff from the wheat is a difficult task.
The Catholic Church & Prophecies
The “Three Days of Darkness” is a prophecy—not from one single source, but from several sources from different time spheres. So it is first of all necessary to look at the principles of judgment concerning prophecies. Therefore, let us consult the Catholic Encyclopedia for some guidelines regarding prophecies—for this summarizes and presents these principles in a succinct manner. The Catholic Encyclopedia, as shown on the New Advent website, states:
● As the term is used in mystical theology, it applies both to the prophecies of canonical Scripture and to private prophecies.
● Understood in its strict sense, it means the foreknowledge of future events, though it may sometimes apply to past events, of which there is no memory, and to present hidden things, which cannot be known by the natural light of reason.
● St. Paul, speaking of prophecy in 1 Corinthians 14, does not confine its meaning to predictions of future events, but includes under it Divine inspirations, concerning what is secret, whether future or not.
● As, however, the manifestation of hidden present mysteries, or past events comes under revelation, we have here to understand by prophecy what is in its strict and proper sense, namely the revelation of future events.
● The knowledge must be supernatural and infused by God, because it concerns things beyond the natural power of created intelligence; and the knowledge must be manifested either by words or signs, because the gift of prophecy is given primarily for the good of others, and hence needs to be manifested.
● It is a Divine light by which God reveals things concerning the unknown future and by which these things are in some way represented to the mind of the prophet, whose duty it is to manifest them to others.
Prudent Discernment Needed
The Church considers the Book of Apocalypse as Divinely inspired and remains to be the last prophetic work that the Church acknowledges as such. Though the prophetic spirit has continued through the centuries, the Church has never promoted any other prophetic work—even if the Church proclaimed countless persons as saints who were gifted with prophesy. Thus the Church shows prudence—by neither absolutely accepting or absolutely denying the prophecies made by those saints. She will simply say that there is nothing in them that can be judged to be against Faith or Morals.
The Church prudently gives ample latitude as to the acceptance or rejection of particular or private prophecies based on evidence for or against them. The Catholic faithful’s attitude should be that of prudence and balance always being careful and slow in accepting or rejecting them—especially when they come from trustworthy sources and do not contradict Catholic doctrine and morals. Unfortunately there are many who are lovers and followers of the sensational, and bite the fruit before testing it.
How Can Prophecy Be Verified?
The only real way a prophecy can be absolutely verified as true is when it is fulfilled. It is much like the police holding a person in suspicion of criminal behavior—they cannot be sure or they cannot arrest the person until their suspicion (or ‘prophecy’) is fulfilled and the person is caught “red-handed” committing the crime. Veracity or accuracy of their fulfillment remains to be the litmus test to which all prophecies are to be judged.
The character of these prophecies covers a wide gamut ranging from pious anticipations of Providence; to events in the lives of saints; to the fate of nations; to the popes and the papacy; and to apocalyptic catastrophes leading to the end of the world. They may sometimes be realized in part and in part may even run contrary to events. Due to the conditional nature of some of them, they may or may not be fulfilled.
For example, Our Lady says at Fatima—if her demands are fulfilled then a certain thing will not happen, but if her demands are not fulfilled, then it will happen. So if we pray and do much penance, the terrible things she foretold at Fatima and also at La Salette and Akita would not happen. Because they would not happen, we cannot say the prophecy of a chastisement was false—it is simply that we took heed of her warnings and put into practice what would stop the prophecy coming true. In this way many prophecies are said to be “conditional”.
“End Time” Prophecies
First of all we must ask ourselves: “Are we in the end times?” Though we are most certainly not on the verge of the actual end of the world, we can almost certainly say that we are within a period that could well be called “The End Times” or “The Latter Days”.
Sr. Lucia of Fatima, in December 1957, speaking to Fr. Fuentes, said: “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that the devil is about to wage a decisive battle with the Virgin, and a decisive battle is a final battle, in which one side wins, the other side loses.”
Only months after Bishop Ito approved the Akita apparitions of Our Lady, Cardinal Ratzinger (the future Pope Benedict XVI) was interviewed on November 11th, 1984 by Jesus magazine. Within this 1984 interview (titled “Here is Why the Faith is in Crisis”), Cardinal Ratzinger acknowledged that he had read the Third Secret and that it speaks of “The dangers threatening the Faith and the life of the Christian, and therefore the world, and also the importance of the last times.”
In the build-up to Christmas 2015, Pope Francis just recently told crowds in St. Peter’s Square that this Christmas might be the last one for humanity. In a grim speech, the Pope said that the current chaotic state of the world marks the beginning of the “end times”, and that this time next year the world is likely to be unrecognizable.
The common and outstanding character among latter day prophecies seems to be the foreboding of a terrible destruction of the world due to an unrepentant mankind, the resurgence of the Church, and the conversion of the world. E.H. Thompson keenly pointed out in his “Life of Anna Maria Taigi” (chapter 18) that the revelations have the following features: “First they all point to some terrible convulsion, to a revolution springing from most deep-rooted impiety, consisting in a formal opposition to God and His truth, and resulting in the most formidable persecution to which the Church has ever been subject. Secondly, they all promise for the Church a victory more splendid than she has ever achieved here below.”
The Fatima prophecies fit exactly into this category when Our Lady spoke of a terrible chastisement if men do not repent and amend their lives—but she also gave hope by promising that in the end Her Immaculate Heart will triumph.
The Three Days of Darkness
The idea or fact of “days of darkness” is nothing new. Holy Scripture has many references to “days of darkness”—therefore this whole idea is not the invention of someone’s feverish imagination!
Firstly, at the very beginning of time, the whole world was enshrouded in darkness: “And the Earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep … And God said: Be light made. And light was made. And God saw the light that it was good; and he divided the light from the darkness. And he called the light Day, and the darkness Night” (Genesis 1:2-4).
Secondly, an event which could be said to resemble most the circumstances of the prophecy about the “Three days of Darkness, is found in the time of Moses and the ten plagues that God sends upon Pharaoh and Egypt, especially the ninth plague—which actually was three days of darkness: “And the Lord said to Moses: ‘Stretch out they hand towards Heaven: and may there be darkness upon the land of Egypt, so thick that it may be felt!’ And Moses stretch forth his hand towards Heaven: and there came horrible darkness in all the land of Egypt for three days. No man saw his brother, nor moved himself out of the place where he was: but wheresoever the children of Israel dwelt there was light” (Exodus 10:21-23). This shows a precedent for the “Three Days of Darkness”.
Once the Israelites left Egypt and were being pursued by the Egyptian soldiers, God again used darkness as weapon before destroying His enemies: “And the children of Israel cried to the Lord: and He put darkness between you and the Egyptians, and brought the sea upon them, and covered them” (Josue 24:7).
In another Old Testament instance, Isaias the prophet also spoke of a day of darkness: “Behold, the day of the Lord shall come, a cruel day, and full of indignation, and of wrath, and fury, to lay the land desolate, and to destroy the sinners thereof out of it. For the stars of Heaven, and their brightness shall not display their light: the sun shall be darkened in his rising, and the moon shall not shine with her light. And I will visit the evils of the world, and against the wicked for their iniquity: and I will make the pride of infidels to cease, and will bring down the arrogancy of the mighty … I form the light, and create darkness, I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord that do all these things” (Isaias 13: 9-11; 45:7).
The Book of Job speaks of day being turned into darkness and death: “Let that day be turned into darkness and let not the light shine upon it. Let darkness, and the shadow of death cover it, let a mist overspread it, and let it be wrapped up in bitterness … He shall drive him out of light into darkness, and shall remove him out of the world” (Job 3:4-5; 18:18).
Coming to the New Testament, we have the “Three Hours of Darkness” that enveloped the whole world at the moment Our Lord died on the cross on Mount Calvary. Three of the Gospel writers mention this fact: “Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over the whole Earth, until the ninth hour” (Matthew 27:45) … “And when the sixth hour was come, there was darkness over the whole Earth until the ninth hour” (Mark 15:33) … “And it was almost the sixth hour; and there was darkness over all the Earth until the ninth hour” (Luke 23:44). Again, a precedent for the “Three Days of Darkness”, showing that God is liable to operate in this way and that it is nothing new.
These and even more Scriptural references, provide a platform of reality and not mere fancy for the prophecies and revelations about days of darkness that would be made—by the saints, the blessed, the venerables, and mystics—after New Testament times and relating to our times.
Article 31
Saturday, February 1st
Candles, Candlemas & You
Saturday, February 1st
Candles, Candlemas & You
History of Candles
The candle can be a beautiful and profound subject for meditation—and this is why we are looking at candles in the build-up to Candlemas Day (February 2nd). Yet the candle is relative a latecomer on scene of light! The “new kids on the block” were the later born gaslights and electric lights, but funnily enough the candle did not come to light much before the year 200 BC—as far we know, but then, what do we know!?! Man’s knowledge, though he thinks it is great, is quite paltry in reality! Anyhow, that’s what they say—around 200 BC.
It is also thought that the earliest known candles were made from whale-fat by the Chinese, during the Qin Dynasty (221–206 BC). In India, wax from boiling cinnamon was used for temple candles. In parts of Europe, the Middle-East and Africa, where lamp-oil made from olives was readily available, candle making remained unknown until the early Middle-Ages. Even today, some Catholic churches and chapels still prefer to burn olive-oil for their sanctuary (tabernacle) lights. Candles were primarily made from tallow and beeswax until about 1850, but since then have been increasingly made from spermaceti, purified animal fats (stearin) and paraffin wax.
Human Candles
You are more of a candle than you think! We speak of Jesus the Light coming at Christmas; and we light the Paschal Candle at Easter. The Paschal Candle is a symbol of Christ―Our Lord speaks of Himself, saying: “I am come a light into the world!” (John 12:46) … “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world!” (John 9:5). But it is not just Jesus who is the light of the world; we are also meant to be the light of the world. Our Lord also says to his followers: “You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid! Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house! So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:14-16). Since we are meant to be the “light of the world” ― the Paschal Candle represents Jesus Christ, the source of light; all other candles are symbolic of the faithful.
At Easter, we light our candles from the Paschal Candle; we get our light from the Paschal Candle, just as we get the light of Faith from Jesus, the divine light or divine Candle that came amongst us. And that light, that we get from Him, we cannot hide, for we, too, are the light of the world. What was light in bygone days? There was no electric light! Light was fire! Light came from the flame! We even paint the sun as exuding flames of fire, ‘flames of light’ so to speak. One of the chief reasons that the world in general, and the Church in particular, is in an appalling mess, is the fact there is no longer any fire in souls of Catholics anymore, there is no “fire in their bellies”, nor fire in their hearts, nor fire enlightening their minds. They sit in darkness and know not the light and love that exudes from the fiery Sacred Heart!
Not Many Like The Light!
Yet, though you are the “light of the world”, don’t expect the world to rejoice over your light! What St. John writes of Our Lord, will also be our lot in life: “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:4-5). Sometimes people just don’t want the light! They prefer the darkness! “The people that sat in darkness … did not comprehend … He was in the world, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (Matthew 4:16; John 1:5-11). Which is why “the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 8:12), “and the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30). “If thy eye be evil, then thy whole body shall be darksome. If then the light that is in thee, be darkness: the darkness itself how great shall it be!” (Matthew 6:23). “Take heed therefore, that the light which is in thee, be not darkness!” (Luke 11:35).
It’s Tough Being a Candle!
We have all heard of the firework entitled “The Roman Candle”. What most people do not know is that this firework was a very brutal fire-work or work of fire in the time of the Christian persecutions. In fact, it was a “real-life” fire work. The story that Nero played the fiddle, while Rome burned, conjures up images of the emperor, dramatically back-lit by the flames from the burning city, alone, calmly playing his fiddle, while his people cried out in suffering. This most certainly was his attitude as he enjoyed watching the Christians that he had arrested, slowly burning to death while attached to posts in his ‘pleasure gardens’ after being coated with tar, so that they would burn better—hence the grotesque title to the firework, “Roman Candle” which is what those poor Christians were—live human candles in Rome!
His persecution of the early Christians was the first the religion would endure, and it resulted in the martyrdom of the apostles Peter and Paul, both of whom were executed during the persecutions. That alone should help us meditate upon the calling of the ‘Christian Candles’ to imitate the ‘Jesus Candle’ and lay down their lives for Christ, Faith and Friends: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13).
Flickering Candles in Tribulation
Life is not always easy for the candle! There are many drafts of air wishing to extinguish the brave candle! The result is a candle that flickers nervously and desperately as it battles the air current; often exuding wavering smoke as it wavers back and forth, like a candle tempted to bend in the direction that the wind blows!
This, of course, is symbolic of our battle against the powerful gusting winds of the devil, the world and our own flesh with its concupiscences. Any one of these can quickly extinguish our candle. Usually, in the case of a candle, the thicker or larger is the wick, the less likely it is to be extinguished by a gust of wind. Likewise, the ticker or bigger the soul (in the sense of being filled more with the things of God), the less likely it is to be blown out. Sometimes brass followers (which are those brass-caps that are placed on top of the candle) aid the candle to burn correctly and give some minor protection against air-drafts. They are like a cross on the shoulder of the candle, that it has to carry, but a cross that preserves its burning flame of charity.
However, sometimes the wind is powerful and sustained (imagine an outdoor procession with candles) and unless there is extra protection for the candle, it stands no chance of keeping its flame alive. In these situations. The remedy for that situation is drastic, and the candle has to isolate itself from everything else around it. The altar server candles will often have a brass follower that allows a 2-3 inch tall glass funnel to sit atop, thus cutting-off the candle from the world and protecting it from the onslaught of the wind. Another, less aesthetic solution, would be to simply put the candle is a glass jar. In all of these cases, the beneficial light can get out, but the damaging wind of the world finds it hard to get in. That is what we have to sometimes do in relation to the world: whether it be in the circle of family and relatives, or in the work and social environment. The flame and fire of God is too precious to lose.
We Were Made To Burn!
Either we burn the debt of sins with the fires of love in our hearts here below; or we burn for the debt of our sins in either Purgatory or Hell. God wants us to do it the least painful way—what do we want to do? It’s a simple logical case of burn now, or burn later! Our Lord said that He came to cast fire on Earth: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). Each time we say the prayer to the Holy Ghost, we ask Him to “enkindle in us the fire” of His love. St. Jacinta Marto of Fatima, not long before dying, said: “Oh! If only I could put into all hearts the fire I feel in my own, which makes me love the Hearts of Jesus and Mary so much!” That fire within us must be kindled and it must burn brightly—either in this world, or in Purgatory. We can only enter Heaven with a raging fire of love in our hearts! That burning must begin here on Earth: “My heart grew hot within me: and, in my meditation, a fire shall flame out” (Psalm 38:4). “And they said one to the other: ‘Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in this way, and opened to us the Scriptures?’” (Luke 24:32)
Burning in Purgatory
By neglecting or refusing to do penance for our sins, then—if we don’t perish in Hell—we will at least burn many a long year in Purgatory. This is a brutal fact that there is no getting away from. This is a terrifying thought and one that makes the bravest man shudder. Which of us does not tremble when he thinks of those persons, in this world, who have been burnt to death in a slow fire? Some may have been deliberately burnt to death, as in the case of many martyrs; others accidentally burnt to death, as in the case of a house burning down. What fear would not be ours if we had to face a similar death? Yet their suffering was of relatively short duration. The incomparably fiercer fire of Purgatory, which we may have to face, may last 20, 50, 100 years or even many centuries!
The Candles of Purgatory
As Fr. Schouppe writes in his book, Purgatory: “Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, so that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next … Purgatory is divided into three distinct parts, which are as the three large provinces of that kingdom of suffering. They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different orders. These souls are buried more deeply in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance. The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers, is that of Hell … The same fire, says St. Gregory, torments the damned and purifies the elect. ‘Almost all theologians,’ says the cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, ‘teach that the reprobate and the souls in Purgatory suffer the action of the same fire’ … Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but not sufficiently expiated during life.” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory).
Speaking of this interchange of love, between the God and the soul in Purgatory, St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book, The Dialogue, says:
“When the soul beholds within herself the amorous flame by which she is drawn toward her sweet Master and her God, the burning heat of love overpowers her and she melts. Then, in that divine light she sees how God, by His great care and constant providence, never ceases to attract her to her last perfection, and that He does so through pure love alone. She sees, too, that she herself, clogged by sin, cannot follow that attraction toward God, that is, that reconciling glance which He casts upon her that He may draw her to Himself. Moreover, a comprehension of that great misery, which it is to be hindered from gazing upon the light of God, is added to the instinctive desire of the soul to be wholly free to yield herself to that unifying flame. I repeat, it is the view of all these things which causes the pain of the suffering souls in Purgatory, not that they esteem their pains as great (cruel thought they be), but they count as far worse that opposition which they find in themselves to the will of that God whom they behold burning for them with so ardent and so pure a love. This love, with its unifying regard, is ever drawing these souls, as if it had no other thing to do; and when the soul beholds this, if she could find a yet more painful Purgatory in which she could be more quickly cleansed, she would plunge at once therein, impelled by the burning, mutual love between herself and God.”
The Candles of Hell
The children at Fatima were commanded to add a prayer after each decade of the Rosary that they would pray--”O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fire of Hell” (Fatima prayer taught by Our Lady). The reason for this was, as Our Lady said: “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!”
Our Lady showed these three young children a vision of Hell, concerning which Sr. Lucia would later say: “She opened her hands once more, as she had done the two previous months. The rays [of light] appeared to penetrate the Earth, and we saw, as it were, a vast sea of fire. Plunged in this fire, we saw the demons and the souls [of the damned]. The latter were like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, having human forms. They were floating about in that conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames which issued from within themselves, together with great clouds of smoke. Now they fell back on every side like sparks in huge fires, without weight or equilibrium, amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fright—it must have been this sight which caused me to cry out, as people say they heard me. The demons were distinguished [from the souls of the damned] by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning coals. That vision only lasted for a moment, thanks to our good Heavenly Mother, who at the first apparition had promised to take us to Heaven! Without that, I think that we would have died of terror and fear!”
In the life of Mother Marian de Jesus Torres, we read of the sufferings she had to undergo to pay for the conversion of a hateful and rebellious religious sister—La Capitana. Shortly after La Capitana’s heart had been touched by God’s merciful grace, Mother Mariana began to fulfill the sentence that she had undertaken for the conversion of this rebellious sister. For five years, she suffered the stench of Hell that tortured her sense of smell. At the end of the five years, Mother Mariana called together the remaining founding mothers, who in spirit had accompanied her in her sufferings with their prayers, sacrifices and penances. She told them: “Alas, my sisters! How terrible Hell is! No words can describe it!”
The Candles of Faith, Hope and Charity
In darkness, with the assistance of light, we can see where we are going, we can see the obstacles that we could trip over, the light is our guide that keeps us safe and out of harm’s way. In this sense, the candle symbolizes our Faith. Our Faith enlightens us as to what to do and what to avoid. Likewise, if we are stuck in a dark cave without a light, things seem to be hopeless; but once we have a candle, then we also have hope that now we can see to emerge from the darkness that we find ourselves in. This links to the supernatural virtue of Hope. The flame of a candle also gives off warmth. This is symbolic of the supernatural virtue of Charity.
Fire—A Sign of the Presence of God
In Judaism, a perpetual light was kept burning in the Temple and the synagogues not only to ensure the ability to light other candles or oil lamps in the evening but also to show the presence of God (cf. Exodus 27:20-21 and Leviticus 24:24). Later, the Talmud prescribed a lit lamp at the Ark, where the Torah and other writings of Sacred Scripture were kept, to show reverence to the Word of God. This practice probably influenced our own practice of having a lit candle near the tabernacle to indicate the presence of and to show reverence for the Blessed Sacrament.
Roman pagan culture also used candles in religious practice. Lit candles were used in religious and military processions, showing the divine presence, aid or favor of the gods. With the development of emperor worship, candles were also lit near his image as a sign of respect and reverence. Remember that by the time of Jesus, the emperor was considered divine and even given the titles Pontifex Maximus (high priest) and Dominus et Deus (Lord and God).
Christian Candles
Christians adapted the use of lit candles (or even oil lamps in the Eastern Roman Empire) for Mass, liturgical processions, evening prayer ceremonies, funeral processions and, again, to show reverence to the reserved Blessed Sacrament. Moreover, there is evidence that lit candles or oil lamps were burned at the tombs of saints, particularly martyrs, by the 200s, and before sacred images and relics by the 300s. St. Jerome (died 420), in his Contra Vigilantium, attested to this practice. The light, then, is a symbol of Faith, truth, wisdom, virtue, grace, the divine life, charity, the ardor of prayer and the sacred presence which flow from Christ Himself.
Also, some medieval spiritual writers expanded the imagery of the candle itself: bees wax symbolized the purity of Christ, the wick, the human soul of Christ, and the light His divinity. Also, the burning candle symbolized a sacrifice, which is made in both the offering of the prayer and the acceptance of the Lord’s Will.
The candle can be a beautiful and profound subject for meditation—and this is why we are looking at candles in the build-up to Candlemas Day (February 2nd). Yet the candle is relative a latecomer on scene of light! The “new kids on the block” were the later born gaslights and electric lights, but funnily enough the candle did not come to light much before the year 200 BC—as far we know, but then, what do we know!?! Man’s knowledge, though he thinks it is great, is quite paltry in reality! Anyhow, that’s what they say—around 200 BC.
It is also thought that the earliest known candles were made from whale-fat by the Chinese, during the Qin Dynasty (221–206 BC). In India, wax from boiling cinnamon was used for temple candles. In parts of Europe, the Middle-East and Africa, where lamp-oil made from olives was readily available, candle making remained unknown until the early Middle-Ages. Even today, some Catholic churches and chapels still prefer to burn olive-oil for their sanctuary (tabernacle) lights. Candles were primarily made from tallow and beeswax until about 1850, but since then have been increasingly made from spermaceti, purified animal fats (stearin) and paraffin wax.
Human Candles
You are more of a candle than you think! We speak of Jesus the Light coming at Christmas; and we light the Paschal Candle at Easter. The Paschal Candle is a symbol of Christ―Our Lord speaks of Himself, saying: “I am come a light into the world!” (John 12:46) … “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world!” (John 9:5). But it is not just Jesus who is the light of the world; we are also meant to be the light of the world. Our Lord also says to his followers: “You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid! Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house! So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:14-16). Since we are meant to be the “light of the world” ― the Paschal Candle represents Jesus Christ, the source of light; all other candles are symbolic of the faithful.
At Easter, we light our candles from the Paschal Candle; we get our light from the Paschal Candle, just as we get the light of Faith from Jesus, the divine light or divine Candle that came amongst us. And that light, that we get from Him, we cannot hide, for we, too, are the light of the world. What was light in bygone days? There was no electric light! Light was fire! Light came from the flame! We even paint the sun as exuding flames of fire, ‘flames of light’ so to speak. One of the chief reasons that the world in general, and the Church in particular, is in an appalling mess, is the fact there is no longer any fire in souls of Catholics anymore, there is no “fire in their bellies”, nor fire in their hearts, nor fire enlightening their minds. They sit in darkness and know not the light and love that exudes from the fiery Sacred Heart!
Not Many Like The Light!
Yet, though you are the “light of the world”, don’t expect the world to rejoice over your light! What St. John writes of Our Lord, will also be our lot in life: “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:4-5). Sometimes people just don’t want the light! They prefer the darkness! “The people that sat in darkness … did not comprehend … He was in the world, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (Matthew 4:16; John 1:5-11). Which is why “the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 8:12), “and the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30). “If thy eye be evil, then thy whole body shall be darksome. If then the light that is in thee, be darkness: the darkness itself how great shall it be!” (Matthew 6:23). “Take heed therefore, that the light which is in thee, be not darkness!” (Luke 11:35).
It’s Tough Being a Candle!
We have all heard of the firework entitled “The Roman Candle”. What most people do not know is that this firework was a very brutal fire-work or work of fire in the time of the Christian persecutions. In fact, it was a “real-life” fire work. The story that Nero played the fiddle, while Rome burned, conjures up images of the emperor, dramatically back-lit by the flames from the burning city, alone, calmly playing his fiddle, while his people cried out in suffering. This most certainly was his attitude as he enjoyed watching the Christians that he had arrested, slowly burning to death while attached to posts in his ‘pleasure gardens’ after being coated with tar, so that they would burn better—hence the grotesque title to the firework, “Roman Candle” which is what those poor Christians were—live human candles in Rome!
His persecution of the early Christians was the first the religion would endure, and it resulted in the martyrdom of the apostles Peter and Paul, both of whom were executed during the persecutions. That alone should help us meditate upon the calling of the ‘Christian Candles’ to imitate the ‘Jesus Candle’ and lay down their lives for Christ, Faith and Friends: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13).
Flickering Candles in Tribulation
Life is not always easy for the candle! There are many drafts of air wishing to extinguish the brave candle! The result is a candle that flickers nervously and desperately as it battles the air current; often exuding wavering smoke as it wavers back and forth, like a candle tempted to bend in the direction that the wind blows!
This, of course, is symbolic of our battle against the powerful gusting winds of the devil, the world and our own flesh with its concupiscences. Any one of these can quickly extinguish our candle. Usually, in the case of a candle, the thicker or larger is the wick, the less likely it is to be extinguished by a gust of wind. Likewise, the ticker or bigger the soul (in the sense of being filled more with the things of God), the less likely it is to be blown out. Sometimes brass followers (which are those brass-caps that are placed on top of the candle) aid the candle to burn correctly and give some minor protection against air-drafts. They are like a cross on the shoulder of the candle, that it has to carry, but a cross that preserves its burning flame of charity.
However, sometimes the wind is powerful and sustained (imagine an outdoor procession with candles) and unless there is extra protection for the candle, it stands no chance of keeping its flame alive. In these situations. The remedy for that situation is drastic, and the candle has to isolate itself from everything else around it. The altar server candles will often have a brass follower that allows a 2-3 inch tall glass funnel to sit atop, thus cutting-off the candle from the world and protecting it from the onslaught of the wind. Another, less aesthetic solution, would be to simply put the candle is a glass jar. In all of these cases, the beneficial light can get out, but the damaging wind of the world finds it hard to get in. That is what we have to sometimes do in relation to the world: whether it be in the circle of family and relatives, or in the work and social environment. The flame and fire of God is too precious to lose.
We Were Made To Burn!
Either we burn the debt of sins with the fires of love in our hearts here below; or we burn for the debt of our sins in either Purgatory or Hell. God wants us to do it the least painful way—what do we want to do? It’s a simple logical case of burn now, or burn later! Our Lord said that He came to cast fire on Earth: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). Each time we say the prayer to the Holy Ghost, we ask Him to “enkindle in us the fire” of His love. St. Jacinta Marto of Fatima, not long before dying, said: “Oh! If only I could put into all hearts the fire I feel in my own, which makes me love the Hearts of Jesus and Mary so much!” That fire within us must be kindled and it must burn brightly—either in this world, or in Purgatory. We can only enter Heaven with a raging fire of love in our hearts! That burning must begin here on Earth: “My heart grew hot within me: and, in my meditation, a fire shall flame out” (Psalm 38:4). “And they said one to the other: ‘Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in this way, and opened to us the Scriptures?’” (Luke 24:32)
Burning in Purgatory
By neglecting or refusing to do penance for our sins, then—if we don’t perish in Hell—we will at least burn many a long year in Purgatory. This is a brutal fact that there is no getting away from. This is a terrifying thought and one that makes the bravest man shudder. Which of us does not tremble when he thinks of those persons, in this world, who have been burnt to death in a slow fire? Some may have been deliberately burnt to death, as in the case of many martyrs; others accidentally burnt to death, as in the case of a house burning down. What fear would not be ours if we had to face a similar death? Yet their suffering was of relatively short duration. The incomparably fiercer fire of Purgatory, which we may have to face, may last 20, 50, 100 years or even many centuries!
The Candles of Purgatory
As Fr. Schouppe writes in his book, Purgatory: “Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, so that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next … Purgatory is divided into three distinct parts, which are as the three large provinces of that kingdom of suffering. They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different orders. These souls are buried more deeply in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance. The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers, is that of Hell … The same fire, says St. Gregory, torments the damned and purifies the elect. ‘Almost all theologians,’ says the cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, ‘teach that the reprobate and the souls in Purgatory suffer the action of the same fire’ … Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but not sufficiently expiated during life.” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory).
Speaking of this interchange of love, between the God and the soul in Purgatory, St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book, The Dialogue, says:
“When the soul beholds within herself the amorous flame by which she is drawn toward her sweet Master and her God, the burning heat of love overpowers her and she melts. Then, in that divine light she sees how God, by His great care and constant providence, never ceases to attract her to her last perfection, and that He does so through pure love alone. She sees, too, that she herself, clogged by sin, cannot follow that attraction toward God, that is, that reconciling glance which He casts upon her that He may draw her to Himself. Moreover, a comprehension of that great misery, which it is to be hindered from gazing upon the light of God, is added to the instinctive desire of the soul to be wholly free to yield herself to that unifying flame. I repeat, it is the view of all these things which causes the pain of the suffering souls in Purgatory, not that they esteem their pains as great (cruel thought they be), but they count as far worse that opposition which they find in themselves to the will of that God whom they behold burning for them with so ardent and so pure a love. This love, with its unifying regard, is ever drawing these souls, as if it had no other thing to do; and when the soul beholds this, if she could find a yet more painful Purgatory in which she could be more quickly cleansed, she would plunge at once therein, impelled by the burning, mutual love between herself and God.”
The Candles of Hell
The children at Fatima were commanded to add a prayer after each decade of the Rosary that they would pray--”O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fire of Hell” (Fatima prayer taught by Our Lady). The reason for this was, as Our Lady said: “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!”
Our Lady showed these three young children a vision of Hell, concerning which Sr. Lucia would later say: “She opened her hands once more, as she had done the two previous months. The rays [of light] appeared to penetrate the Earth, and we saw, as it were, a vast sea of fire. Plunged in this fire, we saw the demons and the souls [of the damned]. The latter were like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, having human forms. They were floating about in that conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames which issued from within themselves, together with great clouds of smoke. Now they fell back on every side like sparks in huge fires, without weight or equilibrium, amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fright—it must have been this sight which caused me to cry out, as people say they heard me. The demons were distinguished [from the souls of the damned] by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning coals. That vision only lasted for a moment, thanks to our good Heavenly Mother, who at the first apparition had promised to take us to Heaven! Without that, I think that we would have died of terror and fear!”
In the life of Mother Marian de Jesus Torres, we read of the sufferings she had to undergo to pay for the conversion of a hateful and rebellious religious sister—La Capitana. Shortly after La Capitana’s heart had been touched by God’s merciful grace, Mother Mariana began to fulfill the sentence that she had undertaken for the conversion of this rebellious sister. For five years, she suffered the stench of Hell that tortured her sense of smell. At the end of the five years, Mother Mariana called together the remaining founding mothers, who in spirit had accompanied her in her sufferings with their prayers, sacrifices and penances. She told them: “Alas, my sisters! How terrible Hell is! No words can describe it!”
The Candles of Faith, Hope and Charity
In darkness, with the assistance of light, we can see where we are going, we can see the obstacles that we could trip over, the light is our guide that keeps us safe and out of harm’s way. In this sense, the candle symbolizes our Faith. Our Faith enlightens us as to what to do and what to avoid. Likewise, if we are stuck in a dark cave without a light, things seem to be hopeless; but once we have a candle, then we also have hope that now we can see to emerge from the darkness that we find ourselves in. This links to the supernatural virtue of Hope. The flame of a candle also gives off warmth. This is symbolic of the supernatural virtue of Charity.
Fire—A Sign of the Presence of God
In Judaism, a perpetual light was kept burning in the Temple and the synagogues not only to ensure the ability to light other candles or oil lamps in the evening but also to show the presence of God (cf. Exodus 27:20-21 and Leviticus 24:24). Later, the Talmud prescribed a lit lamp at the Ark, where the Torah and other writings of Sacred Scripture were kept, to show reverence to the Word of God. This practice probably influenced our own practice of having a lit candle near the tabernacle to indicate the presence of and to show reverence for the Blessed Sacrament.
Roman pagan culture also used candles in religious practice. Lit candles were used in religious and military processions, showing the divine presence, aid or favor of the gods. With the development of emperor worship, candles were also lit near his image as a sign of respect and reverence. Remember that by the time of Jesus, the emperor was considered divine and even given the titles Pontifex Maximus (high priest) and Dominus et Deus (Lord and God).
Christian Candles
Christians adapted the use of lit candles (or even oil lamps in the Eastern Roman Empire) for Mass, liturgical processions, evening prayer ceremonies, funeral processions and, again, to show reverence to the reserved Blessed Sacrament. Moreover, there is evidence that lit candles or oil lamps were burned at the tombs of saints, particularly martyrs, by the 200s, and before sacred images and relics by the 300s. St. Jerome (died 420), in his Contra Vigilantium, attested to this practice. The light, then, is a symbol of Faith, truth, wisdom, virtue, grace, the divine life, charity, the ardor of prayer and the sacred presence which flow from Christ Himself.
Also, some medieval spiritual writers expanded the imagery of the candle itself: bees wax symbolized the purity of Christ, the wick, the human soul of Christ, and the light His divinity. Also, the burning candle symbolized a sacrifice, which is made in both the offering of the prayer and the acceptance of the Lord’s Will.
Article 30
Friday, January 31st
Everyone Must Reach the Pinnacle of Perfection and Unity
Friday, January 31st
Everyone Must Reach the Pinnacle of Perfection and Unity
The Third of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life: The Way of the Perfect, or the The Unitive Way
Flying at High Altitude
Ever tried teaching algebra to a 5-year old? The mind and mentality of an adult is far more elevated than the mind of a 5-year old. He is preoccupied with questions which the 5-year old cannot grasp. The adult understands the child―having already passed through the childhood stage―but the child does not fully understand the adult; conversation between them on certain subjects, except of a very simple superficial kind, is impossible.
Why bother writing about the elevated, high-flying, pinnacle of the spiritual life―the mystical union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Perfection, or the Unitive Way), when almost everything will be over the heads and minds of the readers? As FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, in his Three Ages of the Interior Life, writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories―of beginners, proficients or perfect―but rather to that of stunted souls!” Of such a soul, in the spiritual domain, it is said: “He will be a child for the whole of his life.”
Another major obstacle to navigating the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is lukewarmness, of which of FR. FREDERICK FABER writes: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind.” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, Ch. 25). Most people will not attain the perfection of divine union (the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Unitive Way or the Way of the Perfect) until after death and after the purifying fires of Purgatory.
Nevertheless, the spiritual masters and theologians tell us that everyone is not only called to be baptized in the Catholic Faith, but everyone is also called leave sin (mortal and venial) behind, and to pass through the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life so as to embrace the mystical state―the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Perfection, the Unitive Way (which mystically united us to God here on Earth).
Most of us usually associate the “mystical state” with seeing visions and hearing voices. Visions and locutions, or voices, may or may not occur in the states of mystical union. They are not an essential part of the mystical state. Visions are imaginary. Likewise, locutions (communications) may be either mentally formed phrases representing thoughts, or impressions produced by divine grace in the soul while in a state of recollection, or they may be formed in the mind by direct supernatural intervention. But visions and locutions are not necessarily a part of mystical experience―and all mystical writers agree in asserting that they are the least important part. The possibility of self-delusion in such matters (in addition to the possibility of diabolical deception) is, of course, almost inexhaustible, and no mystical writer fails to warn his readers against this danger. Mysticism is an awareness of the divine activity of God on the soul. Mysticism is a passive and not an active experience―because only the Holy Spirit can produce this mystical experience in us by the activation of His gifts. Mystics are fully aware that what they are experiencing is not produced by themselves. They did not cause the experience and cannot retain it for a second longer than is desired by the One who produces it.
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS writes: “Why it is that there are so few that attain to this lofty state? It must be known that this is not because God is pleased that there should be only a few raised to this high spiritual state—on the contrary it would please God if all were so raised to this lofty state—but unfortunately He finds few souls in whom He can perform so high and lofty a work. For, when He proves and tests them in small things and finds them weak; and also sees that they quickly flee from labor, and desire not to submit to the least discomfort ... God finds that they are not strong enough to bear the favor which He was granting them when He began to purge them, and so He goes no farther with their purification.”
Most of us won’t progress to union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life (the Unitive Way) while living on this Earth, because we won’t give up our wills to God―but we are nevertheless all called to this level of holiness. Most will not even make it into the Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Illuminative Way, or Way of Proficients) because they are at peace with many or most venial sins and will not fight against them to eradicate them. The bottom line is―whether we understand these things or not; whether we like them or not; whether we choose to embark on the path or not―we will not get into Heaven until we have reached a perfect union with God. That has to take place in this life, or in the painful fires of Purgatory (which St. Thomas Aquinas says are as painful as the fires of Hell, the difference being is that at some time the fires of Purgatory end).
The Three Ways are not an option, but an obligation. They are not that complicated to understand―but there are more entertaining things to learn about for most people and the television, internet, social media, etc. supplies those needs. In most worthwhile professions there are certain aspects of that profession that are difficult to learn and master―but they must be learned and mastered if you wish to qualify for that profession. The same is true for Heaven―even more so! You might not like it; you might not wish to conform to it; you might rebel against it and stamp your feet and scream out loud in protest against it―but you are not going to admitted into Heaven until you have reached that perfect union with God. If you refuse to do so on Earth―then you will be brought to that perfect union in the fires of Purgatory (at much greater pain and expense)―the only loser is you!
Entrance Requirements to the Third Way of the Spiritual Life
So what does it take to enter this elevated level, the pinnacle of the spiritual life? Just as the Way of Beginners required a conversion from mortal sin; and the Way of the Proficient required a conversion from venial sin―the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of the Perfect, requires a conversion away from any and all imperfections (which are not even venial sins, but cases where the soul knows it could do better). The characteristics of the soul in this Way of Perfection are as follows:
● No more deliberate mortal or venial sin
● Avoidance of all imperfections
● Perpetually living in presence of God
● Perpetual Prayer
● Conformity to God’s Will in Third Degree (the highest degree)
● Total abandonment to God
● Great spirit of Faith
● No self-love
● Thoughts totally centered on Our Lord
● Love of God becomes sole ruling virtue
● Heroic charity of Christ (love of Christ)
● Heroic service of neighbor
● Heroic love of enemies
● Humility practiced in Third Degree (the highest degree)
● Desire to suffer greatly for God
● Unalterable patience
● Detachment from all things, persons, places and events
Unfortunately, the advanced souls who have been making much progress in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of the Proficient or the Illuminative Way―do not have the above listed virtues or characteristics in any high degree. These advanced souls, these souls who are making progress, are still some way from being fit to enter into the Third Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way. Therefore God is obliged to purify them by what is called “The Dark Night of the Soul.”
Why the Soul or Spirit Still Needs to be Purified
Those souls who are making much progress in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way―are still far from being perfect. That is why they are unfit to enter the Third Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way. God, therefore, must purify the defective soul by a Dark Night of the Soul, before admitting it to the Third Way―just as He purified the senses by the Dark Night of the Senses before allowing the soul to pass from the First Way of Beginners into the Second Way of the Proficient. FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE explains this in his book, The Three Ages of the Interior Life:
“The necessity of the passive purification of the spirit is because of the defects which subsist in proficients or the advanced. There are still many defects in proficients, who have made considerable progress, whose souls, in large part, are already purified in the inferior or sensible part of the soul, and who have begun to live the life of the spirit through the initial infused contemplation of the mysteries of Faith. Nevertheless, the stains of the old man still remain in their spirit like rust that will disappear only under the action of a purifying fire.
“These advanced souls are still often subject to indirectly voluntary distractions in prayer; to dullness; to useless dissipation; to excessively human sympathy for certain persons; leading to a lack of esteem for others, which is more or less contrary to justice and charity. They have moments of natural rudeness―the result of the sin of impatience. Some fall into illusion by being too much attached to certain spiritual communications; they expose themselves to the devil, who takes pleasure in deceiving them by false prophecies. Others, under the same influence, fall into bitter zeal, which leads them to sermonize their neighbor and to deliver untimely corrections. Thereby―though unaware of it―these advanced souls are puffed up with spiritual pride and presumption, and thus deviate from the simplicity, humility, and purity required for close union with God.
“But these are only the defects related to the interior life, to relations with God. What would it be if one were to consider the defects that advanced souls still have in their relations with superiors, equals, and inferiors; if one were to consider―in this period of the spiritual life―all that still injures charity and justice; all that―in those who have to teach, govern or direct souls―stains their apostolate, teaching, government, and direction?
“Spiritual or intellectual pride, which still subsists, inspires excessive attachment to personal judgment, to one’s own way of seeing, feeling, sympathizing, willing. From it are born jealousy, secret ambition, or again great authoritarianism, unless one is by temperament inclined to the contrary defect, that is, to excessive indulgence and to weakness toward those who oppress others. Here, too, may often be remarked a lack of promptness and generosity in obedience, or, on the contrary, a servility inspired by self-love. Frequent also are faults against charity through jealousy, envy, slander, discord, contention.
“The root of the higher faculties of intellect and will is still deeply tainted with pride, personal judgment, and self-will. The divine light and the will of God do not yet reign there uncontested―far from it. These stains have, in some cases, been there for a long time; they may become encrusted as they grow old and may profoundly alter the character by turning it away from true intimacy with God. From this are born many defamations and, at times, most grievous divisions among those who should work together for the good of souls.
“This is why St. Augustine used to say the prayer, often repeated by St. Louis Bertrand centuries later: “Lord, burn, cut, do not spare on this earth, that Thou mayest spare in eternity!” It is important to be purified on Earth with merit, rather than after death without merit. Nothing soiled enters Heaven―consequently, to enter there, the soul must undergo a profound purification sooner or later. It is evident that the beatific vision of God cannot be granted to a soul that is still impure.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Our Unconscious Pride and Egoism Must Go
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE explains that our secret pride and unconscious egoism is the obstacle to a true union with God. Therefore God has to step in and grind down the remaining obstacle and replace it with true humility and total submission to His Divine Will: “The depths of our will needs to be purified from the often unconscious egoism that has for long subsisted in it, leading us to disturbing and fruitless conversation with ourselves and not to tranquilizing and vivifying conversation with God. This unconscious egoism still inclines us to seek ourselves in everything and at times to judge our neighbor with severity while treating ourselves with great indulgence. This same egoism which makes us seek ourselves in many things is especially evident when trial strikes us; we are then completely upset and seek help, consolation, and counsel from without, where God is not to be found. We have not built our house sufficiently on Christ the rock, with the result that it lacks solidity. We have built on self, on self-will, which is equivalent to building on sand; thus at times there is great weakness underlying harshness of judgment. There is only one way to triumph over these obstacles―that is for God to take complete possession of the interior of the soul and occupy it―which is something that happens only to His true friends.”
This passive purification will certainly not be without suffering, and, as St. John of the Cross teaches, it will even be a mystical death, the death to self, the disintegration of self-love, which until then has resisted grace, at times with great obstinacy. Here pride must receive the deathblow that it may give place to genuine humility, a virtue which has been compared to the deepest root of a tree, a root which buries itself so much the more deeply in the soil as the loftiest branch, the symbol of charity, rises higher toward the sky.”
“This center of the soul, the refuge of personal judgment and self-love that is often very subtle, must be illumined by the divine light and filled by God, rendered completely healthy, and vivified. From what we have just said it is evident that the passive purification of the spirit, made necessary by the defects of proficients, is the decisive struggle between two spirits: the spirit of pride, which may grow even to blasphemy, to hatred of God, and despair, and that of humility and charity, which is eternal life begun in us.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Removing the Rust and Stains of the Soul
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “The defects and the remains of spiritual or intellectual pride found in proficients or the advanced, require the absolute need of purification for the soul impregnated with self-love and subtle egoism. The Lord alone can effect this profound purification. Just as the passive purification of the sensible part of the soul (in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life) is manifested by the loss of the sensible consolations to which it was excessively attached, likewise the passive purification of the spirit at first consists in the deprivation of the lights previously received regarding the mysteries of Faith. Having become too familiar with them, the soul, forgetting their infinite elevation, considered them and thought of them in a manner somewhat too human. The soul dwelt, for example, a little too much on Christ’s humanity, without living sufficiently by Faith in His divinity; it only grasped the exterior aspects of the great mysteries of Providence, of the Incarnation, of the redemption, of the Mass, and of the life of the Church in the midst of continually recurring trials. The soul had still only a very superficial knowledge of these spiritual realities; its view of these mysteries was like that of a stained-glass window seen from outside the church.
“Then, what occurs? To lift the soul above this excessively inferior and superficial knowledge of divine things, the Lord detaches the soul from this way of thinking and praying, and seems to strip it of its lights, affections and feelings, leaving the understanding in darkness, leaving the will dry, leaving the memory empty, and leaving the affections of the soul in the deepest affliction, bitterness, and distress―withholding from it the former sweetness it had in spiritual things. The soul must now walk in the dark, in pure Faith―which is like walking in a dark night for our natural faculties and powers.
“Does the soul see nothing in this dark night? In the natural world, when the sun has set and completely disappeared, at least some stars are visible, which convey an idea of the depth of the firmament. Hence at night we can see much farther into to heavens than we can during the day! True―the hills or mountains, fifty or a hundred miles away, are no longer visible, but we can see stars and constellations which are thousands of miles from the Earth. When the soul enters the spiritual darkness we are speaking of, it no longer sees what is near it, but it has an increasingly better anticipatory grasp of the infinite majesty and purity of God, although the soul does not see it, this view is superior to all the ideas that we of ourselves can have of Him; and, by contrast, it sees much more clearly its own indigence and wretchedness.
“When the sun has set, we see the stars in the depths of the firmament. But before enjoying the contemplation of the starry sky, we must become used to walking fearlessly in the night and triumphing over powerful temptations against Faith and Hope―just as, during the Dark Night of the Senses, it was necessary to overcome many temptations against chastity and patience that have their seat in the sensible part of the soul.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Dark Night of Some Saints
In the life of ST. ANGELA OF FOLIGNO we find a striking example of this fact, which she recounts as follows: “I see myself deprived of every good, of every virtue, filled with a multitude of vices; in my soul I see only defects―false humility, pride, hypocrisy. I would wish to cry out my iniquities to others. God is hidden for me. How can I hope in Him? Though all the wise men of the world and all the saints of paradise were to overwhelm me with their consolations, they would bring me no relief, if God does not change me in the depths of my soul. This interior torment is far worse than martyrdom.”
Another striking example of the spiritual night which we are speaking of is found in ST. PAUL OF THE CROSS, the founder of the Passionists. We read in his Letters: “Little corporal or spiritual tribulations are the first steps of this lofty and holy ladder which great and generous souls climb. They ascend step by step until they reach the last rung. There, at the summit, they find the purest suffering, without the slightest admixture of consolation coming from Heaven or Earth (the suffering which comes from offense offered to God). And if these souls are faithful in not seeking consolations, they will pass from this pure suffering to the pure love of God, without anything else being mingled with it. But rare are the souls which reach such a degree. It seems to them that they are abandoned by God, that He no longer loves them, that He is irritated against them. This is almost the pain of damnation, if I may express myself in this manner, a suffering, whose bitterness is comparable to no other. But if the soul is faithful, what treasures it amasses! The storms pass and go, the soul approaches true, very sweet, and very close union with Jesus crucified, who transforms it in Himself and reproduces His own features in it.”
These excerpts show that ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS is not the only one who spoke profoundly of the night of the spirit because he had experienced it. Before even him, HUGH OF ST. VICTOR had compared the passive purification of the soul by grace and the love of God to the transformation which green wood undergoes when attacked by fire: “The dampness is consumed, the smoke diminishes, the victorious flame shows itself; finally it communicates its own nature to the wood, which is set completely on fire. Likewise the love of God gradually grows in the soul, the passions of the heart at first resist, which causes many sufferings and troubles; this thick smoke must be dissipated. Then the love of God becomes more ardent, its flame more lively . . . and finally it penetrates the entire soul. The divine truth is found and assimilated by contemplation; the soul, detached from self, no longer seeks anything but God. He is for it all in all; it rests in His love and finds therein joy and peace.”
We read also in the life of ST. VINCENT DE PAUL that for four years he endured a trial of this type, which was marked by a persistent temptation against Faith. The temptation was so strong that he wrote the Credo on a sheet of paper, which he carried over his heart and pressed from time to time to assure himself that he did not consent to the temptation.
We Are Mere Theoreticians and Not Practitioners
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “If the passive purification of the spirit seems extraordinary to us, who are outside the normal way of sanctity, this is because we do not give enough thought to what a profound purification of the soul is necessary to receive immediately eternal life, the beatific vision of the divine essence, without having to pass through Purgatory, or after having done so. And when we read the exposition of this doctrine in the great masters, we read it perhaps through a certain curiosity about divine things, but without a sufficiently sincere desire for our own sanctification. If we had this desire, we would find in these pages what is suitable for us, and we would see there the one thing necessary. We must―in one way or another―pass through this crucible, without which there is no true sanctity. Sanctifying grace, as it grows, makes us more and more like to God; inasmuch as it assimilates us to Christ crucified, and should make us grow more like Him until our entrance into Heaven.
“The Book of Wisdom says of the just: ‘As gold in the furnace He hath proved them, and as a victim of a holocaust He hath received them.’ Gold in the crucible is purified by material fire; a still more intense fire is needed to transform coal into a diamond; likewise, in tribulation the soul of the just man is purified by a spiritual fire. We can never too strongly desire this purifying light which Scripture speaks of. Unfortunately we often flee from it, because we are afraid we may be told the truth about ourselves, when we so greatly love to tell others the truth about themselves. St. John of the Cross simply explains the nature of the purifying light spoken of in Scripture, when he writes: ‘The dark night is a certain inflowing of God into the soul which cleanses it of its ignorances and imperfections, habitual, natural, and spiritual. Contemplatives call it infused contemplation, or mystical theology, whereby God secretly teaches the soul and instructs it in the perfection of love, without any efforts on its own part, beyond a loving attention to God, listening to His voice and admitting the light He sends, but without understanding how this is infused contemplation.’ In the life of the holy Curé of Ars, St. John Vianney, we have a striking example of this state. Understanding better every day the loftiness of the priestly ideal and judging himself to be farther from it than ever before, he certainly did not think then that he was a contemplative, and yet it was God Himself who was enlightening him and instructing him in this way.
“This salutary crisis is a Purgatory before death, in which the soul is purified under the influence, not of a sensible fire, but of the spiritual fire of contemplation and love. ‘And thus,’ says St. John of the Cross, ‘the soul which passes through this state in the present life, and is perfectly purified, either enters not into Purgatory, or is detained there but a moment, for one hour here is of greater moment than many there.’ The reason is that on Earth man is purified while meriting and growing greatly at times in charity, whereas after death he is purified without meriting. And as Purgatory is a penalty and every penalty presupposes a sin that could have been avoided, the normal way of sanctity is to undergo the passive purifications of which we are speaking before death and not after death. In reality, however, rare are they who go immediately from Earth to Heaven, without passing through Purgatory. The true order of Christian life is fully realized only in the saints.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
When Light Seems Dark
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE says: “The divine wisdom is so high that it transcends the capacity of the soul, and therefore is, in that respect, darkness … just as the light of the sun seems dark to the eye of the owl, which can bear and attain only the dim light of twilight or dawn. The Blessed Trinity, which is Light itself, seems obscure to us―because it is too luminous for the weak eyes of our spirit. Furthermore, the divine light, given in the night of the spirit, causes suffering because of the impurity still existing in the soul. St. Augustine pointed this out, saying: ‘The light which so greatly pleases pure eyes is hateful to weak ones.’ This is so much truer when this divine light must overcome a special resistance of the soul, which is unwilling to be enlightened in regard to certain of its defects, wishing at times to see virtues in them: for example, in regard to a somewhat bitter zeal and a secret complacency, as a result of which it is deceived by its self-love and by the enemy of the good. ‘The light shineth in darkness,’ says St. John at the start of his Gospel, ‘and the [inferior] darkness did not comprehend it.’ This light seems painful when it must overcome resistance, especially a prolonged resistance. It even happens often that the soul suffers greatly because it cannot understand why God tries and tests it in this way, as if He were an implacable judge.
“This interior suffering increases still more through the fear of consenting to temptations arising at this time against Faith, Hope, and the love of God and of neighbor. In this painful state, the soul sees clearly that at times it resists these temptations, but at others it fears that it consented. This fear causes it anguish, for in this state the soul already greatly loves the Lord and would not for anything in the world offend His Majesty. At this stage there is in these tried and tested souls, just as in those of Purgatory, a flux and reflux―they are carried toward God by the impulse of their love, yet they feel themselves repulsed by all the wretchedness and pusillanimity which they see in themselves.
“Scripture states several times: ‘The Lord . . . bringeth down to Hell and bringeth back again. The Lord maketh poor and maketh rich, He humbleth and He exalteth.’ This statement is seen to be especially true in the Dark Night of the Soul, which is the mystical death; it prepares the soul for the intimacy of union with God. The soul empty of all self-love can reach absolute sincerity―every mask drops away. The soul no longer possesses anything of its own, but is ready to possess God, like the Apostles, of whom it was said: ‘As having nothing, and possessing all things.’ The emptiness that it experiences renders it still more eager for God.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Light After Darkness―Life After Death
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “The painful purification we are speaking of creates a great void in the soul by driving out self-love and pride, and gives it an increasingly eager desire for God. The more generously they accept this purification, the quicker it will end. If it is more intense, it will generally be shorter (like the purification of Purgatory) unless the soul is to suffer specially for sinners, over and above its personal purification. Nothing unclean can enter Heaven; therefore the purification of the spirit, which we are speaking of, must be undergone before or after death. However it is far better and more profitable to undergo it before death; for in the present life man merits while growing in charity, whereas in Purgatory he no longer merits. In this period of purification, one should ask our Lord for the love of the cross, for the desire to share in His holy humiliations in the measure willed by Providence. The soul should ask Him also to let it find in this desire the strength to bear whatever may come, the peace, and sometimes the joy, to restore its courage and that of souls that come to it.
“The painful passive purification just described is followed by a resurrection of the soul and a new life. At the end of this trial, charity toward God and one’s neighbor is purified of all alloy, as gold in the crucible is freed from its dross. And not only is the love of charity thus purified, but notably increased. The soul now makes intense and heroic acts of charity, which obtain immediately the increase of grace which they merit, and with sanctifying grace increase greatly at the same time all the infused virtues and the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost, which are connected with charity. Not only during Mass, the Divine Office, or prayer, but in the midst of external occupations, they remain in the presence of God and preserve actual union with Him. The love of God and of souls then becomes increasingly disinterested, ever more ardent and forgetful of self.
“The egoist thinks always of himself and, without realizing it, refers everything to himself. He talks continually with himself about his inordinate desires, sorrows, or superficial joys; his intimate conversation with himself is endless, but it is vain, sterile, and unproductive for all. The perfect man, on the contrary, instead of thinking always of himself, thinks continually of God, His glory, and the salvation of souls; he instinctively makes everything converge toward the object of his thoughts. His intimate conversation is no longer with himself, but with God, and the words of the Gospel frequently recur to his mind to enlighten from on high the smallest pleasurable or painful facts of daily life. Spiritual light and fervor are perpetually bestowed on him from above. The reason for this state is that the perfect man, unlike the beginner, no longer contemplates God only in the mirror of sensible things or of the Gospel parables, about which it is impossible to think continually. Neither does he, like the proficient, contemplate God only in the mirror of the mysteries of the life of Christ, a prayer that cannot last all day long; but, in the penumbra of Faith, he contemplates the divine goodness itself, a little as we see the diffused light that always surrounds us and illumines everything from above.
“As a consequence the perfect know themselves, no longer only in themselves but in God, their beginning and end. In Him they see their poverty, the infinite distance separating them from the Creator; they feel themselves preserved in being by His free love. They ceaselessly experience to what a degree they need His grace for the least salutary act; they do not become discouraged over their sins, but draw a truer humility from them. They sincerely consider themselves useless servants, who of themselves can do nothing, but whom the Lord deigns to use for the accomplishment of great things. If they see their neighbor’s sins, they think there is no sin committed by another which they themselves would not be capable of committing had they the same heredity and were they placed in the same circumstances, faced with the same temptations. If they see the great virtues of other souls, they rejoice in them for the sake of the Lord and of souls, remembering that in the mystical body of Christ the growth of one member redounds to the profit of all the others” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
The Signs of Union with God and the Indwelling of the Trinity in the Soul
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE then lists seven chief signs of our union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, which brings about a fullness of the indwelling of the Holy Trinity and grace in the soul:
“The signs of this indwelling are set forth at length by St. Thomas Aquinas in his Contra Gentes, and more briefly in the Summa Theologica, where he asks whether a man can know if he is in the state of grace. Without having absolute certitude that he has grace, he has signs which enable him, for example, to approach the Holy Table without fear of making a sacrilegious Communion.
“The principal signs of the state of grace, in ascending gradation, are the following.
“The first sign is the testimony of a good conscience, in the sense that he is not conscious of any mortal sin. This is the fundamental sign, presupposed by the following signs which confirm it.
“A second sign is joy in hearing the word of God preached, not only for the sake of hearing it, but to put it into practice. This may be observed in several countries where there is preserved, together with a simple life, a great Christian Faith which leads the faithful to listen willingly to their pastor when he explains the great truths of the Gospel.
“A third sign, confirming the preceding ones, is the relish of divine wisdom, which leads a man to read the Gospel privately, to seek in it the spirit under the letter, to nourish his soul with it, even when it deals with the mystery of the cross and with the cross he must bear every day.
“A fourth sign is the inclination leading the soul to converse intimately with God, and faithfully to resume this conversation when it has been interrupted. We cannot repeat too often that every man carries on an intimate conversation with himself, which, at times, is not good. True interior life begins, as we have often pointed out, when this intimate conversation is no longer only with self, but with God. This intimate conversation with God is like the revelation of the most secret thoughts, in the sense that nothing in us is hidden from the Lord and that He Himself recalls to us the portion of the Gospel that should illumine the duty of every moment.
“A fifth sign is to rejoice in God, fully consenting to His will even in adversity. Sometimes in the midst of dejection there is given us a pure and lofty joy which dissipates all sadness. This is a great sign of the Lord’s visit. Moreover, Jesus, in promising the Holy Ghost, called Him the Paraclete, or Comforter. And normally we rejoice so much the more in the Lord as we more perfectly fulfill His precepts, for by so doing we form increasingly one sole heart with Him.
“A sixth sign is found in the liberty of the children of God. On this subject, St. Thomas writes: “The children of God are led by the Holy Ghost, not like slaves, but like free creatures. . . . The Holy Ghost, in fact, makes us act by inclining our free will to will, for He gives us to love God and inclines us to act for love of Him and not through fear in a servile manner.
“Lastly, a seventh sign of the indwelling of the Blessed Trinity in the soul, according to St. Thomas, is that the person speaks of God out of the abundance of his heart. In this sense is realized what the holy doctor says elsewhere: “Preaching should spring from the plenitude of the contemplation of the mysteries of Faith.” Thus, from Pentecost on, St. Peter and the Apostles preached the mystery of the redemption; so too, St. Stephen, the first martyr, preached before being stoned; and likewise St. Dominic, who knew how to speak only with God or of God. Thus the Holy Ghost appears increasingly as a source of ever new graces, an unexhausted and inexhaustible source, the source of light and love” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Flying at High Altitude
Ever tried teaching algebra to a 5-year old? The mind and mentality of an adult is far more elevated than the mind of a 5-year old. He is preoccupied with questions which the 5-year old cannot grasp. The adult understands the child―having already passed through the childhood stage―but the child does not fully understand the adult; conversation between them on certain subjects, except of a very simple superficial kind, is impossible.
Why bother writing about the elevated, high-flying, pinnacle of the spiritual life―the mystical union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Perfection, or the Unitive Way), when almost everything will be over the heads and minds of the readers? As FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, in his Three Ages of the Interior Life, writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories―of beginners, proficients or perfect―but rather to that of stunted souls!” Of such a soul, in the spiritual domain, it is said: “He will be a child for the whole of his life.”
Another major obstacle to navigating the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is lukewarmness, of which of FR. FREDERICK FABER writes: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind.” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, Ch. 25). Most people will not attain the perfection of divine union (the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Unitive Way or the Way of the Perfect) until after death and after the purifying fires of Purgatory.
Nevertheless, the spiritual masters and theologians tell us that everyone is not only called to be baptized in the Catholic Faith, but everyone is also called leave sin (mortal and venial) behind, and to pass through the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life so as to embrace the mystical state―the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Perfection, the Unitive Way (which mystically united us to God here on Earth).
Most of us usually associate the “mystical state” with seeing visions and hearing voices. Visions and locutions, or voices, may or may not occur in the states of mystical union. They are not an essential part of the mystical state. Visions are imaginary. Likewise, locutions (communications) may be either mentally formed phrases representing thoughts, or impressions produced by divine grace in the soul while in a state of recollection, or they may be formed in the mind by direct supernatural intervention. But visions and locutions are not necessarily a part of mystical experience―and all mystical writers agree in asserting that they are the least important part. The possibility of self-delusion in such matters (in addition to the possibility of diabolical deception) is, of course, almost inexhaustible, and no mystical writer fails to warn his readers against this danger. Mysticism is an awareness of the divine activity of God on the soul. Mysticism is a passive and not an active experience―because only the Holy Spirit can produce this mystical experience in us by the activation of His gifts. Mystics are fully aware that what they are experiencing is not produced by themselves. They did not cause the experience and cannot retain it for a second longer than is desired by the One who produces it.
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS writes: “Why it is that there are so few that attain to this lofty state? It must be known that this is not because God is pleased that there should be only a few raised to this high spiritual state—on the contrary it would please God if all were so raised to this lofty state—but unfortunately He finds few souls in whom He can perform so high and lofty a work. For, when He proves and tests them in small things and finds them weak; and also sees that they quickly flee from labor, and desire not to submit to the least discomfort ... God finds that they are not strong enough to bear the favor which He was granting them when He began to purge them, and so He goes no farther with their purification.”
Most of us won’t progress to union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life (the Unitive Way) while living on this Earth, because we won’t give up our wills to God―but we are nevertheless all called to this level of holiness. Most will not even make it into the Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Illuminative Way, or Way of Proficients) because they are at peace with many or most venial sins and will not fight against them to eradicate them. The bottom line is―whether we understand these things or not; whether we like them or not; whether we choose to embark on the path or not―we will not get into Heaven until we have reached a perfect union with God. That has to take place in this life, or in the painful fires of Purgatory (which St. Thomas Aquinas says are as painful as the fires of Hell, the difference being is that at some time the fires of Purgatory end).
The Three Ways are not an option, but an obligation. They are not that complicated to understand―but there are more entertaining things to learn about for most people and the television, internet, social media, etc. supplies those needs. In most worthwhile professions there are certain aspects of that profession that are difficult to learn and master―but they must be learned and mastered if you wish to qualify for that profession. The same is true for Heaven―even more so! You might not like it; you might not wish to conform to it; you might rebel against it and stamp your feet and scream out loud in protest against it―but you are not going to admitted into Heaven until you have reached that perfect union with God. If you refuse to do so on Earth―then you will be brought to that perfect union in the fires of Purgatory (at much greater pain and expense)―the only loser is you!
Entrance Requirements to the Third Way of the Spiritual Life
So what does it take to enter this elevated level, the pinnacle of the spiritual life? Just as the Way of Beginners required a conversion from mortal sin; and the Way of the Proficient required a conversion from venial sin―the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of the Perfect, requires a conversion away from any and all imperfections (which are not even venial sins, but cases where the soul knows it could do better). The characteristics of the soul in this Way of Perfection are as follows:
● No more deliberate mortal or venial sin
● Avoidance of all imperfections
● Perpetually living in presence of God
● Perpetual Prayer
● Conformity to God’s Will in Third Degree (the highest degree)
● Total abandonment to God
● Great spirit of Faith
● No self-love
● Thoughts totally centered on Our Lord
● Love of God becomes sole ruling virtue
● Heroic charity of Christ (love of Christ)
● Heroic service of neighbor
● Heroic love of enemies
● Humility practiced in Third Degree (the highest degree)
● Desire to suffer greatly for God
● Unalterable patience
● Detachment from all things, persons, places and events
Unfortunately, the advanced souls who have been making much progress in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of the Proficient or the Illuminative Way―do not have the above listed virtues or characteristics in any high degree. These advanced souls, these souls who are making progress, are still some way from being fit to enter into the Third Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way. Therefore God is obliged to purify them by what is called “The Dark Night of the Soul.”
Why the Soul or Spirit Still Needs to be Purified
Those souls who are making much progress in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way―are still far from being perfect. That is why they are unfit to enter the Third Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way. God, therefore, must purify the defective soul by a Dark Night of the Soul, before admitting it to the Third Way―just as He purified the senses by the Dark Night of the Senses before allowing the soul to pass from the First Way of Beginners into the Second Way of the Proficient. FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE explains this in his book, The Three Ages of the Interior Life:
“The necessity of the passive purification of the spirit is because of the defects which subsist in proficients or the advanced. There are still many defects in proficients, who have made considerable progress, whose souls, in large part, are already purified in the inferior or sensible part of the soul, and who have begun to live the life of the spirit through the initial infused contemplation of the mysteries of Faith. Nevertheless, the stains of the old man still remain in their spirit like rust that will disappear only under the action of a purifying fire.
“These advanced souls are still often subject to indirectly voluntary distractions in prayer; to dullness; to useless dissipation; to excessively human sympathy for certain persons; leading to a lack of esteem for others, which is more or less contrary to justice and charity. They have moments of natural rudeness―the result of the sin of impatience. Some fall into illusion by being too much attached to certain spiritual communications; they expose themselves to the devil, who takes pleasure in deceiving them by false prophecies. Others, under the same influence, fall into bitter zeal, which leads them to sermonize their neighbor and to deliver untimely corrections. Thereby―though unaware of it―these advanced souls are puffed up with spiritual pride and presumption, and thus deviate from the simplicity, humility, and purity required for close union with God.
“But these are only the defects related to the interior life, to relations with God. What would it be if one were to consider the defects that advanced souls still have in their relations with superiors, equals, and inferiors; if one were to consider―in this period of the spiritual life―all that still injures charity and justice; all that―in those who have to teach, govern or direct souls―stains their apostolate, teaching, government, and direction?
“Spiritual or intellectual pride, which still subsists, inspires excessive attachment to personal judgment, to one’s own way of seeing, feeling, sympathizing, willing. From it are born jealousy, secret ambition, or again great authoritarianism, unless one is by temperament inclined to the contrary defect, that is, to excessive indulgence and to weakness toward those who oppress others. Here, too, may often be remarked a lack of promptness and generosity in obedience, or, on the contrary, a servility inspired by self-love. Frequent also are faults against charity through jealousy, envy, slander, discord, contention.
“The root of the higher faculties of intellect and will is still deeply tainted with pride, personal judgment, and self-will. The divine light and the will of God do not yet reign there uncontested―far from it. These stains have, in some cases, been there for a long time; they may become encrusted as they grow old and may profoundly alter the character by turning it away from true intimacy with God. From this are born many defamations and, at times, most grievous divisions among those who should work together for the good of souls.
“This is why St. Augustine used to say the prayer, often repeated by St. Louis Bertrand centuries later: “Lord, burn, cut, do not spare on this earth, that Thou mayest spare in eternity!” It is important to be purified on Earth with merit, rather than after death without merit. Nothing soiled enters Heaven―consequently, to enter there, the soul must undergo a profound purification sooner or later. It is evident that the beatific vision of God cannot be granted to a soul that is still impure.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Our Unconscious Pride and Egoism Must Go
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE explains that our secret pride and unconscious egoism is the obstacle to a true union with God. Therefore God has to step in and grind down the remaining obstacle and replace it with true humility and total submission to His Divine Will: “The depths of our will needs to be purified from the often unconscious egoism that has for long subsisted in it, leading us to disturbing and fruitless conversation with ourselves and not to tranquilizing and vivifying conversation with God. This unconscious egoism still inclines us to seek ourselves in everything and at times to judge our neighbor with severity while treating ourselves with great indulgence. This same egoism which makes us seek ourselves in many things is especially evident when trial strikes us; we are then completely upset and seek help, consolation, and counsel from without, where God is not to be found. We have not built our house sufficiently on Christ the rock, with the result that it lacks solidity. We have built on self, on self-will, which is equivalent to building on sand; thus at times there is great weakness underlying harshness of judgment. There is only one way to triumph over these obstacles―that is for God to take complete possession of the interior of the soul and occupy it―which is something that happens only to His true friends.”
This passive purification will certainly not be without suffering, and, as St. John of the Cross teaches, it will even be a mystical death, the death to self, the disintegration of self-love, which until then has resisted grace, at times with great obstinacy. Here pride must receive the deathblow that it may give place to genuine humility, a virtue which has been compared to the deepest root of a tree, a root which buries itself so much the more deeply in the soil as the loftiest branch, the symbol of charity, rises higher toward the sky.”
“This center of the soul, the refuge of personal judgment and self-love that is often very subtle, must be illumined by the divine light and filled by God, rendered completely healthy, and vivified. From what we have just said it is evident that the passive purification of the spirit, made necessary by the defects of proficients, is the decisive struggle between two spirits: the spirit of pride, which may grow even to blasphemy, to hatred of God, and despair, and that of humility and charity, which is eternal life begun in us.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Removing the Rust and Stains of the Soul
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “The defects and the remains of spiritual or intellectual pride found in proficients or the advanced, require the absolute need of purification for the soul impregnated with self-love and subtle egoism. The Lord alone can effect this profound purification. Just as the passive purification of the sensible part of the soul (in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life) is manifested by the loss of the sensible consolations to which it was excessively attached, likewise the passive purification of the spirit at first consists in the deprivation of the lights previously received regarding the mysteries of Faith. Having become too familiar with them, the soul, forgetting their infinite elevation, considered them and thought of them in a manner somewhat too human. The soul dwelt, for example, a little too much on Christ’s humanity, without living sufficiently by Faith in His divinity; it only grasped the exterior aspects of the great mysteries of Providence, of the Incarnation, of the redemption, of the Mass, and of the life of the Church in the midst of continually recurring trials. The soul had still only a very superficial knowledge of these spiritual realities; its view of these mysteries was like that of a stained-glass window seen from outside the church.
“Then, what occurs? To lift the soul above this excessively inferior and superficial knowledge of divine things, the Lord detaches the soul from this way of thinking and praying, and seems to strip it of its lights, affections and feelings, leaving the understanding in darkness, leaving the will dry, leaving the memory empty, and leaving the affections of the soul in the deepest affliction, bitterness, and distress―withholding from it the former sweetness it had in spiritual things. The soul must now walk in the dark, in pure Faith―which is like walking in a dark night for our natural faculties and powers.
“Does the soul see nothing in this dark night? In the natural world, when the sun has set and completely disappeared, at least some stars are visible, which convey an idea of the depth of the firmament. Hence at night we can see much farther into to heavens than we can during the day! True―the hills or mountains, fifty or a hundred miles away, are no longer visible, but we can see stars and constellations which are thousands of miles from the Earth. When the soul enters the spiritual darkness we are speaking of, it no longer sees what is near it, but it has an increasingly better anticipatory grasp of the infinite majesty and purity of God, although the soul does not see it, this view is superior to all the ideas that we of ourselves can have of Him; and, by contrast, it sees much more clearly its own indigence and wretchedness.
“When the sun has set, we see the stars in the depths of the firmament. But before enjoying the contemplation of the starry sky, we must become used to walking fearlessly in the night and triumphing over powerful temptations against Faith and Hope―just as, during the Dark Night of the Senses, it was necessary to overcome many temptations against chastity and patience that have their seat in the sensible part of the soul.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Dark Night of Some Saints
In the life of ST. ANGELA OF FOLIGNO we find a striking example of this fact, which she recounts as follows: “I see myself deprived of every good, of every virtue, filled with a multitude of vices; in my soul I see only defects―false humility, pride, hypocrisy. I would wish to cry out my iniquities to others. God is hidden for me. How can I hope in Him? Though all the wise men of the world and all the saints of paradise were to overwhelm me with their consolations, they would bring me no relief, if God does not change me in the depths of my soul. This interior torment is far worse than martyrdom.”
Another striking example of the spiritual night which we are speaking of is found in ST. PAUL OF THE CROSS, the founder of the Passionists. We read in his Letters: “Little corporal or spiritual tribulations are the first steps of this lofty and holy ladder which great and generous souls climb. They ascend step by step until they reach the last rung. There, at the summit, they find the purest suffering, without the slightest admixture of consolation coming from Heaven or Earth (the suffering which comes from offense offered to God). And if these souls are faithful in not seeking consolations, they will pass from this pure suffering to the pure love of God, without anything else being mingled with it. But rare are the souls which reach such a degree. It seems to them that they are abandoned by God, that He no longer loves them, that He is irritated against them. This is almost the pain of damnation, if I may express myself in this manner, a suffering, whose bitterness is comparable to no other. But if the soul is faithful, what treasures it amasses! The storms pass and go, the soul approaches true, very sweet, and very close union with Jesus crucified, who transforms it in Himself and reproduces His own features in it.”
These excerpts show that ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS is not the only one who spoke profoundly of the night of the spirit because he had experienced it. Before even him, HUGH OF ST. VICTOR had compared the passive purification of the soul by grace and the love of God to the transformation which green wood undergoes when attacked by fire: “The dampness is consumed, the smoke diminishes, the victorious flame shows itself; finally it communicates its own nature to the wood, which is set completely on fire. Likewise the love of God gradually grows in the soul, the passions of the heart at first resist, which causes many sufferings and troubles; this thick smoke must be dissipated. Then the love of God becomes more ardent, its flame more lively . . . and finally it penetrates the entire soul. The divine truth is found and assimilated by contemplation; the soul, detached from self, no longer seeks anything but God. He is for it all in all; it rests in His love and finds therein joy and peace.”
We read also in the life of ST. VINCENT DE PAUL that for four years he endured a trial of this type, which was marked by a persistent temptation against Faith. The temptation was so strong that he wrote the Credo on a sheet of paper, which he carried over his heart and pressed from time to time to assure himself that he did not consent to the temptation.
We Are Mere Theoreticians and Not Practitioners
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “If the passive purification of the spirit seems extraordinary to us, who are outside the normal way of sanctity, this is because we do not give enough thought to what a profound purification of the soul is necessary to receive immediately eternal life, the beatific vision of the divine essence, without having to pass through Purgatory, or after having done so. And when we read the exposition of this doctrine in the great masters, we read it perhaps through a certain curiosity about divine things, but without a sufficiently sincere desire for our own sanctification. If we had this desire, we would find in these pages what is suitable for us, and we would see there the one thing necessary. We must―in one way or another―pass through this crucible, without which there is no true sanctity. Sanctifying grace, as it grows, makes us more and more like to God; inasmuch as it assimilates us to Christ crucified, and should make us grow more like Him until our entrance into Heaven.
“The Book of Wisdom says of the just: ‘As gold in the furnace He hath proved them, and as a victim of a holocaust He hath received them.’ Gold in the crucible is purified by material fire; a still more intense fire is needed to transform coal into a diamond; likewise, in tribulation the soul of the just man is purified by a spiritual fire. We can never too strongly desire this purifying light which Scripture speaks of. Unfortunately we often flee from it, because we are afraid we may be told the truth about ourselves, when we so greatly love to tell others the truth about themselves. St. John of the Cross simply explains the nature of the purifying light spoken of in Scripture, when he writes: ‘The dark night is a certain inflowing of God into the soul which cleanses it of its ignorances and imperfections, habitual, natural, and spiritual. Contemplatives call it infused contemplation, or mystical theology, whereby God secretly teaches the soul and instructs it in the perfection of love, without any efforts on its own part, beyond a loving attention to God, listening to His voice and admitting the light He sends, but without understanding how this is infused contemplation.’ In the life of the holy Curé of Ars, St. John Vianney, we have a striking example of this state. Understanding better every day the loftiness of the priestly ideal and judging himself to be farther from it than ever before, he certainly did not think then that he was a contemplative, and yet it was God Himself who was enlightening him and instructing him in this way.
“This salutary crisis is a Purgatory before death, in which the soul is purified under the influence, not of a sensible fire, but of the spiritual fire of contemplation and love. ‘And thus,’ says St. John of the Cross, ‘the soul which passes through this state in the present life, and is perfectly purified, either enters not into Purgatory, or is detained there but a moment, for one hour here is of greater moment than many there.’ The reason is that on Earth man is purified while meriting and growing greatly at times in charity, whereas after death he is purified without meriting. And as Purgatory is a penalty and every penalty presupposes a sin that could have been avoided, the normal way of sanctity is to undergo the passive purifications of which we are speaking before death and not after death. In reality, however, rare are they who go immediately from Earth to Heaven, without passing through Purgatory. The true order of Christian life is fully realized only in the saints.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
When Light Seems Dark
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE says: “The divine wisdom is so high that it transcends the capacity of the soul, and therefore is, in that respect, darkness … just as the light of the sun seems dark to the eye of the owl, which can bear and attain only the dim light of twilight or dawn. The Blessed Trinity, which is Light itself, seems obscure to us―because it is too luminous for the weak eyes of our spirit. Furthermore, the divine light, given in the night of the spirit, causes suffering because of the impurity still existing in the soul. St. Augustine pointed this out, saying: ‘The light which so greatly pleases pure eyes is hateful to weak ones.’ This is so much truer when this divine light must overcome a special resistance of the soul, which is unwilling to be enlightened in regard to certain of its defects, wishing at times to see virtues in them: for example, in regard to a somewhat bitter zeal and a secret complacency, as a result of which it is deceived by its self-love and by the enemy of the good. ‘The light shineth in darkness,’ says St. John at the start of his Gospel, ‘and the [inferior] darkness did not comprehend it.’ This light seems painful when it must overcome resistance, especially a prolonged resistance. It even happens often that the soul suffers greatly because it cannot understand why God tries and tests it in this way, as if He were an implacable judge.
“This interior suffering increases still more through the fear of consenting to temptations arising at this time against Faith, Hope, and the love of God and of neighbor. In this painful state, the soul sees clearly that at times it resists these temptations, but at others it fears that it consented. This fear causes it anguish, for in this state the soul already greatly loves the Lord and would not for anything in the world offend His Majesty. At this stage there is in these tried and tested souls, just as in those of Purgatory, a flux and reflux―they are carried toward God by the impulse of their love, yet they feel themselves repulsed by all the wretchedness and pusillanimity which they see in themselves.
“Scripture states several times: ‘The Lord . . . bringeth down to Hell and bringeth back again. The Lord maketh poor and maketh rich, He humbleth and He exalteth.’ This statement is seen to be especially true in the Dark Night of the Soul, which is the mystical death; it prepares the soul for the intimacy of union with God. The soul empty of all self-love can reach absolute sincerity―every mask drops away. The soul no longer possesses anything of its own, but is ready to possess God, like the Apostles, of whom it was said: ‘As having nothing, and possessing all things.’ The emptiness that it experiences renders it still more eager for God.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Light After Darkness―Life After Death
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “The painful purification we are speaking of creates a great void in the soul by driving out self-love and pride, and gives it an increasingly eager desire for God. The more generously they accept this purification, the quicker it will end. If it is more intense, it will generally be shorter (like the purification of Purgatory) unless the soul is to suffer specially for sinners, over and above its personal purification. Nothing unclean can enter Heaven; therefore the purification of the spirit, which we are speaking of, must be undergone before or after death. However it is far better and more profitable to undergo it before death; for in the present life man merits while growing in charity, whereas in Purgatory he no longer merits. In this period of purification, one should ask our Lord for the love of the cross, for the desire to share in His holy humiliations in the measure willed by Providence. The soul should ask Him also to let it find in this desire the strength to bear whatever may come, the peace, and sometimes the joy, to restore its courage and that of souls that come to it.
“The painful passive purification just described is followed by a resurrection of the soul and a new life. At the end of this trial, charity toward God and one’s neighbor is purified of all alloy, as gold in the crucible is freed from its dross. And not only is the love of charity thus purified, but notably increased. The soul now makes intense and heroic acts of charity, which obtain immediately the increase of grace which they merit, and with sanctifying grace increase greatly at the same time all the infused virtues and the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost, which are connected with charity. Not only during Mass, the Divine Office, or prayer, but in the midst of external occupations, they remain in the presence of God and preserve actual union with Him. The love of God and of souls then becomes increasingly disinterested, ever more ardent and forgetful of self.
“The egoist thinks always of himself and, without realizing it, refers everything to himself. He talks continually with himself about his inordinate desires, sorrows, or superficial joys; his intimate conversation with himself is endless, but it is vain, sterile, and unproductive for all. The perfect man, on the contrary, instead of thinking always of himself, thinks continually of God, His glory, and the salvation of souls; he instinctively makes everything converge toward the object of his thoughts. His intimate conversation is no longer with himself, but with God, and the words of the Gospel frequently recur to his mind to enlighten from on high the smallest pleasurable or painful facts of daily life. Spiritual light and fervor are perpetually bestowed on him from above. The reason for this state is that the perfect man, unlike the beginner, no longer contemplates God only in the mirror of sensible things or of the Gospel parables, about which it is impossible to think continually. Neither does he, like the proficient, contemplate God only in the mirror of the mysteries of the life of Christ, a prayer that cannot last all day long; but, in the penumbra of Faith, he contemplates the divine goodness itself, a little as we see the diffused light that always surrounds us and illumines everything from above.
“As a consequence the perfect know themselves, no longer only in themselves but in God, their beginning and end. In Him they see their poverty, the infinite distance separating them from the Creator; they feel themselves preserved in being by His free love. They ceaselessly experience to what a degree they need His grace for the least salutary act; they do not become discouraged over their sins, but draw a truer humility from them. They sincerely consider themselves useless servants, who of themselves can do nothing, but whom the Lord deigns to use for the accomplishment of great things. If they see their neighbor’s sins, they think there is no sin committed by another which they themselves would not be capable of committing had they the same heredity and were they placed in the same circumstances, faced with the same temptations. If they see the great virtues of other souls, they rejoice in them for the sake of the Lord and of souls, remembering that in the mystical body of Christ the growth of one member redounds to the profit of all the others” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
The Signs of Union with God and the Indwelling of the Trinity in the Soul
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE then lists seven chief signs of our union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, which brings about a fullness of the indwelling of the Holy Trinity and grace in the soul:
“The signs of this indwelling are set forth at length by St. Thomas Aquinas in his Contra Gentes, and more briefly in the Summa Theologica, where he asks whether a man can know if he is in the state of grace. Without having absolute certitude that he has grace, he has signs which enable him, for example, to approach the Holy Table without fear of making a sacrilegious Communion.
“The principal signs of the state of grace, in ascending gradation, are the following.
“The first sign is the testimony of a good conscience, in the sense that he is not conscious of any mortal sin. This is the fundamental sign, presupposed by the following signs which confirm it.
“A second sign is joy in hearing the word of God preached, not only for the sake of hearing it, but to put it into practice. This may be observed in several countries where there is preserved, together with a simple life, a great Christian Faith which leads the faithful to listen willingly to their pastor when he explains the great truths of the Gospel.
“A third sign, confirming the preceding ones, is the relish of divine wisdom, which leads a man to read the Gospel privately, to seek in it the spirit under the letter, to nourish his soul with it, even when it deals with the mystery of the cross and with the cross he must bear every day.
“A fourth sign is the inclination leading the soul to converse intimately with God, and faithfully to resume this conversation when it has been interrupted. We cannot repeat too often that every man carries on an intimate conversation with himself, which, at times, is not good. True interior life begins, as we have often pointed out, when this intimate conversation is no longer only with self, but with God. This intimate conversation with God is like the revelation of the most secret thoughts, in the sense that nothing in us is hidden from the Lord and that He Himself recalls to us the portion of the Gospel that should illumine the duty of every moment.
“A fifth sign is to rejoice in God, fully consenting to His will even in adversity. Sometimes in the midst of dejection there is given us a pure and lofty joy which dissipates all sadness. This is a great sign of the Lord’s visit. Moreover, Jesus, in promising the Holy Ghost, called Him the Paraclete, or Comforter. And normally we rejoice so much the more in the Lord as we more perfectly fulfill His precepts, for by so doing we form increasingly one sole heart with Him.
“A sixth sign is found in the liberty of the children of God. On this subject, St. Thomas writes: “The children of God are led by the Holy Ghost, not like slaves, but like free creatures. . . . The Holy Ghost, in fact, makes us act by inclining our free will to will, for He gives us to love God and inclines us to act for love of Him and not through fear in a servile manner.
“Lastly, a seventh sign of the indwelling of the Blessed Trinity in the soul, according to St. Thomas, is that the person speaks of God out of the abundance of his heart. In this sense is realized what the holy doctor says elsewhere: “Preaching should spring from the plenitude of the contemplation of the mysteries of Faith.” Thus, from Pentecost on, St. Peter and the Apostles preached the mystery of the redemption; so too, St. Stephen, the first martyr, preached before being stoned; and likewise St. Dominic, who knew how to speak only with God or of God. Thus the Holy Ghost appears increasingly as a source of ever new graces, an unexhausted and inexhaustible source, the source of light and love” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Article 29
Thursday, January 30th
The First Step is the Hardest!
Thursday, January 30th
The First Step is the Hardest!
The Second of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life: The Way of the Proficient, or the The Illuminative Way
The Only Way to Heaven
We are currently embarked upon a series of articles on the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. These are three obligatory stages or levels that every single soul on Earth must pass through if they wish to attain Heaven―except, of course, those baptized souls that die before reaching the age of reason, or those who are martyred for the Faith. The duration of each stage depends upon the Providence of God and the willing cooperation of each individual soul.
The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life could be said be an essential “road map” to Heaven―giving directions and showing what we can expect to encounter on the road. We ignore them at our own peril―and many have perished through ignoring them. The fact that very few people know about these Three Ways of the Spiritual Life (or that very few care to know), can partially explain why the souls of most persons tragically end up being damned. As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” Most people will not attain the perfection of divine union (the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Unitive Way or the Way of the Perfect) until after death and after the purifying fires of Purgatory.
We cannot naively and foolishly make up our own path to Heaven―God has already mapped it out, and He expects us to follow His directions! It is a case of His way or the highway―or rather His way or the “broad way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat!” (Matthew 7:13). “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) ― and many could choose to study the Three Ways, but few choose to do so!
Even though this article will be dealing with Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Proficient Souls or the Illuminative Way), it is necessary to link this to the conversion crisis that Beginners in the First Way of the Spiritual Life must undergo, endure and cooperate with before they gain admittance to the Second Way. So let us briefly look at the faults of the Beginner that have to be purged by God through the means of a conversion crisis that is called the Dark Night of the Senses.
A Beginner is Beginner and No More!
The whole idea of a “beginning” is that it is just that―only a beginning and not an end; it is only a point of departure and not the point of destination. It is a state of imperfection that requires perfection―and that can only come by work and effort―just like being a Kindergartner is a long away from being a 12th Grade graduate; or a U.S. Marine recruit in Boot Camp is a long way from being a polished, battle-hardened, experienced Marine soldier. The Beginner in the Spiritual Life still has one foot in the world and the things of the world, while the other foot has stepped into the spiritual world. Beginners travel on the spiritual road to God in an inferior way and are wrapped-up in their own selfish desires. Beginners by definition are engaged in the balancing act of living by Faith and “doing one’s own thing” at one and the same time. They endeavor to sugarcoat their Faith. This makes for mixed feelings, divided loyalties or contradictory ideas. Their choices are partly for God, partly for themselves.
The Beginners in the spiritual life, those who have managed to pull themselves out of habitual mortal sin, are still susceptible to falling back into it. Like a beginner in any field, they are still inexperienced and weak as regards the depths and workings of the spiritual life. They think themselves safe, and some even rashly think themselves holy, but it is merely the bravado and false confidence akin to that of a child learning in school. It thinks itself to be wiser than its parents at times, but a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing.
Most of the world does not even register venial sin on their radar; or if they do, then it is to them a mere trifle, something that everyone does and something unimportant, since the Church says it cannot send you to Hell. But the Church also teaches that venial sin is, after mortal sin, the GREATEST EVIL IN THE WORLD. The Beginner has not “arrived” by leaving mortal sin behind, he has barely started. A man can be tied down not only by chains (mortal sin), but he can also be tied down by a multitude of strands of cotton thread; both can prevent any progress. A bird, likewise, can be prevented from flying upwards, to the heavens, by both wire and thread.
Faults of Beginners in the Spiritual Life
Beginners also tend to lack enthusiasm and energy when told to do something unpleasant. Because they always look for spiritual gratifications and delights, the result is that they are extremely weak in the fortitude and lax in labor that demands perfection. Like those who are rich and raised in luxury, they run from everything rough, and they are scandalized by the cross in which true spiritual delights are found. And the more spiritual exercises they have, the greater is their boredom. Since they expect to go about in spiritual matters according to the whims and satisfactions of their own will, they find that having to enter the narrow way of life is saddening, depressing and repugnant to them. The imperfect soul of the Beginner will often try to seek the Father without following the way of Jesus crucified, because they have a strong aversion to the suffering they know is required.
In the previous article, we listed some of the chief faults and failings of Beginners in the Spiritual Life, which have to be addressed and corrected―Spiritual inexperience and immaturity; Lack of generosity; Distractions leading away from spiritual things; Discouragement at imagined or perceived lack of progress or success; Seeking personal advantages; Living too much by feelings and emotions; Having a merely theoretical and abstract Faith; Being too material and sensual; Prayer can be mechanical, hurried and distracted.
The Immaturity of Beginners in the Spiritual Life
Being a beginner in the spiritual life―by having entered the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―can affect the soul in various ways. God often showers the new beginner with a variety of spiritual delights and graces. Some beginners risk loving those delights and graces more than they love God, Who is the origin of them. Many beginners want God to desire what they want, and they become sad if they have to desire God’s will. They feel an aversion toward adapting their will to God’s―because His will is usually more demanding than their own self-indulgent will. Hence they frequently believe that what is not their will, or brings them no satisfaction, is not God’s will, and, on the other hand, that if they are satisfied, then God is also satisfied. They measure God by themselves and not themselves by God.
Beginners have an initial knowledge of themselves; little by little they discern the defects they have, the remains of sins that have already been forgiven, and new failings that are more or less deliberate and voluntary. If these beginners are generous, they seek, not to excuse themselves, but to correct themselves, and the Lord shows them their wretchedness and poverty, making them understand, however, that they must consider it only in the light of divine mercy, which exhorts them to advance. They must daily examine their consciences and learn to overcome themselves that they may not follow the unconsidered impulse of their passions.
However, they know themselves as yet only in a superficial way. They have not discovered what a treasure baptism placed in their souls, and they are ignorant of all the self-love and the often unconscious egoism still continuing in them and revealing itself from time to time under a sharp vexation or reproach. Often they have a clearer perception of this self-love in others than in themselves; they ought to remember Christ’s words: “Why seest thou the splinter that is in thy brother’s eye; and seest not the plank that is in thy own eye?” (Matthew 7:3).
Truly generous beginners love the Lord with a holy fear of sin which makes them flee mortal sin, and even deliberate venial sins, by the mortification of the senses and of the inordinate passions, or of the threefold concupiscence of the flesh, the eyes, and pride. This indicates that they have the beginnings of a deep, voluntary love―but as yet an imperfect love.
Nevertheless, a number of beginners practically neglect necessary mortification, and resemble a man who would like to begin climbing a mountain, not from the base of the mountain but halfway up the side. When they do this, they ascend in their imagination only, but not in reality; they travel rapidly, and their first enthusiasm will die out as quickly as burning straw. They will believe that they have a knowledge of spiritual things and will abandon them after having barely examined them superficially. This is, alas, frequently the case.
If, on the contrary, the beginner is generous and seriously wishes to advance, it is not unusual for him to receive, as a reward, some sensible consolations in prayer or in the study of divine things. The Lord thus conquers his sensibility by sensible consolations―since he still lives chiefly by his senses. Sensible grace, so called because it reacts on the sensibility, turns it from dangerous things and draws it toward our Lord and His holy Mother. At these times, the generous beginner already loves God with his whole heart, but not yet with his whole soul, nor with all his strength, nor with all his mind.
Then what generally happens? Almost all beginners, on receiving these sensible consolations, take too much complacency in them―as if they were an end in themselves, and not a means to the end. They then fall into a certain spiritual gluttony accompanied by rash haste and curiosity in the study of divine things, by unconscious pride that makes them wish to talk about these things as if they were already masters of the subject. What follows from this? According to the logic of the spiritual life, it follows that a second conversion is necessary, as described by St. John of the Cross under the name of the passive purification of the senses “common to the greater number of beginners” (The Dark Night of the Soul, Book 1, chapter 8) in order to introduce them into “the Illuminative Way of Proficients, where God nourishes the soul by infused contemplation.” (The Dark Night of the Soul, Book 1, chap. 14).
This passive purification of the senses is manifested by a prolonged sensible aridity in which the beginner is stripped of the sensible consolations wherein he delighted too greatly. If in this aridity there is a keen desire for God, for His reign in us, and the fear of offending Him, it is a sign that a divine purification is taking place.
The Crisis Conversion of the Dark Night of the Senses
The many imperfections of those who live in this beginner’s state prevent them from entering the Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way). Those imperfections require God to purge them so that are a fit and suitable to enter into the state of proficients. He does this by introducing them into the first of two dark night―the Dark Night of the Senses (the other being the Dark Night of the Soul which comes just before the entry into the Third Way of the Spiritual Life). The Dark Night of the Senses can last a long or a short time. It can also repeat itself with both greater and lesser intensity. This crisis of the Dark Night of the Senses is, however, more or less well borne; many persons are not generous enough and may become retarded souls. Others follow divine inspiration with docility and become Proficients.
There are two parts the Dark Night of the Senses―(1) the Active Dark Night of the Senses (where we ourselves purge ourselves from earthly attachments), and (2) the Passive Dark Night of the Senses (where God steps in and perfects the purging).
Active Dark Night of the Senses—This process involves the intentional letting go of all worldly attachments to sin. The soul continues to refocus its desires in such a way that everything within its passions and appetites are turned toward God and His holy will. The goal of the “active dark night of the senses” is to free your soul from the lowest forms of pleasure, so that you can more fully seek God who also produces within you the highest form of spiritual delight, resulting from the perfection of divine union with Him. This first step is just that: the first step. Once a person walks through this initial purgation of their appetites and desires, God will take them through three more levels of purgation. But the first step is where we begin.
In this first purgation in the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the person must engage in intentional acts of self-denial and must also seek to know God in a new and deeper way through the prayer of meditation and not merely vocal prayer. Selfishness must be stripped away, and all the deceptive pleasures flowing from sinful attachments and unhealthy desires must be eliminated. The reason for this is that we are easily deceived about that which is good for us. In the beginning of our spiritual journey, we still cling to the pleasure that comes from sin and from the many other things of this world. We may still believe that the things that satisfy us are money, sensual delights, excessive food or the satisfaction of other disordered cravings. And while those things do produce a certain form of temporary delight, the end result is slavery and bondage. Therefore, God wants you free. So this first step involves you making specific choices to turn away from these deceptive attachments and desires while, at the same time, you grow in your knowledge of the glorious truths that God wants to reveal to you.
Passive Dark Night of the Senses—Is the person who completes the active purgation of the senses, as outlined above, free of all sensory attachments? Well, yes and no. Yes, the person who goes through this first purgation does eliminate all habitual attachments to disordered attachments and desires. But in the process, they became attached to new sensory experiences that they didn’t have before. These new sensory experiences must now be purged so that the soul can attach itself to God and God alone in a spiritual way. What are these “new” sensory attachments? They are all of the many consolations, good feelings and delights that the soul experiences during its Christian journey as a beginner.
The Passive Night of the Senses completes the purgation of the sensory appetites begun in the previous step. The soul no longer finds earthly joy and satisfaction in the things of this world and finds its inordinate appetites drying up. This purgation is painful, but the pain helps the soul to focus on God alone. The soul also becomes aware of the presence of the Seven Capital Sins in a new spiritual form― Spiritual Pride; Spiritual Greed; Spiritual Lust; Spiritual Anger; Spiritual Gluttony; Spiritual Envy; Spiritual Sloth. As a result, God even begins to dry up spiritual desires―so that the soul will no longer serve God because it “feels good,” but rather, because of love of God alone.
In this Dark Night of the Senses, God weans them from the breasts of the initial gratifications and delights, and, through pure dryness and interior darkness, God takes away all trivialities and childish ways, and makes them acquire real and solid virtues. No matter how earnestly beginners practice the mortification of self in all their actions and passions, they will never be able to do so entirely—far from it—until God accomplishes it in them passively by means of the purgation of this Dark Night of the Senses.
The Dark Night of Sense is a passive process we go through where God purges our soul of its need for worldly comforts and worldly attachments to persons, places or things― which can be an obstacle to our growth in a union with God―in order to draw us closer to Him. The Dark Night of the Senses is the also a spiritual crisis in which God deliberately and purposefully withdraws spiritual consolations from the senses―no more warm fuzziness in prayer; no more pleasant emotions; no more pictorial visions in the imagination, no more physical comfort, no more protection from external distractions, etc.
At the same time, the soul typically experiences no more consolation in the things of God, but likewise finds no consolation in created things―it seems to be in a kind of a “no-man’s-land” between God and the world. Secondly, thinks on God but with a painful anxiety. Thirdly, the soul is unable to meditate on the things of God. Fourthly, God allows the beginner to attacked by all kinds of temptations―even blasphemy, impurity, fornication and questioning the reality of the existence of God! All of this causes great anxiety and suffering and the individual will often experience a spirit of confusion―but God is testing the soul as to how willing the individual is prepared to suffer. As St. John of the Cross explains, even though some Christians may want to go deeper in spiritual life, but they do not want to go through the difficulties.
When God starts this purgation of the senses, this is very difficult for the soul, because it begins to worry that it is regressing, or has done something wrong to lose God’s favor. Instead, God is preparing the soul to enter more deeply into the love of God―and excessive natural attachments to things, or spiritual attachments to consolations and feelings, can be a great hindrance and diversion from focusing on God. The soul learns to seek the God of consolation, and not merely the consolations of God. Perhaps this Dark Night of the Senses is one of the most misunderstood elements of daily Christian living.
Advance or Retreat?
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS firmly holds to his conviction that the light of divine union cannot be established in the soul unless inordinate attachments are eradicated: “The road and ascent to God, then, necessarily demands a habitual effort to renounce and mortify the appetites; the sooner this mortification is achieved, the sooner the soul reaches the top.” Faced with this painful purgation or conversion crisis in the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the soul can choose to endure and advance, or flee the purgation and cease advancing towards God. Harsh as it may sound, St. John of the Cross holds that even the most trifling inordinate attachment―for example, to an article of clothing, to a book, to the way food tastes―will make it impossible in the long run to progress to perfection. Therefore, he explains: “It makes little difference whether a bird is tied by a thin thread or by a cord. Even if it is tied by a thread, the bird will be held bound just as surely as if it were tied by a cord; that is, it will be impeded from flying as long as it does not break the thread. Admittedly, the thread is easier to break, but no matter how easily this may be done, the bird will not fly away without first doing so. This is the lot of those who are attached to something: No matter how much virtue they have they will not reach the freedom of the divine union.”
Conversions of the Apostles and Our Conversions
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, who writes: “Beginners in the spiritual life must, after a certain period, undergo a second conversion, similar to the second conversion of the Apostles at the end of Our Lord’s Passion, and, still later, before entering upon the life of perfect union, there must be a third conversion or transformation of the soul, similar to that which took place in the souls of the Apostles on the day of Pentecost. Their first conversion had taken place when Jesus called them, with the words: ‘I will make you fishers of men.’ They followed Our Lord, listened with admiration to His teaching, saw His miracles and took part in His ministry. Three of them saw Him transfigured on Thabor. All were present at the institution of the Eucharist, were ordained priests and received Holy Communion. But when the hour of the Passion arrived, an hour which Jesus had so often foretold, the Apostles abandoned their Master.
“Before the end of the Passion of Christ there was clearly a second conversion in Peter and the other Apostles, a conversion which was consolidated during the days that followed. After His resurrection Our Lord appeared to them several times, enlightening them. He made Peter compensate for his threefold denial by a threefold act of love. The threefold act of love made reparation for the threefold denial. It was a consolidation of the second conversion, a measure of confirmation in grace before the transformation of Pentecost. We may say that if the Apostles stood in need of a second conversion, then still more do we with our faults which make this second conversion necessary―in particular self-love. In varying degrees this egoism survives in all imperfect souls in spite of the state of grace, and it is the source of a multitude of venial sins, of habitual faults which become characteristic features of the soul, making necessary a veritable purging.”
“This self-love is the mercenary love of the imperfect, of those who, without being conscious of it, serve God from self-interest, because they are attached to temporal or spiritual consolations, and who shed tears of self-pity when they are deprived of them. It is a strange but not uncommon mixture of sincere love of God with an inordinate love of self. The soul loves God more than itself, otherwise it would not be in the state of grace, it would not possess Charity; but it still loves itself with an inordinate love. It has not yet reached the stage of loving itself in God and for His sake. Such a state of soul is neither white nor black; it is a light grey, in which there is more white than black. The soul is on the upward path, but it still has a tendency to slip downwards.”
“If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back.” This is what the Fathers of the Church have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God, he who makes no progress, loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child but becomes an idiot, so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!”
ST. CATHERINE OF SIENA, in the 60th chapter of the Dialogue, writes (it is God who speaks): “Among those who have become My trusted servants there are some who serve Me with Faith, without servile fear―it is not the mere fear of punishment, but love which attaches them to My service (thus Peter before the Passion). But this love is still imperfect, because what they seek in My service (at any rate to a great extent) is their own profit, their own satisfaction, or the pleasure that they find in Me. The same imperfection is found in the love which they bear towards their neighbor. And do you know what shows the imperfection of their love? It is that, as soon as they are deprived of the consolations which they find in Me, their love fails and can no longer survive. It becomes weak and gradually cools towards Me when, in order to exercise them in virtue and to detach them from their imperfection, I withdraw spiritual consolations from them and send them difficulties and afflictions. I withdraw from the soul,” says the Lord, “so that it may see and know its defects, so that, feeling itself deprived of consolation and afflicted by pain, it may recognize its own weakness, and learn how incapable it is of stability or perseverance. I act in this way in order to bring them to perfection, to teach them to know themselves, to realize that they are nothing and that of themselves they have no grace. Adversity should have the effect of making them seek refuge in Me, recognize Me as their benefactor, and become attached to Me by a true humility. Then, having recognized the grievousness of its sin and repented of it, the soul begins to weep, for fear of punishment; then it rises to the consideration of My mercy, in which it finds satisfaction and comfort. But it is still imperfect, and, in order to draw it on to perfection, I withdraw from it―not in grace but in feeling. This I do in order to humiliate that soul, and cause it to seek Me in truth―without thought of self and with lively Faith and with hatred of its own sensuality. If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back.” (words of God to St. Catherine of Siena).
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE comments: “This is what the Fathers have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God, he who makes no progress, loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child, but becomes an idiot―so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” (Three Ages of the Interior Life).
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS gives us three signs which mark this second conversion: “The first sign is that the soul finds no pleasure or consolation in the things of God, but it also fails to find pleasure in anything created.... The second sign is that ordinarily the memory is centered upon God, with painful care and solicitude, thinking that it is not serving God, but backsliding, because it finds itself without sweetness in the things of God.... The third sign... is that the soul can no longer meditate or reflect in its sense of the imagination―for God now begins to communicate Himself to it―no longer through sense, as He did before, by means of reflections which joined and sundered its knowledge―but by an act of simple contemplation, which neither the exterior nor the interior senses of the lower part of the soul can attain.” Thus the Beginners advance to entry levels of the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Proficients, or the way of those making progress, according to St. John of the Cross, “upon the road and way of the spirit, which ... is called the way of illumination or of infused contemplation, wherewith God Himself feeds and refreshes the soul.”
The Fruits of Second Conversion
As we undergo this second conversion, as we enter into the Illuminative Way or the Way of Proficients, we reap further benefits of God’s love. One such benefit is an entry into contemplative prayer. We begin to contemplate the great mysteries of our Faith. Our life of contemplation grows without need for consolations from God, almost in replacement of consolation. We gain an even greater appreciation of the price of His Blood paid for our individual soul. Our relationship with God, our encounter with Him, now becomes more continuous as opposed to occasional. We are becoming His constant friend and companion, not just a servant who comes when beckoned. We become much more aware of God within us, of His constant presence within our soul. We become more aware of His continued presence and governance in our lives. The statement we have heard so often, that in a life with God there are no coincidences, now takes on real meaning. We experience the reality of becoming not just sanctified, but sanctified in Him.
During this time, we also understand how difficult it is to speak with those still on the first level of Beginners and communicate to them a true understanding of what we have become after this second conversion. The Proficients in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life observe the Beginners still enamored with the latest car, or fashion, or vacation spot, or technology, or any of the hundred other things that seem so very important. People collecting thousands of sports cards, as if they had real intrinsic value. People devoting enormous amounts of time and money to all sorts of things having no spiritual value whatever. It is like an adolescent trying to have a meaningful conversation about teenage kinds of things with a three year old. You can understand what they are experiencing but they cannot understand what you are experiencing, for they have no relational basis for absorbing what you say. It reminds us of what Jesus told His disciples in the account of the washing of the feet in the Gospel of John: “What I am doing you do not understand now, but you will understand later.”
As God begins to act in our lives, He may withdraw not only our consolations, but also those things to which we hold dear. He has to bring us to a state where we truly live the commandment to love God with our whole being. In some cases, He may remove either things, or people, or both from our lives. He may remove a loved one, or remove personal health, or social status, or the esteem in which we are held in the eyes of others. As these things happen, the suffering soul may cry out and try to hold on even tighter to the things to which they are attached, holding on so tight their knuckles turn white. Then He may remove the knuckles. He continues until finally the soul falls to its knees, and looking up at God cries out, “Why me? Why now? What more will You take from me? What else do You want from me?” He will look on the soul with love and reply: “I want whatever it is you prefer to hold onto instead of holding Me.” Then He will offer His hand, and if we are able to respond to this grace and place our hand in His, He will fill us with Himself and we will finally understand what He has been trying to offer us for so long.
The fruit of this second conversion is a beginning of contemplation by a progressive understanding of the great mystery of the Cross and the Redemption, a living appreciation of the infinite value of the Blood which Christ shed for us. The illuminative life―the Second Way of the Spiritual Life, or the Way of Proficients―brings with it the obscure infused contemplation of the mysteries of Faith, a contemplation which had already been initiated in the passive night of the senses. This early stage and minimal level of contemplation is accompanied by a union with God less dependent upon the fluctuations of sensibility, a purer, a stronger, a more continuous union. Sometimes this full illuminative life involves, not only the infused contemplation of mysteries, but also certain extraordinary graces (visions, revelations, interior speech), such as those described by St. Teresa in her own life.
Subsequently, if not joy, at all events peace, takes up its dwelling in the soul―even in the midst of adversity. The soul becomes filled, no longer with a merely abstract, theoretical and vague persuasion, but with a concrete and living conviction, that in God’s government all things are ordained towards the manifestation of His goodness: “To them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to his purpose, are called to be saints” (Romans 8:28). At the end of the Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena, God Himself declares this truth: “Nothing has ever happened and nothing happens except by the plan of My divine Providence. In all things that I permit, in all things that I give you, in tribulations and in consolations, temporal or spiritual, I do nothing save for your good, so that you may be sanctified in Me and that My Truth be fulfilled in you.”
The Traits and Characteristics of Proficients or Progressives
The Illuminative Way (the Second Way of the Spiritual Life or the Way of Proficients) consists of those who are in the state of progress and have their passions better under control, so that they easily keep themselves from mortal sin, but who do not so easily avoid venial sins, because they still take pleasure in earthly things and allow their minds to be distracted by various imaginations and their hearts with numberless desires―though not in matters that are strictly unlawful.
This second level or stage of the spiritual life is where the soul, now habitually free of mortal sin, starts to focus on THREE chief things: (1) the Proficient soul now starts to look for its venial sins in order to battle them, uproot them and destroy them, (2) It starts to pray much, much more than ever before, and (3) it starts to focus on the systematic (not random or sporadic) acquisition of virtues.
It is called the Illuminative Way, because in it the mind becomes more and more enlightened as to spiritual things and the practice of virtue. In this second stage, Charity is stronger and more perfect than in the state of Beginners; the soul is chiefly occupied with progress in the spiritual life and in all the virtues, both theological and moral. The practice of prayer suitable for this state is meditation on the mysteries of the Incarnation, the life of Our Savior, and the mysteries of His Sacred Passion.
The fundamental virtue of this state is recollection, that is, a constant attention of the mind and of the affections of the heart to thoughts and sentiments which elevate the soul to God ― exterior recollection which consists in the love of silence and retirement, interior recollection in simplicity of spirit and a right intention, as well as attention to God in all our actions. This does not mean that a person has to neglect the duties of his state or position in life, nor does it imply that honest and needful recreation should be avoided, because these lawful or necessary circumstances or occupations can well be reconciled with perfect recollection and the most holy union with God.
The soul in the Illuminative Way will have to experience periods of spiritual consolations and desolations. It does not at once enter upon the Unitive Way when it has passed through the aridities of the first purgation. It must spend some time, perhaps years, after quitting the state of beginners in exercising itself in the state of proficients.
St. John of the Cross tells us that in this state the soul, like one released from a rigorous imprisonment, occupies itself in Divine thoughts with a much greater freedom and satisfaction, and its joy is more abundant and interior than it ever experienced before it entered the night of the senses.
Its purgation is still somewhat incomplete, and the purification of the senses is not yet finished and perfect. It is not without aridities, darkness, and trials, sometimes more severe than in the past. During the period of desolation it will have to endure much suffering from temptations against the theological virtues and against the moral virtues. It will have to endure sometimes other diabolical attacks upon its imagination and senses. Also, God will permit natural causes to combine in afflicting the soul, such as the persecutions of men, and the ingratitude of friends. Patient suffering and resignation have to be borne during all these trials
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE goes on to describe the chief traits and characteristics of souls that have graduated from the first level of Beginners into the second level of Proficients or Progressives (=those making progress):
“The mentality of Proficients, like that of the preceding level of Beginners, must be described in function of their knowledge and love of God. With their self-knowledge there is developed in them a quasi-experimental knowledge of God. They know Him, no longer merely in the mirror of the things of sense or of parables, but in the mirror of the mysteries of salvation, with which they become more and more familiar and which the Rosary, the school of contemplation, sets daily before their eyes.
“The greatness of God is contemplated now, no longer merely in the mirror of the starry heavens, in the sea or the mountains, no longer merely in the parables of the Good Shepherd or the Prodigal Son, but in the incomparably more perfect mirror of the mysteries of the Incarnation and the Redemption. The soul rises in a spiral movement, from the mystery of the Incarnation or the Infancy of Jesus, to those of His Passion, His Resurrection, His Ascension and His Glory; and in these mysteries it contemplates the radiance of the sovereign Goodness of God―thus admirably communicating itself to us. In this contemplation, which is more or less frequent, the Proficients receive an abundance of light—in proportion to their fidelity and generosity—through the gift of understanding, which enables them to penetrate more and more deeply into these mysteries, and to appreciate their beauty, at once so simple and so sublime.
“In the preceding period or stage of Beginners, God had won over their sensibility; now He thoroughly subjugates their intelligence to Himself, raising it above the excessive preoccupations and complications of merely human knowledge. He simplifies their knowledge by spiritualizing it. Accordingly, and as a normal consequence, these Proficients―being thus enlightened concerning the mysteries of the life of Christ―love God, not only by avoiding mortal sin and deliberate venial sin, but by imitating the virtues of Our Lord. His humility, gentleness, patience; and by observing not only those commandments that are laid upon all, but also the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience, or at any rate by keeping the spirit of these counsels, and by avoiding imperfections.
“As happened in the preceding period of Beginners, this generosity is rewarded, but no longer by merely sensible consolations, but by a greater abundance of light in contemplation and in the work of the apostolate; by intense desires for the glory of God and the salvation of souls, and by a greater facility in prayer. Not infrequently we find in the Proficients the prayer of Quiet, in which the will is momentarily held captive by the love of God. This period is marked also by a great facility in doing works for God, such as teaching, directing, organizing, and the rest. This is to love God, not only with the whole heart, but with the whole soul, with the whole of one’s activities; but not yet with the whole strength, nor with the whole mind―because God has not yet achieved complete dominion in that higher region of the soul which we call the spirit.
“And what happens generally at this stage? Something similar to what happened in the case of the Beginners who had been rewarded with sensible consolations. The Proficient begins to take complacency—by reason of an unconscious pride—in this great facility in prayer, working, teaching, or preaching. He tends to forget that these are God’s gifts, and he rejoices in them with a proprietary air which ill beseems one who adores in spirit and in truth. It is true that he is working for God, he is working for souls; but he has not yet sufficiently forgotten himself. An unconscious self-seeking and self-importance cause him to dissipate himself and to lose the sense of the presence of God. He thinks that his labors are being very fruitful; but it is not quite certain. He is becoming too sure of himself, he gives himself too much importance and is perhaps inclined to exaggerate his own talents, to forget his own imperfection and to be too greatly aware of the imperfections of others. Purity of intention, true recollection, perfect straightforwardness, are often lacking; there is something of a lie in his life. The depth of the soul does not belong entirely to God. God is offered an intention which really is only half given to Him.
“St. John of the Cross mentions these defects of Proficients as they are found in pure contemplatives, who, he says, ‘believe in vain visions and presume that God and the saints are speaking with them’―being deceived by the ruses of the devil. Not less notable are the defects, mentioned, for example, by St. Alphonsus, which are found in apostolic men entrusted with the care of souls. These defects in Proficients become manifest especially in the obstacles which they are called upon to meet, or in differences of opinion which, even at this advanced period of the spiritual life, may cause vocations to be lost. It then becomes evident that the presence of God is not sufficiently borne in mind, and that, in the search for God, it is the self which is really being sought. Hence the need of a third purgation; hence the need of that strong lye of the purgation of the spirit, in order to cleanse the very depth of the spiritual faculties.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
The Three Ways “See-Saw” or “Yo-Yo”
It is important to remember that the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in not a “one-way-street” ― even though that is what God would like it to be. What goes up, can come down. We can three steps forward, only to find ourselves taking one, or two, or three steps backwards. Everyone is different―and everyone has different levels of pride―which is the root of all sin: “Pride is the beginning of all sin―he that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Pride is a part of the baggage that comes along with Original Sin. It is one of the first things in our life―and it usually one of the last vices to disappear. As we progress through the Three Ways, our pride certainly diminishes in proportion to our growth in true humility. Nevertheless, even devout and holy persons can still have a good dose of pride―though it not brash and obvious, but disguised and hidden―much like a wolf in the clothing of sheep.
Pride often makes us imagine that we are much advanced in the spiritual life than actually is the case. It is ultimately pride that makes us fall back down the ladder of our spiritual climb to Heaven: “Pride goes before destruction: and the spirit is lifted up before a fall!” (Proverbs 16:18). It is for that reason Our Lord related for us the parable about the Pharisee and the Publican: “And Jesus spoke this parable to certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up into the Temple to pray―the one, a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself: “God! I thank you, that I am not as other men are―extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this Publican! I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes to Heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying: “God! Be merciful to me a sinner!” I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other―for every one that exalts himself shall be abased; and he that humbles himself shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
Our pride might be hiding from us the fact that we lukewarm, or even in mortal sin―thus meaning that we have not even entered the First Way of the Spiritual Life! Remember the sobering words of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” Also the sobering words of Fr. Frederick Faber: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind.” Likewise the sobering words of St. Alphonsus Liguori: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil that is not of rare occurrence, but frequent, especially in small country districts, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.” Could we be in mortal sin and not know it? Possibly―though it is more likely that we have forgotten our bad confession or bad confessions. Let us ask Our Lady―the Refuge of Sinners, the Mother of Mercy, the Seat of Wisdom―to help us clearly see the true state of our soul and then to take the appropriate steps to heal it!
The Only Way to Heaven
We are currently embarked upon a series of articles on the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. These are three obligatory stages or levels that every single soul on Earth must pass through if they wish to attain Heaven―except, of course, those baptized souls that die before reaching the age of reason, or those who are martyred for the Faith. The duration of each stage depends upon the Providence of God and the willing cooperation of each individual soul.
The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life could be said be an essential “road map” to Heaven―giving directions and showing what we can expect to encounter on the road. We ignore them at our own peril―and many have perished through ignoring them. The fact that very few people know about these Three Ways of the Spiritual Life (or that very few care to know), can partially explain why the souls of most persons tragically end up being damned. As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” Most people will not attain the perfection of divine union (the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Unitive Way or the Way of the Perfect) until after death and after the purifying fires of Purgatory.
We cannot naively and foolishly make up our own path to Heaven―God has already mapped it out, and He expects us to follow His directions! It is a case of His way or the highway―or rather His way or the “broad way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat!” (Matthew 7:13). “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) ― and many could choose to study the Three Ways, but few choose to do so!
Even though this article will be dealing with Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Proficient Souls or the Illuminative Way), it is necessary to link this to the conversion crisis that Beginners in the First Way of the Spiritual Life must undergo, endure and cooperate with before they gain admittance to the Second Way. So let us briefly look at the faults of the Beginner that have to be purged by God through the means of a conversion crisis that is called the Dark Night of the Senses.
A Beginner is Beginner and No More!
The whole idea of a “beginning” is that it is just that―only a beginning and not an end; it is only a point of departure and not the point of destination. It is a state of imperfection that requires perfection―and that can only come by work and effort―just like being a Kindergartner is a long away from being a 12th Grade graduate; or a U.S. Marine recruit in Boot Camp is a long way from being a polished, battle-hardened, experienced Marine soldier. The Beginner in the Spiritual Life still has one foot in the world and the things of the world, while the other foot has stepped into the spiritual world. Beginners travel on the spiritual road to God in an inferior way and are wrapped-up in their own selfish desires. Beginners by definition are engaged in the balancing act of living by Faith and “doing one’s own thing” at one and the same time. They endeavor to sugarcoat their Faith. This makes for mixed feelings, divided loyalties or contradictory ideas. Their choices are partly for God, partly for themselves.
The Beginners in the spiritual life, those who have managed to pull themselves out of habitual mortal sin, are still susceptible to falling back into it. Like a beginner in any field, they are still inexperienced and weak as regards the depths and workings of the spiritual life. They think themselves safe, and some even rashly think themselves holy, but it is merely the bravado and false confidence akin to that of a child learning in school. It thinks itself to be wiser than its parents at times, but a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing.
Most of the world does not even register venial sin on their radar; or if they do, then it is to them a mere trifle, something that everyone does and something unimportant, since the Church says it cannot send you to Hell. But the Church also teaches that venial sin is, after mortal sin, the GREATEST EVIL IN THE WORLD. The Beginner has not “arrived” by leaving mortal sin behind, he has barely started. A man can be tied down not only by chains (mortal sin), but he can also be tied down by a multitude of strands of cotton thread; both can prevent any progress. A bird, likewise, can be prevented from flying upwards, to the heavens, by both wire and thread.
Faults of Beginners in the Spiritual Life
Beginners also tend to lack enthusiasm and energy when told to do something unpleasant. Because they always look for spiritual gratifications and delights, the result is that they are extremely weak in the fortitude and lax in labor that demands perfection. Like those who are rich and raised in luxury, they run from everything rough, and they are scandalized by the cross in which true spiritual delights are found. And the more spiritual exercises they have, the greater is their boredom. Since they expect to go about in spiritual matters according to the whims and satisfactions of their own will, they find that having to enter the narrow way of life is saddening, depressing and repugnant to them. The imperfect soul of the Beginner will often try to seek the Father without following the way of Jesus crucified, because they have a strong aversion to the suffering they know is required.
In the previous article, we listed some of the chief faults and failings of Beginners in the Spiritual Life, which have to be addressed and corrected―Spiritual inexperience and immaturity; Lack of generosity; Distractions leading away from spiritual things; Discouragement at imagined or perceived lack of progress or success; Seeking personal advantages; Living too much by feelings and emotions; Having a merely theoretical and abstract Faith; Being too material and sensual; Prayer can be mechanical, hurried and distracted.
The Immaturity of Beginners in the Spiritual Life
Being a beginner in the spiritual life―by having entered the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―can affect the soul in various ways. God often showers the new beginner with a variety of spiritual delights and graces. Some beginners risk loving those delights and graces more than they love God, Who is the origin of them. Many beginners want God to desire what they want, and they become sad if they have to desire God’s will. They feel an aversion toward adapting their will to God’s―because His will is usually more demanding than their own self-indulgent will. Hence they frequently believe that what is not their will, or brings them no satisfaction, is not God’s will, and, on the other hand, that if they are satisfied, then God is also satisfied. They measure God by themselves and not themselves by God.
Beginners have an initial knowledge of themselves; little by little they discern the defects they have, the remains of sins that have already been forgiven, and new failings that are more or less deliberate and voluntary. If these beginners are generous, they seek, not to excuse themselves, but to correct themselves, and the Lord shows them their wretchedness and poverty, making them understand, however, that they must consider it only in the light of divine mercy, which exhorts them to advance. They must daily examine their consciences and learn to overcome themselves that they may not follow the unconsidered impulse of their passions.
However, they know themselves as yet only in a superficial way. They have not discovered what a treasure baptism placed in their souls, and they are ignorant of all the self-love and the often unconscious egoism still continuing in them and revealing itself from time to time under a sharp vexation or reproach. Often they have a clearer perception of this self-love in others than in themselves; they ought to remember Christ’s words: “Why seest thou the splinter that is in thy brother’s eye; and seest not the plank that is in thy own eye?” (Matthew 7:3).
Truly generous beginners love the Lord with a holy fear of sin which makes them flee mortal sin, and even deliberate venial sins, by the mortification of the senses and of the inordinate passions, or of the threefold concupiscence of the flesh, the eyes, and pride. This indicates that they have the beginnings of a deep, voluntary love―but as yet an imperfect love.
Nevertheless, a number of beginners practically neglect necessary mortification, and resemble a man who would like to begin climbing a mountain, not from the base of the mountain but halfway up the side. When they do this, they ascend in their imagination only, but not in reality; they travel rapidly, and their first enthusiasm will die out as quickly as burning straw. They will believe that they have a knowledge of spiritual things and will abandon them after having barely examined them superficially. This is, alas, frequently the case.
If, on the contrary, the beginner is generous and seriously wishes to advance, it is not unusual for him to receive, as a reward, some sensible consolations in prayer or in the study of divine things. The Lord thus conquers his sensibility by sensible consolations―since he still lives chiefly by his senses. Sensible grace, so called because it reacts on the sensibility, turns it from dangerous things and draws it toward our Lord and His holy Mother. At these times, the generous beginner already loves God with his whole heart, but not yet with his whole soul, nor with all his strength, nor with all his mind.
Then what generally happens? Almost all beginners, on receiving these sensible consolations, take too much complacency in them―as if they were an end in themselves, and not a means to the end. They then fall into a certain spiritual gluttony accompanied by rash haste and curiosity in the study of divine things, by unconscious pride that makes them wish to talk about these things as if they were already masters of the subject. What follows from this? According to the logic of the spiritual life, it follows that a second conversion is necessary, as described by St. John of the Cross under the name of the passive purification of the senses “common to the greater number of beginners” (The Dark Night of the Soul, Book 1, chapter 8) in order to introduce them into “the Illuminative Way of Proficients, where God nourishes the soul by infused contemplation.” (The Dark Night of the Soul, Book 1, chap. 14).
This passive purification of the senses is manifested by a prolonged sensible aridity in which the beginner is stripped of the sensible consolations wherein he delighted too greatly. If in this aridity there is a keen desire for God, for His reign in us, and the fear of offending Him, it is a sign that a divine purification is taking place.
The Crisis Conversion of the Dark Night of the Senses
The many imperfections of those who live in this beginner’s state prevent them from entering the Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way). Those imperfections require God to purge them so that are a fit and suitable to enter into the state of proficients. He does this by introducing them into the first of two dark night―the Dark Night of the Senses (the other being the Dark Night of the Soul which comes just before the entry into the Third Way of the Spiritual Life). The Dark Night of the Senses can last a long or a short time. It can also repeat itself with both greater and lesser intensity. This crisis of the Dark Night of the Senses is, however, more or less well borne; many persons are not generous enough and may become retarded souls. Others follow divine inspiration with docility and become Proficients.
There are two parts the Dark Night of the Senses―(1) the Active Dark Night of the Senses (where we ourselves purge ourselves from earthly attachments), and (2) the Passive Dark Night of the Senses (where God steps in and perfects the purging).
Active Dark Night of the Senses—This process involves the intentional letting go of all worldly attachments to sin. The soul continues to refocus its desires in such a way that everything within its passions and appetites are turned toward God and His holy will. The goal of the “active dark night of the senses” is to free your soul from the lowest forms of pleasure, so that you can more fully seek God who also produces within you the highest form of spiritual delight, resulting from the perfection of divine union with Him. This first step is just that: the first step. Once a person walks through this initial purgation of their appetites and desires, God will take them through three more levels of purgation. But the first step is where we begin.
In this first purgation in the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the person must engage in intentional acts of self-denial and must also seek to know God in a new and deeper way through the prayer of meditation and not merely vocal prayer. Selfishness must be stripped away, and all the deceptive pleasures flowing from sinful attachments and unhealthy desires must be eliminated. The reason for this is that we are easily deceived about that which is good for us. In the beginning of our spiritual journey, we still cling to the pleasure that comes from sin and from the many other things of this world. We may still believe that the things that satisfy us are money, sensual delights, excessive food or the satisfaction of other disordered cravings. And while those things do produce a certain form of temporary delight, the end result is slavery and bondage. Therefore, God wants you free. So this first step involves you making specific choices to turn away from these deceptive attachments and desires while, at the same time, you grow in your knowledge of the glorious truths that God wants to reveal to you.
Passive Dark Night of the Senses—Is the person who completes the active purgation of the senses, as outlined above, free of all sensory attachments? Well, yes and no. Yes, the person who goes through this first purgation does eliminate all habitual attachments to disordered attachments and desires. But in the process, they became attached to new sensory experiences that they didn’t have before. These new sensory experiences must now be purged so that the soul can attach itself to God and God alone in a spiritual way. What are these “new” sensory attachments? They are all of the many consolations, good feelings and delights that the soul experiences during its Christian journey as a beginner.
The Passive Night of the Senses completes the purgation of the sensory appetites begun in the previous step. The soul no longer finds earthly joy and satisfaction in the things of this world and finds its inordinate appetites drying up. This purgation is painful, but the pain helps the soul to focus on God alone. The soul also becomes aware of the presence of the Seven Capital Sins in a new spiritual form― Spiritual Pride; Spiritual Greed; Spiritual Lust; Spiritual Anger; Spiritual Gluttony; Spiritual Envy; Spiritual Sloth. As a result, God even begins to dry up spiritual desires―so that the soul will no longer serve God because it “feels good,” but rather, because of love of God alone.
In this Dark Night of the Senses, God weans them from the breasts of the initial gratifications and delights, and, through pure dryness and interior darkness, God takes away all trivialities and childish ways, and makes them acquire real and solid virtues. No matter how earnestly beginners practice the mortification of self in all their actions and passions, they will never be able to do so entirely—far from it—until God accomplishes it in them passively by means of the purgation of this Dark Night of the Senses.
The Dark Night of Sense is a passive process we go through where God purges our soul of its need for worldly comforts and worldly attachments to persons, places or things― which can be an obstacle to our growth in a union with God―in order to draw us closer to Him. The Dark Night of the Senses is the also a spiritual crisis in which God deliberately and purposefully withdraws spiritual consolations from the senses―no more warm fuzziness in prayer; no more pleasant emotions; no more pictorial visions in the imagination, no more physical comfort, no more protection from external distractions, etc.
At the same time, the soul typically experiences no more consolation in the things of God, but likewise finds no consolation in created things―it seems to be in a kind of a “no-man’s-land” between God and the world. Secondly, thinks on God but with a painful anxiety. Thirdly, the soul is unable to meditate on the things of God. Fourthly, God allows the beginner to attacked by all kinds of temptations―even blasphemy, impurity, fornication and questioning the reality of the existence of God! All of this causes great anxiety and suffering and the individual will often experience a spirit of confusion―but God is testing the soul as to how willing the individual is prepared to suffer. As St. John of the Cross explains, even though some Christians may want to go deeper in spiritual life, but they do not want to go through the difficulties.
When God starts this purgation of the senses, this is very difficult for the soul, because it begins to worry that it is regressing, or has done something wrong to lose God’s favor. Instead, God is preparing the soul to enter more deeply into the love of God―and excessive natural attachments to things, or spiritual attachments to consolations and feelings, can be a great hindrance and diversion from focusing on God. The soul learns to seek the God of consolation, and not merely the consolations of God. Perhaps this Dark Night of the Senses is one of the most misunderstood elements of daily Christian living.
Advance or Retreat?
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS firmly holds to his conviction that the light of divine union cannot be established in the soul unless inordinate attachments are eradicated: “The road and ascent to God, then, necessarily demands a habitual effort to renounce and mortify the appetites; the sooner this mortification is achieved, the sooner the soul reaches the top.” Faced with this painful purgation or conversion crisis in the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the soul can choose to endure and advance, or flee the purgation and cease advancing towards God. Harsh as it may sound, St. John of the Cross holds that even the most trifling inordinate attachment―for example, to an article of clothing, to a book, to the way food tastes―will make it impossible in the long run to progress to perfection. Therefore, he explains: “It makes little difference whether a bird is tied by a thin thread or by a cord. Even if it is tied by a thread, the bird will be held bound just as surely as if it were tied by a cord; that is, it will be impeded from flying as long as it does not break the thread. Admittedly, the thread is easier to break, but no matter how easily this may be done, the bird will not fly away without first doing so. This is the lot of those who are attached to something: No matter how much virtue they have they will not reach the freedom of the divine union.”
Conversions of the Apostles and Our Conversions
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, who writes: “Beginners in the spiritual life must, after a certain period, undergo a second conversion, similar to the second conversion of the Apostles at the end of Our Lord’s Passion, and, still later, before entering upon the life of perfect union, there must be a third conversion or transformation of the soul, similar to that which took place in the souls of the Apostles on the day of Pentecost. Their first conversion had taken place when Jesus called them, with the words: ‘I will make you fishers of men.’ They followed Our Lord, listened with admiration to His teaching, saw His miracles and took part in His ministry. Three of them saw Him transfigured on Thabor. All were present at the institution of the Eucharist, were ordained priests and received Holy Communion. But when the hour of the Passion arrived, an hour which Jesus had so often foretold, the Apostles abandoned their Master.
“Before the end of the Passion of Christ there was clearly a second conversion in Peter and the other Apostles, a conversion which was consolidated during the days that followed. After His resurrection Our Lord appeared to them several times, enlightening them. He made Peter compensate for his threefold denial by a threefold act of love. The threefold act of love made reparation for the threefold denial. It was a consolidation of the second conversion, a measure of confirmation in grace before the transformation of Pentecost. We may say that if the Apostles stood in need of a second conversion, then still more do we with our faults which make this second conversion necessary―in particular self-love. In varying degrees this egoism survives in all imperfect souls in spite of the state of grace, and it is the source of a multitude of venial sins, of habitual faults which become characteristic features of the soul, making necessary a veritable purging.”
“This self-love is the mercenary love of the imperfect, of those who, without being conscious of it, serve God from self-interest, because they are attached to temporal or spiritual consolations, and who shed tears of self-pity when they are deprived of them. It is a strange but not uncommon mixture of sincere love of God with an inordinate love of self. The soul loves God more than itself, otherwise it would not be in the state of grace, it would not possess Charity; but it still loves itself with an inordinate love. It has not yet reached the stage of loving itself in God and for His sake. Such a state of soul is neither white nor black; it is a light grey, in which there is more white than black. The soul is on the upward path, but it still has a tendency to slip downwards.”
“If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back.” This is what the Fathers of the Church have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God, he who makes no progress, loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child but becomes an idiot, so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!”
ST. CATHERINE OF SIENA, in the 60th chapter of the Dialogue, writes (it is God who speaks): “Among those who have become My trusted servants there are some who serve Me with Faith, without servile fear―it is not the mere fear of punishment, but love which attaches them to My service (thus Peter before the Passion). But this love is still imperfect, because what they seek in My service (at any rate to a great extent) is their own profit, their own satisfaction, or the pleasure that they find in Me. The same imperfection is found in the love which they bear towards their neighbor. And do you know what shows the imperfection of their love? It is that, as soon as they are deprived of the consolations which they find in Me, their love fails and can no longer survive. It becomes weak and gradually cools towards Me when, in order to exercise them in virtue and to detach them from their imperfection, I withdraw spiritual consolations from them and send them difficulties and afflictions. I withdraw from the soul,” says the Lord, “so that it may see and know its defects, so that, feeling itself deprived of consolation and afflicted by pain, it may recognize its own weakness, and learn how incapable it is of stability or perseverance. I act in this way in order to bring them to perfection, to teach them to know themselves, to realize that they are nothing and that of themselves they have no grace. Adversity should have the effect of making them seek refuge in Me, recognize Me as their benefactor, and become attached to Me by a true humility. Then, having recognized the grievousness of its sin and repented of it, the soul begins to weep, for fear of punishment; then it rises to the consideration of My mercy, in which it finds satisfaction and comfort. But it is still imperfect, and, in order to draw it on to perfection, I withdraw from it―not in grace but in feeling. This I do in order to humiliate that soul, and cause it to seek Me in truth―without thought of self and with lively Faith and with hatred of its own sensuality. If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back.” (words of God to St. Catherine of Siena).
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE comments: “This is what the Fathers have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God, he who makes no progress, loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child, but becomes an idiot―so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” (Three Ages of the Interior Life).
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS gives us three signs which mark this second conversion: “The first sign is that the soul finds no pleasure or consolation in the things of God, but it also fails to find pleasure in anything created.... The second sign is that ordinarily the memory is centered upon God, with painful care and solicitude, thinking that it is not serving God, but backsliding, because it finds itself without sweetness in the things of God.... The third sign... is that the soul can no longer meditate or reflect in its sense of the imagination―for God now begins to communicate Himself to it―no longer through sense, as He did before, by means of reflections which joined and sundered its knowledge―but by an act of simple contemplation, which neither the exterior nor the interior senses of the lower part of the soul can attain.” Thus the Beginners advance to entry levels of the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Proficients, or the way of those making progress, according to St. John of the Cross, “upon the road and way of the spirit, which ... is called the way of illumination or of infused contemplation, wherewith God Himself feeds and refreshes the soul.”
The Fruits of Second Conversion
As we undergo this second conversion, as we enter into the Illuminative Way or the Way of Proficients, we reap further benefits of God’s love. One such benefit is an entry into contemplative prayer. We begin to contemplate the great mysteries of our Faith. Our life of contemplation grows without need for consolations from God, almost in replacement of consolation. We gain an even greater appreciation of the price of His Blood paid for our individual soul. Our relationship with God, our encounter with Him, now becomes more continuous as opposed to occasional. We are becoming His constant friend and companion, not just a servant who comes when beckoned. We become much more aware of God within us, of His constant presence within our soul. We become more aware of His continued presence and governance in our lives. The statement we have heard so often, that in a life with God there are no coincidences, now takes on real meaning. We experience the reality of becoming not just sanctified, but sanctified in Him.
During this time, we also understand how difficult it is to speak with those still on the first level of Beginners and communicate to them a true understanding of what we have become after this second conversion. The Proficients in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life observe the Beginners still enamored with the latest car, or fashion, or vacation spot, or technology, or any of the hundred other things that seem so very important. People collecting thousands of sports cards, as if they had real intrinsic value. People devoting enormous amounts of time and money to all sorts of things having no spiritual value whatever. It is like an adolescent trying to have a meaningful conversation about teenage kinds of things with a three year old. You can understand what they are experiencing but they cannot understand what you are experiencing, for they have no relational basis for absorbing what you say. It reminds us of what Jesus told His disciples in the account of the washing of the feet in the Gospel of John: “What I am doing you do not understand now, but you will understand later.”
As God begins to act in our lives, He may withdraw not only our consolations, but also those things to which we hold dear. He has to bring us to a state where we truly live the commandment to love God with our whole being. In some cases, He may remove either things, or people, or both from our lives. He may remove a loved one, or remove personal health, or social status, or the esteem in which we are held in the eyes of others. As these things happen, the suffering soul may cry out and try to hold on even tighter to the things to which they are attached, holding on so tight their knuckles turn white. Then He may remove the knuckles. He continues until finally the soul falls to its knees, and looking up at God cries out, “Why me? Why now? What more will You take from me? What else do You want from me?” He will look on the soul with love and reply: “I want whatever it is you prefer to hold onto instead of holding Me.” Then He will offer His hand, and if we are able to respond to this grace and place our hand in His, He will fill us with Himself and we will finally understand what He has been trying to offer us for so long.
The fruit of this second conversion is a beginning of contemplation by a progressive understanding of the great mystery of the Cross and the Redemption, a living appreciation of the infinite value of the Blood which Christ shed for us. The illuminative life―the Second Way of the Spiritual Life, or the Way of Proficients―brings with it the obscure infused contemplation of the mysteries of Faith, a contemplation which had already been initiated in the passive night of the senses. This early stage and minimal level of contemplation is accompanied by a union with God less dependent upon the fluctuations of sensibility, a purer, a stronger, a more continuous union. Sometimes this full illuminative life involves, not only the infused contemplation of mysteries, but also certain extraordinary graces (visions, revelations, interior speech), such as those described by St. Teresa in her own life.
Subsequently, if not joy, at all events peace, takes up its dwelling in the soul―even in the midst of adversity. The soul becomes filled, no longer with a merely abstract, theoretical and vague persuasion, but with a concrete and living conviction, that in God’s government all things are ordained towards the manifestation of His goodness: “To them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to his purpose, are called to be saints” (Romans 8:28). At the end of the Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena, God Himself declares this truth: “Nothing has ever happened and nothing happens except by the plan of My divine Providence. In all things that I permit, in all things that I give you, in tribulations and in consolations, temporal or spiritual, I do nothing save for your good, so that you may be sanctified in Me and that My Truth be fulfilled in you.”
The Traits and Characteristics of Proficients or Progressives
The Illuminative Way (the Second Way of the Spiritual Life or the Way of Proficients) consists of those who are in the state of progress and have their passions better under control, so that they easily keep themselves from mortal sin, but who do not so easily avoid venial sins, because they still take pleasure in earthly things and allow their minds to be distracted by various imaginations and their hearts with numberless desires―though not in matters that are strictly unlawful.
This second level or stage of the spiritual life is where the soul, now habitually free of mortal sin, starts to focus on THREE chief things: (1) the Proficient soul now starts to look for its venial sins in order to battle them, uproot them and destroy them, (2) It starts to pray much, much more than ever before, and (3) it starts to focus on the systematic (not random or sporadic) acquisition of virtues.
It is called the Illuminative Way, because in it the mind becomes more and more enlightened as to spiritual things and the practice of virtue. In this second stage, Charity is stronger and more perfect than in the state of Beginners; the soul is chiefly occupied with progress in the spiritual life and in all the virtues, both theological and moral. The practice of prayer suitable for this state is meditation on the mysteries of the Incarnation, the life of Our Savior, and the mysteries of His Sacred Passion.
The fundamental virtue of this state is recollection, that is, a constant attention of the mind and of the affections of the heart to thoughts and sentiments which elevate the soul to God ― exterior recollection which consists in the love of silence and retirement, interior recollection in simplicity of spirit and a right intention, as well as attention to God in all our actions. This does not mean that a person has to neglect the duties of his state or position in life, nor does it imply that honest and needful recreation should be avoided, because these lawful or necessary circumstances or occupations can well be reconciled with perfect recollection and the most holy union with God.
The soul in the Illuminative Way will have to experience periods of spiritual consolations and desolations. It does not at once enter upon the Unitive Way when it has passed through the aridities of the first purgation. It must spend some time, perhaps years, after quitting the state of beginners in exercising itself in the state of proficients.
St. John of the Cross tells us that in this state the soul, like one released from a rigorous imprisonment, occupies itself in Divine thoughts with a much greater freedom and satisfaction, and its joy is more abundant and interior than it ever experienced before it entered the night of the senses.
Its purgation is still somewhat incomplete, and the purification of the senses is not yet finished and perfect. It is not without aridities, darkness, and trials, sometimes more severe than in the past. During the period of desolation it will have to endure much suffering from temptations against the theological virtues and against the moral virtues. It will have to endure sometimes other diabolical attacks upon its imagination and senses. Also, God will permit natural causes to combine in afflicting the soul, such as the persecutions of men, and the ingratitude of friends. Patient suffering and resignation have to be borne during all these trials
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE goes on to describe the chief traits and characteristics of souls that have graduated from the first level of Beginners into the second level of Proficients or Progressives (=those making progress):
“The mentality of Proficients, like that of the preceding level of Beginners, must be described in function of their knowledge and love of God. With their self-knowledge there is developed in them a quasi-experimental knowledge of God. They know Him, no longer merely in the mirror of the things of sense or of parables, but in the mirror of the mysteries of salvation, with which they become more and more familiar and which the Rosary, the school of contemplation, sets daily before their eyes.
“The greatness of God is contemplated now, no longer merely in the mirror of the starry heavens, in the sea or the mountains, no longer merely in the parables of the Good Shepherd or the Prodigal Son, but in the incomparably more perfect mirror of the mysteries of the Incarnation and the Redemption. The soul rises in a spiral movement, from the mystery of the Incarnation or the Infancy of Jesus, to those of His Passion, His Resurrection, His Ascension and His Glory; and in these mysteries it contemplates the radiance of the sovereign Goodness of God―thus admirably communicating itself to us. In this contemplation, which is more or less frequent, the Proficients receive an abundance of light—in proportion to their fidelity and generosity—through the gift of understanding, which enables them to penetrate more and more deeply into these mysteries, and to appreciate their beauty, at once so simple and so sublime.
“In the preceding period or stage of Beginners, God had won over their sensibility; now He thoroughly subjugates their intelligence to Himself, raising it above the excessive preoccupations and complications of merely human knowledge. He simplifies their knowledge by spiritualizing it. Accordingly, and as a normal consequence, these Proficients―being thus enlightened concerning the mysteries of the life of Christ―love God, not only by avoiding mortal sin and deliberate venial sin, but by imitating the virtues of Our Lord. His humility, gentleness, patience; and by observing not only those commandments that are laid upon all, but also the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience, or at any rate by keeping the spirit of these counsels, and by avoiding imperfections.
“As happened in the preceding period of Beginners, this generosity is rewarded, but no longer by merely sensible consolations, but by a greater abundance of light in contemplation and in the work of the apostolate; by intense desires for the glory of God and the salvation of souls, and by a greater facility in prayer. Not infrequently we find in the Proficients the prayer of Quiet, in which the will is momentarily held captive by the love of God. This period is marked also by a great facility in doing works for God, such as teaching, directing, organizing, and the rest. This is to love God, not only with the whole heart, but with the whole soul, with the whole of one’s activities; but not yet with the whole strength, nor with the whole mind―because God has not yet achieved complete dominion in that higher region of the soul which we call the spirit.
“And what happens generally at this stage? Something similar to what happened in the case of the Beginners who had been rewarded with sensible consolations. The Proficient begins to take complacency—by reason of an unconscious pride—in this great facility in prayer, working, teaching, or preaching. He tends to forget that these are God’s gifts, and he rejoices in them with a proprietary air which ill beseems one who adores in spirit and in truth. It is true that he is working for God, he is working for souls; but he has not yet sufficiently forgotten himself. An unconscious self-seeking and self-importance cause him to dissipate himself and to lose the sense of the presence of God. He thinks that his labors are being very fruitful; but it is not quite certain. He is becoming too sure of himself, he gives himself too much importance and is perhaps inclined to exaggerate his own talents, to forget his own imperfection and to be too greatly aware of the imperfections of others. Purity of intention, true recollection, perfect straightforwardness, are often lacking; there is something of a lie in his life. The depth of the soul does not belong entirely to God. God is offered an intention which really is only half given to Him.
“St. John of the Cross mentions these defects of Proficients as they are found in pure contemplatives, who, he says, ‘believe in vain visions and presume that God and the saints are speaking with them’―being deceived by the ruses of the devil. Not less notable are the defects, mentioned, for example, by St. Alphonsus, which are found in apostolic men entrusted with the care of souls. These defects in Proficients become manifest especially in the obstacles which they are called upon to meet, or in differences of opinion which, even at this advanced period of the spiritual life, may cause vocations to be lost. It then becomes evident that the presence of God is not sufficiently borne in mind, and that, in the search for God, it is the self which is really being sought. Hence the need of a third purgation; hence the need of that strong lye of the purgation of the spirit, in order to cleanse the very depth of the spiritual faculties.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
The Three Ways “See-Saw” or “Yo-Yo”
It is important to remember that the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in not a “one-way-street” ― even though that is what God would like it to be. What goes up, can come down. We can three steps forward, only to find ourselves taking one, or two, or three steps backwards. Everyone is different―and everyone has different levels of pride―which is the root of all sin: “Pride is the beginning of all sin―he that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Pride is a part of the baggage that comes along with Original Sin. It is one of the first things in our life―and it usually one of the last vices to disappear. As we progress through the Three Ways, our pride certainly diminishes in proportion to our growth in true humility. Nevertheless, even devout and holy persons can still have a good dose of pride―though it not brash and obvious, but disguised and hidden―much like a wolf in the clothing of sheep.
Pride often makes us imagine that we are much advanced in the spiritual life than actually is the case. It is ultimately pride that makes us fall back down the ladder of our spiritual climb to Heaven: “Pride goes before destruction: and the spirit is lifted up before a fall!” (Proverbs 16:18). It is for that reason Our Lord related for us the parable about the Pharisee and the Publican: “And Jesus spoke this parable to certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up into the Temple to pray―the one, a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself: “God! I thank you, that I am not as other men are―extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this Publican! I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes to Heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying: “God! Be merciful to me a sinner!” I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other―for every one that exalts himself shall be abased; and he that humbles himself shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
Our pride might be hiding from us the fact that we lukewarm, or even in mortal sin―thus meaning that we have not even entered the First Way of the Spiritual Life! Remember the sobering words of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” Also the sobering words of Fr. Frederick Faber: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind.” Likewise the sobering words of St. Alphonsus Liguori: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil that is not of rare occurrence, but frequent, especially in small country districts, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.” Could we be in mortal sin and not know it? Possibly―though it is more likely that we have forgotten our bad confession or bad confessions. Let us ask Our Lady―the Refuge of Sinners, the Mother of Mercy, the Seat of Wisdom―to help us clearly see the true state of our soul and then to take the appropriate steps to heal it!
Article 28
Wednesday, January 29th
The First Step is the Hardest!
Wednesday, January 29th
The First Step is the Hardest!
The First of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life: The Way of Beginners, or the The Purgative Way
Everyone Wants―Not Everyone Gets
Everyone―it is hoped―wants to get to Heaven. Unfortunately, not everyone gets to Heaven! Most people do not get to Heaven. How do you get to Heaven? Some will say: “Just die in a state of sanctifying grace and you will get to Heaven!” Even though this is true, it is also true to say that it is a little too simplistic. It is like saying to a sports team or an athlete: “Just win every game/win every race/ and you will be the champion!” That is true―but to win games and races there also has to be a focus on tactics and methods. Today, there is too much preaching on peripheral topics, social topics, antagonistic topics, financial topics, etc. There is not sufficient preaching on what really matters―which is how to get to Heaven.
The One Thing Necessary
The spiritual life or interior life is essentially a relationship with God―a life of love, whereby God loves us and we return love to God. “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because he has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins! … Let us therefore love God, because God first has loved us!” (1 John 4:10, 19).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The interior life is, for all persons, the one thing necessary. It ought to be constantly developing in our souls―more so than what we call our intellectual life, more so than our scientific, artistic or literary life. The interior life is lived in the depths of the soul; it is the life of the whole man, not merely of one or other of his faculties. And our intellectual life would gain immeasurably by appreciating this; it would receive an inestimable advantage if, instead of attempting to supplant the spiritual life, it recognized its necessity and importance, and welcomed its beneficial influence … The interior life virtually contains the solution of the social question and of the economic crisis which afflicts the world today. The Gospel puts it very simply: ‘Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you.’ If the world today is on its death-bed, it is because it has lost sight of a fundamental truth which for every Christian is elementary ... God is now showing men what a great mistake they make when they try to do without Him, when they regard earthly enjoyment as their highest good” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
The Three Ways Compared to Life
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange continues: “If such is the life of grace, it is not surprising to find that the development of the interior life has often been compared to the three periods or stages of physical life―childhood, youth, and manhood. The transition from childhood to adolescence and from youth to manhood. St. Thomas himself has indicated this analogy. Childhood lasts until the age of puberty, about fourteen―though early childhood, or infancy, ceases at the dawn of reason, about the age of seven. Upon reaching puberty, the second period of youth or adolescence, lasts from the age of fourteen to twenty. Then follows manhood, in which we may distinguish the period which precedes full maturity, about the age of thirty-five, and that which follows it, before the decline of old age sets in.
“A person’s mentality changes with the development of life―the activity of the child is not that of a man in miniature, or of a fatigued adult―childhood is different. The child has as yet no discernment, it is unable to organize in a rational manner; it follows the lead of the imagination and the impulses of sense. And even when its reason begins to awaken it still remains to a great extent dependent upon the senses. The period of puberty, which is the end of childhood, about the age of fourteen, is characterized by a transformation which is psychological, intellectual and moral. The youth is no longer content to follow his imagination as the child was; he now begins to reflect on the things of human life, on the need to prepare himself for some career or occupation in the future. He has no longer the child’s attitude towards family, social and religious matters; his moral personality begins to take shape, and he acquires the sense of honor and of good repute. Or else, on the contrary, if he passes unsuccessfully through this difficult period, he deteriorates and follows evil paths. The law of nature obliges that the transition from childhood to youth must follow a normal development―otherwise the person will assume a positive bias to evil, or else he will remain a half-wit, perhaps even a complete idiot, for the rest of his life. ‘He who makes no progress loses ground’ is a principle of the spiritual life.
“If the physical and moral crisis of puberty is a difficult transition, the same is to be said of the crisis of the first freedom, which occurs at the stage where the youth enters manhood, about the age of twenty. The young man, having now reached his complete physical development, has to begin to take his place in social life. It will soon be time for him to marry and to become an educator in his turn, unless he has received from God a higher vocation still. Many fail to surmount this crisis of the first freedom, and, like the prodigal son, depart from their father’s house and confuse liberty with license. Here again the natural law ordains that the transition must be made normally; otherwise the young man either takes the wrong road, or else his development is arrested and he becomes one of those of whom it is said: ‘He will be a child for the whole of his life.’ The true adult is not merely a young man grown a little older. He has a new mentality; he is preoccupied with wider questions, questions to which the youth does not yet grasp. He understands the younger generation, but the younger generation does not understand him; conversation between them on certain subjects, except of a very superficial kind, is impossible.
“It is at this point that the analogy becomes illuminating for the spiritual life. We shall see that the beginner who fails to become a proficient, either turns to sin or else presents an example of arrested spiritual development. Here, too, it is true that ‘he who makes no progress loses ground,’ as the Fathers of the Church have so often pointed out. There is a somewhat similar relation, in the spiritual life, between the proficient and the perfect. He who is perfect understands the earlier stages through which he has himself already passed; but he cannot expect to be understood by those who are still passing through them. The important thing to be noticed is that, just as there is the crisis of puberty between childhood and adolescence, so in the spiritual life there is a crisis during the transition from the purgative life of beginners to the illuminative life of proficients. Furthermore, just as the youth has to pass through a second crisis―that of the first freedom, in order to reach manhood, so too in the transition from the illuminative way of the proficients to the true life of union, there is a second spiritual crisis―under the name of the passive purgation of the spirit. This may be called a third conversion, or better, a transformation of the soul.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
Not an Option
The Three Ways of the Spiritual are not options but obligations―if we wish to get to Heaven. We have to pass through all three levels or stages of the spiritual life―the Way of Beginners, the Way of Proficients and the Way of the Perfect. Failure to do so results in either Hell or Purgatory. FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE (1877-1964)―who taught Ascetical and Mystical Theology for over 40 years at the Dominican Seminary (Angelicum) in Rome―writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls! At what stage are we ourselves? This is often a very difficult question to answer, and it would perhaps be vain curiosity to inquire at what point we have arrived in our upward path; but at least we must take care not to mistake the road, and not to take a path that leads downwards.” (The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life). Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange wrote those words in the 1930’s―when the world was in a far better state than it is today!
FR. FREDERICK FABER (1814-1863) was of a similar opinion around 80 years earlier―in the 1850s―when he wrote, in his book Growth in Holiness. In his estimation and experience, much of Catholic world was in varying degrees of lukewarmness: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind. The soul feels not altogether right with God. It does not exactly know what is wrong; but it is sure all is not right. It casts about to see. It quarrels with everything it does, and questions each of them, and yet the mischief eludes it. First there comes a false conscience. Then our bad instincts grow stronger in proportion as conscience becomes dark, cold, and finally numb. These bad instincts lead us to avoid anything which will restore life to the conscience. Thus they make us shrink from anything like vigorous spiritual direction. We suspect we shall be awakened, and driven, and made too good. The discretion of the blind conscience tells us this shrinking is wisdom. We must, it says, be moderate in everything, but of all things amazingly moderate in the love of God! So in hearing sermons, reading books, cultivating acquaintances, patronizing works of mercy, it draws back from everything that is likely to come too near or hit too hard.
“There is nothing in the spiritual life which arrests our attention so forcibly as lukewarmness, because of the unusual language in which it has pleased God to express His ineffable disgust with it, and the startling doctrine which accompanies the declaration of His loathing and the extraordinary hatred which God has of this state, that coldness is less offensive to Him than tepidity: ‘I know thy works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I would rather you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth!’ (Apocalypse 3:14-16). This passage is without any parallel in Scripture. God not only prefers coldness, but He rejects tepidity. It turns Him sick who is eternal love. The charity of the Heart of Jesus, our only home, cannot retain us. His disgust is too strong for Him to resist it; and He rejects us with an unconquerable nausea. It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor, the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, and then―lost forever!” (Fr. Frederick Faber, Growth in Holiness, Chapter 25: “Lukewarmness”).
Sin and Lukewarmness Exclude a Soul from the First Way of Beginners
Some people are always in a hurry to get started and will thereby ignore important preparations. Lukewarmness either prevents us from starting out on our Three Ways pilgrimage to God and Heaven; or it drags us back down if we have already begun that pilgrimage. It is of the greatest importance to recognize, know and understand how this deadly virus of lukewarmness arises, disguises itself and operates. Sometimes a house can be repaired, sometimes it needs to be razed so a new one can be raised. To “raze a building” means to destroy or tear it down. Similarly, before planting things in the garden, it is usually necessary to weed out the weeds. Lukewarmness is weed that needs weeding out.
Know it or not―believe it or not―like it or not―accept it or not―the fact is that (1) habitual mortal sin, or (2) acceptance of venial as not being a major issue, or (3) the spirit of lukewarmness―all and any of these things put us outside the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. If we find such an attitude or lifestyle within us, then we have not even entered the mansion of the interior life with God. “It is certain that our God is so offended with sins” (Judith 11:8). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “Because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16).
Mortal sin and venial sin are the two greatest evils in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Lukewarmness and Worldliness
Lukewarmness is closely linked to worldliness, whereby it tries to make a compromise between serving God and enjoying the world―something that Our Lord said cannot be done: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). Holy Scripture further warns: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). To further confirm this point, we have the words of St. Pope Pius V (1504-1572): “All the evils of the world are due to lukewarm Catholics!”
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (1696-1787) writes: “There are two kinds of lukewarmness: one which can be avoided, and the other which cannot be avoided. Unavoidable lukewarmness is that which in the present life is endured even by fervent souls because, through natural weakness, they cannot avoid falling―from time to time―into some slight fault, but without full consent. A lukewarmness that hinders perfection when a person commits deliberate venial faults, is a lukewarmness which is avoidable―because all these faults, committed with open eyes, can effectually be avoided by the Divine grace, even in the present life. All the evil arises from the little love they have for Jesus Christ. They keep their heart open to external objects, and the mind always distracted, with an eagerness to listen to, and to know, so many things that have nothing to do with the service of God.”
ST. JOHN VIANNEY (1786-1859) gave a sermon on lukewarmness which is well worth reading: “A lukewarm soul is not yet quite dead in the eyes of God because the Faith, the Hope, and the Charity which are its spiritual life are not altogether extinct. But it is a Faith without zeal, a Hope without resolution, a Charity without ardor ... Nothing touches this soul―it hears the word of God, yes, that is true; but often it just bores it. Its possessor hears it with difficulty, more or less by habit, like someone who thinks that he knows enough about it and does enough of what he should. Any prayers which are a bit long are distasteful to him. This soul is so full of whatever it has just been doing or what it is going to do next, its boredom is so great, that this poor unfortunate thing is almost in agony. Fast days are reduced to practically nothing, either by advancing the time of the main meal or, under the pretext that Heaven was never taken by famine, by making the collation so abundant that it amounts to a full meal. It is still alive, but it is not capable of doing anything to gain Heaven .... For the last twenty years this soul has been filled with good intentions without doing anything at all to correct its habits.
“If God, in order to force such a soul to detach itself from temporal things, sends it any cross or suffering, it is fretful and grieving and abandons itself to grumbles and complaints. It seems as if it does not want to see that God has sent it these trials for its good, to detach it from this world and to draw it towards Himself. What has it done to deserve these trials? In this state a person thinks in his own mind that there are many others more blameworthy than himself who have not to submit to such trials.
“The lukewarm soul comes to the point of being completely indifferent to its own loss. It has nothing left but a love without tenderness, without action, and without energy which sustains it with difficulty in all that is essential for salvation. But for all other means of Grace, it looks upon them as nothing or almost nothing. Alas, my brethren, this poor soul in its tepidity is like someone between two bouts of sleep. It would like to act, but its will has become so softened that it lacks either the force or the courage to accomplish its wishes.
“It is true that a Christian who lives in tepidity still regularly ― in appearance at least ― fulfils his duties. He will go to the Sacraments―but in all of this there will be such a distaste, so much slackness and so much indifference, so little preparation, so little change in his way of life, that it is easy to see that he is only fulfilling his duties from habit and routine. His Confessions and his Communions are not sacrilegious, but they are Confessions and Communions which bear no fruit ― which, far from making him more perfect and more pleasing to God, only make him more unworthy. After having received Holy Communion, this person will hardly give another thought to God in all the days to follow.
“A lukewarm soul will go to Confession regularly, and even quite frequently. But what kind of Confessions are they? No preparation, no desire to correct faults, or, at the least, a desire so feeble and so small that the slightest difficulty will put a stop to it altogether. The Confessions of such a person are merely repetitions of old ones. Twenty years ago he was accusing himself of the same things he confesses today, and if he goes to Confession for the next twenty years, he will say the same things. A lukewarm soul will not, if you like, commit the big sins. But some slander or backbiting, a lie, a feeling of hatred, of dislike, of jealousy, a slight touch of deceit or double‑dealing ― these count for nothing with it. A lukewarm Christian thinks very little upon the state of his poor soul and almost never lets his mind run over the past. If the thought of making any effort to be better crosses his mind at all, he believes that once he has confessed his sins, he ought to be perfectly happy and at peace. With such people everything that is not a really serious sin is good enough.
“He assists at Holy Mass very much as he would at any ordinary activity. He does not think at all seriously of what he is doing and finds no trouble in chatting about all sorts of things while on the way to Mass. Possibly he will not give a single thought to the fact that he is about to participate in the greatest of all the gifts that God could give us. He might give some thought to the needs of his own soul, yes, but a very small and feeble amount of thought indeed. Frequently he will even present himself before the presence of God without having any idea of what he is going to ask of Him. He has few scruples in arriving late for Mass and cutting out, on the least pretext, the Asperges and the prayers before Mass. During the course of Mass, he does not want to go to sleep, of course, and he is even afraid that someone might see him, but he does not do himself any violence to himself to prevent it. He does not want, of course, to have distractions during prayer, or during the Holy Mass, yet when he should put up some little fight against them, he suffers them very patiently, considering the fact that he does not like them!
“As for his prayers, God alone knows what ― without, of course, any preparation ― he makes of these. In the morning it is not God who occupies his thoughts, nor the salvation of his poor soul―but he is taken up with thoughts of work; thinking about what he is going to be doing during the day; in what way he will expedite his own work. His mind is so wrapped up in the things of Earth, that the thought of God has no place in it. He will say his prayers―but he does not know what he wants to ask God, nor what he needs. Does he offer his day to God, to say his Grace? He does all that, but often without thinking of the One who is addressed. This lukewarm soul has no difficulty, on the slightest pretext, in talking during the course of his prayers. For no reason at all he will abandon them, partly at least, thinking that he will finish them at a later moment. He will not even stop working.
The lukewarm soul shuts God up in an obscure and ugly kind of prison. Its possessor does not crucify Him, but God can find little joy or consolation in his heart. All his dispositions proclaim that his poor soul is struggling for the breath of life. His manner of life tells us that he did not know the greatness of the happiness which had been his.
“The lukewarm like doing good, being faithful, but they wish that it would not cost them anything or, at least, that it cost very little. When he performs good or beneficial actions, his intentions are often very mixed ― sometimes it is to please someone, sometimes it is out of compassion, and sometimes it is just to please the world. They would like to visit the sick, indeed, but it would be more convenient if the sick would come to them. They have something to give away in alms, they know quite well that a certain person has need of help, but they wait until she comes to ask them, instead of anticipating her needs, which would make the kindness so very much more meritorious. We will even say that the person who leads a lukewarm life does not fail to do plenty of good works, to frequent the Sacraments, to assist regularly at all church services, but in all of this one sees only a weak, languishing Faith, Hope which the slightest trial will upset; and a love of God and of neighbor which is without warmth or pleasure. Everything that such a person does is not entirely lost, but it is very nearly so.
“See, before God, on what side you are! Are you on the side of the sinners, who have abandoned everything and plunge themselves into sin without remorse? Are you on the side of the just souls, who seek but God alone? Or are you one of the number of these slack, tepid, and indifferent souls such as we have just been depicting for you? Down which road are you traveling? Who can dare assure himself that he is neither a great sinner, nor a tepid soul, but that he is one of the elect? Alas, how many seem to be good Christians in the eyes of the world, but who are really tepid souls in the eyes of God, Who knows our inmost hearts! Let us ask God with all our hearts, if we are in this state, to give us the grace to get out of it, so that we may take the route that all the saints have taken and arrive at the happiness that they are enjoying.”
No Entry to the First Way with Lukewarmness
There is no admittance to the First Way of the Spiritual Life with deliberate lukewarmness―it has to be left outside the door. It is like a cancerous disease that will only grow and grow if left untreated and not uprooted. It is one of the most dangerous weeds to the spiritual life and union with God. As already stated above, God vomits the lukewarm out of His mouth: “Because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16). Why? Because lukewarmness, by its very nature, is at peace with venial sin and with time it can even lead one to be at peace with mortal sin. Lukewarmness seeks to give God the least it can possibly get away with. Yet Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Woe to souls like this! Woe!” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito Ecuador).
The same is true, for example, with the U.S. Marine Boot Camp! Half-hearted, worldly, “do the minimum” recruits will never make it. When they enter Boot Camp―which you call the Way of Beginners, or the Purgative Way―they are purged of all worldliness, selfishness, laziness, peevishness, grumpiness, goofiness and unfitness! You take up of cross and carry it―or you get out and go home! You show utmost respect to your superiors―or you risk being sent home! Your beloved hairstyle is sacrificed as you are shorn like a sheep! Contact with the outside world and family is severely restricted. Once the new recruits arrive, it was standard practice to keep them from sleeping the first 72 hours! Our Lord’s words to the sleeping Peter, James and John in Gethsemane come to mind: “What? Could you not watch one hour with Me?” (Matthew 26:40). The Boot Camp daily schedule could be compared to the schedule of a strict monastic order! You are allowed to bring very little with you to Boot Camp―which brings to mind Our Lord’s words to the rich young man who wanted to get to Heaven: “If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’” (Matthew 19:21). “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23).
The First Way ― the Way of Beginners ― the Purgative Way ― a Spiritual Boot Camp
You could say that getting to Heaven means having to go through a spiritual “Boot Camp”―which is more or less what Our Lord meant when “He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross and does not follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38) … “If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:26) … “Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:34-37). “They will lay their hands upon you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors, for My Name’s sake” (Luke 21:12). “They deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death, and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake!” (Matthew 24:9).
In the First Way of the Spiritual Life―also called the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―we must be open to purging ourselves, and also letting God purge us, of those things that will hinder our path to God. First and foremost is purging oneself of mortal sin―for you cannot gain entrance to the First Way if you habitually commit mortal sins. Since the First Way is called the Purgative Way, you must declare war on habitual mortal sin and purge and drive it out of your life.
Yet, as the First Way indicates, being also called the Way of Beginners, this is only the beginning of the war―for you will have to perform, and undergo, many other purges before you are fit for Heaven. “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” (Hebrews 12:4).
As they say: “The first step is always the hardest!” Most U.S. Marines will tell you that their first step―which was entering a 3 month Boot Camp―was their hardest step. Most of them hated it―but of those who made it through Boot Camp, most of them were eventually glad of it, seeing its purpose and need, and proud at having completed it. If Our Lord says that “the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violent and the violent bear it away”, then that dovetails perfectly with the idea of a spiritual Boot Camp where those Soldiers of Christ are trained to “fight the good fight of the Faith.” Fighting is not easy―winning wars is not easy. Therefore, being a Catholic Soldier of Christ is not easy and getting to Heaven is not easy. Hence we have to purge ourselves―and allow God to also purge us―from anything and everything that might prevent us from attaining Heaven.
Hence this First Way of the Spiritual Life, or the Way of Beginners, or the Purgative Way! The road to Heaven is not a sight-seeing tour on a luxury air-conditioned bus with comfortable reclining seats―the road is Heaven is straight and narrow: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and straight is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Some of the Fathers of Church make an additional comment upon those verses, saying that few there are that find that narrow path and even fewer are those who actually embark along it once they have found it!
A First Conversion is Necessary to Enter the First Way of the Spiritual Life
As stated above, habitual mortal sin disqualifies a soul from the First Way, the Way of Beginners. A first conversion is necessary before one can enter the First Way (more conversions will follow as we pass from one stage of the Spiritual Life to the next one). That conversion is essentially a purging and abandonment―with the help of God’s grace, without which we can do nothing (John 15:5)―of habitual mortal sin. Sin is an attack upon God.
The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are essentially a progression from friendship with God, to a betrothal to God, and finally to a spiritual union or marriage to God. At each stage a conversion is necessary. It is the soul’s cooperation with grace that will determine whether it experiences all three levels of conversion, or even any conversion at all. How can we become friends of God in the First Way if we are deliberately attacking Him through our habitual mortal sins? Our Lord forgave the woman caught in adultery, but He said to her: “God and sin no more!” (John 8:11). To be a friend of God we must living in an habitual state of sanctifying grace, not habitual mortal sin! In fact, you can measure your friendship with God (or lack of it), by the number of mortal sins you are habitually committing.
After the first conversion, there ought to be a serious beginning of the purgative life, in which beginners love God by avoiding mortal sin and deliberate venial sin, through exterior and interior mortification and through prayer. But in actual fact this purgative life is found under two very different forms ― (1) in some, admittedly very few, this life is intense, generous; it is the narrow way of perfect self-denial described by the saints; (2) in many others the purgative life appears in an attenuated form, varying from good souls, who are a little weak, down to those lukewarm and retarded souls who from time to time fall into mortal sin.
As the soul progresses in this beginning stage, it enjoys certain consolations from God, given by Him to inspire and encourage the soul to continue its discovery of Him. We find that Rosaries turn gold, people see the spinning sun, they have all manner of spiritual experiences that are not explained by the laws of nature. They feel the interior call of God deep within them and they desire to respond. For what may be the first time in their lives, they understand God has a personal interest in them as an individual, not just as a member of the larger human race.
We learn some of how God works in our lives, and we learn the necessity of cooperation with His grace so that we might love Him more. We discover a growing desire for spiritual cleanliness, a desire for sanctifying grace. Our attendance at Mass, which might have been done, if at all, once a week through a sense of duty, is now done, as often as possible, out of a desire to grow in grace and wisdom as we partake of the gift of the Eucharist and the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
We now have a new goal, to “be ye perfect as the heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48), and suddenly we are profoundly aware of the absolute dependence we have on God to achieve this state. We can help by cooperating with grace, but God has to bring us to that state. No matter how gifted we may be, we cannot get there on our own. The closer we come to God, the more of Himself He communicates to us, the more insignificant we understand we are compared to Him, and the more we understand the power and extent of His infinite Love for each of us individually. The more this happens the more easily we discard the worldly baggage we brought with us.
We have undergone our first conversion. We have passed from mortal sin to a state of sanctifying grace. We have passed from indifference toward God, lukewarmness towards Him, to a growing fervor and desire to possess Him as fully as possible. We are tending to go beyond ourselves, and to make God the center of our lives instead of ourselves. We live for Him, and all the while we grow in love for Him and for each other. The more we love the more we understand it is God’s gift of love that we experience, for true love itself is always His supernatural gift.
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE tells us that sanctifying grace is the seed of eternal glory in Heaven. If we do not have that seed to grow, then we cannot get to Heaven. Sanctifying grace is essential for Heaven―and mortal sin destroys that grace in our souls. Charity―which is essentially a love of God―is an accompaniment of sanctifying grace. If we lose sanctifying grace, then we lose Charity, even though Faith and Hope remain within us. Therefore, we cannot be a peace with sin and at peace with God―for sin and God are mutually exclusive. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The blotting out and remission of sins thus described by the Scriptures can be effected only by the infusion of sanctifying grace and Charity—which is the supernatural love of God and of men for God’s sake ... Our interior life is the life of grace, it is the seed or germ of eternal life given to us in Baptism and nourished by the Eucharist. ‘Grace,’ says the whole of Tradition, ‘is the seed of glory.’ The raising of the dead to life, the miracle by which a corpse is reanimated with its natural life, is almost nothing in comparison with the resurrection of a soul, which has been lying spiritually dead in sin and has now been raised to the essentially supernatural life of grace. Grace, then, is eternal life already begun within us.
“St. Thomas expresses this doctrine in the brief statement: ‘Grace is nothing else but a certain beginning of glory within us.’ He also tells us that the lowest degree of grace in a soul, for example in that of a small child after its baptism, is of greater value than the natural goodness of the whole universe. St. Thomas adds that the justification of the sinner is proportionately more precious than the glorification of the just. Hence when a sinner is absolved in the confessional, an event occurs which is proportionately of greater importance than the entrance of a just soul into Heaven. Such is the supernatural life which we received in Baptism; and this is what constitutes our interior life. This beginning of eternal life, as we have called it, has to grow and develop until we enter Heaven. The root principle of this undying organism is sanctifying grace, received in the very essence of the soul; and this grace would last forever, were it not that sin, a radical disorder in the soul, sometimes destroys it.
“We are thus able to appreciate something of the importance of true conversion, by which a man passes from the state of mortal sin to the state of grace. In the state of mortal sin, his energies were dissipated and he was indifferent in regard to God; but now he loves God more than he loves himself, more than he loves anything else―or, at any rate, he esteems God beyond all earthly things, even though his love of God may not be free from all selfish motives. The state of mortal sin was a state of spiritual death; a state in which, more or less consciously, he made himself the center of all his activities and the end of all his desires; in which he was actually the slave of everything, the slave of his passions, of the spirit of the world, of the spirit of evil. The state of sanctifying grace, on the other hand, is a state of life in which man begins seriously to tend beyond himself and to make God the center of his activities, loving God more than himself. The state of sanctifying grace is entrance into the Kingdom of God, where the docile soul begins to reign with God over its own passions, over the spirit of the world and the spirit of evil.
“This is the fundamental truth of Christian spirituality. Consequently our interior life must be a life of humility, for we must remember always that sanctifying grace is a gift, and that we also need an actual grace for the slightest salutary act, for the shortest step forward in the way of salvation. It must be also a life of mortification; as St. Paul says, we must be ‘always bearing about in our body the mortification of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies’ ― that is to say: we must daily more and more die to sin and to the relics that sin leaves in us, so that God may reign more completely in us, even to the depth of the soul. But, above all, our interior life must be a life of Faith, Hope, Charity, and union with God by unceasing prayer; it is above all the life of the three Theological Virtues (Faith, Hope, Charity) and of the Gifts of the Holy Ghost which accompany them: the Gifts of Wisdom, Understanding, Knowledge, Piety, Counsel, Fortitude and Fear of the Lord. In this way we shall enter into the mysteries of Faith and relish them more and more. In other words, our whole interior life tends towards the supernatural contemplation of the mysteries of the inner life of God and of the Incarnation and Redemption; it tends, above all, towards a more intimate union with God; it is a preliminary to that union with Him which will be the consummation of eternal life.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
Humble Beginnings With Too Much Pride
The First Way of the Spiritual Life―which is the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―is just that: a beginning and not the final destination. It is like entering Kindergarten―with lots of learning still in store before graduation in 12th Grade; or it is like an apprentice who has been accepted but who has to be taught and can only work under supervision; or like a freshman at College or University, who has been accepted but whose Degree is not guaranteed. Coming back to the U.S. Marine Boot Camp analogy, of all the applications to join the Marines and enter Boot Camp, over 90% are rejected. “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) … “Many shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!” (Luke 13:24). As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories―of beginners, proficients or perfect―but rather to that of stunted souls!”
In other words, those Catholic who actually embark upon the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way, are not many but a few. The few who actually “make it” can find that their ego is easily inflated and that they might look down upon others, just as the Pharisee did in one of Our Lord’s parables, pridefully saying: “I am not as the rest of men!” (Luke 18:11). In fact, as the spiritual writers tell us, pride will be the last vice to fall in our spiritual progression towards Heaven―it morphs from being a blatant, brash, obvious pride, into being a more subtle, hidden, disguised pride.
A Brief Overview of the Characteristics and Failings in the First Way of the Spiritual Life
► CHIEF CHARACTERISTICS:
● Being in a state of sanctifying grace most of the time
● Main focus being on purifying or purging oneself form past sins
● Avoiding mortal sins, perhaps falling occasionally
● Still committing frequent venial sins
● Conformity to God’s Will in the First Degree (the lowest degree)
● Obeying the Commandments
● Accepting trials reluctantly
● Humility practiced only in First Degree (the lowest degree)
● Still lots of self-love, self-centeredness and selfishness
● Thoughts mainly centered on self, not God
● Regular prayer life―mainly vocal prayer, discursive prayer, active
● Start of Meditation
● Sorrow for past sin
● Acts of Penance (to pay for past sins)
● Acts of Mortification (to avoid future sins)
● Fighting temptation to fall back into sin
● Struggling against sins and temptation
● Practicing virtue in haphazard way
● Bearing with the faults of our neighbor
● Forgiving injuries
GENERAL FAULTS:
● Inexperience
● Lack of generosity
● Distractions leading away from spiritual things
● Discouragement at imagined or perceived lack of progress or success
● Seeking personal advantages
● Living too much by feelings and emotions
● Having a merely theoretical and abstract Faith
● Being too material and sensual
● Prayer can be mechanical, hurried and distracted
Crafty Conversion Con
Sanctifying grace is the essential element for the spiritual life and our relationship with God. We cannot please God if we are without sanctifying grace and in a state of mortal sin. Do not necessarily or automatically presume that you are living in a state of grace. Remember that lukewarmness warps and blinds the conscience. Bad confessions are not a rarity, but far more common than we imagine. Are we confessing mortal sins according to “number and kind”? St. Alphonsus Liguori was of the opinion―in arguably far better times than our times―that most people made bad confessions. Hence he would say: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil that is not of rare occurrence, but frequent, especially in small country districts, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.” Today, this is compounded and made much more frequent due to what recent popes have called “the loss of the sense of sin.”
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Not only do “we let the Kingdom of God crumble”, but we also let our state of sanctifying grace crumble due to our warped notions of what is sinful and what is not sinful! The demons are unbelievably intelligent, and so when the demons coax us into making bad (invalid) confessions they do so in a very subtle way―they do not advertize it, nor blow trumpets, nor wave the fact before our eyes. The perfect “con” is to “con” somebody and leave them oblivious to the fact that they have been conned. So when it comes to “conned” confessions, the demons want to have us thinking that we have confessed sufficiently well, whereas we have “botched” our confession and confessed badly (invalidly).
What Makes Bad Confessions?
What is it, then, that makes a confession invalid? A confession can be bad (invalid) in a variety of different ways, with each way having its own nuances or shades. Any and every Catholic should (but they don’t) know the conditions for a valid confession. The demons are only too happy to make forget or at least misinterpret those conditions. So what are those mysterious, half-forgotten, misinterpreted and twisted notions of the required conditions for a good (valid) confession? The good old Baltimore Catechism, for children making their First Holy Communion, taught us that the steps to a good confession are: (1) find out my sins; (2) be sorry for my sins; (3) make up my mind not to sin again; (4) tell my sins to the priest; (5) do the penance the priest gives me. Those are still the right conditions today, even for adults―even though the adult catechism explains it more thoroughly. Here is a more thorough explanation of each of those five conditions:
(1) EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE ― Most people “do things by halves” ― meaning that do things partially, halfheartedly, incompletely, doing as little as they can to get by. Such persons are Satan’s dream when it comes to the Sacrament of Confession! Examinations of conscience are on “fast-track” mode; knowledge of what is mortal and venial is “half-baked” at best; memory is selective as to what they want to remember and what they want to forget; they restrict the time for examining their conscience to the moment they join the confessional line―the shorter the line, the shorter the examination; or if there is no confessional line then they just dive in to the confessional without any time to examine their conscience and just “wing-it”.
Some persons have lost the sense of sin as to what is mortal and what is venial, whereby they rely on their subjective feelings on the seriousness of sin, rather than the objective teaching of the Church as to what is mortal. Hence, today, you have Catholics who insist that they can still be good Catholics without any need to attend Sunday Mass; or those who feel masturbation is not a mortal sin; or that cohabitation is acceptable these days, etc. The chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, used to say that demons prefer not to be detected―well, the same applies to our sins―demons prefer that we fail to detect our sins!
(2) SUFFICIENT SORROW FOR YOUR SINS ― How much sorrow is sorrow? Sorrow―like so many other things in life, such as intelligence or love―ranges from minimal sorrow to maximum sorrow. Not wishing that any soul be damned (though most souls still manage to damn themselves), God is willing to accept a minimal sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession. This minimal sorrow is called “attrition.” The maximum sorrow is called “contrition”. God is willing to accept this minimal sorrow that fears God and His punishments―but we were created not just to fear God, but more importantly to love God! Our relationship with God should grow from an initial fear of God to a love of God: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18). Our contrition will be perfect when we repent of our sins through the perfect love of God.
(3) A FIRM PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT ― This is another “stumbling-block” or “pit-fall” in making good (valid) confessions. There are too many Catholics who use the confessional like a revolving door―always going and coming out, going back in and coming back out, in again and out again, confessing the same old mortal sins time and time again! If a person does not take practical steps to avoid falling back into the mortal sins they have confessed, then the confession is invalid due to presumed lack of FIRM purpose of amendment. When a particular kind of mortal sin becomes increasingly repetitive and habitual, then one has to question whether or not there is a FIRM purpose of amendment. A FIRM purpose of amendment is far superior to a VAGUE purpose of amendment. A VAGUE purpose of amendment will merely say: “Oh, I’ve really got to stop doing this!” and will go no further. Whereas a FIRM purpose of amendment will go beyond saying: “I’ve got to stop doing this!” and will carefully analyze why these sins are being committed and will take concrete measures and practical plans to avoid the occasions of that particular sin―it goes beyond mere wishful thinking. The VAGUE purpose of amendment resides in the mind or intellect alone. The FIRM purpose of amendment is not only in the mind or intellect, but it then transfers itself to the heart or will, and puts the plans of the mind into practice.
(4) CONFESSING YOUR SINS ― Here is another dangerous area which abounds with demonic interference. The bottom line in this area is this ― if the demons cannot prevent you from going to Confession, then they will try and make you confess your sins in a way that makes the confession invalid. The most common pathways are:
(1) hiding a mortal sin in confession through shame,
(2) fudging, obfuscating, twisting, cosmetically coating, misrepresenting, leaving out details, cloaking the mortal sin in such a way as make a mortal sin seem like a serious venial sin;
(3) not stating the correct number of times that you committed the sin―for example, saying “a few times” instead of saying “ten times”. Ten is much more than “a few”; or simply saying: “I’ve stolen things” without saying what value of things and how many times you stole;
(4) or not being specific as to the KIND of sin you committed―for example, merely saying: “I’ve been impure!” hides the kind of impurity―for there are increasing degrees of gravity in impurity: (a) impure with oneself; (b) impure with another person; (c) impure with animals. As regards impurity with other persons, you have to make distinctions: (a) are you married or single; (b) was the other person married or single; (c) was the other person of the same sex or the opposite sex; (d) was the other person a minor/child; (e) was the other person a religious―monk, nun, etc.
There are certain sins that can the added gravity of being a sacrilege―for example stealing from a store is different to stealing from the church; impurity with a religious adds a sacrilegious aspect to the sin. Always be honest in confession―you might fool the priest; you might fool yourself; but you cannot fool God. God knows all about your sin―He wants YOU to know YOUR sins as they really are so that you can get to work at uprooting them from your life.
(5) COMPLETING THE PENANCE THE PRIEST ASSIGNS TO YOU ― Listen carefully and take note of the penance that the priest assigns to you. Sometimes the instructions are general―such as: “Pray a Rosary!” This does not specify when to pray the Rosary; nor does it specify whether or not you have to pray all five decades at once, or whether you can divide it up into sections; nor does it specify which mysteries of the Rosary to pray; nor does it specify if you also have meditate the mysteries instead just saying the Our Fathers and Hail Marys. Therefore all these variations are left up to you.
Other penances might be more precise―such as: “Make the Stations of the Cross in church on a Friday!” If this is impossible for you, then you must mention that to the priest and give the reason why. He might change some aspect, such as allowing you to make the Stations at home, or make them the next time you go to church, etc.
Priests are obliged―under the pain of sin―to give serious penances for mortal sins: for example, five decades of the Rosary, or the Stations of the Cross, are regarded as the minimum in the class of serious penances. However, if you feel you can more―then tell the priest that you are willing to do more. The reason being is that a penance imposed in the Sacrament of Confession has more power and value than the same penance done by your personal choice―so a Rosary given as penance in Confession has more value than a Rosary prayed by your own free choice.
Penance is essential―as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
Moving Towards the Next Level
In this first state as a beginner, beginning in spiritual infancy, we were going through an active purgation. We have been maturing toward adolescence, shedding our attachments to the world as best we could, and developing a different set of attachments, ones more fitting to a spiritually mature person. We have been developing attachments to God, replacing activities in the world with activities directed toward God, and have been developing an active life of prayer and meditation. With the action of grace, God has been positioning us, through self-knowledge, humility, and love for God and fellow man, for a transition, a second conversion, from beginner to proficient. We believe we are ready to enter the gate leading onto the first bridge, the one which will bring us to the second plateau. In the Interior Castle, Teresa identifies this as the fourth mansions.
If we do cooperate, we will be prepared for the second conversion through a more passive purgation of the senses. If we are successful and do cross over the first bridge, as we step upon the surface of the second plateau we enter what is referred to as the illuminative way. To get there, we have a spiritual crisis to handle, and thus we have a need for a second conversion. John of the Cross speaks of this in Dark Night, and this second conversion is one of purgation of egoism.
Everyone Wants―Not Everyone Gets
Everyone―it is hoped―wants to get to Heaven. Unfortunately, not everyone gets to Heaven! Most people do not get to Heaven. How do you get to Heaven? Some will say: “Just die in a state of sanctifying grace and you will get to Heaven!” Even though this is true, it is also true to say that it is a little too simplistic. It is like saying to a sports team or an athlete: “Just win every game/win every race/ and you will be the champion!” That is true―but to win games and races there also has to be a focus on tactics and methods. Today, there is too much preaching on peripheral topics, social topics, antagonistic topics, financial topics, etc. There is not sufficient preaching on what really matters―which is how to get to Heaven.
The One Thing Necessary
The spiritual life or interior life is essentially a relationship with God―a life of love, whereby God loves us and we return love to God. “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because he has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins! … Let us therefore love God, because God first has loved us!” (1 John 4:10, 19).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The interior life is, for all persons, the one thing necessary. It ought to be constantly developing in our souls―more so than what we call our intellectual life, more so than our scientific, artistic or literary life. The interior life is lived in the depths of the soul; it is the life of the whole man, not merely of one or other of his faculties. And our intellectual life would gain immeasurably by appreciating this; it would receive an inestimable advantage if, instead of attempting to supplant the spiritual life, it recognized its necessity and importance, and welcomed its beneficial influence … The interior life virtually contains the solution of the social question and of the economic crisis which afflicts the world today. The Gospel puts it very simply: ‘Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you.’ If the world today is on its death-bed, it is because it has lost sight of a fundamental truth which for every Christian is elementary ... God is now showing men what a great mistake they make when they try to do without Him, when they regard earthly enjoyment as their highest good” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
The Three Ways Compared to Life
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange continues: “If such is the life of grace, it is not surprising to find that the development of the interior life has often been compared to the three periods or stages of physical life―childhood, youth, and manhood. The transition from childhood to adolescence and from youth to manhood. St. Thomas himself has indicated this analogy. Childhood lasts until the age of puberty, about fourteen―though early childhood, or infancy, ceases at the dawn of reason, about the age of seven. Upon reaching puberty, the second period of youth or adolescence, lasts from the age of fourteen to twenty. Then follows manhood, in which we may distinguish the period which precedes full maturity, about the age of thirty-five, and that which follows it, before the decline of old age sets in.
“A person’s mentality changes with the development of life―the activity of the child is not that of a man in miniature, or of a fatigued adult―childhood is different. The child has as yet no discernment, it is unable to organize in a rational manner; it follows the lead of the imagination and the impulses of sense. And even when its reason begins to awaken it still remains to a great extent dependent upon the senses. The period of puberty, which is the end of childhood, about the age of fourteen, is characterized by a transformation which is psychological, intellectual and moral. The youth is no longer content to follow his imagination as the child was; he now begins to reflect on the things of human life, on the need to prepare himself for some career or occupation in the future. He has no longer the child’s attitude towards family, social and religious matters; his moral personality begins to take shape, and he acquires the sense of honor and of good repute. Or else, on the contrary, if he passes unsuccessfully through this difficult period, he deteriorates and follows evil paths. The law of nature obliges that the transition from childhood to youth must follow a normal development―otherwise the person will assume a positive bias to evil, or else he will remain a half-wit, perhaps even a complete idiot, for the rest of his life. ‘He who makes no progress loses ground’ is a principle of the spiritual life.
“If the physical and moral crisis of puberty is a difficult transition, the same is to be said of the crisis of the first freedom, which occurs at the stage where the youth enters manhood, about the age of twenty. The young man, having now reached his complete physical development, has to begin to take his place in social life. It will soon be time for him to marry and to become an educator in his turn, unless he has received from God a higher vocation still. Many fail to surmount this crisis of the first freedom, and, like the prodigal son, depart from their father’s house and confuse liberty with license. Here again the natural law ordains that the transition must be made normally; otherwise the young man either takes the wrong road, or else his development is arrested and he becomes one of those of whom it is said: ‘He will be a child for the whole of his life.’ The true adult is not merely a young man grown a little older. He has a new mentality; he is preoccupied with wider questions, questions to which the youth does not yet grasp. He understands the younger generation, but the younger generation does not understand him; conversation between them on certain subjects, except of a very superficial kind, is impossible.
“It is at this point that the analogy becomes illuminating for the spiritual life. We shall see that the beginner who fails to become a proficient, either turns to sin or else presents an example of arrested spiritual development. Here, too, it is true that ‘he who makes no progress loses ground,’ as the Fathers of the Church have so often pointed out. There is a somewhat similar relation, in the spiritual life, between the proficient and the perfect. He who is perfect understands the earlier stages through which he has himself already passed; but he cannot expect to be understood by those who are still passing through them. The important thing to be noticed is that, just as there is the crisis of puberty between childhood and adolescence, so in the spiritual life there is a crisis during the transition from the purgative life of beginners to the illuminative life of proficients. Furthermore, just as the youth has to pass through a second crisis―that of the first freedom, in order to reach manhood, so too in the transition from the illuminative way of the proficients to the true life of union, there is a second spiritual crisis―under the name of the passive purgation of the spirit. This may be called a third conversion, or better, a transformation of the soul.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
Not an Option
The Three Ways of the Spiritual are not options but obligations―if we wish to get to Heaven. We have to pass through all three levels or stages of the spiritual life―the Way of Beginners, the Way of Proficients and the Way of the Perfect. Failure to do so results in either Hell or Purgatory. FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE (1877-1964)―who taught Ascetical and Mystical Theology for over 40 years at the Dominican Seminary (Angelicum) in Rome―writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls! At what stage are we ourselves? This is often a very difficult question to answer, and it would perhaps be vain curiosity to inquire at what point we have arrived in our upward path; but at least we must take care not to mistake the road, and not to take a path that leads downwards.” (The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life). Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange wrote those words in the 1930’s―when the world was in a far better state than it is today!
FR. FREDERICK FABER (1814-1863) was of a similar opinion around 80 years earlier―in the 1850s―when he wrote, in his book Growth in Holiness. In his estimation and experience, much of Catholic world was in varying degrees of lukewarmness: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind. The soul feels not altogether right with God. It does not exactly know what is wrong; but it is sure all is not right. It casts about to see. It quarrels with everything it does, and questions each of them, and yet the mischief eludes it. First there comes a false conscience. Then our bad instincts grow stronger in proportion as conscience becomes dark, cold, and finally numb. These bad instincts lead us to avoid anything which will restore life to the conscience. Thus they make us shrink from anything like vigorous spiritual direction. We suspect we shall be awakened, and driven, and made too good. The discretion of the blind conscience tells us this shrinking is wisdom. We must, it says, be moderate in everything, but of all things amazingly moderate in the love of God! So in hearing sermons, reading books, cultivating acquaintances, patronizing works of mercy, it draws back from everything that is likely to come too near or hit too hard.
“There is nothing in the spiritual life which arrests our attention so forcibly as lukewarmness, because of the unusual language in which it has pleased God to express His ineffable disgust with it, and the startling doctrine which accompanies the declaration of His loathing and the extraordinary hatred which God has of this state, that coldness is less offensive to Him than tepidity: ‘I know thy works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I would rather you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth!’ (Apocalypse 3:14-16). This passage is without any parallel in Scripture. God not only prefers coldness, but He rejects tepidity. It turns Him sick who is eternal love. The charity of the Heart of Jesus, our only home, cannot retain us. His disgust is too strong for Him to resist it; and He rejects us with an unconquerable nausea. It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor, the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, and then―lost forever!” (Fr. Frederick Faber, Growth in Holiness, Chapter 25: “Lukewarmness”).
Sin and Lukewarmness Exclude a Soul from the First Way of Beginners
Some people are always in a hurry to get started and will thereby ignore important preparations. Lukewarmness either prevents us from starting out on our Three Ways pilgrimage to God and Heaven; or it drags us back down if we have already begun that pilgrimage. It is of the greatest importance to recognize, know and understand how this deadly virus of lukewarmness arises, disguises itself and operates. Sometimes a house can be repaired, sometimes it needs to be razed so a new one can be raised. To “raze a building” means to destroy or tear it down. Similarly, before planting things in the garden, it is usually necessary to weed out the weeds. Lukewarmness is weed that needs weeding out.
Know it or not―believe it or not―like it or not―accept it or not―the fact is that (1) habitual mortal sin, or (2) acceptance of venial as not being a major issue, or (3) the spirit of lukewarmness―all and any of these things put us outside the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. If we find such an attitude or lifestyle within us, then we have not even entered the mansion of the interior life with God. “It is certain that our God is so offended with sins” (Judith 11:8). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “Because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16).
Mortal sin and venial sin are the two greatest evils in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Lukewarmness and Worldliness
Lukewarmness is closely linked to worldliness, whereby it tries to make a compromise between serving God and enjoying the world―something that Our Lord said cannot be done: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). Holy Scripture further warns: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). To further confirm this point, we have the words of St. Pope Pius V (1504-1572): “All the evils of the world are due to lukewarm Catholics!”
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (1696-1787) writes: “There are two kinds of lukewarmness: one which can be avoided, and the other which cannot be avoided. Unavoidable lukewarmness is that which in the present life is endured even by fervent souls because, through natural weakness, they cannot avoid falling―from time to time―into some slight fault, but without full consent. A lukewarmness that hinders perfection when a person commits deliberate venial faults, is a lukewarmness which is avoidable―because all these faults, committed with open eyes, can effectually be avoided by the Divine grace, even in the present life. All the evil arises from the little love they have for Jesus Christ. They keep their heart open to external objects, and the mind always distracted, with an eagerness to listen to, and to know, so many things that have nothing to do with the service of God.”
ST. JOHN VIANNEY (1786-1859) gave a sermon on lukewarmness which is well worth reading: “A lukewarm soul is not yet quite dead in the eyes of God because the Faith, the Hope, and the Charity which are its spiritual life are not altogether extinct. But it is a Faith without zeal, a Hope without resolution, a Charity without ardor ... Nothing touches this soul―it hears the word of God, yes, that is true; but often it just bores it. Its possessor hears it with difficulty, more or less by habit, like someone who thinks that he knows enough about it and does enough of what he should. Any prayers which are a bit long are distasteful to him. This soul is so full of whatever it has just been doing or what it is going to do next, its boredom is so great, that this poor unfortunate thing is almost in agony. Fast days are reduced to practically nothing, either by advancing the time of the main meal or, under the pretext that Heaven was never taken by famine, by making the collation so abundant that it amounts to a full meal. It is still alive, but it is not capable of doing anything to gain Heaven .... For the last twenty years this soul has been filled with good intentions without doing anything at all to correct its habits.
“If God, in order to force such a soul to detach itself from temporal things, sends it any cross or suffering, it is fretful and grieving and abandons itself to grumbles and complaints. It seems as if it does not want to see that God has sent it these trials for its good, to detach it from this world and to draw it towards Himself. What has it done to deserve these trials? In this state a person thinks in his own mind that there are many others more blameworthy than himself who have not to submit to such trials.
“The lukewarm soul comes to the point of being completely indifferent to its own loss. It has nothing left but a love without tenderness, without action, and without energy which sustains it with difficulty in all that is essential for salvation. But for all other means of Grace, it looks upon them as nothing or almost nothing. Alas, my brethren, this poor soul in its tepidity is like someone between two bouts of sleep. It would like to act, but its will has become so softened that it lacks either the force or the courage to accomplish its wishes.
“It is true that a Christian who lives in tepidity still regularly ― in appearance at least ― fulfils his duties. He will go to the Sacraments―but in all of this there will be such a distaste, so much slackness and so much indifference, so little preparation, so little change in his way of life, that it is easy to see that he is only fulfilling his duties from habit and routine. His Confessions and his Communions are not sacrilegious, but they are Confessions and Communions which bear no fruit ― which, far from making him more perfect and more pleasing to God, only make him more unworthy. After having received Holy Communion, this person will hardly give another thought to God in all the days to follow.
“A lukewarm soul will go to Confession regularly, and even quite frequently. But what kind of Confessions are they? No preparation, no desire to correct faults, or, at the least, a desire so feeble and so small that the slightest difficulty will put a stop to it altogether. The Confessions of such a person are merely repetitions of old ones. Twenty years ago he was accusing himself of the same things he confesses today, and if he goes to Confession for the next twenty years, he will say the same things. A lukewarm soul will not, if you like, commit the big sins. But some slander or backbiting, a lie, a feeling of hatred, of dislike, of jealousy, a slight touch of deceit or double‑dealing ― these count for nothing with it. A lukewarm Christian thinks very little upon the state of his poor soul and almost never lets his mind run over the past. If the thought of making any effort to be better crosses his mind at all, he believes that once he has confessed his sins, he ought to be perfectly happy and at peace. With such people everything that is not a really serious sin is good enough.
“He assists at Holy Mass very much as he would at any ordinary activity. He does not think at all seriously of what he is doing and finds no trouble in chatting about all sorts of things while on the way to Mass. Possibly he will not give a single thought to the fact that he is about to participate in the greatest of all the gifts that God could give us. He might give some thought to the needs of his own soul, yes, but a very small and feeble amount of thought indeed. Frequently he will even present himself before the presence of God without having any idea of what he is going to ask of Him. He has few scruples in arriving late for Mass and cutting out, on the least pretext, the Asperges and the prayers before Mass. During the course of Mass, he does not want to go to sleep, of course, and he is even afraid that someone might see him, but he does not do himself any violence to himself to prevent it. He does not want, of course, to have distractions during prayer, or during the Holy Mass, yet when he should put up some little fight against them, he suffers them very patiently, considering the fact that he does not like them!
“As for his prayers, God alone knows what ― without, of course, any preparation ― he makes of these. In the morning it is not God who occupies his thoughts, nor the salvation of his poor soul―but he is taken up with thoughts of work; thinking about what he is going to be doing during the day; in what way he will expedite his own work. His mind is so wrapped up in the things of Earth, that the thought of God has no place in it. He will say his prayers―but he does not know what he wants to ask God, nor what he needs. Does he offer his day to God, to say his Grace? He does all that, but often without thinking of the One who is addressed. This lukewarm soul has no difficulty, on the slightest pretext, in talking during the course of his prayers. For no reason at all he will abandon them, partly at least, thinking that he will finish them at a later moment. He will not even stop working.
The lukewarm soul shuts God up in an obscure and ugly kind of prison. Its possessor does not crucify Him, but God can find little joy or consolation in his heart. All his dispositions proclaim that his poor soul is struggling for the breath of life. His manner of life tells us that he did not know the greatness of the happiness which had been his.
“The lukewarm like doing good, being faithful, but they wish that it would not cost them anything or, at least, that it cost very little. When he performs good or beneficial actions, his intentions are often very mixed ― sometimes it is to please someone, sometimes it is out of compassion, and sometimes it is just to please the world. They would like to visit the sick, indeed, but it would be more convenient if the sick would come to them. They have something to give away in alms, they know quite well that a certain person has need of help, but they wait until she comes to ask them, instead of anticipating her needs, which would make the kindness so very much more meritorious. We will even say that the person who leads a lukewarm life does not fail to do plenty of good works, to frequent the Sacraments, to assist regularly at all church services, but in all of this one sees only a weak, languishing Faith, Hope which the slightest trial will upset; and a love of God and of neighbor which is without warmth or pleasure. Everything that such a person does is not entirely lost, but it is very nearly so.
“See, before God, on what side you are! Are you on the side of the sinners, who have abandoned everything and plunge themselves into sin without remorse? Are you on the side of the just souls, who seek but God alone? Or are you one of the number of these slack, tepid, and indifferent souls such as we have just been depicting for you? Down which road are you traveling? Who can dare assure himself that he is neither a great sinner, nor a tepid soul, but that he is one of the elect? Alas, how many seem to be good Christians in the eyes of the world, but who are really tepid souls in the eyes of God, Who knows our inmost hearts! Let us ask God with all our hearts, if we are in this state, to give us the grace to get out of it, so that we may take the route that all the saints have taken and arrive at the happiness that they are enjoying.”
No Entry to the First Way with Lukewarmness
There is no admittance to the First Way of the Spiritual Life with deliberate lukewarmness―it has to be left outside the door. It is like a cancerous disease that will only grow and grow if left untreated and not uprooted. It is one of the most dangerous weeds to the spiritual life and union with God. As already stated above, God vomits the lukewarm out of His mouth: “Because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16). Why? Because lukewarmness, by its very nature, is at peace with venial sin and with time it can even lead one to be at peace with mortal sin. Lukewarmness seeks to give God the least it can possibly get away with. Yet Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Woe to souls like this! Woe!” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito Ecuador).
The same is true, for example, with the U.S. Marine Boot Camp! Half-hearted, worldly, “do the minimum” recruits will never make it. When they enter Boot Camp―which you call the Way of Beginners, or the Purgative Way―they are purged of all worldliness, selfishness, laziness, peevishness, grumpiness, goofiness and unfitness! You take up of cross and carry it―or you get out and go home! You show utmost respect to your superiors―or you risk being sent home! Your beloved hairstyle is sacrificed as you are shorn like a sheep! Contact with the outside world and family is severely restricted. Once the new recruits arrive, it was standard practice to keep them from sleeping the first 72 hours! Our Lord’s words to the sleeping Peter, James and John in Gethsemane come to mind: “What? Could you not watch one hour with Me?” (Matthew 26:40). The Boot Camp daily schedule could be compared to the schedule of a strict monastic order! You are allowed to bring very little with you to Boot Camp―which brings to mind Our Lord’s words to the rich young man who wanted to get to Heaven: “If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’” (Matthew 19:21). “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23).
The First Way ― the Way of Beginners ― the Purgative Way ― a Spiritual Boot Camp
You could say that getting to Heaven means having to go through a spiritual “Boot Camp”―which is more or less what Our Lord meant when “He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross and does not follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38) … “If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:26) … “Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:34-37). “They will lay their hands upon you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors, for My Name’s sake” (Luke 21:12). “They deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death, and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake!” (Matthew 24:9).
In the First Way of the Spiritual Life―also called the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―we must be open to purging ourselves, and also letting God purge us, of those things that will hinder our path to God. First and foremost is purging oneself of mortal sin―for you cannot gain entrance to the First Way if you habitually commit mortal sins. Since the First Way is called the Purgative Way, you must declare war on habitual mortal sin and purge and drive it out of your life.
Yet, as the First Way indicates, being also called the Way of Beginners, this is only the beginning of the war―for you will have to perform, and undergo, many other purges before you are fit for Heaven. “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” (Hebrews 12:4).
As they say: “The first step is always the hardest!” Most U.S. Marines will tell you that their first step―which was entering a 3 month Boot Camp―was their hardest step. Most of them hated it―but of those who made it through Boot Camp, most of them were eventually glad of it, seeing its purpose and need, and proud at having completed it. If Our Lord says that “the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violent and the violent bear it away”, then that dovetails perfectly with the idea of a spiritual Boot Camp where those Soldiers of Christ are trained to “fight the good fight of the Faith.” Fighting is not easy―winning wars is not easy. Therefore, being a Catholic Soldier of Christ is not easy and getting to Heaven is not easy. Hence we have to purge ourselves―and allow God to also purge us―from anything and everything that might prevent us from attaining Heaven.
Hence this First Way of the Spiritual Life, or the Way of Beginners, or the Purgative Way! The road to Heaven is not a sight-seeing tour on a luxury air-conditioned bus with comfortable reclining seats―the road is Heaven is straight and narrow: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and straight is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Some of the Fathers of Church make an additional comment upon those verses, saying that few there are that find that narrow path and even fewer are those who actually embark along it once they have found it!
A First Conversion is Necessary to Enter the First Way of the Spiritual Life
As stated above, habitual mortal sin disqualifies a soul from the First Way, the Way of Beginners. A first conversion is necessary before one can enter the First Way (more conversions will follow as we pass from one stage of the Spiritual Life to the next one). That conversion is essentially a purging and abandonment―with the help of God’s grace, without which we can do nothing (John 15:5)―of habitual mortal sin. Sin is an attack upon God.
The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are essentially a progression from friendship with God, to a betrothal to God, and finally to a spiritual union or marriage to God. At each stage a conversion is necessary. It is the soul’s cooperation with grace that will determine whether it experiences all three levels of conversion, or even any conversion at all. How can we become friends of God in the First Way if we are deliberately attacking Him through our habitual mortal sins? Our Lord forgave the woman caught in adultery, but He said to her: “God and sin no more!” (John 8:11). To be a friend of God we must living in an habitual state of sanctifying grace, not habitual mortal sin! In fact, you can measure your friendship with God (or lack of it), by the number of mortal sins you are habitually committing.
After the first conversion, there ought to be a serious beginning of the purgative life, in which beginners love God by avoiding mortal sin and deliberate venial sin, through exterior and interior mortification and through prayer. But in actual fact this purgative life is found under two very different forms ― (1) in some, admittedly very few, this life is intense, generous; it is the narrow way of perfect self-denial described by the saints; (2) in many others the purgative life appears in an attenuated form, varying from good souls, who are a little weak, down to those lukewarm and retarded souls who from time to time fall into mortal sin.
As the soul progresses in this beginning stage, it enjoys certain consolations from God, given by Him to inspire and encourage the soul to continue its discovery of Him. We find that Rosaries turn gold, people see the spinning sun, they have all manner of spiritual experiences that are not explained by the laws of nature. They feel the interior call of God deep within them and they desire to respond. For what may be the first time in their lives, they understand God has a personal interest in them as an individual, not just as a member of the larger human race.
We learn some of how God works in our lives, and we learn the necessity of cooperation with His grace so that we might love Him more. We discover a growing desire for spiritual cleanliness, a desire for sanctifying grace. Our attendance at Mass, which might have been done, if at all, once a week through a sense of duty, is now done, as often as possible, out of a desire to grow in grace and wisdom as we partake of the gift of the Eucharist and the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
We now have a new goal, to “be ye perfect as the heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48), and suddenly we are profoundly aware of the absolute dependence we have on God to achieve this state. We can help by cooperating with grace, but God has to bring us to that state. No matter how gifted we may be, we cannot get there on our own. The closer we come to God, the more of Himself He communicates to us, the more insignificant we understand we are compared to Him, and the more we understand the power and extent of His infinite Love for each of us individually. The more this happens the more easily we discard the worldly baggage we brought with us.
We have undergone our first conversion. We have passed from mortal sin to a state of sanctifying grace. We have passed from indifference toward God, lukewarmness towards Him, to a growing fervor and desire to possess Him as fully as possible. We are tending to go beyond ourselves, and to make God the center of our lives instead of ourselves. We live for Him, and all the while we grow in love for Him and for each other. The more we love the more we understand it is God’s gift of love that we experience, for true love itself is always His supernatural gift.
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE tells us that sanctifying grace is the seed of eternal glory in Heaven. If we do not have that seed to grow, then we cannot get to Heaven. Sanctifying grace is essential for Heaven―and mortal sin destroys that grace in our souls. Charity―which is essentially a love of God―is an accompaniment of sanctifying grace. If we lose sanctifying grace, then we lose Charity, even though Faith and Hope remain within us. Therefore, we cannot be a peace with sin and at peace with God―for sin and God are mutually exclusive. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The blotting out and remission of sins thus described by the Scriptures can be effected only by the infusion of sanctifying grace and Charity—which is the supernatural love of God and of men for God’s sake ... Our interior life is the life of grace, it is the seed or germ of eternal life given to us in Baptism and nourished by the Eucharist. ‘Grace,’ says the whole of Tradition, ‘is the seed of glory.’ The raising of the dead to life, the miracle by which a corpse is reanimated with its natural life, is almost nothing in comparison with the resurrection of a soul, which has been lying spiritually dead in sin and has now been raised to the essentially supernatural life of grace. Grace, then, is eternal life already begun within us.
“St. Thomas expresses this doctrine in the brief statement: ‘Grace is nothing else but a certain beginning of glory within us.’ He also tells us that the lowest degree of grace in a soul, for example in that of a small child after its baptism, is of greater value than the natural goodness of the whole universe. St. Thomas adds that the justification of the sinner is proportionately more precious than the glorification of the just. Hence when a sinner is absolved in the confessional, an event occurs which is proportionately of greater importance than the entrance of a just soul into Heaven. Such is the supernatural life which we received in Baptism; and this is what constitutes our interior life. This beginning of eternal life, as we have called it, has to grow and develop until we enter Heaven. The root principle of this undying organism is sanctifying grace, received in the very essence of the soul; and this grace would last forever, were it not that sin, a radical disorder in the soul, sometimes destroys it.
“We are thus able to appreciate something of the importance of true conversion, by which a man passes from the state of mortal sin to the state of grace. In the state of mortal sin, his energies were dissipated and he was indifferent in regard to God; but now he loves God more than he loves himself, more than he loves anything else―or, at any rate, he esteems God beyond all earthly things, even though his love of God may not be free from all selfish motives. The state of mortal sin was a state of spiritual death; a state in which, more or less consciously, he made himself the center of all his activities and the end of all his desires; in which he was actually the slave of everything, the slave of his passions, of the spirit of the world, of the spirit of evil. The state of sanctifying grace, on the other hand, is a state of life in which man begins seriously to tend beyond himself and to make God the center of his activities, loving God more than himself. The state of sanctifying grace is entrance into the Kingdom of God, where the docile soul begins to reign with God over its own passions, over the spirit of the world and the spirit of evil.
“This is the fundamental truth of Christian spirituality. Consequently our interior life must be a life of humility, for we must remember always that sanctifying grace is a gift, and that we also need an actual grace for the slightest salutary act, for the shortest step forward in the way of salvation. It must be also a life of mortification; as St. Paul says, we must be ‘always bearing about in our body the mortification of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies’ ― that is to say: we must daily more and more die to sin and to the relics that sin leaves in us, so that God may reign more completely in us, even to the depth of the soul. But, above all, our interior life must be a life of Faith, Hope, Charity, and union with God by unceasing prayer; it is above all the life of the three Theological Virtues (Faith, Hope, Charity) and of the Gifts of the Holy Ghost which accompany them: the Gifts of Wisdom, Understanding, Knowledge, Piety, Counsel, Fortitude and Fear of the Lord. In this way we shall enter into the mysteries of Faith and relish them more and more. In other words, our whole interior life tends towards the supernatural contemplation of the mysteries of the inner life of God and of the Incarnation and Redemption; it tends, above all, towards a more intimate union with God; it is a preliminary to that union with Him which will be the consummation of eternal life.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
Humble Beginnings With Too Much Pride
The First Way of the Spiritual Life―which is the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―is just that: a beginning and not the final destination. It is like entering Kindergarten―with lots of learning still in store before graduation in 12th Grade; or it is like an apprentice who has been accepted but who has to be taught and can only work under supervision; or like a freshman at College or University, who has been accepted but whose Degree is not guaranteed. Coming back to the U.S. Marine Boot Camp analogy, of all the applications to join the Marines and enter Boot Camp, over 90% are rejected. “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) … “Many shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!” (Luke 13:24). As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories―of beginners, proficients or perfect―but rather to that of stunted souls!”
In other words, those Catholic who actually embark upon the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way, are not many but a few. The few who actually “make it” can find that their ego is easily inflated and that they might look down upon others, just as the Pharisee did in one of Our Lord’s parables, pridefully saying: “I am not as the rest of men!” (Luke 18:11). In fact, as the spiritual writers tell us, pride will be the last vice to fall in our spiritual progression towards Heaven―it morphs from being a blatant, brash, obvious pride, into being a more subtle, hidden, disguised pride.
A Brief Overview of the Characteristics and Failings in the First Way of the Spiritual Life
► CHIEF CHARACTERISTICS:
● Being in a state of sanctifying grace most of the time
● Main focus being on purifying or purging oneself form past sins
● Avoiding mortal sins, perhaps falling occasionally
● Still committing frequent venial sins
● Conformity to God’s Will in the First Degree (the lowest degree)
● Obeying the Commandments
● Accepting trials reluctantly
● Humility practiced only in First Degree (the lowest degree)
● Still lots of self-love, self-centeredness and selfishness
● Thoughts mainly centered on self, not God
● Regular prayer life―mainly vocal prayer, discursive prayer, active
● Start of Meditation
● Sorrow for past sin
● Acts of Penance (to pay for past sins)
● Acts of Mortification (to avoid future sins)
● Fighting temptation to fall back into sin
● Struggling against sins and temptation
● Practicing virtue in haphazard way
● Bearing with the faults of our neighbor
● Forgiving injuries
GENERAL FAULTS:
● Inexperience
● Lack of generosity
● Distractions leading away from spiritual things
● Discouragement at imagined or perceived lack of progress or success
● Seeking personal advantages
● Living too much by feelings and emotions
● Having a merely theoretical and abstract Faith
● Being too material and sensual
● Prayer can be mechanical, hurried and distracted
Crafty Conversion Con
Sanctifying grace is the essential element for the spiritual life and our relationship with God. We cannot please God if we are without sanctifying grace and in a state of mortal sin. Do not necessarily or automatically presume that you are living in a state of grace. Remember that lukewarmness warps and blinds the conscience. Bad confessions are not a rarity, but far more common than we imagine. Are we confessing mortal sins according to “number and kind”? St. Alphonsus Liguori was of the opinion―in arguably far better times than our times―that most people made bad confessions. Hence he would say: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil that is not of rare occurrence, but frequent, especially in small country districts, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.” Today, this is compounded and made much more frequent due to what recent popes have called “the loss of the sense of sin.”
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Not only do “we let the Kingdom of God crumble”, but we also let our state of sanctifying grace crumble due to our warped notions of what is sinful and what is not sinful! The demons are unbelievably intelligent, and so when the demons coax us into making bad (invalid) confessions they do so in a very subtle way―they do not advertize it, nor blow trumpets, nor wave the fact before our eyes. The perfect “con” is to “con” somebody and leave them oblivious to the fact that they have been conned. So when it comes to “conned” confessions, the demons want to have us thinking that we have confessed sufficiently well, whereas we have “botched” our confession and confessed badly (invalidly).
What Makes Bad Confessions?
What is it, then, that makes a confession invalid? A confession can be bad (invalid) in a variety of different ways, with each way having its own nuances or shades. Any and every Catholic should (but they don’t) know the conditions for a valid confession. The demons are only too happy to make forget or at least misinterpret those conditions. So what are those mysterious, half-forgotten, misinterpreted and twisted notions of the required conditions for a good (valid) confession? The good old Baltimore Catechism, for children making their First Holy Communion, taught us that the steps to a good confession are: (1) find out my sins; (2) be sorry for my sins; (3) make up my mind not to sin again; (4) tell my sins to the priest; (5) do the penance the priest gives me. Those are still the right conditions today, even for adults―even though the adult catechism explains it more thoroughly. Here is a more thorough explanation of each of those five conditions:
(1) EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE ― Most people “do things by halves” ― meaning that do things partially, halfheartedly, incompletely, doing as little as they can to get by. Such persons are Satan’s dream when it comes to the Sacrament of Confession! Examinations of conscience are on “fast-track” mode; knowledge of what is mortal and venial is “half-baked” at best; memory is selective as to what they want to remember and what they want to forget; they restrict the time for examining their conscience to the moment they join the confessional line―the shorter the line, the shorter the examination; or if there is no confessional line then they just dive in to the confessional without any time to examine their conscience and just “wing-it”.
Some persons have lost the sense of sin as to what is mortal and what is venial, whereby they rely on their subjective feelings on the seriousness of sin, rather than the objective teaching of the Church as to what is mortal. Hence, today, you have Catholics who insist that they can still be good Catholics without any need to attend Sunday Mass; or those who feel masturbation is not a mortal sin; or that cohabitation is acceptable these days, etc. The chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, used to say that demons prefer not to be detected―well, the same applies to our sins―demons prefer that we fail to detect our sins!
(2) SUFFICIENT SORROW FOR YOUR SINS ― How much sorrow is sorrow? Sorrow―like so many other things in life, such as intelligence or love―ranges from minimal sorrow to maximum sorrow. Not wishing that any soul be damned (though most souls still manage to damn themselves), God is willing to accept a minimal sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession. This minimal sorrow is called “attrition.” The maximum sorrow is called “contrition”. God is willing to accept this minimal sorrow that fears God and His punishments―but we were created not just to fear God, but more importantly to love God! Our relationship with God should grow from an initial fear of God to a love of God: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18). Our contrition will be perfect when we repent of our sins through the perfect love of God.
(3) A FIRM PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT ― This is another “stumbling-block” or “pit-fall” in making good (valid) confessions. There are too many Catholics who use the confessional like a revolving door―always going and coming out, going back in and coming back out, in again and out again, confessing the same old mortal sins time and time again! If a person does not take practical steps to avoid falling back into the mortal sins they have confessed, then the confession is invalid due to presumed lack of FIRM purpose of amendment. When a particular kind of mortal sin becomes increasingly repetitive and habitual, then one has to question whether or not there is a FIRM purpose of amendment. A FIRM purpose of amendment is far superior to a VAGUE purpose of amendment. A VAGUE purpose of amendment will merely say: “Oh, I’ve really got to stop doing this!” and will go no further. Whereas a FIRM purpose of amendment will go beyond saying: “I’ve got to stop doing this!” and will carefully analyze why these sins are being committed and will take concrete measures and practical plans to avoid the occasions of that particular sin―it goes beyond mere wishful thinking. The VAGUE purpose of amendment resides in the mind or intellect alone. The FIRM purpose of amendment is not only in the mind or intellect, but it then transfers itself to the heart or will, and puts the plans of the mind into practice.
(4) CONFESSING YOUR SINS ― Here is another dangerous area which abounds with demonic interference. The bottom line in this area is this ― if the demons cannot prevent you from going to Confession, then they will try and make you confess your sins in a way that makes the confession invalid. The most common pathways are:
(1) hiding a mortal sin in confession through shame,
(2) fudging, obfuscating, twisting, cosmetically coating, misrepresenting, leaving out details, cloaking the mortal sin in such a way as make a mortal sin seem like a serious venial sin;
(3) not stating the correct number of times that you committed the sin―for example, saying “a few times” instead of saying “ten times”. Ten is much more than “a few”; or simply saying: “I’ve stolen things” without saying what value of things and how many times you stole;
(4) or not being specific as to the KIND of sin you committed―for example, merely saying: “I’ve been impure!” hides the kind of impurity―for there are increasing degrees of gravity in impurity: (a) impure with oneself; (b) impure with another person; (c) impure with animals. As regards impurity with other persons, you have to make distinctions: (a) are you married or single; (b) was the other person married or single; (c) was the other person of the same sex or the opposite sex; (d) was the other person a minor/child; (e) was the other person a religious―monk, nun, etc.
There are certain sins that can the added gravity of being a sacrilege―for example stealing from a store is different to stealing from the church; impurity with a religious adds a sacrilegious aspect to the sin. Always be honest in confession―you might fool the priest; you might fool yourself; but you cannot fool God. God knows all about your sin―He wants YOU to know YOUR sins as they really are so that you can get to work at uprooting them from your life.
(5) COMPLETING THE PENANCE THE PRIEST ASSIGNS TO YOU ― Listen carefully and take note of the penance that the priest assigns to you. Sometimes the instructions are general―such as: “Pray a Rosary!” This does not specify when to pray the Rosary; nor does it specify whether or not you have to pray all five decades at once, or whether you can divide it up into sections; nor does it specify which mysteries of the Rosary to pray; nor does it specify if you also have meditate the mysteries instead just saying the Our Fathers and Hail Marys. Therefore all these variations are left up to you.
Other penances might be more precise―such as: “Make the Stations of the Cross in church on a Friday!” If this is impossible for you, then you must mention that to the priest and give the reason why. He might change some aspect, such as allowing you to make the Stations at home, or make them the next time you go to church, etc.
Priests are obliged―under the pain of sin―to give serious penances for mortal sins: for example, five decades of the Rosary, or the Stations of the Cross, are regarded as the minimum in the class of serious penances. However, if you feel you can more―then tell the priest that you are willing to do more. The reason being is that a penance imposed in the Sacrament of Confession has more power and value than the same penance done by your personal choice―so a Rosary given as penance in Confession has more value than a Rosary prayed by your own free choice.
Penance is essential―as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
Moving Towards the Next Level
In this first state as a beginner, beginning in spiritual infancy, we were going through an active purgation. We have been maturing toward adolescence, shedding our attachments to the world as best we could, and developing a different set of attachments, ones more fitting to a spiritually mature person. We have been developing attachments to God, replacing activities in the world with activities directed toward God, and have been developing an active life of prayer and meditation. With the action of grace, God has been positioning us, through self-knowledge, humility, and love for God and fellow man, for a transition, a second conversion, from beginner to proficient. We believe we are ready to enter the gate leading onto the first bridge, the one which will bring us to the second plateau. In the Interior Castle, Teresa identifies this as the fourth mansions.
If we do cooperate, we will be prepared for the second conversion through a more passive purgation of the senses. If we are successful and do cross over the first bridge, as we step upon the surface of the second plateau we enter what is referred to as the illuminative way. To get there, we have a spiritual crisis to handle, and thus we have a need for a second conversion. John of the Cross speaks of this in Dark Night, and this second conversion is one of purgation of egoism.
Article 27
Tuesday, January 28th
A Four-Letter Word Can Get You Into Heaven!
Tuesday, January 28th
A Four-Letter Word Can Get You Into Heaven!
The Key to Heaven is a Four-Letter-Word
A four-letter word can get you into Heaven! “Huh? Is this a joke?” you say. No joke―but it should leave you laughing with joy! What four-letter-word can get you to Heaven? LOVE! God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and He wants to be loved: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Are you―or have you been―a great filthy sinner? Then LOVE God: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47).
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are essentially a progression of steps in the love of God―starting with no love of God and leading to a total love of God. We will cover all the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in greater detail in the forthcoming articles―but in this article we will give a brief overview of all three. It is important to see the big picture before descending into the details―otherwise we get caught up in the details and cannot see how everything fits together―as the saying goes: “One cannot see the forest because of the trees”, meaning that if you have your nose stuck in a tree looking at its details, then you will not be able to see past that tree and see the forest as a whole.
Similarly, when writing an essay―a basic essay consists of three main parts: introduction, body, and conclusion. The essay’s introduction gives you a glimpse of the forest as a whole―it gives the big picture. Then the body of the essay descends down into the details. Finally, the conclusion once again focuses on the forest as a whole, or the big picture, by rising above the details and giving a general conclusion.
If you are giving directions on how to get from San Francisco to New York, then you first of all give a general overall outline―for example: The fastest route is to take Interstate 80, which runs from San Francisco to Teaneck, New Jersey, which is just outside of New York City. This route will take you across Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and then on to New York. It is approximately 2,900 miles and takes around 43 hours of continuous driving. After the general overview, you can then descend into further details.
The Road to Heaven is a Highway of Love. We start out as sinners with little or no love of God and we are meant to progress along the Highway of Love by gradually and increasingly growing in our love for God (and also our neighbor for God’s sake―because God loves our neighbor too, and not only us).
Dom Jean-Baptiste Chautard, OCSO (1858-1935), was a French Trappist abbot and religious author. In his book, The Soul of the Apostolate, which was one of Pope St. Pius X’s favorite bedside books, Dom Chautard has drawn up a list of spiritual states that every person should study with painstaking care (the list was also included in yesterday’s article). He lists nine states that progress from mortal sin to sanctity. We have linked them to their appropriate levels to the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. The table below lists those states and the chief characteristics of each state.
NINE DEGREES ON THE ROAD FROM MORTAL SIN TO SANCTITY
1. HARDENED IN SIN (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Stubborn persistence in sin, either out of ignorance or because of a maliciously warped conscience.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Deliberate refusal to have any recourse to God.
2. SURFACE CHRISTIANITY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Considered as a trifling evil, easily forgiven. The soul easily gives way and commits mortal sin at almost every possible occasion or temptation. Confession almost without contrition.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Mechanical; either inattention, or always dictated by temporal interest―such souls enter into themselves rarely and superficially.
3. MEDIOCRE PIETY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Weak resistance. Hardly ever avoids occasions, but seriously regrets having sinned and makes good confessions.
►Venial Sin: Complete acceptance of this sin, which is considered as insignificant. Hence tepidity of the will (lukewarmness). Does nothing whatever to prevent venial sin, or to find it out and root it out, when it is concealed.
►Prayer: From time to time, prays well. Momentary fits of fervor.
4. INTERMITTENT PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Loyal resistance. Habitually avoids occasions. Deep regrets if there is a fall into mortal sin. Does penance to make reparation.
►Venial Sin: Sometimes deliberate. Puts up weak fight. Sorrow only superficial. Makes particular examination of conscience, but without any method or coherence.
►Prayer: Not firmly resolved to remain faithful to meditation. Gives it up as soon as dryness is felt or as soon as there is business to attend to.
5. SUSTAINED PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never. At most, very rare, when taken suddenly and violently by surprise. And then, often it is to be doubted if the sin is mortal. It is followed by ardent compunction and penance.
►Venial Sin: Vigilant in avoiding and fighting it. Rarely deliberate. Keen sorrow, but does little by way of reparation. Consistent particular examination of predominant faults, but aiming only at avoidance of deliberate venial sin.
►Imperfections: The soul avoids uncovering them so as not to have to fight them, or else easily excuses them. Approves the thought of renouncing them, and would like to do so, but makes little effort in that direction.
►Prayer: Always faithful to prayer, no matter what. Often affective. Alternating consolations and dryness that is hard to endure.
6. FERVOR (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never deliberate. By surprise, sometimes, or with imperfect advertence. Keenly regretted, and serious reparation made.
►Imperfections: Wants nothing to do with them. Watches over them, fights them with courage, in order to be more pleasing to God. Sometimes accepted, however, but regretted at once. Frequent acts of renunciation. Particular examination aims at perfection in a given virtue.
►Prayer: Mental prayer gladly prolonged. Prayer more affective, or even prayer of simplicity. Alternation between powerful consolations and fierce trials.
7. RELATIVE PERFECTION (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Guards against them energetically and with much love of God. They only happen with half advertence.
►Prayer: Habitual life of prayer even when occupied in external works. Thirst for self renunciation, annihilation, detachment, and divine love. Hunger for the Eucharist, and for heaven. Graces of infused prayer, of different degrees. Often, passive purification (where God’s Providence sends sufferings and trials to the person).
8. HEROIC PERFECTION (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Nothing but the first impulse.
►Prayer: Supernatural graces of contemplation, sometimes accompanied by extraordinary phenomena. Pronounced passive purifications. Contempt of self to the point of complete self-forgetfulness. Prefers suffering to joys.
9. COMPLETE SANCTITY (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Hardly apparent.
►Prayer: Usually, transforming union. Spiritual marriage. Purifications by love. Ardent thirst for sufferings and humiliations. (Few and far between are the souls that belong to the last two, even to the last three categories).
From Hatred to Love
From the above table, we can see the pathway from sin and being an enemy to God, to eventually loving God and entering into a mystical spiritual marriage with God ― as Jesus said: “Sanctify them Father! … And for them do I sanctify Myself … that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee; that they also may be one in Us!” (John 17:17-21). “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make Our abode with him. He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:23-24). “The Father Himself loves you, because you have loved Me!” (John 16:27). “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you! Abide in My love! If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love; just as I have also kept My Father’s commandments, and do abide in His love” (John 15:9-10). “He that has my commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me! And he that loves Me, shall be loved by My Father, and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him!” (John 14:21).
The more we keep the commandments of God, the more we love Him: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15) ... The more we sin, the less we love. The less we sin, the more we love. “He that loves iniquity, hates his own soul! … He that shall sin against Me, shall hurt his own soul!” (Psalm 10:6; Proverbs 8:36). The less we love the world, the more we will love God: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). The less mechanically and distractedly we say our prayers, the more sincere our love becomes: “These people honor Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). The more we talk to God in prayer, the more it indicates a love for God. The more we are prepared to suffer for God, the more we manifest our love for God: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Christ died for our sins out of a love for us: “By this has the charity of God appeared towards us―because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him. In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins!” (1 John 4:9-10) … “Jesus Christ has loved us and washed us from our sins in His own Blood!” (Apocalypse 1:5) … “Christ has loved us and has delivered Himself for us as a sacrifice to God” (Ephesians 5:2) … “Christ loved the Church and delivered himself up for it!” (Ephesians 5:25).
The Power of Love
Love has to be the fuel that drives us through all the three stages of the spiritual life. It is like gasoline for the car―no matter how beautiful the car might be, it is going nowhere without gasoline. The same is true of charity―as was already quoted above: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Sadly and unfortunately, there is very little true love or true charity in the world today―even within the Catholic world. The sad thing is that they are all missing out on the unbelievable power of love.
The Imitation of Christ describes this power of love: “Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs calmly. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and separated from all worldly affections. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger or higher or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth―for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God.
“One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in God, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver. Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much where he who does not love fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle. Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful.
“Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5).
That is why we ask God the Holy Ghost―Who is Charity itself: “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8)―to come and enkindle in us the fire of His love: “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the FIRE OF THY LOVE!” The saints fully understood the place and power of charity in the big scheme of things. Here are just a few quotes:
Testimony of the Saints
“Charity may be a very short word, but with its tremendous meaning of pure love, it sums up man’s entire relation to God and to his neighbor. As Our Lord explained: ‘It is on charity that all the Law and the prophets depend.’” (St. Aelred of Rievaulx, 1110-1167).
“All is contained in these brief words: ‘Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with thy soul, and with all thy strength: and love thy neighbor as thyself.’” (St. Augustine, 354-430).
“Man is the perfection of the Universe. The spirit is the perfection of man. Love is the perfection of the spirit, and charity that of love. Therefore, the love of God is the end, the perfection of the Universe.” (St. Francis de Sales, 1567-1622).
“You ask me for a method of attaining perfection. I know of love—and only love. Love can do all things.” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“Perfection of life is the perfection of love. For love is the life of the soul.” (St. Francis de Sales, 1567-1622).
“To love God as He ought to be loved, we must be detached from all temporal love. We must love nothing but Him, or if we love anything else, we must love it only for His sake.” (St. Peter Claver, 1581-1654).
“He who wishes to love God does not truly love Him if he has not an ardent and constant desire to suffer for His sake.” (St. Aloysius Gonzaga, 1568-1591).
“What a weakness it is to love Jesus Christ only when He caresses us, and to be cold immediately He afflicts us. This is not true love. Those who love thus, love themselves too much to love God with all their heart.” (St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, 1647-1690).
“He who does not acquire the love of God will scarcely persevere in the grace of God, for it is very difficult to renounce sin merely through fear of chastisement.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, 1696-1787).
“If the greatest sinner on Earth should repent at the moment of death, and draw his last breath in an act of love; neither the many graces he had abused, nor the many sins he had committed would stand in his way. Our Lord would receive him into His mercy” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“Daily advance, then, in this love, both by praying and by well-doing, that through the help of Him who enjoined it on you, and whose gift it is, it may be nourished and increased, until, being perfected, it render you perfect.” (St. Augustine, 354-430).
“Love God, serve God―everything is in that.” (St. Clare of Assisi, 1193-1253).
Three Ways―One Thread
Thus we can compare the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life to the Holy Trinity―thee Persons in One God. The Three Ways have one thread that stretches throughout all of them―that thread is charity, which is most fitting since “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). If God is charity, then Heaven must be love. In our pilgrimage through the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life, we must progressively grow in love―first and foremost a love of God, without excluding a love of neighbor.
In the book, Word of Love, by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, we read various quotes of Our Lord to His mystics that stress this supremacy of charity. Here are just some of them (the original sources are listed):
“You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 109).
“You see, Consolata, sanctity means self-forgetfulness in everything, in thoughts, desires, words ... Allow Me to do it all! I will do everything; but you should, at every moment, give Me what I ask for with much love!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 153).
“I delight to work in a soul. You see, I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me.” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 154).
“That soul is dearest to Me who loves Me the most!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 100).
“I ask only for love. Ah, what are you doing about it?” (Jesus to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 44).
“I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift ... I thirst for love!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 75).
“Love Me, and you will be happy; and the more you love Me, the happier you will be! Even when you will find yourself in utter darkness, love will produce light, love will produce strength, and love will produce joy!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., pp. 106-107).
“Oh, if people would only love Me, what happiness would reign in this unhappy world!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 107).
“Love Me, Consolata, love Me alone! Love is everything, and so you will be giving Me everything. When you love Me, you give Jesus everything He desires from His creature: love, Love is everything! If you will now concentrate upon this one resolution, you will be giving everything to Jesus!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 97).
“Love Me more—oh, much more!—than human beings love one another.” (Jesus to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 134).
Love is More About Quality Than Quantity
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange says that the spiritual life is essentially a life of love and our mission and goal is grow in love all throughout our lives. Nevertheless, he points out that this growth is not primarily a growth in quantity, but a growth in quality and intensity. Quality is always superior to quantity. The growth of divine love or charity is through its intensity where we come to love God more perfectly and purely for Himself. The “multiplying” of love is not by the addition of acts upon acts. The science of divine loves works on another dimension where “love increases in us so far as it becomes stronger.”
“Charity does not grow by addition, like a heap of wheat. This addition would multiply charity without making it more intense. The increase would be in the order of quantity rather than quality, which is quite a different thing. In reality, charity or love increases in us in so far as it becomes stronger, takes deeper root in our will. As with the scholar, learning becomes more profound, more penetrating, more certain, without always reaching out to new conclusions. So charity grows in us by making us love God more perfectly and more purely for Himself, and our neighbor for God.” (Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life Volume One, pp 132-133).
In the same way that God is more glorified by a single act of pure love, so is the perfection of one soul of greater benefit to the whole Church, and more pleasing to God, than a number of souls who remain in a mediocre or a lukewarm state. “God is more glorified by a single act of charity of ten talents than by ten acts of charity of one talent each. Likewise, a single, very perfect, just soul pleases God more than many others who remain in mediocrity or tepidity. Quality is superior to quantity. This is why the plenitude of grace in Mary surpassed from the first day of her existence that of all the saints, as a single diamond is worth more than a quantity of precious stones.” (Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life Volume One, p. 136).
A four-letter word can get you into Heaven! “Huh? Is this a joke?” you say. No joke―but it should leave you laughing with joy! What four-letter-word can get you to Heaven? LOVE! God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and He wants to be loved: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Are you―or have you been―a great filthy sinner? Then LOVE God: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47).
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are essentially a progression of steps in the love of God―starting with no love of God and leading to a total love of God. We will cover all the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in greater detail in the forthcoming articles―but in this article we will give a brief overview of all three. It is important to see the big picture before descending into the details―otherwise we get caught up in the details and cannot see how everything fits together―as the saying goes: “One cannot see the forest because of the trees”, meaning that if you have your nose stuck in a tree looking at its details, then you will not be able to see past that tree and see the forest as a whole.
Similarly, when writing an essay―a basic essay consists of three main parts: introduction, body, and conclusion. The essay’s introduction gives you a glimpse of the forest as a whole―it gives the big picture. Then the body of the essay descends down into the details. Finally, the conclusion once again focuses on the forest as a whole, or the big picture, by rising above the details and giving a general conclusion.
If you are giving directions on how to get from San Francisco to New York, then you first of all give a general overall outline―for example: The fastest route is to take Interstate 80, which runs from San Francisco to Teaneck, New Jersey, which is just outside of New York City. This route will take you across Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and then on to New York. It is approximately 2,900 miles and takes around 43 hours of continuous driving. After the general overview, you can then descend into further details.
The Road to Heaven is a Highway of Love. We start out as sinners with little or no love of God and we are meant to progress along the Highway of Love by gradually and increasingly growing in our love for God (and also our neighbor for God’s sake―because God loves our neighbor too, and not only us).
Dom Jean-Baptiste Chautard, OCSO (1858-1935), was a French Trappist abbot and religious author. In his book, The Soul of the Apostolate, which was one of Pope St. Pius X’s favorite bedside books, Dom Chautard has drawn up a list of spiritual states that every person should study with painstaking care (the list was also included in yesterday’s article). He lists nine states that progress from mortal sin to sanctity. We have linked them to their appropriate levels to the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. The table below lists those states and the chief characteristics of each state.
NINE DEGREES ON THE ROAD FROM MORTAL SIN TO SANCTITY
1. HARDENED IN SIN (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Stubborn persistence in sin, either out of ignorance or because of a maliciously warped conscience.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Deliberate refusal to have any recourse to God.
2. SURFACE CHRISTIANITY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Considered as a trifling evil, easily forgiven. The soul easily gives way and commits mortal sin at almost every possible occasion or temptation. Confession almost without contrition.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Mechanical; either inattention, or always dictated by temporal interest―such souls enter into themselves rarely and superficially.
3. MEDIOCRE PIETY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Weak resistance. Hardly ever avoids occasions, but seriously regrets having sinned and makes good confessions.
►Venial Sin: Complete acceptance of this sin, which is considered as insignificant. Hence tepidity of the will (lukewarmness). Does nothing whatever to prevent venial sin, or to find it out and root it out, when it is concealed.
►Prayer: From time to time, prays well. Momentary fits of fervor.
4. INTERMITTENT PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Loyal resistance. Habitually avoids occasions. Deep regrets if there is a fall into mortal sin. Does penance to make reparation.
►Venial Sin: Sometimes deliberate. Puts up weak fight. Sorrow only superficial. Makes particular examination of conscience, but without any method or coherence.
►Prayer: Not firmly resolved to remain faithful to meditation. Gives it up as soon as dryness is felt or as soon as there is business to attend to.
5. SUSTAINED PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never. At most, very rare, when taken suddenly and violently by surprise. And then, often it is to be doubted if the sin is mortal. It is followed by ardent compunction and penance.
►Venial Sin: Vigilant in avoiding and fighting it. Rarely deliberate. Keen sorrow, but does little by way of reparation. Consistent particular examination of predominant faults, but aiming only at avoidance of deliberate venial sin.
►Imperfections: The soul avoids uncovering them so as not to have to fight them, or else easily excuses them. Approves the thought of renouncing them, and would like to do so, but makes little effort in that direction.
►Prayer: Always faithful to prayer, no matter what. Often affective. Alternating consolations and dryness that is hard to endure.
6. FERVOR (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never deliberate. By surprise, sometimes, or with imperfect advertence. Keenly regretted, and serious reparation made.
►Imperfections: Wants nothing to do with them. Watches over them, fights them with courage, in order to be more pleasing to God. Sometimes accepted, however, but regretted at once. Frequent acts of renunciation. Particular examination aims at perfection in a given virtue.
►Prayer: Mental prayer gladly prolonged. Prayer more affective, or even prayer of simplicity. Alternation between powerful consolations and fierce trials.
7. RELATIVE PERFECTION (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Guards against them energetically and with much love of God. They only happen with half advertence.
►Prayer: Habitual life of prayer even when occupied in external works. Thirst for self renunciation, annihilation, detachment, and divine love. Hunger for the Eucharist, and for heaven. Graces of infused prayer, of different degrees. Often, passive purification (where God’s Providence sends sufferings and trials to the person).
8. HEROIC PERFECTION (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Nothing but the first impulse.
►Prayer: Supernatural graces of contemplation, sometimes accompanied by extraordinary phenomena. Pronounced passive purifications. Contempt of self to the point of complete self-forgetfulness. Prefers suffering to joys.
9. COMPLETE SANCTITY (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Hardly apparent.
►Prayer: Usually, transforming union. Spiritual marriage. Purifications by love. Ardent thirst for sufferings and humiliations. (Few and far between are the souls that belong to the last two, even to the last three categories).
From Hatred to Love
From the above table, we can see the pathway from sin and being an enemy to God, to eventually loving God and entering into a mystical spiritual marriage with God ― as Jesus said: “Sanctify them Father! … And for them do I sanctify Myself … that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee; that they also may be one in Us!” (John 17:17-21). “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make Our abode with him. He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:23-24). “The Father Himself loves you, because you have loved Me!” (John 16:27). “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you! Abide in My love! If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love; just as I have also kept My Father’s commandments, and do abide in His love” (John 15:9-10). “He that has my commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me! And he that loves Me, shall be loved by My Father, and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him!” (John 14:21).
The more we keep the commandments of God, the more we love Him: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15) ... The more we sin, the less we love. The less we sin, the more we love. “He that loves iniquity, hates his own soul! … He that shall sin against Me, shall hurt his own soul!” (Psalm 10:6; Proverbs 8:36). The less we love the world, the more we will love God: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). The less mechanically and distractedly we say our prayers, the more sincere our love becomes: “These people honor Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). The more we talk to God in prayer, the more it indicates a love for God. The more we are prepared to suffer for God, the more we manifest our love for God: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Christ died for our sins out of a love for us: “By this has the charity of God appeared towards us―because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him. In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins!” (1 John 4:9-10) … “Jesus Christ has loved us and washed us from our sins in His own Blood!” (Apocalypse 1:5) … “Christ has loved us and has delivered Himself for us as a sacrifice to God” (Ephesians 5:2) … “Christ loved the Church and delivered himself up for it!” (Ephesians 5:25).
The Power of Love
Love has to be the fuel that drives us through all the three stages of the spiritual life. It is like gasoline for the car―no matter how beautiful the car might be, it is going nowhere without gasoline. The same is true of charity―as was already quoted above: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Sadly and unfortunately, there is very little true love or true charity in the world today―even within the Catholic world. The sad thing is that they are all missing out on the unbelievable power of love.
The Imitation of Christ describes this power of love: “Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs calmly. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and separated from all worldly affections. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger or higher or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth―for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God.
“One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in God, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver. Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much where he who does not love fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle. Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful.
“Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5).
That is why we ask God the Holy Ghost―Who is Charity itself: “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8)―to come and enkindle in us the fire of His love: “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the FIRE OF THY LOVE!” The saints fully understood the place and power of charity in the big scheme of things. Here are just a few quotes:
Testimony of the Saints
“Charity may be a very short word, but with its tremendous meaning of pure love, it sums up man’s entire relation to God and to his neighbor. As Our Lord explained: ‘It is on charity that all the Law and the prophets depend.’” (St. Aelred of Rievaulx, 1110-1167).
“All is contained in these brief words: ‘Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with thy soul, and with all thy strength: and love thy neighbor as thyself.’” (St. Augustine, 354-430).
“Man is the perfection of the Universe. The spirit is the perfection of man. Love is the perfection of the spirit, and charity that of love. Therefore, the love of God is the end, the perfection of the Universe.” (St. Francis de Sales, 1567-1622).
“You ask me for a method of attaining perfection. I know of love—and only love. Love can do all things.” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“Perfection of life is the perfection of love. For love is the life of the soul.” (St. Francis de Sales, 1567-1622).
“To love God as He ought to be loved, we must be detached from all temporal love. We must love nothing but Him, or if we love anything else, we must love it only for His sake.” (St. Peter Claver, 1581-1654).
“He who wishes to love God does not truly love Him if he has not an ardent and constant desire to suffer for His sake.” (St. Aloysius Gonzaga, 1568-1591).
“What a weakness it is to love Jesus Christ only when He caresses us, and to be cold immediately He afflicts us. This is not true love. Those who love thus, love themselves too much to love God with all their heart.” (St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, 1647-1690).
“He who does not acquire the love of God will scarcely persevere in the grace of God, for it is very difficult to renounce sin merely through fear of chastisement.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, 1696-1787).
“If the greatest sinner on Earth should repent at the moment of death, and draw his last breath in an act of love; neither the many graces he had abused, nor the many sins he had committed would stand in his way. Our Lord would receive him into His mercy” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“Daily advance, then, in this love, both by praying and by well-doing, that through the help of Him who enjoined it on you, and whose gift it is, it may be nourished and increased, until, being perfected, it render you perfect.” (St. Augustine, 354-430).
“Love God, serve God―everything is in that.” (St. Clare of Assisi, 1193-1253).
Three Ways―One Thread
Thus we can compare the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life to the Holy Trinity―thee Persons in One God. The Three Ways have one thread that stretches throughout all of them―that thread is charity, which is most fitting since “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). If God is charity, then Heaven must be love. In our pilgrimage through the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life, we must progressively grow in love―first and foremost a love of God, without excluding a love of neighbor.
In the book, Word of Love, by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, we read various quotes of Our Lord to His mystics that stress this supremacy of charity. Here are just some of them (the original sources are listed):
“You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 109).
“You see, Consolata, sanctity means self-forgetfulness in everything, in thoughts, desires, words ... Allow Me to do it all! I will do everything; but you should, at every moment, give Me what I ask for with much love!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 153).
“I delight to work in a soul. You see, I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me.” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 154).
“That soul is dearest to Me who loves Me the most!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 100).
“I ask only for love. Ah, what are you doing about it?” (Jesus to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 44).
“I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift ... I thirst for love!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 75).
“Love Me, and you will be happy; and the more you love Me, the happier you will be! Even when you will find yourself in utter darkness, love will produce light, love will produce strength, and love will produce joy!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., pp. 106-107).
“Oh, if people would only love Me, what happiness would reign in this unhappy world!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 107).
“Love Me, Consolata, love Me alone! Love is everything, and so you will be giving Me everything. When you love Me, you give Jesus everything He desires from His creature: love, Love is everything! If you will now concentrate upon this one resolution, you will be giving everything to Jesus!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 97).
“Love Me more—oh, much more!—than human beings love one another.” (Jesus to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 134).
Love is More About Quality Than Quantity
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange says that the spiritual life is essentially a life of love and our mission and goal is grow in love all throughout our lives. Nevertheless, he points out that this growth is not primarily a growth in quantity, but a growth in quality and intensity. Quality is always superior to quantity. The growth of divine love or charity is through its intensity where we come to love God more perfectly and purely for Himself. The “multiplying” of love is not by the addition of acts upon acts. The science of divine loves works on another dimension where “love increases in us so far as it becomes stronger.”
“Charity does not grow by addition, like a heap of wheat. This addition would multiply charity without making it more intense. The increase would be in the order of quantity rather than quality, which is quite a different thing. In reality, charity or love increases in us in so far as it becomes stronger, takes deeper root in our will. As with the scholar, learning becomes more profound, more penetrating, more certain, without always reaching out to new conclusions. So charity grows in us by making us love God more perfectly and more purely for Himself, and our neighbor for God.” (Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life Volume One, pp 132-133).
In the same way that God is more glorified by a single act of pure love, so is the perfection of one soul of greater benefit to the whole Church, and more pleasing to God, than a number of souls who remain in a mediocre or a lukewarm state. “God is more glorified by a single act of charity of ten talents than by ten acts of charity of one talent each. Likewise, a single, very perfect, just soul pleases God more than many others who remain in mediocrity or tepidity. Quality is superior to quantity. This is why the plenitude of grace in Mary surpassed from the first day of her existence that of all the saints, as a single diamond is worth more than a quantity of precious stones.” (Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life Volume One, p. 136).
Article 26
Monday, January 27th
Three Steps to Heaven ― Step One
Monday, January 27th
Three Steps to Heaven ― Step One
One Step at a Time!
The Road to Hell is paved with good intentions, the Road to Heaven is paved with good deeds. Some people start out well―but finish badly. Others start out badly―but finish well. However, since we are not privy to the consciences of souls, nor are we aware and cognizant of the workings of God’s grace behind the scenes―therefore, we can never be really sure of who is damned and who is saved. Nevertheless, we can be sure that in general most souls are lost―for that is what we have been told by Our Lord, Our Lady and many of the saints and theologians.
What is more important than salvation? Our Lord asks the same question: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! Lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Our Lord then speaks of the paths or roads that read to Heaven and Hell: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate! For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction―and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 22:14). Everyone will live somewhere forever without end. Where you live forever is absolutely critical. There are only two options: Hell and eternal punishment, or Heaven and eternal joy. The question then is: “Which is the way to Heaven?”
Are we on the path to Heaven or Hell? “Every way of a man seems right to himself” (Proverbs 21:2). “There is a way which seems just to a man―but the ends of which lead to death!” Do not pride yourself on being Catholic―for “unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required; and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). If you have been given the Catholic Faith―by the grace of God―then much is expected of you! Having the Faith is not enough: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! … You believe that there is one God. You do well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
Road Maps to Heaven and Hell
Do you know where you are going? Sometimes you need a road map to help you reach your destination. Do you really know the way to Heaven? Yes, of course, you could say: “You need to be in state of sanctifying grace to get to Heaven!” ― but that is like saying: “To get to New York from San Francisco, all you have to do is go east!” The advice is true, but not very precise―and you could end up anywhere by merely going east of San Francisco! If that is true of an earthly journey, then how much true is that of our pilgrimage to Heaven! When Our Lord said to His Apostles: “Where I am going you know, and the way you know!” (John 14:4). Yet we have to say with the Apostle St. Thomas: “Lord, how can we know the way?” (John 14:5). Can we know the way to Heaven? Yes. Do we know the way to Heaven? Well, that is another question! Do we know the way―or do only imagine we know the way? God says: “I will lead the blind into the way which they know not; and in the paths which they were ignorant of I will make them walk; I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight!” (Isaias 42:16). “Jesus said: ‘I am the way! No man comes to the Father, but by Me!’” (John 14:6).
“The Chief Priests and the Scribes … asked Him, saying: ‘Master, we know that You teach the way of God in truth’” (Luke 20:19-21) ― they did not say this in order to learn the ways of God from Jesus, but they were seeking to entrap Him in His words, so that they could accuse Him. The Chief Priests and Scribes considered the ways of Jesus to be wrong and their own ways to correct. There are many Catholics who more or less do the same thing―they do not like some of the teachings and His Church, so they twist them, water them down, re-interpret them, or even reject them. Today, anywhere from 50% to 90% of Catholics accept same-sex relationships, same-sex marriages, divorce with remarriage, cohabitation, pre-marital sex, contraception, abortion, etc.
“Every way of a man seems right to himself” (Proverbs 21:2). “Everyone has turned aside into his own way” (Isaias 53:6). “Everyone has erred in his own way” (Isaias 47:15). “The way of knowledge they have not known, … neither did they find the way of knowledge” (Baruch 3:20, 27). “All have turned aside into their own way, everyone after his own gain, from the first even to the last! … They walk in a way that is not good after their own thoughts” (Isaias 56:11; 65:2). “They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst show them” (Exodus 32:8).
The Way to Heaven
From the earliest centuries, the spiritual masters have presented the way to Heaven as being a journey through three stages of the spiritual life. These three ways have various names, but all the names refer to the same stage:
(1) The Way of Beginners (also called the Purgative Way)
(2) The Way of Proficients (also called the Illuminative Way)
(3) The Way of Perfection (also called the Unitive Way)
► Some spiritual writers compare these three ways to the life of a human being and the necessary stages of life that each person must pass through: (1) Childhood, (2) Adolescence, (3) Adulthood. Someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin is not even classified as having entered the beginnings of the spiritual life―like an embryo within the womb of its mother has not yet entered natural life in the world.
► Other spiritual compare these three ways to human relationships between two people: (1) Friendship, which leads to (2) Betrothal, which finally leads to (3) Marriage. Someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin is not a friend of God, but a stranger or enemy to God.
► You could also compare the three ways to the different levels of education in schools: (1) Lower School, (2) Middle School, and (3) High School. Before entering Kindergarten or Pre-Kindergarten, the child is incapable of grasping the levels of understanding required in Lower School―just like someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin fails to grasp and understand the gravity of sin and beauty of the things of God. Or another aspect is: (1) Primary education at primary school or elementary school, and sometimes in the early years of middle school. (2) Secondary education at secondary school or high school, and sometimes in the latter years of middle school. (3) Higher education or vocational education.
► You also have three progressive stages of University degrees: (1) Bachelor’s Degree: These degrees generally take three or four years to finish. (2) Master’s Degree: After an individual completes a Bachelor’s Degree, they may apply for admission to a master’s degree program that typically requires one to three years of further education. This degree focuses more on mastering the field of study a candidate wishes to take. (3) Doctorate Degree: A doctorate degree is the highest level of education an individual may seek, and it involves specializing in a specific focus of study after securing a master’s degree. This degree typically requires candidates to dedicate three to four years to education and research, and individuals gain the title of Doctor upon completing a doctoral program.
► Or again, you could compare the three ways to progressing through the medical field: (1) First comes Medical School, (2) then comes a period of Internship, where you can only practice medicine under guidance and supervision; (3) finally comes the choice of Residency (hospital doctors) or General Practitioner (outside of the hospital).
► Similarly, there are three major phases in military training: (1) Phase One/Red Phase―weeks one through three―which deal with: Fundamentals of soldiering; Core Army values; Army traditions and ethics; What it means to be a soldier; Taking the Army Combat Fitness Test. (2) Phase Two/White Phase―weeks four through five―where the focus is on: Self-discipline; Teamwork; Combat skills; Night training; Hand-to-hand combat and weapons training; Basic rifle marksmanship; Physical fitness. (3) Phase Three/Blue Phase―weeks six through nine―deals with: Additional weapons training and rifle marksmanship; Overview of convoy operations; Military operations in urban terrain; Field training exercises. If all these phases are successfully passed, then you officially graduate from basic combat training and are a fully-fledged soldier.
► We also see this triple stage of formation in some elements of nature. There are three phases of plant growth: (1) Meristematic, (2) Elongation and (3) Maturation. We can understand by looking at a seed. A seed―of itself―will not grow; it is like a soul in mortal sin which cannot grow in the love of God. Yet once that seed is “baptized” by receiving “the grace of water” and is planted in the “soil of the Faith”, then the seed comes to life and begins to grow: “Unless the grain of wheat, falling into the ground die, then it remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit” (John 12:25). When the seed gets planted into the “soil of Faith” with water (grace) and sun (love of God), then it will start to grow into a small sprout. Once “baptized” and “planted” the tips of roots and shoots exhibit continuous growth and hence are meristematic. The cells in this region are rich in protoplasm and have large nuclei. The cells next to this region represent the elongation growth phase, where there is the formation of new cell walls, vacuoles etc. The region next to the elongation phase represents the maturation phase in which the cells attain their maximal size. Seed, sprout, small plant, and adult plant.
► The same is true of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion Preparation for Consecration to Mary, wherein we have an introductory stage of Renouncing the Spirit of the World (which is akin to renouncing mortal sin before one can enter the Way of Beginners―the First Way or Purgative Way―in the spiritual life. This is followed by a period devoted to the Knowledge of Self ― which is equivalent to the Way of Beginners or Purgative Way. The second period of time is devoted to the Knowledge of Mary ― which is equivalent to the Way of the Proficient or the Illuminative Way. The third period is devoted to the Knowledge of Jesus ― which is equivalent to the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way.
The Steps from Mortal Sin to Sanctity
Taken from Soul of Apostolate by Dom Chautard and repeated in Guidance in Spiritual Direction by Fr. Hugo Doyle.
Dom Chautard, the great author of The Soul of the Apostolate, which was one of Pope St. Pius X’s favorite bedside books, has drawn up a list of spiritual states that every person should study with painstaking care:
1. HARDENED IN SIN (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Stubborn persistence in sin, either out of ignorance or because of a maliciously warped conscience.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Deliberate refusal to have any recourse to God.
2. SURFACE CHRISTIANITY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Considered as a trifling evil, easily forgiven. The soul easily gives way and commits mortal sin at almost every possible occasion or temptation. Confession almost without contrition.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Mechanical; either inattention, or always dictated by temporal interest―such souls enter into themselves rarely and superficially.
3. MEDIOCRE PIETY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Weak resistance. Hardly ever avoids occasions, but seriously regrets having sinned and makes good confessions.
►Venial Sin: Complete acceptance of this sin, which is considered as insignificant. Hence tepidity of the will (lukewarmness). Does nothing whatever to prevent venial sin, or to find it out and root it out, when it is concealed.
►Prayer: From time to time, prays well. Momentary fits of fervor.
4. INTERMITTENT PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Loyal resistance. Habitually avoids occasions. Deep regrets if there is a fall into mortal sin. Does penance to make reparation.
►Venial Sin: Sometimes deliberate. Puts up weak fight. Sorrow only superficial. Makes particular examination of conscience, but without any method or coherence.
►Prayer: Not firmly resolved to remain faithful to meditation. Gives it up as soon as dryness is felt or as soon as there is business to attend to.
5. SUSTAINED PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never. At most, very rare, when taken suddenly and violently by surprise. And then, often it is to be doubted if the sin is mortal. It is followed by ardent compunction and penance.
►Venial Sin: Vigilant in avoiding and fighting it. Rarely deliberate. Keen sorrow, but does little by way of reparation. Consistent particular examination of predominant faults, but aiming only at avoidance of deliberate venial sin.
►Imperfections: The soul avoids uncovering them so as not to have to fight them, or else easily excuses them. Approves the thought of renouncing them, and would like to do so, but makes little effort in that direction.
►Prayer: Always faithful to prayer, no matter what. Often affective. Alternating consolations and dryness that is hard to endure.
6. FERVOR (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never deliberate. By surprise, sometimes, or with imperfect advertence. Keenly regretted, and serious reparation made.
►Imperfections: Wants nothing to do with them. Watches over them, fights them with courage, in order to be more pleasing to God. Sometimes accepted, however, but regretted at once. Frequent acts of renunciation. Particular examination aims at perfection in a given virtue.
►Prayer: Mental prayer gladly prolonged. Prayer more affective, or even prayer of simplicity. Alternation between powerful consolations and fierce trials.
7. RELATIVE PERFECTION (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Guards against them energetically and with much love of God. They only happen with half advertence.
►Prayer: Habitual life of prayer even when occupied in external works. Thirst for self renunciation, annihilation, detachment, and divine love. Hunger for the Eucharist, and for heaven. Graces of infused prayer, of different degrees. Often, passive purification (where God's Providence sends sufferings and trials to the person).
8. HEROIC PERFECTION (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Nothing but the first impulse.
►Prayer: Supernatural graces of contemplation, sometimes accompanied by extraordinary phenomena. Pronounced passive purifications. Contempt of self to the point of complete self-forgetfulness. Prefers suffering to joys.
9. COMPLETE SANCTITY (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Hardly apparent.
►Prayer: Usually, transforming union. Spiritual marriage. Purifications by love. Ardent thirst for sufferings and humiliations. (Few and far between are the souls that belong to the last two, even to the last three categories).
Do You See the Big Picture?
Hopefully you can see, from all the above examples, the need of a progressive growth in the spiritual life―which increasingly distances itself from the world and all that the world offers, and increasingly attaches itself to God and all that God offers. We cannot be going forwards and backwards at the same time―as Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth, but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters! For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Baptism is not an end in itself―it is only the beginning of a life that should grow and mature until it finally is at a level which grants the soul entry into Heaven. Baptism merely plants into our souls the seeds of the Theological, Cardinal and Moral virtues―but these need to be cultivated, watered, protected and nourished so that they can grow and thereby produce the fruits necessary for our entrance into Heaven. “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith also, if it have not works, is dead in itself. O vain man, know that Faith without works is dead! For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead” (James 2:14-26). We need to WORK OUT our salvation: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). As Our Lord said: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the husbandman [= gardener or farmer]. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit … In this is My Father glorified; that you bring forth very much fruit, and become My disciples … I have chosen you and have appointed you that you should go and should bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain!” (John 15:1-8, 16).
There can be no armchair Catholics in this life! Our Lord says: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a householder who went out, early in the morning, to hire laborers for his vineyard. And, having agreed a wage, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way into the vineyard. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. About the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why stand you here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:1-7).
One of greatest theologians of the 20th century, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange (1877-1964) was ordained to the priesthood in 1900 in the Dominican Order and has been widely acknowledged as a leading neo-Thomist of the 20th century. He helped write papal encyclicals for several popes. From 1909 to 1960 he taught Mystical and Ascetical Theology (Spiritual Theology) in Rome at the Dominican Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, commonly known as the “Angelicum”. He was thus one of the greatest masters of the spiritual life in the 20th century―some observers were of the opinion that he had reached the mystical state towards the end of his life. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange deals with the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in two different books: The multiple volume book The Three Ages of the Interior Life, and a much smaller book which is summary of the above, entitled The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life (later renamed The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life), in which he writes:
“To understand what our interior life is in itself and in its various phases, we must consider it not merely in its seed, but in its full and complete development. Now, if we ask the Gospel what our interior life is, it tells us that the life of grace, given to us in Baptism and nourished by the Eucharist, is the seed or germ of eternal life. A Christian on Earth could never become one of the blessed in Heaven unless he had already received the divine life in Baptism. We are thus able to appreciate something of the importance of true conversion, by which a man passes from the state of mortal sin to the state of grace. The state of sin was a state of spiritual death. The state of grace, on the other hand, is a state of life in which man begins seriously to tend beyond himself and to make God the center of his activities, loving God more than himself. The state of grace is entrance into the kingdom of God, where the docile soul begins to reign with God over its own passions, over the spirit of the world and the spirit of evil. Our spiritual progress cannot tend in the direction of the life of eternity unless it presupposes the seed of it already existing in us. ‘Grace,’ says the whole of Tradition, ‘is the seed of glory.’ Grace, then, is eternal life already begun within us, and this is why Christ says: ‘The Kingdom of God comes not with observation. Neither shall they say: “Behold here!” or “Behold there!” For behold, the Kingdom of God is within you.’ (Luke 17:20-21). St. Thomas expresses this doctrine in the brief statement: ‘Grace is nothing else but a certain beginning of glory within us.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life, later renamed The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
Your GPS Won’t Get You to Heaven
If you rely on a GPS to get you from point A to point B, you’re not alone. A lot of drivers turn to mapping technology to keep them from getting lost or just simply to avoid the most congested route home. Surveys show that 93% of American drivers depend upon their GPS. 83% of drivers said they would get lost without their GPS. 60% of drivers use a GPS service at least once a week. 20% of respondents said they use it every day. 21% of GPS users surveyed said they have never used a paper map for directions, and 17% said they wouldn’t be able to find their way with one. All of that tells that people need help in navigating from one place to another―especially places that they have rarely or never driven to. Who has driven to Heaven? Nobody! So you would think that everybody would be interested in a “GPS” that could lead them to Heaven―but that is not the case.
Origins with Origen
The “Road Map” to Heaven exists, but it is rarely or never “handed-out” or explained―neither to the clergy, nor the faithful. Most priests will tell that learned little or nothing about the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life ― yet this doctrine seems clearly to be the traditional doctrine such as it is found in the works of the earliest mystical authors from Clement of Alexandria to St. Benedict to St. Thomas Aquinas to St. John of the Cross to St. Teresa of Avila to St. Francis de Sales. You could say the Three Ways find their concrete origins with Origen of Alexandria (185-253), who lived in Egypt long before the Desert Fathers arrived on the scene. Origen said that Christian spirituality can be understood as involving three stages, which he labeled (in Greek) ethike, physike, and enoptike. Origen’s ideas were shaped and adapted by future spiritual writers.
What is Important is Seen As Unimportant
Therefore, the doctrine of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is not something new, nor is it obscure, elitist, marginalized, etc. It is meant for EVERYBODY because it guides and leads us to sanctity and it is only saints who can get into Heaven. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Father Garrigou-Lagrange insisted that the mystical life is meant to be the normal way of Christian perfection for EVERY CHRISTIAN. This thesis seems to be accepted as the more common opinion among theologians, since it is based on the teaching of the greatest doctors on this subject—for instance, St. Bonaventure, St. Bernard, St. Thomas, and above all St. John of the Cross. St. John of the Cross is so explicit on the point that there can be no room for doubt as to his opinion. He identifies perfect charity with the mystical marriage, as did St. Bernard and the Cistercian theologians of the twelfth century. He even asserts that it is only when one has reached transforming union that one is able to fulfill―completely and in total perfection―the will of God as it laid down for us in the first commandment of loving God with our whole heart and our whole mind and our whole strength ― because it is only when we have passed through the Dark Night of total mystical purification from every creature attachment and every imperfection, that we are able really to love God with our whole heart and our whole mind and our whole strength in all the literal truth of those words. Those who fail to achieve that on Earth, must achieve that in the loving fires and Dark Night of Purgatory. We rashly and stupidly underestimate the degree of holiness that is required for entry into Heaven. That is one reason why most souls are lost, and, as St. Padre Pio says, out of the few souls that are saved, most of them have to pass through Purgatory. Martyrs, of course, would go straight to Heaven.
Grave Neglect
The presentation and explanation of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is not rocket science! So why is it being gravely ignored? Why are not priests not preaching it? Why is not part of a Catholic School Curriculum? Why are there so few books and explanations upon the subject? It is not optional just as becoming a saint is not optional―and the Three Ways offer a clear guide to the stages that we must recognize and pass through on our path to an obligatory sanctity. If parents are not neglectful in providing their children with the means necessary to able to live and survive in this world―then why are they neglectful in providing their children with the means necessary to reach Heaven once this brief stay on Earth ends? The parents, after all, are the prime educators of their children!
Teaching the Catechism is fine and necessary―but the Catechism is only the first step. Above that comes the teaching of Catholic Morality―have you never heard the expression “Faith and Morals”? The Catholic Faith (Catechism) and Catholic Morals go in tandem. Yet above those two things is Catholic Spirituality (Catholic Ascetical and Mystical Theology) which builds upon Faith and Morals and deals with charity and our personal relationship of loving God. “Now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:13) and the greatest commandment is to love God: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Charity is a union of love between God and the soul and the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are the stages that everyone must pass through in order to obtain that union with God in Charity.
Our neglect to preach and teach these Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is criminal―especially when we know (or should know) that most souls are being lost! Why do we neglect to preach and teach the Three Ways? The reason is that we never learned much or anything about them in the first place! Sure we have hours and hours each week to watch television, browse the internet, post on blogs, use the smartphone, engage in idle chat, etc. But when comes to learning the ropes on how to increase the chances of saving our souls―then there is little or no time for that!
Sometimes, admittedly, the books that deal with the Three Ways can use language and words that leave us scratching our heads! Yet this should not be the case―for the subject matter can easily be broken down into more simple terms without losing anything of the essence of the teaching. Heck! We do that with the Catechism, don’t we? We start teaching the Catechism in Kindergarten―but in very simple terms―and in every successive school year we build upon those simple foundations with increasingly fuller and more-in-depth material. The same can be done with the Three Ways.
The Road to Hell is paved with good intentions, the Road to Heaven is paved with good deeds. Some people start out well―but finish badly. Others start out badly―but finish well. However, since we are not privy to the consciences of souls, nor are we aware and cognizant of the workings of God’s grace behind the scenes―therefore, we can never be really sure of who is damned and who is saved. Nevertheless, we can be sure that in general most souls are lost―for that is what we have been told by Our Lord, Our Lady and many of the saints and theologians.
What is more important than salvation? Our Lord asks the same question: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! Lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Our Lord then speaks of the paths or roads that read to Heaven and Hell: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate! For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction―and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 22:14). Everyone will live somewhere forever without end. Where you live forever is absolutely critical. There are only two options: Hell and eternal punishment, or Heaven and eternal joy. The question then is: “Which is the way to Heaven?”
Are we on the path to Heaven or Hell? “Every way of a man seems right to himself” (Proverbs 21:2). “There is a way which seems just to a man―but the ends of which lead to death!” Do not pride yourself on being Catholic―for “unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required; and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). If you have been given the Catholic Faith―by the grace of God―then much is expected of you! Having the Faith is not enough: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! … You believe that there is one God. You do well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
Road Maps to Heaven and Hell
Do you know where you are going? Sometimes you need a road map to help you reach your destination. Do you really know the way to Heaven? Yes, of course, you could say: “You need to be in state of sanctifying grace to get to Heaven!” ― but that is like saying: “To get to New York from San Francisco, all you have to do is go east!” The advice is true, but not very precise―and you could end up anywhere by merely going east of San Francisco! If that is true of an earthly journey, then how much true is that of our pilgrimage to Heaven! When Our Lord said to His Apostles: “Where I am going you know, and the way you know!” (John 14:4). Yet we have to say with the Apostle St. Thomas: “Lord, how can we know the way?” (John 14:5). Can we know the way to Heaven? Yes. Do we know the way to Heaven? Well, that is another question! Do we know the way―or do only imagine we know the way? God says: “I will lead the blind into the way which they know not; and in the paths which they were ignorant of I will make them walk; I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight!” (Isaias 42:16). “Jesus said: ‘I am the way! No man comes to the Father, but by Me!’” (John 14:6).
“The Chief Priests and the Scribes … asked Him, saying: ‘Master, we know that You teach the way of God in truth’” (Luke 20:19-21) ― they did not say this in order to learn the ways of God from Jesus, but they were seeking to entrap Him in His words, so that they could accuse Him. The Chief Priests and Scribes considered the ways of Jesus to be wrong and their own ways to correct. There are many Catholics who more or less do the same thing―they do not like some of the teachings and His Church, so they twist them, water them down, re-interpret them, or even reject them. Today, anywhere from 50% to 90% of Catholics accept same-sex relationships, same-sex marriages, divorce with remarriage, cohabitation, pre-marital sex, contraception, abortion, etc.
“Every way of a man seems right to himself” (Proverbs 21:2). “Everyone has turned aside into his own way” (Isaias 53:6). “Everyone has erred in his own way” (Isaias 47:15). “The way of knowledge they have not known, … neither did they find the way of knowledge” (Baruch 3:20, 27). “All have turned aside into their own way, everyone after his own gain, from the first even to the last! … They walk in a way that is not good after their own thoughts” (Isaias 56:11; 65:2). “They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst show them” (Exodus 32:8).
The Way to Heaven
From the earliest centuries, the spiritual masters have presented the way to Heaven as being a journey through three stages of the spiritual life. These three ways have various names, but all the names refer to the same stage:
(1) The Way of Beginners (also called the Purgative Way)
(2) The Way of Proficients (also called the Illuminative Way)
(3) The Way of Perfection (also called the Unitive Way)
► Some spiritual writers compare these three ways to the life of a human being and the necessary stages of life that each person must pass through: (1) Childhood, (2) Adolescence, (3) Adulthood. Someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin is not even classified as having entered the beginnings of the spiritual life―like an embryo within the womb of its mother has not yet entered natural life in the world.
► Other spiritual compare these three ways to human relationships between two people: (1) Friendship, which leads to (2) Betrothal, which finally leads to (3) Marriage. Someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin is not a friend of God, but a stranger or enemy to God.
► You could also compare the three ways to the different levels of education in schools: (1) Lower School, (2) Middle School, and (3) High School. Before entering Kindergarten or Pre-Kindergarten, the child is incapable of grasping the levels of understanding required in Lower School―just like someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin fails to grasp and understand the gravity of sin and beauty of the things of God. Or another aspect is: (1) Primary education at primary school or elementary school, and sometimes in the early years of middle school. (2) Secondary education at secondary school or high school, and sometimes in the latter years of middle school. (3) Higher education or vocational education.
► You also have three progressive stages of University degrees: (1) Bachelor’s Degree: These degrees generally take three or four years to finish. (2) Master’s Degree: After an individual completes a Bachelor’s Degree, they may apply for admission to a master’s degree program that typically requires one to three years of further education. This degree focuses more on mastering the field of study a candidate wishes to take. (3) Doctorate Degree: A doctorate degree is the highest level of education an individual may seek, and it involves specializing in a specific focus of study after securing a master’s degree. This degree typically requires candidates to dedicate three to four years to education and research, and individuals gain the title of Doctor upon completing a doctoral program.
► Or again, you could compare the three ways to progressing through the medical field: (1) First comes Medical School, (2) then comes a period of Internship, where you can only practice medicine under guidance and supervision; (3) finally comes the choice of Residency (hospital doctors) or General Practitioner (outside of the hospital).
► Similarly, there are three major phases in military training: (1) Phase One/Red Phase―weeks one through three―which deal with: Fundamentals of soldiering; Core Army values; Army traditions and ethics; What it means to be a soldier; Taking the Army Combat Fitness Test. (2) Phase Two/White Phase―weeks four through five―where the focus is on: Self-discipline; Teamwork; Combat skills; Night training; Hand-to-hand combat and weapons training; Basic rifle marksmanship; Physical fitness. (3) Phase Three/Blue Phase―weeks six through nine―deals with: Additional weapons training and rifle marksmanship; Overview of convoy operations; Military operations in urban terrain; Field training exercises. If all these phases are successfully passed, then you officially graduate from basic combat training and are a fully-fledged soldier.
► We also see this triple stage of formation in some elements of nature. There are three phases of plant growth: (1) Meristematic, (2) Elongation and (3) Maturation. We can understand by looking at a seed. A seed―of itself―will not grow; it is like a soul in mortal sin which cannot grow in the love of God. Yet once that seed is “baptized” by receiving “the grace of water” and is planted in the “soil of the Faith”, then the seed comes to life and begins to grow: “Unless the grain of wheat, falling into the ground die, then it remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit” (John 12:25). When the seed gets planted into the “soil of Faith” with water (grace) and sun (love of God), then it will start to grow into a small sprout. Once “baptized” and “planted” the tips of roots and shoots exhibit continuous growth and hence are meristematic. The cells in this region are rich in protoplasm and have large nuclei. The cells next to this region represent the elongation growth phase, where there is the formation of new cell walls, vacuoles etc. The region next to the elongation phase represents the maturation phase in which the cells attain their maximal size. Seed, sprout, small plant, and adult plant.
► The same is true of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion Preparation for Consecration to Mary, wherein we have an introductory stage of Renouncing the Spirit of the World (which is akin to renouncing mortal sin before one can enter the Way of Beginners―the First Way or Purgative Way―in the spiritual life. This is followed by a period devoted to the Knowledge of Self ― which is equivalent to the Way of Beginners or Purgative Way. The second period of time is devoted to the Knowledge of Mary ― which is equivalent to the Way of the Proficient or the Illuminative Way. The third period is devoted to the Knowledge of Jesus ― which is equivalent to the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way.
The Steps from Mortal Sin to Sanctity
Taken from Soul of Apostolate by Dom Chautard and repeated in Guidance in Spiritual Direction by Fr. Hugo Doyle.
Dom Chautard, the great author of The Soul of the Apostolate, which was one of Pope St. Pius X’s favorite bedside books, has drawn up a list of spiritual states that every person should study with painstaking care:
1. HARDENED IN SIN (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Stubborn persistence in sin, either out of ignorance or because of a maliciously warped conscience.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Deliberate refusal to have any recourse to God.
2. SURFACE CHRISTIANITY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Considered as a trifling evil, easily forgiven. The soul easily gives way and commits mortal sin at almost every possible occasion or temptation. Confession almost without contrition.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Mechanical; either inattention, or always dictated by temporal interest―such souls enter into themselves rarely and superficially.
3. MEDIOCRE PIETY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Weak resistance. Hardly ever avoids occasions, but seriously regrets having sinned and makes good confessions.
►Venial Sin: Complete acceptance of this sin, which is considered as insignificant. Hence tepidity of the will (lukewarmness). Does nothing whatever to prevent venial sin, or to find it out and root it out, when it is concealed.
►Prayer: From time to time, prays well. Momentary fits of fervor.
4. INTERMITTENT PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Loyal resistance. Habitually avoids occasions. Deep regrets if there is a fall into mortal sin. Does penance to make reparation.
►Venial Sin: Sometimes deliberate. Puts up weak fight. Sorrow only superficial. Makes particular examination of conscience, but without any method or coherence.
►Prayer: Not firmly resolved to remain faithful to meditation. Gives it up as soon as dryness is felt or as soon as there is business to attend to.
5. SUSTAINED PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never. At most, very rare, when taken suddenly and violently by surprise. And then, often it is to be doubted if the sin is mortal. It is followed by ardent compunction and penance.
►Venial Sin: Vigilant in avoiding and fighting it. Rarely deliberate. Keen sorrow, but does little by way of reparation. Consistent particular examination of predominant faults, but aiming only at avoidance of deliberate venial sin.
►Imperfections: The soul avoids uncovering them so as not to have to fight them, or else easily excuses them. Approves the thought of renouncing them, and would like to do so, but makes little effort in that direction.
►Prayer: Always faithful to prayer, no matter what. Often affective. Alternating consolations and dryness that is hard to endure.
6. FERVOR (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never deliberate. By surprise, sometimes, or with imperfect advertence. Keenly regretted, and serious reparation made.
►Imperfections: Wants nothing to do with them. Watches over them, fights them with courage, in order to be more pleasing to God. Sometimes accepted, however, but regretted at once. Frequent acts of renunciation. Particular examination aims at perfection in a given virtue.
►Prayer: Mental prayer gladly prolonged. Prayer more affective, or even prayer of simplicity. Alternation between powerful consolations and fierce trials.
7. RELATIVE PERFECTION (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Guards against them energetically and with much love of God. They only happen with half advertence.
►Prayer: Habitual life of prayer even when occupied in external works. Thirst for self renunciation, annihilation, detachment, and divine love. Hunger for the Eucharist, and for heaven. Graces of infused prayer, of different degrees. Often, passive purification (where God's Providence sends sufferings and trials to the person).
8. HEROIC PERFECTION (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Nothing but the first impulse.
►Prayer: Supernatural graces of contemplation, sometimes accompanied by extraordinary phenomena. Pronounced passive purifications. Contempt of self to the point of complete self-forgetfulness. Prefers suffering to joys.
9. COMPLETE SANCTITY (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Hardly apparent.
►Prayer: Usually, transforming union. Spiritual marriage. Purifications by love. Ardent thirst for sufferings and humiliations. (Few and far between are the souls that belong to the last two, even to the last three categories).
Do You See the Big Picture?
Hopefully you can see, from all the above examples, the need of a progressive growth in the spiritual life―which increasingly distances itself from the world and all that the world offers, and increasingly attaches itself to God and all that God offers. We cannot be going forwards and backwards at the same time―as Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth, but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters! For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Baptism is not an end in itself―it is only the beginning of a life that should grow and mature until it finally is at a level which grants the soul entry into Heaven. Baptism merely plants into our souls the seeds of the Theological, Cardinal and Moral virtues―but these need to be cultivated, watered, protected and nourished so that they can grow and thereby produce the fruits necessary for our entrance into Heaven. “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith also, if it have not works, is dead in itself. O vain man, know that Faith without works is dead! For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead” (James 2:14-26). We need to WORK OUT our salvation: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). As Our Lord said: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the husbandman [= gardener or farmer]. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit … In this is My Father glorified; that you bring forth very much fruit, and become My disciples … I have chosen you and have appointed you that you should go and should bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain!” (John 15:1-8, 16).
There can be no armchair Catholics in this life! Our Lord says: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a householder who went out, early in the morning, to hire laborers for his vineyard. And, having agreed a wage, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way into the vineyard. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. About the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why stand you here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:1-7).
One of greatest theologians of the 20th century, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange (1877-1964) was ordained to the priesthood in 1900 in the Dominican Order and has been widely acknowledged as a leading neo-Thomist of the 20th century. He helped write papal encyclicals for several popes. From 1909 to 1960 he taught Mystical and Ascetical Theology (Spiritual Theology) in Rome at the Dominican Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, commonly known as the “Angelicum”. He was thus one of the greatest masters of the spiritual life in the 20th century―some observers were of the opinion that he had reached the mystical state towards the end of his life. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange deals with the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in two different books: The multiple volume book The Three Ages of the Interior Life, and a much smaller book which is summary of the above, entitled The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life (later renamed The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life), in which he writes:
“To understand what our interior life is in itself and in its various phases, we must consider it not merely in its seed, but in its full and complete development. Now, if we ask the Gospel what our interior life is, it tells us that the life of grace, given to us in Baptism and nourished by the Eucharist, is the seed or germ of eternal life. A Christian on Earth could never become one of the blessed in Heaven unless he had already received the divine life in Baptism. We are thus able to appreciate something of the importance of true conversion, by which a man passes from the state of mortal sin to the state of grace. The state of sin was a state of spiritual death. The state of grace, on the other hand, is a state of life in which man begins seriously to tend beyond himself and to make God the center of his activities, loving God more than himself. The state of grace is entrance into the kingdom of God, where the docile soul begins to reign with God over its own passions, over the spirit of the world and the spirit of evil. Our spiritual progress cannot tend in the direction of the life of eternity unless it presupposes the seed of it already existing in us. ‘Grace,’ says the whole of Tradition, ‘is the seed of glory.’ Grace, then, is eternal life already begun within us, and this is why Christ says: ‘The Kingdom of God comes not with observation. Neither shall they say: “Behold here!” or “Behold there!” For behold, the Kingdom of God is within you.’ (Luke 17:20-21). St. Thomas expresses this doctrine in the brief statement: ‘Grace is nothing else but a certain beginning of glory within us.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life, later renamed The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
Your GPS Won’t Get You to Heaven
If you rely on a GPS to get you from point A to point B, you’re not alone. A lot of drivers turn to mapping technology to keep them from getting lost or just simply to avoid the most congested route home. Surveys show that 93% of American drivers depend upon their GPS. 83% of drivers said they would get lost without their GPS. 60% of drivers use a GPS service at least once a week. 20% of respondents said they use it every day. 21% of GPS users surveyed said they have never used a paper map for directions, and 17% said they wouldn’t be able to find their way with one. All of that tells that people need help in navigating from one place to another―especially places that they have rarely or never driven to. Who has driven to Heaven? Nobody! So you would think that everybody would be interested in a “GPS” that could lead them to Heaven―but that is not the case.
Origins with Origen
The “Road Map” to Heaven exists, but it is rarely or never “handed-out” or explained―neither to the clergy, nor the faithful. Most priests will tell that learned little or nothing about the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life ― yet this doctrine seems clearly to be the traditional doctrine such as it is found in the works of the earliest mystical authors from Clement of Alexandria to St. Benedict to St. Thomas Aquinas to St. John of the Cross to St. Teresa of Avila to St. Francis de Sales. You could say the Three Ways find their concrete origins with Origen of Alexandria (185-253), who lived in Egypt long before the Desert Fathers arrived on the scene. Origen said that Christian spirituality can be understood as involving three stages, which he labeled (in Greek) ethike, physike, and enoptike. Origen’s ideas were shaped and adapted by future spiritual writers.
What is Important is Seen As Unimportant
Therefore, the doctrine of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is not something new, nor is it obscure, elitist, marginalized, etc. It is meant for EVERYBODY because it guides and leads us to sanctity and it is only saints who can get into Heaven. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Father Garrigou-Lagrange insisted that the mystical life is meant to be the normal way of Christian perfection for EVERY CHRISTIAN. This thesis seems to be accepted as the more common opinion among theologians, since it is based on the teaching of the greatest doctors on this subject—for instance, St. Bonaventure, St. Bernard, St. Thomas, and above all St. John of the Cross. St. John of the Cross is so explicit on the point that there can be no room for doubt as to his opinion. He identifies perfect charity with the mystical marriage, as did St. Bernard and the Cistercian theologians of the twelfth century. He even asserts that it is only when one has reached transforming union that one is able to fulfill―completely and in total perfection―the will of God as it laid down for us in the first commandment of loving God with our whole heart and our whole mind and our whole strength ― because it is only when we have passed through the Dark Night of total mystical purification from every creature attachment and every imperfection, that we are able really to love God with our whole heart and our whole mind and our whole strength in all the literal truth of those words. Those who fail to achieve that on Earth, must achieve that in the loving fires and Dark Night of Purgatory. We rashly and stupidly underestimate the degree of holiness that is required for entry into Heaven. That is one reason why most souls are lost, and, as St. Padre Pio says, out of the few souls that are saved, most of them have to pass through Purgatory. Martyrs, of course, would go straight to Heaven.
Grave Neglect
The presentation and explanation of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is not rocket science! So why is it being gravely ignored? Why are not priests not preaching it? Why is not part of a Catholic School Curriculum? Why are there so few books and explanations upon the subject? It is not optional just as becoming a saint is not optional―and the Three Ways offer a clear guide to the stages that we must recognize and pass through on our path to an obligatory sanctity. If parents are not neglectful in providing their children with the means necessary to able to live and survive in this world―then why are they neglectful in providing their children with the means necessary to reach Heaven once this brief stay on Earth ends? The parents, after all, are the prime educators of their children!
Teaching the Catechism is fine and necessary―but the Catechism is only the first step. Above that comes the teaching of Catholic Morality―have you never heard the expression “Faith and Morals”? The Catholic Faith (Catechism) and Catholic Morals go in tandem. Yet above those two things is Catholic Spirituality (Catholic Ascetical and Mystical Theology) which builds upon Faith and Morals and deals with charity and our personal relationship of loving God. “Now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:13) and the greatest commandment is to love God: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Charity is a union of love between God and the soul and the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are the stages that everyone must pass through in order to obtain that union with God in Charity.
Our neglect to preach and teach these Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is criminal―especially when we know (or should know) that most souls are being lost! Why do we neglect to preach and teach the Three Ways? The reason is that we never learned much or anything about them in the first place! Sure we have hours and hours each week to watch television, browse the internet, post on blogs, use the smartphone, engage in idle chat, etc. But when comes to learning the ropes on how to increase the chances of saving our souls―then there is little or no time for that!
Sometimes, admittedly, the books that deal with the Three Ways can use language and words that leave us scratching our heads! Yet this should not be the case―for the subject matter can easily be broken down into more simple terms without losing anything of the essence of the teaching. Heck! We do that with the Catechism, don’t we? We start teaching the Catechism in Kindergarten―but in very simple terms―and in every successive school year we build upon those simple foundations with increasingly fuller and more-in-depth material. The same can be done with the Three Ways.
Article 25
Saturday & Sunday, January 25th & 26th
Conversion
Saturday & Sunday, January 25th & 26th
Conversion
Anyone for Conversion?
Today, January 25th, we celebrate the conversion of St. Paul. When will we celebrate our own conversion? When will we celebrate the conversion of our family, relatives and friends? You will probably be angered by such a presumptuous statement and say: “I have no need of conversion! I am already a Catholic!” Yet even Catholics are in need of a conversion―or, more correctly, they are in need of several repeated conversions before they will be among the few Catholic souls that are saved! Before we look at the need of our own conversion, let us first of all look at the conversion of Saul to the Faith, before eventually becoming St. Paul and no longer Saul!
What Holy Scripture Tells Us
There are several places in Holy Scripture that deal with St. Paul (or Saul as he was called before his conversion). Let us first of all have a look at what they say.
First of all, in chapter 9 of the Acts of the Apostles, we read:
“And Saul, as yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest, and asked of him letters to Damascus, to the synagogues: that if he found any men and women of this way, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.
“And as he went on his journey, it came to pass that he drew nigh to Damascus; and suddenly a light from heaven shined round about him. And falling on the ground, he heard a voice saying to him: ‘Saul! Saul! Why persecutest thou Me?’ Saul said: ‘Who art Thou, Lord?’
And he answered: ‘I am Jesus whom thou persecutes! It is hard for thee to kick against the goad!’
And he, trembling and astonished, said: ‘Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?’
And the Lord said to him: ‘Arise, and go into the city, and there it shall be told thee what thou must do!’
“Now the men who went in company with him, stood amazed, hearing indeed a voice, but seeing no man. And Saul arose from the ground; and when his eyes were opened, he saw nothing. But they leading him by the hands, brought him to Damascus. [9] And he was there three days, without sight, and he did neither eat nor drink.
“Now there was a certain disciple at Damascus, named Ananias. And the Lord said to him in a vision: ‘Ananias!’
And he said: ‘Behold I am here, Lord!’
And the Lord said to him: ‘Arise, and go into the street that is called Strait, and seek in the house of Judas, one named Saul of Tarsus. For behold he prayeth!’
And Ananias saw a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hands upon him, that he might receive his sight.
But Ananias answered: ‘Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to thy saints in Jerusalem. And here he hath authority from the chief priests to bind all that invoke Thy Name!’
And the Lord said to him: ‘Go thy way! For this man is to me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel! For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!’
“And Ananias went his way, and entered into the house. And laying his hands upon him, he said: ‘Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus hath sent me, He that appeared to thee in the way as thou camest; that thou mayest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost!’
And immediately there fell from his eyes as it were scales, and he received his sight; and rising up, he was baptized. And when he had taken meat, he was strengthened. And he was with the disciples that were at Damascus, for some days.
“And immediately he preached Jesus in the synagogues, that He is the Son of God.
And all that heard him, were astonished, and said: ‘Is not this he who persecuted in Jerusalem those that called upon this Name: and came here for that intent, that he might carry them bound to the chief priests?’
But Saul increased much more in strength, and confounded the Jews who dwelt at Damascus, affirming that this is the Christ.
“And when many days were passed, the Jews consulted together to kill him. But their laying in wait was made known to Saul. And they watched the gates also day and night, that they might kill him. But the disciples taking him in the night, conveyed him away by the wall, letting him down in a basket.
“And when he was come into Jerusalem, he tried to join himself to the disciples; and they all were afraid of him, not believing that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him, and brought him to the Apostles, and told them how he had seen the Lord, and that He had spoken to him; and how in Damascus he had dealt confidently in the Name of Jesus.
“And he was with them coming in and going out in Jerusalem, and dealing confidently in the name of the Lord. He spoke also to the Gentiles, and disputed with the Greeks; but they sought to kill him. Which when the brethren had known, they brought him down to Caesarea, and sent him away to Tarsus.” (Acts 9:1-20).
St. Paul’s Personal Account of His Conversion
In various places in the New Testament, St. Paul speaks of his past life, his persecution of the Church and of his conversion to the Faith, also recounting the tremendous sufferings he underwent after his conversion.
“You have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews' religion: how that, beyond measure, I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it. And I made progress in the Jews’ religion above many of my equals in my own nation, being more abundantly zealous for the traditions of my fathers” (Galatians 1:13-14).
“I indeed did formerly think, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. Which also I did at Jerusalem, and many of the saints did I shut up in prison, having received authority of the chief priests: and when they were put to death, I brought the sentence. And oftentimes punishing them, in every synagogue, I compelled them to blaspheme: and being yet more mad against them, I persecuted them even unto foreign cities. Whereupon when I was going to Damascus with authority and permission of the chief priest. At midday, I saw, in the way, a light from heaven above the brightness of the sun, shining round about me, and them that were in company with me. And when we were all fallen down on the ground, I heard a voice speaking to me in the Hebrew tongue: ‘Saul! Saul!’ Why persecutest thou Me? It is hard for thee to kick against the goad!’
And I said: ‘Who art Thou, Lord?’
And the Lord answered: ‘I am Jesus whom thou persecutest! But rise up, and stand upon thy feet! For to this end have I appeared to thee, that I may make thee a minister and a witness of those things which thou hast seen, and of those things wherein I will appear to thee, delivering thee from the people, and from the nations, unto which now I send thee: to open their eyes, that they may be converted from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and a lot among the saints, by the Faith that is in Me!’” (Acts 26:9-18).
In the 22nd chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, we can read St. Paul’s personal account of his conversion on the road to Damascus:
“Men, brethren, and fathers, hear ye the account which I now give unto you! … I am a Jew, born at Tarsus in Cilicia, but brought up in this city, at the feet of Gamaliel, taught according to the truth of the law of the fathers, zealous for the law, as also all you are this day―who persecuted this way unto death, binding and delivering into prisons both men and women. As the high priest doth bear me witness, and all the ancients, from whom also receiving letters to the brethren, I went to Damascus, that I might bring them bound from thence to Jerusalem to be punished.
“And it came to pass, as I was going, and drawing nigh to Damascus at midday, that suddenly from heaven there shone round about me a great light: and falling on the ground, I heard a voice saying to me: ‘Saul! Saul! Why persecutest thou Me?’
And I answered: ‘Who art thou, Lord?’ And He said to me: ‘I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutes!’
And they that were with me, saw indeed the light, but they heard not the voice of him that spoke with me.
And I said: ‘What shall I do, Lord?’
And the Lord said to me: ‘Arise, and go to Damascus; and there it shall be told thee of all things that thou must do!’
“And whereas I did not see for the brightness of that light, being led by the hand by my companions, I came to Damascus. And one Ananias, a man according to the law, having testimony of all the Jews who dwelt there, coming to me, and standing by me, said to me: ‘Brother Saul, look up!’
And I the same hour looked upon him.
But he said: ‘The God of our fathers hath preordained thee that thou shouldst know His will, and see the Just One, and shouldst hear the voice from His mouth. For thou shalt be his witness to all men, of those things which thou hast seen and heard. And now why tarriest thou? Rise up, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, invoking His Name!’”
Our Lord is True to His Word and Makes Paul Suffer
Paul had persecuted Christians—now it Paul that would be persecuted. The persecutor becomes the persecuted. There is a lesson for us there! It is quite simply the fulfilment of Holy Scripture, which warns: “For with what judgment you judge, you shall be judged: and with what measure you give, it shall be measured to you again” (Matthew 7:2). “In what measure you shall give, it shall be measured to you again, and more shall be given to you!” (Mark 4:24). “For with the same measure that you shall give to others, it shall be measured to you again” (Luke 6:38).
In speaking of Paul to Ananias, Our Lord foretold that Paul would have to suffer much: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:16). Later, St. Paul’s own words show the truth of that prophecy:
“I am more; in many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Besides those things which are without: there is my daily instance, the solicitude for all the churches!” (2 Corinthians 11:23-28).
St. John Chrysostom on St. Paul
In his homily on St. Paul of Tarsus, a fellow and later saint, St. John Chrysostom states:
“Paul, more than anyone else, has shown us what man really is, and in what our nobility consists, and of what virtue this particular animal is capable. Each day he aimed ever higher; each day he rose up with greater ardor and faced with new eagerness the dangers that threatened him. He summed up his attitude in the words: I forget what is behind me and push on to what lies ahead [Philippians 4:13]. When he saw death imminent, he bade others share his joy: Rejoice and be glad with me! [cf. Philippians 2:18]. And when danger, injustice and abuse threatened, he said: I am content with weakness, mistreatment and persecution [cf .2 Corinthians 12:10]. These he called the weapons of righteousness, thus telling us that he derived immense profit from them.
“Thus, amid the traps set for him by his enemies, with exultant heart he turned their every attack into a victory for himself; constantly beaten, abused and cursed, he boasted of it as though he were celebrating a triumphal procession and taking trophies home, and offered thanks to God for it all: Thanks be to God who is always victorious in us! [cf. 1 Corinthians 15:57]. This is why he was far more eager for the shameful abuse that his zeal in preaching brought upon him than we are for the most pleasing honors, more eager for death than we are for life, for poverty than we are for wealth; he yearned for toil far more than others yearn for rest after toil. The one thing he feared, indeed dreaded, was to offend God; nothing else could sway him. Therefore, the only thing he really wanted was always to please God.
“The most important thing of all to him, however, was that he knew himself to be loved by Christ. Enjoying this love, he considered himself happier than anyone else; were he without it, it would be no satisfaction to be the friend of principalities and powers. He preferred to be thus loved and be the least of all, or even to be among the damned, than to be without that love and be among the great and honored.
“To be separated from that love was, in his eyes, the greatest and most extraordinary of torments; the pain of that loss would alone have been hell, and endless, unbearable torture.
“So too, in being loved by Christ he thought of himself as possessing life, the world, the angels, present and future, the kingdom, the promise and countless blessings. Apart from that love nothing saddened or delighted him; for nothing earthly did he regard as bitter or sweet.
“Paul set no store by the things that fill our visible world, any more than a man sets value on the withered grass of the field. As for tyrannical rulers or the people enraged against him, he paid them no more heed than gnats.
“Death itself and pain and whatever torments might come were but child’s play to him, provided that thereby he might bear some burden for the sake of Christ.” (Homily of St. John Chrysostom on St. Paul).
A Few Thoughts
Saul, which is Paul’s given name, was born into a Jewish family in Tarsus (Turkey) around the year 8 AD. He was also a Roman citizen, a fact that would play a large role later in his life. Schooled as a Pharisee in the famous school of Gamaliel, he was a tent maker by trade, but was most noted for his hatred of Christians. He believed the teachings of Jesus violated Mosaic Law and zealously harassed, and even jailed, anyone who followed those teachings.
The first Scriptural mention of Saul is found in Acts 7:58, as he is a bystander watching his fellow Jews stone St. Stephen to death. An aggressive persecutor of Christians in Jerusalem, Saul sought and received permission from the high priest to proceed to Damascus for the purpose of imprisoning more followers of Christ.
Most Christians know the story of what happened on the Damascus road: the bright light that knocked Saul down, the voice of Jesus, Saul’s blindness and immediate response to the calling of Christ. In the manner of the first Apostles who, when beckoned by Christ, gave up their lifestyles to follow him, Saul too doesn’t hesitate. He says yes, just as the Blessed Mother said yes. Blinded from his encounter with Jesus, he allowed himself to be led into Damascus where he was baptized, after which he set out to spread the Gospel of Jesus. Paul would repeat the story of his conversion again and again throughout his life, including to the different magistrates and kings who judged his activities. The book of Acts, in three places, tells the story of Saul’s experience on the Damascus road.
The Impact of His Conversion
Saul’s sudden change confused those around him, because he was known as one who hated Christians, who went about seeking them out to eliminate those individuals he genuinely considered as breaking Jewish law. Suddenly he was transformed, from despising the followers of Jesus, into fervently espousing the Gospel of that same Jesus. No one could have anticipated this conversion; it is one of the great miracles of mankind. Even in his day, many could not believe what had happened.
After his baptism, Saul, who would be called Paul in the 13th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, went to the desert of Arabia to pray and contemplate his calling. He then returned to Damascus and into the synagogue, where he attested to the divinity of Jesus. While he had no Christian training, God infused words in his heart and in his mouth.
One sentence determined his theology: “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting” (Acts 9:5b). Jesus was mysteriously identified with people—the loving group of people Saul had been running down like criminals. Jesus, he saw, was the mysterious fulfillment of all he had been blindly pursuing.
From then on, his only work was to “present everyone perfect in Christ. For this I labor and struggle, in accord with the exercise of his power working within me” (Colossians 1:28-29). “For our Gospel did not come to you in word alone, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and [with] much conviction” (1 Thessalonians 1:5).
Paul’s life became a tireless proclaiming and living out of the message of the cross―whereby Christians die baptismally to sin and are buried with Christ; they are dead to all that is sinful and unredeemed in the world. They are made into a new creation, already sharing Christ’s victory and someday to rise from the dead like him. Through this risen Christ the Father pours out the Spirit on them, making them completely new.
The Jews in Damascus would eventually plot against him and he had once plotted against the Christians. The threat grew so severe that other Christians assisted Paul in an escape that included lowering him over the city walls in a basket. This was only the beginning of the threats and attacks on Paul. Henceforth, he was often regarded as a social undesirable, an agitator and a leader of a dangerous sect.
From Damascus, he traveled to Jerusalem, where his reputation as a persecutor of Christians preceded him and Christians there were unsure and confounded by his appearance. Here he met and spent time with Peter, becoming even more determined to serve his Savior.
At the Council of Jerusalem, in the year 49, Paul successfully argued against the widespread belief that non-Jews seeking to become Christians would first have to convert to Judaism, which means comply with Mosaic Law, be circumcised and observe all Jewish dietary customs. Because of Paul’s persuasion, Christianity would become even more widespread.
Like the most fervent convert, Paul simply couldn’t get enough of Christ. With faith and courage inflamed by the Holy Spirit, Paul would spend the rest of his life going from country to country and town to town proclaiming Jesus as the Messiah, organizing and encouraging Christians to be resolute followers of Jesus, and nonbelievers to open their hearts to Christ, repent and be baptized. He would become known as the Apostle of the Gentiles (non-Jews) and his travels, letters and teaching changed the world.
Often in trouble, Paul was confronted, jailed (though angels rescued him), physically abused and repeatedly endangered and harassed for preaching the message he previously attacked. Despite all the dangers he encountered, Paul never faltered or failed his God. In the end, he would be taken to Rome as a prisoner and be beheaded for his teachings.
Why Paul?
Why would Jesus select someone like Paul? There were certainly other devoted followers of Jesus available in those early days of the Church — followers ready to give their lives to proclaim Jesus Christ as savior of the world. But Jesus picked and converted this Pharisee, known as Saul, saying, “This man is to Me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel” (Acts 9:15). God selected this man who had a strong hatred of all Jesus stands for, a man who went into the houses of Christians and “dragging out men and women,” then “handed them over for imprisonment” (Acts 8:3). He admits that many were killed because of him and that he even provoked them to blaspheme: “Many of the saints did I shut up in prison, having received authority of the chief priests: and when they were put to death, I brought the sentence. And oftentimes punishing them, in every synagogue, I compelled them to blaspheme” (Acts 26:10-11). This man became God’s chosen instrument to spread the message of Jesus across the Middle East and parts of Europe. Certainly, our Lord works in mysterious ways.
Paul is Our Consolation
Coming back to ourselves now―we can find an enormous consolation in the conversion of St. Paul. Here was a Pharisee, a zealous persecutor of Christians, with blood on his hands―and yet God spared him and converted him. The same is true for many other great sinners who became great saints― St. Mary Magalen, St. Dismas the Good Thief on Calvary, St. Augustine, St. John of God, and many more. They went from being great sinners to being great saints. Remember―it is ONLY saints that enter Heaven. Therefore you need to become a saint. Yet we are all sinners―we sin many times a day. “For a just man shall fall seven times and shall rise again: but the wicked shall fall down into evil!” (Proverbs 24:16). We are all sinners and so we are all in need of conversion: “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Let us then take consolation at the conversion of these sinners and let us resolve to make SERIOUS EFFORTS not to be among the vast majority of Catholics who end up being damned because they refused or neglected to make the efforts necessary to obtain Heaven. As St. Paul himself writes: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain! And every one that strives for the mastery, refrains himself from all things―and they, indeed, that they may receive a corruptible crown―but we an incorruptible one! I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection―lest, perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
“The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with worldly things; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). “For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
► St. Mary Magdalen: Possessed by Seven Devils & Adulteress
Around the time of Our Lord, we think of St. Mary Magdalen, who was possessed by seven devils and caught in adultery. The notion of Mary Magdalene being a repentant sinner, can be traced at least as far back as St. Ephraim the Syrian, in the fourth century, and became the generally accepted view in Western Christianity after the homily of Pope Gregory I (“Gregory the Great”) in about 591. We would find it difficult to find a greater sinner than Mary Magdalen. She was possessed by seven devils and her life of sin was no secret, but well-known by the community. Yet after all that, Holy Scripture tells us: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). It does not say: “Jesus loved Martha and Lazarus, and only tolerated or put up with Mary.” No! St. John says “Jesus loved … Mary!” The New Testament God is no different from the Old Testament God: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “Go then and learn what this meaneth, ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). “They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill” (Matthew 9:12). She ended up being tremendously devoted to both Our Lord and Our Lady.
► St. Dismas: Robber & Thief
St. Dismas (died around 33 AD) ― the so-called “Good Thief” ― isn’t a saint in the usual or strict sense—for he was never canonized by the Church—but rather a saint by local tradition instead. As the story goes, Dismas asked for Jesus Christ to remember him while he was being crucified next to him. A clue to his past lies in Dismas’ patronage, for he is the patron saint of reformed thieves. Tradition has it that he was converted on Calvary by the prayers of Our Lady.
► St. Callixtus: Thief & Embezzler
St. Callixtus of Rome (died 222) lived a life of many sins before being taken under the wing of Victor I, a second century pope. Callixtus was a Roman slave whose petty theft and reckless investments resulted in being sentenced to forced labor in the mines of Sardinia. He embezzled money and started a public riot, amongst other criminal affairs, but left that all behind early in the third century when he reformed. Released from the mines by a general pardon, he returned to Rome where Pope St. Victor I gradually brought him to repentance. . He was ordained a priest, served as administrator of one of the catacombs, and ultimately Callixtus went on to become a pope himself, but died a martyr shortly thereafter. His Roman catacombs can be toured today.
► St. Hippolytus: Heretic & First Antipope
Hippolytus (170-235) was an arrogant, unforgiving man who believed that Christians guilty of mortal sin should be expelled from the Church and never readmitted. In his pride, Hippolytus permitted his followers to elect him as the Church’s first anti-pope. Inspired by the true pope’s holiness, Hippolytus eventually repented of his own sin and was reconciled to the Catholic Church.
► St. Moses the Black: Cut-throat & Gang Leader
Moses (330-405) was chief of a violent gang of bandits. Fleeing from law enforcement, he took refuge in a monastery. Moses was inspired by the monk’s example and converted. He took a vow never to raise his hand against another human being, even in self-defense. After years of overcoming temptation, Moses was killed by Berber raiders.
► St. Mary of Egypt: Seductress & Whore
At age 12 Mary (344-421) ran away from home to Alexandria, the most exciting city in the Roman Empire. She became an accomplished seductress, who took special pleasure in corrupting innocent young men. Mary was an expert seductress who ensnared any man who caught her eye. Once, on a whim, she joined a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. By the time the ship reached its destination, Mary had seduced the entire crew and all of the pilgrims. She traveled to Jerusalem where a supernatural force prevented her from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. In Jerusalem she realized the enormity of her sins Filled with remorse, Mary sought the Mother of God’s intercession and made a good confession. In penance, Mary lived out her conversion as a hermit, alone in the Jordanian desert.
► St. Augustine: Fornicator and Worldling
Augustine (354-430) was son of Patricius, a well-to-do pagan, whose ideal of life was to get the most out of it he could, without being too particular as to the means. Patricius, at the age of forty, had married Monica, a girl of seventeen, a Christian on both her father’s and her mother’s side. This marriage alone would seem to imply a certain laxity of Faith in the family; the fact that Monica owed most of her religious and moral training to an old nurse confirms it. Three children were born to them, Augustine the first, but none of them were baptized. Augustine grew up among pagan children, apparently in a pagan school, and his morals from the first were no better than theirs. He could steal, he could cheat, he could lie with the best of them; to do these things cleverly and successfully was a mark of talent rather than of vice. Patricius saw that Augustine had an excellent mind and a wonderful disposition for learning, and with a view to his future preferment, spared nothing to breed him up a scholar. He was sent to Madaura, a prosperous city thirty miles away.
Here he was his own master; the longing he had always had to do just what he liked, without hindrance from anyone, was allowed free scope. He fell also into vanity, pleasing himself with the pride of surpassing his companions at play, and loving to have his ears scratched with vain praises. A worse curiosity drew him to the dangerous entertainments of those who were older—public shows, plays, and other diversions of the theatre. The most fatal sin was the vice of impurity, into which he fell in the sixteenth year of his age. He was led into this by reading impure plays in Terence, by sloth, by frequenting stage entertainments, and by bad company and example. The consequences were inevitable. Augustine came home from Madaura addicted to the lowest vices. His father who looked upon the same excess as a proof of manhood. The next step in Augustine’s career was to Carthage― the center of learning and pleasure in North Africa, and Augustine craved for both. There he lived, from the age of seventeen, learning and loving as he wished, for there was no one to check or guide him. “I went to Carthage,” he wrote later, “where shameful love bubbled round me like boiling oil.” Augustine plunged himself headlong into the filth of impurity. At about the age of 17, Augustine began an affair with a young woman in Carthage. Though his mother wanted him to marry a person of his class, the woman remained his lover for over fifteen years and gave birth to his son Adeodatus (372–388). In 385, Augustine ended his relationship with his lover in order to prepare himself to marry a ten-year-old heiress. He had to wait for two years because the legal age of marriage for women was twelve. By the time he was able to marry her, however, he had decided instead to become a priest.
► St. Pelagia: Dancer & Courtesan
The beautiful, teenage Saint Pelagia (4th/5th century) would have been every parent’s nightmare. As legend has it, she was a dancer and courtesan (prostitute) by her early teens. Pelagia’s conversion occurred all of a sudden, following a chance encounter with Saint Nonnus, the bishop of Edessa. The young girl was baptized, gave away her possessions to the poor and lived as a hermit for the rest of her life.
► St. Olga: Murderess
When a neighboring tribe assassinated her husband, Olga (879-969), princess of Kiev, went to war. Olga slaughtered her husband’s murderer and she massacred virtually the entire tribe; the few who did survive, she sold into slavery. Years later, while in Constantinople, to make an alliance with the emperor, Olga visited a church, encountered the splendor and beauty of Christianity and was in awe of the magnificence of the liturgy. She took instruction, was baptized and returned to Kiev, zealous to convert her people. Olga tried very hard to convert her people, but hardly anyone would listen to her. Even her family rejected Christianity. Olga died believing that as a missionary, she was a failure. Yet, she planted a seed of Faith which flourished. Today, Catholic and Orthodox Christians of Russia and Ukraine hail her as “Equal to the Apostles.”
► St. Vladimir: Murderer and Rapist
Olga’s grandson Vladimir (956-1015) became prince of Kiev by murdering his older half-brother. Then he raped his sister-in-law and added her to his harem of several hundred women. He built a new temple to all the gods; and sacrificed a father and his son to the false gods. When the emperor at Constantinople sought his help in putting down a rebellion, Vladimir demanded as his reward the emperor’s sister as his wife (actually, the unhappy woman would be Vladimir’s eighth wife). The emperor countered that Vladimir must convert to Christianity. In order to marry the emperor’s sister, Vladimir accepted Christian baptism. Everyone suspected that once he was back in Kiev, Vladimir would return to his old ways, but the grace of baptism changed him. His zeal for the Faith knew no limits and his efforts helped spread Christianity across Russia and Ukraine. He dismissed his extra wives and his harem, tore down the pagan temple, and launched a vigorous campaign to convert his people. The Faith his grandmother, Olga (see above) planted flourished under Vladimir.
► St. Margaret of Cortona: Rich Man’s Mistress
Margaret (1247-1297) was only twelve when she became Arsenio’s mistress. After years of cohabitation, she realized her sins when she discovered Arsenio’s murdered corpse. Full of the grace of conversion and determined to start a new life, she went to Cortona where the Franciscans ministered to penitent sinners. There, Margaret pursued a life of prayer, penance, and good works.
► St. Angela of Foligno: Worldly and Flirtatious
Angela (1248-1309) was beautiful, wealthy, and vain. As a rich man’s wife she wallowed in luxury. Her passions were expensive clothes and flashy jewels, extravagant meals and rare wines. She dressed and acted in ways that would provoke envy among women and sexual desire among men. When she was not indulging herself, she spent hours gossiping with her friends and maligning her neighbors. In her autobiography Angela discloses that in 1285 she did something so bad that for the first time in her life she began to live in fear of Hell. Her biographers speculate that Angela committed adultery, and given the intensity of her guilt and shame that seems likely. Near despair, she prayed to St. Francis of Assisi to help her. As Angela prayed the saint appeared to her. “Sister,” St. Francis said, “if you would have asked me sooner I would have complied with your request sooner. Nonetheless, your request is granted.” That same day Angela offered a sincere confession to a priest. As she stepped from the shadowy interior of the church into the bright sunlight of the piazza, Angela resolved to begin a new life. She sold her fine clothes and jewels to relieve the suffering of Foligno’s poor. After the death of her husband, she gave away all her wealth, associated herself with the Franciscans, and with a handful of other holy women dedicated herself to tending the poor and the sick. Blessed Angela’s life teaches us a timeless lesson about our weakness and God’s mercy. All that he requires is that we repent and make a sincere effort to do better in the future.
► St. Thomas Becket: Rich and Cruel
As chancellor of England under King Henry II, Thomas Becket (1118-1170) became obscenely wealthy. His wardrobe was larger and more expensive than the king’s. He even had his own private navy. In spite of all his wealth, Becket was cold-hearted and never gave anything to the poor. All that changed after Becket was consecrated archbishop of Canterbury. He gave away all his possessions. He welcomed the poor at his table. And he became a champion of the independence of the Church, for which he was murdered in his own cathedral by four of King Henry’s knights.
► St. Philip Howard: Playboy and Gambler
Son of one of the wealthiest noble families in England, Philip Howard (1557-1595) could afford any pleasure he liked — and he liked them all. At court he was a notorious playboy, gambler and devoted to vanity. He ran up enormous debts, then sold off his wife’s property to settle them. On one occasion he said publicly that he did not really consider himself to be married. In 1581, he joined other members of the court at the Tower of London, to see a debate between several Anglican ministers and a prisoner, the Jesuit priest, St. Edmund Campion. Although the ministers were armed with books and assistants, Father Campion was alone and had only his memory to rely on, yet he did so well in the debate, that the government canceled the debate before a verdict could be given. Inspired by Father Campion, Howard reconciled with his wife, and they both returned to the Catholic Faith. When they tried to leave the country secretly for the Continent of Europe, where they could practice Catholicism freely, they were stopped and Howard was imprisoned in the Tower of London. He died there 10 years later.
► St. Camillus of Lellis: Drinker, Gambler & Whore-Lover
Camillus de Lellis (1550-1614) was born in Italy. A hot-tempered, troublesome child, he joined the army when he was 16, though his aggressive behavior only grew after that. Camillus was a mercenary soldier with all the worst habits— drinking, gambling, swearing, chasing prostitutes. Years of sinful acts followed before his wholehearted reform in 1575. When his father called for a priest on his deathbed, Camillus began to rethink his life. Guided by St. Philip Neri, his spiritual director, Camillus turned away from sin, dedicated himself to the sick, and formed a religious congregation for nursing the poor.
Are You Ready to Convert?
The word “conversion” comes from the Latin verb “convertere” which literally means “to turn around” in the sense of turning around on our path of sin and going back to God. Associated meanings of the verb “convertere” include “to turn back/to change/alter/transform.” We are all in need of conversion because we are all sinners. “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). Every time we sin―whether venially or mortally―we stray from the path to God. Therefore, we need to turn around, turn back, change and transform ourselves by converting, repenting and repairing the damage done.
The saints and spiritual masters speak of three chief stages that everyone must pass through before they can enter Heaven. In his book, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life, the famous Thomistic theologian, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, outlines the classic Catholic traditions on these three stages of the spiritual life. He explains the three stages of the spiritual life as being (1) the Purgative Way; (2) the Illuminative Way; and (3) the Unitive Way. He shows the transitions or conversions that take place in passing from one stage to another. One cannot become a saint without knowing the way to sanctity, the pitfalls on the way, the common mistakes that are made, and drawing on the experience of Saints who have gone before. These three stages or three conversions, cover the entire spectrum of the spiritual life― from living in habitual mortal sin to the highest state of holiness. It is ONLY sanctity that gains entry into Heaven―nothing less than that will do. Failure to reach sanctity in this life results in being sent to one of two places―Purgatory or Hell. The fires and sufferings of Purgatory finish off the work of sanctity that we neglected here on Earth; Hell perpetually punishes those who died in a state of mortal sin (which is a total rejection of sanctity―being its very opposite).
In his book, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange very clearly states this obligation of attaining sanctity while still on Earth: “The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, more profound than artistic or literary life, more profound than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not. This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation.
“There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
In the next article, we will present a summary and simplification of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange’s explanation of the three conversions of the spiritual life. Why this subject is rarely or never taught―even in seminaries―is truly astounding and perplexing. What chance has someone of getting to Heaven if they are not shown the way, nor given a road-map for the journey? If this is neglected, then it is hardly surprising that most Catholic souls end up in Hell!
“There is the way by which I will show him the salvation of God” (Psalm 49:23). “The Lord went before them to show the way … that He might be the guide of their journey … to show them the way by which they should go.” (Exodus 13:21; 2 Esdras 9:19). “Let the Lord thy God show us the way by which we may walk, and the things that we must do” (Jeremias 42:3). “Be zealous for the better gifts. And I show unto you yet a more excellent way!” (1 Corinthians 12:31). “A curse if you obey not the commandments of the Lord your God, but revolt from the way which now I show you, and walk after strange gods which you know not!” (Deuteronomy 11:28).
Today, January 25th, we celebrate the conversion of St. Paul. When will we celebrate our own conversion? When will we celebrate the conversion of our family, relatives and friends? You will probably be angered by such a presumptuous statement and say: “I have no need of conversion! I am already a Catholic!” Yet even Catholics are in need of a conversion―or, more correctly, they are in need of several repeated conversions before they will be among the few Catholic souls that are saved! Before we look at the need of our own conversion, let us first of all look at the conversion of Saul to the Faith, before eventually becoming St. Paul and no longer Saul!
What Holy Scripture Tells Us
There are several places in Holy Scripture that deal with St. Paul (or Saul as he was called before his conversion). Let us first of all have a look at what they say.
First of all, in chapter 9 of the Acts of the Apostles, we read:
“And Saul, as yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest, and asked of him letters to Damascus, to the synagogues: that if he found any men and women of this way, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.
“And as he went on his journey, it came to pass that he drew nigh to Damascus; and suddenly a light from heaven shined round about him. And falling on the ground, he heard a voice saying to him: ‘Saul! Saul! Why persecutest thou Me?’ Saul said: ‘Who art Thou, Lord?’
And he answered: ‘I am Jesus whom thou persecutes! It is hard for thee to kick against the goad!’
And he, trembling and astonished, said: ‘Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?’
And the Lord said to him: ‘Arise, and go into the city, and there it shall be told thee what thou must do!’
“Now the men who went in company with him, stood amazed, hearing indeed a voice, but seeing no man. And Saul arose from the ground; and when his eyes were opened, he saw nothing. But they leading him by the hands, brought him to Damascus. [9] And he was there three days, without sight, and he did neither eat nor drink.
“Now there was a certain disciple at Damascus, named Ananias. And the Lord said to him in a vision: ‘Ananias!’
And he said: ‘Behold I am here, Lord!’
And the Lord said to him: ‘Arise, and go into the street that is called Strait, and seek in the house of Judas, one named Saul of Tarsus. For behold he prayeth!’
And Ananias saw a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hands upon him, that he might receive his sight.
But Ananias answered: ‘Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to thy saints in Jerusalem. And here he hath authority from the chief priests to bind all that invoke Thy Name!’
And the Lord said to him: ‘Go thy way! For this man is to me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel! For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!’
“And Ananias went his way, and entered into the house. And laying his hands upon him, he said: ‘Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus hath sent me, He that appeared to thee in the way as thou camest; that thou mayest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost!’
And immediately there fell from his eyes as it were scales, and he received his sight; and rising up, he was baptized. And when he had taken meat, he was strengthened. And he was with the disciples that were at Damascus, for some days.
“And immediately he preached Jesus in the synagogues, that He is the Son of God.
And all that heard him, were astonished, and said: ‘Is not this he who persecuted in Jerusalem those that called upon this Name: and came here for that intent, that he might carry them bound to the chief priests?’
But Saul increased much more in strength, and confounded the Jews who dwelt at Damascus, affirming that this is the Christ.
“And when many days were passed, the Jews consulted together to kill him. But their laying in wait was made known to Saul. And they watched the gates also day and night, that they might kill him. But the disciples taking him in the night, conveyed him away by the wall, letting him down in a basket.
“And when he was come into Jerusalem, he tried to join himself to the disciples; and they all were afraid of him, not believing that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him, and brought him to the Apostles, and told them how he had seen the Lord, and that He had spoken to him; and how in Damascus he had dealt confidently in the Name of Jesus.
“And he was with them coming in and going out in Jerusalem, and dealing confidently in the name of the Lord. He spoke also to the Gentiles, and disputed with the Greeks; but they sought to kill him. Which when the brethren had known, they brought him down to Caesarea, and sent him away to Tarsus.” (Acts 9:1-20).
St. Paul’s Personal Account of His Conversion
In various places in the New Testament, St. Paul speaks of his past life, his persecution of the Church and of his conversion to the Faith, also recounting the tremendous sufferings he underwent after his conversion.
“You have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews' religion: how that, beyond measure, I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it. And I made progress in the Jews’ religion above many of my equals in my own nation, being more abundantly zealous for the traditions of my fathers” (Galatians 1:13-14).
“I indeed did formerly think, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. Which also I did at Jerusalem, and many of the saints did I shut up in prison, having received authority of the chief priests: and when they were put to death, I brought the sentence. And oftentimes punishing them, in every synagogue, I compelled them to blaspheme: and being yet more mad against them, I persecuted them even unto foreign cities. Whereupon when I was going to Damascus with authority and permission of the chief priest. At midday, I saw, in the way, a light from heaven above the brightness of the sun, shining round about me, and them that were in company with me. And when we were all fallen down on the ground, I heard a voice speaking to me in the Hebrew tongue: ‘Saul! Saul!’ Why persecutest thou Me? It is hard for thee to kick against the goad!’
And I said: ‘Who art Thou, Lord?’
And the Lord answered: ‘I am Jesus whom thou persecutest! But rise up, and stand upon thy feet! For to this end have I appeared to thee, that I may make thee a minister and a witness of those things which thou hast seen, and of those things wherein I will appear to thee, delivering thee from the people, and from the nations, unto which now I send thee: to open their eyes, that they may be converted from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and a lot among the saints, by the Faith that is in Me!’” (Acts 26:9-18).
In the 22nd chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, we can read St. Paul’s personal account of his conversion on the road to Damascus:
“Men, brethren, and fathers, hear ye the account which I now give unto you! … I am a Jew, born at Tarsus in Cilicia, but brought up in this city, at the feet of Gamaliel, taught according to the truth of the law of the fathers, zealous for the law, as also all you are this day―who persecuted this way unto death, binding and delivering into prisons both men and women. As the high priest doth bear me witness, and all the ancients, from whom also receiving letters to the brethren, I went to Damascus, that I might bring them bound from thence to Jerusalem to be punished.
“And it came to pass, as I was going, and drawing nigh to Damascus at midday, that suddenly from heaven there shone round about me a great light: and falling on the ground, I heard a voice saying to me: ‘Saul! Saul! Why persecutest thou Me?’
And I answered: ‘Who art thou, Lord?’ And He said to me: ‘I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutes!’
And they that were with me, saw indeed the light, but they heard not the voice of him that spoke with me.
And I said: ‘What shall I do, Lord?’
And the Lord said to me: ‘Arise, and go to Damascus; and there it shall be told thee of all things that thou must do!’
“And whereas I did not see for the brightness of that light, being led by the hand by my companions, I came to Damascus. And one Ananias, a man according to the law, having testimony of all the Jews who dwelt there, coming to me, and standing by me, said to me: ‘Brother Saul, look up!’
And I the same hour looked upon him.
But he said: ‘The God of our fathers hath preordained thee that thou shouldst know His will, and see the Just One, and shouldst hear the voice from His mouth. For thou shalt be his witness to all men, of those things which thou hast seen and heard. And now why tarriest thou? Rise up, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, invoking His Name!’”
Our Lord is True to His Word and Makes Paul Suffer
Paul had persecuted Christians—now it Paul that would be persecuted. The persecutor becomes the persecuted. There is a lesson for us there! It is quite simply the fulfilment of Holy Scripture, which warns: “For with what judgment you judge, you shall be judged: and with what measure you give, it shall be measured to you again” (Matthew 7:2). “In what measure you shall give, it shall be measured to you again, and more shall be given to you!” (Mark 4:24). “For with the same measure that you shall give to others, it shall be measured to you again” (Luke 6:38).
In speaking of Paul to Ananias, Our Lord foretold that Paul would have to suffer much: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:16). Later, St. Paul’s own words show the truth of that prophecy:
“I am more; in many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Besides those things which are without: there is my daily instance, the solicitude for all the churches!” (2 Corinthians 11:23-28).
St. John Chrysostom on St. Paul
In his homily on St. Paul of Tarsus, a fellow and later saint, St. John Chrysostom states:
“Paul, more than anyone else, has shown us what man really is, and in what our nobility consists, and of what virtue this particular animal is capable. Each day he aimed ever higher; each day he rose up with greater ardor and faced with new eagerness the dangers that threatened him. He summed up his attitude in the words: I forget what is behind me and push on to what lies ahead [Philippians 4:13]. When he saw death imminent, he bade others share his joy: Rejoice and be glad with me! [cf. Philippians 2:18]. And when danger, injustice and abuse threatened, he said: I am content with weakness, mistreatment and persecution [cf .2 Corinthians 12:10]. These he called the weapons of righteousness, thus telling us that he derived immense profit from them.
“Thus, amid the traps set for him by his enemies, with exultant heart he turned their every attack into a victory for himself; constantly beaten, abused and cursed, he boasted of it as though he were celebrating a triumphal procession and taking trophies home, and offered thanks to God for it all: Thanks be to God who is always victorious in us! [cf. 1 Corinthians 15:57]. This is why he was far more eager for the shameful abuse that his zeal in preaching brought upon him than we are for the most pleasing honors, more eager for death than we are for life, for poverty than we are for wealth; he yearned for toil far more than others yearn for rest after toil. The one thing he feared, indeed dreaded, was to offend God; nothing else could sway him. Therefore, the only thing he really wanted was always to please God.
“The most important thing of all to him, however, was that he knew himself to be loved by Christ. Enjoying this love, he considered himself happier than anyone else; were he without it, it would be no satisfaction to be the friend of principalities and powers. He preferred to be thus loved and be the least of all, or even to be among the damned, than to be without that love and be among the great and honored.
“To be separated from that love was, in his eyes, the greatest and most extraordinary of torments; the pain of that loss would alone have been hell, and endless, unbearable torture.
“So too, in being loved by Christ he thought of himself as possessing life, the world, the angels, present and future, the kingdom, the promise and countless blessings. Apart from that love nothing saddened or delighted him; for nothing earthly did he regard as bitter or sweet.
“Paul set no store by the things that fill our visible world, any more than a man sets value on the withered grass of the field. As for tyrannical rulers or the people enraged against him, he paid them no more heed than gnats.
“Death itself and pain and whatever torments might come were but child’s play to him, provided that thereby he might bear some burden for the sake of Christ.” (Homily of St. John Chrysostom on St. Paul).
A Few Thoughts
Saul, which is Paul’s given name, was born into a Jewish family in Tarsus (Turkey) around the year 8 AD. He was also a Roman citizen, a fact that would play a large role later in his life. Schooled as a Pharisee in the famous school of Gamaliel, he was a tent maker by trade, but was most noted for his hatred of Christians. He believed the teachings of Jesus violated Mosaic Law and zealously harassed, and even jailed, anyone who followed those teachings.
The first Scriptural mention of Saul is found in Acts 7:58, as he is a bystander watching his fellow Jews stone St. Stephen to death. An aggressive persecutor of Christians in Jerusalem, Saul sought and received permission from the high priest to proceed to Damascus for the purpose of imprisoning more followers of Christ.
Most Christians know the story of what happened on the Damascus road: the bright light that knocked Saul down, the voice of Jesus, Saul’s blindness and immediate response to the calling of Christ. In the manner of the first Apostles who, when beckoned by Christ, gave up their lifestyles to follow him, Saul too doesn’t hesitate. He says yes, just as the Blessed Mother said yes. Blinded from his encounter with Jesus, he allowed himself to be led into Damascus where he was baptized, after which he set out to spread the Gospel of Jesus. Paul would repeat the story of his conversion again and again throughout his life, including to the different magistrates and kings who judged his activities. The book of Acts, in three places, tells the story of Saul’s experience on the Damascus road.
The Impact of His Conversion
Saul’s sudden change confused those around him, because he was known as one who hated Christians, who went about seeking them out to eliminate those individuals he genuinely considered as breaking Jewish law. Suddenly he was transformed, from despising the followers of Jesus, into fervently espousing the Gospel of that same Jesus. No one could have anticipated this conversion; it is one of the great miracles of mankind. Even in his day, many could not believe what had happened.
After his baptism, Saul, who would be called Paul in the 13th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, went to the desert of Arabia to pray and contemplate his calling. He then returned to Damascus and into the synagogue, where he attested to the divinity of Jesus. While he had no Christian training, God infused words in his heart and in his mouth.
One sentence determined his theology: “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting” (Acts 9:5b). Jesus was mysteriously identified with people—the loving group of people Saul had been running down like criminals. Jesus, he saw, was the mysterious fulfillment of all he had been blindly pursuing.
From then on, his only work was to “present everyone perfect in Christ. For this I labor and struggle, in accord with the exercise of his power working within me” (Colossians 1:28-29). “For our Gospel did not come to you in word alone, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and [with] much conviction” (1 Thessalonians 1:5).
Paul’s life became a tireless proclaiming and living out of the message of the cross―whereby Christians die baptismally to sin and are buried with Christ; they are dead to all that is sinful and unredeemed in the world. They are made into a new creation, already sharing Christ’s victory and someday to rise from the dead like him. Through this risen Christ the Father pours out the Spirit on them, making them completely new.
The Jews in Damascus would eventually plot against him and he had once plotted against the Christians. The threat grew so severe that other Christians assisted Paul in an escape that included lowering him over the city walls in a basket. This was only the beginning of the threats and attacks on Paul. Henceforth, he was often regarded as a social undesirable, an agitator and a leader of a dangerous sect.
From Damascus, he traveled to Jerusalem, where his reputation as a persecutor of Christians preceded him and Christians there were unsure and confounded by his appearance. Here he met and spent time with Peter, becoming even more determined to serve his Savior.
At the Council of Jerusalem, in the year 49, Paul successfully argued against the widespread belief that non-Jews seeking to become Christians would first have to convert to Judaism, which means comply with Mosaic Law, be circumcised and observe all Jewish dietary customs. Because of Paul’s persuasion, Christianity would become even more widespread.
Like the most fervent convert, Paul simply couldn’t get enough of Christ. With faith and courage inflamed by the Holy Spirit, Paul would spend the rest of his life going from country to country and town to town proclaiming Jesus as the Messiah, organizing and encouraging Christians to be resolute followers of Jesus, and nonbelievers to open their hearts to Christ, repent and be baptized. He would become known as the Apostle of the Gentiles (non-Jews) and his travels, letters and teaching changed the world.
Often in trouble, Paul was confronted, jailed (though angels rescued him), physically abused and repeatedly endangered and harassed for preaching the message he previously attacked. Despite all the dangers he encountered, Paul never faltered or failed his God. In the end, he would be taken to Rome as a prisoner and be beheaded for his teachings.
Why Paul?
Why would Jesus select someone like Paul? There were certainly other devoted followers of Jesus available in those early days of the Church — followers ready to give their lives to proclaim Jesus Christ as savior of the world. But Jesus picked and converted this Pharisee, known as Saul, saying, “This man is to Me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel” (Acts 9:15). God selected this man who had a strong hatred of all Jesus stands for, a man who went into the houses of Christians and “dragging out men and women,” then “handed them over for imprisonment” (Acts 8:3). He admits that many were killed because of him and that he even provoked them to blaspheme: “Many of the saints did I shut up in prison, having received authority of the chief priests: and when they were put to death, I brought the sentence. And oftentimes punishing them, in every synagogue, I compelled them to blaspheme” (Acts 26:10-11). This man became God’s chosen instrument to spread the message of Jesus across the Middle East and parts of Europe. Certainly, our Lord works in mysterious ways.
Paul is Our Consolation
Coming back to ourselves now―we can find an enormous consolation in the conversion of St. Paul. Here was a Pharisee, a zealous persecutor of Christians, with blood on his hands―and yet God spared him and converted him. The same is true for many other great sinners who became great saints― St. Mary Magalen, St. Dismas the Good Thief on Calvary, St. Augustine, St. John of God, and many more. They went from being great sinners to being great saints. Remember―it is ONLY saints that enter Heaven. Therefore you need to become a saint. Yet we are all sinners―we sin many times a day. “For a just man shall fall seven times and shall rise again: but the wicked shall fall down into evil!” (Proverbs 24:16). We are all sinners and so we are all in need of conversion: “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Let us then take consolation at the conversion of these sinners and let us resolve to make SERIOUS EFFORTS not to be among the vast majority of Catholics who end up being damned because they refused or neglected to make the efforts necessary to obtain Heaven. As St. Paul himself writes: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain! And every one that strives for the mastery, refrains himself from all things―and they, indeed, that they may receive a corruptible crown―but we an incorruptible one! I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection―lest, perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
“The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with worldly things; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). “For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
► St. Mary Magdalen: Possessed by Seven Devils & Adulteress
Around the time of Our Lord, we think of St. Mary Magdalen, who was possessed by seven devils and caught in adultery. The notion of Mary Magdalene being a repentant sinner, can be traced at least as far back as St. Ephraim the Syrian, in the fourth century, and became the generally accepted view in Western Christianity after the homily of Pope Gregory I (“Gregory the Great”) in about 591. We would find it difficult to find a greater sinner than Mary Magdalen. She was possessed by seven devils and her life of sin was no secret, but well-known by the community. Yet after all that, Holy Scripture tells us: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). It does not say: “Jesus loved Martha and Lazarus, and only tolerated or put up with Mary.” No! St. John says “Jesus loved … Mary!” The New Testament God is no different from the Old Testament God: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “Go then and learn what this meaneth, ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). “They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill” (Matthew 9:12). She ended up being tremendously devoted to both Our Lord and Our Lady.
► St. Dismas: Robber & Thief
St. Dismas (died around 33 AD) ― the so-called “Good Thief” ― isn’t a saint in the usual or strict sense—for he was never canonized by the Church—but rather a saint by local tradition instead. As the story goes, Dismas asked for Jesus Christ to remember him while he was being crucified next to him. A clue to his past lies in Dismas’ patronage, for he is the patron saint of reformed thieves. Tradition has it that he was converted on Calvary by the prayers of Our Lady.
► St. Callixtus: Thief & Embezzler
St. Callixtus of Rome (died 222) lived a life of many sins before being taken under the wing of Victor I, a second century pope. Callixtus was a Roman slave whose petty theft and reckless investments resulted in being sentenced to forced labor in the mines of Sardinia. He embezzled money and started a public riot, amongst other criminal affairs, but left that all behind early in the third century when he reformed. Released from the mines by a general pardon, he returned to Rome where Pope St. Victor I gradually brought him to repentance. . He was ordained a priest, served as administrator of one of the catacombs, and ultimately Callixtus went on to become a pope himself, but died a martyr shortly thereafter. His Roman catacombs can be toured today.
► St. Hippolytus: Heretic & First Antipope
Hippolytus (170-235) was an arrogant, unforgiving man who believed that Christians guilty of mortal sin should be expelled from the Church and never readmitted. In his pride, Hippolytus permitted his followers to elect him as the Church’s first anti-pope. Inspired by the true pope’s holiness, Hippolytus eventually repented of his own sin and was reconciled to the Catholic Church.
► St. Moses the Black: Cut-throat & Gang Leader
Moses (330-405) was chief of a violent gang of bandits. Fleeing from law enforcement, he took refuge in a monastery. Moses was inspired by the monk’s example and converted. He took a vow never to raise his hand against another human being, even in self-defense. After years of overcoming temptation, Moses was killed by Berber raiders.
► St. Mary of Egypt: Seductress & Whore
At age 12 Mary (344-421) ran away from home to Alexandria, the most exciting city in the Roman Empire. She became an accomplished seductress, who took special pleasure in corrupting innocent young men. Mary was an expert seductress who ensnared any man who caught her eye. Once, on a whim, she joined a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. By the time the ship reached its destination, Mary had seduced the entire crew and all of the pilgrims. She traveled to Jerusalem where a supernatural force prevented her from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. In Jerusalem she realized the enormity of her sins Filled with remorse, Mary sought the Mother of God’s intercession and made a good confession. In penance, Mary lived out her conversion as a hermit, alone in the Jordanian desert.
► St. Augustine: Fornicator and Worldling
Augustine (354-430) was son of Patricius, a well-to-do pagan, whose ideal of life was to get the most out of it he could, without being too particular as to the means. Patricius, at the age of forty, had married Monica, a girl of seventeen, a Christian on both her father’s and her mother’s side. This marriage alone would seem to imply a certain laxity of Faith in the family; the fact that Monica owed most of her religious and moral training to an old nurse confirms it. Three children were born to them, Augustine the first, but none of them were baptized. Augustine grew up among pagan children, apparently in a pagan school, and his morals from the first were no better than theirs. He could steal, he could cheat, he could lie with the best of them; to do these things cleverly and successfully was a mark of talent rather than of vice. Patricius saw that Augustine had an excellent mind and a wonderful disposition for learning, and with a view to his future preferment, spared nothing to breed him up a scholar. He was sent to Madaura, a prosperous city thirty miles away.
Here he was his own master; the longing he had always had to do just what he liked, without hindrance from anyone, was allowed free scope. He fell also into vanity, pleasing himself with the pride of surpassing his companions at play, and loving to have his ears scratched with vain praises. A worse curiosity drew him to the dangerous entertainments of those who were older—public shows, plays, and other diversions of the theatre. The most fatal sin was the vice of impurity, into which he fell in the sixteenth year of his age. He was led into this by reading impure plays in Terence, by sloth, by frequenting stage entertainments, and by bad company and example. The consequences were inevitable. Augustine came home from Madaura addicted to the lowest vices. His father who looked upon the same excess as a proof of manhood. The next step in Augustine’s career was to Carthage― the center of learning and pleasure in North Africa, and Augustine craved for both. There he lived, from the age of seventeen, learning and loving as he wished, for there was no one to check or guide him. “I went to Carthage,” he wrote later, “where shameful love bubbled round me like boiling oil.” Augustine plunged himself headlong into the filth of impurity. At about the age of 17, Augustine began an affair with a young woman in Carthage. Though his mother wanted him to marry a person of his class, the woman remained his lover for over fifteen years and gave birth to his son Adeodatus (372–388). In 385, Augustine ended his relationship with his lover in order to prepare himself to marry a ten-year-old heiress. He had to wait for two years because the legal age of marriage for women was twelve. By the time he was able to marry her, however, he had decided instead to become a priest.
► St. Pelagia: Dancer & Courtesan
The beautiful, teenage Saint Pelagia (4th/5th century) would have been every parent’s nightmare. As legend has it, she was a dancer and courtesan (prostitute) by her early teens. Pelagia’s conversion occurred all of a sudden, following a chance encounter with Saint Nonnus, the bishop of Edessa. The young girl was baptized, gave away her possessions to the poor and lived as a hermit for the rest of her life.
► St. Olga: Murderess
When a neighboring tribe assassinated her husband, Olga (879-969), princess of Kiev, went to war. Olga slaughtered her husband’s murderer and she massacred virtually the entire tribe; the few who did survive, she sold into slavery. Years later, while in Constantinople, to make an alliance with the emperor, Olga visited a church, encountered the splendor and beauty of Christianity and was in awe of the magnificence of the liturgy. She took instruction, was baptized and returned to Kiev, zealous to convert her people. Olga tried very hard to convert her people, but hardly anyone would listen to her. Even her family rejected Christianity. Olga died believing that as a missionary, she was a failure. Yet, she planted a seed of Faith which flourished. Today, Catholic and Orthodox Christians of Russia and Ukraine hail her as “Equal to the Apostles.”
► St. Vladimir: Murderer and Rapist
Olga’s grandson Vladimir (956-1015) became prince of Kiev by murdering his older half-brother. Then he raped his sister-in-law and added her to his harem of several hundred women. He built a new temple to all the gods; and sacrificed a father and his son to the false gods. When the emperor at Constantinople sought his help in putting down a rebellion, Vladimir demanded as his reward the emperor’s sister as his wife (actually, the unhappy woman would be Vladimir’s eighth wife). The emperor countered that Vladimir must convert to Christianity. In order to marry the emperor’s sister, Vladimir accepted Christian baptism. Everyone suspected that once he was back in Kiev, Vladimir would return to his old ways, but the grace of baptism changed him. His zeal for the Faith knew no limits and his efforts helped spread Christianity across Russia and Ukraine. He dismissed his extra wives and his harem, tore down the pagan temple, and launched a vigorous campaign to convert his people. The Faith his grandmother, Olga (see above) planted flourished under Vladimir.
► St. Margaret of Cortona: Rich Man’s Mistress
Margaret (1247-1297) was only twelve when she became Arsenio’s mistress. After years of cohabitation, she realized her sins when she discovered Arsenio’s murdered corpse. Full of the grace of conversion and determined to start a new life, she went to Cortona where the Franciscans ministered to penitent sinners. There, Margaret pursued a life of prayer, penance, and good works.
► St. Angela of Foligno: Worldly and Flirtatious
Angela (1248-1309) was beautiful, wealthy, and vain. As a rich man’s wife she wallowed in luxury. Her passions were expensive clothes and flashy jewels, extravagant meals and rare wines. She dressed and acted in ways that would provoke envy among women and sexual desire among men. When she was not indulging herself, she spent hours gossiping with her friends and maligning her neighbors. In her autobiography Angela discloses that in 1285 she did something so bad that for the first time in her life she began to live in fear of Hell. Her biographers speculate that Angela committed adultery, and given the intensity of her guilt and shame that seems likely. Near despair, she prayed to St. Francis of Assisi to help her. As Angela prayed the saint appeared to her. “Sister,” St. Francis said, “if you would have asked me sooner I would have complied with your request sooner. Nonetheless, your request is granted.” That same day Angela offered a sincere confession to a priest. As she stepped from the shadowy interior of the church into the bright sunlight of the piazza, Angela resolved to begin a new life. She sold her fine clothes and jewels to relieve the suffering of Foligno’s poor. After the death of her husband, she gave away all her wealth, associated herself with the Franciscans, and with a handful of other holy women dedicated herself to tending the poor and the sick. Blessed Angela’s life teaches us a timeless lesson about our weakness and God’s mercy. All that he requires is that we repent and make a sincere effort to do better in the future.
► St. Thomas Becket: Rich and Cruel
As chancellor of England under King Henry II, Thomas Becket (1118-1170) became obscenely wealthy. His wardrobe was larger and more expensive than the king’s. He even had his own private navy. In spite of all his wealth, Becket was cold-hearted and never gave anything to the poor. All that changed after Becket was consecrated archbishop of Canterbury. He gave away all his possessions. He welcomed the poor at his table. And he became a champion of the independence of the Church, for which he was murdered in his own cathedral by four of King Henry’s knights.
► St. Philip Howard: Playboy and Gambler
Son of one of the wealthiest noble families in England, Philip Howard (1557-1595) could afford any pleasure he liked — and he liked them all. At court he was a notorious playboy, gambler and devoted to vanity. He ran up enormous debts, then sold off his wife’s property to settle them. On one occasion he said publicly that he did not really consider himself to be married. In 1581, he joined other members of the court at the Tower of London, to see a debate between several Anglican ministers and a prisoner, the Jesuit priest, St. Edmund Campion. Although the ministers were armed with books and assistants, Father Campion was alone and had only his memory to rely on, yet he did so well in the debate, that the government canceled the debate before a verdict could be given. Inspired by Father Campion, Howard reconciled with his wife, and they both returned to the Catholic Faith. When they tried to leave the country secretly for the Continent of Europe, where they could practice Catholicism freely, they were stopped and Howard was imprisoned in the Tower of London. He died there 10 years later.
► St. Camillus of Lellis: Drinker, Gambler & Whore-Lover
Camillus de Lellis (1550-1614) was born in Italy. A hot-tempered, troublesome child, he joined the army when he was 16, though his aggressive behavior only grew after that. Camillus was a mercenary soldier with all the worst habits— drinking, gambling, swearing, chasing prostitutes. Years of sinful acts followed before his wholehearted reform in 1575. When his father called for a priest on his deathbed, Camillus began to rethink his life. Guided by St. Philip Neri, his spiritual director, Camillus turned away from sin, dedicated himself to the sick, and formed a religious congregation for nursing the poor.
Are You Ready to Convert?
The word “conversion” comes from the Latin verb “convertere” which literally means “to turn around” in the sense of turning around on our path of sin and going back to God. Associated meanings of the verb “convertere” include “to turn back/to change/alter/transform.” We are all in need of conversion because we are all sinners. “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). Every time we sin―whether venially or mortally―we stray from the path to God. Therefore, we need to turn around, turn back, change and transform ourselves by converting, repenting and repairing the damage done.
The saints and spiritual masters speak of three chief stages that everyone must pass through before they can enter Heaven. In his book, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life, the famous Thomistic theologian, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, outlines the classic Catholic traditions on these three stages of the spiritual life. He explains the three stages of the spiritual life as being (1) the Purgative Way; (2) the Illuminative Way; and (3) the Unitive Way. He shows the transitions or conversions that take place in passing from one stage to another. One cannot become a saint without knowing the way to sanctity, the pitfalls on the way, the common mistakes that are made, and drawing on the experience of Saints who have gone before. These three stages or three conversions, cover the entire spectrum of the spiritual life― from living in habitual mortal sin to the highest state of holiness. It is ONLY sanctity that gains entry into Heaven―nothing less than that will do. Failure to reach sanctity in this life results in being sent to one of two places―Purgatory or Hell. The fires and sufferings of Purgatory finish off the work of sanctity that we neglected here on Earth; Hell perpetually punishes those who died in a state of mortal sin (which is a total rejection of sanctity―being its very opposite).
In his book, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange very clearly states this obligation of attaining sanctity while still on Earth: “The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, more profound than artistic or literary life, more profound than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not. This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation.
“There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
In the next article, we will present a summary and simplification of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange’s explanation of the three conversions of the spiritual life. Why this subject is rarely or never taught―even in seminaries―is truly astounding and perplexing. What chance has someone of getting to Heaven if they are not shown the way, nor given a road-map for the journey? If this is neglected, then it is hardly surprising that most Catholic souls end up in Hell!
“There is the way by which I will show him the salvation of God” (Psalm 49:23). “The Lord went before them to show the way … that He might be the guide of their journey … to show them the way by which they should go.” (Exodus 13:21; 2 Esdras 9:19). “Let the Lord thy God show us the way by which we may walk, and the things that we must do” (Jeremias 42:3). “Be zealous for the better gifts. And I show unto you yet a more excellent way!” (1 Corinthians 12:31). “A curse if you obey not the commandments of the Lord your God, but revolt from the way which now I show you, and walk after strange gods which you know not!” (Deuteronomy 11:28).
Article 24
Thursday & Friday, January 23rd & 24th
Going Down?
Thursday & Friday, January 23rd & 24th
Going Down?
A Life of Ups and Downs
Life is full of “ups and downs”―sometimes our spirits are up, at other times they are down. The idea of “raising up” is often a positive―whereas the idea of “casting down” is often a negative. Similarly with the material world―the temperature may go up or it may go down; our finances may go up or down; our health may go up or down; our body temperature may go up or down; our rating with others may go up or down; our house or car value may go up or down; our insurance premiums may go up or down; food and gas prices may go up or down, etc., etc.
Add into the mix the facts some “ups” are good and some are bad. Likewise, some “downs” may be good and others bad. For example, if our income goes up then it is good―but if our number of sins goes up then it is bad; if the number of prayers we say goes up then it is good―but if our level of laziness goes up then it is bad. Similarly with the “downs.” If our pride goes down then it is good―but if our virtues go down then it is bad; if our anger goes down then it is good―but if our patience goes down then it is bad. Our Lord also uses this “up and down” analogy when speaking of saved souls and damned souls. “O Capharnaum, shall you be exalted up to Heaven? You shall go down unto Hell!” (Matthew 11:23).
As the spiritual masters say: “There is no standing still in the spiritual life―we are either going forward or backward!” You could rephrase that and say: “There is no standing still in the spiritual life―we are either going up or down!” Sometimes the spiritual life is compared to a person rowing a boat or swimming upstream against the downstream current. If that person stops rowing, or stops swimming and starts treading water―then they will immediately be carried downstream by the downstream current of water. There is no standing still in the spiritual life―we are either going upstream or downstream. You could also compare the spiritual life to a rocket that is being launched into the skies―whereby the rocket fuel could be compared to sanctifying grace. If the rocket loses or runs out of its rocket fuel, then the rocket will plummet back down to the ground. If we lose sanctifying grace from our soul, then we are plummeting towards Hell. There is no standing still in the spiritual life―we are either shooting upward toward Heaven, or we are plummeting downward toward Hell.
In the Preface of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass we are told: “Lift up your hearts!” The ultimate “up” is Heaven. The ultimate “down” is Hell. That is why we speak about going up to Heaven or down to Hell. Our Lord ascended up into Heaven. Our Lady was assumed up into Heaven. Satan was cast down into Hell and seeks to drag our souls down into Hell. Scripture speaks of “Heaven above” (Deuteronomy 4:39) and “Hell below” (Isaias 14:9).
In this journey through life to the destination that God intended for everyone (Heaven) ― we are constantly experiencing ups and downs. Our Faith, Hope and Charity can increase or decrease. Our sufferings can increase or decrease. Our love of God can increase and decrease. Our desire for Heaven can increase or decrease. The sanctifying grace in our souls can increase or decrease. Our infatuation with the world can increase or decrease. Our sins can increase or decrease. Satan’s influence over us can increase or decrease.
Up the Mountain of God
Heaven and salvation is all about seeing and working upon the correct “ups” and seeing and avoiding the correct “downs”. Damnation occurs when we seek the wrong “ups” and avoid beneficial “downs.” We are meant to climb “up” “the mountain of God” (Exodus 3:1) … “Who shall ascend into the mountain of the Lord?” (Psalm 23:3) … “A mountain in which God is well pleased to dwell―for there the Lord shall dwell unto the end!” (Psalm 67:17) … “Exalt ye the Lord our God, and adore at his holy mountain!” (Psalm 98:9) … “In the last days the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it!” (Isaias 2:2) … “Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and He will teach us his ways, and we will walk in His paths!” (Isaias 2:3).
We see Our Lord use the mountain for many spiritual tasks.
● It was after night of prayer on a mountain that Jesus chose and called the men who would become His Apostles: “And it came to pass in those days, that He went out into a mountain to pray, and He passed the whole night in the prayer of God. And when day was come, he called unto him his disciples; and he chose twelve of them―whom also He named Apostles” (Luke 6:12-13). “And going up into a mountain, He called unto Him whom He would himself: and they came to Him. And He made that twelve should be with Him, and that He might send them to preach” (Mark 3:13). “And the eleven disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them” (Matthew 28:16).
● He ascended a mountain on some occasions when He wanted to pray: “And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain alone to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23). “And it came to pass in those days, that He went out into a mountain to pray, and he passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12).
● He would teach on the mountain, for example, the Sermon on the Mount: “And seeing the multitudes, Jesus went up into a mountain, and when He was set down, His disciples came unto Him, And opening His mouth, He taught them” (Matthew 5:1-2).
● Jesus miraculously healed on the mountain: “Jesus came near the Sea of Galilee. And going up into a mountain, he sat there and there came to him great multitudes, having with them the dumb, the blind, the lame, the maimed, and many others―and they cast them down at His feet, and He healed them” (Matthew 15:29-30).
● The Transfiguration of Jesus also took place on a mountain: “And after six days Jesus taketh unto Him Peter and James, and John his brother, and took them up into a high mountain apart. And He was transfigured before them” (Matthew 17:1-2).
● He would take refuge on the mountain when they tried to make Him king: “Jesus, therefore, when He knew that they would come to take Him by force, and make him king, fled again into the mountain Himself alone” (John 6:15).
● He would eventually die on a mountain―being crucified on Mount Calvary.
● Finally, He would ascend into Heaven from a mountain: “While they looked on, Jesus was raised up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. And while they were beholding Him going up to Heaven, behold two men stood by them in white garments, who said: ‘Ye men of Galilee, why stand you looking up to Heaven? This Jesus, Who is taken up from you into Heaven, shall so come, as you have seen Him going into Heaven!’ Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mountain that is called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem” (Acts 1:9-12).
Mountain Refuge
The mountain―being a symbol of God―is our destination and our refuge. The mountain is high above the lush valleys below, which symbolizes the world, its treasures and its pleasures. The world, despite the false face of fun that it seeks to portray, is, as we say in the prayer Hail Holy Queen, nothing else but a “valley of tears.” Our God-given goal is climb out of that valley of tears and to climb the mountain of God to Heaven. “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord and He will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in His paths!” (Micheas 4:2).
Holy Scripture, in speaking of the End Times, tells us: “In the last days the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of mountains” (Isaias 2:2) … “When therefore you shall see the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place―then they that are in Judea, let them flee to the mountains!” (Matthew 24:15-16) ... “Save thyself in the mountain, lest thou be also consumed!” (Genesis 19:17) … “Get thee up upon a high mountain! … Behold your God!” (Isaias 40:9) “Come into the mountain of the Lord!” (Isaias 30:29) ... “I have lifted up my eyes to the mountains, from whence help shall come to me!” (Psalm 120:1).
The Downfall of Sinners
In Holy Scripture, God speaks of sinners as “trees of pleasure” and compares the sinner to a beautiful tall tree that rises [in pride] above all other surrounding trees: “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘[He] was like a cedar in Libanus, with fair branches, and full of leaves, of a high stature … His height exalted above all the trees of the country, and his branches were multiplied … And he was most beautiful for his greatness and for the spreading of his branches … All the trees of pleasure, that were in the paradise of God, envied him ... Because he was exalted in height, his heart was lifted up in his height … I have cast him out according to his wickedness. And strangers, and the most cruel of the nations, shall cut him down! In the day when he went down to Hell all the trees of the field trembled. I shook the nations with the sound of his fall, when I brought him down to Hell with them that descend into the pit! … And all the trees of pleasure shall go down with him to Hell! … To whom art thou like, O thou that art famous and lofty among the trees of pleasure? Behold, thou art brought down with the trees of pleasure to the lowest parts of the Earth!’ saith the Lord God” (Ezechiel 31:3-18).
It absolutely beggars belief and makes us shudder that most Catholics pay so little attention to their salvation―especially since Our Lord, Our Lady and the saints have told us that most Catholic souls end up being damned! It is the mystery of mysteries why this shocking truth has so little impact upon the lives of Catholics and the manner in which they choose to live their lives. “They have not known, nor understood―for their eyes are covered that they may not see, and that they may not understand with their heart!” (Isaias 44:18). “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand!” (Matthew 13:13). “Do you not yet know nor understand? Have you still your heart blinded? Having eyes, see you not? And having ears, hear you not? Neither do you remember?” (Mark 8:17-18). Hence it is that Our Lord says of such complacent and indifferent souls: “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
It is not in vain that Holy Scripture warns us: “Walk not as the Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind―having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their hearts; who have given themselves up to lust; unto the working of all uncleanness; unto covetousness!” (Ephesians 4:17-18). “Seeing, they see not; and hearing, they hear not; neither do they understand. And the prophecy of Isaias is fulfilled in them, who says: ‘By hearing you shall hear and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see and shall not perceive!’ For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them. But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear!” (Matthew 13:13-16).
Yet there is very little fear of Hell and very little trembling at the thought of ending up in Hell! They are more like the Chosen People of old―who, while they were on the road to the Promised Land, were more focused upon eating, drinking and having fun: “The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play … But with most of them God was not well pleased―for they were overthrown in the desert … Now all these things happened to them in figure and they are written for our correction, upon whom the ends of the world are come. Wherefore he that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:5-12).
Going Up or Going Down?
In which direction are you headed? Up or down? “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting. He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (Galatians 6:7-8; 2 Corinthians 9:6). Reflect seriously and often upon the words of Our Lord: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them. Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:16-21). What is the will of the Father? Our Lord tells us: “In this is My Father glorified; that you bring forth very much fruit! … That you should go and should bring forth fruit; and that your fruit should remain!” (John 15:1-16).
“He spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why is it encumbering the ground?” But he, answering, said to him: “Lord, leave it alone for another year, until I dig about it and dung it! Perhaps, happily, it will bear fruit, but, if not, then, after that, thou shalt cut it down!”’” (Luke 13:6-19).
“And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able ... Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … When the master of the house shall go inside and shut the door, you shall stand outside and knock on the door, saying: “Lord! Open to us!” And He, answering, shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are!” Then you shall begin to say: “We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!” Not everyone that says to Me: “Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: “Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?” And then will I profess unto them: “I never knew you! Depart from Me!” There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’ … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:21-23; 22:14).
Life is full of “ups and downs”―sometimes our spirits are up, at other times they are down. The idea of “raising up” is often a positive―whereas the idea of “casting down” is often a negative. Similarly with the material world―the temperature may go up or it may go down; our finances may go up or down; our health may go up or down; our body temperature may go up or down; our rating with others may go up or down; our house or car value may go up or down; our insurance premiums may go up or down; food and gas prices may go up or down, etc., etc.
Add into the mix the facts some “ups” are good and some are bad. Likewise, some “downs” may be good and others bad. For example, if our income goes up then it is good―but if our number of sins goes up then it is bad; if the number of prayers we say goes up then it is good―but if our level of laziness goes up then it is bad. Similarly with the “downs.” If our pride goes down then it is good―but if our virtues go down then it is bad; if our anger goes down then it is good―but if our patience goes down then it is bad. Our Lord also uses this “up and down” analogy when speaking of saved souls and damned souls. “O Capharnaum, shall you be exalted up to Heaven? You shall go down unto Hell!” (Matthew 11:23).
As the spiritual masters say: “There is no standing still in the spiritual life―we are either going forward or backward!” You could rephrase that and say: “There is no standing still in the spiritual life―we are either going up or down!” Sometimes the spiritual life is compared to a person rowing a boat or swimming upstream against the downstream current. If that person stops rowing, or stops swimming and starts treading water―then they will immediately be carried downstream by the downstream current of water. There is no standing still in the spiritual life―we are either going upstream or downstream. You could also compare the spiritual life to a rocket that is being launched into the skies―whereby the rocket fuel could be compared to sanctifying grace. If the rocket loses or runs out of its rocket fuel, then the rocket will plummet back down to the ground. If we lose sanctifying grace from our soul, then we are plummeting towards Hell. There is no standing still in the spiritual life―we are either shooting upward toward Heaven, or we are plummeting downward toward Hell.
In the Preface of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass we are told: “Lift up your hearts!” The ultimate “up” is Heaven. The ultimate “down” is Hell. That is why we speak about going up to Heaven or down to Hell. Our Lord ascended up into Heaven. Our Lady was assumed up into Heaven. Satan was cast down into Hell and seeks to drag our souls down into Hell. Scripture speaks of “Heaven above” (Deuteronomy 4:39) and “Hell below” (Isaias 14:9).
In this journey through life to the destination that God intended for everyone (Heaven) ― we are constantly experiencing ups and downs. Our Faith, Hope and Charity can increase or decrease. Our sufferings can increase or decrease. Our love of God can increase and decrease. Our desire for Heaven can increase or decrease. The sanctifying grace in our souls can increase or decrease. Our infatuation with the world can increase or decrease. Our sins can increase or decrease. Satan’s influence over us can increase or decrease.
Up the Mountain of God
Heaven and salvation is all about seeing and working upon the correct “ups” and seeing and avoiding the correct “downs”. Damnation occurs when we seek the wrong “ups” and avoid beneficial “downs.” We are meant to climb “up” “the mountain of God” (Exodus 3:1) … “Who shall ascend into the mountain of the Lord?” (Psalm 23:3) … “A mountain in which God is well pleased to dwell―for there the Lord shall dwell unto the end!” (Psalm 67:17) … “Exalt ye the Lord our God, and adore at his holy mountain!” (Psalm 98:9) … “In the last days the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it!” (Isaias 2:2) … “Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and He will teach us his ways, and we will walk in His paths!” (Isaias 2:3).
We see Our Lord use the mountain for many spiritual tasks.
● It was after night of prayer on a mountain that Jesus chose and called the men who would become His Apostles: “And it came to pass in those days, that He went out into a mountain to pray, and He passed the whole night in the prayer of God. And when day was come, he called unto him his disciples; and he chose twelve of them―whom also He named Apostles” (Luke 6:12-13). “And going up into a mountain, He called unto Him whom He would himself: and they came to Him. And He made that twelve should be with Him, and that He might send them to preach” (Mark 3:13). “And the eleven disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them” (Matthew 28:16).
● He ascended a mountain on some occasions when He wanted to pray: “And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain alone to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23). “And it came to pass in those days, that He went out into a mountain to pray, and he passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12).
● He would teach on the mountain, for example, the Sermon on the Mount: “And seeing the multitudes, Jesus went up into a mountain, and when He was set down, His disciples came unto Him, And opening His mouth, He taught them” (Matthew 5:1-2).
● Jesus miraculously healed on the mountain: “Jesus came near the Sea of Galilee. And going up into a mountain, he sat there and there came to him great multitudes, having with them the dumb, the blind, the lame, the maimed, and many others―and they cast them down at His feet, and He healed them” (Matthew 15:29-30).
● The Transfiguration of Jesus also took place on a mountain: “And after six days Jesus taketh unto Him Peter and James, and John his brother, and took them up into a high mountain apart. And He was transfigured before them” (Matthew 17:1-2).
● He would take refuge on the mountain when they tried to make Him king: “Jesus, therefore, when He knew that they would come to take Him by force, and make him king, fled again into the mountain Himself alone” (John 6:15).
● He would eventually die on a mountain―being crucified on Mount Calvary.
● Finally, He would ascend into Heaven from a mountain: “While they looked on, Jesus was raised up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. And while they were beholding Him going up to Heaven, behold two men stood by them in white garments, who said: ‘Ye men of Galilee, why stand you looking up to Heaven? This Jesus, Who is taken up from you into Heaven, shall so come, as you have seen Him going into Heaven!’ Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mountain that is called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem” (Acts 1:9-12).
Mountain Refuge
The mountain―being a symbol of God―is our destination and our refuge. The mountain is high above the lush valleys below, which symbolizes the world, its treasures and its pleasures. The world, despite the false face of fun that it seeks to portray, is, as we say in the prayer Hail Holy Queen, nothing else but a “valley of tears.” Our God-given goal is climb out of that valley of tears and to climb the mountain of God to Heaven. “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord and He will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in His paths!” (Micheas 4:2).
Holy Scripture, in speaking of the End Times, tells us: “In the last days the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of mountains” (Isaias 2:2) … “When therefore you shall see the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place―then they that are in Judea, let them flee to the mountains!” (Matthew 24:15-16) ... “Save thyself in the mountain, lest thou be also consumed!” (Genesis 19:17) … “Get thee up upon a high mountain! … Behold your God!” (Isaias 40:9) “Come into the mountain of the Lord!” (Isaias 30:29) ... “I have lifted up my eyes to the mountains, from whence help shall come to me!” (Psalm 120:1).
The Downfall of Sinners
In Holy Scripture, God speaks of sinners as “trees of pleasure” and compares the sinner to a beautiful tall tree that rises [in pride] above all other surrounding trees: “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘[He] was like a cedar in Libanus, with fair branches, and full of leaves, of a high stature … His height exalted above all the trees of the country, and his branches were multiplied … And he was most beautiful for his greatness and for the spreading of his branches … All the trees of pleasure, that were in the paradise of God, envied him ... Because he was exalted in height, his heart was lifted up in his height … I have cast him out according to his wickedness. And strangers, and the most cruel of the nations, shall cut him down! In the day when he went down to Hell all the trees of the field trembled. I shook the nations with the sound of his fall, when I brought him down to Hell with them that descend into the pit! … And all the trees of pleasure shall go down with him to Hell! … To whom art thou like, O thou that art famous and lofty among the trees of pleasure? Behold, thou art brought down with the trees of pleasure to the lowest parts of the Earth!’ saith the Lord God” (Ezechiel 31:3-18).
It absolutely beggars belief and makes us shudder that most Catholics pay so little attention to their salvation―especially since Our Lord, Our Lady and the saints have told us that most Catholic souls end up being damned! It is the mystery of mysteries why this shocking truth has so little impact upon the lives of Catholics and the manner in which they choose to live their lives. “They have not known, nor understood―for their eyes are covered that they may not see, and that they may not understand with their heart!” (Isaias 44:18). “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand!” (Matthew 13:13). “Do you not yet know nor understand? Have you still your heart blinded? Having eyes, see you not? And having ears, hear you not? Neither do you remember?” (Mark 8:17-18). Hence it is that Our Lord says of such complacent and indifferent souls: “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
It is not in vain that Holy Scripture warns us: “Walk not as the Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind―having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their hearts; who have given themselves up to lust; unto the working of all uncleanness; unto covetousness!” (Ephesians 4:17-18). “Seeing, they see not; and hearing, they hear not; neither do they understand. And the prophecy of Isaias is fulfilled in them, who says: ‘By hearing you shall hear and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see and shall not perceive!’ For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them. But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear!” (Matthew 13:13-16).
Yet there is very little fear of Hell and very little trembling at the thought of ending up in Hell! They are more like the Chosen People of old―who, while they were on the road to the Promised Land, were more focused upon eating, drinking and having fun: “The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play … But with most of them God was not well pleased―for they were overthrown in the desert … Now all these things happened to them in figure and they are written for our correction, upon whom the ends of the world are come. Wherefore he that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:5-12).
Going Up or Going Down?
In which direction are you headed? Up or down? “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting. He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (Galatians 6:7-8; 2 Corinthians 9:6). Reflect seriously and often upon the words of Our Lord: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them. Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:16-21). What is the will of the Father? Our Lord tells us: “In this is My Father glorified; that you bring forth very much fruit! … That you should go and should bring forth fruit; and that your fruit should remain!” (John 15:1-16).
“He spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why is it encumbering the ground?” But he, answering, said to him: “Lord, leave it alone for another year, until I dig about it and dung it! Perhaps, happily, it will bear fruit, but, if not, then, after that, thou shalt cut it down!”’” (Luke 13:6-19).
“And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able ... Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … When the master of the house shall go inside and shut the door, you shall stand outside and knock on the door, saying: “Lord! Open to us!” And He, answering, shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are!” Then you shall begin to say: “We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!” Not everyone that says to Me: “Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: “Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?” And then will I profess unto them: “I never knew you! Depart from Me!” There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’ … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:21-23; 22:14).
Article 23
Monday & Tuesday, January 21st & 22nd
Is Criticizing Charitable?
Monday & Tuesday, January 21st & 22nd
Is Criticizing Charitable?
Good or Bad? Necessary or Unnecessary?
Not all criticisms are made equal! Just as “one man’s meat is another man’s poison” ― so too with criticism. What one person thinks is a good criticism, another person will see it as an evil criticism. Is there a need for criticism? Is it wrong to criticize, or is it good to criticize? Is criticism uncharitable or is it charitable? The person who criticizes will usually say that criticism is needed, and that it is good and charitable. The person who is on the receiving end of criticism will usually say that criticism is unnecessary, evil and uncharitable. When it comes to ourselves, we don’t mind criticizing but we hate being criticized. So who decides the issue? There is no better judge than God and the example of God. So let us turn to God for the answer.
What Does God Say?
Criticism―like so many other things―can be used for good or for evil; it can be used to bring about good, or it can result in evil. You can own a gun and use it to protect yourself and your family from evil attacks; or you can use the gun to commit evil by unnecessarily killing innocent people. You can use fire to cook food and heat a home―or you can use fire to kill people and burn down homes. Incidentally, Holy Scripture refers to the tongue as being a fire: “The tongue is indeed a little member and boasts great things! Behold how small a fire sets a great forest on fire. And the tongue is a fire―a world of iniquity. The tongue is placed among our bodily members, which defiles the whole body, and sets the whole course of our life on fire, being set on fire by Hell. For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and has been tamed by the nature of man―but the tongue no man can tame. It is an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison! By it we bless God and the Father―and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God! Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing! My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:5-10).
The Dangers of the Tongue
“Death and life are in the power of the tongue!” (Proverbs 18:21). “The teeth of the sons of men are weapons and arrows, and their tongue is a sharp sword!” (Psalm 56:5). “The stroke of a whip makes a blue mark―but the stroke of the tongue will break the bones!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:21). “A hasty argument kindles a fire; and a hasty quarrel sheds blood; and a tongue that bears witness brings death” (Ecclesiasticus 28:13). “Refrain your tongue from detraction” (Wisdom 1:11). “Be not hasty in thy tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 4:34). “Be not called a whisperer and be not taken in thy tongue and confounded” (Ecclesiasticus 5:16). “Keep thy tongue from evil and thy lips from speaking guile!” (Psalm 33:14). “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22).
Sometimes―or perhaps often―our criticism of others is far from the truth. We may be unaware of all the facts of the situation; or we be influenced by our imagination or prejudice; or we might have a natural dislike for the person we are criticizing and so are quick to make mountains out of molehills; or we might be basing ourselves on outright lies; or exaggerating the facts. In fact, it is very rare to find an unbiased criticism―there is always some kind of prejudice, bias, exaggeration, or animosity that contaminates our criticisms. This may be down to envy or bitterness based upon what that person has in relation to what we have not; or due to something that person may have said or done to us in the past, etc. That is why Our Lord said: “Why do you see the splinter that is in your brother’s eye; but cannot see the plank that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother: ‘Let me remove the splinter out of your eye!’ ― and behold there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite! First cast out the plank from your own eye, and then you shall be able to see in order to cast out the splinter from your brother’s eye!” (Matthew 7:3-5).
Sometimes criticisms are lies or quasi-lies―that is to say, exaggerations of a fault for exaggeration adds power to a criticism; or not based upon the real truth, but upon a twisted truth. Our Lord Himself faced such exaggerated or twisted criticisms while He was on Earth: “And they said: ‘This man [Jesus] said: “I am able to destroy the Temple of God, and after three days to rebuild it!” … We heard him say, “I will destroy this Temple made with hands, and within three days I will build another not made with hands!’” (Matthew 26:61; Mark 14:58).
God hates lies and exaggerations―for God is truth itself―as Our Lord said: “I am the truth!” (John 14:6) and He attributes lies and exaggerations to Satan: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44).
“The Lord hates a lying tongue” (Proverbs 6:16-17). “The Lord hates a mouth with a double tongue!” (Proverbs 8:13). “May the Lord destroy all deceitful lips, and the tongue that speaks proud things! Who have said: ‘We will magnify our tongue! Our lips are our own! Who is Lord over us?’” (Psalm 11:4-5). “With their tongue they lied” (Psalm 77:36). “They have bent their tongue as a bow, for lies and not for truth!” (Jeremias 9:3). “Their tongue is a piercing arrow, it hath spoken deceit” (Jeremias 9:8). “They have spoken lies, and their tongue was deceitful in their mouth” (Micheas 6:12). “Your lips have spoken lies, and your tongue utters iniquity!” (Isaias 59:3). “A man shall mock his brother, and they will not speak the truth―for they have taught their tongue to speak lies!” (Jeremias 9:5). “Your mouth has abounded with evil, and your tongue has framed deceits!” (Psalm 49:19). “All the day long your tongue has devised injustice―as a sharp razor, you have wrought deceit!” (Psalm 51:4). “A man full of tongue is terrible and he that is rash in his word shall be hateful!” (Ecclesiasticus 9:25). “If any man thinks himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man's religion is vain!” (James 1:26).
Shooting from the Hip―Shooting from the Lip!
“Shooting from the hip” is an idiom that means to speak or act quickly and without thinking carefully; to react to situations or give opinion very quickly, without stopping to think; to speak or act recklessly or impulsively. We could transform that to “shooting from the lip” ― meaning exactly the same thing: to speak quickly without thinking carefully; to react to situations and give opinions very quickly, without stopping to think; to speak recklessly or impulsively. Hence we have the secular proverb: “Think before you speak!”
In a certain sense, criticizing can be compared to surgery. No doctor starts cutting-away at his patient without first having investigated the source of the injury/disease; the extent of injury/disease; any potential dangerous side-effects or reactions to surgery; running a series of scans or x-rays, etc. Yes―the injury/disease has to be dealt with, but the patient’s ultimate well-being is of paramount importance. Will there be a dangerous reaction to the surgery or the drugs that will have to be administered? Is there a risk of the patient dying under the procedure? Surgery is meant to help and not to harm―the same can be said of criticism. Hence we speak of (1) Constructive Criticism, and (2) Destructive Criticism. True criticism is meant to be constructive―it is meant to build a person up. Negative criticism seeks to be destructive and tears the person down. True constructive criticism is meant to be a brotherly correction and not a hateful rejection of the wrongdoer.
Jesus the Critic
Some people imagine Jesus to be nothing but love, sweetness, kindness and compassion. He most certainly was all of these things and more besides! Among other things, Jesus was also a critic, a criticizer, a corrector, a reformer who tried to reform the many wayward souls that He encountered. Fraternal correction―that is to say, the correction of others―is an integral part of charity. And if correctional words are ignored―then it is also a part of charity to chastise in order to try and bring people to their senses. We see this to be case in the many apparitions of Our Lady―where she kindly admonishes us in words to bring about a change in us, and she also threatens tremendous chastisements from God if we refuse to listen to her words of admonition. “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and, as a father in the son, He pleases Himself” (Proverbs 3:12). “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives” (Hebrews 12:6). “Behold the Lord comes from afar! His wrath burns; His lips are filled with indignation, and His tongue is like a devouring fire!” (Isaias 30:27).
Thus it was that Jesus “scourged” and “scorched” many a person with His words. He criticizes and corrects His very own Apostles on numerous occasions. He criticizes and corrects the Scribes and the Pharisees. He criticizes and corrects St. Martha. He criticizes and corrects the moneylenders in the Temple. He criticizes and corrects Simon the Pharisee. He criticizes and corrects the sick man whom He cured at the Pool of Bethsaida. He criticizes and corrects
► THE APOSTLES: Our Lord criticizes St. Peter’s well-intentioned but erroneous attitude which sought to prevent Jesus from suffering His Passion and Death: “Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and rise again on the third day. Peter, taking Him aside, began to rebuke Him, saying: ‘Lord, far be it from thee! This shall not happen unto thee!’ Jesus, turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind Me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me―because thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:21-23).
On another occasion, Our Lord criticizes two of His favorite Apostles―St. James and St. John―who were indignant and angry with the inhabitants of Samaritan town that refused to receive Jesus: “He sent messengers before His face; and going, they entered into a city of the Samaritans, to prepare for Him. And they received Him not, because His face was of one going to Jerusalem. And when His disciples, James and John, had seen this, they said: ‘Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from Heaven and consume them?’ And turning, He rebuked them, saying: ‘You know not of what spirit you are! The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!’” (Luke 9:52-56).
On another occasion, when Jesus and His Apostles were caught in a storm on the lake, Jesus criticized the lack of faith in the Apostles shown by their panic and fear: “And when Jesus entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him. And behold a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves, but Jesus was asleep. And they came to Him, and awakened Him, saying: ‘Lord! Save us! We perish!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful, O ye of little faith?’ Then rising up He commanded the winds and the sea, and there came a great calm. And He said to them: ‘Why are you fearful? Have you no faith yet?’” (Matthew 8:23-26; Mark 4:37-40).
After His resurrection from the dead, Jesus appeared to His Apostles and later again to St. Thomas and the Apostles, criticizing them for their lack of belief in the resurrected Christ: “Jesus stood in the midst of them, and said to them: ‘Peace be to you! It is I, fear not!’ But they, being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit. And He said to them: ‘Why are you troubled, and why do these thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet―that it is I Myself! Touch and see―for a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see Me to have!’ And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet. Yet while they believed not, they wondered for joy” (Luke 24:36-41). “Now Thomas, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Unless I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe!’ And after eight days, His disciples were again within, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put your finger in here, and see My hands; and bring here your hand, and put it into My side; and be not faithless, but believing!’ Thomas answered, and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because you have seen Me, Thomas, you have believed! Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:24-29).
► THE SICK MAN BY THE POOLSIDE: Jesus had compassion upon a man who had been sick for 38 years and consequently cured―but He then criticized his past sinfulness and warned him that something worse would happen to him if he did not stop sinning: “There is at Jerusalem a pond, called Probatica, which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida, having five porches. In these porches lay a great multitude of sick, of blind, of lame, of withered―waiting for the moving of the water. And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under. And there was a certain man there, that had been eight and thirty years under his infirmity. When Jesus saw him lying there, knowing that he had been there a long time, He said to him: ‘Do you want to be cured?’ The infirm man answered Him: ‘Sir, I have no man, when the water is moved, to put me into the pool. For while I am coming down, another goes down before me!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Arise! Take up thy bed and walk!’ And immediately the man was cured and he took up his bed and walked … Afterwards, Jesus found him in the Temple, and said to him: ‘Behold! You are cured! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to you!’” (John 5:2-14).
► THE SCRIBES AND THE PHARISEES: “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you shut the Kingdom of Heaven against men, for you yourselves do not enter in; and those that are going in, you suffer not to enter! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you devour the houses of widows, praying long prayers. For this you shall receive the greater judgment! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you go round about the sea and the land to make one proselyte; and when he is made, you make him the child of Hell twofold more than yourselves! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you tithe mint, and anise, and cumin, and have left the weightier things of the law; judgment, and mercy, and Faith. These things you ought to have done, and not to leave those undone! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you are like to whitened sepulchers, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men’s bones, and of all filthiness!” (Matthew 23:13-28).
► ST. MARTHA: We see Jesus criticize St. Martha―the sister of St. Mary Magdalen―for being overly concerned with her material things and duties to the negligence of the spiritual: “Now it came to pass that Jesus entered into a certain town, and a woman named Martha, received Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who, sitting at the Lord’s feet, listened to His words. But Martha was busy about much serving. Martha stood and said: ‘Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, so that she help me!’ And the Lord, answering, said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! You are careful and are troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42).
► THE DISBELIEVING JEWS AND PHARISEES: Jesus criticized the Jews and Pharisees who claimed that they were the children of Abraham and that God was also their Father―yet they disbelieved Jesus Who claimed He was sent by God the Father. Jesus criticized their attitude. “Jesus therefore said to them: ‘If God were your Father, you would indeed love Me. For from God I proceeded and came; for I came not of Myself, but He sent Me! Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word! You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own: for he is a liar and the father of lies! But if I say the truth, you believe Me not!’” (John 8:42-45).
► ENTIRE CITIES: We also see Jesus criticizing entire cities: “Then He began to upbraid the cities wherein were done the most of His miracles, because they had not done penance: ‘Woe to thee, Corozain! Woe to thee, Bethsaida! For if in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the miracles that have been wrought in you, then long ago they would have done penance in sackcloth and ashes! But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the Day of Judgment, than for you! And thou Capharnaum, shalt thou be exalted up to Heaven? Thou shalt go down even unto Hell! For if in Sodom had been wrought the miracles that have been wrought in thee, perhaps it would have remained unto this day! But I say unto you, that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the Day of Judgment, than for thee!’” (Matthew 11:20-24).
There are many more instances of Jesus being critical of both His followers, His enemies and those who were neutral. Let these few examples suffice to show that Jesus was not averse to criticizing when He deemed it necessary―yet He also showed great compassion and mercy when He deemed it necessary. Thus it is that the Justice of God and the Mercy of God are not mutually exclusive, but work together hand-in-hand. God is never merciful without being just―and He is never just without also being merciful. Hence it is that souls that receive the mercy of God and qualify for Heaven, must also experience the justice of God by paying the debts for their forgiven sins in the fires of Purgatory. Whereas those who are justly condemned to Hell, also experience the mercy of God by not being punished in Hell as severely as they deserved. There we have a profound lesson in how we ought to deal with those around us―exercising justice with a dose of mercy, and incorporating justice in our acts of mercy.
Our Lady the Critic
Just as the case with Our Lord, there are many instances where we see Our Lady criticize in her many apparitions. Here are just a few excerpts:
► OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS (1600s): “Styles will come that will offend Our Lord very much. Persons who serve God should not follow the styles. The Church does not have styles. Our Lord is always the same! … O cursed human respect, which makes one ask: ‘What will others say about this?’… Our Heavenly Father communicates His secrets to the simple of heart, and not to those whose hearts are inflated with pride, pretending to know what they do not, or self-satisfied with empty knowledge! … O if only human beings and religious knew what Heaven is and what it is to possess God, how differently they would live, sparing no sacrifice in order to enter more fully into possession of it! But some let themselves be dazzled by the false glamour of honors and human greatness, while others are blinded by self-love, not realizing that they are falling into lukewarmness, that immense evil which in religious houses destroys their fervor, humility, self-renunciation! O if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall! …
“What is most grievious, is that even the ministers of my Most Holy Son do not give to the Sacrament of Penance the value that they should. Many view with cold indifference this valuable and precious treasure, which has been placed in their hands for the restoration of souls redeemed by the Blood of the Redeemer. There are those who consider hearing confession as a loss of time and a futile thing … Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils. No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents.”
► OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846): “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!
“The heads, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence [darkened their mind]. The priests, ministers of my Son, the priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety in the celebration of the Holy Mysteries, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity. Yes, the priests are asking for vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads. Woe to the priests and to those consecrated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! The sins of those consecrated to God cry out towards Heaven and call for vengeance, and now vengeance is at their door, for there is no one to be found to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There are no more generous souls; there is no one left worthy of offering a spotless Sacrifice to the Eternal on behalf of the world. People think of nothing but amusement ... There are none who go to Mass except a few aged women! The rest work on Sunday! … The wicked give themselves over to all kinds of sin!”
► OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1917): At Fatima, Our Lady essentially criticizes a lack of concern for the many souls that are being damned daily: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war one will break out! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” In the 1920s, in private apparitions to Sister Lucia of Fatima, Our Lady further criticized the sinfulness of the world: “There are so many souls whom the Justice of God condemns for sins committed against me! … My daughter, look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude!”
► OUR LADY’S WORDS TO BLESSED ELENA AIELLO: In the 1950s, Blessed Elena Aiello (1895-1961) received many revelations from Our Lord and Our Lady, and some Angels and Saints. Here are some criticisms that Our Lady made: “The times are grievous. The whole world is in turmoil, because it has become worse than at the time of the Deluge! … How youth lives in perdition! How many innocent souls find themselves enwrapped in a chain of scandals ... The world has become as a flooded valley, overflowing with filth and mud ... Men cover themselves with even more filth, and do not want to confess their real faults! ... Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! See how the souls are falling into Hell! See how many priestly souls! … So many souls are going to Hell, because the Church is wounded – inwardly and outwardly! … No longer do men speak according to the true spirit of the Gospel. The immorality of the times has reached a peak …
“The rulers of the people do not have the Christian spirit! … Some leaders are like rapacious wolves in sheep’s’ clothing, while calling themselves Christians! … Many iniquitous and wicked leaders of the people, live and drag their people outside the laws of God, showing themselves in sheep’s’ clothing, while being rapacious wolves, have ruined society, stirring it up against God and His Church … The rulers of nations make so much ado and speak of peace―but, instead, the whole world will soon be at war, and all mankind will he plunged into sorrow! … And these events are near! Tremendous will be the upheaval of the whole world, because men — as at the time of the Deluge — have lost God’s way, and are ruled by the spirit of Satan … Great is my sorrow to see that men do not change! I, for a long time, have advised men in many ways, but they do not listen to my maternal appeals, and they continue to walk the paths of perdition ... Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God! They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … Men do not listen to my motherly warnings, so the world must soon be purified … If men do not amend their ways, a terrifying scourge of fire will come down from Heaven upon all the nations of the world! … All nations will be punished, because sin has spread all over the world!”
► OUR LADY OF AKITA (1973): At Akita, Our Lady once again criticizes the sinfulness of the world: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before!”
Pope St. Pius X on Correction and Criticism
Pope St. Pius X, in his papal encyclical E Supremi Apostolatus, warns against bitter zeal in correcting others and promoting the Faith: “In order that … Christ may be formed in all, be it remembered that no means is more efficacious than charity. ‘For the Lord is not in the earthquake’ (3 Kings 19:11) ― it is vain to hope to attract souls to God by a bitter zeal. On the contrary, harm is done more often than good, by taunting men harshly with their faults, and reproving their vices with sharpness. True the Apostle exhorted Timothy: ‘Accuse, beseech, rebuke,’ but he took care to add: ‘with all patience’ (2 Timothy 4:2). Jesus has certainly left us examples of this. ‘Come to Me,’ we find Him saying, ‘come to Me all ye that labor and are burdened and I will refresh you!’ (Matthew 11:28). And by those that labor and are burdened he meant only those who are slaves of sin and error. What gentleness was that shown by the Divine Master! What tenderness, what compassion towards all kinds of misery! Isaias has marvelously described His heart in the words: ‘I will set my spirit upon Him; He shall not contend, nor cry out; the bruised reed He will not break, He will not extinguish the smoking flax!’ (Isaias 42:1-3). This charity, ‘patient and kind’ (1 Corinthians 13:4), will extend itself also to those who are hostile to us and persecute us. ‘We are reviled,’ thus did St. Paul protest, ‘and we bless; we are persecuted and we suffer it; we are blasphemed and we entreat’ (1 Corinthians 4:12, sq.). They perhaps seem to be worse than they really are. Their associations with others, prejudice, the counsel, advice and example of others, and finally an ill advised shame have dragged them to the side of the impious; but their wills are not so depraved as they themselves would seek to make people believe. Who will prevent us from hoping that the flame of Christian charity may dispel the darkness from their minds and bring to them light and the peace of God? It may be that the fruit of our labors may be slow in coming, but charity wearies not with waiting, knowing that God prepares His rewards not for the results of toil but for the good will shown in it.”
Aquinas On Fraternal Correction
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica (IIa-IIae, q. 33), deals with the question of Fraternal Correction. He first of all established the fact that Fraternal Correction is an act of charity; he then goes on to show that it is also a matter of precept (obligation). He then examines different kinds of omissions in correcting and establishes the differing degrees of sinfulness of each omission in correcting, and deals with the possibility of omitting corrections. After this he tackles the question of whether or not we can correct our superiors. He then discusses the question of whether a sinner is allowed to correct other sinners. Finally, he examines the question of whether corrections should be made privately or publicly. Here is what St. Thomas has to say on these points:
► CORRECTION IS AN ACT OF CHARITY: “To correct the wrongdoer is a spiritual almsdeed and almsdeeds are works of charity. Therefore fraternal correction is an act of charity. The correction of the wrongdoer is a remedy which should be employed against a man’s sin. Now a man’s sin may be considered in two ways, firstly as being harmful to the sinner; secondly as leading to the harm of others, by hurting or scandalizing them, or by being detrimental to the common good. Consequently the correction of a wrongdoer applies a remedy to the sin―which is considered as an evil of the sinner himself. This is fraternal correction is directed to the amendment of the sinner. There is another correction which applies a remedy to the sin of the wrongdoer, considered as hurtful to others, and especially to the common good. To do away with anyone’s evil is the same as obtaining his good―and to procure a person’s good is an act of charity, whereby we wish and do our friend well. Consequently fraternal correction also is an act of charity, because thereby we drive out our brother’s evil―namely, sin―the removal of which pertains to charity.
“Correction seeks in a special way the recovery of an erring brother by means of a simple warning―such like correction belongs to anyone who has charity, be he the subject or the prelate―fraternal correction is common to all. Both priests and all the rest of the faithful should be most solicitous for those who perish, so that their reproof may either correct their sinful ways. Or, if they be incorrigible, cut them off from the Church. We should not be on the lookout for something to denounce, but correcting what we see―or else we will become spies on the lives of others.”
► THE OBLIGATION TO CORRECT: “Fraternal correction is a matter of precept. St. Augustine says: ‘You become worse than the sinner if you fail to correct him.’ Therefore fraternal correction is a matter of precept―but not so that we have to correct our erring brother at all places and times. Fraternal correction may be omitted in three ways.
“First, meritoriously, when out of charity one omits to correct someone. For Augustine says (De Civ. Dei i, 9): ‘If a man refrains from chiding and reproving wrongdoers, because he awaits a suitable time for so doing, or because he fears lest, if he does so, they may become worse, or hinder, oppress, or turn away from the Faith, others who are weak and need to be instructed in a life of goodness and virtue, this does not seem to result from covetousness, but to be counseled by charity.’
“Secondly, fraternal correction may be omitted in such a way that one commits a mortal sin, namely, “when” (as St. Augustine says in the same passage) ‘one fears what people may think, or lest one may suffer grievous pain or death; provided, however, that the mind is so dominated by such things, that it gives them the preference to fraternal charity.’ This would seem to be the case when a man reckons that he might probably withdraw some wrongdoer from sin, and yet omits to do so, through fear or covetousness.
“Thirdly, such an omission is a venial sin, when through fear or covetousness, a man is reluctant to correct his brother’s faults, and yet not to such a degree, that if he saw clearly that he could withdraw him from sin, he would still forbear from so doing, through fear or covetousness, because in his own mind he prefers fraternal charity to these things. It is in this way that holy men sometimes omit to correct wrongdoers.”
► CAN CORRECTIONS BE JUSTIFIABLY OMITTED: “You must not fear lest the scorner insult you when you rebuke him―however, you should bear in mind that by making him hate you, you may make him worse. Therefore one ought to forego fraternal correction, when we fear that we may make a man worse by correcting him. The correction of the wrongdoer is twofold.
One form of correction, which belongs to prelates, is directed to the common good and has coercive force. Such correction should not be omitted just because the person corrected might be disturbed―both (1) because if he is unwilling to amend his ways of his own accord, he should be made to cease sinning by being punished, and (2) because, if he be incorrigible, the common good is safeguarded in this way, since the order of justice is observed, and others are deterred by one being made an example of. Hence a judge does not desist from pronouncing sentence of condemnation against a sinner, for fear of disturbing him or his friends.
The other fraternal correction is directed to the amendment of the wrongdoer―whom it does not coerce, but merely admonishes. Consequently, when it is deemed probable that the sinner will not take the warning and will become worse, then such fraternal correction should be omitted.
► THE CORRECTION OF OUR SUPERIORS: “A subject is not competent to administer to his prelate [superior] a correction that is an act of justice by administering a coercive nature of punishment―but fraternal correction, which is an act of charity, is within the competency of everyone, with regard to any person towards whom he is bound by charity, providing that there be something in that person which requires correction.
“When a subject corrects his prelate, he ought to do so in a becoming manner, not with impudence and harshness, but with gentleness and respect. One who is not an equal can reprove privately and respectfully. Hence the Apostle says: ‘An ancient man rebuke not, but entreat him as a father!’ (1 Timothy 5:1). A subject treats his prelate inordinately when he upbraids him with insolence, as also when he speaks ill of him. It must be observed, however, that if the Faith were endangered, a subject ought to rebuke his prelate even publicly. We must also remember that when a man reproves his prelate charitably, it does not follow that he thinks himself any better, but merely that he offers his help to one who, being in the higher position among you, is therefore in greater danger, as St. Augustine observes.
► CAN SINNERS CORRECT OTHERS: “As to whether a sinner ought to reprove a wrongdoer―sin does not deprive the sinner’s reason of all right judgment, and, in this respect, he may be competent to find fault with others for committing sin. Nevertheless, a previous sin proves somewhat of a hindrance to this correction, for three reasons.
“Firstly, because this previous sin renders a man unworthy to rebuke another; and especially is he unworthy to correct another for a lesser sin, if he himself has committed a greater sin. Hence St. Jerome says on Our Lord’s words, “Why seest thou the splinter in thy brother’s eye?’ etc. (Matthew 7:3): ‘He is speaking of those who, while they are themselves guilty of mortal sin, have no patience with the lesser venial sins of their brethren.’
“Secondly, such like correction becomes unseemly if the corrector’s sin be well known, on account of the scandal which ensues therefrom, because it would seem that he corrects, not out of charity, but more for the sake of ostentation. What you want is, not to save others, but to hide your evil deeds with good teaching, and to seek to be praised by men for your knowledge.
“Thirdly, on account of the rebuker’s pride; when, for instance, a man thinks lightly of his own sins, and, in his own heart, sets himself above his neighbor, judging the latter’s sins with harsh severity, as though he himself were just man. Hence St. Augustine says: ‘To reprove the faults of others is the duty of good and kindly men. When a wicked man rebukes anyone, his rebuke is the latter’s acquittal.’ And so, as St. Augustine says: ‘When we have to find fault with anyone, we should think whether we were never guilty of his sin; and then we must remember that we are men, and might have been guilty of it; or that we once had it on our conscience, but have it no longer: and then we should bethink ourselves that we are all weak, in order that our reproof may be the outcome, not of hatred, but of pity. But if we find that we are guilty of the same sin, we must not rebuke him, but groan with him, and invite him to repent with us.’ It follows from this that, if a sinner reprove a wrongdoer with humility, he does not sin, nor does he bring a further condemnation on himself, although thereby he proves himself deserving of condemnation, either in his brother’s or in his own conscience, on account of his previous sin.”
► SHOULD THE CORRECTION BE PRIVATE OR PUBLIC: “St. Augustine, commenting on Our Lord’s words, “Rebuke him between thee and him alone” (Matthew 18:15), says: ‘Aim at his amendment, while avoiding his disgrace―since perhaps from shame he might begin to defend his sin; and him, whom you thought to make a better man, you make worse.’ With regard to the public denunciation of sins―it is necessary to make a distinction: because sins may be either public or secret. On the case of public sins―a remedy is required, not only for the sinner, so that he may become better, but also for others, who know of his sin, lest they be scandalized. Wherefore such like sins should be denounced in public, according to the saying of the Apostle (1 Timothy 5:20): ‘Them that sin, reprove before all, so that the rest also may have fear,” which is to be understood as referring to public sins, as St. Augustine states.
“On the other hand, in the case of secret sins, the words of Our Lord seem to apply: ‘If thy brother shall offend against thee, then go and rebuke him between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain thy brother!’ (Matthew 18:15). But if he offend thee publicly in the presence of others, he no longer sins against thee alone, but also against others whom he disturbs. Since, however, a man’s neighbor may take offense even at his secret sins, it seems that we must make yet a further distinction. For certain secret sins are hurtful to our neighbor either in his body or in his soul, as, for instance, when a man plots secretly to betray his country to its enemies, or when a heretic secretly turns other men away from the Faith. And since he that sins thus in secret, sins not only against you in particular, but also against others, it is necessary to take steps to denounce him at once, in order to prevent him doing such harm, unless by chance you were firmly persuaded that this evil result would be prevented by admonishing him secretly.
“On the other hand there are other sins which injure none but the sinner, and the person sinned against, either because he alone is hurt by the sinner, or at least because he alone knows about his sin, and then our one purpose should be to succor our sinning brother: and just as the physician of the body restores the sick man to health, if possible, without cutting off a limb, but, if this be unavoidable, cuts off a limb which is least indispensable, in order to preserve the life of the whole body, so too he who desires his brother’s amendment should, if possible, so amend him as regards his conscience, that he keep his good name.
“For a good name is useful, first of all to the sinner himself, not only in temporal matters wherein a man suffers many losses, if he lose his good name, but also in spiritual matters, because many are restrained from sinning, through fear of dishonor, so that when a man finds his honor lost, he puts no curb on his sinning. Hence St. Jerome says on Matthew 18:15: ‘If he sin against thee, thou shouldst rebuke him in private, lest he persist in his sin if he should once become shameless or unabashed.’ Secondly, we ought to safeguard our sinning brother’s good name, both because the dishonor of one leads to the dishonor of others, according to the saying of St. Augustine: ‘When a few of those who bear a name for holiness, are reported falsely, or proved in truth, to have done anything wrong, people will seek by busily repeating it to make it believed of all’ ― and also because when one man’s sin is made public others are incited to sin likewise.
“Since, however, one’s conscience should be preferred to a good name, Our Lord wished that we should publicly denounce our brother and so deliver his conscience from sin, even though he should forfeit his good name. Therefore it is evident that the precept requires a secret admonition to precede public denunciation. Our Lord as God knew the sin of Judas as though it were public, wherefore He could have made it known at once. Yet He did not, but warned Judas of his sin in words that were obscure.”
Start Correcting Correctly
Peeling fruit can be efficient or it can be messy. The same is true for correcting people. Peeling requires some form of cutting―but it needs to be cut and peeled in a way that does not damage the fruit, nor cut away good parts of the fruit, nor create a gooey wet mess. You could say that surgery is much the same―you need to remove the infected, diseased tissue and leave the good tissue in place. Correcting people is much the same―tackle the bad, leave alone the good, and don’t “kill” the “patient” in the process!
When correcting someone, we need to focus on the problem and not every aspect of the person’s life. Dredging up the past every time we correct is counterproductive. We also need to be positive and not just negative. There is more than just one way of getting a point across. When a doctor performs a surgery, he does not just start cutting away at the patient―he first administers an anesthetic in order to eliminate as much pain and discomfort as possible. That should also be the case when we correct others―positivity anesthetizes the necessary negativity. When the doctor has finished surgery, the patient is “sewn-up” with stitches and is prescribed some medicine that will take some of the edge off the inevitable pain that will remain after surgery. Likewise, after correcting someone, we should try to “stitch-up” the inevitable wound of person we have corrected and prescribe some kind and positive words that will help with the healing process.
This is why certain authors recommend the “sandwich method” of correction―(1) soft bread and butter on the bottom slice of bread; (2) the harder meat in the middle; (3) a sweet topping and another soft slice of bread on top. Translated for the purpose of correction, this means: (1) start out by being positive and even point out some of the good qualities of the person; (2) then administer the “meat” of correction; (3) finish off on a positive note by mentioning the positive, pleasant outcome that will result from the correction, and reinforce the qualities the person has in order to achieve that outcome.
For example: (1) You are usually a good worker/student/child/person, as is seen by the way you (describe some of the good things the person has done in the past); (2) that is why it is so painful to see you acting/speaking in this way, which is wrong, hurtful to (mention persons affected) and also against God’s law and commandments. If we refuse to obey God, then He punishes us; likewise, if you refuse to change, you will have to be punished; (3) so let us go back to the good person that you know you can be and which you have been in the past. We will help you all that we can, because we love you and do not want to see you go from bad to worse; and worse still, to see you eventually punished by God both in this life and in the next. We will pray for the graces you need to change, but it is you that has to cooperate with those graces and make the necessary changes.[And most importantly of all ― it is imperative that you follow through with the promise to pray for their amendment! For without the grace of God, NO GOOD CAN HAPPEN! “Without Me―you can do nothing!” said Our Lord (John 15:5). Our Lady of Fatima also indicated the same thing, by saying: “PRAY and MAKE SACRIFICES for the conversion of sinners!”].
Shouting and screaming is often an indicator that normal corrective measures have been ineffectively applied in some way. Furthermore, shouting and screaming gives the impression that the corrector has “lost it” and is out of control. It also gives an excuse the person who is being corrected that the shouting, screaming person hates them rather than loves them. Shouting and screaming is much easier than a well thought-out correction that corrects, threatens punishment, while at the same praising the good qualities of the wrongdoer, showing love towards them, and bringing God and His laws into the act of correction.
According to the teachings of St. Francis de Sales, fraternal correction means offering constructive criticism or advice to another person with genuine love and care, aiming to help them grow spiritually while always prioritizing kindness and gentleness, essentially “catching more flies with honey” rather than harsh confrontation; he believed this should be done with a spirit of humility, recognizing that everyone is capable of making mistakes and needs support in their journey towards holiness.
In his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, St. Francis writes: “Our Lord has particularly recommended to us to be specially consecrated to His service and dedicated to His imitation: ‘Learn of Me,’ he says, ‘for I am meek [gentle] and humble of heart!’ (Matthew 11:29) … According to St. Bernard, charity reaches its perfection when it is not only patient, but also gentle and meek … St. James says bluntly and without reservation that the anger of man does not work the justice of God (1:20) ... We ought, indeed, to resist the evil and restrain the vices of those in our charge constantly and courageously but gently and peacefully. Nothing calms down an angry elephant so quickly as the sight of a little lamb and nothing breaks the force of cannon balls so easily as wool. We do not accept correction given in anger, even though reasonable, so well as the one that has no other origin than reason alone. For the rational soul is naturally subject to reason and is subject to passion only through tyranny. Reason accompanied by passion becomes odious, its rightful dominion being degraded by its association with tyranny … When reason governs, and peacefully administers punishments, corrections and admonitions, then everyone loves and approves it―even though it is done strictly and exactly. But when reason brings with it anger, fury and wrath―which, according St. Augustine, are its soldiers―then it renders itself more terrifying than lovable; the very heart of reason remains always oppressed and ill-treated. As soon as you realize that you have acted with anger, make reparation for the fault by a prompt act of gentleness towards the same person against whom you were irritated. It is a good remedy against anger to correct it instantly by its opposite―through an act of gentleness. As they say, fresh wounds are easily healed!”
It is said that God’s grace works “suaviter et fortiter” ― which how we ought to act when correcting others. The Latin phrase is often used to describe a way of approaching situations that require a balance of firmness with courtesy. It is a way of action that balances strength (fortiter) and gentleness (suaviter). It can also be translated as “gentleness and strength” ― “pleasantly in manner, powerfully in action” ― “gentle in manner, firm in application.” The dictionaries will usually translate the words as follows: Suaviter as meaning “gently, or softly, or sweetly, or pleasantly.” The word Fortiter as meaning "firmly, strongly, powerfully, bravely, or boldly.” All of this is a perfect description on how we ought to correct others if correction is needed.
Jean-Pierre Camus was consecrated to be the Bishop of Belley by the Bishop of Geneva, St. Francis de Sales. The two dioceses of Geneva and Belley bordered one another, which contributed to further that close friendship between the Bishops. Bishop Camus quotes St. Francis de Sales as saying: “A spoon full of honey attracts more flies than a hundred barrels full of vinegar.” (Jean-Pierre Camus, The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales). Let our corrections contain some honey and not barrels of vinegar! After all, Holy Scripture does not say: “God is vinegar!” but it says “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8).
Not all criticisms are made equal! Just as “one man’s meat is another man’s poison” ― so too with criticism. What one person thinks is a good criticism, another person will see it as an evil criticism. Is there a need for criticism? Is it wrong to criticize, or is it good to criticize? Is criticism uncharitable or is it charitable? The person who criticizes will usually say that criticism is needed, and that it is good and charitable. The person who is on the receiving end of criticism will usually say that criticism is unnecessary, evil and uncharitable. When it comes to ourselves, we don’t mind criticizing but we hate being criticized. So who decides the issue? There is no better judge than God and the example of God. So let us turn to God for the answer.
What Does God Say?
Criticism―like so many other things―can be used for good or for evil; it can be used to bring about good, or it can result in evil. You can own a gun and use it to protect yourself and your family from evil attacks; or you can use the gun to commit evil by unnecessarily killing innocent people. You can use fire to cook food and heat a home―or you can use fire to kill people and burn down homes. Incidentally, Holy Scripture refers to the tongue as being a fire: “The tongue is indeed a little member and boasts great things! Behold how small a fire sets a great forest on fire. And the tongue is a fire―a world of iniquity. The tongue is placed among our bodily members, which defiles the whole body, and sets the whole course of our life on fire, being set on fire by Hell. For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and has been tamed by the nature of man―but the tongue no man can tame. It is an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison! By it we bless God and the Father―and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God! Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing! My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:5-10).
The Dangers of the Tongue
“Death and life are in the power of the tongue!” (Proverbs 18:21). “The teeth of the sons of men are weapons and arrows, and their tongue is a sharp sword!” (Psalm 56:5). “The stroke of a whip makes a blue mark―but the stroke of the tongue will break the bones!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:21). “A hasty argument kindles a fire; and a hasty quarrel sheds blood; and a tongue that bears witness brings death” (Ecclesiasticus 28:13). “Refrain your tongue from detraction” (Wisdom 1:11). “Be not hasty in thy tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 4:34). “Be not called a whisperer and be not taken in thy tongue and confounded” (Ecclesiasticus 5:16). “Keep thy tongue from evil and thy lips from speaking guile!” (Psalm 33:14). “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22).
Sometimes―or perhaps often―our criticism of others is far from the truth. We may be unaware of all the facts of the situation; or we be influenced by our imagination or prejudice; or we might have a natural dislike for the person we are criticizing and so are quick to make mountains out of molehills; or we might be basing ourselves on outright lies; or exaggerating the facts. In fact, it is very rare to find an unbiased criticism―there is always some kind of prejudice, bias, exaggeration, or animosity that contaminates our criticisms. This may be down to envy or bitterness based upon what that person has in relation to what we have not; or due to something that person may have said or done to us in the past, etc. That is why Our Lord said: “Why do you see the splinter that is in your brother’s eye; but cannot see the plank that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother: ‘Let me remove the splinter out of your eye!’ ― and behold there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite! First cast out the plank from your own eye, and then you shall be able to see in order to cast out the splinter from your brother’s eye!” (Matthew 7:3-5).
Sometimes criticisms are lies or quasi-lies―that is to say, exaggerations of a fault for exaggeration adds power to a criticism; or not based upon the real truth, but upon a twisted truth. Our Lord Himself faced such exaggerated or twisted criticisms while He was on Earth: “And they said: ‘This man [Jesus] said: “I am able to destroy the Temple of God, and after three days to rebuild it!” … We heard him say, “I will destroy this Temple made with hands, and within three days I will build another not made with hands!’” (Matthew 26:61; Mark 14:58).
God hates lies and exaggerations―for God is truth itself―as Our Lord said: “I am the truth!” (John 14:6) and He attributes lies and exaggerations to Satan: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44).
“The Lord hates a lying tongue” (Proverbs 6:16-17). “The Lord hates a mouth with a double tongue!” (Proverbs 8:13). “May the Lord destroy all deceitful lips, and the tongue that speaks proud things! Who have said: ‘We will magnify our tongue! Our lips are our own! Who is Lord over us?’” (Psalm 11:4-5). “With their tongue they lied” (Psalm 77:36). “They have bent their tongue as a bow, for lies and not for truth!” (Jeremias 9:3). “Their tongue is a piercing arrow, it hath spoken deceit” (Jeremias 9:8). “They have spoken lies, and their tongue was deceitful in their mouth” (Micheas 6:12). “Your lips have spoken lies, and your tongue utters iniquity!” (Isaias 59:3). “A man shall mock his brother, and they will not speak the truth―for they have taught their tongue to speak lies!” (Jeremias 9:5). “Your mouth has abounded with evil, and your tongue has framed deceits!” (Psalm 49:19). “All the day long your tongue has devised injustice―as a sharp razor, you have wrought deceit!” (Psalm 51:4). “A man full of tongue is terrible and he that is rash in his word shall be hateful!” (Ecclesiasticus 9:25). “If any man thinks himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man's religion is vain!” (James 1:26).
Shooting from the Hip―Shooting from the Lip!
“Shooting from the hip” is an idiom that means to speak or act quickly and without thinking carefully; to react to situations or give opinion very quickly, without stopping to think; to speak or act recklessly or impulsively. We could transform that to “shooting from the lip” ― meaning exactly the same thing: to speak quickly without thinking carefully; to react to situations and give opinions very quickly, without stopping to think; to speak recklessly or impulsively. Hence we have the secular proverb: “Think before you speak!”
In a certain sense, criticizing can be compared to surgery. No doctor starts cutting-away at his patient without first having investigated the source of the injury/disease; the extent of injury/disease; any potential dangerous side-effects or reactions to surgery; running a series of scans or x-rays, etc. Yes―the injury/disease has to be dealt with, but the patient’s ultimate well-being is of paramount importance. Will there be a dangerous reaction to the surgery or the drugs that will have to be administered? Is there a risk of the patient dying under the procedure? Surgery is meant to help and not to harm―the same can be said of criticism. Hence we speak of (1) Constructive Criticism, and (2) Destructive Criticism. True criticism is meant to be constructive―it is meant to build a person up. Negative criticism seeks to be destructive and tears the person down. True constructive criticism is meant to be a brotherly correction and not a hateful rejection of the wrongdoer.
Jesus the Critic
Some people imagine Jesus to be nothing but love, sweetness, kindness and compassion. He most certainly was all of these things and more besides! Among other things, Jesus was also a critic, a criticizer, a corrector, a reformer who tried to reform the many wayward souls that He encountered. Fraternal correction―that is to say, the correction of others―is an integral part of charity. And if correctional words are ignored―then it is also a part of charity to chastise in order to try and bring people to their senses. We see this to be case in the many apparitions of Our Lady―where she kindly admonishes us in words to bring about a change in us, and she also threatens tremendous chastisements from God if we refuse to listen to her words of admonition. “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and, as a father in the son, He pleases Himself” (Proverbs 3:12). “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives” (Hebrews 12:6). “Behold the Lord comes from afar! His wrath burns; His lips are filled with indignation, and His tongue is like a devouring fire!” (Isaias 30:27).
Thus it was that Jesus “scourged” and “scorched” many a person with His words. He criticizes and corrects His very own Apostles on numerous occasions. He criticizes and corrects the Scribes and the Pharisees. He criticizes and corrects St. Martha. He criticizes and corrects the moneylenders in the Temple. He criticizes and corrects Simon the Pharisee. He criticizes and corrects the sick man whom He cured at the Pool of Bethsaida. He criticizes and corrects
► THE APOSTLES: Our Lord criticizes St. Peter’s well-intentioned but erroneous attitude which sought to prevent Jesus from suffering His Passion and Death: “Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and rise again on the third day. Peter, taking Him aside, began to rebuke Him, saying: ‘Lord, far be it from thee! This shall not happen unto thee!’ Jesus, turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind Me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me―because thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:21-23).
On another occasion, Our Lord criticizes two of His favorite Apostles―St. James and St. John―who were indignant and angry with the inhabitants of Samaritan town that refused to receive Jesus: “He sent messengers before His face; and going, they entered into a city of the Samaritans, to prepare for Him. And they received Him not, because His face was of one going to Jerusalem. And when His disciples, James and John, had seen this, they said: ‘Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from Heaven and consume them?’ And turning, He rebuked them, saying: ‘You know not of what spirit you are! The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!’” (Luke 9:52-56).
On another occasion, when Jesus and His Apostles were caught in a storm on the lake, Jesus criticized the lack of faith in the Apostles shown by their panic and fear: “And when Jesus entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him. And behold a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves, but Jesus was asleep. And they came to Him, and awakened Him, saying: ‘Lord! Save us! We perish!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful, O ye of little faith?’ Then rising up He commanded the winds and the sea, and there came a great calm. And He said to them: ‘Why are you fearful? Have you no faith yet?’” (Matthew 8:23-26; Mark 4:37-40).
After His resurrection from the dead, Jesus appeared to His Apostles and later again to St. Thomas and the Apostles, criticizing them for their lack of belief in the resurrected Christ: “Jesus stood in the midst of them, and said to them: ‘Peace be to you! It is I, fear not!’ But they, being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit. And He said to them: ‘Why are you troubled, and why do these thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet―that it is I Myself! Touch and see―for a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see Me to have!’ And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet. Yet while they believed not, they wondered for joy” (Luke 24:36-41). “Now Thomas, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Unless I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe!’ And after eight days, His disciples were again within, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put your finger in here, and see My hands; and bring here your hand, and put it into My side; and be not faithless, but believing!’ Thomas answered, and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because you have seen Me, Thomas, you have believed! Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:24-29).
► THE SICK MAN BY THE POOLSIDE: Jesus had compassion upon a man who had been sick for 38 years and consequently cured―but He then criticized his past sinfulness and warned him that something worse would happen to him if he did not stop sinning: “There is at Jerusalem a pond, called Probatica, which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida, having five porches. In these porches lay a great multitude of sick, of blind, of lame, of withered―waiting for the moving of the water. And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under. And there was a certain man there, that had been eight and thirty years under his infirmity. When Jesus saw him lying there, knowing that he had been there a long time, He said to him: ‘Do you want to be cured?’ The infirm man answered Him: ‘Sir, I have no man, when the water is moved, to put me into the pool. For while I am coming down, another goes down before me!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Arise! Take up thy bed and walk!’ And immediately the man was cured and he took up his bed and walked … Afterwards, Jesus found him in the Temple, and said to him: ‘Behold! You are cured! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to you!’” (John 5:2-14).
► THE SCRIBES AND THE PHARISEES: “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you shut the Kingdom of Heaven against men, for you yourselves do not enter in; and those that are going in, you suffer not to enter! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you devour the houses of widows, praying long prayers. For this you shall receive the greater judgment! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you go round about the sea and the land to make one proselyte; and when he is made, you make him the child of Hell twofold more than yourselves! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you tithe mint, and anise, and cumin, and have left the weightier things of the law; judgment, and mercy, and Faith. These things you ought to have done, and not to leave those undone! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you are like to whitened sepulchers, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men’s bones, and of all filthiness!” (Matthew 23:13-28).
► ST. MARTHA: We see Jesus criticize St. Martha―the sister of St. Mary Magdalen―for being overly concerned with her material things and duties to the negligence of the spiritual: “Now it came to pass that Jesus entered into a certain town, and a woman named Martha, received Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who, sitting at the Lord’s feet, listened to His words. But Martha was busy about much serving. Martha stood and said: ‘Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, so that she help me!’ And the Lord, answering, said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! You are careful and are troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42).
► THE DISBELIEVING JEWS AND PHARISEES: Jesus criticized the Jews and Pharisees who claimed that they were the children of Abraham and that God was also their Father―yet they disbelieved Jesus Who claimed He was sent by God the Father. Jesus criticized their attitude. “Jesus therefore said to them: ‘If God were your Father, you would indeed love Me. For from God I proceeded and came; for I came not of Myself, but He sent Me! Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word! You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own: for he is a liar and the father of lies! But if I say the truth, you believe Me not!’” (John 8:42-45).
► ENTIRE CITIES: We also see Jesus criticizing entire cities: “Then He began to upbraid the cities wherein were done the most of His miracles, because they had not done penance: ‘Woe to thee, Corozain! Woe to thee, Bethsaida! For if in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the miracles that have been wrought in you, then long ago they would have done penance in sackcloth and ashes! But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the Day of Judgment, than for you! And thou Capharnaum, shalt thou be exalted up to Heaven? Thou shalt go down even unto Hell! For if in Sodom had been wrought the miracles that have been wrought in thee, perhaps it would have remained unto this day! But I say unto you, that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the Day of Judgment, than for thee!’” (Matthew 11:20-24).
There are many more instances of Jesus being critical of both His followers, His enemies and those who were neutral. Let these few examples suffice to show that Jesus was not averse to criticizing when He deemed it necessary―yet He also showed great compassion and mercy when He deemed it necessary. Thus it is that the Justice of God and the Mercy of God are not mutually exclusive, but work together hand-in-hand. God is never merciful without being just―and He is never just without also being merciful. Hence it is that souls that receive the mercy of God and qualify for Heaven, must also experience the justice of God by paying the debts for their forgiven sins in the fires of Purgatory. Whereas those who are justly condemned to Hell, also experience the mercy of God by not being punished in Hell as severely as they deserved. There we have a profound lesson in how we ought to deal with those around us―exercising justice with a dose of mercy, and incorporating justice in our acts of mercy.
Our Lady the Critic
Just as the case with Our Lord, there are many instances where we see Our Lady criticize in her many apparitions. Here are just a few excerpts:
► OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS (1600s): “Styles will come that will offend Our Lord very much. Persons who serve God should not follow the styles. The Church does not have styles. Our Lord is always the same! … O cursed human respect, which makes one ask: ‘What will others say about this?’… Our Heavenly Father communicates His secrets to the simple of heart, and not to those whose hearts are inflated with pride, pretending to know what they do not, or self-satisfied with empty knowledge! … O if only human beings and religious knew what Heaven is and what it is to possess God, how differently they would live, sparing no sacrifice in order to enter more fully into possession of it! But some let themselves be dazzled by the false glamour of honors and human greatness, while others are blinded by self-love, not realizing that they are falling into lukewarmness, that immense evil which in religious houses destroys their fervor, humility, self-renunciation! O if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall! …
“What is most grievious, is that even the ministers of my Most Holy Son do not give to the Sacrament of Penance the value that they should. Many view with cold indifference this valuable and precious treasure, which has been placed in their hands for the restoration of souls redeemed by the Blood of the Redeemer. There are those who consider hearing confession as a loss of time and a futile thing … Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils. No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents.”
► OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846): “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!
“The heads, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence [darkened their mind]. The priests, ministers of my Son, the priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety in the celebration of the Holy Mysteries, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity. Yes, the priests are asking for vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads. Woe to the priests and to those consecrated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! The sins of those consecrated to God cry out towards Heaven and call for vengeance, and now vengeance is at their door, for there is no one to be found to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There are no more generous souls; there is no one left worthy of offering a spotless Sacrifice to the Eternal on behalf of the world. People think of nothing but amusement ... There are none who go to Mass except a few aged women! The rest work on Sunday! … The wicked give themselves over to all kinds of sin!”
► OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1917): At Fatima, Our Lady essentially criticizes a lack of concern for the many souls that are being damned daily: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war one will break out! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” In the 1920s, in private apparitions to Sister Lucia of Fatima, Our Lady further criticized the sinfulness of the world: “There are so many souls whom the Justice of God condemns for sins committed against me! … My daughter, look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude!”
► OUR LADY’S WORDS TO BLESSED ELENA AIELLO: In the 1950s, Blessed Elena Aiello (1895-1961) received many revelations from Our Lord and Our Lady, and some Angels and Saints. Here are some criticisms that Our Lady made: “The times are grievous. The whole world is in turmoil, because it has become worse than at the time of the Deluge! … How youth lives in perdition! How many innocent souls find themselves enwrapped in a chain of scandals ... The world has become as a flooded valley, overflowing with filth and mud ... Men cover themselves with even more filth, and do not want to confess their real faults! ... Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! See how the souls are falling into Hell! See how many priestly souls! … So many souls are going to Hell, because the Church is wounded – inwardly and outwardly! … No longer do men speak according to the true spirit of the Gospel. The immorality of the times has reached a peak …
“The rulers of the people do not have the Christian spirit! … Some leaders are like rapacious wolves in sheep’s’ clothing, while calling themselves Christians! … Many iniquitous and wicked leaders of the people, live and drag their people outside the laws of God, showing themselves in sheep’s’ clothing, while being rapacious wolves, have ruined society, stirring it up against God and His Church … The rulers of nations make so much ado and speak of peace―but, instead, the whole world will soon be at war, and all mankind will he plunged into sorrow! … And these events are near! Tremendous will be the upheaval of the whole world, because men — as at the time of the Deluge — have lost God’s way, and are ruled by the spirit of Satan … Great is my sorrow to see that men do not change! I, for a long time, have advised men in many ways, but they do not listen to my maternal appeals, and they continue to walk the paths of perdition ... Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God! They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … Men do not listen to my motherly warnings, so the world must soon be purified … If men do not amend their ways, a terrifying scourge of fire will come down from Heaven upon all the nations of the world! … All nations will be punished, because sin has spread all over the world!”
► OUR LADY OF AKITA (1973): At Akita, Our Lady once again criticizes the sinfulness of the world: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before!”
Pope St. Pius X on Correction and Criticism
Pope St. Pius X, in his papal encyclical E Supremi Apostolatus, warns against bitter zeal in correcting others and promoting the Faith: “In order that … Christ may be formed in all, be it remembered that no means is more efficacious than charity. ‘For the Lord is not in the earthquake’ (3 Kings 19:11) ― it is vain to hope to attract souls to God by a bitter zeal. On the contrary, harm is done more often than good, by taunting men harshly with their faults, and reproving their vices with sharpness. True the Apostle exhorted Timothy: ‘Accuse, beseech, rebuke,’ but he took care to add: ‘with all patience’ (2 Timothy 4:2). Jesus has certainly left us examples of this. ‘Come to Me,’ we find Him saying, ‘come to Me all ye that labor and are burdened and I will refresh you!’ (Matthew 11:28). And by those that labor and are burdened he meant only those who are slaves of sin and error. What gentleness was that shown by the Divine Master! What tenderness, what compassion towards all kinds of misery! Isaias has marvelously described His heart in the words: ‘I will set my spirit upon Him; He shall not contend, nor cry out; the bruised reed He will not break, He will not extinguish the smoking flax!’ (Isaias 42:1-3). This charity, ‘patient and kind’ (1 Corinthians 13:4), will extend itself also to those who are hostile to us and persecute us. ‘We are reviled,’ thus did St. Paul protest, ‘and we bless; we are persecuted and we suffer it; we are blasphemed and we entreat’ (1 Corinthians 4:12, sq.). They perhaps seem to be worse than they really are. Their associations with others, prejudice, the counsel, advice and example of others, and finally an ill advised shame have dragged them to the side of the impious; but their wills are not so depraved as they themselves would seek to make people believe. Who will prevent us from hoping that the flame of Christian charity may dispel the darkness from their minds and bring to them light and the peace of God? It may be that the fruit of our labors may be slow in coming, but charity wearies not with waiting, knowing that God prepares His rewards not for the results of toil but for the good will shown in it.”
Aquinas On Fraternal Correction
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica (IIa-IIae, q. 33), deals with the question of Fraternal Correction. He first of all established the fact that Fraternal Correction is an act of charity; he then goes on to show that it is also a matter of precept (obligation). He then examines different kinds of omissions in correcting and establishes the differing degrees of sinfulness of each omission in correcting, and deals with the possibility of omitting corrections. After this he tackles the question of whether or not we can correct our superiors. He then discusses the question of whether a sinner is allowed to correct other sinners. Finally, he examines the question of whether corrections should be made privately or publicly. Here is what St. Thomas has to say on these points:
► CORRECTION IS AN ACT OF CHARITY: “To correct the wrongdoer is a spiritual almsdeed and almsdeeds are works of charity. Therefore fraternal correction is an act of charity. The correction of the wrongdoer is a remedy which should be employed against a man’s sin. Now a man’s sin may be considered in two ways, firstly as being harmful to the sinner; secondly as leading to the harm of others, by hurting or scandalizing them, or by being detrimental to the common good. Consequently the correction of a wrongdoer applies a remedy to the sin―which is considered as an evil of the sinner himself. This is fraternal correction is directed to the amendment of the sinner. There is another correction which applies a remedy to the sin of the wrongdoer, considered as hurtful to others, and especially to the common good. To do away with anyone’s evil is the same as obtaining his good―and to procure a person’s good is an act of charity, whereby we wish and do our friend well. Consequently fraternal correction also is an act of charity, because thereby we drive out our brother’s evil―namely, sin―the removal of which pertains to charity.
“Correction seeks in a special way the recovery of an erring brother by means of a simple warning―such like correction belongs to anyone who has charity, be he the subject or the prelate―fraternal correction is common to all. Both priests and all the rest of the faithful should be most solicitous for those who perish, so that their reproof may either correct their sinful ways. Or, if they be incorrigible, cut them off from the Church. We should not be on the lookout for something to denounce, but correcting what we see―or else we will become spies on the lives of others.”
► THE OBLIGATION TO CORRECT: “Fraternal correction is a matter of precept. St. Augustine says: ‘You become worse than the sinner if you fail to correct him.’ Therefore fraternal correction is a matter of precept―but not so that we have to correct our erring brother at all places and times. Fraternal correction may be omitted in three ways.
“First, meritoriously, when out of charity one omits to correct someone. For Augustine says (De Civ. Dei i, 9): ‘If a man refrains from chiding and reproving wrongdoers, because he awaits a suitable time for so doing, or because he fears lest, if he does so, they may become worse, or hinder, oppress, or turn away from the Faith, others who are weak and need to be instructed in a life of goodness and virtue, this does not seem to result from covetousness, but to be counseled by charity.’
“Secondly, fraternal correction may be omitted in such a way that one commits a mortal sin, namely, “when” (as St. Augustine says in the same passage) ‘one fears what people may think, or lest one may suffer grievous pain or death; provided, however, that the mind is so dominated by such things, that it gives them the preference to fraternal charity.’ This would seem to be the case when a man reckons that he might probably withdraw some wrongdoer from sin, and yet omits to do so, through fear or covetousness.
“Thirdly, such an omission is a venial sin, when through fear or covetousness, a man is reluctant to correct his brother’s faults, and yet not to such a degree, that if he saw clearly that he could withdraw him from sin, he would still forbear from so doing, through fear or covetousness, because in his own mind he prefers fraternal charity to these things. It is in this way that holy men sometimes omit to correct wrongdoers.”
► CAN CORRECTIONS BE JUSTIFIABLY OMITTED: “You must not fear lest the scorner insult you when you rebuke him―however, you should bear in mind that by making him hate you, you may make him worse. Therefore one ought to forego fraternal correction, when we fear that we may make a man worse by correcting him. The correction of the wrongdoer is twofold.
One form of correction, which belongs to prelates, is directed to the common good and has coercive force. Such correction should not be omitted just because the person corrected might be disturbed―both (1) because if he is unwilling to amend his ways of his own accord, he should be made to cease sinning by being punished, and (2) because, if he be incorrigible, the common good is safeguarded in this way, since the order of justice is observed, and others are deterred by one being made an example of. Hence a judge does not desist from pronouncing sentence of condemnation against a sinner, for fear of disturbing him or his friends.
The other fraternal correction is directed to the amendment of the wrongdoer―whom it does not coerce, but merely admonishes. Consequently, when it is deemed probable that the sinner will not take the warning and will become worse, then such fraternal correction should be omitted.
► THE CORRECTION OF OUR SUPERIORS: “A subject is not competent to administer to his prelate [superior] a correction that is an act of justice by administering a coercive nature of punishment―but fraternal correction, which is an act of charity, is within the competency of everyone, with regard to any person towards whom he is bound by charity, providing that there be something in that person which requires correction.
“When a subject corrects his prelate, he ought to do so in a becoming manner, not with impudence and harshness, but with gentleness and respect. One who is not an equal can reprove privately and respectfully. Hence the Apostle says: ‘An ancient man rebuke not, but entreat him as a father!’ (1 Timothy 5:1). A subject treats his prelate inordinately when he upbraids him with insolence, as also when he speaks ill of him. It must be observed, however, that if the Faith were endangered, a subject ought to rebuke his prelate even publicly. We must also remember that when a man reproves his prelate charitably, it does not follow that he thinks himself any better, but merely that he offers his help to one who, being in the higher position among you, is therefore in greater danger, as St. Augustine observes.
► CAN SINNERS CORRECT OTHERS: “As to whether a sinner ought to reprove a wrongdoer―sin does not deprive the sinner’s reason of all right judgment, and, in this respect, he may be competent to find fault with others for committing sin. Nevertheless, a previous sin proves somewhat of a hindrance to this correction, for three reasons.
“Firstly, because this previous sin renders a man unworthy to rebuke another; and especially is he unworthy to correct another for a lesser sin, if he himself has committed a greater sin. Hence St. Jerome says on Our Lord’s words, “Why seest thou the splinter in thy brother’s eye?’ etc. (Matthew 7:3): ‘He is speaking of those who, while they are themselves guilty of mortal sin, have no patience with the lesser venial sins of their brethren.’
“Secondly, such like correction becomes unseemly if the corrector’s sin be well known, on account of the scandal which ensues therefrom, because it would seem that he corrects, not out of charity, but more for the sake of ostentation. What you want is, not to save others, but to hide your evil deeds with good teaching, and to seek to be praised by men for your knowledge.
“Thirdly, on account of the rebuker’s pride; when, for instance, a man thinks lightly of his own sins, and, in his own heart, sets himself above his neighbor, judging the latter’s sins with harsh severity, as though he himself were just man. Hence St. Augustine says: ‘To reprove the faults of others is the duty of good and kindly men. When a wicked man rebukes anyone, his rebuke is the latter’s acquittal.’ And so, as St. Augustine says: ‘When we have to find fault with anyone, we should think whether we were never guilty of his sin; and then we must remember that we are men, and might have been guilty of it; or that we once had it on our conscience, but have it no longer: and then we should bethink ourselves that we are all weak, in order that our reproof may be the outcome, not of hatred, but of pity. But if we find that we are guilty of the same sin, we must not rebuke him, but groan with him, and invite him to repent with us.’ It follows from this that, if a sinner reprove a wrongdoer with humility, he does not sin, nor does he bring a further condemnation on himself, although thereby he proves himself deserving of condemnation, either in his brother’s or in his own conscience, on account of his previous sin.”
► SHOULD THE CORRECTION BE PRIVATE OR PUBLIC: “St. Augustine, commenting on Our Lord’s words, “Rebuke him between thee and him alone” (Matthew 18:15), says: ‘Aim at his amendment, while avoiding his disgrace―since perhaps from shame he might begin to defend his sin; and him, whom you thought to make a better man, you make worse.’ With regard to the public denunciation of sins―it is necessary to make a distinction: because sins may be either public or secret. On the case of public sins―a remedy is required, not only for the sinner, so that he may become better, but also for others, who know of his sin, lest they be scandalized. Wherefore such like sins should be denounced in public, according to the saying of the Apostle (1 Timothy 5:20): ‘Them that sin, reprove before all, so that the rest also may have fear,” which is to be understood as referring to public sins, as St. Augustine states.
“On the other hand, in the case of secret sins, the words of Our Lord seem to apply: ‘If thy brother shall offend against thee, then go and rebuke him between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain thy brother!’ (Matthew 18:15). But if he offend thee publicly in the presence of others, he no longer sins against thee alone, but also against others whom he disturbs. Since, however, a man’s neighbor may take offense even at his secret sins, it seems that we must make yet a further distinction. For certain secret sins are hurtful to our neighbor either in his body or in his soul, as, for instance, when a man plots secretly to betray his country to its enemies, or when a heretic secretly turns other men away from the Faith. And since he that sins thus in secret, sins not only against you in particular, but also against others, it is necessary to take steps to denounce him at once, in order to prevent him doing such harm, unless by chance you were firmly persuaded that this evil result would be prevented by admonishing him secretly.
“On the other hand there are other sins which injure none but the sinner, and the person sinned against, either because he alone is hurt by the sinner, or at least because he alone knows about his sin, and then our one purpose should be to succor our sinning brother: and just as the physician of the body restores the sick man to health, if possible, without cutting off a limb, but, if this be unavoidable, cuts off a limb which is least indispensable, in order to preserve the life of the whole body, so too he who desires his brother’s amendment should, if possible, so amend him as regards his conscience, that he keep his good name.
“For a good name is useful, first of all to the sinner himself, not only in temporal matters wherein a man suffers many losses, if he lose his good name, but also in spiritual matters, because many are restrained from sinning, through fear of dishonor, so that when a man finds his honor lost, he puts no curb on his sinning. Hence St. Jerome says on Matthew 18:15: ‘If he sin against thee, thou shouldst rebuke him in private, lest he persist in his sin if he should once become shameless or unabashed.’ Secondly, we ought to safeguard our sinning brother’s good name, both because the dishonor of one leads to the dishonor of others, according to the saying of St. Augustine: ‘When a few of those who bear a name for holiness, are reported falsely, or proved in truth, to have done anything wrong, people will seek by busily repeating it to make it believed of all’ ― and also because when one man’s sin is made public others are incited to sin likewise.
“Since, however, one’s conscience should be preferred to a good name, Our Lord wished that we should publicly denounce our brother and so deliver his conscience from sin, even though he should forfeit his good name. Therefore it is evident that the precept requires a secret admonition to precede public denunciation. Our Lord as God knew the sin of Judas as though it were public, wherefore He could have made it known at once. Yet He did not, but warned Judas of his sin in words that were obscure.”
Start Correcting Correctly
Peeling fruit can be efficient or it can be messy. The same is true for correcting people. Peeling requires some form of cutting―but it needs to be cut and peeled in a way that does not damage the fruit, nor cut away good parts of the fruit, nor create a gooey wet mess. You could say that surgery is much the same―you need to remove the infected, diseased tissue and leave the good tissue in place. Correcting people is much the same―tackle the bad, leave alone the good, and don’t “kill” the “patient” in the process!
When correcting someone, we need to focus on the problem and not every aspect of the person’s life. Dredging up the past every time we correct is counterproductive. We also need to be positive and not just negative. There is more than just one way of getting a point across. When a doctor performs a surgery, he does not just start cutting away at the patient―he first administers an anesthetic in order to eliminate as much pain and discomfort as possible. That should also be the case when we correct others―positivity anesthetizes the necessary negativity. When the doctor has finished surgery, the patient is “sewn-up” with stitches and is prescribed some medicine that will take some of the edge off the inevitable pain that will remain after surgery. Likewise, after correcting someone, we should try to “stitch-up” the inevitable wound of person we have corrected and prescribe some kind and positive words that will help with the healing process.
This is why certain authors recommend the “sandwich method” of correction―(1) soft bread and butter on the bottom slice of bread; (2) the harder meat in the middle; (3) a sweet topping and another soft slice of bread on top. Translated for the purpose of correction, this means: (1) start out by being positive and even point out some of the good qualities of the person; (2) then administer the “meat” of correction; (3) finish off on a positive note by mentioning the positive, pleasant outcome that will result from the correction, and reinforce the qualities the person has in order to achieve that outcome.
For example: (1) You are usually a good worker/student/child/person, as is seen by the way you (describe some of the good things the person has done in the past); (2) that is why it is so painful to see you acting/speaking in this way, which is wrong, hurtful to (mention persons affected) and also against God’s law and commandments. If we refuse to obey God, then He punishes us; likewise, if you refuse to change, you will have to be punished; (3) so let us go back to the good person that you know you can be and which you have been in the past. We will help you all that we can, because we love you and do not want to see you go from bad to worse; and worse still, to see you eventually punished by God both in this life and in the next. We will pray for the graces you need to change, but it is you that has to cooperate with those graces and make the necessary changes.[And most importantly of all ― it is imperative that you follow through with the promise to pray for their amendment! For without the grace of God, NO GOOD CAN HAPPEN! “Without Me―you can do nothing!” said Our Lord (John 15:5). Our Lady of Fatima also indicated the same thing, by saying: “PRAY and MAKE SACRIFICES for the conversion of sinners!”].
Shouting and screaming is often an indicator that normal corrective measures have been ineffectively applied in some way. Furthermore, shouting and screaming gives the impression that the corrector has “lost it” and is out of control. It also gives an excuse the person who is being corrected that the shouting, screaming person hates them rather than loves them. Shouting and screaming is much easier than a well thought-out correction that corrects, threatens punishment, while at the same praising the good qualities of the wrongdoer, showing love towards them, and bringing God and His laws into the act of correction.
According to the teachings of St. Francis de Sales, fraternal correction means offering constructive criticism or advice to another person with genuine love and care, aiming to help them grow spiritually while always prioritizing kindness and gentleness, essentially “catching more flies with honey” rather than harsh confrontation; he believed this should be done with a spirit of humility, recognizing that everyone is capable of making mistakes and needs support in their journey towards holiness.
In his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, St. Francis writes: “Our Lord has particularly recommended to us to be specially consecrated to His service and dedicated to His imitation: ‘Learn of Me,’ he says, ‘for I am meek [gentle] and humble of heart!’ (Matthew 11:29) … According to St. Bernard, charity reaches its perfection when it is not only patient, but also gentle and meek … St. James says bluntly and without reservation that the anger of man does not work the justice of God (1:20) ... We ought, indeed, to resist the evil and restrain the vices of those in our charge constantly and courageously but gently and peacefully. Nothing calms down an angry elephant so quickly as the sight of a little lamb and nothing breaks the force of cannon balls so easily as wool. We do not accept correction given in anger, even though reasonable, so well as the one that has no other origin than reason alone. For the rational soul is naturally subject to reason and is subject to passion only through tyranny. Reason accompanied by passion becomes odious, its rightful dominion being degraded by its association with tyranny … When reason governs, and peacefully administers punishments, corrections and admonitions, then everyone loves and approves it―even though it is done strictly and exactly. But when reason brings with it anger, fury and wrath―which, according St. Augustine, are its soldiers―then it renders itself more terrifying than lovable; the very heart of reason remains always oppressed and ill-treated. As soon as you realize that you have acted with anger, make reparation for the fault by a prompt act of gentleness towards the same person against whom you were irritated. It is a good remedy against anger to correct it instantly by its opposite―through an act of gentleness. As they say, fresh wounds are easily healed!”
It is said that God’s grace works “suaviter et fortiter” ― which how we ought to act when correcting others. The Latin phrase is often used to describe a way of approaching situations that require a balance of firmness with courtesy. It is a way of action that balances strength (fortiter) and gentleness (suaviter). It can also be translated as “gentleness and strength” ― “pleasantly in manner, powerfully in action” ― “gentle in manner, firm in application.” The dictionaries will usually translate the words as follows: Suaviter as meaning “gently, or softly, or sweetly, or pleasantly.” The word Fortiter as meaning "firmly, strongly, powerfully, bravely, or boldly.” All of this is a perfect description on how we ought to correct others if correction is needed.
Jean-Pierre Camus was consecrated to be the Bishop of Belley by the Bishop of Geneva, St. Francis de Sales. The two dioceses of Geneva and Belley bordered one another, which contributed to further that close friendship between the Bishops. Bishop Camus quotes St. Francis de Sales as saying: “A spoon full of honey attracts more flies than a hundred barrels full of vinegar.” (Jean-Pierre Camus, The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales). Let our corrections contain some honey and not barrels of vinegar! After all, Holy Scripture does not say: “God is vinegar!” but it says “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8).
Article 22
Saturday & Sunday, January 18th & 19th
The Family Glue
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Saturday & Sunday, January 18th & 19th
The Family Glue
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Families Falling Apart
More and more families are splintering, cracking and falling apart! What can you do? Apply some glue! What glue? The glue God gave you! The glue of charity which bonds things together! “Charity is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:14). Everyone loves charity! Everyone loves to be loved! “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Charity is meant to be the DNA of all virtues. It is meant to be the driving force or the fuel for all other virtues―just like God, Who is charity itself, is the driving force of all creation.
St. Thomas Aquinas says that “charity is the life of the soul, even as the soul is the life of the body.” He states that “charity is the form of the virtues” ― meaning it gives structure and purpose to other virtues. He adds: “every virtue depends on charity … No true virtue is possible without charity … Charity is compared to the foundation or root in so far as all other virtues draw their sustenance and nourishment therefrom … Charity is said to be the end of other virtues, because it directs all other virtues to its own end. And since a mother is one who conceives within herself and by another, charity is called the mother of the other virtues, because, by commanding them, it conceives the acts of the other virtues.”
St. Augustine of Hippo recommends: “In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.” Our primary focus should be on essentials and not non-essentials. Focus on what is important and not on things that are unimportant. “The greatest of these is charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:13). Focus on what unites, rather on what divides. No one wins when all our energies are being poured into non-essentials that separate instead of essentials that should unite us. Charity is always the goal and aim of Christians. “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
“Let us love one another―for charity is of God. And everyone that loves, is born of God and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity. The charity of God has appeared towards us, because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world to be a propitiation for our sins … In this is charity―not as though we had first loved God, but because he has first loved us and sent his Son. If God has so loved us; we also ought to love one another. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us!” (1 John 4:7-12).
Family Hurricanes, Tornados and Earthquakes
The absence of charity is the ultimate cause of family friction, family hurricanes, tornados, storms and earthquakes. “The Lord is not in the wind … The Lord is not in the earthquake … The Lord is not in the fire!” (3 Kings 19:11-12). “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalms 144:8-9). “Be kind one to another; merciful, forgiving one another―even as God has forgiven you!” (Ephesians 4:32). “Put ye on, therefore―as the elect of God, holy, and beloved―the bowels of mercy, benignity, humility, modesty, patience, bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another―even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also!” (Colossians 3:12-13). “Be ready to do every good work; to speak evil of no man, not to be litigious, but gentle; showing all mildness towards all men” (Titus 3:1-2). “Charity is patient, is kind; Charity envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeks not her own; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things. Charity never falls away” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8). “Therefore, whilst we still have time, let us work good to all men―but especially to those who are of the household of the Faith!” (Galatians 6:10). “But before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins!” (1 Peter 4:8).
Charity Leads to Friendship
For St. Thomas, friendship is the ideal way we should relate to other persons. We ought to be friends with those around us, because this will enrich our lives in virtue―particularly in the virtue of charity. St. Thomas stretches the notion of friendship far beyond just having warm interactions with the rest of humanity. His view centers on friendship with God. He also wants to befriend angels. That idea is problematic for many people. Some may think it is an unreasonable ambition to become a friend of God―they regard only friendships between equals as genuine friendship. They see the gulf between God and humans as immense―and therefore they question the view that we can befriend God. Yet Our Lord―Who is God―Himself said: “I will not now call you servants … But I have called you friends!” (John 15:15).
In his analysis of friendship, St. Thomas is looking ahead to the afterlife―where our imperfect friendship with God while on Earth, will be perfected in Heaven. “We see now through a glass in a dark manner; but then face to face” (1 Corinthians 13:12). There, he hopes, we can live in the beatific vision of paradise, in which we enjoy the bliss of being in God’s company, together with the community of the blessed who have made it there too. So, he reasons, we should be friendly with fellow human beings now, because in the future they may, with us, be friends of God in Heaven. The principle is pretty much “any friend of God’s is a friend of mine.” Our Lord did not avoid sinners, but mixed and dined with them―thus infuriating the Scribes and Pharisees. “And the Pharisees seeing it, said to His disciples: “Why does your Master eat with publicans and sinners?’” (Matthew 9:11). The answer is quite simply―as Our Lord Himself said―“They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill. Go, then, and learn what this means: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners! … The Son of man is come to save that which was lost!” (Matthew 9:12-13; 18:11).
When families splinter, crack, break and fall apart―some family members stay on the side of God, other family members fall away from God. Christ wants to save those who fall away: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). Our Lord adds: “What man, that has an hundred sheep, if he shall lose one of them, does he not leave the ninety-nine in the desert, and go after that which was lost, until he find it?” (Luke 15:4). “Go ye to the lost sheep!” (Matthew 10:6). “Love your enemies; do good to them that hate you; and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!” (Matthew 5:44). You will find enemies of God in your own family: “A man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 10:36).
Mercy belongs to Charity
The virtue of mercy can be said to be a room in the mansion of charity―that is where St. Thomas Aquinas places it in his treatise on charity. We all love mercy when it is applied to us―therefore we should also show mercy to others. As the saying states: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you!” If we wish to be saved and go to Heaven, then we should wish that our family members and neighbors be saved and get to Heaven―no matter how bad they may have become.
“If your brother shall offend against you, go, and rebuke him between you and him alone. If he shall hear you, then you shall gain your brother. And if he will not hear you, take with you one or two more―so that in the mouth of two or three witnesses, every word may stand. And if he will not hear them, then tell the Church. And if he will not hear the Church, let him be to you as the heathen and publican!” (Matthew 18:15-17).
“Peter unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I do not say to you, till seven times―but till seventy times seven times! … Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned. Forgive, and you shall be forgiven’” (Matthew 18:21-22; Luke 6:37). “Forgive your neighbor if he has hurt you―and then your sins shall be forgiven when you pray!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:2).
Hence we have the Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy. The Corporal Works do good on a physical level: (1) To feed the hungry; (2) To give drink to the thirsty; (3) To clothe the naked; (4) To visit the imprisoned; (5) To shelter the homeless; (6) To visit the sick; (7) To bury the dead. The Spiritual Works of Mercy do good on the level of the soul: (1) To admonish the sinner; (2) To instruct the ignorant; (3) To counsel the doubtful; (4) To comfort the sorrowful; (5) To bear wrongs patiently; (6) To forgive all injuries; (7) To pray for the living and the dead.
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica on his treatise on Charity, writes: “Charity, which unites man to God, is greater than mercy … But of all the virtues which relate to our neighbor, mercy is the greatest … The sum total of the Christian religion consists in mercy, as regards external works: but the inward love of charity, whereby we are united to God rules over both love and mercy for our neighbor ... Mercy signifies grief for another’s distress … Mercy is heartfelt sympathy for another’s distress, impelling us to succor him if we can. For mercy takes its name ‘misericordia’ from denoting a man’s compassionate heart [miserum cor] for another’s unhappiness ... True godliness is not disdainful but compassionate … Pity is sympathy for another’s distress … Pity is a kind of sorrow … Pity is sorrow for a visible evil … Since sorrow or grief is about one’s own ills, one grieves or sorrows for another’s distress, in so far as one looks upon another’s distress as one’s own through a union of the affections, which is the effect of love. God takes pity on us through love alone. Since he who loves another looks upon his friend, as another self, he counts his friend’s hurt as his own, so that he grieves for his friend’s hurt as though he were hurt himself. The proud are without pity, because they despise others, and think them wicked, so that they account them as suffering deservedly whatever they suffer. Hence Pope St. Gregory says (Hom. in Evang. xxxiv) that ‘false godliness,’ i.e. of the proud, ‘is not compassionate but disdainful.’ Harshness drives pity away.” As Holy Scripture says: “A mild answer breaks wrath―but a harsh word stirs up fury” (Proverbs 15:1).
Two-Faced Mercy―Two-Faced Charity
We all love charity when we are on the receiving end of it! We all love mercy when we are on the receiving end of it! Sometimes we audaciously expect to be shown charity and mercy! But how inclined are we to show charity and mercy to others? A parable of Our Lord addresses this point:
“Then came Peter unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say you not just seven times; but seventy times seven times! Therefore is the Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 an ounce, one talent would be worth $22,500―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $225 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“‘But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 per ounce, the penny would be worth $3.75―and a hundred pence would be $375): and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: “Pay what you owe me!” And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“‘Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: “You wicked servant! I forgave you all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?” And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!’” (Matthew 18:21-35).
Merciful love is not optional in relationships―it is the foundation for its long-term success. Marriage is a union of two good forgivers. The same can be said of friendship. Offering forgiveness gives a new beginning to the one who offends and helps relationships build from injuries that inevitably arise in any relationship. In our relationship with God, it is in the “home” of the confessional, in the Sacrament of Confession, that we receive an unmerited forgiveness from Christ. He does not owe us forgiveness and yet He forgives. He also always forgives us despite the number of times we repeatedly fail at the same sin―providing we are sorry for that sin and are working to amend our lives. Christ never tires of mercy. Christ forgave us while we were sinners, even before we were repentant and able to receive that forgiveness. In fact, it is His grace that moves us to repentance―for without Him and His grace we can do nothing: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). His cry on the Cross, “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do!” is echoed down through the centuries.
When we experience this unmerited forgiveness in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, we are healed because Christ loves us. He does not love us because we do not have sin, failures, or weaknesses. He loves us despite these things and the ugliness of our actions. Of course, Christ wants us to be repentant, to promise to be holy and sin no more, in order to be reconciled with Him and others. Yet, at the same time, we must never forget that this divine forgiving love always remains unmerited, because Christ loves unconditionally. Christ said: “A new commandment I give unto you: That you love one another, as I have loved you!” (John 13:34) “If God has so loved us; then we also ought to love one another!” (1 John 4:11).
Discord Destroys Charity
A broken bone is a bone that is broken into two or more pieces. A broken family is a family that has broken into two or more differing attitudes, beliefs, goals or ways of living and acting. As Our Lord said: “If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand” (Mark 3:24-25).
St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Charity is a union of wills … Discord denotes a certain disunion of wills, in so far as one man’s will holds fast to one thing, while the other man’s will holds fast to something else … Discord is opposed to concord. Concord results from charity ... Concord which is an effect of charity, is union of wills not of opinions … Charity directs many hearts together to one thing, which is chiefly the Divine good … Discord is a sin, because it is contrary to charity, in so far as it is opposed to this concord. Hence to cause a discord, whereby a good concord resulting from charity is destroyed, is a grave sin: wherefore it is written (Proverbs 6:16): ‘Six things there are, which the Lord hates, and the seventh His soul detests,” which seventh is stated (Proverbs 6:19) to be ‘him that sows discord among brethren.’ On the other hand, to arouse a discord whereby an evil concord (i.e. concord in an evil will) is destroyed, is praiseworthy. In this way Paul was to be commended for sowing discord among those who concorded together in evil, because Our Lord also said of Himself (Matthew 10:34): ‘I came not to send peace, but the sword.’ Concord makes small things thrive, while discord brings the greatest to ruin, is because the more united a force is, the stronger it is, while the more disunited it is the weaker it becomes.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, treatise on charity).
Satan knows that better than we do, and so he is continually seeking to divide and conquer―as Our Lady of La Salette warned: “God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family.” Today we see the fruits of Satanic division in the moral attitudes of Catholics: Abortion: 60% accept it. Same-sex marriages: 35% of weekly Mass attendees accept it; 61% of monthly/seldom Mass attendees accept it. Use of Contraception: 83% accept it. Holy Communion to unmarried couples who are living together: 75% accept it. The opinion that you can be a good Catholic without going to church every Sunday: 72% accept it. Women priests: 44% of weekly Mass attendees accept it; 71% of monthly/seldom Mass attendees accept it. Allowing priests to marry: 53% accept it. As you can see―a massive division on crucial moral points. Many moral “bones” have been well and truly fractured! Moral laws are being broken.
Charity Heals
We speak of Faith healing―but do we speak of Charity healing? Does charity have the power to heal? Well, for one, it heals the soul from sin: “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). An act of perfect contrition―which is sorrow for sin based upon the love of God, rather than the fear of God―has the power to heal the soul of all mortal sins and restore sanctifying grace to the soul!
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and it was the charity of God that sent Christ to redeem and heal the world: “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “Christ loved the Church and delivered Himself up for it” (Ephesians 5:25) … “Christ also has loved us, and has delivered Himself for us” (Ephesians 5:2). “The Son of God loved me and delivered Himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). “If God has so loved us; then we also ought to love one another!” (1 John 4:11). As Our Lord Himself said: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Love can heal the soul by healing the wounds caused by sin, neglect, and weakness. Love can heal the mind and body by reducing stress and improving the immune system. Love can heal relationships and bring people together. Throughout the Bible we see God’s boundless love redeeming, restoring and sanctifying even the most broken and lost souls. The Gospels show us Jesus’ heart of compassion for the lost and suffering. What was His overriding motive in all the miracles of physical and spiritual healing that He performed? Love! Time and again, we see Christ reaching out with love to touch lepers, dine with tax collectors and sinners, forgive adulterers, and welcome outcasts. His love knew no bounds.
The parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32) beautifully illustrates how the Father’s unfailing love can restore and heal even a child who has strayed far from home. When the wayward son finally returns, expecting judgment. Instead, he is embraced with tears of joy and celebration. The father’s extravagant love washes away shame and restores the son to his rightful place in the family.
Throughout the ages, saints have followed Christ’s example of radical, transformative love. St. Francis of Assisi embraced lepers and saw the face of Christ in the poor and marginalized. St. Damien of Molokai gave up everything to minister to those with leprosy, eventually contracting and dying from the disease himself. St. Therese of Lisieux discovered that even small acts of love and sacrifice could have cosmic significance in God’s economy. Her “Little Way” teaches us that no gesture of love is wasted. Each kind word, patient response, or hidden act of service can be a balm for wounded souls and a light in the darkness. The lives of these saints, and countless others, testify to the healing power of selfless love. By allowing God’s love to flow through them, they became instruments of restoration and hope for those whom society had rejected and abandoned. When we choose to love as Christ loves us ― with patience, kindness, and perseverance ― we participate in God’s redemptive work. Our love becomes a lifeline for souls adrift in a sea of pain, despair and meaninglessness. The power of love should never be underestimated to save and heal. In the end, it is love alone that will conquer all and draw all souls back to the heart of God. May we strive to love as Christ loves, to become living reflections of His mercy and compassion.
Just think upon how you yourself react to charity that is shown to you whenever you are sick, or in need, or helpless, or even when you have sinned. Do you prefer and react better to the harsh word, the harsh treatment―or do you react better to the kind word, and compassionate treatment? The answer is pretty obvious, isn’t it? Therefore, “put on, as the elect of God, mercy, kindness, humility, patience! Bearing with one another and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another―even as the Lord hath forgiven you, so do you also. But above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:12-14). St. Paul reminds us that charity “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:7). “Cease to stretch out [point] the finger, and to speak that which profiteth not! When thou shalt pour out thy soul to the hungry, and shalt satisfy the afflicted soul then shall thy light rise up in darkness, and thy darkness shall be as the noonday!” (Isaias 58:9-10).
Can you remember the last time that God yelled, screamed and shouted at you for all the sins that you have committed against Him? How many times has the priest yelled, screamed and shouted at you in the confessional for all the sins that you have committed? Even if the priest has been angry with you on some occasion―the vast majority of the time the priests have shown you patience, compassion, understanding and kindness, rarely giving you the quantity of penance that your sins truly deserved!
Charity Converts
The Legion of Mary official handbook, states: “All over the world the Legion is doing those simple acts of the love of God in man, and of the love of men for the sake of God; and in every place that love shows its power to stir and win hearts. Likewise, the materialistic systems profess the love and service of man. They have preached a hollow gospel of fraternity. Millions have believed that gospel. In its name, they deserted a religion which they thought to be inert, and they submitted enthusiastically to despotisms. They were convinced that their new leaders loved them best; so they followed them, and now they are trying ardently to induce all mankind to join them. They seem to be in the ascendancy. And yet the position is not a hopeless one. There is a way of bringing back to Faith those determined millions, and of saving countless other millions. That hope lies in the application of a great principle which rules the world, and which the Saint of Ars [St. John Vianney] has stated thus: ‘The world belongs to him who loves it most, and who proves that love!’ Those millions will never listen to the enunciation of the truths of Faith. But they cannot help seeing, and being moved by a real Faith which operates through a real heroic love for all men. Convince them that the Church loves them most, and they will turn their back on those who rule them now. They will return to Faith in spite of everything. They will even lay down their lives for that Faith.”
More and more families are splintering, cracking and falling apart! What can you do? Apply some glue! What glue? The glue God gave you! The glue of charity which bonds things together! “Charity is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:14). Everyone loves charity! Everyone loves to be loved! “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Charity is meant to be the DNA of all virtues. It is meant to be the driving force or the fuel for all other virtues―just like God, Who is charity itself, is the driving force of all creation.
St. Thomas Aquinas says that “charity is the life of the soul, even as the soul is the life of the body.” He states that “charity is the form of the virtues” ― meaning it gives structure and purpose to other virtues. He adds: “every virtue depends on charity … No true virtue is possible without charity … Charity is compared to the foundation or root in so far as all other virtues draw their sustenance and nourishment therefrom … Charity is said to be the end of other virtues, because it directs all other virtues to its own end. And since a mother is one who conceives within herself and by another, charity is called the mother of the other virtues, because, by commanding them, it conceives the acts of the other virtues.”
St. Augustine of Hippo recommends: “In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.” Our primary focus should be on essentials and not non-essentials. Focus on what is important and not on things that are unimportant. “The greatest of these is charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:13). Focus on what unites, rather on what divides. No one wins when all our energies are being poured into non-essentials that separate instead of essentials that should unite us. Charity is always the goal and aim of Christians. “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
“Let us love one another―for charity is of God. And everyone that loves, is born of God and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity. The charity of God has appeared towards us, because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world to be a propitiation for our sins … In this is charity―not as though we had first loved God, but because he has first loved us and sent his Son. If God has so loved us; we also ought to love one another. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us!” (1 John 4:7-12).
Family Hurricanes, Tornados and Earthquakes
The absence of charity is the ultimate cause of family friction, family hurricanes, tornados, storms and earthquakes. “The Lord is not in the wind … The Lord is not in the earthquake … The Lord is not in the fire!” (3 Kings 19:11-12). “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalms 144:8-9). “Be kind one to another; merciful, forgiving one another―even as God has forgiven you!” (Ephesians 4:32). “Put ye on, therefore―as the elect of God, holy, and beloved―the bowels of mercy, benignity, humility, modesty, patience, bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another―even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also!” (Colossians 3:12-13). “Be ready to do every good work; to speak evil of no man, not to be litigious, but gentle; showing all mildness towards all men” (Titus 3:1-2). “Charity is patient, is kind; Charity envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeks not her own; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things. Charity never falls away” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8). “Therefore, whilst we still have time, let us work good to all men―but especially to those who are of the household of the Faith!” (Galatians 6:10). “But before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins!” (1 Peter 4:8).
Charity Leads to Friendship
For St. Thomas, friendship is the ideal way we should relate to other persons. We ought to be friends with those around us, because this will enrich our lives in virtue―particularly in the virtue of charity. St. Thomas stretches the notion of friendship far beyond just having warm interactions with the rest of humanity. His view centers on friendship with God. He also wants to befriend angels. That idea is problematic for many people. Some may think it is an unreasonable ambition to become a friend of God―they regard only friendships between equals as genuine friendship. They see the gulf between God and humans as immense―and therefore they question the view that we can befriend God. Yet Our Lord―Who is God―Himself said: “I will not now call you servants … But I have called you friends!” (John 15:15).
In his analysis of friendship, St. Thomas is looking ahead to the afterlife―where our imperfect friendship with God while on Earth, will be perfected in Heaven. “We see now through a glass in a dark manner; but then face to face” (1 Corinthians 13:12). There, he hopes, we can live in the beatific vision of paradise, in which we enjoy the bliss of being in God’s company, together with the community of the blessed who have made it there too. So, he reasons, we should be friendly with fellow human beings now, because in the future they may, with us, be friends of God in Heaven. The principle is pretty much “any friend of God’s is a friend of mine.” Our Lord did not avoid sinners, but mixed and dined with them―thus infuriating the Scribes and Pharisees. “And the Pharisees seeing it, said to His disciples: “Why does your Master eat with publicans and sinners?’” (Matthew 9:11). The answer is quite simply―as Our Lord Himself said―“They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill. Go, then, and learn what this means: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners! … The Son of man is come to save that which was lost!” (Matthew 9:12-13; 18:11).
When families splinter, crack, break and fall apart―some family members stay on the side of God, other family members fall away from God. Christ wants to save those who fall away: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). Our Lord adds: “What man, that has an hundred sheep, if he shall lose one of them, does he not leave the ninety-nine in the desert, and go after that which was lost, until he find it?” (Luke 15:4). “Go ye to the lost sheep!” (Matthew 10:6). “Love your enemies; do good to them that hate you; and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!” (Matthew 5:44). You will find enemies of God in your own family: “A man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 10:36).
Mercy belongs to Charity
The virtue of mercy can be said to be a room in the mansion of charity―that is where St. Thomas Aquinas places it in his treatise on charity. We all love mercy when it is applied to us―therefore we should also show mercy to others. As the saying states: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you!” If we wish to be saved and go to Heaven, then we should wish that our family members and neighbors be saved and get to Heaven―no matter how bad they may have become.
“If your brother shall offend against you, go, and rebuke him between you and him alone. If he shall hear you, then you shall gain your brother. And if he will not hear you, take with you one or two more―so that in the mouth of two or three witnesses, every word may stand. And if he will not hear them, then tell the Church. And if he will not hear the Church, let him be to you as the heathen and publican!” (Matthew 18:15-17).
“Peter unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I do not say to you, till seven times―but till seventy times seven times! … Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned. Forgive, and you shall be forgiven’” (Matthew 18:21-22; Luke 6:37). “Forgive your neighbor if he has hurt you―and then your sins shall be forgiven when you pray!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:2).
Hence we have the Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy. The Corporal Works do good on a physical level: (1) To feed the hungry; (2) To give drink to the thirsty; (3) To clothe the naked; (4) To visit the imprisoned; (5) To shelter the homeless; (6) To visit the sick; (7) To bury the dead. The Spiritual Works of Mercy do good on the level of the soul: (1) To admonish the sinner; (2) To instruct the ignorant; (3) To counsel the doubtful; (4) To comfort the sorrowful; (5) To bear wrongs patiently; (6) To forgive all injuries; (7) To pray for the living and the dead.
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica on his treatise on Charity, writes: “Charity, which unites man to God, is greater than mercy … But of all the virtues which relate to our neighbor, mercy is the greatest … The sum total of the Christian religion consists in mercy, as regards external works: but the inward love of charity, whereby we are united to God rules over both love and mercy for our neighbor ... Mercy signifies grief for another’s distress … Mercy is heartfelt sympathy for another’s distress, impelling us to succor him if we can. For mercy takes its name ‘misericordia’ from denoting a man’s compassionate heart [miserum cor] for another’s unhappiness ... True godliness is not disdainful but compassionate … Pity is sympathy for another’s distress … Pity is a kind of sorrow … Pity is sorrow for a visible evil … Since sorrow or grief is about one’s own ills, one grieves or sorrows for another’s distress, in so far as one looks upon another’s distress as one’s own through a union of the affections, which is the effect of love. God takes pity on us through love alone. Since he who loves another looks upon his friend, as another self, he counts his friend’s hurt as his own, so that he grieves for his friend’s hurt as though he were hurt himself. The proud are without pity, because they despise others, and think them wicked, so that they account them as suffering deservedly whatever they suffer. Hence Pope St. Gregory says (Hom. in Evang. xxxiv) that ‘false godliness,’ i.e. of the proud, ‘is not compassionate but disdainful.’ Harshness drives pity away.” As Holy Scripture says: “A mild answer breaks wrath―but a harsh word stirs up fury” (Proverbs 15:1).
Two-Faced Mercy―Two-Faced Charity
We all love charity when we are on the receiving end of it! We all love mercy when we are on the receiving end of it! Sometimes we audaciously expect to be shown charity and mercy! But how inclined are we to show charity and mercy to others? A parable of Our Lord addresses this point:
“Then came Peter unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say you not just seven times; but seventy times seven times! Therefore is the Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 an ounce, one talent would be worth $22,500―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $225 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“‘But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 per ounce, the penny would be worth $3.75―and a hundred pence would be $375): and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: “Pay what you owe me!” And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“‘Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: “You wicked servant! I forgave you all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?” And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!’” (Matthew 18:21-35).
Merciful love is not optional in relationships―it is the foundation for its long-term success. Marriage is a union of two good forgivers. The same can be said of friendship. Offering forgiveness gives a new beginning to the one who offends and helps relationships build from injuries that inevitably arise in any relationship. In our relationship with God, it is in the “home” of the confessional, in the Sacrament of Confession, that we receive an unmerited forgiveness from Christ. He does not owe us forgiveness and yet He forgives. He also always forgives us despite the number of times we repeatedly fail at the same sin―providing we are sorry for that sin and are working to amend our lives. Christ never tires of mercy. Christ forgave us while we were sinners, even before we were repentant and able to receive that forgiveness. In fact, it is His grace that moves us to repentance―for without Him and His grace we can do nothing: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). His cry on the Cross, “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do!” is echoed down through the centuries.
When we experience this unmerited forgiveness in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, we are healed because Christ loves us. He does not love us because we do not have sin, failures, or weaknesses. He loves us despite these things and the ugliness of our actions. Of course, Christ wants us to be repentant, to promise to be holy and sin no more, in order to be reconciled with Him and others. Yet, at the same time, we must never forget that this divine forgiving love always remains unmerited, because Christ loves unconditionally. Christ said: “A new commandment I give unto you: That you love one another, as I have loved you!” (John 13:34) “If God has so loved us; then we also ought to love one another!” (1 John 4:11).
Discord Destroys Charity
A broken bone is a bone that is broken into two or more pieces. A broken family is a family that has broken into two or more differing attitudes, beliefs, goals or ways of living and acting. As Our Lord said: “If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand” (Mark 3:24-25).
St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Charity is a union of wills … Discord denotes a certain disunion of wills, in so far as one man’s will holds fast to one thing, while the other man’s will holds fast to something else … Discord is opposed to concord. Concord results from charity ... Concord which is an effect of charity, is union of wills not of opinions … Charity directs many hearts together to one thing, which is chiefly the Divine good … Discord is a sin, because it is contrary to charity, in so far as it is opposed to this concord. Hence to cause a discord, whereby a good concord resulting from charity is destroyed, is a grave sin: wherefore it is written (Proverbs 6:16): ‘Six things there are, which the Lord hates, and the seventh His soul detests,” which seventh is stated (Proverbs 6:19) to be ‘him that sows discord among brethren.’ On the other hand, to arouse a discord whereby an evil concord (i.e. concord in an evil will) is destroyed, is praiseworthy. In this way Paul was to be commended for sowing discord among those who concorded together in evil, because Our Lord also said of Himself (Matthew 10:34): ‘I came not to send peace, but the sword.’ Concord makes small things thrive, while discord brings the greatest to ruin, is because the more united a force is, the stronger it is, while the more disunited it is the weaker it becomes.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, treatise on charity).
Satan knows that better than we do, and so he is continually seeking to divide and conquer―as Our Lady of La Salette warned: “God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family.” Today we see the fruits of Satanic division in the moral attitudes of Catholics: Abortion: 60% accept it. Same-sex marriages: 35% of weekly Mass attendees accept it; 61% of monthly/seldom Mass attendees accept it. Use of Contraception: 83% accept it. Holy Communion to unmarried couples who are living together: 75% accept it. The opinion that you can be a good Catholic without going to church every Sunday: 72% accept it. Women priests: 44% of weekly Mass attendees accept it; 71% of monthly/seldom Mass attendees accept it. Allowing priests to marry: 53% accept it. As you can see―a massive division on crucial moral points. Many moral “bones” have been well and truly fractured! Moral laws are being broken.
Charity Heals
We speak of Faith healing―but do we speak of Charity healing? Does charity have the power to heal? Well, for one, it heals the soul from sin: “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). An act of perfect contrition―which is sorrow for sin based upon the love of God, rather than the fear of God―has the power to heal the soul of all mortal sins and restore sanctifying grace to the soul!
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and it was the charity of God that sent Christ to redeem and heal the world: “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “Christ loved the Church and delivered Himself up for it” (Ephesians 5:25) … “Christ also has loved us, and has delivered Himself for us” (Ephesians 5:2). “The Son of God loved me and delivered Himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). “If God has so loved us; then we also ought to love one another!” (1 John 4:11). As Our Lord Himself said: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Love can heal the soul by healing the wounds caused by sin, neglect, and weakness. Love can heal the mind and body by reducing stress and improving the immune system. Love can heal relationships and bring people together. Throughout the Bible we see God’s boundless love redeeming, restoring and sanctifying even the most broken and lost souls. The Gospels show us Jesus’ heart of compassion for the lost and suffering. What was His overriding motive in all the miracles of physical and spiritual healing that He performed? Love! Time and again, we see Christ reaching out with love to touch lepers, dine with tax collectors and sinners, forgive adulterers, and welcome outcasts. His love knew no bounds.
The parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32) beautifully illustrates how the Father’s unfailing love can restore and heal even a child who has strayed far from home. When the wayward son finally returns, expecting judgment. Instead, he is embraced with tears of joy and celebration. The father’s extravagant love washes away shame and restores the son to his rightful place in the family.
Throughout the ages, saints have followed Christ’s example of radical, transformative love. St. Francis of Assisi embraced lepers and saw the face of Christ in the poor and marginalized. St. Damien of Molokai gave up everything to minister to those with leprosy, eventually contracting and dying from the disease himself. St. Therese of Lisieux discovered that even small acts of love and sacrifice could have cosmic significance in God’s economy. Her “Little Way” teaches us that no gesture of love is wasted. Each kind word, patient response, or hidden act of service can be a balm for wounded souls and a light in the darkness. The lives of these saints, and countless others, testify to the healing power of selfless love. By allowing God’s love to flow through them, they became instruments of restoration and hope for those whom society had rejected and abandoned. When we choose to love as Christ loves us ― with patience, kindness, and perseverance ― we participate in God’s redemptive work. Our love becomes a lifeline for souls adrift in a sea of pain, despair and meaninglessness. The power of love should never be underestimated to save and heal. In the end, it is love alone that will conquer all and draw all souls back to the heart of God. May we strive to love as Christ loves, to become living reflections of His mercy and compassion.
Just think upon how you yourself react to charity that is shown to you whenever you are sick, or in need, or helpless, or even when you have sinned. Do you prefer and react better to the harsh word, the harsh treatment―or do you react better to the kind word, and compassionate treatment? The answer is pretty obvious, isn’t it? Therefore, “put on, as the elect of God, mercy, kindness, humility, patience! Bearing with one another and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another―even as the Lord hath forgiven you, so do you also. But above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:12-14). St. Paul reminds us that charity “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:7). “Cease to stretch out [point] the finger, and to speak that which profiteth not! When thou shalt pour out thy soul to the hungry, and shalt satisfy the afflicted soul then shall thy light rise up in darkness, and thy darkness shall be as the noonday!” (Isaias 58:9-10).
Can you remember the last time that God yelled, screamed and shouted at you for all the sins that you have committed against Him? How many times has the priest yelled, screamed and shouted at you in the confessional for all the sins that you have committed? Even if the priest has been angry with you on some occasion―the vast majority of the time the priests have shown you patience, compassion, understanding and kindness, rarely giving you the quantity of penance that your sins truly deserved!
Charity Converts
The Legion of Mary official handbook, states: “All over the world the Legion is doing those simple acts of the love of God in man, and of the love of men for the sake of God; and in every place that love shows its power to stir and win hearts. Likewise, the materialistic systems profess the love and service of man. They have preached a hollow gospel of fraternity. Millions have believed that gospel. In its name, they deserted a religion which they thought to be inert, and they submitted enthusiastically to despotisms. They were convinced that their new leaders loved them best; so they followed them, and now they are trying ardently to induce all mankind to join them. They seem to be in the ascendancy. And yet the position is not a hopeless one. There is a way of bringing back to Faith those determined millions, and of saving countless other millions. That hope lies in the application of a great principle which rules the world, and which the Saint of Ars [St. John Vianney] has stated thus: ‘The world belongs to him who loves it most, and who proves that love!’ Those millions will never listen to the enunciation of the truths of Faith. But they cannot help seeing, and being moved by a real Faith which operates through a real heroic love for all men. Convince them that the Church loves them most, and they will turn their back on those who rule them now. They will return to Faith in spite of everything. They will even lay down their lives for that Faith.”
Article 21
Thursday & Friday, January 16th & 17th
Resurrecting Dead Catholic Families
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Thursday & Friday, January 16th & 17th
Resurrecting Dead Catholic Families
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
More Than You Think!
There are far more “dead” Catholics and “dead” Catholic families than you think! What do we mean by “dead”? By “dead” we mean not being alive to the word of God, to the teaching of the Church, to the spiritual and moral life that should shape the life of a true Catholic. There are many who like to identify themselves as being Catholic, but, in reality (in the eyes of God), they are far from being truly Catholic―they are Catholic in name only. Our Lord indicates this phenomenon on various occasions:
“Hypocrites! Well has Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me. In vain do they worship Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-9) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord!’ Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) ... “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that doth the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23) … “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside, and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
“The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15).
There are more souls damned than you think! Our Lord stated that above― “Wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” Who goes to Hell? Those who die in a state of mortal sin! There is no other reason that damns souls―only mortal sin. Therefore, we must infer from Our Lord’s words that most souls die in a state of mortal sin, and few die in a state of grace. Hence, most souls are dead to God through mortal sin.
Are there “dead” souls in your family? Do “you dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see, and see not; and have ears to hear, and hear not―for they are a provoking house”? (Ezechiel 12:2). “When they worshipped the Lord, they served also their own gods [our modern day gods and idols like smartphones, computers, televisions, internet, social media, artificial intelligence, etc.] according to the custom of the nations out of which they were brought” (4 Kings 17:33). “Woe to them that are of a double heart and to the sinner that goeth on the Earth two ways!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:14). “In the perverseness of their heart, they have gone after strange gods to serve them and to adore them … whose heart departs from the Lord” (Jeremias 13:10; 17:5).
God Wants to Save Everyone, But…
If you have “dead” souls in your family, then rest assured that Christ came to seek and save those who are lost: “God will [wants to] have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “The Father hath sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32).
Yes―God wants to save everyone. Christ came to save every sinner. Yet all will not be saved. Holy Scripture verifies this: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … [Christ is] the true Light, which enlightens every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and his own received Him not! … The light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil!” (John 1:1-11; 3:19).
There is no sinner who is beyond the mercy of God―“If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18)―but the forgiveness for the sinner and his return to God must be on God’s terms and not the sinner’s terms. What are those terms?
In the Old Testament, God says: “And if I shall say to the wicked: “You shalt surely die”― and he does penance for his sin, and does judgment and justice, and if that wicked man restores the pledge and gives back what he had robbed, and walks in the commandments of life, and does no unjust thing―then he shall surely live and shall not die! None of his sins, which he has committed, shall be imputed to him―for he has done judgment and justice, and he shall surely live!” (Ezechiel 33:14-16). Our Lord adds: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
A Work of Grace
So no matter how much the members of your “dead” family have sinned, God is prepared to accept them back and is willing to forgive them. But how shall you bring that about? How will you convert them? The answer is―you cannot convert them! Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Only the grace of God can convert them. Only the grace of God can bring about a desire in you for their conversion. All is the work of grace of God―as St. Thomas Aquinas forcefully tells us:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For grace is given to many persons to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
How to Obtain God’s Grace
Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace―she is the canal of grace, the pipeline of grace―through whom God distributes all His graces. St. Louis de Montfort writes: “We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. You must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God. Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person. No patriarch nor prophet nor any other holy person of the Old Law could manage to find this grace. It was Mary who gave existence and life to the author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the ‘Mother of Grace.’ God the Father, from Whom, as from its essential source, every perfect gift and every grace come down to us, gave her every grace when He gave her His Son … God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands” (The Secret of Mary).
St. Louis continues: “God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (Latin: mare). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Latin: Maria). This great God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has. This immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich. God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly. To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary” (True Devotion to Mary).
Going Solo is a No No!
Too many Catholics rely too much on their own knowledge, skills, efforts and endeavors. This a subtle form of pride that ignores the universality of Our Lord’s statement: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). You could rephrase that to read: “Without My grace―you can do nothing!” What is it about the word “nothing” that we do not understand. There is no place for “something” in “nothing”―the word “nothing” excludes all other things. The only thing we can do without Christ is commit sin. “I will not trust in my bow; neither shall my sword save me!” (Psalm 43:7). “Some trust in chariots, and some trust in horses―but we will call upon the Name of the Lord our God!” (Psalm 19:8). Our Lord said: “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me!” (John 15:4).
Holy Scripture further tells us: “I can do all things in Him Who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13). “Have confidence in the Lord with all thy heart, and lean not upon thy own prudence!” (Proverbs 3:5). “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father” (James 1:17). “What do you have that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “By grace you are saved and not of yourselves―for it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8). “May God supply all your needs, according to His riches in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19). “God is able to make all grace abound in you; so that you may always, having all sufficiency in all things, abound to every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8). St. Paul writes: “The Lord said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for you― for power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly, therefore, will I glory in my infirmities, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me!” (2 Corinthians 12:9).
Christ Resurrects
You may have the best intentions in the world and great desire to bring back to spiritual life those family members who have “died” spiritually towards God, or who are in the process of “dying” spiritually―but you, of yourself and by yourself, can do nothing to bring this about. It has to be the work of God and His grace. You can talk all you want; you can shout all you want; you can point the finger all you want; criticize all you want; condemn all you want; cry all you want; give them all the books and pamphlets you want; plot and plan all you want―but it will all come to nothing without God and His grace. “Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain that build it!” (Psalm 126:1). It is the heresy of the modern era to be independent in as many things as possible―but without the grace of God we can bring nobody to the Faith; we can convert nobody without God’s grace; we cannot bring anyone back to the Faith without God’s grace―we cannot even think, say and do the right things without God’s grace.
Yet, strangely enough, we often rely on ourselves and not God’s grace; we “go it alone” with the conviction that “we can do it!” It is only when our efforts have failed that we might perhaps turn to God―or, in our humiliated pride, we might throw up our hands in exasperation and claim we have done all that we could have possibly done and that we can do no more! Yet the one essential thing that should have been done, we have neglected―and that is turning to God, humbly and perseveringly begging His grace to turn around the bad situation and bring back the soul(s) who have departed from God. “Humble yourself in all things, and thou shalt find grace before God” (Ecclesiasticus 3:20). “For God resists the proud, but to the humble He gives grace” (1 Peter 5:5). “God resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6).
When Our Lady of Fatima requested that we play our part in the conversion of sinners―she did not give us a list of books to give them, nor a manual of tactics to use. She simply said: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners!”
Furthermore, since God channels all His graces through Mary, it is only logical that she should say: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” ― for all graces come through Mary and we all need the help of grace. That is why Our Lady adds that devotion to her will secure many graces of conversion: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” (June 13th & July 13th, 1917).
Along the same lines, Sister Lucia of Fatima adds: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.” (Sister Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
However―No Spectators
Having said that we need the grace of God for all things, that does not mean that God will do all things why we idly stand around watching! “Why stand you here all the day idle?” (Matthew 20:6). “Send him to work, that he be not idle!” (Ecclesiasticus 33:28). St. Augustine―a Father and Doctor of the Church―tells us that “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us!” Some translate the Latin into the singular: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, but God will not save you without your cooperation. Hence Our Lady of Fatima asked for the prayers and sacrifices for the conversion of sinners―God could save them without our cooperation, but God will not save them without our cooperation. Nevertheless, in all things God is the pilot and we are merely members of the crew―and crew members must work.
Thus Holy Scripture says: “If any man say ― ‘I love God!’ ― and hates his brother; then he is a liar! For he that loves not his brother, whom he sees, how can he love God, whom he sees not?” (1 John 4:20). “He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:17). Many fall into the error of Cain, who said that he was not his brother’s keeper: “And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is thy brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I know not! Am I my brother's keeper?’” (Genesis 4:9). It is our role as believing Christians to seek out the salvation of the non-believers that surround us: “The unbelieving husband is sanctified by the believing wife; and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the believing husband” (1 Corinthians 7:14). “I desire therefore, first of all, that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all men” (1 Timothy 2:1).
There are far more “dead” Catholics and “dead” Catholic families than you think! What do we mean by “dead”? By “dead” we mean not being alive to the word of God, to the teaching of the Church, to the spiritual and moral life that should shape the life of a true Catholic. There are many who like to identify themselves as being Catholic, but, in reality (in the eyes of God), they are far from being truly Catholic―they are Catholic in name only. Our Lord indicates this phenomenon on various occasions:
“Hypocrites! Well has Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me. In vain do they worship Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-9) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord!’ Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) ... “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that doth the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23) … “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside, and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
“The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15).
There are more souls damned than you think! Our Lord stated that above― “Wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” Who goes to Hell? Those who die in a state of mortal sin! There is no other reason that damns souls―only mortal sin. Therefore, we must infer from Our Lord’s words that most souls die in a state of mortal sin, and few die in a state of grace. Hence, most souls are dead to God through mortal sin.
Are there “dead” souls in your family? Do “you dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see, and see not; and have ears to hear, and hear not―for they are a provoking house”? (Ezechiel 12:2). “When they worshipped the Lord, they served also their own gods [our modern day gods and idols like smartphones, computers, televisions, internet, social media, artificial intelligence, etc.] according to the custom of the nations out of which they were brought” (4 Kings 17:33). “Woe to them that are of a double heart and to the sinner that goeth on the Earth two ways!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:14). “In the perverseness of their heart, they have gone after strange gods to serve them and to adore them … whose heart departs from the Lord” (Jeremias 13:10; 17:5).
God Wants to Save Everyone, But…
If you have “dead” souls in your family, then rest assured that Christ came to seek and save those who are lost: “God will [wants to] have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “The Father hath sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32).
Yes―God wants to save everyone. Christ came to save every sinner. Yet all will not be saved. Holy Scripture verifies this: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … [Christ is] the true Light, which enlightens every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and his own received Him not! … The light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil!” (John 1:1-11; 3:19).
There is no sinner who is beyond the mercy of God―“If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18)―but the forgiveness for the sinner and his return to God must be on God’s terms and not the sinner’s terms. What are those terms?
In the Old Testament, God says: “And if I shall say to the wicked: “You shalt surely die”― and he does penance for his sin, and does judgment and justice, and if that wicked man restores the pledge and gives back what he had robbed, and walks in the commandments of life, and does no unjust thing―then he shall surely live and shall not die! None of his sins, which he has committed, shall be imputed to him―for he has done judgment and justice, and he shall surely live!” (Ezechiel 33:14-16). Our Lord adds: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
A Work of Grace
So no matter how much the members of your “dead” family have sinned, God is prepared to accept them back and is willing to forgive them. But how shall you bring that about? How will you convert them? The answer is―you cannot convert them! Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Only the grace of God can convert them. Only the grace of God can bring about a desire in you for their conversion. All is the work of grace of God―as St. Thomas Aquinas forcefully tells us:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For grace is given to many persons to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
How to Obtain God’s Grace
Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace―she is the canal of grace, the pipeline of grace―through whom God distributes all His graces. St. Louis de Montfort writes: “We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. You must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God. Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person. No patriarch nor prophet nor any other holy person of the Old Law could manage to find this grace. It was Mary who gave existence and life to the author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the ‘Mother of Grace.’ God the Father, from Whom, as from its essential source, every perfect gift and every grace come down to us, gave her every grace when He gave her His Son … God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands” (The Secret of Mary).
St. Louis continues: “God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (Latin: mare). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Latin: Maria). This great God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has. This immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich. God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly. To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary” (True Devotion to Mary).
Going Solo is a No No!
Too many Catholics rely too much on their own knowledge, skills, efforts and endeavors. This a subtle form of pride that ignores the universality of Our Lord’s statement: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). You could rephrase that to read: “Without My grace―you can do nothing!” What is it about the word “nothing” that we do not understand. There is no place for “something” in “nothing”―the word “nothing” excludes all other things. The only thing we can do without Christ is commit sin. “I will not trust in my bow; neither shall my sword save me!” (Psalm 43:7). “Some trust in chariots, and some trust in horses―but we will call upon the Name of the Lord our God!” (Psalm 19:8). Our Lord said: “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me!” (John 15:4).
Holy Scripture further tells us: “I can do all things in Him Who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13). “Have confidence in the Lord with all thy heart, and lean not upon thy own prudence!” (Proverbs 3:5). “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father” (James 1:17). “What do you have that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “By grace you are saved and not of yourselves―for it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8). “May God supply all your needs, according to His riches in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19). “God is able to make all grace abound in you; so that you may always, having all sufficiency in all things, abound to every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8). St. Paul writes: “The Lord said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for you― for power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly, therefore, will I glory in my infirmities, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me!” (2 Corinthians 12:9).
Christ Resurrects
You may have the best intentions in the world and great desire to bring back to spiritual life those family members who have “died” spiritually towards God, or who are in the process of “dying” spiritually―but you, of yourself and by yourself, can do nothing to bring this about. It has to be the work of God and His grace. You can talk all you want; you can shout all you want; you can point the finger all you want; criticize all you want; condemn all you want; cry all you want; give them all the books and pamphlets you want; plot and plan all you want―but it will all come to nothing without God and His grace. “Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain that build it!” (Psalm 126:1). It is the heresy of the modern era to be independent in as many things as possible―but without the grace of God we can bring nobody to the Faith; we can convert nobody without God’s grace; we cannot bring anyone back to the Faith without God’s grace―we cannot even think, say and do the right things without God’s grace.
Yet, strangely enough, we often rely on ourselves and not God’s grace; we “go it alone” with the conviction that “we can do it!” It is only when our efforts have failed that we might perhaps turn to God―or, in our humiliated pride, we might throw up our hands in exasperation and claim we have done all that we could have possibly done and that we can do no more! Yet the one essential thing that should have been done, we have neglected―and that is turning to God, humbly and perseveringly begging His grace to turn around the bad situation and bring back the soul(s) who have departed from God. “Humble yourself in all things, and thou shalt find grace before God” (Ecclesiasticus 3:20). “For God resists the proud, but to the humble He gives grace” (1 Peter 5:5). “God resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6).
When Our Lady of Fatima requested that we play our part in the conversion of sinners―she did not give us a list of books to give them, nor a manual of tactics to use. She simply said: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners!”
Furthermore, since God channels all His graces through Mary, it is only logical that she should say: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” ― for all graces come through Mary and we all need the help of grace. That is why Our Lady adds that devotion to her will secure many graces of conversion: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” (June 13th & July 13th, 1917).
Along the same lines, Sister Lucia of Fatima adds: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.” (Sister Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
However―No Spectators
Having said that we need the grace of God for all things, that does not mean that God will do all things why we idly stand around watching! “Why stand you here all the day idle?” (Matthew 20:6). “Send him to work, that he be not idle!” (Ecclesiasticus 33:28). St. Augustine―a Father and Doctor of the Church―tells us that “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us!” Some translate the Latin into the singular: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, but God will not save you without your cooperation. Hence Our Lady of Fatima asked for the prayers and sacrifices for the conversion of sinners―God could save them without our cooperation, but God will not save them without our cooperation. Nevertheless, in all things God is the pilot and we are merely members of the crew―and crew members must work.
Thus Holy Scripture says: “If any man say ― ‘I love God!’ ― and hates his brother; then he is a liar! For he that loves not his brother, whom he sees, how can he love God, whom he sees not?” (1 John 4:20). “He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:17). Many fall into the error of Cain, who said that he was not his brother’s keeper: “And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is thy brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I know not! Am I my brother's keeper?’” (Genesis 4:9). It is our role as believing Christians to seek out the salvation of the non-believers that surround us: “The unbelieving husband is sanctified by the believing wife; and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the believing husband” (1 Corinthians 7:14). “I desire therefore, first of all, that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all men” (1 Timothy 2:1).
Article 20
Tuesday & Wednesday, January 14th & 15th
Modern Day Family Collapse
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Tuesday & Wednesday, January 14th & 15th
Modern Day Family Collapse
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Attacks on the Catholic Family
The Catholic Family is the base unit or “building-brick” in the Catholic Church, which is the Mystical Body of Christ. The attack on Catholicism, in general, inevitably translates into an attack on Catholic Families in particular. We all know the saying: “With each brick you take out of the wall, the wall becomes weaker and weaker.” How true is this today for the “bricks” of Catholic Families. With each “brick” that is loosened and removed―a person within the family, or a family within the Church―there is an increased weakening in the family or the Church.
Sister Lucia of Fatima warned that the devil would launch a massive attack upon the Family. He knows that the Catholic Family is the basic building-block of the Church. Since Sister Lucia spoke of this, we can, in retrospect, see the tragic collapse of Catholic Families throughout the world—they might still be families, but they are less and less Catholic Families. This has reached such dangerous levels, that even the modern Catholic Church and some of few remaining somewhat ‘Conservative’ and/or ‘Conservative-Liberals’ are trying to make a “last-ditch-stand” against the erosion of the Catholic Family.
Our Lady Warned of these Attacks
The Blessed Virgin Mary has also, on many occasions, foretold of the fight that is to come: “I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell. God will allow the demons to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … They will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings―evil will seem to triumph … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and discord will be seen, without love for country or family ...
“The Church will be full of those who accept compromises … The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts … Many will abandon the Faith! … Many will turn upon Religion! … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals. As true Faith fades ― false light will brighten the people … The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten … disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth ... In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost!
“As for the Sacrament of Matrimony, which symbolizes the union of Christ with His Church, it will be attacked and profaned in the fullest sense of the word. Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective of doing away with this Sacrament, making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children born without the blessing of the Church ... The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women … There will be almost no virgin souls in the world … (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
Definition of Divide and Conquer
In the above quotes of Our Lady, she says: “God will allow the demons to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family.” Satan seeks to divide so that he can conquer. The phrase ― “Divide and Conquer” ― is defined as: “To make a group of people disagree and fight with one another so that they will not join together against one” (Merriam Webster Dictionary). “The policy of maintaining control over one's subordinates or opponents by encouraging dissent between them, thereby preventing them from uniting in opposition.” (Oxford Dictionary) “A way of keeping yourself in a position of power by causing disagreements among other people so that they are unable to oppose you” (Cambridge Dictionary). “A strategy by which someone remains in power by making sure that the people under their control quarrel among themselves and so cannot unite to achieve their aims and overthrow their leader.” (Collins Dictionary).
Divide and Conquer―Tactics in Practice
The tactic ― “Divide and Conquer” ― is as old as mankind. There are many instances in the Bible where we see the “divide and conquer” tactic used―either by Satan, or by men, or a combination of both.
● Satan waited until Eve was alone and away from Adam before he tempted her. After Eve had fallen, Adam fell through Satan using Eve to tempt him―and thus both ended up being separated from God through their Original Sin.
● Satan divided Cain and Abel, by making Cain envious and resentful towards Abel―to the point that Cain eventually murdered Abel.
● The Tribes of Israel were divided among themselves after the death of King Solomon. The Kingdom of Israel became divided when the nation split into the Northern Kingdom of Israel and Southern Kingdom of Juda, making them vulnerable to conquest by other powers.
● The Apostles were divided when they argued among themselves as to who was the greatest among them.
● Judas was divided from the rest of the Apostles in spirit, and betrayed Christ.
● Peter the first pope, was divided or separated from the other Apostles when he denied Christ during the Passion.
● The other Apostles fled and abandoned Christ at His arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane.
● Heresy divided the Church from the earliest times and continues to do so until this day.
The Roman Empire is traditionally associated with a policy of “divide et impera”, when, in its early years, the expanding
Roman Republic routinely divisive tactics. When Rome was conquering the rest of Italy in the 4th and early 3rd centuries BC, her enemies rarely showed that harmony among themselves and that singleness of purpose which characterized the Romans, and Rome did her best to develop the spirit of discord among them by turning community against community and turning the aristocracy against the democracy. Rome refused to deal with its adversaries as a block, and instead made a separate treaty with each one of the communities, with the express purpose of preventing future confederations arising between them. In order to destroy channels of communication and to limit interaction between potential cooperators, these Roman treaties with the local communities deprived them, not only of the right to trade with one another, but also of the right to intermarry.
Divide and Conquer has played a crucial role in military tactics throughout history. From ancient battles to modern warfare, military leaders have utilized this approach to gain strategic advantages. The strategic encirclement employed by Hannibal at the Battle of Cannae and the fragmentation tactics of Genghis Khan are just a few examples of how Divide and Conquer has secured victories against formidable opponents. Even in more recent times, renowned leaders like Napoleon Bonaparte and General Zhukov employed Divide and Conquer strategies to outmaneuver their adversaries, disrupt enemy formations, and achieve significant military successes. Moreover, in the Battle of Stalingrad, Soviet General Georgy Zhukov utilized Divide and Conquer by encircling the German Sixth Army, cutting off their supplies and support, leading to a major turning point in World War II.
Divide and Conquer in Politics
“Divide and Rule” (Latin: “divide et impera”), or more commonly known as “Divide and Conquer”, in politics refers to an entity gaining and maintaining political power by using divisive measures. This includes the exploitation of existing divisions within a political group by its political opponents, and also the deliberate creation or strengthening of such divisions. It uses a strategy that breaks up existing power structures, and especially prevents smaller power groups from linking up, causing rivalries and fomenting discord among the people to prevent a rebellion against the elites or the people implementing the strategy. The goal is either to pit the lower classes against themselves to prevent a revolution, or to provide a desired solution to the growing discord that strengthens the power of the elites.
Our Lord speaks of Divide and Conquer
In the Gospels we see Our Lord refer to the divide and conquer tactic: “How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand. And if Satan be risen up against himself, he is divided and cannot stand, but has an end!” (Mark 3:23-26). “Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand! And if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself―how then shall his kingdom stand?” (Matthew 12:25-26). “Every kingdom divided against itself, shall be brought to desolation, and house upon house shall fall. And if Satan also be divided against himself, how shall his kingdom stand?” (Luke 11:17-18).
Our Lord even says that He Himself will be a source of division as He seeks to conquer souls by redeeming them from the clutches of Satan and leading them to Heaven: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled! … Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided―three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. They will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they shall persecute you in this city, flee into another!” (Matthew 10:17-22; 10:32-37; Luke 12:49-53).
As regards this division, Our Lord adds: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words … He that does not love Me, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24). “He that is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do!” (John 8:44). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
Divided and Conquered by the World
The division within families and the division between one family and another family has reached unprecedented levels! Never before have we seen so much division in the world! This division can be seen in the political field, the social field, the religious field, and of course the family field. Ultimately, those divisions can be traced back to Christ. As Christ said―we are either for Him or against Him. There is no third option; there are no seats for spectators in this world.
“The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with worldly things; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where your treasure is, there is your heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! [the world with its pleasures and treasures]” (Matthew 6:19-24). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). All of the above is what God expects from us―but that is not what God gets from us and our families!
“The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness is in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! They are of the world—therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. God has scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God has despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6; 1 John 4:5).
Divided and Conquered Families
There is very little or no doubt that the vast majority of Catholics today have been seduced and conquered by what the modern world has to offer! Just as they say, “Everyone has his price”, so too you could say, “Everyone has their preferred thing” that the world tantalizingly dangles before their eyes―and which conquers the soul and divides it from God. Our Lord says: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where your treasure is, there is your heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
It is the treasures and pleasures of the world that have seduced and divided so many souls from God. Not only have they divided souls from God, but they have often caused division within families―especially the technological treasures and pleasures! Increasingly, people find more pleasure by being on their smartphone/tablet/laptop/computer than they do in spending time with other members of the family―they cannot wait to get away from other family members to spend time with their treasured smartphone/tablet/laptop/computer. They find it impossible to reconcile Our Lord’s command with their own preferences: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). They have no time to “pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). Below you will find a 2024 survey on how much screen time is spent by those aged 18 and above―in other words, all adults.
Media Weekly screen time Daily screen time
Total use of TV 32 hours 18 minutes 4 hours 37 minutes
Internet on a computer 4 hours 56 minutes 42 minutes
Video on a computer 1 hour 59 minutes 17 minutes
App/web on a smartphone 16 hours 24 minutes 2 hours 21 minutes
App/web on a tablet 4 hours 19 minutes 37 minutes
Total 59 hours 56 minutes 8 hours 34 minutes
The Screen Religion
Electronics are the modern-day idols. The smartphone―now combined with Artificial Intelligence―has become a secular ‘tabernacle’ in the hand; a god with all the answers; a secular ‘guardian angel’; a person’s best friend. People cannot imagine living without their smartphone―but they feel that they can live without God! “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God … They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together―there is none that does good; no, not one! … There is no fear of God before their eyes!” (Psalm 13:1-3). Screen time replaces God time! When someone spends an excessive amount of time on their electronic devices, it can effectively take the place of their spiritual connection and devotion to God, acting as a distraction from prayer, reflection, and essentially becoming an idol in their life that consumes their attention and focus away from their Faith.
● Screens have become the objects of our worship. Anything that commands our attention nine hours a day can be accurately described as an idol. Christians now spend the vast majority of their free time interacting with screens. Not God. Not people.
● Screen time is displacing spiritual disciplines. There is less and less time available to devote to spiritual reading, meditation, prayer and spiritual reflection. Those spiritual disciplines just cannot compete with instant gratification that people feel that they can get from their screens.
● Screen time is shortening our attention spans. The human brain is built to seek novelty. Our screens are novelty machines – presenting us with a never-ceasing stream of new images to look at. Over time our brains get used to rapid-fire visuals. Tasks that lack visual novelty or require concentration (such as prayer or Bible reading) feel unpleasant. They simply cannot compete with the pleasure of web surfing, TV watching or video gaming.
● Screens tempt us. says, “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence [desires] of the flesh, and the concupiscence [desires] of the eyes, and the pride of life―which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16). No single verse better describes what screens do to us. They inflame our lusts with an endless gallery of sensual images (desires of the flesh), objects and lifestyles to covet (desires of the eyes), and people to look down upon (the pride of life).
● Screens are anxiety and fear producing machines. Bad news attracts more attention than good news. The producers of screen content know this, so they highlight content designed to make us anxious and alarmed. The more we consume these stories, the more we come to believe the world is falling apart. Instead of moving forward in faith, we retreat into fear. But the Bible is clear: God has not given us a spirit of fear. The most frequently repeated command in all of scripture is fear not.
● Screen content stokes interpersonal conflict. Holy Scripture says, “If it be possible, as much as is in you, have peace with all men” (Romans 12:18). Yet the internet is tearing us apart—dividing us into warring tribes, even within the church. When Christians take to social media to defend their values, they often do so with such vitriol and contempt that they come across as self-righteous jerks.
A single, 30-minute sermon can’t compete with the 60+ hours we spend glued to our screens each week.
Your screens are making disciples of you – far more effectively than the Church is. Both screens and Church teach and preach. Whereas the average churchgoer might be exposed to a single, 30-minute sermon every seven days, the typical social media user spends more than 1,000 minutes on social platforms each week.
Your spiritual life is being displaced by your screen life, and you probably don’t even realize it. Every day, hundreds of former believers join the ranks of the religious “nones” [= having no religious affiliation] because of something they saw on their screens. The Gospel isn’t outdated, it is being overwhelmed. “Be not conformed to this world; but be reformed in the newness of your mind, that you may prove what is the good, and the acceptable, and the perfect will of God!” (Romans 12:2). Be addicted to God and not the screen!
The Catholic Family is the base unit or “building-brick” in the Catholic Church, which is the Mystical Body of Christ. The attack on Catholicism, in general, inevitably translates into an attack on Catholic Families in particular. We all know the saying: “With each brick you take out of the wall, the wall becomes weaker and weaker.” How true is this today for the “bricks” of Catholic Families. With each “brick” that is loosened and removed―a person within the family, or a family within the Church―there is an increased weakening in the family or the Church.
Sister Lucia of Fatima warned that the devil would launch a massive attack upon the Family. He knows that the Catholic Family is the basic building-block of the Church. Since Sister Lucia spoke of this, we can, in retrospect, see the tragic collapse of Catholic Families throughout the world—they might still be families, but they are less and less Catholic Families. This has reached such dangerous levels, that even the modern Catholic Church and some of few remaining somewhat ‘Conservative’ and/or ‘Conservative-Liberals’ are trying to make a “last-ditch-stand” against the erosion of the Catholic Family.
Our Lady Warned of these Attacks
The Blessed Virgin Mary has also, on many occasions, foretold of the fight that is to come: “I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell. God will allow the demons to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … They will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings―evil will seem to triumph … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and discord will be seen, without love for country or family ...
“The Church will be full of those who accept compromises … The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts … Many will abandon the Faith! … Many will turn upon Religion! … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals. As true Faith fades ― false light will brighten the people … The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten … disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth ... In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost!
“As for the Sacrament of Matrimony, which symbolizes the union of Christ with His Church, it will be attacked and profaned in the fullest sense of the word. Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective of doing away with this Sacrament, making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children born without the blessing of the Church ... The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women … There will be almost no virgin souls in the world … (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
Definition of Divide and Conquer
In the above quotes of Our Lady, she says: “God will allow the demons to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family.” Satan seeks to divide so that he can conquer. The phrase ― “Divide and Conquer” ― is defined as: “To make a group of people disagree and fight with one another so that they will not join together against one” (Merriam Webster Dictionary). “The policy of maintaining control over one's subordinates or opponents by encouraging dissent between them, thereby preventing them from uniting in opposition.” (Oxford Dictionary) “A way of keeping yourself in a position of power by causing disagreements among other people so that they are unable to oppose you” (Cambridge Dictionary). “A strategy by which someone remains in power by making sure that the people under their control quarrel among themselves and so cannot unite to achieve their aims and overthrow their leader.” (Collins Dictionary).
Divide and Conquer―Tactics in Practice
The tactic ― “Divide and Conquer” ― is as old as mankind. There are many instances in the Bible where we see the “divide and conquer” tactic used―either by Satan, or by men, or a combination of both.
● Satan waited until Eve was alone and away from Adam before he tempted her. After Eve had fallen, Adam fell through Satan using Eve to tempt him―and thus both ended up being separated from God through their Original Sin.
● Satan divided Cain and Abel, by making Cain envious and resentful towards Abel―to the point that Cain eventually murdered Abel.
● The Tribes of Israel were divided among themselves after the death of King Solomon. The Kingdom of Israel became divided when the nation split into the Northern Kingdom of Israel and Southern Kingdom of Juda, making them vulnerable to conquest by other powers.
● The Apostles were divided when they argued among themselves as to who was the greatest among them.
● Judas was divided from the rest of the Apostles in spirit, and betrayed Christ.
● Peter the first pope, was divided or separated from the other Apostles when he denied Christ during the Passion.
● The other Apostles fled and abandoned Christ at His arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane.
● Heresy divided the Church from the earliest times and continues to do so until this day.
The Roman Empire is traditionally associated with a policy of “divide et impera”, when, in its early years, the expanding
Roman Republic routinely divisive tactics. When Rome was conquering the rest of Italy in the 4th and early 3rd centuries BC, her enemies rarely showed that harmony among themselves and that singleness of purpose which characterized the Romans, and Rome did her best to develop the spirit of discord among them by turning community against community and turning the aristocracy against the democracy. Rome refused to deal with its adversaries as a block, and instead made a separate treaty with each one of the communities, with the express purpose of preventing future confederations arising between them. In order to destroy channels of communication and to limit interaction between potential cooperators, these Roman treaties with the local communities deprived them, not only of the right to trade with one another, but also of the right to intermarry.
Divide and Conquer has played a crucial role in military tactics throughout history. From ancient battles to modern warfare, military leaders have utilized this approach to gain strategic advantages. The strategic encirclement employed by Hannibal at the Battle of Cannae and the fragmentation tactics of Genghis Khan are just a few examples of how Divide and Conquer has secured victories against formidable opponents. Even in more recent times, renowned leaders like Napoleon Bonaparte and General Zhukov employed Divide and Conquer strategies to outmaneuver their adversaries, disrupt enemy formations, and achieve significant military successes. Moreover, in the Battle of Stalingrad, Soviet General Georgy Zhukov utilized Divide and Conquer by encircling the German Sixth Army, cutting off their supplies and support, leading to a major turning point in World War II.
Divide and Conquer in Politics
“Divide and Rule” (Latin: “divide et impera”), or more commonly known as “Divide and Conquer”, in politics refers to an entity gaining and maintaining political power by using divisive measures. This includes the exploitation of existing divisions within a political group by its political opponents, and also the deliberate creation or strengthening of such divisions. It uses a strategy that breaks up existing power structures, and especially prevents smaller power groups from linking up, causing rivalries and fomenting discord among the people to prevent a rebellion against the elites or the people implementing the strategy. The goal is either to pit the lower classes against themselves to prevent a revolution, or to provide a desired solution to the growing discord that strengthens the power of the elites.
Our Lord speaks of Divide and Conquer
In the Gospels we see Our Lord refer to the divide and conquer tactic: “How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand. And if Satan be risen up against himself, he is divided and cannot stand, but has an end!” (Mark 3:23-26). “Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand! And if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself―how then shall his kingdom stand?” (Matthew 12:25-26). “Every kingdom divided against itself, shall be brought to desolation, and house upon house shall fall. And if Satan also be divided against himself, how shall his kingdom stand?” (Luke 11:17-18).
Our Lord even says that He Himself will be a source of division as He seeks to conquer souls by redeeming them from the clutches of Satan and leading them to Heaven: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled! … Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided―three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. They will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they shall persecute you in this city, flee into another!” (Matthew 10:17-22; 10:32-37; Luke 12:49-53).
As regards this division, Our Lord adds: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words … He that does not love Me, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24). “He that is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do!” (John 8:44). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
Divided and Conquered by the World
The division within families and the division between one family and another family has reached unprecedented levels! Never before have we seen so much division in the world! This division can be seen in the political field, the social field, the religious field, and of course the family field. Ultimately, those divisions can be traced back to Christ. As Christ said―we are either for Him or against Him. There is no third option; there are no seats for spectators in this world.
“The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with worldly things; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where your treasure is, there is your heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! [the world with its pleasures and treasures]” (Matthew 6:19-24). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). All of the above is what God expects from us―but that is not what God gets from us and our families!
“The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness is in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! They are of the world—therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. God has scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God has despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6; 1 John 4:5).
Divided and Conquered Families
There is very little or no doubt that the vast majority of Catholics today have been seduced and conquered by what the modern world has to offer! Just as they say, “Everyone has his price”, so too you could say, “Everyone has their preferred thing” that the world tantalizingly dangles before their eyes―and which conquers the soul and divides it from God. Our Lord says: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where your treasure is, there is your heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
It is the treasures and pleasures of the world that have seduced and divided so many souls from God. Not only have they divided souls from God, but they have often caused division within families―especially the technological treasures and pleasures! Increasingly, people find more pleasure by being on their smartphone/tablet/laptop/computer than they do in spending time with other members of the family―they cannot wait to get away from other family members to spend time with their treasured smartphone/tablet/laptop/computer. They find it impossible to reconcile Our Lord’s command with their own preferences: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). They have no time to “pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). Below you will find a 2024 survey on how much screen time is spent by those aged 18 and above―in other words, all adults.
Media Weekly screen time Daily screen time
Total use of TV 32 hours 18 minutes 4 hours 37 minutes
Internet on a computer 4 hours 56 minutes 42 minutes
Video on a computer 1 hour 59 minutes 17 minutes
App/web on a smartphone 16 hours 24 minutes 2 hours 21 minutes
App/web on a tablet 4 hours 19 minutes 37 minutes
Total 59 hours 56 minutes 8 hours 34 minutes
The Screen Religion
Electronics are the modern-day idols. The smartphone―now combined with Artificial Intelligence―has become a secular ‘tabernacle’ in the hand; a god with all the answers; a secular ‘guardian angel’; a person’s best friend. People cannot imagine living without their smartphone―but they feel that they can live without God! “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God … They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together―there is none that does good; no, not one! … There is no fear of God before their eyes!” (Psalm 13:1-3). Screen time replaces God time! When someone spends an excessive amount of time on their electronic devices, it can effectively take the place of their spiritual connection and devotion to God, acting as a distraction from prayer, reflection, and essentially becoming an idol in their life that consumes their attention and focus away from their Faith.
● Screens have become the objects of our worship. Anything that commands our attention nine hours a day can be accurately described as an idol. Christians now spend the vast majority of their free time interacting with screens. Not God. Not people.
● Screen time is displacing spiritual disciplines. There is less and less time available to devote to spiritual reading, meditation, prayer and spiritual reflection. Those spiritual disciplines just cannot compete with instant gratification that people feel that they can get from their screens.
● Screen time is shortening our attention spans. The human brain is built to seek novelty. Our screens are novelty machines – presenting us with a never-ceasing stream of new images to look at. Over time our brains get used to rapid-fire visuals. Tasks that lack visual novelty or require concentration (such as prayer or Bible reading) feel unpleasant. They simply cannot compete with the pleasure of web surfing, TV watching or video gaming.
● Screens tempt us. says, “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence [desires] of the flesh, and the concupiscence [desires] of the eyes, and the pride of life―which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16). No single verse better describes what screens do to us. They inflame our lusts with an endless gallery of sensual images (desires of the flesh), objects and lifestyles to covet (desires of the eyes), and people to look down upon (the pride of life).
● Screens are anxiety and fear producing machines. Bad news attracts more attention than good news. The producers of screen content know this, so they highlight content designed to make us anxious and alarmed. The more we consume these stories, the more we come to believe the world is falling apart. Instead of moving forward in faith, we retreat into fear. But the Bible is clear: God has not given us a spirit of fear. The most frequently repeated command in all of scripture is fear not.
● Screen content stokes interpersonal conflict. Holy Scripture says, “If it be possible, as much as is in you, have peace with all men” (Romans 12:18). Yet the internet is tearing us apart—dividing us into warring tribes, even within the church. When Christians take to social media to defend their values, they often do so with such vitriol and contempt that they come across as self-righteous jerks.
A single, 30-minute sermon can’t compete with the 60+ hours we spend glued to our screens each week.
Your screens are making disciples of you – far more effectively than the Church is. Both screens and Church teach and preach. Whereas the average churchgoer might be exposed to a single, 30-minute sermon every seven days, the typical social media user spends more than 1,000 minutes on social platforms each week.
Your spiritual life is being displaced by your screen life, and you probably don’t even realize it. Every day, hundreds of former believers join the ranks of the religious “nones” [= having no religious affiliation] because of something they saw on their screens. The Gospel isn’t outdated, it is being overwhelmed. “Be not conformed to this world; but be reformed in the newness of your mind, that you may prove what is the good, and the acceptable, and the perfect will of God!” (Romans 12:2). Be addicted to God and not the screen!
Article 19
Monday, January 13th
‘Myrrh-der’ and ‘Myrrh-tification’!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday, January 13th
‘Myrrh-der’ and ‘Myrrh-tification’!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
After Sunday’s feast of the Holy Family, let us now return to our examination of the three gifts of the Magi. We have already looked at the gold and the frankincense―let us now look at the final of myrrh.
As Jesus hung on the cross, “they gave Him to drink wine mingled with myrrh; but He took it not” (Mark 15:23).
“Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight. They took therefore the body of Jesus, and bound it in linen cloths, with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury” (John 19:38:40).
● The thorns of the Myrrh tree perfectly represent suffering for they remind us of the crown of thorns suffered by Our Lord.
● The cutting and wounding of the tree reminds us of the suffering Our Lord underwent in His scourging at the pillar.
● The ‘bleeding’ resin reminds us of the drops of Precious Blood shed for our sins.
● Our life is filled with grains of suffering, weighed and measured by Divine Providence.
● Yet that suffering, like incense, is more profitable in a heart that burns with love for the suffering.
A ‘Myrrh-derous’ Word
‘Myrrh-der’ … ‘myrrh-derer’ … ‘myrrh-derous’ … ‘myrrh-tuary’ … ‘myrrh-tification’ ― all of these made-up words have an element of deadly truth in the them: ‘myrrh-der’ (murder) … ‘myrrh-derer’ (murderer) … ‘myrrh-derous’ (murderous) … ‘myrrh-tuary’ (mortuary) … ‘myrrh-tification’ (mortification). They all involve death of one kind of another—mortification being a compound word of the Latin “mors, mortis” (death) and “facere, factus” (to do, to make), meaning putting something to death, namely bad habits and sins. We could even add ‘myrrh-tyr’ (martyr) to this collection.
The word “myrrh” is derived from the Aramaic “murr”, and Arabic “mur” meaning “bitter”. Its name entered the English language from the Hebrew Bible, where it is called “mor”, and later as a Semitic loanword was used in the Greek myth of Myrrha, and later in the Septuagint; in the Greek language, the related word “mýron” became a general term for perfume—which we could apply to the Christian notion of suffering and dying for the Faith, a sweet perfumed death.
“Who is she that goeth up by the desert, as a pillar of smoke of aromatical spices, of myrrh and frankincense?” (Canticles 3:6). “I will go to the mountain of myrrh and to the hill of frankincense” (Canticles 4:6). These two beautiful lines of Holy Scripture are so evocative of the calling of the true Christian—to a life of suffering (myrrh) and prayer (frankincense).
Our Lord Himself would go to the hill or mountain of Mt. Calvary—a mountain upon which He would reach the pinnacle of suffering and prayer! And He beckons us to follow Him up that mountain: “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me” (Mark 8:34) ... “And He spoke also a parable to them, that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1) … “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). This myrrh of mortification, sacrifice, suffering and penance is found in the desert regions—away from the lush opulent areas of the world—just like the frankincense of prayer. These two are not of the world!
The Myrrh of Death
Myrrh was used by the ancient Egyptians, along with natron, for the embalming of mummies. It was also used in the embalming of the body of Jesus after the crucifixion: “And after these things, Joseph of Arimathea―because he was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews―besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus. And Pilate gave leave. He came therefore, and took the body of Jesus. And Nicodemus also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight. They took therefore the body of Jesus, and bound it in linen cloths, with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury” (John 19:38:40).
It also played a part during the actual crucifixion too! Matthew records that as Jesus hung on the cross, they gave Him vinegar to drink mingled with gall: and when He had tasted thereof, He would not drink (Matthew 27:34). Mark described the drink as wine mingled with myrrh: “And they gave Him to drink wine mingled with myrrh; but He took it not” (Mark 15:23). The drink offered to Jesus was a cheap Roman vinegar wine, which had a drug mixed in to dull the senses. It was the custom of the Romans to offer a man being crucified drugged wine, so that he might more easily endure his cross. Jesus refused the wine, however, apparently so that He could go through his suffering with a clear mind.
The Miracle of Myrrh
St. Nicholas, Archbishop of Myra in Lycia (now modern-day Turkey), was a 4th-century miracle-worker, known also for the healing myrrh that flowed from his sacred relics. A prayer to St. Nicholas is:
With divine myrrh the divine grace of the Spirit anointed thee, who didst preside as the leader of Myra, and having made the ends of the world fragrant with the myrrh of virtues thou holiest of men, through the pleasant breathings of thine intercessions always driving away the evil stench of the passions. Therefore, in Faith we render thee great praise, and celebrate thine all-holy memory, O Nicholas....
In like manner, icons associated with him have been reported to be myrrh-streaming: leaving off a gentle flow of myrrh each day. In 1998, such a phenomenon was reported in Russia for an icon of Czar Nicholas II and from another icon of his family, both originally retained at a church dedicated to Nicholas the miracle-worker.
Going to the Root of the Matter
Where does Myrrh grow? The Myrrh tree is mainly found in the Horn of Africa, which is the exact location where the Frankincense tree grows. Both myrrh and frankincense grow as small trees or shrubs; they are of the botanical family Burseraceae. Their natural growing range is limited, but this has been extended by cultivation, and the current supplies are adequate to meet worldwide demand. Today, most of the internationally-traded myrrh and frankincense are produced in the southern Arabian peninsula (Oman, Yemen) and in northeast Africa (Somalia).
Myrrh gum is commonly harvested from the species Commiphora Myrrha tree, which is native to Yemen, Somalia, Eritrea and eastern Ethiopia. Another commonly used name, Commiphora Molmol, is now considered a synonym of Commiphora Myrrha. The related Commiphora Gileadensis, native to Eastern Mediterranean and particularly the Arabian Peninsula, is the biblically referenced Balm of Gilead, also known as Balsam of Mecca.
Several other species yield bdellium and Indian myrrh. The Commiphora Myrrha tree is one of the primary trees from which myrrh is harvested. The name “myrrh” is also applied to the potherb Myrrhis Odorata, otherwise known as “cicely” or “sweet cicely”.
What is Myrrh?
Myrrh is the aromatic resin of a number of small, thorny tree species of the genus Commiphora, which is an essential oil termed an oleoresin (an oil-resin). Myrrh resin is a natural gum. It has been used throughout history as a perfume, incense and medicine. It can also be ingested by mixing it with wine.
The oleo gum resins of a number of other Commiphora species are also used as perfumes, medicines (such as aromatic wound dressings), and incense ingredients. These myrrh-like resins are known as opopanax, balsam, bdellium, guggul and bisabol.
Fragrant “myrrh beads” are made from the crushed seeds of Detarium Microcarpum, an unrelated West African tree. These beads are traditionally worn by married women in Mali as multiple strands around the hips.
Myrrh—Ancient and Modern
Modern myrrh has long been commented on as coming from a different source to that held in high regard by the ancients, having been superior in some way. Pedanius Dioscorides described the myrrh of the first century AD as most likely to refer to a “species of mimosa”, describing it “like the Egyptian thorn”. He describes its appearance and leaf structure as “pinnate-winged”.
The ancient type of myrrh conjectured was noted for possessing a far more delightful odor than modern myrrh—I guess we could say the same of Catholics as a whole. It was noted in 1837 that “The time, perhaps, is not far distant, when, through the spirit of research, the true myrrh-tree will be found”.
Wounding the Tree
The processes for extracting the sap of Boswellia (for frankincense) and Commiphora (for myrrh) are essentially identical. The sap slowly oozes from the cut and drips down the tree, forming tear-shaped droplets that are left to harden on the side of the tree. These beads are collected after two weeks.
Most resin (whether myrrh or frankincense) is obtained by tapping. Harvesters make a longitudinal cut, about 2 inches long, into the bark of the tree, which pierces gum resin reservoirs located within the bark. These deliberate cuts are made with a specially designed tool or even an ordinary axe. When a tree wound penetrates through the bark and into the sapwood, the tree bleeds its resin from its reservoirs. The liquid that bleeds forth, hardens on exposure to air into droplets or “tears,” which are then easily detached by the collector about two weeks later.
Myrrh gum, when it first flows forth from the ‘cut’ or ‘wound’, is a waxy, reddish resin (symbol of blood) and coagulates quickly. After the harvest, the gum becomes hard and glossy. The gum is yellowish, and may be either clear or opaque. It darkens deeply as it ages, and white streaks emerge.
New tappings are made at the same place as old ones after removing hardened resin from the previous cut. If the tapping interval is short, then a light scratching of the wood is usually sufficient to cause the resin to flow again. The particular details of the tapping vary according to the species and the customs in the area of production—the time of year it is undertaken, its duration, and the interval between individual tappings.
Medicinal Properties
In traditional Chinese medicine, myrrh is classified as bitter and spicy, with a neutral temperature. It is said to have special efficacy on the heart, liver, and spleen meridians, as well as “blood-moving” powers to purge stagnant blood from the uterus. It is therefore recommended for rheumatic, arthritic, and circulatory problems, and for amenorrhea, dysmenorrhea, menopause, and uterine tumors.
Myrrh’s uses are similar to those of frankincense, with which it is often combined in decoctions, liniments and incense. When used in concert, myrrh is “blood-moving” while frankincense makes it more useful for arthritic conditions. It is combined with such herbs as noto-ginseng, safflower petals, angelica sinensis, cinnamon, and salvia miltiorrhiza, usually in alcohol, and used both internally and externally.
Myrrh is used more frequently in Ayurveda and Unani medicine, which ascribe tonic and rejuvenative properties to the resin. It is utilized in many specially processed formulas in Ayurveda. A related species, called “guggul” in Ayurvedic medicine, is considered one of the best substances for the treatment of circulatory problems, nervous system disorders and rheumatic complaints.
In Western medicine, especially in pharmaceuticals, Myrrh is used for indigestion, ulcers, colds, cough, asthma, lung congestion, arthritis pain, cancer, leprosy, spasms, and syphilis. It is also used as a stimulant and to increase menstrual flow. Myrrh is applied directly to the mouth for soreness and swelling, inflamed gums (gingivitis), loose teeth, canker sores, bad breath, and chapped lips and other minor skin ailments. It is also used topically for hemorrhoids, bedsores, wounds, abrasions, boils; and can be used in liniment for bruises, aches, and sprains. In foods and beverages, myrrh is used as a flavoring component.
As part of a larger search for anti-cancer compounds from plants, the researchers obtained extracts from a particular species of myrrh plant (Commiphora Myrrha) and tested it against a human breast tumor cell line known to be resistant to anti-cancer drugs. Research data indicated that the extract killed all of the cancer cells in laboratory dishes. Tests done using the myrrh species Commiphora Molmol, and were also found to inhibit tumor growth.
In an attempt to determine the cause of its effectiveness, researchers examined the individual ingredients of a herbal formula used traditionally by Kuwaiti diabetics to lower blood glucose. Myrrh was shown to produce analgesic effects on mice which were subjected to pain. Researchers at the University of Florence showed that sesquiterpenes furanoeudesma-1,3-diene and curzarene in the myrrh affect receptors in brain which influence pain perception.
Religious Uses for Myrrh
Myrrh was an ingredient of Ketoret, the consecrated incense used in the First and Second Temples at Jerusalem, as described in the Hebrew Bible and Talmud. An offering was made of the Ketoret on a special incense altar, and was an important component of the Temple service. Myrrh is also listed as an ingredient in the holy anointing oil used to anoint the Tabernacle, high priests and kings.
Oil of myrrh is used in the book of Esther (2:12) in a purification ritual for the new queen to King Ahasuerus: “Now when every virgin’s turn came to go in to the king, after all had been done for setting them off to advantage, it was the twelfth month: so that for six months they were anointed with oil of myrrh, and for other six months they used certain perfumes and sweet spices.”
Myrrh was traded by camel caravans overland from areas of production in southern Arabia by the Nabataeans to their capital city of Petra, from which it was distributed throughout the Mediterranean region.
According to St. Matthew’s Gospel (2:11), gold, frankincense and myrrh were among the gifts to Jesus by the Biblical Magi “from the East.” Because of its mention in New Testament, myrrh is an incense offered during Christian liturgical celebrations. Liquid myrrh is sometimes added to egg tempera in the making of icons.
Myrrh is mixed with frankincense and sometimes more scents and is used in almost every service of the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, traditional Roman Catholic and Anglican/Episcopal Churches.
The Spiritual Medicine of Suffering
Myrrh is medicinal just like suffering is medicinal. Myrrh brings health just as suffering brings spiritual health: “But He was wounded for our iniquities, He was bruised for our sins: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and by His bruises we are healed” (Isaias 53:5). “Who His own self bore our sins in His Body upon the tree: that we, being dead to sins, should live to justice: by Whose stripes you were healed” (1 Peter 2:24).
The thorns of the Myrrh tree remind us of the crown of thorns that Our Lord suffered upon His head; and the cutting and wounding of the bark of the Myrrh tree reminds us of the cuts inflicted upon the bark of His Body by the repeated lashes of the scourges, that drew out from Him the healing resin and oil of His Precious Blood.
As Jesus hung on the cross, “they gave Him to drink wine mingled with myrrh; but He took it not” (Mark 15:23).
“Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight. They took therefore the body of Jesus, and bound it in linen cloths, with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury” (John 19:38:40).
● The thorns of the Myrrh tree perfectly represent suffering for they remind us of the crown of thorns suffered by Our Lord.
● The cutting and wounding of the tree reminds us of the suffering Our Lord underwent in His scourging at the pillar.
● The ‘bleeding’ resin reminds us of the drops of Precious Blood shed for our sins.
● Our life is filled with grains of suffering, weighed and measured by Divine Providence.
● Yet that suffering, like incense, is more profitable in a heart that burns with love for the suffering.
A ‘Myrrh-derous’ Word
‘Myrrh-der’ … ‘myrrh-derer’ … ‘myrrh-derous’ … ‘myrrh-tuary’ … ‘myrrh-tification’ ― all of these made-up words have an element of deadly truth in the them: ‘myrrh-der’ (murder) … ‘myrrh-derer’ (murderer) … ‘myrrh-derous’ (murderous) … ‘myrrh-tuary’ (mortuary) … ‘myrrh-tification’ (mortification). They all involve death of one kind of another—mortification being a compound word of the Latin “mors, mortis” (death) and “facere, factus” (to do, to make), meaning putting something to death, namely bad habits and sins. We could even add ‘myrrh-tyr’ (martyr) to this collection.
The word “myrrh” is derived from the Aramaic “murr”, and Arabic “mur” meaning “bitter”. Its name entered the English language from the Hebrew Bible, where it is called “mor”, and later as a Semitic loanword was used in the Greek myth of Myrrha, and later in the Septuagint; in the Greek language, the related word “mýron” became a general term for perfume—which we could apply to the Christian notion of suffering and dying for the Faith, a sweet perfumed death.
“Who is she that goeth up by the desert, as a pillar of smoke of aromatical spices, of myrrh and frankincense?” (Canticles 3:6). “I will go to the mountain of myrrh and to the hill of frankincense” (Canticles 4:6). These two beautiful lines of Holy Scripture are so evocative of the calling of the true Christian—to a life of suffering (myrrh) and prayer (frankincense).
Our Lord Himself would go to the hill or mountain of Mt. Calvary—a mountain upon which He would reach the pinnacle of suffering and prayer! And He beckons us to follow Him up that mountain: “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me” (Mark 8:34) ... “And He spoke also a parable to them, that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1) … “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). This myrrh of mortification, sacrifice, suffering and penance is found in the desert regions—away from the lush opulent areas of the world—just like the frankincense of prayer. These two are not of the world!
The Myrrh of Death
Myrrh was used by the ancient Egyptians, along with natron, for the embalming of mummies. It was also used in the embalming of the body of Jesus after the crucifixion: “And after these things, Joseph of Arimathea―because he was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews―besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus. And Pilate gave leave. He came therefore, and took the body of Jesus. And Nicodemus also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight. They took therefore the body of Jesus, and bound it in linen cloths, with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury” (John 19:38:40).
It also played a part during the actual crucifixion too! Matthew records that as Jesus hung on the cross, they gave Him vinegar to drink mingled with gall: and when He had tasted thereof, He would not drink (Matthew 27:34). Mark described the drink as wine mingled with myrrh: “And they gave Him to drink wine mingled with myrrh; but He took it not” (Mark 15:23). The drink offered to Jesus was a cheap Roman vinegar wine, which had a drug mixed in to dull the senses. It was the custom of the Romans to offer a man being crucified drugged wine, so that he might more easily endure his cross. Jesus refused the wine, however, apparently so that He could go through his suffering with a clear mind.
The Miracle of Myrrh
St. Nicholas, Archbishop of Myra in Lycia (now modern-day Turkey), was a 4th-century miracle-worker, known also for the healing myrrh that flowed from his sacred relics. A prayer to St. Nicholas is:
With divine myrrh the divine grace of the Spirit anointed thee, who didst preside as the leader of Myra, and having made the ends of the world fragrant with the myrrh of virtues thou holiest of men, through the pleasant breathings of thine intercessions always driving away the evil stench of the passions. Therefore, in Faith we render thee great praise, and celebrate thine all-holy memory, O Nicholas....
In like manner, icons associated with him have been reported to be myrrh-streaming: leaving off a gentle flow of myrrh each day. In 1998, such a phenomenon was reported in Russia for an icon of Czar Nicholas II and from another icon of his family, both originally retained at a church dedicated to Nicholas the miracle-worker.
Going to the Root of the Matter
Where does Myrrh grow? The Myrrh tree is mainly found in the Horn of Africa, which is the exact location where the Frankincense tree grows. Both myrrh and frankincense grow as small trees or shrubs; they are of the botanical family Burseraceae. Their natural growing range is limited, but this has been extended by cultivation, and the current supplies are adequate to meet worldwide demand. Today, most of the internationally-traded myrrh and frankincense are produced in the southern Arabian peninsula (Oman, Yemen) and in northeast Africa (Somalia).
Myrrh gum is commonly harvested from the species Commiphora Myrrha tree, which is native to Yemen, Somalia, Eritrea and eastern Ethiopia. Another commonly used name, Commiphora Molmol, is now considered a synonym of Commiphora Myrrha. The related Commiphora Gileadensis, native to Eastern Mediterranean and particularly the Arabian Peninsula, is the biblically referenced Balm of Gilead, also known as Balsam of Mecca.
Several other species yield bdellium and Indian myrrh. The Commiphora Myrrha tree is one of the primary trees from which myrrh is harvested. The name “myrrh” is also applied to the potherb Myrrhis Odorata, otherwise known as “cicely” or “sweet cicely”.
What is Myrrh?
Myrrh is the aromatic resin of a number of small, thorny tree species of the genus Commiphora, which is an essential oil termed an oleoresin (an oil-resin). Myrrh resin is a natural gum. It has been used throughout history as a perfume, incense and medicine. It can also be ingested by mixing it with wine.
The oleo gum resins of a number of other Commiphora species are also used as perfumes, medicines (such as aromatic wound dressings), and incense ingredients. These myrrh-like resins are known as opopanax, balsam, bdellium, guggul and bisabol.
Fragrant “myrrh beads” are made from the crushed seeds of Detarium Microcarpum, an unrelated West African tree. These beads are traditionally worn by married women in Mali as multiple strands around the hips.
Myrrh—Ancient and Modern
Modern myrrh has long been commented on as coming from a different source to that held in high regard by the ancients, having been superior in some way. Pedanius Dioscorides described the myrrh of the first century AD as most likely to refer to a “species of mimosa”, describing it “like the Egyptian thorn”. He describes its appearance and leaf structure as “pinnate-winged”.
The ancient type of myrrh conjectured was noted for possessing a far more delightful odor than modern myrrh—I guess we could say the same of Catholics as a whole. It was noted in 1837 that “The time, perhaps, is not far distant, when, through the spirit of research, the true myrrh-tree will be found”.
Wounding the Tree
The processes for extracting the sap of Boswellia (for frankincense) and Commiphora (for myrrh) are essentially identical. The sap slowly oozes from the cut and drips down the tree, forming tear-shaped droplets that are left to harden on the side of the tree. These beads are collected after two weeks.
Most resin (whether myrrh or frankincense) is obtained by tapping. Harvesters make a longitudinal cut, about 2 inches long, into the bark of the tree, which pierces gum resin reservoirs located within the bark. These deliberate cuts are made with a specially designed tool or even an ordinary axe. When a tree wound penetrates through the bark and into the sapwood, the tree bleeds its resin from its reservoirs. The liquid that bleeds forth, hardens on exposure to air into droplets or “tears,” which are then easily detached by the collector about two weeks later.
Myrrh gum, when it first flows forth from the ‘cut’ or ‘wound’, is a waxy, reddish resin (symbol of blood) and coagulates quickly. After the harvest, the gum becomes hard and glossy. The gum is yellowish, and may be either clear or opaque. It darkens deeply as it ages, and white streaks emerge.
New tappings are made at the same place as old ones after removing hardened resin from the previous cut. If the tapping interval is short, then a light scratching of the wood is usually sufficient to cause the resin to flow again. The particular details of the tapping vary according to the species and the customs in the area of production—the time of year it is undertaken, its duration, and the interval between individual tappings.
Medicinal Properties
In traditional Chinese medicine, myrrh is classified as bitter and spicy, with a neutral temperature. It is said to have special efficacy on the heart, liver, and spleen meridians, as well as “blood-moving” powers to purge stagnant blood from the uterus. It is therefore recommended for rheumatic, arthritic, and circulatory problems, and for amenorrhea, dysmenorrhea, menopause, and uterine tumors.
Myrrh’s uses are similar to those of frankincense, with which it is often combined in decoctions, liniments and incense. When used in concert, myrrh is “blood-moving” while frankincense makes it more useful for arthritic conditions. It is combined with such herbs as noto-ginseng, safflower petals, angelica sinensis, cinnamon, and salvia miltiorrhiza, usually in alcohol, and used both internally and externally.
Myrrh is used more frequently in Ayurveda and Unani medicine, which ascribe tonic and rejuvenative properties to the resin. It is utilized in many specially processed formulas in Ayurveda. A related species, called “guggul” in Ayurvedic medicine, is considered one of the best substances for the treatment of circulatory problems, nervous system disorders and rheumatic complaints.
In Western medicine, especially in pharmaceuticals, Myrrh is used for indigestion, ulcers, colds, cough, asthma, lung congestion, arthritis pain, cancer, leprosy, spasms, and syphilis. It is also used as a stimulant and to increase menstrual flow. Myrrh is applied directly to the mouth for soreness and swelling, inflamed gums (gingivitis), loose teeth, canker sores, bad breath, and chapped lips and other minor skin ailments. It is also used topically for hemorrhoids, bedsores, wounds, abrasions, boils; and can be used in liniment for bruises, aches, and sprains. In foods and beverages, myrrh is used as a flavoring component.
As part of a larger search for anti-cancer compounds from plants, the researchers obtained extracts from a particular species of myrrh plant (Commiphora Myrrha) and tested it against a human breast tumor cell line known to be resistant to anti-cancer drugs. Research data indicated that the extract killed all of the cancer cells in laboratory dishes. Tests done using the myrrh species Commiphora Molmol, and were also found to inhibit tumor growth.
In an attempt to determine the cause of its effectiveness, researchers examined the individual ingredients of a herbal formula used traditionally by Kuwaiti diabetics to lower blood glucose. Myrrh was shown to produce analgesic effects on mice which were subjected to pain. Researchers at the University of Florence showed that sesquiterpenes furanoeudesma-1,3-diene and curzarene in the myrrh affect receptors in brain which influence pain perception.
Religious Uses for Myrrh
Myrrh was an ingredient of Ketoret, the consecrated incense used in the First and Second Temples at Jerusalem, as described in the Hebrew Bible and Talmud. An offering was made of the Ketoret on a special incense altar, and was an important component of the Temple service. Myrrh is also listed as an ingredient in the holy anointing oil used to anoint the Tabernacle, high priests and kings.
Oil of myrrh is used in the book of Esther (2:12) in a purification ritual for the new queen to King Ahasuerus: “Now when every virgin’s turn came to go in to the king, after all had been done for setting them off to advantage, it was the twelfth month: so that for six months they were anointed with oil of myrrh, and for other six months they used certain perfumes and sweet spices.”
Myrrh was traded by camel caravans overland from areas of production in southern Arabia by the Nabataeans to their capital city of Petra, from which it was distributed throughout the Mediterranean region.
According to St. Matthew’s Gospel (2:11), gold, frankincense and myrrh were among the gifts to Jesus by the Biblical Magi “from the East.” Because of its mention in New Testament, myrrh is an incense offered during Christian liturgical celebrations. Liquid myrrh is sometimes added to egg tempera in the making of icons.
Myrrh is mixed with frankincense and sometimes more scents and is used in almost every service of the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, traditional Roman Catholic and Anglican/Episcopal Churches.
The Spiritual Medicine of Suffering
Myrrh is medicinal just like suffering is medicinal. Myrrh brings health just as suffering brings spiritual health: “But He was wounded for our iniquities, He was bruised for our sins: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and by His bruises we are healed” (Isaias 53:5). “Who His own self bore our sins in His Body upon the tree: that we, being dead to sins, should live to justice: by Whose stripes you were healed” (1 Peter 2:24).
The thorns of the Myrrh tree remind us of the crown of thorns that Our Lord suffered upon His head; and the cutting and wounding of the bark of the Myrrh tree reminds us of the cuts inflicted upon the bark of His Body by the repeated lashes of the scourges, that drew out from Him the healing resin and oil of His Precious Blood.
Article 18
Sunday, January 12th, Feast of the Holy Family
The Holy Family and holy families
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, January 12th, Feast of the Holy Family
The Holy Family and holy families
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Christmas and the Family
Today, on the Sunday after the Epiphany, we celebrate the feast of the Holy Family. Christmas is a time to focus on the family; not only your own family, but also the Holy Family—meaning, Jesus, Mary and Joseph. The family is the building block of society. If you can sanctify the family, you can sanctify society through the family. “The Holy Family” should not just be the title for the family containing Jesus, Mary and Joseph, but it should be the title for every family, for God wants every family to be holy. Just as Jesus was born and lived among us for our imitation; likewise the Holy Family was created and lived among us as an example of godly family life.
It is only holy families that will get into Heaven. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Hence it is that Our Lord says: “Be ye perfect as you heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). In the Old Testament, God says: “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26). “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy, because I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 20:7). “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2). “Speak to all the children, and thou shalt say to them: ‘Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!’” (Leviticus 19:2). The Holy Family is a blueprint and example for us in our attempts to reach that obligatory holiness.
THE HISTORY
The Feast of the Holy Family
The Feast of the Holy Family is of recent origin, being instituted by Pope Leo XIII in 1892. It used to be celebrated on the third Sunday after the Epiphany, but has now been moved, by Pope Benedict XV to the first Sunday after the Epiphany. The feast serves as an example of family life. Like other liturgical feasts, it can be a source of many graces in our daily lives. The prayer of the Mass indicates this, when it pleads for the grace to imitate the example of the Holy Family: “O Lord Jesus Christ, You Who while subject to Mary and Joseph, hallowed family life with virtues beyond description, grant us by their combined intercession, that, having been taught by the example of the Holy Family, we may attain unto their everlasting companionship.” (Collect from the Mass of the Holy Family).
The Exiled Holy Family
Joseph and Mary and the Child Jesus had been living in Egypt only a few months when Herod died. Before long, an angel appeared to the head of the Holy Family, St. Joseph, and reported this latest intelligence. It was time to go home. Without any hemming and hawing or seeking after additional details, Joseph and Mary quietly packed up and started off. They had no sooner arrived in Judea than a new problem presented itself in the person of Archelaus.
Herod’s kingdom had been split up among his sons: Archelaus, Antipas, and Philip. Archelaus was to inherit the throne of Judea and therefore control of Jerusalem and Bethlehem. He already had a reputation for diabolical wickedness. The Jews sent a fifty-man delegation to Rome to plead with Caesar Augustus to break up the Herodian dynasty. They had no success. However, Archelaus’ reign was short-lived. He was so cruel and tyrannical that the Jews combined with their old enemies, the Samaritans, and sent off a fresh delegation in 6 A.D. This time Augustus summoned Archelaus to Rome and speedily banished him to Vienne in Gaul. When the Holy Family arrived in Judea, however, Archelaus was apparently still in power and St. Joseph, as guardian of Jesus and Mary, was afraid to settle in his territory. Once again his confidence in God was rewarded by the now familiar visit of the angel. “Being warned in a dream, he withdrew into the region of Galilee.”
The Hidden Life of the Holy Family
Now begins the hidden life of Christ. All we know about the next eleven years is packed into a single verse from St. Luke: “And the Child grew and became strong. He was full of wisdom and the grace of God was upon Him.” Although we have no facts, it is easy to picture Mary stealing occasional glances at her mysteriously wonderful Boy and wondering with a mother’s tender sadness about the prophetic visit of the Magi and the soul-searing prophecy of old Simeon. Her intuitions proved to be correct―for the next time Christ appears in the Gospel, now a boy of twelve, we see her heart wrung anew.
The Trials of the Holy Family
Every Jewish male thirteen years of age or older was obliged to visit the Temple in Jerusalem three times a year on the big feasts of Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles. Women and children frequently accompanied the men of the family. If they came from a distance such as Galilee they traveled in a caravan. Once a caravan got started for the day it usually splintered up into small groups and anyone could float from one group to another as the spirit moved him. At the evening stopover, everybody got back together again. It was all very free and easy and a holiday mood prevailed.
We must not suspect Mary or Joseph of the least neglect of duty when Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem. They had every reason to assume He was visiting with friends or neighbors along the way, as He no doubt had done on the way down from Nazareth, and perhaps even many times before on previous trips. It was at the end of the first day’s travel that the disappearance of Jesus was discovered.
In our own day we hear enough about kidnapped and missing children to appreciate the panic that grips with steel fingers the hearts of mothers or fathers who have lost a child. Or, more commonly, who have lost their children to the world with the consequence that their children no longer practice their Faith. Imagine, then, how Mary and Joseph must have felt when the slow-dawning, truth burst full upon them: Their personal charge, their exclusive responsibility, the Boy Messias had vanished!
It took almost a full day to retrace the route to Jerusalem and another doubt and fear-filled twenty-four hours of buffeting holiday crowds before Jesus could be found. This is a lesson concerning the efforts that parents must make in seeking to recover their lost children for God. The rest of the story we know. Jesus was in the Temple and had been engaged in a discussion with the teachers and doctors. And all who were listening to Him were amazed at His understanding and His answers. And when they saw Him, they were astonished. And His mother said to Him, “Son, why hast Thou done so to us? Behold, Thy father and I have been seeking Thee sorrowing.” And He said to them, “How is it that you sought Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” And they did not understand the word that He spoke to them. And He went down with them and, came to Nazareth, and was subject to them; and His mother kept all these things carefully in her heart. And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and grace before God and men.
What a lesson for children today! How many of them are concerned about their heavenly Father’s business? How many of them can be found in the ‘temple’ of the church and its tabernacle? How many children discuss religious topics as Child Jesus was discussing religion with the priests of the Temple in Jerusalem?
The Holy Family in Complete Obscurity
When Jesus left Jerusalem to go back to Nazareth and be subject to His parents, He began the second phase of His hidden life. He lived in complete obscurity, an unknown, and was subject in humility and obedience to His earthly mother and father. The incarnate Second Person of the Trinity, the Messias, Who later on would dazzle the public with miracles, this God of all mankind hid Himself away in a small town and performed the dull tasks of a carpenter’s helper. Later, after Joseph died, Jesus supported His mother by the work of His hands. In fact, when He afterward came back to His home town and spoke in the local synagogue, neighbors and relatives who had known Him almost since birth and had watched Him grow up, referred to Him by His trade: “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary ... ?”
THE MEANING
The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph serves in many ways as the model for the family virtues. One virtue of the Holy Family that modem families might well emulate is humility. Humility can do much to smooth out the petty frictions and molehill mountains that inevitably rise to the surface when human beings live close together for long periods of time. The young Creator, the God who shaped the cosmos with one effortless volition, now bends to learn the carpenter’s skill from a human foster father and struggles with crude tools to shape stubborn lumber into a useful bit of furniture.
The Humility of the Holy Family
This resplendent example of divine humility should be enough to inspire, for instance, the unsung housewife who goes along for years doing the menial, humdrum jobs without any particular recognition or praise. There may be no glamour in this kind of existence, but it already shines with the far brighter brilliance of paradise. If you are not hounded by the demands of public life, if you are not in the limelight, if you are not soiled with the dust and smut of the world, it is much easier to give yourself to God, to dedicate yourself entirely to the one single purpose of life, saving your immortal soul.
How much harder it must be for the wealthy businessman, the big movie star, the socialite, the politician, for anyone who wastes so much time chasing after money or fame or power! The peace and tranquility that goes with the hidden life is a valuable possession, certainly much more to be prized than the glamor and glitter and noise of the world. If you ever have any doubts about this, remember that when God became man He could have had His pick of any type of life at all. Christ could have been a rich merchant, an idol of the Roman circus, the admired leader of Roman high society, Caesar himself. Christ had His choice. He chose to be a workingman.
The Obedience of the Holy Family
Another virtue perfectly mirrored in the Holy Family is obedience, the virtue that inclines us to submit our will to that of our lawful superiors insofar as they are the representatives of God. The most important words of that definition are the last ones. When we obey a superior whether it be husband, mother or father, a policeman on the comer, the president of the United States, our pastor or bishop—we are obeying God at least indirectly.
It is difficult for us to grasp the concept of obedience, because we have been educated in a tradition that glorifies independence. What we are talking about here, however, is a question of order. In nature we find a God-instituted order: on the lowest rung of the ladder of creation are minerals, then plants, animals, men, and finally angels. The higher creatures use the lower ones to their own advantage and to achieve their ends. Thus plants, which utilize minerals, are in turn eaten by animals, and animals are used by men. This is God’s plan and it is His will that inferiors be subject to superiors. It is also God’s plan to manifest His will to us through our fellow men. And that’s where the rub comes in. We would be delighted and privileged to obey God if He came down on Earth and delivered His orders to us in person, but that is not God’s way and we should try to see in our superiors the envoys of God.
We pay a good deal of attention to obedience because it is the rock-bottom foundation of family life. Children must be obedient to their parents and—despite feminist propaganda and modern heresies—wives must be obedient to their husbands as head of the family. Yet even those heads of the family―the husbands―must be obedient to Christ and the teachings of the Faith and Church.
Role Models in Jesus, Mary & Joseph
This is not to say that husbands are free to act as tyrants. They must carry their authority lightly and rule with justice and kindness. They should take St. Joseph as their ideal of the model father.
Mary, of course, is par excellence the model mother. Children have as their pattern none other than the Boy Jesus Himself., Although children need not obey their parents after they are themselves married and have homes of their own or after they reach their majority, they are never exempt from the command to love and respect their parents. Even after our parents die, we still have the obligation to pray for them that they may not be detained long in Purgatory.
Supreme Lesson of the Holy Family
The supreme lesson of the Holy Family is this: If the God-Man, Jesus Christ, could subject Himself to earthly parents, if God could obey us, His creatures―cannot we obey God? He has clearly spelled out His will for us in His commandments and in the commandments of His Church. The practice of the virtue of obedience is the first and most necessary step in making your family a holy family.
The Family is a Microcosm of the Church
The family is a microcosm of the Church and has, therefore, a hierarchical structure. The husband is the head of the family (1 Corinthians 11:3). Yet the woman is not a slave, but a help-mate for the man, just as the priest is a collaborator of the bishop, i.e. someone who labors with the bishop. The man can be likened to the head, the woman to the heart. The body of the family needs both and they both have an important role to play. Without them to form their parents, they become ‘headless chickens’ or ‘heartless animals’. For both man and wife have complementary abilities and strengths, each of which greatly contributes to the well-being of family life.
The flock that husband and wife must look after are their children. Yet how few parents realize the gravity and magnitude of the task entrusted to them. They often forget that God will judge them as to how they have raised or failed to raise their children. Parents cannot selfishly live for themselves, they have a responsibility in justice towards their children, they also have a responsibility towards God, who created the souls of those children. Too many parents have abdicated from the authority and responsibility of parenting, with disastrous results. When the world gets its often derailed family life back on the tracks, then too will society at large live as it ought. And what most often derails family life is a lack of authority and discipline, joined to an absence of God and His grace.
To Which Family Do We Belong?
Our Lord even goes as far as to call those who do not believe in Him, as being children of the devil: “Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word. You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father thereof. But if I say the truth, you believe Me not” (John 8:43-45). Unpleasant, but true—we belong to whoever’s spirit we follow: if we follow the Spirit of God, we are the children of God; if we follow the spirit of the world, then we are the children of the devil. “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
The Adopted Children of God will be Hated
“Wonder not, brethren, if the world hate you” (1 John 3:13). “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you” (John 15:19). Much like Joseph was hated by his many brothers, and Abel was hated by Cain. “Cain, who was of the wicked one, killed his brother. And wherefore did he kill him? Because his own works were wicked: and his brother’s just” (1 John 3:12). “Woe unto them, for they have gone in the way of Cain” (Jude 1:11).
Yet there are countless Cain and Abel situations in families, in parishes, at work and in the community at large—those who SINCERELY (as opposed to superficially) try to live a godly life, will be hated. Those who merely pray with their lips, deep down hate those who pray with their hearts. Those who love God with only a fraction of their heart, mind, soul and strength, hate those who love God with their whole heart, mind, soul and strength. This is not just a problem between the ‘saved’ and the damned, but even among those whose will be saved in the end. Those who have just started out on the spiritual path to Heaven, feel uncomfortable, envious or even hate those who have reached greater heights! Those who strive to reform things are hated by those who do want reforming—look at the case of St. John of Cross, who was imprisoned and even scourged by his fellow monks for his attempts at reforming the Order for the better.
At the root of this hatred lies the Word of God, which the world hates. Our Lord tries to plant the “good seed” of the Word in our souls—whereas the devil tries to plant ‘bad seed of cockle’ of worldliness in our souls. “The seed is the word of God” (Luke 8:11) … “He that sows the good seed, is the Son of man” (Matthew 13:37) … “I have given them Thy word [Father], and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world; as I also am not of the world” (John 17:14) … “And the servants said to him: “Did you not sow good seed in your field? From where then does it have cockle?’ And he said to them: ‘An enemy has done this!’” (Matthew 13:27-28).
Today, on the Sunday after the Epiphany, we celebrate the feast of the Holy Family. Christmas is a time to focus on the family; not only your own family, but also the Holy Family—meaning, Jesus, Mary and Joseph. The family is the building block of society. If you can sanctify the family, you can sanctify society through the family. “The Holy Family” should not just be the title for the family containing Jesus, Mary and Joseph, but it should be the title for every family, for God wants every family to be holy. Just as Jesus was born and lived among us for our imitation; likewise the Holy Family was created and lived among us as an example of godly family life.
It is only holy families that will get into Heaven. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Hence it is that Our Lord says: “Be ye perfect as you heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). In the Old Testament, God says: “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26). “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy, because I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 20:7). “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2). “Speak to all the children, and thou shalt say to them: ‘Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!’” (Leviticus 19:2). The Holy Family is a blueprint and example for us in our attempts to reach that obligatory holiness.
THE HISTORY
The Feast of the Holy Family
The Feast of the Holy Family is of recent origin, being instituted by Pope Leo XIII in 1892. It used to be celebrated on the third Sunday after the Epiphany, but has now been moved, by Pope Benedict XV to the first Sunday after the Epiphany. The feast serves as an example of family life. Like other liturgical feasts, it can be a source of many graces in our daily lives. The prayer of the Mass indicates this, when it pleads for the grace to imitate the example of the Holy Family: “O Lord Jesus Christ, You Who while subject to Mary and Joseph, hallowed family life with virtues beyond description, grant us by their combined intercession, that, having been taught by the example of the Holy Family, we may attain unto their everlasting companionship.” (Collect from the Mass of the Holy Family).
The Exiled Holy Family
Joseph and Mary and the Child Jesus had been living in Egypt only a few months when Herod died. Before long, an angel appeared to the head of the Holy Family, St. Joseph, and reported this latest intelligence. It was time to go home. Without any hemming and hawing or seeking after additional details, Joseph and Mary quietly packed up and started off. They had no sooner arrived in Judea than a new problem presented itself in the person of Archelaus.
Herod’s kingdom had been split up among his sons: Archelaus, Antipas, and Philip. Archelaus was to inherit the throne of Judea and therefore control of Jerusalem and Bethlehem. He already had a reputation for diabolical wickedness. The Jews sent a fifty-man delegation to Rome to plead with Caesar Augustus to break up the Herodian dynasty. They had no success. However, Archelaus’ reign was short-lived. He was so cruel and tyrannical that the Jews combined with their old enemies, the Samaritans, and sent off a fresh delegation in 6 A.D. This time Augustus summoned Archelaus to Rome and speedily banished him to Vienne in Gaul. When the Holy Family arrived in Judea, however, Archelaus was apparently still in power and St. Joseph, as guardian of Jesus and Mary, was afraid to settle in his territory. Once again his confidence in God was rewarded by the now familiar visit of the angel. “Being warned in a dream, he withdrew into the region of Galilee.”
The Hidden Life of the Holy Family
Now begins the hidden life of Christ. All we know about the next eleven years is packed into a single verse from St. Luke: “And the Child grew and became strong. He was full of wisdom and the grace of God was upon Him.” Although we have no facts, it is easy to picture Mary stealing occasional glances at her mysteriously wonderful Boy and wondering with a mother’s tender sadness about the prophetic visit of the Magi and the soul-searing prophecy of old Simeon. Her intuitions proved to be correct―for the next time Christ appears in the Gospel, now a boy of twelve, we see her heart wrung anew.
The Trials of the Holy Family
Every Jewish male thirteen years of age or older was obliged to visit the Temple in Jerusalem three times a year on the big feasts of Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles. Women and children frequently accompanied the men of the family. If they came from a distance such as Galilee they traveled in a caravan. Once a caravan got started for the day it usually splintered up into small groups and anyone could float from one group to another as the spirit moved him. At the evening stopover, everybody got back together again. It was all very free and easy and a holiday mood prevailed.
We must not suspect Mary or Joseph of the least neglect of duty when Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem. They had every reason to assume He was visiting with friends or neighbors along the way, as He no doubt had done on the way down from Nazareth, and perhaps even many times before on previous trips. It was at the end of the first day’s travel that the disappearance of Jesus was discovered.
In our own day we hear enough about kidnapped and missing children to appreciate the panic that grips with steel fingers the hearts of mothers or fathers who have lost a child. Or, more commonly, who have lost their children to the world with the consequence that their children no longer practice their Faith. Imagine, then, how Mary and Joseph must have felt when the slow-dawning, truth burst full upon them: Their personal charge, their exclusive responsibility, the Boy Messias had vanished!
It took almost a full day to retrace the route to Jerusalem and another doubt and fear-filled twenty-four hours of buffeting holiday crowds before Jesus could be found. This is a lesson concerning the efforts that parents must make in seeking to recover their lost children for God. The rest of the story we know. Jesus was in the Temple and had been engaged in a discussion with the teachers and doctors. And all who were listening to Him were amazed at His understanding and His answers. And when they saw Him, they were astonished. And His mother said to Him, “Son, why hast Thou done so to us? Behold, Thy father and I have been seeking Thee sorrowing.” And He said to them, “How is it that you sought Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” And they did not understand the word that He spoke to them. And He went down with them and, came to Nazareth, and was subject to them; and His mother kept all these things carefully in her heart. And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and grace before God and men.
What a lesson for children today! How many of them are concerned about their heavenly Father’s business? How many of them can be found in the ‘temple’ of the church and its tabernacle? How many children discuss religious topics as Child Jesus was discussing religion with the priests of the Temple in Jerusalem?
The Holy Family in Complete Obscurity
When Jesus left Jerusalem to go back to Nazareth and be subject to His parents, He began the second phase of His hidden life. He lived in complete obscurity, an unknown, and was subject in humility and obedience to His earthly mother and father. The incarnate Second Person of the Trinity, the Messias, Who later on would dazzle the public with miracles, this God of all mankind hid Himself away in a small town and performed the dull tasks of a carpenter’s helper. Later, after Joseph died, Jesus supported His mother by the work of His hands. In fact, when He afterward came back to His home town and spoke in the local synagogue, neighbors and relatives who had known Him almost since birth and had watched Him grow up, referred to Him by His trade: “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary ... ?”
THE MEANING
The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph serves in many ways as the model for the family virtues. One virtue of the Holy Family that modem families might well emulate is humility. Humility can do much to smooth out the petty frictions and molehill mountains that inevitably rise to the surface when human beings live close together for long periods of time. The young Creator, the God who shaped the cosmos with one effortless volition, now bends to learn the carpenter’s skill from a human foster father and struggles with crude tools to shape stubborn lumber into a useful bit of furniture.
The Humility of the Holy Family
This resplendent example of divine humility should be enough to inspire, for instance, the unsung housewife who goes along for years doing the menial, humdrum jobs without any particular recognition or praise. There may be no glamour in this kind of existence, but it already shines with the far brighter brilliance of paradise. If you are not hounded by the demands of public life, if you are not in the limelight, if you are not soiled with the dust and smut of the world, it is much easier to give yourself to God, to dedicate yourself entirely to the one single purpose of life, saving your immortal soul.
How much harder it must be for the wealthy businessman, the big movie star, the socialite, the politician, for anyone who wastes so much time chasing after money or fame or power! The peace and tranquility that goes with the hidden life is a valuable possession, certainly much more to be prized than the glamor and glitter and noise of the world. If you ever have any doubts about this, remember that when God became man He could have had His pick of any type of life at all. Christ could have been a rich merchant, an idol of the Roman circus, the admired leader of Roman high society, Caesar himself. Christ had His choice. He chose to be a workingman.
The Obedience of the Holy Family
Another virtue perfectly mirrored in the Holy Family is obedience, the virtue that inclines us to submit our will to that of our lawful superiors insofar as they are the representatives of God. The most important words of that definition are the last ones. When we obey a superior whether it be husband, mother or father, a policeman on the comer, the president of the United States, our pastor or bishop—we are obeying God at least indirectly.
It is difficult for us to grasp the concept of obedience, because we have been educated in a tradition that glorifies independence. What we are talking about here, however, is a question of order. In nature we find a God-instituted order: on the lowest rung of the ladder of creation are minerals, then plants, animals, men, and finally angels. The higher creatures use the lower ones to their own advantage and to achieve their ends. Thus plants, which utilize minerals, are in turn eaten by animals, and animals are used by men. This is God’s plan and it is His will that inferiors be subject to superiors. It is also God’s plan to manifest His will to us through our fellow men. And that’s where the rub comes in. We would be delighted and privileged to obey God if He came down on Earth and delivered His orders to us in person, but that is not God’s way and we should try to see in our superiors the envoys of God.
We pay a good deal of attention to obedience because it is the rock-bottom foundation of family life. Children must be obedient to their parents and—despite feminist propaganda and modern heresies—wives must be obedient to their husbands as head of the family. Yet even those heads of the family―the husbands―must be obedient to Christ and the teachings of the Faith and Church.
Role Models in Jesus, Mary & Joseph
This is not to say that husbands are free to act as tyrants. They must carry their authority lightly and rule with justice and kindness. They should take St. Joseph as their ideal of the model father.
Mary, of course, is par excellence the model mother. Children have as their pattern none other than the Boy Jesus Himself., Although children need not obey their parents after they are themselves married and have homes of their own or after they reach their majority, they are never exempt from the command to love and respect their parents. Even after our parents die, we still have the obligation to pray for them that they may not be detained long in Purgatory.
Supreme Lesson of the Holy Family
The supreme lesson of the Holy Family is this: If the God-Man, Jesus Christ, could subject Himself to earthly parents, if God could obey us, His creatures―cannot we obey God? He has clearly spelled out His will for us in His commandments and in the commandments of His Church. The practice of the virtue of obedience is the first and most necessary step in making your family a holy family.
The Family is a Microcosm of the Church
The family is a microcosm of the Church and has, therefore, a hierarchical structure. The husband is the head of the family (1 Corinthians 11:3). Yet the woman is not a slave, but a help-mate for the man, just as the priest is a collaborator of the bishop, i.e. someone who labors with the bishop. The man can be likened to the head, the woman to the heart. The body of the family needs both and they both have an important role to play. Without them to form their parents, they become ‘headless chickens’ or ‘heartless animals’. For both man and wife have complementary abilities and strengths, each of which greatly contributes to the well-being of family life.
The flock that husband and wife must look after are their children. Yet how few parents realize the gravity and magnitude of the task entrusted to them. They often forget that God will judge them as to how they have raised or failed to raise their children. Parents cannot selfishly live for themselves, they have a responsibility in justice towards their children, they also have a responsibility towards God, who created the souls of those children. Too many parents have abdicated from the authority and responsibility of parenting, with disastrous results. When the world gets its often derailed family life back on the tracks, then too will society at large live as it ought. And what most often derails family life is a lack of authority and discipline, joined to an absence of God and His grace.
To Which Family Do We Belong?
Our Lord even goes as far as to call those who do not believe in Him, as being children of the devil: “Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word. You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father thereof. But if I say the truth, you believe Me not” (John 8:43-45). Unpleasant, but true—we belong to whoever’s spirit we follow: if we follow the Spirit of God, we are the children of God; if we follow the spirit of the world, then we are the children of the devil. “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
The Adopted Children of God will be Hated
“Wonder not, brethren, if the world hate you” (1 John 3:13). “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you” (John 15:19). Much like Joseph was hated by his many brothers, and Abel was hated by Cain. “Cain, who was of the wicked one, killed his brother. And wherefore did he kill him? Because his own works were wicked: and his brother’s just” (1 John 3:12). “Woe unto them, for they have gone in the way of Cain” (Jude 1:11).
Yet there are countless Cain and Abel situations in families, in parishes, at work and in the community at large—those who SINCERELY (as opposed to superficially) try to live a godly life, will be hated. Those who merely pray with their lips, deep down hate those who pray with their hearts. Those who love God with only a fraction of their heart, mind, soul and strength, hate those who love God with their whole heart, mind, soul and strength. This is not just a problem between the ‘saved’ and the damned, but even among those whose will be saved in the end. Those who have just started out on the spiritual path to Heaven, feel uncomfortable, envious or even hate those who have reached greater heights! Those who strive to reform things are hated by those who do want reforming—look at the case of St. John of Cross, who was imprisoned and even scourged by his fellow monks for his attempts at reforming the Order for the better.
At the root of this hatred lies the Word of God, which the world hates. Our Lord tries to plant the “good seed” of the Word in our souls—whereas the devil tries to plant ‘bad seed of cockle’ of worldliness in our souls. “The seed is the word of God” (Luke 8:11) … “He that sows the good seed, is the Son of man” (Matthew 13:37) … “I have given them Thy word [Father], and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world; as I also am not of the world” (John 17:14) … “And the servants said to him: “Did you not sow good seed in your field? From where then does it have cockle?’ And he said to them: ‘An enemy has done this!’” (Matthew 13:27-28).
Article 17
Saturday, January 11th
Frankincense Makes Spiritual Sense!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Saturday, January 11th
Frankincense Makes Spiritual Sense!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Sense of Frankincense
“They offered him gifts; gold, frankincense, and myrrh.” (Matthew 2:11). There is a logical order to these three elements of gold, frankincense and myrrh. Gold symbolizes Charity; frankincense represents prayer; and myrrh is a sign of suffering and death. Charity precedes prayer in the sense that we usually talk most to those whom we love the most. Likewise, we talk more sincerely to those whom we love the most. Faith has informed us about God and how wonderful He is; Faith has provided the firewood for the fire of love; Hope has ignited or provided a spark for that love and Charity is the resulting fire of love.
The name “frankincense” is derived from the Old French “franc encens”, meaning “pure incense” or, more literally, “free lighting”. Trade in frankincense, which is produced by various trees in the genus Boswellia, dates back to at least 2000 BC. The frankincense trade became the most lucrative in the world from 1000 B.C. through 400 A.D. For a time, it made southern Arabia the richest place on Earth. However, over the centuries demand for frankincense has dropped. The current annual world production of frankincense is about 200,000 tons. More than 82% of the product comes from Somalia, with some frankincense also gathered in adjacent Southern Arabia. Frankincense is a tiny crop by world standards, with Ethiopia exporting around 5,000 tons per year: mostly to China for use in medicines and perfumes. The entire Catholic Church uses around 50 tons a year.
We will first of all look at the physical side of the Boswellia tree and the Frankincense it produces. Then we will look at the spiritual side of things―seeing what fruit we can draw from the physical or material aspects that we will have examined. As you read through the physical aspect of things―try to draw your own analogies for a Catholic living in the world and the spiritual life to be followed.
THE PHYSICAL SIDE OF FRANKINCENSE
Boswellia—The Boss of Incense Giving Trees
Our Lord said: “From the fig tree learn a parable” (Matthew 24:32). Likewise, you could say: “From the Boswellia tree learn a lesson!” It is from that tree that we get Frankincense. It is the source of the oleo-gum-resin frankincense, which besides other uses, has long been valued for its sweet-smelling fumes when burnt. In most of the great ancient cultures, including the Egyptian, Babylonian, Persian, Hebrew, Greek and Roman civilizations, it has played a role in religious and domestic life. Frankincense has been sought after by kings and valued as highly as gold.
A Tough Tree for Tough Terrains
The Frankincense Tree is not a pretty tree or a “good-looker”—in fact there is not much beauty to it. Boswellia Sacra is a tree with papery, peeling bark and leaves clustered at the ends of tangled branches. The frankincense tree is small, growing up to 13-15 feet tall—though a few are known to have reached heights of 20-24ft or more, though they are the exception to the rule. It has a sturdy trunk and dark brown bark that sheds and re-grows repeatedly. Its branches often begin near its base. The leaves are pinnate and grow in clusters at the ends of the branches. The flowers are small and whitish with five petals and ten red stamens. The fruits are small, light brown capsules.
The hardy Frankincense Tree (Boswellia) prefers to rough it and tough it out. It can grow in very tough terrains and unforgiving environments, surviving where many other trees would fail. It goes where others trees fear to tread. It grows in dry and rocky sites where other tree species cannot survive. They sometimes grow out of solid rock. The initial means of attachment to the rock is unknown, but is accomplished by a bulbous disk-like swelling of the trunk. This growth prevents it from being ripped from the rock during violent storms. Frankincense trees require a limestone-rich soil and are mostly found growing on rocky hillsides and cliffs, or in the dried riverbeds. Harvesting can be a very dangerous task.
Frankincense trees require an arid climate where moisture is provided by morning mist. The few ideal environments in the world for this small prized tree are found in Southern Arabia (Oman and Yemen), India, and Northern Africa (Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Kenya). It is a drought-resistant species that continues to grow in marginal lands, produce incense, flower and grow leaves even in harsh and unpredictable biophysical conditions—they sometimes grow out of solid rock. The initial means of attachment to the rock is unknown, but is accomplished by a bulbous disk-like swelling of the trunk. The trees cling to boulders or rock-faces by means of this cushion-like swelling at the base of the trunk. This swollen base helps to stabilize the tree and is most developed in those growing on very steep or exposed rocks. This growth prevents it from being ripped from the rock during violent storms.
In northern Ethiopia, Frankincense trees are found in steep slope with an average gradient range of 30-40%. The majority of the soils (60-80%) in northern Ethiopia (where Boswellia grows) are only about 8 inches deep. Further, frankincense trees require a limestone-rich soil and are mostly found growing on rocky hillsides and cliffs, or in the dried riverbeds below.
A Dying Breed
The forests that remain are declining, because the old individuals are dying continuously, and there are no new individuals coming into the system. This is partly due to over-exploitation. Heavily tapped trees produce seeds that germinate at only 16% while seeds of trees that had not been tapped so heavily, germinate at more than 80%. That means that the forests are running out of trees. Scientific experiments show that nine taps per tree is sustainable, but some of the trees there have 23 taps, which is outrageous.
Each year, up to about 6 lbs of resin can be tapped from an individual tree. After about five years of tapping, management techniques suggest that the tree should be rested for a similar period in order to maximize future yields. This over-tapping has been ‘good’ for the farmers in the short-term, because they can make more money, but terrible for the trees. The over-tapped trees produce less resin and the farmers are having to use a greater land area to obtain the same yield that they got in bygone years. Furthermore, these over-tapped trees are weakened are unable to fight disease and pests. Tapping makes them more vulnerable to attacks from the longhorn beetle, which lays its eggs under the bark.
In places like Oman and Yemen, the Frankincense tree is being cut down systematically. Now, in Ethiopia, it is being cut down as land is being turned over to agriculture. Farmers are turning to more profitable crops such as sesame and cotton, and clearing their Boswellia forests. Forests have also been cleared to cater for the grazing of animals.
The encroachment of more opportunistic tree species is also affecting the long-term survival of the frankincense forests. In the landscape, this tree has been the dominant species. In these woodlands, 80% of the individual trees were frankincense trees. Yet some areas at the verges of the distribution of the species, there are other species coming in with the result that the frankincense trees are phasing out as the other species are coming in. The forests running out of frankincense—and other species are taking over. Within 50 years, populations of Boswellia (Frankincense trees) will be decimated, and the declining populations mean frankincense production is doomed. Older trees of the Frankincense population are not being replaced, because few Boswellia seedlings survived to become saplings. The number of fires and intensity of grazing has increased over recent decades as a result of a large increase in the number of cattle, and this could be one reason why seedlings fail to grow into saplings.
THE SPIRITUAL SIDE OF FRANKINCENSE
God and Trees
God has a thing about trees! It was a tree in the Garden of Paradise, whose fruit was not to be eaten! God appears to Moses under the form of a burning bush (tree). Jesus is born and placed upon the wood of a tree in the cave outside Bethlehem. Our Lord later has a “run-in” with a fig tree, which He then curses and it withers and dies. He later dies on the wood of a tree on Calvary. There is something about trees and the wood of trees that seems to run continuously through God’s dealings with men! One might think that we are barking-up the right tree by saying this!
How Will We Be Tree-ted?
Having covered the material aspect of things in the previous article, which looked at the life of the Frankincense tree, let us today draw some spiritual lessons that we can find by analogy. By the wisdom and genius of God’s Providence, there are many lessons to be drawn from the life of Frankincense trees. The fate and treatment of the Frankincense tree is very similar to the fate and the treatment that the Church receives in this world.
Our Lord warns us of how we shall be treated as His followers: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled! … Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. For they will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they shall persecute you in this city, flee into another!” (Matthew 10:17-22; 10:32-37; Luke 12:49-53).
The martyrdom and persecution of so many Catholics throughout history are a witness to the truth of Our Lord’s warnings of how His followers would be treated.
Unforgiving Environments
God’s Providence, in creating the Frankincense tree, has ruled that they will have to grow in unforgiving environments. God has placed them in an arid, desert-like setting with its harsh climate—yet He has given the tree an innate ability to survive, grow and produce in such a seemingly handicapped environment. The tree survives droughts and continues to grow in marginal lands, produce incense, flower and grow leaves despite the harsh and unpredictable biophysical conditions—so much so that they sometimes even grow out of solid rock. It attaches itself to the rock by means of a bulbous disk-like swelling of the trunk. The trees cling to boulders or rock-faces by means of this cushion-like swelling at the base of the trunk. This swollen base helps to stabilize the tree and is most noticeably developed in those Frankincense trees growing on very steep or exposed rocks. This bulbous growth prevents the tree from being ripped away from the rock during violent storms.
The Rock of the Faith
God also seems to have a thing about rocks and stone. He has a penchant for mountains and appears to Moses on mountains; Mount Carmel was a haven for Elias and other prophets; Our Lord gives the famous Sermon on the Mount; He is transfigured on a mountain and dies on Mount Calvary and later ascends into Heaven from a mountain.
We can see here a symbolism to the Church and the Faith. Our Lord built His Church upon a Rock—He gave Simon the name of Peter (coming from the Latin word “petrus” meaning “rock” or “stone”) and He built His Church upon the Rock of Peter: “Jesus said to him: ‘Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jona … And I say to thee that thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18).
We, like the Frankincense should grow on the rock, be attached to the rock. Just like the bulbose, swollen growth at the base of the tree somehow attaches the Frankincense tree to the rock, so does our Faith, ever-swelling and increasing, attach us to the Rock of the Church and prevents us from being ripped away from the Rock during the violent storms of Liberalism, Modernism, Hedonism (pleasure-seeking), Materialism or whatever other “-ism” tries to drag us away from the Church.
Rocks in the Wilderness
The Rock of Peter is in a desert-like location—meaning, it is not part of the world. God led His Chosen People away from the world into the wilderness. Most of God’s prophets lived away from world in the wilderness. Our Lord goes away from the world into the desert and wilderness to fast and pray for forty-days. St. John the Baptist lives, works and prays in the desert wilderness. Later, the Desert Fathers would leave the world for the wilderness and grow into great trees of sanctity and holiness in that unforgiving environment. God likewise wants to separate us from the world, for the world follows the broad and wide road to perdition. The world is an enemy of God.
Also, the mountain is a rock and Our Lord would go there to pray often: “And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain, alone, to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23). This evokes the image of the Frankincense tree, alone in the desert or mountainous regions. “He went out into a mountain to pray, and He passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12). “He took Peter, and James, and John, and went up into a mountain to pray” (Luke 9:28). The Frankincense tree—planted and growing in the barren, arid, rocky desert regions, besides being a symbol of prayer, is also a symbol of this vocation that God has given to us, of living in the world, but yet living apart from the world.
To the Pharisees and Jews Jesus said: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world” (John 8:23). Of His followers He says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). Speaking to His followers, He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you” (John 15:19). St. John adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
‘SimilariTrees’ with Humans
There are uncanny similarities that God has placed in the Frankincense tree with regard to humans. The trees start producing resin anywhere from 6 to 10 years old, which is akin to a child reaching the age of being able to reason and start producing simple intellectual fruits. The trees can live to around 100 years of age—if they are not overworked by excessive wounding and tapping for the valuable frankincense resin.
As with human-beings, appearances can deceive. The Frankincense tree is not going to win any awards for its beauty and aesthetical qualities—for it has none. It is not a tall tree that towers majestically above others—in fact it will struggle to reach a height of 24 feet, more likely than not it will be merely 13-15 feet tall (or small)—a midget among trees. But great things come in little packages! Rather than being a plush and handsome tree, it is scraggly and stumpy—but, boy, it is tough! When locals try and plant fancier trees in the same area, very few can survive the harsh, uncompromising environment!
The Frankincense tree is also “picked-on” by its owners—it is wounded over and over again throughout the year, as they try to bleed all the sap they can get, like squeezing blood out of a stone, almost ‘squeezing’ it dry. Many trees die young from the abuse.
Yet what it produces is so precious! At one time Frankincense was valued like gold—even today, the top grade frankincense is very valuable and is priced accordingly. $16 a pound. So far so good. However when this is distilled you may get as little as 5% of this as an essential oil. That makes things pretty expensive. Now you are looking at something that has cost you at least US$330 a pound. That’s about US$20 an ounce for the essential oil. However, its benefits are quite phenomenal.
‘SimilariTrees’ with the Spiritual Life
The Frankincense tree, upon first glance, may seem rather unremarkable. It appears as a giant shrub, with many knurled branches topped with abundant slender leaves and occasionally, small white flowers. It was stated above: “The Frankincense Tree is not a pretty tree or a ‘good-looker’—in fact there is not much beauty to it.” From this we learn not to be fooled by appearances—the “ugly duckling” can actually be a “beautiful swan” in disguise! The little rejected Babe of Bethlehem was actually God is disguise. The sufferings of this life are really heavenly glory in disguise. The “Ugly Duckling” was rejected by all other animals just like Christ was rejected by the world, and we have to be rejected by the world if we want to be accepted by Heaven.
Used for many thousands of years, the Frankincense tree has perhaps the greatest association with spiritual practice of any plant on Earth. For more than 5,000 years, the hardened resin has been burned in not only in the Old Testament worship of the Chosen People, but also in the temples of false religions throughout Egypt, China and India―and the Catholic Church continues to use it today during Mass. It is one of the four main ingredients in Jewish ceremonial incense, forming an important part of the Sabbath day offerings. The smoke of Frankincense (as with other ritual incense) is thought to carry prayers to Heaven upon its smoke. It is also said to deepen the breath and still the mind, making it useful for meditation. The incense may have health benefits as well, producing a highly antiseptic smoke, keeping churches and churchgoers free from disease.
According to ancient documents, the great Baal temple of Babylon consumed two-and-a-half tons of Frankincense a year. The Frankincense trade was of immense importance in ancient times, peaking about 2,000 years ago. Caravans grew to as many as 2,000 to 3,000 camels in number. Cities grew up along the trade routes, and heavy taxes and fees for protection, lodging and camel fodder raised the cost of the resin considerably, so much so that it was valued as much as gold. The wealth involved inspired Alexander the Great to plot to control the region, though his death happened to precede the invasion.
Just as the Boswellia Tree is a hardy tree, so too must Catholics be hardy persons. As was stated above: “The hardy Frankincense Tree (Boswellia) prefers to rough it and tough it out. It can grow in very tough terrains and unforgiving environments, surviving where many other trees would fail. It goes where others trees fear to tread. It grows in dry and rocky sites where other tree species cannot survive.” Those words are equally applicable to Catholics―who, by the grace of God, should be able to survive and thrive in any kind of environment.
We have to be ‘distilled’ before we can get to Heaven. Just as there is only 5% essential oil in the frankincense resin, there is very little good in us in comparison to our sins, faults and failings. We have to be distilled. As water works upon the frankincense resin, so does grace work on the residue of our sins and, though sufferings, purifies and perfects us into a sweet-smelling fragrance for God.
Secondly, we see that the best ‘fruit’ of the Frankincense tree is not found on its branches among its leaves, like the fruit of other trees, but it lies hidden beneath the surface bark. This ‘fruit’, or resin, will only be produced through the tree being wounded and bled. Likewise, the fruit of Catholics requires that they be wounded, that they ‘bleed’ and shed ‘tears’ like the Frankincense tree.
Our Lord emphatically states this: “You shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 10:22) … “They will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues” (Matthew 10:17) … “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death” (Matthew 24:9) … “But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved” (Matthew 10:22). Heaven is only won by wounds, blood, tears and suffering: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
‘SimilariTrees’ with Prayer
It was also stated above: “Heavily tapped trees produce seeds that germinate at only 16% while seeds of trees that had not been tapped so heavily, germinate at more than 80%.” We can link this to spiritual axiom of quality being preferred to quantity. A limited amount of prayers that are said very well, with much fervor and intensity are far more productive than lots and lots of prayers that are prayed badly.
Frankincense is, as St. Thomas Aquinas said, symbolic of fervent prayer—how fervent is my prayer? Does is cry out loud from the blazing furnace of my heart, or whispered and mumbled from lukewarm lips? St. Francis de Sales says: “Do not hurry along and say many things, but try to speak from your heart. A single Our Father, said with feeling, has greater value than many said quickly and hurriedly!” St. Louis de Montfort adds: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly!” (Secret of the Rosary).
Prayer, or our conversation or communication with God, is the incense and resulting fragrant smoke that rises upwards to God. Our Lady says to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Thy ceaseless offering, however, must be love―which is the gold; continual prayer―which is the incense; and the patient acceptance of labors and true mortifications―which is the myrrh!” (The Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, The Incarnation).
St. Thomas Aquinas explains: “They offer gifts in keeping with Christ’s greatness: ... they offer up incense as to God, because it is used in the Divine Sacrifice ... We offer God incense, which signifies fervor in prayer, if our constant prayers mount up to God with an odor of sweetness.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica). King David prayed to God: “Let my prayer be directed as incense in thy sight” (Psalm 140:2).
‘SimilariTrees’ with Doctors
Frankincense resin is thought to have a bounty of health properties. At one time it “was used to treat every conceivable ill to man”. Medicinally, it has been used for thousands of years for a variety of ailments such as arthritis, bronchitis, ulcers, vomiting and fevers. The famous eleventh-century Arabian physician, Avicenna, recommended its cooling effects as a remedy for infections and illnesses that increase the body’s temperature. Ancient Romans considered it an antidote to Hemlock poisoning. Many other medicinal uses of frankincense throughout the ages appear in ancient records.
The early physicians described the properties of frankincense as being hot, dry, astringent, detergent, and extractant. Childbirth was protected by fumigation of frankincense and fresh frankincense was traditionally used in poultices and plasters to treat a wide variety of skin lesions. The gum was made into pills to treat thinning of blood and of abdominal and chest pain, cholera, and a wide variety of problems.
Frankincense mixtures were claimed to cure all known ails and to be an antidote to all known poisons. Frankincense was thought to be very good for the healing of bone fractures and it was also thought to aid conception. Even the pollen was prescribed in a remedy for gout, and the buds and the berries for the cleansing of an infected throat.
The University of Munich found the anti-inflammatory properties of frankincense very effective as a treatment for joint pain and arthritis. Scientific studies have shown that the active compounds have anti-arthritic properties―they inhibit the inflammatory process; improve blood supply; and prevent further cartilage reduction. Frankincense resin also helps to alleviate anxiety and depression.
Scientific research is also being done to investigate the effect of Frankincense on cancer. Recent research by scientists shows that frankincense contains an agent that halts the spread of. According to immunologist Dr. Mahmoud Suhail, frankincense resets the DNA code that has been corrupted by cancer cells and reprograms the correct code back into the cell. Frankincense also effectively separates the nuclei of cancer cells from their cytoplasm bodies which stops cancer cells from reproducing themselves and the corrupted DNA codes.
Because frankincense attacks only malignant cells while leaving health cells alone, it could revolutionize cancer treatment protocols. Currently, scientists are working to isolate the active agent (there are at least 19 active agents) within frankincense that fights cancer and trials are currently being conducted to identify which one it is.
In modern natural medicine it used for respiratory conditions such as bronchitis, catarrh and asthma; for wrinkles, wounds and dry skin, and in cases of rheumatism, cystitis and leukorrea. Frankincense oil contains sesquiterpenes, which stimulate the limbic system, the hypothalamus, the pineal and the pituitary glands.
Just like it was thought that frankincense was a medicine for all ills, in a similar vein we have Our Lady saying the Holy Rosary is the solution for all problems. Sister Lucia of Fatima stated: “Prayer and sacrifice are the two means to save the world. As for the Holy Rosary, the Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.” (Words of Sister Lucia spoken on December 26th, 1957, to Fr. Augustine Fuentes).
‘SimilariTrees’ with Healing Prayer
St. Thomas Aquinas says that “Frankincense is a fragrant inflammable resin, burnt as incense, producing a sweet smelling odor. In the spiritual order it signifies a devout prayer. Hence King David, the royal Psalmist says, ‘O Lord, hear my voice, and let my prayer be directed as incense in Thy sight’ (Psalm 140:2). To have our prayers thus directed to God, they must be fervent and inflamed with the fire of charity.”
For prayer to be effective, it has to be PURE and FERVENT—or, shall we say that it is likely to work in proportion to its fervor and sincerity. Furthermore, much like frankincense (or most natural medicines), the more pure it is, then the more effective it is.
This PURITY seems to be the indication of Holy Scripture, for it says: “Thou shalt make incense … pure and most worthy of sanctification” (Exodus 30:35) ... “The candlesticks also of most pure gold” (2 Paralipomenon 4:20) ... “I offered pure prayers to God” (Job 16:18) … “Evil thoughts are an abomination to the Lord: and pure words most beautiful” (Proverbs 15:26) ... “Call on the Lord out of a pure heart” (2 Timothy 2:22) … “Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8) … “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’ ?” (Proverbs 20:9) … “Create a clean heart in me, O God!” (Psalm 50:12) ... “Praise is not seemly in the mouth of a sinner” (Ecclesiasticus 15:9) … “He who turns his ears from hearing the law, his prayer is an abomination” (Proverbs. 28:9) ... “Now we know that God doth not hear sinners: but if a man be a server of God, and doth his will, him He hears” (John 9:31).
That is why the prayers of little children and the saints are so powerful, for they have sinned less than other people―their souls are more pure in the sight of the Lord.
Added to that purity of heart must be FERVOR—for no matter how pure frankincense may be, it will not produce fragrant smoke that rises heavenwards, unless it is placed on burning coals, which symbolize a fervent burning heart. Our Lord complains of this lack of fervor when He says: “These people honor Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8) and Holy Scripture adds: “Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth” (Apocalypse 3:16) and commands “Cease not to cry to the Lord!” (1 Kings 7:8). “Thou shalt cry, and He shall say, ‘Here I am!’” (Isaias 58:9). “In my distress I will call upon the Lord, and I will cry to my God: and He will hear my voice” (2 Kings 22:7).
‘SimilariTrees’ with the Prayers of Jesus
Jesus Himself put fervor into His prayers and commands: “Jesus therefore cried out in the temple, teaching” (John 7:28) … At the bedside of the dead girl, Jesus, “taking her by the hand, cried out, saying: ‘Maid, arise!’ And her spirit returned, and she arose immediately” (Luke 8:54-55). The same fervor was in His voice when He commanded the dead man, Lazarus, to arise: “He cried with a loud voice: ‘Lazarus, come forth!’” (John 11:43). Even during His own death His prayer was fervent: “And at the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying: ‘Eloi, Eloi, lamma sabacthani?’ … And Jesus having cried out with a loud voice, gave up the ghost.” (Mark 15:34, 37).
The fervent, pleading, crying, tearful prayer is heard by God: “When thou didst pray with tears ... I offered thy prayer to the Lord” (Tobias 12:12). “Melchisedech, who in the days of his flesh, with a strong cry and tears, offering up prayers and supplications to Him that was able to save him from death, was heard for his reverence” (Hebrews 5:6-7). “And immediately the father of the boy, crying out with tears, said: ‘I do believe, Lord! Help my unbelief!’” (Mark 9:23).
This is the kind of prayer that pierces God’s Ears and moves His Heart! It is the prayer of deep Faith—a prayer that brings about miracles, for it comes groaning from the depth of the heart and not just from the lips. It is a prayer that brings about healing—both bodily and spiritual—for it is humble and sincere. It is such Faith and prayer that Our Lord answered.
To the woman troubled with an issue of blood twelve years, He said: “Be of good heart, daughter, thy Faith has made thee whole!” (Matthew 9:22) … “Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way, thy Faith hath made thee whole!’” (Mark 10:52) … To the blind man, He said: “Receive thy sight: thy Faith hath made thee whole!” (Luke 18:42). To the leper, He said: “Arise, go thy way; for thy Faith hath made thee whole!” (Luke 17:19). To the man “sick of the palsy lying in a bed, Jesus, seeing their Faith, said to the man sick of the palsy: ‘Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house!’” (Matthew 9:1-6).
‘SimilariTrees’ with Suffering and Tears
Frankincense is tapped, from the scraggly but hardy trees, by slashing the bark, which is called “striping” due to the lashes or stripes produced by the knife, and allowing the exuded resin to bleed out and harden. These hardened resins are called tears. The aroma from these tears are more valuable for their presumed healing abilities and are also said to have superior qualities for religious ritual.
The frankincense tree begins to yield resin at very earliest in its third or fourth year, or as late as its eighth or ninth year of existence. Tapping for resin is done two to three times a year, with the final taps producing the best “tears” due to their higher aromatic content. Frankincense trees are ideally harvested for resin twice per year, from January to March and again from August to October, and then after five years of tapping, they should be rested five years for the wounds to be able to heal properly and for the tree to regain its vitality and strength.
Techniques of tapping and harvesting of frankincense remained virtually the same since ancient times. Frankincense resin or sap is tapped from the scraggly, but hardy trees, by slashing the bark, which is called “striping”. This slashing or wounding is done by making long (as much a five inches), deep incisions in the bark of the stout lower branches of the tree with a special knife called a “mengaff”, which looks like a scalpel. When slashed, the wounded bark ‘bleeds’ out an oily gum resin, in the shape of tears.
Tapping in Ethiopia is carried out slightly differently by shaving-off a very thin (1/24 inch deep and an area of 1 square inch) layer of the bark, without making deep incisions and allowing the resin to flow from this wound. A tree could be tapped 8-12 times during the dry periods of the year. During the cooler parts of the year a slightly different method is used: a similar set of incisions are made on the tree, and for several weeks as the weather warms up, the resinous sap slowly oozes out of the cuts on the tree in small droplets that steadily builds up into spherules that sometimes reach the size of a hen’s egg before they are finally harvested. This oily gum resin is allowed to dry and harden on the tree in the sunlight. The tree is marked and the harvester returns in around 10 to 14 days two weeks to scrape what has become hardened frankincense resin from the tree. Resins which fall to the ground are collected on large palm leaves placed when first tapping the tree. The process repeats itself for about 3 months during harvesting.
Here we see the need to pray with all our heart, to have our heart slashed, wounded and pierced with tribulation and affliction, just like Our Lord’s heart was pierced on the Cross, and tears of blood and water wept forth from it. “When thou didst pray with tears ... I offered thy prayer to the Lord” (Tobias 12:12). “Melchisedech, who in the days of his flesh, with a strong cry and tears, offering up prayers and supplications to him that was able to save him from death, was heard for his reverence” (Hebrews 5:6-7). “And immediately the father of the boy crying out, with tears said: ‘I do believe, Lord: help my unbelief!’” (Mark 9:23).
‘SimilariTrees’ with a Burning Heart
The word “incense” is linked to the Latin verb “incendere” meaning “to burn”. Some clear derivatives of the Latin word are English words such as “incendiary devices”, “incendiary weapons”, or “incendiary bombs” which are tools or weapons designed to start fires or destroy sensitive equipment using fire.
The actual Latin word for incense is “thus” (Greek: “thumiama”) and we see that root play its part in the word “thurible” which is the receptacle in which incense is burned during Mass and which is carried by an altar-server called the “thurifer.” An alternative word for the “thurible” is “censer” which brings us back to the Latin root “incendere” meaning to burn. Therefore, the thurible or censer is the receptacle in which incense is burned.
The thurible or censer also represents the human person, and the hot coals that are placed inside the thurible or censer, represent our hearts that should be burning with love for God. If the coals are not alight—not on fire—not burning—then no matter how many grains of incense you may pour onto those coals, no aromatic smoke would be produced—even if you poured a ton of incense onto them!
All the three Persons of the Holy Trinity have chosen fire to represent Their Divinity. God the Father appears to Moses taking the form of fire in the burning bush: “And the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush” (Exodus 3:2).
We see the Sacred Heart of Jesus issuing forth flames of fire, manifesting His Divine Love and in Scripture Our Lord says: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49).
The Holy Ghost comes down upon Our Lady and the Apostles at Pentecost in the form of tongues of fire: “And there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them: and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost” (Acts 2:3-4).
For prayer to be effective, it must come from a ‘burning heart’ like incense needs burning coals. “Prove me, O Lord, and try me; burn my heart” (Psalm 25:2). The two disciples on the road to Emmaus, after the resurrection of Our Lord, encountered Jesus on the road and “they said one to the other: ‘Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in this way, and opened to us the Scriptures?’” (Luke 24:32).
This brings to mind other words of Holy Scripture: “Thou shalt make also an altar to burn incense … and Aaron shall burn sweet smelling incense upon it in the morning ... He shall burn an everlasting incense before the Lord throughout your generations” (Exodus 30:1; 30:7-8).
“And taking the censer, which he hath filled with the burning coals of the altar, and taking up with his hand the compounded perfume for incense, he shall go in within the veil into the holy place: that when the perfumes are put upon the fire, the cloud and vapor thereof may cover the oracle” (Leviticus 16:12-13).
“Moses said to Aaron: ‘Take the censer, and putting fire in it from the altar, put incense upon it, and go quickly to the people to pray for them!’” (Numbers 16:46). “Take every one of you censers, and put incense upon them” (Numbers 16:17). “Everyone had a censer in his hand: and a cloud of smoke went up from the incense” (Ezechiel 8:11).
The picture of prayers wafting up to Heaven like incense is captured in David’s psalm and also in John’s vision in Apocalypse: “May my prayer be set before you like incense; may the lifting up of my hands be like the evening sacrifice!” (Psalm 141:2). “Another angel, who had a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer, with the prayers of all the saints, on the golden altar before the throne. The smoke of the incense, together with the prayers of the saints, went up before God from the angel’s hand” (Apocalypse 8:3-4).
“They offered him gifts; gold, frankincense, and myrrh.” (Matthew 2:11). There is a logical order to these three elements of gold, frankincense and myrrh. Gold symbolizes Charity; frankincense represents prayer; and myrrh is a sign of suffering and death. Charity precedes prayer in the sense that we usually talk most to those whom we love the most. Likewise, we talk more sincerely to those whom we love the most. Faith has informed us about God and how wonderful He is; Faith has provided the firewood for the fire of love; Hope has ignited or provided a spark for that love and Charity is the resulting fire of love.
The name “frankincense” is derived from the Old French “franc encens”, meaning “pure incense” or, more literally, “free lighting”. Trade in frankincense, which is produced by various trees in the genus Boswellia, dates back to at least 2000 BC. The frankincense trade became the most lucrative in the world from 1000 B.C. through 400 A.D. For a time, it made southern Arabia the richest place on Earth. However, over the centuries demand for frankincense has dropped. The current annual world production of frankincense is about 200,000 tons. More than 82% of the product comes from Somalia, with some frankincense also gathered in adjacent Southern Arabia. Frankincense is a tiny crop by world standards, with Ethiopia exporting around 5,000 tons per year: mostly to China for use in medicines and perfumes. The entire Catholic Church uses around 50 tons a year.
We will first of all look at the physical side of the Boswellia tree and the Frankincense it produces. Then we will look at the spiritual side of things―seeing what fruit we can draw from the physical or material aspects that we will have examined. As you read through the physical aspect of things―try to draw your own analogies for a Catholic living in the world and the spiritual life to be followed.
THE PHYSICAL SIDE OF FRANKINCENSE
Boswellia—The Boss of Incense Giving Trees
Our Lord said: “From the fig tree learn a parable” (Matthew 24:32). Likewise, you could say: “From the Boswellia tree learn a lesson!” It is from that tree that we get Frankincense. It is the source of the oleo-gum-resin frankincense, which besides other uses, has long been valued for its sweet-smelling fumes when burnt. In most of the great ancient cultures, including the Egyptian, Babylonian, Persian, Hebrew, Greek and Roman civilizations, it has played a role in religious and domestic life. Frankincense has been sought after by kings and valued as highly as gold.
A Tough Tree for Tough Terrains
The Frankincense Tree is not a pretty tree or a “good-looker”—in fact there is not much beauty to it. Boswellia Sacra is a tree with papery, peeling bark and leaves clustered at the ends of tangled branches. The frankincense tree is small, growing up to 13-15 feet tall—though a few are known to have reached heights of 20-24ft or more, though they are the exception to the rule. It has a sturdy trunk and dark brown bark that sheds and re-grows repeatedly. Its branches often begin near its base. The leaves are pinnate and grow in clusters at the ends of the branches. The flowers are small and whitish with five petals and ten red stamens. The fruits are small, light brown capsules.
The hardy Frankincense Tree (Boswellia) prefers to rough it and tough it out. It can grow in very tough terrains and unforgiving environments, surviving where many other trees would fail. It goes where others trees fear to tread. It grows in dry and rocky sites where other tree species cannot survive. They sometimes grow out of solid rock. The initial means of attachment to the rock is unknown, but is accomplished by a bulbous disk-like swelling of the trunk. This growth prevents it from being ripped from the rock during violent storms. Frankincense trees require a limestone-rich soil and are mostly found growing on rocky hillsides and cliffs, or in the dried riverbeds. Harvesting can be a very dangerous task.
Frankincense trees require an arid climate where moisture is provided by morning mist. The few ideal environments in the world for this small prized tree are found in Southern Arabia (Oman and Yemen), India, and Northern Africa (Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Kenya). It is a drought-resistant species that continues to grow in marginal lands, produce incense, flower and grow leaves even in harsh and unpredictable biophysical conditions—they sometimes grow out of solid rock. The initial means of attachment to the rock is unknown, but is accomplished by a bulbous disk-like swelling of the trunk. The trees cling to boulders or rock-faces by means of this cushion-like swelling at the base of the trunk. This swollen base helps to stabilize the tree and is most developed in those growing on very steep or exposed rocks. This growth prevents it from being ripped from the rock during violent storms.
In northern Ethiopia, Frankincense trees are found in steep slope with an average gradient range of 30-40%. The majority of the soils (60-80%) in northern Ethiopia (where Boswellia grows) are only about 8 inches deep. Further, frankincense trees require a limestone-rich soil and are mostly found growing on rocky hillsides and cliffs, or in the dried riverbeds below.
A Dying Breed
The forests that remain are declining, because the old individuals are dying continuously, and there are no new individuals coming into the system. This is partly due to over-exploitation. Heavily tapped trees produce seeds that germinate at only 16% while seeds of trees that had not been tapped so heavily, germinate at more than 80%. That means that the forests are running out of trees. Scientific experiments show that nine taps per tree is sustainable, but some of the trees there have 23 taps, which is outrageous.
Each year, up to about 6 lbs of resin can be tapped from an individual tree. After about five years of tapping, management techniques suggest that the tree should be rested for a similar period in order to maximize future yields. This over-tapping has been ‘good’ for the farmers in the short-term, because they can make more money, but terrible for the trees. The over-tapped trees produce less resin and the farmers are having to use a greater land area to obtain the same yield that they got in bygone years. Furthermore, these over-tapped trees are weakened are unable to fight disease and pests. Tapping makes them more vulnerable to attacks from the longhorn beetle, which lays its eggs under the bark.
In places like Oman and Yemen, the Frankincense tree is being cut down systematically. Now, in Ethiopia, it is being cut down as land is being turned over to agriculture. Farmers are turning to more profitable crops such as sesame and cotton, and clearing their Boswellia forests. Forests have also been cleared to cater for the grazing of animals.
The encroachment of more opportunistic tree species is also affecting the long-term survival of the frankincense forests. In the landscape, this tree has been the dominant species. In these woodlands, 80% of the individual trees were frankincense trees. Yet some areas at the verges of the distribution of the species, there are other species coming in with the result that the frankincense trees are phasing out as the other species are coming in. The forests running out of frankincense—and other species are taking over. Within 50 years, populations of Boswellia (Frankincense trees) will be decimated, and the declining populations mean frankincense production is doomed. Older trees of the Frankincense population are not being replaced, because few Boswellia seedlings survived to become saplings. The number of fires and intensity of grazing has increased over recent decades as a result of a large increase in the number of cattle, and this could be one reason why seedlings fail to grow into saplings.
THE SPIRITUAL SIDE OF FRANKINCENSE
God and Trees
God has a thing about trees! It was a tree in the Garden of Paradise, whose fruit was not to be eaten! God appears to Moses under the form of a burning bush (tree). Jesus is born and placed upon the wood of a tree in the cave outside Bethlehem. Our Lord later has a “run-in” with a fig tree, which He then curses and it withers and dies. He later dies on the wood of a tree on Calvary. There is something about trees and the wood of trees that seems to run continuously through God’s dealings with men! One might think that we are barking-up the right tree by saying this!
How Will We Be Tree-ted?
Having covered the material aspect of things in the previous article, which looked at the life of the Frankincense tree, let us today draw some spiritual lessons that we can find by analogy. By the wisdom and genius of God’s Providence, there are many lessons to be drawn from the life of Frankincense trees. The fate and treatment of the Frankincense tree is very similar to the fate and the treatment that the Church receives in this world.
Our Lord warns us of how we shall be treated as His followers: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled! … Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. For they will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they shall persecute you in this city, flee into another!” (Matthew 10:17-22; 10:32-37; Luke 12:49-53).
The martyrdom and persecution of so many Catholics throughout history are a witness to the truth of Our Lord’s warnings of how His followers would be treated.
Unforgiving Environments
God’s Providence, in creating the Frankincense tree, has ruled that they will have to grow in unforgiving environments. God has placed them in an arid, desert-like setting with its harsh climate—yet He has given the tree an innate ability to survive, grow and produce in such a seemingly handicapped environment. The tree survives droughts and continues to grow in marginal lands, produce incense, flower and grow leaves despite the harsh and unpredictable biophysical conditions—so much so that they sometimes even grow out of solid rock. It attaches itself to the rock by means of a bulbous disk-like swelling of the trunk. The trees cling to boulders or rock-faces by means of this cushion-like swelling at the base of the trunk. This swollen base helps to stabilize the tree and is most noticeably developed in those Frankincense trees growing on very steep or exposed rocks. This bulbous growth prevents the tree from being ripped away from the rock during violent storms.
The Rock of the Faith
God also seems to have a thing about rocks and stone. He has a penchant for mountains and appears to Moses on mountains; Mount Carmel was a haven for Elias and other prophets; Our Lord gives the famous Sermon on the Mount; He is transfigured on a mountain and dies on Mount Calvary and later ascends into Heaven from a mountain.
We can see here a symbolism to the Church and the Faith. Our Lord built His Church upon a Rock—He gave Simon the name of Peter (coming from the Latin word “petrus” meaning “rock” or “stone”) and He built His Church upon the Rock of Peter: “Jesus said to him: ‘Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jona … And I say to thee that thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18).
We, like the Frankincense should grow on the rock, be attached to the rock. Just like the bulbose, swollen growth at the base of the tree somehow attaches the Frankincense tree to the rock, so does our Faith, ever-swelling and increasing, attach us to the Rock of the Church and prevents us from being ripped away from the Rock during the violent storms of Liberalism, Modernism, Hedonism (pleasure-seeking), Materialism or whatever other “-ism” tries to drag us away from the Church.
Rocks in the Wilderness
The Rock of Peter is in a desert-like location—meaning, it is not part of the world. God led His Chosen People away from the world into the wilderness. Most of God’s prophets lived away from world in the wilderness. Our Lord goes away from the world into the desert and wilderness to fast and pray for forty-days. St. John the Baptist lives, works and prays in the desert wilderness. Later, the Desert Fathers would leave the world for the wilderness and grow into great trees of sanctity and holiness in that unforgiving environment. God likewise wants to separate us from the world, for the world follows the broad and wide road to perdition. The world is an enemy of God.
Also, the mountain is a rock and Our Lord would go there to pray often: “And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain, alone, to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23). This evokes the image of the Frankincense tree, alone in the desert or mountainous regions. “He went out into a mountain to pray, and He passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12). “He took Peter, and James, and John, and went up into a mountain to pray” (Luke 9:28). The Frankincense tree—planted and growing in the barren, arid, rocky desert regions, besides being a symbol of prayer, is also a symbol of this vocation that God has given to us, of living in the world, but yet living apart from the world.
To the Pharisees and Jews Jesus said: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world” (John 8:23). Of His followers He says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). Speaking to His followers, He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you” (John 15:19). St. John adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
‘SimilariTrees’ with Humans
There are uncanny similarities that God has placed in the Frankincense tree with regard to humans. The trees start producing resin anywhere from 6 to 10 years old, which is akin to a child reaching the age of being able to reason and start producing simple intellectual fruits. The trees can live to around 100 years of age—if they are not overworked by excessive wounding and tapping for the valuable frankincense resin.
As with human-beings, appearances can deceive. The Frankincense tree is not going to win any awards for its beauty and aesthetical qualities—for it has none. It is not a tall tree that towers majestically above others—in fact it will struggle to reach a height of 24 feet, more likely than not it will be merely 13-15 feet tall (or small)—a midget among trees. But great things come in little packages! Rather than being a plush and handsome tree, it is scraggly and stumpy—but, boy, it is tough! When locals try and plant fancier trees in the same area, very few can survive the harsh, uncompromising environment!
The Frankincense tree is also “picked-on” by its owners—it is wounded over and over again throughout the year, as they try to bleed all the sap they can get, like squeezing blood out of a stone, almost ‘squeezing’ it dry. Many trees die young from the abuse.
Yet what it produces is so precious! At one time Frankincense was valued like gold—even today, the top grade frankincense is very valuable and is priced accordingly. $16 a pound. So far so good. However when this is distilled you may get as little as 5% of this as an essential oil. That makes things pretty expensive. Now you are looking at something that has cost you at least US$330 a pound. That’s about US$20 an ounce for the essential oil. However, its benefits are quite phenomenal.
‘SimilariTrees’ with the Spiritual Life
The Frankincense tree, upon first glance, may seem rather unremarkable. It appears as a giant shrub, with many knurled branches topped with abundant slender leaves and occasionally, small white flowers. It was stated above: “The Frankincense Tree is not a pretty tree or a ‘good-looker’—in fact there is not much beauty to it.” From this we learn not to be fooled by appearances—the “ugly duckling” can actually be a “beautiful swan” in disguise! The little rejected Babe of Bethlehem was actually God is disguise. The sufferings of this life are really heavenly glory in disguise. The “Ugly Duckling” was rejected by all other animals just like Christ was rejected by the world, and we have to be rejected by the world if we want to be accepted by Heaven.
Used for many thousands of years, the Frankincense tree has perhaps the greatest association with spiritual practice of any plant on Earth. For more than 5,000 years, the hardened resin has been burned in not only in the Old Testament worship of the Chosen People, but also in the temples of false religions throughout Egypt, China and India―and the Catholic Church continues to use it today during Mass. It is one of the four main ingredients in Jewish ceremonial incense, forming an important part of the Sabbath day offerings. The smoke of Frankincense (as with other ritual incense) is thought to carry prayers to Heaven upon its smoke. It is also said to deepen the breath and still the mind, making it useful for meditation. The incense may have health benefits as well, producing a highly antiseptic smoke, keeping churches and churchgoers free from disease.
According to ancient documents, the great Baal temple of Babylon consumed two-and-a-half tons of Frankincense a year. The Frankincense trade was of immense importance in ancient times, peaking about 2,000 years ago. Caravans grew to as many as 2,000 to 3,000 camels in number. Cities grew up along the trade routes, and heavy taxes and fees for protection, lodging and camel fodder raised the cost of the resin considerably, so much so that it was valued as much as gold. The wealth involved inspired Alexander the Great to plot to control the region, though his death happened to precede the invasion.
Just as the Boswellia Tree is a hardy tree, so too must Catholics be hardy persons. As was stated above: “The hardy Frankincense Tree (Boswellia) prefers to rough it and tough it out. It can grow in very tough terrains and unforgiving environments, surviving where many other trees would fail. It goes where others trees fear to tread. It grows in dry and rocky sites where other tree species cannot survive.” Those words are equally applicable to Catholics―who, by the grace of God, should be able to survive and thrive in any kind of environment.
We have to be ‘distilled’ before we can get to Heaven. Just as there is only 5% essential oil in the frankincense resin, there is very little good in us in comparison to our sins, faults and failings. We have to be distilled. As water works upon the frankincense resin, so does grace work on the residue of our sins and, though sufferings, purifies and perfects us into a sweet-smelling fragrance for God.
Secondly, we see that the best ‘fruit’ of the Frankincense tree is not found on its branches among its leaves, like the fruit of other trees, but it lies hidden beneath the surface bark. This ‘fruit’, or resin, will only be produced through the tree being wounded and bled. Likewise, the fruit of Catholics requires that they be wounded, that they ‘bleed’ and shed ‘tears’ like the Frankincense tree.
Our Lord emphatically states this: “You shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 10:22) … “They will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues” (Matthew 10:17) … “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death” (Matthew 24:9) … “But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved” (Matthew 10:22). Heaven is only won by wounds, blood, tears and suffering: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
‘SimilariTrees’ with Prayer
It was also stated above: “Heavily tapped trees produce seeds that germinate at only 16% while seeds of trees that had not been tapped so heavily, germinate at more than 80%.” We can link this to spiritual axiom of quality being preferred to quantity. A limited amount of prayers that are said very well, with much fervor and intensity are far more productive than lots and lots of prayers that are prayed badly.
Frankincense is, as St. Thomas Aquinas said, symbolic of fervent prayer—how fervent is my prayer? Does is cry out loud from the blazing furnace of my heart, or whispered and mumbled from lukewarm lips? St. Francis de Sales says: “Do not hurry along and say many things, but try to speak from your heart. A single Our Father, said with feeling, has greater value than many said quickly and hurriedly!” St. Louis de Montfort adds: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly!” (Secret of the Rosary).
Prayer, or our conversation or communication with God, is the incense and resulting fragrant smoke that rises upwards to God. Our Lady says to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Thy ceaseless offering, however, must be love―which is the gold; continual prayer―which is the incense; and the patient acceptance of labors and true mortifications―which is the myrrh!” (The Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, The Incarnation).
St. Thomas Aquinas explains: “They offer gifts in keeping with Christ’s greatness: ... they offer up incense as to God, because it is used in the Divine Sacrifice ... We offer God incense, which signifies fervor in prayer, if our constant prayers mount up to God with an odor of sweetness.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica). King David prayed to God: “Let my prayer be directed as incense in thy sight” (Psalm 140:2).
‘SimilariTrees’ with Doctors
Frankincense resin is thought to have a bounty of health properties. At one time it “was used to treat every conceivable ill to man”. Medicinally, it has been used for thousands of years for a variety of ailments such as arthritis, bronchitis, ulcers, vomiting and fevers. The famous eleventh-century Arabian physician, Avicenna, recommended its cooling effects as a remedy for infections and illnesses that increase the body’s temperature. Ancient Romans considered it an antidote to Hemlock poisoning. Many other medicinal uses of frankincense throughout the ages appear in ancient records.
The early physicians described the properties of frankincense as being hot, dry, astringent, detergent, and extractant. Childbirth was protected by fumigation of frankincense and fresh frankincense was traditionally used in poultices and plasters to treat a wide variety of skin lesions. The gum was made into pills to treat thinning of blood and of abdominal and chest pain, cholera, and a wide variety of problems.
Frankincense mixtures were claimed to cure all known ails and to be an antidote to all known poisons. Frankincense was thought to be very good for the healing of bone fractures and it was also thought to aid conception. Even the pollen was prescribed in a remedy for gout, and the buds and the berries for the cleansing of an infected throat.
The University of Munich found the anti-inflammatory properties of frankincense very effective as a treatment for joint pain and arthritis. Scientific studies have shown that the active compounds have anti-arthritic properties―they inhibit the inflammatory process; improve blood supply; and prevent further cartilage reduction. Frankincense resin also helps to alleviate anxiety and depression.
Scientific research is also being done to investigate the effect of Frankincense on cancer. Recent research by scientists shows that frankincense contains an agent that halts the spread of. According to immunologist Dr. Mahmoud Suhail, frankincense resets the DNA code that has been corrupted by cancer cells and reprograms the correct code back into the cell. Frankincense also effectively separates the nuclei of cancer cells from their cytoplasm bodies which stops cancer cells from reproducing themselves and the corrupted DNA codes.
Because frankincense attacks only malignant cells while leaving health cells alone, it could revolutionize cancer treatment protocols. Currently, scientists are working to isolate the active agent (there are at least 19 active agents) within frankincense that fights cancer and trials are currently being conducted to identify which one it is.
In modern natural medicine it used for respiratory conditions such as bronchitis, catarrh and asthma; for wrinkles, wounds and dry skin, and in cases of rheumatism, cystitis and leukorrea. Frankincense oil contains sesquiterpenes, which stimulate the limbic system, the hypothalamus, the pineal and the pituitary glands.
Just like it was thought that frankincense was a medicine for all ills, in a similar vein we have Our Lady saying the Holy Rosary is the solution for all problems. Sister Lucia of Fatima stated: “Prayer and sacrifice are the two means to save the world. As for the Holy Rosary, the Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.” (Words of Sister Lucia spoken on December 26th, 1957, to Fr. Augustine Fuentes).
‘SimilariTrees’ with Healing Prayer
St. Thomas Aquinas says that “Frankincense is a fragrant inflammable resin, burnt as incense, producing a sweet smelling odor. In the spiritual order it signifies a devout prayer. Hence King David, the royal Psalmist says, ‘O Lord, hear my voice, and let my prayer be directed as incense in Thy sight’ (Psalm 140:2). To have our prayers thus directed to God, they must be fervent and inflamed with the fire of charity.”
For prayer to be effective, it has to be PURE and FERVENT—or, shall we say that it is likely to work in proportion to its fervor and sincerity. Furthermore, much like frankincense (or most natural medicines), the more pure it is, then the more effective it is.
This PURITY seems to be the indication of Holy Scripture, for it says: “Thou shalt make incense … pure and most worthy of sanctification” (Exodus 30:35) ... “The candlesticks also of most pure gold” (2 Paralipomenon 4:20) ... “I offered pure prayers to God” (Job 16:18) … “Evil thoughts are an abomination to the Lord: and pure words most beautiful” (Proverbs 15:26) ... “Call on the Lord out of a pure heart” (2 Timothy 2:22) … “Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8) … “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’ ?” (Proverbs 20:9) … “Create a clean heart in me, O God!” (Psalm 50:12) ... “Praise is not seemly in the mouth of a sinner” (Ecclesiasticus 15:9) … “He who turns his ears from hearing the law, his prayer is an abomination” (Proverbs. 28:9) ... “Now we know that God doth not hear sinners: but if a man be a server of God, and doth his will, him He hears” (John 9:31).
That is why the prayers of little children and the saints are so powerful, for they have sinned less than other people―their souls are more pure in the sight of the Lord.
Added to that purity of heart must be FERVOR—for no matter how pure frankincense may be, it will not produce fragrant smoke that rises heavenwards, unless it is placed on burning coals, which symbolize a fervent burning heart. Our Lord complains of this lack of fervor when He says: “These people honor Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8) and Holy Scripture adds: “Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth” (Apocalypse 3:16) and commands “Cease not to cry to the Lord!” (1 Kings 7:8). “Thou shalt cry, and He shall say, ‘Here I am!’” (Isaias 58:9). “In my distress I will call upon the Lord, and I will cry to my God: and He will hear my voice” (2 Kings 22:7).
‘SimilariTrees’ with the Prayers of Jesus
Jesus Himself put fervor into His prayers and commands: “Jesus therefore cried out in the temple, teaching” (John 7:28) … At the bedside of the dead girl, Jesus, “taking her by the hand, cried out, saying: ‘Maid, arise!’ And her spirit returned, and she arose immediately” (Luke 8:54-55). The same fervor was in His voice when He commanded the dead man, Lazarus, to arise: “He cried with a loud voice: ‘Lazarus, come forth!’” (John 11:43). Even during His own death His prayer was fervent: “And at the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying: ‘Eloi, Eloi, lamma sabacthani?’ … And Jesus having cried out with a loud voice, gave up the ghost.” (Mark 15:34, 37).
The fervent, pleading, crying, tearful prayer is heard by God: “When thou didst pray with tears ... I offered thy prayer to the Lord” (Tobias 12:12). “Melchisedech, who in the days of his flesh, with a strong cry and tears, offering up prayers and supplications to Him that was able to save him from death, was heard for his reverence” (Hebrews 5:6-7). “And immediately the father of the boy, crying out with tears, said: ‘I do believe, Lord! Help my unbelief!’” (Mark 9:23).
This is the kind of prayer that pierces God’s Ears and moves His Heart! It is the prayer of deep Faith—a prayer that brings about miracles, for it comes groaning from the depth of the heart and not just from the lips. It is a prayer that brings about healing—both bodily and spiritual—for it is humble and sincere. It is such Faith and prayer that Our Lord answered.
To the woman troubled with an issue of blood twelve years, He said: “Be of good heart, daughter, thy Faith has made thee whole!” (Matthew 9:22) … “Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way, thy Faith hath made thee whole!’” (Mark 10:52) … To the blind man, He said: “Receive thy sight: thy Faith hath made thee whole!” (Luke 18:42). To the leper, He said: “Arise, go thy way; for thy Faith hath made thee whole!” (Luke 17:19). To the man “sick of the palsy lying in a bed, Jesus, seeing their Faith, said to the man sick of the palsy: ‘Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house!’” (Matthew 9:1-6).
‘SimilariTrees’ with Suffering and Tears
Frankincense is tapped, from the scraggly but hardy trees, by slashing the bark, which is called “striping” due to the lashes or stripes produced by the knife, and allowing the exuded resin to bleed out and harden. These hardened resins are called tears. The aroma from these tears are more valuable for their presumed healing abilities and are also said to have superior qualities for religious ritual.
The frankincense tree begins to yield resin at very earliest in its third or fourth year, or as late as its eighth or ninth year of existence. Tapping for resin is done two to three times a year, with the final taps producing the best “tears” due to their higher aromatic content. Frankincense trees are ideally harvested for resin twice per year, from January to March and again from August to October, and then after five years of tapping, they should be rested five years for the wounds to be able to heal properly and for the tree to regain its vitality and strength.
Techniques of tapping and harvesting of frankincense remained virtually the same since ancient times. Frankincense resin or sap is tapped from the scraggly, but hardy trees, by slashing the bark, which is called “striping”. This slashing or wounding is done by making long (as much a five inches), deep incisions in the bark of the stout lower branches of the tree with a special knife called a “mengaff”, which looks like a scalpel. When slashed, the wounded bark ‘bleeds’ out an oily gum resin, in the shape of tears.
Tapping in Ethiopia is carried out slightly differently by shaving-off a very thin (1/24 inch deep and an area of 1 square inch) layer of the bark, without making deep incisions and allowing the resin to flow from this wound. A tree could be tapped 8-12 times during the dry periods of the year. During the cooler parts of the year a slightly different method is used: a similar set of incisions are made on the tree, and for several weeks as the weather warms up, the resinous sap slowly oozes out of the cuts on the tree in small droplets that steadily builds up into spherules that sometimes reach the size of a hen’s egg before they are finally harvested. This oily gum resin is allowed to dry and harden on the tree in the sunlight. The tree is marked and the harvester returns in around 10 to 14 days two weeks to scrape what has become hardened frankincense resin from the tree. Resins which fall to the ground are collected on large palm leaves placed when first tapping the tree. The process repeats itself for about 3 months during harvesting.
Here we see the need to pray with all our heart, to have our heart slashed, wounded and pierced with tribulation and affliction, just like Our Lord’s heart was pierced on the Cross, and tears of blood and water wept forth from it. “When thou didst pray with tears ... I offered thy prayer to the Lord” (Tobias 12:12). “Melchisedech, who in the days of his flesh, with a strong cry and tears, offering up prayers and supplications to him that was able to save him from death, was heard for his reverence” (Hebrews 5:6-7). “And immediately the father of the boy crying out, with tears said: ‘I do believe, Lord: help my unbelief!’” (Mark 9:23).
‘SimilariTrees’ with a Burning Heart
The word “incense” is linked to the Latin verb “incendere” meaning “to burn”. Some clear derivatives of the Latin word are English words such as “incendiary devices”, “incendiary weapons”, or “incendiary bombs” which are tools or weapons designed to start fires or destroy sensitive equipment using fire.
The actual Latin word for incense is “thus” (Greek: “thumiama”) and we see that root play its part in the word “thurible” which is the receptacle in which incense is burned during Mass and which is carried by an altar-server called the “thurifer.” An alternative word for the “thurible” is “censer” which brings us back to the Latin root “incendere” meaning to burn. Therefore, the thurible or censer is the receptacle in which incense is burned.
The thurible or censer also represents the human person, and the hot coals that are placed inside the thurible or censer, represent our hearts that should be burning with love for God. If the coals are not alight—not on fire—not burning—then no matter how many grains of incense you may pour onto those coals, no aromatic smoke would be produced—even if you poured a ton of incense onto them!
All the three Persons of the Holy Trinity have chosen fire to represent Their Divinity. God the Father appears to Moses taking the form of fire in the burning bush: “And the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush” (Exodus 3:2).
We see the Sacred Heart of Jesus issuing forth flames of fire, manifesting His Divine Love and in Scripture Our Lord says: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49).
The Holy Ghost comes down upon Our Lady and the Apostles at Pentecost in the form of tongues of fire: “And there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them: and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost” (Acts 2:3-4).
For prayer to be effective, it must come from a ‘burning heart’ like incense needs burning coals. “Prove me, O Lord, and try me; burn my heart” (Psalm 25:2). The two disciples on the road to Emmaus, after the resurrection of Our Lord, encountered Jesus on the road and “they said one to the other: ‘Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in this way, and opened to us the Scriptures?’” (Luke 24:32).
This brings to mind other words of Holy Scripture: “Thou shalt make also an altar to burn incense … and Aaron shall burn sweet smelling incense upon it in the morning ... He shall burn an everlasting incense before the Lord throughout your generations” (Exodus 30:1; 30:7-8).
“And taking the censer, which he hath filled with the burning coals of the altar, and taking up with his hand the compounded perfume for incense, he shall go in within the veil into the holy place: that when the perfumes are put upon the fire, the cloud and vapor thereof may cover the oracle” (Leviticus 16:12-13).
“Moses said to Aaron: ‘Take the censer, and putting fire in it from the altar, put incense upon it, and go quickly to the people to pray for them!’” (Numbers 16:46). “Take every one of you censers, and put incense upon them” (Numbers 16:17). “Everyone had a censer in his hand: and a cloud of smoke went up from the incense” (Ezechiel 8:11).
The picture of prayers wafting up to Heaven like incense is captured in David’s psalm and also in John’s vision in Apocalypse: “May my prayer be set before you like incense; may the lifting up of my hands be like the evening sacrifice!” (Psalm 141:2). “Another angel, who had a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer, with the prayers of all the saints, on the golden altar before the throne. The smoke of the incense, together with the prayers of the saints, went up before God from the angel’s hand” (Apocalypse 8:3-4).
Article 16
Friday, January 10th
God’s Gold Standard―Are You Up to Standard?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Friday, January 10th
God’s Gold Standard―Are You Up to Standard?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Buy Gold from God
God addresses the lukewarm, in the Book of the Apocalypse, in very strong terms: “I know thy works―that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth! Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ ― and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire tried, so that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see” (Apocalypse 3:14-18).
Yes, we are spiritually poor, blind and naked, as the Apocalypse just said. Just as the three kings brought three gifts, so do the three Persons of the Holy Trinity counsel us to turn to Them for the solution: to buy from Them gold, white garments, and eye-salve. These three are an echo of the three gifts offered to Jesus by the Magi.
The Gold in both cases is the gold of charity, which, as we said with the Scriptural quote above, will have grown cold in many souls.
The white garments correspond to the Myrrh. The Myrrh is a symbol of suffering, being used both as a painkiller and for embalming the dead. The white garments reflect that suffering, as shown by this quote: “These are they who are come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and have made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 7:14).
The Eye-Salve corresponds to the frankincense of prayer, which rises like smoke to Heaven. The blind man is begging and praying to Jesus for his blindness to be removed. “Jesus asked him saying: ‘What wilt thou that I do to thee?’ But he said: ‘Lord, that I may see!’” (Luke 18:41). His prayer is the eye-salve that removes his blindness.
Today there is not enough gold, frankincense and myrrh in our lives. We love too little; we pray too little; we suffer too little. That is why we risk having little chance for salvation unless we follow the example of the three kings and follow the counsels of the Apocalypse in our apocalyptic times!
Of these three gifts―gold, frankincense and myrrh―the most precious is that of gold. This is because gold symbolizes charity―which is the supreme virtue because “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and Our Lord told us to “be perfect as your heavenly Father in perfect” (Matthew 5:48) ― and that ultimately means being perfect in charity, for “charity is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14).
Heavenly Gold
Of these three gifts―gold, frankincense and myrrh―the most precious is that of gold. This is because gold symbolizes charity―which is the supreme virtue because “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and Our Lord told us to “be perfect as your heavenly Father in perfect” (Matthew 5:48) ― and that ultimately means being perfect in charity, for “charity is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14). St. John tells us: “He that loves not, knows not God: for God is charity ... And we have known, and have believed the charity, which God has for us. God is charity: and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:8; 4:16). We should love this ‘Gold’ above all things: “Jesus said: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment!’” (Matthew 22:37-38).
Today, we love another gold! The gold of the world, not the gold of Heaven. Our Lord warned us: “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Earthly Gold
Today, we can say that gold no longer stands for God, but it stands for materialism. Man has sold his soul for gold, like Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of soup (Genesis 25:29-34). Earthly gold brings nothing but trouble to those who set their hearts upon it: “You shall not make gods of silver, nor shall you make to yourselves gods of gold” (Exodus 20:23). Aaron had taken the gold of the people to make a false god—the golden calf—whereas Moses was given the gold of the people as an offering to the Lord: “Therefore we offer as gifts to the Lord what gold every one of us could find—rings and bracelets, and chains—that thou mayest pray to the Lord for us! And Moses and Eleazar the priest received all the gold in divers kinds” (Number 31:50-51).
The False God of Gold
Let us then look, as we said, at the story of King Nabuchodonosor’s golden statue. We read, in the third chapter of the Book of Daniel, that King Nabuchodonosor made a gold statue, 90 feet high and nine feet wide. He set it up on the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon. He then summoned the satraps, prefects, governors, advisers, treasurers, judges, magistrates and all the other provincial officials to come to the dedication of the image King Nabuchodonosor had set up. So the satraps, prefects, governors, advisers, treasurers, judges, magistrates and all the other provincial officials assembled for the dedication of the image that King Nabuchodonosor had set up, and they stood before it.
Adore or Else…Go Along to Get Along
Then the herald loudly proclaimed, “Nations and peoples of every language, this is what you are commanded to do: as soon as you hear the sound of the trumpet, flute, harp, lyre, harp, pipe and all kinds of music, you must fall down and worship the image of gold that King Nabuchodonosor has set up. And whoever does not fall down and worship shall immediately be cast into a burning fiery furnace!”
Some People Just Won’t Listen!
Upon this therefore, when all the people heard the sound of the trumpet, the flute, harp, lyre, and all kinds of music, all the nations, tribes, and languages fell down and adored the golden statue which King Nabuchodonosor had set up. However, at that very time, some Chaldeans came and accused the Jews, and said to King Nabuchodonosor: “Thou, O king, hast made a decree that every man shall prostrate himself, and adore the golden statue; and that if any man shall not fall down and adore, he should be cast into a furnace of burning fire. Now there are certain Jews whom thou hast set over the works of the province of Babylon—Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago—these men, O king, have disregarded thy decree: they worship not thy gods, nor do they adore the golden statue which thou hast set up!”
You Asked For It!
Then Nabuchodonosor in fury, and in wrath, commanded that Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago should be brought before him: and immediately they were brought before the king. Nabuchodonosor spoke to them, and said: “Is it true, O Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, that you do not worship my gods, nor adore the golden statue that I have set up? Now, therefore, if you be ready, then the moment you shall hear the sound of the trumpet, flute, harp, lyre and all kinds of music, prostrate yourselves, and adore the statue which I have made! But if you do not adore, you shall be cast, at that same hour, into the furnace of burning fire: and who is the God that shall deliver you out of my hand?”
We’re Not Scared of You!
Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago answered and said to King Nabuchodonosor: “We have no occasion to answer thee concerning this matter we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. For behold our God, whom we worship, is able to save us from the furnace of burning fire, and to deliver us out of thy hands, O king! But even if He does not rescue us, we want you as king to know that we will not serve your gods or worship the gold statue you set up!”
Then Nebuchadnezzar was filled with rage, and the expression on his face changed toward Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago. He gave orders to heat the furnace seven times more than was customary. And he commanded the strongest men that were in his army, to bind the feet of Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, and to cast them into the furnace of burning fire. And immediately these men were bound and were cast into the furnace of burning fire, with their coats, and their caps, and their shoes, and their garments. The king’s command was so urgent and the furnace so hot that the flames of the fire killed the soldiers who took up Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago. But Sidrach, Misach and Abdenago, fell into the midst of the furnace of blazing fire, still tied up. Then they walked in the midst of the flame, praising God and blessing the Lord. Then Azarias standing up prayed in this manner, and opening his mouth in the midst of the fire, he said what we should be saying today:
A Prayer for Modern Man
“Blessed art thou, O Lord, the God of our fathers, and Thy Name is worthy of praise, and glorious forever: for Thou art just in all that Thou hast done to us, and all Thy works are true, and Thy ways right, and all Thy judgments true. For Thou hast executed true judgments in all the things that thou hast brought upon us, and upon Jerusalem the holy city of our fathers: for according to truth and judgment, Thou hast brought all these things upon us for our sins. For we have sinned, and committed iniquity, departing from Thee: and we have trespassed in all things: and we have not obeyed Thy commandments, nor have we observed nor done as Thou hadst commanded us, that it might go well with us. Wherefore all that Thou hast brought upon us, and everything that Thou hast done to us, Thou hast done in true judgment! Thou hast delivered us into the hands of our enemies that are unjust, and most wicked, and prevaricators, and into the hands of a king who is unjust, and most wicked beyond all that are upon the Earth. And now we cannot open our mouths: we are become a shame and reproach to Thy servants, and to them that worship thee.
“Deliver us not up for ever, we beseech thee, for Thy Name’s sake, and abolish not Thy covenant. Take not away Thy mercy from us for the sake of Abraham Thy beloved, and Isaac Thy servant, and Israel Thy holy one: to whom Thou hast spoken, promising that Thou wouldst multiply their seed as the stars of Heaven, and as the sand that is on the sea shore. For we, O Lord, are diminished more than any nation, and are brought low in all the Earth this day for our sins.
“Neither is there at this time prince, or leader, or prophet, or holocaust, or sacrifice, or oblation, or incense, or place of first-fruits before Thee, that we may find Thy mercy! Nevertheless, in a contrite heart and humble spirit, let us be accepted. Now we follow Thee with all our heart, and we fear Thee, and seek Thy face. Put us not to confusion, but deal with us according to Thy meekness, and according to the multitude of Thy mercies. Deliver us according to Thy wonderful works, and give glory to Thy name, O Lord! And let all them be confounded that show evils to Thy servants, let them be confounded in all Thy might, and let their strength be broken. And let them know that Thou art the Lord, the only God, and glorious over all the world!”
The Fire of Love Extinguishes the Fire of Evil
The next part reminds us of the prophet Elias on Mount Carmel, where the false prophets of Baal were trying to bring fire down from the heavens upon their idolatrous sacrifice, while Elias stands around mocking them. Now King Nabuchodonosor’s servants, that had cast in Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, ceased not to heat the furnace with brimstone, and tow, and pitch, and dry sticks, and the flame mounted over 70 feet high. And the flames broke forth, and burnt those Chaldeans who were near the furnace—as you do unto others, the same shall be done unto you!
But the angel of the Lord went down to be with Azarias and his companions into the furnace: and he drove the flame of the fire out of the furnace, and made the midst of the furnace like the blowing of a wind bringing dew! And the fire did not touch them at all, nor troubled them, nor did it do them any harm. Then these three as with one mouth praised, and glorified, and blessed God in the furnace! This brings to mind the Holy Scripture verse: “And these signs shall follow them that believe … They shall take up serpents; and if they shall drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them” (Mark 16:17-18). Not to mention the survival of the Jesuits when the Atom Bomb was dropped on Hiroshima during the Second World War!
Heaven’s Gold Premium Insurance Policy
Then Nabuchodonosor was astonished, and rose up in haste, and said to his nobles: “Were not these three men tied-up when we cast them into the midst of the fire?” They answered the king, and said: “It is true, O king!” He answered, and said: “Behold I see four men untied and loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods!” Then Nabuchodonosor approached the opening of the blazing furnace and shouted, “Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, servants of the Most High God, come out! Come here!” So Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out of the fire—just like the Jesuits came out unharmed from the ‘fire’ of the Atom Bomb.
And the nobles, and the magistrates, and the judges, and the great men of the king crowded around them. They saw that the fire had not harmed their bodies, nor was a hair of their heads singed; their robes were not scorched, and there was no smell of fire on them. The scientists examined the Jesuits of Hiroshima hundreds of times and found none of the radiation side effects that had afflicted other survivors.
Then Nabuchodonosor breaking forth, said: “Blessed be the God of them of Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, who has sent His angel, and delivered His servants that believed in Him. They trusted in him and defied the king’s command and were willing to give up their lives rather than serve or adore any god except their own God. Therefore I decree that the people of any nation or language who say anything against the God of Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, shall be destroyed, and their houses laid waste: for there is no other God that can save in this manner” (Daniel 3:1-96).
No God Like Our God—No Gold like our ‘Gold’
The world seeks gold when it should be seeking God. “You have seen their abominations and filth, that is to say, their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which they worshiped” (Deuteronomy 29:17). “The idols of the gentiles are silver and gold, the works of the hands of men” (Psalm 113:12). These “works of the hands of men” now fill our stores and are desired and sought after more than God! People spend many more hours ‘worshiping’ in the malls and stores than they do in church—if they can even be seen in church! “They drank wine, and praised their gods of gold” (Daniel 5:4).
To this modern-day idolatry, God has some old-fashioned news: “Their silver shall be cast forth, and their gold shall become a dunghill. Their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the Lord. They shall not satisfy their soul, and their bellies shall not be filled: because it hath been the stumbling-block of their iniquity” (Ezechiel 7:19). All this materialism makes souls lukewarm towards God—to them, God is just plain old boring compared to the wonderful gods available at the malls and stores.
God Gives—But Man Does Not Know How To Take
God has no problem granting wonderful health, wealth and material goods and assistance in abundance to those who truly love Him and keep His Commandments. God Himself has even promised these things:
“I am the Lord your God: you shall not make to yourselves any idol or graven thing, neither shall you erect pillars, nor set up a remarkable stone in your land, to adore it: for I am the Lord your God. Keep my Sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary: I am the Lord. If you walk in My precepts, and keep My Commandments, and do them, I will give you rain in due seasons. And the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit. The threshing of your harvest shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land without fear. I will give peace in your coasts: you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid. I will take away evil beasts: and the sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. Five of yours shall pursue a hundred others, and a hundred of you ten thousand: your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. I will look on you, and make you increase: you shall be multiplied, and I will establish My covenant with you. You shall eat the oldest of the old store, and, new coming on, you shall cast away the old. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My Soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people” (Leviticus 26:1-11).
What Is Our Gold?
If we put God first, His Providence will see to our needs. I guess today’s expression would be: “You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours!” This is the kind of care that God will give to the world after the coming Chastisement—it will be “mind-blowing”, as they say. Yet, as always, there is a danger with opulence and plenitude of material things—even though they may come from the Creator, we become attached to the gifts and not to the Giver! This has been the downfall of many a person. “Blessed is the rich man that is found without blemish: and that hath not gone after gold, nor put his trust in money nor in treasures” (Ecclesiasticus 31:8).
We fail to drive, into our thick skulls, the truth that spiritual things are of greater importance and value than mere material things. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life” (The Three Ages of the Interior Life). “Get wisdom, because it is better than gold: and purchase prudence, for it is more precious than silver” (Proverbs 16:16). “Receive my instruction, and not money: choose knowledge rather than gold” (Proverbs 8:10).
The ‘Gold’ of Solomon
King Solomon was asked, by God, what he wanted God to give him. Solomon wisely replied: “‘Give therefore to Thy servant an understanding heart, to judge Thy people, and discern between good and evil. For who shall be able to judge this people, Thy people which is so numerous?’ And the word was pleasing to the Lord that Solomon had asked such a thing. And the Lord said to Solomon: ‘Because thou hast asked this thing, and hast not asked for thyself long life or riches, nor the lives of thy enemies, but hast asked for thyself wisdom to discern judgment, behold, I have done for thee according to thy words, and have given thee a wise and understanding heart, insomuch that there has been no one like thee before thee, nor shall arise after thee. Yea and the things also which thou didst not ask, I have given thee: to wit riches and glory, as that no one hath been like thee among the kings in all days heretofore” (3 Kings 3:9-13).
Gold Prices May Rise—Effects of Gold Bring Falls
Yet, sadly, this unasked for wealth that God gave Solomon in addition to the wisdom he did ask for, would eventually lead to his downfall! As Holy Scripture so rightly warns: “Many have been brought to fall for gold” (Ecclesiasticus 31:6). Solomon started out right, but, due to his attachment to the wealth that fell into his lap and things that money could buy and do—he began to fall away from his initial position of putting God first. God even appeared to him twice to warn him, but to no avail—his heart was no longer fully focused upon God. In one of the apparitions to Solomon, God said:
“If you and your children revolting shall turn away from following Me, and will not keep My commandments, and My ceremonies, which I have set before you, but will go and worship strange gods, and adore them: then I will take away Israel from the face of the land which I have given them; and the temple which I have sanctified to My Name, I will cast out of my sight; and Israel shall be a proverb, and a byword among all people” (3 Kings 9:6-7).
Not that Solomon suddenly stopped worshiping God—he actually never ceased to worship God, but he also worshiped false gods at the same time. He spent vast sums of money in building the Temple—which was one the “Wonders of the World” in his time; yet he later built temples to false gods too! We have a tendency to do the same, mixing with the world and drinking-in and taking-on their false values. The following passage is equally applicable to us today:
Solomon Goes Bankrupt
“King Solomon loved many strange women besides the daughter of Pharao, and women of Moab, and of Ammon, and of Edom, and of Sidon, and of the Hethite. The Lord had said to the children of Israel concerning these nations: ‘You shall not go in unto them, neither shall any of them come in to yours: for they will most certainly turn away your heart to follow their gods!’ And to these was Solomon joined with a most ardent love. And he had seven hundred wives as queens, and three hundred concubines: and the women turned away his heart.
“And when he was now old, his heart was turned away by women to follow strange gods: and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father. For Solomon worshiped Astarthe the goddess of the Sidonians, and Moloch the idol of the ammonites. And Solomon did that which was not pleasing before the Lord, and did not fully follow the Lord, as David his father.
“Then Solomon built a temple for Chamos the idol of Moab, on the hill that is over against Jerusalem, and for Moloch the idol of the children of Ammon. And he did in this manner for all his wives that were strangers [non-Israelites], who burnt incense, and offered sacrifice to their gods. And the Lord was angry with Solomon, because his mind was turned away from the Lord the God of Israel, Who had appeared to him twice, and had commanded him concerning this thing, that he should not follow strange gods—but he did obey the things which the Lord commanded him” (3 Kings 11:1-10).
Couldn’t Handle Wealth
There we see the black story of Solomon’s apostasy. What was its extent? Did he himself take part in idolatrous worship, or simply, with the foolish fondness of an old sensualist, let these foreign women have their shrines? The darker supposition seems to be the correct one. The expression, “to follow strange gods”, is commonly used to mean actual idolatry; and his wives could scarcely have been said to have “turned away his heart,” if all that he did was to wink at, or even to facilitate, their worship. But, on the other hand, he does not seem to have abandoned worship of the true God. The charge against him is that “his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God”—in other words, he was not wholly devoted to the Lord, or, as a later verse puts it, that he “did not fully follow the Lord”.
His was a case of halting between two opinions, or rather, of trying to hold both at once. He wanted to be a worshiper of God and, for the sake of peace with his wives and concubines, of these false idols also. Isn’t that the way of most modern-day Catholics in the world today? Most Catholics are like the rich young who was called by Jesus to follow Him:
“Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:21-24). Solomon proved the point back then; how many prove the point today?
Nailed by Our Lady
Our Lady hits the nail on the head and echoes the times of Solomon, when she says: “Many people … will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs ... People will think of nothing but amusement ... In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost ...
“Priests will become careless in their sacred duties [just like Solomon became careless]. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain ... The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... as true Faith has faded and false light brightens the people” (Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette).
Irreversible Path
Was Solomon’s apostasy final? Yes, so far as we can gather from the narrative. Not only is there no statement of his repentance, but the silence with which he receives the divine announcement of retribution is very suspicious; and the prophecy of Ahias to one of Solomon’s future successors, Jeroboam, which obviously comes later in time than the threats of God to Solomon, treats the idolatry as still existing. Further, we learn from 4 Kings, 23:13, that the shrines which Solomon built to false gods, stood until Josias’ time. If Solomon had ever abandoned his idolatry, he would not have left them standing. So we seem to have a case of a fall which knew no recovery, an eclipse which did not pass.
So there, on Olivet’s southern ridge, right opposite the Temple, stood the three altars, and there the king worshiped; and, if he did, he would have a crowd of imitators. The lessons of such a fall are many. It teaches the destructive effect of yielding to sensual indulgence with persons, places or things. Solomon’s unbridled and monstrous polygamy sapped his manhood and his principles, it gradually darkened his clear mind, blinded his keen eye, and turned a youth of noble aspiration and a manhood of noble accomplishment, into an old age without dignity, reverence, or calm. All his wisdom was worth little if it could not master himself. A young man, who lets his passions run away with him, is less to be condemned than an old sensualist. God means that reason should govern impulses and desires, and that conscience should govern all and be governed by His will.
There But for the Grace of God Go We!
All this warns us that, till the very end of life, a fall is possible. This ship went down when the voyage was nearly over. In sight of port it struck a rock, and that despite no shortage of beacons. Our Lady, our beacon, has warned us many times, yet we sail on regardless. What a pathetic warning is found in that phrase, “when Solomon was old”! After so many years of high aims, so many temptations overcome, with such habits of wisdom and kingly nobility, after such prayers and visions, he fell; and, if he fell, who can be sure of standing?
No length of life spent in holy thoughts and service secures us against the possibility of disastrous fall, which will invariably come once we try to make peace with the world or get along with the world—this was Solomon’s downfall. The riches, the women, the feasting eroded his spirituality. Only one thing will work — a constant faithfulness to prayer, penance and the Sacraments. That is the true gold that we should amass! Our Lord told us that we “ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1) and that “unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3) and “he that shall persevere to the end, he shall be saved” (Matthew 24:13). “For many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able” (Luke 13:24).
‘Solomon’ Marriages Today?
May we not venture to see a warning here against marriages in which there is not unity in the deepest things, and a common Faith? When you run in double harness, take a good look at the other horse! If a young Catholic man or woman enters on such a union with one who is not a Catholic, or a zealous Catholic with a lukewarm Catholic—you will quickly find that you are only as strong as your weakest link. It is a great deal more probable that, in the end, there will be two unbelievers than that there will be two Catholics; or two lukewarm Catholics rather than two fervent Catholics—not to mention what kind of offspring will be produced by such a hybrid marriage. They marry for the wrong reasons. The gold is fake. It is at best only gold plating and then of a low quality.
God forbade this kind of union in the Old Testament and the same spirit comes through the pages of the New Testament: “And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever?” (2 Corinthians 6:15). Solomon made that mistake! The glistening gold of beauty overcame his heart and he piled wife upon wife, taken from strange lands, like one gold coin after another, into his treasury. Our Lord would later say: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21). Not all that glistens is gold! Many have been fooled into what turn out to be bad marriages, because they fell for the glistening fake gold. “Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days” (James 5:3).
‘Gold Mixed With Metal’ Souls
We cannot be sure of Solomon’s final condition and fate, but he stands on the page of this history, a sad, enigmatical figure, a warning to all young people to take heed in case the attrition of the world does not rub off from their souls the bloom of early religion, or make them cynically ashamed of or discouraged with the unselfishness of their early religious desires and goals. There is no sadder sight than older persons, whose youthful enthusiasm, fervor, goodness, and belief in the super-excellency of principles wisdom have withered, eroded or compromised, leaving them as hard, bitter, excuse-seeking worldling or a gross sensualists or materialists—half religious and half worldly. Where their gold has been mixed with base metal, and their heavenly principles have been poisoned by worldly ones. Better the early days, when they were obscure and poor, and believed in wisdom and in the God of wisdom, than the late ones, when worldly success has spoiled them or worldliness has compromised them! “He that loveth gold, shall not be justified” (Ecclesiasticus 31:5). “Many have been brought to fall for gold” (Ecclesiasticus 31:6). “Blessed is the rich man that is found without blemish: and that hath not gone after gold, nor put his trust in money nor in treasures” (Ecclesiasticus 31:8).
We Need Refining!
We ourselves are like mined, raw nuggets of gold encased and mixed with ore or stone. “As silver is tried by fire, and gold in the furnace: so the Lord trieth the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3). “For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5). There has to be a separation of the two elements—the gold must be removed from the ore or stone, and we have to be separated from the world. “What concord hath Christ (gold) with Belial (base metal)? Or what part hath the faithful (gold) with the unbeliever (base metal)?” (2 Corinthians 6:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world (base metal) is the enemy of God (gold)? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world (base metal), becomes an enemy of God (gold)” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world (base metal), the charity (gold) of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Separate From The World
God wants to separate us from the world, just as we seek to separate gold from its ore or being mixed with base metal. This is where our Faith has to lead us: “That the trial of your Faith—much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire—may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7). “As silver is tried by fire, and gold in the furnace: so the Lord trieth the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3). “For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5). “As gold in the furnace He hath proved them” (Wisdom 3:6). “And I will bring them through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined: and I will try them as gold is tried. They shall call on My name, and I will hear them. I will say: ‘Thou art My people!’ and they shall say: ‘The Lord is my God!’” (Zacharias 13:9).
A Lesson From Gold-Mining
We can learn much for our spiritual life and its stages of progress from the mining and purification of gold. Within this process we can loosely see the three stages of the spiritual life that we must pass through, before we are allowed to enter Heaven (as pure gold). The Way of Beginners, the Way of the Proficients, and the Way of Perfection.
In the mining process, once the vein of gold ore is discovered, it must first removed from the rock in which it is embedded (we could liken it to a soul hardened in sin, which has to be extracted from the habit of sin). Yet even after it is mined, the gold is not pure—therefore, once extracted, the gold ore must be pulverized to prepare it for refining. Likewise, once we are pulled out of mortal sin, we are still not pure enough. There are still many, many venial sins still ingrained in our soul. Once the gold ore has been mined, it usually is washed and filtered at the mine as a preliminary refinement technique—the washing reminds us of Baptism and Confession, which remove sin; and the filtering reminds us of our daily examination of conscience, that filters out the sins of the day. This constitutes the Way of Beginners.
The gold is then shipped to mills, where it is first combined with water (a symbol of God’s grace) and ground into smaller chunks (a symbol of God’s painful Providence, that sends us various kinds of trials and sufferings to purify us). The resulting mixture is then further ground to pulverize the ore. The gold is then separated from the ore using one of several methods. (1) Floatation, (2) Cyanidation, (3) Amalgamation and the (4) Carbon-in-Pulp method—these are the 4 processes used to further refine the gold. We could say that this represents the middle way of the spiritual life—the Way of Proficients.
(1) FLOATATION involves the separation of gold from its ore by using certain chemicals and air. The finely ground ore is dumped into a solution that contains a frothing agent (which causes the water to foam), a collecting agent (which bonds onto the gold, forming an oily film that sticks to air bubbles), and a mixture of organic chemicals (which keep the other contaminants from also bonding to the air bubbles). The solution is then aerated—air bubbles are blown in—and the gold attaches to the air bubbles. The bubbles float to the top taking the gold with them, and the gold is then skimmed off.
(2) CYANIDATION also involves using chemicals to separate the gold from its contaminants. In this process, the ground ore is placed in a tank containing a weak solution of cyanide. Next, zinc is added to the tank, causing a chemical reaction in which the end result is the separation of the gold from its ore. The gold is then separated from the cyanide solution in a filter press.
(3) AMALGAMATION uses the same process but only with different chemicals. First, a solution carries the ground ore over plates covered with mercury. The mercury attracts the gold, forming an alloy called an amalgam. The amalgam is then heated, causing the mercury to boil off as a gas and leaving behind the gold.
(4) THE CARBON-IN-PULP method also uses cyanide, but utilizes carbon instead of zinc to separate the gold. The first step is to mix the ground ore with water to form a pulp. Next, cyanide is added to dissolve the gold, and then carbon is added to bond with the gold. After the carbon particles are removed from the pulp, they are placed in a hot caustic (corrosive) carbon solution, which separates the gold from the carbon.
If any of these four methods does not make the gold pure enough, then it can be smelted. This represents the third way of the spiritual life—the Way of Perfection.
SMELTING sees the gold heated with a chemical substance called “flux”. The flux bonds with the contaminants and floats on top of the melted gold. The gold is then cooled and allowed to harden in molds, and the flux-contaminant mixture (slag) is hauled away as a solid waste, leaving the gold behind.
Burn Now or Burn Later
“As silver is tried by fire, and gold in the furnace: so the Lord trieth the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3). “For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5). “As gold in the furnace He hath proved them” (Wisdom 3:6). “And I will bring them through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined: and I will try them as gold is tried. They shall call on My name, and I will hear them. I will say: ‘Thou art My people!’ and they shall say: ‘The Lord is my God!’” (Zacharias 13:9). “That the trial of your Faith—much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire—may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7).
Are you ready for smelting? “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” said Our Lord (Luke 12:49). Ouch! But if we don’t step into the furnace now, on Earth, then the furnace of Purgatory or, God forbid, Hell awaits. The temperature here below is far less than that of the other two smelting furnaces! “For a fire is kindled in My rage, it shall burn upon you” (Jeremias 15:14) … “A fire is kindled in My wrath, and shall burn even to the lowest Hell: and shall devour the Earth with her increase” (Deuteronomy 32:22).
Our hearts should burn with love here below, and so will extinguish the fires of Purgatory or Hell that were due to us.
“A hot soul is a burning fire” (Ecclesiasticus 23:22) as testified by the two disciples, on the road to Emmaus, to whom Christ appeared after His resurrection: “Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in this way, and opened to us the Scriptures?” (Luke 24:31). Likewise, God has given us a chance to burn with love for Him here on Earth, and thus avoid burning after our death—it will permit Him to say of such souls: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much!” (Luke 7:47) and “For charity covers a multitude of sins!” (1 Peter 4:8).
God addresses the lukewarm, in the Book of the Apocalypse, in very strong terms: “I know thy works―that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth! Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ ― and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire tried, so that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see” (Apocalypse 3:14-18).
Yes, we are spiritually poor, blind and naked, as the Apocalypse just said. Just as the three kings brought three gifts, so do the three Persons of the Holy Trinity counsel us to turn to Them for the solution: to buy from Them gold, white garments, and eye-salve. These three are an echo of the three gifts offered to Jesus by the Magi.
The Gold in both cases is the gold of charity, which, as we said with the Scriptural quote above, will have grown cold in many souls.
The white garments correspond to the Myrrh. The Myrrh is a symbol of suffering, being used both as a painkiller and for embalming the dead. The white garments reflect that suffering, as shown by this quote: “These are they who are come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and have made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 7:14).
The Eye-Salve corresponds to the frankincense of prayer, which rises like smoke to Heaven. The blind man is begging and praying to Jesus for his blindness to be removed. “Jesus asked him saying: ‘What wilt thou that I do to thee?’ But he said: ‘Lord, that I may see!’” (Luke 18:41). His prayer is the eye-salve that removes his blindness.
Today there is not enough gold, frankincense and myrrh in our lives. We love too little; we pray too little; we suffer too little. That is why we risk having little chance for salvation unless we follow the example of the three kings and follow the counsels of the Apocalypse in our apocalyptic times!
Of these three gifts―gold, frankincense and myrrh―the most precious is that of gold. This is because gold symbolizes charity―which is the supreme virtue because “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and Our Lord told us to “be perfect as your heavenly Father in perfect” (Matthew 5:48) ― and that ultimately means being perfect in charity, for “charity is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14).
Heavenly Gold
Of these three gifts―gold, frankincense and myrrh―the most precious is that of gold. This is because gold symbolizes charity―which is the supreme virtue because “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and Our Lord told us to “be perfect as your heavenly Father in perfect” (Matthew 5:48) ― and that ultimately means being perfect in charity, for “charity is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14). St. John tells us: “He that loves not, knows not God: for God is charity ... And we have known, and have believed the charity, which God has for us. God is charity: and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:8; 4:16). We should love this ‘Gold’ above all things: “Jesus said: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment!’” (Matthew 22:37-38).
Today, we love another gold! The gold of the world, not the gold of Heaven. Our Lord warned us: “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Earthly Gold
Today, we can say that gold no longer stands for God, but it stands for materialism. Man has sold his soul for gold, like Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of soup (Genesis 25:29-34). Earthly gold brings nothing but trouble to those who set their hearts upon it: “You shall not make gods of silver, nor shall you make to yourselves gods of gold” (Exodus 20:23). Aaron had taken the gold of the people to make a false god—the golden calf—whereas Moses was given the gold of the people as an offering to the Lord: “Therefore we offer as gifts to the Lord what gold every one of us could find—rings and bracelets, and chains—that thou mayest pray to the Lord for us! And Moses and Eleazar the priest received all the gold in divers kinds” (Number 31:50-51).
The False God of Gold
Let us then look, as we said, at the story of King Nabuchodonosor’s golden statue. We read, in the third chapter of the Book of Daniel, that King Nabuchodonosor made a gold statue, 90 feet high and nine feet wide. He set it up on the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon. He then summoned the satraps, prefects, governors, advisers, treasurers, judges, magistrates and all the other provincial officials to come to the dedication of the image King Nabuchodonosor had set up. So the satraps, prefects, governors, advisers, treasurers, judges, magistrates and all the other provincial officials assembled for the dedication of the image that King Nabuchodonosor had set up, and they stood before it.
Adore or Else…Go Along to Get Along
Then the herald loudly proclaimed, “Nations and peoples of every language, this is what you are commanded to do: as soon as you hear the sound of the trumpet, flute, harp, lyre, harp, pipe and all kinds of music, you must fall down and worship the image of gold that King Nabuchodonosor has set up. And whoever does not fall down and worship shall immediately be cast into a burning fiery furnace!”
Some People Just Won’t Listen!
Upon this therefore, when all the people heard the sound of the trumpet, the flute, harp, lyre, and all kinds of music, all the nations, tribes, and languages fell down and adored the golden statue which King Nabuchodonosor had set up. However, at that very time, some Chaldeans came and accused the Jews, and said to King Nabuchodonosor: “Thou, O king, hast made a decree that every man shall prostrate himself, and adore the golden statue; and that if any man shall not fall down and adore, he should be cast into a furnace of burning fire. Now there are certain Jews whom thou hast set over the works of the province of Babylon—Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago—these men, O king, have disregarded thy decree: they worship not thy gods, nor do they adore the golden statue which thou hast set up!”
You Asked For It!
Then Nabuchodonosor in fury, and in wrath, commanded that Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago should be brought before him: and immediately they were brought before the king. Nabuchodonosor spoke to them, and said: “Is it true, O Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, that you do not worship my gods, nor adore the golden statue that I have set up? Now, therefore, if you be ready, then the moment you shall hear the sound of the trumpet, flute, harp, lyre and all kinds of music, prostrate yourselves, and adore the statue which I have made! But if you do not adore, you shall be cast, at that same hour, into the furnace of burning fire: and who is the God that shall deliver you out of my hand?”
We’re Not Scared of You!
Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago answered and said to King Nabuchodonosor: “We have no occasion to answer thee concerning this matter we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. For behold our God, whom we worship, is able to save us from the furnace of burning fire, and to deliver us out of thy hands, O king! But even if He does not rescue us, we want you as king to know that we will not serve your gods or worship the gold statue you set up!”
Then Nebuchadnezzar was filled with rage, and the expression on his face changed toward Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago. He gave orders to heat the furnace seven times more than was customary. And he commanded the strongest men that were in his army, to bind the feet of Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, and to cast them into the furnace of burning fire. And immediately these men were bound and were cast into the furnace of burning fire, with their coats, and their caps, and their shoes, and their garments. The king’s command was so urgent and the furnace so hot that the flames of the fire killed the soldiers who took up Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago. But Sidrach, Misach and Abdenago, fell into the midst of the furnace of blazing fire, still tied up. Then they walked in the midst of the flame, praising God and blessing the Lord. Then Azarias standing up prayed in this manner, and opening his mouth in the midst of the fire, he said what we should be saying today:
A Prayer for Modern Man
“Blessed art thou, O Lord, the God of our fathers, and Thy Name is worthy of praise, and glorious forever: for Thou art just in all that Thou hast done to us, and all Thy works are true, and Thy ways right, and all Thy judgments true. For Thou hast executed true judgments in all the things that thou hast brought upon us, and upon Jerusalem the holy city of our fathers: for according to truth and judgment, Thou hast brought all these things upon us for our sins. For we have sinned, and committed iniquity, departing from Thee: and we have trespassed in all things: and we have not obeyed Thy commandments, nor have we observed nor done as Thou hadst commanded us, that it might go well with us. Wherefore all that Thou hast brought upon us, and everything that Thou hast done to us, Thou hast done in true judgment! Thou hast delivered us into the hands of our enemies that are unjust, and most wicked, and prevaricators, and into the hands of a king who is unjust, and most wicked beyond all that are upon the Earth. And now we cannot open our mouths: we are become a shame and reproach to Thy servants, and to them that worship thee.
“Deliver us not up for ever, we beseech thee, for Thy Name’s sake, and abolish not Thy covenant. Take not away Thy mercy from us for the sake of Abraham Thy beloved, and Isaac Thy servant, and Israel Thy holy one: to whom Thou hast spoken, promising that Thou wouldst multiply their seed as the stars of Heaven, and as the sand that is on the sea shore. For we, O Lord, are diminished more than any nation, and are brought low in all the Earth this day for our sins.
“Neither is there at this time prince, or leader, or prophet, or holocaust, or sacrifice, or oblation, or incense, or place of first-fruits before Thee, that we may find Thy mercy! Nevertheless, in a contrite heart and humble spirit, let us be accepted. Now we follow Thee with all our heart, and we fear Thee, and seek Thy face. Put us not to confusion, but deal with us according to Thy meekness, and according to the multitude of Thy mercies. Deliver us according to Thy wonderful works, and give glory to Thy name, O Lord! And let all them be confounded that show evils to Thy servants, let them be confounded in all Thy might, and let their strength be broken. And let them know that Thou art the Lord, the only God, and glorious over all the world!”
The Fire of Love Extinguishes the Fire of Evil
The next part reminds us of the prophet Elias on Mount Carmel, where the false prophets of Baal were trying to bring fire down from the heavens upon their idolatrous sacrifice, while Elias stands around mocking them. Now King Nabuchodonosor’s servants, that had cast in Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, ceased not to heat the furnace with brimstone, and tow, and pitch, and dry sticks, and the flame mounted over 70 feet high. And the flames broke forth, and burnt those Chaldeans who were near the furnace—as you do unto others, the same shall be done unto you!
But the angel of the Lord went down to be with Azarias and his companions into the furnace: and he drove the flame of the fire out of the furnace, and made the midst of the furnace like the blowing of a wind bringing dew! And the fire did not touch them at all, nor troubled them, nor did it do them any harm. Then these three as with one mouth praised, and glorified, and blessed God in the furnace! This brings to mind the Holy Scripture verse: “And these signs shall follow them that believe … They shall take up serpents; and if they shall drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them” (Mark 16:17-18). Not to mention the survival of the Jesuits when the Atom Bomb was dropped on Hiroshima during the Second World War!
Heaven’s Gold Premium Insurance Policy
Then Nabuchodonosor was astonished, and rose up in haste, and said to his nobles: “Were not these three men tied-up when we cast them into the midst of the fire?” They answered the king, and said: “It is true, O king!” He answered, and said: “Behold I see four men untied and loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods!” Then Nabuchodonosor approached the opening of the blazing furnace and shouted, “Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, servants of the Most High God, come out! Come here!” So Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out of the fire—just like the Jesuits came out unharmed from the ‘fire’ of the Atom Bomb.
And the nobles, and the magistrates, and the judges, and the great men of the king crowded around them. They saw that the fire had not harmed their bodies, nor was a hair of their heads singed; their robes were not scorched, and there was no smell of fire on them. The scientists examined the Jesuits of Hiroshima hundreds of times and found none of the radiation side effects that had afflicted other survivors.
Then Nabuchodonosor breaking forth, said: “Blessed be the God of them of Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, who has sent His angel, and delivered His servants that believed in Him. They trusted in him and defied the king’s command and were willing to give up their lives rather than serve or adore any god except their own God. Therefore I decree that the people of any nation or language who say anything against the God of Sidrach, Misach, and Abdenago, shall be destroyed, and their houses laid waste: for there is no other God that can save in this manner” (Daniel 3:1-96).
No God Like Our God—No Gold like our ‘Gold’
The world seeks gold when it should be seeking God. “You have seen their abominations and filth, that is to say, their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which they worshiped” (Deuteronomy 29:17). “The idols of the gentiles are silver and gold, the works of the hands of men” (Psalm 113:12). These “works of the hands of men” now fill our stores and are desired and sought after more than God! People spend many more hours ‘worshiping’ in the malls and stores than they do in church—if they can even be seen in church! “They drank wine, and praised their gods of gold” (Daniel 5:4).
To this modern-day idolatry, God has some old-fashioned news: “Their silver shall be cast forth, and their gold shall become a dunghill. Their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the Lord. They shall not satisfy their soul, and their bellies shall not be filled: because it hath been the stumbling-block of their iniquity” (Ezechiel 7:19). All this materialism makes souls lukewarm towards God—to them, God is just plain old boring compared to the wonderful gods available at the malls and stores.
God Gives—But Man Does Not Know How To Take
God has no problem granting wonderful health, wealth and material goods and assistance in abundance to those who truly love Him and keep His Commandments. God Himself has even promised these things:
“I am the Lord your God: you shall not make to yourselves any idol or graven thing, neither shall you erect pillars, nor set up a remarkable stone in your land, to adore it: for I am the Lord your God. Keep my Sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary: I am the Lord. If you walk in My precepts, and keep My Commandments, and do them, I will give you rain in due seasons. And the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit. The threshing of your harvest shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land without fear. I will give peace in your coasts: you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid. I will take away evil beasts: and the sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. Five of yours shall pursue a hundred others, and a hundred of you ten thousand: your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. I will look on you, and make you increase: you shall be multiplied, and I will establish My covenant with you. You shall eat the oldest of the old store, and, new coming on, you shall cast away the old. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My Soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people” (Leviticus 26:1-11).
What Is Our Gold?
If we put God first, His Providence will see to our needs. I guess today’s expression would be: “You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours!” This is the kind of care that God will give to the world after the coming Chastisement—it will be “mind-blowing”, as they say. Yet, as always, there is a danger with opulence and plenitude of material things—even though they may come from the Creator, we become attached to the gifts and not to the Giver! This has been the downfall of many a person. “Blessed is the rich man that is found without blemish: and that hath not gone after gold, nor put his trust in money nor in treasures” (Ecclesiasticus 31:8).
We fail to drive, into our thick skulls, the truth that spiritual things are of greater importance and value than mere material things. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life” (The Three Ages of the Interior Life). “Get wisdom, because it is better than gold: and purchase prudence, for it is more precious than silver” (Proverbs 16:16). “Receive my instruction, and not money: choose knowledge rather than gold” (Proverbs 8:10).
The ‘Gold’ of Solomon
King Solomon was asked, by God, what he wanted God to give him. Solomon wisely replied: “‘Give therefore to Thy servant an understanding heart, to judge Thy people, and discern between good and evil. For who shall be able to judge this people, Thy people which is so numerous?’ And the word was pleasing to the Lord that Solomon had asked such a thing. And the Lord said to Solomon: ‘Because thou hast asked this thing, and hast not asked for thyself long life or riches, nor the lives of thy enemies, but hast asked for thyself wisdom to discern judgment, behold, I have done for thee according to thy words, and have given thee a wise and understanding heart, insomuch that there has been no one like thee before thee, nor shall arise after thee. Yea and the things also which thou didst not ask, I have given thee: to wit riches and glory, as that no one hath been like thee among the kings in all days heretofore” (3 Kings 3:9-13).
Gold Prices May Rise—Effects of Gold Bring Falls
Yet, sadly, this unasked for wealth that God gave Solomon in addition to the wisdom he did ask for, would eventually lead to his downfall! As Holy Scripture so rightly warns: “Many have been brought to fall for gold” (Ecclesiasticus 31:6). Solomon started out right, but, due to his attachment to the wealth that fell into his lap and things that money could buy and do—he began to fall away from his initial position of putting God first. God even appeared to him twice to warn him, but to no avail—his heart was no longer fully focused upon God. In one of the apparitions to Solomon, God said:
“If you and your children revolting shall turn away from following Me, and will not keep My commandments, and My ceremonies, which I have set before you, but will go and worship strange gods, and adore them: then I will take away Israel from the face of the land which I have given them; and the temple which I have sanctified to My Name, I will cast out of my sight; and Israel shall be a proverb, and a byword among all people” (3 Kings 9:6-7).
Not that Solomon suddenly stopped worshiping God—he actually never ceased to worship God, but he also worshiped false gods at the same time. He spent vast sums of money in building the Temple—which was one the “Wonders of the World” in his time; yet he later built temples to false gods too! We have a tendency to do the same, mixing with the world and drinking-in and taking-on their false values. The following passage is equally applicable to us today:
Solomon Goes Bankrupt
“King Solomon loved many strange women besides the daughter of Pharao, and women of Moab, and of Ammon, and of Edom, and of Sidon, and of the Hethite. The Lord had said to the children of Israel concerning these nations: ‘You shall not go in unto them, neither shall any of them come in to yours: for they will most certainly turn away your heart to follow their gods!’ And to these was Solomon joined with a most ardent love. And he had seven hundred wives as queens, and three hundred concubines: and the women turned away his heart.
“And when he was now old, his heart was turned away by women to follow strange gods: and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father. For Solomon worshiped Astarthe the goddess of the Sidonians, and Moloch the idol of the ammonites. And Solomon did that which was not pleasing before the Lord, and did not fully follow the Lord, as David his father.
“Then Solomon built a temple for Chamos the idol of Moab, on the hill that is over against Jerusalem, and for Moloch the idol of the children of Ammon. And he did in this manner for all his wives that were strangers [non-Israelites], who burnt incense, and offered sacrifice to their gods. And the Lord was angry with Solomon, because his mind was turned away from the Lord the God of Israel, Who had appeared to him twice, and had commanded him concerning this thing, that he should not follow strange gods—but he did obey the things which the Lord commanded him” (3 Kings 11:1-10).
Couldn’t Handle Wealth
There we see the black story of Solomon’s apostasy. What was its extent? Did he himself take part in idolatrous worship, or simply, with the foolish fondness of an old sensualist, let these foreign women have their shrines? The darker supposition seems to be the correct one. The expression, “to follow strange gods”, is commonly used to mean actual idolatry; and his wives could scarcely have been said to have “turned away his heart,” if all that he did was to wink at, or even to facilitate, their worship. But, on the other hand, he does not seem to have abandoned worship of the true God. The charge against him is that “his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God”—in other words, he was not wholly devoted to the Lord, or, as a later verse puts it, that he “did not fully follow the Lord”.
His was a case of halting between two opinions, or rather, of trying to hold both at once. He wanted to be a worshiper of God and, for the sake of peace with his wives and concubines, of these false idols also. Isn’t that the way of most modern-day Catholics in the world today? Most Catholics are like the rich young who was called by Jesus to follow Him:
“Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:21-24). Solomon proved the point back then; how many prove the point today?
Nailed by Our Lady
Our Lady hits the nail on the head and echoes the times of Solomon, when she says: “Many people … will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs ... People will think of nothing but amusement ... In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost ...
“Priests will become careless in their sacred duties [just like Solomon became careless]. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain ... The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... as true Faith has faded and false light brightens the people” (Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette).
Irreversible Path
Was Solomon’s apostasy final? Yes, so far as we can gather from the narrative. Not only is there no statement of his repentance, but the silence with which he receives the divine announcement of retribution is very suspicious; and the prophecy of Ahias to one of Solomon’s future successors, Jeroboam, which obviously comes later in time than the threats of God to Solomon, treats the idolatry as still existing. Further, we learn from 4 Kings, 23:13, that the shrines which Solomon built to false gods, stood until Josias’ time. If Solomon had ever abandoned his idolatry, he would not have left them standing. So we seem to have a case of a fall which knew no recovery, an eclipse which did not pass.
So there, on Olivet’s southern ridge, right opposite the Temple, stood the three altars, and there the king worshiped; and, if he did, he would have a crowd of imitators. The lessons of such a fall are many. It teaches the destructive effect of yielding to sensual indulgence with persons, places or things. Solomon’s unbridled and monstrous polygamy sapped his manhood and his principles, it gradually darkened his clear mind, blinded his keen eye, and turned a youth of noble aspiration and a manhood of noble accomplishment, into an old age without dignity, reverence, or calm. All his wisdom was worth little if it could not master himself. A young man, who lets his passions run away with him, is less to be condemned than an old sensualist. God means that reason should govern impulses and desires, and that conscience should govern all and be governed by His will.
There But for the Grace of God Go We!
All this warns us that, till the very end of life, a fall is possible. This ship went down when the voyage was nearly over. In sight of port it struck a rock, and that despite no shortage of beacons. Our Lady, our beacon, has warned us many times, yet we sail on regardless. What a pathetic warning is found in that phrase, “when Solomon was old”! After so many years of high aims, so many temptations overcome, with such habits of wisdom and kingly nobility, after such prayers and visions, he fell; and, if he fell, who can be sure of standing?
No length of life spent in holy thoughts and service secures us against the possibility of disastrous fall, which will invariably come once we try to make peace with the world or get along with the world—this was Solomon’s downfall. The riches, the women, the feasting eroded his spirituality. Only one thing will work — a constant faithfulness to prayer, penance and the Sacraments. That is the true gold that we should amass! Our Lord told us that we “ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1) and that “unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3) and “he that shall persevere to the end, he shall be saved” (Matthew 24:13). “For many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able” (Luke 13:24).
‘Solomon’ Marriages Today?
May we not venture to see a warning here against marriages in which there is not unity in the deepest things, and a common Faith? When you run in double harness, take a good look at the other horse! If a young Catholic man or woman enters on such a union with one who is not a Catholic, or a zealous Catholic with a lukewarm Catholic—you will quickly find that you are only as strong as your weakest link. It is a great deal more probable that, in the end, there will be two unbelievers than that there will be two Catholics; or two lukewarm Catholics rather than two fervent Catholics—not to mention what kind of offspring will be produced by such a hybrid marriage. They marry for the wrong reasons. The gold is fake. It is at best only gold plating and then of a low quality.
God forbade this kind of union in the Old Testament and the same spirit comes through the pages of the New Testament: “And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever?” (2 Corinthians 6:15). Solomon made that mistake! The glistening gold of beauty overcame his heart and he piled wife upon wife, taken from strange lands, like one gold coin after another, into his treasury. Our Lord would later say: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21). Not all that glistens is gold! Many have been fooled into what turn out to be bad marriages, because they fell for the glistening fake gold. “Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days” (James 5:3).
‘Gold Mixed With Metal’ Souls
We cannot be sure of Solomon’s final condition and fate, but he stands on the page of this history, a sad, enigmatical figure, a warning to all young people to take heed in case the attrition of the world does not rub off from their souls the bloom of early religion, or make them cynically ashamed of or discouraged with the unselfishness of their early religious desires and goals. There is no sadder sight than older persons, whose youthful enthusiasm, fervor, goodness, and belief in the super-excellency of principles wisdom have withered, eroded or compromised, leaving them as hard, bitter, excuse-seeking worldling or a gross sensualists or materialists—half religious and half worldly. Where their gold has been mixed with base metal, and their heavenly principles have been poisoned by worldly ones. Better the early days, when they were obscure and poor, and believed in wisdom and in the God of wisdom, than the late ones, when worldly success has spoiled them or worldliness has compromised them! “He that loveth gold, shall not be justified” (Ecclesiasticus 31:5). “Many have been brought to fall for gold” (Ecclesiasticus 31:6). “Blessed is the rich man that is found without blemish: and that hath not gone after gold, nor put his trust in money nor in treasures” (Ecclesiasticus 31:8).
We Need Refining!
We ourselves are like mined, raw nuggets of gold encased and mixed with ore or stone. “As silver is tried by fire, and gold in the furnace: so the Lord trieth the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3). “For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5). There has to be a separation of the two elements—the gold must be removed from the ore or stone, and we have to be separated from the world. “What concord hath Christ (gold) with Belial (base metal)? Or what part hath the faithful (gold) with the unbeliever (base metal)?” (2 Corinthians 6:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world (base metal) is the enemy of God (gold)? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world (base metal), becomes an enemy of God (gold)” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world (base metal), the charity (gold) of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Separate From The World
God wants to separate us from the world, just as we seek to separate gold from its ore or being mixed with base metal. This is where our Faith has to lead us: “That the trial of your Faith—much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire—may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7). “As silver is tried by fire, and gold in the furnace: so the Lord trieth the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3). “For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5). “As gold in the furnace He hath proved them” (Wisdom 3:6). “And I will bring them through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined: and I will try them as gold is tried. They shall call on My name, and I will hear them. I will say: ‘Thou art My people!’ and they shall say: ‘The Lord is my God!’” (Zacharias 13:9).
A Lesson From Gold-Mining
We can learn much for our spiritual life and its stages of progress from the mining and purification of gold. Within this process we can loosely see the three stages of the spiritual life that we must pass through, before we are allowed to enter Heaven (as pure gold). The Way of Beginners, the Way of the Proficients, and the Way of Perfection.
In the mining process, once the vein of gold ore is discovered, it must first removed from the rock in which it is embedded (we could liken it to a soul hardened in sin, which has to be extracted from the habit of sin). Yet even after it is mined, the gold is not pure—therefore, once extracted, the gold ore must be pulverized to prepare it for refining. Likewise, once we are pulled out of mortal sin, we are still not pure enough. There are still many, many venial sins still ingrained in our soul. Once the gold ore has been mined, it usually is washed and filtered at the mine as a preliminary refinement technique—the washing reminds us of Baptism and Confession, which remove sin; and the filtering reminds us of our daily examination of conscience, that filters out the sins of the day. This constitutes the Way of Beginners.
The gold is then shipped to mills, where it is first combined with water (a symbol of God’s grace) and ground into smaller chunks (a symbol of God’s painful Providence, that sends us various kinds of trials and sufferings to purify us). The resulting mixture is then further ground to pulverize the ore. The gold is then separated from the ore using one of several methods. (1) Floatation, (2) Cyanidation, (3) Amalgamation and the (4) Carbon-in-Pulp method—these are the 4 processes used to further refine the gold. We could say that this represents the middle way of the spiritual life—the Way of Proficients.
(1) FLOATATION involves the separation of gold from its ore by using certain chemicals and air. The finely ground ore is dumped into a solution that contains a frothing agent (which causes the water to foam), a collecting agent (which bonds onto the gold, forming an oily film that sticks to air bubbles), and a mixture of organic chemicals (which keep the other contaminants from also bonding to the air bubbles). The solution is then aerated—air bubbles are blown in—and the gold attaches to the air bubbles. The bubbles float to the top taking the gold with them, and the gold is then skimmed off.
(2) CYANIDATION also involves using chemicals to separate the gold from its contaminants. In this process, the ground ore is placed in a tank containing a weak solution of cyanide. Next, zinc is added to the tank, causing a chemical reaction in which the end result is the separation of the gold from its ore. The gold is then separated from the cyanide solution in a filter press.
(3) AMALGAMATION uses the same process but only with different chemicals. First, a solution carries the ground ore over plates covered with mercury. The mercury attracts the gold, forming an alloy called an amalgam. The amalgam is then heated, causing the mercury to boil off as a gas and leaving behind the gold.
(4) THE CARBON-IN-PULP method also uses cyanide, but utilizes carbon instead of zinc to separate the gold. The first step is to mix the ground ore with water to form a pulp. Next, cyanide is added to dissolve the gold, and then carbon is added to bond with the gold. After the carbon particles are removed from the pulp, they are placed in a hot caustic (corrosive) carbon solution, which separates the gold from the carbon.
If any of these four methods does not make the gold pure enough, then it can be smelted. This represents the third way of the spiritual life—the Way of Perfection.
SMELTING sees the gold heated with a chemical substance called “flux”. The flux bonds with the contaminants and floats on top of the melted gold. The gold is then cooled and allowed to harden in molds, and the flux-contaminant mixture (slag) is hauled away as a solid waste, leaving the gold behind.
Burn Now or Burn Later
“As silver is tried by fire, and gold in the furnace: so the Lord trieth the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3). “For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5). “As gold in the furnace He hath proved them” (Wisdom 3:6). “And I will bring them through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined: and I will try them as gold is tried. They shall call on My name, and I will hear them. I will say: ‘Thou art My people!’ and they shall say: ‘The Lord is my God!’” (Zacharias 13:9). “That the trial of your Faith—much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire—may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7).
Are you ready for smelting? “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” said Our Lord (Luke 12:49). Ouch! But if we don’t step into the furnace now, on Earth, then the furnace of Purgatory or, God forbid, Hell awaits. The temperature here below is far less than that of the other two smelting furnaces! “For a fire is kindled in My rage, it shall burn upon you” (Jeremias 15:14) … “A fire is kindled in My wrath, and shall burn even to the lowest Hell: and shall devour the Earth with her increase” (Deuteronomy 32:22).
Our hearts should burn with love here below, and so will extinguish the fires of Purgatory or Hell that were due to us.
“A hot soul is a burning fire” (Ecclesiasticus 23:22) as testified by the two disciples, on the road to Emmaus, to whom Christ appeared after His resurrection: “Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in this way, and opened to us the Scriptures?” (Luke 24:31). Likewise, God has given us a chance to burn with love for Him here on Earth, and thus avoid burning after our death—it will permit Him to say of such souls: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much!” (Luke 7:47) and “For charity covers a multitude of sins!” (1 Peter 4:8).
Article 15
Thursday, January 9th
Three Kings Bring Three Solutions
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Thursday, January 9th
Three Kings Bring Three Solutions
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Bringing The One Thing Necessary
The “One Thing Necessary” is the one thing that is overlooked and forgotten—yet it is the sole solution—or the soul solution—or sole ‘soul-ution’ to our problems. What is the “One Thing Necessary”? Let the Gospel give us a clue: “Now it came to pass as they went, that Jesus entered into a certain town: and a certain woman, named Martha, received Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who, sitting also at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Who stood and said: ‘Lord! Hast Thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! Thou art careful and art troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary! Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42).
Seeking the “One Thing Necessary”
The Three Kings, or Three Wise Men, left their homes and risked their lives in search of the “One Thing Necessary”—Our Lord Jesus Christ. As an adult, Our Lord would say: “And every one that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands for My Name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall possess life everlasting!” (Matthew 19:29). The Three Kings were really Wise Men who got their reward—in Heaven above. They came seeking the “One Thing Necessary”—Christ!
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange clearly points this out in a passage that deserves to be read again and again, until it penetrates our worldly mind and permeates our soul, to the point of making us truly seek the “One Thing Necessary” above anything and everything else:
“We shall briefly recall what constitutes the one thing necessary for every Christian, and we shall also recall how urgently this question is being raised at the present time ... As everyone can easily understand, the interior life is an elevated form of intimate conversation which everyone has with himself as soon as he is alone, even in the tumult of a great city. From the moment he ceases to converse with his fellow men, man converses interiorly with himself about what preoccupies him most. This conversation varies greatly according to the different ages of life; that of an old man is not that of a youth. It also varies greatly according as a man is good or bad.
“As soon as a man seriously seeks truth and goodness, this intimate conversation with himself tends to become conversation with God. Little by little, instead of seeking himself in everything, instead of tending more or less consciously to make himself a center, man tends to seek God in everything, and to substitute for egoism love of God and of souls in Him. This constitutes the interior life. No sincere man will have any difficulty in recognizing it. The one thing necessary which Jesus spoke of—to Martha and Mary—consists in hearing the word of God and living by it.
“The interior life thus conceived is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Sanctity is the “One Thing Necessary”
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange continues: “The interior life of a just man, who tends toward God and who already lives by Him, is indeed the one thing necessary. This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation. There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death or after purification in purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul.
“To be a saint, neither intellectual culture nor great exterior activity is a requisite; it suffices that we live profoundly by God. This truth is evident in the saints of the early Church; several of those saints were poor people, even slaves. It is evident also in St. Francis, St. Benedict Joseph Labre, in the Cure of Ars, and many others. They all had a deep understanding of these words of our Savior: ‘For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?’ (Matthew 16:26). If people sacrifice so many things to save the life of the body, which must ultimately die, what should we not sacrifice to save the life of our soul, which is to last forever? Ought not man to love his soul more than his body? ‘Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?’ our Lord adds. ‘One thing is necessary,’ He tells us (Luke 10:42). To save our soul, one thing alone is necessary: to hear the word of God and to live by it. Therein lies ‘the best part’, which will not be taken away from a faithful soul even though it should lose everything else!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
The Failure in Seeking the “One Thing Necessary”
Read and re-read the above passage again and again. Copy, paste it and print it out—place on your wall, on your refrigerator, anywhere where it will be seen often. Then reflect upon the words of Holy Scripture that warns us of the few that truly seek the “One Thing Necessary” and their inevitable fate:
“God looked down from Heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that doth good, no not one! … They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear! For God hath scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God hath despised them!” (Psalm 52:3-6).
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: “Lord! Open to us!” And He answering, shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are!” Then you shall begin to say: “We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!” There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out. And there shall come from the east and the west, and the north and the south; and shall sit down in the Kingdom of God. And behold, they are last that shall be first; and they are first that shall be last!’” (Luke 13:23-30).
Chosen or Not?
The Chosen People chose not to acknowledge the Chosen One of God, whereas the non-Chosen People—the Three Kings, being hated Gentiles—sought the Chosen One, found Him, and found themselves to be Chosen by Him for Heaven! “Behold, they are last that shall be first; and they are first that shall be last!” Likewise, the “Chosen People” of the New Testament times—the Catholics—are no longer truly seeking the Chosen One of God. Their decision to choose the world above Christ, will find that Christ will no longer choose them for Heaven! “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 10:32-33). What was said of the Chosen People of old, can readily and truthfully be said of the “Chosen People” (Catholics) of today: “With most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:5).
God is the Only Solution
Isn’t it strange and telling that, when we have some kind of a problem, we first of all try all the human means open to us in order to try and resolve and remove the problem. Now, there is nothing wrong in seeking human solutions, material solutions, physical solutions—but to do so without God is tantamount to a disbelief in God’s power of intervention, God’s desire for intervention and Our Lord’s blunt truth when He says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
God wants to be involved in all things and He wants to be at the head of all things and He wants credit for all things! “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). “What hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7).
God Likes Working Against the Odds
We see a classic and typical attitude of God in the case of Gedeon’s battle with the Madianites. Israel was greatly outnumbered and needed “every man on deck”, yet God decided otherwise:
“Now the camp of Madian was in the valley on the north side of the high hill. And the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘The people that are with thee are many, and Madian shall not be delivered into their hands: lest Israel should glory against Me, and say: “I was delivered by my own strength!” Speak to the people, and proclaim in the hearing of all, “Whosoever is fearful and timorous, let him return!”‘ So two and twenty thousand men went away from mount Galaad and returned home, and only ten thousand remained. And the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘The people are still too many, bring them to the waters, and there I will try them: and of whom I shall say to thee: “This shall go with thee, let him go: whom I shall forbid to go, let him return!”‘ And when the people were come down to the waters, the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘They that shall lap the water with their tongues, as dogs are wont to lap, thou shalt set apart by themselves: but they that shall drink bowing down their knees, shall be on the other side!’ And the number of them that had lapped water, casting it with the hand to their mouth, was three hundred men: and all the rest of the multitude had drunk kneeling. And the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘By the three hundred men, that lapped water, I will save you, and deliver Madian into thy hand!’” (Judges 7:1-7).
“I Want The Glory” Says God
Notice the phrase: “Lest Israel should glory against Me, and say: ‘I was delivered by my own strength!’” By this we see that God will not choose for His instruments in great achievements—which depend purely and solely upon his grace—such persons who, through pride and self-conceit, will take the glory to themselves. There are numerous similar cases in Holy Scripture that reinforce this principle:
(1) God chooses the tiny tribe of Abraham, and not some great nation, to be the foundation of His Chosen People.
(2) God chooses the weaker Jacob over the more “macho” Esau.
(3) God chooses a stutterer in speech, Moses, to be the leader of His Chosen People.
(4) God allows the relatively small tribes of Israel overcome many far mightier foes: the Egyptians, the Amalecites, the Madianites, the Philistines, etc.
(5) God chooses a mere boy, not a soldier, to overcome Goliath.
(6) On Mount Carmel, God overcomes 450 prophets of Baal with just one of His own prophets—Elias.
(7) God overcomes mighty foes with a small number of faithful Machabeans.
(8) Christ chooses uneducated and insignificant men to be His Apostles instead of the far better educated Scribes and Pharisees and Sadducees.
These are just a few examples of the principle stated in Holy Scripture: “The foolish things of the world hath God chosen, that He may confound the wise; and the weak things of the world hath God chosen, that He may confound the strong” (1 Corinthians 1:27).
God in the Closet—Man on the Pedestal
The last 100 years has seen an unprecedented acceleration in the worship of man and his achievements. The adulation of man began its gestation period, or pregnancy, with the arrival of Humanism in the 15th and 16th centuries, finally being dramatically born with the 1789 French Revolution—from which time this ‘Child of Revolution’ has grown alarmingly and unceasingly, with a tremendous spurt in growth over the last 100 years or so, with the advent of great advances in science and technology. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange already hit the nail on the head in the mid-twentieth century, when he wrote:
“Many men have separated themselves from God and tried to organize intellectual and social life without Him. The great problems, that have always preoccupied humanity, have taken on a new and sometimes tragic aspect. To wish to get along without God—the first Cause and last End—leads to an abyss; not only to nothingness, but also to physical and moral wretchedness that is worse than nothingness. Likewise, great problems grow exasperatingly serious, and man must finally perceive that all these problems ultimately lead to the fundamental religious problem. In other words, he will finally have to declare himself entirely for God, or against Him. This is in its essence the problem of the interior life. Christ Himself says: ‘He that is not with Me is against Me!’ (Matthew 12:30)
“The great modern scientific and social tendencies—in the midst of the conflicts that arise among them, and in spite of the opposition of those who represent them—converge in this way, whether one wills it or not, toward the fundamental question of the intimate relations of man with God. This point is reached after many deviations. When man will no longer fulfill his great religious duties toward God, Who created him and Who is his last End, he makes a religion for himself, since he absolutely cannot get along without religion. To replace the superior ideal which he has abandoned, man may, for example, place his religion in science, or in the cult of social justice, or in some human ideal, which finally he considers in a religious manner and even in a mystical manner. Thus, he turns away from supreme reality, and there arises a vast number of problems, that will be solved only if he returns to the fundamental problem of the intimate relations of the soul with God.
“It has often been remarked that, today, science pretends to be a religion. Likewise Socialism and Communism claim to be a code of ethics and present themselves under the guise of a feverish cult of justice, thereby trying to captivate hearts and minds. As a matter of fact, the modern scholar seems to have a scrupulous devotion to the scientific method. He cultivates it to such a degree, that he often seems to prefer the method of research to the truth! If he bestowed equally serious care on his interior life, he would quickly reach sanctity! Often, however, this religion of science is directed toward the apotheosis of man (the elevation of a human to the rank of a god), rather than toward the love of God. As much must be also said of social activity, particularly under the form it assumes in Socialism and Communism” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
The Epiphany of Man
What Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange calls “the apotheosis of man”—the elevation of a human to the rank of a god—could well be also called “The Epiphany of Man.”
Etymologically (the roots and origins of words), the word “epiphany” can be traced back from the Old French “epyphanie”, to the Late Latin “epiphania”, to the Ancient Greek ἐπιφάνεια ”epipháneia”—meaning “manifestation, striking appearance”, and the Ancient Greek ἐπιφαίνω ”epiphaínō”—meaning “I appear, I display”), and the Ancient Greek ἐπί ”epí” meaning “upon”) + φαίνω ”phaínō” meaning “I shine, I appear”.
The classic dictionary will define “epiphany” as:
1. A manifestation or appearance of a divine or superhuman being.
2. An illuminating realization or discovery, often resulting in a personal feeling of elation, awe, or wonder.
Man wants a “piece of the action”, he wants “a slice of the cake” of praise. He is not satisfied “playing second-fiddle” to God. He wants his own epiphany—he wants to shine, display, make a striking appearance, he wants to be divinized by the depth and breadth of knowledge and ability he has acquired in science and technology. He and they are the “new kids on the block” and they do not intend to go unnoticed.
Time of Great Knowledge, But No Saints
Speaking to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame), Our Lord said: “The times will come when doctrine will be commonly known among the learned and the ignorant. ... Many religious books will be written. But the practice of the virtues and of these doctrines will be found in only a few souls; for this reason, saints will become rare.” As Holy Scripture warns: “Faith without works is dead! What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? But some man will say: ‘Thou hast Faith, and I have works!’ show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith. Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well―but the devils also believe and tremble! But wilt thou know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead?” (James 2:14-20).
While Our Lady, referring to the fruits of all our ‘wonderful’ technological gizmos and appliances, said to the same Mother Mariana: “Moreover, in these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost”—while adding at La Salette: “People will think of nothing but amusement!” We may have the Faith, but for most souls their works are pure worldliness!
Relying More on the World than God
We see those fruits all around us today—where people delight in and rely more on the capabilities of their cellphone or smartphone, than they delight in and rely on the grace of God. They rely more on the power of the computer or i-pad or tablet, than they rely upon the power of the Rosary. They will spend hours sitting in front of a screen watching TV, or DVD’s or videos on YouTube, rather than sitting in front of the ‘Heavenly Box’—the tabernacle—watching and praying to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament: “Could you not watch one hour with Me?” (Matthew 26:40).
They know their sports stats for their favorite teams, musicians, actors, and celebrities more than they know about the Faith and the Saints. Who needs to be a disciple or follower of Christ, when you have your own personal disciples or followers on Facebook, Twitter (X), Linkedin, etc.? Who wants to “watch one hour” with Christ, when you can watch with your friends for hours on end on some social media site? It is man who is now on pedestal, while God and His saints have been relegated to closet—only to brought-out, dusted-down, and displayed for guest appearances at Christmas, Easter or some other important feast! After that, it’s back into the closet!
There’s Enough Grace to Solve All Problems
Not for the slightest second is it possible or permissible to think that everything is so out of control that God cannot do anything about it! The term “Almighty God” means just that—there is nothing that God cannot do, for He can do all things. This reminds us of the words of Our Lord Himself: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!” (Matthew 19:26) … “With men it is impossible; but not with God: for all things are possible with God” (Mark 10:27) … “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27).
For as St. Paul correctly writes: “Sin might abound. And where sin abounded, grace did more abound! … What shall we say, then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid!” (Romans 5:20; 6:1-2). “God is able to make all grace abound in you; that ye always, having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work!” (2 Corinthians 9:8). “I can do all these things in Him who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13). There is more than enough grace to solve any and every problem—but those graces (1) have to be obtained, (2) they have to be paid for and (3) they have to be utilized.
Does God Want to Help?
If we are tempted to ask: “Does God want to do something about all these problems: the present ones and future ones?” The answer to that question requires that we distinguish between two things or scenarios. Yes, God does want to do something about the problems of the world, the sinfulness of the world, and the impending doom hanging over most people in the world. But, no, God will not do anything about those things unless we work with Him. He wants proof that we want to extricate ourselves from these problems, sins, and impending doom. Even though He doesn’t need it, He nevertheless wants to play a part in putting the problems right. We must shake ourselves out of our indifference, lukewarmness, neglect, complacency, illusions, and presumption in order to finally start doing what Heaven has been demanding for many, many years! As was just said—we need to work with God and His graces—but those graces (1) have to be obtained, (2) they have to be paid for and (3) they have to be utilized.
God Helps Those Who Help Themselves
Even though the phrase—“God helps those who help themselves”—is nowhere to be found in the Bible, the concept most certainly is to be found in numerous places. God rarely “clicks his fingers” whenever He decides to help mankind.
Noe is told to spend many decades in building the ark that will eventually save him. God could have saved Noe, his family and the animals in hundreds of ways. He could, for example, have taken them up into the sky, as He did with Elias the prophet, and then placed them back on the Earth after the Great Flood, and then, in the twinkling of an eye, created anew all the animals He wished. But, no, God made Noe work laboriously for decade after decade on the ark.
God commands Moses: “Lift thou up thy rod, and stretch forth thy hand over the sea, and divide it: that the children of Israel may go through the midst of the sea on dry ground!” God did not strictly need Moses nor the rod, but He nevertheless wanted both Moses and a rod to play a part in what God was about to do. Without God, Moses and the rod could do nothing.
Against the many different enemies that Israel encountered, God, by merely “clicking His fingers”, could have destroyed them all—but, no, God required that the Israelites go into battle themselves, and at times losing life in battle, while at the same time God promised to fight with them: “Then the Lord shall go forth, and shall fight against those nations!” (Zacharias 14:3) … “One of you shall chase a thousand men of the enemies: because the Lord your God himself will fight for you, as He has promised!” (Josue 23:10) … “Fear them not: for the Lord your God will fight for you!” (Deuteronomy 3:22). Nevertheless, blood was spilt and life was lost—even though the enemy was vanquished. We see a similar situation with the Turkish Muslim threat of the Ottoman Empire, that was given a mortal blow at the Battle of Lepanto. A lot of Christian blood was shed, but nowhere near as much as that suffered by the enemies.
Dormant Spiritual Weapons
We already have what we need, but we need to use what we have! God has already told us what we must do, we just need to do as we have been told! It is no ‘rocket-science’, it requires no advanced university degree, no mystical experiences or insights—it just needs good plain old Catholic common sense and a willingness to “roll-up those sleeves” and put in some “elbow-grease”—or could we say ‘finger-grease’ as we slide the Rosary beads through our fingers. The problems and the increasing evil in the world will not be stopped by any natural means—neither politics, finance, education, or merely natural virtue can stop or avert what is and what will be. It can only be stopped supernaturally and the Rosary is our wire or power-cord by which we can plug into the supernatural power that is needed.
This is a truth communicated to us by Our Lady herself, through Sr. Lucia of Fatima, who tells us: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls!” (Sr. Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 27th, 1957).
Too Hard To Understand?
What is there that is so difficult to understand about that? Do we need a university professor to dissect and explain the message? Do we need to take a language course to better understand it? Is it too cryptic or obscure to understand? Nothing could be plainer or clearer! Even a child can understand that message! Even a child can comply with that message and go to war in the fight against sin, evil and the worldliness that is their vehicle. “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith: lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Which is exactly what the three young children of Fatima did—aged 7, 9 and 20—once Our Lady invited them to the fight for souls.
If Little Children Can Do It—Why Don’t You?
Right from the start—at her first apparition at Fatima—Our Lady recruited YOUNG children for what we might consider to be a MAN’S role. “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners?” When the three children agreed, Our Lady continued: “Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort!”
Take some time to look, in some detail, at the lives of those three Fatima children after they accepted Our Lady’s invitation to pray and suffer for sinners and the offense of sin. We have become so “soft” and “sanitized”, that if our children were to start doing similar things, then people would question their sanity and call Social Services to investigate you and your family! These days, Our Lady would be taken to court and sued! Imagine the callousness and cruelty in telling a child to kiss the soil, drink muddy water and eat grass—which is what Our Lady commanded St. Bernadette to do at Lourdes!
The Three Seekers
What are we seeking in life? Are we really seeking God? Ourselves? Wealth? Comfort? Pleasure? The company and friendship of the world? Placing those things above God has brought us into the mess that we currently find ourselves in. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted: and your garments are moth-eaten! Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire! You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3). Those rich elitists, who are playing as gods in this world, take notice! Your money will not be your solution, but you dissolution! Your attraction will become your destruction!
Okay, perhaps the world is not Number One on our priority list; but are we seeking a bit of both, a bit of God and a bit of the world, are we trying to marry the two? “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24). You cannot seek God and the world, not seek to please God and the world. The world seeks to destroy Christ and God’s presence in the world. They are represented by Herod and the Pharisees; one during Christ’s youth, the others during Christ’s manhood. “Herod will seek the Child to destroy Him” (Matthew 2:13). “Jesus walked in Galilee; for He would not walk in Judea, because the Jews sought to kill Him” (John 7:1).
Everyone Seeks Christ, But For Different Reasons
In a certain sense, everyone is seeking Christ, but for different reasons: some truly seek Him to adore and serve Him; some seek Him as an insurance policy against Hell, but they do not love Him; others seek Him in the hope that He might serve them, or do something for them; others seek Him out of curiosity; others seek Him to destroy Him. “Why seek you to kill Me?” (John 7:20). “You seek to kill Me, because My word has no place in you” (John 8:37).
The three wise men, the Magi or the three kings, though pagans, sought Him in all sincerity. They were rich, they were wise and they sought Him who is called the Eternal Wisdom. They did not let their riches get in the way, they did not let their worldly wisdom get in the way. They risked life and limb to personally go in search of the greatest treasure and wisest Being in the whole universe! “And many peoples, and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem” (Zacharias 8:22). These were pagans, we are Catholics! How much more sincerely and effectively should we not be seeking Christ! In the season of Christmas, how many are still seeking Christ, thinking about Christ, getting to know Christ better, drawing closer to Christ? Whom do we seek? In all honesty. “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that does good, no not one!” (Psalm 52:3-4).
Seeking Solutions From Jesus Through Mary
Seeking solutions requires the seeking of God and Our Lady, whom God has appointed as the solution provider for our age. As Our Lady herself said at Fatima: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary … because only she can help you!” (August 1917). At Akita, in 1973, she added: “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.”
Our Lady is inseparable from her Son. Just as the famous saying—“Ubi Petrus, ibi ecclesia!”—expounds the truth of “Where Peter is, there too is the Church!”, likewise could we coin the phrase—“Ubi Maria, ibi Jesus!”—expounding an equal truth of “Where Mary is, there too is her Son!” We read in Holy Scripture that when the three kings or wise men arrived in Bethlehem, “entering into the house, they found the Child with Mary His Mother” (Matthew 2:11). This inseparability is again shown in the angel’s message to St. Joseph. When the three kings “were departed, behold an angel of the Lord appeared in sleep to Joseph, saying: ‘Arise, and take the Child and His Mother, and flee into Egypt!’” (Matthew 2:13). The next verse once again repeats this inseparability: “Who arose, and took the Child and His mother by night, and retired into Egypt” (Matthew 2:14). Once the danger had passed and Herod had died, this inseparability is once more seen in the angel’s message to St. Joseph: “Arise, and take the Child and His Mother, and go into the land of Israel. For they are dead that sought the life of the Child!” (Matthew 2:20). St. Joseph’s obedience is noted once again in repeating this inseparability: “Who arose, and took the Child and His Mother, and came into the land of Israel” (Matthew 2:21).
Hence, as the three kings sought the Christ Child and found “the Child with Mary His Mother”, so too must we seek the Christ Child’s help and we will find Him through and with Mary His Mother. Hence, too, the phrase: “To Jesus through Mary!”
This idea and truth was well-expounded by St. Louis de Montfort: “The power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel—that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children—whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But in return for this they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.”
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be “like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful” Mary to pierce her enemies. (Ps. 126:4). They shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body … They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High.
“They shall be the true apostles of the latter times … In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior. These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious, the idolaters and the Mahometans. But when and how shall this be? God alone knows!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The Three Gifts of the Three Kings
Notice that in the above quote of St. Louis de Montfort, which describes the apostles of the latter times, he writes: “They shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body.” This brings us to the three gifts, brought by the three kings or wise men, for Our Lord in Bethlehem. The gifts were gold, frankincense and myrrh. These gifts have an eternal significance and preach an eternal lesson—a lesson that we need to especially note and put into practice in our present day.
The Need For Gold
Today, as the financial markets are on the verge of collapse, there is much of talk of returning to the “gold standard” which guarantees a nation’s true wealth. People are being told to stock up on gold. Gold stands at the top of the mountain of precious metals, just as God stands above all creatures. Gold is a symbol of both God and Charity, which is appropriate, since Holy Scripture tells us that “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). Charity is defined primarily as a love of God. The high esteem and love of gold, symbolizes or represents the high esteem and love that we must have for God. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30). “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you. Abide in My love!” (John 15:9).
The entire 25th chapter of the Book of Exodus, describes the commands of God that the things made for His worship be made of gold. “And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Frame an ark of setim wood, and thou shalt overlay it with the purest gold within and without. And over it thou shalt make a golden crown round about. And four golden rings, which thou shall put at the four corners of the ark. Thou shalt also make bars of setim wood, and shalt overlay them with gold.
Thou shalt make also a propitiatory of the purest gold … Thou shalt make also two cherubims of beaten gold … Thou shalt make a table also of setim wood and thou shalt overlay it with the purest gold: and thou shalt make to it a golden ledge round about. And to the ledge itself a polished crown and over the same another little golden crown. Thou shalt prepare also four golden rings … Thou shalt prepare also dishes, and bowls, censers, and cups of the purest gold … Thou shalt make also a candlestick of beaten work of the finest gold … And both the bowls and the branches shall be of the same beaten work of the purest gold. Thou shalt make also seven lamps … The snuffers also and where the snuffings shall be put out, shall be made of the purest gold. The whole weight of the candlestick with all the furniture thereof shall be a talent of the purest gold.’” (Exodus 25:10-39).
From this we can see that God loves gold—as we should love God! “Set aside with you first fruits to the Lord. Let everyone that is willing and hath a ready heart, offer them to the Lord: gold, and silver” (Exodus 35:5). “Therefore we offer as gifts to the Lord what gold every one of us could find” (Numbers 31:50).
However, just as we can love ourselves above God, we can also love gold above God. Whereas gold can undoubtedly do much good, it can also bring about evils and even damnation. “The idols of the Gentiles are silver and gold, the works of men’s hands” (Psalm 134:15). “You have seen their abominations and filth, that is to say, their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which they worshipped!” (Deuteronomy 29:17). “For gold and silver have destroyed many, and have reached even to the heart of kings, and perverted them” (Ecclesiasticus 8:3). “Many have been brought to fall for gold, and the beauty thereof has been their ruin!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:6). “You shall not make gods of silver, nor shall you make to yourselves gods of gold!” (Exodus 20:23). “Their silver shall be cast forth, and their gold shall become a dunghill. Their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the Lord!” (Ezechiel 7:19). “Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted … Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you! … You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
“Health of the soul in holiness is better than all gold!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:15). That health of soul is obtained when we do as we are told: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30). “As gold is tried by fire in the furnace: so the Lord tries the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3). “As gold in the furnace He hath proved them” (Wisdom 3:6). “He knows my way, and has tried me as gold that passes through the fire!” (Job 23:10).
Without that love of God in our hearts, WE ARE NOTHING! “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
If we are to find solutions to the problems that currently besiege us and the problems that threaten us in the near future, then we must first find the gold of charity. Without that charity, no matter what we may attempt and do, will be impotent and powerless and temporary.
The Need for Frankincense
The Catechism tells us that we were made to know, love and serve God. We cannot love what we do not know, and we won’t serve for long, or very well, those whom we do not love. This is very important when it comes to the service of God—for the service of God entails inescapable suffering (see below in the myrrh section). To be able to suffer and continue to love God, we need the frankincense of prayer. This king of incense is a symbol of prayer—for, as the liturgy says, “Let my prayer ascend like incense in Thy sight, O Lord!” which is based upon Holy Scripture: “And the smoke of the incense of the prayers of the saints ascended up before God” (Apocalypse 8:4).
Prayer, if you like, is the air that we breathe. Stop breathing and you are in big trouble. Stop praying and you are in even bigger trouble. This is why Our Lord Himself said: “that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1), while St. Paul adds: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17).
St Augustine states “What is more excellent than prayer? What is more useful and profitable? What is sweeter and more delicious? What is higher and more exalted in the whole scheme of our Christian religion?” Pope Celestine, in a decree dealing with prayer says: “I know nothing better to say to you than what my predecessor Zozimus said: ‘What time is there in which we have no need of God?’ None. Therefore at all times, and in all cases, in all affairs we need to have recourse to Him by prayer and crave His favor. For it is a great pride for a weak and miserable man to presume anything by himself.”
St. Thomas, writing of prayer, says that what God decided from all eternity to grant us by His Divine Providence, He will give it to us by means of prayer, and on this depends the deliverance, salvation, conversion and cure of many souls and the progress and perfection of others. God has ruled that Matrimony begets children. Ploughing and sowing brings an abundance of crops. Prayer brings gifts and graces to the world.
This is precisely what Our Lord means, when He says: “Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and it shall be opened to you. For everyone that asks receives, and he that seeks finds, and the door shall be opened to him that knocked” (Matthew 7:7).
St. Augustine says that prayer is the key of Heaven that fits all the gates of Heaven and all the treasure chests of God. Elsewhere he says that what bread is to the body, prayer is to the soul. And “He knows how to live well, who knows how to pray well.” It could also be said: “He who prays badly, lives badly!” Likewise, “He who prays well, suffers well—but he who prays badly, suffers badly!” This leads us into the opinion of St. Augustine, looking at the fate of the two thieves suffering and dying alongside Christ on Calvary—which causes St. Augustine to say: “The same crosses lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell!” A lot of that comes down to how much and how well we pray—besides how much we love God.
Frankincense, also called olibanum, is an aromatic resin obtained from trees of the genus Boswellia, particularly Boswellia Sacra. The English word is derived from Old French “franc encens” (i.e., high quality incense) and is used in incense and perfumes. So we see that there is “incense” and “frankincense” with frankincense being high quality incense. The same applies to our prayers: there are prayers that are “said” and there are prayers that are “prayed”. The difference is what Our Lord Himself spoke of: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8).
Frankincense is tapped from the scraggly but hardy trees by slashing the bark, which is called striping, and allowing the exuded resin to bleed out and harden. These hardened resins are called tears. The aroma from these tears are more valuable for their presumed healing abilities and are also said to have superior qualities for religious ritual. When the trunk is slashed or tapped, the resin weeps or oozes out like tears falling from the eyes and then hardens into nuggets of pure frankincense, called tears, after a few months. Here we see the need to pray with all our heart, to have our heart slashed, wounded and pierced with tribulation and affliction, just like Our Lord’s heart was pierced on the Cross, and tears of blood and water wept forth form it. As the Archangel Raphael said to Tobias: “When thou didst pray with tears … I offered thy prayer to the Lord!” (Tobias 12:12). “Melchisedech, who in the days of his flesh, with a strong cry and tears, offering up prayers and supplications to him that was able to save him from death, was heard for his reverence” (Hebrews 5:6-7). “And immediately the father of the boy crying out, with tears said: ‘I do believe, Lord! Help my unbelief!’” (Mark 9:23).
The Need for Myrrh
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: “Thy ceaseless offering, however, must be love, which is the gold; continual prayer, which is the incense; and the patient acceptance of labors and true mortifications, which is the myrrh.” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, The Incarnation).
The name Myrrh is rooted in the Aramaic word for “bitter.” Mar, Mor, Myrrh. Some associate the name Mary, Miriam, Mariam to meaning the bitter of the sea, froth of the sea? For in Latin, both “Mary” and “Sea” are spelt “Maria.”
What is Myrrh? It is a fragrant gum/resin obtained from certain trees, especially in the Near East, which is used as incense, perfume and medicine. Frankincense and myrrh were the antibiotics of the ancient world. Likewise, prayer (frankincense) and myrrh (suffering) are our spiritual anti-biotics that attack and kill the various viruses and bacteria of sin.
Myrrh is the aromatic resin extract of a number of small, thorny, stiff-branched tree with white flowers and plum-like fruit tree species of the genus Commiphora, which is an essential oil termed an oleoresin. Myrrh resin is a natural gum. It can also be ingested by mixing it with wine. The soldiers mixed Myrrh with wine and offered it on a sponge on the end a lance, for Jesus to drink as He was dying on the Cross, but Jesus refused it. It was meant to act as a painkiller, but Jesus did not want any painkillers, He wanted to suffer as much as He possibly could to prove His love for us. “And they gave Him to drink wine mingled with myrrh; but He took it not” (Mark 15:23).
To get Myrrh, the Myrrh tree must be first wounded, this is done with a knife or some other lance-like pointed object. This reminds us of Our Lord being pierced with the nails and the lance upon the cross. When a tree wound penetrates through the thin bark and into the sapwood, the tree bleeds a resin, just as Our Lord bled on the Tree of the Cross when his skin (the thin bark) was pierced. Myrrh gum, like frankincense, is such a resin. When people harvest myrrh, they wound the trees repeatedly to bleed them of the gum, just as Jesus was repeatedly wounded and bled. Myrrh gum is waxy, and coagulates quickly, as does blood. After the harvest, the gum becomes hard and glossy.
The rugged appearance of the Myrrh tree, together with its sharp thorny branches, cries out loud and clear the idea of suffering and mortification. Looking at its thorns, one is easily reminded of the crown of thorns that was forced upon the Sacred Head of Our Lord during His Passion.
We were born to suffer, we need to suffer, suffering is the test and touchstone of a Christian. “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me! … And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!’” (Luke 9:23; 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
The cross is the practical exam we must sit (or carry) and pass (but not pass-off to someone else) before we can be admitted into Heaven. Like every exam, some pass and some fail. In the exam for Heaven, quite a few people might the pass the theory, but most fail the practical. “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). Few are chosen because few choose to suffer and few choose to carry the cross. “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). That “strait way that leads to life” is the Way of the Cross. And many who do carry the cross—because they cannot avoid it—carry it more like the Bad Thief on Calvary (muttering and complaining) and not like the Good Thief (accepting and rejoicing).
“For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5). “For whom the Lord loveth, He chastises” (Hebrews 12:6).
Suffering should lead us to more prayer and better prayer. Suffering is a test of our love for God. “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). What better friend have we than God? What better friend than Christ? What better friend is there to die for? As the Way of Cross prayers remind us: “Jesus, You died for love of me—let me die for love of Thee!”
The “One Thing Necessary” is the one thing that is overlooked and forgotten—yet it is the sole solution—or the soul solution—or sole ‘soul-ution’ to our problems. What is the “One Thing Necessary”? Let the Gospel give us a clue: “Now it came to pass as they went, that Jesus entered into a certain town: and a certain woman, named Martha, received Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who, sitting also at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Who stood and said: ‘Lord! Hast Thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! Thou art careful and art troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary! Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42).
Seeking the “One Thing Necessary”
The Three Kings, or Three Wise Men, left their homes and risked their lives in search of the “One Thing Necessary”—Our Lord Jesus Christ. As an adult, Our Lord would say: “And every one that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands for My Name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall possess life everlasting!” (Matthew 19:29). The Three Kings were really Wise Men who got their reward—in Heaven above. They came seeking the “One Thing Necessary”—Christ!
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange clearly points this out in a passage that deserves to be read again and again, until it penetrates our worldly mind and permeates our soul, to the point of making us truly seek the “One Thing Necessary” above anything and everything else:
“We shall briefly recall what constitutes the one thing necessary for every Christian, and we shall also recall how urgently this question is being raised at the present time ... As everyone can easily understand, the interior life is an elevated form of intimate conversation which everyone has with himself as soon as he is alone, even in the tumult of a great city. From the moment he ceases to converse with his fellow men, man converses interiorly with himself about what preoccupies him most. This conversation varies greatly according to the different ages of life; that of an old man is not that of a youth. It also varies greatly according as a man is good or bad.
“As soon as a man seriously seeks truth and goodness, this intimate conversation with himself tends to become conversation with God. Little by little, instead of seeking himself in everything, instead of tending more or less consciously to make himself a center, man tends to seek God in everything, and to substitute for egoism love of God and of souls in Him. This constitutes the interior life. No sincere man will have any difficulty in recognizing it. The one thing necessary which Jesus spoke of—to Martha and Mary—consists in hearing the word of God and living by it.
“The interior life thus conceived is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Sanctity is the “One Thing Necessary”
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange continues: “The interior life of a just man, who tends toward God and who already lives by Him, is indeed the one thing necessary. This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation. There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death or after purification in purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul.
“To be a saint, neither intellectual culture nor great exterior activity is a requisite; it suffices that we live profoundly by God. This truth is evident in the saints of the early Church; several of those saints were poor people, even slaves. It is evident also in St. Francis, St. Benedict Joseph Labre, in the Cure of Ars, and many others. They all had a deep understanding of these words of our Savior: ‘For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?’ (Matthew 16:26). If people sacrifice so many things to save the life of the body, which must ultimately die, what should we not sacrifice to save the life of our soul, which is to last forever? Ought not man to love his soul more than his body? ‘Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?’ our Lord adds. ‘One thing is necessary,’ He tells us (Luke 10:42). To save our soul, one thing alone is necessary: to hear the word of God and to live by it. Therein lies ‘the best part’, which will not be taken away from a faithful soul even though it should lose everything else!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
The Failure in Seeking the “One Thing Necessary”
Read and re-read the above passage again and again. Copy, paste it and print it out—place on your wall, on your refrigerator, anywhere where it will be seen often. Then reflect upon the words of Holy Scripture that warns us of the few that truly seek the “One Thing Necessary” and their inevitable fate:
“God looked down from Heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that doth good, no not one! … They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear! For God hath scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God hath despised them!” (Psalm 52:3-6).
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: “Lord! Open to us!” And He answering, shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are!” Then you shall begin to say: “We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!” There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out. And there shall come from the east and the west, and the north and the south; and shall sit down in the Kingdom of God. And behold, they are last that shall be first; and they are first that shall be last!’” (Luke 13:23-30).
Chosen or Not?
The Chosen People chose not to acknowledge the Chosen One of God, whereas the non-Chosen People—the Three Kings, being hated Gentiles—sought the Chosen One, found Him, and found themselves to be Chosen by Him for Heaven! “Behold, they are last that shall be first; and they are first that shall be last!” Likewise, the “Chosen People” of the New Testament times—the Catholics—are no longer truly seeking the Chosen One of God. Their decision to choose the world above Christ, will find that Christ will no longer choose them for Heaven! “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 10:32-33). What was said of the Chosen People of old, can readily and truthfully be said of the “Chosen People” (Catholics) of today: “With most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:5).
God is the Only Solution
Isn’t it strange and telling that, when we have some kind of a problem, we first of all try all the human means open to us in order to try and resolve and remove the problem. Now, there is nothing wrong in seeking human solutions, material solutions, physical solutions—but to do so without God is tantamount to a disbelief in God’s power of intervention, God’s desire for intervention and Our Lord’s blunt truth when He says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
God wants to be involved in all things and He wants to be at the head of all things and He wants credit for all things! “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). “What hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7).
God Likes Working Against the Odds
We see a classic and typical attitude of God in the case of Gedeon’s battle with the Madianites. Israel was greatly outnumbered and needed “every man on deck”, yet God decided otherwise:
“Now the camp of Madian was in the valley on the north side of the high hill. And the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘The people that are with thee are many, and Madian shall not be delivered into their hands: lest Israel should glory against Me, and say: “I was delivered by my own strength!” Speak to the people, and proclaim in the hearing of all, “Whosoever is fearful and timorous, let him return!”‘ So two and twenty thousand men went away from mount Galaad and returned home, and only ten thousand remained. And the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘The people are still too many, bring them to the waters, and there I will try them: and of whom I shall say to thee: “This shall go with thee, let him go: whom I shall forbid to go, let him return!”‘ And when the people were come down to the waters, the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘They that shall lap the water with their tongues, as dogs are wont to lap, thou shalt set apart by themselves: but they that shall drink bowing down their knees, shall be on the other side!’ And the number of them that had lapped water, casting it with the hand to their mouth, was three hundred men: and all the rest of the multitude had drunk kneeling. And the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘By the three hundred men, that lapped water, I will save you, and deliver Madian into thy hand!’” (Judges 7:1-7).
“I Want The Glory” Says God
Notice the phrase: “Lest Israel should glory against Me, and say: ‘I was delivered by my own strength!’” By this we see that God will not choose for His instruments in great achievements—which depend purely and solely upon his grace—such persons who, through pride and self-conceit, will take the glory to themselves. There are numerous similar cases in Holy Scripture that reinforce this principle:
(1) God chooses the tiny tribe of Abraham, and not some great nation, to be the foundation of His Chosen People.
(2) God chooses the weaker Jacob over the more “macho” Esau.
(3) God chooses a stutterer in speech, Moses, to be the leader of His Chosen People.
(4) God allows the relatively small tribes of Israel overcome many far mightier foes: the Egyptians, the Amalecites, the Madianites, the Philistines, etc.
(5) God chooses a mere boy, not a soldier, to overcome Goliath.
(6) On Mount Carmel, God overcomes 450 prophets of Baal with just one of His own prophets—Elias.
(7) God overcomes mighty foes with a small number of faithful Machabeans.
(8) Christ chooses uneducated and insignificant men to be His Apostles instead of the far better educated Scribes and Pharisees and Sadducees.
These are just a few examples of the principle stated in Holy Scripture: “The foolish things of the world hath God chosen, that He may confound the wise; and the weak things of the world hath God chosen, that He may confound the strong” (1 Corinthians 1:27).
God in the Closet—Man on the Pedestal
The last 100 years has seen an unprecedented acceleration in the worship of man and his achievements. The adulation of man began its gestation period, or pregnancy, with the arrival of Humanism in the 15th and 16th centuries, finally being dramatically born with the 1789 French Revolution—from which time this ‘Child of Revolution’ has grown alarmingly and unceasingly, with a tremendous spurt in growth over the last 100 years or so, with the advent of great advances in science and technology. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange already hit the nail on the head in the mid-twentieth century, when he wrote:
“Many men have separated themselves from God and tried to organize intellectual and social life without Him. The great problems, that have always preoccupied humanity, have taken on a new and sometimes tragic aspect. To wish to get along without God—the first Cause and last End—leads to an abyss; not only to nothingness, but also to physical and moral wretchedness that is worse than nothingness. Likewise, great problems grow exasperatingly serious, and man must finally perceive that all these problems ultimately lead to the fundamental religious problem. In other words, he will finally have to declare himself entirely for God, or against Him. This is in its essence the problem of the interior life. Christ Himself says: ‘He that is not with Me is against Me!’ (Matthew 12:30)
“The great modern scientific and social tendencies—in the midst of the conflicts that arise among them, and in spite of the opposition of those who represent them—converge in this way, whether one wills it or not, toward the fundamental question of the intimate relations of man with God. This point is reached after many deviations. When man will no longer fulfill his great religious duties toward God, Who created him and Who is his last End, he makes a religion for himself, since he absolutely cannot get along without religion. To replace the superior ideal which he has abandoned, man may, for example, place his religion in science, or in the cult of social justice, or in some human ideal, which finally he considers in a religious manner and even in a mystical manner. Thus, he turns away from supreme reality, and there arises a vast number of problems, that will be solved only if he returns to the fundamental problem of the intimate relations of the soul with God.
“It has often been remarked that, today, science pretends to be a religion. Likewise Socialism and Communism claim to be a code of ethics and present themselves under the guise of a feverish cult of justice, thereby trying to captivate hearts and minds. As a matter of fact, the modern scholar seems to have a scrupulous devotion to the scientific method. He cultivates it to such a degree, that he often seems to prefer the method of research to the truth! If he bestowed equally serious care on his interior life, he would quickly reach sanctity! Often, however, this religion of science is directed toward the apotheosis of man (the elevation of a human to the rank of a god), rather than toward the love of God. As much must be also said of social activity, particularly under the form it assumes in Socialism and Communism” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
The Epiphany of Man
What Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange calls “the apotheosis of man”—the elevation of a human to the rank of a god—could well be also called “The Epiphany of Man.”
Etymologically (the roots and origins of words), the word “epiphany” can be traced back from the Old French “epyphanie”, to the Late Latin “epiphania”, to the Ancient Greek ἐπιφάνεια ”epipháneia”—meaning “manifestation, striking appearance”, and the Ancient Greek ἐπιφαίνω ”epiphaínō”—meaning “I appear, I display”), and the Ancient Greek ἐπί ”epí” meaning “upon”) + φαίνω ”phaínō” meaning “I shine, I appear”.
The classic dictionary will define “epiphany” as:
1. A manifestation or appearance of a divine or superhuman being.
2. An illuminating realization or discovery, often resulting in a personal feeling of elation, awe, or wonder.
Man wants a “piece of the action”, he wants “a slice of the cake” of praise. He is not satisfied “playing second-fiddle” to God. He wants his own epiphany—he wants to shine, display, make a striking appearance, he wants to be divinized by the depth and breadth of knowledge and ability he has acquired in science and technology. He and they are the “new kids on the block” and they do not intend to go unnoticed.
Time of Great Knowledge, But No Saints
Speaking to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame), Our Lord said: “The times will come when doctrine will be commonly known among the learned and the ignorant. ... Many religious books will be written. But the practice of the virtues and of these doctrines will be found in only a few souls; for this reason, saints will become rare.” As Holy Scripture warns: “Faith without works is dead! What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? But some man will say: ‘Thou hast Faith, and I have works!’ show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith. Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well―but the devils also believe and tremble! But wilt thou know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead?” (James 2:14-20).
While Our Lady, referring to the fruits of all our ‘wonderful’ technological gizmos and appliances, said to the same Mother Mariana: “Moreover, in these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost”—while adding at La Salette: “People will think of nothing but amusement!” We may have the Faith, but for most souls their works are pure worldliness!
Relying More on the World than God
We see those fruits all around us today—where people delight in and rely more on the capabilities of their cellphone or smartphone, than they delight in and rely on the grace of God. They rely more on the power of the computer or i-pad or tablet, than they rely upon the power of the Rosary. They will spend hours sitting in front of a screen watching TV, or DVD’s or videos on YouTube, rather than sitting in front of the ‘Heavenly Box’—the tabernacle—watching and praying to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament: “Could you not watch one hour with Me?” (Matthew 26:40).
They know their sports stats for their favorite teams, musicians, actors, and celebrities more than they know about the Faith and the Saints. Who needs to be a disciple or follower of Christ, when you have your own personal disciples or followers on Facebook, Twitter (X), Linkedin, etc.? Who wants to “watch one hour” with Christ, when you can watch with your friends for hours on end on some social media site? It is man who is now on pedestal, while God and His saints have been relegated to closet—only to brought-out, dusted-down, and displayed for guest appearances at Christmas, Easter or some other important feast! After that, it’s back into the closet!
There’s Enough Grace to Solve All Problems
Not for the slightest second is it possible or permissible to think that everything is so out of control that God cannot do anything about it! The term “Almighty God” means just that—there is nothing that God cannot do, for He can do all things. This reminds us of the words of Our Lord Himself: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!” (Matthew 19:26) … “With men it is impossible; but not with God: for all things are possible with God” (Mark 10:27) … “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27).
For as St. Paul correctly writes: “Sin might abound. And where sin abounded, grace did more abound! … What shall we say, then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid!” (Romans 5:20; 6:1-2). “God is able to make all grace abound in you; that ye always, having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work!” (2 Corinthians 9:8). “I can do all these things in Him who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13). There is more than enough grace to solve any and every problem—but those graces (1) have to be obtained, (2) they have to be paid for and (3) they have to be utilized.
Does God Want to Help?
If we are tempted to ask: “Does God want to do something about all these problems: the present ones and future ones?” The answer to that question requires that we distinguish between two things or scenarios. Yes, God does want to do something about the problems of the world, the sinfulness of the world, and the impending doom hanging over most people in the world. But, no, God will not do anything about those things unless we work with Him. He wants proof that we want to extricate ourselves from these problems, sins, and impending doom. Even though He doesn’t need it, He nevertheless wants to play a part in putting the problems right. We must shake ourselves out of our indifference, lukewarmness, neglect, complacency, illusions, and presumption in order to finally start doing what Heaven has been demanding for many, many years! As was just said—we need to work with God and His graces—but those graces (1) have to be obtained, (2) they have to be paid for and (3) they have to be utilized.
God Helps Those Who Help Themselves
Even though the phrase—“God helps those who help themselves”—is nowhere to be found in the Bible, the concept most certainly is to be found in numerous places. God rarely “clicks his fingers” whenever He decides to help mankind.
Noe is told to spend many decades in building the ark that will eventually save him. God could have saved Noe, his family and the animals in hundreds of ways. He could, for example, have taken them up into the sky, as He did with Elias the prophet, and then placed them back on the Earth after the Great Flood, and then, in the twinkling of an eye, created anew all the animals He wished. But, no, God made Noe work laboriously for decade after decade on the ark.
God commands Moses: “Lift thou up thy rod, and stretch forth thy hand over the sea, and divide it: that the children of Israel may go through the midst of the sea on dry ground!” God did not strictly need Moses nor the rod, but He nevertheless wanted both Moses and a rod to play a part in what God was about to do. Without God, Moses and the rod could do nothing.
Against the many different enemies that Israel encountered, God, by merely “clicking His fingers”, could have destroyed them all—but, no, God required that the Israelites go into battle themselves, and at times losing life in battle, while at the same time God promised to fight with them: “Then the Lord shall go forth, and shall fight against those nations!” (Zacharias 14:3) … “One of you shall chase a thousand men of the enemies: because the Lord your God himself will fight for you, as He has promised!” (Josue 23:10) … “Fear them not: for the Lord your God will fight for you!” (Deuteronomy 3:22). Nevertheless, blood was spilt and life was lost—even though the enemy was vanquished. We see a similar situation with the Turkish Muslim threat of the Ottoman Empire, that was given a mortal blow at the Battle of Lepanto. A lot of Christian blood was shed, but nowhere near as much as that suffered by the enemies.
Dormant Spiritual Weapons
We already have what we need, but we need to use what we have! God has already told us what we must do, we just need to do as we have been told! It is no ‘rocket-science’, it requires no advanced university degree, no mystical experiences or insights—it just needs good plain old Catholic common sense and a willingness to “roll-up those sleeves” and put in some “elbow-grease”—or could we say ‘finger-grease’ as we slide the Rosary beads through our fingers. The problems and the increasing evil in the world will not be stopped by any natural means—neither politics, finance, education, or merely natural virtue can stop or avert what is and what will be. It can only be stopped supernaturally and the Rosary is our wire or power-cord by which we can plug into the supernatural power that is needed.
This is a truth communicated to us by Our Lady herself, through Sr. Lucia of Fatima, who tells us: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls!” (Sr. Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 27th, 1957).
Too Hard To Understand?
What is there that is so difficult to understand about that? Do we need a university professor to dissect and explain the message? Do we need to take a language course to better understand it? Is it too cryptic or obscure to understand? Nothing could be plainer or clearer! Even a child can understand that message! Even a child can comply with that message and go to war in the fight against sin, evil and the worldliness that is their vehicle. “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith: lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Which is exactly what the three young children of Fatima did—aged 7, 9 and 20—once Our Lady invited them to the fight for souls.
If Little Children Can Do It—Why Don’t You?
Right from the start—at her first apparition at Fatima—Our Lady recruited YOUNG children for what we might consider to be a MAN’S role. “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners?” When the three children agreed, Our Lady continued: “Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort!”
Take some time to look, in some detail, at the lives of those three Fatima children after they accepted Our Lady’s invitation to pray and suffer for sinners and the offense of sin. We have become so “soft” and “sanitized”, that if our children were to start doing similar things, then people would question their sanity and call Social Services to investigate you and your family! These days, Our Lady would be taken to court and sued! Imagine the callousness and cruelty in telling a child to kiss the soil, drink muddy water and eat grass—which is what Our Lady commanded St. Bernadette to do at Lourdes!
The Three Seekers
What are we seeking in life? Are we really seeking God? Ourselves? Wealth? Comfort? Pleasure? The company and friendship of the world? Placing those things above God has brought us into the mess that we currently find ourselves in. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted: and your garments are moth-eaten! Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire! You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3). Those rich elitists, who are playing as gods in this world, take notice! Your money will not be your solution, but you dissolution! Your attraction will become your destruction!
Okay, perhaps the world is not Number One on our priority list; but are we seeking a bit of both, a bit of God and a bit of the world, are we trying to marry the two? “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24). You cannot seek God and the world, not seek to please God and the world. The world seeks to destroy Christ and God’s presence in the world. They are represented by Herod and the Pharisees; one during Christ’s youth, the others during Christ’s manhood. “Herod will seek the Child to destroy Him” (Matthew 2:13). “Jesus walked in Galilee; for He would not walk in Judea, because the Jews sought to kill Him” (John 7:1).
Everyone Seeks Christ, But For Different Reasons
In a certain sense, everyone is seeking Christ, but for different reasons: some truly seek Him to adore and serve Him; some seek Him as an insurance policy against Hell, but they do not love Him; others seek Him in the hope that He might serve them, or do something for them; others seek Him out of curiosity; others seek Him to destroy Him. “Why seek you to kill Me?” (John 7:20). “You seek to kill Me, because My word has no place in you” (John 8:37).
The three wise men, the Magi or the three kings, though pagans, sought Him in all sincerity. They were rich, they were wise and they sought Him who is called the Eternal Wisdom. They did not let their riches get in the way, they did not let their worldly wisdom get in the way. They risked life and limb to personally go in search of the greatest treasure and wisest Being in the whole universe! “And many peoples, and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem” (Zacharias 8:22). These were pagans, we are Catholics! How much more sincerely and effectively should we not be seeking Christ! In the season of Christmas, how many are still seeking Christ, thinking about Christ, getting to know Christ better, drawing closer to Christ? Whom do we seek? In all honesty. “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that does good, no not one!” (Psalm 52:3-4).
Seeking Solutions From Jesus Through Mary
Seeking solutions requires the seeking of God and Our Lady, whom God has appointed as the solution provider for our age. As Our Lady herself said at Fatima: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary … because only she can help you!” (August 1917). At Akita, in 1973, she added: “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.”
Our Lady is inseparable from her Son. Just as the famous saying—“Ubi Petrus, ibi ecclesia!”—expounds the truth of “Where Peter is, there too is the Church!”, likewise could we coin the phrase—“Ubi Maria, ibi Jesus!”—expounding an equal truth of “Where Mary is, there too is her Son!” We read in Holy Scripture that when the three kings or wise men arrived in Bethlehem, “entering into the house, they found the Child with Mary His Mother” (Matthew 2:11). This inseparability is again shown in the angel’s message to St. Joseph. When the three kings “were departed, behold an angel of the Lord appeared in sleep to Joseph, saying: ‘Arise, and take the Child and His Mother, and flee into Egypt!’” (Matthew 2:13). The next verse once again repeats this inseparability: “Who arose, and took the Child and His mother by night, and retired into Egypt” (Matthew 2:14). Once the danger had passed and Herod had died, this inseparability is once more seen in the angel’s message to St. Joseph: “Arise, and take the Child and His Mother, and go into the land of Israel. For they are dead that sought the life of the Child!” (Matthew 2:20). St. Joseph’s obedience is noted once again in repeating this inseparability: “Who arose, and took the Child and His Mother, and came into the land of Israel” (Matthew 2:21).
Hence, as the three kings sought the Christ Child and found “the Child with Mary His Mother”, so too must we seek the Christ Child’s help and we will find Him through and with Mary His Mother. Hence, too, the phrase: “To Jesus through Mary!”
This idea and truth was well-expounded by St. Louis de Montfort: “The power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel—that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children—whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But in return for this they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.”
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be “like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful” Mary to pierce her enemies. (Ps. 126:4). They shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body … They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High.
“They shall be the true apostles of the latter times … In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior. These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious, the idolaters and the Mahometans. But when and how shall this be? God alone knows!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The Three Gifts of the Three Kings
Notice that in the above quote of St. Louis de Montfort, which describes the apostles of the latter times, he writes: “They shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body.” This brings us to the three gifts, brought by the three kings or wise men, for Our Lord in Bethlehem. The gifts were gold, frankincense and myrrh. These gifts have an eternal significance and preach an eternal lesson—a lesson that we need to especially note and put into practice in our present day.
The Need For Gold
Today, as the financial markets are on the verge of collapse, there is much of talk of returning to the “gold standard” which guarantees a nation’s true wealth. People are being told to stock up on gold. Gold stands at the top of the mountain of precious metals, just as God stands above all creatures. Gold is a symbol of both God and Charity, which is appropriate, since Holy Scripture tells us that “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). Charity is defined primarily as a love of God. The high esteem and love of gold, symbolizes or represents the high esteem and love that we must have for God. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30). “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you. Abide in My love!” (John 15:9).
The entire 25th chapter of the Book of Exodus, describes the commands of God that the things made for His worship be made of gold. “And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Frame an ark of setim wood, and thou shalt overlay it with the purest gold within and without. And over it thou shalt make a golden crown round about. And four golden rings, which thou shall put at the four corners of the ark. Thou shalt also make bars of setim wood, and shalt overlay them with gold.
Thou shalt make also a propitiatory of the purest gold … Thou shalt make also two cherubims of beaten gold … Thou shalt make a table also of setim wood and thou shalt overlay it with the purest gold: and thou shalt make to it a golden ledge round about. And to the ledge itself a polished crown and over the same another little golden crown. Thou shalt prepare also four golden rings … Thou shalt prepare also dishes, and bowls, censers, and cups of the purest gold … Thou shalt make also a candlestick of beaten work of the finest gold … And both the bowls and the branches shall be of the same beaten work of the purest gold. Thou shalt make also seven lamps … The snuffers also and where the snuffings shall be put out, shall be made of the purest gold. The whole weight of the candlestick with all the furniture thereof shall be a talent of the purest gold.’” (Exodus 25:10-39).
From this we can see that God loves gold—as we should love God! “Set aside with you first fruits to the Lord. Let everyone that is willing and hath a ready heart, offer them to the Lord: gold, and silver” (Exodus 35:5). “Therefore we offer as gifts to the Lord what gold every one of us could find” (Numbers 31:50).
However, just as we can love ourselves above God, we can also love gold above God. Whereas gold can undoubtedly do much good, it can also bring about evils and even damnation. “The idols of the Gentiles are silver and gold, the works of men’s hands” (Psalm 134:15). “You have seen their abominations and filth, that is to say, their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which they worshipped!” (Deuteronomy 29:17). “For gold and silver have destroyed many, and have reached even to the heart of kings, and perverted them” (Ecclesiasticus 8:3). “Many have been brought to fall for gold, and the beauty thereof has been their ruin!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:6). “You shall not make gods of silver, nor shall you make to yourselves gods of gold!” (Exodus 20:23). “Their silver shall be cast forth, and their gold shall become a dunghill. Their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the Lord!” (Ezechiel 7:19). “Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted … Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you! … You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
“Health of the soul in holiness is better than all gold!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:15). That health of soul is obtained when we do as we are told: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30). “As gold is tried by fire in the furnace: so the Lord tries the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3). “As gold in the furnace He hath proved them” (Wisdom 3:6). “He knows my way, and has tried me as gold that passes through the fire!” (Job 23:10).
Without that love of God in our hearts, WE ARE NOTHING! “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
If we are to find solutions to the problems that currently besiege us and the problems that threaten us in the near future, then we must first find the gold of charity. Without that charity, no matter what we may attempt and do, will be impotent and powerless and temporary.
The Need for Frankincense
The Catechism tells us that we were made to know, love and serve God. We cannot love what we do not know, and we won’t serve for long, or very well, those whom we do not love. This is very important when it comes to the service of God—for the service of God entails inescapable suffering (see below in the myrrh section). To be able to suffer and continue to love God, we need the frankincense of prayer. This king of incense is a symbol of prayer—for, as the liturgy says, “Let my prayer ascend like incense in Thy sight, O Lord!” which is based upon Holy Scripture: “And the smoke of the incense of the prayers of the saints ascended up before God” (Apocalypse 8:4).
Prayer, if you like, is the air that we breathe. Stop breathing and you are in big trouble. Stop praying and you are in even bigger trouble. This is why Our Lord Himself said: “that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1), while St. Paul adds: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17).
St Augustine states “What is more excellent than prayer? What is more useful and profitable? What is sweeter and more delicious? What is higher and more exalted in the whole scheme of our Christian religion?” Pope Celestine, in a decree dealing with prayer says: “I know nothing better to say to you than what my predecessor Zozimus said: ‘What time is there in which we have no need of God?’ None. Therefore at all times, and in all cases, in all affairs we need to have recourse to Him by prayer and crave His favor. For it is a great pride for a weak and miserable man to presume anything by himself.”
St. Thomas, writing of prayer, says that what God decided from all eternity to grant us by His Divine Providence, He will give it to us by means of prayer, and on this depends the deliverance, salvation, conversion and cure of many souls and the progress and perfection of others. God has ruled that Matrimony begets children. Ploughing and sowing brings an abundance of crops. Prayer brings gifts and graces to the world.
This is precisely what Our Lord means, when He says: “Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and it shall be opened to you. For everyone that asks receives, and he that seeks finds, and the door shall be opened to him that knocked” (Matthew 7:7).
St. Augustine says that prayer is the key of Heaven that fits all the gates of Heaven and all the treasure chests of God. Elsewhere he says that what bread is to the body, prayer is to the soul. And “He knows how to live well, who knows how to pray well.” It could also be said: “He who prays badly, lives badly!” Likewise, “He who prays well, suffers well—but he who prays badly, suffers badly!” This leads us into the opinion of St. Augustine, looking at the fate of the two thieves suffering and dying alongside Christ on Calvary—which causes St. Augustine to say: “The same crosses lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell!” A lot of that comes down to how much and how well we pray—besides how much we love God.
Frankincense, also called olibanum, is an aromatic resin obtained from trees of the genus Boswellia, particularly Boswellia Sacra. The English word is derived from Old French “franc encens” (i.e., high quality incense) and is used in incense and perfumes. So we see that there is “incense” and “frankincense” with frankincense being high quality incense. The same applies to our prayers: there are prayers that are “said” and there are prayers that are “prayed”. The difference is what Our Lord Himself spoke of: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8).
Frankincense is tapped from the scraggly but hardy trees by slashing the bark, which is called striping, and allowing the exuded resin to bleed out and harden. These hardened resins are called tears. The aroma from these tears are more valuable for their presumed healing abilities and are also said to have superior qualities for religious ritual. When the trunk is slashed or tapped, the resin weeps or oozes out like tears falling from the eyes and then hardens into nuggets of pure frankincense, called tears, after a few months. Here we see the need to pray with all our heart, to have our heart slashed, wounded and pierced with tribulation and affliction, just like Our Lord’s heart was pierced on the Cross, and tears of blood and water wept forth form it. As the Archangel Raphael said to Tobias: “When thou didst pray with tears … I offered thy prayer to the Lord!” (Tobias 12:12). “Melchisedech, who in the days of his flesh, with a strong cry and tears, offering up prayers and supplications to him that was able to save him from death, was heard for his reverence” (Hebrews 5:6-7). “And immediately the father of the boy crying out, with tears said: ‘I do believe, Lord! Help my unbelief!’” (Mark 9:23).
The Need for Myrrh
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: “Thy ceaseless offering, however, must be love, which is the gold; continual prayer, which is the incense; and the patient acceptance of labors and true mortifications, which is the myrrh.” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, The Incarnation).
The name Myrrh is rooted in the Aramaic word for “bitter.” Mar, Mor, Myrrh. Some associate the name Mary, Miriam, Mariam to meaning the bitter of the sea, froth of the sea? For in Latin, both “Mary” and “Sea” are spelt “Maria.”
What is Myrrh? It is a fragrant gum/resin obtained from certain trees, especially in the Near East, which is used as incense, perfume and medicine. Frankincense and myrrh were the antibiotics of the ancient world. Likewise, prayer (frankincense) and myrrh (suffering) are our spiritual anti-biotics that attack and kill the various viruses and bacteria of sin.
Myrrh is the aromatic resin extract of a number of small, thorny, stiff-branched tree with white flowers and plum-like fruit tree species of the genus Commiphora, which is an essential oil termed an oleoresin. Myrrh resin is a natural gum. It can also be ingested by mixing it with wine. The soldiers mixed Myrrh with wine and offered it on a sponge on the end a lance, for Jesus to drink as He was dying on the Cross, but Jesus refused it. It was meant to act as a painkiller, but Jesus did not want any painkillers, He wanted to suffer as much as He possibly could to prove His love for us. “And they gave Him to drink wine mingled with myrrh; but He took it not” (Mark 15:23).
To get Myrrh, the Myrrh tree must be first wounded, this is done with a knife or some other lance-like pointed object. This reminds us of Our Lord being pierced with the nails and the lance upon the cross. When a tree wound penetrates through the thin bark and into the sapwood, the tree bleeds a resin, just as Our Lord bled on the Tree of the Cross when his skin (the thin bark) was pierced. Myrrh gum, like frankincense, is such a resin. When people harvest myrrh, they wound the trees repeatedly to bleed them of the gum, just as Jesus was repeatedly wounded and bled. Myrrh gum is waxy, and coagulates quickly, as does blood. After the harvest, the gum becomes hard and glossy.
The rugged appearance of the Myrrh tree, together with its sharp thorny branches, cries out loud and clear the idea of suffering and mortification. Looking at its thorns, one is easily reminded of the crown of thorns that was forced upon the Sacred Head of Our Lord during His Passion.
We were born to suffer, we need to suffer, suffering is the test and touchstone of a Christian. “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me! … And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!’” (Luke 9:23; 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
The cross is the practical exam we must sit (or carry) and pass (but not pass-off to someone else) before we can be admitted into Heaven. Like every exam, some pass and some fail. In the exam for Heaven, quite a few people might the pass the theory, but most fail the practical. “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). Few are chosen because few choose to suffer and few choose to carry the cross. “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). That “strait way that leads to life” is the Way of the Cross. And many who do carry the cross—because they cannot avoid it—carry it more like the Bad Thief on Calvary (muttering and complaining) and not like the Good Thief (accepting and rejoicing).
“For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5). “For whom the Lord loveth, He chastises” (Hebrews 12:6).
Suffering should lead us to more prayer and better prayer. Suffering is a test of our love for God. “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). What better friend have we than God? What better friend than Christ? What better friend is there to die for? As the Way of Cross prayers remind us: “Jesus, You died for love of me—let me die for love of Thee!”
Article 14
Tuesday & Wednesday, January 7th & 8th
The Gifts that will Lead You to Heaven
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Tuesday & Wednesday, January 7th & 8th
The Gifts that will Lead You to Heaven
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
A Time of Gifts
The Christmas season―from December 25th to February 2nd―is a time of gifts. Usually, gifts express our love towards the person to whom we are giving the gift. Love is reciprocal―which means it is not a “one-way-street” but a “two-way-street”. We receive gifts and we give gifts. A “one-way-street” marriage―where one spouse selflessly does all the giving and the other spouse selfishly does all the taking―will not work. Love is a reciprocal give and take. It is the essence of love to be reciprocal. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that we ought to try and return the charity of others towards us by trying to give more than we have received. If this advice was always followed, then our levels of charity would quickly shoot through the roof!
God is the ultimate gift-giver. There is nobody―not even the greatest sinner in the world―who has not received gifts from the abundant generosity of God. “Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). “From His fullness we all have received” (John 1:16). “To every one of us is given grace, according to the measure of the giving of Christ” (Ephesians 4:7). “By grace you are saved, and not of yourselves, for it is the gift of God!” (Ephesians 2:8). Our Lord associated love with giving when He said: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13) ― and He would lay down His life for both His friends and His enemies, to prove His love for us. Life is the most precious thing that we have―to give one’s life, is to give what is most precious. “In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down his life for us―and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16). “For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting! For God did not send His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:16-17).
The Greatest Gifts
Salvation is the greatest gift that we can receive―apart from God Himself. Damnation is the greatest loss we can experience―for it is the loss of the greatest gift. Salvation is attained by the gift of mercy: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). “God wants all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). Another underrated gift of God is the gift of Faith―for “without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6). “You are saved through Faith” (Ephesians 2:8) and the Baltimore Catechism tells us that “Faith is a supernatural gift of God, freely given” to us by God. “O if thou didst know the gift of God!” said Jesus (John 4:10). The more we know, the more grateful we would be! How grateful are we for the gifts of salvation, mercy and Faith? As Jesus said: “There is no one found to return and give glory to God!” (Luke 17:18).
Gift of the Three Theological Virtues
That doesn’t sound very exciting, does it? Three Theological Virtues―Faith, Hope and Charity. It’s not something to get your pulse racing, is it? Not something that makes you smack and lick your lips! Yet these are our keys to God in our relationship with God―for the theological virtues relate directly to God. “Let us have on the breastplate of Faith and Charity, and for a helmet the Hope of salvation!” (1 Thessalonians 5:8).
► FAITH: We must believe in God and believe what God has revealed: “Believe in the Lord your God, and you shall be secure!” (2 Paralipomenon 20:20) … “He that believes in Him is not judged. But he that does not believe, is already judged!” (John 3:18). “If thou believe, then thou shalt see the glory of God!” (John 11:40). “The Kingdom of God is at hand! Repent and believe the Gospel!” (Mark 1:15). “Believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God” (John 20:31). “He that shall believe in Him, shall not be confounded!” (1 Peter 2:6). “Confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved!” (Romans 10:9). “Know that you have eternal life, you who believe in the Name of the Son of God!” (1 John 5:13). “If you believe not, you shall die in your sin!” (John 8:24). “Ye that fear the Lord, believe Him and your reward shall not be made void! … Woe to them that are fainthearted, who believe not God ― they shall not be protected by Him!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:8; 2:15) … “for they believe for a while, and in time of temptation, they fall away!” (Luke 8:13).
► HOPE: We must hope, have trust and confidence in God: “For we are saved by hope” (Romans 8:24). We should hang on dearly to “hope of life everlasting” (Titus 3:7). Otherwise souls “are consumed without any hope … The ways of all that forget God, and the hope of the hypocrite, shall perish! … His hope shall fail him, and in the sight of all he shall be cast down!” (Job 7:6; 8:13; 40:28). “The eyes of the Lord are on them that fear Him and hope in His mercy” (Psalm 32:18). “The Lord takes pleasure in them that fear Him and in them that hope in His mercy” (Psalm 146:11). “Ye that fear the Lord, hope in Him―and mercy shall come to you!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:90. “God has not forsaken them that hope in Him!” (Judith 13:17). “The Lord is good to them that hope in Him” (Lamentations 3:25). “God is a shield to them that hope in Him” (Proverbs 30:5). “For their hope is in Him that saves them, and the eyes of God are upon them that love Him!” (Ecclesiasticus 34:15). “If thou lose hope, being weary in the day of distress, thy strength shall be diminished!” (Proverbs 24:10). “Hold fast to the hope set before us! … Let us hold fast to our hope without wavering! … Hope unto the end!” (Hebrews 6:18; 10:23; 6:11).
► CHARITY: We must love God above all things: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). These three Theological Virtues are like three keys that unlock the three locks on Heaven’s door. “Now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13) ― because “every one that loves, is born of God, and knows God. For God is Charity! … If we love one another, God abides in us … He that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in Him … and His charity is perfected in us” (1 John 4:7-8, 12, 16). We have become―mainly due to modern technology, especially the internet―a race of “know-alls” but we do little with that knowledge in the field of Charity: “Knowledge puffs up; but Charity edifies!” (1 Corinthians 8:1). Yes ― Faith is all about knowledge, and “without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6) ― “but Faith works by Charity” (Galatians 5:6). “Above all things have Charity!” (Colossians 3:14). “May your Charity more and more abound in knowledge!” (Philippians 1:9). “The Charity of Christ surpasses all knowledge” (Ephesians 3:19). “May Christ dwell by Faith in your hearts, being rooted and founded in Charity!” (Ephesians 3:17). “Let all your things be done in Charity!” (1 Corinthians 16:14).
Not Ornaments on the Mantelpiece
These three Theological Virtues are, in a certain sense, as inseparable as the three Persons of the Holy Trinity. Without Faith we cannot be saved. Without Hope we cannot be saved, for we fall into despair. Without Charity we cannot be saved, for Charity and Sanctifying Grace go hand-in-hand.
FAITH is the foundation of our relationship with God and our salvation. “You are saved through Faith … Being justified by Faith … Without Faith it is impossible to please God … It is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8; Romans 5:1; Hebrews 11:6). Yet the gift of our Faith is not meant to be an ornament gathering dust on the mantelpiece, but it is meant to be a tool by which we work out our salvation: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! … You believe that there is one God. You do well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26). “They, who believe in God, must be careful to excel in good works!” (Titus 3:8). “Unto you it is given for Christ, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for Him!” (Philippians 1:29).
The same can be said of the Theological Virtues of Hope and Charity―they have to be active and productive. They are not to be kept hidden in the drawer or closet of our soul. If Faith without works is dead, then Hope and Charity without works are dead. Our Lord indicated this when He criticized the Jews, saying: “This people honoureth Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me! And in vain do they worship Me!” (Matthew 15:8-9).
Likewise, HOPE has to exercise its muscle and sometimes tested so that it is made to hope against hope (Romans 4:18). “I have labored with crying; my jaws are become hoarse; my eyes have failed―whilst I hope in my God!” (Psalm 68:4). Hope is tested and strengthened by adversity and tribulation. “Thou art my hope in the day of affliction!” (Jeremias 17:17). “Do ye manfully and let your heart be strengthened, all ye that hope in the Lord!” (Psalm 30:25). “They that hope in the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall not be weary, they shall not faint!” (Isaias 40:31). Hope keeps us from discouragement; it sustains us during times of abandonment; it opens up our hearts in expectation of eternal life and salvation.
CHARITY is not meant to be a mere lip-love or lip-service, which Our Lord condemns as being hypocritical: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Let us not love in words, nor in tongue, but by deeds!” (1 John 3:18). Thus we say: “Actions speak louder than words!” This is what Our Lord means, when He says: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words … He that does not love Me, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24). Holy Scripture points out this practical or active side of Charity: “If any man says, I love God, and hates his brother―then he is a liar. For he that loves not his brother, whom he sees, how can he love God, Whom he sees not?” (1 John 4:20-21). “He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him? Let us not love in word, nor in tongue―but by deeds and in truth!” (1 John 3:17-18). “Charity is patient, is kind, Charity envies not, deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious, is not self-seeking, is not provoked to anger. Charity thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears with all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never fails―whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed.” (1 Corinthians 13:6-8). Unfortunately, as Our Lord prophesied of our days: “Because iniquity will abound, the charity of many shall grow cold!” (Matthew 24:12).
Knowledge Placed Above Charity!
Just as people have reversed the correct order in love of God and love of neighbor, so too have many relegated charity below knowledge, and placed knowledge on the throne. Today, many pride themselves on their knowledge and flaunt it at home, at work, in their social life and on the modern-day public square of ‘forums and blogs.’ But the passport to Heaven is not knowledge, but charity: “We know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffs up; but charity edifies” (1 Corinthians 8:1).
Knowledge without charity is useless: “And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:2). Knowledge [of good things] should lead to charity and love, for we cannot love what we do not know—but knowledge that fails to do so, is like a tree whose fruit never ripens and remains hard and bitter.
That is why the author of The Imitation of Christ, writes: “What good does it do to speak learnedly about the Trinity if, lacking humility, you displease the Trinity? Indeed it is not learning that makes a man holy and just, but a virtuous life makes him pleasing to God. I would rather feel contrition than know how to define it. For what would it profit us to know the whole Bible by heart and the principles of all the philosophers, if we live without grace and the love of God? Vanity of vanities and all is vanity, except to love God and serve Him alone” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 1).
“Every man naturally desires knowledge; but what good is knowledge without fear of God? Indeed a humble rustic, who serves God, is better than a proud intellectual, who neglects his soul to study the course of the stars. He who knows himself well, becomes mean in his own eyes and is not happy when praised by men. If I knew all things in the world and had not charity, what would it profit me, before God, Who will judge me by my deeds?
“Shun too great a desire for knowledge, for in it there is much fretting and delusion. Intellectuals like to appear learned and to be called wise. Yet there are many things the knowledge of which does little or no good to the soul, and he who concerns himself about other things than those which lead to salvation is very unwise. Many words do not satisfy the soul; but a good life eases the mind and a clean conscience inspires great trust in God” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 2).
“The more you know and the better you understand, the more severely will you be judged, unless your life is also the more holy. Do not be proud, therefore, because of your learning or skill. Rather, fear, because of the talent given you. If you think you know many things and understand them well enough, realize at the same time that there is much you do not know.
“Hence, do not affect wisdom, but admit your ignorance. Why prefer yourself to anyone else, when many are more learned, more cultured than you? If you wish to learn and appreciate something worthwhile, then love to be unknown and considered as nothing. Truly to know and despise self is the best and most perfect counsel. To think of oneself as nothing, and always to think well and highly of others is the best and most perfect wisdom” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 2).
The Foundation of Virtue
Everything has a foundation. Everything rests upon or stands upon something else. A building needs a foundation―and the same is true for virtues. What is the foundation of virtues? It is the virtue of humility. “Perfect humility is the fruit of perfect charity. The more we love God, the less we value ourselves.” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility). In chapter 63 of The Dialogue, St. Catherine of Siena says: “Every perfection and every virtue proceeds from charity, and charity is nourished by humility, which results from the knowledge and holy hatred of self.” In chapter 4, God speaks to the saint and says to her: “In self-knowledge, then, thou wilt humble thyself, seeing that, in thyself, thou dost not even exist; for thy very being is derived from Me!” Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange explains that “A soul cannot have lofty charity without profound humility, just as the highest branch of a tree rises toward Heaven in proportion as its roots plunge more deeply into the soil” (Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Saint Augustine famously called humility the foundation of all other virtues: “Humility is the foundation of all the other virtues hence, in the soul in which this virtue does not exist there cannot be any other virtue except in mere appearance.” Without humility, it is difficult to truly cultivate other virtues. “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart,” says Our Lord (Matthew 11:29). Our highest teacher and lawgiver, Jesus Christ, urged us to learn the virtue of humility. For whoever cultivates this marvelous virtue will quickly arrive at spiritual perfection. But without humility, no amount of study of Sacred Scripture or theology, nor any efforts at good works are able to achieve anything lasting. In vain are all our labors unless they are accompanied by humility.
The very first lesson of Christ is, therefore, humility of heart; for this is the foundation of all virtues and indispensable to the attainment of eternal salvation. Humility was a particular virtue of Christ; it is therefore feared by the devil and despised by the world. But those who hold it firmly in their hearts are pleasing to God and His angels. Such people will have a secure and blessed passage from this world to the next in accordance with Christ’s words: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:3).
Pride is the opposite of humility. Humility was Christ’s virtue―pride is Satan’s ‘virtue’. Just as Christ said: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart” ― Satan says: “Learn of me, for I am proud of heart!” Pride is essentially self-love. The more pride we have, the more we love ourselves exaggeratedly. Pride makes us question the teachings of God, the Church and our Faith. Pride makes us fall into despair, by making us think that we beyond the mercy of God, and preventing us from humbly admitting and confessing our sins. Pride makes us channel our love away from God and onto ourselves. As Holy Scripture says: “Pride is the beginning of all sin. He that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions and it shall ruin him in the end!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Humility is the foundation of all virtue and pride is the beginning of all sin. Without humility, there is neither salvation nor real virtue. Nor can any action done without humility be pleasing to God. Any work or deed—no matter how noble or persevering—achieves nothing for the soul if it is motivated or accompanied by pride and arrogance.
Without humility, any aspirations or pretensions to sanctity remain empty and fruitless. External piety and uprightness mean nothing unless accompanied by internal humility. The person who seeks to gain the approval of others and being thought of as great―becomes more and more distant from God. Everyone who is proud becomes impure in the sight of God. The more pride raises up one’s own self-estimation, the more liable one becomes to the judgment of God. The one who climbs high in pride, raises himself up for an inevitable fall: “Pride goes before destruction; and the spirit is lifted up before a fall!” (Proverbs 16:18). The humble person, however, who keeps his feet firmly planted on the ground, will stand securely.
We see those truths epitomized in Our Lord’s parable about the Pharisee and the Publican: “And to some who trusted in themselves as being just and despised others, Jesus spoke this parable: ‘Two men went up into the temple to pray―the one a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus within himself: “O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers―as also is this Publican! I fast twice in a week. I give tithes of all that I possess.” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: “O God, be merciful to me a sinner!” I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other―because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled; and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
The Greater the Virtue, the Greater the Sin
The more important or the more valuable something is, then the more serious or more consequential is breaking or damage that is done to that thing. Burning a piece of paper is less serious and consequential than burning a $100 bill (which is also a piece of paper). Killing a person is more serious and consequential than killing an animal. Hatred shown toward God is worse than hatred shown toward a human being. Since the three Theological Virtues are above all other virtues in importance―since their object/target/end/goal is God Himself―therefore it stands to reason that sins against those virtues are among the greatest sins that we can commit.
Degrees of Charity
► The first or lowest level of charity is that of keeping the Commandments of God. That is a pretty simple and brutal test of a raw and basic charity. Our Lord Himself requires this: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15). The contrary is shown by the quote: “Because iniquity has abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12), meaning that sin destroys charity: venial sin keeps weakening it more and more; while mortal sins destroys it entirely. The ship of Faith may well be afloat, but one of its engines (venial sin) or all of it engines (mortal sin) are down and out of action. This very first level of charity, avoiding mortal sin, brings us into the service of God as His servants. “For this is the charity of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not heavy” (1 John 5:3).
► The second or middle level of charity is one where we advance from the role of a servant with servile fear (fear of God’s punishments) to a more elevated position of a friend with a love of friendship. Our Lord invites to this position saying: “ I will not now call you servants―for the servant knows not what his lord does. But I have called you friends―because all things whatsoever I have heard of My Father, I have made known to you” (John 15:15). This second level is where fear of God gives way to a delight about God, which is the result of an increasing friendship with God, which, in turn, can only be possible and is proportionate to a decrease in sin, which offends God and works against any potential friendship.
At this second level, we increasingly seek to know and fulfill the Will of God; our self-will is being mortified and gradually put to death. “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Here the soul, not only avoids mortal sin, but is now seeking to avoid all deliberate venial sin. The seed of this quote is now planted in us, at the beginning of our friendship with Christ, but it has to grow to maturity and perfection. Since Jesus is becoming our Friend, we are increasingly trying to lay down our own will and accept His Will. At first, it is difficult and we do so with pain and reluctance; but practice, with the aid of grace, makes perfect if we persevere.
► The third and highest level of charity is expressed by the words of Scripture: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” This takes charity to a higher level, to a perfect level, like a seed that grows throughout all the varying stages to becoming a mature and fruit-bearing tree. This level of charity now seeks to prove its love for God by willingly and joyfully suffering anything and everything that God wishes; nay, even more, even going out to look for opportunities to be able suffer and die to self out of a love of God. At this level, there is no more sin—neither mortal, not venial—for the pull of God is becoming too great. Now it is mere imperfections that are looked upon with the same horror that was once given to sin.
In a nutshell, very briefly stated, those are the levels of charity that we MUST pass through to get to Heaven. If we refuse to be inflamed by charity here below, then our charity will have to be heated-up in the fires of Purgatory. For God is charity and we cannot enter Haven until our charity has reached the heights required and has been perfected. God is charity. God is love. He burns with love and wishes us to burn with love: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). And once kindled, it will burn away both the guilt and the temporal punishment dues to our sins: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) ... “But before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves: for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) ... “Wherefore I say to thee: Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47).
The Christmas season―from December 25th to February 2nd―is a time of gifts. Usually, gifts express our love towards the person to whom we are giving the gift. Love is reciprocal―which means it is not a “one-way-street” but a “two-way-street”. We receive gifts and we give gifts. A “one-way-street” marriage―where one spouse selflessly does all the giving and the other spouse selfishly does all the taking―will not work. Love is a reciprocal give and take. It is the essence of love to be reciprocal. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that we ought to try and return the charity of others towards us by trying to give more than we have received. If this advice was always followed, then our levels of charity would quickly shoot through the roof!
God is the ultimate gift-giver. There is nobody―not even the greatest sinner in the world―who has not received gifts from the abundant generosity of God. “Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). “From His fullness we all have received” (John 1:16). “To every one of us is given grace, according to the measure of the giving of Christ” (Ephesians 4:7). “By grace you are saved, and not of yourselves, for it is the gift of God!” (Ephesians 2:8). Our Lord associated love with giving when He said: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13) ― and He would lay down His life for both His friends and His enemies, to prove His love for us. Life is the most precious thing that we have―to give one’s life, is to give what is most precious. “In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down his life for us―and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16). “For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting! For God did not send His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:16-17).
The Greatest Gifts
Salvation is the greatest gift that we can receive―apart from God Himself. Damnation is the greatest loss we can experience―for it is the loss of the greatest gift. Salvation is attained by the gift of mercy: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). “God wants all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). Another underrated gift of God is the gift of Faith―for “without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6). “You are saved through Faith” (Ephesians 2:8) and the Baltimore Catechism tells us that “Faith is a supernatural gift of God, freely given” to us by God. “O if thou didst know the gift of God!” said Jesus (John 4:10). The more we know, the more grateful we would be! How grateful are we for the gifts of salvation, mercy and Faith? As Jesus said: “There is no one found to return and give glory to God!” (Luke 17:18).
Gift of the Three Theological Virtues
That doesn’t sound very exciting, does it? Three Theological Virtues―Faith, Hope and Charity. It’s not something to get your pulse racing, is it? Not something that makes you smack and lick your lips! Yet these are our keys to God in our relationship with God―for the theological virtues relate directly to God. “Let us have on the breastplate of Faith and Charity, and for a helmet the Hope of salvation!” (1 Thessalonians 5:8).
► FAITH: We must believe in God and believe what God has revealed: “Believe in the Lord your God, and you shall be secure!” (2 Paralipomenon 20:20) … “He that believes in Him is not judged. But he that does not believe, is already judged!” (John 3:18). “If thou believe, then thou shalt see the glory of God!” (John 11:40). “The Kingdom of God is at hand! Repent and believe the Gospel!” (Mark 1:15). “Believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God” (John 20:31). “He that shall believe in Him, shall not be confounded!” (1 Peter 2:6). “Confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved!” (Romans 10:9). “Know that you have eternal life, you who believe in the Name of the Son of God!” (1 John 5:13). “If you believe not, you shall die in your sin!” (John 8:24). “Ye that fear the Lord, believe Him and your reward shall not be made void! … Woe to them that are fainthearted, who believe not God ― they shall not be protected by Him!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:8; 2:15) … “for they believe for a while, and in time of temptation, they fall away!” (Luke 8:13).
► HOPE: We must hope, have trust and confidence in God: “For we are saved by hope” (Romans 8:24). We should hang on dearly to “hope of life everlasting” (Titus 3:7). Otherwise souls “are consumed without any hope … The ways of all that forget God, and the hope of the hypocrite, shall perish! … His hope shall fail him, and in the sight of all he shall be cast down!” (Job 7:6; 8:13; 40:28). “The eyes of the Lord are on them that fear Him and hope in His mercy” (Psalm 32:18). “The Lord takes pleasure in them that fear Him and in them that hope in His mercy” (Psalm 146:11). “Ye that fear the Lord, hope in Him―and mercy shall come to you!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:90. “God has not forsaken them that hope in Him!” (Judith 13:17). “The Lord is good to them that hope in Him” (Lamentations 3:25). “God is a shield to them that hope in Him” (Proverbs 30:5). “For their hope is in Him that saves them, and the eyes of God are upon them that love Him!” (Ecclesiasticus 34:15). “If thou lose hope, being weary in the day of distress, thy strength shall be diminished!” (Proverbs 24:10). “Hold fast to the hope set before us! … Let us hold fast to our hope without wavering! … Hope unto the end!” (Hebrews 6:18; 10:23; 6:11).
► CHARITY: We must love God above all things: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). These three Theological Virtues are like three keys that unlock the three locks on Heaven’s door. “Now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13) ― because “every one that loves, is born of God, and knows God. For God is Charity! … If we love one another, God abides in us … He that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in Him … and His charity is perfected in us” (1 John 4:7-8, 12, 16). We have become―mainly due to modern technology, especially the internet―a race of “know-alls” but we do little with that knowledge in the field of Charity: “Knowledge puffs up; but Charity edifies!” (1 Corinthians 8:1). Yes ― Faith is all about knowledge, and “without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6) ― “but Faith works by Charity” (Galatians 5:6). “Above all things have Charity!” (Colossians 3:14). “May your Charity more and more abound in knowledge!” (Philippians 1:9). “The Charity of Christ surpasses all knowledge” (Ephesians 3:19). “May Christ dwell by Faith in your hearts, being rooted and founded in Charity!” (Ephesians 3:17). “Let all your things be done in Charity!” (1 Corinthians 16:14).
Not Ornaments on the Mantelpiece
These three Theological Virtues are, in a certain sense, as inseparable as the three Persons of the Holy Trinity. Without Faith we cannot be saved. Without Hope we cannot be saved, for we fall into despair. Without Charity we cannot be saved, for Charity and Sanctifying Grace go hand-in-hand.
FAITH is the foundation of our relationship with God and our salvation. “You are saved through Faith … Being justified by Faith … Without Faith it is impossible to please God … It is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8; Romans 5:1; Hebrews 11:6). Yet the gift of our Faith is not meant to be an ornament gathering dust on the mantelpiece, but it is meant to be a tool by which we work out our salvation: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! … You believe that there is one God. You do well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26). “They, who believe in God, must be careful to excel in good works!” (Titus 3:8). “Unto you it is given for Christ, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for Him!” (Philippians 1:29).
The same can be said of the Theological Virtues of Hope and Charity―they have to be active and productive. They are not to be kept hidden in the drawer or closet of our soul. If Faith without works is dead, then Hope and Charity without works are dead. Our Lord indicated this when He criticized the Jews, saying: “This people honoureth Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me! And in vain do they worship Me!” (Matthew 15:8-9).
Likewise, HOPE has to exercise its muscle and sometimes tested so that it is made to hope against hope (Romans 4:18). “I have labored with crying; my jaws are become hoarse; my eyes have failed―whilst I hope in my God!” (Psalm 68:4). Hope is tested and strengthened by adversity and tribulation. “Thou art my hope in the day of affliction!” (Jeremias 17:17). “Do ye manfully and let your heart be strengthened, all ye that hope in the Lord!” (Psalm 30:25). “They that hope in the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall not be weary, they shall not faint!” (Isaias 40:31). Hope keeps us from discouragement; it sustains us during times of abandonment; it opens up our hearts in expectation of eternal life and salvation.
CHARITY is not meant to be a mere lip-love or lip-service, which Our Lord condemns as being hypocritical: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Let us not love in words, nor in tongue, but by deeds!” (1 John 3:18). Thus we say: “Actions speak louder than words!” This is what Our Lord means, when He says: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words … He that does not love Me, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24). Holy Scripture points out this practical or active side of Charity: “If any man says, I love God, and hates his brother―then he is a liar. For he that loves not his brother, whom he sees, how can he love God, Whom he sees not?” (1 John 4:20-21). “He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him? Let us not love in word, nor in tongue―but by deeds and in truth!” (1 John 3:17-18). “Charity is patient, is kind, Charity envies not, deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious, is not self-seeking, is not provoked to anger. Charity thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears with all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never fails―whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed.” (1 Corinthians 13:6-8). Unfortunately, as Our Lord prophesied of our days: “Because iniquity will abound, the charity of many shall grow cold!” (Matthew 24:12).
Knowledge Placed Above Charity!
Just as people have reversed the correct order in love of God and love of neighbor, so too have many relegated charity below knowledge, and placed knowledge on the throne. Today, many pride themselves on their knowledge and flaunt it at home, at work, in their social life and on the modern-day public square of ‘forums and blogs.’ But the passport to Heaven is not knowledge, but charity: “We know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffs up; but charity edifies” (1 Corinthians 8:1).
Knowledge without charity is useless: “And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:2). Knowledge [of good things] should lead to charity and love, for we cannot love what we do not know—but knowledge that fails to do so, is like a tree whose fruit never ripens and remains hard and bitter.
That is why the author of The Imitation of Christ, writes: “What good does it do to speak learnedly about the Trinity if, lacking humility, you displease the Trinity? Indeed it is not learning that makes a man holy and just, but a virtuous life makes him pleasing to God. I would rather feel contrition than know how to define it. For what would it profit us to know the whole Bible by heart and the principles of all the philosophers, if we live without grace and the love of God? Vanity of vanities and all is vanity, except to love God and serve Him alone” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 1).
“Every man naturally desires knowledge; but what good is knowledge without fear of God? Indeed a humble rustic, who serves God, is better than a proud intellectual, who neglects his soul to study the course of the stars. He who knows himself well, becomes mean in his own eyes and is not happy when praised by men. If I knew all things in the world and had not charity, what would it profit me, before God, Who will judge me by my deeds?
“Shun too great a desire for knowledge, for in it there is much fretting and delusion. Intellectuals like to appear learned and to be called wise. Yet there are many things the knowledge of which does little or no good to the soul, and he who concerns himself about other things than those which lead to salvation is very unwise. Many words do not satisfy the soul; but a good life eases the mind and a clean conscience inspires great trust in God” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 2).
“The more you know and the better you understand, the more severely will you be judged, unless your life is also the more holy. Do not be proud, therefore, because of your learning or skill. Rather, fear, because of the talent given you. If you think you know many things and understand them well enough, realize at the same time that there is much you do not know.
“Hence, do not affect wisdom, but admit your ignorance. Why prefer yourself to anyone else, when many are more learned, more cultured than you? If you wish to learn and appreciate something worthwhile, then love to be unknown and considered as nothing. Truly to know and despise self is the best and most perfect counsel. To think of oneself as nothing, and always to think well and highly of others is the best and most perfect wisdom” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 2).
The Foundation of Virtue
Everything has a foundation. Everything rests upon or stands upon something else. A building needs a foundation―and the same is true for virtues. What is the foundation of virtues? It is the virtue of humility. “Perfect humility is the fruit of perfect charity. The more we love God, the less we value ourselves.” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility). In chapter 63 of The Dialogue, St. Catherine of Siena says: “Every perfection and every virtue proceeds from charity, and charity is nourished by humility, which results from the knowledge and holy hatred of self.” In chapter 4, God speaks to the saint and says to her: “In self-knowledge, then, thou wilt humble thyself, seeing that, in thyself, thou dost not even exist; for thy very being is derived from Me!” Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange explains that “A soul cannot have lofty charity without profound humility, just as the highest branch of a tree rises toward Heaven in proportion as its roots plunge more deeply into the soil” (Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Saint Augustine famously called humility the foundation of all other virtues: “Humility is the foundation of all the other virtues hence, in the soul in which this virtue does not exist there cannot be any other virtue except in mere appearance.” Without humility, it is difficult to truly cultivate other virtues. “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart,” says Our Lord (Matthew 11:29). Our highest teacher and lawgiver, Jesus Christ, urged us to learn the virtue of humility. For whoever cultivates this marvelous virtue will quickly arrive at spiritual perfection. But without humility, no amount of study of Sacred Scripture or theology, nor any efforts at good works are able to achieve anything lasting. In vain are all our labors unless they are accompanied by humility.
The very first lesson of Christ is, therefore, humility of heart; for this is the foundation of all virtues and indispensable to the attainment of eternal salvation. Humility was a particular virtue of Christ; it is therefore feared by the devil and despised by the world. But those who hold it firmly in their hearts are pleasing to God and His angels. Such people will have a secure and blessed passage from this world to the next in accordance with Christ’s words: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:3).
Pride is the opposite of humility. Humility was Christ’s virtue―pride is Satan’s ‘virtue’. Just as Christ said: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart” ― Satan says: “Learn of me, for I am proud of heart!” Pride is essentially self-love. The more pride we have, the more we love ourselves exaggeratedly. Pride makes us question the teachings of God, the Church and our Faith. Pride makes us fall into despair, by making us think that we beyond the mercy of God, and preventing us from humbly admitting and confessing our sins. Pride makes us channel our love away from God and onto ourselves. As Holy Scripture says: “Pride is the beginning of all sin. He that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions and it shall ruin him in the end!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Humility is the foundation of all virtue and pride is the beginning of all sin. Without humility, there is neither salvation nor real virtue. Nor can any action done without humility be pleasing to God. Any work or deed—no matter how noble or persevering—achieves nothing for the soul if it is motivated or accompanied by pride and arrogance.
Without humility, any aspirations or pretensions to sanctity remain empty and fruitless. External piety and uprightness mean nothing unless accompanied by internal humility. The person who seeks to gain the approval of others and being thought of as great―becomes more and more distant from God. Everyone who is proud becomes impure in the sight of God. The more pride raises up one’s own self-estimation, the more liable one becomes to the judgment of God. The one who climbs high in pride, raises himself up for an inevitable fall: “Pride goes before destruction; and the spirit is lifted up before a fall!” (Proverbs 16:18). The humble person, however, who keeps his feet firmly planted on the ground, will stand securely.
We see those truths epitomized in Our Lord’s parable about the Pharisee and the Publican: “And to some who trusted in themselves as being just and despised others, Jesus spoke this parable: ‘Two men went up into the temple to pray―the one a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus within himself: “O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers―as also is this Publican! I fast twice in a week. I give tithes of all that I possess.” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: “O God, be merciful to me a sinner!” I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other―because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled; and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
The Greater the Virtue, the Greater the Sin
The more important or the more valuable something is, then the more serious or more consequential is breaking or damage that is done to that thing. Burning a piece of paper is less serious and consequential than burning a $100 bill (which is also a piece of paper). Killing a person is more serious and consequential than killing an animal. Hatred shown toward God is worse than hatred shown toward a human being. Since the three Theological Virtues are above all other virtues in importance―since their object/target/end/goal is God Himself―therefore it stands to reason that sins against those virtues are among the greatest sins that we can commit.
Degrees of Charity
► The first or lowest level of charity is that of keeping the Commandments of God. That is a pretty simple and brutal test of a raw and basic charity. Our Lord Himself requires this: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15). The contrary is shown by the quote: “Because iniquity has abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12), meaning that sin destroys charity: venial sin keeps weakening it more and more; while mortal sins destroys it entirely. The ship of Faith may well be afloat, but one of its engines (venial sin) or all of it engines (mortal sin) are down and out of action. This very first level of charity, avoiding mortal sin, brings us into the service of God as His servants. “For this is the charity of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not heavy” (1 John 5:3).
► The second or middle level of charity is one where we advance from the role of a servant with servile fear (fear of God’s punishments) to a more elevated position of a friend with a love of friendship. Our Lord invites to this position saying: “ I will not now call you servants―for the servant knows not what his lord does. But I have called you friends―because all things whatsoever I have heard of My Father, I have made known to you” (John 15:15). This second level is where fear of God gives way to a delight about God, which is the result of an increasing friendship with God, which, in turn, can only be possible and is proportionate to a decrease in sin, which offends God and works against any potential friendship.
At this second level, we increasingly seek to know and fulfill the Will of God; our self-will is being mortified and gradually put to death. “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Here the soul, not only avoids mortal sin, but is now seeking to avoid all deliberate venial sin. The seed of this quote is now planted in us, at the beginning of our friendship with Christ, but it has to grow to maturity and perfection. Since Jesus is becoming our Friend, we are increasingly trying to lay down our own will and accept His Will. At first, it is difficult and we do so with pain and reluctance; but practice, with the aid of grace, makes perfect if we persevere.
► The third and highest level of charity is expressed by the words of Scripture: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” This takes charity to a higher level, to a perfect level, like a seed that grows throughout all the varying stages to becoming a mature and fruit-bearing tree. This level of charity now seeks to prove its love for God by willingly and joyfully suffering anything and everything that God wishes; nay, even more, even going out to look for opportunities to be able suffer and die to self out of a love of God. At this level, there is no more sin—neither mortal, not venial—for the pull of God is becoming too great. Now it is mere imperfections that are looked upon with the same horror that was once given to sin.
In a nutshell, very briefly stated, those are the levels of charity that we MUST pass through to get to Heaven. If we refuse to be inflamed by charity here below, then our charity will have to be heated-up in the fires of Purgatory. For God is charity and we cannot enter Haven until our charity has reached the heights required and has been perfected. God is charity. God is love. He burns with love and wishes us to burn with love: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). And once kindled, it will burn away both the guilt and the temporal punishment dues to our sins: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) ... “But before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves: for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) ... “Wherefore I say to thee: Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47).
Article 13
Monday, January 6th, Feast of the Epiphany
The Epiphany―a Day of the Threedom of God
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday, January 6th, Feast of the Epiphany
The Epiphany―a Day of the Threedom of God
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Mystery of “Three”
“Three” seems to be a favorite number with God! We have the “three” Divine Persons of the Holy Trinity―Father, Son and Holy Ghost. We also have the “three” member of the Holy Family―Jesus, Mary and Joseph. We have the “three” Kings or Magi seeking Jesus―Balthasar, Caspar and Melchior. These kings bring “three” gifts for Christ―gold, frankincense and myrrh. Our Lord had “three” favorite Apostles―Peter, James and John. Our Lord’s public ministry is commonly held to have been around “three” years. At Our Lord’s death, there were “three” crosses on Calvary―those of the two thieves, and that of Jesus. Our Lord, after His death, would rise on the “third” day―having spent parts of Friday, Saturday and Sunday in the tomb. We have “three” theological virtues that guide all our relations with God―Faith, Hope and Charity. We have “three” sets of mysteries for the Holy Rosary―the Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious mysteries. We have the “three” Sacraments that leave an indelible mark upon the soul―Baptism, Confirmation and Holy Orders. We have the “three” Stages of the Spiritual Life, through which we must all pass on our journey to God and Heaven―the Way of Beginners; the Way of the Proficient; and the Way of the Perfect. Likewise, we all pass through the three stages of our physical existence―childhood, adolescence and adulthood. There are three immediate options facing us right after death―Heaven, Purgatory or Hell.
Out of all the wise men in the world, only THREE, the Magi, found the way that led to the narrow entrance of the cave at Bethlehem. Out of all the people in world, only THREE families were chosen by God (symbolizing Jesus) to join Noe (symbol of Joseph) and his wife (symbol of Mary) in the ark: they were his THREE sons (Sem, and Cham, and Japheth) and their THREE wives. “Noe, and Sem, and Cham, and Japheth his sons: his wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, went into the ark” (Genesis 7:13). Few found salvation back then, too! Again, we see wood play a large part in the salvation, since the ark was made of wood. God commanded that ark be THREE-hundred cubits long and thirty (THREE times ten) cubits high.
Coming back to today’s feast of the Epiphany, we have the encounter between the three wise pagans, the Magi, and the three Christians (Jesus, Mary and Joseph). That encounter in Bethlehem was a “watershed” or “stable-shed” moment in their lives. It must have been like a spiritual ‘baptism’ of sorts, when the seed of Faith was planted in their pagan souls. Our Lord had that effect on them at the very beginning of His life in Bethlehem, just as He would have an effect on the Good Thief on the cross at the end of His life on Calvary. The Alpha and the Omega. The beginning and the end. The one thing in common was that He was laid out on wood: in Bethlehem the wood of the manger or the crib, on Calvary on the wood of the cross.
The Mystery of the Three Gifts
The THREE gifts given to Him on the wood of the manger by the THREE Magi, would be reflected on Calvary, where THREE men were being crucified: Jesus and the two thieves. Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Thy ceaseless offer, however, must be love, which is the gold; continual prayer, which is the incense; and the patient acceptance of labors and true mortifications, which is the myrrh. All that thou dost for the Lord, thou should offer up to Him with fervent affection and promptitude, without negligence or fear; for negligent works, and those not enlivened by love, are not an acceptable sacrifice in the eyes of his Majesty” (The Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, The Incarnation).
(1) The GOLD, symbolizing charity, would be the charity that Jesus showed in laying down His innocent life for us miserable and ungrateful sinners: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Well, actually, He did show an even greater love than that, for He laid down His life, not only for His friends, but also for His enemies! Gold is a symbol of charity and God Himself is charity—as St. John tells us: “He that loves not, knows not God: for God is charity ... And we have known, and have believed the charity, which God has for us. God is charity: and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:8; 4:16). We should love this ‘Gold’ above all things: “Jesus said: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment!’” (Matthew 22:37-38).
Today, we love another gold! The gold of the world, not the gold of Heaven. Today, we can say that gold no longer stands for God, but it stands for materialism. Man has sold his soul for gold, like Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of soup (Genesis 25:29-34). Earthly gold brings nothing but trouble to those who set their hearts upon it: “You shall not make gods of silver, nor shall you make to yourselves gods of gold” (Exodus 20:23). Our Lord warned us: “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
(2) The FRANKINCENSE, symbolizing prayer, would be the prayer of Christ on the Cross, being offered up like incense to His Father in Heaven, begging mercy for both His friends and His enemies: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34). St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Moreover, they [the three kings] offer gifts in keeping with Christ’s greatness: ... they offer up incense as to God, because it is used in the Divine Sacrifice ... We offer God incense, which signifies fervor in prayer, if our constant prayers mount up to God with an odor of sweetness.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica). King David prayed to God: “Let my prayer be directed as incense in thy sight” (Psalm 140:2).
The Frankincense reminds us of the Offertory of the Mass, for the priest incenses the gifts during the Offertory and formerly said the following prayer:”Through the intercession of Blessed Michael the Archangel, standing at the right hand of the altar of incense, and of all His elect may the Lord vouchsafe to bless this incense and to receive it in the odor of sweetness. May this incense blessed by You, arise before You, O Lord, and may Your mercy come down upon us Let my prayer, O Lord, come like incense before You; the lifting up of my hands, like the evening sacrifice.”
Frankincense is an aromatic resin obtained from trees of the genus Boswellia, particularly Boswellia Sacra. This is the pinnacle of all incense—the “top of the line” so to speak. The English word is derived from the medieval or Old French “franc encens” (i.e., high quality incense) and is used in incense and perfumes. So we see that there is “incense” and “frankincense” with frankincense being high quality incense. The same applies to our prayers: there are prayers that are “said” and there are prayers that are “prayed”. The difference is what Our Lord Himself spoke of: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). Our Lord wants fervor and this is fervor is implied in His words when He states: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). He wants our hearts to be on fire (the gold of Charity purified in the furnace) so that the incense of prayer will produce a prayer worthy of God. Yet just as there is prayer from the lips and prayer from the heart, so too is there incense and frankincense.
Boswellia Sacra trees are considered unusual for their ability to grow in environments so unforgiving that they sometimes grow out of solid rock. The initial means of attachment to the rock is unknown but is accomplished by a bulbous disk-like swelling of the trunk. This growth prevents it from being ripped from the rock during violent storms. Likewise, if we are a prayerful tree, we will survive in difficult situations. But like Our Lord said on the Mount of Olives: “Pray! That ye enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak” (Matthew 26:41). Our Lord spent forty days and nights praying in the unforgiving environment of the desert. Also, the mountain is a rock and Our Lord would go there to pray often: “And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain alone to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23). “He went out into a mountain to pray, and He passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12). “He took Peter, and James, and John, and went up into a mountain to pray” (Luke 9:28).
(3) The MYRRH, symbolizing suffering, would be reserved for the moment of ultimate suffering which is death itself: “I will go to the mountain of myrrh, and to the hill of frankincense” (Canticles 4:16). “And they gave Him to drink wine mingled with myrrh; but He took it not” (Mark 15:23). “And Nicodemus also came, (he who at the first came to Jesus by night,) bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred-pound weight” (John 19:39). Myrrh is a symbol of the supreme sacrifice, as it is used for embalming after the supreme sacrifice of death has taken the life of person; and myrrh also has healing ‘graces’, for it is also used for medicinal purposes. Myrrh is called a “bitter-sweet perfume” and was used as both incense and embalming ointment in funerals. It symbolizes the sweetness of suffering, that earns for us an unimaginable heavenly reward.
‘Myrrh-der’ … ‘myrrh-derer’ … ‘myrrh-derous’ … ‘myrrh-tuary’ … ‘myrrh-tification’ ― all of these made-up words have an element of deadly truth in the them: ‘myrrh-der’ (murder) … ‘myrrh-derer’ (murderer) … ‘myrrh-derous’ (murderous) … ‘myrrh-tuary’ (mortuary) … ‘myrrh-tification’ (mortification). They all involve death of one kind of another—mortification being a compound word of the Latin mors, mortis (death) and facere, factus (to do, to make), meaning putting something to death, namely bad habits and sins. We could even add ‘myrrh-tyr’ (martyr) to this collection.
The word “myrrh” is derived from the Aramaic “murr”, and Arabic “mur” meaning “bitter”. Its name entered the English language from the Hebrew Bible, where it is called “mor”, and later as a Semitic loanword was used in the Greek myth of Myrrha, and later in the Septuagint; in the Greek language, the related word “mýron” became a general term for perfume—which we could apply to the Christian notion of suffering and dying for the Faith, a sweet perfumed death.
The Three Stages of Our Journey
These THREE gifts and their respective meanings, are also THREE stages that we must ALL pass through on that narrow path that so few find and that leads to Heaven: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Out of all the wise men in the world, only THREE, the Magi, found the way that led to the narrow entrance of the cave at Bethlehem. Out of all the people in world, only THREE families were chosen by God (symbolizing Jesus) to join Noe (symbol of Joseph) and his wife (symbol of Mary) in the ark: they were his THREE sons (Sem, and Cham, and Japheth) and their THREE wives. “Noe, and Sem, and Cham, and Japheth his sons: his wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, went into the ark” (Genesis 7:13).
Few found salvation back then, too! Again, we see wood play a large part in the salvation, since the ark was made of wood. God commanded that ark be THREE-hundred cubits long and thirty (THREE times ten) cubits high.
That same number THREE comes into play in our interior life or our journey towards perfection and Heaven. THREE is a number of perfection and our spiritual road or journey to perfection consists of THREE parts. This has been the perennial teaching among the spiritual masters of the Church, going back to the earliest times. Just as there are three major stages in our physical life, which transition from one into another (childhood-adolescence-adulthood), so too are there THREE major stages in our spiritual life, where we transition from one into another (the beginners, the proficient and the perfect; or otherwise called the Purgative Way for the beginners, the Illuminative Way for those who are more proficient, and the Unitive Way for those reaching perfection).
Three Painful Trials
Each of these THREE stages is preceded by a crisis or a painful transition. These are sometimes called “CONVERSIONS” by the spiritual writers. Before one can be a BEGINNER in the spiritual life, one has to convert from the state of not-possessing the grace of God in the soul (for an adult this means being in Mortal Sin, for a new born child, or child under the age of reason, it is the state of Original Sin) to a state of possessing the grace of God in the soul. This FIRST CONVERSION therefore initially takes place in the Sacrament of Baptism, when sanctifying grace is infused into the soul for the first time, and in the Sacrament of Confession where Mortal Sin is removed and grace once again returns to the soul. This can be a real battle-royal for the soul. A battle that is painful and one that costs dearly. During this FIRST CONVERSION the soul of the Beginner is concerned with THREE chief things: (1) To battle and eradicate Mortal Sin, (2) to do penance for past mortal sins, and (3) to preserve the state of grace in the soul on an habitual basis. The soul therefore has to PURGE itself (hence the name “Purgative Way”), not only from the present Mortal Sin, but also remedy the past effects of Mortal Sin by doing penance. It is only by an habitual avoidance of Mortal Sin that a soul can truly lay claim to being a Beginner in the spiritual life. Authors like the Fr. Faber and the 20th century spiritual master, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, are of the opinion that most souls are not even beginners, but are going backwards and forwards between the state of grace and the state of Mortal Sin. As regards lukewarm souls, many others state that they are not truly Beginners, for they have one foot inside the room and the other foot outside, neither in nor out.
The second level or stage of the spiritual life (the Illuminative Way of those making progress—the Proficients) is where the soul, now habitually free of Mortal Sin, starts to focus on THREE chief things: (1) the Proficient soul now starts to look for its Venial Sins in order to battle them, uproot them and destroy them, (2) It starts to pray much, much more than ever before, and (3) it starts to focus on the systematic (not random or sporadic) acquisition of virtues. Before the soul acquires these great graces, it has to undergo the SECOND CONVERSION, which has THREE chief areas of combat. These are (1) the painful endurance of a spiritual dryness despite wanting and trying to draw closer to God, (2) the battle to overcome all deliberate Venial Sin, which in earlier years didn’t even seem like sin at all! And (3) the pulling away from all the sensible, tangible, non-sinful pleasures and consolations that the soul instinctively still desires. Many, if not most souls, who enter this level, do not have the fortitude and resolution to do this, and will often make peace with Venial Sin (which will then require a painful Purgatory at the end their life, unless they finally push through this stage). This peace with Venial Sin will quite frequently lead some souls back into Mortal Sin more or less frequently—for as one of the maxims of the spiritual life says: “If we are not making progress, then we will find ourselves going backwards.”
The third level or stage of the spiritual life (the Unitive Way of the Perfect) is one has to be preceded by a third trial or THIRD CONVERSION, which now hones or perfects the soul even more. The first conversion centered around the elimination of all Mortal Sin; the second conversion focused on the elimination of all Venial Sin; this third conversion has as its target the elimination of all imperfections—which are all thoughts, words and actions that are not sinful in any way, but could be more perfectly done. In short, it means trying to always do the most perfect thing, to take the most perfect option or solution. This can be an excruciating crucible of suffering. To add to the trial, at this stage or level, God often pulls away from the soul—much more than in the second conversion, where the pulling away only meant a kind of dryness being experienced. In this third stage, the soul has the impression that it has been completely abandoned by God, so much so that it feels an unworthiness so great that it feels it will be damned. You can read of this in the lives of many of the saints. It is the final test for the soul, whereby God purifies it of all self-interest and self-love, and examines the soul to see if it seeks God for His own sake, or if it was only seeking it for consolations and self-interest. As the saying goes: “Do you seek the consolations of God, or do you seek the God of consolations?”
The Price of Failure, Refusal or Neglect
If we die in a state of grace, but have neglected or refused to go through these stages here on Earth, then the same work of purification and sanctification has to be done in the fires of Purgatory. For we are all called to perfection and it is only the perfect (the saints) who are allowed into Heaven. “I am the Almighty God: walk before me, and be perfect” (Genesis 17:1). “Thou shalt be perfect and without spot, before the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). “Fear the Lord, and serve Him with a perfect and most sincere heart” (Josue 24:14). “That the man of God may be perfect” (2 Timothy 3:17). “Let us go on to things more perfect” (Hebrews 6:1). “The disciple is not above his Master: but everyone shall be perfect, if he be as his Master” (Luke 6:40). “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). “Strengthen me with a perfect spirit” (Psalm 50:14). “Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a little, will Himself perfect you” (1 Peter 5:10).
Modern-Day Kings Take a Wrong Turning!
Today, most of us live like kings and queens, but we don’t even realize it! How many kings and queens had access to the variety of food and drink that modern man can find in any supermarket? How many had the medical support that is available today? How many had such comfortable, economical life, with central heating and air-conditioning? They would have jumped at the chance to trade-in their horse and carriage for one of our cars! They could not even imagine the communications and electronic appliances available to us today, with their possibilities of instant communications with anyone anywhere in the world. The list of advantages that we have over the kings and queens of old is endless.
The following words were written by a newspaper columnist, and they essentially echo what has just been said: “We live in largely peaceful times, with better access to medicine and education ― the world is easily in the best place it’s ever been. Humanity as a whole is doing better than it ever has: the world is becoming more prosperous, cleaner, increasingly peaceful and healthier. We are living longer, better lives. Virtually all of our existing problems are less bad than at any previous time in history.”
Modern Day Gods
The problem with all this is that when we have so much available; when we enjoy so much relative security; when we can rely on the insurance gods to look after our health, wealth and loved ones, then the danger is that we can led into a neglect, an indifference, a laxity or lukewarmness with regard to our heavenly provider, almighty God and His Divine Providence. We pay thousands of dollars annually to the insurance gods, but how much do pay by way of prayers and attention to the real God?
This attitude of complacency hits everyone without exception. It was also the underlying feature of the relationship between God and His Chosen People in the Old Testament. When things were going well for them, they forgot about God and at times even took on board false idols. So God had to do something about the cause of this neglect, indifference and idolatry. God’s solution was always to make things go badly for His fallen away Chosen People; this would bring them to their knees and their senses, and they would come pleading to God for help and mercy.
What on Earth do we need God for now? We have health insurance; we have car accident insurance to replace the car or pay for its repair; we have house insurance to guarantee the replacement of certain things; we can even have insurance on the gas, electricity and water supplies and the repair of their pipes and lines; we have the possibility of insurance on the multitude of appliances and articles that we buy for ourselves and our homes; we have the insurance of welfare if we lose our jobs; we have life insurance to care for our loved ones from beyond the grave! What a bevy of assurance through insurance! God is almost redundant and unnecessary! All that we need Him for is insurance against Hell!
Material Success―Spiritual Failure
Sadly, that is the case with an increasing number of people today, either explicitly or at least implicitly. The current statistics show that over 90% of graduates will cease to practicing their Faith on a regular basis once their schooling is over. In other words, once school is finished, God is finished (unless they live at home and are made to practice their Faith by their parents).
But it is not just youngsters that offend and irritate God; the oldsters are at it too! Only 20% of Catholic adults regularly attend Sunday Mass (and that is a very generous and over optimistic number). Most of the weekly Mass goers (90%) believe that Jesus is really present in the Holy Eucharist. Those numbers fall significantly among less frequent attendees. Of those who attend Mass around once a month, only 65% believe in the Real Presence; whole among those who only attend a few times a year, only 40% believe in the Real Presence. The words of Jesus come hauntingly back to mind: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8), “and because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12).
It is clear that plenty of goods does not beget plenty of Faith; nor does an abundance of comfort beget abundant charity. Earthly riches impoverish spirituality, and ultimately greatly handicap our chances of salvation. Our Lord Himself said: “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:23-26).
Ensure You Are Insured With God!
In the words of Our Lord, God and His Providence seems to be the best insurance policy we can have (not that we should quit paying insurance, but our primary agent should be God and not man). “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [riches, worldly interest]. Therefore I say to you―be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat; and the body more than the clothing? Behold the birds of the air! For they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns―and your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you of much more value than they? And which of you by being anxious, can add to his stature by one cubit? And for clothing―why are you solicitous? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow―they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as one of these. And if the grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, God doth so clothe: how much more you, O ye of little Faith? Be not solicitous therefore, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek. For your Father knows that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:24-33).
More Important Things Than Christmas!
The opulence of the modern world has not much time for Jesus, cribs or mangers, kings and gifts. Once the lip service is accomplished and the human parties have been attended, it is time to take down the Christmas Tree and get back to the usual business. The whole idea of Forty Days of Christmas is foreign to modern man. Some hang on their Christmas decorations until January 6th, and though the decorations may be standing, the meditations have long since been dead and buried. Material Christmases have long since buried Spiritual Christmases. We are more or less spiritual naked, yet like the “King with No Clothes”, modern-man proudly parades around in his self-satisfied smugness of having acquired most of what he wants, without anyone’s help. Our Lord condemns him saying: “Without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
The Apocalypse has even stronger words to say: “I know thy works―that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth! Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ ― and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire tried, so that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see” (Apocalypse 3:14-18).
Yes, we are spiritually poor, blind and naked, as the Apocalypse just said. Just as the three kings brought three gifts, so do the three Persons of the Holy Trinity counsel us to turn to Them for the solution: to buy from Them gold, white garments, and eye-salve. These three are an echo of the three gifts offered to Jesus by the Magi.
The Gold in both cases is the gold of charity, which, as we said with the Scriptural quote above, will have grown cold in many souls.
The white garments correspond to the Myrrh. The Myrrh is a symbol of suffering, being used both as a painkiller and for embalming the dead. The white garments reflect that suffering, as shown by this quote: “These are they who are come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and have made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 7:14).
The Eye-Salve corresponds to the frankincense of prayer, which rises like smoke to Heaven. The blind man is begging and praying to Jesus for his blindness to be removed. “Jesus asked him saying: ‘What wilt thou that I do to thee?’ But he said: ‘Lord, that I may see!’” (Luke 18:41). His prayer is the eye-salve that removes his blindness.
Today there is not enough gold, frankincense and myrrh in our lives. We love too little; we pray too little; we suffer too little. That is why we risk having little chance for salvation unless we follow the example of the three kings and follow the counsels of the Apocalypse in our apocalyptic times! Love, pray and suffer!
“Three” seems to be a favorite number with God! We have the “three” Divine Persons of the Holy Trinity―Father, Son and Holy Ghost. We also have the “three” member of the Holy Family―Jesus, Mary and Joseph. We have the “three” Kings or Magi seeking Jesus―Balthasar, Caspar and Melchior. These kings bring “three” gifts for Christ―gold, frankincense and myrrh. Our Lord had “three” favorite Apostles―Peter, James and John. Our Lord’s public ministry is commonly held to have been around “three” years. At Our Lord’s death, there were “three” crosses on Calvary―those of the two thieves, and that of Jesus. Our Lord, after His death, would rise on the “third” day―having spent parts of Friday, Saturday and Sunday in the tomb. We have “three” theological virtues that guide all our relations with God―Faith, Hope and Charity. We have “three” sets of mysteries for the Holy Rosary―the Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious mysteries. We have the “three” Sacraments that leave an indelible mark upon the soul―Baptism, Confirmation and Holy Orders. We have the “three” Stages of the Spiritual Life, through which we must all pass on our journey to God and Heaven―the Way of Beginners; the Way of the Proficient; and the Way of the Perfect. Likewise, we all pass through the three stages of our physical existence―childhood, adolescence and adulthood. There are three immediate options facing us right after death―Heaven, Purgatory or Hell.
Out of all the wise men in the world, only THREE, the Magi, found the way that led to the narrow entrance of the cave at Bethlehem. Out of all the people in world, only THREE families were chosen by God (symbolizing Jesus) to join Noe (symbol of Joseph) and his wife (symbol of Mary) in the ark: they were his THREE sons (Sem, and Cham, and Japheth) and their THREE wives. “Noe, and Sem, and Cham, and Japheth his sons: his wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, went into the ark” (Genesis 7:13). Few found salvation back then, too! Again, we see wood play a large part in the salvation, since the ark was made of wood. God commanded that ark be THREE-hundred cubits long and thirty (THREE times ten) cubits high.
Coming back to today’s feast of the Epiphany, we have the encounter between the three wise pagans, the Magi, and the three Christians (Jesus, Mary and Joseph). That encounter in Bethlehem was a “watershed” or “stable-shed” moment in their lives. It must have been like a spiritual ‘baptism’ of sorts, when the seed of Faith was planted in their pagan souls. Our Lord had that effect on them at the very beginning of His life in Bethlehem, just as He would have an effect on the Good Thief on the cross at the end of His life on Calvary. The Alpha and the Omega. The beginning and the end. The one thing in common was that He was laid out on wood: in Bethlehem the wood of the manger or the crib, on Calvary on the wood of the cross.
The Mystery of the Three Gifts
The THREE gifts given to Him on the wood of the manger by the THREE Magi, would be reflected on Calvary, where THREE men were being crucified: Jesus and the two thieves. Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Thy ceaseless offer, however, must be love, which is the gold; continual prayer, which is the incense; and the patient acceptance of labors and true mortifications, which is the myrrh. All that thou dost for the Lord, thou should offer up to Him with fervent affection and promptitude, without negligence or fear; for negligent works, and those not enlivened by love, are not an acceptable sacrifice in the eyes of his Majesty” (The Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, The Incarnation).
(1) The GOLD, symbolizing charity, would be the charity that Jesus showed in laying down His innocent life for us miserable and ungrateful sinners: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Well, actually, He did show an even greater love than that, for He laid down His life, not only for His friends, but also for His enemies! Gold is a symbol of charity and God Himself is charity—as St. John tells us: “He that loves not, knows not God: for God is charity ... And we have known, and have believed the charity, which God has for us. God is charity: and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:8; 4:16). We should love this ‘Gold’ above all things: “Jesus said: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment!’” (Matthew 22:37-38).
Today, we love another gold! The gold of the world, not the gold of Heaven. Today, we can say that gold no longer stands for God, but it stands for materialism. Man has sold his soul for gold, like Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of soup (Genesis 25:29-34). Earthly gold brings nothing but trouble to those who set their hearts upon it: “You shall not make gods of silver, nor shall you make to yourselves gods of gold” (Exodus 20:23). Our Lord warned us: “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
(2) The FRANKINCENSE, symbolizing prayer, would be the prayer of Christ on the Cross, being offered up like incense to His Father in Heaven, begging mercy for both His friends and His enemies: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34). St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Moreover, they [the three kings] offer gifts in keeping with Christ’s greatness: ... they offer up incense as to God, because it is used in the Divine Sacrifice ... We offer God incense, which signifies fervor in prayer, if our constant prayers mount up to God with an odor of sweetness.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica). King David prayed to God: “Let my prayer be directed as incense in thy sight” (Psalm 140:2).
The Frankincense reminds us of the Offertory of the Mass, for the priest incenses the gifts during the Offertory and formerly said the following prayer:”Through the intercession of Blessed Michael the Archangel, standing at the right hand of the altar of incense, and of all His elect may the Lord vouchsafe to bless this incense and to receive it in the odor of sweetness. May this incense blessed by You, arise before You, O Lord, and may Your mercy come down upon us Let my prayer, O Lord, come like incense before You; the lifting up of my hands, like the evening sacrifice.”
Frankincense is an aromatic resin obtained from trees of the genus Boswellia, particularly Boswellia Sacra. This is the pinnacle of all incense—the “top of the line” so to speak. The English word is derived from the medieval or Old French “franc encens” (i.e., high quality incense) and is used in incense and perfumes. So we see that there is “incense” and “frankincense” with frankincense being high quality incense. The same applies to our prayers: there are prayers that are “said” and there are prayers that are “prayed”. The difference is what Our Lord Himself spoke of: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). Our Lord wants fervor and this is fervor is implied in His words when He states: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). He wants our hearts to be on fire (the gold of Charity purified in the furnace) so that the incense of prayer will produce a prayer worthy of God. Yet just as there is prayer from the lips and prayer from the heart, so too is there incense and frankincense.
Boswellia Sacra trees are considered unusual for their ability to grow in environments so unforgiving that they sometimes grow out of solid rock. The initial means of attachment to the rock is unknown but is accomplished by a bulbous disk-like swelling of the trunk. This growth prevents it from being ripped from the rock during violent storms. Likewise, if we are a prayerful tree, we will survive in difficult situations. But like Our Lord said on the Mount of Olives: “Pray! That ye enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak” (Matthew 26:41). Our Lord spent forty days and nights praying in the unforgiving environment of the desert. Also, the mountain is a rock and Our Lord would go there to pray often: “And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain alone to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23). “He went out into a mountain to pray, and He passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12). “He took Peter, and James, and John, and went up into a mountain to pray” (Luke 9:28).
(3) The MYRRH, symbolizing suffering, would be reserved for the moment of ultimate suffering which is death itself: “I will go to the mountain of myrrh, and to the hill of frankincense” (Canticles 4:16). “And they gave Him to drink wine mingled with myrrh; but He took it not” (Mark 15:23). “And Nicodemus also came, (he who at the first came to Jesus by night,) bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred-pound weight” (John 19:39). Myrrh is a symbol of the supreme sacrifice, as it is used for embalming after the supreme sacrifice of death has taken the life of person; and myrrh also has healing ‘graces’, for it is also used for medicinal purposes. Myrrh is called a “bitter-sweet perfume” and was used as both incense and embalming ointment in funerals. It symbolizes the sweetness of suffering, that earns for us an unimaginable heavenly reward.
‘Myrrh-der’ … ‘myrrh-derer’ … ‘myrrh-derous’ … ‘myrrh-tuary’ … ‘myrrh-tification’ ― all of these made-up words have an element of deadly truth in the them: ‘myrrh-der’ (murder) … ‘myrrh-derer’ (murderer) … ‘myrrh-derous’ (murderous) … ‘myrrh-tuary’ (mortuary) … ‘myrrh-tification’ (mortification). They all involve death of one kind of another—mortification being a compound word of the Latin mors, mortis (death) and facere, factus (to do, to make), meaning putting something to death, namely bad habits and sins. We could even add ‘myrrh-tyr’ (martyr) to this collection.
The word “myrrh” is derived from the Aramaic “murr”, and Arabic “mur” meaning “bitter”. Its name entered the English language from the Hebrew Bible, where it is called “mor”, and later as a Semitic loanword was used in the Greek myth of Myrrha, and later in the Septuagint; in the Greek language, the related word “mýron” became a general term for perfume—which we could apply to the Christian notion of suffering and dying for the Faith, a sweet perfumed death.
The Three Stages of Our Journey
These THREE gifts and their respective meanings, are also THREE stages that we must ALL pass through on that narrow path that so few find and that leads to Heaven: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Out of all the wise men in the world, only THREE, the Magi, found the way that led to the narrow entrance of the cave at Bethlehem. Out of all the people in world, only THREE families were chosen by God (symbolizing Jesus) to join Noe (symbol of Joseph) and his wife (symbol of Mary) in the ark: they were his THREE sons (Sem, and Cham, and Japheth) and their THREE wives. “Noe, and Sem, and Cham, and Japheth his sons: his wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, went into the ark” (Genesis 7:13).
Few found salvation back then, too! Again, we see wood play a large part in the salvation, since the ark was made of wood. God commanded that ark be THREE-hundred cubits long and thirty (THREE times ten) cubits high.
That same number THREE comes into play in our interior life or our journey towards perfection and Heaven. THREE is a number of perfection and our spiritual road or journey to perfection consists of THREE parts. This has been the perennial teaching among the spiritual masters of the Church, going back to the earliest times. Just as there are three major stages in our physical life, which transition from one into another (childhood-adolescence-adulthood), so too are there THREE major stages in our spiritual life, where we transition from one into another (the beginners, the proficient and the perfect; or otherwise called the Purgative Way for the beginners, the Illuminative Way for those who are more proficient, and the Unitive Way for those reaching perfection).
Three Painful Trials
Each of these THREE stages is preceded by a crisis or a painful transition. These are sometimes called “CONVERSIONS” by the spiritual writers. Before one can be a BEGINNER in the spiritual life, one has to convert from the state of not-possessing the grace of God in the soul (for an adult this means being in Mortal Sin, for a new born child, or child under the age of reason, it is the state of Original Sin) to a state of possessing the grace of God in the soul. This FIRST CONVERSION therefore initially takes place in the Sacrament of Baptism, when sanctifying grace is infused into the soul for the first time, and in the Sacrament of Confession where Mortal Sin is removed and grace once again returns to the soul. This can be a real battle-royal for the soul. A battle that is painful and one that costs dearly. During this FIRST CONVERSION the soul of the Beginner is concerned with THREE chief things: (1) To battle and eradicate Mortal Sin, (2) to do penance for past mortal sins, and (3) to preserve the state of grace in the soul on an habitual basis. The soul therefore has to PURGE itself (hence the name “Purgative Way”), not only from the present Mortal Sin, but also remedy the past effects of Mortal Sin by doing penance. It is only by an habitual avoidance of Mortal Sin that a soul can truly lay claim to being a Beginner in the spiritual life. Authors like the Fr. Faber and the 20th century spiritual master, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, are of the opinion that most souls are not even beginners, but are going backwards and forwards between the state of grace and the state of Mortal Sin. As regards lukewarm souls, many others state that they are not truly Beginners, for they have one foot inside the room and the other foot outside, neither in nor out.
The second level or stage of the spiritual life (the Illuminative Way of those making progress—the Proficients) is where the soul, now habitually free of Mortal Sin, starts to focus on THREE chief things: (1) the Proficient soul now starts to look for its Venial Sins in order to battle them, uproot them and destroy them, (2) It starts to pray much, much more than ever before, and (3) it starts to focus on the systematic (not random or sporadic) acquisition of virtues. Before the soul acquires these great graces, it has to undergo the SECOND CONVERSION, which has THREE chief areas of combat. These are (1) the painful endurance of a spiritual dryness despite wanting and trying to draw closer to God, (2) the battle to overcome all deliberate Venial Sin, which in earlier years didn’t even seem like sin at all! And (3) the pulling away from all the sensible, tangible, non-sinful pleasures and consolations that the soul instinctively still desires. Many, if not most souls, who enter this level, do not have the fortitude and resolution to do this, and will often make peace with Venial Sin (which will then require a painful Purgatory at the end their life, unless they finally push through this stage). This peace with Venial Sin will quite frequently lead some souls back into Mortal Sin more or less frequently—for as one of the maxims of the spiritual life says: “If we are not making progress, then we will find ourselves going backwards.”
The third level or stage of the spiritual life (the Unitive Way of the Perfect) is one has to be preceded by a third trial or THIRD CONVERSION, which now hones or perfects the soul even more. The first conversion centered around the elimination of all Mortal Sin; the second conversion focused on the elimination of all Venial Sin; this third conversion has as its target the elimination of all imperfections—which are all thoughts, words and actions that are not sinful in any way, but could be more perfectly done. In short, it means trying to always do the most perfect thing, to take the most perfect option or solution. This can be an excruciating crucible of suffering. To add to the trial, at this stage or level, God often pulls away from the soul—much more than in the second conversion, where the pulling away only meant a kind of dryness being experienced. In this third stage, the soul has the impression that it has been completely abandoned by God, so much so that it feels an unworthiness so great that it feels it will be damned. You can read of this in the lives of many of the saints. It is the final test for the soul, whereby God purifies it of all self-interest and self-love, and examines the soul to see if it seeks God for His own sake, or if it was only seeking it for consolations and self-interest. As the saying goes: “Do you seek the consolations of God, or do you seek the God of consolations?”
The Price of Failure, Refusal or Neglect
If we die in a state of grace, but have neglected or refused to go through these stages here on Earth, then the same work of purification and sanctification has to be done in the fires of Purgatory. For we are all called to perfection and it is only the perfect (the saints) who are allowed into Heaven. “I am the Almighty God: walk before me, and be perfect” (Genesis 17:1). “Thou shalt be perfect and without spot, before the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). “Fear the Lord, and serve Him with a perfect and most sincere heart” (Josue 24:14). “That the man of God may be perfect” (2 Timothy 3:17). “Let us go on to things more perfect” (Hebrews 6:1). “The disciple is not above his Master: but everyone shall be perfect, if he be as his Master” (Luke 6:40). “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). “Strengthen me with a perfect spirit” (Psalm 50:14). “Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a little, will Himself perfect you” (1 Peter 5:10).
Modern-Day Kings Take a Wrong Turning!
Today, most of us live like kings and queens, but we don’t even realize it! How many kings and queens had access to the variety of food and drink that modern man can find in any supermarket? How many had the medical support that is available today? How many had such comfortable, economical life, with central heating and air-conditioning? They would have jumped at the chance to trade-in their horse and carriage for one of our cars! They could not even imagine the communications and electronic appliances available to us today, with their possibilities of instant communications with anyone anywhere in the world. The list of advantages that we have over the kings and queens of old is endless.
The following words were written by a newspaper columnist, and they essentially echo what has just been said: “We live in largely peaceful times, with better access to medicine and education ― the world is easily in the best place it’s ever been. Humanity as a whole is doing better than it ever has: the world is becoming more prosperous, cleaner, increasingly peaceful and healthier. We are living longer, better lives. Virtually all of our existing problems are less bad than at any previous time in history.”
Modern Day Gods
The problem with all this is that when we have so much available; when we enjoy so much relative security; when we can rely on the insurance gods to look after our health, wealth and loved ones, then the danger is that we can led into a neglect, an indifference, a laxity or lukewarmness with regard to our heavenly provider, almighty God and His Divine Providence. We pay thousands of dollars annually to the insurance gods, but how much do pay by way of prayers and attention to the real God?
This attitude of complacency hits everyone without exception. It was also the underlying feature of the relationship between God and His Chosen People in the Old Testament. When things were going well for them, they forgot about God and at times even took on board false idols. So God had to do something about the cause of this neglect, indifference and idolatry. God’s solution was always to make things go badly for His fallen away Chosen People; this would bring them to their knees and their senses, and they would come pleading to God for help and mercy.
What on Earth do we need God for now? We have health insurance; we have car accident insurance to replace the car or pay for its repair; we have house insurance to guarantee the replacement of certain things; we can even have insurance on the gas, electricity and water supplies and the repair of their pipes and lines; we have the possibility of insurance on the multitude of appliances and articles that we buy for ourselves and our homes; we have the insurance of welfare if we lose our jobs; we have life insurance to care for our loved ones from beyond the grave! What a bevy of assurance through insurance! God is almost redundant and unnecessary! All that we need Him for is insurance against Hell!
Material Success―Spiritual Failure
Sadly, that is the case with an increasing number of people today, either explicitly or at least implicitly. The current statistics show that over 90% of graduates will cease to practicing their Faith on a regular basis once their schooling is over. In other words, once school is finished, God is finished (unless they live at home and are made to practice their Faith by their parents).
But it is not just youngsters that offend and irritate God; the oldsters are at it too! Only 20% of Catholic adults regularly attend Sunday Mass (and that is a very generous and over optimistic number). Most of the weekly Mass goers (90%) believe that Jesus is really present in the Holy Eucharist. Those numbers fall significantly among less frequent attendees. Of those who attend Mass around once a month, only 65% believe in the Real Presence; whole among those who only attend a few times a year, only 40% believe in the Real Presence. The words of Jesus come hauntingly back to mind: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8), “and because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12).
It is clear that plenty of goods does not beget plenty of Faith; nor does an abundance of comfort beget abundant charity. Earthly riches impoverish spirituality, and ultimately greatly handicap our chances of salvation. Our Lord Himself said: “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:23-26).
Ensure You Are Insured With God!
In the words of Our Lord, God and His Providence seems to be the best insurance policy we can have (not that we should quit paying insurance, but our primary agent should be God and not man). “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [riches, worldly interest]. Therefore I say to you―be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat; and the body more than the clothing? Behold the birds of the air! For they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns―and your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you of much more value than they? And which of you by being anxious, can add to his stature by one cubit? And for clothing―why are you solicitous? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow―they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as one of these. And if the grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, God doth so clothe: how much more you, O ye of little Faith? Be not solicitous therefore, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek. For your Father knows that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:24-33).
More Important Things Than Christmas!
The opulence of the modern world has not much time for Jesus, cribs or mangers, kings and gifts. Once the lip service is accomplished and the human parties have been attended, it is time to take down the Christmas Tree and get back to the usual business. The whole idea of Forty Days of Christmas is foreign to modern man. Some hang on their Christmas decorations until January 6th, and though the decorations may be standing, the meditations have long since been dead and buried. Material Christmases have long since buried Spiritual Christmases. We are more or less spiritual naked, yet like the “King with No Clothes”, modern-man proudly parades around in his self-satisfied smugness of having acquired most of what he wants, without anyone’s help. Our Lord condemns him saying: “Without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
The Apocalypse has even stronger words to say: “I know thy works―that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth! Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ ― and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire tried, so that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see” (Apocalypse 3:14-18).
Yes, we are spiritually poor, blind and naked, as the Apocalypse just said. Just as the three kings brought three gifts, so do the three Persons of the Holy Trinity counsel us to turn to Them for the solution: to buy from Them gold, white garments, and eye-salve. These three are an echo of the three gifts offered to Jesus by the Magi.
The Gold in both cases is the gold of charity, which, as we said with the Scriptural quote above, will have grown cold in many souls.
The white garments correspond to the Myrrh. The Myrrh is a symbol of suffering, being used both as a painkiller and for embalming the dead. The white garments reflect that suffering, as shown by this quote: “These are they who are come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and have made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 7:14).
The Eye-Salve corresponds to the frankincense of prayer, which rises like smoke to Heaven. The blind man is begging and praying to Jesus for his blindness to be removed. “Jesus asked him saying: ‘What wilt thou that I do to thee?’ But he said: ‘Lord, that I may see!’” (Luke 18:41). His prayer is the eye-salve that removes his blindness.
Today there is not enough gold, frankincense and myrrh in our lives. We love too little; we pray too little; we suffer too little. That is why we risk having little chance for salvation unless we follow the example of the three kings and follow the counsels of the Apocalypse in our apocalyptic times! Love, pray and suffer!
Article 12
Sunday, January 5th
The Power of Epiphany Water (Part 2 of 2)
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, January 5th
The Power of Epiphany Water (Part 2 of 2)
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
SECTION 1
The Rite of Blessing
To do justice to any article on the power of Epiphany Water, it is only logical and necessary to first of all examine the words of the rite of blessing used in the creation of Epiphany Water. So, first of all, we publish the rite in full (apart from the entire text of the Litany of Saints―which most people are already familiar with). After that, we will begin commenting upon the rite and giving examples of the power of Epiphany Water in its use.
This blessing comes from the Orient, where the Church has long emphasized in her celebration of Epiphany the mystery of Our Lord’s Baptism, and by analogy our Baptism. This aspect is not neglected in western Christendom, although in practice we have concentrated on the visit of the Magi. Many years before the Latin Rite officially adopted the blessing of Epiphany water, diocesan rituals, notably in lower Italy, had contained such a blessing.
At the appointed time the celebrant, vested in white cope (if a bishop, the miter is worn, but removed during the prayers), and the deacon and subdeacon, vested in white dalmatic and tunic respectively, come before the altar. They are preceded by acolytes, who carry the processional cross and lighted candles (which are put in their proper place), and by the other clergy. A vessel of water and a container of salt are in readiness in the sanctuary.
THE LITANY OF THE SAINTS
First the Litany of the Saints is sung, during which time all kneel. After the invocation “That you grant eternal rest,” etc. the celebrant rises and sings the following two invocations, the second in a higher key:
V. That you bless + this water.
R. We beg you to hear us.
V. That you bless + and sanctify + this water
R. We beg you to hear us.
Then the chanters continue the litany up to and including the last Lord, have mercy. After this the celebrant chants Our Father the rest inaudibly until:
Priest: And lead us not into temptation.
All: But deliver us from evil.
After the Litany of Saints has ended, the following psalms are sung:
PSALM 28
Priest: Give to the Lord, you sons of God, * give to the Lord glory and praise.
All: Give to the Lord the glory due His Name; * adore the Lord in holy attire.
Priest: The voice of the Lord is over the waters, the God of glory thunders, * The Lord, over vast waters.
All: The voice of the Lord is mighty; * the voice of the Lord is majestic.
Priest: The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars, * the Lord breaks the cedars of Lebanon.
All: He makes Lebanon leap like a calf * and Sarion like a young wild bull.
Priest: The voice of the Lord strikes fiery flames; the voice of the Lord shakes the desert, * the Lord shakes the wilderness of Cades.
All: The voice of the Lord twists the oaks and strips the forests, * and in His temple all say, “Glory!”
Priest: The Lord is enthroned above the flood; * the Lord is enthroned as king forever.
All: May the Lord give strength to His people; * may the Lord bless His people with peace.
Priest: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
All: As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
PSALM 45
Priest: God is our refuge and our strength, * an ever-present help in distress.
All: Therefore we fear not, though the Earth be shaken and mountains plunge into the depths of the sea;
Priest: Though its waters rage and foam * and the mountains quake at its surging.
All: The Lord of hosts is with us; * our stronghold is the God of Jacob.
Priest: There is a stream whose runlets gladden the city of God, * the holy dwelling of the Most High.
All: God is in its midst; it shall not be disturbed; * God will help it at the break of dawn.
Priest: Though nations are in turmoil, kingdoms totter, * His voice resounds, the Earth melts away;
All: The Lord of hosts is with us; * our stronghold is the God of Jacob.
Priest: Come, see the deeds of the Lord, * the astounding things He has wrought on Earth.
All: He has stopped wars to the end of the Earth; * the bow He breaks; He splinters the spears; He burns the shields with fire.
Priest: Desist, and confess that I am God, * exalted among the nations, exalted upon the Earth.
All: The Lord of hosts is with us; * our stronghold is the God of Jacob.
Priest: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
All: As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
PSALM 146
Priest: Praise the Lord, for He is good; * sing praise to our God, for He is gracious; it is fitting to praise Him.
All: The Lord rebuilds Jerusalem; * the dispersed of Israel He gathers.
Priest: He heals the brokenhearted * and binds up their wounds.
All: He tells the number of the stars; * He calls each by name.
Priest: Great is our Lord and mighty in power; * to His wisdom there is no limit.
All: The Lord sustains the lowly; * the wicked He casts to the ground.
Priest: Sing to the Lord with thanksgiving; * sing praise with the harp to our God.
All: Who covers the heavens with clouds, * who provides rain for the Earth;
Priest: Who makes grass sprout on the mountains * and herbs for the service of men;
All: Who gives food to the cattle, * and to the young ravens when they cry to Him.
Priest: He delights not in the strength of the steed, * nor is He pleased with the fleetness of men.
All: The Lord is pleased with those who fear Him, * with those who hope for His kindness.
Priest: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
All: As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
The celebrant then chants and Exorcism against Satan and his devils.
EXORCISM AGAINST SATAN AND HIS DEVILS
In the Name of our Lord Jesus + Christ and by His power, we cast you out, every unclean spirit, every devilish power, every assault of the infernal adversary, every legion, every diabolical group and sect; begone and stay far from the Church of God, from all who are made in the image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of the Divine + Lamb! Never again dare, you cunning serpent, to deceive the human race, to persecute the Church of God, nor to strike the chosen of God and to sift them as + wheat! For it is the Most High God Who commands you, + He to Whom you heretofore in your great pride considered yourself equal; He Who desires that all men might be saved and come to the knowledge of truth. God the Father + commands you. God the Son + commands you! God the Holy + Spirit commands you. The majesty of Christ, the eternal Word of God made flesh + commands you; He Who for the salvation of our race, the race that was lost through your envy, humbled Himself and became obedient even unto death; He who built His Church upon a solid rock, and proclaimed that the gates of Hell should never prevail against her, and that He would remain with her all days, even to the end of the world! The sacred mystery of the Cross + commands you, as well as the power of all the mysteries of Christian Faith! The exalted Virgin Mary, Mother of God + commands you, who in her lowliness crushed your proud head from the first moment of her Immaculate Conception! The Faith of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul and the other Apostles + commands you! The blood of the martyrs and the devout intercession of all holy men and women commands you!
Therefore, accursed dragon and every diabolical legion, we adjure you by the living + God, by the true + God, by the holy + God, by the God Who so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but shall have life everlasting; cease your deception of the human race and your giving them to drink of the poison of everlasting damnation; desist from harming the Church and fettering her freedom! Begone Satan, you father and teacher of lies and enemy of mankind! Give place to Christ, in Whom you found none of your works! Give place to the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, which Christ Himself purchased with His blood! May you be brought low under God’s mighty hand! May you tremble and flee, as we call upon the holy and awesome Name of Jesus, before Whom Hell quakes, and to Whom the Virtues, Powers, and Dominations are subject; whom the Cherubim and Seraphim praise with unwearied voices, saying: “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts!”
Next the following antiphon and canticle is sung or said (either the Benedictus, or the Magnificat):
CANTICLE OF ZACHARY
Luke 1.68-79
Antiphon: Today the Church is espoused to her heavenly bridegroom, for Christ washes her sins in the Jordan; the Magi hasten with gifts to the regal nuptials; and the guests are gladdened with water made wine, alleluia.
Priest: Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel! * He has visited His people and brought about its redemption.
All: He has raised for us a stronghold of salvation * in the house of David His servant,
Priest: And redeemed the promise He had made * through the mouth of His holy prophets of old,
All: To grant salvation from our foes * and from the hand of all that hate us;
Priest: To deal in mercy with our fathers * and be mindful of His holy covenant,
All: Of the oath he had sworn to our father Abraham, * that He would enable us
Priest: Rescued from the clutches of our foes, * to worship Him without fear,
All: In holiness and observance of the Law, * in His presence, all our days.
Priest: And you, my little one, will be hailed ‘Prophet of the Most High’; * for the Lord’s precursor you will be to prepare His ways;
All: You are to impart to His people knowledge of salvation * through forgiveness of their sins.
Priest: Thanks be to the merciful heart of our God! * a dawning Light from on high will visit us
All: To shine upon those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, * and guide our feet into the path of peace.
Priest: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, * and to the Holy Spirit,
All: As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, * world without end. Amen.
Antiphon: Today the Church is espoused to her heavenly bridegroom, for Christ washes her sins in the Jordan; the Magi hasten with gifts to the regal nuptials; and the guests are gladdened with water made wine, alleluia.
Or, instead of the Benedictus, the Magnificat may be chosen.
THE MAGNIFICAT
Antiphon: Today the Church is espoused to her heavenly bridegroom, for Christ washes her sins in the Jordan; the Magi hasten with gifts to the regal nuptials; and the guests are gladdened with water made wine, alleluia.
Priest: My soul doth magnify the Lord * and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior
All: For He hath regarded the humility of His handmaiden.* for behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
Priest: For He that is mighty hath done great things to me, * and holy is His Name.
All: And His Mercy is from generation unto generations * upon them that fear Him.
Priest: He hath shown might in His arm, * He hath scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart.
All: He hath put down the mighty from their seat, * and hath exalted the humble.
Priest: He hath filled the hungry with good things, * and the rich He hath sent empty away.
All: He hath received Israel, His servant, * being mindful of His mercy.
Priest: As He spoke to our Fathers, * Abraham and his seed forever.
All: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, * and to the Holy Spirit,
Priest: As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, * world without end. Amen.
All:
Antiphon: Today the Church is espoused to her heavenly bridegroom, for Christ washes her sins in the Jordan; the Magi hasten with gifts to the regal nuptials; and the guests are gladdened with water made wine, alleluia.
At the end of the canticle (the Benedictus or the Magnificat) the antiphon given above is repeated. Then the celebrant sings:
Priest: The Lord be with you.
All: May He also be with you.
Priest: Let us pray. God, who on this day revealed your only-begotten Son to all nations by the guidance of a star, grant that we who now know you by faith may finally behold you in your heavenly majesty; through Christ our Lord.
All: Amen.
THE RITE FOR PROVIDING HOLY WATER
Next he performs an exorcism over the salt and water and blesses them. On Sundays, or whenever this blessing takes place, salt and fresh water are prepared in the church or in the sacristy. The priest, vested in surplice and purple stole, says:
Priest: Our help is in the Name of the Lord.
All: Who made Heaven and Earth.
THE EXORCISM OF THE SALT:
Priest: O salt, creature of God, I cast out the demon from you by the living + God, by the true + God, by the holy + God, by God who ordered you to be thrown into the water-spring by Eliseus to heal it of its barrenness. May you be a purified salt, a means of health for those who believe, a medicine for body and soul for all who make use of you. May all evil fancies of the foul fiend, his malice and cunning, be driven afar from the place where you are sprinkled. And let every unclean spirit be repulsed by Him who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire.
All: Amen.
Priest: Let us pray. Almighty everlasting God, we humbly appeal to Your mercy and goodness to graciously bless + this creature, salt, which You have given for mankind’s use. May all who use it find in it a remedy for body and mind. And may everything that it touches or sprinkles be freed from uncleanness and any influence of the evil spirit; through Christ our Lord.
All: Amen.
THE EXORCISM OF THE WATER:
Priest: O water, creature of God, I cast out the demon from you in the name of God + the Father almighty, in the name of Jesus + Christ, His Son, our Lord, and in the power of the Holy + Spirit. May you be a purified water, empowered to drive afar all power of the enemy, in fact, to root out and banish the enemy himself, along with his fallen angels. We ask this through the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire.
All: Amen.
Priest: Let us pray. O God, who for man’s welfare established the most wonderful mysteries in the substance of water, hearken to our prayer, and pour forth Your blessing + on this element of water, now being prepared with various purifying rites. May this creature of yours, when used in Your mysteries and endowed with your grace, serve to cast out demons and to banish disease. May everything that this water sprinkles in the homes and gatherings of the faithful be delivered from all that is unclean and hurtful; let no breath of contagion hover there, no taint of corruption; let all the wiles of the lurking enemy come to nothing. By the sprinkling of this water may everything opposed to the safety and peace of the occupants of these homes be banished, so that in calling on Your Holy Name they may know the well-being they desire, and be protected from every peril; through Christ our Lord.
All: Amen.
The priest pours the salt into the water in the form of a cross, saying:
Priest: May this salt and water be mixed together; in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, + and of the Holy Spirit.
All: Amen.
Priest: The Lord be with you.
All: May He also be with you.
Priest: Let us pray. God, source of irresistible might and king of an invincible realm, the ever-glorious conqueror; Who restrain the force of the adversary, silencing the uproar of his rage, and valiantly subduing his wickedness; in awe and humility we beg You, Lord, to regard with favor this creature thing of salt and water, to let the light of your kindness shine upon it, and to hallow it with the dew of Your mercy; so that wherever it is sprinkled and Your Holy Name is invoked, every assault of the unclean spirit may be baffled, and all dread of the serpent’s venom be cast out. To us who entreat Your mercy grant that the Holy Spirit may be with us wherever we may be; through Christ our Lord.
All: Amen.
SECTION 2
The Commentary and Examples
Taking Things for Granted
There are far too many things that we take for granted―both in the material sphere and the spiritual sphere. Take, for example, the air that we breathe―a human being can only survive for a few minutes without air; the availability of water to drink, clean, and irrigate our plants; or sunlight―without which life on Earth would end; or our health; or our job and its income; or peace between nations; etc. The list of presumptions, by which we take things for granted, is endless. “Boast not for tomorrow, for thou knowest not what today may bring forth!” (Proverbs 27:1). “Today he is lifted up, and tomorrow he shall not be found―because he is returned into his earth; and his thought is come to nothing!” (1 Machabees 2:63). “The grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven!” (Matthew 6:30). “Behold, now you that say: ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such a city, and there we will spend a year, and will traffic, and make our gain!’ ― whereas you know not what shall be tomorrow! For what is your life? It is a vapor which appears for a little while, and afterwards shall vanish away!” (James 4:13-15).
For many of us, water is everywhere; we take for granted the water piped to us each day from huge reservoirs via waterworks and treatment systems, through the miles of pipes that transport it to our kitchens and bathrooms; all day and all night, aqueducts hum with life giving water. On average, each person draws about 87 gallons a day: 24 gallons for flushing, 32 gallons for bathing, laundry, and dishwashing and 25 gallons for swimming pools and watering the lawn. We use only two gallons a day for drinking and cooking―the only water we actually require in order to survive. In general, a person can survive for about three days without water. The world record for the longest survival time without water and food is 18 days, achieved by an 18-year-old man in Austria who was accidentally locked in a government facility in 1979. Modern obstetrics has shown that the human embryo is born from the amniotic fluid in the mother’s womb, and that this fluid has the same composition as sea water. Water is absolutely essential to human life. It carries blood through the 60,000 miles of arteries, capillaries and veins in our bodies. It is necessary for digestion. It lubricates our joints, keeps mucous membranes moist, and enables our eyes to function. It regulates our body heat, and it is essential to all plant and animal life, which are so important to human survival.
So what of holy water? Probably, we think of this even less than we think of the water that flows from the taps/faucets into our homes. Think of the last time you entered a Catholic church. You probably blessed yourself with holy water. Was it an automatic gesture? A finger dipped in the water, a quick slide of the fingers to forehead and across the breast―but, perhaps, accompanied by little or no thought? Perhaps we need to look again at that humble substance awaiting us as we enter our churches! Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). The Little Flower, St. Thérèse of the Infant Jesus (a.k.a. St. Thérèse of Lisieux) used to say: “Everything is grace!” ― which is true, since all grace ultimately comes from God (Christ), without Whom we can do nothing ― and water is a symbol of grace. The waters of salvation, or the graces from salvation, flow from Christ through Mary, just as the water flowed from His pierced side on the Cross of Calvary. Christ is, as He himself said, the One of Whom we should be drinking: “If any man thirst, let him come to Me and drink! He that believes in Me, as the Scripture says: ‘Out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water!’” (John 7:37-38).
In theological terms, holy water is a Sacramental. It is a mixture of blessed salt and blessed water, and, although, by its use, Sanctifying Grace is not conferred, Actual Grace is obtained. “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God!” (John 3:5). Baptism is essential to our salvation―and the use of holy water daily is a remembrance that we are marked by the waters of our Baptism, as well as being marked out by them as disciples of Christ in a world where a relentless war is waged upon our souls. Theologians say: “God will not do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices!” God seldom helps us directly and miraculously―usually He offers us His help and assistance in an ordinary way, through the mediation of His consecrated servants, the priests, and through the mediation of grace; that is the Sacraments, the Sacramentals and prayers. Holy water is one of those Sacramentals of the Church. During His life on Earth, the Savior sent forth His apostles and disciples “and gave them power and authority over all devils, and to cure diseases.” The Apostles and their immediate successors and assistants, by numerous miracles, soon revealed that God was with them, that through them He bestowed His blessing on men of good will. It was not the apostles and disciples who cured people and cast out demons―it was Christ Who did it through them, using them as instruments. Holy water is an instrument of Christ.
Naaman the Syrian general, who was a leper, was told by Elias to go and wash himself in the River Jordan seven times―after which he was cured of his leprosy (4 Kings 5:1-15). God would later have St. John the Baptist baptize Christ in the River Jordan―among many others. “Then Jesus came from Galilee to the River Jordan, unto John, to be baptized by him … And Jesus, being baptized, came out of the water and the heavens were opened to Him: and He saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon Him. And behold a voice from Heaven, saying: ‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!’” (Matthew 3:13-17). The Epiphany season celebrates more than just the Three Kings coming to adore Jesus―the Church’s Liturgy for the feast of Epiphany also includes: (1) the Baptism of Jesus in the River Jordan; (2) the miraculous changing of water into wine at the marriage feast of Cana; and (3) the arrival of Three Kings to adore Jesus in Bethlehem: “This day we keep a holiday in honor of three wonders, this day a star led the wise men to the manger; this day at the marriage, water was made wine; this day Christ was, for our salvation, pleased to be baptized of John in Jordan. Alleluia.” (Antiphon for the Magnificat, Vespers of the feast of the Epiphany). The Baptism of Jesus and the Miracle of Cana are both essentially focused upon―yes, you guessed it―water!
For Spirtiual and Material Needs
Our Lord’s work as Redeemer is to be continued in the world, and to this end His priests are endowed with the power which the Redeemer Himself received from His Father. Even as Jesus healed, the Catholic priest shall and can heal, save and bless. In the Name of Jesus, the priest shall and can break the power of evil spirits, that they may not harm us. He shall and can place us under the protection and blessing of God in all places and in all conditions of life. The Catholic Church has received from her divine Founder the power, through her servants, the priests, of penetrating the whole human existence with divine inspiration and grace. We have the surest foundation for believing this.
The Catholic Church offers us her Sacramentals, that is, exorcisms, consecrations, blessings, through which all that is harmful, especially the influence of the evil spirits, is warded off from us, and all that may help us rendered good and beneficial. To this end the Church uses the power bestowed upon her by Christ and follows the example He gave when He laid His hands on the little children and blessed them; when, looking up to Heaven, He blessed the loaves and fishes for the hungry multitudes. In the same way the Catholic Church blesses mothers and children, food and drink, dwellings, clothing, pasture and corn, domestic animals, barns, stables, workshops, machines and innumerable other things. She consecrates her churches and all that is intended for God’s service; she consecrates cemeteries and blesses the graves of our dear ones, oil, candles, herbs, palms, crucifixes, rosaries, scapulars, medals, and especially holy water for the manifold, pious use of body and soul.
The Church uses holy water very frequently in the numerous blessings and consecrations undertaken by her. The ritual (Handbook of Ecclesiastical Ceremonies) contains a supplement of over a hundred different consecrations and blessings. In almost every case, holy water is applied. After the sign of the cross, holy water is used by the Church more frequently than any other Sacramental.
Profit from the Power
Holy water is composed of two elements, water and salt. Very beautiful are the prayers, and deeply significant the ceremonies with which the priest converts both into a mediation of divine grace; the evil spirits are exorcised so that the water may be efficacious in warding off their evil influence; and it is consecrated so that it may become a mediator of divine grace. It is through the power of the prayers of the Church that holy water possesses the effects enumerated above. Prayer, above all the prayer of the Church, can obtain the divine assistance even for one utterly undeserving. Therefore holy water will not be used in vain even in the case of one who is in the state of mortal sin. It can always bring him predisposing grace to return to God’s friendship, protection of the body and other assistance. But its power is far greater when used by those in the state of grace and applied with devout intention.
The Church not only uses holy water frequently, but she desires the faithful to do likewise. Therefore she gives the priest unlimited power to bless holy water for the use of the faithful. In many churches it is blessed every Sunday. Furthermore, the Church allows, nay, even wishes that Catholics should take holy water to their homes and keep it for private use. In this way the Christian family is enabled to experience the operation of holy water in their souls as often as desired.
As one priest writes: “The Enemy really hates holy water. One of the explicit purposes of holy water is to put demons to flight wherever it is sprinkled. In exorcising and blessing the salt used for holy water, the priest says: ‘May [it] rid whatever it touches or sprinkles of all uncleanness and protect it from every assault of evil spirits!’ In exorcising and blessing the water: ‘I exorcise you so that you may put to flight all the power of the Enemy, and be able to root out and supplant that Enemy with his apostate angels!’ In blessing the combined water and salt: ‘Let whatever might menace the safety and peace of those who live here be put to flight by the sprinkling of this water!’”
St. Teresa of Avila, in chapter 31 her autobiography, explains how she was being tormented by demons. She used holy water against them and wrote: “From long experience I have learned that there is nothing like holy water to put devils to flight and prevent them from coming back again. They also flee from the Cross, but return; so holy water must have great virtue.”
● See to it that you always have holy water in your home. This should be a principal concern of all Catholic families. Have holy water fonts in all the bedrooms and in the living room of your family. Set the good example yourself by frequently making the sign of the cross with holy water. Encourage others in your home to do the same.
● Teach your children always to take holy water before going to sleep, and to sprinkle their beds with a few drops; also to bless themselves with it when they rise in the morning and before going to school. Bless your children yourself with holy water, especially your youngest child when you have attended to him in the morning; sprinkle it on his little cot and his clothing, and from time to time place a little in his bath.
● When anyone is ill it is essential to have holy water by the bedside. The patient should be encouraged often to bless himself with it. Bless his medicine with it also.
● From time to time, and at least once a year, you should sprinkle all the rooms in the house with holy water, using a palm branch for the purpose; also cellar, storeroom and granary. Similarly with workshops, stables and barns, machines and cowsheds, garden and fields. Do not think this is a desecration. As we are permitted to pray for all these material things, so too we may invoke God’s protection on them through the Sacramentals of the Church.
● Nor need you have any scruple in putting holy water in the food of sick animals. The Church has herself instituted formulae for blessing with holy water, our food and drink, animals—their food and stables; fields (to protect them from all kinds of noxious insects); machines, telegraph apparatus, railways, wells, furnaces, tile works, and so on. The whole creation is intended for man’s use, to serve his welfare, corporal and spiritual, temporal and eternal. And to this end the Church pronounces her blessing given in God’s Name.
Not to mention, there is a partial indulgence for the use of holy water, which explains why Catholics cross themselves with reverence as they enter or exit a church. This indulgence was renewed by Blessed Pope Pius IX in 1876 in a brief (cf. The Raccolta, p. 5) encouraging Catholics to sign themselves with holy water under these conditions:
● The Sign of the Cross must be made with holy water.
● We must say, “In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
● We must have contrition for our sins.
● For this, as for any indulgence, we must be in the state of grace.
The Rite of Blessing
To do justice to any article on the power of Epiphany Water, it is only logical and necessary to first of all examine the words of the rite of blessing used in the creation of Epiphany Water. So, first of all, we publish the rite in full (apart from the entire text of the Litany of Saints―which most people are already familiar with). After that, we will begin commenting upon the rite and giving examples of the power of Epiphany Water in its use.
This blessing comes from the Orient, where the Church has long emphasized in her celebration of Epiphany the mystery of Our Lord’s Baptism, and by analogy our Baptism. This aspect is not neglected in western Christendom, although in practice we have concentrated on the visit of the Magi. Many years before the Latin Rite officially adopted the blessing of Epiphany water, diocesan rituals, notably in lower Italy, had contained such a blessing.
At the appointed time the celebrant, vested in white cope (if a bishop, the miter is worn, but removed during the prayers), and the deacon and subdeacon, vested in white dalmatic and tunic respectively, come before the altar. They are preceded by acolytes, who carry the processional cross and lighted candles (which are put in their proper place), and by the other clergy. A vessel of water and a container of salt are in readiness in the sanctuary.
THE LITANY OF THE SAINTS
First the Litany of the Saints is sung, during which time all kneel. After the invocation “That you grant eternal rest,” etc. the celebrant rises and sings the following two invocations, the second in a higher key:
V. That you bless + this water.
R. We beg you to hear us.
V. That you bless + and sanctify + this water
R. We beg you to hear us.
Then the chanters continue the litany up to and including the last Lord, have mercy. After this the celebrant chants Our Father the rest inaudibly until:
Priest: And lead us not into temptation.
All: But deliver us from evil.
After the Litany of Saints has ended, the following psalms are sung:
PSALM 28
Priest: Give to the Lord, you sons of God, * give to the Lord glory and praise.
All: Give to the Lord the glory due His Name; * adore the Lord in holy attire.
Priest: The voice of the Lord is over the waters, the God of glory thunders, * The Lord, over vast waters.
All: The voice of the Lord is mighty; * the voice of the Lord is majestic.
Priest: The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars, * the Lord breaks the cedars of Lebanon.
All: He makes Lebanon leap like a calf * and Sarion like a young wild bull.
Priest: The voice of the Lord strikes fiery flames; the voice of the Lord shakes the desert, * the Lord shakes the wilderness of Cades.
All: The voice of the Lord twists the oaks and strips the forests, * and in His temple all say, “Glory!”
Priest: The Lord is enthroned above the flood; * the Lord is enthroned as king forever.
All: May the Lord give strength to His people; * may the Lord bless His people with peace.
Priest: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
All: As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
PSALM 45
Priest: God is our refuge and our strength, * an ever-present help in distress.
All: Therefore we fear not, though the Earth be shaken and mountains plunge into the depths of the sea;
Priest: Though its waters rage and foam * and the mountains quake at its surging.
All: The Lord of hosts is with us; * our stronghold is the God of Jacob.
Priest: There is a stream whose runlets gladden the city of God, * the holy dwelling of the Most High.
All: God is in its midst; it shall not be disturbed; * God will help it at the break of dawn.
Priest: Though nations are in turmoil, kingdoms totter, * His voice resounds, the Earth melts away;
All: The Lord of hosts is with us; * our stronghold is the God of Jacob.
Priest: Come, see the deeds of the Lord, * the astounding things He has wrought on Earth.
All: He has stopped wars to the end of the Earth; * the bow He breaks; He splinters the spears; He burns the shields with fire.
Priest: Desist, and confess that I am God, * exalted among the nations, exalted upon the Earth.
All: The Lord of hosts is with us; * our stronghold is the God of Jacob.
Priest: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
All: As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
PSALM 146
Priest: Praise the Lord, for He is good; * sing praise to our God, for He is gracious; it is fitting to praise Him.
All: The Lord rebuilds Jerusalem; * the dispersed of Israel He gathers.
Priest: He heals the brokenhearted * and binds up their wounds.
All: He tells the number of the stars; * He calls each by name.
Priest: Great is our Lord and mighty in power; * to His wisdom there is no limit.
All: The Lord sustains the lowly; * the wicked He casts to the ground.
Priest: Sing to the Lord with thanksgiving; * sing praise with the harp to our God.
All: Who covers the heavens with clouds, * who provides rain for the Earth;
Priest: Who makes grass sprout on the mountains * and herbs for the service of men;
All: Who gives food to the cattle, * and to the young ravens when they cry to Him.
Priest: He delights not in the strength of the steed, * nor is He pleased with the fleetness of men.
All: The Lord is pleased with those who fear Him, * with those who hope for His kindness.
Priest: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
All: As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
The celebrant then chants and Exorcism against Satan and his devils.
EXORCISM AGAINST SATAN AND HIS DEVILS
In the Name of our Lord Jesus + Christ and by His power, we cast you out, every unclean spirit, every devilish power, every assault of the infernal adversary, every legion, every diabolical group and sect; begone and stay far from the Church of God, from all who are made in the image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of the Divine + Lamb! Never again dare, you cunning serpent, to deceive the human race, to persecute the Church of God, nor to strike the chosen of God and to sift them as + wheat! For it is the Most High God Who commands you, + He to Whom you heretofore in your great pride considered yourself equal; He Who desires that all men might be saved and come to the knowledge of truth. God the Father + commands you. God the Son + commands you! God the Holy + Spirit commands you. The majesty of Christ, the eternal Word of God made flesh + commands you; He Who for the salvation of our race, the race that was lost through your envy, humbled Himself and became obedient even unto death; He who built His Church upon a solid rock, and proclaimed that the gates of Hell should never prevail against her, and that He would remain with her all days, even to the end of the world! The sacred mystery of the Cross + commands you, as well as the power of all the mysteries of Christian Faith! The exalted Virgin Mary, Mother of God + commands you, who in her lowliness crushed your proud head from the first moment of her Immaculate Conception! The Faith of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul and the other Apostles + commands you! The blood of the martyrs and the devout intercession of all holy men and women commands you!
Therefore, accursed dragon and every diabolical legion, we adjure you by the living + God, by the true + God, by the holy + God, by the God Who so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but shall have life everlasting; cease your deception of the human race and your giving them to drink of the poison of everlasting damnation; desist from harming the Church and fettering her freedom! Begone Satan, you father and teacher of lies and enemy of mankind! Give place to Christ, in Whom you found none of your works! Give place to the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, which Christ Himself purchased with His blood! May you be brought low under God’s mighty hand! May you tremble and flee, as we call upon the holy and awesome Name of Jesus, before Whom Hell quakes, and to Whom the Virtues, Powers, and Dominations are subject; whom the Cherubim and Seraphim praise with unwearied voices, saying: “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts!”
Next the following antiphon and canticle is sung or said (either the Benedictus, or the Magnificat):
CANTICLE OF ZACHARY
Luke 1.68-79
Antiphon: Today the Church is espoused to her heavenly bridegroom, for Christ washes her sins in the Jordan; the Magi hasten with gifts to the regal nuptials; and the guests are gladdened with water made wine, alleluia.
Priest: Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel! * He has visited His people and brought about its redemption.
All: He has raised for us a stronghold of salvation * in the house of David His servant,
Priest: And redeemed the promise He had made * through the mouth of His holy prophets of old,
All: To grant salvation from our foes * and from the hand of all that hate us;
Priest: To deal in mercy with our fathers * and be mindful of His holy covenant,
All: Of the oath he had sworn to our father Abraham, * that He would enable us
Priest: Rescued from the clutches of our foes, * to worship Him without fear,
All: In holiness and observance of the Law, * in His presence, all our days.
Priest: And you, my little one, will be hailed ‘Prophet of the Most High’; * for the Lord’s precursor you will be to prepare His ways;
All: You are to impart to His people knowledge of salvation * through forgiveness of their sins.
Priest: Thanks be to the merciful heart of our God! * a dawning Light from on high will visit us
All: To shine upon those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, * and guide our feet into the path of peace.
Priest: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, * and to the Holy Spirit,
All: As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, * world without end. Amen.
Antiphon: Today the Church is espoused to her heavenly bridegroom, for Christ washes her sins in the Jordan; the Magi hasten with gifts to the regal nuptials; and the guests are gladdened with water made wine, alleluia.
Or, instead of the Benedictus, the Magnificat may be chosen.
THE MAGNIFICAT
Antiphon: Today the Church is espoused to her heavenly bridegroom, for Christ washes her sins in the Jordan; the Magi hasten with gifts to the regal nuptials; and the guests are gladdened with water made wine, alleluia.
Priest: My soul doth magnify the Lord * and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior
All: For He hath regarded the humility of His handmaiden.* for behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
Priest: For He that is mighty hath done great things to me, * and holy is His Name.
All: And His Mercy is from generation unto generations * upon them that fear Him.
Priest: He hath shown might in His arm, * He hath scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart.
All: He hath put down the mighty from their seat, * and hath exalted the humble.
Priest: He hath filled the hungry with good things, * and the rich He hath sent empty away.
All: He hath received Israel, His servant, * being mindful of His mercy.
Priest: As He spoke to our Fathers, * Abraham and his seed forever.
All: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, * and to the Holy Spirit,
Priest: As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, * world without end. Amen.
All:
Antiphon: Today the Church is espoused to her heavenly bridegroom, for Christ washes her sins in the Jordan; the Magi hasten with gifts to the regal nuptials; and the guests are gladdened with water made wine, alleluia.
At the end of the canticle (the Benedictus or the Magnificat) the antiphon given above is repeated. Then the celebrant sings:
Priest: The Lord be with you.
All: May He also be with you.
Priest: Let us pray. God, who on this day revealed your only-begotten Son to all nations by the guidance of a star, grant that we who now know you by faith may finally behold you in your heavenly majesty; through Christ our Lord.
All: Amen.
THE RITE FOR PROVIDING HOLY WATER
Next he performs an exorcism over the salt and water and blesses them. On Sundays, or whenever this blessing takes place, salt and fresh water are prepared in the church or in the sacristy. The priest, vested in surplice and purple stole, says:
Priest: Our help is in the Name of the Lord.
All: Who made Heaven and Earth.
THE EXORCISM OF THE SALT:
Priest: O salt, creature of God, I cast out the demon from you by the living + God, by the true + God, by the holy + God, by God who ordered you to be thrown into the water-spring by Eliseus to heal it of its barrenness. May you be a purified salt, a means of health for those who believe, a medicine for body and soul for all who make use of you. May all evil fancies of the foul fiend, his malice and cunning, be driven afar from the place where you are sprinkled. And let every unclean spirit be repulsed by Him who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire.
All: Amen.
Priest: Let us pray. Almighty everlasting God, we humbly appeal to Your mercy and goodness to graciously bless + this creature, salt, which You have given for mankind’s use. May all who use it find in it a remedy for body and mind. And may everything that it touches or sprinkles be freed from uncleanness and any influence of the evil spirit; through Christ our Lord.
All: Amen.
THE EXORCISM OF THE WATER:
Priest: O water, creature of God, I cast out the demon from you in the name of God + the Father almighty, in the name of Jesus + Christ, His Son, our Lord, and in the power of the Holy + Spirit. May you be a purified water, empowered to drive afar all power of the enemy, in fact, to root out and banish the enemy himself, along with his fallen angels. We ask this through the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire.
All: Amen.
Priest: Let us pray. O God, who for man’s welfare established the most wonderful mysteries in the substance of water, hearken to our prayer, and pour forth Your blessing + on this element of water, now being prepared with various purifying rites. May this creature of yours, when used in Your mysteries and endowed with your grace, serve to cast out demons and to banish disease. May everything that this water sprinkles in the homes and gatherings of the faithful be delivered from all that is unclean and hurtful; let no breath of contagion hover there, no taint of corruption; let all the wiles of the lurking enemy come to nothing. By the sprinkling of this water may everything opposed to the safety and peace of the occupants of these homes be banished, so that in calling on Your Holy Name they may know the well-being they desire, and be protected from every peril; through Christ our Lord.
All: Amen.
The priest pours the salt into the water in the form of a cross, saying:
Priest: May this salt and water be mixed together; in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, + and of the Holy Spirit.
All: Amen.
Priest: The Lord be with you.
All: May He also be with you.
Priest: Let us pray. God, source of irresistible might and king of an invincible realm, the ever-glorious conqueror; Who restrain the force of the adversary, silencing the uproar of his rage, and valiantly subduing his wickedness; in awe and humility we beg You, Lord, to regard with favor this creature thing of salt and water, to let the light of your kindness shine upon it, and to hallow it with the dew of Your mercy; so that wherever it is sprinkled and Your Holy Name is invoked, every assault of the unclean spirit may be baffled, and all dread of the serpent’s venom be cast out. To us who entreat Your mercy grant that the Holy Spirit may be with us wherever we may be; through Christ our Lord.
All: Amen.
SECTION 2
The Commentary and Examples
Taking Things for Granted
There are far too many things that we take for granted―both in the material sphere and the spiritual sphere. Take, for example, the air that we breathe―a human being can only survive for a few minutes without air; the availability of water to drink, clean, and irrigate our plants; or sunlight―without which life on Earth would end; or our health; or our job and its income; or peace between nations; etc. The list of presumptions, by which we take things for granted, is endless. “Boast not for tomorrow, for thou knowest not what today may bring forth!” (Proverbs 27:1). “Today he is lifted up, and tomorrow he shall not be found―because he is returned into his earth; and his thought is come to nothing!” (1 Machabees 2:63). “The grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven!” (Matthew 6:30). “Behold, now you that say: ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such a city, and there we will spend a year, and will traffic, and make our gain!’ ― whereas you know not what shall be tomorrow! For what is your life? It is a vapor which appears for a little while, and afterwards shall vanish away!” (James 4:13-15).
For many of us, water is everywhere; we take for granted the water piped to us each day from huge reservoirs via waterworks and treatment systems, through the miles of pipes that transport it to our kitchens and bathrooms; all day and all night, aqueducts hum with life giving water. On average, each person draws about 87 gallons a day: 24 gallons for flushing, 32 gallons for bathing, laundry, and dishwashing and 25 gallons for swimming pools and watering the lawn. We use only two gallons a day for drinking and cooking―the only water we actually require in order to survive. In general, a person can survive for about three days without water. The world record for the longest survival time without water and food is 18 days, achieved by an 18-year-old man in Austria who was accidentally locked in a government facility in 1979. Modern obstetrics has shown that the human embryo is born from the amniotic fluid in the mother’s womb, and that this fluid has the same composition as sea water. Water is absolutely essential to human life. It carries blood through the 60,000 miles of arteries, capillaries and veins in our bodies. It is necessary for digestion. It lubricates our joints, keeps mucous membranes moist, and enables our eyes to function. It regulates our body heat, and it is essential to all plant and animal life, which are so important to human survival.
So what of holy water? Probably, we think of this even less than we think of the water that flows from the taps/faucets into our homes. Think of the last time you entered a Catholic church. You probably blessed yourself with holy water. Was it an automatic gesture? A finger dipped in the water, a quick slide of the fingers to forehead and across the breast―but, perhaps, accompanied by little or no thought? Perhaps we need to look again at that humble substance awaiting us as we enter our churches! Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). The Little Flower, St. Thérèse of the Infant Jesus (a.k.a. St. Thérèse of Lisieux) used to say: “Everything is grace!” ― which is true, since all grace ultimately comes from God (Christ), without Whom we can do nothing ― and water is a symbol of grace. The waters of salvation, or the graces from salvation, flow from Christ through Mary, just as the water flowed from His pierced side on the Cross of Calvary. Christ is, as He himself said, the One of Whom we should be drinking: “If any man thirst, let him come to Me and drink! He that believes in Me, as the Scripture says: ‘Out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water!’” (John 7:37-38).
In theological terms, holy water is a Sacramental. It is a mixture of blessed salt and blessed water, and, although, by its use, Sanctifying Grace is not conferred, Actual Grace is obtained. “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God!” (John 3:5). Baptism is essential to our salvation―and the use of holy water daily is a remembrance that we are marked by the waters of our Baptism, as well as being marked out by them as disciples of Christ in a world where a relentless war is waged upon our souls. Theologians say: “God will not do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices!” God seldom helps us directly and miraculously―usually He offers us His help and assistance in an ordinary way, through the mediation of His consecrated servants, the priests, and through the mediation of grace; that is the Sacraments, the Sacramentals and prayers. Holy water is one of those Sacramentals of the Church. During His life on Earth, the Savior sent forth His apostles and disciples “and gave them power and authority over all devils, and to cure diseases.” The Apostles and their immediate successors and assistants, by numerous miracles, soon revealed that God was with them, that through them He bestowed His blessing on men of good will. It was not the apostles and disciples who cured people and cast out demons―it was Christ Who did it through them, using them as instruments. Holy water is an instrument of Christ.
Naaman the Syrian general, who was a leper, was told by Elias to go and wash himself in the River Jordan seven times―after which he was cured of his leprosy (4 Kings 5:1-15). God would later have St. John the Baptist baptize Christ in the River Jordan―among many others. “Then Jesus came from Galilee to the River Jordan, unto John, to be baptized by him … And Jesus, being baptized, came out of the water and the heavens were opened to Him: and He saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon Him. And behold a voice from Heaven, saying: ‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!’” (Matthew 3:13-17). The Epiphany season celebrates more than just the Three Kings coming to adore Jesus―the Church’s Liturgy for the feast of Epiphany also includes: (1) the Baptism of Jesus in the River Jordan; (2) the miraculous changing of water into wine at the marriage feast of Cana; and (3) the arrival of Three Kings to adore Jesus in Bethlehem: “This day we keep a holiday in honor of three wonders, this day a star led the wise men to the manger; this day at the marriage, water was made wine; this day Christ was, for our salvation, pleased to be baptized of John in Jordan. Alleluia.” (Antiphon for the Magnificat, Vespers of the feast of the Epiphany). The Baptism of Jesus and the Miracle of Cana are both essentially focused upon―yes, you guessed it―water!
For Spirtiual and Material Needs
Our Lord’s work as Redeemer is to be continued in the world, and to this end His priests are endowed with the power which the Redeemer Himself received from His Father. Even as Jesus healed, the Catholic priest shall and can heal, save and bless. In the Name of Jesus, the priest shall and can break the power of evil spirits, that they may not harm us. He shall and can place us under the protection and blessing of God in all places and in all conditions of life. The Catholic Church has received from her divine Founder the power, through her servants, the priests, of penetrating the whole human existence with divine inspiration and grace. We have the surest foundation for believing this.
The Catholic Church offers us her Sacramentals, that is, exorcisms, consecrations, blessings, through which all that is harmful, especially the influence of the evil spirits, is warded off from us, and all that may help us rendered good and beneficial. To this end the Church uses the power bestowed upon her by Christ and follows the example He gave when He laid His hands on the little children and blessed them; when, looking up to Heaven, He blessed the loaves and fishes for the hungry multitudes. In the same way the Catholic Church blesses mothers and children, food and drink, dwellings, clothing, pasture and corn, domestic animals, barns, stables, workshops, machines and innumerable other things. She consecrates her churches and all that is intended for God’s service; she consecrates cemeteries and blesses the graves of our dear ones, oil, candles, herbs, palms, crucifixes, rosaries, scapulars, medals, and especially holy water for the manifold, pious use of body and soul.
The Church uses holy water very frequently in the numerous blessings and consecrations undertaken by her. The ritual (Handbook of Ecclesiastical Ceremonies) contains a supplement of over a hundred different consecrations and blessings. In almost every case, holy water is applied. After the sign of the cross, holy water is used by the Church more frequently than any other Sacramental.
Profit from the Power
Holy water is composed of two elements, water and salt. Very beautiful are the prayers, and deeply significant the ceremonies with which the priest converts both into a mediation of divine grace; the evil spirits are exorcised so that the water may be efficacious in warding off their evil influence; and it is consecrated so that it may become a mediator of divine grace. It is through the power of the prayers of the Church that holy water possesses the effects enumerated above. Prayer, above all the prayer of the Church, can obtain the divine assistance even for one utterly undeserving. Therefore holy water will not be used in vain even in the case of one who is in the state of mortal sin. It can always bring him predisposing grace to return to God’s friendship, protection of the body and other assistance. But its power is far greater when used by those in the state of grace and applied with devout intention.
The Church not only uses holy water frequently, but she desires the faithful to do likewise. Therefore she gives the priest unlimited power to bless holy water for the use of the faithful. In many churches it is blessed every Sunday. Furthermore, the Church allows, nay, even wishes that Catholics should take holy water to their homes and keep it for private use. In this way the Christian family is enabled to experience the operation of holy water in their souls as often as desired.
As one priest writes: “The Enemy really hates holy water. One of the explicit purposes of holy water is to put demons to flight wherever it is sprinkled. In exorcising and blessing the salt used for holy water, the priest says: ‘May [it] rid whatever it touches or sprinkles of all uncleanness and protect it from every assault of evil spirits!’ In exorcising and blessing the water: ‘I exorcise you so that you may put to flight all the power of the Enemy, and be able to root out and supplant that Enemy with his apostate angels!’ In blessing the combined water and salt: ‘Let whatever might menace the safety and peace of those who live here be put to flight by the sprinkling of this water!’”
St. Teresa of Avila, in chapter 31 her autobiography, explains how she was being tormented by demons. She used holy water against them and wrote: “From long experience I have learned that there is nothing like holy water to put devils to flight and prevent them from coming back again. They also flee from the Cross, but return; so holy water must have great virtue.”
● See to it that you always have holy water in your home. This should be a principal concern of all Catholic families. Have holy water fonts in all the bedrooms and in the living room of your family. Set the good example yourself by frequently making the sign of the cross with holy water. Encourage others in your home to do the same.
● Teach your children always to take holy water before going to sleep, and to sprinkle their beds with a few drops; also to bless themselves with it when they rise in the morning and before going to school. Bless your children yourself with holy water, especially your youngest child when you have attended to him in the morning; sprinkle it on his little cot and his clothing, and from time to time place a little in his bath.
● When anyone is ill it is essential to have holy water by the bedside. The patient should be encouraged often to bless himself with it. Bless his medicine with it also.
● From time to time, and at least once a year, you should sprinkle all the rooms in the house with holy water, using a palm branch for the purpose; also cellar, storeroom and granary. Similarly with workshops, stables and barns, machines and cowsheds, garden and fields. Do not think this is a desecration. As we are permitted to pray for all these material things, so too we may invoke God’s protection on them through the Sacramentals of the Church.
● Nor need you have any scruple in putting holy water in the food of sick animals. The Church has herself instituted formulae for blessing with holy water, our food and drink, animals—their food and stables; fields (to protect them from all kinds of noxious insects); machines, telegraph apparatus, railways, wells, furnaces, tile works, and so on. The whole creation is intended for man’s use, to serve his welfare, corporal and spiritual, temporal and eternal. And to this end the Church pronounces her blessing given in God’s Name.
Not to mention, there is a partial indulgence for the use of holy water, which explains why Catholics cross themselves with reverence as they enter or exit a church. This indulgence was renewed by Blessed Pope Pius IX in 1876 in a brief (cf. The Raccolta, p. 5) encouraging Catholics to sign themselves with holy water under these conditions:
● The Sign of the Cross must be made with holy water.
● We must say, “In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
● We must have contrition for our sins.
● For this, as for any indulgence, we must be in the state of grace.
Article 11
Saturday, January 4th
The Power of Epiphany Water (Part 1 of 2)
Saturday, January 4th
The Power of Epiphany Water (Part 1 of 2)
Water to Douse the Fires of Hell
“Water, water everywhere―and not a drop to drink” is a line from Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s famous poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. The line is used to describe the irony and anguish of being surrounded by something, but unable to benefit from it. In the poem, the line refers to sailors who are stuck at sea and surrounded by undrinkable salt water. The line can also be used to describe situations where someone is surrounded by something, but cannot partake of it. For example, someone might be in a situation where they have access to water, but it is not clean or safe to drink.
We could rename the poem and call it The Rime of Heaven’s Mariner and rephrase it a little:
Holy water everywhere, but no one stops to think!
Few there are that really care, as into Hell they sink!
Water could change how they fare, and snatch them from the brink!
For water, when joined to prayer, can wash away sin’s stink;
And help avoid the devil’s snare, through which he will hoodwink;
Those who are unaware, and cannot see the link
Of all the glitz, fun and fanfare, on the world’s skating rink,
With Satan’s endless warfare, who behind the scenes does slink,
Ever seeking to ensnare, with his seductive wink.
For penance they don’t really care, preferring much food and drink;
Sinking into the armchair, but on their knees they will not sink.
Parties, fun and games they prepare, but from God they quickly shrink.
Beer, wine and spirits they will share, but of holy water they do not think.
The Waters of the World
As Coleridge’s line from his poem The Ancient Mariner states: “Water, water everywhere―and not a drop to drink!” It refers to being surrounded by water that is extremely dangerous to drink―which is what can be said of the worldliness that surrounds us on all sides. It may be tempting to drink sea-water if you are extremely thirsty. Sea-water is not safe to drink due to its high salt content. Sea-water is toxic to humans because your body is unable to get rid of the salt that comes from sea-water. Drinking sea-water can lead to dehydration, kidney damage, and other health issues because the salt concentration is much higher than what the human body can handle. The salt would get absorbed into your blood along with the water. That would make your blood too salty. So, your kidneys would have to remove the salt. But to do that they would need to use even more water! That’s why drinking seawater would just make you thirstier.
It is the same with the world, when we drink-in what the world has to offer, we become more and more thirsty for that “bad-water” of worldliness. Just as sea-water is toxic to the physical body, so too is the water of worldliness toxic to the spiritual soul. Hence it is that Our Lord says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Scripture tells us keep apart from the world―even though we have to live in this world: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). Hence we are told: “Do not eat and drink with the wicked!” (Tobias 4:18). We are pilgrims in this world―merely passing through enemy territory on our way to Heaven. We should say to the worldlings that surround us: “We will not drink the waters of your wells, but we will go by the common highway, neither turning aside to the right hand, nor to the left, till we are past your borders!” (Numbers 20:17). “And the man of God answered the king: ‘If you would give me half your house I will not go with you, nor eat your bread, nor drink water in this place!’” (3 Kings 13:8).
Fight Fire with Fire―Fight Water with Water!
You have, no doubt, heard of the expression: “Fight fire with fire!” If you fight fire with fire, you deal with people attacking or threatening you by using similar methods, tactics or weapons to the ones that they are using. Christians, St. Augustine makes clear, are not to fight fire with fire in the sense that they are not to fight evil with evil. They know another way. As the Apostle Paul teaches, only good can conquer evil: “To no man rendering evil for evil. Revenge not yourselves, but give place unto wrath, for it is written: ‘Revenge is mine, I will repay!’ says the Lord. But if your enemy be hungry, give him to eat; if he thirsts, give him to drink! For, doing this, you shalt heap coals of fire upon his head. Be not overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good!” (Romans 12:17-21).
To fight fire with fire―as regards Christians―should refer to the fire of zeal. The world is very zealous in what it does―so too must Christians being even more zealous in overcoming the world. The fire that we use to fight the fires of Hell and the world, is the fire of charity―first and foremost a love of God, a love of His teachings and a love of His commandments.
Similarly―even though the expression does not exist―we can fight water with water. What does that mean? It means fighting the “waters” of worldliness with the “waters” of grace. Our Lady of Good Success speaks of these sinful waters of worldliness when she predicts: “The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
God used water to cleanse the world from the filth of its sin in the time Noe by the means of the Great Flood: “I will rain upon the Earth forty days and forty nights; and I will destroy every substance that I have made, from the face of the Earth … And Noe went into the ark, and his sons, his wife and the wives of his sons went with him into the ark, because of the waters of the flood ... And after the seven days were passed, the waters of the flood began to overflow the Earth ... And the flood was forty days upon the Earth, and the waters increased … They overflowed exceedingly and filled all on the face of the Earth … And the waters prevailed beyond measure upon the Earth and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered. The water was fifteen cubits higher than the mountains which it covered … And all things wherein there is the breath of life on the Earth, died. And God destroyed all the substance that was upon the Earth, from man even to beast, and the creeping things and fowls of the air―and they were destroyed from the Earth and only Noe remained, and they that were with him in the ark” (Genesis 7:4-23). God destroyed the flood of sin with His own flood of water!
Water, Water Everywhere!
Today, approximately 71% of the Earth’s surface is covered by water. 70% of the oxygen that we breathe comes from the marine plants at the bottom of the oceans. The oceans cover almost 75% of the Earth’s surface and contain about 97% of the Earth’s water in the form of salty seawater―which is too salty for human consumption. Only a small fraction of Earth’s water―only about 3% of the Earth’s water―is freshwater. Of that 3% of freshwater, 2.5% of the Earth’s freshwater is unavailable, and is mostly locked up in glaciers, polar ice caps, atmosphere; or in highly polluted soil; or lies too far under the Earth’s surface to be extracted at an affordable cost. Only 0.5% of the Earth’s water is available fresh water―which is found in lakes, rivers, and wetlands. This should make us think of the small fraction of souls that are saved and the vast majority of souls who end up being ‘drowned’ in the fires of Hell.
Human beings seem to reflect similar percentages in their bodies. By weight, the average adult human is approximately 60% water, and the average child is approximately 65% water. Babies have the most, being born at about 78%. By one year of age, that amount drops to about 65%. About 75% of the brain is made up of water. Water is absolutely essential to human life. It carries blood through the 60,000 miles of arteries, capillaries and veins in our bodies. It is necessary for digestion. It lubricates our joints, keeps mucous membranes moist, and enables our eyes to function. It regulates our body heat, and it is essential to all plant and animal life, which are so important to human survival.
Water helps regulate body temperature by redistributing heat from active tissues to the skin and cooling the body through perspiration. Water has a high heat capacity, which means it can absorb a lot of heat before its temperature rises. This property allows water to stabilize the internal temperature of living organisms.
Water is a major part of most of the body’s cells (except for fat cells) and is crucial for cell life. Water acts as the medium of transportation between the cell and its surroundings, which is vital to cell life.
Water helps remove waste from the body by acting as a solvent for waste products, dissolving them and allowing them to pass out of the body via urine and perspiration. The kidneys and liver use water to help flush out waste, as do your intestines.
Truly it is a case of “water, water everywhere”―more than we would think! Water! What an amazing gift! A few drops lift up a plant’s drooping leaves, or refresh a human body. You can wash in it, splash in it, swim in it. You can relish in its sounds―the babble of a brook, or the roaring of the sea, or the breaking of the waves upon the sandy beach. Life springs from water. Not just physical life, but spiritual life as well. For we are born anew in Baptism of water and the Spirit.
Partly because we take water for granted, partly because it’s cheaper than dirt (in most cities a ton of water delivered to your kitchen costs very little), we use it lavishly. We each draw about 87 gallons a day: 24 for flushing, 32 for bathing, laundry, and dishwashing and 25 for swimming pools and watering the lawn. We use only two gallons a day for drinking and cooking―the only water we actually require in order to survive.
But this is just the beginning. An immense amount of water is needed for irrigation and industrial use. For example, the eggs you ate for breakfast this morning required 120 gallons of water each; the steak you might have for dinner, 3,500 gallons; the ton of steel in your car 60,000 gallons. When we consider these indirect uses of water, our daily need soars to 2,000 gallons each day for each person.
Despite this staggering use of water, experts do not think we will be running out of water. They tell us that four trillion gallons of rain water falls on the United States each day and that we use a mere tenth of it. Most of this one tenth returns to its source. The rest escapes into the atmosphere, but only briefly. None is lost; the water that St. John used to baptize Jesus still exists. Its billions of molecules are now dispersed throughout the world.
Water is a Symbol of Grace
Water is widely considered a symbol of grace due to its ability to cleanse and purify, often representing the forgiveness and renewal offered by God through Baptism―by which the soul is cleansed from the stains of sin and is filled with sanctifying grace. Holy water, outside of Baptism, has special powers, such as washing away venial sin, protecting from evil spirits, and sanctifying the soul.
Our Lord―the Author of all grace―associated Himself with water on many occasions.
● He was baptized by St. John the Baptist in the waters of the River Jordan (Matthew 3:13-17; Luke 3:21).
● His first public miracle was the changing of water into wine (John 2:1-11).
● He would miraculously walk on water (Matthew 14:22-34).
● He used the spittle from His mouth to miraculously open the eyes of the blind man― saliva is 99% water and 1% proteins: “When He had said these things, He spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and spread the clay on his eyes. And said to him: Go, wash in the pool of Siloe. He went and washed, and he came back seeing” (John 9:6-7).
● Similarly, he cured a deaf and dumb man with His spittle: “They brought to Him one deaf and dumb; and they begged Him that he would lay His hand upon him. And taking him apart from the multitude, He put His fingers into his ears, and spitting, He touched his tongue. And looking up to Heaven, he groaned, and said to him: ‘Ephpheta!’ ― which is, ‘Be thou opened!’ And immediately his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spoke right” (Mark 7:32-35).
● Our Lord miraculously calmed the stormy waters of the lake: “And rising up, He rebuked the wind, and said to the sea: ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased and there was made a great calm” (Mark 4:39).
● We see Jesus bring about a miraculous catch of fish out of the water for St. Peter (Luke 5:1-10).
● Jesus spoke of a living water to the Samaritan woman: “A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her: ‘Give Me to drink!’ The Samaritan woman said to Him: ‘How is it that You, being a Jew, ask of me to drink, who am a Samaritan woman? For the Jews do not communicate with the Samaritans!’ Jesus said to her: ‘If you only knew the gift of God, and Who He is that says to you: ‘Give Me to drink!’ ―then you perhaps would have asked of Him, and He would have given you living water!’ The woman said to Him: Sir, You have nothing with which to draw out water, and the well is deep! From where, then, have You living water? Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank thereof himself, and his children, and his cattle?’ Jesus answered and said to her: ‘Whosoever drinks of this water shall thirst again; but he that shall drink of the water that I will give him, he shall not thirst for ever! For the water that I will give him, shall become in him a fountain of water, springing up into life everlasting!” (John 4:7-14).
● When Jesus had died on the cross on Calvary, “one of the soldiers with a spear opened his side, and immediately there came out blood and water” (John 19:3).
The Blessing of Holy Water
Before looking at the much longer and much more solemn blessing of Epiphany Water, let us take a look at the regular blessing of Holy Water and the words the priest uses. Holy water is composed of two elements, water and salt. Very beautiful are the prayers, and deeply significant the ceremonies with which the priest converts both into a mediation of divine grace; the evil spirits are exorcised so that the water may be efficacious in warding off their evil influence; and it is consecrated so that it may become a mediator of divine grace.
The priest, wearing a purple stole, blesses the holy water in the following manner:
“Our help in the Name of the Lord”
“Who made Heaven and Earth.”
[The Priest then exorcises the salt].
“I exorcise thee, creature of salt, by the living + God, by the true + God, by the holy + God, by that God Who ordered thee to be put by Eliseus the prophet into the water, that the barrenness of the water might be healed; that thou mayest become exorcised salt for the salvation of those that believe; and that thou mayest be for the healing of soul and body to all those receiving thee, and that there may be banished from the place in which thou hast been sprinkled, every kind of hallucination and wickedness, or wile of devilish deceit, and every unclean spirit, adjured in the Name of Him Who will come to judge the living and the dead, and the world by fire. Amen.”
LET US PRAY.
“O Almighty and eternal God, we humbly implore Thine infinite mercy, that this creature of salt which Thou hast bestowed for the use of mankind may be blessed + and sanctified + through Thy mercy, that it may make for health of mind and body to all who partake of it; and that whatever is touched or sprinkled with it, may be freed from all uncleanness, and from the assaults of the evil spirit. Through Our Lord Jesus Christ Thy Son, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee for ever and ever. Amen.”
[He then exorcises the water.]
“I exorcise thee, creature of water, in the Name of God + the Father Almighty, and in the Name of Jesus + Christ His Son our Lord, and in the power of the Holy + Spirit, that thou mayest be made exorcised water for the banishment of every power of the enemy, and that thou mayest be able to uproot and cast out that enemy himself, together with his rebel angels: by the power of the same Jesus Christ Our Lord, Who will come to judge the living and the dead, and the world by fire. Amen.”
LET US PRAY.
“O God, who for the salvation of mankind has appointed water to be the foundation of Thy greatest Sacraments, graciously hear our prayers, and fill this element, which has in manifold ways been purified, with Thy power and blessing + so that this creature of Thine, for use in Thy mysteries, may be endowed with divine grace to drive away devils and to cast out diseases; that whatever in the houses or possessions of the faithful may be sprinkled by this water, may be freed from everything unclean and delivered from what is hurtful. Let no spirit of pestilence or baleful breath abide therein; let all the snares of the enemy who lieth in wait be driven forth; and let everything that threatens the safety or peace of the dwellers therein, be banished by the sprinkling of this water; so that the health which they seek, by calling upon Thy holy Name, may be guarded from all assault. Through Our Lord, etc…..”
[The Priest then puts blessed salt thrice into the water crosswise, saying:]
“Let salt and water mingle together in the Name of the Father + and of the Son +, and of the Holy + Ghost. Amen.”
“The Lord be with you.”
“And with thy spirit.”
LET US PRAY.
“O God, the giver of invincible strength, and King of irresistible power, ever wonderful in triumph, Who holdest in check the power of the enemy, Who overcomest the fury of raging enemies, Who by Thy might gainest the victory over all their guile; we humbly pray and beseech Thee, O Lord, to look upon this Thy creation of salt and water, to bless it in Thy mercy and hallow it with the dew of Thy loving kindness: that wherever it be sprinkled and Thy holy Name shall be invoked in prayer, every assault of the unclean spirit may be baffled, all fear of the venomous serpent cast out, and the presence of the Holy Spirit everywhere vouchsafed to us who entreat Thy mercy. Through Our Lord . . . in the unity of the same Holy Ghost, etc ….”
Water, Water Everywhere―Even in the Church!
The Church is flooded with water! Water is used to start a person out on their way to Heaven by the Sacrament of Baptism. Holy water is traditionally blessed before the sung Sunday Mass and is then used to sprinkle the people during the Asperges ceremony that precedes that Sunday Mass. There are special solemn blessings to sanctify holy water on the vigil of the Epiphany in a rite that can take anywhere from 40 minutes to 1 hour. Another type of holy water is Easter water. It is so called because of the fact that it is distributed to the people on Holy Saturday, the vigil day before Easter. Part of the water is used for the blessing of baptismal water, the remainder is given to the parishioners. It is used for various purposes in the homes, but particularly for the blessing of the Easter food. In some places it is used for the solemn blessing of the homes of the parishioners by the priest on Holy Saturday. Besides the usual holy water, Easter water and baptismal water, there is still a fourth kind of holy water. This is known as water of consecration. It is used in the consecration of churches, altars and altar stones. It is also called Gregorian water, after Pope Gregory IX, who ordered its use.
Water is used (mixed with flour) to make the Communion hosts and large host that will be consecrated at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Water is mingled with wine at the Offertory of the Mass. The priest washes and purifies his hands with water during the Offertory and after Communion during Mass. People usually bless themselves with holy water from the holy water font by the door upon entering the church. All the blessings for persons, places, or things―have the use of holy water with which they are sprinkled. The consecration of a church and its altar sees the use of holy water. Our Lady of Lourdes brought about the miraculous appearance of water by which many have been healed and cured of their spiritual or physical maladies. It was a very ancient monastic custom that every night before the monks went to bed after the Salve Regina that the abbot or prior of the monastery would bless the monks with holy water. In funerals, the body of the deceased is sprinkled with holy water and, at the cemetery, the grave is also blessed with holy water.
The Profound and Beautiful Significance of Holy Water
Our Lord taught by means of parables and similes, in order to render the divine truths clearer and more easily understood by His audience. He used the same method of teaching in the institution of His means of grace, which in their outward signs are mainly symbolic of the effects which they produce in the soul. Thus the washing in Baptism is symbolic of cleansing the soul of Original Sin; the anointing with Chrism at Confirmation is symbolic of fortifying the soul to fight for the Faith; the bread under the form of which the Blessed Eucharist is received is a symbol of food for the soul, and so on. In the same way holy water is a beautiful, profound symbol of its significance and its effects on body and soul.
(1) Pure water is clear and transparent. In it the heavens are reflected, the light of the sun, and the light of the stars. Similarly our souls should radiate purity that in them may be clearly reflected the heavens of faith, the sun of divine charity, and the starlight of the Christian virtues.
(2) Water cleanses and purifies. Holy water reminds us that our souls have been washed and made pure by the water of holy Baptism, and thereby we have been received into the community of the children of God. Every time we sign our foreheads with holy water, we are reminded of our holy baptismal vows and of the obligation then undertaken, to keep our souls pure. So too holy water is a constant exhortation to purge our hearts from sin by penance and reparation. For this reason pious Christians when taking holy water, pray: “Thou shalt sprinkle me with hyssop, O Lord, and I shall be cleansed; Thou shalt wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow.”
(3) Water quenches our thirst and refreshes us, it revives and fructifies the earth, falling from the heavens as rain or dew, Holy water is a symbol of the dew of divine grace which refreshes our souls and fructifies our work, so that it becomes a service of God.
(4) Water cools the hot air and extinguishes fire. Holy water should remind us that we must cool the ardor of our passions and extinguish the fire of inordinate desires.
(5) The salt which is mixed with the water during the blessing bears a threefold symbolic meaning. In the first place, salt preserves from corruption. Our souls should be preserved from the corruption of sin, especially grievous sin and kept fresh and pure throughout our lives as children of God. Again, salt has always been regarded as a symbol of wisdom. But Christian wisdom leads to a wholesome fear of God and thence to a love of God. Finally, salt imparts an agreeable taste to food to which it is added; and so, too, virtue makes our souls pleasing to God.
(6) Finally, let us consider the many signs of the cross which the priest makes over the elements when blessing the holy water and mixing the salt with it; and how we ourselves make the sign of the cross when we take holy water The meaning of this is that all the graces and helps which we receive from God have been merited for us by the sacrifice made by Jesus Christ on the Cross and flow to us from this source.
From all this we see how inspiring holy water is. It is true that only the Catholic who is imbued with holy faith can understand these truths and receive the grace that is derived from its use. Only the believing Catholic can have a right understanding of the beneficial operation of holy water on body and soul.
Effects of Holy Water
If we would know the effects of using holy water and its advantages, we need only to read the prayers said by the priest during the blessing, according to which we are offered the following helps:
(1) Protection against the evil spirit, the devil. We cannot fail to be impressed by the urgent supplication of the Church, during the blessing of holy water, for protection from the infernal enemy, from his cunning and wickedness. This petition recurs in each of the five prayers. For the Catholic Church is deeply convinced that Satan brought on man sin and its sad consequences, and that he never ceases to harm him when he can. As he once made use of the fruit of the tree in Paradise to rob our first parents of God’s friendship, he continues to use for our destruction the creatures intended for our use. Therefore the Church, by exorcising, prays to God that the devil and his evil influence may give way before holy water and everything with which it is sprinkled.
How terrible is the power of Satan we see from the accounts given in the Gospel of the possessed who were liberated by the Savior or His apostles. St. Paul warns us: “The devil goes about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith.” Among the many means of resisting the devil, holy water holds a very special place, since it has been specially blessed that it may break the power and wickedness of Satan. We have seen, in the above account of St. Teresa, something of the extraordinary power which holy water has against the snares of the devil.
(2) Protection from Storms and the Damage caused by them. When holy water is being blessed, the Church prays to God asking that wherever holy water is sprinkled, disaster caused by storms may be warded off.
(3) Well-being of the Body. The Church prays that holy water may protect us from illness, especially infectious diseases.
(4) Holy water brings us help and grace for the sanctification of our souls. This is the first aim of all supernatural means of grace. When we sprinkle ourselves devoutly with holy water, the merits of the Precious Blood of Jesus are applied to our souls.
(5) Pardon for Venial Sins and the remittance of the temporal punishment due to sin are obtained when we use holy water devoutly and make an act of contrition. This is true in the case of all Sacramentals. But there is scarcely any one which we can use for this purpose so easily and conveniently or so frequently as holy water. How many graces we can obtain for our souls, and what an easy way of going through our Purgatory here on Earth by frequent devout use of this means of grace!
(6) By using holy water we obtain the assistance of the Holy Ghost, for the Church prays that through the power of holy water, the Holy Ghost may be always present by us. The evil spirit will be expelled; but the divine Spirit, will enter our hearts and our dwellings when we sanctify them by using holy water.
(7) Finally, by holy water consolation and mitigation of punishment can be obtained for the holy souls. We know this from the beautiful ceremonies observed by the Church at the burial of her children. The body, coffin and grave are sprinkled with holy water. The body being blessed, shall rest in consecrated ground; and by God’s mercy the soul shall be given consolation and mitigation in Purgatory. “As the flowers, withered by the heat of the sun, are refreshed by the gentle shower of rain, so too Heaven’s flowers burning in Purgatory, are refreshed by holy water” (St. Theodatus).
It is through the power of the prayers of the Church that holy water possesses the effects enumerated above. Prayer, above all the prayer of the Church, can obtain the divine assistance even for one utterly undeserving. Therefore holy water will not be used in vain even in the case of one who is in the state of mortal sin. It can always bring him predisposing grace to return to God’s friendship, protection of the body and other assistance. But its power is far greater when used by those in the state of grace and applied with devout intention. The words spoken by the Redeemer when the Apostles desired peace may be applied to the Church’s blessing: “And when you come into the house, salute it, saying, ‘Peace be to this house!’ And if that house be worthy, your peace shall come upon it” (Matthew 20). Similarly when holy water is used devoutly, the numerous blessings pronounced by the Church at the blessing of the holy water, will be received by the children of God, by Catholics, who are in the state of sanctifying grace. The blessings obtained from a devout use of holy water are indeed manifold.
In the next article, we shall look at the power of Epiphany Water in particular.
“Water, water everywhere―and not a drop to drink” is a line from Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s famous poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. The line is used to describe the irony and anguish of being surrounded by something, but unable to benefit from it. In the poem, the line refers to sailors who are stuck at sea and surrounded by undrinkable salt water. The line can also be used to describe situations where someone is surrounded by something, but cannot partake of it. For example, someone might be in a situation where they have access to water, but it is not clean or safe to drink.
We could rename the poem and call it The Rime of Heaven’s Mariner and rephrase it a little:
Holy water everywhere, but no one stops to think!
Few there are that really care, as into Hell they sink!
Water could change how they fare, and snatch them from the brink!
For water, when joined to prayer, can wash away sin’s stink;
And help avoid the devil’s snare, through which he will hoodwink;
Those who are unaware, and cannot see the link
Of all the glitz, fun and fanfare, on the world’s skating rink,
With Satan’s endless warfare, who behind the scenes does slink,
Ever seeking to ensnare, with his seductive wink.
For penance they don’t really care, preferring much food and drink;
Sinking into the armchair, but on their knees they will not sink.
Parties, fun and games they prepare, but from God they quickly shrink.
Beer, wine and spirits they will share, but of holy water they do not think.
The Waters of the World
As Coleridge’s line from his poem The Ancient Mariner states: “Water, water everywhere―and not a drop to drink!” It refers to being surrounded by water that is extremely dangerous to drink―which is what can be said of the worldliness that surrounds us on all sides. It may be tempting to drink sea-water if you are extremely thirsty. Sea-water is not safe to drink due to its high salt content. Sea-water is toxic to humans because your body is unable to get rid of the salt that comes from sea-water. Drinking sea-water can lead to dehydration, kidney damage, and other health issues because the salt concentration is much higher than what the human body can handle. The salt would get absorbed into your blood along with the water. That would make your blood too salty. So, your kidneys would have to remove the salt. But to do that they would need to use even more water! That’s why drinking seawater would just make you thirstier.
It is the same with the world, when we drink-in what the world has to offer, we become more and more thirsty for that “bad-water” of worldliness. Just as sea-water is toxic to the physical body, so too is the water of worldliness toxic to the spiritual soul. Hence it is that Our Lord says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Scripture tells us keep apart from the world―even though we have to live in this world: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). Hence we are told: “Do not eat and drink with the wicked!” (Tobias 4:18). We are pilgrims in this world―merely passing through enemy territory on our way to Heaven. We should say to the worldlings that surround us: “We will not drink the waters of your wells, but we will go by the common highway, neither turning aside to the right hand, nor to the left, till we are past your borders!” (Numbers 20:17). “And the man of God answered the king: ‘If you would give me half your house I will not go with you, nor eat your bread, nor drink water in this place!’” (3 Kings 13:8).
Fight Fire with Fire―Fight Water with Water!
You have, no doubt, heard of the expression: “Fight fire with fire!” If you fight fire with fire, you deal with people attacking or threatening you by using similar methods, tactics or weapons to the ones that they are using. Christians, St. Augustine makes clear, are not to fight fire with fire in the sense that they are not to fight evil with evil. They know another way. As the Apostle Paul teaches, only good can conquer evil: “To no man rendering evil for evil. Revenge not yourselves, but give place unto wrath, for it is written: ‘Revenge is mine, I will repay!’ says the Lord. But if your enemy be hungry, give him to eat; if he thirsts, give him to drink! For, doing this, you shalt heap coals of fire upon his head. Be not overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good!” (Romans 12:17-21).
To fight fire with fire―as regards Christians―should refer to the fire of zeal. The world is very zealous in what it does―so too must Christians being even more zealous in overcoming the world. The fire that we use to fight the fires of Hell and the world, is the fire of charity―first and foremost a love of God, a love of His teachings and a love of His commandments.
Similarly―even though the expression does not exist―we can fight water with water. What does that mean? It means fighting the “waters” of worldliness with the “waters” of grace. Our Lady of Good Success speaks of these sinful waters of worldliness when she predicts: “The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
God used water to cleanse the world from the filth of its sin in the time Noe by the means of the Great Flood: “I will rain upon the Earth forty days and forty nights; and I will destroy every substance that I have made, from the face of the Earth … And Noe went into the ark, and his sons, his wife and the wives of his sons went with him into the ark, because of the waters of the flood ... And after the seven days were passed, the waters of the flood began to overflow the Earth ... And the flood was forty days upon the Earth, and the waters increased … They overflowed exceedingly and filled all on the face of the Earth … And the waters prevailed beyond measure upon the Earth and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered. The water was fifteen cubits higher than the mountains which it covered … And all things wherein there is the breath of life on the Earth, died. And God destroyed all the substance that was upon the Earth, from man even to beast, and the creeping things and fowls of the air―and they were destroyed from the Earth and only Noe remained, and they that were with him in the ark” (Genesis 7:4-23). God destroyed the flood of sin with His own flood of water!
Water, Water Everywhere!
Today, approximately 71% of the Earth’s surface is covered by water. 70% of the oxygen that we breathe comes from the marine plants at the bottom of the oceans. The oceans cover almost 75% of the Earth’s surface and contain about 97% of the Earth’s water in the form of salty seawater―which is too salty for human consumption. Only a small fraction of Earth’s water―only about 3% of the Earth’s water―is freshwater. Of that 3% of freshwater, 2.5% of the Earth’s freshwater is unavailable, and is mostly locked up in glaciers, polar ice caps, atmosphere; or in highly polluted soil; or lies too far under the Earth’s surface to be extracted at an affordable cost. Only 0.5% of the Earth’s water is available fresh water―which is found in lakes, rivers, and wetlands. This should make us think of the small fraction of souls that are saved and the vast majority of souls who end up being ‘drowned’ in the fires of Hell.
Human beings seem to reflect similar percentages in their bodies. By weight, the average adult human is approximately 60% water, and the average child is approximately 65% water. Babies have the most, being born at about 78%. By one year of age, that amount drops to about 65%. About 75% of the brain is made up of water. Water is absolutely essential to human life. It carries blood through the 60,000 miles of arteries, capillaries and veins in our bodies. It is necessary for digestion. It lubricates our joints, keeps mucous membranes moist, and enables our eyes to function. It regulates our body heat, and it is essential to all plant and animal life, which are so important to human survival.
Water helps regulate body temperature by redistributing heat from active tissues to the skin and cooling the body through perspiration. Water has a high heat capacity, which means it can absorb a lot of heat before its temperature rises. This property allows water to stabilize the internal temperature of living organisms.
Water is a major part of most of the body’s cells (except for fat cells) and is crucial for cell life. Water acts as the medium of transportation between the cell and its surroundings, which is vital to cell life.
Water helps remove waste from the body by acting as a solvent for waste products, dissolving them and allowing them to pass out of the body via urine and perspiration. The kidneys and liver use water to help flush out waste, as do your intestines.
Truly it is a case of “water, water everywhere”―more than we would think! Water! What an amazing gift! A few drops lift up a plant’s drooping leaves, or refresh a human body. You can wash in it, splash in it, swim in it. You can relish in its sounds―the babble of a brook, or the roaring of the sea, or the breaking of the waves upon the sandy beach. Life springs from water. Not just physical life, but spiritual life as well. For we are born anew in Baptism of water and the Spirit.
Partly because we take water for granted, partly because it’s cheaper than dirt (in most cities a ton of water delivered to your kitchen costs very little), we use it lavishly. We each draw about 87 gallons a day: 24 for flushing, 32 for bathing, laundry, and dishwashing and 25 for swimming pools and watering the lawn. We use only two gallons a day for drinking and cooking―the only water we actually require in order to survive.
But this is just the beginning. An immense amount of water is needed for irrigation and industrial use. For example, the eggs you ate for breakfast this morning required 120 gallons of water each; the steak you might have for dinner, 3,500 gallons; the ton of steel in your car 60,000 gallons. When we consider these indirect uses of water, our daily need soars to 2,000 gallons each day for each person.
Despite this staggering use of water, experts do not think we will be running out of water. They tell us that four trillion gallons of rain water falls on the United States each day and that we use a mere tenth of it. Most of this one tenth returns to its source. The rest escapes into the atmosphere, but only briefly. None is lost; the water that St. John used to baptize Jesus still exists. Its billions of molecules are now dispersed throughout the world.
Water is a Symbol of Grace
Water is widely considered a symbol of grace due to its ability to cleanse and purify, often representing the forgiveness and renewal offered by God through Baptism―by which the soul is cleansed from the stains of sin and is filled with sanctifying grace. Holy water, outside of Baptism, has special powers, such as washing away venial sin, protecting from evil spirits, and sanctifying the soul.
Our Lord―the Author of all grace―associated Himself with water on many occasions.
● He was baptized by St. John the Baptist in the waters of the River Jordan (Matthew 3:13-17; Luke 3:21).
● His first public miracle was the changing of water into wine (John 2:1-11).
● He would miraculously walk on water (Matthew 14:22-34).
● He used the spittle from His mouth to miraculously open the eyes of the blind man― saliva is 99% water and 1% proteins: “When He had said these things, He spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and spread the clay on his eyes. And said to him: Go, wash in the pool of Siloe. He went and washed, and he came back seeing” (John 9:6-7).
● Similarly, he cured a deaf and dumb man with His spittle: “They brought to Him one deaf and dumb; and they begged Him that he would lay His hand upon him. And taking him apart from the multitude, He put His fingers into his ears, and spitting, He touched his tongue. And looking up to Heaven, he groaned, and said to him: ‘Ephpheta!’ ― which is, ‘Be thou opened!’ And immediately his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spoke right” (Mark 7:32-35).
● Our Lord miraculously calmed the stormy waters of the lake: “And rising up, He rebuked the wind, and said to the sea: ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased and there was made a great calm” (Mark 4:39).
● We see Jesus bring about a miraculous catch of fish out of the water for St. Peter (Luke 5:1-10).
● Jesus spoke of a living water to the Samaritan woman: “A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her: ‘Give Me to drink!’ The Samaritan woman said to Him: ‘How is it that You, being a Jew, ask of me to drink, who am a Samaritan woman? For the Jews do not communicate with the Samaritans!’ Jesus said to her: ‘If you only knew the gift of God, and Who He is that says to you: ‘Give Me to drink!’ ―then you perhaps would have asked of Him, and He would have given you living water!’ The woman said to Him: Sir, You have nothing with which to draw out water, and the well is deep! From where, then, have You living water? Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank thereof himself, and his children, and his cattle?’ Jesus answered and said to her: ‘Whosoever drinks of this water shall thirst again; but he that shall drink of the water that I will give him, he shall not thirst for ever! For the water that I will give him, shall become in him a fountain of water, springing up into life everlasting!” (John 4:7-14).
● When Jesus had died on the cross on Calvary, “one of the soldiers with a spear opened his side, and immediately there came out blood and water” (John 19:3).
The Blessing of Holy Water
Before looking at the much longer and much more solemn blessing of Epiphany Water, let us take a look at the regular blessing of Holy Water and the words the priest uses. Holy water is composed of two elements, water and salt. Very beautiful are the prayers, and deeply significant the ceremonies with which the priest converts both into a mediation of divine grace; the evil spirits are exorcised so that the water may be efficacious in warding off their evil influence; and it is consecrated so that it may become a mediator of divine grace.
The priest, wearing a purple stole, blesses the holy water in the following manner:
“Our help in the Name of the Lord”
“Who made Heaven and Earth.”
[The Priest then exorcises the salt].
“I exorcise thee, creature of salt, by the living + God, by the true + God, by the holy + God, by that God Who ordered thee to be put by Eliseus the prophet into the water, that the barrenness of the water might be healed; that thou mayest become exorcised salt for the salvation of those that believe; and that thou mayest be for the healing of soul and body to all those receiving thee, and that there may be banished from the place in which thou hast been sprinkled, every kind of hallucination and wickedness, or wile of devilish deceit, and every unclean spirit, adjured in the Name of Him Who will come to judge the living and the dead, and the world by fire. Amen.”
LET US PRAY.
“O Almighty and eternal God, we humbly implore Thine infinite mercy, that this creature of salt which Thou hast bestowed for the use of mankind may be blessed + and sanctified + through Thy mercy, that it may make for health of mind and body to all who partake of it; and that whatever is touched or sprinkled with it, may be freed from all uncleanness, and from the assaults of the evil spirit. Through Our Lord Jesus Christ Thy Son, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee for ever and ever. Amen.”
[He then exorcises the water.]
“I exorcise thee, creature of water, in the Name of God + the Father Almighty, and in the Name of Jesus + Christ His Son our Lord, and in the power of the Holy + Spirit, that thou mayest be made exorcised water for the banishment of every power of the enemy, and that thou mayest be able to uproot and cast out that enemy himself, together with his rebel angels: by the power of the same Jesus Christ Our Lord, Who will come to judge the living and the dead, and the world by fire. Amen.”
LET US PRAY.
“O God, who for the salvation of mankind has appointed water to be the foundation of Thy greatest Sacraments, graciously hear our prayers, and fill this element, which has in manifold ways been purified, with Thy power and blessing + so that this creature of Thine, for use in Thy mysteries, may be endowed with divine grace to drive away devils and to cast out diseases; that whatever in the houses or possessions of the faithful may be sprinkled by this water, may be freed from everything unclean and delivered from what is hurtful. Let no spirit of pestilence or baleful breath abide therein; let all the snares of the enemy who lieth in wait be driven forth; and let everything that threatens the safety or peace of the dwellers therein, be banished by the sprinkling of this water; so that the health which they seek, by calling upon Thy holy Name, may be guarded from all assault. Through Our Lord, etc…..”
[The Priest then puts blessed salt thrice into the water crosswise, saying:]
“Let salt and water mingle together in the Name of the Father + and of the Son +, and of the Holy + Ghost. Amen.”
“The Lord be with you.”
“And with thy spirit.”
LET US PRAY.
“O God, the giver of invincible strength, and King of irresistible power, ever wonderful in triumph, Who holdest in check the power of the enemy, Who overcomest the fury of raging enemies, Who by Thy might gainest the victory over all their guile; we humbly pray and beseech Thee, O Lord, to look upon this Thy creation of salt and water, to bless it in Thy mercy and hallow it with the dew of Thy loving kindness: that wherever it be sprinkled and Thy holy Name shall be invoked in prayer, every assault of the unclean spirit may be baffled, all fear of the venomous serpent cast out, and the presence of the Holy Spirit everywhere vouchsafed to us who entreat Thy mercy. Through Our Lord . . . in the unity of the same Holy Ghost, etc ….”
Water, Water Everywhere―Even in the Church!
The Church is flooded with water! Water is used to start a person out on their way to Heaven by the Sacrament of Baptism. Holy water is traditionally blessed before the sung Sunday Mass and is then used to sprinkle the people during the Asperges ceremony that precedes that Sunday Mass. There are special solemn blessings to sanctify holy water on the vigil of the Epiphany in a rite that can take anywhere from 40 minutes to 1 hour. Another type of holy water is Easter water. It is so called because of the fact that it is distributed to the people on Holy Saturday, the vigil day before Easter. Part of the water is used for the blessing of baptismal water, the remainder is given to the parishioners. It is used for various purposes in the homes, but particularly for the blessing of the Easter food. In some places it is used for the solemn blessing of the homes of the parishioners by the priest on Holy Saturday. Besides the usual holy water, Easter water and baptismal water, there is still a fourth kind of holy water. This is known as water of consecration. It is used in the consecration of churches, altars and altar stones. It is also called Gregorian water, after Pope Gregory IX, who ordered its use.
Water is used (mixed with flour) to make the Communion hosts and large host that will be consecrated at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Water is mingled with wine at the Offertory of the Mass. The priest washes and purifies his hands with water during the Offertory and after Communion during Mass. People usually bless themselves with holy water from the holy water font by the door upon entering the church. All the blessings for persons, places, or things―have the use of holy water with which they are sprinkled. The consecration of a church and its altar sees the use of holy water. Our Lady of Lourdes brought about the miraculous appearance of water by which many have been healed and cured of their spiritual or physical maladies. It was a very ancient monastic custom that every night before the monks went to bed after the Salve Regina that the abbot or prior of the monastery would bless the monks with holy water. In funerals, the body of the deceased is sprinkled with holy water and, at the cemetery, the grave is also blessed with holy water.
The Profound and Beautiful Significance of Holy Water
Our Lord taught by means of parables and similes, in order to render the divine truths clearer and more easily understood by His audience. He used the same method of teaching in the institution of His means of grace, which in their outward signs are mainly symbolic of the effects which they produce in the soul. Thus the washing in Baptism is symbolic of cleansing the soul of Original Sin; the anointing with Chrism at Confirmation is symbolic of fortifying the soul to fight for the Faith; the bread under the form of which the Blessed Eucharist is received is a symbol of food for the soul, and so on. In the same way holy water is a beautiful, profound symbol of its significance and its effects on body and soul.
(1) Pure water is clear and transparent. In it the heavens are reflected, the light of the sun, and the light of the stars. Similarly our souls should radiate purity that in them may be clearly reflected the heavens of faith, the sun of divine charity, and the starlight of the Christian virtues.
(2) Water cleanses and purifies. Holy water reminds us that our souls have been washed and made pure by the water of holy Baptism, and thereby we have been received into the community of the children of God. Every time we sign our foreheads with holy water, we are reminded of our holy baptismal vows and of the obligation then undertaken, to keep our souls pure. So too holy water is a constant exhortation to purge our hearts from sin by penance and reparation. For this reason pious Christians when taking holy water, pray: “Thou shalt sprinkle me with hyssop, O Lord, and I shall be cleansed; Thou shalt wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow.”
(3) Water quenches our thirst and refreshes us, it revives and fructifies the earth, falling from the heavens as rain or dew, Holy water is a symbol of the dew of divine grace which refreshes our souls and fructifies our work, so that it becomes a service of God.
(4) Water cools the hot air and extinguishes fire. Holy water should remind us that we must cool the ardor of our passions and extinguish the fire of inordinate desires.
(5) The salt which is mixed with the water during the blessing bears a threefold symbolic meaning. In the first place, salt preserves from corruption. Our souls should be preserved from the corruption of sin, especially grievous sin and kept fresh and pure throughout our lives as children of God. Again, salt has always been regarded as a symbol of wisdom. But Christian wisdom leads to a wholesome fear of God and thence to a love of God. Finally, salt imparts an agreeable taste to food to which it is added; and so, too, virtue makes our souls pleasing to God.
(6) Finally, let us consider the many signs of the cross which the priest makes over the elements when blessing the holy water and mixing the salt with it; and how we ourselves make the sign of the cross when we take holy water The meaning of this is that all the graces and helps which we receive from God have been merited for us by the sacrifice made by Jesus Christ on the Cross and flow to us from this source.
From all this we see how inspiring holy water is. It is true that only the Catholic who is imbued with holy faith can understand these truths and receive the grace that is derived from its use. Only the believing Catholic can have a right understanding of the beneficial operation of holy water on body and soul.
Effects of Holy Water
If we would know the effects of using holy water and its advantages, we need only to read the prayers said by the priest during the blessing, according to which we are offered the following helps:
(1) Protection against the evil spirit, the devil. We cannot fail to be impressed by the urgent supplication of the Church, during the blessing of holy water, for protection from the infernal enemy, from his cunning and wickedness. This petition recurs in each of the five prayers. For the Catholic Church is deeply convinced that Satan brought on man sin and its sad consequences, and that he never ceases to harm him when he can. As he once made use of the fruit of the tree in Paradise to rob our first parents of God’s friendship, he continues to use for our destruction the creatures intended for our use. Therefore the Church, by exorcising, prays to God that the devil and his evil influence may give way before holy water and everything with which it is sprinkled.
How terrible is the power of Satan we see from the accounts given in the Gospel of the possessed who were liberated by the Savior or His apostles. St. Paul warns us: “The devil goes about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith.” Among the many means of resisting the devil, holy water holds a very special place, since it has been specially blessed that it may break the power and wickedness of Satan. We have seen, in the above account of St. Teresa, something of the extraordinary power which holy water has against the snares of the devil.
(2) Protection from Storms and the Damage caused by them. When holy water is being blessed, the Church prays to God asking that wherever holy water is sprinkled, disaster caused by storms may be warded off.
(3) Well-being of the Body. The Church prays that holy water may protect us from illness, especially infectious diseases.
(4) Holy water brings us help and grace for the sanctification of our souls. This is the first aim of all supernatural means of grace. When we sprinkle ourselves devoutly with holy water, the merits of the Precious Blood of Jesus are applied to our souls.
(5) Pardon for Venial Sins and the remittance of the temporal punishment due to sin are obtained when we use holy water devoutly and make an act of contrition. This is true in the case of all Sacramentals. But there is scarcely any one which we can use for this purpose so easily and conveniently or so frequently as holy water. How many graces we can obtain for our souls, and what an easy way of going through our Purgatory here on Earth by frequent devout use of this means of grace!
(6) By using holy water we obtain the assistance of the Holy Ghost, for the Church prays that through the power of holy water, the Holy Ghost may be always present by us. The evil spirit will be expelled; but the divine Spirit, will enter our hearts and our dwellings when we sanctify them by using holy water.
(7) Finally, by holy water consolation and mitigation of punishment can be obtained for the holy souls. We know this from the beautiful ceremonies observed by the Church at the burial of her children. The body, coffin and grave are sprinkled with holy water. The body being blessed, shall rest in consecrated ground; and by God’s mercy the soul shall be given consolation and mitigation in Purgatory. “As the flowers, withered by the heat of the sun, are refreshed by the gentle shower of rain, so too Heaven’s flowers burning in Purgatory, are refreshed by holy water” (St. Theodatus).
It is through the power of the prayers of the Church that holy water possesses the effects enumerated above. Prayer, above all the prayer of the Church, can obtain the divine assistance even for one utterly undeserving. Therefore holy water will not be used in vain even in the case of one who is in the state of mortal sin. It can always bring him predisposing grace to return to God’s friendship, protection of the body and other assistance. But its power is far greater when used by those in the state of grace and applied with devout intention. The words spoken by the Redeemer when the Apostles desired peace may be applied to the Church’s blessing: “And when you come into the house, salute it, saying, ‘Peace be to this house!’ And if that house be worthy, your peace shall come upon it” (Matthew 20). Similarly when holy water is used devoutly, the numerous blessings pronounced by the Church at the blessing of the holy water, will be received by the children of God, by Catholics, who are in the state of sanctifying grace. The blessings obtained from a devout use of holy water are indeed manifold.
In the next article, we shall look at the power of Epiphany Water in particular.
Article 10
Friday, January 3rd
The Christmas Season Microwave and Depression
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Friday, January 3rd
The Christmas Season Microwave and Depression
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Confusion and Depression
For many persons, Christmas comes and goes before you know it! Here today, gone tomorrow! Or here on Christmas Day and gone by New Year’s Day! Their secular Christmas season is microwaved and gone before you can barely say “Happy New Year!” Doctors will tell you that the post-Christmas season is one where depression hits high numbers. They have “come down” from the boozy, glitzy, festive Christmas period and are now face with a return to grind of daily work once again.
You could say it is somewhat like post-natal depression. Postnatal depression (PND) is a mood disorder that can affect people who are pregnant or have recently given birth. Symptoms include low mood, anxiety, crying, irritability, and changes in sleep or eating patterns. Other symptoms include difficulty concentrating, loss of interest in activities, and feeling confused or lost. You could compare this post-natal depression to a post-Nativity depression, which leaves many persons feeling similar symptoms as they “come down” from the secular “highs” of Christmas with its secular focus on food, drink, parties, festivities and fun. Of such superficial persons Holy Scripture says: “They are enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:19). To ask those people to focus on the spiritual side of Christmas for the whole Christmas season of 40 days (the Christmas season ends on February 2nd), would be a massive and unbearable cross for all those secular-minded worldlings―similar to having to sit through a long sermon; or spend years in a prison!
Christmas Crossroads
Christmas is essentially a season of the Cross―just ask the Holy Family and they will confirm it. A nine-month pregnant Mary―drawing close to the time of her delivery―has to walk (no cars back then) around 80 to 100 miles from Nazareth to Bethlehem. The average walking speed on a hike for an adult is around 2.5 miles per hour. A pregnant woman is not going to walk all day long at a brisk pace of 4 miles per hour! The terrain also made walking more laborious and difficult―there were no paved roads; some steep climbs, and the pathways would have been muddied by the frequent mid-winter rainfall. Even 2.5 miles per hour is pushing it for a nine-month pregnant woman―especially if having to walk many hours a day, and day after day in succession. If it was 2 miles per hour, then the whole trip would take around 50 hours of continuous walking. That means many days of walking―anywhere from 5 days (walking for 10 hours a day) to 10 days (walking for 5 hours a day). Another aspect to the equation is that a donkey goes about 12 to 15 miles a day depending on the geography. If you are calculating the length of the trip from the viewpoint of the donkey they had taken with them, then the approximate 100 mile trip would have taken anywhere from 7 to 8 days.
Divine Providence saw to it that it would be in mid-winter. We can have a rough idea of the climate of most areas—especially since the days of meticulous record-keeping. If you look at the average temperatures for Nazareth during the end of the month of December, you will see that the average high during the day is around 55°F. At night the average minimum temperature drops down to around 42°F. The temperatures for Bethlehem—being merely 75 miles or so, as the crow flies, to the south—were pretty much the same as Nazareth.
Added to that factor is that this is the wet season in the Holy Land, with LOTS of rain and wind (that means wind-chill also has to be taken into account) adding to the unwelcoming climate—which, as we know today, reduces the REAL FEEL of the average temperatures even more! December, January and February account for over half of annual rainfall—with it raining every other day on average. The average rainfall for December is 8 to 10 inches for the month—which means that if it rains every other day, or 15 days in the month, then the average daily rainfall around half-an-inch to three-quarters-of-an-inch daily. That classifies, according our modern way of measuring rainfall, as being moderate to heavy rain—depending on whether it fell in a few hours or was spread throughout the day and night intermittently. So they were exposed to the cold, the wind and the rain. Their clothes would have been wet and soggy, even after the rain stopped! Nine-months pregnant—out in that kind of stuff? Well, God knows best!
Now, of course, people were much hardier in those days and were somewhat acclimatized to the conditions—not having windows, insulation, central heating, etc.—but anywhere from a minimum 5 days to around 10 days on the road, in the outdoors, for the best part of the day—is still cool if not cold! From sunrise after 6:30 am, to sunset around 4:30 pm, gives around 10 hours of daylight. The Christmas of Mary and Joseph was far from being microwaved! Yes, the first Christmas was a cross!
At Bethlehem they were met with rejection―they tried to find accommodation with friends, relatives and the inn, but there was no room for them, no charity for them, no compassion for them―especially in view of Mary’s obvious pregnancy. No family around, no relatives, no friends! The Son of God would have to face the shame and ignominy of being born in an animal stable or cave, devoid of any human comforts such as water, heat, food, bedding, etc. There was no microwaving of the time they spent there―it was not 1 minute on the high setting! Yes, the first Christmas was a cross!
King “Killjoy” Herod added to their Christmas “joys” by plotting to kill Jesus―which necessitated in the Holy Family having to flee the country to the alien country of Egypt. No planes, trains or busses were available―the whole journey had to be made on foot over dangerous country. There was no microwaving of that journey―even for the beloved Mother of God and the Son of God! Yes, the first Christmas was a cross!
Confusion of Christmas
We find a similar microwaving of Christmas in the Church’s Christmas Liturgy. The further we go into the Church’s season of the Forty Days of Christmas (which ends with the feast of the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple and the Purification of His most Holy Mother on February 2nd), the more we accelerate through time, entering what could be called a ‘time-microwave’, and also the more confusing becomes the liturgical calendar!
We celebrate the birth of Our Lord on December 25th, and then, on the 8th day, we celebrate the Circumcision of the Lord (January 1st), keeping in line with the schedule of the Jewish law at that time, which commanded that a child be circumcised on the 8th day. Then we have the Epiphany on January 6th, which still falls into a chronological timeline, as does the feast of the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple and the Purification of His Holy Mother (February 2nd); for the Jewish law commanded that women giving birth, should be legally purified 40 days after giving birth; and February 2nd is 40 days after December 25th.
Fitting It All In
The problem is this: the Church has just one year in which it has to fit thirty-three years of Our Lord’s life. So something is going to have to ‘give’ somewhere. We have the birth of Our Lord on December 25th, and then, within a space of just a few weeks, the pre-Lenten season of Septuagesima begins, by which time Our Lord is supposed to have fled to Egypt, lived there in exile a some years, come back His homeland, spent His childhood in Nazareth, grown into an adult, and entered His public ministry and performed a miracle or two! All in the space of a few weeks, or as little as 25 days.
The earliest date on which Septuagesima Sunday can occur is January 18th (Easter falling on March 22nd in a non-leap year) and the latest is February 22nd (Easter falling on April 25th in a leap year). That means that the first 30 years of Our Lord’s life has to be squeezed into anything from a mere 25 days (if Septuagesima starts on January 18th) or 59 days if Septuagesima begins on the latest possible date!
So His life is sadly microwaved; with many of its riches, open for our contemplation, being rushed through or hurried past, and so left untouched or barely examined.
From Baby to Man to Baby Again
Furthermore, when Septuagesima Sunday falls before February 2nd (the Fortieth Day of Christmas), then we have the weird and confusing experience of penitential purple being introduced into the liturgy before the Forty Day of Christmas have been joyously celebrated! Fortunately, this year, Septuagesima Sunday falls on February 16th; but the yo-yo timeline will remain. From the Epiphany as a Child, we will jump to His Baptism as a man, then read of His first public miracle at Cana as an adult, then read of His being found in the Temple at the age of 12, and then finally back to His infancy with the Presentation in the Temple!
Post-Christmas Depression
Other factors that add to the potential destruction of our contemplation of the Christmas mysteries is the fact that the civil world also gives little time and possibility to being able to calmly and peacefully reflect upon the inexhaustible mysteries of Christmas; for within days of Christmas, many are called back to work, and the duties and necessities of the ‘daily-grind’ receive more attention than the spiritual treasures that we could daily find.
Doctors also report an annual tendency of a post-Thanksgiving and post-Christmas depression. For over a month, focus has been placed on celebrations, family gatherings, parties, feasts, gifts and fun; now all of that comes to end at a time of year that is naturally cold, bleak, cloudy and depressing. The weather largely keeps people indoors, and the fun outdoor distractions and amusements are just not available in the same quantity as those on offer over the spring and summer months. For those who find and place most of their joy in the things of the world, the “party is over” as they say. It is a sobering and depressing experience, much like that of a drug-addict or an alcoholic “coming-down” from their drug or alcoholic “high”.
Saints Who Fled To Find Christ
Yet, there were saints who would deliberately, willingly and joyfully flee the attractions of the world in order to “Seek first the Kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31), so that they could better fulfill the commandment to “love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind” (Luke 10:27). The Desert Fathers (and Mothers) are a case in point, they fled to the desert regions, both in times of persecution and times of peace, in order to better sanctify themselves by avoiding the world: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God.” (James 4:4).
The account of Martha and Mary is especially applicable to this time of the year: “A certain woman named Martha, received Jesus into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sitting also at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Who stood and said: ‘Lord, hast Thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me.’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha, Martha, thou art careful, and art troubled about many things: but one thing is necessary. Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42). It’s our choice, what have we chosen? What will we choose? To be busy with the world and neglect the Word; or be busy with the Word and neglect the world?
What Meat Do We Labor For?
Of course we have to work, but we do not live to eat, but eat merely to live. Sadly, the opposite is true today, for the world is full of persons “whose God is their belly; and who mind earthly things.” (Philippians 3:19). Too much emphasis is placed on busying ourselves with the things of this world, and not enough emphasis on busying ourselves with the Word of God—whether it be the Word made flesh, as in the Holy Eucharist, or in the Word written and recorded in Holy Scripture.
Jesus told us: “Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting, which the Son of man will give you” (John 6:27). For “Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word of God” (Luke 4:4), and Jesus is “the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God ... And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth” (John 1:1; 1:14).
There is a food that is far more nutritious and tastier that any earthly food: the Word of God and the Word made flesh in the Holy Eucharist. “O taste and see that the Lord is sweet” (Psalm 33:9). For this sugar-loving generation that we are, that should be sufficient an advertisement to have everyone scurrying for a taste!
Sowing What Seed?
We have a choice in whether to be Marthas or Marys. We can be busy with the world, or busy with Our Lord. Each choice has its inescapable consequences. As we sow, so shall we reap. To those who sow their seed in the world, it will be said:”Because thou hast forgotten God thy Savior, thou shalt sow strange seed” (Isaias 17:10); “Thou shalt sow, but shalt not reap” (Micheas 6:15) ... “You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies” (Leviticus 26:16).
Jesus spoke of those who were too preoccupied with the world and were thus unable to see the mysteries of God: “And the prophecy of Isaias is fulfilled in them, who saith: ‘By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand: and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive .For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them. But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear” (Matthew 13:14-16).
Explaining the Parable of the Sower of the Seed, Jesus tells His Apostles that the seed is the Word of God. He then continues: “He that soweth, soweth the Word. And these are they by the way side, where the Word is sown, and as soon as they have heard, immediately Satan cometh and taketh away the Word that was sown in their hearts. And these likewise are they that are sown on the stony ground: who, when they have heard the Word, immediately receive it with joy. And they have no root in themselves, but are only for a time: and then when tribulation and persecution ariseth for the Word, they are presently scandalized. And others there are who are sown among thorns: these are they that hear the Word, and the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things entering in choke the Word, and it is made fruitless. And these are they who are sown upon the good ground, who hear the Word, and receive it, and yield fruit, the one thirty, another sixty, and another a hundred” (Mark 4:14-20).
The Joy That Brings Pain
Of course, to receive the Word fruitfully, means not allowing oneself to be sucked into the whirlpool of worldly cares. The Imitation of Christ warns us against this:
“Do you think that men of the world have no suffering, or perhaps but little? Ask even those who enjoy the most delights and you will learn otherwise. ‘But,’ you will say, ‘they enjoy many pleasures and follow their own wishes; therefore they do not feel their troubles very much.’ Granted that they do have whatever they wish, how long do you think it will last? Behold, they, who prosper in the world, shall perish as smoke, and there shall be no memory of their past joys. Even in this life they do not find rest in these pleasures without bitterness, weariness, and fear. For they often receive the penalty of sorrow from the very thing from which they believe their happiness comes. And it is just. Since they seek and follow after pleasures without reason, they should not enjoy them without shame and bitterness. How brief, how false, how unreasonable and shameful all these pleasures are! Yet, in their drunken blindness, men do not understand this, but, like brute beasts, incur death of soul for the miserly enjoyment of a corruptible life. Therefore, my child, do not pursue your lusts, but turn away from your own will. Seek thy pleasure in the Lord and He will give thee thy heart’s desires” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 12).
Trust More in God
We are drawn into this whirlpool of worldly cares, either because we prefer the amusements of the world to the less tangible attractions of God, or because we lack a trust in the Providence of God to look after our needs if we were to give God’s Word our primary focus. Our Lord gently criticizes this latter attitude in His Sermon on the Mount:
“Be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat: and the body more than the raiment? Behold the birds of the air, for they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns: and your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not you of much more value than they? ... Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was arrayed as one of these. And if the grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, God doth so clothe: how much more you, O ye of little Faith? Be not solicitous therefore, saying, ‘What shall we eat: or what shall we drink, or wherewith shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek. For your Father knoweth that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:25-33).
Believers and Doubters
The theory is easy to accept; intellectually, we have no problem with this passage! Yet, when it comes to practicing it, then many a soul falls foul of false reasoning and fortitude fails them. We see a similar kind of Martha and Mary syndrome in the account of the Angel Gabriel’s words to both Zachary and Mary with regard to the conception of John the Baptist and Jesus respectively.
Zachary believes that an angel has really appeared to him, but he doubts the message will come true for him. He puts his human reason (my wife is too old) above the power of God. Mary, on the other hand, believes what the Angel Gabriel tells her; and from the point of human reason, Mary’s conception is far more incredulous that Elizabeth’s. Elizabeth was to conceive through the natural actions of marriage; Mary was to conceive without knowing man! Zachary is punished, Mary is not punished.
Zachary’s wife, Elizabeth, even praises Mary’s Faith and trust in God, saying:”Blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord.” (Luke 1:45). Whereas the Angel Gabriel tells Zachary: “Thou shalt be dumb, and shalt not be able to speak until the day wherein these things shall come to pass, because thou hast not believed my words!” (Luke 1:20).
So let us not neglect the Word of God, especially in this holy season, when “the Word became Flesh and dwelt amongst us” (John 1:14). Let it not be said of us that “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:11).
Running Out Of Time
As The Imitation of Christ says: “How many there are who perish because of vain worldly knowledge and too little care for serving God” (Book 1, Chapter 3). For life is short. If we are old, we have not long left to get things right. If we are young, we may still have not long left, if the Chastisement Our Lady keeps warning us about comes soon, where the good will die alongside the bad, with neither priest nor faithful being spared the sufferings. So let us take to heart the Word of God, and let us engrave in our hearts the words of the The Imitation of Christ :
“In that day every trial borne in patience will be pleasing and the voice of iniquity will be stilled; the devout will be glad; the irreligious will mourn; and the mortified body will rejoice far more than if it had been pampered with every pleasure.
► Then the cheap garment will shine with splendor and the rich one become faded and worn; the poor cottage will be more praised than the gilded palace.
► In that day persevering patience will count more than all the power in this world;
► Simple obedience will be exalted above all worldly cleverness;
► A good and clean conscience will gladden the heart of man far more than the philosophy of the learned;
► And contempt for riches will be of more weight than every treasure on Earth.
► Then you will find more consolation in having prayed devoutly than in having fared daintily;
► You will be happy that you preferred silence to prolonged gossip.
► Then holy works will be of greater value than many fair words;
► Strictness of life and hard penances will be more pleasing than all earthly delights.
“Learn, then, to suffer little things now, that you may not have to suffer greater ones in eternity. Prove here what you can bear hereafter. If you can suffer only a little now, how will you be able to endure eternal torment? If a little suffering makes you impatient now, what will hell fire do? In truth, you cannot have two joys: you cannot taste the pleasures of this world and afterward reign with Christ. If your life to this moment had been full of honors and pleasures, what good would it do if at this instant you should die? All is vanity, therefore, except to love God and to serve Him alone” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 24).
Withdrawal Symptoms
Of course, naturally and humanly speaking, withdrawal from the world will bring with it withdrawal symptoms. We will feel isolated, we will feel left out, we will feel hated, we will feel persecuted, we will feel abandoned, we will feel like giving-up! Let us, at those inevitable moments (for they will come), take to heart the words of the Word of God, who said: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “They hated Me without cause!” (John 15:25). “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:22).
Heaven is not a ‘freebie’ but requires effort: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). That violent effort (fighting the devil, fighting the world, and fighting ourselves) will cost us many bruises, wounds and tears, but he that perseveres unto the end shall be saved. This was the kind of fight the Infant Jesus entered from the moment of His entry into this world at Bethlehem. Hated by the devil and the world. Fighting for His life and for our souls from the very first moments of His infancy. It has been said before and it shall be said again: Christmas is not a sentimental time of parties and fun; the very first Christmas was a time of great suffering (with some consolations) for our forgiveness and salvation. It was a time of joyful suffering, not a time of sorrowful joys! A time where suffering would bring joy, and not a time where joy would bring suffering!
“Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. You now indeed have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you” (John 16:20-22).
“They that sow in tears shall reap in joy” (Psalm 125:5).
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings on His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12). Keep the fires of Christmas burning in your heart and soul!
Unto us a Child is born!
Glory to God in the highest!
Peace on Earth to men of good will!
For many persons, Christmas comes and goes before you know it! Here today, gone tomorrow! Or here on Christmas Day and gone by New Year’s Day! Their secular Christmas season is microwaved and gone before you can barely say “Happy New Year!” Doctors will tell you that the post-Christmas season is one where depression hits high numbers. They have “come down” from the boozy, glitzy, festive Christmas period and are now face with a return to grind of daily work once again.
You could say it is somewhat like post-natal depression. Postnatal depression (PND) is a mood disorder that can affect people who are pregnant or have recently given birth. Symptoms include low mood, anxiety, crying, irritability, and changes in sleep or eating patterns. Other symptoms include difficulty concentrating, loss of interest in activities, and feeling confused or lost. You could compare this post-natal depression to a post-Nativity depression, which leaves many persons feeling similar symptoms as they “come down” from the secular “highs” of Christmas with its secular focus on food, drink, parties, festivities and fun. Of such superficial persons Holy Scripture says: “They are enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:19). To ask those people to focus on the spiritual side of Christmas for the whole Christmas season of 40 days (the Christmas season ends on February 2nd), would be a massive and unbearable cross for all those secular-minded worldlings―similar to having to sit through a long sermon; or spend years in a prison!
Christmas Crossroads
Christmas is essentially a season of the Cross―just ask the Holy Family and they will confirm it. A nine-month pregnant Mary―drawing close to the time of her delivery―has to walk (no cars back then) around 80 to 100 miles from Nazareth to Bethlehem. The average walking speed on a hike for an adult is around 2.5 miles per hour. A pregnant woman is not going to walk all day long at a brisk pace of 4 miles per hour! The terrain also made walking more laborious and difficult―there were no paved roads; some steep climbs, and the pathways would have been muddied by the frequent mid-winter rainfall. Even 2.5 miles per hour is pushing it for a nine-month pregnant woman―especially if having to walk many hours a day, and day after day in succession. If it was 2 miles per hour, then the whole trip would take around 50 hours of continuous walking. That means many days of walking―anywhere from 5 days (walking for 10 hours a day) to 10 days (walking for 5 hours a day). Another aspect to the equation is that a donkey goes about 12 to 15 miles a day depending on the geography. If you are calculating the length of the trip from the viewpoint of the donkey they had taken with them, then the approximate 100 mile trip would have taken anywhere from 7 to 8 days.
Divine Providence saw to it that it would be in mid-winter. We can have a rough idea of the climate of most areas—especially since the days of meticulous record-keeping. If you look at the average temperatures for Nazareth during the end of the month of December, you will see that the average high during the day is around 55°F. At night the average minimum temperature drops down to around 42°F. The temperatures for Bethlehem—being merely 75 miles or so, as the crow flies, to the south—were pretty much the same as Nazareth.
Added to that factor is that this is the wet season in the Holy Land, with LOTS of rain and wind (that means wind-chill also has to be taken into account) adding to the unwelcoming climate—which, as we know today, reduces the REAL FEEL of the average temperatures even more! December, January and February account for over half of annual rainfall—with it raining every other day on average. The average rainfall for December is 8 to 10 inches for the month—which means that if it rains every other day, or 15 days in the month, then the average daily rainfall around half-an-inch to three-quarters-of-an-inch daily. That classifies, according our modern way of measuring rainfall, as being moderate to heavy rain—depending on whether it fell in a few hours or was spread throughout the day and night intermittently. So they were exposed to the cold, the wind and the rain. Their clothes would have been wet and soggy, even after the rain stopped! Nine-months pregnant—out in that kind of stuff? Well, God knows best!
Now, of course, people were much hardier in those days and were somewhat acclimatized to the conditions—not having windows, insulation, central heating, etc.—but anywhere from a minimum 5 days to around 10 days on the road, in the outdoors, for the best part of the day—is still cool if not cold! From sunrise after 6:30 am, to sunset around 4:30 pm, gives around 10 hours of daylight. The Christmas of Mary and Joseph was far from being microwaved! Yes, the first Christmas was a cross!
At Bethlehem they were met with rejection―they tried to find accommodation with friends, relatives and the inn, but there was no room for them, no charity for them, no compassion for them―especially in view of Mary’s obvious pregnancy. No family around, no relatives, no friends! The Son of God would have to face the shame and ignominy of being born in an animal stable or cave, devoid of any human comforts such as water, heat, food, bedding, etc. There was no microwaving of the time they spent there―it was not 1 minute on the high setting! Yes, the first Christmas was a cross!
King “Killjoy” Herod added to their Christmas “joys” by plotting to kill Jesus―which necessitated in the Holy Family having to flee the country to the alien country of Egypt. No planes, trains or busses were available―the whole journey had to be made on foot over dangerous country. There was no microwaving of that journey―even for the beloved Mother of God and the Son of God! Yes, the first Christmas was a cross!
Confusion of Christmas
We find a similar microwaving of Christmas in the Church’s Christmas Liturgy. The further we go into the Church’s season of the Forty Days of Christmas (which ends with the feast of the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple and the Purification of His most Holy Mother on February 2nd), the more we accelerate through time, entering what could be called a ‘time-microwave’, and also the more confusing becomes the liturgical calendar!
We celebrate the birth of Our Lord on December 25th, and then, on the 8th day, we celebrate the Circumcision of the Lord (January 1st), keeping in line with the schedule of the Jewish law at that time, which commanded that a child be circumcised on the 8th day. Then we have the Epiphany on January 6th, which still falls into a chronological timeline, as does the feast of the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple and the Purification of His Holy Mother (February 2nd); for the Jewish law commanded that women giving birth, should be legally purified 40 days after giving birth; and February 2nd is 40 days after December 25th.
Fitting It All In
The problem is this: the Church has just one year in which it has to fit thirty-three years of Our Lord’s life. So something is going to have to ‘give’ somewhere. We have the birth of Our Lord on December 25th, and then, within a space of just a few weeks, the pre-Lenten season of Septuagesima begins, by which time Our Lord is supposed to have fled to Egypt, lived there in exile a some years, come back His homeland, spent His childhood in Nazareth, grown into an adult, and entered His public ministry and performed a miracle or two! All in the space of a few weeks, or as little as 25 days.
The earliest date on which Septuagesima Sunday can occur is January 18th (Easter falling on March 22nd in a non-leap year) and the latest is February 22nd (Easter falling on April 25th in a leap year). That means that the first 30 years of Our Lord’s life has to be squeezed into anything from a mere 25 days (if Septuagesima starts on January 18th) or 59 days if Septuagesima begins on the latest possible date!
So His life is sadly microwaved; with many of its riches, open for our contemplation, being rushed through or hurried past, and so left untouched or barely examined.
From Baby to Man to Baby Again
Furthermore, when Septuagesima Sunday falls before February 2nd (the Fortieth Day of Christmas), then we have the weird and confusing experience of penitential purple being introduced into the liturgy before the Forty Day of Christmas have been joyously celebrated! Fortunately, this year, Septuagesima Sunday falls on February 16th; but the yo-yo timeline will remain. From the Epiphany as a Child, we will jump to His Baptism as a man, then read of His first public miracle at Cana as an adult, then read of His being found in the Temple at the age of 12, and then finally back to His infancy with the Presentation in the Temple!
Post-Christmas Depression
Other factors that add to the potential destruction of our contemplation of the Christmas mysteries is the fact that the civil world also gives little time and possibility to being able to calmly and peacefully reflect upon the inexhaustible mysteries of Christmas; for within days of Christmas, many are called back to work, and the duties and necessities of the ‘daily-grind’ receive more attention than the spiritual treasures that we could daily find.
Doctors also report an annual tendency of a post-Thanksgiving and post-Christmas depression. For over a month, focus has been placed on celebrations, family gatherings, parties, feasts, gifts and fun; now all of that comes to end at a time of year that is naturally cold, bleak, cloudy and depressing. The weather largely keeps people indoors, and the fun outdoor distractions and amusements are just not available in the same quantity as those on offer over the spring and summer months. For those who find and place most of their joy in the things of the world, the “party is over” as they say. It is a sobering and depressing experience, much like that of a drug-addict or an alcoholic “coming-down” from their drug or alcoholic “high”.
Saints Who Fled To Find Christ
Yet, there were saints who would deliberately, willingly and joyfully flee the attractions of the world in order to “Seek first the Kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31), so that they could better fulfill the commandment to “love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind” (Luke 10:27). The Desert Fathers (and Mothers) are a case in point, they fled to the desert regions, both in times of persecution and times of peace, in order to better sanctify themselves by avoiding the world: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God.” (James 4:4).
The account of Martha and Mary is especially applicable to this time of the year: “A certain woman named Martha, received Jesus into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sitting also at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Who stood and said: ‘Lord, hast Thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me.’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha, Martha, thou art careful, and art troubled about many things: but one thing is necessary. Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42). It’s our choice, what have we chosen? What will we choose? To be busy with the world and neglect the Word; or be busy with the Word and neglect the world?
What Meat Do We Labor For?
Of course we have to work, but we do not live to eat, but eat merely to live. Sadly, the opposite is true today, for the world is full of persons “whose God is their belly; and who mind earthly things.” (Philippians 3:19). Too much emphasis is placed on busying ourselves with the things of this world, and not enough emphasis on busying ourselves with the Word of God—whether it be the Word made flesh, as in the Holy Eucharist, or in the Word written and recorded in Holy Scripture.
Jesus told us: “Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting, which the Son of man will give you” (John 6:27). For “Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word of God” (Luke 4:4), and Jesus is “the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God ... And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth” (John 1:1; 1:14).
There is a food that is far more nutritious and tastier that any earthly food: the Word of God and the Word made flesh in the Holy Eucharist. “O taste and see that the Lord is sweet” (Psalm 33:9). For this sugar-loving generation that we are, that should be sufficient an advertisement to have everyone scurrying for a taste!
Sowing What Seed?
We have a choice in whether to be Marthas or Marys. We can be busy with the world, or busy with Our Lord. Each choice has its inescapable consequences. As we sow, so shall we reap. To those who sow their seed in the world, it will be said:”Because thou hast forgotten God thy Savior, thou shalt sow strange seed” (Isaias 17:10); “Thou shalt sow, but shalt not reap” (Micheas 6:15) ... “You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies” (Leviticus 26:16).
Jesus spoke of those who were too preoccupied with the world and were thus unable to see the mysteries of God: “And the prophecy of Isaias is fulfilled in them, who saith: ‘By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand: and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive .For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them. But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear” (Matthew 13:14-16).
Explaining the Parable of the Sower of the Seed, Jesus tells His Apostles that the seed is the Word of God. He then continues: “He that soweth, soweth the Word. And these are they by the way side, where the Word is sown, and as soon as they have heard, immediately Satan cometh and taketh away the Word that was sown in their hearts. And these likewise are they that are sown on the stony ground: who, when they have heard the Word, immediately receive it with joy. And they have no root in themselves, but are only for a time: and then when tribulation and persecution ariseth for the Word, they are presently scandalized. And others there are who are sown among thorns: these are they that hear the Word, and the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things entering in choke the Word, and it is made fruitless. And these are they who are sown upon the good ground, who hear the Word, and receive it, and yield fruit, the one thirty, another sixty, and another a hundred” (Mark 4:14-20).
The Joy That Brings Pain
Of course, to receive the Word fruitfully, means not allowing oneself to be sucked into the whirlpool of worldly cares. The Imitation of Christ warns us against this:
“Do you think that men of the world have no suffering, or perhaps but little? Ask even those who enjoy the most delights and you will learn otherwise. ‘But,’ you will say, ‘they enjoy many pleasures and follow their own wishes; therefore they do not feel their troubles very much.’ Granted that they do have whatever they wish, how long do you think it will last? Behold, they, who prosper in the world, shall perish as smoke, and there shall be no memory of their past joys. Even in this life they do not find rest in these pleasures without bitterness, weariness, and fear. For they often receive the penalty of sorrow from the very thing from which they believe their happiness comes. And it is just. Since they seek and follow after pleasures without reason, they should not enjoy them without shame and bitterness. How brief, how false, how unreasonable and shameful all these pleasures are! Yet, in their drunken blindness, men do not understand this, but, like brute beasts, incur death of soul for the miserly enjoyment of a corruptible life. Therefore, my child, do not pursue your lusts, but turn away from your own will. Seek thy pleasure in the Lord and He will give thee thy heart’s desires” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 12).
Trust More in God
We are drawn into this whirlpool of worldly cares, either because we prefer the amusements of the world to the less tangible attractions of God, or because we lack a trust in the Providence of God to look after our needs if we were to give God’s Word our primary focus. Our Lord gently criticizes this latter attitude in His Sermon on the Mount:
“Be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat: and the body more than the raiment? Behold the birds of the air, for they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns: and your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not you of much more value than they? ... Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was arrayed as one of these. And if the grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, God doth so clothe: how much more you, O ye of little Faith? Be not solicitous therefore, saying, ‘What shall we eat: or what shall we drink, or wherewith shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek. For your Father knoweth that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:25-33).
Believers and Doubters
The theory is easy to accept; intellectually, we have no problem with this passage! Yet, when it comes to practicing it, then many a soul falls foul of false reasoning and fortitude fails them. We see a similar kind of Martha and Mary syndrome in the account of the Angel Gabriel’s words to both Zachary and Mary with regard to the conception of John the Baptist and Jesus respectively.
Zachary believes that an angel has really appeared to him, but he doubts the message will come true for him. He puts his human reason (my wife is too old) above the power of God. Mary, on the other hand, believes what the Angel Gabriel tells her; and from the point of human reason, Mary’s conception is far more incredulous that Elizabeth’s. Elizabeth was to conceive through the natural actions of marriage; Mary was to conceive without knowing man! Zachary is punished, Mary is not punished.
Zachary’s wife, Elizabeth, even praises Mary’s Faith and trust in God, saying:”Blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord.” (Luke 1:45). Whereas the Angel Gabriel tells Zachary: “Thou shalt be dumb, and shalt not be able to speak until the day wherein these things shall come to pass, because thou hast not believed my words!” (Luke 1:20).
So let us not neglect the Word of God, especially in this holy season, when “the Word became Flesh and dwelt amongst us” (John 1:14). Let it not be said of us that “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:11).
Running Out Of Time
As The Imitation of Christ says: “How many there are who perish because of vain worldly knowledge and too little care for serving God” (Book 1, Chapter 3). For life is short. If we are old, we have not long left to get things right. If we are young, we may still have not long left, if the Chastisement Our Lady keeps warning us about comes soon, where the good will die alongside the bad, with neither priest nor faithful being spared the sufferings. So let us take to heart the Word of God, and let us engrave in our hearts the words of the The Imitation of Christ :
“In that day every trial borne in patience will be pleasing and the voice of iniquity will be stilled; the devout will be glad; the irreligious will mourn; and the mortified body will rejoice far more than if it had been pampered with every pleasure.
► Then the cheap garment will shine with splendor and the rich one become faded and worn; the poor cottage will be more praised than the gilded palace.
► In that day persevering patience will count more than all the power in this world;
► Simple obedience will be exalted above all worldly cleverness;
► A good and clean conscience will gladden the heart of man far more than the philosophy of the learned;
► And contempt for riches will be of more weight than every treasure on Earth.
► Then you will find more consolation in having prayed devoutly than in having fared daintily;
► You will be happy that you preferred silence to prolonged gossip.
► Then holy works will be of greater value than many fair words;
► Strictness of life and hard penances will be more pleasing than all earthly delights.
“Learn, then, to suffer little things now, that you may not have to suffer greater ones in eternity. Prove here what you can bear hereafter. If you can suffer only a little now, how will you be able to endure eternal torment? If a little suffering makes you impatient now, what will hell fire do? In truth, you cannot have two joys: you cannot taste the pleasures of this world and afterward reign with Christ. If your life to this moment had been full of honors and pleasures, what good would it do if at this instant you should die? All is vanity, therefore, except to love God and to serve Him alone” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 24).
Withdrawal Symptoms
Of course, naturally and humanly speaking, withdrawal from the world will bring with it withdrawal symptoms. We will feel isolated, we will feel left out, we will feel hated, we will feel persecuted, we will feel abandoned, we will feel like giving-up! Let us, at those inevitable moments (for they will come), take to heart the words of the Word of God, who said: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “They hated Me without cause!” (John 15:25). “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:22).
Heaven is not a ‘freebie’ but requires effort: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). That violent effort (fighting the devil, fighting the world, and fighting ourselves) will cost us many bruises, wounds and tears, but he that perseveres unto the end shall be saved. This was the kind of fight the Infant Jesus entered from the moment of His entry into this world at Bethlehem. Hated by the devil and the world. Fighting for His life and for our souls from the very first moments of His infancy. It has been said before and it shall be said again: Christmas is not a sentimental time of parties and fun; the very first Christmas was a time of great suffering (with some consolations) for our forgiveness and salvation. It was a time of joyful suffering, not a time of sorrowful joys! A time where suffering would bring joy, and not a time where joy would bring suffering!
“Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. You now indeed have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you” (John 16:20-22).
“They that sow in tears shall reap in joy” (Psalm 125:5).
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings on His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12). Keep the fires of Christmas burning in your heart and soul!
Unto us a Child is born!
Glory to God in the highest!
Peace on Earth to men of good will!
Article 9
Thursday, January 2nd
Is It Really Worth It?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Thursday, January 2nd
Is It Really Worth It?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Is the Real Christmas Worth the Effort?
Christmas is not about fun and games, feasting and drinking―it is all about being saved from Hell. Brushing aside the false sentimentality that has been created around Christmas, we should listen to Holy Mother Church as to true purpose of Christmas. Holy Mother Church reveals this in the Christmas Liturgy. The following quotes are taken from the Masses and Divine Office (Breviary) from Christmas Eve onwards:
“This day you shall know that the Lord will come and save us!” (Exodus 16:6-7) … “O God, You gladden us year after year with the expectation of our redemption!” … “Do not be afraid, Joseph, son of David, to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is begotten in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she shall bring forth a Son, and you shall call His Name Jesus; for He shall save His people from their sins!” … “It is fitting and profitable to salvation, that we should at all times and in all places give thanks to You, Lord. For You have promised Him as a Savior for the lost human race … the time of His coming is near, and the day of our liberation is dawning!” … “Lift up your heads, for your redemption is at hand!” … “This day a Savior is born unto thee!” … “The Lord has made known His salvation!” … “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men; instructing us, that we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world by , denying ungodliness and worldly desires” … “Our Savior Jesus Christ, gave Himself for us, so that He might redeem us from all iniquity” … “These things speak, and exhort and rebuke with all authority!” … “Grant that the birth of Your only begotten Son may set us free, who are held by the bondage and chains of sin!” … “By the birth of Your only begotten Son cleanse us from our sins!” … “Take away from us our iniquities, we beseech Thee, O Lord!”
Being born Catholic has marked advantages over not being born Catholic. Proverbially, it is like being “born with a silver spoon in your mouth”; or like having a three lap start in a four lap race. But even though it has great advantages, God does not give us Heaven on a golden plate. If something is worth doing, then it’s worth doing well; if Heaven is worth getting, then we need to put serious effort into getting there!
Our Lord puts it this way: “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) ... “A rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:23) ... “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:3) ... “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice’ sake: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:10) ...”Unless your justice abound more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:20) … “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
Painful Prophecy
Our Lord is not full of “sweet talk” but He tells us as it is, without wrapping things up in cotton balls. The following prophecy is worth pondering―since it refers to the so-called “End Times” or “Last Days”, which Our Lady of Fatima said that we have entered:
“And as it came to pass in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat and drink, they married wives, and were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark: and the flood came and destroyed them all. Likewise as it came to pass, in the days of Lot: they did eat and drink, they bought and sold, they planted and built. And in the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from Heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man shall be revealed. In that hour, he that shall be on the housetop, and his goods in the house, let him not go down to take them away: and he that shall be in the field, in like manner, let him not return back. Remember Lot’s wife! Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it. I say to you: in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left. Two women shall be grinding together: the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left: two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left.” (Luke 17:26-35).
The Many and the Few
We see this poignantly fulfilled as Jesus died on the Cross: one thief was saved, the other thief was lost. Even before that, many Jews and Pharisees rejected Him, few accepted Him: “Many are called, but few chosen” (Matthew 20:16). Many are baptized, but few will be saved.
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able” (Luke 13:23-24) ... “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14) ... “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12) ... “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
Life is No Joke―Christmas is No Party
All this points to the seriousness and gravity of the time allotted to us here on Earth by God. Some live for pleasure and fun; others live to work out their salvation. For some, Christmas is a time for fun, food, drink, gifts and parties. For others, Christmas is a time of seeking Christ in a more profitable way, through better prayer, more spiritual reading and a greater detachment from the world. “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). It is a reflection of the foolish and wise virgins, mentioned by Our Lord in one of His parables. Time is too precious to lose, yet we have all lost much time. Now is the time to wake up from our illusions and wishful thinking, and face the reality of life, the reality of eternal life, the reality of salvation or ...
Going Out to Meet Christ
So, just like the wise virgins, we must go out to meet our Bridegroom, Christ: “There was a cry made: ‘Behold the bridegroom cometh! Go ye forth to meet him!” (Matthew 25:6). Like the wise virgins, we must be ever ready to seek Him, ever ready to go to Him, ever ready to meet Him. Love is reciprocal, meaning it is a “two-way-street” — it is about give and take. At Christmas, Our Lord, out of love, leaves Heaven to come and save us; we must likewise leave the world and go to Him to be saved.
Mary and Joseph had to leave their home and daily occupations in Nazareth to give birth to Him far away in Bethlehem. The Magi had to leave their homes and daily occupations and travel a long way to find and meet Him in Bethlehem. Because of Him, Mary and Joseph had to go even further afield, to distant Egypt, in order to preserve Him in their lives. The Apostles had to leave their jobs and families to be with Him; and would later even have to leave their home country as they were sent into the whole wide world to take His word to others.
Love for Love, Life for Life
He gave His life for us and He demands that we give Him our lives. “For he that will save his life, shall lose it; and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25) ... “Unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, itself remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit. He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal” (John 12:24-25).
Dying to Live for Christ
That “dying” may take all kinds of shapes and forms. The most common form will be that of dying to the world and its worldly spirit and worldly ambitions and worldly fashions and attitudes. Yet another form, more and more common in these modern times of religious indifference, is having to “die” to human respect which makes us “go along so as to get along” with family, relatives, work colleagues and friends. We are tempted to hide our Faith and shut our mouths to avoid rocking the boat. Yet Our Lord has said: “Everyone that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 10:32-33). Dying to human respect can be one of the most profitable, yet one of the most painful things we could do.
Our perpetual battle is the one against the blatant lie that tries to tell us that we can have the best of both worlds: that we can live like the rest of the world and also save our souls. Yet, He Who is Truth itself, tells us: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24), while His Apostle, St. James, adds: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
But what About My Family and Friends?
But then we are faced with those who surround us—our family, relatives, work colleagues and social acquaintances! Surely we cannot turn our backs on them?!? Surely that cannot be what God wants! There is a prudent path that must be trodden, as the following Scriptural quotes will explain.
First of all, it is certain that God has come to save sinners: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “The Pharisees and the scribes murmured, saying: ‘This man receives sinners, and eats with them!’” (Luke 15:2). He forgave sins and accepted sinners into His entourage—as we see in the case of His choosing St. Matthew as an Apostle, whereas he was a publican; and St. Mary Magdalen, who was an adulteress who had been possessed by seven devils; and the Good Thief on the cross. So we clearly see that He does not avoid sinners, but goes to them.
Limits to Love
Yet there are limits that Our Lord Himself sets. The first one being the salvation of our own soul and the avoidance of any dangers that may make us lose our salvation: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Secondly, we cannot put family or relatives or friends before God. Do we really want to side with those who are deliberately and stubbornly offending God and are refusing to change their sinful ways? “He that is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). If they will not follow God, then after trying to change their minds, we cannot let family ties or friendship weaken our Faith, or, worse still, separate us from God.
Jesus Causes Division
Jesus already foresaw and foretold splits in families because of His teaching: “Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves a son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that takes not up his cross and follows Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:34-38).
If They Will Not Listen, Then...
Thirdly, where there is opposition to Christ’s teaching, and division because of it, then we are told to first of all try and bring them round to the truth, for that is Christ’s wish.
“For the Son of man is come to save that which was lost! What think you? If a man has an hundred sheep, and one of them should go astray: does he not leave the ninety-nine in the mountains, and go to seek that which is gone astray? And if it so be that he find it: Amen I say to you, he rejoices more for that, than for the ninety-nine that went not astray! Even so it is not the will of your Father, Who is in Heaven, that one of these little ones should perish. But if thy brother shall offend against thee―then go and rebuke him between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain thy brother. And if he will not hear thee, take with thee one or two more―so that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may stand. And if he will not hear them―then tell the church. And if he will not hear the church―then let him be to thee as the heathen and publican” (Matthew 18:11-17). “Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words― going forth out of that house or city, shake off the dust from your feet!” (Matthew 10:14).
One Bad Apple...
We must separate ourselves from and avoid those who are a danger to our Faith, as St. Paul writes: “Know you not that a little leaven corrupts the whole lump? ... I wrote to you in an epistle, not to keep company with fornicators. I mean not with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or the extortioners, or the servers of idols; otherwise you must needs go out of this world. But now I have written to you, not to keep company, if any man that is named a brother, be a fornicator, or covetous, or a server of idols, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner: with such a one, not so much as to eat! ... Put away the evil one from among yourselves!” (1 Corinthians 5:6-13).
What Really Converts
As for their conversion, prayer and sacrifice (which Our Lady requested at Fatima) will do more to convert souls that mere human words. Faith is a supernatural gift of God, not man; and it is God who freely gives it. We can give nobody the Faith, we can merely plant seeds, and water them, but it is God who sparks Faith to life: “I have planted, Apollo watered―but God gave the increase!” (1 Corinthians 3:6). Because we are too human and not supernatural enough, we place too much emphasis on human efforts, forgetting (or at least twisting) the words of Our Lord, Who said: “Without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Limited Edition of Full Version?
At Christmas Christ comes with a challenge; He challenges us to go out of our customary human, self-made (or twisted) partial notion or limited-edition of the Catholic Faith and to embrace the full version or the entire Catholic Faith. It means dying to our personal version of the Faith, a death that will invariably be humiliating and painful, but less humiliating and painful here below, than having to undergo the transformation hereafter! He is there to help us should we decide to do so. Are we among the foolish virgins or the wise virgins? Will we take on the role of the bad thief or the Good Thief? Will we be Simon the Pharisee or Mary Magdalen? We live and die by our choices. Let us choose to die to self and live for Christ. “For to me, to live is Christ; and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). “Whether we live, we live unto the Lord; or whether we die, we die unto the Lord. Therefore, whether we live, or whether we die, we are the Lord’s” (Romans 14:8).
Christmas is not about fun and games, feasting and drinking―it is all about being saved from Hell. Brushing aside the false sentimentality that has been created around Christmas, we should listen to Holy Mother Church as to true purpose of Christmas. Holy Mother Church reveals this in the Christmas Liturgy. The following quotes are taken from the Masses and Divine Office (Breviary) from Christmas Eve onwards:
“This day you shall know that the Lord will come and save us!” (Exodus 16:6-7) … “O God, You gladden us year after year with the expectation of our redemption!” … “Do not be afraid, Joseph, son of David, to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is begotten in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she shall bring forth a Son, and you shall call His Name Jesus; for He shall save His people from their sins!” … “It is fitting and profitable to salvation, that we should at all times and in all places give thanks to You, Lord. For You have promised Him as a Savior for the lost human race … the time of His coming is near, and the day of our liberation is dawning!” … “Lift up your heads, for your redemption is at hand!” … “This day a Savior is born unto thee!” … “The Lord has made known His salvation!” … “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men; instructing us, that we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world by , denying ungodliness and worldly desires” … “Our Savior Jesus Christ, gave Himself for us, so that He might redeem us from all iniquity” … “These things speak, and exhort and rebuke with all authority!” … “Grant that the birth of Your only begotten Son may set us free, who are held by the bondage and chains of sin!” … “By the birth of Your only begotten Son cleanse us from our sins!” … “Take away from us our iniquities, we beseech Thee, O Lord!”
Being born Catholic has marked advantages over not being born Catholic. Proverbially, it is like being “born with a silver spoon in your mouth”; or like having a three lap start in a four lap race. But even though it has great advantages, God does not give us Heaven on a golden plate. If something is worth doing, then it’s worth doing well; if Heaven is worth getting, then we need to put serious effort into getting there!
Our Lord puts it this way: “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) ... “A rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:23) ... “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:3) ... “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice’ sake: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:10) ...”Unless your justice abound more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:20) … “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
Painful Prophecy
Our Lord is not full of “sweet talk” but He tells us as it is, without wrapping things up in cotton balls. The following prophecy is worth pondering―since it refers to the so-called “End Times” or “Last Days”, which Our Lady of Fatima said that we have entered:
“And as it came to pass in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat and drink, they married wives, and were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark: and the flood came and destroyed them all. Likewise as it came to pass, in the days of Lot: they did eat and drink, they bought and sold, they planted and built. And in the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from Heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man shall be revealed. In that hour, he that shall be on the housetop, and his goods in the house, let him not go down to take them away: and he that shall be in the field, in like manner, let him not return back. Remember Lot’s wife! Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it. I say to you: in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left. Two women shall be grinding together: the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left: two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left.” (Luke 17:26-35).
The Many and the Few
We see this poignantly fulfilled as Jesus died on the Cross: one thief was saved, the other thief was lost. Even before that, many Jews and Pharisees rejected Him, few accepted Him: “Many are called, but few chosen” (Matthew 20:16). Many are baptized, but few will be saved.
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able” (Luke 13:23-24) ... “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14) ... “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12) ... “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
Life is No Joke―Christmas is No Party
All this points to the seriousness and gravity of the time allotted to us here on Earth by God. Some live for pleasure and fun; others live to work out their salvation. For some, Christmas is a time for fun, food, drink, gifts and parties. For others, Christmas is a time of seeking Christ in a more profitable way, through better prayer, more spiritual reading and a greater detachment from the world. “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). It is a reflection of the foolish and wise virgins, mentioned by Our Lord in one of His parables. Time is too precious to lose, yet we have all lost much time. Now is the time to wake up from our illusions and wishful thinking, and face the reality of life, the reality of eternal life, the reality of salvation or ...
Going Out to Meet Christ
So, just like the wise virgins, we must go out to meet our Bridegroom, Christ: “There was a cry made: ‘Behold the bridegroom cometh! Go ye forth to meet him!” (Matthew 25:6). Like the wise virgins, we must be ever ready to seek Him, ever ready to go to Him, ever ready to meet Him. Love is reciprocal, meaning it is a “two-way-street” — it is about give and take. At Christmas, Our Lord, out of love, leaves Heaven to come and save us; we must likewise leave the world and go to Him to be saved.
Mary and Joseph had to leave their home and daily occupations in Nazareth to give birth to Him far away in Bethlehem. The Magi had to leave their homes and daily occupations and travel a long way to find and meet Him in Bethlehem. Because of Him, Mary and Joseph had to go even further afield, to distant Egypt, in order to preserve Him in their lives. The Apostles had to leave their jobs and families to be with Him; and would later even have to leave their home country as they were sent into the whole wide world to take His word to others.
Love for Love, Life for Life
He gave His life for us and He demands that we give Him our lives. “For he that will save his life, shall lose it; and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25) ... “Unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, itself remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit. He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal” (John 12:24-25).
Dying to Live for Christ
That “dying” may take all kinds of shapes and forms. The most common form will be that of dying to the world and its worldly spirit and worldly ambitions and worldly fashions and attitudes. Yet another form, more and more common in these modern times of religious indifference, is having to “die” to human respect which makes us “go along so as to get along” with family, relatives, work colleagues and friends. We are tempted to hide our Faith and shut our mouths to avoid rocking the boat. Yet Our Lord has said: “Everyone that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 10:32-33). Dying to human respect can be one of the most profitable, yet one of the most painful things we could do.
Our perpetual battle is the one against the blatant lie that tries to tell us that we can have the best of both worlds: that we can live like the rest of the world and also save our souls. Yet, He Who is Truth itself, tells us: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24), while His Apostle, St. James, adds: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
But what About My Family and Friends?
But then we are faced with those who surround us—our family, relatives, work colleagues and social acquaintances! Surely we cannot turn our backs on them?!? Surely that cannot be what God wants! There is a prudent path that must be trodden, as the following Scriptural quotes will explain.
First of all, it is certain that God has come to save sinners: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “The Pharisees and the scribes murmured, saying: ‘This man receives sinners, and eats with them!’” (Luke 15:2). He forgave sins and accepted sinners into His entourage—as we see in the case of His choosing St. Matthew as an Apostle, whereas he was a publican; and St. Mary Magdalen, who was an adulteress who had been possessed by seven devils; and the Good Thief on the cross. So we clearly see that He does not avoid sinners, but goes to them.
Limits to Love
Yet there are limits that Our Lord Himself sets. The first one being the salvation of our own soul and the avoidance of any dangers that may make us lose our salvation: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Secondly, we cannot put family or relatives or friends before God. Do we really want to side with those who are deliberately and stubbornly offending God and are refusing to change their sinful ways? “He that is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). If they will not follow God, then after trying to change their minds, we cannot let family ties or friendship weaken our Faith, or, worse still, separate us from God.
Jesus Causes Division
Jesus already foresaw and foretold splits in families because of His teaching: “Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves a son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that takes not up his cross and follows Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:34-38).
If They Will Not Listen, Then...
Thirdly, where there is opposition to Christ’s teaching, and division because of it, then we are told to first of all try and bring them round to the truth, for that is Christ’s wish.
“For the Son of man is come to save that which was lost! What think you? If a man has an hundred sheep, and one of them should go astray: does he not leave the ninety-nine in the mountains, and go to seek that which is gone astray? And if it so be that he find it: Amen I say to you, he rejoices more for that, than for the ninety-nine that went not astray! Even so it is not the will of your Father, Who is in Heaven, that one of these little ones should perish. But if thy brother shall offend against thee―then go and rebuke him between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain thy brother. And if he will not hear thee, take with thee one or two more―so that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may stand. And if he will not hear them―then tell the church. And if he will not hear the church―then let him be to thee as the heathen and publican” (Matthew 18:11-17). “Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words― going forth out of that house or city, shake off the dust from your feet!” (Matthew 10:14).
One Bad Apple...
We must separate ourselves from and avoid those who are a danger to our Faith, as St. Paul writes: “Know you not that a little leaven corrupts the whole lump? ... I wrote to you in an epistle, not to keep company with fornicators. I mean not with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or the extortioners, or the servers of idols; otherwise you must needs go out of this world. But now I have written to you, not to keep company, if any man that is named a brother, be a fornicator, or covetous, or a server of idols, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner: with such a one, not so much as to eat! ... Put away the evil one from among yourselves!” (1 Corinthians 5:6-13).
What Really Converts
As for their conversion, prayer and sacrifice (which Our Lady requested at Fatima) will do more to convert souls that mere human words. Faith is a supernatural gift of God, not man; and it is God who freely gives it. We can give nobody the Faith, we can merely plant seeds, and water them, but it is God who sparks Faith to life: “I have planted, Apollo watered―but God gave the increase!” (1 Corinthians 3:6). Because we are too human and not supernatural enough, we place too much emphasis on human efforts, forgetting (or at least twisting) the words of Our Lord, Who said: “Without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Limited Edition of Full Version?
At Christmas Christ comes with a challenge; He challenges us to go out of our customary human, self-made (or twisted) partial notion or limited-edition of the Catholic Faith and to embrace the full version or the entire Catholic Faith. It means dying to our personal version of the Faith, a death that will invariably be humiliating and painful, but less humiliating and painful here below, than having to undergo the transformation hereafter! He is there to help us should we decide to do so. Are we among the foolish virgins or the wise virgins? Will we take on the role of the bad thief or the Good Thief? Will we be Simon the Pharisee or Mary Magdalen? We live and die by our choices. Let us choose to die to self and live for Christ. “For to me, to live is Christ; and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). “Whether we live, we live unto the Lord; or whether we die, we die unto the Lord. Therefore, whether we live, or whether we die, we are the Lord’s” (Romans 14:8).
Article 8
Wednesday, January 1st
Is There Hope on the Horizon?
Wednesday, January 1st
Is There Hope on the Horizon?
It’s a New Year! Will There Be a New You?
Frequently, we search out “new” things to own, “new” things to do, “new” experiences in which to participate, “new” excitements to enjoy, “new” ways of doing things, “new” beginnings, “new” hopes, etc. In all of these “new” enterprises the word “new” is synonymous with the word “better”. Usually, when we seek something “new”, we seek something “better” than what we have.
Our Lord is most certainly seeking something “new”—something “new” from you! As He says in Holy Scripture: “And He that sat on the throne, said: ‘Behold, I make all things new!’” (Apocalypse 21:5). He wants to make a “new” you—He always has wanted to make a “new” you—but you have always resisted Him, going only so far and not far enough, or not even going anywhere! In the Old Testament, God says: “Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit!” (Ezechiel 18:31) … “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you! I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh and will give you a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 36:26) … “I will give them one heart and will put a new spirit in their bowels: and I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 11:19).
What Makes a Happy New Year?
The answers to that question are endless. Perhaps the most common answers would include: Not having any financial worries or problems. Not having any health problems. Not having relationship problems. In short―not having any kind of suffering. People equate happiness with the absence of suffering—which to a certain degree is true—for who is happy is Hell? Not even the devil—regardless of how many souls he pulls down there! In fact, the unhappiest of all creatures in Hell is Satan (Lucifer) himself—and nobody suffers more than Satan. Whereas Heaven—where there is an absence of any and all suffering—is a happy place! So we can agree that absence of suffering creates happiness.
Can We Have Happiness on Earth?
The question arises--”Can we be happy—and thus without any suffering—here on Earth?” Without having committed any kind of sin—the answer would be “Yes!”—and this was the case for Adam and Eve, until they sinned. They were perfectly happy, as far as they could be, here on Earth, without yet having the Beatific Vision of God. Sin, however, brings unhappiness with it, for sin has to be paid-for and the payment is painful. “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death” (James 1:15). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56) … “By one man [Adam] sin entered into this world, and, by sin, death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). “From the woman [Eve] came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33). “What fruit therefore had you then in those things, of which you are now ashamed? For the end of them is death!” (Romans 6:21). Death is not a happy thing!
Love Brings Happiness and Unhappiness
Some seek happiness in love. Low is certainly appealing and satisfying. Everyone would probably agree that love brings happiness. We all want to be loved and we all want to love. We all do love—one thing or another—but we also find that our love does not always bring happiness with it! St. Augustine uttered that famous phrase: “Love God and do what you want!” There is more to those words than at first meets the eye! St. Augustine does not mean: “Love God and sin as much as you want!” For Our Lord said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
“Tell me who you’re friends are and I will tell you what you are!” We have all heard that saying and many of its derivatives: “Tell me what you like/love and I will tell what you are!” … “Tell me what you think of the most / what you eat / what you do the most / what you read or watch the most / etc.” In a certain sense, we become what we love. So it depends upon whether that which we love is good or bad, healthy or unhealthy, holy or sinful. “He that loves danger, shall perish in it!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). “He that loves iniquity, hates his own soul” (Psalm 10:6).
To the Christian soul, the world is dangerous and full of iniquity, which is why Holy Scripture says: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16).
Those who love healthy food tend towards healthiness, while those who love unhealthy food tend towards unhealthiness. Those who think about and love sin tend towards sinfulness, while those who think about and love holy things tend towards holiness. The complicating factor is that—regardless of whether we tend to holiness or sinfulness, healthiness or unhealthiness—we always think that our choice is going to make us happy—otherwise we would not do it. It is just that some fail to see beyond the superficial and temporary ‘happiness’ to the great unhappiness that lies beneath the surface—and the devil makes good use of this blindness, for he usually tempts us to sin under the guise of good, telling us that the sin he dangles before us will bring us more happiness than unhappiness. He blinds us to the word of God as he blinded Eve to the word of God:
“Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why hath God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat: but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God hath commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No! You shall not die the death! For God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’ And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold: and she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband who did eat” (Genesis 3:1-6). The superficial appearance of happiness brought a terrible unhappiness in its wake. “From the woman [Eve] came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33).
Love Makes the World Go Round!
You have certainly heard the saying: “Love makes the world go round!”—yet you have probably not thought about it from a supernatural or theological perspective. Just stop and think! Who really makes the world go round? It is God! “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by him: and without him was made nothing that was made!” (John 1:103)—and that Word of God, Jesus Christ, said: “Without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), “Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches, are from God” (Ecclesiasticus 11:14). Many more Scriptural quotes could be summoned to testify to the fact that “God makes the world go round!” Now, who or what is God? “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8). God is love. Therefore, Love (God) makes the world go round.
Made for Love!
God has made us for love! In the ship of our soul, it is our heart (our will) that is the engine of love, and our mind (our intellect) is the rudder for love. A powerful engine will quickly drive the ship of the soul through the waters of life. But the “engine of love” is blind and needs the “rudder of the mind” to guide it in the right direction. What good is it to be sailing “full steam ahead” if we are sailing in the wrong direction? We must love the right things, not the wrong things—and it is our mind (our intellect) that must enlighten or steer our powerful love in the right direction.
We were made to love God! From our earliest days, the catechism taught us that we were made to love God: “God made me because He loves me … God made me to be happy with Him in Heaven … God is always happy … God made me to be happy with Him forever … I cannot be happy without God … I need God … Everybody in Heaven is happy … To be happy forever, we must get to Heaven … To be happy with God in Heaven, I must know Him, love Him, and serve Him in this world … I must make my life a gift to God … I must love God more than I love myself … I must love God more than I love anybody else … I must love God above all things” (extracts from the New St. Joseph First Communion Catechism).
As St. John the Evangelist—the “Beloved Disciple”—says: “Let us therefore love God, because God has first loved us!” (1 John 4:19). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
The Power and Energy of Divine Love
Sin is the greatest evil in the world and love is the greatest antidote to sin. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD). “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47).
It is said: “Love makes the world go round”—it is certain that the more we love God, then the more energy and power we have for the voyage to Heaven, which is always “against the tide” of the world. In this “loveless world”—or more precisely, this “loveless godless world” which does not love God—we need a powerful love, or powerful engine, to make headway against the powerful contrary tide of the world. We can easily become discouraged in seeing the vast majority of vessels (souls) happily sailing with the current or with the tide, down to the ‘Niagara Falls of Hell’—with even family and friends blindly and happily “sailing down the swanee.” It is only a powerful love of God―like powerful strokes the oar―that can stop us from being washed downstream with the worldly current.
Sadly and tragically, most souls are being washed downstream by the waters of the world and Hell. As Our Lord said: “Broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Our Lady of Fatima said: “Many souls go to Hell!” She also said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! The number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation.”
We might be tempted to say with the Apostles: “Who then can be saved?” (Matthew 19:25) ― especially when Our Lord says: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). No wonder, then, that St. Paul writes: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). God loves you! God wants your salvation! Christ came to save you! But “be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
The Chemistry of Faith, Hope and Charity
The theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity are the basis on which the Christian’s moral life is based. These virtues give the Christian life and form his special character. God instills these virtues in the soul of the faithful to permit them to behave as His children to become worthy of eternal life. The greatest of these virtues is the virtue of love or charity.
By Faith we know about God and Heaven. This knowledge gives a Hope of God’s friendship and a desire and Hope of reaching Heaven. Hope draws us towards God and Heaven. Before hope comes desire―and before desire must come knowledge. We cannot desire what we do not know; we cannot hope in what we do not know; and we cannot love what we do not know. Faith gives us that knowledge―so that we can desire, hope and love. You first know of the existence of something; you then desire that thing; and then you hope to obtain that thing; and your efforts increase your love of that thing. What is not desired is not hoped for! Faith tells us that the road to Heaven is not easy. Hope gives us strength so we will not become discouraged. Faith and Hope also spark within us a love of God―for we cannot love what do not know, and we will love more if there is a hope of attaining the object of our love.
We can liken Faith, Hope and Charity to the building of a fire—which is what Our Lord wants, as He said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). Before there can be a fire, we have to gather the things that the fire can burn—for example, no wood, then no fire.
Faith is the firewood of our fire. We must learn about God like we gather logs for the fire. Yet the danger is that the wood is not sufficiently seasoned, or it is too damp to burn. Likewise our knowledge can be too superficial (unseasoned) or it can be soaked with worldliness. “I say to you, the Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
The more wood (Faith) we have acquired, the greater will be our fire (Charity)—and it is Charity that burns away the debt of sin: “Wherefore I say to thee: ‘Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much!’” (Luke 7:47). Gathering the wood (growing in Faith) takes time and effort—if we want to just play in the world, we will find little time or desire to gather information about God to feed our Faith!
Wood—Spark—Flame
Yet even with much wood, there is no fire without a spark—Hope is that spark. Yet sparks are often the result of friction, and nothing could be truer in the spiritual life. Hope is tested through a ‘friction’ of sorts—Hope is really tested in adversity and tribulation. The greater the tribulation, then the greater must be the hope. What is really easy is rarely hoped for—it is more of certitude than an uncertainty that we hope for. It is the difference between saying: “I know I’ll succeed!” and “I hope to succeed!” and “I’ve no chance of succeeding!” Presumption—Hope—Despair.
Hope keeps a soul from discouragement, and also keeps presumption at bay; it sustains the soul during times of abandonment; it opens up the soul in expectation of eternal beatitude. Buoyed up by Hope, the soul is preserved from selfishness and, with the appropriate efforts, is led to the happiness that flows from Charity.
New Year—New Hopes
For many—especially for those who suffer anything—a ‘New Year’ brings hopes of being a better year. We are, by nature, hopeful creatures! That’s why so many people buy lottery tickets! Or enter the ‘lottery’ of marriage with high hopes! Just kidding! Yet there is some truth to this—very few, if any, get married with the expectation that their marriage will be a miserable marriage; they all hope for the best.
Hope, in this sense, springs eternal. People used to try and climb unconquered mountains, in the hope of the being the first one to reach the summit. Athletes and sports teams enter races and competitions hoping to win the first prize. A person starts a business in the hope that it will be successful and not a failure. A patient takes a medicine in the hope that it will defeat a disease and bring health. These, and many such like examples, manifest the presence of a natural hope, which can be described as the desire to attain something that at present is outside their reach.
Wrong Hopes
But what if the marriage is successful—what comes after that? Eventually, death! What if the business is successful—what comes after that? Eventually, death! What if the athlete or team wins the prize? What if he reaches the summit? What if the disease is cured? What if this? What if that? Ultimately, eventually, inescapably there comes death! And what comes after death? Aha! Now we are getting ‘warm’—then come either the fires of Hell, the fires of Purgatory or the fire of love in Heaven (God likes to represent Himself as fire!).
Heavenly Hopes
If there is Hope of a successful marriage, business, cure, etc., then there should also be a hope for Heaven. Yet Heaven is beyond our capacities and capabilities. We can barely jump a foot or two above the ground unaided—so how on Earth are we going to get to Heaven. The soul is planted in the Earth (God’s creation), yet it should be totally focused on moving towards Heaven (God himself). It is a delicate balance of attitudes towards creation and the Creator.
Some poor souls never get beyond the scope of creation and lose themselves irredeemably in its pleasures. Others use creation for the purpose it was made to be—stepping stones or rungs on a ladder that leads to God―the temporary that leads to the eternal. Since Heaven is beyond the reach of our natural powers, we need some super-natural powers to get there. This is where the supernatural virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity come in to help us. Faith makes us adhere to God as the source of truth; Hope makes us adhere to God as the source of good; Charity makes us adhere to God for his own sake.
We all hope to get to Heaven―but Hope cannot be mere wishful thinking! Hope has to spur us on to action―just like Faith has to spur us on to action: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself. But some man will say: ‘You have Faith, and I have works!’ Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! You believe that there is one God. You do well―but the devils also believe and tremble! Will you know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead? … Do you see that a man is justified by works, and not by Faith only? For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
Frequently, we search out “new” things to own, “new” things to do, “new” experiences in which to participate, “new” excitements to enjoy, “new” ways of doing things, “new” beginnings, “new” hopes, etc. In all of these “new” enterprises the word “new” is synonymous with the word “better”. Usually, when we seek something “new”, we seek something “better” than what we have.
Our Lord is most certainly seeking something “new”—something “new” from you! As He says in Holy Scripture: “And He that sat on the throne, said: ‘Behold, I make all things new!’” (Apocalypse 21:5). He wants to make a “new” you—He always has wanted to make a “new” you—but you have always resisted Him, going only so far and not far enough, or not even going anywhere! In the Old Testament, God says: “Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit!” (Ezechiel 18:31) … “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you! I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh and will give you a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 36:26) … “I will give them one heart and will put a new spirit in their bowels: and I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 11:19).
What Makes a Happy New Year?
The answers to that question are endless. Perhaps the most common answers would include: Not having any financial worries or problems. Not having any health problems. Not having relationship problems. In short―not having any kind of suffering. People equate happiness with the absence of suffering—which to a certain degree is true—for who is happy is Hell? Not even the devil—regardless of how many souls he pulls down there! In fact, the unhappiest of all creatures in Hell is Satan (Lucifer) himself—and nobody suffers more than Satan. Whereas Heaven—where there is an absence of any and all suffering—is a happy place! So we can agree that absence of suffering creates happiness.
Can We Have Happiness on Earth?
The question arises--”Can we be happy—and thus without any suffering—here on Earth?” Without having committed any kind of sin—the answer would be “Yes!”—and this was the case for Adam and Eve, until they sinned. They were perfectly happy, as far as they could be, here on Earth, without yet having the Beatific Vision of God. Sin, however, brings unhappiness with it, for sin has to be paid-for and the payment is painful. “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death” (James 1:15). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56) … “By one man [Adam] sin entered into this world, and, by sin, death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). “From the woman [Eve] came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33). “What fruit therefore had you then in those things, of which you are now ashamed? For the end of them is death!” (Romans 6:21). Death is not a happy thing!
Love Brings Happiness and Unhappiness
Some seek happiness in love. Low is certainly appealing and satisfying. Everyone would probably agree that love brings happiness. We all want to be loved and we all want to love. We all do love—one thing or another—but we also find that our love does not always bring happiness with it! St. Augustine uttered that famous phrase: “Love God and do what you want!” There is more to those words than at first meets the eye! St. Augustine does not mean: “Love God and sin as much as you want!” For Our Lord said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
“Tell me who you’re friends are and I will tell you what you are!” We have all heard that saying and many of its derivatives: “Tell me what you like/love and I will tell what you are!” … “Tell me what you think of the most / what you eat / what you do the most / what you read or watch the most / etc.” In a certain sense, we become what we love. So it depends upon whether that which we love is good or bad, healthy or unhealthy, holy or sinful. “He that loves danger, shall perish in it!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). “He that loves iniquity, hates his own soul” (Psalm 10:6).
To the Christian soul, the world is dangerous and full of iniquity, which is why Holy Scripture says: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16).
Those who love healthy food tend towards healthiness, while those who love unhealthy food tend towards unhealthiness. Those who think about and love sin tend towards sinfulness, while those who think about and love holy things tend towards holiness. The complicating factor is that—regardless of whether we tend to holiness or sinfulness, healthiness or unhealthiness—we always think that our choice is going to make us happy—otherwise we would not do it. It is just that some fail to see beyond the superficial and temporary ‘happiness’ to the great unhappiness that lies beneath the surface—and the devil makes good use of this blindness, for he usually tempts us to sin under the guise of good, telling us that the sin he dangles before us will bring us more happiness than unhappiness. He blinds us to the word of God as he blinded Eve to the word of God:
“Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why hath God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat: but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God hath commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No! You shall not die the death! For God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’ And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold: and she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband who did eat” (Genesis 3:1-6). The superficial appearance of happiness brought a terrible unhappiness in its wake. “From the woman [Eve] came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33).
Love Makes the World Go Round!
You have certainly heard the saying: “Love makes the world go round!”—yet you have probably not thought about it from a supernatural or theological perspective. Just stop and think! Who really makes the world go round? It is God! “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by him: and without him was made nothing that was made!” (John 1:103)—and that Word of God, Jesus Christ, said: “Without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), “Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches, are from God” (Ecclesiasticus 11:14). Many more Scriptural quotes could be summoned to testify to the fact that “God makes the world go round!” Now, who or what is God? “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8). God is love. Therefore, Love (God) makes the world go round.
Made for Love!
God has made us for love! In the ship of our soul, it is our heart (our will) that is the engine of love, and our mind (our intellect) is the rudder for love. A powerful engine will quickly drive the ship of the soul through the waters of life. But the “engine of love” is blind and needs the “rudder of the mind” to guide it in the right direction. What good is it to be sailing “full steam ahead” if we are sailing in the wrong direction? We must love the right things, not the wrong things—and it is our mind (our intellect) that must enlighten or steer our powerful love in the right direction.
We were made to love God! From our earliest days, the catechism taught us that we were made to love God: “God made me because He loves me … God made me to be happy with Him in Heaven … God is always happy … God made me to be happy with Him forever … I cannot be happy without God … I need God … Everybody in Heaven is happy … To be happy forever, we must get to Heaven … To be happy with God in Heaven, I must know Him, love Him, and serve Him in this world … I must make my life a gift to God … I must love God more than I love myself … I must love God more than I love anybody else … I must love God above all things” (extracts from the New St. Joseph First Communion Catechism).
As St. John the Evangelist—the “Beloved Disciple”—says: “Let us therefore love God, because God has first loved us!” (1 John 4:19). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
The Power and Energy of Divine Love
Sin is the greatest evil in the world and love is the greatest antidote to sin. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD). “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47).
It is said: “Love makes the world go round”—it is certain that the more we love God, then the more energy and power we have for the voyage to Heaven, which is always “against the tide” of the world. In this “loveless world”—or more precisely, this “loveless godless world” which does not love God—we need a powerful love, or powerful engine, to make headway against the powerful contrary tide of the world. We can easily become discouraged in seeing the vast majority of vessels (souls) happily sailing with the current or with the tide, down to the ‘Niagara Falls of Hell’—with even family and friends blindly and happily “sailing down the swanee.” It is only a powerful love of God―like powerful strokes the oar―that can stop us from being washed downstream with the worldly current.
Sadly and tragically, most souls are being washed downstream by the waters of the world and Hell. As Our Lord said: “Broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Our Lady of Fatima said: “Many souls go to Hell!” She also said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! The number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation.”
We might be tempted to say with the Apostles: “Who then can be saved?” (Matthew 19:25) ― especially when Our Lord says: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). No wonder, then, that St. Paul writes: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). God loves you! God wants your salvation! Christ came to save you! But “be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
The Chemistry of Faith, Hope and Charity
The theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity are the basis on which the Christian’s moral life is based. These virtues give the Christian life and form his special character. God instills these virtues in the soul of the faithful to permit them to behave as His children to become worthy of eternal life. The greatest of these virtues is the virtue of love or charity.
By Faith we know about God and Heaven. This knowledge gives a Hope of God’s friendship and a desire and Hope of reaching Heaven. Hope draws us towards God and Heaven. Before hope comes desire―and before desire must come knowledge. We cannot desire what we do not know; we cannot hope in what we do not know; and we cannot love what we do not know. Faith gives us that knowledge―so that we can desire, hope and love. You first know of the existence of something; you then desire that thing; and then you hope to obtain that thing; and your efforts increase your love of that thing. What is not desired is not hoped for! Faith tells us that the road to Heaven is not easy. Hope gives us strength so we will not become discouraged. Faith and Hope also spark within us a love of God―for we cannot love what do not know, and we will love more if there is a hope of attaining the object of our love.
We can liken Faith, Hope and Charity to the building of a fire—which is what Our Lord wants, as He said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). Before there can be a fire, we have to gather the things that the fire can burn—for example, no wood, then no fire.
Faith is the firewood of our fire. We must learn about God like we gather logs for the fire. Yet the danger is that the wood is not sufficiently seasoned, or it is too damp to burn. Likewise our knowledge can be too superficial (unseasoned) or it can be soaked with worldliness. “I say to you, the Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
The more wood (Faith) we have acquired, the greater will be our fire (Charity)—and it is Charity that burns away the debt of sin: “Wherefore I say to thee: ‘Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much!’” (Luke 7:47). Gathering the wood (growing in Faith) takes time and effort—if we want to just play in the world, we will find little time or desire to gather information about God to feed our Faith!
Wood—Spark—Flame
Yet even with much wood, there is no fire without a spark—Hope is that spark. Yet sparks are often the result of friction, and nothing could be truer in the spiritual life. Hope is tested through a ‘friction’ of sorts—Hope is really tested in adversity and tribulation. The greater the tribulation, then the greater must be the hope. What is really easy is rarely hoped for—it is more of certitude than an uncertainty that we hope for. It is the difference between saying: “I know I’ll succeed!” and “I hope to succeed!” and “I’ve no chance of succeeding!” Presumption—Hope—Despair.
Hope keeps a soul from discouragement, and also keeps presumption at bay; it sustains the soul during times of abandonment; it opens up the soul in expectation of eternal beatitude. Buoyed up by Hope, the soul is preserved from selfishness and, with the appropriate efforts, is led to the happiness that flows from Charity.
New Year—New Hopes
For many—especially for those who suffer anything—a ‘New Year’ brings hopes of being a better year. We are, by nature, hopeful creatures! That’s why so many people buy lottery tickets! Or enter the ‘lottery’ of marriage with high hopes! Just kidding! Yet there is some truth to this—very few, if any, get married with the expectation that their marriage will be a miserable marriage; they all hope for the best.
Hope, in this sense, springs eternal. People used to try and climb unconquered mountains, in the hope of the being the first one to reach the summit. Athletes and sports teams enter races and competitions hoping to win the first prize. A person starts a business in the hope that it will be successful and not a failure. A patient takes a medicine in the hope that it will defeat a disease and bring health. These, and many such like examples, manifest the presence of a natural hope, which can be described as the desire to attain something that at present is outside their reach.
Wrong Hopes
But what if the marriage is successful—what comes after that? Eventually, death! What if the business is successful—what comes after that? Eventually, death! What if the athlete or team wins the prize? What if he reaches the summit? What if the disease is cured? What if this? What if that? Ultimately, eventually, inescapably there comes death! And what comes after death? Aha! Now we are getting ‘warm’—then come either the fires of Hell, the fires of Purgatory or the fire of love in Heaven (God likes to represent Himself as fire!).
Heavenly Hopes
If there is Hope of a successful marriage, business, cure, etc., then there should also be a hope for Heaven. Yet Heaven is beyond our capacities and capabilities. We can barely jump a foot or two above the ground unaided—so how on Earth are we going to get to Heaven. The soul is planted in the Earth (God’s creation), yet it should be totally focused on moving towards Heaven (God himself). It is a delicate balance of attitudes towards creation and the Creator.
Some poor souls never get beyond the scope of creation and lose themselves irredeemably in its pleasures. Others use creation for the purpose it was made to be—stepping stones or rungs on a ladder that leads to God―the temporary that leads to the eternal. Since Heaven is beyond the reach of our natural powers, we need some super-natural powers to get there. This is where the supernatural virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity come in to help us. Faith makes us adhere to God as the source of truth; Hope makes us adhere to God as the source of good; Charity makes us adhere to God for his own sake.
We all hope to get to Heaven―but Hope cannot be mere wishful thinking! Hope has to spur us on to action―just like Faith has to spur us on to action: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself. But some man will say: ‘You have Faith, and I have works!’ Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! You believe that there is one God. You do well―but the devils also believe and tremble! Will you know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead? … Do you see that a man is justified by works, and not by Faith only? For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
Article 7
Tuesday, December 31st
Will 2025 See Something New, or Just More of the Same Old, Same Old?
Tuesday, December 31st
Will 2025 See Something New, or Just More of the Same Old, Same Old?
New Year Comes Late!
The Church has already beaten the State to the New Year—the New Liturgical Year started with the First Sunday of Advent! However, since many are partying tonight and waiting for the secular “New Year”, let us look at some aspects of the “new” from a spiritual perspective. To do so, let us primarily turn to the Word of God—Holy Scripture—for a look at the “new.”
Our Lord Comes to Make Things New
There are times when the “old” is better, and there are times when the “new” is necessary. Our Lord Himself came to perfect the old with the new—the Old Testament gave way to the New Testament. Our “old” selves, likewise, need to make for our “new” selves—renewed by the grace of God. Heaven is often called the “New Jerusalem”—a heavenly Jerusalem that replaces or perfects the earthly Jerusalem. We see this focus on the “new” in the words of Our Lord and the New Testament authors. “But we look for new heavens and a new Earth” (2 Peter 3:13).
Don’t Mix the Old with the New
We cannot make a blend of the world and God; nor can we marry spirituality to materialism: “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24) … “And what concord has Christ with Belial?” (2 Corinthians 6:15). “And you, when you were dead in your offences, and sins, wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit that now works on the children of unbelief―in which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, Who is rich in mercy, even when we were dead in sins, has quickened us together in Christ, by Whose grace you are saved, and has raised us up together, and has made us sit together in the heavenly places, through Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:1-5).
Purge Out the Old
“And He that sat on the throne, said: ‘Behold, I make all things new!’ And He said to me: ‘Write! For these words are most faithful and true!’” (Apocalypse 21:5). “A new commandment I give unto you” (John 13:34) ... “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste” (1 Corinthians 5:7). “Put off, according to former conversation, the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error and be renewed in the spirit of your mind: and put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness of truth” (Ephesians 4:22-24). “And putting on the new, him who is renewed unto knowledge, according to the image of Him that created him” (Colossians 3:10). “If then anyone be in Christ a new creature, the old things are passed away, behold all things are made new” (2 Corinthians 5:17). “In saying ‘a new’, He has made the former old” (Hebrews 8:13). God wants us to be new creatures, new persons, better creatures, better persons. That is why He came on Earth—the Advent and Christmas liturgy speaks of Our Lord coming to restore, to renew, to recreate what was lost through sin. This is the spirit that we should positively and effectively undertake in the coming New Year—putting on a new man, a new self, created in justice and holiness; becoming a new leaven, renewed in mind and heart, so that we are a new creature in Christ, having put the old ways behind us and having made all things new!
Vintage Year for God
While others toast the New Year with glasses of wine, we should be preparing to give God a special vintage this coming year—not mixing our old cheap wine with the vintage wine that God expects from us: “Neither do they put new wine into old bottles. Otherwise the bottles break, and the wine runs out, and the bottles perish. But new wine they put into new bottles―and both are preserved” (Matthew 9:17). “No man sews a piece of raw cloth onto an old garment” (Mark 2:21). “No man puts a piece from a new garment upon an old garment; otherwise the piece taken from the new agrees not with the old” (Luke 5:36).
God Seeks Improvement
All these Scriptural quotes stress or imply the need for improvement—not just “new” for sake of it being “new”, but “new’ in the sense of something better than was there before. In this sense, we go through school learning new things every year and, thereby, our intelligence becomes better. We learn new skills and thereby become better. Our spiritual life should follow the same pattern—each year we should become better due to new things and changes that we have made; much like a tree that each year grows more, becomes stronger and bears more fruit: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof” (Matthew 13:31-32).
The tree or vine should be always improving, as Our Lord points out at the Last Supper: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit … I am the vine and you are the branches: he that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit. If anyone does not abide in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:1-6).
Fruitless and Loveless
The Apocalypse has even stronger words to say: “I know your works, that you are neither cold, nor hot. I would prefer that you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm―and neither cold, not hot―I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and do you not know that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel you to buy of Me gold fire tried, so that you may be made rich; and may be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of your nakedness may not appear; and anoint your eyes with eye-salve, so that you may see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
This New Year—Buy the Gold of Charity
Yes, we are spiritually poor, blind and naked―as the Book of Apocalypse just said. Just as the three kings brought three gifts, so do the three persons of the Holy Trinity counsel us to turn to Them for the solution―which is to buy from Them gold, white garments, and eye-salve. These three are an echo of the three gifts offered to Jesus by the Magi. The Gold in both cases—the Apocalypse account and that of the Magi—is the gold of charity, which, as we said with the Scriptural quote above, will have grown cold in many souls: “Because iniquity has abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). Will this be a cold year in my heart, or will I kindle a fire in my heart towards God: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). Will the fire in my heart grow or burn-out?
This New Year—Cloth Yourself with Suffering
The white garments, spoken of in Apocalypse, correspond to the Myrrh. The Myrrh is a symbol of suffering, being used both as a painkiller and for embalming the dead. The white garments reflect that suffering, as shown by this quote: “These are they who are come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and have made them white in the Blood of the Lamb.” (Apocalypse 7:14). This coming New Year, no doubt, will bring increased suffering in an increasingly sinful world—“Be not deceived, God is not mocked” (Galatians 6:7). The world cannot sin with impunity: “For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). “Sin has reigned to death” (Romans 5:21). “When concupiscence has conceived, it brings forth sin. But sin, when it is completed, begets death” (James 1:15).
This New Year—Use the Eye-Salve of Fervent Prayer
The Eye-Salve, spoken of in Apocalypse, corresponds to the frankincense of prayer, which rises like smoke to Heaven. The blind man is begging and praying to Jesus for his blindness to be removed. “Jesus asked him saying: ‘What do you want Me to do for you?’ But he said: ‘Lord, that I may see!’” (Luke 18:41). His prayer is the eye-salve that removes his blindness. This blindness corresponds to lukewarmness—as Fr. Faber writes: “The diseases and evils of the body are in a great degree typical of the miseries and misfortunes of the soul. If we seek the correlative of lukewarmness, we shall find it in blindness. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness). Our Lady of Good Success says: “Others are blinded by self-love, not realizing that they are falling into lukewarmness, that immense evil.” The lukewarm need the ‘eye-salve’ of prayer to save them from the fate of lukewarmness—which is being vomited out from the mouth of God. Let us resolve to use this ‘eye-salve’ regularly and properly this coming New Year! As Our Lord said: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1).
Today there is not enough gold, frankincense and myrrh in our lives. We love too little; we pray too little; we suffer too little. That is why we risk having little chance for salvation unless we follow the counsels of the Apocalypse in our apocalyptic times! Love, pray and suffer! This should be our New Year resolution! Have a charitable New Year! Have a prayerful New Year! Have a painful New Year! Ouch!
But that is what Our Lady herself told us: “The children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God!” (Our Lady of La Salette). “Pray, pray very much!” (Our Lady of Fatima). “Are you willing to bear all the sufferings God wills to send you? Then you are going to have much to suffer … Are you suffering a great deal? Don’t lose heart. I will never forsake you!” (Our Lady of Fatima). “I do not promise to make you Happy [New Year] in this life, but in the next!” (Our Lady of Lourdes). Ouch! Our Lady is wishing us a ‘Happy’ New Year! Will happily take what Providence will send our way?
Happiness and Holiness
Tonight and tomorrow we will be wishing everyone a “Happy New Year!” This phrase has become a mindless cliché that is uttered without much thought or sincerity. What is it that truly makes us happy? It can only be holiness, for it is only saints that go to Heaven and Heaven is the ultimate happiness—as pointed out by Our Lord: “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). As Our Lady pointed out to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!” It is pointless striving for earthly happiness, if we have lose out on heavenly happiness. It is only holiness that leads to happiness.
Are You Happy and Holy?
You must be careful not to make the mistake of asking yourself first whether you are saintly and second whether you are happy. Both are stupid questions, getting you nowhere. It is only sham saints who are forever wondering how holy they are; the real ones forget about themselves in their desire to please God. In the same way, it is only people who are not awfully happy who question their happiness.
The Holiest People Are the Happiest People
Have you ever noticed how the holiest people you have come across always seem to be the happiest? You would think that enclosed nuns in their Carmelite convents, with no possessions and no pleasures such as movies and parties, might be lonely and sad. But not at all: they are just the ones who seem to be laughing whenever you visit them. Then on the other side of it, you would think that men and women who have lots of money and lovely houses would be proclaiming their happiness all day long. But it does not work out like this. The lonely ones are men with two or three wives (“which ought to be company enough,” you would have said) and the women who are so busy running after pleasure that they are never alone.
St. Francis de Sales has a punchy phrase that says: “Une sainte qui est triste, est une triste sainte!” which means, “A saint who is sad is sad saint!” that is to say a “poor example of a saint”. Yet it is a real test to find happiness in the many crosses that we encounter each day—but it is those crosses and sufferings that make us holy.
Worldliness is Not Really Happiness
It is a known fact that the people who kill themselves are mostly the rich and the worldly, not the poor and the religious. Does not this prove something? Well, it points to a lot of things, but chiefly it seems to show that filling your life with enjoyment only empties your life of happiness, and that collecting more and more money or possessions or power simply does not work.
After what Our Lord has said, this is only to be expected. “A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions” (Luke 12:15). “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33). “Your treasure is in Heaven where the rust does not consume and thieves do not break through and steal” (Matthew 6:20). “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Mark 8:36). “The peace, which I give, is not the peace which the world gives, for My peace no man can take from you” (John 14:27; John 16:22). Remember the parable of Dives, the rich man, and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31), or the parable of the rich man, who tried to store up his goods in bigger and bigger barns (Luke 12:16-21), and the parable of the woman who gave away even the last of her savings (Mark 12:41-44). Remember the incident of the rich young man, who was called to be a disciple, but who turned away, because he could not bring himself to part from his wealth (Mark 10:17-22).
Peace in Sorrow
Remember that Our Lord promised that those who carried their burdens willingly, with Him and as though they were His, would find the weight light; the hard yoke of service would turn into something sweet. “Come to Me, all you who are heavily laden,” He invited. He would ease matters for these hard-pressed souls, and they would find rest for their souls and peace (Matthew 11:28-30).
The strange thing is that worldly people, quite sinful people, read these words of Our Lord and do not deny them. They know in their hearts that what He said was perfectly true. They admit the uselessness of luxury when it comes to the question of happiness, and they know that hardship cannot on its own make people miserable. But they cannot bring themselves to put the Gospel teaching into practice. They are afraid to let go of their pleasures, and they are afraid of the Cross. Sanctity would be their one solution, but they do not want to think about what might be expected of them if they went all out for it.
The Church has already beaten the State to the New Year—the New Liturgical Year started with the First Sunday of Advent! However, since many are partying tonight and waiting for the secular “New Year”, let us look at some aspects of the “new” from a spiritual perspective. To do so, let us primarily turn to the Word of God—Holy Scripture—for a look at the “new.”
Our Lord Comes to Make Things New
There are times when the “old” is better, and there are times when the “new” is necessary. Our Lord Himself came to perfect the old with the new—the Old Testament gave way to the New Testament. Our “old” selves, likewise, need to make for our “new” selves—renewed by the grace of God. Heaven is often called the “New Jerusalem”—a heavenly Jerusalem that replaces or perfects the earthly Jerusalem. We see this focus on the “new” in the words of Our Lord and the New Testament authors. “But we look for new heavens and a new Earth” (2 Peter 3:13).
Don’t Mix the Old with the New
We cannot make a blend of the world and God; nor can we marry spirituality to materialism: “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24) … “And what concord has Christ with Belial?” (2 Corinthians 6:15). “And you, when you were dead in your offences, and sins, wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit that now works on the children of unbelief―in which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, Who is rich in mercy, even when we were dead in sins, has quickened us together in Christ, by Whose grace you are saved, and has raised us up together, and has made us sit together in the heavenly places, through Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:1-5).
Purge Out the Old
“And He that sat on the throne, said: ‘Behold, I make all things new!’ And He said to me: ‘Write! For these words are most faithful and true!’” (Apocalypse 21:5). “A new commandment I give unto you” (John 13:34) ... “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste” (1 Corinthians 5:7). “Put off, according to former conversation, the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error and be renewed in the spirit of your mind: and put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness of truth” (Ephesians 4:22-24). “And putting on the new, him who is renewed unto knowledge, according to the image of Him that created him” (Colossians 3:10). “If then anyone be in Christ a new creature, the old things are passed away, behold all things are made new” (2 Corinthians 5:17). “In saying ‘a new’, He has made the former old” (Hebrews 8:13). God wants us to be new creatures, new persons, better creatures, better persons. That is why He came on Earth—the Advent and Christmas liturgy speaks of Our Lord coming to restore, to renew, to recreate what was lost through sin. This is the spirit that we should positively and effectively undertake in the coming New Year—putting on a new man, a new self, created in justice and holiness; becoming a new leaven, renewed in mind and heart, so that we are a new creature in Christ, having put the old ways behind us and having made all things new!
Vintage Year for God
While others toast the New Year with glasses of wine, we should be preparing to give God a special vintage this coming year—not mixing our old cheap wine with the vintage wine that God expects from us: “Neither do they put new wine into old bottles. Otherwise the bottles break, and the wine runs out, and the bottles perish. But new wine they put into new bottles―and both are preserved” (Matthew 9:17). “No man sews a piece of raw cloth onto an old garment” (Mark 2:21). “No man puts a piece from a new garment upon an old garment; otherwise the piece taken from the new agrees not with the old” (Luke 5:36).
God Seeks Improvement
All these Scriptural quotes stress or imply the need for improvement—not just “new” for sake of it being “new”, but “new’ in the sense of something better than was there before. In this sense, we go through school learning new things every year and, thereby, our intelligence becomes better. We learn new skills and thereby become better. Our spiritual life should follow the same pattern—each year we should become better due to new things and changes that we have made; much like a tree that each year grows more, becomes stronger and bears more fruit: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof” (Matthew 13:31-32).
The tree or vine should be always improving, as Our Lord points out at the Last Supper: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit … I am the vine and you are the branches: he that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit. If anyone does not abide in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:1-6).
Fruitless and Loveless
The Apocalypse has even stronger words to say: “I know your works, that you are neither cold, nor hot. I would prefer that you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm―and neither cold, not hot―I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and do you not know that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel you to buy of Me gold fire tried, so that you may be made rich; and may be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of your nakedness may not appear; and anoint your eyes with eye-salve, so that you may see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
This New Year—Buy the Gold of Charity
Yes, we are spiritually poor, blind and naked―as the Book of Apocalypse just said. Just as the three kings brought three gifts, so do the three persons of the Holy Trinity counsel us to turn to Them for the solution―which is to buy from Them gold, white garments, and eye-salve. These three are an echo of the three gifts offered to Jesus by the Magi. The Gold in both cases—the Apocalypse account and that of the Magi—is the gold of charity, which, as we said with the Scriptural quote above, will have grown cold in many souls: “Because iniquity has abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). Will this be a cold year in my heart, or will I kindle a fire in my heart towards God: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). Will the fire in my heart grow or burn-out?
This New Year—Cloth Yourself with Suffering
The white garments, spoken of in Apocalypse, correspond to the Myrrh. The Myrrh is a symbol of suffering, being used both as a painkiller and for embalming the dead. The white garments reflect that suffering, as shown by this quote: “These are they who are come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and have made them white in the Blood of the Lamb.” (Apocalypse 7:14). This coming New Year, no doubt, will bring increased suffering in an increasingly sinful world—“Be not deceived, God is not mocked” (Galatians 6:7). The world cannot sin with impunity: “For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). “Sin has reigned to death” (Romans 5:21). “When concupiscence has conceived, it brings forth sin. But sin, when it is completed, begets death” (James 1:15).
This New Year—Use the Eye-Salve of Fervent Prayer
The Eye-Salve, spoken of in Apocalypse, corresponds to the frankincense of prayer, which rises like smoke to Heaven. The blind man is begging and praying to Jesus for his blindness to be removed. “Jesus asked him saying: ‘What do you want Me to do for you?’ But he said: ‘Lord, that I may see!’” (Luke 18:41). His prayer is the eye-salve that removes his blindness. This blindness corresponds to lukewarmness—as Fr. Faber writes: “The diseases and evils of the body are in a great degree typical of the miseries and misfortunes of the soul. If we seek the correlative of lukewarmness, we shall find it in blindness. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness). Our Lady of Good Success says: “Others are blinded by self-love, not realizing that they are falling into lukewarmness, that immense evil.” The lukewarm need the ‘eye-salve’ of prayer to save them from the fate of lukewarmness—which is being vomited out from the mouth of God. Let us resolve to use this ‘eye-salve’ regularly and properly this coming New Year! As Our Lord said: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1).
Today there is not enough gold, frankincense and myrrh in our lives. We love too little; we pray too little; we suffer too little. That is why we risk having little chance for salvation unless we follow the counsels of the Apocalypse in our apocalyptic times! Love, pray and suffer! This should be our New Year resolution! Have a charitable New Year! Have a prayerful New Year! Have a painful New Year! Ouch!
But that is what Our Lady herself told us: “The children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God!” (Our Lady of La Salette). “Pray, pray very much!” (Our Lady of Fatima). “Are you willing to bear all the sufferings God wills to send you? Then you are going to have much to suffer … Are you suffering a great deal? Don’t lose heart. I will never forsake you!” (Our Lady of Fatima). “I do not promise to make you Happy [New Year] in this life, but in the next!” (Our Lady of Lourdes). Ouch! Our Lady is wishing us a ‘Happy’ New Year! Will happily take what Providence will send our way?
Happiness and Holiness
Tonight and tomorrow we will be wishing everyone a “Happy New Year!” This phrase has become a mindless cliché that is uttered without much thought or sincerity. What is it that truly makes us happy? It can only be holiness, for it is only saints that go to Heaven and Heaven is the ultimate happiness—as pointed out by Our Lord: “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). As Our Lady pointed out to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!” It is pointless striving for earthly happiness, if we have lose out on heavenly happiness. It is only holiness that leads to happiness.
Are You Happy and Holy?
You must be careful not to make the mistake of asking yourself first whether you are saintly and second whether you are happy. Both are stupid questions, getting you nowhere. It is only sham saints who are forever wondering how holy they are; the real ones forget about themselves in their desire to please God. In the same way, it is only people who are not awfully happy who question their happiness.
The Holiest People Are the Happiest People
Have you ever noticed how the holiest people you have come across always seem to be the happiest? You would think that enclosed nuns in their Carmelite convents, with no possessions and no pleasures such as movies and parties, might be lonely and sad. But not at all: they are just the ones who seem to be laughing whenever you visit them. Then on the other side of it, you would think that men and women who have lots of money and lovely houses would be proclaiming their happiness all day long. But it does not work out like this. The lonely ones are men with two or three wives (“which ought to be company enough,” you would have said) and the women who are so busy running after pleasure that they are never alone.
St. Francis de Sales has a punchy phrase that says: “Une sainte qui est triste, est une triste sainte!” which means, “A saint who is sad is sad saint!” that is to say a “poor example of a saint”. Yet it is a real test to find happiness in the many crosses that we encounter each day—but it is those crosses and sufferings that make us holy.
Worldliness is Not Really Happiness
It is a known fact that the people who kill themselves are mostly the rich and the worldly, not the poor and the religious. Does not this prove something? Well, it points to a lot of things, but chiefly it seems to show that filling your life with enjoyment only empties your life of happiness, and that collecting more and more money or possessions or power simply does not work.
After what Our Lord has said, this is only to be expected. “A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions” (Luke 12:15). “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33). “Your treasure is in Heaven where the rust does not consume and thieves do not break through and steal” (Matthew 6:20). “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Mark 8:36). “The peace, which I give, is not the peace which the world gives, for My peace no man can take from you” (John 14:27; John 16:22). Remember the parable of Dives, the rich man, and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31), or the parable of the rich man, who tried to store up his goods in bigger and bigger barns (Luke 12:16-21), and the parable of the woman who gave away even the last of her savings (Mark 12:41-44). Remember the incident of the rich young man, who was called to be a disciple, but who turned away, because he could not bring himself to part from his wealth (Mark 10:17-22).
Peace in Sorrow
Remember that Our Lord promised that those who carried their burdens willingly, with Him and as though they were His, would find the weight light; the hard yoke of service would turn into something sweet. “Come to Me, all you who are heavily laden,” He invited. He would ease matters for these hard-pressed souls, and they would find rest for their souls and peace (Matthew 11:28-30).
The strange thing is that worldly people, quite sinful people, read these words of Our Lord and do not deny them. They know in their hearts that what He said was perfectly true. They admit the uselessness of luxury when it comes to the question of happiness, and they know that hardship cannot on its own make people miserable. But they cannot bring themselves to put the Gospel teaching into practice. They are afraid to let go of their pleasures, and they are afraid of the Cross. Sanctity would be their one solution, but they do not want to think about what might be expected of them if they went all out for it.
Article 6
Monday, December 30th
A Christmas Diet of Dung and Wine!
Monday, December 30th
A Christmas Diet of Dung and Wine!
Yuck!
A diet of dung and wine? Yuck! Disgusting! Well, maybe the wine is fine―but not the dung! This is true if you look at the dung and wine literally. However, things change when you look at the dung and wine metaphorically or symbolically. The Bible uses the word “dung” in multiple ways―using the word to refer to fuel, manure, and various figurative expressions. It is used as a fertilizer to help crops grow, burned as a fuel for heat, and is even used as a building material.
● Fuel ― Dung was used as a substitute for firewood to heat ovens and bake cakes. It was often mixed with straw and dried before use. For example, the Book of Ezechiel describes how dung was used as fuel: “I have given thee neat’s dung for man’s dung, and thou shalt make thy bread therewith” (Ezechiel 4:12-15).
● Manure ― Dung was used to fertilize soil. For example, Our Lord describes how people would dig around a fig tree and apply dung to it: “And the master of the vineyard said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why does it encumber the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, leave it alone also for this year, until I dig around it and dung it! And perhaps happily it bears fruit! But if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:7-9).
● Figurative Expressions ― The phrase “cast out as dung” is a figurative expression that means to be rejected as unprofitable. For example: “Dung is cast out!” (Deuteronomy 28:27). “I will sweep away the remnant of the house of Jeroboam, as dung is swept away, till all be clean!” (3 Kings 14:10). “The flesh of Jezabel shall be as dung upon the face of the Earth!” (4 Kings 9:37). “They shall not be gathered, and they shall not be buried―they shall be as dung upon the face of the Earth!” (Jeremias 8:2). “They shall not be lamented, and they shall not be gathered up, nor buried―they shall lie as dung upon the face of the Earth!” (Jeremias 25:33).
● Worthlessness ― Dung was often used figuratively to express worthlessness, especially for something perishable that no one cares about. “The sluggard is pelted with the dung of oxen” (Ecclesiasticus 22:2). “O ye priests, if you will not hear, and if you will not lay it to heart, to give glory to My Name, saith the Lord of hosts, then I will … cast the shoulder to you, and I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities!” (Malachias 2:1-3). “I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ!” (Philippians 3:8).
● Defilement ― Dung was used to symbolize defilement, degradation, and uncleanness. “Every woman that is a harlot, shall be trodden upon as dung in the way!” (Ecclesiasticus 9:10). “Thou shalt not bring any idol into thy house! … Thou shalt detest it as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth!” (Deuteronomy 7:26). “They have sinned against the Lord and their blood shall be poured out as earth, and their bodies as dung!” (Sophonias 1:17). “The glory of a sinful man is dung!” (1 Machabees 2:62).
● The Dung Gate ― The Dung Gate was one of the eleven gates of Jerusalem during the time Nehemiah. It was located in the southwest corner of the wall and was used to dispose of garbage, dung and rubbish. “I went out by night to the Dung Gate, and I viewed the wall of Jerusalem which was broken down” (2 Esdras 2:13).
● Penance ― “Queen Esther laid aside her royal apparel, and she put on garments suitable for weeping and mourning. Instead of various precious ointments, she covered her head with ashes and dung, and she humbled her body with fasts” (Esther 14:2).
● Humiliation and Trial ― “Tobias was sleeping, and hot dung out of a swallow’s nest fell upon his eyes, and he was made blind” (Tobias 2:11).
Dung and Humility
Dung is very symbolic of humility. To have dung thrown at you is a humiliation. To have the dung of your sins exposed is humbling. To be treated as dung is a humiliation. Our Lord was treated like dung by His enemies―and Our Lord tells us: “Take up My yoke upon you, and learn of Me―because I am meek and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:2). Christ warned: “Whosoever shall exalt himself shall be humbled―and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted!” (Matthew 23:12). The Bible describes humility as being meekness, lowliness, absence of self, and self-abasement. The foremost example of humility in Holy Scripture is Christ Himself. Our Lord―being God and King of Heaven and Earth―chose to be born in a dung infested place reserved for animals, for there was no room for Him in the homes and hearts of Bethlehem. “Being in the form of God, He thought it no robbery to be equal with God, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of man; and in habit found as a man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.” (Philippians 2:6-8).
Archbishop Ullathorne writes: “Through His Incarnation, the Son of God both consecrated and deified humility, making it more glorious to be humble with God, than to be exalted with pride among the children of men … Our Lord, therefore, united His humility with poverty, and His poverty with self‑abnegation. And this was not merely for our example, but because the life of humility, poverty, and self‑abnegation is the most perfect of human lives, as depending on God alone … Having once learned from Christ that the great lesson He has come to teach us is His own meekness and humility, we then discover that His Incarnation, His birth, all the actions of His life, His sufferings and death, all speak to us, and breathe into us, this divine lesson of humility. Everywhere―even when His voice is silent―His life and conduct say to us: ‘Learn of Me, because I am meek and humble of heart!’
“The Passion of Our Lord presents all the great virtues in their perfection for our imitation, whether self, denial, poverty of spirit, obedience, silence, humility, purity, patience, prayer, resignation, contempt of the world, or charity. But among all these virtues, He pre-eminently appears as the master of humility. His Passion is the book of humility; His Cross is the throne of humility; the terrible way from the Mount of Olives to Mount Calvary is the substantive exposition of the words ‘Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart!’ The Cross is the instrument of contrition upon which the earthly man is broken to be reformed into the heavenly man. The Cross is the divine school of patience, the school of self-abnegation, the school of penance, and the school of charity. The foot of the Cross, where Mary stood with John, and where the prostrate Magdalene wept her loving grief, is the great school of humility, where the soul is purified and brought to God. There forever sounds the great command of the divine Master: ‘Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart!’” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility).
Metaphorical Dung is Humility―the Real Dung is Pride
If you like, you could say that humility is good dung, whereas pride is bad dung. Humility smells sweet―but pride stinks to high Heaven! Pride is the beginning and root of all sin: “For pride is the beginning of all sin―and he that holds it shall be filled with maledictions, and it shall ruin him in the end!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Original Sin is essentially a sin of pride and disobedience―Our Lord came to undo its damage by His humility and obedience. There is no place in Heaven for the proud―as Our Lady says in her Magnificat. She says that God “has regarded the humility of His handmaid … He, that is mighty, has done great things to me! … He has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart. He has put down the mighty from their seat, and has exalted the humble!” (Luke 1:46-55).
“The proud man does not behave like one whom God has recently created from nothing, and whom He may summon to His presence at any hour. He acts as though he were not dependent on God, and as if what he is, and has, were not altogether owing to the divine will and bounty. This vice is so thoroughly opposed to the nature and condition of man, as well as to the rights and claims of God, and is so destructive of all spiritual good, that God has proclaimed to us this warning in His Scripture: ‘Pride was not made for man!’ (Ecclesiasticus 10:22). As pride is the root of all evil, the vice of vices, and the destruction of the virtues, it is the chief enemy of God and of man. It contradicts the whole reason of humility. It is not only irrational, as all sins are, but it is also an uncreaturely sin, which other sins are not” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility).
In our pride we forget that we need God for everything! Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” except sin (John 15:5). Every good thing we do―whether it be in thought, word, or action―is a consequence of the grace of God with which we have cooperated. “What have you that you hast not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7).
Total Dependence on the Grace of God
St. Thomas Aquinas truly humbles our minds with his comments on the grace of God: “Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For grace is given to many persons to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Everything is grace!” ― and you could add to that: “Grace is everything!” Let us explain that.
There is nobody in Heaven without Sanctifying Grace in their soul―and there is nobody in Hell with Sanctifying Grace in their soul. Grace is everything―it is all that really matters. If you are the richest person in world, but do not have Sanctifying Grace in your soul, then you cannot enter Heaven, you cannot buy your way into Heaven, nor can you bribe your way into Heaven. You might be the most famous person in the world―but without Sanctifying Grace your fame will get you nowhere when it comes to Heaven. You might be the most powerful person in the world―but without Sanctifying Grace in your soul, you will be powerless in getting to Heaven.
You might be the poorest person on Earth―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you are richer than the richest person on Earth. You may be hated by everyone and have no friends―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you are loved by God and all the angels and saints in Heaven. You may have been the biggest sinner the world has ever seen―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you will avoid Hell and eventually get to Heaven. Yes―grace is everything. Grace is everything we need to get to Heaven.
What is Grace?
The catechism, My Catholic Faith, tells us: “Grace is a supernatural gift of God bestowed on us through the merits of Jesus Christ for our salvation. Grace is a favor, a free gift, granted to us though we have no claim to it. God grants us graces because He is good, not because we deserve them. God grants us graces for the sake of His Son, Who died on the cross to earn for us these graces―we men can never merit these graces. Graces are supernatural and the supernatural is that which is beyond natural powers. Without the help of the graces that He dispenses, with merely natural powers, we cannot do the least work to merit salvation. Without God, we are nothing. We say with the Apostle: “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything, as from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God” (2 Corinthians 3:5).” Our Lord puts it succinctly when He says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 1:5).
What Does Grace Do?
What does grace do? Grace does everything―everything that is not sinful. That is why St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Everything is grace!” Our Lord Himself said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). We can expand upon that and have Our Lord say: “Without My grace―you can do nothing!” What is it about the word “NOTHING” that we fail to understand? “Nothing” means zero, nichts, nič, ništa, nada, niente, natin, nekas, rien ― or whatever other language you choose to use! We truly underestimate and misunderstand the extent to which grace works in our lives. There can no salvation without grace: “The grace of God [brings] life everlasting” (Romans 6:23) … “By grace you are saved, and not of yourselves, for it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8) … “By Christ’s grace you are saved!” (Ephesians 2:5). “Being justified by His grace, we may be heirs to life everlasting” (Titus 3:7). “Let us go therefore with confidence to the throne of grace―so that we may obtain mercy!” (Hebrews 4:16).
The Snare of Pride
God does not wish to exclude anyone from His grace: “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:17). “Every man has received grace” (1 Peter 4:10). “To every one of us is given grace, according to the measure of the giving of Christ” (Ephesians 4:7). Even the pagans are offered God’s graces: “The grace of the Holy Ghost was poured out upon the Gentiles also! … God gave them the same grace, as to us also who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ!” (Acts 10:45). “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men―instructing us, that by denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world” (Titus 2:11-12). Unfortunately, with our God-given free will, we can stubbornly and tragically refuse to accept and cooperate with God’s graces, or if we automatically presume that God will automatically give us His graces.
Catholics can pridefully fall into the trap of thinking that God is like a “vending machine” of grace. We go to church, we put our money in the basket, we say our prayers, we do something nice for someone and then we expect God to give us our grace. And, when He doesn’t―or we don’t immediately sense or feel that the grace is given―we kick the “vending machine,” grumble and walk away feeling ripped-off. However, God is not a vending machine and “owes” us nothing. In our pride, we can easily fall into the same trap of the Pharisee in Our Lord’s parable of the Pharisee and the Publican:
“And Jesus spoke this parable to certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up into the Temple to pray―the one, a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself: “O God! I thank you, that I am not like the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this Publican! I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes to Heaven, but stuck upon his breast, saying: “O God! Be merciful to me a sinner!” I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other―for every one that exalts himself shall be humbled; and he that humbles himself shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14). As Holy Scripture says: “God resists the proud, but to the humble He gives grace!” (1 Peter 5:5) … “The greater you are, the more you should humble yourself in all things, and you shall find grace before God” (Ecclesiasticus 3:20) ... “For who distinguishes you? Or what have you that you have not received? And if you have received, why do you glory as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7).
From Dung to Wine―From Humility to Charity
Wine is a symbol of love. In the Canticle of Canticles we read: “He brought me into the cellar of wine, He set in order charity in me” (Canticles 2:4). His love for us is like a wine, but it also shows us that our love for Him is the same. It’s a wine that He delights in. Just as we long for the wine of His love, so does He long for the wine of our love. We have to choose to love Him and when we choose to love Him, especially in the face of pain and adverse circumstances, it enriches and intoxicates Him and is extremely precious. Just as wine takes years to mature, so does our love for Him take time to mature. It becomes more and more powerful and intoxicating as the years go by, if kept untainted.
Thus it is fitting that Christ chose wine to be the substance that would be transubstantiated into His Precious Blood―for Christ shed His blood for us and our sins, out of a love for us. “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death―even to the death of the cross” (Philippians 2:8) … “The Son of God, who loved me, delivered Himself for me!” (Galatians 2:20) … “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). It was Christ’s humility and Christ’s charity that redeemed us!
Archbishop Ullathorne (1806-1889) writes: “Charity can never come from oneself, it can only come from God … Humility and charity are the dominant virtues … Monastic and religious institutions are founded on the virtues of humility and charity … Perfect humility is the fruit of perfect charity ... Humility disposes the soul and prepares the way for charity, and greater humility prepares and disposes the soul for greater charity. True humility never was, never is, and never can be without charity. Humility is the sacrificial element in all sincere love. For as love is the transfer of our affection from ourselves to another, it includes a surrender of self‑love―and this surrender is humility. To humble souls ― for they alone are capable ― the grace of charity will never be lacking … When we give up our love of ourselves to God, this giving up of our love of self to God is humility, and the love that we give to God is charity ... The more we love God, the less we value ourselves … Inordinate self‑love is the cause of pride. What God accepts from man is humility, and that what He rejects is pride. His blessings are for the humble; His maledictions are for the proud. In every virtue, it is humility that He rewards; in every vice, it is pride that He punishes.” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility).
“There is no other reason for the existence of this world than the charity of God and the communication of His charity. The world was made for man, man for the soul, and the soul for charity; and charity unites the soul with God. From charity God created the world, and by charity He perfects the end for which the world was made, for that end is the happiness of souls possessed of charity. There is a kind of life in the soul without charity, but it is not the life for which the soul was made; not true life, but initiatory and merely infantile life, which is life in pain and sorrow from want of our true life” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility).
“When pride throws off obedience to God, humility dies. When the mind rebels against the authority of God as the revealer of truth, Faith dies together with humility. When the graceless soul allows the body to revolt and defile the soul with uncleanness, holiness is extinct. When self-love holds the place of charity, the spiritual life of man is no more. When these virtues have departed, the man is left to nature and the world, but to nature in cruel disorder, and to the world, not as God has made it in His goodness, but as man has made it in his concupiscence; to the world as it is taken up for a final end in place of God” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility).
No Charity―No Chance!
We are told that “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and that of all the theological virtues by which we relate to God, “the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13). We are told to love God above everything else: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Without a supernatural charity, we are incapable of doing anything supernatural or spiritual with regard to gaining Heaven: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Let that sink in―“If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
The Power of Charity
First and foremost―by loving God with all our mind, heart, soul and strength―charity obtains for us the forgiveness of the guilt of sin and forgiveness of debt incurred by sin: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). You will obtain forgiveness in proportion to the degree of your charity.
The Imitation of Christ has a beautiful passage on the power of love: “Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed! It makes every difficulty easy and bears all wrongs with calmness and evenness of temper. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself, there he falls from love. Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound! Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger, or higher, or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice!” (Book 3, Chapter 5).
No Bias in Charity
We cannot be selective in our charity―for every person is a creature of God. Our Lord drives that point home on several occasions:
“Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven! Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for my sake! Be glad and rejoice―for your reward is very great in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:10-12) … “You have heard that it has been said: ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth!’ But I say to you not to resist evil―but if someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn to him also the other cheek; and if a man will contend with you in judgment and take away your coat―then let your cloak also go unto him; and whosoever will force you to go one mile―go with him another two. Give to him that asks of you and from him that would borrow from you, turn not away. You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor, and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you: Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you! ― so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven―Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and makes His rain to fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even sinners [publicans] do this? And if you only salute your brethren, what do you do that is more? Do not the heathens and pagans also do this? Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:38-48).
Mercy and Forgiveness are a part of charity―you could say that they are rooms in the mansion of charity. Our Lord insists that we must show mercy to others if we seek mercy for ourselves: “For if you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). “If thy brother sin against you, reprove him―and if he does penance, then forgive him. And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times in a day he be converted, saying, ‘I repent!’― then forgive him!” (Luke 17:3-4).
“And the Scribes and the Pharisees brought unto Him a woman taken in adultery: and they set her in the midst, and said to Him: ‘Master, this woman was even now taken in adultery! Now Moses in the law commanded us to stone such a one. But what sayest Thou?’ And this they said tempting Him, so that they might accuse Him. But Jesus, bowing Himself down, wrote with His finger on the ground. When therefore they continued asking Him, He lifted up Himself, and said to them: ‘He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!’ And again stooping down, He wrote on the ground. But they hearing this, went out, one by one, beginning at the eldest. And Jesus alone remained, and the woman standing in the midst. Then Jesus lifting up Himself, said to her: ‘Woman, where are they that accused you? Has no man condemned you?’ She said: ‘No man, Lord!’ And Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn you! Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:3-11).
Jesus also spoke a parable along similar lines of mercy: “Therefore is the Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of around $30 an ounce, one talent would be worth $22,500―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $225 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!’ And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“‘But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 per ounce, the penny would be worth $3.75―and a hundred pence would be $375). And laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: ‘Pay what you owe me!’ And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!’ But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?’ And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!” (Matthew 18:21-35).
Mercy―being a part of charity―is like the sweet wine of charity! Our Lord warned that in the latter days of the world, “because iniquity will abound, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). You could rephrase that and say: “Because of the sinfulness of the world, the sweet wine of charity will become bitter!” ― and that is how we are today, more likely to point the finger and throttle the sinner, rather than have compassion and show mercy to the sinner.
A diet of dung and wine? Yuck! Disgusting! Well, maybe the wine is fine―but not the dung! This is true if you look at the dung and wine literally. However, things change when you look at the dung and wine metaphorically or symbolically. The Bible uses the word “dung” in multiple ways―using the word to refer to fuel, manure, and various figurative expressions. It is used as a fertilizer to help crops grow, burned as a fuel for heat, and is even used as a building material.
● Fuel ― Dung was used as a substitute for firewood to heat ovens and bake cakes. It was often mixed with straw and dried before use. For example, the Book of Ezechiel describes how dung was used as fuel: “I have given thee neat’s dung for man’s dung, and thou shalt make thy bread therewith” (Ezechiel 4:12-15).
● Manure ― Dung was used to fertilize soil. For example, Our Lord describes how people would dig around a fig tree and apply dung to it: “And the master of the vineyard said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why does it encumber the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, leave it alone also for this year, until I dig around it and dung it! And perhaps happily it bears fruit! But if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:7-9).
● Figurative Expressions ― The phrase “cast out as dung” is a figurative expression that means to be rejected as unprofitable. For example: “Dung is cast out!” (Deuteronomy 28:27). “I will sweep away the remnant of the house of Jeroboam, as dung is swept away, till all be clean!” (3 Kings 14:10). “The flesh of Jezabel shall be as dung upon the face of the Earth!” (4 Kings 9:37). “They shall not be gathered, and they shall not be buried―they shall be as dung upon the face of the Earth!” (Jeremias 8:2). “They shall not be lamented, and they shall not be gathered up, nor buried―they shall lie as dung upon the face of the Earth!” (Jeremias 25:33).
● Worthlessness ― Dung was often used figuratively to express worthlessness, especially for something perishable that no one cares about. “The sluggard is pelted with the dung of oxen” (Ecclesiasticus 22:2). “O ye priests, if you will not hear, and if you will not lay it to heart, to give glory to My Name, saith the Lord of hosts, then I will … cast the shoulder to you, and I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities!” (Malachias 2:1-3). “I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ!” (Philippians 3:8).
● Defilement ― Dung was used to symbolize defilement, degradation, and uncleanness. “Every woman that is a harlot, shall be trodden upon as dung in the way!” (Ecclesiasticus 9:10). “Thou shalt not bring any idol into thy house! … Thou shalt detest it as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth!” (Deuteronomy 7:26). “They have sinned against the Lord and their blood shall be poured out as earth, and their bodies as dung!” (Sophonias 1:17). “The glory of a sinful man is dung!” (1 Machabees 2:62).
● The Dung Gate ― The Dung Gate was one of the eleven gates of Jerusalem during the time Nehemiah. It was located in the southwest corner of the wall and was used to dispose of garbage, dung and rubbish. “I went out by night to the Dung Gate, and I viewed the wall of Jerusalem which was broken down” (2 Esdras 2:13).
● Penance ― “Queen Esther laid aside her royal apparel, and she put on garments suitable for weeping and mourning. Instead of various precious ointments, she covered her head with ashes and dung, and she humbled her body with fasts” (Esther 14:2).
● Humiliation and Trial ― “Tobias was sleeping, and hot dung out of a swallow’s nest fell upon his eyes, and he was made blind” (Tobias 2:11).
Dung and Humility
Dung is very symbolic of humility. To have dung thrown at you is a humiliation. To have the dung of your sins exposed is humbling. To be treated as dung is a humiliation. Our Lord was treated like dung by His enemies―and Our Lord tells us: “Take up My yoke upon you, and learn of Me―because I am meek and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:2). Christ warned: “Whosoever shall exalt himself shall be humbled―and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted!” (Matthew 23:12). The Bible describes humility as being meekness, lowliness, absence of self, and self-abasement. The foremost example of humility in Holy Scripture is Christ Himself. Our Lord―being God and King of Heaven and Earth―chose to be born in a dung infested place reserved for animals, for there was no room for Him in the homes and hearts of Bethlehem. “Being in the form of God, He thought it no robbery to be equal with God, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of man; and in habit found as a man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.” (Philippians 2:6-8).
Archbishop Ullathorne writes: “Through His Incarnation, the Son of God both consecrated and deified humility, making it more glorious to be humble with God, than to be exalted with pride among the children of men … Our Lord, therefore, united His humility with poverty, and His poverty with self‑abnegation. And this was not merely for our example, but because the life of humility, poverty, and self‑abnegation is the most perfect of human lives, as depending on God alone … Having once learned from Christ that the great lesson He has come to teach us is His own meekness and humility, we then discover that His Incarnation, His birth, all the actions of His life, His sufferings and death, all speak to us, and breathe into us, this divine lesson of humility. Everywhere―even when His voice is silent―His life and conduct say to us: ‘Learn of Me, because I am meek and humble of heart!’
“The Passion of Our Lord presents all the great virtues in their perfection for our imitation, whether self, denial, poverty of spirit, obedience, silence, humility, purity, patience, prayer, resignation, contempt of the world, or charity. But among all these virtues, He pre-eminently appears as the master of humility. His Passion is the book of humility; His Cross is the throne of humility; the terrible way from the Mount of Olives to Mount Calvary is the substantive exposition of the words ‘Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart!’ The Cross is the instrument of contrition upon which the earthly man is broken to be reformed into the heavenly man. The Cross is the divine school of patience, the school of self-abnegation, the school of penance, and the school of charity. The foot of the Cross, where Mary stood with John, and where the prostrate Magdalene wept her loving grief, is the great school of humility, where the soul is purified and brought to God. There forever sounds the great command of the divine Master: ‘Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart!’” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility).
Metaphorical Dung is Humility―the Real Dung is Pride
If you like, you could say that humility is good dung, whereas pride is bad dung. Humility smells sweet―but pride stinks to high Heaven! Pride is the beginning and root of all sin: “For pride is the beginning of all sin―and he that holds it shall be filled with maledictions, and it shall ruin him in the end!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Original Sin is essentially a sin of pride and disobedience―Our Lord came to undo its damage by His humility and obedience. There is no place in Heaven for the proud―as Our Lady says in her Magnificat. She says that God “has regarded the humility of His handmaid … He, that is mighty, has done great things to me! … He has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart. He has put down the mighty from their seat, and has exalted the humble!” (Luke 1:46-55).
“The proud man does not behave like one whom God has recently created from nothing, and whom He may summon to His presence at any hour. He acts as though he were not dependent on God, and as if what he is, and has, were not altogether owing to the divine will and bounty. This vice is so thoroughly opposed to the nature and condition of man, as well as to the rights and claims of God, and is so destructive of all spiritual good, that God has proclaimed to us this warning in His Scripture: ‘Pride was not made for man!’ (Ecclesiasticus 10:22). As pride is the root of all evil, the vice of vices, and the destruction of the virtues, it is the chief enemy of God and of man. It contradicts the whole reason of humility. It is not only irrational, as all sins are, but it is also an uncreaturely sin, which other sins are not” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility).
In our pride we forget that we need God for everything! Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” except sin (John 15:5). Every good thing we do―whether it be in thought, word, or action―is a consequence of the grace of God with which we have cooperated. “What have you that you hast not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7).
Total Dependence on the Grace of God
St. Thomas Aquinas truly humbles our minds with his comments on the grace of God: “Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For grace is given to many persons to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Everything is grace!” ― and you could add to that: “Grace is everything!” Let us explain that.
There is nobody in Heaven without Sanctifying Grace in their soul―and there is nobody in Hell with Sanctifying Grace in their soul. Grace is everything―it is all that really matters. If you are the richest person in world, but do not have Sanctifying Grace in your soul, then you cannot enter Heaven, you cannot buy your way into Heaven, nor can you bribe your way into Heaven. You might be the most famous person in the world―but without Sanctifying Grace your fame will get you nowhere when it comes to Heaven. You might be the most powerful person in the world―but without Sanctifying Grace in your soul, you will be powerless in getting to Heaven.
You might be the poorest person on Earth―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you are richer than the richest person on Earth. You may be hated by everyone and have no friends―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you are loved by God and all the angels and saints in Heaven. You may have been the biggest sinner the world has ever seen―but with Sanctifying Grace in your soul you will avoid Hell and eventually get to Heaven. Yes―grace is everything. Grace is everything we need to get to Heaven.
What is Grace?
The catechism, My Catholic Faith, tells us: “Grace is a supernatural gift of God bestowed on us through the merits of Jesus Christ for our salvation. Grace is a favor, a free gift, granted to us though we have no claim to it. God grants us graces because He is good, not because we deserve them. God grants us graces for the sake of His Son, Who died on the cross to earn for us these graces―we men can never merit these graces. Graces are supernatural and the supernatural is that which is beyond natural powers. Without the help of the graces that He dispenses, with merely natural powers, we cannot do the least work to merit salvation. Without God, we are nothing. We say with the Apostle: “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything, as from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God” (2 Corinthians 3:5).” Our Lord puts it succinctly when He says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 1:5).
What Does Grace Do?
What does grace do? Grace does everything―everything that is not sinful. That is why St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Everything is grace!” Our Lord Himself said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). We can expand upon that and have Our Lord say: “Without My grace―you can do nothing!” What is it about the word “NOTHING” that we fail to understand? “Nothing” means zero, nichts, nič, ništa, nada, niente, natin, nekas, rien ― or whatever other language you choose to use! We truly underestimate and misunderstand the extent to which grace works in our lives. There can no salvation without grace: “The grace of God [brings] life everlasting” (Romans 6:23) … “By grace you are saved, and not of yourselves, for it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8) … “By Christ’s grace you are saved!” (Ephesians 2:5). “Being justified by His grace, we may be heirs to life everlasting” (Titus 3:7). “Let us go therefore with confidence to the throne of grace―so that we may obtain mercy!” (Hebrews 4:16).
The Snare of Pride
God does not wish to exclude anyone from His grace: “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:17). “Every man has received grace” (1 Peter 4:10). “To every one of us is given grace, according to the measure of the giving of Christ” (Ephesians 4:7). Even the pagans are offered God’s graces: “The grace of the Holy Ghost was poured out upon the Gentiles also! … God gave them the same grace, as to us also who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ!” (Acts 10:45). “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men―instructing us, that by denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world” (Titus 2:11-12). Unfortunately, with our God-given free will, we can stubbornly and tragically refuse to accept and cooperate with God’s graces, or if we automatically presume that God will automatically give us His graces.
Catholics can pridefully fall into the trap of thinking that God is like a “vending machine” of grace. We go to church, we put our money in the basket, we say our prayers, we do something nice for someone and then we expect God to give us our grace. And, when He doesn’t―or we don’t immediately sense or feel that the grace is given―we kick the “vending machine,” grumble and walk away feeling ripped-off. However, God is not a vending machine and “owes” us nothing. In our pride, we can easily fall into the same trap of the Pharisee in Our Lord’s parable of the Pharisee and the Publican:
“And Jesus spoke this parable to certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up into the Temple to pray―the one, a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself: “O God! I thank you, that I am not like the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this Publican! I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes to Heaven, but stuck upon his breast, saying: “O God! Be merciful to me a sinner!” I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other―for every one that exalts himself shall be humbled; and he that humbles himself shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14). As Holy Scripture says: “God resists the proud, but to the humble He gives grace!” (1 Peter 5:5) … “The greater you are, the more you should humble yourself in all things, and you shall find grace before God” (Ecclesiasticus 3:20) ... “For who distinguishes you? Or what have you that you have not received? And if you have received, why do you glory as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7).
From Dung to Wine―From Humility to Charity
Wine is a symbol of love. In the Canticle of Canticles we read: “He brought me into the cellar of wine, He set in order charity in me” (Canticles 2:4). His love for us is like a wine, but it also shows us that our love for Him is the same. It’s a wine that He delights in. Just as we long for the wine of His love, so does He long for the wine of our love. We have to choose to love Him and when we choose to love Him, especially in the face of pain and adverse circumstances, it enriches and intoxicates Him and is extremely precious. Just as wine takes years to mature, so does our love for Him take time to mature. It becomes more and more powerful and intoxicating as the years go by, if kept untainted.
Thus it is fitting that Christ chose wine to be the substance that would be transubstantiated into His Precious Blood―for Christ shed His blood for us and our sins, out of a love for us. “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death―even to the death of the cross” (Philippians 2:8) … “The Son of God, who loved me, delivered Himself for me!” (Galatians 2:20) … “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). It was Christ’s humility and Christ’s charity that redeemed us!
Archbishop Ullathorne (1806-1889) writes: “Charity can never come from oneself, it can only come from God … Humility and charity are the dominant virtues … Monastic and religious institutions are founded on the virtues of humility and charity … Perfect humility is the fruit of perfect charity ... Humility disposes the soul and prepares the way for charity, and greater humility prepares and disposes the soul for greater charity. True humility never was, never is, and never can be without charity. Humility is the sacrificial element in all sincere love. For as love is the transfer of our affection from ourselves to another, it includes a surrender of self‑love―and this surrender is humility. To humble souls ― for they alone are capable ― the grace of charity will never be lacking … When we give up our love of ourselves to God, this giving up of our love of self to God is humility, and the love that we give to God is charity ... The more we love God, the less we value ourselves … Inordinate self‑love is the cause of pride. What God accepts from man is humility, and that what He rejects is pride. His blessings are for the humble; His maledictions are for the proud. In every virtue, it is humility that He rewards; in every vice, it is pride that He punishes.” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility).
“There is no other reason for the existence of this world than the charity of God and the communication of His charity. The world was made for man, man for the soul, and the soul for charity; and charity unites the soul with God. From charity God created the world, and by charity He perfects the end for which the world was made, for that end is the happiness of souls possessed of charity. There is a kind of life in the soul without charity, but it is not the life for which the soul was made; not true life, but initiatory and merely infantile life, which is life in pain and sorrow from want of our true life” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility).
“When pride throws off obedience to God, humility dies. When the mind rebels against the authority of God as the revealer of truth, Faith dies together with humility. When the graceless soul allows the body to revolt and defile the soul with uncleanness, holiness is extinct. When self-love holds the place of charity, the spiritual life of man is no more. When these virtues have departed, the man is left to nature and the world, but to nature in cruel disorder, and to the world, not as God has made it in His goodness, but as man has made it in his concupiscence; to the world as it is taken up for a final end in place of God” (Archbishop Ullathorne, Patience & Humility).
No Charity―No Chance!
We are told that “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and that of all the theological virtues by which we relate to God, “the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13). We are told to love God above everything else: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Without a supernatural charity, we are incapable of doing anything supernatural or spiritual with regard to gaining Heaven: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Let that sink in―“If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
The Power of Charity
First and foremost―by loving God with all our mind, heart, soul and strength―charity obtains for us the forgiveness of the guilt of sin and forgiveness of debt incurred by sin: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). You will obtain forgiveness in proportion to the degree of your charity.
The Imitation of Christ has a beautiful passage on the power of love: “Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed! It makes every difficulty easy and bears all wrongs with calmness and evenness of temper. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself, there he falls from love. Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound! Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger, or higher, or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice!” (Book 3, Chapter 5).
No Bias in Charity
We cannot be selective in our charity―for every person is a creature of God. Our Lord drives that point home on several occasions:
“Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven! Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for my sake! Be glad and rejoice―for your reward is very great in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:10-12) … “You have heard that it has been said: ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth!’ But I say to you not to resist evil―but if someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn to him also the other cheek; and if a man will contend with you in judgment and take away your coat―then let your cloak also go unto him; and whosoever will force you to go one mile―go with him another two. Give to him that asks of you and from him that would borrow from you, turn not away. You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor, and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you: Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you! ― so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven―Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and makes His rain to fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even sinners [publicans] do this? And if you only salute your brethren, what do you do that is more? Do not the heathens and pagans also do this? Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:38-48).
Mercy and Forgiveness are a part of charity―you could say that they are rooms in the mansion of charity. Our Lord insists that we must show mercy to others if we seek mercy for ourselves: “For if you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). “If thy brother sin against you, reprove him―and if he does penance, then forgive him. And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times in a day he be converted, saying, ‘I repent!’― then forgive him!” (Luke 17:3-4).
“And the Scribes and the Pharisees brought unto Him a woman taken in adultery: and they set her in the midst, and said to Him: ‘Master, this woman was even now taken in adultery! Now Moses in the law commanded us to stone such a one. But what sayest Thou?’ And this they said tempting Him, so that they might accuse Him. But Jesus, bowing Himself down, wrote with His finger on the ground. When therefore they continued asking Him, He lifted up Himself, and said to them: ‘He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!’ And again stooping down, He wrote on the ground. But they hearing this, went out, one by one, beginning at the eldest. And Jesus alone remained, and the woman standing in the midst. Then Jesus lifting up Himself, said to her: ‘Woman, where are they that accused you? Has no man condemned you?’ She said: ‘No man, Lord!’ And Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn you! Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:3-11).
Jesus also spoke a parable along similar lines of mercy: “Therefore is the Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of around $30 an ounce, one talent would be worth $22,500―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $225 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!’ And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“‘But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 per ounce, the penny would be worth $3.75―and a hundred pence would be $375). And laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: ‘Pay what you owe me!’ And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!’ But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?’ And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!” (Matthew 18:21-35).
Mercy―being a part of charity―is like the sweet wine of charity! Our Lord warned that in the latter days of the world, “because iniquity will abound, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). You could rephrase that and say: “Because of the sinfulness of the world, the sweet wine of charity will become bitter!” ― and that is how we are today, more likely to point the finger and throttle the sinner, rather than have compassion and show mercy to the sinner.
Article 5
Sunday, December 29th
A Very Poor Christmas!
Sunday, December 29th
A Very Poor Christmas!
Happy Poor Man or Poor Happy Man
Are the poor really rich? Are the rich really poor? “Hearken, my dearest brethren! Has not God chosen the poor in this world, rich in Faith, and heirs of the Kingdom which God has promised to them that love Him?” (James 2:5) ... “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:3) ... “Blessed are ye poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God” (Luke 6:20) ... “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Sion, shout for joy, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold your King will come to you, the Just and Savior! He is poor, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass!” (Zacharias 9:9). That King―Our Lord Jesus Christ―said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24) … “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
That same King―Our Lord Jesus Christ―said to rich young man: “‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:16-29; Mark 10:17-31; Luke 18:18-25).
The Preference of Christ
Thus speaks Holy Scripture. Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: “This great God and Lord does not wish to enter into the world in the pomp of ostentatious riches and royal majesty. He has need of none of these, nor does He come from Heaven for such vanities. He comes to redeem the world and to guide men on the path of eternal life; and this is to be done by means of humility and poverty; in these He wishes to be born, live and die” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“Jesus came to conquer the devil, not only by his Omnipotence, but by humility, meekness, obedience and poverty, which are the weapons of His warfare. Far from Him are the empty show and vanity maintained by the riches of the world. He came disguised and hidden in the outward appearance of lowliness; He chose a poor Mother. All that the world values, He came to despise, teaching the true science of life in word and example” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
That’s How God Wants It!
Such was the design of Divine Providence, and therefore, even though God could have arranged for Jesus to be born to rich royalty, in the splendors of some palace, surrounded by wealth, courtiers and servants, God, instead chose to place His Son into a life and surroundings of poverty. Therefore, it was important that God’s Providence make Mary and Joseph poor. Here are a few extracts from The Mystical City of God that describe and point out the poverty of the Queen of Heaven and her spouse, St. Joseph.
“Her garments were humble and poor ... poor dwelling ... her humble cottage and her poor little oratory... her poor table and at her humble meals ... She, with her husband, belonged to the poorest, humblest, and the most insignificant people in this world” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”). Such was the life of the Queen of Heaven and Earth!
Temptation to Avarice
The devil, seeing Our Lady’s incredible holiness, tried to derail her with an onslaught of different kinds of temptations, among which was a temptation of avarice.
“At one point the devils had organized a massive onslaught of temptation against the Mother of God. One of attacks was to tempt her to the sin of avarice. They offered to her great riches, gold, silver, and most precious gems and in order that these might not seem empty promises, thy placed before her a great quantity of these riches, although they were only apparent; for they thought that they could exert greater influence on her will by actually presenting these objects before her. They accompanied this offer with many deceitful words and told her that God had sent her all this for distribution among the poor. When they saw that all this had no effect upon her, they changed their tactics and urged, that, since she was so holy, it was a great wrong that she should remain so poor. It was more reasonable that she possess these riches, than that they remain in the hands of wicked sinners, for this would be an injustice and a disarrangement of the Divine Providence that the just be visited with poverty, while God’s wicked enemies abound in riches and affluence” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“The most prudent Lady, although she possessed divine wisdom, never undertook to argue with these enemies, as in truth nobody should―for they battle against the manifest truth and will not admit defeat. The most holy Mary made use of some words of the Holy Scriptures and repeated them with serene humility. On this occasion she selected the words of the 118th Psalm: ‘I have acquired for my heritage and for my riches the keeping of thy testimonies and thy laws, my Lord.’ In this most wise manner she rejected and overcame the temptation, to the confusion and torment of these agents of iniquity” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Neither was St. Joseph spared temptations against the poverty that God had placed upon his shoulders: “The demon suggested a feeling of restlessness to St. Joseph, irritating and disgusting him against his poverty” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
When he had found out that the Child that Mary was carrying in her womb was the Son of God, with tears of joy St. Joseph said: “Is it possible, that in your most chaste arms I shall see my God and Redeemer? That I shall hear Him speak, and touch Him, and that my eyes shall look upon His Divine Face, and that the sweat of my brow shall be so blessed as to be poured out in His service and for His sustenance? That He shall live with us, and that we shall eat with Him at the same table, and that we shall speak and converse with Him? Whence comes to me this good fortune which nobody can ever deserve? O how much do I regret that I am so poor! If only I possessed the richest palaces for his entertainment and many treasures to offer Him!” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
But Our Lady, understanding and treasuring the burden of poverty that God had placed upon them, answered: “My master and spouse, there is abundant reason that your desires extend to all things possible for the reception of your Creator; but this great God and Lord does not wish to enter into the world in the pomp of ostentatious riches and royal majesty. He has need of none of these, nor does He come from Heaven for such vanities. He comes to redeem the world and to guide men on the path of eternal life; and this is to be done by means of humility and poverty; in these He wishes to be born, live and die, in order to destroy in the hearts of men the fetters of covetousness and pride, which keep them from blessedness. On this account He chose our poor and humble house, and desired us not to be rich in apparent, deceitful and transitory goods, which are but vanity of vanities and affliction of spirit and which oppress and obscure the understanding” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Poverty, a Tough Reality
We find it hard to grasp that God would treat His most prized creation, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and His only-begotten Son, with such seeming coldness of heart as to make them endure the extremes of poverty.
“It happened also, not a few times, that the heavenly Lady and her spouse found themselves so poor and destitute of means that they were in want of the necessaries of life―for they were most generous in their gifts to the poor, and they were never anxious to store up beforehand food or clothing, as is tends to with the children of this world in their faint-hearted covetousness” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Our Lady herself reveals to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “I and my holy spouse, Joseph, were poor, and at times we suffered great wants; but none of them were powerful enough to engender within our hearts the contagion of avarice. We concerned ourselves entirely with the glory of the Most High, relying wholly on His most faithful and tender care. This was what pleased Him so much, since He supplied our wants in various ways” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Mary and Joseph even found a pleasure and a delight in their poverty at times. When telling Joseph of her readiness in accompanying him to Bethlehem, she says: “My spouse and my master, I accompany thee with much pleasure, and we will make this journey as poor people in the name of the Lord: for the Most High will not despise poverty, which He came to seek with so much love” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Their journey to Bethlehem was to be one of humiliation in their poverty. “Mary and St. Joseph departed from Nazareth for Bethlehem alone, poor and humble in the eyes of the world. None of the mortals thought more of them than what was warranted by their poverty and humility” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Not only was their home in Nazareth a clear indication of their poverty, but their ‘lodgings’ in Bethlehem would bring them to new lows, not yet experienced. There would be no room available for them in the houses and inns of Bethlehem, so they would be reduced to the shame of having to use a residence of animals.
“The palace which the supreme King of kings and the Lord of lords had chosen for entertaining His eternal and incarnate Son in this world was a most poor and insignificant hut or cave, to which most holy Mary and Joseph betook themselves after they had been denied all hospitality and the most ordinary kindness by their fellow-men” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Second-Class Visitors
The first visitors to be called to the ‘animal hotel’ would themselves be the custodians of animals. These were the shepherds, poor second-class citizens, who smelt of sheep and were looked down upon by many.
“Amongst all these, the shepherds of that region, who were watching their flocks at the time of the birth of Christ, were especially blessed; not only because they accepted the labor and inconvenience of their calling with resignation from the hand of God; but also because, being poor and humble, and despised by the world, they belonged in sincerity and uprightness of heart to those Israelites, who fervently hoped and longed for the coming of the Messias, speaking and discoursing of Him among themselves many times. They resembled the Author of life, as they were removed from the riches, vanity and ostentation of the world and far from its diabolical cunning” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Once the shepherds had witnessed the marvel of the Christ-Child, they went to tell all and sundry of the angelic vision and the Child in the Cave. Some people then began to visit Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Most of them were poor people. “During the days in which the most holy Queen tarried near Bethlehem before the purification, some of the people came to see and speak with her; but almost all of them were of the poorest class” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”)
St. Elizabeth, who did not live too far away from Bethlehem, had sent her servants with certain provisions and supplies to relieve the stresses being endured by the Holy Family in their inhospitable circumstances. “Of the things sent by St. Elizabeth, Our Lady appropriated some for relieving their extreme poverty, while she distributed the rest of them to the poor; for she did not wish to be deprived of the company of the poor during the days in which she would have to remain in the portal or cave of the Nativity” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Our Lady on Riches and Poverty
Here are the words of Our Lady on the subject, as spoken to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “I assure thee, my dearest, there is no more acceptable gift to the Most High than voluntary poverty. There are very few in the world in our days who use well the temporal riches and offer them to their God and Lord with the generosity and love of these holy Kings. The poor of the Lord, so numerous in our day, experience and give witness how cruel and avaricious human nature has become; since in their great necessities they are so little assisted by the rich. This gross uncharitableness of men offends the holy angels and grieves the Holy Ghost, since they are bound to witness the nobility of the souls so degraded and abased in the service of vile greed of gold with all its evil powers. As if all things had been created for the individual use of the rich, they appropriate them to themselves and deprive the poor, their brothers springing from the same nature and flesh; and denying them even to God, Who created and preserves all things, and Who can give or take at will. It is most lamentable that while the rich might purchase eternal life with their possessions, they abuse them to draw upon themselves damnation as sense less and foolish creatures. This evil is common among the children of Adam; and therefore voluntary poverty is so excellent and safe a remedy. By it, making man willing to part joyfully with his possessions for the sake of the poor, a great sacrifice is offered to the Lord” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“The Father in Heaven, Who lets the sun rise over the just and the unjust and lets the rain fall on the good and the bad, nevertheless helps all, giving them life and nourishment. However, just as His blessings are distributed to the good and to the bad, so also it cannot be a rule with God to give greater temporal goods to the good and less to the bad. On the contrary, He prefers that the chosen and predestined ones be poor, both because they thus gain more merit and reward, and because there are few who know how to use wealth properly and who can retain it without inordinate greed. Although my most holy Son and I had nothing to fear from this danger, yet He wished to furnish this example to men and to teach them this science, through which eternal life comes to them” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Poor Rich Man
All of this should puncture any desire we may have of trying to serve both God while at the same time trying to grow in wealth and worldly possessions. This was the problem of the rich young man, who came asking Jesus what he must do to save his soul and gain salvation. Jesus first gives him the foundation that must be laid down, the keeping of the commandments. The rich young man tells Jesus that he has kept them all his life. Jesus then moves to the next stage, and tells him to sell all he has, give the money to the poor and then to come and follow Him. “And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is lacking in you! Go sell whatsoever you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me!’” (Mark 10:21).
At this point the rich young man becomes sad, turns around and leaves Jesus, for he had great possessions and could not bear to part from them. As he walks away, Jesus says to His disciples:”Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:16-24). Elsewhere Our Lord adds: The cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word of God, and it becomes fruitless!” (Matthew 13:22)
Hence it is that Holy Scripture says: “Do not trust in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God!” (1 Timothy 6:17) … “He that trusts in his riches shall fall!” (Proverbs 11:28) … “You say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and you know not that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!” (Apocalypse 3:17) ... “Labor not to be rich!” (Proverbs 23:4) … “For gold and silver have destroyed many!” (Ecclesiasticus 8:3) ... “If you are rich, you shall not be free from sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 11:10) … “For they that will become rich, fall into temptation, and into the snares of the devil, and into many unprofitable and hurtful desires, which drown men into destruction and perdition!” (1 Timothy 6:9) … “Go now, you rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted! Your gold and silver is cankered―and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
The Complacency of Wealth
Many possessions and great wealth make us very complacent by leading us to rely and trust primarily in what we have, rather than trusting in God, “without Whom we can do nothing” (John 15:5). Wealth and great possessions often render a soul lukewarm in the service of God, and, just like the Israelites, when things went very well for them, there comes a falling away from God to a greater or lesser degree. It might be a total departure from God through mortal sin, or a growing indifference to God through lukewarmness. This latter disease, reminds us of the grave warning given by God in the Apocalypse:
“But because you are lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and know not that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel you to buy from Me gold, fire tried, so that you may be made rich; and may be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of your nakedness may not appear; and anoint your eyes with eye-salve, so that you may see!” (Apocalypse 3:16-18).
Though it may not be pleasant, it is perhaps better to poor than rich. After all, it is the way chosen by Jesus for Himself and His Mother and her spouse. It was the way into which God led His prophets in the Old Testament. It was the way chosen for the New Testament prophet, St. John the Baptist. It is the way chosen by so many of the saintly religious orders of ancient times.
Our Lord and God chose to be a Poor God; and it was to teach us a lesson about the hidden riches of being poor. A very good poor lesson, from a very good poor God.
Spiritually Rich Quotes on Poverty
“Better is the poor man, that walks in his simplicity, than a rich man that is perverse in his lips, and unwise” (Proverbs 19:1).
“One is as it were rich, when he has nothing―and another is as it were poor, when he has great riches” (Proverbs 13:7).
“He saves not the wicked, and He grants judgment to the poor” (Job 36:6).
“And the poor people Thou wilt save!” (2 Kings 22:28).
“Better is the poor man’s fare under a roof of boards, than sumptuous cheer abroad in another man’s house” (Ecclesiasticus 29:28).
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings during the octave of His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12).
Unto us a Child is born!
Glory to God in the highest!
Peace on Earth to men of good will!
Are the poor really rich? Are the rich really poor? “Hearken, my dearest brethren! Has not God chosen the poor in this world, rich in Faith, and heirs of the Kingdom which God has promised to them that love Him?” (James 2:5) ... “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:3) ... “Blessed are ye poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God” (Luke 6:20) ... “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Sion, shout for joy, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold your King will come to you, the Just and Savior! He is poor, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass!” (Zacharias 9:9). That King―Our Lord Jesus Christ―said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24) … “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
That same King―Our Lord Jesus Christ―said to rich young man: “‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:16-29; Mark 10:17-31; Luke 18:18-25).
The Preference of Christ
Thus speaks Holy Scripture. Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: “This great God and Lord does not wish to enter into the world in the pomp of ostentatious riches and royal majesty. He has need of none of these, nor does He come from Heaven for such vanities. He comes to redeem the world and to guide men on the path of eternal life; and this is to be done by means of humility and poverty; in these He wishes to be born, live and die” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“Jesus came to conquer the devil, not only by his Omnipotence, but by humility, meekness, obedience and poverty, which are the weapons of His warfare. Far from Him are the empty show and vanity maintained by the riches of the world. He came disguised and hidden in the outward appearance of lowliness; He chose a poor Mother. All that the world values, He came to despise, teaching the true science of life in word and example” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
That’s How God Wants It!
Such was the design of Divine Providence, and therefore, even though God could have arranged for Jesus to be born to rich royalty, in the splendors of some palace, surrounded by wealth, courtiers and servants, God, instead chose to place His Son into a life and surroundings of poverty. Therefore, it was important that God’s Providence make Mary and Joseph poor. Here are a few extracts from The Mystical City of God that describe and point out the poverty of the Queen of Heaven and her spouse, St. Joseph.
“Her garments were humble and poor ... poor dwelling ... her humble cottage and her poor little oratory... her poor table and at her humble meals ... She, with her husband, belonged to the poorest, humblest, and the most insignificant people in this world” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”). Such was the life of the Queen of Heaven and Earth!
Temptation to Avarice
The devil, seeing Our Lady’s incredible holiness, tried to derail her with an onslaught of different kinds of temptations, among which was a temptation of avarice.
“At one point the devils had organized a massive onslaught of temptation against the Mother of God. One of attacks was to tempt her to the sin of avarice. They offered to her great riches, gold, silver, and most precious gems and in order that these might not seem empty promises, thy placed before her a great quantity of these riches, although they were only apparent; for they thought that they could exert greater influence on her will by actually presenting these objects before her. They accompanied this offer with many deceitful words and told her that God had sent her all this for distribution among the poor. When they saw that all this had no effect upon her, they changed their tactics and urged, that, since she was so holy, it was a great wrong that she should remain so poor. It was more reasonable that she possess these riches, than that they remain in the hands of wicked sinners, for this would be an injustice and a disarrangement of the Divine Providence that the just be visited with poverty, while God’s wicked enemies abound in riches and affluence” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“The most prudent Lady, although she possessed divine wisdom, never undertook to argue with these enemies, as in truth nobody should―for they battle against the manifest truth and will not admit defeat. The most holy Mary made use of some words of the Holy Scriptures and repeated them with serene humility. On this occasion she selected the words of the 118th Psalm: ‘I have acquired for my heritage and for my riches the keeping of thy testimonies and thy laws, my Lord.’ In this most wise manner she rejected and overcame the temptation, to the confusion and torment of these agents of iniquity” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Neither was St. Joseph spared temptations against the poverty that God had placed upon his shoulders: “The demon suggested a feeling of restlessness to St. Joseph, irritating and disgusting him against his poverty” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
When he had found out that the Child that Mary was carrying in her womb was the Son of God, with tears of joy St. Joseph said: “Is it possible, that in your most chaste arms I shall see my God and Redeemer? That I shall hear Him speak, and touch Him, and that my eyes shall look upon His Divine Face, and that the sweat of my brow shall be so blessed as to be poured out in His service and for His sustenance? That He shall live with us, and that we shall eat with Him at the same table, and that we shall speak and converse with Him? Whence comes to me this good fortune which nobody can ever deserve? O how much do I regret that I am so poor! If only I possessed the richest palaces for his entertainment and many treasures to offer Him!” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
But Our Lady, understanding and treasuring the burden of poverty that God had placed upon them, answered: “My master and spouse, there is abundant reason that your desires extend to all things possible for the reception of your Creator; but this great God and Lord does not wish to enter into the world in the pomp of ostentatious riches and royal majesty. He has need of none of these, nor does He come from Heaven for such vanities. He comes to redeem the world and to guide men on the path of eternal life; and this is to be done by means of humility and poverty; in these He wishes to be born, live and die, in order to destroy in the hearts of men the fetters of covetousness and pride, which keep them from blessedness. On this account He chose our poor and humble house, and desired us not to be rich in apparent, deceitful and transitory goods, which are but vanity of vanities and affliction of spirit and which oppress and obscure the understanding” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Poverty, a Tough Reality
We find it hard to grasp that God would treat His most prized creation, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and His only-begotten Son, with such seeming coldness of heart as to make them endure the extremes of poverty.
“It happened also, not a few times, that the heavenly Lady and her spouse found themselves so poor and destitute of means that they were in want of the necessaries of life―for they were most generous in their gifts to the poor, and they were never anxious to store up beforehand food or clothing, as is tends to with the children of this world in their faint-hearted covetousness” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Our Lady herself reveals to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “I and my holy spouse, Joseph, were poor, and at times we suffered great wants; but none of them were powerful enough to engender within our hearts the contagion of avarice. We concerned ourselves entirely with the glory of the Most High, relying wholly on His most faithful and tender care. This was what pleased Him so much, since He supplied our wants in various ways” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Mary and Joseph even found a pleasure and a delight in their poverty at times. When telling Joseph of her readiness in accompanying him to Bethlehem, she says: “My spouse and my master, I accompany thee with much pleasure, and we will make this journey as poor people in the name of the Lord: for the Most High will not despise poverty, which He came to seek with so much love” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Their journey to Bethlehem was to be one of humiliation in their poverty. “Mary and St. Joseph departed from Nazareth for Bethlehem alone, poor and humble in the eyes of the world. None of the mortals thought more of them than what was warranted by their poverty and humility” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Not only was their home in Nazareth a clear indication of their poverty, but their ‘lodgings’ in Bethlehem would bring them to new lows, not yet experienced. There would be no room available for them in the houses and inns of Bethlehem, so they would be reduced to the shame of having to use a residence of animals.
“The palace which the supreme King of kings and the Lord of lords had chosen for entertaining His eternal and incarnate Son in this world was a most poor and insignificant hut or cave, to which most holy Mary and Joseph betook themselves after they had been denied all hospitality and the most ordinary kindness by their fellow-men” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Second-Class Visitors
The first visitors to be called to the ‘animal hotel’ would themselves be the custodians of animals. These were the shepherds, poor second-class citizens, who smelt of sheep and were looked down upon by many.
“Amongst all these, the shepherds of that region, who were watching their flocks at the time of the birth of Christ, were especially blessed; not only because they accepted the labor and inconvenience of their calling with resignation from the hand of God; but also because, being poor and humble, and despised by the world, they belonged in sincerity and uprightness of heart to those Israelites, who fervently hoped and longed for the coming of the Messias, speaking and discoursing of Him among themselves many times. They resembled the Author of life, as they were removed from the riches, vanity and ostentation of the world and far from its diabolical cunning” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Once the shepherds had witnessed the marvel of the Christ-Child, they went to tell all and sundry of the angelic vision and the Child in the Cave. Some people then began to visit Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Most of them were poor people. “During the days in which the most holy Queen tarried near Bethlehem before the purification, some of the people came to see and speak with her; but almost all of them were of the poorest class” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”)
St. Elizabeth, who did not live too far away from Bethlehem, had sent her servants with certain provisions and supplies to relieve the stresses being endured by the Holy Family in their inhospitable circumstances. “Of the things sent by St. Elizabeth, Our Lady appropriated some for relieving their extreme poverty, while she distributed the rest of them to the poor; for she did not wish to be deprived of the company of the poor during the days in which she would have to remain in the portal or cave of the Nativity” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Our Lady on Riches and Poverty
Here are the words of Our Lady on the subject, as spoken to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “I assure thee, my dearest, there is no more acceptable gift to the Most High than voluntary poverty. There are very few in the world in our days who use well the temporal riches and offer them to their God and Lord with the generosity and love of these holy Kings. The poor of the Lord, so numerous in our day, experience and give witness how cruel and avaricious human nature has become; since in their great necessities they are so little assisted by the rich. This gross uncharitableness of men offends the holy angels and grieves the Holy Ghost, since they are bound to witness the nobility of the souls so degraded and abased in the service of vile greed of gold with all its evil powers. As if all things had been created for the individual use of the rich, they appropriate them to themselves and deprive the poor, their brothers springing from the same nature and flesh; and denying them even to God, Who created and preserves all things, and Who can give or take at will. It is most lamentable that while the rich might purchase eternal life with their possessions, they abuse them to draw upon themselves damnation as sense less and foolish creatures. This evil is common among the children of Adam; and therefore voluntary poverty is so excellent and safe a remedy. By it, making man willing to part joyfully with his possessions for the sake of the poor, a great sacrifice is offered to the Lord” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“The Father in Heaven, Who lets the sun rise over the just and the unjust and lets the rain fall on the good and the bad, nevertheless helps all, giving them life and nourishment. However, just as His blessings are distributed to the good and to the bad, so also it cannot be a rule with God to give greater temporal goods to the good and less to the bad. On the contrary, He prefers that the chosen and predestined ones be poor, both because they thus gain more merit and reward, and because there are few who know how to use wealth properly and who can retain it without inordinate greed. Although my most holy Son and I had nothing to fear from this danger, yet He wished to furnish this example to men and to teach them this science, through which eternal life comes to them” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Poor Rich Man
All of this should puncture any desire we may have of trying to serve both God while at the same time trying to grow in wealth and worldly possessions. This was the problem of the rich young man, who came asking Jesus what he must do to save his soul and gain salvation. Jesus first gives him the foundation that must be laid down, the keeping of the commandments. The rich young man tells Jesus that he has kept them all his life. Jesus then moves to the next stage, and tells him to sell all he has, give the money to the poor and then to come and follow Him. “And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is lacking in you! Go sell whatsoever you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me!’” (Mark 10:21).
At this point the rich young man becomes sad, turns around and leaves Jesus, for he had great possessions and could not bear to part from them. As he walks away, Jesus says to His disciples:”Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:16-24). Elsewhere Our Lord adds: The cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word of God, and it becomes fruitless!” (Matthew 13:22)
Hence it is that Holy Scripture says: “Do not trust in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God!” (1 Timothy 6:17) … “He that trusts in his riches shall fall!” (Proverbs 11:28) … “You say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and you know not that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!” (Apocalypse 3:17) ... “Labor not to be rich!” (Proverbs 23:4) … “For gold and silver have destroyed many!” (Ecclesiasticus 8:3) ... “If you are rich, you shall not be free from sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 11:10) … “For they that will become rich, fall into temptation, and into the snares of the devil, and into many unprofitable and hurtful desires, which drown men into destruction and perdition!” (1 Timothy 6:9) … “Go now, you rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted! Your gold and silver is cankered―and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
The Complacency of Wealth
Many possessions and great wealth make us very complacent by leading us to rely and trust primarily in what we have, rather than trusting in God, “without Whom we can do nothing” (John 15:5). Wealth and great possessions often render a soul lukewarm in the service of God, and, just like the Israelites, when things went very well for them, there comes a falling away from God to a greater or lesser degree. It might be a total departure from God through mortal sin, or a growing indifference to God through lukewarmness. This latter disease, reminds us of the grave warning given by God in the Apocalypse:
“But because you are lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and know not that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel you to buy from Me gold, fire tried, so that you may be made rich; and may be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of your nakedness may not appear; and anoint your eyes with eye-salve, so that you may see!” (Apocalypse 3:16-18).
Though it may not be pleasant, it is perhaps better to poor than rich. After all, it is the way chosen by Jesus for Himself and His Mother and her spouse. It was the way into which God led His prophets in the Old Testament. It was the way chosen for the New Testament prophet, St. John the Baptist. It is the way chosen by so many of the saintly religious orders of ancient times.
Our Lord and God chose to be a Poor God; and it was to teach us a lesson about the hidden riches of being poor. A very good poor lesson, from a very good poor God.
Spiritually Rich Quotes on Poverty
“Better is the poor man, that walks in his simplicity, than a rich man that is perverse in his lips, and unwise” (Proverbs 19:1).
“One is as it were rich, when he has nothing―and another is as it were poor, when he has great riches” (Proverbs 13:7).
“He saves not the wicked, and He grants judgment to the poor” (Job 36:6).
“And the poor people Thou wilt save!” (2 Kings 22:28).
“Better is the poor man’s fare under a roof of boards, than sumptuous cheer abroad in another man’s house” (Ecclesiasticus 29:28).
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings during the octave of His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12).
Unto us a Child is born!
Glory to God in the highest!
Peace on Earth to men of good will!
Article 4
Saturday, December 28th
The Holy Innocents and Not-So-Innocents!
Saturday, December 28th
The Holy Innocents and Not-So-Innocents!
Who Were the Holy Innocents?
On December 28th, the Catholic Church honors and remembers the Holy Innocents. The Holy Innocents are those Jewish infants who were murdered, by the order of King Herod,
Today, December 28th, we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Innocents, all those young boys in and around Bethlehem, two and under, whom Herod had massacred in order to kill Jesus Christ. Herod feared that a newborn king of the Jews would usurp his throne. “Then Herod perceiving that he was deluded by the wise men, was exceeding angry: and sending killed all the men children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the borders thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men” (Matthew 2:16). We do not know their number or their names, but the Church lists them as among her martyrs.
Martyrs or Not Martyrs?
The martyrdom of the Holy Innocents is a difficult theological problem. There have been those who have argued that the Holy Innocents are not truly martyrs, because martyrdom is an act of virtue and therefore a voluntary act. Yet, infants have not yet reached the age of reason and so they cannot voluntarily lay down their lives for God. They argue that they should be called martyrs since they did not submit freely for the sake of Christ but were “merely victims” of Herod. So it seems that the Holy Innocents are not strictly “martyrs”, since they did not willingly die for the sake of Christ. Nevertheless, the Church has long numbered them in her ranks of martyrs.
St. Augustine says of them: “And while [Herod] thus persecutes Christ, he furnished an army (or martyrs) clothed in white robes of the same age as the Lord…. O blessed infants! He only will doubt of your crown in this your passion for Christ, who doubts that the baptism of Christ has a benefit for infants. He who at His birth had Angels to proclaim Him, the heavens to testify, and Magi to worship Him, could surely have prevented that these should not have died for Him, had He not known that they died not in that death, but rather lived in higher bliss. Far be the thought, that Christ who came to set men free, did nothing to reward those who died in His behalf, when hanging on the cross He prayed for those who put Him to death.” (Serm. 373, 3, quoted in the Catena Aurea).
St. Thomas Aquinas defends the traditional definition of martyrdom as a voluntary act of heroic virtue, wherein a believer dies for Christ. Yet he also defends the Holy Innocents as true martyrs. Here is what St. Thomas thinks: “Some have said that in the case of the Innocents the use of their free will was miraculously accelerated, so that they suffered martyrdom, even voluntarily. Since, however, Scripture contains no proof of this, it is better to say that these babes, in being slain, obtained, by God’s grace, the glory of martyrdom, which others acquire by their own will. For the shedding of one’s blood for Christ’s sake takes the place of Baptism. Wherefore, just as in the case of baptized children the merit of Christ is conducive to the acquisition of glory through the baptismal grace, so in those, who were slain for Christ’s sake, the merit of Christ’s martyrdom is conducive to the acquisition of the martyr’s palm. Hence Augustine says, in a sermon on the Epiphany, as though he were addressing them: ‘A man, that does not believe that children are benefited by the baptism of Christ, will doubt of your being crowned in suffering for Christ. You were not old enough to believe in Christ’s future sufferings, but you had a body wherein you could endure suffering of Christ Who was to suffer’” (Summa Theologica II-II, q. 124, art. 1, ad. 1).
St. Augustine and St. Thomas answer by associating their martyrdom with the Baptism of Blood. The Catholic Church, faithful to Our Lord’s teaching in John 3:3-5, states that no man can be saved without baptism. The Holy Innocents, by their bloody death, received all the benefits of bloody baptism. Their infant souls were regenerated, cleansed of Original Sin, and infused with sanctifying grace.
“Stand-Ins” for Christ
The Holy Innocents were true martyrs who “stood-in” for Christ: they anticipated in their flesh the scourging, the nails, and the spear by which our salvation was wrought, and by which theirs was completed. What a triumphant victory, to have won without fighting, to have rushed ahead into the mystery of the Cross!
By being circumcised into the covenant with Abraham, the Holy Innocents had professed their Faith in the coming Messias, Who had just come into the world. They were spared the bitter test of fallen human life, the risk of mortal sin, the all-too-real possibility of eternal damnation. We consider it a terrible tragedy when human life is cut short, and it always is, for us; but the Holy Innocents remind us that there is a higher viewpoint, a supernatural viewpoint that is more important than mere human or natural considerations. Though they will have screamed and cried at their death, they quickly rejoiced forever in the vision of God’s glory, in the joyous celebrations of all the saints and angels; to them earthly life looks like a mere moment, as it will look to all of us.
Washed in the Blood of the Lamb, the Holy Innocents bask in the light of the beauty of Christ the Savior born in Bethlehem. The sacred liturgy immortalizes their mortal story. We know they are transformed in soul and will be resurrected in their mature bodies — as great a surprise to their mothers as ever a butterfly was, compared to the caterpillar.
Furthermore, they are a prototype for all centuries and especially today. Of course, the cases of abortion make us think of the Holy Innocents, but there are the countless numbers of Christians who are born and then hunted and killed, either physically killed, morally killed, economically killed or socially killed. As the Book of Job so truly warns: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and Our Lord adds: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12) … “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!’” (Matthew 16:24-25).
The Slaughter Continues and Never Ends
Today we honor the sacrifice of the Holy Innocents―and through our honoring of them, and worship of God, we seek to atone for the many sins against human life, beginning with abortion, and including other forms of murder, and euthanasia, disregard for the safety and dignity of others, mistreatment and indifference to the plight of others, and all other sins against life.
Almost immediately after Christmas, we have a feast of unspeakable malicious slaughter, a product of bloodthirsty egotism, the ugly shadow of corrupt politics overshadowing the cradle of Bethlehem—the massacre of the Holy Innocents. God’s Providence and Holy Mother Church’s wisdom has followed upon the birth of our Savior on Earth, with a series of feasts of martyrs, who were born into Heaven. Sadly, our world has still not let itself be redeemed by Christ, and is still waging war against the Christ-child, and is still plotting to suppress Christianity or even kill the King of kings in His Mystical Body—the Church.
This slaughter of Christians is a slaughter that has never ended and will not cease until the world ceases to be. In every century the devil and the world has pursued the Mystical Body of Christ, like Herod with his soldiers, seeking to eradicate what it sees as being a threat to itself.
Following Jesus is Not Fashionable Today
Just as there was no room for Christ at the inn at Bethlehem, so too is there is no room for Christians in our present day society. Just as abortion says there is no room for this or that baby in the lives of the man and woman who selfishly conceived the child, so too is this attitude beginning to pass into the religious realm, where society is increasingly saying there is no room for Christ in our modern-day world. Just as Herod of old tried to kill Christ back then, so too do many modern-day Herods try to kill the Mystical Body of Christ—the members of the Catholic Church—in our present day and age.
Where does human cruelty come from? Surely it grows in us by stages, for most of us are not born with murderous fear of others. It is “bequeathed” to us by others, and we grow it in our heart. Hatred, rooted in fear, is handed on down through the generations, and the murderous inherit a thinking that there are some who are not worthy of their respect and love. Perhaps they are a threat, perhaps their relatives did something in the past. Perhaps they may do something in the future. Herod was clearly a fearful man, so fearful that he was unmoved by the cries of wailing parents, or of suffering infants. His heart had grow cruel through repeated insensitivity inflicted on others, due to raging and irrational fear.
An Old Latin Hymn says, “Crudelis Herodes, Deum Regem venire quid times? Non eripit mortalia, Qui regna dat caelestia” (“Cruel Herod what do you fear in the King and God to come? He seizes not earthly things who gives heavenly kingdoms”). But in the end it IS his fear that drives him.
We know well that Holy Innocents continue to be killed in our world through abortion. And here too, it is most often fear that drives the killing. “How will the baby be afforded?! What changes will this baby bring that I cannot take? Perhaps the prenatal tests show a possible defect. I cannot deal with this! What if my parents know that I am pregnant? How will this pregnancy affect my career?! What if my father finds out I got my girl-friend pregnant!?” And society says, “What of poverty? What of overpopulation? What of deformity? How can we collectively handle all this?”
And thus fear drives the current bloodshed. Fear makes us focus on our self, such that we think too little of what we do to others. Abortion thus becomes an “abstraction,” an “issue” that is debated, a “choice.” Abortion―for many people―is anything but real. The reality of fetal pain is out of sight and thus less real than the fear. What abortion is doing to our world, that too is less real than the fear. It is the fear that is real, and the fear eclipses everything else. And fear desensitizes, and thus the killing of the innocent becomes plausible, a woman’s “choice,” reproductive “freedom.”
The only solution to fear is trust, Faith in God. God alone can set us free from the awful fears that currently drive abortion. We in the Church must be realistic about the fears that many face before the mystery of new life and we must provide reasons for hope and trust. Fear is a cruel task-master and it drives us to do some pretty awful things.
When God was drawing close to liberating his chosen people from slavery in Egypt there occurred the order to murder of the all the baby boys among the Hebrews. It is almost as though Satan sensed that God was up to something good, and Satan raged, through Pharaoh, in murderous anger driven by fear. Thankfully the actual numbers were reduced since the Egyptian midwives engaged in civil disobedience, refusing to allow the practice to continue.
At the time of Jesus, when God was preparing to liberate his people from sin, there also occurred the murder of innocent baby boys. Here too, it is almost as though the Devil sensed that God was up to something good and, he once again raged, this time through Herod, in murderous anger driven by fear. Thankfully too this infanticide also ended at some point.
Notice the pattern. When God prepared a great liberation, the Devil, raging in fear, went after the babies. In our time, on a scale as never before, the Devil is going after our babies in murderous anger driven by fear. What is he afraid of? Is God planning something big in the near future? Is there a great liberation at hand? Is there a great advancement of evangelization and conversion in the offing? We can only speculate. But patterns are patterns and Scripture has a way of repeating its patterns and echoing down through the centuries.
On December 28th, the Catholic Church honors and remembers the Holy Innocents. The Holy Innocents are those Jewish infants who were murdered, by the order of King Herod,
Today, December 28th, we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Innocents, all those young boys in and around Bethlehem, two and under, whom Herod had massacred in order to kill Jesus Christ. Herod feared that a newborn king of the Jews would usurp his throne. “Then Herod perceiving that he was deluded by the wise men, was exceeding angry: and sending killed all the men children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the borders thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men” (Matthew 2:16). We do not know their number or their names, but the Church lists them as among her martyrs.
Martyrs or Not Martyrs?
The martyrdom of the Holy Innocents is a difficult theological problem. There have been those who have argued that the Holy Innocents are not truly martyrs, because martyrdom is an act of virtue and therefore a voluntary act. Yet, infants have not yet reached the age of reason and so they cannot voluntarily lay down their lives for God. They argue that they should be called martyrs since they did not submit freely for the sake of Christ but were “merely victims” of Herod. So it seems that the Holy Innocents are not strictly “martyrs”, since they did not willingly die for the sake of Christ. Nevertheless, the Church has long numbered them in her ranks of martyrs.
St. Augustine says of them: “And while [Herod] thus persecutes Christ, he furnished an army (or martyrs) clothed in white robes of the same age as the Lord…. O blessed infants! He only will doubt of your crown in this your passion for Christ, who doubts that the baptism of Christ has a benefit for infants. He who at His birth had Angels to proclaim Him, the heavens to testify, and Magi to worship Him, could surely have prevented that these should not have died for Him, had He not known that they died not in that death, but rather lived in higher bliss. Far be the thought, that Christ who came to set men free, did nothing to reward those who died in His behalf, when hanging on the cross He prayed for those who put Him to death.” (Serm. 373, 3, quoted in the Catena Aurea).
St. Thomas Aquinas defends the traditional definition of martyrdom as a voluntary act of heroic virtue, wherein a believer dies for Christ. Yet he also defends the Holy Innocents as true martyrs. Here is what St. Thomas thinks: “Some have said that in the case of the Innocents the use of their free will was miraculously accelerated, so that they suffered martyrdom, even voluntarily. Since, however, Scripture contains no proof of this, it is better to say that these babes, in being slain, obtained, by God’s grace, the glory of martyrdom, which others acquire by their own will. For the shedding of one’s blood for Christ’s sake takes the place of Baptism. Wherefore, just as in the case of baptized children the merit of Christ is conducive to the acquisition of glory through the baptismal grace, so in those, who were slain for Christ’s sake, the merit of Christ’s martyrdom is conducive to the acquisition of the martyr’s palm. Hence Augustine says, in a sermon on the Epiphany, as though he were addressing them: ‘A man, that does not believe that children are benefited by the baptism of Christ, will doubt of your being crowned in suffering for Christ. You were not old enough to believe in Christ’s future sufferings, but you had a body wherein you could endure suffering of Christ Who was to suffer’” (Summa Theologica II-II, q. 124, art. 1, ad. 1).
St. Augustine and St. Thomas answer by associating their martyrdom with the Baptism of Blood. The Catholic Church, faithful to Our Lord’s teaching in John 3:3-5, states that no man can be saved without baptism. The Holy Innocents, by their bloody death, received all the benefits of bloody baptism. Their infant souls were regenerated, cleansed of Original Sin, and infused with sanctifying grace.
“Stand-Ins” for Christ
The Holy Innocents were true martyrs who “stood-in” for Christ: they anticipated in their flesh the scourging, the nails, and the spear by which our salvation was wrought, and by which theirs was completed. What a triumphant victory, to have won without fighting, to have rushed ahead into the mystery of the Cross!
By being circumcised into the covenant with Abraham, the Holy Innocents had professed their Faith in the coming Messias, Who had just come into the world. They were spared the bitter test of fallen human life, the risk of mortal sin, the all-too-real possibility of eternal damnation. We consider it a terrible tragedy when human life is cut short, and it always is, for us; but the Holy Innocents remind us that there is a higher viewpoint, a supernatural viewpoint that is more important than mere human or natural considerations. Though they will have screamed and cried at their death, they quickly rejoiced forever in the vision of God’s glory, in the joyous celebrations of all the saints and angels; to them earthly life looks like a mere moment, as it will look to all of us.
Washed in the Blood of the Lamb, the Holy Innocents bask in the light of the beauty of Christ the Savior born in Bethlehem. The sacred liturgy immortalizes their mortal story. We know they are transformed in soul and will be resurrected in their mature bodies — as great a surprise to their mothers as ever a butterfly was, compared to the caterpillar.
Furthermore, they are a prototype for all centuries and especially today. Of course, the cases of abortion make us think of the Holy Innocents, but there are the countless numbers of Christians who are born and then hunted and killed, either physically killed, morally killed, economically killed or socially killed. As the Book of Job so truly warns: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and Our Lord adds: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12) … “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!’” (Matthew 16:24-25).
The Slaughter Continues and Never Ends
Today we honor the sacrifice of the Holy Innocents―and through our honoring of them, and worship of God, we seek to atone for the many sins against human life, beginning with abortion, and including other forms of murder, and euthanasia, disregard for the safety and dignity of others, mistreatment and indifference to the plight of others, and all other sins against life.
Almost immediately after Christmas, we have a feast of unspeakable malicious slaughter, a product of bloodthirsty egotism, the ugly shadow of corrupt politics overshadowing the cradle of Bethlehem—the massacre of the Holy Innocents. God’s Providence and Holy Mother Church’s wisdom has followed upon the birth of our Savior on Earth, with a series of feasts of martyrs, who were born into Heaven. Sadly, our world has still not let itself be redeemed by Christ, and is still waging war against the Christ-child, and is still plotting to suppress Christianity or even kill the King of kings in His Mystical Body—the Church.
This slaughter of Christians is a slaughter that has never ended and will not cease until the world ceases to be. In every century the devil and the world has pursued the Mystical Body of Christ, like Herod with his soldiers, seeking to eradicate what it sees as being a threat to itself.
Following Jesus is Not Fashionable Today
Just as there was no room for Christ at the inn at Bethlehem, so too is there is no room for Christians in our present day society. Just as abortion says there is no room for this or that baby in the lives of the man and woman who selfishly conceived the child, so too is this attitude beginning to pass into the religious realm, where society is increasingly saying there is no room for Christ in our modern-day world. Just as Herod of old tried to kill Christ back then, so too do many modern-day Herods try to kill the Mystical Body of Christ—the members of the Catholic Church—in our present day and age.
Where does human cruelty come from? Surely it grows in us by stages, for most of us are not born with murderous fear of others. It is “bequeathed” to us by others, and we grow it in our heart. Hatred, rooted in fear, is handed on down through the generations, and the murderous inherit a thinking that there are some who are not worthy of their respect and love. Perhaps they are a threat, perhaps their relatives did something in the past. Perhaps they may do something in the future. Herod was clearly a fearful man, so fearful that he was unmoved by the cries of wailing parents, or of suffering infants. His heart had grow cruel through repeated insensitivity inflicted on others, due to raging and irrational fear.
An Old Latin Hymn says, “Crudelis Herodes, Deum Regem venire quid times? Non eripit mortalia, Qui regna dat caelestia” (“Cruel Herod what do you fear in the King and God to come? He seizes not earthly things who gives heavenly kingdoms”). But in the end it IS his fear that drives him.
We know well that Holy Innocents continue to be killed in our world through abortion. And here too, it is most often fear that drives the killing. “How will the baby be afforded?! What changes will this baby bring that I cannot take? Perhaps the prenatal tests show a possible defect. I cannot deal with this! What if my parents know that I am pregnant? How will this pregnancy affect my career?! What if my father finds out I got my girl-friend pregnant!?” And society says, “What of poverty? What of overpopulation? What of deformity? How can we collectively handle all this?”
And thus fear drives the current bloodshed. Fear makes us focus on our self, such that we think too little of what we do to others. Abortion thus becomes an “abstraction,” an “issue” that is debated, a “choice.” Abortion―for many people―is anything but real. The reality of fetal pain is out of sight and thus less real than the fear. What abortion is doing to our world, that too is less real than the fear. It is the fear that is real, and the fear eclipses everything else. And fear desensitizes, and thus the killing of the innocent becomes plausible, a woman’s “choice,” reproductive “freedom.”
The only solution to fear is trust, Faith in God. God alone can set us free from the awful fears that currently drive abortion. We in the Church must be realistic about the fears that many face before the mystery of new life and we must provide reasons for hope and trust. Fear is a cruel task-master and it drives us to do some pretty awful things.
When God was drawing close to liberating his chosen people from slavery in Egypt there occurred the order to murder of the all the baby boys among the Hebrews. It is almost as though Satan sensed that God was up to something good, and Satan raged, through Pharaoh, in murderous anger driven by fear. Thankfully the actual numbers were reduced since the Egyptian midwives engaged in civil disobedience, refusing to allow the practice to continue.
At the time of Jesus, when God was preparing to liberate his people from sin, there also occurred the murder of innocent baby boys. Here too, it is almost as though the Devil sensed that God was up to something good and, he once again raged, this time through Herod, in murderous anger driven by fear. Thankfully too this infanticide also ended at some point.
Notice the pattern. When God prepared a great liberation, the Devil, raging in fear, went after the babies. In our time, on a scale as never before, the Devil is going after our babies in murderous anger driven by fear. What is he afraid of? Is God planning something big in the near future? Is there a great liberation at hand? Is there a great advancement of evangelization and conversion in the offing? We can only speculate. But patterns are patterns and Scripture has a way of repeating its patterns and echoing down through the centuries.
Article 3
Friday, December 27th
Modern Christmas Caveman!
Friday, December 27th
Modern Christmas Caveman!
It’s Amazing What You Can Find in a Cave!
What’s in a cave? Most people have no idea. We speak of cavemen, but have little knowledge of what the realities of living in a cave must be like. Yet Our Lord and God chose a cave for His very first dwelling at the very outset of His life, and, after living in a tiny house for most of His life, He ends His life without having a dwelling, as He says of Himself: “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests―but the Son of man has not where to lay His head” (Matthew 8:20).
Jesus was not the only cave-dweller―many saints have spent years willingly separated from the world in caves throughout the world. Let us look at St. Paul the Hermit and Dan the American: which will show us that literally following Our Lord’s example has not quite gone out of fashion. Then we will look at the possibility of finding ourselves in a cave one day, perhaps not in too distant a future!
Cave-Woman and Cave-Man
Our Lady could be said to be a “cave-woman” in the literal sense of the word―for it is said that her home in Nazareth was part cave and part house, which was the case for many homes in that area―being a hollowed-out cave onto which an exteriorly protruding simple building was built to make it half-cave and half-house. She also gave birth to Christ in a cave. In this sense, she was a ‘cave-woman’ accustomed to living and surviving in caves, so to speak.
The same can be said for her Divine Son―Our Lord Jesus Christ―Who was born in cave/barn/stable; Who shared Our Lady’s “half-cave and half-house” in Nazareth until the age of 30; Who, during His itinerant or wandering Public Ministry would say: “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests: but the son of man hath not where to lay his head!” (Matthew 8:20); and who was, after being crucified on Calvary, was entombed in a cave. Our Lord was in that sense a “Cave-Man”.
Early Christian Cavemen
The Desert Fathers (along with Desert Mothers) were early Christian hermits, ascetics, and monks who lived mainly in the Scetes desert of Egypt, beginning around the third century AD. The most well known was St. Anthony the Great, who moved to the desert in 270–271 and became known as both the father and founder of desert monasticism. By the time Anthony died in 356, thousands of men and women had been drawn to living in the desert as monks and nuns, following St. Anthony’s example—his biographer, St. Athanasius of Alexandria, wrote that “the desert had become a city.”
The desert monastic communities that grew out of the informal gathering of hermit monks became the model for Christian monasticism. St. Paul of Thebes (also known as St. Paul the Hermit) is often credited with being the first hermit monk to go to the desert, and who lived alone in the desert for almost 100 years, from the age of sixteen to one hundred thirteen years of age.
Firstly, let us have a brief look at St. Paul the Hermit (whose feast it was on January 15th) as written by St. Jerome around 375 A.D. as well as the Desert Fathers in general. Then we will look at Dan the Man, or better still Dan the Caveman, an American following Christ’s and Paul’s footsteps in modern-day America. Finally, we will look at some prophecies about the end times, and see what kind of residence they predict we will have.
Paul the Ancient ‘Caveman’
St. Jerome writes: “Paul and his newly married sister were bereaved of both their parents, he being about sixteen years of age. He was heir to a rich inheritance, highly skilled in both Greek and Egyptian learning, gifted with a gentle disposition and a deep love for God. Amid the thunders of persecution he retired to a house at a considerable distance and in a more secluded spot. But to what crimes does not the ‘accursed thirst for gold’ impel the human heart? His brother-in-law conceived the thought of betraying the youth whom he was bound to conceal. Neither a wife’s tears which so often prevail, nor the ties of blood, nor the all-seeing eye of God above him could turn the traitor from his wickedness. ‘He came, he was urgent, he acted with cruelty while seeming only to press the claims of affection.’
“The young man had the tact to understand this, and, conforming his will to the necessity, fled to the mountain wilds to wait for the end of the persecution. He began with easy stages, and repeated halts, to advance into the desert. At length he found a rocky mountain, at the foot of which, closed by a stone, was a cave of no great size. He removed the stone (so eager are men to learn what is hidden), made eager search, and saw within a large hall, open to the sky, but shaded by the wide-spread branches of an ancient palm. The tree, however, did not conceal a fountain of transparent clearness, the waters whereof no sooner gushed forth than the stream was swallowed up in a small opening of the same ground which gave it birth. There were besides in the mountain, which was full of cavities, many habitable places, in which were seen, now rough with rust, anvils and hammers for stamping money. The place, Egyptian writers relate, was a secret mint at the time of Antony’s union with Cleopatra.
“Accordingly, regarding his abode as a gift from God, he fell in love with it, and there in prayer and solitude spent all the rest of his life. The palm afforded him food and clothing. And, that no one may deem this impossible, I call to witness Jesus and His holy angels that I have seen and still see in that part of the desert which lies between Syria and the Saracens’ country, monks of whom one was shut up for thirty years and lived on barley bread and muddy water, while another in an old cistern (called in the country dialect of Syria Gubba) kept himself alive on five dried figs a day. What I relate then is so strange that it will appear incredible to those who do not believe the words that ‘all things are possible to him that believeth!’” (text of St. Jerome).
St. Anthony and the Desert Fathers
Nevertheless, it was St. Anthony the Great who launched the movement that became the Desert Fathers. Sometime around AD 270, Anthony heard a Sunday sermon stating that perfection could be achieved by selling all of one’s possessions, giving the proceeds to the poor, and following Christ (Matthew 19:21). He followed the advice and made the further step of moving deep into the desert to seek complete solitude. The solitude, austerity, and sacrifice of the desert was seen by Anthony as an alternative to martyrdom, which was formerly seen by many Christians as the highest form of sacrifice.
Anthony quickly gained followers eager to live their lives in accordance with this solidarity and separation from material goods. From these prohibitions it is recorded by Athanasius that Anthony received special privileges from God, such as the ability to heal the sick, inspire others to have Faith in healing through God, and even converse with God on occasion. Around this time, desert monasticism appeared nearly simultaneously in several areas, including Egypt and Syria.
Over time, the model of Anthony and other hermits attracted many followers, who lived alone in the desert or in small groups. They chose a life of extreme asceticism, renouncing all the pleasures of the senses, rich food, baths, rest, and anything that made them comfortable. They instead focused their energies on praying, singing psalms, fasting, giving alms to the needy, and preserving love and harmony with one another while keeping their thoughts and desires for God alone. Thousands joined them in the desert, mostly men but also a handful of women. Religious seekers also began going to the desert seeking advice and counsel from the early Desert Fathers.
The Desert Fathers advocated three main approaches to monasticism. The first kind of “monasticism” was the austere life of the hermit, as practiced by Anthony and his followers in lower Egypt. The second kind of “monasticism” was the cenobitic life, communities of monks and nuns in upper Egypt formed by Pachomius. The third kind of “monasticism” was a semi-hermitic lifestyle seen mostly in Nitria, Kellia and Scetis, west of the Nile, begun by St. Amun. The latter were small groups (two to six) of monks or nuns with a common spiritual elder—these separate groups would join together in larger gatherings to worship on Saturdays and Sundays.
Enter the Modern-Day Caveman
We have made idols of “the work of human hands”―especially in our day and age. Man has seemingly created a new “Tower of Babel” which is not just epitomized by the skyward soaring skyscrapers, but is seen in all forms of science and technology. Man has become his own god. God created Adam and Eve (or “AE” for short). The modern god-man has created an artificial man, a robot of sorts, called “Artificial Intelligence” (or “AI” for short). The pride of man is reaching to the heavens! “And they said: ‘Come! Let us make a city and a tower, the top whereof may reach to Heaven! And let us make our name famous before we be scattered abroad into all lands!’ And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of Adam were building!” (Genesis 11:4-5). God will not tolerate any idols in His sight: “And so the Lord scattered them from that place into all lands, and they ceased to build the city. And therefore the name thereof was called Babel―because there the language of the whole Earth was confounded! And, from thence, the Lord scattered them abroad upon the face of all countries!” (Genesis 11:8-9).
Dan the Man or Dan the Caveman
Before we begin with “Dan the Man” or “Dan the Caveman”―there are some caveats or warnings that should be stated. The man that we will be studying is NOT a Catholic, but a PROTESTANT. There is NO WAY THAT PROTESTANTISM IS BEING ADVOCATED OR PRAISED by doing so. It is simply a case of taking the actions and attitudes of a particular person as an example for ourselves―who, as a consequence of having the True Faith (Catholicism), should be doing much better than he or any other Protestant, or even any pagan, is doing. Our Lord did and said the same thing, when taking the worldly as an example for His followers, saying that they were wiser than His followers were: “And the lord commended the unjust steward, forasmuch as he had done wisely―for the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light!” (Luke 16:8). On another occasion, Our Lord takes the example and efforts of His enemies―the Scribes and Pharisees―as a benchmark for His own followers, saying: “For I tell you, that unless your justice abound more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees―you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:20).
So, take what will be written here―not as praise for Protestantism―but more of an example of how much better we should be doing, since we have the True Faith and the grace of God to help us. The following words of Our Lord should be like a scourge or whip upon our backs: “That servant who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. But he that knew not, and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. And unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke12:47-48). We, who have the True Faith, should be producing much more than those who do not have the True Faith. So, with that said, let the story of “Dan the Caveman” be like lashes of a whip upon the backs of our comfortable, worldly, materialistic lives.
Dan Who?
Daniel James Shellabarger is probably a name you have never heard mentioned. He is more commonly known as Daniel Suelo, or simply Suelo, and The Man Who Quit Money. Dan, an American (or Ameridan or A-Merry-Dan), was born in 1961 in Arvada, Colorado, a suburb of Denver. At just 40 years of age, in the fall of 2000, Dan Suelo stopped using money. In 2000, he put his entire life savings in a phone booth, walked away, and has lived moneyless ever since. Most frequently, he lives in the caves and wilderness of Utah where he eats wild vegetation, scavenges road-kill, pulls food from dumpsters, and is sometimes fed by friends and strangers. Daniel proudly boasts that he does not take food stamps or government handouts.
From the fall and winter of 2000, he lived part-time in a cave near Moab, Utah, when he was not wandering the country.
Dan the Caveman quickly became “Dan the Man”―which is an idiom for someone who is seen to be heroic. Dan Suelo (a.k.a. Daniel James Shellabarger) gained fame in the fall of 2009 when his caveman like existence story publicly appeared. He was interviewed for the BBC in September of 2009. Then, in October of 2009 the US magazine Details ran the story on Dan Suelo. In the same month, this story was picked up by news websites such as The Guardian newspaper in the UK, The Huffington Post, and Matador Change. In November of 2009, The Denver Post and the Brazilian INFO in November of 2009 also gave much coverage. His story has since been repeated by many websites and news agencies around the world. Suelo was the subject of a 2006 video profile, entitled Moneyless in Moab, and a 2009 video profile entitled Zero Currency, in addition to being featured on KBYU’s Beehive Stories in 2010.
Penguin Books talked with Dan Suelo about a potential autobiography―but Suelo refused any payment for telling his story―instead, he wanted the book given away for free, which Penguin Books refused to do. Finally, in 2012, a friend of Dan’s, Mark Sundeen, wrote a biography entitled, The Man Who Quit Money. Suelo did not accept any money from this book, but requested that the publishers give away a certain number of copies to people for free, which they did.
After living his “caveman-like” existence for around 16 years―which shows it was no “flash-in-the-pan”―in 2016 Suelo temporarily moved back to his hometown to care for his aging parents, who were around 90 years of age. Currently, his father passed-away, but he is still caring for his mother who is in her nineties as of 2019.
Straight From the Horse’s Mouth
If you want to know the truth―go to the source, and “hear something straight from the horse’s mouth”― meaning that you hear the information from someone who has personal knowledge on the spoken matter. An example in use: “I don’t believe it that he did it! I’m going to go to ask him and hear it straight from the horse’s mouth!” So, let us hear it from the mouth of Dan! Here is what he has said in interviews and on his own website and blog. There is a lot that puts us Catholics to shame―it is truly a case of Our Lord’s “the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light!” (Luke 16:8).
Living-Off People or Living-Off Providence?
Suelo says: “I don’t care for the statement―Daniel proudly boasts that he does not take food stamps or government handouts―because it can be construed that I put myself above those who must take food stamps or government handouts. I don’t judge those who do. I merely mention that I don’t take government assistance for the sake of those who might think I’m living on their tax dollars. I do boast about having few possessions and no money, because it’s ironic fun to boast about nothing special (wild creatures, after all, have few possessions or money and it really feels like no big deal), and to boast about what the rest of our commercial society debases.
“I will add that I do make a small exception to taking government handouts: I use the public library to maintain my blog, website, do emails, and read books. This does cause ire in people searching for loopholes in my lifestyle. In my blog comments, a woman once responded to their anger by declaring that she pays taxes and doesn’t use the library, and that she donates all her library time to me. Then they were quiet!”
Crazy? Who is Really the Crazy One?
Suelo, when told that some people think he is crazy, replies: “A crazy man does not think himself crazy, so my opinion on the matter is meaningless. People will have to judge my sanity for themselves. But it would be nice if we lived in a world that considered it crazy to cause harm to ourselves, others, and our environment, or to praise those who do cause such harm. Then we’d have to say we live in a truly crazy civilization. A sane society would consider it crazy to kill living things and destroy food and water supplies, in order to amass something that nobody can eat or drink, like gold, silver, and money. It’s crazy to sacrifice reality to the idol of illusion.”
Why Don’t Christians Practice What They Preach?
Dan Suelo reveals the religious motivation behind his lifestyle: “My first thought of living moneyless came when I was a child. In my Evangelical Christian upbringing, I wondered why, if we were followers of Jesus, we didn’t practice his teachings―namely, giving up possessions and doing things not for the sake of reward (money and barter), but giving freely and receiving freely. When I left home for college, I studied other religions and found that all the world’s major religions teach giving up possessions and doing things not for the sake of reward. If all the separated witnesses [religions] are saying the same thing, it must be true. Ironically, few practice the one thing they all agree upon in word. What would happen if we actually practiced this stuff, I thought.”
Thinking Naturally
Suelo explains his “Nature Economics”: “My dad also took us camping a lot, and I was a nature freak. I couldn’t help but see how perfectly balanced nature was, and it ran on no money. Why, then, couldn’t we? As an adult, I thought it through more thoroughly. Nature’s economy is a pay-it-forward economy. This means one sows, another reaps, ad infinitum. For example, a bear takes a raspberry, and the raspberry bush demands nothing in return. The Bear takes with zero sense of obligation, zero guilt. The bear then poops somewhere else, not only providing food for soil organisms, but also propagating raspberry seeds. You never see two wild creatures consciously bartering. There are no accountants worrying what the bush will get in return. This is exactly why it works, because nobody knows how it works! There is no consciousness of credit and debt in nature. Consciousness of credit and debt is knowledge of good and evil, valuing one thing and devaluing another. Consciousness of credit and debt is our fall from Grace. Grace means gratis, free gift.
“My next impetus for living moneyless came from observing the world economy and politics. Do our economy and politics function well? It’s self-evident, isn’t it?
“My next impetus for living moneyless was to find authenticity for myself. To do out of one’s heart is to be real. To do for somebody, expecting something from them, is ulterior motivation, which is to not be real, which is to prostitute oneself.
“My last impetus for living moneyless was to heal myself. Okay, I guess I’ll talk about my craziness. To heal myself was to first see myself as crazy, and only them could I become free of craziness. To cling to thoughts is to possess thoughts and this outwardly manifests itself in having unnecessary physical possessions. We accumulate what we don’t need out of fear and anxiety. This is true craziness. Unnecessary thoughts and unnecessary physical possessions (including possessing people) are inextricably linked. To accumulate unnecessary possessions is not to live in abundance, as we’re led to believe, but is to live in scarcity. Why would we have too much stuff if we believed the universe was abundant? Why would we worry if we weren’t crazy? Worry is simply lack of Faith, Faith that everything we need is in the here and now. Faith is eliminating unnecessary thought, trusting that everything we need comes as we need it, whether it is the right thoughts or the right possessions. Faith is being grounded in the Eternal Present. This is the common truth of the world’s religions.
“Most important is that I’ve learned our true nature lives moneyless, giving freely and receiving freely. Even the most staid CEO is human underneath, and gives and receives freely with friends and family. By cultivating this nature in myself, I can see it in others, and it can be cultivated in others. When our real selves are cultivated, the gift economy is cultivated, our unreal selves (based on ulterior motivation) and all the nonsense drops away.
“I have been surprised at the intensely angry reaction thousands of people have had at my living moneyless. It used to bother me, but now I realize that anger doesn’t come from people’s true nature, but from the facade they build up. The facade is threatened by reality. Who wants to hear that the basis of our commercial civilization is an illusion? Money only exists if two or more people believe it exists. Money is not a physical substance, but merely a belief in the head. Money is credit, and credit literally means belief (e.g. credibility). Money is literally a creed, the most agreed-upon creed, or religion, in the world. And which fundamentalists won’t get angry if you question their creed?”
Disasters Restore True Economics and Charity
Dan Suelo says that many people tell him they find him inspiring and his lifestyle, strangely comforting: “As I said, we all live moneyless at our core, in our everyday actions with friends, family, and even strangers. People tell me almost every day that they find living this way inspiring and even comforting. Even if people don’t intend on giving up money, they can still find that it isn’t the end of the world if they lose their money. If you are not religious, it is comforting to be reminded that life has flourished in balance for millions of years without money, and why should it fall apart without money now? Nature evolved you from an amoeboid to a human over millions of years, with zero money, so why should nature give up on you now? How is it that, when natural disasters (tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis) hit towns and cities, people suddenly forget about money and start helping each other? It’s comforting that we have a true nature beneath the falseness and ulterior motivation of commercial civilization.
“And if you are religious, it’s comforting to know there is profound truth at the core of your religion that actually works if you practice it, that it isn’t all a lie. If we don’t practice the core truth of giving up possessions and ulterior motivation that every religion teaches, then of course our religion becomes a destructive lie, as we see all around us.
“People get overwhelmed unless they realize that all the tools they have are here and now, and steps can be taken right here and now. Everybody, no matter how entrenched they are in the money system, can freely give and freely receive. Freely giving and freely receiving is our true nature, is true human-ness. And everybody is human. As I said earlier, it’s about being real, cultivating our true nature, and everything else falls into place, and all the falsehood drops away, no matter what station in life people are in. Even if somebody is totally skeptical about what I am doing, I challenge them to make it their goal to be totally real, with themselves and with every human interaction, and I propose they will then know whether or not I’m living a pipe dream. Somebody once commented that our cities and towns could not function without money. But I say they and the world can’t function right now in the present system.
“Take classic American suburbia, for example. People don’t know their neighbors, and everybody has their own cars, computers, TVs, lawn mowers, washing machines, etc, etc, as well as stockpiles of food and land they could grow food on. All we need is right here, but the only thing that’s holding us back is, not physical reality, but belief, dogma. What if we actually spoke to our neighbors and agreed to share, like we learned in kindergarten and in church? What if we realized we could share cars, computers, washing-machines, have dinners together, etc, which would not only save us expense, but would save expense on the environment, and, as a bonus, put smiles on our lonely faces? Then cities and technology would start serving us, rather than us serving them. But what’s holding us back? Not reality, not scarcity, but only our thinking!
“As far as going all the way and living without money, people often ask me to teach them survival skills. Often I feel like I don’t know many skills, that it’s really about determination and getting up the confidence more than actual skill. Sometimes I tell folks to imagine something really silly: what if somebody offered you a million dollars to live without money for a year? I guarantee most people would figure out how to do it, skilled or no. This is about finding a determination, a motivation greater than a million dollars!
“I now have a strong urge to spread the message. At first I just wanted to live my own life, whether or not anybody else took notice or not. Then I realized a message was erupting in me, that I could no more suppress than an erupting volcano. Our society is not sustainable and we are not only heading rapidly into, but most the world has already reached disaster, due directly to our being trapped by our own beliefs. I want to shout this out to the world. But talk isn’t enough. It must be talk with action, right now.”
Caveman Food?
Asked what he does for food―Dan Suelo answers: “Before I go into details, I’ll say it is best if you don’t think about where or how your food will come. It can be totally different for different people. The secret isn’t knowing where or how your food will come, and never putting your trust in a single source (which could fail tomorrow―but it is simply about having Faith, and letting what you need come automatically. And how can you know if you don’t put it to the test and live by Faith? ‘Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat; nor for your body, what you shall put on. The life is more than the meat, and the body is more than the clothing! Consider the raven― for they sow not, neither do they reap, neither have they storehouse nor barn, and God feeds them. How much are you more valuable than they? And which of you, by taking thought, can add to his stature one cubit? If then ye be not able to do so much as the least thing, why are you solicitous for the rest? Consider the lilies, how they grow―they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed like one of these. Now if God clothes in this manner the grass that is today in the field, and tomorrow is cast into the oven―then how much more you, O ye of little Faith? And seek not you what you shall eat, or what you shall drink: and be not lifted up on high. For all these things do the nations of the world seek. But your Father knows that you have need of these things. But seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!”‘ (Luke 12:22-31).
Freegan Diet
“I freely take what is freely given, with no obligation on either side. I forage for wild, feral, and domestic edibles. I also freely rely on human generosity. I live on waste: dumpster-diving, trash can fishing, table-surfing, and sometimes asking people and food-service institutions for extras and throw-aways. I don’t ask people to give me what they don’t intend to throw out. I also eat road-kill―if it is fresh, of course. I’ve eaten squirrel, raccoon, rabbit, and deer, so far. I’ve also hunted and eaten ants, grubs, grasshoppers, crickets, termites, lizards, snakes, fish, pigeons, and ducks. I think I’d be a vegan if I used money, unless I could hunt. I do not want to support or encourage the animal industry. But I will eat fresh meat thrown in dumpsters. I hope to talk about the ethics of eating meat later.”
Wild & Feral Edibles
“When I’m living near Moab in the Utah desert, I eat lots of wild plants. Plants of the mustard family are almost always edible and found year-round, not only in Moab, but around the US. Watercress is a mustard and plentiful in Utah streams. Then there is globe mallow, with edible leaves even in winter. Globe mallow is related to an edible mallow that grows in towns all over the US, too. Many parts of cat-tail are edible, though only in warmer seasons. Evergreen needles of all kinds (including pines and cedars) are high in vitamin C and other vitamins and minerals and make delicious tea, which I’m constantly drinking. Even high in the mountains you don’t have to worry about vitamin deficiencies if you think to drink delicious pine and cedar teas. I often eat prickly pear cactus pads, raw, through the winter, and prickly pear fruits in the summer. The fruits are delicious and juicy, a lot like kiwi fruit; but you have to scrape off the micro-needles with a stone. Juniper berries are good for spice flavoring when green, roasting for a coffee substitute, and are good eating straight when ripe (brown-purple colored). Wild onions are a winter and early-spring treat. Mormon tea has a little pseudo-fed in it, good for colds, and the bark and buds of trees and shrubs in the willow family (including pussy-willow, cottonwood, aspen, poplar, etc) contain a precursor to aspirin, for pain relief in a tea. Service berries and pinion nuts are a more rare treat.
“When I’m in town, I gather fruits and nuts from orchards, feral trees and bushes―mulberry, apple, peach, apricot, plum, almond, walnut, cherry, grape, and rose-hips. Miniature crab apples are delicious in the winter after they have frozen and dried a bit. Honey locus beans can be a main staple sustaining you all year long. The beans can be eaten raw when green, and when dry must be cooked for a couple hours, like pintos. They are a bit slimy, but high in protein. Some scholars believe that John the Baptist ate honey locust beans rather than locust and wild honey ― “locust and wild honey” possibly being a Scripture mistranslation.”
Hitching & Walking
“Again, I can usually find varieties of mustard anywhere in the US, often year-round. Fennel is common along roadsides near the west coast, as well as amaranth. You can eat both the leaves and the seeds of amaranth. Thistle, related to artichoke, has delicious hearts & young leaves. I glean farmland and orchards for produce and nuts, too. I could go for weeks living on just fruit and nuts on the west coast. I once walked down beach coast of northern California for weeks and lived totally off the land, eating mussels, sea-weed, berries, and shrubbery.
“I lived totally off the land in Alaska twice, eating salmon, berries, and mushrooms. My first time in Alaska, I speared salmon with my friend. My second time in Alaska, I found it was actually easier to catch salmon with my bare hands, very slowly moving my hands with patience.”
Road-Kill & Wasted Animals
“I’ve eaten squirrel, raccoon, rabbit, and deer, so far, and hunted and eaten ants, grubs, grasshoppers, crickets, termites, lizards, snakes, fish, pigeons, and ducks. I can’t, in good conscience, kill animals to eat them if I don’t need to, when there are droves and droves of meats thrown away in dumpsters. It is the ultimate in waste and disrespect when animals live their lives confined in cages, only to be killed and thrown into dumpsters by the tons every day. It is criminal not only for the animals’ sake, but it is criminal when millions of humans on earth are starving.
“Because all we humans know the truth in our hearts, it’s quite ridiculous I have to quote Scripture here to convince many folks what they already know about the ethics of respecting animal life: “A righteous person regards the life of his animal, but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel” (Proverbs 12:10). “The lazy person does not roast what he took in hunting: but the substance of a diligent person is precious” (Proverbs 12:27).”
Tyrants Retaining Their Own Waste
“Often when you are caught at a dumpster by store owners, you are treated with contempt. What if what we considered contemptible and inexcusable were the waste of our society in a world where millions are starving? What if we considered it contemptible and ridiculous to actually lock up this waste (as most corporate dumpsters are) to keep hungry people from eating, and having the gall to act self-righteous in the process? Notice how corporate authorities almost always tell you it is “for your safety”. Notice that tyranny in all its forms all over the world is almost always done “for your safety”, “for your security”. The corporate tyrant is turning the tables to look like the compassionate one, the intelligent one. The tyrant is telling you that you are not smart enough to take care of yourself. Simply because the tyrant is a “have” and you are a “have-not”, somehow makes the tyrant worthy to treat you like a child who can’t take care of yourself.”
“The tyrant is also not speaking his or her own mind, not speaking from the heart, but is speaking a script programmed into him or her by the corporation that is paying him or her. Notice how the tyranny in humans is not from reality, not from human-ness, but is scripted programming, paid programming. A human running from the heart and not from a program is not going to guard a dumpster from the hungry. A human running from the heart has common sense, because he or she is not motivated by dollars and cents, not motivated from fear of losing a job. This is the secret in human relations, learning how to see the human beneath the scripted program, and appealing to that human. Believe it or not, there is actually a human beneath the facade of corporate managers and cops and their lackeys. We all know what it’s like to be a paid employee, compromising who we are―so we don’t lose our jobs. It’s hard. It’s hard for the store manager, for the cop, for us. But overcoming what’s hard―to be authentic― is the whole point of life. Learn how to be totally real, totally sincere, with these robots and, as a result, you learn how to wake up the sleeping human within them. I mean, respect them, as humans. Never respect them as robots. You can love a human. You cannot love a robot―so don’t pretend. Try it! Be bold, be brave, be real! Be wise as a serpent, gentle as a dove.”
What Do You Do For Shelter?
“In the desert, my primary home is a cave in the desert canyon, near Moab, Utah. The latest cave I’ve been staying in is maybe 5 feet wide and 5 feet tall inside and 15 feet back. It has a tear-drop shaped opening, which is part of a crevice in a cliff wall. I cover it with plastic in the winter and it stays fairly warm―even without fire. But I built a little wood heating and cooking stove, out of a large tin, with connected cans as a flue, which takes the smoke out a small hole conveniently above the entrance. Just a couple small sticks will be enough cook a meal and make the cave warm and toasty. The cave is very stealth, hard to find, and doesn’t even look like a cave―even when you’re close by. The entrance is south-facing, high on a ledge―meaning it gets sun most days in the winter. I can sunbathe up there in the dead of winter, while the temperatures are frigid in the canyon below, as well as in town! I usually have a ringtail cat companion―which isn’t really a cat―who periodically tries to move into the cave with me. Ringtails are only seen at night, so I feel privileged seeing such a rare sight. I also usually have a camp or two around town, or on the outskirts of town, a place to crash when I’m feeling lazy or can’t make it back up the canyon at night. In these camps I shelter myself with tarps or abandoned tents that I find.
“When I’m on the road, I camp in random places, including in groves of trees, prairies, farm fields, sheds and abandoned houses. In cities I’ve slept in open spaces, parks, on roofs, and abandoned buildings. On time I camped right by a police station, the least likely place for a cop to look. College campuses are also a great place to camp. I usually carry a tarp and sleeping bag with me when traveling. But I’ve ventured out without tarps, or sleeping bags, or blankets―and have always found everything I needed, like large pieces of plastic or tarps from construction dumpsters and such, and blankets and sleeping bags. Several times I have traveled with a hammock. I can hang a hammock between trees where the ground is not level or wet. And I often hang hammocks high in trees in parks. Most people don’t look up, so I can even sleep stealthily in busy parks this way. Strangers have also offered me a place in their homes. Whether I’ve gone out with a lot or nothing, I’ve never ever found myself lacking shelter and bedding, even at the times I find myself doubting, lacking Faith.
“Friends often offer me their back yards to sleep in. I once spent several months living in a friend’s tree house. I also house-sit. People ask me to house-sit for them, because they need their animals, plants, gardens, and yards cared for, and they don’t want their pipes to freeze in the winter while they’re gone. In all my years of living moneyless, I have never asked for or looked for a house-sit, and I do not advertise my house-sitting services. I often turn down requests for house-sitting, because I often prefer living outdoors. I sleep much better in the fresh air than inside walls, in winter or summer. Some winters I have received house-sits for most of the winter. Some winters I’ve spent the entire winter outdoors. Because of house-sitting, with computers available, I was able to create this website.”
Do You Get Sick from Dumpster & Road-Kill Food & Living in the Cold?
“All I know is I am sick way less often than when I lived with money! Yes―I’ve sometimes gotten a little queasy from being careless―but less so than when I lived a moneyed, sterile life―I can assure you! I’ve been sick and vomiting 3 in 8 years living moneyless. Ironically, the first two times were not from my usual dumpster dine-outs, but the first time when a friend had me over to her house for dinner and the second time when a friend bought me food at a restaurant. The third time I got sick and vomited was when I carelessly ate a poison cactus.
“The immune system is like your muscles. If you don’t exercise it, it will atrophy, and you will get sick more often. If you live too cleanly, you will get weak and sick more often. This should be common sense.
“I never, ever get colds and flu when I live outdoors―even in below-freezing weather. The only times I’ve gotten colds― since I started living this way in 2000―has been when I house-sit. Constantly going from indoors to outdoors, from warm to cold and cold to warm, as well as being in stale indoor air, is hard on the body.
“There is nothing more detrimental to health than worrying about health. I’m not talking about thinking and caring about health―but worrying about health.”
How Long Do You Plan To Live This Way?
“I have taken no vows. I don’t know what tomorrow holds, and I’m open to anything. But the more I live this way, the more absurd it seems to go back to living in the prison of money. I was unhappy under money and I’m happy free of it. Why would I trade happiness for unhappiness again? Why would I trade freedom for slavery?”
On his website, in 2023, Suelo writes: “Since the Spring of 2015, I had to put my life of house-less and moneyless freedom on hold to be a live-in caretaker for my aging parents. My dad finally passed away last February 2016, so now I just care for my mom. With a few exceptions, I still don't take or use money for myself. But I did have to get a state ID, I manage my mom's finances, I pay her bills, and I shop for her, dealing with general bureaucracy. I don't have a driver's license, though I've been offered the gift of a car several times but have refused it. I feel as passionate as ever about a moneyless world, and I hope to return to moneyless living.”
End-Time Cavemen
Throughout the Scriptures, terrible times are forecast for the end of this present age. Isaiah describes the earth “empty and wasted”: “Behold the Lord shall lay waste the earth, and shall strip it, and shall afflict the face thereof, and scatter abroad the inhabitants thereof” (Isaias 24:1).
In the book of Apocalypse we read of an “hour of trial” which shall come upon the whole world to test those who dwell on the earth (Apocalypse 3:10). Jesus, in the Gospel of Matthew, warns us of a “great tribulation” which shall threaten the survival of all life on Earth: “For there shall be then great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be! And unless those days had been shortened, no flesh should be saved: but for the sake of the elect those days shall be shortened!” (Matthew 24:21-22).
The apostle Paul speaks of sudden destruction that shall come just when men are saying “peace and safety.” “For when they shall say, ‘peace and security’; then shall sudden destruction come upon them!” (1 Thessalonians 5:3).
As these verses indicate, the Scriptures (along with current events) make it plain that world conditions will be characterized by chaos, destruction, and death just before our Lord returns to take control of planet earth. In the book of Apocalypse we read of the poisoning of the oceans, the burning up of the grass and the trees, and the sun scorching people with great heat.
The book also tells us that horrible plagues will afflict mankind, that there will be widespread wars and famines, and that the atmosphere will become so polluted as to reduce visibility by one third. In the midst of all this devastation, the earth’s population will flee to the caves, as people cry to the mountains and rocks: “And the stars from heaven fell upon the earth...and every mountain, and the islands were moved out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the princes, and tribunes, and the rich, and the strong, and every bondman, and every freeman, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of mountains” (Apocalypse 6:13-16).
Isaias prophesies something similar: “And they shall go into the holes of rocks, and into the caves of the earth from the face of the fear of the Lord, and from the glory of his majesty, when he shall rise up to strike the Earth” (Isaias 2:19).
“When therefore you shall see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place―he that reads, let him understand. Then they that are in Judea, let them flee to the mountains” (Matthew 24:15-16). St. Hippolytus prophesied: “God will shorten even those days to the period of three years and a half, and He will curtail those times on account of the remnant of those who hide in the mountains and caves” (St. Hippolytus).
Cave Masses
Melanie, one of seers at La Salette, said to the French Father Combe: “The Church will be eclipsed. At first, we will not know which is the true pope. Then secondly, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass will cease to be offered in churches and houses―it will be such that, for a time, there will not be public Masses any more. But I see that the Holy Sacrifice has not really ceased―it will be offered in barns, in alcoves, in caves, and underground.” (Father Combe, The Secret of Melanie and the Actual Crisis, Rome, 1906, p.137).
Cardinal Manning writes: “Rome shall apostatize from the Faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ and return to its ancient paganism. Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible; hidden in catacombs, in dens, in mountains, in lurking places; for a time it shall be swept, as it were from the face of the Earth. Such is the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church.” (Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, The Present Crisis of the Holy See, 1861, pp. 88-90).
Yves DuPont, in his book, Catholic Prophecy, and his many other works on prophecy, wrote in 1970: “Some prophecies seem to warrant the inference that the true Catholic Church will disappear completely for a while as an organization; but although disorganized, it will survive in the persons of the faithful members of the clergy and laity who will go underground.”
This Christmas Season started in a cave, and it looks like we will end up in caves! The important thing is that you do not let your Faith cave-in, no matter what comes!
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings on His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12). Keep the fires of Christmas burning in your heart and soul!
Unto us a Child is born!
Glory to God in the highest!
Peace on Earth to men of good will!
What’s in a cave? Most people have no idea. We speak of cavemen, but have little knowledge of what the realities of living in a cave must be like. Yet Our Lord and God chose a cave for His very first dwelling at the very outset of His life, and, after living in a tiny house for most of His life, He ends His life without having a dwelling, as He says of Himself: “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests―but the Son of man has not where to lay His head” (Matthew 8:20).
Jesus was not the only cave-dweller―many saints have spent years willingly separated from the world in caves throughout the world. Let us look at St. Paul the Hermit and Dan the American: which will show us that literally following Our Lord’s example has not quite gone out of fashion. Then we will look at the possibility of finding ourselves in a cave one day, perhaps not in too distant a future!
Cave-Woman and Cave-Man
Our Lady could be said to be a “cave-woman” in the literal sense of the word―for it is said that her home in Nazareth was part cave and part house, which was the case for many homes in that area―being a hollowed-out cave onto which an exteriorly protruding simple building was built to make it half-cave and half-house. She also gave birth to Christ in a cave. In this sense, she was a ‘cave-woman’ accustomed to living and surviving in caves, so to speak.
The same can be said for her Divine Son―Our Lord Jesus Christ―Who was born in cave/barn/stable; Who shared Our Lady’s “half-cave and half-house” in Nazareth until the age of 30; Who, during His itinerant or wandering Public Ministry would say: “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests: but the son of man hath not where to lay his head!” (Matthew 8:20); and who was, after being crucified on Calvary, was entombed in a cave. Our Lord was in that sense a “Cave-Man”.
Early Christian Cavemen
The Desert Fathers (along with Desert Mothers) were early Christian hermits, ascetics, and monks who lived mainly in the Scetes desert of Egypt, beginning around the third century AD. The most well known was St. Anthony the Great, who moved to the desert in 270–271 and became known as both the father and founder of desert monasticism. By the time Anthony died in 356, thousands of men and women had been drawn to living in the desert as monks and nuns, following St. Anthony’s example—his biographer, St. Athanasius of Alexandria, wrote that “the desert had become a city.”
The desert monastic communities that grew out of the informal gathering of hermit monks became the model for Christian monasticism. St. Paul of Thebes (also known as St. Paul the Hermit) is often credited with being the first hermit monk to go to the desert, and who lived alone in the desert for almost 100 years, from the age of sixteen to one hundred thirteen years of age.
Firstly, let us have a brief look at St. Paul the Hermit (whose feast it was on January 15th) as written by St. Jerome around 375 A.D. as well as the Desert Fathers in general. Then we will look at Dan the Man, or better still Dan the Caveman, an American following Christ’s and Paul’s footsteps in modern-day America. Finally, we will look at some prophecies about the end times, and see what kind of residence they predict we will have.
Paul the Ancient ‘Caveman’
St. Jerome writes: “Paul and his newly married sister were bereaved of both their parents, he being about sixteen years of age. He was heir to a rich inheritance, highly skilled in both Greek and Egyptian learning, gifted with a gentle disposition and a deep love for God. Amid the thunders of persecution he retired to a house at a considerable distance and in a more secluded spot. But to what crimes does not the ‘accursed thirst for gold’ impel the human heart? His brother-in-law conceived the thought of betraying the youth whom he was bound to conceal. Neither a wife’s tears which so often prevail, nor the ties of blood, nor the all-seeing eye of God above him could turn the traitor from his wickedness. ‘He came, he was urgent, he acted with cruelty while seeming only to press the claims of affection.’
“The young man had the tact to understand this, and, conforming his will to the necessity, fled to the mountain wilds to wait for the end of the persecution. He began with easy stages, and repeated halts, to advance into the desert. At length he found a rocky mountain, at the foot of which, closed by a stone, was a cave of no great size. He removed the stone (so eager are men to learn what is hidden), made eager search, and saw within a large hall, open to the sky, but shaded by the wide-spread branches of an ancient palm. The tree, however, did not conceal a fountain of transparent clearness, the waters whereof no sooner gushed forth than the stream was swallowed up in a small opening of the same ground which gave it birth. There were besides in the mountain, which was full of cavities, many habitable places, in which were seen, now rough with rust, anvils and hammers for stamping money. The place, Egyptian writers relate, was a secret mint at the time of Antony’s union with Cleopatra.
“Accordingly, regarding his abode as a gift from God, he fell in love with it, and there in prayer and solitude spent all the rest of his life. The palm afforded him food and clothing. And, that no one may deem this impossible, I call to witness Jesus and His holy angels that I have seen and still see in that part of the desert which lies between Syria and the Saracens’ country, monks of whom one was shut up for thirty years and lived on barley bread and muddy water, while another in an old cistern (called in the country dialect of Syria Gubba) kept himself alive on five dried figs a day. What I relate then is so strange that it will appear incredible to those who do not believe the words that ‘all things are possible to him that believeth!’” (text of St. Jerome).
St. Anthony and the Desert Fathers
Nevertheless, it was St. Anthony the Great who launched the movement that became the Desert Fathers. Sometime around AD 270, Anthony heard a Sunday sermon stating that perfection could be achieved by selling all of one’s possessions, giving the proceeds to the poor, and following Christ (Matthew 19:21). He followed the advice and made the further step of moving deep into the desert to seek complete solitude. The solitude, austerity, and sacrifice of the desert was seen by Anthony as an alternative to martyrdom, which was formerly seen by many Christians as the highest form of sacrifice.
Anthony quickly gained followers eager to live their lives in accordance with this solidarity and separation from material goods. From these prohibitions it is recorded by Athanasius that Anthony received special privileges from God, such as the ability to heal the sick, inspire others to have Faith in healing through God, and even converse with God on occasion. Around this time, desert monasticism appeared nearly simultaneously in several areas, including Egypt and Syria.
Over time, the model of Anthony and other hermits attracted many followers, who lived alone in the desert or in small groups. They chose a life of extreme asceticism, renouncing all the pleasures of the senses, rich food, baths, rest, and anything that made them comfortable. They instead focused their energies on praying, singing psalms, fasting, giving alms to the needy, and preserving love and harmony with one another while keeping their thoughts and desires for God alone. Thousands joined them in the desert, mostly men but also a handful of women. Religious seekers also began going to the desert seeking advice and counsel from the early Desert Fathers.
The Desert Fathers advocated three main approaches to monasticism. The first kind of “monasticism” was the austere life of the hermit, as practiced by Anthony and his followers in lower Egypt. The second kind of “monasticism” was the cenobitic life, communities of monks and nuns in upper Egypt formed by Pachomius. The third kind of “monasticism” was a semi-hermitic lifestyle seen mostly in Nitria, Kellia and Scetis, west of the Nile, begun by St. Amun. The latter were small groups (two to six) of monks or nuns with a common spiritual elder—these separate groups would join together in larger gatherings to worship on Saturdays and Sundays.
Enter the Modern-Day Caveman
We have made idols of “the work of human hands”―especially in our day and age. Man has seemingly created a new “Tower of Babel” which is not just epitomized by the skyward soaring skyscrapers, but is seen in all forms of science and technology. Man has become his own god. God created Adam and Eve (or “AE” for short). The modern god-man has created an artificial man, a robot of sorts, called “Artificial Intelligence” (or “AI” for short). The pride of man is reaching to the heavens! “And they said: ‘Come! Let us make a city and a tower, the top whereof may reach to Heaven! And let us make our name famous before we be scattered abroad into all lands!’ And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of Adam were building!” (Genesis 11:4-5). God will not tolerate any idols in His sight: “And so the Lord scattered them from that place into all lands, and they ceased to build the city. And therefore the name thereof was called Babel―because there the language of the whole Earth was confounded! And, from thence, the Lord scattered them abroad upon the face of all countries!” (Genesis 11:8-9).
Dan the Man or Dan the Caveman
Before we begin with “Dan the Man” or “Dan the Caveman”―there are some caveats or warnings that should be stated. The man that we will be studying is NOT a Catholic, but a PROTESTANT. There is NO WAY THAT PROTESTANTISM IS BEING ADVOCATED OR PRAISED by doing so. It is simply a case of taking the actions and attitudes of a particular person as an example for ourselves―who, as a consequence of having the True Faith (Catholicism), should be doing much better than he or any other Protestant, or even any pagan, is doing. Our Lord did and said the same thing, when taking the worldly as an example for His followers, saying that they were wiser than His followers were: “And the lord commended the unjust steward, forasmuch as he had done wisely―for the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light!” (Luke 16:8). On another occasion, Our Lord takes the example and efforts of His enemies―the Scribes and Pharisees―as a benchmark for His own followers, saying: “For I tell you, that unless your justice abound more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees―you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:20).
So, take what will be written here―not as praise for Protestantism―but more of an example of how much better we should be doing, since we have the True Faith and the grace of God to help us. The following words of Our Lord should be like a scourge or whip upon our backs: “That servant who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. But he that knew not, and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. And unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke12:47-48). We, who have the True Faith, should be producing much more than those who do not have the True Faith. So, with that said, let the story of “Dan the Caveman” be like lashes of a whip upon the backs of our comfortable, worldly, materialistic lives.
Dan Who?
Daniel James Shellabarger is probably a name you have never heard mentioned. He is more commonly known as Daniel Suelo, or simply Suelo, and The Man Who Quit Money. Dan, an American (or Ameridan or A-Merry-Dan), was born in 1961 in Arvada, Colorado, a suburb of Denver. At just 40 years of age, in the fall of 2000, Dan Suelo stopped using money. In 2000, he put his entire life savings in a phone booth, walked away, and has lived moneyless ever since. Most frequently, he lives in the caves and wilderness of Utah where he eats wild vegetation, scavenges road-kill, pulls food from dumpsters, and is sometimes fed by friends and strangers. Daniel proudly boasts that he does not take food stamps or government handouts.
From the fall and winter of 2000, he lived part-time in a cave near Moab, Utah, when he was not wandering the country.
Dan the Caveman quickly became “Dan the Man”―which is an idiom for someone who is seen to be heroic. Dan Suelo (a.k.a. Daniel James Shellabarger) gained fame in the fall of 2009 when his caveman like existence story publicly appeared. He was interviewed for the BBC in September of 2009. Then, in October of 2009 the US magazine Details ran the story on Dan Suelo. In the same month, this story was picked up by news websites such as The Guardian newspaper in the UK, The Huffington Post, and Matador Change. In November of 2009, The Denver Post and the Brazilian INFO in November of 2009 also gave much coverage. His story has since been repeated by many websites and news agencies around the world. Suelo was the subject of a 2006 video profile, entitled Moneyless in Moab, and a 2009 video profile entitled Zero Currency, in addition to being featured on KBYU’s Beehive Stories in 2010.
Penguin Books talked with Dan Suelo about a potential autobiography―but Suelo refused any payment for telling his story―instead, he wanted the book given away for free, which Penguin Books refused to do. Finally, in 2012, a friend of Dan’s, Mark Sundeen, wrote a biography entitled, The Man Who Quit Money. Suelo did not accept any money from this book, but requested that the publishers give away a certain number of copies to people for free, which they did.
After living his “caveman-like” existence for around 16 years―which shows it was no “flash-in-the-pan”―in 2016 Suelo temporarily moved back to his hometown to care for his aging parents, who were around 90 years of age. Currently, his father passed-away, but he is still caring for his mother who is in her nineties as of 2019.
Straight From the Horse’s Mouth
If you want to know the truth―go to the source, and “hear something straight from the horse’s mouth”― meaning that you hear the information from someone who has personal knowledge on the spoken matter. An example in use: “I don’t believe it that he did it! I’m going to go to ask him and hear it straight from the horse’s mouth!” So, let us hear it from the mouth of Dan! Here is what he has said in interviews and on his own website and blog. There is a lot that puts us Catholics to shame―it is truly a case of Our Lord’s “the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light!” (Luke 16:8).
Living-Off People or Living-Off Providence?
Suelo says: “I don’t care for the statement―Daniel proudly boasts that he does not take food stamps or government handouts―because it can be construed that I put myself above those who must take food stamps or government handouts. I don’t judge those who do. I merely mention that I don’t take government assistance for the sake of those who might think I’m living on their tax dollars. I do boast about having few possessions and no money, because it’s ironic fun to boast about nothing special (wild creatures, after all, have few possessions or money and it really feels like no big deal), and to boast about what the rest of our commercial society debases.
“I will add that I do make a small exception to taking government handouts: I use the public library to maintain my blog, website, do emails, and read books. This does cause ire in people searching for loopholes in my lifestyle. In my blog comments, a woman once responded to their anger by declaring that she pays taxes and doesn’t use the library, and that she donates all her library time to me. Then they were quiet!”
Crazy? Who is Really the Crazy One?
Suelo, when told that some people think he is crazy, replies: “A crazy man does not think himself crazy, so my opinion on the matter is meaningless. People will have to judge my sanity for themselves. But it would be nice if we lived in a world that considered it crazy to cause harm to ourselves, others, and our environment, or to praise those who do cause such harm. Then we’d have to say we live in a truly crazy civilization. A sane society would consider it crazy to kill living things and destroy food and water supplies, in order to amass something that nobody can eat or drink, like gold, silver, and money. It’s crazy to sacrifice reality to the idol of illusion.”
Why Don’t Christians Practice What They Preach?
Dan Suelo reveals the religious motivation behind his lifestyle: “My first thought of living moneyless came when I was a child. In my Evangelical Christian upbringing, I wondered why, if we were followers of Jesus, we didn’t practice his teachings―namely, giving up possessions and doing things not for the sake of reward (money and barter), but giving freely and receiving freely. When I left home for college, I studied other religions and found that all the world’s major religions teach giving up possessions and doing things not for the sake of reward. If all the separated witnesses [religions] are saying the same thing, it must be true. Ironically, few practice the one thing they all agree upon in word. What would happen if we actually practiced this stuff, I thought.”
Thinking Naturally
Suelo explains his “Nature Economics”: “My dad also took us camping a lot, and I was a nature freak. I couldn’t help but see how perfectly balanced nature was, and it ran on no money. Why, then, couldn’t we? As an adult, I thought it through more thoroughly. Nature’s economy is a pay-it-forward economy. This means one sows, another reaps, ad infinitum. For example, a bear takes a raspberry, and the raspberry bush demands nothing in return. The Bear takes with zero sense of obligation, zero guilt. The bear then poops somewhere else, not only providing food for soil organisms, but also propagating raspberry seeds. You never see two wild creatures consciously bartering. There are no accountants worrying what the bush will get in return. This is exactly why it works, because nobody knows how it works! There is no consciousness of credit and debt in nature. Consciousness of credit and debt is knowledge of good and evil, valuing one thing and devaluing another. Consciousness of credit and debt is our fall from Grace. Grace means gratis, free gift.
“My next impetus for living moneyless came from observing the world economy and politics. Do our economy and politics function well? It’s self-evident, isn’t it?
“My next impetus for living moneyless was to find authenticity for myself. To do out of one’s heart is to be real. To do for somebody, expecting something from them, is ulterior motivation, which is to not be real, which is to prostitute oneself.
“My last impetus for living moneyless was to heal myself. Okay, I guess I’ll talk about my craziness. To heal myself was to first see myself as crazy, and only them could I become free of craziness. To cling to thoughts is to possess thoughts and this outwardly manifests itself in having unnecessary physical possessions. We accumulate what we don’t need out of fear and anxiety. This is true craziness. Unnecessary thoughts and unnecessary physical possessions (including possessing people) are inextricably linked. To accumulate unnecessary possessions is not to live in abundance, as we’re led to believe, but is to live in scarcity. Why would we have too much stuff if we believed the universe was abundant? Why would we worry if we weren’t crazy? Worry is simply lack of Faith, Faith that everything we need is in the here and now. Faith is eliminating unnecessary thought, trusting that everything we need comes as we need it, whether it is the right thoughts or the right possessions. Faith is being grounded in the Eternal Present. This is the common truth of the world’s religions.
“Most important is that I’ve learned our true nature lives moneyless, giving freely and receiving freely. Even the most staid CEO is human underneath, and gives and receives freely with friends and family. By cultivating this nature in myself, I can see it in others, and it can be cultivated in others. When our real selves are cultivated, the gift economy is cultivated, our unreal selves (based on ulterior motivation) and all the nonsense drops away.
“I have been surprised at the intensely angry reaction thousands of people have had at my living moneyless. It used to bother me, but now I realize that anger doesn’t come from people’s true nature, but from the facade they build up. The facade is threatened by reality. Who wants to hear that the basis of our commercial civilization is an illusion? Money only exists if two or more people believe it exists. Money is not a physical substance, but merely a belief in the head. Money is credit, and credit literally means belief (e.g. credibility). Money is literally a creed, the most agreed-upon creed, or religion, in the world. And which fundamentalists won’t get angry if you question their creed?”
Disasters Restore True Economics and Charity
Dan Suelo says that many people tell him they find him inspiring and his lifestyle, strangely comforting: “As I said, we all live moneyless at our core, in our everyday actions with friends, family, and even strangers. People tell me almost every day that they find living this way inspiring and even comforting. Even if people don’t intend on giving up money, they can still find that it isn’t the end of the world if they lose their money. If you are not religious, it is comforting to be reminded that life has flourished in balance for millions of years without money, and why should it fall apart without money now? Nature evolved you from an amoeboid to a human over millions of years, with zero money, so why should nature give up on you now? How is it that, when natural disasters (tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis) hit towns and cities, people suddenly forget about money and start helping each other? It’s comforting that we have a true nature beneath the falseness and ulterior motivation of commercial civilization.
“And if you are religious, it’s comforting to know there is profound truth at the core of your religion that actually works if you practice it, that it isn’t all a lie. If we don’t practice the core truth of giving up possessions and ulterior motivation that every religion teaches, then of course our religion becomes a destructive lie, as we see all around us.
“People get overwhelmed unless they realize that all the tools they have are here and now, and steps can be taken right here and now. Everybody, no matter how entrenched they are in the money system, can freely give and freely receive. Freely giving and freely receiving is our true nature, is true human-ness. And everybody is human. As I said earlier, it’s about being real, cultivating our true nature, and everything else falls into place, and all the falsehood drops away, no matter what station in life people are in. Even if somebody is totally skeptical about what I am doing, I challenge them to make it their goal to be totally real, with themselves and with every human interaction, and I propose they will then know whether or not I’m living a pipe dream. Somebody once commented that our cities and towns could not function without money. But I say they and the world can’t function right now in the present system.
“Take classic American suburbia, for example. People don’t know their neighbors, and everybody has their own cars, computers, TVs, lawn mowers, washing machines, etc, etc, as well as stockpiles of food and land they could grow food on. All we need is right here, but the only thing that’s holding us back is, not physical reality, but belief, dogma. What if we actually spoke to our neighbors and agreed to share, like we learned in kindergarten and in church? What if we realized we could share cars, computers, washing-machines, have dinners together, etc, which would not only save us expense, but would save expense on the environment, and, as a bonus, put smiles on our lonely faces? Then cities and technology would start serving us, rather than us serving them. But what’s holding us back? Not reality, not scarcity, but only our thinking!
“As far as going all the way and living without money, people often ask me to teach them survival skills. Often I feel like I don’t know many skills, that it’s really about determination and getting up the confidence more than actual skill. Sometimes I tell folks to imagine something really silly: what if somebody offered you a million dollars to live without money for a year? I guarantee most people would figure out how to do it, skilled or no. This is about finding a determination, a motivation greater than a million dollars!
“I now have a strong urge to spread the message. At first I just wanted to live my own life, whether or not anybody else took notice or not. Then I realized a message was erupting in me, that I could no more suppress than an erupting volcano. Our society is not sustainable and we are not only heading rapidly into, but most the world has already reached disaster, due directly to our being trapped by our own beliefs. I want to shout this out to the world. But talk isn’t enough. It must be talk with action, right now.”
Caveman Food?
Asked what he does for food―Dan Suelo answers: “Before I go into details, I’ll say it is best if you don’t think about where or how your food will come. It can be totally different for different people. The secret isn’t knowing where or how your food will come, and never putting your trust in a single source (which could fail tomorrow―but it is simply about having Faith, and letting what you need come automatically. And how can you know if you don’t put it to the test and live by Faith? ‘Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat; nor for your body, what you shall put on. The life is more than the meat, and the body is more than the clothing! Consider the raven― for they sow not, neither do they reap, neither have they storehouse nor barn, and God feeds them. How much are you more valuable than they? And which of you, by taking thought, can add to his stature one cubit? If then ye be not able to do so much as the least thing, why are you solicitous for the rest? Consider the lilies, how they grow―they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed like one of these. Now if God clothes in this manner the grass that is today in the field, and tomorrow is cast into the oven―then how much more you, O ye of little Faith? And seek not you what you shall eat, or what you shall drink: and be not lifted up on high. For all these things do the nations of the world seek. But your Father knows that you have need of these things. But seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!”‘ (Luke 12:22-31).
Freegan Diet
“I freely take what is freely given, with no obligation on either side. I forage for wild, feral, and domestic edibles. I also freely rely on human generosity. I live on waste: dumpster-diving, trash can fishing, table-surfing, and sometimes asking people and food-service institutions for extras and throw-aways. I don’t ask people to give me what they don’t intend to throw out. I also eat road-kill―if it is fresh, of course. I’ve eaten squirrel, raccoon, rabbit, and deer, so far. I’ve also hunted and eaten ants, grubs, grasshoppers, crickets, termites, lizards, snakes, fish, pigeons, and ducks. I think I’d be a vegan if I used money, unless I could hunt. I do not want to support or encourage the animal industry. But I will eat fresh meat thrown in dumpsters. I hope to talk about the ethics of eating meat later.”
Wild & Feral Edibles
“When I’m living near Moab in the Utah desert, I eat lots of wild plants. Plants of the mustard family are almost always edible and found year-round, not only in Moab, but around the US. Watercress is a mustard and plentiful in Utah streams. Then there is globe mallow, with edible leaves even in winter. Globe mallow is related to an edible mallow that grows in towns all over the US, too. Many parts of cat-tail are edible, though only in warmer seasons. Evergreen needles of all kinds (including pines and cedars) are high in vitamin C and other vitamins and minerals and make delicious tea, which I’m constantly drinking. Even high in the mountains you don’t have to worry about vitamin deficiencies if you think to drink delicious pine and cedar teas. I often eat prickly pear cactus pads, raw, through the winter, and prickly pear fruits in the summer. The fruits are delicious and juicy, a lot like kiwi fruit; but you have to scrape off the micro-needles with a stone. Juniper berries are good for spice flavoring when green, roasting for a coffee substitute, and are good eating straight when ripe (brown-purple colored). Wild onions are a winter and early-spring treat. Mormon tea has a little pseudo-fed in it, good for colds, and the bark and buds of trees and shrubs in the willow family (including pussy-willow, cottonwood, aspen, poplar, etc) contain a precursor to aspirin, for pain relief in a tea. Service berries and pinion nuts are a more rare treat.
“When I’m in town, I gather fruits and nuts from orchards, feral trees and bushes―mulberry, apple, peach, apricot, plum, almond, walnut, cherry, grape, and rose-hips. Miniature crab apples are delicious in the winter after they have frozen and dried a bit. Honey locus beans can be a main staple sustaining you all year long. The beans can be eaten raw when green, and when dry must be cooked for a couple hours, like pintos. They are a bit slimy, but high in protein. Some scholars believe that John the Baptist ate honey locust beans rather than locust and wild honey ― “locust and wild honey” possibly being a Scripture mistranslation.”
Hitching & Walking
“Again, I can usually find varieties of mustard anywhere in the US, often year-round. Fennel is common along roadsides near the west coast, as well as amaranth. You can eat both the leaves and the seeds of amaranth. Thistle, related to artichoke, has delicious hearts & young leaves. I glean farmland and orchards for produce and nuts, too. I could go for weeks living on just fruit and nuts on the west coast. I once walked down beach coast of northern California for weeks and lived totally off the land, eating mussels, sea-weed, berries, and shrubbery.
“I lived totally off the land in Alaska twice, eating salmon, berries, and mushrooms. My first time in Alaska, I speared salmon with my friend. My second time in Alaska, I found it was actually easier to catch salmon with my bare hands, very slowly moving my hands with patience.”
Road-Kill & Wasted Animals
“I’ve eaten squirrel, raccoon, rabbit, and deer, so far, and hunted and eaten ants, grubs, grasshoppers, crickets, termites, lizards, snakes, fish, pigeons, and ducks. I can’t, in good conscience, kill animals to eat them if I don’t need to, when there are droves and droves of meats thrown away in dumpsters. It is the ultimate in waste and disrespect when animals live their lives confined in cages, only to be killed and thrown into dumpsters by the tons every day. It is criminal not only for the animals’ sake, but it is criminal when millions of humans on earth are starving.
“Because all we humans know the truth in our hearts, it’s quite ridiculous I have to quote Scripture here to convince many folks what they already know about the ethics of respecting animal life: “A righteous person regards the life of his animal, but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel” (Proverbs 12:10). “The lazy person does not roast what he took in hunting: but the substance of a diligent person is precious” (Proverbs 12:27).”
Tyrants Retaining Their Own Waste
“Often when you are caught at a dumpster by store owners, you are treated with contempt. What if what we considered contemptible and inexcusable were the waste of our society in a world where millions are starving? What if we considered it contemptible and ridiculous to actually lock up this waste (as most corporate dumpsters are) to keep hungry people from eating, and having the gall to act self-righteous in the process? Notice how corporate authorities almost always tell you it is “for your safety”. Notice that tyranny in all its forms all over the world is almost always done “for your safety”, “for your security”. The corporate tyrant is turning the tables to look like the compassionate one, the intelligent one. The tyrant is telling you that you are not smart enough to take care of yourself. Simply because the tyrant is a “have” and you are a “have-not”, somehow makes the tyrant worthy to treat you like a child who can’t take care of yourself.”
“The tyrant is also not speaking his or her own mind, not speaking from the heart, but is speaking a script programmed into him or her by the corporation that is paying him or her. Notice how the tyranny in humans is not from reality, not from human-ness, but is scripted programming, paid programming. A human running from the heart and not from a program is not going to guard a dumpster from the hungry. A human running from the heart has common sense, because he or she is not motivated by dollars and cents, not motivated from fear of losing a job. This is the secret in human relations, learning how to see the human beneath the scripted program, and appealing to that human. Believe it or not, there is actually a human beneath the facade of corporate managers and cops and their lackeys. We all know what it’s like to be a paid employee, compromising who we are―so we don’t lose our jobs. It’s hard. It’s hard for the store manager, for the cop, for us. But overcoming what’s hard―to be authentic― is the whole point of life. Learn how to be totally real, totally sincere, with these robots and, as a result, you learn how to wake up the sleeping human within them. I mean, respect them, as humans. Never respect them as robots. You can love a human. You cannot love a robot―so don’t pretend. Try it! Be bold, be brave, be real! Be wise as a serpent, gentle as a dove.”
What Do You Do For Shelter?
“In the desert, my primary home is a cave in the desert canyon, near Moab, Utah. The latest cave I’ve been staying in is maybe 5 feet wide and 5 feet tall inside and 15 feet back. It has a tear-drop shaped opening, which is part of a crevice in a cliff wall. I cover it with plastic in the winter and it stays fairly warm―even without fire. But I built a little wood heating and cooking stove, out of a large tin, with connected cans as a flue, which takes the smoke out a small hole conveniently above the entrance. Just a couple small sticks will be enough cook a meal and make the cave warm and toasty. The cave is very stealth, hard to find, and doesn’t even look like a cave―even when you’re close by. The entrance is south-facing, high on a ledge―meaning it gets sun most days in the winter. I can sunbathe up there in the dead of winter, while the temperatures are frigid in the canyon below, as well as in town! I usually have a ringtail cat companion―which isn’t really a cat―who periodically tries to move into the cave with me. Ringtails are only seen at night, so I feel privileged seeing such a rare sight. I also usually have a camp or two around town, or on the outskirts of town, a place to crash when I’m feeling lazy or can’t make it back up the canyon at night. In these camps I shelter myself with tarps or abandoned tents that I find.
“When I’m on the road, I camp in random places, including in groves of trees, prairies, farm fields, sheds and abandoned houses. In cities I’ve slept in open spaces, parks, on roofs, and abandoned buildings. On time I camped right by a police station, the least likely place for a cop to look. College campuses are also a great place to camp. I usually carry a tarp and sleeping bag with me when traveling. But I’ve ventured out without tarps, or sleeping bags, or blankets―and have always found everything I needed, like large pieces of plastic or tarps from construction dumpsters and such, and blankets and sleeping bags. Several times I have traveled with a hammock. I can hang a hammock between trees where the ground is not level or wet. And I often hang hammocks high in trees in parks. Most people don’t look up, so I can even sleep stealthily in busy parks this way. Strangers have also offered me a place in their homes. Whether I’ve gone out with a lot or nothing, I’ve never ever found myself lacking shelter and bedding, even at the times I find myself doubting, lacking Faith.
“Friends often offer me their back yards to sleep in. I once spent several months living in a friend’s tree house. I also house-sit. People ask me to house-sit for them, because they need their animals, plants, gardens, and yards cared for, and they don’t want their pipes to freeze in the winter while they’re gone. In all my years of living moneyless, I have never asked for or looked for a house-sit, and I do not advertise my house-sitting services. I often turn down requests for house-sitting, because I often prefer living outdoors. I sleep much better in the fresh air than inside walls, in winter or summer. Some winters I have received house-sits for most of the winter. Some winters I’ve spent the entire winter outdoors. Because of house-sitting, with computers available, I was able to create this website.”
Do You Get Sick from Dumpster & Road-Kill Food & Living in the Cold?
“All I know is I am sick way less often than when I lived with money! Yes―I’ve sometimes gotten a little queasy from being careless―but less so than when I lived a moneyed, sterile life―I can assure you! I’ve been sick and vomiting 3 in 8 years living moneyless. Ironically, the first two times were not from my usual dumpster dine-outs, but the first time when a friend had me over to her house for dinner and the second time when a friend bought me food at a restaurant. The third time I got sick and vomited was when I carelessly ate a poison cactus.
“The immune system is like your muscles. If you don’t exercise it, it will atrophy, and you will get sick more often. If you live too cleanly, you will get weak and sick more often. This should be common sense.
“I never, ever get colds and flu when I live outdoors―even in below-freezing weather. The only times I’ve gotten colds― since I started living this way in 2000―has been when I house-sit. Constantly going from indoors to outdoors, from warm to cold and cold to warm, as well as being in stale indoor air, is hard on the body.
“There is nothing more detrimental to health than worrying about health. I’m not talking about thinking and caring about health―but worrying about health.”
How Long Do You Plan To Live This Way?
“I have taken no vows. I don’t know what tomorrow holds, and I’m open to anything. But the more I live this way, the more absurd it seems to go back to living in the prison of money. I was unhappy under money and I’m happy free of it. Why would I trade happiness for unhappiness again? Why would I trade freedom for slavery?”
On his website, in 2023, Suelo writes: “Since the Spring of 2015, I had to put my life of house-less and moneyless freedom on hold to be a live-in caretaker for my aging parents. My dad finally passed away last February 2016, so now I just care for my mom. With a few exceptions, I still don't take or use money for myself. But I did have to get a state ID, I manage my mom's finances, I pay her bills, and I shop for her, dealing with general bureaucracy. I don't have a driver's license, though I've been offered the gift of a car several times but have refused it. I feel as passionate as ever about a moneyless world, and I hope to return to moneyless living.”
End-Time Cavemen
Throughout the Scriptures, terrible times are forecast for the end of this present age. Isaiah describes the earth “empty and wasted”: “Behold the Lord shall lay waste the earth, and shall strip it, and shall afflict the face thereof, and scatter abroad the inhabitants thereof” (Isaias 24:1).
In the book of Apocalypse we read of an “hour of trial” which shall come upon the whole world to test those who dwell on the earth (Apocalypse 3:10). Jesus, in the Gospel of Matthew, warns us of a “great tribulation” which shall threaten the survival of all life on Earth: “For there shall be then great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be! And unless those days had been shortened, no flesh should be saved: but for the sake of the elect those days shall be shortened!” (Matthew 24:21-22).
The apostle Paul speaks of sudden destruction that shall come just when men are saying “peace and safety.” “For when they shall say, ‘peace and security’; then shall sudden destruction come upon them!” (1 Thessalonians 5:3).
As these verses indicate, the Scriptures (along with current events) make it plain that world conditions will be characterized by chaos, destruction, and death just before our Lord returns to take control of planet earth. In the book of Apocalypse we read of the poisoning of the oceans, the burning up of the grass and the trees, and the sun scorching people with great heat.
The book also tells us that horrible plagues will afflict mankind, that there will be widespread wars and famines, and that the atmosphere will become so polluted as to reduce visibility by one third. In the midst of all this devastation, the earth’s population will flee to the caves, as people cry to the mountains and rocks: “And the stars from heaven fell upon the earth...and every mountain, and the islands were moved out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the princes, and tribunes, and the rich, and the strong, and every bondman, and every freeman, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of mountains” (Apocalypse 6:13-16).
Isaias prophesies something similar: “And they shall go into the holes of rocks, and into the caves of the earth from the face of the fear of the Lord, and from the glory of his majesty, when he shall rise up to strike the Earth” (Isaias 2:19).
“When therefore you shall see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place―he that reads, let him understand. Then they that are in Judea, let them flee to the mountains” (Matthew 24:15-16). St. Hippolytus prophesied: “God will shorten even those days to the period of three years and a half, and He will curtail those times on account of the remnant of those who hide in the mountains and caves” (St. Hippolytus).
Cave Masses
Melanie, one of seers at La Salette, said to the French Father Combe: “The Church will be eclipsed. At first, we will not know which is the true pope. Then secondly, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass will cease to be offered in churches and houses―it will be such that, for a time, there will not be public Masses any more. But I see that the Holy Sacrifice has not really ceased―it will be offered in barns, in alcoves, in caves, and underground.” (Father Combe, The Secret of Melanie and the Actual Crisis, Rome, 1906, p.137).
Cardinal Manning writes: “Rome shall apostatize from the Faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ and return to its ancient paganism. Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible; hidden in catacombs, in dens, in mountains, in lurking places; for a time it shall be swept, as it were from the face of the Earth. Such is the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church.” (Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, The Present Crisis of the Holy See, 1861, pp. 88-90).
Yves DuPont, in his book, Catholic Prophecy, and his many other works on prophecy, wrote in 1970: “Some prophecies seem to warrant the inference that the true Catholic Church will disappear completely for a while as an organization; but although disorganized, it will survive in the persons of the faithful members of the clergy and laity who will go underground.”
This Christmas Season started in a cave, and it looks like we will end up in caves! The important thing is that you do not let your Faith cave-in, no matter what comes!
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings on His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12). Keep the fires of Christmas burning in your heart and soul!
Unto us a Child is born!
Glory to God in the highest!
Peace on Earth to men of good will!
Article 2
Thursday, December 26th
Bloody Christmas!
Thursday, December 26th
Bloody Christmas!
Party-Pooper Church
When we compare the Christmas of the worldly-minded to the Christmas mind of the Church, the latter looks like a ‘party-pooper’ compared to former fun-loving, ‘anything-goes’, carefree world! When we take a quick scan of the table of goodies prepared for us by the world, they look much more appetizing than what the Church dishes up! The world’s dishes are nothing but sweetness, while the dishes served by the Church—even though many are sweet—have a tinge of sourness or bitterness or a pungency to them!
Sweet and Sour Serving
A brief selection of extracts from the Christmas liturgy sours our sweet palate and irritates our sweet-tooth! We keep finding small irritating fish-bones, grape seeds, olive pits or cherry stones―all of which seem to spoil the enjoyment of the fish or fruit. These are some of the bones, seeds, pits and stones that the Church refuses to take out of the food She serves us over the Christmas festivities:
“Our Lord―Who is the destroyer of sin and of death― is come to make all free” … “The wickedness of the Earth shall be destroyed and the Savior of the world will rule over us” … “He shall save His people from their sins” … and “set us free, whom the old bondage holds under the yoke of sin” – but we like some of our sins! We like some of the wickedness of the world! We don’t really want to be freed from these—especially the Venial Sins, for they say that we won’t go to Hell because of them! “Our Savior has appeared to all men; instructing us, that, denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world”—“But I don’t want to be sober all the time, I don’t want to be drunk, but I like being ‘tipsy’!”, say many.
Honest Mother
Holy Mother Church, like any good mother, is uncompromising when it comes to the good of Her children. She tells the Christmas Story as it really is, and does not embellish it or disguise it or lace it with unnecessary sugary sweetness. Celebrate we must—for as Pope St. Leo the Great says in his Christmas homily, “It would be unlawful for any man to refuse to partake in our rejoicing”—yet, at the same time, we must realize why it is that we are celebrating! We rejoice because Christ comes, with His power and grace, to help us change our lives for the better; to help us cut ourselves free from the bondage of sin; to help us detach ourselves from this world and to attach ourselves more to heavenly things:
“Seek ye first the Kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31) … “Seek the things that are above” (Colossians 3:1) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21). “The Lord hath looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God” (Psalm 13:2). The whole point of Christmas is that Jesus becomes man, in order to make us like unto God: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). “You shall be holy men to Me!” (Exodus 22:31). “For I am the Lord your God! Be holy because I am holy! Defile not your souls by any thing … upon the Earth” (Leviticus 11:44).
The ‘Bloody’ Mind of the Church
Dom Guéranger, in the Christmas volume of his Liturgical Year, writes: “We have so much to learn from the mystery of the Sacred Infancy, we shall be in strict accordance with the spirit of the Church if, whilst assisting at Mass, we keep before our minds, not only the bleeding Victim of Calvary, but likewise the sweet Lamb of Bethlehem. Moreover, does not our Jesus offer Himself for us to his Father from His Crib as well as from His Cross? … Then let us go to Him, that we may know Him; let us know Him, that we may love Him; let us love Him, that we may grow like Him. What He demands of us by this Christmas mystery is that we become, like Him―little children.”
Yet to love Him, means to lay down our life for Him—whether that be bloodily or bloodlessly. He Himself said: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). The Gospels repeatedly quote Our Lord saying that we must “lose” our life in this world for His sake: “For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:25) … “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35) … “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it!” (Luke 9:24) … “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it!” (Luke 17:33).
In our current culture, the emphasis is on the preservation of youth and bodily life, the concept of martyrdom does seem foreign.
Divine Providence Arranges All Things
Nothing happens by chance—even Our Lord said: “Fear ye not them that kill the body, and are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? And not one of them shall fall on the ground without your Father” (Matthew 10:28-29).
In that masterpiece of a book, Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, we read: “Nothing happens in the universe without God willing and allowing it. This statement must be taken absolutely of everything with the exception of sin. ‘Nothing occurs by chance in the whole course of our lives’ is the unanimous teaching of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, ‘and God intervenes everywhere.’ ‘I am the Lord,’ He tells us Himself by the mouth of the prophet Isaias, ‘and there is none else. I form light and create darkness; I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things.’ … ‘It is I who bring both death and life, I who inflict wounds and heal them,’ He said to Moses … ‘The Lord kills and makes alive,’ it is written in the Canticle of Anna, the mother of Samuel, ‘He brings down to the tomb and He brings back again; the Lord makes poor and makes rich, he humbles and he exalts.’ ‘Shall there be evil (disaster, affliction) in a city which the Lord has not done?” asks the prophet Amos. ‘Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches are from God,’ Solomon proclaims. And so on in numerous other passages of Scripture” (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, chapter 1).
A Christmas of Bloody Martyrdom
Providence has arranged for His Son’s birthday to be celebrated by many martyrdoms throughout the course of time, and Holy Mother Church, in Her wisdom, has arranged for a succession of martyrs feasts to be celebrated in the liturgical calendar, starting with Christmas Day itself!
December 25th: St. Anastasia, Wife and Widow
December 26th: St. Stephen the First Martyr, Deacon
December 27th: St. John the Apostle & Evangelist, Apostle
December 28th: The Massacre of the Holy Innocents,
December 29th: St. Thomas Becket, Bishop
Our Lord came to give His life for us and these martyrs gave up their lives for Him. As we say in the Stations of the Cross: “Jesus, you died for love of me! Let me die for love of you!” If Christmas is about giving and receiving presents, as a sign of our love, then Our Lord points out that “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) and “he that will save his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25).
St. Anastasia—a Christmas Day Martyr
In the very midst of her celebration of this mystery of the Birth of Jesus, the Church offers us another object of admiration and joy: it is one of her own children. Whilst solemnizing the divine Mystery of today’s Feast, she commemorates in this second Mass one of those glorious heroines who preserved the Light of Christ within their souls, in spite of all the attacks made to rob them of it. Her name is Anastasia. This holy Widow of Rome suffered martyrdom under the persecution of Diocletian, and had the privilege of being thus born to eternal life on the Birthday of that Jesus for whom she suffered death.
She had been married to a Pagan of the name of Publius; himself also a Roman; who, being irritated against her on account of her great charities to the Christians, treated her with every sort of cruelty. She endured all with admirable patience; and when this heavy trial was removed from her by the death of her husband, she devoted herself to visiting and solacing the holy Confessors who had been cast into the prisons of Rome for the Faith. Being at length apprehended as a Christian, she was tied to a stake and burned to death.
“Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) and “he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25).
Martyrs of Christmas Day, 303 AD
God’s providence arranged for a bloody martyrdom on Christmas Day, December 25th, 303 AD. The Roman Emperor, Diocletian had published the famous edict of persecution, which waged against the Church the fiercest war she has ever experienced. The edict was torn down from the Emperor’s palace at Nicomedia by one of the Christians, who paid for this holy daring by a glorious martyrdom. The faithful of the same city were ready for the combat, and feared not to brave the Emperor’s power by continuing to frequent their Church, which was condemned to be pulled down. Christmas Day came and several thousands of them had assembled there, in order to celebrate, for the last time within those walls, the Nativity of our Savior.
Being informed of it, the Emperor became furious and sent one of the officers of his court to order the Church doors to be fastened shut, with the congregation of Christians trapped inside the church, and a fire to be enkindled on each side of the building. This being done, the clang of trumpets was heard, and then a herald’s voice proclaiming to the faithful, in the Emperor’s name, that they who wished to save their lives would be permitted to leave the Basilica, on the condition of their offering incense on an altar of Jupiter, which had been placed near the door; but that otherwise, all were to be left a prey to the flames.
One of the Christians thus answered, in the name of the whole assembly: “We are all of us Christians; we honor Christ as the one only God and King; and we are all ready to lay down our lives for him on this Day.” Whereupon the soldiers were commanded to set fire to the Church. In a very short time, it was one immense mass of flames, whence was offered to the Son of God who deigned to begin, on this same day the human life he had assumed, the generous holocaust of these thousands of lives, laid down as witness to his having come into this world. Thus was glorified, in the year 303.
“Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) and “he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25).
St. Stephen the First Martyr
The second day after Christmas, sees the celebration of another martyr—one whom we call “The First Martyr”. St. Stephen’s name means “crown,” and he was the first disciple of Jesus to receive the martyr’s crown. Stephen was a deacon in the early Christian Church. The apostles had found that they needed helpers to look after the care of the widows and the poor. So they ordained seven deacons, and Stephen is the most famous of these.
God worked many miracles through St. Stephen and he spoke with such wisdom and grace that many of his hearers became followers of Jesus. The enemies of the Church of Jesus were furious to see how successful Stephen’s preaching was. At last, they laid a plot for him. They could not answer his wise argument, so they got men to lie about him, saying that he had spoken sinfully against God. St. Stephen faced that great assembly of enemies without fear. In fact, the Holy Bible says that his face looked like the face of an angel.
The saint spoke about Jesus, showing that He is the Savior, God had promised to send. He scolded his enemies for not having believed in Jesus. At that, they rose up in great anger and shouted at him. But Stephen looked up to Heaven and said that he saw the heavens opening and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.
His hearers plugged their ears and refused to listen to another word. They dragged St. Stephen outside the city of Jerusalem and stoned him to death. The saint prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!” Then he fell to his knees and begged God not to punish his enemies for killing him. “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) and “he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25).
The Apostle of Love and Martyrdom
We all know the ‘Apostle of Love’—St. John the Apostle and Evangelist—who laid his head on Our Lord’s heart. St. John, the son of Zebedee, and the brother of St. James the Great, was called to be an Apostle by our Lord in the first year of His public ministry. He became the “beloved disciple” and the only one of the Twelve who did not forsake the Savior in the hour of His Passion. He stood faithfully at the cross when the Savior made him the guardian of His Mother. His later life was passed chiefly in Jerusalem and at Ephesus. He founded many churches in Asia Minor. He wrote the fourth Gospel, and three Epistles, and the Book of the Apocalypse is also attributed to him.
Even though he died of old age, he should have and would have died a martyr—if God had not intervened in the arranged process of martyrdom. Brought to Rome, tradition relates that he was by order of Emperor Domitian cast into a cauldron of boiling oil, where St. John was placed in a cauldron of boiling oil, which, rather than killing him, did him no harm whatever. He was then banished to the island of Patmos for a year. St. John is called the Apostle of Charity, a virtue he had learned from his Divine Master, and which he constantly inculcated by word and example. The “beloved disciple” died at Ephesus, where a stately church was erected over his tomb. It was afterwards converted into a Mohammedan mosque. He lived to an extreme old age, surviving all his fellow apostles, and died at Ephesus about the year 100.
The Holy Innocents
On December 28th, the day following the feast of St. John the Apostle and Evangelist, we celebrate the martyrdom of the Holy Innocents. This is probably the most astounding, or perplexing, disconcerting or puzzling actions of Gods’ Providence. He allows these innocent babies to be killed! He—the Almighty and All-Knowing God, Who could well have prevented this by simply wishing it—allows the indiscriminate slaughter of innocent children aged two years and under. We do not know how many babies were killed—the Greek Liturgy asserts that Herod killed 14,000 boys, the Syrians speak of 64,000, many medieval authors of 144,000, according to Apocalypse 14:3, but 144,000 seems to be a symbolic number and historically, there was no way that there were so many babies in a town like Bethlehem! Modern writers reduce the number considerably, since Bethlehem was a rather small town—but it must be remembered that Herod was not likely to have just stopped with the children in Bethlehem, but, to be safe, he may have had those in nearby areas killed also.
The Church venerates these children as martyrs; they are the first buds of the Church, killed by the frost of persecution; they died not only for Christ, but in his place, says St. Augustine. The Latin Church instituted the feast of the Holy Innocents at a date now unknown, not before the end of the fourth and not later than the end of the fifth century. It is, with the feasts of St. Stephen and St. John, first found in the Leonine Sacramentary, dating from about 485. The Latin Church keeps it on December 28th, the Greeks on December 29th, the Syrians and Chaldeans on December 27th. These dates have nothing to do with the chronological order of the event; the feast is kept within the octave of Christmas because the Holy Innocents gave their life for the newborn Savior. Stephen the first martyr (martyr by will, love, and blood), John, the Disciple of Love (martyr by will and love, but not blood), and these first flowers of the Church (martyrs by blood alone) accompany the Holy Child Jesus entering this world on Christmas day.
St. Thomas Becket, Martyr
December 29th sees the feast of St. Thomas Becket, the English martyr of the 12th century (martyred in 1172). Originally quite a worldly young, even after entering the religious life, he later changed his worldly way when he was appointed Archbishop of the chief see in England—Canterbury. A long-time friend and companion of the King—Henry II—he was even appointed Chancellor for the King. Although, when he became Archbishop, Thomas had resigned the secular post of Chancellor for the King, against the King’s wish, initially the relations between the two men seemed to be unchanged for a time, but he soon found that his reformed life and principles did not meet with the approval of the King, who preferred the old Thomas to the new one. A host of troubles was brewing, and the crux of all of them was the relationship between Church and state. Gradually, as their interests grew in different directions, the King found himself being increasingly opposed by the Church, in the form of Thomas.
After several setbacks, the King was bent on vengeance for what he considered the disloyalty and ingratitude of the Archbishop. Fuel was added to the fire by several subordinate bishops of Thomas’ who lodged complaints with the King about punishments they had received from Thomas. When the three bishops had laid their complaints before the King, someone had exclaimed aloud that there would be no peace for the realm of England while Becket lived. At this, the King, in a fit of rage, pronounced some words, which several of his hearers took as a rebuke to them for allowing Becket to continue to live and thereby disturb him. Four of his knights at once set off for Canterbury.
On the afternoon of December 29th, the four knights came to see him in his episcopal palace. The knights broke in shouting, “Where is Thomas the traitor?” “Where is the archbishop?” “Here I am,” he replied, “no traitor, but archbishop and priest of God!” The knights demanded that he absolve the three bishops he had punished, and Thomas. One knight made a threatening gesture with his axe. “I am ready to die,” said Thomas, “but God’s curse on you if you harm my people!” The knight flung down his axe and drew his sword. At this, Thomas covered his face and called aloud on God and the saints. Tracy struck a blow, which partially missed and grazed Thomas’ skull and blood ran down into his eyes. He wiped the stain away and cried, “Into Thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit!” Another blow beat him to his knees, and he pitched forward onto his face, murmuring, “For the name of Jesus and in defense of the Church I am willing to die.” With a vigorous thrust another knight struck his sword deep into his head, breaking his sword against the pavement. The murderers then, brandishing their swords, dashed away through the cloisters, shouting “The King’s men! The King’s men!”
When the news was brought to the King, he shut himself up and fasted for forty days, for he knew that his chance remark had caused the knights to go Canterbury full of vengeance. He later performed public penance in Canterbury Cathedral and in 1172 received absolution from the papal delegates. Within three years of his death the archbishop had been canonized as a martyr. Though far from a faultless character, Thomas Becket, when his time of testing came, had the courage to lay down his life to defend the ancient rights of the Church against an aggressive state. This should be an encouragement for all worldly Catholics today—but it must remembered that Thomas became a saint, not because he was worldly, but because he changed his ways and rejected his past worldliness. The discovery of his hair-shirt and other evidences of austerity, and the many miracles which were reported at his tomb, increased the veneration in which he was held.
Future Martyrs?
What about martyrdom today? There are some statisticians who state that the 20th century has more martyrs that any previous century. It is estimated that two thirds of all the martyrs in Christian history died in the twentieth century. However, with the term “Christian” they are taking in all Christian religions and not just the One, True Religion, the Catholic Faith. Most are not martyrs in the strictly canonical sense. Given the sheer numbers of Christian dead and the number of ways they were killed, it is difficult to determine whether they fit the canonical criteria of dying in odium fidei (meaning a hatred of the Faith, by enemies of the Faith), or for refusing to apostatize under specific pressure to do so. Instead, those Christians who have suffered for their Faith, not necessarily as individuals, but rather in whole groups, whole communities, whole generations of believers—they are known as “new martyrs.”
Widespread Martyrdom
Modern day martyrdom covers the world from South and Central America to Europe and the Communist countries, and on into Africa and Asia. It encompasses the African slaughterhouse, the Cristeros, the Spanish Civil War, and the post-World War II period. It is seen around the globe and it is growing annually. On July 24th, 1936, near the start of the Spanish Civil War, Republican militiamen in Madrid shot three Carmelite nuns in the middle of a street. “One died instantly,” Royal writes, “another was at first refused transport to a hospital by a bus driver, who wanted to ‘finish her off,’ a third wandered around dazed until another band of militiamen executed her.” By July 31st, in Madrid and Barcelona alone, 321 priests had been murdered. Between 1950 and 1953 in Communist North Korea, “50 percent of the hierarchy, one third of the clergy, and at least fifteen thousand lay persons perished”; many more died in the notorious Death March to the Yalu River.
One After Another
► Hundreds of thousands of Catholics were murdered in Mexico, beginning in the 1920s.
► Priests, nuns, and lay people were tortured in Soviet labor camps and in Nazi-occupied Poland.
► Sadistic brainwashing techniques were developed against Romanian Catholics, who nonetheless kept attending Mass at a rate of almost 80 percent.
► “Accidents” befell priests in Lithuania.
► “Reeducation centers” were established by the North Vietnamese.
► Missionaries in Angola and the Trappist monks at Tibhirine were murdered for their Faith.
► In Albania, Catholics, the only religious group that refused to cede power to that Communist state, though they were later forced to sign an agreement in which they submitted to state control, were tortured, their bishops forced to clean the streets and public bathrooms wearing clown outfits with paper signs across their chests saying, “I have sinned against the people.”
► In 1967 the Albanian government outlawed religion altogether, and declared the traditional family to be reactionary. Over two thousand religious buildings were closed or destroyed, and almost all the clergy were imprisoned. Under Soviet rule, the Ukrainian Catholic Church was the largest suppressed group of believers in the world.
► The persecution of Catholics in Communist China, especially from the 1940s onwards, could fill many books with stories of relentless brutality.
The stories are overwhelming, all the more so because they all tell the same tale. In every part of the world, throughout the twentieth century, Christians were being slaughtered on the altar of the atheist state.
Forewarned by the Queen of Martyrs
Our Lady of Good Success, speaking of our era, has said: “The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom. Many will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings and those who sacrifice themselves for the Church and their country will be counted as martyrs.” (Our Lady of Good Success, January 16th, 1611). At Fatima, Our Lady warned: “Russia … will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, various nations will be annihilated” (Our Lady of Fatima, July, 1917).
Sweet Apostasy
To those who can drag themselves away from their food and alcoholic tipples, their parties, TV’s and internet—Christmas is a reminder of the essential and important things in life. The reason for Christmas is sin and salvation from those sins; yet the destruction of Christmas is also sin, and an addiction to those sins. Though we may not quite be at the doors of a bloody martyrdom, there is a bloodless martyrdom being conducted against the true Faith all throughout the world. The instruments of martyrdom are not swords, knives, axes, guillotines, fires, nooses or bombs, but much more pleasant instruments of torture like the TV, the internet, bad books and magazines, alcohol, drugs, social outlets, etc. These seem to have a far greater success rate than the hard-nosed persecutions of old—which always risked sparking a resistance. These new weapons of torture are too nice to resist—they seem almost harmless by comparison!
This is what Our Lady warns us of: “In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to ensnare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost. Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women. In this supreme moment of need of the Church, those who should speak will fall silent. The precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of customs. People will think of nothing but amusement. All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds” (Our Lady of Good Success & La Salette).
Faith & Pottage
Christ came at Christmas to enlighten those who sit in darkness and to open their eyes to the light of the Faith. The martyrs died for the Faith, in order to preserve their Faith. Take your Faith seriously and do not exchange our Faith for the latest kind of modern-day pottage―“And so taking bread and the pottage of lentils, Esau ate, and drank, and went his way; making little account of having sold his first birthright” (Genesis 25:34). Keep the Faith and it will keep you: “For whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world: and this is the victory which overcomes the world, our Faith” (1 John 5:4). Yet not many will keep the Faith, preferring the latest pottage to the Faith: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
When we compare the Christmas of the worldly-minded to the Christmas mind of the Church, the latter looks like a ‘party-pooper’ compared to former fun-loving, ‘anything-goes’, carefree world! When we take a quick scan of the table of goodies prepared for us by the world, they look much more appetizing than what the Church dishes up! The world’s dishes are nothing but sweetness, while the dishes served by the Church—even though many are sweet—have a tinge of sourness or bitterness or a pungency to them!
Sweet and Sour Serving
A brief selection of extracts from the Christmas liturgy sours our sweet palate and irritates our sweet-tooth! We keep finding small irritating fish-bones, grape seeds, olive pits or cherry stones―all of which seem to spoil the enjoyment of the fish or fruit. These are some of the bones, seeds, pits and stones that the Church refuses to take out of the food She serves us over the Christmas festivities:
“Our Lord―Who is the destroyer of sin and of death― is come to make all free” … “The wickedness of the Earth shall be destroyed and the Savior of the world will rule over us” … “He shall save His people from their sins” … and “set us free, whom the old bondage holds under the yoke of sin” – but we like some of our sins! We like some of the wickedness of the world! We don’t really want to be freed from these—especially the Venial Sins, for they say that we won’t go to Hell because of them! “Our Savior has appeared to all men; instructing us, that, denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world”—“But I don’t want to be sober all the time, I don’t want to be drunk, but I like being ‘tipsy’!”, say many.
Honest Mother
Holy Mother Church, like any good mother, is uncompromising when it comes to the good of Her children. She tells the Christmas Story as it really is, and does not embellish it or disguise it or lace it with unnecessary sugary sweetness. Celebrate we must—for as Pope St. Leo the Great says in his Christmas homily, “It would be unlawful for any man to refuse to partake in our rejoicing”—yet, at the same time, we must realize why it is that we are celebrating! We rejoice because Christ comes, with His power and grace, to help us change our lives for the better; to help us cut ourselves free from the bondage of sin; to help us detach ourselves from this world and to attach ourselves more to heavenly things:
“Seek ye first the Kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31) … “Seek the things that are above” (Colossians 3:1) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21). “The Lord hath looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God” (Psalm 13:2). The whole point of Christmas is that Jesus becomes man, in order to make us like unto God: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). “You shall be holy men to Me!” (Exodus 22:31). “For I am the Lord your God! Be holy because I am holy! Defile not your souls by any thing … upon the Earth” (Leviticus 11:44).
The ‘Bloody’ Mind of the Church
Dom Guéranger, in the Christmas volume of his Liturgical Year, writes: “We have so much to learn from the mystery of the Sacred Infancy, we shall be in strict accordance with the spirit of the Church if, whilst assisting at Mass, we keep before our minds, not only the bleeding Victim of Calvary, but likewise the sweet Lamb of Bethlehem. Moreover, does not our Jesus offer Himself for us to his Father from His Crib as well as from His Cross? … Then let us go to Him, that we may know Him; let us know Him, that we may love Him; let us love Him, that we may grow like Him. What He demands of us by this Christmas mystery is that we become, like Him―little children.”
Yet to love Him, means to lay down our life for Him—whether that be bloodily or bloodlessly. He Himself said: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). The Gospels repeatedly quote Our Lord saying that we must “lose” our life in this world for His sake: “For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:25) … “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35) … “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it!” (Luke 9:24) … “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it!” (Luke 17:33).
In our current culture, the emphasis is on the preservation of youth and bodily life, the concept of martyrdom does seem foreign.
Divine Providence Arranges All Things
Nothing happens by chance—even Our Lord said: “Fear ye not them that kill the body, and are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? And not one of them shall fall on the ground without your Father” (Matthew 10:28-29).
In that masterpiece of a book, Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, we read: “Nothing happens in the universe without God willing and allowing it. This statement must be taken absolutely of everything with the exception of sin. ‘Nothing occurs by chance in the whole course of our lives’ is the unanimous teaching of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, ‘and God intervenes everywhere.’ ‘I am the Lord,’ He tells us Himself by the mouth of the prophet Isaias, ‘and there is none else. I form light and create darkness; I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things.’ … ‘It is I who bring both death and life, I who inflict wounds and heal them,’ He said to Moses … ‘The Lord kills and makes alive,’ it is written in the Canticle of Anna, the mother of Samuel, ‘He brings down to the tomb and He brings back again; the Lord makes poor and makes rich, he humbles and he exalts.’ ‘Shall there be evil (disaster, affliction) in a city which the Lord has not done?” asks the prophet Amos. ‘Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches are from God,’ Solomon proclaims. And so on in numerous other passages of Scripture” (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, chapter 1).
A Christmas of Bloody Martyrdom
Providence has arranged for His Son’s birthday to be celebrated by many martyrdoms throughout the course of time, and Holy Mother Church, in Her wisdom, has arranged for a succession of martyrs feasts to be celebrated in the liturgical calendar, starting with Christmas Day itself!
December 25th: St. Anastasia, Wife and Widow
December 26th: St. Stephen the First Martyr, Deacon
December 27th: St. John the Apostle & Evangelist, Apostle
December 28th: The Massacre of the Holy Innocents,
December 29th: St. Thomas Becket, Bishop
Our Lord came to give His life for us and these martyrs gave up their lives for Him. As we say in the Stations of the Cross: “Jesus, you died for love of me! Let me die for love of you!” If Christmas is about giving and receiving presents, as a sign of our love, then Our Lord points out that “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) and “he that will save his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25).
St. Anastasia—a Christmas Day Martyr
In the very midst of her celebration of this mystery of the Birth of Jesus, the Church offers us another object of admiration and joy: it is one of her own children. Whilst solemnizing the divine Mystery of today’s Feast, she commemorates in this second Mass one of those glorious heroines who preserved the Light of Christ within their souls, in spite of all the attacks made to rob them of it. Her name is Anastasia. This holy Widow of Rome suffered martyrdom under the persecution of Diocletian, and had the privilege of being thus born to eternal life on the Birthday of that Jesus for whom she suffered death.
She had been married to a Pagan of the name of Publius; himself also a Roman; who, being irritated against her on account of her great charities to the Christians, treated her with every sort of cruelty. She endured all with admirable patience; and when this heavy trial was removed from her by the death of her husband, she devoted herself to visiting and solacing the holy Confessors who had been cast into the prisons of Rome for the Faith. Being at length apprehended as a Christian, she was tied to a stake and burned to death.
“Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) and “he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25).
Martyrs of Christmas Day, 303 AD
God’s providence arranged for a bloody martyrdom on Christmas Day, December 25th, 303 AD. The Roman Emperor, Diocletian had published the famous edict of persecution, which waged against the Church the fiercest war she has ever experienced. The edict was torn down from the Emperor’s palace at Nicomedia by one of the Christians, who paid for this holy daring by a glorious martyrdom. The faithful of the same city were ready for the combat, and feared not to brave the Emperor’s power by continuing to frequent their Church, which was condemned to be pulled down. Christmas Day came and several thousands of them had assembled there, in order to celebrate, for the last time within those walls, the Nativity of our Savior.
Being informed of it, the Emperor became furious and sent one of the officers of his court to order the Church doors to be fastened shut, with the congregation of Christians trapped inside the church, and a fire to be enkindled on each side of the building. This being done, the clang of trumpets was heard, and then a herald’s voice proclaiming to the faithful, in the Emperor’s name, that they who wished to save their lives would be permitted to leave the Basilica, on the condition of their offering incense on an altar of Jupiter, which had been placed near the door; but that otherwise, all were to be left a prey to the flames.
One of the Christians thus answered, in the name of the whole assembly: “We are all of us Christians; we honor Christ as the one only God and King; and we are all ready to lay down our lives for him on this Day.” Whereupon the soldiers were commanded to set fire to the Church. In a very short time, it was one immense mass of flames, whence was offered to the Son of God who deigned to begin, on this same day the human life he had assumed, the generous holocaust of these thousands of lives, laid down as witness to his having come into this world. Thus was glorified, in the year 303.
“Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) and “he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25).
St. Stephen the First Martyr
The second day after Christmas, sees the celebration of another martyr—one whom we call “The First Martyr”. St. Stephen’s name means “crown,” and he was the first disciple of Jesus to receive the martyr’s crown. Stephen was a deacon in the early Christian Church. The apostles had found that they needed helpers to look after the care of the widows and the poor. So they ordained seven deacons, and Stephen is the most famous of these.
God worked many miracles through St. Stephen and he spoke with such wisdom and grace that many of his hearers became followers of Jesus. The enemies of the Church of Jesus were furious to see how successful Stephen’s preaching was. At last, they laid a plot for him. They could not answer his wise argument, so they got men to lie about him, saying that he had spoken sinfully against God. St. Stephen faced that great assembly of enemies without fear. In fact, the Holy Bible says that his face looked like the face of an angel.
The saint spoke about Jesus, showing that He is the Savior, God had promised to send. He scolded his enemies for not having believed in Jesus. At that, they rose up in great anger and shouted at him. But Stephen looked up to Heaven and said that he saw the heavens opening and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.
His hearers plugged their ears and refused to listen to another word. They dragged St. Stephen outside the city of Jerusalem and stoned him to death. The saint prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!” Then he fell to his knees and begged God not to punish his enemies for killing him. “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) and “he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25).
The Apostle of Love and Martyrdom
We all know the ‘Apostle of Love’—St. John the Apostle and Evangelist—who laid his head on Our Lord’s heart. St. John, the son of Zebedee, and the brother of St. James the Great, was called to be an Apostle by our Lord in the first year of His public ministry. He became the “beloved disciple” and the only one of the Twelve who did not forsake the Savior in the hour of His Passion. He stood faithfully at the cross when the Savior made him the guardian of His Mother. His later life was passed chiefly in Jerusalem and at Ephesus. He founded many churches in Asia Minor. He wrote the fourth Gospel, and three Epistles, and the Book of the Apocalypse is also attributed to him.
Even though he died of old age, he should have and would have died a martyr—if God had not intervened in the arranged process of martyrdom. Brought to Rome, tradition relates that he was by order of Emperor Domitian cast into a cauldron of boiling oil, where St. John was placed in a cauldron of boiling oil, which, rather than killing him, did him no harm whatever. He was then banished to the island of Patmos for a year. St. John is called the Apostle of Charity, a virtue he had learned from his Divine Master, and which he constantly inculcated by word and example. The “beloved disciple” died at Ephesus, where a stately church was erected over his tomb. It was afterwards converted into a Mohammedan mosque. He lived to an extreme old age, surviving all his fellow apostles, and died at Ephesus about the year 100.
The Holy Innocents
On December 28th, the day following the feast of St. John the Apostle and Evangelist, we celebrate the martyrdom of the Holy Innocents. This is probably the most astounding, or perplexing, disconcerting or puzzling actions of Gods’ Providence. He allows these innocent babies to be killed! He—the Almighty and All-Knowing God, Who could well have prevented this by simply wishing it—allows the indiscriminate slaughter of innocent children aged two years and under. We do not know how many babies were killed—the Greek Liturgy asserts that Herod killed 14,000 boys, the Syrians speak of 64,000, many medieval authors of 144,000, according to Apocalypse 14:3, but 144,000 seems to be a symbolic number and historically, there was no way that there were so many babies in a town like Bethlehem! Modern writers reduce the number considerably, since Bethlehem was a rather small town—but it must be remembered that Herod was not likely to have just stopped with the children in Bethlehem, but, to be safe, he may have had those in nearby areas killed also.
The Church venerates these children as martyrs; they are the first buds of the Church, killed by the frost of persecution; they died not only for Christ, but in his place, says St. Augustine. The Latin Church instituted the feast of the Holy Innocents at a date now unknown, not before the end of the fourth and not later than the end of the fifth century. It is, with the feasts of St. Stephen and St. John, first found in the Leonine Sacramentary, dating from about 485. The Latin Church keeps it on December 28th, the Greeks on December 29th, the Syrians and Chaldeans on December 27th. These dates have nothing to do with the chronological order of the event; the feast is kept within the octave of Christmas because the Holy Innocents gave their life for the newborn Savior. Stephen the first martyr (martyr by will, love, and blood), John, the Disciple of Love (martyr by will and love, but not blood), and these first flowers of the Church (martyrs by blood alone) accompany the Holy Child Jesus entering this world on Christmas day.
St. Thomas Becket, Martyr
December 29th sees the feast of St. Thomas Becket, the English martyr of the 12th century (martyred in 1172). Originally quite a worldly young, even after entering the religious life, he later changed his worldly way when he was appointed Archbishop of the chief see in England—Canterbury. A long-time friend and companion of the King—Henry II—he was even appointed Chancellor for the King. Although, when he became Archbishop, Thomas had resigned the secular post of Chancellor for the King, against the King’s wish, initially the relations between the two men seemed to be unchanged for a time, but he soon found that his reformed life and principles did not meet with the approval of the King, who preferred the old Thomas to the new one. A host of troubles was brewing, and the crux of all of them was the relationship between Church and state. Gradually, as their interests grew in different directions, the King found himself being increasingly opposed by the Church, in the form of Thomas.
After several setbacks, the King was bent on vengeance for what he considered the disloyalty and ingratitude of the Archbishop. Fuel was added to the fire by several subordinate bishops of Thomas’ who lodged complaints with the King about punishments they had received from Thomas. When the three bishops had laid their complaints before the King, someone had exclaimed aloud that there would be no peace for the realm of England while Becket lived. At this, the King, in a fit of rage, pronounced some words, which several of his hearers took as a rebuke to them for allowing Becket to continue to live and thereby disturb him. Four of his knights at once set off for Canterbury.
On the afternoon of December 29th, the four knights came to see him in his episcopal palace. The knights broke in shouting, “Where is Thomas the traitor?” “Where is the archbishop?” “Here I am,” he replied, “no traitor, but archbishop and priest of God!” The knights demanded that he absolve the three bishops he had punished, and Thomas. One knight made a threatening gesture with his axe. “I am ready to die,” said Thomas, “but God’s curse on you if you harm my people!” The knight flung down his axe and drew his sword. At this, Thomas covered his face and called aloud on God and the saints. Tracy struck a blow, which partially missed and grazed Thomas’ skull and blood ran down into his eyes. He wiped the stain away and cried, “Into Thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit!” Another blow beat him to his knees, and he pitched forward onto his face, murmuring, “For the name of Jesus and in defense of the Church I am willing to die.” With a vigorous thrust another knight struck his sword deep into his head, breaking his sword against the pavement. The murderers then, brandishing their swords, dashed away through the cloisters, shouting “The King’s men! The King’s men!”
When the news was brought to the King, he shut himself up and fasted for forty days, for he knew that his chance remark had caused the knights to go Canterbury full of vengeance. He later performed public penance in Canterbury Cathedral and in 1172 received absolution from the papal delegates. Within three years of his death the archbishop had been canonized as a martyr. Though far from a faultless character, Thomas Becket, when his time of testing came, had the courage to lay down his life to defend the ancient rights of the Church against an aggressive state. This should be an encouragement for all worldly Catholics today—but it must remembered that Thomas became a saint, not because he was worldly, but because he changed his ways and rejected his past worldliness. The discovery of his hair-shirt and other evidences of austerity, and the many miracles which were reported at his tomb, increased the veneration in which he was held.
Future Martyrs?
What about martyrdom today? There are some statisticians who state that the 20th century has more martyrs that any previous century. It is estimated that two thirds of all the martyrs in Christian history died in the twentieth century. However, with the term “Christian” they are taking in all Christian religions and not just the One, True Religion, the Catholic Faith. Most are not martyrs in the strictly canonical sense. Given the sheer numbers of Christian dead and the number of ways they were killed, it is difficult to determine whether they fit the canonical criteria of dying in odium fidei (meaning a hatred of the Faith, by enemies of the Faith), or for refusing to apostatize under specific pressure to do so. Instead, those Christians who have suffered for their Faith, not necessarily as individuals, but rather in whole groups, whole communities, whole generations of believers—they are known as “new martyrs.”
Widespread Martyrdom
Modern day martyrdom covers the world from South and Central America to Europe and the Communist countries, and on into Africa and Asia. It encompasses the African slaughterhouse, the Cristeros, the Spanish Civil War, and the post-World War II period. It is seen around the globe and it is growing annually. On July 24th, 1936, near the start of the Spanish Civil War, Republican militiamen in Madrid shot three Carmelite nuns in the middle of a street. “One died instantly,” Royal writes, “another was at first refused transport to a hospital by a bus driver, who wanted to ‘finish her off,’ a third wandered around dazed until another band of militiamen executed her.” By July 31st, in Madrid and Barcelona alone, 321 priests had been murdered. Between 1950 and 1953 in Communist North Korea, “50 percent of the hierarchy, one third of the clergy, and at least fifteen thousand lay persons perished”; many more died in the notorious Death March to the Yalu River.
One After Another
► Hundreds of thousands of Catholics were murdered in Mexico, beginning in the 1920s.
► Priests, nuns, and lay people were tortured in Soviet labor camps and in Nazi-occupied Poland.
► Sadistic brainwashing techniques were developed against Romanian Catholics, who nonetheless kept attending Mass at a rate of almost 80 percent.
► “Accidents” befell priests in Lithuania.
► “Reeducation centers” were established by the North Vietnamese.
► Missionaries in Angola and the Trappist monks at Tibhirine were murdered for their Faith.
► In Albania, Catholics, the only religious group that refused to cede power to that Communist state, though they were later forced to sign an agreement in which they submitted to state control, were tortured, their bishops forced to clean the streets and public bathrooms wearing clown outfits with paper signs across their chests saying, “I have sinned against the people.”
► In 1967 the Albanian government outlawed religion altogether, and declared the traditional family to be reactionary. Over two thousand religious buildings were closed or destroyed, and almost all the clergy were imprisoned. Under Soviet rule, the Ukrainian Catholic Church was the largest suppressed group of believers in the world.
► The persecution of Catholics in Communist China, especially from the 1940s onwards, could fill many books with stories of relentless brutality.
The stories are overwhelming, all the more so because they all tell the same tale. In every part of the world, throughout the twentieth century, Christians were being slaughtered on the altar of the atheist state.
Forewarned by the Queen of Martyrs
Our Lady of Good Success, speaking of our era, has said: “The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom. Many will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings and those who sacrifice themselves for the Church and their country will be counted as martyrs.” (Our Lady of Good Success, January 16th, 1611). At Fatima, Our Lady warned: “Russia … will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, various nations will be annihilated” (Our Lady of Fatima, July, 1917).
Sweet Apostasy
To those who can drag themselves away from their food and alcoholic tipples, their parties, TV’s and internet—Christmas is a reminder of the essential and important things in life. The reason for Christmas is sin and salvation from those sins; yet the destruction of Christmas is also sin, and an addiction to those sins. Though we may not quite be at the doors of a bloody martyrdom, there is a bloodless martyrdom being conducted against the true Faith all throughout the world. The instruments of martyrdom are not swords, knives, axes, guillotines, fires, nooses or bombs, but much more pleasant instruments of torture like the TV, the internet, bad books and magazines, alcohol, drugs, social outlets, etc. These seem to have a far greater success rate than the hard-nosed persecutions of old—which always risked sparking a resistance. These new weapons of torture are too nice to resist—they seem almost harmless by comparison!
This is what Our Lady warns us of: “In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to ensnare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost. Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women. In this supreme moment of need of the Church, those who should speak will fall silent. The precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of customs. People will think of nothing but amusement. All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds” (Our Lady of Good Success & La Salette).
Faith & Pottage
Christ came at Christmas to enlighten those who sit in darkness and to open their eyes to the light of the Faith. The martyrs died for the Faith, in order to preserve their Faith. Take your Faith seriously and do not exchange our Faith for the latest kind of modern-day pottage―“And so taking bread and the pottage of lentils, Esau ate, and drank, and went his way; making little account of having sold his first birthright” (Genesis 25:34). Keep the Faith and it will keep you: “For whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world: and this is the victory which overcomes the world, our Faith” (1 John 5:4). Yet not many will keep the Faith, preferring the latest pottage to the Faith: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
Article 1
Wednesday, December 25th, Christmas Day
Look Who's Here!
Wednesday, December 25th, Christmas Day
Look Who's Here!
What on Earth?
What on earth are we to make of this day? Who on earth was born? What on earth is going on? What on earth is He doing here? Where on earth is all this going to lead?
Different persons have conflicting answers to these questions. If you want the answer to them, then go to the Mother. Go to the Mother of God and go to Holy Mother Church. They will tell it as it is! From the Breviary readings from Matins for Christmas Day, we have these words of Pope St. Leo the Great (died 461):
“Dearly beloved brethren, “Unto us is born this day a Savior.” ... Today is Life’s Birthday; the Birthday of that Life, Which, for us dying creatures, taketh away the sting of death, and bringeth the bright promise of the eternal gladness hereafter ... Our Lord, Who is the destroyer of sin and of death, is come to make all free. Rejoice, O thou that art holy, thou drawest nearer to thy crown! Rejoice, O thou that art sinful, thy Savior offers thee pardon! Rejoice also, O thou Gentile, God calls thee to life! For the Son of God ... took upon Himself the nature of man, that He might reconcile that nature to Him Who made it.”
Through the readings from the Mass of the Vigil of Christmas, Holy Mother Church explained to us what on earth is happening regarding the birth of Our Lord, Jesus Christ.
At the Vigil Mass, the Introit tells us that “This day you shall know that the Lord will come and save us.” In the Gospel, Joseph is told by the angel not to fear taking Mary for his wife, for “she shall bring forth a Son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus (Savior), for He shall save His people from their sins.” By the time the day is over and midnight arrives, Holy Mother Church, at the first Mass of Christmas, is telling us: “Why have the people devised vain things” (Introit) ... “Our Savior has appeared to all men; instructing us, that, denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world” (Epistle) ... “Grant that we who rejoice in celebrating the Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ, may by dignified conversation become worthy to attain fellowship with Him” (Postcommunion).
By the following morning’s Dawn Mass, Holy Mother Church continues: “...that we may show forth in our actions that which by Faith shines in our minds” (Collect of 2nd Mass) ... “that the new birth of Thy only-begotten Son, may set us free, whom the old bondage holds under the yoke of sin” (Collect of 3rd Mass).... “and cleanse us from the stains of our sins” (Secret of the 3rd Mass).
Let Mary Teach You
The other mother―the Mother of God―in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says the same things in speaking of the mystery of Christmas:
“My most holy Son has set me as the teacher and living example of the love of humility and true contempt of worldly vanity and pride … He also sought destitution and poverty … in order to teach mortals the shortest and surest way for reaching the heights of divine love and union with God ... If men would keep their heart disengaged and if they would rightly and worthily consider this great mystery of the kindness of the Most High towards men; if they would only make use of their freedom to treat this mystery with the reverence due to its greatness; then who would be so hardened as not to be moved at the sight of their God become man, humiliated in poverty, despised, unknown, entering the world in a cave, lying in a manger surrounded by brute animals, protected only by a poverty-stricken Mother, and cast off by the foolish arrogance of the world?
“Who will dare to love the vanity and pride, which was openly abhorred and condemned by the Creator of Heaven and Earth in his conduct? No one can despise the humility, poverty and indigence, which the Lord loved and chose for Himself as the very means of teaching the way of eternal life. Few there are, who stop to consider this truth and example―and, on account of this vile ingratitude, only the few will reap the fruit of these great mysteries ...
“I remind and exhort you to forget all that is of Earth and lose it out of your sight; so that you seek nothing, or engage yourself with nothing except what can help you to withdraw and detach you from the world and its inhabitants; so that, with a heart freed from all terrestrial affection, thou dispose yourself to celebrate in it the mysteries of the poverty, humility and divine love of the incarnate God ... His coming down from Heaven onto the Earth, His being born in humility and poverty, His living and dying in it, giving such rare example of the contempt of the world and its deceits; the knowledge, which you have received concerning His conduct and which you have penetrated so deeply by divine intelligence. All these things should be for you like living voices, which you must heed and inscribe into the interior of your heart.” (Words of Our Lady, The Mystical City of God, vol. 2, The Incarnation, Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Hopeless Hype, Fickle Fame
The coming of the Messias was also a ‘big thing’ for the Jews. Centuries of prophecies had foretold of this wonderful person whom God would send to His Chosen People. There was a fair amount of hype that came and went throughout the years. When finally it did happen, almost nobody noticed. It was the greatest event in the history of mankind, but, seemingly, it fell flat! There was certainly a lot of substance; but not enough hype about it!
But did God want “a lot of hype” to accompany the birth of His only-begotten Son? His thoughts are not our thoughts, nor are our ways His ways: “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways’, saith the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts’” (Isaias 55:8-9).
It would seem that Christ’s birth should have been made known to all. Because fulfillment should correspond to promise. Now, the promise of Christ’s coming is thus expressed (Psalm 49:3): God shall come manifestly. But He came by His birth in the flesh. Therefore it seems that His birth should have been made known to the whole world.
St. Thomas Aquinas quotes an objection that says since Christ came into this world to save sinners, and since everyone in the world is a sinner, therefore it seems only fitting that Christ’s birth should have been made known to all. He then answers the objection quoting Isaias (45:15): “Thou art a hidden God, the Holy of Israel, the Savior.” And, again (Isaias43:3): “His look was, as it were, hidden and despised.” Aquinas explains that it was unfitting that Christ’s birth should be made known to all men without distinction.
Firstly, because this would have been a hindrance to the redemption of man, which was accomplished by means of the Cross; for, as it is written: “If they had known it, they would never have crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Cor.2:8).
Secondly, because this would have lessened the merit of Faith, for if, when Christ was born, His birth had been made known to all by evident signs, the very nature of Faith would have been destroyed, since it is the evidence of things that appear not, as stated in Scripture, “Faith is the substance of things to be hoped for, the evidence of things that appear not” (Hebrews 11:1).
Thirdly, if the glory of the Godhead would not have been hidden in Christ, the reality of His human nature would have come into doubt, whereby everyone would think He is just God and not God and man.
St. Augustine says: “If He had not passed through the different stages of age from babyhood to youth, had neither eaten nor slept, would He not have strengthened an erroneous opinion, and made it impossible for us to believe that He had become true man? And while He is doing all things wondrously, would He have taken away that which He accomplished in mercy?”
Or look at it from a modern-day perspective. If a billionaire wants to get married, what is the best approach to finding a good spouse? Is it by flaunting his millions in a lavish manifestation of his wealth; or is it by hiding the fact that he is a billionaire? If he flaunts his wealth, the potential spouses are more likely to marry him, not because they like and love him, but because they like and love the idea of being married to all that money and not so much the man.
The worldly way to celebrate the central event of all history would be a worldwide mega-party. The humility of God goes in the opposite direction! God the Father had centuries to prepare for this event, and He did not even book a room for Mary and Joseph at one of the local inns for the event! They had to suffer the ignominy of bringing the Son of God into this world in a dingy, smelly, cold little cave! To human eyes, it looks like the Master of Providence had “failed big-time” when it mattered the most! But that is the human ‘take’ on things, not the Divine ‘take’ on things. To God, the arrangements for the birth of His Son were perfect, as God’s will always is perfect.
Messianic Credentials
The legendary Bible exegete and commentator, the Benedictine monk Fr. Augustine Calmet (1672-1757), writes: “When and how should the Kingdom of God come? When and how will the Messias come? The Pharisees expected a Messias who would be powerful according to the evaluation of this world: a conqueror, a monarch, a revenger of the injuries of Israel; one who would restore them to liberty, and bless them with temporal goods and prosperity. Neither in His infancy, nor in His adult life could the Jews see in Jesus anything that corresponded to these attributes and qualities; they saw nothing that corresponded to these magnificent hopes; and therefore they would ask Him, by way of insult and reproach, when this Kingdom of God would come (Luke 17:20), of which He so often talked of and announced to His disciples. He answered them, that the manifestation of the Messias, and the establishment of His kingdom, shall not be manifested in a conspicuous, splendid manner. It would be brought about insensibly, and shall appear a casualty, and the effect of secondary causes. You shall not see the Messias coming at the head of armies, to spread terror and desolation. His arrival shall not be announced by ambassadors, etc. Everything in the establishment of His kingdom would be the reverse of temporal power” (Bible Commentary of Fr. Augustine Calmet, O.S.B., Aquinas Study Bible).
Of course, to prove that He came from God and to prove that He was God Himself, Jesus had to show the identity card of God―miracles and prophecies. For only God can perform true miracles and only God can predict a future that depends precariously on the free-will of man. He performed many miracles in His lifetime and also made prophecies that came true in His lifetime, and others cane true after He had ascended into Heaven. But He did not use the power of miracles to gain political power, to gain wealth, or to destroy His enemies.
Politically, he overthrew nobody even though He could have―He even fled when they sought to take Him by force and make Him king: “Jesus therefore, when He knew that they would come to take Him by force, and make Him king, fled again into the mountain Himself alone” (John 6:15). As regards wealth, He gave away what came His way, and lived in deliberately willed poverty. His enemies, even though He avoided them, He did not destroy them—he even restored the ear to Malchus, that St. Peter had cut-off with his sword (Malchus was one of those who had come to arrest Him in Gethsemane), and begged God to forgive His enemies as He died on the Cross. Jesus was the opposite of what the world was.
Rejected Redeemer―Scorned Savior
Today’s modern vocabulary would be tempted to describe Jesus as “radical”, “extreme”, “fanatical”, “anti-establishment”, “anti-social”, “rebellious”, “guilty of hate crimes” against the Pharisees (Matthew 23:13-35) and other Jews. Already in His own day some of the things they said of him were along the same lines: “These words are hard to accept!” (John 6:48-59, when He says “eat my flesh”); “Thou hast a devil!” (John 7:20); “Thou art a Samaritan!” (John 8:48); “He has blasphemed!” (Matthew 26:65); “How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles?” (John 9); “He seduces the people” (John 7:12). He “makes Himself a king, [and] speaks against Caesar!” (John 19:12); “We have found this man perverting our nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar!” (Luke 23:2).
It seems that Jesus did not live up to the expectations of His contemporaries! Do we live up to the expectations of our contemporaries? If we do, then Heaven help us! For Jesus said: “Remember My word that I said to you: ‘The servant is not greater than his master.’ If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you!” (John 15:20) ... “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:8) ... “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 10:22) ... “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death: and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake!” (Matthew 24:9).
Poor Jesus! That persecution already started for Him at His birth! He was rejected at the doors of Bethlehem; He was envied and hated by Herod, who even tried to kill Him, forcing Him to have to be exiled from His own country and nation as He fled into Egypt! Truly His life was “radical” and “extreme”, provoking extreme love or extreme hatred or extreme indifference from His contemporaries. How is the world treating you these days? We are all called to the imitation of Christ!
Celebrate in a True Spirit
This day deserves something less banal and more spiritual and more profound. So as we celebrate this astounding day, let us grasp the true spirit of the day, which is not to be found in stuffing ourselves with good food, merrily enjoying intoxicating drinks, watching worldly movies or sports on the TV, or partying away with family, friends and relatives―while relegating Our Lord to the closet, or a mere distant memory who has no place in our conversations and activities. “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). “We have not received the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God―so that we may know the things that are given us from God!” (1 Corinthians 2:12).
Many are Called―Few are Chosen!
On two separate occasions it is reported that Jesus said: “Many are called but few are chosen!” (Matthew 20:16; 22:14). Is that because many refuse to answer the call? Jesus calls everyone―He hates no one. But not everyone likes or wants to hear what Jesus is saying: “They would not listen, and they turned away the shoulder to depart. And they stopped their ears, not to hear!” (Zacharias 7:11). Jesus Himself says: “Having eyes, do you not see? And having ears, do you not hear? Neither do you remember!” (Mark 8:18). “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15).
Of such folk God says: “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21). “You dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see and see not; and have ears to hear and hear not―for they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2). “I will blind the heart of this people, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes―lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted and I heal them” (Isaias 6:10). “And when, in their distress, they shall return to the Lord the God and shall seek Him, they shall find Him” (2 Paralipomenon 15:4).
How true are the following words of Holy Scripture for our typical Christmas celebrations: “The Lord looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they have become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and have become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they have acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness are in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. God has scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God has despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6).
Our Lord comes desiring to give mercy and pardon: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). The following incident from Our Lord’s life shows the “great divide” in the attitudes of people―even Catholics:
“And it came to pass, as He was going to Jerusalem, He passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee. And as He entered into a certain town, there met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off; and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus! Master! Have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before Jesus’ feet, giving thanks: and this was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering, said, ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the nine? There is no one found to return and give glory to God, but this stranger!’” (Luke 17:11-18).
Sadly, today, the vast majority of Catholics no longer go to Sunday Mass regularly. All of them once received the mercy of Baptism, whereby they were made clean of the leprosy of Original Sin (and all Actual Sins, if they were baptized as adults). Yet, today, they no longer come back to adore and thank Jesus for that mercy. Many have committed sins since their Baptism and have received mercy in the confessional, where they “showed themselves to the priests”; but few are truly grateful and thankful, “with a loud voice glorifying God.” Of the minority who did go to Mass on Christmas Day, how many will go back to Jesus throughout the rest of the day, “with a loud voice glorifying God”?
Let us not fall (and let us nor permit those closest to us to fall) into that selfish, ungrateful, worldly-minded spirit that has succeeded in almost de-Christianizing Christmas into a winter fun-fest of food, drink, parties, presents and pleasure. When we take a realistic and honest look at the Holy Family, we none of those elements present. If our Christmas is full of things, then there is a good chance that there will be no thing or nothing for Christ; but if we have little or nothing to do over Christmas, then there is nothing to distract us from Christ―who is the Heart of Christmas, the reason for Christmas. The soil of our soul will reap whatever we plant therein; if we plant the seed of the infant Christ, then Christ will grow in us; if we plant the seeds the world offers, then worldliness will grow in us.
Let us not de-Christianize this holy day, but let us often go back in thoughts and words to the Person whom we should be celebrating today. It is His birthday―not ours or anyone else’s―that is the cause of universal festivities. Otherwise it is like going to a birthday party, and completely ignoring the person whose birthday it is, while taking all the food and drink they have provided. How many will stop their celebrations for prayer, let alone even extra prayers (which should be the case―for on a birthday, we do more than the usual for the person concerned)? How many will have attended a second Mass today (for the Church allows each priest to offer three Masses today)?
Let us show our gratitude and love for Christ this Christmas! As Our Lady has said at several of her apparitions, God is already offended enough, we must stop offending Him. Let us make up for the countless offences that will rise heavenward on what should be a truly holy and spiritual day!
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings on His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12).
Unto us a Child is born!
Glory to God in the highest!
Peace on Earth to men of good will!
What on earth are we to make of this day? Who on earth was born? What on earth is going on? What on earth is He doing here? Where on earth is all this going to lead?
Different persons have conflicting answers to these questions. If you want the answer to them, then go to the Mother. Go to the Mother of God and go to Holy Mother Church. They will tell it as it is! From the Breviary readings from Matins for Christmas Day, we have these words of Pope St. Leo the Great (died 461):
“Dearly beloved brethren, “Unto us is born this day a Savior.” ... Today is Life’s Birthday; the Birthday of that Life, Which, for us dying creatures, taketh away the sting of death, and bringeth the bright promise of the eternal gladness hereafter ... Our Lord, Who is the destroyer of sin and of death, is come to make all free. Rejoice, O thou that art holy, thou drawest nearer to thy crown! Rejoice, O thou that art sinful, thy Savior offers thee pardon! Rejoice also, O thou Gentile, God calls thee to life! For the Son of God ... took upon Himself the nature of man, that He might reconcile that nature to Him Who made it.”
Through the readings from the Mass of the Vigil of Christmas, Holy Mother Church explained to us what on earth is happening regarding the birth of Our Lord, Jesus Christ.
At the Vigil Mass, the Introit tells us that “This day you shall know that the Lord will come and save us.” In the Gospel, Joseph is told by the angel not to fear taking Mary for his wife, for “she shall bring forth a Son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus (Savior), for He shall save His people from their sins.” By the time the day is over and midnight arrives, Holy Mother Church, at the first Mass of Christmas, is telling us: “Why have the people devised vain things” (Introit) ... “Our Savior has appeared to all men; instructing us, that, denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world” (Epistle) ... “Grant that we who rejoice in celebrating the Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ, may by dignified conversation become worthy to attain fellowship with Him” (Postcommunion).
By the following morning’s Dawn Mass, Holy Mother Church continues: “...that we may show forth in our actions that which by Faith shines in our minds” (Collect of 2nd Mass) ... “that the new birth of Thy only-begotten Son, may set us free, whom the old bondage holds under the yoke of sin” (Collect of 3rd Mass).... “and cleanse us from the stains of our sins” (Secret of the 3rd Mass).
Let Mary Teach You
The other mother―the Mother of God―in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says the same things in speaking of the mystery of Christmas:
“My most holy Son has set me as the teacher and living example of the love of humility and true contempt of worldly vanity and pride … He also sought destitution and poverty … in order to teach mortals the shortest and surest way for reaching the heights of divine love and union with God ... If men would keep their heart disengaged and if they would rightly and worthily consider this great mystery of the kindness of the Most High towards men; if they would only make use of their freedom to treat this mystery with the reverence due to its greatness; then who would be so hardened as not to be moved at the sight of their God become man, humiliated in poverty, despised, unknown, entering the world in a cave, lying in a manger surrounded by brute animals, protected only by a poverty-stricken Mother, and cast off by the foolish arrogance of the world?
“Who will dare to love the vanity and pride, which was openly abhorred and condemned by the Creator of Heaven and Earth in his conduct? No one can despise the humility, poverty and indigence, which the Lord loved and chose for Himself as the very means of teaching the way of eternal life. Few there are, who stop to consider this truth and example―and, on account of this vile ingratitude, only the few will reap the fruit of these great mysteries ...
“I remind and exhort you to forget all that is of Earth and lose it out of your sight; so that you seek nothing, or engage yourself with nothing except what can help you to withdraw and detach you from the world and its inhabitants; so that, with a heart freed from all terrestrial affection, thou dispose yourself to celebrate in it the mysteries of the poverty, humility and divine love of the incarnate God ... His coming down from Heaven onto the Earth, His being born in humility and poverty, His living and dying in it, giving such rare example of the contempt of the world and its deceits; the knowledge, which you have received concerning His conduct and which you have penetrated so deeply by divine intelligence. All these things should be for you like living voices, which you must heed and inscribe into the interior of your heart.” (Words of Our Lady, The Mystical City of God, vol. 2, The Incarnation, Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Hopeless Hype, Fickle Fame
The coming of the Messias was also a ‘big thing’ for the Jews. Centuries of prophecies had foretold of this wonderful person whom God would send to His Chosen People. There was a fair amount of hype that came and went throughout the years. When finally it did happen, almost nobody noticed. It was the greatest event in the history of mankind, but, seemingly, it fell flat! There was certainly a lot of substance; but not enough hype about it!
But did God want “a lot of hype” to accompany the birth of His only-begotten Son? His thoughts are not our thoughts, nor are our ways His ways: “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways’, saith the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts’” (Isaias 55:8-9).
It would seem that Christ’s birth should have been made known to all. Because fulfillment should correspond to promise. Now, the promise of Christ’s coming is thus expressed (Psalm 49:3): God shall come manifestly. But He came by His birth in the flesh. Therefore it seems that His birth should have been made known to the whole world.
St. Thomas Aquinas quotes an objection that says since Christ came into this world to save sinners, and since everyone in the world is a sinner, therefore it seems only fitting that Christ’s birth should have been made known to all. He then answers the objection quoting Isaias (45:15): “Thou art a hidden God, the Holy of Israel, the Savior.” And, again (Isaias43:3): “His look was, as it were, hidden and despised.” Aquinas explains that it was unfitting that Christ’s birth should be made known to all men without distinction.
Firstly, because this would have been a hindrance to the redemption of man, which was accomplished by means of the Cross; for, as it is written: “If they had known it, they would never have crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Cor.2:8).
Secondly, because this would have lessened the merit of Faith, for if, when Christ was born, His birth had been made known to all by evident signs, the very nature of Faith would have been destroyed, since it is the evidence of things that appear not, as stated in Scripture, “Faith is the substance of things to be hoped for, the evidence of things that appear not” (Hebrews 11:1).
Thirdly, if the glory of the Godhead would not have been hidden in Christ, the reality of His human nature would have come into doubt, whereby everyone would think He is just God and not God and man.
St. Augustine says: “If He had not passed through the different stages of age from babyhood to youth, had neither eaten nor slept, would He not have strengthened an erroneous opinion, and made it impossible for us to believe that He had become true man? And while He is doing all things wondrously, would He have taken away that which He accomplished in mercy?”
Or look at it from a modern-day perspective. If a billionaire wants to get married, what is the best approach to finding a good spouse? Is it by flaunting his millions in a lavish manifestation of his wealth; or is it by hiding the fact that he is a billionaire? If he flaunts his wealth, the potential spouses are more likely to marry him, not because they like and love him, but because they like and love the idea of being married to all that money and not so much the man.
The worldly way to celebrate the central event of all history would be a worldwide mega-party. The humility of God goes in the opposite direction! God the Father had centuries to prepare for this event, and He did not even book a room for Mary and Joseph at one of the local inns for the event! They had to suffer the ignominy of bringing the Son of God into this world in a dingy, smelly, cold little cave! To human eyes, it looks like the Master of Providence had “failed big-time” when it mattered the most! But that is the human ‘take’ on things, not the Divine ‘take’ on things. To God, the arrangements for the birth of His Son were perfect, as God’s will always is perfect.
Messianic Credentials
The legendary Bible exegete and commentator, the Benedictine monk Fr. Augustine Calmet (1672-1757), writes: “When and how should the Kingdom of God come? When and how will the Messias come? The Pharisees expected a Messias who would be powerful according to the evaluation of this world: a conqueror, a monarch, a revenger of the injuries of Israel; one who would restore them to liberty, and bless them with temporal goods and prosperity. Neither in His infancy, nor in His adult life could the Jews see in Jesus anything that corresponded to these attributes and qualities; they saw nothing that corresponded to these magnificent hopes; and therefore they would ask Him, by way of insult and reproach, when this Kingdom of God would come (Luke 17:20), of which He so often talked of and announced to His disciples. He answered them, that the manifestation of the Messias, and the establishment of His kingdom, shall not be manifested in a conspicuous, splendid manner. It would be brought about insensibly, and shall appear a casualty, and the effect of secondary causes. You shall not see the Messias coming at the head of armies, to spread terror and desolation. His arrival shall not be announced by ambassadors, etc. Everything in the establishment of His kingdom would be the reverse of temporal power” (Bible Commentary of Fr. Augustine Calmet, O.S.B., Aquinas Study Bible).
Of course, to prove that He came from God and to prove that He was God Himself, Jesus had to show the identity card of God―miracles and prophecies. For only God can perform true miracles and only God can predict a future that depends precariously on the free-will of man. He performed many miracles in His lifetime and also made prophecies that came true in His lifetime, and others cane true after He had ascended into Heaven. But He did not use the power of miracles to gain political power, to gain wealth, or to destroy His enemies.
Politically, he overthrew nobody even though He could have―He even fled when they sought to take Him by force and make Him king: “Jesus therefore, when He knew that they would come to take Him by force, and make Him king, fled again into the mountain Himself alone” (John 6:15). As regards wealth, He gave away what came His way, and lived in deliberately willed poverty. His enemies, even though He avoided them, He did not destroy them—he even restored the ear to Malchus, that St. Peter had cut-off with his sword (Malchus was one of those who had come to arrest Him in Gethsemane), and begged God to forgive His enemies as He died on the Cross. Jesus was the opposite of what the world was.
Rejected Redeemer―Scorned Savior
Today’s modern vocabulary would be tempted to describe Jesus as “radical”, “extreme”, “fanatical”, “anti-establishment”, “anti-social”, “rebellious”, “guilty of hate crimes” against the Pharisees (Matthew 23:13-35) and other Jews. Already in His own day some of the things they said of him were along the same lines: “These words are hard to accept!” (John 6:48-59, when He says “eat my flesh”); “Thou hast a devil!” (John 7:20); “Thou art a Samaritan!” (John 8:48); “He has blasphemed!” (Matthew 26:65); “How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles?” (John 9); “He seduces the people” (John 7:12). He “makes Himself a king, [and] speaks against Caesar!” (John 19:12); “We have found this man perverting our nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar!” (Luke 23:2).
It seems that Jesus did not live up to the expectations of His contemporaries! Do we live up to the expectations of our contemporaries? If we do, then Heaven help us! For Jesus said: “Remember My word that I said to you: ‘The servant is not greater than his master.’ If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you!” (John 15:20) ... “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:8) ... “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 10:22) ... “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death: and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake!” (Matthew 24:9).
Poor Jesus! That persecution already started for Him at His birth! He was rejected at the doors of Bethlehem; He was envied and hated by Herod, who even tried to kill Him, forcing Him to have to be exiled from His own country and nation as He fled into Egypt! Truly His life was “radical” and “extreme”, provoking extreme love or extreme hatred or extreme indifference from His contemporaries. How is the world treating you these days? We are all called to the imitation of Christ!
Celebrate in a True Spirit
This day deserves something less banal and more spiritual and more profound. So as we celebrate this astounding day, let us grasp the true spirit of the day, which is not to be found in stuffing ourselves with good food, merrily enjoying intoxicating drinks, watching worldly movies or sports on the TV, or partying away with family, friends and relatives―while relegating Our Lord to the closet, or a mere distant memory who has no place in our conversations and activities. “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). “We have not received the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God―so that we may know the things that are given us from God!” (1 Corinthians 2:12).
Many are Called―Few are Chosen!
On two separate occasions it is reported that Jesus said: “Many are called but few are chosen!” (Matthew 20:16; 22:14). Is that because many refuse to answer the call? Jesus calls everyone―He hates no one. But not everyone likes or wants to hear what Jesus is saying: “They would not listen, and they turned away the shoulder to depart. And they stopped their ears, not to hear!” (Zacharias 7:11). Jesus Himself says: “Having eyes, do you not see? And having ears, do you not hear? Neither do you remember!” (Mark 8:18). “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15).
Of such folk God says: “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21). “You dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see and see not; and have ears to hear and hear not―for they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2). “I will blind the heart of this people, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes―lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted and I heal them” (Isaias 6:10). “And when, in their distress, they shall return to the Lord the God and shall seek Him, they shall find Him” (2 Paralipomenon 15:4).
How true are the following words of Holy Scripture for our typical Christmas celebrations: “The Lord looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they have become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and have become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they have acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness are in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. God has scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God has despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6).
Our Lord comes desiring to give mercy and pardon: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). The following incident from Our Lord’s life shows the “great divide” in the attitudes of people―even Catholics:
“And it came to pass, as He was going to Jerusalem, He passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee. And as He entered into a certain town, there met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off; and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus! Master! Have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before Jesus’ feet, giving thanks: and this was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering, said, ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the nine? There is no one found to return and give glory to God, but this stranger!’” (Luke 17:11-18).
Sadly, today, the vast majority of Catholics no longer go to Sunday Mass regularly. All of them once received the mercy of Baptism, whereby they were made clean of the leprosy of Original Sin (and all Actual Sins, if they were baptized as adults). Yet, today, they no longer come back to adore and thank Jesus for that mercy. Many have committed sins since their Baptism and have received mercy in the confessional, where they “showed themselves to the priests”; but few are truly grateful and thankful, “with a loud voice glorifying God.” Of the minority who did go to Mass on Christmas Day, how many will go back to Jesus throughout the rest of the day, “with a loud voice glorifying God”?
Let us not fall (and let us nor permit those closest to us to fall) into that selfish, ungrateful, worldly-minded spirit that has succeeded in almost de-Christianizing Christmas into a winter fun-fest of food, drink, parties, presents and pleasure. When we take a realistic and honest look at the Holy Family, we none of those elements present. If our Christmas is full of things, then there is a good chance that there will be no thing or nothing for Christ; but if we have little or nothing to do over Christmas, then there is nothing to distract us from Christ―who is the Heart of Christmas, the reason for Christmas. The soil of our soul will reap whatever we plant therein; if we plant the seed of the infant Christ, then Christ will grow in us; if we plant the seeds the world offers, then worldliness will grow in us.
Let us not de-Christianize this holy day, but let us often go back in thoughts and words to the Person whom we should be celebrating today. It is His birthday―not ours or anyone else’s―that is the cause of universal festivities. Otherwise it is like going to a birthday party, and completely ignoring the person whose birthday it is, while taking all the food and drink they have provided. How many will stop their celebrations for prayer, let alone even extra prayers (which should be the case―for on a birthday, we do more than the usual for the person concerned)? How many will have attended a second Mass today (for the Church allows each priest to offer three Masses today)?
Let us show our gratitude and love for Christ this Christmas! As Our Lady has said at several of her apparitions, God is already offended enough, we must stop offending Him. Let us make up for the countless offences that will rise heavenward on what should be a truly holy and spiritual day!
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings on His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12).
Unto us a Child is born!
Glory to God in the highest!
Peace on Earth to men of good will!
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR ADVENT 2024
Article 20
Tueday, December 24th
A Shocking Present for Jesus at Christmas!
Tueday, December 24th
A Shocking Present for Jesus at Christmas!
Jesus and Jerome
The well-known story of St. Jerome should be an encouragement to us. About four centuries after the birth of Christ, after many years spent in Jerusalem translating the Word of God from various different Bibles and languages into what would be later known as the Latin Vulgate version of the Bible, St. Jerome had finished his grand project just days before Christmas. To celebrate this great forty-year long accomplishment, Jerome decides to spend Christmas Eve in nearby Bethlehem. He comes as a pilgrim to Bethlehem. He longs to venerate the place where Christ was born. He comes to the cave of the Nativity, where he humbly prays. He himself speaks later on about the divine experience he had.
Surprise Visitor! Surprise Gift!
According to the ancient account, sometime around midnight, Jesus appeared to him, saying: “Jerome, what will you give Me for My birthday?”
Immediately and enthusiastically, Jerome declared: “Lord, I give You my translation of Your Word!”
But instead of congratulating him, Jesus simply replied: “No, Jerome, that is not what I want!”
St. Jerome was speechless. Then he began to complain and remonstrate with Jesus, asking why He had let him go on for forty years, far from home, laboring at something other than what God most wanted from him. But Jesus remained silent. Jerome started suggesting other ways of honoring Jesus’ birthday—fasting, or becoming a hermit, or giving his possessions to the poor.
To each of these Jesus replied, “No. Jerome. That is not what I want most!”
St. Jerome then pleaded: “Oh Lord, You know that it is for You I have abandoned everything … both the court of the rulers, and the majesties of Rome, and the pleasures and the riches… and at this time my mind, my whole heart, my thoughts and even my life, everything belongs to You! What else could I give You? I don’t have anything else to give you today on Your on this feast day of Your birth!”
Jesus replied: “You still have something to give Me, Jerome! You have something which you have forgotten and today I want you to place it at My feet!”
Finally, Jerome protested, “What is that, my Lord? Please tell me! Do I truly have something else to give you? Would I be so evil as to keep something for myself! Tell me, dear Lord, what is there that I can still give You? Tell me, Lord! Tell me what would give You the most joy on Your birthday, and You shall have it!”
“Do you promise, Jerome?” asked Our Lord.
“Yes, Lord, anything at all!” cried Jerome.
Jesus replied, “Give Me your sins!”
“My sins, O Lord? What would You do with my sins?” asked a bewildered Jerome.
“Jerome, give Me all your sins, so that I can forgive them all.”
Hearing this, St. Jerome broke down into tears of emotion, happiness and love at the merciful words of Jesus.
“Give me your sins.” In His limitless humility, more than any service we can render Him, the Lord considers it a gift that we “allow” Him to take away our sins. Why? Precisely because He thirsts for us, because He longs for union with us, and the only obstacle to that union is our sin — which, in His eyes, then, becomes the most precious gift we can offer.
Hope and Confidence in God
Sometimes, the sight of our many sins can induce dejection discouragement, despondency, or even despair. That is not the work of God, but of the devil. God loves the sinner, but hates the sin. If you can arrive at that same hatred of sin, then there is nothing to worry about—no matter how great or frequent those sins may have been! Our Lord Himself said: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10; Matthew 18:11). “But the Pharisees and Scribes murmured, saying to His disciples: ‘Why do you eat and drink with publicans and sinners?’ And Jesus answering, said to them: ‘They that are whole need not the physician, but they that are sick! I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!’” (Luke 5:30-32). That is what Christmas and the coming of Christ is all about!
There Is No Sin That Cannot Be Forgiven
“If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow; and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). All God wants is repentance and sorrow for past sin. “If the wicked man does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live and shall not die! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live. Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?... Because he considers and turns himself away from all his iniquities which he has wrought, he shall surely live, and not die .... Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities: and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart and a new spirit!” (Ezechiel 18:21-31).
Rise to a New Life
The Sacrament of Confession casts away our transgressions and gives us a new heart and a new spirit. It is a spiritual resurrection. We enter the “tomb” of the confessional and leave our sins and guilt there, emerging as a new person, having put off the “old man” and put on the new—as St. Paul says: “To put off ... the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error, and be renewed in spirit of your mind: and put on the new man...” (Ephesians 4:22-23).
The Mercies of God Are Above all His Works
It is of capital importance that we never ever let our past sins—no matter how great or filthy they may have been—come between God and ourselves, or make us in any way doubt God’s love, friendship and mercy. As the Psalmist says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all, and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm144:8-9). God does not do things by halves. When He forgives sins, He forgives completely. Their guilt is blotted out entirely and He will not reproach us with them again. Yet, His generosity goes even further. When a soul falls into mortal sin, all the merits from its past life are lost. If, however, the soul repents and obtains pardon, these merits revive again―in proportion to the sinner’s sorrow and love. Such is God’s generosity and love.
This is a point of great importance. There is always a great temptation to discouragement and distrust, even after our sins have been forgiven. We feel that God still holds our sins against us; that His providence will be less favorable to us in the future; we feel that He no longer trusts us and that He will be reserved and sparing in His granting of graces. We imagine, too, that no matter how great our progress may be in the future, the ultimate result will always be spoiled by that unfortunate past.
All that is natural—but it is also quite wrong! It is based upon a wrong notion of God. God loves to bring good out of evil. He did so with St. Paul, with Mary Magdalen, with St. Augustine, with St. John of God, with the Venerable Matthew Talbot and many, many more. It is our lack of confidence that places obstacles in the way. Many sins were forgiven Mary Magdalen, because she loved much. If we love Him as she did, our sins will be forgiven us―and the more we love, the more debt is wiped away. We can be more pleasing to God by a life of ardent love after our sin, than the lukewarm life of our previous innocence. Truly God can bring good out of evil!
To Obtain Mercy, We Must Show Mercy
At the sermon on the Mount, Our Lord stated: “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). If we want mercy, we have to show mercy. “The just are merciful and show mercy” (Proverbs 13:13).
We pray: “Forgive us our trespasses” but perhaps wish that we could omit the next part: “as we forgive those who trespass against us.” The perennial human problem is not “What is good for the goose is good for the gander”, but rather “What is good for me, is not good for anyone else—unless I say so!” We want mercy badly, but we are often bad about showing mercy to others. But Scripture says: “Judgment without mercy to him that hath not done mercy” (James 2:13). The parable of the Unmerciful Servant, serves as warning to us. Just before this parable, “Peter came unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say not to thee, seven times; but seventy times seven times.
“The Kingdom of Heaven can be likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 an ounce, one talent would be worth $22,500―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $225 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!’ And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of $22 per ounce, the penny would be worth $2.75―and a hundred pence would be $275): and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: ‘Pay what you owe me!’ And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!’ But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: ‘You wicked servant! I forgave thee all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?’ And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!” (Matthew 18:21-35).
We Are Awaiting a Forgiving Christ this Christmas!
We are preparing to celebrate the next mystery resulting from the Incarnation―which is the Nativity of Jesus Christ, of Emmanuel, the “God with us”, Who works wonders for His people, especially the least and most fragile. In Jesus Christ, God’s saving love is tangible: “The blind regain their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are purified, the deaf hear, the dead rise, and the Gospel is announced to the poor!” (Matthew 11.5). These are the signs that accompany the realization of the Kingdom of God. But even more miraculous than curing the sick, is curing the morally sick―forgiving them their sins. We see Jesus point this out on one occasion.
“Jesus was in the house and many came together―so that there was no room; no, not even at the door! And He spoke to them the word of God. And there came to him, four men bringing one sick of the palsy. And when they could not bring him before Jesus because of the crowd, they uncovered the roof where Jesus was―and opening it, they let down the bed wherein the man sick of the palsy lay. And when Jesus had seen their Faith, he said to the man sick of the palsy: ‘Son, thy sins are forgiven thee!’ And there were some of the scribes sitting there and thinking in their hearts: ‘Why does this man speak thus? He blasphemes! Who can forgive sins, but God only!’ Jesus knowing in His spirit, that they thought so within themselves, said to them: ‘Why think you these things in your hearts? Which is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy: “Thy sins are forgiven thee!” or to say: “Arise, take up thy bed and walk!” But so that you may know that the Son of man hath power on Earth to forgive sins’ ― Jesus said to the man sick of the palsy ― ‘I say to thee: Arise! Take up thy bed and go into thy house!’ And immediately he arose―and taking up his bed, went his way in the sight of all; so that all wondered and glorified God, saying: ‘We never saw anything like this!’” (Mark 2:2-12).
The 11th Hours of Advent and the Vineyard
We can see a certain compassion, mercy and kindness in the parable of the workers in the vineyard, where the owner of the vineyard, “…went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’ And when evening was come, the lord of the vineyard said to his steward: ‘Call the laborers and pay them their hire―beginning from the last even to the first!’ When therefore they were come, those that came about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny. But when the first also came, they thought that they should receive more―and they also received every man a penny. And receiving it they murmured against the master of the house, saying: ‘These last have worked but one hour, and you have made them equal to us, that have borne the burden of the day and the heat!’ But he answering said to one of them: ‘Friend, I do you no wrong! Did you not agree with me for a penny? Take what is yours, and go on your way. I will also give to this last the same as I give to you. Or, is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Is your eye evil, because I am good?’” (Matthew 20:1-15).
This dovetails beautifully with the symbolism of Advent. We have the master calling in workers at four main periods of the day, just as we have the four weeks of Advent and four Advent candles that we lit: (1) the start of the day, represented by the first candle is lit at the start of Advent and burns throughout the whole Advent period―just like the workers who worked from the start of the day to the end of the day; (2) the third hour represents the second week of Advent and the second candle that is lit at the start of the second week; (3) the sixth hour represents the third week of Advent and the third candle; and (4) the ninth hour represents the fourth week of Advent. Yet, being merciful, the owner of the vineyard goes out at the eleventh hour, which could represent Christmas Eve and even accepts workers at the last minute, like Christ accepted the Good Thief’s repentance on the cross, at the last hour of his life. Yet, no matter at what time the laborers came into work, they all saw the same reward—one penny! That penny seems a little thing to us today, for today’s minimum wage is many hundreds of pennies for just one hour’s work! Yet that little penny can also be seen to represent the little Child Jesus, Who wants to give Himself to each and every one of us, no matter how early or how late we came in to labor and sweat in His vineyard. The reward is the same—the little ‘mustard-seed’ of the Infant Jesus is given to all who repent of sin, do penance and sincerely (and even half-sincerely) desire Him.
Liturgical Lessons
Holy Mother Church, in the Christmas Liturgy, gives us the true purpose and spirit of Christmas that should prevail in Catholic minds and homes:
“Sanctify yourselves and be ready! … Sanctify yourselves, says the Lord, for tomorrow the Lord will come down and will take away from you all sickness. Tomorrow the sins of the Earth shall be washed away, and the Savior of the world will be our King!” (Matins for Christmas Eve).
“Tomorrow the sins of the Earth shall be washed away, and the Savior of the world will be our King!” (Antiphon at Lauds for Christmas Eve).
“Grant, we beseech Thee, almighty God, that the new birth of Thy Only-begotten Son as man may set us free, who are held by the old bondage under the yoke of sin!” (Christmas Eve prayer from the First Vespers of Christmas).
“Enlighten our hearts; vain hopes destroy;
And in Thy love's consuming fire
Fill all the soul with heavenly joy,
And melt the dross of low desire.”
(Hymn from Matins, Christmas Eve).
“Behold the Lamb, so long expected,
Comes with pardon down from Heaven;
Let us haste, with tears of sorrow,
One and all to be forgiven!”
(Hymn from Lauds, Christmas Eve).
Christmas is not a sentimental, superficial, secular sideshow―Christmas is all about sin and forgiveness; redemption and salvation; ransom and rescue! Christ comes to free us from the shackles of this world and the chains of its customs! Let not the gooey, slushy, mushy, sentimental side of a secularized and sanitized Christmas distract from its true purpose and meaning. Christ does not come to party and have fun―Christ comes to suffer and die for our sins, so that He can redeem and rescue us from this wicked world: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). Very few Catholics actually believe those words. They have befriended the world and enjoy the world. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
The well-known story of St. Jerome should be an encouragement to us. About four centuries after the birth of Christ, after many years spent in Jerusalem translating the Word of God from various different Bibles and languages into what would be later known as the Latin Vulgate version of the Bible, St. Jerome had finished his grand project just days before Christmas. To celebrate this great forty-year long accomplishment, Jerome decides to spend Christmas Eve in nearby Bethlehem. He comes as a pilgrim to Bethlehem. He longs to venerate the place where Christ was born. He comes to the cave of the Nativity, where he humbly prays. He himself speaks later on about the divine experience he had.
Surprise Visitor! Surprise Gift!
According to the ancient account, sometime around midnight, Jesus appeared to him, saying: “Jerome, what will you give Me for My birthday?”
Immediately and enthusiastically, Jerome declared: “Lord, I give You my translation of Your Word!”
But instead of congratulating him, Jesus simply replied: “No, Jerome, that is not what I want!”
St. Jerome was speechless. Then he began to complain and remonstrate with Jesus, asking why He had let him go on for forty years, far from home, laboring at something other than what God most wanted from him. But Jesus remained silent. Jerome started suggesting other ways of honoring Jesus’ birthday—fasting, or becoming a hermit, or giving his possessions to the poor.
To each of these Jesus replied, “No. Jerome. That is not what I want most!”
St. Jerome then pleaded: “Oh Lord, You know that it is for You I have abandoned everything … both the court of the rulers, and the majesties of Rome, and the pleasures and the riches… and at this time my mind, my whole heart, my thoughts and even my life, everything belongs to You! What else could I give You? I don’t have anything else to give you today on Your on this feast day of Your birth!”
Jesus replied: “You still have something to give Me, Jerome! You have something which you have forgotten and today I want you to place it at My feet!”
Finally, Jerome protested, “What is that, my Lord? Please tell me! Do I truly have something else to give you? Would I be so evil as to keep something for myself! Tell me, dear Lord, what is there that I can still give You? Tell me, Lord! Tell me what would give You the most joy on Your birthday, and You shall have it!”
“Do you promise, Jerome?” asked Our Lord.
“Yes, Lord, anything at all!” cried Jerome.
Jesus replied, “Give Me your sins!”
“My sins, O Lord? What would You do with my sins?” asked a bewildered Jerome.
“Jerome, give Me all your sins, so that I can forgive them all.”
Hearing this, St. Jerome broke down into tears of emotion, happiness and love at the merciful words of Jesus.
“Give me your sins.” In His limitless humility, more than any service we can render Him, the Lord considers it a gift that we “allow” Him to take away our sins. Why? Precisely because He thirsts for us, because He longs for union with us, and the only obstacle to that union is our sin — which, in His eyes, then, becomes the most precious gift we can offer.
Hope and Confidence in God
Sometimes, the sight of our many sins can induce dejection discouragement, despondency, or even despair. That is not the work of God, but of the devil. God loves the sinner, but hates the sin. If you can arrive at that same hatred of sin, then there is nothing to worry about—no matter how great or frequent those sins may have been! Our Lord Himself said: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10; Matthew 18:11). “But the Pharisees and Scribes murmured, saying to His disciples: ‘Why do you eat and drink with publicans and sinners?’ And Jesus answering, said to them: ‘They that are whole need not the physician, but they that are sick! I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!’” (Luke 5:30-32). That is what Christmas and the coming of Christ is all about!
There Is No Sin That Cannot Be Forgiven
“If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow; and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). All God wants is repentance and sorrow for past sin. “If the wicked man does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live and shall not die! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live. Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?... Because he considers and turns himself away from all his iniquities which he has wrought, he shall surely live, and not die .... Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities: and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart and a new spirit!” (Ezechiel 18:21-31).
Rise to a New Life
The Sacrament of Confession casts away our transgressions and gives us a new heart and a new spirit. It is a spiritual resurrection. We enter the “tomb” of the confessional and leave our sins and guilt there, emerging as a new person, having put off the “old man” and put on the new—as St. Paul says: “To put off ... the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error, and be renewed in spirit of your mind: and put on the new man...” (Ephesians 4:22-23).
The Mercies of God Are Above all His Works
It is of capital importance that we never ever let our past sins—no matter how great or filthy they may have been—come between God and ourselves, or make us in any way doubt God’s love, friendship and mercy. As the Psalmist says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all, and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm144:8-9). God does not do things by halves. When He forgives sins, He forgives completely. Their guilt is blotted out entirely and He will not reproach us with them again. Yet, His generosity goes even further. When a soul falls into mortal sin, all the merits from its past life are lost. If, however, the soul repents and obtains pardon, these merits revive again―in proportion to the sinner’s sorrow and love. Such is God’s generosity and love.
This is a point of great importance. There is always a great temptation to discouragement and distrust, even after our sins have been forgiven. We feel that God still holds our sins against us; that His providence will be less favorable to us in the future; we feel that He no longer trusts us and that He will be reserved and sparing in His granting of graces. We imagine, too, that no matter how great our progress may be in the future, the ultimate result will always be spoiled by that unfortunate past.
All that is natural—but it is also quite wrong! It is based upon a wrong notion of God. God loves to bring good out of evil. He did so with St. Paul, with Mary Magdalen, with St. Augustine, with St. John of God, with the Venerable Matthew Talbot and many, many more. It is our lack of confidence that places obstacles in the way. Many sins were forgiven Mary Magdalen, because she loved much. If we love Him as she did, our sins will be forgiven us―and the more we love, the more debt is wiped away. We can be more pleasing to God by a life of ardent love after our sin, than the lukewarm life of our previous innocence. Truly God can bring good out of evil!
To Obtain Mercy, We Must Show Mercy
At the sermon on the Mount, Our Lord stated: “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). If we want mercy, we have to show mercy. “The just are merciful and show mercy” (Proverbs 13:13).
We pray: “Forgive us our trespasses” but perhaps wish that we could omit the next part: “as we forgive those who trespass against us.” The perennial human problem is not “What is good for the goose is good for the gander”, but rather “What is good for me, is not good for anyone else—unless I say so!” We want mercy badly, but we are often bad about showing mercy to others. But Scripture says: “Judgment without mercy to him that hath not done mercy” (James 2:13). The parable of the Unmerciful Servant, serves as warning to us. Just before this parable, “Peter came unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say not to thee, seven times; but seventy times seven times.
“The Kingdom of Heaven can be likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of $30 an ounce, one talent would be worth $22,500―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $225 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!’ And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of $22 per ounce, the penny would be worth $2.75―and a hundred pence would be $275): and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: ‘Pay what you owe me!’ And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!’ But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: ‘You wicked servant! I forgave thee all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?’ And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!” (Matthew 18:21-35).
We Are Awaiting a Forgiving Christ this Christmas!
We are preparing to celebrate the next mystery resulting from the Incarnation―which is the Nativity of Jesus Christ, of Emmanuel, the “God with us”, Who works wonders for His people, especially the least and most fragile. In Jesus Christ, God’s saving love is tangible: “The blind regain their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are purified, the deaf hear, the dead rise, and the Gospel is announced to the poor!” (Matthew 11.5). These are the signs that accompany the realization of the Kingdom of God. But even more miraculous than curing the sick, is curing the morally sick―forgiving them their sins. We see Jesus point this out on one occasion.
“Jesus was in the house and many came together―so that there was no room; no, not even at the door! And He spoke to them the word of God. And there came to him, four men bringing one sick of the palsy. And when they could not bring him before Jesus because of the crowd, they uncovered the roof where Jesus was―and opening it, they let down the bed wherein the man sick of the palsy lay. And when Jesus had seen their Faith, he said to the man sick of the palsy: ‘Son, thy sins are forgiven thee!’ And there were some of the scribes sitting there and thinking in their hearts: ‘Why does this man speak thus? He blasphemes! Who can forgive sins, but God only!’ Jesus knowing in His spirit, that they thought so within themselves, said to them: ‘Why think you these things in your hearts? Which is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy: “Thy sins are forgiven thee!” or to say: “Arise, take up thy bed and walk!” But so that you may know that the Son of man hath power on Earth to forgive sins’ ― Jesus said to the man sick of the palsy ― ‘I say to thee: Arise! Take up thy bed and go into thy house!’ And immediately he arose―and taking up his bed, went his way in the sight of all; so that all wondered and glorified God, saying: ‘We never saw anything like this!’” (Mark 2:2-12).
The 11th Hours of Advent and the Vineyard
We can see a certain compassion, mercy and kindness in the parable of the workers in the vineyard, where the owner of the vineyard, “…went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’ And when evening was come, the lord of the vineyard said to his steward: ‘Call the laborers and pay them their hire―beginning from the last even to the first!’ When therefore they were come, those that came about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny. But when the first also came, they thought that they should receive more―and they also received every man a penny. And receiving it they murmured against the master of the house, saying: ‘These last have worked but one hour, and you have made them equal to us, that have borne the burden of the day and the heat!’ But he answering said to one of them: ‘Friend, I do you no wrong! Did you not agree with me for a penny? Take what is yours, and go on your way. I will also give to this last the same as I give to you. Or, is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Is your eye evil, because I am good?’” (Matthew 20:1-15).
This dovetails beautifully with the symbolism of Advent. We have the master calling in workers at four main periods of the day, just as we have the four weeks of Advent and four Advent candles that we lit: (1) the start of the day, represented by the first candle is lit at the start of Advent and burns throughout the whole Advent period―just like the workers who worked from the start of the day to the end of the day; (2) the third hour represents the second week of Advent and the second candle that is lit at the start of the second week; (3) the sixth hour represents the third week of Advent and the third candle; and (4) the ninth hour represents the fourth week of Advent. Yet, being merciful, the owner of the vineyard goes out at the eleventh hour, which could represent Christmas Eve and even accepts workers at the last minute, like Christ accepted the Good Thief’s repentance on the cross, at the last hour of his life. Yet, no matter at what time the laborers came into work, they all saw the same reward—one penny! That penny seems a little thing to us today, for today’s minimum wage is many hundreds of pennies for just one hour’s work! Yet that little penny can also be seen to represent the little Child Jesus, Who wants to give Himself to each and every one of us, no matter how early or how late we came in to labor and sweat in His vineyard. The reward is the same—the little ‘mustard-seed’ of the Infant Jesus is given to all who repent of sin, do penance and sincerely (and even half-sincerely) desire Him.
Liturgical Lessons
Holy Mother Church, in the Christmas Liturgy, gives us the true purpose and spirit of Christmas that should prevail in Catholic minds and homes:
“Sanctify yourselves and be ready! … Sanctify yourselves, says the Lord, for tomorrow the Lord will come down and will take away from you all sickness. Tomorrow the sins of the Earth shall be washed away, and the Savior of the world will be our King!” (Matins for Christmas Eve).
“Tomorrow the sins of the Earth shall be washed away, and the Savior of the world will be our King!” (Antiphon at Lauds for Christmas Eve).
“Grant, we beseech Thee, almighty God, that the new birth of Thy Only-begotten Son as man may set us free, who are held by the old bondage under the yoke of sin!” (Christmas Eve prayer from the First Vespers of Christmas).
“Enlighten our hearts; vain hopes destroy;
And in Thy love's consuming fire
Fill all the soul with heavenly joy,
And melt the dross of low desire.”
(Hymn from Matins, Christmas Eve).
“Behold the Lamb, so long expected,
Comes with pardon down from Heaven;
Let us haste, with tears of sorrow,
One and all to be forgiven!”
(Hymn from Lauds, Christmas Eve).
Christmas is not a sentimental, superficial, secular sideshow―Christmas is all about sin and forgiveness; redemption and salvation; ransom and rescue! Christ comes to free us from the shackles of this world and the chains of its customs! Let not the gooey, slushy, mushy, sentimental side of a secularized and sanitized Christmas distract from its true purpose and meaning. Christ does not come to party and have fun―Christ comes to suffer and die for our sins, so that He can redeem and rescue us from this wicked world: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). Very few Catholics actually believe those words. They have befriended the world and enjoy the world. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Article 19
Monday, December 23rd
Prepare the Way for the Lord!
Monday, December 23rd
Prepare the Way for the Lord!
Prepare the Way for the Lord!
The Gospel of the Fourth and last Sunday of Advent clearly cries out through St. John the Baptist: “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight his paths! Every valley shall be filled; and every mountain and hill shall be brought low; and the crooked shall be made straight; and the rough ways plain; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God!”
But that is not even half of the story! The Church proposes readings for us each Sunday and also on each day of the year, but they are like a mere ‘trailer’ from a movie, which show only a glimpse of what is going on. The same is true for the Gospel of the Fourth Sunday of Advent. It takes only the first six verses of chapter 3 of St. Luke, but the whole incident reported by Luke takes up eighteen verses. St. John the Baptist is only warming up in verses 1 to 6. Here is the whole passage for you to savor:
“The word of the Lord was made unto John, the son of Zachary, in the desert. And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of penance for the remission of sins; as it was written in the book of the sayings of Isaias the prophet: ‘A voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight his paths. Every valley shall be filled; and every mountain and hill shall be brought low; and the crooked shall be made straight; and the rough ways plain; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’
“He said therefore to the multitudes that went forth to be baptized by him: ‘Ye offspring of vipers, who hath showed you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruits worthy of penance; and do not begin to say, “We have Abraham for our father!” For I say unto you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham of these stones. For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees! Every tree therefore that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down and cast into the fire!’
“And the people asked him, saying: ‘What then shall we do?’ And he, answering, said to them: ‘He that has two coats, let him give to him that has none; and he that has meat, let him do in like manner!’ And the publicans also came to be baptized, and said to him: ‘Master, what shall we do?’ But he said to them: ‘Do nothing more than that which is appointed to you!’ And the soldiers also asked him, saying: ‘And what shall we do?’ And he said to them: ‘Do violence to no man; neither calumniate any man; and be content with your pay!’
Getting Fired-Up for Christmas!
“And as the people were of opinion, and all were thinking in their hearts of John, that perhaps he might be the Christ; John answered, saying unto all: ‘I indeed baptize you with water; but there shall come One mightier than I, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to loose! He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire―Whose fan is in his hand, and He will purge His floor, and will gather the wheat into His barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire.’ And many other things exhorting, did he preach to the people” (Luke 3:1-18).
Again we see this symbol of fire brought to the fore—the play between the fires of love and the fires of punishment. Jesus will be coming with the fires of love at Christmas, and He comes to light a real fire: “I am come to cast fire on the earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). His burning Sacred Heart wants love, not lukewarmness or coldness―as Jesus stated to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque: “My Divine Heart is so passionately inflamed with love for men! … Behold this Heart which has so loved men that It spared nothing―even going so far as to exhaust and consume Itself to prove to them Its love! And in return I receive― from the greater part of men―nothing but ingratitude, by the contempt, irreverence, sacrileges and coldness with which they treat Me! … If they would only give Me some return of love―but they have only coldness and contempt for all My endeavors to do them good. This is more grievous to Me than all that I endured in My Passion!” Holy Scripture asks you: “Shall thy zeal be kindled like a fire?” (Psalm 78:5). Here too there is allusion by St. John of the Holy Ghost, of Whom we ask each time we pray to Him, “enkindle in us the fires of Thy love!”
Let us start kindling the fires for Christmas, so that when He comes, He may find a sincere and warm welcome, and not a fake welcome that falls from cold lips that betray a cold heart. Let us pull out the tinder wood of spiritual reading; expose it to the flame of perhaps an extra Mass if possible, or a visit to the ever-burning fire of the Blessed Sacrament; let us pile on some logs of extra prayers and sacrifices and keep from it the cold, dousing water of the world and its cold, damp materialistic spirit. His coming is but days away! Prepare the ways of the Lord! Prepare His way, not the world’s way!
Worrying About the Wrong Things
Our priorities are all wrong―we worry too much about the material side of Christmas and not enough about the spiritual side of Christmas. Our Lord tells us: “Be not solicitous therefore, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek! … Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God!” (Matthew 6:31-33).
“No man can serve two masters [a spiritual Christmas and a material Christmas]. For either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat, and the body more than the clothing? [and isn’t Christmas more than just food, drink, parties and presents?].” (Matthew 6:22-23). “Man does not live by bread alone, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4; Luke 4:4).
The Seeds of Christmas
Christmas will be like the planting of a seed; but the soul, like soil, needs to be receptive and free from the weeds of the world. Our Lord’s words from the parable of the Sower of Seed come to mind here: “He that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choketh up the word, and he becometh fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). This is what will happen to us if we do not remove the thorns and weeds of the world before Christmas arrives—hence the time of Advent, a time of work and penance in tilling and preparing the soil of the soul for the planting of the seed of Christ at Christmas. Christmas is all about Christ, not about us!
Be Courageous for Christ!
Hey! You are a Soldier of Christ by receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation! Why not confirm that by being courageous this Christmas and saying: “Enough of this secular materialism! Enough is enough! Christmas is time for Christ and spiritual things!” Of course, this will not be liked by most of those in your family circle and friends―it will come across like a lead-balloon, and risks criticism, resentment, mockery, ostracization, etc. Yet Our Lord―Whose birthday we should be celebrating at Christmas―has already foretold this kind of reaction: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 8:23; 18:36). “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (Matthew 10:22; 24:9; John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7). “He that is not with Me, is against Me! … Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to bring peace upon Earth―I came not to bring peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:32-37).
Job was Simple―But the Job was not Simple!
“There was a man whose name was Job, and that man was simple and upright, and fearing God, and avoiding evil. And there were born to him seven sons and three daughters. And his possession was seven thousand sheep, and three thousand camels, and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she asses, and a family exceeding great: and this man was great among all the people of the east. And his sons went, and made a feast by houses everyone in his day [That is, each made a feast in his own house and had his day, inviting the others, and their sisters, to the feast]. And sending they called their three sisters to eat and drink with them. And when the days of their feasting were gone about, Job sent to them, and sanctified them: and rising up early offered holocausts for every one of them. For he said: ‘Lest perhaps my sons have sinned, and have blessed God in their hearts!’ [that is to say, committed sacrilege, by sinning in their parties and then blessing God]. So did Job all days” (Job 1:1-5).
Here we see the dangers of having many things and much wealth! Job was able to handle it; his children could not handle it. Job was not the one going from one party to another, but his children could not refrain from organizing parties and “living-it-up”! Job realized the dangers and potential sins that his children could be committing, as was afraid of them being hypocritical towards God—sinning through their parties and feasts and then mocking God by pretending to be religious. So Job would daily offer sacrifices to God—both to protect them from evil and make reparation for any evil they may have committed at their parties and feasts. Nevertheless, it seems that all their partying and feasting led them astray, and it is generally accepted that they were punished by God by death: “Does God pervert judgment, or does the Almighty overthrow that which is just? … Thy children have sinned against Him, and He has left them in the hand of their iniquity!” (Job 8:3-4).
False Gods and Festivities
This preoccupation with eating, drinking and playing is nothing new. We see it in time of Moses, in the desert, when “Aaron said to them: ‘Take the golden earrings from the ears of your wives, and your sons and daughters, and bring them to me!’ And the people did what he had commanded, bringing the earrings to Aaron. And when he had received them, he fashioned and made of them a molten calf. And they said: ‘These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt!’ And when Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it, and … rising in the morning, they offered holocausts, and peace victims, and the people sat down to eat, and drink, and they rose up to play. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Go, get thee down! Thy people, which thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt, hath sinned! They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst show them, and they have made to themselves a molten calf, and have adored it, and sacrificing victims to it, have said: “These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt”!’” (Exodus 32:2-8).
“Moses returned from the mount … And when he came near to the camp, he saw the calf and the dances―and being very angry, he threw the tablets [on which the Ten Commandments were engraved] out of his hand, and broke them at the foot of the mount: and laying hold of the calf which they had made, he burnt it, and beat it to powder … And he said to Aaron: ‘What has this people done to thee, that thou shouldst bring upon them a most heinous sin?’ And he answered him: ‘Let not my lord be offended! For thou knowest this people, that they are prone to evil! They said to me: “Make us gods, that may go before us: for as to this Moses, who brought us forth out of the land of Egypt, we know not what is befallen him!”’” (Exodus 32:19-23).
When the Cat’s Away, the Mice...
As the saying goes, “While the cat’s away, the mice will play” and here, while Moses was away, the Chosen People forgot their One True God, and replaced him with this idol—the golden calf. Something similar has happened to Christmas. We have forgotten the real purpose of Christmas, the coming of the One True God, Jesus, to come and bring us out of our own “Land of Egypt” which is the increasingly sinful world that surrounds us. For most people, Christmas will be a matter of sitting down to eat and drink, and then rising up to play. Out of the estimated two million Israelites that were there in the desert, only one of them—Moses—was in the presence of God, up on the mountain with Him for forty-days and forty-nights.
Forty Days of Fun, or Forty Days with God
That mystical number of forty, has some significance here. Advent used to be a forty-day period—beginning in mid-November. These were forty days of preparation for the coming of God. Then, when God came at Christmas, there were and still are the forty day of Christmas, which take us up to the feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary on February 2nd. How many people have spent these days of Advent on the mountain with God? How many will spend the forty days of Christmas on the mountain with God? God knows! We can only guess! But our guess might well be pretty accurate if we say “Hardly anyone will be found on that mountain!” The world is only giving God lip-service, while it adores the world and the parties and feasts that the world has to offer, especially at this time of year. What should be a spiritual feast, has degenerated into a material feast. Yes, we all celebrate Christmas, but in what manner? Like Job would? Or like Job’s sinful children? Like Moses would? Or like Moses’ sinful Israelites? God’s anger visited both Job’s children and the Israelites, just as Our Lady of La Salette says that God’s anger will visit us.
Fun Will End Up Not Being Funny
Our Lady of La Salette warned of the consequences of chasing after fun and being forgetful of God: “Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God. God will strike in an unprecedented way. Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together. The leaders of the people of God have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell [much like Satan was unleashed by God upon Job]; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them [with lukewarmness, indifferentism, presumption] in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell. Several religious institutions will lose the Faith and will lose many souls [as in the case of the Job’s children and the Israelites in the desert]. Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening in all that concerns the service of God.
“People will think of nothing but amusement [like Job’s children and the idolaters with the golden calf ― sitting down to eat and drink, and rising up to play]. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin. But the children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me. Blessed are the souls humbly guided by the Holy Ghost! I shall fight at their side until they reach fullness of years. Nature is asking for vengeance because of man, and she trembles with dread at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime. Tremble, Earth, and you who proclaim yourselves as serving Jesus Christ, and who, on the inside, only adore yourselves, tremble for God will hand you over to His enemy, because the holy places are in a state of corruption!” (Our Lady of La Salette, in 1846). At Fatima in 1917 and in Akita in 1973, she repeats this general warning.
Destroy the ‘Golden Calf’ Christmas
One of major complaints Our Lady had at La Salette was that people no longer attributed much importance to religion and their religious duties. They had become lukewarm. Today, matters have not improved, but have grown much worse. But Our Lady speaks of “the children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers” ― hopefully this includes us, who do not want to be feasting with Job’s children and who do not want to adore the golden Christmas calf, with its ritual of sitting down to eat and drink and rising up to play! Our Lady says that these “children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me. Blessed are the souls humbly guided by the Holy Ghost! I shall fight at their side until they reach fullness of years.” Let us return, therefore to the true notion of a Christian and Marian Christmas and, like Moses, burn and pulverize the ‘golden calf’ Christmas which only serves to fulfill Our Lady’s La Salette prophecy of “People will think of nothing but amusement.” We may find ourselves alone in this desire and resolution, but at least we will be alone with God and God alone.
The Gospel of the Fourth and last Sunday of Advent clearly cries out through St. John the Baptist: “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight his paths! Every valley shall be filled; and every mountain and hill shall be brought low; and the crooked shall be made straight; and the rough ways plain; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God!”
But that is not even half of the story! The Church proposes readings for us each Sunday and also on each day of the year, but they are like a mere ‘trailer’ from a movie, which show only a glimpse of what is going on. The same is true for the Gospel of the Fourth Sunday of Advent. It takes only the first six verses of chapter 3 of St. Luke, but the whole incident reported by Luke takes up eighteen verses. St. John the Baptist is only warming up in verses 1 to 6. Here is the whole passage for you to savor:
“The word of the Lord was made unto John, the son of Zachary, in the desert. And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of penance for the remission of sins; as it was written in the book of the sayings of Isaias the prophet: ‘A voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight his paths. Every valley shall be filled; and every mountain and hill shall be brought low; and the crooked shall be made straight; and the rough ways plain; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’
“He said therefore to the multitudes that went forth to be baptized by him: ‘Ye offspring of vipers, who hath showed you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruits worthy of penance; and do not begin to say, “We have Abraham for our father!” For I say unto you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham of these stones. For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees! Every tree therefore that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down and cast into the fire!’
“And the people asked him, saying: ‘What then shall we do?’ And he, answering, said to them: ‘He that has two coats, let him give to him that has none; and he that has meat, let him do in like manner!’ And the publicans also came to be baptized, and said to him: ‘Master, what shall we do?’ But he said to them: ‘Do nothing more than that which is appointed to you!’ And the soldiers also asked him, saying: ‘And what shall we do?’ And he said to them: ‘Do violence to no man; neither calumniate any man; and be content with your pay!’
Getting Fired-Up for Christmas!
“And as the people were of opinion, and all were thinking in their hearts of John, that perhaps he might be the Christ; John answered, saying unto all: ‘I indeed baptize you with water; but there shall come One mightier than I, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to loose! He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire―Whose fan is in his hand, and He will purge His floor, and will gather the wheat into His barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire.’ And many other things exhorting, did he preach to the people” (Luke 3:1-18).
Again we see this symbol of fire brought to the fore—the play between the fires of love and the fires of punishment. Jesus will be coming with the fires of love at Christmas, and He comes to light a real fire: “I am come to cast fire on the earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). His burning Sacred Heart wants love, not lukewarmness or coldness―as Jesus stated to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque: “My Divine Heart is so passionately inflamed with love for men! … Behold this Heart which has so loved men that It spared nothing―even going so far as to exhaust and consume Itself to prove to them Its love! And in return I receive― from the greater part of men―nothing but ingratitude, by the contempt, irreverence, sacrileges and coldness with which they treat Me! … If they would only give Me some return of love―but they have only coldness and contempt for all My endeavors to do them good. This is more grievous to Me than all that I endured in My Passion!” Holy Scripture asks you: “Shall thy zeal be kindled like a fire?” (Psalm 78:5). Here too there is allusion by St. John of the Holy Ghost, of Whom we ask each time we pray to Him, “enkindle in us the fires of Thy love!”
Let us start kindling the fires for Christmas, so that when He comes, He may find a sincere and warm welcome, and not a fake welcome that falls from cold lips that betray a cold heart. Let us pull out the tinder wood of spiritual reading; expose it to the flame of perhaps an extra Mass if possible, or a visit to the ever-burning fire of the Blessed Sacrament; let us pile on some logs of extra prayers and sacrifices and keep from it the cold, dousing water of the world and its cold, damp materialistic spirit. His coming is but days away! Prepare the ways of the Lord! Prepare His way, not the world’s way!
Worrying About the Wrong Things
Our priorities are all wrong―we worry too much about the material side of Christmas and not enough about the spiritual side of Christmas. Our Lord tells us: “Be not solicitous therefore, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek! … Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God!” (Matthew 6:31-33).
“No man can serve two masters [a spiritual Christmas and a material Christmas]. For either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat, and the body more than the clothing? [and isn’t Christmas more than just food, drink, parties and presents?].” (Matthew 6:22-23). “Man does not live by bread alone, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4; Luke 4:4).
The Seeds of Christmas
Christmas will be like the planting of a seed; but the soul, like soil, needs to be receptive and free from the weeds of the world. Our Lord’s words from the parable of the Sower of Seed come to mind here: “He that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choketh up the word, and he becometh fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). This is what will happen to us if we do not remove the thorns and weeds of the world before Christmas arrives—hence the time of Advent, a time of work and penance in tilling and preparing the soil of the soul for the planting of the seed of Christ at Christmas. Christmas is all about Christ, not about us!
Be Courageous for Christ!
Hey! You are a Soldier of Christ by receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation! Why not confirm that by being courageous this Christmas and saying: “Enough of this secular materialism! Enough is enough! Christmas is time for Christ and spiritual things!” Of course, this will not be liked by most of those in your family circle and friends―it will come across like a lead-balloon, and risks criticism, resentment, mockery, ostracization, etc. Yet Our Lord―Whose birthday we should be celebrating at Christmas―has already foretold this kind of reaction: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 8:23; 18:36). “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (Matthew 10:22; 24:9; John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7). “He that is not with Me, is against Me! … Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to bring peace upon Earth―I came not to bring peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:32-37).
Job was Simple―But the Job was not Simple!
“There was a man whose name was Job, and that man was simple and upright, and fearing God, and avoiding evil. And there were born to him seven sons and three daughters. And his possession was seven thousand sheep, and three thousand camels, and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she asses, and a family exceeding great: and this man was great among all the people of the east. And his sons went, and made a feast by houses everyone in his day [That is, each made a feast in his own house and had his day, inviting the others, and their sisters, to the feast]. And sending they called their three sisters to eat and drink with them. And when the days of their feasting were gone about, Job sent to them, and sanctified them: and rising up early offered holocausts for every one of them. For he said: ‘Lest perhaps my sons have sinned, and have blessed God in their hearts!’ [that is to say, committed sacrilege, by sinning in their parties and then blessing God]. So did Job all days” (Job 1:1-5).
Here we see the dangers of having many things and much wealth! Job was able to handle it; his children could not handle it. Job was not the one going from one party to another, but his children could not refrain from organizing parties and “living-it-up”! Job realized the dangers and potential sins that his children could be committing, as was afraid of them being hypocritical towards God—sinning through their parties and feasts and then mocking God by pretending to be religious. So Job would daily offer sacrifices to God—both to protect them from evil and make reparation for any evil they may have committed at their parties and feasts. Nevertheless, it seems that all their partying and feasting led them astray, and it is generally accepted that they were punished by God by death: “Does God pervert judgment, or does the Almighty overthrow that which is just? … Thy children have sinned against Him, and He has left them in the hand of their iniquity!” (Job 8:3-4).
False Gods and Festivities
This preoccupation with eating, drinking and playing is nothing new. We see it in time of Moses, in the desert, when “Aaron said to them: ‘Take the golden earrings from the ears of your wives, and your sons and daughters, and bring them to me!’ And the people did what he had commanded, bringing the earrings to Aaron. And when he had received them, he fashioned and made of them a molten calf. And they said: ‘These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt!’ And when Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it, and … rising in the morning, they offered holocausts, and peace victims, and the people sat down to eat, and drink, and they rose up to play. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Go, get thee down! Thy people, which thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt, hath sinned! They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst show them, and they have made to themselves a molten calf, and have adored it, and sacrificing victims to it, have said: “These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt”!’” (Exodus 32:2-8).
“Moses returned from the mount … And when he came near to the camp, he saw the calf and the dances―and being very angry, he threw the tablets [on which the Ten Commandments were engraved] out of his hand, and broke them at the foot of the mount: and laying hold of the calf which they had made, he burnt it, and beat it to powder … And he said to Aaron: ‘What has this people done to thee, that thou shouldst bring upon them a most heinous sin?’ And he answered him: ‘Let not my lord be offended! For thou knowest this people, that they are prone to evil! They said to me: “Make us gods, that may go before us: for as to this Moses, who brought us forth out of the land of Egypt, we know not what is befallen him!”’” (Exodus 32:19-23).
When the Cat’s Away, the Mice...
As the saying goes, “While the cat’s away, the mice will play” and here, while Moses was away, the Chosen People forgot their One True God, and replaced him with this idol—the golden calf. Something similar has happened to Christmas. We have forgotten the real purpose of Christmas, the coming of the One True God, Jesus, to come and bring us out of our own “Land of Egypt” which is the increasingly sinful world that surrounds us. For most people, Christmas will be a matter of sitting down to eat and drink, and then rising up to play. Out of the estimated two million Israelites that were there in the desert, only one of them—Moses—was in the presence of God, up on the mountain with Him for forty-days and forty-nights.
Forty Days of Fun, or Forty Days with God
That mystical number of forty, has some significance here. Advent used to be a forty-day period—beginning in mid-November. These were forty days of preparation for the coming of God. Then, when God came at Christmas, there were and still are the forty day of Christmas, which take us up to the feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary on February 2nd. How many people have spent these days of Advent on the mountain with God? How many will spend the forty days of Christmas on the mountain with God? God knows! We can only guess! But our guess might well be pretty accurate if we say “Hardly anyone will be found on that mountain!” The world is only giving God lip-service, while it adores the world and the parties and feasts that the world has to offer, especially at this time of year. What should be a spiritual feast, has degenerated into a material feast. Yes, we all celebrate Christmas, but in what manner? Like Job would? Or like Job’s sinful children? Like Moses would? Or like Moses’ sinful Israelites? God’s anger visited both Job’s children and the Israelites, just as Our Lady of La Salette says that God’s anger will visit us.
Fun Will End Up Not Being Funny
Our Lady of La Salette warned of the consequences of chasing after fun and being forgetful of God: “Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God. God will strike in an unprecedented way. Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together. The leaders of the people of God have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell [much like Satan was unleashed by God upon Job]; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them [with lukewarmness, indifferentism, presumption] in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell. Several religious institutions will lose the Faith and will lose many souls [as in the case of the Job’s children and the Israelites in the desert]. Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening in all that concerns the service of God.
“People will think of nothing but amusement [like Job’s children and the idolaters with the golden calf ― sitting down to eat and drink, and rising up to play]. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin. But the children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me. Blessed are the souls humbly guided by the Holy Ghost! I shall fight at their side until they reach fullness of years. Nature is asking for vengeance because of man, and she trembles with dread at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime. Tremble, Earth, and you who proclaim yourselves as serving Jesus Christ, and who, on the inside, only adore yourselves, tremble for God will hand you over to His enemy, because the holy places are in a state of corruption!” (Our Lady of La Salette, in 1846). At Fatima in 1917 and in Akita in 1973, she repeats this general warning.
Destroy the ‘Golden Calf’ Christmas
One of major complaints Our Lady had at La Salette was that people no longer attributed much importance to religion and their religious duties. They had become lukewarm. Today, matters have not improved, but have grown much worse. But Our Lady speaks of “the children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers” ― hopefully this includes us, who do not want to be feasting with Job’s children and who do not want to adore the golden Christmas calf, with its ritual of sitting down to eat and drink and rising up to play! Our Lady says that these “children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me. Blessed are the souls humbly guided by the Holy Ghost! I shall fight at their side until they reach fullness of years.” Let us return, therefore to the true notion of a Christian and Marian Christmas and, like Moses, burn and pulverize the ‘golden calf’ Christmas which only serves to fulfill Our Lady’s La Salette prophecy of “People will think of nothing but amusement.” We may find ourselves alone in this desire and resolution, but at least we will be alone with God and God alone.
Article 18
Saturday & Sunday, December 21st & 22nd
Avoid a Very Messy Christmess
Saturday & Sunday, December 21st & 22nd
Avoid a Very Messy Christmess
Christmas or Christmess?
It is very easy to lose our focus on what a true Advent and what a true Christmas is, or should be. The materialistic, external, superficial trends of the world have even indoctrinated and brainwashed Catholics―including Conservative and Traditional Catholics. Our Faith should be able to cut through that materialistic, external, superficial indoctrination―but it rarely does. As they say: “You cannot leave clothes in smoky room for long, without them taking on the smell of smoke.” We live in a materialistic, external, superficial world―and our exposure to it gradually makes us increasingly materialistic, external and superficial in one or several areas of our life. Religion is one of those areas that quickly succumbs to its nefarious influence.
If you read Holy Scripture often, you will recall the following words of Our Lord that pertain to such a materialistic, external and superficial attitude and behavior: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24) … “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, then appeared also the cockle. And the servants of the good-man of the house said to him: ‘Did you not sow good seed in your field? How then has it cockle?’ And he said to them: ‘An enemy has done this!’” (Matthew 13:24-28) … “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6) … “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of uncleanness” (Matthew 23:25).
Stew and Chew
Let us stew and chew those words―so that we can draw some spiritual nourishment from them!
► “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). This is a direct warning against worldliness as well as a warning against being two-faced by trying to serve God and follow the world. Our Lord adds: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7).
Other Scripture quotes hammer that point home: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life―which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16) ... “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
► “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). This is a hammer blow against materialism. The world speaks about possessions and wealth. People want to be rich more than they want to be holy. The vast majority of conversations is focused on material things rather than spiritual things. Our Lord encountered the well-meaning rich young man who had lots of possessions and wanted to get to Heaven. Our Lord told him to sell what he had, to give the proceeds to the poor, and then to come and follow Him. The rich young man could not bear to part with his many possessions and went away sad.
“A certain rich young man, a ruler, kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined abbreviated account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
Which is why Holy Scripture adds: “Woe to you that are rich!” (Luke 6:24). “Do not trust in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God!” (1 Timothy 6:17) … “He that trusts in his riches shall fall!” (Proverbs 11:28) … “You say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and you know not that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!” (Apocalypse 3:17) ... “Labor not to be rich!” (Proverbs 23:4) … “For gold and silver hath destroyed many!” (Ecclesiasticus 8:3) ... “If you are rich, you shall not be free from sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 11:10) … “For they that will become rich, fall into temptation, and into the snares of the devil, and into many unprofitable and hurtful desires, which drown men into destruction and perdition!” (1 Timothy 6:9) … “Go now, you rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted! Your gold and silver is cankered―and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
► “The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, then appeared also the cockle. And the servants of the good-man of the house said to him: ‘Did you not sow good seed in your field? How then has it cockle?’ And he said to them: ‘An enemy has done this!’” (Matthew 13:24-28).
God, through His Church, seeks to sow the seed of the Word of God in our souls. The world―which is the enemy of God (James 4:4)―seeks to sow the seeds of worldliness in our souls. If we allow this worldliness to be sown in our souls, then it will choke the Word of God and make it fruitless―as Our Lord pointed out in the parable about the Sower of the Seed:
“The sower went out to sow his seed. And whilst he sowed, some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down by men, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And some seed fell upon stony ground, where it had not much depth of earth, and the seed sprouted and shot up immediately, because there was no deepness of earth. But when the sun was risen, the sprouted seed was scorched, because it had no root and no moisture. And other seed fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up with it and choked it and it yielded no fruit. And others fell upon good ground: and this seed brought forth fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold.
“And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom Jesus said: ‘The parable is this! Hear therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil, Satan, comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and such bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
► “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). This hypocrisy―which is very common among today’s Catholics―is a result of trying to follow the world with its fashions, maxims and attitudes, while thinking oneself to be a good Catholic in doing so. Our heart is not in our Faith―and so we fall into the category of those who honor God with their lips, while their heart is planted in the world.
► “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of uncleanness” (Matthew 23:25). We put on a Catholic ‘face’ while inside we are far from being good Catholics. There are many who call themselves Catholic―but who are far from the Faith. For example, here are the views of Catholics from a survey conducted in 2022:
Abortion: 60% accept it
Same-sex marriages: 35% of weekly Mass attendees accept it; 61% of monthly/seldom Mass attendees accept it.
Use of Contraception: 83% accept it.
Holy Communion to unmarried couples who are living together: 75% accept it.
You can be a good Catholic without going to church every Sunday: 72% accept it.
Women priests: 44% of weekly Mass attendees accept it; 71% of monthly/seldom Mass attendees accept it.
Allow priests to marry: 53% accept it.
“They profess that they know God―but in their works they deny him!” (Titus 1:16). “He did evil, and did not prepare his heart to seek the Lord” (2 Paralipomenon 12:14).
Festive Focus―God or Man? Spiritual or Material?
As Christmas draws palpably near, is our focus becoming clear and sharp? The festive focus of many of those who surround us—whether it be family, relatives or work colleagues—will be mainly on the material elements of Christmas and that can very quickly discourage and deaden our spiritual focus, even when we are not of their ilk. Human respect makes us bow to, not only blatant pressure, but also to subtle pressure—and there are more material influences clamoring around us than there are spiritual influences.
The Vanity Trap
Let not the coming of Christ be in vain! Do not let vanity make a mess of Christmas! “O children, how long will you love childishness, and fools covet those things which are hurtful to themselves, and the unwise hate knowledge?” (Proverbs 1:22). “The perverse are hard to be corrected, and the number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). “I have seen all things that are done under the sun, and behold all is vanity … Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity” (Ecclesiastes 1:14; 1:2). “O ye sons of men, why do you love vanity?” (Psalms 4:3). “And their days were consumed in vanity, and their years in haste” (Psalms 77:33). “Turn away my eyes that they may not behold vanity” (Psalms 118:37). There will be much vanity to distract us this Christmas—will we fall into the trap of vanity?
Vain? What?
What is vanity? Vanity comes from the Latin word vanus, meaning “empty”—we see traces of this in our English language that imply emptiness: the word “van” implies a empty vehicle in which we can store things; something that “vanishing” implies its removal to leave nothing but empty space; the word “vandalism” implies destruction, which in turn leaves an emptiness; when we “vanquish” someone, we empty them of their power. Vanity is an emptiness, a void, something that might promise much or glitter a lot, but leaves us feeling empty afterwards, much like candy-floss in place of a good, hearty meal. Similarly, there are those who will coat their Christmas with much glamour and glitz, but which will, at the end of the day, leave those who know better, feeling empty and hollow. Do we want an empty, hollow Christmas, or do we want a happy and holy Christmas? If Christ is no liar and His words—“Without Me, you can do nothing”—are true, then Christmas without Christ is a ‘Christmess’ or just a plain old mess! Without Christ, we mess-up Christmas.
Putting Christ Back Into Christmas
It has become a popular slogan these days, to say “Put Christ back into Christmas”, because the baby, or the Christ-Child, has been thrown out with the bathwater, so to speak. Many have washed their hands of Christ, so much so that they feel offended to hear His Name mentioned during their “Holiday Season”! Fools! Even their “Holiday” season is based upon Christ indirectly—for holiday comes from “holy day”, which was the Catholic “day-off” from work in order to celebrate a major feast of Our Lord, Our Lady or one of the Saints! Christmas is a “holy day” par excellence, whether they like it or not.
Sadly, even government bodies have outlawed the crèche or nativity scene in many public places, yet they still call themselves a “Christian State”—but only barely so! In earlier decades, they were at least Christian in name, if not by their laws and nature. Today you have to ask yourself if they really even want to be Christian in name, which is superficial Christianity, or do they prefer to be called neo-pagan, which is what most are by nature. “Why have the Gentiles raged, and the people devised vain things? The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ. Let us break Their bonds asunder: and let us cast away Their yoke from us” (Psalm 2:1-3).
Collecting Christmas Courage
With most of the nominal Catholic world population barely practicing the Faith—many no longer believing in the Virgin birth; others making of their God a mere man; others still refusing to believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, the Bread that has come down from Heaven in the “Town of Bread” (which is what the word “Bethlehem” means) and is laid in an eating trough for us (a “manger” is a feeding trough for animals)—with such beliefs or disbeliefs and more besides, we have our work cut-out if we are to try and place Christ back into Christmas.
It will need and take much Christmas Courage to do so—for it will be met with varying degrees of discomfort, resentment, exasperation or even outright mockery or hatred in those around us. Yet we should not be surprised at this, for did not Our Lord say of some: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world” (John 8:23) and, speaking to His Father about His followers, He says: “I have given them Thy word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world; as I also am not of the world!” (John 17:14), while He directly warns His followers: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18) … “You shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake!” (Matthew 24:9).
What is that name? It is Christ! Where do we find it? In the word “Christmas”—where it should rightfully be! To make sure that this actually happens, takes more and more courage each year! “The Lord has looked down from Heaven, upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God” (Psalm 13:2).
If You Scratch My Back…
This means standing-up for the spiritual Christ against the current popular materialism. That is reason we received the Sacrament of Confirmation—to be a Soldier FOR Christ, not a Soldier AGAINST Christ. We were even anointed with CHRIS-m―chrism, which placed an indelible mark of Christ in our soul—so that the mark of Christ is in our soul just as Christ should be in our Christmas. Am I that soldier? Or have I gone AWOL amidst the dishes, drinks, delectables, gifts and entertainment of the material Christmas feast? Our Lord requires that we stand-up for Him: “Everyone, therefore, that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father, Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father, Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 10:32-33).
Soldier or Diplomat?
Are we a courageous soldier or a liberal diplomat? Will we go along with Christ? Or will we go along to get along with the world? Our Lord tells that times will come when we will be required to speak out: “For they will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. You shall be brought before governors and before kings, for My sake, for a testimony to them and to the Gentiles. But when they shall deliver you up, take no thought how or what to speak―for it shall be given you in that hour what to speak. For it is not you that speak, but the Spirit of your Father that speaks in you” (Matthew 10:17-20).
Kindergarten vs. University
That may well come one day soon—but for now, we have a less hostile group to which we have to bear witness and speak out: our own family, relatives and friends. If we cannot summon up enough courage to defend Christ among family and friends, and place Christ at the center and forefront of Christmas—before the food, booze, sweets, presents, TV or some other entertainment—then how on earth will be summon up courage to defend Him in the face His enemies, when all Hell breaks loose? If we cannot stand the raised-eyebrows, rolled-eyes, smirks, snide comments or ridicule of family, relatives and friends today―then how will we stand up against far more painful sanctions and tortures from His enemies tomorrow? Our family ‘boot-camp’ training is like kindergarten class compared to a university.
Ideas Before Actions
But before we go into any detail, let us remember that ideas have consequences and that actions follow ideas. Our actions tend to align themselves with our thoughts, or how we think. We plan, draw and ‘build’ a house in our minds, then on paper, and finally on a plot of land. That is the whole point of being a “rational creature”. So it is with ideas that we must start, before letting those ideas spill-over into actions.
Putting Christ First in Our Minds and Thoughts
Before we can be effective outside of ourselves, we have to be effective within ourselves. Strength in action must follow upon strength of mind. Before Christ can be truly and sincerely upon our lips, He must first be found to sincerely exist in our minds and hearts. Our Lord Himself said: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). Is this not a logical extension of Christ’s command: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind” (Luke 10:27). “Seek ye first the kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31)—and not your presents, food, booze, entertainment, or parties!
What is foremost in our minds? The spiritual Christmas or the material Christmas? God or mammon? Heaven or the world? Our friends in Heaven or our friends upon Earth? Tell me what you are thinking most about, and I will tell you what degree of Catholicism and Charity (which is a love of God) you really have! Our Christmas will come out of the abundance of our heart—but what is in our heart? “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks!” said Our Lord (Matthew 12:34).
What Can You Give To Others?
One of the greatest penances, that you may encounter, might be the purging of the mind from its material Christmas obsession and redecorating the mind with the ‘boring’ spiritual elements that make up a spiritual Christmas. If your mind is content with superficial two-bit phrases and considerations, then Christmas will be hollow and shallow; but if you force your mind and quell your passions enough to immerse yourself into the beautiful, unfathomable mysteries of Christmas, then your Christmas will be meaningful and deep. Not only that, you will also be able to share your insights with others and perhaps also wean them off their feasting, boozing and partying, to leave the town of Bethlehem and its festivities, to seek out the Christ-Child in the empty cave of each person’s soul. You cannot give what you do not have! The more you have, the more you can give!
Marinated—But With What?
Christ did not come to Earth because He was tired of the food, drink and company in Heaven, and preferred, instead, a change of diet and friends here upon Earth! There is one meat that He prefers over all others—it is an organ meat—it is the heart! He has come for your heart—and if your heart is marinated in the world and pickled with its booze and stuffed with its food, then Our Lord will not taste it: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Our Lord wants your heart to be marinated in charity, nothing else tastes good to Him: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Little Time Left—Yet A Lot Can Be Done
Truly, the following words of Christ apply more to our day than any other age in the history of the Church: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall he find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). It has to be said that there is less and less Faith found on Earth with each passing year! While those, who still retain the Faith, find that their Faith has been contaminated more and more with each passing year. Each Christmas becomes more of a Christmess.
We are often late with the things of God, many times putting them somewhere down the list of our “To Do” list. At Christmas this can be even more true than at other times—we don’t seek God first, but we slake our thirst first; that is to say, our thirst for the material. We may admire Mary, but we prefer to be Martha—it seems to be more fun, there is more to do, it seems more interesting than simply sitting at Our Lord’s feet listening to the same old words again and again! Yet that is what we must do! We must feed our souls with the words of Faith! Our Lord Himself said: “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word of God!” (Luke 4:4). “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6). Nevertheless, “What shall it profit if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it have not works, is dead in itself.” (James 2:14-17). Faith is necessary for salvation―but Faith without works is dead; and “Faith works by charity” (Galatians 5:6).
St. John the Apostle and Evangelist, nearing the end of his life, would frequently repeat the same old words over and over again, as he was carried aloft by his disciples, unable to walk much anymore. Those same old words were: “My children, love one another!” The people grew sick and tired of hearing him say this over and over again—so they complained saying: “Don’t you have something else to say?” To which he replied, “No! For that says it all!” This is true, for on Judgment Day we will be judged not so much on what we have done, but on the amount of charity (or lack of charity) that was present in all our thoughts, words and actions.
Faith is necessary for salvation―but Faith without works is dead; and “Faith works by charity” (Galatians 5:6). Without that charity, we are nothing and what we do is worthless on a supernatural level: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Our Lord summed it up this way: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets” (Matthew 22:37-40).
Empty and Full
Of course, love of God comes before love of neighbor—and love of neighbor must have, as its motive and reason, the love of God, for our neighbor is God’s creation, made in His image and likeness. The beginning of the new liturgical year prepares us for this love of God—the love of the Christ-Child at Bethlehem, Who also wants to be born into our minds, hearts and souls. If the mind, heart and soul is filled with the world and its attachments, then there is no room for Christ in the “inn” of our soul. The cave, where He was eventually born, was an empty place―vanus—so too must our mind, heart and soul be emptied of the vain considerations, activities and vanities of the world, if it is to be a fit dwelling for Him Who comes to save our souls from ourselves, the world and the devil. First empty your mind, heart and soul of these things, and then, even though the hour is late, fill it with the things of Christ. There is no shortage of material available—online and offline. You could, for instance, read the sections in the Life of Mary that deal with the time leading up to Our Lord’s birth (Part 2 & Part 3). After all, whose birthday is it anyway?
It is very easy to lose our focus on what a true Advent and what a true Christmas is, or should be. The materialistic, external, superficial trends of the world have even indoctrinated and brainwashed Catholics―including Conservative and Traditional Catholics. Our Faith should be able to cut through that materialistic, external, superficial indoctrination―but it rarely does. As they say: “You cannot leave clothes in smoky room for long, without them taking on the smell of smoke.” We live in a materialistic, external, superficial world―and our exposure to it gradually makes us increasingly materialistic, external and superficial in one or several areas of our life. Religion is one of those areas that quickly succumbs to its nefarious influence.
If you read Holy Scripture often, you will recall the following words of Our Lord that pertain to such a materialistic, external and superficial attitude and behavior: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24) … “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, then appeared also the cockle. And the servants of the good-man of the house said to him: ‘Did you not sow good seed in your field? How then has it cockle?’ And he said to them: ‘An enemy has done this!’” (Matthew 13:24-28) … “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6) … “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of uncleanness” (Matthew 23:25).
Stew and Chew
Let us stew and chew those words―so that we can draw some spiritual nourishment from them!
► “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). This is a direct warning against worldliness as well as a warning against being two-faced by trying to serve God and follow the world. Our Lord adds: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7).
Other Scripture quotes hammer that point home: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life―which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16) ... “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
► “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). This is a hammer blow against materialism. The world speaks about possessions and wealth. People want to be rich more than they want to be holy. The vast majority of conversations is focused on material things rather than spiritual things. Our Lord encountered the well-meaning rich young man who had lots of possessions and wanted to get to Heaven. Our Lord told him to sell what he had, to give the proceeds to the poor, and then to come and follow Him. The rich young man could not bear to part with his many possessions and went away sad.
“A certain rich young man, a ruler, kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined abbreviated account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
Which is why Holy Scripture adds: “Woe to you that are rich!” (Luke 6:24). “Do not trust in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God!” (1 Timothy 6:17) … “He that trusts in his riches shall fall!” (Proverbs 11:28) … “You say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and you know not that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!” (Apocalypse 3:17) ... “Labor not to be rich!” (Proverbs 23:4) … “For gold and silver hath destroyed many!” (Ecclesiasticus 8:3) ... “If you are rich, you shall not be free from sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 11:10) … “For they that will become rich, fall into temptation, and into the snares of the devil, and into many unprofitable and hurtful desires, which drown men into destruction and perdition!” (1 Timothy 6:9) … “Go now, you rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted! Your gold and silver is cankered―and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
► “The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, then appeared also the cockle. And the servants of the good-man of the house said to him: ‘Did you not sow good seed in your field? How then has it cockle?’ And he said to them: ‘An enemy has done this!’” (Matthew 13:24-28).
God, through His Church, seeks to sow the seed of the Word of God in our souls. The world―which is the enemy of God (James 4:4)―seeks to sow the seeds of worldliness in our souls. If we allow this worldliness to be sown in our souls, then it will choke the Word of God and make it fruitless―as Our Lord pointed out in the parable about the Sower of the Seed:
“The sower went out to sow his seed. And whilst he sowed, some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down by men, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And some seed fell upon stony ground, where it had not much depth of earth, and the seed sprouted and shot up immediately, because there was no deepness of earth. But when the sun was risen, the sprouted seed was scorched, because it had no root and no moisture. And other seed fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up with it and choked it and it yielded no fruit. And others fell upon good ground: and this seed brought forth fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold.
“And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom Jesus said: ‘The parable is this! Hear therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil, Satan, comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and such bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
► “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). This hypocrisy―which is very common among today’s Catholics―is a result of trying to follow the world with its fashions, maxims and attitudes, while thinking oneself to be a good Catholic in doing so. Our heart is not in our Faith―and so we fall into the category of those who honor God with their lips, while their heart is planted in the world.
► “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of uncleanness” (Matthew 23:25). We put on a Catholic ‘face’ while inside we are far from being good Catholics. There are many who call themselves Catholic―but who are far from the Faith. For example, here are the views of Catholics from a survey conducted in 2022:
Abortion: 60% accept it
Same-sex marriages: 35% of weekly Mass attendees accept it; 61% of monthly/seldom Mass attendees accept it.
Use of Contraception: 83% accept it.
Holy Communion to unmarried couples who are living together: 75% accept it.
You can be a good Catholic without going to church every Sunday: 72% accept it.
Women priests: 44% of weekly Mass attendees accept it; 71% of monthly/seldom Mass attendees accept it.
Allow priests to marry: 53% accept it.
“They profess that they know God―but in their works they deny him!” (Titus 1:16). “He did evil, and did not prepare his heart to seek the Lord” (2 Paralipomenon 12:14).
Festive Focus―God or Man? Spiritual or Material?
As Christmas draws palpably near, is our focus becoming clear and sharp? The festive focus of many of those who surround us—whether it be family, relatives or work colleagues—will be mainly on the material elements of Christmas and that can very quickly discourage and deaden our spiritual focus, even when we are not of their ilk. Human respect makes us bow to, not only blatant pressure, but also to subtle pressure—and there are more material influences clamoring around us than there are spiritual influences.
The Vanity Trap
Let not the coming of Christ be in vain! Do not let vanity make a mess of Christmas! “O children, how long will you love childishness, and fools covet those things which are hurtful to themselves, and the unwise hate knowledge?” (Proverbs 1:22). “The perverse are hard to be corrected, and the number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). “I have seen all things that are done under the sun, and behold all is vanity … Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity” (Ecclesiastes 1:14; 1:2). “O ye sons of men, why do you love vanity?” (Psalms 4:3). “And their days were consumed in vanity, and their years in haste” (Psalms 77:33). “Turn away my eyes that they may not behold vanity” (Psalms 118:37). There will be much vanity to distract us this Christmas—will we fall into the trap of vanity?
Vain? What?
What is vanity? Vanity comes from the Latin word vanus, meaning “empty”—we see traces of this in our English language that imply emptiness: the word “van” implies a empty vehicle in which we can store things; something that “vanishing” implies its removal to leave nothing but empty space; the word “vandalism” implies destruction, which in turn leaves an emptiness; when we “vanquish” someone, we empty them of their power. Vanity is an emptiness, a void, something that might promise much or glitter a lot, but leaves us feeling empty afterwards, much like candy-floss in place of a good, hearty meal. Similarly, there are those who will coat their Christmas with much glamour and glitz, but which will, at the end of the day, leave those who know better, feeling empty and hollow. Do we want an empty, hollow Christmas, or do we want a happy and holy Christmas? If Christ is no liar and His words—“Without Me, you can do nothing”—are true, then Christmas without Christ is a ‘Christmess’ or just a plain old mess! Without Christ, we mess-up Christmas.
Putting Christ Back Into Christmas
It has become a popular slogan these days, to say “Put Christ back into Christmas”, because the baby, or the Christ-Child, has been thrown out with the bathwater, so to speak. Many have washed their hands of Christ, so much so that they feel offended to hear His Name mentioned during their “Holiday Season”! Fools! Even their “Holiday” season is based upon Christ indirectly—for holiday comes from “holy day”, which was the Catholic “day-off” from work in order to celebrate a major feast of Our Lord, Our Lady or one of the Saints! Christmas is a “holy day” par excellence, whether they like it or not.
Sadly, even government bodies have outlawed the crèche or nativity scene in many public places, yet they still call themselves a “Christian State”—but only barely so! In earlier decades, they were at least Christian in name, if not by their laws and nature. Today you have to ask yourself if they really even want to be Christian in name, which is superficial Christianity, or do they prefer to be called neo-pagan, which is what most are by nature. “Why have the Gentiles raged, and the people devised vain things? The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ. Let us break Their bonds asunder: and let us cast away Their yoke from us” (Psalm 2:1-3).
Collecting Christmas Courage
With most of the nominal Catholic world population barely practicing the Faith—many no longer believing in the Virgin birth; others making of their God a mere man; others still refusing to believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, the Bread that has come down from Heaven in the “Town of Bread” (which is what the word “Bethlehem” means) and is laid in an eating trough for us (a “manger” is a feeding trough for animals)—with such beliefs or disbeliefs and more besides, we have our work cut-out if we are to try and place Christ back into Christmas.
It will need and take much Christmas Courage to do so—for it will be met with varying degrees of discomfort, resentment, exasperation or even outright mockery or hatred in those around us. Yet we should not be surprised at this, for did not Our Lord say of some: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world” (John 8:23) and, speaking to His Father about His followers, He says: “I have given them Thy word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world; as I also am not of the world!” (John 17:14), while He directly warns His followers: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18) … “You shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake!” (Matthew 24:9).
What is that name? It is Christ! Where do we find it? In the word “Christmas”—where it should rightfully be! To make sure that this actually happens, takes more and more courage each year! “The Lord has looked down from Heaven, upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God” (Psalm 13:2).
If You Scratch My Back…
This means standing-up for the spiritual Christ against the current popular materialism. That is reason we received the Sacrament of Confirmation—to be a Soldier FOR Christ, not a Soldier AGAINST Christ. We were even anointed with CHRIS-m―chrism, which placed an indelible mark of Christ in our soul—so that the mark of Christ is in our soul just as Christ should be in our Christmas. Am I that soldier? Or have I gone AWOL amidst the dishes, drinks, delectables, gifts and entertainment of the material Christmas feast? Our Lord requires that we stand-up for Him: “Everyone, therefore, that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father, Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father, Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 10:32-33).
Soldier or Diplomat?
Are we a courageous soldier or a liberal diplomat? Will we go along with Christ? Or will we go along to get along with the world? Our Lord tells that times will come when we will be required to speak out: “For they will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. You shall be brought before governors and before kings, for My sake, for a testimony to them and to the Gentiles. But when they shall deliver you up, take no thought how or what to speak―for it shall be given you in that hour what to speak. For it is not you that speak, but the Spirit of your Father that speaks in you” (Matthew 10:17-20).
Kindergarten vs. University
That may well come one day soon—but for now, we have a less hostile group to which we have to bear witness and speak out: our own family, relatives and friends. If we cannot summon up enough courage to defend Christ among family and friends, and place Christ at the center and forefront of Christmas—before the food, booze, sweets, presents, TV or some other entertainment—then how on earth will be summon up courage to defend Him in the face His enemies, when all Hell breaks loose? If we cannot stand the raised-eyebrows, rolled-eyes, smirks, snide comments or ridicule of family, relatives and friends today―then how will we stand up against far more painful sanctions and tortures from His enemies tomorrow? Our family ‘boot-camp’ training is like kindergarten class compared to a university.
Ideas Before Actions
But before we go into any detail, let us remember that ideas have consequences and that actions follow ideas. Our actions tend to align themselves with our thoughts, or how we think. We plan, draw and ‘build’ a house in our minds, then on paper, and finally on a plot of land. That is the whole point of being a “rational creature”. So it is with ideas that we must start, before letting those ideas spill-over into actions.
Putting Christ First in Our Minds and Thoughts
Before we can be effective outside of ourselves, we have to be effective within ourselves. Strength in action must follow upon strength of mind. Before Christ can be truly and sincerely upon our lips, He must first be found to sincerely exist in our minds and hearts. Our Lord Himself said: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). Is this not a logical extension of Christ’s command: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind” (Luke 10:27). “Seek ye first the kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31)—and not your presents, food, booze, entertainment, or parties!
What is foremost in our minds? The spiritual Christmas or the material Christmas? God or mammon? Heaven or the world? Our friends in Heaven or our friends upon Earth? Tell me what you are thinking most about, and I will tell you what degree of Catholicism and Charity (which is a love of God) you really have! Our Christmas will come out of the abundance of our heart—but what is in our heart? “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks!” said Our Lord (Matthew 12:34).
What Can You Give To Others?
One of the greatest penances, that you may encounter, might be the purging of the mind from its material Christmas obsession and redecorating the mind with the ‘boring’ spiritual elements that make up a spiritual Christmas. If your mind is content with superficial two-bit phrases and considerations, then Christmas will be hollow and shallow; but if you force your mind and quell your passions enough to immerse yourself into the beautiful, unfathomable mysteries of Christmas, then your Christmas will be meaningful and deep. Not only that, you will also be able to share your insights with others and perhaps also wean them off their feasting, boozing and partying, to leave the town of Bethlehem and its festivities, to seek out the Christ-Child in the empty cave of each person’s soul. You cannot give what you do not have! The more you have, the more you can give!
Marinated—But With What?
Christ did not come to Earth because He was tired of the food, drink and company in Heaven, and preferred, instead, a change of diet and friends here upon Earth! There is one meat that He prefers over all others—it is an organ meat—it is the heart! He has come for your heart—and if your heart is marinated in the world and pickled with its booze and stuffed with its food, then Our Lord will not taste it: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Our Lord wants your heart to be marinated in charity, nothing else tastes good to Him: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Little Time Left—Yet A Lot Can Be Done
Truly, the following words of Christ apply more to our day than any other age in the history of the Church: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall he find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). It has to be said that there is less and less Faith found on Earth with each passing year! While those, who still retain the Faith, find that their Faith has been contaminated more and more with each passing year. Each Christmas becomes more of a Christmess.
We are often late with the things of God, many times putting them somewhere down the list of our “To Do” list. At Christmas this can be even more true than at other times—we don’t seek God first, but we slake our thirst first; that is to say, our thirst for the material. We may admire Mary, but we prefer to be Martha—it seems to be more fun, there is more to do, it seems more interesting than simply sitting at Our Lord’s feet listening to the same old words again and again! Yet that is what we must do! We must feed our souls with the words of Faith! Our Lord Himself said: “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word of God!” (Luke 4:4). “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6). Nevertheless, “What shall it profit if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it have not works, is dead in itself.” (James 2:14-17). Faith is necessary for salvation―but Faith without works is dead; and “Faith works by charity” (Galatians 5:6).
St. John the Apostle and Evangelist, nearing the end of his life, would frequently repeat the same old words over and over again, as he was carried aloft by his disciples, unable to walk much anymore. Those same old words were: “My children, love one another!” The people grew sick and tired of hearing him say this over and over again—so they complained saying: “Don’t you have something else to say?” To which he replied, “No! For that says it all!” This is true, for on Judgment Day we will be judged not so much on what we have done, but on the amount of charity (or lack of charity) that was present in all our thoughts, words and actions.
Faith is necessary for salvation―but Faith without works is dead; and “Faith works by charity” (Galatians 5:6). Without that charity, we are nothing and what we do is worthless on a supernatural level: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Our Lord summed it up this way: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets” (Matthew 22:37-40).
Empty and Full
Of course, love of God comes before love of neighbor—and love of neighbor must have, as its motive and reason, the love of God, for our neighbor is God’s creation, made in His image and likeness. The beginning of the new liturgical year prepares us for this love of God—the love of the Christ-Child at Bethlehem, Who also wants to be born into our minds, hearts and souls. If the mind, heart and soul is filled with the world and its attachments, then there is no room for Christ in the “inn” of our soul. The cave, where He was eventually born, was an empty place―vanus—so too must our mind, heart and soul be emptied of the vain considerations, activities and vanities of the world, if it is to be a fit dwelling for Him Who comes to save our souls from ourselves, the world and the devil. First empty your mind, heart and soul of these things, and then, even though the hour is late, fill it with the things of Christ. There is no shortage of material available—online and offline. You could, for instance, read the sections in the Life of Mary that deal with the time leading up to Our Lord’s birth (Part 2 & Part 3). After all, whose birthday is it anyway?
Article 17
Friday, December 20th
One of the Greats
Friday, December 20th
One of the Greats
700 Years Before Christ
The holy Prophet Isaias lived 700 years before the Birth of Christ, and was descended of royal lineage. Isaias was one of the greatest of the Old Testament prophets; one of the outstanding evangelists of the Hebrew race; and one of the pillars of Advent chosen by Holy Mother Church. Advent is full of readings―especially in the latter part of Advent―taken from the prophet Isaias. His name means “the salvation of Yahweh” or “Yahweh is salvation.” The prophet was conscious of his name and realized that he did not bear it accidentally.
Family
His, father, Amos – no relation to the prophet of that name – appears to have been a citizen of Jerusalem. The social position of Amos cannot be defined, but Isaias seems to have held high rank, for when Ezechias, King of Juda, enquired of him, he sent a deputation of his chief officials (4 Kings 19.2). His ease of access to the court and Temple (Isaias 7:3; 8:2), together with sources that tell us that Isaias was possibly the cousin of King Ozias, suggests he was of a family of high rank.
Prophetic Ministry
He exercised the functions of his prophetic office in the Southern Kingdom, during the reigns of Ozias, Joathan, Achaz, and Ezechias, kings of Juda. Ozias reigned 52 years in the middle of the eighth century B.C. Isaias must have begun his career a few years before Ozias’ death, probably in the 740s. Isaias lived at least until the fourteenth year of Ezechias, who died in the 690’s, and may have been contemporary for some years with King Manasses. Thus Isaias may have prophesied for the long period of 60 years or more.
God Calls Isaias
His original call to the prophetical office is not recorded. However, a powerful vision came to him “in the year that King Ozias died,” in which he reports seeing God enthroned among angelic beings. Isaias receives God’s instruction and reports it thus:
“And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: 'Whom shall I send? and who shall go for us?'“
And I said: “Behold, here am I, send me!”
And He said: “Go, and thou shalt say to this people: ‘Hearing, hear, and understand not! And see the vision, and know it not! Blind the heart of this people, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes: lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted and I heal them.”
And I said: “How long, O Lord?”
And He said: “Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land shall be left desolate.” (Isaias 6:8-11).
Isaias Ignored
Isaias’ personal life, like his public persona, was a reflection of his religious calling as prophet, whose oracles were destined to fall on deaf ears. Thus we must realize and accept that we too may well be ignored and rejected by deaf ears, but, like Isaias, we must nevertheless continue to give out God’s messages embodied in the teaching of the Church and Our Lady’s messages from Church approved apparitions.
Isaias, thought to be a priest by some authors, was also married to a woman referred to as “the prophetess” (Isaias 8:3). Isaias had by her two sons, who bore symbolic names given by God--Shear-jashub (“Remnant will return,” Isaias 7:3) and Maher-shalal-hash-baz (“Destruction is imminent,” Isaias 8:1-4). These sons assisted Isaias in his ministry and may have carried on his tradition after his death.
Isaias’ Troubled Times
Contrary to the inspiring spirit of the prophecies in the Book of Isaias for which he is best known, the historical Isaias was not primarily a prophet of hope, but more a prophet of doom. The names of Isaias’ sons—signaling impending destruction and the survival of only a remnant—were emblematic of the themes of his ministry. He lived during a time of terrible military and political upheavals, which witnessed Israel (the Northern Kingdom) and Juda (the Southern Kingdom) allying and mingling with pagan neighbors and warring against each other by in-fighting.
Isaias exercised his ministry in a spirit of uncompromising firmness and boldness in regard to all that bore on the interests of religion. Although his prophecies consistently concern themselves with the fate of nations and kings, political issues were secondary. The key to Juda’s fate was the faithfulness of at least a remnant of righteous believers to the commands of God alone.
This is exactly the scenario that we find ourselves in today—the Church has become worldly as Our Lady foretold: “The priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, are asking for vengeance … Civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism … disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the earth … People will think of nothing but amusement” (La Salette).
Furthermore, God is ignored, as Our Lady also stated: “True Faith has faded … the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … Only a few old women go to Mass in the summer, the rest work all day Sunday and in the winter, when they are at a loose end, they only go to Mass to make fun of religion. During Lent, they go to the butcher’s like hungry dogs. [People] have neglected prayer and penance … wanting to shake off the yoke of the Lord of Lords … Churches will be locked up or desecrated ... for they will not have been guided by the good spirit of the Gospel” (La Salette).
The consequences of all this? Same as the consequences we see inflicted upon the wayward Chosen People of God.
Never-Ending Prophet
Isaias’ prophetic ministry extends through the reigns of four kings: Ozias, Joathan, Achaz and Ezechias, covering a period of a minimum of nearly 50 years or even over 60 years—it is difficult to ascertain precisely. In this long career, spanning the late eighth and early seventh century B.C., he warned both Israel and Juda of impending doom as a punishment from God for His people’s sin. As court prophet to Juda’s King Ezechias, the Bible reports he inspired that King Ezechias to a faith, which—with God’s miraculous help—turned back the rampaging armies of Assyria that had ravaged the nation. Isaias’ prophecies have much in common with those of the other great prophets of the same period, Amos, Osee and Micheas.
Five Periods of Prophecy
It is convenient to divide Isaias’ ministry into five periods, which, although unequal in length, are each marked by features peculiar to itself. The first three may be said to be Assyrian in outlook, the fourth Assyrian and Babylonian, and the fifth Babylonian.
First Period—Denouncing Corruption and Lack of Religion
The first period extends from the death of Ozias, about 740 B.C. to the beginning of the reign of Achaz (Isaias, chapters 9 and 32). Like Amos, Isaias appears here mainly as a preacher of righteousness and judgment to come. His ministry begins at a time when Israel had forsaken God and placed their confidence in worldly prosperity, warlike resources, superstition and idolatry. Middle-class luxury, oppression of the poor by wealthy merchants and tradesmen, wantonness of women, excess in festive drinking, and the perversion of moral distinctions, abounded everywhere.
He portrays this tragic condition of the spiritual life of Juda in these words; “And the daughter of Sion is left as a booth in a vineyard, as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city” (Isaias 1.8). He describes their waywardness in these words from the Lord: “The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib: but Israel hath not known Me, and My people hath not understood” (Isaias 1.3). Isaias traces all the manifestations of national corruption to a single source; absence of a religious spirit or the knowledge of God, in the men of his time. This truth he graphically describes in the unique story of the vineyard:
“My beloved had a vineyard on a hill in a fruitful place. And he fenced it in, and picked the stones out of it, and planted it with the choicest vines, and built a tower in the midst thereof, and set up a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes. And now, O ye inhabitants of Jerusalem, and ye men of Juda, judge between Me and My vineyard. What is there that I ought to do more to My vineyard, that I have not done to it? And now I will show you what I will do to My vineyard. I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be wasted: I will break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down. And I will make it desolate: it shall not be pruned, and it shall not be dug; but briers and thorns shall come up, and I will command the clouds to rain no rain upon it. For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel: and the man of Juda, his pleasant plant: and I looked that he should do judgment, and behold iniquity: and do justice” (Isaias 5:1-7).
We learn from this that we have obligation to bear good fruit, not wild fruit. Yet the Catholic world today has, for the most part, gone wild. They walls of the vineyard (Church) are in disrepair, broken-down and breached. The clouds (Heaven and the Churches sources of grace) have been made “to rain no rain upon it.” Rather than raining-down grace, God will rain down justice. Unless…! But, like the proverbial frog in the gradually heated saucepan of water, we refuse to jump into action—being, like the frog, spiritually cold-blooded.
Second Period—Political Adviser
The second period covers the critical period of the Syro-Ephraimite invasion of Juda, about 735 B.C. and is described in chapters 7, 8 and perhaps 9. This period finds Isaias in an entirely new role, that of a political adviser. One of the outstanding events of this period is the impressive interview between Isaias as a result of the invasion of Juda by the combined forces of Syria and Ephraim. By this unbrotherly act the Northern Kingdom sealed its own doom. Both it and Syria fell prey to the advancing Assyrians under the leadership of Theglathphalasar.
Chapter 7 of Isaias sets out the interview between God’s prophet and the faithless Achaz. Isaias assures the king that the conspiracy will come to nothing, and holds out a promise of deliverance on the condition of faith in God. Achaz replied: “I will not ask, neither will I tempt the Lord” (Isaias 7:12). Isaias then continued the conversation, and gave utterance to the remarkable promise concerning a coming king in these words: “Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel” (Isaias 7:14). The king’s unbelief is punished by the threat of an Assyrian invasion.
Isaias did not accept the king’s decision as final, but made an appeal to the people at large. The people did not believe him; his message fell on deaf ears. The prophet was right. Damascus was overthrown by the Assyrians in 732 B.C. and Samaria fell to the same fate, ten years later, as the Assyrians came closer and closer to Juda and Jerusalem.
“Achaz sent messengers to Theglathphalasar king of the Assyrians, saying: I am thy servant, and thy son: come up, and save me out of the hand of the King of Syria, and out of the hand of the King of Israel, who are risen up together against me. And when he had gathered together the silver and gold that could be found in the house of the Lord, and in the king’s treasures, he sent it for a present to the king of the Assyrians. And Theglathphalasar agreed to the desire of Achaz: for the King of the Assyrians went up against Damascus, and laid it waste: and he carried away the inhabitants thereof to Cyrene, but Basin he slew. And King Achaz went to Damascus to meet Theglathphalasar, King of the Assyrians, and when he had seen the altar of Damascus, King Achaz sent to Urias the priest a pattern of it, and its likeness according to all the work thereof” (4 Kings 16:7-10). Not heeding Isaias’ warnings, Achaz thus falls even deeper into idolatry.
The rejection of the prophet’s message by the common people marks a temporary end to his public activity. The Lord hid His face from the house of Israel, in that he withdrew the guidance of the prophetic word that had been so coldly received.
This reminds us of the Queen of Prophets, who just like Isaias, one of the ‘kings’ of Prophets, has been ignored and her messages have met with relatively little acceptance on a practical level. Our Lady has also prophesied invasions by modern-day ‘Assyrians’ that will cause wars and take over peoples. Sr. Lucia said that “the Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.”
Third Period—The Fall of Samaria
The next period is marked by the strange absence of any record of Isaias’ reflections on the events with which it is associated, namely the fall of Samaria in 722 BC. This event is foretold in several of Isaias’ most striking prophecies in Isaias:
“Damascus shall cease to be a city, and shall be as a ruinous heap of stones. The cities of Aroer shall be left for flocks ... And it shall come to pass that the glory of Jacob shall be made thin, and the fatness of his flesh shall grow lean. In that day his strong cities shall be forsaken and thou shalt be desolate. Because thou hast forgotten God thy savior, and hast not remembered thy strong helper. Woe to the multitude of many people, like the multitude of the roaring sea: and the tumult of crowds, like the noise of many waters. Nations shall make a noise like the noise of waters overflowing, and he shall be carried away as the dust of the mountains before the wind, and as a whirlwind before a tempest” … “Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, staggering with wine. Behold the Lord is mighty and strong, as a storm of hail: a destroying whirlwind, as the violence of many waters overflowing, and sent forth upon a spacious land. The crown of pride of the drunkards of Ephraim shall be trodden under feet” (Isaias 17:1-13; 28:1-3).
Count on God to Get it Right
And so it came to pass, as is the always the case when God promises to do something, that “in the ninth year of Osee, the king of the Assyrians took Samaria, and carried Israel away to Assyria” (Isaias 17:6). In 722 B.C., the Northern Kingdom of Israel (Samaria) was completely overrun and many of its citizens taken into exile in the Assyrian Empire. Later, Sennacherib of Assyria conquered nearly all of Juda, capturing all of its major towns except Jerusalem and exiling many Judeans as well.
The fall of Samaria must have profoundly affected Juda, especially so when it is realized that the Ten Tribes of Israel, that populated Samaria, comprised the larger portion of God’s people. It had been prophesied: “Shall I not, as I have done to Samaria and her idols, so do to Jerusalem and her idols?” (Isaias 10:11).
This warning should have had a very chastening effect on the heart of Juda. Juda seems to have concluded that if God failed to avert the doom of the Northern Kingdom, there was no assurance that He would protect her. This may have been the cause of the desperate struggle that afterwards took place to throw off the Assyrian yoke.
Don't Mess with God!
What do we learn from all this? We SHOULD learn that nobody messes with God! The good, kind, sweet, merciful God also has a side to Him that can get quite angry at times—as the Old Testament accounts gives testimony. Since God never changes, we can rightfully assume that He is likely to act in the same way today, if His ‘prophets’ are not listened to and obeyed. This is essentially what Our Lady is warning us about the good, kind, sweet, merciful God:
“If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it ... Woe to the inhabitants of the earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other … Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Our Lord's Warning Words
Earlier, in Quito, Ecuador, Our Lord Himself had warned Mother Mariana—of Our Lady of Good Success fame: “Know, moreover, that Divine Justice releases terrible chastisements on entire nations, not only for the sins of the people, but for those of priests and religious persons. Straying from their divine mission, they degrade themselves in such a way that, before the eyes of God they quicken the rigor of the punishments ... to let My Justice fall upon My beloved cloisters ― and even over cities ― when those so near to Me who belong to Me reject My spirit, abandoning Me alone in Tabernacles, rarely remembering that I live there especially for love of them.” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito Ecuador).
We learn from all this that when God speaks through His prophets, He is not wasting His breath and time, but He is very serious! Ignoring Him has serious consequences—not just for the person who ignores Him, but for all those associated to that person. One king ignores Isaias and the whole nation is overrun, many are slaughtered and the rest taken away as slaves. That is serious! Just like the sin of Adam: through the sin of one man, death entered the world and everyone in the world from thenceforward was doomed to die! See the serious effects of one man's sin! King Louis XIV of France refused Our Lord's request though one of His 'prophetesses'—St. Margaret Mary—to consecrate France to the Sacred Heart, and the whole nation was punished with the barbaric and bloody French Revolution. One man's neglect was visited upon a whole nation. Today, the popes have refused to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary...! What will the effect of that be?
Fourth Period—Trying to Preserve Israel from Mingling with the World
We now come to the most eventful stage of Isaias’ career, which covers a period from 720 B.C. to 701 B.C., during which time Ezechias is king of Juda. It must be remembered that, throughout his prophetic career, Isaias had always urged upon Juda the need for a position of isolation and absolute dependence upon God. King Achaz ruled wickedly for 16 years and absolutely refused to be guided by the prophet, and, fearing the consequences of a Syrio-Ephraimite conspiracy, sought to trust, not in God’s aid and power, but in human aid and power, by giving his allegiance to King Theglathphalasar of Assyria, who promptly responded to his appeal:
We learn from this the need to separate ourselves from the world and not to take on the values of the world, which lead to an idolatrous attitude. What was true in the Old Testament, is still true in the New Testament—we have to separate ourselves from the world that surrounds us: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15) … “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4). What is about to befall us some time soon, is a direct result of our ignoring this advice. Find it hard to believe? Read again Our Lady’s messages at Quito, La Salette, Fatima and Akita.
Fifth Period—Isaias and King Ezechias
Achaz later dies and his son, Ezechias, ruled in his place. The first hint that Ezechias might endeavor to free himself from the pact to which his father was a party, might be found in the short oracle of Isaias (14:29-32), which is thought to have been the year of Ezechias’ accession to the throne. Ezechias is particularly remembered for his monotheistic religious reform, which not only campaigned against idolatry, but attempted to centralize the formal worship of God exclusively in the Temple of Jerusalem, so that idolatry in the provinces could be eliminated through supervision of all sacrifices in Jerusalem.
The Fourth Book of Kings tells us that “Ezechias was five and twenty years old when he began to reign: and he reigned nine and twenty years in Jerusalem: the name of his mother was Abi the daughter of Zacharias. And he did that which was good before the Lord, according to all that David his father had done. He destroyed the high places, and broke the statues in pieces, and cut down the groves, and broke the brazen serpent, which Moses had made: for till that time the children of Israel burnt incense to it. He trusted in the Lord the God of Israel: so that after him there was none like him among all the kings of Juda, nor any of them that were before him. And he stuck to the Lord, and departed not from His steps, but kept His commandments, which the Lord commanded Moses. Wherefore the Lord also was with him, and in all things, to which he went forth, he behaved himself wisely. And he rebelled against the king of the Assyrians, and served him not” (4 Kings 18:1-7).
Assyria Reacts to Ezechias' Rebelliousness
The period Ezechias’ reign witnessed the rise of Assyrian Empire as the dominant power in the region. In 722 B.C., the Northern Kingdom of Israel fell to Assyria, which exiled large numbers of its people and replaced them with Assyrian populations. Many citizens of Israel also fled to Juda during this time. Ezechias probably welcomed the refugees, as he had previously invited the citizens of Ephraim and Manasses to celebrate Passover in Jerusalem. Perhaps believing himself invulnerable to the fate of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, on account of his pious devotion to the Lord, Ezechias refused to pay the tribute enforced on his father. This led to Sennacherib's invasion, probably c. 701 B.C. “Sennacherib king of the Assyrians came up against the fenced cities of Juda: and took them” (4 Kings 18:13). He then laid siege to Jerusalem.
This led to Isaias’ most dramatic success. While Sennacherib of Assyria was in the process of besieging the major Judean city of Lachish and his armies threatened the capital of Jerusalem, Isaias had counseled Ezechias not to capitulate. Isaias foretells that: “Out of Jerusalem shall go forth a, remnant, and salvation from mount Sion: the zeal of the Lord of hosts shall do this. Wherefore thus saith the Lord concerning the king of the Assyrians: ‘He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow into it, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a trench about it. By the way that he came, he shall return, and into this city he shall not come, saith the Lord. And I will protect this city, and will save it for my own sake, and for the sake of David my servant!’” (Isaias 37:32-34).
Jerusalem was saved, but at a price. Sennacherib himself writes: ”Because Ezechias, King of Juda, would not submit to my yoke, I came up against him, and by force of arms and by the might of my power I took 46 of his strong fenced cities; and of the smaller towns which were scattered about, I took and plundered a countless number... Ezechias, himself, I shut up in Jerusalem, his capital city, like a bird in a cage, building towers round the city to hem him in, and raising banks of earth against the gates, so as to prevent escape... Then upon Ezechias there fell the fear of the power of my arms, and he sent out to me the chiefs and the elders of Jerusalem with 30 talents of gold and 800 talents of silver, and divers treasures, a rich and immense booty...”
The Scriptural version of the same event confirms Sennacherib's account, although it gives a lower figure from the amount of silver demanded than Sennacherib does. Holy Scripture says: “Then Ezechias, King of Juda sent messengers to the King of the Assyrians, saying: 'I have offended, depart from me: and all that thou shalt put upon me, I will bear!'. And the King of the Assyrians put a tax upon Ezechias, King of Juda, of three hundred talents of silver, and thirty talents of gold. And Ezechias gave all the silver that was found in the house of the Lord, and in the king's treasures. At that time Ezechias broke the doors of the Temple of the Lord, and the plates of gold which he had fastened on them, and gave them to the king of the Assyrians” (4 Kings 18:13-16).
While Sennacherib claims he lifted his siege of Jerusalem after Ezechias acknowledged him as his overlord and paid him tribute, which the Bible seems to confirm, the biblical account describes the Assyrian invasion ending miraculously through God's intervention. It says that when the Assyrian army arrived at Jerusalem after capturing Lachish, Ezechias went to the Temple of Jerusalem to pray for God's deliverance. Isaias the prophet soon sent the following message:
“Wherefore, thus saith the Lord concerning the king of the Assyrians: ‘He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow into it, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a trench about it. By the way that he came, he shall return: and into this city he shall not come, saith the Lord. And I will protect this city, and will save it for my own sake, and for David my servant's sake. And it came to pass that night, that an angel of the Lord came, and slew in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and eighty-five thousand. And when he arose early in the morning, he saw all the bodies of the dead. And Sennacherib king of the Assyrians departing went away, and he returned and abode in Ninive” (4 Kings 19:32-36).
Ezechias Dying, But Spared for 15 Years
Soon after, Ezechias fell ill, and Isaias foretold his imminent death (Isaias, chapter 38). As a result, Ezechias then prayed desperately to God for deliverance. Isaias, instructing that a poultice of figs be applied to Ezechias’ infected boil, declared that God had added 15 years to his life. Not only that, but because of Ezechias’ determination to act as God wishes, God would protect Jerusalem from the Assyrians. There is no mention in Isaias of Ezechias’ stripping the Temple to pay tribute to Sennacherib.
Isaias Condemns Ezechias' Seeking of Human Help
The next time that unrest is witnessed in Juda, we find Ezechias in the black books of Sargon, a later king of the Assyrians. To save his skin, Ezechias entered into a pact with Egypt against the Assyrian power. (Isaias 30-31, 2 Kings 18-19).
It has been suggested that chapters 28-31 of Isaias consist of the prophet’s protests against negotiations on the part of King Ezechias with Egypt with a view to a revolt against Assyria. It is interesting to note that the originators of this revolt against Assyria, in favor of an alliance with Egypt instead, were anxious to keep the prophet in the dark regarding their plot. They did not succeed. Isaias draws attention to their attempt to outwit the Almighty (Isaias 29.15; 30.1-12; 31.1-2).
Isaias strongly disapproved of this treaty, saying: “Woe to you, apostate children, saith the Lord, that you would take counsel, and not of me: and would begin a web, and not by my spirit, that you might add sin upon sin: who walk to go down into Egypt, and have not asked at my mouth, hoping for help in the strength of Pharao, and trusting in the shadow of Egypt. And the strength of Pharao shall be to your confusion, and the confidence of the shadow of Egypt to your shame” (Isaias 30:1-3)
Isaias then resorted to an even more drastic attempt to turn public opinion against rebellion. For three years he walked the streets of Jerusalem “naked and barefooted” as a sign of humiliation which awaited not only Egypt – the power with which certain statesmen of Juda sought alliance – but the power of Ethiopia at the hands of Assyria (20.2,4). One author writes: “Isaias consistently upheld the maxim that the safety of the state lay in abstinence from all attempts to recover its independence, and in quiet resignation to the will of God.” There is no reason to suppose that the prophet held out any hope that such alliance would spare them from the trial of an Assyrian invasion.
We can learn from Isaias' dogged persistence, even in the face of rejection. Being a prophet of doom and gloom is much tougher than being a prophet and happiness and hope, but I guess someone has to do the job! Likewise today, the gentle Mother of God has been repeatedly coming with messages of doom and gloom, which she has said must be made known to all. If this is what Heaven wants, who are we to decide otherwise?
Isaias Battles Religious Corruption
God not only makes use of Isaias to address corrupt kings, but also a corrupt priesthood. Echoing Amos’ harsh denunciation of priestly corruption, Isaias delivers God message:
“Hear the word of the Lord … To what purpose do you offer me the multitude of your victims, saith the Lord? I am full! I do not desire holocausts of rams, and fat of fatlings, and blood of calves, and lambs, and buck goats. Offer sacrifice no more in vain: incense is an abomination to me. Your assemblies are wicked and your solemnities are become troublesome to me, I am weary of bearing them. And when you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away my eyes from you: and when you multiply prayer, I will not hear: for your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, be clean, take away the evil of your devices from my eyes: cease to do perversely. Learn to do well! Seek judgment! Relieve the oppressed, judge for the fatherless, defend the widow!” (Isaias 1:10-17)
Chief Prophecies of Isaias
The prophet foretells the birth of the Messias from a Virgin, and with particular clarity he describes the Suffering of the Messias for the sins of the world. He foresees His Resurrection and the universal spreading of His Church. By his clear foretelling of Christ the Savior, the Prophet Isaias deserves to be called an Old Testament Evangelist. To him belong the words, “He beareth our sins and is smitten for us.... He was wounded for our sins and tortured for our transgressions. The chastisement of our world was upon Him, and by His wounds we were healed....” (Isaias 53:4-5).
Isaias the Miracle Man
The holy Prophet Isaias had also a gift of miracle-working. And so, when during the time of a siege of Jerusalem by enemies the besieged had become exhausted with thirst, he by his prayer drew out from beneath Mount Sion a spring of water, which was called Siloam, which means “sent from God.” It was to this spring afterwards that the Savior sent the man blind from birth to wash, and He restored his sight. By the prayer of the Prophet Isaias, the Lord also prolonged the life of King Ezechias for 15 years.
Isaias the Martyr?
Both Jewish and Christian apocryphal traditions state that after Ezechias’ death, Isaias became a martyr at the hands of King Ezechias’ son, King Manasses of Juda, who had liberalized Ezechias’ religious policy and considered Isaias a thorn in his side. Whether such traditions have a basis in history or result from a polemic against the wicked Manasses is hard to know. However, tradition has it that by order of King Manasses he was sawn-through by a wood-saw. The prophet was buried not far from the Pool of Siloam. The relics of the holy Prophet Isaias were afterwards transferred by the Emperor Theodosius the Younger, to Constantinople and installed in the church of St Laurence at Blachernae. At the present time part of the head of the Prophet Isaias is preserved at Athos, in the Hilandar monastery.
Isaias’ School of Disciples
Isaias may have had disciples and descendants who carried on his tradition, possibly even into the period of the Jewish exile in Babylon. Such followers are hinted at in an oracle preserved in Isaias, chapter 8:16-18: “Bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples. And I will wait for the Lord, Who hath hid His face from the house of Jacob, and I will look for Him. Behold I and my children, whom the Lord hath given me for a sign, and for a wonder in Israel from the Lord of hosts, who dwelleth in mount Sion.”
Some scholars suggest that the disciples of Isaias formed a “School of Isaias” that perpetuated his traditions and added to his prophecies over the following two centuries. One of the members of his school may have written the funeral dirge mocking the king of Babylon (Isaias, chapter 14) that describes the fall of Lucifer for striving to surpass God. The king of Babylon became a threat to Israel a hundred years after Isaias’ death.
Isaias left behind him a book of prophecy in which he denounces the Jews for their unfaithfulness to the God of their Fathers. He predicted the captivity of the Jews and their return from captivity during the time of the emperor Cyrus, the destruction and renewal of Jerusalem and of the Temple. Together with this he predicts the historical fate also of the other nations bordering the Jews. But what is most important of all for us, the prophet Isaias with particular clarity and detail prophesies about the coming of the Messias, Christ the Savior. The prophet names the Messias as God and Man, teacher of all the nations, founder of the Kingdom of peace and love.
No wonder that Isaias in one the chief figures of the Advent season, with his words appearing almost every day in the liturgy—either at Mass or in the Liturgical Hours. He is represented by one of the four candles on the Advent Wreath.
The holy Prophet Isaias lived 700 years before the Birth of Christ, and was descended of royal lineage. Isaias was one of the greatest of the Old Testament prophets; one of the outstanding evangelists of the Hebrew race; and one of the pillars of Advent chosen by Holy Mother Church. Advent is full of readings―especially in the latter part of Advent―taken from the prophet Isaias. His name means “the salvation of Yahweh” or “Yahweh is salvation.” The prophet was conscious of his name and realized that he did not bear it accidentally.
Family
His, father, Amos – no relation to the prophet of that name – appears to have been a citizen of Jerusalem. The social position of Amos cannot be defined, but Isaias seems to have held high rank, for when Ezechias, King of Juda, enquired of him, he sent a deputation of his chief officials (4 Kings 19.2). His ease of access to the court and Temple (Isaias 7:3; 8:2), together with sources that tell us that Isaias was possibly the cousin of King Ozias, suggests he was of a family of high rank.
Prophetic Ministry
He exercised the functions of his prophetic office in the Southern Kingdom, during the reigns of Ozias, Joathan, Achaz, and Ezechias, kings of Juda. Ozias reigned 52 years in the middle of the eighth century B.C. Isaias must have begun his career a few years before Ozias’ death, probably in the 740s. Isaias lived at least until the fourteenth year of Ezechias, who died in the 690’s, and may have been contemporary for some years with King Manasses. Thus Isaias may have prophesied for the long period of 60 years or more.
God Calls Isaias
His original call to the prophetical office is not recorded. However, a powerful vision came to him “in the year that King Ozias died,” in which he reports seeing God enthroned among angelic beings. Isaias receives God’s instruction and reports it thus:
“And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: 'Whom shall I send? and who shall go for us?'“
And I said: “Behold, here am I, send me!”
And He said: “Go, and thou shalt say to this people: ‘Hearing, hear, and understand not! And see the vision, and know it not! Blind the heart of this people, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes: lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted and I heal them.”
And I said: “How long, O Lord?”
And He said: “Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land shall be left desolate.” (Isaias 6:8-11).
Isaias Ignored
Isaias’ personal life, like his public persona, was a reflection of his religious calling as prophet, whose oracles were destined to fall on deaf ears. Thus we must realize and accept that we too may well be ignored and rejected by deaf ears, but, like Isaias, we must nevertheless continue to give out God’s messages embodied in the teaching of the Church and Our Lady’s messages from Church approved apparitions.
Isaias, thought to be a priest by some authors, was also married to a woman referred to as “the prophetess” (Isaias 8:3). Isaias had by her two sons, who bore symbolic names given by God--Shear-jashub (“Remnant will return,” Isaias 7:3) and Maher-shalal-hash-baz (“Destruction is imminent,” Isaias 8:1-4). These sons assisted Isaias in his ministry and may have carried on his tradition after his death.
Isaias’ Troubled Times
Contrary to the inspiring spirit of the prophecies in the Book of Isaias for which he is best known, the historical Isaias was not primarily a prophet of hope, but more a prophet of doom. The names of Isaias’ sons—signaling impending destruction and the survival of only a remnant—were emblematic of the themes of his ministry. He lived during a time of terrible military and political upheavals, which witnessed Israel (the Northern Kingdom) and Juda (the Southern Kingdom) allying and mingling with pagan neighbors and warring against each other by in-fighting.
Isaias exercised his ministry in a spirit of uncompromising firmness and boldness in regard to all that bore on the interests of religion. Although his prophecies consistently concern themselves with the fate of nations and kings, political issues were secondary. The key to Juda’s fate was the faithfulness of at least a remnant of righteous believers to the commands of God alone.
This is exactly the scenario that we find ourselves in today—the Church has become worldly as Our Lady foretold: “The priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, are asking for vengeance … Civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism … disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the earth … People will think of nothing but amusement” (La Salette).
Furthermore, God is ignored, as Our Lady also stated: “True Faith has faded … the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … Only a few old women go to Mass in the summer, the rest work all day Sunday and in the winter, when they are at a loose end, they only go to Mass to make fun of religion. During Lent, they go to the butcher’s like hungry dogs. [People] have neglected prayer and penance … wanting to shake off the yoke of the Lord of Lords … Churches will be locked up or desecrated ... for they will not have been guided by the good spirit of the Gospel” (La Salette).
The consequences of all this? Same as the consequences we see inflicted upon the wayward Chosen People of God.
Never-Ending Prophet
Isaias’ prophetic ministry extends through the reigns of four kings: Ozias, Joathan, Achaz and Ezechias, covering a period of a minimum of nearly 50 years or even over 60 years—it is difficult to ascertain precisely. In this long career, spanning the late eighth and early seventh century B.C., he warned both Israel and Juda of impending doom as a punishment from God for His people’s sin. As court prophet to Juda’s King Ezechias, the Bible reports he inspired that King Ezechias to a faith, which—with God’s miraculous help—turned back the rampaging armies of Assyria that had ravaged the nation. Isaias’ prophecies have much in common with those of the other great prophets of the same period, Amos, Osee and Micheas.
Five Periods of Prophecy
It is convenient to divide Isaias’ ministry into five periods, which, although unequal in length, are each marked by features peculiar to itself. The first three may be said to be Assyrian in outlook, the fourth Assyrian and Babylonian, and the fifth Babylonian.
First Period—Denouncing Corruption and Lack of Religion
The first period extends from the death of Ozias, about 740 B.C. to the beginning of the reign of Achaz (Isaias, chapters 9 and 32). Like Amos, Isaias appears here mainly as a preacher of righteousness and judgment to come. His ministry begins at a time when Israel had forsaken God and placed their confidence in worldly prosperity, warlike resources, superstition and idolatry. Middle-class luxury, oppression of the poor by wealthy merchants and tradesmen, wantonness of women, excess in festive drinking, and the perversion of moral distinctions, abounded everywhere.
He portrays this tragic condition of the spiritual life of Juda in these words; “And the daughter of Sion is left as a booth in a vineyard, as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city” (Isaias 1.8). He describes their waywardness in these words from the Lord: “The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib: but Israel hath not known Me, and My people hath not understood” (Isaias 1.3). Isaias traces all the manifestations of national corruption to a single source; absence of a religious spirit or the knowledge of God, in the men of his time. This truth he graphically describes in the unique story of the vineyard:
“My beloved had a vineyard on a hill in a fruitful place. And he fenced it in, and picked the stones out of it, and planted it with the choicest vines, and built a tower in the midst thereof, and set up a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes. And now, O ye inhabitants of Jerusalem, and ye men of Juda, judge between Me and My vineyard. What is there that I ought to do more to My vineyard, that I have not done to it? And now I will show you what I will do to My vineyard. I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be wasted: I will break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down. And I will make it desolate: it shall not be pruned, and it shall not be dug; but briers and thorns shall come up, and I will command the clouds to rain no rain upon it. For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel: and the man of Juda, his pleasant plant: and I looked that he should do judgment, and behold iniquity: and do justice” (Isaias 5:1-7).
We learn from this that we have obligation to bear good fruit, not wild fruit. Yet the Catholic world today has, for the most part, gone wild. They walls of the vineyard (Church) are in disrepair, broken-down and breached. The clouds (Heaven and the Churches sources of grace) have been made “to rain no rain upon it.” Rather than raining-down grace, God will rain down justice. Unless…! But, like the proverbial frog in the gradually heated saucepan of water, we refuse to jump into action—being, like the frog, spiritually cold-blooded.
Second Period—Political Adviser
The second period covers the critical period of the Syro-Ephraimite invasion of Juda, about 735 B.C. and is described in chapters 7, 8 and perhaps 9. This period finds Isaias in an entirely new role, that of a political adviser. One of the outstanding events of this period is the impressive interview between Isaias as a result of the invasion of Juda by the combined forces of Syria and Ephraim. By this unbrotherly act the Northern Kingdom sealed its own doom. Both it and Syria fell prey to the advancing Assyrians under the leadership of Theglathphalasar.
Chapter 7 of Isaias sets out the interview between God’s prophet and the faithless Achaz. Isaias assures the king that the conspiracy will come to nothing, and holds out a promise of deliverance on the condition of faith in God. Achaz replied: “I will not ask, neither will I tempt the Lord” (Isaias 7:12). Isaias then continued the conversation, and gave utterance to the remarkable promise concerning a coming king in these words: “Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel” (Isaias 7:14). The king’s unbelief is punished by the threat of an Assyrian invasion.
Isaias did not accept the king’s decision as final, but made an appeal to the people at large. The people did not believe him; his message fell on deaf ears. The prophet was right. Damascus was overthrown by the Assyrians in 732 B.C. and Samaria fell to the same fate, ten years later, as the Assyrians came closer and closer to Juda and Jerusalem.
“Achaz sent messengers to Theglathphalasar king of the Assyrians, saying: I am thy servant, and thy son: come up, and save me out of the hand of the King of Syria, and out of the hand of the King of Israel, who are risen up together against me. And when he had gathered together the silver and gold that could be found in the house of the Lord, and in the king’s treasures, he sent it for a present to the king of the Assyrians. And Theglathphalasar agreed to the desire of Achaz: for the King of the Assyrians went up against Damascus, and laid it waste: and he carried away the inhabitants thereof to Cyrene, but Basin he slew. And King Achaz went to Damascus to meet Theglathphalasar, King of the Assyrians, and when he had seen the altar of Damascus, King Achaz sent to Urias the priest a pattern of it, and its likeness according to all the work thereof” (4 Kings 16:7-10). Not heeding Isaias’ warnings, Achaz thus falls even deeper into idolatry.
The rejection of the prophet’s message by the common people marks a temporary end to his public activity. The Lord hid His face from the house of Israel, in that he withdrew the guidance of the prophetic word that had been so coldly received.
This reminds us of the Queen of Prophets, who just like Isaias, one of the ‘kings’ of Prophets, has been ignored and her messages have met with relatively little acceptance on a practical level. Our Lady has also prophesied invasions by modern-day ‘Assyrians’ that will cause wars and take over peoples. Sr. Lucia said that “the Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.”
Third Period—The Fall of Samaria
The next period is marked by the strange absence of any record of Isaias’ reflections on the events with which it is associated, namely the fall of Samaria in 722 BC. This event is foretold in several of Isaias’ most striking prophecies in Isaias:
“Damascus shall cease to be a city, and shall be as a ruinous heap of stones. The cities of Aroer shall be left for flocks ... And it shall come to pass that the glory of Jacob shall be made thin, and the fatness of his flesh shall grow lean. In that day his strong cities shall be forsaken and thou shalt be desolate. Because thou hast forgotten God thy savior, and hast not remembered thy strong helper. Woe to the multitude of many people, like the multitude of the roaring sea: and the tumult of crowds, like the noise of many waters. Nations shall make a noise like the noise of waters overflowing, and he shall be carried away as the dust of the mountains before the wind, and as a whirlwind before a tempest” … “Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, staggering with wine. Behold the Lord is mighty and strong, as a storm of hail: a destroying whirlwind, as the violence of many waters overflowing, and sent forth upon a spacious land. The crown of pride of the drunkards of Ephraim shall be trodden under feet” (Isaias 17:1-13; 28:1-3).
Count on God to Get it Right
And so it came to pass, as is the always the case when God promises to do something, that “in the ninth year of Osee, the king of the Assyrians took Samaria, and carried Israel away to Assyria” (Isaias 17:6). In 722 B.C., the Northern Kingdom of Israel (Samaria) was completely overrun and many of its citizens taken into exile in the Assyrian Empire. Later, Sennacherib of Assyria conquered nearly all of Juda, capturing all of its major towns except Jerusalem and exiling many Judeans as well.
The fall of Samaria must have profoundly affected Juda, especially so when it is realized that the Ten Tribes of Israel, that populated Samaria, comprised the larger portion of God’s people. It had been prophesied: “Shall I not, as I have done to Samaria and her idols, so do to Jerusalem and her idols?” (Isaias 10:11).
This warning should have had a very chastening effect on the heart of Juda. Juda seems to have concluded that if God failed to avert the doom of the Northern Kingdom, there was no assurance that He would protect her. This may have been the cause of the desperate struggle that afterwards took place to throw off the Assyrian yoke.
Don't Mess with God!
What do we learn from all this? We SHOULD learn that nobody messes with God! The good, kind, sweet, merciful God also has a side to Him that can get quite angry at times—as the Old Testament accounts gives testimony. Since God never changes, we can rightfully assume that He is likely to act in the same way today, if His ‘prophets’ are not listened to and obeyed. This is essentially what Our Lady is warning us about the good, kind, sweet, merciful God:
“If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it ... Woe to the inhabitants of the earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other … Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Our Lord's Warning Words
Earlier, in Quito, Ecuador, Our Lord Himself had warned Mother Mariana—of Our Lady of Good Success fame: “Know, moreover, that Divine Justice releases terrible chastisements on entire nations, not only for the sins of the people, but for those of priests and religious persons. Straying from their divine mission, they degrade themselves in such a way that, before the eyes of God they quicken the rigor of the punishments ... to let My Justice fall upon My beloved cloisters ― and even over cities ― when those so near to Me who belong to Me reject My spirit, abandoning Me alone in Tabernacles, rarely remembering that I live there especially for love of them.” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito Ecuador).
We learn from all this that when God speaks through His prophets, He is not wasting His breath and time, but He is very serious! Ignoring Him has serious consequences—not just for the person who ignores Him, but for all those associated to that person. One king ignores Isaias and the whole nation is overrun, many are slaughtered and the rest taken away as slaves. That is serious! Just like the sin of Adam: through the sin of one man, death entered the world and everyone in the world from thenceforward was doomed to die! See the serious effects of one man's sin! King Louis XIV of France refused Our Lord's request though one of His 'prophetesses'—St. Margaret Mary—to consecrate France to the Sacred Heart, and the whole nation was punished with the barbaric and bloody French Revolution. One man's neglect was visited upon a whole nation. Today, the popes have refused to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary...! What will the effect of that be?
Fourth Period—Trying to Preserve Israel from Mingling with the World
We now come to the most eventful stage of Isaias’ career, which covers a period from 720 B.C. to 701 B.C., during which time Ezechias is king of Juda. It must be remembered that, throughout his prophetic career, Isaias had always urged upon Juda the need for a position of isolation and absolute dependence upon God. King Achaz ruled wickedly for 16 years and absolutely refused to be guided by the prophet, and, fearing the consequences of a Syrio-Ephraimite conspiracy, sought to trust, not in God’s aid and power, but in human aid and power, by giving his allegiance to King Theglathphalasar of Assyria, who promptly responded to his appeal:
We learn from this the need to separate ourselves from the world and not to take on the values of the world, which lead to an idolatrous attitude. What was true in the Old Testament, is still true in the New Testament—we have to separate ourselves from the world that surrounds us: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15) … “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4). What is about to befall us some time soon, is a direct result of our ignoring this advice. Find it hard to believe? Read again Our Lady’s messages at Quito, La Salette, Fatima and Akita.
Fifth Period—Isaias and King Ezechias
Achaz later dies and his son, Ezechias, ruled in his place. The first hint that Ezechias might endeavor to free himself from the pact to which his father was a party, might be found in the short oracle of Isaias (14:29-32), which is thought to have been the year of Ezechias’ accession to the throne. Ezechias is particularly remembered for his monotheistic religious reform, which not only campaigned against idolatry, but attempted to centralize the formal worship of God exclusively in the Temple of Jerusalem, so that idolatry in the provinces could be eliminated through supervision of all sacrifices in Jerusalem.
The Fourth Book of Kings tells us that “Ezechias was five and twenty years old when he began to reign: and he reigned nine and twenty years in Jerusalem: the name of his mother was Abi the daughter of Zacharias. And he did that which was good before the Lord, according to all that David his father had done. He destroyed the high places, and broke the statues in pieces, and cut down the groves, and broke the brazen serpent, which Moses had made: for till that time the children of Israel burnt incense to it. He trusted in the Lord the God of Israel: so that after him there was none like him among all the kings of Juda, nor any of them that were before him. And he stuck to the Lord, and departed not from His steps, but kept His commandments, which the Lord commanded Moses. Wherefore the Lord also was with him, and in all things, to which he went forth, he behaved himself wisely. And he rebelled against the king of the Assyrians, and served him not” (4 Kings 18:1-7).
Assyria Reacts to Ezechias' Rebelliousness
The period Ezechias’ reign witnessed the rise of Assyrian Empire as the dominant power in the region. In 722 B.C., the Northern Kingdom of Israel fell to Assyria, which exiled large numbers of its people and replaced them with Assyrian populations. Many citizens of Israel also fled to Juda during this time. Ezechias probably welcomed the refugees, as he had previously invited the citizens of Ephraim and Manasses to celebrate Passover in Jerusalem. Perhaps believing himself invulnerable to the fate of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, on account of his pious devotion to the Lord, Ezechias refused to pay the tribute enforced on his father. This led to Sennacherib's invasion, probably c. 701 B.C. “Sennacherib king of the Assyrians came up against the fenced cities of Juda: and took them” (4 Kings 18:13). He then laid siege to Jerusalem.
This led to Isaias’ most dramatic success. While Sennacherib of Assyria was in the process of besieging the major Judean city of Lachish and his armies threatened the capital of Jerusalem, Isaias had counseled Ezechias not to capitulate. Isaias foretells that: “Out of Jerusalem shall go forth a, remnant, and salvation from mount Sion: the zeal of the Lord of hosts shall do this. Wherefore thus saith the Lord concerning the king of the Assyrians: ‘He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow into it, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a trench about it. By the way that he came, he shall return, and into this city he shall not come, saith the Lord. And I will protect this city, and will save it for my own sake, and for the sake of David my servant!’” (Isaias 37:32-34).
Jerusalem was saved, but at a price. Sennacherib himself writes: ”Because Ezechias, King of Juda, would not submit to my yoke, I came up against him, and by force of arms and by the might of my power I took 46 of his strong fenced cities; and of the smaller towns which were scattered about, I took and plundered a countless number... Ezechias, himself, I shut up in Jerusalem, his capital city, like a bird in a cage, building towers round the city to hem him in, and raising banks of earth against the gates, so as to prevent escape... Then upon Ezechias there fell the fear of the power of my arms, and he sent out to me the chiefs and the elders of Jerusalem with 30 talents of gold and 800 talents of silver, and divers treasures, a rich and immense booty...”
The Scriptural version of the same event confirms Sennacherib's account, although it gives a lower figure from the amount of silver demanded than Sennacherib does. Holy Scripture says: “Then Ezechias, King of Juda sent messengers to the King of the Assyrians, saying: 'I have offended, depart from me: and all that thou shalt put upon me, I will bear!'. And the King of the Assyrians put a tax upon Ezechias, King of Juda, of three hundred talents of silver, and thirty talents of gold. And Ezechias gave all the silver that was found in the house of the Lord, and in the king's treasures. At that time Ezechias broke the doors of the Temple of the Lord, and the plates of gold which he had fastened on them, and gave them to the king of the Assyrians” (4 Kings 18:13-16).
While Sennacherib claims he lifted his siege of Jerusalem after Ezechias acknowledged him as his overlord and paid him tribute, which the Bible seems to confirm, the biblical account describes the Assyrian invasion ending miraculously through God's intervention. It says that when the Assyrian army arrived at Jerusalem after capturing Lachish, Ezechias went to the Temple of Jerusalem to pray for God's deliverance. Isaias the prophet soon sent the following message:
“Wherefore, thus saith the Lord concerning the king of the Assyrians: ‘He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow into it, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a trench about it. By the way that he came, he shall return: and into this city he shall not come, saith the Lord. And I will protect this city, and will save it for my own sake, and for David my servant's sake. And it came to pass that night, that an angel of the Lord came, and slew in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and eighty-five thousand. And when he arose early in the morning, he saw all the bodies of the dead. And Sennacherib king of the Assyrians departing went away, and he returned and abode in Ninive” (4 Kings 19:32-36).
Ezechias Dying, But Spared for 15 Years
Soon after, Ezechias fell ill, and Isaias foretold his imminent death (Isaias, chapter 38). As a result, Ezechias then prayed desperately to God for deliverance. Isaias, instructing that a poultice of figs be applied to Ezechias’ infected boil, declared that God had added 15 years to his life. Not only that, but because of Ezechias’ determination to act as God wishes, God would protect Jerusalem from the Assyrians. There is no mention in Isaias of Ezechias’ stripping the Temple to pay tribute to Sennacherib.
Isaias Condemns Ezechias' Seeking of Human Help
The next time that unrest is witnessed in Juda, we find Ezechias in the black books of Sargon, a later king of the Assyrians. To save his skin, Ezechias entered into a pact with Egypt against the Assyrian power. (Isaias 30-31, 2 Kings 18-19).
It has been suggested that chapters 28-31 of Isaias consist of the prophet’s protests against negotiations on the part of King Ezechias with Egypt with a view to a revolt against Assyria. It is interesting to note that the originators of this revolt against Assyria, in favor of an alliance with Egypt instead, were anxious to keep the prophet in the dark regarding their plot. They did not succeed. Isaias draws attention to their attempt to outwit the Almighty (Isaias 29.15; 30.1-12; 31.1-2).
Isaias strongly disapproved of this treaty, saying: “Woe to you, apostate children, saith the Lord, that you would take counsel, and not of me: and would begin a web, and not by my spirit, that you might add sin upon sin: who walk to go down into Egypt, and have not asked at my mouth, hoping for help in the strength of Pharao, and trusting in the shadow of Egypt. And the strength of Pharao shall be to your confusion, and the confidence of the shadow of Egypt to your shame” (Isaias 30:1-3)
Isaias then resorted to an even more drastic attempt to turn public opinion against rebellion. For three years he walked the streets of Jerusalem “naked and barefooted” as a sign of humiliation which awaited not only Egypt – the power with which certain statesmen of Juda sought alliance – but the power of Ethiopia at the hands of Assyria (20.2,4). One author writes: “Isaias consistently upheld the maxim that the safety of the state lay in abstinence from all attempts to recover its independence, and in quiet resignation to the will of God.” There is no reason to suppose that the prophet held out any hope that such alliance would spare them from the trial of an Assyrian invasion.
We can learn from Isaias' dogged persistence, even in the face of rejection. Being a prophet of doom and gloom is much tougher than being a prophet and happiness and hope, but I guess someone has to do the job! Likewise today, the gentle Mother of God has been repeatedly coming with messages of doom and gloom, which she has said must be made known to all. If this is what Heaven wants, who are we to decide otherwise?
Isaias Battles Religious Corruption
God not only makes use of Isaias to address corrupt kings, but also a corrupt priesthood. Echoing Amos’ harsh denunciation of priestly corruption, Isaias delivers God message:
“Hear the word of the Lord … To what purpose do you offer me the multitude of your victims, saith the Lord? I am full! I do not desire holocausts of rams, and fat of fatlings, and blood of calves, and lambs, and buck goats. Offer sacrifice no more in vain: incense is an abomination to me. Your assemblies are wicked and your solemnities are become troublesome to me, I am weary of bearing them. And when you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away my eyes from you: and when you multiply prayer, I will not hear: for your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, be clean, take away the evil of your devices from my eyes: cease to do perversely. Learn to do well! Seek judgment! Relieve the oppressed, judge for the fatherless, defend the widow!” (Isaias 1:10-17)
Chief Prophecies of Isaias
The prophet foretells the birth of the Messias from a Virgin, and with particular clarity he describes the Suffering of the Messias for the sins of the world. He foresees His Resurrection and the universal spreading of His Church. By his clear foretelling of Christ the Savior, the Prophet Isaias deserves to be called an Old Testament Evangelist. To him belong the words, “He beareth our sins and is smitten for us.... He was wounded for our sins and tortured for our transgressions. The chastisement of our world was upon Him, and by His wounds we were healed....” (Isaias 53:4-5).
Isaias the Miracle Man
The holy Prophet Isaias had also a gift of miracle-working. And so, when during the time of a siege of Jerusalem by enemies the besieged had become exhausted with thirst, he by his prayer drew out from beneath Mount Sion a spring of water, which was called Siloam, which means “sent from God.” It was to this spring afterwards that the Savior sent the man blind from birth to wash, and He restored his sight. By the prayer of the Prophet Isaias, the Lord also prolonged the life of King Ezechias for 15 years.
Isaias the Martyr?
Both Jewish and Christian apocryphal traditions state that after Ezechias’ death, Isaias became a martyr at the hands of King Ezechias’ son, King Manasses of Juda, who had liberalized Ezechias’ religious policy and considered Isaias a thorn in his side. Whether such traditions have a basis in history or result from a polemic against the wicked Manasses is hard to know. However, tradition has it that by order of King Manasses he was sawn-through by a wood-saw. The prophet was buried not far from the Pool of Siloam. The relics of the holy Prophet Isaias were afterwards transferred by the Emperor Theodosius the Younger, to Constantinople and installed in the church of St Laurence at Blachernae. At the present time part of the head of the Prophet Isaias is preserved at Athos, in the Hilandar monastery.
Isaias’ School of Disciples
Isaias may have had disciples and descendants who carried on his tradition, possibly even into the period of the Jewish exile in Babylon. Such followers are hinted at in an oracle preserved in Isaias, chapter 8:16-18: “Bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples. And I will wait for the Lord, Who hath hid His face from the house of Jacob, and I will look for Him. Behold I and my children, whom the Lord hath given me for a sign, and for a wonder in Israel from the Lord of hosts, who dwelleth in mount Sion.”
Some scholars suggest that the disciples of Isaias formed a “School of Isaias” that perpetuated his traditions and added to his prophecies over the following two centuries. One of the members of his school may have written the funeral dirge mocking the king of Babylon (Isaias, chapter 14) that describes the fall of Lucifer for striving to surpass God. The king of Babylon became a threat to Israel a hundred years after Isaias’ death.
Isaias left behind him a book of prophecy in which he denounces the Jews for their unfaithfulness to the God of their Fathers. He predicted the captivity of the Jews and their return from captivity during the time of the emperor Cyrus, the destruction and renewal of Jerusalem and of the Temple. Together with this he predicts the historical fate also of the other nations bordering the Jews. But what is most important of all for us, the prophet Isaias with particular clarity and detail prophesies about the coming of the Messias, Christ the Savior. The prophet names the Messias as God and Man, teacher of all the nations, founder of the Kingdom of peace and love.
No wonder that Isaias in one the chief figures of the Advent season, with his words appearing almost every day in the liturgy—either at Mass or in the Liturgical Hours. He is represented by one of the four candles on the Advent Wreath.
Article 16
Thursday, December 19th
Advent Pregnancy
Thursday, December 19th
Advent Pregnancy
The Seed of God
Holy Scripture speaks of the Mystical Body of Christ as being a seed given to man by God. Already in the Garden of Eden, God speaks of this future Mystical Body, warning the devil of His future coming: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel” (Genesis 3:15). Scripture adds: “His seed shall be mighty upon Earth” (Psalm 111:2).
In preparing the way for the Mystical Body of Christ, God chooses Abraham as a foundation for this Seed, which is Christ, and which the Pharisees would seek to abort when He finally did come: “The Lord appeared to Abram, and said to him: ‘To thy seed will I give this land!’” (Genesis 12:7). “The Lord said to Abram, after Lot was separated from him: ‘Lift up thy eyes, and look from the place wherein thou now art, to the north and to the south, to the east and to the west. All the land which thou seest, I will give to thee, and to thy seed for ever. And I will make thy seed as the dust of the Earth: if any man be able to number the dust of the Earth, he shall be able to number thy seed also!’” (Genesis 13:13-16).
God renewed this promise time and time again, to Abraham and his descendants. He renews it after He had tested Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice Isaac: “‘By My own self have I sworn,’ saith the Lord: ‘because thou hast done this thing, and hast not spared thy only begotten son for My sake! I will bless thee, and I will multiply thy seed as the stars of Heaven, and as the sand that is by the sea shore: thy seed shall possess the gates of their enemies!’” (Genesis 22:17).
This promise is later renewed to Abraham’s son, Isaac: “The Lord appeared to him, saying: ‘I am the God of Abraham thy father; do not fear, for I am with thee: I will bless thee, and multiply thy seed for My servant Abraham’s sake!’” (Genesis 26:24).
The Kingdom of God is a Seed
Our Lord is the known as the Word—and the “Word of God” was made flesh and dwelt amongst us (John 1). Our Lord is the Seed of His Mystical Body—from that little embryo in Mary’s womb, has grown a massive Mystical Body, which will have no end—yet the end of some parts of that Body will be Heaven, for others Hell.
Just as Our Lord first came to world over 2,000 years ago—as a tiny “Seed”, so to speak, in Mary’s womb—so too does He wish to come this Christmas (and every Christmas) like a husband seeking to impregnate his wife with his seed, in order to create new life: “I am come that they may have life” (John 10:10), and he comes again and again so that the Seed of Life may truly sprout and enroot itself in our soul: “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly” (John 10:10).
The Pregnancy of Advent
The Advent season is like a pregnancy, a time of gestation or incubation—in which the Church fills us with and makes grow in us the Word of God, just like a baby grows within its mother’s womb, until the time for birth has come. However, the baby in the womb, or the seedling in the ground is very vulnerable in this early period. Inadvertent or unwanted miscarriages can be unhappily provoked by a lifestyle that does not promote the healthy growth of the baby.
Some even resent having become pregnant and will even seek to deliberately abort the baby. The same is true for our Advent ‘pregnancy’ or ‘gestation’—the “fruit of the womb, Jesus”, will never see the light of day, because of the lifestyle of so many Catholics, who inadvertently destroy the Seed of Faith, that Jesus is, or deliberately abort the Church’s attempts at giving birth to Him in our souls.
There is a lifestyle (Prayer & Penance) that leads to a healthy birth of Our Lord in the soul, and there is an unhealthy lifestyle (neglect of prayer and penance in favor of worldliness) that eventually leads to a miscarriage of Our Lord from the soul.
Wheat and Cockle
“Another parable He proposed to them, saying: ‘The kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, and had brought forth fruit, then appeared also the cockle. And the servants of the good man of the house coming said to him: “Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? Whence then hath it cockle?”
And he said to them: “An enemy hath done this!” And the servants said to him: “Wilt thou that we go and gather it up?” And he said: “No, lest perhaps gathering up the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it. Suffer both to grow until the harvest, and, in the time of the harvest, I will say to the reapers: ‘Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn’” (Matthew 13:24-30).
Prior to this parable, Our Lord had spoken of the “Sower of the Seed” and lamented about the destruction of much of that seed, not least by worldliness: “He that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). St. Mark relates the same: “And the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things, entering in, choke the word, and it is made fruitless” (Mark 4:19).
Historical Destruction of the Seed of Faith
This worldliness—the thorns or the cockle—has choked the life out of many Catholic seeds over the years. We see it as being greatly responsible in the early 1500s and Catholic England’s fall from the Faith, as well as in the late 1700s and Catholic France’s fall from the Faith.
The French Revolution ‘hit town’ in 1789—but for many years the Faith was being weakened by France’s enjoyment of the then modern Renaissance Period, with all its focus on man and the things of the world (Humanism and Materialism).
The Protestant Revolution against the Catholic Church had indirectly led to an elevation of man and a preoccupation with man. The newly discovered and colonized countries, all around the world, had led to, not only an influx of material goods into Europe, but the increase in trade also led to an influx of non-Catholic culture and non-Catholic ideas into a once Catholic Europe.
Money, wealth, possessions, art, music, fashion, etc, were the new seeds of idolatry, that distracted men from God and the Faith. Even churchmen succumbed to these tantalizing worldly newcomers, that were suddenly promoted over and above the age-old foundation of the Faith.
France was decaying long before 1789—the French Revolution was God’s punishment for decades or centuries of lukewarmness, indifference and hypocrisy. When the guillotine finally fell, the Faith of many fell with it. Bishops, priests and laity were willing to compromise their Faith, or even abandon their Faith, in order to save their lives—they sacrificed the security of Heaven for a temporary security on Earth. France has never recovered from that Revolution.
Once proudly called the “Eldest Daughter of the Church”—she very quickly left her Father’s House and prostituted herself with the false philosophies and pleasures of the world. What happened to Germany, England and France, can easily happen to us, or anyone in our family!
20th Century Miscarriages and Abortions of the Seed
Let us again fast-forward a couple of centuries, from the late 1700’s and the French Revolution, to the late 1900’s and the Modernist-Liberal Revolution in the Catholic Church. We see that same old story repeat itself. A preoccupation with the world that leads to a distancing from, or even an abandonment of God. Already back in the 1600’s, during her apparitions at Quito, in Ecuador, the Blessed Virgin under the title of Our Lady of Good Success said of our times that: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs.”
The Two Faces of God
God cannot and does remain inactive and silent amidst all this destruction. He has to act as He has always acted and always will act. The terrible actions or reactions of God, that Our Lady speaks of in the future, are nothing other than the terrible actions and reactions that God has shown in the past. Holy Scripture speaks of God rewarding good and punishing evil and the following passage from Leviticus sums up God’s attitude perfectly:
“I am the Lord your God: you shall not make to yourselves any idol or graven thing to adore it: for I am the Lord your God. Keep my [holy days], and reverence My sanctuary: I am the Lord. If you walk in My precepts, and keep My commandments, and do them, I will give you rain in due seasons. And the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit. You shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land without fear. I will give peace in your coasts: you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid. I will take away evil beasts: and the sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. Five of yours shall pursue a hundred others, and a hundred of you ten thousand: your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. I will look on you, and make you increase: you shall be multiplied. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people” (Leviticus 26:1-12).
“But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments; if you despise My laws and contemn My judgments, so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, then I also will do these things to you: I will quickly visit you with poverty, and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes, and consume your lives. You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies. I will set My face against you, and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you, you shall flee when no man pursues you. But if you will not yet for all this obey Me: I will chastise you seven times more for your sins, and I will break the pride of your stubbornness, and I will make to you the Heaven above as iron, and the Earth as brass. Your labor shall be spent in vain, the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit.
“If you walk contrary to Me, and will not hearken to Me, I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins: And I will send in upon you the beasts of the held, to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number, and that your highways may be desolate. And if even so you will not amend, but will walk contrary to Me: I also will walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins. And I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge My covenant. And when you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies, after I shall have broken the staff of your bread: so that ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and give it out by weight: and you shall eat, and shall not be filled.
“But if you will not for all this hearken to Me, but will walk against Me: I will also go against you with opposite fury, and I will chastise you with seven plagues for your sins, so that you shall eat the flesh of your sons and of your daughters. I will destroy your high places, and break your idols. You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you. Insomuch that I will bring your cities to be a wilderness, and I will make your sanctuaries desolate, and will receive no more your sweet odors. And I will destroy your land, and your enemies shall be astonished at it, when they shall be the inhabitants thereof. And I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed” (Leviticus 26:13-33). Compare the above to the sum total of Our Lady’s modern-day prophecies, and the tone, the threats and the consequences are exactly the same.
Good & Evil
Philosophically, evil is defined as “an absence of good that is due to or expected of something.” We expect a boat to float, but if it has a hole in the hull, this is an evil. A baby is expected to have a healthy heart, but if it has a hole in the heart, then this an evil. Spouses are expected to live in marriage until death does them part, but if they divorce and remarry, then this an evil. The world expects rain in due season, but if there is a drought, then this is an evil. We are expected to find, obtain and maintain the grace of God, but if we lose His grace, then this is an evil. Holy Scripture tells us that God expects us to do good and avoid evil: “Turn away from evil and do good” (Psalms 33:15). “Hating that which is evil, cleaving to that which is good” (Romans 12:9). For God calls us to sanctity, not sinfulness: “You shall be holy men to Me” (Exodus 22:31). “For I am the Lord your God: be holy because I am holy. Defile not your souls” (Leviticus 11:44). We are to be trees of holiness, not sinfulness—fruitful, not fruitless.
“Either make the tree good and its fruit good: or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil” (Matthew 12:33). “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth that which is evil” (Luke 6:45). “So every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:17-20).
Reversal of Values
Today, we have many who have reversed the true sense of values—looking upon good things as being ‘evil’ and evil things as being ‘good’! Prayer and penance is suffered like an evil; whereas perpetual fun and over-indulgence is regarded as a ‘good’ thing. Humility is seen as being a weakness and therefore evil; whereas pride and boastfulness seem to bring power, and are thought to be good. Poverty, the preferred lifestyle of Our Lord and Our Lady, is seen as an evil; whereas riches and many possessions are looked upon as good.
“The evil of their hands they call good” (Micheas 7:3). “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter” (Isaias 5:20) ... “You that hate good, and love evil” (Micheas 3:2). “How can you speak good things, whereas you are evil?” (Matthew 12:34). Know, O foolish man, that “the eyes of the Lord, in every place, behold the good and the evil” (Proverbs 15:3). “Good is set against evil, and life against death: so also is the sinner against a just man” (Ecclesiasticus 33:15).
God and mammon is synonymous with good and evil. We cannot pursue both and call it “balanced diet”! “Decline from evil and do good” (Psalms 36:27). “Seek ye good, and not evil, that you may live” (Amos 5:14). This is so fundamental that St. Peter repeats it in the New Testament: “Let him decline from evil, and do good” (1 Peter 3:11). Do evil, and you will sow a poisonous seed in your soul. Cancer begins as a very small cell or ‘seed’, but if not attacked and destroyed, it will itself grow, attack and destroy the entire body. Is there a cancer present in your Advent season?
Cultivating the Soul’s Soil
In some versions of the Bible, we encounter the mysterious word “Husbandman” in many places: “Abel was a shepherd, and Cain a husbandman” (Genesis 4:2) … “And Noe, a husbandman, began to till the ground, and planted a vineyard” (Genesis 9:20) … “Esau became a skillful hunter and a husbandman, but Jacob a plain man dwelt in tents” (Genesis 25:27). Our Lord, speaking of Himself and His relation to the Father, says: “I am the true vine; and my Father is the husbandman” (John 15:1). The husbandman was in essence a farmer or a cultivator—sometimes, the husbandman was the actual owner of the land, sometimes he was employed by the owner of the land. However, it both cases, whether he owned the land or not, it was his business to cultivate the ground, the land, the soil and what was planted and grew in that soil. This imagery easily lends itself to the spiritual sphere, as we shall presently see.
What a Waste!
“Jesus spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it done therefore! Why does it encumber the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it! And if happily it bear fruit: but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-69).
We could relate this to Advent and paraphrase it thus: “Our Lord had planted souls in His Vineyard, the Church. In due season—Advent—He came looking for fruit, but found none. He said: ‘Behold, for all these years I come seeking some serious fruit from this soul, but I find none or very little! I will cut it down! It is just wasting My time and My grace! This fruitless soul no longer serves the purpose for which it was planted in this world!’ But Our Lady and Holy Mother Church begs: “Lord, please give this soul one more year! We will humiliate it (dung it), to see if this provokes it to happily bear fruit. If not, then You can cut it down, Lord!’”
How much time and grace have we wasted? Are we profitable and worth the investment, in God eyes? God is a serious businessman when it comes to spiritual business! Our Lord pointed this out at the Last Supper: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the husbandman. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit ... He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit: for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he shall burn!” (John 15:1-2; 15:5-6).
Not a Pretty Picture!
Our Lady of Good Success paints a similar picture: “The effects of secular education will increase … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs … There will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost” … will be a “false sentimentality” … and “many priests will lose their spirit” and “become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain” … Many will “be dazzled by the false glamour of honors and human greatness, while others are blinded by self-love, not realizing that they are falling into lukewarmness, that immense evil … O, if men only understood how to appreciate the time given to them and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
What is the fruit of my life? No doubt there are some fruits! But how many? What do they taste like to God? Are my fruits bitter or sweet? Are they ripe, or are they hard? Are they, above all, SPIRITUAL fruits, or am I besotted by the material world? Has this Advent really been a spiritual preparation? Or have been sidetracked by a thousand-and-one material, worldly, non-spiritual concerns. What is time ratio between my spiritual and material preparations for Christmas? If some stranger was observing me and counting the hours spent on everything, would he say I was mainly spiritual or materialistic?
Toiling in the Advent Vineyard
“The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a householder, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They say to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:1-7).
We could paraphrase the above to suit Advent, and say: “Advent is all about Our Lord seeking laborers who will work throughout in the Advent Vineyard of Prayer and Penance. The Church went out early in Advent to find laborers and finding some, sent them into the Advent Vineyard of Prayer and Penance, promising spiritual rewards at the end of the season’s toil—at Christmas. Going out again, at the Second Sunday in Advent, the Church saw souls standing around idle, and so said to them: ‘Go you also into the Advent Vineyard and you shall receive what is just!’ And they went in to toil for the remainder of Advent. The Church did the same on the Third Sunday of Advent. Finally with the Fourth Sunday of Advent fast approaching—the eleventh hour of Advent—the Church once again found souls in spiritual idleness, busying themselves with all kinds of material things, and the Church said to them: ‘Why are you so spiritually idle throughout this entire season of Advent?’ They reply: “Because no man has fired us up!” The Church says to them: ‘Go you also into the Advent Vineyard and at least toil throughout the few remaining days!’”
The Good Thief on Calvary is not just a parable, but a real-life proof that Jesus meant what He said in the above parable about the vineyard.
The Value of Time --The Waste of Time
As Our Lady said: “O, if men only understood how to appreciate the time given to them and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be!” (Our Lady of Good Success). In these terrible times in which we live—yet for many materially minded souls, they are not that terrible at all—Our Lady has repeatedly and firmly called the world to penance, not fun. Yet as Sr. Lucia of Fatima fame says, nobody is paying much attention to Our Lady’s message. Let us say this: many may pay theoretical attention—inasmuch as they have read and remember what she has said--but there is no practical attention—in that they do nothing about it.
Leaving it Late!
This reminds of the time wasted by the kings of France, in response to Our Lord’s request that France be consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. One king after another, for one hundred years, neglected or rejected Our Lord’s demands. Finally, as a punishment, God allowed the bloody French Revolution to be unleashed as a punishment and France has still not recovered from that bloody Revolution to this very day—which can be seen by the fact that today only 10% of Catholics regularly practice their Faith in France!
Our Lady warns us about wasting time in responding to her messages: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it.” (La Salette) ...”The good will be martyred, various nations will be annihilated” (Fatima) ...”As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Akita).
Procrastinating Pharao
In Egypt, in the time of Moses and the Exodus, the Pharao delayed the departure of the Israelites, time and time again—and he was rewarded for his efforts by the Ten Plagues. “And the Lord said to Moses: Arise in the morning, and stand before Pharao, and thou shalt say to him: ‘Thus saith the Lord the God of the Hebrews: “Let My people go to sacrifice to Me. For I will at this time send all My plagues upon thy heart, and upon thy servants, and upon thy people: that thou mayest know there is none like Me in all the Earth. For now I will stretch out My hand to strike thee, and thy people with pestilence, and thou shalt perish from the Earth”’” (Exodus 9:13-15). If only the Pharao had done the right thing early and at the first time of asking, he would have saved himself a lot of grief!
An AcceptableTime
Do you want to experience God’s mercy? Then now is the acceptable time! “Thus saith the Lord: ‘In an acceptable time I have heard thee, and in the day of salvation I have helped thee!’ … Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (Isaias 49:8; 2 Corinthians 6:2). “God has given him time for penance” (Job 24:23).
Go to the store of mercy and pay the price! Mercy has a price—part of the price was the Blood of Christ, the rest of the price is our penance. “From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say: ‘Do penance, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!’ … ‘No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!’” (Matthew 4:17; Luke 13:3). “Let him do penance for his sin” (Leviticus 5:5). “If the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment, and justice―then living he shall live, and shall not die” (Ezechiel 18:21). Today, however, “penance” is a dirty word—it doesn’t seem to fit with today’s “funerals in white” that pretend that every Tom, Dick and Harry goes straight to Heaven after death, no matter what they have done—because God is so sweet and nice! If God is so forgiving no matter what, and wipes the slate clean with no debt being reckoned for sin and thus no penance being required—then what on earth is Our Lady doing going around threatening all kinds of not-so-sweet things that are going to come from God if we don’t do penance!!? Someone is lying and making things up—and one should tend to think Our Lady is no liar! If we want mercy, then now is the acceptable time for penance—God will accept our payment for mere cents on the dollar! But if we neglect to pay, or even refuse to pay, then…
“God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23).
Advent Abusers
Have you abused Advent? Have you neglected to pay your debts to God? Have you minimized the gravity of sin and exaggerated the mercy of God so much as to make of Him a doormat on which we can wipe of sinful boots as we walk into Heaven for free? “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). “God hath given him place for penance” (Job 24:23). “Let him do penance for his sin” (Leviticus 5:5). Let us say contritely and humbly with St. Peter: “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!” (Luke 5:8). Let us say with sinner and publican, Zacheus: “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have wronged any man of any thing, I restore him fourfold!” (Luke 19:8).
Let us learn from the Good Thief on Calvary: “And one of those robbers who were hanged, blasphemed Him, saying: ‘If Thou be Christ, save Thyself and us!’ But the other answering, rebuked him, saying: ‘Neither dost thou fear God, seeing thou art condemned under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man hath done no evil!’ And he said to Jesus: ‘Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!’” (Luke 23:39-42). And Jesus may say to us what He said to him: “Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). “God has given him time for penance” (Job 24:23). Waste not, want not!
Holy Scripture speaks of the Mystical Body of Christ as being a seed given to man by God. Already in the Garden of Eden, God speaks of this future Mystical Body, warning the devil of His future coming: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel” (Genesis 3:15). Scripture adds: “His seed shall be mighty upon Earth” (Psalm 111:2).
In preparing the way for the Mystical Body of Christ, God chooses Abraham as a foundation for this Seed, which is Christ, and which the Pharisees would seek to abort when He finally did come: “The Lord appeared to Abram, and said to him: ‘To thy seed will I give this land!’” (Genesis 12:7). “The Lord said to Abram, after Lot was separated from him: ‘Lift up thy eyes, and look from the place wherein thou now art, to the north and to the south, to the east and to the west. All the land which thou seest, I will give to thee, and to thy seed for ever. And I will make thy seed as the dust of the Earth: if any man be able to number the dust of the Earth, he shall be able to number thy seed also!’” (Genesis 13:13-16).
God renewed this promise time and time again, to Abraham and his descendants. He renews it after He had tested Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice Isaac: “‘By My own self have I sworn,’ saith the Lord: ‘because thou hast done this thing, and hast not spared thy only begotten son for My sake! I will bless thee, and I will multiply thy seed as the stars of Heaven, and as the sand that is by the sea shore: thy seed shall possess the gates of their enemies!’” (Genesis 22:17).
This promise is later renewed to Abraham’s son, Isaac: “The Lord appeared to him, saying: ‘I am the God of Abraham thy father; do not fear, for I am with thee: I will bless thee, and multiply thy seed for My servant Abraham’s sake!’” (Genesis 26:24).
The Kingdom of God is a Seed
Our Lord is the known as the Word—and the “Word of God” was made flesh and dwelt amongst us (John 1). Our Lord is the Seed of His Mystical Body—from that little embryo in Mary’s womb, has grown a massive Mystical Body, which will have no end—yet the end of some parts of that Body will be Heaven, for others Hell.
Just as Our Lord first came to world over 2,000 years ago—as a tiny “Seed”, so to speak, in Mary’s womb—so too does He wish to come this Christmas (and every Christmas) like a husband seeking to impregnate his wife with his seed, in order to create new life: “I am come that they may have life” (John 10:10), and he comes again and again so that the Seed of Life may truly sprout and enroot itself in our soul: “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly” (John 10:10).
The Pregnancy of Advent
The Advent season is like a pregnancy, a time of gestation or incubation—in which the Church fills us with and makes grow in us the Word of God, just like a baby grows within its mother’s womb, until the time for birth has come. However, the baby in the womb, or the seedling in the ground is very vulnerable in this early period. Inadvertent or unwanted miscarriages can be unhappily provoked by a lifestyle that does not promote the healthy growth of the baby.
Some even resent having become pregnant and will even seek to deliberately abort the baby. The same is true for our Advent ‘pregnancy’ or ‘gestation’—the “fruit of the womb, Jesus”, will never see the light of day, because of the lifestyle of so many Catholics, who inadvertently destroy the Seed of Faith, that Jesus is, or deliberately abort the Church’s attempts at giving birth to Him in our souls.
There is a lifestyle (Prayer & Penance) that leads to a healthy birth of Our Lord in the soul, and there is an unhealthy lifestyle (neglect of prayer and penance in favor of worldliness) that eventually leads to a miscarriage of Our Lord from the soul.
Wheat and Cockle
“Another parable He proposed to them, saying: ‘The kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, and had brought forth fruit, then appeared also the cockle. And the servants of the good man of the house coming said to him: “Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? Whence then hath it cockle?”
And he said to them: “An enemy hath done this!” And the servants said to him: “Wilt thou that we go and gather it up?” And he said: “No, lest perhaps gathering up the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it. Suffer both to grow until the harvest, and, in the time of the harvest, I will say to the reapers: ‘Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn’” (Matthew 13:24-30).
Prior to this parable, Our Lord had spoken of the “Sower of the Seed” and lamented about the destruction of much of that seed, not least by worldliness: “He that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). St. Mark relates the same: “And the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things, entering in, choke the word, and it is made fruitless” (Mark 4:19).
Historical Destruction of the Seed of Faith
This worldliness—the thorns or the cockle—has choked the life out of many Catholic seeds over the years. We see it as being greatly responsible in the early 1500s and Catholic England’s fall from the Faith, as well as in the late 1700s and Catholic France’s fall from the Faith.
The French Revolution ‘hit town’ in 1789—but for many years the Faith was being weakened by France’s enjoyment of the then modern Renaissance Period, with all its focus on man and the things of the world (Humanism and Materialism).
The Protestant Revolution against the Catholic Church had indirectly led to an elevation of man and a preoccupation with man. The newly discovered and colonized countries, all around the world, had led to, not only an influx of material goods into Europe, but the increase in trade also led to an influx of non-Catholic culture and non-Catholic ideas into a once Catholic Europe.
Money, wealth, possessions, art, music, fashion, etc, were the new seeds of idolatry, that distracted men from God and the Faith. Even churchmen succumbed to these tantalizing worldly newcomers, that were suddenly promoted over and above the age-old foundation of the Faith.
France was decaying long before 1789—the French Revolution was God’s punishment for decades or centuries of lukewarmness, indifference and hypocrisy. When the guillotine finally fell, the Faith of many fell with it. Bishops, priests and laity were willing to compromise their Faith, or even abandon their Faith, in order to save their lives—they sacrificed the security of Heaven for a temporary security on Earth. France has never recovered from that Revolution.
Once proudly called the “Eldest Daughter of the Church”—she very quickly left her Father’s House and prostituted herself with the false philosophies and pleasures of the world. What happened to Germany, England and France, can easily happen to us, or anyone in our family!
20th Century Miscarriages and Abortions of the Seed
Let us again fast-forward a couple of centuries, from the late 1700’s and the French Revolution, to the late 1900’s and the Modernist-Liberal Revolution in the Catholic Church. We see that same old story repeat itself. A preoccupation with the world that leads to a distancing from, or even an abandonment of God. Already back in the 1600’s, during her apparitions at Quito, in Ecuador, the Blessed Virgin under the title of Our Lady of Good Success said of our times that: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs.”
The Two Faces of God
God cannot and does remain inactive and silent amidst all this destruction. He has to act as He has always acted and always will act. The terrible actions or reactions of God, that Our Lady speaks of in the future, are nothing other than the terrible actions and reactions that God has shown in the past. Holy Scripture speaks of God rewarding good and punishing evil and the following passage from Leviticus sums up God’s attitude perfectly:
“I am the Lord your God: you shall not make to yourselves any idol or graven thing to adore it: for I am the Lord your God. Keep my [holy days], and reverence My sanctuary: I am the Lord. If you walk in My precepts, and keep My commandments, and do them, I will give you rain in due seasons. And the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit. You shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land without fear. I will give peace in your coasts: you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid. I will take away evil beasts: and the sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. Five of yours shall pursue a hundred others, and a hundred of you ten thousand: your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. I will look on you, and make you increase: you shall be multiplied. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people” (Leviticus 26:1-12).
“But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments; if you despise My laws and contemn My judgments, so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, then I also will do these things to you: I will quickly visit you with poverty, and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes, and consume your lives. You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies. I will set My face against you, and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you, you shall flee when no man pursues you. But if you will not yet for all this obey Me: I will chastise you seven times more for your sins, and I will break the pride of your stubbornness, and I will make to you the Heaven above as iron, and the Earth as brass. Your labor shall be spent in vain, the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit.
“If you walk contrary to Me, and will not hearken to Me, I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins: And I will send in upon you the beasts of the held, to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number, and that your highways may be desolate. And if even so you will not amend, but will walk contrary to Me: I also will walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins. And I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge My covenant. And when you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies, after I shall have broken the staff of your bread: so that ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and give it out by weight: and you shall eat, and shall not be filled.
“But if you will not for all this hearken to Me, but will walk against Me: I will also go against you with opposite fury, and I will chastise you with seven plagues for your sins, so that you shall eat the flesh of your sons and of your daughters. I will destroy your high places, and break your idols. You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you. Insomuch that I will bring your cities to be a wilderness, and I will make your sanctuaries desolate, and will receive no more your sweet odors. And I will destroy your land, and your enemies shall be astonished at it, when they shall be the inhabitants thereof. And I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed” (Leviticus 26:13-33). Compare the above to the sum total of Our Lady’s modern-day prophecies, and the tone, the threats and the consequences are exactly the same.
Good & Evil
Philosophically, evil is defined as “an absence of good that is due to or expected of something.” We expect a boat to float, but if it has a hole in the hull, this is an evil. A baby is expected to have a healthy heart, but if it has a hole in the heart, then this an evil. Spouses are expected to live in marriage until death does them part, but if they divorce and remarry, then this an evil. The world expects rain in due season, but if there is a drought, then this is an evil. We are expected to find, obtain and maintain the grace of God, but if we lose His grace, then this is an evil. Holy Scripture tells us that God expects us to do good and avoid evil: “Turn away from evil and do good” (Psalms 33:15). “Hating that which is evil, cleaving to that which is good” (Romans 12:9). For God calls us to sanctity, not sinfulness: “You shall be holy men to Me” (Exodus 22:31). “For I am the Lord your God: be holy because I am holy. Defile not your souls” (Leviticus 11:44). We are to be trees of holiness, not sinfulness—fruitful, not fruitless.
“Either make the tree good and its fruit good: or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil” (Matthew 12:33). “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth that which is evil” (Luke 6:45). “So every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:17-20).
Reversal of Values
Today, we have many who have reversed the true sense of values—looking upon good things as being ‘evil’ and evil things as being ‘good’! Prayer and penance is suffered like an evil; whereas perpetual fun and over-indulgence is regarded as a ‘good’ thing. Humility is seen as being a weakness and therefore evil; whereas pride and boastfulness seem to bring power, and are thought to be good. Poverty, the preferred lifestyle of Our Lord and Our Lady, is seen as an evil; whereas riches and many possessions are looked upon as good.
“The evil of their hands they call good” (Micheas 7:3). “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter” (Isaias 5:20) ... “You that hate good, and love evil” (Micheas 3:2). “How can you speak good things, whereas you are evil?” (Matthew 12:34). Know, O foolish man, that “the eyes of the Lord, in every place, behold the good and the evil” (Proverbs 15:3). “Good is set against evil, and life against death: so also is the sinner against a just man” (Ecclesiasticus 33:15).
God and mammon is synonymous with good and evil. We cannot pursue both and call it “balanced diet”! “Decline from evil and do good” (Psalms 36:27). “Seek ye good, and not evil, that you may live” (Amos 5:14). This is so fundamental that St. Peter repeats it in the New Testament: “Let him decline from evil, and do good” (1 Peter 3:11). Do evil, and you will sow a poisonous seed in your soul. Cancer begins as a very small cell or ‘seed’, but if not attacked and destroyed, it will itself grow, attack and destroy the entire body. Is there a cancer present in your Advent season?
Cultivating the Soul’s Soil
In some versions of the Bible, we encounter the mysterious word “Husbandman” in many places: “Abel was a shepherd, and Cain a husbandman” (Genesis 4:2) … “And Noe, a husbandman, began to till the ground, and planted a vineyard” (Genesis 9:20) … “Esau became a skillful hunter and a husbandman, but Jacob a plain man dwelt in tents” (Genesis 25:27). Our Lord, speaking of Himself and His relation to the Father, says: “I am the true vine; and my Father is the husbandman” (John 15:1). The husbandman was in essence a farmer or a cultivator—sometimes, the husbandman was the actual owner of the land, sometimes he was employed by the owner of the land. However, it both cases, whether he owned the land or not, it was his business to cultivate the ground, the land, the soil and what was planted and grew in that soil. This imagery easily lends itself to the spiritual sphere, as we shall presently see.
What a Waste!
“Jesus spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it done therefore! Why does it encumber the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it! And if happily it bear fruit: but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-69).
We could relate this to Advent and paraphrase it thus: “Our Lord had planted souls in His Vineyard, the Church. In due season—Advent—He came looking for fruit, but found none. He said: ‘Behold, for all these years I come seeking some serious fruit from this soul, but I find none or very little! I will cut it down! It is just wasting My time and My grace! This fruitless soul no longer serves the purpose for which it was planted in this world!’ But Our Lady and Holy Mother Church begs: “Lord, please give this soul one more year! We will humiliate it (dung it), to see if this provokes it to happily bear fruit. If not, then You can cut it down, Lord!’”
How much time and grace have we wasted? Are we profitable and worth the investment, in God eyes? God is a serious businessman when it comes to spiritual business! Our Lord pointed this out at the Last Supper: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the husbandman. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit ... He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit: for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he shall burn!” (John 15:1-2; 15:5-6).
Not a Pretty Picture!
Our Lady of Good Success paints a similar picture: “The effects of secular education will increase … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs … There will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost” … will be a “false sentimentality” … and “many priests will lose their spirit” and “become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain” … Many will “be dazzled by the false glamour of honors and human greatness, while others are blinded by self-love, not realizing that they are falling into lukewarmness, that immense evil … O, if men only understood how to appreciate the time given to them and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
What is the fruit of my life? No doubt there are some fruits! But how many? What do they taste like to God? Are my fruits bitter or sweet? Are they ripe, or are they hard? Are they, above all, SPIRITUAL fruits, or am I besotted by the material world? Has this Advent really been a spiritual preparation? Or have been sidetracked by a thousand-and-one material, worldly, non-spiritual concerns. What is time ratio between my spiritual and material preparations for Christmas? If some stranger was observing me and counting the hours spent on everything, would he say I was mainly spiritual or materialistic?
Toiling in the Advent Vineyard
“The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a householder, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They say to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:1-7).
We could paraphrase the above to suit Advent, and say: “Advent is all about Our Lord seeking laborers who will work throughout in the Advent Vineyard of Prayer and Penance. The Church went out early in Advent to find laborers and finding some, sent them into the Advent Vineyard of Prayer and Penance, promising spiritual rewards at the end of the season’s toil—at Christmas. Going out again, at the Second Sunday in Advent, the Church saw souls standing around idle, and so said to them: ‘Go you also into the Advent Vineyard and you shall receive what is just!’ And they went in to toil for the remainder of Advent. The Church did the same on the Third Sunday of Advent. Finally with the Fourth Sunday of Advent fast approaching—the eleventh hour of Advent—the Church once again found souls in spiritual idleness, busying themselves with all kinds of material things, and the Church said to them: ‘Why are you so spiritually idle throughout this entire season of Advent?’ They reply: “Because no man has fired us up!” The Church says to them: ‘Go you also into the Advent Vineyard and at least toil throughout the few remaining days!’”
The Good Thief on Calvary is not just a parable, but a real-life proof that Jesus meant what He said in the above parable about the vineyard.
The Value of Time --The Waste of Time
As Our Lady said: “O, if men only understood how to appreciate the time given to them and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be!” (Our Lady of Good Success). In these terrible times in which we live—yet for many materially minded souls, they are not that terrible at all—Our Lady has repeatedly and firmly called the world to penance, not fun. Yet as Sr. Lucia of Fatima fame says, nobody is paying much attention to Our Lady’s message. Let us say this: many may pay theoretical attention—inasmuch as they have read and remember what she has said--but there is no practical attention—in that they do nothing about it.
Leaving it Late!
This reminds of the time wasted by the kings of France, in response to Our Lord’s request that France be consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. One king after another, for one hundred years, neglected or rejected Our Lord’s demands. Finally, as a punishment, God allowed the bloody French Revolution to be unleashed as a punishment and France has still not recovered from that bloody Revolution to this very day—which can be seen by the fact that today only 10% of Catholics regularly practice their Faith in France!
Our Lady warns us about wasting time in responding to her messages: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it.” (La Salette) ...”The good will be martyred, various nations will be annihilated” (Fatima) ...”As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Akita).
Procrastinating Pharao
In Egypt, in the time of Moses and the Exodus, the Pharao delayed the departure of the Israelites, time and time again—and he was rewarded for his efforts by the Ten Plagues. “And the Lord said to Moses: Arise in the morning, and stand before Pharao, and thou shalt say to him: ‘Thus saith the Lord the God of the Hebrews: “Let My people go to sacrifice to Me. For I will at this time send all My plagues upon thy heart, and upon thy servants, and upon thy people: that thou mayest know there is none like Me in all the Earth. For now I will stretch out My hand to strike thee, and thy people with pestilence, and thou shalt perish from the Earth”’” (Exodus 9:13-15). If only the Pharao had done the right thing early and at the first time of asking, he would have saved himself a lot of grief!
An AcceptableTime
Do you want to experience God’s mercy? Then now is the acceptable time! “Thus saith the Lord: ‘In an acceptable time I have heard thee, and in the day of salvation I have helped thee!’ … Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (Isaias 49:8; 2 Corinthians 6:2). “God has given him time for penance” (Job 24:23).
Go to the store of mercy and pay the price! Mercy has a price—part of the price was the Blood of Christ, the rest of the price is our penance. “From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say: ‘Do penance, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!’ … ‘No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!’” (Matthew 4:17; Luke 13:3). “Let him do penance for his sin” (Leviticus 5:5). “If the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment, and justice―then living he shall live, and shall not die” (Ezechiel 18:21). Today, however, “penance” is a dirty word—it doesn’t seem to fit with today’s “funerals in white” that pretend that every Tom, Dick and Harry goes straight to Heaven after death, no matter what they have done—because God is so sweet and nice! If God is so forgiving no matter what, and wipes the slate clean with no debt being reckoned for sin and thus no penance being required—then what on earth is Our Lady doing going around threatening all kinds of not-so-sweet things that are going to come from God if we don’t do penance!!? Someone is lying and making things up—and one should tend to think Our Lady is no liar! If we want mercy, then now is the acceptable time for penance—God will accept our payment for mere cents on the dollar! But if we neglect to pay, or even refuse to pay, then…
“God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23).
Advent Abusers
Have you abused Advent? Have you neglected to pay your debts to God? Have you minimized the gravity of sin and exaggerated the mercy of God so much as to make of Him a doormat on which we can wipe of sinful boots as we walk into Heaven for free? “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). “God hath given him place for penance” (Job 24:23). “Let him do penance for his sin” (Leviticus 5:5). Let us say contritely and humbly with St. Peter: “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!” (Luke 5:8). Let us say with sinner and publican, Zacheus: “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have wronged any man of any thing, I restore him fourfold!” (Luke 19:8).
Let us learn from the Good Thief on Calvary: “And one of those robbers who were hanged, blasphemed Him, saying: ‘If Thou be Christ, save Thyself and us!’ But the other answering, rebuked him, saying: ‘Neither dost thou fear God, seeing thou art condemned under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man hath done no evil!’ And he said to Jesus: ‘Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!’” (Luke 23:39-42). And Jesus may say to us what He said to him: “Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). “God has given him time for penance” (Job 24:23). Waste not, want not!
Article 15
Wednesday, December 18th
Advent in Mary's Womb
Wednesday, December 18th
Advent in Mary's Womb
Talk About Big Families!
A big family may be part of God’s plan, but it’s not “piece-of-cake” running one, or being part of one. That, too, must be part of God’s plan: the cross. Advent, and its spilling over into Christmas, is the time of families par excellence. During Advent we await a new-born Child; after Advent comes life together with the new-born Child. God’s providence gives Mary and Joseph abundant crosses both before and after the birth of Christ!
Jesus Brings Trouble Upon Trouble
Jesus seems to bring nothing but trouble! As soon as Mary gives her “fiat” or consent to be the Mother of God, trouble starts brewing! Immediately after conceiving Jesus in her womb, she undergoes a dangerous 100 mile trek to go the assistance of her cousin St. Elizabeth, who is also with child. Let us remember that travel, in those days, was not the fast, secure, comfortable and safe undertaking that it is for us today. No cars, no buses, no trains, no planes. The usual means of travel was by foot. The roads were not paved, nor asphalted. There was no street lighting. No hotels or motels for overnight stops, with heating, running-water, electric lights, toilets, baths and showers; shelter from the cold, wind and rain. No guarantee of safety, with robbers abounding on those long lonely, uninhabited roads through desert and mountain stretches. No cell phone for emergencies; no police to come to the rescue; no convenience stores for the hungry, thirsty traveler.
Does God Care?
After making her the Mother of God and placing His Only-Begotten Son in her womb, why does God subject his most beloved and most precious masterpiece to a 100 mile walk; risking life and limb; having to sleep out in the open, exposed to the attendant bugs and reptiles that abound; eating little and walking much, etc. etc. It brings to mind the case of St. Teresa of Avila, who, as she is trying to go around the country in an effort to reform the Carmelite Order for the greater glory of God, ends up meeting with one setback after another, from persons, places things and the climate. Finally, in a pique of indignation, she questions God as to why on earth He is letting all these things happen to her when she is trying to work for His glory. The famous response she got was: “But Teresa, I treat all my friends like that!” To which she even more famously retorted: “Then I’m not surprised that You have so few of them!”
Then, right after the three month visitation with Elizabeth, Mary has to undergo the trials and pains of Joseph preparing to abandon her, because he had noticed that she was with child, and this was ‘tearing him up.’ Holy though they both were, God did not spare Mary or Joseph this excruciating torment and strain—until, finally, and angel tells Joseph what has really happened.
Reading some of the revelations that Our Lady has made to the mystics, we see that these two cases were not isolated bouts of suffering and trial, but a regular daily dose that God administered to them. Our Lady revealed to one of the mystics that there was not one day in her whole life that she did not suffer greatly, one way or another, for the glory of God and for the salvation of souls.
Bread and Butter
Suffering is the “bread and butter” of God’s friends. It is why Our Lord said: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me” (Matthew 16:24); and this was echoed by Our Lady to St. Bernadette of Lourdes, when she said that she would not make Bernadette happy in this world, but in the next. We can be sure that, humanly speaking, Bernadette was just as disappointed in hearing those words as the Apostles must have been at the Last Supper, when Jesus said to them: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman, when she is in labor, has sorrow, because her hour is come; but when she has brought forth the child, she remembers no more the anguish, for the joy that a man is born into the world” (John 16:20-21).
Advent in the Womb
During Advent, Mary carries Jesus in her womb; after Advent, she will carry Him in her arms; after Lent He will have died her arms. She knows that she is bringing Him into world, so that He may die for the world. She will give Him to the world, so that He may lead souls away from the world. She knows too, that He who made the world, will be hated by the world. The world of Mary’s womb, is more of a paradise that the world into which He will find Himself thrust.
Mother and Son
Children take on the attitudes, opinions, language, characteristics and manner of acting that they witness in their parents. We say: “Like father, like son!” ... “Like mother, like daughter!” It is only natural, and it is also supernatural. As Jesus died on the Cross, He addressed Our Lady and St. John, saying: “‘Woman, behold thy son!’ After that, He said to the disciple: ‘Behold thy Mother!’ And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own” (John 19:26-27). From that hour, too, Mary took him for her son. Yet, as the commentators say, those words also apply to us. She is our spiritual Mother also; and we are her spiritual children.
Living in Mary’s Womb
This reminds us of the words of St. Augustine, quoted by St. Louis de Montfort in his True Devotion to Mary: “St. Augustine, surpassing himself, and going beyond all I have yet said, affirms that all the predestinate, in order to be conformed to the image of the Son of God, are in this world hidden in the womb of the most holy Virgin, where they are guarded, nourished, brought up and made to grow by that good Mother until she has brought them forth to glory after death, which is properly the day of their birth.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“God the Holy Ghost, being barren in God―that is to say, not producing another Divine Person―is become fruitful by Mary, whom He has espoused. It was with her, in her, and of her that He produced His Masterpiece, which is God made Man, and that He goes on producing daily, to the end of the world, the predestinate and the members of the Body of that adorable Head ... (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
God Wants More Children Through Mary
“God the Father wishes to have children by Mary till the consummation of the world ... Just as in the natural and corporal generation of children there are a father and a mother, so in the supernatural and spiritual generation there are a Father, who is God, and a Mother, who is Mary. All the true children of God, the predestinate, have God for their Father and Mary for their Mother. He who has not Mary for his Mother has not God for his Father.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“God the Son wishes to form Himself, and, so to speak, to incarnate Himself in His members every day, by His dear Mother ... One and the same mother does not bring forth into the world the head without the members, or the members without the head; for this would be a monster of nature. So in like manner, in the order of grace, the head and the members are born of one and the same Mother; and if a member of the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ―that is to say, one of the predestinate―were born of any other mother than Mary, who has produced the Head, he would not be one of the predestinate, nor a member of Jesus Christ, but simply a monster in the order of grace.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce, because she alone is the fruitful Virgin who never has had, and never will have, her equal in purity and in fruitfulness. Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be―a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints who shall come at the end of the world are reserved for her. For it is only that singular and miraculous Virgin who can produce, in union with the Holy Ghost, singular and extraordinary things.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“When the Holy Ghost, her Spouse, has found Mary in a soul, He flies there. He enters there in His fullness; He communicates Himself to that soul abundantly, and to the full extent to which it makes room for His spouse. Nay, one of the greatest reasons why the Holy Ghost does not now do startling wonders in our souls is because He does not find there a sufficiently great union with His faithful and inseparable spouse.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Similarly for us. If we want to follow Jesus and Mary to an eternal happiness, we must be prepared for temporal suffering: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross.” We have to make a choice―God or the Devil; good or evil; Heaven or the world. There is not and cannot be any compromise or fraternity between them. “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). When Our Lord says: “You cannot serve God and mammon”, He is not joking. When St. James writes: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4) he is not joking. When Jesus tells the young man: “Go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me” He is not joking.
We can be very easily brainwashed—by the devil, the world and the flesh—into believing the contrary. We rationalize, water-down, twist, filter, cover-up, ignore or forget those words of God and His saints that seem to command, demand and reprimand too much. We fallaciously argue and debate with ourselves, saying: “Hold on! Take it easy! Don’t go overboard! Remember that true virtue is a balance between two extremes—those of excess and neglect. So to be sure of being virtuous, I will not be excessively worldly, nor will I be excessively spiritual; and neither will I neglect the ways of the world, nor will I neglect God!” All of this is the false reasoning of Satan and the world that we too easily accept.
Growth in Mary
St. Louis de Montfort has that beautiful prayer entitled Jesus Living in Mary, which outlines exactly what should be happening with us―especially during this Advent season. The prayer reads as follows:
O Jesus living in Mary
Come and live in Thy servants;
In the spirit of Thy holiness,
In the fullness of Thy might,
In the truth of Thy virtues,
In the perfection of Thy ways,
In the communion of Thy mysteries,
Subdue every hostile power,
In Thy spirit, for the glory of the Father. Amen.
Spiritual Womb
Do you recall St. Augustine’s statement that, while living in this world, we are, as it were, in the spiritual womb of Mary, living and growing in her protective womb until the happy day she gives birth to us in Heaven? The whole point of normal, natural, healthy life is gradual, steady, progressive growth. The same is true for our spiritual life. Yet, in that area, most people are satisfied even if there is no growth at all. It is not uncommon to see persons in the middle or later stages of their life, in whom there is little or no spiritual growth or progress: the same sins are being committed and confessed year after year without any real reduction in quantities or frequencies; and the appetite and intensity for acquiring new virtues, or improving the quality of the ones already possessed, is almost non-existent. If that phenomenon were translated to a baby’s state or condition in its mother’s womb, then both mother and doctor would be alarmed and worried about the future of the child.
Relating the Spiritual to the Physical
Our spiritual life is much more important than our natural or physiological life. If we die physically, we can still go to Heaven (if we die in God’s grace); but if we die spiritually, then Hell is the only option. It is like a spiritual abortion.
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange―arguably the 20th century’s greatest theologian in relation to the spiritual life―compares the spiritual life to our physical life―though he begins his comparisons, not from the womb-stage, but after birth. But the idea of growth and progress is the same. In his book, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life, he writes:
“The development of the interior life has often been compared to the three periods or stages of physical life―childhood, youth, and manhood. St. Thomas himself has indicated this analogy―and it is an analogy which is worth pursuing, particular attention being paid to the transition from one period to the other.
“It is generally admitted that childhood lasts until the age of puberty, about fourteen years of age; though early childhood, or infancy, ceases at the dawn of reason, about the age of seven. Youth, or adolescence, lasts from the age of fourteen to twenty. Then follows manhood, in which we may distinguish the period which precedes full maturity, about the age of thirty-five, and that which follows it, before the decline of old age sets in.
“Most important to be noticed, for the purposes of our present subject, is the transition from childhood to adolescence and from youth to manhood.
He Who Makes No Progress, Loses Ground
“The period of puberty, at the end of childhood, about the age of fourteen, is characterized by a transformation [from being a beginner in life, to someone more proficient]. The youth is no longer content to follow his imagination, as the child was; he begins to reflect on the things of human life, on the need to prepare himself for some career or occupation in the future. He has no longer the child’s attitude towards family, social and religious matters. Or else, on the contrary, if he passes unsuccessfully through this difficult period, he deteriorates and follows evil courses. The law of nature so ordains that the transition from childhood to youth must follow a normal development; otherwise the subject will assume a positive bias to evil, or else he will remain a half-wit, perhaps even a complete idiot, for the rest of his life. ‘He who makes no progress loses ground.’
Arrested Spiritual Development
“It is at this point that the analogy becomes illuminating for the spiritual life. We shall see that the beginner who fails to become a proficient, either turns to sin or else presents an example of arrested spiritual development. Here, too, it is true that ‘he who makes no progress loses ground’ ― as the Fathers of the Church have so often pointed out.
“Let us pursue the analogy further. If the physical and moral crisis of puberty is a difficult transition, the same is to be said of another crisis, which we may call the crisis of the first freedom, and which occurs at the stage where the youth enters manhood, about the age of twenty. The young man, having now reached his complete physical development, has to begin to take his place in social life. It will soon be time for him to marry and to become an educator in his turn, unless he has received from God a higher vocation still. Many fail to surmount this crisis of the first freedom, and, like the prodigal son, depart from their father’s house and confuse liberty with license. Here again the law ordains that the transition must be made normally; otherwise the young man either takes the wrong road, or else his development is arrested and he becomes one of those of whom it is said: ‘He will be a child for the whole of his life.’
The Need of Conversion
“The liturgy, especially at periods such as Advent and Lent, speaks often of the need of conversion, even for those who are leading a Christian life. Spiritual writers also refer often to this second conversion, necessary for the Christian who, though he has thought seriously of his salvation and made an effort to walk in the way of God, has nevertheless begun once more to follow the bent of his nature and to fall into a state of tepidity—like an engrafted plant reverting to its wild state ... This question is of the greatest interest for every spiritual soul.
“In the Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena, we read the following words of God to her: ‘If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back.’ This is what the Fathers have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God he who makes no progress loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child but becomes an idiot, so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls! At what stage are we ourselves? This is often a very difficult question to answer, and it would perhaps be vain curiosity to inquire at what point we have arrived in our upward path; but at least we must take care not to mistake the road, not to take a path that leads downwards.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
So, coming back to St. Augustine’s thought of our being in Mary’s spiritual womb in this life, as we await birth into Heaven, let us not neglect that spiritual growth, that only comes with spiritual work and exercises, or we may be victims of ‘stunted-growth’ or, worse still, a spiritual abortion or spiritual miscarriage!
This Advent is like a spiritual womb, in which we await the birth of our Savior, let it be time well spent more on spiritual matters than the material matters that so often lead to that spiritual abortion or a spiritual miscarriage!
The first thing to do is to make sure we have a healthy habitat for that growth. If we are, as St. Augustine says, in Mary’s spiritual womb, then we have to make sure that the womb is intact and healthy. This translates to two things: (1) It is intact if we have a devotion to Our Lady; (2) It is healthy if that devotion is a true devotion and not a one of the false devotions listed by St. Louis de Montfort (cf. True Devotion to Mary, §92-§104), where he lists them: “I find seven kinds of false devotees and false devotions to Our Lady, namely: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the interested devotees.”
A big family may be part of God’s plan, but it’s not “piece-of-cake” running one, or being part of one. That, too, must be part of God’s plan: the cross. Advent, and its spilling over into Christmas, is the time of families par excellence. During Advent we await a new-born Child; after Advent comes life together with the new-born Child. God’s providence gives Mary and Joseph abundant crosses both before and after the birth of Christ!
Jesus Brings Trouble Upon Trouble
Jesus seems to bring nothing but trouble! As soon as Mary gives her “fiat” or consent to be the Mother of God, trouble starts brewing! Immediately after conceiving Jesus in her womb, she undergoes a dangerous 100 mile trek to go the assistance of her cousin St. Elizabeth, who is also with child. Let us remember that travel, in those days, was not the fast, secure, comfortable and safe undertaking that it is for us today. No cars, no buses, no trains, no planes. The usual means of travel was by foot. The roads were not paved, nor asphalted. There was no street lighting. No hotels or motels for overnight stops, with heating, running-water, electric lights, toilets, baths and showers; shelter from the cold, wind and rain. No guarantee of safety, with robbers abounding on those long lonely, uninhabited roads through desert and mountain stretches. No cell phone for emergencies; no police to come to the rescue; no convenience stores for the hungry, thirsty traveler.
Does God Care?
After making her the Mother of God and placing His Only-Begotten Son in her womb, why does God subject his most beloved and most precious masterpiece to a 100 mile walk; risking life and limb; having to sleep out in the open, exposed to the attendant bugs and reptiles that abound; eating little and walking much, etc. etc. It brings to mind the case of St. Teresa of Avila, who, as she is trying to go around the country in an effort to reform the Carmelite Order for the greater glory of God, ends up meeting with one setback after another, from persons, places things and the climate. Finally, in a pique of indignation, she questions God as to why on earth He is letting all these things happen to her when she is trying to work for His glory. The famous response she got was: “But Teresa, I treat all my friends like that!” To which she even more famously retorted: “Then I’m not surprised that You have so few of them!”
Then, right after the three month visitation with Elizabeth, Mary has to undergo the trials and pains of Joseph preparing to abandon her, because he had noticed that she was with child, and this was ‘tearing him up.’ Holy though they both were, God did not spare Mary or Joseph this excruciating torment and strain—until, finally, and angel tells Joseph what has really happened.
Reading some of the revelations that Our Lady has made to the mystics, we see that these two cases were not isolated bouts of suffering and trial, but a regular daily dose that God administered to them. Our Lady revealed to one of the mystics that there was not one day in her whole life that she did not suffer greatly, one way or another, for the glory of God and for the salvation of souls.
Bread and Butter
Suffering is the “bread and butter” of God’s friends. It is why Our Lord said: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me” (Matthew 16:24); and this was echoed by Our Lady to St. Bernadette of Lourdes, when she said that she would not make Bernadette happy in this world, but in the next. We can be sure that, humanly speaking, Bernadette was just as disappointed in hearing those words as the Apostles must have been at the Last Supper, when Jesus said to them: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman, when she is in labor, has sorrow, because her hour is come; but when she has brought forth the child, she remembers no more the anguish, for the joy that a man is born into the world” (John 16:20-21).
Advent in the Womb
During Advent, Mary carries Jesus in her womb; after Advent, she will carry Him in her arms; after Lent He will have died her arms. She knows that she is bringing Him into world, so that He may die for the world. She will give Him to the world, so that He may lead souls away from the world. She knows too, that He who made the world, will be hated by the world. The world of Mary’s womb, is more of a paradise that the world into which He will find Himself thrust.
Mother and Son
Children take on the attitudes, opinions, language, characteristics and manner of acting that they witness in their parents. We say: “Like father, like son!” ... “Like mother, like daughter!” It is only natural, and it is also supernatural. As Jesus died on the Cross, He addressed Our Lady and St. John, saying: “‘Woman, behold thy son!’ After that, He said to the disciple: ‘Behold thy Mother!’ And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own” (John 19:26-27). From that hour, too, Mary took him for her son. Yet, as the commentators say, those words also apply to us. She is our spiritual Mother also; and we are her spiritual children.
Living in Mary’s Womb
This reminds us of the words of St. Augustine, quoted by St. Louis de Montfort in his True Devotion to Mary: “St. Augustine, surpassing himself, and going beyond all I have yet said, affirms that all the predestinate, in order to be conformed to the image of the Son of God, are in this world hidden in the womb of the most holy Virgin, where they are guarded, nourished, brought up and made to grow by that good Mother until she has brought them forth to glory after death, which is properly the day of their birth.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“God the Holy Ghost, being barren in God―that is to say, not producing another Divine Person―is become fruitful by Mary, whom He has espoused. It was with her, in her, and of her that He produced His Masterpiece, which is God made Man, and that He goes on producing daily, to the end of the world, the predestinate and the members of the Body of that adorable Head ... (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
God Wants More Children Through Mary
“God the Father wishes to have children by Mary till the consummation of the world ... Just as in the natural and corporal generation of children there are a father and a mother, so in the supernatural and spiritual generation there are a Father, who is God, and a Mother, who is Mary. All the true children of God, the predestinate, have God for their Father and Mary for their Mother. He who has not Mary for his Mother has not God for his Father.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“God the Son wishes to form Himself, and, so to speak, to incarnate Himself in His members every day, by His dear Mother ... One and the same mother does not bring forth into the world the head without the members, or the members without the head; for this would be a monster of nature. So in like manner, in the order of grace, the head and the members are born of one and the same Mother; and if a member of the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ―that is to say, one of the predestinate―were born of any other mother than Mary, who has produced the Head, he would not be one of the predestinate, nor a member of Jesus Christ, but simply a monster in the order of grace.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce, because she alone is the fruitful Virgin who never has had, and never will have, her equal in purity and in fruitfulness. Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be―a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints who shall come at the end of the world are reserved for her. For it is only that singular and miraculous Virgin who can produce, in union with the Holy Ghost, singular and extraordinary things.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“When the Holy Ghost, her Spouse, has found Mary in a soul, He flies there. He enters there in His fullness; He communicates Himself to that soul abundantly, and to the full extent to which it makes room for His spouse. Nay, one of the greatest reasons why the Holy Ghost does not now do startling wonders in our souls is because He does not find there a sufficiently great union with His faithful and inseparable spouse.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Similarly for us. If we want to follow Jesus and Mary to an eternal happiness, we must be prepared for temporal suffering: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross.” We have to make a choice―God or the Devil; good or evil; Heaven or the world. There is not and cannot be any compromise or fraternity between them. “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). When Our Lord says: “You cannot serve God and mammon”, He is not joking. When St. James writes: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4) he is not joking. When Jesus tells the young man: “Go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me” He is not joking.
We can be very easily brainwashed—by the devil, the world and the flesh—into believing the contrary. We rationalize, water-down, twist, filter, cover-up, ignore or forget those words of God and His saints that seem to command, demand and reprimand too much. We fallaciously argue and debate with ourselves, saying: “Hold on! Take it easy! Don’t go overboard! Remember that true virtue is a balance between two extremes—those of excess and neglect. So to be sure of being virtuous, I will not be excessively worldly, nor will I be excessively spiritual; and neither will I neglect the ways of the world, nor will I neglect God!” All of this is the false reasoning of Satan and the world that we too easily accept.
Growth in Mary
St. Louis de Montfort has that beautiful prayer entitled Jesus Living in Mary, which outlines exactly what should be happening with us―especially during this Advent season. The prayer reads as follows:
O Jesus living in Mary
Come and live in Thy servants;
In the spirit of Thy holiness,
In the fullness of Thy might,
In the truth of Thy virtues,
In the perfection of Thy ways,
In the communion of Thy mysteries,
Subdue every hostile power,
In Thy spirit, for the glory of the Father. Amen.
Spiritual Womb
Do you recall St. Augustine’s statement that, while living in this world, we are, as it were, in the spiritual womb of Mary, living and growing in her protective womb until the happy day she gives birth to us in Heaven? The whole point of normal, natural, healthy life is gradual, steady, progressive growth. The same is true for our spiritual life. Yet, in that area, most people are satisfied even if there is no growth at all. It is not uncommon to see persons in the middle or later stages of their life, in whom there is little or no spiritual growth or progress: the same sins are being committed and confessed year after year without any real reduction in quantities or frequencies; and the appetite and intensity for acquiring new virtues, or improving the quality of the ones already possessed, is almost non-existent. If that phenomenon were translated to a baby’s state or condition in its mother’s womb, then both mother and doctor would be alarmed and worried about the future of the child.
Relating the Spiritual to the Physical
Our spiritual life is much more important than our natural or physiological life. If we die physically, we can still go to Heaven (if we die in God’s grace); but if we die spiritually, then Hell is the only option. It is like a spiritual abortion.
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange―arguably the 20th century’s greatest theologian in relation to the spiritual life―compares the spiritual life to our physical life―though he begins his comparisons, not from the womb-stage, but after birth. But the idea of growth and progress is the same. In his book, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life, he writes:
“The development of the interior life has often been compared to the three periods or stages of physical life―childhood, youth, and manhood. St. Thomas himself has indicated this analogy―and it is an analogy which is worth pursuing, particular attention being paid to the transition from one period to the other.
“It is generally admitted that childhood lasts until the age of puberty, about fourteen years of age; though early childhood, or infancy, ceases at the dawn of reason, about the age of seven. Youth, or adolescence, lasts from the age of fourteen to twenty. Then follows manhood, in which we may distinguish the period which precedes full maturity, about the age of thirty-five, and that which follows it, before the decline of old age sets in.
“Most important to be noticed, for the purposes of our present subject, is the transition from childhood to adolescence and from youth to manhood.
He Who Makes No Progress, Loses Ground
“The period of puberty, at the end of childhood, about the age of fourteen, is characterized by a transformation [from being a beginner in life, to someone more proficient]. The youth is no longer content to follow his imagination, as the child was; he begins to reflect on the things of human life, on the need to prepare himself for some career or occupation in the future. He has no longer the child’s attitude towards family, social and religious matters. Or else, on the contrary, if he passes unsuccessfully through this difficult period, he deteriorates and follows evil courses. The law of nature so ordains that the transition from childhood to youth must follow a normal development; otherwise the subject will assume a positive bias to evil, or else he will remain a half-wit, perhaps even a complete idiot, for the rest of his life. ‘He who makes no progress loses ground.’
Arrested Spiritual Development
“It is at this point that the analogy becomes illuminating for the spiritual life. We shall see that the beginner who fails to become a proficient, either turns to sin or else presents an example of arrested spiritual development. Here, too, it is true that ‘he who makes no progress loses ground’ ― as the Fathers of the Church have so often pointed out.
“Let us pursue the analogy further. If the physical and moral crisis of puberty is a difficult transition, the same is to be said of another crisis, which we may call the crisis of the first freedom, and which occurs at the stage where the youth enters manhood, about the age of twenty. The young man, having now reached his complete physical development, has to begin to take his place in social life. It will soon be time for him to marry and to become an educator in his turn, unless he has received from God a higher vocation still. Many fail to surmount this crisis of the first freedom, and, like the prodigal son, depart from their father’s house and confuse liberty with license. Here again the law ordains that the transition must be made normally; otherwise the young man either takes the wrong road, or else his development is arrested and he becomes one of those of whom it is said: ‘He will be a child for the whole of his life.’
The Need of Conversion
“The liturgy, especially at periods such as Advent and Lent, speaks often of the need of conversion, even for those who are leading a Christian life. Spiritual writers also refer often to this second conversion, necessary for the Christian who, though he has thought seriously of his salvation and made an effort to walk in the way of God, has nevertheless begun once more to follow the bent of his nature and to fall into a state of tepidity—like an engrafted plant reverting to its wild state ... This question is of the greatest interest for every spiritual soul.
“In the Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena, we read the following words of God to her: ‘If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back.’ This is what the Fathers have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God he who makes no progress loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child but becomes an idiot, so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls! At what stage are we ourselves? This is often a very difficult question to answer, and it would perhaps be vain curiosity to inquire at what point we have arrived in our upward path; but at least we must take care not to mistake the road, not to take a path that leads downwards.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
So, coming back to St. Augustine’s thought of our being in Mary’s spiritual womb in this life, as we await birth into Heaven, let us not neglect that spiritual growth, that only comes with spiritual work and exercises, or we may be victims of ‘stunted-growth’ or, worse still, a spiritual abortion or spiritual miscarriage!
This Advent is like a spiritual womb, in which we await the birth of our Savior, let it be time well spent more on spiritual matters than the material matters that so often lead to that spiritual abortion or a spiritual miscarriage!
The first thing to do is to make sure we have a healthy habitat for that growth. If we are, as St. Augustine says, in Mary’s spiritual womb, then we have to make sure that the womb is intact and healthy. This translates to two things: (1) It is intact if we have a devotion to Our Lady; (2) It is healthy if that devotion is a true devotion and not a one of the false devotions listed by St. Louis de Montfort (cf. True Devotion to Mary, §92-§104), where he lists them: “I find seven kinds of false devotees and false devotions to Our Lady, namely: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the interested devotees.”
Article 14
Tuesday, December 17th
Can You Spot the Seven Deadly Signs?
Tuesday, December 17th
Can You Spot the Seven Deadly Signs?
PART ONE
The Seven Deadly Signs
Earlier, it was said that, the habit of leaving of things to the last minute, is often a sign of our looking upon those things with indifference, thinking them of little or no importance in comparison to the things we do beforehand or earlier in the day. When this attitude creeps into our spiritual life, it is called lukewarmness, or tepidity, spiritual sloth, or spiritual languor, or any other alias that it likes to use to conceal its real identity.
We quoted extensively from Fr. Faber’s essay on lukewarmness, taken from his book, Growth in Holiness, to paint the picture of lukewarmness as a kind of ‘spiritual blindness’ that does not even realize that it is blind. Fr. Faber gave three chief causes: “It is usual to consider that this blindness is owing principally to three causes: the frequency of venial sins, habitual dissipation of mind and the ruling passion.”
He went on to say that these causes produce the first-born children of lukewarmness, which he states are: “In the first place conscience becomes untrue [and]... in proportion as conscience becomes dark, cold, and finally numb, in the same proportion the bad instincts of the human spirit, like owls at night, get more far‑sighted, animated and vivacious. These instincts lead us with uncommon tact to avoid anything which will restore animation to the conscience. Thus they make us shrink from anything like vigorous spiritual direction. So in hearing sermons, reading books, cultivating acquaintances, patronizing works of mercy, it draws back from everything that is likely to come too near or hit too hard. This is the second result of this blindness. Out of the two preceding results flows a third, which is a profane use of the Sacraments. Thus frequent or even daily Communion seems to have only a negative effect upon us. We do not know how bad things might be without it; and that is all. Weekly confession gives us no additional power over our commonest imperfections.”
Having thus stated the problem, Fr. Faber the proceeds with a simple form of diagnosis, through which we can examine ourselves to see if, and to what degree, we might be lukewarm. He writes:
“It is plain from this description that what is of the greatest practical usefulness, in this matter of lukewarmness, is a thorough acquaintance with the symptoms by which the insidious disease allows itself to be detected. These are seven in number; and inasmuch as we notice that we unite any of them in ourselves, either in number or degree, so we have reason painfully to doubt whether our spiritual eyesight is not failing.
(1) “It’ll have to wait!”
The first sign of lukewarmness is a great ease in omitting our spiritual exercises, which is the exact contradictory of fervor. Everyone has his routine of spiritual exercises; and there are few days in which they do not give us some little inconveniences. Now these little inconveniences suggest dispensations, or at least delays, which will turn out dispensations in the end. Clearly there are cases in which conflicting duties, or the needs of charity, will interfere with our spiritual duties, and it will be more perfect to attend to them rather than to read or meditate. But most often the inconveniences concern only ourselves. We have the power to dispense ourselves; and we grant these dispensations either rarely and with reluctance, or often and easily. If the latter be the case, behold the first mark of tepidity or lukewarmness! I do not say that, by itself, it proves everything; but it proves much. At all events, wherever there is lukewarmness, there also is this symptom of easily dispensing ourselves from some spiritual exercises.
(2) “Just as long as it’s done…!”
The second sign of lukewarmness is that we do not only easily leave out spiritual exercises, but we are negligent in those which we do perform. We care more about the fact of going through them, than the manner or the spirit of it. Thus our prayers rise to Heaven loaded with venial sins and the angels are reluctant witnesses of our Confessions and Communions. This is a second symptom—a poor routine performance of our spiritual exercises.
(3) “Something Not Quite Right Here!”
Here is a third symptom of lukewarmness. The soul feels not altogether right with God. It does not exactly know what is wrong; but it is sure all is not right. It looks around to find the cause. It quarrels with everything it does, and questions each action, and yet the mischief still eludes it. It is angry with its Confessions; yet it is not easy to settle how to amend them. Something always seems unexpressed, something left behind which ought to have come out and does not. What is it? Then the Communions are overhauled in a similar way, the examinations of conscience are tortured to find the answer; meditations are criticized and reprimanded, spiritual books are put under the microscope, all this is done with a determination to reform everything. General orders are issued from self’s headquarters, in which strong things are said ambiguously. Everyone feels he is aimed at. Blame lies everywhere. Yet all to no purpose. At last when we have given the matter up, we suddenly come upon the offending thing, just as we look for a lost article until we are hot and tired, and then all at once see it lying in open day in a spot we have searched four or five times before. Now when we have this feeling of not being altogether right with God, and yet will not vigorously face the inquiry and make the disturbance I have described, and force ourselves to put into play the triple task of discovery, punishment, and reformation, it is a symptom of our being lukewarm.
(4) “Aimless Existence”
A fourth symptom of lukewarmness is a habitual acting without any intention at all, good, bad or indifferent. We do things routinely, automatically, without thinking much as to why or how well or how badly we are doing them. As the spiritual masters say—routine is the killer of fervor and devotion. We say our Rosaries, but out of routine, with no particular intention being assigned to them—we just do it. We assist at Mass routinely; we are there because we have to be there (for example, to fulfill the Sunday obligation); any good works we do are done routinely, without being offered either as a penance or for a particular need or cause. It is as though our mind was numbed, or “put on ice.”
(5) “Virtues not even a Hobby”
A fifth symptom of lukewarmness is a carelessness or negligence about forming or acquiring habits of virtue. Not that we don’t produce any good actions—we do good things—but virtue is not just an occasional, intermittent good action. A virtue, by definition, is a frequent and habitual good action and not an occasional one; just like “vice” is not just a particular kind of sin that is sometimes committed, but a frequent and habitual sin. The acquisition and regular practice of virtue is a fundamental requirement for a Catholic. It is part of our profession of Faith. We are meant to professionals in the spiritual life and not just weekend amateurs. It is our profession, not just a hobby.
(6) “It’s Only a Little Thing!”
A sixth symptom of lukewarmness is a contempt of little things and of little daily opportunities. This is a necessary part of our blindness—for a blind person can only see the big objects and shapes; the little things escape the blind person’s view. We despise little things because we do not see in them the capabilities of glorifying God, and advancing our own spiritual interest and profit, which those little things contain.
(7) “Milking the Past”
The seventh and last symptom of lukewarmness is thinking more of the good we have done in the past, rather than of the good we have left undone. It is a selective view of things, which looks only at the good, but deliberately ignores the evil. It is resting on the past rather than striving for the future; loving to look at people below us, who are worse than we are, rather than people above us, who are better than we are. Our desire for ease, comfort and self‑complacency, and our prideful horror of truth, are the reasons that lie behind this attitude of the soul.
This is not just how lukewarmness takes over people living in the world; it is also the way in which lukewarmness attacks priests, and the inmates of convents. When religious become lukewarm, they like to measure themselves with the poor citizens of the world, rather than with the grand saints of their own religious order. They are ever calculating and weighing-up the sacrifices they have made, and fondly praising, to themselves, the glory of their self‑devotion. When these signs are observed, we can recognize in them the alarming symptoms of lukewarmness. It all lies in that one word.
Such religious do what St. Paul said he did not do. They count themselves to have apprehended. “If by any means I may attain to the resurrection which is from the dead. Not as though I has already attained, or were already perfect; but I follow after, if I may by any means apprehend, wherein I am also apprehended by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended. But one thing I do―forgetting the things that are behind, and stretching forth myself to those that are before, I press on towards the mark, to the prize of the supernal vocation of God in Christ Jesus!” (Philippians 3:11-14).
God’s Hatred for Lukewarmness
From these fatal marks let us pass to consider the extraordinary hatred which God has of this state.
“And to the angel of the church of Laodicea, write: ‘These things saith the Amen [i.e., the Truth itself; the Word and Son of God], the faithful and true Witness, Who is the beginning of the creation of God: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth. Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ ― and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!”’” (Apocalypse 3:14-17).
This passage is without any parallel in Scripture. God not only prefers coldness, but He rejects tepidity. It turns Him sick who is eternal love. The charity of the Heart of Jesus, our only home, cannot retain us. His disgust is too strong for Him to resist it; and He rejects us with an unconquerable nausea, which even redeeming love cannot temper or allay. It is a most awful figure, and one which, but for His own word, we should not dare to have mentioned in the same breath with His adorable majesty. How much He must have meant to teach us by the singularity of that terrific language! Now God is infinitely just, therefore His hatred of this state cannot be too great. It is not in His majesty to exaggerate. But He is also infinitely forbearing, so that His punishment must be, if anything, short of its horrible deserts. What then must its real horror be?
But why does He hate it so? Let us venture to search for reasons. Because it is a quiet intentional appreciation of other things over God. It cheapens God, and parts with Him secondhand. Meanwhile, as it is not open wickedness, but is even an open profession and exterior practice of His service, it pretends friendship, and takes rank in the world as one of God’s friends; and hence it involves the twofold guilt of treachery and hypocrisy. It thus has a peculiar ability to wound God’s glory by the scandal it gives. It has God’s honor in its power, and treats it shamefully and cruelly. It profanes grace by the indifference with which it misuses it. It takes it as a right, and misapplies it, as a dishonest man spends money on purposes for which it was not trusted to him. It is taking a liberty with the majesty of God’s exceeding goodness, which is a terrible thing to do. It were better to play with His thunderbolts, than to make sport with His compassions. And all this is done with knowledge, the double knowledge of God and of evil. What wonder that it turns God’s whole being, and sours even the sweetness of the Sacred Heart!
Don’t Go Away ― The Cure is Coming!
Fr. Faber, and some other solid and classical authors, give us some suggestions and recommendations on how to tackle and cure this fatal and widespread disease. Let us once again end the patient home on a brighter note with these words of God that immediately follow the passage where God threatens to vomit the lukewarm out of His mouth:
“I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance! Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock. If any man shall hear My voice, and open to Me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me” (Apocalypse 3:18-20).
To these words we will add some quotes from the book Words of Love, by Fr. Gottemoller, where Jesus, speaking or being roused from lukewarmness, says the following to Sr. Josefa Menendez:
“As soon as your soul is touched by grace, and before the struggle has even begun, hasten to My Heart; beg of Me to let a drop of My Blood fall on your soul.... Ah! Hasten to My Heart ... and be without fear for the past; all has been swallowed up in the abyss of My mercy, and My love is preparing new graces for you. The memory of your lapses will be an incentive to humility and a source of merit, and you cannot give Me a greater proof of affection than to count on My full pardon and to believe that your sins will never be as great as My mercy, which is infinite.”
PART TWO
Remedies for Lukewarmness
The foundation of all remedies has to be a confidence in both the doctor and the remedy. The cure of lukewarmness is immensely difficult; St. Bernard would make us almost despair of its being curable at all. Only, we made up our minds at the beginning to hold this all the way through, that nothing is incurable, though many things in the spiritual life are nearly so; and neither doctor, nor father, nor saint, but only the Pope, shall drive us from this doctrine.
St. Bernard therefore will have to be satisfied if we say that its cure is immensely difficult, because all the Saints have said so, because the evil is unsuspected, because even the good is mixed with evil, because men do not realize the possible loss of grace to help them keep God’s Commandments when they have been playing fast and loose with God’s Gospel’s counsels, and because, as St. Teresa teaches, for some souls perfection is accidentally necessary even for their salvation!
Besides, we have the following words and actions of Our Lord to assure and re-assure us of the possibility of a cure for the spiritual disease of lukewarmness:
1st. We Must Admit to our Sickness
The Samaritan woman at the well, was ‘not quite right’ with God. She had five husbands and the man she was presently with, was not her true husband. Jesus said to her: Jesus saith to her: “‘Go, call thy husband, and come hither!’ The woman answered, and said: ‘I have no husband!’ Jesus said to her: ‘Thou hast said well, “I have no husband” ― for thou hast had five husbands: and he whom thou now hast, is not thy husband. This thou hast said truly!’” (John 4:16-18).
We must be humble and honest. There is no point falling into the Adam and Eve finger-pointing syndrome of “the devil made me do it!” The devil is behind many temptations and spiritual diseases, but, ultimately, it is our cooperation with the devil’s temptations and lack of cooperation with God’s suggestions, that makes us sin or become lukewarm. So let us be perfectly honest and admit our lukewarmness. If you go to a doctor, but will admit to no illness and say nothing of your symptoms, or perhaps lie about them—then don’t expect to be given the correct remedy or even any remedy.
2nd. We must Want, Ask and Beg for a Cure
► “Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you” (Matthew 7:7).
► “Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go to him at midnight, and shall say to him: ‘Friend, lend me three loaves―because a friend of mine has come off his journey to me, and I have not what to set before him!’ And he, from within, should answer and say: ‘Trouble me not! The door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed! I cannot rise and give thee anything!’ Yet if he shall continue knocking, I say to you, although he will not rise and give him because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise, and give him as many as he needs. And I say to you, ‘Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you. For every one that asks, receives; and he that seeks, finds; and to him that knocks, it shall be opened!’” (Luke 11:5-10).
► “And as he went out of Jericho, Bartimeus the blind man, sat by the way side, begging. Who, when he had heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, began to cry out, and to say: ‘Jesus son of David, have mercy on me!’ And many rebuked him, that he might hold his peace―but he cried a great deal more: ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’” (Mark 10:46-52, Luke 18:35-43).
3rd. We must Believe that we Can be Cured
► “All things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive” (Matthew 21:22).
► “And when He was come to the house, the blind men came to Him. And Jesus said to them: ‘Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?’ They said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord!’”
► “As thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!” (Matthew 8:13).
► “According to your Faith, be it done unto you!” (Matthew 9:29).
► “Great is thy Faith! Be it done to thee as thou wilt!” (Matthew 15:28).
► “Whosoever shall say to this mountain, ‘Be thou removed and be cast into the sea!’ and shall not stagger in his heart, but believes that whatsoever he says shall be done―then it shall be done unto him!” (Mark 11:23).
4th. We must Believe Jesus Wants to Cure us
► “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me ... He has sent Me to heal the contrite of heart, to preach deliverance to the captives, and give sight to the blind!” (Luke 4:18-19).
► “Jesus saith to him: ‘I will come and heal him!’” (Matthew 8:7).
► “Having called His twelve disciples together, He gave them power over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of diseases, and all manner of infirmities” (Matthew 10:1).
Yes, we also believe that He can and will cure us of our lukewarmness, which is like a blindness, a lameness, a leprosy of the spiritual life.
► “A leper came and adored Him, saying: ‘Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean!’ And Jesus stretching forth His hand, touched him, saying: ‘I will, be thou made clean!’ And forthwith his leprosy was cleansed” (Matthew 8:2-3)
► “And there came a leper to Him, beseeching Him, and kneeling down said to Him: ‘If thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean!’ And Jesus having compassion on him, stretched forth His hand; and touching him, said to him: ‘I will! Be thou made clean!’ And when He had spoken, immediately the leprosy departed from him, and he was made clean” (Mark 1:40-42).
► “Now there is at Jerusalem a pond, called Probatica, which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of sick, of blind, of lame, of withered; waiting for the moving of the water. And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under. And there was a certain man there, who had been under his infirmity for thirty-eight years. When Jesus had seen him lying there, and knew how a long time that he had been there, He said to him: ‘Wilt thou be made whole?’ The infirm man answered Him: ‘Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pond! For whilst I am coming, another goes down before me!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Arise, take up thy bed, and walk!’ And immediately the man was made whole―and he took up his bed and walked” (John 5:2-8).
Likewise, we need to be humble and honest in showing and admitting to Jesus our spiritual leprosy, lameness and blindness; crying out loudly to Him and begging him, on our knees, for a cure; and if He seems to turn a ‘deaf-ear’ to our entreaties, then we should cry out all the more loudly and knock ever more intensely until He compassionately hears and answers our prayers. But “be not deceived, God is not mocked!” (Galatians 6:7). We must remember that He despises lukewarmness so much, that He wishes to vomit the lukewarm out of His mouth (Apocalypse 3:16). When He grants the cure we desire, the words spoken in the Bible will apply to us also: “Go―and now sin no more!” (John 8:11) and “Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more―lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14).
Just like lukewarmness, both leprosy and blindness were considered impossible to cure. Yet Jesus compassionately cures them. As Fr. Faber writes, lukewarmness is to the soul what blindness is to the body. When we are lukewarm (and we all are from time to time, sometimes for a long time, sometimes a shorter time, but lukewarmness hits everyone—you’d better believe it!) Therefore, we all suffer from a spiritual blindness. Jesus has the cure for that blindness, but it needs some work on our part. God spoils nobody; He did not even spoil Jesus and Mary, but demanded effort and required them to suffer.
Therefore, let us take note of the above instances and see what brings about the miraculous cures. For a cure of lukewarmness, as the spiritual writers suggest, is almost miraculous! But a miracle has already happened to you if you can see and admit that you are lukewarm, for as Fr. Faber writes:
“I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor, the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, and then―lost forever.”
5th. Take the Not-So-Feeble ‘Feeble’ Remedies
How absurd it seems to now mention the seemingly ‘feeble’ remedies! But just as water seems ‘feeble’ in taking away the guilt of Original Sin and even removing all temporal punishment due to any Actual Sin committed before Baptism; these ‘feeble’ remedies have a power of their own: “But the foolish things of the world has God chosen, that He may confound the wise; and the weak things of the world has God chosen, that He may confound the strong” (1 Corinthians 1:27).
THE FIRST IS TO ENLIVEN AND STRENGTHEN OUR FAITH BY MEDITATION ON ETERNAL TRUTHS, so as to fill our minds habitually (not occasionally) with their overwhelming importance and their exacting purity. Just as it is true that “we are what we eat”—in the sense that if we eat healthy food, it will gradually improve and then maintain our health; but if we eat junk food, then it will gradually weaken and destroy our health—it is likewise true that “we are what we think.” If we mainly think and talk about the world, we will become more and worldlier, and we lose our spiritual health—which is how we have become lukewarm in the first place. But just as we can eat our way back to health, we can think our way back to spiritual health. For both disease and health start in the mind, just like sin or virtue, start in the mind: first comes the temptation or suggestion, then, soon after, there follows the action—for better or for worse, as we perform a virtuous action or commit a sin. But the process cannot and must not just stay in the mind or be relegated to the realm of the theoretical. Meditation, if it is to be true and sincere meditation, is always about resolutions to do something about it. Contemplation is only perfect when it translates into action. But there can be no action with thought. Hence, think and do!
THE SECOND IS, NOT HAVING SO MANY THINGS TO DO. It is no use. The times are busy. But we cannot save our souls if we have so many things to do. But the remedy? Good soul! There are some knots in life which cannot be untied; the thing is to cut them, and leave the consequences to help themselves. If you have more duties to do than you can do well, you must boldly neglect some of them. Only have Faith, and God will spirit the consequences away, so that you will see nothing more of them.
THE THIRD REMEDY IS THE PRACTICE OF SILENCE, not in any offensive or singular way, but proportionally to our state of life. God speaks in the silence of the mind and heart. The world is all about noise and distractions. Jesus will raise us back to life—to a true spiritual life—but we must banish the noise and tumult of the world.
“And when Jesus was come into the house of the ruler, and saw the minstrels and the multitude making a rout, He said: ‘Give place―for the girl is not dead, but sleeps!’ And they laughed Him to scorn. And when the multitude was put forth, He went in, and took her by the hand. And the maid arose” (Matthew 9:23-25).
St. Mark reports the same miracle: “And they come to the house of the ruler of the synagogue; and He seeth a tumult, and people weeping and wailing much. And going in, He saith to them: ‘Why make you this ado, and weep? The girl is not dead, but sleeps!’ And they laughed Him to scorn. But He, having put them all out, took the father and the mother of the girl, and them that were with Him, and entered in where the girl was lying. And taking the girl by the hand, He said to her: ‘I say to thee arise!’ And immediately the girl rose up, and walked” (Mark 5:38-42).
THE FOURTH REMEDY IS TO PERSEVERE IN OUR SPIRITUAL EXERCISES in spite of dryness and distractions. Medicines, or even healthy food, rarely make an instant impact. We gradually get sick and we will gradually get better. Of course, as with St. Paul, Jesus could step in with a miraculous conversion and cure; but normally, He does not do the extraordinary when the ordinary sits on our doorstep. Besides, the laborious and painful efforts that we will have to take to get better will serve both as a penance for our sin, as well as a salutary reminder not to fall back into that fatal, but sweet-feeling, disease of lukewarmness.
THE FIFTH REMEDY IS A HABIT OF MORTIFICATION, NOT INTERIOR, BUT EXTERIOR. The interior will look out for itself when its time comes. Just now I want the flesh to suffer. If you turn away from this I give you up for lost. It is the necessary bitter-tasting medicine for your sickness. Alas! Alas! What does all this come to but the admission that the only sure remedy for lukewarmness is never to be lukewarm, an oracle worthy of the pompous physician of the old comedy? Yet, does it not in reality say a great deal?
I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor, the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, but then—lost forever. (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, chapter on Lukewarmness).
The Seven Deadly Signs
Earlier, it was said that, the habit of leaving of things to the last minute, is often a sign of our looking upon those things with indifference, thinking them of little or no importance in comparison to the things we do beforehand or earlier in the day. When this attitude creeps into our spiritual life, it is called lukewarmness, or tepidity, spiritual sloth, or spiritual languor, or any other alias that it likes to use to conceal its real identity.
We quoted extensively from Fr. Faber’s essay on lukewarmness, taken from his book, Growth in Holiness, to paint the picture of lukewarmness as a kind of ‘spiritual blindness’ that does not even realize that it is blind. Fr. Faber gave three chief causes: “It is usual to consider that this blindness is owing principally to three causes: the frequency of venial sins, habitual dissipation of mind and the ruling passion.”
He went on to say that these causes produce the first-born children of lukewarmness, which he states are: “In the first place conscience becomes untrue [and]... in proportion as conscience becomes dark, cold, and finally numb, in the same proportion the bad instincts of the human spirit, like owls at night, get more far‑sighted, animated and vivacious. These instincts lead us with uncommon tact to avoid anything which will restore animation to the conscience. Thus they make us shrink from anything like vigorous spiritual direction. So in hearing sermons, reading books, cultivating acquaintances, patronizing works of mercy, it draws back from everything that is likely to come too near or hit too hard. This is the second result of this blindness. Out of the two preceding results flows a third, which is a profane use of the Sacraments. Thus frequent or even daily Communion seems to have only a negative effect upon us. We do not know how bad things might be without it; and that is all. Weekly confession gives us no additional power over our commonest imperfections.”
Having thus stated the problem, Fr. Faber the proceeds with a simple form of diagnosis, through which we can examine ourselves to see if, and to what degree, we might be lukewarm. He writes:
“It is plain from this description that what is of the greatest practical usefulness, in this matter of lukewarmness, is a thorough acquaintance with the symptoms by which the insidious disease allows itself to be detected. These are seven in number; and inasmuch as we notice that we unite any of them in ourselves, either in number or degree, so we have reason painfully to doubt whether our spiritual eyesight is not failing.
(1) “It’ll have to wait!”
The first sign of lukewarmness is a great ease in omitting our spiritual exercises, which is the exact contradictory of fervor. Everyone has his routine of spiritual exercises; and there are few days in which they do not give us some little inconveniences. Now these little inconveniences suggest dispensations, or at least delays, which will turn out dispensations in the end. Clearly there are cases in which conflicting duties, or the needs of charity, will interfere with our spiritual duties, and it will be more perfect to attend to them rather than to read or meditate. But most often the inconveniences concern only ourselves. We have the power to dispense ourselves; and we grant these dispensations either rarely and with reluctance, or often and easily. If the latter be the case, behold the first mark of tepidity or lukewarmness! I do not say that, by itself, it proves everything; but it proves much. At all events, wherever there is lukewarmness, there also is this symptom of easily dispensing ourselves from some spiritual exercises.
(2) “Just as long as it’s done…!”
The second sign of lukewarmness is that we do not only easily leave out spiritual exercises, but we are negligent in those which we do perform. We care more about the fact of going through them, than the manner or the spirit of it. Thus our prayers rise to Heaven loaded with venial sins and the angels are reluctant witnesses of our Confessions and Communions. This is a second symptom—a poor routine performance of our spiritual exercises.
(3) “Something Not Quite Right Here!”
Here is a third symptom of lukewarmness. The soul feels not altogether right with God. It does not exactly know what is wrong; but it is sure all is not right. It looks around to find the cause. It quarrels with everything it does, and questions each action, and yet the mischief still eludes it. It is angry with its Confessions; yet it is not easy to settle how to amend them. Something always seems unexpressed, something left behind which ought to have come out and does not. What is it? Then the Communions are overhauled in a similar way, the examinations of conscience are tortured to find the answer; meditations are criticized and reprimanded, spiritual books are put under the microscope, all this is done with a determination to reform everything. General orders are issued from self’s headquarters, in which strong things are said ambiguously. Everyone feels he is aimed at. Blame lies everywhere. Yet all to no purpose. At last when we have given the matter up, we suddenly come upon the offending thing, just as we look for a lost article until we are hot and tired, and then all at once see it lying in open day in a spot we have searched four or five times before. Now when we have this feeling of not being altogether right with God, and yet will not vigorously face the inquiry and make the disturbance I have described, and force ourselves to put into play the triple task of discovery, punishment, and reformation, it is a symptom of our being lukewarm.
(4) “Aimless Existence”
A fourth symptom of lukewarmness is a habitual acting without any intention at all, good, bad or indifferent. We do things routinely, automatically, without thinking much as to why or how well or how badly we are doing them. As the spiritual masters say—routine is the killer of fervor and devotion. We say our Rosaries, but out of routine, with no particular intention being assigned to them—we just do it. We assist at Mass routinely; we are there because we have to be there (for example, to fulfill the Sunday obligation); any good works we do are done routinely, without being offered either as a penance or for a particular need or cause. It is as though our mind was numbed, or “put on ice.”
(5) “Virtues not even a Hobby”
A fifth symptom of lukewarmness is a carelessness or negligence about forming or acquiring habits of virtue. Not that we don’t produce any good actions—we do good things—but virtue is not just an occasional, intermittent good action. A virtue, by definition, is a frequent and habitual good action and not an occasional one; just like “vice” is not just a particular kind of sin that is sometimes committed, but a frequent and habitual sin. The acquisition and regular practice of virtue is a fundamental requirement for a Catholic. It is part of our profession of Faith. We are meant to professionals in the spiritual life and not just weekend amateurs. It is our profession, not just a hobby.
(6) “It’s Only a Little Thing!”
A sixth symptom of lukewarmness is a contempt of little things and of little daily opportunities. This is a necessary part of our blindness—for a blind person can only see the big objects and shapes; the little things escape the blind person’s view. We despise little things because we do not see in them the capabilities of glorifying God, and advancing our own spiritual interest and profit, which those little things contain.
(7) “Milking the Past”
The seventh and last symptom of lukewarmness is thinking more of the good we have done in the past, rather than of the good we have left undone. It is a selective view of things, which looks only at the good, but deliberately ignores the evil. It is resting on the past rather than striving for the future; loving to look at people below us, who are worse than we are, rather than people above us, who are better than we are. Our desire for ease, comfort and self‑complacency, and our prideful horror of truth, are the reasons that lie behind this attitude of the soul.
This is not just how lukewarmness takes over people living in the world; it is also the way in which lukewarmness attacks priests, and the inmates of convents. When religious become lukewarm, they like to measure themselves with the poor citizens of the world, rather than with the grand saints of their own religious order. They are ever calculating and weighing-up the sacrifices they have made, and fondly praising, to themselves, the glory of their self‑devotion. When these signs are observed, we can recognize in them the alarming symptoms of lukewarmness. It all lies in that one word.
Such religious do what St. Paul said he did not do. They count themselves to have apprehended. “If by any means I may attain to the resurrection which is from the dead. Not as though I has already attained, or were already perfect; but I follow after, if I may by any means apprehend, wherein I am also apprehended by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended. But one thing I do―forgetting the things that are behind, and stretching forth myself to those that are before, I press on towards the mark, to the prize of the supernal vocation of God in Christ Jesus!” (Philippians 3:11-14).
God’s Hatred for Lukewarmness
From these fatal marks let us pass to consider the extraordinary hatred which God has of this state.
“And to the angel of the church of Laodicea, write: ‘These things saith the Amen [i.e., the Truth itself; the Word and Son of God], the faithful and true Witness, Who is the beginning of the creation of God: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth. Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ ― and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!”’” (Apocalypse 3:14-17).
This passage is without any parallel in Scripture. God not only prefers coldness, but He rejects tepidity. It turns Him sick who is eternal love. The charity of the Heart of Jesus, our only home, cannot retain us. His disgust is too strong for Him to resist it; and He rejects us with an unconquerable nausea, which even redeeming love cannot temper or allay. It is a most awful figure, and one which, but for His own word, we should not dare to have mentioned in the same breath with His adorable majesty. How much He must have meant to teach us by the singularity of that terrific language! Now God is infinitely just, therefore His hatred of this state cannot be too great. It is not in His majesty to exaggerate. But He is also infinitely forbearing, so that His punishment must be, if anything, short of its horrible deserts. What then must its real horror be?
But why does He hate it so? Let us venture to search for reasons. Because it is a quiet intentional appreciation of other things over God. It cheapens God, and parts with Him secondhand. Meanwhile, as it is not open wickedness, but is even an open profession and exterior practice of His service, it pretends friendship, and takes rank in the world as one of God’s friends; and hence it involves the twofold guilt of treachery and hypocrisy. It thus has a peculiar ability to wound God’s glory by the scandal it gives. It has God’s honor in its power, and treats it shamefully and cruelly. It profanes grace by the indifference with which it misuses it. It takes it as a right, and misapplies it, as a dishonest man spends money on purposes for which it was not trusted to him. It is taking a liberty with the majesty of God’s exceeding goodness, which is a terrible thing to do. It were better to play with His thunderbolts, than to make sport with His compassions. And all this is done with knowledge, the double knowledge of God and of evil. What wonder that it turns God’s whole being, and sours even the sweetness of the Sacred Heart!
Don’t Go Away ― The Cure is Coming!
Fr. Faber, and some other solid and classical authors, give us some suggestions and recommendations on how to tackle and cure this fatal and widespread disease. Let us once again end the patient home on a brighter note with these words of God that immediately follow the passage where God threatens to vomit the lukewarm out of His mouth:
“I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance! Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock. If any man shall hear My voice, and open to Me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me” (Apocalypse 3:18-20).
To these words we will add some quotes from the book Words of Love, by Fr. Gottemoller, where Jesus, speaking or being roused from lukewarmness, says the following to Sr. Josefa Menendez:
“As soon as your soul is touched by grace, and before the struggle has even begun, hasten to My Heart; beg of Me to let a drop of My Blood fall on your soul.... Ah! Hasten to My Heart ... and be without fear for the past; all has been swallowed up in the abyss of My mercy, and My love is preparing new graces for you. The memory of your lapses will be an incentive to humility and a source of merit, and you cannot give Me a greater proof of affection than to count on My full pardon and to believe that your sins will never be as great as My mercy, which is infinite.”
PART TWO
Remedies for Lukewarmness
The foundation of all remedies has to be a confidence in both the doctor and the remedy. The cure of lukewarmness is immensely difficult; St. Bernard would make us almost despair of its being curable at all. Only, we made up our minds at the beginning to hold this all the way through, that nothing is incurable, though many things in the spiritual life are nearly so; and neither doctor, nor father, nor saint, but only the Pope, shall drive us from this doctrine.
St. Bernard therefore will have to be satisfied if we say that its cure is immensely difficult, because all the Saints have said so, because the evil is unsuspected, because even the good is mixed with evil, because men do not realize the possible loss of grace to help them keep God’s Commandments when they have been playing fast and loose with God’s Gospel’s counsels, and because, as St. Teresa teaches, for some souls perfection is accidentally necessary even for their salvation!
Besides, we have the following words and actions of Our Lord to assure and re-assure us of the possibility of a cure for the spiritual disease of lukewarmness:
1st. We Must Admit to our Sickness
The Samaritan woman at the well, was ‘not quite right’ with God. She had five husbands and the man she was presently with, was not her true husband. Jesus said to her: Jesus saith to her: “‘Go, call thy husband, and come hither!’ The woman answered, and said: ‘I have no husband!’ Jesus said to her: ‘Thou hast said well, “I have no husband” ― for thou hast had five husbands: and he whom thou now hast, is not thy husband. This thou hast said truly!’” (John 4:16-18).
We must be humble and honest. There is no point falling into the Adam and Eve finger-pointing syndrome of “the devil made me do it!” The devil is behind many temptations and spiritual diseases, but, ultimately, it is our cooperation with the devil’s temptations and lack of cooperation with God’s suggestions, that makes us sin or become lukewarm. So let us be perfectly honest and admit our lukewarmness. If you go to a doctor, but will admit to no illness and say nothing of your symptoms, or perhaps lie about them—then don’t expect to be given the correct remedy or even any remedy.
2nd. We must Want, Ask and Beg for a Cure
► “Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you” (Matthew 7:7).
► “Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go to him at midnight, and shall say to him: ‘Friend, lend me three loaves―because a friend of mine has come off his journey to me, and I have not what to set before him!’ And he, from within, should answer and say: ‘Trouble me not! The door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed! I cannot rise and give thee anything!’ Yet if he shall continue knocking, I say to you, although he will not rise and give him because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise, and give him as many as he needs. And I say to you, ‘Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you. For every one that asks, receives; and he that seeks, finds; and to him that knocks, it shall be opened!’” (Luke 11:5-10).
► “And as he went out of Jericho, Bartimeus the blind man, sat by the way side, begging. Who, when he had heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, began to cry out, and to say: ‘Jesus son of David, have mercy on me!’ And many rebuked him, that he might hold his peace―but he cried a great deal more: ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’” (Mark 10:46-52, Luke 18:35-43).
3rd. We must Believe that we Can be Cured
► “All things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive” (Matthew 21:22).
► “And when He was come to the house, the blind men came to Him. And Jesus said to them: ‘Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?’ They said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord!’”
► “As thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!” (Matthew 8:13).
► “According to your Faith, be it done unto you!” (Matthew 9:29).
► “Great is thy Faith! Be it done to thee as thou wilt!” (Matthew 15:28).
► “Whosoever shall say to this mountain, ‘Be thou removed and be cast into the sea!’ and shall not stagger in his heart, but believes that whatsoever he says shall be done―then it shall be done unto him!” (Mark 11:23).
4th. We must Believe Jesus Wants to Cure us
► “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me ... He has sent Me to heal the contrite of heart, to preach deliverance to the captives, and give sight to the blind!” (Luke 4:18-19).
► “Jesus saith to him: ‘I will come and heal him!’” (Matthew 8:7).
► “Having called His twelve disciples together, He gave them power over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of diseases, and all manner of infirmities” (Matthew 10:1).
Yes, we also believe that He can and will cure us of our lukewarmness, which is like a blindness, a lameness, a leprosy of the spiritual life.
► “A leper came and adored Him, saying: ‘Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean!’ And Jesus stretching forth His hand, touched him, saying: ‘I will, be thou made clean!’ And forthwith his leprosy was cleansed” (Matthew 8:2-3)
► “And there came a leper to Him, beseeching Him, and kneeling down said to Him: ‘If thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean!’ And Jesus having compassion on him, stretched forth His hand; and touching him, said to him: ‘I will! Be thou made clean!’ And when He had spoken, immediately the leprosy departed from him, and he was made clean” (Mark 1:40-42).
► “Now there is at Jerusalem a pond, called Probatica, which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of sick, of blind, of lame, of withered; waiting for the moving of the water. And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under. And there was a certain man there, who had been under his infirmity for thirty-eight years. When Jesus had seen him lying there, and knew how a long time that he had been there, He said to him: ‘Wilt thou be made whole?’ The infirm man answered Him: ‘Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pond! For whilst I am coming, another goes down before me!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Arise, take up thy bed, and walk!’ And immediately the man was made whole―and he took up his bed and walked” (John 5:2-8).
Likewise, we need to be humble and honest in showing and admitting to Jesus our spiritual leprosy, lameness and blindness; crying out loudly to Him and begging him, on our knees, for a cure; and if He seems to turn a ‘deaf-ear’ to our entreaties, then we should cry out all the more loudly and knock ever more intensely until He compassionately hears and answers our prayers. But “be not deceived, God is not mocked!” (Galatians 6:7). We must remember that He despises lukewarmness so much, that He wishes to vomit the lukewarm out of His mouth (Apocalypse 3:16). When He grants the cure we desire, the words spoken in the Bible will apply to us also: “Go―and now sin no more!” (John 8:11) and “Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more―lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14).
Just like lukewarmness, both leprosy and blindness were considered impossible to cure. Yet Jesus compassionately cures them. As Fr. Faber writes, lukewarmness is to the soul what blindness is to the body. When we are lukewarm (and we all are from time to time, sometimes for a long time, sometimes a shorter time, but lukewarmness hits everyone—you’d better believe it!) Therefore, we all suffer from a spiritual blindness. Jesus has the cure for that blindness, but it needs some work on our part. God spoils nobody; He did not even spoil Jesus and Mary, but demanded effort and required them to suffer.
Therefore, let us take note of the above instances and see what brings about the miraculous cures. For a cure of lukewarmness, as the spiritual writers suggest, is almost miraculous! But a miracle has already happened to you if you can see and admit that you are lukewarm, for as Fr. Faber writes:
“I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor, the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, and then―lost forever.”
5th. Take the Not-So-Feeble ‘Feeble’ Remedies
How absurd it seems to now mention the seemingly ‘feeble’ remedies! But just as water seems ‘feeble’ in taking away the guilt of Original Sin and even removing all temporal punishment due to any Actual Sin committed before Baptism; these ‘feeble’ remedies have a power of their own: “But the foolish things of the world has God chosen, that He may confound the wise; and the weak things of the world has God chosen, that He may confound the strong” (1 Corinthians 1:27).
THE FIRST IS TO ENLIVEN AND STRENGTHEN OUR FAITH BY MEDITATION ON ETERNAL TRUTHS, so as to fill our minds habitually (not occasionally) with their overwhelming importance and their exacting purity. Just as it is true that “we are what we eat”—in the sense that if we eat healthy food, it will gradually improve and then maintain our health; but if we eat junk food, then it will gradually weaken and destroy our health—it is likewise true that “we are what we think.” If we mainly think and talk about the world, we will become more and worldlier, and we lose our spiritual health—which is how we have become lukewarm in the first place. But just as we can eat our way back to health, we can think our way back to spiritual health. For both disease and health start in the mind, just like sin or virtue, start in the mind: first comes the temptation or suggestion, then, soon after, there follows the action—for better or for worse, as we perform a virtuous action or commit a sin. But the process cannot and must not just stay in the mind or be relegated to the realm of the theoretical. Meditation, if it is to be true and sincere meditation, is always about resolutions to do something about it. Contemplation is only perfect when it translates into action. But there can be no action with thought. Hence, think and do!
THE SECOND IS, NOT HAVING SO MANY THINGS TO DO. It is no use. The times are busy. But we cannot save our souls if we have so many things to do. But the remedy? Good soul! There are some knots in life which cannot be untied; the thing is to cut them, and leave the consequences to help themselves. If you have more duties to do than you can do well, you must boldly neglect some of them. Only have Faith, and God will spirit the consequences away, so that you will see nothing more of them.
THE THIRD REMEDY IS THE PRACTICE OF SILENCE, not in any offensive or singular way, but proportionally to our state of life. God speaks in the silence of the mind and heart. The world is all about noise and distractions. Jesus will raise us back to life—to a true spiritual life—but we must banish the noise and tumult of the world.
“And when Jesus was come into the house of the ruler, and saw the minstrels and the multitude making a rout, He said: ‘Give place―for the girl is not dead, but sleeps!’ And they laughed Him to scorn. And when the multitude was put forth, He went in, and took her by the hand. And the maid arose” (Matthew 9:23-25).
St. Mark reports the same miracle: “And they come to the house of the ruler of the synagogue; and He seeth a tumult, and people weeping and wailing much. And going in, He saith to them: ‘Why make you this ado, and weep? The girl is not dead, but sleeps!’ And they laughed Him to scorn. But He, having put them all out, took the father and the mother of the girl, and them that were with Him, and entered in where the girl was lying. And taking the girl by the hand, He said to her: ‘I say to thee arise!’ And immediately the girl rose up, and walked” (Mark 5:38-42).
THE FOURTH REMEDY IS TO PERSEVERE IN OUR SPIRITUAL EXERCISES in spite of dryness and distractions. Medicines, or even healthy food, rarely make an instant impact. We gradually get sick and we will gradually get better. Of course, as with St. Paul, Jesus could step in with a miraculous conversion and cure; but normally, He does not do the extraordinary when the ordinary sits on our doorstep. Besides, the laborious and painful efforts that we will have to take to get better will serve both as a penance for our sin, as well as a salutary reminder not to fall back into that fatal, but sweet-feeling, disease of lukewarmness.
THE FIFTH REMEDY IS A HABIT OF MORTIFICATION, NOT INTERIOR, BUT EXTERIOR. The interior will look out for itself when its time comes. Just now I want the flesh to suffer. If you turn away from this I give you up for lost. It is the necessary bitter-tasting medicine for your sickness. Alas! Alas! What does all this come to but the admission that the only sure remedy for lukewarmness is never to be lukewarm, an oracle worthy of the pompous physician of the old comedy? Yet, does it not in reality say a great deal?
I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor, the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, but then—lost forever. (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, chapter on Lukewarmness).
Article 13
Monday, December 16th
Wanna Be A Baptist?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday, December 16th
Wanna Be A Baptist?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
A Pillar of Advent
The Liturgy of Advent mentions St. John the Baptist quite a lot. He is mentioned in the Gospels for the 2nd, 3rd and 4th Sundays of Advent! Much like the prophet Isaias, St. John the Baptist is a major figure for the season of Advent, since he is a precursor or forerunner of Christ. Isaias was a remote forerunner and prophet of the future Christ; whereas St. John the Baptist was the immediate forerunner of Christ. His role was to baptize Christ and be the catalyst to the Public Life of Christ. He was a second cousin to Jesus―since St. Elizabeth was a cousin to Our Lady. Jesus said of him: “Amen I say to you, there has not risen, among them that are born of women, a greater than John the Baptist!” (Matthew 11:11).
Therefore, St. John the Baptist has a pretty good pedigree and an excellent testimonial given by Christ Himself. Hence, there should be much to glean and learn from St. John the Baptist―especially in this Advent season.
Desert Life
We are given the story of the public ministry of St. John the Baptist―with some variation in details―in the three Gospels of St. Matthew, St. Mark, and St. Luke, as well as in the Gospel of St. John. St. Luke tells us of the birth of John the Baptist in a town of Judaea, about six months before the birth of the Savior. The circumstances are miraculous and wonderful. The New Testament tells us nothing much of John’s early years. St. Luke tell us only that “the child grew, and was strengthened in spirit; and was in the deserts, until the day of his manifestation to Israel” (Luke 1:80).
If we ask just when the Precursor went into the wilderness, an old tradition, echoed in the hymn, “Ut queant laxis”, composed in honor of the saint, gives an equally vague answer―hardly more precise than the statement of the Gospel, saying that in his early years he was in the desert praying. Other writers, thought they knew better.
For instance, St. Peter of Alexandria believed St. John was taken into the desert to escape the wrath of Herod, who, if we may believe report, was impelled, by fear of losing his kingdom, to seek the life of the Precursor. It was added also that Herod on this account had St. Zachary put to death between the temple and the altar, because he had prophesied the coming of the Messias. These are of course only legends―long since branded by St. Jerome as “apocryphorum somnia—apocryphal dreams”.
Man of Penance—Living Rough
The desert―where St. John lived and fasted and prayed―was actually a grazing land, unfit for growing crops, but able to sustain the life of hermits and herds; nor was it rare in those days for hermits to seek a life of solitude in the desert. That he ate locusts (grasshoppers, if you prefer) invariably draws a shudder from us―but this was not uncommon, and is not uncommon today, when Arab and African people still dry and save them as protection against famine. Or they may have been carob beans, a common “fruit” used for thousands of years in Mediterranean lands and called by the name of locust. Wild honey, on the other hand, sounds quite delicious.
Rough Clothes, Tough Food
His garment, like the tents of Saul of Tarsus, was cloth woven of camel’s hair, and he wore a leather girdle about his loins. This is the extent of his physical description. It is only when we meet him in public life that we discover what he was like; and when we hear him addressing the Pharisees and Sadducees in almost the same words Our Lord used later, we realize the divine cunning and wisdom in naming “John the Voice” that would announce “Christ the Word.”
Calling Others to Penance
“Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!”―this was John’s oft-repeated theme. For the evils of the times his remedy was individual purification. “Every tree,” he said, “that is not bringing forth good fruit, is to be cut down and thrown into the fire!” The reformation of each person’s life must be complete—the wheat must be separated from the chaff and the chaff burned “with unquenchable fire.”
“Brood of vipers! Who has shown you how to flee from the wrath to come?” he cried out to their faces.
“Serpents, brood of vipers! How are you to escape the judgment of Hell?” Jesus would cry, perhaps to the same faces.
But John was tender; and when earnest seekers asked him what to do, he gave them straight answers that they could understand. “Let him who has two coats share with him who has none, and let him who has food do likewise!”
When the soldiers asked what they should do, he said: “Do not plunder, nor accuse the innocent falsely, and be content with your pay!” He told the tax collectors to take no more than was due from the people they taxed.
Foundation of Humility
He lived in humble surroundings; he ate humble food; he dressed humbly; and he had a humble opinion of himself. When the followers, who loved him, began to wonder if he was the Messias, he finally spoke the words for which he is most famous: “I, indeed, baptize you with water. But one mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose shoe I am not worthy to loose!”
Humility was his staple diet—in dwelling, in food, in clothing. It is humility that attracts the love and graces of God—as Our Lady said in her Magnificat, spoken to St. John’s mother, St. Elizabeth: “He has regarded the humility of His handmaid! … He has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart! He has put down the mighty from their seat, and has exalted the humble!”
Humility to a Point and No Further
Rarely does anyone sincerely say: “I am not worthy!” Most sinners, even pint-size sinners, are certain that their business is far too important to be interrupted for the tying of someone shoes. But when St. John says he is unworthy to tie Our Lord’s shoe! It is what all of us would say, isn’t it? Likewise when St. Peter said, at the Last Supper on Holy Thursday night, that he was not worthy to have Our Lord wash his feet—it is what anyone would say, right? Yet it is not just about Jesus, but all the other members of His Mystical Body.
We, Catholics, are the arms, legs, hands, feet, eyes, ears, mouth, etc., of Christ in His Mystical Body. Our Lord said that whatever we do to the least of His brethren, we do unto Him: “Amen I say to you, as long as you DID it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me ... as long as you DID IT NOT to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me” (Matthew 25:40, 45). This is not just about seeing Christ in Christ, but in seeing Christ in others.
Looking For and Seeing Christ in Others
If we are to see Christ in our brothers and sisters, then like St. John we are not even worthy to tie their shoes. We tend to want to lord it over others, but Jesus did the work of a servant before us, and told us to imitate Him: “Whosoever will be first among you, shall be the servant of all!” (Mark 10:44). It is being another Christ and seeing Christ in one another, at one and the same time. To be like Him we must do as He did. To see Him in one another, we must feel as St. John did.
He Must Increase and I Must Decrease
John said, concerning Christ: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30). Once again, we have no problem if this refers to Christ—but if it refers to other Members of Christ’s Mystical Body, then we might be reluctant to say the same. After all, modern man’s attitude is one of: “Another man’s gain is my loss”. Much like the Apostles, who were arguing among themselves as to who was the greatest among them―we tend to bicker and squabble in a similar selfish way.
“And there was also a strife amongst them, which of them should seem to be the greater. And Jesus said to them: ‘The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and they that have power over them, are called beneficent. But you not so―but he that is the greater among you, let him become as the younger; and he that is the leader, as he that serves. For which is greater, he that sits at table, or he that serves? Is it not he that sits at table? But I am in the midst of you, as he that serves.’” (Luke 22:24-27).
Amazing Life—Ignominious Death
John was an amazing man! Imagine the Faith of him, doggedly preaching the advent of Christ, Whom he would not recognize if he saw Him. That day Jesus approached to be baptized, he guessed, but not until it was done did he know. It had been so many years since their infancy and childhood and they had both changed so much.
Ironically enough, after all those years of self-denial and hardship; the reputation he had earned; the glowing testimonial Jesus had given of him, his final curtain-call and final bow was not what the world would look upon as successful—he was imprisoned and beheaded at the behest of a dancer! His death became an entertainment at a king’s birthday party. Another Herod was king, a son of the Herod who was king when John and Jesus were born; and, beside him on the throne, sat the impure wife of his brother.
In the course of John’s preaching, he had denounced in unmeasured terms the immorality of Herod’s petty court, and had even boldly upbraided Herod to his face for his defiance of old Jewish law―especially in having taken to himself the wife of his half-brother, Philip. This woman, the dissolute Herodias, was also Herod’s niece. Herod feared and reverenced John, knowing him to be a holy man, and he followed his advice in many matters―but he could not endure having his private life castigated.
Herodias stoked-up Herod’s anger by lies and artifices. His resentment at length got the better of his judgment and he had John cast into the fortress of Machaerus, near the Dead Sea. When Jesus heard of this, and knew that some of His disciples had gone to see John, He spoke thus of him: “What went you to see? A prophet? Yea, I say to you, and more than a prophet! This is he of whom it is written: ‘Behold I send my angel before thy face, who shall prepare thy way before thee.’ For I say to you, amongst those that are born of women, there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist” (Matthew 11: 10-12).
Herodias, Herod’s invalid wife, hated John because he had shouted at the sinfulness of their invalid adulterous marriage. Not content with having had him thrown in prison, she was determined to take his life. Slyly she watched Herod admire the dancing of her daughter. Greedily she waited for Herod to offer the girl a gift. When he did, the mother viciously whispered what it should be, and the child ran back to the king and said: “I want you, right away, to give me on a dish the head of John the Baptist!” The strange thing is that Herod didn’t want to kill John, just as Pilate didn’t want the death of Jesus. But high men in high places cannot bear to lose face. St. Mark tells that because of his promise, and “because of his oath and because of his guests,” he sent an executioner and commanded that his head be brought on a dish.
John’s death, like Christ’s, was a spectacle, and St. Mark concludes his account of it with words that could refer to the death of Our Lord. “And his disciples, hearing it, came and took away his body, and laid it in a tomb”, while the angels with joy took away his soul to Heaven.
Learning from and Imitating St. John the Baptist
What do we learn from this man of whom Jesus said: “There has not risen, among them that are born of women, a greater than John the Baptist!” (Matthew 11:11)? We learn many things that can and should be imitated:
The Archangel Gabriel, when announcing the future birth of St. John the Baptist to his father, St. Zachary, had said: “Fear not, Zachary, for thy prayer is heard! Thy wife, Elizabeth, shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name John: and thou shalt have joy and gladness, and many shall rejoice in his nativity. For he shall be great before the Lord; and shall drink no wine nor strong drink: and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother’s womb. And he shall convert many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God. And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias; that he may turn the hearts of the fathers unto the children, and the incredulous to the wisdom of the just, to prepare unto the Lord a perfect people” (Luke 1:8-17).
DETACHMENT FROM THE WORLD: St. John the Baptist—as great as he was in God’s eyes—lived away from the world in the barren, bleak lands of the desert. We are all called to a detachment from the world―as Our Lord and Holy Scripture tell us: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
POVERTY: St. John was the son of a priest—he could have had an illustrious and comfortable ‘career’ in the service of the Temple of Jerusalem, yet his ‘temple’ was the desert and rich trappings of the Temple in Jerusalem he exchanged for the rich trappings of virtues in his soul: “You are the temple of the living God!” (2 Corinthians 6:16). “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19). Life was far from comfortable, but life was far richer spiritually. His treasure was in Heaven, where thief cannot break in and steal, nor rust or moth corrupt. As Jesus would say: “Lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal” (Matthew 6:20). “How hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God!” (Mark 10:24). “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God!” (Mark 10:25).
PRAYER: What was St. John doing for those many years in the desert before God finally launched his public ministry? Building sand-castles? Counting grains of sand? Of course, not! His mind and heart would have been raised to God—which is the definition of prayer. Would Jesus give that glowing testimonial of St. John if he was not a man of prayer? Of course not! The desert is conducive to prayer—for there little else there and little else to do. The importance of prayer is clearly stated in Holy Scripture Our Lord says that we should pray much and not faint: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). “Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times!” (Luke 21:36). To which Scripture adds: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). When God’s future chastisement renders Earth desert-like (as prophecies have foretold), then those who survive will have little else to do but pray and clean up the mess.
PENANCE: “And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching” (Luke 3:1-3), clothed not in the soft garments of a courtier (Matthew 11:8; Luke 7:24), but in those “of camel’s hair, and a leather girdle about his loins”; and “his meat” — he looked as if he came neither eating nor drinking (Matthew 11:18; Luke 7:33) — “was locusts and wild honey” (Matthew 3:4; Mark 1:6); his whole countenance, far from suggesting the idea of a reed shaken by the wind (Matthew 11:7; Luke 7:24), manifested undaunted constancy. A few incredulous scoffers feigned to be scandalized: “He hath a devil” (Matthew 11:18). Nevertheless, “Jerusalem and all Judea, and all the country about Jordan” (Matthew 3:5), drawn by his strong and winning personality, went out to him; the austerity of his life added immensely to the weight of his words; for the simple folk, he was truly a prophet (Matthew 11:9; cf. Luke 1:76, 77). Men of all conditions flocked round him. He would tell them: “Do penance―for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2), such was the burden of his teaching. This was echoed by Our Lord also: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
COURAGE: St. John was not afraid to lay his life on the line for God and His Law. Just like Christ would do some time later. He could have remained silent, but Herod was living in sin. Truth would cost him his life, just as truth cost Jesus His life. For Catholics today, besieged by Liberalism, Modernism and a false Ecumenism with false religions, there is a temptation to turn a blind-eye; to be silent about compromises of the Faith; to go along with these false “–ISMS” and to scornfully say, like Pilate, “What is truth?” St. John may have lost his head, but he did not lose his soul, which reminds us of the words of Our Lord: “Fear ye not them that kill the body, and are not able to kill the soul―but rather fear Him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell!” (Matthew 10:28).
APOSTOLIC SPIRIT: The Archangel Gabriel said that St. John would be filled with the Holy Ghost and the spirit of the prophet Elias and that he would convert many souls to God. This is everyone’s calling to a certain degree. Our Lord said that we should go and preach and teach all nations, every creature and bring them to the Faith (Matthew 28:19-20). Priests alone (today less than 450,000) cannot convert and given spiritual maintenance to 8,000,000,000 souls by themselves—it is the work of the entire Mystical Body of Christ. That is why everyone, in the Sacrament of Confirmation, is made a soldier for Christ—to not only defend the Faith, but go out and conquer more souls for the Faith.
HUMILITY: So transcendent was the power radiating out from the holy man that, after hearing him, many believed he was indeed the long-awaited Messias. John quickly put them right, saying he had come only to prepare the way, and that he was not worthy to unloose the Master’s sandals. Although his preaching and baptizing continued for some months during the Savior’s own ministry, John always made plain that he was merely the Forerunner. His humility remained incorruptible even when his fame spread to Jerusalem and members of the higher priesthood came to make inquiries and to hear him. His whole desire was to efface himself, which is typified by his words: “He [Christ] must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30).
Let us reflect more than once, in this Advent season, upon the life and spirit of St. John the Baptist. There is much to see, learn and imitate!
The Liturgy of Advent mentions St. John the Baptist quite a lot. He is mentioned in the Gospels for the 2nd, 3rd and 4th Sundays of Advent! Much like the prophet Isaias, St. John the Baptist is a major figure for the season of Advent, since he is a precursor or forerunner of Christ. Isaias was a remote forerunner and prophet of the future Christ; whereas St. John the Baptist was the immediate forerunner of Christ. His role was to baptize Christ and be the catalyst to the Public Life of Christ. He was a second cousin to Jesus―since St. Elizabeth was a cousin to Our Lady. Jesus said of him: “Amen I say to you, there has not risen, among them that are born of women, a greater than John the Baptist!” (Matthew 11:11).
Therefore, St. John the Baptist has a pretty good pedigree and an excellent testimonial given by Christ Himself. Hence, there should be much to glean and learn from St. John the Baptist―especially in this Advent season.
Desert Life
We are given the story of the public ministry of St. John the Baptist―with some variation in details―in the three Gospels of St. Matthew, St. Mark, and St. Luke, as well as in the Gospel of St. John. St. Luke tells us of the birth of John the Baptist in a town of Judaea, about six months before the birth of the Savior. The circumstances are miraculous and wonderful. The New Testament tells us nothing much of John’s early years. St. Luke tell us only that “the child grew, and was strengthened in spirit; and was in the deserts, until the day of his manifestation to Israel” (Luke 1:80).
If we ask just when the Precursor went into the wilderness, an old tradition, echoed in the hymn, “Ut queant laxis”, composed in honor of the saint, gives an equally vague answer―hardly more precise than the statement of the Gospel, saying that in his early years he was in the desert praying. Other writers, thought they knew better.
For instance, St. Peter of Alexandria believed St. John was taken into the desert to escape the wrath of Herod, who, if we may believe report, was impelled, by fear of losing his kingdom, to seek the life of the Precursor. It was added also that Herod on this account had St. Zachary put to death between the temple and the altar, because he had prophesied the coming of the Messias. These are of course only legends―long since branded by St. Jerome as “apocryphorum somnia—apocryphal dreams”.
Man of Penance—Living Rough
The desert―where St. John lived and fasted and prayed―was actually a grazing land, unfit for growing crops, but able to sustain the life of hermits and herds; nor was it rare in those days for hermits to seek a life of solitude in the desert. That he ate locusts (grasshoppers, if you prefer) invariably draws a shudder from us―but this was not uncommon, and is not uncommon today, when Arab and African people still dry and save them as protection against famine. Or they may have been carob beans, a common “fruit” used for thousands of years in Mediterranean lands and called by the name of locust. Wild honey, on the other hand, sounds quite delicious.
Rough Clothes, Tough Food
His garment, like the tents of Saul of Tarsus, was cloth woven of camel’s hair, and he wore a leather girdle about his loins. This is the extent of his physical description. It is only when we meet him in public life that we discover what he was like; and when we hear him addressing the Pharisees and Sadducees in almost the same words Our Lord used later, we realize the divine cunning and wisdom in naming “John the Voice” that would announce “Christ the Word.”
Calling Others to Penance
“Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!”―this was John’s oft-repeated theme. For the evils of the times his remedy was individual purification. “Every tree,” he said, “that is not bringing forth good fruit, is to be cut down and thrown into the fire!” The reformation of each person’s life must be complete—the wheat must be separated from the chaff and the chaff burned “with unquenchable fire.”
“Brood of vipers! Who has shown you how to flee from the wrath to come?” he cried out to their faces.
“Serpents, brood of vipers! How are you to escape the judgment of Hell?” Jesus would cry, perhaps to the same faces.
But John was tender; and when earnest seekers asked him what to do, he gave them straight answers that they could understand. “Let him who has two coats share with him who has none, and let him who has food do likewise!”
When the soldiers asked what they should do, he said: “Do not plunder, nor accuse the innocent falsely, and be content with your pay!” He told the tax collectors to take no more than was due from the people they taxed.
Foundation of Humility
He lived in humble surroundings; he ate humble food; he dressed humbly; and he had a humble opinion of himself. When the followers, who loved him, began to wonder if he was the Messias, he finally spoke the words for which he is most famous: “I, indeed, baptize you with water. But one mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose shoe I am not worthy to loose!”
Humility was his staple diet—in dwelling, in food, in clothing. It is humility that attracts the love and graces of God—as Our Lady said in her Magnificat, spoken to St. John’s mother, St. Elizabeth: “He has regarded the humility of His handmaid! … He has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart! He has put down the mighty from their seat, and has exalted the humble!”
Humility to a Point and No Further
Rarely does anyone sincerely say: “I am not worthy!” Most sinners, even pint-size sinners, are certain that their business is far too important to be interrupted for the tying of someone shoes. But when St. John says he is unworthy to tie Our Lord’s shoe! It is what all of us would say, isn’t it? Likewise when St. Peter said, at the Last Supper on Holy Thursday night, that he was not worthy to have Our Lord wash his feet—it is what anyone would say, right? Yet it is not just about Jesus, but all the other members of His Mystical Body.
We, Catholics, are the arms, legs, hands, feet, eyes, ears, mouth, etc., of Christ in His Mystical Body. Our Lord said that whatever we do to the least of His brethren, we do unto Him: “Amen I say to you, as long as you DID it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me ... as long as you DID IT NOT to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me” (Matthew 25:40, 45). This is not just about seeing Christ in Christ, but in seeing Christ in others.
Looking For and Seeing Christ in Others
If we are to see Christ in our brothers and sisters, then like St. John we are not even worthy to tie their shoes. We tend to want to lord it over others, but Jesus did the work of a servant before us, and told us to imitate Him: “Whosoever will be first among you, shall be the servant of all!” (Mark 10:44). It is being another Christ and seeing Christ in one another, at one and the same time. To be like Him we must do as He did. To see Him in one another, we must feel as St. John did.
He Must Increase and I Must Decrease
John said, concerning Christ: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30). Once again, we have no problem if this refers to Christ—but if it refers to other Members of Christ’s Mystical Body, then we might be reluctant to say the same. After all, modern man’s attitude is one of: “Another man’s gain is my loss”. Much like the Apostles, who were arguing among themselves as to who was the greatest among them―we tend to bicker and squabble in a similar selfish way.
“And there was also a strife amongst them, which of them should seem to be the greater. And Jesus said to them: ‘The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and they that have power over them, are called beneficent. But you not so―but he that is the greater among you, let him become as the younger; and he that is the leader, as he that serves. For which is greater, he that sits at table, or he that serves? Is it not he that sits at table? But I am in the midst of you, as he that serves.’” (Luke 22:24-27).
Amazing Life—Ignominious Death
John was an amazing man! Imagine the Faith of him, doggedly preaching the advent of Christ, Whom he would not recognize if he saw Him. That day Jesus approached to be baptized, he guessed, but not until it was done did he know. It had been so many years since their infancy and childhood and they had both changed so much.
Ironically enough, after all those years of self-denial and hardship; the reputation he had earned; the glowing testimonial Jesus had given of him, his final curtain-call and final bow was not what the world would look upon as successful—he was imprisoned and beheaded at the behest of a dancer! His death became an entertainment at a king’s birthday party. Another Herod was king, a son of the Herod who was king when John and Jesus were born; and, beside him on the throne, sat the impure wife of his brother.
In the course of John’s preaching, he had denounced in unmeasured terms the immorality of Herod’s petty court, and had even boldly upbraided Herod to his face for his defiance of old Jewish law―especially in having taken to himself the wife of his half-brother, Philip. This woman, the dissolute Herodias, was also Herod’s niece. Herod feared and reverenced John, knowing him to be a holy man, and he followed his advice in many matters―but he could not endure having his private life castigated.
Herodias stoked-up Herod’s anger by lies and artifices. His resentment at length got the better of his judgment and he had John cast into the fortress of Machaerus, near the Dead Sea. When Jesus heard of this, and knew that some of His disciples had gone to see John, He spoke thus of him: “What went you to see? A prophet? Yea, I say to you, and more than a prophet! This is he of whom it is written: ‘Behold I send my angel before thy face, who shall prepare thy way before thee.’ For I say to you, amongst those that are born of women, there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist” (Matthew 11: 10-12).
Herodias, Herod’s invalid wife, hated John because he had shouted at the sinfulness of their invalid adulterous marriage. Not content with having had him thrown in prison, she was determined to take his life. Slyly she watched Herod admire the dancing of her daughter. Greedily she waited for Herod to offer the girl a gift. When he did, the mother viciously whispered what it should be, and the child ran back to the king and said: “I want you, right away, to give me on a dish the head of John the Baptist!” The strange thing is that Herod didn’t want to kill John, just as Pilate didn’t want the death of Jesus. But high men in high places cannot bear to lose face. St. Mark tells that because of his promise, and “because of his oath and because of his guests,” he sent an executioner and commanded that his head be brought on a dish.
John’s death, like Christ’s, was a spectacle, and St. Mark concludes his account of it with words that could refer to the death of Our Lord. “And his disciples, hearing it, came and took away his body, and laid it in a tomb”, while the angels with joy took away his soul to Heaven.
Learning from and Imitating St. John the Baptist
What do we learn from this man of whom Jesus said: “There has not risen, among them that are born of women, a greater than John the Baptist!” (Matthew 11:11)? We learn many things that can and should be imitated:
The Archangel Gabriel, when announcing the future birth of St. John the Baptist to his father, St. Zachary, had said: “Fear not, Zachary, for thy prayer is heard! Thy wife, Elizabeth, shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name John: and thou shalt have joy and gladness, and many shall rejoice in his nativity. For he shall be great before the Lord; and shall drink no wine nor strong drink: and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother’s womb. And he shall convert many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God. And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias; that he may turn the hearts of the fathers unto the children, and the incredulous to the wisdom of the just, to prepare unto the Lord a perfect people” (Luke 1:8-17).
DETACHMENT FROM THE WORLD: St. John the Baptist—as great as he was in God’s eyes—lived away from the world in the barren, bleak lands of the desert. We are all called to a detachment from the world―as Our Lord and Holy Scripture tell us: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
POVERTY: St. John was the son of a priest—he could have had an illustrious and comfortable ‘career’ in the service of the Temple of Jerusalem, yet his ‘temple’ was the desert and rich trappings of the Temple in Jerusalem he exchanged for the rich trappings of virtues in his soul: “You are the temple of the living God!” (2 Corinthians 6:16). “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19). Life was far from comfortable, but life was far richer spiritually. His treasure was in Heaven, where thief cannot break in and steal, nor rust or moth corrupt. As Jesus would say: “Lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal” (Matthew 6:20). “How hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God!” (Mark 10:24). “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God!” (Mark 10:25).
PRAYER: What was St. John doing for those many years in the desert before God finally launched his public ministry? Building sand-castles? Counting grains of sand? Of course, not! His mind and heart would have been raised to God—which is the definition of prayer. Would Jesus give that glowing testimonial of St. John if he was not a man of prayer? Of course not! The desert is conducive to prayer—for there little else there and little else to do. The importance of prayer is clearly stated in Holy Scripture Our Lord says that we should pray much and not faint: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). “Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times!” (Luke 21:36). To which Scripture adds: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). When God’s future chastisement renders Earth desert-like (as prophecies have foretold), then those who survive will have little else to do but pray and clean up the mess.
PENANCE: “And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching” (Luke 3:1-3), clothed not in the soft garments of a courtier (Matthew 11:8; Luke 7:24), but in those “of camel’s hair, and a leather girdle about his loins”; and “his meat” — he looked as if he came neither eating nor drinking (Matthew 11:18; Luke 7:33) — “was locusts and wild honey” (Matthew 3:4; Mark 1:6); his whole countenance, far from suggesting the idea of a reed shaken by the wind (Matthew 11:7; Luke 7:24), manifested undaunted constancy. A few incredulous scoffers feigned to be scandalized: “He hath a devil” (Matthew 11:18). Nevertheless, “Jerusalem and all Judea, and all the country about Jordan” (Matthew 3:5), drawn by his strong and winning personality, went out to him; the austerity of his life added immensely to the weight of his words; for the simple folk, he was truly a prophet (Matthew 11:9; cf. Luke 1:76, 77). Men of all conditions flocked round him. He would tell them: “Do penance―for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2), such was the burden of his teaching. This was echoed by Our Lord also: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
COURAGE: St. John was not afraid to lay his life on the line for God and His Law. Just like Christ would do some time later. He could have remained silent, but Herod was living in sin. Truth would cost him his life, just as truth cost Jesus His life. For Catholics today, besieged by Liberalism, Modernism and a false Ecumenism with false religions, there is a temptation to turn a blind-eye; to be silent about compromises of the Faith; to go along with these false “–ISMS” and to scornfully say, like Pilate, “What is truth?” St. John may have lost his head, but he did not lose his soul, which reminds us of the words of Our Lord: “Fear ye not them that kill the body, and are not able to kill the soul―but rather fear Him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell!” (Matthew 10:28).
APOSTOLIC SPIRIT: The Archangel Gabriel said that St. John would be filled with the Holy Ghost and the spirit of the prophet Elias and that he would convert many souls to God. This is everyone’s calling to a certain degree. Our Lord said that we should go and preach and teach all nations, every creature and bring them to the Faith (Matthew 28:19-20). Priests alone (today less than 450,000) cannot convert and given spiritual maintenance to 8,000,000,000 souls by themselves—it is the work of the entire Mystical Body of Christ. That is why everyone, in the Sacrament of Confirmation, is made a soldier for Christ—to not only defend the Faith, but go out and conquer more souls for the Faith.
HUMILITY: So transcendent was the power radiating out from the holy man that, after hearing him, many believed he was indeed the long-awaited Messias. John quickly put them right, saying he had come only to prepare the way, and that he was not worthy to unloose the Master’s sandals. Although his preaching and baptizing continued for some months during the Savior’s own ministry, John always made plain that he was merely the Forerunner. His humility remained incorruptible even when his fame spread to Jerusalem and members of the higher priesthood came to make inquiries and to hear him. His whole desire was to efface himself, which is typified by his words: “He [Christ] must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30).
Let us reflect more than once, in this Advent season, upon the life and spirit of St. John the Baptist. There is much to see, learn and imitate!
Article 12
Sunday, December 15th
True and False Joy
Sunday, December 15th
True and False Joy
Happy in Prison?
For some people, Advent―much like Lent―is a penitential prison or penitential penitentiary, in which they would rather not be! They feel imprisoned, constrained, cramped and straitjacketed by the Church’s recommendation to do penance. As regards the “Prison of Advent”, today―the Third Sunday of Advent―is called Gaudete Sunday. The title “Gaudete” originates from the reading at Mass on the Third Sunday of Advent, which is taken from St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians, for the Church uses the passage from Philippians chapter 4, verse 4, which says: “Rejoice in the Lord always; again, I say, rejoice!” The Church uses that phrase, both in the entrance hymn and in the reading for the Third Sunday of Advent.
The Introit or Entrance Hymn for Gaudete Sunday commands: “Rejoice in the Lord always! Again I say, rejoice! Let your moderation be known to all men―for the Lord is near! Have no anxiety, but in everything, by prayer, let your petitions be made known to God!”
Then, in the Epistle reading of the Mass for Gaudete Sunday―lo and behold―the same injunction is repeated, slightly expanded and with an additional verse at the end: “Brethren! Rejoice in the Lord always! Again I say, rejoice! Let your moderation be known to all men! The Lord is near! Have no anxiety, but, in every prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known to God! And may the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord!” (Philippians 4:4-7).
To put it into its proper context, you need to know that St. Paul is writing this during the time of his imprisonment at Rome―and he is joyful despite that. Gaudete Sunday is the point in Advent when the traditional purple of Advent “lightens-up” and rose colored vestments are worn. Gaudete Sunday is the day upon which the Church encourages us to “lighten-up” a little and rejoice. To rejoice! What does it mean “to rejoice”? When we look at that word and break it down, we see that it is a combination of two things: (1) to show joy, (2) once again. If we simplify or divide the word “rejoice” into more understandable parts, we come up with the prefix “re-” and word “joy.” The prefix “re-” means to do something over again or do something once more after a relapse. Hence we have similar examples in the following words: re-think, re-do, re-paint, re-write, re-make, etc.
What is “Rejoicing”?
To “rejoice” means to put aside sadness, sorrow, despondency, discouragement and despair, and take up once again feelings of joy. People are sad and disheartened in poverty, but rejoice if somebody somehow alleviates their poverty, even if it is only for a short time. A nation can be discouraged and depressed in a war, but rejoices in victory, when the war is won, the enemy defeated and peace ensues.
The Example of St. Paul
In like manner, sinful mankind can be sad and sorrowful at sight of its sins; for which it is paying through penance and piteously pleading for pardon and peace; yet the Divine deafness leaves them downcast and discouraged under the domination of devils. All this can be seen united in the person of St. Paul: (1) He was a great sinner who had persecuted Christians until converted by Our Lord Himself; (2) He penitentially practiced powerful penances and perseveringly prayed for the rest of his life in order to make amends; (3) yet God seemed to turn a blind-eye to his penances and deaf-ear to his prayers, as Providence showered him with suffering after suffering. In fact, the Lord had said to Ananias, just after Paul’s conversion: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake” (Acts 9:16). And suffer he did! Here is St. Paul’s partial list, written down by himself, of just a fraction of his sufferings:
“They are Hebrews: so am I. They are Israelites: so am I. They are the seed of Abraham: so am I. They are the ministers of Christ, I am more―in many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, minus one. Three times was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Besides those things which are without: my daily instance, the solicitude for all the churches. If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity” (2 Corinthians 11:22-30). And now he finds himself in prison, and what does he say? He writes to the Philippians:
“Brethren! Rejoice in the Lord always! Again I say, rejoice! Let your moderation be known to all men. The Lord is near. Have no anxiety, but in every prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known to God. And may the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord” (Philippians 4:4-7).
St. Paul’s Silver-Lined Cloud
This letter of St. Paul to the Christians of Philippi—his first converts in Europe—was written to them from his prison in Rome. When the Philippians, who were very attached to their Apostle, heard of Paul’s imprisonment, they sent one of the community, Epaphroditus, with a sum of money, and with instructions to remain with Paul, to help him in his needs. Epaphroditus became seriously ill in Rome and nearly died; when he recovered Paul sent him back and sent this letter with him to the Christians of Philippi. In it he thanks them and praises them for their generosity and true Christian love, he exhorts them to remain firm in the Faith, despite the present adversity of Paul being in prison. In the four verse extract, read at today’s Mass, St. Paul urges them to “rejoice always.” He repeats it to emphasize how important he thought it: “again I say rejoice.”
The joy St. Paul urges them to practice is the spiritual joy, which comes from the knowledge that, as Christians, they are incorporated by their baptism into the Mystical Body of Christ. Part of the ‘contract’ means having to take up your cross daily and carry it with joy, as did the Apostles, who “went from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were accounted worthy to suffer reproach for the name of Jesus” (Acts 5:41). This was simply the small print of the ‘contract’ that Jesus revealed at the Last Supper, when He said: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” (John 16:20).
Can You Spot Christ?
We need our supernatural glasses, or contact lenses, to see Jesus in our sufferings―but, as the old adage goes: “Where there is the cross, there too is Christ!” St. Paul understood this and that is why he can speak so joyfully and courageously of the cross and suffering:
“For the word of the cross, to them indeed that perish, is foolishness; but to them that are saved, that is, to us, it is the power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18) ... “That I may live to God: with Christ I am nailed to the cross” (Galatians 2:19) ... “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world” (Galatians 6:14) ... “For I reckon that the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come” (Romans 8:18) ... “I Paul...now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ, in my flesh” (Colossians 1:23-24).
This attitude of St. Paul is approved and ‘rubber-stamped’ by St. Peter, who writes: “If you partake of the sufferings of Christ, then rejoice, that when His glory shall be revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy” (1 Peter 4:13).
St. Peter and St. Paul fully realize, understand and accept that God’s gifts of grace and His promise of future glory, are sufficient at all times to give us a ready and joyful acceptance of God’s will in adversity as well as in prosperity. St. Paul himself “rejoices” in his imprisonment, because his chains have turned out to be a means of spreading the Gospel, and are, for him, a means to his own salvation as well the salvation of others (1:12-20).
Rejoice—No Matter What
There are many lessons we may learn from these words of St. Paul written from a Roman dungeon to the Christians of Philippi, but the principal lesson and the one the Church wishes to place before us today is the lesson of joy. We must rejoice in the Lord—no matter what. For all that happens to us and around us, is only happening because God either wants it to happen (if it something good and not sinful) or God has allowed it to happen (if the action we suffer happens to be unjust or sinful). In all events, we must remember that nothing can happen without God’s permission. This should give us a similar attitude to suffering to that of St. Paul.
Yet our joy should not only be a result of the crosses that come our way, but let us also stop for a moment to count our blessings and see how many positive reasons we have for rejoicing.
We are alive; we are probably reasonably healthy; reasonably well-off compared to the vast majority in this world who live in poverty or near poverty; we are most certainly much better off than the people who lived centuries ago; we are human beings who can think, reason and love; we have a body with many talents and gifts, we have a soul which is destined to last forever.
The Passion of Joy
Joy is one of the passions of the soul. The passions of the soul are very powerful, but they are also blind; they need to be correctly guided, and this guidance is expected to be given by the reason and the will (popularly known as the mind and the heart, as in the Scriptural command of loving God with your whole mind, heart, etc.). If this guidance is neglected, weak or erroneous, then mayhem results, but a mayhem that the passions find intoxicatingly and deliriously joyful.
Original Sin Turns Original Joy Sour
The passions of the soul are the following: love-hatred, desire-aversion, joy-grief; hope-despair, courage-fear, and anger. Adam and Eve, in the state of innocence, were not subject to the passions that have reference to evil, for they had to face no evil, present or threatening; therefore they were not subject to fear, grief, despair, anger, or inordinate desire. They had only such passions as refer to present and future good: joy, love, hope, orderly desire. And these passions of our first parents were, before the fall, perfectly subject and obedient to their reason and will, which, in turn, were perfectly subject and obedient to the enlightenment of God’s grace.
Once they had rebelled against God through their Original Sin, it was only fitting justice that God allow the inferior passions to rebel against the superior intellect and will, just as the inferior will and intellect rebelled against the superior grace of God, thus causing the inferior Adam and Eve to rebel against the superiority of God.
It is from that Original Sin that our passions beget their rebelliousness and it is from Original Sin that our intellect and our will find themselves wounded and weakened; no longer being in total domination over our passions, who now use false ‘reasoning’ in order to extort from our intellect and will an excess of what they feel will satisfy them. The passions are blind and need to be led by right reason and a strong will, when the passions overpower our reason and the will by their constant nagging and begging, then we have a case of the blind leading the weak—and as Our Lord says, they both fall into the pit (Matthew 15:14). “For the good which I will, I do not; but the evil which I will not, that I do” (Romans 7:19).
Blind Passions Cannot See True Joy
Our passions being blind, do not discern between good and evil; their measurement stick is not a moral measurement, but a measurement of pleasure: “Does this give me pleasure or does it not give me pleasure?” To the uncontrolled and unguided passions, moral good and moral evil do not enter into the equation. For them, if something is pleasurable then it is automatically good; if something is not pleasurable, then it is automatically evil. The result is what Holy Scripture warns us about: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter” (Isaias 5:20). “Dearly beloved, follow not that which is evil, but that which is good. He that does good, is of God; he that does evil, has not seen God” (3 John 1:11).
Passionate Results
The results brought about by our blind passions are partially listed by St. Paul: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God: having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid.” (1 Timothy 3:1-5). Those who practice some or all of the above sins, find joy in them, but it is a misguided joy, a false joy, a sinful joy.
The Greedy Joy of the Passions
The passions are all about themselves and not the common good. Each one is like a gluttonous child taking his place at the dinner table—what results is a “free for all” grab and fight, unless the parents (reason and will) take charge and impose some discipline. Similarly, a child could eat ice-cream all day long and every day, or some other junk food of their choice—however, sickness or tooth decay will sooner or later show the existence of justice. Likewise, God will eventually step-in and with justice He will correct matters. Justice is giving someone their due―whether it be a good effect (a reward) or a bad effect (a punishment). “All things equally happen to the just and to the wicked, to the good and to the evil, to the clean and to the unclean” (Ecclesiastes 9:2).
Happiness and Joy is Every Person’s Goal
Whether we admit it nor and whether we like it or not, we all have the same ultimate supreme good. Our last end is a complete and enduring satisfaction or fulfillment; such a fulfillment is called beatitude or happiness and joy. But all men do not agree about the precise things in which their fulfillment and consequent happiness are to be found. Some think to attain the end by becoming rich, some by enjoying pleasures, some by exercising power, some by being praised and honored, and so on.
The desire for happiness and joy is behind our ceaseless drive towards his supreme and universal good—which, in other words, means seeking something that is wholly complete, perfectly satisfying. The problem lies in the fact that we have different ideas as to what that supreme good is; and we also differ in our opinions on how best to obtain it. Even in our sinful acts, we are seeking what we imagine to be a ‘good’, that is, satisfaction, although we are perversely seeking it in the wrong place, with the wrong persons, with the wrong things, or in the wrong manner.
Everyone seeks fulfillment or satisfaction, happiness and joy. These are the feelings we wish to experience. But those feelings need an object for their fulfillment or realization; the object which, when possessed, will give us complete happiness and joy.
The Joy of Knowing and the Joy of Possessing
We cannot enjoy something that we either know nothing about, nor enjoy something that we do not, at least temporarily, possess. I cannot enjoy a conversation if I am not engaged in one; I cannot enjoy a meal unless I am eating one; I cannot enjoy the weather unless I am actually experiencing it; I cannot enjoy a thought unless I am thinking it, and so on and so forth.
St. Louis de Montfort asks that popular philosophical question: “Is it possible for man to love that which he does not know? Can he love ardently that which he knows but imperfectly? Why then is the adorable Jesus, Eternal and Incarnate Wisdom, loved so little? Because He is not known, or known but little. Very few of us, like St. Paul, make a sincere study of the super-eminent science of Jesus, which is, nevertheless the most noble, the most consoling, the most useful and the most necessary of all sciences in Heaven and on Earth” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of the Eternal Wisdom).
Joy—the Icing on the Cake of Love
Joy is the fruit or the proverbial “icing-on-the-cake” that comes with possessing of being in the presence of what we love. Love is, in a certain sense, incomplete without the actual union with what we love. In fact, love is driven on powerfully to obtain the object of its love and will not find ultimate peace or joy until it successfully obtains the loved object.
Hence persons, who love food, are happiest and most joyful when they actually engaged in eating food. Lovers of music are happiest and most joyful when they are playing or listening to their favorite music. Sports lovers experience the height of joy only when they are actually engaged in playing or watching their favorite sport. Those who love drugs or alcohol will experience the greatest joy when they are actually united to and are consuming their beloved substance.
False Happiness and Fake Joy
However, our happiness is not to be found in wealth, whether this be natural wealth which serves our normal needs (such as food, clothing, housing), or artificial wealth (money) which provides us with the items of natural wealth. Wealth of any kind is a means for acquiring something else; it is a thing that serves; it does not fulfill. Therefore wealth cannot be the true last end of man and the object that will render him eternally and completely happy.
Nor can power supply us with perfect happiness and joy, because power, like money, is a means to achieving something further, it is not an end in itself, but a means to something else.
Nor can our full happiness be found in being honored, respected and loved on account of some of our qualities or excellence, nor can it be found in fame and glory, because all these things are imperfect, they are not universal (not everybody feels that way about us), nor are they enduring (their opinions about us may change). Any excellence in a man is in him by reason of some good already possessed; it means that he already has some degree of happiness. Honors come to him because of this happiness, and therefore honor, praise and respect cannot themselves be the elements of perfect happiness.
Our ultimate happiness does not consist in goods of the body―life, health, strength, beauty, agility, etc. for these goods preserve the body and its perfections. Merely to preserve life cannot be the end of life. Just like money and power, goods of the body are to be used as a means by reason (intellect and will) and not to be looked upon as end in itself, just like a ship is used by its captain; or a car by its owner. The car is a means of transportation and of carrying cargo, it is not there to be just looked at and enjoyed. The captain does not dock his ship in harbor to be admired, but to carry passengers or profitable cargoes to desired ports. Likewise the goods of the body are means to an end, and not complete ends in themselves. Besides, being a rational being as well as a bodily being; we can never be completely fulfilled and satisfied by bodily goods alone, for the soul ranks higher than the body.
Joy from Above, or Joy from Below?
In fact, no created good or creature can give us perfect happiness, for they all have limits and degrees that allow them to give only partial happiness and a passing joy. No created good is wholly perfect, in all areas and limitless in its degrees of fulfillment; only an uncreated and limitless good can be our ultimate end and joy. And this uncreated good is God.
However, if we listen to our passions more than we listen to God, then problems will arise. As already stated, happiness and joy are our ultimate goals, and if we no longer seek happiness and joy in the things that are above, then, nature abhorring a vacuum, will look for that happiness and joy the things that are below, for the hungry passion needs to be fed on something. If we refuse to eat healthy food, then we will by default eat junk food. Our Lord clearly tells us:
“My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36) ... “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world” (John 8:23). “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24). To which St. James adds: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” (John 16:20). That is why St. Paul says: “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2).
No doubt friendship with the world, acceptance by the world, the ways of acting of the world, may bring us great happiness and joy, but it is not the happiness and joy of Heaven, it is not a true and enduring happiness: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Obtaining that Heavenly Joy
True happiness and joy cannot be perfectly attained without rightness or rectitude in our will, where the will is conformed to and obedient to the guidance of grace and the teachings of Christ, Who tells us what to love and what not to love; what to seek and what not to seek. This sets our will in proper alignment with the supreme good, and makes our will love what it loves in perfect subordination to God. Without this subordination and perfection of our human will, we will never be perfectly happy. “But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Luke 12:31). “Not everyone that saiys to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). “If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love” (John 15:10).
Love, when it is true, brings joy. But love is reciprocal (two-way-street); it means not just being loved, but loving in return; it means not just taking, but giving in return. “He that loves Me, shall be loved of My Father: and I will love him” (John 14:21). If we love Our Lord we must keep His commandments. This will bring, what is known as the “Joy of a Good Conscience.”
Happiness and Joy are Essentially in the Soul
Our ultimate happiness is essentially an operation of our soul: it is to know God with our intellect (our mind) and to love God with our will (our heart); both are faculties and actions of the soul. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole mind ... This is the greatest and the first commandment” (Matthew 22:37-38).
Therefore the body is not essential to our ultimate happiness. But there is a need in each soul to be in its own body, God made us that way. In the present life, a fit and healthy body is required for earthly happiness and joy, whereas a feeble and sick body is often the source of sickness and sorrow. In the after-life, though the body is not essential to the soul’s happiness and joy in Heaven, a body will be supplied to the soul at the general resurrection. Then the body itself will attain full perfection, but is will only be a secondary or accidental factor to the happiness and joy of Heaven.
Heavenly Joys without Food, Drink, Sleep and Belongings
External goods, such as food, drink, and property, which are required in due measure for earthly happiness, will not be required at all in Heaven. When souls and bodies are reunited at the general resurrection, our human bodies will be spiritualized and will no longer have material or animal needs. In Heaven, the fellowship of friends will not be essential to our happiness, for God will be all-sufficing. Nevertheless, friends will be loved and their fellowship will be enjoyed in God.
In the present earthly life we can reach a certain degree of happiness, but we cannot have perfect happiness. On Earth limitations and drawbacks are associated with happiness. Only the vision, experience and possession of God can make us perfectly happy, and this vision cannot be had in earthly life. Once we have attained this perfect joy and happiness, it cannot be lost. For perfect happiness fills up our capacity and all our desires for what is good; that there is no tendency remaining in us which might lead us astray and away from our joyful and happy state.
We have been redeemed and been given a chance to attain eternal happiness in Heaven; we have the means of going there and have a guarantee we will get there if we use those means. We are among the minority in this world who have been baptized; we are part of an even greater minority of the baptized who still practice the Faith; we are able to receive our God and Creator in Holy Communion—daily if we wish (in most cases); we have access to the Sacrament of Confession in the case we fall into mortal sin and lose, thereby, our chance of going to Heaven.
And while we battle and struggle on the road to Heaven, we are allowed to enjoy many temporal gifts offered us from the generous hand of a loving Father. Have we not reason to rejoice, to be glad? Indeed, can any true Christian be sad? Of course, we meet with snags and setbacks on the road. To reach the summit of the everlasting hills of Heaven we have to climb the rugged foothills that lead to the summit, but a true Christian will not moan and murmur because of that. It is only those who are going nowhere, those who are to remain forever in a lowly painful valley, who meet no obstacles and have no hills to climb. For them there is only the broad, wide road that leads downwards. We have a chance of going to Heaven and so we realize that every obstacle we overcome, every little summit we scale, is bringing us nearer to the lofty peaks where everlasting happiness and the “peace of God” will be our eternal reward together with an unending joy!
For some people, Advent―much like Lent―is a penitential prison or penitential penitentiary, in which they would rather not be! They feel imprisoned, constrained, cramped and straitjacketed by the Church’s recommendation to do penance. As regards the “Prison of Advent”, today―the Third Sunday of Advent―is called Gaudete Sunday. The title “Gaudete” originates from the reading at Mass on the Third Sunday of Advent, which is taken from St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians, for the Church uses the passage from Philippians chapter 4, verse 4, which says: “Rejoice in the Lord always; again, I say, rejoice!” The Church uses that phrase, both in the entrance hymn and in the reading for the Third Sunday of Advent.
The Introit or Entrance Hymn for Gaudete Sunday commands: “Rejoice in the Lord always! Again I say, rejoice! Let your moderation be known to all men―for the Lord is near! Have no anxiety, but in everything, by prayer, let your petitions be made known to God!”
Then, in the Epistle reading of the Mass for Gaudete Sunday―lo and behold―the same injunction is repeated, slightly expanded and with an additional verse at the end: “Brethren! Rejoice in the Lord always! Again I say, rejoice! Let your moderation be known to all men! The Lord is near! Have no anxiety, but, in every prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known to God! And may the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord!” (Philippians 4:4-7).
To put it into its proper context, you need to know that St. Paul is writing this during the time of his imprisonment at Rome―and he is joyful despite that. Gaudete Sunday is the point in Advent when the traditional purple of Advent “lightens-up” and rose colored vestments are worn. Gaudete Sunday is the day upon which the Church encourages us to “lighten-up” a little and rejoice. To rejoice! What does it mean “to rejoice”? When we look at that word and break it down, we see that it is a combination of two things: (1) to show joy, (2) once again. If we simplify or divide the word “rejoice” into more understandable parts, we come up with the prefix “re-” and word “joy.” The prefix “re-” means to do something over again or do something once more after a relapse. Hence we have similar examples in the following words: re-think, re-do, re-paint, re-write, re-make, etc.
What is “Rejoicing”?
To “rejoice” means to put aside sadness, sorrow, despondency, discouragement and despair, and take up once again feelings of joy. People are sad and disheartened in poverty, but rejoice if somebody somehow alleviates their poverty, even if it is only for a short time. A nation can be discouraged and depressed in a war, but rejoices in victory, when the war is won, the enemy defeated and peace ensues.
The Example of St. Paul
In like manner, sinful mankind can be sad and sorrowful at sight of its sins; for which it is paying through penance and piteously pleading for pardon and peace; yet the Divine deafness leaves them downcast and discouraged under the domination of devils. All this can be seen united in the person of St. Paul: (1) He was a great sinner who had persecuted Christians until converted by Our Lord Himself; (2) He penitentially practiced powerful penances and perseveringly prayed for the rest of his life in order to make amends; (3) yet God seemed to turn a blind-eye to his penances and deaf-ear to his prayers, as Providence showered him with suffering after suffering. In fact, the Lord had said to Ananias, just after Paul’s conversion: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake” (Acts 9:16). And suffer he did! Here is St. Paul’s partial list, written down by himself, of just a fraction of his sufferings:
“They are Hebrews: so am I. They are Israelites: so am I. They are the seed of Abraham: so am I. They are the ministers of Christ, I am more―in many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, minus one. Three times was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Besides those things which are without: my daily instance, the solicitude for all the churches. If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity” (2 Corinthians 11:22-30). And now he finds himself in prison, and what does he say? He writes to the Philippians:
“Brethren! Rejoice in the Lord always! Again I say, rejoice! Let your moderation be known to all men. The Lord is near. Have no anxiety, but in every prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known to God. And may the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord” (Philippians 4:4-7).
St. Paul’s Silver-Lined Cloud
This letter of St. Paul to the Christians of Philippi—his first converts in Europe—was written to them from his prison in Rome. When the Philippians, who were very attached to their Apostle, heard of Paul’s imprisonment, they sent one of the community, Epaphroditus, with a sum of money, and with instructions to remain with Paul, to help him in his needs. Epaphroditus became seriously ill in Rome and nearly died; when he recovered Paul sent him back and sent this letter with him to the Christians of Philippi. In it he thanks them and praises them for their generosity and true Christian love, he exhorts them to remain firm in the Faith, despite the present adversity of Paul being in prison. In the four verse extract, read at today’s Mass, St. Paul urges them to “rejoice always.” He repeats it to emphasize how important he thought it: “again I say rejoice.”
The joy St. Paul urges them to practice is the spiritual joy, which comes from the knowledge that, as Christians, they are incorporated by their baptism into the Mystical Body of Christ. Part of the ‘contract’ means having to take up your cross daily and carry it with joy, as did the Apostles, who “went from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were accounted worthy to suffer reproach for the name of Jesus” (Acts 5:41). This was simply the small print of the ‘contract’ that Jesus revealed at the Last Supper, when He said: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” (John 16:20).
Can You Spot Christ?
We need our supernatural glasses, or contact lenses, to see Jesus in our sufferings―but, as the old adage goes: “Where there is the cross, there too is Christ!” St. Paul understood this and that is why he can speak so joyfully and courageously of the cross and suffering:
“For the word of the cross, to them indeed that perish, is foolishness; but to them that are saved, that is, to us, it is the power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18) ... “That I may live to God: with Christ I am nailed to the cross” (Galatians 2:19) ... “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world” (Galatians 6:14) ... “For I reckon that the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come” (Romans 8:18) ... “I Paul...now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ, in my flesh” (Colossians 1:23-24).
This attitude of St. Paul is approved and ‘rubber-stamped’ by St. Peter, who writes: “If you partake of the sufferings of Christ, then rejoice, that when His glory shall be revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy” (1 Peter 4:13).
St. Peter and St. Paul fully realize, understand and accept that God’s gifts of grace and His promise of future glory, are sufficient at all times to give us a ready and joyful acceptance of God’s will in adversity as well as in prosperity. St. Paul himself “rejoices” in his imprisonment, because his chains have turned out to be a means of spreading the Gospel, and are, for him, a means to his own salvation as well the salvation of others (1:12-20).
Rejoice—No Matter What
There are many lessons we may learn from these words of St. Paul written from a Roman dungeon to the Christians of Philippi, but the principal lesson and the one the Church wishes to place before us today is the lesson of joy. We must rejoice in the Lord—no matter what. For all that happens to us and around us, is only happening because God either wants it to happen (if it something good and not sinful) or God has allowed it to happen (if the action we suffer happens to be unjust or sinful). In all events, we must remember that nothing can happen without God’s permission. This should give us a similar attitude to suffering to that of St. Paul.
Yet our joy should not only be a result of the crosses that come our way, but let us also stop for a moment to count our blessings and see how many positive reasons we have for rejoicing.
We are alive; we are probably reasonably healthy; reasonably well-off compared to the vast majority in this world who live in poverty or near poverty; we are most certainly much better off than the people who lived centuries ago; we are human beings who can think, reason and love; we have a body with many talents and gifts, we have a soul which is destined to last forever.
The Passion of Joy
Joy is one of the passions of the soul. The passions of the soul are very powerful, but they are also blind; they need to be correctly guided, and this guidance is expected to be given by the reason and the will (popularly known as the mind and the heart, as in the Scriptural command of loving God with your whole mind, heart, etc.). If this guidance is neglected, weak or erroneous, then mayhem results, but a mayhem that the passions find intoxicatingly and deliriously joyful.
Original Sin Turns Original Joy Sour
The passions of the soul are the following: love-hatred, desire-aversion, joy-grief; hope-despair, courage-fear, and anger. Adam and Eve, in the state of innocence, were not subject to the passions that have reference to evil, for they had to face no evil, present or threatening; therefore they were not subject to fear, grief, despair, anger, or inordinate desire. They had only such passions as refer to present and future good: joy, love, hope, orderly desire. And these passions of our first parents were, before the fall, perfectly subject and obedient to their reason and will, which, in turn, were perfectly subject and obedient to the enlightenment of God’s grace.
Once they had rebelled against God through their Original Sin, it was only fitting justice that God allow the inferior passions to rebel against the superior intellect and will, just as the inferior will and intellect rebelled against the superior grace of God, thus causing the inferior Adam and Eve to rebel against the superiority of God.
It is from that Original Sin that our passions beget their rebelliousness and it is from Original Sin that our intellect and our will find themselves wounded and weakened; no longer being in total domination over our passions, who now use false ‘reasoning’ in order to extort from our intellect and will an excess of what they feel will satisfy them. The passions are blind and need to be led by right reason and a strong will, when the passions overpower our reason and the will by their constant nagging and begging, then we have a case of the blind leading the weak—and as Our Lord says, they both fall into the pit (Matthew 15:14). “For the good which I will, I do not; but the evil which I will not, that I do” (Romans 7:19).
Blind Passions Cannot See True Joy
Our passions being blind, do not discern between good and evil; their measurement stick is not a moral measurement, but a measurement of pleasure: “Does this give me pleasure or does it not give me pleasure?” To the uncontrolled and unguided passions, moral good and moral evil do not enter into the equation. For them, if something is pleasurable then it is automatically good; if something is not pleasurable, then it is automatically evil. The result is what Holy Scripture warns us about: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter” (Isaias 5:20). “Dearly beloved, follow not that which is evil, but that which is good. He that does good, is of God; he that does evil, has not seen God” (3 John 1:11).
Passionate Results
The results brought about by our blind passions are partially listed by St. Paul: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God: having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid.” (1 Timothy 3:1-5). Those who practice some or all of the above sins, find joy in them, but it is a misguided joy, a false joy, a sinful joy.
The Greedy Joy of the Passions
The passions are all about themselves and not the common good. Each one is like a gluttonous child taking his place at the dinner table—what results is a “free for all” grab and fight, unless the parents (reason and will) take charge and impose some discipline. Similarly, a child could eat ice-cream all day long and every day, or some other junk food of their choice—however, sickness or tooth decay will sooner or later show the existence of justice. Likewise, God will eventually step-in and with justice He will correct matters. Justice is giving someone their due―whether it be a good effect (a reward) or a bad effect (a punishment). “All things equally happen to the just and to the wicked, to the good and to the evil, to the clean and to the unclean” (Ecclesiastes 9:2).
Happiness and Joy is Every Person’s Goal
Whether we admit it nor and whether we like it or not, we all have the same ultimate supreme good. Our last end is a complete and enduring satisfaction or fulfillment; such a fulfillment is called beatitude or happiness and joy. But all men do not agree about the precise things in which their fulfillment and consequent happiness are to be found. Some think to attain the end by becoming rich, some by enjoying pleasures, some by exercising power, some by being praised and honored, and so on.
The desire for happiness and joy is behind our ceaseless drive towards his supreme and universal good—which, in other words, means seeking something that is wholly complete, perfectly satisfying. The problem lies in the fact that we have different ideas as to what that supreme good is; and we also differ in our opinions on how best to obtain it. Even in our sinful acts, we are seeking what we imagine to be a ‘good’, that is, satisfaction, although we are perversely seeking it in the wrong place, with the wrong persons, with the wrong things, or in the wrong manner.
Everyone seeks fulfillment or satisfaction, happiness and joy. These are the feelings we wish to experience. But those feelings need an object for their fulfillment or realization; the object which, when possessed, will give us complete happiness and joy.
The Joy of Knowing and the Joy of Possessing
We cannot enjoy something that we either know nothing about, nor enjoy something that we do not, at least temporarily, possess. I cannot enjoy a conversation if I am not engaged in one; I cannot enjoy a meal unless I am eating one; I cannot enjoy the weather unless I am actually experiencing it; I cannot enjoy a thought unless I am thinking it, and so on and so forth.
St. Louis de Montfort asks that popular philosophical question: “Is it possible for man to love that which he does not know? Can he love ardently that which he knows but imperfectly? Why then is the adorable Jesus, Eternal and Incarnate Wisdom, loved so little? Because He is not known, or known but little. Very few of us, like St. Paul, make a sincere study of the super-eminent science of Jesus, which is, nevertheless the most noble, the most consoling, the most useful and the most necessary of all sciences in Heaven and on Earth” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of the Eternal Wisdom).
Joy—the Icing on the Cake of Love
Joy is the fruit or the proverbial “icing-on-the-cake” that comes with possessing of being in the presence of what we love. Love is, in a certain sense, incomplete without the actual union with what we love. In fact, love is driven on powerfully to obtain the object of its love and will not find ultimate peace or joy until it successfully obtains the loved object.
Hence persons, who love food, are happiest and most joyful when they actually engaged in eating food. Lovers of music are happiest and most joyful when they are playing or listening to their favorite music. Sports lovers experience the height of joy only when they are actually engaged in playing or watching their favorite sport. Those who love drugs or alcohol will experience the greatest joy when they are actually united to and are consuming their beloved substance.
False Happiness and Fake Joy
However, our happiness is not to be found in wealth, whether this be natural wealth which serves our normal needs (such as food, clothing, housing), or artificial wealth (money) which provides us with the items of natural wealth. Wealth of any kind is a means for acquiring something else; it is a thing that serves; it does not fulfill. Therefore wealth cannot be the true last end of man and the object that will render him eternally and completely happy.
Nor can power supply us with perfect happiness and joy, because power, like money, is a means to achieving something further, it is not an end in itself, but a means to something else.
Nor can our full happiness be found in being honored, respected and loved on account of some of our qualities or excellence, nor can it be found in fame and glory, because all these things are imperfect, they are not universal (not everybody feels that way about us), nor are they enduring (their opinions about us may change). Any excellence in a man is in him by reason of some good already possessed; it means that he already has some degree of happiness. Honors come to him because of this happiness, and therefore honor, praise and respect cannot themselves be the elements of perfect happiness.
Our ultimate happiness does not consist in goods of the body―life, health, strength, beauty, agility, etc. for these goods preserve the body and its perfections. Merely to preserve life cannot be the end of life. Just like money and power, goods of the body are to be used as a means by reason (intellect and will) and not to be looked upon as end in itself, just like a ship is used by its captain; or a car by its owner. The car is a means of transportation and of carrying cargo, it is not there to be just looked at and enjoyed. The captain does not dock his ship in harbor to be admired, but to carry passengers or profitable cargoes to desired ports. Likewise the goods of the body are means to an end, and not complete ends in themselves. Besides, being a rational being as well as a bodily being; we can never be completely fulfilled and satisfied by bodily goods alone, for the soul ranks higher than the body.
Joy from Above, or Joy from Below?
In fact, no created good or creature can give us perfect happiness, for they all have limits and degrees that allow them to give only partial happiness and a passing joy. No created good is wholly perfect, in all areas and limitless in its degrees of fulfillment; only an uncreated and limitless good can be our ultimate end and joy. And this uncreated good is God.
However, if we listen to our passions more than we listen to God, then problems will arise. As already stated, happiness and joy are our ultimate goals, and if we no longer seek happiness and joy in the things that are above, then, nature abhorring a vacuum, will look for that happiness and joy the things that are below, for the hungry passion needs to be fed on something. If we refuse to eat healthy food, then we will by default eat junk food. Our Lord clearly tells us:
“My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36) ... “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world” (John 8:23). “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24). To which St. James adds: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” (John 16:20). That is why St. Paul says: “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2).
No doubt friendship with the world, acceptance by the world, the ways of acting of the world, may bring us great happiness and joy, but it is not the happiness and joy of Heaven, it is not a true and enduring happiness: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Obtaining that Heavenly Joy
True happiness and joy cannot be perfectly attained without rightness or rectitude in our will, where the will is conformed to and obedient to the guidance of grace and the teachings of Christ, Who tells us what to love and what not to love; what to seek and what not to seek. This sets our will in proper alignment with the supreme good, and makes our will love what it loves in perfect subordination to God. Without this subordination and perfection of our human will, we will never be perfectly happy. “But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Luke 12:31). “Not everyone that saiys to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). “If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love” (John 15:10).
Love, when it is true, brings joy. But love is reciprocal (two-way-street); it means not just being loved, but loving in return; it means not just taking, but giving in return. “He that loves Me, shall be loved of My Father: and I will love him” (John 14:21). If we love Our Lord we must keep His commandments. This will bring, what is known as the “Joy of a Good Conscience.”
Happiness and Joy are Essentially in the Soul
Our ultimate happiness is essentially an operation of our soul: it is to know God with our intellect (our mind) and to love God with our will (our heart); both are faculties and actions of the soul. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole mind ... This is the greatest and the first commandment” (Matthew 22:37-38).
Therefore the body is not essential to our ultimate happiness. But there is a need in each soul to be in its own body, God made us that way. In the present life, a fit and healthy body is required for earthly happiness and joy, whereas a feeble and sick body is often the source of sickness and sorrow. In the after-life, though the body is not essential to the soul’s happiness and joy in Heaven, a body will be supplied to the soul at the general resurrection. Then the body itself will attain full perfection, but is will only be a secondary or accidental factor to the happiness and joy of Heaven.
Heavenly Joys without Food, Drink, Sleep and Belongings
External goods, such as food, drink, and property, which are required in due measure for earthly happiness, will not be required at all in Heaven. When souls and bodies are reunited at the general resurrection, our human bodies will be spiritualized and will no longer have material or animal needs. In Heaven, the fellowship of friends will not be essential to our happiness, for God will be all-sufficing. Nevertheless, friends will be loved and their fellowship will be enjoyed in God.
In the present earthly life we can reach a certain degree of happiness, but we cannot have perfect happiness. On Earth limitations and drawbacks are associated with happiness. Only the vision, experience and possession of God can make us perfectly happy, and this vision cannot be had in earthly life. Once we have attained this perfect joy and happiness, it cannot be lost. For perfect happiness fills up our capacity and all our desires for what is good; that there is no tendency remaining in us which might lead us astray and away from our joyful and happy state.
We have been redeemed and been given a chance to attain eternal happiness in Heaven; we have the means of going there and have a guarantee we will get there if we use those means. We are among the minority in this world who have been baptized; we are part of an even greater minority of the baptized who still practice the Faith; we are able to receive our God and Creator in Holy Communion—daily if we wish (in most cases); we have access to the Sacrament of Confession in the case we fall into mortal sin and lose, thereby, our chance of going to Heaven.
And while we battle and struggle on the road to Heaven, we are allowed to enjoy many temporal gifts offered us from the generous hand of a loving Father. Have we not reason to rejoice, to be glad? Indeed, can any true Christian be sad? Of course, we meet with snags and setbacks on the road. To reach the summit of the everlasting hills of Heaven we have to climb the rugged foothills that lead to the summit, but a true Christian will not moan and murmur because of that. It is only those who are going nowhere, those who are to remain forever in a lowly painful valley, who meet no obstacles and have no hills to climb. For them there is only the broad, wide road that leads downwards. We have a chance of going to Heaven and so we realize that every obstacle we overcome, every little summit we scale, is bringing us nearer to the lofty peaks where everlasting happiness and the “peace of God” will be our eternal reward together with an unending joy!
Article 11
Friday & Saturday, December 13th & 14th
Will You Win Heaven's Lottery?
Friday & Saturday, December 13th & 14th
Will You Win Heaven's Lottery?
Lotteries on Friday the 13th?
Today, as you know, is Friday the 13th! For those who are superstitious, Friday the 13th is looked upon as an unlucky day! Not a day to buy your lottery ticket for Heaven! Some folk try to tie Friday the 13th to the 13 persons present at the Last Supper and they look upon Judas Iscariot as the 13th person, the one who betrayed Christ and was instrumental in His Passion and Death. Judas went on to commit suicide by hanging himself―many commentators think that it was on the same Friday as Christ was crucified.
The superstition that Friday the 13th is an unlucky day has only been around as a popular thing for the past few hundred years or so―it doesn’t have the ancient origins that many might expect. It is hard to pinpoint exactly why Friday the 13th is considered an unlucky day. Experts merely speculate. The first references saying that Friday the 13th is unlucky, are from French writing and plays. A character in the 1834 play, Les Finesses des Gribouilles, says “I was born on a Friday, December 13th, 1813―from which come all of my misfortunes.” And in the French literary magazine Revue de Paris, Marquis de Salvo wrote about a father who killed his daughter on Friday the 13th, and said: “It is always Fridays and the number thirteen that bring back luck!”
While the combination of Friday and 13 is a relatively new invention, the idea that Fridays are unlucky is not. Fridays were considered unlucky days, and that has been true since the Middle-Ages in the English speaking world and probably through most of Europe―because Friday was the day of the Crucifixion. Some think that the arrest of the Knights Templar on Friday, October 13th, 1307 influenced the superstition, but it's not clear if it was the origin. In Norse mythology, the 13th god, Loki, brought chaos and death.
Some argue that 12 is a number that is very mathematically significant. It's divisible by many different numbers―2, 3, 4 and 6. There are 12 months, 12 zodiac signs, 12 inches in a foot. And then along comes the number 13―it is kind of a dud number. It doesn't really help you out much mathematically.
There are other superstitions―such as …
● Breaking a mirror: Breaking a mirror is said to bring seven years of bad luck.
● Walking under a ladder: This superstition stems from the idea that walking under a ladder disrupts the triangle, a symbol of life, and invites misfortune.
● Spilling salt: Accidentally spilling salt has been seen as bad luck for centuries. To counteract, throw a pinch over your left shoulder to ward off evil.
● Crossing paths with a black cat: Black cats, often associated with witches and bad omens, are considered unlucky, especially when they cross your path on Friday the 13th.
● Stepping on Cracks: The rhyme "step on a crack, break your mother's back" comes from the idea that stepping on cracks invites bad energy or harm.
To avoid bad luck and attract good luck, some people will:
● Carry a lucky charm: Items like four-leaf clovers, horseshoes, or rabbit’s feet are believed to bring good luck and protection from bad luck.
● Knock on wood: This age-old superstition is believed to prevent bad luck or jinxes. They say that if you say something hopeful, knock on wood to “seal the deal” then you will keep good fortune on your side.
These are merely two of many such superstitious practices seeking out good luck.
However, there is no such thing as luck―neither good luck, nor bad luck. All is ruled and guided by Divine Providence. Nothing happens without God either wanting good things to happen, or allowing bad things to happen.
Our Lady and the 13th
If anything blasts superstitious practices out of the water, then it is Our Lady of Fatima. Our Lady chose the 13th of each month―from May to October―to appear to the three children at Fatima. One of those had her appearing on Friday the 13th―which was July 13th, 1917. Friday the 13th occurs at least once a year and, occasionally but not often, up to three times in a single year. There can be no more than three Friday the 13ths in a single calendar year.
Is Heaven a Lottery?
Just as we do not know which ticket will win a lottery―likewise we do not know which souls will win the reward of Heaven when they die. Holy Scripture, through St. Paul, tells us: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? Therefore, run so that you may obtain it! I, therefore, so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection! Lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27). Elsewhere he adds: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Heaven is not guaranteed to anyone―it is not a “freebie”, we have no inherent right to salvation―we have work out our salvation, because “many are called, but few are chosen!” says Our Lord (Matthew 22:14). “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
Our Lord further adds: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). We read in the Old Testament that Esau sold his birthright to his twin brother for a bowl of stew (pottage):
“When they were grown up, Esau became a skillful hunter and farmer, but Jacob, a plain man, dwelt in tents. Isaac loved his son Esau, because he ate of his hunting; and Isaac’s wife, Rebecca, loved Jacob. And Jacob boiled pottage (stew), to whom Esau, coming hungry and faint out of the field, said: ‘Give me of this red pottage, for I am exceeding faint!’ And Jacob said to him: ‘Sell me thy first birthright!’ Esau answered: ‘Look, I am dying of hunger, what will the first birthright avail me?’ Jacob said: ‘Swear, therefore, to me!’ Esau swore to him, and sold his first birthright. And so taking bread and the pottage of lentils, he ate, and drank, and went his way―making little account of having sold his first birthright” (Genesis 25:27-34).
Our Lord echoes something similar: “And as in the days of Noe, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be! For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, even until that day in which Noe entered into the ark! And they knew not until the flood came and took them all away―so also shall the coming of the Son of man be! Then two shall be in the field―one shall be taken, and one shall be left!” (Matthew 24:37-40). Holy Scripture adds: “In the days of Noe, when the Ark was being built, wherein a few―that is, only eight souls―were saved by water! … God spared not the original world, but preserved Noe, one of eight persons in the Ark, the preacher of justice, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly!” (1 Peter 3:20; 2 Peter 2:5). Some lottery, huh? Eight winning tickets out of God knows how many millions!
Trading Heaven for the World
Our Lady said to St. Bernadette of Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next world!” Tragically, most people end up trading Heaven for the world. They prefer the here and now to the hereafter. Or, insanely, they imagine that “you can keep your cake and also eat it”! They imagine that they can love the world and love God! Yet Our Lord and Holy Scripture burst that false bubble, saying: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” says Our Lord (Matthew 6:19-24). Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Yet most people―even Catholics, even Conservative and Traditional Catholics―ignore that truth and create their own preferred ‘truth’.
The gospel of the world is more popular today than the Gospel of Christ. As Our Lady of La Salette warned: The Gospel of Jesus Christ has been forgotten … The devil will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus!” The current statistics prove all of this be true. The obligatory Sunday Mass attendance has plummeted over the last 60 years or so―from around 75% to 80% down to anywhere from 5% to 20%. Most Catholics believe you can be a ‘good’ Catholic without attending Sunday Mass. The majority of Catholics today accept contraception, abortion, LGBTQ+ relationships, same-sex marriages, divorce and remarriage, etc. That kind of “lottery ticket” is a guaranteed loser! These ‘lottery losers’ are what Our Lord refers to when He says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Our Lady warned of such times: “From the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France). Very few lottery winners among all that! Yet that is what we are seeing today all around us! The Catholic Faith has decayed. There is an increasing general corruption of morals. Luxury rules. Impurity rules. Immodesty is everywhere―even in Catholic churches on Sundays. Less and less children maintain their innocence. Very few winning tickets are to be found!
Our Lady warned of such times: “From the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France).
Very few lottery winners among all that! Yet that is what we are seeing today all around us! The Catholic Faith has decayed. There is an increasing general corruption of morals. Luxury rules. Impurity rules. Immodesty is everywhere―even in Catholic churches on Sundays. Less and less children maintain their innocence. People prefer to talk online or on social media rather than talk to God. Hours are spent on worldly occupations―God gets barely a few minutes and those minutes are not very enthusiastic! Very few winning tickets are to be found among such people! Hardly anyone wants to be saint―most people want to rich, powerful, sexy and well-liked by the world. Our Lord warned us: “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:24). The words of Holy Scripture are ignored: “For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! … He that sows iniquity shall reap evils! … For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting. He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (Galatians 6:8; Proverbs 22:8; 2 Corinthians 9:6).
God Wants Everyone to be a Winner
God wants everyone to have a winning lottery ticket to Heaven: “God will have [“to will” means “to want”] all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). God tries to sow His Word into the soil of our souls, but it requires our cooperation for it to grow and bear fruit―eventually winning for us the eternal fruit of Heaven. “The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. The sower went out to sow his seed. And whilst he sowed, some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down by men, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And some seed fell upon stony ground, where it had not much depth of earth, and the seed sprouted and shot up immediately, because there was no deepness of earth. But when the sun was risen, the sprouted seed was scorched, because it had no root and no moisture. And other seed fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up with it and choked it and it yielded no fruit. And others fell upon good ground: and this seed brought forth fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold.
“And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom Jesus said: ‘The parable is this! Hear therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil, Satan, comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
Not Everyone Wins
Though God wants everyone to be a winner, not everyone wins the lottery of Heaven. It is not due to a failure on God’s part―but a failure on our part. We neglect or refuse to cooperate with God and follow His instructions. St. Augustine―a Father and Doctor of the Church―tells us that “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us!” Some translate the Latin into the singular: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, but God will not save you without your cooperation.
We see this indicated in the parable about the Sowing of the Seed of the Word of God: “And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom Jesus said: ‘The parable is this! Hear therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil, Satan, comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
As the above parable indicates―very few people let the word of God take hold of their minds and hearts so that it may grow within them and bear fruit. It is fruit that God is after―as Our Lord indicated at the Last Supper: “I am the true vine and My Father is the farmer. I am the vine―you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. Every branch in Me that bears not fruit, He will take away; and everyone that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit. In this is My Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit, and become My disciples. If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch and shall wither―and they shall gather him up and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 5:1-8).
This is echoed in Our Lord’s parable about the unfruitful fig tree: “A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why does it encumber the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And, perhaps happily it will bear fruit, but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-9).
Another parable of Our Lord’s dovetails with this need to produce fruit in order to assure oneself of a winning lottery ticket to Heaven―it is the parable of the talents, where one man buried his talent and failed to produce fruit with it: “A man going into a far country, called his servants, and delivered to them his goods. And to one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―giving to everyone according to his proper ability: and immediately he took his journey. [1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of around $30 per ounce, that would make 1 talent worth over $22,000, thus 5 talents would be around $110,000; 2 talents would be $60,000, and 1 talent would be $30,000]. And he that had received the five talents, went his way, and traded with the same, and gained other five. And in like manner he that had received the two, gained other two. But he that had received the one, going his way dug into the earth, and hid his lord’s money.
“After a long time, the lord of those servants came and reckoned with them. And he that had received the five talents, came and brought other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you delivered to me five talents! Behold I have gained other five over and above!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place you over many things―enter into the joy of your lord!’
“And he also, that had received the two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you delivered two talents to me! Behold I have gained other two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place you over many things―enter into the joy of your lord!’
“But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man―you reap where you have not sown, and gather where you have not strewn. And, being afraid, I went and hid you talent in the earth! Behold, here you can have that which is yours!’ And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewn! Therefore you ought to have committed my money to the bankers, and, at my coming, I should have received my own with usury! Take away, therefore, the talent from him, and give it to him that has ten talents! For to everyone that has shall be given, and he shall abound―but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have, shall be taken away! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness! There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
Making Sure You Win the Lottery!
God wants you to be saved! We want you to be saved! You want to be saved! But all of that does not guarantee that you will be saved. If you fail to make the necessary efforts; fail to listen and follow instructions; if you are indifferent, lazy, neglectful; if you make peace with the world, feel at home in the world, love the world and follow it maxims―then you severely handicap any chance you might have of “winning the race”―as St. Paul calls it―or of winning Heaven’s lottery ticket―as we have called it. Everyone can be a winner―but not everyone does what it takes to win. “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). So what can we do to ensure that we come out as winners and not losers? It does not take a rocket-scientist or a university professor to figure out the answer! We have already been given the answer―but we pay little attention to it!
(1) Love God Above All Things
Holy Scripture, speaking of the virtues, says: The greatest of these is charity (1 Corinthians 13:13). Charity is first and foremost a love of God; and secondarily it is a love of neighbor for the sake of God: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Without Charity we are nothing! “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Nobody―apart from the Blessed Virgin Mary―is born with a total love of God. Love, you could say, is a labor of love. We must work at growing progressively in a love of God―just like a baby grows progressively into a mature adult.
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE writes: “The common teaching is, on the contrary, that Christian perfection requires great Charity. Charity is the bond of perfection because it is the highest of the virtues which unites our soul to God and it vivifies all the other virtues by rendering their acts meritorious. Perfection does not consist chiefly in humility, nor does it consist especially in poverty, nor in acts of worship, or of the virtue of religion―but it lies primarily in the love of God and of one’s neighbor, which renders the acts of all the other virtues meritorious. By Charity we become the temples of the Holy Ghost. St. John gives us the same doctrine in his First Epistle (4:16-21): ‘God is Charity: and he that abides in Charity, abides in God, and God in him.’ Without Charity, the most excellent extraordinary gifts are of no avail for eternal life. St. Augustine says: ‘Love and do what you wish!’ and what you will do, will merit eternal life for you, if you truly love your God more than yourself. Charity ought ever to increase in us until death and it should grow in three ways―by merit, prayer, and the sacraments. The Charity of beginners is not victorious over all egoism; far from it. We find in our souls an inordinate love of self which, without being gravely culpable, is an obstacle. Gray stands between black and white. Between the state of mortal sin and that of perfect and radiant Charity, stands Charity of a very low degree―the exercise of which is often hindered by a troop of habitual venial sins, of immoderate self-love, of vanity, of laziness, of injustice, and the like. Undoubtedly, this Charity of low degree ought to grow. It should grow because the Christian on Earth is a traveler or wayfarer, who is advancing spiritually toward God.
“Every traveler toward eternity should, while on Earth, grow in Charity as they draw nearer to God―not only beginners and proficients. They ought to advance toward Him so much the more rapidly as they are nearer to Him and as He draws them more strongly. God moves us and draws us to Himself. He is the beginning and the end of all, sovereign Good, who attracts love so much the more strongly as one draws nearer to Him. Thus, in the lives of the saints the progress of love during their last years is much more rapid than in their earlier life. This increasingly rapid progress existed especially in the life of the Blessed Virgin for it found no obstacle in her, and it was so much the more intense as the initial speed, or the first grace, was greater. There was in her a marvelous acceleration of the love of God. We see thus why Charity ought not only to grow in us until death, but to increase more and more like a falling body, the speed of which increases until it reaches its last end.”
“How, then, does Charity grow in us? In its lowest degree, Charity already loves God above all else and its neighbor in general, without excluding anyone. In this sense, it cannot have a greater extension―but it can grow in intensity, it can take a deeper root in our will, and more strongly determine to turn to God and to flee sin by more generous acts. Charity does not grow by addition, like a heap of wheat grains. This addition would multiply Charity without making it more intense. The increase would be in the order of quantity, rather than of quality―which is quite a different thing. In reality, Charity increases in us in so far as it becomes stronger, takes deeper root in our will, and inheres more strongly in our will and determines the will more profoundly toward supernatural good by withdrawing it from evil. As in the scholar, learning becomes more profound, more penetrating, more certain, without always reaching out to new conclusions―so too Charity grows in us by making us love God more perfectly and more purely for Himself, and our neighbor for God.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
► INCREASE BY MERIT: “By his supernatural good works the just man merits the increase of Charity. Meritorious acts do not themselves directly produce the increase of Charity; for Charity is not automatically augmented by the repetition of acts. Our acts of Charity cannot produce the increase of this virtue, but they merit an increase by preparing us to receive it. God alone can produce it in us and He alone also can increase it. Merit is a right to a recompense by God; merit does not produce this reward, it obtains it from God who produces the increase. The Lord gives a just man, here on Earth, the recompense of growing in divine love. The increase of Sanctifying Grace and of Charity is conferred by God only, according to the disposition of the subject who is to receive it. A very generous act of love of God sometimes decides a whole life and merits a great increase of Charity by disposing us to receive it immediately. An intense or fervent act of Charity disposes us to receive immediately an increase of this virtue and of all the other virtues connected with it. This doctrine should lead us often to make generous acts of Charity. God is more glorified by a single act of Charity of ten talents than by ten acts of Charity of one talent each. Likewise a single very perfect just soul pleases God more than many others who remain in mediocrity or tepidity. Quality is superior to quantity. Therefore, Charity ought, by our merits, to grow until death.”
“We too often forget that we are en route to eternity, and we try to settle down in the present life as if it were going to last forever. The present life is like one of these great trains where people forget that they are on a journey. Then some persons get off the train, that is to say, they die, and we are reminded that we must end the journey and die also. But, although we see many persons die, we do not succeed in realizing that some day our turn will come. Let us live, on the contrary, with our eyes fixed on the end of the journey; then we shall not lose the time that is given us, and it will become more and more filled with merits for eternity.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
► INCREASE BY PRAYER: “The growth of Charity is obtained not only by merit, but also by prayer. We should recall here the difference between the prayer of petition and merit. The impetrating power of prayer does not presuppose the state of being in Sanctifying Grace, whereas merit does presuppose the state of being in Sanctifying Grace. Charity and Sanctifying Grace go together [like a husband and wife]―you cannot have one without the other. You cannot be in mortal sin and love God. The sinner can pray; he can ask for the grace of conversion; and, if he asks for it with humility, confidence, and perseverance, he will obtain it. After conversion or justification, we can obtain the increase of the life of grace both by merit and by prayer. The mental prayer of a just man, who delights, for example, in meditating slowly on the Our Father, in nourishing his soul profoundly with each of its petitions, in remaining, at times, for half an hour in the loving contemplation of one of them―this kind of mental prayer is at once meritorious and beseeching or supplicating. Mental prayer draws God strongly toward us, so that He may give Himself intimately to us and that we may give ourselves to Him. In it is a fervent meritorious act which immediately obtains the increase of Charity that it merits, and a supplication which obtains even more than it merits. Moreover, the just man may, by prayer, obtain certain graces which he could not merit, in particular the gift of final perseverance―the continuation until death of the state of grace.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
► INCREASE THROUGH THE SACRAMENTS: “Charity and the other virtues, as well as the Seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost, grow in us through the Sacraments―especially by absolution from sin in Confession and also by Holy Communion. The Sacraments, by themselves, produce grace in those who do not place an obstacle to it. They produce grace independently of the prayers and the merits of a person―either of the minister who confers them, or of those who receive them. This explains why a bad priest, and even an unbeliever, may validly administer Baptism, provided he has the intention of doing what the Church does in conferring it. Although the Sacraments of themselves produce grace in those who do not place an obstacle to it, they produce it more or less abundantly according to the fervor of him who receives it. It follows also from these principles that one fervent Communion is worth more than many tepid Communions taken together. Holy Communion, received with very little devotion, obtains only a tiny increase of Charity, just as a person profits from the heat of a fireplace in proportion as he draws nearer to it, instead of remaining at a distance. This should make us reflect seriously, if we show no true spiritual advancement after years of frequent or daily Communion.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
(2) The Necessity of Humility
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE states that “Humility is considered in all Christian tradition as the foundation of the spiritual life―since it removes pride, which is, says Holy Scripture, the beginning of every sin, because it separates us from God. Thus Humility has often been compared to the excavation which must be dug for the erection of a building―an excavation which should be so much the deeper in proportion as the building is to be higher. From this point of view, the two principal pillars of the temple to be built are Faith and Hope, and its dome is Charity―but Humility is the foundation of the spiritual edifice.
“When the spiritual man shall have been brought to nothing, when his humility is perfect, then will take place the union of the soul and God … The state of perfection consists in the perfect love of God and contempt of self … The doctrine of requiring great Charity for perfection, is entirely conformable to what St. Thomas says of the seven degrees of humility. Following St. Anselm, he enumerates them as follows: (1) to acknowledge ourselves contemptible; (2) to grieve on account of this; (3) to admit that we are so; (4) to wish our neighbor to believe it; (5) patiently to endure its being said; (6) willingly to be treated as a person worthy of contempt; (7) to love to be treated in this fashion. Such humility is truly perfection. It is the state of those who aim chiefly at union with and enjoyment of God; who desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ, and who do not recoil before hard things to be accomplished for the glory of God and the salvation of souls. Perfection thus conceived evidently requires great love of God.
“The act proper to Humility consists in bowing toward the earth―called humus in Latin―from which the name of this virtue is derived [humus ― humility]. Its essential act consists in abasing ourselves before God and adoring what is of God in every creature. To abase ourselves before the Most High is to recognize our inferiority, littleness, and indigence, manifest in us―even though we are innocent, and, once we have sinned, it consists in recognizing our wretchedness. Humility, thus conceived, is based on truth―especially on the truth that there is an infinite distance between the Creator and the creature. The more this distance appears to us in a living and concrete manner, the more humble we are. Humility is also based on the mystery of grace, and on the necessity of Actual Grace for the slightest salutary act; and it is expressed in these words of the Savior: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing’ in the order of salvation.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
► FOUR KEY POINTS: “Firstly, in relation to God the Creator, we should recognize that of ourselves we are nothing: ‘My substance is as nothing before Thee!’ (Psalm 38:6). ‘What hast thou that thou hast not received?’ (1 Corinthians 4:7). We were created out of nothing by God, by His love, which preserves us in existence, without which we would be immediately annihilated. Therefore in comparison with God we are not. If all that comes from God were taken away from even our best free acts, strictly speaking nothing would remain. We should recognize practically that without God, the Creator and Preserver of all things, we are nothing.
Secondly, in regard to Providence, without God’s providence which directs all things, our life completely lacks direction. We should, therefore, humbly receive from Him the general direction of the precepts, so that we may reach eternal life, and the particular direction that God has chosen from all eternity for each one of us. Consequently we should humbly accept the place―it may perhaps be very modest―which God has willed from all eternity for each one of us. Christ, in His sorrowful life, humbly wished the last place―that in which Barabbas was preferred to Him; the shamefulness of the cross. We ought, therefore, to receive humbly the special direction He has chosen for us, even though it should lead us to profound suffering.
“Thirdly, in this special direction chosen by God for us, we cannot take the slightest step forward, or perform the least salutary and meritorious act without the help of an Actual Grace from God. We need this grace particularly to persevere to the end and should, consequently, humbly ask for it. Even if we had a high degree of Sanctifying Grace and Charity, ten talents for example, we should still need an Actual Grace for the least salutary act. And especially for a happy death we need the great gift of final perseverance, which we must daily ask for in the Hail Mary―‘Pray for us now and at the hour of our death’―with Humility and confidence. Christian Humility says with St. Paul: ‘Not that we are sufficient to think anything of ourselves, as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is from God’ (2 Corinthians 3:5) In short, Humility should recognize practically, and a little better every day, the majesty of God the Creator, the Ordainer of all things, and the Author of grace.
“Fourthly, while Humility, which recognizes our poverty, it should be found especially in all who commit. We should recognize not only our spiritual poverty, but also our wretchedness: the baseness of our selfish, narrow hearts, of our inconstant wills, of our vacillating, whimsical, ungovernable characters; the wretched weaknesses of our minds, guilty of unpardonable forgetfulness and contradictions that they could and should avoid; the wretchedness of pride, of concupiscence, which leads to indifference to the glory of God and an indifference to the salvation of souls. This wretchedness is beneath nothingness itself―since it is a disorder, and it occasionally plunges our souls into a contemptible state of abjection.”
“Practically, what must we do to reach the perfection of Humility―without which we cannot have that of Charity? Our attitude toward praise and reproach is of great importance. In regard to praise―we must not praise ourselves; by so doing we would soil ourselves. Men praise themselves when they think they are not sufficiently praised by others. Furthermore, we must not seek praise―should we do this, we would make ourselves ridiculous and lose the merit of our good acts. Lastly, we should not take pleasure in praise when it comes―to do so would be to lose, if not the merit of our good actions, at least the flower of merit. We must, however, mount still higher by acting as we should in regard to reproaches. We must patiently accept deserved reproaches, especially when they come from superiors who have the right and the duty to make them. If we pout, we lose the benefit of these just observations. It is also fitting that we accept patiently at times a reproach that is only slightly deserved or undeserved.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
There are many other points that could be addressed in seeking the winning lottery ticket for Heaven―but the chief of those are Charity and Humility. All the virtues are worthless without Charity―and you cannot have Charity without Humility. Humility paves the way and makes room for the love of God and neighbor―because Pride is an excessive love of self, to the point where there is little love left for God or others. If you seek to practice those two virtues―Charity and Humility―then all the other virtues will naturally follow, for in the spiritual life, as in the life of the body, everything is linked together in one way or another.
Today, as you know, is Friday the 13th! For those who are superstitious, Friday the 13th is looked upon as an unlucky day! Not a day to buy your lottery ticket for Heaven! Some folk try to tie Friday the 13th to the 13 persons present at the Last Supper and they look upon Judas Iscariot as the 13th person, the one who betrayed Christ and was instrumental in His Passion and Death. Judas went on to commit suicide by hanging himself―many commentators think that it was on the same Friday as Christ was crucified.
The superstition that Friday the 13th is an unlucky day has only been around as a popular thing for the past few hundred years or so―it doesn’t have the ancient origins that many might expect. It is hard to pinpoint exactly why Friday the 13th is considered an unlucky day. Experts merely speculate. The first references saying that Friday the 13th is unlucky, are from French writing and plays. A character in the 1834 play, Les Finesses des Gribouilles, says “I was born on a Friday, December 13th, 1813―from which come all of my misfortunes.” And in the French literary magazine Revue de Paris, Marquis de Salvo wrote about a father who killed his daughter on Friday the 13th, and said: “It is always Fridays and the number thirteen that bring back luck!”
While the combination of Friday and 13 is a relatively new invention, the idea that Fridays are unlucky is not. Fridays were considered unlucky days, and that has been true since the Middle-Ages in the English speaking world and probably through most of Europe―because Friday was the day of the Crucifixion. Some think that the arrest of the Knights Templar on Friday, October 13th, 1307 influenced the superstition, but it's not clear if it was the origin. In Norse mythology, the 13th god, Loki, brought chaos and death.
Some argue that 12 is a number that is very mathematically significant. It's divisible by many different numbers―2, 3, 4 and 6. There are 12 months, 12 zodiac signs, 12 inches in a foot. And then along comes the number 13―it is kind of a dud number. It doesn't really help you out much mathematically.
There are other superstitions―such as …
● Breaking a mirror: Breaking a mirror is said to bring seven years of bad luck.
● Walking under a ladder: This superstition stems from the idea that walking under a ladder disrupts the triangle, a symbol of life, and invites misfortune.
● Spilling salt: Accidentally spilling salt has been seen as bad luck for centuries. To counteract, throw a pinch over your left shoulder to ward off evil.
● Crossing paths with a black cat: Black cats, often associated with witches and bad omens, are considered unlucky, especially when they cross your path on Friday the 13th.
● Stepping on Cracks: The rhyme "step on a crack, break your mother's back" comes from the idea that stepping on cracks invites bad energy or harm.
To avoid bad luck and attract good luck, some people will:
● Carry a lucky charm: Items like four-leaf clovers, horseshoes, or rabbit’s feet are believed to bring good luck and protection from bad luck.
● Knock on wood: This age-old superstition is believed to prevent bad luck or jinxes. They say that if you say something hopeful, knock on wood to “seal the deal” then you will keep good fortune on your side.
These are merely two of many such superstitious practices seeking out good luck.
However, there is no such thing as luck―neither good luck, nor bad luck. All is ruled and guided by Divine Providence. Nothing happens without God either wanting good things to happen, or allowing bad things to happen.
Our Lady and the 13th
If anything blasts superstitious practices out of the water, then it is Our Lady of Fatima. Our Lady chose the 13th of each month―from May to October―to appear to the three children at Fatima. One of those had her appearing on Friday the 13th―which was July 13th, 1917. Friday the 13th occurs at least once a year and, occasionally but not often, up to three times in a single year. There can be no more than three Friday the 13ths in a single calendar year.
Is Heaven a Lottery?
Just as we do not know which ticket will win a lottery―likewise we do not know which souls will win the reward of Heaven when they die. Holy Scripture, through St. Paul, tells us: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? Therefore, run so that you may obtain it! I, therefore, so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection! Lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27). Elsewhere he adds: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Heaven is not guaranteed to anyone―it is not a “freebie”, we have no inherent right to salvation―we have work out our salvation, because “many are called, but few are chosen!” says Our Lord (Matthew 22:14). “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
Our Lord further adds: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). We read in the Old Testament that Esau sold his birthright to his twin brother for a bowl of stew (pottage):
“When they were grown up, Esau became a skillful hunter and farmer, but Jacob, a plain man, dwelt in tents. Isaac loved his son Esau, because he ate of his hunting; and Isaac’s wife, Rebecca, loved Jacob. And Jacob boiled pottage (stew), to whom Esau, coming hungry and faint out of the field, said: ‘Give me of this red pottage, for I am exceeding faint!’ And Jacob said to him: ‘Sell me thy first birthright!’ Esau answered: ‘Look, I am dying of hunger, what will the first birthright avail me?’ Jacob said: ‘Swear, therefore, to me!’ Esau swore to him, and sold his first birthright. And so taking bread and the pottage of lentils, he ate, and drank, and went his way―making little account of having sold his first birthright” (Genesis 25:27-34).
Our Lord echoes something similar: “And as in the days of Noe, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be! For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, even until that day in which Noe entered into the ark! And they knew not until the flood came and took them all away―so also shall the coming of the Son of man be! Then two shall be in the field―one shall be taken, and one shall be left!” (Matthew 24:37-40). Holy Scripture adds: “In the days of Noe, when the Ark was being built, wherein a few―that is, only eight souls―were saved by water! … God spared not the original world, but preserved Noe, one of eight persons in the Ark, the preacher of justice, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly!” (1 Peter 3:20; 2 Peter 2:5). Some lottery, huh? Eight winning tickets out of God knows how many millions!
Trading Heaven for the World
Our Lady said to St. Bernadette of Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next world!” Tragically, most people end up trading Heaven for the world. They prefer the here and now to the hereafter. Or, insanely, they imagine that “you can keep your cake and also eat it”! They imagine that they can love the world and love God! Yet Our Lord and Holy Scripture burst that false bubble, saying: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” says Our Lord (Matthew 6:19-24). Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Yet most people―even Catholics, even Conservative and Traditional Catholics―ignore that truth and create their own preferred ‘truth’.
The gospel of the world is more popular today than the Gospel of Christ. As Our Lady of La Salette warned: The Gospel of Jesus Christ has been forgotten … The devil will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus!” The current statistics prove all of this be true. The obligatory Sunday Mass attendance has plummeted over the last 60 years or so―from around 75% to 80% down to anywhere from 5% to 20%. Most Catholics believe you can be a ‘good’ Catholic without attending Sunday Mass. The majority of Catholics today accept contraception, abortion, LGBTQ+ relationships, same-sex marriages, divorce and remarriage, etc. That kind of “lottery ticket” is a guaranteed loser! These ‘lottery losers’ are what Our Lord refers to when He says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Our Lady warned of such times: “From the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France). Very few lottery winners among all that! Yet that is what we are seeing today all around us! The Catholic Faith has decayed. There is an increasing general corruption of morals. Luxury rules. Impurity rules. Immodesty is everywhere―even in Catholic churches on Sundays. Less and less children maintain their innocence. Very few winning tickets are to be found!
Our Lady warned of such times: “From the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France).
Very few lottery winners among all that! Yet that is what we are seeing today all around us! The Catholic Faith has decayed. There is an increasing general corruption of morals. Luxury rules. Impurity rules. Immodesty is everywhere―even in Catholic churches on Sundays. Less and less children maintain their innocence. People prefer to talk online or on social media rather than talk to God. Hours are spent on worldly occupations―God gets barely a few minutes and those minutes are not very enthusiastic! Very few winning tickets are to be found among such people! Hardly anyone wants to be saint―most people want to rich, powerful, sexy and well-liked by the world. Our Lord warned us: “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:24). The words of Holy Scripture are ignored: “For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! … He that sows iniquity shall reap evils! … For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting. He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (Galatians 6:8; Proverbs 22:8; 2 Corinthians 9:6).
God Wants Everyone to be a Winner
God wants everyone to have a winning lottery ticket to Heaven: “God will have [“to will” means “to want”] all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). God tries to sow His Word into the soil of our souls, but it requires our cooperation for it to grow and bear fruit―eventually winning for us the eternal fruit of Heaven. “The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. The sower went out to sow his seed. And whilst he sowed, some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down by men, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And some seed fell upon stony ground, where it had not much depth of earth, and the seed sprouted and shot up immediately, because there was no deepness of earth. But when the sun was risen, the sprouted seed was scorched, because it had no root and no moisture. And other seed fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up with it and choked it and it yielded no fruit. And others fell upon good ground: and this seed brought forth fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold.
“And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom Jesus said: ‘The parable is this! Hear therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil, Satan, comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
Not Everyone Wins
Though God wants everyone to be a winner, not everyone wins the lottery of Heaven. It is not due to a failure on God’s part―but a failure on our part. We neglect or refuse to cooperate with God and follow His instructions. St. Augustine―a Father and Doctor of the Church―tells us that “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us!” Some translate the Latin into the singular: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, but God will not save you without your cooperation.
We see this indicated in the parable about the Sowing of the Seed of the Word of God: “And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom Jesus said: ‘The parable is this! Hear therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil, Satan, comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
As the above parable indicates―very few people let the word of God take hold of their minds and hearts so that it may grow within them and bear fruit. It is fruit that God is after―as Our Lord indicated at the Last Supper: “I am the true vine and My Father is the farmer. I am the vine―you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. Every branch in Me that bears not fruit, He will take away; and everyone that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit. In this is My Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit, and become My disciples. If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch and shall wither―and they shall gather him up and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 5:1-8).
This is echoed in Our Lord’s parable about the unfruitful fig tree: “A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why does it encumber the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And, perhaps happily it will bear fruit, but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-9).
Another parable of Our Lord’s dovetails with this need to produce fruit in order to assure oneself of a winning lottery ticket to Heaven―it is the parable of the talents, where one man buried his talent and failed to produce fruit with it: “A man going into a far country, called his servants, and delivered to them his goods. And to one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―giving to everyone according to his proper ability: and immediately he took his journey. [1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of around $30 per ounce, that would make 1 talent worth over $22,000, thus 5 talents would be around $110,000; 2 talents would be $60,000, and 1 talent would be $30,000]. And he that had received the five talents, went his way, and traded with the same, and gained other five. And in like manner he that had received the two, gained other two. But he that had received the one, going his way dug into the earth, and hid his lord’s money.
“After a long time, the lord of those servants came and reckoned with them. And he that had received the five talents, came and brought other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you delivered to me five talents! Behold I have gained other five over and above!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place you over many things―enter into the joy of your lord!’
“And he also, that had received the two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you delivered two talents to me! Behold I have gained other two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place you over many things―enter into the joy of your lord!’
“But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man―you reap where you have not sown, and gather where you have not strewn. And, being afraid, I went and hid you talent in the earth! Behold, here you can have that which is yours!’ And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewn! Therefore you ought to have committed my money to the bankers, and, at my coming, I should have received my own with usury! Take away, therefore, the talent from him, and give it to him that has ten talents! For to everyone that has shall be given, and he shall abound―but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have, shall be taken away! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness! There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
Making Sure You Win the Lottery!
God wants you to be saved! We want you to be saved! You want to be saved! But all of that does not guarantee that you will be saved. If you fail to make the necessary efforts; fail to listen and follow instructions; if you are indifferent, lazy, neglectful; if you make peace with the world, feel at home in the world, love the world and follow it maxims―then you severely handicap any chance you might have of “winning the race”―as St. Paul calls it―or of winning Heaven’s lottery ticket―as we have called it. Everyone can be a winner―but not everyone does what it takes to win. “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). So what can we do to ensure that we come out as winners and not losers? It does not take a rocket-scientist or a university professor to figure out the answer! We have already been given the answer―but we pay little attention to it!
(1) Love God Above All Things
Holy Scripture, speaking of the virtues, says: The greatest of these is charity (1 Corinthians 13:13). Charity is first and foremost a love of God; and secondarily it is a love of neighbor for the sake of God: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Without Charity we are nothing! “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Nobody―apart from the Blessed Virgin Mary―is born with a total love of God. Love, you could say, is a labor of love. We must work at growing progressively in a love of God―just like a baby grows progressively into a mature adult.
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE writes: “The common teaching is, on the contrary, that Christian perfection requires great Charity. Charity is the bond of perfection because it is the highest of the virtues which unites our soul to God and it vivifies all the other virtues by rendering their acts meritorious. Perfection does not consist chiefly in humility, nor does it consist especially in poverty, nor in acts of worship, or of the virtue of religion―but it lies primarily in the love of God and of one’s neighbor, which renders the acts of all the other virtues meritorious. By Charity we become the temples of the Holy Ghost. St. John gives us the same doctrine in his First Epistle (4:16-21): ‘God is Charity: and he that abides in Charity, abides in God, and God in him.’ Without Charity, the most excellent extraordinary gifts are of no avail for eternal life. St. Augustine says: ‘Love and do what you wish!’ and what you will do, will merit eternal life for you, if you truly love your God more than yourself. Charity ought ever to increase in us until death and it should grow in three ways―by merit, prayer, and the sacraments. The Charity of beginners is not victorious over all egoism; far from it. We find in our souls an inordinate love of self which, without being gravely culpable, is an obstacle. Gray stands between black and white. Between the state of mortal sin and that of perfect and radiant Charity, stands Charity of a very low degree―the exercise of which is often hindered by a troop of habitual venial sins, of immoderate self-love, of vanity, of laziness, of injustice, and the like. Undoubtedly, this Charity of low degree ought to grow. It should grow because the Christian on Earth is a traveler or wayfarer, who is advancing spiritually toward God.
“Every traveler toward eternity should, while on Earth, grow in Charity as they draw nearer to God―not only beginners and proficients. They ought to advance toward Him so much the more rapidly as they are nearer to Him and as He draws them more strongly. God moves us and draws us to Himself. He is the beginning and the end of all, sovereign Good, who attracts love so much the more strongly as one draws nearer to Him. Thus, in the lives of the saints the progress of love during their last years is much more rapid than in their earlier life. This increasingly rapid progress existed especially in the life of the Blessed Virgin for it found no obstacle in her, and it was so much the more intense as the initial speed, or the first grace, was greater. There was in her a marvelous acceleration of the love of God. We see thus why Charity ought not only to grow in us until death, but to increase more and more like a falling body, the speed of which increases until it reaches its last end.”
“How, then, does Charity grow in us? In its lowest degree, Charity already loves God above all else and its neighbor in general, without excluding anyone. In this sense, it cannot have a greater extension―but it can grow in intensity, it can take a deeper root in our will, and more strongly determine to turn to God and to flee sin by more generous acts. Charity does not grow by addition, like a heap of wheat grains. This addition would multiply Charity without making it more intense. The increase would be in the order of quantity, rather than of quality―which is quite a different thing. In reality, Charity increases in us in so far as it becomes stronger, takes deeper root in our will, and inheres more strongly in our will and determines the will more profoundly toward supernatural good by withdrawing it from evil. As in the scholar, learning becomes more profound, more penetrating, more certain, without always reaching out to new conclusions―so too Charity grows in us by making us love God more perfectly and more purely for Himself, and our neighbor for God.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
► INCREASE BY MERIT: “By his supernatural good works the just man merits the increase of Charity. Meritorious acts do not themselves directly produce the increase of Charity; for Charity is not automatically augmented by the repetition of acts. Our acts of Charity cannot produce the increase of this virtue, but they merit an increase by preparing us to receive it. God alone can produce it in us and He alone also can increase it. Merit is a right to a recompense by God; merit does not produce this reward, it obtains it from God who produces the increase. The Lord gives a just man, here on Earth, the recompense of growing in divine love. The increase of Sanctifying Grace and of Charity is conferred by God only, according to the disposition of the subject who is to receive it. A very generous act of love of God sometimes decides a whole life and merits a great increase of Charity by disposing us to receive it immediately. An intense or fervent act of Charity disposes us to receive immediately an increase of this virtue and of all the other virtues connected with it. This doctrine should lead us often to make generous acts of Charity. God is more glorified by a single act of Charity of ten talents than by ten acts of Charity of one talent each. Likewise a single very perfect just soul pleases God more than many others who remain in mediocrity or tepidity. Quality is superior to quantity. Therefore, Charity ought, by our merits, to grow until death.”
“We too often forget that we are en route to eternity, and we try to settle down in the present life as if it were going to last forever. The present life is like one of these great trains where people forget that they are on a journey. Then some persons get off the train, that is to say, they die, and we are reminded that we must end the journey and die also. But, although we see many persons die, we do not succeed in realizing that some day our turn will come. Let us live, on the contrary, with our eyes fixed on the end of the journey; then we shall not lose the time that is given us, and it will become more and more filled with merits for eternity.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
► INCREASE BY PRAYER: “The growth of Charity is obtained not only by merit, but also by prayer. We should recall here the difference between the prayer of petition and merit. The impetrating power of prayer does not presuppose the state of being in Sanctifying Grace, whereas merit does presuppose the state of being in Sanctifying Grace. Charity and Sanctifying Grace go together [like a husband and wife]―you cannot have one without the other. You cannot be in mortal sin and love God. The sinner can pray; he can ask for the grace of conversion; and, if he asks for it with humility, confidence, and perseverance, he will obtain it. After conversion or justification, we can obtain the increase of the life of grace both by merit and by prayer. The mental prayer of a just man, who delights, for example, in meditating slowly on the Our Father, in nourishing his soul profoundly with each of its petitions, in remaining, at times, for half an hour in the loving contemplation of one of them―this kind of mental prayer is at once meritorious and beseeching or supplicating. Mental prayer draws God strongly toward us, so that He may give Himself intimately to us and that we may give ourselves to Him. In it is a fervent meritorious act which immediately obtains the increase of Charity that it merits, and a supplication which obtains even more than it merits. Moreover, the just man may, by prayer, obtain certain graces which he could not merit, in particular the gift of final perseverance―the continuation until death of the state of grace.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
► INCREASE THROUGH THE SACRAMENTS: “Charity and the other virtues, as well as the Seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost, grow in us through the Sacraments―especially by absolution from sin in Confession and also by Holy Communion. The Sacraments, by themselves, produce grace in those who do not place an obstacle to it. They produce grace independently of the prayers and the merits of a person―either of the minister who confers them, or of those who receive them. This explains why a bad priest, and even an unbeliever, may validly administer Baptism, provided he has the intention of doing what the Church does in conferring it. Although the Sacraments of themselves produce grace in those who do not place an obstacle to it, they produce it more or less abundantly according to the fervor of him who receives it. It follows also from these principles that one fervent Communion is worth more than many tepid Communions taken together. Holy Communion, received with very little devotion, obtains only a tiny increase of Charity, just as a person profits from the heat of a fireplace in proportion as he draws nearer to it, instead of remaining at a distance. This should make us reflect seriously, if we show no true spiritual advancement after years of frequent or daily Communion.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
(2) The Necessity of Humility
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE states that “Humility is considered in all Christian tradition as the foundation of the spiritual life―since it removes pride, which is, says Holy Scripture, the beginning of every sin, because it separates us from God. Thus Humility has often been compared to the excavation which must be dug for the erection of a building―an excavation which should be so much the deeper in proportion as the building is to be higher. From this point of view, the two principal pillars of the temple to be built are Faith and Hope, and its dome is Charity―but Humility is the foundation of the spiritual edifice.
“When the spiritual man shall have been brought to nothing, when his humility is perfect, then will take place the union of the soul and God … The state of perfection consists in the perfect love of God and contempt of self … The doctrine of requiring great Charity for perfection, is entirely conformable to what St. Thomas says of the seven degrees of humility. Following St. Anselm, he enumerates them as follows: (1) to acknowledge ourselves contemptible; (2) to grieve on account of this; (3) to admit that we are so; (4) to wish our neighbor to believe it; (5) patiently to endure its being said; (6) willingly to be treated as a person worthy of contempt; (7) to love to be treated in this fashion. Such humility is truly perfection. It is the state of those who aim chiefly at union with and enjoyment of God; who desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ, and who do not recoil before hard things to be accomplished for the glory of God and the salvation of souls. Perfection thus conceived evidently requires great love of God.
“The act proper to Humility consists in bowing toward the earth―called humus in Latin―from which the name of this virtue is derived [humus ― humility]. Its essential act consists in abasing ourselves before God and adoring what is of God in every creature. To abase ourselves before the Most High is to recognize our inferiority, littleness, and indigence, manifest in us―even though we are innocent, and, once we have sinned, it consists in recognizing our wretchedness. Humility, thus conceived, is based on truth―especially on the truth that there is an infinite distance between the Creator and the creature. The more this distance appears to us in a living and concrete manner, the more humble we are. Humility is also based on the mystery of grace, and on the necessity of Actual Grace for the slightest salutary act; and it is expressed in these words of the Savior: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing’ in the order of salvation.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
► FOUR KEY POINTS: “Firstly, in relation to God the Creator, we should recognize that of ourselves we are nothing: ‘My substance is as nothing before Thee!’ (Psalm 38:6). ‘What hast thou that thou hast not received?’ (1 Corinthians 4:7). We were created out of nothing by God, by His love, which preserves us in existence, without which we would be immediately annihilated. Therefore in comparison with God we are not. If all that comes from God were taken away from even our best free acts, strictly speaking nothing would remain. We should recognize practically that without God, the Creator and Preserver of all things, we are nothing.
Secondly, in regard to Providence, without God’s providence which directs all things, our life completely lacks direction. We should, therefore, humbly receive from Him the general direction of the precepts, so that we may reach eternal life, and the particular direction that God has chosen from all eternity for each one of us. Consequently we should humbly accept the place―it may perhaps be very modest―which God has willed from all eternity for each one of us. Christ, in His sorrowful life, humbly wished the last place―that in which Barabbas was preferred to Him; the shamefulness of the cross. We ought, therefore, to receive humbly the special direction He has chosen for us, even though it should lead us to profound suffering.
“Thirdly, in this special direction chosen by God for us, we cannot take the slightest step forward, or perform the least salutary and meritorious act without the help of an Actual Grace from God. We need this grace particularly to persevere to the end and should, consequently, humbly ask for it. Even if we had a high degree of Sanctifying Grace and Charity, ten talents for example, we should still need an Actual Grace for the least salutary act. And especially for a happy death we need the great gift of final perseverance, which we must daily ask for in the Hail Mary―‘Pray for us now and at the hour of our death’―with Humility and confidence. Christian Humility says with St. Paul: ‘Not that we are sufficient to think anything of ourselves, as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is from God’ (2 Corinthians 3:5) In short, Humility should recognize practically, and a little better every day, the majesty of God the Creator, the Ordainer of all things, and the Author of grace.
“Fourthly, while Humility, which recognizes our poverty, it should be found especially in all who commit. We should recognize not only our spiritual poverty, but also our wretchedness: the baseness of our selfish, narrow hearts, of our inconstant wills, of our vacillating, whimsical, ungovernable characters; the wretched weaknesses of our minds, guilty of unpardonable forgetfulness and contradictions that they could and should avoid; the wretchedness of pride, of concupiscence, which leads to indifference to the glory of God and an indifference to the salvation of souls. This wretchedness is beneath nothingness itself―since it is a disorder, and it occasionally plunges our souls into a contemptible state of abjection.”
“Practically, what must we do to reach the perfection of Humility―without which we cannot have that of Charity? Our attitude toward praise and reproach is of great importance. In regard to praise―we must not praise ourselves; by so doing we would soil ourselves. Men praise themselves when they think they are not sufficiently praised by others. Furthermore, we must not seek praise―should we do this, we would make ourselves ridiculous and lose the merit of our good acts. Lastly, we should not take pleasure in praise when it comes―to do so would be to lose, if not the merit of our good actions, at least the flower of merit. We must, however, mount still higher by acting as we should in regard to reproaches. We must patiently accept deserved reproaches, especially when they come from superiors who have the right and the duty to make them. If we pout, we lose the benefit of these just observations. It is also fitting that we accept patiently at times a reproach that is only slightly deserved or undeserved.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
There are many other points that could be addressed in seeking the winning lottery ticket for Heaven―but the chief of those are Charity and Humility. All the virtues are worthless without Charity―and you cannot have Charity without Humility. Humility paves the way and makes room for the love of God and neighbor―because Pride is an excessive love of self, to the point where there is little love left for God or others. If you seek to practice those two virtues―Charity and Humility―then all the other virtues will naturally follow, for in the spiritual life, as in the life of the body, everything is linked together in one way or another.
Article 10
Thursday, December 12th
The Miracles and Power of Our Lady of Guadalupe
Thursday, December 12th
The Miracles and Power of Our Lady of Guadalupe
MIRACLES CONCERNING THE TILMA (CLOAK OR MANTLE) OF JUAN DIEGO
Miracles Attract and Convince
God has always used miracles as a kind of “signature” by which He can be authentically recognized and known. The other “signature” that God will use is that of prophecy. You could say that those two “signatures” are God’s first and second names―just as we known by our “first-names” or “Christian names” and our “family names” or “second-names”. The miracles surrounding the shroud are quite stupendous and mind-boggling! Not all of them were noticed or discovered at first―it took the massive advances in science and technology to uncover some of them, yet from the very beginning (in 1531) the image of Our Lady on St. Juan Diego’s Tilma produced one miracle after another over almost 500 years since 1531.
Here are some of the discoveries that researchers and scientists have found over the last 500 years. Remarkably, as time goes on, the Tilma has become more—not less—mysterious. The enigma of the Tilma has piqued the interest of believers and scientists—and the efforts of politically-motivated critics and ridiculers—through the ages.
What Science Shows Us
THE FABRIC
► First, there’s the physical makeup of the Tilma itself. The image that she left of herself imprinted miraculously on the Tilma―a poor quality cactus-cloth― should have deteriorated in 20 years, but to this very day it shows no sign of decay almost 500 years later and still defies all scientific explanations of its origin. For more than 100 years it was hung in a primitive chapel—an unshielded environment ―exposed to constant candle smoke, damp and other damaging factors. After much human contact by scientists’ examinations and pilgrims kissing it, the Tilma is still in good condition with the cloth it was made of that ordinarily would have lasted no more than 20-30 years has now lasted almost 500 years―and is still going strong.
► The reverse side of the Tilma is rough and coarse, while the front side is as soft as silk. This delicate fabric should have wasted away in a matter of a few decades―like most other Tilmas. Yet it still remains to this day, nearly 500 years later.
► Power magnification has revealed the fact that the coarse weave of the Tilma was deliberately used in a precise manner to give depth to the face on the image.
THE IMAGE
► The overall image of Our Lady cannot be explained by science. Both its color rendering and brightness enduring over the centuries are inexplicable. Pigment of the fabric used were from no known source; whether natural, animal, mineral, or vegetable. All pigments known to exist in Mexico 500 years ago would have faded.
► NASA scientists have no explanation as to how the image got on the cloth; no brush strokes or stretch marks on it. Careful testing using modern restoration techniques have demonstrated that the image was made using no under-drawing, no sizing, no protective over-varnish and no brush strokes.
► Colors float above the surface of the Tilma at a distance of 3/10th of a milimeter or 1/100 of an inch.
► When the Tilma is examined at a distance of less than 10 inches, the colors totally disappear.
► Image seems to increase and decrease―owing it to the unknown property of surface and substance of which it is made.
► Under high magnification the image shows no sign of fading or cracking, after almost 500 years.
► Strangely, the pink color of the gown is transparent to infra-red light, unlike all other pigments of this hue, which are opaque.
► Viewed close up, the face and hands are of a grey-white color which gradually becomes olive as one backs away — an impossible accomplishment for any human painter. Scientists have compared this to the same effect in nature with iridescent bird feathers, butterfly scales and brightly-colored beetles.
► After filtering and processing―the digitized images reveal that portion of the face, hands, robe, and mantle had been painted in one step, with no sketches, or corrections, and no visible brush strokes or sizing used that smoothed the surface and no protective varnish covering the surface.
► Image changes in color slightly depending on the angle of viewing, a phenomenon known as “iridescence”, a technique that cannot be reproduced with human hands.
► What and how the colors of the image appeared on the cloak remains a total scientific mystery.
► The Virgin’s head is slightly tilted to her right and had she not done so the center stitch, which holds the Tilma together, would have divided her face in two.
► Specialists at Kodiak Corporation in Mexico, explain the image is smooth and bears more resemblance to a photograph than anything else.
► Our Lady’s height in the Image is 4’8” and of a woman of 18-20 years old. The face is that of a “metiza” ― which is a mixture of Spanish and Indian race as a result of intermarriage.
► The Tilma maintains a constant temperature of 36.6 degrees Celsius (98.6 degrees Fahrenheit), which is the average temperature of a living person.
► Carlos Fernandez del Castillo, a gynecologist, examined the Image and indicates stage of pregnancy on December 9th for Jesus birth to occur on Christmas day. A stethoscope placed below the black band at the waist of Our Lady and he heard rhythmic repeating heartbeats at 115 beats per minute, the same as that of a baby in the womb.
► The stellar arrangement that appear on the Mantle of Our Lady, accurately display the various constellations of the Mexican sky the day of the apparition occurred which was in the winter-morning solstice of December 12th, 1531, Saturday, at 10:26 a.m.
► The star map is in the reverse (the cardinal axis rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise) provides a view of the constellations from beyond them, as it would be seen looking through them toward the earth.
► It has been also found that imposing a topographical map of central Mexico on Our Lady’s dress, the mountains, river, and principal lakes coincide with the decoration on the dress.
OUR LADY’S EYES
► Beginning in 1929 and continuing until today, photographers, scientists and opthalmologists have demonstrated the existence of images of human figures in both of the Virgin’s eyes. These are found in the precise location wherein figures reflected by a live human eye would be found in a photograph.
► The shape, placement and size of human figures of St. Juan Diego and the interpreter present when the Tilma was opened imply that this was literally what the Virgin saw as she stared out from the image on the Tilma at that moment. As to whether this could have been created by a human painter, the placement of these images in her eyes is impossible to replicate on an even, flat surface.
► It was discovered that the reflection of Bishop Juan de Zumarraga looking in astonishment in the pupil of Our Lady’s eyes.
► When exposed to light, Our Lady’s eye contracts and dilates when light is withdrawn.
► Our Lady’s eyes have been ophthalmologically determined to be alive on the Tilma.
► In 1976, some twenty doctors had confirmed, orally and in writing, the “unexplainable presence” of a man with a beard in the cornea and lenses of the Virgin.
►By 1979, Dr. Jose’ Aste Tonsmann, PhD., a Peruvian ophthalmologist and an expert at IBM in the digital processing of images, and who for over 20 years studied the Tilma, digitally enlarges the Image of Our Lady’s eyes by 2,500 times the actual size under extremely high resolution and had found not only a single figure, but images of the witnesses present when the Tilma was first revealed before the Bishop in 1531, including a small family group, 13 persons in all. In addition, Dr. Tonsmann used digital technology similar to that used in the images received from satellites and space probes in transmitting visual information. The image of the Bishop Zumarraga in the eyes of Our Lady was also enlarged 1,000 times than the actual size to able to see what is reflected in his eyes. The eye of the Bishop contains the image of Juan Diego opening his Tilma before the bishop. The size of the image is a quarter of a micron, which is ¼ of a millionth of a millimeter.
MIRACLES ATTRIBUTED TO THE IMAGE OF OUR LADY OF GUADALUPE
► 9 million Indians were converted to Christianity within just a short few years.
► This conversion of Indians also brought a halt to the pagan rituals of human sacrifice.
► Spaniards and Mexicans who were mortal enemies embraced one another with affection.
The earliest published version of the story of Guadalupe was written by Fr. Miguel Sánchez (1606-1674) in 1648. Fr. Sánchez describes seven miracles that were attributed to Our Lady of Guadalupe.
► The first miracle took place on the very day that the sacred image was brought to the new hermitage. On December 26th, 1531, only days after the miraculous image of Our Lady appeared on the Tilma of Juan Diego, the Chichimeca Indians were celebrating the newly built chapel, with dancing and bows and arrows according to their custom. One of the Indians was struck in the neck by a wayward arrow, giving him a mortal wound and immediately killing him. With great alarm, the Indians carried the dead man within the chapel and laid him beneath the sacred image of Our Lady of Guadalupe and prayed fervently for a miracle. When the arrow was removed, he returned to life, without any visible injury. All that was left were marks where the arrow had penetrated. The miracle aroused the Indians admiration and won many hearts among the recently converted.
► The second miracle related by Fr. Sanchez occurred in 1544, when a strong pestilence (cocolixtli) arose among the Indians, killing more than twelve thousand people in the towns surrounding Mexico. The Franciscans led a procession of Indian children aged six to seven from the convent of Santiago Tlatelolco to the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, where they made supplication. The following day the effects were evident, for instead of burying a hundred corpses a day, only one or two died each day, so that soon all were fully relieved from the plague. This was a very public miracle and gave rise to great devotion to the holy image among the Indians.
► The third miracle of the Virgin of Guadalupe pertains to the seer of the Virgin of Los Remedios. The image of Nuestra Señora de los Remedios was brought to Mexico by the conquistadores. In 1520, Captain Juan Rodríguez de Villafuerte hid it in an Indian shrine on the hill of Otomcapulco, west of the city of Mexico. Twenty years later, guided by supernatural signs, an Indian named Juan (called Juan de Tobar or Juan del Águila in other accounts) discovered the image there under a maguey. As Fr. Sánchez tells it, the image “appeared” to the Indian, though we are not here talking of an apparition of the Virgin herself. Don Juan, who was the cacique (roughly, “mayor”) of the town of San Juan Totoltepec, kept the image in his home for several years. At one point he fell gravely ill (in 1544 according to other accounts), and he asked his companions to bring him to the shrine of Guadalupe. There the Virgin spoke to him, that he may know that she and the Virgin of Los Remedios were the same person, and she restored his health. She told him to return to his house and build a humble shrine for the image of Los Remedios. The shrine of Totoltepec was built for it in 1550. A greater temple was built in its place by order of the Archbishop in 1574-75.
► The fourth miracle was witnessed by a gentleman named don Antonio de Carvajal, who was traveling with his company from the city of Mexico to the town of Tulancingo. A young relative of his was carried away by his angered horse at full gallop for half a league across rocky ground. His companions found him on the ground with one foot in a stirrup, and fully expected him to be dead and dismembered. Instead, they found him alive and intact. The young man explained that when they had stopped to pray at the shrine of Guadalupe, and later heard much talk of the miracles of that holy image, he was deeply impressed, so he invoked the Virgin Mary of Guadalupe when he was in danger. He instantly saw the Virgin appear just as she is painted in the image of Guadalupe. She stopped the horse, which obeyed her reverently. The man was so moved that he wished to kneel and kiss the ground in her presence.
► The fifth miracle involved a man who was in the major chapel of the hermitage, kneeling and praying before the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, when the cord holding a large hanging lamp broke. The heavy lamp fell a great height onto the man's head, with enough force to kill him or severely injure him, yet he was unharmed. The lamp was not dented, nor was its glass broken, nor its oil spilt, and its flame stayed alight.
► The sixth miracle was when Fr. Juan Vázquez de Acuña, who was vicar of the hermitage for many years (around 1600 AD), went up to the main altar to say Mass. The lights were all extinguished because of the strong winds. A minister went out to start a light. The priest, waiting at the altar, saw two rays of sun, in the middle of which was the miraculous image of the Virgin. The two candles on the altar lighted miraculously, in the view of other persons present. The minister came back with the light, and found that candles were already lit, and he knew without being told that they had been lit by a miracle.
► The seventh and last miracle recorded is that which occurred during the inundation of Mexico (in 1629). This was a time recent enough to be remembered by Fr. Sánchez, with much sadness and tenderness. The flooding of the city began on Tuesday, September 25th. To console the afflicted people, Archbishop Francisco Manzo y Zúñiga brought the miraculous image of Guadalupe from its shrine down to his palace, where it was displayed that night, “perhaps so it may see the place and house where it had been reborn among the flowers and appeared painted on that cloak.” The next morning it was moved to the main altar of the cathedral, where it remained throughout the flood. While the people feared that the city would remain permanently underwater, after a while the waters subsided little by little, and the city was dry. On Saturday, May 14th, 1634, the Archbishop offered Mass and started a solemn procession of the image back to its shrine. The following morning it was returned to its original sanctuary. Everyone proclaimed the miracle of the image.
The above seven miracles were not the only miracles to have occurred, but simply those chosen by Fr. Sanchez in his book on Guadalupe―and only up to the time of writing in 1648. Fr. Sanchez died in 1674―but the miracles did not die! The continued for hundreds of years.
In his book, the Nican moctepana, Lasso de la Vega includes not only factual details but entire miracle narratives not found in Fr. Sánchez accounts. There are fourteen miracle accounts in all, summarized below.
► An Indian killed by an arrow during the procession was miraculously restored to life.
► In 1544, during a severe plague, the Franciscans in Tlatelolco led a procession to Tepeyácac. From that day onward, only two or three persons died each day, instead of a hundred.
► Juan of Totoltépec, the Indian who discovered Our Lady of Los Remedios, fell ill and was brought to Tepeyácac, where he was cured.
► A young relative of Don Antonio Carbajal was dragged by his startled horse for well over a mile, but was miraculously spared any injury. He had invoked Our Lady of Guadalupe, whose shrine they had passed.
► A large hanging lamp fell on a Spanish man who was praying at the shrine. The witnesses thought he died, but he was uninjured and the lamp was undamaged and still lit.
► The vicar of the shrine, Juan Vázquez de Acuña, was about to say Mass, when all the candles went out. While he waited for someone to get a new fire, two beams of light appeared and lit the candles, to the marvel of those in attendance.
► A spring appeared behind the shrine. Its water is clean but acidic, and countless cures have been attested by those who drank or bathed in it.
► A Spanish lady who lived in Mexico City began to have swelling in her belly. After ten months of failed treatment, she was brought to the shrine of Guadalupe in the morning. After praying and drinking some water from the spring, she fell asleep. An Indian saw a snake come out from under the sleeping woman, and she awoke in fright. They killed the snake, and her swelling went down. Four days later, she was able to walk back cured.
► A noble Spaniard, a resident of Mexico City, had strong pains in his head and ears. He was brought to the shrine of Guadalupe, where he prayed to be healed and swore that, if cured, he would make an offering of a head of silver. He was cured shortly after his arrival, and he remained in her shrine for nine days.
► A youth named Catalina had dropsy. The doctors said she could not get up, or she would die. She was carried to the shrine of Guadalupe. She prayed for her health; then two men came to take her out, and she use all her strength to go to the fount, and drink the water there. She was instantly cured as she drank.
► A discalced Franciscan friar, named Pedro de Valderrama, had a pestiferous cancer in his toe, which needed to be amputated. They took him to the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe. In her presence, he untied the rag around his toe and prayed to be healed. He was instantly cured and walked back to Pachuca on foot.
► A Spanish nobleman, don Luis de Castilla, had a badly swollen foot, which the doctors could not cure, and so he was sure to die. It is said that the above-mentioned friar told him of his cure by Our Lady of Guadalupe. The nobleman ordered silversmiths to make a foot of silver, the size of his foot, and he sent it to the shrine to be placed before her, entrusting her to heal him. When the messenger left to deliver the foot, the sick man was so afflicted that he wanted to die. Yet when he returned, he found the man well, having been cured.
► A sacristan named Juan Pavón, who was in charge of the temple of Our Lady of Guadalupe, had a son with a large swelling in the neck. He was so gravely ill that he wanted to die and could not breathe. The sacristan took his son to the presence of Our Lady and anointed him with oil from the lamp that was burning. He was instantly healed.
► Don Francisco Quetzalmamalitzin, of Teotihuacán, turned to Our Lady when his town was destroyed and left deserted, because they opposed being deprived of the Franciscan friars. The viceroy Luis de Velasco wanted to replace the Franciscans with Augustinians, which the townspeople thought a great offense. Since he was sought everywhere, don Francisco went in secret to Azcapotzalco, to pray to Our Lady of Guadalupe to change the heart of the viceroy and nobles so that his people would be pardoned and could return to their homes, and again be ministered by the Franciscans. This indeed occurred: the people were pardoned, including Don Francisco and his courtesans in hiding; the Franciscans were again sent there, and all could return to their homes without incident. This was in the year 1558. Don Francisco entrusted his soul to Our Lady of Guadalupe at the hour of his death, which was March 2nd, 1563.
► On November 14th, 1921, a Spanish anarchist, Luciano Perez, planted 29 sticks of dynamite in a flower arrangement of the altar under the Tilma. When it exploded all the marble altar, railing and floor were broken, however, the normal glass which encased the Tilma, and the Tilma itself was remarkable all intact. Now, the Tilma is preserved in a bullet proof glass in the Basilica of Guadalupe.
Miracles Attract and Convince
God has always used miracles as a kind of “signature” by which He can be authentically recognized and known. The other “signature” that God will use is that of prophecy. You could say that those two “signatures” are God’s first and second names―just as we known by our “first-names” or “Christian names” and our “family names” or “second-names”. The miracles surrounding the shroud are quite stupendous and mind-boggling! Not all of them were noticed or discovered at first―it took the massive advances in science and technology to uncover some of them, yet from the very beginning (in 1531) the image of Our Lady on St. Juan Diego’s Tilma produced one miracle after another over almost 500 years since 1531.
Here are some of the discoveries that researchers and scientists have found over the last 500 years. Remarkably, as time goes on, the Tilma has become more—not less—mysterious. The enigma of the Tilma has piqued the interest of believers and scientists—and the efforts of politically-motivated critics and ridiculers—through the ages.
What Science Shows Us
THE FABRIC
► First, there’s the physical makeup of the Tilma itself. The image that she left of herself imprinted miraculously on the Tilma―a poor quality cactus-cloth― should have deteriorated in 20 years, but to this very day it shows no sign of decay almost 500 years later and still defies all scientific explanations of its origin. For more than 100 years it was hung in a primitive chapel—an unshielded environment ―exposed to constant candle smoke, damp and other damaging factors. After much human contact by scientists’ examinations and pilgrims kissing it, the Tilma is still in good condition with the cloth it was made of that ordinarily would have lasted no more than 20-30 years has now lasted almost 500 years―and is still going strong.
► The reverse side of the Tilma is rough and coarse, while the front side is as soft as silk. This delicate fabric should have wasted away in a matter of a few decades―like most other Tilmas. Yet it still remains to this day, nearly 500 years later.
► Power magnification has revealed the fact that the coarse weave of the Tilma was deliberately used in a precise manner to give depth to the face on the image.
THE IMAGE
► The overall image of Our Lady cannot be explained by science. Both its color rendering and brightness enduring over the centuries are inexplicable. Pigment of the fabric used were from no known source; whether natural, animal, mineral, or vegetable. All pigments known to exist in Mexico 500 years ago would have faded.
► NASA scientists have no explanation as to how the image got on the cloth; no brush strokes or stretch marks on it. Careful testing using modern restoration techniques have demonstrated that the image was made using no under-drawing, no sizing, no protective over-varnish and no brush strokes.
► Colors float above the surface of the Tilma at a distance of 3/10th of a milimeter or 1/100 of an inch.
► When the Tilma is examined at a distance of less than 10 inches, the colors totally disappear.
► Image seems to increase and decrease―owing it to the unknown property of surface and substance of which it is made.
► Under high magnification the image shows no sign of fading or cracking, after almost 500 years.
► Strangely, the pink color of the gown is transparent to infra-red light, unlike all other pigments of this hue, which are opaque.
► Viewed close up, the face and hands are of a grey-white color which gradually becomes olive as one backs away — an impossible accomplishment for any human painter. Scientists have compared this to the same effect in nature with iridescent bird feathers, butterfly scales and brightly-colored beetles.
► After filtering and processing―the digitized images reveal that portion of the face, hands, robe, and mantle had been painted in one step, with no sketches, or corrections, and no visible brush strokes or sizing used that smoothed the surface and no protective varnish covering the surface.
► Image changes in color slightly depending on the angle of viewing, a phenomenon known as “iridescence”, a technique that cannot be reproduced with human hands.
► What and how the colors of the image appeared on the cloak remains a total scientific mystery.
► The Virgin’s head is slightly tilted to her right and had she not done so the center stitch, which holds the Tilma together, would have divided her face in two.
► Specialists at Kodiak Corporation in Mexico, explain the image is smooth and bears more resemblance to a photograph than anything else.
► Our Lady’s height in the Image is 4’8” and of a woman of 18-20 years old. The face is that of a “metiza” ― which is a mixture of Spanish and Indian race as a result of intermarriage.
► The Tilma maintains a constant temperature of 36.6 degrees Celsius (98.6 degrees Fahrenheit), which is the average temperature of a living person.
► Carlos Fernandez del Castillo, a gynecologist, examined the Image and indicates stage of pregnancy on December 9th for Jesus birth to occur on Christmas day. A stethoscope placed below the black band at the waist of Our Lady and he heard rhythmic repeating heartbeats at 115 beats per minute, the same as that of a baby in the womb.
► The stellar arrangement that appear on the Mantle of Our Lady, accurately display the various constellations of the Mexican sky the day of the apparition occurred which was in the winter-morning solstice of December 12th, 1531, Saturday, at 10:26 a.m.
► The star map is in the reverse (the cardinal axis rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise) provides a view of the constellations from beyond them, as it would be seen looking through them toward the earth.
► It has been also found that imposing a topographical map of central Mexico on Our Lady’s dress, the mountains, river, and principal lakes coincide with the decoration on the dress.
OUR LADY’S EYES
► Beginning in 1929 and continuing until today, photographers, scientists and opthalmologists have demonstrated the existence of images of human figures in both of the Virgin’s eyes. These are found in the precise location wherein figures reflected by a live human eye would be found in a photograph.
► The shape, placement and size of human figures of St. Juan Diego and the interpreter present when the Tilma was opened imply that this was literally what the Virgin saw as she stared out from the image on the Tilma at that moment. As to whether this could have been created by a human painter, the placement of these images in her eyes is impossible to replicate on an even, flat surface.
► It was discovered that the reflection of Bishop Juan de Zumarraga looking in astonishment in the pupil of Our Lady’s eyes.
► When exposed to light, Our Lady’s eye contracts and dilates when light is withdrawn.
► Our Lady’s eyes have been ophthalmologically determined to be alive on the Tilma.
► In 1976, some twenty doctors had confirmed, orally and in writing, the “unexplainable presence” of a man with a beard in the cornea and lenses of the Virgin.
►By 1979, Dr. Jose’ Aste Tonsmann, PhD., a Peruvian ophthalmologist and an expert at IBM in the digital processing of images, and who for over 20 years studied the Tilma, digitally enlarges the Image of Our Lady’s eyes by 2,500 times the actual size under extremely high resolution and had found not only a single figure, but images of the witnesses present when the Tilma was first revealed before the Bishop in 1531, including a small family group, 13 persons in all. In addition, Dr. Tonsmann used digital technology similar to that used in the images received from satellites and space probes in transmitting visual information. The image of the Bishop Zumarraga in the eyes of Our Lady was also enlarged 1,000 times than the actual size to able to see what is reflected in his eyes. The eye of the Bishop contains the image of Juan Diego opening his Tilma before the bishop. The size of the image is a quarter of a micron, which is ¼ of a millionth of a millimeter.
MIRACLES ATTRIBUTED TO THE IMAGE OF OUR LADY OF GUADALUPE
► 9 million Indians were converted to Christianity within just a short few years.
► This conversion of Indians also brought a halt to the pagan rituals of human sacrifice.
► Spaniards and Mexicans who were mortal enemies embraced one another with affection.
The earliest published version of the story of Guadalupe was written by Fr. Miguel Sánchez (1606-1674) in 1648. Fr. Sánchez describes seven miracles that were attributed to Our Lady of Guadalupe.
► The first miracle took place on the very day that the sacred image was brought to the new hermitage. On December 26th, 1531, only days after the miraculous image of Our Lady appeared on the Tilma of Juan Diego, the Chichimeca Indians were celebrating the newly built chapel, with dancing and bows and arrows according to their custom. One of the Indians was struck in the neck by a wayward arrow, giving him a mortal wound and immediately killing him. With great alarm, the Indians carried the dead man within the chapel and laid him beneath the sacred image of Our Lady of Guadalupe and prayed fervently for a miracle. When the arrow was removed, he returned to life, without any visible injury. All that was left were marks where the arrow had penetrated. The miracle aroused the Indians admiration and won many hearts among the recently converted.
► The second miracle related by Fr. Sanchez occurred in 1544, when a strong pestilence (cocolixtli) arose among the Indians, killing more than twelve thousand people in the towns surrounding Mexico. The Franciscans led a procession of Indian children aged six to seven from the convent of Santiago Tlatelolco to the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, where they made supplication. The following day the effects were evident, for instead of burying a hundred corpses a day, only one or two died each day, so that soon all were fully relieved from the plague. This was a very public miracle and gave rise to great devotion to the holy image among the Indians.
► The third miracle of the Virgin of Guadalupe pertains to the seer of the Virgin of Los Remedios. The image of Nuestra Señora de los Remedios was brought to Mexico by the conquistadores. In 1520, Captain Juan Rodríguez de Villafuerte hid it in an Indian shrine on the hill of Otomcapulco, west of the city of Mexico. Twenty years later, guided by supernatural signs, an Indian named Juan (called Juan de Tobar or Juan del Águila in other accounts) discovered the image there under a maguey. As Fr. Sánchez tells it, the image “appeared” to the Indian, though we are not here talking of an apparition of the Virgin herself. Don Juan, who was the cacique (roughly, “mayor”) of the town of San Juan Totoltepec, kept the image in his home for several years. At one point he fell gravely ill (in 1544 according to other accounts), and he asked his companions to bring him to the shrine of Guadalupe. There the Virgin spoke to him, that he may know that she and the Virgin of Los Remedios were the same person, and she restored his health. She told him to return to his house and build a humble shrine for the image of Los Remedios. The shrine of Totoltepec was built for it in 1550. A greater temple was built in its place by order of the Archbishop in 1574-75.
► The fourth miracle was witnessed by a gentleman named don Antonio de Carvajal, who was traveling with his company from the city of Mexico to the town of Tulancingo. A young relative of his was carried away by his angered horse at full gallop for half a league across rocky ground. His companions found him on the ground with one foot in a stirrup, and fully expected him to be dead and dismembered. Instead, they found him alive and intact. The young man explained that when they had stopped to pray at the shrine of Guadalupe, and later heard much talk of the miracles of that holy image, he was deeply impressed, so he invoked the Virgin Mary of Guadalupe when he was in danger. He instantly saw the Virgin appear just as she is painted in the image of Guadalupe. She stopped the horse, which obeyed her reverently. The man was so moved that he wished to kneel and kiss the ground in her presence.
► The fifth miracle involved a man who was in the major chapel of the hermitage, kneeling and praying before the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, when the cord holding a large hanging lamp broke. The heavy lamp fell a great height onto the man's head, with enough force to kill him or severely injure him, yet he was unharmed. The lamp was not dented, nor was its glass broken, nor its oil spilt, and its flame stayed alight.
► The sixth miracle was when Fr. Juan Vázquez de Acuña, who was vicar of the hermitage for many years (around 1600 AD), went up to the main altar to say Mass. The lights were all extinguished because of the strong winds. A minister went out to start a light. The priest, waiting at the altar, saw two rays of sun, in the middle of which was the miraculous image of the Virgin. The two candles on the altar lighted miraculously, in the view of other persons present. The minister came back with the light, and found that candles were already lit, and he knew without being told that they had been lit by a miracle.
► The seventh and last miracle recorded is that which occurred during the inundation of Mexico (in 1629). This was a time recent enough to be remembered by Fr. Sánchez, with much sadness and tenderness. The flooding of the city began on Tuesday, September 25th. To console the afflicted people, Archbishop Francisco Manzo y Zúñiga brought the miraculous image of Guadalupe from its shrine down to his palace, where it was displayed that night, “perhaps so it may see the place and house where it had been reborn among the flowers and appeared painted on that cloak.” The next morning it was moved to the main altar of the cathedral, where it remained throughout the flood. While the people feared that the city would remain permanently underwater, after a while the waters subsided little by little, and the city was dry. On Saturday, May 14th, 1634, the Archbishop offered Mass and started a solemn procession of the image back to its shrine. The following morning it was returned to its original sanctuary. Everyone proclaimed the miracle of the image.
The above seven miracles were not the only miracles to have occurred, but simply those chosen by Fr. Sanchez in his book on Guadalupe―and only up to the time of writing in 1648. Fr. Sanchez died in 1674―but the miracles did not die! The continued for hundreds of years.
In his book, the Nican moctepana, Lasso de la Vega includes not only factual details but entire miracle narratives not found in Fr. Sánchez accounts. There are fourteen miracle accounts in all, summarized below.
► An Indian killed by an arrow during the procession was miraculously restored to life.
► In 1544, during a severe plague, the Franciscans in Tlatelolco led a procession to Tepeyácac. From that day onward, only two or three persons died each day, instead of a hundred.
► Juan of Totoltépec, the Indian who discovered Our Lady of Los Remedios, fell ill and was brought to Tepeyácac, where he was cured.
► A young relative of Don Antonio Carbajal was dragged by his startled horse for well over a mile, but was miraculously spared any injury. He had invoked Our Lady of Guadalupe, whose shrine they had passed.
► A large hanging lamp fell on a Spanish man who was praying at the shrine. The witnesses thought he died, but he was uninjured and the lamp was undamaged and still lit.
► The vicar of the shrine, Juan Vázquez de Acuña, was about to say Mass, when all the candles went out. While he waited for someone to get a new fire, two beams of light appeared and lit the candles, to the marvel of those in attendance.
► A spring appeared behind the shrine. Its water is clean but acidic, and countless cures have been attested by those who drank or bathed in it.
► A Spanish lady who lived in Mexico City began to have swelling in her belly. After ten months of failed treatment, she was brought to the shrine of Guadalupe in the morning. After praying and drinking some water from the spring, she fell asleep. An Indian saw a snake come out from under the sleeping woman, and she awoke in fright. They killed the snake, and her swelling went down. Four days later, she was able to walk back cured.
► A noble Spaniard, a resident of Mexico City, had strong pains in his head and ears. He was brought to the shrine of Guadalupe, where he prayed to be healed and swore that, if cured, he would make an offering of a head of silver. He was cured shortly after his arrival, and he remained in her shrine for nine days.
► A youth named Catalina had dropsy. The doctors said she could not get up, or she would die. She was carried to the shrine of Guadalupe. She prayed for her health; then two men came to take her out, and she use all her strength to go to the fount, and drink the water there. She was instantly cured as she drank.
► A discalced Franciscan friar, named Pedro de Valderrama, had a pestiferous cancer in his toe, which needed to be amputated. They took him to the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe. In her presence, he untied the rag around his toe and prayed to be healed. He was instantly cured and walked back to Pachuca on foot.
► A Spanish nobleman, don Luis de Castilla, had a badly swollen foot, which the doctors could not cure, and so he was sure to die. It is said that the above-mentioned friar told him of his cure by Our Lady of Guadalupe. The nobleman ordered silversmiths to make a foot of silver, the size of his foot, and he sent it to the shrine to be placed before her, entrusting her to heal him. When the messenger left to deliver the foot, the sick man was so afflicted that he wanted to die. Yet when he returned, he found the man well, having been cured.
► A sacristan named Juan Pavón, who was in charge of the temple of Our Lady of Guadalupe, had a son with a large swelling in the neck. He was so gravely ill that he wanted to die and could not breathe. The sacristan took his son to the presence of Our Lady and anointed him with oil from the lamp that was burning. He was instantly healed.
► Don Francisco Quetzalmamalitzin, of Teotihuacán, turned to Our Lady when his town was destroyed and left deserted, because they opposed being deprived of the Franciscan friars. The viceroy Luis de Velasco wanted to replace the Franciscans with Augustinians, which the townspeople thought a great offense. Since he was sought everywhere, don Francisco went in secret to Azcapotzalco, to pray to Our Lady of Guadalupe to change the heart of the viceroy and nobles so that his people would be pardoned and could return to their homes, and again be ministered by the Franciscans. This indeed occurred: the people were pardoned, including Don Francisco and his courtesans in hiding; the Franciscans were again sent there, and all could return to their homes without incident. This was in the year 1558. Don Francisco entrusted his soul to Our Lady of Guadalupe at the hour of his death, which was March 2nd, 1563.
► On November 14th, 1921, a Spanish anarchist, Luciano Perez, planted 29 sticks of dynamite in a flower arrangement of the altar under the Tilma. When it exploded all the marble altar, railing and floor were broken, however, the normal glass which encased the Tilma, and the Tilma itself was remarkable all intact. Now, the Tilma is preserved in a bullet proof glass in the Basilica of Guadalupe.
Article 9
Tuesday & Wednesday, December 10th & 11th
Lessons from Guadalupe
Tuesday & Wednesday, December 10th & 11th
Lessons from Guadalupe
|
Pagan Lands of the Americas
North and South America were basically pagan lands until various Spanish expeditions brought them the Holy Catholic Faith. The most well-known American pagan civilizations were the Mayans, the Incas and the Aztecs. The Aztec Empire was located in central Mexico. It ruled much of the region from the 1400s until the Spanish arrived in 1519. Much of the Aztec society centered around their religion and gods. The Maya civilization began as early as 2000 BC and continued to have a strong presence in Mesoamerica for over 3,000 years until the Spanish arrived in 1519. The Maya were the only American civilization to develop an advanced written language. They also excelled in mathematics, art, architecture, and astronomy. The Inca Empire was centered in Peru and ruled over much of the west coast of South America from the 1400s to the time of the Spanish arrival in 1532. At its height, the Inca Empire had an estimated population of over 10 million people. The Aztec Empire reigned in present-day central Mexico for nearly one century until the early 1500s, when it was conquered by the Spaniards. Originating from a small group of poverty-stricken wanderers, the Aztec empire developed into one of the largest empires in the Americas. At its height the Aztec empire consisted of a ruling class of Aztecs with nearly fifteen million subjects of different cultures living in five hundred different cities and towns. The Aztecs followed a demanding religion that required human sacrifices, wrote poetry, engineered huge stone temples, devised two calendars—one for the days of the year and another for religious events—and developed a system of strict laws that covered all aspects of life, including what clothes a person could wear. |
The Inca Empire spanned a large portion of South America by the late 1400s. Although many different cultures prospered in the South American Andes Mountains for many centuries beforehand, the Incas developed their distinctive culture beginning in 1200, and by 1471 became the largest empire in South America, reigning over a region that stretched from modern-day Ecuador to Chile. They were pagans, like the Aztecs. The Incas built roads, developed trade, created stone architecture, made beautifully worked gold art and jewelry, became skillful potters, and wove lovely fabrics. Much like the Aztecs, the Inca Empire was conquered by the Spaniards. In 1532, the Spaniard, Francisco Pizarro conquered the Incas and their territory soon became a colony of Spain.
Pagan Human Sacrifice
Both the Aztecs and the Incas practiced human sacrifice, with some notable differences in their rituals and beliefs:
The Incas practiced human sacrifice in a ceremony called capacocha, where children were chosen to join their deities. The children were given alcohol and coca leaves to help them breathe during the long journey to the sacrifice site, which was often on a high mountaintop. Once there, the children were given an intoxicating drink to reduce pain and fear, and then killed by strangulation, blows to the head, or exposure to the cold. The Incas believed that the best members of humanity should be sent to join their deities.
The Aztecs practiced human sacrifice on a large scale, often at festivals and other special occasions. Sacrifices could be people who embodied the gods, captured enemies, or others chosen to be sacrificed. The Aztecs believed that human sacrifice restored blood lost by Huitzilopochtli, the sun god, and prevented the end of the world.
The Aztec looked upon the earth and sun as being a mother and a father. They believed that to keep the sun on its course, and prevent darkness from overtaking the world forever, it was necessary everyday to feed it human blood. Without blood the world would stop. Each time a priest stood on top of a pyramid and held up a bleeding heart and placed it in the “quauhxixalli” (where the hearts were burned together with incense), a disaster was avoided and the end of the world was postponed once more.
Human sacrifice was believed to have been introduced to the Aztecs by the Toltecs. It was performed almost exactly the same way by the Mayans. First, conch horns sounded and the victim was led to the top of the pyramid. Four priests held the victim still as he laid stretched-out on his back on a flat or convex stone. A fifth priest dressed in a black robe with long black hair cut out the heart with a flint or obsidian knife. Occasionally, victims were allowed to fight for freedom, and if he defeated several Aztec warriors he was allowed to live. Sadly, this almost never happened. These special warriors wore their own unique costumes and they were well respected.
This was not the only type of sacrifice. Women were sacrificed during dances, children were sacrificed to the rain god Tlaloc, and victims were burned in fires in honor of the fire god. Also, like the Mayans, the Aztecs would dress their victims up to look like their god of choice, attach him to a wooden frame and shoot him full of arrows. When the Aztecs practiced cannibalism after the rites they believed that they were eating god's own flesh.
The Paganism of Old Testament Times
This human sacrifice can also be seen in the Old Testament:
“King Manasses made his son pass through fire; and he used divination; and observed omens; and appointed pythons; and multiplied soothsayers to do evil before the Lord and to provoke Him” (4 Kings 21:6).
The King of Moab sacrifices his firstborn son and heir as a burnt offering to Chemosh, the Moabite god. This act was considered an emergency measure in the Ancient Near East, when divine favor was desperately needed: “When the king of Moab saw this, to wit, that the enemies had prevailed, he took with him seven hundred men that drew the sword, to break in upon the King of Edom―but they could not. Then he took his eldest son that should have reigned in his stead, and offered him for a burnt offering upon the wall” (4 Kings 3:26-27).
God speaks out angrily at such practices: “They have built the high places to burn their sons, and their daughters in the fire!” (Jeremias 7:31). “They have done to their gods all the abominations which the Lord abhors―offering their sons and daughters, and burning them with fire!” (Deuteronomy 12:31). “When you will have come into the land which the Lord your God shall give to you, beware lest you have a mind to imitate the abominations of those nations! Neither let there be found among you anyone that shall expiate his son or daughter, making them to pass through the fire; or that consults soothsayers, or observes dreams and omens; neither let there be any wizard, nor charmer, nor any one that consults pythonic spirits, or fortune tellers, or that seeks the truth from the dead. For the Lord abhors all these things, and for these abominations he will destroy them!” (Deuteronomy 18:9-12). “They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils! They shed innocent blood―the blood of their sons and of their daughters, which they sacrificed to the idols of Chanaan! And the land was polluted with blood and was defiled with their works! And they went aside after their own inventions. And the Lord was exceedingly angry with His people, and He abhorred His inheritance” (Psalm 105:37-40).
Divine Providence Makes Inroads into Paganism
Prior to the 1500s, North and South America were pagan continents, Today, every single country in the continent has Mary as a patroness, venerated under a different name (see below).
Argentina ― Our Lady of Luján
Bolivia ― Our Lady of Copacabana
Brazil ― Our Lady of Aparecida
Chile ― Our Lady of Carmel of Maipú
Colombia ― Our Lady of Chiquinquirá
Costa Rica ― Our Lady of the Angels
Cuba ― La Virgen the Caridad del Cobre
Dominican Republic ― Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes
Ecuador ― Our Lady of Quinche
El Salvador ― Our Lady of Peace
Guatemala ― Our Lady of the Rosary
Honduras ― La Virgen de Suyapa
Mexico ― Our Lady of Guadalupe
Nicaragua ― Our Lady of "El Viejo"
Panama ― Santa María La Antigua
Paraguay ― Our Lady of Caacupé
Peru ― Our Lady of la Merced
Puerto Rico ― Our Lady of the Divine Providence
Uruguay ― La Virgen de los Treinta y Tres
Venezuela ― Our Lady of Coromoto
United States ― Immaculate Conception
Canada ― Mary of the Hurons, Our Lady of the Cape
In this article, our focus will be on Our Lady of Guadalupe. Outside of Mexico, Our Lady of Guadalupe is honored by millions in the United States, other countries in Latin America, and beyond. In 1754, the Church declared Our Lady of Guadalupe patroness of what was then named “New Spain”, corresponding to Spanish Central and Northern America. In the 20th century, the Church extended Our Lady of Guadalupe’s patronage to the entire North and South American continents. The Virgin of Guadalupe has been proclaimed “Queen of Mexico”, “Patroness of the Americas”, “Empress of Latin America”, and “Protectress of Unborn Children.”
Before focusing solely upon Our Lady of Guadalupe, let us first of all look at how the Faith originally came to the pagan North and South American continents.
First Mass in South America
The first Mass recorded on continental South America occurred when the expedition of a Portuguese nobleman, Pedro Álvares Cabral, reached the coast of Brazil, where, at Porto Seguro, the Franciscan Fr. Henriques Soares de Coimbra offered Mass and erected a cross, on April 26th, 1500, naming the place Vera Cruz (which translates as “The True Cross”), and claiming it for the King of Portugal. Earlier Spanish expeditions along the continental coast appear to have been mainly occupied with charting and mapping the region, while also stopping to trade with natives for gold, pearls, and lumber.
First Mass in Puerto Rico
In March 1509,the Spanish explorer, Juan Ponce de León, with a group of colonists, including priests, landed in Puerto Rico at “Caparra” (now Pueblo Viejo, in Guaynabo) and established a settlement there (the ruins remain and are a U.S. National Historic Landmark). That group’s first Mass would have been the first Mass that we can say was offered on what is now U.S. territory.
West Coast of South America
On the west coast of South America, another Spanish expedition under the command of the explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa, reached the Pacific Ocean at the shore of the Bay of San Miguel on September 29th, 1513, the feast of St. Michael the Archangel, at the sight of which the expedition’s chaplain Fr. Adrés de Vera chanted the Te Deum.
First Mass in Peru
The Spanish Dominican priest, Fr. Vicente de Valverde, and a secular priest, Fr. Juan de Sosa, accompanied the Spanish conquistador, Francisco Pizarro, on his expedition to Peru in 1533 (two years after the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe) and offered Mass along the way. Pizarro’s earlier expeditions, from 1527-1531, may also have had priests accompanying them.
First Mass in Mexico
A priest, Fr. Pedro Gonzalez, accompanied the Spanish expedition of Juan de Grijalva in 1518 that landed briefly at Yucatan and further along the coast of Mexico, as described by Bernal Diaz del Castillo, who did not, however, record that Mass was offered there. Indeed, the priest appears in the narrative only to have assisted in helping the expedition locate and collect gold images of native deities that were then carried away.
The history of the Catholic Church in Mexico dates from the period of the Spanish conquest (1519–1521). On Easter Sunday, in April 1519, Fr. Bartolomé de Olmedo, the chaplain of Hernan Cortés’s Spanish expedition to Mexico, offered a High Mass, in commemoration of the landing of the expedition two days prior, at the site of the settlement they founded― the town of Vera Cruz (which translates as “The True Cross”).
Uncertainty about Florida in 1522
In early 1522 (nine years before Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared),the Spanish explorer, Ponce de León, attempted, from his bases in Puerto Rico, to establish a settlement near Charlotte Harbor, on the west coast of Florida. But he was unable to do so, owing to the hostility of natives, who attacked and drove away the Spaniards, fatally wounding Ponce in the battle. The disaster occurred almost immediately upon their landing, but the brief account of the expedition by Gonzalo Fernandez de Oviedo y Valdés, in his Historia general y natural de las Indias suggests that some days elapsed between their landing and the attack, during which time the priests accompanying the expedition tried to preach to the natives and come to terms with them, but to no avail. If the priests were indeed onshore for a few days, as Oviedo suggests, before being driven away, they may well have offered Mass there, at Charlotte Harbor, which would have been the first Mass offered on what would become the continental U.S. But if they did so, it was not noted in the spotty records that remain of the expedition.
Uncertainty about North Carolina in 1526
In June 1526 (five years before Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared), two Dominican priests, Antonio Montesino and Anthony de Cervantes, accompanied several hundred colonists from San Domingo, under the leadership of the Spanish explorer, Lucas Vasques de Ayllón, and attempted a settlement upon the Atlantic coast of the mainland north of Florida. They first made land at Cape Fear (near present-day Wilmington, North Carolina) but chose to sail on, looking for a more salubrious spot, which they found and established the small settlement of San Miguel de Guandape (or Gualdape), North Carolina, where, during the summer and fall of 1526, they certainly did offer Mass.
Uncertainty about Florida in 1528
The Spanish conquistador Panfilo de Navaez (including Alvar Nuñez Caveza De Vaca) put ashore at present day Stump Pass near Englewood on the Gulf Coast of Florida on Good Friday, April 10th, 1528 (three years before Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared), and the landing party was resting at an evacuated Indian village there on Easter Sunday, where Franciscan priest Juan Suarez would possibly have celebrated Mass.
When Our Lady appeared to Juan Diego in 1531, it had only been 10 years since Hernando Cortez had conquered Mexico City in 1521. In 1523, Franciscan missionaries came evangelizing the Indian people. They were so successful that the Diocese of Mexico City was established in 1528. Take note also, that in North America, Jamestown, the first permanent English colony, was not established until 1607.
The Birth of Juan Diego―the future seer of Our Lady of Guadalupe
Juan Diego, of poor peasant stock, was born a pagan in 1474. He lived as a pagan until the time of the Spanish evangelization of those pagan lands in the early 1500s. Juan Diego and many of his family members were among these early converts to the Faith. He was baptized “Juan Diego” in 1525, along with his wife, who was given the names “Maria Lucia”, and his uncle, who was baptized “Juan Bernardino.”
Satan’s Bloody Paganism
One must also not forget that Juan Diego had grown up under Aztec oppression. The Aztec religious practices, which included human sacrifice, play an interesting and integral role in this story. Every major Aztec city had a temple pyramid, about 100 feet high, on top of which was erected an altar. Upon this altar, the Aztec priests offered human sacrifice to their god Huitzilopochtli, called the “Lover of Hearts and Drinker of Blood,” by cutting out the beating hearts of their victims, usually adult men but often children. Considering that the Aztecs controlled 371 towns and the law required 1,000 human sacrifices for each town with a temple pyramid, over 50,000 human beings were sacrificed each year. Moreover, the early Mexican historian Ixtlilxochitl estimated that one out of every five children fell victim to this bloodthirsty religion.
In 1487, when Juan Diego was just 13 years old, he would have witnessed the most horrible event: Tlacaellel, the 89-year-old Aztec ruler, dedicated the new temple pyramid of the sun, dedicated to the two chief gods of the Aztec pantheon — Huitzilopochtli and Tezcatlipoca, (the god of hell and darkness) — in the center of Tenochtitlan (later Mexico City).
The temple pyramid was 100 feet high with 114 steps to reach the top. More than 80,000 men were sacrificed over a period of four days and four nights. While this number of sacrifices seems incredible, evidence indicates it took only 15 seconds to cut the heart out of each victim. (For more information, see Our Lady of Guadalupe and the Conquest of Darkness by Dr. Warren Carroll).
“And the land was polluted with blood,” by idolaters who sacrificed their sons and daughters to devils. “The heathens … served their idols … and they sacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils. And they shed innocent blood―the blood of their sons and of their daughters―which they sacrificed to the idols … And the land was polluted with blood” (Psalm 105:35-38).
Such was Mexico when Hernando Cortes arrived there in 1519. Some ten million native Nahuatl Indians formed a vast confederation of tribes at this time. These tribes were dominated by the powerful Aztecs who, for all their intelligence, industry, and valor, were equally barbaric, enslaved by an extravagant system of idolatry which placated its numerous gods with gruesome orgies of human sacrifice and cannibalism. For centuries torrents of blood literally flowed from the temple pyramids, with as many as 20,000 humans being sacrificed in one day.
Nevertheless, in 1520, Hernando Cortes outlawed human sacrifice. He stripped the temple pyramid of its two idols, cleansed the stone of its blood and erected a new altar. Cortez, his soldiers and Father Olmedo then ascended the stairs with the Holy Cross and images of the Blessed Mother and St. Christopher. Upon this new altar, Father Olmedo offered the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Upon what had been the place of evil pagan sacrifice, now the unbloody, eternal and true sacrifice of our Lord was offered. Such an action, however, sparked the all-out war with the Aztecs, whom Cortez finally subdued in August of 1521. In 1523, Franciscan missionaries came evangelizing the Indian people. They were so successful that the Diocese of Mexico City was established in 1528―three years before the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
Cortes came and liberated the Nahuatls from their slavery to Satan, but because of the corruption of some of the Spanish rulers and because of the Aztec’s attachment to polygamy and other pagan practices, very few converted to Catholicism in the first decade of Spanish rule. The saintly Juan de Zumarraga, Mexico’s first bishop, could do little to convert the Aztecs, but he remained confident in the unfailing help of the Queen of Heaven, to whom he entrusted the future of New Spain.
The Americas are Returning to Paganism and Human Sacrifice
It cannot be denied that, over the last 50 or 60 years, we have been witnessing an accelerated return to paganism―with ever increasing numbers leaving the Catholic Church as well as the Protestant sects. Latin America is home to more than 425 million Catholics – nearly 40% of the world’s total Catholic population. In 2014, 69% of adults in Latin America identified as Catholic, down from over 90% in the mid-1900s.
The number of Catholics who fulfill their obligation of attending Sunday Mass has also fallen drastically. For example, in Mexico only 16% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday Mass. Other countries are also low on Mass attendance: Colombia has 37%; Brazil has 23%; Bolivia 20%; Peru 19%; Argentina 9%; Chile 8%; Uruguay 7%.
A report, released in January 2024, by Pew Research Center, shows that “nones” (those who have no religious affiliation whatsoever) now account for 28% of the total U.S. population, outstripping the next largest group, Catholics, who make up 20% of the population. Nearly half of “nones”, 43%, believe that organized religion does more harm than good, while over half, 56%, believe that science does more good than harm.
In 2015–2019, there were 3,680,000 abortions in South America, out of a total of 11,900,000 pregnancies. The USA, for the year 2020, performed over 930,000 abortions. These numbers are far in excess of the pagan human sacrifices of the Mayans, Aztecs and Incas put together!
Euthanasia has also got its “foot in the door” in ever increasing number of countries in North and South America― Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, United States and Uruguay all permit euthanasia in certain provinces or states under a variety of conditions. This will only grow over time―just as it did with divorce, contraception, abortion and LGBTQ+.
Enter Juan Diego and Our Lady
Let us now turn our attention to the event of the day―the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe, being her feast tomorrow― and look at the principal character or recipient of her apparition and see what might apply to us at the current time in which we live. Are there parallels that can be drawn between the 1500s and the 2000s? Are there things that are applicable to both centuries? What can learn from Our Lady of Guadalupe’s apparitions, the messages she gave, the effect that she had, the miracles she performed and the events which unfolded in the short term and the long term?
In the year of Our Lord, 1531, Our Lady of Guadalupe would make her appearance. Ten years and four months earlier, the Spaniards, led by Hernan Cortes, had conquered the proud pagan Aztec nation. The opening of the New World brought with it both fortune-seekers and religious preachers desiring to convert the native populations to the Christian Faith. Now, scarcely a decade later, a million and a half of the indigenous population of around 16 to 20 million (some scholars say 20 to 25 million, other say as little as 10 million―it is hard to know, since populations were not counted by a census) had already embraced baptism and the Faith of Christ. One of the pagan converts, in the first 10 years, was a poor Aztec Indian named Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin (1474–1548), also known simply as Juan Diego―a simple and God-fearing man. He and his wife, María Lucía, were among the first to be baptized Catholic, after the arrival of the main group of twelve Franciscan missionaries in Mexico in 1524. Fifty-seven-year-old Juan was a simple and good man whose wife had recently died, two years before the apparitions, and who was now caring for his sick uncle― Juan Bernardino. Juan Diego was not destitute, he was neither rich nor influential.
December 9th, 1531
You never know what can happen next! This is especially true of the workings and plans of Heaven. Juan Diego left his humble dwelling in Cuauhtitlan before dawn, on his way to hear Mass at the Church of Santiago, in the barrio of Tlatelolco. His path led past a hill called by the Indians Tepeyac (Hill of the Nose), and as dawn was breaking he arrived at the foot of the hill. Suddenly he heard the sound of melodious singing, like the voices, singing together with such indescribable harmony that he was overcome with wonder and delight. Raising his eyes to the summit of Tepeyac, Juan saw, as it were a white and shining cloud, and within it a rainbow of color, with rays of dazzling light. The Indian stood spellbound, yet unafraid, filled with a amazement, and asked himself whether it were all a dream: “What is this I hear and see? Where am I? By chance have I been transported to that Paradise of Delights where our race came into being? Or is it some heavenly country, hidden from the eyes of men?”
The singing stopped, but Juan remained entranced, gazing at the shining cloud above him on the hill. And then he heard a voice, a woman’s voice, soft and clear, calling to him from the midst of the cloud: “Juan! Juan!” What was going on, he thought. Was he hearing correctly? Was the voice calling him? There it came again, this time more gently insistent: “Juan! Come closer!”
All hesitation was removed. Juan Diego rushed up the hill and stood just below the shining cloud. Within the shining cloud there stood a beautiful Lady. The radiance of her garments transformed into the likeness of precious jewels the stones beneath her feet, and the leaves of the hawthorn and nopal appeared clusters of rare emeralds on surfaces polished and glowing. The very soil had become a carpet of jasper, tinted in many colors.
“My son, Juan Diego, whom I love tenderly, like a small and delicate child! Where are you going?” The Lady’s words were spoken in Nahuatl, the language of Juan’s people. Who can reproduce their delicacy of feeling in any other tongue?
“O noble Mistress and my Lady,” Juan answered, “I am going to Mexico, to the barrio of Tlatelolco, to hear the Mass, which the ministers of God present for us in His place.”
“Know, my beloved son,” replied the Lady, “that I am the Ever-Virgin Mary, Mother of the true God, who is the Author of Life, the Creator of all things and the Lord of Heaven and Earth; who is everywhere. It is my wish that you build me a temple on this site. Here, as the loving Mother of you and of your fellow men, I will show forth my living kindness and compassion for your people and for those who love me and seek me, and call upon me in their labors and afflictions. Here I will hear their cries and their petitions, I will comfort and assist you. In order that my will may be accomplished, you must go to Mexico, to the palace of the Bishop who resides there. You are to tell him that I sent you, and that it is my pleasure that he build me a temple in this place. You will relate to him what you have seen and heard. And be certain of this: I will be grateful for what you do for me in this matter with which I charge you, and I will raise you up and make you renowned because of it. My son, you have heard my wish. Go in peace. And bear in mind that I will repay the labor and care that you employ; so in this matter exert all your strength.”
On his knees and with his head humbly bowed to the ground, Juan Diego answered: “I go, most noble Lady and my Mistress, as your humble slave, to carry out your order!” And having said this, Juan Diego took leave of the Lady.
Our Lady’s Paths Are Not Always Smooth!
Juan Diego descended the western slope of the Tepeyac Hill and took the road into the City of Mexico. As he had promised the Lady, Juan went directly to the palace of the Bishop, Fray Juan de Zumarraga. He asked the servants to tell the Bishop he wanted to see him; but, because of the early hour, and because they saw only an Indian of the poorest class, the servants simply let him wait. Finally, however, struck by his patience, they let him in for an audience with the Bishop. On his knees before the Bishop, Juan poured out his story. Bishop Zumarraga listened to the extraordinary tale and questioned Juan closely. In the end he sent Juan Diego away, telling him to return in some days.
Sorrowfully Juan left the palace. He felt that the Bishop had not believed the story. What was more important to Juan Diego, he felt that he had failed to carry out the will of the Blessed Lady. With heavy heart he began the journey to his pueblo, Tulpetlac.
It was after sunset when he reached the summit of the Tepeyac Hill. The Lady was waiting for him. As soon as Juan saw her, he humbly prostrated himself and began to explain things: “My well-beloved Daughter, my Queen and Lady most high! I did what you commanded me, although I did not talk to the Bishop until after a long wait. I gave him your message in the form you commanded me; he heard me calmly and with attention. But, from what I observed in his manner, and from the questions which he put to me, I gathered that he did not believe me; for he told me to come back at a later date, so that he might investigate the matter at length. He thinks that the temple you wish to be built for you is a tale of my own making, or my own fancy rather than your will. So I pray you, for this work send some noble and important personage, worthy of respect, whom he will believe. For as you see, my Mistress, I am only a poor rustic, a lowly man of the people, and unsuited for this business on which you send me. Pardon my boldness, my Queen, if I have failed in the reverence due to your high station. Let not your wrath fall upon me, nor may my answer displease you.”
The Most Holy Mary listened to his tale with a benign countenance, and then answered: “Listen, my well-beloved son. Know that I do not lack servants, nor domestics, under my command. For I have many whom I can send, if I wish, who will do what they are commanded. But it is fitting that you undertake this matter. It is through your intervention that my will and my desire must be done. So I ask you, my son, and I order you, to return tomorrow, to see and talk to the Bishop. Tell him to build for me the temple that I requst, and tell him that she who sends you is the Virgin Mary, Mother of the true God.”
If At First You Don’t Succeed―Try and Try Again!
With reverence Juan Diego took his leave and continued on the way to his home in Tulpetlac. As far as we know, he said not a word to anyone about the matter. Perhaps, overcome by the events of the day and disturbed that the Bishop had not believed the events, he had decided to keep things secret for the time being.
The next day, December 10th, was Sunday, and Juan went to the Church of Santiago in Tlatelolco for Mass and the Catechism class in Christian doctrine which the Indian converts had to attend. Then he went again to the palace of the Bishop. Once more the servants made him wait a long time, but finally he was admitted.
Once more, prostrate and with tears and urgent words, Juan related to Bishop Zumarraga how, for the second time, he had seen the Mother of God in the same place that he had seen her the first time. That she was waiting for the reply to the message which she had given him earlier. That once again she had commanded him to go and tell the Bishop to build her a church on the very site where he had seen and talked to her. That he should tell the Bishop that she who sent him was the Mother of Jesus Christ and the Ever-Virgin Mary.
The Bishop listened with greater attention this time, and began to think that there might be something to the tale. He questioned and re-questioned Juan Diego very closely, warning him to weigh his words carefully. He asked Juan to describe the appearance of the Virgin, and satisfied himself that it could be neither dream nor imagination. Yet, as Bishop, he could not appear to accept lightly such a tale from the lips of a simple Indian. So he replied: “What you have told me is not enough to make me undertake the task that you request. Therefore, tell the Lady who sent you to give you other signs, by which I may know that it is the Mother of God who sent you, and that it is her will that we build her a temple.”
“What sign would you like me to ask for?” said Juan.
The calmness and confidence of Juan Diego strangely disturbed the Bishop. The Indian spoke as though the sign were as good as granted. And so the Bishop answered: “Let the Lady choose whatever sign seems good to her.”
Then he summoned several of the most trusted servants in his household. Speaking to them in Spanish, which Juan did not understand, the Bishop told them to follow Juan without his knowledge, to report upon what he did and with whom he spoke. The servants followed Juan, easily keeping him in sight until he arrived at a little bridge crossing a stream, almost at the foot of Tepeyac. Here Juan Diego disappeared from their sight, and although the servants looked everywhere, searching the hill on every side, Juan could not be found. They took him for either an impostor or a wizard, and returned to tell the Bishop what had occurred, asking him to punish the Indian if he should again come to the palace.
Failed Again! What Now?
When Juan reached the summit of the hill, the Virgin was waiting for him. On his knees he told her what had happened: “…how,” as the most ancient recital has it, “carrying out her command, he had returned to the palace of the Bishop and had given him her message. And that, after questions and cross-questions, the Bishop had said that this simple tale was not sufficient to make him take action in so serious a matter.”
Juan continued his relation:
“I am to ask you, O Lady, for a particular sign, by which he may know that you sent me, and that it is your will that temple for you be built on this site.”
With loving words Mary commended the care and diligence of Juan. She told him to return on the morrow, when she would give him a sign that the Bishop would believe. Juan promised to return, and took his leave of the Sovereign Lady.
But on the next day, Monday, December 11th, Juan was unable to keep his promise. Upon reaching his pueblo, he found that his uncle, Juan Bernardino, was seriously ill. The greater part of the day Juan spent in looking for a curandero (native medicine man) and when finally he found one, the latter’s treatments only made the sick man worse. Juan Bernardino requested his nephew to go early on Tuesday to the Convent of Santiago at Tlatelolco, for a priest who would administer the last rites of the Church. Before daybreak on Tuesday, December 12th, therefore, Juan Diego set out for Tlatelolco. But when he arrived at the foot of the Tepeyac Hill, and was about to take the trail over the hill, he recalled his neglected promise to the Lady. Thinking that she would reproach him, he determined to avoid a meeting by skirting around the hill. But as Juan approached the spot, where today there is a spring of sparking water, Mary came forth to meet him. Encompassed by a shining cloud, she came down the hill, directly across his path, and spoke: “Where are you going, my son, and what road are you taking?”
Struck with shame and fear, the Indian fell to the ground and answered: “My beloved Daughter and my Lady, may God watch over you! Do not be displeased at what I am going to tell you. Know, my Mistress, that one of your servants, my uncle, is gravely ill and about to die, and as he seems very weak I am going to the temple of Tlatelolco for a priest to confess and anoint him. After having discharged this duty I will return here to obey your command. Forgive me, I pray you, my Lady, and bear with me a little. I am not asking to be excused from doing what you have commanded, nor is it a false excuse I give you. Tomorrow I will return without fail.”
Mary heard Juan Diego’s story with understanding, and then spoke to him: “Listen, my son, to what I tell you now. Do not let anything worry or afflict you; do not fear illness nor any troublesome happening nor pain. Am I not here, I who am your Mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection? Am I not your life and health? Are you not in my embrace and in my prayers? What else do you need? Have no care nor worry about the illness of your uncle, for he will not die from it. Rest assured that he is already well!”
Consoled by the words of Our Lady, Juan replied: “Then send me, by Lady, to see the Bishop, and give me the sign of which you spoke so that he will believe me!”
Say it with Flowers!
And Mary answered: “My dearly beloved son, go up to the summit of the hill where you have seen me and talked with me, and cut the roses which you find there. Gather them into your cloak and bring them to me. I will tell you what you are to do and say.”
Without another word Juan obeyed, although he knew that the rocky summit had never produced flowers, nor vegetation of any kind. But, arriving at the top, he found a beautiful garden of Castilian roses, fresh and fragrant and covered with dew. Laying out his tilma (mantle), he gathered into it as many roses as it would hold, and carried them to Mary.
Mary gathered up the roses and rearranged them in the mantle of Juan Diego, saying: “You see here the sign which you are to take to the Bishop. Tell him, by the sign of these roses, to do what I order him. And pay attention, my son, to what I am telling you, and know that I have confidence in you. Show no one on the way what you are carrying, nor open your cloak except in the presence of the Bishop, and tell him what I sent you for. This will convince him that he is to start work on my temple.” And so saying, the Virgin sent him away.
At the Episcopal palace, Juan Diego asked to see Bishop Zumarraga; but as before, the servants of the Bishop saw only a humble Indian, and paid him little attention. Finally, someone became curious about what he was carrying so carefully in his tilma, but Juan refused to show them. With some force they pulled at the cloak, and obtained a glimpse of the roses. At this discovery the servants informed the Bishop, and Juan was brought into his presence. Juan gave him Our Lady’s message, and added that he had brought from her the sign which the Bishop had demanded. When he let fall the ends of his mantle, a shower of roses covered the floor, and upon his garment was seen the image of Our Lady, just as Juan had seen her on the hill of Tepeyac. The astonished Bishop venerated the miraculous image before his entire household and then bore it reverently to his private chapel.
Miraculous Cure
Later, Juan was conducted, with signs of great respect, to the home of Juan Bernardino, by Spaniards who were commissioned to investigate the cure of the old man. Juan Bernardino related how the Most Holy Virgin had visited him at the very moment his nephew affirmed the cure had taken place, and had perfectly restored his health. The Virgin also told him “...that it was her pleasure for a temple to be erected for him in the place where his nephew had seen her; and also that her sacred image was to be called Santa Maria de Guadalupe.”
Miraculous Conversions
The Virgin of Guadalupe united the tribes and races of Mexico into a nation, for all recognize her as their Mother. Of the million and a half Indians baptized by 1531, almost all had been among the poor and the children. The noble Aztec families, mindful of their former glory, had nourished resentment of the Spanish conquerors and their religion. But with the miracle of Guadalupe, class distinctions were put aside, and noble and commoner, landholder and peasant, cacique and tribesman, embraced the Faith.
Six years after Tepeyac, there were nine million converts among the Indians, embracing the nucleus of all the nations among the tribes in the valley of Anahuac. Mexico thus became the first Christian nation of the American continent. The first little temple was finished, and the miraculous image placed therein on December 26th, 1531. This temporary structure was replaced by one of adobe, built at the expense of Bishop Zumarraga, and finished in 1533. The sacred image remained there until November, 1622, when Archbishop Juan de la Serna solemnly blessed a new collegiate church on the site. In 1895 the reconstruction of that edifice was completed for the Pontifical Coronation of the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe. In 1931 a further reconstruction was carried out, to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the apparitions.
Miraculous Image
The beautiful image of the Blessed Virgin is obviously of miraculous origin, and science is at a loss to explain it. The fabric, which the tilma was made of, should have deteriorated after 20 years―yet it is now around 500 years old and in good condition. This is impossible for science to explain. An analysis of the image shows that there was no sketch of the image of Our Lady made prior to the image being produced, and that it was made without brush strokes. Modern science is unfamiliar with the substance used to produce the image. Even though the fabric is coarse, the images of several people can be seen reflected in the eyes of the Virgin, just as they would be in a living person’s eyes. The placement of those images, and the distortion that is the effect of the curve of a normal eye, is impossible to reproduce on a flat surface. The stars about Our Lady on the mantle coincide with the constellations that were in the sky on December 12th, 1531.
In 1921 a bomb was placed before the image by those who hate God and His Holy Catholic Church. It exploded with such force that a heavy cast iron crucifix was bent backwards, a marble communion rail destroyed, and yet the tilma remained completely undamaged! The result of this act of hatred and violence against the Church and Our Lady obviously did not have the effect that the perpetrators intended, for their act further confirms that the miraculous preservation of the image is supernatural in origin and enjoys the protection of Christ and His holy Mother!
What to Learn?
Is Our Lady of Guadalupe merely a thing of the past? Or does Our Lady of Guadalupe have part to play in our present day crises on both a spiritual and secular level? If you examine Our Lady’s other apparitions―such as Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Lourdes, Our Lady of Fatima, Our Lady of Akita―then you will see that they all have a very long “shelf-life” and don’t seem to have an expiry date. Our Lady of God Success―who appeared in the late 1500s and early 1600s―spoke of a large portion of time, spanning many decades, that also included our present day times. Our Lady of La Salette spoke of a period of time that extended from her apparition in 1846 up to the end of the world. Our Lady of Fatima spoke of a period of time that extended from her apparition in 1917 up to and beyond the Triumph of her Immaculate Heart and including elements concerning the end of the world. Our Lady of Akita’s message in 1973 also spans many decades that will have dire consequences and which are yet to arrive.
Mary’s Fight Against Satan
As for Our Lady of Guadalupe, tradition holds that Juan Diego asked our Blessed Mother her name. She responded in his native language of Nahuatl: “Tlecuatlecupe,” which means “the one who crushes the head of the serpent” (a clear reference to Genesis 3:15 and perhaps to the prominent symbol of the serpent in the Aztec religion). “Tlecuatlecupe” when correctly pronounced, sounds remarkably similar to “Guadalupe.” Consequently, when Juan Diego told Bishop Zumarraga her name in his native tongue, he probably confused it with the familiar Spanish name “Guadalupe,” a city with a prominent Marian shrine. The image of Our Lady of Guadalupe has her crushing the head of the sepent―the devil. The battle against the serpent―that is to say, the devil―is not just a battle confined to a certain year, a certain decade or a certain century―it is a battle that has been and will be fought throughout all time. Our Lady speaks of this crushing of the head of the serpent at several of her other apparitions.
In 1577, Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres―to whom Our Lady of Good Success appeared―when Mariana was only 13 years old, she left Spain in the company of her aunt, Mother Maria de Jesus Taboada, and four other religious sisters, to found a branch of the Order of the Immaculate Conception in San Francisco de Quito (Ecuador). No sooner had they embarked than a tempest of unimaginable fury came over the sea. The ship began to sink, and the sailors themselves were in despair. In the midst of the fury, Mother Maria and the young Mariana saw a monstrous serpent with seven heads in the ocean that was trying to destroy the ship. They heard a terrible voice that said: “I will not permit this foundation. I will not permit it to go forward. I will not permit it to endure until the end of time, and I will persecute it unceasingly.” This was the voice of the serpent crying out shortly before the waters became calm. Only the two holy virgins understood why the storm had ended so mysteriously. As the waves threatened to swallow the ship, they witnessed the appearance of the Holy Virgin who carried the Child Jesus in her right arm. He carried a sword that He used to slash the heads of the serpent to pieces. Our Lady of Good Success also speaks of what is logically the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, when she says: “My hour will arrive, when I, in an amazing manner, will overthrow proud Satan, crushing him under my feet, chaining him in the infernal abyss, leaving the Church free of this cruel tyranny.”
When Our Lady appeared to St. Catherine Labouré in 1830, at the convent of the Daughters of Charity of Saint Vincent de Paul, on the Rue du Bac in Paris―Our Lady showed Catherine the design of the Miraculous Medal (actually called the Medal of the Immaculate Conception, but the many miracles the medal produced led to its being popularly called “The Miraculous Medal). On this medal we again see the image of Our Lady standing upon and crushing the head of the serpent or devil.
Our Lady of La Salette warned: “God will strike in an unprecedented way! Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His anger upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together. The heads, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become like wandering stars which the ancient serpent will drag with his tail to destruction. God will permit the ancient serpent to cause divisions among rulers, in every society and in every family! … The Antichrist will be born of a Hebrew nun, a false virgin, who will communicate with the old serpent, the master of impurity, his father will be a bishop. He will spew out blasphemies; he will be the devil incarnate!”
Our Lady of Fatima spoke of this battle with Satan―revealing it to Sister Lucia of Fatima, who later communicated it to us: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them!” Lucia later wrote: “A time will come when the decisive battle between the Kingdom of Christ and Satan will be over marriage and the family. And those who will work for the good of the family will experience persecution and tribulation. But do not be afraid, because Our Lady has already crushed his head!”
We are undoubtedly right in the middle of that battle against Satan―and we should be able to clearly see the truth of the observations and words of the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, who said: “The influence of Satan is immense! … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The Devil does not like to be seen ― that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways! … Today, Satan has free hands … The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican! Legions of demons have lodged there! I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office! …
“Satan’s power over the world includes physical and mental obsession … The evil one can cause unrestrained animosities, especially toward those who love us the most ... Satan also ruins friendships; through his intervention, the victim feels unwelcome everywhere, avoided by everyone, ending in a desire for isolation. Every time that a friendly relationship grows and blossoms, it suddenly ends, without reason … He destroys marriages, breaks up engagements; he fosters screaming fights in families where everyone truly loves one another, and always for futile reasons. Then there follows a conviction of total lack of love and understanding, a complete affective void that makes marriage an impossibility … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan!”
Fight, Fear, Flight, Fall
Holy Scripture warns us: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). Satan seeks to destroy that Faith: “Satan comes and takes away the word of God that was sown in their hearts!” (Mark 4:15). “Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat! But I have prayed for thee, that thy Faith fail not―and thou, being once converted, confirm thy brethren!” (Luke 22:31-32). “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7). Not even Our Lord was exempt from battling with Satan: “Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil” (Matthew 4:1).
Our Lady has warned of laxity and complacency in our battles with the devils. To the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “I wish to warn thee of the cunning of Satan. From the very moment in which mortals begin to have the use of their reason, each one of them is followed by many watchful and relentless demons. For as soon as the souls are in a position to raise their thoughts to the knowledge of their God and commence the practice of the virtues infused by Baptism, these demons, with incredible fury and astuteness, seek to root out the divine seed; and if they cannot succeed in this, they try to hinder its growth, and prevent it from bringing forth fruit by engaging men in vicious, useless, or trifling things. Thus they divert their thoughts from Faith and Hope, and from the pursuit of other virtues, leading them to forget that they are Christians and diverting their attention from the knowledge of God and from the mysteries of the Redemption and of life eternal. The lovers of the world have subjected themselves and are following the standard and the fables of the devil! They allow themselves to be so insanely blinded by the devil that they neither regard nor avoid this danger! As the soul finds herself weakened by vicious acts and habits and without strength of grace, she does not resist the attack with fortitude, and the devil, acquiring more and more power over her, begins to subject and oppress her without opposition.
“The powerful arms for battling against those who make war on thee, must be the doctrines of the Catholic Faith, for the firm belief in them and the continual exercise of them, the incessant meditation and remembrance of them, enlightens souls, drives away errors, discloses the deceits of Satan and disperses his falsehoods just as the rays of the sun dispel the dark clouds. Moreover, all these exercises serve as substantial nourishment of the spirit to strengthen the soul for the battles of the Lord. If the faithful do not feel these and even more wonderful effects of Faith, it is not because Faith has not the strength and efficacy to produce them, but it is because some of the faithful are so forgetting and negligent, while others give themselves up so much to a carnal and bestial life and thereby counteract the blessing of Faith. They think so rarely of it, that they might as well not have received it at all. As they live like the infidels who have never enjoyed its advantages and as they gradually become conscious of their unhappy infidelity, they fall into greater wickedness than the unbelievers.
“Understand that this infernal serpent can have no power to lead anyone toward the good, but very much toward leading those souls into sin, who are neglectful in issuing from their evil state. Truly I say to thee, my daughter, that if mortals would thoroughly understand this danger, they would be struck with great terror; for there is no created power, which can prevent a soul that has once yielded to sin from casting itself from abyss to abyss. Since the sin of Adam, the weight of human nature, burdened with the concupiscible and irascible passions, is drawn toward sin as the stone toward its center. Joined to this tendency are the bad habits and customs, the power of Satan over those who have sinned, and his unceasing tyranny. Who is there, that is so much an enemy of his own welfare as to despise these dangers? The Almighty alone can free him and to His right hand is reserved the remedy. In spite of all this mortals live as secure and forgetful of their ruin as if each one had it in his own power to prevent and repair it at his pleasure.
“All their life they labor and exert themselves to become more and more entangled in the snares of their passions, to be consumed in deceitful vanities and to deliver themselves over to an inextinguishable fire, death and everlasting perdition in Hell, as if all were a mere joke! They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as of eternal life! All of them commonly chase after riches and earthly possessions; claiming, thereby, merely to satisfy their needs―which is only a lame pretext for hiding their lack of interest in higher things, spiritual things. In reality they lie to themselves abominously, since they are seeking superfluous things that they do not really need and not what is really necessary! The faithful are in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness! Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ Fear this sentence and renew in thy heart the care and zeal for thy salvation! Do not allow thyself to desire worldly things―a desire which seduces the human sense, disturbs the judgment and obscures reason. It will cause eternal perdition! The lovers of the world have subjected themselves and are following the standard and the fables of the devil! In the midst of this ruin, Hell has opened its mouth and the more it is fed, the more insatiable becomes its hunger! The number of fools is infinite, and the number of the damned is also uncountable!” (compilation of words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
Devotion to Mary is the Weapon
St. Louis de Montfort has several passages in his books that reveal the power of Mary against the demons. Here is one such passage from his book, The Secret of the Rosary, where the devils were forced to admit the power of Mary during an exorcism. St, Louis writes: “When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone, an Albigensian was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people. The devils who were in possession of this wretched man were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions in spite of themselves. St. Dominic put his Rosary round the neck of the possessed man and asked them who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most, who should therefore be the most loved and revered by men. At this they let out such unearthly screams and used all their cunning so as not to answer. So he knelt down and said this prayer to Our Lady: ‘O most glorious Virgin Mary, I implore you by the power of the Holy Rosary, command these enemies of the human race to answer my question!’ No sooner had he said this prayer than a glowing flame leaped out of the ears, nostrils and mouth of the possessed man. St. Dominic had scarcely finished this prayer when he saw the Blessed Virgin near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod that she held and said: ‘Answer my servant Dominic at once!’
“Then the devils started screaming: ‘You, who are our enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven, must we, in spite of ourselves, tell the whole truth and confess before everyone who it is who is the cause of our shame and our ruin? Then listen, you Christians! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! One single sigh, that she offers to the Blessed Trinity, is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints! We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants! Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards are saved by her intercession! And if that Marietta (it is thus in their fury they called her) did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity! Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!’” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
Mary is the weapon for our times, and the Rosary is a part of our devotion to Mary. Neglect Mary, and you neglect your salvation. As Our Lady herself said to St. Bridget of Sweden: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
Pagan Human Sacrifice
Both the Aztecs and the Incas practiced human sacrifice, with some notable differences in their rituals and beliefs:
The Incas practiced human sacrifice in a ceremony called capacocha, where children were chosen to join their deities. The children were given alcohol and coca leaves to help them breathe during the long journey to the sacrifice site, which was often on a high mountaintop. Once there, the children were given an intoxicating drink to reduce pain and fear, and then killed by strangulation, blows to the head, or exposure to the cold. The Incas believed that the best members of humanity should be sent to join their deities.
The Aztecs practiced human sacrifice on a large scale, often at festivals and other special occasions. Sacrifices could be people who embodied the gods, captured enemies, or others chosen to be sacrificed. The Aztecs believed that human sacrifice restored blood lost by Huitzilopochtli, the sun god, and prevented the end of the world.
The Aztec looked upon the earth and sun as being a mother and a father. They believed that to keep the sun on its course, and prevent darkness from overtaking the world forever, it was necessary everyday to feed it human blood. Without blood the world would stop. Each time a priest stood on top of a pyramid and held up a bleeding heart and placed it in the “quauhxixalli” (where the hearts were burned together with incense), a disaster was avoided and the end of the world was postponed once more.
Human sacrifice was believed to have been introduced to the Aztecs by the Toltecs. It was performed almost exactly the same way by the Mayans. First, conch horns sounded and the victim was led to the top of the pyramid. Four priests held the victim still as he laid stretched-out on his back on a flat or convex stone. A fifth priest dressed in a black robe with long black hair cut out the heart with a flint or obsidian knife. Occasionally, victims were allowed to fight for freedom, and if he defeated several Aztec warriors he was allowed to live. Sadly, this almost never happened. These special warriors wore their own unique costumes and they were well respected.
This was not the only type of sacrifice. Women were sacrificed during dances, children were sacrificed to the rain god Tlaloc, and victims were burned in fires in honor of the fire god. Also, like the Mayans, the Aztecs would dress their victims up to look like their god of choice, attach him to a wooden frame and shoot him full of arrows. When the Aztecs practiced cannibalism after the rites they believed that they were eating god's own flesh.
The Paganism of Old Testament Times
This human sacrifice can also be seen in the Old Testament:
“King Manasses made his son pass through fire; and he used divination; and observed omens; and appointed pythons; and multiplied soothsayers to do evil before the Lord and to provoke Him” (4 Kings 21:6).
The King of Moab sacrifices his firstborn son and heir as a burnt offering to Chemosh, the Moabite god. This act was considered an emergency measure in the Ancient Near East, when divine favor was desperately needed: “When the king of Moab saw this, to wit, that the enemies had prevailed, he took with him seven hundred men that drew the sword, to break in upon the King of Edom―but they could not. Then he took his eldest son that should have reigned in his stead, and offered him for a burnt offering upon the wall” (4 Kings 3:26-27).
God speaks out angrily at such practices: “They have built the high places to burn their sons, and their daughters in the fire!” (Jeremias 7:31). “They have done to their gods all the abominations which the Lord abhors―offering their sons and daughters, and burning them with fire!” (Deuteronomy 12:31). “When you will have come into the land which the Lord your God shall give to you, beware lest you have a mind to imitate the abominations of those nations! Neither let there be found among you anyone that shall expiate his son or daughter, making them to pass through the fire; or that consults soothsayers, or observes dreams and omens; neither let there be any wizard, nor charmer, nor any one that consults pythonic spirits, or fortune tellers, or that seeks the truth from the dead. For the Lord abhors all these things, and for these abominations he will destroy them!” (Deuteronomy 18:9-12). “They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils! They shed innocent blood―the blood of their sons and of their daughters, which they sacrificed to the idols of Chanaan! And the land was polluted with blood and was defiled with their works! And they went aside after their own inventions. And the Lord was exceedingly angry with His people, and He abhorred His inheritance” (Psalm 105:37-40).
Divine Providence Makes Inroads into Paganism
Prior to the 1500s, North and South America were pagan continents, Today, every single country in the continent has Mary as a patroness, venerated under a different name (see below).
Argentina ― Our Lady of Luján
Bolivia ― Our Lady of Copacabana
Brazil ― Our Lady of Aparecida
Chile ― Our Lady of Carmel of Maipú
Colombia ― Our Lady of Chiquinquirá
Costa Rica ― Our Lady of the Angels
Cuba ― La Virgen the Caridad del Cobre
Dominican Republic ― Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes
Ecuador ― Our Lady of Quinche
El Salvador ― Our Lady of Peace
Guatemala ― Our Lady of the Rosary
Honduras ― La Virgen de Suyapa
Mexico ― Our Lady of Guadalupe
Nicaragua ― Our Lady of "El Viejo"
Panama ― Santa María La Antigua
Paraguay ― Our Lady of Caacupé
Peru ― Our Lady of la Merced
Puerto Rico ― Our Lady of the Divine Providence
Uruguay ― La Virgen de los Treinta y Tres
Venezuela ― Our Lady of Coromoto
United States ― Immaculate Conception
Canada ― Mary of the Hurons, Our Lady of the Cape
In this article, our focus will be on Our Lady of Guadalupe. Outside of Mexico, Our Lady of Guadalupe is honored by millions in the United States, other countries in Latin America, and beyond. In 1754, the Church declared Our Lady of Guadalupe patroness of what was then named “New Spain”, corresponding to Spanish Central and Northern America. In the 20th century, the Church extended Our Lady of Guadalupe’s patronage to the entire North and South American continents. The Virgin of Guadalupe has been proclaimed “Queen of Mexico”, “Patroness of the Americas”, “Empress of Latin America”, and “Protectress of Unborn Children.”
Before focusing solely upon Our Lady of Guadalupe, let us first of all look at how the Faith originally came to the pagan North and South American continents.
First Mass in South America
The first Mass recorded on continental South America occurred when the expedition of a Portuguese nobleman, Pedro Álvares Cabral, reached the coast of Brazil, where, at Porto Seguro, the Franciscan Fr. Henriques Soares de Coimbra offered Mass and erected a cross, on April 26th, 1500, naming the place Vera Cruz (which translates as “The True Cross”), and claiming it for the King of Portugal. Earlier Spanish expeditions along the continental coast appear to have been mainly occupied with charting and mapping the region, while also stopping to trade with natives for gold, pearls, and lumber.
First Mass in Puerto Rico
In March 1509,the Spanish explorer, Juan Ponce de León, with a group of colonists, including priests, landed in Puerto Rico at “Caparra” (now Pueblo Viejo, in Guaynabo) and established a settlement there (the ruins remain and are a U.S. National Historic Landmark). That group’s first Mass would have been the first Mass that we can say was offered on what is now U.S. territory.
West Coast of South America
On the west coast of South America, another Spanish expedition under the command of the explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa, reached the Pacific Ocean at the shore of the Bay of San Miguel on September 29th, 1513, the feast of St. Michael the Archangel, at the sight of which the expedition’s chaplain Fr. Adrés de Vera chanted the Te Deum.
First Mass in Peru
The Spanish Dominican priest, Fr. Vicente de Valverde, and a secular priest, Fr. Juan de Sosa, accompanied the Spanish conquistador, Francisco Pizarro, on his expedition to Peru in 1533 (two years after the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe) and offered Mass along the way. Pizarro’s earlier expeditions, from 1527-1531, may also have had priests accompanying them.
First Mass in Mexico
A priest, Fr. Pedro Gonzalez, accompanied the Spanish expedition of Juan de Grijalva in 1518 that landed briefly at Yucatan and further along the coast of Mexico, as described by Bernal Diaz del Castillo, who did not, however, record that Mass was offered there. Indeed, the priest appears in the narrative only to have assisted in helping the expedition locate and collect gold images of native deities that were then carried away.
The history of the Catholic Church in Mexico dates from the period of the Spanish conquest (1519–1521). On Easter Sunday, in April 1519, Fr. Bartolomé de Olmedo, the chaplain of Hernan Cortés’s Spanish expedition to Mexico, offered a High Mass, in commemoration of the landing of the expedition two days prior, at the site of the settlement they founded― the town of Vera Cruz (which translates as “The True Cross”).
Uncertainty about Florida in 1522
In early 1522 (nine years before Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared),the Spanish explorer, Ponce de León, attempted, from his bases in Puerto Rico, to establish a settlement near Charlotte Harbor, on the west coast of Florida. But he was unable to do so, owing to the hostility of natives, who attacked and drove away the Spaniards, fatally wounding Ponce in the battle. The disaster occurred almost immediately upon their landing, but the brief account of the expedition by Gonzalo Fernandez de Oviedo y Valdés, in his Historia general y natural de las Indias suggests that some days elapsed between their landing and the attack, during which time the priests accompanying the expedition tried to preach to the natives and come to terms with them, but to no avail. If the priests were indeed onshore for a few days, as Oviedo suggests, before being driven away, they may well have offered Mass there, at Charlotte Harbor, which would have been the first Mass offered on what would become the continental U.S. But if they did so, it was not noted in the spotty records that remain of the expedition.
Uncertainty about North Carolina in 1526
In June 1526 (five years before Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared), two Dominican priests, Antonio Montesino and Anthony de Cervantes, accompanied several hundred colonists from San Domingo, under the leadership of the Spanish explorer, Lucas Vasques de Ayllón, and attempted a settlement upon the Atlantic coast of the mainland north of Florida. They first made land at Cape Fear (near present-day Wilmington, North Carolina) but chose to sail on, looking for a more salubrious spot, which they found and established the small settlement of San Miguel de Guandape (or Gualdape), North Carolina, where, during the summer and fall of 1526, they certainly did offer Mass.
Uncertainty about Florida in 1528
The Spanish conquistador Panfilo de Navaez (including Alvar Nuñez Caveza De Vaca) put ashore at present day Stump Pass near Englewood on the Gulf Coast of Florida on Good Friday, April 10th, 1528 (three years before Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared), and the landing party was resting at an evacuated Indian village there on Easter Sunday, where Franciscan priest Juan Suarez would possibly have celebrated Mass.
When Our Lady appeared to Juan Diego in 1531, it had only been 10 years since Hernando Cortez had conquered Mexico City in 1521. In 1523, Franciscan missionaries came evangelizing the Indian people. They were so successful that the Diocese of Mexico City was established in 1528. Take note also, that in North America, Jamestown, the first permanent English colony, was not established until 1607.
The Birth of Juan Diego―the future seer of Our Lady of Guadalupe
Juan Diego, of poor peasant stock, was born a pagan in 1474. He lived as a pagan until the time of the Spanish evangelization of those pagan lands in the early 1500s. Juan Diego and many of his family members were among these early converts to the Faith. He was baptized “Juan Diego” in 1525, along with his wife, who was given the names “Maria Lucia”, and his uncle, who was baptized “Juan Bernardino.”
Satan’s Bloody Paganism
One must also not forget that Juan Diego had grown up under Aztec oppression. The Aztec religious practices, which included human sacrifice, play an interesting and integral role in this story. Every major Aztec city had a temple pyramid, about 100 feet high, on top of which was erected an altar. Upon this altar, the Aztec priests offered human sacrifice to their god Huitzilopochtli, called the “Lover of Hearts and Drinker of Blood,” by cutting out the beating hearts of their victims, usually adult men but often children. Considering that the Aztecs controlled 371 towns and the law required 1,000 human sacrifices for each town with a temple pyramid, over 50,000 human beings were sacrificed each year. Moreover, the early Mexican historian Ixtlilxochitl estimated that one out of every five children fell victim to this bloodthirsty religion.
In 1487, when Juan Diego was just 13 years old, he would have witnessed the most horrible event: Tlacaellel, the 89-year-old Aztec ruler, dedicated the new temple pyramid of the sun, dedicated to the two chief gods of the Aztec pantheon — Huitzilopochtli and Tezcatlipoca, (the god of hell and darkness) — in the center of Tenochtitlan (later Mexico City).
The temple pyramid was 100 feet high with 114 steps to reach the top. More than 80,000 men were sacrificed over a period of four days and four nights. While this number of sacrifices seems incredible, evidence indicates it took only 15 seconds to cut the heart out of each victim. (For more information, see Our Lady of Guadalupe and the Conquest of Darkness by Dr. Warren Carroll).
“And the land was polluted with blood,” by idolaters who sacrificed their sons and daughters to devils. “The heathens … served their idols … and they sacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils. And they shed innocent blood―the blood of their sons and of their daughters―which they sacrificed to the idols … And the land was polluted with blood” (Psalm 105:35-38).
Such was Mexico when Hernando Cortes arrived there in 1519. Some ten million native Nahuatl Indians formed a vast confederation of tribes at this time. These tribes were dominated by the powerful Aztecs who, for all their intelligence, industry, and valor, were equally barbaric, enslaved by an extravagant system of idolatry which placated its numerous gods with gruesome orgies of human sacrifice and cannibalism. For centuries torrents of blood literally flowed from the temple pyramids, with as many as 20,000 humans being sacrificed in one day.
Nevertheless, in 1520, Hernando Cortes outlawed human sacrifice. He stripped the temple pyramid of its two idols, cleansed the stone of its blood and erected a new altar. Cortez, his soldiers and Father Olmedo then ascended the stairs with the Holy Cross and images of the Blessed Mother and St. Christopher. Upon this new altar, Father Olmedo offered the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Upon what had been the place of evil pagan sacrifice, now the unbloody, eternal and true sacrifice of our Lord was offered. Such an action, however, sparked the all-out war with the Aztecs, whom Cortez finally subdued in August of 1521. In 1523, Franciscan missionaries came evangelizing the Indian people. They were so successful that the Diocese of Mexico City was established in 1528―three years before the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
Cortes came and liberated the Nahuatls from their slavery to Satan, but because of the corruption of some of the Spanish rulers and because of the Aztec’s attachment to polygamy and other pagan practices, very few converted to Catholicism in the first decade of Spanish rule. The saintly Juan de Zumarraga, Mexico’s first bishop, could do little to convert the Aztecs, but he remained confident in the unfailing help of the Queen of Heaven, to whom he entrusted the future of New Spain.
The Americas are Returning to Paganism and Human Sacrifice
It cannot be denied that, over the last 50 or 60 years, we have been witnessing an accelerated return to paganism―with ever increasing numbers leaving the Catholic Church as well as the Protestant sects. Latin America is home to more than 425 million Catholics – nearly 40% of the world’s total Catholic population. In 2014, 69% of adults in Latin America identified as Catholic, down from over 90% in the mid-1900s.
The number of Catholics who fulfill their obligation of attending Sunday Mass has also fallen drastically. For example, in Mexico only 16% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday Mass. Other countries are also low on Mass attendance: Colombia has 37%; Brazil has 23%; Bolivia 20%; Peru 19%; Argentina 9%; Chile 8%; Uruguay 7%.
A report, released in January 2024, by Pew Research Center, shows that “nones” (those who have no religious affiliation whatsoever) now account for 28% of the total U.S. population, outstripping the next largest group, Catholics, who make up 20% of the population. Nearly half of “nones”, 43%, believe that organized religion does more harm than good, while over half, 56%, believe that science does more good than harm.
In 2015–2019, there were 3,680,000 abortions in South America, out of a total of 11,900,000 pregnancies. The USA, for the year 2020, performed over 930,000 abortions. These numbers are far in excess of the pagan human sacrifices of the Mayans, Aztecs and Incas put together!
Euthanasia has also got its “foot in the door” in ever increasing number of countries in North and South America― Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, United States and Uruguay all permit euthanasia in certain provinces or states under a variety of conditions. This will only grow over time―just as it did with divorce, contraception, abortion and LGBTQ+.
Enter Juan Diego and Our Lady
Let us now turn our attention to the event of the day―the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe, being her feast tomorrow― and look at the principal character or recipient of her apparition and see what might apply to us at the current time in which we live. Are there parallels that can be drawn between the 1500s and the 2000s? Are there things that are applicable to both centuries? What can learn from Our Lady of Guadalupe’s apparitions, the messages she gave, the effect that she had, the miracles she performed and the events which unfolded in the short term and the long term?
In the year of Our Lord, 1531, Our Lady of Guadalupe would make her appearance. Ten years and four months earlier, the Spaniards, led by Hernan Cortes, had conquered the proud pagan Aztec nation. The opening of the New World brought with it both fortune-seekers and religious preachers desiring to convert the native populations to the Christian Faith. Now, scarcely a decade later, a million and a half of the indigenous population of around 16 to 20 million (some scholars say 20 to 25 million, other say as little as 10 million―it is hard to know, since populations were not counted by a census) had already embraced baptism and the Faith of Christ. One of the pagan converts, in the first 10 years, was a poor Aztec Indian named Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin (1474–1548), also known simply as Juan Diego―a simple and God-fearing man. He and his wife, María Lucía, were among the first to be baptized Catholic, after the arrival of the main group of twelve Franciscan missionaries in Mexico in 1524. Fifty-seven-year-old Juan was a simple and good man whose wife had recently died, two years before the apparitions, and who was now caring for his sick uncle― Juan Bernardino. Juan Diego was not destitute, he was neither rich nor influential.
December 9th, 1531
You never know what can happen next! This is especially true of the workings and plans of Heaven. Juan Diego left his humble dwelling in Cuauhtitlan before dawn, on his way to hear Mass at the Church of Santiago, in the barrio of Tlatelolco. His path led past a hill called by the Indians Tepeyac (Hill of the Nose), and as dawn was breaking he arrived at the foot of the hill. Suddenly he heard the sound of melodious singing, like the voices, singing together with such indescribable harmony that he was overcome with wonder and delight. Raising his eyes to the summit of Tepeyac, Juan saw, as it were a white and shining cloud, and within it a rainbow of color, with rays of dazzling light. The Indian stood spellbound, yet unafraid, filled with a amazement, and asked himself whether it were all a dream: “What is this I hear and see? Where am I? By chance have I been transported to that Paradise of Delights where our race came into being? Or is it some heavenly country, hidden from the eyes of men?”
The singing stopped, but Juan remained entranced, gazing at the shining cloud above him on the hill. And then he heard a voice, a woman’s voice, soft and clear, calling to him from the midst of the cloud: “Juan! Juan!” What was going on, he thought. Was he hearing correctly? Was the voice calling him? There it came again, this time more gently insistent: “Juan! Come closer!”
All hesitation was removed. Juan Diego rushed up the hill and stood just below the shining cloud. Within the shining cloud there stood a beautiful Lady. The radiance of her garments transformed into the likeness of precious jewels the stones beneath her feet, and the leaves of the hawthorn and nopal appeared clusters of rare emeralds on surfaces polished and glowing. The very soil had become a carpet of jasper, tinted in many colors.
“My son, Juan Diego, whom I love tenderly, like a small and delicate child! Where are you going?” The Lady’s words were spoken in Nahuatl, the language of Juan’s people. Who can reproduce their delicacy of feeling in any other tongue?
“O noble Mistress and my Lady,” Juan answered, “I am going to Mexico, to the barrio of Tlatelolco, to hear the Mass, which the ministers of God present for us in His place.”
“Know, my beloved son,” replied the Lady, “that I am the Ever-Virgin Mary, Mother of the true God, who is the Author of Life, the Creator of all things and the Lord of Heaven and Earth; who is everywhere. It is my wish that you build me a temple on this site. Here, as the loving Mother of you and of your fellow men, I will show forth my living kindness and compassion for your people and for those who love me and seek me, and call upon me in their labors and afflictions. Here I will hear their cries and their petitions, I will comfort and assist you. In order that my will may be accomplished, you must go to Mexico, to the palace of the Bishop who resides there. You are to tell him that I sent you, and that it is my pleasure that he build me a temple in this place. You will relate to him what you have seen and heard. And be certain of this: I will be grateful for what you do for me in this matter with which I charge you, and I will raise you up and make you renowned because of it. My son, you have heard my wish. Go in peace. And bear in mind that I will repay the labor and care that you employ; so in this matter exert all your strength.”
On his knees and with his head humbly bowed to the ground, Juan Diego answered: “I go, most noble Lady and my Mistress, as your humble slave, to carry out your order!” And having said this, Juan Diego took leave of the Lady.
Our Lady’s Paths Are Not Always Smooth!
Juan Diego descended the western slope of the Tepeyac Hill and took the road into the City of Mexico. As he had promised the Lady, Juan went directly to the palace of the Bishop, Fray Juan de Zumarraga. He asked the servants to tell the Bishop he wanted to see him; but, because of the early hour, and because they saw only an Indian of the poorest class, the servants simply let him wait. Finally, however, struck by his patience, they let him in for an audience with the Bishop. On his knees before the Bishop, Juan poured out his story. Bishop Zumarraga listened to the extraordinary tale and questioned Juan closely. In the end he sent Juan Diego away, telling him to return in some days.
Sorrowfully Juan left the palace. He felt that the Bishop had not believed the story. What was more important to Juan Diego, he felt that he had failed to carry out the will of the Blessed Lady. With heavy heart he began the journey to his pueblo, Tulpetlac.
It was after sunset when he reached the summit of the Tepeyac Hill. The Lady was waiting for him. As soon as Juan saw her, he humbly prostrated himself and began to explain things: “My well-beloved Daughter, my Queen and Lady most high! I did what you commanded me, although I did not talk to the Bishop until after a long wait. I gave him your message in the form you commanded me; he heard me calmly and with attention. But, from what I observed in his manner, and from the questions which he put to me, I gathered that he did not believe me; for he told me to come back at a later date, so that he might investigate the matter at length. He thinks that the temple you wish to be built for you is a tale of my own making, or my own fancy rather than your will. So I pray you, for this work send some noble and important personage, worthy of respect, whom he will believe. For as you see, my Mistress, I am only a poor rustic, a lowly man of the people, and unsuited for this business on which you send me. Pardon my boldness, my Queen, if I have failed in the reverence due to your high station. Let not your wrath fall upon me, nor may my answer displease you.”
The Most Holy Mary listened to his tale with a benign countenance, and then answered: “Listen, my well-beloved son. Know that I do not lack servants, nor domestics, under my command. For I have many whom I can send, if I wish, who will do what they are commanded. But it is fitting that you undertake this matter. It is through your intervention that my will and my desire must be done. So I ask you, my son, and I order you, to return tomorrow, to see and talk to the Bishop. Tell him to build for me the temple that I requst, and tell him that she who sends you is the Virgin Mary, Mother of the true God.”
If At First You Don’t Succeed―Try and Try Again!
With reverence Juan Diego took his leave and continued on the way to his home in Tulpetlac. As far as we know, he said not a word to anyone about the matter. Perhaps, overcome by the events of the day and disturbed that the Bishop had not believed the events, he had decided to keep things secret for the time being.
The next day, December 10th, was Sunday, and Juan went to the Church of Santiago in Tlatelolco for Mass and the Catechism class in Christian doctrine which the Indian converts had to attend. Then he went again to the palace of the Bishop. Once more the servants made him wait a long time, but finally he was admitted.
Once more, prostrate and with tears and urgent words, Juan related to Bishop Zumarraga how, for the second time, he had seen the Mother of God in the same place that he had seen her the first time. That she was waiting for the reply to the message which she had given him earlier. That once again she had commanded him to go and tell the Bishop to build her a church on the very site where he had seen and talked to her. That he should tell the Bishop that she who sent him was the Mother of Jesus Christ and the Ever-Virgin Mary.
The Bishop listened with greater attention this time, and began to think that there might be something to the tale. He questioned and re-questioned Juan Diego very closely, warning him to weigh his words carefully. He asked Juan to describe the appearance of the Virgin, and satisfied himself that it could be neither dream nor imagination. Yet, as Bishop, he could not appear to accept lightly such a tale from the lips of a simple Indian. So he replied: “What you have told me is not enough to make me undertake the task that you request. Therefore, tell the Lady who sent you to give you other signs, by which I may know that it is the Mother of God who sent you, and that it is her will that we build her a temple.”
“What sign would you like me to ask for?” said Juan.
The calmness and confidence of Juan Diego strangely disturbed the Bishop. The Indian spoke as though the sign were as good as granted. And so the Bishop answered: “Let the Lady choose whatever sign seems good to her.”
Then he summoned several of the most trusted servants in his household. Speaking to them in Spanish, which Juan did not understand, the Bishop told them to follow Juan without his knowledge, to report upon what he did and with whom he spoke. The servants followed Juan, easily keeping him in sight until he arrived at a little bridge crossing a stream, almost at the foot of Tepeyac. Here Juan Diego disappeared from their sight, and although the servants looked everywhere, searching the hill on every side, Juan could not be found. They took him for either an impostor or a wizard, and returned to tell the Bishop what had occurred, asking him to punish the Indian if he should again come to the palace.
Failed Again! What Now?
When Juan reached the summit of the hill, the Virgin was waiting for him. On his knees he told her what had happened: “…how,” as the most ancient recital has it, “carrying out her command, he had returned to the palace of the Bishop and had given him her message. And that, after questions and cross-questions, the Bishop had said that this simple tale was not sufficient to make him take action in so serious a matter.”
Juan continued his relation:
“I am to ask you, O Lady, for a particular sign, by which he may know that you sent me, and that it is your will that temple for you be built on this site.”
With loving words Mary commended the care and diligence of Juan. She told him to return on the morrow, when she would give him a sign that the Bishop would believe. Juan promised to return, and took his leave of the Sovereign Lady.
But on the next day, Monday, December 11th, Juan was unable to keep his promise. Upon reaching his pueblo, he found that his uncle, Juan Bernardino, was seriously ill. The greater part of the day Juan spent in looking for a curandero (native medicine man) and when finally he found one, the latter’s treatments only made the sick man worse. Juan Bernardino requested his nephew to go early on Tuesday to the Convent of Santiago at Tlatelolco, for a priest who would administer the last rites of the Church. Before daybreak on Tuesday, December 12th, therefore, Juan Diego set out for Tlatelolco. But when he arrived at the foot of the Tepeyac Hill, and was about to take the trail over the hill, he recalled his neglected promise to the Lady. Thinking that she would reproach him, he determined to avoid a meeting by skirting around the hill. But as Juan approached the spot, where today there is a spring of sparking water, Mary came forth to meet him. Encompassed by a shining cloud, she came down the hill, directly across his path, and spoke: “Where are you going, my son, and what road are you taking?”
Struck with shame and fear, the Indian fell to the ground and answered: “My beloved Daughter and my Lady, may God watch over you! Do not be displeased at what I am going to tell you. Know, my Mistress, that one of your servants, my uncle, is gravely ill and about to die, and as he seems very weak I am going to the temple of Tlatelolco for a priest to confess and anoint him. After having discharged this duty I will return here to obey your command. Forgive me, I pray you, my Lady, and bear with me a little. I am not asking to be excused from doing what you have commanded, nor is it a false excuse I give you. Tomorrow I will return without fail.”
Mary heard Juan Diego’s story with understanding, and then spoke to him: “Listen, my son, to what I tell you now. Do not let anything worry or afflict you; do not fear illness nor any troublesome happening nor pain. Am I not here, I who am your Mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection? Am I not your life and health? Are you not in my embrace and in my prayers? What else do you need? Have no care nor worry about the illness of your uncle, for he will not die from it. Rest assured that he is already well!”
Consoled by the words of Our Lady, Juan replied: “Then send me, by Lady, to see the Bishop, and give me the sign of which you spoke so that he will believe me!”
Say it with Flowers!
And Mary answered: “My dearly beloved son, go up to the summit of the hill where you have seen me and talked with me, and cut the roses which you find there. Gather them into your cloak and bring them to me. I will tell you what you are to do and say.”
Without another word Juan obeyed, although he knew that the rocky summit had never produced flowers, nor vegetation of any kind. But, arriving at the top, he found a beautiful garden of Castilian roses, fresh and fragrant and covered with dew. Laying out his tilma (mantle), he gathered into it as many roses as it would hold, and carried them to Mary.
Mary gathered up the roses and rearranged them in the mantle of Juan Diego, saying: “You see here the sign which you are to take to the Bishop. Tell him, by the sign of these roses, to do what I order him. And pay attention, my son, to what I am telling you, and know that I have confidence in you. Show no one on the way what you are carrying, nor open your cloak except in the presence of the Bishop, and tell him what I sent you for. This will convince him that he is to start work on my temple.” And so saying, the Virgin sent him away.
At the Episcopal palace, Juan Diego asked to see Bishop Zumarraga; but as before, the servants of the Bishop saw only a humble Indian, and paid him little attention. Finally, someone became curious about what he was carrying so carefully in his tilma, but Juan refused to show them. With some force they pulled at the cloak, and obtained a glimpse of the roses. At this discovery the servants informed the Bishop, and Juan was brought into his presence. Juan gave him Our Lady’s message, and added that he had brought from her the sign which the Bishop had demanded. When he let fall the ends of his mantle, a shower of roses covered the floor, and upon his garment was seen the image of Our Lady, just as Juan had seen her on the hill of Tepeyac. The astonished Bishop venerated the miraculous image before his entire household and then bore it reverently to his private chapel.
Miraculous Cure
Later, Juan was conducted, with signs of great respect, to the home of Juan Bernardino, by Spaniards who were commissioned to investigate the cure of the old man. Juan Bernardino related how the Most Holy Virgin had visited him at the very moment his nephew affirmed the cure had taken place, and had perfectly restored his health. The Virgin also told him “...that it was her pleasure for a temple to be erected for him in the place where his nephew had seen her; and also that her sacred image was to be called Santa Maria de Guadalupe.”
Miraculous Conversions
The Virgin of Guadalupe united the tribes and races of Mexico into a nation, for all recognize her as their Mother. Of the million and a half Indians baptized by 1531, almost all had been among the poor and the children. The noble Aztec families, mindful of their former glory, had nourished resentment of the Spanish conquerors and their religion. But with the miracle of Guadalupe, class distinctions were put aside, and noble and commoner, landholder and peasant, cacique and tribesman, embraced the Faith.
Six years after Tepeyac, there were nine million converts among the Indians, embracing the nucleus of all the nations among the tribes in the valley of Anahuac. Mexico thus became the first Christian nation of the American continent. The first little temple was finished, and the miraculous image placed therein on December 26th, 1531. This temporary structure was replaced by one of adobe, built at the expense of Bishop Zumarraga, and finished in 1533. The sacred image remained there until November, 1622, when Archbishop Juan de la Serna solemnly blessed a new collegiate church on the site. In 1895 the reconstruction of that edifice was completed for the Pontifical Coronation of the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe. In 1931 a further reconstruction was carried out, to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the apparitions.
Miraculous Image
The beautiful image of the Blessed Virgin is obviously of miraculous origin, and science is at a loss to explain it. The fabric, which the tilma was made of, should have deteriorated after 20 years―yet it is now around 500 years old and in good condition. This is impossible for science to explain. An analysis of the image shows that there was no sketch of the image of Our Lady made prior to the image being produced, and that it was made without brush strokes. Modern science is unfamiliar with the substance used to produce the image. Even though the fabric is coarse, the images of several people can be seen reflected in the eyes of the Virgin, just as they would be in a living person’s eyes. The placement of those images, and the distortion that is the effect of the curve of a normal eye, is impossible to reproduce on a flat surface. The stars about Our Lady on the mantle coincide with the constellations that were in the sky on December 12th, 1531.
In 1921 a bomb was placed before the image by those who hate God and His Holy Catholic Church. It exploded with such force that a heavy cast iron crucifix was bent backwards, a marble communion rail destroyed, and yet the tilma remained completely undamaged! The result of this act of hatred and violence against the Church and Our Lady obviously did not have the effect that the perpetrators intended, for their act further confirms that the miraculous preservation of the image is supernatural in origin and enjoys the protection of Christ and His holy Mother!
What to Learn?
Is Our Lady of Guadalupe merely a thing of the past? Or does Our Lady of Guadalupe have part to play in our present day crises on both a spiritual and secular level? If you examine Our Lady’s other apparitions―such as Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Lourdes, Our Lady of Fatima, Our Lady of Akita―then you will see that they all have a very long “shelf-life” and don’t seem to have an expiry date. Our Lady of God Success―who appeared in the late 1500s and early 1600s―spoke of a large portion of time, spanning many decades, that also included our present day times. Our Lady of La Salette spoke of a period of time that extended from her apparition in 1846 up to the end of the world. Our Lady of Fatima spoke of a period of time that extended from her apparition in 1917 up to and beyond the Triumph of her Immaculate Heart and including elements concerning the end of the world. Our Lady of Akita’s message in 1973 also spans many decades that will have dire consequences and which are yet to arrive.
Mary’s Fight Against Satan
As for Our Lady of Guadalupe, tradition holds that Juan Diego asked our Blessed Mother her name. She responded in his native language of Nahuatl: “Tlecuatlecupe,” which means “the one who crushes the head of the serpent” (a clear reference to Genesis 3:15 and perhaps to the prominent symbol of the serpent in the Aztec religion). “Tlecuatlecupe” when correctly pronounced, sounds remarkably similar to “Guadalupe.” Consequently, when Juan Diego told Bishop Zumarraga her name in his native tongue, he probably confused it with the familiar Spanish name “Guadalupe,” a city with a prominent Marian shrine. The image of Our Lady of Guadalupe has her crushing the head of the sepent―the devil. The battle against the serpent―that is to say, the devil―is not just a battle confined to a certain year, a certain decade or a certain century―it is a battle that has been and will be fought throughout all time. Our Lady speaks of this crushing of the head of the serpent at several of her other apparitions.
In 1577, Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres―to whom Our Lady of Good Success appeared―when Mariana was only 13 years old, she left Spain in the company of her aunt, Mother Maria de Jesus Taboada, and four other religious sisters, to found a branch of the Order of the Immaculate Conception in San Francisco de Quito (Ecuador). No sooner had they embarked than a tempest of unimaginable fury came over the sea. The ship began to sink, and the sailors themselves were in despair. In the midst of the fury, Mother Maria and the young Mariana saw a monstrous serpent with seven heads in the ocean that was trying to destroy the ship. They heard a terrible voice that said: “I will not permit this foundation. I will not permit it to go forward. I will not permit it to endure until the end of time, and I will persecute it unceasingly.” This was the voice of the serpent crying out shortly before the waters became calm. Only the two holy virgins understood why the storm had ended so mysteriously. As the waves threatened to swallow the ship, they witnessed the appearance of the Holy Virgin who carried the Child Jesus in her right arm. He carried a sword that He used to slash the heads of the serpent to pieces. Our Lady of Good Success also speaks of what is logically the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, when she says: “My hour will arrive, when I, in an amazing manner, will overthrow proud Satan, crushing him under my feet, chaining him in the infernal abyss, leaving the Church free of this cruel tyranny.”
When Our Lady appeared to St. Catherine Labouré in 1830, at the convent of the Daughters of Charity of Saint Vincent de Paul, on the Rue du Bac in Paris―Our Lady showed Catherine the design of the Miraculous Medal (actually called the Medal of the Immaculate Conception, but the many miracles the medal produced led to its being popularly called “The Miraculous Medal). On this medal we again see the image of Our Lady standing upon and crushing the head of the serpent or devil.
Our Lady of La Salette warned: “God will strike in an unprecedented way! Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His anger upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together. The heads, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become like wandering stars which the ancient serpent will drag with his tail to destruction. God will permit the ancient serpent to cause divisions among rulers, in every society and in every family! … The Antichrist will be born of a Hebrew nun, a false virgin, who will communicate with the old serpent, the master of impurity, his father will be a bishop. He will spew out blasphemies; he will be the devil incarnate!”
Our Lady of Fatima spoke of this battle with Satan―revealing it to Sister Lucia of Fatima, who later communicated it to us: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them!” Lucia later wrote: “A time will come when the decisive battle between the Kingdom of Christ and Satan will be over marriage and the family. And those who will work for the good of the family will experience persecution and tribulation. But do not be afraid, because Our Lady has already crushed his head!”
We are undoubtedly right in the middle of that battle against Satan―and we should be able to clearly see the truth of the observations and words of the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, who said: “The influence of Satan is immense! … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The Devil does not like to be seen ― that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways! … Today, Satan has free hands … The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican! Legions of demons have lodged there! I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office! …
“Satan’s power over the world includes physical and mental obsession … The evil one can cause unrestrained animosities, especially toward those who love us the most ... Satan also ruins friendships; through his intervention, the victim feels unwelcome everywhere, avoided by everyone, ending in a desire for isolation. Every time that a friendly relationship grows and blossoms, it suddenly ends, without reason … He destroys marriages, breaks up engagements; he fosters screaming fights in families where everyone truly loves one another, and always for futile reasons. Then there follows a conviction of total lack of love and understanding, a complete affective void that makes marriage an impossibility … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan!”
Fight, Fear, Flight, Fall
Holy Scripture warns us: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). Satan seeks to destroy that Faith: “Satan comes and takes away the word of God that was sown in their hearts!” (Mark 4:15). “Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat! But I have prayed for thee, that thy Faith fail not―and thou, being once converted, confirm thy brethren!” (Luke 22:31-32). “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7). Not even Our Lord was exempt from battling with Satan: “Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil” (Matthew 4:1).
Our Lady has warned of laxity and complacency in our battles with the devils. To the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “I wish to warn thee of the cunning of Satan. From the very moment in which mortals begin to have the use of their reason, each one of them is followed by many watchful and relentless demons. For as soon as the souls are in a position to raise their thoughts to the knowledge of their God and commence the practice of the virtues infused by Baptism, these demons, with incredible fury and astuteness, seek to root out the divine seed; and if they cannot succeed in this, they try to hinder its growth, and prevent it from bringing forth fruit by engaging men in vicious, useless, or trifling things. Thus they divert their thoughts from Faith and Hope, and from the pursuit of other virtues, leading them to forget that they are Christians and diverting their attention from the knowledge of God and from the mysteries of the Redemption and of life eternal. The lovers of the world have subjected themselves and are following the standard and the fables of the devil! They allow themselves to be so insanely blinded by the devil that they neither regard nor avoid this danger! As the soul finds herself weakened by vicious acts and habits and without strength of grace, she does not resist the attack with fortitude, and the devil, acquiring more and more power over her, begins to subject and oppress her without opposition.
“The powerful arms for battling against those who make war on thee, must be the doctrines of the Catholic Faith, for the firm belief in them and the continual exercise of them, the incessant meditation and remembrance of them, enlightens souls, drives away errors, discloses the deceits of Satan and disperses his falsehoods just as the rays of the sun dispel the dark clouds. Moreover, all these exercises serve as substantial nourishment of the spirit to strengthen the soul for the battles of the Lord. If the faithful do not feel these and even more wonderful effects of Faith, it is not because Faith has not the strength and efficacy to produce them, but it is because some of the faithful are so forgetting and negligent, while others give themselves up so much to a carnal and bestial life and thereby counteract the blessing of Faith. They think so rarely of it, that they might as well not have received it at all. As they live like the infidels who have never enjoyed its advantages and as they gradually become conscious of their unhappy infidelity, they fall into greater wickedness than the unbelievers.
“Understand that this infernal serpent can have no power to lead anyone toward the good, but very much toward leading those souls into sin, who are neglectful in issuing from their evil state. Truly I say to thee, my daughter, that if mortals would thoroughly understand this danger, they would be struck with great terror; for there is no created power, which can prevent a soul that has once yielded to sin from casting itself from abyss to abyss. Since the sin of Adam, the weight of human nature, burdened with the concupiscible and irascible passions, is drawn toward sin as the stone toward its center. Joined to this tendency are the bad habits and customs, the power of Satan over those who have sinned, and his unceasing tyranny. Who is there, that is so much an enemy of his own welfare as to despise these dangers? The Almighty alone can free him and to His right hand is reserved the remedy. In spite of all this mortals live as secure and forgetful of their ruin as if each one had it in his own power to prevent and repair it at his pleasure.
“All their life they labor and exert themselves to become more and more entangled in the snares of their passions, to be consumed in deceitful vanities and to deliver themselves over to an inextinguishable fire, death and everlasting perdition in Hell, as if all were a mere joke! They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as of eternal life! All of them commonly chase after riches and earthly possessions; claiming, thereby, merely to satisfy their needs―which is only a lame pretext for hiding their lack of interest in higher things, spiritual things. In reality they lie to themselves abominously, since they are seeking superfluous things that they do not really need and not what is really necessary! The faithful are in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness! Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ Fear this sentence and renew in thy heart the care and zeal for thy salvation! Do not allow thyself to desire worldly things―a desire which seduces the human sense, disturbs the judgment and obscures reason. It will cause eternal perdition! The lovers of the world have subjected themselves and are following the standard and the fables of the devil! In the midst of this ruin, Hell has opened its mouth and the more it is fed, the more insatiable becomes its hunger! The number of fools is infinite, and the number of the damned is also uncountable!” (compilation of words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
Devotion to Mary is the Weapon
St. Louis de Montfort has several passages in his books that reveal the power of Mary against the demons. Here is one such passage from his book, The Secret of the Rosary, where the devils were forced to admit the power of Mary during an exorcism. St, Louis writes: “When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone, an Albigensian was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people. The devils who were in possession of this wretched man were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions in spite of themselves. St. Dominic put his Rosary round the neck of the possessed man and asked them who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most, who should therefore be the most loved and revered by men. At this they let out such unearthly screams and used all their cunning so as not to answer. So he knelt down and said this prayer to Our Lady: ‘O most glorious Virgin Mary, I implore you by the power of the Holy Rosary, command these enemies of the human race to answer my question!’ No sooner had he said this prayer than a glowing flame leaped out of the ears, nostrils and mouth of the possessed man. St. Dominic had scarcely finished this prayer when he saw the Blessed Virgin near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod that she held and said: ‘Answer my servant Dominic at once!’
“Then the devils started screaming: ‘You, who are our enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven, must we, in spite of ourselves, tell the whole truth and confess before everyone who it is who is the cause of our shame and our ruin? Then listen, you Christians! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! One single sigh, that she offers to the Blessed Trinity, is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints! We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants! Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards are saved by her intercession! And if that Marietta (it is thus in their fury they called her) did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity! Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!’” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
Mary is the weapon for our times, and the Rosary is a part of our devotion to Mary. Neglect Mary, and you neglect your salvation. As Our Lady herself said to St. Bridget of Sweden: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
Article 8
Sunday & Monday, December 8th & 9th
Immaculate Mary and the Dirty World
Sunday & Monday, December 8th & 9th
Immaculate Mary and the Dirty World
Why was Mary made Immaculate?
Our Lady was not created immaculate so that she could gaze in the mirror and say: “Mirror, mirror on the wall! Who is the most immaculate of all?” Our Lady is not into “navel gazing” or self-centeredness. One reason why Our Lady was created immaculate by God, was because she was destined by God to be the Mother of God the Son―Who was immaculate beyond measure. The immaculate Son of God came into a dirty sinful world in order to seek-out and save dirty, rotten sinners―as He Himself said: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32).
You cannot clean a dirty, filthy object if you yourself have dirty, filthy hands and use a dirty, filthy rag. You cannot rescue someone from the sea if you are immersed in the waters of the sea yourself. You cannot rescue someone from quicksand if you are sinking in that same quicksand. You cannot give a lost person directions if you are lost yourself. You cannot feed a hungry person if you have no food yourself. You cannot teach French to someone if you are unable to speak and understand French yourself.
Mankind was incapable of saving itself from the consequences of sin―for sin is an offense against the infinite God, and therefore sin becomes an infinite offense and contracts an infinite debt. We are not infinite beings, but only finite beings―therefore, we cannot pay an infinite debt. Only an infinite being can an infinite debt. Yet the debt for sin is a HUMAN debt and therefore humanity must pay for that debt. All of this requires a being that is, at one and the same time, both human and infinite. Only God is infinite―and so Christ became man so that, as the infinite God, He could pay the infinite debt of sin; and, as a human being through His incarnation, He could pay a human debt. There is no salvation without Christ; there is no forgiveness without Christ; there is no grace without Christ―hence Christ said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
In the scheme of things regarding our redemption and salvation, Christ has chosen to work through His most Holy Mother. Christ is the source of all our graces―yet He chooses to dispense all of His graces through the hands of His Immaculate Mother. Hence it is that we call Mary “the Mediatrix of All Grace.” In 1921, Pope Benedict XV instituted November 8th as the feast day of Our Lady Mediatrix of All Graces. Yet that date was soon embarking on a “musical chairs of dates” ― by the 1940s the traditional feast day was May 31st; however, other dates were May 8th and June 7th!
Pope St. Pius X stated: “By the communion of sorrows and of will between Christ and Mary she merited to become the dispenser of all the benefits which Jesus acquired for us by shedding His Blood” (Ad Diem Illium). This resonates with what Pope Leo XIII had previously affirmed: “It may be affirmed that, according to God’s will, nothing comes to us without going through Mary’s hands. Just as no one can approach the Almighty Father except through the Son, so no one can approach the Almighty Father except through the Son, so no one can approach Christ except through His Mother” (Octobri Mense). St. John Vianney’s words from a few centuries before these holy pontiffs bear similar testimony: “All the saints have a great devotion to Our Lady. No grace comes from Heaven without passing through her hands. We cannot go into a house without speaking to the doorkeeper. Well, the Holy Virgin is the doorkeeper of Heaven.”
St. Louis de Montfort, in his True Devotion to Mary, writes: “It was only through Mary that God the Father gave His Only-Begotten to the world. Whatever sighs the patriarchs may have sent forth, whatever prayers the prophets and the saints of the Old Law may have offered up to obtain this treasure for full four thousand years, it was only Mary who merited it and found grace before God (Luke 1:30) by the force of her prayers and the eminence of her virtues. The world was unworthy, says St. Augustine, to receive the Son of God directly from the Father’s hands. He gave Him to Mary, in order that the world might receive Him through her. The Son of God became man for our salvation―but it was in Mary and by Mary. God the Holy Ghost formed Jesus Christ in Mary―but it was only after having asked her consent by one of the first ministers of His court.”
“God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (mare). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Maria). This great God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has of beauty and splendor, of rarity and preciousness―including even His own Son―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich.
“God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly.
“To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary―so that she who, impoverished, humbled, and who hid herself even unto the abyss of nothingness by her profound humility her whole life long, should now be enriched and exalted and honored by the Most High. Such are the sentiments of the Church and the holy Fathers.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
An Immaculate Mother for a Dirty World
If Christ “came to seek and save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10), then the role and purpose of the Immaculately conceived Mary can be no different. Hence it is that we also call her “the Refuge of Sinners” and “the Mother of Mercy.” The Blessed Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion; for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be; no one, therefore, who is not entirely damned, is so entirely cast off by God that he may not return and enjoy his mercy if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the ‘Mother of Mercy’, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this, being able, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (taken from The Glories of Mary, by St. Alphonsus Liguori).
There are rich people who despise the poor; and there are rich people who feel sorry for the poor. There are rich people who rarely help the poor; and there are rich people who often help the poor. Our Lady is rich in grace. Guess which category she falls into! The answer is obvious of course. But that is only the beginning of the matter.
Let us look at things from the side of the poor. There are the poor who use well and wisely the assistance given to them by the rich; and there are the poor who waste and squander the assistance given to them by the rich. To whom do you think the rich are most likely to give more to? Again, the answer is obvious.
We have all heard of the saying: “Give the man a fish and you will feed him for a day; but teach a man to fish and you will feed him for life.” To complement this, we can add the saying: “God helps those who help themselves” and the words of Our Lady to the servants at the Marriage Feast at Cana: “Whatsoever he shall say to you, do ye!” (John 2:5).
A Merciful Mother for a Sinful World
If we poor sinners wish to find shelter under Our Lady’s protective mantle, then we need to do as she says. Our Lady will not protect us if we persist in attacking her Son through sin. Of course, she wants to reconcile the two warring children, that of the sinful adopted child with her attacked and aggrieved real Child. But if she sees that the adopted sinful child is not wanting to stop attacking her Divine Son, with whom, do you think, is she going to side? Again, the answer is obvious. To continue to sin deliberately, while telling ourselves that it’s alright because Our Lady will obtain pardon for us, is a despicable sin of presumption upon the mercy of God.
But if we regret our falls and sincerely wish to repent and make amends for all that we have done, then we will find no more powerful a help that Our Lady, the Mother of Perpetual Help, the Help of Christians, of whom the devils say that they are powerless to snatch and damn souls that are under her special protection, no matter how sinful they may have been. The following quote comes from the devils themselves, who, during an exorcism by St. Dominic, were commanded to speak by Our Lady:
“Oh, you who are enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven, must we, in spite of ourselves, tell the whole truth and confess before everyone who it is who is the cause of our shame and our ruin? Oh, woe to us, princes of darkness! Then listen, you Christians! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective!
“Reluctantly, we have to say that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us; one single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints. We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants! Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death and who really ought to be damned, according to our ordinary standards, are saved by her intercession! And if that Marietta (it is thus in their fury they called her) did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity! Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!”
Mercy Removes Dirt―Grace Cleans the Soul
Sin is synonymous with dirt, filth, stain and guilt. Grace is synonymous with cleansing, purity, immaculateness and innocence. “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9) .... “My word is pure, and I am clean in thy sight!” (Job 11:4). “I am without sin and am innocent!” (Jeremias 2:35) ... “Now to Him Who is able to preserve you without sin, and to present you spotless before the presence of His glory ... to the only God be glory and magnificence!” (Jude 1:24-25).
“‘Thou art stained in thy iniquity before Me!’ saith the Lord God” (Jeremias 2:22). “Let no stain sully thy glory!” (Ecclesiasticus 33:24). “Let us not stain our glory!” (1 Machabees 9:10). “We are all become as one unclean … and our iniquities have taken us away!” (Isaias 64:6). “Know you not, that your bodily members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and that you are not your own! For you are bought with a great price. Glorify and bear God in your body!” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). “Wash away thy sins!” (Acts 22:16). “Wash thy heart from wickedness, that thou mayest be saved!” (Jeremias 4:14). “Wash yourselves, be clean, take away the evil of your devices from my eyes and cease to do perversely!” (Isaias 1:16). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). “Wash me yet more from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin! … Thou shalt sprinkle me with hyssop, and I shall be cleansed! Thou shalt wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow!” (Psalm 50:4, 9).
If we want to go to Heaven, then we must be immaculate: “There shall not enter into it anything defiled” (Apocalypse 21:27). “The Lord shall wash away the filth … by the spirit of burning” (Isaias 4:4). “Blessed are they that wash their robes in the Blood of the Lamb, so that they may have a right to the Tree of Life, and may enter in by the gates into the City” (Apocalypse 22:14).
Heaven Ain’t Cheap or a Freebie!
Too many people underestimate what it takes to get to Heaven―they imagine that they will get to Heaven regardless of what they may done in this life, and God will somehow turn a blind-eye to their sins, lukewarmness and lack of effort. The word of God in Holy Scripture bursts the bubble of armchair Catholics with such vain dreams: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21-22). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Do penance―for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:3-4). “For I tell you, that unless your justice abound more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:20).
Yes―God wants to save all souls, but it has to be on His terms, not on our terms. “God will [wants to] have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! … He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly! … For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8; 2 Corinthians 9:6).
Penance is the price that we must pay for our many sins if we wish to get to Heaven. Our Immaculate Mother has told us this on numerous occasions. To the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Their inclinations and their blind love of visible things, detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart. The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular! For, altogether different from the saints―who glory in tribulation as the fulfillment of their most earnest desires―these worldly souls desire none of it and abhor all that is painful. In many of the faithful this ignorance goes still farther―for some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored! Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment!”
Our Lady of La Salette says that we have “have neglected prayer and penance”, lamenting that “people only think of amusements.” Our Lady of Good Success stated: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay and the precious light of Faith will gradually be extinguished until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals! … A small number of souls will preserve the Faith and practice virtue, and will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom! … Offer sacrifices and prayers to shorten the duration of this terrible catastrophe!” Our Lady of La Salette adds: “Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession!” Our Lord added: “Communities can only be preserved ― while they exist ― at the cost of much penance!” Our Lady of Lourdes emphatically insisted upon “Penance! Penance! Penance!” Our Lady of Akita added: “Penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
Pray or Play? Mortification or Gratification? Penance or Overindulgence?
God, Our Lady and Heaven are out of sight and so they are out of our mind. The world is not out of sight, but in full view, and so the world fills our mind. “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). Most Catholics are more on the wavelength of the world than they are on the wavelength of God. It is the world which preoccupies them for the most part. Things like prayer, spiritual reading, meditation, Bible reading, daily examination of conscience, planned program for pursuing virtues and the spiritual life, etc. ― all these all into the category of “I’ll fit them in if I can!” These persons “fit God in” if they can―which means that other things take precedence over God. Whatever happened to: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31)? For most Catholics this has changed to: “I will love the Lord my God with a part of my heart; with a part of my soul; with a part of my mind; with part of my strength; for part of the time!”
They totally ignore and bury their heads in the sand to avoid quotes like: “Love God all thy life!” (Ecclesiasticus 13:18). “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). “We ought always to pray, and not to faint!” (Luke 18:1). “Unless you do penance, you will perish!” (Luke 13:3). “Whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ” (Colossians 3:17). “Giving thanks always for all things!” (Ephesians 5:20). “Forgive men their offences, and your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). “Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! Pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!” (Matthew 5:44). These―and other such like quotes―have no place in the preferred personal doctrine of the Faith composed by most Catholics for themselves.
Our Lady’s requests are treated in a similar fashion. They totally or partially ignore quotes like: “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners―for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” … “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much! … Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” … “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” … “My daughter, look at surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce my Heart at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. Console me, and make the first Saturday of five consecutive months; go to confession and receive Holy Communion; recite five decades of the Rosary and keep me company for a quarter of an hour, while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me!”
Sister Lucia of Fatima told Fr. Fuentes (December 26th, 1957): “Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message and uniting their lives to the Message of Fatima. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil, ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
Seduced by Satan
Satan, in the words of Our Lord, is “the prince of this world” (John 12:31). He adds: “The prince of this world [the devil) cometh, and in Me he hath not anything!” (John 14:30). “That old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him! … Woe to the Earth, because the devil is come down unto you” (Apocalypse 12:9-11). How does Satan seduce the world? Does he dress-up and approach us with wily charms? No! Satan uses his princedom―the world―to seduce us. He diverts our attentions from Heaven by the things of this world. The world is like a minefield that attracts with many things above the surface, while hiding the mines beneath the surface. Therefore, in essence, the world is enemy territory―for it is the playground and possession of “the prince of this world” (John 12:31). We are living in enemy territory, through which we must navigate carefully on our journey to our true home―Heaven. “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
That is why Holy Scripture warns: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). Our Lord echoes those words: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―for where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Hence Our Lord says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). To those who love the world, He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above! You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). To His true followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, for I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works thereof are evil!” (John 7:7).
Jesus is the Light that came into this world: “I am the light of the world!” (John 8:12). “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not … He came unto His own, and His own received Him not … the light shone in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:5-11). “The light came into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 3:19). “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life―which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “The wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God―for it is not subject to the law of God, neither can it be. And they who are in the flesh, cannot please God.” (Romans 8:5-8). “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world! And this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4).
Our Lady was not created immaculate so that she could gaze in the mirror and say: “Mirror, mirror on the wall! Who is the most immaculate of all?” Our Lady is not into “navel gazing” or self-centeredness. One reason why Our Lady was created immaculate by God, was because she was destined by God to be the Mother of God the Son―Who was immaculate beyond measure. The immaculate Son of God came into a dirty sinful world in order to seek-out and save dirty, rotten sinners―as He Himself said: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32).
You cannot clean a dirty, filthy object if you yourself have dirty, filthy hands and use a dirty, filthy rag. You cannot rescue someone from the sea if you are immersed in the waters of the sea yourself. You cannot rescue someone from quicksand if you are sinking in that same quicksand. You cannot give a lost person directions if you are lost yourself. You cannot feed a hungry person if you have no food yourself. You cannot teach French to someone if you are unable to speak and understand French yourself.
Mankind was incapable of saving itself from the consequences of sin―for sin is an offense against the infinite God, and therefore sin becomes an infinite offense and contracts an infinite debt. We are not infinite beings, but only finite beings―therefore, we cannot pay an infinite debt. Only an infinite being can an infinite debt. Yet the debt for sin is a HUMAN debt and therefore humanity must pay for that debt. All of this requires a being that is, at one and the same time, both human and infinite. Only God is infinite―and so Christ became man so that, as the infinite God, He could pay the infinite debt of sin; and, as a human being through His incarnation, He could pay a human debt. There is no salvation without Christ; there is no forgiveness without Christ; there is no grace without Christ―hence Christ said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
In the scheme of things regarding our redemption and salvation, Christ has chosen to work through His most Holy Mother. Christ is the source of all our graces―yet He chooses to dispense all of His graces through the hands of His Immaculate Mother. Hence it is that we call Mary “the Mediatrix of All Grace.” In 1921, Pope Benedict XV instituted November 8th as the feast day of Our Lady Mediatrix of All Graces. Yet that date was soon embarking on a “musical chairs of dates” ― by the 1940s the traditional feast day was May 31st; however, other dates were May 8th and June 7th!
Pope St. Pius X stated: “By the communion of sorrows and of will between Christ and Mary she merited to become the dispenser of all the benefits which Jesus acquired for us by shedding His Blood” (Ad Diem Illium). This resonates with what Pope Leo XIII had previously affirmed: “It may be affirmed that, according to God’s will, nothing comes to us without going through Mary’s hands. Just as no one can approach the Almighty Father except through the Son, so no one can approach the Almighty Father except through the Son, so no one can approach Christ except through His Mother” (Octobri Mense). St. John Vianney’s words from a few centuries before these holy pontiffs bear similar testimony: “All the saints have a great devotion to Our Lady. No grace comes from Heaven without passing through her hands. We cannot go into a house without speaking to the doorkeeper. Well, the Holy Virgin is the doorkeeper of Heaven.”
St. Louis de Montfort, in his True Devotion to Mary, writes: “It was only through Mary that God the Father gave His Only-Begotten to the world. Whatever sighs the patriarchs may have sent forth, whatever prayers the prophets and the saints of the Old Law may have offered up to obtain this treasure for full four thousand years, it was only Mary who merited it and found grace before God (Luke 1:30) by the force of her prayers and the eminence of her virtues. The world was unworthy, says St. Augustine, to receive the Son of God directly from the Father’s hands. He gave Him to Mary, in order that the world might receive Him through her. The Son of God became man for our salvation―but it was in Mary and by Mary. God the Holy Ghost formed Jesus Christ in Mary―but it was only after having asked her consent by one of the first ministers of His court.”
“God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (mare). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Maria). This great God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has of beauty and splendor, of rarity and preciousness―including even His own Son―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich.
“God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly.
“To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary―so that she who, impoverished, humbled, and who hid herself even unto the abyss of nothingness by her profound humility her whole life long, should now be enriched and exalted and honored by the Most High. Such are the sentiments of the Church and the holy Fathers.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
An Immaculate Mother for a Dirty World
If Christ “came to seek and save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10), then the role and purpose of the Immaculately conceived Mary can be no different. Hence it is that we also call her “the Refuge of Sinners” and “the Mother of Mercy.” The Blessed Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion; for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be; no one, therefore, who is not entirely damned, is so entirely cast off by God that he may not return and enjoy his mercy if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the ‘Mother of Mercy’, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this, being able, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (taken from The Glories of Mary, by St. Alphonsus Liguori).
There are rich people who despise the poor; and there are rich people who feel sorry for the poor. There are rich people who rarely help the poor; and there are rich people who often help the poor. Our Lady is rich in grace. Guess which category she falls into! The answer is obvious of course. But that is only the beginning of the matter.
Let us look at things from the side of the poor. There are the poor who use well and wisely the assistance given to them by the rich; and there are the poor who waste and squander the assistance given to them by the rich. To whom do you think the rich are most likely to give more to? Again, the answer is obvious.
We have all heard of the saying: “Give the man a fish and you will feed him for a day; but teach a man to fish and you will feed him for life.” To complement this, we can add the saying: “God helps those who help themselves” and the words of Our Lady to the servants at the Marriage Feast at Cana: “Whatsoever he shall say to you, do ye!” (John 2:5).
A Merciful Mother for a Sinful World
If we poor sinners wish to find shelter under Our Lady’s protective mantle, then we need to do as she says. Our Lady will not protect us if we persist in attacking her Son through sin. Of course, she wants to reconcile the two warring children, that of the sinful adopted child with her attacked and aggrieved real Child. But if she sees that the adopted sinful child is not wanting to stop attacking her Divine Son, with whom, do you think, is she going to side? Again, the answer is obvious. To continue to sin deliberately, while telling ourselves that it’s alright because Our Lady will obtain pardon for us, is a despicable sin of presumption upon the mercy of God.
But if we regret our falls and sincerely wish to repent and make amends for all that we have done, then we will find no more powerful a help that Our Lady, the Mother of Perpetual Help, the Help of Christians, of whom the devils say that they are powerless to snatch and damn souls that are under her special protection, no matter how sinful they may have been. The following quote comes from the devils themselves, who, during an exorcism by St. Dominic, were commanded to speak by Our Lady:
“Oh, you who are enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven, must we, in spite of ourselves, tell the whole truth and confess before everyone who it is who is the cause of our shame and our ruin? Oh, woe to us, princes of darkness! Then listen, you Christians! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective!
“Reluctantly, we have to say that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us; one single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints. We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants! Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death and who really ought to be damned, according to our ordinary standards, are saved by her intercession! And if that Marietta (it is thus in their fury they called her) did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity! Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!”
Mercy Removes Dirt―Grace Cleans the Soul
Sin is synonymous with dirt, filth, stain and guilt. Grace is synonymous with cleansing, purity, immaculateness and innocence. “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9) .... “My word is pure, and I am clean in thy sight!” (Job 11:4). “I am without sin and am innocent!” (Jeremias 2:35) ... “Now to Him Who is able to preserve you without sin, and to present you spotless before the presence of His glory ... to the only God be glory and magnificence!” (Jude 1:24-25).
“‘Thou art stained in thy iniquity before Me!’ saith the Lord God” (Jeremias 2:22). “Let no stain sully thy glory!” (Ecclesiasticus 33:24). “Let us not stain our glory!” (1 Machabees 9:10). “We are all become as one unclean … and our iniquities have taken us away!” (Isaias 64:6). “Know you not, that your bodily members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and that you are not your own! For you are bought with a great price. Glorify and bear God in your body!” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). “Wash away thy sins!” (Acts 22:16). “Wash thy heart from wickedness, that thou mayest be saved!” (Jeremias 4:14). “Wash yourselves, be clean, take away the evil of your devices from my eyes and cease to do perversely!” (Isaias 1:16). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). “Wash me yet more from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin! … Thou shalt sprinkle me with hyssop, and I shall be cleansed! Thou shalt wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow!” (Psalm 50:4, 9).
If we want to go to Heaven, then we must be immaculate: “There shall not enter into it anything defiled” (Apocalypse 21:27). “The Lord shall wash away the filth … by the spirit of burning” (Isaias 4:4). “Blessed are they that wash their robes in the Blood of the Lamb, so that they may have a right to the Tree of Life, and may enter in by the gates into the City” (Apocalypse 22:14).
Heaven Ain’t Cheap or a Freebie!
Too many people underestimate what it takes to get to Heaven―they imagine that they will get to Heaven regardless of what they may done in this life, and God will somehow turn a blind-eye to their sins, lukewarmness and lack of effort. The word of God in Holy Scripture bursts the bubble of armchair Catholics with such vain dreams: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21-22). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Do penance―for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:3-4). “For I tell you, that unless your justice abound more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:20).
Yes―God wants to save all souls, but it has to be on His terms, not on our terms. “God will [wants to] have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! … He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly! … For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8; 2 Corinthians 9:6).
Penance is the price that we must pay for our many sins if we wish to get to Heaven. Our Immaculate Mother has told us this on numerous occasions. To the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Their inclinations and their blind love of visible things, detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart. The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular! For, altogether different from the saints―who glory in tribulation as the fulfillment of their most earnest desires―these worldly souls desire none of it and abhor all that is painful. In many of the faithful this ignorance goes still farther―for some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored! Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment!”
Our Lady of La Salette says that we have “have neglected prayer and penance”, lamenting that “people only think of amusements.” Our Lady of Good Success stated: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay and the precious light of Faith will gradually be extinguished until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals! … A small number of souls will preserve the Faith and practice virtue, and will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom! … Offer sacrifices and prayers to shorten the duration of this terrible catastrophe!” Our Lady of La Salette adds: “Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession!” Our Lord added: “Communities can only be preserved ― while they exist ― at the cost of much penance!” Our Lady of Lourdes emphatically insisted upon “Penance! Penance! Penance!” Our Lady of Akita added: “Penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
Pray or Play? Mortification or Gratification? Penance or Overindulgence?
God, Our Lady and Heaven are out of sight and so they are out of our mind. The world is not out of sight, but in full view, and so the world fills our mind. “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). Most Catholics are more on the wavelength of the world than they are on the wavelength of God. It is the world which preoccupies them for the most part. Things like prayer, spiritual reading, meditation, Bible reading, daily examination of conscience, planned program for pursuing virtues and the spiritual life, etc. ― all these all into the category of “I’ll fit them in if I can!” These persons “fit God in” if they can―which means that other things take precedence over God. Whatever happened to: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31)? For most Catholics this has changed to: “I will love the Lord my God with a part of my heart; with a part of my soul; with a part of my mind; with part of my strength; for part of the time!”
They totally ignore and bury their heads in the sand to avoid quotes like: “Love God all thy life!” (Ecclesiasticus 13:18). “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). “We ought always to pray, and not to faint!” (Luke 18:1). “Unless you do penance, you will perish!” (Luke 13:3). “Whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ” (Colossians 3:17). “Giving thanks always for all things!” (Ephesians 5:20). “Forgive men their offences, and your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). “Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! Pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!” (Matthew 5:44). These―and other such like quotes―have no place in the preferred personal doctrine of the Faith composed by most Catholics for themselves.
Our Lady’s requests are treated in a similar fashion. They totally or partially ignore quotes like: “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners―for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” … “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much! … Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” … “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” … “My daughter, look at surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce my Heart at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. Console me, and make the first Saturday of five consecutive months; go to confession and receive Holy Communion; recite five decades of the Rosary and keep me company for a quarter of an hour, while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me!”
Sister Lucia of Fatima told Fr. Fuentes (December 26th, 1957): “Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message and uniting their lives to the Message of Fatima. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil, ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
Seduced by Satan
Satan, in the words of Our Lord, is “the prince of this world” (John 12:31). He adds: “The prince of this world [the devil) cometh, and in Me he hath not anything!” (John 14:30). “That old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him! … Woe to the Earth, because the devil is come down unto you” (Apocalypse 12:9-11). How does Satan seduce the world? Does he dress-up and approach us with wily charms? No! Satan uses his princedom―the world―to seduce us. He diverts our attentions from Heaven by the things of this world. The world is like a minefield that attracts with many things above the surface, while hiding the mines beneath the surface. Therefore, in essence, the world is enemy territory―for it is the playground and possession of “the prince of this world” (John 12:31). We are living in enemy territory, through which we must navigate carefully on our journey to our true home―Heaven. “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
That is why Holy Scripture warns: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). Our Lord echoes those words: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―for where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Hence Our Lord says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). To those who love the world, He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above! You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). To His true followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, for I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works thereof are evil!” (John 7:7).
Jesus is the Light that came into this world: “I am the light of the world!” (John 8:12). “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not … He came unto His own, and His own received Him not … the light shone in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:5-11). “The light came into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 3:19). “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life―which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “The wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God―for it is not subject to the law of God, neither can it be. And they who are in the flesh, cannot please God.” (Romans 8:5-8). “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world! And this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4).
Article 7
Saturday, December 7th
The Immaculate Conception
Saturday, December 7th
The Immaculate Conception
Today Comes Before Tomorrow
That seems a pretty obvious statement, doesn’t it? Today always comes before tomorrow! Yet there is a relation between the two. Have you ever heard of the saying: “Don’t put-off until tomorrow what you can do today”? Well, tomorrow (Sunday, December 8th) is the feast of the Immaculate Conception―and we should not put-off our preparations for that feast and thus we ought to prepare for tomorrow’s feast today. We do exactly that on so many other occasions―holidays, birthdays, anniversaries, etc. ―so that we have everything “in place” and “ready to go” when that big day arrives. Let us ‘cook’ the idea of the Immaculate Conception in the oven of our minds today―so that when tomorrow comes, we have already prepared the material that we can nibble on throughout this glorious feastday. It is a little late to start thinking about the feast day only on the day itself―that reminds us of the parable about the wise and foolish virgins:
“Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be like to ten virgins, who taking their lamps went out to meet the bridegroom and the bride. And five of them were foolish, and five wise. But the five foolish, having taken their lamps, did not take oil with them. But the wise took oil in their vessels with the lamps. And the bridegroom tarrying, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made: ‘Behold the bridegroom cometh! Go ye forth to meet him!’ Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said to the wise: ‘Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out!’ The wise answered, saying: ‘Lest perhaps there be not enough for us and for you, go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves!’ Now whilst they went to buy, the bridegroom came: and they that were ready, went in with him to the marriage, and the door was shut. But at last come also the other virgins, saying: ‘Lord! Lord! Open to us! But He answering said: ‘Amen I say to you, I know you not!’” (Matthew 25:1-12).
You Have an Immaculate Mother
Talking of “virgins” ― let us spend some time talking and thinking about the Virgin of all virgins― the Blessed Virgin Mary and her Immaculate Conception. Sadly, most Catholics today―especially young Catholics―are clueless to a greater or lesser degree about the Immaculate Conception. Some think it is all about Mary conceiving Jesus in her womb―wrong! Others confuse the Immaculate Conception with the “virgin birth”―namely, the belief that Mary gave birth to Jesus while remaining a virgin―wrong! Yes, she was a virgin before and after giving birth―but that is not the Immaculate Conception! Then there are those who think that the Immaculate Conception means that Mary’s mother, St. Anne, conceived Mary without having marital relations with her husband, St. Joachim―wrong! Mary was conceived in the womb of St. Anne according to normal rules of nature.
Getting a little more technical―some think that the dogma of the Immaculate Conception includes only Mary’s sanctification in soul at moment of her conception, but does not preserve her body from ALL EFFECTS of Original Sin (the triple concupiscence―namely, the concupiscence of the eyes, the concupiscence of the flesh and the pride of life―and being prone to disease, injury and death)―wrong again! The Immaculate Conception preserved the Virgin Mary from the effects of Original Sin on both the body and soul. Mary was not subject to death or injury or disease, due to Original Sin―“For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) … “By one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). If she died at the end of her life, this occurred only because it was the will of God, and not because of any personal sin or Original Sin.
So What Exactly is the “Immaculate Conception”
Before we go further―and look at the what the “Immaculate Conception” should mean to us and how it should influence our lives―let us first get a clear idea of what exactly is this term, “the Immaculate Conception”.
In his encyclical, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854, Blessed Pope Pius IX pronounced and enforced the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary: “Wherefore, in humility and fasting, we unceasingly offered our private prayers as well as the public prayers of the Church to God the Father, through his Son, that he would deign to direct and strengthen our mind by the power of the Holy Spirit. In like manner did we implore the help of the entire heavenly host as we ardently invoked the Paraclete. Accordingly, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, for the honor of the Holy and undivided Trinity, for the glory and adornment of the Virgin Mother of God, for the exaltation of the Catholic Faith, and for the furtherance of the Catholic religion, by the authority of Jesus Christ our Lord, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own: ‘We declare, pronounce, and define that the doctrine which holds that the most Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instance of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege granted by Almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin, is a doctrine revealed by God and therefore to be believed firmly and constantly by all the faithful.’” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854).
Woe to Unbelievers!
“Hence, if anyone shall dare—which God forbid!—to think otherwise than as has been defined by us, let him know and understand that he is condemned by his own judgment; that he has suffered shipwreck in the Faith; that he has separated from the unity of the Church; and that, furthermore, by his own action he incurs the penalties established by law, if he should are to express in words, or writing, or by any other outward means the errors he thinks in his heart” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854).
No Impulsive Dogma
Winding back just 5 years, to 1849, we see Blessed Pope Pius IX already perusing if the time was then right to make the dogmatic declaration concerning the Immaculate Conception. “There was in the entire Catholic world a most ardent and wondrous revival of the desire that the most holy Mother of God—the beloved Mother of us all, the immaculate Virgin Mary—be finally declared by a solemn definition of the Church to have been conceived without the stain of Original Sin ... “Many persons are now wondering why this honor has not already been accorded to the Blessed Virgin by the Church and the Apostolic See—an honor which the widespread piety of the Christian people so fervently desires ... Accordingly, We have appointed certain priests of recognized piety and theological learning, as well as several cardinals of the Holy Roman Church who are renowned because of their ability, piety, wisdom, prudence, and knowledge of the things of God; and We have directed them to make, carefully and thoroughly, a most diligent examination into this most important matter and then provide Us with a complete report” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Encyclical Ubi Primum, on the Immaculate Conception, February 2nd, 1849).
The Pope goes on to say that this doctrine has been in the minds of Christians from antiquity: “This doctrine so filled the minds and souls of our ancestors in the Faith that a singular and truly marvelous style of speech came into vogue among them. They have frequently addressed the Mother of God as immaculate, as immaculate in every respect; innocent, and verily most innocent; spotless, and entirely spotless; holy and removed from every stain of sin; all pure, all stainless, the very model of purity and innocence; more beautiful than beauty, more lovely than loveliness; more holy than holiness, singularly holy and most pure in soul and body; the one who surpassed all integrity and virginity; the only one who has become the dwelling place of all the graces of the most Holy Ghost. God alone excepted, Mary is more excellent than all, and by nature fair and beautiful, and more holy than the Cherubim and Seraphim. To praise her all the tongues of Heaven and Earth do not suffice.” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Encyclical Ineffabilis Deus, proclaiming the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th, 1854).
Our Lady’s Lourdes Confirmation
A little over three years after the dogmatic declaration on the Immaculate Conception, Our Lady makes a series of apparitions at Lourdes, in France, beginning on February 11th, 1858—at which time she ratifies and confirms the pope’s declaration by telling St. Bernadette that she was the Immaculate Conception.
Pope St. Pius X also weighed-in to the matter around 50 years later, by stating: “The Virgin was kept the more free from all stain of Original Sin because she was to be the Mother of Christ” (Pope St. Pius X, Encyclical Ad Diem Illum, on the Immaculate Conception, February 2, 1904).
Habemus Matrem
If, at the election of a pope, we can shout “Habemus papam!” meaning “we have a pope (‘father’)”, then, in regard to this dogmatic declaration, we can shout “Habemus Matrem—Habemus Matrem Immaculatam”, meaning “We have a Mother—an Immaculate Mother!” Even more than the pope is the Holy Father, Our Lady is the Holiest of mothers. The “immaculate” aspect is of great importance―for, as the spiritual masters teach, purity infuses an enormous power into the petitions we place before God and purity makes us extremely close to God: “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God!” (Matthew 5:8) … “Evil thoughts are an abomination to the Lord and pure words most beautiful” (Proverbs 15:26).
Why on Earth…?
Of all questions―such as “What? Where? How? When? Which? Why?”―the “Why?” is foremost. It concerns the “Final End” of matters. It is the king or queen of questions. So ‘what is the why’ of the Immaculate Conception? Blessed Pope Pius XII gives us the answer in the proclaiming encyclical of December 8th, 1954:
Before getting to the heart of the matter, he prefaces it with the following statement: “God, having foreseen from all eternity the lamentable wretchedness of the entire human race, which would result from the sin of Adam, decreed, by a plan hidden from the centuries, to complete the first work of his goodness through the Incarnation of the Word. This He decreed in order that man, who had been led into sin by the cunning malice of Satan, should not perish. The eternal Father chose and prepared, for His only-begotten Son, a Mother in whom the Son of God would become incarnate and from whom He would be born into this world. God loved her above all creatures and endowed her with the abundance of all heavenly gifts, so that this Mother, ever free of all stain of sin, would possess that fullness of holy innocence and sanctity than which, under God, one cannot even imagine anything greater, and which, outside of God, no mind can succeed in comprehending fully” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854).
In other words, the height and depth, length and breadth of her ‘immaculateness’ is simply mind-blowing and beyond our puny capacities to grasp and understand. It is something that we should be in total awe over, yet, for many, if not most, there is only an indifference—an attitude of “So what?” “It’s just another title!” “Let’s just get on with life! I’ve got better things to do than try fathom out how immaculate she is!”
The Supreme Reason: The Divine Maternity
The Pope Pius IX goes on to explain the “Why?” of the Immaculate Conception: “And indeed it was wholly fitting that so wonderful a mother should be ever resplendent, with the glory of most sublime holiness, and so completely free from all taint of Original Sin, that she would triumph utterly over the ancient serpent. To her did the Father will to give His only-begotten Son—the Son, the Father loves from His heart—and to give this Son in such a way that He would be the one and the same common Son of God the Father and of the Blessed Virgin Mary. It was she whom the Son Himself chose to make His Mother; and it was from her that the Holy Spirit willed, and brought it about, that He should be conceived and born from whom He himself proceeds.” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854).
St. Thomas Aquinas explains it by equating the means with the end. Mary is the means to the end—which is the Incarnation of God (or God taking on flesh). He could have done it many different ways, but since He chose to become incarnate through Mary, it was necessary that the means be the best possible means—and since with God nothing is impossible, He made sure that Mary was the best means available. St. Thomas puts it thus:
“Mary’s whole life was free from sin. For God so prepares and endows those whom He selects for some particular office, that they are rendered capable of fulfilling it, according to 2 Corinthians 3:6: ‘Who hath made us fit ministers of the New Testament.’ Now the Blessed Virgin was chosen by God to be His Mother. Therefore, there can be no doubt that God, by His grace, made her worthy of that office, according to the words spoken to her by the Angel (Luke 1:30), ‘Thou hast found grace with God, behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb and shall bring forth a son and thou shalt call His Name Jesus.’ But she would not have been worthy to be the Mother of God if she had ever sinned.
“First, because the honor of the parents reflects upon the child, according to Proverbs 17:6: ‘The glory of the children are their fathers’; and consequently, on the other hand, the Mother’s shame would have reflected on her Son. Secondly, because of the singular affinity between her and Christ Who took flesh from her. And it is written (2 Corinthians 6:15): ‘What concord hath Christ with Belial?’ Thirdly, because of the singular manner in which the Son of God, ‘Who is the Divine Wisdom’ (1 Corinthians 1:24), dwelt in her, not only in her soul but in her womb. And thus, it is written (Wisdom 1:4): ‘Wisdom will not enter into a malicious soul, nor dwell in a body subject to sins.’ We must therefore confess simply that the Blessed Virgin committed no actual sin, either mortal or venial; so that what is written (Canticles 4:7), is fulfilled: ‘Thou art all fair, O my love, and there is not a spot in thee.’” (Summa Theologica, 3a, q. 27).
The Awesome Terrible Sanctity of God Detests Sin
God is Sanctity itself, much more so than the sun is light, and no shadow of sin can endure before His face. “Thy eyes are too pure to behold evil, and Thou canst not look on iniquity” (Habacuc 1:13). The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended.
It was sin that led to banishment of the fallen angels to Hell, and it was sin led to Adam and Eve to be cast out of the Garden of Eden and to suffer and die. Both the Angels and our First Parents were created immaculate, that is to say, in a state of grace. Yet many of the angels failed to keep that grace, and both Adam and Eve lost that grace through Mortal Sin. God cannot tolerate sin. Sin is an attack upon the holiness and purity of God. Sin has to be eliminated and reparation has to be made.
The Price and Pain of Sin
Since Adam and Even listened to the devil and fell into sin, they thereby abused and threw away the gifts the gifts that God had given them: (1) the supernatural grace of God; (2) the possibility of never having to die; (3) the possibility of being free from any and all forms of suffering; (4) the harmonious submission and obedience of the soul to God’s grace, and the obedience of the body and its passions to the soul; and finally, (5) they weakened the infused knowledge that God had created them with, to the point that now they would experience a darkened intellect that finds learning difficult, a weak will that struggles with temptation, and rebellious passions.
They had offended God in the name of humanity, all their future descendants would participate in the effects of that sin. As St. Paul writes: “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). Truly, as St. Paul states later, “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23).
The gates of Heaven were closed. Humanity had failed the test through Adam and Eve. It is because we downplay sin in our own thoughts, that we have such a wrong notion about what sin really is. As the old, but very clear and simple, Penny Catechism says: “It is the greatest of all evils to fall into mortal sin.” Another catechism, My Catholic Faith, states that “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God ... Although venial sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is nevertheless a great moral evil, next alone to mortal sin ... We are prone to look upon venial sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that it is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin.” (from the catechism My Catholic Faith).
The New Adam, the New Eve
After his fall, man was not abandoned by God. The passage in Genesis, which is called the Proto-evangelium (“first gospel”), makes the first announcement of the Messias and Redeemer, of a battle between the serpent and the Woman, and of the final victory of a descendant of hers. The Christian tradition sees in this passage an announcement of the “New Adam” who, because He “became obedient unto death, even death on a cross”, makes amends super-abundantly for the disobedience, of Adam. Additionally, many Fathers and Doctors of the Church have seen the Woman announced in the Proto-evangelium as Mary, the Mother of Christ, the “New Eve”. Mary benefited first of all and uniquely from Christ’s victory over sin: for she was preserved from all stain of Original Sin and by a special grace of God committed no sin of any kind during her whole earthly life.
Immaculate Mary needs Immaculate Children
We all know the saying: “Like father, like son!” or “Like mother, like daughter!” or “He takes after his father!” and “She’s just like her mother!” Our Lord and Our Lady—the new Adam and Eve—want us to imitate them and Heaven. Of Our Lady, it can be said: “I am clean, and without sin: I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me” (Job 33:9) .... “My word is pure, and I am clean in thy sight” (Job 11:4). “I am without sin and am innocent” (Jeremias 2:35). We became her spiritual children at the foot of the Cross, and so we should take on the traits of our spiritual Mother. Children imitate their parents.
Jesus said: “Learn of Me…!” (Matthew 11:29) … “If you love Me, keep my Commandments” (John 14:15) … “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48) … “I am the Lord your God: be holy because I am holy” (Leviticus 11:44) … “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine” (Leviticus 20:26). St. Peter repeats that command in the New Testament: “According to Him that hath called you, Who is holy, be you also in all manner of conversation holy, because it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy’” (1 Peter 1:15-16). While St. Paul writes: “He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight in charity” (Ephesians 1:4).
Only saints go to Heaven, that is the pedigree of the New Adam and Eve—we have to be immaculate to enter therein: “There shall not enter into it any thing defiled” (Apocalypse 27:21). We have to be wholly holy, or “Holy, Holy, Holy” as we say in the Sanctus at Mass—which, incidentally, should remind of the three ever-increasing stages of holiness that we have to pass through: as beginners in holiness, (2) as proficients in holiness, and (3) as perfect in holiness. Purgatory will be necessary for even the slightest stains of sin or smallest unpaid debts for previously forgiven sin. For, as it was said above, God detests sin. “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8).
“For the Highest hateth sinners, and hath mercy on the penitent” (Ecclesiasticus 12:3). “Six things there are, which the Lord hateth, and the seventh his soul detesteth: (1) Haughty eyes, (2) a lying tongue, (3) hands that shed innocent blood, (4) heart that deviseth wicked plots, (5) feet that are swift to run into mischief, (6) deceitful witness that uttereth lies, and (7) him that soweth discord among brethren” (Proverbs 6:16-19). “I hate arrogance, and pride, and every wicked way, and a mouth with a double tongue” (Proverbs 8:13).
The Articulate Deception of the World Opposes the Immaculate Conception of Mary
The devil and Mary are irreconcilable enemies―a fact already foretold by God after the first sin of Adam and Eve, what we now call “Original Sin”, after which God solemnly said: “And the Lord God said to the serpent: ‘Because thou hast done this thing, thou art cursed among all cattle, and beasts of the Earth! Upon thy breast shalt thou go and earth shalt thou eat all the days of thy life! I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed! She shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!’” (Genesis 3:14-15). Thus, Mary and devil are irreconcilable enemies.
The devil, however, is also the “prince of this world” and thus the world is also an enemy of God and Mary―as mentioned by Our Lord on several occasions: “For the prince of this world cometh, and in me he hath not any thing!” (John 14:30). “The prince of this world is already judged!” (John 16:11). “Now is the judgment of the world―now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31). How does Our Lord judge the world, of which the devil is prince? Jesus says: “My kingdom is not of this world … My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). Jesus “gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present wicked world!” (Galatians 1:4). “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:10-11)―we forget that it is actually a good sign if the world does not ‘receive’ us or does not like us!
Exposing the Seductive Lies and Deception of the World
To His followers Jesus says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works thereof are evil!” (John 7:7). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
In the parable of the Sower of the Seed, Jesus says: “He that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word of God, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15). “He that loves his life [in this world] shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:25). To His Father in Heaven, Jesus prays: “I have manifested Thy Name, Father, to the men whom Thou hast given Me out of the world ... Thine they were, and to Me Thou gavest them … I am not of the world, and these are in the world … I pray for them! … I pray not for the world, but for them whom Thou hast given Me! … I have given them Thy word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world; as I also am not of the world” (John 17:6-14).
This inescapable and unpleasant truth―unpleasant to us because we love the world and want the world to love us―is further driven home by the Apostles: “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “We are blasphemed [by the world], and we are made as the refuse of this world, the off-scouring of all―even until now!” (1 Corinthians 4:13). “The world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “If then you be dead with Christ from the elements of this world, why do you still act as though living in the world?” (Colossians 2:20). “Adulterers! Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). “We have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; so that we may know the things that are given us from God! … Use this world, as if [you] used it not―for the fashion of this world passes away!” (1 Corinthians 2:12; 7:31). “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
The Seductive Lies of the World are the Lies of the Devil
As Our Lord says of the devil and of worldly people: “The world cannot receive the spirit of truth” (John 14:17). To the worldly-minded, who are thereby implicit slaves of the “prince of this world”, the devil, Our Lord says: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar and the father of lies!” (John 8:44). Yet those lies are very seductive lies―they promise a paradise on Earth, a life of ease and comfort, many useful possessions, etc.
Articulate Deceptions of the World
St. Louis de Montfort, in one of his lesser know books, Love of Eternal Wisdom, paints a very striking and clear picture of those who have been seduced by the lies of the world and the devil:
“Those who proceed according to the wisdom of the world are those who know how to manage well their affairs and to arrange things to their temporal advantage without appearing to do so; who know the art of deceiving and how to cleverly cheat without being noticed; who say or do one thing and have another thing in mind; who are thoroughly acquainted with the way and the flattery of the world; who know how to please everybody in order to reach their goal, not troubling much about the honor and interests of God; who make a secret but deadly fusion of truth with untruth, of the Gospel with the world, of virtue with vice, of Jesus Christ with Satan; who wish to pass as honest people, but not as religious men; who despise and corrupt or readily condemn every religious practice which does not conform to their own. In short, the worldly‑wise are those who, being guided only by their human senses and reason, seek only to appear as Christian and honest folk, without troubling much to please God or to do penance for the sins which they have committed against His divine Majesty.
“The worldling bases his conduct upon his honor, upon what people say, upon convention, upon good cheer, upon personal interest, upon refined manners, upon witty jokes. These are the seven innocent incentives, so he thinks, upon which he can rely that he may lead an easy life. He has virtues of his own for which he is canonized by the world. These are manliness, finesse, diplomacy, tact, gallantry, politeness, sprightliness. He considers as serious sins such traits as lack of feeling, silliness, dullness, sanctimoniousness. He adheres as strictly as possible to the commandments which the world has given him:
(1) Thou shalt be well acquainted with the world.
(2) Thou shalt be an “honest” man.
(3) Thou shalt be successful in business.
(4) Thou shalt keep what is thine.
(5) Thou shalt get on in the world.
(6) Thou shalt make friends.
(7) Thou shalt be a society man.
(8) Thou shalt make merry.
(9) Thou shalt not be a killjoy.
(10) Thou shalt avoid singularity, dullness and an air of piety.
“Never was the world so corrupt as it is now, because it was never so astute, so wise in its own conceit, so cunning. It is so skillful in deceiving the soul seeking perfection that it makes use of truth to foster untruth, of virtue to authorize vice and it even distorts the meaning of Christ’s own truths to give authority to its own maxims. “The number of those who are fools according to God, is infinite.” The earthly wisdom spoken of by St. James, is an excessive striving for worldly goods. The worldly-wise make a secret profession of this type of wisdom when they allow themselves to become attached to their earthly possessions, when they strive to become rich, when they go to law and bring useless actions against others in order to acquire or to keep temporal goods; when their every thought, word and deed is mainly directed toward obtaining or retaining something temporal. As to working out their eternal salvation and making use of the means to do so, such as reception of the Sacraments and prayer, they accomplish these duties only carelessly, in a very offhand manner, once in a while, and for the sake of appearances” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom §76-§79).
Even the Good are Seduced by the Articulate Deceptions of the World
Even good people are seduced by some seductive aspect of the world―as we see in the real-life encounter between Jesus and good young rich man:
“And behold, a certain rich young man, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’
“And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-29; Mark 10:17-31; Luke 18:18-25).
Which is why the Apostles write the following words of warning―which almost everyone chooses to ignore: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). “God forbid that I should glory in anything, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “This is the victory which overcometh the world―our Faith” (1 John 5:4). But sadly, the world has overcome the Faith in most cases today!
We Need to Clean Up Our Act
God never changes and His demands for holiness never change. In the Old Testament it says: “Turn away from evil and do good” (Psalms 33:15); and St. Peter repeats the same in the New Testament: “Let him decline from evil, and do good” (1 Peter 3:11). Our Lady even echoes this today, for at Fatima she said: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended.” However, Sr. Lucia of Fatima tells us that: “the Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.” St. Paul clearly tells us: “Let no sin therefore reign in your mortal body” (Romans 6:12). Not even the slightest Venial Sin, for that still separates us from God and has to paid for—either here or in Purgatory, as Our Lord says: “Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing” (Matthew 5:26).
“Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8). But “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness” (Matthew 23:25).
Fatal Failure
Failure to clean up our act will have fatal consequences, as we already know: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it” (La Salette) … “As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” (Akita).
We must cease being overly preoccupied with the things of the world, entertainment and amusement—all things that Our Lady has complained about—and begin to reform ourselves, to clean up our act. No matter how much we may have sinned—as with Mary Magdalen, the Good Thief, the Prodigal Son—there is a way back, but we have work hard and clean house. The foundation is prayer and penance—the things that Our Lady has insistently commanded in one apparition after another—there is no other way. We must pray VERY MUCH and we must do MUCH penance.
Detesting Sin and Worldliness
One of the chief contributors to the deluge of sin in the world today is the absence of a fear of God and a fear of offending God. This is there has to be a terrible, frightening chastisement—in order to re-establish the foundation of fear. Fear is essential, even when we love God—it is the foundation of the spiritual life. It is even one of the Gifts of the Holy Ghost—a Fear of the Lord. As Holy Scripture says: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalms 110:10). “The fear of God is the beginning of His love” (Ecclesiasticus 25:16). “The fear of the Lord drives out sin” (Ecclesiasticus 1:27). “The fear of the Lord hates evil” (Proverbs 8:13). “The Lord hates all abomination of error, and they that fear Him shall not love it” (Ecclesiasticus 15:13). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5).
“Neither shalt thou bring any thing of the idol into thy house, lest thou become an anathema, like it. Thou shalt detest it as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth, because it is an anathema” (Deuteronomy 7:26). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
This detestation of the spirit of the world and of the ways of the world is absolutely essential if we are clean house and clean-up our act. The source of sin has to be stopped, like a leak in a boat, or the boat (soul) will sink. Once the incoming flow of sin has been dealt, then we can deal with the flooded basement (soul) and start pumping the bilge out.
Grace Cleans and Beautifies
We say of Our Lady: “Hail, full of grace!” Grace perfects our human nature, it heals the wounds of sin, it strengthens our weaknesses, it pushes us on to higher heights. St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this cleaning of soul and the role of grace in his Secret of Mary, saying: “
“It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say ‘not in the same measure,’ because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary).
To find the Grace of God, we must discover Mary
St. Louis continues: “It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.
“I explain;
(1) Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person (Luke 1:30). No patriarch nor prophet nor any other holy person of the Old Law could manage to find this grace;
(2) It was Mary who gave existence and life to the author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the “Mother of Grace.”
(3) God the Father, from Whom, as from its essential source, every perfect gift and every grace come down to us (James 1:17), gave her every grace when He gave her His Son. Thus, as St. Bernard says, the will of God is manifested to her in Jesus and with Jesus.
(4) God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands. Such is the power that she has received from Him that, according to St. Bernardine, she gives the graces of the eternal Father, the virtues of Jesus Christ, and the gifts of the Holy Ghost to whom she wills, as and when she wills, and as much as she wills.
(5) As in the natural life a child must have a father and a mother, so in the supernatural life of grace a true child of the Church must have God for his Father and Mary for his mother. If he prides himself on having God for his Father, but does not give Mary the tender affection of a true child, he is an imposter and his father is the devil.
(6) Since Mary produced the head of the elect, Jesus Christ, she must also produce the members of that head, that is, all true Christians. A mother does not conceive a head without members, nor members without a head. If anyone, then, wishes to become a member of Jesus Christ, and consequently be filled with grace and truth (John 1:14), he must be formed in Mary through the grace of Jesus Christ, which she possesses with a fullness enabling her to communicate it abundantly to true members of Jesus Christ, her true children.
(7) The Holy Ghost espoused Mary and produced His greatest work, the incarnate Word, in her, by her and through her. He has never disowned her and so He continues to produce every day, in a mysterious but very real manner, the souls of the elect in her and through her.
(8) Mary received, from God, a unique dominion over souls, enabling her to nourish them and make them more and more godlike. St. Augustine went so far as to say that, even in this world, all the elect are enclosed in the womb of Mary, and that their real birthday is when this good mother brings them forth to eternal life. Consequently, just as an infant draws all its nourishment from its mother, who gives according to its needs, so the elect draw all their spiritual nourishment and all their strength from Mary.
(9) It was to Mary that God the Father said, ‘Dwell in Jacob’ (Ecclesiasticus 24:8,12) that is, dwell in my elect, who are typified by Jacob. It was to Mary that God the Son said, “My dear Mother, your inheritance is in Israel,” that is, in the elect. It was to Mary that the Holy Ghost said, “Place your roots in my elect.” Whoever, then, is of the chosen and predestinate, will have the Blessed Virgin living within him, and he will let her plant, in his very soul, the roots of every virtue, but especially deep humility and ardent charity.
(10) Mary is called by St. Augustine, and is indeed, the ‘living mold of God.’ In her alone the God-man was formed in His human nature without losing any feature of the Godhead. In her alone, by the grace of Jesus Christ, man is made godlike as far as human nature is capable of it” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary).
That seems a pretty obvious statement, doesn’t it? Today always comes before tomorrow! Yet there is a relation between the two. Have you ever heard of the saying: “Don’t put-off until tomorrow what you can do today”? Well, tomorrow (Sunday, December 8th) is the feast of the Immaculate Conception―and we should not put-off our preparations for that feast and thus we ought to prepare for tomorrow’s feast today. We do exactly that on so many other occasions―holidays, birthdays, anniversaries, etc. ―so that we have everything “in place” and “ready to go” when that big day arrives. Let us ‘cook’ the idea of the Immaculate Conception in the oven of our minds today―so that when tomorrow comes, we have already prepared the material that we can nibble on throughout this glorious feastday. It is a little late to start thinking about the feast day only on the day itself―that reminds us of the parable about the wise and foolish virgins:
“Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be like to ten virgins, who taking their lamps went out to meet the bridegroom and the bride. And five of them were foolish, and five wise. But the five foolish, having taken their lamps, did not take oil with them. But the wise took oil in their vessels with the lamps. And the bridegroom tarrying, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made: ‘Behold the bridegroom cometh! Go ye forth to meet him!’ Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said to the wise: ‘Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out!’ The wise answered, saying: ‘Lest perhaps there be not enough for us and for you, go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves!’ Now whilst they went to buy, the bridegroom came: and they that were ready, went in with him to the marriage, and the door was shut. But at last come also the other virgins, saying: ‘Lord! Lord! Open to us! But He answering said: ‘Amen I say to you, I know you not!’” (Matthew 25:1-12).
You Have an Immaculate Mother
Talking of “virgins” ― let us spend some time talking and thinking about the Virgin of all virgins― the Blessed Virgin Mary and her Immaculate Conception. Sadly, most Catholics today―especially young Catholics―are clueless to a greater or lesser degree about the Immaculate Conception. Some think it is all about Mary conceiving Jesus in her womb―wrong! Others confuse the Immaculate Conception with the “virgin birth”―namely, the belief that Mary gave birth to Jesus while remaining a virgin―wrong! Yes, she was a virgin before and after giving birth―but that is not the Immaculate Conception! Then there are those who think that the Immaculate Conception means that Mary’s mother, St. Anne, conceived Mary without having marital relations with her husband, St. Joachim―wrong! Mary was conceived in the womb of St. Anne according to normal rules of nature.
Getting a little more technical―some think that the dogma of the Immaculate Conception includes only Mary’s sanctification in soul at moment of her conception, but does not preserve her body from ALL EFFECTS of Original Sin (the triple concupiscence―namely, the concupiscence of the eyes, the concupiscence of the flesh and the pride of life―and being prone to disease, injury and death)―wrong again! The Immaculate Conception preserved the Virgin Mary from the effects of Original Sin on both the body and soul. Mary was not subject to death or injury or disease, due to Original Sin―“For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) … “By one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). If she died at the end of her life, this occurred only because it was the will of God, and not because of any personal sin or Original Sin.
So What Exactly is the “Immaculate Conception”
Before we go further―and look at the what the “Immaculate Conception” should mean to us and how it should influence our lives―let us first get a clear idea of what exactly is this term, “the Immaculate Conception”.
In his encyclical, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854, Blessed Pope Pius IX pronounced and enforced the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary: “Wherefore, in humility and fasting, we unceasingly offered our private prayers as well as the public prayers of the Church to God the Father, through his Son, that he would deign to direct and strengthen our mind by the power of the Holy Spirit. In like manner did we implore the help of the entire heavenly host as we ardently invoked the Paraclete. Accordingly, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, for the honor of the Holy and undivided Trinity, for the glory and adornment of the Virgin Mother of God, for the exaltation of the Catholic Faith, and for the furtherance of the Catholic religion, by the authority of Jesus Christ our Lord, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own: ‘We declare, pronounce, and define that the doctrine which holds that the most Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instance of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege granted by Almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin, is a doctrine revealed by God and therefore to be believed firmly and constantly by all the faithful.’” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854).
Woe to Unbelievers!
“Hence, if anyone shall dare—which God forbid!—to think otherwise than as has been defined by us, let him know and understand that he is condemned by his own judgment; that he has suffered shipwreck in the Faith; that he has separated from the unity of the Church; and that, furthermore, by his own action he incurs the penalties established by law, if he should are to express in words, or writing, or by any other outward means the errors he thinks in his heart” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854).
No Impulsive Dogma
Winding back just 5 years, to 1849, we see Blessed Pope Pius IX already perusing if the time was then right to make the dogmatic declaration concerning the Immaculate Conception. “There was in the entire Catholic world a most ardent and wondrous revival of the desire that the most holy Mother of God—the beloved Mother of us all, the immaculate Virgin Mary—be finally declared by a solemn definition of the Church to have been conceived without the stain of Original Sin ... “Many persons are now wondering why this honor has not already been accorded to the Blessed Virgin by the Church and the Apostolic See—an honor which the widespread piety of the Christian people so fervently desires ... Accordingly, We have appointed certain priests of recognized piety and theological learning, as well as several cardinals of the Holy Roman Church who are renowned because of their ability, piety, wisdom, prudence, and knowledge of the things of God; and We have directed them to make, carefully and thoroughly, a most diligent examination into this most important matter and then provide Us with a complete report” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Encyclical Ubi Primum, on the Immaculate Conception, February 2nd, 1849).
The Pope goes on to say that this doctrine has been in the minds of Christians from antiquity: “This doctrine so filled the minds and souls of our ancestors in the Faith that a singular and truly marvelous style of speech came into vogue among them. They have frequently addressed the Mother of God as immaculate, as immaculate in every respect; innocent, and verily most innocent; spotless, and entirely spotless; holy and removed from every stain of sin; all pure, all stainless, the very model of purity and innocence; more beautiful than beauty, more lovely than loveliness; more holy than holiness, singularly holy and most pure in soul and body; the one who surpassed all integrity and virginity; the only one who has become the dwelling place of all the graces of the most Holy Ghost. God alone excepted, Mary is more excellent than all, and by nature fair and beautiful, and more holy than the Cherubim and Seraphim. To praise her all the tongues of Heaven and Earth do not suffice.” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Encyclical Ineffabilis Deus, proclaiming the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th, 1854).
Our Lady’s Lourdes Confirmation
A little over three years after the dogmatic declaration on the Immaculate Conception, Our Lady makes a series of apparitions at Lourdes, in France, beginning on February 11th, 1858—at which time she ratifies and confirms the pope’s declaration by telling St. Bernadette that she was the Immaculate Conception.
Pope St. Pius X also weighed-in to the matter around 50 years later, by stating: “The Virgin was kept the more free from all stain of Original Sin because she was to be the Mother of Christ” (Pope St. Pius X, Encyclical Ad Diem Illum, on the Immaculate Conception, February 2, 1904).
Habemus Matrem
If, at the election of a pope, we can shout “Habemus papam!” meaning “we have a pope (‘father’)”, then, in regard to this dogmatic declaration, we can shout “Habemus Matrem—Habemus Matrem Immaculatam”, meaning “We have a Mother—an Immaculate Mother!” Even more than the pope is the Holy Father, Our Lady is the Holiest of mothers. The “immaculate” aspect is of great importance―for, as the spiritual masters teach, purity infuses an enormous power into the petitions we place before God and purity makes us extremely close to God: “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God!” (Matthew 5:8) … “Evil thoughts are an abomination to the Lord and pure words most beautiful” (Proverbs 15:26).
Why on Earth…?
Of all questions―such as “What? Where? How? When? Which? Why?”―the “Why?” is foremost. It concerns the “Final End” of matters. It is the king or queen of questions. So ‘what is the why’ of the Immaculate Conception? Blessed Pope Pius XII gives us the answer in the proclaiming encyclical of December 8th, 1954:
Before getting to the heart of the matter, he prefaces it with the following statement: “God, having foreseen from all eternity the lamentable wretchedness of the entire human race, which would result from the sin of Adam, decreed, by a plan hidden from the centuries, to complete the first work of his goodness through the Incarnation of the Word. This He decreed in order that man, who had been led into sin by the cunning malice of Satan, should not perish. The eternal Father chose and prepared, for His only-begotten Son, a Mother in whom the Son of God would become incarnate and from whom He would be born into this world. God loved her above all creatures and endowed her with the abundance of all heavenly gifts, so that this Mother, ever free of all stain of sin, would possess that fullness of holy innocence and sanctity than which, under God, one cannot even imagine anything greater, and which, outside of God, no mind can succeed in comprehending fully” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854).
In other words, the height and depth, length and breadth of her ‘immaculateness’ is simply mind-blowing and beyond our puny capacities to grasp and understand. It is something that we should be in total awe over, yet, for many, if not most, there is only an indifference—an attitude of “So what?” “It’s just another title!” “Let’s just get on with life! I’ve got better things to do than try fathom out how immaculate she is!”
The Supreme Reason: The Divine Maternity
The Pope Pius IX goes on to explain the “Why?” of the Immaculate Conception: “And indeed it was wholly fitting that so wonderful a mother should be ever resplendent, with the glory of most sublime holiness, and so completely free from all taint of Original Sin, that she would triumph utterly over the ancient serpent. To her did the Father will to give His only-begotten Son—the Son, the Father loves from His heart—and to give this Son in such a way that He would be the one and the same common Son of God the Father and of the Blessed Virgin Mary. It was she whom the Son Himself chose to make His Mother; and it was from her that the Holy Spirit willed, and brought it about, that He should be conceived and born from whom He himself proceeds.” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854).
St. Thomas Aquinas explains it by equating the means with the end. Mary is the means to the end—which is the Incarnation of God (or God taking on flesh). He could have done it many different ways, but since He chose to become incarnate through Mary, it was necessary that the means be the best possible means—and since with God nothing is impossible, He made sure that Mary was the best means available. St. Thomas puts it thus:
“Mary’s whole life was free from sin. For God so prepares and endows those whom He selects for some particular office, that they are rendered capable of fulfilling it, according to 2 Corinthians 3:6: ‘Who hath made us fit ministers of the New Testament.’ Now the Blessed Virgin was chosen by God to be His Mother. Therefore, there can be no doubt that God, by His grace, made her worthy of that office, according to the words spoken to her by the Angel (Luke 1:30), ‘Thou hast found grace with God, behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb and shall bring forth a son and thou shalt call His Name Jesus.’ But she would not have been worthy to be the Mother of God if she had ever sinned.
“First, because the honor of the parents reflects upon the child, according to Proverbs 17:6: ‘The glory of the children are their fathers’; and consequently, on the other hand, the Mother’s shame would have reflected on her Son. Secondly, because of the singular affinity between her and Christ Who took flesh from her. And it is written (2 Corinthians 6:15): ‘What concord hath Christ with Belial?’ Thirdly, because of the singular manner in which the Son of God, ‘Who is the Divine Wisdom’ (1 Corinthians 1:24), dwelt in her, not only in her soul but in her womb. And thus, it is written (Wisdom 1:4): ‘Wisdom will not enter into a malicious soul, nor dwell in a body subject to sins.’ We must therefore confess simply that the Blessed Virgin committed no actual sin, either mortal or venial; so that what is written (Canticles 4:7), is fulfilled: ‘Thou art all fair, O my love, and there is not a spot in thee.’” (Summa Theologica, 3a, q. 27).
The Awesome Terrible Sanctity of God Detests Sin
God is Sanctity itself, much more so than the sun is light, and no shadow of sin can endure before His face. “Thy eyes are too pure to behold evil, and Thou canst not look on iniquity” (Habacuc 1:13). The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended.
It was sin that led to banishment of the fallen angels to Hell, and it was sin led to Adam and Eve to be cast out of the Garden of Eden and to suffer and die. Both the Angels and our First Parents were created immaculate, that is to say, in a state of grace. Yet many of the angels failed to keep that grace, and both Adam and Eve lost that grace through Mortal Sin. God cannot tolerate sin. Sin is an attack upon the holiness and purity of God. Sin has to be eliminated and reparation has to be made.
The Price and Pain of Sin
Since Adam and Even listened to the devil and fell into sin, they thereby abused and threw away the gifts the gifts that God had given them: (1) the supernatural grace of God; (2) the possibility of never having to die; (3) the possibility of being free from any and all forms of suffering; (4) the harmonious submission and obedience of the soul to God’s grace, and the obedience of the body and its passions to the soul; and finally, (5) they weakened the infused knowledge that God had created them with, to the point that now they would experience a darkened intellect that finds learning difficult, a weak will that struggles with temptation, and rebellious passions.
They had offended God in the name of humanity, all their future descendants would participate in the effects of that sin. As St. Paul writes: “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). Truly, as St. Paul states later, “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23).
The gates of Heaven were closed. Humanity had failed the test through Adam and Eve. It is because we downplay sin in our own thoughts, that we have such a wrong notion about what sin really is. As the old, but very clear and simple, Penny Catechism says: “It is the greatest of all evils to fall into mortal sin.” Another catechism, My Catholic Faith, states that “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God ... Although venial sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is nevertheless a great moral evil, next alone to mortal sin ... We are prone to look upon venial sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that it is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin.” (from the catechism My Catholic Faith).
The New Adam, the New Eve
After his fall, man was not abandoned by God. The passage in Genesis, which is called the Proto-evangelium (“first gospel”), makes the first announcement of the Messias and Redeemer, of a battle between the serpent and the Woman, and of the final victory of a descendant of hers. The Christian tradition sees in this passage an announcement of the “New Adam” who, because He “became obedient unto death, even death on a cross”, makes amends super-abundantly for the disobedience, of Adam. Additionally, many Fathers and Doctors of the Church have seen the Woman announced in the Proto-evangelium as Mary, the Mother of Christ, the “New Eve”. Mary benefited first of all and uniquely from Christ’s victory over sin: for she was preserved from all stain of Original Sin and by a special grace of God committed no sin of any kind during her whole earthly life.
Immaculate Mary needs Immaculate Children
We all know the saying: “Like father, like son!” or “Like mother, like daughter!” or “He takes after his father!” and “She’s just like her mother!” Our Lord and Our Lady—the new Adam and Eve—want us to imitate them and Heaven. Of Our Lady, it can be said: “I am clean, and without sin: I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me” (Job 33:9) .... “My word is pure, and I am clean in thy sight” (Job 11:4). “I am without sin and am innocent” (Jeremias 2:35). We became her spiritual children at the foot of the Cross, and so we should take on the traits of our spiritual Mother. Children imitate their parents.
Jesus said: “Learn of Me…!” (Matthew 11:29) … “If you love Me, keep my Commandments” (John 14:15) … “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48) … “I am the Lord your God: be holy because I am holy” (Leviticus 11:44) … “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine” (Leviticus 20:26). St. Peter repeats that command in the New Testament: “According to Him that hath called you, Who is holy, be you also in all manner of conversation holy, because it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy’” (1 Peter 1:15-16). While St. Paul writes: “He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight in charity” (Ephesians 1:4).
Only saints go to Heaven, that is the pedigree of the New Adam and Eve—we have to be immaculate to enter therein: “There shall not enter into it any thing defiled” (Apocalypse 27:21). We have to be wholly holy, or “Holy, Holy, Holy” as we say in the Sanctus at Mass—which, incidentally, should remind of the three ever-increasing stages of holiness that we have to pass through: as beginners in holiness, (2) as proficients in holiness, and (3) as perfect in holiness. Purgatory will be necessary for even the slightest stains of sin or smallest unpaid debts for previously forgiven sin. For, as it was said above, God detests sin. “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8).
“For the Highest hateth sinners, and hath mercy on the penitent” (Ecclesiasticus 12:3). “Six things there are, which the Lord hateth, and the seventh his soul detesteth: (1) Haughty eyes, (2) a lying tongue, (3) hands that shed innocent blood, (4) heart that deviseth wicked plots, (5) feet that are swift to run into mischief, (6) deceitful witness that uttereth lies, and (7) him that soweth discord among brethren” (Proverbs 6:16-19). “I hate arrogance, and pride, and every wicked way, and a mouth with a double tongue” (Proverbs 8:13).
The Articulate Deception of the World Opposes the Immaculate Conception of Mary
The devil and Mary are irreconcilable enemies―a fact already foretold by God after the first sin of Adam and Eve, what we now call “Original Sin”, after which God solemnly said: “And the Lord God said to the serpent: ‘Because thou hast done this thing, thou art cursed among all cattle, and beasts of the Earth! Upon thy breast shalt thou go and earth shalt thou eat all the days of thy life! I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed! She shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!’” (Genesis 3:14-15). Thus, Mary and devil are irreconcilable enemies.
The devil, however, is also the “prince of this world” and thus the world is also an enemy of God and Mary―as mentioned by Our Lord on several occasions: “For the prince of this world cometh, and in me he hath not any thing!” (John 14:30). “The prince of this world is already judged!” (John 16:11). “Now is the judgment of the world―now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31). How does Our Lord judge the world, of which the devil is prince? Jesus says: “My kingdom is not of this world … My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). Jesus “gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present wicked world!” (Galatians 1:4). “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:10-11)―we forget that it is actually a good sign if the world does not ‘receive’ us or does not like us!
Exposing the Seductive Lies and Deception of the World
To His followers Jesus says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works thereof are evil!” (John 7:7). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
In the parable of the Sower of the Seed, Jesus says: “He that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word of God, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15). “He that loves his life [in this world] shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:25). To His Father in Heaven, Jesus prays: “I have manifested Thy Name, Father, to the men whom Thou hast given Me out of the world ... Thine they were, and to Me Thou gavest them … I am not of the world, and these are in the world … I pray for them! … I pray not for the world, but for them whom Thou hast given Me! … I have given them Thy word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world; as I also am not of the world” (John 17:6-14).
This inescapable and unpleasant truth―unpleasant to us because we love the world and want the world to love us―is further driven home by the Apostles: “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “We are blasphemed [by the world], and we are made as the refuse of this world, the off-scouring of all―even until now!” (1 Corinthians 4:13). “The world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “If then you be dead with Christ from the elements of this world, why do you still act as though living in the world?” (Colossians 2:20). “Adulterers! Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). “We have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; so that we may know the things that are given us from God! … Use this world, as if [you] used it not―for the fashion of this world passes away!” (1 Corinthians 2:12; 7:31). “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
The Seductive Lies of the World are the Lies of the Devil
As Our Lord says of the devil and of worldly people: “The world cannot receive the spirit of truth” (John 14:17). To the worldly-minded, who are thereby implicit slaves of the “prince of this world”, the devil, Our Lord says: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar and the father of lies!” (John 8:44). Yet those lies are very seductive lies―they promise a paradise on Earth, a life of ease and comfort, many useful possessions, etc.
Articulate Deceptions of the World
St. Louis de Montfort, in one of his lesser know books, Love of Eternal Wisdom, paints a very striking and clear picture of those who have been seduced by the lies of the world and the devil:
“Those who proceed according to the wisdom of the world are those who know how to manage well their affairs and to arrange things to their temporal advantage without appearing to do so; who know the art of deceiving and how to cleverly cheat without being noticed; who say or do one thing and have another thing in mind; who are thoroughly acquainted with the way and the flattery of the world; who know how to please everybody in order to reach their goal, not troubling much about the honor and interests of God; who make a secret but deadly fusion of truth with untruth, of the Gospel with the world, of virtue with vice, of Jesus Christ with Satan; who wish to pass as honest people, but not as religious men; who despise and corrupt or readily condemn every religious practice which does not conform to their own. In short, the worldly‑wise are those who, being guided only by their human senses and reason, seek only to appear as Christian and honest folk, without troubling much to please God or to do penance for the sins which they have committed against His divine Majesty.
“The worldling bases his conduct upon his honor, upon what people say, upon convention, upon good cheer, upon personal interest, upon refined manners, upon witty jokes. These are the seven innocent incentives, so he thinks, upon which he can rely that he may lead an easy life. He has virtues of his own for which he is canonized by the world. These are manliness, finesse, diplomacy, tact, gallantry, politeness, sprightliness. He considers as serious sins such traits as lack of feeling, silliness, dullness, sanctimoniousness. He adheres as strictly as possible to the commandments which the world has given him:
(1) Thou shalt be well acquainted with the world.
(2) Thou shalt be an “honest” man.
(3) Thou shalt be successful in business.
(4) Thou shalt keep what is thine.
(5) Thou shalt get on in the world.
(6) Thou shalt make friends.
(7) Thou shalt be a society man.
(8) Thou shalt make merry.
(9) Thou shalt not be a killjoy.
(10) Thou shalt avoid singularity, dullness and an air of piety.
“Never was the world so corrupt as it is now, because it was never so astute, so wise in its own conceit, so cunning. It is so skillful in deceiving the soul seeking perfection that it makes use of truth to foster untruth, of virtue to authorize vice and it even distorts the meaning of Christ’s own truths to give authority to its own maxims. “The number of those who are fools according to God, is infinite.” The earthly wisdom spoken of by St. James, is an excessive striving for worldly goods. The worldly-wise make a secret profession of this type of wisdom when they allow themselves to become attached to their earthly possessions, when they strive to become rich, when they go to law and bring useless actions against others in order to acquire or to keep temporal goods; when their every thought, word and deed is mainly directed toward obtaining or retaining something temporal. As to working out their eternal salvation and making use of the means to do so, such as reception of the Sacraments and prayer, they accomplish these duties only carelessly, in a very offhand manner, once in a while, and for the sake of appearances” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom §76-§79).
Even the Good are Seduced by the Articulate Deceptions of the World
Even good people are seduced by some seductive aspect of the world―as we see in the real-life encounter between Jesus and good young rich man:
“And behold, a certain rich young man, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’
“And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-29; Mark 10:17-31; Luke 18:18-25).
Which is why the Apostles write the following words of warning―which almost everyone chooses to ignore: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). “God forbid that I should glory in anything, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “This is the victory which overcometh the world―our Faith” (1 John 5:4). But sadly, the world has overcome the Faith in most cases today!
We Need to Clean Up Our Act
God never changes and His demands for holiness never change. In the Old Testament it says: “Turn away from evil and do good” (Psalms 33:15); and St. Peter repeats the same in the New Testament: “Let him decline from evil, and do good” (1 Peter 3:11). Our Lady even echoes this today, for at Fatima she said: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended.” However, Sr. Lucia of Fatima tells us that: “the Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.” St. Paul clearly tells us: “Let no sin therefore reign in your mortal body” (Romans 6:12). Not even the slightest Venial Sin, for that still separates us from God and has to paid for—either here or in Purgatory, as Our Lord says: “Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing” (Matthew 5:26).
“Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8). But “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness” (Matthew 23:25).
Fatal Failure
Failure to clean up our act will have fatal consequences, as we already know: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it” (La Salette) … “As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” (Akita).
We must cease being overly preoccupied with the things of the world, entertainment and amusement—all things that Our Lady has complained about—and begin to reform ourselves, to clean up our act. No matter how much we may have sinned—as with Mary Magdalen, the Good Thief, the Prodigal Son—there is a way back, but we have work hard and clean house. The foundation is prayer and penance—the things that Our Lady has insistently commanded in one apparition after another—there is no other way. We must pray VERY MUCH and we must do MUCH penance.
Detesting Sin and Worldliness
One of the chief contributors to the deluge of sin in the world today is the absence of a fear of God and a fear of offending God. This is there has to be a terrible, frightening chastisement—in order to re-establish the foundation of fear. Fear is essential, even when we love God—it is the foundation of the spiritual life. It is even one of the Gifts of the Holy Ghost—a Fear of the Lord. As Holy Scripture says: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalms 110:10). “The fear of God is the beginning of His love” (Ecclesiasticus 25:16). “The fear of the Lord drives out sin” (Ecclesiasticus 1:27). “The fear of the Lord hates evil” (Proverbs 8:13). “The Lord hates all abomination of error, and they that fear Him shall not love it” (Ecclesiasticus 15:13). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5).
“Neither shalt thou bring any thing of the idol into thy house, lest thou become an anathema, like it. Thou shalt detest it as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth, because it is an anathema” (Deuteronomy 7:26). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
This detestation of the spirit of the world and of the ways of the world is absolutely essential if we are clean house and clean-up our act. The source of sin has to be stopped, like a leak in a boat, or the boat (soul) will sink. Once the incoming flow of sin has been dealt, then we can deal with the flooded basement (soul) and start pumping the bilge out.
Grace Cleans and Beautifies
We say of Our Lady: “Hail, full of grace!” Grace perfects our human nature, it heals the wounds of sin, it strengthens our weaknesses, it pushes us on to higher heights. St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this cleaning of soul and the role of grace in his Secret of Mary, saying: “
“It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say ‘not in the same measure,’ because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary).
To find the Grace of God, we must discover Mary
St. Louis continues: “It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.
“I explain;
(1) Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person (Luke 1:30). No patriarch nor prophet nor any other holy person of the Old Law could manage to find this grace;
(2) It was Mary who gave existence and life to the author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the “Mother of Grace.”
(3) God the Father, from Whom, as from its essential source, every perfect gift and every grace come down to us (James 1:17), gave her every grace when He gave her His Son. Thus, as St. Bernard says, the will of God is manifested to her in Jesus and with Jesus.
(4) God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands. Such is the power that she has received from Him that, according to St. Bernardine, she gives the graces of the eternal Father, the virtues of Jesus Christ, and the gifts of the Holy Ghost to whom she wills, as and when she wills, and as much as she wills.
(5) As in the natural life a child must have a father and a mother, so in the supernatural life of grace a true child of the Church must have God for his Father and Mary for his mother. If he prides himself on having God for his Father, but does not give Mary the tender affection of a true child, he is an imposter and his father is the devil.
(6) Since Mary produced the head of the elect, Jesus Christ, she must also produce the members of that head, that is, all true Christians. A mother does not conceive a head without members, nor members without a head. If anyone, then, wishes to become a member of Jesus Christ, and consequently be filled with grace and truth (John 1:14), he must be formed in Mary through the grace of Jesus Christ, which she possesses with a fullness enabling her to communicate it abundantly to true members of Jesus Christ, her true children.
(7) The Holy Ghost espoused Mary and produced His greatest work, the incarnate Word, in her, by her and through her. He has never disowned her and so He continues to produce every day, in a mysterious but very real manner, the souls of the elect in her and through her.
(8) Mary received, from God, a unique dominion over souls, enabling her to nourish them and make them more and more godlike. St. Augustine went so far as to say that, even in this world, all the elect are enclosed in the womb of Mary, and that their real birthday is when this good mother brings them forth to eternal life. Consequently, just as an infant draws all its nourishment from its mother, who gives according to its needs, so the elect draw all their spiritual nourishment and all their strength from Mary.
(9) It was to Mary that God the Father said, ‘Dwell in Jacob’ (Ecclesiasticus 24:8,12) that is, dwell in my elect, who are typified by Jacob. It was to Mary that God the Son said, “My dear Mother, your inheritance is in Israel,” that is, in the elect. It was to Mary that the Holy Ghost said, “Place your roots in my elect.” Whoever, then, is of the chosen and predestinate, will have the Blessed Virgin living within him, and he will let her plant, in his very soul, the roots of every virtue, but especially deep humility and ardent charity.
(10) Mary is called by St. Augustine, and is indeed, the ‘living mold of God.’ In her alone the God-man was formed in His human nature without losing any feature of the Godhead. In her alone, by the grace of Jesus Christ, man is made godlike as far as human nature is capable of it” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary).
Article 6
Friday, December 6th
Going Round in Circles
Friday, December 6th
Going Round in Circles
Losing Time Going Round in Circles?
We have all had that experience where we feel we are “going round in circles”. To us, that seems a waste of time, we feel we are “spinning our wheels” and getting nowhere fast. The Church, too, has us going round in circles—liturgical circles—but these circles are supposed to get us somewhere fast, safe and sound. Even the Advent Wreath speaks to us of “going round in circles”!
These liturgical circles are none other than the continuous repetition of the Church’s Liturgical Cycle or Liturgical Year. Even though there exists the possibility of using many more readings from both Holy Scripture and the writings of the Saints, the Church keeps repeating the same few specially chosen readings, year after year after year after year. Why?
We Repeat Ceaselessly
The answer, of course, is that essential things need to be repeated again and again. We eat—usually the same range of foods, though many more kinds of food exist—again and again; we need to drink water again and again, year after year—though other liquid beverages are available, lack of water will harm our quality and length of life; we use the same vocabulary and our favorite phrases over and over; we have established certain repetitive routines in our daily life, that are repeated almost every day of our life; we drive the same route to work/school/Sunday Mass every single time, every day of the week, even though alternative routes are possible; for a particular illness we take the same remedy again and again.
Sugar and Junk Food
All these things, if done correctly and regularly, will advance our well-being and keep us from harm. If the food we eat is nutritious God-made food and not man-made ‘junk-food’, then it will help us maintain and even improve our health; but if we give in to the temptation to fill ourselves with man-made ‘junk-food’ then, very quickly, good health will turn to ‘junk-health’. Similarly, if we neglect God’s water in favor of man’s soda, then, too, our health will quickly decline. More often than not, man-made things tend to offer a sweetness and sugariness far in excess of what God has naturally put into His produce. As we all know, too much sugar destroys our health.
The Church’s liturgy, like a good parent, knows what kind of spiritual food is good for its children and that is why she serves that food to us year-in-year-out, even though other spiritual food is available. But, as parents know, children have a preference for the sweet things and there often ensues a battle over what will be served and what will be eaten. Even the consumer market caters to the consumer’s ‘sweet-tooth’ by sweetening foods and drinks that should not be sweetened. A non-American, upon tasting American-produced meat for the first time, noticed that it had a sweet taste. He said that in his country, meat was not sweetened like this.
Spiritual Sweetening
This tendency of sweetening things has also crept into the spiritual life and the life of the Church as a whole. For example, in the early days of the Church, the penitential season of Advent used to start in early November, rather than the modern-day start-time of early December. Back then, it was a time of penance for a whole forty-days; but over time it has been reduced to a mere four weeks (and in most cases, when Christmas Day does not fall on a Sunday, the fourth week is invariably left unfinished, sometimes the fourth week is only two days long!).
In the old days, priests and religious were obliged to a strict fast; then the fast was reduced to a few days and, today, the fast is no longer obligatory. We see the same ‘sweetening’ during Lent, where now only two days of Lent oblige everyone, clergy and laity alike, to fast under pain of mortal sin—these two days are Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, whereas in the past everyone had to fast from Monday to Saturday all throughout Lent. Similarly with the fast before Holy Communion; it used to require fasting from midnight on the day you would receive Holy Communion, then it was reduced to three hours, then, later, in was reduced to one hour. In the early days of the Church, penances received in Confession were very severe—one single mortal sin would have a penance (saying a particular prayer, or fasting, or abstinence, etc.) imposed from anything from 1 to 25 years; nowadays a whole bunch of mortal sins only gets a penance of a few Our Fathers or Hail Marys.
Is Sweeter Better? The Proof of the Pudding is in the Eating!
Some may argue that sweeter is better; but has the Catholic world got better because of it? No! Never has sin abounded so much as it presently does in this ‘Sweet Age of the Church’. It has become so sweet that it provoked our sweet Mother, Our Lady, to come several times in various apparitions, over the last 180 years, to tell us to pray more, to do more penance, to mortify ourselves more and to offend God less, because we are becoming increasingly godless.
Despite Our Lord wanting all the world to be baptized--”Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:19-20)—never has the world been so unmortified, unrepentant, unfaithful and un-Christian as it is today, and that includes the Catholic world too. Statistics show that most Catholics no longer to Sunday Mass regularly; they rarely go to Confession; their prayer time is minimal or non-existent; many no longer baptize their children; their moral values now increasingly accept things like contraception, divorce with remarriage, solitary sexual sins, lustful thoughts, and now even Sodom and Gomorrah lifestyles and abortion. Sweet, eh?
Our Lady’s Diet
This is why our sweet Mother says she can barely hold back the hand of her sweet Son anymore, from punishing the world! Just as any parent would, Our Lady warns of what will befall the world if it does not cease offending God and return to the less sweet diet of prayer and penance.
At the Rue du Bac (1830) she said: “Times are evil in France and in the world. The side of Our Lord will be pierced anew. The Cross will be treated with contempt; they will hurl it to the ground. Blood will flow; they will open up again the side of Our Lord. The streets will run with blood ... The whole world will be in sadness. The whole world will be plunged into every kind of misery.”
At La Salette (1846) she said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much I can no longer keep hold of it … A great famine will come … others will do penance through hunger ... Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them. The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God ... blood will flow on all sides. Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A general war will follow which will be appalling … The righteous will suffer greatly. Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession.” She insists on the not so sweet diet of PRAYER and PENANCE, “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) ... “unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3).
At Lourdes (1858) she said: “I do not promise you happiness in this world, but in the next ... Pray for sinners ... Penance! Penance! Penance! … Kiss the ground as a penance for sinners.”
At Fatima (1917) she said: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort ... Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners … Are you suffering a great deal? Don’t lose heart! ... You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved ... but if people do not cease offending God … God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father … [Russia] will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, and various nations will be annihilated.”
At Beauraing (1932-33) she says: “Pray, pray very much … Pray always [she emphasized the word always] … I will convert sinners … I am the Mother of God, the Queen of Heaven. Pray always!”
At Banneux (1933) she says: “Pray much!”
At Tre Fontane, Rome (1947) she said: “The Hail Marys that you pray with Faith and love are like golden arrows that go straight to the heart of Jesus … Pray much and recite the Rosary for the conversion of sinners, of unbelievers and of all Christians.”
What’s My Diet Like?
Is this Advent a growing time of prayer? How much are we praying? Our Lady keeps insisting on praying much and praying always. The modern world seems to have mistranslated her message from “pray much” to “play much”! That was the mistake of the children at Fatima, just before the second apparition of the Angel at Fatima. They had invented a quick method of praying the Rosary—merely saying the first and last words of the Hail Mary, “Ave Maria, Amen!” That gave more time for play. The Angel appeared to them, while they were playing near the well of Lucia’s house, and said: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! The Hearts of Jesus and Mary have merciful designs on you. Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High.”
So you see, the message is consistent because the world consistently ignores prayer and penance; neglects the spiritual life and especially devotion to Our Lady—placing those things way down the in their list of daily priorities; the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is neglected and even rushed through; Holy Communion, our greatest treasure on Earth, is not only neglected, but increasingly not believed in—with American statistics showing varying figures from 60% to 80% of Catholics no longer believing in the Real Presence! Direct sins against God and against the Faith are the worst sins man can commit—perhaps not the most subjectively embarrassing, but objectively the worst. God’s heavy hand is raised against us! As Our Lady prophesied, it will fall upon us.
The Advent Meal
That is why we have these seasons of penance, like Advent and Lent, for penance appeases the wrath of God, and the sweet words of the Rosary placate his ire: “If they do penance in their heart saying: ‘We have sinned, we have done unjustly, we have committed wickedness!’ and return to Thee with all their heart and all their soul … and pray to Thee … then hear, Thou in Heaven, their prayers, and their supplications, and forgive Thy people, that have sinned against thee, all their iniquities” (3 Kings 47:50). On the other hand, “I gave her a time that she might do penance, but she will not repent” (Apocalypse 2:21). “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3).
Let us ignore the world’s manner of spending Advent, and let us at least build our own little Advent Ark in which to place Jesus this Christmas! Noe had to ignore the world around him and patiently and laboriously build his Ark of Salvation. Have you ever thought much of the cradle or crib in which Jesus was placed at His birth? It is like a mini-ark, made of wood that would float in any deluge. The Cross was also made of wood and Jesus was lifted above the sinking world as He died upon it! Our Advent penances are crosses, but those crosses will also keep us afloat among a world that is sinking fast all around us—even the Catholic world!
We have all had that experience where we feel we are “going round in circles”. To us, that seems a waste of time, we feel we are “spinning our wheels” and getting nowhere fast. The Church, too, has us going round in circles—liturgical circles—but these circles are supposed to get us somewhere fast, safe and sound. Even the Advent Wreath speaks to us of “going round in circles”!
These liturgical circles are none other than the continuous repetition of the Church’s Liturgical Cycle or Liturgical Year. Even though there exists the possibility of using many more readings from both Holy Scripture and the writings of the Saints, the Church keeps repeating the same few specially chosen readings, year after year after year after year. Why?
We Repeat Ceaselessly
The answer, of course, is that essential things need to be repeated again and again. We eat—usually the same range of foods, though many more kinds of food exist—again and again; we need to drink water again and again, year after year—though other liquid beverages are available, lack of water will harm our quality and length of life; we use the same vocabulary and our favorite phrases over and over; we have established certain repetitive routines in our daily life, that are repeated almost every day of our life; we drive the same route to work/school/Sunday Mass every single time, every day of the week, even though alternative routes are possible; for a particular illness we take the same remedy again and again.
Sugar and Junk Food
All these things, if done correctly and regularly, will advance our well-being and keep us from harm. If the food we eat is nutritious God-made food and not man-made ‘junk-food’, then it will help us maintain and even improve our health; but if we give in to the temptation to fill ourselves with man-made ‘junk-food’ then, very quickly, good health will turn to ‘junk-health’. Similarly, if we neglect God’s water in favor of man’s soda, then, too, our health will quickly decline. More often than not, man-made things tend to offer a sweetness and sugariness far in excess of what God has naturally put into His produce. As we all know, too much sugar destroys our health.
The Church’s liturgy, like a good parent, knows what kind of spiritual food is good for its children and that is why she serves that food to us year-in-year-out, even though other spiritual food is available. But, as parents know, children have a preference for the sweet things and there often ensues a battle over what will be served and what will be eaten. Even the consumer market caters to the consumer’s ‘sweet-tooth’ by sweetening foods and drinks that should not be sweetened. A non-American, upon tasting American-produced meat for the first time, noticed that it had a sweet taste. He said that in his country, meat was not sweetened like this.
Spiritual Sweetening
This tendency of sweetening things has also crept into the spiritual life and the life of the Church as a whole. For example, in the early days of the Church, the penitential season of Advent used to start in early November, rather than the modern-day start-time of early December. Back then, it was a time of penance for a whole forty-days; but over time it has been reduced to a mere four weeks (and in most cases, when Christmas Day does not fall on a Sunday, the fourth week is invariably left unfinished, sometimes the fourth week is only two days long!).
In the old days, priests and religious were obliged to a strict fast; then the fast was reduced to a few days and, today, the fast is no longer obligatory. We see the same ‘sweetening’ during Lent, where now only two days of Lent oblige everyone, clergy and laity alike, to fast under pain of mortal sin—these two days are Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, whereas in the past everyone had to fast from Monday to Saturday all throughout Lent. Similarly with the fast before Holy Communion; it used to require fasting from midnight on the day you would receive Holy Communion, then it was reduced to three hours, then, later, in was reduced to one hour. In the early days of the Church, penances received in Confession were very severe—one single mortal sin would have a penance (saying a particular prayer, or fasting, or abstinence, etc.) imposed from anything from 1 to 25 years; nowadays a whole bunch of mortal sins only gets a penance of a few Our Fathers or Hail Marys.
Is Sweeter Better? The Proof of the Pudding is in the Eating!
Some may argue that sweeter is better; but has the Catholic world got better because of it? No! Never has sin abounded so much as it presently does in this ‘Sweet Age of the Church’. It has become so sweet that it provoked our sweet Mother, Our Lady, to come several times in various apparitions, over the last 180 years, to tell us to pray more, to do more penance, to mortify ourselves more and to offend God less, because we are becoming increasingly godless.
Despite Our Lord wanting all the world to be baptized--”Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:19-20)—never has the world been so unmortified, unrepentant, unfaithful and un-Christian as it is today, and that includes the Catholic world too. Statistics show that most Catholics no longer to Sunday Mass regularly; they rarely go to Confession; their prayer time is minimal or non-existent; many no longer baptize their children; their moral values now increasingly accept things like contraception, divorce with remarriage, solitary sexual sins, lustful thoughts, and now even Sodom and Gomorrah lifestyles and abortion. Sweet, eh?
Our Lady’s Diet
This is why our sweet Mother says she can barely hold back the hand of her sweet Son anymore, from punishing the world! Just as any parent would, Our Lady warns of what will befall the world if it does not cease offending God and return to the less sweet diet of prayer and penance.
At the Rue du Bac (1830) she said: “Times are evil in France and in the world. The side of Our Lord will be pierced anew. The Cross will be treated with contempt; they will hurl it to the ground. Blood will flow; they will open up again the side of Our Lord. The streets will run with blood ... The whole world will be in sadness. The whole world will be plunged into every kind of misery.”
At La Salette (1846) she said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much I can no longer keep hold of it … A great famine will come … others will do penance through hunger ... Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them. The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God ... blood will flow on all sides. Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A general war will follow which will be appalling … The righteous will suffer greatly. Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession.” She insists on the not so sweet diet of PRAYER and PENANCE, “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) ... “unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3).
At Lourdes (1858) she said: “I do not promise you happiness in this world, but in the next ... Pray for sinners ... Penance! Penance! Penance! … Kiss the ground as a penance for sinners.”
At Fatima (1917) she said: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort ... Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners … Are you suffering a great deal? Don’t lose heart! ... You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved ... but if people do not cease offending God … God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father … [Russia] will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, and various nations will be annihilated.”
At Beauraing (1932-33) she says: “Pray, pray very much … Pray always [she emphasized the word always] … I will convert sinners … I am the Mother of God, the Queen of Heaven. Pray always!”
At Banneux (1933) she says: “Pray much!”
At Tre Fontane, Rome (1947) she said: “The Hail Marys that you pray with Faith and love are like golden arrows that go straight to the heart of Jesus … Pray much and recite the Rosary for the conversion of sinners, of unbelievers and of all Christians.”
What’s My Diet Like?
Is this Advent a growing time of prayer? How much are we praying? Our Lady keeps insisting on praying much and praying always. The modern world seems to have mistranslated her message from “pray much” to “play much”! That was the mistake of the children at Fatima, just before the second apparition of the Angel at Fatima. They had invented a quick method of praying the Rosary—merely saying the first and last words of the Hail Mary, “Ave Maria, Amen!” That gave more time for play. The Angel appeared to them, while they were playing near the well of Lucia’s house, and said: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! The Hearts of Jesus and Mary have merciful designs on you. Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High.”
So you see, the message is consistent because the world consistently ignores prayer and penance; neglects the spiritual life and especially devotion to Our Lady—placing those things way down the in their list of daily priorities; the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is neglected and even rushed through; Holy Communion, our greatest treasure on Earth, is not only neglected, but increasingly not believed in—with American statistics showing varying figures from 60% to 80% of Catholics no longer believing in the Real Presence! Direct sins against God and against the Faith are the worst sins man can commit—perhaps not the most subjectively embarrassing, but objectively the worst. God’s heavy hand is raised against us! As Our Lady prophesied, it will fall upon us.
The Advent Meal
That is why we have these seasons of penance, like Advent and Lent, for penance appeases the wrath of God, and the sweet words of the Rosary placate his ire: “If they do penance in their heart saying: ‘We have sinned, we have done unjustly, we have committed wickedness!’ and return to Thee with all their heart and all their soul … and pray to Thee … then hear, Thou in Heaven, their prayers, and their supplications, and forgive Thy people, that have sinned against thee, all their iniquities” (3 Kings 47:50). On the other hand, “I gave her a time that she might do penance, but she will not repent” (Apocalypse 2:21). “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3).
Let us ignore the world’s manner of spending Advent, and let us at least build our own little Advent Ark in which to place Jesus this Christmas! Noe had to ignore the world around him and patiently and laboriously build his Ark of Salvation. Have you ever thought much of the cradle or crib in which Jesus was placed at His birth? It is like a mini-ark, made of wood that would float in any deluge. The Cross was also made of wood and Jesus was lifted above the sinking world as He died upon it! Our Advent penances are crosses, but those crosses will also keep us afloat among a world that is sinking fast all around us—even the Catholic world!
Article 5
Thursday, December 5th
Advent Wreath Symbolism Explained
Thursday, December 5th
Advent Wreath Symbolism Explained
An Ancient Tradition
The Advent Wreath is one of the most popular Advent traditions. The Advent Wreath has deep origins, extending back to pre-Christian pagan customs of burning lights during the darkest months of winter. Its origin is in pre-Christian pagan Germany and Scandinavia, where the people gathered to both beg and celebrate the return of the sun during and after the winter solstice.
There is evidence of pre-Christian pagan Germanic peoples using Wreaths, with lit candles, during the cold and dark December, days as a sign of hope in the future warmth and extended-sunlight days of spring. In Scandinavia, during winter, lighted candles were placed around a wheel, and prayers were offered to the god of light to turn “the wheel of the Earth” back toward the sun to lengthen the days and restore warmth.
These pagan people thus tried to break the darkness of winter with candles and invoke the sun god to quickly return with the warmth and light of spring. In addition, the evergreen wreath would remind them, during the apparent death of nature during winter, that there is still life and the circle of time would again come back to spring and warmth. As the days grew longer, people lit more candles to offer thanks to the “sun god” for the light.
The design of today’s Advent Wreaths was borrowed from the customs of those pre-Christian pagan cultures, who used candles and greenery (often paired together), where the candle represents light and the evergreen represents life. The circular wreath made of evergreens, with four candles interspersed, and represented the circle of the seasons of year and the life that endures through the winter.
Medieval Christians retained the custom, while seeing such lights as an obvious symbol of Christ, for they used candles themselves in many liturgical functions, not least the Sacrifice of the Mass. For us, the lighting of the Advent candles represents the promise of the coming of Jesus, the light of the world. After all, Christ is “the Light that came into the world” to dispel the darkness of sin and to radiate the truth and love of God (John 3:19-21).
Today, many, if not most, Christian churches and families prominently display an evergreen wreath with four candles throughout the Advent Season. The Christian version of the winter wreath, or Advent Wreath, actually originated among the Lutherans of Eastern Germany in the 16th century. The Advent Wreath became quite popular in homes in post-Reformation Protestant Germany. Many German homes families had a custom of lighting four candles during Advent, candles placed in a wreath of evergreens.
When these candles were lit, Scripture and prayer was part of the custom and the family devotion time was a time of instructing the children about Christ’s coming. Later, the custom crossed over different denominational lines and other Christian religions adapted its use. It was quickly adopted by both Protestants and Catholics throughout Germany, and it was brought to the United States by German immigrants in the 19th century.
The Advent Wreath is very symbolic and therefore, spiritually, very beautiful.
► The circle of the wreath reminds us of God Himself, His eternity and endless mercy, which has no beginning or end.
► The green of the wreath speaks of the hope that we have in God, the hope of newness, of renewal, of eternal life.
► The circular form reminds us that God’s love is eternal; it has no beginning and no end.
► The evergreen leaves of the wreath remind us that God never changes.
► The evergreens used for the wreath itself are a reminder of continuous life. Whereas most the leaves (the children) of most trees have lived their life and are now fallen and rotting on the ground, the evergreens live on, seemingly immortal, though some needles are fallen on the ground, the branches are still laden with them. The shaping of the evergreens into a circle reinforces that meaning.
► The circle of the wreath, which has no beginning or end, symbolizes the eternity of God, the immortality of the soul, and the everlasting life found in Christ. The Faith offers us that immortality, not to mention the strength that it gives us to stand firm on our branch of the Faith, while those of other faiths die and fall to the ground at the approach of the hardships and harshness of winter (which symbolizes the devil and the world, in whom there is no warmth or love of God).
► It is traditionally made of some type or mixture of evergreens (fir, spruce, juniper, holly, etc.), symbolizing the continuation of life in the middle of the cold and dark winter (in the northerly latitudes, at least, which is where the Advent Wreath originated).
► The wreath is made of various evergreens, signifying different virtues.
► The evergreens have a traditional meaning which can be adapted to our Faith.
► The laurel signifies victory over persecution and suffering.
► The pine, holly, and yew, signify immortality; and cedar, strength and healing. Holly also has a special Christian symbolism. One English legend tells of how the cross was made of holly.
► The prickly leaves remind us of the crown of thorns.
► The pine cones, nuts, or seedpods of the evergreens are used to decorate the wreath also symbolize life and resurrection.
► All together, the wreath of evergreens depicts the immortality of our soul and the new, everlasting life promised to us through Christ, the eternal Word of the Father, who entered our world becoming true man and who was victorious over sin and death through His own passion, death, and resurrection.
► Finally, the wreath reminds us of the crown of joy waiting for us in Heaven, if we are prepared to wear Christ’s crown of thorns here below!
Taking Things For Granted
Let us now take a look at what light the Advent Candles can shed upon us, enlightening us about some of the deeper aspects of Advent and thus increasing our Advent fervor. Sometimes we risk taking God for granted. In our spiritual lives, we just go through the motions: automatic and thoughtless signs of the cross; mindless half-hearted prayers; robotic genuflections; chore-like and mundane assistance at Mass; empty-headed and profitless spiritual reading; sleepy and drowsy meditations; machine-gun-like and aimless Rosaries; absent-minded and ill-prepared confessions; fast-food or fast-track style Holy Communions and many other ways of showing the truth of Our Lord’s words: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8).
“Familiarity breeds contempt” is what they say, and that so readily applies to our Faith and our relationship with God. What was once a period of awe, amazement and attraction, has now for many become something bland, boring and burdensome. They say that routine is the prime killer of devotion—this is true not only in the natural sphere, but also in the supernatural sphere. This routine affects the relationship between spouses, parents and children, friends and work colleagues and even our relationship with God Himself.
We have been in God’s workplace, the Church, for so long, that familiarity has bred, if not contempt, then at least a growing indifference to God and the things of God. We hear the same readings at Mass year after year; we say the same prayers year after year; we hear the same sermons and appeals year after year; we see the same unimproved faults and weaknesses among our fellow Catholics year after year; we confess the same sins year after year; we seem to get away unpunished by God year after year—so it is hardly surprising that we find ourselves slipping into the fatal fantasy of feeling that God is somehow far away and couldn’t care less about what we are really doing or not doing. This helps us make a compromise with indifference and lukewarmness—at first uneasy, but more and more easy with each passing year.
This is one of the several ingredients that make us go through our spiritual and liturgical exercises in a half-awake, partially attentive, automatic, mindless, thoughtless and loveless manner, like some sort of cloned Catholic robot. Sure, we go through the motions, but our minds, thoughts, hearts and affections—if not yet divorced—are living separated from what we are doing, with only occasional ‘weekend visiting rights.’ The fact that so many religious and spiritual activities have become boring, bland and burdensome, inevitably makes this cancer slowly grow to rapidly approaching fatal levels.
Putting Things Right
How can we pull out this kind of spiritual tail-spin that will rapidly end our hopeful flight to Heaven? The traditional remedy has always been “agere contra” ( which means: do the opposite or act against) as St. Ignatius of Loyola puts it in his Rules for the Spiritual Exercises (rules, by the way, which were given to him by Our Lady, as being the fundamental rules that she herself followed in life).
Instead of becoming more superficial, agere contra would require that we go against our natural tendency and dig deeper than usual. Painful? Yes! But how many serious illnesses have a sweet, pleasant, instant remedy? Few, if none!
So in this season Advent, instead of passing through it superficially, with lukewarm or even cold hearts, let us dig deeper into the season and search for the precious nuggets of gold and nutritious minerals that it has to offer. Hard work, but rewarding work. With this in mind, let us try shedding some light on the darkness of our minds, with the deeper meaning and symbolism that lays beneath the all too often routine and superficial lighting of the Advent candles during this season.
What the Candles Teach
Even the pagans gave their candles some kind of symbolism. For them, the candle represented a weak and poor imitation of their sun-god, who they thought gave them light and warmth. If they can see such things represented in a candle, how much more should a follower of Christ see!
Of course, for us the candle also represents a deity, but not some pagan god, but the one, true God—Our Lord Jesus Christ. We are but poor and weak imitations of Christ in this world. Even though it was the Lutherans who initially, in the 1500s, took the pagan custom of lighting candles during the winter season and gave to their custom a Christian meaning and symbolism, it does not annul certain truths found therein. Otherwise the Catholic Church would not have accepted and integrated the custom into its bosom. For some particular aspects of truth can still be discovered even by those who are in general error.
Candle Controversies
Some Advent wreaths have four candles; other wreaths have five. Those which have five, always have a larger white candle in the center of the four surrounding candles (4 purple, or 3 purple and 1 rose; or 4 white; or 4 blue—varying from country to country, and from one religious denomination to another). Some may argue over the number and the color and which is more appropriate, but personally, since the custom comes the pagans and was then ‘christened’ by the Lutherans, and only then was it adopted and adapted by the Catholics, one would think that it doesn’t really matter—after all, it is not a dogmatic thing, but a symbolic thing, and the symbolic interpretations are many and varied, even among Catholics alone!
Christ is Central
The most Christocentric combination would seem to be the larger, wider and taller central candle that represents Jesus Christ, being surrounded by the four smaller candles. For Christ should be at the center of all things; He should be the center of our existence; He should have the prime place in the center of our hearts; our whole life should revolve around Him: “In all things God may be honored through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 4:11) … “Giving thanks always for all things, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God and the Father” (Ephesians 5:20).
As for the color, it seems most fitting and theologically correct that the larger central candle, representing Christ, should, just like the Paschal Candle at Easter, be made of beeswax (symbolizing innocence and purity); and that the surrounding candles be purple—a color which symbolizes penance, which in turn presupposes, not innocence and purity, but sin and guilt, which are things that have to be paid for through penance. The small candles are not made of beeswax, but of some lesser material, representing the world, its sin, guilt and worldliness.
Advent Candles & Paschal Candles
All of this is a foreshadowing of the use of two kinds and sizes of candle used during the Paschal or Easter Vigil ceremonies, that bring to an end another penitential period—that of Lent. There we see the large Paschal Candle representing Christ, which is lit in total darkness—symbolizing the darkness of a world that tries to do without Christ—and, from that Paschal Candle, we light our smaller candles. Again, the Paschal Candle is made of beeswax, but the smaller candles are not. The more candles that are lit from the Paschal Candle, the more light is shed around and everything brightens up. Similarly, the greater the number of persons professing the light of the One True Faith, then the ‘brighter’ and better the world would be in proportion to that number.
The flame of the candles represents God, His divinity and grace. God the Father appeared to Moses in the burning bush; God the Son showed Himself as a burning heart to St. Margaret Mary; God the Holy Ghost came down upon Our Lady and the Apostles in the form of burning tongues of fire at Pentecost. God chooses fire to show both His love, His mercy and His justice. Those in Heaven experience the fire of His love; those in Purgatory experience the fire of His mercy; those in Hell experience the fire of His justice. We even say, in the prayer to the Holy Ghost: “Come O Holy Ghost … enkindle in us the fire of Thy love.” Without God and His grace in our souls (candles), we are useless―just like an extinguished candle is useless. A candle was made to burn, not to be extinguished. A candle without a flame of fire, is like a soul without the fire of love, or the light of Faith, or like a body without its soul. A candle should spend its life giving light to those around, as Our Lord said: “Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:15).
Candle & Virtue
The candle very fittingly represents the three theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity. A candle gives off light, so that we see the things around us clearly, just as Faith helps us see God more clearly and helps us see the world for what it really is.
A candle is also necessary to light our path and to lead us out of pit or cavern of this sinful world, into which we have blundered. Without that light, there is a danger of injury in the darkness by stumbling into things, and there is no hope of seeing where to go in order to emerge from the darkness; this symbolizes the virtue of Hope.
The candle also gives off, not just light, but also warmth. This is a symbol of Charity, that we should show to all those around us, just as God does, so “that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45).
The combination of these three virtues should lead us to imitate the larger Candle of Christ, in burning ourselves out in this life for the love of God and neighbor … “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind: and thy neighbor as thyself” (Luke 10:27) ... “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) ... and our first and foremost Friend is God (Father, Son and Holy Ghost), then Our Lady, then the rest of the Mystical Body in hierarchical order.
Candle, Mercy & Grace
As the candle cannot light itself, neither can we obtain the grace of God by ourselves—nobody has an automatic meritorious right to the initial grace of God. Grace, as the catechism tells us, is “a gift of God, freely given.” God’s grace inspires us; God’s grace ‘jump-starts’ us; God’s grace keeps us running until we reach our destination—“Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Each time we relight the Advent candles, we should think of the times when grace was absent from our souls, and God, by His mercy, re-lit divine life in our sinful repentant souls.
The wax of candle is a figure of the body, and the wick inside the body of the candle represents the soul. If we use a 5-candle Advent wreath, with the 5th candle being a larger white candle, surrounded by 4 smaller purple candles, we can see the beautiful symbolism of the innocence of Christ reflected in the color white, and the guilt and need for penance of ourselves reflected in the color purple.
Weeping Burning Candles
The wax that the purple candles ‘weep’ and drip, is symbolic of tears of sorrow for sin. The diminishing size of the candles as they burn with the flame of love and sorrow, is a symbol of humility, as St. John the Baptist, the prophet of penance who burned in the scorching desert heat, said: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30). These two aspects, humility and charity, are the foundation of our sanctity and salvation. Let us develop that theme a little a more.
The purple candles will have been lit and burned at different stages throughout Advent, yet all will have spent considerable time burning before they enjoy seeing the white candle of Christ finally lit and burning in the midst of them at the end of the Vigil of Christmas, at midnight, signifying the birth and long-awaited arrival of the Son of God at Bethlehem. The fact that the purple candles have been lit at different stages throughout Advent (1st week, 2nd week, 3rd week and 4th week) can interpreted in various ways.
Advent Candles and the Vineyard
One interpretation is linked to the parable of the workers in the vineyard, where the owner of the vineyard, “…went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us’. He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’ And when evening was come, the lord of the vineyard said to his steward: ‘Call the laborers and pay them their hire, beginning from the last even to the first.’ When therefore they were come, that came about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny. But when the first also came, they thought that they should receive more: and they also received every man a penny. And receiving it they murmured against the master of the house, saying: ‘These last have worked but one hour, and you have made them equal to us, that have borne the burden of the day and the heats!’ But he answering said to one of them: ‘Friend, I do thee no wrong! Did you not agree with me for a penny? Take what is yours, and go your way. I will also give to this last, even as to you! Or, is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Is your eye evil, because I am good?’” (Matthew 20:1-15).
This dovetails beautifully with the symbolism of the Advent candles. We have the master calling in workers at four main periods of the day, just as we have the four weeks of Advent: (1) the start of the day, as the first candle is lit at the start of Advent and burns throughout the whole Advent period; (2) at the third hour, which is akin to the second week of Advent; (3) at the sixth hour, which can represent the third week of Advent; and (4) the ninth hour, in which we can see the fourth week of Advent.
Finally, being merciful, he goes out at the eleventh hour, which could represent Christmas Eve and even accepts workers at the last minute, like Christ accepted the Good Thief’s repentance on the cross, at the last hour of his life. Yet, no matter at what time the laborers came into work, they all saw the same reward—one penny! That penny seems a little thing to us today, for today’s minimum wage is many hundreds of pennies for just one hour’s work! Yet that little penny can also be seen to represent the little child Jesus, Who wants to give Himself to each and every one of us, no matter how early or how late we came in to labor and sweat in His vineyard. The reward is the same—the little ‘mustard-seed’ of the Infant Jesus is given to all who repent of sin, do penance and sincerely (and even half-sincerely) desire Him.
Seeing Sin
As we said earlier, the purple of small candles denotes penance. Faced with the adulteress and the crowd of stone-throwers, Jesus said: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!” (John 8:7) for “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:10).
We are all in need of penance; whether we think we are good or bad. For God judges differently to man: “My thoughts are not your thoughts; nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord” (Isaias 55:8) ... “I judge according to the look of man―for man sees those things that appear, but the Lord sees the heart!” (1 Kings 16:7). We judge merely on the surface, but God, who notices the loss of one single hair from our head, and takes note of every idle word we utter, also takes into account everything that contributes to our sins. For some are tempted more frequently, others less frequently; some are tempted with great vehemence, others lightly; some have many souls praying for them, others have few praying for them; some may have a natural temperament that will open them up to more temptation, others have a naturally strong blend of temperaments that help them resist temptation; some are hated more by the devil, others hated less; some are trying hard to be spiritual and will thus attract the devil’s attention and temptations, others are lukewarm, and so they are partially doing the devil’s work for him.
The list of possibilities is endless. That is why the ex-Pharisee, St. Paul, writes: “It is a very small thing to be judged by you, or by man’s day―but neither do I judge my own self!” (1 Corinthians 4:3).
Pharisees or Prostitutes
But the Pharisees, who were self-professed upholders of tradition and judges of religious matters, were not afraid to judge, but their judgment was merely superficial and biased. In fact, they judged those who were better than themselves and those who were worse than themselves in the same way—because neither was like themselves. They judged Our Lord as being possessed by a devil, in the same way as they judged the adulteress (St. Mary Magdalen), a whore who actually was possessed by seven devils. Yet both the innocent Jesus (the white candle) and the guilty Mary Magdalen (the purple candle) were accepted by God, whereas the Pharisees and their middle of road lukewarmness (extinguished candles) were rejected and cursed (cf. Matthew chapter 23) with Our Lord imprecating one woe after another in His tirade of indignation against them.
We remember well the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican: “The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week; I give tithes of all that I possess!’ And the publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ ... I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other―because every one that exalts himself, shall be humbled; and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!” (Luke 18:11-14). We see this parable play-out in reality at the banquet of Simon the Pharisee.
Love and Penance
Jesus (the white candle) burnt Himself out with pure love as a penance for our sins. Mary Magdalen (the purple candle) burnt out her impure love with penance performed out of love for the Pure Love. This is why she wept at Our Lord’s feet at the banquet of another Pharisee, Simon (Luke, chapter 7). Simon the Pharisee, “who had invited Him, seeing it, spoke within himself, saying: ‘This man, if He were a prophet, would know surely who and what manner of woman this is that touches Him―that she is a sinner. And Jesus answering, said to him: ‘Simon, I have something to say to thee … Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much. But to whom less is forgiven, he loves less. And He said to her: ‘Thy sins are forgiven thee!’” (Luke 7:36-50).
Where Mary Magdalen had once burned with impure love, she now burned with a pure love. Love, like fire, burns away impurities. Love, like fires or flames, can be of differing temperatures. To one who loves much, much is forgiven; to one who loves less, less is forgiven. That is why a perfect act of contrition, which by its very essence is based upon love, can wipe out, not only the guilt of sin, but also all the temporal punishment due to sin in this world and in the next. In other words, someone who is the worst sinner in the world, can, only by God’s grace, make such a perfect act of contrition that it will take that sinner past the souls of persons who had lived much holier lives, but at a low degree of love, but are still languishing in Purgatory, and take that sinner straight to Heaven.
The ‘Fast-Track’ of Love
It is like seeing someone at the back of a super long airport check-in line or a supermarket check-out line, being ‘fast-tracked’ to the other side in a matter of seconds, while we may been standing in that line for over half-an-hour! The instinctive feeling is just like that of the laborers in the vineyard, who had borne the brunt of the work under the scorching heat—a reaction of indignation, injustice, anger and protest! The reply will be the same: “Is it not lawful for Me to do what I will? Is your eye evil, because I am good?”
The priest is also instructed to approach penitents the same way in confession. If he judges that the penitent truly has great sorrow and remorse for what he/she has done, then he is instructed to give a lesser penance than he would give to somebody who merely confesses the sin as a matter of course. And if the priest discovers that the penitent has already done much penance for his/her transgression, then even less penance is to be given to the penitent. Such is the mind of the Church, which reflects the mind of Christ—as seen at the banquet of Simon the Pharisee.
Whom Does Jesus Love?
So when we encounter “sinners” in the world, we never know what has transpired in their heart or in the confessional. The sinner, whom I may hold in contempt, might well be very close to Our Lord and Our Lady, as was Mary Magdalen. The love of Jesus embraces all and He gives chances to all—but they must take and profit from those offers of His love. There are three kinds of persons of whom the Bible says that Jesus loved them:
(1) The fervent and ever-present Apostle, the virgin, St. John, the “disciple whom Jesus loved” (John 20:2): “Now there was leaning on Jesus’ bosom one of His disciples, whom Jesus loved” (John 13:23). John’s white virginal candle burned to the end.
(2) The two women, Martha (the hard-working virgin) and her sister Mary Magdalen (the converted demonically possessed whore), and their brother Lazarus: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). Here we see both sinner and non-sinner, but of the three, Jesus loved Mary Magdalen the most—she was sat at His feet listening to His words; another time laid weeping over His feet and drying them with her hair; standing at His feet as died on the Cross; and stood at His feet as He was lying in the tomb. Her purple candle burned to the end.
(3) The third case was that of the rich young man “And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto you―go, sell whatsoever you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have a treasure in Heaven; and then come and follow Me’” (Mark 10:21). But whereas the fisherman John left everything to follow Jesus, and Mary left sin to follow Jesus, this young man could not pull himself away from his love of his present state in the world: “Who being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.” (Mark 10:22). He would not light his candle with the divine flame!
Words of Love
Let us finish with a few quotes from Our Lord, taken from the book Words of Love, by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, which is compilation of extracts of revelations made by Our Lord to three mystics of the last century―Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Consolata Betrone and Sr. Mary of the Trinity.
“Love is sanctity. The more you love Me, the more you will become holy!” … “He who never needs forgiveness is not the most happy, but rather he who has humbled himself many times.”
“I want to tell you this, that My best-loved and specially favored souls—My priests and My consecrated nuns—may learn it through you. My Heart is never wounded unless it be by My chosen souls. If their infidelities wound Me deeply, their love consoles and delights My Heart to such a degree that I, so to speak, forget the sins of many others on their account. I do not say that by the fact of My choice, a [chosen] soul is freed from her faults and wretchedness. That soul may and will fall often again, but if she humbles herself, if she recognizes her nothingness, if she tries to repair her faults by little acts of generosity and love, if she confides and surrenders herself once more to My Heart ... she gives Me more glory and can do more good to other souls than if she had never fallen. Miseries and weaknesses are of no consequence; what I do ask of them is love.”
“The obstinacy of a guilty soul wounds My Heart deeply, but the tender affection of one who loves Me, not only heals the wound, but turns away the effects of My Father’s Justice” … “As soon as a soul throws itself at My feet and implores My forgiveness, I forget all her sins” … “Love is reparation and reparation is love” … “It is love that makes reparation, because that which offends God in sin is the absence of love.”
“A soul will profit even after the greatest sins, if she humbles herself. I will raise up the humble, and make little of their frailties, and even of their falls, provided they have humility and love.” … “Yes, I love all souls, but with very special affection those who are the most weak and little.”
“Think no longer about yourself, about your perfection, on how to attain to sanctity, or about your defects, your present and future troubles. No. I will see to your sanctification, to your sanctity. You must henceforth think only of Me and of souls; of Me to love Me, and of souls to save them!”
“A true mother will not consider her child ugly, no matter how much it may be so; to her it is always lovely, and so it will always remain in her innermost heart. That is precisely the way My Heart feels toward souls: though they be ugly, soiled, filthy, My love considers them always beautiful. I suffer when their ugliness is confirmed to Me; on the other hand, I rejoice when, in conformity with My parental sentiments, someone dissuades Me about their ugliness and tells Me that it is not true and that they are still beautiful. The souls are Mine; for them I have given all My Blood!”
“I ask only for love. Ah, what are you doing about it ? … I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift ... I thirst for love.” … “That soul is dearest to Me who loves Me the most.”
Reality, not Poetry
Beautiful words! Not just poetry―but reality! The reality of love! These quotes are a fitting finale to the Scriptural examples selected above. Advent is a time of preparation; a time of preparing to receive the seed of God, Who is Love itself, into our poor human souls with our meager love; a time of preparing this fire of love in the coldness of a dark wintry world. Love will light up any soul—the souls of sinners, the souls of the just and the souls of saints. It is a universal solution to the ills of the soul and the ills of the world. Truly, “love makes the world go around”, but only when it is a love with a divine flame! The absence of love, like the absence of God Who is Love itself, is pure Hell. “He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:8). “In this we have known the charity of God―because He has laid down His life for us―and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16). The candle is a symbol of that charity―burning itself out to extinction in order to give light to those around it.
The Advent Wreath is one of the most popular Advent traditions. The Advent Wreath has deep origins, extending back to pre-Christian pagan customs of burning lights during the darkest months of winter. Its origin is in pre-Christian pagan Germany and Scandinavia, where the people gathered to both beg and celebrate the return of the sun during and after the winter solstice.
There is evidence of pre-Christian pagan Germanic peoples using Wreaths, with lit candles, during the cold and dark December, days as a sign of hope in the future warmth and extended-sunlight days of spring. In Scandinavia, during winter, lighted candles were placed around a wheel, and prayers were offered to the god of light to turn “the wheel of the Earth” back toward the sun to lengthen the days and restore warmth.
These pagan people thus tried to break the darkness of winter with candles and invoke the sun god to quickly return with the warmth and light of spring. In addition, the evergreen wreath would remind them, during the apparent death of nature during winter, that there is still life and the circle of time would again come back to spring and warmth. As the days grew longer, people lit more candles to offer thanks to the “sun god” for the light.
The design of today’s Advent Wreaths was borrowed from the customs of those pre-Christian pagan cultures, who used candles and greenery (often paired together), where the candle represents light and the evergreen represents life. The circular wreath made of evergreens, with four candles interspersed, and represented the circle of the seasons of year and the life that endures through the winter.
Medieval Christians retained the custom, while seeing such lights as an obvious symbol of Christ, for they used candles themselves in many liturgical functions, not least the Sacrifice of the Mass. For us, the lighting of the Advent candles represents the promise of the coming of Jesus, the light of the world. After all, Christ is “the Light that came into the world” to dispel the darkness of sin and to radiate the truth and love of God (John 3:19-21).
Today, many, if not most, Christian churches and families prominently display an evergreen wreath with four candles throughout the Advent Season. The Christian version of the winter wreath, or Advent Wreath, actually originated among the Lutherans of Eastern Germany in the 16th century. The Advent Wreath became quite popular in homes in post-Reformation Protestant Germany. Many German homes families had a custom of lighting four candles during Advent, candles placed in a wreath of evergreens.
When these candles were lit, Scripture and prayer was part of the custom and the family devotion time was a time of instructing the children about Christ’s coming. Later, the custom crossed over different denominational lines and other Christian religions adapted its use. It was quickly adopted by both Protestants and Catholics throughout Germany, and it was brought to the United States by German immigrants in the 19th century.
The Advent Wreath is very symbolic and therefore, spiritually, very beautiful.
► The circle of the wreath reminds us of God Himself, His eternity and endless mercy, which has no beginning or end.
► The green of the wreath speaks of the hope that we have in God, the hope of newness, of renewal, of eternal life.
► The circular form reminds us that God’s love is eternal; it has no beginning and no end.
► The evergreen leaves of the wreath remind us that God never changes.
► The evergreens used for the wreath itself are a reminder of continuous life. Whereas most the leaves (the children) of most trees have lived their life and are now fallen and rotting on the ground, the evergreens live on, seemingly immortal, though some needles are fallen on the ground, the branches are still laden with them. The shaping of the evergreens into a circle reinforces that meaning.
► The circle of the wreath, which has no beginning or end, symbolizes the eternity of God, the immortality of the soul, and the everlasting life found in Christ. The Faith offers us that immortality, not to mention the strength that it gives us to stand firm on our branch of the Faith, while those of other faiths die and fall to the ground at the approach of the hardships and harshness of winter (which symbolizes the devil and the world, in whom there is no warmth or love of God).
► It is traditionally made of some type or mixture of evergreens (fir, spruce, juniper, holly, etc.), symbolizing the continuation of life in the middle of the cold and dark winter (in the northerly latitudes, at least, which is where the Advent Wreath originated).
► The wreath is made of various evergreens, signifying different virtues.
► The evergreens have a traditional meaning which can be adapted to our Faith.
► The laurel signifies victory over persecution and suffering.
► The pine, holly, and yew, signify immortality; and cedar, strength and healing. Holly also has a special Christian symbolism. One English legend tells of how the cross was made of holly.
► The prickly leaves remind us of the crown of thorns.
► The pine cones, nuts, or seedpods of the evergreens are used to decorate the wreath also symbolize life and resurrection.
► All together, the wreath of evergreens depicts the immortality of our soul and the new, everlasting life promised to us through Christ, the eternal Word of the Father, who entered our world becoming true man and who was victorious over sin and death through His own passion, death, and resurrection.
► Finally, the wreath reminds us of the crown of joy waiting for us in Heaven, if we are prepared to wear Christ’s crown of thorns here below!
Taking Things For Granted
Let us now take a look at what light the Advent Candles can shed upon us, enlightening us about some of the deeper aspects of Advent and thus increasing our Advent fervor. Sometimes we risk taking God for granted. In our spiritual lives, we just go through the motions: automatic and thoughtless signs of the cross; mindless half-hearted prayers; robotic genuflections; chore-like and mundane assistance at Mass; empty-headed and profitless spiritual reading; sleepy and drowsy meditations; machine-gun-like and aimless Rosaries; absent-minded and ill-prepared confessions; fast-food or fast-track style Holy Communions and many other ways of showing the truth of Our Lord’s words: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8).
“Familiarity breeds contempt” is what they say, and that so readily applies to our Faith and our relationship with God. What was once a period of awe, amazement and attraction, has now for many become something bland, boring and burdensome. They say that routine is the prime killer of devotion—this is true not only in the natural sphere, but also in the supernatural sphere. This routine affects the relationship between spouses, parents and children, friends and work colleagues and even our relationship with God Himself.
We have been in God’s workplace, the Church, for so long, that familiarity has bred, if not contempt, then at least a growing indifference to God and the things of God. We hear the same readings at Mass year after year; we say the same prayers year after year; we hear the same sermons and appeals year after year; we see the same unimproved faults and weaknesses among our fellow Catholics year after year; we confess the same sins year after year; we seem to get away unpunished by God year after year—so it is hardly surprising that we find ourselves slipping into the fatal fantasy of feeling that God is somehow far away and couldn’t care less about what we are really doing or not doing. This helps us make a compromise with indifference and lukewarmness—at first uneasy, but more and more easy with each passing year.
This is one of the several ingredients that make us go through our spiritual and liturgical exercises in a half-awake, partially attentive, automatic, mindless, thoughtless and loveless manner, like some sort of cloned Catholic robot. Sure, we go through the motions, but our minds, thoughts, hearts and affections—if not yet divorced—are living separated from what we are doing, with only occasional ‘weekend visiting rights.’ The fact that so many religious and spiritual activities have become boring, bland and burdensome, inevitably makes this cancer slowly grow to rapidly approaching fatal levels.
Putting Things Right
How can we pull out this kind of spiritual tail-spin that will rapidly end our hopeful flight to Heaven? The traditional remedy has always been “agere contra” ( which means: do the opposite or act against) as St. Ignatius of Loyola puts it in his Rules for the Spiritual Exercises (rules, by the way, which were given to him by Our Lady, as being the fundamental rules that she herself followed in life).
Instead of becoming more superficial, agere contra would require that we go against our natural tendency and dig deeper than usual. Painful? Yes! But how many serious illnesses have a sweet, pleasant, instant remedy? Few, if none!
So in this season Advent, instead of passing through it superficially, with lukewarm or even cold hearts, let us dig deeper into the season and search for the precious nuggets of gold and nutritious minerals that it has to offer. Hard work, but rewarding work. With this in mind, let us try shedding some light on the darkness of our minds, with the deeper meaning and symbolism that lays beneath the all too often routine and superficial lighting of the Advent candles during this season.
What the Candles Teach
Even the pagans gave their candles some kind of symbolism. For them, the candle represented a weak and poor imitation of their sun-god, who they thought gave them light and warmth. If they can see such things represented in a candle, how much more should a follower of Christ see!
Of course, for us the candle also represents a deity, but not some pagan god, but the one, true God—Our Lord Jesus Christ. We are but poor and weak imitations of Christ in this world. Even though it was the Lutherans who initially, in the 1500s, took the pagan custom of lighting candles during the winter season and gave to their custom a Christian meaning and symbolism, it does not annul certain truths found therein. Otherwise the Catholic Church would not have accepted and integrated the custom into its bosom. For some particular aspects of truth can still be discovered even by those who are in general error.
Candle Controversies
Some Advent wreaths have four candles; other wreaths have five. Those which have five, always have a larger white candle in the center of the four surrounding candles (4 purple, or 3 purple and 1 rose; or 4 white; or 4 blue—varying from country to country, and from one religious denomination to another). Some may argue over the number and the color and which is more appropriate, but personally, since the custom comes the pagans and was then ‘christened’ by the Lutherans, and only then was it adopted and adapted by the Catholics, one would think that it doesn’t really matter—after all, it is not a dogmatic thing, but a symbolic thing, and the symbolic interpretations are many and varied, even among Catholics alone!
Christ is Central
The most Christocentric combination would seem to be the larger, wider and taller central candle that represents Jesus Christ, being surrounded by the four smaller candles. For Christ should be at the center of all things; He should be the center of our existence; He should have the prime place in the center of our hearts; our whole life should revolve around Him: “In all things God may be honored through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 4:11) … “Giving thanks always for all things, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God and the Father” (Ephesians 5:20).
As for the color, it seems most fitting and theologically correct that the larger central candle, representing Christ, should, just like the Paschal Candle at Easter, be made of beeswax (symbolizing innocence and purity); and that the surrounding candles be purple—a color which symbolizes penance, which in turn presupposes, not innocence and purity, but sin and guilt, which are things that have to be paid for through penance. The small candles are not made of beeswax, but of some lesser material, representing the world, its sin, guilt and worldliness.
Advent Candles & Paschal Candles
All of this is a foreshadowing of the use of two kinds and sizes of candle used during the Paschal or Easter Vigil ceremonies, that bring to an end another penitential period—that of Lent. There we see the large Paschal Candle representing Christ, which is lit in total darkness—symbolizing the darkness of a world that tries to do without Christ—and, from that Paschal Candle, we light our smaller candles. Again, the Paschal Candle is made of beeswax, but the smaller candles are not. The more candles that are lit from the Paschal Candle, the more light is shed around and everything brightens up. Similarly, the greater the number of persons professing the light of the One True Faith, then the ‘brighter’ and better the world would be in proportion to that number.
The flame of the candles represents God, His divinity and grace. God the Father appeared to Moses in the burning bush; God the Son showed Himself as a burning heart to St. Margaret Mary; God the Holy Ghost came down upon Our Lady and the Apostles in the form of burning tongues of fire at Pentecost. God chooses fire to show both His love, His mercy and His justice. Those in Heaven experience the fire of His love; those in Purgatory experience the fire of His mercy; those in Hell experience the fire of His justice. We even say, in the prayer to the Holy Ghost: “Come O Holy Ghost … enkindle in us the fire of Thy love.” Without God and His grace in our souls (candles), we are useless―just like an extinguished candle is useless. A candle was made to burn, not to be extinguished. A candle without a flame of fire, is like a soul without the fire of love, or the light of Faith, or like a body without its soul. A candle should spend its life giving light to those around, as Our Lord said: “Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:15).
Candle & Virtue
The candle very fittingly represents the three theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity. A candle gives off light, so that we see the things around us clearly, just as Faith helps us see God more clearly and helps us see the world for what it really is.
A candle is also necessary to light our path and to lead us out of pit or cavern of this sinful world, into which we have blundered. Without that light, there is a danger of injury in the darkness by stumbling into things, and there is no hope of seeing where to go in order to emerge from the darkness; this symbolizes the virtue of Hope.
The candle also gives off, not just light, but also warmth. This is a symbol of Charity, that we should show to all those around us, just as God does, so “that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45).
The combination of these three virtues should lead us to imitate the larger Candle of Christ, in burning ourselves out in this life for the love of God and neighbor … “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind: and thy neighbor as thyself” (Luke 10:27) ... “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) ... and our first and foremost Friend is God (Father, Son and Holy Ghost), then Our Lady, then the rest of the Mystical Body in hierarchical order.
Candle, Mercy & Grace
As the candle cannot light itself, neither can we obtain the grace of God by ourselves—nobody has an automatic meritorious right to the initial grace of God. Grace, as the catechism tells us, is “a gift of God, freely given.” God’s grace inspires us; God’s grace ‘jump-starts’ us; God’s grace keeps us running until we reach our destination—“Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Each time we relight the Advent candles, we should think of the times when grace was absent from our souls, and God, by His mercy, re-lit divine life in our sinful repentant souls.
The wax of candle is a figure of the body, and the wick inside the body of the candle represents the soul. If we use a 5-candle Advent wreath, with the 5th candle being a larger white candle, surrounded by 4 smaller purple candles, we can see the beautiful symbolism of the innocence of Christ reflected in the color white, and the guilt and need for penance of ourselves reflected in the color purple.
Weeping Burning Candles
The wax that the purple candles ‘weep’ and drip, is symbolic of tears of sorrow for sin. The diminishing size of the candles as they burn with the flame of love and sorrow, is a symbol of humility, as St. John the Baptist, the prophet of penance who burned in the scorching desert heat, said: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30). These two aspects, humility and charity, are the foundation of our sanctity and salvation. Let us develop that theme a little a more.
The purple candles will have been lit and burned at different stages throughout Advent, yet all will have spent considerable time burning before they enjoy seeing the white candle of Christ finally lit and burning in the midst of them at the end of the Vigil of Christmas, at midnight, signifying the birth and long-awaited arrival of the Son of God at Bethlehem. The fact that the purple candles have been lit at different stages throughout Advent (1st week, 2nd week, 3rd week and 4th week) can interpreted in various ways.
Advent Candles and the Vineyard
One interpretation is linked to the parable of the workers in the vineyard, where the owner of the vineyard, “…went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us’. He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’ And when evening was come, the lord of the vineyard said to his steward: ‘Call the laborers and pay them their hire, beginning from the last even to the first.’ When therefore they were come, that came about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny. But when the first also came, they thought that they should receive more: and they also received every man a penny. And receiving it they murmured against the master of the house, saying: ‘These last have worked but one hour, and you have made them equal to us, that have borne the burden of the day and the heats!’ But he answering said to one of them: ‘Friend, I do thee no wrong! Did you not agree with me for a penny? Take what is yours, and go your way. I will also give to this last, even as to you! Or, is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Is your eye evil, because I am good?’” (Matthew 20:1-15).
This dovetails beautifully with the symbolism of the Advent candles. We have the master calling in workers at four main periods of the day, just as we have the four weeks of Advent: (1) the start of the day, as the first candle is lit at the start of Advent and burns throughout the whole Advent period; (2) at the third hour, which is akin to the second week of Advent; (3) at the sixth hour, which can represent the third week of Advent; and (4) the ninth hour, in which we can see the fourth week of Advent.
Finally, being merciful, he goes out at the eleventh hour, which could represent Christmas Eve and even accepts workers at the last minute, like Christ accepted the Good Thief’s repentance on the cross, at the last hour of his life. Yet, no matter at what time the laborers came into work, they all saw the same reward—one penny! That penny seems a little thing to us today, for today’s minimum wage is many hundreds of pennies for just one hour’s work! Yet that little penny can also be seen to represent the little child Jesus, Who wants to give Himself to each and every one of us, no matter how early or how late we came in to labor and sweat in His vineyard. The reward is the same—the little ‘mustard-seed’ of the Infant Jesus is given to all who repent of sin, do penance and sincerely (and even half-sincerely) desire Him.
Seeing Sin
As we said earlier, the purple of small candles denotes penance. Faced with the adulteress and the crowd of stone-throwers, Jesus said: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!” (John 8:7) for “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:10).
We are all in need of penance; whether we think we are good or bad. For God judges differently to man: “My thoughts are not your thoughts; nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord” (Isaias 55:8) ... “I judge according to the look of man―for man sees those things that appear, but the Lord sees the heart!” (1 Kings 16:7). We judge merely on the surface, but God, who notices the loss of one single hair from our head, and takes note of every idle word we utter, also takes into account everything that contributes to our sins. For some are tempted more frequently, others less frequently; some are tempted with great vehemence, others lightly; some have many souls praying for them, others have few praying for them; some may have a natural temperament that will open them up to more temptation, others have a naturally strong blend of temperaments that help them resist temptation; some are hated more by the devil, others hated less; some are trying hard to be spiritual and will thus attract the devil’s attention and temptations, others are lukewarm, and so they are partially doing the devil’s work for him.
The list of possibilities is endless. That is why the ex-Pharisee, St. Paul, writes: “It is a very small thing to be judged by you, or by man’s day―but neither do I judge my own self!” (1 Corinthians 4:3).
Pharisees or Prostitutes
But the Pharisees, who were self-professed upholders of tradition and judges of religious matters, were not afraid to judge, but their judgment was merely superficial and biased. In fact, they judged those who were better than themselves and those who were worse than themselves in the same way—because neither was like themselves. They judged Our Lord as being possessed by a devil, in the same way as they judged the adulteress (St. Mary Magdalen), a whore who actually was possessed by seven devils. Yet both the innocent Jesus (the white candle) and the guilty Mary Magdalen (the purple candle) were accepted by God, whereas the Pharisees and their middle of road lukewarmness (extinguished candles) were rejected and cursed (cf. Matthew chapter 23) with Our Lord imprecating one woe after another in His tirade of indignation against them.
We remember well the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican: “The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week; I give tithes of all that I possess!’ And the publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ ... I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other―because every one that exalts himself, shall be humbled; and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!” (Luke 18:11-14). We see this parable play-out in reality at the banquet of Simon the Pharisee.
Love and Penance
Jesus (the white candle) burnt Himself out with pure love as a penance for our sins. Mary Magdalen (the purple candle) burnt out her impure love with penance performed out of love for the Pure Love. This is why she wept at Our Lord’s feet at the banquet of another Pharisee, Simon (Luke, chapter 7). Simon the Pharisee, “who had invited Him, seeing it, spoke within himself, saying: ‘This man, if He were a prophet, would know surely who and what manner of woman this is that touches Him―that she is a sinner. And Jesus answering, said to him: ‘Simon, I have something to say to thee … Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much. But to whom less is forgiven, he loves less. And He said to her: ‘Thy sins are forgiven thee!’” (Luke 7:36-50).
Where Mary Magdalen had once burned with impure love, she now burned with a pure love. Love, like fire, burns away impurities. Love, like fires or flames, can be of differing temperatures. To one who loves much, much is forgiven; to one who loves less, less is forgiven. That is why a perfect act of contrition, which by its very essence is based upon love, can wipe out, not only the guilt of sin, but also all the temporal punishment due to sin in this world and in the next. In other words, someone who is the worst sinner in the world, can, only by God’s grace, make such a perfect act of contrition that it will take that sinner past the souls of persons who had lived much holier lives, but at a low degree of love, but are still languishing in Purgatory, and take that sinner straight to Heaven.
The ‘Fast-Track’ of Love
It is like seeing someone at the back of a super long airport check-in line or a supermarket check-out line, being ‘fast-tracked’ to the other side in a matter of seconds, while we may been standing in that line for over half-an-hour! The instinctive feeling is just like that of the laborers in the vineyard, who had borne the brunt of the work under the scorching heat—a reaction of indignation, injustice, anger and protest! The reply will be the same: “Is it not lawful for Me to do what I will? Is your eye evil, because I am good?”
The priest is also instructed to approach penitents the same way in confession. If he judges that the penitent truly has great sorrow and remorse for what he/she has done, then he is instructed to give a lesser penance than he would give to somebody who merely confesses the sin as a matter of course. And if the priest discovers that the penitent has already done much penance for his/her transgression, then even less penance is to be given to the penitent. Such is the mind of the Church, which reflects the mind of Christ—as seen at the banquet of Simon the Pharisee.
Whom Does Jesus Love?
So when we encounter “sinners” in the world, we never know what has transpired in their heart or in the confessional. The sinner, whom I may hold in contempt, might well be very close to Our Lord and Our Lady, as was Mary Magdalen. The love of Jesus embraces all and He gives chances to all—but they must take and profit from those offers of His love. There are three kinds of persons of whom the Bible says that Jesus loved them:
(1) The fervent and ever-present Apostle, the virgin, St. John, the “disciple whom Jesus loved” (John 20:2): “Now there was leaning on Jesus’ bosom one of His disciples, whom Jesus loved” (John 13:23). John’s white virginal candle burned to the end.
(2) The two women, Martha (the hard-working virgin) and her sister Mary Magdalen (the converted demonically possessed whore), and their brother Lazarus: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). Here we see both sinner and non-sinner, but of the three, Jesus loved Mary Magdalen the most—she was sat at His feet listening to His words; another time laid weeping over His feet and drying them with her hair; standing at His feet as died on the Cross; and stood at His feet as He was lying in the tomb. Her purple candle burned to the end.
(3) The third case was that of the rich young man “And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto you―go, sell whatsoever you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have a treasure in Heaven; and then come and follow Me’” (Mark 10:21). But whereas the fisherman John left everything to follow Jesus, and Mary left sin to follow Jesus, this young man could not pull himself away from his love of his present state in the world: “Who being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.” (Mark 10:22). He would not light his candle with the divine flame!
Words of Love
Let us finish with a few quotes from Our Lord, taken from the book Words of Love, by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, which is compilation of extracts of revelations made by Our Lord to three mystics of the last century―Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Consolata Betrone and Sr. Mary of the Trinity.
“Love is sanctity. The more you love Me, the more you will become holy!” … “He who never needs forgiveness is not the most happy, but rather he who has humbled himself many times.”
“I want to tell you this, that My best-loved and specially favored souls—My priests and My consecrated nuns—may learn it through you. My Heart is never wounded unless it be by My chosen souls. If their infidelities wound Me deeply, their love consoles and delights My Heart to such a degree that I, so to speak, forget the sins of many others on their account. I do not say that by the fact of My choice, a [chosen] soul is freed from her faults and wretchedness. That soul may and will fall often again, but if she humbles herself, if she recognizes her nothingness, if she tries to repair her faults by little acts of generosity and love, if she confides and surrenders herself once more to My Heart ... she gives Me more glory and can do more good to other souls than if she had never fallen. Miseries and weaknesses are of no consequence; what I do ask of them is love.”
“The obstinacy of a guilty soul wounds My Heart deeply, but the tender affection of one who loves Me, not only heals the wound, but turns away the effects of My Father’s Justice” … “As soon as a soul throws itself at My feet and implores My forgiveness, I forget all her sins” … “Love is reparation and reparation is love” … “It is love that makes reparation, because that which offends God in sin is the absence of love.”
“A soul will profit even after the greatest sins, if she humbles herself. I will raise up the humble, and make little of their frailties, and even of their falls, provided they have humility and love.” … “Yes, I love all souls, but with very special affection those who are the most weak and little.”
“Think no longer about yourself, about your perfection, on how to attain to sanctity, or about your defects, your present and future troubles. No. I will see to your sanctification, to your sanctity. You must henceforth think only of Me and of souls; of Me to love Me, and of souls to save them!”
“A true mother will not consider her child ugly, no matter how much it may be so; to her it is always lovely, and so it will always remain in her innermost heart. That is precisely the way My Heart feels toward souls: though they be ugly, soiled, filthy, My love considers them always beautiful. I suffer when their ugliness is confirmed to Me; on the other hand, I rejoice when, in conformity with My parental sentiments, someone dissuades Me about their ugliness and tells Me that it is not true and that they are still beautiful. The souls are Mine; for them I have given all My Blood!”
“I ask only for love. Ah, what are you doing about it ? … I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift ... I thirst for love.” … “That soul is dearest to Me who loves Me the most.”
Reality, not Poetry
Beautiful words! Not just poetry―but reality! The reality of love! These quotes are a fitting finale to the Scriptural examples selected above. Advent is a time of preparation; a time of preparing to receive the seed of God, Who is Love itself, into our poor human souls with our meager love; a time of preparing this fire of love in the coldness of a dark wintry world. Love will light up any soul—the souls of sinners, the souls of the just and the souls of saints. It is a universal solution to the ills of the soul and the ills of the world. Truly, “love makes the world go around”, but only when it is a love with a divine flame! The absence of love, like the absence of God Who is Love itself, is pure Hell. “He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:8). “In this we have known the charity of God―because He has laid down His life for us―and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16). The candle is a symbol of that charity―burning itself out to extinction in order to give light to those around it.
Article 4
Wednesday, December 4th
Are You In The Dark?
Wednesday, December 4th
Are You In The Dark?
Bringing Light into Darkness
The commentators of Holy Scripture tell us that God waited until the world was in darkness before giving them the Light that was to be Christ, Who said of Himself: “I am the light of the world―he that follows Me, walks not in darkness, but shall have the light of life … I am come a light into the world; that whosoever believeth in Me, may not remain in darkness” (John 8:12; John 12:46). Christ will be born in the darkest time of the year, when the hours of light are very few and darkness rules most of the day. Christ is also born in the middle of the night. Night is symbolical of evil when the evil ones like to do their work under the secrecy of darkness, as Psalm 103 says: “it is night: in it shall all the beasts of the woods go about.” ... “I beheld in the vision of the night, and lo, a fourth beast, terrible and exceedingly strong, it had great iron teeth, eating and breaking in pieces, and treading down the rest with its feet” (Daniel 7:7).
The Darkness
Though we look upon Christmas as a season of light, the truth is, the time of the birth of Our Lord Jesus Christ was filled with darkness. Speaking of the future birth of the Christ Child, centuries beforehand, Isaias says: “The people that walked in darkness, have seen a great light. To them that dwelt in the region of the shadow of death, light is risen” (Isaias 9:2). It was a time of gloom, anguish, and contempt for religion; a time when the Chosen People of God, once slaves in Egypt and in Babylon, were now enslaved in their own country under Roman rule. God chose a time for the coming of His Son, which would at a low ebb, a time of dejection and despondency, a time of impotence and powerlessness.
Thus, in order understand the full revelation of the light which came into the world, when Christ was born, we need to recognize and understand the darkness into which Our Lord was born. Today, we will consider some aspects of the darkness, aspects not out of God’s control, but rather allowed or ordained by God, so that Christ’s light would radiate all the more brilliantly.
The Absence of God
First, when Christ was born, the word of God had not been heard for four centuries. Malachias is the last book of the word of God in the Old Testament, written in the fifth century BC (The Books of the Machabees are just books of history, but not prophetical books of the word of God). The Book of Malachias ends with the statement that God would send Elias the prophet as a forerunner for the Messias.
Now since the Messias has two “comings” ― the first being His birth in Bethlehem, the second being at the end of time—the first forerunner of the Messias was St. John the Baptist, whereas the forerunner for the second coming is widely held to be Elias himself. But from the time of Malachias’ prophecy, God had been silent until the prophecy was partially fulfilled in St. John the Baptist. And everyone knew it. Listen to some of the Jewish writers of the day who prove that point.
Babylonian Talmud: “After the latter prophets Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi had died, the Holy Spirit departed from Israel, but they still availed themselves of the voice from Heaven.”
The famous Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus, in his writing Against Apion, says: “From Artaxerxes to our own times a complete history has been written, but has not been deemed worthy of equal credit with the earlier records, because of the failure of the exact succession of the prophets.”
1st Book of Machabees: “So they tore down the altar and stored the stones in a convenient place on the temple hill until there should come a prophet to tell what to do with them.”
Without the word of God present among them, the people walked in spiritual darkness.
The People of God Slaves of the World
The second aspect of this darkness was that the Chosen People of God were under the oppressive rule of Rome. This is evident from the Gospel of St. Luke (2:1), which records the census taken up by Caesar Augustus. It was a blatant reminder that the people of Israel were owned by another. Likewise, Herod, a descendent of Edom (therefore a Gentile and a non-Jew), ruled in Jerusalem. Long gone were the days of a Davidic king. Soldiers walked the streets of Jerusalem; Roman guards, called to police the city of David.
In some ways, Israel had escaped exile. No longer did they live in Egypt or Babylon. But in many ways, they were exiles in their own country. Even their own temple was built by a foreigner—Herod the Great was a descendent of a rival nation. Political darkness reigned!
Internal Arguments and Fighting
The third aspect of darkness was that the nation of Israel was breaking-up. Four groups in Israel sought and fought to lead the people.
(1) The Pharisees resided in Jerusalem. They attempted to shape religious life in Israel through their traditions. Jesus had many run-ins with these legalistic Jews, who led astray the people of God (cf. Matthew 23).
(2) Sadducees opposed the strict legalism of the Pharisees, and only embraced Moses law (the Torah, or the five first books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy). They rejected the resurrection, belief in angels, but still had an influential place in the temple and law courts.
(3) The Essenes, who lived in a commune near Qumran―they were the scribes who penned and preserved the Dead Sea Scrolls―lived an especially pure life. They devoted themselves to God, and prayed for God’s overthrow of Rome.
(4) The Zealots were a band of brothers who did not pray for change so much as they sought violent means of overthrowing Roman rule.
The result of these four competing sects in Judaism led to constant friction, only increased by the oppressive rule of Rome. Riots were common. Tension was unceasing. Darkness permeated Judaism.
What Goes Around Comes Around
Does that bear some resemblance to our day? You bet it does! And just as Mary was needed to bring Christ into their darkness way back then; so too is Mary necessary to bring Christ into our darkness today. Mary came before Jesus over 2,000 years ago; Mary must come again before Jesus in our darkness today. She is the Mother who gives the world her Child, without her, we will receive nothing. That is why we are, by God’s Providence, currently living what is called “The Age of Mary”—which began with Our Lady’s apparitions to St. Catherine Labouré in 1830 and which will ends its period of gestation or pregnancy with the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. This is why God wishes to establish, in the world, devotion to her Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart. The knocking on the doors of the houses of Bethlehem is taking place all over again, as Mary seeks entrance into our minds, hearts and lives, in order to give birth to the Light of World into our own pervading darkness. Will we open the door? Will we let her in with her Child? Here is what St. John says of those to whom Christ tried to come over 2,000 years ago:
“In Him was Life, and the Life was the Light of men. And the Light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … That was the true Light, which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:4-11).
Yet as the people of Bethlehem were preoccupied with themselves and their poor worldliness, and so refused entrance to Mary, today we find the modern world is doing the same thing. Just as it was around four centuries since the word of God was properly heard among the Israelites, so too we have over four centuries since the Protestant Revolution had been fully born in Europe by the end of the Sixteenth Century and at the start of the 1600s. Likewise, as the Jews found several factions battling among themselves for the control of the people (Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes and Zealots), so too we have the Traditionalists, Conservatives, Liberals and Modernists fighting to control the Church today. Similarly, as the Jerusalem saw herself under Roman occupation, the New Jerusalem, the Church, finds herself today occupied also, as, in the words of Pope Paul VI, the smoke of Satan has entered into the Church. Today we have our own darkness as the Jews had theirs 2,000 years ago. Satan has also long since entered into politics―and we can see Satan rearing his ugly head right now, in the satanic crisis he has concocted through his human minions and worshipers. What will our response be to the solution that God sends? We will accept it, or carry on doing our own thing and reject it?
Mary Wants to Plant Jesus in Your Soul
Advent is, par excellence, the time of the Divine Maternity, the Motherhood of the Blessed Virgin, as she draws ever closer to giving birth to God’s Greatest Gift for fallen human nature. During Advent, we should not lose focus of Our Lady, for without her there is no Christmas; without her, God will not be born into this world. It is her cooperation with God that has brought about the Incarnation—God becoming flesh, becoming man so as to save and redeem mankind.
But for mankind to be saved and redeemed, Christ our Savior has to be born into our souls. Nay, perhaps that one word will be passed over and looked upon as a routine phrase! Christ wants to be born in our souls, our hearts, our minds, our thoughts, our memories, our hopes, our conversations, our daydreams, our home life, our work life, our social life —in other words, everywhere, in everything, in every moment of our day and night!
That is what is meant by the first and greatest commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
The word “Advent” is a compound of two Latin words: “ad” meaning “to” and “venire” meaning “to come”, of which the past participle in Latin is “ventus”. Therefore we see the word “Advent” meaning “to come to”.
Do You Want Jesus to Come?
There is no doubt whatsoever that, on the part of Jesus, He truly wants to come to us. He loves us beyond our comprehension and our wildest dreams. There is no problem on the part of Jesus. However, on our side, we have to ask the question: “Do we really want Jesus to come to us?” The stress is on the word “really” ― not just theoretically and not just by lip-service. Do we really and truly want Jesus in our lives? To drive the point home more clearly and to avoid misconceptions, do we really and truly want Jesus to be our life? Notice the words “be our life”, which is different to being “a part of our life.” If we want Jesus to be “a part of our life”, then we only partially want Him—for some that means on Sundays and prayer times only, for others a little more perhaps, but they place a limit on “how much of Jesus they can take.” He wants to be our whole life, not just a part of our life, and that is what is meant by the commandment to love God with our whole mind, heart, soul and strength.
Our Lady also wants Jesus to be our whole life, and she is willing to help give birth to Jesus in our life, so that He may grow and occupy and whole life, just as He did hers. This is, in essence, what St. Louis de Montfort is trying to say in his book, True Devotion to Mary. It is TOTAL consecration, a TOTAL giving of self in return for the TOTAL giving that Christ and His Mother showed towards us poor sinful creatures. The following quotes, taken from different sections of the book, will try to show this picture of Mary as the birth-giver of Jesus in our lives.
“God having willed to commence and to complete His greatest works by the most holy Virgin ever since He created her―we may well think He will not change His conduct in the eternal ages; for He is God, and He changes not, either in His sentiments or in His conduct.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“It was only through Mary that God the Father gave His Only begotten to the world. Whatever sighs the patriarchs may have sent forth, whatever prayers the prophets and the saints of the Old Law may have offered up to obtain this treasure for full four thousand years, it was only Mary who merited it and found grace before God (Luke 1:30) by the force of her prayers and the eminence of her virtues. The world was unworthy, says St. Augustine, to receive the Son of God directly from the Father’s hands. He gave Him to Mary in order that the world might receive Him through her. The Son of God became man for our salvation; but it was in Mary and by Mary” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The commentators of Holy Scripture tell us that God waited until the world was in darkness before giving them the Light that was to be Christ, Who said of Himself: “I am the light of the world―he that follows Me, walks not in darkness, but shall have the light of life … I am come a light into the world; that whosoever believeth in Me, may not remain in darkness” (John 8:12; John 12:46). Christ will be born in the darkest time of the year, when the hours of light are very few and darkness rules most of the day. Christ is also born in the middle of the night. Night is symbolical of evil when the evil ones like to do their work under the secrecy of darkness, as Psalm 103 says: “it is night: in it shall all the beasts of the woods go about.” ... “I beheld in the vision of the night, and lo, a fourth beast, terrible and exceedingly strong, it had great iron teeth, eating and breaking in pieces, and treading down the rest with its feet” (Daniel 7:7).
The Darkness
Though we look upon Christmas as a season of light, the truth is, the time of the birth of Our Lord Jesus Christ was filled with darkness. Speaking of the future birth of the Christ Child, centuries beforehand, Isaias says: “The people that walked in darkness, have seen a great light. To them that dwelt in the region of the shadow of death, light is risen” (Isaias 9:2). It was a time of gloom, anguish, and contempt for religion; a time when the Chosen People of God, once slaves in Egypt and in Babylon, were now enslaved in their own country under Roman rule. God chose a time for the coming of His Son, which would at a low ebb, a time of dejection and despondency, a time of impotence and powerlessness.
Thus, in order understand the full revelation of the light which came into the world, when Christ was born, we need to recognize and understand the darkness into which Our Lord was born. Today, we will consider some aspects of the darkness, aspects not out of God’s control, but rather allowed or ordained by God, so that Christ’s light would radiate all the more brilliantly.
The Absence of God
First, when Christ was born, the word of God had not been heard for four centuries. Malachias is the last book of the word of God in the Old Testament, written in the fifth century BC (The Books of the Machabees are just books of history, but not prophetical books of the word of God). The Book of Malachias ends with the statement that God would send Elias the prophet as a forerunner for the Messias.
Now since the Messias has two “comings” ― the first being His birth in Bethlehem, the second being at the end of time—the first forerunner of the Messias was St. John the Baptist, whereas the forerunner for the second coming is widely held to be Elias himself. But from the time of Malachias’ prophecy, God had been silent until the prophecy was partially fulfilled in St. John the Baptist. And everyone knew it. Listen to some of the Jewish writers of the day who prove that point.
Babylonian Talmud: “After the latter prophets Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi had died, the Holy Spirit departed from Israel, but they still availed themselves of the voice from Heaven.”
The famous Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus, in his writing Against Apion, says: “From Artaxerxes to our own times a complete history has been written, but has not been deemed worthy of equal credit with the earlier records, because of the failure of the exact succession of the prophets.”
1st Book of Machabees: “So they tore down the altar and stored the stones in a convenient place on the temple hill until there should come a prophet to tell what to do with them.”
Without the word of God present among them, the people walked in spiritual darkness.
The People of God Slaves of the World
The second aspect of this darkness was that the Chosen People of God were under the oppressive rule of Rome. This is evident from the Gospel of St. Luke (2:1), which records the census taken up by Caesar Augustus. It was a blatant reminder that the people of Israel were owned by another. Likewise, Herod, a descendent of Edom (therefore a Gentile and a non-Jew), ruled in Jerusalem. Long gone were the days of a Davidic king. Soldiers walked the streets of Jerusalem; Roman guards, called to police the city of David.
In some ways, Israel had escaped exile. No longer did they live in Egypt or Babylon. But in many ways, they were exiles in their own country. Even their own temple was built by a foreigner—Herod the Great was a descendent of a rival nation. Political darkness reigned!
Internal Arguments and Fighting
The third aspect of darkness was that the nation of Israel was breaking-up. Four groups in Israel sought and fought to lead the people.
(1) The Pharisees resided in Jerusalem. They attempted to shape religious life in Israel through their traditions. Jesus had many run-ins with these legalistic Jews, who led astray the people of God (cf. Matthew 23).
(2) Sadducees opposed the strict legalism of the Pharisees, and only embraced Moses law (the Torah, or the five first books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy). They rejected the resurrection, belief in angels, but still had an influential place in the temple and law courts.
(3) The Essenes, who lived in a commune near Qumran―they were the scribes who penned and preserved the Dead Sea Scrolls―lived an especially pure life. They devoted themselves to God, and prayed for God’s overthrow of Rome.
(4) The Zealots were a band of brothers who did not pray for change so much as they sought violent means of overthrowing Roman rule.
The result of these four competing sects in Judaism led to constant friction, only increased by the oppressive rule of Rome. Riots were common. Tension was unceasing. Darkness permeated Judaism.
What Goes Around Comes Around
Does that bear some resemblance to our day? You bet it does! And just as Mary was needed to bring Christ into their darkness way back then; so too is Mary necessary to bring Christ into our darkness today. Mary came before Jesus over 2,000 years ago; Mary must come again before Jesus in our darkness today. She is the Mother who gives the world her Child, without her, we will receive nothing. That is why we are, by God’s Providence, currently living what is called “The Age of Mary”—which began with Our Lady’s apparitions to St. Catherine Labouré in 1830 and which will ends its period of gestation or pregnancy with the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. This is why God wishes to establish, in the world, devotion to her Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart. The knocking on the doors of the houses of Bethlehem is taking place all over again, as Mary seeks entrance into our minds, hearts and lives, in order to give birth to the Light of World into our own pervading darkness. Will we open the door? Will we let her in with her Child? Here is what St. John says of those to whom Christ tried to come over 2,000 years ago:
“In Him was Life, and the Life was the Light of men. And the Light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … That was the true Light, which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:4-11).
Yet as the people of Bethlehem were preoccupied with themselves and their poor worldliness, and so refused entrance to Mary, today we find the modern world is doing the same thing. Just as it was around four centuries since the word of God was properly heard among the Israelites, so too we have over four centuries since the Protestant Revolution had been fully born in Europe by the end of the Sixteenth Century and at the start of the 1600s. Likewise, as the Jews found several factions battling among themselves for the control of the people (Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes and Zealots), so too we have the Traditionalists, Conservatives, Liberals and Modernists fighting to control the Church today. Similarly, as the Jerusalem saw herself under Roman occupation, the New Jerusalem, the Church, finds herself today occupied also, as, in the words of Pope Paul VI, the smoke of Satan has entered into the Church. Today we have our own darkness as the Jews had theirs 2,000 years ago. Satan has also long since entered into politics―and we can see Satan rearing his ugly head right now, in the satanic crisis he has concocted through his human minions and worshipers. What will our response be to the solution that God sends? We will accept it, or carry on doing our own thing and reject it?
Mary Wants to Plant Jesus in Your Soul
Advent is, par excellence, the time of the Divine Maternity, the Motherhood of the Blessed Virgin, as she draws ever closer to giving birth to God’s Greatest Gift for fallen human nature. During Advent, we should not lose focus of Our Lady, for without her there is no Christmas; without her, God will not be born into this world. It is her cooperation with God that has brought about the Incarnation—God becoming flesh, becoming man so as to save and redeem mankind.
But for mankind to be saved and redeemed, Christ our Savior has to be born into our souls. Nay, perhaps that one word will be passed over and looked upon as a routine phrase! Christ wants to be born in our souls, our hearts, our minds, our thoughts, our memories, our hopes, our conversations, our daydreams, our home life, our work life, our social life —in other words, everywhere, in everything, in every moment of our day and night!
That is what is meant by the first and greatest commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
The word “Advent” is a compound of two Latin words: “ad” meaning “to” and “venire” meaning “to come”, of which the past participle in Latin is “ventus”. Therefore we see the word “Advent” meaning “to come to”.
Do You Want Jesus to Come?
There is no doubt whatsoever that, on the part of Jesus, He truly wants to come to us. He loves us beyond our comprehension and our wildest dreams. There is no problem on the part of Jesus. However, on our side, we have to ask the question: “Do we really want Jesus to come to us?” The stress is on the word “really” ― not just theoretically and not just by lip-service. Do we really and truly want Jesus in our lives? To drive the point home more clearly and to avoid misconceptions, do we really and truly want Jesus to be our life? Notice the words “be our life”, which is different to being “a part of our life.” If we want Jesus to be “a part of our life”, then we only partially want Him—for some that means on Sundays and prayer times only, for others a little more perhaps, but they place a limit on “how much of Jesus they can take.” He wants to be our whole life, not just a part of our life, and that is what is meant by the commandment to love God with our whole mind, heart, soul and strength.
Our Lady also wants Jesus to be our whole life, and she is willing to help give birth to Jesus in our life, so that He may grow and occupy and whole life, just as He did hers. This is, in essence, what St. Louis de Montfort is trying to say in his book, True Devotion to Mary. It is TOTAL consecration, a TOTAL giving of self in return for the TOTAL giving that Christ and His Mother showed towards us poor sinful creatures. The following quotes, taken from different sections of the book, will try to show this picture of Mary as the birth-giver of Jesus in our lives.
“God having willed to commence and to complete His greatest works by the most holy Virgin ever since He created her―we may well think He will not change His conduct in the eternal ages; for He is God, and He changes not, either in His sentiments or in His conduct.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“It was only through Mary that God the Father gave His Only begotten to the world. Whatever sighs the patriarchs may have sent forth, whatever prayers the prophets and the saints of the Old Law may have offered up to obtain this treasure for full four thousand years, it was only Mary who merited it and found grace before God (Luke 1:30) by the force of her prayers and the eminence of her virtues. The world was unworthy, says St. Augustine, to receive the Son of God directly from the Father’s hands. He gave Him to Mary in order that the world might receive Him through her. The Son of God became man for our salvation; but it was in Mary and by Mary” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Article 3
Tuesday, December 3rd
What We Have Lost
Tuesday, December 3rd
What We Have Lost
The Liturgical Alarm Bells Ring!
“It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day: not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and impurities, not in contention and envy: but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 13:11-14).
Which Christ Would You Like To Encounter?
The Advent liturgy sounds the alarm! Wake up from the slumbers of the world and awaken yourself to words and way of Christ! Life is too short! We have a debt to pay! We have do away with sin! We have to prepare ourselves, not only to meet Jesus at Christmas, but also meet Him on Judgment Day. Now He comes offering mercy—and the price is penance. On Judgment Day He will come administering justice—and the price will be, for most, Purgatory or even Hell. In this short life we all have a heavy debt to pay! Let us not fritter our time away!
Don’t Count on a Long Life or Many More Years!
Adam lived to the ripe old age of 930 years! Our Lord died aged around 33 years. Our Lady is said to have died in her early to mid-sixties. St. Dominic Savio died aged 14 years. St. Maria Goretti was 11 years old when she was killed. Little Blessed Francisco of Fatima was only 10 years old when he died; Blessed Jacinta, his sister was only 9 years old. The Venerable Anne de Guigné was 10 years old.
Time waits for nobody. Time is precious. Time means more than money. Time and how it is spent, means the difference between Heaven and Hell. Death is the most untimely thing around. Death respects no one. Even in the forthcoming chastisement of which Our Lady has warned us, time and time again, she says that the good will die with the bad; and neither will priests be spared, but they will die with the laity.
That is why our time is so precious. That is why the Church chooses the words of St. Paul to open the season of Advent, the time of mercy, so that we can receive, plant, nurture and grow the spirit of Christ in our souls, and so prepare favorably for the time of our Final Judgment, when the time of mercy will cease, and the time of Justice will have arrived.
Putting-Off the World—Putting-On Christ
Advent is a time of preparation for the “putting on of the Lord Jesus Christ.” It is a time of self-examination, of correction and confession; a time of serious spiritual renewal and rejuvenation, a time of spiritual betterment and improvement, a time of re-assessing our motives and values, a time of preparing the soil of our soul to receive the seed of sanctity that our Savior wants to sow.
Advent is marked by a spirit of expectation, of anticipation, of preparation, of longing. There is a yearning for deliverance from the evils of the world, first expressed by Israelite slaves in Egypt as they cried out from their bitter oppression.
A Serious Time
It is not a frivolous time; it is not a time of worldly worry over the material and social side of Christmas. It was this material preoccupation—at the lucrative time of the Emperor Caesar Augustus’ census and the ‘tourist’ swelling of Bethlehem as people returned to register—that blinded the Bethlehemites to the True Treasure that had arrived on their doorsteps, disguised as poverty and hidden in Mary’s womb.
They thought they were rich, but in reality they were very poor. They thought Mary and Joseph were poor, but they were the richest people in Heaven and Earth. They carried the only thing that really matters; the Bethlehemites sought many things, but missed the one essential thing that matters.
When we total up the man-hours spent on the material and social side of Advent and its successor, Christmas, and then compare it to the man-hours that will have been spent on the spiritual side of Advent and Christmas, then I think most people would have to blush with shame.
Our Lord is not coming to play, but to pay—pay for our sins. He is not coming to enjoy life, but to give eternal life—and that comes at a price, the price is giving up the worldly life. He comes not to live on Earth forever, but to forever detach us from this Earth. He prefers poverty over power; humility over honors; rejection over riches and suffering over splendor. His way is not our way, yet He Who called Himself “the Way” shows us wayward wayfarers the true way—and it is not a pleasant way, but the Way of the Cross. It is the way that takes away debt for sin and leads us away from the ways of the world to world of Heaven.
The West Goes Soft—the East Stays Tough
Our separated brethren, the schismatic Eastern Orthodox Church and the non-schismatic Eastern Catholic Church, still keeps Advent in the same spirit with which we in the West used to keep it, before relaxation followed upon relaxation. The so-called “Nativity Fast” is a period of abstinence and penance practiced by the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Eastern Catholic Churches, in preparation for the Nativity of Christ, (December 25th).
Like the Western Advent, the Nativity Fast prepares Eastern Christians for the feast of Christmas. However, it differs in two significant respects: the Eastern fast runs for 40 days instead of four weeks (in Roman rite) or six weeks (in the Ambrosian rite). The main theme during this time of penance, largely focuses on proclamation and glorification of the Incarnation of God, whereas the Western Advent focuses on the two comings (or two advents) of Jesus Christ: His first coming at His birth and His Second Coming at the end of the world.
The fast is kept from November 15th to December 24th, inclusively. These dates apply to those Orthodox Churches which use the Revised Julian calendar, which currently matches the modern Gregorian calendar (that replaced the Julian Calendar).
For those Eastern Orthodox Churches which still follow the ancient Julian calendar (Churches of Russia, Georgia, Serbia, Ukraine, Macedonia, Mount Athos and Jerusalem), the Winter Lent does not begin until November 28th (on our Gregorian calendar) which coincides with November 15th on the Julian calendar. The Ancient Church of the East fasts from dawn till dusk, from December 1st until the 25th of December on the Gregorian calendar.
Sometimes the fast is called Philip’s Fast (or the Philippian Fast), as it traditionally begins on the day following the Feast of St. Philip the Apostle (November 14th). Some churches, such as the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, have abbreviated the fast to start on December 10th, following the Feast of the Conception, by St. Anne, of the Most Holy Theotokos.
Fasting Physically and Spiritually
Through the discipline of fasting, practiced with humility and repentance, it is believed that by learning to temper the body’s primary desire for food, that other worldly desires can be more easily tempered as well. Through this practice one is better enabled to draw closer to God, in the hope of becoming more Christ-like. While the fast influences the body, it is important to note that emphasis is placed on the spiritual facet of the fast, rather than mere physical deprivation. Orthodox theology sees a synthesis between the body and the soul, so what happens to one affects the other. The church teaches that it is not enough to fast from food; one must also fast from anger, greed and covetousness. In addition to fasting, almsgiving is also emphasized.
Taking Things Seriously
In the Eastern Orthodox Church, the fast traditionally entails fasting from red meat, poultry, meat products, eggs, dairy products, fish, oil, and wine. Fish, wine and oil are allowed on Saturdays and Sundays, and oil and wine are allowed on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
The fasting rules permit fish, and/or wine and oil on certain feast days that occur during the course of the fast. These feast days are that of Evangelist St. Matthew (November 16th), the Apostle St. Andrew (November 30th), the Great-martyr St. Barbara (December 4th), St. Nicholas (December 6th), St. Spiridon and St. Herman (December 12th), St. Ignatius (December 20th), etc. The Nativity Fast is not as severe as the Great Lent Fast.
During the course of the fast, a number of lesser feast days celebrate those Old Testament prophets who prophesied the Incarnation; for instance: Abdias also called Obadiah (November 19th), Nahum (December 1st), Habacuc (December 2nd), Sophonias also called Zephaniah (December 3rd), Aggeus also called Haggai (December 16th), Daniel and the Three Holy Youths (December 17th). These last are significant not only because of their perseverance in fasting, but also because their preservation unharmed in the midst of the fiery furnace (Daniel, chapter 3) is interpreted as being symbolic of the Incarnation—the Virgin Mary conceived God the Word in her womb, without being consumed by the fire of the Godhead.
Tough Ending to a Tough Advent
The Eve of Nativity (December 24th) is a strict fast day, called Paramony (meaning “preparation”), on which no solid food is eaten until the first star is seen in the evening sky, or, at the very least, until after the (evening) Vesperal Divine Liturgy that day.
The All-Night Vigil on the night of December 24th consists of Great Compline, Matins and the First Hour. One of the highlights of Great Compline is the exultant chanting of “God is with us!” interspersed between selected verses from the prophesy of Isaias 8:9-18, foretelling the triumph of the Kingdom of God, and 9:2-7, foretelling the birth of the Messias (“For unto us a child is born...and he shall be called...the Mighty God....”).
The Orthodox do not normally have a Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve; rather, their Divine Liturgy for the Nativity of Christ is celebrated the next morning. However, in those monasteries which continue to celebrate the All-Night Vigil in its long form—where it literally lasts throughout the entire night—the conclusion of the Vigil, at dawn on Christmas morning, will often lead directly into the celebration of the Divine Liturgy (Holy Mass). When the Vigil is separate from the Divine Liturgy (Holy Mass), the Lenten fast continues even after the Vigil, until the end of the Liturgy the next morning.
Western Relaxation
As Dom Guéranger writes, in his Liturgical Year, in the volume on Advent:
“We find, as far back as the fifth century, the custom of giving exhortations to the people in order to prepare them for the feast of Christmas ... The oldest document in which we find the length and exercises of Advent mentioned [that] about the year 480, a fast three times a week, from the feast of St. Martin (November 11th) until Christmas. This interval of forty, or rather of forty-three days, was consecrated to penance, as though it were a second Lent, though less strict and severe than that which precedes Easter ... Later on, we find the ninth canon of the first Council of Mâcon, held in 582, ordaining that during the same interval between St. Martin’s day and Christmas, the Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, should be fasting days. Not many years before that, namely in 567, the second Council of Tours had enjoined the monks to fast [every day except Sunday] from the beginning of December till Christmas. This practice of penance soon extended to the whole forty days, even for the laity: and it was commonly called St. Martin’s Lent.
“The obligation of observing this [Winter] Lent—which, though introduced so imperceptibly, had by degrees acquired the force of a sacred law—began to be relaxed, and the forty days from St. Martin’s day to Christmas were reduced to four weeks. We have seen that this fast began to be observed first in France; but thence it spread into England, Italy, Germany, Spain and then other countries. The discipline of the Churches of the West, after having reduced the time of the Advent fast [to four weeks from forty days], so far relented, in a few years, as to change the fast into a simple abstinence. This much is certain, that, by degrees, the custom of fasting so far fell into disuse, that when, in 1362, Pope Urban V endeavored to prevent the total decay of the Advent penance, all he insisted upon was that all the clerics of his court should keep abstinence during Advent, without [sadly] in any way including others, either clergy or laity, in this law. St. Charles Borromeo also strove to bring back his people of Milan to the spirit, if not to the letter, of ancient times. Finally, Pope Benedict XIV, when archbishop of Bologna, following these illustrious examples, wrote a diocesan letter for the purpose of exciting in the minds of his diocesans, the exalted idea which the Christians of former times had of the holy season of Advent, and of removing an erroneous opinion which prevailed in those parts, namely, that Advent concerned religious only and not the laity. He shows them that such an opinion is, strictly speaking, rash and scandalous … The exterior practices of penance which formerly sanctified the season of Advent, have been, in the western Church, so gradually relaxed as to have become now quite obsolete except in some monasteries” (Dom Guéranger, Liturgical Year). [Today, most monasteries are totally ‘relaxed’].
Looking With Heaven’s Eyes
In this age of wanton materialism and luxury, of which Our Lady prophesied complainingly, which attitude would seem to be the one Heaven would desire to be seen on Earth? The Western relaxation or the stricter Eastern discipline? We are of course abstracting from the fact that some of those practicing the stricter Advent are schismatics, but not all of them are, for the Eastern Catholic Churches still adhere to the strict Advent, though some have relaxed things.
What Heaven Dislikes
Which would Heaven prefer? If we need a yardstick with which to measure things with, then Our Lady’s comments at her apparitions may help us measure things: “During this epoch the Church will find herself attacked by terrible assaults from … the corruption of customs, unbridled luxury and extravagance … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs ... In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost ... for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth ... People will think of nothing but amusement … They will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church ... The priests, by their wicked lives, by their … by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures … have neglected prayer and penance … Many hearts consecrated to God, in the priestly and religious state, will fall into lukewarmness … The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God ... Civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds. There is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There are no more generous souls” (Our Lady of Good Success, Quito & Our Lady of La Salette).
Our Lord, following up on the apparitions of Our Lady of Good Success to Mother Mariana, said to her: “The times will come when doctrine will be commonly known among the learned and the ignorant. ... Many religious books will be written. But the practice of the virtues and of these doctrines will be found in only a few souls; for this reason, saints will become rare. And precisely for this reason, My priests and My religious will fall into a fatal indifference. Their coldness will extinguish the fire of divine love, afflicting My Loving Heart with these small thorns that you see.”
What Our Lord and Our Lady Recommend or Command
That was the negative or complaining part of Our Lady’s messages. Her positive part was the encouragement of penance and prayer, which works against the spirit of relaxation of these later modern times.
At Quito, Our Lady of Good Success says: “[I wish] that men in the future might realize how powerful I am in placating Divine Justice and obtaining mercy and pardon for every sinner, who comes to me with a contrite heart. For I am the Mother of Mercy and in me there is only goodness and love … Clamor insistently without tiring and weep with bitter tears in the privacy of your heart … O, if men only understood how to appreciate the time given to them and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!”
At Quito, Our Lord added: “Alas, if they only knew and were convinced of how much I love them and how much I desire that they should enter into the very depths of their souls! Then, without a doubt, they would find Me and would necessarily live the life of love, light and continuous union with Me to which they were not only called, but chosen!” Our Lord also assured Mother Mariana that He was greatly pleased by those souls who take upon themselves the sublime work of suffering for the sanctification of the clergy, by means of their prayers, sacrifices and penances, and He promised such souls a special glory in Heaven.
At La Salette, Our Lady says: “If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually. And the rest of you think little of this. In vain you will pray, in vain you will act, you will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for the rest of you ... The righteous will suffer greatly. Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession … But the children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me … God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will … Do you say your prayers properly?”
At Lourdes, the Blessed Mother commands: “Pray for sinners … Penance! Penance! Penance! … Kiss the ground as a penance for sinners.”
At Fatima she says: “Do not be afraid, I will not harm you … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort … Are you suffering a great deal? Don’t lose heart! I will never forsake you … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them. God is pleased with your sacrifices. He does not want you to sleep with the rope on, but only to wear it during the daytime.”
At Akita she tell us: “Pray in reparation for the sins of men … Pray very much … I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair by their suffering and their poverty for the sinners and the ungrateful ... Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger … Already souls who wish to pray are on the way to being gathered together … Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary ... Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.”
That’s the Spirit!
That is the spirit of Our Lord and Our Lady; that should be the spirit of everyone who professes or pretends to follow them; that was the ancient spirit of the Church; that should be the spirit of Advent. The world sleeps it sleep of comfort and lukewarmness, yet the Church cries out with the voice of St. Paul: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day: not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and impurities, not in contention and envy: but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 13:11-14). The alarm bell has been rung! Will we rise up to the battle, or will we hit the snooze button and return to the slumbers of lukewarmness?
“It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day: not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and impurities, not in contention and envy: but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 13:11-14).
Which Christ Would You Like To Encounter?
The Advent liturgy sounds the alarm! Wake up from the slumbers of the world and awaken yourself to words and way of Christ! Life is too short! We have a debt to pay! We have do away with sin! We have to prepare ourselves, not only to meet Jesus at Christmas, but also meet Him on Judgment Day. Now He comes offering mercy—and the price is penance. On Judgment Day He will come administering justice—and the price will be, for most, Purgatory or even Hell. In this short life we all have a heavy debt to pay! Let us not fritter our time away!
Don’t Count on a Long Life or Many More Years!
Adam lived to the ripe old age of 930 years! Our Lord died aged around 33 years. Our Lady is said to have died in her early to mid-sixties. St. Dominic Savio died aged 14 years. St. Maria Goretti was 11 years old when she was killed. Little Blessed Francisco of Fatima was only 10 years old when he died; Blessed Jacinta, his sister was only 9 years old. The Venerable Anne de Guigné was 10 years old.
Time waits for nobody. Time is precious. Time means more than money. Time and how it is spent, means the difference between Heaven and Hell. Death is the most untimely thing around. Death respects no one. Even in the forthcoming chastisement of which Our Lady has warned us, time and time again, she says that the good will die with the bad; and neither will priests be spared, but they will die with the laity.
That is why our time is so precious. That is why the Church chooses the words of St. Paul to open the season of Advent, the time of mercy, so that we can receive, plant, nurture and grow the spirit of Christ in our souls, and so prepare favorably for the time of our Final Judgment, when the time of mercy will cease, and the time of Justice will have arrived.
Putting-Off the World—Putting-On Christ
Advent is a time of preparation for the “putting on of the Lord Jesus Christ.” It is a time of self-examination, of correction and confession; a time of serious spiritual renewal and rejuvenation, a time of spiritual betterment and improvement, a time of re-assessing our motives and values, a time of preparing the soil of our soul to receive the seed of sanctity that our Savior wants to sow.
Advent is marked by a spirit of expectation, of anticipation, of preparation, of longing. There is a yearning for deliverance from the evils of the world, first expressed by Israelite slaves in Egypt as they cried out from their bitter oppression.
A Serious Time
It is not a frivolous time; it is not a time of worldly worry over the material and social side of Christmas. It was this material preoccupation—at the lucrative time of the Emperor Caesar Augustus’ census and the ‘tourist’ swelling of Bethlehem as people returned to register—that blinded the Bethlehemites to the True Treasure that had arrived on their doorsteps, disguised as poverty and hidden in Mary’s womb.
They thought they were rich, but in reality they were very poor. They thought Mary and Joseph were poor, but they were the richest people in Heaven and Earth. They carried the only thing that really matters; the Bethlehemites sought many things, but missed the one essential thing that matters.
When we total up the man-hours spent on the material and social side of Advent and its successor, Christmas, and then compare it to the man-hours that will have been spent on the spiritual side of Advent and Christmas, then I think most people would have to blush with shame.
Our Lord is not coming to play, but to pay—pay for our sins. He is not coming to enjoy life, but to give eternal life—and that comes at a price, the price is giving up the worldly life. He comes not to live on Earth forever, but to forever detach us from this Earth. He prefers poverty over power; humility over honors; rejection over riches and suffering over splendor. His way is not our way, yet He Who called Himself “the Way” shows us wayward wayfarers the true way—and it is not a pleasant way, but the Way of the Cross. It is the way that takes away debt for sin and leads us away from the ways of the world to world of Heaven.
The West Goes Soft—the East Stays Tough
Our separated brethren, the schismatic Eastern Orthodox Church and the non-schismatic Eastern Catholic Church, still keeps Advent in the same spirit with which we in the West used to keep it, before relaxation followed upon relaxation. The so-called “Nativity Fast” is a period of abstinence and penance practiced by the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Eastern Catholic Churches, in preparation for the Nativity of Christ, (December 25th).
Like the Western Advent, the Nativity Fast prepares Eastern Christians for the feast of Christmas. However, it differs in two significant respects: the Eastern fast runs for 40 days instead of four weeks (in Roman rite) or six weeks (in the Ambrosian rite). The main theme during this time of penance, largely focuses on proclamation and glorification of the Incarnation of God, whereas the Western Advent focuses on the two comings (or two advents) of Jesus Christ: His first coming at His birth and His Second Coming at the end of the world.
The fast is kept from November 15th to December 24th, inclusively. These dates apply to those Orthodox Churches which use the Revised Julian calendar, which currently matches the modern Gregorian calendar (that replaced the Julian Calendar).
For those Eastern Orthodox Churches which still follow the ancient Julian calendar (Churches of Russia, Georgia, Serbia, Ukraine, Macedonia, Mount Athos and Jerusalem), the Winter Lent does not begin until November 28th (on our Gregorian calendar) which coincides with November 15th on the Julian calendar. The Ancient Church of the East fasts from dawn till dusk, from December 1st until the 25th of December on the Gregorian calendar.
Sometimes the fast is called Philip’s Fast (or the Philippian Fast), as it traditionally begins on the day following the Feast of St. Philip the Apostle (November 14th). Some churches, such as the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, have abbreviated the fast to start on December 10th, following the Feast of the Conception, by St. Anne, of the Most Holy Theotokos.
Fasting Physically and Spiritually
Through the discipline of fasting, practiced with humility and repentance, it is believed that by learning to temper the body’s primary desire for food, that other worldly desires can be more easily tempered as well. Through this practice one is better enabled to draw closer to God, in the hope of becoming more Christ-like. While the fast influences the body, it is important to note that emphasis is placed on the spiritual facet of the fast, rather than mere physical deprivation. Orthodox theology sees a synthesis between the body and the soul, so what happens to one affects the other. The church teaches that it is not enough to fast from food; one must also fast from anger, greed and covetousness. In addition to fasting, almsgiving is also emphasized.
Taking Things Seriously
In the Eastern Orthodox Church, the fast traditionally entails fasting from red meat, poultry, meat products, eggs, dairy products, fish, oil, and wine. Fish, wine and oil are allowed on Saturdays and Sundays, and oil and wine are allowed on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
The fasting rules permit fish, and/or wine and oil on certain feast days that occur during the course of the fast. These feast days are that of Evangelist St. Matthew (November 16th), the Apostle St. Andrew (November 30th), the Great-martyr St. Barbara (December 4th), St. Nicholas (December 6th), St. Spiridon and St. Herman (December 12th), St. Ignatius (December 20th), etc. The Nativity Fast is not as severe as the Great Lent Fast.
During the course of the fast, a number of lesser feast days celebrate those Old Testament prophets who prophesied the Incarnation; for instance: Abdias also called Obadiah (November 19th), Nahum (December 1st), Habacuc (December 2nd), Sophonias also called Zephaniah (December 3rd), Aggeus also called Haggai (December 16th), Daniel and the Three Holy Youths (December 17th). These last are significant not only because of their perseverance in fasting, but also because their preservation unharmed in the midst of the fiery furnace (Daniel, chapter 3) is interpreted as being symbolic of the Incarnation—the Virgin Mary conceived God the Word in her womb, without being consumed by the fire of the Godhead.
Tough Ending to a Tough Advent
The Eve of Nativity (December 24th) is a strict fast day, called Paramony (meaning “preparation”), on which no solid food is eaten until the first star is seen in the evening sky, or, at the very least, until after the (evening) Vesperal Divine Liturgy that day.
The All-Night Vigil on the night of December 24th consists of Great Compline, Matins and the First Hour. One of the highlights of Great Compline is the exultant chanting of “God is with us!” interspersed between selected verses from the prophesy of Isaias 8:9-18, foretelling the triumph of the Kingdom of God, and 9:2-7, foretelling the birth of the Messias (“For unto us a child is born...and he shall be called...the Mighty God....”).
The Orthodox do not normally have a Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve; rather, their Divine Liturgy for the Nativity of Christ is celebrated the next morning. However, in those monasteries which continue to celebrate the All-Night Vigil in its long form—where it literally lasts throughout the entire night—the conclusion of the Vigil, at dawn on Christmas morning, will often lead directly into the celebration of the Divine Liturgy (Holy Mass). When the Vigil is separate from the Divine Liturgy (Holy Mass), the Lenten fast continues even after the Vigil, until the end of the Liturgy the next morning.
Western Relaxation
As Dom Guéranger writes, in his Liturgical Year, in the volume on Advent:
“We find, as far back as the fifth century, the custom of giving exhortations to the people in order to prepare them for the feast of Christmas ... The oldest document in which we find the length and exercises of Advent mentioned [that] about the year 480, a fast three times a week, from the feast of St. Martin (November 11th) until Christmas. This interval of forty, or rather of forty-three days, was consecrated to penance, as though it were a second Lent, though less strict and severe than that which precedes Easter ... Later on, we find the ninth canon of the first Council of Mâcon, held in 582, ordaining that during the same interval between St. Martin’s day and Christmas, the Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, should be fasting days. Not many years before that, namely in 567, the second Council of Tours had enjoined the monks to fast [every day except Sunday] from the beginning of December till Christmas. This practice of penance soon extended to the whole forty days, even for the laity: and it was commonly called St. Martin’s Lent.
“The obligation of observing this [Winter] Lent—which, though introduced so imperceptibly, had by degrees acquired the force of a sacred law—began to be relaxed, and the forty days from St. Martin’s day to Christmas were reduced to four weeks. We have seen that this fast began to be observed first in France; but thence it spread into England, Italy, Germany, Spain and then other countries. The discipline of the Churches of the West, after having reduced the time of the Advent fast [to four weeks from forty days], so far relented, in a few years, as to change the fast into a simple abstinence. This much is certain, that, by degrees, the custom of fasting so far fell into disuse, that when, in 1362, Pope Urban V endeavored to prevent the total decay of the Advent penance, all he insisted upon was that all the clerics of his court should keep abstinence during Advent, without [sadly] in any way including others, either clergy or laity, in this law. St. Charles Borromeo also strove to bring back his people of Milan to the spirit, if not to the letter, of ancient times. Finally, Pope Benedict XIV, when archbishop of Bologna, following these illustrious examples, wrote a diocesan letter for the purpose of exciting in the minds of his diocesans, the exalted idea which the Christians of former times had of the holy season of Advent, and of removing an erroneous opinion which prevailed in those parts, namely, that Advent concerned religious only and not the laity. He shows them that such an opinion is, strictly speaking, rash and scandalous … The exterior practices of penance which formerly sanctified the season of Advent, have been, in the western Church, so gradually relaxed as to have become now quite obsolete except in some monasteries” (Dom Guéranger, Liturgical Year). [Today, most monasteries are totally ‘relaxed’].
Looking With Heaven’s Eyes
In this age of wanton materialism and luxury, of which Our Lady prophesied complainingly, which attitude would seem to be the one Heaven would desire to be seen on Earth? The Western relaxation or the stricter Eastern discipline? We are of course abstracting from the fact that some of those practicing the stricter Advent are schismatics, but not all of them are, for the Eastern Catholic Churches still adhere to the strict Advent, though some have relaxed things.
What Heaven Dislikes
Which would Heaven prefer? If we need a yardstick with which to measure things with, then Our Lady’s comments at her apparitions may help us measure things: “During this epoch the Church will find herself attacked by terrible assaults from … the corruption of customs, unbridled luxury and extravagance … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs ... In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost ... for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth ... People will think of nothing but amusement … They will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church ... The priests, by their wicked lives, by their … by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures … have neglected prayer and penance … Many hearts consecrated to God, in the priestly and religious state, will fall into lukewarmness … The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God ... Civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds. There is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There are no more generous souls” (Our Lady of Good Success, Quito & Our Lady of La Salette).
Our Lord, following up on the apparitions of Our Lady of Good Success to Mother Mariana, said to her: “The times will come when doctrine will be commonly known among the learned and the ignorant. ... Many religious books will be written. But the practice of the virtues and of these doctrines will be found in only a few souls; for this reason, saints will become rare. And precisely for this reason, My priests and My religious will fall into a fatal indifference. Their coldness will extinguish the fire of divine love, afflicting My Loving Heart with these small thorns that you see.”
What Our Lord and Our Lady Recommend or Command
That was the negative or complaining part of Our Lady’s messages. Her positive part was the encouragement of penance and prayer, which works against the spirit of relaxation of these later modern times.
At Quito, Our Lady of Good Success says: “[I wish] that men in the future might realize how powerful I am in placating Divine Justice and obtaining mercy and pardon for every sinner, who comes to me with a contrite heart. For I am the Mother of Mercy and in me there is only goodness and love … Clamor insistently without tiring and weep with bitter tears in the privacy of your heart … O, if men only understood how to appreciate the time given to them and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!”
At Quito, Our Lord added: “Alas, if they only knew and were convinced of how much I love them and how much I desire that they should enter into the very depths of their souls! Then, without a doubt, they would find Me and would necessarily live the life of love, light and continuous union with Me to which they were not only called, but chosen!” Our Lord also assured Mother Mariana that He was greatly pleased by those souls who take upon themselves the sublime work of suffering for the sanctification of the clergy, by means of their prayers, sacrifices and penances, and He promised such souls a special glory in Heaven.
At La Salette, Our Lady says: “If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually. And the rest of you think little of this. In vain you will pray, in vain you will act, you will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for the rest of you ... The righteous will suffer greatly. Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession … But the children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me … God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will … Do you say your prayers properly?”
At Lourdes, the Blessed Mother commands: “Pray for sinners … Penance! Penance! Penance! … Kiss the ground as a penance for sinners.”
At Fatima she says: “Do not be afraid, I will not harm you … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort … Are you suffering a great deal? Don’t lose heart! I will never forsake you … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them. God is pleased with your sacrifices. He does not want you to sleep with the rope on, but only to wear it during the daytime.”
At Akita she tell us: “Pray in reparation for the sins of men … Pray very much … I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair by their suffering and their poverty for the sinners and the ungrateful ... Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger … Already souls who wish to pray are on the way to being gathered together … Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary ... Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.”
That’s the Spirit!
That is the spirit of Our Lord and Our Lady; that should be the spirit of everyone who professes or pretends to follow them; that was the ancient spirit of the Church; that should be the spirit of Advent. The world sleeps it sleep of comfort and lukewarmness, yet the Church cries out with the voice of St. Paul: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day: not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and impurities, not in contention and envy: but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 13:11-14). The alarm bell has been rung! Will we rise up to the battle, or will we hit the snooze button and return to the slumbers of lukewarmness?
Article 2
Monday, December 2nd
Stuttering? Spluttering? Need a Push?
Monday, December 2nd
Stuttering? Spluttering? Need a Push?
How is your Advent going? Racing along fine? Chugging along? Spluttering and misfiring? Come to a stop? Never got going? Or dead in the water?
The Devil Made Me Do It
The devil is a master of procrastination and distraction. For centuries he has mastered the art. When he sees that we are contemplating doing something good, the master tactician weighs in with his almost limitless “side-shows”, mood-swings, delays, distractions or derailings.
Here are some extracts from a book entitled Discernment of Spirits, by Fr. Barrielle:
“Many people do not realize the influences that a spirit can have on us. A young man may say to me: ‘Father, I’m down in the dumps!’ I reply: ‘No, you are not down in the dumps. That does not exist. You have the devil hovering about you.’ He replies: ‘Father, you see the devil everywhere. I’m down in the dumps because the sun is not out today, and when the weather is bad I’m sad, that’s all! It has nothing to do with the devil’―so I tell him: ‘Exactly! Do you not know that the devil uses everything when coming to tempt you? He will use advantageously the bad weather, as a disposition. You just are not aware of the fact that if you are feeling sad, the devil is hovering about you. Beware!’ Behold a sad young man. I do not say that he has sinned. I say: ‘The devil is hovering about him.’ Attention! How does one know that? ... There are rules, brought by the Blessed Virgin Mary to St. Ignatius.” (Discernment of Spirits, by Fr. Barrielle),
The Screwtape Letters
Here is an extract from C.S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters, which is a book that presents an exchange of letters from two devils, Screwtape being the uncle and master tempter, and the other his nephew, a beginner in the field of temptation. The master tempter, Screwtape, writes to his apprentice nephew:
“Never having been a human (oh, that abominable advantage of the Enemy’s!), you don’t realize how enslaved they are to the pressure of the ordinary. I once had a patient, a sound atheist, who used to read in British Museum. One day, as he sat reading, I saw a train of thought in his mind beginning to go the ‘wrong way’ towards the Enemy [God]. The Enemy, of course, was at his elbow in a moment. Before I knew where I was I saw my twenty years’ work beginning to totter. If I had lost my head and begun to attempt a defense by argument, I should have been undone.
“But I was not such a fool. I struck instantly at the part of the man which I had best under my control, and suggested that it was just about time he had some lunch. The Enemy presumably made the counter suggestion (you know how one can never quite overhear what He says to them?) that this was more important than lunch. At least I think that must have been His line, for when I said, “Quite. In fact much too important to tackle at the end of a morning,” the patient brightened up considerably, and by the time I had added “Much better come back after lunch and go into it with a fresh mind,” he was already halfway to the door.
“Once he was in the street the battle was won. I showed him a newsboy shouting the midday paper, and a No. 73 bus going past, and before he reached the bottom of the steps I had got into him an unalterable conviction that, whatever odd ideas might come into a man’s head when he was shut up alone with his books, a healthy dose of “real life” (by which he meant the bus and the newsboy) was enough to show him that all “that sort of thing” just couldn’t be true. He knew he’d had a narrow escape, and in later years was fond of talking about that inarticulate sense for actuality which is our ultimate safeguard against the aberrations of mere logic. He is now safe in Our Father’s house [Hell].”
The Devil of Later
The devil works similarly on our spiritual duties and exercises. If he can, he will have us lay them aside until later. It is easier for him, and more likely to be successful, if he whispers to us: “Oh, you can do it later!” than saying to us: “Don’t do it!” This is because he knows that it is easier to extract from us a compromise rather than an outright capitulation or surrender. Thereby, he has us midway, neither doing our spiritual exercises, nor rejecting our spiritual exercise, but simply putting them off until later. But, as we all know, later, like tomorrow, never comes. Feeling comfortable with “a little later” it soon becomes “a lot later” and this often becomes “never” and our good intention is consigned to the cemetery of good intentions. Remember that phrase: “Hell is full of good intentions!”
So when Advent or Lent comes around, which are essentially times of more prayer and penance, the devil is working overtime, camouflaged better than ever, at getting us to consign our good intentions for Advent to that cemetery of good intentions.
Advent’s False Sense of Security
Most Catholics will have fallen victim to this subtle purveyor of spiritual lethargy during this Advent season. They are led by him to falsely imagine and erroneously feel secure in their superficial Advent preparations. The fact they have an Advent wreath and candles burning at home, makes them feel secure from burning in Purgatory, or worse yet, Hell. The fact that they do not give in to the modern temptation of hanging out the Christmas lights and putting up the Christmas Tree and Nativity set at the start of December, makes them feel some kind of aura of holiness, as they wait for the real Christmas season to begin on the 25th day of the month.
Yet for many, if not most, there are no extra prayers, no penances, no special readings, no deepening and multiplying of spiritual exercises. Advent is just like any other month of the year, except for the above-mentioned superficial trimmings. Any extra time they may have will be spent on those lights, trees and statues—unpacking them, unraveling them, cleaning them and then hanging them up and putting them on display. They will spend far more time, effort and money on these material trimmings than they do on the essential spiritual duties that should be foremost in their minds.
Brighten Up! Lighten Up!
In this area of the country, there is one man whose front and back garden would put most towns, villages and churches to shame in the matter of Christmas lights. It is all one sea of lights! All the trees and bushes glitter, his sidewalk has a tunnel erected covered with lights, there are all kinds of light-laden shapes and animals sitting on the lawn, Santa Claus, sleigh and reindeers sparkling on the roof with a massive LED American flag, and finally and unashamedly, to his credit, a nativity scene right in your face by the sidewalk, and the flashing (forbidden words) “Merry Christmas” lights accompanied with piped Christmas Carols coming from speakers parked on the front lawn. Oh, and a “Donations Welcome” box too!
The man said that it took him one whole month, of time after work, to set everything up and the electricity bill for the 6,000 lights he had working, was an extra $250 a month (he puts it up way before Thanksgiving, around the start of November, and takes it down in late January). Dedication? Yes! But sadly in the wrong area. Does he put in equal time into spiritual duties? No! Because there is not enough time in the day. He has a lot of zeal; is tireless in his efforts, generous from his wallet; but misguided in putting those qualities to good or better use.
“First Things First” or “The First Shall Be Last and the Last Shall Be First”
And that is what the devil will do to us, distract us into focusing more on the secondary aspects of Advent and Christmas, rather than focusing on the essentials. As the saying goes: “First things first!” If we are not guilty of the above recounted Christmas Lights story, then perhaps we have our own distractions that take us away from a preparation that would please the souls in Heaven more than the souls on Earth. In fact, if we did prepare properly for Christmas through Advent, we would, most likely, end up being very unpopular with souls upon Earth.
So we fall into the world’s non-spiritual habit of preparing for the Christmas arrival of family, relatives and friends, rather than prepare for the arrival of Christ in our souls. The planning, the shopping, the setting-up, the cooking, the many little extras to impress and delight the visitors, etc., all this takes up our main focus and most of our time. We twist and pervert to our favor the Scriptural phrase: “The first shall be last and the last shall be first.” (Matthew 19:30). Christ, who should be first, ends up being last; and our family, relatives and friends, who should come after Christ, end up being first.
That is why, for many, if not most, Advent has been a superficial non-starter. There is little or nothing different in their lives except for some external trimmings and lights. In fact, with all the time and effort they spend in preparing for a mainly human Christmas, they have even less time for their usual meager prayers and spiritual exercises!
Never Too Late! Start Now!
However, here we must bring in the devil’s Enemy, God. It is never too late to change, as the Good Thief on his cross found out, and it is never too late to start work in the Lord’s Advent Vineyard, as the Parable of the workers in the vineyard tells us:
“And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just.’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he saith to them: ‘Why stand you here all the day idle?’ They say to him: ‘Because no man hath hired us.’ He saith to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard.’” (Matthew 20:3-7).
Roll Up Those Sleeves
If we have been more or less idle so far, let us go into the Advent Vineyard and work. Here are a few items on the work-list that you could tackle:
(1) Read about the life of Mary and Joseph from the time of the Annunciation to the Nativity of Our Lord. Some good books are: (a) The Life of Mary As Seen By The Mystics by Raphael Brown; (b) The Mystical City of God by the Venerable Mary of Agreda; (c) The Life of the Blessed Virgin Mary by Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich.
(2) Make your daily Rosary more meaningful and fruitful by inserting either Scriptural readings between the mysteries, or by reading accounts of the mystery from some good book (the above books would also supply for this need).
(3) Pick several virtues that you know you are definitely lacking and then do two things about them: (a) read up on those virtues from books you may already have, or look up those virtues online, there are many sources available; (b) make a plan, where and when you will try to practice those virtues. Don’t just keep it in your head, but write it down; better still, rewrite it every day; even better than that, tell everyone around you what virtues you are trying to acquire, that way you commit yourself to the public scrutiny and assessment on how you are doing! Tough, but effective!
(4) In the old days, when the Faith was taken more seriously as it should be, some would fast all through Advent just as they did in Lent; others would fast on three days of the week. Fasting with prayer, as Our Lord said, is one of the most powerful tools against the devil. Why not fast? At least on some days of the week. If we cannot or will not fast, then how about a simpler manner of eating. It does not have to be unhealthy, but more frugal. Eat raw rather than cook; eat foods that are healthy, but ones we don’t usually buy, because we don’t like them; eat all that is on the plate rather than waste food by having it thrown away; eat it in a timely manner, so that, in eating it earlier, it does not spoil through our negligence. There are many, many ways that we can practice mortification with regard to food and drink.
(5) Let’s face it; never has the world been as spoiled as it is today! Not even the kings and queens of old had such a wide selection of goods available to them. Nor the vast array of technological titillation that surrounds us all day long: radios, hi-fi’s, TV’s, computers, i-Pods, i-Pads, i-Phones, and goodness knows what else! They coped without these things and were not much sadder or more deprived for it. Could we not banish the non-essentials for the rest of the month? Or at least limit them to only strictly necessary usage?
These are just some of many possible suggestions on how to ‘kick-start’ our Advent if it hasn’t really started as yet, or is stuttering and spluttering!
Get Started!
“Consider all the past as nothing, and say, like David: ‘Now I begin to love my God!’” (St. Francis de Sales). It was in this manner that the Apostle St. Paul acted; though, after his conversion, he had become a vessel of election, filled with the spirit of Jesus Christ, yet, to persevere and advance along Heaven’s way, he made use of this means, for he said in his Epistle to the Philippians: “Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended. But one thing I do―forgetting the things that are behind, and stretching forth myself to those that are before, I press towards the mark, to the prize of the supernal vocation of God in Christ Jesus.”
The glorious St. Anthony went on from day to day, stimulating himself to virtue. St. Anastasius said of him, that he always looked upon himself as a beginner, as if every day were the first in which he was serving God, and as if in the past he had done nothing good, and were but just setting foot in the way of the Lord, and taking the first steps on the road to Heaven. And this was the very last admonition he left to his monks at his death: “My sons,” he said to them, “if you wish to advance in virtue and perfection, never give up the practice of considering each day that you are then beginning, and of conducting yourselves always as you did on the day you began.”
We find that St. Gregory, St. Bernard, and St. Charles acted likewise and advised others to act in the same manner. To make the necessity and utility of this method clearer to all, they made use of two beautiful comparisons, saying, that we must act in this like travelers, who do not regard the road they have gone over, but, rather, what remains for them to traverse, and this they keep always before their eyes, even to their journey’s end; or, like merchants, eager for riches, who make no account of what they have so far acquired, nor of the fatigue they have borne, but put all their thought and care upon new acquisitions, and upon daily multiplying their possessions, as if in the past they had made no profit at all.
Resolutions, Resolutions and More Resolutions!
St. Francis de Sales stated that: “We must begin with a strong and constant resolution to give ourselves wholly to God, professing to Him, in a tender, loving manner, from the bottom of our hearts, that we intend to be His without any reserve, and then we must often go back and renew this same resolution.”
One of the means for the acquisition of perfection, which was chiefly inculcated and much practiced by St. Philip Neri, was a frequent renewal of good resolutions. St. Francis de Sales made, from time to time, a spiritual renovation, and always conceived in it new desires to serve God better.
St. John Berchmans, at his very entrance into religion, planted in his heart a strong resolution to become a Saint, and then he not only remained constant in all the practices and resolutions which he took up for this end, but he went on daily gaining new vigor to his spiritual advantage.
When a holy Religious was giving the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius in Rome, a nun, called Sr. Marie Bonaventura, who was living a very easy and relaxed life, did not wish to be present. After much effort, she was finally persuaded to attend. The first meditation, on the end of man, enkindled such fervor in her heart, that the priest had scarcely finished when she called him to her, and said: “Father, I intend to be a Saint, and quickly!” She then retired to her cell, and, writing the same words on a scrap of paper, fastened them to the foot of her crucifix. From that moment, she applied herself with so much zeal to the practice of perfection, that a memoir about her was written at her death, which occurred eleven months later.
God Wants Everyone to be Holy—Even the Greatest Sinner
St. Teresa of Avila explains that “The Lord chiefly desires of us that we should be completely perfect, so that we may be wholly one with Him. Let us aim, therefore, at whatever we need to reach this.”
Father Peter Faber, a companion of St. Ignatius, and highly esteemed by St. Francis de Sales, often dwelt on the thought that God greatly desires our advancement. And so he endeavored to grow constantly, and not to let a day pass without some progress in virtue, so that he gradually rose to great perfection and a high reputation for sanctity. St. Pacomius and St. Anthony, by studying the virtues of others, stimulated themselves to attain similar excellence.
The Terraces of Perfection
The Venerable Sister Mary Villani had the following vision. On the Feast of St. Francis, for whom she had a particular devotion, this Saint appeared to her and led her to a lofty place, more beautiful than any she had ever seen.
To reach it, one was obliged to ascend four very high terraces, which signified, as the Saint revealed to her, the four degrees of perfection. We stress here that we are speaking of levels of PERFECTION, and not therefore about the lower levels of the spiritual life, which are the first or lowest level of the Way of Beginners or Way of Purgation; and the middle level or Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way, which leads to the third way, the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way. These four terraces are within the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way.
With great difficulty she ascended, by his help, the first terrace, and he explained to her that this was the first state of perfection, called purity of conscience, which borders on angelic purity. In it the soul becomes like that of a little child, enjoys a pure and holy tranquility, never thinks evil of others, nor interests itself in what does not belong to its own position.
Then he brought her up to the second terrace, telling her that whoever had arrived at purity of conscience, becomes capable of prayer and of true love, which is the inseparable fruit of prayer. Here he enumerated to her the properties of true love, which is pure, simple, unselfish, and founded upon the truth of God, who can give Himself only to souls already possessed of purity.
Then he raised her to the third terrace, that of the cross and mortification, adding that from purity and love the soul passes on to taking up the cross courageously and to being itself crucified, and that to arrive at this state one must acquire four cardinal virtues. These are, a true mortification of all vices and of every earthly affection; a perfect poverty of spirit, which tramples under foot all temporal goods; a living death, by which the soul dies to itself and to all affections of sense, and lives in a total annihilation and transformation into its crucified Lord, so as to be able to say: “I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.” The soul that has gained this state, seems to have conquered the world, and bears sufferings and crosses as if it could no longer feel them.
The fourth terrace, he said, typified the state of real and perfect union. This is the required level for entry into Heaven. There is no exception for anyone, for only saints go to Heaven. This Advent season is a seedbed of sanctity for those who choose to detach themselves from the world and attach themselves more to God through a serious and systematic spiritual life—which is very much different from the common half-hearted, haphazard, part-time spirituality of most souls. Let us for once use Advent profitably!
The Devil Made Me Do It
The devil is a master of procrastination and distraction. For centuries he has mastered the art. When he sees that we are contemplating doing something good, the master tactician weighs in with his almost limitless “side-shows”, mood-swings, delays, distractions or derailings.
Here are some extracts from a book entitled Discernment of Spirits, by Fr. Barrielle:
“Many people do not realize the influences that a spirit can have on us. A young man may say to me: ‘Father, I’m down in the dumps!’ I reply: ‘No, you are not down in the dumps. That does not exist. You have the devil hovering about you.’ He replies: ‘Father, you see the devil everywhere. I’m down in the dumps because the sun is not out today, and when the weather is bad I’m sad, that’s all! It has nothing to do with the devil’―so I tell him: ‘Exactly! Do you not know that the devil uses everything when coming to tempt you? He will use advantageously the bad weather, as a disposition. You just are not aware of the fact that if you are feeling sad, the devil is hovering about you. Beware!’ Behold a sad young man. I do not say that he has sinned. I say: ‘The devil is hovering about him.’ Attention! How does one know that? ... There are rules, brought by the Blessed Virgin Mary to St. Ignatius.” (Discernment of Spirits, by Fr. Barrielle),
The Screwtape Letters
Here is an extract from C.S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters, which is a book that presents an exchange of letters from two devils, Screwtape being the uncle and master tempter, and the other his nephew, a beginner in the field of temptation. The master tempter, Screwtape, writes to his apprentice nephew:
“Never having been a human (oh, that abominable advantage of the Enemy’s!), you don’t realize how enslaved they are to the pressure of the ordinary. I once had a patient, a sound atheist, who used to read in British Museum. One day, as he sat reading, I saw a train of thought in his mind beginning to go the ‘wrong way’ towards the Enemy [God]. The Enemy, of course, was at his elbow in a moment. Before I knew where I was I saw my twenty years’ work beginning to totter. If I had lost my head and begun to attempt a defense by argument, I should have been undone.
“But I was not such a fool. I struck instantly at the part of the man which I had best under my control, and suggested that it was just about time he had some lunch. The Enemy presumably made the counter suggestion (you know how one can never quite overhear what He says to them?) that this was more important than lunch. At least I think that must have been His line, for when I said, “Quite. In fact much too important to tackle at the end of a morning,” the patient brightened up considerably, and by the time I had added “Much better come back after lunch and go into it with a fresh mind,” he was already halfway to the door.
“Once he was in the street the battle was won. I showed him a newsboy shouting the midday paper, and a No. 73 bus going past, and before he reached the bottom of the steps I had got into him an unalterable conviction that, whatever odd ideas might come into a man’s head when he was shut up alone with his books, a healthy dose of “real life” (by which he meant the bus and the newsboy) was enough to show him that all “that sort of thing” just couldn’t be true. He knew he’d had a narrow escape, and in later years was fond of talking about that inarticulate sense for actuality which is our ultimate safeguard against the aberrations of mere logic. He is now safe in Our Father’s house [Hell].”
The Devil of Later
The devil works similarly on our spiritual duties and exercises. If he can, he will have us lay them aside until later. It is easier for him, and more likely to be successful, if he whispers to us: “Oh, you can do it later!” than saying to us: “Don’t do it!” This is because he knows that it is easier to extract from us a compromise rather than an outright capitulation or surrender. Thereby, he has us midway, neither doing our spiritual exercises, nor rejecting our spiritual exercise, but simply putting them off until later. But, as we all know, later, like tomorrow, never comes. Feeling comfortable with “a little later” it soon becomes “a lot later” and this often becomes “never” and our good intention is consigned to the cemetery of good intentions. Remember that phrase: “Hell is full of good intentions!”
So when Advent or Lent comes around, which are essentially times of more prayer and penance, the devil is working overtime, camouflaged better than ever, at getting us to consign our good intentions for Advent to that cemetery of good intentions.
Advent’s False Sense of Security
Most Catholics will have fallen victim to this subtle purveyor of spiritual lethargy during this Advent season. They are led by him to falsely imagine and erroneously feel secure in their superficial Advent preparations. The fact they have an Advent wreath and candles burning at home, makes them feel secure from burning in Purgatory, or worse yet, Hell. The fact that they do not give in to the modern temptation of hanging out the Christmas lights and putting up the Christmas Tree and Nativity set at the start of December, makes them feel some kind of aura of holiness, as they wait for the real Christmas season to begin on the 25th day of the month.
Yet for many, if not most, there are no extra prayers, no penances, no special readings, no deepening and multiplying of spiritual exercises. Advent is just like any other month of the year, except for the above-mentioned superficial trimmings. Any extra time they may have will be spent on those lights, trees and statues—unpacking them, unraveling them, cleaning them and then hanging them up and putting them on display. They will spend far more time, effort and money on these material trimmings than they do on the essential spiritual duties that should be foremost in their minds.
Brighten Up! Lighten Up!
In this area of the country, there is one man whose front and back garden would put most towns, villages and churches to shame in the matter of Christmas lights. It is all one sea of lights! All the trees and bushes glitter, his sidewalk has a tunnel erected covered with lights, there are all kinds of light-laden shapes and animals sitting on the lawn, Santa Claus, sleigh and reindeers sparkling on the roof with a massive LED American flag, and finally and unashamedly, to his credit, a nativity scene right in your face by the sidewalk, and the flashing (forbidden words) “Merry Christmas” lights accompanied with piped Christmas Carols coming from speakers parked on the front lawn. Oh, and a “Donations Welcome” box too!
The man said that it took him one whole month, of time after work, to set everything up and the electricity bill for the 6,000 lights he had working, was an extra $250 a month (he puts it up way before Thanksgiving, around the start of November, and takes it down in late January). Dedication? Yes! But sadly in the wrong area. Does he put in equal time into spiritual duties? No! Because there is not enough time in the day. He has a lot of zeal; is tireless in his efforts, generous from his wallet; but misguided in putting those qualities to good or better use.
“First Things First” or “The First Shall Be Last and the Last Shall Be First”
And that is what the devil will do to us, distract us into focusing more on the secondary aspects of Advent and Christmas, rather than focusing on the essentials. As the saying goes: “First things first!” If we are not guilty of the above recounted Christmas Lights story, then perhaps we have our own distractions that take us away from a preparation that would please the souls in Heaven more than the souls on Earth. In fact, if we did prepare properly for Christmas through Advent, we would, most likely, end up being very unpopular with souls upon Earth.
So we fall into the world’s non-spiritual habit of preparing for the Christmas arrival of family, relatives and friends, rather than prepare for the arrival of Christ in our souls. The planning, the shopping, the setting-up, the cooking, the many little extras to impress and delight the visitors, etc., all this takes up our main focus and most of our time. We twist and pervert to our favor the Scriptural phrase: “The first shall be last and the last shall be first.” (Matthew 19:30). Christ, who should be first, ends up being last; and our family, relatives and friends, who should come after Christ, end up being first.
That is why, for many, if not most, Advent has been a superficial non-starter. There is little or nothing different in their lives except for some external trimmings and lights. In fact, with all the time and effort they spend in preparing for a mainly human Christmas, they have even less time for their usual meager prayers and spiritual exercises!
Never Too Late! Start Now!
However, here we must bring in the devil’s Enemy, God. It is never too late to change, as the Good Thief on his cross found out, and it is never too late to start work in the Lord’s Advent Vineyard, as the Parable of the workers in the vineyard tells us:
“And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just.’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he saith to them: ‘Why stand you here all the day idle?’ They say to him: ‘Because no man hath hired us.’ He saith to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard.’” (Matthew 20:3-7).
Roll Up Those Sleeves
If we have been more or less idle so far, let us go into the Advent Vineyard and work. Here are a few items on the work-list that you could tackle:
(1) Read about the life of Mary and Joseph from the time of the Annunciation to the Nativity of Our Lord. Some good books are: (a) The Life of Mary As Seen By The Mystics by Raphael Brown; (b) The Mystical City of God by the Venerable Mary of Agreda; (c) The Life of the Blessed Virgin Mary by Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich.
(2) Make your daily Rosary more meaningful and fruitful by inserting either Scriptural readings between the mysteries, or by reading accounts of the mystery from some good book (the above books would also supply for this need).
(3) Pick several virtues that you know you are definitely lacking and then do two things about them: (a) read up on those virtues from books you may already have, or look up those virtues online, there are many sources available; (b) make a plan, where and when you will try to practice those virtues. Don’t just keep it in your head, but write it down; better still, rewrite it every day; even better than that, tell everyone around you what virtues you are trying to acquire, that way you commit yourself to the public scrutiny and assessment on how you are doing! Tough, but effective!
(4) In the old days, when the Faith was taken more seriously as it should be, some would fast all through Advent just as they did in Lent; others would fast on three days of the week. Fasting with prayer, as Our Lord said, is one of the most powerful tools against the devil. Why not fast? At least on some days of the week. If we cannot or will not fast, then how about a simpler manner of eating. It does not have to be unhealthy, but more frugal. Eat raw rather than cook; eat foods that are healthy, but ones we don’t usually buy, because we don’t like them; eat all that is on the plate rather than waste food by having it thrown away; eat it in a timely manner, so that, in eating it earlier, it does not spoil through our negligence. There are many, many ways that we can practice mortification with regard to food and drink.
(5) Let’s face it; never has the world been as spoiled as it is today! Not even the kings and queens of old had such a wide selection of goods available to them. Nor the vast array of technological titillation that surrounds us all day long: radios, hi-fi’s, TV’s, computers, i-Pods, i-Pads, i-Phones, and goodness knows what else! They coped without these things and were not much sadder or more deprived for it. Could we not banish the non-essentials for the rest of the month? Or at least limit them to only strictly necessary usage?
These are just some of many possible suggestions on how to ‘kick-start’ our Advent if it hasn’t really started as yet, or is stuttering and spluttering!
Get Started!
“Consider all the past as nothing, and say, like David: ‘Now I begin to love my God!’” (St. Francis de Sales). It was in this manner that the Apostle St. Paul acted; though, after his conversion, he had become a vessel of election, filled with the spirit of Jesus Christ, yet, to persevere and advance along Heaven’s way, he made use of this means, for he said in his Epistle to the Philippians: “Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended. But one thing I do―forgetting the things that are behind, and stretching forth myself to those that are before, I press towards the mark, to the prize of the supernal vocation of God in Christ Jesus.”
The glorious St. Anthony went on from day to day, stimulating himself to virtue. St. Anastasius said of him, that he always looked upon himself as a beginner, as if every day were the first in which he was serving God, and as if in the past he had done nothing good, and were but just setting foot in the way of the Lord, and taking the first steps on the road to Heaven. And this was the very last admonition he left to his monks at his death: “My sons,” he said to them, “if you wish to advance in virtue and perfection, never give up the practice of considering each day that you are then beginning, and of conducting yourselves always as you did on the day you began.”
We find that St. Gregory, St. Bernard, and St. Charles acted likewise and advised others to act in the same manner. To make the necessity and utility of this method clearer to all, they made use of two beautiful comparisons, saying, that we must act in this like travelers, who do not regard the road they have gone over, but, rather, what remains for them to traverse, and this they keep always before their eyes, even to their journey’s end; or, like merchants, eager for riches, who make no account of what they have so far acquired, nor of the fatigue they have borne, but put all their thought and care upon new acquisitions, and upon daily multiplying their possessions, as if in the past they had made no profit at all.
Resolutions, Resolutions and More Resolutions!
St. Francis de Sales stated that: “We must begin with a strong and constant resolution to give ourselves wholly to God, professing to Him, in a tender, loving manner, from the bottom of our hearts, that we intend to be His without any reserve, and then we must often go back and renew this same resolution.”
One of the means for the acquisition of perfection, which was chiefly inculcated and much practiced by St. Philip Neri, was a frequent renewal of good resolutions. St. Francis de Sales made, from time to time, a spiritual renovation, and always conceived in it new desires to serve God better.
St. John Berchmans, at his very entrance into religion, planted in his heart a strong resolution to become a Saint, and then he not only remained constant in all the practices and resolutions which he took up for this end, but he went on daily gaining new vigor to his spiritual advantage.
When a holy Religious was giving the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius in Rome, a nun, called Sr. Marie Bonaventura, who was living a very easy and relaxed life, did not wish to be present. After much effort, she was finally persuaded to attend. The first meditation, on the end of man, enkindled such fervor in her heart, that the priest had scarcely finished when she called him to her, and said: “Father, I intend to be a Saint, and quickly!” She then retired to her cell, and, writing the same words on a scrap of paper, fastened them to the foot of her crucifix. From that moment, she applied herself with so much zeal to the practice of perfection, that a memoir about her was written at her death, which occurred eleven months later.
God Wants Everyone to be Holy—Even the Greatest Sinner
St. Teresa of Avila explains that “The Lord chiefly desires of us that we should be completely perfect, so that we may be wholly one with Him. Let us aim, therefore, at whatever we need to reach this.”
Father Peter Faber, a companion of St. Ignatius, and highly esteemed by St. Francis de Sales, often dwelt on the thought that God greatly desires our advancement. And so he endeavored to grow constantly, and not to let a day pass without some progress in virtue, so that he gradually rose to great perfection and a high reputation for sanctity. St. Pacomius and St. Anthony, by studying the virtues of others, stimulated themselves to attain similar excellence.
The Terraces of Perfection
The Venerable Sister Mary Villani had the following vision. On the Feast of St. Francis, for whom she had a particular devotion, this Saint appeared to her and led her to a lofty place, more beautiful than any she had ever seen.
To reach it, one was obliged to ascend four very high terraces, which signified, as the Saint revealed to her, the four degrees of perfection. We stress here that we are speaking of levels of PERFECTION, and not therefore about the lower levels of the spiritual life, which are the first or lowest level of the Way of Beginners or Way of Purgation; and the middle level or Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way, which leads to the third way, the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way. These four terraces are within the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way.
With great difficulty she ascended, by his help, the first terrace, and he explained to her that this was the first state of perfection, called purity of conscience, which borders on angelic purity. In it the soul becomes like that of a little child, enjoys a pure and holy tranquility, never thinks evil of others, nor interests itself in what does not belong to its own position.
Then he brought her up to the second terrace, telling her that whoever had arrived at purity of conscience, becomes capable of prayer and of true love, which is the inseparable fruit of prayer. Here he enumerated to her the properties of true love, which is pure, simple, unselfish, and founded upon the truth of God, who can give Himself only to souls already possessed of purity.
Then he raised her to the third terrace, that of the cross and mortification, adding that from purity and love the soul passes on to taking up the cross courageously and to being itself crucified, and that to arrive at this state one must acquire four cardinal virtues. These are, a true mortification of all vices and of every earthly affection; a perfect poverty of spirit, which tramples under foot all temporal goods; a living death, by which the soul dies to itself and to all affections of sense, and lives in a total annihilation and transformation into its crucified Lord, so as to be able to say: “I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.” The soul that has gained this state, seems to have conquered the world, and bears sufferings and crosses as if it could no longer feel them.
The fourth terrace, he said, typified the state of real and perfect union. This is the required level for entry into Heaven. There is no exception for anyone, for only saints go to Heaven. This Advent season is a seedbed of sanctity for those who choose to detach themselves from the world and attach themselves more to God through a serious and systematic spiritual life—which is very much different from the common half-hearted, haphazard, part-time spirituality of most souls. Let us for once use Advent profitably!
Article 1
Sunday, December 1st
Wake-Up! It's Advent! Why Are You Sleeping?
Sunday, December 1st
Wake-Up! It's Advent! Why Are You Sleeping?
Advent Alarm!
The words from St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans for the First Sunday of Advent, are like an alarm clock waking us from the sleep of worldliness, lukewarmness and indifference to God: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light.” These words of St. Paul, for the first day of Advent, dovetail well with the Church again quoting St. Paul on the First Sunday Lent: “Behold, now is the acceptable time! Behold, now is the time of salvation!”
Advent is a time of preparation for the “putting on of the Lord Jesus Christ.” It is a time to “cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light” by self-examination, of correction and confession; a time of serious spiritual renewal and rejuvenation, a time of spiritual betterment and improvement, a time of re-assessing our motives and values, a time of preparing the soil of our soul to receive the seed of sanctity that our Savior wants to sow. Basically, it is a time to start really living our Faith and not just sleepily professing it with our lips―“It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep!”
Will Advent Lead to Christ’s Birth in Your Soul?
For mankind to be saved and redeemed, Christ our Savior has to be born into our souls. Nay, perhaps that one word―“born”―will be passed over and looked upon as a routine phrase! Christ wants to be born in our souls, our hearts, our minds, our thoughts, our memories, our hopes, our conversations, our daydreams, our home life, our work life, our social life —in other words, everywhere, in everything, in every moment of our day and night! That is what is meant by the first and greatest commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
The word “Advent” is a compound of two Latin words: “ad” meaning “to” and “venire” meaning “to come”, of which the past participle in Latin is “ventus”. Therefore we see the word “Advent” meaning “to come to”. The Church teaches that first “coming” of Jesus at His birth, is a coming of mercy. His second “coming” will be a coming of justice.
There is no doubt whatsoever that, on the part of Jesus, He truly wants to come to us. He loves us beyond our comprehension and our wildest dreams. There is no problem on the part of Jesus. However, on our side, we have to ask the question: “Do we really want Jesus to come to us?” The stress is on the word “really” ― not just theoretically and not just by lip-service. Do we really and truly want Jesus in our lives? To drive the point home more clearly and to avoid misconceptions, do we really and truly want Jesus to be our life? Notice the words “be our life”, which is different to being “a part of our life.” If we want Jesus to be “a part of our life”, then we only partially want Him—for some that means on Sundays and prayer times only, for others a little more perhaps, but they place a limit on “how much of Jesus they can take.” He wants to be our whole life, not just a part of our life, and that is what is meant by the commandment to love God with our whole mind, heart, soul and strength.
Fruitless Figs
For most Catholics, Jesus is not the life of the soul, but only a part of the soul. We ration out the time we are prepared to give Him. Does that please Him? No! Such persons are like the fig tree that was bearing no fruit in one of Our Lord’s parables―are we like that fig tree? “A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why does it encumber the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And, perhaps happily it will bear fruit, but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-9).
Need Some Dung?
The dresser of the vineyard says that he will dung the fig tree to try and make it bear fruit. What is that “dung” that we need? It is the “dung” of penance. Without it, we shall bear no fruit―as Our Lord said: “I came to call sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10). Are you a sinner? Of course you are―“Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Advent is that time to do penance. The time to heat up our lukewarmness into a fiery zeal; to refocus our blurred indifference into a sharp focus on spiritual matters and our salvation, rather than our relaxation and recreation. So many in the world are so focused on money, wealth, pleasures and treasures, which they see enticing them in the distance, that their farsightedness or long-sightedness prevents them from threading the eye of the needle with the thread of their soul. Their spiritual eyesight is all too blurred and they fail, time and time again, year after year, to use Advent well and pass through the eye of the needle. As Our Lord warned us: “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:24).
Who Needs Dung When You Can Have Fun!
To the Israelites and Jews, God gave all kinds of types, figures and prophecies of the “One Who is to come.” But as history teaches us, by the time Jesus was scheduled to come, most of the people had fallen into a religious superficiality, a spiritual blindness, and lukewarm indifference that left their minds, hearts, soul and strength so weak, that it could not recognize the Truth when it came; and, even though it was charmed and enchanted by the glamour of the shining miracles that Jesus performed, it was to them a sideshow, a superficial attraction, a titillation of the senses, much like Christmas is to most Catholics today. It’s mainly (but not entirely) about fun, presents, parties, visits, food, drink, entertainment, free-time off work and school—but of most, Jesus would say: “Their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8).
“Many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14). Many start on the road to Heaven, but most prefer the broad road that is easy and leads downhill to Hell; few seek and find the narrow, rocky, thorny path that climbs steeply to Heaven (Matthew 7:13-14). God wants all souls to be saved, but most will not be saved, because even though they want the goal (Heaven), they reject the means that get us to Heaven. They create their own ‘make-believe’ religion, where everything is sweet, cozy, comfortable and conformable to worldly values. They forget God’s condemnation of the world: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
To strive for Heaven, means to go AGAINST the current of the world, or the current trends of the world. The underlying goal of the world is to either destroy suffering or to flee suffering. The underlying principle of Christianity is to embrace the Cross and to carry the Cross. The two camps are diametrically opposed. There can be no peace or truce between them. As Holy Scripture says: “What concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever?” (2 Corinthians 6:15).
Unfortunately, it is Belial and the unbeliever who have set the tone for modern day trends to be followed during Advent and Christmas, and the believers like shy, shorn, silenced sheep meekly follow in their footsteps. Hence it is that Jesus and Mary are not loved as much as ‘Joe’ and ‘Sally’ who throw the Christmas party; those visits to the tabernacle lose-out in favor of visits to the modern tabernacles of TV’s, movie-theaters, and computer screens; that possibilities to receive the Bread of Life more often during the Christmas vacation time are passed by in favor of enjoying earthly food and drink at some friend’s or relative’s home.
It takes courage to step off the worldly treadmill and to go back to, what the world would call, a ‘boring hermit-like’ Christmas. It takes courage to stand up in your own family and finally say: “Enough is enough!” It takes courage to comply with Our Lord’s words, where He said:
“He who honors not the Son, honors not the Father, Who has sent Him” (John 5:23) and “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven. Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:32-38).
Christ’s religion is a demanding religion. It is not a religion that has been purged of all suffering and all confrontation. It takes a certain courage to follow Him, but, throughout history, that courage and grace has been given to the old and the young; to the strong and the weak; to men, to women and to young children; to good persons and to sinners; to the brave and to the faint-hearted. All that Our Lord required was good will and a sincere desire to comply with His demands. Some may be discouraged, as the Apostles were discouraged when, after the young man, with great possessions, would not follow Jesus, but walked away, and the Apostles heard Jesus say it would be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of needle than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. If you are searching for the riches of this world, then most likely you will not find the riches of Heaven.
Sleep and the Unpleasant
We speak of “burying our heads in the sand” when we want to ignore something that is unpleasant. Sleep is one way of “burying your head in the sand”―or burying your head under the bed-sheets! Sometimes, when faced with a difficult day, you just don’t want to get out of bed―wishing that you could escape the difficult day by sleeping through it. Sometimes people sleep as a way to avoid facing life. Sleep escapism is when someone sleeps too much to avoid facing life’s challenges or difficult emotions. We want to escape reality by sleeping through it. The body can experience sleepiness after going into “fight, flight, or freeze” mode when encountering a stressful situation. This is an automatic physiological response the nervous system produces as a survival mechanism, where hormones are released into the body during a stress response.
As one person writes: “My mind developed a mechanism to use sleep as a means of escapism. I noticed that I loved night time, because I would sleep and I wouldn’t need to be reminded of many things. I wouldn’t need to be conscious of everything―even if it was for a few hours―and I anticipated those hours of sleep. Prior to this, my escape mechanism had been ‘living in my imagination’ so I wondered what this new thing was―because using sleep as a means of escaping reality seemed strange, yet it brought a sense of peace. It felt automatic―if I was sad or feeling any negative way, the thought of sleeping would come and it felt good. If something bad had happened to me, I’d remind myself that I could sleep and not remember it for few hours. It brought so much relief to me, even if it was temporary. I enjoyed the relief so much, sleep was like Heaven to me. The thought of not being conscious about anything, made me so happy and when morning would come, I would be so afraid and sad. I hated mornings, I hated waking up, I hated being conscious again, sometimes I still do. I prefer sleeping and not being awake. Call me a coward―it’s fine―but I love to sleep everything away even though I know it’s just temporary. I don’t want to die, but I don’t want to wake up either.”
“I’ve realized and it’s that we all have our different escape mechanisms. For me one time it was my mind, I lived in my illusions, I created things that weren’t real but made myself believe that they were real, I created an entirely different world in my mind, a perfect world, a perfect life and I would hide in these illusions and indeed they brought me relief but only for a short period of time. Eventually someone would come and disrupt my little world of fantasy and it was only a matter of time before I came back to reality. Even now, it’s tempting to still fall back to those times, for me it was sort of an addiction, I’d probably call it addiction to illusions. Sometimes it’s tempting to fall back to those times and create a world that doesn’t exist but with conscious effort I don’t, I remind myself that those things are not real and this is the real life.”
On this First Sunday of Advent, Holy Mother Church tells us that it is time to wake-up and get our bed and face the reality of the day: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light.” (St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans for the First Sunday of Advent).
Our salvation is at risk, our salvation is in danger―especially in these modern times. If, at the best of times, the saints have told us that most souls are damned [read more here]―then what must it be like in our times!!!? We cannot bury our heads in the sand to try and ignore that reality and truth! We cannot sleep away reality―if we try to do so, we will wake up in Hell. As the reading from the Mass for the First Sunday in Advent says: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed!” If you are elderly, then death waits for you not too far along the road. Even if you are younger, or even young, the current world crisis threatens to spill over into a World War and that means a whole lot of people are doing to die a long time before they expected to die―even young children among them. Hence it is that Holy Mother Church presents to us the following “End Times” Gospel reading from St. Luke on the First Sunday of Advent―and also last week, on the Last Sunday of the Liturgical Year from the Gospel of St. Matthew).
First Sunday of Advent: “There will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, and upon the Earth distress of nations, bewildered by the roaring of sea and waves; men fainting for fear and for expectation of the things that are coming on the world―for the powers of Heaven will be shaken. And then they will see the Son of Man coming upon a cloud with great power and majesty. But when these things begin to come to pass, look up, and lift up your heads, because your redemption is at hand. And He spoke to them a parable. Behold the fig tree, and all the trees. When they now put forth their buds, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see these things coming to pass, know that the Kingdom of God is near.” (Gospel reading on the First Sunday of Advent; from Luke 21:25-32).
Last Sunday of the Liturgical Year: “At that time, Jesus said to His disciples: ‘When you see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place ― let him who reads understand ― then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains; and let him who is on the housetop not go down to take anything from his house; and let him who is in the field not turn back to take his cloak. But woe to those who are with child, or have infants at the breast in those days! But pray that your flight may not be in the winter, or on the Sabbath! For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, nor will be. And unless those days had been shortened, no living creature would be saved. But, for the sake of the elect, those days will be shortened. Then if anyone say to you: ‘Behold, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There He is!’ ― do not believe it! For false christs and false prophets will arise, and will show great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. Behold, I have told it to you beforehand! If therefore they say to you: ‘Behold, He is in the desert!’ do not go forth; or ‘Behold, He is in the inner chambers!’ do not believe it. For as the lightning comes forth from the east and shines even to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. Wherever the body is, there will the eagles be gathered together. But immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give her light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of heaven will be shaken. And then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven; and then will all tribes of the Earth mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming upon the clouds of Heaven with great power and majesty. And He will send forth His angels with a trumpet and a great sound, and they will gather His elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other. Now from the fig tree learn this parable. When its branch is now tender, and the leaves break forth, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see all these things, know that it is near, even at the door!” (Gospel reading on the Last Sunday of the Liturgical Year; from Matthew 24:15-33).
Our Lady echoes this in her warnings to us: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals]. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost … Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned ... Nature is asking for vengeance on account of men, and she trembles, with dread, at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime! ... The seasons will be altered, the Earth, the stars will lose their regular motion, the moon will only reflect a faint reddish glow. Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains and cities.
Their sins will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy ... There will be bloody wars and famines, plagues and infectious diseases ... France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war ... For a time, God will cease to remember France and Italy, because the Gospel of Jesus Christ has been forgotten ... Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian ... Men will kill and massacre each other, even in their homes … Blood will flow in the streets. Then a general war will follow which will be appalling. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy ... Blood will flow on all sides ... There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. People will believe that all is lost! … Nations will be annihilated … A number of large cities will be shaken down, shattered and swallowed up by earthquakes ... Paris will be burned and Marseilles will be swallowed-up ... The Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will strike in an unprecedented way. God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other. The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God. (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
What Does This Mean Here and Now?
What does all this mean for us today? Well, today is not only the beginning of Advent, it is also the beginning of the days you have left to the end of your life. It is the beginning of your journey to salvation, or your journey to damnation. Yes―most souls are damned. However, God wishes the salvation of EVERY SINGLE SOUL that He created: “God will have [“to will” means “to want”] all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). Here God speaks of damnation (death) and salvation (life). We only die once, but Hell is called a “second death” or an “eternal death” in the sense that the souls in Hell are eternally dead to God and have no love, but only hatred towards Him. “It is appointed unto men to die once, and after this comes the judgment” (Hebrews 9:27) … “But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, they shall have their portion in the pool burning with fire and brimstone, which is the second death” (Apocalypse 21:8) … “Blessed and holy is he that has part in the first resurrection. In these the second death has no power” (Apocalypse 20:6).
Thus, we see that God wants all souls to be saved. “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “The Father sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). So why is it that most souls are damned? They are damned―not because God is at fault, not because of God’s negligence, not because of a failure on the part of God―they are damned through their own fault, their own negligence and their own failure. They slept their way through life dreaming that they would get to Heaven―only to wake-up and find themselves in Hell. They lost valuable time in their vain dreams and illusions, being asleep to God, but wide-awake to the world and themselves. They wasted time on the world and themselves―time which should have been given to God and working-out their own salvation: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12).
Holy Scripture warns us: “Take ye heed―watch and pray! For ye know not when the time is! Watch ye therefore―for you know not when the Lord comes, He finds you sleeping!” (Mark 13:33-36). “How long will you sleep, O sluggard? When will you rise out of your sleep?” (Proverbs 6:9). “Why are you fast asleep? Rise up! Call upon God, so that we may not perish!” (Jonas 1:6). “Love not sleep!” (Proverbs 20:13) … “Let us not sleep, as others do; but let us watch!” (1 Thessalonians 5:6). “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep! For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed!” (Romans 13:11). The words that Jesus addressed to Peter, James and John in the Garden of Gethsemane, can also be applied to many of us: “Jesus came and found them sleeping. And He said to Peter: ‘Simon, are you sleeping? Could you not watch one hour? Watch and pray so that you do not enter into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak!’” (Mark 14:37).
CINO Catholics
The vast majority of Catholics today have been lulled to sleep by the world. They no longer see the world as an enemy of God. They bury their heads in the sand to ignore Scriptural quotes such as: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). This vast majority of world loving Catholics risk joining the vast majority of souls that end up being damned! They are “CINOs” ― Catholics In Name Only ― whose attitude Our Lord condemns, saying: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:16-21) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Woe to you hypocrites; because you make the outside of the cup and of the dish look clean, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness” (Matthew 23:25).
Our Lady spoke of such souls to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Sinners are asleep and perfectly at ease as to their ruin, when they ought justly to fear and take heed of the swiftly approaching eternal death … Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. Men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. They are lovers of earthly riches. They seek gold and silver with great anxiety, sleeplessness, labors and sweat. They are thus weighed down acquiring riches. Let the countless numbers that have fallen into Hell proclaim it. Souls, who are in the religious life, are sunk in sleepy forgetfulness of their high blessing and lead a life more listless and lax than many worldly men! How great is the necessity of not falling asleep in the midst of so many dangers! Rouse yourself and live always in watchfulness and preparation for the attacks of the enemies, who never sleep. Let your meditation day and night be, how you can avoid losing the highest Good, which you love. It is not befitting that you sleep or slumber in the midst of invisible enemies! God wishes the creature never relax in vigilance, nor trust in its own strength, nor ever be remiss in asking and desiring His help―for without it, man can do nothing and will soon perish! Imperfect human nature takes occasion of the slightest circumstance to relax its vigilance! You must live with great vigilance and caution! It suffices to remind you of your soft and yielding nature, which your enemies will strive to make use of for your destruction. I warn thee again of the cunning vigilance of the serpent, who seeks to induce mortals to neglect the veneration and worship due to God … For your enemy and adversary is laboring with ceaseless vigilance to obscure your understanding in order to lead you to a forgetfulness of the divine law.”
Take Your Salvation Seriously―Or You Will Be In Serious Trouble!
As the Epistle reading for the First Sunday of Advent clearly stated: “Our salvation is nearer than we believed!” However, nobody is guaranteed salvation―and we know that most souls end up being damned. When Our Lord was asked: “‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ Jesus said: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14). Our Lady echoed this on several occasions. At Fatima she said: “Many souls go to Hell!” To the Venerable Mary of Agreda she revealed: “How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! I will not tell you how many souls are lost, in order to not cause you to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!”
That is why Holy Scripture tells us: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). The sin of presumption is the expectation of salvation without taking the necessary steps to obtain it, or expecting pardon for sins without repenting of them. It is a reliance on God's mercy and power without doing anything to deserve salvation. The sin of presumption starts out with committing small sins presuming that God will forgive them without sincere repentance―it is an easy trap to fall into. To decide to sin is to offend God. To decide to sin because one knows that he can be forgiven―is to sin twice. It is using and abusing God, reducing him to a mere utility at the service of our whim. It is to laugh at His passion and death. The sin of presumption starts out with committing small sins presuming that God will forgive them. But over time our conscience will become dulled to sin and we will be led to presume that God will forgive our mortal sins. However, at that point, because of our presumption, we will be missing the necessary condition for the forgiveness of mortal sins: sorrow for our sin and a firm purpose of amendment. We don’t really desire to amend and our sorrow is imperfect―we merely use the confessional like a car-wash and then go and drive through the mud all over again, knowing that we can always for back and wash the car once more. Wake up! No firm purpose of amendment invalidates your confession!
The words from St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans for the First Sunday of Advent, are like an alarm clock waking us from the sleep of worldliness, lukewarmness and indifference to God: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light.” These words of St. Paul, for the first day of Advent, dovetail well with the Church again quoting St. Paul on the First Sunday Lent: “Behold, now is the acceptable time! Behold, now is the time of salvation!”
Advent is a time of preparation for the “putting on of the Lord Jesus Christ.” It is a time to “cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light” by self-examination, of correction and confession; a time of serious spiritual renewal and rejuvenation, a time of spiritual betterment and improvement, a time of re-assessing our motives and values, a time of preparing the soil of our soul to receive the seed of sanctity that our Savior wants to sow. Basically, it is a time to start really living our Faith and not just sleepily professing it with our lips―“It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep!”
Will Advent Lead to Christ’s Birth in Your Soul?
For mankind to be saved and redeemed, Christ our Savior has to be born into our souls. Nay, perhaps that one word―“born”―will be passed over and looked upon as a routine phrase! Christ wants to be born in our souls, our hearts, our minds, our thoughts, our memories, our hopes, our conversations, our daydreams, our home life, our work life, our social life —in other words, everywhere, in everything, in every moment of our day and night! That is what is meant by the first and greatest commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
The word “Advent” is a compound of two Latin words: “ad” meaning “to” and “venire” meaning “to come”, of which the past participle in Latin is “ventus”. Therefore we see the word “Advent” meaning “to come to”. The Church teaches that first “coming” of Jesus at His birth, is a coming of mercy. His second “coming” will be a coming of justice.
There is no doubt whatsoever that, on the part of Jesus, He truly wants to come to us. He loves us beyond our comprehension and our wildest dreams. There is no problem on the part of Jesus. However, on our side, we have to ask the question: “Do we really want Jesus to come to us?” The stress is on the word “really” ― not just theoretically and not just by lip-service. Do we really and truly want Jesus in our lives? To drive the point home more clearly and to avoid misconceptions, do we really and truly want Jesus to be our life? Notice the words “be our life”, which is different to being “a part of our life.” If we want Jesus to be “a part of our life”, then we only partially want Him—for some that means on Sundays and prayer times only, for others a little more perhaps, but they place a limit on “how much of Jesus they can take.” He wants to be our whole life, not just a part of our life, and that is what is meant by the commandment to love God with our whole mind, heart, soul and strength.
Fruitless Figs
For most Catholics, Jesus is not the life of the soul, but only a part of the soul. We ration out the time we are prepared to give Him. Does that please Him? No! Such persons are like the fig tree that was bearing no fruit in one of Our Lord’s parables―are we like that fig tree? “A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why does it encumber the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And, perhaps happily it will bear fruit, but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-9).
Need Some Dung?
The dresser of the vineyard says that he will dung the fig tree to try and make it bear fruit. What is that “dung” that we need? It is the “dung” of penance. Without it, we shall bear no fruit―as Our Lord said: “I came to call sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5; 15:7-10). Are you a sinner? Of course you are―“Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For in many things we all offend” (James 3:2). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Advent is that time to do penance. The time to heat up our lukewarmness into a fiery zeal; to refocus our blurred indifference into a sharp focus on spiritual matters and our salvation, rather than our relaxation and recreation. So many in the world are so focused on money, wealth, pleasures and treasures, which they see enticing them in the distance, that their farsightedness or long-sightedness prevents them from threading the eye of the needle with the thread of their soul. Their spiritual eyesight is all too blurred and they fail, time and time again, year after year, to use Advent well and pass through the eye of the needle. As Our Lord warned us: “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:24).
Who Needs Dung When You Can Have Fun!
To the Israelites and Jews, God gave all kinds of types, figures and prophecies of the “One Who is to come.” But as history teaches us, by the time Jesus was scheduled to come, most of the people had fallen into a religious superficiality, a spiritual blindness, and lukewarm indifference that left their minds, hearts, soul and strength so weak, that it could not recognize the Truth when it came; and, even though it was charmed and enchanted by the glamour of the shining miracles that Jesus performed, it was to them a sideshow, a superficial attraction, a titillation of the senses, much like Christmas is to most Catholics today. It’s mainly (but not entirely) about fun, presents, parties, visits, food, drink, entertainment, free-time off work and school—but of most, Jesus would say: “Their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8).
“Many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14). Many start on the road to Heaven, but most prefer the broad road that is easy and leads downhill to Hell; few seek and find the narrow, rocky, thorny path that climbs steeply to Heaven (Matthew 7:13-14). God wants all souls to be saved, but most will not be saved, because even though they want the goal (Heaven), they reject the means that get us to Heaven. They create their own ‘make-believe’ religion, where everything is sweet, cozy, comfortable and conformable to worldly values. They forget God’s condemnation of the world: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
To strive for Heaven, means to go AGAINST the current of the world, or the current trends of the world. The underlying goal of the world is to either destroy suffering or to flee suffering. The underlying principle of Christianity is to embrace the Cross and to carry the Cross. The two camps are diametrically opposed. There can be no peace or truce between them. As Holy Scripture says: “What concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever?” (2 Corinthians 6:15).
Unfortunately, it is Belial and the unbeliever who have set the tone for modern day trends to be followed during Advent and Christmas, and the believers like shy, shorn, silenced sheep meekly follow in their footsteps. Hence it is that Jesus and Mary are not loved as much as ‘Joe’ and ‘Sally’ who throw the Christmas party; those visits to the tabernacle lose-out in favor of visits to the modern tabernacles of TV’s, movie-theaters, and computer screens; that possibilities to receive the Bread of Life more often during the Christmas vacation time are passed by in favor of enjoying earthly food and drink at some friend’s or relative’s home.
It takes courage to step off the worldly treadmill and to go back to, what the world would call, a ‘boring hermit-like’ Christmas. It takes courage to stand up in your own family and finally say: “Enough is enough!” It takes courage to comply with Our Lord’s words, where He said:
“He who honors not the Son, honors not the Father, Who has sent Him” (John 5:23) and “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven. Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:32-38).
Christ’s religion is a demanding religion. It is not a religion that has been purged of all suffering and all confrontation. It takes a certain courage to follow Him, but, throughout history, that courage and grace has been given to the old and the young; to the strong and the weak; to men, to women and to young children; to good persons and to sinners; to the brave and to the faint-hearted. All that Our Lord required was good will and a sincere desire to comply with His demands. Some may be discouraged, as the Apostles were discouraged when, after the young man, with great possessions, would not follow Jesus, but walked away, and the Apostles heard Jesus say it would be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of needle than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. If you are searching for the riches of this world, then most likely you will not find the riches of Heaven.
Sleep and the Unpleasant
We speak of “burying our heads in the sand” when we want to ignore something that is unpleasant. Sleep is one way of “burying your head in the sand”―or burying your head under the bed-sheets! Sometimes, when faced with a difficult day, you just don’t want to get out of bed―wishing that you could escape the difficult day by sleeping through it. Sometimes people sleep as a way to avoid facing life. Sleep escapism is when someone sleeps too much to avoid facing life’s challenges or difficult emotions. We want to escape reality by sleeping through it. The body can experience sleepiness after going into “fight, flight, or freeze” mode when encountering a stressful situation. This is an automatic physiological response the nervous system produces as a survival mechanism, where hormones are released into the body during a stress response.
As one person writes: “My mind developed a mechanism to use sleep as a means of escapism. I noticed that I loved night time, because I would sleep and I wouldn’t need to be reminded of many things. I wouldn’t need to be conscious of everything―even if it was for a few hours―and I anticipated those hours of sleep. Prior to this, my escape mechanism had been ‘living in my imagination’ so I wondered what this new thing was―because using sleep as a means of escaping reality seemed strange, yet it brought a sense of peace. It felt automatic―if I was sad or feeling any negative way, the thought of sleeping would come and it felt good. If something bad had happened to me, I’d remind myself that I could sleep and not remember it for few hours. It brought so much relief to me, even if it was temporary. I enjoyed the relief so much, sleep was like Heaven to me. The thought of not being conscious about anything, made me so happy and when morning would come, I would be so afraid and sad. I hated mornings, I hated waking up, I hated being conscious again, sometimes I still do. I prefer sleeping and not being awake. Call me a coward―it’s fine―but I love to sleep everything away even though I know it’s just temporary. I don’t want to die, but I don’t want to wake up either.”
“I’ve realized and it’s that we all have our different escape mechanisms. For me one time it was my mind, I lived in my illusions, I created things that weren’t real but made myself believe that they were real, I created an entirely different world in my mind, a perfect world, a perfect life and I would hide in these illusions and indeed they brought me relief but only for a short period of time. Eventually someone would come and disrupt my little world of fantasy and it was only a matter of time before I came back to reality. Even now, it’s tempting to still fall back to those times, for me it was sort of an addiction, I’d probably call it addiction to illusions. Sometimes it’s tempting to fall back to those times and create a world that doesn’t exist but with conscious effort I don’t, I remind myself that those things are not real and this is the real life.”
On this First Sunday of Advent, Holy Mother Church tells us that it is time to wake-up and get our bed and face the reality of the day: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light.” (St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans for the First Sunday of Advent).
Our salvation is at risk, our salvation is in danger―especially in these modern times. If, at the best of times, the saints have told us that most souls are damned [read more here]―then what must it be like in our times!!!? We cannot bury our heads in the sand to try and ignore that reality and truth! We cannot sleep away reality―if we try to do so, we will wake up in Hell. As the reading from the Mass for the First Sunday in Advent says: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed!” If you are elderly, then death waits for you not too far along the road. Even if you are younger, or even young, the current world crisis threatens to spill over into a World War and that means a whole lot of people are doing to die a long time before they expected to die―even young children among them. Hence it is that Holy Mother Church presents to us the following “End Times” Gospel reading from St. Luke on the First Sunday of Advent―and also last week, on the Last Sunday of the Liturgical Year from the Gospel of St. Matthew).
First Sunday of Advent: “There will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, and upon the Earth distress of nations, bewildered by the roaring of sea and waves; men fainting for fear and for expectation of the things that are coming on the world―for the powers of Heaven will be shaken. And then they will see the Son of Man coming upon a cloud with great power and majesty. But when these things begin to come to pass, look up, and lift up your heads, because your redemption is at hand. And He spoke to them a parable. Behold the fig tree, and all the trees. When they now put forth their buds, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see these things coming to pass, know that the Kingdom of God is near.” (Gospel reading on the First Sunday of Advent; from Luke 21:25-32).
Last Sunday of the Liturgical Year: “At that time, Jesus said to His disciples: ‘When you see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place ― let him who reads understand ― then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains; and let him who is on the housetop not go down to take anything from his house; and let him who is in the field not turn back to take his cloak. But woe to those who are with child, or have infants at the breast in those days! But pray that your flight may not be in the winter, or on the Sabbath! For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, nor will be. And unless those days had been shortened, no living creature would be saved. But, for the sake of the elect, those days will be shortened. Then if anyone say to you: ‘Behold, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There He is!’ ― do not believe it! For false christs and false prophets will arise, and will show great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. Behold, I have told it to you beforehand! If therefore they say to you: ‘Behold, He is in the desert!’ do not go forth; or ‘Behold, He is in the inner chambers!’ do not believe it. For as the lightning comes forth from the east and shines even to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. Wherever the body is, there will the eagles be gathered together. But immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give her light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of heaven will be shaken. And then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven; and then will all tribes of the Earth mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming upon the clouds of Heaven with great power and majesty. And He will send forth His angels with a trumpet and a great sound, and they will gather His elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other. Now from the fig tree learn this parable. When its branch is now tender, and the leaves break forth, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see all these things, know that it is near, even at the door!” (Gospel reading on the Last Sunday of the Liturgical Year; from Matthew 24:15-33).
Our Lady echoes this in her warnings to us: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals]. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost … Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned ... Nature is asking for vengeance on account of men, and she trembles, with dread, at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime! ... The seasons will be altered, the Earth, the stars will lose their regular motion, the moon will only reflect a faint reddish glow. Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains and cities.
Their sins will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy ... There will be bloody wars and famines, plagues and infectious diseases ... France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war ... For a time, God will cease to remember France and Italy, because the Gospel of Jesus Christ has been forgotten ... Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian ... Men will kill and massacre each other, even in their homes … Blood will flow in the streets. Then a general war will follow which will be appalling. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy ... Blood will flow on all sides ... There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. People will believe that all is lost! … Nations will be annihilated … A number of large cities will be shaken down, shattered and swallowed up by earthquakes ... Paris will be burned and Marseilles will be swallowed-up ... The Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will strike in an unprecedented way. God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other. The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God. (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
What Does This Mean Here and Now?
What does all this mean for us today? Well, today is not only the beginning of Advent, it is also the beginning of the days you have left to the end of your life. It is the beginning of your journey to salvation, or your journey to damnation. Yes―most souls are damned. However, God wishes the salvation of EVERY SINGLE SOUL that He created: “God will have [“to will” means “to want”] all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). Here God speaks of damnation (death) and salvation (life). We only die once, but Hell is called a “second death” or an “eternal death” in the sense that the souls in Hell are eternally dead to God and have no love, but only hatred towards Him. “It is appointed unto men to die once, and after this comes the judgment” (Hebrews 9:27) … “But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, they shall have their portion in the pool burning with fire and brimstone, which is the second death” (Apocalypse 21:8) … “Blessed and holy is he that has part in the first resurrection. In these the second death has no power” (Apocalypse 20:6).
Thus, we see that God wants all souls to be saved. “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “The Father sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). So why is it that most souls are damned? They are damned―not because God is at fault, not because of God’s negligence, not because of a failure on the part of God―they are damned through their own fault, their own negligence and their own failure. They slept their way through life dreaming that they would get to Heaven―only to wake-up and find themselves in Hell. They lost valuable time in their vain dreams and illusions, being asleep to God, but wide-awake to the world and themselves. They wasted time on the world and themselves―time which should have been given to God and working-out their own salvation: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12).
Holy Scripture warns us: “Take ye heed―watch and pray! For ye know not when the time is! Watch ye therefore―for you know not when the Lord comes, He finds you sleeping!” (Mark 13:33-36). “How long will you sleep, O sluggard? When will you rise out of your sleep?” (Proverbs 6:9). “Why are you fast asleep? Rise up! Call upon God, so that we may not perish!” (Jonas 1:6). “Love not sleep!” (Proverbs 20:13) … “Let us not sleep, as others do; but let us watch!” (1 Thessalonians 5:6). “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep! For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed!” (Romans 13:11). The words that Jesus addressed to Peter, James and John in the Garden of Gethsemane, can also be applied to many of us: “Jesus came and found them sleeping. And He said to Peter: ‘Simon, are you sleeping? Could you not watch one hour? Watch and pray so that you do not enter into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak!’” (Mark 14:37).
CINO Catholics
The vast majority of Catholics today have been lulled to sleep by the world. They no longer see the world as an enemy of God. They bury their heads in the sand to ignore Scriptural quotes such as: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). This vast majority of world loving Catholics risk joining the vast majority of souls that end up being damned! They are “CINOs” ― Catholics In Name Only ― whose attitude Our Lord condemns, saying: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:16-21) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Woe to you hypocrites; because you make the outside of the cup and of the dish look clean, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness” (Matthew 23:25).
Our Lady spoke of such souls to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Sinners are asleep and perfectly at ease as to their ruin, when they ought justly to fear and take heed of the swiftly approaching eternal death … Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. Men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. They are lovers of earthly riches. They seek gold and silver with great anxiety, sleeplessness, labors and sweat. They are thus weighed down acquiring riches. Let the countless numbers that have fallen into Hell proclaim it. Souls, who are in the religious life, are sunk in sleepy forgetfulness of their high blessing and lead a life more listless and lax than many worldly men! How great is the necessity of not falling asleep in the midst of so many dangers! Rouse yourself and live always in watchfulness and preparation for the attacks of the enemies, who never sleep. Let your meditation day and night be, how you can avoid losing the highest Good, which you love. It is not befitting that you sleep or slumber in the midst of invisible enemies! God wishes the creature never relax in vigilance, nor trust in its own strength, nor ever be remiss in asking and desiring His help―for without it, man can do nothing and will soon perish! Imperfect human nature takes occasion of the slightest circumstance to relax its vigilance! You must live with great vigilance and caution! It suffices to remind you of your soft and yielding nature, which your enemies will strive to make use of for your destruction. I warn thee again of the cunning vigilance of the serpent, who seeks to induce mortals to neglect the veneration and worship due to God … For your enemy and adversary is laboring with ceaseless vigilance to obscure your understanding in order to lead you to a forgetfulness of the divine law.”
Take Your Salvation Seriously―Or You Will Be In Serious Trouble!
As the Epistle reading for the First Sunday of Advent clearly stated: “Our salvation is nearer than we believed!” However, nobody is guaranteed salvation―and we know that most souls end up being damned. When Our Lord was asked: “‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ Jesus said: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14). Our Lady echoed this on several occasions. At Fatima she said: “Many souls go to Hell!” To the Venerable Mary of Agreda she revealed: “How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! I will not tell you how many souls are lost, in order to not cause you to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!”
That is why Holy Scripture tells us: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). The sin of presumption is the expectation of salvation without taking the necessary steps to obtain it, or expecting pardon for sins without repenting of them. It is a reliance on God's mercy and power without doing anything to deserve salvation. The sin of presumption starts out with committing small sins presuming that God will forgive them without sincere repentance―it is an easy trap to fall into. To decide to sin is to offend God. To decide to sin because one knows that he can be forgiven―is to sin twice. It is using and abusing God, reducing him to a mere utility at the service of our whim. It is to laugh at His passion and death. The sin of presumption starts out with committing small sins presuming that God will forgive them. But over time our conscience will become dulled to sin and we will be led to presume that God will forgive our mortal sins. However, at that point, because of our presumption, we will be missing the necessary condition for the forgiveness of mortal sins: sorrow for our sin and a firm purpose of amendment. We don’t really desire to amend and our sorrow is imperfect―we merely use the confessional like a car-wash and then go and drive through the mud all over again, knowing that we can always for back and wash the car once more. Wake up! No firm purpose of amendment invalidates your confession!
Article 23
Saturday, November 30th
Making a Success of Advent
Saturday, November 30th
Making a Success of Advent
Time Waits for Nobody―Make Time for Advent
Adam lived to the ripe old age of 930 years! Our Lord died aged around 33 years. Our Lady is said to have died in her early to mid-sixties. St. Dominic Savio died aged 14 years. St. Maria Goretti was 11 years old when she was killed. Little Blessed Francisco of Fatima was only 10 years old when he died; Blessed Jacinta, his sister was only 9 years old. The Venerable Anne de Guigné was 10 years old.
Time waits for nobody. Time is precious. Time means more than money. Time and how it is spent, means the difference between Heaven and Hell. Death is the most untimely thing around. Death respects no one. Even in the forthcoming chastisement of which Our Lady has warned us, time and time again, she says that the good will die with the bad; and neither will priests be spared, but they will die with the laity.
Time is Precious―Advent is Precious
That is why our time is so precious. That is why the Church chooses the words of St. Paul to open the season of Advent, the time of mercy, so that we can receive, plant, nurture and grow the spirit of Christ in our souls, and so prepare favorably for the time of our Final Judgment, when the time of mercy will cease, and the time of Justice will have arrived. Those words of St. Paul that open Advent season for us are:
“It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day: not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and impurities, not in contention and envy: but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 13:11-14).
Advent is a time of preparation for the “putting on of the Lord Jesus Christ.” It is a time of self-examination, of correction and confession; a time of serious spiritual renewal and rejuvenation, a time of spiritual betterment and improvement, a time of re-assessing our motives and values, a time of preparing the soil of our soul to receive the seed of sanctity that our Savior wants to sow.
It is not a frivolous time; it is not a time of worldly worry over the material and social side of Christmas. It was this material preoccupation at the lucrative time of the Emperor Caesar Augustus’ census and the ‘tourist’ swelling of Bethlehem as people returned to register, that blinded the Bethlehemites to the True Treasure that had arrived on their doorsteps disguised as poverty and hidden in Mary’s womb.
Too Materialistic―Not Spiritual Enough
They thought they were rich, but in reality they were very poor. They thought Mary and Joseph were poor, but they were the richest people in Heaven and earth. They carried the only thing that really matters; the Bethlehemites sought many things but missed the one essential thing.
Ultimately, you will reap what you sow: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8) … “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
When we total up the man-hours spent on the material and social side of Advent and its successor, Christmas, and then compare it to the man-hours that will have been spent on the spiritual side of Advent and Christmas, then I think most people would have to blush with shame—as they will on Judgment Day. Then the King will say to them:
“Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry, and you gave Me not to eat: I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink. I was a stranger, and you took Me not in: naked, and you covered Me not: sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me” (Matthew 25:41-43).
Harsh? Well, Our Lord complained of the lukewarmness, indifference, coldness and sacrilege of many souls to St. Margaret Mary, in his apparitions to her from 1673-1675. And the fruit of lukewarmness is clearly stated in the Book of the Apocalypse:
“I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth. Because thou sayest: I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing: and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel thee to buy of me gold fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
That Dirty Word―Penance!
Advent is that time to do penance. The time to heat up our lukewarmness into a fiery zeal; to refocus our blurred indifference into a sharp focus on spiritual matters and our salvation, rather than our relaxation and recreation. So many of the world are so focused on money, wealth, pleasures and treasures that they see enticing them in the distance, that their farsightedness or long-sightedness prevents them from threading the eye of the needle with the thread of their soul. Their spiritual eyesight is all too blurred and they fail, time and time again, year after year, to use Advent well and pass through the eye of the needle. As Our Lord warned us: “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:24).
In fact, it is worth reading the whole passage, for its context is very typical of the Advent-Christmas mentality seen in today’s modern world.
“Behold one came and said to Him: ‘Good master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ ... The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth―what is still lacking to me?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven―and then come follow Me.’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad―for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven’” (Matthew 19:16-24).
Don’t Sleep Through Advent!
So, to borrow the Church’s other opening line, from the season of Lent, when the Church again quotes St. Paul, saying: “Behold, now is the acceptable time! Behold, now is the time of salvation!” Which dovetails with the words quoted above from St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans for the First Sunday of Advent: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light.”
The Light of World is coming, let us not sleep without having prepared our lamps, like the foolish virgins, who were without oil at the crucial time when the Bridegroom came, and, while they were scurrying to buy some, they were locked-out of the feast. Now is the acceptable time, now is the hour to fill the lamps of our souls with the spiritual oil needed to have a truly happy, holy and blessed Christmas. Noe did not build his ark at the last minute, but took much time to build it well. Let us do the same this Advent. Let us not worry about “sitting down to eat and drink, and rising up to play” (Exodus 32:6; 1 Corinthians 10:7), but let us rather “sit down to read and think, and kneel down to pray.”
Adam lived to the ripe old age of 930 years! Our Lord died aged around 33 years. Our Lady is said to have died in her early to mid-sixties. St. Dominic Savio died aged 14 years. St. Maria Goretti was 11 years old when she was killed. Little Blessed Francisco of Fatima was only 10 years old when he died; Blessed Jacinta, his sister was only 9 years old. The Venerable Anne de Guigné was 10 years old.
Time waits for nobody. Time is precious. Time means more than money. Time and how it is spent, means the difference between Heaven and Hell. Death is the most untimely thing around. Death respects no one. Even in the forthcoming chastisement of which Our Lady has warned us, time and time again, she says that the good will die with the bad; and neither will priests be spared, but they will die with the laity.
Time is Precious―Advent is Precious
That is why our time is so precious. That is why the Church chooses the words of St. Paul to open the season of Advent, the time of mercy, so that we can receive, plant, nurture and grow the spirit of Christ in our souls, and so prepare favorably for the time of our Final Judgment, when the time of mercy will cease, and the time of Justice will have arrived. Those words of St. Paul that open Advent season for us are:
“It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day: not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and impurities, not in contention and envy: but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 13:11-14).
Advent is a time of preparation for the “putting on of the Lord Jesus Christ.” It is a time of self-examination, of correction and confession; a time of serious spiritual renewal and rejuvenation, a time of spiritual betterment and improvement, a time of re-assessing our motives and values, a time of preparing the soil of our soul to receive the seed of sanctity that our Savior wants to sow.
It is not a frivolous time; it is not a time of worldly worry over the material and social side of Christmas. It was this material preoccupation at the lucrative time of the Emperor Caesar Augustus’ census and the ‘tourist’ swelling of Bethlehem as people returned to register, that blinded the Bethlehemites to the True Treasure that had arrived on their doorsteps disguised as poverty and hidden in Mary’s womb.
Too Materialistic―Not Spiritual Enough
They thought they were rich, but in reality they were very poor. They thought Mary and Joseph were poor, but they were the richest people in Heaven and earth. They carried the only thing that really matters; the Bethlehemites sought many things but missed the one essential thing.
Ultimately, you will reap what you sow: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8) … “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
When we total up the man-hours spent on the material and social side of Advent and its successor, Christmas, and then compare it to the man-hours that will have been spent on the spiritual side of Advent and Christmas, then I think most people would have to blush with shame—as they will on Judgment Day. Then the King will say to them:
“Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry, and you gave Me not to eat: I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink. I was a stranger, and you took Me not in: naked, and you covered Me not: sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me” (Matthew 25:41-43).
Harsh? Well, Our Lord complained of the lukewarmness, indifference, coldness and sacrilege of many souls to St. Margaret Mary, in his apparitions to her from 1673-1675. And the fruit of lukewarmness is clearly stated in the Book of the Apocalypse:
“I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth. Because thou sayest: I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing: and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel thee to buy of me gold fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
That Dirty Word―Penance!
Advent is that time to do penance. The time to heat up our lukewarmness into a fiery zeal; to refocus our blurred indifference into a sharp focus on spiritual matters and our salvation, rather than our relaxation and recreation. So many of the world are so focused on money, wealth, pleasures and treasures that they see enticing them in the distance, that their farsightedness or long-sightedness prevents them from threading the eye of the needle with the thread of their soul. Their spiritual eyesight is all too blurred and they fail, time and time again, year after year, to use Advent well and pass through the eye of the needle. As Our Lord warned us: “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:24).
In fact, it is worth reading the whole passage, for its context is very typical of the Advent-Christmas mentality seen in today’s modern world.
“Behold one came and said to Him: ‘Good master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ ... The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth―what is still lacking to me?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven―and then come follow Me.’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad―for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven’” (Matthew 19:16-24).
Don’t Sleep Through Advent!
So, to borrow the Church’s other opening line, from the season of Lent, when the Church again quotes St. Paul, saying: “Behold, now is the acceptable time! Behold, now is the time of salvation!” Which dovetails with the words quoted above from St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans for the First Sunday of Advent: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep. For now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. The night is passed, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light.”
The Light of World is coming, let us not sleep without having prepared our lamps, like the foolish virgins, who were without oil at the crucial time when the Bridegroom came, and, while they were scurrying to buy some, they were locked-out of the feast. Now is the acceptable time, now is the hour to fill the lamps of our souls with the spiritual oil needed to have a truly happy, holy and blessed Christmas. Noe did not build his ark at the last minute, but took much time to build it well. Let us do the same this Advent. Let us not worry about “sitting down to eat and drink, and rising up to play” (Exodus 32:6; 1 Corinthians 10:7), but let us rather “sit down to read and think, and kneel down to pray.”
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR NOVEMBER 2024
THE MONTH OF THE POOR HOLY SOULS IN PURGATORY
THE MONTH OF THE POOR HOLY SOULS IN PURGATORY
Article 22
Friday, November 29th
Is Black Friday a Good Friday?
Friday, November 29th
Is Black Friday a Good Friday?
Aping God
The devil likes to “ape” God, that is to say, he likes to imitate aspects of God and God’s Church. Tertullian once said: “Diabolos est Dei simia,” and that basically translates into “The devil is God’s monkey (or ape).” What Tertullian meant was that the devil likes nothing better than to ape God. Satanists and secret societies are pretty big on copying or aping certain elements of Catholic religious ceremonies—the Black Mass is one such blasphemous example.
Black Friday
Talking of the word “black”, today happens to be what the world (in the USA world) calls “Black Friday” and it comes right after “Thanksgiving Day” which is always a Thursday. In recent years, most major retailers have opened very early and offered promotional sales to kick off the holiday shopping season, similar to Boxing Day (the day after Christmas Day) sales in many British Commonwealth nations. Many non-retail employees and schools have both Thanksgiving and the day after off, followed by a weekend, thereby increasing the number of potential shoppers.
For many years, it was common for retailers to open at 6:00 a.m. on the morning of Black Friday, but in the late 2000’s many had crept to 5:00 a.m. or even 4:00 a.m. This was taken to a new extreme in 2011, when several retailers (including Target, Kohl’s, Macy’s, Best Buy, and Bealls) opened at midnight for the first time. In 2012, Wal-Mart and several other retailers announced that they would open most of their stores at 8:00 p.m. This year, 2014, stores are even opening as early as 6:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day. On and on it goes…
It has routinely been the busiest shopping day of the year since 2005, although news reports, which at that time were inaccurate, have described it as the busiest shopping day of the year for a much longer period of time. In 2003, however, Black Friday actually was the busiest shopping day of the year, and it has retained that position every year since, with the exception of 2004. In 2013, approximately 141 million U.S. consumers shopped during Black Friday, spending a total of $57.4 billion (57 thousand million), with online sales reaching $1.2 billion (one thousand million).
Black Friday masquerades as the first day of traditional Christmas shopping, during which crowds of consumers are drawn to special offers by retailers. The thought sprang to mind that this has an uncanny resemblance to our Holy Thursday and Good Friday, except that it tends to go in the opposite direction. One could almost say that it is a parody. Here are the reasons that occurred in formulating this idea:
Comparisons
► The days are the same day: Holy Thursday and Good Friday / Thanksgiving Thursday and Black Friday.
► Holy Thursday is centered around Our Lord’s Last Supper; Thanksgiving in centered around the secular Thanksgiving meal.
► Good Friday and Black Friday are all about the world and materialism: Our Lord detaches Himself from the world and material things and dies to save souls; Black Friday is all about attaching oneself to materialism in order to save something too—money!
► Good Friday is frugal in its ceremony (the bare bones) and has somber black vestments; whereas Black Friday is all about opulence with its colorful glitz and glamour.
► The message of Good Friday is one of dying to this world—as Our Lord said: “I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Whereas the message of Black Friday is one of living for the world and grabbing all one can of this world.
► Good Friday is a day of obligatory fasting; while Black Friday for many is almost a day of compulsory spending and indulging. It is common for prospective shoppers to camp out over the Thanksgiving holiday, even in cold freezing temperatures, in an effort to secure a place in front of the line and thus a better chance at getting desired items.
► Just as the Faith spread throughout the world, so too is Black Friday spreading throughout the world since really “taking-off” in the USA. Canada has started the Black Friday practice. Black Friday was the inspiration for the Mexican government and retailing industry to create an annual weekend of discounts and extended credit terms, El Buen Fin, meaning “the good weekend” in Spanish. Black Friday is also celebrated in the United Kingdom by major online retailers, and more and more UK-based retailers have adopted the Black Friday marketing scheme than ever. In Panama Black Friday was first celebrated in 2012, as a move from the Government to attract local tourism to the countries capital city. In recent years, Black Friday has been promoted in Australia by online retailers. In 2012, after two years of disappointing results, several department stores in Brazil joined their foreign competitors in a successful Black Friday, which more than doubled the total revenue in comparison to the previous year. In Germany, Austria and Switzerland, Black Friday Sale is a joint sales initiative by hundreds of online vendors.
The Violence of Good Friday and Black Friday
We all know, of course, the extreme violence generated against Our Lord on Good Friday by the sinful passions of the Pharisees, Jews and Roman soldiers. Yet we also see those evil passions surge to the fore on Black Friday. Somehow money, things and greed combine to make a toxic poison for basic Christian charity―or even non-Christian charity and civility. Black Friday entails shopping for and getting cheap deals, but Black Friday crime is actually very common, and it can have a negative impact on the event. Black Friday violence can arise―as the excitement of the day bubbles over and becomes an issue. Disagreements can easily turn into crazy Black Friday fights. Black Friday has become a setting for consumer misbehavior as shoppers compete for deeply discounted products. Fighting, pepper-spraying, dumping merchandise, ransacking stores, robberies and shootings have all been reported on Black Friday.
In 2006, a man shopping at Best Buy was recorded on video assaulting another shopper in a dispute over an article that each wanted to buy. Unruly Wal-Mart shoppers at a store outside Columbus, Ohio, quickly flooded in the doors at opening, pinning several employees against stacks of merchandise. Nine shoppers in a California mall were injured, including an elderly woman who had to be taken to the hospital, when the crowd rushed to grab gift certificates that had been released from the ceiling. If only people had the same passion for attending Masses, receiving Holy Communion and going to Confession!
In 2008, a crowd of approximately 2,000 shoppers in Valley Stream, New York, waited outside for the 5:00 a.m. opening of the local Wal-Mart. [Wouldn’t it be a pleasant surprise for priests to find similar crowds outside their church on a morning, pining to get in!) As opening time approached, the crowd grew anxious and when the doors were opened the crowd pushed forward, breaking the door down, and trampling a 34-year old employee to death. The shoppers did not appear concerned with the victim’s fate, expressing refusal to halt their stampede when other employees attempted to intervene and help the injured employee, complaining that they had been waiting in the cold and were not willing to wait any longer. Shoppers had begun assembling as early as 9:00 p.m. the night before [what a massive mortification for mammon, but for God, no mortification is shown!]. Even when police arrived and attempted to render aid to the injured man, shoppers continued to pour in, shoving and pushing the officers as they made their way into the store. Several other people incurred minor injuries, including a pregnant woman who had to be taken to the hospital. The incident may be the first case of a death occurring during Black Friday sales; according to the National Retail Federation, “We are not aware of any other circumstances where a retail employee has died working on the day after Thanksgiving.”
On the same day, two people were fatally shot during an altercation at the Toys “R” Us store in Palm Desert, California.
During Black Friday 2010, a Madison, Wisconsin woman was arrested outside of aToys “R” Us store after cutting in line, and threatening to shoot other shoppers who tried to object. A Toys for Tots volunteer in Georgia was stabbed by a shoplifter. An Indianapolis woman was arrested after causing a disturbance by arguing with other Wal-Mart shoppers. She had been asked to leave the store, but refused. A man in Buffalo, New York, was trampled when doors opened at a Target store and unruly shoppers rushed in, in an episode reminiscent of the deadly 2008 Wal-Martstampede.
On Black Friday 2011, a woman at a Porter Ranch, California Wal-Mart used pepper spray on fellow shoppers, causing minor injuries to at least 10 people, who had been waiting hours for the store to open. It was later reported that the incident caused 20 injuries. The incident started as people waited in line for the newly discounted Xbox 360 (a video game console). A witness said a woman with two children in tow became upset with the way people were pushing in line. The witness said she pulled out pepper spray and sprayed the other people in line. Another account stated that the store had brought out a crate of discounted Xbox 360s, and a crowd had formed to wait for the unwrapping, when the woman began spraying people “in order to get an advantage,” according to the police. In an incident outside a Wal-Mart store in San Leandro, California, one man was wounded after being shot following Black Friday shopping at about 1:45 a.m.
On Black Friday 2012, two people were shot outside a Wal-Mart in Tallahassee, Florida during a dispute over a parking space.
On Black Friday in 2013, a person in Las Vegas who was carrying a big-screen TV home from a Target store on Thanksgiving was shot in the leg as he tried to wrestle the item back from a robber who had just stolen it from him at gunpoint. In Romeoville IL, a police officer shot a suspected shoplifter driving a car that was dragging a fellow officer at a Kohl’s department store. The suspect and the dragged officer were treated for shoulder injuries. Three people were arrested.
Between 2006 and 2021, according to the website Black Friday Death Count, Black Friday incidents in America left 17 dead and 125 injured. Those numbers are only from “reported cases” ― there are many more incidents that go unreported. Trampling incidents are a significant risk during Black Friday, as impatient crowds push towards their objectives, leading to individuals being trampled, highlighting the potential dangers of overcrowding and impatience during the event.
Biggest Violence of All
But the biggest violence of committed on this Black Friday is the violence against the Faith. The whole spirit of Black Friday and what it represents, goes against the spirit of Christ and what He represents. Our Lord came to live in poverty, not in riches. He did not pamper His body by living in luxury, but lived a simple and mortified life: “Jesus saith to him: The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests: but the Son of man hath not where to lay His head” (Matthew 8:20). He explicitly told us: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21). “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God .. Wherefore, Go out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing” (2 Corinthians 6:15-17).
Riches and Wealth Work Against Heaven
We see a clear example of this with the rich young man, who wanted to save his soul, yet also wanted to enjoy his possessions. Our Lord refused this two-facedness. Here is St. Matthew’s account: “And behold one came and said to him: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:16-24).
The Religion of Money and Goods
Many have argued that the new priesthood today consists of scientists, professors, teachers and merchants, and advertisers, who are organized as a part of a new secular tradition—they are a parody or an aping of the Church, with its pope, cardinals, bishops and priests. They deny (or relegate) the existence of the supernatural and ridicule it. For them, what is primary is the material world. The world is their god and their teacher, and they gratefully bow down and worship the world and all that the world can supply by means of material goods and their offshoot, or side-effect—money. These ‘priests’ of the secular religion of materialism, preach throughout their ‘churches’ of schools, colleges; universities, in the media and in the stores. The scientist, or man of natural knowledge, or entrepreneur has become a mini-god, falling into the same trap of Adam of Eve—who wanted to be like unto God. The devil, who in the words of Our Lord, is the prince of this world that they adore, will only too willingly aid and abet them in their folly. As materialists, they see themselves as material producers and consumers of goods, the lifestyle and economics of consumerist capitalism seems natural. Hedonism (the doctrine that pleasure is the highest good) also seems natural, because as a body that has certain needs and wants, what that idiot of a psychologist Freud rightly called modern man ― “desire-producing-machine” whereby life becomes primarily about the fulfillment of the desires of the body ― the cult of the body.
Saints Peter and Paul Prophesied This
“Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God: having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid” (2 Timothy 1-5).
“In the last days there shall come deceitful scoffers, walking after their own lusts, saying: ‘Where is His promise or His coming?’ … But of this one thing be not ignorant, my beloved, that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance. But the day of the Lord shall come as a thief, in which the heavens shall pass away with great violence, and the elements shall be melted with heat, and the Earth and the works which are in it, shall be burnt up” (2 Peter 3:3-10).
Not of the World
Speaking of the devil, Our Lord said: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing” (John 14:30). “And Jesus said to the Jews [today read that as pagan scientists, pagan academics, and the pagan entrepreneurs]: ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!’” (John 8:23). Of His followers, He says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world [Black Friday]” (1 John 2:16). To which St. John adds: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). This is why we are told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Besotted by the World
Today materialism has reached fever-pitch, even among so-called Catholics—who are really worshipers of mammon. As Our Lady said in her apparitions: “All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds ... The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin ... The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … Woe to the Princes of the Church who think only of piling riches upon riches, to protect their authority and dominate with pride ... The priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety in the celebration of the Holy Mysteries, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity” (Our Lady of Good Success & Our Lady of La Salette).
An Insane Thirst and Attachment to the World
After the Last Supper, Our Lord went to the Garden of Gethsemane—after eating their Thanksgiving meal, many go to their Gardens of Getsomeforfree, the stores and shopping malls. Our Lord sweated blood thinking of His future passion and death for our sins—today’s souls sweat worryingly thinking about the deals and goodies that they might miss-out on. Our Lord said to His three Apostles: “Could you not watch one hour with Me?” ― Today we say: “Could you not shop one hour with me?” Our Lord was sold by Judas for thirty pieces of silver—today many sell themselves to the world and mammon, for a few paltry idols on a shelf. Our Lord was arrested, tied-up and taken captive—today many are tied-up and captivated by things of the world that have arrested their attention. On the Cross Our Lord said: “I thirst!”--thirsting for souls. The world thirsts too, but it is not for Christ nor the spiritual, but it is an unquenchable thirst for the things that this world has to offer. Our Lord was nearly stripped of all that He had and was attached to the Cross by nails—yet souls do not want to be divested of their possessions (they want even more of them) and they are so attached to them that we could say that “they are nailed to them.”
We would do well to memorize and often repeat to ourselves (and family members, relatives, friends, etc.) the already quoted passages from Holy Scripture: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). This is why we are told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
The devil likes to “ape” God, that is to say, he likes to imitate aspects of God and God’s Church. Tertullian once said: “Diabolos est Dei simia,” and that basically translates into “The devil is God’s monkey (or ape).” What Tertullian meant was that the devil likes nothing better than to ape God. Satanists and secret societies are pretty big on copying or aping certain elements of Catholic religious ceremonies—the Black Mass is one such blasphemous example.
Black Friday
Talking of the word “black”, today happens to be what the world (in the USA world) calls “Black Friday” and it comes right after “Thanksgiving Day” which is always a Thursday. In recent years, most major retailers have opened very early and offered promotional sales to kick off the holiday shopping season, similar to Boxing Day (the day after Christmas Day) sales in many British Commonwealth nations. Many non-retail employees and schools have both Thanksgiving and the day after off, followed by a weekend, thereby increasing the number of potential shoppers.
For many years, it was common for retailers to open at 6:00 a.m. on the morning of Black Friday, but in the late 2000’s many had crept to 5:00 a.m. or even 4:00 a.m. This was taken to a new extreme in 2011, when several retailers (including Target, Kohl’s, Macy’s, Best Buy, and Bealls) opened at midnight for the first time. In 2012, Wal-Mart and several other retailers announced that they would open most of their stores at 8:00 p.m. This year, 2014, stores are even opening as early as 6:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day. On and on it goes…
It has routinely been the busiest shopping day of the year since 2005, although news reports, which at that time were inaccurate, have described it as the busiest shopping day of the year for a much longer period of time. In 2003, however, Black Friday actually was the busiest shopping day of the year, and it has retained that position every year since, with the exception of 2004. In 2013, approximately 141 million U.S. consumers shopped during Black Friday, spending a total of $57.4 billion (57 thousand million), with online sales reaching $1.2 billion (one thousand million).
Black Friday masquerades as the first day of traditional Christmas shopping, during which crowds of consumers are drawn to special offers by retailers. The thought sprang to mind that this has an uncanny resemblance to our Holy Thursday and Good Friday, except that it tends to go in the opposite direction. One could almost say that it is a parody. Here are the reasons that occurred in formulating this idea:
Comparisons
► The days are the same day: Holy Thursday and Good Friday / Thanksgiving Thursday and Black Friday.
► Holy Thursday is centered around Our Lord’s Last Supper; Thanksgiving in centered around the secular Thanksgiving meal.
► Good Friday and Black Friday are all about the world and materialism: Our Lord detaches Himself from the world and material things and dies to save souls; Black Friday is all about attaching oneself to materialism in order to save something too—money!
► Good Friday is frugal in its ceremony (the bare bones) and has somber black vestments; whereas Black Friday is all about opulence with its colorful glitz and glamour.
► The message of Good Friday is one of dying to this world—as Our Lord said: “I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Whereas the message of Black Friday is one of living for the world and grabbing all one can of this world.
► Good Friday is a day of obligatory fasting; while Black Friday for many is almost a day of compulsory spending and indulging. It is common for prospective shoppers to camp out over the Thanksgiving holiday, even in cold freezing temperatures, in an effort to secure a place in front of the line and thus a better chance at getting desired items.
► Just as the Faith spread throughout the world, so too is Black Friday spreading throughout the world since really “taking-off” in the USA. Canada has started the Black Friday practice. Black Friday was the inspiration for the Mexican government and retailing industry to create an annual weekend of discounts and extended credit terms, El Buen Fin, meaning “the good weekend” in Spanish. Black Friday is also celebrated in the United Kingdom by major online retailers, and more and more UK-based retailers have adopted the Black Friday marketing scheme than ever. In Panama Black Friday was first celebrated in 2012, as a move from the Government to attract local tourism to the countries capital city. In recent years, Black Friday has been promoted in Australia by online retailers. In 2012, after two years of disappointing results, several department stores in Brazil joined their foreign competitors in a successful Black Friday, which more than doubled the total revenue in comparison to the previous year. In Germany, Austria and Switzerland, Black Friday Sale is a joint sales initiative by hundreds of online vendors.
The Violence of Good Friday and Black Friday
We all know, of course, the extreme violence generated against Our Lord on Good Friday by the sinful passions of the Pharisees, Jews and Roman soldiers. Yet we also see those evil passions surge to the fore on Black Friday. Somehow money, things and greed combine to make a toxic poison for basic Christian charity―or even non-Christian charity and civility. Black Friday entails shopping for and getting cheap deals, but Black Friday crime is actually very common, and it can have a negative impact on the event. Black Friday violence can arise―as the excitement of the day bubbles over and becomes an issue. Disagreements can easily turn into crazy Black Friday fights. Black Friday has become a setting for consumer misbehavior as shoppers compete for deeply discounted products. Fighting, pepper-spraying, dumping merchandise, ransacking stores, robberies and shootings have all been reported on Black Friday.
In 2006, a man shopping at Best Buy was recorded on video assaulting another shopper in a dispute over an article that each wanted to buy. Unruly Wal-Mart shoppers at a store outside Columbus, Ohio, quickly flooded in the doors at opening, pinning several employees against stacks of merchandise. Nine shoppers in a California mall were injured, including an elderly woman who had to be taken to the hospital, when the crowd rushed to grab gift certificates that had been released from the ceiling. If only people had the same passion for attending Masses, receiving Holy Communion and going to Confession!
In 2008, a crowd of approximately 2,000 shoppers in Valley Stream, New York, waited outside for the 5:00 a.m. opening of the local Wal-Mart. [Wouldn’t it be a pleasant surprise for priests to find similar crowds outside their church on a morning, pining to get in!) As opening time approached, the crowd grew anxious and when the doors were opened the crowd pushed forward, breaking the door down, and trampling a 34-year old employee to death. The shoppers did not appear concerned with the victim’s fate, expressing refusal to halt their stampede when other employees attempted to intervene and help the injured employee, complaining that they had been waiting in the cold and were not willing to wait any longer. Shoppers had begun assembling as early as 9:00 p.m. the night before [what a massive mortification for mammon, but for God, no mortification is shown!]. Even when police arrived and attempted to render aid to the injured man, shoppers continued to pour in, shoving and pushing the officers as they made their way into the store. Several other people incurred minor injuries, including a pregnant woman who had to be taken to the hospital. The incident may be the first case of a death occurring during Black Friday sales; according to the National Retail Federation, “We are not aware of any other circumstances where a retail employee has died working on the day after Thanksgiving.”
On the same day, two people were fatally shot during an altercation at the Toys “R” Us store in Palm Desert, California.
During Black Friday 2010, a Madison, Wisconsin woman was arrested outside of aToys “R” Us store after cutting in line, and threatening to shoot other shoppers who tried to object. A Toys for Tots volunteer in Georgia was stabbed by a shoplifter. An Indianapolis woman was arrested after causing a disturbance by arguing with other Wal-Mart shoppers. She had been asked to leave the store, but refused. A man in Buffalo, New York, was trampled when doors opened at a Target store and unruly shoppers rushed in, in an episode reminiscent of the deadly 2008 Wal-Martstampede.
On Black Friday 2011, a woman at a Porter Ranch, California Wal-Mart used pepper spray on fellow shoppers, causing minor injuries to at least 10 people, who had been waiting hours for the store to open. It was later reported that the incident caused 20 injuries. The incident started as people waited in line for the newly discounted Xbox 360 (a video game console). A witness said a woman with two children in tow became upset with the way people were pushing in line. The witness said she pulled out pepper spray and sprayed the other people in line. Another account stated that the store had brought out a crate of discounted Xbox 360s, and a crowd had formed to wait for the unwrapping, when the woman began spraying people “in order to get an advantage,” according to the police. In an incident outside a Wal-Mart store in San Leandro, California, one man was wounded after being shot following Black Friday shopping at about 1:45 a.m.
On Black Friday 2012, two people were shot outside a Wal-Mart in Tallahassee, Florida during a dispute over a parking space.
On Black Friday in 2013, a person in Las Vegas who was carrying a big-screen TV home from a Target store on Thanksgiving was shot in the leg as he tried to wrestle the item back from a robber who had just stolen it from him at gunpoint. In Romeoville IL, a police officer shot a suspected shoplifter driving a car that was dragging a fellow officer at a Kohl’s department store. The suspect and the dragged officer were treated for shoulder injuries. Three people were arrested.
Between 2006 and 2021, according to the website Black Friday Death Count, Black Friday incidents in America left 17 dead and 125 injured. Those numbers are only from “reported cases” ― there are many more incidents that go unreported. Trampling incidents are a significant risk during Black Friday, as impatient crowds push towards their objectives, leading to individuals being trampled, highlighting the potential dangers of overcrowding and impatience during the event.
Biggest Violence of All
But the biggest violence of committed on this Black Friday is the violence against the Faith. The whole spirit of Black Friday and what it represents, goes against the spirit of Christ and what He represents. Our Lord came to live in poverty, not in riches. He did not pamper His body by living in luxury, but lived a simple and mortified life: “Jesus saith to him: The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests: but the Son of man hath not where to lay His head” (Matthew 8:20). He explicitly told us: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21). “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God .. Wherefore, Go out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing” (2 Corinthians 6:15-17).
Riches and Wealth Work Against Heaven
We see a clear example of this with the rich young man, who wanted to save his soul, yet also wanted to enjoy his possessions. Our Lord refused this two-facedness. Here is St. Matthew’s account: “And behold one came and said to him: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:16-24).
The Religion of Money and Goods
Many have argued that the new priesthood today consists of scientists, professors, teachers and merchants, and advertisers, who are organized as a part of a new secular tradition—they are a parody or an aping of the Church, with its pope, cardinals, bishops and priests. They deny (or relegate) the existence of the supernatural and ridicule it. For them, what is primary is the material world. The world is their god and their teacher, and they gratefully bow down and worship the world and all that the world can supply by means of material goods and their offshoot, or side-effect—money. These ‘priests’ of the secular religion of materialism, preach throughout their ‘churches’ of schools, colleges; universities, in the media and in the stores. The scientist, or man of natural knowledge, or entrepreneur has become a mini-god, falling into the same trap of Adam of Eve—who wanted to be like unto God. The devil, who in the words of Our Lord, is the prince of this world that they adore, will only too willingly aid and abet them in their folly. As materialists, they see themselves as material producers and consumers of goods, the lifestyle and economics of consumerist capitalism seems natural. Hedonism (the doctrine that pleasure is the highest good) also seems natural, because as a body that has certain needs and wants, what that idiot of a psychologist Freud rightly called modern man ― “desire-producing-machine” whereby life becomes primarily about the fulfillment of the desires of the body ― the cult of the body.
Saints Peter and Paul Prophesied This
“Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God: having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid” (2 Timothy 1-5).
“In the last days there shall come deceitful scoffers, walking after their own lusts, saying: ‘Where is His promise or His coming?’ … But of this one thing be not ignorant, my beloved, that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance. But the day of the Lord shall come as a thief, in which the heavens shall pass away with great violence, and the elements shall be melted with heat, and the Earth and the works which are in it, shall be burnt up” (2 Peter 3:3-10).
Not of the World
Speaking of the devil, Our Lord said: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing” (John 14:30). “And Jesus said to the Jews [today read that as pagan scientists, pagan academics, and the pagan entrepreneurs]: ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!’” (John 8:23). Of His followers, He says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world [Black Friday]” (1 John 2:16). To which St. John adds: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). This is why we are told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Besotted by the World
Today materialism has reached fever-pitch, even among so-called Catholics—who are really worshipers of mammon. As Our Lady said in her apparitions: “All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds ... The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin ... The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … Woe to the Princes of the Church who think only of piling riches upon riches, to protect their authority and dominate with pride ... The priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety in the celebration of the Holy Mysteries, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity” (Our Lady of Good Success & Our Lady of La Salette).
An Insane Thirst and Attachment to the World
After the Last Supper, Our Lord went to the Garden of Gethsemane—after eating their Thanksgiving meal, many go to their Gardens of Getsomeforfree, the stores and shopping malls. Our Lord sweated blood thinking of His future passion and death for our sins—today’s souls sweat worryingly thinking about the deals and goodies that they might miss-out on. Our Lord said to His three Apostles: “Could you not watch one hour with Me?” ― Today we say: “Could you not shop one hour with me?” Our Lord was sold by Judas for thirty pieces of silver—today many sell themselves to the world and mammon, for a few paltry idols on a shelf. Our Lord was arrested, tied-up and taken captive—today many are tied-up and captivated by things of the world that have arrested their attention. On the Cross Our Lord said: “I thirst!”--thirsting for souls. The world thirsts too, but it is not for Christ nor the spiritual, but it is an unquenchable thirst for the things that this world has to offer. Our Lord was nearly stripped of all that He had and was attached to the Cross by nails—yet souls do not want to be divested of their possessions (they want even more of them) and they are so attached to them that we could say that “they are nailed to them.”
We would do well to memorize and often repeat to ourselves (and family members, relatives, friends, etc.) the already quoted passages from Holy Scripture: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). This is why we are told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Article 21
Thursday, November 28th
Your Litany of Thanksgiving
Thursday, November 28th
Your Litany of Thanksgiving
Changing the Tune
In today’s world, we are more like to hear a Litany of Complaints than a Litany of Thanksgiving! We have become such a negative people! Psychologists tell us that on a purely natural human level, our brains are naturally wired to focus on negative stimuli as a survival mechanism. Our brains are designed to prioritize potential threats, so we are more likely to pick up on negative experiences than positive ones. It is easier to notice and express dissatisfaction with things that are not ideal, while positive aspects often go unnoticed.
Our Lord puts it this way: “Judge not, that you may not be judged! For with what judgment you judge others, you shall be judged; and with what measure you give to others, it shall be measured to you! Why do you see the splinter that is in your brother’s eye; but cannot see the plank that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother: ‘Let me remove the splinter out of your eye!’ ― and behold there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite! First cast out the plank from your own eye, and then you shall be able to see in order to cast out the splinter from your brother’s eye!” (Matthew 7:1-5). “Jesus said to them: ‘Murmur not among yourselves!’” (John 6:43).
Holy Scripture adds: “Do not hold grudges one against another, so that you may not be judged!” (James 5:9). “Keep yourselves therefore from murmuring, which profits nothing!” (Wisdom 1:11). “They did not receive the trials with the fear of the Lord, but uttered their impatience and the reproach of their murmuring against the Lord” (Judith 8:24). “There arose a murmuring of the people against the Lord, as it were complaining at their fatigue. And when the Lord heard it, He was angry. And the fire of the Lord being kindled against them, devoured them!” (Numbers 11:1). “Neither do you murmur―as some of them murmured, and were destroyed by the destroyer!” (1 Corinthians 10:10). “They set at nought the Promised Land. They believed not His word. They murmured and did not listen to the voice of the Lord. So He lifted up His hand over them, to overthrow them in the desert and to cast down their seed among the nations, and scatter them in the countries … He delivered them into the hands of the nations, and they that hated them had dominion over them, and their enemies afflicted them, and they were humbled under their hands!” (Psalm 105:24-27). “Do all things without murmuring” (Philippians 2:14). “Show hospitality one towards another, without murmuring” (1 Peter 4:9). “In all things give thanks―for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you all!” (1 Thessalonians 5:18).
Our complaining world can learn from the patient and holy example of Job. We read in Holy Scripture of the calamities that befell Job―yet he thanked the Lord for the evil as much as he did for good things: “If we have received good things at the hand of God, why should we not receive evil? … The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away―as it has pleased the Lord, so is it done! Blessed be the Name of the Lord!” (Job 2:10; 1:21). “To them that love God, all things work together unto good” (Romans 8:28). Yet we rarely see things that way! We are ever ready to moan, murmur and complain at the slightest inconvenience, mishap, setback, failure, loss, verbal correction, insult, mockery, etc. We fail to see the hand of God behind all things that happen to us―and, therefore, instead of thanking Him, we moan, murmur and complain instead. God says in Holy Scripture: “How long does this wicked multitude murmur against Me? I have heard the murmurings!” (Numbers 14:27). “Behold, the Lord comes to execute judgment upon all the hard things which ungodly sinners have spoken against God. These are murmurers, full of complaints, walking according to their own desires, and their mouth speaketh proud things!” (Jude 1:14-16). “If any man thinks himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man’s religion is vain!” (James 1:26).
Selfish, Egotistical, Half-Blind and Biased
We are selfish, egotistical, half-blind and biased―we exaggerate what little good we might do; and we downplay and trivialize whatever sins we might commit. We have an attitude of entitlement whereby we imagine that we are entitled to all kinds of blessings and favors by God; but we blot-out and ignore the supreme gravity of sin, which, in justice, deserves God’s punishments. We expect God to reward us―but we reject that God should punish us. We readily and happily forget that “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Consequently, God rewards what is good and punishes what is evil. “In every place the eyes of the Lord behold the good and the evil” (Proverbs 15:3). “All things that are done, God will bring into judgment―whether it be good or evil” (Ecclesiastes 12:14). “All be manifested before the judgment seat of Christ―whether it be good or evil” (2 Corinthians 5:10). “The Son of man shall render to every man according to his works” (Matthew 16:27). “Behold, I come quickly; and My reward is with Me, to render to every man according to his works!” (Apocalypse 22:12). “The just judgment of God will render to every man according to his works!” (Romans 2:6).
We Need Both Justice and Mercy
In the book, Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, we read: “God is careful to remind us, if His Providence continues to have “care of all things” (Wisdom 12:13), then it is “in measure and number and weight” (Wisdom 11:20) ― it is “with justice and mercy” (Wisdom 12:15; 16:1). We mistakenly think of God’s punishments as primarily being an act of God’s anger and fail to realize that punishment is also a sign of God’s love for us: “For whomever the Lord love, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives!” (Hebrews 12:6) … “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and as a father in the son, He pleases Himself!” (Proverbs 3:12). “Neither can any man say to Him: ‘Why dost Thou so?’” (Ecclesiastes 8:4).
In the book, Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, we further read: “I am the Lord,” He tells us Himself by the mouth of the prophet Isaias, “and there is none else. I form light and create darkness; I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things” (Isaias 45:6-7). “It is I who bring both death and life, I who inflict wounds and heal them,” He said to Moses (Deuteronomy 32:39). “The Lord killeth and maketh alive,” it is written in the Canticle of Anna, the mother of Samuel, “He bringeth down to the tomb and He bringeth back again; the Lord maketh poor and maketh rich, He humbleth and He exalteth” (1 Kings 2:6-7). “Shall there be evil (disaster, affliction) in a city which the Lord hath not done?” asks the prophet Amos (Amos 3:6). “Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches are from God,” Solomon proclaims (Ecclesiasticus 11:14). And so on in numerous other passages of Scripture. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
Let us never, then, attribute our losses, our disappointments, our afflictions, our humiliations to the devil or to men―but to God as their real source. “To act otherwise” says St. Dorothy, “would be to do the same as a dog, who vents his anger on the stone, instead of putting the blame on the hand that threw it at him.” So let us be careful not to say “So-and-so is the cause of my misfortune.” Your misfortunes are the work not of this or that person, but of God. And what should give you reassurance is that God, the sovereign good, is guided in all His actions by His most profound wisdom for holy and supernatural purposes. “We ought then” says St. Basil, “to ponder well on this thought, that we are the work of a good Workman, and that He dispenses and distributes to us all things great and small with the wisest providence, so that there is nothing bad, nothing that could even be conceived better!” (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
When it is necessary for our good for you to afflict us or send us some illness or make us suffer some loss or pain, you always do so with a certain respect and a kind of deference. As a surgeon who has to operate on a person of importance takes extra care to cause him as little suffering as possible and only what is strictly necessary for his recovery, or as a father unwillingly punishes a son be loves dearly only because he is obliged to do so for his son’s good, so God treats us as noble beings for whom He has the highest regard, or as beloved children whom He chastises because He loves them. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
We should accept with the same conformity to the will of God the loss of employment or money and all other setbacks in our temporal affairs, repeating with Faith the words of Job: “The Lord has given and the Lord has taken away; as it has pleased the Lord, so is it done. Blessed be the name of the Lord!” What does it matter why those who are the instruments of your reverse of fortune have acted as, they have done? The misfortunes of Job were brought about by the devil because he was a just and God-fearing man. In the times of persecution Christians were deprived of rank and position, despoiled of their possessions, torn from their families, thrown into prison and sent to execution all for their religious convictions and Faith in Christ. Far from complaining, they went their way, like the Apostles, rejoicing that they had been counted worthy to suffer disgrace for the name of Jesus. Whatever the excuse for the persecution you may be made to suffer―and especially if it is because of your religion―accept it all without hesitation as coming from the understanding and paternal hand of your Father Who is in Heaven. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
It is the same with regard to money matters. You may find yourself obliged to make a payment you consider unjust, something you have already paid but cannot prove, the forfeit of a security you have given for someone, or taxes you consider excessive, or anything of this nature. If the payment can be, and is, lawfully required of you, then it is the will of God you should pay it. It is He who is asking you for the money and it is to Him you are really giving it when you bow to the necessity in a spirit of submission to His will. Those who act in this way can be assured of His manifold graces. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
Let us take the case of two persons. One, out of a spirit of conformity to God’s will, makes a payment which is perhaps excessive, perhaps quite unfair, but which his creditor has the power to demand. The other, of his own free choice, gives an equal sum to charity. It is well known what great advantages, even in this life, are to be gained from giving to charity, but the person who makes a sacrifice of his money, not of his own accord, or to someone he chooses to give it, but out of a spirit of conformity to God’s will, is performing an even more profitable act. By the very fact that it is against his will, the act is purer and more agreeable in the sight of God, and if it can be said that from the experiences of all ages, charity brings down upon man the abundant blessing of God, it can also be said without exaggeration that such an act, as has been described, brings down still more abundant blessings. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
Giving Thanks for All Things
We need to learn to thank God for ALL things―for, as Jesus said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). What is it about the word “NOTHING” that you don’t understand? Nothing is excluded from “nothing”―meaning that we need God for everything, even the tiniest most insignificant things! Humbling, isn’t it? Furthermore, we need to thank God, not only for those things that we personally perceive to be good, but also for those things that we perceive to be bad or undesirable (except for sin). As stated above, the good and the evil that comes our way, is a consequence of God’s will and all-wise providence. As Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence states: “We should avoid saying, for instance, “What awful heat!” “What terrible cold!” “What shocking weather!” “Just my bad luck!” and other expressions of the same kind which only serve to show our lack of Faith and of submission to God’s will ... We ought to conform to God’s will in all public calamities such as war, famine and pestilence, and reverence and adore His judgments with deep humility in the firm belief that, however severe they may seem, the God of infinite goodness would not send such disasters unless some great good were to result from them. Consider how many souls may be saved through tribulation which would otherwise be lost, how many persons through affliction are converted to God and die with sincere repentance for their sins. What may appear a scourge and punishment is often a sign of great grace and mercy.” (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
“In other words, we cannot suffer the least harm unless He wills and orders it. Relying on this truth we can easily understand that we have nothing more or less to fear in times of public calamity than at any other time. God can just as easily protect us in the midst of general ruin and despair as He can deliver us from evil while all around is peace and content. The only thing we need to be concerned about is to gain His favor, and this is the inevitable effect of conforming our will to His. Let us therefore hasten to accept from His hand all that He sends us, and as a result of our trustful surrender He will either cause us to gain the greatest advantages from our misfortunes, or else spare us them altogether.” (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
Thanks for Everything―the Good and the Bad
Consequently, we ought to be giving thanks to God for EVERYTHING―for pleasant things and unpleasant things; for comforts and difficulties; for successes and failures; for health and sickness; for wealth and poverty; for praise and criticism; for acceptance and rejection; for rewards and punishments; for peace and war; for freedom and persecution; for being loved and being hated; etc. The bad elements are not so bad when you consider that they are often punishments for sin―and it is better to suffer for sin in this life rather than in the next life in either Purgatory or Hell!
When God chastises us for sin in this life, it is a heavily discounted price! Who, in their right mind, would prefer to be placed in the fire of Purgatory or Hell for many years rather than pay for sin in this life? If that is what you prefer, then just recall any encounter that you had with fire in this world and how little heat you could endure and the pains of a burn! Thank God that He allows you get-off cheaply with various chastisements in this life! It is the height of insanity to imagine that we can sin as much as we want without their being any consequences to our sins! Sin is the greatest evil in the world and the reward for sin is death: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127) ― and Holy Scripture tells us: “The wages of sin is death! ... The sting of death is sin! ... The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Romans 6:23; 1 Corinthians 15:56; Ezechiel 18:20).
The Good Thief on his cross on Calvary understood this and accepted the punishment for his sins―the other thief on Calvary wanted to get away without being punished for his sins: “One of those robbers who were hanging on the cross, blasphemed Jesus, saying: ‘If thou be Christ, save Thyself and us!’ But the other robber answering, rebuked him, saying: ‘Neither dost thou fear God, seeing thou art condemned under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man has done no evil!’ And he said to Jesus: ‘Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in paradise!’” (Luke 23:39-43). Most of us are like the ‘Bad Thief’ on Calvary―we have sinned, but we do not want to pay for sin, nor accept the punishment for sin!
In today’s world, we are more like to hear a Litany of Complaints than a Litany of Thanksgiving! We have become such a negative people! Psychologists tell us that on a purely natural human level, our brains are naturally wired to focus on negative stimuli as a survival mechanism. Our brains are designed to prioritize potential threats, so we are more likely to pick up on negative experiences than positive ones. It is easier to notice and express dissatisfaction with things that are not ideal, while positive aspects often go unnoticed.
Our Lord puts it this way: “Judge not, that you may not be judged! For with what judgment you judge others, you shall be judged; and with what measure you give to others, it shall be measured to you! Why do you see the splinter that is in your brother’s eye; but cannot see the plank that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother: ‘Let me remove the splinter out of your eye!’ ― and behold there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite! First cast out the plank from your own eye, and then you shall be able to see in order to cast out the splinter from your brother’s eye!” (Matthew 7:1-5). “Jesus said to them: ‘Murmur not among yourselves!’” (John 6:43).
Holy Scripture adds: “Do not hold grudges one against another, so that you may not be judged!” (James 5:9). “Keep yourselves therefore from murmuring, which profits nothing!” (Wisdom 1:11). “They did not receive the trials with the fear of the Lord, but uttered their impatience and the reproach of their murmuring against the Lord” (Judith 8:24). “There arose a murmuring of the people against the Lord, as it were complaining at their fatigue. And when the Lord heard it, He was angry. And the fire of the Lord being kindled against them, devoured them!” (Numbers 11:1). “Neither do you murmur―as some of them murmured, and were destroyed by the destroyer!” (1 Corinthians 10:10). “They set at nought the Promised Land. They believed not His word. They murmured and did not listen to the voice of the Lord. So He lifted up His hand over them, to overthrow them in the desert and to cast down their seed among the nations, and scatter them in the countries … He delivered them into the hands of the nations, and they that hated them had dominion over them, and their enemies afflicted them, and they were humbled under their hands!” (Psalm 105:24-27). “Do all things without murmuring” (Philippians 2:14). “Show hospitality one towards another, without murmuring” (1 Peter 4:9). “In all things give thanks―for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you all!” (1 Thessalonians 5:18).
Our complaining world can learn from the patient and holy example of Job. We read in Holy Scripture of the calamities that befell Job―yet he thanked the Lord for the evil as much as he did for good things: “If we have received good things at the hand of God, why should we not receive evil? … The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away―as it has pleased the Lord, so is it done! Blessed be the Name of the Lord!” (Job 2:10; 1:21). “To them that love God, all things work together unto good” (Romans 8:28). Yet we rarely see things that way! We are ever ready to moan, murmur and complain at the slightest inconvenience, mishap, setback, failure, loss, verbal correction, insult, mockery, etc. We fail to see the hand of God behind all things that happen to us―and, therefore, instead of thanking Him, we moan, murmur and complain instead. God says in Holy Scripture: “How long does this wicked multitude murmur against Me? I have heard the murmurings!” (Numbers 14:27). “Behold, the Lord comes to execute judgment upon all the hard things which ungodly sinners have spoken against God. These are murmurers, full of complaints, walking according to their own desires, and their mouth speaketh proud things!” (Jude 1:14-16). “If any man thinks himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man’s religion is vain!” (James 1:26).
Selfish, Egotistical, Half-Blind and Biased
We are selfish, egotistical, half-blind and biased―we exaggerate what little good we might do; and we downplay and trivialize whatever sins we might commit. We have an attitude of entitlement whereby we imagine that we are entitled to all kinds of blessings and favors by God; but we blot-out and ignore the supreme gravity of sin, which, in justice, deserves God’s punishments. We expect God to reward us―but we reject that God should punish us. We readily and happily forget that “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Consequently, God rewards what is good and punishes what is evil. “In every place the eyes of the Lord behold the good and the evil” (Proverbs 15:3). “All things that are done, God will bring into judgment―whether it be good or evil” (Ecclesiastes 12:14). “All be manifested before the judgment seat of Christ―whether it be good or evil” (2 Corinthians 5:10). “The Son of man shall render to every man according to his works” (Matthew 16:27). “Behold, I come quickly; and My reward is with Me, to render to every man according to his works!” (Apocalypse 22:12). “The just judgment of God will render to every man according to his works!” (Romans 2:6).
We Need Both Justice and Mercy
In the book, Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, we read: “God is careful to remind us, if His Providence continues to have “care of all things” (Wisdom 12:13), then it is “in measure and number and weight” (Wisdom 11:20) ― it is “with justice and mercy” (Wisdom 12:15; 16:1). We mistakenly think of God’s punishments as primarily being an act of God’s anger and fail to realize that punishment is also a sign of God’s love for us: “For whomever the Lord love, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives!” (Hebrews 12:6) … “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises; and as a father in the son, He pleases Himself!” (Proverbs 3:12). “Neither can any man say to Him: ‘Why dost Thou so?’” (Ecclesiastes 8:4).
In the book, Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence, we further read: “I am the Lord,” He tells us Himself by the mouth of the prophet Isaias, “and there is none else. I form light and create darkness; I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things” (Isaias 45:6-7). “It is I who bring both death and life, I who inflict wounds and heal them,” He said to Moses (Deuteronomy 32:39). “The Lord killeth and maketh alive,” it is written in the Canticle of Anna, the mother of Samuel, “He bringeth down to the tomb and He bringeth back again; the Lord maketh poor and maketh rich, He humbleth and He exalteth” (1 Kings 2:6-7). “Shall there be evil (disaster, affliction) in a city which the Lord hath not done?” asks the prophet Amos (Amos 3:6). “Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches are from God,” Solomon proclaims (Ecclesiasticus 11:14). And so on in numerous other passages of Scripture. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
Let us never, then, attribute our losses, our disappointments, our afflictions, our humiliations to the devil or to men―but to God as their real source. “To act otherwise” says St. Dorothy, “would be to do the same as a dog, who vents his anger on the stone, instead of putting the blame on the hand that threw it at him.” So let us be careful not to say “So-and-so is the cause of my misfortune.” Your misfortunes are the work not of this or that person, but of God. And what should give you reassurance is that God, the sovereign good, is guided in all His actions by His most profound wisdom for holy and supernatural purposes. “We ought then” says St. Basil, “to ponder well on this thought, that we are the work of a good Workman, and that He dispenses and distributes to us all things great and small with the wisest providence, so that there is nothing bad, nothing that could even be conceived better!” (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
When it is necessary for our good for you to afflict us or send us some illness or make us suffer some loss or pain, you always do so with a certain respect and a kind of deference. As a surgeon who has to operate on a person of importance takes extra care to cause him as little suffering as possible and only what is strictly necessary for his recovery, or as a father unwillingly punishes a son be loves dearly only because he is obliged to do so for his son’s good, so God treats us as noble beings for whom He has the highest regard, or as beloved children whom He chastises because He loves them. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
We should accept with the same conformity to the will of God the loss of employment or money and all other setbacks in our temporal affairs, repeating with Faith the words of Job: “The Lord has given and the Lord has taken away; as it has pleased the Lord, so is it done. Blessed be the name of the Lord!” What does it matter why those who are the instruments of your reverse of fortune have acted as, they have done? The misfortunes of Job were brought about by the devil because he was a just and God-fearing man. In the times of persecution Christians were deprived of rank and position, despoiled of their possessions, torn from their families, thrown into prison and sent to execution all for their religious convictions and Faith in Christ. Far from complaining, they went their way, like the Apostles, rejoicing that they had been counted worthy to suffer disgrace for the name of Jesus. Whatever the excuse for the persecution you may be made to suffer―and especially if it is because of your religion―accept it all without hesitation as coming from the understanding and paternal hand of your Father Who is in Heaven. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
It is the same with regard to money matters. You may find yourself obliged to make a payment you consider unjust, something you have already paid but cannot prove, the forfeit of a security you have given for someone, or taxes you consider excessive, or anything of this nature. If the payment can be, and is, lawfully required of you, then it is the will of God you should pay it. It is He who is asking you for the money and it is to Him you are really giving it when you bow to the necessity in a spirit of submission to His will. Those who act in this way can be assured of His manifold graces. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
Let us take the case of two persons. One, out of a spirit of conformity to God’s will, makes a payment which is perhaps excessive, perhaps quite unfair, but which his creditor has the power to demand. The other, of his own free choice, gives an equal sum to charity. It is well known what great advantages, even in this life, are to be gained from giving to charity, but the person who makes a sacrifice of his money, not of his own accord, or to someone he chooses to give it, but out of a spirit of conformity to God’s will, is performing an even more profitable act. By the very fact that it is against his will, the act is purer and more agreeable in the sight of God, and if it can be said that from the experiences of all ages, charity brings down upon man the abundant blessing of God, it can also be said without exaggeration that such an act, as has been described, brings down still more abundant blessings. (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
Giving Thanks for All Things
We need to learn to thank God for ALL things―for, as Jesus said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). What is it about the word “NOTHING” that you don’t understand? Nothing is excluded from “nothing”―meaning that we need God for everything, even the tiniest most insignificant things! Humbling, isn’t it? Furthermore, we need to thank God, not only for those things that we personally perceive to be good, but also for those things that we perceive to be bad or undesirable (except for sin). As stated above, the good and the evil that comes our way, is a consequence of God’s will and all-wise providence. As Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence states: “We should avoid saying, for instance, “What awful heat!” “What terrible cold!” “What shocking weather!” “Just my bad luck!” and other expressions of the same kind which only serve to show our lack of Faith and of submission to God’s will ... We ought to conform to God’s will in all public calamities such as war, famine and pestilence, and reverence and adore His judgments with deep humility in the firm belief that, however severe they may seem, the God of infinite goodness would not send such disasters unless some great good were to result from them. Consider how many souls may be saved through tribulation which would otherwise be lost, how many persons through affliction are converted to God and die with sincere repentance for their sins. What may appear a scourge and punishment is often a sign of great grace and mercy.” (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
“In other words, we cannot suffer the least harm unless He wills and orders it. Relying on this truth we can easily understand that we have nothing more or less to fear in times of public calamity than at any other time. God can just as easily protect us in the midst of general ruin and despair as He can deliver us from evil while all around is peace and content. The only thing we need to be concerned about is to gain His favor, and this is the inevitable effect of conforming our will to His. Let us therefore hasten to accept from His hand all that He sends us, and as a result of our trustful surrender He will either cause us to gain the greatest advantages from our misfortunes, or else spare us them altogether.” (Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence).
Thanks for Everything―the Good and the Bad
Consequently, we ought to be giving thanks to God for EVERYTHING―for pleasant things and unpleasant things; for comforts and difficulties; for successes and failures; for health and sickness; for wealth and poverty; for praise and criticism; for acceptance and rejection; for rewards and punishments; for peace and war; for freedom and persecution; for being loved and being hated; etc. The bad elements are not so bad when you consider that they are often punishments for sin―and it is better to suffer for sin in this life rather than in the next life in either Purgatory or Hell!
When God chastises us for sin in this life, it is a heavily discounted price! Who, in their right mind, would prefer to be placed in the fire of Purgatory or Hell for many years rather than pay for sin in this life? If that is what you prefer, then just recall any encounter that you had with fire in this world and how little heat you could endure and the pains of a burn! Thank God that He allows you get-off cheaply with various chastisements in this life! It is the height of insanity to imagine that we can sin as much as we want without their being any consequences to our sins! Sin is the greatest evil in the world and the reward for sin is death: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127) ― and Holy Scripture tells us: “The wages of sin is death! ... The sting of death is sin! ... The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Romans 6:23; 1 Corinthians 15:56; Ezechiel 18:20).
The Good Thief on his cross on Calvary understood this and accepted the punishment for his sins―the other thief on Calvary wanted to get away without being punished for his sins: “One of those robbers who were hanging on the cross, blasphemed Jesus, saying: ‘If thou be Christ, save Thyself and us!’ But the other robber answering, rebuked him, saying: ‘Neither dost thou fear God, seeing thou art condemned under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man has done no evil!’ And he said to Jesus: ‘Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in paradise!’” (Luke 23:39-43). Most of us are like the ‘Bad Thief’ on Calvary―we have sinned, but we do not want to pay for sin, nor accept the punishment for sin!
Article 20
Wednesday, November 27th
An American Thanksgiving or a Catholic Thanksgiving?
Wednesday, November 27th
An American Thanksgiving or a Catholic Thanksgiving?
Tomorrow is Thanksgiving Thursday! Hmm!
For those living in the United States of America, the fourth Thursday of the month of November is, in our current times, the day that has been called “Thanksgiving Day.” Perhaps for non-USA residents, a short little explanation of the meaning and its historical origins might be in order.
Will the First Thanksgiving Please Step Forward!
In the USA, the secular holiday of “Thanksgiving” is celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November (it used to be on the last Thursday of November). This recalls the fact that in 1621, the Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feast that is today thought to be the first Thanksgiving celebrations in the colonies. For more than two centuries, days of thanksgiving were celebrated by individual colonies and states. It wasn’t until 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, that President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day to be held each November.
Will the Real Thanksgiving Please Stand Up!
Let us now turn to the secular American Thanksgiving Day, which is celebrated these days on the 4th Thursday of November. The event of the first Thanksgiving in America is not that which was celebrated by the Pilgrims in 1621, as the vast majority of Americans have been taught. The first Thanksgiving to the one true God was celebrated eighty years before the Pilgrims’ feast. It occurred during the expedition of the Catholic conquistador Francisco Vazquez de Coronado.
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number One
Beginning in 1539, Francisco Coronado organized a large expedition from Mexico, which included five Franciscan missionaries. He brought with him 336 soldiers and settlers, 100 native Mexican Christians, 552 horses, 600 mules, 5000 sheep, and 500 cows, pigs, and goats. (This marked the introduction of these animals into the southwestern United States).
The expedition arrived in what is now Arizona and found Indian pueblos. After establishing a base in Arizona, Coronado headed east to establish a base-mission near present-day Albuquerque, New Mexico. When they crossed the river which is now called the Rio Grande, they named it Rio de Nuestra Señora (the River of Our Lady). This is its original name as it appeared on the first maps of the region.
Though no “cities of gold” were found, Coronado continued to send out expeditions — and missionaries with them. That there were missionaries on every expedition should tell us that the search for supposed “golden cities” was not the primary reason for Coronado’s ventures. (The gold was needed to fund expeditions and was not sought for personal gain). Spreading the one true Faith among the pagan native Indians was of primary importance.
In April of 1541, Coronado, with a group of soldiers and some missionaries, left Albuquerque, New Mexico, headed northeast, and crossed a section of what is now northwest Texas (the Panhandle). In encountering some of the local Indians, the missionaries found that the natives were immediately open to receiving the Gospel of Jesus Christ. After a few weeks of instruction, members of the Jumano Indian tribe converted and received Baptism.
The expedition then arrived in Palo Duro Canyon where, on May 29th, 1541, Father Juan Padilla, O.F.M., offered the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. (Father Padilla would eventually become the very first martyr of the Faith in America when he was killed in 1542, in what is now Kansas). A Thanksgiving feast followed the Mass. It consisted of game that had earlier been caught. The feast was celebrated in thanksgiving to God for His many blessings and for the recent converts. This 1541 event is the first actual Thanksgiving Day celebrated in the future United States―80 years before the 1621 Thanksgiving of the Pilgrim Fathers.
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number Two
The second Catholic Thanksgiving Day―that preceded the Pilgrims’ Plymouth Rock 1621 celebration by 56 years―was at St. Augustine, Florida, which is the first and oldest city of present day United States, founded in 1565 by Spanish Catholic explorers―the Spanish Captain General Pedro Menendez de Aviles and his fleet of soldiers and colonists ― accompanied by priests. It was the first permanent European settlement in North America. There had been other attempts by the Spanish to establish colonies in Florida and Texas, but all were short-lived. The first sighting of land had been on August 28th, 1565, the feast of St. Augustine, so when they eventually came to shore, they named the settlement after him. On September 8th, the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, they came ashore with great fanfare, to the astonishment of the natives.
A Mass of Thanksgiving was held, after which a communal feast was celebrated with the local Seloy tribe (Timucuan Indians)—thus taking place 56 years before the Plymouth Rock Thanksgiving. St. Augustine was the first permanently settled European colony on American soil.
In an official ceremony Don Pedro Menendez came ashore amid the sounding of trumpets, artillery salutes and the firing of cannons to claim the land for King Philip II and Spain. One of the priests, Fr. Francisco Lopez de Mendoza Grajales, who had gone ashore the previous day, advanced to meet him, chanting the Te Deum Laudamus and carrying a Cross, which Menendez and those with him reverently kissed. Then the 500 soldiers, 200 sailors and 100 families and artisans, along with the Timucuan Indians from the nearby village of Seloy, gathered at a makeshift altar, and a Mass in honor of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary was said in Thanksgiving. The Mass was followed by a feast shared by the Spanish and the Timucuan Indians.
According to Michael Gannon, a professor of colonial history at University of Florida, related further that this first Thanksgiving took place in 1565 when the Spanish founder of St. Augustine, Pedro Menindez de Avilis, and 800 Spanish settlers shared in a Mass of Thanksgiving. Following the Mass, Menindez ordered a communal meal to be shared by the Spaniards and the Seloy Indians (Timucuan Indians) who occupied the landing site.
In his book, Cross in the Sand, the Thanksgiving menu would most likely have consisted of what the Spanish settlers had with them during their voyage: cocido, a stew made from salted pork and garbanzo beans laced with garlic seasoning, hard sea biscuits, and red wine. The Timucuans brought wild turkey, venison, oysters and giant clams, as well as maize (corn), beans, squash, nuts and fruits. The Spaniards contribution wascocido, a stew made with pork, garbanzo beans and onions, along with biscuits, olive oil and red wine. In his well-researched book on the State of Florida titled Cross in the Sand, Dr. Michael Gannon duly affirmed that this Mass and feast was “the first community act of religion and thanksgiving in the first permanent European settlement in the land.”
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number Three
There was another Thanksgiving celebration which occurred 23 years before the Pilgrims celebrated at Plymouth Rock in 1621. In 1598, Catholic explorer Juan de Oñate led an expedition from Mexico City into New Mexico. The expedition included over 200 soldiers and colonists, the soldiers being headed by Captain Gaspar Perez de Villagra. Many had their families with them.
A number of Christian Indian converts with their families from Mexico were also in the party. With the group were several thousand head of livestock, including cows, horses, mules, sheep, goats, and pigs. Eighty-three wagons carried provisions, ammunition, tools, plants, and seeds for wheat, oats, rye, onions, chili, peas, beans, and different nuts.
On the expedition were eight Franciscan friars: two priests and six brothers. The party experienced many hardships. Soon after entering New Mexico, just across the Rio de Nuestra Señora, they were attacked by hostile Indians near present-day El Paso, Texas. A number of wagons and numerous head of livestock were lost, but no members of the expedition were killed. The same was not true for the attacking Indians, a number of whom died.
Moving a little farther up along the river, Juan de Oñate and the Franciscans erected a large cross, and Oñate took possession of the land. He declared: “I want to take possession of this land today, April 30th, 1598, in honor of Our Lord Jesus Christ, on this day of the Ascension of Our Lord.”
Immediately afterward a High Mass was offered in thanksgiving. Then the entire group gathered for a Banquet of Thanksgiving to God for protecting them and for allowing them to arrive at the place after so many hardships along the way. The festive meal consisted of fish, game, fruits, and vegetables. After this Thanksgiving Banquet, the expedition headed further up along the river and by June had established the mission-town of San Juan (still populated to this day).
Though there was a Thanksgiving Feast celebrated in 1541, as we earlier saw, it was never commemorated afterward. In contrast, for some years after the Thanksgiving Feast of 1598, a feast was celebrated by the Spanish and the Christian Indians of New Mexico in thanks to the true God for bringing them through many hardships and for His blessings. Today this Thanksgiving Feast is commemorated in San Juan on the thirtieth day of April every year.
The Thanksgiving of the Pilgrim Fathers
It is only now that we can turn to the story of the Pilgrims and their Thanksgiving. After a long and harsh winter, the Pilgrims received help from the Wampanoag Indians in planting crops during the spring of 1621. They worked hard and in autumn (fall) had a very good harvest.
It is thought that in November of 1621 they invited the local Indians, who were still pagan and worshiped false gods, to feast with them and give thanks to God for the blessings of a successful harvest.
The Catholic student of history should recognize that it is impossible to give thanks to the same God, let alone the true God, when those involved believe in different gods. But this apparently didn’t bother anyone. The event was not celebrated yearly by the Pilgrims, as many think, nor by anyone in the original thirteen colonies for many years.
Thanksgiving Day as Public Holiday
Though George Washington called for a day of Thanksgiving while he was President, it was not celebrated as a yearly holiday feast until Abraham Lincoln established Thanksgiving Day as a holiday on October 3rd, 1863 (almost 250 years after the Pilgrims landed on the shores of America and over 320 years after the first Catholic Thanksgiving), in response to the victory at the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863 by the United States. With this victory in mind, as well as its cost, President Lincoln issued a proclamation stating:
“The year … has been filled with the blessings … which are of so extraordinary a nature that they cannot fail to penetrate and even soften the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever-watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign states to invite and provoke their aggressions; peace has been preserved with all nations; order has been maintained; the laws have been respected and obeyed; and harmony has prevailed everywhere, except in the theater of military conflict … the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. No human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American people. I do, therefore, invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a Day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwells in the heavens. And I recommend to them that, while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation, and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes, to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility, and union.”
So now we know that the Pilgrims did not celebrate the first Thanksgiving in America. The first act of Thanksgiving was the Mass of Thanksgiving celebrated by Fr. Juan Padilla, in 1541, and was followed by a feast. This was 80 years before the Plymouth Rock event.
The second feast of Thanksgiving was celebrated at St. Augustine, Florida, in 1565, at the founding of the first permanent European settlement on American soil.
The third feast of Thanksgiving was celebrated back in 1598, in New Mexico, by Spanish-Catholic colonists and Indian converts to the Faith—53 years before the Plymouth Rock event. They thanked the true God for bringing them safely through many troubles and dangers and for the fact that the seed of the Gospel of Christ was beginning to take root.
Because of the often anti-Spanish and anti-Catholic prejudice of English-speaking Protestants, generations of Americans have never learned this fact of American history.
For those living in the United States of America, the fourth Thursday of the month of November is, in our current times, the day that has been called “Thanksgiving Day.” Perhaps for non-USA residents, a short little explanation of the meaning and its historical origins might be in order.
Will the First Thanksgiving Please Step Forward!
In the USA, the secular holiday of “Thanksgiving” is celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November (it used to be on the last Thursday of November). This recalls the fact that in 1621, the Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feast that is today thought to be the first Thanksgiving celebrations in the colonies. For more than two centuries, days of thanksgiving were celebrated by individual colonies and states. It wasn’t until 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, that President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day to be held each November.
Will the Real Thanksgiving Please Stand Up!
Let us now turn to the secular American Thanksgiving Day, which is celebrated these days on the 4th Thursday of November. The event of the first Thanksgiving in America is not that which was celebrated by the Pilgrims in 1621, as the vast majority of Americans have been taught. The first Thanksgiving to the one true God was celebrated eighty years before the Pilgrims’ feast. It occurred during the expedition of the Catholic conquistador Francisco Vazquez de Coronado.
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number One
Beginning in 1539, Francisco Coronado organized a large expedition from Mexico, which included five Franciscan missionaries. He brought with him 336 soldiers and settlers, 100 native Mexican Christians, 552 horses, 600 mules, 5000 sheep, and 500 cows, pigs, and goats. (This marked the introduction of these animals into the southwestern United States).
The expedition arrived in what is now Arizona and found Indian pueblos. After establishing a base in Arizona, Coronado headed east to establish a base-mission near present-day Albuquerque, New Mexico. When they crossed the river which is now called the Rio Grande, they named it Rio de Nuestra Señora (the River of Our Lady). This is its original name as it appeared on the first maps of the region.
Though no “cities of gold” were found, Coronado continued to send out expeditions — and missionaries with them. That there were missionaries on every expedition should tell us that the search for supposed “golden cities” was not the primary reason for Coronado’s ventures. (The gold was needed to fund expeditions and was not sought for personal gain). Spreading the one true Faith among the pagan native Indians was of primary importance.
In April of 1541, Coronado, with a group of soldiers and some missionaries, left Albuquerque, New Mexico, headed northeast, and crossed a section of what is now northwest Texas (the Panhandle). In encountering some of the local Indians, the missionaries found that the natives were immediately open to receiving the Gospel of Jesus Christ. After a few weeks of instruction, members of the Jumano Indian tribe converted and received Baptism.
The expedition then arrived in Palo Duro Canyon where, on May 29th, 1541, Father Juan Padilla, O.F.M., offered the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. (Father Padilla would eventually become the very first martyr of the Faith in America when he was killed in 1542, in what is now Kansas). A Thanksgiving feast followed the Mass. It consisted of game that had earlier been caught. The feast was celebrated in thanksgiving to God for His many blessings and for the recent converts. This 1541 event is the first actual Thanksgiving Day celebrated in the future United States―80 years before the 1621 Thanksgiving of the Pilgrim Fathers.
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number Two
The second Catholic Thanksgiving Day―that preceded the Pilgrims’ Plymouth Rock 1621 celebration by 56 years―was at St. Augustine, Florida, which is the first and oldest city of present day United States, founded in 1565 by Spanish Catholic explorers―the Spanish Captain General Pedro Menendez de Aviles and his fleet of soldiers and colonists ― accompanied by priests. It was the first permanent European settlement in North America. There had been other attempts by the Spanish to establish colonies in Florida and Texas, but all were short-lived. The first sighting of land had been on August 28th, 1565, the feast of St. Augustine, so when they eventually came to shore, they named the settlement after him. On September 8th, the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, they came ashore with great fanfare, to the astonishment of the natives.
A Mass of Thanksgiving was held, after which a communal feast was celebrated with the local Seloy tribe (Timucuan Indians)—thus taking place 56 years before the Plymouth Rock Thanksgiving. St. Augustine was the first permanently settled European colony on American soil.
In an official ceremony Don Pedro Menendez came ashore amid the sounding of trumpets, artillery salutes and the firing of cannons to claim the land for King Philip II and Spain. One of the priests, Fr. Francisco Lopez de Mendoza Grajales, who had gone ashore the previous day, advanced to meet him, chanting the Te Deum Laudamus and carrying a Cross, which Menendez and those with him reverently kissed. Then the 500 soldiers, 200 sailors and 100 families and artisans, along with the Timucuan Indians from the nearby village of Seloy, gathered at a makeshift altar, and a Mass in honor of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary was said in Thanksgiving. The Mass was followed by a feast shared by the Spanish and the Timucuan Indians.
According to Michael Gannon, a professor of colonial history at University of Florida, related further that this first Thanksgiving took place in 1565 when the Spanish founder of St. Augustine, Pedro Menindez de Avilis, and 800 Spanish settlers shared in a Mass of Thanksgiving. Following the Mass, Menindez ordered a communal meal to be shared by the Spaniards and the Seloy Indians (Timucuan Indians) who occupied the landing site.
In his book, Cross in the Sand, the Thanksgiving menu would most likely have consisted of what the Spanish settlers had with them during their voyage: cocido, a stew made from salted pork and garbanzo beans laced with garlic seasoning, hard sea biscuits, and red wine. The Timucuans brought wild turkey, venison, oysters and giant clams, as well as maize (corn), beans, squash, nuts and fruits. The Spaniards contribution wascocido, a stew made with pork, garbanzo beans and onions, along with biscuits, olive oil and red wine. In his well-researched book on the State of Florida titled Cross in the Sand, Dr. Michael Gannon duly affirmed that this Mass and feast was “the first community act of religion and thanksgiving in the first permanent European settlement in the land.”
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number Three
There was another Thanksgiving celebration which occurred 23 years before the Pilgrims celebrated at Plymouth Rock in 1621. In 1598, Catholic explorer Juan de Oñate led an expedition from Mexico City into New Mexico. The expedition included over 200 soldiers and colonists, the soldiers being headed by Captain Gaspar Perez de Villagra. Many had their families with them.
A number of Christian Indian converts with their families from Mexico were also in the party. With the group were several thousand head of livestock, including cows, horses, mules, sheep, goats, and pigs. Eighty-three wagons carried provisions, ammunition, tools, plants, and seeds for wheat, oats, rye, onions, chili, peas, beans, and different nuts.
On the expedition were eight Franciscan friars: two priests and six brothers. The party experienced many hardships. Soon after entering New Mexico, just across the Rio de Nuestra Señora, they were attacked by hostile Indians near present-day El Paso, Texas. A number of wagons and numerous head of livestock were lost, but no members of the expedition were killed. The same was not true for the attacking Indians, a number of whom died.
Moving a little farther up along the river, Juan de Oñate and the Franciscans erected a large cross, and Oñate took possession of the land. He declared: “I want to take possession of this land today, April 30th, 1598, in honor of Our Lord Jesus Christ, on this day of the Ascension of Our Lord.”
Immediately afterward a High Mass was offered in thanksgiving. Then the entire group gathered for a Banquet of Thanksgiving to God for protecting them and for allowing them to arrive at the place after so many hardships along the way. The festive meal consisted of fish, game, fruits, and vegetables. After this Thanksgiving Banquet, the expedition headed further up along the river and by June had established the mission-town of San Juan (still populated to this day).
Though there was a Thanksgiving Feast celebrated in 1541, as we earlier saw, it was never commemorated afterward. In contrast, for some years after the Thanksgiving Feast of 1598, a feast was celebrated by the Spanish and the Christian Indians of New Mexico in thanks to the true God for bringing them through many hardships and for His blessings. Today this Thanksgiving Feast is commemorated in San Juan on the thirtieth day of April every year.
The Thanksgiving of the Pilgrim Fathers
It is only now that we can turn to the story of the Pilgrims and their Thanksgiving. After a long and harsh winter, the Pilgrims received help from the Wampanoag Indians in planting crops during the spring of 1621. They worked hard and in autumn (fall) had a very good harvest.
It is thought that in November of 1621 they invited the local Indians, who were still pagan and worshiped false gods, to feast with them and give thanks to God for the blessings of a successful harvest.
The Catholic student of history should recognize that it is impossible to give thanks to the same God, let alone the true God, when those involved believe in different gods. But this apparently didn’t bother anyone. The event was not celebrated yearly by the Pilgrims, as many think, nor by anyone in the original thirteen colonies for many years.
Thanksgiving Day as Public Holiday
Though George Washington called for a day of Thanksgiving while he was President, it was not celebrated as a yearly holiday feast until Abraham Lincoln established Thanksgiving Day as a holiday on October 3rd, 1863 (almost 250 years after the Pilgrims landed on the shores of America and over 320 years after the first Catholic Thanksgiving), in response to the victory at the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863 by the United States. With this victory in mind, as well as its cost, President Lincoln issued a proclamation stating:
“The year … has been filled with the blessings … which are of so extraordinary a nature that they cannot fail to penetrate and even soften the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever-watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign states to invite and provoke their aggressions; peace has been preserved with all nations; order has been maintained; the laws have been respected and obeyed; and harmony has prevailed everywhere, except in the theater of military conflict … the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. No human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American people. I do, therefore, invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a Day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwells in the heavens. And I recommend to them that, while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation, and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes, to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility, and union.”
So now we know that the Pilgrims did not celebrate the first Thanksgiving in America. The first act of Thanksgiving was the Mass of Thanksgiving celebrated by Fr. Juan Padilla, in 1541, and was followed by a feast. This was 80 years before the Plymouth Rock event.
The second feast of Thanksgiving was celebrated at St. Augustine, Florida, in 1565, at the founding of the first permanent European settlement on American soil.
The third feast of Thanksgiving was celebrated back in 1598, in New Mexico, by Spanish-Catholic colonists and Indian converts to the Faith—53 years before the Plymouth Rock event. They thanked the true God for bringing them safely through many troubles and dangers and for the fact that the seed of the Gospel of Christ was beginning to take root.
Because of the often anti-Spanish and anti-Catholic prejudice of English-speaking Protestants, generations of Americans have never learned this fact of American history.
Article 19
Tuesday, November 26th
Make it a Godly―Not Godless―Thanksgiving Day!
Tuesday, November 26th
Make it a Godly―Not Godless―Thanksgiving Day!
Will You Be Thankful It’s Here? Or Thankful When It’s Over?
Just as Our Lord says: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30)―you could also say that some are for Thanksgiving Day and some face it reluctantly. Will you be glad when it has finally arrived? Or will you will glad when it’s finally over?
In one sense, Thanksgiving Day can be a wonderful experience if―like anything else in life―it is used properly and in that way it was intended to be used. However, if we abuse it rather than use it―then the Thanksgiving Day side-effects begin to flow in as much abundance as the food and wine flow.
Thanksgiving Day is mainly a Secular Day, a Materialistic Day, a Pleasure-Seeing Day, and worst of all, a Godless Day! Thanksgiving Day can often become an Argument Day, or a Gossiping Day, or a Needling Day, or an Insulting Day, or a Show-Off Day, or a Competitive Day, or a Jealousy Day, or a Criticism Day, or one of the many other flavors popular these days. It often sets the annual tone for the prolonged, almost ceaseless partying spirit that begins with Thanksgiving Day, takes in all the pre-Christmas parties at work and at school, then the actual Christmas Day and beyond parties, up until the New Year’s Eve party. For the worldly “party-animal” it is the high-point of the year―whereas for spiritual folk it the high-stress-point of the year, when they feel obliged to “go-along-to-get-along” and the fear and cringe at the thought of saying “No” to an invite just as much as they fear and cringe at saying “Yes” to an invite.
Thanksgiving Tongue-Talking-Terrorists?
Thanksgiving Terrorists! Have you ever thought of seeing your guests, over the holiday season, as potential terrorists? Tongue-Terrorists! Tongue-Talking-Terrorists! Thanksgiving Tongue-Talking-Terrorists! They come armed with a two-edged tongue, sharpened and ready to use! They should be asked to show their tongue at the door, for inspection!! “A slippery mouth works ruin” (Proverbs 26:28)—and during this holiday season many “slippery mouths” will surface! “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22). As St. James so truly says:
“If any man think himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man’s religion is vain!” (James 1:26). “For in many things we all offend. If any man offends not in word, the same is a perfect man. Even so, the tongue is indeed a little member, but boasts great things! Behold how small a fire sets on aflame a great forest. And the tongue is a fire―a world of iniquity. The tongue defiles the whole body―being set on fire by Hell. For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and has been tamed, by the nature of man. But the tongue no man can tame―an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison. By it we bless God and the Father; and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God! Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing! My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:2-10).
Is God Invited?
That brings us to the question: “Is God invited to your Thanksgiving Day party?” You reply: “Huh? Who? God? What has He got to do with Thanksgiving Day? It’s a secular celebration! It’s a secular holiday! It’s not a Church feast-day! Religion has nothing to do with it!” Really? Is that so? Is that what you think? Is that what you were taught?
Is there anything from which we can and should exclude God? Does not Holy Scripture say: “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31)? And “We give thanks to God always … without ceasing! … We ought to give thanks to God always! … We also give thanks to God without ceasing! … In all things give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you all … We are bound to give thanks always to God!” (1 Thessalonians 1:2; 2:12-13; 5:18; 2 Thessalonians 1:3). “Cease not to give thanks! … "Giving thanks always for all things, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God and the Father” (Ephesians 1:16; 5:20). “I give thanks to my God always!” (1 Corinthians 1:4). Does not the Preface of the Sacrifice of the Mass say: “It is truly meet and just, right and for our salvation, that we should at all times, and in all places, give thanks unto Thee, O holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God”?
Protestant Presidents, Thermodynamics and the Holy Eucharist
“Huh?” you exclaim, “Protestant Presidents, thermodynamics and the Holy Eucharist? Are you crazy? What on earth are you talking about?” Well, okay, let’s go one step at a time. First of all “Protestant Presidents”.
Protestant Presidents
Just like a broken clock is gives the correct time twice a day, even the Protestant are right about some things! This happens to be the case with the point and purpose of the original Thanksgiving Day. In fact, the first official call for a Day of Thanksgiving in the U.S., issued by the Continental Congress in 1777, enjoined Americans to offer both thanks and prayers of repentance to God. “That together with their sincere acknowledgments and offerings, they may join the penitent confession of their manifold sins,” says the proclamation. Twelve years later, George Washington issued the first presidential Thanksgiving proclamation, also calling for a day of unified prayer for America. The first president wrote: “Now, therefore, I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next, to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be ― That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks … And, also, that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions.”
That―most definitely―is no longer the spirit, purpose and practice on Thanksgiving Day today! It has degenerated from being a day dedicated to God, prayer and penance, to a day that is filled with indifferentism, naturalism, materialism, hedonism (pleasure seeking), criticism and antagonism. Why? Because of an intellectual and spiritual degeneration―as they say: “Use it or lose it!” If you don’t review or refresh your knowledge, you will lose your knowledge. If you forget the past in order to only focus on the present―then you will repeat the mistakes of the past or fail to learn the wisdom of the past―which leads us to The Second Law of Thermodynamics.
Thermodynamics
The First Law of Thermodynamics (Conservation): The First Law of Thermodynamics, also known as Law of Conservation of Energy, states that energy can be changed from one form to another, but it cannot be created or destroyed; energy can only be transferred or changed from one form to another. The First Law of Thermodynamics (Conservation) states that energy is always conserved, it cannot be created or destroyed. In essence, energy can be converted from one form into another. For example, turning on a light would seem to produce energy; however, it is electrical energy that is converted. The total amount of energy and matter in the Universe remains constant, merely changing from one form to another.
The energy in any system can be converted to heat or work or other things, but you always have the same total that you started with―for example, if the energy level is 7 units, then you could have heat at 4 units, work at 2 units and something else at 1 unit, or 5+1+1, or 2+2+3, etc. It is like saying you have $10 to spend―you spend $7 on a meal, $2 on a drink and $1 on tipping the waiter. Or, in relation to time―you have 24 hours in a day―which never changes but is always a constant 24 hours, of which you may spend 8 hours sleeping, 8 hours working and 8 hours praying, house cleaning, traveling, visiting, reading, studying, etc. If you decide to sleep more, you have less time for other things, but if you dedicate more time to other things, then you have less time to sleep. You cannot change the 24 hours in a day―but you can change how you use those hours. Your income does not change (very much), but you can decide on what you will spend that income―but if you spend more on one thing, then you must spend less on another.
If we look at this from the perspective of the soul―God has given us our soul and the ‘positive energy’ of sanctifying to run it and guide it. The soul needs that exterior intervention of energy to maintain it. Yet, the soul can also ‘run’ on ‘negative energy’―which is sin. The soul has a certain capacity or volume and―since nature abhors a vacuum―it has to be and will be filled with some form of energy―either ‘positive energy’ (grace) or ‘negative energy’ (sin). That is an inescapable truth and it is our wise or foolish choice that will dictate on what ‘energy’ our soul will ‘run’.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics: The Second Law of Thermodynamics is commonly known as the Law of Increased Entropy. The word “entropy” means “the tendency to disorder and the degree of disorder” in any given thing. The Second Law of Thermodynamics is the best verified law that we have in science, and yet it is also a law that is often misused and misunderstood. It has been confusing physics students for many years, not to mention laymen. In simple terms, you could call it “The Law of Decay”― The Second Law of Thermodynamics is the tendency for everything in nature to gradually wind-down to its most disorderly possible state―unless there is some outside intervention that slows-down, stops or reverses the tendency to wind-down or decay.
Things can become more ordered by themselves, but only if an appropriate mechanism is in place. But in the absence of such a mechanism, intelligence (transmitted, for example, in the form of an external teaching program) is needed. The Second Law of Thermodynamics strikingly attests to the power and intelligence of our Creator, for the fact that the universe is unstoppably winding down, with less and less energy available for work, points to a Creator who ‘wound up’ the universe to begin with.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics also explains why things, left to themselves, naturally become more and more disordered with time. And why the energy, available for work in any system or person, just naturally and spontaneously decreases―unless that energy is ‘topped-up’ or reinvigorated by some external source―like plugging a draining battery into an external electrical outlet to prevent continual draining (entropy), or an athlete needs to keep exercising and training in order to maintain a certain level of fitness and prevent his fitness from deteriorating (entropy), or the need for rehydrating a dehydrated body by taking a quantity of external water to prevent further dehydration (entropy). Likewise, our mind and soul needs to ‘drink-in’ the ‘water’ of religious doctrine if wants to prevent spiritual dehydration (entropy).
Put into the perspective of the spiritual life―we will progressively get worse and worse as time goes on, unless there is some outside intervention that will come and slow-down, or stop, or even reverse the degeneration. This outside help is, of course, God and His grace―as Our Lord says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) and St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Grace perfects nature” (Summa Theologica, 1a, q. 1, art. 8). The more ‘outside intervention’ we can secure, the less degenerate and more perfect we will become.
Yet we don’t seek the grace and help of God as much as we should. We do not read and learn as much as we should. We do not remember as much as we should. That is why our Faith degenerates, decays, decomposes and dies. Ask most Catholic adults to name you the Ten Commandments in correct order―or in any order for that matter―and most of them will fail to do so! The Ten Commandments is something that a six or seven-year-old child learns! Yet, they, as adults, have allowed that knowledge to decay, decompose and perhaps even die! There you have living proof of The Second Law of Thermodynamics, or the Law of Increased Entropy, or, in even more simple terms, The Law of Decay.
The Holy Eucharist
This brings us to the Most Holy Eucharist. The Holy Eucharist—the word “Eucharist” means “thanksgiving”—should be at the heart of any Thanksgiving Day. The Greek word “eucharistia” (εὐχαριστία) means “thankfulness, gratitude; giving of thanks, thanksgiving” and comes from another similar Greek word “eucharistos” (εὐχάριστος) meaning “thankful, grateful”. This, of course, makes us think of the Holy Eucharist. The Greek word “eucharistia” later entered the Latin language, also keeping the form “eucharistia”. The same word, or at least the same root, is found in Hebrew (oikharístia), French (eucharistie), Spanish (eucaristía), English (eucharist), Irish (eocairist), German (eucharistie) and Dutch (eucharistie) languages.
The Last Supper was the Thanksgiving (Eucharistia) par excellence. The Last Supper was the institution of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which gives us the greatest imaginable Gift—Our Lord Jesus Christ, God Himself! Man can never and should never cease to give thanks for this Gift of gifts, this Sharing of all possible sharings! The Last Supper, though primarily a sacrifice, was also meal that Christ commanded to be done again and again in commemoration of Him, of which the Thanksgiving Meal is but a pale secular, non-sacramental, non-grace giving, imitation. In fact, since the Last Supper, you could say that the Sacrifice and its secondary element, the Supper, has never ceased—but is one long perpetual Sacrifice and Meal. At the Last Supper, Our Lord “whilst they were at supper, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke, and gave to His disciples, and said: ‘Take ye, and eat! This is My Body!’ And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave to them, saying: ‘Drink ye all of this. For this is My Blood of the new testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!’” (Matthew 26:26-28).
Also at the Last Supper, Our Lord gave a ‘new’ commandment, of which the idea of the American notion of “Thanksgiving Day” is a small piece of the gigantic spiritual jigsaw puzzle. Our Lord said: “A new commandment I give unto you: That you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another!” (John 13:34-35). It is sad to see how many celebrations of Thanksgiving are spoiled and ruined by a lack of charity—by bringing in grudges, hatred, anger, envy, gossip, calumny, detraction, barbed or sarcastic comments, immodest talk, impure thoughts, insults, coldness, indifference, etc. This indicates that though these persons might be Christians in name, they are far from being Christians in nature. Imagine Our Lord or Our Lady at a Thanksgiving Day gathering and imagine what their behavior in thoughts, words and actions would be like. A follower of Christ should seek to be like Christ, not the opposite.
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the Greatest Thanksgiving
Yet the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (Eucharistia) is only secondarily a Meal, it is above all a sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, whereby He gives again, but this time He gives up all that He has—life itself! “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13)—and Our Lord performed this greatest of loving actions, not only for His friends, but also for His enemies, whom He hoped to convert. What Our Lord began at the Last Supper—the institution of the Holy Sacrifice of Mass—He filled-up and completed over the next 18 hours or so, with His Passion and Death upon the cross on Calvary—the consummation of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Just as Christ calls Himself the “Alpha” and “Omega” (the beginning and the end) so too was the Last Supper and Calvary the beginning and the end of the first Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
Hence it is fitting that on Thanksgiving Day, wherever possible, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass should be attended in a spirit of profound, humble and heartfelt thanksgiving for all that God has given us—and He has given all that we have! We should thank Christ for his soul-saving sacrifice and His grace-winning and grace-giving Sacrifice of the Mass, for at the Last Supper He also reminded us that we are in total dependence upon Him, “independence” is a misnomer: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Thanksgiving After the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a Must
In His revelations to St. Margaret Mary, Our Lord repeatedly asked for acts of love and adoration, thanksgiving and reparation to His Sacred Heart. There is one occasion especially when these acts of love are most efficacious: during the time after Holy Communion when the Sacramental Species have not yet disintegrated.
The writings of the saints are filled with praise of the blessings that come to a soul that is properly disposed while in physical contact with the Sacred Heart. “The time after Communion,” says St. Teresa of Avila, “is the best time for negotiating with Jesus Christ; for then He is in the soul, seated, as it were, on a throne of grace, and saying, as He said to the blind man: ‘What wilt thou that I should do to thee?’”
But more authoritative is the exhortation of Pope Pius XII in the encyclical Mediator Dei, where he devotes a full six paragraphs to this single subject. “When Mass is finished,” he directs that, “the person who has received the Eucharist should recollect himself, and in intimate union with the Divine Master hold loving and fruitful converse with Him.” If this seems like stressing the obvious, the Pope does not think so. He complains there are some teachers who discourage such private communication between the soul and the Eucharistic Christ “because this pertains to a private and personal act of piety and not to the good of the community.” Hence it is not liturgical, they say.
How many people, except priests and religious, ever spend any time in prayer after Holy Mass at which they received Holy Communion? Yet Pope Pius XII insists that this is not a mere spiritual luxury, but “such personal conversations are very necessary, so that we may all enjoy more fully the supernatural treasures that are contained in the Eucharist and, according to our means, share them with others, so that Christ Our Lord may exert the greatest possible influence on the souls of all.” Addressing himself to the bishops, and through them to us, the Pope asks: “Why should we not approve of those who, when they receive Holy Communion, remain on in closest familiarity with their Divine Redeemer―even after the congregation has been officially dismissed?”
There are three reasons for this: “ . . . (1) for the consolation of conversing with Him, (2) also to render Him due thanks and praise, but especially to ask help to defend their souls against anything that may lessen the efficacy of the Sacrament and (3) to do everything in their power to cooperate with the action of Christ Who is so intimately present.”
Sadly, however, we have many a woeful instance of ‘thanksgiving’ after the Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion. Take a typical Sunday Mass. Within seconds of the priest leaving the altar, people are pouring out of the doors as though the church was on fire! It shows what their minds are thinking, or betrays the values system in their minds—they have just received their Lord and God, and off they go out the door! It would be one thing if they were spiritually on fire and were rushing out to preach the Faith to all and sundry—but that is not the case! They are off to gossip with Sally and Sam, Judy and Jack; they’re off to the coffee and donuts; they have a TV show or sports game to catch, or whatever each person’s passion may be. This week, they have all the Thanksgiving Day things to prepare, see and attend to. They have not time for God!
Back to Thermodynamics
Why? Why do they have this attitude? Why this indifference to the Holiest of holies? Because of a spiritual degeneration―which leads us back, once again, to The Second Law of Thermodynamics, or The Law of Increased Entropy, or, in even more simple terms, The Law of Decay―which is the tendency for everything in nature to gradually wind-down to its most disorderly state―unless there is some outside intervention that slows-down, stops or reverses the tendency to wind-down or decay. Your house or car will depreciate and degenerate more quickly if you rarely take care of it. A car, that has run out of gas, will not run again until you walk 10 miles to and from a gas station and refuel the car. Your body will follow the same path, if you do not take care of it with regular exercise, a good diet and sufficient sleep. Your mind will follow the same path if you do not keep it active by regular and challenging mental work. The less you read, the less you learn, the less you know, which lets your ignorance grow as your intellect hits a low. The same applies to your Faith―if you do not exercise it, nourish it, maintain it, protect it on a regular basis, then it will degenerate, decay and eventually die―all of which corresponds to The Second Law of Thermodynamics, or The Law of Increased Entropy, or, in even more simple terms, The Law of Decay.
Holy Scripture puts it thus: “For all flesh is as grass; and all the glory thereof as the flower of grass. The grass is withered, and the flower thereof is fallen away!” (1 Peter 1:24). “In the morning man shall grow up like grass; in the morning he shall flourish and pass away: in the evening he shall fall, grow dry, and wither!” (Psalm 89:6). “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:8). “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20). We will progressively get worse and worse as time goes on, unless there is some outside intervention that will come and slow-down, or stop, or even reverse the degeneration. This outside help, ultimately, can only come from God and His grace―as Our Lord says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) and St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Grace perfects nature” (Summa Theologica, 1a, q. 1, art. 8).
The more ‘outside intervention’ we can secure―through the Sacraments, prayers, reading spiritual books, listening to sermons and spiritual talks, seeking spiritual guidance―the less degenerate and more perfect we will become. Without that outside or external help, we will spiritually deteriorate, degenerate, decay and die. That is what is actually happening to the Faith in the Catholic world right now―spiritual deterioration, degeneration, decay and death. It is The Law of Entropy or The Law of Decay in action, which will reach such a point as to prove the truth of Our Lord’s rhetorical question: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Following The Law of Entropy or The Law of Decay, each generation is becoming worse and worse―for they do not use the external mechanisms that God has put into place to prevent this spiritual deterioration, degeneration, decay and death―namely, the Church and all the external remedies (‘energy boosters’ or sources of grace) that it offers: Sacraments, Sacramentals, Catechism, Sermons, Conferences, Books, etc.
That is why, following the principles of The Law of Entropy or The Law of Decay, we have arrived at this present state of quasi-secularism, a strange, almost superstitious state, where we mix God and mammon, Catholicity and worldliness, order and disorder, grace and sin, Sacraments and Smartphones, Holy Communion and Unholy Computers, Tabernacles and TVs, all the time deteriorating in our knowledge about God and increasing in our knowledge of the world; decreasing in our love of God and increasing in our love of the world; degenerating the right order of things and regenerating a disordered value of things; relinquishing the supernatural for the natural, the graceful for the ungraceful, switching from a gratitude to God to an ingratitude to God, from a dependence on God to an independence from God. Welcome to our world! Welcome to our universe! As the The Second Law of Thermodynamics says: “The entropy (tendency to disorder) of the universe only increases and never decreases.”
Thanksgiving Day Thermodynamics
If you read, once again, the initial reason and purpose for Thanksgiving Day― where the first official call for a day of thanksgiving in the U.S., issued by the Continental Congress in 1777, enjoined Americans to offer both thanks and prayers of repentance to God. “That together with their sincere acknowledgments and offerings, they may join the penitent confession of their manifold sins,” says the proclamation―and the Protestant George Washington’s first presidential Thanksgiving proclamation, twelve years later in 1789, also calling for a day of unified prayer for America.
On October 3rd, 1789, the first Protestant president, George Washington, wrote: “Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor ― and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me ‘to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.’ Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, Who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be ― That we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the People of this country previous to their becoming a Nation; for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of His providence, which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war; … and in general for all the great and various favors which He hath been pleased to confer upon us. And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions.”
Most, if not all of that is today, forgotten and ignored―even though it comes from a Protestant and Protestant and even Masonic government―truth is nevertheless the truth. Just as no person is totally evil―as St. Thomas Aquinas says―so no man is totally wrong. Even apostates, heretics, pagans, etc. speak the truth in some things. Or, as they say, “A broken clock tells the correct time twice a day!” Maybe we should try change a largely godless day into a godly day―a secular day into a more spiritual day! Download the Thanksgiving Day Prayers and Rituals [click here and scroll down to almost the bottom of the page] and you will have a head-start on everybody else!
Just as Our Lord says: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30)―you could also say that some are for Thanksgiving Day and some face it reluctantly. Will you be glad when it has finally arrived? Or will you will glad when it’s finally over?
In one sense, Thanksgiving Day can be a wonderful experience if―like anything else in life―it is used properly and in that way it was intended to be used. However, if we abuse it rather than use it―then the Thanksgiving Day side-effects begin to flow in as much abundance as the food and wine flow.
Thanksgiving Day is mainly a Secular Day, a Materialistic Day, a Pleasure-Seeing Day, and worst of all, a Godless Day! Thanksgiving Day can often become an Argument Day, or a Gossiping Day, or a Needling Day, or an Insulting Day, or a Show-Off Day, or a Competitive Day, or a Jealousy Day, or a Criticism Day, or one of the many other flavors popular these days. It often sets the annual tone for the prolonged, almost ceaseless partying spirit that begins with Thanksgiving Day, takes in all the pre-Christmas parties at work and at school, then the actual Christmas Day and beyond parties, up until the New Year’s Eve party. For the worldly “party-animal” it is the high-point of the year―whereas for spiritual folk it the high-stress-point of the year, when they feel obliged to “go-along-to-get-along” and the fear and cringe at the thought of saying “No” to an invite just as much as they fear and cringe at saying “Yes” to an invite.
Thanksgiving Tongue-Talking-Terrorists?
Thanksgiving Terrorists! Have you ever thought of seeing your guests, over the holiday season, as potential terrorists? Tongue-Terrorists! Tongue-Talking-Terrorists! Thanksgiving Tongue-Talking-Terrorists! They come armed with a two-edged tongue, sharpened and ready to use! They should be asked to show their tongue at the door, for inspection!! “A slippery mouth works ruin” (Proverbs 26:28)—and during this holiday season many “slippery mouths” will surface! “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22). As St. James so truly says:
“If any man think himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man’s religion is vain!” (James 1:26). “For in many things we all offend. If any man offends not in word, the same is a perfect man. Even so, the tongue is indeed a little member, but boasts great things! Behold how small a fire sets on aflame a great forest. And the tongue is a fire―a world of iniquity. The tongue defiles the whole body―being set on fire by Hell. For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and has been tamed, by the nature of man. But the tongue no man can tame―an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison. By it we bless God and the Father; and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God! Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing! My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:2-10).
Is God Invited?
That brings us to the question: “Is God invited to your Thanksgiving Day party?” You reply: “Huh? Who? God? What has He got to do with Thanksgiving Day? It’s a secular celebration! It’s a secular holiday! It’s not a Church feast-day! Religion has nothing to do with it!” Really? Is that so? Is that what you think? Is that what you were taught?
Is there anything from which we can and should exclude God? Does not Holy Scripture say: “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31)? And “We give thanks to God always … without ceasing! … We ought to give thanks to God always! … We also give thanks to God without ceasing! … In all things give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you all … We are bound to give thanks always to God!” (1 Thessalonians 1:2; 2:12-13; 5:18; 2 Thessalonians 1:3). “Cease not to give thanks! … "Giving thanks always for all things, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God and the Father” (Ephesians 1:16; 5:20). “I give thanks to my God always!” (1 Corinthians 1:4). Does not the Preface of the Sacrifice of the Mass say: “It is truly meet and just, right and for our salvation, that we should at all times, and in all places, give thanks unto Thee, O holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God”?
Protestant Presidents, Thermodynamics and the Holy Eucharist
“Huh?” you exclaim, “Protestant Presidents, thermodynamics and the Holy Eucharist? Are you crazy? What on earth are you talking about?” Well, okay, let’s go one step at a time. First of all “Protestant Presidents”.
Protestant Presidents
Just like a broken clock is gives the correct time twice a day, even the Protestant are right about some things! This happens to be the case with the point and purpose of the original Thanksgiving Day. In fact, the first official call for a Day of Thanksgiving in the U.S., issued by the Continental Congress in 1777, enjoined Americans to offer both thanks and prayers of repentance to God. “That together with their sincere acknowledgments and offerings, they may join the penitent confession of their manifold sins,” says the proclamation. Twelve years later, George Washington issued the first presidential Thanksgiving proclamation, also calling for a day of unified prayer for America. The first president wrote: “Now, therefore, I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next, to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be ― That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks … And, also, that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions.”
That―most definitely―is no longer the spirit, purpose and practice on Thanksgiving Day today! It has degenerated from being a day dedicated to God, prayer and penance, to a day that is filled with indifferentism, naturalism, materialism, hedonism (pleasure seeking), criticism and antagonism. Why? Because of an intellectual and spiritual degeneration―as they say: “Use it or lose it!” If you don’t review or refresh your knowledge, you will lose your knowledge. If you forget the past in order to only focus on the present―then you will repeat the mistakes of the past or fail to learn the wisdom of the past―which leads us to The Second Law of Thermodynamics.
Thermodynamics
The First Law of Thermodynamics (Conservation): The First Law of Thermodynamics, also known as Law of Conservation of Energy, states that energy can be changed from one form to another, but it cannot be created or destroyed; energy can only be transferred or changed from one form to another. The First Law of Thermodynamics (Conservation) states that energy is always conserved, it cannot be created or destroyed. In essence, energy can be converted from one form into another. For example, turning on a light would seem to produce energy; however, it is electrical energy that is converted. The total amount of energy and matter in the Universe remains constant, merely changing from one form to another.
The energy in any system can be converted to heat or work or other things, but you always have the same total that you started with―for example, if the energy level is 7 units, then you could have heat at 4 units, work at 2 units and something else at 1 unit, or 5+1+1, or 2+2+3, etc. It is like saying you have $10 to spend―you spend $7 on a meal, $2 on a drink and $1 on tipping the waiter. Or, in relation to time―you have 24 hours in a day―which never changes but is always a constant 24 hours, of which you may spend 8 hours sleeping, 8 hours working and 8 hours praying, house cleaning, traveling, visiting, reading, studying, etc. If you decide to sleep more, you have less time for other things, but if you dedicate more time to other things, then you have less time to sleep. You cannot change the 24 hours in a day―but you can change how you use those hours. Your income does not change (very much), but you can decide on what you will spend that income―but if you spend more on one thing, then you must spend less on another.
If we look at this from the perspective of the soul―God has given us our soul and the ‘positive energy’ of sanctifying to run it and guide it. The soul needs that exterior intervention of energy to maintain it. Yet, the soul can also ‘run’ on ‘negative energy’―which is sin. The soul has a certain capacity or volume and―since nature abhors a vacuum―it has to be and will be filled with some form of energy―either ‘positive energy’ (grace) or ‘negative energy’ (sin). That is an inescapable truth and it is our wise or foolish choice that will dictate on what ‘energy’ our soul will ‘run’.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics: The Second Law of Thermodynamics is commonly known as the Law of Increased Entropy. The word “entropy” means “the tendency to disorder and the degree of disorder” in any given thing. The Second Law of Thermodynamics is the best verified law that we have in science, and yet it is also a law that is often misused and misunderstood. It has been confusing physics students for many years, not to mention laymen. In simple terms, you could call it “The Law of Decay”― The Second Law of Thermodynamics is the tendency for everything in nature to gradually wind-down to its most disorderly possible state―unless there is some outside intervention that slows-down, stops or reverses the tendency to wind-down or decay.
Things can become more ordered by themselves, but only if an appropriate mechanism is in place. But in the absence of such a mechanism, intelligence (transmitted, for example, in the form of an external teaching program) is needed. The Second Law of Thermodynamics strikingly attests to the power and intelligence of our Creator, for the fact that the universe is unstoppably winding down, with less and less energy available for work, points to a Creator who ‘wound up’ the universe to begin with.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics also explains why things, left to themselves, naturally become more and more disordered with time. And why the energy, available for work in any system or person, just naturally and spontaneously decreases―unless that energy is ‘topped-up’ or reinvigorated by some external source―like plugging a draining battery into an external electrical outlet to prevent continual draining (entropy), or an athlete needs to keep exercising and training in order to maintain a certain level of fitness and prevent his fitness from deteriorating (entropy), or the need for rehydrating a dehydrated body by taking a quantity of external water to prevent further dehydration (entropy). Likewise, our mind and soul needs to ‘drink-in’ the ‘water’ of religious doctrine if wants to prevent spiritual dehydration (entropy).
Put into the perspective of the spiritual life―we will progressively get worse and worse as time goes on, unless there is some outside intervention that will come and slow-down, or stop, or even reverse the degeneration. This outside help is, of course, God and His grace―as Our Lord says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) and St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Grace perfects nature” (Summa Theologica, 1a, q. 1, art. 8). The more ‘outside intervention’ we can secure, the less degenerate and more perfect we will become.
Yet we don’t seek the grace and help of God as much as we should. We do not read and learn as much as we should. We do not remember as much as we should. That is why our Faith degenerates, decays, decomposes and dies. Ask most Catholic adults to name you the Ten Commandments in correct order―or in any order for that matter―and most of them will fail to do so! The Ten Commandments is something that a six or seven-year-old child learns! Yet, they, as adults, have allowed that knowledge to decay, decompose and perhaps even die! There you have living proof of The Second Law of Thermodynamics, or the Law of Increased Entropy, or, in even more simple terms, The Law of Decay.
The Holy Eucharist
This brings us to the Most Holy Eucharist. The Holy Eucharist—the word “Eucharist” means “thanksgiving”—should be at the heart of any Thanksgiving Day. The Greek word “eucharistia” (εὐχαριστία) means “thankfulness, gratitude; giving of thanks, thanksgiving” and comes from another similar Greek word “eucharistos” (εὐχάριστος) meaning “thankful, grateful”. This, of course, makes us think of the Holy Eucharist. The Greek word “eucharistia” later entered the Latin language, also keeping the form “eucharistia”. The same word, or at least the same root, is found in Hebrew (oikharístia), French (eucharistie), Spanish (eucaristía), English (eucharist), Irish (eocairist), German (eucharistie) and Dutch (eucharistie) languages.
The Last Supper was the Thanksgiving (Eucharistia) par excellence. The Last Supper was the institution of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which gives us the greatest imaginable Gift—Our Lord Jesus Christ, God Himself! Man can never and should never cease to give thanks for this Gift of gifts, this Sharing of all possible sharings! The Last Supper, though primarily a sacrifice, was also meal that Christ commanded to be done again and again in commemoration of Him, of which the Thanksgiving Meal is but a pale secular, non-sacramental, non-grace giving, imitation. In fact, since the Last Supper, you could say that the Sacrifice and its secondary element, the Supper, has never ceased—but is one long perpetual Sacrifice and Meal. At the Last Supper, Our Lord “whilst they were at supper, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke, and gave to His disciples, and said: ‘Take ye, and eat! This is My Body!’ And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave to them, saying: ‘Drink ye all of this. For this is My Blood of the new testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!’” (Matthew 26:26-28).
Also at the Last Supper, Our Lord gave a ‘new’ commandment, of which the idea of the American notion of “Thanksgiving Day” is a small piece of the gigantic spiritual jigsaw puzzle. Our Lord said: “A new commandment I give unto you: That you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another!” (John 13:34-35). It is sad to see how many celebrations of Thanksgiving are spoiled and ruined by a lack of charity—by bringing in grudges, hatred, anger, envy, gossip, calumny, detraction, barbed or sarcastic comments, immodest talk, impure thoughts, insults, coldness, indifference, etc. This indicates that though these persons might be Christians in name, they are far from being Christians in nature. Imagine Our Lord or Our Lady at a Thanksgiving Day gathering and imagine what their behavior in thoughts, words and actions would be like. A follower of Christ should seek to be like Christ, not the opposite.
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the Greatest Thanksgiving
Yet the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (Eucharistia) is only secondarily a Meal, it is above all a sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, whereby He gives again, but this time He gives up all that He has—life itself! “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13)—and Our Lord performed this greatest of loving actions, not only for His friends, but also for His enemies, whom He hoped to convert. What Our Lord began at the Last Supper—the institution of the Holy Sacrifice of Mass—He filled-up and completed over the next 18 hours or so, with His Passion and Death upon the cross on Calvary—the consummation of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Just as Christ calls Himself the “Alpha” and “Omega” (the beginning and the end) so too was the Last Supper and Calvary the beginning and the end of the first Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
Hence it is fitting that on Thanksgiving Day, wherever possible, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass should be attended in a spirit of profound, humble and heartfelt thanksgiving for all that God has given us—and He has given all that we have! We should thank Christ for his soul-saving sacrifice and His grace-winning and grace-giving Sacrifice of the Mass, for at the Last Supper He also reminded us that we are in total dependence upon Him, “independence” is a misnomer: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Thanksgiving After the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a Must
In His revelations to St. Margaret Mary, Our Lord repeatedly asked for acts of love and adoration, thanksgiving and reparation to His Sacred Heart. There is one occasion especially when these acts of love are most efficacious: during the time after Holy Communion when the Sacramental Species have not yet disintegrated.
The writings of the saints are filled with praise of the blessings that come to a soul that is properly disposed while in physical contact with the Sacred Heart. “The time after Communion,” says St. Teresa of Avila, “is the best time for negotiating with Jesus Christ; for then He is in the soul, seated, as it were, on a throne of grace, and saying, as He said to the blind man: ‘What wilt thou that I should do to thee?’”
But more authoritative is the exhortation of Pope Pius XII in the encyclical Mediator Dei, where he devotes a full six paragraphs to this single subject. “When Mass is finished,” he directs that, “the person who has received the Eucharist should recollect himself, and in intimate union with the Divine Master hold loving and fruitful converse with Him.” If this seems like stressing the obvious, the Pope does not think so. He complains there are some teachers who discourage such private communication between the soul and the Eucharistic Christ “because this pertains to a private and personal act of piety and not to the good of the community.” Hence it is not liturgical, they say.
How many people, except priests and religious, ever spend any time in prayer after Holy Mass at which they received Holy Communion? Yet Pope Pius XII insists that this is not a mere spiritual luxury, but “such personal conversations are very necessary, so that we may all enjoy more fully the supernatural treasures that are contained in the Eucharist and, according to our means, share them with others, so that Christ Our Lord may exert the greatest possible influence on the souls of all.” Addressing himself to the bishops, and through them to us, the Pope asks: “Why should we not approve of those who, when they receive Holy Communion, remain on in closest familiarity with their Divine Redeemer―even after the congregation has been officially dismissed?”
There are three reasons for this: “ . . . (1) for the consolation of conversing with Him, (2) also to render Him due thanks and praise, but especially to ask help to defend their souls against anything that may lessen the efficacy of the Sacrament and (3) to do everything in their power to cooperate with the action of Christ Who is so intimately present.”
Sadly, however, we have many a woeful instance of ‘thanksgiving’ after the Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion. Take a typical Sunday Mass. Within seconds of the priest leaving the altar, people are pouring out of the doors as though the church was on fire! It shows what their minds are thinking, or betrays the values system in their minds—they have just received their Lord and God, and off they go out the door! It would be one thing if they were spiritually on fire and were rushing out to preach the Faith to all and sundry—but that is not the case! They are off to gossip with Sally and Sam, Judy and Jack; they’re off to the coffee and donuts; they have a TV show or sports game to catch, or whatever each person’s passion may be. This week, they have all the Thanksgiving Day things to prepare, see and attend to. They have not time for God!
Back to Thermodynamics
Why? Why do they have this attitude? Why this indifference to the Holiest of holies? Because of a spiritual degeneration―which leads us back, once again, to The Second Law of Thermodynamics, or The Law of Increased Entropy, or, in even more simple terms, The Law of Decay―which is the tendency for everything in nature to gradually wind-down to its most disorderly state―unless there is some outside intervention that slows-down, stops or reverses the tendency to wind-down or decay. Your house or car will depreciate and degenerate more quickly if you rarely take care of it. A car, that has run out of gas, will not run again until you walk 10 miles to and from a gas station and refuel the car. Your body will follow the same path, if you do not take care of it with regular exercise, a good diet and sufficient sleep. Your mind will follow the same path if you do not keep it active by regular and challenging mental work. The less you read, the less you learn, the less you know, which lets your ignorance grow as your intellect hits a low. The same applies to your Faith―if you do not exercise it, nourish it, maintain it, protect it on a regular basis, then it will degenerate, decay and eventually die―all of which corresponds to The Second Law of Thermodynamics, or The Law of Increased Entropy, or, in even more simple terms, The Law of Decay.
Holy Scripture puts it thus: “For all flesh is as grass; and all the glory thereof as the flower of grass. The grass is withered, and the flower thereof is fallen away!” (1 Peter 1:24). “In the morning man shall grow up like grass; in the morning he shall flourish and pass away: in the evening he shall fall, grow dry, and wither!” (Psalm 89:6). “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:8). “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20). We will progressively get worse and worse as time goes on, unless there is some outside intervention that will come and slow-down, or stop, or even reverse the degeneration. This outside help, ultimately, can only come from God and His grace―as Our Lord says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) and St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Grace perfects nature” (Summa Theologica, 1a, q. 1, art. 8).
The more ‘outside intervention’ we can secure―through the Sacraments, prayers, reading spiritual books, listening to sermons and spiritual talks, seeking spiritual guidance―the less degenerate and more perfect we will become. Without that outside or external help, we will spiritually deteriorate, degenerate, decay and die. That is what is actually happening to the Faith in the Catholic world right now―spiritual deterioration, degeneration, decay and death. It is The Law of Entropy or The Law of Decay in action, which will reach such a point as to prove the truth of Our Lord’s rhetorical question: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Following The Law of Entropy or The Law of Decay, each generation is becoming worse and worse―for they do not use the external mechanisms that God has put into place to prevent this spiritual deterioration, degeneration, decay and death―namely, the Church and all the external remedies (‘energy boosters’ or sources of grace) that it offers: Sacraments, Sacramentals, Catechism, Sermons, Conferences, Books, etc.
That is why, following the principles of The Law of Entropy or The Law of Decay, we have arrived at this present state of quasi-secularism, a strange, almost superstitious state, where we mix God and mammon, Catholicity and worldliness, order and disorder, grace and sin, Sacraments and Smartphones, Holy Communion and Unholy Computers, Tabernacles and TVs, all the time deteriorating in our knowledge about God and increasing in our knowledge of the world; decreasing in our love of God and increasing in our love of the world; degenerating the right order of things and regenerating a disordered value of things; relinquishing the supernatural for the natural, the graceful for the ungraceful, switching from a gratitude to God to an ingratitude to God, from a dependence on God to an independence from God. Welcome to our world! Welcome to our universe! As the The Second Law of Thermodynamics says: “The entropy (tendency to disorder) of the universe only increases and never decreases.”
Thanksgiving Day Thermodynamics
If you read, once again, the initial reason and purpose for Thanksgiving Day― where the first official call for a day of thanksgiving in the U.S., issued by the Continental Congress in 1777, enjoined Americans to offer both thanks and prayers of repentance to God. “That together with their sincere acknowledgments and offerings, they may join the penitent confession of their manifold sins,” says the proclamation―and the Protestant George Washington’s first presidential Thanksgiving proclamation, twelve years later in 1789, also calling for a day of unified prayer for America.
On October 3rd, 1789, the first Protestant president, George Washington, wrote: “Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor ― and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me ‘to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.’ Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, Who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be ― That we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the People of this country previous to their becoming a Nation; for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of His providence, which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war; … and in general for all the great and various favors which He hath been pleased to confer upon us. And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions.”
Most, if not all of that is today, forgotten and ignored―even though it comes from a Protestant and Protestant and even Masonic government―truth is nevertheless the truth. Just as no person is totally evil―as St. Thomas Aquinas says―so no man is totally wrong. Even apostates, heretics, pagans, etc. speak the truth in some things. Or, as they say, “A broken clock tells the correct time twice a day!” Maybe we should try change a largely godless day into a godly day―a secular day into a more spiritual day! Download the Thanksgiving Day Prayers and Rituals [click here and scroll down to almost the bottom of the page] and you will have a head-start on everybody else!
Article 18
Monday, November 25th
The Power of Thanksgiving!
Monday, November 25th
The Power of Thanksgiving!
Let’s Get This Straight!
For a Catholic, every day is—in a sense—“Thanksgiving Day.” The word “Eucharistia” is Greek for “thanksgiving”! The Holy Eucharist—or the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass—is celebrated thousands of times each day throughout the world. The Holy Eucharist is God’s gift to man—in fact the greatest Gift that God could give man—because it is both God Himself, and also the Sacrifice of God for our sins and our salvation! The very gift of the Eucharist and the receiving of the Eucharist, should lead to a thanksgiving for the Eucharist—as is implied by its very name: “Holy Eucharist” meaning “Holy Thanksgiving”!
Our Lord and Thanksgiving
Jesus frequently gave us the example of thanksgiving throughout His life—that is to say, a thanksgiving to God His Father.
As a prefiguration of the Holy Eucharist, Our Lord performed, several times, the miracle of the multiplication of loaves—and we notice that on these occasions He always gave thanks to God before performing the miracle. “And taking the seven loaves and the fishes, and giving thanks, He broke, and gave to His disciples, and the disciples to the people” (Matthew 15:36). “And taking the seven loaves, giving thanks, He broke, and gave to His disciples for to set before them; and they set them before the people” (Mark 8:6). “And Jesus took the loaves: and when He had given thanks, He distributed to them that were set down” (John 6:11).
When Our Lord performed the stupendous miracle of raising Lazarus, after commanding that the stone of the tomb be rolled away and before commanding Lazarus to arise and come forth, Our Lord again first gives thanks to God: “They took therefore the stone away. And Jesus, lifting up His eyes, said: ‘Father, I give Thee thanks that Thou hast heard Me!’” (John 11:41).
At the Last Supper, when He instituted the Holy Eucharist (Holy Thanksgiving), He is reported by the Evangelists as once again giving thanks to God. “And taking bread, He gave thanks, and broke; and gave to them, saying: ‘This is My body, which is given for you. Do this for a commemoration of Me!’” (Luke 22:19). “And having taken the chalice, He gave thanks, and said: ‘Take, and divide it among you!’” (Luke 22:17). “And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave to them, saying: ‘Drink ye all of this!’” (Matthew 26:27). “And having taken the chalice, giving thanks, He gave it to them. And they all drank of it” (Mark 14:23).
Our Lord Condemns Ingratitude
The chief and most striking incident whereby Our Lord condemned in gratitude was His encounter with the Ten Lepers, where only one was found to come back and give thanks. “And as Jesus entered into a certain town, there met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off; and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!’ To whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before Jesus’ feet, giving thanks: and this was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering, said, ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the nine? There is no one found to return and give glory [and thanks] to God, but this stranger!’” (Luke 17:12-18).
Today, it is not even one-in-ten that gives the thanks to God that ought to be given! It might not even be one-in-a-hundred-thousand! Many may think they give thanks, but, as you will read further below, it is mere lip service thanks, but not heart service thanks.
An Ungrateful Time, an Age of Ingratitude
Ingratitude has always been around, but St. Paul makes especial mention of it as a trait that will be seen in the End Times in particular: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God! Having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5). These kinds of persons have simply forgotten Our Lord’s incontestable truth: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). They have decided that they will do many things without Him, they will “do their own thing” and He will not be a part of it.
In these last days, Our Lady also asks for reparation for ungrateful sinners. Our Lady of Good Success speaks of “the grandeur of this restoring and life-giving Sacrament of Penance, so forgotten and even scorned by ungrateful men, who in their foolish madness, do not realize that it is the only sure means of salvation after one has lost his baptismal innocence” and how “the Host, is exposed to the sacrilegious profanations of His ungrateful sons.”
At Fatima, the Angel took the Chalice and Host. He gave Lucia the Sacred Host on the tongue. Then while giving the Precious Blood from the Chalice to Francisco and Jacinta, he said: “Eat and drink the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly outraged by ungrateful men. Make reparation for their crimes and console your God.”
Some years after the 1917 Fatima apparitions, on Thursday, December 10th, 1925, the Blessed Virgin, accompanied by the Child Jesus, appeared to Lucia in her cell. Lucia recounted that Mary showed her a Heart encircled by thorns in her hand. The Child Jesus spoke first, saying: “Have pity on the Heart of your Most Holy Mother. It is covered with the thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to remove them with an act of reparation.” Then Mary said: “My daughter, look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console me.”
Some 43 years later, Our Lady said at Akita (August 1973): “Many men in this world afflict the Lord. I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair by their suffering and their poverty for the sinners and the ungrateful.”
Give Thanks Always, Everywhere and for Everything!
This is why St. Paul commands that we should be “giving thanks always for all things, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God and the Father” (Ephesians 5:20). Again, elsewhere, he writes that should be “giving thanks to God the Father, who hath made us worthy to be partakers of the lot of the saints in light” (Colossians 1:12) and that “All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 3:17).
The Eucharistic Sacrifice echoes these sentiments in every single one of its Prefaces, that precede the Canon of the Mass: “…we should at all times, and in all places, give thanks to thee, O Holy Lord, Father Almighty, eternal God, through Christ, our Lord.”
This means giving thanks, not only for the pleasant things in life, but also the unpleasant. Not only for things that God gives, but also when God takes away things—like health, wealth, possessions, benefits, jobs, friends, etc. Speaking of jobs, let us remind ourselves of Job’s famous words when God had taken from him his health, his wealth, his children and his livestock: “Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither! The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away! As it hath pleased the Lord so is it done! Blessed be the name of the Lord!” (Job 1:21).
Gratitude or Thankfulness is Not an Option!
We all remember being forcefully told by our parents to say “Thank you!” to someone who had just given us something or helped us some way! Even though we begrudgingly and sourly squeezed those words from our mouth, it cannot be said that we truly thankful or genuinely grateful—it was more a case of a “Shotgun-Thank-You!” whereby a metaphorical ‘gun’ was held to our head (a slap or a whack) to ‘encourage’ us to give thanks. But, as St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “thanksgiving is less thankful when compelled” (Summa, IIa-IIae, q. 106, art. 1). He goes on to say that “thankfulness a special part of justice”—meaning that it is owed in justice—and that “when there is greater favor on the part of the giver, greater thanks are due on the part of the recipient.”
In commenting upon the words of St. Paul, “in all things give thanks” (1 Thessalonians 5:18), St. Thomas Aquinas points out that our greatest thanks are due to God, for He is the first principle or ultimate cause of all our goods. Our Lord laid the foundation for this truth with His own words, when He said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Gratitude for Mercy!
Talking of ‘great gifts’—what greater gift is there than mercy? Holy Scripture tells us: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all his works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). God’s mercy is above all His works! What kind of gratitude should not be shown to someone who gives us the greatest gift possible? St. Thomas Aquinas says: “The penitent is more bound to give thanks than the innocent, because what he receives from God is more gratuitously given: since, whereas he was deserving of punishment, he has received grace” (Summa, IIa-IIae, q. 106, art. 2).
How much mercy have you received in your life? How much thanks is due from you in justice, in gratitude for the greatest gift of God—given time and time again? The 1st century Roman philosopher, Seneca, said that “Among all our many and great vices, none is as common as ingratitude … and the most ungrateful of all is the man who has forgotten a benefit.”
Blind to the Benefits of God!
How blind, indifferent, presumptuous and abusive we are to our greatest benefactor—the Good Lord. The One who gets thanked the least and gets taken for granted the most, is the Good Lord. Every day He gives us blessings beyond all counting through His Divine Providence. There is no provider like God. We breathe His air; we drink His water; we need His light and sunshine; we cultivate His soil; we eat His fruits and crops; we eat His fish and animals; we make medicines from his creation; we clothe ourselves with His materials; we depend upon His seasons; we build our homes with his materials; we depend upon His protection against animals, men and devils; it is He that gives us life by creating our soul; it is He that gives us health by His protective Providence; it is He who calls time, and brings death and final judgment.
Most of all He gave His only Son, Who remains living amongst us in the Blessed Sacrament. He gave us a share in His life through the sanctifying grace received at Baptism. He increased that supernatural life by the coming of his Holy Spirit, with His Gifts, into our souls at Confirmation. He has given us the treasure of the Sacrifice of the Mass—the greatest action that can possible take place anywhere in the world on any given day. To crown all that, He offers us eternal joys in Heaven. And how we take Him for granted! How we fail to say “thank you” to the One from Whom all good gifts come! It is a mystery, a tragedy, an injustice, a blindness, a neglect that should be punished; that has to be punished; and one that will be punished.
We should be spending the whole day, counting our blessings and thanking the One Who grants those blessings—the Almighty, All-Merciful, All-Providing God. As the Preface of the Mass so truly says: ”…we should at all times, and in all places, give thanks to thee, O Holy Lord, Father Almighty, eternal God, through Christ, our Lord.”
God is Owed Gratitude and Love!
St. Thomas points out that “a man owes love to his benefactor, just as he owes him gratitude” and that “to whom more is forgiven, he loveth more” (Summa, IIa-IIae, q. 106, art. 2). And St. John tells us: “If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us!” (1 John 1:10). Therefore, we owe God much gratitude and great love, because “the Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all his works!” (Psalm 144:8-9).
Nobody Excused From Thanksgiving—Neither Sinner, nor Just
“Now a favor is something bestowed freely without obligation [“gratis”]. Therefore, on the part of the giver, the favor may be greater on two counts. First, it may be great owing to the quantity of the thing given—and in this way the innocent person owes greater thanksgiving, because he receives a greater gift from God, also, absolutely speaking, a more continuous gift, other things being equal. Secondly, a favor may be said to be greater, because it is given more gratuitously; and in this sense the penitent is more bound to give thanks than the innocent, because what he receives from God is more gratuitously given—since, whereas the sinner was deserving of punishment, he has received grace. Wherefore, although the gift bestowed on the innocent is, considered absolutely, greater, yet the gift bestowed on the penitent is greater in relation to him—just as a small gift, given to a poor man, is greater to the poor man, than a great gift is to a rich man” (Summa, IIa-IIae, q. 106, art. 2).
Degree of Thankfulness
The degree of thankfulness in the recipient should correspond to the degree of favor in the giver — when there is greater favor on the part of the giver, greater thanks are due on the part of the recipient. In judging the magnitude of a favor two things are to be considered, namely, the affection of the heart and the gift itself.
St. Thomas quotes Seneca, who says “We are sometimes under a greater obligation to one who has given little with a large heart, and has bestowed a small favor, yet willingly.”
Holy Scripture bears this out, when Our Lord says: “Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For they all contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, her whole living.”
The more we thank God, the more inclined He is to give us more—we operate the same way, don’t we? Let us then think of the incredible mercies—and other graces too—that God has bestowed upon us, and let these thoughts trigger profuse sentiments of thanksgiving within us!
Two Pillars of Thanksgiving!
Have you ever read about the Two Pillars in St. John Bosco’s vision (click here)? One of the chief things we learn from those Two Pillars is thanksgiving! The word “Eucharistia” is Greek for “thanksgiving”! The very gift of the Eucharist and the receiving of the Eucharist, should lead to a thanksgiving for the Eucharist—as is implied by its very name: “Holy Eucharist” meaning “Holy Thanksgiving”!
Under the statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary on the other pillar, was the inscription “Auxilium Christianorum” which means “Help of Christians”. Again, the “Help of Christians” should lead to a “Thanksgiving by Christians” for that help.
Finally, the very outcome of the battle seen by St. John Bosco, should again lead to a thanksgiving for the victory when all seemed lost. As was stated above, the more a person give thanks in gratitude, the more God seems to give; to those who thank but little, little is given.
Nobody was as grateful to God as Our Lady, and nobody received more from God than Our Lady. Her eyes were fully open to all the wonderful things God did for her, and she thanked Him for it—her canticle, the Magnificat, is an indication of this attitude: “My soul doth magnify the Lord and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior. Because he that is mighty, hath done great things to me; and holy is His Name. He hath shown might in His arm: He hath scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart. He hath put down the mighty from their seat, and hath exalted the humble. He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich He hath sent empty away” (Luke 1:46-53).
Oh if we could learn how to thank God like He deserves to be thanked! Yet we fail to see that He “hath done great things to me” ― for we take those “great things” for granted!
Our Lady Speaks on Gratitude
How many times do you thank God daily? With what fervor and sincerity of heart do you thank Him? How many different things do you thank Him for? If you can count the number of times you thank Him on both hands and both sets of toes (20 for the normal person) then you are a miserly miser! If you thank Him as many times as you have hairs on your head (bald men excluded), then you are still a miser! Our Lady says to the Venerable Mary of Agreda:
Our Lady’s Own Gratitude
“Every day, at beginning of dawn, I prostrated myself in the presence of the Most High and gave Him thanks and praise for his immutable Being, his infinite perfections, and for having created me out of nothing; acknowledging myself as His creature and the work of His hands, I blessed Him and adored Him, giving Him honor, magnificence and Divinity, as the supreme Lord and Creator of myself and of all that exists. I raised up my spirit to place it into His hands, offering myself with profound humility and resignation to Him and asking Him to dispose of me according to His will during that day and during all the days of my life, and to teach me to fulfill whatever would be to His greater pleasure. This I repeated many times during the external works of the day …
“I gave thanks to the Author of all things, acknowledging His works as benefits freely bestowed upon me, and not as dues, which He owed to me. Therefore, when anything was wanting of the necessaries of life, I remained in peace and contentedness and deemed it all perfectly reasonable and proper in my regard, since I had merited none of the gifts and could justly be deprived of all of them” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Our Lady Complains of Our Ingratitude
“Ponder upon the small return given by mortals for the love of my Son and Lord, and how forgetful of thanks even His faithful continue to be ... Let mortals inquire what treasures and riches they did possess before they came into life? What services had they rendered unto God, in order to merit them? And if out of nothing there cannot arise anything, and if they could not merit the being which they have received, what obligation is there on the part of God to preserve, out of justice, what was given to them entirely gratuitously?
“That God created man, was of no benefit to Himself; but to man it was a benefit, and one as great as the being given to him, and as high as the object for which it was given. And if, in His creation, man becomes indebted so much, that he never can pay his debt, tell me, what right can he invoke at present for his preservation? Has he not received his being without merit and many times forfeited it? What an execrable disorder and what a despicable blindness of mortals is this? For that, which the Lord gives them gratuitously, they do not thank Him, or even give Him acknowledgment, and for that which He denies them justly, and sometimes most mercifully, they are restless and proudly desirous, and they try to procure it by unjust and forbidden means, throwing themselves into the very destruction which flies from them” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
He Who Receives More Should Be More Grateful
“He that received more ought to consider himself more needy, since his debt becomes so much the greater. All should humiliate themselves since of themselves they are nothing, nor can they do anything or possess ought. On this account they, that are raised up by the hand of the Almighty, should humiliate themselves as mere dust. For, left to themselves and to their nothingness and unworthiness, they should esteem themselves so much the more indebted and bound to thankfulness, for that which, by themselves, they can never repay!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Those Who Give Thanks, Give Poor Thanks
“If some of them do render it, it is so coarse, inattentive and discourteous, that they do not merit reward, but chastisement. They revere and adore profoundly the princes and magnates of the Earth; they ask favors and seek to obtain them with the utmost diligence; they are effusive in their thanks, when they succeed, protesting their lifelong gratitude. But the supreme Lord, Who gives them being, life and activity, Who preserves and sustains them, Who has redeemed them and raised them to the dignity of sons,Who wishes to confer upon them His own glory, Who is in Himself the infinite and the highest Good; Him, the highest Majesty, they forget, because they cannot see Him with their corporal eyes. As if not all good came from Him, they return, at the highest, merely a sluggish remembrance and a hasty thanksgiving” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Ingratitude Will Be Punished
“Meditate much, and weigh over and over again, how exactly mortals ought to correspond to this immense kindness of God and to His eagerness to assist them. Compare at the same time the heartless obduracy of the children of Adam. I wish that thy heart be softened in affectionate thankfulness toward the Lord, and melted in sorrow at these unhappy proceedings of men. I assure thee, that on the day of the general judgment, the cause of the greatest wrath of the just Judge shall be man’s most ungrateful forgetfulness of this truth; and the confusion of men, on account of this wrath, shall be such, that, on that day, they would of their own accord cast themselves into the abyss of pain, if there were no ministers of divine justice to visit this retribution upon them ... Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Our Lady Encourages Gratitude
“By incessant praise and acknowledgment, show thyself thankful for the favor which God vouchsafed thee in appointing angels to assist thee, teach thee, and guide thee through the tribulations and sorrows. Mortals, in their abominable ingratitude and grossness, ordinarily forget this blessing ... Acknowledge these blessings and give Him thanks with all thy heart ... Raise thyself above thyself and give Him thanks for the special blessings conferred upon thee and for those conferred upon the human race ... . Thank Him for the benefits, which He has conferred and confers on all, whether they know Him or not, whether they confess or repudiate Him!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Humble Gratitude
“Accustom thyself to humble thanksgiving for the benefits which thou receivest … Do not deceive thyself with the pretext of being humble; for there is a great difference between thankful humility and humble thanklessness. Remember that the Lord very often shows great favors to the unworthy, in order to manifest His goodness and munificence. On the contrary let no one become inflated, but let everyone acknowledge so much the more his unworthiness, using it as a medicine against the poison of presumption. But gratitude will agree with this humble opinion of self, since we must acknowledge, that every good gift comes from the Father of lights ... Let then thy thanks be greater than that of all the creatures!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Gratitude Leads to Love, Love Gains More Favors
St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that if we feel that we are lacking or deficient in our love for God, then one remedy is to start thanking God for all that He has done and is doing for us. This forces us to really examine our lives and discover what we have so far been blind to―that is to say, the constant and endless kindness of God’s Providence in every little detail of our everyday lives! Our Lady says: “Renew many times a day the memory of His blessings, always giving thanks to the Lord with humble and loving affection. Especially memorable among His benefits are that He has called thee, waited for thee, and excused thy faults, and added thereto such often repeated favors. This remembrance will cause in thee sweet and strong movements of love; and thou wilt find new grace and favor before the Lord, since He is so much pleased by a faithful and thankful heart” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Time for Thanksgiving that Will Spark Our Love
“Now, therefore, our God, we give thanks to Thee and we praise Thy glorious name!” (1 Paralipomenon 29:13).
“Bless the Lord, O my soul: and let all that is within me bless His holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and never forget all He hath done for thee. Who forgiveth all thy iniquities. Who healeth all thy diseases. Who redeemeth thy life from destruction. Who crowneth thee with mercy and compassion. Who satisfieth thy desire with good things” (Psalm 102:1-5). “For all these things bless the Lord” (Ecclesiasticus 32:17). “Therefore will I give thanks to Thee, O Lord!” (2 Kings 22:50). “I will bless the Lord at all times, His praise shall be always in my mouth” (Psalm 33:2). “I will bless the Lord, Who hath given me understanding” (Psalm 15:7). “I will give great thanks to the Lord with my mouth: and in the midst of many I will praise Him!” (Psalm 108:30). And, as Our Lady said: “Thou wilt find new grace and favor before the Lord, since He is so much pleased by a faithful and thankful heart.”
Loving and Thanking Our Lady and Our Lord More Than Anyone Else
So, yes, let there be someone whom we love more than our spouse, more than our children, more than our parents or anyone else. What was said in humor at the start of the article, let it be said seriously now—let it be said openly—let it be said often—let it be said as often as it needs to be said until the fact sinks into the minds of the family—not just in theory, for the theory is already there, but IN PRACTICE. Let it be seen and experienced by all that Jesus and Mary are your first loves. Let your actions speak louder than your words! Let your sacrifices speak louder than your prayers! Let everyone see that you attend to the needs and requests of Jesus and Mary, before those of any others.
Then they will start to grasp the reality of the commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength” (Mark 12:30). Then they will begin to understand Our Lord’s warning: “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 10:32-33) and His insistence that: “He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37).
Heaven is Expensive
Heaven is expensive—any and every soul that has passed through Purgatory will tell you that. Let that be said in capital letters—EXPENSIVE! As St. Paul tells us: “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). However, before we are let loose in Heaven, St. Paul also tells us that we have to “Fight the good fight of Faith: lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called” (1 Timothy 6:12). For “the life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and “the Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). That is why Christ gives us the mark of a soldier in the Sacrament of Confirmation, so that we might be soldiers of Christ who fight to defend and obtain this heavenly Kingdom.
For a Catholic, every day is—in a sense—“Thanksgiving Day.” The word “Eucharistia” is Greek for “thanksgiving”! The Holy Eucharist—or the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass—is celebrated thousands of times each day throughout the world. The Holy Eucharist is God’s gift to man—in fact the greatest Gift that God could give man—because it is both God Himself, and also the Sacrifice of God for our sins and our salvation! The very gift of the Eucharist and the receiving of the Eucharist, should lead to a thanksgiving for the Eucharist—as is implied by its very name: “Holy Eucharist” meaning “Holy Thanksgiving”!
Our Lord and Thanksgiving
Jesus frequently gave us the example of thanksgiving throughout His life—that is to say, a thanksgiving to God His Father.
As a prefiguration of the Holy Eucharist, Our Lord performed, several times, the miracle of the multiplication of loaves—and we notice that on these occasions He always gave thanks to God before performing the miracle. “And taking the seven loaves and the fishes, and giving thanks, He broke, and gave to His disciples, and the disciples to the people” (Matthew 15:36). “And taking the seven loaves, giving thanks, He broke, and gave to His disciples for to set before them; and they set them before the people” (Mark 8:6). “And Jesus took the loaves: and when He had given thanks, He distributed to them that were set down” (John 6:11).
When Our Lord performed the stupendous miracle of raising Lazarus, after commanding that the stone of the tomb be rolled away and before commanding Lazarus to arise and come forth, Our Lord again first gives thanks to God: “They took therefore the stone away. And Jesus, lifting up His eyes, said: ‘Father, I give Thee thanks that Thou hast heard Me!’” (John 11:41).
At the Last Supper, when He instituted the Holy Eucharist (Holy Thanksgiving), He is reported by the Evangelists as once again giving thanks to God. “And taking bread, He gave thanks, and broke; and gave to them, saying: ‘This is My body, which is given for you. Do this for a commemoration of Me!’” (Luke 22:19). “And having taken the chalice, He gave thanks, and said: ‘Take, and divide it among you!’” (Luke 22:17). “And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave to them, saying: ‘Drink ye all of this!’” (Matthew 26:27). “And having taken the chalice, giving thanks, He gave it to them. And they all drank of it” (Mark 14:23).
Our Lord Condemns Ingratitude
The chief and most striking incident whereby Our Lord condemned in gratitude was His encounter with the Ten Lepers, where only one was found to come back and give thanks. “And as Jesus entered into a certain town, there met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off; and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!’ To whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before Jesus’ feet, giving thanks: and this was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering, said, ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the nine? There is no one found to return and give glory [and thanks] to God, but this stranger!’” (Luke 17:12-18).
Today, it is not even one-in-ten that gives the thanks to God that ought to be given! It might not even be one-in-a-hundred-thousand! Many may think they give thanks, but, as you will read further below, it is mere lip service thanks, but not heart service thanks.
An Ungrateful Time, an Age of Ingratitude
Ingratitude has always been around, but St. Paul makes especial mention of it as a trait that will be seen in the End Times in particular: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God! Having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5). These kinds of persons have simply forgotten Our Lord’s incontestable truth: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). They have decided that they will do many things without Him, they will “do their own thing” and He will not be a part of it.
In these last days, Our Lady also asks for reparation for ungrateful sinners. Our Lady of Good Success speaks of “the grandeur of this restoring and life-giving Sacrament of Penance, so forgotten and even scorned by ungrateful men, who in their foolish madness, do not realize that it is the only sure means of salvation after one has lost his baptismal innocence” and how “the Host, is exposed to the sacrilegious profanations of His ungrateful sons.”
At Fatima, the Angel took the Chalice and Host. He gave Lucia the Sacred Host on the tongue. Then while giving the Precious Blood from the Chalice to Francisco and Jacinta, he said: “Eat and drink the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly outraged by ungrateful men. Make reparation for their crimes and console your God.”
Some years after the 1917 Fatima apparitions, on Thursday, December 10th, 1925, the Blessed Virgin, accompanied by the Child Jesus, appeared to Lucia in her cell. Lucia recounted that Mary showed her a Heart encircled by thorns in her hand. The Child Jesus spoke first, saying: “Have pity on the Heart of your Most Holy Mother. It is covered with the thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to remove them with an act of reparation.” Then Mary said: “My daughter, look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console me.”
Some 43 years later, Our Lady said at Akita (August 1973): “Many men in this world afflict the Lord. I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair by their suffering and their poverty for the sinners and the ungrateful.”
Give Thanks Always, Everywhere and for Everything!
This is why St. Paul commands that we should be “giving thanks always for all things, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God and the Father” (Ephesians 5:20). Again, elsewhere, he writes that should be “giving thanks to God the Father, who hath made us worthy to be partakers of the lot of the saints in light” (Colossians 1:12) and that “All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 3:17).
The Eucharistic Sacrifice echoes these sentiments in every single one of its Prefaces, that precede the Canon of the Mass: “…we should at all times, and in all places, give thanks to thee, O Holy Lord, Father Almighty, eternal God, through Christ, our Lord.”
This means giving thanks, not only for the pleasant things in life, but also the unpleasant. Not only for things that God gives, but also when God takes away things—like health, wealth, possessions, benefits, jobs, friends, etc. Speaking of jobs, let us remind ourselves of Job’s famous words when God had taken from him his health, his wealth, his children and his livestock: “Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither! The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away! As it hath pleased the Lord so is it done! Blessed be the name of the Lord!” (Job 1:21).
Gratitude or Thankfulness is Not an Option!
We all remember being forcefully told by our parents to say “Thank you!” to someone who had just given us something or helped us some way! Even though we begrudgingly and sourly squeezed those words from our mouth, it cannot be said that we truly thankful or genuinely grateful—it was more a case of a “Shotgun-Thank-You!” whereby a metaphorical ‘gun’ was held to our head (a slap or a whack) to ‘encourage’ us to give thanks. But, as St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “thanksgiving is less thankful when compelled” (Summa, IIa-IIae, q. 106, art. 1). He goes on to say that “thankfulness a special part of justice”—meaning that it is owed in justice—and that “when there is greater favor on the part of the giver, greater thanks are due on the part of the recipient.”
In commenting upon the words of St. Paul, “in all things give thanks” (1 Thessalonians 5:18), St. Thomas Aquinas points out that our greatest thanks are due to God, for He is the first principle or ultimate cause of all our goods. Our Lord laid the foundation for this truth with His own words, when He said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Gratitude for Mercy!
Talking of ‘great gifts’—what greater gift is there than mercy? Holy Scripture tells us: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all his works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). God’s mercy is above all His works! What kind of gratitude should not be shown to someone who gives us the greatest gift possible? St. Thomas Aquinas says: “The penitent is more bound to give thanks than the innocent, because what he receives from God is more gratuitously given: since, whereas he was deserving of punishment, he has received grace” (Summa, IIa-IIae, q. 106, art. 2).
How much mercy have you received in your life? How much thanks is due from you in justice, in gratitude for the greatest gift of God—given time and time again? The 1st century Roman philosopher, Seneca, said that “Among all our many and great vices, none is as common as ingratitude … and the most ungrateful of all is the man who has forgotten a benefit.”
Blind to the Benefits of God!
How blind, indifferent, presumptuous and abusive we are to our greatest benefactor—the Good Lord. The One who gets thanked the least and gets taken for granted the most, is the Good Lord. Every day He gives us blessings beyond all counting through His Divine Providence. There is no provider like God. We breathe His air; we drink His water; we need His light and sunshine; we cultivate His soil; we eat His fruits and crops; we eat His fish and animals; we make medicines from his creation; we clothe ourselves with His materials; we depend upon His seasons; we build our homes with his materials; we depend upon His protection against animals, men and devils; it is He that gives us life by creating our soul; it is He that gives us health by His protective Providence; it is He who calls time, and brings death and final judgment.
Most of all He gave His only Son, Who remains living amongst us in the Blessed Sacrament. He gave us a share in His life through the sanctifying grace received at Baptism. He increased that supernatural life by the coming of his Holy Spirit, with His Gifts, into our souls at Confirmation. He has given us the treasure of the Sacrifice of the Mass—the greatest action that can possible take place anywhere in the world on any given day. To crown all that, He offers us eternal joys in Heaven. And how we take Him for granted! How we fail to say “thank you” to the One from Whom all good gifts come! It is a mystery, a tragedy, an injustice, a blindness, a neglect that should be punished; that has to be punished; and one that will be punished.
We should be spending the whole day, counting our blessings and thanking the One Who grants those blessings—the Almighty, All-Merciful, All-Providing God. As the Preface of the Mass so truly says: ”…we should at all times, and in all places, give thanks to thee, O Holy Lord, Father Almighty, eternal God, through Christ, our Lord.”
God is Owed Gratitude and Love!
St. Thomas points out that “a man owes love to his benefactor, just as he owes him gratitude” and that “to whom more is forgiven, he loveth more” (Summa, IIa-IIae, q. 106, art. 2). And St. John tells us: “If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us!” (1 John 1:10). Therefore, we owe God much gratitude and great love, because “the Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all his works!” (Psalm 144:8-9).
Nobody Excused From Thanksgiving—Neither Sinner, nor Just
“Now a favor is something bestowed freely without obligation [“gratis”]. Therefore, on the part of the giver, the favor may be greater on two counts. First, it may be great owing to the quantity of the thing given—and in this way the innocent person owes greater thanksgiving, because he receives a greater gift from God, also, absolutely speaking, a more continuous gift, other things being equal. Secondly, a favor may be said to be greater, because it is given more gratuitously; and in this sense the penitent is more bound to give thanks than the innocent, because what he receives from God is more gratuitously given—since, whereas the sinner was deserving of punishment, he has received grace. Wherefore, although the gift bestowed on the innocent is, considered absolutely, greater, yet the gift bestowed on the penitent is greater in relation to him—just as a small gift, given to a poor man, is greater to the poor man, than a great gift is to a rich man” (Summa, IIa-IIae, q. 106, art. 2).
Degree of Thankfulness
The degree of thankfulness in the recipient should correspond to the degree of favor in the giver — when there is greater favor on the part of the giver, greater thanks are due on the part of the recipient. In judging the magnitude of a favor two things are to be considered, namely, the affection of the heart and the gift itself.
St. Thomas quotes Seneca, who says “We are sometimes under a greater obligation to one who has given little with a large heart, and has bestowed a small favor, yet willingly.”
Holy Scripture bears this out, when Our Lord says: “Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For they all contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, her whole living.”
The more we thank God, the more inclined He is to give us more—we operate the same way, don’t we? Let us then think of the incredible mercies—and other graces too—that God has bestowed upon us, and let these thoughts trigger profuse sentiments of thanksgiving within us!
Two Pillars of Thanksgiving!
Have you ever read about the Two Pillars in St. John Bosco’s vision (click here)? One of the chief things we learn from those Two Pillars is thanksgiving! The word “Eucharistia” is Greek for “thanksgiving”! The very gift of the Eucharist and the receiving of the Eucharist, should lead to a thanksgiving for the Eucharist—as is implied by its very name: “Holy Eucharist” meaning “Holy Thanksgiving”!
Under the statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary on the other pillar, was the inscription “Auxilium Christianorum” which means “Help of Christians”. Again, the “Help of Christians” should lead to a “Thanksgiving by Christians” for that help.
Finally, the very outcome of the battle seen by St. John Bosco, should again lead to a thanksgiving for the victory when all seemed lost. As was stated above, the more a person give thanks in gratitude, the more God seems to give; to those who thank but little, little is given.
Nobody was as grateful to God as Our Lady, and nobody received more from God than Our Lady. Her eyes were fully open to all the wonderful things God did for her, and she thanked Him for it—her canticle, the Magnificat, is an indication of this attitude: “My soul doth magnify the Lord and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior. Because he that is mighty, hath done great things to me; and holy is His Name. He hath shown might in His arm: He hath scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart. He hath put down the mighty from their seat, and hath exalted the humble. He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich He hath sent empty away” (Luke 1:46-53).
Oh if we could learn how to thank God like He deserves to be thanked! Yet we fail to see that He “hath done great things to me” ― for we take those “great things” for granted!
Our Lady Speaks on Gratitude
How many times do you thank God daily? With what fervor and sincerity of heart do you thank Him? How many different things do you thank Him for? If you can count the number of times you thank Him on both hands and both sets of toes (20 for the normal person) then you are a miserly miser! If you thank Him as many times as you have hairs on your head (bald men excluded), then you are still a miser! Our Lady says to the Venerable Mary of Agreda:
Our Lady’s Own Gratitude
“Every day, at beginning of dawn, I prostrated myself in the presence of the Most High and gave Him thanks and praise for his immutable Being, his infinite perfections, and for having created me out of nothing; acknowledging myself as His creature and the work of His hands, I blessed Him and adored Him, giving Him honor, magnificence and Divinity, as the supreme Lord and Creator of myself and of all that exists. I raised up my spirit to place it into His hands, offering myself with profound humility and resignation to Him and asking Him to dispose of me according to His will during that day and during all the days of my life, and to teach me to fulfill whatever would be to His greater pleasure. This I repeated many times during the external works of the day …
“I gave thanks to the Author of all things, acknowledging His works as benefits freely bestowed upon me, and not as dues, which He owed to me. Therefore, when anything was wanting of the necessaries of life, I remained in peace and contentedness and deemed it all perfectly reasonable and proper in my regard, since I had merited none of the gifts and could justly be deprived of all of them” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Our Lady Complains of Our Ingratitude
“Ponder upon the small return given by mortals for the love of my Son and Lord, and how forgetful of thanks even His faithful continue to be ... Let mortals inquire what treasures and riches they did possess before they came into life? What services had they rendered unto God, in order to merit them? And if out of nothing there cannot arise anything, and if they could not merit the being which they have received, what obligation is there on the part of God to preserve, out of justice, what was given to them entirely gratuitously?
“That God created man, was of no benefit to Himself; but to man it was a benefit, and one as great as the being given to him, and as high as the object for which it was given. And if, in His creation, man becomes indebted so much, that he never can pay his debt, tell me, what right can he invoke at present for his preservation? Has he not received his being without merit and many times forfeited it? What an execrable disorder and what a despicable blindness of mortals is this? For that, which the Lord gives them gratuitously, they do not thank Him, or even give Him acknowledgment, and for that which He denies them justly, and sometimes most mercifully, they are restless and proudly desirous, and they try to procure it by unjust and forbidden means, throwing themselves into the very destruction which flies from them” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
He Who Receives More Should Be More Grateful
“He that received more ought to consider himself more needy, since his debt becomes so much the greater. All should humiliate themselves since of themselves they are nothing, nor can they do anything or possess ought. On this account they, that are raised up by the hand of the Almighty, should humiliate themselves as mere dust. For, left to themselves and to their nothingness and unworthiness, they should esteem themselves so much the more indebted and bound to thankfulness, for that which, by themselves, they can never repay!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Those Who Give Thanks, Give Poor Thanks
“If some of them do render it, it is so coarse, inattentive and discourteous, that they do not merit reward, but chastisement. They revere and adore profoundly the princes and magnates of the Earth; they ask favors and seek to obtain them with the utmost diligence; they are effusive in their thanks, when they succeed, protesting their lifelong gratitude. But the supreme Lord, Who gives them being, life and activity, Who preserves and sustains them, Who has redeemed them and raised them to the dignity of sons,Who wishes to confer upon them His own glory, Who is in Himself the infinite and the highest Good; Him, the highest Majesty, they forget, because they cannot see Him with their corporal eyes. As if not all good came from Him, they return, at the highest, merely a sluggish remembrance and a hasty thanksgiving” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Ingratitude Will Be Punished
“Meditate much, and weigh over and over again, how exactly mortals ought to correspond to this immense kindness of God and to His eagerness to assist them. Compare at the same time the heartless obduracy of the children of Adam. I wish that thy heart be softened in affectionate thankfulness toward the Lord, and melted in sorrow at these unhappy proceedings of men. I assure thee, that on the day of the general judgment, the cause of the greatest wrath of the just Judge shall be man’s most ungrateful forgetfulness of this truth; and the confusion of men, on account of this wrath, shall be such, that, on that day, they would of their own accord cast themselves into the abyss of pain, if there were no ministers of divine justice to visit this retribution upon them ... Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Our Lady Encourages Gratitude
“By incessant praise and acknowledgment, show thyself thankful for the favor which God vouchsafed thee in appointing angels to assist thee, teach thee, and guide thee through the tribulations and sorrows. Mortals, in their abominable ingratitude and grossness, ordinarily forget this blessing ... Acknowledge these blessings and give Him thanks with all thy heart ... Raise thyself above thyself and give Him thanks for the special blessings conferred upon thee and for those conferred upon the human race ... . Thank Him for the benefits, which He has conferred and confers on all, whether they know Him or not, whether they confess or repudiate Him!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Humble Gratitude
“Accustom thyself to humble thanksgiving for the benefits which thou receivest … Do not deceive thyself with the pretext of being humble; for there is a great difference between thankful humility and humble thanklessness. Remember that the Lord very often shows great favors to the unworthy, in order to manifest His goodness and munificence. On the contrary let no one become inflated, but let everyone acknowledge so much the more his unworthiness, using it as a medicine against the poison of presumption. But gratitude will agree with this humble opinion of self, since we must acknowledge, that every good gift comes from the Father of lights ... Let then thy thanks be greater than that of all the creatures!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Gratitude Leads to Love, Love Gains More Favors
St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that if we feel that we are lacking or deficient in our love for God, then one remedy is to start thanking God for all that He has done and is doing for us. This forces us to really examine our lives and discover what we have so far been blind to―that is to say, the constant and endless kindness of God’s Providence in every little detail of our everyday lives! Our Lady says: “Renew many times a day the memory of His blessings, always giving thanks to the Lord with humble and loving affection. Especially memorable among His benefits are that He has called thee, waited for thee, and excused thy faults, and added thereto such often repeated favors. This remembrance will cause in thee sweet and strong movements of love; and thou wilt find new grace and favor before the Lord, since He is so much pleased by a faithful and thankful heart” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Time for Thanksgiving that Will Spark Our Love
“Now, therefore, our God, we give thanks to Thee and we praise Thy glorious name!” (1 Paralipomenon 29:13).
“Bless the Lord, O my soul: and let all that is within me bless His holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and never forget all He hath done for thee. Who forgiveth all thy iniquities. Who healeth all thy diseases. Who redeemeth thy life from destruction. Who crowneth thee with mercy and compassion. Who satisfieth thy desire with good things” (Psalm 102:1-5). “For all these things bless the Lord” (Ecclesiasticus 32:17). “Therefore will I give thanks to Thee, O Lord!” (2 Kings 22:50). “I will bless the Lord at all times, His praise shall be always in my mouth” (Psalm 33:2). “I will bless the Lord, Who hath given me understanding” (Psalm 15:7). “I will give great thanks to the Lord with my mouth: and in the midst of many I will praise Him!” (Psalm 108:30). And, as Our Lady said: “Thou wilt find new grace and favor before the Lord, since He is so much pleased by a faithful and thankful heart.”
Loving and Thanking Our Lady and Our Lord More Than Anyone Else
So, yes, let there be someone whom we love more than our spouse, more than our children, more than our parents or anyone else. What was said in humor at the start of the article, let it be said seriously now—let it be said openly—let it be said often—let it be said as often as it needs to be said until the fact sinks into the minds of the family—not just in theory, for the theory is already there, but IN PRACTICE. Let it be seen and experienced by all that Jesus and Mary are your first loves. Let your actions speak louder than your words! Let your sacrifices speak louder than your prayers! Let everyone see that you attend to the needs and requests of Jesus and Mary, before those of any others.
Then they will start to grasp the reality of the commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength” (Mark 12:30). Then they will begin to understand Our Lord’s warning: “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 10:32-33) and His insistence that: “He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37).
Heaven is Expensive
Heaven is expensive—any and every soul that has passed through Purgatory will tell you that. Let that be said in capital letters—EXPENSIVE! As St. Paul tells us: “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). However, before we are let loose in Heaven, St. Paul also tells us that we have to “Fight the good fight of Faith: lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called” (1 Timothy 6:12). For “the life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and “the Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). That is why Christ gives us the mark of a soldier in the Sacrament of Confirmation, so that we might be soldiers of Christ who fight to defend and obtain this heavenly Kingdom.
Article 17
Sunday, November 24th
Last Sunday of the Liturgical Year, the Four Last Things & the End Times
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, November 24th
Last Sunday of the Liturgical Year, the Four Last Things & the End Times
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Scary Four-Letter Word
Life does not last! Everyone will one day arrive at their last day on Earth! Everyone shall one day draw their last breath and speak their last word! Everyone shall experience a Last Judgment! As we arrive at this Last Sunday of the Liturgical Year―with the First Sunday of Advent beginning the New Liturgical Year―we would do well to ponder and examine what the Church calls “The Four Last Things” ― which are Death, Judgment, Heaven and Hell. Yuck! Yikes! Ouch! Ugh! Such thoughts are not very palatable thoughts, but distasteful. They are not welcome thoughts. They are not happy thoughts. They are dreadful thoughts. Most people dread death―and so they bury their heads in the sand when it comes to thinking about burying their bodies in the earth.
Talking about the “distasteful” and “unpalatable” brings to mind food and eating. The original (Pre-Vatican II) ritual and discipline for the religious Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, would require that at all meal times there would be placed a skull upon the dining table within visibility of all the religious present—so that, even though they were eating to live, they would be reminded that one day they would die. The Carmelites would also display a written sign which said: “Remember man that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return!” ― which is what the priest says to us as he places a sign of the cross with ashes on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday. We have all been sentenced to death by Original Sin (Adam and Eve’s sin) and by the Actual Sins (our own personal sins). We may not be certain about where we will end up after death—Heaven, Purgatory or Hell—but we can be absolutely sure of dying.
Death is the end of our earthly life and it will send our soul before the Judgment Seat of God. It is a sobering thought that we should always keep before our eyes and not stuff it into the closet. St. Thomas Aquinas says that we should always keep our end or goal in view—for as we live, so shall we die; as we sow, so shall we reap: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Life’s one certainty is death. Everyone knows this, though not everyone knows what comes next. The rich shall die just as the poor. Some will die young, other will die in old age. Some will die alone, others will die amongst family and friends. Some will be martyred or murdered, others will die in accidents. Some will die when God wants them to die, others will commit suicide. Some will die quickly, others slowly. Some will die loved, other will die hated. Some will die healthy, others will die sick. Some will die with the Faith, others will be die without the Faith. Some of those with the Faith will die in a state of grace, others will die in a state of mortal sin. All of these variables are unknown to us—but what IS KNOWN is that WE WILL DIE! We will die just as Our Lord died and Our Lady died. Death is not the question—it will certainly come—the question is what will happen to us after death? Will be go to Heaven, to Purgatory, or to Hell?
St. John Bosco Terrifies His Schoolboys
Let us turn to St. John Bosco for a moment. The year is 1854. The scene, a room at St. John Bosco’s school, filled with boyss gathered to hear the spiritual lecture of the evening. Don Bosco entered, looked around the room and described a strange dream. He had seen a number of his boys on the playground, but one was draped in black and wearing a kind of top-hat with the number 22 on it. He was confused about what this meant, until a dignified stranger appeared and told him that the lad had only 22 “moons” to live.
“I know who that boy is. He is right here among you!” the priest announced. Terror gripped the boys. This was the first time that Don Bosco had predicted the death of anyone in his school publicly and so solemnly. He noticed the fear and continued, “Don’t be afraid! True, I know that boy―and he is here now―but this is a dream, and you know that dreams are only dreams. One thing is certain, though―we must always be prepared, just as Our Divine Savior has warned us in the Gospel, and never commit sins. If we follow this rule, death will not frighten us. Put your conscience in order, therefore, and resolve not to offend God anymore. And on my part, I shall look after the boy of the 22 moons. These moons signify 22 months. I hope he will die a good death.”
The announcement caused an understandable fear among the boys. And, it did them good because each one began to consider the state of his soul should he be called to stand before God. The fear of God is the beginning of the wisdom. The focus on death kept the boys in God’s grace as they counted the months. At the end of the 22 months, one young man had a sudden attack of abdominal pains and died unexpectedly. He had made a general confession only a week before.
This was the first of a series of the dreams of St. John Bosco in which he saw the impending death of one of his boys. Each time, he announced to the auditorium that he had seen the boy, he knew him, but would tell no one, since it was only a dream. But he warned each one “to look after and correct himself, for while he wonders who it is, he himself may be just the one.” Each time, one of the boys would die within the prescribed time. Each time, the fervor of the whole group would increase, as the boys made more frequent and fervent Confessions and Communions, preparing themselves for the Novissima or Four Last Things.
How fortunate those boys were. The Saint entered the room and announced: “One of you will die. That is that. You can believe it or not. It was only a dream.” The boys believed the dreams because everything that he related actually came to pass. Therefore, those dreams forced them into seriousness about life. Death was no longer something distant, for the old, the weak, the sick. No, it could be I, a healthy young man, or anyone else in the room, and it could be soon. I better be prepared. And the confession lines would lengthen, and acts of piety and contrition would increase, as each one began to think about and prepare for death.
How should a Catholic act in response to the possibility of unexpected death? A Catholic should follow the advice that St. John Bosco gave to his boys and make sure that he or she is prepared at all times. The bishops and priests should be at the pulpit reminding the flocks: “You could go to Hell!” It is enough to have committed one mortal sin, and at the moment the terrorist bullet hits, you may not have a chance to repent, to confess, to return to a state of grace. The last opportunity for that can be now.
At times God permits a sudden death with the intention, among others, that many others might become frightened and turn to the path of virtue. Suddenly, a man begins to think on the Novissima: “I need to put my life in order, to consider not just the things of this life ― my family, my house, my business, etc. I better have my soul in order because an eternity of happiness, or an eternity of suffering and Hell, depends on what I do now.”
It is a sign of the mercy of God that He allows us to glimpse the Damocles’ sword handing over the heads of us all ― to invite us to think about death, and understand that things in this life are not worth anything except to the degree they help us to die well. Because if we die well, we will have eternal happiness sharing the happiness of God. If we die badly, we also will have eternity, but the eternal suffering of Hell. What a difference!
As Don Bosco with proverbial wisdom warned his sons: “Make hay while the sun shines! Let us not allow the devil to delude us into thinking we may put our consciences in order only at the moment of death!” And he added: “For the Son of Man is coming at the time you least expect!”
We are encouraged to meditate on the “Four Last Things” often [see more here], so that death does not come and find us unprepared, like a thief in the night. Unpleasant? Yes, of course! But there is no other way to package death. But, like all things, it has a both a negative and positive side to it. The negative is that our soul is taken forcibly out of our body, which leaves it dead. The positive side to it is that our ‘deathday’ is also our ‘birthday’ in which we are born to a new and, hopefully, better life.
Double-Barreled Delivery by Church
On this last Sunday of the Church’s Liturgical Year, Holy Mother Church fires the first of two almost identical shots across our bows as a warning. That double-barreled salvo concerns our salvation. It comes in the form of two almost identical Gospel readings from St. Matthew and St. Luke―the first is on this last Sunday of the Liturgical Year; the second comes the following week, on the first Sunday of the Liturgical Year, which is the First Sunday of Advent.
GOSPEL FOR THE LAST SUNDAY OF THE LITURGICAL YEAR:
“At that time, Jesus said to His disciples: ‘When you see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place ― let him who reads understand ― then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains; and let him who is on the housetop not go down to take anything from his house; and let him who is in the field not turn back to take his cloak. But woe to those who are with child, or have infants at the breast in those days! But pray that your flight may not be in the winter, or on the Sabbath. For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, nor will be. And unless those days had been shortened, no living creature would be saved. But for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened. Then if anyone say to you, “Behold, here is the Christ!” or “There He is!” ― do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will arise, and will show great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. Behold, I have told it to you beforehand. Therefore, if they say to you, “Behold, He is in the desert!” do not go forth; or “Behold, He is in the inner chambers!” do not believe it. … But immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give her light, and the stars will fall from Heaven, and the powers of Heaven will be shaken. And then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in Heaven; and then will all tribes of the Earth mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming upon the clouds of Heaven with great power and majesty. And He will send forth His angels with a trumpet and a great sound, and they will gather His elect from the four winds, from one end of the Heavens to the other … Heaven and Earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away!’” (Matthew 24:15-35).
GOSPEL FOR THE FIRST SUNDAY OF THE LITURGICAL YEAR:
“At that time, Jesus said to His disciples: ‘There will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, and upon the Earth distress of nations, bewildered by the roaring of sea and waves; men fainting for fear and for expectation of the things that are coming on the world; for the powers of Heaven will be shaken! And then they will see the son of Man coming upon a cloud with great power and majesty! But when these things begin to come to pass, look up, and lift up your heads, because your redemption is at hand!’ And He spoke to them a parable: ‘Behold the fig tree, and all the trees. When they now put forth their buds, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see these things coming to pass, know that the Kingdom of God is near! Amen I say to you, this generation will not pass away till all things have been accomplished! Heaven and Earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away!’” (Luke 21:25-33).
The Time Draws Ever Nearer!
We now enter the last week of the Church’s liturgical year, before we recommence, once again, with the season of Advent. It is time to cast a glance on the previous year to see and take stock of our spiritual lives. Have we made progress? Have we gone backwards? Are we stagnating with no apparent gains or losses? Each passing day and year is a day and year nearer to our own personal “end of time”!
God has given us time for a purpose—how have we used it? What words are more applicable to us--“God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23), or “Well done, good and faithful servant, because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord” (Matthew 25:21).
Use or Abuse of Time
We all know that famous passage from the Book of Ecclesiasticus: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under Heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal. A time to destroy, and a time to build. A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather. A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces. A time to get, and a time to lose. A time to keep, and a time to cast away. A time to rend, and a time to sew. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-7).
The Thread Through Time
Yet throughout all these differing times and fortunes of time, there has to be a unifying thread that weaves it way through all these things—that thread has to be God. St. Paul says: “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31). Which is nothing else than putting into practice the command of Our Lord: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). Such is the purpose of time and if there is time not spent loving God, it is time forever lost!
The Present Moment
The author of The Soul of Apostolate, Dom Chautard, stresses the importance of “the present moment” which will never come back again. If we do not profit from “the present moment” we have lost the profit that it presented to us. In essence, this means seeing every moment of our lives as a moment of grace—which will be given to those who use “the present moment” well; and will be refused to those who fail to use the “the present moment” well. As he himself writes: “O my soul, at every instant Jesus presents Himself to you by the GRACE OF THE PRESENT MOMENT — every time there is a prayer to say, a Mass to celebrate or to hear, reading to be done, or acts of patience, of zeal, of renunciation, of struggle, confidence, or love to be produced. Would you dare look the other way, or try to avoid His gaze?”
Cardinal Mermillod, in his Preface to Dom Chautard’s book, writes: “If there is one concept that is capable of summing up Dom Chautard’s spirituality, it is one which is sometimes seen written, most appropriately, over the doors of Cistercian monasteries: “GOD ALONE.” Not contemplation, not action, not works, not rest, not this or that particular thing, but God in everything, God in anything, God in His will, God in other men, God present in his own soul. To do whatever God willed, to suffer whatever He willed, that was enough for Dom Chautard, because all he asked was the opportunity to give himself, to give his will, utterly, without recall, to the infinite Wisdom and Love Who created and redeemed us all. It is the spirit of St. Bernard, and the spirit of the White Monks. It is the spirit of Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (Preface by Cardinal Mermillod, The Soul of the Apostolate, by Dom Chautard).
Wasted Moments
Alas, for some, it is not God but self that is the thread that weaves through everything—more or less everything is done for self, even spiritual things. Yet even worse is the thread of pleasure, entertainment and amusement, over which Our Lady laments: “People will think of nothing but amusement … [Even priests] will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain” (La Salette).
Some Have Much Time, Others Less Time
We do not know how much time God will give us! Some receive more, others less. The good die young and the bad die young. The good live to a ripe old age and so do the bad! Adam lived to the ripe old age of 930 years! Our Lord died aged around 33 years. Our Lady is said to have died in her early to mid-sixties. St. Dominic Savio died aged 14 years. St. Maria Goretti was 11 years old when she was killed. Little Blessed Francisco of Fatima was only 10 years old when he died; Blessed Jacinta, his sister was only 9 years old. The Venerable Anne de Guigné was 10 years old. “And he knows not what time shall pass, and that death approaches, and that he must leave all to others, and shall die” (Ecclesiasticus 11:20).
Time Waits For Nobody
“Our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no going back of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returns” (Wisdom 2:5). Time waits for nobody. Time is precious. Time means more than money. Time and how it is spent, means the difference between Heaven and Hell. Death is the most untimely thing around. Death respects no one. Even in the forthcoming chastisement of which Our Lady has warned us, time and time again, she says that the good will die with the bad; and neither will priests be spared, but they will die with the laity. That is why our time is so precious.
Time Means Money—Time Means Souls
The worldly have a saying about time: “Time means money!” ―meaning that wasted time means money lost. The same idea was expressed by Our Lord to one of His mystics, when He said: “Do not lose time! Every act of love means a soul!” (Our Lord to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Words of Love, Fr. Gottemuller). St. John Bosco had a somewhat similar attitude. When St. Dominic Savio entered the office of St. John Bosco, he saw a sign on the wall that said: “Da mihi animas, cetera tolle!” which means: “Give me souls, keep the rest!”
We have heard of the expression: “My time is not my own!” as applicable at work, when we have to our employer’s will and not just do what we want. The same is true of life—it is not our time, but time given to us by God. “Man born of a woman, living for a short time, is filled with many miseries … [and there are some] who were taken away before their time” (Job 14:1; 22:16). “Therefore I say, brethren; the time is short; it remaineth, that they also who have wives, be as if they had none; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as if they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use this world, as if they used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away!” (1 Corinthians 7:29-31).
Heaven Deals in Souls, Not Money
Our Lord did not come on Earth to seek money, wealth and riches—He came to seek souls: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). The Pharisees, just like us, praised the good and detested sinners—Our Lord loved sinners but detested their sins. He came to call them to conversion, penance and a change of life: “Go then and learn what this means: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners!’” (Matthew 9:13). “Jesus said to them: ‘They that are well have no need of a physician, but they that are sick. For I came not to call the just, but sinners!’” (Mark 2:17). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). And to those who listen to Him and convert, He further says: “Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:11). “Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14).
Our Lord comes for souls and He deals in souls, as St. James points out: “He must know that he who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20). Souls are pricey and expensive—St. Thomas Aquinas says that one single soul in a state of sanctifying grace is worth more than all the treasures of universe.
No wonder, then, that Our Lady comes to Fatima asking that we pray and make sacrifices for the conversion of sinners so that they return to, or find for the first time, that precious state of sanctifying grace. God loves sinners and came to work for their salvation—we must do likewise. God, nevertheless, hates sin—we must do likewise. “He that loves iniquity hates his own soul” (Psalm 10:6).
Time For A Change!
We need to change! Everybody—without exception. Who can say: “I am as holy as I should be! I have no need of progress because I have reached perfection!” For St. John says: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). If we have sins, we are not perfect; and if we are not perfect, we shall not enter Heaven, but Purgatory at best! Perfection is obligatory: “Thou shalt be perfect, and without spot before the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). Our Lord also commands perfection: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). St. Paul also requires “that the man of God may be perfect” (2 Timothy 3:17).
Change Later or Change Now?
“There is no time like the present!” as the saying goes. For “His wrath shall be kindled in a short time” (Psalm 2:13), as Our Lady warned at La Salette: “If my people do not wish to submit [change] themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it!” Therefore, I need to change now, not later, “Lest at any time he [the devil] seize upon my soul like a lion, while there is no one to redeem me, nor to save” (Psalm 7:3), “because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8).
Wasting Time
As the saying goes: “Do what you have to do today, for tomorrow may never come!” Holy Scripture, along the same lines, says: “And he knows not what time shall pass, and that death approaches, and that he must leave all to others, and shall die” (Ecclesiasticus 11:20). “Work your work before the time!” (Ecclesiasticus 51:38).
As the Church teaches, right now, while we are alive, it is a time of God’s mercy. Once life ends, it is time for God’s justice. At Bethlehem, Our Lord comes in mercy. At the end of time, He will come in justice. “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). “Bring forth, therefore, fruits worthy of penance!” (Luke 3:8), as Our Lady commanded at Lourdes: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” while at Fatima she demanded prayer and sacrifice; and at Akita she pointed out: “Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
So we must “do penance: for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2). The “end is nigh” ―as the proverbial guy with his sandwich board placard says pacing along the sidewalk. Waste not your time like the Israelites with their golden calf, who only thought of food and fun. St. Paul warns us of this: “Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play’” (1 Corinthians 10:7). As Our Lady lamented at La Salette: “The people will think of nothing but amusements!”—are we among those people?
Now is the Acceptable Time!
St. Paul writes and the Church echoes this at times of penance (Lent): “For God saith: ‘In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). “There is no time like the present!” Let us not “waste our time” on the things of the world (which often only serve as to lead us into sin or indifference to God). Let us let “time run away from us” while we vainly and selfishly “have the time of our life”!
On the contrary, let us “spend our time well” in the spirit of Our Lady Good Success’ words at Quito: “Oh, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!”
“For our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no going back of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returns” (Wisdom 2:5). “The time of our life is short and tedious, and in the end of a man there is no remedy [all must die], and no man has been known to have returned from Hell!” (Wisdom 2:1). “Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth, before the time of affliction come!” (Ecclesiastes 12:1). “Be not overmuch wicked; and be not foolish, lest thou die before thy time!” (Ecclesiastes 7:18). “For His wrath shall come on a sudden, and in the time of vengeance He will destroy thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:9).
As Our Lady herself says: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended” (Fatima) … “Many men in this world afflict the Lord! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity! It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful! The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Akita).
Time Waits For No One
Time waits for no one. Each moment in time is time we cannot waste, but from which we must draw great profit. God gives us the “the grace of the present moment” as Dom Chautard writes in his book, The Soul of the Apostolate. God, especially today, through Our Lady, says to us: “Behold I come against thee, O proud one, saith the Lord the God of hosts: for thy day is come, the time of thy visitation” (Jeremias 50:31).
Do We Know the Time of Our Visitation?
Let it not be said of us, as Our Lord said of Jerusalem in His own day, when they rejected Him and His teaching: “And when He drew near, seeing the city, He wept over it, saying: ‘If thou also hadst known, and that in this thy day, the things that are to thy peace; but now they are hidden from thy eyes. For the days shall come upon thee, and thy enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and straiten thee on every side, and beat thee flat to the ground, and thy children who are in thee: and they shall not leave in thee a stone upon a stone―because thou hast not known the time of thy visitation!’” (Luke 19:41-44).
Therefore, “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). Will we “pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) and “Bring forth fruits worthy of penance!” (Luke 3:8)? Or will we “think of nothing but amusements” and “sit down to eat and drink and rise up to play”? The rewards are great! The punishments are great! It’s our life, our choice, our fate!
Life does not last! Everyone will one day arrive at their last day on Earth! Everyone shall one day draw their last breath and speak their last word! Everyone shall experience a Last Judgment! As we arrive at this Last Sunday of the Liturgical Year―with the First Sunday of Advent beginning the New Liturgical Year―we would do well to ponder and examine what the Church calls “The Four Last Things” ― which are Death, Judgment, Heaven and Hell. Yuck! Yikes! Ouch! Ugh! Such thoughts are not very palatable thoughts, but distasteful. They are not welcome thoughts. They are not happy thoughts. They are dreadful thoughts. Most people dread death―and so they bury their heads in the sand when it comes to thinking about burying their bodies in the earth.
Talking about the “distasteful” and “unpalatable” brings to mind food and eating. The original (Pre-Vatican II) ritual and discipline for the religious Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, would require that at all meal times there would be placed a skull upon the dining table within visibility of all the religious present—so that, even though they were eating to live, they would be reminded that one day they would die. The Carmelites would also display a written sign which said: “Remember man that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return!” ― which is what the priest says to us as he places a sign of the cross with ashes on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday. We have all been sentenced to death by Original Sin (Adam and Eve’s sin) and by the Actual Sins (our own personal sins). We may not be certain about where we will end up after death—Heaven, Purgatory or Hell—but we can be absolutely sure of dying.
Death is the end of our earthly life and it will send our soul before the Judgment Seat of God. It is a sobering thought that we should always keep before our eyes and not stuff it into the closet. St. Thomas Aquinas says that we should always keep our end or goal in view—for as we live, so shall we die; as we sow, so shall we reap: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Life’s one certainty is death. Everyone knows this, though not everyone knows what comes next. The rich shall die just as the poor. Some will die young, other will die in old age. Some will die alone, others will die amongst family and friends. Some will be martyred or murdered, others will die in accidents. Some will die when God wants them to die, others will commit suicide. Some will die quickly, others slowly. Some will die loved, other will die hated. Some will die healthy, others will die sick. Some will die with the Faith, others will be die without the Faith. Some of those with the Faith will die in a state of grace, others will die in a state of mortal sin. All of these variables are unknown to us—but what IS KNOWN is that WE WILL DIE! We will die just as Our Lord died and Our Lady died. Death is not the question—it will certainly come—the question is what will happen to us after death? Will be go to Heaven, to Purgatory, or to Hell?
St. John Bosco Terrifies His Schoolboys
Let us turn to St. John Bosco for a moment. The year is 1854. The scene, a room at St. John Bosco’s school, filled with boyss gathered to hear the spiritual lecture of the evening. Don Bosco entered, looked around the room and described a strange dream. He had seen a number of his boys on the playground, but one was draped in black and wearing a kind of top-hat with the number 22 on it. He was confused about what this meant, until a dignified stranger appeared and told him that the lad had only 22 “moons” to live.
“I know who that boy is. He is right here among you!” the priest announced. Terror gripped the boys. This was the first time that Don Bosco had predicted the death of anyone in his school publicly and so solemnly. He noticed the fear and continued, “Don’t be afraid! True, I know that boy―and he is here now―but this is a dream, and you know that dreams are only dreams. One thing is certain, though―we must always be prepared, just as Our Divine Savior has warned us in the Gospel, and never commit sins. If we follow this rule, death will not frighten us. Put your conscience in order, therefore, and resolve not to offend God anymore. And on my part, I shall look after the boy of the 22 moons. These moons signify 22 months. I hope he will die a good death.”
The announcement caused an understandable fear among the boys. And, it did them good because each one began to consider the state of his soul should he be called to stand before God. The fear of God is the beginning of the wisdom. The focus on death kept the boys in God’s grace as they counted the months. At the end of the 22 months, one young man had a sudden attack of abdominal pains and died unexpectedly. He had made a general confession only a week before.
This was the first of a series of the dreams of St. John Bosco in which he saw the impending death of one of his boys. Each time, he announced to the auditorium that he had seen the boy, he knew him, but would tell no one, since it was only a dream. But he warned each one “to look after and correct himself, for while he wonders who it is, he himself may be just the one.” Each time, one of the boys would die within the prescribed time. Each time, the fervor of the whole group would increase, as the boys made more frequent and fervent Confessions and Communions, preparing themselves for the Novissima or Four Last Things.
How fortunate those boys were. The Saint entered the room and announced: “One of you will die. That is that. You can believe it or not. It was only a dream.” The boys believed the dreams because everything that he related actually came to pass. Therefore, those dreams forced them into seriousness about life. Death was no longer something distant, for the old, the weak, the sick. No, it could be I, a healthy young man, or anyone else in the room, and it could be soon. I better be prepared. And the confession lines would lengthen, and acts of piety and contrition would increase, as each one began to think about and prepare for death.
How should a Catholic act in response to the possibility of unexpected death? A Catholic should follow the advice that St. John Bosco gave to his boys and make sure that he or she is prepared at all times. The bishops and priests should be at the pulpit reminding the flocks: “You could go to Hell!” It is enough to have committed one mortal sin, and at the moment the terrorist bullet hits, you may not have a chance to repent, to confess, to return to a state of grace. The last opportunity for that can be now.
At times God permits a sudden death with the intention, among others, that many others might become frightened and turn to the path of virtue. Suddenly, a man begins to think on the Novissima: “I need to put my life in order, to consider not just the things of this life ― my family, my house, my business, etc. I better have my soul in order because an eternity of happiness, or an eternity of suffering and Hell, depends on what I do now.”
It is a sign of the mercy of God that He allows us to glimpse the Damocles’ sword handing over the heads of us all ― to invite us to think about death, and understand that things in this life are not worth anything except to the degree they help us to die well. Because if we die well, we will have eternal happiness sharing the happiness of God. If we die badly, we also will have eternity, but the eternal suffering of Hell. What a difference!
As Don Bosco with proverbial wisdom warned his sons: “Make hay while the sun shines! Let us not allow the devil to delude us into thinking we may put our consciences in order only at the moment of death!” And he added: “For the Son of Man is coming at the time you least expect!”
We are encouraged to meditate on the “Four Last Things” often [see more here], so that death does not come and find us unprepared, like a thief in the night. Unpleasant? Yes, of course! But there is no other way to package death. But, like all things, it has a both a negative and positive side to it. The negative is that our soul is taken forcibly out of our body, which leaves it dead. The positive side to it is that our ‘deathday’ is also our ‘birthday’ in which we are born to a new and, hopefully, better life.
Double-Barreled Delivery by Church
On this last Sunday of the Church’s Liturgical Year, Holy Mother Church fires the first of two almost identical shots across our bows as a warning. That double-barreled salvo concerns our salvation. It comes in the form of two almost identical Gospel readings from St. Matthew and St. Luke―the first is on this last Sunday of the Liturgical Year; the second comes the following week, on the first Sunday of the Liturgical Year, which is the First Sunday of Advent.
GOSPEL FOR THE LAST SUNDAY OF THE LITURGICAL YEAR:
“At that time, Jesus said to His disciples: ‘When you see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place ― let him who reads understand ― then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains; and let him who is on the housetop not go down to take anything from his house; and let him who is in the field not turn back to take his cloak. But woe to those who are with child, or have infants at the breast in those days! But pray that your flight may not be in the winter, or on the Sabbath. For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, nor will be. And unless those days had been shortened, no living creature would be saved. But for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened. Then if anyone say to you, “Behold, here is the Christ!” or “There He is!” ― do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will arise, and will show great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. Behold, I have told it to you beforehand. Therefore, if they say to you, “Behold, He is in the desert!” do not go forth; or “Behold, He is in the inner chambers!” do not believe it. … But immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give her light, and the stars will fall from Heaven, and the powers of Heaven will be shaken. And then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in Heaven; and then will all tribes of the Earth mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming upon the clouds of Heaven with great power and majesty. And He will send forth His angels with a trumpet and a great sound, and they will gather His elect from the four winds, from one end of the Heavens to the other … Heaven and Earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away!’” (Matthew 24:15-35).
GOSPEL FOR THE FIRST SUNDAY OF THE LITURGICAL YEAR:
“At that time, Jesus said to His disciples: ‘There will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, and upon the Earth distress of nations, bewildered by the roaring of sea and waves; men fainting for fear and for expectation of the things that are coming on the world; for the powers of Heaven will be shaken! And then they will see the son of Man coming upon a cloud with great power and majesty! But when these things begin to come to pass, look up, and lift up your heads, because your redemption is at hand!’ And He spoke to them a parable: ‘Behold the fig tree, and all the trees. When they now put forth their buds, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see these things coming to pass, know that the Kingdom of God is near! Amen I say to you, this generation will not pass away till all things have been accomplished! Heaven and Earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away!’” (Luke 21:25-33).
The Time Draws Ever Nearer!
We now enter the last week of the Church’s liturgical year, before we recommence, once again, with the season of Advent. It is time to cast a glance on the previous year to see and take stock of our spiritual lives. Have we made progress? Have we gone backwards? Are we stagnating with no apparent gains or losses? Each passing day and year is a day and year nearer to our own personal “end of time”!
God has given us time for a purpose—how have we used it? What words are more applicable to us--“God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23), or “Well done, good and faithful servant, because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord” (Matthew 25:21).
Use or Abuse of Time
We all know that famous passage from the Book of Ecclesiasticus: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under Heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal. A time to destroy, and a time to build. A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather. A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces. A time to get, and a time to lose. A time to keep, and a time to cast away. A time to rend, and a time to sew. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-7).
The Thread Through Time
Yet throughout all these differing times and fortunes of time, there has to be a unifying thread that weaves it way through all these things—that thread has to be God. St. Paul says: “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31). Which is nothing else than putting into practice the command of Our Lord: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). Such is the purpose of time and if there is time not spent loving God, it is time forever lost!
The Present Moment
The author of The Soul of Apostolate, Dom Chautard, stresses the importance of “the present moment” which will never come back again. If we do not profit from “the present moment” we have lost the profit that it presented to us. In essence, this means seeing every moment of our lives as a moment of grace—which will be given to those who use “the present moment” well; and will be refused to those who fail to use the “the present moment” well. As he himself writes: “O my soul, at every instant Jesus presents Himself to you by the GRACE OF THE PRESENT MOMENT — every time there is a prayer to say, a Mass to celebrate or to hear, reading to be done, or acts of patience, of zeal, of renunciation, of struggle, confidence, or love to be produced. Would you dare look the other way, or try to avoid His gaze?”
Cardinal Mermillod, in his Preface to Dom Chautard’s book, writes: “If there is one concept that is capable of summing up Dom Chautard’s spirituality, it is one which is sometimes seen written, most appropriately, over the doors of Cistercian monasteries: “GOD ALONE.” Not contemplation, not action, not works, not rest, not this or that particular thing, but God in everything, God in anything, God in His will, God in other men, God present in his own soul. To do whatever God willed, to suffer whatever He willed, that was enough for Dom Chautard, because all he asked was the opportunity to give himself, to give his will, utterly, without recall, to the infinite Wisdom and Love Who created and redeemed us all. It is the spirit of St. Bernard, and the spirit of the White Monks. It is the spirit of Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (Preface by Cardinal Mermillod, The Soul of the Apostolate, by Dom Chautard).
Wasted Moments
Alas, for some, it is not God but self that is the thread that weaves through everything—more or less everything is done for self, even spiritual things. Yet even worse is the thread of pleasure, entertainment and amusement, over which Our Lady laments: “People will think of nothing but amusement … [Even priests] will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain” (La Salette).
Some Have Much Time, Others Less Time
We do not know how much time God will give us! Some receive more, others less. The good die young and the bad die young. The good live to a ripe old age and so do the bad! Adam lived to the ripe old age of 930 years! Our Lord died aged around 33 years. Our Lady is said to have died in her early to mid-sixties. St. Dominic Savio died aged 14 years. St. Maria Goretti was 11 years old when she was killed. Little Blessed Francisco of Fatima was only 10 years old when he died; Blessed Jacinta, his sister was only 9 years old. The Venerable Anne de Guigné was 10 years old. “And he knows not what time shall pass, and that death approaches, and that he must leave all to others, and shall die” (Ecclesiasticus 11:20).
Time Waits For Nobody
“Our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no going back of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returns” (Wisdom 2:5). Time waits for nobody. Time is precious. Time means more than money. Time and how it is spent, means the difference between Heaven and Hell. Death is the most untimely thing around. Death respects no one. Even in the forthcoming chastisement of which Our Lady has warned us, time and time again, she says that the good will die with the bad; and neither will priests be spared, but they will die with the laity. That is why our time is so precious.
Time Means Money—Time Means Souls
The worldly have a saying about time: “Time means money!” ―meaning that wasted time means money lost. The same idea was expressed by Our Lord to one of His mystics, when He said: “Do not lose time! Every act of love means a soul!” (Our Lord to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Words of Love, Fr. Gottemuller). St. John Bosco had a somewhat similar attitude. When St. Dominic Savio entered the office of St. John Bosco, he saw a sign on the wall that said: “Da mihi animas, cetera tolle!” which means: “Give me souls, keep the rest!”
We have heard of the expression: “My time is not my own!” as applicable at work, when we have to our employer’s will and not just do what we want. The same is true of life—it is not our time, but time given to us by God. “Man born of a woman, living for a short time, is filled with many miseries … [and there are some] who were taken away before their time” (Job 14:1; 22:16). “Therefore I say, brethren; the time is short; it remaineth, that they also who have wives, be as if they had none; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as if they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use this world, as if they used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away!” (1 Corinthians 7:29-31).
Heaven Deals in Souls, Not Money
Our Lord did not come on Earth to seek money, wealth and riches—He came to seek souls: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). The Pharisees, just like us, praised the good and detested sinners—Our Lord loved sinners but detested their sins. He came to call them to conversion, penance and a change of life: “Go then and learn what this means: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners!’” (Matthew 9:13). “Jesus said to them: ‘They that are well have no need of a physician, but they that are sick. For I came not to call the just, but sinners!’” (Mark 2:17). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). And to those who listen to Him and convert, He further says: “Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:11). “Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14).
Our Lord comes for souls and He deals in souls, as St. James points out: “He must know that he who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20). Souls are pricey and expensive—St. Thomas Aquinas says that one single soul in a state of sanctifying grace is worth more than all the treasures of universe.
No wonder, then, that Our Lady comes to Fatima asking that we pray and make sacrifices for the conversion of sinners so that they return to, or find for the first time, that precious state of sanctifying grace. God loves sinners and came to work for their salvation—we must do likewise. God, nevertheless, hates sin—we must do likewise. “He that loves iniquity hates his own soul” (Psalm 10:6).
Time For A Change!
We need to change! Everybody—without exception. Who can say: “I am as holy as I should be! I have no need of progress because I have reached perfection!” For St. John says: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). If we have sins, we are not perfect; and if we are not perfect, we shall not enter Heaven, but Purgatory at best! Perfection is obligatory: “Thou shalt be perfect, and without spot before the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). Our Lord also commands perfection: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). St. Paul also requires “that the man of God may be perfect” (2 Timothy 3:17).
Change Later or Change Now?
“There is no time like the present!” as the saying goes. For “His wrath shall be kindled in a short time” (Psalm 2:13), as Our Lady warned at La Salette: “If my people do not wish to submit [change] themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it!” Therefore, I need to change now, not later, “Lest at any time he [the devil] seize upon my soul like a lion, while there is no one to redeem me, nor to save” (Psalm 7:3), “because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8).
Wasting Time
As the saying goes: “Do what you have to do today, for tomorrow may never come!” Holy Scripture, along the same lines, says: “And he knows not what time shall pass, and that death approaches, and that he must leave all to others, and shall die” (Ecclesiasticus 11:20). “Work your work before the time!” (Ecclesiasticus 51:38).
As the Church teaches, right now, while we are alive, it is a time of God’s mercy. Once life ends, it is time for God’s justice. At Bethlehem, Our Lord comes in mercy. At the end of time, He will come in justice. “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). “Bring forth, therefore, fruits worthy of penance!” (Luke 3:8), as Our Lady commanded at Lourdes: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” while at Fatima she demanded prayer and sacrifice; and at Akita she pointed out: “Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
So we must “do penance: for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2). The “end is nigh” ―as the proverbial guy with his sandwich board placard says pacing along the sidewalk. Waste not your time like the Israelites with their golden calf, who only thought of food and fun. St. Paul warns us of this: “Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play’” (1 Corinthians 10:7). As Our Lady lamented at La Salette: “The people will think of nothing but amusements!”—are we among those people?
Now is the Acceptable Time!
St. Paul writes and the Church echoes this at times of penance (Lent): “For God saith: ‘In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). “There is no time like the present!” Let us not “waste our time” on the things of the world (which often only serve as to lead us into sin or indifference to God). Let us let “time run away from us” while we vainly and selfishly “have the time of our life”!
On the contrary, let us “spend our time well” in the spirit of Our Lady Good Success’ words at Quito: “Oh, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!”
“For our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no going back of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returns” (Wisdom 2:5). “The time of our life is short and tedious, and in the end of a man there is no remedy [all must die], and no man has been known to have returned from Hell!” (Wisdom 2:1). “Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth, before the time of affliction come!” (Ecclesiastes 12:1). “Be not overmuch wicked; and be not foolish, lest thou die before thy time!” (Ecclesiastes 7:18). “For His wrath shall come on a sudden, and in the time of vengeance He will destroy thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:9).
As Our Lady herself says: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended” (Fatima) … “Many men in this world afflict the Lord! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity! It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful! The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Akita).
Time Waits For No One
Time waits for no one. Each moment in time is time we cannot waste, but from which we must draw great profit. God gives us the “the grace of the present moment” as Dom Chautard writes in his book, The Soul of the Apostolate. God, especially today, through Our Lady, says to us: “Behold I come against thee, O proud one, saith the Lord the God of hosts: for thy day is come, the time of thy visitation” (Jeremias 50:31).
Do We Know the Time of Our Visitation?
Let it not be said of us, as Our Lord said of Jerusalem in His own day, when they rejected Him and His teaching: “And when He drew near, seeing the city, He wept over it, saying: ‘If thou also hadst known, and that in this thy day, the things that are to thy peace; but now they are hidden from thy eyes. For the days shall come upon thee, and thy enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and straiten thee on every side, and beat thee flat to the ground, and thy children who are in thee: and they shall not leave in thee a stone upon a stone―because thou hast not known the time of thy visitation!’” (Luke 19:41-44).
Therefore, “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). Will we “pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) and “Bring forth fruits worthy of penance!” (Luke 3:8)? Or will we “think of nothing but amusements” and “sit down to eat and drink and rise up to play”? The rewards are great! The punishments are great! It’s our life, our choice, our fate!
Article 16
Saturday, November 23rd
I Have Sinned Too Much!
Saturday, November 23rd
I Have Sinned Too Much!
But I Have Sinned Too Much!
“But,” exclaims a soul, frightened at the thought of her many past offences, “how must Our Lord and Savior look upon me, after the many outrages which I have committed against Him! Can He any longer interest Himself for one who has been so long His enemy?” Can a well-instructed Christian soul have any doubt on this point? Did not Jesus Christ Himself assure us that He came into the world to suffer and die for sinners; that He came chiefly to seek for sinners? Now, in the face of this assertion, will they still imagine that, because they are sinners, they will be refused the help they require to return to God? No, Heaven and Earth may pass away, but the promises of God shall not pass away unfulfilled. These promises relate to sinners, and if there had been no sinners, would Jesus Christ have suffered? Would He have submitted to a cruel death? The more sinful man is, the more strikingly are the mercy of God, and the power of the Savior’s merits displayed. Is there any blacker crime than the treachery of Judas? Yes, answers St. Jerome, there is one still more enormous―it is despair! Judas rendered himself more guilty in taking away his own life than in betraying his divine Master.
Ask With Faith
“But I have sinned too much! There can be no mercy for me!” some will still say. No, as the apostle, St. James, says, “Let him ask in Faith, nothing wavering” (1:6). The heart that prays with doubt and distrust shall obtain nothing. And we also know that Jesus Christ whilst on Earth granted miracles only when there was confidence: “Daughter, thy Faith hath made thee whole” (Matthew 9:22). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow―and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool!” (Isaias 1:18). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10).
God’s almighty power gives the crowning strength to this motive for Christian hope, seeing that He exceeds all that we can require of Him. Men often promise what they are unable to give, but it is not thus with the all-powerful God. We can find no insurmountable obstacles to His will, in the gifts which He desires to make to us. He has in the boundless treasury of His graces, infallible means to lead us to holiness. Therefore we ought never to fear asking Him too much, or asking things too difficult.
God being infinitely rich, possesses all good, in the order of grace as in the order of nature. Being infinitely powerful, there are none of these treasures of which He cannot make us partake. Being infinitely good, He is disposed to grant us, according to His promises, all that is necessary for our salvation. It is on these substantial motives, drawn from the perfections of God, that we should found our hope—and only thus can our confidence have that unshaken firmness which it ought to have.
Confidence in the Sufferings and Merits of Jesus Christ
A soul that is addicted to despondency is swayed by fear, which prevents it from reflecting on the immovable foundations of confidence in God. We cannot therefore give her too many motives for overcoming that fear which harasses her incessantly. She will find a powerful one in the sufferings of Jesus Christ, which are as immense as the dignity of His person is infinite. This divine Savior, dying for all mankind, praying for all, offering for all His sufferings and His death, has merited for them all the graces which are necessary for them to overcome their spiritual enemy and to gain eternal happiness. These merits which Jesus Christ did not need for Himself He has given over to mankind. So that, according to St. Bernard, these merits become our own. And by offering them to the Father, we obtain that help which we need to strengthen us against the enemies of our salvation. It is from this principle that the Church, in all the prayers she makes to God, always invokes the merits of Jesus Christ our Lord.
You Have To Beg For His Merits
Let us then never fear to have recourse to the merits of Jesus Christ. We honor them when we make use of them to obtain the helps which we need, since it was for this that Jesus Christ vouchsafed to acquire them and to give them over to us. It is in applying them to ourselves through prayer and good works, that we fulfil the end for which they were purchased. It would be a singular way of honoring them, the not daring to make use of them; it would be going directly against the end which our divine Savior proposed to Himself. In turning from His gifts as useless, we should not be evincing our esteem for them, but only proving our indifference.
Since we acknowledge that we are poor, weak, and miserable, should we not seek to enrich and to strengthen ourselves, and to cure our evils? Jesus Christ offers Himself to accomplish these miracles in us, by offering His infinite merits. With loving tenderness He says to us, “Come to me, all you that labor, and are burdened, and I will refresh you” (Matt. 11:28). Is it not therefore against every principle, against every feeling, and still more against the intention of the Savior Himself to fear to have recourse to Him?
Temptation attacks the soul in every way. Through a sentiment of false humility a fear is conceived which fills the soul with dejection. Christian humility and sound reason require that we should recognize our unworthiness of heavenly benefits; but they do not require us to refuse those which are offered, or not to ask for those that have been promised to our prayers. Still more does the gratitude which we owe to Jesus Christ require that we should obey His will, in profiting by His sufferings, to obtain the graces which He has earned for us. Never can we honor Him more than in corresponding to the merciful designs which He had in immolating Himself for us.
On what could we rely to appease the justice of God outraged by sin, and to draw down His mercy, if not upon the merits of Our Savior? It is in presenting them to God that we may hope to disarm His anger. Just as He can see in us only that which must provoke His justice, so in His Son He only sees what solicits His mercy. This divine mercy is exercised in our behalf as soon as we, with sentiments of regret, present ourselves to Him, under the shadow of the Savior’s cross, and covered with His precious blood. And thus also is justice appeased. Mercy and truth, justice and peace make together a blessed treaty for us. In the language of the Psalmist: “Mercy and truth have met each other: justice and peace have kissed” (Psalm 84:11).
False Ideas And Feelings Which We Ascribe To God
It is because we judge God by our own weak human hearts, that we fear to exhaust His mercy. If a person to whom we have given important assistance, whom we have loaded with benefits, treats us with ingratitude, and, in return for kindness, heaps insults upon us, we turn away from him as unworthy of further notice; more especially if he has made use of our very benefits to injure us, we abandon him forever. We should consider we were acting against every dictate of common sense and prudence, did we continue to furnish him with arms to use against us.
The same feelings and judgment we ascribe to God, forgetting that His ways are as far removed from our ways as the heavens are from the Earth. God bears with our wanderings because He is eternal and all-powerful, and He knows that the day of His justice will come, when all shall be brought into order, and forever.
Wrong Idea of God—Wrong Idea of Justice & Mercy
He is patient because He is infinitely good, and wishes to give us the means to return to Him. He who knows all things has seen from all eternity all our weaknesses, our ingratitude, and our reiterated falls. He has foreseen that we could not do anything of ourselves, much less return to Him without help; and that help He has prepared for us in the person of His Son, Jesus. He entreats us, He even commands us to call upon Him in all our wanderings, and He will assist us, He will be our propitiation; for it is in helping us and pardoning us that His mercy is exercised.
God Has Always Been Just and Merciful
This conduct God brought out in a striking manner toward the Jewish nation. Whenever they fell into idolatry, God punished them, to bring them back to their allegiance. When they abandoned their Lord to serve strange gods, He would deliver them over to their enemies, to be held in cruel bondage. Then, when bowed down by the miseries of their servitude, they lifted up their hearts to God and called upon Him with confidence, God sent them a deliverer to free them from the hard yoke under which they groaned. And so did they continue during a period of four hundred years, continually relapsing into idolatry, and as often experiencing the mercy of God when they called upon Him.
Judge from this if God will tire in pardoning us, if we turn to Him with a sincerely contrite heart. But if the conduct of God toward His Jewish people does not remove your fears, listen to the words of the Prophet-King, inspired by the Holy Ghost, who assures us that God will not despise “a contrite and humbled heart” (Psalm 1:19).
God Wishes to Pardon—Do We Wish to Pay?
When, terrified by the recollection of our sins, we have the thought or the wish to return to God, it is He who is then attracting us by His grace. Does He call us only that He may refuse to receive us? Who can think it? He told St. Peter to forgive after every offence, “I say not to thee, till seven times: but till seventy times seven!” (Matthew 18:22), and by this we may learn to know His dispositions in our regard. Ah! We little know the boundless tenderness of that divine Heart, if we judge of it by our own, or if we imagine that it ever ceases to care for us. So long as we are in this life we are under the law of mercy, and of that mercy we can ever avail ourselves. It is death only that places us under the law of immutable justice.
Repeated Falls?
Our repeated infidelities ought not to make us lose confidence in God — it is the want of Faith that makes us fear. God, Who is the tender Father of all His creatures, has taken every means to remove that excessive fear which would draw them from Him. To prevent the soul that has become sensible of its ingratitude and terrified at the view of its repeated relapses into sin, after so often obtaining pardon for them ― to prevent such a soul from losing all hope and daring no longer to cry out to Him from the abyss into which it has again fallen, not only does He assure it, by the mouth of the Psalmist, “That those who hope in Him shall never be confounded,” but He expressly declares the positive law of His mercy, and commands us to hope in Him.
God is Faithful
This precept we cannot fully accomplish but with the help of His grace; and can the Almighty have made this precept and not wish to help us keep it? And can He fall to be touched by our obedience when we endeavor to do so? Can He turn away from us, when we call upon Him, as He has ordered us to do? NO; God cannot be otherwise than faithful to His promises. If we fail, it is because we have not asked with confidence, and because our Faith is weak.
Let the Holy Scripture here furnish you with another proof of this. St. Peter, at the order of his divine Master, confidently walks upon the waters. The wind rises, and the Apostle’s trust lessens; he fears, and immediately begins to sink, but the danger reanimates his confidence. Peter has recourse to his divine Master, who stretches forth His hand to save him from perishing. For our instruction Jesus let His apostle know what danger he had been in, when He thus reproached him: “O thou of little Faith! Why didst thou doubt?” (Matthew 14:31)
Fair-weather Christians
A faithful picture of what too often happens to Christian souls! So long as all is at peace in our hearts, we proceed with confidence toward Jesus. But let the winds of temptation arise; let the difficulties of our vocation be felt, we become terrified-we forget that we are walking at the call of Jesus; we begin to fear, we hesitate in our confidence; and this first infidelity weakens us still further—and we begin to sink. If our confidence does not reanimate and lead us to ask for help, we shall be overwhelmed.
St. Peter would have perished had he not called upon Jesus for help; and his kind Master heard him. If we have imitated the apostle in our weakness, like him also let us lose no time in invoking the Saviour in our need. We should experience His protection, and thus should we be spared all those anxieties, and fears, and falls, which our want of confidence occasions. Help is ever at hand, and ever ready for the asking; it is our own fault if we do not make use of it.
God is Nearby ― If You Would Ask!
God is never so near to us to assist us in our conflicts as when we imagine Him far away. He hides himself only that we may seek Him and find Him. Sometimes God does not make us wait for Him long, and we have a sensible feeling of His assistance as soon as we call upon Him. Hardly had Peter exclaimed, “Lord, save me, or I perish!” But the hand of the Savior was stretched forth to save him. At other times our divine Lord acts in a more hidden manner. Sometimes He watches our struggles without letting His presence be felt, but never is He so near to us, so ready to help us as soon as we call, as when the danger is greatest and most pressing. We become terrified because we do not seriously realize Our Savior’s presence; we think He is afar off, and yet He is in our very heart, and it is He that is strengthening us. We think He is unmindful of our danger, and all the time He is watching over our preservation, moderating the swelling waves of our passions that might cause us to sink, saying to them: “Hitherto thou shall come, and thou shall go no further, and here thou shall break thy swelling waves!” (Job 38:11).
God Is Always There
Our Savior, who has taught us by His actions as well as by His words, gives us upon this subject a lesson which is as clear as it is consoling. Once, as He lay sleeping in Peter’s boat, it was tossed by a furious storm, which seemed to threaten its total wreck. He appears to be sleeping and unconscious of the danger―but He is all the while directing the disciples in the efforts they are making to save their little craft. But the danger and the labor continue as long as they forget to have recourse to their divine Master, and with that confidence which works miracles. As soon as they call upon Him, He answers, He rises, and commands the winds and waves to be still. “And there came a great calm” (Matthew 8:26).
How often have we not experienced the same thing? When exposed to temptation, which God permits in order to strengthen us in humility and vigilance, we see ourselves upon the very edge of a precipice, into which we look with horror; we imagine that we have no longer any strength, and that we are on the point of yielding; but notwithstanding the efforts of the enemy, we keep up our courage, we resist, and we continue at the post of duty. In that trying situation, what strength upheld us? Surely we will not have the presumption to suppose that we have resisted by the power or by the strength of our own resolutions which have so often wavered? Oh, no! We must admit that it was a celestial power that rescued us from shipwreck. Jesus Christ Himself was secretly working in our hearts. His assistance was not apparent, it was not the less real; the arm that upheld us was invisible, it was not the less strong.
We know not how we resisted, we only know that we have been victorious in our combat through the grace of Jesus Christ, who has once more reestablished in our heart that peace which our temptation had disturbed. It is on such occasions that the soul must “against hope believe in hope” (Romans 4:18).
We Cannot Conquer Without Fighting—There Is No Fighting Without Trouble
The arguments that show the necessity for Christian hope are readily admitted; but the devil endeavors, by his artful suggestions, to make the despondent soul find pretexts for not applying them to herself. Indolence or aversion to everything that gives trouble is common to all men. When we have devoted ourselves to God’s service, we would like to enjoy the happiness of our condition without its costing us much, forgetting the words of Our Savior -- “The kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Let us ever remember that Christ did not enter into His glory until after He had suffered, and that He has admitted His saints to share it only after crosses, and combats, and sacrifices, the renouncing of their passions and their self-will.
Heaven Is A Reward For Struggle
Heaven is a reward; and we can earn it only by preferring God and His holy will before all other things, and being ready to sacrifice whatever is dearest to us whenever He requires it. This, then, is certain, and St. Paul declares it: “He also that strives for the mastery is not crowned unless he strives lawfully” (2 Timothy 2:5). To aspire to the crown of justice without fighting is a contradiction to the truths of Faith — to expect to fight and yet not to suffer is contrary to common sense.
Devil’s Argument
But it is often from the very knowledge we have of what God requires of us, that the devil uses his arguments for discouraging us, making use of our sloth to intimidate us from under-taking the necessary labor. It costs us nothing to follow our natural inclinations; it costs us much to repress them, and the enemy of our souls never loses sight of that, and contrives, readily enough, to make us prefer the former. Therefore does he set before our eyes a lively representation of the difficulties we shall undergo in the service of God, and that our life will be a constant torture and a constant battle. But, on the other hand, he carefully conceals the peace of heart which we shall find in obeying God, the solid consolations we shall receive in our trials, the hope of our eternal reward. No, the devil will show us our weakness to its fullest extent, will remind us of our repeated relapses; but the mercy of God, and the support of that all-powerful arm which so often upheld us, he will try to make us forget.
We Are Discouraged Too Easily
Let us now see how we are apt to behave under this species of temptation. Entirely absorbed by the thought of our weakness, and the difficulties of what we have undertaken, we fall into discouragement, instead of exclaiming with holy king David: “Though I should walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will fear no evils: for Thou art with me” (Psalm 32:4). In this state of discouragement we have but a feeble hope that God will help us; we hardly expect it, we scarcely dare to ask for it; perhaps, even, we fear to attain it, lest it should oblige us to relinquish certain favorite inclinations. In this condition, despairing of being able to persevere in such a life of self-violence, we struggle but feebly, if at all. Our first relapse serves to confirm this impression—that it is useless for us to resist, and that we must only wait for the time when our passions shall be weaker.
Henceforward, everything becomes more difficult. Disgust and the spirit of indifference with regard to our duties take possession of our mind and heart, and these duties are thus rendered only the more arduous. Our exercises of piety we omit altogether, or acquit ourselves of them so carelessly that they can scarcely be pleasing to God. A dissipated and distracted state of mind and heart succeed the interior life which we formerly led. We abandon our pious practices, resist grace, silence the voice of our conscience, and even avoid entertaining good thoughts. We follow only the bent of our inclinations and caprices, where we meet with no resistance. In His mercy God may at times speak to us, but we have begun to dread the voice that would urge us to shake off the bonds of sloth and lukewarmness. This is the point to which the enemy of our salvation has sought to lead us; he wished to prevent us from reflection and from working for our salvation; and he has succeeded.
These details are perhaps lengthy, but they may help you to understand the enemy’s plan of attack, and enable you to prepare a defense which shall defeat his designs.
Battle We Must
I am quite aware that could we foresee all the difficulties and trials that must be encountered in the service of God, taken collectively for the space of a long life, we might well feel appalled. But is this the way in which we are called upon to encounter the trials of a Christian life? Our temptations and trials generally meet us separately; today we have one enemy to combat, tomorrow another, according to the occasion. If there are some that again and again have to be met and overcome, there are others that return but seldom. Against the former we must guard ourselves in an especial manner; against the latter we must prepare ourselves by frequent exercise of the love of God. It would surely evince great pusillanimity to be afraid to resist an enemy that opposes us singly, and grows strong only in proportion as we show ourselves to be weak. Tremble at his approach and you are overcome; but resist him, invoking God’s assistance, and you are sure to conquer.
Do Not Worry About The Future
Never consider collectively what is to be presented to you separately. We have only to answer for the present, and therefore to torment one’s self about the uncertain future is folly. Such conduct is really going in advance of temptation, or, in other words, seeking it; it is laying snares for one’s own destruction. Why should we suffer in imagination that which we may never have to suffer in reality? “Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof” (Matthew 6:34). To expose oneself to temptation is contrary alike to religion and to Christian prudence.
If, then, a person does violence to himself for the love of God, and in the hope of reward ― if, at any trial to which he is exposed, he occupies himself exclusively with it, and thinks only how he will derive from it the greatest benefit ― he will easily undergo them all successively, by the grace of Our Lord, and with great merit to himself.
A person in religious life feels a repugnance for the yoke and restraint of obedience and regularity. Suppose, instead of overcoming himself on each occasion, he begins to consider the difficulty of a whole life passed in such constraint; his courage sinks at the prospect, and he is ready to despair. But let him only look at it as the restraint of a day, or half a day, or only in connection with the present duty; half the difficulty vanishes, and he finds his strength is fully equal to it. And, indeed, it is frequently but a momentary trial, and the trouble ceases when the determination is firmly taken. Let us rest assured, too, that we are very much mistaken, if we think that the difficulty which we experience in self-mortification, and in performing our duties for the love of God, will continue as vivid and painful as we find it in the beginning.
Experience teaches us that, on merely natural principles, when we frequently perform any action, or through the assistance of divine grace accustom ourselves to act from good motives, we contract a habit of doing so which becomes easier with every repetition. Whatever difficulty at first existed gradually diminishes and finally disappears. Let us only, for a while, do violence to ourselves, and perform our actions with fidelity and exactness as to time and place, and we shall soon find that we do them, as it were, instinctively, and the religious motive seems to present itself of its own accord. So true is this that some scrupulous souls are apt to become troubled and wrongly imagine that they have no merit, because they no longer feel the sacrifice or the suffering in the duty which had cost them so much at first. They overlook the fact that it is the supernatural motive, under the instigation of grace, which gives merit to the action, and not its difficulty.
Religion, moreover, teaches us that God rewards the efforts we make to overcome ourselves, by imparting graces which not only lessen our difficulties, but even cause us to derive pleasure from what was at first so painful. And even though the trial continues for a longer time, He will never stiffer it to surpass our strength aided by the grace which He has provided, and which we can always obtain through prayer. Rely on this promise, for it can never fail.
Let us never dwell upon the uncertainty of our perseverance, without also remembering God’s assurance that He will help us and reward us; this will strengthen us and reanimate our confidence.
Lack of Confidence
Despondency or discouragement is the most dangerous temptation the devil can employ. It saps us of our confidence. Of course, many of us have the wrong kind of confidence in the first place—we seek to have confidence in ourselves, rather than having confidence in God. But once discouragement or despondency sets in, the confidence quickly flies out the window—some temperaments may resist better and for longer than others, but everyone is prone to this temptation—and we must remind ourselves that it is a TEMPTATION—it is not a part of ourselves, it comes from outside of ourselves, like a virus. In other temptations the devil attacks one particular virtue: by despondency he attacks them all. In despondency there is nothing to lean upon: we feel that God is asking for that which are unable to give. We would like to turn to God, but the devil convinces us that we dare not hope to receive from God all the help we need to overcome our sins and pay for their debt, because we feel that God does not like us all that much after committing so many sins; thus we become discouraged and nearly reduced to despair, which is the final goal of the devil for the despondent soul.
Purgatory quickly becomes like a debt that has spiraled out of control. Yet we know that, with God, nobody can declare bankruptcy and get away without paying anything. Just as debt seems to crush the heart in our material life, so too does the debt of our sins crush us in relation to our spiritual life. Sometimes people cast all care to the wind and spend, spend, spend, while the credit card still works—knowing that they won’t be able to pay. The devil tries to make us sin, sin, sin, to the point where our hope and confidence of pardon is so low, that we fall into despair.
Any Debt Can Be Paid-Off, But…
First of all, we must remember the words of Scripture: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked!” (Galatians 6:7). We cannot commit the sin of presumption—which is just as much a sin against hope as despair is—by sinning, sinning and sinning with the presumption that God will still show us His mercy. Read the sermon of St. Alphonsus Liguori on “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More”, from which we will just give a few extracts:
“You say: ‘I am young! There are many who have committed more sins than I have!’ But is God, on that account, obliged to wait for your repentance if you offend Him? In the Gospel of St. Matthew (21:19) we read, that the Savior cursed a fig tree the first time He saw it without fruit. ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward forever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away. You must, then, tremble at the thought of committing a single mortal sin, particularly if you have already been guilty of mortal sins. ‘Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin’ (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Say not then, O sinner; ‘As God has forgiven me other sins, so He will pardon me this one if I commit it!’ Say not this! For, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned.”
Be Realistic, Be Confident
We cannot focus exclusively on God’s mercy, while sweeping His justice under carpet. St. Catherine of Genoa gave us that warning in her Treatise on Purgatory: “Would that I could utter so strong a cry that it would strike all men with terror, and say to them: O wretched beings! Why are you so blinded by this world that you make, as you will find at the hour of death, no provision for the great necessity that will then come upon you? You shelter yourselves beneath your hope in the mercy of God, which you unceasingly exalt. Have not the boldness to say: ‘I will go to confession and gain a plenary indulgence and thus I shall be saved.’ Remember that the full confession and entire contrition which are requisite to gain a plenary indulgence are not easily attained. If you knew how hard they are to come by, you would tremble with fear and be more sure of losing than of gaining them!” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
Nevertheless…
Let it, however, be well understood that despondency is a temptation. Hope and confidence in God are commanded equally with Faith and the other virtues. Therefore the feeling of despondency, which is opposed to hope, must be resisted strongly and CONFIDENTLY. God will forgive if we do not abuse His mercy, even though we will still have to pay—but what kind of person would want to get into Heaven on the back of a life of endless sin, without having settled his debts with God?
Words of Our Lord
In Fr. Gottemoller’s book, Words of Love, which deals with Our Lord’s apparitions to three religious sisters (Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Consolata Betrone and Sr. Mary of the Trinity), Our Lord says: “Let them [souls] give themselves up to thoughts of confidence, not fear, for I am a God of pity, ever ready to receive them into My Heart ... I make little account of all that [miseries and weakness], provided souls come to Me with confidence and love. … You must do all that you can, and it is only after that, that you can count infallibly on My help … To those who ask with love, that is to say, with unlimited confidence, I cannot prevent Myself from granting even more, far more than what is asked … Oh, if you knew what My love is! And how I long for you to have confidence in it! … You will be lacking in help only when My Divine Heart will be lacking in power! …
“It often happens that good and pious souls, and very frequently also souls who are consecrated to Me, wound My Heart to Its very depths by some diffident phrase such as: ‘Who knows whether I will be saved?’ Open the Gospel and read there My promises. I promised to My sheep: ‘I will give them life everlasting; and they shall not perish forever, and no man shall pluck them out of My Hand.’ Do you understand? No one can take a soul from Me! Now read on: ‘That which My Father has given Me, is greater than all; and no one can snatch them out of the Hand of My Father.’ Do you understand? No one can snatch a soul from Me ... In all eternity they will not perish ... because I give them eternal life. For whom have I spoken these words? For all the sheep, for all souls! Why then the insult, ‘Who knows whether I will be saved?’ I have given assurances, in the Gospel, that no one can pluck a soul from Me and that I will give that soul eternal life, and so the soul cannot perish. Believe Me, Consolata, into Hell go only those who really wish to go there; for, though no one can snatch a soul from Me, the soul may, through the free will granted her, flee from Me, may betray Me, deny Me, and so go to Satan of her own volition.
“Oh, if instead of wounding My Heart with such distrust, you would give a little thought to the Heaven which awaits you! I did not create you for Hell, but for Heaven, not as a companion for the devil, but to enjoy Me in everlasting love! You see, to Hell go only those who wish to go there ... How foolish is your fear of being damned! After having shed My Blood in order to save your soul, after having surrounded your soul with graces upon graces all through your entire existence ... would I permit Satan, My worst enemy, to rob Me of that soul, at the last moment of her life, just when I am about to gather in the fruit of the Redemption and when, therefore, that soul is on the point of loving Me forever? Would I do that, when in the Holy Gospel I have promised to give the soul eternal life and that no one can snatch her from My Hands? How is it possible to believe such a monstrosity? You see, final impenitence is found only in a soul who purposely wishes to go to Hell and therefore obstinately refuses My mercy, for I never refuse to pardon anyone. I offer the gift of My immense compassion to all, for My Blood was shed for all, for all! No, it is not the multiplicity of sins which condemns a soul, for I forgive everything if she repents, but it is the obstinacy of not wishing to be pardoned, of wishing to be damned! Dismas on the cross had only one single act of Faith in Me, but many, many sins; he was pardoned in an instant, however, and on the very day of his repentance he entered into My kingdom and is a saint! Behold the triumph of My Mercy and of Faith in Me!” (Words of Love, Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, chapter 6, “Confidence”).
Beautiful words, but words spoken to those who were sincere in their sorrow for sin and were trying to put things right—as Our Lord said: “I forgive everything if she repents ... You must do all that you can, and it is only after that, that you can count infallibly on My help ... Though no one can snatch a soul from Me, the soul may, through the free will granted her, flee from Me, may betray Me, deny Me, and so go to Satan of her own volition.” Repentance means sorrow for sin, a firm desire to change one’s life, and the desire to pay for the damage done. Our Lord adds: “Have confidence in Me! Trust Me always! You must have a blind confidence that I will fulfill all the great promises which I have made you, for I am kind, immensely kind and merciful, and ‘I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live.’” (Words of Love, Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, chapter 6, “Confidence”).
“But,” exclaims a soul, frightened at the thought of her many past offences, “how must Our Lord and Savior look upon me, after the many outrages which I have committed against Him! Can He any longer interest Himself for one who has been so long His enemy?” Can a well-instructed Christian soul have any doubt on this point? Did not Jesus Christ Himself assure us that He came into the world to suffer and die for sinners; that He came chiefly to seek for sinners? Now, in the face of this assertion, will they still imagine that, because they are sinners, they will be refused the help they require to return to God? No, Heaven and Earth may pass away, but the promises of God shall not pass away unfulfilled. These promises relate to sinners, and if there had been no sinners, would Jesus Christ have suffered? Would He have submitted to a cruel death? The more sinful man is, the more strikingly are the mercy of God, and the power of the Savior’s merits displayed. Is there any blacker crime than the treachery of Judas? Yes, answers St. Jerome, there is one still more enormous―it is despair! Judas rendered himself more guilty in taking away his own life than in betraying his divine Master.
Ask With Faith
“But I have sinned too much! There can be no mercy for me!” some will still say. No, as the apostle, St. James, says, “Let him ask in Faith, nothing wavering” (1:6). The heart that prays with doubt and distrust shall obtain nothing. And we also know that Jesus Christ whilst on Earth granted miracles only when there was confidence: “Daughter, thy Faith hath made thee whole” (Matthew 9:22). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow―and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool!” (Isaias 1:18). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10).
God’s almighty power gives the crowning strength to this motive for Christian hope, seeing that He exceeds all that we can require of Him. Men often promise what they are unable to give, but it is not thus with the all-powerful God. We can find no insurmountable obstacles to His will, in the gifts which He desires to make to us. He has in the boundless treasury of His graces, infallible means to lead us to holiness. Therefore we ought never to fear asking Him too much, or asking things too difficult.
God being infinitely rich, possesses all good, in the order of grace as in the order of nature. Being infinitely powerful, there are none of these treasures of which He cannot make us partake. Being infinitely good, He is disposed to grant us, according to His promises, all that is necessary for our salvation. It is on these substantial motives, drawn from the perfections of God, that we should found our hope—and only thus can our confidence have that unshaken firmness which it ought to have.
Confidence in the Sufferings and Merits of Jesus Christ
A soul that is addicted to despondency is swayed by fear, which prevents it from reflecting on the immovable foundations of confidence in God. We cannot therefore give her too many motives for overcoming that fear which harasses her incessantly. She will find a powerful one in the sufferings of Jesus Christ, which are as immense as the dignity of His person is infinite. This divine Savior, dying for all mankind, praying for all, offering for all His sufferings and His death, has merited for them all the graces which are necessary for them to overcome their spiritual enemy and to gain eternal happiness. These merits which Jesus Christ did not need for Himself He has given over to mankind. So that, according to St. Bernard, these merits become our own. And by offering them to the Father, we obtain that help which we need to strengthen us against the enemies of our salvation. It is from this principle that the Church, in all the prayers she makes to God, always invokes the merits of Jesus Christ our Lord.
You Have To Beg For His Merits
Let us then never fear to have recourse to the merits of Jesus Christ. We honor them when we make use of them to obtain the helps which we need, since it was for this that Jesus Christ vouchsafed to acquire them and to give them over to us. It is in applying them to ourselves through prayer and good works, that we fulfil the end for which they were purchased. It would be a singular way of honoring them, the not daring to make use of them; it would be going directly against the end which our divine Savior proposed to Himself. In turning from His gifts as useless, we should not be evincing our esteem for them, but only proving our indifference.
Since we acknowledge that we are poor, weak, and miserable, should we not seek to enrich and to strengthen ourselves, and to cure our evils? Jesus Christ offers Himself to accomplish these miracles in us, by offering His infinite merits. With loving tenderness He says to us, “Come to me, all you that labor, and are burdened, and I will refresh you” (Matt. 11:28). Is it not therefore against every principle, against every feeling, and still more against the intention of the Savior Himself to fear to have recourse to Him?
Temptation attacks the soul in every way. Through a sentiment of false humility a fear is conceived which fills the soul with dejection. Christian humility and sound reason require that we should recognize our unworthiness of heavenly benefits; but they do not require us to refuse those which are offered, or not to ask for those that have been promised to our prayers. Still more does the gratitude which we owe to Jesus Christ require that we should obey His will, in profiting by His sufferings, to obtain the graces which He has earned for us. Never can we honor Him more than in corresponding to the merciful designs which He had in immolating Himself for us.
On what could we rely to appease the justice of God outraged by sin, and to draw down His mercy, if not upon the merits of Our Savior? It is in presenting them to God that we may hope to disarm His anger. Just as He can see in us only that which must provoke His justice, so in His Son He only sees what solicits His mercy. This divine mercy is exercised in our behalf as soon as we, with sentiments of regret, present ourselves to Him, under the shadow of the Savior’s cross, and covered with His precious blood. And thus also is justice appeased. Mercy and truth, justice and peace make together a blessed treaty for us. In the language of the Psalmist: “Mercy and truth have met each other: justice and peace have kissed” (Psalm 84:11).
False Ideas And Feelings Which We Ascribe To God
It is because we judge God by our own weak human hearts, that we fear to exhaust His mercy. If a person to whom we have given important assistance, whom we have loaded with benefits, treats us with ingratitude, and, in return for kindness, heaps insults upon us, we turn away from him as unworthy of further notice; more especially if he has made use of our very benefits to injure us, we abandon him forever. We should consider we were acting against every dictate of common sense and prudence, did we continue to furnish him with arms to use against us.
The same feelings and judgment we ascribe to God, forgetting that His ways are as far removed from our ways as the heavens are from the Earth. God bears with our wanderings because He is eternal and all-powerful, and He knows that the day of His justice will come, when all shall be brought into order, and forever.
Wrong Idea of God—Wrong Idea of Justice & Mercy
He is patient because He is infinitely good, and wishes to give us the means to return to Him. He who knows all things has seen from all eternity all our weaknesses, our ingratitude, and our reiterated falls. He has foreseen that we could not do anything of ourselves, much less return to Him without help; and that help He has prepared for us in the person of His Son, Jesus. He entreats us, He even commands us to call upon Him in all our wanderings, and He will assist us, He will be our propitiation; for it is in helping us and pardoning us that His mercy is exercised.
God Has Always Been Just and Merciful
This conduct God brought out in a striking manner toward the Jewish nation. Whenever they fell into idolatry, God punished them, to bring them back to their allegiance. When they abandoned their Lord to serve strange gods, He would deliver them over to their enemies, to be held in cruel bondage. Then, when bowed down by the miseries of their servitude, they lifted up their hearts to God and called upon Him with confidence, God sent them a deliverer to free them from the hard yoke under which they groaned. And so did they continue during a period of four hundred years, continually relapsing into idolatry, and as often experiencing the mercy of God when they called upon Him.
Judge from this if God will tire in pardoning us, if we turn to Him with a sincerely contrite heart. But if the conduct of God toward His Jewish people does not remove your fears, listen to the words of the Prophet-King, inspired by the Holy Ghost, who assures us that God will not despise “a contrite and humbled heart” (Psalm 1:19).
God Wishes to Pardon—Do We Wish to Pay?
When, terrified by the recollection of our sins, we have the thought or the wish to return to God, it is He who is then attracting us by His grace. Does He call us only that He may refuse to receive us? Who can think it? He told St. Peter to forgive after every offence, “I say not to thee, till seven times: but till seventy times seven!” (Matthew 18:22), and by this we may learn to know His dispositions in our regard. Ah! We little know the boundless tenderness of that divine Heart, if we judge of it by our own, or if we imagine that it ever ceases to care for us. So long as we are in this life we are under the law of mercy, and of that mercy we can ever avail ourselves. It is death only that places us under the law of immutable justice.
Repeated Falls?
Our repeated infidelities ought not to make us lose confidence in God — it is the want of Faith that makes us fear. God, Who is the tender Father of all His creatures, has taken every means to remove that excessive fear which would draw them from Him. To prevent the soul that has become sensible of its ingratitude and terrified at the view of its repeated relapses into sin, after so often obtaining pardon for them ― to prevent such a soul from losing all hope and daring no longer to cry out to Him from the abyss into which it has again fallen, not only does He assure it, by the mouth of the Psalmist, “That those who hope in Him shall never be confounded,” but He expressly declares the positive law of His mercy, and commands us to hope in Him.
God is Faithful
This precept we cannot fully accomplish but with the help of His grace; and can the Almighty have made this precept and not wish to help us keep it? And can He fall to be touched by our obedience when we endeavor to do so? Can He turn away from us, when we call upon Him, as He has ordered us to do? NO; God cannot be otherwise than faithful to His promises. If we fail, it is because we have not asked with confidence, and because our Faith is weak.
Let the Holy Scripture here furnish you with another proof of this. St. Peter, at the order of his divine Master, confidently walks upon the waters. The wind rises, and the Apostle’s trust lessens; he fears, and immediately begins to sink, but the danger reanimates his confidence. Peter has recourse to his divine Master, who stretches forth His hand to save him from perishing. For our instruction Jesus let His apostle know what danger he had been in, when He thus reproached him: “O thou of little Faith! Why didst thou doubt?” (Matthew 14:31)
Fair-weather Christians
A faithful picture of what too often happens to Christian souls! So long as all is at peace in our hearts, we proceed with confidence toward Jesus. But let the winds of temptation arise; let the difficulties of our vocation be felt, we become terrified-we forget that we are walking at the call of Jesus; we begin to fear, we hesitate in our confidence; and this first infidelity weakens us still further—and we begin to sink. If our confidence does not reanimate and lead us to ask for help, we shall be overwhelmed.
St. Peter would have perished had he not called upon Jesus for help; and his kind Master heard him. If we have imitated the apostle in our weakness, like him also let us lose no time in invoking the Saviour in our need. We should experience His protection, and thus should we be spared all those anxieties, and fears, and falls, which our want of confidence occasions. Help is ever at hand, and ever ready for the asking; it is our own fault if we do not make use of it.
God is Nearby ― If You Would Ask!
God is never so near to us to assist us in our conflicts as when we imagine Him far away. He hides himself only that we may seek Him and find Him. Sometimes God does not make us wait for Him long, and we have a sensible feeling of His assistance as soon as we call upon Him. Hardly had Peter exclaimed, “Lord, save me, or I perish!” But the hand of the Savior was stretched forth to save him. At other times our divine Lord acts in a more hidden manner. Sometimes He watches our struggles without letting His presence be felt, but never is He so near to us, so ready to help us as soon as we call, as when the danger is greatest and most pressing. We become terrified because we do not seriously realize Our Savior’s presence; we think He is afar off, and yet He is in our very heart, and it is He that is strengthening us. We think He is unmindful of our danger, and all the time He is watching over our preservation, moderating the swelling waves of our passions that might cause us to sink, saying to them: “Hitherto thou shall come, and thou shall go no further, and here thou shall break thy swelling waves!” (Job 38:11).
God Is Always There
Our Savior, who has taught us by His actions as well as by His words, gives us upon this subject a lesson which is as clear as it is consoling. Once, as He lay sleeping in Peter’s boat, it was tossed by a furious storm, which seemed to threaten its total wreck. He appears to be sleeping and unconscious of the danger―but He is all the while directing the disciples in the efforts they are making to save their little craft. But the danger and the labor continue as long as they forget to have recourse to their divine Master, and with that confidence which works miracles. As soon as they call upon Him, He answers, He rises, and commands the winds and waves to be still. “And there came a great calm” (Matthew 8:26).
How often have we not experienced the same thing? When exposed to temptation, which God permits in order to strengthen us in humility and vigilance, we see ourselves upon the very edge of a precipice, into which we look with horror; we imagine that we have no longer any strength, and that we are on the point of yielding; but notwithstanding the efforts of the enemy, we keep up our courage, we resist, and we continue at the post of duty. In that trying situation, what strength upheld us? Surely we will not have the presumption to suppose that we have resisted by the power or by the strength of our own resolutions which have so often wavered? Oh, no! We must admit that it was a celestial power that rescued us from shipwreck. Jesus Christ Himself was secretly working in our hearts. His assistance was not apparent, it was not the less real; the arm that upheld us was invisible, it was not the less strong.
We know not how we resisted, we only know that we have been victorious in our combat through the grace of Jesus Christ, who has once more reestablished in our heart that peace which our temptation had disturbed. It is on such occasions that the soul must “against hope believe in hope” (Romans 4:18).
We Cannot Conquer Without Fighting—There Is No Fighting Without Trouble
The arguments that show the necessity for Christian hope are readily admitted; but the devil endeavors, by his artful suggestions, to make the despondent soul find pretexts for not applying them to herself. Indolence or aversion to everything that gives trouble is common to all men. When we have devoted ourselves to God’s service, we would like to enjoy the happiness of our condition without its costing us much, forgetting the words of Our Savior -- “The kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Let us ever remember that Christ did not enter into His glory until after He had suffered, and that He has admitted His saints to share it only after crosses, and combats, and sacrifices, the renouncing of their passions and their self-will.
Heaven Is A Reward For Struggle
Heaven is a reward; and we can earn it only by preferring God and His holy will before all other things, and being ready to sacrifice whatever is dearest to us whenever He requires it. This, then, is certain, and St. Paul declares it: “He also that strives for the mastery is not crowned unless he strives lawfully” (2 Timothy 2:5). To aspire to the crown of justice without fighting is a contradiction to the truths of Faith — to expect to fight and yet not to suffer is contrary to common sense.
Devil’s Argument
But it is often from the very knowledge we have of what God requires of us, that the devil uses his arguments for discouraging us, making use of our sloth to intimidate us from under-taking the necessary labor. It costs us nothing to follow our natural inclinations; it costs us much to repress them, and the enemy of our souls never loses sight of that, and contrives, readily enough, to make us prefer the former. Therefore does he set before our eyes a lively representation of the difficulties we shall undergo in the service of God, and that our life will be a constant torture and a constant battle. But, on the other hand, he carefully conceals the peace of heart which we shall find in obeying God, the solid consolations we shall receive in our trials, the hope of our eternal reward. No, the devil will show us our weakness to its fullest extent, will remind us of our repeated relapses; but the mercy of God, and the support of that all-powerful arm which so often upheld us, he will try to make us forget.
We Are Discouraged Too Easily
Let us now see how we are apt to behave under this species of temptation. Entirely absorbed by the thought of our weakness, and the difficulties of what we have undertaken, we fall into discouragement, instead of exclaiming with holy king David: “Though I should walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will fear no evils: for Thou art with me” (Psalm 32:4). In this state of discouragement we have but a feeble hope that God will help us; we hardly expect it, we scarcely dare to ask for it; perhaps, even, we fear to attain it, lest it should oblige us to relinquish certain favorite inclinations. In this condition, despairing of being able to persevere in such a life of self-violence, we struggle but feebly, if at all. Our first relapse serves to confirm this impression—that it is useless for us to resist, and that we must only wait for the time when our passions shall be weaker.
Henceforward, everything becomes more difficult. Disgust and the spirit of indifference with regard to our duties take possession of our mind and heart, and these duties are thus rendered only the more arduous. Our exercises of piety we omit altogether, or acquit ourselves of them so carelessly that they can scarcely be pleasing to God. A dissipated and distracted state of mind and heart succeed the interior life which we formerly led. We abandon our pious practices, resist grace, silence the voice of our conscience, and even avoid entertaining good thoughts. We follow only the bent of our inclinations and caprices, where we meet with no resistance. In His mercy God may at times speak to us, but we have begun to dread the voice that would urge us to shake off the bonds of sloth and lukewarmness. This is the point to which the enemy of our salvation has sought to lead us; he wished to prevent us from reflection and from working for our salvation; and he has succeeded.
These details are perhaps lengthy, but they may help you to understand the enemy’s plan of attack, and enable you to prepare a defense which shall defeat his designs.
Battle We Must
I am quite aware that could we foresee all the difficulties and trials that must be encountered in the service of God, taken collectively for the space of a long life, we might well feel appalled. But is this the way in which we are called upon to encounter the trials of a Christian life? Our temptations and trials generally meet us separately; today we have one enemy to combat, tomorrow another, according to the occasion. If there are some that again and again have to be met and overcome, there are others that return but seldom. Against the former we must guard ourselves in an especial manner; against the latter we must prepare ourselves by frequent exercise of the love of God. It would surely evince great pusillanimity to be afraid to resist an enemy that opposes us singly, and grows strong only in proportion as we show ourselves to be weak. Tremble at his approach and you are overcome; but resist him, invoking God’s assistance, and you are sure to conquer.
Do Not Worry About The Future
Never consider collectively what is to be presented to you separately. We have only to answer for the present, and therefore to torment one’s self about the uncertain future is folly. Such conduct is really going in advance of temptation, or, in other words, seeking it; it is laying snares for one’s own destruction. Why should we suffer in imagination that which we may never have to suffer in reality? “Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof” (Matthew 6:34). To expose oneself to temptation is contrary alike to religion and to Christian prudence.
If, then, a person does violence to himself for the love of God, and in the hope of reward ― if, at any trial to which he is exposed, he occupies himself exclusively with it, and thinks only how he will derive from it the greatest benefit ― he will easily undergo them all successively, by the grace of Our Lord, and with great merit to himself.
A person in religious life feels a repugnance for the yoke and restraint of obedience and regularity. Suppose, instead of overcoming himself on each occasion, he begins to consider the difficulty of a whole life passed in such constraint; his courage sinks at the prospect, and he is ready to despair. But let him only look at it as the restraint of a day, or half a day, or only in connection with the present duty; half the difficulty vanishes, and he finds his strength is fully equal to it. And, indeed, it is frequently but a momentary trial, and the trouble ceases when the determination is firmly taken. Let us rest assured, too, that we are very much mistaken, if we think that the difficulty which we experience in self-mortification, and in performing our duties for the love of God, will continue as vivid and painful as we find it in the beginning.
Experience teaches us that, on merely natural principles, when we frequently perform any action, or through the assistance of divine grace accustom ourselves to act from good motives, we contract a habit of doing so which becomes easier with every repetition. Whatever difficulty at first existed gradually diminishes and finally disappears. Let us only, for a while, do violence to ourselves, and perform our actions with fidelity and exactness as to time and place, and we shall soon find that we do them, as it were, instinctively, and the religious motive seems to present itself of its own accord. So true is this that some scrupulous souls are apt to become troubled and wrongly imagine that they have no merit, because they no longer feel the sacrifice or the suffering in the duty which had cost them so much at first. They overlook the fact that it is the supernatural motive, under the instigation of grace, which gives merit to the action, and not its difficulty.
Religion, moreover, teaches us that God rewards the efforts we make to overcome ourselves, by imparting graces which not only lessen our difficulties, but even cause us to derive pleasure from what was at first so painful. And even though the trial continues for a longer time, He will never stiffer it to surpass our strength aided by the grace which He has provided, and which we can always obtain through prayer. Rely on this promise, for it can never fail.
Let us never dwell upon the uncertainty of our perseverance, without also remembering God’s assurance that He will help us and reward us; this will strengthen us and reanimate our confidence.
Lack of Confidence
Despondency or discouragement is the most dangerous temptation the devil can employ. It saps us of our confidence. Of course, many of us have the wrong kind of confidence in the first place—we seek to have confidence in ourselves, rather than having confidence in God. But once discouragement or despondency sets in, the confidence quickly flies out the window—some temperaments may resist better and for longer than others, but everyone is prone to this temptation—and we must remind ourselves that it is a TEMPTATION—it is not a part of ourselves, it comes from outside of ourselves, like a virus. In other temptations the devil attacks one particular virtue: by despondency he attacks them all. In despondency there is nothing to lean upon: we feel that God is asking for that which are unable to give. We would like to turn to God, but the devil convinces us that we dare not hope to receive from God all the help we need to overcome our sins and pay for their debt, because we feel that God does not like us all that much after committing so many sins; thus we become discouraged and nearly reduced to despair, which is the final goal of the devil for the despondent soul.
Purgatory quickly becomes like a debt that has spiraled out of control. Yet we know that, with God, nobody can declare bankruptcy and get away without paying anything. Just as debt seems to crush the heart in our material life, so too does the debt of our sins crush us in relation to our spiritual life. Sometimes people cast all care to the wind and spend, spend, spend, while the credit card still works—knowing that they won’t be able to pay. The devil tries to make us sin, sin, sin, to the point where our hope and confidence of pardon is so low, that we fall into despair.
Any Debt Can Be Paid-Off, But…
First of all, we must remember the words of Scripture: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked!” (Galatians 6:7). We cannot commit the sin of presumption—which is just as much a sin against hope as despair is—by sinning, sinning and sinning with the presumption that God will still show us His mercy. Read the sermon of St. Alphonsus Liguori on “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More”, from which we will just give a few extracts:
“You say: ‘I am young! There are many who have committed more sins than I have!’ But is God, on that account, obliged to wait for your repentance if you offend Him? In the Gospel of St. Matthew (21:19) we read, that the Savior cursed a fig tree the first time He saw it without fruit. ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward forever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away. You must, then, tremble at the thought of committing a single mortal sin, particularly if you have already been guilty of mortal sins. ‘Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin’ (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Say not then, O sinner; ‘As God has forgiven me other sins, so He will pardon me this one if I commit it!’ Say not this! For, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned.”
Be Realistic, Be Confident
We cannot focus exclusively on God’s mercy, while sweeping His justice under carpet. St. Catherine of Genoa gave us that warning in her Treatise on Purgatory: “Would that I could utter so strong a cry that it would strike all men with terror, and say to them: O wretched beings! Why are you so blinded by this world that you make, as you will find at the hour of death, no provision for the great necessity that will then come upon you? You shelter yourselves beneath your hope in the mercy of God, which you unceasingly exalt. Have not the boldness to say: ‘I will go to confession and gain a plenary indulgence and thus I shall be saved.’ Remember that the full confession and entire contrition which are requisite to gain a plenary indulgence are not easily attained. If you knew how hard they are to come by, you would tremble with fear and be more sure of losing than of gaining them!” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
Nevertheless…
Let it, however, be well understood that despondency is a temptation. Hope and confidence in God are commanded equally with Faith and the other virtues. Therefore the feeling of despondency, which is opposed to hope, must be resisted strongly and CONFIDENTLY. God will forgive if we do not abuse His mercy, even though we will still have to pay—but what kind of person would want to get into Heaven on the back of a life of endless sin, without having settled his debts with God?
Words of Our Lord
In Fr. Gottemoller’s book, Words of Love, which deals with Our Lord’s apparitions to three religious sisters (Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Consolata Betrone and Sr. Mary of the Trinity), Our Lord says: “Let them [souls] give themselves up to thoughts of confidence, not fear, for I am a God of pity, ever ready to receive them into My Heart ... I make little account of all that [miseries and weakness], provided souls come to Me with confidence and love. … You must do all that you can, and it is only after that, that you can count infallibly on My help … To those who ask with love, that is to say, with unlimited confidence, I cannot prevent Myself from granting even more, far more than what is asked … Oh, if you knew what My love is! And how I long for you to have confidence in it! … You will be lacking in help only when My Divine Heart will be lacking in power! …
“It often happens that good and pious souls, and very frequently also souls who are consecrated to Me, wound My Heart to Its very depths by some diffident phrase such as: ‘Who knows whether I will be saved?’ Open the Gospel and read there My promises. I promised to My sheep: ‘I will give them life everlasting; and they shall not perish forever, and no man shall pluck them out of My Hand.’ Do you understand? No one can take a soul from Me! Now read on: ‘That which My Father has given Me, is greater than all; and no one can snatch them out of the Hand of My Father.’ Do you understand? No one can snatch a soul from Me ... In all eternity they will not perish ... because I give them eternal life. For whom have I spoken these words? For all the sheep, for all souls! Why then the insult, ‘Who knows whether I will be saved?’ I have given assurances, in the Gospel, that no one can pluck a soul from Me and that I will give that soul eternal life, and so the soul cannot perish. Believe Me, Consolata, into Hell go only those who really wish to go there; for, though no one can snatch a soul from Me, the soul may, through the free will granted her, flee from Me, may betray Me, deny Me, and so go to Satan of her own volition.
“Oh, if instead of wounding My Heart with such distrust, you would give a little thought to the Heaven which awaits you! I did not create you for Hell, but for Heaven, not as a companion for the devil, but to enjoy Me in everlasting love! You see, to Hell go only those who wish to go there ... How foolish is your fear of being damned! After having shed My Blood in order to save your soul, after having surrounded your soul with graces upon graces all through your entire existence ... would I permit Satan, My worst enemy, to rob Me of that soul, at the last moment of her life, just when I am about to gather in the fruit of the Redemption and when, therefore, that soul is on the point of loving Me forever? Would I do that, when in the Holy Gospel I have promised to give the soul eternal life and that no one can snatch her from My Hands? How is it possible to believe such a monstrosity? You see, final impenitence is found only in a soul who purposely wishes to go to Hell and therefore obstinately refuses My mercy, for I never refuse to pardon anyone. I offer the gift of My immense compassion to all, for My Blood was shed for all, for all! No, it is not the multiplicity of sins which condemns a soul, for I forgive everything if she repents, but it is the obstinacy of not wishing to be pardoned, of wishing to be damned! Dismas on the cross had only one single act of Faith in Me, but many, many sins; he was pardoned in an instant, however, and on the very day of his repentance he entered into My kingdom and is a saint! Behold the triumph of My Mercy and of Faith in Me!” (Words of Love, Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, chapter 6, “Confidence”).
Beautiful words, but words spoken to those who were sincere in their sorrow for sin and were trying to put things right—as Our Lord said: “I forgive everything if she repents ... You must do all that you can, and it is only after that, that you can count infallibly on My help ... Though no one can snatch a soul from Me, the soul may, through the free will granted her, flee from Me, may betray Me, deny Me, and so go to Satan of her own volition.” Repentance means sorrow for sin, a firm desire to change one’s life, and the desire to pay for the damage done. Our Lord adds: “Have confidence in Me! Trust Me always! You must have a blind confidence that I will fulfill all the great promises which I have made you, for I am kind, immensely kind and merciful, and ‘I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live.’” (Words of Love, Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, chapter 6, “Confidence”).
Article 15
Friday, November 22nd
How Long, Lord, How Long?
Friday, November 22nd
How Long, Lord, How Long?
How Long Do Souls Remain in Purgatory?
The length of time souls are detained in Purgatory depends on:
(a) The number of their sins and faults;
(b) The malice and deliberation with which these sins and faults have been committed;
(c) The penance done, or not done, the satisfaction made, or not made, for sins during life;
(d) Much, too, depends on the suffrages (prayers, sacrifices, almsdeeds, Masses) offered for them after death.
What can safely be said is that the time souls spend in Purgatory is, as a rule, very much longer than people commonly imagine. We will quote a few of the many instances which are recounted in the lives and revelations of the Saints.
► St. Louis Bertrand’s father was an exemplary Christian―as we should naturally expect, being the father of so great a Saint. At one time, he had even wished to become a Carthusian monk―until he learned that it was not God’s will for him. When he died, after long years spent in the practice of every Christian virtue, his saintly son, fully aware of the rigors of God’s Justice, offered many Masses and poured forth the most fervent supplications for the soul he so dearly loved. A vision of his father still in Purgatory forced him to intensify a hundredfold his suffrages. He added most severe penances and long fasts to his Masses and prayers. Yet eight whole years passed before he obtained the release of his father.
► St. Malachy’s sister was detained in Purgatory for a very long time, despite the Masses, prayers and heroic mortifications the Saint offered for her!
► It was related to a holy nun in Pampluna, who had succeeded in releasing many Carmelite nuns from Purgatory, that most of these nuns had spent terms there ranging from 30 to 60 years! Carmelite nuns in Purgatory for 40, 50 and 60 years! What will it be for those living amidst the temptations of the world and with all their hundreds of weaknesses?
► St. Vincent Ferrer, after the death of his sister, prayed with incredible fervor for her soul and offered many Masses for her release. She appeared to him at length and told him that had it not been for his powerful intercession with God, she should have remained an interminable time in Purgatory.
► In the Dominican Order it is the rule to pray for the Master Generals by name on their anniversaries. Many of these have been dead several hundred years! They were men especially eminent for piety and learning. This rule would not be approved by the Church were it not necessary and prudent.
We do not mean to imply that all souls are detained equally long periods in the expiatory fires. Many have committed lesser faults and have done more penance. Therefore, their punishment will be much less severe. Still, the instances we have quoted are very much to the point, for if these souls who enjoyed the intimacy of God, who saw the example holy persons around them, and who shared in the intercession of great saints during their lives and were aided by their most efficacious suffrages after death―were yet detained for such a length of time in Purgatory! What may not happen to us who enjoy none of these wonderful privileges?
Why Such a Long Expiation?
The reasons are not difficult to find:
1. The malice of sin is very great. What appear to us small faults are in reality serious offenses against the infinite goodness of God. “My thoughts are not your thoughts; nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord” (Isaias 55:8). It is enough to see how the Saints wept over their faults. We are weak, it may be urged. That is true, but then God offers us abundant graces to strengthen our weakness, gives us light to see the gravity of our faults, and the necessary force to conquer temptation. If we are still weak, the fault is all our own. We do not use the light and strength God so generously offers us; we do not pray, we do not receive the Sacraments as we should.
2. One single mortal sin sends some souls to Hell! An eminent theologian wisely remarks that if souls are condemned to Hell for all eternity because of one mortal sin, it is not to be wondered at that other souls should be detained for long years in Purgatory who have committed countless deliberate venial sins, some of which are so grave that at the time of their commission the sinner scarcely knows if they are mortal or venial. Too, they may have committed many mortal sins for which they have had little sorrow and done little or no penance. The guilt has been remitted by absolution in the Sacrament of Confession, but the pain and punishment due to the sins will have to be paid in Purgatory.
Our Lord tells us that we shall have to render an account for each and every idle word we say and that we may not leave our prison until we shall have paid the last farthing (Matthew 5:26).
The Saints committed few and slight sins, and still they sorrowed much and did severe penances. We commit many and grave sins, and we sorrow little and do little or no penance.
VENIAL SINS
It would be difficult to calculate the immense number of venial sins that any Catholic commits.
► There is an infinite number of faults of self-love, selfishness; thoughts, words and acts of sensuality, too, in a hundreds of forms; faults of charity in thought, word and deed; laziness, vanity, jealousy, tepidity and innumerable other faults.
► There are sins of omission― to which we pay so little attention. We love God so little, yet He has a thousand claims on our love for the thousands of things he has done for us every day! Nothing happens in our lives that is exempt from the Providence of God. Yet, we treat Him with coldness, indifference and base ingratitude. He died for each one of us. Do we ever thank Him as we ought? He remains day and night on the Altar, waiting for our visits, anxious to help us. How seldom we go to Him! He longs to come into our souls in Holy Communion, and we refuse Him entrance, or are cold, or lukewarm, or indifferent towards Him. He offers Himself up for us on the Altar every morning at Mass and gives oceans of graces to those who assist at this great Sacrifice. Yet many are too lazy to go to this Calvary! What an abuse of grace! What an ingratitude for grace!
► Our hearts are mean and hard, full of self-love. We have happy homes, splendid food, warm clothing, an abundance of many good things. Many around us live in hunger and misery, and we give them so little; whereas, we spend lavishly and needlessly on ourselves.
► Life is given us to love and serve God and to save our souls. Most Christians, however, are satisfied to give God five minutes of prayer in the morning, five minutes at night! The rest of the 24 hours is given to work, rest and pleasure. Ten minutes to God, to our immortal souls, to the great work we have to do―that is to say, our salvation. Many people spend more time in the restroom/toilet than they spend in prayer! Twenty‑three hours and 50 minutes to this transitory life! Is it fair to God? Is that fulfilling the commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
It may be alleged that our work, our rest, our sufferings are done for God! They should be, and then our merits would be indeed great. The truth is that many scarcely ever think of God during the day. The one engrossing object of their thoughts is self. They think and labor and rest and sleep to satisfy self. God gets a very little place in their day and in their minds. This is an outrage to His loving Heart―which is always thinking of us.
MORTAL SINS
Many Christians unfortunately commit mortal sins during their lives, but though they confess them, they do not make sufficient satisfaction for them, as we have already said.
► The Venerable St. Bede appears to be of the opinion that those who pass a great part of their lives in the commission of grave sins and confess them on their deathbed may be detained in Purgatory even until the Last Day. St. Bede lived in the 600s and 700s and in those times the Last Day was an even longer way away than it is today!
► St. Gertrude, in her revelations, states that those who have committed many grave sins and have not done sufficient penance for them, may not benefit from, nor share in the ordinary suffrages of the Church for a very considerable time!
All those sins, mortal and venial, are accumulating for the 20, 30, 40, 60 years of our lives. Each and every one has to be atoned for after death.
PURGATORIAL MATH
We again take the extract from Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, which shows a hypothetical sin-calculator that goes towards showing how and why such long times are spent in Purgatory.
“Father Mumford, of the Company of Jesus, in his “Treatise on Charity Towards the Departed”, bases the long duration of Purgatory on a calculation of probability, which we shall give in substance. He goes out on the principle that, according to the words of the Holy Ghost, The just man falls seven times a day (Proverbs 24:16), that is to say, that even those who apply themselves most perfectly to the service of God, notwithstanding their good-will, commit a great number of faults in the infinitely pure eyes of God. We have but to enter into our own conscience, and there analyze before God our thoughts, our words, and works, to be convinced of this sad effect of human misery. Oh, how easy it is to lack respect in prayer, to prefer our ease to the accomplishment of duty, to sin by vanity, by impatience, by sensuality, by uncharitable thoughts and words, by lack of conformity to the will of God! The day is long―is it very difficult for even a virtuous person to commit, I do not say seven, but twenty or thirty of these kinds of faults and imperfections?
“Let us take a moderate estimate, and suppose that you commit about ten [venial] faults a day; at the end of 365 days you will have a sum of 3,650 faults. Let us diminish, and, to facilitate the calculation, place it at 3,000 per year. At the end of ten years this will amount to 30,000, and at the end of twenty years to 60,000. Suppose that of these 60,000 faults you have expiated one half by penance and good works, there will still remain 30,000 to be atoned for.
“Let us continue our hypothesis: You die after these twenty years of virtuous life, and appear before God with a debt of 30,000 faults, which you must discharge in Purgatory. How much time will you need to accomplish this expiation? Suppose, on an average, each fault requires one hour of Purgatory. This measure is very moderate, if we judge by the revelations of the saints; but at any rate this will give you a Purgatory of 30,000 hours. Now, do you know how many years these 30,000 hours represent? Three years, three months, and fifteen days. Thus a good Christian who watches over himself, who applies himself to penance and good works, finds himself liable to three years, three months, and fifteen days of Purgatory.
“The preceding calculation is based on an estimate which is lenient in the extreme. Now, if you extend the duration of the pain, and, instead of an hour, you take a day for the expiation of a fault, if, instead of having nothing but venial sins, you bring before God a debt resulting from mortal sins, more or less numerous, which you formerly committed, if you assign, on the average, as St. Frances of Rome says, seven years for the expiation of one mortal sin, remitted as to the guilt, who does not see that we arrive at an appalling duration, and that the expiation may easily be prolonged for many years, and even for centuries?” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained, chapter 22, “The Duration of Purgatory”).
Purgatorial Calculator
Without trying to be silly, or artificial, we have decided to put Fr. Mumford’s above statements into table form, so that we can more easily see and understand his message. We have gone with 7 venial sins a day (instead of his 10) based on Scripture: “For a just man shall fall seven times” (Proverbs 24:16). However, experience shows that on some days it is possible to commit seven venial sins, or even more, in an hour—a grumpy start to the day: we mutter when the alarm goes off; we utter a bad word when we stub our toe against something on the way to the bathroom, or when the shower water is too hot or too cold; we complain about the murky weather outside; we put-off our morning prayers or say them in haste or distractedly; we show irritability to the rest of the family at breakfast; we tell a “white lie” or two; we eat too much; we speed on the way to work; we complain about the traffic delays, the red lights, the other drivers, etc.
The tables below show at a glance the cost of such accumulated sin. Of course it is all hypothetical and all this varies with the differing gravity of each venial sin and upon the knowledge and state of the soul, e.g. priest or layman, adult or child, etc. For to whom more is given, more is expected.
The length of time souls are detained in Purgatory depends on:
(a) The number of their sins and faults;
(b) The malice and deliberation with which these sins and faults have been committed;
(c) The penance done, or not done, the satisfaction made, or not made, for sins during life;
(d) Much, too, depends on the suffrages (prayers, sacrifices, almsdeeds, Masses) offered for them after death.
What can safely be said is that the time souls spend in Purgatory is, as a rule, very much longer than people commonly imagine. We will quote a few of the many instances which are recounted in the lives and revelations of the Saints.
► St. Louis Bertrand’s father was an exemplary Christian―as we should naturally expect, being the father of so great a Saint. At one time, he had even wished to become a Carthusian monk―until he learned that it was not God’s will for him. When he died, after long years spent in the practice of every Christian virtue, his saintly son, fully aware of the rigors of God’s Justice, offered many Masses and poured forth the most fervent supplications for the soul he so dearly loved. A vision of his father still in Purgatory forced him to intensify a hundredfold his suffrages. He added most severe penances and long fasts to his Masses and prayers. Yet eight whole years passed before he obtained the release of his father.
► St. Malachy’s sister was detained in Purgatory for a very long time, despite the Masses, prayers and heroic mortifications the Saint offered for her!
► It was related to a holy nun in Pampluna, who had succeeded in releasing many Carmelite nuns from Purgatory, that most of these nuns had spent terms there ranging from 30 to 60 years! Carmelite nuns in Purgatory for 40, 50 and 60 years! What will it be for those living amidst the temptations of the world and with all their hundreds of weaknesses?
► St. Vincent Ferrer, after the death of his sister, prayed with incredible fervor for her soul and offered many Masses for her release. She appeared to him at length and told him that had it not been for his powerful intercession with God, she should have remained an interminable time in Purgatory.
► In the Dominican Order it is the rule to pray for the Master Generals by name on their anniversaries. Many of these have been dead several hundred years! They were men especially eminent for piety and learning. This rule would not be approved by the Church were it not necessary and prudent.
We do not mean to imply that all souls are detained equally long periods in the expiatory fires. Many have committed lesser faults and have done more penance. Therefore, their punishment will be much less severe. Still, the instances we have quoted are very much to the point, for if these souls who enjoyed the intimacy of God, who saw the example holy persons around them, and who shared in the intercession of great saints during their lives and were aided by their most efficacious suffrages after death―were yet detained for such a length of time in Purgatory! What may not happen to us who enjoy none of these wonderful privileges?
Why Such a Long Expiation?
The reasons are not difficult to find:
1. The malice of sin is very great. What appear to us small faults are in reality serious offenses against the infinite goodness of God. “My thoughts are not your thoughts; nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord” (Isaias 55:8). It is enough to see how the Saints wept over their faults. We are weak, it may be urged. That is true, but then God offers us abundant graces to strengthen our weakness, gives us light to see the gravity of our faults, and the necessary force to conquer temptation. If we are still weak, the fault is all our own. We do not use the light and strength God so generously offers us; we do not pray, we do not receive the Sacraments as we should.
2. One single mortal sin sends some souls to Hell! An eminent theologian wisely remarks that if souls are condemned to Hell for all eternity because of one mortal sin, it is not to be wondered at that other souls should be detained for long years in Purgatory who have committed countless deliberate venial sins, some of which are so grave that at the time of their commission the sinner scarcely knows if they are mortal or venial. Too, they may have committed many mortal sins for which they have had little sorrow and done little or no penance. The guilt has been remitted by absolution in the Sacrament of Confession, but the pain and punishment due to the sins will have to be paid in Purgatory.
Our Lord tells us that we shall have to render an account for each and every idle word we say and that we may not leave our prison until we shall have paid the last farthing (Matthew 5:26).
The Saints committed few and slight sins, and still they sorrowed much and did severe penances. We commit many and grave sins, and we sorrow little and do little or no penance.
VENIAL SINS
It would be difficult to calculate the immense number of venial sins that any Catholic commits.
► There is an infinite number of faults of self-love, selfishness; thoughts, words and acts of sensuality, too, in a hundreds of forms; faults of charity in thought, word and deed; laziness, vanity, jealousy, tepidity and innumerable other faults.
► There are sins of omission― to which we pay so little attention. We love God so little, yet He has a thousand claims on our love for the thousands of things he has done for us every day! Nothing happens in our lives that is exempt from the Providence of God. Yet, we treat Him with coldness, indifference and base ingratitude. He died for each one of us. Do we ever thank Him as we ought? He remains day and night on the Altar, waiting for our visits, anxious to help us. How seldom we go to Him! He longs to come into our souls in Holy Communion, and we refuse Him entrance, or are cold, or lukewarm, or indifferent towards Him. He offers Himself up for us on the Altar every morning at Mass and gives oceans of graces to those who assist at this great Sacrifice. Yet many are too lazy to go to this Calvary! What an abuse of grace! What an ingratitude for grace!
► Our hearts are mean and hard, full of self-love. We have happy homes, splendid food, warm clothing, an abundance of many good things. Many around us live in hunger and misery, and we give them so little; whereas, we spend lavishly and needlessly on ourselves.
► Life is given us to love and serve God and to save our souls. Most Christians, however, are satisfied to give God five minutes of prayer in the morning, five minutes at night! The rest of the 24 hours is given to work, rest and pleasure. Ten minutes to God, to our immortal souls, to the great work we have to do―that is to say, our salvation. Many people spend more time in the restroom/toilet than they spend in prayer! Twenty‑three hours and 50 minutes to this transitory life! Is it fair to God? Is that fulfilling the commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
It may be alleged that our work, our rest, our sufferings are done for God! They should be, and then our merits would be indeed great. The truth is that many scarcely ever think of God during the day. The one engrossing object of their thoughts is self. They think and labor and rest and sleep to satisfy self. God gets a very little place in their day and in their minds. This is an outrage to His loving Heart―which is always thinking of us.
MORTAL SINS
Many Christians unfortunately commit mortal sins during their lives, but though they confess them, they do not make sufficient satisfaction for them, as we have already said.
► The Venerable St. Bede appears to be of the opinion that those who pass a great part of their lives in the commission of grave sins and confess them on their deathbed may be detained in Purgatory even until the Last Day. St. Bede lived in the 600s and 700s and in those times the Last Day was an even longer way away than it is today!
► St. Gertrude, in her revelations, states that those who have committed many grave sins and have not done sufficient penance for them, may not benefit from, nor share in the ordinary suffrages of the Church for a very considerable time!
All those sins, mortal and venial, are accumulating for the 20, 30, 40, 60 years of our lives. Each and every one has to be atoned for after death.
PURGATORIAL MATH
We again take the extract from Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, which shows a hypothetical sin-calculator that goes towards showing how and why such long times are spent in Purgatory.
“Father Mumford, of the Company of Jesus, in his “Treatise on Charity Towards the Departed”, bases the long duration of Purgatory on a calculation of probability, which we shall give in substance. He goes out on the principle that, according to the words of the Holy Ghost, The just man falls seven times a day (Proverbs 24:16), that is to say, that even those who apply themselves most perfectly to the service of God, notwithstanding their good-will, commit a great number of faults in the infinitely pure eyes of God. We have but to enter into our own conscience, and there analyze before God our thoughts, our words, and works, to be convinced of this sad effect of human misery. Oh, how easy it is to lack respect in prayer, to prefer our ease to the accomplishment of duty, to sin by vanity, by impatience, by sensuality, by uncharitable thoughts and words, by lack of conformity to the will of God! The day is long―is it very difficult for even a virtuous person to commit, I do not say seven, but twenty or thirty of these kinds of faults and imperfections?
“Let us take a moderate estimate, and suppose that you commit about ten [venial] faults a day; at the end of 365 days you will have a sum of 3,650 faults. Let us diminish, and, to facilitate the calculation, place it at 3,000 per year. At the end of ten years this will amount to 30,000, and at the end of twenty years to 60,000. Suppose that of these 60,000 faults you have expiated one half by penance and good works, there will still remain 30,000 to be atoned for.
“Let us continue our hypothesis: You die after these twenty years of virtuous life, and appear before God with a debt of 30,000 faults, which you must discharge in Purgatory. How much time will you need to accomplish this expiation? Suppose, on an average, each fault requires one hour of Purgatory. This measure is very moderate, if we judge by the revelations of the saints; but at any rate this will give you a Purgatory of 30,000 hours. Now, do you know how many years these 30,000 hours represent? Three years, three months, and fifteen days. Thus a good Christian who watches over himself, who applies himself to penance and good works, finds himself liable to three years, three months, and fifteen days of Purgatory.
“The preceding calculation is based on an estimate which is lenient in the extreme. Now, if you extend the duration of the pain, and, instead of an hour, you take a day for the expiation of a fault, if, instead of having nothing but venial sins, you bring before God a debt resulting from mortal sins, more or less numerous, which you formerly committed, if you assign, on the average, as St. Frances of Rome says, seven years for the expiation of one mortal sin, remitted as to the guilt, who does not see that we arrive at an appalling duration, and that the expiation may easily be prolonged for many years, and even for centuries?” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained, chapter 22, “The Duration of Purgatory”).
Purgatorial Calculator
Without trying to be silly, or artificial, we have decided to put Fr. Mumford’s above statements into table form, so that we can more easily see and understand his message. We have gone with 7 venial sins a day (instead of his 10) based on Scripture: “For a just man shall fall seven times” (Proverbs 24:16). However, experience shows that on some days it is possible to commit seven venial sins, or even more, in an hour—a grumpy start to the day: we mutter when the alarm goes off; we utter a bad word when we stub our toe against something on the way to the bathroom, or when the shower water is too hot or too cold; we complain about the murky weather outside; we put-off our morning prayers or say them in haste or distractedly; we show irritability to the rest of the family at breakfast; we tell a “white lie” or two; we eat too much; we speed on the way to work; we complain about the traffic delays, the red lights, the other drivers, etc.
The tables below show at a glance the cost of such accumulated sin. Of course it is all hypothetical and all this varies with the differing gravity of each venial sin and upon the knowledge and state of the soul, e.g. priest or layman, adult or child, etc. For to whom more is given, more is expected.
Do Not Undervalue the Gravity of Sin
“Be not without fear about sin forgiven!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance!” (Matthew 3:8). “Thou shalt not go out thence, until thou pay the very last penny!” (Luke 12:59). Sin is expensive, very expensive—it is the most expensive thing in the world because “Mortal Sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, and a greater evil than disease, or war ... Mortal Sin must be a most terrible thing indeed, to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the eternal punishment of sinners who die with even only one Mortal Sin!” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 22, “Mortal Sin”). If an eternal Hell is created to punish just one single Mortal Sin, how on Earth can war, flooding, earthquakes, pestilence, disease, death or fire from Heaven be thought to be worse than Hell? No matter what punishment Heaven sends us, it will still be like being tickled in comparison to the punishment of Hell.
As for Venial Sin, the same catechism says: “Although Venial Sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is, nevertheless, a great moral evil, next alone to Mortal Sin. We are prone to look upon Venial Sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that IT IS SECOND ONLY IN EVIL CONSEQUENCE TO MORTAL SIN. In Holy Scripture we see, from many examples, how God regards Venial Sin. Even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished. He was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land [and died at its borders]” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 23, “Venial Sin”).
How Saints Looked Upon Sin
If that is the value of sin, then what is the price we have to pay for sin? If St. Thomas Aquinas says that one single soul, in a state of sanctifying grace, is of more value than all the material wealth of the universe―then what price can we put on a soul that is, or has been, in a state of mortal sin? What price has to be paid to regain that state of grace? Is it any wonder that there are souls—like Amelia, the young friend of the three Fatima visionaries, of whom Our Lady said that she would burn in Purgatory until the end of the world! What is the cost of sin?!! Do the three Hail Marys, that the priest gives you in confession, pay for it? Far from it! It is a merely a down-payment for the damage sin has caused and the Church expects us to do additional penance to pay for our sins!
While we are in this world, God mercifully accepts a lesser payment than shown in the hypothetical tables above. But when this life comes to a close, the mercy ceases and then the just amount will be collected. Let us not waste time in vain occupations, which can often be sinful too and so only add fuel to the fire—but let us take the rest of our life much more seriously than we have done until now. Remember the power of love—it is not so much the multiplicity of actions and penances that count, but the intensity of love and sorrow that we do them with: “for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) and “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). However, to love much we must sin less—for how can we say we love someone if we don’t cease mocking them and slapping them around, which is what Venial Sin essentially does?
“Be not without fear about sin forgiven!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance!” (Matthew 3:8). “Thou shalt not go out thence, until thou pay the very last penny!” (Luke 12:59). Sin is expensive, very expensive—it is the most expensive thing in the world because “Mortal Sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, and a greater evil than disease, or war ... Mortal Sin must be a most terrible thing indeed, to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the eternal punishment of sinners who die with even only one Mortal Sin!” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 22, “Mortal Sin”). If an eternal Hell is created to punish just one single Mortal Sin, how on Earth can war, flooding, earthquakes, pestilence, disease, death or fire from Heaven be thought to be worse than Hell? No matter what punishment Heaven sends us, it will still be like being tickled in comparison to the punishment of Hell.
As for Venial Sin, the same catechism says: “Although Venial Sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is, nevertheless, a great moral evil, next alone to Mortal Sin. We are prone to look upon Venial Sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that IT IS SECOND ONLY IN EVIL CONSEQUENCE TO MORTAL SIN. In Holy Scripture we see, from many examples, how God regards Venial Sin. Even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished. He was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land [and died at its borders]” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 23, “Venial Sin”).
How Saints Looked Upon Sin
If that is the value of sin, then what is the price we have to pay for sin? If St. Thomas Aquinas says that one single soul, in a state of sanctifying grace, is of more value than all the material wealth of the universe―then what price can we put on a soul that is, or has been, in a state of mortal sin? What price has to be paid to regain that state of grace? Is it any wonder that there are souls—like Amelia, the young friend of the three Fatima visionaries, of whom Our Lady said that she would burn in Purgatory until the end of the world! What is the cost of sin?!! Do the three Hail Marys, that the priest gives you in confession, pay for it? Far from it! It is a merely a down-payment for the damage sin has caused and the Church expects us to do additional penance to pay for our sins!
While we are in this world, God mercifully accepts a lesser payment than shown in the hypothetical tables above. But when this life comes to a close, the mercy ceases and then the just amount will be collected. Let us not waste time in vain occupations, which can often be sinful too and so only add fuel to the fire—but let us take the rest of our life much more seriously than we have done until now. Remember the power of love—it is not so much the multiplicity of actions and penances that count, but the intensity of love and sorrow that we do them with: “for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) and “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). However, to love much we must sin less—for how can we say we love someone if we don’t cease mocking them and slapping them around, which is what Venial Sin essentially does?
Article 14
Thursday, November 21st
Is There Another Way?
Thursday, November 21st
Is There Another Way?
One Road or Many?
Is there a middle road that we can take in our spiritual lives? Is there a middle road that can take us to Heaven? Is there road that is not too harsh on the feet—a road that winds and climbs gently, rather than the rugged, off-the-beaten-track road that seems too tough? We all know of the spiritual axiom that says: “Virtue stands in the middle between excess and neglect”—is there then a road that steers the middle path, between excess and neglect? Furthermore, there is the saying “All roads lead to Rome”—which seems to suggest that there is more than one road to Heaven. Also, we have the phrase: “To Jesus through Mary” which means that perhaps there is a way to Jesus without Mary! Interesting questions!
The Road Map of Scripture
First of all, Holy Scripture speaks of only two final destinations for our spiritual journey—Heaven and Hell. Our Lord speaks of two roads leading to two different destinations when He says: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Our Lord is the gate or door to Heaven: “Jesus said to him: ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father, but by Me!’” (John 14:6). “Jesus therefore said to them again: ‘Amen, amen I say to you, I am the door of the sheep!’” (John 10:7). “I am the door. By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved!” (John 10:9). “Be it known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth―the stone which was rejected by you the builders―is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other. For there is no other name under Heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved!” (Acts 4:10-12). “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and thou shalt be saved!” (Acts 16:31). But all this simply shows that Jesus is the one single door, the only door, by which we can be saved—but cannot many different roads lead to the same door?
The Road to Salvation
“You are saved through Faith” (Ephesians 2:18) … but “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20) … But Faith gives birth to Hope, which is also necessary for salvation: “We are saved by Hope” (Romans 8:24). It is hope that moves us to work towards our salvation and produce works worthy of salvation. However, works need the ‘soul’ of charity, otherwise they are dead and useless: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). We cannot be saved without Faith, Hope and Charity. Thus, the three chief or foundational elements for our journey are Faith, Hope and Charity ― “There remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three: but the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13), but, again, these are not three roads, but only the means to use on the road.
But is there a Middle Road?
It is not so much that there is a middle road, but a variety of degrees that are applied on the road to Heaven. When we seek a ‘middle-road’, we are really seeking to put less effort in our spiritual lives. The degree of effort should be growing as we grow older—much a child is expected to more physically as it grows older, from doing nothing and having everything done for it, to eventually have nothing done for it because it has to do it all by itself in adulthood. The same is true for the spiritual life—except that we must always remember that without God we do nothing: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Here is what Fr. Tanquerey says in his classic book, The Spiritual Life…
“Love alone unites us fully to God. It presupposes Faith and Hope, but it surpasses them. It lays hold of our entire soul, intellect, heart, will, activity, and delivers all unreservedly to God. It excludes mortal sin, God’s enemy, and makes us enjoy the divine friendship … The essence of love itself is devotedness. It is a firm determination of the will to give itself up to God, and, if need be, to make the entire sacrifice of self to Him and His glory, preferring His good pleasure to that of self and others … Worldlings, even when they have the Faith, often entertain very false ideas concerning perfection or, as they call it, devotion” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
The Varying Degrees on the Road
“The degrees by which one is raised to perfection are numerous. According to the common doctrine, explained by St. Thomas, there are three principal stages or, as they are commonly called, three ways: that of beginners the purgative way, that of souls already advanced the illuminative way, and that of the perfect the unitive way.
The Lowest Degree
(a) The chief care of beginners is that of preserving charity. Their efforts, then, are directed toward the avoidance of sin, above all, mortal sin, and toward the conquest of evil inclinations, of the passions, and of all that could make them lose the love of God. This is the purgative way, the end of which is the purification of the soul.
The Middle Degree
(b) The chief concern of those already advanced, the proficients, is progress in the positive exercise of the virtues and growth in Charity. The heart, already purified, is all the more open to divine light and to the love of God. The soul wishes to follow Jesus and to imitate His virtues, and since by following Him one walks in the Light, this is called the illuminative way. Here the soul strives to avoid not only mortal, but even venial sin.
The Highest Degree
(c) Perfect souls have but one concern to cling to God and to take their delight in Him. Ever seeking to unite themselves to God, they are in the unitive way. Sin fills them with horror, for they fear to displease God and to offend Him. The virtues that most attract them are the theological virtues, which unite them to God. Hence, the Earth seems to them an exile, and, like St. Paul, they long to die to be joined to Christ. These are only brief indications. Later on we shall resume them again and develop them in the Second Part of this work. There we shall take the soul from the first stage, that of the purification, to the transforming union that prepares it for the Beatific Vision” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
The Road of Penance
“It is admitted, on all hands, that no one can afford, at any time, to put out of his life the spirit of penance, even though it may take different forms according to the different degrees of perfection. In the same manner, it is agreed that, in order to arrive at the unitive way [the highest stage of the spiritual life], one must exercise oneself more and more perfectly in the practice of both the moral and the theological virtues; that the gifts of the Holy Ghost, cultivated with care, endow the soul with a certain docility that renders it more submissive to the inspirations of grace” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
Our Limitations
There are, however, limits to our perfection here on Earth. Beyond these we must not wish to go, for fear of falling back into a lower degree of perfection, or even lapse into mortal sin. It is certain that we cannot love God as He deserves to be loved. He is infinitely lovable, and, our hearts being finite, can never love Him, even in Heaven, except with a finite love. We can, therefore, and we must always strive to love Him more. According to St. Bernard, the measure with which to love God is to love Him without measure.
Let us not forget, however, that real love consists less in pious sentiments than in acts of the will [actions speak louder than words—and words and actions must be in harmony], and that the best way to love God is to make the will conform to His. On Earth one cannot love God uninterruptedly, nor unfailingly. One can, with the aid of special graces, avoid all deliberate Venial Sin, but not all faults of frailty. No one ever becomes impeccable, as the Church has declared on many occasions.
As Fr. Tanquerey says: “Behold, then, the whole of Christian perfection: love and sacrifice. Who cannot, with God’s grace, fulfill this twofold condition? Is it really so difficult to love Him Who is infinitely lovable and infinitely loving? The love that He asks of us is nothing extraordinary; it is the devotedness of love the gift of oneself consisting chiefly in conformity to the divine will. To want to love; is to love. To keep the commandments for God’s sake is to love. To pray is to love. To fulfill our duties of state in view of pleasing God, this is likewise to love. Even to recreate ourselves, to take our meals with the like intention is to love. To serve our neighbor, for God’s sake is to love. Nothing then is easier, God’s grace helping, than the constant exercise of divine love and through this, steady advance toward perfection” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
Love Must Translate Into Sacrifice
As for sacrifice, without doubt it seems hard. But we are not asked to love it for its own sake. It is enough if we love it for God’s sake, or, in other words if we realize that, here on Earth, one cannot love God without renouncing whatever gets in the way of His love. Then sacrifice at first becomes tolerable and soon it becomes even lovable.
Does not a mother, passing long, sleepless nights at the bedside of her sick son, joyously accept fatigue, when she has the hope and, more especially, when she has the certainty of thereby saving his life? Now, when we accept, for the sake of God, the sacrifices He demands, we have not only the hope, but the certainty itself, of pleasing Him, of giving Him glory and of working out the salvation of our own souls. This too is what the Mother of mothers, Our Lady, asked for at Fatima. She asked the three children: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort!” Heaven is endlessly trying to turn up the heat, so to speak, of our love—so that we might be able to suffer more. To the worldling, that sounds surprising, shocking even scandalous, but just as the molly-coddled baby must grow into a hard-working man, so too must love of God grow into suffering for God.
School of Suffering
To the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “My most holy Son and myself are trying to find, among those who have arrived at the Way of the Cross, some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If you wish to be our disciple, then enter into this school, in which alone is taught the doctrine of the Cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights. With this wisdom the earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the blear-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors, and so full of ignorant admiration for costly grandeur.”
To be able to do this, we have example and the help of the God-Man—Jesus Christ. Has He not suffered as much as and even more than we ourselves suffer, for the glory of His Father and the salvation of our souls? Shall we, His disciples, incorporated into Him in Baptism, nourished with His Body and Blood, shall we hesitate when we are called to suffer together with Him, out of love for Him and for His intentions? Is it not true that in the Cross there is immense profit, especially for loving hearts? “In the Cross” says the Imitation of Christ, “is salvation; in the Cross is life; in the Cross is protection from enemies. In the Cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness; in the Cross is strength of mind; in the Cross is joy of spirit. In the Cross is height of “virtue; in the Cross is perfection, of sanctity” (Book 2, chapter 12).
Saint Augustine tells us: “There are no labors too great for loving hearts. In fact, one finds pleasure therein, as we observe in the case of the fisherman fishing, the hunter at the chase, the merchant at the market. For where there is love, there is no labor, or if there be labor, it is a labor of love.” Let us then make haste toward perfection by this path of love and sacrifice.
Degrees of Suffering
St. Bernard distinguishes three degrees of this virtue, corresponding to the three stages of Christian perfection: “The beginner, moved by fear, patiently bears the Cross of Christ; the one who has already made some progress on the road to perfection, inspired by hope, carries it cheerfully; the perfect soul, consumed by love, embraces it ardently.” Beginners, upheld by the fear of God, do not love pain, but rather seek to escape it. However, they choose to suffer rather than to offend God and, though groaning under the weight of the Cross, they resign themselves to carrying the Cross and they endure it in patience.
Those who have already made some progress, are sustained by the hope and the desire of heavenly things; and, though they do not yet seek the Cross, they willingly carry it with a certain joy, knowing that each new pang represents an additional degree of glory: “Going, they went and wept, casting their seeds. But coming, they shall come with joyfulness carrying their sheaves.” (Psalm 125:6-7).
The perfect, led by love, go even further. To glorify the God they love, to become more like our Lord, they go forth to meet the Cross, they long for it and embrace it lovingly, not because it is in itself lovable, but because it offers them the means of proving their love for God and. for Christ Like the Apostles, they rejoice that they are counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name of Jesus. Like St. Paul, they rejoice in their tribulations: “God forbid that I should glory, save in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14).
All Roads Lead to Rome, but…
Though all roads may lead to Rome, the only road to Heaven is that of Love and Sacrifice. We will be judged on how much we have loved God and how much we have suffered with love for God. There are many, many texts of Holy Scripture that testify to this—here we list but a few: “Love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment. And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:30-31). That love requires sacrifices and brings sufferings: “Love your enemies: do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you” (Matthew 5:44). That love calls for sacrificing the world in order to keep the Commandments: “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). That love will be tested by suffering: “Who then shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation? Or distress? Or famine? Or nakedness? Or danger? Or persecution? Or the sword?” (Romans 8:35).
Cross
Therefore, if we wish to follow Our Lord on the road to Heaven, we must take the road of the Cross: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:27). “And he that takes not up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:38). Perhaps it will even call upon us to give up our lives out of love for Christ: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Love
And all our works, if they are to be profitable, must be infused by this love: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
A Refusal to Suffer Brings More Suffering in Purgatory
The “Middle-Road” is exactly that—it falls in the middle between Heaven and Hell, which is Purgatory. By not wanting to “give-it-one’s-all” while here on Earth, the soul finds itself having to give more than it bargained for in Purgatory. It tried to get to Heaven for a reduced price, and without fully paying for its sins. As St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “For if the debt of punishment is not paid in full after the stain of sin has been washed away by contrition, nor again are venial sins always removed when mortal sins are remitted, and if justice demands that sin be set in order by due punishment, it follows that one who after contrition for his fault and after being absolved, dies before making due satisfaction, is punished after this life. Wherefore those who deny Purgatory speak against the justice of God: for which reason such a statement is erroneous and contrary to Faith” (Summa Theologica, Appendix II, art. 1).
In Purgatory we suffer far more than we could ever have suffered on Earth. St. Thomas tells us that “The fire of Purgatory is the same as the fire of Hell” (Summa Theologica, Appendix II, art. 2). Quoting St. Augustine, St. Thomas writes: “This fire of Purgatory will be more severe than any pain that can be felt, seen or conceived in this world ... the pain of Purgatory, both of loss and of sense, surpasses all the pains of this life … The severity of that punishment is not so much a consequence of the degree of sin, as of the disposition of the person punished, because the same sin is more severely punished then than now” (Summa Theologica, Appendix I, q. 2, art. 1).
The “Middle-Road” tries to do things by halves, it half-loves God; it half-pays for its sins—but we are told to love God with our WHOLE heart, not part of it. Sadly, most Catholics are “middle-of-the-road” Catholics, who, if they do not change, will find themselves in the middle of Purgatory!
Bargaining With God
Can you imagine being bold enough to bargain with God? When you’re bargaining with a merchant, you hold the money and he holds the merchandise. You each have something the other person wants, so you have some bargaining power. But when it comes to God, He holds everything! He needs nothing! Who could imagine bargaining with the God of the universe? Yet, surprisingly, the first instance of intercessory prayer, found in the Bible, shows Abraham bargaining with God! At first you may think Abraham to be a bit brash to do such a thing. But, as you examine the story, you discover that God was actually encouraging Abraham in this bargaining or ‘arm-twisting’ prayer. God took the initiative by revealing His intent to destroy Sodom and Gomorrha to Abraham, His friend, who was then moved by grace to pray for mercy, based on what he knew of God’s character, for a city that teetered on the brink of destruction.
Abraham Twists God’s Arm
“The Lord said: ‘The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied, and their sin is become exceedingly grievous. I will go down and see whether they have done according to the cry that is come to me: or whether it be not so, that I may know.’
“But Abraham stood before the Lord and, drawing nigh, he said: ‘Wilt Thou destroy the just with the wicked? If there be fifty just men in the city, shall they perish withal? And wilt Thou not spare that place for the sake of the fifty just, if they be therein? Far be it from Thee to do this thing, and to slay the just with the wicked, and for the just to be in like case as the wicked, this is not beseeming Thee: Thou who judgest all the Earth, wilt not make this judgment!’
“And the Lord said to him: ‘If I find in Sodom fifty just within the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake.’
“And Abraham answered, and said: ‘Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord, whereas I am dust and ashes. What if there be five less than fifty just persons? Wilt Thou, for five and forty, destroy the whole city?’
“And He said: ‘I will not destroy it, if I find five and forty.’
“And again he said to Him: ‘But if forty be found there, what wilt Thou do?’
“He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of forty.’
“‘Lord!’, saith he, ‘be not angry, I beseech Thee, if I speak! What if thirty shall be found there?’
“He answered: ‘I will not do it, if I find thirty there.’
“‘Seeing,’ saith he, ‘I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord. What if twenty be found there?’
“He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of twenty.’
“‘I beseech thee,’ said he, ‘be not angry, Lord, if I speak yet once more! What if ten should be found there?’
“And He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of ten.’
“And the Lord departed, after He had left speaking to Abraham: and Abraham returned to his place” (Genesis 18:20-33).
Sodom and Gomorrha Destroyed Anyway
After all that pleading and bargaining, not even ten just men could be found and Sodom and Gomorrha were destroyed anyway--“And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from Heaven. And he destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the Earth” (Genesis 19:24-25).
The Threat of Fire Today
The same fate faces the world today. God is angry with not just two cities, but with the whole world. Our Lady has warned that: “If there are not souls who by their lives of immolation and sacrifice appease the Divine Justice, fire will rain from Heaven … Without virginity, it will be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon these lands in order to purify them.” (Our Lady of Good Success) ... “Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume thee cities … And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed” (La Salette) … “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Our Lady of Akita, 1973).
St. John the Baptist, the fiery preacher in the desert, also warns of punishment by fire: “He that shall come after me, is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear; He shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire. Whose fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly cleanse His floor and gather His wheat into the barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire” (Matthew 3:11-12).
Our Lord also speaks of this punishing fire in Holy Scripture: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire!” (Matthew 3:10). “Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:19). “Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire: so shall it be at the end of the world. The Son of man shall send his angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all them that work iniquity. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth … So shall it be at the end of the world. The angels shall go out, and shall separate the wicked from among the just. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. ‘Have ye understood all these things?’ They say to him: ‘Yes!’” (Matthew 13:40-42; 13:49-51).
Beware of Provoking the Hand of God
Holy Scripture paints a fearsome picture concerning the consequences of provoking God: “Evils shall come upon you in the latter times, when you shall do evil in the sight of the Lord, to provoke Him by the works of your hands!” (Deuteronomy 31:29). “They have provoked Me and have angered Me with their vanities!” (Deuteronomy 32:21). “But [thou] hast done evil and hast made thee strange gods to provoke Me to anger, and [thou] hast cast Me behind thy back!” (3 Kings 14:9). “And I will leave the remnants of my inheritance, and will deliver them into the hands of their enemies: and they shall become a prey, and a spoil to all their enemies. Because they have done evil before Me, and have continued to provoke Me, even unto this day!” (4 Kings 21:14-15). “Because they have forsaken Me, and have sacrificed to strange gods, to provoke Me to wrath with all the works of their hands, therefore My wrath shall fall upon this place, and shall not be quenched!” (2 Paralipomenon 34:25).
Forcing the Hand of God
Once provoked, God is forced to let His hand fall in justice: “Woe to you that devise that which is unprofitable, and work evil in your beds: in the morning light they execute it, because their hand is against God!” (Micheas 2:1). “But thou that hast been the author of all mischief, shalt not escape the hand of God!” (2 Machabees 7:31). “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘Behold I will stretch forth My hand upon the Philistines, and will kill the killers!’” (Ezechiel 25:16). “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘Behold I will lift up My hand to the Gentiles!’” (Isaias 49:22). “As I live, saith the Lord God, I will reign over you with a strong hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out!” (Ezechiel 20:33). “For there was the fear of death in every city, and the hand of God was exceeding heavy” (1 Kings 5:12).
Avoid Sin—Avoid the Fire!
It takes no rocket-scientist to work out the spiritual math in all this. It is quite simply this: sin = fire. And if 2+2=4, then sin + more sin = more fire. As Our Lord says: “And if thy hand, or thy foot scandalize thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee! It is better for thee to go into life maimed or lame, than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into everlasting fire! And if thy eye scandalize thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee! It is better for thee having one eye to enter into life, than having two eyes to be cast into Hell fire!” (Matthew 18:8-9). “And if thy hand scandalize thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life, maimed, than having two hands to go into Hell, into unquenchable fire: where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not extinguished!” (Mark 9:42-43). Talk about forcing God’s hand!!
Cardinal Raises His Sister From the Dead
Yesterday, we saw what a glimpse of Purgatory did for Drithelm, the man raised from the dead. It changed his whole value system. He was already living what we would call an exemplary Catholic life before he died, but he realized how woefully deficient it was. Given a second chance by God, he lived a life of total detachment from the world, immersing himself in prayer, extraordinary penances and the hardest labor. We find something similar in the life of a Dominican nun who also happened to be the sister of a cardinal—Blessed John Baptist Tolomei. She was raised from the dead by her own brother, and gave a testimony of the rigor of God’s judgments.
Blessed John Baptist Tolomei, whose rare virtues and the gift of miracles has placed him on our altars, had a sister, Angela Tolomei, the heroism of whose virtue has also been recognized by the Church. She fell dangerously sick, and her holy brother, by earnest prayer, begged Our Lord to cure her. Our Lord replied, as He once did to Martha, the sister of Lazarus, that He would not cure Angela, but that He would do something more. He would raise her from the dead, for the glory of God and the good of souls.
Dead and Alive
Eventually, Angela Tolomei died, recommending herself to the prayers of her holy brother. Whilst she was being carried to the tomb, Blessed John Baptist, in obedience, no doubt, inspired by the Holy Ghost, approached the coffin, and, in the name of Our Lord Jesus Christ, commanded his sister to rise up from the coffin. Immediately she awoke as from a profound slumber, and returned to life.
A Change of Approach to Life
That holy soul seemed struck with terror at what she had seen after death, and related such things concerning the severity of God’s judgments as make us shudder. She commenced, at the same time, to lead a life which proved the truth of her words. Her penance was frightful.
Not content with the ordinary practices of the saints, such as fasting, watching, hair-shirts, and bloody disciplines, she went so far as to cast herself into flames, and to roll herself therein until her flesh was entirely burnt. Her macerated body became an object of pity and of horror. She was censured and accused of destroying, by her excess, the idea of true Christian penance.
She continued, nevertheless, and contented herself with replying: “If you knew the rigors of the judgments of God, you would not speak thus. What are my trifling penances compared with the torments reserved in the other life for those infidelities which we so easily permit ourselves in this world? What are they? What are they? Would that I could do a hundred times more!”
Angela Was Not Even a Great Sinner
There is no question here, as we see, of the tortures to which great sinners, who converted before death, are subjected to in Purgatory (which must be far greater), but of the chastisements which God inflicts upon a fervent Religious for the slightest faults. As we said before, our valuations of Heaven and sin are way off the mark.
Yet, when we read accounts such as these, we still don’t change our misguided sense of values! Do we need to see Purgatory for ourselves, and put our big toe or finger in the fire—like a ‘doubting Thomas’—before we will do something different in our lives? The reply to that would be much the same as the reply given to the rich man—in the Parable about poor Lazarus and the Rich Man—who had died and found himself in Hell, while Lazarus went to Heaven:
The Rich Man and Lazarus
“There was a certain beggar, named Lazarus, who lay at his gate, full of sores, desiring to be filled with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’ s table, and no one did give him; moreover the dogs came, and licked his sores. And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom. And the rich man also died: and he was buried in Hell. And lifting up his eyes, when he was in torments, he saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom: and he cried, and said: ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, to cool my tongue: for I am tormented in this flame!’ And Abraham said to him: ‘Son, remember that thou didst receive good things in thy lifetime, and likewise Lazarus evil things, but now he is comforted; and thou art tormented.
“And besides all this, between us and you, there is fixed a great chasm: so that they who would pass from hence to you, cannot, nor from thence come hither.’ And he said: ‘Then, father, I beseech thee, that thou wouldst send him to my father’s house—for I have five brethren—that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torments.’ And Abraham said to him: ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them!’ But he said: ‘No, father Abraham: but if one went to them from the dead, they will do penance!’ And he said to him: ‘If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they believe, if one rise again from the dead!” (Luke 16:20-31).
We have Purgatorial sermons galore given by saints; numerous books written on Purgatory, citing cases and incidents like these—but the world does not listen nor does it want to know. They do so at their own peril. But if they could only see a miracle like this for themselves, then they would certainly change! There have been miracles galore—the problem is a lack of Faith, not a lack of miracles. As Our Lord said: “Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed” (John 20:29) … “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
Spirit or Flesh?
Let us be strong in our Faith and follow the examples of Faith that we have seen these last two day—those of two souls resurrected from the death, Drithelm and Angela Tolomei, whose Faith was radically reformed after seeing the torments of Purgatory! As Scripture says: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
We can well imagine that, during these recurring months of November, Heaven is trying, year after year, to light a fire in our hearts—but the wood is green and the fire won’t take hold. But if we don’t allow the Holy Ghost to enkindle in our hearts the fire of His love while we are still living on this Earth, then our charity is going to have to fired-up by the fires of Purgatory after we die. In a nutshell, we were made to burn! Either we burn the debt of sins with the fires of love in our hearts here below; or we burn for the debt of our sins in either Purgatory or Hell. God wants us to do it the least painful way—what do we want to do? It’s a simple logical case of burn now, or burn later!
Is there a middle road that we can take in our spiritual lives? Is there a middle road that can take us to Heaven? Is there road that is not too harsh on the feet—a road that winds and climbs gently, rather than the rugged, off-the-beaten-track road that seems too tough? We all know of the spiritual axiom that says: “Virtue stands in the middle between excess and neglect”—is there then a road that steers the middle path, between excess and neglect? Furthermore, there is the saying “All roads lead to Rome”—which seems to suggest that there is more than one road to Heaven. Also, we have the phrase: “To Jesus through Mary” which means that perhaps there is a way to Jesus without Mary! Interesting questions!
The Road Map of Scripture
First of all, Holy Scripture speaks of only two final destinations for our spiritual journey—Heaven and Hell. Our Lord speaks of two roads leading to two different destinations when He says: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Our Lord is the gate or door to Heaven: “Jesus said to him: ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father, but by Me!’” (John 14:6). “Jesus therefore said to them again: ‘Amen, amen I say to you, I am the door of the sheep!’” (John 10:7). “I am the door. By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved!” (John 10:9). “Be it known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth―the stone which was rejected by you the builders―is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other. For there is no other name under Heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved!” (Acts 4:10-12). “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and thou shalt be saved!” (Acts 16:31). But all this simply shows that Jesus is the one single door, the only door, by which we can be saved—but cannot many different roads lead to the same door?
The Road to Salvation
“You are saved through Faith” (Ephesians 2:18) … but “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20) … But Faith gives birth to Hope, which is also necessary for salvation: “We are saved by Hope” (Romans 8:24). It is hope that moves us to work towards our salvation and produce works worthy of salvation. However, works need the ‘soul’ of charity, otherwise they are dead and useless: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). We cannot be saved without Faith, Hope and Charity. Thus, the three chief or foundational elements for our journey are Faith, Hope and Charity ― “There remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three: but the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13), but, again, these are not three roads, but only the means to use on the road.
But is there a Middle Road?
It is not so much that there is a middle road, but a variety of degrees that are applied on the road to Heaven. When we seek a ‘middle-road’, we are really seeking to put less effort in our spiritual lives. The degree of effort should be growing as we grow older—much a child is expected to more physically as it grows older, from doing nothing and having everything done for it, to eventually have nothing done for it because it has to do it all by itself in adulthood. The same is true for the spiritual life—except that we must always remember that without God we do nothing: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Here is what Fr. Tanquerey says in his classic book, The Spiritual Life…
“Love alone unites us fully to God. It presupposes Faith and Hope, but it surpasses them. It lays hold of our entire soul, intellect, heart, will, activity, and delivers all unreservedly to God. It excludes mortal sin, God’s enemy, and makes us enjoy the divine friendship … The essence of love itself is devotedness. It is a firm determination of the will to give itself up to God, and, if need be, to make the entire sacrifice of self to Him and His glory, preferring His good pleasure to that of self and others … Worldlings, even when they have the Faith, often entertain very false ideas concerning perfection or, as they call it, devotion” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
The Varying Degrees on the Road
“The degrees by which one is raised to perfection are numerous. According to the common doctrine, explained by St. Thomas, there are three principal stages or, as they are commonly called, three ways: that of beginners the purgative way, that of souls already advanced the illuminative way, and that of the perfect the unitive way.
The Lowest Degree
(a) The chief care of beginners is that of preserving charity. Their efforts, then, are directed toward the avoidance of sin, above all, mortal sin, and toward the conquest of evil inclinations, of the passions, and of all that could make them lose the love of God. This is the purgative way, the end of which is the purification of the soul.
The Middle Degree
(b) The chief concern of those already advanced, the proficients, is progress in the positive exercise of the virtues and growth in Charity. The heart, already purified, is all the more open to divine light and to the love of God. The soul wishes to follow Jesus and to imitate His virtues, and since by following Him one walks in the Light, this is called the illuminative way. Here the soul strives to avoid not only mortal, but even venial sin.
The Highest Degree
(c) Perfect souls have but one concern to cling to God and to take their delight in Him. Ever seeking to unite themselves to God, they are in the unitive way. Sin fills them with horror, for they fear to displease God and to offend Him. The virtues that most attract them are the theological virtues, which unite them to God. Hence, the Earth seems to them an exile, and, like St. Paul, they long to die to be joined to Christ. These are only brief indications. Later on we shall resume them again and develop them in the Second Part of this work. There we shall take the soul from the first stage, that of the purification, to the transforming union that prepares it for the Beatific Vision” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
The Road of Penance
“It is admitted, on all hands, that no one can afford, at any time, to put out of his life the spirit of penance, even though it may take different forms according to the different degrees of perfection. In the same manner, it is agreed that, in order to arrive at the unitive way [the highest stage of the spiritual life], one must exercise oneself more and more perfectly in the practice of both the moral and the theological virtues; that the gifts of the Holy Ghost, cultivated with care, endow the soul with a certain docility that renders it more submissive to the inspirations of grace” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
Our Limitations
There are, however, limits to our perfection here on Earth. Beyond these we must not wish to go, for fear of falling back into a lower degree of perfection, or even lapse into mortal sin. It is certain that we cannot love God as He deserves to be loved. He is infinitely lovable, and, our hearts being finite, can never love Him, even in Heaven, except with a finite love. We can, therefore, and we must always strive to love Him more. According to St. Bernard, the measure with which to love God is to love Him without measure.
Let us not forget, however, that real love consists less in pious sentiments than in acts of the will [actions speak louder than words—and words and actions must be in harmony], and that the best way to love God is to make the will conform to His. On Earth one cannot love God uninterruptedly, nor unfailingly. One can, with the aid of special graces, avoid all deliberate Venial Sin, but not all faults of frailty. No one ever becomes impeccable, as the Church has declared on many occasions.
As Fr. Tanquerey says: “Behold, then, the whole of Christian perfection: love and sacrifice. Who cannot, with God’s grace, fulfill this twofold condition? Is it really so difficult to love Him Who is infinitely lovable and infinitely loving? The love that He asks of us is nothing extraordinary; it is the devotedness of love the gift of oneself consisting chiefly in conformity to the divine will. To want to love; is to love. To keep the commandments for God’s sake is to love. To pray is to love. To fulfill our duties of state in view of pleasing God, this is likewise to love. Even to recreate ourselves, to take our meals with the like intention is to love. To serve our neighbor, for God’s sake is to love. Nothing then is easier, God’s grace helping, than the constant exercise of divine love and through this, steady advance toward perfection” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
Love Must Translate Into Sacrifice
As for sacrifice, without doubt it seems hard. But we are not asked to love it for its own sake. It is enough if we love it for God’s sake, or, in other words if we realize that, here on Earth, one cannot love God without renouncing whatever gets in the way of His love. Then sacrifice at first becomes tolerable and soon it becomes even lovable.
Does not a mother, passing long, sleepless nights at the bedside of her sick son, joyously accept fatigue, when she has the hope and, more especially, when she has the certainty of thereby saving his life? Now, when we accept, for the sake of God, the sacrifices He demands, we have not only the hope, but the certainty itself, of pleasing Him, of giving Him glory and of working out the salvation of our own souls. This too is what the Mother of mothers, Our Lady, asked for at Fatima. She asked the three children: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort!” Heaven is endlessly trying to turn up the heat, so to speak, of our love—so that we might be able to suffer more. To the worldling, that sounds surprising, shocking even scandalous, but just as the molly-coddled baby must grow into a hard-working man, so too must love of God grow into suffering for God.
School of Suffering
To the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “My most holy Son and myself are trying to find, among those who have arrived at the Way of the Cross, some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If you wish to be our disciple, then enter into this school, in which alone is taught the doctrine of the Cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights. With this wisdom the earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the blear-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors, and so full of ignorant admiration for costly grandeur.”
To be able to do this, we have example and the help of the God-Man—Jesus Christ. Has He not suffered as much as and even more than we ourselves suffer, for the glory of His Father and the salvation of our souls? Shall we, His disciples, incorporated into Him in Baptism, nourished with His Body and Blood, shall we hesitate when we are called to suffer together with Him, out of love for Him and for His intentions? Is it not true that in the Cross there is immense profit, especially for loving hearts? “In the Cross” says the Imitation of Christ, “is salvation; in the Cross is life; in the Cross is protection from enemies. In the Cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness; in the Cross is strength of mind; in the Cross is joy of spirit. In the Cross is height of “virtue; in the Cross is perfection, of sanctity” (Book 2, chapter 12).
Saint Augustine tells us: “There are no labors too great for loving hearts. In fact, one finds pleasure therein, as we observe in the case of the fisherman fishing, the hunter at the chase, the merchant at the market. For where there is love, there is no labor, or if there be labor, it is a labor of love.” Let us then make haste toward perfection by this path of love and sacrifice.
Degrees of Suffering
St. Bernard distinguishes three degrees of this virtue, corresponding to the three stages of Christian perfection: “The beginner, moved by fear, patiently bears the Cross of Christ; the one who has already made some progress on the road to perfection, inspired by hope, carries it cheerfully; the perfect soul, consumed by love, embraces it ardently.” Beginners, upheld by the fear of God, do not love pain, but rather seek to escape it. However, they choose to suffer rather than to offend God and, though groaning under the weight of the Cross, they resign themselves to carrying the Cross and they endure it in patience.
Those who have already made some progress, are sustained by the hope and the desire of heavenly things; and, though they do not yet seek the Cross, they willingly carry it with a certain joy, knowing that each new pang represents an additional degree of glory: “Going, they went and wept, casting their seeds. But coming, they shall come with joyfulness carrying their sheaves.” (Psalm 125:6-7).
The perfect, led by love, go even further. To glorify the God they love, to become more like our Lord, they go forth to meet the Cross, they long for it and embrace it lovingly, not because it is in itself lovable, but because it offers them the means of proving their love for God and. for Christ Like the Apostles, they rejoice that they are counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name of Jesus. Like St. Paul, they rejoice in their tribulations: “God forbid that I should glory, save in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14).
All Roads Lead to Rome, but…
Though all roads may lead to Rome, the only road to Heaven is that of Love and Sacrifice. We will be judged on how much we have loved God and how much we have suffered with love for God. There are many, many texts of Holy Scripture that testify to this—here we list but a few: “Love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment. And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:30-31). That love requires sacrifices and brings sufferings: “Love your enemies: do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you” (Matthew 5:44). That love calls for sacrificing the world in order to keep the Commandments: “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). That love will be tested by suffering: “Who then shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation? Or distress? Or famine? Or nakedness? Or danger? Or persecution? Or the sword?” (Romans 8:35).
Cross
Therefore, if we wish to follow Our Lord on the road to Heaven, we must take the road of the Cross: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:27). “And he that takes not up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:38). Perhaps it will even call upon us to give up our lives out of love for Christ: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Love
And all our works, if they are to be profitable, must be infused by this love: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
A Refusal to Suffer Brings More Suffering in Purgatory
The “Middle-Road” is exactly that—it falls in the middle between Heaven and Hell, which is Purgatory. By not wanting to “give-it-one’s-all” while here on Earth, the soul finds itself having to give more than it bargained for in Purgatory. It tried to get to Heaven for a reduced price, and without fully paying for its sins. As St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “For if the debt of punishment is not paid in full after the stain of sin has been washed away by contrition, nor again are venial sins always removed when mortal sins are remitted, and if justice demands that sin be set in order by due punishment, it follows that one who after contrition for his fault and after being absolved, dies before making due satisfaction, is punished after this life. Wherefore those who deny Purgatory speak against the justice of God: for which reason such a statement is erroneous and contrary to Faith” (Summa Theologica, Appendix II, art. 1).
In Purgatory we suffer far more than we could ever have suffered on Earth. St. Thomas tells us that “The fire of Purgatory is the same as the fire of Hell” (Summa Theologica, Appendix II, art. 2). Quoting St. Augustine, St. Thomas writes: “This fire of Purgatory will be more severe than any pain that can be felt, seen or conceived in this world ... the pain of Purgatory, both of loss and of sense, surpasses all the pains of this life … The severity of that punishment is not so much a consequence of the degree of sin, as of the disposition of the person punished, because the same sin is more severely punished then than now” (Summa Theologica, Appendix I, q. 2, art. 1).
The “Middle-Road” tries to do things by halves, it half-loves God; it half-pays for its sins—but we are told to love God with our WHOLE heart, not part of it. Sadly, most Catholics are “middle-of-the-road” Catholics, who, if they do not change, will find themselves in the middle of Purgatory!
Bargaining With God
Can you imagine being bold enough to bargain with God? When you’re bargaining with a merchant, you hold the money and he holds the merchandise. You each have something the other person wants, so you have some bargaining power. But when it comes to God, He holds everything! He needs nothing! Who could imagine bargaining with the God of the universe? Yet, surprisingly, the first instance of intercessory prayer, found in the Bible, shows Abraham bargaining with God! At first you may think Abraham to be a bit brash to do such a thing. But, as you examine the story, you discover that God was actually encouraging Abraham in this bargaining or ‘arm-twisting’ prayer. God took the initiative by revealing His intent to destroy Sodom and Gomorrha to Abraham, His friend, who was then moved by grace to pray for mercy, based on what he knew of God’s character, for a city that teetered on the brink of destruction.
Abraham Twists God’s Arm
“The Lord said: ‘The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied, and their sin is become exceedingly grievous. I will go down and see whether they have done according to the cry that is come to me: or whether it be not so, that I may know.’
“But Abraham stood before the Lord and, drawing nigh, he said: ‘Wilt Thou destroy the just with the wicked? If there be fifty just men in the city, shall they perish withal? And wilt Thou not spare that place for the sake of the fifty just, if they be therein? Far be it from Thee to do this thing, and to slay the just with the wicked, and for the just to be in like case as the wicked, this is not beseeming Thee: Thou who judgest all the Earth, wilt not make this judgment!’
“And the Lord said to him: ‘If I find in Sodom fifty just within the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake.’
“And Abraham answered, and said: ‘Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord, whereas I am dust and ashes. What if there be five less than fifty just persons? Wilt Thou, for five and forty, destroy the whole city?’
“And He said: ‘I will not destroy it, if I find five and forty.’
“And again he said to Him: ‘But if forty be found there, what wilt Thou do?’
“He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of forty.’
“‘Lord!’, saith he, ‘be not angry, I beseech Thee, if I speak! What if thirty shall be found there?’
“He answered: ‘I will not do it, if I find thirty there.’
“‘Seeing,’ saith he, ‘I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord. What if twenty be found there?’
“He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of twenty.’
“‘I beseech thee,’ said he, ‘be not angry, Lord, if I speak yet once more! What if ten should be found there?’
“And He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of ten.’
“And the Lord departed, after He had left speaking to Abraham: and Abraham returned to his place” (Genesis 18:20-33).
Sodom and Gomorrha Destroyed Anyway
After all that pleading and bargaining, not even ten just men could be found and Sodom and Gomorrha were destroyed anyway--“And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from Heaven. And he destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the Earth” (Genesis 19:24-25).
The Threat of Fire Today
The same fate faces the world today. God is angry with not just two cities, but with the whole world. Our Lady has warned that: “If there are not souls who by their lives of immolation and sacrifice appease the Divine Justice, fire will rain from Heaven … Without virginity, it will be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon these lands in order to purify them.” (Our Lady of Good Success) ... “Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume thee cities … And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed” (La Salette) … “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Our Lady of Akita, 1973).
St. John the Baptist, the fiery preacher in the desert, also warns of punishment by fire: “He that shall come after me, is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear; He shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire. Whose fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly cleanse His floor and gather His wheat into the barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire” (Matthew 3:11-12).
Our Lord also speaks of this punishing fire in Holy Scripture: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire!” (Matthew 3:10). “Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:19). “Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire: so shall it be at the end of the world. The Son of man shall send his angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all them that work iniquity. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth … So shall it be at the end of the world. The angels shall go out, and shall separate the wicked from among the just. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. ‘Have ye understood all these things?’ They say to him: ‘Yes!’” (Matthew 13:40-42; 13:49-51).
Beware of Provoking the Hand of God
Holy Scripture paints a fearsome picture concerning the consequences of provoking God: “Evils shall come upon you in the latter times, when you shall do evil in the sight of the Lord, to provoke Him by the works of your hands!” (Deuteronomy 31:29). “They have provoked Me and have angered Me with their vanities!” (Deuteronomy 32:21). “But [thou] hast done evil and hast made thee strange gods to provoke Me to anger, and [thou] hast cast Me behind thy back!” (3 Kings 14:9). “And I will leave the remnants of my inheritance, and will deliver them into the hands of their enemies: and they shall become a prey, and a spoil to all their enemies. Because they have done evil before Me, and have continued to provoke Me, even unto this day!” (4 Kings 21:14-15). “Because they have forsaken Me, and have sacrificed to strange gods, to provoke Me to wrath with all the works of their hands, therefore My wrath shall fall upon this place, and shall not be quenched!” (2 Paralipomenon 34:25).
Forcing the Hand of God
Once provoked, God is forced to let His hand fall in justice: “Woe to you that devise that which is unprofitable, and work evil in your beds: in the morning light they execute it, because their hand is against God!” (Micheas 2:1). “But thou that hast been the author of all mischief, shalt not escape the hand of God!” (2 Machabees 7:31). “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘Behold I will stretch forth My hand upon the Philistines, and will kill the killers!’” (Ezechiel 25:16). “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘Behold I will lift up My hand to the Gentiles!’” (Isaias 49:22). “As I live, saith the Lord God, I will reign over you with a strong hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out!” (Ezechiel 20:33). “For there was the fear of death in every city, and the hand of God was exceeding heavy” (1 Kings 5:12).
Avoid Sin—Avoid the Fire!
It takes no rocket-scientist to work out the spiritual math in all this. It is quite simply this: sin = fire. And if 2+2=4, then sin + more sin = more fire. As Our Lord says: “And if thy hand, or thy foot scandalize thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee! It is better for thee to go into life maimed or lame, than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into everlasting fire! And if thy eye scandalize thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee! It is better for thee having one eye to enter into life, than having two eyes to be cast into Hell fire!” (Matthew 18:8-9). “And if thy hand scandalize thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life, maimed, than having two hands to go into Hell, into unquenchable fire: where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not extinguished!” (Mark 9:42-43). Talk about forcing God’s hand!!
Cardinal Raises His Sister From the Dead
Yesterday, we saw what a glimpse of Purgatory did for Drithelm, the man raised from the dead. It changed his whole value system. He was already living what we would call an exemplary Catholic life before he died, but he realized how woefully deficient it was. Given a second chance by God, he lived a life of total detachment from the world, immersing himself in prayer, extraordinary penances and the hardest labor. We find something similar in the life of a Dominican nun who also happened to be the sister of a cardinal—Blessed John Baptist Tolomei. She was raised from the dead by her own brother, and gave a testimony of the rigor of God’s judgments.
Blessed John Baptist Tolomei, whose rare virtues and the gift of miracles has placed him on our altars, had a sister, Angela Tolomei, the heroism of whose virtue has also been recognized by the Church. She fell dangerously sick, and her holy brother, by earnest prayer, begged Our Lord to cure her. Our Lord replied, as He once did to Martha, the sister of Lazarus, that He would not cure Angela, but that He would do something more. He would raise her from the dead, for the glory of God and the good of souls.
Dead and Alive
Eventually, Angela Tolomei died, recommending herself to the prayers of her holy brother. Whilst she was being carried to the tomb, Blessed John Baptist, in obedience, no doubt, inspired by the Holy Ghost, approached the coffin, and, in the name of Our Lord Jesus Christ, commanded his sister to rise up from the coffin. Immediately she awoke as from a profound slumber, and returned to life.
A Change of Approach to Life
That holy soul seemed struck with terror at what she had seen after death, and related such things concerning the severity of God’s judgments as make us shudder. She commenced, at the same time, to lead a life which proved the truth of her words. Her penance was frightful.
Not content with the ordinary practices of the saints, such as fasting, watching, hair-shirts, and bloody disciplines, she went so far as to cast herself into flames, and to roll herself therein until her flesh was entirely burnt. Her macerated body became an object of pity and of horror. She was censured and accused of destroying, by her excess, the idea of true Christian penance.
She continued, nevertheless, and contented herself with replying: “If you knew the rigors of the judgments of God, you would not speak thus. What are my trifling penances compared with the torments reserved in the other life for those infidelities which we so easily permit ourselves in this world? What are they? What are they? Would that I could do a hundred times more!”
Angela Was Not Even a Great Sinner
There is no question here, as we see, of the tortures to which great sinners, who converted before death, are subjected to in Purgatory (which must be far greater), but of the chastisements which God inflicts upon a fervent Religious for the slightest faults. As we said before, our valuations of Heaven and sin are way off the mark.
Yet, when we read accounts such as these, we still don’t change our misguided sense of values! Do we need to see Purgatory for ourselves, and put our big toe or finger in the fire—like a ‘doubting Thomas’—before we will do something different in our lives? The reply to that would be much the same as the reply given to the rich man—in the Parable about poor Lazarus and the Rich Man—who had died and found himself in Hell, while Lazarus went to Heaven:
The Rich Man and Lazarus
“There was a certain beggar, named Lazarus, who lay at his gate, full of sores, desiring to be filled with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’ s table, and no one did give him; moreover the dogs came, and licked his sores. And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom. And the rich man also died: and he was buried in Hell. And lifting up his eyes, when he was in torments, he saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom: and he cried, and said: ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, to cool my tongue: for I am tormented in this flame!’ And Abraham said to him: ‘Son, remember that thou didst receive good things in thy lifetime, and likewise Lazarus evil things, but now he is comforted; and thou art tormented.
“And besides all this, between us and you, there is fixed a great chasm: so that they who would pass from hence to you, cannot, nor from thence come hither.’ And he said: ‘Then, father, I beseech thee, that thou wouldst send him to my father’s house—for I have five brethren—that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torments.’ And Abraham said to him: ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them!’ But he said: ‘No, father Abraham: but if one went to them from the dead, they will do penance!’ And he said to him: ‘If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they believe, if one rise again from the dead!” (Luke 16:20-31).
We have Purgatorial sermons galore given by saints; numerous books written on Purgatory, citing cases and incidents like these—but the world does not listen nor does it want to know. They do so at their own peril. But if they could only see a miracle like this for themselves, then they would certainly change! There have been miracles galore—the problem is a lack of Faith, not a lack of miracles. As Our Lord said: “Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed” (John 20:29) … “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
Spirit or Flesh?
Let us be strong in our Faith and follow the examples of Faith that we have seen these last two day—those of two souls resurrected from the death, Drithelm and Angela Tolomei, whose Faith was radically reformed after seeing the torments of Purgatory! As Scripture says: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
We can well imagine that, during these recurring months of November, Heaven is trying, year after year, to light a fire in our hearts—but the wood is green and the fire won’t take hold. But if we don’t allow the Holy Ghost to enkindle in our hearts the fire of His love while we are still living on this Earth, then our charity is going to have to fired-up by the fires of Purgatory after we die. In a nutshell, we were made to burn! Either we burn the debt of sins with the fires of love in our hearts here below; or we burn for the debt of our sins in either Purgatory or Hell. God wants us to do it the least painful way—what do we want to do? It’s a simple logical case of burn now, or burn later!
Article 13
Wednesday, November 20th
Dead Man Changes His Life!
Wednesday, November 20th
Dead Man Changes His Life!
What a Loss!! What a Pain!!
According to common doctrine, the chief pain in Purgatory is the delay of the beatific vision. This delay is sometimes called “a temporary pain of loss” ― meaning the loss of God for a longer or shorter time. But, in the proper sense, the “pain of loss” is eternal, and hence found only in Hell.
These two pains of loss differ immensely in rigor, in duration, and in consequences. The damned have lost hope and charity; they blaspheme without ceasing; they have a will that is obstinately rooted in evil; they will never repent; they desire the damnation of everyone in a spiteful way. The souls in Purgatory have assured hope of salvation and a charity that can no longer be lost; they love God; they adore divine justice; they are confirmed in good; they repent profoundly; they love all God’s children and desire everyone’s salvation.
This delay of the beatific vision in Purgatory differs notably from that which existed in Limbo before the death of Our Lord. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and the prophets, saw in this delay a punishment that was inflicted, not, properly speaking, on their person, but a punishment inflicted upon human nature not yet perfectly regenerated. The time for deliverance by Christ the Redeemer had not yet arrived. This time has now arrived. Therefore the delay in Purgatory is truly a suffering―the chief of purgatorial sufferings.
Suffering in Purgatory and Suffering on Earth
Suffering in Purgatory is greater than all suffering on Earth. Such is the doctrine of tradition, supported by theological reasoning. Tradition is expressed by St. Augustine: “That fire will be more painful than anything man can suffer in the present life.” St. Isidore speaks in the same sense. According to these testimonies and others similar to them, the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest sufferings of the present life.
St. Bonaventure says: “In the next life, by reason of the state of the souls there retained, the purifying purgatorial suffering will be, in its kind, more severe than the greatest trials on Earth.” What he means is that for one and the same sin, the smallest suffering in Purgatory is greater than any corresponding suffering on Earth. But it does not follow that the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest suffering on Earth. On this point St. Bonaventure is followed by St. Robert Bellarmine. According to Bellarmine, being deprived of the vision of God, is, without doubt, a very great suffering, but it is sweetened and consoled by the assured hope of possessing Him in the future. From this hope there arises an incredible joy, which grows in measure as the soul approaches the end of its exile.
Many theologians, especially Suarez, rightly remark that the sufferings in Purgatory―especially the delay of the beatific vision―are of a higher order than our earthly sufferings, and, in this sense, we may say that the smallest suffering in Purgatory is more severe than the greatest suffering on Earth. The joy they have in the hope of deliverance cannot diminish the suffering they feel in being deprived of the beatific vision. We see this truth in Jesus crucified―the supreme beatitude, His love of God and of souls, far from diminishing His pains, augmented them.
St. Catherine of Genoa says: “Souls in Purgatory unite great joy with great suffering. One does not diminish the other.” She continues: “No peace is comparable to that of the souls in Purgatory, except that of the saints in Heaven. On the other hand, the souls in Purgatory endure torments which no tongue can describe and no intelligence comprehend, without special revelation.” As we recall, St. Catherine of Genoa experienced on Earth the pains of Purgatory.
Tough and Kind—Severe and Loving
This testimony of tradition is illustrated by the character of great saints. While they are more severe than ordinary preachers, they also have much greater love of God and souls. They show forth, not only the justice of God, but also His boundless love. A good Christian illustrates the same truth. A Christian mother, for instance, is severe, in order to correct her children, but the element that predominates is sweetness and maternal goodness. Today, on the contrary, it often happens that many parents lack both severity and love. Those persons who do not undergo Purgatory on Earth, will have it later on at a much more severe and painful level. Nor must we make too sharp a distinction between sanctification and salvation. If we neglect sanctification, we may miss salvation itself.
Isn’t God Going Overboard with Purgatory?
Many souls are in Purgatory who have sinned only venially. Can punishment so severe be proportioned to venial sins? St. Thomas Aquinas replies: “Pain corresponds less to the gravity of the sin than to the disposition of the suffering soul. One and the same sin is punished more severely in Purgatory than it is on Earth. To illustrate. A man of delicate constitution suffers a scourging far more than a hardy man.”
Why is one and the same sin punished more rigorously in Purgatory than on Earth? The Church speaks of the two comings of Christ—His first coming was in mercy, His second coming will be in justice. While we live on Earth, we live in the time of mercy—yet we have to honest, confess our sins, change our lives and do penance to profit from this “time of mercy”. In this merciful period we are able to pay for sins—not at their true value, but at a vastly reduced rate.
If we neglect, put-off, or refuse to pay now at a reduced rate, then we will have to pay what is just when Christ comes the second time to judge us upon our death. While we are in this life, we have a weak understanding of the majesty and purity of God, and so we make light of sin. But when we die, the light of God will illuminate our minds and the separated soul will know much better than it did before, that God is the one thing necessary and that sin is the greatest evil there is.
“Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Suffering for Sin Grows with Love of God
The more saintly a soul is, the more it loves God, the more it desires to see God and the more it suffers at being delayed in that desire. Pain corresponds to desire. Souls in Purgatory, desiring the beatific vision, suffer from its delay, just as on Earth the saints desire to die and to be with God. This normal consequence of intense love. But this great pain is compensated by their greater abandonment to Providence and their greater love of divine justice.
Suffering for sin grows with love of God. The reason you don’t feel the gravity of your past sins is that you only have a small love of God. Likewise the reason you complain when Divine Providence makes you suffer for your past sins is your small love of God. The more we love, then the more we weep over having offended the object of our love—God. The more we love, the more we want to make reparation and so the more we are prepared to suffer. We see this reflected somewhat in the chilling story of Drithelm, a good Christian who died and was resurrected to live out his Purgatory on Earth.
The Life of Drithelm
Fr. Schouppe, in his book Purgatory Explained, writes:
If the pain of loss makes but a feeble impression upon us, it is far different with the pain of sense; the torment of fire, the torture of a sharp and intense cold, affrights our sensibility. This is why Divine Mercy―wishing to excite a holy fear in our souls―speaks but little of the pain of loss, but we are continually shown the fire, the cold, and other torments, which constitute the pain of sense. This is what we see in the Gospel, and in particular revelations, by which God is pleased to manifest to His servants, from time to time, the mysteries of the other life.
St. Robert Bellarmine and St. Bede testify…
Let us mention one of these revelations. In the first place, let us see what the pious and learned Cardinal St. Robert Bellarmine quotes from the Venerable St. Bede. England has been witness in our own days, writes St. Bede, to a singular prodigy, which may be compared to the miracles of the first ages of the Church. To excite the living to fear the death of the soul, God permitted that a man, after having slept the sleep of death, should return to life and reveal what he had seen in the other world. The frightful, unheard-of details which he relates, and his life of extraordinary penance, which corresponded with his words, produced a lively impression throughout the country. I will now resume the principal circumstances of this history.
Drithelm was a Good Christian
There was in Northumberland, the north-east of England, a man named Drithelm, who, with his family, led a most Christian life. He fell sick, and his malady increasing day by day, he was soon reduced to extremity, and died, to the great desolation and grief of his wife and children.
The latter [wife and children] passed the night in tears by the remains, but the following day, before his interment, they saw him suddenly return to life, arise, and place himself in a sitting posture. At this sight they were seized with such fear that they all took to flight, with the exception of the wife, who, trembling, remained alone with her risen husband.
He reassured her immediately: “Fear not!” he said; “It is God who restores to me my life! He wishes to show in my person a man raised from the dead. I have yet long to live upon Earth, but my new life will be very different from the one I led heretofore.”
Resurrected and Penitent
Then he arose full of health, went straight to the chapel or church of the place, and there remained long in prayer. He returned home only to take leave of those who had been dear to him upon Earth, to whom he declared that he would live only to prepare himself for death, and advised them to do likewise. Then, having divided his property into three parts, he gave one to his children, another to his wife, and reserved the third part to give in alms.
When he had distributed all to the poor, and had reduced himself to extreme poverty, he went and knocked at the door of a monastery, and begged the Abbot to receive him as a penitent Religious, who would be a servant to all the others.
Unbelievable Penances
The Abbot gave him a retired cell, which he occupied for the rest of his life. Three exercises divided his time prayer, the hardest labor, and extraordinary penances. The most rigorous fasts he accounted as nothing. In winter he was seen to plunge himself into frozen water, and remain there for hours and hours in prayer, whilst he recited the whole 150 psalms from the Psalter of David.
The mortified life of Drithelm, his downcast eyes, even his features, indicated a soul struck with fear of the judgments of God. He kept a perpetual silence, but on being pressed to relate, for the edification of others, what God had manifested to him after his death, he thus described his vision:
Drithelm Tells of His Vision
“On leaving my body, I was received by a benevolent person, who took me under his guidance. His face was brilliant, and he appeared surrounded with light. He arrived at a large deep valley of immense extent, all fire on one side, all ice and snow on the other; on the one hand braziers and caldrons of flame, on the other the most intense cold and the blast of a glacial wind.
“This mysterious valley was filled with innumerable souls, which, tossed as by a furious tempest, threw themselves from one side to the other. When they could no longer endure the violence of the fire, they sought relief amidst the ice and snow; but finding only a new torture, they cast themselves again into the midst of the flames.
“I contemplated in a stupor these continual vicissitudes of horrible torments, and as far as my sight could extend, I saw nothing but a multitude of souls which suffered without ever having repose. Their very aspect inspired me with fear. I thought at first that I saw Hell―but my guide, who walked before me, turned to me and said, ‘No; this is not, as you think, the Hell of the reprobate. Do you know, he continued, what place this is?’ ‘No,’ I answered. ‘Know,’ he resumed, ‘that this valley, where you see so much fire and so much ice, is the place where the souls of those are punished who, during life, have neglected to confess their sins, and who have deferred their conversion to the end. Thanks to a special mercy of God, they have had the happiness of sincerely repenting before death, of confessing and detesting their sins. This is why they are not damned, and on the great Day of Judgment will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Several of them will obtain their deliverance before that time, by the merits of prayers, alms, and fasts, offered in their favor by the living, and especially in virtue of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass offered for their relief.’”
Such was the recital of Drithelm. When asked why he so rudely treated his body, why he plunged himself into frozen water, he replied that he had seen other torments, and cold of another kind.
If his brethren expressed astonishment that he could endure these extraordinary austerities, “I have seen,” said he, “penances still more astonishing!” To the day when it pleased God to call him to Himself, he ceased not to afflict his body, and although broken down with age, he would accept no alleviation.
Drithelm’s Life Produced Many Conversions
This event produced a deep sensation in England; a great number of sinners, touched by the words of Drithelm, and struck by the austerity of his life, became sincerely converted.
This fact, adds St. Robert Bellarmine, appears to me of incontestable truth, since, besides being conformable to the words of Holy Scripture, “Let him pass from the snow waters to excessive heat” (Job 29:19), the Venerable St. Bede relates it as a recent and well-known event. More than this, it was followed by the conversion of a great number of sinners, the sign of the work of God, who is accustomed to work prodigies in order to produce fruit in souls.
A Question of Penance
We are sinners and sinners must do penance! “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves!” (1 John 1:8). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32). “Do penance: for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance!” (Matthew 3:8). “Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein were done the most of his miracles, for that they had not done penance” (Matthew 11:20). “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Questions To Ask Yourself
(1) Do I REALLY WANT to change my life? This is a crucial question! Before performing some of His miracles, Our Lord would sometimes ask: “If you WANT!” We have to WANT to do something first before we DO it.
And then there are degrees of HOW MUCH we want something. We see this in the words of Our Lord to the young man who had many possessions. The young man WANTED to go to Heaven, but he also WANTED TO DO THE MINIMUM to get there. To his question on what he had to DO to get there, Our Lord said: “If you WANT to enter into life, keep the commandments!” (Matthew 19:17).
But then Our Lord tries to encourage him from merely doing the MINUMUM into doing the MAXIMUM, in other words to increase his desire, to increase his want. “Jesus said to him: ‘If you WANT to be perfect, go sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions.” (Matthew 19:21-22).
(2) Do I WANT to give myself entirely to God, Jesus and Mary? Do I REALLY WANT to give myself to them? Or am I attached to myself and the world so much, that what I am REALLY WANTING is to both save my soul, yet still remain attached to myself and things of this life?
This is the case with most people! They are primarily concerned about themselves and the world, they want dual-citizenship! They want to be ‘good’ citizens of the world, and ‘good’ citizens of Heaven.
Yet Our Lord said: “No man can serve two masters! For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not life more than the meat; and the body more than the clothing?” (Matthew 6:24-25).
(3) We all know the saying: “He who desires the end, must necessarily desire the means to that end!” We know that is true in theory, just like we know we cannot serve God and mammon in theory; but, in practice, are we seeking to do the opposite?
Like most of the world, WE WANT THINGS FOR FREE! We want to get to Heaven; we want to avoid Hell; we want to save our souls—but we don’t want to do ALL that it takes to get there! We want a discount; we want a reduced fare; we want a ‘freebie’ if at all possible!
This is what the young man with many possessions wanted, and he could not bring himself round to sacrificing what Jesus asked for! It says in the Gospel that Jesus LOVED him! He must have sensed Jesus’ love in some way; yet he preferred his petty possessions (creatures, possessions and wealth) to Jesus (the Creator).
Sadly, most of us are the same. We may even ask the same question as Jesus’ followers asked, who had witnessed the encounter with the rich young man: “The disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’” (Matthew 19:25). Jesus replied: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:28).
So, the good news is that IF WE NO LONGER WANT TO BE LIKE THAT; IF WE WANT TO CHANGE, even though we may FEEL powerless to change, then Jesus, through His Holy Mother, will bring about that miracle of grace within you. You have to WANT and you have to ASK! The grace will then come to help you DO, not without any pain, but it will help you with the pain too!
Make Resolutions
(1) I will not be discouraged by what I may see in examining myself and my surroundings. Discouragement comes from the devil, not from God. Discouragement is the devil’s chief weapon of paralysis.
(2) I will realize that without God I can do nothing — “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) — yet with the help of God, anything and everything is possible — “With God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:28).
(3) So even though I may FEEL that I don’t want to change, or if I may FEEL that I am not able to change, I will nevertheless ASK TO CHANGE, knowing that Our Lady of Fatima said that we can obtain all things through the Rosary. However, our Rosaries need to IMPROVE; we need to PRAY the Rosary more and SAY it less; we need to put more ATTENTION and more FERVOR into our Rosaries, remembering the words of St. Louis de Montfort, who says:
“In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin” (The Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-Second Rose”).
According to common doctrine, the chief pain in Purgatory is the delay of the beatific vision. This delay is sometimes called “a temporary pain of loss” ― meaning the loss of God for a longer or shorter time. But, in the proper sense, the “pain of loss” is eternal, and hence found only in Hell.
These two pains of loss differ immensely in rigor, in duration, and in consequences. The damned have lost hope and charity; they blaspheme without ceasing; they have a will that is obstinately rooted in evil; they will never repent; they desire the damnation of everyone in a spiteful way. The souls in Purgatory have assured hope of salvation and a charity that can no longer be lost; they love God; they adore divine justice; they are confirmed in good; they repent profoundly; they love all God’s children and desire everyone’s salvation.
This delay of the beatific vision in Purgatory differs notably from that which existed in Limbo before the death of Our Lord. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and the prophets, saw in this delay a punishment that was inflicted, not, properly speaking, on their person, but a punishment inflicted upon human nature not yet perfectly regenerated. The time for deliverance by Christ the Redeemer had not yet arrived. This time has now arrived. Therefore the delay in Purgatory is truly a suffering―the chief of purgatorial sufferings.
Suffering in Purgatory and Suffering on Earth
Suffering in Purgatory is greater than all suffering on Earth. Such is the doctrine of tradition, supported by theological reasoning. Tradition is expressed by St. Augustine: “That fire will be more painful than anything man can suffer in the present life.” St. Isidore speaks in the same sense. According to these testimonies and others similar to them, the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest sufferings of the present life.
St. Bonaventure says: “In the next life, by reason of the state of the souls there retained, the purifying purgatorial suffering will be, in its kind, more severe than the greatest trials on Earth.” What he means is that for one and the same sin, the smallest suffering in Purgatory is greater than any corresponding suffering on Earth. But it does not follow that the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest suffering on Earth. On this point St. Bonaventure is followed by St. Robert Bellarmine. According to Bellarmine, being deprived of the vision of God, is, without doubt, a very great suffering, but it is sweetened and consoled by the assured hope of possessing Him in the future. From this hope there arises an incredible joy, which grows in measure as the soul approaches the end of its exile.
Many theologians, especially Suarez, rightly remark that the sufferings in Purgatory―especially the delay of the beatific vision―are of a higher order than our earthly sufferings, and, in this sense, we may say that the smallest suffering in Purgatory is more severe than the greatest suffering on Earth. The joy they have in the hope of deliverance cannot diminish the suffering they feel in being deprived of the beatific vision. We see this truth in Jesus crucified―the supreme beatitude, His love of God and of souls, far from diminishing His pains, augmented them.
St. Catherine of Genoa says: “Souls in Purgatory unite great joy with great suffering. One does not diminish the other.” She continues: “No peace is comparable to that of the souls in Purgatory, except that of the saints in Heaven. On the other hand, the souls in Purgatory endure torments which no tongue can describe and no intelligence comprehend, without special revelation.” As we recall, St. Catherine of Genoa experienced on Earth the pains of Purgatory.
Tough and Kind—Severe and Loving
This testimony of tradition is illustrated by the character of great saints. While they are more severe than ordinary preachers, they also have much greater love of God and souls. They show forth, not only the justice of God, but also His boundless love. A good Christian illustrates the same truth. A Christian mother, for instance, is severe, in order to correct her children, but the element that predominates is sweetness and maternal goodness. Today, on the contrary, it often happens that many parents lack both severity and love. Those persons who do not undergo Purgatory on Earth, will have it later on at a much more severe and painful level. Nor must we make too sharp a distinction between sanctification and salvation. If we neglect sanctification, we may miss salvation itself.
Isn’t God Going Overboard with Purgatory?
Many souls are in Purgatory who have sinned only venially. Can punishment so severe be proportioned to venial sins? St. Thomas Aquinas replies: “Pain corresponds less to the gravity of the sin than to the disposition of the suffering soul. One and the same sin is punished more severely in Purgatory than it is on Earth. To illustrate. A man of delicate constitution suffers a scourging far more than a hardy man.”
Why is one and the same sin punished more rigorously in Purgatory than on Earth? The Church speaks of the two comings of Christ—His first coming was in mercy, His second coming will be in justice. While we live on Earth, we live in the time of mercy—yet we have to honest, confess our sins, change our lives and do penance to profit from this “time of mercy”. In this merciful period we are able to pay for sins—not at their true value, but at a vastly reduced rate.
If we neglect, put-off, or refuse to pay now at a reduced rate, then we will have to pay what is just when Christ comes the second time to judge us upon our death. While we are in this life, we have a weak understanding of the majesty and purity of God, and so we make light of sin. But when we die, the light of God will illuminate our minds and the separated soul will know much better than it did before, that God is the one thing necessary and that sin is the greatest evil there is.
“Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Suffering for Sin Grows with Love of God
The more saintly a soul is, the more it loves God, the more it desires to see God and the more it suffers at being delayed in that desire. Pain corresponds to desire. Souls in Purgatory, desiring the beatific vision, suffer from its delay, just as on Earth the saints desire to die and to be with God. This normal consequence of intense love. But this great pain is compensated by their greater abandonment to Providence and their greater love of divine justice.
Suffering for sin grows with love of God. The reason you don’t feel the gravity of your past sins is that you only have a small love of God. Likewise the reason you complain when Divine Providence makes you suffer for your past sins is your small love of God. The more we love, then the more we weep over having offended the object of our love—God. The more we love, the more we want to make reparation and so the more we are prepared to suffer. We see this reflected somewhat in the chilling story of Drithelm, a good Christian who died and was resurrected to live out his Purgatory on Earth.
The Life of Drithelm
Fr. Schouppe, in his book Purgatory Explained, writes:
If the pain of loss makes but a feeble impression upon us, it is far different with the pain of sense; the torment of fire, the torture of a sharp and intense cold, affrights our sensibility. This is why Divine Mercy―wishing to excite a holy fear in our souls―speaks but little of the pain of loss, but we are continually shown the fire, the cold, and other torments, which constitute the pain of sense. This is what we see in the Gospel, and in particular revelations, by which God is pleased to manifest to His servants, from time to time, the mysteries of the other life.
St. Robert Bellarmine and St. Bede testify…
Let us mention one of these revelations. In the first place, let us see what the pious and learned Cardinal St. Robert Bellarmine quotes from the Venerable St. Bede. England has been witness in our own days, writes St. Bede, to a singular prodigy, which may be compared to the miracles of the first ages of the Church. To excite the living to fear the death of the soul, God permitted that a man, after having slept the sleep of death, should return to life and reveal what he had seen in the other world. The frightful, unheard-of details which he relates, and his life of extraordinary penance, which corresponded with his words, produced a lively impression throughout the country. I will now resume the principal circumstances of this history.
Drithelm was a Good Christian
There was in Northumberland, the north-east of England, a man named Drithelm, who, with his family, led a most Christian life. He fell sick, and his malady increasing day by day, he was soon reduced to extremity, and died, to the great desolation and grief of his wife and children.
The latter [wife and children] passed the night in tears by the remains, but the following day, before his interment, they saw him suddenly return to life, arise, and place himself in a sitting posture. At this sight they were seized with such fear that they all took to flight, with the exception of the wife, who, trembling, remained alone with her risen husband.
He reassured her immediately: “Fear not!” he said; “It is God who restores to me my life! He wishes to show in my person a man raised from the dead. I have yet long to live upon Earth, but my new life will be very different from the one I led heretofore.”
Resurrected and Penitent
Then he arose full of health, went straight to the chapel or church of the place, and there remained long in prayer. He returned home only to take leave of those who had been dear to him upon Earth, to whom he declared that he would live only to prepare himself for death, and advised them to do likewise. Then, having divided his property into three parts, he gave one to his children, another to his wife, and reserved the third part to give in alms.
When he had distributed all to the poor, and had reduced himself to extreme poverty, he went and knocked at the door of a monastery, and begged the Abbot to receive him as a penitent Religious, who would be a servant to all the others.
Unbelievable Penances
The Abbot gave him a retired cell, which he occupied for the rest of his life. Three exercises divided his time prayer, the hardest labor, and extraordinary penances. The most rigorous fasts he accounted as nothing. In winter he was seen to plunge himself into frozen water, and remain there for hours and hours in prayer, whilst he recited the whole 150 psalms from the Psalter of David.
The mortified life of Drithelm, his downcast eyes, even his features, indicated a soul struck with fear of the judgments of God. He kept a perpetual silence, but on being pressed to relate, for the edification of others, what God had manifested to him after his death, he thus described his vision:
Drithelm Tells of His Vision
“On leaving my body, I was received by a benevolent person, who took me under his guidance. His face was brilliant, and he appeared surrounded with light. He arrived at a large deep valley of immense extent, all fire on one side, all ice and snow on the other; on the one hand braziers and caldrons of flame, on the other the most intense cold and the blast of a glacial wind.
“This mysterious valley was filled with innumerable souls, which, tossed as by a furious tempest, threw themselves from one side to the other. When they could no longer endure the violence of the fire, they sought relief amidst the ice and snow; but finding only a new torture, they cast themselves again into the midst of the flames.
“I contemplated in a stupor these continual vicissitudes of horrible torments, and as far as my sight could extend, I saw nothing but a multitude of souls which suffered without ever having repose. Their very aspect inspired me with fear. I thought at first that I saw Hell―but my guide, who walked before me, turned to me and said, ‘No; this is not, as you think, the Hell of the reprobate. Do you know, he continued, what place this is?’ ‘No,’ I answered. ‘Know,’ he resumed, ‘that this valley, where you see so much fire and so much ice, is the place where the souls of those are punished who, during life, have neglected to confess their sins, and who have deferred their conversion to the end. Thanks to a special mercy of God, they have had the happiness of sincerely repenting before death, of confessing and detesting their sins. This is why they are not damned, and on the great Day of Judgment will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Several of them will obtain their deliverance before that time, by the merits of prayers, alms, and fasts, offered in their favor by the living, and especially in virtue of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass offered for their relief.’”
Such was the recital of Drithelm. When asked why he so rudely treated his body, why he plunged himself into frozen water, he replied that he had seen other torments, and cold of another kind.
If his brethren expressed astonishment that he could endure these extraordinary austerities, “I have seen,” said he, “penances still more astonishing!” To the day when it pleased God to call him to Himself, he ceased not to afflict his body, and although broken down with age, he would accept no alleviation.
Drithelm’s Life Produced Many Conversions
This event produced a deep sensation in England; a great number of sinners, touched by the words of Drithelm, and struck by the austerity of his life, became sincerely converted.
This fact, adds St. Robert Bellarmine, appears to me of incontestable truth, since, besides being conformable to the words of Holy Scripture, “Let him pass from the snow waters to excessive heat” (Job 29:19), the Venerable St. Bede relates it as a recent and well-known event. More than this, it was followed by the conversion of a great number of sinners, the sign of the work of God, who is accustomed to work prodigies in order to produce fruit in souls.
A Question of Penance
We are sinners and sinners must do penance! “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves!” (1 John 1:8). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32). “Do penance: for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance!” (Matthew 3:8). “Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein were done the most of his miracles, for that they had not done penance” (Matthew 11:20). “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Questions To Ask Yourself
(1) Do I REALLY WANT to change my life? This is a crucial question! Before performing some of His miracles, Our Lord would sometimes ask: “If you WANT!” We have to WANT to do something first before we DO it.
And then there are degrees of HOW MUCH we want something. We see this in the words of Our Lord to the young man who had many possessions. The young man WANTED to go to Heaven, but he also WANTED TO DO THE MINIMUM to get there. To his question on what he had to DO to get there, Our Lord said: “If you WANT to enter into life, keep the commandments!” (Matthew 19:17).
But then Our Lord tries to encourage him from merely doing the MINUMUM into doing the MAXIMUM, in other words to increase his desire, to increase his want. “Jesus said to him: ‘If you WANT to be perfect, go sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions.” (Matthew 19:21-22).
(2) Do I WANT to give myself entirely to God, Jesus and Mary? Do I REALLY WANT to give myself to them? Or am I attached to myself and the world so much, that what I am REALLY WANTING is to both save my soul, yet still remain attached to myself and things of this life?
This is the case with most people! They are primarily concerned about themselves and the world, they want dual-citizenship! They want to be ‘good’ citizens of the world, and ‘good’ citizens of Heaven.
Yet Our Lord said: “No man can serve two masters! For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not life more than the meat; and the body more than the clothing?” (Matthew 6:24-25).
(3) We all know the saying: “He who desires the end, must necessarily desire the means to that end!” We know that is true in theory, just like we know we cannot serve God and mammon in theory; but, in practice, are we seeking to do the opposite?
Like most of the world, WE WANT THINGS FOR FREE! We want to get to Heaven; we want to avoid Hell; we want to save our souls—but we don’t want to do ALL that it takes to get there! We want a discount; we want a reduced fare; we want a ‘freebie’ if at all possible!
This is what the young man with many possessions wanted, and he could not bring himself round to sacrificing what Jesus asked for! It says in the Gospel that Jesus LOVED him! He must have sensed Jesus’ love in some way; yet he preferred his petty possessions (creatures, possessions and wealth) to Jesus (the Creator).
Sadly, most of us are the same. We may even ask the same question as Jesus’ followers asked, who had witnessed the encounter with the rich young man: “The disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’” (Matthew 19:25). Jesus replied: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:28).
So, the good news is that IF WE NO LONGER WANT TO BE LIKE THAT; IF WE WANT TO CHANGE, even though we may FEEL powerless to change, then Jesus, through His Holy Mother, will bring about that miracle of grace within you. You have to WANT and you have to ASK! The grace will then come to help you DO, not without any pain, but it will help you with the pain too!
Make Resolutions
(1) I will not be discouraged by what I may see in examining myself and my surroundings. Discouragement comes from the devil, not from God. Discouragement is the devil’s chief weapon of paralysis.
(2) I will realize that without God I can do nothing — “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) — yet with the help of God, anything and everything is possible — “With God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:28).
(3) So even though I may FEEL that I don’t want to change, or if I may FEEL that I am not able to change, I will nevertheless ASK TO CHANGE, knowing that Our Lady of Fatima said that we can obtain all things through the Rosary. However, our Rosaries need to IMPROVE; we need to PRAY the Rosary more and SAY it less; we need to put more ATTENTION and more FERVOR into our Rosaries, remembering the words of St. Louis de Montfort, who says:
“In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin” (The Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-Second Rose”).
Article 12
Tuesday, November 19th
Rome Burns!
Tuesday, November 19th
Rome Burns!
Rome Burns
In July of 64 A.D., a great fire ravaged Rome For six days and seven nights the citizens of ancient Rome watched helplessly as their city burned. The Great Fire spread quickly and savagely, destroying 70% of the city. “Of Rome’s 14 districts, only four remained intact. Three were leveled to the ground. The other seven were reduced to a few scorched and mangled ruins,” writes a contemporary Roman historian, Tacitus. Of the approximate one million-person population, an estimated half was made newly homeless by the fire.
As is usually seen in such mass tragedies, rumors began to wind through the devastated streets. Reports emerged that some men seen fanning the flames claimed they were under orders. As a result of the tremendous losses, the Roman people, feeling the effects of paranoia, looked for someone who might be responsible for the fire. They blamed their emperor—Nero.
Nero Fiddles While Rome Burns
Some rumors speculated that Nero himself had set the fire, others that he had ordered it. Seeing as Nero, after the fire, rebuilt Rome in a new style more to his liking, especially after he used land cleared by the fire to build his Golden Palace and its surrounding pleasure gardens, some believed he used the fire as an excuse for new construction. But perhaps the most interesting rumor that emerged from the Great Fire. According to a well-known expression, the decadent and unpopular Nero, “fiddled while Rome burned.” The expression has a double meaning: Not only did Nero play music while his people suffered, but he was an ineffectual leader in a time of crisis. When the Great Fire broke out, Nero was at his villa at Antium, some 35 miles from Rome. Though he immediately returned and began relief measures, people still didn’t trust him.
In the face of such charges, Nero searched for a scapegoat for the fire. He chose the Christians and persecuted them ruthlessly, torturing and executing them in hideous ways. Despite this public spectacle, Nero still found himself blamed for the fire.
Obsessed with Music
The idea that Nero fiddled while Rome burned is odd. But a mad tyrant who preferred to play music rather than offer succor to his people isn’t unbelievable, and Nero was unquestionably cruel. However, music historians believe the viol class of instruments (an earlier ancestor of the fiddle) was not developed until the 11th century, with the fiddle coming along much later. If Nero played anything, it would probably have been the cithara, a heavy wooden instrument with four to seven strings—but there is still no solid evidence that he played one during the Great Fire. The Roman historian Tacitus wrote that Nero was rumored to have sung about the destruction of Troy, while watching the city burn―maybe he sang and accompanied himself on the cithara; however, he stated clearly that this was unconfirmed by eyewitness accounts. Roman historians record that Nero had a real passion for the cithara. In conquered lands, Nero coordinated festivals that featured musical competitions on such dates that he could attend and compete in them all. Nero is said to have been very emotionally wrapped-up with these competitions. Nero’s interest in these musical competitions apparently bothered some of his rivals in the Senate, who found the idea of the emperor competing side by side with common musicians unseemly.
‘Roman Candles’
The story that Nero played the fiddle while Rome burned conjures up images of the emperor, dramatically backlit by the flames from the burning city, alone, calmly playing his fiddle while his people cried out in suffering. This most certainly was his attitude as he enjoyed watching the Christians that he had arrested, slowly burning to death attached to posts in his pleasure gardens and coated with tar, so that they would burn better—hence the grotesque title to the firework, “Roman Candle” which is what those poor Christians were—live human candles! His persecution of the early Christians was the first the religion would endure, and it resulted in the martyrdom of the apostles Peter and Paul, both of whom were executed during the persecutions.
Brutal Life, Brutal Death
The emperor has a well-documented history of brutality. He ascended to the throne after his mother killed his uncle; Nero later had her killed. In the face of blame for the Great Fire, he chose to look for scapegoats and found them in the Christians. Ultimately, the Great Fire helped bring Nero down. Discontent with his reign, his infantries threatened mutiny, and he was declared a public enemy by the Senate. Facing execution, Nero pushed a dagger into his throat and took his life four years after the fire.
Parallels with Purgatory
What is the point of this pagan historical account of Rome burning? Well, there are perhaps more parallels than one would first imagine. Of course, each one may draw something different and there may be many, many spiritual parallels to be found in this event and the ‘key players’ in the tragedy. We will look at a few to try a spark you and fire you up, so that you can draw your own analogies from the event.
Rome Burns
There are increasing numbers today who believe that Rome is beginning to burn down—metaphorically speaking! The Church has become increasingly worldly, with the fire of worldliness raging through the Church at an alarmingly increasing rate—not all the wood has caught fire, but much of it has and a lot it is burnt to ashes. Could we say that 70% of Rome (a.k.a. the Catholic Church throughout the world) has been destroyed? Perhaps so, with all the church closings and sales that have increased in the last 50 years; the constantly plummeting Mass attendance numbers; the falling numbers of Catholic births and baptisms; the massive loss of vocations over the last half-century, etc. Yes, perhaps 70% of the Church is destroyed as was Rome in 64 A.D. A passion for the world, rather than God, burns brightly and rages vehemently in the hearts of most Catholics today.
Half the Population Homeless
This is closely linked to what was said in the previous paragraph. Heaven is supposed to be our home and the Faith is the key to Heaven’s Gates, yet “many are called, but few chosen” (Matthew 20:16). Many have been given the key to the gates at their Baptism, but have since thrown that key away. Our Lady says: “There will be many who will not believe … Many souls will be deprived of innumerable graces they need to make that great leap from time to eternity … Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... Many will let themselves be led astray, because they have not worshiped the true Christ … There are so many souls whom the Justice of God condemns for sins committed against me … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them … The thought of the loss of so many souls is the cause of my sadness” (Our Lady at Quito, La Salette, Fatima & Akita). These words of our heavenly Mother merely reinforce the words of her Son: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). “Many men are called merciful: but who shall find a faithful man?” (Proverbs 20:6).
Ever-increasing numbers of Catholics are becoming ‘homeless’—they have made this world their home and know little or care little for their true home, Heaven. What are we doing for the ‘homeless’? Are fiddling while Rome burns? Are we too preoccupied with our personal slice of the pie of the world to care or do something for those that are ‘homeless’? We might be tempted to think or say those fateful words of Cain: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). The answer is found in Our Lord parable of the Sheep and the Goats: “Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was a homeless, and you took Me not in! … Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me.” (Matthew 25:41-43). Souls fall into Hell daily while the Catholic world fiddles with the world; souls burn daily in Purgatory while the Catholic world ignores them as it burns with a love of the world! We fiddle, souls burn!
Corruption of Nero and the Romans
Sister Lucia wrote to a priest nephew of hers, Fr. Jose Valinho in 1970: “I see by your letter that you are disturbed by the confusion of our time. It is sad indeed that so many persons let themselves be dominated by the diabolical wave which is sweeping the world and that they are blinded to the point of being incapable of seeing error!”
Which is more or less what Our Lady foretold at La Salette: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that … several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls .. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God.” Going back even further in time, we see Our Lady of Good Success foretelling similar things: “The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor with cruel and subtle astuteness to deviate them from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them … Many priests will lose their spirit, placing their souls in great danger … Many hearts consecrated to God in the priestly and religious state will fall into lukewarmness.”
Much like Nero and the many among the Roman populous: “The priests, ministers of my Son, the priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety in the celebration of the Holy Mysteries, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity” (La Salette). As the spiritual writers all state, impurity dulls and blinds the mind in relation to the things of God. Our Lord shows this by speaking of the reverse side of the coin: “Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8).
“It Will Begin At The Top”
Because the Church becomes besotted by worldliness, sensuality and pleasure-- “May those in charge of religious communities be on their guard against the people they receive, for the devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth” (La Salette). “Every type of vice will enter, calling down in turn every type of chastisement, such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy, the cause of the perdition of so many souls” (Our Lady of Good Success). The final outcome of all this? “Rome will lose the Faith” (Our Lady of La Salette). Which is borne out by the recent comments of Cardinal Ciappi, in a personal communication to a Professor Baumgartner in Salzburg, Austria. Cardinal Ciappi was the Papal Theologian of Pope John Paul II, said: “In the Third Secret, it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.” The recent divisions over morality amongst the bishops and cardinals at the recent Synod in Rome (October) are a frightening indication of this burning of Rome!
Nero’s Persecution
The world has no problem with the following Scripture verse: “This world is the enemy of God” (James 4:4), but many Catholics do not have a problem with the enemy of God! “Let’s be friends” they say, “after all, our religion is one of love!” Which is what the world loves to hear as it ‘sweet-talks’ so many Catholics out of the Faith. These so-called Catholics not only bury the talent of the Faith that God has given them, but they also bury any uncompromising quotes like: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15) or “No man can serve two masters. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24).
Those whom the world cannot ‘sweet-talk’ into accepting a new gospel, they will no longer ‘sweet-talk’ but persecute and even put to death! They “will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds ... The righteous will suffer greatly ... The good will be martyred … There will be desecration of holy places … Churches will be locked up or desecrated ... Churches and altars sacked. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord ...The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God ... The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres … Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death … The thought of the loss of so many souls is the cause of my sadness. If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them”“ (La Salette, Fatima, Akita).
A Divided City Falls
Our Lady, in several of her recent apparitions (La Salette and Akita especially) seems to speak of a division in the Church—something which is borne out by other revelations made to the mystics. Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, in her vision of May 13th, 1820, says : “I saw how harmful) would be the consequences of this false church. I saw it increase in size; heretics of every kind came into the city (of Rome). The local clergy grew lukewarm, and I saw a great darkness … Then the vision seemed to extend on every side. Whole Catholic communities were being oppressed, harassed, confined, and deprived of their freedom. I saw many churches closed down, great miseries everywhere, wars and bloodshed. A wild and ignorant mob took violent action.”
Fiddling While Souls Burn
“You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved” (Our Lady of Fatima, July 13th, 1917). Whether it is keeping souls out of the fires of Hell, or rescuing souls from the fires of Purgatory—the fire must be fought. That is the whole point and purpose of Our Lord’s coming: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10) and He wants our help in this matter! If we are caught up with the world or ourselves, then we will not hear His voice or will deaden His voice. Too many fiddle while souls burn!
The Price of Not Helping
“For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap” (Galatians 6:8). Or as Scripture says: “With what measure you mete, it shall be measured to you again” (Matthew 7:2). The moderns would say: “You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours!” Neglect to help the souls in Purgatory will result in our not being helped when we find ourselves there. Of this we have several proofs, taken from the Life of St. Margaret Mary. “I learned from Sister Margaret,” says Mother Greffier in her Memoirs, “that she one day prayed for two persons of high rank in the world who had just died. She saw them both in Purgatory. The one was condemned for several years to those sufferings, notwithstanding the great number of Masses which were celebrated for her. All those prayers and suffrages were, by Divine Justice, applied to the souls belonging to some of the families of her subjects [instead of her], which had been ruined by their injustice and lack of charity. As nothing was left to those poor people to enable them to have prayers offered for them after their death, God compensated these poor people in the manner we have related” [by taking the Masses offered for those two persons of high rank and applying them to members of their families].
Everyone Owns a Spiritual Treasure Chest
Indulgences are, in the Church, a true spiritual treasure laid open to all the faithful; from which all are allowed to take what they need—for themselves or for others, to pay their own debts and those of others. It was under this figure that God was one day pleased to show them to Blessed Mary of Quito (May 26th). One day, when in ecstasy, she saw in the midst of a large space an immense table covered with heaps of silver, gold, rubies, pearls, and diamonds, and at the same time she heard a voice saying, “These riches are public property; each one may approach and take as much as he pleases.” God made known to her that this was a symbol of indulgences (Fr. Rossignoli, Merveilles 29). We may say, with the author of the Merveilles, how culpable we are if, in such abundance, we ourselves remain poor and destitute and neglect to assist others. The souls in Purgatory are in such extreme necessity, they would beg us with tears in the midst of their torments; and we have the means of paying their debts by indulgences, and we make no or little attempt to do so. Their fire rages and we try put it out with what is equivalent to a glass of water!!
Oh, it’s so hard!
Does access to this treasury demand painful efforts on our parts, such as fasts, pilgrimages, and deprivation that is insupportable to our human nature? “Even though such were the case,” says Fr. Segneri, “we should submit to them.” Do we not see how men, for love of gold, in order to preserve a work of art, to save a part of their fortune or some precious possessions, expose themselves to the flames of a fire? Should we not do at least as much to save from the fires of Puragatory—which are, as Aquinas says, the same as the fires of Hell—those poor souls ransomed by the Blood of Jesus Christ? God’s divine goodness asks nothing so painful: it requires only such works as are ordinary and easy as having a Mass offered for the soul, praying some Rosaries, some Holy Communions, visits to the Blessed Sacrament, the giving of an alms. And we neglect to acquire the most precious treasures by such easy means, and have no desire to apply them to our poor family, relatives and friends suffering in the flames of Purgatory.
Examples
In Fr. Schouppe’s book he speaks of Thomas of Cantimpre and an incident that happened in his own family. The grandmother of Thomas had lost a son in whom she had centered her fondest hopes. Day and night she wept for him and refused all consolation. In the excess of her grief she forgot the great duty of Christian love, and did not think of praying for that soul so dear to her. The unfortunate object of this barren tenderness languished amid the flames of Purgatory, receiving no alleviation in his sufferings. Finally God took pity on him. One day, whilst plunged in the depths of her grief, this woman had a miraculous vision. She saw on a beautiful road a procession of young men, as graceful as angels, advancing full of joy towards a magnificent city. She understood that they were souls from Purgatory making their triumphal entry into Heaven. She looked eagerly to see if among their ranks she could not discover her son. Alas! The child was not there; but she perceived him approaching far behind the others, sad, suffering, and fatigued, his garments drenched with water. “Oh, dear object of my grief,” she cried out to him, “how is it that you remain behind that brilliant band? I should wish to see you at the head of your companions.” (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
“Mother,” replied the child in a plaintive tone, “it is you, it is these tears which you shed over me that moisten and soil my garments, and retard my entrance into the glory of Heaven. Cease to abandon yourself to a blind and useless grief. Open your heart to more Christian sentiments. If you truly love me, relieve me in my sufferings; apply some indulgences to me, say prayers, give alms, obtain for me the fruits of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is by this means that you will prove your love; for by so doing you will deliver me from prison where languish, and bring me forth to eternal life, which is far more desirable than the life terrestrial which you have given me.” Then the vision disappeared, and that mother, thus admonished and brought back to true Christian sentiments, instead of giving way to immoderate grief, applied to the practice of every good work which could give relief to the soul of her son. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
The great causes of this forgetfulness, this indifference, guilty neglect, and injustice towards the dead, is lack of Faith. For do we not see that true Christians, those animated by a spirit of Faith, make the most noble sacrifices in behalf of their departed friends? Descending in spirit into those penal flames, there contemplating the rigors of Divine Justice, listening to the voice of the dead who implore their compassion, they think only how to give relief to those poor souls, and consider it their most sacred duty to procure for their parents and departed friends all the suffrages possible, according to their means and condition. Happy are those Christians; they show their Faith by their works; they are merciful, and in their turn they shall obtain mercy. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
The Power of Almsgiving
The Angelic Doctor, St. Thomas, gives the preference to alms before fasting and prayer, when there is a question of expiating past faults. “Almsgiving,” he says, “possesses more completely the virtue of satisfaction than prayer, and prayer more completely than fasting.” This is why the great servants of God and the great saints have chosen it as a principal means of assisting the dead. Amongst them we may mention as one of the most remarkable the holy Abbot Raban-Maur (February 4th), first Abbot of Fulda, in the tenth century, and afterwards Archbishop of Mayence. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Father Trithemius, a well-known writer of the Order of St. Benedict, caused abundant alms to be distributed for the dead. He had established a rule that whenever a Religious died, his portion of food should be distributed among the poor for thirty days, that the soul of the deceased might be relieved by the alms. It happened in the year 830 that the monastery of Fulda was attacked by a contagious disease, which carried off a large number of the Religious. Raban-Maur, full of zeal and charity for their souls, called Edelard, the Procurator of the monastery, and reminded him of the rule established regarding the alms for the departed. “Take great care,” said he, “that our constitutions be faithfully observed, and that the poor be fed for a whole month with the food destined for the brethren we have lost.” (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Edelard failed both in obedience and charity. Under pretext that such liberality was extravagant, and that he must economize the resources of the monastery, but in reality because he was influenced by a secret avarice, he neglected to distribute the food, or did so in a manner far short of the command he had received. God did not leave this disobedience unpunished. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
A month elapsed, when one evening, after the community had retired, he walked across the chapter-room with a lamp in his hand. What was his astonishment when, at an hour that the room should be unoccupied, he found there a great number of Religious. His astonishment turned into fear when, looking at them attentively, he recognized the Religious lately deceased. Terror seized him, an icy coldness ran through his veins and riveted him to the spot like a lifeless statue. Then, one of the dead brothers addressed him with terrible reproaches. “Unfortunate creature,” said he, “why didst thou not distribute the alms which were destined to give relief to the souls of thy departed brethren? Why hast thou deprived us of that assistance amid the torments of Purgatory. Receive, from this moment, the punishment of thy avarice; another and more terrible chastisement is reserved for thee, when, after three days, thou shall appear before thy God.” (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
At these words Edelard fell as though struck by a thunderbolt, and remained immovable until after midnight, at the hour when the community went to choir. There they found him half-dead, in the same condition as was Heliodorus of old, after he had been scourged by the angels in the temple of Jerusalem (2 Machabees 3). He was carried to the infirmary, where all possible care was lavished upon him, so that he recovered consciousness. As soon as he was able to speak, in the presence of the Abbot and of all his brethren, he related with tears the terrible occurence to which his sad condition but too evidently bore witness. Then adding that he was to die within three; days, he asked for the last Sacraments, with all signs of humble repentance. He received them with sentiments of piety, and three days later expired, assisted by the prayers of his brethren. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Mass for the dead was immediately sung, and his share of food was distributed to the poor, for the benefit of his soul. Meanwhile, his punishment was not at an end. Edelard appeared to Abbot Raban, pale and disfigured. Touched with compassion, Raban inquired what he could do for him. “Ah!” replied the unfortunate soul, “nowithstanding the prayers of our holy community, I cannot obtain the grace of my deliverance until all my brethren, whom my avarice defrauded of the suffrages due to them, have been released. That which has been given to the poor for me has been of no profit but to them, and this by order of Divine Justice. I entreat you, therefore, O venerated and merciful Father, redouble your alms. I hope that by these powerful means Divine clemency will vouchsafe to deliver us all, my brethren first, and afterwards myself, who am the least deserving of mercy.” (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Raban-Maur increased his alms, and scarcely had another month elapsed, when Edelard again appeared; but clad in white, surrounded with rays of light and his countenance beaming with joy. He thanked, in the most touching manner, his Abbot and all the members of the monastery for the charity exercised towards him (Vie de Raban-Maur; Rossignoli, Merveilles, 2). (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Hard Hearted Scrooges
What instruction does not this history contain! In the first place, the virtue of almsgiving for the dead shines forth in a most striking manner. Then we see how God chastises, even in this life, those who through avarice fear not to deprive the dead of their suffrages. I speak not here of those heirs who render themselves culpable, by neglecting to make the endowments which devolve upon them by last will and testament of their deceased relatives, a negligence which constitutes a sacrilegious injustice; but of those children or relatives who, through miserable motives of interest, have as few Masses as possible celebrated, are sparing in the distribution of alms, having no pity for the souls of their departed relatives, which they leave to languish in the horrible torments of Purgatory. It is the blackest ingratitude, a hardness of heart entirely opposed to Christian charity, and which will meet its punishment perhaps even in this world. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Gold in Your Pocket or Purse
“The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.” (Sr. Lucia)
Fiddling While Others Burn
So let us not neglect to use that powerful weapon, let us not fiddle with the world when we can be fiddling with our Rosaries. The more we fiddle with our Rosaries for the souls in Purgatory, the more God will have others fiddle with their Rosaries when it is our turn to burn there! That’s the kind of fiddling we like and want. In fact we hope that there will be thousands fiddling while we burn—fiddling with their Rosaries in compassion, and not fiddling on their fiddles in joy! Let us pray!
In July of 64 A.D., a great fire ravaged Rome For six days and seven nights the citizens of ancient Rome watched helplessly as their city burned. The Great Fire spread quickly and savagely, destroying 70% of the city. “Of Rome’s 14 districts, only four remained intact. Three were leveled to the ground. The other seven were reduced to a few scorched and mangled ruins,” writes a contemporary Roman historian, Tacitus. Of the approximate one million-person population, an estimated half was made newly homeless by the fire.
As is usually seen in such mass tragedies, rumors began to wind through the devastated streets. Reports emerged that some men seen fanning the flames claimed they were under orders. As a result of the tremendous losses, the Roman people, feeling the effects of paranoia, looked for someone who might be responsible for the fire. They blamed their emperor—Nero.
Nero Fiddles While Rome Burns
Some rumors speculated that Nero himself had set the fire, others that he had ordered it. Seeing as Nero, after the fire, rebuilt Rome in a new style more to his liking, especially after he used land cleared by the fire to build his Golden Palace and its surrounding pleasure gardens, some believed he used the fire as an excuse for new construction. But perhaps the most interesting rumor that emerged from the Great Fire. According to a well-known expression, the decadent and unpopular Nero, “fiddled while Rome burned.” The expression has a double meaning: Not only did Nero play music while his people suffered, but he was an ineffectual leader in a time of crisis. When the Great Fire broke out, Nero was at his villa at Antium, some 35 miles from Rome. Though he immediately returned and began relief measures, people still didn’t trust him.
In the face of such charges, Nero searched for a scapegoat for the fire. He chose the Christians and persecuted them ruthlessly, torturing and executing them in hideous ways. Despite this public spectacle, Nero still found himself blamed for the fire.
Obsessed with Music
The idea that Nero fiddled while Rome burned is odd. But a mad tyrant who preferred to play music rather than offer succor to his people isn’t unbelievable, and Nero was unquestionably cruel. However, music historians believe the viol class of instruments (an earlier ancestor of the fiddle) was not developed until the 11th century, with the fiddle coming along much later. If Nero played anything, it would probably have been the cithara, a heavy wooden instrument with four to seven strings—but there is still no solid evidence that he played one during the Great Fire. The Roman historian Tacitus wrote that Nero was rumored to have sung about the destruction of Troy, while watching the city burn―maybe he sang and accompanied himself on the cithara; however, he stated clearly that this was unconfirmed by eyewitness accounts. Roman historians record that Nero had a real passion for the cithara. In conquered lands, Nero coordinated festivals that featured musical competitions on such dates that he could attend and compete in them all. Nero is said to have been very emotionally wrapped-up with these competitions. Nero’s interest in these musical competitions apparently bothered some of his rivals in the Senate, who found the idea of the emperor competing side by side with common musicians unseemly.
‘Roman Candles’
The story that Nero played the fiddle while Rome burned conjures up images of the emperor, dramatically backlit by the flames from the burning city, alone, calmly playing his fiddle while his people cried out in suffering. This most certainly was his attitude as he enjoyed watching the Christians that he had arrested, slowly burning to death attached to posts in his pleasure gardens and coated with tar, so that they would burn better—hence the grotesque title to the firework, “Roman Candle” which is what those poor Christians were—live human candles! His persecution of the early Christians was the first the religion would endure, and it resulted in the martyrdom of the apostles Peter and Paul, both of whom were executed during the persecutions.
Brutal Life, Brutal Death
The emperor has a well-documented history of brutality. He ascended to the throne after his mother killed his uncle; Nero later had her killed. In the face of blame for the Great Fire, he chose to look for scapegoats and found them in the Christians. Ultimately, the Great Fire helped bring Nero down. Discontent with his reign, his infantries threatened mutiny, and he was declared a public enemy by the Senate. Facing execution, Nero pushed a dagger into his throat and took his life four years after the fire.
Parallels with Purgatory
What is the point of this pagan historical account of Rome burning? Well, there are perhaps more parallels than one would first imagine. Of course, each one may draw something different and there may be many, many spiritual parallels to be found in this event and the ‘key players’ in the tragedy. We will look at a few to try a spark you and fire you up, so that you can draw your own analogies from the event.
Rome Burns
There are increasing numbers today who believe that Rome is beginning to burn down—metaphorically speaking! The Church has become increasingly worldly, with the fire of worldliness raging through the Church at an alarmingly increasing rate—not all the wood has caught fire, but much of it has and a lot it is burnt to ashes. Could we say that 70% of Rome (a.k.a. the Catholic Church throughout the world) has been destroyed? Perhaps so, with all the church closings and sales that have increased in the last 50 years; the constantly plummeting Mass attendance numbers; the falling numbers of Catholic births and baptisms; the massive loss of vocations over the last half-century, etc. Yes, perhaps 70% of the Church is destroyed as was Rome in 64 A.D. A passion for the world, rather than God, burns brightly and rages vehemently in the hearts of most Catholics today.
Half the Population Homeless
This is closely linked to what was said in the previous paragraph. Heaven is supposed to be our home and the Faith is the key to Heaven’s Gates, yet “many are called, but few chosen” (Matthew 20:16). Many have been given the key to the gates at their Baptism, but have since thrown that key away. Our Lady says: “There will be many who will not believe … Many souls will be deprived of innumerable graces they need to make that great leap from time to eternity … Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... Many will let themselves be led astray, because they have not worshiped the true Christ … There are so many souls whom the Justice of God condemns for sins committed against me … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them … The thought of the loss of so many souls is the cause of my sadness” (Our Lady at Quito, La Salette, Fatima & Akita). These words of our heavenly Mother merely reinforce the words of her Son: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). “Many men are called merciful: but who shall find a faithful man?” (Proverbs 20:6).
Ever-increasing numbers of Catholics are becoming ‘homeless’—they have made this world their home and know little or care little for their true home, Heaven. What are we doing for the ‘homeless’? Are fiddling while Rome burns? Are we too preoccupied with our personal slice of the pie of the world to care or do something for those that are ‘homeless’? We might be tempted to think or say those fateful words of Cain: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). The answer is found in Our Lord parable of the Sheep and the Goats: “Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was a homeless, and you took Me not in! … Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me.” (Matthew 25:41-43). Souls fall into Hell daily while the Catholic world fiddles with the world; souls burn daily in Purgatory while the Catholic world ignores them as it burns with a love of the world! We fiddle, souls burn!
Corruption of Nero and the Romans
Sister Lucia wrote to a priest nephew of hers, Fr. Jose Valinho in 1970: “I see by your letter that you are disturbed by the confusion of our time. It is sad indeed that so many persons let themselves be dominated by the diabolical wave which is sweeping the world and that they are blinded to the point of being incapable of seeing error!”
Which is more or less what Our Lady foretold at La Salette: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that … several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls .. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God.” Going back even further in time, we see Our Lady of Good Success foretelling similar things: “The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor with cruel and subtle astuteness to deviate them from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them … Many priests will lose their spirit, placing their souls in great danger … Many hearts consecrated to God in the priestly and religious state will fall into lukewarmness.”
Much like Nero and the many among the Roman populous: “The priests, ministers of my Son, the priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety in the celebration of the Holy Mysteries, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity” (La Salette). As the spiritual writers all state, impurity dulls and blinds the mind in relation to the things of God. Our Lord shows this by speaking of the reverse side of the coin: “Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8).
“It Will Begin At The Top”
Because the Church becomes besotted by worldliness, sensuality and pleasure-- “May those in charge of religious communities be on their guard against the people they receive, for the devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth” (La Salette). “Every type of vice will enter, calling down in turn every type of chastisement, such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy, the cause of the perdition of so many souls” (Our Lady of Good Success). The final outcome of all this? “Rome will lose the Faith” (Our Lady of La Salette). Which is borne out by the recent comments of Cardinal Ciappi, in a personal communication to a Professor Baumgartner in Salzburg, Austria. Cardinal Ciappi was the Papal Theologian of Pope John Paul II, said: “In the Third Secret, it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.” The recent divisions over morality amongst the bishops and cardinals at the recent Synod in Rome (October) are a frightening indication of this burning of Rome!
Nero’s Persecution
The world has no problem with the following Scripture verse: “This world is the enemy of God” (James 4:4), but many Catholics do not have a problem with the enemy of God! “Let’s be friends” they say, “after all, our religion is one of love!” Which is what the world loves to hear as it ‘sweet-talks’ so many Catholics out of the Faith. These so-called Catholics not only bury the talent of the Faith that God has given them, but they also bury any uncompromising quotes like: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15) or “No man can serve two masters. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24).
Those whom the world cannot ‘sweet-talk’ into accepting a new gospel, they will no longer ‘sweet-talk’ but persecute and even put to death! They “will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds ... The righteous will suffer greatly ... The good will be martyred … There will be desecration of holy places … Churches will be locked up or desecrated ... Churches and altars sacked. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord ...The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God ... The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres … Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death … The thought of the loss of so many souls is the cause of my sadness. If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them”“ (La Salette, Fatima, Akita).
A Divided City Falls
Our Lady, in several of her recent apparitions (La Salette and Akita especially) seems to speak of a division in the Church—something which is borne out by other revelations made to the mystics. Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, in her vision of May 13th, 1820, says : “I saw how harmful) would be the consequences of this false church. I saw it increase in size; heretics of every kind came into the city (of Rome). The local clergy grew lukewarm, and I saw a great darkness … Then the vision seemed to extend on every side. Whole Catholic communities were being oppressed, harassed, confined, and deprived of their freedom. I saw many churches closed down, great miseries everywhere, wars and bloodshed. A wild and ignorant mob took violent action.”
Fiddling While Souls Burn
“You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved” (Our Lady of Fatima, July 13th, 1917). Whether it is keeping souls out of the fires of Hell, or rescuing souls from the fires of Purgatory—the fire must be fought. That is the whole point and purpose of Our Lord’s coming: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10) and He wants our help in this matter! If we are caught up with the world or ourselves, then we will not hear His voice or will deaden His voice. Too many fiddle while souls burn!
The Price of Not Helping
“For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap” (Galatians 6:8). Or as Scripture says: “With what measure you mete, it shall be measured to you again” (Matthew 7:2). The moderns would say: “You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours!” Neglect to help the souls in Purgatory will result in our not being helped when we find ourselves there. Of this we have several proofs, taken from the Life of St. Margaret Mary. “I learned from Sister Margaret,” says Mother Greffier in her Memoirs, “that she one day prayed for two persons of high rank in the world who had just died. She saw them both in Purgatory. The one was condemned for several years to those sufferings, notwithstanding the great number of Masses which were celebrated for her. All those prayers and suffrages were, by Divine Justice, applied to the souls belonging to some of the families of her subjects [instead of her], which had been ruined by their injustice and lack of charity. As nothing was left to those poor people to enable them to have prayers offered for them after their death, God compensated these poor people in the manner we have related” [by taking the Masses offered for those two persons of high rank and applying them to members of their families].
Everyone Owns a Spiritual Treasure Chest
Indulgences are, in the Church, a true spiritual treasure laid open to all the faithful; from which all are allowed to take what they need—for themselves or for others, to pay their own debts and those of others. It was under this figure that God was one day pleased to show them to Blessed Mary of Quito (May 26th). One day, when in ecstasy, she saw in the midst of a large space an immense table covered with heaps of silver, gold, rubies, pearls, and diamonds, and at the same time she heard a voice saying, “These riches are public property; each one may approach and take as much as he pleases.” God made known to her that this was a symbol of indulgences (Fr. Rossignoli, Merveilles 29). We may say, with the author of the Merveilles, how culpable we are if, in such abundance, we ourselves remain poor and destitute and neglect to assist others. The souls in Purgatory are in such extreme necessity, they would beg us with tears in the midst of their torments; and we have the means of paying their debts by indulgences, and we make no or little attempt to do so. Their fire rages and we try put it out with what is equivalent to a glass of water!!
Oh, it’s so hard!
Does access to this treasury demand painful efforts on our parts, such as fasts, pilgrimages, and deprivation that is insupportable to our human nature? “Even though such were the case,” says Fr. Segneri, “we should submit to them.” Do we not see how men, for love of gold, in order to preserve a work of art, to save a part of their fortune or some precious possessions, expose themselves to the flames of a fire? Should we not do at least as much to save from the fires of Puragatory—which are, as Aquinas says, the same as the fires of Hell—those poor souls ransomed by the Blood of Jesus Christ? God’s divine goodness asks nothing so painful: it requires only such works as are ordinary and easy as having a Mass offered for the soul, praying some Rosaries, some Holy Communions, visits to the Blessed Sacrament, the giving of an alms. And we neglect to acquire the most precious treasures by such easy means, and have no desire to apply them to our poor family, relatives and friends suffering in the flames of Purgatory.
Examples
In Fr. Schouppe’s book he speaks of Thomas of Cantimpre and an incident that happened in his own family. The grandmother of Thomas had lost a son in whom she had centered her fondest hopes. Day and night she wept for him and refused all consolation. In the excess of her grief she forgot the great duty of Christian love, and did not think of praying for that soul so dear to her. The unfortunate object of this barren tenderness languished amid the flames of Purgatory, receiving no alleviation in his sufferings. Finally God took pity on him. One day, whilst plunged in the depths of her grief, this woman had a miraculous vision. She saw on a beautiful road a procession of young men, as graceful as angels, advancing full of joy towards a magnificent city. She understood that they were souls from Purgatory making their triumphal entry into Heaven. She looked eagerly to see if among their ranks she could not discover her son. Alas! The child was not there; but she perceived him approaching far behind the others, sad, suffering, and fatigued, his garments drenched with water. “Oh, dear object of my grief,” she cried out to him, “how is it that you remain behind that brilliant band? I should wish to see you at the head of your companions.” (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
“Mother,” replied the child in a plaintive tone, “it is you, it is these tears which you shed over me that moisten and soil my garments, and retard my entrance into the glory of Heaven. Cease to abandon yourself to a blind and useless grief. Open your heart to more Christian sentiments. If you truly love me, relieve me in my sufferings; apply some indulgences to me, say prayers, give alms, obtain for me the fruits of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is by this means that you will prove your love; for by so doing you will deliver me from prison where languish, and bring me forth to eternal life, which is far more desirable than the life terrestrial which you have given me.” Then the vision disappeared, and that mother, thus admonished and brought back to true Christian sentiments, instead of giving way to immoderate grief, applied to the practice of every good work which could give relief to the soul of her son. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
The great causes of this forgetfulness, this indifference, guilty neglect, and injustice towards the dead, is lack of Faith. For do we not see that true Christians, those animated by a spirit of Faith, make the most noble sacrifices in behalf of their departed friends? Descending in spirit into those penal flames, there contemplating the rigors of Divine Justice, listening to the voice of the dead who implore their compassion, they think only how to give relief to those poor souls, and consider it their most sacred duty to procure for their parents and departed friends all the suffrages possible, according to their means and condition. Happy are those Christians; they show their Faith by their works; they are merciful, and in their turn they shall obtain mercy. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
The Power of Almsgiving
The Angelic Doctor, St. Thomas, gives the preference to alms before fasting and prayer, when there is a question of expiating past faults. “Almsgiving,” he says, “possesses more completely the virtue of satisfaction than prayer, and prayer more completely than fasting.” This is why the great servants of God and the great saints have chosen it as a principal means of assisting the dead. Amongst them we may mention as one of the most remarkable the holy Abbot Raban-Maur (February 4th), first Abbot of Fulda, in the tenth century, and afterwards Archbishop of Mayence. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Father Trithemius, a well-known writer of the Order of St. Benedict, caused abundant alms to be distributed for the dead. He had established a rule that whenever a Religious died, his portion of food should be distributed among the poor for thirty days, that the soul of the deceased might be relieved by the alms. It happened in the year 830 that the monastery of Fulda was attacked by a contagious disease, which carried off a large number of the Religious. Raban-Maur, full of zeal and charity for their souls, called Edelard, the Procurator of the monastery, and reminded him of the rule established regarding the alms for the departed. “Take great care,” said he, “that our constitutions be faithfully observed, and that the poor be fed for a whole month with the food destined for the brethren we have lost.” (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Edelard failed both in obedience and charity. Under pretext that such liberality was extravagant, and that he must economize the resources of the monastery, but in reality because he was influenced by a secret avarice, he neglected to distribute the food, or did so in a manner far short of the command he had received. God did not leave this disobedience unpunished. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
A month elapsed, when one evening, after the community had retired, he walked across the chapter-room with a lamp in his hand. What was his astonishment when, at an hour that the room should be unoccupied, he found there a great number of Religious. His astonishment turned into fear when, looking at them attentively, he recognized the Religious lately deceased. Terror seized him, an icy coldness ran through his veins and riveted him to the spot like a lifeless statue. Then, one of the dead brothers addressed him with terrible reproaches. “Unfortunate creature,” said he, “why didst thou not distribute the alms which were destined to give relief to the souls of thy departed brethren? Why hast thou deprived us of that assistance amid the torments of Purgatory. Receive, from this moment, the punishment of thy avarice; another and more terrible chastisement is reserved for thee, when, after three days, thou shall appear before thy God.” (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
At these words Edelard fell as though struck by a thunderbolt, and remained immovable until after midnight, at the hour when the community went to choir. There they found him half-dead, in the same condition as was Heliodorus of old, after he had been scourged by the angels in the temple of Jerusalem (2 Machabees 3). He was carried to the infirmary, where all possible care was lavished upon him, so that he recovered consciousness. As soon as he was able to speak, in the presence of the Abbot and of all his brethren, he related with tears the terrible occurence to which his sad condition but too evidently bore witness. Then adding that he was to die within three; days, he asked for the last Sacraments, with all signs of humble repentance. He received them with sentiments of piety, and three days later expired, assisted by the prayers of his brethren. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Mass for the dead was immediately sung, and his share of food was distributed to the poor, for the benefit of his soul. Meanwhile, his punishment was not at an end. Edelard appeared to Abbot Raban, pale and disfigured. Touched with compassion, Raban inquired what he could do for him. “Ah!” replied the unfortunate soul, “nowithstanding the prayers of our holy community, I cannot obtain the grace of my deliverance until all my brethren, whom my avarice defrauded of the suffrages due to them, have been released. That which has been given to the poor for me has been of no profit but to them, and this by order of Divine Justice. I entreat you, therefore, O venerated and merciful Father, redouble your alms. I hope that by these powerful means Divine clemency will vouchsafe to deliver us all, my brethren first, and afterwards myself, who am the least deserving of mercy.” (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Raban-Maur increased his alms, and scarcely had another month elapsed, when Edelard again appeared; but clad in white, surrounded with rays of light and his countenance beaming with joy. He thanked, in the most touching manner, his Abbot and all the members of the monastery for the charity exercised towards him (Vie de Raban-Maur; Rossignoli, Merveilles, 2). (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Hard Hearted Scrooges
What instruction does not this history contain! In the first place, the virtue of almsgiving for the dead shines forth in a most striking manner. Then we see how God chastises, even in this life, those who through avarice fear not to deprive the dead of their suffrages. I speak not here of those heirs who render themselves culpable, by neglecting to make the endowments which devolve upon them by last will and testament of their deceased relatives, a negligence which constitutes a sacrilegious injustice; but of those children or relatives who, through miserable motives of interest, have as few Masses as possible celebrated, are sparing in the distribution of alms, having no pity for the souls of their departed relatives, which they leave to languish in the horrible torments of Purgatory. It is the blackest ingratitude, a hardness of heart entirely opposed to Christian charity, and which will meet its punishment perhaps even in this world. (Fr. Schuoppe, Purgatory Explained).
Gold in Your Pocket or Purse
“The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.” (Sr. Lucia)
Fiddling While Others Burn
So let us not neglect to use that powerful weapon, let us not fiddle with the world when we can be fiddling with our Rosaries. The more we fiddle with our Rosaries for the souls in Purgatory, the more God will have others fiddle with their Rosaries when it is our turn to burn there! That’s the kind of fiddling we like and want. In fact we hope that there will be thousands fiddling while we burn—fiddling with their Rosaries in compassion, and not fiddling on their fiddles in joy! Let us pray!
Article 11
Monday, November 18th
Don't Play With Fire!
Monday, November 18th
Don't Play With Fire!
Can’t Have It Both Ways!
What on Earth is wrong with us?! We want to be allowed to do what we want, yet we despise hearing the consequences of our actions! We throw a fit if our good actions are not acknowledged and rewarded, yet we throw a greater fit if our bad actions ARE noticed and rewarded (i.e., punished)! There is an interesting book entitled, Ideas Have Consequences, but even more so is it true that our actions have consequences.
As Holy Scripture says: “For the Son of man shall come in the glory of His Father with His angels: and then will He render to every man according to his works” (Matthew 16:27). “And this is the judgment―because the light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light; for their works were evil. For everyone that does evil, hates the light, and comes not to the light, so that his works may not be reproved. But he that does truth, comes to the light, so that his works may be made manifest―because they are done in God” (John 3:19-21).
A Lose-Lose Situation!
If you read Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, you will read some very sobering passages about Purgatory. One of the things he points out is the fact that the fires of Purgatory are the same fires as those of Hell. He also points out that there is in Purgatory, as in Hell, a double pain—the pain of loss in the soul and the pain of the senses. The pain suffered by the loss of God, is greater than the pain of the fire, or any of the other tortures, that the soul suffers.
The pain of loss consists in being deprived for a time of the sight of God, Who is our Supreme Good, for Whom our souls were made. In Purgatory, there is a thirst for God—which should have been there while living on Earth, but the soul thirsted more for worldly things rather than God.
The pain of sense, or sensible suffering, is the same as that which we experience in our flesh. Its nature is not defined by Faith, but it is the common opinion of the Doctors of the Church that it consists in fire and other species of suffering. The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers, is that of Hell, of which the rich glutton speaks when he says: “I am tormented in this flame” (Luke 16:24).
Taking the Heat!
The same fire, says Pope St. Gregory the Great, torments the damned and purifies the elect. “Almost all theologians,” says the cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, “teach that the damned in Hell and the souls in Purgatory suffer the action of the same fire.” It must be held as certain, writes St. Robert Bellarmine, that there is no proportion between the sufferings of this life and those of Purgatory. St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book on Purgatory, writes: “As to the suffering―it is equal to that of Hell.” St. Thomas Aquinas states: “The fire of Purgatory is the same as the fire of Hell” (Summa Theologica, Supplement, Appendix II, Art. 1).
We know what a terrible thing fire is, and what pain is caused by the slightest burn, no matter how feeble the flame may be―how much more terrible must be that fire which is fed neither with wood, gas nor oil.
St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book on Purgatory, says: “The souls endure a torment so extreme, that no tongue can describe it, nor could the understanding conceive the least notion of it, if God did not make it known by a particular grace.”
Admission Prices Are Different
As regards the severity of these pains, since they are inflicted by Infinite Justice, they are proportioned to the nature, gravity, and number of sins committed. Each one receives according to his works, each one must acquit himself of the debts with which he sees himself charged before God. As Jesus said: “Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the day of judgment!” (Matthew 12:36).
Now these debts differ greatly in quality. Some, which have accumulated during a long life, have reached the ten thousand talents of the Gospel, that is to say, millions and tens of millions; whilst others are reduced to a few pennies, the trifling remainder of that which has not been expiated on Earth. “Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing!” [farthing = a quarter of an old penny] said Our Lord (Matthew 5:26). It follows from this that the souls undergo various kinds of sufferings, that there are innumerable degrees of expiation in Purgatory, and that some are incomparably more severe than others. However, speaking in general, the doctors agree in saying that the pains are most excruciating.
Don’t Play the Credit-Card Game with Purgatory!
There are some who look at Purgatory much like they look upon their credit card—they will buy now (sin now) and pay later, thinking little of the interest rates. They forget that the interest rates for Purgatory are beyond their wildest imagination! St. Augustine believes that even though the souls in Purgatory will be saved, no doubt, after the trial of fire, but that trial will be terrible, that torment of Purgatory will be far more intolerable than all the most excruciating sufferings in this world.
St. Thomas goes even further; he maintains that the least pain of Purgatory surpasses all the sufferings of this life, whatsoever they may be. The author of the “Imitation of Christ” explains this doctrine by a practical and striking sentence. Speaking in general of the sufferings of the other life, he says: “There, one hour of torment will be more terrible than a hundred years of rigorous penance done her.”
Happy to Be Saved—But Painfully Happy!
However, before we get carried-away by exaggerated thoughts of “feeling-sorry-for-myself” doom and gloom, let us also remember that joyful and positive outlook of the souls in Purgatory. Another Doctor of the Church, St. Francis de Sales, renowned for his calming and soothing words, says:
“We may draw from the thought of Purgatory more consolation than apprehension. The greater part of those who dread Purgatory so much, think more of their own interests than of the interests of God’s glory; this proceeds from the fact that they think only of the sufferings, without considering the peace and happiness which are there enjoyed by the holy souls. It is true that the torments are so great that the most acute sufferings of this life bear no comparison to them; but the interior satisfaction which is there enjoyed, is such that no prosperity nor contentment upon Earth can equal it.
“The souls are in a continual union with God. They are perfectly resigned to His will, or rather, their will is so transformed into that of God, that they cannot will but what God wills; so that if Paradise were to be opened to them, they would precipitate themselves into Hell, rather than appear before God with the stains with which they see themselves disfigured. They purify themselves willingly and lovingly, because such is the Divine good pleasure. They wish to be there in the state wherein God pleases, and as long as it shall please Him. They cannot sin, nor can they experience the least movement of impatience, nor commit the slightest imperfection. They love God more than they love themselves, and more than all things else; they love Him with a perfect, pure, and disinterested love. They are consoled by angels. They are assured of their eternal salvation, and filled with a hope that can never be disappointed in its expectations. Their bitterest anguish is soothed by a certain profound peace. It is a species of Hell as regards the suffering; it is a Paradise as regards the delight infused into their hearts by charity—Charity, stronger than death and more powerful than Hell ; Charity, whose lamps are all fire and flame. Happy state! More desirable than appalling, since its flames are flames of love and charity.” (The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales, chapter 9).
No Room for the “Sweet-Tooth”
Yet, we must not fall into our “sweet-tooth” tendency and suddenly extract and abstract all pains from Purgatory—just as God is extremely just while being extremely merciful, so too are the Poor Souls in extreme pain while being extremely happy. Such are the teachings of the Saints and the Doctors of Church, from which it follows that, if the pains of Purgatory are rigorous, they are not without consolation. When imposing His cross upon us in this life, God pours upon it the sweetness of His grace, and in purifying the souls in Purgatory like gold in the crucible, He soothes their flames by inexpressible consolations.
Our God is an Extreme God
We must not lose sight of this consoling element, this bright side of the often gloomy picture which we are going to examine. This, as you can see, is the balance between the Justice and Mercy of God—Whose wisdom can do no wrong, nor can He deceive or be deceived. We must remember that God is extreme—for He is infinitely perfect, and perfection implies an extreme, for someone who is perfect is extremely good. Therefore, all the attributes of God are perfect to the extreme—wherefore, He has to be extreme in His Justice while at the same time being extreme in His mercy. Our puny minds cannot reconcile what seem like two opposites—justice and mercy—but that is just like our incapacity to grasp the notion of eternity. Let us also not deceive ourselves on the probable punishment due to our sins—whether here on Earth (if we are wise to accept it) or in Purgatory (if we are foolish enough to refuse paying while in Earth). It is because we have such a low estimation of what Heaven is and what it costs, which is compounded with our trivialization of sin, whereby we think it is insignificant in some cases—forgetting that our Faith teaches us that both Mortal Sin and Venial Sin are the two greatest evils in the world!
Pay Now, Not Later
As Fr. Schouppe writes, in Purgatory Explained: “God is Sanctity itself, much more so than the sun is light, and no shadow of sin can endure before His face. ‘Thine eyes are pure’, says the prophet, ‘and thou canst not look on iniquity’ (Habacuc 1:13). When iniquity manifests itself in creatures, the Sanctity of God exacts expiation, and when this expiation is made in all the rigor of justice, it is terrible.
“It is for this reason that the Scripture says again, ‘Holy and terrible is His Name’ (Psalm 110:9); as though it would say, His Justice is terrible because His Sanctity is infinite. The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended, the demands enormous atonement. This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear.
“This fear of Purgatory is a salutary fear; its effect is, not only to animate us with a charitable compassion towards the poor suffering souls, but also with a vigilant zeal for our own spiritual welfare. Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Why Burn in Purgatory if You Can Burn for Less Now?
What’s the point of paying for something with ‘big-bucks’ when you pay for it for mere cents on a dollar? Sure it’s discouraging to read about Purgatory—but there would be no worry about Purgatory if we would only do what we should be doing here below! Why burn in Purgatory when you can burn at a lower temperature and for a shorter time here below? What are we talking about? Well, the prayer that most of us probably say every day—or at least most days—gives us the answer: “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of Thy love!” Love is the word—love is a fire. Our Lord Himself showed us this imagery and reality in His apparition to St. Margaret Mary.
Mercy Depends on Love
Love is the pinnacle of all virtues—“the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13)—and as such it deserves to be honored above all the others. Therefore, in Our Lord, we honor and adore His Sacred Heart which is the seat of His love for mankind. Mercy is a property or a child of love. St. Thomas Aquinas deals of Mercy under his section on Charity. As Psalm 144 says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). The Sacred Heart is all about those two pinnacles within God—His Love and His Mercy.
Our Lord Himself indicated this in His apparitions to St. Margaret Mary, especially in the fourth, called the “Great Apparition”. To what did He draw attention in the first place? To the Heart that beats in His breast and to the flames of love that surrounded that Heart. St. Margaret Mary says: “Discovering to me His Heart, He said to me: ‘Behold this Heart ...’” And what did He declare concerning this Heart? That It ineffably loves us and is sensible to the manner in which men repay Its love: “Behold this Heart which has so loved men. ... And in return I receive from the greater part of them nothing but ingratitude.”
What would the reward if men would only love the Heart that loved them? The reward would be mercy! As Jesus said of St. Mary Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). Holy Scripture further cements this: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
Pre-Purgatorial Personal Payment Plan
We can choose our own payment plan for our sins—we can learn to truly and effectively love God here below, or we can learn in fires of Purgatory. Either way we burn, but burning now—with love—is better than burning later—in pain! “What will you? Shall I come to you with a rod; or in charity?” (1 Corinthians 4:21). In both places we will have to suffer—both here below and in the fires of Purgatory. Suffering is part of the master plan—“If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). “For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake” (Acts 9:16). “He must suffer many things and be despised!” (Mark 9:11).
To which St. Paul adds: “If we suffer with Him, it is that we may be also glorified with Him” (Romans 8:17). “In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed; we are straitened, but are not destitute. We suffer persecution, but are not forsaken; we are cast down, but we perish not! … For that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, worketh for us above measure exceedingly an eternal weight of glory!” (1 Corinthians 4:8-9, 17). In other words, St. Paul says that whatever we suffer here below is only for a short time and is relatively light—compared to Purgatory—and it brings for us eternal glory while reducing our temporal punishment.
Thou Shalt Love!
“Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength” (Deuteronomy 6:4‑5). To refuse to love, is to disobey God. Thou shalt love—or else. The Crisis of Faith, in our thinking today, manifests itself as a Crisis of Love in our wills [hearts]. Not believing, we can’t love; not loving, we stop believing. All God’s lesser commandments depend on His command to love. To disobey it, disqualifies us for all other tests, whereas obeying it, automatically leads us to do everything God wants us to do, and to avoid everything He doesn’t want us to do. For, as St. Thomas Aquinas says, love is a union of wills.
God is Love
God Himself is Charity, He is Charity Itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). This charity God has shown to a world that has not deserved or merited it—it is not as though we had something first, that necessitated God to repay. “Who has first given to Him, and recompense shall be made him?” (Romans 11:35). In fact, the world, by its sins, was more deserving of punishment and damnation than it was deserving of God’s charity! Yet that did not extinguish the charity of God.
A New Heart
“But I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first charity!” (Apocalypse 2:4). “Justify not thyself before God, for He knows the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 7:5). “The imagination and thought of man’s heart are prone to evil from his youth” (Genesis 8:21). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “Be mindful therefore from whence thou art fallen, and do penance, and do the first works. Or else I shall come to thee, and will move thy candlestick out of its place, unless thou do penance!” (Apocalypse 2:4-5). “Return to the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy soul!” (Deuteronomy 30:10).”Not serving to the eye―as it were pleasing men―but, as, the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart!” (Ephesians 6:6). “Covet ye therefore My words, and love them, and you shall have instruction!” (Wisdom 6:12).
“Create a clean heart in me, O God, and renew a right spirit within my bowels” (Psalm 50:12). “And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 36:26). “God has softened my heart, and the Almighty hath troubled me!” (Job 23:16). “A contrite and humbled heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise!” (Psalm 50:19). “God gave unto him another heart” (1 Kings 10:9).
Let us take the words of God to heart! Let us beg Him to give us new heart! Let us admit that our present hearts are more often than not like stone, cold and hard! He who can change bread into His Flesh, can also change our hearts of stone into hearts of flesh. Ask, and you shall receive!
Spiritual Cardiac Arrest
We have all, more or less, become spiritual cardiac patients, our every move is conditioned by the dread possibility of imminent spiritual heart failure. Loving in the face of the malice that confronts us at every turn, is such uphill work, so great a strain, only the force and power of a divine command, driving us from behind, could keep us at it. Reason alone would tell us to relax. Lots of us have―and that hasn’t helped our environment, nor our spiritual life!
Once we lose that spark of love and become lukewarm, it can be very, very difficult to regain the former level of love. We must guard and feed our love of God just like the ancients would zealously guard and feed their fires. They knew how difficult it was to create that first spark that led to the fire being kindled, so they give their utmost attention and care to preserving the fire that cost so much effort in the first place.
Love is at the Heart of the Answer
The heart of our spiritual life is love. Love is and has to be the soul of all that we do. “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Therefore, once again: “Let all your things be done in charity!” (1 Corinthians 16:14) because “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) ― and we all have a multitude of sins that need covering!
Two Extremes
If there is one problem that hits and besieges most souls, it is their attitude to the mercy of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Some are very presumptuous in heart, thinking that they can sin as much as they want and forgiveness will be automatically given; others tend to lose heart, thinking themselves unworthy of His mercy.
Do You Love Me?
“Jesus said to Simon Peter: ‘Simon son of John, lovest thou Me more than these?’ Peter said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord! Thou knowest that I love Thee!’” (John 21:15). Do we love Him “more than these”—more than all these things and distractions that surround us in this world? If we wish to avoid Purgatory through our burning love, then it has to be a love that corresponds to what Our Lord and Holy Scripture commands and demands: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). Purgatory comes about because souls fail to keep and honor those basic commands and demands. They only love God half-heartedly and they love the world sometimes wholeheartedly!
Love is Tough!
It’s hard to love. These days it doesn’t seem to come naturally any more—if it ever did. One act of perfect love of God can wipe away all the guilt and debt of temporal punishment due to sin—no matter how much one has sinned! Yet that act of perfect love, though not impossible, is not easy. We love the persons, places and things of this world more than we love God—or at least our love for them is more vehement than is our love of God. As Our Lord warned us, towards the End Times, evil would be so rampant that charity would grow cold: “Because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). As the fires of charity grow colder, the fires of Purgatory are being stoked up to be hotter.
There Can Be No Love Without Penance
If we have done wrong to someone we love, then we must make reparation. This is almost an absolute prerequisite of love. The souls in Purgatory are there because they wanted to love God without doing enough reparation or penance for having previously offended Him. Our Lord Himself warned us: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” and Jesus repeats Himself two verses later: “I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). “Therefore, saith the Lord God, be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities, and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:30). “Hear, I beseech you, My words, and do penance!” (Job 21:2).
Our Lord complained, already in His own day, that too few were doing penance: “Woe to thee, Corozain, woe to thee, Bethsaida! For if in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the mighty works that have been wrought in you, then they would have done penance long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes!” (Luke 10:13). “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23).
St. John the Baptist, even before Jesus’ Public Ministry began, was preaching penance in the desert: “The word of the Lord was made unto John, the son of Zachary, in the desert. And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of penance for the remission of sins” (Luke 3:2-3).
Our Lord sent out His disciples to preach penance: “Jesus called the Twelve; and began to send them two and two and gave them power over unclean spirits … and He said to them: ‘Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear you; going forth from thence, shake off the dust from your feet for a testimony to them!’ And, going forth, they preached that men should do penance” (Mark 6:7-12). When the Apostles, despite being given power over devils, had failed to cast out a devil from a boy, they asked Our Lord why they had failed. He replied: “This kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting” ― in other words, prayer and penance (Matthew 17:20). This is why Our Lady, at Fatima, asks for the Rosary and sacrifices ― in other words, prayer and penance.
Let us take a cue the example quoted from Holy Scripture: “He prayed to the Lord his God and did penance exceedingly” (2 Paralipomenon 33:12). “Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes!” (Job 42:6).
What Is Love?
What does it mean to love to Jesus? The first level of love is to keep His commandments: “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). Fr. Tanquerey, in his renowned classic The Spiritual Life, writes:
Lowest Level of Love: “The chief care of beginners is that of preserving charity. Their efforts, then, are directed toward the avoidance of sin, above all, mortal sin, and toward the conquest of evil inclinations, of the passions, and of all that could make them lose the love of God. This is the purgative way, the end of which is the purification of the soul.
Middle Level of Love: “The chief concern of those already advanced, the proficients, is progress in the positive exercise of the virtues and growth in charity. The heart, already purified, is all the more open to divine light and to the love of God. The soul wishes to follow Jesus and to imitate His virtues, and since by following Him one walks in the Light, this is called the illuminative way. Here the soul strives to avoid not only mortal, but even venial sin.
Highest Level of Love: “Perfect souls have but one concern―which is to cling to God and to take their delight in Him. Ever seeking to unite themselves to God, they are in the unitive way. Sin fills them with horror, for they fear to displease God and to offend Him. The virtues that most attract them are the theological virtues, which unite them to God. Hence, the Earth seems to them an exile, and, like St. Paul, they long to die, so as to be joined to Christ.” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §§ 341-343).
“And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26). “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of Thy love!” So that “charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
What on Earth is wrong with us?! We want to be allowed to do what we want, yet we despise hearing the consequences of our actions! We throw a fit if our good actions are not acknowledged and rewarded, yet we throw a greater fit if our bad actions ARE noticed and rewarded (i.e., punished)! There is an interesting book entitled, Ideas Have Consequences, but even more so is it true that our actions have consequences.
As Holy Scripture says: “For the Son of man shall come in the glory of His Father with His angels: and then will He render to every man according to his works” (Matthew 16:27). “And this is the judgment―because the light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light; for their works were evil. For everyone that does evil, hates the light, and comes not to the light, so that his works may not be reproved. But he that does truth, comes to the light, so that his works may be made manifest―because they are done in God” (John 3:19-21).
A Lose-Lose Situation!
If you read Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, you will read some very sobering passages about Purgatory. One of the things he points out is the fact that the fires of Purgatory are the same fires as those of Hell. He also points out that there is in Purgatory, as in Hell, a double pain—the pain of loss in the soul and the pain of the senses. The pain suffered by the loss of God, is greater than the pain of the fire, or any of the other tortures, that the soul suffers.
The pain of loss consists in being deprived for a time of the sight of God, Who is our Supreme Good, for Whom our souls were made. In Purgatory, there is a thirst for God—which should have been there while living on Earth, but the soul thirsted more for worldly things rather than God.
The pain of sense, or sensible suffering, is the same as that which we experience in our flesh. Its nature is not defined by Faith, but it is the common opinion of the Doctors of the Church that it consists in fire and other species of suffering. The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers, is that of Hell, of which the rich glutton speaks when he says: “I am tormented in this flame” (Luke 16:24).
Taking the Heat!
The same fire, says Pope St. Gregory the Great, torments the damned and purifies the elect. “Almost all theologians,” says the cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, “teach that the damned in Hell and the souls in Purgatory suffer the action of the same fire.” It must be held as certain, writes St. Robert Bellarmine, that there is no proportion between the sufferings of this life and those of Purgatory. St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book on Purgatory, writes: “As to the suffering―it is equal to that of Hell.” St. Thomas Aquinas states: “The fire of Purgatory is the same as the fire of Hell” (Summa Theologica, Supplement, Appendix II, Art. 1).
We know what a terrible thing fire is, and what pain is caused by the slightest burn, no matter how feeble the flame may be―how much more terrible must be that fire which is fed neither with wood, gas nor oil.
St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book on Purgatory, says: “The souls endure a torment so extreme, that no tongue can describe it, nor could the understanding conceive the least notion of it, if God did not make it known by a particular grace.”
Admission Prices Are Different
As regards the severity of these pains, since they are inflicted by Infinite Justice, they are proportioned to the nature, gravity, and number of sins committed. Each one receives according to his works, each one must acquit himself of the debts with which he sees himself charged before God. As Jesus said: “Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the day of judgment!” (Matthew 12:36).
Now these debts differ greatly in quality. Some, which have accumulated during a long life, have reached the ten thousand talents of the Gospel, that is to say, millions and tens of millions; whilst others are reduced to a few pennies, the trifling remainder of that which has not been expiated on Earth. “Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing!” [farthing = a quarter of an old penny] said Our Lord (Matthew 5:26). It follows from this that the souls undergo various kinds of sufferings, that there are innumerable degrees of expiation in Purgatory, and that some are incomparably more severe than others. However, speaking in general, the doctors agree in saying that the pains are most excruciating.
Don’t Play the Credit-Card Game with Purgatory!
There are some who look at Purgatory much like they look upon their credit card—they will buy now (sin now) and pay later, thinking little of the interest rates. They forget that the interest rates for Purgatory are beyond their wildest imagination! St. Augustine believes that even though the souls in Purgatory will be saved, no doubt, after the trial of fire, but that trial will be terrible, that torment of Purgatory will be far more intolerable than all the most excruciating sufferings in this world.
St. Thomas goes even further; he maintains that the least pain of Purgatory surpasses all the sufferings of this life, whatsoever they may be. The author of the “Imitation of Christ” explains this doctrine by a practical and striking sentence. Speaking in general of the sufferings of the other life, he says: “There, one hour of torment will be more terrible than a hundred years of rigorous penance done her.”
Happy to Be Saved—But Painfully Happy!
However, before we get carried-away by exaggerated thoughts of “feeling-sorry-for-myself” doom and gloom, let us also remember that joyful and positive outlook of the souls in Purgatory. Another Doctor of the Church, St. Francis de Sales, renowned for his calming and soothing words, says:
“We may draw from the thought of Purgatory more consolation than apprehension. The greater part of those who dread Purgatory so much, think more of their own interests than of the interests of God’s glory; this proceeds from the fact that they think only of the sufferings, without considering the peace and happiness which are there enjoyed by the holy souls. It is true that the torments are so great that the most acute sufferings of this life bear no comparison to them; but the interior satisfaction which is there enjoyed, is such that no prosperity nor contentment upon Earth can equal it.
“The souls are in a continual union with God. They are perfectly resigned to His will, or rather, their will is so transformed into that of God, that they cannot will but what God wills; so that if Paradise were to be opened to them, they would precipitate themselves into Hell, rather than appear before God with the stains with which they see themselves disfigured. They purify themselves willingly and lovingly, because such is the Divine good pleasure. They wish to be there in the state wherein God pleases, and as long as it shall please Him. They cannot sin, nor can they experience the least movement of impatience, nor commit the slightest imperfection. They love God more than they love themselves, and more than all things else; they love Him with a perfect, pure, and disinterested love. They are consoled by angels. They are assured of their eternal salvation, and filled with a hope that can never be disappointed in its expectations. Their bitterest anguish is soothed by a certain profound peace. It is a species of Hell as regards the suffering; it is a Paradise as regards the delight infused into their hearts by charity—Charity, stronger than death and more powerful than Hell ; Charity, whose lamps are all fire and flame. Happy state! More desirable than appalling, since its flames are flames of love and charity.” (The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales, chapter 9).
No Room for the “Sweet-Tooth”
Yet, we must not fall into our “sweet-tooth” tendency and suddenly extract and abstract all pains from Purgatory—just as God is extremely just while being extremely merciful, so too are the Poor Souls in extreme pain while being extremely happy. Such are the teachings of the Saints and the Doctors of Church, from which it follows that, if the pains of Purgatory are rigorous, they are not without consolation. When imposing His cross upon us in this life, God pours upon it the sweetness of His grace, and in purifying the souls in Purgatory like gold in the crucible, He soothes their flames by inexpressible consolations.
Our God is an Extreme God
We must not lose sight of this consoling element, this bright side of the often gloomy picture which we are going to examine. This, as you can see, is the balance between the Justice and Mercy of God—Whose wisdom can do no wrong, nor can He deceive or be deceived. We must remember that God is extreme—for He is infinitely perfect, and perfection implies an extreme, for someone who is perfect is extremely good. Therefore, all the attributes of God are perfect to the extreme—wherefore, He has to be extreme in His Justice while at the same time being extreme in His mercy. Our puny minds cannot reconcile what seem like two opposites—justice and mercy—but that is just like our incapacity to grasp the notion of eternity. Let us also not deceive ourselves on the probable punishment due to our sins—whether here on Earth (if we are wise to accept it) or in Purgatory (if we are foolish enough to refuse paying while in Earth). It is because we have such a low estimation of what Heaven is and what it costs, which is compounded with our trivialization of sin, whereby we think it is insignificant in some cases—forgetting that our Faith teaches us that both Mortal Sin and Venial Sin are the two greatest evils in the world!
Pay Now, Not Later
As Fr. Schouppe writes, in Purgatory Explained: “God is Sanctity itself, much more so than the sun is light, and no shadow of sin can endure before His face. ‘Thine eyes are pure’, says the prophet, ‘and thou canst not look on iniquity’ (Habacuc 1:13). When iniquity manifests itself in creatures, the Sanctity of God exacts expiation, and when this expiation is made in all the rigor of justice, it is terrible.
“It is for this reason that the Scripture says again, ‘Holy and terrible is His Name’ (Psalm 110:9); as though it would say, His Justice is terrible because His Sanctity is infinite. The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended, the demands enormous atonement. This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear.
“This fear of Purgatory is a salutary fear; its effect is, not only to animate us with a charitable compassion towards the poor suffering souls, but also with a vigilant zeal for our own spiritual welfare. Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Why Burn in Purgatory if You Can Burn for Less Now?
What’s the point of paying for something with ‘big-bucks’ when you pay for it for mere cents on a dollar? Sure it’s discouraging to read about Purgatory—but there would be no worry about Purgatory if we would only do what we should be doing here below! Why burn in Purgatory when you can burn at a lower temperature and for a shorter time here below? What are we talking about? Well, the prayer that most of us probably say every day—or at least most days—gives us the answer: “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of Thy love!” Love is the word—love is a fire. Our Lord Himself showed us this imagery and reality in His apparition to St. Margaret Mary.
Mercy Depends on Love
Love is the pinnacle of all virtues—“the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13)—and as such it deserves to be honored above all the others. Therefore, in Our Lord, we honor and adore His Sacred Heart which is the seat of His love for mankind. Mercy is a property or a child of love. St. Thomas Aquinas deals of Mercy under his section on Charity. As Psalm 144 says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). The Sacred Heart is all about those two pinnacles within God—His Love and His Mercy.
Our Lord Himself indicated this in His apparitions to St. Margaret Mary, especially in the fourth, called the “Great Apparition”. To what did He draw attention in the first place? To the Heart that beats in His breast and to the flames of love that surrounded that Heart. St. Margaret Mary says: “Discovering to me His Heart, He said to me: ‘Behold this Heart ...’” And what did He declare concerning this Heart? That It ineffably loves us and is sensible to the manner in which men repay Its love: “Behold this Heart which has so loved men. ... And in return I receive from the greater part of them nothing but ingratitude.”
What would the reward if men would only love the Heart that loved them? The reward would be mercy! As Jesus said of St. Mary Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). Holy Scripture further cements this: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
Pre-Purgatorial Personal Payment Plan
We can choose our own payment plan for our sins—we can learn to truly and effectively love God here below, or we can learn in fires of Purgatory. Either way we burn, but burning now—with love—is better than burning later—in pain! “What will you? Shall I come to you with a rod; or in charity?” (1 Corinthians 4:21). In both places we will have to suffer—both here below and in the fires of Purgatory. Suffering is part of the master plan—“If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). “For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake” (Acts 9:16). “He must suffer many things and be despised!” (Mark 9:11).
To which St. Paul adds: “If we suffer with Him, it is that we may be also glorified with Him” (Romans 8:17). “In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed; we are straitened, but are not destitute. We suffer persecution, but are not forsaken; we are cast down, but we perish not! … For that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, worketh for us above measure exceedingly an eternal weight of glory!” (1 Corinthians 4:8-9, 17). In other words, St. Paul says that whatever we suffer here below is only for a short time and is relatively light—compared to Purgatory—and it brings for us eternal glory while reducing our temporal punishment.
Thou Shalt Love!
“Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength” (Deuteronomy 6:4‑5). To refuse to love, is to disobey God. Thou shalt love—or else. The Crisis of Faith, in our thinking today, manifests itself as a Crisis of Love in our wills [hearts]. Not believing, we can’t love; not loving, we stop believing. All God’s lesser commandments depend on His command to love. To disobey it, disqualifies us for all other tests, whereas obeying it, automatically leads us to do everything God wants us to do, and to avoid everything He doesn’t want us to do. For, as St. Thomas Aquinas says, love is a union of wills.
God is Love
God Himself is Charity, He is Charity Itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). This charity God has shown to a world that has not deserved or merited it—it is not as though we had something first, that necessitated God to repay. “Who has first given to Him, and recompense shall be made him?” (Romans 11:35). In fact, the world, by its sins, was more deserving of punishment and damnation than it was deserving of God’s charity! Yet that did not extinguish the charity of God.
A New Heart
“But I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first charity!” (Apocalypse 2:4). “Justify not thyself before God, for He knows the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 7:5). “The imagination and thought of man’s heart are prone to evil from his youth” (Genesis 8:21). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “Be mindful therefore from whence thou art fallen, and do penance, and do the first works. Or else I shall come to thee, and will move thy candlestick out of its place, unless thou do penance!” (Apocalypse 2:4-5). “Return to the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy soul!” (Deuteronomy 30:10).”Not serving to the eye―as it were pleasing men―but, as, the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart!” (Ephesians 6:6). “Covet ye therefore My words, and love them, and you shall have instruction!” (Wisdom 6:12).
“Create a clean heart in me, O God, and renew a right spirit within my bowels” (Psalm 50:12). “And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 36:26). “God has softened my heart, and the Almighty hath troubled me!” (Job 23:16). “A contrite and humbled heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise!” (Psalm 50:19). “God gave unto him another heart” (1 Kings 10:9).
Let us take the words of God to heart! Let us beg Him to give us new heart! Let us admit that our present hearts are more often than not like stone, cold and hard! He who can change bread into His Flesh, can also change our hearts of stone into hearts of flesh. Ask, and you shall receive!
Spiritual Cardiac Arrest
We have all, more or less, become spiritual cardiac patients, our every move is conditioned by the dread possibility of imminent spiritual heart failure. Loving in the face of the malice that confronts us at every turn, is such uphill work, so great a strain, only the force and power of a divine command, driving us from behind, could keep us at it. Reason alone would tell us to relax. Lots of us have―and that hasn’t helped our environment, nor our spiritual life!
Once we lose that spark of love and become lukewarm, it can be very, very difficult to regain the former level of love. We must guard and feed our love of God just like the ancients would zealously guard and feed their fires. They knew how difficult it was to create that first spark that led to the fire being kindled, so they give their utmost attention and care to preserving the fire that cost so much effort in the first place.
Love is at the Heart of the Answer
The heart of our spiritual life is love. Love is and has to be the soul of all that we do. “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Therefore, once again: “Let all your things be done in charity!” (1 Corinthians 16:14) because “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) ― and we all have a multitude of sins that need covering!
Two Extremes
If there is one problem that hits and besieges most souls, it is their attitude to the mercy of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Some are very presumptuous in heart, thinking that they can sin as much as they want and forgiveness will be automatically given; others tend to lose heart, thinking themselves unworthy of His mercy.
Do You Love Me?
“Jesus said to Simon Peter: ‘Simon son of John, lovest thou Me more than these?’ Peter said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord! Thou knowest that I love Thee!’” (John 21:15). Do we love Him “more than these”—more than all these things and distractions that surround us in this world? If we wish to avoid Purgatory through our burning love, then it has to be a love that corresponds to what Our Lord and Holy Scripture commands and demands: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). Purgatory comes about because souls fail to keep and honor those basic commands and demands. They only love God half-heartedly and they love the world sometimes wholeheartedly!
Love is Tough!
It’s hard to love. These days it doesn’t seem to come naturally any more—if it ever did. One act of perfect love of God can wipe away all the guilt and debt of temporal punishment due to sin—no matter how much one has sinned! Yet that act of perfect love, though not impossible, is not easy. We love the persons, places and things of this world more than we love God—or at least our love for them is more vehement than is our love of God. As Our Lord warned us, towards the End Times, evil would be so rampant that charity would grow cold: “Because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). As the fires of charity grow colder, the fires of Purgatory are being stoked up to be hotter.
There Can Be No Love Without Penance
If we have done wrong to someone we love, then we must make reparation. This is almost an absolute prerequisite of love. The souls in Purgatory are there because they wanted to love God without doing enough reparation or penance for having previously offended Him. Our Lord Himself warned us: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” and Jesus repeats Himself two verses later: “I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). “Therefore, saith the Lord God, be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities, and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:30). “Hear, I beseech you, My words, and do penance!” (Job 21:2).
Our Lord complained, already in His own day, that too few were doing penance: “Woe to thee, Corozain, woe to thee, Bethsaida! For if in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the mighty works that have been wrought in you, then they would have done penance long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes!” (Luke 10:13). “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23).
St. John the Baptist, even before Jesus’ Public Ministry began, was preaching penance in the desert: “The word of the Lord was made unto John, the son of Zachary, in the desert. And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of penance for the remission of sins” (Luke 3:2-3).
Our Lord sent out His disciples to preach penance: “Jesus called the Twelve; and began to send them two and two and gave them power over unclean spirits … and He said to them: ‘Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear you; going forth from thence, shake off the dust from your feet for a testimony to them!’ And, going forth, they preached that men should do penance” (Mark 6:7-12). When the Apostles, despite being given power over devils, had failed to cast out a devil from a boy, they asked Our Lord why they had failed. He replied: “This kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting” ― in other words, prayer and penance (Matthew 17:20). This is why Our Lady, at Fatima, asks for the Rosary and sacrifices ― in other words, prayer and penance.
Let us take a cue the example quoted from Holy Scripture: “He prayed to the Lord his God and did penance exceedingly” (2 Paralipomenon 33:12). “Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes!” (Job 42:6).
What Is Love?
What does it mean to love to Jesus? The first level of love is to keep His commandments: “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). Fr. Tanquerey, in his renowned classic The Spiritual Life, writes:
Lowest Level of Love: “The chief care of beginners is that of preserving charity. Their efforts, then, are directed toward the avoidance of sin, above all, mortal sin, and toward the conquest of evil inclinations, of the passions, and of all that could make them lose the love of God. This is the purgative way, the end of which is the purification of the soul.
Middle Level of Love: “The chief concern of those already advanced, the proficients, is progress in the positive exercise of the virtues and growth in charity. The heart, already purified, is all the more open to divine light and to the love of God. The soul wishes to follow Jesus and to imitate His virtues, and since by following Him one walks in the Light, this is called the illuminative way. Here the soul strives to avoid not only mortal, but even venial sin.
Highest Level of Love: “Perfect souls have but one concern―which is to cling to God and to take their delight in Him. Ever seeking to unite themselves to God, they are in the unitive way. Sin fills them with horror, for they fear to displease God and to offend Him. The virtues that most attract them are the theological virtues, which unite them to God. Hence, the Earth seems to them an exile, and, like St. Paul, they long to die, so as to be joined to Christ.” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §§ 341-343).
“And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26). “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of Thy love!” So that “charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
Article 10
Sunday, November 17th
Back to Purgatory!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, November 17th
Back to Purgatory!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Price of Sin: Heaven’s Estimation and Our Estimation
As God tells us through His prophet Isaias: “My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9). We could well transpose and paraphrase that into: “My idea of the gravity of sin is not your idea of the gravity of sin: nor is your estimation of the price of sin the same as My estimation of the price of sin, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so is my idea of its gravity exalted above your idea of its gravity, and My price for sin above your price for sin.”
Sin has to be extremely grave and pricey—even Venial Sin. This is seen from Divine Public Revelation in the form of Holy Scripture, and is seconded by what we know through Divine Private Revelation over the course of the centuries—which has been given by God to various saints and mystics.
The Price According to Scripture
In the very beginning of Holy Scripture, in the book of Genesis, we see God place a grave consequence on sin, when He tells Adam what will happen if Adam disobeys Him and eats of the ‘forbidden fruit’: “For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!” (Genesis 2:17). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Sin was (and is) so grave, that each man would go to his grave because of the one single sin of Adam. St. Paul writes: “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12).
Furthermore, God made an eternal, never-ending Hell the punishment for even one single, short-lived, temporary, brief, unconfessed and unrepented Mortal Sin—that is terrifyingly striking and underlines the gravity of sin. Our Lord tells us that perhaps most souls are lost and sent to this awful place: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’ … ‘Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. [14] How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!’ “ (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14). Many lost for ETERNITY! Burning in Hell for ETERNITY! Why? Because of sin!
The Price According to the Catechism
It is not for nothing that the Catechism calls sin the greatest evil in the world! “Mortal Sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, and a greater evil than disease, or war ... Mortal Sin must be a most terrible thing indeed, to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the eternal punishment of sinners who die with even only one Mortal Sin” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 22, “Mortal Sin”).
As for Venial Sin, the same catechism says: “Although Venial Sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is, nevertheless, a great moral evil, next alone to Mortal Sin. We are prone to look upon Venial Sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that IT IS SECOND ONLY IN EVIL CONSEQUENCE TO MORTAL SIN. In Holy Scripture we see, from many examples, how God regards Venial Sin. Even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished. He was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land [and died at its borders]” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 23, “Venial Sin”).
The Price According to the Private Revelations of Our Lady
“You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go ... Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them” (Our Lady of Fatima). Speaking of our times, she says that “There will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost” (Our Lady of Good Success). “Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls” (Our Lady of La Salette).
In our folly, we ignore the only antidote to the gravity, poison and consequence of sin: “See and contemplate the grandeur of this restoring and life-giving Sacrament of Penance, so forgotten and even scorned by ungrateful men, who in their foolish madness, do not realize that it is the only sure means of salvation after one has lost his baptismal innocence. What is most grievious is that even the ministers of My Most Holy Son do not give to it the value that they should, viewing with cold indifference this valuable and precious treasure, which has been placed in their hands for the restoration of souls redeemed by the Blood of the Redeemer. There are those who consider hearing confession as a loss of time and a futile thing” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Purgatory is Pretty Pricey Too!
We might think that Hell is expensive destination for an eternal vacation, but Purgatory, even though it offers shorter stays, is very pricey too! When we think of what we call dismissively—“Oh, it’s only a Venial Sin! I won’t go to Hell for that!”—we forget that Purgatory, in some respects, is like Hell, though not permanent! That’s a pretty pricey price to pay for a paltry ‘little’ sin—though that is only our estimation of sin, not God’s.
Expensive Trivia
In the book, The Life of St. Louis Bertrand, of the Order of St. Dominic, written Fr. Antist, a Religious of the same Order, and who personally lived with the saint, we read that in the year 1557, whilst St. Louis Bertrand resided at the convent of Valentia, a plague broke out in that city. The terrible plague spread rapidly, threatening to wipe out its inhabitants, and each one feared for his life. A Religious of the community, wishing to prepare himself fervently for death, made a general confession of his whole life to the saint; and on leaving him said, “Father, if it should now please God to call me, I shall return and make known to you my condition in the other life.”
He died a short time afterwards, and the following night he appeared to the saint. He told him that he was detained in Purgatory on account of a few slight faults which remained to be expiated, and begged the saint to recommend him to the community. St. Louis communicated the request immediately to the Prior, who hastened to recommend the soul of the departed to the prayers and Holy Sacrifices of the brethren assembled in chapter. Six days later, a man of the town, who knew nothing of what had passed at the convent, came to make his confession to Father Louis, and told him “that the soul of Father Clement had appeared to him. He saw, he said, the Earth open, and the soul of the deceased Father come forth all glorious; it resembled, he added, a resplendent star, which rose through the air towards Heaven.”
Working-Out the Price of Purgatory
According to the common opinion of the doctors, the expiatory pains are of long duration. “There is no doubt,” says St. Robert Bellarmine (De Gemitu, lib. 2, c. 9), “that the pains of Purgatory are not limited to ten or twenty years, and that they last in some cases entire centuries. But allowing it to be true that their duration did not exceed ten or twenty years, can we account it as nothing to have to endure for ten or twenty years the most excruciating sufferings without the least alleviation? If a man was assured that he should suffer some violent pain in his feet, or his head, or teeth for the space of twenty years, and that without ever sleeping or taking the least repose, would he not a thousand times rather die than live in such a state? And if the choice were given to him between a life thus miserable and the loss of all his temporal goods, would he hesitate to make the sacrifice of his fortune to be delivered from such a torment? Shall we then find any difficulty in embracing labor and penance to free ourselves from the sufferings of Purgatory? Shall we fear to practice the most painful exercises: vigils, fasts, almsgiving, long prayers, and especially contrition, accompanied with sighs and tears?” (St. Robert Bellarmine). These words comprise the whole doctrine of the saints and theologians.
The Math of Sin
Father Mumford, of the Company of Jesus, in his “Treatise on Charity towards the Departed,” bases the long duration of Purgatory on a calculation of probability, which we shall give in substance. He goes out on the principle that, according to the words of the Holy Ghost, “The just man falls seven times a day” (Prov. 24:16), that is to say, that even those who apply themselves most perfectly to the service of God, notwithstanding their good-will, commit a great number of faults in the infinitely pure eyes of God. We have but to enter into our own conscience, and there analyze before God our thoughts, our words, and works, to be convinced of this sad effect of human misery—we might even be capable of committing sin “seven times a minute” on a bad day, never mind “seven times a day”. Oh, how easy it is to lack respect in prayer, to prefer our ease to the accomplishment of duty, to sin by vanity, by impatience, by sensuality, by uncharitable thoughts and words, by want of conformity to the will of God! The day is long; is it very difficult for even a virtuous person to commit, I do not say seven, but twenty or thirty of this kind of faults and imperfections?
Let us take a moderate estimate, and suppose that you commit about ten faults a day; at the end of 365 days you will have a sum of 3,650 faults. Let us diminish, and, to facilitate the calculation, place it at 3,000 per year. At the end of ten years this will amount to 30,000 faults, and at the end of twenty years to 60,000. Suppose that of these 60,000 faults you have expiated one half by penance and good works, there will still remain 30,000 to be atoned for.
Let us continue our hypothesis: You die after these twenty years of virtuous life, and appear before God with a debt of 30,000 faults, which you must discharge in Purgatory. How much time will you need to accomplish this expiation? Suppose, on an average, each fault requires one hour of Purgatory. This measure is very moderate, if we judge by the revelations of the saints; but at any rate this will give you a Purgatory of 30,000 hours. Now, do you know how many years these 30,000 hours represent? Three years, three months, and fifteen days. Thus a good Christian who watches over himself, who applies himself to penance and good works, finds himself liable to three years, three months, and fifteen days of Purgatory.
A Low-End Estimate Only
The preceding calculation is based on an estimate which is lenient in the extreme. Now, if you extend the duration of the pain, and, instead of an hour, you take a day for the expiation of a fault, if, instead of having nothing but venial sins, you bring before God a debt resulting from mortal sins, more or less numerous, which you formerly committed, if you assign, on the average, as St. Frances of Rome says, seven years for the expiation of one mortal sin, remitted as to the guilt, who does not see that we arrive at an appalling duration, and that the expiation may easily be prolonged for many years, and even for centuries?
Years and centuries in torments! Oh! if we only thought of it, with what care should we not avoid the least faults! with what fervor should we not practice penance to make satisfaction in this world!
First Class, Business Class and Coach
Our flight to Heaven, on the plane of Purgatory, has three classes of seats: First Class, Business Class and Coach. It has pleased God to show, in spirit, the gloomy abodes of Purgatory to some privileged souls, who were then told to reveal these sorrowful mysteries for the benefit of faithful. One of this number was St. Frances of Rome, foundress of the Oblates, who died in Rome in 1440. God favored her with great lights concerning the state of souls in the other life. She saw Hell and its horrible torments; she saw also the interior of Purgatory, and the mysterious order or hierarchy that exists there.
Purgatory, she said, is divided into three distinct parts, which are like three large provinces of that kingdom of suffering. They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different orders. These souls are buried more deeply in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance.
The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but have not sufficiently expiated during life. The servant of God then learned that, for all forgiven mortal sin, there remains to be undergone a suffering of seven years. This term cannot evidently be taken to mean a definite measure, since mortal sins differ in enormity, but as an average penalty. Although the souls are enveloped in the same flames, their sufferings are not the same; they differ according to the number and nature of their former sins.
In this lower Purgatory the saint beheld clergy and the religious consecrated to God. The clergy were those who, after a life of sin, had had the happiness of being sincerely converted; the religious, consecrated to God, were those who had not lived according to the sanctity of their state. At that same moment she saw descend the soul of a priest whom she knew, but whose name she does not reveal. She remarked that he had his face covered with a veil which concealed a stain. Although he had led an edifying life, this priest had not always observed strict temperance, and had sought too eagerly the satisfactions of the table.
The saint was then conducted into the intermediate Purgatory, destined for souls which had deserved less rigorous chastisement. It had three distinct compartments; one resembled an immense dungeon of ice, the cold of which was indescribably intense; the second, on the contrary, was like a huge caldron of boiling oil and pitch; the third had the appearance of a pond of liquid metal resembling molten gold or silver.
The upper Purgatory, which the saint does not describe, is the temporary abode of souls which suffer little, except the pain of loss, and approach the happy moment of their deliverance.
This, in essence, was the vision of St. Frances saw of Purgatory.
The Supermarket of Sin is Expensive
So, hopefully, we have a more objective and realistic idea of the price of sin—rather than the one the devil would like us to have, in order to order more items from his Supermarket of Sin. More objective than our own wishful fancies, based upon an exaggeration of the mercy of God, which has removed all notions of His justice. Our ideas have to be clear and true, otherwise our actions will not be correct and virtuous. Of course, the devil will step-in with his trump card of discouragement—which does the opposite of what we mentioned above, and focuses solely on God’s justice with not the slightest mention or hope of mercy. This is equally false as focusing on His mercy without any thought to His justice. The first thing we have to get straight in our minds is the gravity of sin, and awfulness of offending God. Unless we do that, we will never change and will be lucky to eventually scrape into Purgatory!
As Holy Scripture says: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18)—but at what price? Below, you will find some extracts from Fr. Schouppe’s classic work, Purgatory Explained.
Fires of Hell, but Focused on Heaven
“The word ‘Purgatory’ is sometimes taken to mean a place, sometimes as an intermediate state, between Hell and Heaven. It is, properly speaking, the condition of souls which, at the moment of death, are in the state of grace, but which have not completely expiated their faults, nor “attained the degree of purity necessary to enjoy the vision of God” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Passions Were Satisfied; Justice Must Be Satisfied
“Purgatory is, then, a transitory state which terminates in a life of everlasting happiness. It is not a trial by which merit may be gained or lost, but a state of atonement and expiation. The soul has arrived at the term of its earthly career; that life was a time of trial, a time of merit for the soul, a time of mercy on the part of God. This time once expired, nothing but justice is to be expected from God, whilst the soul can neither gain nor lose merit. She remains in the state in which death found her; and since it found her in the state of sanctifying grace, she is certain of never forfeiting that happy state, and of arriving at the eternal possession of God. Nevertheless, since she is burdened with certain debts of temporal punishment, she must satisfy Divine Justice by enduring this punishment in all its rigor” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Lovers of Earth Banished to Earth
“Although Faith tells us nothing definite regarding the location of Purgatory, the most common opinion, that which most accords with the language of Scripture, and which is the most generally received among theologians, places it in the bowels of the Earth, not far from the Hell of the reprobates. Theologians are almost unanimous, says Bellarmine, in teaching that Purgatory, at least the ordinary place of expiation, is situated in the interior of the Earth, that the souls in Purgatory and the reprobate are in the same subterranean space in the deep abyss which the Scripture calls Hell. (Roman Cathechism, chapter 6, §1)” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Different Kinds of Hell
“When we say in the Apostles Creed that after His death “Jesus Christ descended into Hell,” the name Hell, says the Catechism of the Council of Trent, signifies those hidden places where the souls are detained which have not yet reached eternal beatitude. But these prisons are of different kinds. One is a dark and gloomy dungeon, where the damned are continually tormented by evil spirits, and by a fire which is never extinguished. This place, which is Hell properly so called, is also named Gehenna and abyss” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“There is another Hell, which contains the fire of Purgatory. There the souls of the just suffer for a certain time, that they may become entirely purified before being admitted into their heavenly fatherland, where nothing defiled can ever enter” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“A third Hell was that into which the souls of the saints who died before the coming of Jesus Christ were received, and in which they enjoyed peaceful repose, exempt from pain, consoled and sustained by the hope of their redemption. They were those holy souls which awaited Jesus Christ in Abraham s bosom, and which were delivered when Christ descended into Hell. Our Savior suddenly diffused among them a brilliant light, which filled them with infinite joy, and gave them sovereign beatitude, which is the vision of God. Then was fulfilled the promise of Jesus to the good thief: This day thou shalt be with me in Paradise” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“A very probable opinion,” says St. Thomas, “and one which, moreover, corresponds with the words of the saints in particular revelation is, that Purgatory has a double place for expiation. The first will be destined for the generality of souls, and is situated below, near to Hell; the second will be for particular cases, and it is from thence that so many apparitions occur.” (Summa Theologica, Suppl., part. 3, ques. ult.).” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“The holy Doctor admits, then, like so many others who share his opinions, that sometimes Divine Justice assigns a special place of purification to certain souls, and even permits them to appear either to instruct the living or to procure for the departed the suffrages of which they stand in need; sometimes also for other motives worthy of the wisdom and mercy of God” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Fitting Fires of Hell
“Such is the general view concerning the location of Purgatory. Since we are not writing a controversial treatise, we add neither proofs nor refutations; these can be seen in authors such as Suarez and Bellarmine. We will content ourselves by remarking that the opinion concerning a subterranean Hell has nothing to fear from modern science. A science purely natural is incompetent in questions which belong, as does this one, to the supernatural order. Moreover, we know that spirits may be in a place occupied by bodies, as though these bodies did not exist. Whatever, then, the interior of the Earth may be, whether it be entirely of fire, as geologists commonly say, or whether it be in any other state, there is nothing to prevent its serving as a sojourn of spirits, even of spirits clothed with a risen body. The Apostle, St. Paul teaches us that the air is filled with a multitude of evil spirits: We have to combat, says he, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places (Ephesians 6:12).” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“On the other hand, we know that the good angels who protect us are no less numerous in the world. Now, if angels and other spirits can inhabit our atmosphere, whilst the physical world is not in the least degree changed, why cannot the souls of the dead dwell in the bosom of the Earth?” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Fear and Confidence
“In order to be perfect, devotion, to the souls in Purgatory must be animated both by a spirit of fear and a spirit of confidence. On the one hand, the Sanctity of God and His Justice inspires us with a salutary fear; on the other, His infinite Mercy gives us boundless confidence” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Do You Realize the Holiness of God?
“God is Sanctity itself, much more so than the sun is light, and no shadow of sin can endure before His face. ‘Thine eyes are pure,’ says the prophet, ‘and thou canst not look on iniquity’ (Habacuc 1:13). When iniquity manifests itself in creatures, the Sanctity of God exacts expiation, and when this expiation is made in all the rigor of justice, it is terrible. It is for this reason that the Scripture says again, ‘Holy and terrible is His name’ (Ps. 110:7); as though it would say, His Justice is terrible because His Sanctity is infinite” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
The Tiniest Sin is Greatly Displeasing
“The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended, the demands enormous atonement. This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Purpose to the Pain
“This fear of Purgatory is a salutary fear; its effect is, not only to animate us with a charitable compassion towards the poor suffering souls, but also with a vigilant zeal for our own spiritual welfare. Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Fear, but with Confidence
“Let us, however, guard against excessive fear, and not lose confidence. Let us not forget the Mercy of God, which is not less infinite than His Justice. ‘Thy mercy, Lord, is great above the Heavens’, says the prophet (Psalm 107:5); and elsewhere, ‘The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient, and plenteous in mercy’ (Psalm 144:8). This ineffable mercy should calm the most lively apprehensions, and fill us with a holy confidence, according to the words, ‘In Thee, O Lord, I have hoped; let me never be put to confusion’ (Psalm 70:1)” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“If we are animated with this double sentiment, if our confidence in God s Mercy is equal to the fear with which
His Justice inspires us, we shall have the true spirit of devotion to the souls in Purgatory. This double sentiment springs naturally from the dogma of Purgatory rightly understood a dogma which contains the double mystery of Justice and Mercy: of Justice which punishes, of Mercy which pardons. It is from this double point of view that we are about to consider Purgatory and illustrate its doctrine” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
As God tells us through His prophet Isaias: “My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9). We could well transpose and paraphrase that into: “My idea of the gravity of sin is not your idea of the gravity of sin: nor is your estimation of the price of sin the same as My estimation of the price of sin, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so is my idea of its gravity exalted above your idea of its gravity, and My price for sin above your price for sin.”
Sin has to be extremely grave and pricey—even Venial Sin. This is seen from Divine Public Revelation in the form of Holy Scripture, and is seconded by what we know through Divine Private Revelation over the course of the centuries—which has been given by God to various saints and mystics.
The Price According to Scripture
In the very beginning of Holy Scripture, in the book of Genesis, we see God place a grave consequence on sin, when He tells Adam what will happen if Adam disobeys Him and eats of the ‘forbidden fruit’: “For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!” (Genesis 2:17). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Sin was (and is) so grave, that each man would go to his grave because of the one single sin of Adam. St. Paul writes: “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12).
Furthermore, God made an eternal, never-ending Hell the punishment for even one single, short-lived, temporary, brief, unconfessed and unrepented Mortal Sin—that is terrifyingly striking and underlines the gravity of sin. Our Lord tells us that perhaps most souls are lost and sent to this awful place: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’ … ‘Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. [14] How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!’ “ (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14). Many lost for ETERNITY! Burning in Hell for ETERNITY! Why? Because of sin!
The Price According to the Catechism
It is not for nothing that the Catechism calls sin the greatest evil in the world! “Mortal Sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, and a greater evil than disease, or war ... Mortal Sin must be a most terrible thing indeed, to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the eternal punishment of sinners who die with even only one Mortal Sin” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 22, “Mortal Sin”).
As for Venial Sin, the same catechism says: “Although Venial Sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is, nevertheless, a great moral evil, next alone to Mortal Sin. We are prone to look upon Venial Sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that IT IS SECOND ONLY IN EVIL CONSEQUENCE TO MORTAL SIN. In Holy Scripture we see, from many examples, how God regards Venial Sin. Even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished. He was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land [and died at its borders]” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 23, “Venial Sin”).
The Price According to the Private Revelations of Our Lady
“You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go ... Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them” (Our Lady of Fatima). Speaking of our times, she says that “There will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost” (Our Lady of Good Success). “Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls” (Our Lady of La Salette).
In our folly, we ignore the only antidote to the gravity, poison and consequence of sin: “See and contemplate the grandeur of this restoring and life-giving Sacrament of Penance, so forgotten and even scorned by ungrateful men, who in their foolish madness, do not realize that it is the only sure means of salvation after one has lost his baptismal innocence. What is most grievious is that even the ministers of My Most Holy Son do not give to it the value that they should, viewing with cold indifference this valuable and precious treasure, which has been placed in their hands for the restoration of souls redeemed by the Blood of the Redeemer. There are those who consider hearing confession as a loss of time and a futile thing” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Purgatory is Pretty Pricey Too!
We might think that Hell is expensive destination for an eternal vacation, but Purgatory, even though it offers shorter stays, is very pricey too! When we think of what we call dismissively—“Oh, it’s only a Venial Sin! I won’t go to Hell for that!”—we forget that Purgatory, in some respects, is like Hell, though not permanent! That’s a pretty pricey price to pay for a paltry ‘little’ sin—though that is only our estimation of sin, not God’s.
Expensive Trivia
In the book, The Life of St. Louis Bertrand, of the Order of St. Dominic, written Fr. Antist, a Religious of the same Order, and who personally lived with the saint, we read that in the year 1557, whilst St. Louis Bertrand resided at the convent of Valentia, a plague broke out in that city. The terrible plague spread rapidly, threatening to wipe out its inhabitants, and each one feared for his life. A Religious of the community, wishing to prepare himself fervently for death, made a general confession of his whole life to the saint; and on leaving him said, “Father, if it should now please God to call me, I shall return and make known to you my condition in the other life.”
He died a short time afterwards, and the following night he appeared to the saint. He told him that he was detained in Purgatory on account of a few slight faults which remained to be expiated, and begged the saint to recommend him to the community. St. Louis communicated the request immediately to the Prior, who hastened to recommend the soul of the departed to the prayers and Holy Sacrifices of the brethren assembled in chapter. Six days later, a man of the town, who knew nothing of what had passed at the convent, came to make his confession to Father Louis, and told him “that the soul of Father Clement had appeared to him. He saw, he said, the Earth open, and the soul of the deceased Father come forth all glorious; it resembled, he added, a resplendent star, which rose through the air towards Heaven.”
Working-Out the Price of Purgatory
According to the common opinion of the doctors, the expiatory pains are of long duration. “There is no doubt,” says St. Robert Bellarmine (De Gemitu, lib. 2, c. 9), “that the pains of Purgatory are not limited to ten or twenty years, and that they last in some cases entire centuries. But allowing it to be true that their duration did not exceed ten or twenty years, can we account it as nothing to have to endure for ten or twenty years the most excruciating sufferings without the least alleviation? If a man was assured that he should suffer some violent pain in his feet, or his head, or teeth for the space of twenty years, and that without ever sleeping or taking the least repose, would he not a thousand times rather die than live in such a state? And if the choice were given to him between a life thus miserable and the loss of all his temporal goods, would he hesitate to make the sacrifice of his fortune to be delivered from such a torment? Shall we then find any difficulty in embracing labor and penance to free ourselves from the sufferings of Purgatory? Shall we fear to practice the most painful exercises: vigils, fasts, almsgiving, long prayers, and especially contrition, accompanied with sighs and tears?” (St. Robert Bellarmine). These words comprise the whole doctrine of the saints and theologians.
The Math of Sin
Father Mumford, of the Company of Jesus, in his “Treatise on Charity towards the Departed,” bases the long duration of Purgatory on a calculation of probability, which we shall give in substance. He goes out on the principle that, according to the words of the Holy Ghost, “The just man falls seven times a day” (Prov. 24:16), that is to say, that even those who apply themselves most perfectly to the service of God, notwithstanding their good-will, commit a great number of faults in the infinitely pure eyes of God. We have but to enter into our own conscience, and there analyze before God our thoughts, our words, and works, to be convinced of this sad effect of human misery—we might even be capable of committing sin “seven times a minute” on a bad day, never mind “seven times a day”. Oh, how easy it is to lack respect in prayer, to prefer our ease to the accomplishment of duty, to sin by vanity, by impatience, by sensuality, by uncharitable thoughts and words, by want of conformity to the will of God! The day is long; is it very difficult for even a virtuous person to commit, I do not say seven, but twenty or thirty of this kind of faults and imperfections?
Let us take a moderate estimate, and suppose that you commit about ten faults a day; at the end of 365 days you will have a sum of 3,650 faults. Let us diminish, and, to facilitate the calculation, place it at 3,000 per year. At the end of ten years this will amount to 30,000 faults, and at the end of twenty years to 60,000. Suppose that of these 60,000 faults you have expiated one half by penance and good works, there will still remain 30,000 to be atoned for.
Let us continue our hypothesis: You die after these twenty years of virtuous life, and appear before God with a debt of 30,000 faults, which you must discharge in Purgatory. How much time will you need to accomplish this expiation? Suppose, on an average, each fault requires one hour of Purgatory. This measure is very moderate, if we judge by the revelations of the saints; but at any rate this will give you a Purgatory of 30,000 hours. Now, do you know how many years these 30,000 hours represent? Three years, three months, and fifteen days. Thus a good Christian who watches over himself, who applies himself to penance and good works, finds himself liable to three years, three months, and fifteen days of Purgatory.
A Low-End Estimate Only
The preceding calculation is based on an estimate which is lenient in the extreme. Now, if you extend the duration of the pain, and, instead of an hour, you take a day for the expiation of a fault, if, instead of having nothing but venial sins, you bring before God a debt resulting from mortal sins, more or less numerous, which you formerly committed, if you assign, on the average, as St. Frances of Rome says, seven years for the expiation of one mortal sin, remitted as to the guilt, who does not see that we arrive at an appalling duration, and that the expiation may easily be prolonged for many years, and even for centuries?
Years and centuries in torments! Oh! if we only thought of it, with what care should we not avoid the least faults! with what fervor should we not practice penance to make satisfaction in this world!
First Class, Business Class and Coach
Our flight to Heaven, on the plane of Purgatory, has three classes of seats: First Class, Business Class and Coach. It has pleased God to show, in spirit, the gloomy abodes of Purgatory to some privileged souls, who were then told to reveal these sorrowful mysteries for the benefit of faithful. One of this number was St. Frances of Rome, foundress of the Oblates, who died in Rome in 1440. God favored her with great lights concerning the state of souls in the other life. She saw Hell and its horrible torments; she saw also the interior of Purgatory, and the mysterious order or hierarchy that exists there.
Purgatory, she said, is divided into three distinct parts, which are like three large provinces of that kingdom of suffering. They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different orders. These souls are buried more deeply in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance.
The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but have not sufficiently expiated during life. The servant of God then learned that, for all forgiven mortal sin, there remains to be undergone a suffering of seven years. This term cannot evidently be taken to mean a definite measure, since mortal sins differ in enormity, but as an average penalty. Although the souls are enveloped in the same flames, their sufferings are not the same; they differ according to the number and nature of their former sins.
In this lower Purgatory the saint beheld clergy and the religious consecrated to God. The clergy were those who, after a life of sin, had had the happiness of being sincerely converted; the religious, consecrated to God, were those who had not lived according to the sanctity of their state. At that same moment she saw descend the soul of a priest whom she knew, but whose name she does not reveal. She remarked that he had his face covered with a veil which concealed a stain. Although he had led an edifying life, this priest had not always observed strict temperance, and had sought too eagerly the satisfactions of the table.
The saint was then conducted into the intermediate Purgatory, destined for souls which had deserved less rigorous chastisement. It had three distinct compartments; one resembled an immense dungeon of ice, the cold of which was indescribably intense; the second, on the contrary, was like a huge caldron of boiling oil and pitch; the third had the appearance of a pond of liquid metal resembling molten gold or silver.
The upper Purgatory, which the saint does not describe, is the temporary abode of souls which suffer little, except the pain of loss, and approach the happy moment of their deliverance.
This, in essence, was the vision of St. Frances saw of Purgatory.
The Supermarket of Sin is Expensive
So, hopefully, we have a more objective and realistic idea of the price of sin—rather than the one the devil would like us to have, in order to order more items from his Supermarket of Sin. More objective than our own wishful fancies, based upon an exaggeration of the mercy of God, which has removed all notions of His justice. Our ideas have to be clear and true, otherwise our actions will not be correct and virtuous. Of course, the devil will step-in with his trump card of discouragement—which does the opposite of what we mentioned above, and focuses solely on God’s justice with not the slightest mention or hope of mercy. This is equally false as focusing on His mercy without any thought to His justice. The first thing we have to get straight in our minds is the gravity of sin, and awfulness of offending God. Unless we do that, we will never change and will be lucky to eventually scrape into Purgatory!
As Holy Scripture says: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18)—but at what price? Below, you will find some extracts from Fr. Schouppe’s classic work, Purgatory Explained.
Fires of Hell, but Focused on Heaven
“The word ‘Purgatory’ is sometimes taken to mean a place, sometimes as an intermediate state, between Hell and Heaven. It is, properly speaking, the condition of souls which, at the moment of death, are in the state of grace, but which have not completely expiated their faults, nor “attained the degree of purity necessary to enjoy the vision of God” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Passions Were Satisfied; Justice Must Be Satisfied
“Purgatory is, then, a transitory state which terminates in a life of everlasting happiness. It is not a trial by which merit may be gained or lost, but a state of atonement and expiation. The soul has arrived at the term of its earthly career; that life was a time of trial, a time of merit for the soul, a time of mercy on the part of God. This time once expired, nothing but justice is to be expected from God, whilst the soul can neither gain nor lose merit. She remains in the state in which death found her; and since it found her in the state of sanctifying grace, she is certain of never forfeiting that happy state, and of arriving at the eternal possession of God. Nevertheless, since she is burdened with certain debts of temporal punishment, she must satisfy Divine Justice by enduring this punishment in all its rigor” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Lovers of Earth Banished to Earth
“Although Faith tells us nothing definite regarding the location of Purgatory, the most common opinion, that which most accords with the language of Scripture, and which is the most generally received among theologians, places it in the bowels of the Earth, not far from the Hell of the reprobates. Theologians are almost unanimous, says Bellarmine, in teaching that Purgatory, at least the ordinary place of expiation, is situated in the interior of the Earth, that the souls in Purgatory and the reprobate are in the same subterranean space in the deep abyss which the Scripture calls Hell. (Roman Cathechism, chapter 6, §1)” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Different Kinds of Hell
“When we say in the Apostles Creed that after His death “Jesus Christ descended into Hell,” the name Hell, says the Catechism of the Council of Trent, signifies those hidden places where the souls are detained which have not yet reached eternal beatitude. But these prisons are of different kinds. One is a dark and gloomy dungeon, where the damned are continually tormented by evil spirits, and by a fire which is never extinguished. This place, which is Hell properly so called, is also named Gehenna and abyss” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“There is another Hell, which contains the fire of Purgatory. There the souls of the just suffer for a certain time, that they may become entirely purified before being admitted into their heavenly fatherland, where nothing defiled can ever enter” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“A third Hell was that into which the souls of the saints who died before the coming of Jesus Christ were received, and in which they enjoyed peaceful repose, exempt from pain, consoled and sustained by the hope of their redemption. They were those holy souls which awaited Jesus Christ in Abraham s bosom, and which were delivered when Christ descended into Hell. Our Savior suddenly diffused among them a brilliant light, which filled them with infinite joy, and gave them sovereign beatitude, which is the vision of God. Then was fulfilled the promise of Jesus to the good thief: This day thou shalt be with me in Paradise” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“A very probable opinion,” says St. Thomas, “and one which, moreover, corresponds with the words of the saints in particular revelation is, that Purgatory has a double place for expiation. The first will be destined for the generality of souls, and is situated below, near to Hell; the second will be for particular cases, and it is from thence that so many apparitions occur.” (Summa Theologica, Suppl., part. 3, ques. ult.).” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“The holy Doctor admits, then, like so many others who share his opinions, that sometimes Divine Justice assigns a special place of purification to certain souls, and even permits them to appear either to instruct the living or to procure for the departed the suffrages of which they stand in need; sometimes also for other motives worthy of the wisdom and mercy of God” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Fitting Fires of Hell
“Such is the general view concerning the location of Purgatory. Since we are not writing a controversial treatise, we add neither proofs nor refutations; these can be seen in authors such as Suarez and Bellarmine. We will content ourselves by remarking that the opinion concerning a subterranean Hell has nothing to fear from modern science. A science purely natural is incompetent in questions which belong, as does this one, to the supernatural order. Moreover, we know that spirits may be in a place occupied by bodies, as though these bodies did not exist. Whatever, then, the interior of the Earth may be, whether it be entirely of fire, as geologists commonly say, or whether it be in any other state, there is nothing to prevent its serving as a sojourn of spirits, even of spirits clothed with a risen body. The Apostle, St. Paul teaches us that the air is filled with a multitude of evil spirits: We have to combat, says he, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places (Ephesians 6:12).” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“On the other hand, we know that the good angels who protect us are no less numerous in the world. Now, if angels and other spirits can inhabit our atmosphere, whilst the physical world is not in the least degree changed, why cannot the souls of the dead dwell in the bosom of the Earth?” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Fear and Confidence
“In order to be perfect, devotion, to the souls in Purgatory must be animated both by a spirit of fear and a spirit of confidence. On the one hand, the Sanctity of God and His Justice inspires us with a salutary fear; on the other, His infinite Mercy gives us boundless confidence” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Do You Realize the Holiness of God?
“God is Sanctity itself, much more so than the sun is light, and no shadow of sin can endure before His face. ‘Thine eyes are pure,’ says the prophet, ‘and thou canst not look on iniquity’ (Habacuc 1:13). When iniquity manifests itself in creatures, the Sanctity of God exacts expiation, and when this expiation is made in all the rigor of justice, it is terrible. It is for this reason that the Scripture says again, ‘Holy and terrible is His name’ (Ps. 110:7); as though it would say, His Justice is terrible because His Sanctity is infinite” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
The Tiniest Sin is Greatly Displeasing
“The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended, the demands enormous atonement. This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Purpose to the Pain
“This fear of Purgatory is a salutary fear; its effect is, not only to animate us with a charitable compassion towards the poor suffering souls, but also with a vigilant zeal for our own spiritual welfare. Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Fear, but with Confidence
“Let us, however, guard against excessive fear, and not lose confidence. Let us not forget the Mercy of God, which is not less infinite than His Justice. ‘Thy mercy, Lord, is great above the Heavens’, says the prophet (Psalm 107:5); and elsewhere, ‘The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient, and plenteous in mercy’ (Psalm 144:8). This ineffable mercy should calm the most lively apprehensions, and fill us with a holy confidence, according to the words, ‘In Thee, O Lord, I have hoped; let me never be put to confusion’ (Psalm 70:1)” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
“If we are animated with this double sentiment, if our confidence in God s Mercy is equal to the fear with which
His Justice inspires us, we shall have the true spirit of devotion to the souls in Purgatory. This double sentiment springs naturally from the dogma of Purgatory rightly understood a dogma which contains the double mystery of Justice and Mercy: of Justice which punishes, of Mercy which pardons. It is from this double point of view that we are about to consider Purgatory and illustrate its doctrine” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Article 9
Friday & Saturday, November 15th & 16th
The Church Cannot Be Destroyed―But We Can
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Friday & Saturday, November 15th & 16th
The Church Cannot Be Destroyed―But We Can
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Solid as a Rock
Our Lord promised that His Church would not be destroyed when He said to St. Peter: “Thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it!” (Matthew 16:18). To Peter, Our Lord further said: “Simon, behold Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat―but I have prayed for thee, that thy Faith fail not!” (Luke 22:31-32). This means that His Church will never be destroyed and will never fall away from Him. His Church will survive until His return. When Our Lord commanded the Apostles to go into the whole world, teaching all nations and baptizing all persons (Matthew 28:19-20), He added: “I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world!” (Matthew 28:20). Thus Christ further guarantees the existence of His Church until the end of the world. This was also indicated in the Old Testament prophecy of Christ: “The Son of man came with the clouds of Heaven, and they presented Him … a kingdom … and His kingdom that shall not be destroyed” (Daniel 7:13-14). The Archangel Gabriel indicated the same thing to Our Lady at the Annunciation: “…of His kingdom there shall be no end” (Luke 1:33).
Christ Did Not Promise …
When Our Lord promised that “the gates of Hell shall not prevail against” His Church and that its “Faith fail not”―He was not guaranteeing to protect each and every member unconditionally and to unconditionally guarantee that nobody’s Faith would be lost. There are conditions that we must adhere to if we wish to obtain that guarantee. For Our Lord also warned that “wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! … Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:13; 7:21) ― adding that “many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14) and “the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness, where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30). Speaking of those who would not meet the conditions required by Christ for salvation, He says: “The children of the kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness, where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 8:12).
Our Lord did not promise that His Church would be free from tribulations, persecutions and sufferings. On the contrary, He said: “If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you!” (John 15:20). “They shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake!” (Matthew 5:11). “They will lay their hands upon you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors, for My Name’s sake!” (Luke 21:12). “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death, and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake! … But he that shall persevere [in the Faith] to the end―he shall be saved!” (Matthew 24:9-13). “All that have pleased God, passed through many tribulations, remaining faithful” (Judith 8:23). “Who then shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation? Or distress? Or famine? Or danger? Or persecution? Or the sword?” (Romans 8:35).
Burying the Talent of Faith
The danger and common mistake of most Catholics is that they “bury” their Faith―like the man in Our Lord’s parable on the talents. “A man going into a far country, called his servants, and delivered to them his goods. To one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―to everyone according to his proper ability―and then immediately he took his journey. And he that had received the five talents, went his way, and traded with the same, and gained another five. And in like manner he that had received the two, gained another two. But he that had received the one, going his way dug a hole into the earth and hid his lord’s money. But after a long time, the lord of those servants came, and reckoned with them. And he that had received the five talents, brought the other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you delivered to me five talents, behold I have gained another five over and above!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place you over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’ And he also, that had received the two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you delivered two talents to me! Behold, I have gained another two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’ But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man―you reap where you have not sown, and gather where you have not strewn. And, being afraid, I went and hid your talent in the ground! Behold here it is―you can take back that which is yours!’ And his lord, answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You ought to have committed my money to the bankers, so that, at my coming, I should have received my own money back with usury [additional interest]!’ Take away, therefore, the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has, shall be given, and he shall abound! But from him that has not, that also which he seems to have shall be taken away! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
Our Faith is not meant to be buried; it not meant to be dormant; it is not meant to be unused. God expects to see some profit from the gift of Faith that He has given us! “So let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” said Our Lord (Matthew 5:16). Are we “trading” with the Faith and showing the fruits of our works? Or have we traded the Faith for worldliness?
Faith Like Muscle
You could say, broadly speaking, that Faith is like muscle―use it or lose it! It is not enough to merely have the Faith―which is given to us by God at our baptism, together with the other theological virtues of Hope and Charity; as well as the Moral Virtues. Faith, like our muscles, is meant to be exercised so that it can grow and be strengthened. Everyone has muscle, but everyone is not strong. Those who exercise their muscles attain strength through strong muscles. Not everyone who has the Faith has a strong Faith―only those who exercise their Faith and use their Faith end up with a strong Faith.
As Holy Scripture says: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has the Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith also, if it have not works, is dead in itself! But some man will say: ‘Thou hast Faith, and I have works!’ Show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith. Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well! But the devils also believe and tremble! But will thou know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead?” (James 2:13-20). Hence we are told to WORK out our salvation with fear and trembling ― “with fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12) ― and to “fight the good fight of Faith to lay hold on eternal life” (1 Timothy 6:12).
Tough Times, Tough Church
Persecution has been the staple diet of Catholicism from the very beginning of the Church. Our Lord foretold that it would happen―and happen it did! You have probably heard the secular proverb: “When the going gets tough, the tough get going!” ― which basically means that we need to have fortitude, resilience, determination and perseverance when facing tough times and tough situations. The saying, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going!” could just as easily be communicated with the phrase: “Sink, or swim!” The Catholic must perpetually swim against the contrary current of the world. If we stop swimming, then we are quickly carried downstream. As Our Lord said: “He that shall persevere to the end―he shall be saved!” (Matthew 24:9-13). The Church’s Martyrs, Confessors and Virgins were tough when the going got tough. They persevered to the end.
The tough times of the persecution of the Faith have come in many forms―physical persecution, mental persecution, financial persecution, cultural persecution, etc. Those are the temptations that we have to pass through if we wish to gain eternal life Heaven: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) ― that is why the Sacrament of Confirmation makes us Soldiers of Christ and that is why the Church on Earth is called “The Church Militant”. We are told: “When you come to the service of God, stand in fear and prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith and lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Our perseverance in the fight should lead us to eventually say with St. Paul: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the Faith!” (2 Timothy 4:7). Scripture rebukes a reluctance to go into the fight: “What! Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). There are a lot of “armchair soldiers” who just sit and watch the Faith being attacked and diminished.
Our attitude to this inescapable fight should be―as said above―one of fear and one of confidence. Not every soldier who goes to war, ends up coming home alive. Yet each soldier is [hopefully] trained in such a way so as to reduce the chances of being killed in battle. The combat fatality rate in the Second World War saw 55% of soldiers being killed. The spiritual soldier (the Catholic Soldier of Christ) fatality rate is much greater―with most Catholics falling in battle and falling into Hell: “Wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life, and few there are that find it!” said Our Lord (Matthew 7:13-14).
Does God Hate Us?
Is the fact that few are saved because God is mean and nasty and hates crowds and does not want the rabble of this world disturbing the peace of Heaven? Far from it! God wants everyone to be saved―but everyone does not do what it takes to be saved: “[God] will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4) … “The Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “[Jesus] was the true Light, which enlightens every man that comes into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him―and the world knew Him not!” (John 1:9-10). “The Light shone in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it!” (John 1:5). “Men loved darkness rather than the Light―for their works were evil!” (John 3:19). As Jesus said: “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
That is why we are told to have no part with the world, to not befriend the world, to not side with the world―for the world is an enemy of God: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
There is the problem―God loves us, but we love the world more that God. God’s Divine Providence takes care of everyone each and every moment of the day, but can barely spare a few minutes for God each day! Whatever happened to Christ’s command to love God totally? “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Love Saves―Lack of Love Loses
The whole economy of Heaven revolves around love―for God is love itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). “Let us therefore love God, because God has first loved us!” (1 John 4:19). Without love or charity, we are nothing: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Many Scriptural commentators see the virtue of charity in the wedding garment that Our Lord refers to in His parable about the wedding feast: “And the king went in to see the guests and he saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment. And he said to him: ‘Friend, how is it that you came in here not having a wedding garment?’ But he was silent. Then the king said to the waiters: ‘Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the exterior darkness: where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth! For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Matthew 22:11-14). It is the “garment” of charity that we must clothe ourselves with if we wish to enter Heaven. Hell is the place for those who have no charity.
Our Lord promised that His Church would not be destroyed when He said to St. Peter: “Thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it!” (Matthew 16:18). To Peter, Our Lord further said: “Simon, behold Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat―but I have prayed for thee, that thy Faith fail not!” (Luke 22:31-32). This means that His Church will never be destroyed and will never fall away from Him. His Church will survive until His return. When Our Lord commanded the Apostles to go into the whole world, teaching all nations and baptizing all persons (Matthew 28:19-20), He added: “I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world!” (Matthew 28:20). Thus Christ further guarantees the existence of His Church until the end of the world. This was also indicated in the Old Testament prophecy of Christ: “The Son of man came with the clouds of Heaven, and they presented Him … a kingdom … and His kingdom that shall not be destroyed” (Daniel 7:13-14). The Archangel Gabriel indicated the same thing to Our Lady at the Annunciation: “…of His kingdom there shall be no end” (Luke 1:33).
Christ Did Not Promise …
When Our Lord promised that “the gates of Hell shall not prevail against” His Church and that its “Faith fail not”―He was not guaranteeing to protect each and every member unconditionally and to unconditionally guarantee that nobody’s Faith would be lost. There are conditions that we must adhere to if we wish to obtain that guarantee. For Our Lord also warned that “wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! … Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:13; 7:21) ― adding that “many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14) and “the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness, where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30). Speaking of those who would not meet the conditions required by Christ for salvation, He says: “The children of the kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness, where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 8:12).
Our Lord did not promise that His Church would be free from tribulations, persecutions and sufferings. On the contrary, He said: “If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you!” (John 15:20). “They shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake!” (Matthew 5:11). “They will lay their hands upon you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors, for My Name’s sake!” (Luke 21:12). “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death, and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake! … But he that shall persevere [in the Faith] to the end―he shall be saved!” (Matthew 24:9-13). “All that have pleased God, passed through many tribulations, remaining faithful” (Judith 8:23). “Who then shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation? Or distress? Or famine? Or danger? Or persecution? Or the sword?” (Romans 8:35).
Burying the Talent of Faith
The danger and common mistake of most Catholics is that they “bury” their Faith―like the man in Our Lord’s parable on the talents. “A man going into a far country, called his servants, and delivered to them his goods. To one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―to everyone according to his proper ability―and then immediately he took his journey. And he that had received the five talents, went his way, and traded with the same, and gained another five. And in like manner he that had received the two, gained another two. But he that had received the one, going his way dug a hole into the earth and hid his lord’s money. But after a long time, the lord of those servants came, and reckoned with them. And he that had received the five talents, brought the other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you delivered to me five talents, behold I have gained another five over and above!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place you over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’ And he also, that had received the two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you delivered two talents to me! Behold, I have gained another two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’ But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man―you reap where you have not sown, and gather where you have not strewn. And, being afraid, I went and hid your talent in the ground! Behold here it is―you can take back that which is yours!’ And his lord, answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You ought to have committed my money to the bankers, so that, at my coming, I should have received my own money back with usury [additional interest]!’ Take away, therefore, the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has, shall be given, and he shall abound! But from him that has not, that also which he seems to have shall be taken away! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
Our Faith is not meant to be buried; it not meant to be dormant; it is not meant to be unused. God expects to see some profit from the gift of Faith that He has given us! “So let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” said Our Lord (Matthew 5:16). Are we “trading” with the Faith and showing the fruits of our works? Or have we traded the Faith for worldliness?
Faith Like Muscle
You could say, broadly speaking, that Faith is like muscle―use it or lose it! It is not enough to merely have the Faith―which is given to us by God at our baptism, together with the other theological virtues of Hope and Charity; as well as the Moral Virtues. Faith, like our muscles, is meant to be exercised so that it can grow and be strengthened. Everyone has muscle, but everyone is not strong. Those who exercise their muscles attain strength through strong muscles. Not everyone who has the Faith has a strong Faith―only those who exercise their Faith and use their Faith end up with a strong Faith.
As Holy Scripture says: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has the Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith also, if it have not works, is dead in itself! But some man will say: ‘Thou hast Faith, and I have works!’ Show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith. Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well! But the devils also believe and tremble! But will thou know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead?” (James 2:13-20). Hence we are told to WORK out our salvation with fear and trembling ― “with fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12) ― and to “fight the good fight of Faith to lay hold on eternal life” (1 Timothy 6:12).
Tough Times, Tough Church
Persecution has been the staple diet of Catholicism from the very beginning of the Church. Our Lord foretold that it would happen―and happen it did! You have probably heard the secular proverb: “When the going gets tough, the tough get going!” ― which basically means that we need to have fortitude, resilience, determination and perseverance when facing tough times and tough situations. The saying, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going!” could just as easily be communicated with the phrase: “Sink, or swim!” The Catholic must perpetually swim against the contrary current of the world. If we stop swimming, then we are quickly carried downstream. As Our Lord said: “He that shall persevere to the end―he shall be saved!” (Matthew 24:9-13). The Church’s Martyrs, Confessors and Virgins were tough when the going got tough. They persevered to the end.
The tough times of the persecution of the Faith have come in many forms―physical persecution, mental persecution, financial persecution, cultural persecution, etc. Those are the temptations that we have to pass through if we wish to gain eternal life Heaven: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) ― that is why the Sacrament of Confirmation makes us Soldiers of Christ and that is why the Church on Earth is called “The Church Militant”. We are told: “When you come to the service of God, stand in fear and prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith and lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Our perseverance in the fight should lead us to eventually say with St. Paul: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the Faith!” (2 Timothy 4:7). Scripture rebukes a reluctance to go into the fight: “What! Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). There are a lot of “armchair soldiers” who just sit and watch the Faith being attacked and diminished.
Our attitude to this inescapable fight should be―as said above―one of fear and one of confidence. Not every soldier who goes to war, ends up coming home alive. Yet each soldier is [hopefully] trained in such a way so as to reduce the chances of being killed in battle. The combat fatality rate in the Second World War saw 55% of soldiers being killed. The spiritual soldier (the Catholic Soldier of Christ) fatality rate is much greater―with most Catholics falling in battle and falling into Hell: “Wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life, and few there are that find it!” said Our Lord (Matthew 7:13-14).
Does God Hate Us?
Is the fact that few are saved because God is mean and nasty and hates crowds and does not want the rabble of this world disturbing the peace of Heaven? Far from it! God wants everyone to be saved―but everyone does not do what it takes to be saved: “[God] will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4) … “The Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “[Jesus] was the true Light, which enlightens every man that comes into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him―and the world knew Him not!” (John 1:9-10). “The Light shone in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it!” (John 1:5). “Men loved darkness rather than the Light―for their works were evil!” (John 3:19). As Jesus said: “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
That is why we are told to have no part with the world, to not befriend the world, to not side with the world―for the world is an enemy of God: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
There is the problem―God loves us, but we love the world more that God. God’s Divine Providence takes care of everyone each and every moment of the day, but can barely spare a few minutes for God each day! Whatever happened to Christ’s command to love God totally? “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Love Saves―Lack of Love Loses
The whole economy of Heaven revolves around love―for God is love itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). “Let us therefore love God, because God has first loved us!” (1 John 4:19). Without love or charity, we are nothing: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Many Scriptural commentators see the virtue of charity in the wedding garment that Our Lord refers to in His parable about the wedding feast: “And the king went in to see the guests and he saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment. And he said to him: ‘Friend, how is it that you came in here not having a wedding garment?’ But he was silent. Then the king said to the waiters: ‘Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the exterior darkness: where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth! For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Matthew 22:11-14). It is the “garment” of charity that we must clothe ourselves with if we wish to enter Heaven. Hell is the place for those who have no charity.
Article 8
Wednesday & Thursday, November 13th & 14th
The Stupidity of Modern Day Catholics
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Wednesday & Thursday, November 13th & 14th
The Stupidity of Modern Day Catholics
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
What is Stupidity?
Stupidity is defined as behavior that shows a lack of good sense or judgment; slow of mind; lacking intelligence or quickness of mind; poor judgment or lack of clear thinking; given to unintelligent decisions or actions; decisions that seem to lack common sense; acting in an unintelligent or careless manner; a poor ability to understand or to profit from experience; the condition of being unable to learn quickly or think correctly; being low in intelligence.
To Know is Not Enough
Knowledge is not intelligence. The word “intelligence” comes from the Latin verb “intellegere” which means “to understand.” The verb “intellegere” is a compound of two words: “inter” meaning “between”; and the verb “legere” meaning “to read” ― hence, you could say that “intellegere” means reading between the lines―that is to say, not just what appears on the surface, but what is hidden between the lines, what is beneath the surface. Similarly, “to understand” means to know and grasp what “stands under the surface”, what is beneath the surface, it requires going deeper into something. Intelligence takes knowledge to a higher, deeper, broader level.
Limited Knowledge
An infant might recognize and know that you are working on your computer―the infant knows it is a computer because you call it a computer, but does the infant know how to use it? No. The ability of the infant to know ‘surface’ things has not yet evolved into intelligence, which is a higher, deeper, broader form of knowledge.
You will recognize a car engine when you lift the hood/bonnet of your car. You know it is an engine―but do you know how to take it apart, how to fix it, how to put it together. The vast majority of people do not know how to do this―their knowledge of a car engine stops at simply recognizing it and has not increased to the level of the intelligence required to dis-assemble, fix and re-assemble it.
Do you know where your heart, lungs, kidneys, adrenals, liver, gallbladder and spleen are located? Some people know, others don’t know. But do you know how they are interconnected, how they work and how to heal them? Most people do not have that intelligence.
Do you know what are the different kinds of grace? Maybe you do―justifying grace; sanctifying grace; actual grace; prevenient grace; concomitant grace; persevering/sustaining grace; sacramental grace; healing grace; the grace of state, etc. Yet how many have the deeper knowledge, or intelligence, to explain how each of those graces work, what are their requirements, and what they depend upon?
So, as you can see, knowledge is not intelligence―it is merely the beginning of the road, or the seed of intelligence. It needs to be used, exercised, cultivated, fed, increased, deepened, broadened and strengthened.
Happily Stupid
Unfortunately, most people are happy with their limited knowledge―it gets them by in this world―so why bother to know more? Who wants to waste time learning when you spend that time having fun instead? That is why so few Catholics know their Faith well. They are “Catholic Minimalists” who want the biggest bang for their buck ― they want to get to Heaven with the most minimal of efforts; they want the greatest thing possible for the smallest price possible. Holy Scripture warns us: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! … He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (Galatians 6:7-8; 2 Corinthians 9:6). “The senseless man shall not know, nor will the fool understand these things!” (Psalm 91:7). “Wisdom is too high for a fool!” (Proverbs 24:7). “Fools despise wisdom and instruction!” (Proverbs 1:7). “Doctrine to a fool is like having chains on the feet and manacles on the hand … Weep for the fool, for his understanding fails!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:22) … “A fool shall be filled with his own ways! … As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly! … The way of a fool is right in his own eyes! … Folly is joy to the fool! … The thought of a fool is sin!” (Proverbs 14:14; 26:11; 12:15; 15:21; 24:9). “The number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). “The fool walks in darkness … The fool esteems all men to be fools, whereas he himself is a fool!” (Ecclesiastes 10:3; 2:14). “For professing themselves to be wise, they became fools!” (Romans 1:22).
Our Lady Speaks of Our Stupidity
“Consider the wicked disposition of mortals in the present age! … There are so few who are perfect and who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption. Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become so measureless, there are some who foolishly think that the number of perfect souls is also as numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be! Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him! … The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God, Whose Wisdom finds no place in the evil heart, nor in a body subject to sin! … There is only one true Good, the highest Good is to be appreciated and recognized. All the other lesser goods are merely fictitious and apparent. But this wisdom seems far from the mind of carnal men―for, with a most perverse blindness, they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them. Because they never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or appreciation of it ...
“How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! Under the outwardly good intention, are often hidden the earthly passions and inclinations, which dominate the heart ... Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error! … The wisdom of the sons of this world is carnal and diabolical, and their ways lead to death! … They must withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom! … Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with [true] wisdom! … In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls, and they hold as being wisdom that which is nothing but diabolical and earthly ignorance! ... God knows that this insane love will pervert the greater part of the human nature!
“Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. This dreadful carelessness arises from two causes: (1) on the one hand, men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. Anything that is interior seems harmless in their estimation; (2) on the other hand, since the princes of darkness are invisible and cannot be perceived by any of the senses and since carnal men neither touch, nor feel, nor see them―the result is that they forget the fear of them ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day!
“The learned and those who think themselves wise, wish to be applauded and looked up to, bragging about their knowledge. The unlearned try to appear wise! ... Worldly wisdom looks upon the exterior person―not at the state of the souls, nor at virtue, but only at outward show … The learned and wise, and the powerful of this world, so reluctantly correct and amend their lives ... Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment … Many persons―whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable! … Abhor human ostentation! The world does not know where true wisdom dwells. The wisdom of the flesh―worldly wisdom―has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God! Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom!
“The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation. So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing―because the wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... As the Mother of clemency, it is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, for failing to call upon me, so many souls should be lost!” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Trading Heaven for a Bowl of Soup
Just as the hungry Esau sold his birthright to his brother Jacob for a bowl of soup (Genesis 26)―so too do many Catholics stupidly trade Heaven for the things of this world. “Jacob boiled pottage. Esau, coming hungry and faint out of the field said to Esau: ‘Give me of this red pottage―for I am exceedingly faint!’ And Jacob said to him: ‘Sell me thy first birthright!’ Esau answered: ‘Behold, I am dying of hunger! What will the first birthright avail me?” Jacob said to Esau: ‘Swear, therefore, to me!’ Esau swore to him and sold his first birthright. And so taking bread and the pottage of lentils, he ate and drank, and went his way―making little account of having sold his first birthright” (Genesis 25:29-34).
As Our Lord says: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Yet most Catholics, as Our Lady stated above, are “carnal men, with a most perverse blindness, they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good. The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God. Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure. All delights and joys of the world are the source of foolishness which intoxicates the heart. In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
There seems to be little doubt that most Catholics would prefer to be rich more than being holy. They are preoccupied with the material and financial side of life rather than the spiritual side of life. This is easily seen by the amount of time, effort and money that is spent upon bettering and feathering their earthly nest, rather than their heavenly nest. Our Lord seems to have wasted His breath when He said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters! … You cannot serve God and mammon [riches, worldly interests]. Therefore I say to you, be not anxious for your life―what you shall eat; nor for your body―what you shall put on. Life is more than meat; and the body is more than clothing. Be not anxious, therefore, saying: ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-33).
Catholics run the greatest risk when they order their ways according to the maxims of the modern world. Holy Scripture says: “Many walk and are enemies of the cross of Christ―whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
It is hardly surprising that the worldly-minded Catholic is quickly perverted. He becomes a slave to his worldly surroundings; he finds great difficulty in rising above the sensible, material and the earthly to the spiritual and the heavenly. For the worldly-minded man, as St. Paul teaches us, cannot grasp the spiritual and it seems foolish to him: “The sensual man perceives not these things that are of the Spirit of God―for it is foolishness to him, and he cannot understand!” (1 Corinthians 2:14). His faith, though not extinct, is so sluggish and inactive, so that it does very little to enlighten his intellect (mind) or to move his will (heart). Hence the supernatural―which rests upon Faith and is made known to us by Faith―is something unreal, incomprehensible and undesirable to him. For, unlike the just man, he lives not by Faith, but by appearances.
Seek First the Kingdom of God
Even though Christ tells us to “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33), that is not how it works out in practice. Below you will find the percentage of Americans who state what is extremely or very important to living a fulfilling life, according to Pew Research:
Having a job or career they enjoy: 71%
Having close friends: 61%
Having children: 26%
Having a lot of money: 24%
Being married: 23%
The majority of Americans say they need to earn at least $100,000 a year just to be comfortable, according to the most recent CNBC Your Money Survey. Money may make it easier for you to obtain the things that ultimately bring you fulfillment, and 49% of Americans agree having a lot of money is “somewhat important” to living a fulfilled life. 24% of all adults say money is “very important” to their feeling of fulfillment, that percentage jumps to 35% for those ages 18 to 29, Pew reports. Here’s the percentage of each age group that says money is very important to feel fulfilled:
Ages 18 to 29: 35%
Ages 30 to 49: 26%
Ages 50 to 64: 19%
Ages 65 and older: 13%
Stupidity is defined as behavior that shows a lack of good sense or judgment; slow of mind; lacking intelligence or quickness of mind; poor judgment or lack of clear thinking; given to unintelligent decisions or actions; decisions that seem to lack common sense; acting in an unintelligent or careless manner; a poor ability to understand or to profit from experience; the condition of being unable to learn quickly or think correctly; being low in intelligence.
To Know is Not Enough
Knowledge is not intelligence. The word “intelligence” comes from the Latin verb “intellegere” which means “to understand.” The verb “intellegere” is a compound of two words: “inter” meaning “between”; and the verb “legere” meaning “to read” ― hence, you could say that “intellegere” means reading between the lines―that is to say, not just what appears on the surface, but what is hidden between the lines, what is beneath the surface. Similarly, “to understand” means to know and grasp what “stands under the surface”, what is beneath the surface, it requires going deeper into something. Intelligence takes knowledge to a higher, deeper, broader level.
Limited Knowledge
An infant might recognize and know that you are working on your computer―the infant knows it is a computer because you call it a computer, but does the infant know how to use it? No. The ability of the infant to know ‘surface’ things has not yet evolved into intelligence, which is a higher, deeper, broader form of knowledge.
You will recognize a car engine when you lift the hood/bonnet of your car. You know it is an engine―but do you know how to take it apart, how to fix it, how to put it together. The vast majority of people do not know how to do this―their knowledge of a car engine stops at simply recognizing it and has not increased to the level of the intelligence required to dis-assemble, fix and re-assemble it.
Do you know where your heart, lungs, kidneys, adrenals, liver, gallbladder and spleen are located? Some people know, others don’t know. But do you know how they are interconnected, how they work and how to heal them? Most people do not have that intelligence.
Do you know what are the different kinds of grace? Maybe you do―justifying grace; sanctifying grace; actual grace; prevenient grace; concomitant grace; persevering/sustaining grace; sacramental grace; healing grace; the grace of state, etc. Yet how many have the deeper knowledge, or intelligence, to explain how each of those graces work, what are their requirements, and what they depend upon?
So, as you can see, knowledge is not intelligence―it is merely the beginning of the road, or the seed of intelligence. It needs to be used, exercised, cultivated, fed, increased, deepened, broadened and strengthened.
Happily Stupid
Unfortunately, most people are happy with their limited knowledge―it gets them by in this world―so why bother to know more? Who wants to waste time learning when you spend that time having fun instead? That is why so few Catholics know their Faith well. They are “Catholic Minimalists” who want the biggest bang for their buck ― they want to get to Heaven with the most minimal of efforts; they want the greatest thing possible for the smallest price possible. Holy Scripture warns us: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! … He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (Galatians 6:7-8; 2 Corinthians 9:6). “The senseless man shall not know, nor will the fool understand these things!” (Psalm 91:7). “Wisdom is too high for a fool!” (Proverbs 24:7). “Fools despise wisdom and instruction!” (Proverbs 1:7). “Doctrine to a fool is like having chains on the feet and manacles on the hand … Weep for the fool, for his understanding fails!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:22) … “A fool shall be filled with his own ways! … As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly! … The way of a fool is right in his own eyes! … Folly is joy to the fool! … The thought of a fool is sin!” (Proverbs 14:14; 26:11; 12:15; 15:21; 24:9). “The number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). “The fool walks in darkness … The fool esteems all men to be fools, whereas he himself is a fool!” (Ecclesiastes 10:3; 2:14). “For professing themselves to be wise, they became fools!” (Romans 1:22).
Our Lady Speaks of Our Stupidity
“Consider the wicked disposition of mortals in the present age! … There are so few who are perfect and who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption. Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become so measureless, there are some who foolishly think that the number of perfect souls is also as numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be! Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him! … The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God, Whose Wisdom finds no place in the evil heart, nor in a body subject to sin! … There is only one true Good, the highest Good is to be appreciated and recognized. All the other lesser goods are merely fictitious and apparent. But this wisdom seems far from the mind of carnal men―for, with a most perverse blindness, they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them. Because they never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or appreciation of it ...
“How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! Under the outwardly good intention, are often hidden the earthly passions and inclinations, which dominate the heart ... Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error! … The wisdom of the sons of this world is carnal and diabolical, and their ways lead to death! … They must withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom! … Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with [true] wisdom! … In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls, and they hold as being wisdom that which is nothing but diabolical and earthly ignorance! ... God knows that this insane love will pervert the greater part of the human nature!
“Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. This dreadful carelessness arises from two causes: (1) on the one hand, men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. Anything that is interior seems harmless in their estimation; (2) on the other hand, since the princes of darkness are invisible and cannot be perceived by any of the senses and since carnal men neither touch, nor feel, nor see them―the result is that they forget the fear of them ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day!
“The learned and those who think themselves wise, wish to be applauded and looked up to, bragging about their knowledge. The unlearned try to appear wise! ... Worldly wisdom looks upon the exterior person―not at the state of the souls, nor at virtue, but only at outward show … The learned and wise, and the powerful of this world, so reluctantly correct and amend their lives ... Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment … Many persons―whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable! … Abhor human ostentation! The world does not know where true wisdom dwells. The wisdom of the flesh―worldly wisdom―has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God! Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom!
“The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation. So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing―because the wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... As the Mother of clemency, it is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, for failing to call upon me, so many souls should be lost!” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Trading Heaven for a Bowl of Soup
Just as the hungry Esau sold his birthright to his brother Jacob for a bowl of soup (Genesis 26)―so too do many Catholics stupidly trade Heaven for the things of this world. “Jacob boiled pottage. Esau, coming hungry and faint out of the field said to Esau: ‘Give me of this red pottage―for I am exceedingly faint!’ And Jacob said to him: ‘Sell me thy first birthright!’ Esau answered: ‘Behold, I am dying of hunger! What will the first birthright avail me?” Jacob said to Esau: ‘Swear, therefore, to me!’ Esau swore to him and sold his first birthright. And so taking bread and the pottage of lentils, he ate and drank, and went his way―making little account of having sold his first birthright” (Genesis 25:29-34).
As Our Lord says: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Yet most Catholics, as Our Lady stated above, are “carnal men, with a most perverse blindness, they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good. The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God. Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure. All delights and joys of the world are the source of foolishness which intoxicates the heart. In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
There seems to be little doubt that most Catholics would prefer to be rich more than being holy. They are preoccupied with the material and financial side of life rather than the spiritual side of life. This is easily seen by the amount of time, effort and money that is spent upon bettering and feathering their earthly nest, rather than their heavenly nest. Our Lord seems to have wasted His breath when He said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters! … You cannot serve God and mammon [riches, worldly interests]. Therefore I say to you, be not anxious for your life―what you shall eat; nor for your body―what you shall put on. Life is more than meat; and the body is more than clothing. Be not anxious, therefore, saying: ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-33).
Catholics run the greatest risk when they order their ways according to the maxims of the modern world. Holy Scripture says: “Many walk and are enemies of the cross of Christ―whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
It is hardly surprising that the worldly-minded Catholic is quickly perverted. He becomes a slave to his worldly surroundings; he finds great difficulty in rising above the sensible, material and the earthly to the spiritual and the heavenly. For the worldly-minded man, as St. Paul teaches us, cannot grasp the spiritual and it seems foolish to him: “The sensual man perceives not these things that are of the Spirit of God―for it is foolishness to him, and he cannot understand!” (1 Corinthians 2:14). His faith, though not extinct, is so sluggish and inactive, so that it does very little to enlighten his intellect (mind) or to move his will (heart). Hence the supernatural―which rests upon Faith and is made known to us by Faith―is something unreal, incomprehensible and undesirable to him. For, unlike the just man, he lives not by Faith, but by appearances.
Seek First the Kingdom of God
Even though Christ tells us to “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33), that is not how it works out in practice. Below you will find the percentage of Americans who state what is extremely or very important to living a fulfilling life, according to Pew Research:
Having a job or career they enjoy: 71%
Having close friends: 61%
Having children: 26%
Having a lot of money: 24%
Being married: 23%
The majority of Americans say they need to earn at least $100,000 a year just to be comfortable, according to the most recent CNBC Your Money Survey. Money may make it easier for you to obtain the things that ultimately bring you fulfillment, and 49% of Americans agree having a lot of money is “somewhat important” to living a fulfilled life. 24% of all adults say money is “very important” to their feeling of fulfillment, that percentage jumps to 35% for those ages 18 to 29, Pew reports. Here’s the percentage of each age group that says money is very important to feel fulfilled:
Ages 18 to 29: 35%
Ages 30 to 49: 26%
Ages 50 to 64: 19%
Ages 65 and older: 13%
As regards the above chart, the topic of faith, religion and spirituality is also one where some societies notably differ. Outside of the U.S., religion/faith/God is never one of the top 10 sources of meaning cited ― and no more than just 5% of any non-American public mention it. In the U.S., only 15% mention religion/faith/God as a source of meaning, making it the fifth most mentioned topic in the U.S. So much for “Seek first the kingdom of God!” (Matthew 6:33).
Most observers of American society notice that there has been a significant decline in measures of religiosity over the past decades. Both Gallup and The Wall Street Journal surveys show the importance of religion to Americans has decreased over time―although the two surveys reflect different patterns of how that decline has occurred over time. The Wall Street Journal’s data shows that 62% of Americans rated religion as very important in 1998, compared with only 48% in 2019 ― a 14-point percentage decline in only 21 years. The latest (2023) reading of 39% represents an even steeper drop, falling 9 percentage points in only four years. Gallup’s comparable trend asks: “How important would you say religion is in your daily life?” and this survey also shows a decline, but at a steadier pace. Similar to the first two measurement points in the Wall Street Journal trend, Gallup’s “very important” reading was 61% in 1998 and 49% in 2019 ― a 12-percentage point decline in 21 years. However, Gallup’s data shows a four percentage point dip to 45% this year (2023), roughly half the pace of decline measured by The Wall Street Journal.
You might well argue that the above statistics include ALL Americans and not just Catholics―and therefore it cannot be indicative of Catholic values. However, it must be noticed and stated that the current viewpoints of Catholics seem to indicate that they are “just like all the rest” ― for 6 out 10 Catholics think abortion should be legal; only 1 out of 5 Catholics regularly fulfill their obligation of attending Sunday Mass; most Catholics imagine that you can be a “good” Catholic without attending Sunday Mass; over half of U.S. Catholics go to confession either less than once a year or not at all; only over 65% of Catholics no longer believe in the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist; almost 6 out 10 Catholics strongly favor same-sex marriages; a majority of Catholics also believe it is acceptable for a man and woman in a romantic relationship to live together without being married, including 55% who say this is as good as any other way of life. All of this clearly manifests the fact that the Faith and its teachings have lost their importance and effect in guiding the lives of Catholics today.
You do not need to be a “rocket-scientist” or an all-knowing God to notice and realize the immense disproportion in time that is spent by today’s youth on things of the world compared to spiritual things. According to a Pew Research Center survey, only 13% of Catholics aged 18–29 pray at least daily; 21% only pray weekly; 24% only pray around once a month; and 28% never pray, or pray very rarely. Whereas recent surveys show that the average teenager spends around 4.8 hours per day on social media/screen media, which likely applies to Catholic youths as well. Some surveys place it at around 7 hours per day on one kind of screen or another. Other surveys are somewhere in between. The bottom line is that an awful lot of hours are being on worldly media, and little or no time is being spent with God in prayer, meditation, spiritual reading, spiritual conversations, visits to the Blessed Sacrament and extra Masses. Our Lord’s words ― “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33) ― are wasted on modern-day Catholics. They seek the world before they seek God. Those haunting words come back to mind: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). Very few are sowing spiritual seeds and producing spiritual fruit! “The number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15).
The frightening thing is that nobody is really worried about this relegation of God from first place to goodness what place! As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! … The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God … With a most perverse blindness, they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good … In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as being sweet, and they take deadly poison as a remedy for their souls! Guard thyself against those living in darkness and the lovers of the world more than against fire―for the wisdom of the sons of this world is carnal and diabolical, and their ways lead to death!”
You might well argue that the above statistics include ALL Americans and not just Catholics―and therefore it cannot be indicative of Catholic values. However, it must be noticed and stated that the current viewpoints of Catholics seem to indicate that they are “just like all the rest” ― for 6 out 10 Catholics think abortion should be legal; only 1 out of 5 Catholics regularly fulfill their obligation of attending Sunday Mass; most Catholics imagine that you can be a “good” Catholic without attending Sunday Mass; over half of U.S. Catholics go to confession either less than once a year or not at all; only over 65% of Catholics no longer believe in the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist; almost 6 out 10 Catholics strongly favor same-sex marriages; a majority of Catholics also believe it is acceptable for a man and woman in a romantic relationship to live together without being married, including 55% who say this is as good as any other way of life. All of this clearly manifests the fact that the Faith and its teachings have lost their importance and effect in guiding the lives of Catholics today.
You do not need to be a “rocket-scientist” or an all-knowing God to notice and realize the immense disproportion in time that is spent by today’s youth on things of the world compared to spiritual things. According to a Pew Research Center survey, only 13% of Catholics aged 18–29 pray at least daily; 21% only pray weekly; 24% only pray around once a month; and 28% never pray, or pray very rarely. Whereas recent surveys show that the average teenager spends around 4.8 hours per day on social media/screen media, which likely applies to Catholic youths as well. Some surveys place it at around 7 hours per day on one kind of screen or another. Other surveys are somewhere in between. The bottom line is that an awful lot of hours are being on worldly media, and little or no time is being spent with God in prayer, meditation, spiritual reading, spiritual conversations, visits to the Blessed Sacrament and extra Masses. Our Lord’s words ― “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33) ― are wasted on modern-day Catholics. They seek the world before they seek God. Those haunting words come back to mind: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). Very few are sowing spiritual seeds and producing spiritual fruit! “The number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15).
The frightening thing is that nobody is really worried about this relegation of God from first place to goodness what place! As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! … The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God … With a most perverse blindness, they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good … In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as being sweet, and they take deadly poison as a remedy for their souls! Guard thyself against those living in darkness and the lovers of the world more than against fire―for the wisdom of the sons of this world is carnal and diabolical, and their ways lead to death!”
Article 7
Monday & Tuesday, November 11th & 12th
The Blind Leading the Blind
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday & Tuesday, November 11th & 12th
The Blind Leading the Blind
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Seeing is Believing
St. Thomas the Apostle did not believe the other Apostles when they told him that Jesus had risen from the dead. “Thomas, one of the Twelve Apostles, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Unless I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe!’ After eight days His disciples were again within and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst of them, and said to Thomas: ‘Put in your finger here and see My hands; and bring here your hand and put it into My side; and be not faithless, but believing!’” (John 20:24-27).
Our Lord, on another occasion, lamented: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6). “You are saved through Faith!” (Ephesians 2:8). That is why Our Lord says: “Go ye into the whole world and preach the gospel to every creature … Teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you! … He that believes and is baptized, shall be saved―but he that believes not shall be condemned!” (Matthew 28:19-20; Mark 16:16).
Thus “Faith comes by hearing … the word of Christ … This is the word of Faith which we preach” (Romans 10:17: 10:8). Faith is concerned with knowledge about God and the things of God―we must learn about God and that involves being taught about God: “Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed” (John 20:29). We have not seen God; we have not seen Christ; we cannot see Christ in the Holy Eucharist―but we believe. We did not hear Christ preach and teach―but we believe what He is said to have preached and taught on account of the authority of others―the Apostles, who then passed down what they heard throughout all centuries in the writings of the New Testament.
“This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Fight the good fight of Faith! (1 Timothy 6:12) “…taking the shield of Faith, with which you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:16). But how important is the Faith to people? The less important it is, the weaker their Faith is likely to be―and the weaker their Faith is, the less and less will they live their Faith and be more and more susceptible to losing their Faith. Hence it is that Our Lord indicated that He would find very little “Faith on Earth” when He comes again (Luke 18:8) and Our Lady of Good Success, in referring to our times, spoke of “the small number of souls who will preserve the treasures of the Faith.”
The Fate of Faith
Regarding the Faith, Our Lady of La Salette and Good Success said of our times: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell. They will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises! … The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... Churches will be locked up or desecrated … and altars will be sacked … Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death ... The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts … Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned ... The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom … The Gospel of Jesus Christ having been forgotten … the devil will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals] ... The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent and be superior to others! … In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost!”
The words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda expand upon this notion of spiritual blindness: “Just as the material sun denies its light and warmth to nothing that is capable and fit for its influence, so also the divine Wisdom invites and calls out to all, and hides itself or denies itself to no one. But the foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf; their impious malice makes them scoffers; and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God, whose Wisdom finds no place in the malevolent heart, nor in a body that is subject to sin. This Wisdom seems far from the mind of carnal men: with a most perverse blindness they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them. Because they never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or reckoning of It. How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! The inestimable treasure of the virtue of divine Faith is hidden to those mortals who have only carnal and earthly eyes ... Under the outwardly good intention, are often hidden the earthly passions and inclinations, which dominate the heart.
“Open thy eyes in the deep darkness and blindness which overwhelm men around you! … The wisdom of the flesh―worldly wisdom―has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God! Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom! … Man is full of blindest inclinations, and if he does not restrain them, he will begin to ask for that which will cause his eternal perdition. Men blindly pursue the deceitful and vile delights of the senses ... In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls, and they hold as being wisdom that which is nothing but diabolical and earthly ignorance! ... The judgments of men are only too easily blinded by their passions … They follow their blind passions, seeking after possessions or the transitory pleasures―all of which will end with this life … Earthly-minded men blindly prefer temporal blessings, forgetting the eternal ones … This blind greed is the root of all evils … God knows that this insane love will pervert the greater part of the human nature! …
“There is only one true Good, the highest Good is to be appreciated and recognized. All the other lesser goods are merely fictitious and apparent. Then only shall you give God true appreciation and love, when you shall enjoy and esteem Him above all created things. But this wisdom seems far from the mind of carnal men―for, with a most perverse blindness, they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them. Because they never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or appreciation of it. O what an execrable disorder and what a despicable blindness of mortals! O most unhappy blindness of mortals! O torpid negligence, that holds in deceit so many souls! There are not words or sentences sufficient to describe this terrible and tremendous danger. They allow themselves to be so insanely blinded by the devil―so that they neither see nor avoid this danger! They are not aware of the cause of their evil state and of their blindness!
“The wisdom of the sons of this world is carnal and diabolical, and their ways lead to death! Many are the faithless, many the bad Catholics, many the hypocrites! Their inclinations and their blind love of visible things, hold them back. The sons of the world are ignorant, precisely because they are lovers of earthly riches. They feel and suffer the heavy weight of riches, which pins them to the Earth and drives them into its very bowels to seek gold and silver with great anxiety, sleeplessness, labors and sweat―as if they were not men, but wild beasts that do not know what they are suffering and doing. And if they are thus weighed down before acquiring riches, then how much more are they weighed down when they have come into possession of those riches and possessions? Such souls receive an earthly reward―but no heavenly reward! In this manner has he been able to introduce into the world his tyrannical power, spreading among men forgetfulness of death, judgment, Heaven and Hell, and casting so many nations from abyss to abyss of darkness. Let the countless numbers that have fallen into Hell with their burden, proclaim it! This cruel enemy avails himself in order fills their minds with images of creatures and draw them away from their salvation or make them incapable of it.
“Their inclinations and their blind love of visible things, detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart―these inclinations and this blindness rob them of remembrance and affection toward these higher things, which could raise them above their worldliness. Instead of fearing and avoiding the occasions of evil, they encounter and seek for them in blind ignorance. In senseless fury they follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and care not where they walk, even if to the most dangerous precipices. How many men whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―on account of the lack of light of Faith, from the darkness of their unbelief―have thrown themselves into most abominable sins, and thence into the eternal darkness of Hell! How many kingdoms and provinces, being blind themselves, follow these still more blind leaders, until they together fall into the abyss of eternal pains, and they are followed by the bad Christians! Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error, who, desiring to appear wise, speak much and multiply words like the foolish.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
A Faithless Modern Catholic World
Today’s Catholic world is becoming increasingly faithless―from the top down; from pope, down through cardinals, bishops, priests, religious orders and laity. As Our Lady said above: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them … The work of the devil will infiltrate into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises! … The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts … Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned! … A small number of souls will preserve the treasures of the Faith.”
Since the close of the Second Vatican Council in 1965, the number of priests in the United States has fallen by around 40%. The decline in graduate level seminarians in the U.S. is even worse―having fallen by 57%. Only 64% of U.S. diocesan priests are active in ministry―which is a fall of 26% from the 90% active priests in 1970. The number of U.S. religious brothers and sisters has declined sharply since 1965―approximately a 68% fall in religious brothers and a fall of 75% in religious sisters. We have closed a Catholic parish in the United States every three days for the past thirty-five years. 3,500 parishes in the United States are now without a resident priest. We have closed a Catholic school in the United States every four days for the past twenty-five years.
As for the laity, only about 15% of U.S. adults who were raised Catholic as children, have remained practicing Catholics attending weekly Sunday Mass into adulthood. Modern Catholics are experiencing a crisis of faith. More than fifty million Catholics in the United States have stopped practicing their faith over the past thirty years. Around 1 in 4 (23%) Catholics regularly fulfill their obligation of attending Sunday Mass. Materialism and secularism have been eroding the Faith of Catholics for decades. One of the many catastrophic results is that only 31% percent of Catholics in the United States believe Jesus is truly present in the Holy Eucharist. More than 6 out of every 10 Catholics accept abortion. Over 95% have practiced contraception. Faith is weak! Faith is declining! Faith is collapsing! “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6). We are becoming increasingly myopic or even blind to the spiritual―while we have the eye of an eagle for the material!
God can rightly say of today’s Modern Catholics: “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool hath said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that doth good, no not one! With their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear! They have been confounded, because God has despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6).
“And they said: ‘We will go after our own thoughts, and we will do every one according to the perverseness of his evil heart!’” (Jeremias 18:12)―which is exactly what we are doing today, following our own thoughts and opinions, our own personal preferences and desires, but not the preferences and desires of God. “Thus have you spoken, for I know the thoughts of your heart!” (Ezechiel 11:5). “They will not set their thoughts to return to their God―for the spirit of fornication is in the midst of them, and they have not known the Lord!” (Osee 5:4)―which is the case today, where, as Our Lady said, most marriages are not of God, cohabitation increases daily, and sexual sins and homosexual sins have sky-rocketed―all of which underlines the truth of Our Lady’s words when she said the sin that damns most souls today is the sin of impurity―whether in thought, word or action. Yet most people think that all of these sins are acceptable nowadays, for times have changed and morals have changed with the times. They who think this way, think wrong!
Holy Scripture has already condemned such thoughts, saying: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil―that put darkness for light, and light for darkness―that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20). “For the Holy Spirit of discipline will flee from the deceitful, and will withdraw himself from thoughts that are without understanding, and he shall not abide when iniquity comes in” (Wisdom 1:5). “Their thoughts are unprofitable thoughts!” (Isaias 59:7). “How long shall hurtful thoughts abide in thee?” (Jeremias 4:14). “The Lord will search out your thoughts!” (Wisdom 6:4). “Inquisition shall be made into the thoughts of the ungodly” (Wisdom 1:9). “Evil thoughts are an abomination to the Lord!” (Proverbs 15:26). “For perverse thoughts separate from God” (Wisdom 1:3).
There is so much focus on what we think about things personally, that the thoughts of God are largely or totally ignored: “When they knew God, they have not glorified Him as God, or given thanks―but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened!” (Romans 1:21). Yet it is what God thinks that is the most important―for God will be the judge of all our thoughts (and words and actions) one day―and our salvation and damnation will not depend upon what we think, but what God thinks. “Hear, O Earth! Behold I will bring evils upon this people―the fruits of their own thoughts―because they have not heard My words, and they have cast away My law” (Jeremias 6:19).
Family Failures in Faith
Faith is focus on God and the things of God. Faith comes first in acquisition―Charity comes first in importance. Faith is about knowing―Charity is about loving. We cannot love what we do not know―hence we have to get to know God through Faith before we can love Him through Charity. “Faith worketh by Charity” (Galatians 5:6) … “If I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not Charity―then I am nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:2). We have all heard the secular proverb: “Charity begins at home!” The same has to be said about Faith. A child receives the gift of Faith at its baptism―but it is the parents who must nourish, grow and strengthen that Faith in the opening years of the child’s life. The Church teaches that parents are primary educators of their children―the Church and schools merely assist the parents in their teaching vocation. However, as the philosophical axiom states: “Nemo dat quod non habet" which means “no one can give what they do not have.” If you know little or nothing about the Faith, then you can only teach your children little or nothing about the Faith.
Sadly, most Catholics could not name the Ten Commandments of God―they might know some of them, but rarely all of them. They know even less about the Six Chief Commandments of the Church. Ask them to name the conditions that must be present for a sin to be a mortal sin―and most Catholics will struggle to name them all. Ask them how many books there are in the Old Testament and how many in the New Testament―and they are lost! Don’t even dare to ask them to name those books! Most Catholics today have even forgotten their First Holy Communion Catechism teachings. Ask them to name the difference between Sanctifying Grace and Actual Grace―and most will scratch their heads. Ask them what are the chief effects of Original Sin―and they will stare at you blankly. Ask them to name the Holy Days of Obligation in the U.S. and most Catholics will not know how many there are, nor their titles, nor their dates. All of this is not even “theological rocket-science” but mere parrot-fashion repetition of mere facts that require no great learning nor understanding! Little children are taught to learn and repeat those facts! Yet adults are clueless about many of them. You cannot give to others what you do not have yourself!
How can parents (or teachers) instruct children on how to pray when they don’t know how to pray themselves. Reciting the words of a prayer in parrot fashion is not praying the prayer, but merely saying the prayer―which you could teach a parrot to say! Praying is more than merely saying. When it comes to meditation―wow, that is spiritual rocket science that very few want or dare to try! How can you teach a child to meditate if you yourself are clueless on the subject and have rarely, if ever, meditated? There is lots of time to watch television, or browse the internet, or be glued to social media―but no time for the word of God, which is the Bible. What should be a daily reading, is rarely read at all! “The sensual man perceives not these things that are of the Spirit of God―for it is foolishness to him, and he cannot understand” (1 Corinthians 2:14).
Blind towards God, but not the World
All of this is symptomatic of a spiritual blindness. “The god of this world [Satan] has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that the light of the Gospel of Christ should not shine unto them” (2 Corinthians 4:4). It is hardly surprising that Our Lord says: “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). “Broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Holy Scripture adds: “Hear O foolish people without understanding―who have eyes and see not; and have ears and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21) … “You that see many things―will you not observe them? You that have ears open, will you not hear?” (Isaias 42:20) ... “Having eyes, do you not see? And having ears, can you not hear? Neither do you remember?” (Mark 8:18) … “They would not listen … They shut their ears, not to hear!” (Zacharias 7:11) … “Son of man, you dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see, and see not; and have ears to hear, and hear not―for they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2). “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and ears, and hear not! Will not you then fear Me, says the Lord, and will you not repent at My presence? … The heart of this people is become hard of belief and provoking―they have revolted and gone away. And they have not said in their heart: ‘Let us fear the Lord our God!’” (Jeremias 5:21-24).
As a punishment, “God has given them the spirit of insensibility―eyes that they should not see; and ears that they should not hear!” (Romans 11:8). “O foolish people without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21). “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand!” (Matthew 13:13). “His watchmen [parents, teachers, priests] are all blind, they are all ignorant; dumb dogs not able to bark; seeing vain things; sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10). “Woe to you blind guides! … Ye foolish and blind!” (Matthew 23:16-17). “Understand these things―you that forget God―lest He snatch you away and there be none to deliver you!” (Psalm 49:22). “Understand, ye senseless among the people! You fools―be wise at last!” (Psalm 93:8).
What is frightening and disconcerting is the fact that so many foolish Catholics turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the reality that most Catholic souls end up being damned! It is as though by closing their eyes and ears to this indisputable fact, they imagine that it will go away!
St. Thomas the Apostle did not believe the other Apostles when they told him that Jesus had risen from the dead. “Thomas, one of the Twelve Apostles, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Unless I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe!’ After eight days His disciples were again within and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst of them, and said to Thomas: ‘Put in your finger here and see My hands; and bring here your hand and put it into My side; and be not faithless, but believing!’” (John 20:24-27).
Our Lord, on another occasion, lamented: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6). “You are saved through Faith!” (Ephesians 2:8). That is why Our Lord says: “Go ye into the whole world and preach the gospel to every creature … Teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you! … He that believes and is baptized, shall be saved―but he that believes not shall be condemned!” (Matthew 28:19-20; Mark 16:16).
Thus “Faith comes by hearing … the word of Christ … This is the word of Faith which we preach” (Romans 10:17: 10:8). Faith is concerned with knowledge about God and the things of God―we must learn about God and that involves being taught about God: “Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed” (John 20:29). We have not seen God; we have not seen Christ; we cannot see Christ in the Holy Eucharist―but we believe. We did not hear Christ preach and teach―but we believe what He is said to have preached and taught on account of the authority of others―the Apostles, who then passed down what they heard throughout all centuries in the writings of the New Testament.
“This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Fight the good fight of Faith! (1 Timothy 6:12) “…taking the shield of Faith, with which you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:16). But how important is the Faith to people? The less important it is, the weaker their Faith is likely to be―and the weaker their Faith is, the less and less will they live their Faith and be more and more susceptible to losing their Faith. Hence it is that Our Lord indicated that He would find very little “Faith on Earth” when He comes again (Luke 18:8) and Our Lady of Good Success, in referring to our times, spoke of “the small number of souls who will preserve the treasures of the Faith.”
The Fate of Faith
Regarding the Faith, Our Lady of La Salette and Good Success said of our times: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell. They will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises! … The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... Churches will be locked up or desecrated … and altars will be sacked … Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death ... The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts … Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned ... The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom … The Gospel of Jesus Christ having been forgotten … the devil will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals] ... The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent and be superior to others! … In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost!”
The words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda expand upon this notion of spiritual blindness: “Just as the material sun denies its light and warmth to nothing that is capable and fit for its influence, so also the divine Wisdom invites and calls out to all, and hides itself or denies itself to no one. But the foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf; their impious malice makes them scoffers; and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God, whose Wisdom finds no place in the malevolent heart, nor in a body that is subject to sin. This Wisdom seems far from the mind of carnal men: with a most perverse blindness they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them. Because they never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or reckoning of It. How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! The inestimable treasure of the virtue of divine Faith is hidden to those mortals who have only carnal and earthly eyes ... Under the outwardly good intention, are often hidden the earthly passions and inclinations, which dominate the heart.
“Open thy eyes in the deep darkness and blindness which overwhelm men around you! … The wisdom of the flesh―worldly wisdom―has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God! Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom! … Man is full of blindest inclinations, and if he does not restrain them, he will begin to ask for that which will cause his eternal perdition. Men blindly pursue the deceitful and vile delights of the senses ... In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls, and they hold as being wisdom that which is nothing but diabolical and earthly ignorance! ... The judgments of men are only too easily blinded by their passions … They follow their blind passions, seeking after possessions or the transitory pleasures―all of which will end with this life … Earthly-minded men blindly prefer temporal blessings, forgetting the eternal ones … This blind greed is the root of all evils … God knows that this insane love will pervert the greater part of the human nature! …
“There is only one true Good, the highest Good is to be appreciated and recognized. All the other lesser goods are merely fictitious and apparent. Then only shall you give God true appreciation and love, when you shall enjoy and esteem Him above all created things. But this wisdom seems far from the mind of carnal men―for, with a most perverse blindness, they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them. Because they never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or appreciation of it. O what an execrable disorder and what a despicable blindness of mortals! O most unhappy blindness of mortals! O torpid negligence, that holds in deceit so many souls! There are not words or sentences sufficient to describe this terrible and tremendous danger. They allow themselves to be so insanely blinded by the devil―so that they neither see nor avoid this danger! They are not aware of the cause of their evil state and of their blindness!
“The wisdom of the sons of this world is carnal and diabolical, and their ways lead to death! Many are the faithless, many the bad Catholics, many the hypocrites! Their inclinations and their blind love of visible things, hold them back. The sons of the world are ignorant, precisely because they are lovers of earthly riches. They feel and suffer the heavy weight of riches, which pins them to the Earth and drives them into its very bowels to seek gold and silver with great anxiety, sleeplessness, labors and sweat―as if they were not men, but wild beasts that do not know what they are suffering and doing. And if they are thus weighed down before acquiring riches, then how much more are they weighed down when they have come into possession of those riches and possessions? Such souls receive an earthly reward―but no heavenly reward! In this manner has he been able to introduce into the world his tyrannical power, spreading among men forgetfulness of death, judgment, Heaven and Hell, and casting so many nations from abyss to abyss of darkness. Let the countless numbers that have fallen into Hell with their burden, proclaim it! This cruel enemy avails himself in order fills their minds with images of creatures and draw them away from their salvation or make them incapable of it.
“Their inclinations and their blind love of visible things, detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart―these inclinations and this blindness rob them of remembrance and affection toward these higher things, which could raise them above their worldliness. Instead of fearing and avoiding the occasions of evil, they encounter and seek for them in blind ignorance. In senseless fury they follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and care not where they walk, even if to the most dangerous precipices. How many men whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―on account of the lack of light of Faith, from the darkness of their unbelief―have thrown themselves into most abominable sins, and thence into the eternal darkness of Hell! How many kingdoms and provinces, being blind themselves, follow these still more blind leaders, until they together fall into the abyss of eternal pains, and they are followed by the bad Christians! Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error, who, desiring to appear wise, speak much and multiply words like the foolish.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
A Faithless Modern Catholic World
Today’s Catholic world is becoming increasingly faithless―from the top down; from pope, down through cardinals, bishops, priests, religious orders and laity. As Our Lady said above: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them … The work of the devil will infiltrate into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises! … The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts … Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned! … A small number of souls will preserve the treasures of the Faith.”
Since the close of the Second Vatican Council in 1965, the number of priests in the United States has fallen by around 40%. The decline in graduate level seminarians in the U.S. is even worse―having fallen by 57%. Only 64% of U.S. diocesan priests are active in ministry―which is a fall of 26% from the 90% active priests in 1970. The number of U.S. religious brothers and sisters has declined sharply since 1965―approximately a 68% fall in religious brothers and a fall of 75% in religious sisters. We have closed a Catholic parish in the United States every three days for the past thirty-five years. 3,500 parishes in the United States are now without a resident priest. We have closed a Catholic school in the United States every four days for the past twenty-five years.
As for the laity, only about 15% of U.S. adults who were raised Catholic as children, have remained practicing Catholics attending weekly Sunday Mass into adulthood. Modern Catholics are experiencing a crisis of faith. More than fifty million Catholics in the United States have stopped practicing their faith over the past thirty years. Around 1 in 4 (23%) Catholics regularly fulfill their obligation of attending Sunday Mass. Materialism and secularism have been eroding the Faith of Catholics for decades. One of the many catastrophic results is that only 31% percent of Catholics in the United States believe Jesus is truly present in the Holy Eucharist. More than 6 out of every 10 Catholics accept abortion. Over 95% have practiced contraception. Faith is weak! Faith is declining! Faith is collapsing! “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6). We are becoming increasingly myopic or even blind to the spiritual―while we have the eye of an eagle for the material!
God can rightly say of today’s Modern Catholics: “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool hath said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that doth good, no not one! With their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear! They have been confounded, because God has despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6).
“And they said: ‘We will go after our own thoughts, and we will do every one according to the perverseness of his evil heart!’” (Jeremias 18:12)―which is exactly what we are doing today, following our own thoughts and opinions, our own personal preferences and desires, but not the preferences and desires of God. “Thus have you spoken, for I know the thoughts of your heart!” (Ezechiel 11:5). “They will not set their thoughts to return to their God―for the spirit of fornication is in the midst of them, and they have not known the Lord!” (Osee 5:4)―which is the case today, where, as Our Lady said, most marriages are not of God, cohabitation increases daily, and sexual sins and homosexual sins have sky-rocketed―all of which underlines the truth of Our Lady’s words when she said the sin that damns most souls today is the sin of impurity―whether in thought, word or action. Yet most people think that all of these sins are acceptable nowadays, for times have changed and morals have changed with the times. They who think this way, think wrong!
Holy Scripture has already condemned such thoughts, saying: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil―that put darkness for light, and light for darkness―that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20). “For the Holy Spirit of discipline will flee from the deceitful, and will withdraw himself from thoughts that are without understanding, and he shall not abide when iniquity comes in” (Wisdom 1:5). “Their thoughts are unprofitable thoughts!” (Isaias 59:7). “How long shall hurtful thoughts abide in thee?” (Jeremias 4:14). “The Lord will search out your thoughts!” (Wisdom 6:4). “Inquisition shall be made into the thoughts of the ungodly” (Wisdom 1:9). “Evil thoughts are an abomination to the Lord!” (Proverbs 15:26). “For perverse thoughts separate from God” (Wisdom 1:3).
There is so much focus on what we think about things personally, that the thoughts of God are largely or totally ignored: “When they knew God, they have not glorified Him as God, or given thanks―but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened!” (Romans 1:21). Yet it is what God thinks that is the most important―for God will be the judge of all our thoughts (and words and actions) one day―and our salvation and damnation will not depend upon what we think, but what God thinks. “Hear, O Earth! Behold I will bring evils upon this people―the fruits of their own thoughts―because they have not heard My words, and they have cast away My law” (Jeremias 6:19).
Family Failures in Faith
Faith is focus on God and the things of God. Faith comes first in acquisition―Charity comes first in importance. Faith is about knowing―Charity is about loving. We cannot love what we do not know―hence we have to get to know God through Faith before we can love Him through Charity. “Faith worketh by Charity” (Galatians 5:6) … “If I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not Charity―then I am nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:2). We have all heard the secular proverb: “Charity begins at home!” The same has to be said about Faith. A child receives the gift of Faith at its baptism―but it is the parents who must nourish, grow and strengthen that Faith in the opening years of the child’s life. The Church teaches that parents are primary educators of their children―the Church and schools merely assist the parents in their teaching vocation. However, as the philosophical axiom states: “Nemo dat quod non habet" which means “no one can give what they do not have.” If you know little or nothing about the Faith, then you can only teach your children little or nothing about the Faith.
Sadly, most Catholics could not name the Ten Commandments of God―they might know some of them, but rarely all of them. They know even less about the Six Chief Commandments of the Church. Ask them to name the conditions that must be present for a sin to be a mortal sin―and most Catholics will struggle to name them all. Ask them how many books there are in the Old Testament and how many in the New Testament―and they are lost! Don’t even dare to ask them to name those books! Most Catholics today have even forgotten their First Holy Communion Catechism teachings. Ask them to name the difference between Sanctifying Grace and Actual Grace―and most will scratch their heads. Ask them what are the chief effects of Original Sin―and they will stare at you blankly. Ask them to name the Holy Days of Obligation in the U.S. and most Catholics will not know how many there are, nor their titles, nor their dates. All of this is not even “theological rocket-science” but mere parrot-fashion repetition of mere facts that require no great learning nor understanding! Little children are taught to learn and repeat those facts! Yet adults are clueless about many of them. You cannot give to others what you do not have yourself!
How can parents (or teachers) instruct children on how to pray when they don’t know how to pray themselves. Reciting the words of a prayer in parrot fashion is not praying the prayer, but merely saying the prayer―which you could teach a parrot to say! Praying is more than merely saying. When it comes to meditation―wow, that is spiritual rocket science that very few want or dare to try! How can you teach a child to meditate if you yourself are clueless on the subject and have rarely, if ever, meditated? There is lots of time to watch television, or browse the internet, or be glued to social media―but no time for the word of God, which is the Bible. What should be a daily reading, is rarely read at all! “The sensual man perceives not these things that are of the Spirit of God―for it is foolishness to him, and he cannot understand” (1 Corinthians 2:14).
Blind towards God, but not the World
All of this is symptomatic of a spiritual blindness. “The god of this world [Satan] has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that the light of the Gospel of Christ should not shine unto them” (2 Corinthians 4:4). It is hardly surprising that Our Lord says: “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). “Broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Holy Scripture adds: “Hear O foolish people without understanding―who have eyes and see not; and have ears and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21) … “You that see many things―will you not observe them? You that have ears open, will you not hear?” (Isaias 42:20) ... “Having eyes, do you not see? And having ears, can you not hear? Neither do you remember?” (Mark 8:18) … “They would not listen … They shut their ears, not to hear!” (Zacharias 7:11) … “Son of man, you dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see, and see not; and have ears to hear, and hear not―for they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2). “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and ears, and hear not! Will not you then fear Me, says the Lord, and will you not repent at My presence? … The heart of this people is become hard of belief and provoking―they have revolted and gone away. And they have not said in their heart: ‘Let us fear the Lord our God!’” (Jeremias 5:21-24).
As a punishment, “God has given them the spirit of insensibility―eyes that they should not see; and ears that they should not hear!” (Romans 11:8). “O foolish people without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21). “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand!” (Matthew 13:13). “His watchmen [parents, teachers, priests] are all blind, they are all ignorant; dumb dogs not able to bark; seeing vain things; sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10). “Woe to you blind guides! … Ye foolish and blind!” (Matthew 23:16-17). “Understand these things―you that forget God―lest He snatch you away and there be none to deliver you!” (Psalm 49:22). “Understand, ye senseless among the people! You fools―be wise at last!” (Psalm 93:8).
What is frightening and disconcerting is the fact that so many foolish Catholics turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the reality that most Catholic souls end up being damned! It is as though by closing their eyes and ears to this indisputable fact, they imagine that it will go away!
Article 6
Sunday, November 10th
So What Now? Where To?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, November 10th
So What Now? Where To?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Holiness or Hollywood?
So the Election is over―the results are almost complete. We have a Republican President, a Republican majority in the Senate, and most likely it will also be a Republican majority in the House of Representatives. So where to America? Are you on the path to holiness, or on the road to Hollywood? One way or another, MAGA ― Trump’s political slogan “Make America Great Again” ― will happen. Either America will be “Great” in the eyes of God by embracing God’s Laws and acquiring holiness―or America will be in “Great Mess” by continuing to blindly walk down the paths of secularism, materialism and hedonism (the seeking of pleasures). There are no other paths available―as Our Lord said: “He that is not with Me, is against Me! … Everyone therefore that shall confess me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:32-33).
Hollywood is the land of make-believe. The mainstream media also is often a land of make-believe―which often does report the actual truth, but a version of truth that they want you to believe. Christ is Truth itself―Satan is a liar. Christ says of Himself: “I am the way and the truth!” (John 14:6). Speaking of Satan, Christ says: “He was a murderer from the beginning and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44). Satan is all about making the lie seem to be true. The phrase “Repeat a lie enough times and it will be believed” is often attributed to Joseph Goebbels, a Nazi propaganda minister for Adolf Hitler, and encapsulates the concept of the “Big Lie” ― where a large-scale falsehood, if repeated persistently, will most likely be accepted as truth by the majority of the public, even when there is evidence that contradicts it.
What is really true is also good. What is really true is also morally good. Truth and goodness cannot be opposed or separated. Truth and morality cannot be opposed or separated. Goodness and morality cannot be separated. We cannot―each and every one of us―have our own personal idea of truth, goodness or morality. Truth, goodness and morality exist outside of us and our own little world. We are not the creators of truth, goodness or morality―we can only reflect truth, goodness and morality. That is why we say truth, goodness and morality are objective and not subjective―they do not depend upon us, but exist independently of us and our opinions. We must conform to what is true―we cannot make truth conform to our wishes, opinions or biases.
What Are You Eating and Drinking?
Almost half of the tap water in the US is contaminated with “forever chemicals” known as PFAS, according to a study. These chemicals are linked to learning delays in children, cancer, and other health problems Similarly, movies and television are like PFAS in the sense that they transmit “make-believes” into our minds―which contaminate or corrupt the health of truth in our minds, thereby creating all kinds of problems in our spiritual and moral lives. Just as man-made foods are inferior to God-made foods, so too has man tried to create “man-made truths” that are opposed and inferior to “God’s truths.”
Half of Americans in a recent survey indicated they believe national news organizations intend to mislead, misinform or persuade the public. Asked in the survey whether they agreed with the statement that national news organizations do not intend to mislead, 50% of respondents said they disagreed―they believe there is an intent to deceive. Who owns the national news organizations? The mainstream news media is controlled by a small number of persons or organizations. Concentration of media ownership, also known as media consolidation or media convergence, is a process wherein fewer individuals or organizations control shares of the mass media. As of 2022, the largest media conglomerates in America are AT&T, Comcast (which owns NBC, CNBC, MSNBC, Telemundo), The Walt Disney Company (which owns ABC, ESPN, Vice), National Amusements (which includes Viacom Inc. and CBS), Warner Bros. Discovery (which owns CNN) News Corp (which owns FOX). Most newspapers are ultimately under the control of seven companies. For example, the company Gannett owns more than 200 daily newspapers, around 175 weekly newspapers and USA Today. Just 37 years ago, there were 50 companies in charge of most American media. Now, 90% of the media in the United States is controlled by just six corporations.
So the Election is over―the results are almost complete. We have a Republican President, a Republican majority in the Senate, and most likely it will also be a Republican majority in the House of Representatives. So where to America? Are you on the path to holiness, or on the road to Hollywood? One way or another, MAGA ― Trump’s political slogan “Make America Great Again” ― will happen. Either America will be “Great” in the eyes of God by embracing God’s Laws and acquiring holiness―or America will be in “Great Mess” by continuing to blindly walk down the paths of secularism, materialism and hedonism (the seeking of pleasures). There are no other paths available―as Our Lord said: “He that is not with Me, is against Me! … Everyone therefore that shall confess me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:32-33).
Hollywood is the land of make-believe. The mainstream media also is often a land of make-believe―which often does report the actual truth, but a version of truth that they want you to believe. Christ is Truth itself―Satan is a liar. Christ says of Himself: “I am the way and the truth!” (John 14:6). Speaking of Satan, Christ says: “He was a murderer from the beginning and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44). Satan is all about making the lie seem to be true. The phrase “Repeat a lie enough times and it will be believed” is often attributed to Joseph Goebbels, a Nazi propaganda minister for Adolf Hitler, and encapsulates the concept of the “Big Lie” ― where a large-scale falsehood, if repeated persistently, will most likely be accepted as truth by the majority of the public, even when there is evidence that contradicts it.
What is really true is also good. What is really true is also morally good. Truth and goodness cannot be opposed or separated. Truth and morality cannot be opposed or separated. Goodness and morality cannot be separated. We cannot―each and every one of us―have our own personal idea of truth, goodness or morality. Truth, goodness and morality exist outside of us and our own little world. We are not the creators of truth, goodness or morality―we can only reflect truth, goodness and morality. That is why we say truth, goodness and morality are objective and not subjective―they do not depend upon us, but exist independently of us and our opinions. We must conform to what is true―we cannot make truth conform to our wishes, opinions or biases.
What Are You Eating and Drinking?
Almost half of the tap water in the US is contaminated with “forever chemicals” known as PFAS, according to a study. These chemicals are linked to learning delays in children, cancer, and other health problems Similarly, movies and television are like PFAS in the sense that they transmit “make-believes” into our minds―which contaminate or corrupt the health of truth in our minds, thereby creating all kinds of problems in our spiritual and moral lives. Just as man-made foods are inferior to God-made foods, so too has man tried to create “man-made truths” that are opposed and inferior to “God’s truths.”
Half of Americans in a recent survey indicated they believe national news organizations intend to mislead, misinform or persuade the public. Asked in the survey whether they agreed with the statement that national news organizations do not intend to mislead, 50% of respondents said they disagreed―they believe there is an intent to deceive. Who owns the national news organizations? The mainstream news media is controlled by a small number of persons or organizations. Concentration of media ownership, also known as media consolidation or media convergence, is a process wherein fewer individuals or organizations control shares of the mass media. As of 2022, the largest media conglomerates in America are AT&T, Comcast (which owns NBC, CNBC, MSNBC, Telemundo), The Walt Disney Company (which owns ABC, ESPN, Vice), National Amusements (which includes Viacom Inc. and CBS), Warner Bros. Discovery (which owns CNN) News Corp (which owns FOX). Most newspapers are ultimately under the control of seven companies. For example, the company Gannett owns more than 200 daily newspapers, around 175 weekly newspapers and USA Today. Just 37 years ago, there were 50 companies in charge of most American media. Now, 90% of the media in the United States is controlled by just six corporations.
|
|
|
Digging Deeper into the Deep
These above “Big Six” companies―and other lesser giants―are not owned by the CEO, but by shareholders. The CEO is merely the “front-man” for the behind-scenes-owners. There are three major investment companies that own the most shares in just about all the chief corporations and companies―these are the (1) Vanguard Group, (2) BlackRock Inc., and (3) State Street Corp.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in Warner Bros. Discovery.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in Comcast.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in The Walt Disney Company.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in National Amusements.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in News Corp.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in Sony Group Corporation.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in Gannet.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in Sinclair.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp collectively own each other. These companies are owned by their funds; and those funds are owned by the shareholders―but that is where things become misty, smoky, vague and hidden. The names of those shareholders are untraceable. They are hidden behind-the-scenes and use “front-men” to do their work.
BlackRock’s CEO, Larry Fink, angled for the position of Treasury Secretary when it looked like Hillary Clinton might be president. He served briefly on an advisory committee for Donald Trump and was heavily promoted to be Treasury Secretary in the Biden Administration. Fink’s former chief of staff at BlackRock, Adewale “Wally” Adeyemo, is now deputy secretary of the U.S. Treasury. Former BlackRock executive Brian Deese is Biden’s top economic advisor; former BlackRock executive Michael Pyle serves as chief economic advisor to Vice President Kamala Harris. Critics call BlackRock a “great vampire squid,” a “shadow bank,” and “almost a shadow government”—one that cleverly and neatly avoids the spotlight.
And You Thought Trump is the Man in Charge!
There are many gullible, naïve, foolish people who imagine that the President of the United States is the most powerful person in the land! Past presidents of the United States and other high profile political leaders have repeatedly issued warnings over the last 214 years that the U.S. government is under the control of an “invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.”
According to six of our former presidents, one vice-president, and a myriad of other high profile political leaders, an invisible government that is “incredibly evil in intent” has been in control of the U.S. government “ever since the days of Andrew Jackson” (since at least 1836). They “virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties … It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.”
As a result, “we have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.”
The sources for the above quotes (and more) are listed below. All of the quotes in this article have been verified as authentic and have associated links to the source materials. Also included below are statements made by David Rockefeller Sr., former director of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), and Federal Reserve Chairman’s Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke that appear to confirm some of the warnings.
Warnings About the Invisible Government Running the U.S.
The warnings listed below, which appear in chronological order, began with the first U.S. president ― George Washington. The last president to speak out was John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated. Read what they and other political leaders have said about the invisible government.
► PRESIDENT GEORGE WASHINGTON wrote that the Illuminati want to separate the People from their Government: “It was not my intention to doubt that the Doctrines of the Illuminati and principles of Jacobinism had not spread in the United States. On the contrary, no one is more truly satisfied of this fact than I am. The idea, that I meant to convey, was that I did not believe that the Lodges of Free Masons in this Country had, as Societies, endeavored to propagate the diabolical tenets of the first, or pernicious principles of the latter (if they are susceptible of separation). That Individuals of them may … actually had a separation of the People from their Government in view, is too evident to be questioned.” (George Washington, 1st President of the United States (1789―1797), from a letter that Washington wrote on October 24th, 1798, which can be found in the Library of Congress. For an analysis of Washington’s warning, see the article “Library of Congress: George Washington Warns of Illuminati”).
► PRESIDENT THOMAS JEFFERSON wrote: “I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.” (Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States (1801―1809) and principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence (1776), in a letter written to John Taylor on May 28th, 1816).
► VICE-PRESIDENT JOHN C. CALHOUN stated: “A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various powerful interests, combined in one mass, and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in banks.” (John C. Calhoun, Vice President (1825-1832) and U.S. Senator, from a speech given on May 27th, 1836).
Note that it appears that Washington’s and Jefferson’s concerns regarding bankers and separation of the people from the government was realized by 1836. This fact was confirmed in a letter written by Franklyn D. Roosevelt in 1933 (see below) in which he wrote that “a financial element in the large centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” Jackson was the seventh president of the United States (1829-1837). Calhoun served as Jackson’s vice-president from 1829-1832.
► PRESIDENT THEODORE ROOSEVELT said: “Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day.” (Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, An Autobiography, 1913, Appendix B).
► PRESIDENT WOODROW WILSON said: “A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is privately concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men … [W]e have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► PRESIDENT WOODROW WILSON also said: “Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men’s views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► NEW YORK CITY MAYOR JOHN F. HYLAN stated: “The real menace of our Republic is the invisible government, which like a giant octopus sprawls its slimy legs over our cities, states and nation… The little coterie of powerful international bankers virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties, … and control the majority of the newspapers and magazines in this country. They use the columns of these papers to club into submission or drive out of office public officials who refuse to do the bidding of the powerful corrupt cliques which compose the invisible government. It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.” (New York City Mayor John F. Hylan, New York Times, March 26th, 1922).
► CONGRESSMAN LOUIS T. MCFADDEN said: “Mr. Chairman, we have in this country one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Banks. The Federal Reserve Board, a Government board, has cheated the Government of the United States and the people of the United States out of enough money to pay the national debt…Mr. Chairman, when the Federal Reserve act was passed, the people of the United States did not perceive that a world system was being set up here… and that this country was to supply financial power to an international superstate — a superstate controlled by international bankers and international industrialists acting together to enslave the world for their own pleasure.” (Congressman Louis T. McFadden, from a speech delivered to the House of Representatives on June 10th, 1932).
► PRESIDENT FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT stated: “The real truth of the matter is―as you and I know―that a financial element, in the large centers, has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” (Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States (1933―1945), in a letter to Colonel Edward M. House, dated November 21st, 1933, as quoted in F.D.R. ― His Personal Letters, 1928-1945).
► SENATOR WILLIAM JENNER said: “Today the path to total dictatorship in the U.S. can be laid by strictly legal means … We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state … It operates secretly, silently, continuously to transform our Government … This ruthless power-seeking elite is a disease of our century… This group…is answerable neither to the President, the Congress, nor the courts. It is practically irremovable.” (Senator William Jenner, 1954 speech).
► J. EDGAR HOOVER stated: “The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous, he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent.” (J. Edgar Hoover, The Elks Magazine, 1956).
► PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY said: “The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are, as a people, inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings … Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe … No war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are awaiting a finding of “clear and present danger,” then I can only say that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent … For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy, that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence―on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources, into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine, that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.” (John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States, from a speech delivered to the American Newspaper Publishers Association on April 27th, 1961 and known as the “Secret Society” speech).
► CONGRESSMAN LARRY P. MCDONALD stated: “The Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world. Do I mean conspiracy? Yes, I do. I am convinced there is such a plot, international in scope, generations old in planning, and incredibly evil in intent.” (Congressman Larry P. McDonald, November 1975, from the introduction to a book titled The Rockefeller File).
► SENATOR DANIEL K. INOUYE said: “There exists a shadowy government with its own Air Force, its own Navy, its own fundraising mechanism, and the ability to pursue its own ideas of national interest, free from all checks and balances, and free from the law itself.” (Daniel K. Inouye, US Senator from Hawaii, testimony at the Iran Contra Hearings, 1986).
The Federal Reserve
“A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves…” (John C. Calhoun).
“… owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.” (Theodore Roosevelt).
“… one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Bank.“ (Louis T. McFadden).
In an interview with Jim Lehrer that was aired on PBS’ News Hour, on September 18th, 2007, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said, essentially, that the Federal Reserve was above the law and that no agency of government can overrule their actions:
Jim Lehrer asked: “What is the proper relationship, what should be the proper relationship between a chairman of the Fed [Federal Reserve] and a president of the United States?” Alan Greenspan replied: “Well, first of all, the Federal Reserve is an independent agency, and that means, basically, that there is no other agency of government which can overrule actions that we take. So long as that is in place and there is no evidence that the administration, or the Congress, or anybody else, is requesting that we do things other than what we think is the appropriate thing, then what the relationships are don’t frankly matter.”
The fact that the Federal Reserve is above the law was demonstrated by the former Federal Reserve chairman, Ben Bernanke, during his appearance before Congress on March 4th, 2009. Senator Bernie Sanders asked Bernanke about $2.2 trillion in American tax dollars that was lent out by Federal Reserve. Bernanke refused to provide an answer. Senator Sanders asked: “Will you tell the American people to whom you lent $2.2 trillion of their dollars? … Can you tell us who they are?” Bernanke replied: “No!”
“We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state…” (William Jenner).
“The Rockefellers and their allies have―for at least fifty years―been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world.” (Larry P. McDonald).
In 1921 the stockholders of the Federal Reserve financed an organization called the “Council on Foreign Relations” (CFR). A full discussion on the CFR is beyond the scope of this article. Suffice it to say that the CFR likely plays a prominent role in the invisible government that we have been warned about. The CFR is alleged to be the arm of the Ruling Elite in the United States. Most influential politicians, academics and media personalities are members.
These above “Big Six” companies―and other lesser giants―are not owned by the CEO, but by shareholders. The CEO is merely the “front-man” for the behind-scenes-owners. There are three major investment companies that own the most shares in just about all the chief corporations and companies―these are the (1) Vanguard Group, (2) BlackRock Inc., and (3) State Street Corp.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in Warner Bros. Discovery.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in Comcast.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in The Walt Disney Company.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in National Amusements.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in News Corp.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in Sony Group Corporation.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in Gannet.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp are the top shareholders in Sinclair.
Vanguard Group, BlackRock Inc., and State Street Corp collectively own each other. These companies are owned by their funds; and those funds are owned by the shareholders―but that is where things become misty, smoky, vague and hidden. The names of those shareholders are untraceable. They are hidden behind-the-scenes and use “front-men” to do their work.
BlackRock’s CEO, Larry Fink, angled for the position of Treasury Secretary when it looked like Hillary Clinton might be president. He served briefly on an advisory committee for Donald Trump and was heavily promoted to be Treasury Secretary in the Biden Administration. Fink’s former chief of staff at BlackRock, Adewale “Wally” Adeyemo, is now deputy secretary of the U.S. Treasury. Former BlackRock executive Brian Deese is Biden’s top economic advisor; former BlackRock executive Michael Pyle serves as chief economic advisor to Vice President Kamala Harris. Critics call BlackRock a “great vampire squid,” a “shadow bank,” and “almost a shadow government”—one that cleverly and neatly avoids the spotlight.
And You Thought Trump is the Man in Charge!
There are many gullible, naïve, foolish people who imagine that the President of the United States is the most powerful person in the land! Past presidents of the United States and other high profile political leaders have repeatedly issued warnings over the last 214 years that the U.S. government is under the control of an “invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.”
According to six of our former presidents, one vice-president, and a myriad of other high profile political leaders, an invisible government that is “incredibly evil in intent” has been in control of the U.S. government “ever since the days of Andrew Jackson” (since at least 1836). They “virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties … It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.”
As a result, “we have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.”
The sources for the above quotes (and more) are listed below. All of the quotes in this article have been verified as authentic and have associated links to the source materials. Also included below are statements made by David Rockefeller Sr., former director of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), and Federal Reserve Chairman’s Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke that appear to confirm some of the warnings.
Warnings About the Invisible Government Running the U.S.
The warnings listed below, which appear in chronological order, began with the first U.S. president ― George Washington. The last president to speak out was John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated. Read what they and other political leaders have said about the invisible government.
► PRESIDENT GEORGE WASHINGTON wrote that the Illuminati want to separate the People from their Government: “It was not my intention to doubt that the Doctrines of the Illuminati and principles of Jacobinism had not spread in the United States. On the contrary, no one is more truly satisfied of this fact than I am. The idea, that I meant to convey, was that I did not believe that the Lodges of Free Masons in this Country had, as Societies, endeavored to propagate the diabolical tenets of the first, or pernicious principles of the latter (if they are susceptible of separation). That Individuals of them may … actually had a separation of the People from their Government in view, is too evident to be questioned.” (George Washington, 1st President of the United States (1789―1797), from a letter that Washington wrote on October 24th, 1798, which can be found in the Library of Congress. For an analysis of Washington’s warning, see the article “Library of Congress: George Washington Warns of Illuminati”).
► PRESIDENT THOMAS JEFFERSON wrote: “I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.” (Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States (1801―1809) and principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence (1776), in a letter written to John Taylor on May 28th, 1816).
► VICE-PRESIDENT JOHN C. CALHOUN stated: “A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various powerful interests, combined in one mass, and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in banks.” (John C. Calhoun, Vice President (1825-1832) and U.S. Senator, from a speech given on May 27th, 1836).
Note that it appears that Washington’s and Jefferson’s concerns regarding bankers and separation of the people from the government was realized by 1836. This fact was confirmed in a letter written by Franklyn D. Roosevelt in 1933 (see below) in which he wrote that “a financial element in the large centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” Jackson was the seventh president of the United States (1829-1837). Calhoun served as Jackson’s vice-president from 1829-1832.
► PRESIDENT THEODORE ROOSEVELT said: “Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day.” (Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, An Autobiography, 1913, Appendix B).
► PRESIDENT WOODROW WILSON said: “A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is privately concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men … [W]e have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► PRESIDENT WOODROW WILSON also said: “Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men’s views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► NEW YORK CITY MAYOR JOHN F. HYLAN stated: “The real menace of our Republic is the invisible government, which like a giant octopus sprawls its slimy legs over our cities, states and nation… The little coterie of powerful international bankers virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties, … and control the majority of the newspapers and magazines in this country. They use the columns of these papers to club into submission or drive out of office public officials who refuse to do the bidding of the powerful corrupt cliques which compose the invisible government. It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.” (New York City Mayor John F. Hylan, New York Times, March 26th, 1922).
► CONGRESSMAN LOUIS T. MCFADDEN said: “Mr. Chairman, we have in this country one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Banks. The Federal Reserve Board, a Government board, has cheated the Government of the United States and the people of the United States out of enough money to pay the national debt…Mr. Chairman, when the Federal Reserve act was passed, the people of the United States did not perceive that a world system was being set up here… and that this country was to supply financial power to an international superstate — a superstate controlled by international bankers and international industrialists acting together to enslave the world for their own pleasure.” (Congressman Louis T. McFadden, from a speech delivered to the House of Representatives on June 10th, 1932).
► PRESIDENT FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT stated: “The real truth of the matter is―as you and I know―that a financial element, in the large centers, has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” (Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States (1933―1945), in a letter to Colonel Edward M. House, dated November 21st, 1933, as quoted in F.D.R. ― His Personal Letters, 1928-1945).
► SENATOR WILLIAM JENNER said: “Today the path to total dictatorship in the U.S. can be laid by strictly legal means … We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state … It operates secretly, silently, continuously to transform our Government … This ruthless power-seeking elite is a disease of our century… This group…is answerable neither to the President, the Congress, nor the courts. It is practically irremovable.” (Senator William Jenner, 1954 speech).
► J. EDGAR HOOVER stated: “The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous, he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent.” (J. Edgar Hoover, The Elks Magazine, 1956).
► PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY said: “The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are, as a people, inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings … Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe … No war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are awaiting a finding of “clear and present danger,” then I can only say that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent … For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy, that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence―on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources, into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine, that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.” (John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States, from a speech delivered to the American Newspaper Publishers Association on April 27th, 1961 and known as the “Secret Society” speech).
► CONGRESSMAN LARRY P. MCDONALD stated: “The Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world. Do I mean conspiracy? Yes, I do. I am convinced there is such a plot, international in scope, generations old in planning, and incredibly evil in intent.” (Congressman Larry P. McDonald, November 1975, from the introduction to a book titled The Rockefeller File).
► SENATOR DANIEL K. INOUYE said: “There exists a shadowy government with its own Air Force, its own Navy, its own fundraising mechanism, and the ability to pursue its own ideas of national interest, free from all checks and balances, and free from the law itself.” (Daniel K. Inouye, US Senator from Hawaii, testimony at the Iran Contra Hearings, 1986).
The Federal Reserve
“A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves…” (John C. Calhoun).
“… owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.” (Theodore Roosevelt).
“… one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Bank.“ (Louis T. McFadden).
In an interview with Jim Lehrer that was aired on PBS’ News Hour, on September 18th, 2007, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said, essentially, that the Federal Reserve was above the law and that no agency of government can overrule their actions:
Jim Lehrer asked: “What is the proper relationship, what should be the proper relationship between a chairman of the Fed [Federal Reserve] and a president of the United States?” Alan Greenspan replied: “Well, first of all, the Federal Reserve is an independent agency, and that means, basically, that there is no other agency of government which can overrule actions that we take. So long as that is in place and there is no evidence that the administration, or the Congress, or anybody else, is requesting that we do things other than what we think is the appropriate thing, then what the relationships are don’t frankly matter.”
The fact that the Federal Reserve is above the law was demonstrated by the former Federal Reserve chairman, Ben Bernanke, during his appearance before Congress on March 4th, 2009. Senator Bernie Sanders asked Bernanke about $2.2 trillion in American tax dollars that was lent out by Federal Reserve. Bernanke refused to provide an answer. Senator Sanders asked: “Will you tell the American people to whom you lent $2.2 trillion of their dollars? … Can you tell us who they are?” Bernanke replied: “No!”
“We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state…” (William Jenner).
“The Rockefellers and their allies have―for at least fifty years―been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world.” (Larry P. McDonald).
In 1921 the stockholders of the Federal Reserve financed an organization called the “Council on Foreign Relations” (CFR). A full discussion on the CFR is beyond the scope of this article. Suffice it to say that the CFR likely plays a prominent role in the invisible government that we have been warned about. The CFR is alleged to be the arm of the Ruling Elite in the United States. Most influential politicians, academics and media personalities are members.
Article 5
Thursday & Friday, November 7th & 8th
Who Really Won the Election?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Thursday & Friday, November 7th & 8th
Who Really Won the Election?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
So Who Won?
Did Donald Trump win? No! Did Kamala Harris win? No! Did the Republicans win the House and Senate? No! Did the Democrats win the House and Senate? No! “Are you crazy?” you will say. So who did win? Did the people win? Did democracy win? No!
Before we go further with this, let us raise the level of our gaze to a higher level. Let us get out of this “valley of tears” and valley of materialism―and ascend the mountain of God, so as to look at the big picture from God’s viewpoint, rather than the little picture of what is happening in one part of world in 2024―namely, the 2024 Presidential Election―which is only a fraction of the big picture. Wisdom is the highest virtue of the mind―just as Charity is the highest virtue of the heart. Wisdom is defined as the knowledge of the ultimate principle, ultimate cause, or ultimate reason of something, or, to put it another way―the knowledge of things by their ultimate “whys?” That is how we ought look at, examine, dissect and judge the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election results―with wisdom. Not earthly wisdom―which excludes God―but with heavenly wisdom which incorporates God and sees God as the ultimate cause of all things.
Looking Beneath the Surface and Behind the Veil
The opening line of Aristotle’s Metaphysics, is: “All men, by nature, desire to know.” We can seek to know earthly things, or heavenly things, or both. Wisdom is both the knowledge of and judgment about “divine things” and the ability to judge and direct human affairs according to divine truth (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia, q. 6; Ia-IIae, q. 69, art. 3; IIa-IIae, q. 8, art 6; IIa-IIae, q. 45, articles 1–5). Wisdom is knowledge's crowning point: a knowledge of causes, especially the ultimate causes of things. Wisdom is the grace to discern the will of God in every situation. The Gift of Wisdom assists me to see the world as God does, through a lens of love. Wisdom is understanding the truths behind our Catholic Faith, and then applying them to choose what God desires.
Superficiality is not wisdom. Taking things at face value is not wisdom. Believing all you hear is not wisdom. Failing to ask questions is not wisdom. Neglecting to dig-deeper is not wisdom. Failure to link things together in not wisdom. Failure to link things to God is not wisdom. Failure to see Satan and Hell having their hands in things is not wisdom. Failure to look beyond the immediate causes of things and search for the ultimate causes of things, is not wisdom.
Our Lord, Our Lady and Exorcists Unveil Things
Our Lord did not refer to Satan under the title “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) for no reason at all. If Satan is the prince of this world, then it logically follows that Satan has a certain command and control over this world and the people in the world―but always according to the permission and scope that God allows Satan to have. Satan can do nothing without God allowing it.
Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, stated: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican ... Legions of demons have lodged there! … In the Vatican there are members of Satanic cults―there are priests, monsignors and even cardinals! I know from people who reported to me how they got to know this directly. It is also something, that has been “confessed” several times by the Devil, himself, under obedience during the exorcisms … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office!”
Fr. Amorth is merely confirming what Our Lady foretold when she said: “I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … Masonry will take control of the civil government and will enact iniquitous laws, making it easy for everyone to live in sin … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil and ecclesiastical rights and authority ... During this time the Church will find herself attacked by terrible assaults from the Masonic sect … All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and discord will be seen, without love for country or family ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family.” (Our Lady of Good Success & Our Lady of La Salette).
A Heavenly Conspiracy Theory?
Is all of the above a conspiracy theory spread by Heaven? To think that would be the height of stupidity―for as Holy Scripture says, “God is not a man, that He should lie!” (Numbers 23:19)―or could we say: “God is not a politican, that He should lie!” And the Church teaches in the Catechism: “God cannot deceive, nor be deceived!” Whilst Christ says of Himself: “I am the truth!” (John 14:6).
Today’s Politics and Christ are Diametrically Opposed
Christ, Who is truth itself, says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). The current trend of world politics is evil―it is not based on the laws of Christ, it does serve Christ, no matter how many times it might say or sing” “God bless America!” They merely mention God with their lips, but not really follow Him with their heart. Our Lord says of such persons: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
In reality, “the kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3). This is clearly seen by almost universal legislation in favor of abortion, contraception, in-vitro-fertilization, sex-gender change, homosexuality, cohabitation in place of or prior to marriage, divorce, remarriage of divorcees, immodesty, impurity, elimination of religious education in the public schools, removal of prayer in public functions, etc. To the anti-Christian politicians of today―many of whom profess or pretend to be Christians―Christ would say: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words … If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love … This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
To the worldlings Christ says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (Matthew 10:22; 24:9; John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7). “They are of the world—therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them! We are of God. He that knows God, hears us. He that is not of God, hears us not. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error” (1 John 4:5-6). “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9).
Trump’s Victory Speech is a Loser in God’s Eyes
Extracts from Donald Trump’s Victory Speech Comments Upon Trump Speech
Below, you will find some selected extracts from Donald Trump's Below, you will find some comments regarding Donald Trump's Victory Speech, which
Victory Speech in the early hours of Wednesday, November 6th, compare the spirit and words of Trump to the spirit and words of Holy Scripture.
as the votes were being counted and it was becoming apparent that
he would win the 2024 Presidential Election.
Did Donald Trump win? No! Did Kamala Harris win? No! Did the Republicans win the House and Senate? No! Did the Democrats win the House and Senate? No! “Are you crazy?” you will say. So who did win? Did the people win? Did democracy win? No!
Before we go further with this, let us raise the level of our gaze to a higher level. Let us get out of this “valley of tears” and valley of materialism―and ascend the mountain of God, so as to look at the big picture from God’s viewpoint, rather than the little picture of what is happening in one part of world in 2024―namely, the 2024 Presidential Election―which is only a fraction of the big picture. Wisdom is the highest virtue of the mind―just as Charity is the highest virtue of the heart. Wisdom is defined as the knowledge of the ultimate principle, ultimate cause, or ultimate reason of something, or, to put it another way―the knowledge of things by their ultimate “whys?” That is how we ought look at, examine, dissect and judge the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election results―with wisdom. Not earthly wisdom―which excludes God―but with heavenly wisdom which incorporates God and sees God as the ultimate cause of all things.
Looking Beneath the Surface and Behind the Veil
The opening line of Aristotle’s Metaphysics, is: “All men, by nature, desire to know.” We can seek to know earthly things, or heavenly things, or both. Wisdom is both the knowledge of and judgment about “divine things” and the ability to judge and direct human affairs according to divine truth (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia, q. 6; Ia-IIae, q. 69, art. 3; IIa-IIae, q. 8, art 6; IIa-IIae, q. 45, articles 1–5). Wisdom is knowledge's crowning point: a knowledge of causes, especially the ultimate causes of things. Wisdom is the grace to discern the will of God in every situation. The Gift of Wisdom assists me to see the world as God does, through a lens of love. Wisdom is understanding the truths behind our Catholic Faith, and then applying them to choose what God desires.
Superficiality is not wisdom. Taking things at face value is not wisdom. Believing all you hear is not wisdom. Failing to ask questions is not wisdom. Neglecting to dig-deeper is not wisdom. Failure to link things together in not wisdom. Failure to link things to God is not wisdom. Failure to see Satan and Hell having their hands in things is not wisdom. Failure to look beyond the immediate causes of things and search for the ultimate causes of things, is not wisdom.
Our Lord, Our Lady and Exorcists Unveil Things
Our Lord did not refer to Satan under the title “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) for no reason at all. If Satan is the prince of this world, then it logically follows that Satan has a certain command and control over this world and the people in the world―but always according to the permission and scope that God allows Satan to have. Satan can do nothing without God allowing it.
Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, stated: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican ... Legions of demons have lodged there! … In the Vatican there are members of Satanic cults―there are priests, monsignors and even cardinals! I know from people who reported to me how they got to know this directly. It is also something, that has been “confessed” several times by the Devil, himself, under obedience during the exorcisms … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office!”
Fr. Amorth is merely confirming what Our Lady foretold when she said: “I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … Masonry will take control of the civil government and will enact iniquitous laws, making it easy for everyone to live in sin … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil and ecclesiastical rights and authority ... During this time the Church will find herself attacked by terrible assaults from the Masonic sect … All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and discord will be seen, without love for country or family ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family.” (Our Lady of Good Success & Our Lady of La Salette).
A Heavenly Conspiracy Theory?
Is all of the above a conspiracy theory spread by Heaven? To think that would be the height of stupidity―for as Holy Scripture says, “God is not a man, that He should lie!” (Numbers 23:19)―or could we say: “God is not a politican, that He should lie!” And the Church teaches in the Catechism: “God cannot deceive, nor be deceived!” Whilst Christ says of Himself: “I am the truth!” (John 14:6).
Today’s Politics and Christ are Diametrically Opposed
Christ, Who is truth itself, says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). The current trend of world politics is evil―it is not based on the laws of Christ, it does serve Christ, no matter how many times it might say or sing” “God bless America!” They merely mention God with their lips, but not really follow Him with their heart. Our Lord says of such persons: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
In reality, “the kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3). This is clearly seen by almost universal legislation in favor of abortion, contraception, in-vitro-fertilization, sex-gender change, homosexuality, cohabitation in place of or prior to marriage, divorce, remarriage of divorcees, immodesty, impurity, elimination of religious education in the public schools, removal of prayer in public functions, etc. To the anti-Christian politicians of today―many of whom profess or pretend to be Christians―Christ would say: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words … If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love … This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
To the worldlings Christ says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (Matthew 10:22; 24:9; John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7). “They are of the world—therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them! We are of God. He that knows God, hears us. He that is not of God, hears us not. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error” (1 John 4:5-6). “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9).
Trump’s Victory Speech is a Loser in God’s Eyes
Extracts from Donald Trump’s Victory Speech Comments Upon Trump Speech
Below, you will find some selected extracts from Donald Trump's Below, you will find some comments regarding Donald Trump's Victory Speech, which
Victory Speech in the early hours of Wednesday, November 6th, compare the spirit and words of Trump to the spirit and words of Holy Scripture.
as the votes were being counted and it was becoming apparent that
he would win the 2024 Presidential Election.
|
“Thank you very much! Wow! Well, I want to thank you all very much! … I want to thank Mike Johnson … I want to also thank my beautiful wife Melania and First Lady … I want to thank my whole family, my amazing children … Let me also express my tremendous appreciation for Susie [Wiles] and Chris [LaCivita] … I want to thank the U.S. Open champion, Bryson DeChambeau, he’s fantastic! ... I want to thank the millions of hard working Americans across the nation who have always been the heart and soul of this really great movement!
“We’ve been through so much together and today you showed up in record numbers to deliver a victory, probably like no other! … This was, I believe, the greatest political movement of all time! … We overcame obstacles that nobody thought possible and it is now clear that we’ve achieved the most incredible political thing! Look what happened! Is this crazy? But it’s a political victory that our country has never seen before, nothing like this! … “America has given us an unprecedented and powerful mandate! … I want to thank the American people for the extraordinary honor of being elected your 47th president and your 45th president … “And every citizen, I will fight for you, for your family and your future, every single day I will be fighting for you with every breath in my body, I will not rest until we have delivered the strong, safe and prosperous America that our children deserve and that you deserve. This will truly be the golden age of America, that’s what we have to have! ... This is also a massive victory for democracy and for freedom. Together, we’re going to unlock America’s glorious destiny. We’re going to achieve the most incredible future for our people … That’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to make our country better than it ever has been. “Many people have told me that God spared my life for a reason. And that reason was to save our country and to restore America to greatness. And now we are going to fulfill that mission together. We’re gonna fulfill that mission. The task before us will not be easy, but I will bring every ounce of energy, spirit, and fight that I have in my soul, to the job that you’ve entrusted to me! I will govern by a simple motto: Promises made, promises kept. We’re going to keep our promises. Nothing will stop me from keeping my word to you, the people. “We will make America safe, strong, prosperous, powerful, and free again! ... Success is going to bring us together and we are going to start by all putting America first ... We have to fix it―because together we can truly make America great again for all Americans! ... America’s future will be bigger, better, bolder, richer, safer and stronger than it has ever been before! God bless you and God bless America! Thank you very much. Thank you very much!” |
A lot of gratitude and thanks being expressed―but where is God? Gratitude is good, but gratitude can never exclude God. As Scripture says: “What hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7) … “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17) … “Give thanks always for all things, in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God the Father!” (Ephesians 5:20). “What have you that you have not received? And if you have received, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7)
Once again, no mention of God with regard to the “victory like no other! ...The greatest political movement of all time! ... The most incredible political thing! ... A political victory that our country has never seen before, nothing like it!” He should say: “Thanks be to God, who has given us the victory!” (1 Corinthians 15:57). What good is a political victory if it is not accompanied by a heavenly victory? Our Lord said: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Has America given you a powerful mandate? Or is it God? Christ said Pontius Pilate: “Thou shouldst not have any power against me, unless it were given thee from above!” (John 19:11). Like Pilate, Trump is too humanist and not godly. How can you fight for every citizen if the citizens are diametrically opposed to each other. Some want freedom of abortion while others want abortion banned. Same for homosexuality and same-sex marriages, etc. How can you possibly satisfy every citizen? It is blowing hot air and no more. Furthermore, to “unlock America's glorious destiny” and “achieve the most incredible future for our people” and “make our country better than it ever has been” is not going to happen without God. And if you continue to permit and legislate for sins such as abortion, homosexuality, same-sex marriages, contraception, etc. then God is not going to bless America―no matter how often you sing or say: “God bless America!” God won’t bless a godless America. The vast majority of America accept or desire blatant mortal sins. Trump says: “God spared my life … to restore America to greatness!” So God chooses someone living in a state of mortal sin to make America great? Someone who professes to be Christian―but knows little or nothing about Christianity or the Bible. Was America ever great? That is to say, was America ever great in the eyes of God? It was founded upon Freemasonic principles. It refused to have religion [God] involved in State matters. It has increasingly passed godless laws. The only acceptable way to “Make America Great [Again?]” is to make America holy for the first time in its history. Making America safe, strong, prosperous and powerful is not quite how God operates! Our Lady says: “He has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart! He has put down the mighty from their seat, and has exalted the humble! And the rich He has sent empty away!” (Luke 1:51-53). Our Lord adds: “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 19:24). “Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you!” (James 5:1) “Has not God chosen the poor in this world, rich in Faith?” (James 2:5). “Rejected by men, but chosen and made honorable by God!” (1 Peter 2:4). “I have chosen thee in the furnace of poverty!” (Isaias 48:10). “The base things of the world, and the things that are contemptible, and things that are not, God has chosen, so that He might bring to nought things that are!” (1 Corinthians 1:28). “The foolish things of the world hath God chosen, that he may confound the wise; and the weak things of the world hath God chosen, that he may confound the strong!” (1 Corinthians 1:27). |
Mary, not Trump, will Make America Great Again
The apparitions of Our Lady of America to Sister Mary Ephrem (Mildred Marie Neuzil) took place in the chapel of the Precious Blood Sisters Convent in Kneipp Springs Sanitarium (also spelt “Sanatorium”), near Rome City, Indiana, and later, the apparitions continued in Fostoria, Ohio. On September 25th, 1956, the eve of the feast of the North American Martyrs, Our Lady appeared to Sister Mary Ephrem as Our Lady of Lourdes. The next day, September 26th, 1956, on the actual feast of the North American Martyrs, she appeared to Sister Mary Ephrem for the first time as Our Lady of America, The Immaculate Virgin. On October 13th, 1956, Our Lady appeared as Our Lady of America, but instead of a lily in her hand, she held, with both hands, a small replica of the finished Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. She gave thanks to the Bishops and the faithful of America for this great gift in honor of her Immaculate Conception. On October 7th, 1957, the evening of the feast of the Most Holy Rosary, Our Lady again appeared. Strong warnings were repeated by Our Lady throughout 1957 and 1958. Below is a compilation and arrangement of the key elements of what Our Lady revealed.
“I am Our Lady of America. I am pleased with the love and honor my children in America give to me, especially through my glorious and unique privilege of the Immaculate Conception. I promise to reward their love by working―through the power of my Son’s Heart and my Immaculate Heart―miracles of grace among them. I do not promise miracles of the body, but of the soul. For it is mainly through these miracles of grace that the Holy Trinity is glorified among men and nations. Let America grow in its love for me, and I in return, in union with the Heart of my Son, promise to work wonders in her.
“I desire that my children honor me, especially by the purity of their lives … I wish it to be the country dedicated to my purity. The wonders I will work will be the wonders of the Soul. They must have Faith and believe firmly in my love for them. I desire that they be the children of my Pure Heart. I desire, through my children of America, to further the cause of Faith and purity among peoples and nations. Let them come to me with confidence and simplicity, and I, their Mother, will teach them to become pure like to my Heart that their own hearts may be more pleasing to the Heart of my Son … To make your hearts grow more and more like to the Heart of the Son, you must go to the Mother, whose heart is most like His. From this Pure and Immaculate Heart you will learn all that will make you more pleasing to the Divine Heart of the Son of God.
“Making the Rosary a family prayer is very pleasing to me. I ask that all families strive to do so. But be careful to say it with great devotion, meditating on each mystery and striving to imitate in your daily lives the virtues depicted therein. Live the mysteries of the Rosary as I lived them, and it will become a chain binding you to me forever. They who are found in the circle of my Rosary will never be lost. I myself will lead them at death to the throne of my Son, to be eternally united to Him.
“It is the wish of my Son that fathers and mothers strive to imitate me and my chaste spouse in our holy life at Nazareth. We practiced the simple virtues of family life, Jesus our Son being the center of all our love and activity. The Holy Trinity dwelt with us in a manner far surpassing anything that can ever be imagined. For ours was the earthly paradise where once again God walked among men. As in our little home no sin was to be found, so it is the wish of the Heart of my Son and my Immaculate Heart that sin should, as far as possible, be unheard of in the homes of our children. The Divine Trinity will dwell in your midst only if you are faithful in practicing the virtues of our life at Nazareth. Then, you also, my children, you also will become another paradise. God will then walk among you and you will have peace …
“I come to you, O children of America, as a last resort. I plead with you to listen to my voice. Time passes and with it wasted graces and constant refusals on the part of man to co-operate with me in the accomplishment of the Divine Will for his own sanctification and salvation! When will my desires be realized? My Immaculate Heart desires with great desire to see the kingdom of Jesus my Son established in all hearts. I have pleaded with my children to open their hearts to Him, but most are cold and indifferent. Has ever a mother shown more love and interest in her children’s welfare than I have done? What am I to do, when my children turn from me? Oh, if you knew the punishments I am holding back from you by my pleading and intercession on your behalf! My Immaculate Heart will win in the end, and the Spirit of Christ will dwell in the hearts of men. Those in whom this Spirit is not found will be condemned to eternal Hell-fire. Prepare yourself by prayer, penance, and suffering for what is to come! Prepare to suffer much. You see the sword in the Heart of your Mother. Suffering completed the work of divine grace in my soul. He who refuses to suffer will never abide in the Spirit of Christ, will never be formed into His image. But my children will not take heed; they will not listen. Every other way they will take, but not this one! I come again to warn and to plead. Oh, penance, penance! How little my children understand it! They give me many words, but sacrifice themselves they will not. It is not me that they love, but themselves. Oh, what blindness, what blindness! How it pierces my heart!
“The false peace of this world lures them and in the end will destroy them. They think they have done enough in consecrating themselves to my Immaculate Heart. It is not enough! That which I ask for, and is most important, many have not given me. What I ask, have asked, and will continue to ask is reformation of life. There must be sanctification from within. I will work my miracles of grace only in those who ask for them and empty their souls of the love and attachment to sin and all that is displeasing to my Son. Souls who cling to sin cannot have their hands free to receive the treasures of grace that I hold out to them
“Cleanse your souls in the Precious Blood of My Son. Live in His Heart, and take me in that I may teach you to live in great purity of heart which is so pleasing to God. Be my army of chaste soldiers, ready to fight to the death to preserve the purity of your souls. I am the Immaculate One, Patroness of your land. Be my faithful children as I have been your faithful Mother. I desire to make the whole of America my shrine by making every heart accessible to the love of my Son.”
“The hour grows late. My Son’s patience will not last forever. Help me hold back His anger, which is about to descend on sinful and ungrateful men. Suffering and anguish, such as never before experienced, is about to overtake mankind. It is the darkest hour. But if men will come to me, my Immaculate Heart will make it bright again with the mercy which my Son will rain down through my hands. Help me save those who will not save themselves. Help me bring once again God’s peace upon the world … Will my children in America listen to my pleadings and console my Immaculate Heart? Will my loyal sons carry out my desires and thus help me bring the peace of Christ once again to mankind? Pray and do penance, so that this may come to pass. Unless they do penance by mortification and self-denial and thus reform their lives, God will visit them with punishments hitherto unknown to them. Either you will do as I desire and reform your lives, or God Himself will need to cleanse you in the fires of untold punishment. Trust me and love me―I so desire it! Do not forget your poor Mother, who weeps over the loss of so many of her children!
“Reform of life is what I ask as the sign and proof of my children’s love for me. I wish to gather about me an army of brave lovers, who as my torchbearers will enkindle the fire of Divine Love in the souls of men. Only those who are strong in love can become my soldiers to bear aloft, not the sword of destruction, but the sword of fire, the flaming torch of Divine Charity. God looks at the heart, and if it resembles the Heart of His Divine Son, it is with the greatest pleasure He regards it. My Son asks of souls love, that true love willing to sacrifice itself for the One loved. Man fears to sacrifice himself because he is selfish. If souls would place themselves into my keeping, I would teach them the way of true love. If men truly loved my Son, they would not quarrel with each other and they would have peace in their own hearts. Peace is from within, not from without. If mankind were at peace with itself, there would be peace in the world. Man will only have peace if he has in his heart that true love of neighbor that springs from a whole-hearted love for my Son. If love does not have its roots implanted deeply within the soul, it will die out or be rooted up by the first storm that besets it.
“There will be peace, as has been promised, but not until my children are purified and cleansed from defilement, and, clothed thus with the white garment of grace, are made ready to receive this peace, so long promised and so long held back because of the sins of men. You must be prepared to receive His great gift of peace. If you will not prepare yourselves, God will Himself be forced to do so in His justice and mercy. I weep, but my children show me no compassion. They behold the sword in my heart, but will make no move to withdraw it. I give them love; they give me only ingratitude. Weep, then, weep with your Mother over the sins of men! Intercede with me before the throne of mercy―for sin is overwhelming the world and punishment is not far away!”
The apparitions of Our Lady of America to Sister Mary Ephrem (Mildred Marie Neuzil) took place in the chapel of the Precious Blood Sisters Convent in Kneipp Springs Sanitarium (also spelt “Sanatorium”), near Rome City, Indiana, and later, the apparitions continued in Fostoria, Ohio. On September 25th, 1956, the eve of the feast of the North American Martyrs, Our Lady appeared to Sister Mary Ephrem as Our Lady of Lourdes. The next day, September 26th, 1956, on the actual feast of the North American Martyrs, she appeared to Sister Mary Ephrem for the first time as Our Lady of America, The Immaculate Virgin. On October 13th, 1956, Our Lady appeared as Our Lady of America, but instead of a lily in her hand, she held, with both hands, a small replica of the finished Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. She gave thanks to the Bishops and the faithful of America for this great gift in honor of her Immaculate Conception. On October 7th, 1957, the evening of the feast of the Most Holy Rosary, Our Lady again appeared. Strong warnings were repeated by Our Lady throughout 1957 and 1958. Below is a compilation and arrangement of the key elements of what Our Lady revealed.
“I am Our Lady of America. I am pleased with the love and honor my children in America give to me, especially through my glorious and unique privilege of the Immaculate Conception. I promise to reward their love by working―through the power of my Son’s Heart and my Immaculate Heart―miracles of grace among them. I do not promise miracles of the body, but of the soul. For it is mainly through these miracles of grace that the Holy Trinity is glorified among men and nations. Let America grow in its love for me, and I in return, in union with the Heart of my Son, promise to work wonders in her.
“I desire that my children honor me, especially by the purity of their lives … I wish it to be the country dedicated to my purity. The wonders I will work will be the wonders of the Soul. They must have Faith and believe firmly in my love for them. I desire that they be the children of my Pure Heart. I desire, through my children of America, to further the cause of Faith and purity among peoples and nations. Let them come to me with confidence and simplicity, and I, their Mother, will teach them to become pure like to my Heart that their own hearts may be more pleasing to the Heart of my Son … To make your hearts grow more and more like to the Heart of the Son, you must go to the Mother, whose heart is most like His. From this Pure and Immaculate Heart you will learn all that will make you more pleasing to the Divine Heart of the Son of God.
“Making the Rosary a family prayer is very pleasing to me. I ask that all families strive to do so. But be careful to say it with great devotion, meditating on each mystery and striving to imitate in your daily lives the virtues depicted therein. Live the mysteries of the Rosary as I lived them, and it will become a chain binding you to me forever. They who are found in the circle of my Rosary will never be lost. I myself will lead them at death to the throne of my Son, to be eternally united to Him.
“It is the wish of my Son that fathers and mothers strive to imitate me and my chaste spouse in our holy life at Nazareth. We practiced the simple virtues of family life, Jesus our Son being the center of all our love and activity. The Holy Trinity dwelt with us in a manner far surpassing anything that can ever be imagined. For ours was the earthly paradise where once again God walked among men. As in our little home no sin was to be found, so it is the wish of the Heart of my Son and my Immaculate Heart that sin should, as far as possible, be unheard of in the homes of our children. The Divine Trinity will dwell in your midst only if you are faithful in practicing the virtues of our life at Nazareth. Then, you also, my children, you also will become another paradise. God will then walk among you and you will have peace …
“I come to you, O children of America, as a last resort. I plead with you to listen to my voice. Time passes and with it wasted graces and constant refusals on the part of man to co-operate with me in the accomplishment of the Divine Will for his own sanctification and salvation! When will my desires be realized? My Immaculate Heart desires with great desire to see the kingdom of Jesus my Son established in all hearts. I have pleaded with my children to open their hearts to Him, but most are cold and indifferent. Has ever a mother shown more love and interest in her children’s welfare than I have done? What am I to do, when my children turn from me? Oh, if you knew the punishments I am holding back from you by my pleading and intercession on your behalf! My Immaculate Heart will win in the end, and the Spirit of Christ will dwell in the hearts of men. Those in whom this Spirit is not found will be condemned to eternal Hell-fire. Prepare yourself by prayer, penance, and suffering for what is to come! Prepare to suffer much. You see the sword in the Heart of your Mother. Suffering completed the work of divine grace in my soul. He who refuses to suffer will never abide in the Spirit of Christ, will never be formed into His image. But my children will not take heed; they will not listen. Every other way they will take, but not this one! I come again to warn and to plead. Oh, penance, penance! How little my children understand it! They give me many words, but sacrifice themselves they will not. It is not me that they love, but themselves. Oh, what blindness, what blindness! How it pierces my heart!
“The false peace of this world lures them and in the end will destroy them. They think they have done enough in consecrating themselves to my Immaculate Heart. It is not enough! That which I ask for, and is most important, many have not given me. What I ask, have asked, and will continue to ask is reformation of life. There must be sanctification from within. I will work my miracles of grace only in those who ask for them and empty their souls of the love and attachment to sin and all that is displeasing to my Son. Souls who cling to sin cannot have their hands free to receive the treasures of grace that I hold out to them
“Cleanse your souls in the Precious Blood of My Son. Live in His Heart, and take me in that I may teach you to live in great purity of heart which is so pleasing to God. Be my army of chaste soldiers, ready to fight to the death to preserve the purity of your souls. I am the Immaculate One, Patroness of your land. Be my faithful children as I have been your faithful Mother. I desire to make the whole of America my shrine by making every heart accessible to the love of my Son.”
“The hour grows late. My Son’s patience will not last forever. Help me hold back His anger, which is about to descend on sinful and ungrateful men. Suffering and anguish, such as never before experienced, is about to overtake mankind. It is the darkest hour. But if men will come to me, my Immaculate Heart will make it bright again with the mercy which my Son will rain down through my hands. Help me save those who will not save themselves. Help me bring once again God’s peace upon the world … Will my children in America listen to my pleadings and console my Immaculate Heart? Will my loyal sons carry out my desires and thus help me bring the peace of Christ once again to mankind? Pray and do penance, so that this may come to pass. Unless they do penance by mortification and self-denial and thus reform their lives, God will visit them with punishments hitherto unknown to them. Either you will do as I desire and reform your lives, or God Himself will need to cleanse you in the fires of untold punishment. Trust me and love me―I so desire it! Do not forget your poor Mother, who weeps over the loss of so many of her children!
“Reform of life is what I ask as the sign and proof of my children’s love for me. I wish to gather about me an army of brave lovers, who as my torchbearers will enkindle the fire of Divine Love in the souls of men. Only those who are strong in love can become my soldiers to bear aloft, not the sword of destruction, but the sword of fire, the flaming torch of Divine Charity. God looks at the heart, and if it resembles the Heart of His Divine Son, it is with the greatest pleasure He regards it. My Son asks of souls love, that true love willing to sacrifice itself for the One loved. Man fears to sacrifice himself because he is selfish. If souls would place themselves into my keeping, I would teach them the way of true love. If men truly loved my Son, they would not quarrel with each other and they would have peace in their own hearts. Peace is from within, not from without. If mankind were at peace with itself, there would be peace in the world. Man will only have peace if he has in his heart that true love of neighbor that springs from a whole-hearted love for my Son. If love does not have its roots implanted deeply within the soul, it will die out or be rooted up by the first storm that besets it.
“There will be peace, as has been promised, but not until my children are purified and cleansed from defilement, and, clothed thus with the white garment of grace, are made ready to receive this peace, so long promised and so long held back because of the sins of men. You must be prepared to receive His great gift of peace. If you will not prepare yourselves, God will Himself be forced to do so in His justice and mercy. I weep, but my children show me no compassion. They behold the sword in my heart, but will make no move to withdraw it. I give them love; they give me only ingratitude. Weep, then, weep with your Mother over the sins of men! Intercede with me before the throne of mercy―for sin is overwhelming the world and punishment is not far away!”
Article 4
Monday & Tuesday, November 4th & 5th
Election or Pre-Selection?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday & Tuesday, November 4th & 5th
Election or Pre-Selection?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Learn From History―Or Else!
“Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” (George Santayana).
Past presidents of the United States and other high profile political leaders have repeatedly issued warnings for more than 200 years that the U.S. government is under the control of an “invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.”
According to six of our former presidents, one vice-president, and a myriad of other high profile political leaders, an invisible government that is “incredibly evil in intent” has been in control of the U.S. government “ever since the days of Andrew Jackson” (since at least 1836). They “virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties … It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.”
As a result, “we have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.”
The sources for the above quotes (and more) are listed below. All of the quotes in this article have been verified as authentic and have associated links to the source materials. Also included below are statements made by David Rockefeller Sr., former director of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), and Federal Reserve Chairman’s Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke that appear to confirm some of the warnings.
Warnings About the Invisible Government Running the U.S.
The warnings listed below, which appear in chronological order, began with the first U.S. president ― George Washington. The last president to speak out was John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated. Read what they and other political leaders have said about the invisible government.
► GEORGE WASHINGTON wrote that the Illuminati want to separate the People from their Government: “It was not my intention to doubt that the Doctrines of the Illuminati and principles of Jacobinism had not spread in the United States. On the contrary, no one is more truly satisfied of this fact than I am. The idea, that I meant to convey, was that I did not believe that the Lodges of Free Masons in this Country had, as Societies, endeavored to propagate the diabolical tenets of the first, or pernicious principles of the latter (if they are susceptible of separation). That Individuals of them may … actually had a separation of the People from their Government in view, is too evident to be questioned.” (George Washington, 1st President of the United States (1789―1797), from a letter that Washington wrote on October 24th, 1798, which can be found in the Library of Congress. For an analysis of Washington’s warning, see the article “Library of Congress: George Washington Warns of Illuminati”).
► THOMAS JEFFERSON wrote: “I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.” (Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States (1801―1809) and principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence (1776), in a letter written to John Taylor on May 28th, 1816).
► JOHN C. CALHOUN stated: “A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various powerful interests, combined in one mass, and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in banks.” (John C. Calhoun, Vice President (1825-1832) and U.S. Senator, from a speech given on May 27th, 1836).
Note that it appears that Washington’s and Jefferson’s concerns regarding bankers and separation of the people from the government was realized by 1836. This fact was confirmed in a letter written by Franklyn D. Roosevelt in 1933 (see below) in which he wrote that “a financial element in the large centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” Jackson was the seventh president of the United States (1829-1837). Calhoun served as Jackson’s vice-president from 1829-1832.
► THEODORE ROOSEVELT said: “Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day.” (Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, An Autobiography, 1913, Appendix B).
► WOODROW WILSON said: “A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is privately concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men … [W]e have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► WOODROW WILSON also said: “Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men’s views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► NEW YORK CITY MAYOR JOHN F. HYLAN stated: “The real menace of our Republic is the invisible government, which like a giant octopus sprawls its slimy legs over our cities, states and nation… The little coterie of powerful international bankers virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties, … and control the majority of the newspapers and magazines in this country. They use the columns of these papers to club into submission or drive out of office public officials who refuse to do the bidding of the powerful corrupt cliques which compose the invisible government. It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.” (New York City Mayor John F. Hylan, New York Times, March 26th, 1922).
► CONGRESSMAN LOUIS T. MCFADDEN said: “Mr. Chairman, we have in this country one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Banks. The Federal Reserve Board, a Government board, has cheated the Government of the United States and the people of the United States out of enough money to pay the national debt…Mr. Chairman, when the Federal Reserve act was passed, the people of the United States did not perceive that a world system was being set up here… and that this country was to supply financial power to an international super-state — a super-state controlled by international bankers and international industrialists acting together to enslave the world for their own pleasure.” (Congressman Louis T. McFadden, from a speech delivered to the House of Representatives on June 10th, 1932).
► FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT stated: “The real truth of the matter is―as you and I know―that a financial element, in the large centers, has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” (Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States (1933―1945), in a letter to Colonel Edward M. House, dated November 21st, 1933, as quoted in F.D.R. ― His Personal Letters, 1928-1945).
► SENATOR WILLIAM JENNER said: “Today the path to total dictatorship in the U.S. can be laid by strictly legal means … We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state … It operates secretly, silently, continuously to transform our Government … This ruthless power-seeking elite is a disease of our century… This group…is answerable neither to the President, the Congress, nor the courts. It is practically irremovable.” (Senator William Jenner, 1954 speech).
► J. EDGAR HOOVER stated: “The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous, he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent.” (J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the FBI for over 50 years, The Elks Magazine, 1956).
► JOHN F. KENNEDY said: “The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are, as a people, inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings … Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe … No war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are awaiting a finding of “clear and present danger,” then I can only say that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent … For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy, that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence―on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources, into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine, that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.” (John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States, from a speech delivered to the American Newspaper Publishers Association on April 27th, 1961 and known as the “Secret Society” speech).
► CONGRESSMAN LARRY P. MCDONALD stated: “The Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world. Do I mean conspiracy? Yes, I do. I am convinced there is such a plot, international in scope, generations old in planning, and incredibly evil in intent.” (Congressman Larry P. McDonald, November 1975, from the introduction to a book titled The Rockefeller File).
► SENATOR DANIEL K. INOUYE said: “There exists a shadowy government with its own Air Force, its own Navy, its own fundraising mechanism, and the ability to pursue its own ideas of national interest, free from all checks and balances, and free from the law itself.” (Daniel K. Inouye, US Senator from Hawaii, testimony at the Iran Contra Hearings, 1986).
The Federal Reserve
► JOHN C. CALHOUN “A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves…” (John C. Calhoun, 7th vice president of the United States from 1825 to 1832).
► THEODORE ROOSEVELT “… owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.” (Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th president of the United States, from 1901 to 1909).
► LOUIS T. MCFADDEN, who served in Congress for 20 years, became a vociferous foe of the Federal Reserve, which he claimed was created and operated by Jewish banking interests who conspired to economically control the United States. He said it was “… one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Bank.” (Louis T. McFadden Republican Representative to the Sixty-Fourth Congress and to the nine succeeding Congresses, 1915 to 1935).
In an interview with Jim Lehrer that was aired on PBS’ News Hour, on September 18th, 2007, that you can watch on YouTube, former Federal Reserve Chairman ALAN GREENSPAN said, essentially, that the Federal Reserve was above the law and that no agency of government can overrule their actions:
Jim Lehrer asked: “What is the proper relationship, what should be the proper relationship between a chairman of the Fed [Federal Reserve] and a president of the United States?”
► ALAN GREENSPAN replied: “Well, first of all, the Federal Reserve is an independent agency, and that means, basically, that there is no other agency of government which can overrule actions that we take. So long as that is in place and there is no evidence that the administration, or the Congress, or anybody else, is requesting that we do things other than what we think is the appropriate thing, then what the relationships are don’t frankly matter.”
► BEN BERNANKE another Federal Reserve chairman, also underlined the fact that the Federal Reserve is above the law. During his appearance before Congress, on March 4th, 2009, Senator Bernie Sanders asked Bernanke about $2.2 trillion in American tax dollars that was lent out by Federal Reserve. Bernanke refused to provide an answer. Senator Sanders asked: “Will you tell the American people to whom you lent $2.2 trillion of their dollars? … Can you tell us who they are?” Bernanke emphatically replied: “No!”
David Rockefeller and the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)
► SENATOR WILLIAM JENNER said: “We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state…” (William Jenner was a Republican Indiana state senator from 1934 to 1942, and a U.S. senator from 1944 to 1945 and again from 1947 to 1959).
► CONGRESSMAN LARRY P. MCDONALD stated: “The Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world.” (Larry P. McDonald was a member of the United States House of Representatives, representing Georgia's 7th congressional district as a Democrat from 1975 until 1983 when he was killed while a passenger on board Korean Air Lines Flight 007 which was shot down by Soviet interceptors).
In 1921, the stockholders of the Federal Reserve financed an organization called the “Council on Foreign Relations” (CFR). A full discussion on the CFR is so voluminous that it is beyond the scope of this article. Suffice it to say that the CFR likely plays a prominent role in the invisible government that the above presidents and politicians warned about. The CFR is alleged to be the arm of the Ruling Elite in the United States. Most influential politicians, academics and media personalities are members. The CFR uses its influence to push their New World Order agenda on the American people.
► DAVID ROCKEFELLER, SR. was patriarch of the Rockefeller family from 2004 until his death in 2017. He was the only surviving grandchild of oil tycoon, John D. Rockefeller, founder of Standard Oil. David Rockefeller began a lifelong association with the CFR [Council on Foreign Relations] when he joined them as a director in 1949. In David Rockefeller’s 2002 autobiography Memoirs, he wrote: “For more than a century ideological extremists at either end of the political spectrum have seized upon well-publicized incidents such as my encounter with Castro to attack the Rockefeller family for the inordinate influence they claim we wield over American political and economic institutions. Some even believe we are part of a secret cabal working against the best interests of the United States, characterizing my family and me as internationalists and of conspiring with others around the world to build a more integrated global political and economic structure — one world, if you will. If that’s the charge, I stand guilty, and I am proud of it.”
► JAMES WARBURG (1896–1969), was the son of banker Paul Warburg. Paul Warburg was the “father” of the Federal Reserve system. His son, James Warburg, became a member of the CFR (Council on Foreign Relations)―an American think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and international relations. He also became the financial adviser to President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Warburg, delivered blunt testimony before the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on February 17th, 1950: “We shall have world government―whether or not we like it! The question is only whether world government will be achieved by consent or by conquest!”
Just as Stalin stated: “It doesn't matter who votes. It only matters who counts the votes.” Today, you could say: “It doesn’t matter who votes, because a computer counts the votes!” ― and those computers can be easily fixed and programmed or hacked to give you the result that you want. But does that really matter at the end of the day ― for both parties and presidential candidates are merely “puppets” who are ultimately controlled by “puppeteers” behind the scenes. Those “puppeteers” have unbelievable wealth, resources and access to the greatest minds that there are―do you really naively think that they will not use those things to further and consolidate their power and control? Do you naively imagine that they are indifferent as to who is elected to rule and govern the major countries of the world? Do you think that they sit back in a spirit of neutrality as to what goes on in the major sectors of the world? “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12).
Crazy Conspiracy Theory?
Today, the term “Conspiracy Theory” has become synonymous with the idea of “Crazy Talk.” If you suggest that there is a conspiracy, then you are crazy. Conspiracy theories usually receive the mockery treatment; they are laughed at; they are immediately “debunked”; those who profess a conspiracy theory are “tarred-and-feathered” and held up to public ridicule.
Psychologists tell us that “deflecting guilt by humor or mockery” refers to a psychological defense mechanism, where someone tries to avoid feeling guilty about something by making a joke or using sarcasm to lighten the mood, often by turning the focus onto the accuser, thereby effectively shifting the blame away from themselves. Deflection is a tactic where someone avoids criticism or blame by shifting the focus or responsibility onto something or someone else.
The act of mocking conspiracy theories has become a favored pastime, touted as a quick fix to dismiss ideas that many see as being ludicrous or baseless beliefs. A conspiracy theory has become a negative term that pronounces guilt before truly examining the evidence for the theory. It is like someone who is on trial in court not being allowed a defense attorney, while the prosecuting attorney blasts away with accusations that are not allowed to be rationally defended.
Conspiracy theories―like so many other things in life―can be true. Some are true, others are false. The best way to discredit conspiracy theories is to make up some really crazy conspiracy theories that are obviously false―and, with time, this tactic―by association―will make people look upon all conspiracy theories as being crazy and false.
Are You A Conspiracy Theorist?
The list of conspiracy theories grows every month! You can take your pick from literally hundreds of conspiracy theories that are circulating the internet! You could study a different one for each day of the year! Some of the most popular ones being: The assassination of President Kennedy; Nine-Eleven; Freemasonry; the Global Elitists; the death of Pope John Paul I; the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI; the overturned election of Cardinal Siri being replaced by Pope John XXIII; the infiltration of the Church by Satanists and Masons; the ruling of America by the “Deep State”; the plan to reduce world population to a mere 500 million; the political scripting of wars; the fake two-party political system in the USA; the chemtrails; the control and manipulation of weather and natural disasters; vaccinations; water fluoridation; government surveillance of all that we do electronically; etc., etc.
What is a “Conspiracy Theory”? It’s a term used by many to brush off something that clashes with what they believe in, or have believed in for a long period of time. Taking in new information ― that runs counter to a current belief system ― is not easy and can cause the feeling of cognitive dissonance ― a term used in modern psychology to describe the feeling of discomfort that arises from being confronted with two or more conflicting ideas, beliefs, or values. It suggests that we have an inner drive to hold onto all of our beliefs and attitudes ― avoiding the feelings of discomfort and instability that accompany new ideas ― regardless of whether those ideas are backed by evidence and sound logic.
Why do we always believe, without further consideration, what is presented to us through mainstream sources? Why do we hold it to be true, without question? One reason is that we are insufficiently informed and poorly educated. If you do not understand how a car works, then the mechanic could tell you all kinds of lies about what needs to be done to fix your car and would believe him. The same is true for history, religion, economics, health issues, etc.
Dumb and Blind is What You Find
When one is dumb and blind, what you will find, is that thoughts of conspiracy are far from one’s mind. Dumb people couldn’t recognize a conspiracy, even it was staring them in the face. To start asking too many questions might betray their ‘dumbness’ and so they “go with the flow.” It really pays to have dumb people. They are at the mercy of whatever someone else tells them. This ‘dumbness’ is more often than not the result of laziness. They could read more, research more, study more, think more deeply, analyze more—it would make them more intelligent and ‘sharp’—but they have more important trivial and fun things to attend to—watch the TV, listen to music, surf the internet for trivial stuff, follow some sport, spend time on social media, catch-up on the latest gossip, pursue a hobby, etc.
Why is it so common for many of us to not even acknowledge, listen, or look at evidence which runs counter to the accepted ideology? To ignore available information which presents an alternative to what is so commonly believed by many – or what we ourselves believe can place the human race in a very vulnerable, gullible state. Even if there is an overwhelming amount of evidence, many find it easy to dismiss.
Laughing at Conspiracy Theories
The world laughs at Catholic conspiracy theories. Catholics laugh at Catholic conspiracy theories. Those who hold to conspiracy theories are looked upon as lunatics! It is actually those who think that there is no conspiracy, who are the real lunatics. As they say: “Truth is stranger than fiction!” From the very beginning of time conspiracy has been around. Satan ― the ultimate conspirator before his fall from grace after his conspiracy failed ― later conspired against Adam and Eve. The brothers of Joseph (of colorful coat fame) conspired to kill him. Saul conspired to kill David. David conspired to kill his general Urias. The Pharisees conspired to kill Jesus. This is not even the tip of the iceberg (see further below).
Add to this the clear statements of Our Lord that family members will revolt and conspire against other family members and betray them: “And the brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death” (Mark 13:12). While Our Lady of Akita states: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops.” Is Our Lord a lunatic? Is Our Lady a lunatic? Of course not, but the best way to deflect attention is to attack and discredit anyone who points out what is going-on and ridicule them to ‘high-heaven’.
Do Things “Just Happen”?
All revolutions are, at the end of the day, conspiracies. Did the Russian Revolution “just happen” or was it staged to happen? Do we believe the sanitized version of ‘surface history’ or does something more lie beneath the surface? If something lies beneath the surface, then there are lies on the surface! Franklin D. Roosevelt was alleged to have said: “In politics, nothing happens by accident. If it happens, you can bet it was planned that way.” Though some dispute that he ever said that, there can be little dispute over the truth of the statement—especially in the political theater over the last 200 to 250 years. Some may say that smells of a “Conspiracy Theory” attitude, but then we would have to condemn Our Lady as also being a “Conspiracy Theorist”—for she herself said:
Our Lady is a Conspiracy Theorist
“All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds” (Our Lady of La Salette) … “From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! … The evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government—will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities … As for the Sacrament of Matrimony, which symbolizes the union of Christ with His Church, it will be attacked and profaned in the fullest sense of the word. Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective of doing away with this Sacrament. This will make it easy for everyone to live in sin and will encourage the procreation of illegitimate children born without being incorporated into the Church.” (Our Lady of Good Success).
The Bible Subscribes to Conspiracy Theories
Conspiracy is as old as time and Holy Scripture gives many examples of it. There was a conspiracy among the angels and, after St. Michael destroyed that conspiracy, Lucifer and his fellow conspirators were driven out into Hell. Then the devil conspires against Adam and Eve: “Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why has God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ etc…” (Genesis 3:1-5). We see Cain conspire to kill Abel (Genesis 4:8). Conspiracies then flow freely: “There was a strong conspiracy” (2 Kings 15:12) … “Baasa conspired against him and slew him in Gebbethon” (3 Kings 15:27) … “Jehu conspired against Joram” (4 Kings 9:14) … “I conspired against my master, and slew him” (4 Kings 10:9) … “She rent her garments, and cried: ‘A conspiracy! A conspiracy!’” (4 Kings 11:14) … “And his servants arose, and conspired among themselves, and slew Joas” (4 Kings 12:20) … “Sellum conspired against him and killed him, and reigned in his place” (4 Kings 15:10) … “And Phacee conspired against him, and smote him in Samaria” (4 Kings 15:25) … “Osee conspired, and formed a plot against Phacee” (4 Kings 15:30) … “But the people of the land slew all them that had conspired against King Amen” (4 Kings 21:24) … “Now the men that conspired against him were Zabad and Jozabad” (2 Para. 24:26) … “His servants conspired against him, and slew him in his own house” (2 Paralipomenon 33:24).
The Prophet Jeremias writes: “And the Lord said to me: ‘A conspiracy is found among the men of Juda, and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem!’”
King Saul says: “All of you have conspired against me, and there is no one to inform me, especially when even my son has entered into league with the soil of Isai? There is not one of you that pities my case, nor that gives me any information: because my son has raised up my servant against me, plotting against me to this day! … Why have you conspired against me?” (1 Kings 22:8, 13).
The Book of Psalms says: “O God, Thy enemies have made a noise: and they that hate Thee have lifted up the head. They have taken a malicious counsel against Thy people, and have consulted against Thy saints. They have said: ‘Come and let us destroy them, so that they be not a nation: and let the name of Israel be remembered no more!’ For they have contrived with one consent: they have made a covenant together against Thee!” (Psalm 82:2-6; Jeremias 11:9).
St. Matthew relates: “Then were gathered together the chief priests and ancients of the people into the court of the high priest, who was called Caiphas: and they consulted together, that by subtlety they might apprehend Jesus, and put Him to death” (Matthew 26:2-4).
St. Mark reports: “And the Pharisees going out, immediately made a consultation with the Herodians against Jesus, how they might destroy Him.” (Mark 3:6).
St. Luke writes: “And when day was come, some of the Jews gathered together, and bound themselves under a curse, saying, that they would neither eat, nor drink, till they killed Paul. And they were more than forty men that had made this conspiracy. Who came to the chief priests and the ancients, and said: ‘We have bound ourselves under a great curse that we will eat nothing till we have slain Paul!’” (Acts 23:12-14).
Who Really Is A Lunatic?
All of this should put the gainsayers and mockers of “Conspiracy Theories” in the lunatic asylum, for it is crazier to imagine that there are no conspiracies than to think there are conspiracies. The devils are constantly conspiring and plotting how to ensnare and damn souls, and they use humans as pawns in that task. Whether or not Franklin D. Roosevelt actually said: “In politics, nothing happens by accident. If it happens, you can bet it was planned that way” is of little importance. What is important is that such a statement is very true—especially in the major events of the world.
“Why have the Gentiles raged, and the people devised vain things? The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against his Christ, saying: ‘Let us break their bonds asunder: and let us cast away their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:1-3). This is what the rulers of the modern world are trying to do today—they are conspiring to cast-off Christ and His yoke.
Wise Words of Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson, when he was still President of the United States (1801-1809), wrote: “Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in situations to confront facts within their knowledge with the lies of the day. I really look with commiseration over the great body of my fellow citizens, who, reading newspapers, live and die in the belief that they have known something of what has been passing in the world” (Letter to John Norvell, June 14th, 1807).
Today, of course, mass media takes many forms besides newspapers. But the standards Jefferson spoke of haven’t changed. “Television network newscast” or “internet posts” might be substituted for “newspaper” in the above paragraph.
Jefferson further said: “I will add, that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.”
In a world complicated by many lies, telling the truth is sometimes not enough. It is often important to disprove the lies ― especially ones that, through the psychological ploy of repetition, have been embedded in the public mind as facts by the corporate media. With the lies washed away, the truth becomes easier to see.
Even Wiser Words of Pope Pius XI
In his great encyclical “On Atheistic Communism” (Divini Redemptoris) of 1937, Pope Pius XI spoke of the deviousness of the Communist methods, pointing out that Communists show all the attributes of a well-hidden conspiracy: “The peril only grows greater from day to day because of the pressure exerted by clever agitators [conspiracy] … The Communism of today, conceals in itself a false messianic idea. A pseudo-ideal of justice, of equality and fraternity in labor impregnates all its doctrine and activity with a deceptive mysticism, which communicates a zealous and contagious enthusiasm to the multitudes entrapped by delusive promises. This is especially true in an age like ours, when unusual misery has resulted from the unequal distribution of the goods of this world ... The doctrine of modern Communism is often concealed under the most seductive trappings … How is it possible that such a system, long since rejected scientifically and now proved erroneous by experience, how is it, We ask, that such a system could spread so rapidly in all parts of the world? The explanation lies in the fact that too few have been able to grasp the nature of Communism. The majority instead succumb to its deception, skillfully concealed by the most extravagant promises … The preachers of Communism are also proficient in exploiting racial antagonisms and political divisions and oppositions … ”
“A third powerful factor in the diffusion of Communism is the conspiracy of silence on the part of a large section of the non-Catholic press of the world. We say conspiracy, because it is impossible otherwise to explain how a press, usually so eager to exploit even the little daily incidents of life, has been able to remain silent for so long about the horrors perpetrated in Russia, in Mexico and even in a great part of Spain; and that it should have relatively so little to say concerning a world organization as vast as Russian Communism. This silence … is favored by various occult forces which for a long time have been working for the overthrow of the Christian Social Order … it has striven to destroy Christian civilization and the Christian religion …. Bishops and priests were exiled, condemned to forced labor, shot and done to death in inhuman fashion; laymen suspected of defending their religion were vexed, persecuted, dragged off to trial and thrown into prison … [and,] as far as possible, every church and every monastery was destroyed. Every vestige of the Christian religion was eradicated ... The fury of Communism has not confined itself to the indiscriminate slaughter of Bishops, of thousands of priests and religious of both sexes; … but the majority of its victims have been laymen of all conditions and classes. Even up to the present moment, masses of them are slain almost daily for no other offense than the fact that they are good Christians or at least opposed to atheistic Communism.”
The Pope then speaks of the objectives and effects of the Communist conspiracy: “Communism, moreover, strips man of his liberty, robs human personality of all its dignity, and removes all the moral restraints that check the eruptions of blind impulse. There is no recognition of any right of the individual in his relations to the collectivity; no natural right is accorded to human personality, which is a mere cog-wheel in the Communist system. In man’s relations with other individuals, besides, Communists hold the principle of absolute equality, rejecting all hierarchy and divinely-constituted authority, including the authority of parents. What men call authority and subordination is derived from the community as its first and only font. Nor is the individual granted any property rights over material goods or the means of production, for inasmuch as these are the source of further wealth, their possession would give one man power over another. Precisely on this score, all forms of private property must be eradicated, for they are at the origin of all economic enslavement. Refusing to human life any sacred or spiritual character, such a doctrine logically makes of marriage and the family a purely artificial and civil institution, the outcome of a specific economic system. There exists no matrimonial bond of a juridico-moral nature that is not subject to the whim of the individual or of the collectivity. Naturally, therefore, the notion of an indissoluble marriage-tie is scouted. Communism is particularly characterized by the rejection of any link that binds woman to the family and the home, and her emancipation is proclaimed as a basic principle. She is withdrawn from the family and the care of her children, to be thrust instead into public life and collective production under the same conditions as man. The care of home and children then devolves upon the collectivity. Finally, the right of education is denied to parents, for it is conceived as the exclusive prerogative of the community, in whose name and by whose mandate alone parents may exercise this right.”
Pope Pius XI pointed out that “the most persistent enemies of the Church, who from Moscow are directing the struggle against Christian civilization, themselves bear witness ... that the Papacy ... has called public attention to the perils of Communism more frequently and more effectively than any other public authority on Earth.” (par. 6) If, then, the Catholic Church is such an effective opponent of Communism, it is obvious that the annihilation of the opposition (the Church) would be top priority for the Marxist-Leninists. It must be destroyed, if not by direct destruction, then by infiltration and subversion.
For years there have been rumors and reports of infiltration of the Church by Communists, who would enter seminaries and be ordained priests, for the purpose of destroying the Church from within. We present here strong and undeniable confirmation of these rumors. The following are quotes and paraphrases from ex-Communists themselves, who admit that Moscow had ordered, directed and implemented a terrifyingly successful strategy for the infiltration of the Church.
Albert Vassert, a former member of the French Communist Party, revealed, in 1955, that Moscow had issued a 1936 order that carefully selected members of the Communist youth enter seminaries, and after training, receive ordination as priests. Some of these were to infiltrate religious orders, particularly the Dominicans. (In his essay “Satan at Work”, Deitrich von Hildebrand reported that the French Dominicans had become so Communistic in their ‘evangelization’, that, in 1953, the Order barely escaped dissolution by the order of Pope Pius XII).
Kremlin Orders Infiltration of Catholic Clergy
Mr. Manning Johnson, a former official of the Communist Party in America, gave the following testimony in 1953 to the House Unamerican Activities Committee: “Once the tactic of infiltration of religious organizations was set by the Kremlin ... the Communists discovered that the destruction of religion could proceed much faster through infiltration of the Church by Communists operating within the Church itself. The Communist leadership, in the United States, realized that the infiltration tactic in this country would have to adapt itself to American conditions and the religious make-up peculiar to this country. In the earliest stages, it was determined that, with only small forces available to them, it would be necessary to concentrate Communist agents in the seminaries. The practical conclusion drawn by the Red leaders was that these institutions would make it possible for a small Communist minority to influence the ideology of future clergymen in the paths conducive to Communist purposes.”
Further on in his testimony, Mr. Johnson pointed out the grim fact that: “This policy of infiltrating seminaries was successful beyond even our Communist expectations ... It is the axiom of Communist organization’s strategy that if a body has 1% Communist Party and 9% Party sympathizers, this 10% can effectively control the remaining 90% who act and think on an individual basis.”
Mr. Johnson further testified that the goals of this infiltration were twofold:
(1) To make the Catholic Church no longer effective against Communism.
(2) To direct clerical thinking away from the spiritual and toward the temporal and political ... hence, the preaching of the “social gospel”.
Sadly, the Second Vatican Council only mentioned Communism in one footnote of its entire 16 documents! It seems as though the infiltrators, who had reached the highest positions, had done their job well! During the Council, a petition signed by 454 Council Fathers requesting that Communism receive explicit treatment was “mysteriously misplaced”. Since the Second Vatican Council, the Church now “dialogues” with Communists instead of opposing them ... a Marxist’s dream come true!
In the U.S.A., around 1,100 Young Radicals Entered the Seminaries in 1930s
Dr. Bella Dodd spent most of her life in the Communist Party in America and was designated to become the Attorney General had the Party won the White House. After her defection from the Communist Party, she revealed that one of her jobs as a Communist agent was to encourage young radicals (not always card-carrying Communists) to enter Catholic seminaries. She said that, before she had left the Party in the United States, she herself had encouraged around 1,000 young radicals to infiltrate the seminaries and religious orders ... and she was only one Communist.
The Benedictine Brother, Joseph Natale, O.S.B. (died 1995), Superior of Most Holy Family Monastery, was present at one of Bella Dodd’s lectures in the early 1950s. He relates the following: “I listened to that woman for four hours and she had my hair standing on end. Everything she said has been fulfilled to the letter. You would think she was the world's greatest prophet, but she was no prophet. She was merely exposing the step-by-step battle plan of Communist subversion of the Catholic Church. She explained that of all the world's religions, the Catholic Church was the only one feared by the Communists, for it was its only effective opponent. Back then [early 1950s], she said: “Right now they are in the highest places in the Church. They are working to bring about change in order that the Catholic Church would not be effective against Communism” ... that these changes would be so drastic that “you will not recognize the Catholic Church. The whole idea was to destroy, not the institution of the Church, but rather the Faith of the people, and even use the institution of the Church, if possible, to destroy the Faith through the promotion of a pseudo-religion — something that resembled Catholicism, but was not the real thing. This would be necessary in order to shame Church leaders into an ‘openness to the world’ and to a more flexible attitude toward all religions and philosophies. The Communists would then exploit this openness in order to undermine the Church.”
Brother Joseph Natale explains: “She said that of all the world’s religions, the Catholic Church was the only one feared by the Communists, for it was its only effective opponent. Speaking as an ex-Communist, she said: ‘In the 1930s, we put eleven hundred men into the priesthood in order to destroy the Church from within.’ The idea was for these men to be ordained, and then climb the ladder of influence and authority -- to come to be monsignors and bishops. Back then she said ‘RIGHT NOW THEY ARE IN THE HIGHEST PLACES, and they are working to bring about change in order that the Catholic Church will no longer be effective against Communism.’ She also said that the changes would be so drastic that ‘you will not recognize the Catholic Church’.” (Note, this was about 10 to 12 years before the Second Vatican Council).
The Popes on Conspiracies
In the modern, post-French Revolution era, there are two chief areas that have commanded the attention of the popes with regard to “conspiracy” in a general sense. These are Freemasonry and Communism. The popes are not intimidated by mockery about believing in “conspiracy theories” and state their positions very clearly indeed.
Pope Leo XIII on the Conspiracy of Freemasonry
Pope Leo XIII, in Humanum Genus, his encyclical against Freemasonry, writes:
“At this period, however, the partisans of evil seems to be combining together [which is what a conspiracy is], and to be struggling with united vehemence, led on or assisted by that strongly organized and widespread association called the Freemasons. No longer making any secret of their purposes, they are now boldly rising up against God Himself. They are planning the destruction of holy Church publicly and openly [which is what a conspiracy is], and this with the set purpose of utterly despoiling the nations of Christendom of the blessings obtained for us through Jesus Christ our Savior … At so urgent a crisis, it is Our office to point out the danger and their plans and devices … The Roman Pontiffs were prompt in detecting the presence and the purpose of this capital enemy … hiding as a dark conspiracy; and , they took occasion not allow themselves to be caught by the devices and snares laid out to deceive them …
“But their provident and paternal solicitude had not always and everywhere the result desired; and this, either because of the deception and cunning of some who were active agents in the mischief, or else of the thoughtless levity of the rest … The sect of Freemasons grew with a rapidity beyond conception in the course of a century and a half, until it came to be able, by means of fraud or of audacity, to gain such entrance into every rank of the State as to seem to be almost its ruling power.
“There are several organized bodies which, though differing in name, in ceremonial, in form and origin, are nevertheless so bound together by a common purpose and by the similarity of their main opinions, as to make in fact one thing with the sect of the Freemasons―which is a kind of center from which they all go forth, and to which they all return. Now, these no longer show a desire to remain concealed; for they hold their meetings in the daylight and before the public eye, and publish their own newspaper organs; and yet, when thoroughly understood, they are found still to retain the nature and the habits of secret societies. There are many things, like mysteries, which it is the fixed rule to hide with extreme care, not only from strangers, but from very many members, also; such as their secret and final designs, the names of the chief leaders, and certain secret and inner meetings, as well as their decisions, and the ways and means of carrying them out …
“Candidates are generally commanded to promise ― nay, with a special oath, to swear ― that they will never make known, to any person, at any time or in any way, the members, the passes, or the subjects discussed … They must submit to the direst penalties and death itself, if any are judged to have betrayed the doings of the sect or to have resisted commands given, punishment is inflicted on them not infrequently, and with so much audacity and dexterity that the assassin very often escapes the detection and penalty of his crime [until he comes face-to-face with God].
“Thus, with a fraudulent external appearance, and with a style of willful deception which is always the same, the Freemasons strive, as far as possible, to conceal themselves, and to admit no witnesses but their own members. As a convenient manner of concealment, they assume the character of literary men and scholars associated for purposes of learning. They speak of their zeal for a more cultured refinement, and of their love for the poor; and they declare their one wish to be the amelioration of the condition of the masses, and to share with the largest possible number all the benefits of civil life … But their ultimate purpose forces itself into view ― namely, the utter overthrow of that whole religious and political order of the world which the Christian teaching has produced, and the substitution of a new state of things in accordance with their ideas, of which the foundations and laws shall be drawn from mere naturalism.
“The sect of the Freemasons shows itself insolent and proud of its success, and seems as if it would put no bounds to its pertinacity. Its followers, joined together by a wicked compact and by secret counsels, give help one to another, and excite one another to an audacity for evil things.” (Pope Leo XIII, Encyclical Humanum Genus).
Pope Pius XI on the Conspiracy of Communism
Pope Pius XI, in Divini Redemptoris, his encyclical against atheistic Communism, writes: “A powerful factor in the diffusion of Communism is the conspiracy of silence on the part of a large section of the non-Catholic press of the world. We say conspiracy, because it is impossible otherwise to explain how a press usually so eager to exploit even the little daily incidents of life has been able to remain silent for so long about the horrors perpetrated in Russia, in Mexico and even in a great part of Spain; and that it should have relatively so little to say concerning a world organization as vast as Russian Communism. This silence is due in part to shortsighted political policy, and is favored by various occult forces which for a long time have been working for the overthrow of the Christian Social Order.”
“In making these observations, it is no part of Our intention to condemn en masse the peoples of the Soviet Union. For them We cherish the warmest paternal affection. We are well aware that not a few of them groan beneath the yoke imposed on them by men who, in very large part, are strangers to the real interests of the country. We recognize that many others were deceived by fallacious hopes. We blame only the system, with its authors and abettors who considered Russia the best-prepared field for experimenting with a plan elaborated decades ago, and who from there continue to spread it from one end of the world to the other.” (Pope Pius XI, Encyclical Divini Redemptoris).
Pope St. Pius X on the Conspiracy of Modernists
Pope St. Pius X, in Pascendi, his encyclical against Modernism and Modernists, writes:
“Further, none is more skillful, none more astute than they, in the employment of a thousand noxious devices; for they play the double part of rationalist and Catholic, and this so craftily that they easily lead the unwary into error; and as audacity is their chief characteristic, there is no conclusion of any kind from which they shrink or which they do not thrust forward with pertinacity and assurance To this must be added the fact, which indeed is well calculated to deceive souls, that they lead a life of the greatest activity, of assiduous and ardent application to every branch of learning, and that they possess, as a rule, a reputation for irreproachable morality … It is one of the cleverest devices of the Modernists (as they are commonly and rightly called) to present their doctrines without order and systematic arrangement, in a scattered and disjointed manner, so as to make it appear as if their minds were in doubt or hesitation, whereas in reality they are quite fixed and steadfast.
“We have already some of the artifices employed by Modernists to exploit their wares. What efforts do they not make to win new recruits! They seize upon professorships in the seminaries and universities, and gradually make of them chairs of pestilence. In sermons from the pulpit they disseminate their doctrines, although possibly in utterances which are veiled … They are to be found among the laity, and in the ranks of the clergy, and they are not wanting even in the last place where one might expect to meet them, in religious communities.
“The Modernists vent all their gall and hatred on Catholics who sturdily fight the battles of the Church. But of all the insults they heap on them―those of ignorance and obstinacy are the favorites. When an adversary rises up against them with an erudition and force that render him redoubtable, they try to make a conspiracy of silence around him to nullify the effects of his attack … Such is a summary description of the Modernists with their doctrines ― methods and doctrines replete with errors, made not for edification, but for destruction, not for the making of Catholics, but for the seduction of those who are Catholics into heresy; and tending to the utter subversion of all religion.” (Pope St. Pius X, Encyclical Pascendi).
Listen To The Conspirators―Straight From The Marxist Mouth
In Marxist philosophy the “bourgeoisie” is the social class that came to own the means of production during modern industrialization and whose societal concerns are the value of property and the preservation of capital, to ensure the perpetuation of their economic supremacy in society. The “bourgeoisie” is the ruling class of the capitalist era. They were a middle class during the feudal era under the land-owning aristocracy. Capitalism has now simplified the class structure to “owners” and “workers”, and the owners have all the power. The owners are the “bourgeoisie”, and the workers are the “proletariat”.
In Marxism, the “proletariat” is the working class, including farmers and low-skilled factory workers. They do not own any means of production. The bourgeoisie are the capitalist class, the wealthy, who own most of the means of production. Marx argued that the capitalist bourgeoisie mercilessly exploited the proletariat. Here are some extracts from Marx’s Communist Manifesto:
“Society as a whole is more and more splitting up into two great hostile camps, into two great classes, directly facing each other: Bourgeoisie and Proletariat.”
“The discovery of America, the rounding of the Cape, opened up fresh ground for the rising bourgeoisie. The East-Indian and Chinese markets, the colonization of America, trade with the colonies, the increase in the means of exchange and in commodities generally, gave to commerce, to navigation, to industry, an impulse never before known, and thereby, to the revolutionary element in the tottering feudal society, a rapid development.”
The immediate aim of the Communists is the same as that of all other proletarian parties: formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat:
“The struggle of the proletariat (working classes) with the bourgeoisie (the wealthy class) is at first a national struggle. The proletariat of each country must, of course, first of all settle matters with its own bourgeoisie. In depicting the most general phases of the development of the proletariat, we traced the more or less veiled civil war, raging within existing society, up to the point where that war breaks out into open revolution, and where the violent overthrow of the bourgeoisie lays the foundation for the sway of the proletariat.”
“The modern laborer, on the contrary, instead of rising with the progress of industry, sinks deeper and deeper below the conditions of existence of his own class. He becomes a pauper, and pauperism develops more rapidly than population and wealth. And here it becomes evident, that the bourgeoisie is unfit any longer to be the ruling class in society, and to impose its conditions of existence upon society as an over-riding law. It is unfit to rule because it is incompetent to assure an existence to its slave within his slavery, because it cannot help letting him sink into such a state, that it has to feed him, instead of being fed by him. Society can no longer live under this bourgeoisie, in other words, its existence is no longer compatible with society … What the bourgeoisie, therefore, produces, above all, is its own grave-diggers. Its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable.”
“In what relation do the Communists stand to the proletarians as a whole? The Communists do not form a separate party opposed to other working-class parties. They have no interests separate and apart from those of the proletariat as a whole. They do not set up any sectarian principles of their own, by which to shape and mold the proletarian movement. The Communists are distinguished from the other working-class parties by this only:
(1) In the national struggles of the proletarians of the different countries, they point out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat, independently of all nationality.
(2) In the various stages of development which the struggle of the working class against the bourgeoisie has to pass through, they always and everywhere represent the interests of the movement as a whole.
“The Communists, therefore, are on the one hand, practically, the most advanced and resolute section of the working-class parties of every country, Communists are that section which pushes forward all others; on the other hand, theoretically, Communists have the advantage over the great mass of the proletariat of clearly understanding the line of march, the conditions, and the ultimate general results of the proletarian movement. The immediate aim of the Communist is the same as that of all the other proletarian parties: formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat … Communists never cease, for a single instant, to instill into the working class the clearest possible recognition of the hostile antagonism between bourgeoisie and proletariat … The theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property.”
“The first step in the revolution by the working class, is to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling as to win the battle of democracy. The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degrees, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralize all instruments of production in the hands of the State … The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions. Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win.”
“Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” (George Santayana).
Past presidents of the United States and other high profile political leaders have repeatedly issued warnings for more than 200 years that the U.S. government is under the control of an “invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.”
According to six of our former presidents, one vice-president, and a myriad of other high profile political leaders, an invisible government that is “incredibly evil in intent” has been in control of the U.S. government “ever since the days of Andrew Jackson” (since at least 1836). They “virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties … It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.”
As a result, “we have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.”
The sources for the above quotes (and more) are listed below. All of the quotes in this article have been verified as authentic and have associated links to the source materials. Also included below are statements made by David Rockefeller Sr., former director of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), and Federal Reserve Chairman’s Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke that appear to confirm some of the warnings.
Warnings About the Invisible Government Running the U.S.
The warnings listed below, which appear in chronological order, began with the first U.S. president ― George Washington. The last president to speak out was John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated. Read what they and other political leaders have said about the invisible government.
► GEORGE WASHINGTON wrote that the Illuminati want to separate the People from their Government: “It was not my intention to doubt that the Doctrines of the Illuminati and principles of Jacobinism had not spread in the United States. On the contrary, no one is more truly satisfied of this fact than I am. The idea, that I meant to convey, was that I did not believe that the Lodges of Free Masons in this Country had, as Societies, endeavored to propagate the diabolical tenets of the first, or pernicious principles of the latter (if they are susceptible of separation). That Individuals of them may … actually had a separation of the People from their Government in view, is too evident to be questioned.” (George Washington, 1st President of the United States (1789―1797), from a letter that Washington wrote on October 24th, 1798, which can be found in the Library of Congress. For an analysis of Washington’s warning, see the article “Library of Congress: George Washington Warns of Illuminati”).
► THOMAS JEFFERSON wrote: “I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.” (Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States (1801―1809) and principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence (1776), in a letter written to John Taylor on May 28th, 1816).
► JOHN C. CALHOUN stated: “A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various powerful interests, combined in one mass, and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in banks.” (John C. Calhoun, Vice President (1825-1832) and U.S. Senator, from a speech given on May 27th, 1836).
Note that it appears that Washington’s and Jefferson’s concerns regarding bankers and separation of the people from the government was realized by 1836. This fact was confirmed in a letter written by Franklyn D. Roosevelt in 1933 (see below) in which he wrote that “a financial element in the large centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” Jackson was the seventh president of the United States (1829-1837). Calhoun served as Jackson’s vice-president from 1829-1832.
► THEODORE ROOSEVELT said: “Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day.” (Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, An Autobiography, 1913, Appendix B).
► WOODROW WILSON said: “A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is privately concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men … [W]e have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► WOODROW WILSON also said: “Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men’s views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► NEW YORK CITY MAYOR JOHN F. HYLAN stated: “The real menace of our Republic is the invisible government, which like a giant octopus sprawls its slimy legs over our cities, states and nation… The little coterie of powerful international bankers virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties, … and control the majority of the newspapers and magazines in this country. They use the columns of these papers to club into submission or drive out of office public officials who refuse to do the bidding of the powerful corrupt cliques which compose the invisible government. It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.” (New York City Mayor John F. Hylan, New York Times, March 26th, 1922).
► CONGRESSMAN LOUIS T. MCFADDEN said: “Mr. Chairman, we have in this country one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Banks. The Federal Reserve Board, a Government board, has cheated the Government of the United States and the people of the United States out of enough money to pay the national debt…Mr. Chairman, when the Federal Reserve act was passed, the people of the United States did not perceive that a world system was being set up here… and that this country was to supply financial power to an international super-state — a super-state controlled by international bankers and international industrialists acting together to enslave the world for their own pleasure.” (Congressman Louis T. McFadden, from a speech delivered to the House of Representatives on June 10th, 1932).
► FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT stated: “The real truth of the matter is―as you and I know―that a financial element, in the large centers, has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” (Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States (1933―1945), in a letter to Colonel Edward M. House, dated November 21st, 1933, as quoted in F.D.R. ― His Personal Letters, 1928-1945).
► SENATOR WILLIAM JENNER said: “Today the path to total dictatorship in the U.S. can be laid by strictly legal means … We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state … It operates secretly, silently, continuously to transform our Government … This ruthless power-seeking elite is a disease of our century… This group…is answerable neither to the President, the Congress, nor the courts. It is practically irremovable.” (Senator William Jenner, 1954 speech).
► J. EDGAR HOOVER stated: “The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous, he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent.” (J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the FBI for over 50 years, The Elks Magazine, 1956).
► JOHN F. KENNEDY said: “The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are, as a people, inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings … Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe … No war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are awaiting a finding of “clear and present danger,” then I can only say that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent … For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy, that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence―on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources, into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine, that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.” (John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States, from a speech delivered to the American Newspaper Publishers Association on April 27th, 1961 and known as the “Secret Society” speech).
► CONGRESSMAN LARRY P. MCDONALD stated: “The Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world. Do I mean conspiracy? Yes, I do. I am convinced there is such a plot, international in scope, generations old in planning, and incredibly evil in intent.” (Congressman Larry P. McDonald, November 1975, from the introduction to a book titled The Rockefeller File).
► SENATOR DANIEL K. INOUYE said: “There exists a shadowy government with its own Air Force, its own Navy, its own fundraising mechanism, and the ability to pursue its own ideas of national interest, free from all checks and balances, and free from the law itself.” (Daniel K. Inouye, US Senator from Hawaii, testimony at the Iran Contra Hearings, 1986).
The Federal Reserve
► JOHN C. CALHOUN “A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves…” (John C. Calhoun, 7th vice president of the United States from 1825 to 1832).
► THEODORE ROOSEVELT “… owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.” (Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th president of the United States, from 1901 to 1909).
► LOUIS T. MCFADDEN, who served in Congress for 20 years, became a vociferous foe of the Federal Reserve, which he claimed was created and operated by Jewish banking interests who conspired to economically control the United States. He said it was “… one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Bank.” (Louis T. McFadden Republican Representative to the Sixty-Fourth Congress and to the nine succeeding Congresses, 1915 to 1935).
In an interview with Jim Lehrer that was aired on PBS’ News Hour, on September 18th, 2007, that you can watch on YouTube, former Federal Reserve Chairman ALAN GREENSPAN said, essentially, that the Federal Reserve was above the law and that no agency of government can overrule their actions:
Jim Lehrer asked: “What is the proper relationship, what should be the proper relationship between a chairman of the Fed [Federal Reserve] and a president of the United States?”
► ALAN GREENSPAN replied: “Well, first of all, the Federal Reserve is an independent agency, and that means, basically, that there is no other agency of government which can overrule actions that we take. So long as that is in place and there is no evidence that the administration, or the Congress, or anybody else, is requesting that we do things other than what we think is the appropriate thing, then what the relationships are don’t frankly matter.”
► BEN BERNANKE another Federal Reserve chairman, also underlined the fact that the Federal Reserve is above the law. During his appearance before Congress, on March 4th, 2009, Senator Bernie Sanders asked Bernanke about $2.2 trillion in American tax dollars that was lent out by Federal Reserve. Bernanke refused to provide an answer. Senator Sanders asked: “Will you tell the American people to whom you lent $2.2 trillion of their dollars? … Can you tell us who they are?” Bernanke emphatically replied: “No!”
David Rockefeller and the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)
► SENATOR WILLIAM JENNER said: “We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state…” (William Jenner was a Republican Indiana state senator from 1934 to 1942, and a U.S. senator from 1944 to 1945 and again from 1947 to 1959).
► CONGRESSMAN LARRY P. MCDONALD stated: “The Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world.” (Larry P. McDonald was a member of the United States House of Representatives, representing Georgia's 7th congressional district as a Democrat from 1975 until 1983 when he was killed while a passenger on board Korean Air Lines Flight 007 which was shot down by Soviet interceptors).
In 1921, the stockholders of the Federal Reserve financed an organization called the “Council on Foreign Relations” (CFR). A full discussion on the CFR is so voluminous that it is beyond the scope of this article. Suffice it to say that the CFR likely plays a prominent role in the invisible government that the above presidents and politicians warned about. The CFR is alleged to be the arm of the Ruling Elite in the United States. Most influential politicians, academics and media personalities are members. The CFR uses its influence to push their New World Order agenda on the American people.
► DAVID ROCKEFELLER, SR. was patriarch of the Rockefeller family from 2004 until his death in 2017. He was the only surviving grandchild of oil tycoon, John D. Rockefeller, founder of Standard Oil. David Rockefeller began a lifelong association with the CFR [Council on Foreign Relations] when he joined them as a director in 1949. In David Rockefeller’s 2002 autobiography Memoirs, he wrote: “For more than a century ideological extremists at either end of the political spectrum have seized upon well-publicized incidents such as my encounter with Castro to attack the Rockefeller family for the inordinate influence they claim we wield over American political and economic institutions. Some even believe we are part of a secret cabal working against the best interests of the United States, characterizing my family and me as internationalists and of conspiring with others around the world to build a more integrated global political and economic structure — one world, if you will. If that’s the charge, I stand guilty, and I am proud of it.”
► JAMES WARBURG (1896–1969), was the son of banker Paul Warburg. Paul Warburg was the “father” of the Federal Reserve system. His son, James Warburg, became a member of the CFR (Council on Foreign Relations)―an American think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and international relations. He also became the financial adviser to President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Warburg, delivered blunt testimony before the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on February 17th, 1950: “We shall have world government―whether or not we like it! The question is only whether world government will be achieved by consent or by conquest!”
Just as Stalin stated: “It doesn't matter who votes. It only matters who counts the votes.” Today, you could say: “It doesn’t matter who votes, because a computer counts the votes!” ― and those computers can be easily fixed and programmed or hacked to give you the result that you want. But does that really matter at the end of the day ― for both parties and presidential candidates are merely “puppets” who are ultimately controlled by “puppeteers” behind the scenes. Those “puppeteers” have unbelievable wealth, resources and access to the greatest minds that there are―do you really naively think that they will not use those things to further and consolidate their power and control? Do you naively imagine that they are indifferent as to who is elected to rule and govern the major countries of the world? Do you think that they sit back in a spirit of neutrality as to what goes on in the major sectors of the world? “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12).
Crazy Conspiracy Theory?
Today, the term “Conspiracy Theory” has become synonymous with the idea of “Crazy Talk.” If you suggest that there is a conspiracy, then you are crazy. Conspiracy theories usually receive the mockery treatment; they are laughed at; they are immediately “debunked”; those who profess a conspiracy theory are “tarred-and-feathered” and held up to public ridicule.
Psychologists tell us that “deflecting guilt by humor or mockery” refers to a psychological defense mechanism, where someone tries to avoid feeling guilty about something by making a joke or using sarcasm to lighten the mood, often by turning the focus onto the accuser, thereby effectively shifting the blame away from themselves. Deflection is a tactic where someone avoids criticism or blame by shifting the focus or responsibility onto something or someone else.
The act of mocking conspiracy theories has become a favored pastime, touted as a quick fix to dismiss ideas that many see as being ludicrous or baseless beliefs. A conspiracy theory has become a negative term that pronounces guilt before truly examining the evidence for the theory. It is like someone who is on trial in court not being allowed a defense attorney, while the prosecuting attorney blasts away with accusations that are not allowed to be rationally defended.
Conspiracy theories―like so many other things in life―can be true. Some are true, others are false. The best way to discredit conspiracy theories is to make up some really crazy conspiracy theories that are obviously false―and, with time, this tactic―by association―will make people look upon all conspiracy theories as being crazy and false.
Are You A Conspiracy Theorist?
The list of conspiracy theories grows every month! You can take your pick from literally hundreds of conspiracy theories that are circulating the internet! You could study a different one for each day of the year! Some of the most popular ones being: The assassination of President Kennedy; Nine-Eleven; Freemasonry; the Global Elitists; the death of Pope John Paul I; the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI; the overturned election of Cardinal Siri being replaced by Pope John XXIII; the infiltration of the Church by Satanists and Masons; the ruling of America by the “Deep State”; the plan to reduce world population to a mere 500 million; the political scripting of wars; the fake two-party political system in the USA; the chemtrails; the control and manipulation of weather and natural disasters; vaccinations; water fluoridation; government surveillance of all that we do electronically; etc., etc.
What is a “Conspiracy Theory”? It’s a term used by many to brush off something that clashes with what they believe in, or have believed in for a long period of time. Taking in new information ― that runs counter to a current belief system ― is not easy and can cause the feeling of cognitive dissonance ― a term used in modern psychology to describe the feeling of discomfort that arises from being confronted with two or more conflicting ideas, beliefs, or values. It suggests that we have an inner drive to hold onto all of our beliefs and attitudes ― avoiding the feelings of discomfort and instability that accompany new ideas ― regardless of whether those ideas are backed by evidence and sound logic.
Why do we always believe, without further consideration, what is presented to us through mainstream sources? Why do we hold it to be true, without question? One reason is that we are insufficiently informed and poorly educated. If you do not understand how a car works, then the mechanic could tell you all kinds of lies about what needs to be done to fix your car and would believe him. The same is true for history, religion, economics, health issues, etc.
Dumb and Blind is What You Find
When one is dumb and blind, what you will find, is that thoughts of conspiracy are far from one’s mind. Dumb people couldn’t recognize a conspiracy, even it was staring them in the face. To start asking too many questions might betray their ‘dumbness’ and so they “go with the flow.” It really pays to have dumb people. They are at the mercy of whatever someone else tells them. This ‘dumbness’ is more often than not the result of laziness. They could read more, research more, study more, think more deeply, analyze more—it would make them more intelligent and ‘sharp’—but they have more important trivial and fun things to attend to—watch the TV, listen to music, surf the internet for trivial stuff, follow some sport, spend time on social media, catch-up on the latest gossip, pursue a hobby, etc.
Why is it so common for many of us to not even acknowledge, listen, or look at evidence which runs counter to the accepted ideology? To ignore available information which presents an alternative to what is so commonly believed by many – or what we ourselves believe can place the human race in a very vulnerable, gullible state. Even if there is an overwhelming amount of evidence, many find it easy to dismiss.
Laughing at Conspiracy Theories
The world laughs at Catholic conspiracy theories. Catholics laugh at Catholic conspiracy theories. Those who hold to conspiracy theories are looked upon as lunatics! It is actually those who think that there is no conspiracy, who are the real lunatics. As they say: “Truth is stranger than fiction!” From the very beginning of time conspiracy has been around. Satan ― the ultimate conspirator before his fall from grace after his conspiracy failed ― later conspired against Adam and Eve. The brothers of Joseph (of colorful coat fame) conspired to kill him. Saul conspired to kill David. David conspired to kill his general Urias. The Pharisees conspired to kill Jesus. This is not even the tip of the iceberg (see further below).
Add to this the clear statements of Our Lord that family members will revolt and conspire against other family members and betray them: “And the brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death” (Mark 13:12). While Our Lady of Akita states: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops.” Is Our Lord a lunatic? Is Our Lady a lunatic? Of course not, but the best way to deflect attention is to attack and discredit anyone who points out what is going-on and ridicule them to ‘high-heaven’.
Do Things “Just Happen”?
All revolutions are, at the end of the day, conspiracies. Did the Russian Revolution “just happen” or was it staged to happen? Do we believe the sanitized version of ‘surface history’ or does something more lie beneath the surface? If something lies beneath the surface, then there are lies on the surface! Franklin D. Roosevelt was alleged to have said: “In politics, nothing happens by accident. If it happens, you can bet it was planned that way.” Though some dispute that he ever said that, there can be little dispute over the truth of the statement—especially in the political theater over the last 200 to 250 years. Some may say that smells of a “Conspiracy Theory” attitude, but then we would have to condemn Our Lady as also being a “Conspiracy Theorist”—for she herself said:
Our Lady is a Conspiracy Theorist
“All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds” (Our Lady of La Salette) … “From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! … The evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government—will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities … As for the Sacrament of Matrimony, which symbolizes the union of Christ with His Church, it will be attacked and profaned in the fullest sense of the word. Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective of doing away with this Sacrament. This will make it easy for everyone to live in sin and will encourage the procreation of illegitimate children born without being incorporated into the Church.” (Our Lady of Good Success).
The Bible Subscribes to Conspiracy Theories
Conspiracy is as old as time and Holy Scripture gives many examples of it. There was a conspiracy among the angels and, after St. Michael destroyed that conspiracy, Lucifer and his fellow conspirators were driven out into Hell. Then the devil conspires against Adam and Eve: “Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why has God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ etc…” (Genesis 3:1-5). We see Cain conspire to kill Abel (Genesis 4:8). Conspiracies then flow freely: “There was a strong conspiracy” (2 Kings 15:12) … “Baasa conspired against him and slew him in Gebbethon” (3 Kings 15:27) … “Jehu conspired against Joram” (4 Kings 9:14) … “I conspired against my master, and slew him” (4 Kings 10:9) … “She rent her garments, and cried: ‘A conspiracy! A conspiracy!’” (4 Kings 11:14) … “And his servants arose, and conspired among themselves, and slew Joas” (4 Kings 12:20) … “Sellum conspired against him and killed him, and reigned in his place” (4 Kings 15:10) … “And Phacee conspired against him, and smote him in Samaria” (4 Kings 15:25) … “Osee conspired, and formed a plot against Phacee” (4 Kings 15:30) … “But the people of the land slew all them that had conspired against King Amen” (4 Kings 21:24) … “Now the men that conspired against him were Zabad and Jozabad” (2 Para. 24:26) … “His servants conspired against him, and slew him in his own house” (2 Paralipomenon 33:24).
The Prophet Jeremias writes: “And the Lord said to me: ‘A conspiracy is found among the men of Juda, and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem!’”
King Saul says: “All of you have conspired against me, and there is no one to inform me, especially when even my son has entered into league with the soil of Isai? There is not one of you that pities my case, nor that gives me any information: because my son has raised up my servant against me, plotting against me to this day! … Why have you conspired against me?” (1 Kings 22:8, 13).
The Book of Psalms says: “O God, Thy enemies have made a noise: and they that hate Thee have lifted up the head. They have taken a malicious counsel against Thy people, and have consulted against Thy saints. They have said: ‘Come and let us destroy them, so that they be not a nation: and let the name of Israel be remembered no more!’ For they have contrived with one consent: they have made a covenant together against Thee!” (Psalm 82:2-6; Jeremias 11:9).
St. Matthew relates: “Then were gathered together the chief priests and ancients of the people into the court of the high priest, who was called Caiphas: and they consulted together, that by subtlety they might apprehend Jesus, and put Him to death” (Matthew 26:2-4).
St. Mark reports: “And the Pharisees going out, immediately made a consultation with the Herodians against Jesus, how they might destroy Him.” (Mark 3:6).
St. Luke writes: “And when day was come, some of the Jews gathered together, and bound themselves under a curse, saying, that they would neither eat, nor drink, till they killed Paul. And they were more than forty men that had made this conspiracy. Who came to the chief priests and the ancients, and said: ‘We have bound ourselves under a great curse that we will eat nothing till we have slain Paul!’” (Acts 23:12-14).
Who Really Is A Lunatic?
All of this should put the gainsayers and mockers of “Conspiracy Theories” in the lunatic asylum, for it is crazier to imagine that there are no conspiracies than to think there are conspiracies. The devils are constantly conspiring and plotting how to ensnare and damn souls, and they use humans as pawns in that task. Whether or not Franklin D. Roosevelt actually said: “In politics, nothing happens by accident. If it happens, you can bet it was planned that way” is of little importance. What is important is that such a statement is very true—especially in the major events of the world.
“Why have the Gentiles raged, and the people devised vain things? The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against his Christ, saying: ‘Let us break their bonds asunder: and let us cast away their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:1-3). This is what the rulers of the modern world are trying to do today—they are conspiring to cast-off Christ and His yoke.
Wise Words of Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson, when he was still President of the United States (1801-1809), wrote: “Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in situations to confront facts within their knowledge with the lies of the day. I really look with commiseration over the great body of my fellow citizens, who, reading newspapers, live and die in the belief that they have known something of what has been passing in the world” (Letter to John Norvell, June 14th, 1807).
Today, of course, mass media takes many forms besides newspapers. But the standards Jefferson spoke of haven’t changed. “Television network newscast” or “internet posts” might be substituted for “newspaper” in the above paragraph.
Jefferson further said: “I will add, that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.”
In a world complicated by many lies, telling the truth is sometimes not enough. It is often important to disprove the lies ― especially ones that, through the psychological ploy of repetition, have been embedded in the public mind as facts by the corporate media. With the lies washed away, the truth becomes easier to see.
Even Wiser Words of Pope Pius XI
In his great encyclical “On Atheistic Communism” (Divini Redemptoris) of 1937, Pope Pius XI spoke of the deviousness of the Communist methods, pointing out that Communists show all the attributes of a well-hidden conspiracy: “The peril only grows greater from day to day because of the pressure exerted by clever agitators [conspiracy] … The Communism of today, conceals in itself a false messianic idea. A pseudo-ideal of justice, of equality and fraternity in labor impregnates all its doctrine and activity with a deceptive mysticism, which communicates a zealous and contagious enthusiasm to the multitudes entrapped by delusive promises. This is especially true in an age like ours, when unusual misery has resulted from the unequal distribution of the goods of this world ... The doctrine of modern Communism is often concealed under the most seductive trappings … How is it possible that such a system, long since rejected scientifically and now proved erroneous by experience, how is it, We ask, that such a system could spread so rapidly in all parts of the world? The explanation lies in the fact that too few have been able to grasp the nature of Communism. The majority instead succumb to its deception, skillfully concealed by the most extravagant promises … The preachers of Communism are also proficient in exploiting racial antagonisms and political divisions and oppositions … ”
“A third powerful factor in the diffusion of Communism is the conspiracy of silence on the part of a large section of the non-Catholic press of the world. We say conspiracy, because it is impossible otherwise to explain how a press, usually so eager to exploit even the little daily incidents of life, has been able to remain silent for so long about the horrors perpetrated in Russia, in Mexico and even in a great part of Spain; and that it should have relatively so little to say concerning a world organization as vast as Russian Communism. This silence … is favored by various occult forces which for a long time have been working for the overthrow of the Christian Social Order … it has striven to destroy Christian civilization and the Christian religion …. Bishops and priests were exiled, condemned to forced labor, shot and done to death in inhuman fashion; laymen suspected of defending their religion were vexed, persecuted, dragged off to trial and thrown into prison … [and,] as far as possible, every church and every monastery was destroyed. Every vestige of the Christian religion was eradicated ... The fury of Communism has not confined itself to the indiscriminate slaughter of Bishops, of thousands of priests and religious of both sexes; … but the majority of its victims have been laymen of all conditions and classes. Even up to the present moment, masses of them are slain almost daily for no other offense than the fact that they are good Christians or at least opposed to atheistic Communism.”
The Pope then speaks of the objectives and effects of the Communist conspiracy: “Communism, moreover, strips man of his liberty, robs human personality of all its dignity, and removes all the moral restraints that check the eruptions of blind impulse. There is no recognition of any right of the individual in his relations to the collectivity; no natural right is accorded to human personality, which is a mere cog-wheel in the Communist system. In man’s relations with other individuals, besides, Communists hold the principle of absolute equality, rejecting all hierarchy and divinely-constituted authority, including the authority of parents. What men call authority and subordination is derived from the community as its first and only font. Nor is the individual granted any property rights over material goods or the means of production, for inasmuch as these are the source of further wealth, their possession would give one man power over another. Precisely on this score, all forms of private property must be eradicated, for they are at the origin of all economic enslavement. Refusing to human life any sacred or spiritual character, such a doctrine logically makes of marriage and the family a purely artificial and civil institution, the outcome of a specific economic system. There exists no matrimonial bond of a juridico-moral nature that is not subject to the whim of the individual or of the collectivity. Naturally, therefore, the notion of an indissoluble marriage-tie is scouted. Communism is particularly characterized by the rejection of any link that binds woman to the family and the home, and her emancipation is proclaimed as a basic principle. She is withdrawn from the family and the care of her children, to be thrust instead into public life and collective production under the same conditions as man. The care of home and children then devolves upon the collectivity. Finally, the right of education is denied to parents, for it is conceived as the exclusive prerogative of the community, in whose name and by whose mandate alone parents may exercise this right.”
Pope Pius XI pointed out that “the most persistent enemies of the Church, who from Moscow are directing the struggle against Christian civilization, themselves bear witness ... that the Papacy ... has called public attention to the perils of Communism more frequently and more effectively than any other public authority on Earth.” (par. 6) If, then, the Catholic Church is such an effective opponent of Communism, it is obvious that the annihilation of the opposition (the Church) would be top priority for the Marxist-Leninists. It must be destroyed, if not by direct destruction, then by infiltration and subversion.
For years there have been rumors and reports of infiltration of the Church by Communists, who would enter seminaries and be ordained priests, for the purpose of destroying the Church from within. We present here strong and undeniable confirmation of these rumors. The following are quotes and paraphrases from ex-Communists themselves, who admit that Moscow had ordered, directed and implemented a terrifyingly successful strategy for the infiltration of the Church.
Albert Vassert, a former member of the French Communist Party, revealed, in 1955, that Moscow had issued a 1936 order that carefully selected members of the Communist youth enter seminaries, and after training, receive ordination as priests. Some of these were to infiltrate religious orders, particularly the Dominicans. (In his essay “Satan at Work”, Deitrich von Hildebrand reported that the French Dominicans had become so Communistic in their ‘evangelization’, that, in 1953, the Order barely escaped dissolution by the order of Pope Pius XII).
Kremlin Orders Infiltration of Catholic Clergy
Mr. Manning Johnson, a former official of the Communist Party in America, gave the following testimony in 1953 to the House Unamerican Activities Committee: “Once the tactic of infiltration of religious organizations was set by the Kremlin ... the Communists discovered that the destruction of religion could proceed much faster through infiltration of the Church by Communists operating within the Church itself. The Communist leadership, in the United States, realized that the infiltration tactic in this country would have to adapt itself to American conditions and the religious make-up peculiar to this country. In the earliest stages, it was determined that, with only small forces available to them, it would be necessary to concentrate Communist agents in the seminaries. The practical conclusion drawn by the Red leaders was that these institutions would make it possible for a small Communist minority to influence the ideology of future clergymen in the paths conducive to Communist purposes.”
Further on in his testimony, Mr. Johnson pointed out the grim fact that: “This policy of infiltrating seminaries was successful beyond even our Communist expectations ... It is the axiom of Communist organization’s strategy that if a body has 1% Communist Party and 9% Party sympathizers, this 10% can effectively control the remaining 90% who act and think on an individual basis.”
Mr. Johnson further testified that the goals of this infiltration were twofold:
(1) To make the Catholic Church no longer effective against Communism.
(2) To direct clerical thinking away from the spiritual and toward the temporal and political ... hence, the preaching of the “social gospel”.
Sadly, the Second Vatican Council only mentioned Communism in one footnote of its entire 16 documents! It seems as though the infiltrators, who had reached the highest positions, had done their job well! During the Council, a petition signed by 454 Council Fathers requesting that Communism receive explicit treatment was “mysteriously misplaced”. Since the Second Vatican Council, the Church now “dialogues” with Communists instead of opposing them ... a Marxist’s dream come true!
In the U.S.A., around 1,100 Young Radicals Entered the Seminaries in 1930s
Dr. Bella Dodd spent most of her life in the Communist Party in America and was designated to become the Attorney General had the Party won the White House. After her defection from the Communist Party, she revealed that one of her jobs as a Communist agent was to encourage young radicals (not always card-carrying Communists) to enter Catholic seminaries. She said that, before she had left the Party in the United States, she herself had encouraged around 1,000 young radicals to infiltrate the seminaries and religious orders ... and she was only one Communist.
The Benedictine Brother, Joseph Natale, O.S.B. (died 1995), Superior of Most Holy Family Monastery, was present at one of Bella Dodd’s lectures in the early 1950s. He relates the following: “I listened to that woman for four hours and she had my hair standing on end. Everything she said has been fulfilled to the letter. You would think she was the world's greatest prophet, but she was no prophet. She was merely exposing the step-by-step battle plan of Communist subversion of the Catholic Church. She explained that of all the world's religions, the Catholic Church was the only one feared by the Communists, for it was its only effective opponent. Back then [early 1950s], she said: “Right now they are in the highest places in the Church. They are working to bring about change in order that the Catholic Church would not be effective against Communism” ... that these changes would be so drastic that “you will not recognize the Catholic Church. The whole idea was to destroy, not the institution of the Church, but rather the Faith of the people, and even use the institution of the Church, if possible, to destroy the Faith through the promotion of a pseudo-religion — something that resembled Catholicism, but was not the real thing. This would be necessary in order to shame Church leaders into an ‘openness to the world’ and to a more flexible attitude toward all religions and philosophies. The Communists would then exploit this openness in order to undermine the Church.”
Brother Joseph Natale explains: “She said that of all the world’s religions, the Catholic Church was the only one feared by the Communists, for it was its only effective opponent. Speaking as an ex-Communist, she said: ‘In the 1930s, we put eleven hundred men into the priesthood in order to destroy the Church from within.’ The idea was for these men to be ordained, and then climb the ladder of influence and authority -- to come to be monsignors and bishops. Back then she said ‘RIGHT NOW THEY ARE IN THE HIGHEST PLACES, and they are working to bring about change in order that the Catholic Church will no longer be effective against Communism.’ She also said that the changes would be so drastic that ‘you will not recognize the Catholic Church’.” (Note, this was about 10 to 12 years before the Second Vatican Council).
The Popes on Conspiracies
In the modern, post-French Revolution era, there are two chief areas that have commanded the attention of the popes with regard to “conspiracy” in a general sense. These are Freemasonry and Communism. The popes are not intimidated by mockery about believing in “conspiracy theories” and state their positions very clearly indeed.
Pope Leo XIII on the Conspiracy of Freemasonry
Pope Leo XIII, in Humanum Genus, his encyclical against Freemasonry, writes:
“At this period, however, the partisans of evil seems to be combining together [which is what a conspiracy is], and to be struggling with united vehemence, led on or assisted by that strongly organized and widespread association called the Freemasons. No longer making any secret of their purposes, they are now boldly rising up against God Himself. They are planning the destruction of holy Church publicly and openly [which is what a conspiracy is], and this with the set purpose of utterly despoiling the nations of Christendom of the blessings obtained for us through Jesus Christ our Savior … At so urgent a crisis, it is Our office to point out the danger and their plans and devices … The Roman Pontiffs were prompt in detecting the presence and the purpose of this capital enemy … hiding as a dark conspiracy; and , they took occasion not allow themselves to be caught by the devices and snares laid out to deceive them …
“But their provident and paternal solicitude had not always and everywhere the result desired; and this, either because of the deception and cunning of some who were active agents in the mischief, or else of the thoughtless levity of the rest … The sect of Freemasons grew with a rapidity beyond conception in the course of a century and a half, until it came to be able, by means of fraud or of audacity, to gain such entrance into every rank of the State as to seem to be almost its ruling power.
“There are several organized bodies which, though differing in name, in ceremonial, in form and origin, are nevertheless so bound together by a common purpose and by the similarity of their main opinions, as to make in fact one thing with the sect of the Freemasons―which is a kind of center from which they all go forth, and to which they all return. Now, these no longer show a desire to remain concealed; for they hold their meetings in the daylight and before the public eye, and publish their own newspaper organs; and yet, when thoroughly understood, they are found still to retain the nature and the habits of secret societies. There are many things, like mysteries, which it is the fixed rule to hide with extreme care, not only from strangers, but from very many members, also; such as their secret and final designs, the names of the chief leaders, and certain secret and inner meetings, as well as their decisions, and the ways and means of carrying them out …
“Candidates are generally commanded to promise ― nay, with a special oath, to swear ― that they will never make known, to any person, at any time or in any way, the members, the passes, or the subjects discussed … They must submit to the direst penalties and death itself, if any are judged to have betrayed the doings of the sect or to have resisted commands given, punishment is inflicted on them not infrequently, and with so much audacity and dexterity that the assassin very often escapes the detection and penalty of his crime [until he comes face-to-face with God].
“Thus, with a fraudulent external appearance, and with a style of willful deception which is always the same, the Freemasons strive, as far as possible, to conceal themselves, and to admit no witnesses but their own members. As a convenient manner of concealment, they assume the character of literary men and scholars associated for purposes of learning. They speak of their zeal for a more cultured refinement, and of their love for the poor; and they declare their one wish to be the amelioration of the condition of the masses, and to share with the largest possible number all the benefits of civil life … But their ultimate purpose forces itself into view ― namely, the utter overthrow of that whole religious and political order of the world which the Christian teaching has produced, and the substitution of a new state of things in accordance with their ideas, of which the foundations and laws shall be drawn from mere naturalism.
“The sect of the Freemasons shows itself insolent and proud of its success, and seems as if it would put no bounds to its pertinacity. Its followers, joined together by a wicked compact and by secret counsels, give help one to another, and excite one another to an audacity for evil things.” (Pope Leo XIII, Encyclical Humanum Genus).
Pope Pius XI on the Conspiracy of Communism
Pope Pius XI, in Divini Redemptoris, his encyclical against atheistic Communism, writes: “A powerful factor in the diffusion of Communism is the conspiracy of silence on the part of a large section of the non-Catholic press of the world. We say conspiracy, because it is impossible otherwise to explain how a press usually so eager to exploit even the little daily incidents of life has been able to remain silent for so long about the horrors perpetrated in Russia, in Mexico and even in a great part of Spain; and that it should have relatively so little to say concerning a world organization as vast as Russian Communism. This silence is due in part to shortsighted political policy, and is favored by various occult forces which for a long time have been working for the overthrow of the Christian Social Order.”
“In making these observations, it is no part of Our intention to condemn en masse the peoples of the Soviet Union. For them We cherish the warmest paternal affection. We are well aware that not a few of them groan beneath the yoke imposed on them by men who, in very large part, are strangers to the real interests of the country. We recognize that many others were deceived by fallacious hopes. We blame only the system, with its authors and abettors who considered Russia the best-prepared field for experimenting with a plan elaborated decades ago, and who from there continue to spread it from one end of the world to the other.” (Pope Pius XI, Encyclical Divini Redemptoris).
Pope St. Pius X on the Conspiracy of Modernists
Pope St. Pius X, in Pascendi, his encyclical against Modernism and Modernists, writes:
“Further, none is more skillful, none more astute than they, in the employment of a thousand noxious devices; for they play the double part of rationalist and Catholic, and this so craftily that they easily lead the unwary into error; and as audacity is their chief characteristic, there is no conclusion of any kind from which they shrink or which they do not thrust forward with pertinacity and assurance To this must be added the fact, which indeed is well calculated to deceive souls, that they lead a life of the greatest activity, of assiduous and ardent application to every branch of learning, and that they possess, as a rule, a reputation for irreproachable morality … It is one of the cleverest devices of the Modernists (as they are commonly and rightly called) to present their doctrines without order and systematic arrangement, in a scattered and disjointed manner, so as to make it appear as if their minds were in doubt or hesitation, whereas in reality they are quite fixed and steadfast.
“We have already some of the artifices employed by Modernists to exploit their wares. What efforts do they not make to win new recruits! They seize upon professorships in the seminaries and universities, and gradually make of them chairs of pestilence. In sermons from the pulpit they disseminate their doctrines, although possibly in utterances which are veiled … They are to be found among the laity, and in the ranks of the clergy, and they are not wanting even in the last place where one might expect to meet them, in religious communities.
“The Modernists vent all their gall and hatred on Catholics who sturdily fight the battles of the Church. But of all the insults they heap on them―those of ignorance and obstinacy are the favorites. When an adversary rises up against them with an erudition and force that render him redoubtable, they try to make a conspiracy of silence around him to nullify the effects of his attack … Such is a summary description of the Modernists with their doctrines ― methods and doctrines replete with errors, made not for edification, but for destruction, not for the making of Catholics, but for the seduction of those who are Catholics into heresy; and tending to the utter subversion of all religion.” (Pope St. Pius X, Encyclical Pascendi).
Listen To The Conspirators―Straight From The Marxist Mouth
In Marxist philosophy the “bourgeoisie” is the social class that came to own the means of production during modern industrialization and whose societal concerns are the value of property and the preservation of capital, to ensure the perpetuation of their economic supremacy in society. The “bourgeoisie” is the ruling class of the capitalist era. They were a middle class during the feudal era under the land-owning aristocracy. Capitalism has now simplified the class structure to “owners” and “workers”, and the owners have all the power. The owners are the “bourgeoisie”, and the workers are the “proletariat”.
In Marxism, the “proletariat” is the working class, including farmers and low-skilled factory workers. They do not own any means of production. The bourgeoisie are the capitalist class, the wealthy, who own most of the means of production. Marx argued that the capitalist bourgeoisie mercilessly exploited the proletariat. Here are some extracts from Marx’s Communist Manifesto:
“Society as a whole is more and more splitting up into two great hostile camps, into two great classes, directly facing each other: Bourgeoisie and Proletariat.”
“The discovery of America, the rounding of the Cape, opened up fresh ground for the rising bourgeoisie. The East-Indian and Chinese markets, the colonization of America, trade with the colonies, the increase in the means of exchange and in commodities generally, gave to commerce, to navigation, to industry, an impulse never before known, and thereby, to the revolutionary element in the tottering feudal society, a rapid development.”
The immediate aim of the Communists is the same as that of all other proletarian parties: formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat:
“The struggle of the proletariat (working classes) with the bourgeoisie (the wealthy class) is at first a national struggle. The proletariat of each country must, of course, first of all settle matters with its own bourgeoisie. In depicting the most general phases of the development of the proletariat, we traced the more or less veiled civil war, raging within existing society, up to the point where that war breaks out into open revolution, and where the violent overthrow of the bourgeoisie lays the foundation for the sway of the proletariat.”
“The modern laborer, on the contrary, instead of rising with the progress of industry, sinks deeper and deeper below the conditions of existence of his own class. He becomes a pauper, and pauperism develops more rapidly than population and wealth. And here it becomes evident, that the bourgeoisie is unfit any longer to be the ruling class in society, and to impose its conditions of existence upon society as an over-riding law. It is unfit to rule because it is incompetent to assure an existence to its slave within his slavery, because it cannot help letting him sink into such a state, that it has to feed him, instead of being fed by him. Society can no longer live under this bourgeoisie, in other words, its existence is no longer compatible with society … What the bourgeoisie, therefore, produces, above all, is its own grave-diggers. Its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable.”
“In what relation do the Communists stand to the proletarians as a whole? The Communists do not form a separate party opposed to other working-class parties. They have no interests separate and apart from those of the proletariat as a whole. They do not set up any sectarian principles of their own, by which to shape and mold the proletarian movement. The Communists are distinguished from the other working-class parties by this only:
(1) In the national struggles of the proletarians of the different countries, they point out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat, independently of all nationality.
(2) In the various stages of development which the struggle of the working class against the bourgeoisie has to pass through, they always and everywhere represent the interests of the movement as a whole.
“The Communists, therefore, are on the one hand, practically, the most advanced and resolute section of the working-class parties of every country, Communists are that section which pushes forward all others; on the other hand, theoretically, Communists have the advantage over the great mass of the proletariat of clearly understanding the line of march, the conditions, and the ultimate general results of the proletarian movement. The immediate aim of the Communist is the same as that of all the other proletarian parties: formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat … Communists never cease, for a single instant, to instill into the working class the clearest possible recognition of the hostile antagonism between bourgeoisie and proletariat … The theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property.”
“The first step in the revolution by the working class, is to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling as to win the battle of democracy. The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degrees, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralize all instruments of production in the hands of the State … The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions. Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win.”
Article 3
Sunday, November 3rd
Air-Conditioned Purgatory?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, November 3rd
Air-Conditioned Purgatory?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Today’s Air-Conditioned Purgatory
Some people have the weirdest ideas about Purgatory. They amount of sins that they commit would make you think that they imagine Purgatory to be like a five-star hotel, with a bar and Jacuzzi in every room, air-conditioning and climate-control, Olympic size swimming-pool and golf-course thrown in. They sin more and more so that they can spend more and more time there! The Modernist or Liberal Catholic, may well accept the existence of Purgatory in theory, however, in practice, they live as though Purgatory is empty. Let’s face it, how many sermons do you hear on Purgatory these days? Even when they are preached, many ‘water-down’ Purgatory to a point where we think little of the sufferings of the souls detained there—as though they were merely stuck in a traffic jam or in slow-moving traffic on the road to Heaven! The Modernist and Liberal mentality is, in the words of Fr. Felix Salvany, in his book Liberalism is a Sin,
Offend God rather than Neighbor!
“The Catholic simply tainted with Liberalism is generally a good man and sincerely pious; he exhales, nevertheless, an odor of Liberalism in everything he says, writes, or takes up. This courageous man reasons, speaks, and acts as a Liberal without knowing it. His strong point is charity; he is charity itself. … How the devil must chuckle over the mushy charity held out as a bait to abet his own cause! … Charity is a supernatural virtue which induces us to love God above all things and our neighbors as ourselves for the love of God. … Charity is primarily the love of God, secondarily the love of our neighbor for God’s sake. To sacrifice the first is to abandon the latter. Therefore, to offend our neighbor for the love of God, is a true act of charity. Not to offend our neighbor for the love of God is a sin. Modern Liberalism reverses this order; it imposes a false notion of charity: our neighbor first, and, if at all, God afterwards” (Fr. Felix Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin).
Hey! Nobody’s Perfect!
The result of this reversal of charity therefore sees people being prepared to see God offended rather than having to be ‘uncharitable’ by correcting the sinning neighbor! Unbelievable! Yet this modern behavior consequently allows mountains of sins to be piled-up under the pretext of what they think and protest is charity—all they really do is allow others to pile-up their Purgatory! “Sin now, burn later”—that’s their idea of charity. They help their neighbor pile-up the firewood with their excuses for not correcting others—“Everyone has their faults!” … “Nobody’s perfect!” … “It’s only a Venial Sin!” Huh? Only a Venial Sin? Well read some accounts of the suffering undergone in the fires of Purgatory for only Venial Sins! Then come back and say “only”! The entrance fee to Heaven is PERFECTION—as Our Lord Himself said: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48), which echoes the Old Testament: “Thou shalt be perfect and without spot before the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). Heaven is no place for mediocrity or half-baked Catholics—hence the need for the fires of Purgatory to fully-bake the half-baked Catholics. Remember—many, if not most saints, had to pass to through Purgatory—with the exception of martyrs.
Dense Wood Burns Longer
They say that dense wood burns for much longer—well, these Liberals and Modernists with their fake and false notions of charity and sin, must be pretty dense. Therefore, if they manage to scrape into Purgatory, they will burn all the longer. The physician cauterizing his patient, or cutting off his gangrened limb, may nonetheless love him. Likewise the ‘cauterizing’ effect of Purgatory is an inexplicably painful act of mercy and love by God—God chastises those whom He loves: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou wert cold, or hot! But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth! Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ And knowest not, that thou art wretched [a sinner], and miserable [finding joy in the world, not God], and poor [in grace and merits], and blind [lukewarm], and naked [without virtues]. I counsel thee to buy of Me gold fire tried [true charity], that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see! Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise! Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
As Penance Goes Down, the Temperature Goes Up
It is lack of penance that places souls in the terrible fires of Purgatory. Our Lord has warned us: product of confession is the receiving and doing of penance. “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). The dogmatic teaching of the Catholic Church on the doctrine of Purgatory, was specified in 1439 by the Council of Florence, which declared: “It has likewise been defined that, if those truly penitent have departed in the love of God, before they have made satisfaction by worthy fruits of penance for sins of commission and omission, the souls of these are cleansed after death by purgatorial punishments.” The Council of Trent later added: “If anyone says that, after receiving the grace of justification, the guilt of any repentant sinner is remitted and the debt of eternal punishment is blotted out, in such a way that no debt of temporal punishment remains to be paid, either in this life or in Purgatory, before the gate to the Kingdom of Heaven can be opened―let him be anathema!”
White-Weddings, okay! White-Funerals? You’re Kidding!
St. Paul said that in the last times there would be people with “itching ears” seeking after novelties and believing fables. Well, one of those fables is that Purgatory and Hell are empty—or almost empty. God is love, and love is sweet, and the sweet loving God in His loving sweetness cannot bear to send anyone to Purgatory, let alone Hell! This novelty of funerals in white is a fable-feeding funeral—funerals in white used to be performed ONLY for children who had died below the “age-of-reason” and were thus incapable of committing sin—which meant that after death they went straight to Heaven, hence the “funeral in white” with the Mass being that of the Angels, not the Requiem Mass. Today, everyone gets a “White-Funeral” and everyone talks as though the deceased is already clinking glasses with the angels and saints in Heaven, at a homecoming party! Sadly, Heaven IS NOT filling up and Purgatory is NOT empty. In fact, the common opinion among theologians is that MOST SOULS, that end up going to Heaven, have to pass through the fires of Purgatory. As Scripture says: “There shall not enter into it any thing defiled, or that worketh abomination or maketh a lie …” (Apocalypse 21:27).
Full-Price Ticket to Heaven
The poor souls in Purgatory still have the stains of sin within them. This means two things. First, it means that the souls have not yet paid the temporal penalty due to sin, either for venial sins, or for mortal sins whose guilt was forgiven before death. There is also the problem of unrepented and unforgiven venial sin, for which the guilt and punishment were not removed before death. It is not certain whether the guilt of venial sins is strictly speaking remitted after death, and if so, how the remission takes place.
Discounts Only On Earth
We can pay for damage of sin after death in Purgatory, or we can pay the penalties of satisfaction for sin on Earth before death, which can be done by souls in a state of grace during the course of their whole life on Earth. Whereas before death a soul can cleanse itself by freely choosing to suffer for its sins, and so can gain merit for this suffering; a soul in Purgatory cannot choose to do so and gains no merit for its suffering and no increase in its glory. Rather, it is cleansed according to the demands of Divine Justice.
The Price is Right!
There are simply, or perhaps even too obviously, several basic reasons why souls have to undergo the terrible, yet at the same time joyful, sufferings of Purgatory. To keep things simple, let us enumerate them in a list form:
(1) Those who never lost the grace of God throughout their life, and died after having committed only venial sins in their life, but who were not sufficiently sorry for those venial sins, nor did sufficient penance for them, nor accepted the trials and sufferings that God sent them as a payment for their sins.
(2) Those who have committed mortal sins and therefore lost the grace of God, which they regained through the Sacrament of Confession, but like the case above, they were not sufficiently sorry for those venial sins, nor did sufficient penance for them, nor accepted the trials and sufferings that God sent them as a payment for their sins. Of course, mortal sin is much more expensive than venial sin, and so requires more penance than would be required for venial sin.
(3) The third group, of course, is a combination of the two previous groups listed above—those who have sinned both mortally and venially, and who have died with their mortal sins confessed and forgiven in the Sacrament of Confession. These have an even greater debt for having committed a combination of both kinds of sins.
Each Size of Sin Has Its Price Tag
What modifies this is the personal number and kind of sin that has been committed. There is a hierarchy among sins, which only God can properly and correctly evaluate. Objective and subjective elements come into play to create almost infinite levels of gravity for the same species of sin—the sin of violence will be judged differently in each case: what was duration of the act of violence? What was its intensity? On whom was it inflicted? Was it in self-defense? What damage or injury was inflicted? Was there any sorrow? Was there any apology made? Was any reparation made? Did the behavior improve or cease?
A Just Judge Judges the Just
These are just a few of the many questions that need to be asked to form a correct and just judgment of the level of guilt involved. Thank heavens it God Who judges and nobody else? It would be hard enough to judge one single sin correctly, let alone the thousands or hundreds of thousands of sins that one single person has committed!
It is good to know that, in all of His judgments, God is always both merciful and just. He never applies His justice without mercy; and He never shows mercy without justice. If He would do so, then He would be lacking in one or the other virtue—but God is perfect and so He exercises both in perfect balance and with the utmost harmony. However, it is worth noting one of the psalms, from Holy Scripture, which says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works” (Psalm 144:8-9).
Mercy in Hell?
Even those who are damned in Hell, realize that God is merciful to them, and has not permitted them to be punished to degree that they truly deserved—even though they will be punished for eternity. The time of punishment remains the same—eternity—but the degree or intensity of punishment has been reduced. A combination of justice and mercy.
Sweeping Purgatory Under the Carpet?
Unfortunately, our sense of values has been deformed and corrupted, and we have no real inkling of the gravity of sin, nor of the punishment that sin deserves. Furthermore, we have little idea of what Purgatory is really like. For many, it is like a taboo subject—let’s not talk about it, let’s talk about something more pleasant! But when we avoid looking at the doctrine and revelations about Purgatory, we risk harming ourselves by avoiding the issue of the gravity and consequence of sin. When we read and truly meditate upon what goes on in Purgatory, we cannot avoid being struck with a salutary and healthy fear of the consequences of even the most ‘trivial’ sin (if one dare call sin ‘trivial’) and the rigor of God’s justice, even though he simultaneously applies some of His mercy.
“Ouch” and “Ouch” again!
If you read Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, you will read some very sobering passages about Purgatory. One of the things he points out is the fact that the fires of Purgatory are the same fires as those of Hell. He also points out that there is in Purgatory, as in Hell, a double pain—the pain of loss in the soul and the pain of the senses. The pain suffered by the loss of God, is greater than the pain of the fire, or any of the other tortures, that the soul suffers.
Massive Loss
The pain of loss consists in being deprived for a time of the sight of God, Who is our Supreme Good, for Whom our souls were made. In Purgatory, there is a thirst for God—which should have been there while living on Earth, but the soul thirsted more for worldly things rather than God. The pain of sense, or sensible suffering, is the same as that which we experience in our flesh. Its nature is not defined by Faith, but it is the common opinion of the Doctors that it consists in fire and other species of suffering.
Fearsome Fire—Hot as Hell
The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers, is that of Hell, of which the rich glutton speaks when he says: “I am tormented in this flame” (Luke 16:24). The same fire, says Pope St. Gregory the Great, torments the damned and purifies the elect. “Almost all theologians,” says the cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, “teach that the damned in Hell and the souls in Purgatory suffer the action of the same fire.” It must be held as certain, writes St. Robert Bellarmine, that there is no proportion between the sufferings of this life and those of Purgatory. St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book on Purgatory, writes: “As to the suffering, it is equal to that of Hell.”
We know what a terrible thing fire is, and what pain is caused by the slightest burn, no matter how feeble the flame may be; how much more terrible must be that fire which is fed neither with wood, gas nor oil.
St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book on Purgatory, says: “The souls endure a torment so extreme that no tongue can describe it, nor could the understanding conceive the least notion of it, if God did not make it known by a particular grace.”
Perfectly Weighted Justice
As regards the severity of these pains, since they are inflicted by Infinite Justice, they are proportioned to the nature, gravity, and number of sins committed. Each one receives according to his works, each one must acquit himself of the debts with which he sees himself charged before God. Now these debts differ greatly in quality. Some, which have accumulated during a long life, have reached the ten thousand talents of the Gospel, that is to say, millions and tens of millions; whilst others are reduced to a few farthings, the trifling remainder of that which has not been expiated on Earth. It follows from this that the souls undergo various kinds of sufferings, that there are innumerable degrees of expiation in Purgatory, and that some are incomparably more severe than others. However, speaking in general, the doctors agree in saying that the pains are most excruciating.
Terrible Time of Torment
St. Augustine believes that even though the souls in Purgatory will be saved, no doubt, after the trial of fire, but that trial will be terrible, that torment of Purgatory will be far more intolerable than all the most excruciating sufferings in this world. St. Thomas goes even further; he maintains that the least pain of Purgatory surpasses all the sufferings of this life, whatsoever they may be. The author of The Imitation of Christ explains this doctrine by a practical and striking sentence. Speaking in general of the sufferings of the other life, he says: “There, one hour of torment will be more terrible than a hundred years of rigorous penance done her.”
Crazy Catholics
Why, O why, do people want to pile up unnecessary punishment in the unimaginably painful and hot fires of Purgatory, which are in essence the fires of Hell, when they could avoid that by either not-sinning here below, or doing fitting serious penance for past sins. If people were physically burned on Earth each time they committed a Mortal or Venial Sin, then sin would soon stop. Because there payment is deferred to a later time, they sin like crazy! They—and we—are crazy! You have to be—if you stop and think about it seriously!
Some people have the weirdest ideas about Purgatory. They amount of sins that they commit would make you think that they imagine Purgatory to be like a five-star hotel, with a bar and Jacuzzi in every room, air-conditioning and climate-control, Olympic size swimming-pool and golf-course thrown in. They sin more and more so that they can spend more and more time there! The Modernist or Liberal Catholic, may well accept the existence of Purgatory in theory, however, in practice, they live as though Purgatory is empty. Let’s face it, how many sermons do you hear on Purgatory these days? Even when they are preached, many ‘water-down’ Purgatory to a point where we think little of the sufferings of the souls detained there—as though they were merely stuck in a traffic jam or in slow-moving traffic on the road to Heaven! The Modernist and Liberal mentality is, in the words of Fr. Felix Salvany, in his book Liberalism is a Sin,
Offend God rather than Neighbor!
“The Catholic simply tainted with Liberalism is generally a good man and sincerely pious; he exhales, nevertheless, an odor of Liberalism in everything he says, writes, or takes up. This courageous man reasons, speaks, and acts as a Liberal without knowing it. His strong point is charity; he is charity itself. … How the devil must chuckle over the mushy charity held out as a bait to abet his own cause! … Charity is a supernatural virtue which induces us to love God above all things and our neighbors as ourselves for the love of God. … Charity is primarily the love of God, secondarily the love of our neighbor for God’s sake. To sacrifice the first is to abandon the latter. Therefore, to offend our neighbor for the love of God, is a true act of charity. Not to offend our neighbor for the love of God is a sin. Modern Liberalism reverses this order; it imposes a false notion of charity: our neighbor first, and, if at all, God afterwards” (Fr. Felix Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin).
Hey! Nobody’s Perfect!
The result of this reversal of charity therefore sees people being prepared to see God offended rather than having to be ‘uncharitable’ by correcting the sinning neighbor! Unbelievable! Yet this modern behavior consequently allows mountains of sins to be piled-up under the pretext of what they think and protest is charity—all they really do is allow others to pile-up their Purgatory! “Sin now, burn later”—that’s their idea of charity. They help their neighbor pile-up the firewood with their excuses for not correcting others—“Everyone has their faults!” … “Nobody’s perfect!” … “It’s only a Venial Sin!” Huh? Only a Venial Sin? Well read some accounts of the suffering undergone in the fires of Purgatory for only Venial Sins! Then come back and say “only”! The entrance fee to Heaven is PERFECTION—as Our Lord Himself said: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48), which echoes the Old Testament: “Thou shalt be perfect and without spot before the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). Heaven is no place for mediocrity or half-baked Catholics—hence the need for the fires of Purgatory to fully-bake the half-baked Catholics. Remember—many, if not most saints, had to pass to through Purgatory—with the exception of martyrs.
Dense Wood Burns Longer
They say that dense wood burns for much longer—well, these Liberals and Modernists with their fake and false notions of charity and sin, must be pretty dense. Therefore, if they manage to scrape into Purgatory, they will burn all the longer. The physician cauterizing his patient, or cutting off his gangrened limb, may nonetheless love him. Likewise the ‘cauterizing’ effect of Purgatory is an inexplicably painful act of mercy and love by God—God chastises those whom He loves: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou wert cold, or hot! But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth! Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ And knowest not, that thou art wretched [a sinner], and miserable [finding joy in the world, not God], and poor [in grace and merits], and blind [lukewarm], and naked [without virtues]. I counsel thee to buy of Me gold fire tried [true charity], that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see! Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise! Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
As Penance Goes Down, the Temperature Goes Up
It is lack of penance that places souls in the terrible fires of Purgatory. Our Lord has warned us: product of confession is the receiving and doing of penance. “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). The dogmatic teaching of the Catholic Church on the doctrine of Purgatory, was specified in 1439 by the Council of Florence, which declared: “It has likewise been defined that, if those truly penitent have departed in the love of God, before they have made satisfaction by worthy fruits of penance for sins of commission and omission, the souls of these are cleansed after death by purgatorial punishments.” The Council of Trent later added: “If anyone says that, after receiving the grace of justification, the guilt of any repentant sinner is remitted and the debt of eternal punishment is blotted out, in such a way that no debt of temporal punishment remains to be paid, either in this life or in Purgatory, before the gate to the Kingdom of Heaven can be opened―let him be anathema!”
White-Weddings, okay! White-Funerals? You’re Kidding!
St. Paul said that in the last times there would be people with “itching ears” seeking after novelties and believing fables. Well, one of those fables is that Purgatory and Hell are empty—or almost empty. God is love, and love is sweet, and the sweet loving God in His loving sweetness cannot bear to send anyone to Purgatory, let alone Hell! This novelty of funerals in white is a fable-feeding funeral—funerals in white used to be performed ONLY for children who had died below the “age-of-reason” and were thus incapable of committing sin—which meant that after death they went straight to Heaven, hence the “funeral in white” with the Mass being that of the Angels, not the Requiem Mass. Today, everyone gets a “White-Funeral” and everyone talks as though the deceased is already clinking glasses with the angels and saints in Heaven, at a homecoming party! Sadly, Heaven IS NOT filling up and Purgatory is NOT empty. In fact, the common opinion among theologians is that MOST SOULS, that end up going to Heaven, have to pass through the fires of Purgatory. As Scripture says: “There shall not enter into it any thing defiled, or that worketh abomination or maketh a lie …” (Apocalypse 21:27).
Full-Price Ticket to Heaven
The poor souls in Purgatory still have the stains of sin within them. This means two things. First, it means that the souls have not yet paid the temporal penalty due to sin, either for venial sins, or for mortal sins whose guilt was forgiven before death. There is also the problem of unrepented and unforgiven venial sin, for which the guilt and punishment were not removed before death. It is not certain whether the guilt of venial sins is strictly speaking remitted after death, and if so, how the remission takes place.
Discounts Only On Earth
We can pay for damage of sin after death in Purgatory, or we can pay the penalties of satisfaction for sin on Earth before death, which can be done by souls in a state of grace during the course of their whole life on Earth. Whereas before death a soul can cleanse itself by freely choosing to suffer for its sins, and so can gain merit for this suffering; a soul in Purgatory cannot choose to do so and gains no merit for its suffering and no increase in its glory. Rather, it is cleansed according to the demands of Divine Justice.
The Price is Right!
There are simply, or perhaps even too obviously, several basic reasons why souls have to undergo the terrible, yet at the same time joyful, sufferings of Purgatory. To keep things simple, let us enumerate them in a list form:
(1) Those who never lost the grace of God throughout their life, and died after having committed only venial sins in their life, but who were not sufficiently sorry for those venial sins, nor did sufficient penance for them, nor accepted the trials and sufferings that God sent them as a payment for their sins.
(2) Those who have committed mortal sins and therefore lost the grace of God, which they regained through the Sacrament of Confession, but like the case above, they were not sufficiently sorry for those venial sins, nor did sufficient penance for them, nor accepted the trials and sufferings that God sent them as a payment for their sins. Of course, mortal sin is much more expensive than venial sin, and so requires more penance than would be required for venial sin.
(3) The third group, of course, is a combination of the two previous groups listed above—those who have sinned both mortally and venially, and who have died with their mortal sins confessed and forgiven in the Sacrament of Confession. These have an even greater debt for having committed a combination of both kinds of sins.
Each Size of Sin Has Its Price Tag
What modifies this is the personal number and kind of sin that has been committed. There is a hierarchy among sins, which only God can properly and correctly evaluate. Objective and subjective elements come into play to create almost infinite levels of gravity for the same species of sin—the sin of violence will be judged differently in each case: what was duration of the act of violence? What was its intensity? On whom was it inflicted? Was it in self-defense? What damage or injury was inflicted? Was there any sorrow? Was there any apology made? Was any reparation made? Did the behavior improve or cease?
A Just Judge Judges the Just
These are just a few of the many questions that need to be asked to form a correct and just judgment of the level of guilt involved. Thank heavens it God Who judges and nobody else? It would be hard enough to judge one single sin correctly, let alone the thousands or hundreds of thousands of sins that one single person has committed!
It is good to know that, in all of His judgments, God is always both merciful and just. He never applies His justice without mercy; and He never shows mercy without justice. If He would do so, then He would be lacking in one or the other virtue—but God is perfect and so He exercises both in perfect balance and with the utmost harmony. However, it is worth noting one of the psalms, from Holy Scripture, which says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works” (Psalm 144:8-9).
Mercy in Hell?
Even those who are damned in Hell, realize that God is merciful to them, and has not permitted them to be punished to degree that they truly deserved—even though they will be punished for eternity. The time of punishment remains the same—eternity—but the degree or intensity of punishment has been reduced. A combination of justice and mercy.
Sweeping Purgatory Under the Carpet?
Unfortunately, our sense of values has been deformed and corrupted, and we have no real inkling of the gravity of sin, nor of the punishment that sin deserves. Furthermore, we have little idea of what Purgatory is really like. For many, it is like a taboo subject—let’s not talk about it, let’s talk about something more pleasant! But when we avoid looking at the doctrine and revelations about Purgatory, we risk harming ourselves by avoiding the issue of the gravity and consequence of sin. When we read and truly meditate upon what goes on in Purgatory, we cannot avoid being struck with a salutary and healthy fear of the consequences of even the most ‘trivial’ sin (if one dare call sin ‘trivial’) and the rigor of God’s justice, even though he simultaneously applies some of His mercy.
“Ouch” and “Ouch” again!
If you read Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, you will read some very sobering passages about Purgatory. One of the things he points out is the fact that the fires of Purgatory are the same fires as those of Hell. He also points out that there is in Purgatory, as in Hell, a double pain—the pain of loss in the soul and the pain of the senses. The pain suffered by the loss of God, is greater than the pain of the fire, or any of the other tortures, that the soul suffers.
Massive Loss
The pain of loss consists in being deprived for a time of the sight of God, Who is our Supreme Good, for Whom our souls were made. In Purgatory, there is a thirst for God—which should have been there while living on Earth, but the soul thirsted more for worldly things rather than God. The pain of sense, or sensible suffering, is the same as that which we experience in our flesh. Its nature is not defined by Faith, but it is the common opinion of the Doctors that it consists in fire and other species of suffering.
Fearsome Fire—Hot as Hell
The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers, is that of Hell, of which the rich glutton speaks when he says: “I am tormented in this flame” (Luke 16:24). The same fire, says Pope St. Gregory the Great, torments the damned and purifies the elect. “Almost all theologians,” says the cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, “teach that the damned in Hell and the souls in Purgatory suffer the action of the same fire.” It must be held as certain, writes St. Robert Bellarmine, that there is no proportion between the sufferings of this life and those of Purgatory. St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book on Purgatory, writes: “As to the suffering, it is equal to that of Hell.”
We know what a terrible thing fire is, and what pain is caused by the slightest burn, no matter how feeble the flame may be; how much more terrible must be that fire which is fed neither with wood, gas nor oil.
St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book on Purgatory, says: “The souls endure a torment so extreme that no tongue can describe it, nor could the understanding conceive the least notion of it, if God did not make it known by a particular grace.”
Perfectly Weighted Justice
As regards the severity of these pains, since they are inflicted by Infinite Justice, they are proportioned to the nature, gravity, and number of sins committed. Each one receives according to his works, each one must acquit himself of the debts with which he sees himself charged before God. Now these debts differ greatly in quality. Some, which have accumulated during a long life, have reached the ten thousand talents of the Gospel, that is to say, millions and tens of millions; whilst others are reduced to a few farthings, the trifling remainder of that which has not been expiated on Earth. It follows from this that the souls undergo various kinds of sufferings, that there are innumerable degrees of expiation in Purgatory, and that some are incomparably more severe than others. However, speaking in general, the doctors agree in saying that the pains are most excruciating.
Terrible Time of Torment
St. Augustine believes that even though the souls in Purgatory will be saved, no doubt, after the trial of fire, but that trial will be terrible, that torment of Purgatory will be far more intolerable than all the most excruciating sufferings in this world. St. Thomas goes even further; he maintains that the least pain of Purgatory surpasses all the sufferings of this life, whatsoever they may be. The author of The Imitation of Christ explains this doctrine by a practical and striking sentence. Speaking in general of the sufferings of the other life, he says: “There, one hour of torment will be more terrible than a hundred years of rigorous penance done her.”
Crazy Catholics
Why, O why, do people want to pile up unnecessary punishment in the unimaginably painful and hot fires of Purgatory, which are in essence the fires of Hell, when they could avoid that by either not-sinning here below, or doing fitting serious penance for past sins. If people were physically burned on Earth each time they committed a Mortal or Venial Sin, then sin would soon stop. Because there payment is deferred to a later time, they sin like crazy! They—and we—are crazy! You have to be—if you stop and think about it seriously!
Article 2
Saturday, November 2nd, Feast of the Holy Souls in Purgatory
Two Views of Purgatory
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Saturday, November 2nd, Feast of the Holy Souls in Purgatory
Two Views of Purgatory
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Two Views of Purgatory
There have always been two views of Purgatory prevailing in the Church, not contradictory, the one of the other, but rather expressive of the mind and devotion of those who have embraced them. Yet the error lies in embracing either one of them, while neglecting to embrace both of them simultaneously. They are like two sides of a coin that have different images on each side—yet they are both an essential part of the coin, though standing on opposite sides.
The Grim View
The first view represents Purgatory as a Hell which is not eternal. Violence, confusion, wailing, horror, preside over its descriptions. It dwells, and truly so, on the terribleness of the pain of sense, which the soul is mysteriously permitted to endure. The fire is the same fire as that of Hell, our earthly fire is said to be like a mere painted fire compared to it. The sense of imprisonment and intense darkness, are additional features in the horror of the scene, which prepare us for that sensible neighborhood to Hell, which many Saints have spoken of as belonging to Purgatory. Then to this terribleness of the pain of sense, is added the dreadfulness of the pain of loss—which again is true, though it is not a permanent loss.
The beauty of God remains, in itself, the same immensely desirable object that it always was. But the soul is changed. All that in life, and in the world of sense, once distracted and dulled its desires for God, is now gone from it—it sees the truth of things like it never so them before, it understands like it never understood before—so that it now seeks God with an impetuosity and a frenzy that no imagination can possibly conceive. God is that light at the end of long, dark, excruciatingly hot tunnel, and that light grows brighter as the soul draws nearer. The very burning excess of its love and desire for God (which it should have had on Earth) becomes the measure of its intolerable pain. What love can do, even on Earth, we learn from the example of Father John Baptist Sanchez, who said that, if any morning he awoke and realized that would not die that day, then he would be a miserable as death at having to live her another day. To those horrors we might add many more which depict Purgatory simply as a Hell which is not eternal. Now all these aspects of Purgatory are true, but they are merely one side of a two-sided coin.
The Joyous View
The second view of Purgatory does not deny any one of the features of the preceding grim view, but it almost puts them out of sight, by the other considerations which it brings more prominently forward. In this view, the soul goes into Purgatory with its eyes fascinated and its spirit sweetly tranquillized, by the face of Jesus, which it glimpsed at the particular Judgment which it has undergone. That remembrance of that Holy Face remains with it, and pacify and tranquillize the terrors of its Purgatorial prison. In the sea of fire, into which it is plunged, it holds fast to that image. The moment that the soul saw that its own unfitness for Heaven, it wings its voluntary flight to Purgatory, like a dove to her proper nest in the shadows of the forest. No prison guards, no angels are needed to escort the soul to its prison. The soul’s understanding of the purity of God suffices.
Seriousness of Sin Sorrowfully Seen
In that moment of Judgment after death, the soul loves God most tenderly, and in return is most tenderly loved by Him. The soul is in punishment, true; but it is in unbroken union with God. St. Catherine of Genoa most positively says, “It has no remembrance, no remembrance at all of its past sins, or of Earth.” Its sweet prison, its holy sepulcher, is in the adorable will of its Heavenly Father, and there it abides the term of its purification with the most perfect contentment and the most unutterable love—yet all the while suffering the most inexpressible pains.
God is All About Extremes
If God is to be perfect, He must be extreme, for perfection implies being extremely good at something. God is extreme in His mercy and extreme in His justice—and the soul reflects this with its extreme love under extreme suffering. As it is not teased or taunted by any vision of self or sin, so neither is it harassed by an atom of fear, or by a single doubt of its own safety or security. It is now in a state of sinlessness—it cannot and will not ever sin again. It cannot even commit the slightest imperfection. It cannot have the least movement of impatience. It can do nothing whatever which will in the least displease God. It loves God above everything, and it loves Him with a pure and disinterested love. It is constantly consoled by angels, and can only rejoice in the confirmed assurance of its own salvation.
Heaven Extremely Expensive
The soul now realizes what it refused or failed to realize on Earth—that Heaven is not the cheap thing that most people made it out to be, thinking they could walk in after a few hastily said prayers and some distractedly heard Masses. Heaven, being the greatest place there is, also carries the greatest admission price—a price few were willing to pay on Earth. Nor could they pay it, even if the wishfully desired to, for they had insufficient funds in the bank of their souls. Now they must earn and pay the full price—which could have been paid at a discounted rate here on Earth, but it was judged, even then, as being far too high a price to pay! The world offered its wares and pleasures and a much cheaper rate, and so that is what most souls spent the time and effort on—the world.
Extremely Bitter-Sweet
Even the most bitter and excruciating agonies that it suffers, are accompanied by a profound unshaken peace, such as the language of this world has no words to tell. It has reached a pinnacle of suffering and a pinnacle of virtue—although now, it will no longer receive any reward for virtuously suffering, as it could have done on Earth. It is forced to do what it should have done on Earth—it is the most painful, yet most successful remedial school there is, having a 100% graduation record with a grade of 100%—for only saints can get into Heaven, and sanctity is total perfection; partial perfection is fodder for Purgatory.
No sooner has a soul, with the guilt of no mortal sin upon it, but owing to God a debt of temporal punishment, issued from the world, and been judged, than it sees itself eternally confirmed in grace and charity (according to St. Catherine of Genoa). It is incapable either of sinning or of meriting anymore; and it is destined, by an eternal and immutable decree, to enter one day as a king or a queen into the kingdom of the blessed, to see, to love, and to enjoy God, the perpetual fountain of all happiness.
Finally the Soul Detests Sin like it Should
In that instant of judgment, all the sins of its past are represented to the soul, whether mortal or venial, even though they have been already forgiven here below by contrition and the Sacrament of Penance. But after this temporary and instantaneous view of them, the soul remembers nothing more about them. St. Catherine’s words are: “The cause of Purgatory, which these souls have in themselves, they see once and for all, in passing out of this life, and never afterwards.” The reason of this exhibition of sins is, she teaches us, to enable the soul in that moment, by an act, no longer indeed meritorious, but nevertheless a real act of the will, to detest all its sins afresh, and especially those venial sins for which it had not contrition during life, either through the weakness of an imperfect heart, or through the accident of a sudden death, that so it may be strictly true, that no sin whatever is pardoned, unless the sinner makes an act of detestation of each and every sin.
Burning-Off the Rust of Sin
After this momentary view of sins and formal detestation of them, the soul sees in itself their evil consequences and these form, what the St. Catherine calls “the impediment of seeing God … The rust of sin is the impediment, and the fire keeps consuming the rust; and, as a thing which is covered cannot correspond to the reverberation of the sun’s rays, so, if the covering be consumed, the thing is at length laid open to the sun.
Burning Inside and Outside
As soon as the soul perceives itself to be acceptable to God, and constituted heir of paradise, but unable, because of this impediment, to take immediate possession of its inheritance, it conceives an intense desire to be rid of this hindrance, this double obligation of guilt and punishment. But knowing that Purgatory alone can consume these two obligations, and that it is for that very end God condemns the soul to fire, it desires itself to endure the punishment. St. Catherin of Genoa says that, “The soul separated from the body, not finding in itself this impediment which cannot be taken away except by Purgatory, at once throws itself into it with right good will. The souls in Purgatory have wills conformed in all things with the will of God, who therefore sheds on them His goodness, and they, as far as their will goes, are happy and cleansed of all their sin. As for guilt, these cleansed souls are as they were when God created them, for God forgives their guilt immediately who have passed from this life ill content with their sins, having confessed all they have committed and having the will to commit no more. Only the rust of sin is left them and from this they cleanse themselves by pain in the fire.”
If the soul did not find this punishment and purgation of Purgatory, to help the soul remove the rust of sin, there would instantaneously be generated in the soul a Hell far worse than Purgatory, because it would see that with this impediment of the stain of sin with its unpaid debt, it could not unite itself to God Who is its end. Wherefore, if the soul could somewhere find another Purgatory fiercer than this, in which it could the sooner get rid of this impediment, it would quickly plunge itself therein, through the impetuosity of the love it bears to God.
A Thousand Hells if Necessary
But this is not all. St. Catherine of Genoa goes on to teach that if the soul, laboring under this impediment, were free to choose between immediately ascending to paradise, and descending to suffer in Purgatory, it would choose to suffer, although the sufferings be almost as dreadful as those of Hell. These are her words: “Of how much importance Purgatory is no tongue can tell, no mind conceive. So much I see, that its pain is almost as if it were that of Hell; and yet I see also that the soul which perceives in itself the slightest flaw or mote of imperfection, would rather throw itself into a thousand Hells, than find itself in the presence of the divine Majesty with that defect upon it; and, therefore, seeing Purgatory to be ordained for the very taking away of these flaws, forthwith it plunges into it, and it seems by its bearing, as I see, to conceive that it finds there an invention of no little mercy, simply in the being able to get rid of this impediment.”
Too Late Have I Loved Thee!
When the righteous soul has thus arrived in Purgatory, losing sight of everything else, it sees before it only two objects—the extremity of suffering, and the extremity of joys. A most tremendous pain is caused by knowing that God loves it with an infinite love, that He is the Chief Good, that He regards the soul as His daughter, and that He has predestined it to enjoy Him forever in company with the Blessed: and hence the soul loves Him with a pure and most perfect charity. At the same time it perceives that it cannot see Him or enjoy Him yet, though it so intensely yearns to do so ; and this afflicts it so much the more, as it is quite uncertain when the term of its penal exile, away from its Lord and paradise, will be fulfilled. This is the pain of loss in Purgatory, of which the St. Catherine of Genoa says that it is “a pain so extreme, that no tongue can tell it, no understanding grasp the least portion of it. Though God in His favor showed me a little spark thereof, yet can I not in any way express it with my tongue.”
Finally the Soul Finds Joy in Suffering
Now let us examine the other object, the extremity of joy. As it loves God with the purest affection, and knows its sufferings to be the will of God in order to procure its purification, it conforms itself perfectly to the divine decree. While in Purgatory, it sees nothing but that this pleases God; it takes in no idea but that of His will; it apprehends nothing so clearly as the suitableness of this purification, in order to present it all fair and lovely to so great a majesty. Thus, St. Catherine of Genoa says: “If a soul, having still something left to be cleansed away, were presented to the Vision of God, it would be worse than that of ten purgatories; for it would be quite unable to endure that excessive goodness and that exquisite justice.” Hence it is that the suffering soul is entirely resigned to the will of its Creator. It loves its very pains, and rejoices in them because they are a holy ordinance of God. Thus in the midst of the ardent heats it enjoys a contentment so complete that it exceeds the grasp of human intelligence to comprehend it. “I do not believe,” says St. Catherine of Genoa, “that it is possible to find a contentment to compare with that of the souls in Purgatory, unless it be the contentment of the Saints in paradise. This contentment increases daily through the influx of God into those souls, and this influx increases in proportion as the impediment is consumed and worn away. Indeed, so far as the will is concerned, we can hardly say that the pains are pains at all, so contentedly do the souls rest in the ordinance of God, to whose will pure love unites them.”
Holily Wholly Indifferent
In another place, St. Catherine says that this inexplicable joy of the soul, while it is undergoing the indescribable Purgatory, springs from the strength and purity of its love of God. “This love gives to the soul such a contentment as cannot be expressed. But this contentment does not take away one iota from the pain; nay, it is the retarding of love from the possession of its object which causes the pain; and the pain is greater according to the greater perfection of love of which God has made the soul capable. Thus the souls in Purgatory have at once the greatest contentment and the greatest suffering; and the one in no way hinders the other.” As to prayers, alms, and Masses, she asserts that the souls experience great consolation from them; but that in these, as in other matters, their principal solicitude is that everything should be “weighed in the most equitable scales of the Divine Will, leaving God to take His own course in everything, and to pay Himself and His justice in the way His own infinite goodness chooses to select.”
Scraping into Purgatory by the Skin of our Teeth
I suppose there is none of us who expects to be lost and damned—how many in Hell actually thought they would end up there? We know and feel, with more or less of alarm, the greatness of the risk we are running by the life we are leading—lukewarm and at peace with many venial sins; but to expect to be lost would be the sin of despair. Hell is only practical to us as a motive of greater diligence, greater strictness, greater circumspectness, greater fear. It is not so with Purgatory. I suppose we all expect, or think ourselves sure, to go there. If we do not think much about the matter at all, then we must have some vague notion of going straight to Heaven as soon as we are judged! But if we seriously reflect upon it, upon our own lives, upon God’s sanctity, upon what we read in books of devotion, in the lives of the Saints, and the revelations that God has permitted to come our way by means of souls condemned to Purgatory, then I can hardly imagine any one of us expecting to escape Purgatory, and perhaps even feeling that it must be almost a stretch of the divine mercy which will get us even there in the first place! Now, if we really expect that our road to Heaven will be through the punishment of Purgatory, for surely its purification is penal, it very much concerns us to know what is common to both the views of Purgatory, which it appears prevail in the Church.
Budgeting for Heaven (or rather, Purgatory).
First, both these views agree that the pains are extremely severe, as well because of the office which God intends them to fulfil, as because of the disembodied soul being the subject of them. Both agree, also, in the length of the suffering.
Do You Have Enough Money and Supplies for Sixty Years?
This requires to be dwelt upon, as it is hard to convince people of it, and a great deal comes of the conviction, both to ourselves and others. This duration may be understood in two ways: first, as of actual length of time, and, secondly, as of seeming length from the excess of pain. With regard to the first, if we look into the revelations of Sister Francesca of Pampeluna, we shall find, among some hundreds of cases, that by far the great majority suffered thirty, forty, or sixty years.
Long-Term Rentals
This disclosure may teach us greater watchfulness over ourselves, and more unwearied perseverance in praying for the departed. The old foundations for perpetual Masses embody the same sentiment. We are apt to leave off too soon, imagining with a foolish and unenlightened fondness that our friends are freed from Purgatory much sooner than they really are. If Sister Francesca beheld the souls of many fervent Carmelites, some of whom had wrought miracles in lifetime still in Purgatory ten, twenty, thirty, sixty years after their death, and still not near their deliverance, as many told her, what must become of us and ours? Then as to seeming length from the extremity of pain, there are many instances on record in the Chronicles of the Franciscans, the life of St. Francis Jerome, and elsewhere, of souls appearing an hour or two after death, and thinking they had been many years in Purgatory.
Our Trivial Faults Are Far From Trivial
Both views agree again in holding that, what we in the world call very trivial faults, are most severely dealt with in Purgatory. St. Peter Damian gives us many instances of this, and others are collected and quoted by St. Robert Bellarmine. Slight feelings of self-complacency, trifling inattentions in the recital of the Divine Office, and the like, occur frequently among them! Sister Francesca mentions the case of a girl of fourteen who was in Purgatory, because she was not quite conformed to the will of God in dying so young: and one soul said to her in Purgatory: “Ah, men little think in the world, how dearly they are going to pay here for faults that they hardly note there.” She even saw souls that were immensely punished only for having been scrupulous in this life; either, I suppose, because there is mostly self-will in scruples, or because they did not lay down the scruples when obedience commanded. Wrong notions about small faults may thus lead us to neglect the dead, or leave off our prayers too soon, as well as losing a salutary lesson for ourselves.
Broke and Begging
Then, again, both views agree as to the helplessness of the Holy Souls. They lie like the paralytic at the pool. It would seem as if even the coming of the angel were not an effectual blessing to them, unless there be some one of us to help them. Some have even thought they cannot pray. Anyhow, they have no means of making themselves heard by us, on whose charity they depend. Some writers have said that Our Blessed Lord will not help them without our cooperation; and that Our Blessed Lady cannot help them, except in indirect ways, because she is no longer able to make satisfaction; though I never like to hear anything our dearest mother cannot do; and I regard such statements with suspicion. Whatever may come of these opinions, they at least illustrate the strong way in which theologians apprehend the helplessness of the Holy Souls.
Stupid Notions of ‘Sanctity’!
Then another feature in their helplessness is the forgetfulness of the living, or the cruel flattery of relations who will always have it that those near or dear to them die the deaths of saints. They would surely have a scruple, if they knew of how many Masses and prayers they rob the souls, by the selfish exaggeration of their goodness. I call it selfish, for it is nothing more than a miserable device to console themselves in their sorrow. The very state of the Holy Souls is one of the most unbounded helplessness. They cannot do penance; they cannot merit; they cannot satisfy; they cannot gain indulgences; they have no Sacraments; they are not under the jurisdiction of God’s Vicar, overflowing with the plentitude of means of grace and manifold benedictions. They are a part of the Church, but without either priesthood or altar at their own command.
Lazy, Lukewarm and Blind
Those are the points common to both views of Purgatory; and how manifold are the lessons we learn from them, on our own behalf as well as on behalf of the Holy Souls. For ourselves, what light does all this throw on slovenliness, lukewarmness, and love of ease? What does it make us think of performing our devotions out of a mere spirit of formality, or a trick of habit? What diligence in our examens, confessions, Communions, and prayers! It seems as if the grace of all graces for which we should ever be importuning our dear Lord, would be to hate sin with something of the hatred wherewith He hated it in the garden of Gethsemane. Oh, is not the purity of God something awful, unspeakable, adorable?
Anger at Purgatory
But some persons turn in anger from the thought of Purgatory, as if it were not to be endured, that after trying all our lives long to serve God, we should accomplish the tremendous feat of a good death, only to pass from the agonies of the death-bed into fire, long, keen, searching, triumphant, incomparable fire. Sadly, your anger will not help you, nor alter the facts. But have you thought sufficiently about God? Have you tried to realize His holiness and purity in assiduous meditation? Is there a real divorce between you and the world, which you know is God’s enemy? Do you take God’s side? Are you devoted to His interests? Do you truly long for His glory? Is there a happy marriage between the theory of Catholicism and the practice of Catholicism in your life, or are they separated and divorced? Have you put sin alongside of our dear Saviors’ Passion, and measured the one by the other?
Surely, if you had, Purgatory would only seem to you the last, kind, unexpected, and inexpressibly tender invention of the obstinate love of God, which was mercifully determined to save you in spite of yourself. It would be a perpetual wonder to you, a joyous wonder, fresh every morning, a wonder that would be meat and drink to your soul, that you, being what you know yourself to be, what God knows you to be, should be saved eternally. Remember what the suffering soul said so simply, yet with such force, to Sister Francesca: “Ah! Those on that side of the grave little reckon how dearly they will pay on this side for the lives they live!”
Angry or Lucky?
To be angry, because you are told you will go to Purgatory! Silly, silly people! Most likely it is a great false flattery, and that you will never be good enough to even scrape into Purgatory at all! Why, positively, you do not recognize how lucky you are to be told of it, and told of it truthfully? None but the humble go there. St. Maria Crocifissa di Rosa was told that although many of the saints, while on Earth, loved God more than some do even in Heaven, yet those greatest saints on Earth were not so humble as are the souls in Purgatory. You see―it is not good to be angry about Purgatory; for, as Fr. Faber says, those only are lucky enough to get into Purgatory, who sincerely believe themselves to be worthy of Hell.
There have always been two views of Purgatory prevailing in the Church, not contradictory, the one of the other, but rather expressive of the mind and devotion of those who have embraced them. Yet the error lies in embracing either one of them, while neglecting to embrace both of them simultaneously. They are like two sides of a coin that have different images on each side—yet they are both an essential part of the coin, though standing on opposite sides.
The Grim View
The first view represents Purgatory as a Hell which is not eternal. Violence, confusion, wailing, horror, preside over its descriptions. It dwells, and truly so, on the terribleness of the pain of sense, which the soul is mysteriously permitted to endure. The fire is the same fire as that of Hell, our earthly fire is said to be like a mere painted fire compared to it. The sense of imprisonment and intense darkness, are additional features in the horror of the scene, which prepare us for that sensible neighborhood to Hell, which many Saints have spoken of as belonging to Purgatory. Then to this terribleness of the pain of sense, is added the dreadfulness of the pain of loss—which again is true, though it is not a permanent loss.
The beauty of God remains, in itself, the same immensely desirable object that it always was. But the soul is changed. All that in life, and in the world of sense, once distracted and dulled its desires for God, is now gone from it—it sees the truth of things like it never so them before, it understands like it never understood before—so that it now seeks God with an impetuosity and a frenzy that no imagination can possibly conceive. God is that light at the end of long, dark, excruciatingly hot tunnel, and that light grows brighter as the soul draws nearer. The very burning excess of its love and desire for God (which it should have had on Earth) becomes the measure of its intolerable pain. What love can do, even on Earth, we learn from the example of Father John Baptist Sanchez, who said that, if any morning he awoke and realized that would not die that day, then he would be a miserable as death at having to live her another day. To those horrors we might add many more which depict Purgatory simply as a Hell which is not eternal. Now all these aspects of Purgatory are true, but they are merely one side of a two-sided coin.
The Joyous View
The second view of Purgatory does not deny any one of the features of the preceding grim view, but it almost puts them out of sight, by the other considerations which it brings more prominently forward. In this view, the soul goes into Purgatory with its eyes fascinated and its spirit sweetly tranquillized, by the face of Jesus, which it glimpsed at the particular Judgment which it has undergone. That remembrance of that Holy Face remains with it, and pacify and tranquillize the terrors of its Purgatorial prison. In the sea of fire, into which it is plunged, it holds fast to that image. The moment that the soul saw that its own unfitness for Heaven, it wings its voluntary flight to Purgatory, like a dove to her proper nest in the shadows of the forest. No prison guards, no angels are needed to escort the soul to its prison. The soul’s understanding of the purity of God suffices.
Seriousness of Sin Sorrowfully Seen
In that moment of Judgment after death, the soul loves God most tenderly, and in return is most tenderly loved by Him. The soul is in punishment, true; but it is in unbroken union with God. St. Catherine of Genoa most positively says, “It has no remembrance, no remembrance at all of its past sins, or of Earth.” Its sweet prison, its holy sepulcher, is in the adorable will of its Heavenly Father, and there it abides the term of its purification with the most perfect contentment and the most unutterable love—yet all the while suffering the most inexpressible pains.
God is All About Extremes
If God is to be perfect, He must be extreme, for perfection implies being extremely good at something. God is extreme in His mercy and extreme in His justice—and the soul reflects this with its extreme love under extreme suffering. As it is not teased or taunted by any vision of self or sin, so neither is it harassed by an atom of fear, or by a single doubt of its own safety or security. It is now in a state of sinlessness—it cannot and will not ever sin again. It cannot even commit the slightest imperfection. It cannot have the least movement of impatience. It can do nothing whatever which will in the least displease God. It loves God above everything, and it loves Him with a pure and disinterested love. It is constantly consoled by angels, and can only rejoice in the confirmed assurance of its own salvation.
Heaven Extremely Expensive
The soul now realizes what it refused or failed to realize on Earth—that Heaven is not the cheap thing that most people made it out to be, thinking they could walk in after a few hastily said prayers and some distractedly heard Masses. Heaven, being the greatest place there is, also carries the greatest admission price—a price few were willing to pay on Earth. Nor could they pay it, even if the wishfully desired to, for they had insufficient funds in the bank of their souls. Now they must earn and pay the full price—which could have been paid at a discounted rate here on Earth, but it was judged, even then, as being far too high a price to pay! The world offered its wares and pleasures and a much cheaper rate, and so that is what most souls spent the time and effort on—the world.
Extremely Bitter-Sweet
Even the most bitter and excruciating agonies that it suffers, are accompanied by a profound unshaken peace, such as the language of this world has no words to tell. It has reached a pinnacle of suffering and a pinnacle of virtue—although now, it will no longer receive any reward for virtuously suffering, as it could have done on Earth. It is forced to do what it should have done on Earth—it is the most painful, yet most successful remedial school there is, having a 100% graduation record with a grade of 100%—for only saints can get into Heaven, and sanctity is total perfection; partial perfection is fodder for Purgatory.
No sooner has a soul, with the guilt of no mortal sin upon it, but owing to God a debt of temporal punishment, issued from the world, and been judged, than it sees itself eternally confirmed in grace and charity (according to St. Catherine of Genoa). It is incapable either of sinning or of meriting anymore; and it is destined, by an eternal and immutable decree, to enter one day as a king or a queen into the kingdom of the blessed, to see, to love, and to enjoy God, the perpetual fountain of all happiness.
Finally the Soul Detests Sin like it Should
In that instant of judgment, all the sins of its past are represented to the soul, whether mortal or venial, even though they have been already forgiven here below by contrition and the Sacrament of Penance. But after this temporary and instantaneous view of them, the soul remembers nothing more about them. St. Catherine’s words are: “The cause of Purgatory, which these souls have in themselves, they see once and for all, in passing out of this life, and never afterwards.” The reason of this exhibition of sins is, she teaches us, to enable the soul in that moment, by an act, no longer indeed meritorious, but nevertheless a real act of the will, to detest all its sins afresh, and especially those venial sins for which it had not contrition during life, either through the weakness of an imperfect heart, or through the accident of a sudden death, that so it may be strictly true, that no sin whatever is pardoned, unless the sinner makes an act of detestation of each and every sin.
Burning-Off the Rust of Sin
After this momentary view of sins and formal detestation of them, the soul sees in itself their evil consequences and these form, what the St. Catherine calls “the impediment of seeing God … The rust of sin is the impediment, and the fire keeps consuming the rust; and, as a thing which is covered cannot correspond to the reverberation of the sun’s rays, so, if the covering be consumed, the thing is at length laid open to the sun.
Burning Inside and Outside
As soon as the soul perceives itself to be acceptable to God, and constituted heir of paradise, but unable, because of this impediment, to take immediate possession of its inheritance, it conceives an intense desire to be rid of this hindrance, this double obligation of guilt and punishment. But knowing that Purgatory alone can consume these two obligations, and that it is for that very end God condemns the soul to fire, it desires itself to endure the punishment. St. Catherin of Genoa says that, “The soul separated from the body, not finding in itself this impediment which cannot be taken away except by Purgatory, at once throws itself into it with right good will. The souls in Purgatory have wills conformed in all things with the will of God, who therefore sheds on them His goodness, and they, as far as their will goes, are happy and cleansed of all their sin. As for guilt, these cleansed souls are as they were when God created them, for God forgives their guilt immediately who have passed from this life ill content with their sins, having confessed all they have committed and having the will to commit no more. Only the rust of sin is left them and from this they cleanse themselves by pain in the fire.”
If the soul did not find this punishment and purgation of Purgatory, to help the soul remove the rust of sin, there would instantaneously be generated in the soul a Hell far worse than Purgatory, because it would see that with this impediment of the stain of sin with its unpaid debt, it could not unite itself to God Who is its end. Wherefore, if the soul could somewhere find another Purgatory fiercer than this, in which it could the sooner get rid of this impediment, it would quickly plunge itself therein, through the impetuosity of the love it bears to God.
A Thousand Hells if Necessary
But this is not all. St. Catherine of Genoa goes on to teach that if the soul, laboring under this impediment, were free to choose between immediately ascending to paradise, and descending to suffer in Purgatory, it would choose to suffer, although the sufferings be almost as dreadful as those of Hell. These are her words: “Of how much importance Purgatory is no tongue can tell, no mind conceive. So much I see, that its pain is almost as if it were that of Hell; and yet I see also that the soul which perceives in itself the slightest flaw or mote of imperfection, would rather throw itself into a thousand Hells, than find itself in the presence of the divine Majesty with that defect upon it; and, therefore, seeing Purgatory to be ordained for the very taking away of these flaws, forthwith it plunges into it, and it seems by its bearing, as I see, to conceive that it finds there an invention of no little mercy, simply in the being able to get rid of this impediment.”
Too Late Have I Loved Thee!
When the righteous soul has thus arrived in Purgatory, losing sight of everything else, it sees before it only two objects—the extremity of suffering, and the extremity of joys. A most tremendous pain is caused by knowing that God loves it with an infinite love, that He is the Chief Good, that He regards the soul as His daughter, and that He has predestined it to enjoy Him forever in company with the Blessed: and hence the soul loves Him with a pure and most perfect charity. At the same time it perceives that it cannot see Him or enjoy Him yet, though it so intensely yearns to do so ; and this afflicts it so much the more, as it is quite uncertain when the term of its penal exile, away from its Lord and paradise, will be fulfilled. This is the pain of loss in Purgatory, of which the St. Catherine of Genoa says that it is “a pain so extreme, that no tongue can tell it, no understanding grasp the least portion of it. Though God in His favor showed me a little spark thereof, yet can I not in any way express it with my tongue.”
Finally the Soul Finds Joy in Suffering
Now let us examine the other object, the extremity of joy. As it loves God with the purest affection, and knows its sufferings to be the will of God in order to procure its purification, it conforms itself perfectly to the divine decree. While in Purgatory, it sees nothing but that this pleases God; it takes in no idea but that of His will; it apprehends nothing so clearly as the suitableness of this purification, in order to present it all fair and lovely to so great a majesty. Thus, St. Catherine of Genoa says: “If a soul, having still something left to be cleansed away, were presented to the Vision of God, it would be worse than that of ten purgatories; for it would be quite unable to endure that excessive goodness and that exquisite justice.” Hence it is that the suffering soul is entirely resigned to the will of its Creator. It loves its very pains, and rejoices in them because they are a holy ordinance of God. Thus in the midst of the ardent heats it enjoys a contentment so complete that it exceeds the grasp of human intelligence to comprehend it. “I do not believe,” says St. Catherine of Genoa, “that it is possible to find a contentment to compare with that of the souls in Purgatory, unless it be the contentment of the Saints in paradise. This contentment increases daily through the influx of God into those souls, and this influx increases in proportion as the impediment is consumed and worn away. Indeed, so far as the will is concerned, we can hardly say that the pains are pains at all, so contentedly do the souls rest in the ordinance of God, to whose will pure love unites them.”
Holily Wholly Indifferent
In another place, St. Catherine says that this inexplicable joy of the soul, while it is undergoing the indescribable Purgatory, springs from the strength and purity of its love of God. “This love gives to the soul such a contentment as cannot be expressed. But this contentment does not take away one iota from the pain; nay, it is the retarding of love from the possession of its object which causes the pain; and the pain is greater according to the greater perfection of love of which God has made the soul capable. Thus the souls in Purgatory have at once the greatest contentment and the greatest suffering; and the one in no way hinders the other.” As to prayers, alms, and Masses, she asserts that the souls experience great consolation from them; but that in these, as in other matters, their principal solicitude is that everything should be “weighed in the most equitable scales of the Divine Will, leaving God to take His own course in everything, and to pay Himself and His justice in the way His own infinite goodness chooses to select.”
Scraping into Purgatory by the Skin of our Teeth
I suppose there is none of us who expects to be lost and damned—how many in Hell actually thought they would end up there? We know and feel, with more or less of alarm, the greatness of the risk we are running by the life we are leading—lukewarm and at peace with many venial sins; but to expect to be lost would be the sin of despair. Hell is only practical to us as a motive of greater diligence, greater strictness, greater circumspectness, greater fear. It is not so with Purgatory. I suppose we all expect, or think ourselves sure, to go there. If we do not think much about the matter at all, then we must have some vague notion of going straight to Heaven as soon as we are judged! But if we seriously reflect upon it, upon our own lives, upon God’s sanctity, upon what we read in books of devotion, in the lives of the Saints, and the revelations that God has permitted to come our way by means of souls condemned to Purgatory, then I can hardly imagine any one of us expecting to escape Purgatory, and perhaps even feeling that it must be almost a stretch of the divine mercy which will get us even there in the first place! Now, if we really expect that our road to Heaven will be through the punishment of Purgatory, for surely its purification is penal, it very much concerns us to know what is common to both the views of Purgatory, which it appears prevail in the Church.
Budgeting for Heaven (or rather, Purgatory).
First, both these views agree that the pains are extremely severe, as well because of the office which God intends them to fulfil, as because of the disembodied soul being the subject of them. Both agree, also, in the length of the suffering.
Do You Have Enough Money and Supplies for Sixty Years?
This requires to be dwelt upon, as it is hard to convince people of it, and a great deal comes of the conviction, both to ourselves and others. This duration may be understood in two ways: first, as of actual length of time, and, secondly, as of seeming length from the excess of pain. With regard to the first, if we look into the revelations of Sister Francesca of Pampeluna, we shall find, among some hundreds of cases, that by far the great majority suffered thirty, forty, or sixty years.
Long-Term Rentals
This disclosure may teach us greater watchfulness over ourselves, and more unwearied perseverance in praying for the departed. The old foundations for perpetual Masses embody the same sentiment. We are apt to leave off too soon, imagining with a foolish and unenlightened fondness that our friends are freed from Purgatory much sooner than they really are. If Sister Francesca beheld the souls of many fervent Carmelites, some of whom had wrought miracles in lifetime still in Purgatory ten, twenty, thirty, sixty years after their death, and still not near their deliverance, as many told her, what must become of us and ours? Then as to seeming length from the extremity of pain, there are many instances on record in the Chronicles of the Franciscans, the life of St. Francis Jerome, and elsewhere, of souls appearing an hour or two after death, and thinking they had been many years in Purgatory.
Our Trivial Faults Are Far From Trivial
Both views agree again in holding that, what we in the world call very trivial faults, are most severely dealt with in Purgatory. St. Peter Damian gives us many instances of this, and others are collected and quoted by St. Robert Bellarmine. Slight feelings of self-complacency, trifling inattentions in the recital of the Divine Office, and the like, occur frequently among them! Sister Francesca mentions the case of a girl of fourteen who was in Purgatory, because she was not quite conformed to the will of God in dying so young: and one soul said to her in Purgatory: “Ah, men little think in the world, how dearly they are going to pay here for faults that they hardly note there.” She even saw souls that were immensely punished only for having been scrupulous in this life; either, I suppose, because there is mostly self-will in scruples, or because they did not lay down the scruples when obedience commanded. Wrong notions about small faults may thus lead us to neglect the dead, or leave off our prayers too soon, as well as losing a salutary lesson for ourselves.
Broke and Begging
Then, again, both views agree as to the helplessness of the Holy Souls. They lie like the paralytic at the pool. It would seem as if even the coming of the angel were not an effectual blessing to them, unless there be some one of us to help them. Some have even thought they cannot pray. Anyhow, they have no means of making themselves heard by us, on whose charity they depend. Some writers have said that Our Blessed Lord will not help them without our cooperation; and that Our Blessed Lady cannot help them, except in indirect ways, because she is no longer able to make satisfaction; though I never like to hear anything our dearest mother cannot do; and I regard such statements with suspicion. Whatever may come of these opinions, they at least illustrate the strong way in which theologians apprehend the helplessness of the Holy Souls.
Stupid Notions of ‘Sanctity’!
Then another feature in their helplessness is the forgetfulness of the living, or the cruel flattery of relations who will always have it that those near or dear to them die the deaths of saints. They would surely have a scruple, if they knew of how many Masses and prayers they rob the souls, by the selfish exaggeration of their goodness. I call it selfish, for it is nothing more than a miserable device to console themselves in their sorrow. The very state of the Holy Souls is one of the most unbounded helplessness. They cannot do penance; they cannot merit; they cannot satisfy; they cannot gain indulgences; they have no Sacraments; they are not under the jurisdiction of God’s Vicar, overflowing with the plentitude of means of grace and manifold benedictions. They are a part of the Church, but without either priesthood or altar at their own command.
Lazy, Lukewarm and Blind
Those are the points common to both views of Purgatory; and how manifold are the lessons we learn from them, on our own behalf as well as on behalf of the Holy Souls. For ourselves, what light does all this throw on slovenliness, lukewarmness, and love of ease? What does it make us think of performing our devotions out of a mere spirit of formality, or a trick of habit? What diligence in our examens, confessions, Communions, and prayers! It seems as if the grace of all graces for which we should ever be importuning our dear Lord, would be to hate sin with something of the hatred wherewith He hated it in the garden of Gethsemane. Oh, is not the purity of God something awful, unspeakable, adorable?
Anger at Purgatory
But some persons turn in anger from the thought of Purgatory, as if it were not to be endured, that after trying all our lives long to serve God, we should accomplish the tremendous feat of a good death, only to pass from the agonies of the death-bed into fire, long, keen, searching, triumphant, incomparable fire. Sadly, your anger will not help you, nor alter the facts. But have you thought sufficiently about God? Have you tried to realize His holiness and purity in assiduous meditation? Is there a real divorce between you and the world, which you know is God’s enemy? Do you take God’s side? Are you devoted to His interests? Do you truly long for His glory? Is there a happy marriage between the theory of Catholicism and the practice of Catholicism in your life, or are they separated and divorced? Have you put sin alongside of our dear Saviors’ Passion, and measured the one by the other?
Surely, if you had, Purgatory would only seem to you the last, kind, unexpected, and inexpressibly tender invention of the obstinate love of God, which was mercifully determined to save you in spite of yourself. It would be a perpetual wonder to you, a joyous wonder, fresh every morning, a wonder that would be meat and drink to your soul, that you, being what you know yourself to be, what God knows you to be, should be saved eternally. Remember what the suffering soul said so simply, yet with such force, to Sister Francesca: “Ah! Those on that side of the grave little reckon how dearly they will pay on this side for the lives they live!”
Angry or Lucky?
To be angry, because you are told you will go to Purgatory! Silly, silly people! Most likely it is a great false flattery, and that you will never be good enough to even scrape into Purgatory at all! Why, positively, you do not recognize how lucky you are to be told of it, and told of it truthfully? None but the humble go there. St. Maria Crocifissa di Rosa was told that although many of the saints, while on Earth, loved God more than some do even in Heaven, yet those greatest saints on Earth were not so humble as are the souls in Purgatory. You see―it is not good to be angry about Purgatory; for, as Fr. Faber says, those only are lucky enough to get into Purgatory, who sincerely believe themselves to be worthy of Hell.
Article 1
Friday, November 1st, Feast of All Saints
Saints Alive!!!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Friday, November 1st, Feast of All Saints
Saints Alive!!!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Today is Your Feast Day!
Today is the feast of All Saints! Well, happy feast to you, dear saint! “Aw c’mon!” you say, “Stop joking around! I’m no saint and you know it!” Well, maybe and probably you are no saint—but are you on the way to being a saint? Is that your goal in life? Is that—apart from the superior goal of glorifying God—the main focus of your life?
There’s Only One Way
“There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven―whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin, though it should be venial, must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Vol. 1, “Introduction”).
Therefore, in Heaven, the saint is not someone extraordinary, the saint is someone who is ordinary, for there are only saints in Heaven—that is one thing that they all have in common, and something that is common is not extraordinary.
Saintly Common Denominator
Another thing that all the saints have in common is that they owe their sanctity, in part, to Our Lady. Explicitly or implicitly, directly or indirectly, knowingly or unknowingly, they all depended upon Our Lady who is the Mediatrix of all Grace. It is through her that God has chosen to distribute all of His graces. Therefore, to pass the exam of sanctity ― to achieve sanctity in this life on Earth and to avoid the remedial school of sanctity in Purgatory―we need to seek-out Mary, to find Mary, to work with Mary, to let Mary teach us, guide us, encourage us and lead to those heights of sanctity which God ear-marked for us on the day He first created our soul.
Your Saintly Calling
St. Louis de Montfort puts it so beautifully in his booklet, The Secret of Mary:
“Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next. It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
Heaven Ain’t Cheap, Ya Know!
It must be remembered that most saints have to pass through the fires of Purgatory before they are allowed admittance into Heaven—except, of course, martyrs, who would go straight to Heaven. But remember, too, that for martyrdom to ‘work’, the martyr has to be sorry for all his sins, otherwise the martyrdom would be in vain (in the case of unrepented mortal sin) and require Purgatory for unrepented venial sin―for no sin can be forgiven if we are not sorry for it. So even some martyrs could, in theory, pass some time in Purgatory if they refuse to be sorry for some of their venial sins.
And if the non-martyred saint has the grace and gift of going straight to Heaven after death, then rest assured that the saint has most certainly done his or her Purgatory here on Earth, by the trials, sorrows, anxieties, humiliations, persecutions, illnesses, pains and sufferings that they would have undergone before being granted such a great privilege.
Burn We Must
At the end of the day, it is the degree of love for God in the heart of the soul that decides the fate of the soul: Heaven, Purgatory or Hell. Love or charity is what will be judged. As St. Paul writes: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). To which Jesus adds: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47), while St. Peter affirms: “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). Charity is a fire that burns sins in this world—if we refuse to burn here, we will burn in Purgatory or Hell―but burn we must!
The Remedial School of Saints
Which brings us to the subject of saints and life on Earth. We are all called to be saints, for only saints go to Heaven. We know this in theory, but it is frightening to see how few people try to live this out in practice. If we don’t successfully pass our “sainthood exam” here on Earth, then we will have to spend a long time in the remedial school of sanctity in the fires of Purgatory. Most people have an erroneous notion that Heaven will be populated by the saints on the one hand, and themselves—plain old Mr. and Mrs. so and so on the other hand. They seem to think that Heaven is a place for both sanctity and plain old mediocrity. FALSE! That could not be further from the truth!
Heaven’s Mixed-Bag of Saints
In Heaven, there are all kinds of saints: big and small saints; strong and weak saints; old and young saints; male and female saints; rich and poor saints; “never-sinned-much” saints and “sinned-a-lot” saints; quickly processed saints and slowly processed saints; saints from all kinds of different backgrounds, countries, times and circumstances. But the one thing they have in common is that they are SAINTS and NOT mediocre souls. The mediocre souls find a place in Purgatory, where they have to make up for lost and wasted time and misguided efforts.
How Will I Ever Become A Saint?
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say “not in the same measure,” because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
Sanctity Needs Grace; Grace Comes Through Mary
“To find the grace of God, we must discover Mary. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
This truth was later most perfectly manifested by Our Lady’s apparitions to St. Catherine Labouré, in 1830, at the convent of the Sisters of Charity on the Rue du Bac in Paris, France. It is from these apparitions that we received the so-called “Miraculous Medal.” However, it is more formally known as “The Medal of Our Lady of Grace” and “The Medal of the Immaculate Conception.”
Our Lady herself stipulated the design of the medal, by showing St. Catherine a vision of what it was to look like. There are rays of light beaming forth out of the rings upon Our Lady’s fingers. St. Catherine asked what these rays of light were. Our Lady replied that they were graces. St. Catherine noticed that some rays were shining brilliantly, while other rays of light were dull, so she asked Our Lady what they meant. Our Lady replied that the bright rays were graces that God gave to people, but the dull rays were graces that God did not give to people. St. Catherine, disappointed, asked why God would withhold some graces from us. Our Lady simply replied that they are withheld from us because we don’t ask for them!
If Only I Would Have ...
The poor souls in Purgatory could have avoided those fires if they had only taken their life―their spiritual life―much more seriously. Grace and sanctity was not at the top of their shopping-list, nor did they ask Our Lady for the graces they would have needed to avoid being sent to Purgatory. The words of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange―already partially quoted above―perfectly represent this truth and we will repeat the aforementioned quote, adding a further passage to it:
The Real Life, the One That Matters
“The interior life, thus conceived, is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists and astronomers, have no interior life―so to speak―but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him.
“Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity―which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called ‘the one thing necessary’, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation.
“There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul.
“Every sin―though it should be venial―must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Vol. 1, “Introduction”).
Preconceived Ideas About Saints
Workers of miracles—readers of minds—makers of prophecy—severe penances—endless prayers—faultless lives—these and similar traits are what we tend to associate with saints and becoming saints. We forget that when it was announced in the Carmelite Convent of Lisieux, that one of the deceased sisters was “up for canonization”—when the sisters finally extracted the name of the candidate from “those in the know”, they were shocked to find out that it Thérèse of the Infant Jesus! The common reaction was one of “What did she ever do that was worthy of canonization?” Of course, we now know that ‘her way’ is what we now call “The Little Way”—and Pope St. Pius X calls her the model for sanctity in this modern world.
Even Sinner Saints!
For those discouraged about achieving sanctity, there can be no better thing than to read and study the lives of the great sinners who became great saints. They are walking proof of the words of God in Holy Scripture, Who said: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18).
Around the time of Our Lord, we think of ST. MARY MAGDALEN, who was possessed by seven devils and caught in adultery. Then there is ST. DISMAS, THE GOOD THIEF on the cross, who―after a life of stealing, violence and perhaps even murder―by his sufferings and sorrow for sin, steals Heaven with his dying breath. There too, on Calvary, is the Roman legionary, ST. LONGINUS, who pierces Our Lord’s heart with his spear, and ends up being pierced with sorrow in his own heart—finally converting, leaving the military and becoming a saint. Then there is ST. PAUL the persecutor of Christians, who converts and becomes a pillar of the Faith and paying for his sins through a lifetime of suffering.
A little later in time, as the Church grows, we have ST. CALLIXTUS OF ROME, who had a very sinful life before being taken under the wing of Victor I, a second century pope. Callixtus had embezzled money and started a public riot, amongst other criminal affairs, but left that all behind early in the third century, when he reformed. Callixtus went on to become a pope himself, and died a martyr shortly thereafter, thereby sufficiently paying his debts for sin.
ST. MARY OF EGYPT (c.344-c.421), at the age of 12, ran away from home to Alexandria, the most ‘exciting’ city in the Roman Empire. She became an accomplished seductress, who took special pleasure in corrupting innocent young men. Once, on a whim, she joined a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. By the time the ship reached its destination, Mary had seduced the entire crew and all of the pilgrims. In Jerusalem she realized the enormity of her sins, when a supernatural force prevented her from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Filled with remorse, Mary sought the Mother of God’s intercession and made a good confession. In penance, Mary then spent the rest of her life as a hermit, alone in the Jordanian desert.
The beautiful, teenage ST. PELAGIA would have been every parent’s nightmare. As legend has it, she was a dancer and courtesan by her early teens. Pelagia’s conversion occurred all of a sudden, following a chance encounter with Saint Nonnus, the bishop of Edessa. The young girl was baptized, gave away her possessions to the poor and lived as a hermit for the rest of her life.
Another sinner turned saint was ST. OLGA (879-969). When a neighboring tribe assassinated her husband, St. Olga, princess of Kiev, went to war. Olga slaughtered her husband’s murderer and almost all of his people. In vengeance, she massacred virtually the entire tribe; the few who did survive she sold into slavery. Years later, while in Constantinople to make an alliance with the emperor, Olga visited a church and was in awe of the magnificence of the liturgy. She took instruction, was baptized and returned to Kiev as a Christian, zealous to convert her people. Olga tried to convert her people, but hardly anyone would listen to her―even her family rejected Christianity. Olga died believing that as a missionary, she was a failure. Yet, she planted a seed of Faith which flourished. Today, Catholic and Orthodox Christians of Russia and Ukraine hail her as “Equal to the Apostles.”
Heaven’s Surprise
I was shocked, confused, bewildered
As I entered Heaven’s door,
Not by the beauty of it all,
Nor the lights or its decor.
But it was the folks in Heaven
Who made me sputter and gasp―
The thieves, the liars, the sinners,
The alcoholics and the trash!
There stood the kid from seventh grade
Who swiped my lunch money twice.
Next to him was my old neighbor
Who never said anything nice.
Herb, who I always thought
Was rotting away in Hell,
Was sitting pretty on cloud nine,
Looking incredibly well.
I nudged Jesus, “What’s the deal?
I would love to hear your take!”
“How’d all these sinners get up here?
God must’ve made a mistake!”
‘And why’s everyone so quiet, so somber?”
“Give me a clue!’
“My Friend,” He said, “They’re all in shock!”
“They never thought they’d be seeing you!”
Museum or Hospital?
As St. Augustine says: “The Church is not a museum of saints, but a hospital of sinners … There is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future” (St. Augustine of Hippo, Doctor of the Church—sinners need a good doctor!).
Saints can seem remote and distant, close to God, but far from people. But they’re more like us than we give them credit for. Their lives were like ours, full of dilemmas and struggles, with bad choices as well as good. But their goodness won out in the end, as ours can. Interest in angels is quite popular at the moment, but it is the saints who are really like us in both their strengths and frailties―they should be our focal point and encouragement. They came to Heaven’s Hospital wounded by sin, and they found a cure—sometimes a painful cure—in Christ’s care.
You’d Better Believe It and Want It!
Let it be said and let it be understood and let it be believed and let it be desired: God expects you to be a saint and Our Lady will help you be a saint! Don’t question it and don’t doubt it! It is not, as you may think, an act of pride to want and expect to be a saint—it is an act of insanity not to do so! What’s the alternative to not wanting to and actually becoming a saint in this life? It is either Hell or Purgatory! Either way, it is insanity! Why pay a thousand times more, or pay eternally, for what could have been bought at a fraction of the effort and pain here below? You are expected to be a saint. You can be a saint. You must be a saint. Only saints go to Heaven.
Wow! How?
Whew! That’s a tall order, but one that is possible for everyone, for God never demands the impossible! We might be tempted to agree with the Apostles: “When they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:25-26). Our Lord adds: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) ― Our Lord is the Author of Grace and without His grace we can do nothing with regard to saving our souls and reaching Heaven. Grace perfects nature, and therefore we need to drink copiously from the fountains of grace—which are found in the Sacraments, in quality prayer and in generous sacrifices, penances and alms-giving.
This is what St. Louis de Montfort also says—that this tall order can only be accomplished by grace: “Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God. The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say ‘not in the same measure,’ because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Find God’s Grace Through the Mediatrix of All Grace
St. Louis goes on to say what Our Lady herself will later reiterate in a variety of ways: “It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary). At Fatima, Our Lady said of herself: “Only she (Our Lady of the Rosary) can help you now!” At Akita, Our Lady said: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.” This merely echoes what the Church says in her liturgy concerning Our Lady: “He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord!” (Proverbs 8:35; Mass of the Immaculate Conception, traditional or extraordinary rite, Epistle). It is only saints that go to Heaven, and there is no saint who became a saint without the Mother of God, the Mediatrix of All Graces.
This is why the saints can say the following things about Our Lady:
● St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.”
● St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation.”
● St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.”
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
● St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.”
● St. Anselm (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost.”
● St. Antonine is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified.”
You could fill books with quotes from saints about Our Lady—these few barely whet the appetite or do her justice. Nevertheless, on this feast of All Saints let all souls realize that all graces come to us through Mary; and, in her own words, she is all we have left in the current dire predicament of the world. Whether we want to survive, or get to Heaven, without her, there is not even the slightest hope of either or both.
Father Faber’s Holy Diagnosis and Prognosis
Let us end with the words of Fr. Faber from the Preface of his own translation, from French to English, of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary. These words were written in November of 1862—how much worse has the situation become today!
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one. Mary is not half enough preached. Devotion to her is low and thin and poor. ... It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be. It has no faith in itself. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized.
“Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background. Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them. It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines. Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother.
“I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable Grignion de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ.
“Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!” (Fr. Frederick Faber, Preface to his translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary).
Today is the feast of All Saints! Well, happy feast to you, dear saint! “Aw c’mon!” you say, “Stop joking around! I’m no saint and you know it!” Well, maybe and probably you are no saint—but are you on the way to being a saint? Is that your goal in life? Is that—apart from the superior goal of glorifying God—the main focus of your life?
There’s Only One Way
“There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven―whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin, though it should be venial, must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Vol. 1, “Introduction”).
Therefore, in Heaven, the saint is not someone extraordinary, the saint is someone who is ordinary, for there are only saints in Heaven—that is one thing that they all have in common, and something that is common is not extraordinary.
Saintly Common Denominator
Another thing that all the saints have in common is that they owe their sanctity, in part, to Our Lady. Explicitly or implicitly, directly or indirectly, knowingly or unknowingly, they all depended upon Our Lady who is the Mediatrix of all Grace. It is through her that God has chosen to distribute all of His graces. Therefore, to pass the exam of sanctity ― to achieve sanctity in this life on Earth and to avoid the remedial school of sanctity in Purgatory―we need to seek-out Mary, to find Mary, to work with Mary, to let Mary teach us, guide us, encourage us and lead to those heights of sanctity which God ear-marked for us on the day He first created our soul.
Your Saintly Calling
St. Louis de Montfort puts it so beautifully in his booklet, The Secret of Mary:
“Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next. It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
Heaven Ain’t Cheap, Ya Know!
It must be remembered that most saints have to pass through the fires of Purgatory before they are allowed admittance into Heaven—except, of course, martyrs, who would go straight to Heaven. But remember, too, that for martyrdom to ‘work’, the martyr has to be sorry for all his sins, otherwise the martyrdom would be in vain (in the case of unrepented mortal sin) and require Purgatory for unrepented venial sin―for no sin can be forgiven if we are not sorry for it. So even some martyrs could, in theory, pass some time in Purgatory if they refuse to be sorry for some of their venial sins.
And if the non-martyred saint has the grace and gift of going straight to Heaven after death, then rest assured that the saint has most certainly done his or her Purgatory here on Earth, by the trials, sorrows, anxieties, humiliations, persecutions, illnesses, pains and sufferings that they would have undergone before being granted such a great privilege.
Burn We Must
At the end of the day, it is the degree of love for God in the heart of the soul that decides the fate of the soul: Heaven, Purgatory or Hell. Love or charity is what will be judged. As St. Paul writes: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). To which Jesus adds: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47), while St. Peter affirms: “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). Charity is a fire that burns sins in this world—if we refuse to burn here, we will burn in Purgatory or Hell―but burn we must!
The Remedial School of Saints
Which brings us to the subject of saints and life on Earth. We are all called to be saints, for only saints go to Heaven. We know this in theory, but it is frightening to see how few people try to live this out in practice. If we don’t successfully pass our “sainthood exam” here on Earth, then we will have to spend a long time in the remedial school of sanctity in the fires of Purgatory. Most people have an erroneous notion that Heaven will be populated by the saints on the one hand, and themselves—plain old Mr. and Mrs. so and so on the other hand. They seem to think that Heaven is a place for both sanctity and plain old mediocrity. FALSE! That could not be further from the truth!
Heaven’s Mixed-Bag of Saints
In Heaven, there are all kinds of saints: big and small saints; strong and weak saints; old and young saints; male and female saints; rich and poor saints; “never-sinned-much” saints and “sinned-a-lot” saints; quickly processed saints and slowly processed saints; saints from all kinds of different backgrounds, countries, times and circumstances. But the one thing they have in common is that they are SAINTS and NOT mediocre souls. The mediocre souls find a place in Purgatory, where they have to make up for lost and wasted time and misguided efforts.
How Will I Ever Become A Saint?
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say “not in the same measure,” because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
Sanctity Needs Grace; Grace Comes Through Mary
“To find the grace of God, we must discover Mary. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
This truth was later most perfectly manifested by Our Lady’s apparitions to St. Catherine Labouré, in 1830, at the convent of the Sisters of Charity on the Rue du Bac in Paris, France. It is from these apparitions that we received the so-called “Miraculous Medal.” However, it is more formally known as “The Medal of Our Lady of Grace” and “The Medal of the Immaculate Conception.”
Our Lady herself stipulated the design of the medal, by showing St. Catherine a vision of what it was to look like. There are rays of light beaming forth out of the rings upon Our Lady’s fingers. St. Catherine asked what these rays of light were. Our Lady replied that they were graces. St. Catherine noticed that some rays were shining brilliantly, while other rays of light were dull, so she asked Our Lady what they meant. Our Lady replied that the bright rays were graces that God gave to people, but the dull rays were graces that God did not give to people. St. Catherine, disappointed, asked why God would withhold some graces from us. Our Lady simply replied that they are withheld from us because we don’t ask for them!
If Only I Would Have ...
The poor souls in Purgatory could have avoided those fires if they had only taken their life―their spiritual life―much more seriously. Grace and sanctity was not at the top of their shopping-list, nor did they ask Our Lady for the graces they would have needed to avoid being sent to Purgatory. The words of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange―already partially quoted above―perfectly represent this truth and we will repeat the aforementioned quote, adding a further passage to it:
The Real Life, the One That Matters
“The interior life, thus conceived, is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists and astronomers, have no interior life―so to speak―but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him.
“Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity―which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called ‘the one thing necessary’, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation.
“There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul.
“Every sin―though it should be venial―must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Vol. 1, “Introduction”).
Preconceived Ideas About Saints
Workers of miracles—readers of minds—makers of prophecy—severe penances—endless prayers—faultless lives—these and similar traits are what we tend to associate with saints and becoming saints. We forget that when it was announced in the Carmelite Convent of Lisieux, that one of the deceased sisters was “up for canonization”—when the sisters finally extracted the name of the candidate from “those in the know”, they were shocked to find out that it Thérèse of the Infant Jesus! The common reaction was one of “What did she ever do that was worthy of canonization?” Of course, we now know that ‘her way’ is what we now call “The Little Way”—and Pope St. Pius X calls her the model for sanctity in this modern world.
Even Sinner Saints!
For those discouraged about achieving sanctity, there can be no better thing than to read and study the lives of the great sinners who became great saints. They are walking proof of the words of God in Holy Scripture, Who said: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18).
Around the time of Our Lord, we think of ST. MARY MAGDALEN, who was possessed by seven devils and caught in adultery. Then there is ST. DISMAS, THE GOOD THIEF on the cross, who―after a life of stealing, violence and perhaps even murder―by his sufferings and sorrow for sin, steals Heaven with his dying breath. There too, on Calvary, is the Roman legionary, ST. LONGINUS, who pierces Our Lord’s heart with his spear, and ends up being pierced with sorrow in his own heart—finally converting, leaving the military and becoming a saint. Then there is ST. PAUL the persecutor of Christians, who converts and becomes a pillar of the Faith and paying for his sins through a lifetime of suffering.
A little later in time, as the Church grows, we have ST. CALLIXTUS OF ROME, who had a very sinful life before being taken under the wing of Victor I, a second century pope. Callixtus had embezzled money and started a public riot, amongst other criminal affairs, but left that all behind early in the third century, when he reformed. Callixtus went on to become a pope himself, and died a martyr shortly thereafter, thereby sufficiently paying his debts for sin.
ST. MARY OF EGYPT (c.344-c.421), at the age of 12, ran away from home to Alexandria, the most ‘exciting’ city in the Roman Empire. She became an accomplished seductress, who took special pleasure in corrupting innocent young men. Once, on a whim, she joined a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. By the time the ship reached its destination, Mary had seduced the entire crew and all of the pilgrims. In Jerusalem she realized the enormity of her sins, when a supernatural force prevented her from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Filled with remorse, Mary sought the Mother of God’s intercession and made a good confession. In penance, Mary then spent the rest of her life as a hermit, alone in the Jordanian desert.
The beautiful, teenage ST. PELAGIA would have been every parent’s nightmare. As legend has it, she was a dancer and courtesan by her early teens. Pelagia’s conversion occurred all of a sudden, following a chance encounter with Saint Nonnus, the bishop of Edessa. The young girl was baptized, gave away her possessions to the poor and lived as a hermit for the rest of her life.
Another sinner turned saint was ST. OLGA (879-969). When a neighboring tribe assassinated her husband, St. Olga, princess of Kiev, went to war. Olga slaughtered her husband’s murderer and almost all of his people. In vengeance, she massacred virtually the entire tribe; the few who did survive she sold into slavery. Years later, while in Constantinople to make an alliance with the emperor, Olga visited a church and was in awe of the magnificence of the liturgy. She took instruction, was baptized and returned to Kiev as a Christian, zealous to convert her people. Olga tried to convert her people, but hardly anyone would listen to her―even her family rejected Christianity. Olga died believing that as a missionary, she was a failure. Yet, she planted a seed of Faith which flourished. Today, Catholic and Orthodox Christians of Russia and Ukraine hail her as “Equal to the Apostles.”
Heaven’s Surprise
I was shocked, confused, bewildered
As I entered Heaven’s door,
Not by the beauty of it all,
Nor the lights or its decor.
But it was the folks in Heaven
Who made me sputter and gasp―
The thieves, the liars, the sinners,
The alcoholics and the trash!
There stood the kid from seventh grade
Who swiped my lunch money twice.
Next to him was my old neighbor
Who never said anything nice.
Herb, who I always thought
Was rotting away in Hell,
Was sitting pretty on cloud nine,
Looking incredibly well.
I nudged Jesus, “What’s the deal?
I would love to hear your take!”
“How’d all these sinners get up here?
God must’ve made a mistake!”
‘And why’s everyone so quiet, so somber?”
“Give me a clue!’
“My Friend,” He said, “They’re all in shock!”
“They never thought they’d be seeing you!”
Museum or Hospital?
As St. Augustine says: “The Church is not a museum of saints, but a hospital of sinners … There is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future” (St. Augustine of Hippo, Doctor of the Church—sinners need a good doctor!).
Saints can seem remote and distant, close to God, but far from people. But they’re more like us than we give them credit for. Their lives were like ours, full of dilemmas and struggles, with bad choices as well as good. But their goodness won out in the end, as ours can. Interest in angels is quite popular at the moment, but it is the saints who are really like us in both their strengths and frailties―they should be our focal point and encouragement. They came to Heaven’s Hospital wounded by sin, and they found a cure—sometimes a painful cure—in Christ’s care.
You’d Better Believe It and Want It!
Let it be said and let it be understood and let it be believed and let it be desired: God expects you to be a saint and Our Lady will help you be a saint! Don’t question it and don’t doubt it! It is not, as you may think, an act of pride to want and expect to be a saint—it is an act of insanity not to do so! What’s the alternative to not wanting to and actually becoming a saint in this life? It is either Hell or Purgatory! Either way, it is insanity! Why pay a thousand times more, or pay eternally, for what could have been bought at a fraction of the effort and pain here below? You are expected to be a saint. You can be a saint. You must be a saint. Only saints go to Heaven.
Wow! How?
Whew! That’s a tall order, but one that is possible for everyone, for God never demands the impossible! We might be tempted to agree with the Apostles: “When they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:25-26). Our Lord adds: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) ― Our Lord is the Author of Grace and without His grace we can do nothing with regard to saving our souls and reaching Heaven. Grace perfects nature, and therefore we need to drink copiously from the fountains of grace—which are found in the Sacraments, in quality prayer and in generous sacrifices, penances and alms-giving.
This is what St. Louis de Montfort also says—that this tall order can only be accomplished by grace: “Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God. The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say ‘not in the same measure,’ because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Find God’s Grace Through the Mediatrix of All Grace
St. Louis goes on to say what Our Lady herself will later reiterate in a variety of ways: “It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary). At Fatima, Our Lady said of herself: “Only she (Our Lady of the Rosary) can help you now!” At Akita, Our Lady said: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.” This merely echoes what the Church says in her liturgy concerning Our Lady: “He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord!” (Proverbs 8:35; Mass of the Immaculate Conception, traditional or extraordinary rite, Epistle). It is only saints that go to Heaven, and there is no saint who became a saint without the Mother of God, the Mediatrix of All Graces.
This is why the saints can say the following things about Our Lady:
● St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.”
● St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation.”
● St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.”
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
● St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.”
● St. Anselm (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost.”
● St. Antonine is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified.”
You could fill books with quotes from saints about Our Lady—these few barely whet the appetite or do her justice. Nevertheless, on this feast of All Saints let all souls realize that all graces come to us through Mary; and, in her own words, she is all we have left in the current dire predicament of the world. Whether we want to survive, or get to Heaven, without her, there is not even the slightest hope of either or both.
Father Faber’s Holy Diagnosis and Prognosis
Let us end with the words of Fr. Faber from the Preface of his own translation, from French to English, of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary. These words were written in November of 1862—how much worse has the situation become today!
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one. Mary is not half enough preached. Devotion to her is low and thin and poor. ... It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be. It has no faith in itself. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized.
“Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background. Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them. It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines. Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother.
“I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable Grignion de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ.
“Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!” (Fr. Frederick Faber, Preface to his translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary).
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR OCTOBER 2024
THE MONTH OF THE MOST HOLY ROSARY
THE MONTH OF THE MOST HOLY ROSARY
Article 17
Thursday, October 31st
One Hell of a Day! Halloween
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Thursday, October 31st
One Hell of a Day! Halloween
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Three Days of Hell, Heaven and Purgatory
We have entered a period of time which, under the surface, could be said to be a battle between Heaven and Hell. Today, October 31st, the eve of All Saints Day, which traditionally begins with the liturgy of First Vespers on (October 31st) the evening before All Saints Day (November 1st), has been turned into a glorification of pagan and diabolical customs. We will therefore, over the course of three days, a triduum of sorts, look at Hell (Halloween), Heaven (All Saints Day) and Purgatory (All Souls Day).
Halloween or Hell-O-Ween?
Few people know the history behind Halloween—they prefer to stop at the sweet superficial aspect of it, and have little or no clue about its origins. They are happy to pass over it with “two-bit” phrases or vague platitudes while smiling at the quaintness of much of the customs.
In a nutshell, Halloween has pagan origins, which the Church tried to replace with a Christian overtone, and which now has reverted back to pagan overtones. One could almost say it parallels the fate of the Church—which was born in a time of pagan darkness, Christianized much of that darkness, and is not falling back into an increasingly pagan atmosphere.
The Gods of Gentiles and Pagans Are Devils
Holy Scripture clearly tells us that: “For all the gods of the Gentiles are devils” (Psalm 95:5). “They sacrificed to devils and not to God: to gods whom they knew not” (Deuteronomy 32:17). “For you have provoked Him who made you, the eternal God, offering sacrifice to devils, and not to God” (Baruch 4:7). God tells them to stop this devilish and hellish practice: “And they shall no more sacrifice their victims to devils, with whom they have committed fornication. It shall be an ordinance for ever to them and to their posterity” (Leviticus 17:7). Which leads St. Paul to warn us: “And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever?” (2 Corinthians 6:15).
Pagan Celtic and Druid New Year
Halloween’s origins date back to the ancient pagan Druid and Celtic festival of Samhain―variously pronounced as “sow-in”, “sah-win”, “sam-hayne” plus more. A Druid was a member of the educated, professional class among the Celtic peoples. The pagan Celts―who lived over 2,000 years ago in the area that is now Ireland, the United Kingdom and northern France― It was the beginning of their new year and was generally celebrated on October 31st, but some preferred November 1st. This day marked the end of summer and the harvest and the beginning of the dark, cold winter, a time of year that was often associated with human death. Celts believed that on the night before the new year, the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead became blurred.
Communication With The Dead
On the night of October 31st they celebrated Samhain, when it was believed that the ghosts of the dead returned to earth. In addition to causing trouble and damaging crops, Celts thought that the presence of the otherworldly spirits made it easier for the Druids, or Celtic priests, to make predictions about the future. For a people entirely dependent on the volatile natural world, these prophecies were an important source of comfort and direction during the long, dark winter.
It is one of the two “spirit-nights” each year, the other being Beltane. It is a ‘magical’ interval when the mundane laws of time and space are thought to be temporarily suspended, and the “Thin Veil” between the worlds is lifted. Communicating with ancestors and departed loved ones is thought to be easy at this time, for they journey through this world on their way to the “Summerlands”. It is a time to study the “Dark Mysteries” and honor the “Dark Mother” and the “Dark Father”, symbolized by the “Crone” and her aged “Consort”.
To commemorate the event, Druids (the Celtic ‘priests’) built huge sacred bonfires, where the people gathered to burn crops and animals as sacrifices to the pagan Celtic deities. Originally the “Feast of the Dead” was celebrated in Celtic countries by leaving food offerings on altars and doorsteps for the “wandering dead”. Today a lot of practitioners still carry out that tradition. Single candles were lit and left in a window to help guide the spirits of ancestors and loved ones home. Extra chairs were set to the table and around the hearth for the unseen guest. Apples were buried along roadsides and paths for spirits who were lost or had no descendants to provide for them. Turnips were hollowed out and carved to look like protective spirits, for this was a night of magic and chaos.
The “Wee Folke” became very active, pulling pranks on unsuspecting humans. During the celebration, the Celts wore costumes, typically consisting of animal heads and skins, and attempted to tell each other’s fortunes. Traveling after dark was not advised. People dressed in white (like ghosts), wore disguises made of straw, or dressed as the opposite gender in order to fool the Nature spirits. When the celebration was over, they re-lit their hearth fires, which they had extinguished earlier that evening, from the sacred bonfire to help protect them during the coming winter.
Human Sacrifice
“He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord: but he that shall sin against Me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate Me love death” (Proverbs 8:35-36).
There is a debate among scholars as to whether human sacrifices were performed during Druid/Celtic celebrations of Halloween. Of course modern druids will say that they were not. They say that the only evidence that this custom was practiced is a reference in an ancient Roman document by Julius Caesar (see below). We do know that human sacrifice was practiced among the Celts in ancient times because of several “bog men”, or mummies preserved in the peat bogs that show signs of ritual killing. Of course, there would be no remains of any humans that were sacrificed in the fire. At any rate, the word “bonfire” comes from a compound of the Middle English words bon (bone) and fir (fire) ... meaning a fire kindled upon bones.
The author Merle Severy, in his book The Celts (National Geographic, May 1977, pages 625-626), describes "the eve of Samhain... the start of the Celtic new year: “According to the Dinshenchas―a medieval collection of the lore of prominent places―firstborn children were sacrificed before a great idol to ensure fertility of cattle and crops. Samhain eve was a night of dread and danger. At this juncture of the old year and the new, our world and the otherworld opened up to each other. The dead returned, ghosts and demons were abroad, and the future could be seen.. . . Behind such Halloween games as bobbing for apples lie Celtic divination arts to discern who would marry, thrive, or die in the coming year. Behind the masks and mischief, the jack-o-lanterns and food offerings, lurk the fear of malevolent spirits and the rites to propitiate them.” Page 601 gives additional insight: “Tacitus tells us of the bloodstained Druid altars of Anglesey in Wales.”
Julius Caesar, speaking on Celtic sacrifices said: “The whole nation of the Gauls is greatly devoted to ritual observances, and for that reason those who are smitten with the more grievous maladies and who are engaged in the perils of battle either sacrifice human victims or vow so to do, employing the druids as ministers for such sacrifices. They believe, in effect, that, unless for a man's life a man's life be paid, the majesty of the immortal gods may not be appeased; and in public, as in private life they observe an ordinance of sacrifices of the same kind. Others use figures of immense size whose limbs, woven out of twigs, they fill with living men and set on fire, and the men perish in a sheet of flame. They believe that the execution of those who have been caught in the act of theft or robbery or some crime is more pleasing to the immortal gods; but when the supply of such fails they resort to the execution even of the innocent.”
The classical author, Diodorus Siculus, also reported scenes of human sacrifice by the Druids: “When they attempt divination upon important matters they practice a strange and incredible custom, for they kill a man by a knife-stab in the region above his midriff.” After the sacrificial victim fell dead ... “they foretell the future by the convulsions of his limbs and the pouring of his blood.”
The 1984 discovery of a sacrificial victim in Cheshire, England, helps validate the reality of ritualistic human sacrifice. The well-preserved young man had apparently belonged to an elite social class in the second century BC. After two sharp blows to the head, he had been strangled. Then, like the countless sacrifices to Aztec and Mayan gods, his body had been drained of the human blood needed to please and appease their gods
Here Come the Pagan Romans!
By 43 A.D., the pagan Roman Empire had conquered the majority of Celtic territory. In the course of the four hundred years that they ruled the Celtic lands, two festivals of pagan Roman origin were combined with the traditional pagan Celtic celebration of Samhain. Pagan + Pagan = More Pagan.
The first pagan Roman celebration was Feralia, a day in late October, when the pagan Romans traditionally commemorated the passing of the dead. The second was a day to honor Pomona, the pagan Roman goddess of fruit and trees. The symbol of Pomona is the apple and the incorporation of this celebration into Samhain probably explains the tradition of “bobbing” for apples that is practiced today on Halloween.
Throw-Out Devil & Put In Christ!
Early Christianity developed in an era of the Roman Empire during which many religions were practiced, that are, due to the lack of a better term, labeled paganism. Paganism is commonly used to refer to various, largely unconnected religions from the time period before and after the birth of Christ. The Church found itself in direct conflict with centuries of pagan—and sometimes barbarically evil—customs. Many of these pagan and evil customs the Church sought to Christianize—this was often done by keeping the timetable or schedule but replacing the pagan with the Christian, the evil replaced by good.
For the first 300 years or so, Christianity was on the defensive and largely kept a low profile due to persecution. After the time of the Emperor Constantine, more freedom was obtained—though freedom and persecution alternated, ebbed and flowed. The persecutions produced so many martyrs, that there were not enough days in the year to give each martyr his feast day. Frequently groups of martyrs suffered on the same day, which naturally led to a joint commemoration. In the persecution of Diocletian the number of martyrs became so great that a separate day could not be assigned to each. But the Church, feeling that every martyr should be venerated, appointed a common day for all.
On May 13th, 609 A.D., Pope Boniface IV dedicated the Pantheon in Rome in honor of all Christian martyrs, and the Catholic feast of All Martyrs Day was established in the Western church. Pope Gregory III (731–741) later expanded the festival to include all saints as well as all martyrs, and moved the observance from May 13th to November 1st. By the 9th century the influence of Christianity had spread into Celtic lands, where it gradually blended with and supplanted the older Celtic rites. In 1000 A.D., the Church would make November 2nd to be “All Souls’ Day”, a day to honor the dead. It is widely believed today that the church was attempting to replace the Celtic festival of the dead with a related, but church-sanctioned holy day (holiday).
All Souls Day was celebrated similarly to Samhain, with big bonfires, parades, and dressing up in costumes as saints, angels and devils. The All Saints Day celebration was also called All-hallows or All-hallowmas (from Middle English Alholowmesse meaning All Saints’ Mass (“hallow” means “holy” as in “hallowed by Thy Name”), much like “Candlemas” on February 2nd, means “The Mass of Candles”) and the night before it was celebrated with the singing of First Vespers (which always starts the celebration of great feasts on the evening prior to the feast), and thus began to be called All-hallows Eve and Hallow-even’ [ing], eventually becoming Halloween. The word ‘'Halloween'’, therefore, is a contracted form of ''Holy Evening'' and refers to the evening of All Saints Day (November 1st), when the Church traditionally remember the saints of bygone days; many of whom were persecuted, tortured, and/or died rather than renounce Christ.
Christianizing the Pagan Samhain
As northern Europe and the British Isles became Christianized, the Church saw that the pagan festivals still lured Christians to compromise their faith. Consequently, the Church in those areas designated October 31st and November 1st as the "Holy Evening" and Holy Day of All Saints Day. The Church not only sought to give Christians an alternative, spiritually edifying holiday; but also to proclaim the supremacy of the Gospel over pagan superstition.
There was no need to ''placate'' the spirits, or buy their way into the afterlife — eternal life is offered to all who believe in the atonement of Jesus Christ, Who shed His blood to reconcile us to God and bring us eternal life. Rather than fearing the ''tricks'' of those who have died, Christians reflected on the lives and deaths of those who were faithful and used them as role models for their own journey to the true after life and Heaven; and thanked God for preserving the saints in the midst of suffering and persecution.
As northern Europe and the British Isles became Christianized, the Church saw that the pagan festivals still lured Christians to compromise their faith. Consequently, the Church in those areas designated October 31st and November 1st as the "Holy Evening" and Holy Day of All Saints Day. The Church not only sought to give Christians an alternative, spiritually edifying holiday; but also to proclaim the supremacy of the Gospel over pagan superstition. There was no need to ''placate'' the spirits, or buy their way into the afterlife — eternal life is offered to all who believe in the atonement of Jesus Christ, Who shed His blood to reconcile us to God and bring us eternal life. Rather than fearing the ''tricks'' of those who have died, Christians reflected on the lives and deaths of those who were faithful and used them as role models for their own journey to the true after life and Heaven; and thanked God for preserving the saints in the midst of suffering and persecution.
The Evolution of Halloween
"Trick-or-treating" is a modern tradition that probably finds it's roots in the early All Souls' Day parades in England. During the festivities, poor citizens would beg for food and families would give them pastries called "soul cakes" in return for their promise to pray for the family's dead relatives. The distribution of “soul cakes” was encouraged by the Church as a way to replace the ancient pagan practice of leaving food and wine for roaming spirits. The practice, which was referred to as "going a-souling" was eventually taken up by children who would visit the houses in their neighborhood and be given drinks, food and money—but the praying for souls gradually fell away into neglect. So it was a case of all pay, but no pray!
Dressing Up
"Dressing up" for Halloween gets it roots from the pagan custom of dressing up around the ‘sacred’(?) bonfire during the original Celtic festival. Some suggest, this practice originates from England, when it was believed that ghosts came back to the earthly world on Halloween. People thought that they would encounter ghosts if they left their homes, so to avoid being recognized people would wear masks after dark so that the ghosts would mistake them for fellow spirits. In addition, these early English people, would place bowls of food outside their homes to appease the ghosts and prevent them from attempting to enter or cause harm to their homes. A tradition obviously taken from the ancient Celtic pagans.
The Church would try to Christianize this “dressing up” and have folk dress up as saints. They would then organize a parade of saints on All Saints day.
Reaction and Action
Because of its Occult history and symbolism, many informed Christians avoid any activity that would appear to support, promote, or celebrate Halloween. Other Liberal Christians attempt to minimize the glorification of Halloween's Occult roots, by refusing to directly participate in costuming or activities where witchcraft, Satan, or demonic themes are prevalent. They feel that participation in Halloween and even trick-or-treating is acceptable if alternative costumes and themes are substituted. There is not total agreement among Christians concerning appropriate Christian responses to this pagan holiday.
Biblical Blast
The Bible has many warnings and examples of involvement with the Occult. Occult practices are an abomination to the Lord: “Neither let there be found among you any one that consulteth soothsayers, or observeth dreams and omens, neither let there be any wizard, nor charmer, nor any one that consulteth pythonic spirits, or fortune tellers, or that seeketh the truth from the dead. For the Lord abhorreth all these things, and for these abominations he will destroy them” (Deuteronomy 18:10-12) and Witchcraft was a crime punishable by death in the Old Testament: “Wizards thou shalt not suffer to live” (Exodus 22:18). The New Testament gives several examples of proper Christian response to the Occult: “And many of them who had followed curious [magical] arts, brought together their books, and burnt them before all” (Acts 19:19); “What fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial?” (2 Corinthians 6:14-15). “For all the gods of the Gentiles are devils” (Psalm 95:5) … “They sacrificed to devils and not to God: to gods whom they knew not” (Deuteronomy 32:17). “And they were mingled among the heathens, and learned their works and served their idols, and it became a stumbling-block to them. And they sacrificed their sons, and their daughters to devils” (Psalm 105:35-37).
Wicca and Halloween
Just before reaching a conclusion on the subject, let us find out what Wicca, the official religion of witchcraft, has to say about Halloween. Perhaps they view the day as simple fun and innocent neighborhood activity? “Shock” should be the only word to describe what the truth actually is on the matter. Halloween is a real, sacred day for those who follow Wicca. In fact, it is one of two high and holy days for them. The Celtic belief of spirits being released is current, along with the worship of Samhain (the lord of death) – both are promoted as something to embrace on that day. There is no question that to those who believe and follow the practices of witchcraft, Halloween represents an opportunity to embrace the evil, devilish, dark side of the spiritual world.
Witch Way to Go
Here are some excerpts from a news report from ABC news (2009) on a typical witch!
“Patti Wigington is a soccer mom. She is the vice president of her local PTA. And she's a witch. This Saturday while her neighborhood outside Columbus, Ohio, is crawling with costumed witches in search of candy, Wigington and a group of other local witches will not be celebrating Halloween, but the new year festival Samhain, which also occurs October 31st. In her backyard, Wigington and six other local women, who make up her coven of witches, will stand in a circle, each holding a lit candle dedicated to a dead ancestor. They will offer an invocation in each direction of the four winds. They will build an altar upon which they will offer their deceased ancestors gifts of food and wine and "celebrate the coming of the dark half of the year… and do a ritual that honors death."
"Look," she says, “We welcome and celebrate the coming of the dark half of the year. It's at this time of year we communicate with the spirit world and we honor the spirit world," said Wigington, who writes extensively about her faith and hosts the page on paganism and Wicca at about.com. Wicca is a relatively new religion, which its practitioners say is based on ancient precepts. A hodgepodge of ancient European pagan practices and new age spirituality, Wicca is practiced by a small but growing number of Americans. In 2008, some 342,000 people identified themselves as Wiccans, up from 134,000 in 2001 and up significantly from 8,000 in 1990. Modern Wicca, which draws its practices mainly from pre-Christian Europe, was established in the U.K. in the 1950s. Its popularity coincided with an in interest in other ancient religions that emphasize beliefs in magic and nature.
“Magical religions ― paganism, Wicca, the earth-based religions – have really gone mainstream," said Wigington. "The witches in Harry Potter are not wiccans, but it gets interested in wondering if magic could be real. The best thing that ever happened to Wicca is that it went mainstream, and the worst that happened is that it went mainstream." The Rev. Don Lewis established the Witch School to train the next generation of practitioners of Wicca and other so-called natural religions. With some 250,000 students enrolled in online classes, the school recently moved its physical location from Illinois, to the a far more likely setting – Salem, Mass., home of the famous 1692 witch hunt. "Interest in Wicca has been building for years, but every year there is a spike in interest around Halloween. It's a huge advertising campaign the world runs for us," he said. The practitioners all stressed that Wicca is in no way associated with Satanism or devil worship. "Satan is a Christian concept," explained Fox. "We don't believe in him at all."
The Occult and Halloween
While Halloween masquerades as childish fun and frolic, it’s serious business in the occult world. Witchcraft, Wicca, Satanism and paganism believe, that on the night of Halloween, devils and spirits are unleashed. They perform their most hideous and potent rituals on the night of Halloween. Here are some testimonies from Satanists and writers on Satanism:
“Samhain: This is the Witch’s New Year and the primary Sabbat from which all others flow” (Silver RavenWolf, Teen Witch, p. 42). “Halloween is one of the four major Sabbats celebrated by the modern Witch, and it is by far the most popular and important of the eight that are observed. . . Witches regard Halloween as their New Year’s Eve, celebrating it with sacred rituals” (Gerina Dunwich, The Pagan Book of Halloween, p. 120).
Halloween is also among Satanism’s most cherished days. Anton LaVey, founder of The Church of Satan and author of The Satanic Bible writes: “After one's own birthday, the two major Satanic holidays are Walpurgisnacht (Witches Night, May 1st) and Halloween” (Anton LaVey, The Satanic Bible, p. 96).
The Satanic High Priestess, Blanche Barton, on The Church of Satan web site, praises Halloween: “It [Halloween] gives even the most mundane people the opportunity to taste wickedness for one night. They have a chance to dance with the Devil ... I see Satanists all over the world meeting in small groups this night and Halloweens 500 years hence, to raise a glass to the Infernal Hosts.”
The Satanic Calendar decrees for Halloween: “One of the two most important nights of the year. . . Blood and sexual rituals. Sexual association with demons. Animal and human sacrifice—male or female.”
Former occultist Johanna Michaelsen reveals, “Halloween is also a prime recruiting season for Satanists.” (Johanna Michaelsen, Like Lambs to the Slaughter, p. 192).
Precautions and Praycautions
The first thing is to be convinced that your enemy exists. The devil exists and we do not talk to the devil, we do not play with the devil. Some dangerous things to avoid include spells, charms, curses, witchcraft, ouija boards, seances and anything having to do with the occult. These kinds of things, some of them innocently done at children’s parties, are not only strictly forbidden by the Catholic faith, but dangerous, in that they open us up to evil spirits, which are real and not just imaginary. Please don’t ever let your children/teens attend parties (especially popular at slumber parties) where there are seances and ouija boards and/or playing with spells and witchcraft. Ask beforehand what will be done at before allowing your children to attend parties. Witchcraft and spells are becoming more popular due to books and movies and somehow we need protect our children from these dangers of without getting them fascinated with them or making them seem interesting to them.
The chief spiritual weapons we have are, first of all, a state of grace—mortal sin puts us under the devil’s influence. Therefore frequent Confession and Holy Communion (in a state of grace) are the chief guardians of the state of grace. Much—once again, much prayer is another barrier—especially the prayer of the Holy Rosary—but well prayed, not just mechanically, routinely, hurriedly, distractedly said.
Remember the words of St. Louis de Montfort: “If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins ‘you shall receive a never fading crown of glory’ (1 Peter 5:4). Even if you are on the brink of damnation, even if you have one foot in Hell, even if you have sold your soul to the devil as sorcerers do who practice black magic, and even if you are a heretic as obstinate as a devil, sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and save your soul, if — and mark well what I say — if you say the Rosary devoutly every day until death for the purpose of knowing the truth and obtaining contrition and pardon for your sins” (The Secret of the Rosary, “A Red Rose”).
Add to this the use and wearing of blessed sacramentals—especially the Brown Scapular, the Miraculous Medal, the St. Benedict Medal—these are big guns among the sacramentals. You can also wear a blessed Rosary too! Holy Water is another powerful weapon, as is a blessed crucifix (both are used in exorcisms).
What Does Vatican’s Chief Exorcist Think?
Fr. Gabriele Amorth (born 1925, ordained a priest in 1954, became an exorcist in 1986, died 2016) was an Italian Roman Catholic priest and former chief exorcist (now retired) of the Diocese of Rome, who has performed thousands of exorcisms. Fr. Amorth said: “Halloween is a trick of the devil. It is pagan, anti-Christian and anti-Catholic. It the creation of a devil and an obstacle to holiness and disrupts the plans of God. The young people follow fads and the devil knows how to use them. To celebrate Halloween is to give the devil a ‘Hosanna’! Which, if loved, even if it’s only for one night, gives the devil a claim or rights over that person … 'I'm very sad to see that Italy, like the rest of Europe, is moving away from the Lord Jesus, and is even paying homage to Satan … Halloween is a kind of a séance, which is presented in the form of game. The cunning of the devil is here. If you notice everything is presented in a playful, innocent manner. Sin is no longer a sin in today's world. But everything comes disguised in the form of a need, a freedom, or a personal pleasure. I think that society is losing its mind, losing the sense of the meaning of life, losing the use of reason, and is becoming increasingly sick. People have lost the Faith, and superstition, magic, Satanism, or ouija boards have taken its place, which then open all the doors to the presence of demons.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, former Vatican Chief Exorcist).
So What Do Exorcisms Have To Do With Halloween?
Some priest-exorcists have been sharing their vast experience with the wide public, and have made it known that during exorcisms, Satan usually speaks through the possessed person. The devil makes known certain things which a lot of people would normally not be aware of. One of the important pieces of information which has been gathered during exorcisms has to do with Halloween. As it turns out, the night between October 31st and November 1st is a time when, all over the world, Satanic practice is on the increase, because on that night, the greatest number of satanic rituals are performed, especially so-called demonic “black masses” which are celebrated with the use of animal or even human sacrifice. So someone may say: “Okay, fair enough, but I have nothing to do with it. My children have nothing to do with it. How does this concern me and my children, if what we are doing on Halloween is just a game with my kids wearing all kinds of funny costumes?”
Is All Hallow's Eve really an evil holiday? The Daily Mail (a British newspaper) reported in 2104 that the International Association of Exorcists (also known as the AIE) held its first official conference over the weekend in Rome (2014). More than 300 exorcists attended after being officially recognized by the Vatican this summer. Father Aldo Buonaiuto told the British publication, The Daily Mail, that his organization's emergency number receives hundreds of calls on October 31st, up from an average of 40 per day, due to concerns about increased occult activity.
Father Buonaiuto said: “Many say Halloween is a simple carnival, but in fact there is nothing innocent or fun about it … There are always more evil rituals, animal sacrifices, desecrations of cemeteries and thefts of sacred bones ... From here the door to the devil can be opened.”
According to the Religious News Service, AIE spokesman, Dr. Valter Cascioli, a psychologist and scientific consultant to the International Association of Exorcists, told Vatican Radio there has been a “steady increase” in possessions. “The battle against evil is becoming more of an emergency. We are calling for major vigilance,” Cascioli added.
The Thoughts of the Famous Exorcist on Halloween
Father Gabriele Amorth, probably the most well-known exorcist in the world, who died on September 16th in 2016—had condemned the celebration of Halloween and warned of a danger to young people, because of the increase in occult activity, which fuels insomnia, mental illness; depression and suicidal thoughts in children. “Psychiatrical and psychological studies show that children can’t sleep, are agitated, depressed, obsessed, suicidal.” Fr. Amorth said: “Halloween is really a spiritual gathering presented as a form of game, and that is the equivalent of singing hosannas to the devil.”
Fr. Gabriele Amorth, performed an estimated 70,000 exorcisms, often repeating the rite of exorcism on the same persons. Fr. Amorth asked the poignant question, “Should Catholics Celebrate Halloween?” For your information Fr. Amorth condemned the celebration of Halloween because of the danger to young people who might be lured to the occult, which promotes suicidal thoughts, psychiatric or psychological stress. Many Catholic parents tolerate their children to celebrate Halloween because it is just for fun and can bring no harm!
But Fr. Amorth said, “Halloween is really a spiritual gathering presented as a form of game, and that is the equivalent of singing hosannas to the devil. We should understand that, 843 years after Christ, Pope Gregory IV moved the Feast of All Saints Day--which was then celebrated on May 13th--to the present November 1st, in order to stop the evil tradition which arrived from Ireland of adoring the world of the dead.”
Fr. Amorth counseled that the battle against evil begins in the family. The reason why many individuals become evil is often because so many young people “live without knowing the sacredness of being children” and therefore do not know what it means to be a good father or mother, he said.
Fr. Amorth added, “The Battle against evil begins in the family. The reason why many individuals become evil is often because so many young people “live without knowing the sacredness of being children” and therefore do not know what it means to be a good father or mother.” How very true this when we become a tolerant society―we end up tolerating this celebration of evil itself! We cannot throw away our Catholicism simply because we want to have fun on Halloween night! Calling it “harmless fun” is one step on the way to calling the devil “harmless” too!
Towards the end of his life, Fr. Amorth would often remind us that Satan has gained control of the world: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican! Legions of demons have lodged there! I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office!”
These statements by Fr. Amorth are not far from what we learned from Sister Lucia of Fatima, one of the three children whom the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared at the Cova de Ira in Fatima a hundred years ago. Sister Lucia once confided to Cardinal Caffara: “The decisive battle between the Lord and the kingdom of Satan will be over marriage and the family.” Cardinal Caffara once stated that the great tragedy of mankind today is Atheism. Once we lose respect for the spiritual, we become easy prey for the devil.
The Core of the Problem
Dressing up in costumes that stand for demons, goblins, witches, and vampires is not the same as putting on a mask with the face of J. F. Kennedy, or a shirt similar to the one used by Elvis Presley. Exorcists have been finding out that when we start playing with something that resembles Satan, and his demons, we open ourselves to these malevolent creatures’ influence, which is not just something psychological or intellectual in nature. Satan sees such behavior as an invitation on our part: an open door to his evil spiritual influence on the minds and souls of human beings.
As exorcists confirm unequivocally, even if we are not consciously seeking demonic influence, it is still possible for us to be dangerously affected by it. Actually, it is a lot easier for the devil to enter into the mind of those who think nothing of things that “innocently” resemble the devil. So while it is true that there is an unhealthy intellectual and psychological aspect which negatively influences children dressing up in costumes of demons, witches, goblins, and vampires, there is an even more serious area which we should be concerned about: the spiritual aspect of demonic activity which appears innocent and harmless. It becomes more dangerous, because the innocent appearance of evil desensitizes us to what we are dealing with.
Let us never forget that it is not only members of Satanic cults who enter into a spiritual relationship with Satan. A spiritual relationship with the devil can take place in various degrees. It does not always have to end up in diabolical possession. But, as exorcists warn, exposing kids to something which has some kind of a demonic connotation, draws the risk of entering into a relationship with the devil. It is like a slightly open window that a thief sees from a distance: for him it a signal which he interprets as an invitation to enter into the house. Dressing up children in costumes of all kinds of evil spirits and creatures, hanging pumpkins outside the house with evil faces carved on them, is like sending an invitation card to the devil by express mail. We can be assured that the devil will get interested in the invitation. But once he comes, it will not be that easy to fend him off.
St. Paul’s Reminder on Evil
St. Paul writes in his Letter to the Ephesians that: “ …our struggle is not with flesh and blood, but with the principalities, with the powers, with the world rulers of this present darkness, with the evil spirits in the heavens. Therefore, put on the armor of God, that you may be able to resist on the evil day and, having done everything, to hold your ground.” (Ephesians 6:12-13).
Let’s face it: the “world” is at war with Christ, but it’s not just the world that we see on TV news reports. There is also an invisible evil world out there that we have to know about, and we cannot be naïve about its impact. Satan exists, but in order to harm us, he first has to create the impression that he exists only in our imagination, as a naughty creature with harmless horns, and a long tail. While it is true that there is no such thing as ghosts, or spirits of dead people coming to haunt us, it is also true that there are demons who are not the souls of the dead, but evil spirits whose only aim is to ruin us spiritually.
So What Shall We Do?
We can try to imagine the following situation. Let’s say we see a freshly baked delicious cake, but we do not know that someone laced it with poison. We start eating it. Will the fact that we are not aware of the poison prevent us from getting sick, or even dying? Of course not. The poisonous effects will take their course and have their effect regardless of our will or our awareness of what’s inside the cake. This is precisely what happens with Halloween, but with one exception. We are fortunate to have the information which more and more priest-exorcists are sharing about its tremendous danger. Knowing what we know now--who in his right mind would want to dress up his children in costumes of demonic creatures? Parents’ concerns should go in a totally different direction. Have we ever wondered why so many young people start drinking, taking drugs, fall into depression, end up in a bad company, and even commit suicide? Parents often say: “What have we done wrong? We have always tried to give our children a lot of love; we taught them respect and proper behavior. So what went wrong?”
While each situation could be analyzed separately, parents may be wise to ask themselves whether, throughout the years that their children were growing up, they might have senselessly and naively exposed them to Satan’s influence which had appeared as something innocent, but was actually infiltrating their kids’ minds and souls more and more—television and music are full of such insidious traps which, like Halloween, are always well disguised or trivialized. We must never take the devil lightly. Playing with fire is neither a game nor a joke. But knowing this is not enough to protect ourselves from demonic influence. It is also necessary to be in the state of sanctifying grace rather than as state of mortal sin, and to be strengthened by the frequent reception of the Sacraments—especially Holy Communion and Confession. It is also important to wear the Miraculous Medal of the Blessed Virgin Mary and to have Holy Water in the house. We know for certain that the devil stays away from homes which have a blessed crucifix in a prominent location on the wall and saints’ images hanging in various places in the house—with a pride of place given to the image of the Divine Mercy, the Sacred Heart, and the Immaculate Heart of Mary. All these things are crucially important in order to create an environment where all the members of the household are protected. Exorcists tell us that Satan does not visit homes where family members pray the Rosary together, where the Bible as well as the Catechism are read regularly, and where all in the family practice their faith diligently.
Doing The Right Thing
It is good to hear that more and more parishes and Catholic schools in America (but not many) move away from Halloween for the above reasons, and put a greater emphasis on All Saints Day. On this occasion children are encouraged to dress up as the true heroes of history: saints and biblical figures. Nevertheless, while this is a good idea, it is also important for priests, religious, and parents to remember that this is a separate celebration from Halloween.
Unfortunately, when children are exposed to minimum, or no spirituality in the home, it is no wonder that they are going to feel bad, and be surprised when other children, whom they know celebrate Halloween, while their own parents tell them that Halloween is not something good. Children will spontaneously, and more easily understand, that there is something wrong with Halloween when they start praying the Rosary, read the Bible, hear more about their patron saints, as well as guardian angels and, most importantly, when they look at their parents and see how devoutly they practice their Catholic faith. This is how the grace of God will work its way, not only into the child’s mind, but also into the child’s soul.
Teaching by Courageous Example
On September 13th, 2015, a 43-year-old South African martyr, and a convert to Catholicism, by the name of Benedict Daswa, was declared blessed. He was a husband and a father of eight children. As a teacher and a school principle, he worked hard to spread the Catholic faith primarily through a virtuous life. Known for his opposition to occult practices, which were prevalent in the area where he lived, Benedict risked retaliation from those who insisted on adhering to devil worship. On February 2nd, 1990, while returning to his house, he was ambushed by a group of such people, who savagely clubbed him to death. As Benedict was dying, they gathered around him, and in an effort to increase his suffering, poured boiling water on his bleeding head, into his ears, nostrils, and mouth.
Sometimes, we may be under a lot of pressure to adhere to practices which have become so common that a mere opposition to them may draw a lot of criticism. All of us would like to have peace of mind, but at what cost? Blessed Benedict Daswa was a layman who would be the first one to remind priests, religious, and parents about the duty to be watchmen who have their eyes open. A good watchman sees danger when it approaches, but also has the courage to speak out, and resist anything that’s unbecoming to our Catholic faith. Let’s be prudent and vigilant. Let’s not be naïve at the face of the slightest semblance of evil. We cannot afford to be so. Our destiny, and the destiny of our young people, may be at stake, both in this life and in the next.
We have entered a period of time which, under the surface, could be said to be a battle between Heaven and Hell. Today, October 31st, the eve of All Saints Day, which traditionally begins with the liturgy of First Vespers on (October 31st) the evening before All Saints Day (November 1st), has been turned into a glorification of pagan and diabolical customs. We will therefore, over the course of three days, a triduum of sorts, look at Hell (Halloween), Heaven (All Saints Day) and Purgatory (All Souls Day).
Halloween or Hell-O-Ween?
Few people know the history behind Halloween—they prefer to stop at the sweet superficial aspect of it, and have little or no clue about its origins. They are happy to pass over it with “two-bit” phrases or vague platitudes while smiling at the quaintness of much of the customs.
In a nutshell, Halloween has pagan origins, which the Church tried to replace with a Christian overtone, and which now has reverted back to pagan overtones. One could almost say it parallels the fate of the Church—which was born in a time of pagan darkness, Christianized much of that darkness, and is not falling back into an increasingly pagan atmosphere.
The Gods of Gentiles and Pagans Are Devils
Holy Scripture clearly tells us that: “For all the gods of the Gentiles are devils” (Psalm 95:5). “They sacrificed to devils and not to God: to gods whom they knew not” (Deuteronomy 32:17). “For you have provoked Him who made you, the eternal God, offering sacrifice to devils, and not to God” (Baruch 4:7). God tells them to stop this devilish and hellish practice: “And they shall no more sacrifice their victims to devils, with whom they have committed fornication. It shall be an ordinance for ever to them and to their posterity” (Leviticus 17:7). Which leads St. Paul to warn us: “And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever?” (2 Corinthians 6:15).
Pagan Celtic and Druid New Year
Halloween’s origins date back to the ancient pagan Druid and Celtic festival of Samhain―variously pronounced as “sow-in”, “sah-win”, “sam-hayne” plus more. A Druid was a member of the educated, professional class among the Celtic peoples. The pagan Celts―who lived over 2,000 years ago in the area that is now Ireland, the United Kingdom and northern France― It was the beginning of their new year and was generally celebrated on October 31st, but some preferred November 1st. This day marked the end of summer and the harvest and the beginning of the dark, cold winter, a time of year that was often associated with human death. Celts believed that on the night before the new year, the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead became blurred.
Communication With The Dead
On the night of October 31st they celebrated Samhain, when it was believed that the ghosts of the dead returned to earth. In addition to causing trouble and damaging crops, Celts thought that the presence of the otherworldly spirits made it easier for the Druids, or Celtic priests, to make predictions about the future. For a people entirely dependent on the volatile natural world, these prophecies were an important source of comfort and direction during the long, dark winter.
It is one of the two “spirit-nights” each year, the other being Beltane. It is a ‘magical’ interval when the mundane laws of time and space are thought to be temporarily suspended, and the “Thin Veil” between the worlds is lifted. Communicating with ancestors and departed loved ones is thought to be easy at this time, for they journey through this world on their way to the “Summerlands”. It is a time to study the “Dark Mysteries” and honor the “Dark Mother” and the “Dark Father”, symbolized by the “Crone” and her aged “Consort”.
To commemorate the event, Druids (the Celtic ‘priests’) built huge sacred bonfires, where the people gathered to burn crops and animals as sacrifices to the pagan Celtic deities. Originally the “Feast of the Dead” was celebrated in Celtic countries by leaving food offerings on altars and doorsteps for the “wandering dead”. Today a lot of practitioners still carry out that tradition. Single candles were lit and left in a window to help guide the spirits of ancestors and loved ones home. Extra chairs were set to the table and around the hearth for the unseen guest. Apples were buried along roadsides and paths for spirits who were lost or had no descendants to provide for them. Turnips were hollowed out and carved to look like protective spirits, for this was a night of magic and chaos.
The “Wee Folke” became very active, pulling pranks on unsuspecting humans. During the celebration, the Celts wore costumes, typically consisting of animal heads and skins, and attempted to tell each other’s fortunes. Traveling after dark was not advised. People dressed in white (like ghosts), wore disguises made of straw, or dressed as the opposite gender in order to fool the Nature spirits. When the celebration was over, they re-lit their hearth fires, which they had extinguished earlier that evening, from the sacred bonfire to help protect them during the coming winter.
Human Sacrifice
“He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord: but he that shall sin against Me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate Me love death” (Proverbs 8:35-36).
There is a debate among scholars as to whether human sacrifices were performed during Druid/Celtic celebrations of Halloween. Of course modern druids will say that they were not. They say that the only evidence that this custom was practiced is a reference in an ancient Roman document by Julius Caesar (see below). We do know that human sacrifice was practiced among the Celts in ancient times because of several “bog men”, or mummies preserved in the peat bogs that show signs of ritual killing. Of course, there would be no remains of any humans that were sacrificed in the fire. At any rate, the word “bonfire” comes from a compound of the Middle English words bon (bone) and fir (fire) ... meaning a fire kindled upon bones.
The author Merle Severy, in his book The Celts (National Geographic, May 1977, pages 625-626), describes "the eve of Samhain... the start of the Celtic new year: “According to the Dinshenchas―a medieval collection of the lore of prominent places―firstborn children were sacrificed before a great idol to ensure fertility of cattle and crops. Samhain eve was a night of dread and danger. At this juncture of the old year and the new, our world and the otherworld opened up to each other. The dead returned, ghosts and demons were abroad, and the future could be seen.. . . Behind such Halloween games as bobbing for apples lie Celtic divination arts to discern who would marry, thrive, or die in the coming year. Behind the masks and mischief, the jack-o-lanterns and food offerings, lurk the fear of malevolent spirits and the rites to propitiate them.” Page 601 gives additional insight: “Tacitus tells us of the bloodstained Druid altars of Anglesey in Wales.”
Julius Caesar, speaking on Celtic sacrifices said: “The whole nation of the Gauls is greatly devoted to ritual observances, and for that reason those who are smitten with the more grievous maladies and who are engaged in the perils of battle either sacrifice human victims or vow so to do, employing the druids as ministers for such sacrifices. They believe, in effect, that, unless for a man's life a man's life be paid, the majesty of the immortal gods may not be appeased; and in public, as in private life they observe an ordinance of sacrifices of the same kind. Others use figures of immense size whose limbs, woven out of twigs, they fill with living men and set on fire, and the men perish in a sheet of flame. They believe that the execution of those who have been caught in the act of theft or robbery or some crime is more pleasing to the immortal gods; but when the supply of such fails they resort to the execution even of the innocent.”
The classical author, Diodorus Siculus, also reported scenes of human sacrifice by the Druids: “When they attempt divination upon important matters they practice a strange and incredible custom, for they kill a man by a knife-stab in the region above his midriff.” After the sacrificial victim fell dead ... “they foretell the future by the convulsions of his limbs and the pouring of his blood.”
The 1984 discovery of a sacrificial victim in Cheshire, England, helps validate the reality of ritualistic human sacrifice. The well-preserved young man had apparently belonged to an elite social class in the second century BC. After two sharp blows to the head, he had been strangled. Then, like the countless sacrifices to Aztec and Mayan gods, his body had been drained of the human blood needed to please and appease their gods
Here Come the Pagan Romans!
By 43 A.D., the pagan Roman Empire had conquered the majority of Celtic territory. In the course of the four hundred years that they ruled the Celtic lands, two festivals of pagan Roman origin were combined with the traditional pagan Celtic celebration of Samhain. Pagan + Pagan = More Pagan.
The first pagan Roman celebration was Feralia, a day in late October, when the pagan Romans traditionally commemorated the passing of the dead. The second was a day to honor Pomona, the pagan Roman goddess of fruit and trees. The symbol of Pomona is the apple and the incorporation of this celebration into Samhain probably explains the tradition of “bobbing” for apples that is practiced today on Halloween.
Throw-Out Devil & Put In Christ!
Early Christianity developed in an era of the Roman Empire during which many religions were practiced, that are, due to the lack of a better term, labeled paganism. Paganism is commonly used to refer to various, largely unconnected religions from the time period before and after the birth of Christ. The Church found itself in direct conflict with centuries of pagan—and sometimes barbarically evil—customs. Many of these pagan and evil customs the Church sought to Christianize—this was often done by keeping the timetable or schedule but replacing the pagan with the Christian, the evil replaced by good.
For the first 300 years or so, Christianity was on the defensive and largely kept a low profile due to persecution. After the time of the Emperor Constantine, more freedom was obtained—though freedom and persecution alternated, ebbed and flowed. The persecutions produced so many martyrs, that there were not enough days in the year to give each martyr his feast day. Frequently groups of martyrs suffered on the same day, which naturally led to a joint commemoration. In the persecution of Diocletian the number of martyrs became so great that a separate day could not be assigned to each. But the Church, feeling that every martyr should be venerated, appointed a common day for all.
On May 13th, 609 A.D., Pope Boniface IV dedicated the Pantheon in Rome in honor of all Christian martyrs, and the Catholic feast of All Martyrs Day was established in the Western church. Pope Gregory III (731–741) later expanded the festival to include all saints as well as all martyrs, and moved the observance from May 13th to November 1st. By the 9th century the influence of Christianity had spread into Celtic lands, where it gradually blended with and supplanted the older Celtic rites. In 1000 A.D., the Church would make November 2nd to be “All Souls’ Day”, a day to honor the dead. It is widely believed today that the church was attempting to replace the Celtic festival of the dead with a related, but church-sanctioned holy day (holiday).
All Souls Day was celebrated similarly to Samhain, with big bonfires, parades, and dressing up in costumes as saints, angels and devils. The All Saints Day celebration was also called All-hallows or All-hallowmas (from Middle English Alholowmesse meaning All Saints’ Mass (“hallow” means “holy” as in “hallowed by Thy Name”), much like “Candlemas” on February 2nd, means “The Mass of Candles”) and the night before it was celebrated with the singing of First Vespers (which always starts the celebration of great feasts on the evening prior to the feast), and thus began to be called All-hallows Eve and Hallow-even’ [ing], eventually becoming Halloween. The word ‘'Halloween'’, therefore, is a contracted form of ''Holy Evening'' and refers to the evening of All Saints Day (November 1st), when the Church traditionally remember the saints of bygone days; many of whom were persecuted, tortured, and/or died rather than renounce Christ.
Christianizing the Pagan Samhain
As northern Europe and the British Isles became Christianized, the Church saw that the pagan festivals still lured Christians to compromise their faith. Consequently, the Church in those areas designated October 31st and November 1st as the "Holy Evening" and Holy Day of All Saints Day. The Church not only sought to give Christians an alternative, spiritually edifying holiday; but also to proclaim the supremacy of the Gospel over pagan superstition.
There was no need to ''placate'' the spirits, or buy their way into the afterlife — eternal life is offered to all who believe in the atonement of Jesus Christ, Who shed His blood to reconcile us to God and bring us eternal life. Rather than fearing the ''tricks'' of those who have died, Christians reflected on the lives and deaths of those who were faithful and used them as role models for their own journey to the true after life and Heaven; and thanked God for preserving the saints in the midst of suffering and persecution.
As northern Europe and the British Isles became Christianized, the Church saw that the pagan festivals still lured Christians to compromise their faith. Consequently, the Church in those areas designated October 31st and November 1st as the "Holy Evening" and Holy Day of All Saints Day. The Church not only sought to give Christians an alternative, spiritually edifying holiday; but also to proclaim the supremacy of the Gospel over pagan superstition. There was no need to ''placate'' the spirits, or buy their way into the afterlife — eternal life is offered to all who believe in the atonement of Jesus Christ, Who shed His blood to reconcile us to God and bring us eternal life. Rather than fearing the ''tricks'' of those who have died, Christians reflected on the lives and deaths of those who were faithful and used them as role models for their own journey to the true after life and Heaven; and thanked God for preserving the saints in the midst of suffering and persecution.
The Evolution of Halloween
"Trick-or-treating" is a modern tradition that probably finds it's roots in the early All Souls' Day parades in England. During the festivities, poor citizens would beg for food and families would give them pastries called "soul cakes" in return for their promise to pray for the family's dead relatives. The distribution of “soul cakes” was encouraged by the Church as a way to replace the ancient pagan practice of leaving food and wine for roaming spirits. The practice, which was referred to as "going a-souling" was eventually taken up by children who would visit the houses in their neighborhood and be given drinks, food and money—but the praying for souls gradually fell away into neglect. So it was a case of all pay, but no pray!
Dressing Up
"Dressing up" for Halloween gets it roots from the pagan custom of dressing up around the ‘sacred’(?) bonfire during the original Celtic festival. Some suggest, this practice originates from England, when it was believed that ghosts came back to the earthly world on Halloween. People thought that they would encounter ghosts if they left their homes, so to avoid being recognized people would wear masks after dark so that the ghosts would mistake them for fellow spirits. In addition, these early English people, would place bowls of food outside their homes to appease the ghosts and prevent them from attempting to enter or cause harm to their homes. A tradition obviously taken from the ancient Celtic pagans.
The Church would try to Christianize this “dressing up” and have folk dress up as saints. They would then organize a parade of saints on All Saints day.
Reaction and Action
Because of its Occult history and symbolism, many informed Christians avoid any activity that would appear to support, promote, or celebrate Halloween. Other Liberal Christians attempt to minimize the glorification of Halloween's Occult roots, by refusing to directly participate in costuming or activities where witchcraft, Satan, or demonic themes are prevalent. They feel that participation in Halloween and even trick-or-treating is acceptable if alternative costumes and themes are substituted. There is not total agreement among Christians concerning appropriate Christian responses to this pagan holiday.
Biblical Blast
The Bible has many warnings and examples of involvement with the Occult. Occult practices are an abomination to the Lord: “Neither let there be found among you any one that consulteth soothsayers, or observeth dreams and omens, neither let there be any wizard, nor charmer, nor any one that consulteth pythonic spirits, or fortune tellers, or that seeketh the truth from the dead. For the Lord abhorreth all these things, and for these abominations he will destroy them” (Deuteronomy 18:10-12) and Witchcraft was a crime punishable by death in the Old Testament: “Wizards thou shalt not suffer to live” (Exodus 22:18). The New Testament gives several examples of proper Christian response to the Occult: “And many of them who had followed curious [magical] arts, brought together their books, and burnt them before all” (Acts 19:19); “What fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial?” (2 Corinthians 6:14-15). “For all the gods of the Gentiles are devils” (Psalm 95:5) … “They sacrificed to devils and not to God: to gods whom they knew not” (Deuteronomy 32:17). “And they were mingled among the heathens, and learned their works and served their idols, and it became a stumbling-block to them. And they sacrificed their sons, and their daughters to devils” (Psalm 105:35-37).
Wicca and Halloween
Just before reaching a conclusion on the subject, let us find out what Wicca, the official religion of witchcraft, has to say about Halloween. Perhaps they view the day as simple fun and innocent neighborhood activity? “Shock” should be the only word to describe what the truth actually is on the matter. Halloween is a real, sacred day for those who follow Wicca. In fact, it is one of two high and holy days for them. The Celtic belief of spirits being released is current, along with the worship of Samhain (the lord of death) – both are promoted as something to embrace on that day. There is no question that to those who believe and follow the practices of witchcraft, Halloween represents an opportunity to embrace the evil, devilish, dark side of the spiritual world.
Witch Way to Go
Here are some excerpts from a news report from ABC news (2009) on a typical witch!
“Patti Wigington is a soccer mom. She is the vice president of her local PTA. And she's a witch. This Saturday while her neighborhood outside Columbus, Ohio, is crawling with costumed witches in search of candy, Wigington and a group of other local witches will not be celebrating Halloween, but the new year festival Samhain, which also occurs October 31st. In her backyard, Wigington and six other local women, who make up her coven of witches, will stand in a circle, each holding a lit candle dedicated to a dead ancestor. They will offer an invocation in each direction of the four winds. They will build an altar upon which they will offer their deceased ancestors gifts of food and wine and "celebrate the coming of the dark half of the year… and do a ritual that honors death."
"Look," she says, “We welcome and celebrate the coming of the dark half of the year. It's at this time of year we communicate with the spirit world and we honor the spirit world," said Wigington, who writes extensively about her faith and hosts the page on paganism and Wicca at about.com. Wicca is a relatively new religion, which its practitioners say is based on ancient precepts. A hodgepodge of ancient European pagan practices and new age spirituality, Wicca is practiced by a small but growing number of Americans. In 2008, some 342,000 people identified themselves as Wiccans, up from 134,000 in 2001 and up significantly from 8,000 in 1990. Modern Wicca, which draws its practices mainly from pre-Christian Europe, was established in the U.K. in the 1950s. Its popularity coincided with an in interest in other ancient religions that emphasize beliefs in magic and nature.
“Magical religions ― paganism, Wicca, the earth-based religions – have really gone mainstream," said Wigington. "The witches in Harry Potter are not wiccans, but it gets interested in wondering if magic could be real. The best thing that ever happened to Wicca is that it went mainstream, and the worst that happened is that it went mainstream." The Rev. Don Lewis established the Witch School to train the next generation of practitioners of Wicca and other so-called natural religions. With some 250,000 students enrolled in online classes, the school recently moved its physical location from Illinois, to the a far more likely setting – Salem, Mass., home of the famous 1692 witch hunt. "Interest in Wicca has been building for years, but every year there is a spike in interest around Halloween. It's a huge advertising campaign the world runs for us," he said. The practitioners all stressed that Wicca is in no way associated with Satanism or devil worship. "Satan is a Christian concept," explained Fox. "We don't believe in him at all."
The Occult and Halloween
While Halloween masquerades as childish fun and frolic, it’s serious business in the occult world. Witchcraft, Wicca, Satanism and paganism believe, that on the night of Halloween, devils and spirits are unleashed. They perform their most hideous and potent rituals on the night of Halloween. Here are some testimonies from Satanists and writers on Satanism:
“Samhain: This is the Witch’s New Year and the primary Sabbat from which all others flow” (Silver RavenWolf, Teen Witch, p. 42). “Halloween is one of the four major Sabbats celebrated by the modern Witch, and it is by far the most popular and important of the eight that are observed. . . Witches regard Halloween as their New Year’s Eve, celebrating it with sacred rituals” (Gerina Dunwich, The Pagan Book of Halloween, p. 120).
Halloween is also among Satanism’s most cherished days. Anton LaVey, founder of The Church of Satan and author of The Satanic Bible writes: “After one's own birthday, the two major Satanic holidays are Walpurgisnacht (Witches Night, May 1st) and Halloween” (Anton LaVey, The Satanic Bible, p. 96).
The Satanic High Priestess, Blanche Barton, on The Church of Satan web site, praises Halloween: “It [Halloween] gives even the most mundane people the opportunity to taste wickedness for one night. They have a chance to dance with the Devil ... I see Satanists all over the world meeting in small groups this night and Halloweens 500 years hence, to raise a glass to the Infernal Hosts.”
The Satanic Calendar decrees for Halloween: “One of the two most important nights of the year. . . Blood and sexual rituals. Sexual association with demons. Animal and human sacrifice—male or female.”
Former occultist Johanna Michaelsen reveals, “Halloween is also a prime recruiting season for Satanists.” (Johanna Michaelsen, Like Lambs to the Slaughter, p. 192).
Precautions and Praycautions
The first thing is to be convinced that your enemy exists. The devil exists and we do not talk to the devil, we do not play with the devil. Some dangerous things to avoid include spells, charms, curses, witchcraft, ouija boards, seances and anything having to do with the occult. These kinds of things, some of them innocently done at children’s parties, are not only strictly forbidden by the Catholic faith, but dangerous, in that they open us up to evil spirits, which are real and not just imaginary. Please don’t ever let your children/teens attend parties (especially popular at slumber parties) where there are seances and ouija boards and/or playing with spells and witchcraft. Ask beforehand what will be done at before allowing your children to attend parties. Witchcraft and spells are becoming more popular due to books and movies and somehow we need protect our children from these dangers of without getting them fascinated with them or making them seem interesting to them.
The chief spiritual weapons we have are, first of all, a state of grace—mortal sin puts us under the devil’s influence. Therefore frequent Confession and Holy Communion (in a state of grace) are the chief guardians of the state of grace. Much—once again, much prayer is another barrier—especially the prayer of the Holy Rosary—but well prayed, not just mechanically, routinely, hurriedly, distractedly said.
Remember the words of St. Louis de Montfort: “If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins ‘you shall receive a never fading crown of glory’ (1 Peter 5:4). Even if you are on the brink of damnation, even if you have one foot in Hell, even if you have sold your soul to the devil as sorcerers do who practice black magic, and even if you are a heretic as obstinate as a devil, sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and save your soul, if — and mark well what I say — if you say the Rosary devoutly every day until death for the purpose of knowing the truth and obtaining contrition and pardon for your sins” (The Secret of the Rosary, “A Red Rose”).
Add to this the use and wearing of blessed sacramentals—especially the Brown Scapular, the Miraculous Medal, the St. Benedict Medal—these are big guns among the sacramentals. You can also wear a blessed Rosary too! Holy Water is another powerful weapon, as is a blessed crucifix (both are used in exorcisms).
What Does Vatican’s Chief Exorcist Think?
Fr. Gabriele Amorth (born 1925, ordained a priest in 1954, became an exorcist in 1986, died 2016) was an Italian Roman Catholic priest and former chief exorcist (now retired) of the Diocese of Rome, who has performed thousands of exorcisms. Fr. Amorth said: “Halloween is a trick of the devil. It is pagan, anti-Christian and anti-Catholic. It the creation of a devil and an obstacle to holiness and disrupts the plans of God. The young people follow fads and the devil knows how to use them. To celebrate Halloween is to give the devil a ‘Hosanna’! Which, if loved, even if it’s only for one night, gives the devil a claim or rights over that person … 'I'm very sad to see that Italy, like the rest of Europe, is moving away from the Lord Jesus, and is even paying homage to Satan … Halloween is a kind of a séance, which is presented in the form of game. The cunning of the devil is here. If you notice everything is presented in a playful, innocent manner. Sin is no longer a sin in today's world. But everything comes disguised in the form of a need, a freedom, or a personal pleasure. I think that society is losing its mind, losing the sense of the meaning of life, losing the use of reason, and is becoming increasingly sick. People have lost the Faith, and superstition, magic, Satanism, or ouija boards have taken its place, which then open all the doors to the presence of demons.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, former Vatican Chief Exorcist).
So What Do Exorcisms Have To Do With Halloween?
Some priest-exorcists have been sharing their vast experience with the wide public, and have made it known that during exorcisms, Satan usually speaks through the possessed person. The devil makes known certain things which a lot of people would normally not be aware of. One of the important pieces of information which has been gathered during exorcisms has to do with Halloween. As it turns out, the night between October 31st and November 1st is a time when, all over the world, Satanic practice is on the increase, because on that night, the greatest number of satanic rituals are performed, especially so-called demonic “black masses” which are celebrated with the use of animal or even human sacrifice. So someone may say: “Okay, fair enough, but I have nothing to do with it. My children have nothing to do with it. How does this concern me and my children, if what we are doing on Halloween is just a game with my kids wearing all kinds of funny costumes?”
Is All Hallow's Eve really an evil holiday? The Daily Mail (a British newspaper) reported in 2104 that the International Association of Exorcists (also known as the AIE) held its first official conference over the weekend in Rome (2014). More than 300 exorcists attended after being officially recognized by the Vatican this summer. Father Aldo Buonaiuto told the British publication, The Daily Mail, that his organization's emergency number receives hundreds of calls on October 31st, up from an average of 40 per day, due to concerns about increased occult activity.
Father Buonaiuto said: “Many say Halloween is a simple carnival, but in fact there is nothing innocent or fun about it … There are always more evil rituals, animal sacrifices, desecrations of cemeteries and thefts of sacred bones ... From here the door to the devil can be opened.”
According to the Religious News Service, AIE spokesman, Dr. Valter Cascioli, a psychologist and scientific consultant to the International Association of Exorcists, told Vatican Radio there has been a “steady increase” in possessions. “The battle against evil is becoming more of an emergency. We are calling for major vigilance,” Cascioli added.
The Thoughts of the Famous Exorcist on Halloween
Father Gabriele Amorth, probably the most well-known exorcist in the world, who died on September 16th in 2016—had condemned the celebration of Halloween and warned of a danger to young people, because of the increase in occult activity, which fuels insomnia, mental illness; depression and suicidal thoughts in children. “Psychiatrical and psychological studies show that children can’t sleep, are agitated, depressed, obsessed, suicidal.” Fr. Amorth said: “Halloween is really a spiritual gathering presented as a form of game, and that is the equivalent of singing hosannas to the devil.”
Fr. Gabriele Amorth, performed an estimated 70,000 exorcisms, often repeating the rite of exorcism on the same persons. Fr. Amorth asked the poignant question, “Should Catholics Celebrate Halloween?” For your information Fr. Amorth condemned the celebration of Halloween because of the danger to young people who might be lured to the occult, which promotes suicidal thoughts, psychiatric or psychological stress. Many Catholic parents tolerate their children to celebrate Halloween because it is just for fun and can bring no harm!
But Fr. Amorth said, “Halloween is really a spiritual gathering presented as a form of game, and that is the equivalent of singing hosannas to the devil. We should understand that, 843 years after Christ, Pope Gregory IV moved the Feast of All Saints Day--which was then celebrated on May 13th--to the present November 1st, in order to stop the evil tradition which arrived from Ireland of adoring the world of the dead.”
Fr. Amorth counseled that the battle against evil begins in the family. The reason why many individuals become evil is often because so many young people “live without knowing the sacredness of being children” and therefore do not know what it means to be a good father or mother, he said.
Fr. Amorth added, “The Battle against evil begins in the family. The reason why many individuals become evil is often because so many young people “live without knowing the sacredness of being children” and therefore do not know what it means to be a good father or mother.” How very true this when we become a tolerant society―we end up tolerating this celebration of evil itself! We cannot throw away our Catholicism simply because we want to have fun on Halloween night! Calling it “harmless fun” is one step on the way to calling the devil “harmless” too!
Towards the end of his life, Fr. Amorth would often remind us that Satan has gained control of the world: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican! Legions of demons have lodged there! I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office!”
These statements by Fr. Amorth are not far from what we learned from Sister Lucia of Fatima, one of the three children whom the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared at the Cova de Ira in Fatima a hundred years ago. Sister Lucia once confided to Cardinal Caffara: “The decisive battle between the Lord and the kingdom of Satan will be over marriage and the family.” Cardinal Caffara once stated that the great tragedy of mankind today is Atheism. Once we lose respect for the spiritual, we become easy prey for the devil.
The Core of the Problem
Dressing up in costumes that stand for demons, goblins, witches, and vampires is not the same as putting on a mask with the face of J. F. Kennedy, or a shirt similar to the one used by Elvis Presley. Exorcists have been finding out that when we start playing with something that resembles Satan, and his demons, we open ourselves to these malevolent creatures’ influence, which is not just something psychological or intellectual in nature. Satan sees such behavior as an invitation on our part: an open door to his evil spiritual influence on the minds and souls of human beings.
As exorcists confirm unequivocally, even if we are not consciously seeking demonic influence, it is still possible for us to be dangerously affected by it. Actually, it is a lot easier for the devil to enter into the mind of those who think nothing of things that “innocently” resemble the devil. So while it is true that there is an unhealthy intellectual and psychological aspect which negatively influences children dressing up in costumes of demons, witches, goblins, and vampires, there is an even more serious area which we should be concerned about: the spiritual aspect of demonic activity which appears innocent and harmless. It becomes more dangerous, because the innocent appearance of evil desensitizes us to what we are dealing with.
Let us never forget that it is not only members of Satanic cults who enter into a spiritual relationship with Satan. A spiritual relationship with the devil can take place in various degrees. It does not always have to end up in diabolical possession. But, as exorcists warn, exposing kids to something which has some kind of a demonic connotation, draws the risk of entering into a relationship with the devil. It is like a slightly open window that a thief sees from a distance: for him it a signal which he interprets as an invitation to enter into the house. Dressing up children in costumes of all kinds of evil spirits and creatures, hanging pumpkins outside the house with evil faces carved on them, is like sending an invitation card to the devil by express mail. We can be assured that the devil will get interested in the invitation. But once he comes, it will not be that easy to fend him off.
St. Paul’s Reminder on Evil
St. Paul writes in his Letter to the Ephesians that: “ …our struggle is not with flesh and blood, but with the principalities, with the powers, with the world rulers of this present darkness, with the evil spirits in the heavens. Therefore, put on the armor of God, that you may be able to resist on the evil day and, having done everything, to hold your ground.” (Ephesians 6:12-13).
Let’s face it: the “world” is at war with Christ, but it’s not just the world that we see on TV news reports. There is also an invisible evil world out there that we have to know about, and we cannot be naïve about its impact. Satan exists, but in order to harm us, he first has to create the impression that he exists only in our imagination, as a naughty creature with harmless horns, and a long tail. While it is true that there is no such thing as ghosts, or spirits of dead people coming to haunt us, it is also true that there are demons who are not the souls of the dead, but evil spirits whose only aim is to ruin us spiritually.
So What Shall We Do?
We can try to imagine the following situation. Let’s say we see a freshly baked delicious cake, but we do not know that someone laced it with poison. We start eating it. Will the fact that we are not aware of the poison prevent us from getting sick, or even dying? Of course not. The poisonous effects will take their course and have their effect regardless of our will or our awareness of what’s inside the cake. This is precisely what happens with Halloween, but with one exception. We are fortunate to have the information which more and more priest-exorcists are sharing about its tremendous danger. Knowing what we know now--who in his right mind would want to dress up his children in costumes of demonic creatures? Parents’ concerns should go in a totally different direction. Have we ever wondered why so many young people start drinking, taking drugs, fall into depression, end up in a bad company, and even commit suicide? Parents often say: “What have we done wrong? We have always tried to give our children a lot of love; we taught them respect and proper behavior. So what went wrong?”
While each situation could be analyzed separately, parents may be wise to ask themselves whether, throughout the years that their children were growing up, they might have senselessly and naively exposed them to Satan’s influence which had appeared as something innocent, but was actually infiltrating their kids’ minds and souls more and more—television and music are full of such insidious traps which, like Halloween, are always well disguised or trivialized. We must never take the devil lightly. Playing with fire is neither a game nor a joke. But knowing this is not enough to protect ourselves from demonic influence. It is also necessary to be in the state of sanctifying grace rather than as state of mortal sin, and to be strengthened by the frequent reception of the Sacraments—especially Holy Communion and Confession. It is also important to wear the Miraculous Medal of the Blessed Virgin Mary and to have Holy Water in the house. We know for certain that the devil stays away from homes which have a blessed crucifix in a prominent location on the wall and saints’ images hanging in various places in the house—with a pride of place given to the image of the Divine Mercy, the Sacred Heart, and the Immaculate Heart of Mary. All these things are crucially important in order to create an environment where all the members of the household are protected. Exorcists tell us that Satan does not visit homes where family members pray the Rosary together, where the Bible as well as the Catechism are read regularly, and where all in the family practice their faith diligently.
Doing The Right Thing
It is good to hear that more and more parishes and Catholic schools in America (but not many) move away from Halloween for the above reasons, and put a greater emphasis on All Saints Day. On this occasion children are encouraged to dress up as the true heroes of history: saints and biblical figures. Nevertheless, while this is a good idea, it is also important for priests, religious, and parents to remember that this is a separate celebration from Halloween.
Unfortunately, when children are exposed to minimum, or no spirituality in the home, it is no wonder that they are going to feel bad, and be surprised when other children, whom they know celebrate Halloween, while their own parents tell them that Halloween is not something good. Children will spontaneously, and more easily understand, that there is something wrong with Halloween when they start praying the Rosary, read the Bible, hear more about their patron saints, as well as guardian angels and, most importantly, when they look at their parents and see how devoutly they practice their Catholic faith. This is how the grace of God will work its way, not only into the child’s mind, but also into the child’s soul.
Teaching by Courageous Example
On September 13th, 2015, a 43-year-old South African martyr, and a convert to Catholicism, by the name of Benedict Daswa, was declared blessed. He was a husband and a father of eight children. As a teacher and a school principle, he worked hard to spread the Catholic faith primarily through a virtuous life. Known for his opposition to occult practices, which were prevalent in the area where he lived, Benedict risked retaliation from those who insisted on adhering to devil worship. On February 2nd, 1990, while returning to his house, he was ambushed by a group of such people, who savagely clubbed him to death. As Benedict was dying, they gathered around him, and in an effort to increase his suffering, poured boiling water on his bleeding head, into his ears, nostrils, and mouth.
Sometimes, we may be under a lot of pressure to adhere to practices which have become so common that a mere opposition to them may draw a lot of criticism. All of us would like to have peace of mind, but at what cost? Blessed Benedict Daswa was a layman who would be the first one to remind priests, religious, and parents about the duty to be watchmen who have their eyes open. A good watchman sees danger when it approaches, but also has the courage to speak out, and resist anything that’s unbecoming to our Catholic faith. Let’s be prudent and vigilant. Let’s not be naïve at the face of the slightest semblance of evil. We cannot afford to be so. Our destiny, and the destiny of our young people, may be at stake, both in this life and in the next.
Article 16
Monday to Wednesday, October 28th to 30th
Christ is King for More than One Day
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday to Wednesday, October 28th to 30th
Christ is King for More than One Day
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Here Today―Gone Tomorrow!
The seemingly contradictory phrase “The king is dead! Long live the king!” is a traditional proclamation made following the accession of a new monarch in various countries. The phrase goes back to 15th century France, where the proclamation was made the moment the coffin of the deceased monarch descended into the vault of the church. “The king is dead!” obviously refers to the deceased king―whereas “Long live the king!” refers to his successor on the throne. It was first declared upon the accession to the French throne of Charles VII after the death of his father Charles VI in 1422.
Now that we have seen the feast of Christ the King come and go―is it not a case of Christ the King having “died” in our memories and hearts, while we now install a new “king” for the rest of the year―whoever or whatever that might be. Christ the King―in most Catholic families―is “here today and gone tomorrow”―or more precisely, since we celebrated the feast yesterday―“here yesterday and gone today.” We take Christ the King out of closet for a day and then stuff Him back into the closet for another 12 months! We treat human being better than we treat Christ the King! We celebrate a spouse’s birthday, a child’s birthday, a parent’s birthday―but we don’t stuff them away and out sight for the rest of year! We live alongside them daily―they are a daily part of our lives―it is just that we celebrate their birthday on day of the year. Why is it that we make Christ the King to merely be “a one day wonder”?
A secular king is king―not just on the day of his crowning and enthronement, and once a year after that on the anniversary of his crowning and enthronement―he is king every single day of year, and year after year. He rules that kingdom every single day. When a nation elects someone to be their president―he is not president for a day, but for each and every day until his presidency expires. When you choose and marry a spouse―it is not just for a day, nor even to point of divorce, but for each and every day until the end of your life: “until death do us part.” A child becomes inseparably tied to its biological parents―not just on the day of the child’s birth, but for the remainder of the child’s life. When you receive the Sacrament of Baptism―you do not receive its effects and obligations just for a day, but for each and every day of your life. When Christ forgives you your sins in the Sacrament of Confession―it is not just for that particular day, but all the sins that you have validly confessed up to that confession will remain forgiven for the rest of your life―Christ will not come back to nag and taunt you about your past failings.
Uncrowning Christ
How can we expect Christ to help us when our heart is not really “into” His Kingship? When we honor Him as King at Mass on Sunday―but then dethrone Him on Monday and replace Him by having the world rule over us from Monday to Saturday? Christ the King ends up being replaced by the “Prince of this world” who is Satan: “The Prince of this world [the devil] is coming, and in Me he has not anything!” (John 14:30). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). Sadly, the hearts of most Catholics are captivated more by the world than they are by Christ! Essentially, they give their heart to the world and give lip-service to Christ―which is why Christ says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Our Lord, in one of His parables, speaks of this rejection: “A certain nobleman went into a far country, to receive for himself a kingdom. But his citizens hated him―and they sent a delegation after him, saying: ‘We will not have this man to reign over us!’” (Luke 19:12-14). We see the rejection of the reign of God over Israel in the Old Testament. Israel was a theocracy―which means that they were ruled by God―but the Israelites became tired of this and demanded a human king like all nations around them: “Then all the ancients of Israel being assembled, came to [the prophet] Samuel and they said to him: ‘Make us a king to judge us, as all nations have!’ And the word was displeasing in the eyes of Samuel, that they should say: ‘Give us a king to judge us!’ And Samuel prayed to the Lord and the Lord said to Samuel: ‘They have not rejected thee, but Me, so that I should not reign over them!’” (1 Kings 8:4-7). “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, saying: ‘Let us break their bonds asunder! And let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3). Sadly, that is foolishness of the rulers of the world today―and even the rulers of families!
God Cannot Be Dethroned or Uncrowned!
Yet “God is not mocked!” (Galatians 6:7). No matter what His proud, independent minded, rebellious creatures think, say or do―in the end God will show His power, strength and justice and overthrow them: “Thou art God and rulest over all the kingdoms and nations! In Thy hand is strength and power―and no one can resist Thee!” (2 Paralipomenon 20:6). “Pour out Thy wrath upon the nations that have not known Thee; and upon the kingdoms that have not called upon Thy Name!” (Psalm 78:6).
“The Lord made all nations fear Him!” (1 Paralipomenon 14:17). “He troubled kingdoms!” (Isaias 23:11). “The Lord shall strike all nations!” (Zacharias 14:12). “The indignation of the Lord is upon all nations, and His fury upon all their armies! He has killed them and delivered them to slaughter!” (Isaias 34:2). “After these things I will return, and will rebuild that which is fallen down; and the ruins I will rebuild, so that that the residue of men may seek after the Lord, and all nations upon whom My Name is invoked, saith the Lord, who does these things!” (Acts 15:17). “God shall reign over the nations!” (Psalm 46:9). “The Lord shall reign for ever and ever!” (Exodus 15:1). “Be still and see that I am God! I will be exalted among the nations, and I will be exalted in the Earth!” (Psalm 45:11). “Hear the word of the Lord, O ye nations!” (Jeremias 31:10). “Thy God shall reign!” (Isaias 52:7). “The Lord shall reign to eternity!” (Psalm 9:116).
Of Christ the King, the Angel Gabriel said to Our Lady: “He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High! And the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of David his father―and He shall reign in the house of Jacob for ever! And of His kingdom there shall be no end!” (Luke 1:32-33). “The kingdom of this world is become our Lord’s and His Christ’s, and He shall reign for ever and ever!” (Apocalypse 11:1).
The seemingly contradictory phrase “The king is dead! Long live the king!” is a traditional proclamation made following the accession of a new monarch in various countries. The phrase goes back to 15th century France, where the proclamation was made the moment the coffin of the deceased monarch descended into the vault of the church. “The king is dead!” obviously refers to the deceased king―whereas “Long live the king!” refers to his successor on the throne. It was first declared upon the accession to the French throne of Charles VII after the death of his father Charles VI in 1422.
Now that we have seen the feast of Christ the King come and go―is it not a case of Christ the King having “died” in our memories and hearts, while we now install a new “king” for the rest of the year―whoever or whatever that might be. Christ the King―in most Catholic families―is “here today and gone tomorrow”―or more precisely, since we celebrated the feast yesterday―“here yesterday and gone today.” We take Christ the King out of closet for a day and then stuff Him back into the closet for another 12 months! We treat human being better than we treat Christ the King! We celebrate a spouse’s birthday, a child’s birthday, a parent’s birthday―but we don’t stuff them away and out sight for the rest of year! We live alongside them daily―they are a daily part of our lives―it is just that we celebrate their birthday on day of the year. Why is it that we make Christ the King to merely be “a one day wonder”?
A secular king is king―not just on the day of his crowning and enthronement, and once a year after that on the anniversary of his crowning and enthronement―he is king every single day of year, and year after year. He rules that kingdom every single day. When a nation elects someone to be their president―he is not president for a day, but for each and every day until his presidency expires. When you choose and marry a spouse―it is not just for a day, nor even to point of divorce, but for each and every day until the end of your life: “until death do us part.” A child becomes inseparably tied to its biological parents―not just on the day of the child’s birth, but for the remainder of the child’s life. When you receive the Sacrament of Baptism―you do not receive its effects and obligations just for a day, but for each and every day of your life. When Christ forgives you your sins in the Sacrament of Confession―it is not just for that particular day, but all the sins that you have validly confessed up to that confession will remain forgiven for the rest of your life―Christ will not come back to nag and taunt you about your past failings.
Uncrowning Christ
How can we expect Christ to help us when our heart is not really “into” His Kingship? When we honor Him as King at Mass on Sunday―but then dethrone Him on Monday and replace Him by having the world rule over us from Monday to Saturday? Christ the King ends up being replaced by the “Prince of this world” who is Satan: “The Prince of this world [the devil] is coming, and in Me he has not anything!” (John 14:30). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). Sadly, the hearts of most Catholics are captivated more by the world than they are by Christ! Essentially, they give their heart to the world and give lip-service to Christ―which is why Christ says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Our Lord, in one of His parables, speaks of this rejection: “A certain nobleman went into a far country, to receive for himself a kingdom. But his citizens hated him―and they sent a delegation after him, saying: ‘We will not have this man to reign over us!’” (Luke 19:12-14). We see the rejection of the reign of God over Israel in the Old Testament. Israel was a theocracy―which means that they were ruled by God―but the Israelites became tired of this and demanded a human king like all nations around them: “Then all the ancients of Israel being assembled, came to [the prophet] Samuel and they said to him: ‘Make us a king to judge us, as all nations have!’ And the word was displeasing in the eyes of Samuel, that they should say: ‘Give us a king to judge us!’ And Samuel prayed to the Lord and the Lord said to Samuel: ‘They have not rejected thee, but Me, so that I should not reign over them!’” (1 Kings 8:4-7). “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, saying: ‘Let us break their bonds asunder! And let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3). Sadly, that is foolishness of the rulers of the world today―and even the rulers of families!
God Cannot Be Dethroned or Uncrowned!
Yet “God is not mocked!” (Galatians 6:7). No matter what His proud, independent minded, rebellious creatures think, say or do―in the end God will show His power, strength and justice and overthrow them: “Thou art God and rulest over all the kingdoms and nations! In Thy hand is strength and power―and no one can resist Thee!” (2 Paralipomenon 20:6). “Pour out Thy wrath upon the nations that have not known Thee; and upon the kingdoms that have not called upon Thy Name!” (Psalm 78:6).
“The Lord made all nations fear Him!” (1 Paralipomenon 14:17). “He troubled kingdoms!” (Isaias 23:11). “The Lord shall strike all nations!” (Zacharias 14:12). “The indignation of the Lord is upon all nations, and His fury upon all their armies! He has killed them and delivered them to slaughter!” (Isaias 34:2). “After these things I will return, and will rebuild that which is fallen down; and the ruins I will rebuild, so that that the residue of men may seek after the Lord, and all nations upon whom My Name is invoked, saith the Lord, who does these things!” (Acts 15:17). “God shall reign over the nations!” (Psalm 46:9). “The Lord shall reign for ever and ever!” (Exodus 15:1). “Be still and see that I am God! I will be exalted among the nations, and I will be exalted in the Earth!” (Psalm 45:11). “Hear the word of the Lord, O ye nations!” (Jeremias 31:10). “Thy God shall reign!” (Isaias 52:7). “The Lord shall reign to eternity!” (Psalm 9:116).
Of Christ the King, the Angel Gabriel said to Our Lady: “He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High! And the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of David his father―and He shall reign in the house of Jacob for ever! And of His kingdom there shall be no end!” (Luke 1:32-33). “The kingdom of this world is become our Lord’s and His Christ’s, and He shall reign for ever and ever!” (Apocalypse 11:1).
Article 15
Sunday, October 27th
Christ the King is No Longer King
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, October 27th
Christ the King is No Longer King
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Feast of Christ the King
The Feast of Christ the King is traditionally celebrated on the last Sunday of October. Pope Paul VI went and changed the date to the last Sunday of the liturgical year (or the Sunday before the First Sunday of Advent). Regardless of the date, the Feast of Christ the King, as established by Pope Pius XI in 1925, was meant to be an antidote to secularism. This heinous state of Secularism, is a way of life which leaves God out of man’s thinking, and then living and organizes his life as if God did not exist. Even Catholics are guilty of Secularism, for even though they know in their minds that God exists, there is little place for God in their hearts, for they live as though God did not exist. Is your family guilty of this? Are some members of your family tending towards this? Have they contracted the fatal disease of Secularism, at least its early stages?
The Purpose of the Feast
The Feast of Christ the King is intended to proclaim in a striking and effective manner Christ’s royalty over individuals, families, society, governments, and nations. This feast can and should be a springboard to re-establishing Christ’s absolute authority and rule in ourselves first of all, and then in our families.
King of What? King of Whom?
The Mass of Christ the King establishes the titles for Christ’s royalty over men:
(1) Christ is God, the Creator of the universe and hence wields a supreme power over all things; “All things were created by Him”;
(2) Christ is our Redeemer, He purchased us by His precious Blood, and made us His property and possession;
(3) Christ is Head of the Church, “holding in all things the primacy”;
(4) God bestowed upon Christ the nations of the world as His special possession and dominion.
Today’s Mass also describes the qualities of Christ’s Kingdom:
(1) This Kingdom is supreme, extending not only to all people, but also to their princes and kings;
(2) This Kingdom is universal, extending to all nations and to all places;
(3) This Kingdom is eternal, for “The Lord shall sit a King forever”;
(4) This Kingdom is spiritual, Christ’s “kingdom is not of this world.”
The Recognition of the Reign of Christ the King
The Kingdom of God is revealed by Our Lord Jesus to men who should submit to it in Faith. The Kingdom comes to us individually when we recognize our sinfulness and the absolute necessity of the Savior, and begin to reform our lives, believing in and surrendering to the sovereignty of God in the person of Jesus Christ, abandoning habitual sin, if we are adults or of the age of reason, and if infants, through Baptism and the Faith of our parents. He said, “the reign of God is at hand! Repent and believe in the Gospel!” (Mark 1:15). Those who fail to do this must face severe judgment (Matthew 11:22-24). But to those who accept the help of God’s grace He promises the sweetness of his yoke (Matthew 11:22-24 ff.).
Jesus, as King of All Nations
In Holy Scripture we see that the Angel Gabriel announced to Our Lady that the reign of Jesus was to be without end: Luke 1:32-33. For us, that means He should be king, not just of a portion of our lives—such as when we pray or go to church—but of every moment of our lives without end.
This is a declaration from Heaven that He is King by birthright as the Divine Son of God but His kingdom was not of this world. (John 18:36) He said that He would come in majesty with His Angels to judge all nations which will be assembled before Him sitting upon His royal throne: “And when the Son of man shall come in His majesty, and all the angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the seat of His majesty. And all nations shall be gathered together before Him, and He shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats” (Matthew 25:31-32).
He solemnly proclaimed that full authority has been given to Him both in Heaven and on Earth and commanded His Apostles to go out, to Baptize, and make disciples of all the nations: “All power is given to Me―in Heaven and on Earth! Go, therefore, teach ye all nations―baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost―teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:18-20).
Christ the King means what He says: His power is great and His reign extends over every nation on Earth.
The reign of Jesus Christ, King of every nation, is in the spiritual world over the minds, wills and hearts of humanity because He is the truth, the way and the life (John 14:6) This is accomplished through His Holy Catholic Church, His Kingdom on Earth, which teaches, governs and sanctifies His subjects through the administration of the Seven Sacraments, by decrees and the definition of dogma and guarding the deposit of Faith, maintained by holding to Tradition. The Church is the authentic teacher of His doctrine and ministers His graces of forgiveness and eternal life. As Jesus commanded her, the Church teaches His Commandments (Matthew 28:20) to every nation to guide them in Faith and Morals.
Executive Power
Jesus Christ the King holds all executive power. All men must obey His sovereign rule. He must reign over every nation until the end of the world when He puts all enemies beneath the feet of God the Father: “For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet” (1 Corinthians 15:25). Against those who refuse His rule He has issued a penalty of eternal punishment which no one may escape: “These shall go into everlasting punishment!” (Matthew 25:46)
Judicial Power
Jesus Christ the King also has all judicial power―that is to say, the power to make laws and to judge. “All judgment has been given to the Son” (John 5:22). This power of judgment is eternal and includes the privilege of rewarding and punishing of every single one of us and it will be immediately executed. “These will go off to eternal punishment and the just to eternal life” (Matthew 25:46).
Universal Power
Recognition of the Reign of Jesus Christ the King must first of all be recognized by every individual. Each person must accept Christ’s sovereignty and submit himself to His reign through Faith, conversion and membership in His Church. Recognition of the Reign of Jesus Christ the King must first of all be recognized by every individual. Each person must accept Christ’s sovereignty and submit himself to His reign through Faith, conversion and membership in His Church.
The reign of Jesus Christ, Sovereign King, was not recognized by the Jews who said, “We have no king except Caesar” (John 19:15) and “we will not have this Man to reign over us” (Luke 19:14). Jesus had informed Pilate that His Kingdom was not of this world (John 18:36). The only kingdoms recognized by the chief priests were the kingdoms of this world―which were created and doomed to perish. They did not follow Christ’s teaching, as reported in St. Matthew, to render to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s (Matthew 22:21).
Rejected Today
Neither do the nations today follow Christ’s teachings nor do they recognize His reign. They only recognize the reign of the kingdoms of this world and not the reign of Jesus Christ, Sovereign King of every nation. Yet, He must reign! (1 Corinthians 15:25).
The presence, Name and commandments of Jesus have been removed from governments, schools and public places. Laws are continually passed that violate His commandments (such as “legalized” abortion) thus opposing His kingdom. We must remember Pope Leo XIII’s words that “all public power proceeds from God―for God alone is the true and supreme Lord of the world. Rulers are legates of God.” (Encyclical Letter, Immortale Dei).
The Church, as Christ’s Kingdom on Earth, has a natural and inalienable right to full freedom and immunity, from the power of the State, in establishing the Kingdom of Christ. If the reign of Jesus Christ is not recognized, authority is derived from man and not from God, which is a cornerstone of the false creed of Americanism. This will result in the collapse of human society―because its foundation has been eliminated: “Built upon the foundation of Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone!” (Ephesians 2:20). “Everyone that hears these My words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:26-27). In fact one can easily see that the collapse is happening before our very eyes. Only those who have willingly blinded themselves cannot see.
Since the Kingdom of Christ is not of this world, the Catholic Church takes nothing away from the temporal welfare of any nation by establishing this spiritual Kingdom. Rather the Church fosters and takes to herself―insofar as they are good―the ability, resources, and customs of each people. Taking them to herself―she purifies, strengthens, and ennobles them. And if they would submit to Him as Sovereign, wars and animosity would cease.
Am I Like Pilate?
On the feast of Christ the King, we are called to acknowledge that Jesus is, in fact, our King. It is one thing to merely SAY that He is our King―just because the hymn we sing in church on His feast day says so; or because the priest says Christ is King in the sermon; or because the Bible says that. But there comes a moment when WE must say that Jesus is our King―and not just with our lips, but with our hearts. When we must personally affirm and confirm what the Church has always taught: “Jesus is the Lord, Jesus is King, He is my personal King. He has authority in my personal life.” And this must become more than lip service. It must become a daily, increasing reality in our life.
Kings take care of us, but they also have the authority to command us. Can Christ command us? Or are we more typical of the modern person who doesn’t like to be told what to do? So, again, the question for us: “Is Jesus Christ your King?” WE have to answer the question. Pontius Pilate could not answer that question in a practical way―even though in a theoretical way he was prepared to accept Christ as being a King. Our Lord asks the critical question of Pilate (and us). We cannot simply look at how Pilate answers that question, WE have to answer it also. Consider that dramatic Gospel account, for in this Gospel passage of the trial of Jesus, Pilate goes in and out of the Praetorium (i.e. the Governor’s palace) more than a bell-hop goes through the revolving doors of a hotel. Indeed he goes in and out seven times. Note the text within the texts describing his motions highlighted in bold text:
“So Pilate went out to them and said, “What accusation do you bring against this man?” …. Pilate [re-]entered the praetorium and called Jesus ….. After he had said this, he went out to the Jews again, and told them, “I find no crime in Him ….. Then Pilate took Jesus [back into the praetorium] and scourged Him …… Pilate went out again, and said to them: ‘See, I am bringing Him out to you, that you may know that I find no crime in Him!’ …. They cried: ‘Crucify Him!’ … When Pilate heard these words, he was all the more afraid; he re-entered the praetorium and [spoke] to Jesus …. After this Pilate [went back out] and sought to release Him, but the Jews cried out: ‘If you release this Man, you are not Caesar’s friend!’ … When Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out and he sat down on the judgment seat” (Gospel of St. John, chapters 18 & 19; selected verses).
“Pilate therefore went out to them, and said: ‘What accusation bring you against this man?’ They answered, and said to him: ‘If He were not an evildoer, we would not have delivered Him up to thee!’
“Pilate therefore said to them: ‘Take Him you, and judge Him according to your law!’ The Jews therefore said to him: ‘It is not lawful for us to put any man to death!’ That the word of Jesus might be fulfilled, which He said, signifying what death He should die. Pilate therefore went into the hall again, and called Jesus, and said to Him: ‘Art Thou the King of the Jews?’ Jesus answered: ‘Do thou say this thing of thyself, or have others told it thee of Me?’ Pilate answered: ‘Am I a Jew? Thy own nation, and the chief priests, have delivered Thee up to me! What hast Thou done?’
“Jesus answered: ‘My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would certainly strive that I should not be delivered to the Jews―but now My kingdom is not from hence!’ Pilate therefore said to Him: ‘Art Thou a king then?’ Jesus answered: ‘Thou sayest that I am a king. For this was I born, and for this came I into the world―so that I should give testimony to the truth. Everyone that is of the truth, hears My voice!’ Pilate said to Him: ‘What is truth?’ And when he said this, he went out again to the Jews, and saith to them: ‘I find no cause in Him! But you have a custom that I should release someone unto you at the Pasch! Will you, therefore, that I release unto you the King of the Jews?’ Then cried they all again, saying: ‘Not this Man, but Barabbas!’ Now Barabbas was a robber.
“Then therefore, Pilate took Jesus [back into the praetorium], and scourged Him. And the soldiers platting a crown of thorns, put it upon His head; and they put on Him a purple garment. And they came to Him, and said: ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ and they gave Him blows. Pilate therefore went forth again, and said to them: ‘Behold, I bring Him forth unto you, so that you may know that I find no cause in Him!’ Jesus therefore came forth, bearing the crown of thorns and the purple garment. And Pilate said to them: ‘Behold the Man!’
“When the chief priests, therefore, and the servants, had seen Him, they cried out, saying: ‘Crucify Him! Crucify Him!’ Pilate said to them: ‘Take Him you, and crucify Him! For I find no cause in Him!’ The Jews answered him: ‘We have a law; and according to the law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God!’ When Pilate therefore had heard this saying, he feared the more. And he entered into the hall again, and He said to Jesus: ‘Whence art Thou?’ But Jesus gave him no answer. Pilate therefore said to Him: ‘Speakest Thou not to me? Knowest Thou not that I have power to crucify Thee, and I have power to release Thee?’
“Jesus answered: ‘Thou wouldst not have any power against Me, unless it were given thee from above! Therefore, he that hath delivered Me to thee, hath the greater sin!’ Henceforth Pilate sought to release Him [and went back out to the Jews]. But the Jews cried out, saying: ‘If thou release this Man, thou art not Caesar’s friend! For whosoever makes himself a king, speaks against Caesar!’Now when Pilate had heard these words, he brought Jesus forth, and sat down in the judgment seat, in the place that is called Lithostrotos, and in Hebrew Gabbatha. And it was the Parasceve of the Pasch, about the sixth hour, and he saith to the Jews: ‘Behold your King!’ But they cried out: ‘Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him!’ Pilate saith to them: ‘Shall I crucify your King?’ The chief priests answered: ‘We have no king but Caesar!’ Then therefore he delivered Him to them to be crucified.”
Did you count? Seven times Pilate goes in or out of the Praetorium! After which he brought Jesus out to be judged and sentenced. Such a picture of indecision and vacillation! He is trying to please the crowds; he is trying to please his wife (who had warned him to have nothing to do with that innocent Man (Matthew 27:19), he is trying to help Jesus. But he can’t decide! In and out he goes!
He is like us. We say we love God, but we also love the world. We want to please others, we want to please God. We cannot do both. We have to decide. But instead we vacillate, we go back and forth. We are Pilate. We are often locked in indecision, we vacillate, trying to please the world, trying to please others and to please God.
Is Pilate really so different from many of us? Faced with a crucial decision, he weighs the consequences that choosing Jesus will have on his career, his future, his family, his loyalty to country and Caesar, his access to power, and so forth. And while we may rightfully criticize Pilate for his choice, is it not very easy for so many of us to make compromises with the world for the sake of similar things? How often does Jesus our King take a back seat to career, politics, convenience, and so on? And so we easily stay rooted in vacillation, compromise and indecision.
The Feast of Christ the King is traditionally celebrated on the last Sunday of October. Pope Paul VI went and changed the date to the last Sunday of the liturgical year (or the Sunday before the First Sunday of Advent). Regardless of the date, the Feast of Christ the King, as established by Pope Pius XI in 1925, was meant to be an antidote to secularism. This heinous state of Secularism, is a way of life which leaves God out of man’s thinking, and then living and organizes his life as if God did not exist. Even Catholics are guilty of Secularism, for even though they know in their minds that God exists, there is little place for God in their hearts, for they live as though God did not exist. Is your family guilty of this? Are some members of your family tending towards this? Have they contracted the fatal disease of Secularism, at least its early stages?
The Purpose of the Feast
The Feast of Christ the King is intended to proclaim in a striking and effective manner Christ’s royalty over individuals, families, society, governments, and nations. This feast can and should be a springboard to re-establishing Christ’s absolute authority and rule in ourselves first of all, and then in our families.
King of What? King of Whom?
The Mass of Christ the King establishes the titles for Christ’s royalty over men:
(1) Christ is God, the Creator of the universe and hence wields a supreme power over all things; “All things were created by Him”;
(2) Christ is our Redeemer, He purchased us by His precious Blood, and made us His property and possession;
(3) Christ is Head of the Church, “holding in all things the primacy”;
(4) God bestowed upon Christ the nations of the world as His special possession and dominion.
Today’s Mass also describes the qualities of Christ’s Kingdom:
(1) This Kingdom is supreme, extending not only to all people, but also to their princes and kings;
(2) This Kingdom is universal, extending to all nations and to all places;
(3) This Kingdom is eternal, for “The Lord shall sit a King forever”;
(4) This Kingdom is spiritual, Christ’s “kingdom is not of this world.”
The Recognition of the Reign of Christ the King
The Kingdom of God is revealed by Our Lord Jesus to men who should submit to it in Faith. The Kingdom comes to us individually when we recognize our sinfulness and the absolute necessity of the Savior, and begin to reform our lives, believing in and surrendering to the sovereignty of God in the person of Jesus Christ, abandoning habitual sin, if we are adults or of the age of reason, and if infants, through Baptism and the Faith of our parents. He said, “the reign of God is at hand! Repent and believe in the Gospel!” (Mark 1:15). Those who fail to do this must face severe judgment (Matthew 11:22-24). But to those who accept the help of God’s grace He promises the sweetness of his yoke (Matthew 11:22-24 ff.).
Jesus, as King of All Nations
In Holy Scripture we see that the Angel Gabriel announced to Our Lady that the reign of Jesus was to be without end: Luke 1:32-33. For us, that means He should be king, not just of a portion of our lives—such as when we pray or go to church—but of every moment of our lives without end.
This is a declaration from Heaven that He is King by birthright as the Divine Son of God but His kingdom was not of this world. (John 18:36) He said that He would come in majesty with His Angels to judge all nations which will be assembled before Him sitting upon His royal throne: “And when the Son of man shall come in His majesty, and all the angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the seat of His majesty. And all nations shall be gathered together before Him, and He shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats” (Matthew 25:31-32).
He solemnly proclaimed that full authority has been given to Him both in Heaven and on Earth and commanded His Apostles to go out, to Baptize, and make disciples of all the nations: “All power is given to Me―in Heaven and on Earth! Go, therefore, teach ye all nations―baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost―teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:18-20).
Christ the King means what He says: His power is great and His reign extends over every nation on Earth.
The reign of Jesus Christ, King of every nation, is in the spiritual world over the minds, wills and hearts of humanity because He is the truth, the way and the life (John 14:6) This is accomplished through His Holy Catholic Church, His Kingdom on Earth, which teaches, governs and sanctifies His subjects through the administration of the Seven Sacraments, by decrees and the definition of dogma and guarding the deposit of Faith, maintained by holding to Tradition. The Church is the authentic teacher of His doctrine and ministers His graces of forgiveness and eternal life. As Jesus commanded her, the Church teaches His Commandments (Matthew 28:20) to every nation to guide them in Faith and Morals.
Executive Power
Jesus Christ the King holds all executive power. All men must obey His sovereign rule. He must reign over every nation until the end of the world when He puts all enemies beneath the feet of God the Father: “For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet” (1 Corinthians 15:25). Against those who refuse His rule He has issued a penalty of eternal punishment which no one may escape: “These shall go into everlasting punishment!” (Matthew 25:46)
Judicial Power
Jesus Christ the King also has all judicial power―that is to say, the power to make laws and to judge. “All judgment has been given to the Son” (John 5:22). This power of judgment is eternal and includes the privilege of rewarding and punishing of every single one of us and it will be immediately executed. “These will go off to eternal punishment and the just to eternal life” (Matthew 25:46).
Universal Power
Recognition of the Reign of Jesus Christ the King must first of all be recognized by every individual. Each person must accept Christ’s sovereignty and submit himself to His reign through Faith, conversion and membership in His Church. Recognition of the Reign of Jesus Christ the King must first of all be recognized by every individual. Each person must accept Christ’s sovereignty and submit himself to His reign through Faith, conversion and membership in His Church.
The reign of Jesus Christ, Sovereign King, was not recognized by the Jews who said, “We have no king except Caesar” (John 19:15) and “we will not have this Man to reign over us” (Luke 19:14). Jesus had informed Pilate that His Kingdom was not of this world (John 18:36). The only kingdoms recognized by the chief priests were the kingdoms of this world―which were created and doomed to perish. They did not follow Christ’s teaching, as reported in St. Matthew, to render to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s (Matthew 22:21).
Rejected Today
Neither do the nations today follow Christ’s teachings nor do they recognize His reign. They only recognize the reign of the kingdoms of this world and not the reign of Jesus Christ, Sovereign King of every nation. Yet, He must reign! (1 Corinthians 15:25).
The presence, Name and commandments of Jesus have been removed from governments, schools and public places. Laws are continually passed that violate His commandments (such as “legalized” abortion) thus opposing His kingdom. We must remember Pope Leo XIII’s words that “all public power proceeds from God―for God alone is the true and supreme Lord of the world. Rulers are legates of God.” (Encyclical Letter, Immortale Dei).
The Church, as Christ’s Kingdom on Earth, has a natural and inalienable right to full freedom and immunity, from the power of the State, in establishing the Kingdom of Christ. If the reign of Jesus Christ is not recognized, authority is derived from man and not from God, which is a cornerstone of the false creed of Americanism. This will result in the collapse of human society―because its foundation has been eliminated: “Built upon the foundation of Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone!” (Ephesians 2:20). “Everyone that hears these My words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:26-27). In fact one can easily see that the collapse is happening before our very eyes. Only those who have willingly blinded themselves cannot see.
Since the Kingdom of Christ is not of this world, the Catholic Church takes nothing away from the temporal welfare of any nation by establishing this spiritual Kingdom. Rather the Church fosters and takes to herself―insofar as they are good―the ability, resources, and customs of each people. Taking them to herself―she purifies, strengthens, and ennobles them. And if they would submit to Him as Sovereign, wars and animosity would cease.
Am I Like Pilate?
On the feast of Christ the King, we are called to acknowledge that Jesus is, in fact, our King. It is one thing to merely SAY that He is our King―just because the hymn we sing in church on His feast day says so; or because the priest says Christ is King in the sermon; or because the Bible says that. But there comes a moment when WE must say that Jesus is our King―and not just with our lips, but with our hearts. When we must personally affirm and confirm what the Church has always taught: “Jesus is the Lord, Jesus is King, He is my personal King. He has authority in my personal life.” And this must become more than lip service. It must become a daily, increasing reality in our life.
Kings take care of us, but they also have the authority to command us. Can Christ command us? Or are we more typical of the modern person who doesn’t like to be told what to do? So, again, the question for us: “Is Jesus Christ your King?” WE have to answer the question. Pontius Pilate could not answer that question in a practical way―even though in a theoretical way he was prepared to accept Christ as being a King. Our Lord asks the critical question of Pilate (and us). We cannot simply look at how Pilate answers that question, WE have to answer it also. Consider that dramatic Gospel account, for in this Gospel passage of the trial of Jesus, Pilate goes in and out of the Praetorium (i.e. the Governor’s palace) more than a bell-hop goes through the revolving doors of a hotel. Indeed he goes in and out seven times. Note the text within the texts describing his motions highlighted in bold text:
“So Pilate went out to them and said, “What accusation do you bring against this man?” …. Pilate [re-]entered the praetorium and called Jesus ….. After he had said this, he went out to the Jews again, and told them, “I find no crime in Him ….. Then Pilate took Jesus [back into the praetorium] and scourged Him …… Pilate went out again, and said to them: ‘See, I am bringing Him out to you, that you may know that I find no crime in Him!’ …. They cried: ‘Crucify Him!’ … When Pilate heard these words, he was all the more afraid; he re-entered the praetorium and [spoke] to Jesus …. After this Pilate [went back out] and sought to release Him, but the Jews cried out: ‘If you release this Man, you are not Caesar’s friend!’ … When Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out and he sat down on the judgment seat” (Gospel of St. John, chapters 18 & 19; selected verses).
“Pilate therefore went out to them, and said: ‘What accusation bring you against this man?’ They answered, and said to him: ‘If He were not an evildoer, we would not have delivered Him up to thee!’
“Pilate therefore said to them: ‘Take Him you, and judge Him according to your law!’ The Jews therefore said to him: ‘It is not lawful for us to put any man to death!’ That the word of Jesus might be fulfilled, which He said, signifying what death He should die. Pilate therefore went into the hall again, and called Jesus, and said to Him: ‘Art Thou the King of the Jews?’ Jesus answered: ‘Do thou say this thing of thyself, or have others told it thee of Me?’ Pilate answered: ‘Am I a Jew? Thy own nation, and the chief priests, have delivered Thee up to me! What hast Thou done?’
“Jesus answered: ‘My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would certainly strive that I should not be delivered to the Jews―but now My kingdom is not from hence!’ Pilate therefore said to Him: ‘Art Thou a king then?’ Jesus answered: ‘Thou sayest that I am a king. For this was I born, and for this came I into the world―so that I should give testimony to the truth. Everyone that is of the truth, hears My voice!’ Pilate said to Him: ‘What is truth?’ And when he said this, he went out again to the Jews, and saith to them: ‘I find no cause in Him! But you have a custom that I should release someone unto you at the Pasch! Will you, therefore, that I release unto you the King of the Jews?’ Then cried they all again, saying: ‘Not this Man, but Barabbas!’ Now Barabbas was a robber.
“Then therefore, Pilate took Jesus [back into the praetorium], and scourged Him. And the soldiers platting a crown of thorns, put it upon His head; and they put on Him a purple garment. And they came to Him, and said: ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ and they gave Him blows. Pilate therefore went forth again, and said to them: ‘Behold, I bring Him forth unto you, so that you may know that I find no cause in Him!’ Jesus therefore came forth, bearing the crown of thorns and the purple garment. And Pilate said to them: ‘Behold the Man!’
“When the chief priests, therefore, and the servants, had seen Him, they cried out, saying: ‘Crucify Him! Crucify Him!’ Pilate said to them: ‘Take Him you, and crucify Him! For I find no cause in Him!’ The Jews answered him: ‘We have a law; and according to the law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God!’ When Pilate therefore had heard this saying, he feared the more. And he entered into the hall again, and He said to Jesus: ‘Whence art Thou?’ But Jesus gave him no answer. Pilate therefore said to Him: ‘Speakest Thou not to me? Knowest Thou not that I have power to crucify Thee, and I have power to release Thee?’
“Jesus answered: ‘Thou wouldst not have any power against Me, unless it were given thee from above! Therefore, he that hath delivered Me to thee, hath the greater sin!’ Henceforth Pilate sought to release Him [and went back out to the Jews]. But the Jews cried out, saying: ‘If thou release this Man, thou art not Caesar’s friend! For whosoever makes himself a king, speaks against Caesar!’Now when Pilate had heard these words, he brought Jesus forth, and sat down in the judgment seat, in the place that is called Lithostrotos, and in Hebrew Gabbatha. And it was the Parasceve of the Pasch, about the sixth hour, and he saith to the Jews: ‘Behold your King!’ But they cried out: ‘Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him!’ Pilate saith to them: ‘Shall I crucify your King?’ The chief priests answered: ‘We have no king but Caesar!’ Then therefore he delivered Him to them to be crucified.”
Did you count? Seven times Pilate goes in or out of the Praetorium! After which he brought Jesus out to be judged and sentenced. Such a picture of indecision and vacillation! He is trying to please the crowds; he is trying to please his wife (who had warned him to have nothing to do with that innocent Man (Matthew 27:19), he is trying to help Jesus. But he can’t decide! In and out he goes!
He is like us. We say we love God, but we also love the world. We want to please others, we want to please God. We cannot do both. We have to decide. But instead we vacillate, we go back and forth. We are Pilate. We are often locked in indecision, we vacillate, trying to please the world, trying to please others and to please God.
Is Pilate really so different from many of us? Faced with a crucial decision, he weighs the consequences that choosing Jesus will have on his career, his future, his family, his loyalty to country and Caesar, his access to power, and so forth. And while we may rightfully criticize Pilate for his choice, is it not very easy for so many of us to make compromises with the world for the sake of similar things? How often does Jesus our King take a back seat to career, politics, convenience, and so on? And so we easily stay rooted in vacillation, compromise and indecision.
Article 14
Saturday, October 26th
Christian Charity Conquers & Converts
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Saturday, October 26th
Christian Charity Conquers & Converts
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Most Powerful Thing We Have
Charity is powerful. How so? Well―“God is Charity” (1 John 4:8)―and you can’t get more powerful than that! The secular proverb―“Love makes the world go around!”―is unwittingly based upon a spiritual truth. For it is God’s Divine Providence that “makes the world go round”―and God is Charity, so, you could say that love makes the world go round. If “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8), and Christ is God, then Christ is Charity―and Christ says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), then it logically follows that without Charity we can do nothing. In fact, that is what Holy Scripture tells us: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Let some of those words really penetrate your mind and heart: “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Our primary communication with God takes place by using the three theological virtues―Faith, Hope and Charity. All other virtues are subsidiary to these three. Yet the greatest of these three is Charity: “There remain Faith, Hope and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13). “Above all these things have Charity―which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:1). “This is the Charity of God―that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not heavy!” (1 John 5:3).
Another aspect of the immense power of Charity is its power to forgive the guilt of sin and even remove all the punishment due to sin―so that a perfect act of contrition, which is sorrow for sin based upon a deep love of God, can remove both guilt and punishment, thus opening for us the gates of Heaven: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Charity covers a multitude of sins!” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much!” says Our Lord (Luke 7:47). When you consider that sin is the greatest evil in the world (that includes both mortal and venial sin), then that gives you an indication of the immense power of Charity. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD).
No Wishy-Washy Charity
Charity is not some kind of wishy-washy, vague thing. Charity is not an emotional feeling; nor a fast palpitation of the heart; it does not involve dizzily swooning and mooning around. Charity is something concrete that might well reside in the heart―but it also needs to be proved by deeds―otherwise it remains a theoretical Charity, a lip-service Charity, which was condemned by Our Lord: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Our Lord wants concrete proof of Charity: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words … He that does not love Me, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
In fact, Our Lord encourages a high degree of Charity: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13). Our Lord Himself went one step better than that―He not only laid down His life for His friends, but also for His enemies! He not only preached a love for enemies―He also practiced what He preached! “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor, and hate your enemy!’ ― but I say to you: ‘Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!’” (Matthew 5:43-44). He had said: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10) and He laid down His life for those who were lost! “By this has the charity of God appeared towards us―because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him. In this is Charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins. If God has so loved us, then we also ought to love one another!” (1 John 4:11). As St. Francis de Sales says: “To love our neighbor in Charity, is to love God in man.” St. Bede the Venerable adds: “He alone loves the Creator perfectly, who manifests a pure love for his neighbor.” While St. Vincent Pallotti says: “Since God is perfect in loving man, man must be perfect in loving his neighbor.” As Our Lord said: “Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me! … As long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40, 45).
Ignore Charity at Your Peril!
St. John of the Cross says that “at the end of our life, we shall all be judged on our Charity.” Unfortunately, today, Charity is fading while animosity and hatred are growing. Catholics have become weak in their Faith―and, consequently, they have become weak in Charity. For Faith concerns knowledge about the things of God―and we cannot love what we do not know―and we will only love a little what we know little about. Hence St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say that Jesus is so little loved because He is so little known. Our Lord forewarned us about the lack of Faith and Charity in the so-called “End Times” or “Last Days”: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8) … “Because iniquity has abounded, the Charity of many shall grow cold!” (Matthew 24:12).
Of all the virtues it is the virtue of Charity that should be our focal point. “Charity―as queen of all virtues, queen of all commandments, all counsels, and, in short, of all laws and all Christian actions―gives to all of them their rank, order, time, and value” writes St. Francis de Sales (Love of God, 8, 6). Holy Scripture encourages us: “Follow after charity! … Let charity abide in you! … He that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him! … Let all your things be done in charity! … Abound in charity towards one another, and towards all men! … He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity!” (1 Corinthians 14:1; 16:14; Hebrews 13:1; 1 Thessalonians 3:12; 1 John 4:8, 16).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “Without Charity, the most excellent extraordinary gifts are of no avail for eternal life. Why is this? Because if I do not have Charity, I do not fulfill the first commandment of God; I do not conform my will to His; I am turned away from Him, and my heart is set in the opposite direction from the heart of God. Therefore, ‘if I have not Charity, I am nothing’ personally in the order of salvation; I merit nothing, even though by preaching and miracles I should lead others to save their souls. With this meaning, St. Augustine says: ‘Love and do what you wish’ and what you will do, will merit eternal life for you, if you truly love your God more than yourself. Still more, we must have true Charity, for there is nothing worse than the false, which has nothing in common with genuine Charity except the name.”
Our Charity must be a true Charity―which means thinking, saying, doing and not doing things primarily out of a love of God and not a love of self. Selfish charity is not true Charity. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange says: “True Charity, as opposed to false Charity, implies all the virtues that are subordinate to it and that, from this point of view, appear as so many modalities or aspects of the love of God and of one’s neighbor. This is why St. Paul says: ‘Charity is patient, is kind; Charity envies not, deals not perversely, is not puffed up, is not ambitious, seeks not her own; is not provoked to anger, thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things!’”
Charity is powerful. How so? Well―“God is Charity” (1 John 4:8)―and you can’t get more powerful than that! The secular proverb―“Love makes the world go around!”―is unwittingly based upon a spiritual truth. For it is God’s Divine Providence that “makes the world go round”―and God is Charity, so, you could say that love makes the world go round. If “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8), and Christ is God, then Christ is Charity―and Christ says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), then it logically follows that without Charity we can do nothing. In fact, that is what Holy Scripture tells us: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Let some of those words really penetrate your mind and heart: “If I … have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. If I … have not Charity―then I am nothing. If I … have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Our primary communication with God takes place by using the three theological virtues―Faith, Hope and Charity. All other virtues are subsidiary to these three. Yet the greatest of these three is Charity: “There remain Faith, Hope and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13). “Above all these things have Charity―which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:1). “This is the Charity of God―that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not heavy!” (1 John 5:3).
Another aspect of the immense power of Charity is its power to forgive the guilt of sin and even remove all the punishment due to sin―so that a perfect act of contrition, which is sorrow for sin based upon a deep love of God, can remove both guilt and punishment, thus opening for us the gates of Heaven: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Charity covers a multitude of sins!” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much!” says Our Lord (Luke 7:47). When you consider that sin is the greatest evil in the world (that includes both mortal and venial sin), then that gives you an indication of the immense power of Charity. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD).
No Wishy-Washy Charity
Charity is not some kind of wishy-washy, vague thing. Charity is not an emotional feeling; nor a fast palpitation of the heart; it does not involve dizzily swooning and mooning around. Charity is something concrete that might well reside in the heart―but it also needs to be proved by deeds―otherwise it remains a theoretical Charity, a lip-service Charity, which was condemned by Our Lord: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Our Lord wants concrete proof of Charity: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words … He that does not love Me, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24).
In fact, Our Lord encourages a high degree of Charity: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 15:13). Our Lord Himself went one step better than that―He not only laid down His life for His friends, but also for His enemies! He not only preached a love for enemies―He also practiced what He preached! “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor, and hate your enemy!’ ― but I say to you: ‘Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!’” (Matthew 5:43-44). He had said: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10) and He laid down His life for those who were lost! “By this has the charity of God appeared towards us―because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him. In this is Charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins. If God has so loved us, then we also ought to love one another!” (1 John 4:11). As St. Francis de Sales says: “To love our neighbor in Charity, is to love God in man.” St. Bede the Venerable adds: “He alone loves the Creator perfectly, who manifests a pure love for his neighbor.” While St. Vincent Pallotti says: “Since God is perfect in loving man, man must be perfect in loving his neighbor.” As Our Lord said: “Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me! … As long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40, 45).
Ignore Charity at Your Peril!
St. John of the Cross says that “at the end of our life, we shall all be judged on our Charity.” Unfortunately, today, Charity is fading while animosity and hatred are growing. Catholics have become weak in their Faith―and, consequently, they have become weak in Charity. For Faith concerns knowledge about the things of God―and we cannot love what we do not know―and we will only love a little what we know little about. Hence St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say that Jesus is so little loved because He is so little known. Our Lord forewarned us about the lack of Faith and Charity in the so-called “End Times” or “Last Days”: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8) … “Because iniquity has abounded, the Charity of many shall grow cold!” (Matthew 24:12).
Of all the virtues it is the virtue of Charity that should be our focal point. “Charity―as queen of all virtues, queen of all commandments, all counsels, and, in short, of all laws and all Christian actions―gives to all of them their rank, order, time, and value” writes St. Francis de Sales (Love of God, 8, 6). Holy Scripture encourages us: “Follow after charity! … Let charity abide in you! … He that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him! … Let all your things be done in charity! … Abound in charity towards one another, and towards all men! … He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity!” (1 Corinthians 14:1; 16:14; Hebrews 13:1; 1 Thessalonians 3:12; 1 John 4:8, 16).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “Without Charity, the most excellent extraordinary gifts are of no avail for eternal life. Why is this? Because if I do not have Charity, I do not fulfill the first commandment of God; I do not conform my will to His; I am turned away from Him, and my heart is set in the opposite direction from the heart of God. Therefore, ‘if I have not Charity, I am nothing’ personally in the order of salvation; I merit nothing, even though by preaching and miracles I should lead others to save their souls. With this meaning, St. Augustine says: ‘Love and do what you wish’ and what you will do, will merit eternal life for you, if you truly love your God more than yourself. Still more, we must have true Charity, for there is nothing worse than the false, which has nothing in common with genuine Charity except the name.”
Our Charity must be a true Charity―which means thinking, saying, doing and not doing things primarily out of a love of God and not a love of self. Selfish charity is not true Charity. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange says: “True Charity, as opposed to false Charity, implies all the virtues that are subordinate to it and that, from this point of view, appear as so many modalities or aspects of the love of God and of one’s neighbor. This is why St. Paul says: ‘Charity is patient, is kind; Charity envies not, deals not perversely, is not puffed up, is not ambitious, seeks not her own; is not provoked to anger, thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things!’”
Article 13
Thursday & Friday, October 24th & 25th
Is There Hope?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Thursday & Friday, October 24th & 25th
Is There Hope?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Our Lady Warns of Bleak Times
In all of her most recent apparitions, Our Lady has spoken of bleak times; warned of great chastisements that would fall upon all nations and upon the good and the bad alike! Most of what she says sounds hopeless and does very little to raise our hopes: “Woe to the world! … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil and ecclesiastical rights and authority. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and discord will be seen, without love for country or family ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … Many will turn upon Religion! … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! …
“The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises! … The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... Churches will be locked up or desecrated … and altars will be sacked … Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death ... The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts … Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals]. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! …
“This, in turn, will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy! … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume cities! All the universe will be struck with terror! … … Men will kill and massacre each other, even in their homes … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. Then a general war will follow which will be appalling. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy ... Blood will flow on all sides ... People will believe that all is lost! There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
Feeling of Falling Fast and Far
Did that just pop the last bit of hope in you? Pretty grim, huh? Sounds pretty hopeless, eh? How can hope survive a forecast like that? One might imagine what it feels like to be on an aircraft when turbulence makes the plane suddenly drop several hundred feet in just a few seconds―a feeling like someone just removed the floor from under you and start to drop down into empty space! A Singapore Airlines flight in May of 2024 turned deadly in severe turbulence, so that the plane dropped 178 feet in just four seconds―it was so bad that it killed one passenger and injured over 100 other people― including several with paralysis, skull and back trauma, and brain injuries. Report indicate the plane’s sudden catastrophic drop, was one of the worst turbulence incidents in recent history, causing passengers who weren't wearing their seatbelts to fly out of their seats and then slam back down again. Passengers described a sudden, dramatic drop as “all hell broke loose” on board the Boeing airliner carrying 229 passengers and crew. One passenger said: “Very suddenly there was a very dramatic drop so everyone seated and not wearing a seatbelt was launched immediately into the ceiling. Some people hit their heads on the baggage cabins overhead and dented it, they hit the places where lights and masks are and broke straight through it.” Several passengers were treated at hospital, many apparently with spinal injuries. Several passengers had broken arms, but the majority of injuries were cuts and bruises. What feelings of helplessness and hopelessness must not those passengers have experienced in those few short seconds!
Falling Bomb Hits Hopes
Let us stay up in the air and in a plane for the next cameo of helplessness and hopelessness. In the early morning hours of August 6th, 1945, a United States B-29 bomber dropped the first atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima, Japan―which had a civilian population of almost 300,000 and was an important military center, containing about 43,000 soldiers. On the ground, moments before the blast, it was a calm and sunny Monday morning. The city was alive with activity―soldiers doing their morning calisthenics, commuters on foot or on bicycles, groups of women and children working.
One massive explosion, that lasted a few seconds, would change all that. The U.S. B-29 bomber dropped the world’s first atom bomb—known as “Little Boy”—by parachute at 8:15 a.m. in the morning. Little Boy fell almost six miles in 43 seconds before detonating at an altitude of 2,000 feet. The bomb exploded with the force of more than 15,000 tons of TNT. Less than 2% of the bomb’s uranium achieved fission―so it could have been much, much worse―but the resulting explosion and reaction engulfed the city in a blinding flash of heat and light, destroying five square miles of the city―some 90% of the city was destroyed. The temperature at ground level reached 7,000 degrees Fahrenheit in less than a second―typically, your oven at Gas Mark 10 is around 500 degrees Fahrenheit, while your open flame on the stove top gas burner is typically 1,100 to 1,200 degrees Fahrenheit. The 7,000 degrees Fahrenheit of the atom bomb explosion is a lot, lot more than you imagine it to be!
The bomb vaporized people half a mile away from ground zero. Bronze statues melted, roof tiles fused together, and the exposed skin of people miles away burned from the intense infrared energy unleashed. Those closest to the explosion died instantly, their bodies turned to black char. Within minutes, 9 out of 10 people, half-a-mile or less from ground zero, were dead. No one will ever know for certain how many died as a result of the attack on Hiroshima. Some 70,000 to 80,000 people probably died as a result of initial blast, heat, and radiation effects. 90% of Hiroshima’s medical rescue teams perished and hospitals were all destroyed on the first day of the bombing, with 90% of medical staffs, doctors, nurses, and pharmacists dead. It therefore was impossible to find any meaningful medical aid. As a result of this lack of care, many survivors who were alive on the first and second days began to die due to severe bleeding from injuries such as severe fractures, dislocations, abdominal ruptures, thoracic punctures, and scalp and brain damage and also from dehydration and lack of adequate food supplies.
Nearby birds burst into flames in mid-air, and dry, combustible materials such as paper instantly ignited as far away as 6,400 feet (1.2 miles) from ground zero. Many victims were also burned to white bones. The skin of people was soon peeled off because of necrosis in the deep skin layer. With large areas of skin peeling off, people suffered severe pain and bleeding. The white light acted as a giant flashbulb, burning the dark patterns of clothing onto skin and the creating shadows of bodies onto walls. Survivors outdoors close to the blast generally describe a literally blinding light combined with a sudden and overwhelming wave of heat. The blast wave followed almost instantly for those close-in, often knocking them from their feet. Those that were indoors were usually spared the flash burns, but flying glass from broken windows filled most rooms, and all but the very strongest structures collapsed. One boy was blown through the windows of his house and across the street, as the house collapsed behind him.
People, farther from the point of detonation, experienced first the flash and heat, followed seconds later by a deafening boom and the blast wave. Nearly every structure within one mile of ground zero was destroyed, and almost every building within three miles was damaged. Less than 10% of the buildings in the city survived without any damage, and the blast wave shattered glass in suburbs twelve miles away. The numerous small fires that erupted simultaneously all around the city soon merged into one large firestorm, creating extremely strong winds that blew towards the center of the fire. The firestorm eventually engulfed 4.4 square miles of the city, killing anyone who had not escaped in the first minutes after the attack.
For hours after the attack the Japanese government did not even know for sure what had happened. Radio and telegraph communications with Hiroshima had suddenly ended at 8:16 a.m., and vague reports of some sort of large explosion had begun to filter in, but the Japanese high command knew that no large-scale air raid had taken place over the city and that there were no large stores of explosives there. Eventually a Japanese staff officer was dispatched by plane to survey the city from overhead, and while he was still nearly 100 miles away from the city he began to report on a huge cloud of smoke that hung over it. The first confirmation of exactly what had happened came only sixteen hours later with the announcement of the bombing by the United States. Relief workers from outside the city eventually began to arrive and the situation stabilized somewhat. Power in undamaged areas of the city was even restored on August 7th, with limited rail service resuming the following day.
Several days after the blast, however, medical staff began to recognize the first symptoms of radiation sickness among the survivors. Soon the death rate actually began to climb again as patients who had appeared to be recovering began suffering from this strange new illness. Deaths from radiation sickness did not peak until three to four weeks after the attacks and did not taper off until seven to eight weeks after the attack. Long-range health dangers associated with radiation exposure, such as an increased danger of cancer, would linger for the rest of the victims’ lives, as would the psychological effects of the attack. By the end of 1945, because of the lingering effects of radioactive fallout and other after effects, the Hiroshima death toll was probably over 100,000. The five-year death total may have reached or even exceeded 200,000, as cancer and other long-term effects took hold.
What Hope Today?
If the above mentioned fall-out and damage was so horrendous―then think of the damage that modern day nuclear-weapons can inflict! Modern warheads are almost exclusively thermonuclear bombs, or hydrogen (H) bombs, which use both fusion and fission reactions to generate higher release of energy―from tens of kilotons to even several megatons TNT equivalent, or tens of times more powerful than the early atomic bombs such as the one dropped on Hiroshima.
The largest nuclear weapon to ever been tested, Tsar Bomba, had an estimated yield of 50 megatons (although it had a capacity double that) ― an explosive yield greater than that of the “Little Boy” atom bomb by a factor of 3,500. Literally translated as “King of Bombs,” this monster atomic bomb, designed by the Soviet Union, generated a fireball that reached a diameter of 2.5 miles (4 km), and a mushroom cloud that rose over 40 miles (60 km) into the atmosphere. The blast wave was felt over 620 miles away (over 1,000 km), and its shockwave was detected 2,500 miles away (4,000 km) from its source. To illustrate the increased scale of destructive power, if the same atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima was detonated in a major U.S. city like New York City, then 264,000 lives will be lost, along with an additional 512,000 injuries. Dropping the Tsar Bomba on the same city, would kill more than 7.6 million people, while injuring an additional 4.2 million.
In all of her most recent apparitions, Our Lady has spoken of bleak times; warned of great chastisements that would fall upon all nations and upon the good and the bad alike! Most of what she says sounds hopeless and does very little to raise our hopes: “Woe to the world! … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil and ecclesiastical rights and authority. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and discord will be seen, without love for country or family ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … Many will turn upon Religion! … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! …
“The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises! … The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... Churches will be locked up or desecrated … and altars will be sacked … Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death ... The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself the king of all hearts … Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals]. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! …
“This, in turn, will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy! … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume cities! All the universe will be struck with terror! … … Men will kill and massacre each other, even in their homes … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. Then a general war will follow which will be appalling. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy ... Blood will flow on all sides ... People will believe that all is lost! There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
Feeling of Falling Fast and Far
Did that just pop the last bit of hope in you? Pretty grim, huh? Sounds pretty hopeless, eh? How can hope survive a forecast like that? One might imagine what it feels like to be on an aircraft when turbulence makes the plane suddenly drop several hundred feet in just a few seconds―a feeling like someone just removed the floor from under you and start to drop down into empty space! A Singapore Airlines flight in May of 2024 turned deadly in severe turbulence, so that the plane dropped 178 feet in just four seconds―it was so bad that it killed one passenger and injured over 100 other people― including several with paralysis, skull and back trauma, and brain injuries. Report indicate the plane’s sudden catastrophic drop, was one of the worst turbulence incidents in recent history, causing passengers who weren't wearing their seatbelts to fly out of their seats and then slam back down again. Passengers described a sudden, dramatic drop as “all hell broke loose” on board the Boeing airliner carrying 229 passengers and crew. One passenger said: “Very suddenly there was a very dramatic drop so everyone seated and not wearing a seatbelt was launched immediately into the ceiling. Some people hit their heads on the baggage cabins overhead and dented it, they hit the places where lights and masks are and broke straight through it.” Several passengers were treated at hospital, many apparently with spinal injuries. Several passengers had broken arms, but the majority of injuries were cuts and bruises. What feelings of helplessness and hopelessness must not those passengers have experienced in those few short seconds!
Falling Bomb Hits Hopes
Let us stay up in the air and in a plane for the next cameo of helplessness and hopelessness. In the early morning hours of August 6th, 1945, a United States B-29 bomber dropped the first atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima, Japan―which had a civilian population of almost 300,000 and was an important military center, containing about 43,000 soldiers. On the ground, moments before the blast, it was a calm and sunny Monday morning. The city was alive with activity―soldiers doing their morning calisthenics, commuters on foot or on bicycles, groups of women and children working.
One massive explosion, that lasted a few seconds, would change all that. The U.S. B-29 bomber dropped the world’s first atom bomb—known as “Little Boy”—by parachute at 8:15 a.m. in the morning. Little Boy fell almost six miles in 43 seconds before detonating at an altitude of 2,000 feet. The bomb exploded with the force of more than 15,000 tons of TNT. Less than 2% of the bomb’s uranium achieved fission―so it could have been much, much worse―but the resulting explosion and reaction engulfed the city in a blinding flash of heat and light, destroying five square miles of the city―some 90% of the city was destroyed. The temperature at ground level reached 7,000 degrees Fahrenheit in less than a second―typically, your oven at Gas Mark 10 is around 500 degrees Fahrenheit, while your open flame on the stove top gas burner is typically 1,100 to 1,200 degrees Fahrenheit. The 7,000 degrees Fahrenheit of the atom bomb explosion is a lot, lot more than you imagine it to be!
The bomb vaporized people half a mile away from ground zero. Bronze statues melted, roof tiles fused together, and the exposed skin of people miles away burned from the intense infrared energy unleashed. Those closest to the explosion died instantly, their bodies turned to black char. Within minutes, 9 out of 10 people, half-a-mile or less from ground zero, were dead. No one will ever know for certain how many died as a result of the attack on Hiroshima. Some 70,000 to 80,000 people probably died as a result of initial blast, heat, and radiation effects. 90% of Hiroshima’s medical rescue teams perished and hospitals were all destroyed on the first day of the bombing, with 90% of medical staffs, doctors, nurses, and pharmacists dead. It therefore was impossible to find any meaningful medical aid. As a result of this lack of care, many survivors who were alive on the first and second days began to die due to severe bleeding from injuries such as severe fractures, dislocations, abdominal ruptures, thoracic punctures, and scalp and brain damage and also from dehydration and lack of adequate food supplies.
Nearby birds burst into flames in mid-air, and dry, combustible materials such as paper instantly ignited as far away as 6,400 feet (1.2 miles) from ground zero. Many victims were also burned to white bones. The skin of people was soon peeled off because of necrosis in the deep skin layer. With large areas of skin peeling off, people suffered severe pain and bleeding. The white light acted as a giant flashbulb, burning the dark patterns of clothing onto skin and the creating shadows of bodies onto walls. Survivors outdoors close to the blast generally describe a literally blinding light combined with a sudden and overwhelming wave of heat. The blast wave followed almost instantly for those close-in, often knocking them from their feet. Those that were indoors were usually spared the flash burns, but flying glass from broken windows filled most rooms, and all but the very strongest structures collapsed. One boy was blown through the windows of his house and across the street, as the house collapsed behind him.
People, farther from the point of detonation, experienced first the flash and heat, followed seconds later by a deafening boom and the blast wave. Nearly every structure within one mile of ground zero was destroyed, and almost every building within three miles was damaged. Less than 10% of the buildings in the city survived without any damage, and the blast wave shattered glass in suburbs twelve miles away. The numerous small fires that erupted simultaneously all around the city soon merged into one large firestorm, creating extremely strong winds that blew towards the center of the fire. The firestorm eventually engulfed 4.4 square miles of the city, killing anyone who had not escaped in the first minutes after the attack.
For hours after the attack the Japanese government did not even know for sure what had happened. Radio and telegraph communications with Hiroshima had suddenly ended at 8:16 a.m., and vague reports of some sort of large explosion had begun to filter in, but the Japanese high command knew that no large-scale air raid had taken place over the city and that there were no large stores of explosives there. Eventually a Japanese staff officer was dispatched by plane to survey the city from overhead, and while he was still nearly 100 miles away from the city he began to report on a huge cloud of smoke that hung over it. The first confirmation of exactly what had happened came only sixteen hours later with the announcement of the bombing by the United States. Relief workers from outside the city eventually began to arrive and the situation stabilized somewhat. Power in undamaged areas of the city was even restored on August 7th, with limited rail service resuming the following day.
Several days after the blast, however, medical staff began to recognize the first symptoms of radiation sickness among the survivors. Soon the death rate actually began to climb again as patients who had appeared to be recovering began suffering from this strange new illness. Deaths from radiation sickness did not peak until three to four weeks after the attacks and did not taper off until seven to eight weeks after the attack. Long-range health dangers associated with radiation exposure, such as an increased danger of cancer, would linger for the rest of the victims’ lives, as would the psychological effects of the attack. By the end of 1945, because of the lingering effects of radioactive fallout and other after effects, the Hiroshima death toll was probably over 100,000. The five-year death total may have reached or even exceeded 200,000, as cancer and other long-term effects took hold.
What Hope Today?
If the above mentioned fall-out and damage was so horrendous―then think of the damage that modern day nuclear-weapons can inflict! Modern warheads are almost exclusively thermonuclear bombs, or hydrogen (H) bombs, which use both fusion and fission reactions to generate higher release of energy―from tens of kilotons to even several megatons TNT equivalent, or tens of times more powerful than the early atomic bombs such as the one dropped on Hiroshima.
The largest nuclear weapon to ever been tested, Tsar Bomba, had an estimated yield of 50 megatons (although it had a capacity double that) ― an explosive yield greater than that of the “Little Boy” atom bomb by a factor of 3,500. Literally translated as “King of Bombs,” this monster atomic bomb, designed by the Soviet Union, generated a fireball that reached a diameter of 2.5 miles (4 km), and a mushroom cloud that rose over 40 miles (60 km) into the atmosphere. The blast wave was felt over 620 miles away (over 1,000 km), and its shockwave was detected 2,500 miles away (4,000 km) from its source. To illustrate the increased scale of destructive power, if the same atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima was detonated in a major U.S. city like New York City, then 264,000 lives will be lost, along with an additional 512,000 injuries. Dropping the Tsar Bomba on the same city, would kill more than 7.6 million people, while injuring an additional 4.2 million.
60 years after the biggest nuclear test, nuclear weapons have become smaller and more compact ― a process of miniaturization that allows integration into various delivery systems. Some modern weapons are also designed with multiple warheads, with enhanced precision for guidance and targeting systems, allowing a single delivery vehicle to carry multiple independent nuclear payloads. Alongside high-yield strategic nuclear weapons, there has been significant development of non-strategic, or tactical nuclear weapons designed for limited use scenarios. These weapons are generally of lower yield and intended for use on the battlefield i.e., strikes against relatively close and specific targets that minimize collateral damage affecting the civilian population. But despite sometimes being referred to as “small nukes”, these weapons still cause devastating destruction. The explosive yield of tactical nuclear weapons today ranges from anywhere below 1,000 tons (1 KT or kiloton) of TNT to above 100,000 tons (100 KT or kilotons) of TNT: the high-end number surpasses the yield of the “Little Boy” atomic bomb of 15,000 tons of TNT by more than 6 times. Most portable weapons have a yield of about 1 kiloton (KT), which is equivalent to the 1,000 tons of TNT. This magnitude of detonation is not large enough to destroy a city, but large enough to destroy a large building and much of a city block. In the US nuclear arsenal, the US has nuclear weapons with the explosive power a fraction of the Hiroshima bomb, as well as weapons that go all the way up to almost 100 times the power of the Hiroshima bomb. The US had much more powerful weapons in the past, but it slowly retired those―because as missiles became more accurate, you didn’t need so much explosive power.
Nine countries now have nuclear weapons, with the United States and Russia possessing about 90% of the world’s nearly 13,000 weapons. At the same time, China’s nuclear arsenal is rapidly increasing, potentially to 1,500 warheads by 2035 (China currently has more than 400 nuclear warheads). Diplomatic relations between Washington and Moscow have plummeted. While U.S. and China relations are at a historic low. Tensions between India and Pakistan ― both nuclear-armed countries ― and tensions between India and China continue to simmer. North Korea’s nuclear program is advancing. Unfortunately, public awareness of all these steadily increasing threats is very low, which is why many nuclear experts fear we could be sleepwalking into a nuclear disaster. You might be tempted to think you would be safe if nuclear weapons were used halfway across the globe from your location. Sure, you would be able to avoid the immediate blast effects, but you would experience the after-effects. There is significant evidence that the entire globe could be impacted by even a small-scale nuclear war.
As Our Lord said: “You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom! Now all these are the beginnings of sorrows. See that you be not troubled. Fear not! For these things must come to pass, for such things must needs be―but the end is not yet!” (Matthew 24:6-8; Mark 13:7-8). Our Lady echoed Our Lord at her apparitions: “France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. Then a general war will follow which will be appalling― a formidable and frightful war, in which both native and foreign blood will flow, including that of secular and regular priests, as well as that of other religious! Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy! ... Blood will flow on all sides! ... This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph … There will be occasions when all will seem to be lost and paralyzed ... People will believe that all is lost ... Men will beat their heads against walls, call for their death, yet death will constitute their torment!”
What Hope is There?
It all sounds so hopeless! What on earth can we do? It is, quite frankly, humanly impossible to do anything with regard to the current downward spiraling trajectory of the world! Yes―it is impossible―but as Our Lord says: “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27) … “With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible!” (Matthew 19:26) … “With men it is impossible, but not with God―for all things are possible with God!’” (Mark 10:27) ― and, as the Archangel Gabriel said to Our Lady: “No word shall be impossible with God” (Luke 1:37).
Yes, humanly speaking, all is lost―because we are ultimately fighting humans but demons. Sure―we see evil people all around and there are many more evil people behind the scenes. Yet, behind them all is Satan and his demons: “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). Therefore, mere human words and mere human actions are not sufficient―we need spiritual words (prayer) and spiritual actions (sacrifices) in order to fight this seemingly hopeless battle. The three theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity are what we must rely upon: “Having on the breastplate of Faith and Charity, and for a helmet the Hope of salvation” (1 Thessalonians 5:8). Hence Scripture says: “Put you on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil! … Take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day and to stand in all things perfect! Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth; and having on the breastplate of justice; and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. In all things taking the shield of Faith, with which you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one! And take unto you the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God. By all prayer and supplication―praying at all times in the spirit” (Ephesians 6:11-18).
For certain, we are in a battle―as Sister Lucia of Fatima said: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them! … For this reason, Father, it is my mission not just to speak about the material punishments, that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to also tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin. We should not wait for a call to the world from Rome, on the part of the Holy Father, to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No―Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed! So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway.” (Sister Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Heavenly Hope―Heavenly Help
Yet our hope must be in God and in Our Lady―as she herself said at Fatima: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” (July 1917). At Akita, she essentially says the same thing: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!” (Akita, Japan, 1973). As Our Lady of Good Success she warns that those calamities will be so great that “there will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed!” At La Salette she added: “People will believe that all is lost!”
It is easy to get discouraged these days―but things are only going to get worse. We have not yet been hit by the prophesied wars, plagues, famines, earthquakes, floods, etc. The widespread persecution of the Church has not yet broken out. Though we might think things are bad―they are nowhere near what is to come! Our sentiments might be like those expressed in Holy Scripture―we might feel abandoned by God: “My days are consumed without any hope!” (Job 7:6) … “He has destroyed me on every side and I am lost; and He has taken away my hope!” (Job 19:10) … “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost, and we are cut off!” (Ezechiel 37:11).
It is at times such as this that our virtue of Hope must surface―not hope in man; not a hope in human solutions; but a hope in God, Our Lady and Heaven. “Trust not thyself!” (Ecclesiasticus 7:28) … “Trust not in a prince!” (Micheas 7:5) … “Put not your trust in princes!” (Psalm 145:2) … “It is good to trust in the Lord, rather than to trust in princes!” (Psalm 117:9). “We should not trust in ourselves, but in God” (2 Corinthians 1:9). Holy Mother Church places the following words of Scripture in Our Lady’s mouth: “I am the mother of holy hope! … In me is all hope!” (Epistle for Our Lady of Mount Carmel, July 16th; taken from Ecclesiasticus 24:24-25). Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace―distributing all of God’s graces―and it is the grace of God that we must hope and trust: “Hope in grace!” (2 Thessalonians 2:15) ― and it is the Introit or Entrance Hymn for the Mass of the Immaculate Heart of Mary that says: “Let us go therefore with confidence to the throne of grace―so that we may obtain mercy and find grace…” (Hebrews 4:16).
Hence the saints tell us to have great confidence and hope in Mary. St. Bernard writes: “When the storm of temptation arises, when you are midst the reefs and shoals of tribulation, fix your gaze upon the Star of the Sea―call upon Mary! If tossed by the rising tide of pride and ambition, if lost upon the troubled waters of scandal and contention―look then at the Star, invoke her name! Do the billows of anger, of avarice, of lust batter against your soul―cast thy eyes upon Mary! Does the greatness of your crime fill your soul with terror? Does your wretched conscience beat you down in shame and the fear of judgment paralyze your heart?―then, when about to sink to the depths of despondency, to plunge headlong into despair, then think of Mary! In perils and in sorrows and in fears―think of her, call upon her name! Let her name be ever on your lips and the thought of her be ever in your heart! Follow her―so that the power of her intercession may attend to your needs! Imitate her―for in her footsteps you cannot go astray! Call upon her―and you will not despair! Think of her―and you cannot fail. If she holds you by the hand―how can you fall? Under her protection you shall know no fear! Under her guidance you shall not falter! Under her patronage you shall surely reach the goal!” (St. Bernard of Clairvaux).
Lose Hope and You Lose! Hope When It’s Hopeless!
In a certain sense, Hope is a test to see if your Faith is real. Hope is an extension of Faith from the theoretical field into the practical field. Faith must necessarily grow into Hope―because a seed must grow and bear fruit, rather than merely remain a seed forever. When the Bible speaks of “faith”, it often means a “practical faith”, a faith that has moved someone to do something―often without any guarantee of success. This biblical “faith” could be called a “confident faith”, a “trusting faith”, a “hoping faith”―which confidently trusts and hopes despite the darkness, the uncertainty, the unknown and the lack of certitude and guarantees. This double aspect of biblical faith is implied when Our Lord said: “Why did you doubt? O ye of little faith!” (Matthew 14:31) … “Why are you fearful, O ye of little faith?” (Matthew 8:26). Our theoretical Faith in God is frequently tested to see if it is a real, growing, practical and courageous Faith in the many uncertainties, doubts, risks, persecutions, fears and ups-and-downs on the battlefield of life. We move onwards through all these with a Faith that takes the next step forward in the darkness with trust and hope in God.
Hence we see this “double-barreled” combination of Faith and Hope in many of cases where persons came to Jesus seeking some kind of help―they had faith and believed that He could provide what they were asking for; and they had hope and confidence that He would actually show them mercy and do what they were asking for.
“And behold a woman who was troubled with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind him, and touched the hem of his garment―for she said within herself: ‘If I shall touch only His garment, I shall be healed!’ But Jesus turning and seeing her, said: ‘Be of good heart, daughter! Thy faith has made thee whole!’ And the woman was made whole from that hour” (Matthew 9:20-22).
“As he went out of Jericho, with His disciples, Bartimeus the blind man, sat by the way side begging. When he had heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth passing by, began to cry out, and to say: ‘Jesus! Son of David! Have mercy on me!’ And many rebuked him, that he might hold his peace―but he cried a great deal the more: ‘Son of David! Have mercy on me!’ And Jesus, standing still, commanded him to be called. And they call the blind man, saying to him: ‘Arise! He calls thee!’ Who casting off his garment leaped up, and came to Him. And Jesus said to him: ‘What do you want that I should do to thee?’ And the blind man said to Him: ‘Rabboni, that I may see!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way! Thy faith has made thee whole!’ And immediately he saw and followed Jesus along the way” (Mark 10:52).
“And behold they brought to Jesus one sick of the palsy lying in a bed. And Jesus, seeing their faith, said to the man sick of the palsy: ‘Be of good heart, son, thy sins are forgiven thee!’” Matthew 9:2).
“And as Jesus entered into a certain town, there met him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus! Master! Have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass that, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before the feet of Jesus, giving thanks―and this was a Samaritan. And Jesus said: ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the other nine? There is no one found to return and give glory to God, but this stranger!’ And He said to him: ‘Arise! Go thy way! For thy faith has made thee whole!’” (Luke 17:12-19).
“And behold a woman of Canaan, came crying out, and said to Jesus: ‘Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou son of David! My daughter is grievously troubled by the devil!’ Who answered her not a word. And His disciples came and besought Him, saying: ‘Send her away! For she cries after us!’ And Jesus said to her: ‘I was not sent except to the sheep that are lost of the house of Israel!’ But she came and adored Him, saying: ‘Lord! Help me!’ Who answering, said: ‘It is not good to take the bread of the children, and to cast it to the dogs!’ But she said: ‘Yes, Lord; but the dogs also eat of the crumbs that fall from the table of their masters!’ Then Jesus said to her: ‘O woman, great is thy faith! Be it done to thee as you want!’ And her daughter was cured from that hour” (Matthew 15:22-28).
Scripture Tells Us to Hope and Trust in God
“Abraham, against all hope, believed in hope, so that he might be made the father of many nations” (Romans 4:18).
“Machabeus ever trusted with all hope that God would help them” (2 Machabees 15:7).
“They called upon God in the battle and He heard them, because they had put their faith in Him” (1 Paralipomenon 5:20).
Yet Hope is not Hope if what is hoped for is guaranteed―for then it would be certitude about attaining something, and not a hope for attaining something. “We are saved by hope! But hope that is seen, is not hope! For what a man sees, why does he hope for it? We hope for that which we see not!” (Romans 8:24). “We hope for that which we see not!” (Romans 8:25).
Yet there is a kind of certitude about hope in the sense that we are told that God hears those who hope in Him: “God has not forsaken them that hope in Him!” (Judith 13:17). “The Lord takes pleasure in them that hope in His mercy!” (Psalm 146:11). “The Lord is good to them that hope in Him!” (Lamentations 3:25). “Hope in the Name of the Lord and lean upon God!” (Isaias 50:10). “Hope in thy God always!” (Osee 12:6). “Look for hope from God!” (2 Machabees 7:14). “God is a shield to them that hope in Him!” (Proverbs 30:5). “The Lord shall be the hope and strength of His people!” (Joel 3:16). “He that fears the Lord shall tremble at nothing and shall not be afraid―for the Lord is his hope!” (Ecclesiasticus 34:16). “Do manfully and let your heart be strengthened, all ye that hope in the Lord!” (Psalm 30:25).
We need to convince ourselves of the power of this hope in God: “Why are you sad, O my soul? Why do you trouble me? Hope in God!” (Psalm 41:6). “It is good for me to put my hope in the Lord God!” (Psalm 72:28). “What is my hope? Is it not the Lord?” (Psalm 38:8). “O God, Who art mighty above all, hear the voice of them that have no other hope, and deliver us from the hand of the wicked, and deliver me from my fear!” (Esther 14:19). “In God have I hoped―I will not fear what man can do to me!” (Psalm 55:11). “We hope in the living God!” (1 Timothy 4:10). “Happy is he that has not fallen from his hope!” (Ecclesiasticus 14:2). “Rejoicing in hope. Patient in tribulation. Instant in prayer” (Romans 12:12). “The God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing; so that you may abound in hope!” (Romans 15:13).
Nine countries now have nuclear weapons, with the United States and Russia possessing about 90% of the world’s nearly 13,000 weapons. At the same time, China’s nuclear arsenal is rapidly increasing, potentially to 1,500 warheads by 2035 (China currently has more than 400 nuclear warheads). Diplomatic relations between Washington and Moscow have plummeted. While U.S. and China relations are at a historic low. Tensions between India and Pakistan ― both nuclear-armed countries ― and tensions between India and China continue to simmer. North Korea’s nuclear program is advancing. Unfortunately, public awareness of all these steadily increasing threats is very low, which is why many nuclear experts fear we could be sleepwalking into a nuclear disaster. You might be tempted to think you would be safe if nuclear weapons were used halfway across the globe from your location. Sure, you would be able to avoid the immediate blast effects, but you would experience the after-effects. There is significant evidence that the entire globe could be impacted by even a small-scale nuclear war.
As Our Lord said: “You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom! Now all these are the beginnings of sorrows. See that you be not troubled. Fear not! For these things must come to pass, for such things must needs be―but the end is not yet!” (Matthew 24:6-8; Mark 13:7-8). Our Lady echoed Our Lord at her apparitions: “France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. Then a general war will follow which will be appalling― a formidable and frightful war, in which both native and foreign blood will flow, including that of secular and regular priests, as well as that of other religious! Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy! ... Blood will flow on all sides! ... This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph … There will be occasions when all will seem to be lost and paralyzed ... People will believe that all is lost ... Men will beat their heads against walls, call for their death, yet death will constitute their torment!”
What Hope is There?
It all sounds so hopeless! What on earth can we do? It is, quite frankly, humanly impossible to do anything with regard to the current downward spiraling trajectory of the world! Yes―it is impossible―but as Our Lord says: “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27) … “With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible!” (Matthew 19:26) … “With men it is impossible, but not with God―for all things are possible with God!’” (Mark 10:27) ― and, as the Archangel Gabriel said to Our Lady: “No word shall be impossible with God” (Luke 1:37).
Yes, humanly speaking, all is lost―because we are ultimately fighting humans but demons. Sure―we see evil people all around and there are many more evil people behind the scenes. Yet, behind them all is Satan and his demons: “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). Therefore, mere human words and mere human actions are not sufficient―we need spiritual words (prayer) and spiritual actions (sacrifices) in order to fight this seemingly hopeless battle. The three theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity are what we must rely upon: “Having on the breastplate of Faith and Charity, and for a helmet the Hope of salvation” (1 Thessalonians 5:8). Hence Scripture says: “Put you on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil! … Take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day and to stand in all things perfect! Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth; and having on the breastplate of justice; and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. In all things taking the shield of Faith, with which you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one! And take unto you the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God. By all prayer and supplication―praying at all times in the spirit” (Ephesians 6:11-18).
For certain, we are in a battle―as Sister Lucia of Fatima said: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them! … For this reason, Father, it is my mission not just to speak about the material punishments, that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to also tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin. We should not wait for a call to the world from Rome, on the part of the Holy Father, to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No―Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed! So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway.” (Sister Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Heavenly Hope―Heavenly Help
Yet our hope must be in God and in Our Lady―as she herself said at Fatima: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” (July 1917). At Akita, she essentially says the same thing: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!” (Akita, Japan, 1973). As Our Lady of Good Success she warns that those calamities will be so great that “there will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed!” At La Salette she added: “People will believe that all is lost!”
It is easy to get discouraged these days―but things are only going to get worse. We have not yet been hit by the prophesied wars, plagues, famines, earthquakes, floods, etc. The widespread persecution of the Church has not yet broken out. Though we might think things are bad―they are nowhere near what is to come! Our sentiments might be like those expressed in Holy Scripture―we might feel abandoned by God: “My days are consumed without any hope!” (Job 7:6) … “He has destroyed me on every side and I am lost; and He has taken away my hope!” (Job 19:10) … “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost, and we are cut off!” (Ezechiel 37:11).
It is at times such as this that our virtue of Hope must surface―not hope in man; not a hope in human solutions; but a hope in God, Our Lady and Heaven. “Trust not thyself!” (Ecclesiasticus 7:28) … “Trust not in a prince!” (Micheas 7:5) … “Put not your trust in princes!” (Psalm 145:2) … “It is good to trust in the Lord, rather than to trust in princes!” (Psalm 117:9). “We should not trust in ourselves, but in God” (2 Corinthians 1:9). Holy Mother Church places the following words of Scripture in Our Lady’s mouth: “I am the mother of holy hope! … In me is all hope!” (Epistle for Our Lady of Mount Carmel, July 16th; taken from Ecclesiasticus 24:24-25). Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace―distributing all of God’s graces―and it is the grace of God that we must hope and trust: “Hope in grace!” (2 Thessalonians 2:15) ― and it is the Introit or Entrance Hymn for the Mass of the Immaculate Heart of Mary that says: “Let us go therefore with confidence to the throne of grace―so that we may obtain mercy and find grace…” (Hebrews 4:16).
Hence the saints tell us to have great confidence and hope in Mary. St. Bernard writes: “When the storm of temptation arises, when you are midst the reefs and shoals of tribulation, fix your gaze upon the Star of the Sea―call upon Mary! If tossed by the rising tide of pride and ambition, if lost upon the troubled waters of scandal and contention―look then at the Star, invoke her name! Do the billows of anger, of avarice, of lust batter against your soul―cast thy eyes upon Mary! Does the greatness of your crime fill your soul with terror? Does your wretched conscience beat you down in shame and the fear of judgment paralyze your heart?―then, when about to sink to the depths of despondency, to plunge headlong into despair, then think of Mary! In perils and in sorrows and in fears―think of her, call upon her name! Let her name be ever on your lips and the thought of her be ever in your heart! Follow her―so that the power of her intercession may attend to your needs! Imitate her―for in her footsteps you cannot go astray! Call upon her―and you will not despair! Think of her―and you cannot fail. If she holds you by the hand―how can you fall? Under her protection you shall know no fear! Under her guidance you shall not falter! Under her patronage you shall surely reach the goal!” (St. Bernard of Clairvaux).
Lose Hope and You Lose! Hope When It’s Hopeless!
In a certain sense, Hope is a test to see if your Faith is real. Hope is an extension of Faith from the theoretical field into the practical field. Faith must necessarily grow into Hope―because a seed must grow and bear fruit, rather than merely remain a seed forever. When the Bible speaks of “faith”, it often means a “practical faith”, a faith that has moved someone to do something―often without any guarantee of success. This biblical “faith” could be called a “confident faith”, a “trusting faith”, a “hoping faith”―which confidently trusts and hopes despite the darkness, the uncertainty, the unknown and the lack of certitude and guarantees. This double aspect of biblical faith is implied when Our Lord said: “Why did you doubt? O ye of little faith!” (Matthew 14:31) … “Why are you fearful, O ye of little faith?” (Matthew 8:26). Our theoretical Faith in God is frequently tested to see if it is a real, growing, practical and courageous Faith in the many uncertainties, doubts, risks, persecutions, fears and ups-and-downs on the battlefield of life. We move onwards through all these with a Faith that takes the next step forward in the darkness with trust and hope in God.
Hence we see this “double-barreled” combination of Faith and Hope in many of cases where persons came to Jesus seeking some kind of help―they had faith and believed that He could provide what they were asking for; and they had hope and confidence that He would actually show them mercy and do what they were asking for.
“And behold a woman who was troubled with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind him, and touched the hem of his garment―for she said within herself: ‘If I shall touch only His garment, I shall be healed!’ But Jesus turning and seeing her, said: ‘Be of good heart, daughter! Thy faith has made thee whole!’ And the woman was made whole from that hour” (Matthew 9:20-22).
“As he went out of Jericho, with His disciples, Bartimeus the blind man, sat by the way side begging. When he had heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth passing by, began to cry out, and to say: ‘Jesus! Son of David! Have mercy on me!’ And many rebuked him, that he might hold his peace―but he cried a great deal the more: ‘Son of David! Have mercy on me!’ And Jesus, standing still, commanded him to be called. And they call the blind man, saying to him: ‘Arise! He calls thee!’ Who casting off his garment leaped up, and came to Him. And Jesus said to him: ‘What do you want that I should do to thee?’ And the blind man said to Him: ‘Rabboni, that I may see!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way! Thy faith has made thee whole!’ And immediately he saw and followed Jesus along the way” (Mark 10:52).
“And behold they brought to Jesus one sick of the palsy lying in a bed. And Jesus, seeing their faith, said to the man sick of the palsy: ‘Be of good heart, son, thy sins are forgiven thee!’” Matthew 9:2).
“And as Jesus entered into a certain town, there met him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus! Master! Have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass that, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before the feet of Jesus, giving thanks―and this was a Samaritan. And Jesus said: ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the other nine? There is no one found to return and give glory to God, but this stranger!’ And He said to him: ‘Arise! Go thy way! For thy faith has made thee whole!’” (Luke 17:12-19).
“And behold a woman of Canaan, came crying out, and said to Jesus: ‘Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou son of David! My daughter is grievously troubled by the devil!’ Who answered her not a word. And His disciples came and besought Him, saying: ‘Send her away! For she cries after us!’ And Jesus said to her: ‘I was not sent except to the sheep that are lost of the house of Israel!’ But she came and adored Him, saying: ‘Lord! Help me!’ Who answering, said: ‘It is not good to take the bread of the children, and to cast it to the dogs!’ But she said: ‘Yes, Lord; but the dogs also eat of the crumbs that fall from the table of their masters!’ Then Jesus said to her: ‘O woman, great is thy faith! Be it done to thee as you want!’ And her daughter was cured from that hour” (Matthew 15:22-28).
Scripture Tells Us to Hope and Trust in God
“Abraham, against all hope, believed in hope, so that he might be made the father of many nations” (Romans 4:18).
“Machabeus ever trusted with all hope that God would help them” (2 Machabees 15:7).
“They called upon God in the battle and He heard them, because they had put their faith in Him” (1 Paralipomenon 5:20).
Yet Hope is not Hope if what is hoped for is guaranteed―for then it would be certitude about attaining something, and not a hope for attaining something. “We are saved by hope! But hope that is seen, is not hope! For what a man sees, why does he hope for it? We hope for that which we see not!” (Romans 8:24). “We hope for that which we see not!” (Romans 8:25).
Yet there is a kind of certitude about hope in the sense that we are told that God hears those who hope in Him: “God has not forsaken them that hope in Him!” (Judith 13:17). “The Lord takes pleasure in them that hope in His mercy!” (Psalm 146:11). “The Lord is good to them that hope in Him!” (Lamentations 3:25). “Hope in the Name of the Lord and lean upon God!” (Isaias 50:10). “Hope in thy God always!” (Osee 12:6). “Look for hope from God!” (2 Machabees 7:14). “God is a shield to them that hope in Him!” (Proverbs 30:5). “The Lord shall be the hope and strength of His people!” (Joel 3:16). “He that fears the Lord shall tremble at nothing and shall not be afraid―for the Lord is his hope!” (Ecclesiasticus 34:16). “Do manfully and let your heart be strengthened, all ye that hope in the Lord!” (Psalm 30:25).
We need to convince ourselves of the power of this hope in God: “Why are you sad, O my soul? Why do you trouble me? Hope in God!” (Psalm 41:6). “It is good for me to put my hope in the Lord God!” (Psalm 72:28). “What is my hope? Is it not the Lord?” (Psalm 38:8). “O God, Who art mighty above all, hear the voice of them that have no other hope, and deliver us from the hand of the wicked, and deliver me from my fear!” (Esther 14:19). “In God have I hoped―I will not fear what man can do to me!” (Psalm 55:11). “We hope in the living God!” (1 Timothy 4:10). “Happy is he that has not fallen from his hope!” (Ecclesiasticus 14:2). “Rejoicing in hope. Patient in tribulation. Instant in prayer” (Romans 12:12). “The God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing; so that you may abound in hope!” (Romans 15:13).
Article 12
Sunday to Wednesday, October 20th to 23rd
A Lack of Faith Means a Lack of Help
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday to Wednesday, October 20th to 23rd
A Lack of Faith Means a Lack of Help
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Powerful but Weak
Faith can be powerful and it can be weak. Faith can produce miracles, but Faith can also lead to damnation. Faith is like powerful chemical that can have wonderful effects, yet, if not used correctly, it can be dangerous. Remember―the lowest pit and most intense fire of Hell is reserved for Catholics! They had the Faith, but did not use it as they should have used it!
In Holy Scripture we see incredible miracles that have been brought about by Faith. It is not for nothing that Our Lord says: “Go, and as thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!” (Matthew 8:13) … “According to your Faith, be it done unto you!” (Matthew 9:29) ... “Go thy way, thy Faith hath made thee whole!” (Mark 10:52) … “O great is thy Faith! Be it done to thee as thou wilt!” (Matthew 15:28) ... “Thy Faith has made thee safe! Go in peace!” (Luke 7:50) … “All things, whatsoever you ask for when you pray, believe that you shall receive and they shall come unto you!” (Mark 11:24) … “Amen I say to you, if you have Faith like a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain ― ‘Remove from here to there!’ ― and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you!” (Matthew 17:19). After miraculously making the fig tree wither, “Jesus said to them: ‘Amen, I say to you, if you shall have Faith, and stagger not, not only this of the fig tree shall you do, but also if you shall say to this mountain ― “Take up and cast thyself into the sea!” ― it shall be done!’” (Matthew 21:21).
Our Lord’s words from the Gospels could well be applied to us today: “And He said to them: ‘Why are you fearful? Have you no Faith yet?’” (Mark 4:40). “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6). Jesus had just miraculously calmed the tremendous storm on the lake―and His Apostles were afraid seeing this great manifestation of power. At Christ’s bidding, St. Peter was miraculously walking on the stormy waters of the lake―until he began to fear and doubt―at which point he started to sink into the waves. “Immediately Jesus, stretching forth His hand, took hold of him and said to him: ‘O thou of little Faith, why didst thou doubt?’” (Matthew 14:31).
Today, we are surrounded by many storms―do we have the required Faith to provoke God to step-in and dispel them? We are told: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:16). “Who is he that overcomes the world? He that believes!” (1 John 5:5). “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world and this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4).
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this need for Faith, the power of Faith and the victory of Faith: “The just and faithful client of Mary lives by the Faith and not by natural sentiment … She communicates to him her Faith … Our Blessed Lady will give you also a portion of her Faith, which was the greatest of all faiths that ever were on Earth. Greater than the Faith of all the patriarchs, prophets, apostles and saints put together. Now that she is reigning in Heaven, she no longer exercises this Faith, because she sees all things clearly in God by the light of glory. Nevertheless, with the consent of the Most High, in entering into glory she did not lose her Faith. She kept it for her faithful servants in the Church Militant. The more, then, that you gain the favor of that august Princess and faithful Virgin, the more will you act by pure Faith; a pure Faith which will make you care hardly at all about sensible consolations and extraordinary favors; a lively Faith animated by charity, which will enable you to perform all your actions from the motive of pure love; a Faith firm and immovable as a rock, through which you will rest quiet and constant in the midst of storms and hurricanes; a Faith active and piercing, which like a mysterious passkey, will give you entrance into all the mysteries of Jesus, into the last ends of man, and into the Heart of God Himself; a courageous Faith, which will enable you to undertake and carry out without hesitation great things for God and for the salvation of souls; lastly, a Faith which will be your blazing torch, your divine life, your hidden treasure of divine wisdom and your omnipotent arm; which you will use to enlighten those who are in the darkness of the shadow of death, to inflame those who are lukewarm and who have need of the heated gold of charity, to give life to those who are dead in sin, to touch and overthrow, by your meek and powerful words, the hearts of marble and the cedars of Lebanon; and finally, to resist the devil and all the enemies of salvation.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Where is Your Faith? What is the State of Your Faith?
So where is your Faith? What state is it in? Have you buried you Faith like the unprofitable servant in the parable of the talents? He had no profit to show for the talent the Lord had entrusted to him―what profit can you show the Lord for the gift of Faith that He entrusted to you at your Baptism? The unprofitable servant did not lose the talent that was entrusted to him, but he did not put it use and did not make a profit on it. Likewise, you might not have lost the Faith that God entrusted to you―but can you show a profit from it? Having the Faith is not enough―you have to do something with it. “If a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead―so also Faith without works is dead! … Will you know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead?” (James 2:14-26).
Fr. Frederick Faber, in the Preface of his own personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary from the original French into English, writes: “Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It has no Faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls, which might be saints, wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized. Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow, which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin, that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines! If Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith!”
Already back in the Middle-Ages, a mystic asked Our Lord why we no longer see the tremendous miracles being performed that we read about in Holy Scripture. Our Lord replied that it was due to a lack of Faith! What He means is not a lack of Faith in the sense of believing what the Church teaches, but a lack of Faith in sense of the belief, hope and confidence that God will perform a miracle. That kind of Faith only comes from a deep attachment to God, a deep love of God―but you cannot love what you do not know. The Little Flower of Lisieux, St. Thérèse of the Infant Jesus, used to say: “Jesus is so little loved because He is so little known!”
The Seed of Faith and Growth of Faith
Our Lord compares both Faith and the Kingdom of Heaven to the mustard seed. We can combine both statements to refer to the seed of Faith and the growth of Faith: “Jesus said to them: ‘Because of your unbelief. For, amen I say to you, if you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain ― “Remove from here to there!” ― and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you.” (Matthew 17:19). “And the Lord said: ‘If you had Faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you might say to this mulberry tree ― “Be thou rooted up, and be thou transplanted into the sea!” ― and it would obey you!’” (Luke 17:6). “To what is the Kingdom of God like, and whereunto shall I resemble it? It is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and cast into his garden, and it grew and became a great tree, and the birds of the air lodged in the branches thereof!” (Luke 13:18-19). “The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field―which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof!” (Matthew 13:31-32). “To what shall we liken the Kingdom of God? Or to what parable shall we compare it? It is as a grain of mustard seed― which, when it is sown in the earth, is less than all the seeds that are in the earth. But when it is sown, it grows up, and becomes greater than all herbs, and shoots out great branches, so that the birds of the air may dwell under the shadow thereof!” (Mark 4:30-32).
Faith Must Lead to Love
If you ask any well-versed Protestant what you need to be saved, you will more than likely hear a one word answer: “Faith.” They quote Ephesians 2:8-9 with conviction: “For by grace you have been saved through Faith!” Catholics, of course, agree with this scriptural teaching. However, Catholic disagree with the Protestant assertion that we are saved by Faith “alone” ― because it implies that Hope and Charity are optional. The theological virtue of Charity cannot exist in our hearts, however, without both Faith and Hope. We cannot love God if we do not know Him and believe in Him through Faith, or trust in Him through Hope. Our love of God is only as strong as our Faith and Hope in Him.
St. Thomas Aquinas showed how the three theological virtues are related in the order of precedence and the order of perfection. In the order of precedence, Faith comes first, followed by Hope and then Charity. In St. Thomas’s view, a man loves a thing because he apprehends it as his good. When we believe a person to be good, we develop hope in that person and then proceed to love him or her. But in the order of perfection, Charity precedes Faith and Hope, for it is through Charity that they reach their fullness as virtues. Hence, Charity is the “mother and the root of all the virtues.”
St. Thomas Aquinas’s view is grounded in Scripture. St. Paul taught that of all the theological virtues the greatest is Charity (1 Corinthians 13:13). Charity never fails, because the goal of our Faith and what we Hope for is the presence of God — and “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8). Thus, although Faith and Hope can exist without Charity, they are not perfect and Christian without Charity. Faith is genuine only if crowned by Charity―for Faith is not meant to stand alone, it is a springboard that should lead to Charity. God should be at the core of both Faith and Charity: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Faith is not an end in itself―it is merely the beginning of a journey that needs to end in charity and Heaven. Faith is a seed that God plants in our soul and He requires that this Faith grow so as to produce fruits of Hope (confidence and trust) as well as charity and love (of both God and neighbor). Charity is the ultimate work of Faith: “Faith that worketh by Charity” (Galatians 5:6) … “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:26) ... “If I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:2).
The interesting point is that it is possible for us to have Faith, but to lack Charity. Faith is believing what God reveals to us. But even the demons believe! “You believe that there is one God. You do well! But the devils also believe and tremble!” (James 2:19). Charity requires we interiorly embrace what God teaches and let it transform our lives. This is an important point to understand―because we can often struggle with this same situation. At times we can find we believe something on the level of Faith, but are not living it in practice. Both are required for a life of authentic holiness. Being a Christian means you let your Faith sink from your head down to your heart and will! Holy Scripture often mentions Faith and Charity in tandem―like brother and sister, or husband and wife: “Hearing of thy Charity and Faith, which you have in the Lord Jesus” (Philemon 1:5) … “Timothy came to us from you, and related to us your Faith and Charity” (1 Thessalonians 3:6) … “Be sober, having on the breastplate of Faith and Charity” (1 Thessalonians 5:8) … a “Faith that works by Charity” (Galatians 5:6) … “I know thy Faith and thy Charity” (Apocalypse 2:19) … “We are bound to give thanks always to God for you, because your Faith grows exceedingly, and the Charity of everyone of you towards each other, abounds” (2 Thessalonians 1:3). “Now the end of the commandment is Charity, from an unfeigned Faith!” (1 Timothy 1:5). “May Christ dwell by Faith in your hearts; being rooted and founded in Charity” (Ephesians 3:17). “May hearts may be comforted, being instructed in Charity, unto the fullness of understanding, unto the knowledge of the mystery of God the Father and of Christ Jesus!” (Colossians 2:2). “We have known and have believed [by Faith] the Charity, which God has to us. God is Charity: and he that abides in Charity, abides in God, and God in him!” (1 John 4:16). What more can you want but God? “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8) and so if you want God, you need Charity. Faith is your springboard to Charity―for we cannot love what we do not know.
Our Faith is primarily about knowing God―and the more you know somebody who is all good and perfect, the more you love them, the more you seek them out, the more you turn to them, the more you rely upon them―that attitude is, more often than not, what produces the miracle when it is asked for. Don’t we tend to go the extra mile and do more for those people who love us and are close to us? The same applies to God. “Thou hast not forsaken them that love Thee!” (Daniel 14:37) … “The eyes of God are upon them that love Him” (Ecclesiasticus 34:15) … “The Lord keeps all them that love Him!” (Psalm 144:20) … “This we know―when we love God and keep His commandments” (1 John 5:2) … “I love them that love Me!” (Proverbs 8:17) … “showing mercy unto thousands to them that love Me and keep My commandments” (Exodus 20:6) … “Eye has not seen; nor has the ear heard; neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9).
Faith Moves Mountains―Charity Moves Hearts
In these multiple current crises that rise up in both the Church and the world, we need a miracle to save us. Things are so bad that no human endeavor, no human plan, no human skill, no human force can turn things around. We find ourselves―like the Apostles tossed about in their boat on the stormy lake while Our Lord slept through it all―screaming: “Lord! Save us! We perish!” (Matthew 8:25). “And behold a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves, but Jesus was asleep. And they came to Him and awakened Him, saying: ‘Lord! Save us! We perish!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful, O ye of little Faith?’ Then rising up He commanded the winds and the sea, and there came a great calm” (Matthew 8:26). Speaking of the End Times―which Our Lady of Fatima said we had already entered―Our Lord says: “By reason of the confusion of the roaring of the sea and of the waves, men withering away for fear and expectation of what shall come upon the whole world. For the powers of Heaven shall be moved!” (Luke 21:26).
Pope John Paul II made some comments along these lines when asked, in 1980, about the contents of the Third Secret of Fatima. The October 1981 issue of the German magazine, Stimme des Glaubens, reported that the Holy Father was asked: “What about the Third Secret of Fatima? Should it not have already been published by 1960?” Pope John Paul II replied: “Given the seriousness of the contents, my predecessors in the Petrine office diplomatically preferred to postpone publication, so as not to encourage the world power of Communism to make certain moves. On the other hand, it should be sufficient for all Christians to know this: if there is a message in which it is written that the oceans will flood whole areas of the Earth, and that, from one moment to the next, millions of people will perish, then truly the publication of such a message is no longer something to be so much desired. Many wish to know simply from curiosity and a taste for the sensational, but they forget that knowledge also implies responsibility. They only seek the satisfaction of their curiosity, and that is dangerous if at the same time they are not disposed to do something, and if they are convinced that it is impossible to do anything against evil. Here is the remedy against this evil―the Rosary. Pray! Pray, and ask for nothing more! Leave everything else to the Mother of God! We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ! … With your and my prayer it is possible to mitigate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectively renewed! How many times has the renewal of the Church sprung from blood! This time, too, it will not be otherwise! We must be strong and prepared, and trust in Christ and His Mother, and be very, very assiduous in praying the Rosary!”
The Legion of Mary―An Example of Faith and Love
As Holy Scripture tells us: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) … “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4) … “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12) … “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4) … “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6).
If you are at peace with the world, then you are at peace with the enemy of God―and thus you yourself become an enemy of God. “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). The Legion of Mary is an army of lay-people who fight the good fight of the Faith―and very successfully too! We can take a leaf out of the Legion of Mary Handbook to help forge a steely attitude that is necessary these days to fight the pervasive and perverting spirit of the world. Here are a few paragraphs from the Legion Handbook that deal particularly with some aspects of Faith and Charity (Love) that we have been discussing above:
“This [is] a time of particular peril for religion. The old armies of paganism and irreligion have been supplemented by that of militant atheism, which now dominates the landscape, spreads its corrupting influences in constantly widening circles, and it seems capable of engulfing the world. The aims of the Legion of Mary and of that other legion [the world] which ‘denies the only Sovereign Ruler and Our Lord Jesus Christ’ (Jude 1:4) are diametrically opposed. The Legionary scheme is in deliberate opposition to that empire of unbelief.
“The Legion is composed of souls who are united to the Virgin most Powerful. Moreover, it contains within itself great principles, and it knows how to apply them in effective ways. Their methods are somewhat similar. Each concentrates on the individual. Each has its own vivid idealism, which it seeks to impress upon all men with enthusiasm; not that empty enthusiasm which talks much, but an enthusiasm which talks but little, and pursues a thought-out plan of campaign. Each declares that it sets out to love and serve mankind. Each makes its campaign an instrument to a supreme purpose. That of the Legion is to bring God and religion to every soul; the avowed object of the other forces [the world] is to accomplish the very opposite.
“The Legion is doing simple acts of the love of God in man, and of the love of men for the sake of God; and in every place that love shows its power to stir and win hearts. Likewise, the materialistic systems profess the love and service of man. They have preached a hollow gospel of fraternity. Millions have believed that gospel. In its name, they deserted religion and submitted enthusiastically to despotisms. They were convinced that their new leaders loved them best; so they followed them, and now they are trying ardently to induce all mankind to join them. They seem to be in the ascendant. And yet the position is not a hopeless one. There is a way of bringing back to Faith those determined millions, and of saving countless other millions. That hope lies in the application of a great principle which rules the world, and which the St. John Vianney, the Curé of Ars, has stated thus: ‘The world belongs to him who loves it most, and who proves that love!’ Those millions will never listen to the enunciation of the truths of Faith. But they cannot help seeing, and being moved by a real Faith which operates through a real heroic love for all men. Convince them that the Church loves them most, and they will turn their back on those who rule them now. They will return to Faith in spite of everything. They will even lay down their lives for that Faith.
“No common love can conquer men thus. Neither will it be accomplished by a mediocre Catholicism which can hardly preserve itself. It can be done by a Catholicism which loves Christ its Lord with all its heart, and then sees Him and loves Him in all men of whatsoever description. But this supreme charity of Christ must be practiced on such a scale that they who look on are driven to admit that it is indeed a characteristic of the Church, and not merely the acts of sublime members of the Church. Therefore, it must be exhibited in the lives of the general body of the laity. But it seems a hopeless thing to fire the entire household of the Church with this exalted spirit? Yes, the task is herculean! So unending, indeed, are the perspectives of the problem, so infinite the hosts which possess the land, that even the courage of the strongest heart might well fail. But Mary is the heart of the Legion, and that heart is Faith and Love unutterable. So thinking, the Legion looks out over the world, and all at once excited hope is born: ‘The world belongs to him who loves it most.’ Then it turns to its great Queen, as it did at the beginning: ‘Lead us!’
“The Legion and militant materialism confront each other. Let us measure them up. The true motive-power of the materialistic system is its ruthless discipline working through its spy and informer network. This is so developed that the ordinary citizens feel that everything they do or say will be reported. Utilizing that instrument of universal fear, a tyrannical authority can impose its will on a whole nation. It is an efficient system, but a horrible one. A complete submission to that absolute control means the extinction of liberty and in the end of moral quality as well. ‘When these two forces, the Legion and that other one, come into conflict, the latter is able to kill and persecute, but it will fail to crush the spirit of the Legion. The Legionaries sustain the cruel treatment and, by keeping alive the flames of freedom and religion, must finally triumph.’ (Father Aedan McGrath). Nothing short of total mobilization of the Catholic people will avail to resist that domination. For this purpose the Legion of Mary possesses the perfect machinery, a fact admitted by the opposing army. But machinery by itself is useless without a sufficient driving-force. This motive-power lies in the Legion spirituality, which is a real appreciation of and reliance on the Holy Ghost and on True Devotion to His Spouse, the Blessed Virgin Mary, nurtured on the Bread of Life, the Eucharist.” (The Official Handbook of the Legion of Mary).
Our Faith is about Saving Souls
Canon Law tells us that the supreme law is the salvation of souls―which echoes Our Lord’s words: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Our purpose in life is save our own souls and to save as many other souls as we can―which is essentially what Our Lady of Fatima tried to tell us: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! ... Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners―for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, July & August of 1917).
That is what our Faith is all about―first and foremost about loving God; and then loving our neighbor (which includes the whole world). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). “If any man say: ‘I love God!’ and hates his brother―then he is a liar! For he that loves not his brother whom he sees, how can he love God Whom he sees not?” (1 John 4:20). Jesus says: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you, Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! Pray for them that persecute and calumniate you―so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you love them that love you, what reward shall you have?” (Matthew 5:43-46).
A true love of God is to seek what God seeks―which is the salvation of souls, no matter who they are, or how evil they are. A true love of neighbor is to seek the salvation of our neighbor so that they can obtain eternal happiness in Heaven―regardless of whether they are our friends or enemies. Is that what our life is all about? If we save the souls of others, then we will save our own souls: “Know that he who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20).
Fight not Fright―Fly and Fry
We all know the “elephant in the room” that we plainly see and are afraid to address or talk about―that “elephant in the room” is the fact most Catholic souls end up being damned. We are not talking about atheists, pagans or Protestants―we are talking about Catholics. It is frightening, it is unpleasant, it is discouraging, it can even be depressing―but that is how it is. Why is that the case? Does God not want to save them? Are there not enough rooms in Heaven to accommodate them? Is it too hard and difficult for someone to save their soul? Does God enjoy sending souls to Hell? That is “devil talk”―that is what Satan would like you believe?
The truth is the exact opposite―as Holy Scripture overwhelmingly states: “God will [“to will” means “to want”] have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men, … that He might redeem us” (Titus 2:11-14). “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9). “God declares unto men, that all should everywhere do penance!” (Acts 17:30). “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but so that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “The Father hath sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32).
Don’t you think that it is only fair on the part of God that the more we help sinners save their souls, then the more help God will also give to us; and that the less help we give sinners in saving their souls, then the less help God will give us? Of course it true, fair and right! Holy Scripture often says that―though in different words: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:8) … “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly―and he who sows in blessings, shall also reap blessings!” (2 Corinthians 9:6). We might be tempted to use Cain’s lame excuse when God asked Cain where his brother Abel was―whom Cain had murdered: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). The truth of the matter is that―yes, we are the keepers of our “brothers” and that is why Our Lady asks that we pray and sacrifice ourselves for the conversion of our sinful “brothers” so that they do not end up in Hell. If we fail to “keep” our brothers from falling into Hell, then the words that God spoke to Cain might also be addressed to us: “What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to me from the earth (or in this case, Hell). Now, therefore, cursed shalt thou be upon the Earth!” (Genesis 4:10-11).
We have not been created and placed upon this Earth to have fun and play games, to eat, drink and be merry! We are here to give glory to God; to save our souls (which glorifies God); and to help save the souls of others (which also glorifies God). Holy Scripture warns us not to fall into that trap―as did the Chosen People: “I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea! And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud and in the sea! And did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink―and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased―for they were overthrown in the desert! Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play!’ Now these things were done in a figure of us!” (1 Corinthians 10:1-7). We are not here to eat and drink, have fun and play―our purpose in life in much more serious than that!
Faith can be powerful and it can be weak. Faith can produce miracles, but Faith can also lead to damnation. Faith is like powerful chemical that can have wonderful effects, yet, if not used correctly, it can be dangerous. Remember―the lowest pit and most intense fire of Hell is reserved for Catholics! They had the Faith, but did not use it as they should have used it!
In Holy Scripture we see incredible miracles that have been brought about by Faith. It is not for nothing that Our Lord says: “Go, and as thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!” (Matthew 8:13) … “According to your Faith, be it done unto you!” (Matthew 9:29) ... “Go thy way, thy Faith hath made thee whole!” (Mark 10:52) … “O great is thy Faith! Be it done to thee as thou wilt!” (Matthew 15:28) ... “Thy Faith has made thee safe! Go in peace!” (Luke 7:50) … “All things, whatsoever you ask for when you pray, believe that you shall receive and they shall come unto you!” (Mark 11:24) … “Amen I say to you, if you have Faith like a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain ― ‘Remove from here to there!’ ― and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you!” (Matthew 17:19). After miraculously making the fig tree wither, “Jesus said to them: ‘Amen, I say to you, if you shall have Faith, and stagger not, not only this of the fig tree shall you do, but also if you shall say to this mountain ― “Take up and cast thyself into the sea!” ― it shall be done!’” (Matthew 21:21).
Our Lord’s words from the Gospels could well be applied to us today: “And He said to them: ‘Why are you fearful? Have you no Faith yet?’” (Mark 4:40). “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6). Jesus had just miraculously calmed the tremendous storm on the lake―and His Apostles were afraid seeing this great manifestation of power. At Christ’s bidding, St. Peter was miraculously walking on the stormy waters of the lake―until he began to fear and doubt―at which point he started to sink into the waves. “Immediately Jesus, stretching forth His hand, took hold of him and said to him: ‘O thou of little Faith, why didst thou doubt?’” (Matthew 14:31).
Today, we are surrounded by many storms―do we have the required Faith to provoke God to step-in and dispel them? We are told: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:16). “Who is he that overcomes the world? He that believes!” (1 John 5:5). “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world and this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4).
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this need for Faith, the power of Faith and the victory of Faith: “The just and faithful client of Mary lives by the Faith and not by natural sentiment … She communicates to him her Faith … Our Blessed Lady will give you also a portion of her Faith, which was the greatest of all faiths that ever were on Earth. Greater than the Faith of all the patriarchs, prophets, apostles and saints put together. Now that she is reigning in Heaven, she no longer exercises this Faith, because she sees all things clearly in God by the light of glory. Nevertheless, with the consent of the Most High, in entering into glory she did not lose her Faith. She kept it for her faithful servants in the Church Militant. The more, then, that you gain the favor of that august Princess and faithful Virgin, the more will you act by pure Faith; a pure Faith which will make you care hardly at all about sensible consolations and extraordinary favors; a lively Faith animated by charity, which will enable you to perform all your actions from the motive of pure love; a Faith firm and immovable as a rock, through which you will rest quiet and constant in the midst of storms and hurricanes; a Faith active and piercing, which like a mysterious passkey, will give you entrance into all the mysteries of Jesus, into the last ends of man, and into the Heart of God Himself; a courageous Faith, which will enable you to undertake and carry out without hesitation great things for God and for the salvation of souls; lastly, a Faith which will be your blazing torch, your divine life, your hidden treasure of divine wisdom and your omnipotent arm; which you will use to enlighten those who are in the darkness of the shadow of death, to inflame those who are lukewarm and who have need of the heated gold of charity, to give life to those who are dead in sin, to touch and overthrow, by your meek and powerful words, the hearts of marble and the cedars of Lebanon; and finally, to resist the devil and all the enemies of salvation.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Where is Your Faith? What is the State of Your Faith?
So where is your Faith? What state is it in? Have you buried you Faith like the unprofitable servant in the parable of the talents? He had no profit to show for the talent the Lord had entrusted to him―what profit can you show the Lord for the gift of Faith that He entrusted to you at your Baptism? The unprofitable servant did not lose the talent that was entrusted to him, but he did not put it use and did not make a profit on it. Likewise, you might not have lost the Faith that God entrusted to you―but can you show a profit from it? Having the Faith is not enough―you have to do something with it. “If a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead―so also Faith without works is dead! … Will you know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead?” (James 2:14-26).
Fr. Frederick Faber, in the Preface of his own personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary from the original French into English, writes: “Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It has no Faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls, which might be saints, wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized. Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow, which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin, that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines! If Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith!”
Already back in the Middle-Ages, a mystic asked Our Lord why we no longer see the tremendous miracles being performed that we read about in Holy Scripture. Our Lord replied that it was due to a lack of Faith! What He means is not a lack of Faith in the sense of believing what the Church teaches, but a lack of Faith in sense of the belief, hope and confidence that God will perform a miracle. That kind of Faith only comes from a deep attachment to God, a deep love of God―but you cannot love what you do not know. The Little Flower of Lisieux, St. Thérèse of the Infant Jesus, used to say: “Jesus is so little loved because He is so little known!”
The Seed of Faith and Growth of Faith
Our Lord compares both Faith and the Kingdom of Heaven to the mustard seed. We can combine both statements to refer to the seed of Faith and the growth of Faith: “Jesus said to them: ‘Because of your unbelief. For, amen I say to you, if you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain ― “Remove from here to there!” ― and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you.” (Matthew 17:19). “And the Lord said: ‘If you had Faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you might say to this mulberry tree ― “Be thou rooted up, and be thou transplanted into the sea!” ― and it would obey you!’” (Luke 17:6). “To what is the Kingdom of God like, and whereunto shall I resemble it? It is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and cast into his garden, and it grew and became a great tree, and the birds of the air lodged in the branches thereof!” (Luke 13:18-19). “The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field―which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof!” (Matthew 13:31-32). “To what shall we liken the Kingdom of God? Or to what parable shall we compare it? It is as a grain of mustard seed― which, when it is sown in the earth, is less than all the seeds that are in the earth. But when it is sown, it grows up, and becomes greater than all herbs, and shoots out great branches, so that the birds of the air may dwell under the shadow thereof!” (Mark 4:30-32).
Faith Must Lead to Love
If you ask any well-versed Protestant what you need to be saved, you will more than likely hear a one word answer: “Faith.” They quote Ephesians 2:8-9 with conviction: “For by grace you have been saved through Faith!” Catholics, of course, agree with this scriptural teaching. However, Catholic disagree with the Protestant assertion that we are saved by Faith “alone” ― because it implies that Hope and Charity are optional. The theological virtue of Charity cannot exist in our hearts, however, without both Faith and Hope. We cannot love God if we do not know Him and believe in Him through Faith, or trust in Him through Hope. Our love of God is only as strong as our Faith and Hope in Him.
St. Thomas Aquinas showed how the three theological virtues are related in the order of precedence and the order of perfection. In the order of precedence, Faith comes first, followed by Hope and then Charity. In St. Thomas’s view, a man loves a thing because he apprehends it as his good. When we believe a person to be good, we develop hope in that person and then proceed to love him or her. But in the order of perfection, Charity precedes Faith and Hope, for it is through Charity that they reach their fullness as virtues. Hence, Charity is the “mother and the root of all the virtues.”
St. Thomas Aquinas’s view is grounded in Scripture. St. Paul taught that of all the theological virtues the greatest is Charity (1 Corinthians 13:13). Charity never fails, because the goal of our Faith and what we Hope for is the presence of God — and “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8). Thus, although Faith and Hope can exist without Charity, they are not perfect and Christian without Charity. Faith is genuine only if crowned by Charity―for Faith is not meant to stand alone, it is a springboard that should lead to Charity. God should be at the core of both Faith and Charity: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Faith is not an end in itself―it is merely the beginning of a journey that needs to end in charity and Heaven. Faith is a seed that God plants in our soul and He requires that this Faith grow so as to produce fruits of Hope (confidence and trust) as well as charity and love (of both God and neighbor). Charity is the ultimate work of Faith: “Faith that worketh by Charity” (Galatians 5:6) … “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:26) ... “If I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:2).
The interesting point is that it is possible for us to have Faith, but to lack Charity. Faith is believing what God reveals to us. But even the demons believe! “You believe that there is one God. You do well! But the devils also believe and tremble!” (James 2:19). Charity requires we interiorly embrace what God teaches and let it transform our lives. This is an important point to understand―because we can often struggle with this same situation. At times we can find we believe something on the level of Faith, but are not living it in practice. Both are required for a life of authentic holiness. Being a Christian means you let your Faith sink from your head down to your heart and will! Holy Scripture often mentions Faith and Charity in tandem―like brother and sister, or husband and wife: “Hearing of thy Charity and Faith, which you have in the Lord Jesus” (Philemon 1:5) … “Timothy came to us from you, and related to us your Faith and Charity” (1 Thessalonians 3:6) … “Be sober, having on the breastplate of Faith and Charity” (1 Thessalonians 5:8) … a “Faith that works by Charity” (Galatians 5:6) … “I know thy Faith and thy Charity” (Apocalypse 2:19) … “We are bound to give thanks always to God for you, because your Faith grows exceedingly, and the Charity of everyone of you towards each other, abounds” (2 Thessalonians 1:3). “Now the end of the commandment is Charity, from an unfeigned Faith!” (1 Timothy 1:5). “May Christ dwell by Faith in your hearts; being rooted and founded in Charity” (Ephesians 3:17). “May hearts may be comforted, being instructed in Charity, unto the fullness of understanding, unto the knowledge of the mystery of God the Father and of Christ Jesus!” (Colossians 2:2). “We have known and have believed [by Faith] the Charity, which God has to us. God is Charity: and he that abides in Charity, abides in God, and God in him!” (1 John 4:16). What more can you want but God? “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8) and so if you want God, you need Charity. Faith is your springboard to Charity―for we cannot love what we do not know.
Our Faith is primarily about knowing God―and the more you know somebody who is all good and perfect, the more you love them, the more you seek them out, the more you turn to them, the more you rely upon them―that attitude is, more often than not, what produces the miracle when it is asked for. Don’t we tend to go the extra mile and do more for those people who love us and are close to us? The same applies to God. “Thou hast not forsaken them that love Thee!” (Daniel 14:37) … “The eyes of God are upon them that love Him” (Ecclesiasticus 34:15) … “The Lord keeps all them that love Him!” (Psalm 144:20) … “This we know―when we love God and keep His commandments” (1 John 5:2) … “I love them that love Me!” (Proverbs 8:17) … “showing mercy unto thousands to them that love Me and keep My commandments” (Exodus 20:6) … “Eye has not seen; nor has the ear heard; neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9).
Faith Moves Mountains―Charity Moves Hearts
In these multiple current crises that rise up in both the Church and the world, we need a miracle to save us. Things are so bad that no human endeavor, no human plan, no human skill, no human force can turn things around. We find ourselves―like the Apostles tossed about in their boat on the stormy lake while Our Lord slept through it all―screaming: “Lord! Save us! We perish!” (Matthew 8:25). “And behold a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves, but Jesus was asleep. And they came to Him and awakened Him, saying: ‘Lord! Save us! We perish!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful, O ye of little Faith?’ Then rising up He commanded the winds and the sea, and there came a great calm” (Matthew 8:26). Speaking of the End Times―which Our Lady of Fatima said we had already entered―Our Lord says: “By reason of the confusion of the roaring of the sea and of the waves, men withering away for fear and expectation of what shall come upon the whole world. For the powers of Heaven shall be moved!” (Luke 21:26).
Pope John Paul II made some comments along these lines when asked, in 1980, about the contents of the Third Secret of Fatima. The October 1981 issue of the German magazine, Stimme des Glaubens, reported that the Holy Father was asked: “What about the Third Secret of Fatima? Should it not have already been published by 1960?” Pope John Paul II replied: “Given the seriousness of the contents, my predecessors in the Petrine office diplomatically preferred to postpone publication, so as not to encourage the world power of Communism to make certain moves. On the other hand, it should be sufficient for all Christians to know this: if there is a message in which it is written that the oceans will flood whole areas of the Earth, and that, from one moment to the next, millions of people will perish, then truly the publication of such a message is no longer something to be so much desired. Many wish to know simply from curiosity and a taste for the sensational, but they forget that knowledge also implies responsibility. They only seek the satisfaction of their curiosity, and that is dangerous if at the same time they are not disposed to do something, and if they are convinced that it is impossible to do anything against evil. Here is the remedy against this evil―the Rosary. Pray! Pray, and ask for nothing more! Leave everything else to the Mother of God! We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ! … With your and my prayer it is possible to mitigate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectively renewed! How many times has the renewal of the Church sprung from blood! This time, too, it will not be otherwise! We must be strong and prepared, and trust in Christ and His Mother, and be very, very assiduous in praying the Rosary!”
The Legion of Mary―An Example of Faith and Love
As Holy Scripture tells us: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) … “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4) … “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12) … “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4) … “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6).
If you are at peace with the world, then you are at peace with the enemy of God―and thus you yourself become an enemy of God. “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). The Legion of Mary is an army of lay-people who fight the good fight of the Faith―and very successfully too! We can take a leaf out of the Legion of Mary Handbook to help forge a steely attitude that is necessary these days to fight the pervasive and perverting spirit of the world. Here are a few paragraphs from the Legion Handbook that deal particularly with some aspects of Faith and Charity (Love) that we have been discussing above:
“This [is] a time of particular peril for religion. The old armies of paganism and irreligion have been supplemented by that of militant atheism, which now dominates the landscape, spreads its corrupting influences in constantly widening circles, and it seems capable of engulfing the world. The aims of the Legion of Mary and of that other legion [the world] which ‘denies the only Sovereign Ruler and Our Lord Jesus Christ’ (Jude 1:4) are diametrically opposed. The Legionary scheme is in deliberate opposition to that empire of unbelief.
“The Legion is composed of souls who are united to the Virgin most Powerful. Moreover, it contains within itself great principles, and it knows how to apply them in effective ways. Their methods are somewhat similar. Each concentrates on the individual. Each has its own vivid idealism, which it seeks to impress upon all men with enthusiasm; not that empty enthusiasm which talks much, but an enthusiasm which talks but little, and pursues a thought-out plan of campaign. Each declares that it sets out to love and serve mankind. Each makes its campaign an instrument to a supreme purpose. That of the Legion is to bring God and religion to every soul; the avowed object of the other forces [the world] is to accomplish the very opposite.
“The Legion is doing simple acts of the love of God in man, and of the love of men for the sake of God; and in every place that love shows its power to stir and win hearts. Likewise, the materialistic systems profess the love and service of man. They have preached a hollow gospel of fraternity. Millions have believed that gospel. In its name, they deserted religion and submitted enthusiastically to despotisms. They were convinced that their new leaders loved them best; so they followed them, and now they are trying ardently to induce all mankind to join them. They seem to be in the ascendant. And yet the position is not a hopeless one. There is a way of bringing back to Faith those determined millions, and of saving countless other millions. That hope lies in the application of a great principle which rules the world, and which the St. John Vianney, the Curé of Ars, has stated thus: ‘The world belongs to him who loves it most, and who proves that love!’ Those millions will never listen to the enunciation of the truths of Faith. But they cannot help seeing, and being moved by a real Faith which operates through a real heroic love for all men. Convince them that the Church loves them most, and they will turn their back on those who rule them now. They will return to Faith in spite of everything. They will even lay down their lives for that Faith.
“No common love can conquer men thus. Neither will it be accomplished by a mediocre Catholicism which can hardly preserve itself. It can be done by a Catholicism which loves Christ its Lord with all its heart, and then sees Him and loves Him in all men of whatsoever description. But this supreme charity of Christ must be practiced on such a scale that they who look on are driven to admit that it is indeed a characteristic of the Church, and not merely the acts of sublime members of the Church. Therefore, it must be exhibited in the lives of the general body of the laity. But it seems a hopeless thing to fire the entire household of the Church with this exalted spirit? Yes, the task is herculean! So unending, indeed, are the perspectives of the problem, so infinite the hosts which possess the land, that even the courage of the strongest heart might well fail. But Mary is the heart of the Legion, and that heart is Faith and Love unutterable. So thinking, the Legion looks out over the world, and all at once excited hope is born: ‘The world belongs to him who loves it most.’ Then it turns to its great Queen, as it did at the beginning: ‘Lead us!’
“The Legion and militant materialism confront each other. Let us measure them up. The true motive-power of the materialistic system is its ruthless discipline working through its spy and informer network. This is so developed that the ordinary citizens feel that everything they do or say will be reported. Utilizing that instrument of universal fear, a tyrannical authority can impose its will on a whole nation. It is an efficient system, but a horrible one. A complete submission to that absolute control means the extinction of liberty and in the end of moral quality as well. ‘When these two forces, the Legion and that other one, come into conflict, the latter is able to kill and persecute, but it will fail to crush the spirit of the Legion. The Legionaries sustain the cruel treatment and, by keeping alive the flames of freedom and religion, must finally triumph.’ (Father Aedan McGrath). Nothing short of total mobilization of the Catholic people will avail to resist that domination. For this purpose the Legion of Mary possesses the perfect machinery, a fact admitted by the opposing army. But machinery by itself is useless without a sufficient driving-force. This motive-power lies in the Legion spirituality, which is a real appreciation of and reliance on the Holy Ghost and on True Devotion to His Spouse, the Blessed Virgin Mary, nurtured on the Bread of Life, the Eucharist.” (The Official Handbook of the Legion of Mary).
Our Faith is about Saving Souls
Canon Law tells us that the supreme law is the salvation of souls―which echoes Our Lord’s words: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Our purpose in life is save our own souls and to save as many other souls as we can―which is essentially what Our Lady of Fatima tried to tell us: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! ... Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners―for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, July & August of 1917).
That is what our Faith is all about―first and foremost about loving God; and then loving our neighbor (which includes the whole world). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). “If any man say: ‘I love God!’ and hates his brother―then he is a liar! For he that loves not his brother whom he sees, how can he love God Whom he sees not?” (1 John 4:20). Jesus says: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you, Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! Pray for them that persecute and calumniate you―so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you love them that love you, what reward shall you have?” (Matthew 5:43-46).
A true love of God is to seek what God seeks―which is the salvation of souls, no matter who they are, or how evil they are. A true love of neighbor is to seek the salvation of our neighbor so that they can obtain eternal happiness in Heaven―regardless of whether they are our friends or enemies. Is that what our life is all about? If we save the souls of others, then we will save our own souls: “Know that he who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20).
Fight not Fright―Fly and Fry
We all know the “elephant in the room” that we plainly see and are afraid to address or talk about―that “elephant in the room” is the fact most Catholic souls end up being damned. We are not talking about atheists, pagans or Protestants―we are talking about Catholics. It is frightening, it is unpleasant, it is discouraging, it can even be depressing―but that is how it is. Why is that the case? Does God not want to save them? Are there not enough rooms in Heaven to accommodate them? Is it too hard and difficult for someone to save their soul? Does God enjoy sending souls to Hell? That is “devil talk”―that is what Satan would like you believe?
The truth is the exact opposite―as Holy Scripture overwhelmingly states: “God will [“to will” means “to want”] have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men, … that He might redeem us” (Titus 2:11-14). “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9). “God declares unto men, that all should everywhere do penance!” (Acts 17:30). “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but so that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “The Father hath sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32).
Don’t you think that it is only fair on the part of God that the more we help sinners save their souls, then the more help God will also give to us; and that the less help we give sinners in saving their souls, then the less help God will give us? Of course it true, fair and right! Holy Scripture often says that―though in different words: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:8) … “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly―and he who sows in blessings, shall also reap blessings!” (2 Corinthians 9:6). We might be tempted to use Cain’s lame excuse when God asked Cain where his brother Abel was―whom Cain had murdered: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). The truth of the matter is that―yes, we are the keepers of our “brothers” and that is why Our Lady asks that we pray and sacrifice ourselves for the conversion of our sinful “brothers” so that they do not end up in Hell. If we fail to “keep” our brothers from falling into Hell, then the words that God spoke to Cain might also be addressed to us: “What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to me from the earth (or in this case, Hell). Now, therefore, cursed shalt thou be upon the Earth!” (Genesis 4:10-11).
We have not been created and placed upon this Earth to have fun and play games, to eat, drink and be merry! We are here to give glory to God; to save our souls (which glorifies God); and to help save the souls of others (which also glorifies God). Holy Scripture warns us not to fall into that trap―as did the Chosen People: “I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea! And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud and in the sea! And did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink―and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased―for they were overthrown in the desert! Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play!’ Now these things were done in a figure of us!” (1 Corinthians 10:1-7). We are not here to eat and drink, have fun and play―our purpose in life in much more serious than that!
Article 11
Wednesday, October 16th
Will God Intervene in this November Presidential Election?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Wednesday, October 16th
Will God Intervene in this November Presidential Election?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
What Will God Elect to Do?
Is God interested in politics? Well―what is politics all about? Most people can spell the word, use the word―but can they define the word “politics”? You would doubtlessly be surprised and shocked and the hundreds of different and vague definitions that most people would give you! The word “politics” comes from the Greek word “politicos”, which comes from the Greek “politēs” meaning “citizen”, which comes from “polis” meaning “city” and “politiká” means “affairs of the cities” and thus, you could say that politics is about policies in these “affairs of the cities” or the affairs of states and nations. In Ancient Greece, the city was looked upon as being its own “state” or “nation”.
So―is God interested in the affairs of cities, states and nations? Of course He is―for all thoughts, words and actions fall under the moral spectrum as being either morally good or morally bad. The affairs or politics between cities, states and nations can be good or evil―they can be according to God’s laws or against God’s laws. Politics cannot separate itself from God’s jurisdiction―and, as a consequence, neither can it separate itself from the Church. Though we see a separation between Church and State in 99.9% of countries in the world―it is not according to mind of God. The Church is the mentor, guide and overseer of the State―and furnishes the State with teachings, principles and laws of God that the State should be putting into practice.
The Mercy of God
Let us make no mistake about the mercy of God. As Holy Scripture says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). God, in the Old Testament, says: “I am He that blot out thy iniquities, for My own sake, and I will not remember thy sins!” (Isaias 43:25). “I desired mercy, and not sacrifice―and the knowledge of God more than holocausts!” (Osee 6:6). Our Lord echoes that, referring to the previous quote, by adding: “Go then and learn what this means―I will have mercy and not sacrifice. For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13).
Our Lord adds: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you: ‘Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!’ ― so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and lets His rain fall upon the just and the unjust!” (Matthew 5:43-45).
Our Lord even tells an outstanding and shocking parable about debt and debt for sin: “Then came Peter unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say you not just seven times; but seventy times seven times! Therefore is the Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s―October 2024―silver prices of around $30 an ounce, one talent would be worth $22,500―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $225,000,000 or $225 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“‘But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of around $30 per ounce, the penny would be worth $3.75―and a hundred pence would be $375): and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: “Pay what you owe me!” And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“‘Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: “You wicked servant! I forgave thee all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?” And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!’” (Matthew 18:21-35).
The 10,000 talents (or $225 million in today’s money) was almost 600,000 times more than the 100 pence ($375 in today’s money).
The Mercy of God is Not to Be Abused!
Nevertheless, God is not a doormat of mercy, upon which we can ceaselessly wipe our dirty, muddy, sinful feet. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6).
St. Alphonsus Liguori gave a Lenten sermon entitled: “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More.” The title reminds us of the words of Our Lady of Akita, several centuries later, in 1973, when she said: “If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them!” Here are some extracts from that sermon of St. Alphonsus:
“In this day’s Gospel we read: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God” (Matthew 4:7). The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations―or without at least asking God’s help to conquer them and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice―tempts God to work miracles, or rather to show to him an extraordinary mercy that is not extended to the generality of Christians. Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. But God does not forget them. He numbers the graces which He dispenses, as well as the sins which we commit. Hence, when the time which He has fixed arrives, God deprives us of His graces, and begins to inflict chastisement. He has determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more. God is ready to heal those who sincerely wish to amend their lives, but cannot take pity on the obstinate sinner. “Be not without fear about sins forgiven, and add not sin to sin.” (Ecclesiasticus v. 5). Say not then, O sinner: “As God has forgiven me other sins, so He will pardon me this one if I commit it!” Say not this; for, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned. God waits with patience until a certain number of sins are committed, but, when the measure of guilt is filled up, He waits no longer, but chastises the sinner. Sinners multiply their sins without keeping any account of them; but God numbers them that, when the harvest is ripe, that is, when the number of sins is completed, He may take vengeance on them. Be persuaded that, even though God bears with us, He does not wait, nor bear with us forever. The Lord warns you not to say: “I have committed so many sins, and God has not chastised me” … “Say not: I have sinned, and what harm hath befallen me? For the Most High is a patient rewarder.” (Ecclesiasticus 5:4). God has patience for a certain term, after which He punishes the first and last sins. And the greater has been His patience, the more severe His vengeance.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, sermon for the 1st Sunday of Lent).
Modern man needs to take heed of all this! It is an abuse of God’s mercy to obstinately sin against Him and then to expect His help without stopping to sin, or reducing the number of sins. Modern day politics has become a politics of sin. It is riddled with lawmaking that goes contrary to the laws of God―and it is further filled with deceit, lies, corruption and countless personal sins on the part of most politicians!
What Kind of Intervention―if any―Can We Expect from God?
In one sense, God never ceases to act or intervene in anything―for all things are continually ruled by Divine Providence. As for evil―God wants good things to happen, but in His unfathomable wisdom He also allows evil things to happen. One reason for that is that God allows evil to happen as a punishment for sinners. Secondly, God allows evil to happen knowing full well that He is capable of bring good out of even the greatest evil. We only need to look at St. Mary Magdalen, a promiscuous sinner who was also possessed by seven devils; or look at the “Good Thief” on Calvary; or Saul (St. Paul) the persecutor of the Church; or St. Augustine who was a fornicator; or St. Mary of Egypt, who was a seductress and a prostitute; or St. Pelagia, another prostitute; or St. Margaret of Cortona, a rich man’s mistress; or St. Philip Howard, a playboy and gambler; or St. Olga, princess of Kiev, who slaughtered her husband’s murderer and she massacred virtually the entire tribe; the few who did survive, she sold into slavery; or St. Olga’s grandson Vladimir, who became prince of Kiev by murdering his older half-brother. Then he raped his sister-in-law and added her to his harem of several hundred women. He built a new temple to all the gods; and sacrificed a father and his son to the false gods. The list could go on and on―yet God brought all these evil people out of their evil life style and eventually formed them into saints, who are now in Heaven!
Do we expect to see a St. Donald Trump? St. Kamala Harris? St. James David Vance? St. Tim Walz? St. Joe Biden? St. Barack Obama? St. Bill Clinton? St. Hilary Clinton? We may laugh at the thought―but when God made the soul of each one them, God expected that soul to become a saint! How far down the line of sin are they―beyond which there will no longer be any forgiveness? Sure―they do some good―but every single person in Hell did a certain amount of good while they were still on Earth! That good did them very little good―for they are now in Hell! There is no person that is 100% evil―but whatever good they had or did not guarantee them Heaven or the avoidance of Hell. As the proverb says: “There, but for the grace of God, go I!” Hence Scripture says: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). We might be rubbing with Trump, Harris, Vance, Walz, Biden, Obama, and Clinton in Hell; or might be rubbing shoulders with them in Heaven! “Many that are first, shall be last: and the last, first!” (Mark 10:31).
The famous witty but wise poem ― “I Went To Heaven” ― comes to mind:
I was shocked, confused, bewildered
As I entered Heaven’s door,
Not by the beauty of it all,
Nor the lights or its decor.
But it was the folks in Heaven
Who made me sputter and gasp―
The thieves, the liars, the sinners,
The alcoholics and the trash.
There stood the kid from seventh grade
Who swiped my lunch money! Twice!
Next to him was my old neighbor
Who never said anything nice.
Jerry, who I always thought
Was rotting away in Hell,
Was sitting pretty on cloud nine,
Looking incredibly well.
I nudged Jesus, ‘What’s the deal?
I would love to hear Your take.
How’d all these sinners get up here?
God must’ve made a mistake!’
‘And why’s everyone so quiet,
So somber? ― Please give me a clue.’
‘Hush, child,’ He said, ‘it’s because they’re all in shock!
No one thought they’d be seeing you!’
God Will Intervene if We Beg Him
We cannot just sit back, eat our favorite, snacks, sip our favorite beverage, watch our favorite televisions shows, listen to our favorite music, play games, socialize and laze around while God does all the work. That goes totally against the message of Our Lady of Fatima who demanded that we pray and sacrifice for the conversion of sinners and the salvation of souls. As St. Augustine says―God could save us without our participation and cooperation, but He will not do so. He expects to play our part, even though the major part belongs to God and His grace. As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) ― which at the same insinuates that we must be doing things, but not without His guidance and help. The mess in this is solvable ― but not without our efforts, prayers and sacrifices.
Holy Scripture is clear about the grace of God being more powerful than all evil: “Where sin abounded, grace did more abound―that as sin has reigned to death; so also grace might reign unto life everlasting!” (Romans 5:20). “There was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me. For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me. And He said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee! For power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. For which cause I please myself in my infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ! For when I am weak, then am I powerful!” (2 Corinthians 12:7-10).
Our basic problem is that we are too lazy, too lethargic, too preoccupied with things of this world so that we have little time or inclination to be preoccupied with the things of God and the will of God! “See with thy eyes, and hear with thy ears, and set thy heart upon all that I shall show thee!” (Ezechiel 40:4). “Having eyes, see you not? And having ears, hear you not?” (Mark 8:18). We shut our eyes to what God wants and open them only for the things that attract us! “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15). “O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not: and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21). “You dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see, and see not; and have ears to hear, and hear not! For they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2). In short, we are “unprofitable servants” who risk provoking the punishment Our Lord speaks about in His Parable of Talents: “The unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30).
When we sufficiently want something, then we are prepared to humiliate ourselves and beg for it. Imagine a gun being held to someone’s head―it is likely that they will beg with all their might that their life be spared. We have not reached that point―we are still complacent, indifferent, detached and untroubled by what surrounds us. Our Lady describes this “begging” scenario that God requires to be moved: “There is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There are no more generous souls! So God will strike in an unprecedented way! … The righteous will suffer greatly. Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession! At the blood, the tears and prayers of the righteous, God will relent!” (Our Lady of La Salette). “Clamor insistently, without tiring, and weep with bitter tears in your heart! Implore our Celestial Father that He might take pity and bring to an end those ominous times!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
We don’t beg enough, but merely ask in a blasé, nonchalant, casual, offhand manner. We ask with our lips, but not with our heart―a manner which Our Lord rebuked when He said: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Most of us are blasé, nonchalant, casual Catholics, whose Faith lingers on our lips and does not really penetrate our hearts. The consequence of that is that our nonchalant, casual prayers do not penetrate the Heart of God!
Is God interested in politics? Well―what is politics all about? Most people can spell the word, use the word―but can they define the word “politics”? You would doubtlessly be surprised and shocked and the hundreds of different and vague definitions that most people would give you! The word “politics” comes from the Greek word “politicos”, which comes from the Greek “politēs” meaning “citizen”, which comes from “polis” meaning “city” and “politiká” means “affairs of the cities” and thus, you could say that politics is about policies in these “affairs of the cities” or the affairs of states and nations. In Ancient Greece, the city was looked upon as being its own “state” or “nation”.
So―is God interested in the affairs of cities, states and nations? Of course He is―for all thoughts, words and actions fall under the moral spectrum as being either morally good or morally bad. The affairs or politics between cities, states and nations can be good or evil―they can be according to God’s laws or against God’s laws. Politics cannot separate itself from God’s jurisdiction―and, as a consequence, neither can it separate itself from the Church. Though we see a separation between Church and State in 99.9% of countries in the world―it is not according to mind of God. The Church is the mentor, guide and overseer of the State―and furnishes the State with teachings, principles and laws of God that the State should be putting into practice.
The Mercy of God
Let us make no mistake about the mercy of God. As Holy Scripture says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). God, in the Old Testament, says: “I am He that blot out thy iniquities, for My own sake, and I will not remember thy sins!” (Isaias 43:25). “I desired mercy, and not sacrifice―and the knowledge of God more than holocausts!” (Osee 6:6). Our Lord echoes that, referring to the previous quote, by adding: “Go then and learn what this means―I will have mercy and not sacrifice. For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13).
Our Lord adds: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you: ‘Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!’ ― so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and lets His rain fall upon the just and the unjust!” (Matthew 5:43-45).
Our Lord even tells an outstanding and shocking parable about debt and debt for sin: “Then came Peter unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say you not just seven times; but seventy times seven times! Therefore is the Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s―October 2024―silver prices of around $30 an ounce, one talent would be worth $22,500―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $225,000,000 or $225 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“‘But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of around $30 per ounce, the penny would be worth $3.75―and a hundred pence would be $375): and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: “Pay what you owe me!” And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“‘Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: “You wicked servant! I forgave thee all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?” And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!’” (Matthew 18:21-35).
The 10,000 talents (or $225 million in today’s money) was almost 600,000 times more than the 100 pence ($375 in today’s money).
The Mercy of God is Not to Be Abused!
Nevertheless, God is not a doormat of mercy, upon which we can ceaselessly wipe our dirty, muddy, sinful feet. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6).
St. Alphonsus Liguori gave a Lenten sermon entitled: “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More.” The title reminds us of the words of Our Lady of Akita, several centuries later, in 1973, when she said: “If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them!” Here are some extracts from that sermon of St. Alphonsus:
“In this day’s Gospel we read: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God” (Matthew 4:7). The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations―or without at least asking God’s help to conquer them and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice―tempts God to work miracles, or rather to show to him an extraordinary mercy that is not extended to the generality of Christians. Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. But God does not forget them. He numbers the graces which He dispenses, as well as the sins which we commit. Hence, when the time which He has fixed arrives, God deprives us of His graces, and begins to inflict chastisement. He has determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more. God is ready to heal those who sincerely wish to amend their lives, but cannot take pity on the obstinate sinner. “Be not without fear about sins forgiven, and add not sin to sin.” (Ecclesiasticus v. 5). Say not then, O sinner: “As God has forgiven me other sins, so He will pardon me this one if I commit it!” Say not this; for, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned. God waits with patience until a certain number of sins are committed, but, when the measure of guilt is filled up, He waits no longer, but chastises the sinner. Sinners multiply their sins without keeping any account of them; but God numbers them that, when the harvest is ripe, that is, when the number of sins is completed, He may take vengeance on them. Be persuaded that, even though God bears with us, He does not wait, nor bear with us forever. The Lord warns you not to say: “I have committed so many sins, and God has not chastised me” … “Say not: I have sinned, and what harm hath befallen me? For the Most High is a patient rewarder.” (Ecclesiasticus 5:4). God has patience for a certain term, after which He punishes the first and last sins. And the greater has been His patience, the more severe His vengeance.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, sermon for the 1st Sunday of Lent).
Modern man needs to take heed of all this! It is an abuse of God’s mercy to obstinately sin against Him and then to expect His help without stopping to sin, or reducing the number of sins. Modern day politics has become a politics of sin. It is riddled with lawmaking that goes contrary to the laws of God―and it is further filled with deceit, lies, corruption and countless personal sins on the part of most politicians!
What Kind of Intervention―if any―Can We Expect from God?
In one sense, God never ceases to act or intervene in anything―for all things are continually ruled by Divine Providence. As for evil―God wants good things to happen, but in His unfathomable wisdom He also allows evil things to happen. One reason for that is that God allows evil to happen as a punishment for sinners. Secondly, God allows evil to happen knowing full well that He is capable of bring good out of even the greatest evil. We only need to look at St. Mary Magdalen, a promiscuous sinner who was also possessed by seven devils; or look at the “Good Thief” on Calvary; or Saul (St. Paul) the persecutor of the Church; or St. Augustine who was a fornicator; or St. Mary of Egypt, who was a seductress and a prostitute; or St. Pelagia, another prostitute; or St. Margaret of Cortona, a rich man’s mistress; or St. Philip Howard, a playboy and gambler; or St. Olga, princess of Kiev, who slaughtered her husband’s murderer and she massacred virtually the entire tribe; the few who did survive, she sold into slavery; or St. Olga’s grandson Vladimir, who became prince of Kiev by murdering his older half-brother. Then he raped his sister-in-law and added her to his harem of several hundred women. He built a new temple to all the gods; and sacrificed a father and his son to the false gods. The list could go on and on―yet God brought all these evil people out of their evil life style and eventually formed them into saints, who are now in Heaven!
Do we expect to see a St. Donald Trump? St. Kamala Harris? St. James David Vance? St. Tim Walz? St. Joe Biden? St. Barack Obama? St. Bill Clinton? St. Hilary Clinton? We may laugh at the thought―but when God made the soul of each one them, God expected that soul to become a saint! How far down the line of sin are they―beyond which there will no longer be any forgiveness? Sure―they do some good―but every single person in Hell did a certain amount of good while they were still on Earth! That good did them very little good―for they are now in Hell! There is no person that is 100% evil―but whatever good they had or did not guarantee them Heaven or the avoidance of Hell. As the proverb says: “There, but for the grace of God, go I!” Hence Scripture says: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). We might be rubbing with Trump, Harris, Vance, Walz, Biden, Obama, and Clinton in Hell; or might be rubbing shoulders with them in Heaven! “Many that are first, shall be last: and the last, first!” (Mark 10:31).
The famous witty but wise poem ― “I Went To Heaven” ― comes to mind:
I was shocked, confused, bewildered
As I entered Heaven’s door,
Not by the beauty of it all,
Nor the lights or its decor.
But it was the folks in Heaven
Who made me sputter and gasp―
The thieves, the liars, the sinners,
The alcoholics and the trash.
There stood the kid from seventh grade
Who swiped my lunch money! Twice!
Next to him was my old neighbor
Who never said anything nice.
Jerry, who I always thought
Was rotting away in Hell,
Was sitting pretty on cloud nine,
Looking incredibly well.
I nudged Jesus, ‘What’s the deal?
I would love to hear Your take.
How’d all these sinners get up here?
God must’ve made a mistake!’
‘And why’s everyone so quiet,
So somber? ― Please give me a clue.’
‘Hush, child,’ He said, ‘it’s because they’re all in shock!
No one thought they’d be seeing you!’
God Will Intervene if We Beg Him
We cannot just sit back, eat our favorite, snacks, sip our favorite beverage, watch our favorite televisions shows, listen to our favorite music, play games, socialize and laze around while God does all the work. That goes totally against the message of Our Lady of Fatima who demanded that we pray and sacrifice for the conversion of sinners and the salvation of souls. As St. Augustine says―God could save us without our participation and cooperation, but He will not do so. He expects to play our part, even though the major part belongs to God and His grace. As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) ― which at the same insinuates that we must be doing things, but not without His guidance and help. The mess in this is solvable ― but not without our efforts, prayers and sacrifices.
Holy Scripture is clear about the grace of God being more powerful than all evil: “Where sin abounded, grace did more abound―that as sin has reigned to death; so also grace might reign unto life everlasting!” (Romans 5:20). “There was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me. For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me. And He said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee! For power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. For which cause I please myself in my infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ! For when I am weak, then am I powerful!” (2 Corinthians 12:7-10).
Our basic problem is that we are too lazy, too lethargic, too preoccupied with things of this world so that we have little time or inclination to be preoccupied with the things of God and the will of God! “See with thy eyes, and hear with thy ears, and set thy heart upon all that I shall show thee!” (Ezechiel 40:4). “Having eyes, see you not? And having ears, hear you not?” (Mark 8:18). We shut our eyes to what God wants and open them only for the things that attract us! “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15). “O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not: and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21). “You dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see, and see not; and have ears to hear, and hear not! For they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2). In short, we are “unprofitable servants” who risk provoking the punishment Our Lord speaks about in His Parable of Talents: “The unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30).
When we sufficiently want something, then we are prepared to humiliate ourselves and beg for it. Imagine a gun being held to someone’s head―it is likely that they will beg with all their might that their life be spared. We have not reached that point―we are still complacent, indifferent, detached and untroubled by what surrounds us. Our Lady describes this “begging” scenario that God requires to be moved: “There is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There are no more generous souls! So God will strike in an unprecedented way! … The righteous will suffer greatly. Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession! At the blood, the tears and prayers of the righteous, God will relent!” (Our Lady of La Salette). “Clamor insistently, without tiring, and weep with bitter tears in your heart! Implore our Celestial Father that He might take pity and bring to an end those ominous times!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
We don’t beg enough, but merely ask in a blasé, nonchalant, casual, offhand manner. We ask with our lips, but not with our heart―a manner which Our Lord rebuked when He said: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Most of us are blasé, nonchalant, casual Catholics, whose Faith lingers on our lips and does not really penetrate our hearts. The consequence of that is that our nonchalant, casual prayers do not penetrate the Heart of God!
Article 10
Monday & Tuesday, October 14th & 15th
The Significance of Miracle of the Sun for Today and for You
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday & Tuesday, October 14th & 15th
The Significance of Miracle of the Sun for Today and for You
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Significant or Insignificant?
The October 13th, 1917, Miracle of the Sun should have great significance for the entire world and for each one us personally. It is surprising that this great miracle―arguably the greatest miracle since the Resurrection―is little known and even less appreciated in the world at large. It should shake the very world itself. It should shake our governments; it should shake our media; it should shake our own souls; it should shake us awake! Yet how many are shaken by it? How many are awakened by it? How any adjust or change their lives because of it?
Miracles are not a way for God to “show-off” in these sense of “Look what I can do!” Miracles are meant to authenticate God’s presence, God’s intervention and God’s messages. Miracles are like a litmus test that proves something comes from God. Miracles are a sure sign of a revelation coming from God. That is why nobody can be beatified (“Blessed”) or canonized (“Saint”) by the Church, without the authentication of miracles happening through praying to the person to be beatified or canonized. A miracle is not required prior to a martyr's beatification, but one miracle is required before the beatified person can be canonized.
If God chooses to endorse something with a miracle, then it is a clear indication that He wants us to pay attention to what He is endorsing. The tremendous miracle―and it was tremendous if it fails to register with us―the tremendous Miracle of the Sun at Fatima is an endorsement of Our Lady’s Fatima messages. Yet, sadly―not just for Our Lady, but also sadly for us as regards the consequences―very few people have paid attention to her messages, and even fewer have put her requests into practice. As Sister Lucia of Fatima said: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message and uniting their lives to the Message of Fatima. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil while ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
Our Lady could quite rightly use the words of Our Lord and say: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) … “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” Matthew 13:15).
The Fatima Message is not an optional message―it is, in essence, the message of the Gospels and we ignore it at our own peril. The purpose of Divine Private Revelation is not to add new truths to the Faith―but to draw our attention to existing truths in Divine Public Revelation that have either forgotten, neglected or outright refused. It is like alarm bells that sound a warning―which, if it not heeded and attended to―can lead to great harm and destruction. Hence it is that Our Lady said: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell!” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
A 2023 survey showed the most common types of goals Americans set for themselves―persons were not limited to stating only one goal, they could choose multiple goals. Personal health or fitness goals were the most common goals, mentioned by 56% of all Americans. Financial goals were next at 48% among U.S. adults. Personal development goals were chosen by 41% of Americans. Work or career goals were next with 35%. Then came relationship or social life goals at 30%. Religious or spiritual goals were chosen by only 23%. Our Lord’s words ― “Seek first the kingdom of God” and “Love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind” (Matthew 6:33; 22:37) ― have no place in the mind and heart of most modern folk. There are better and more exciting things to love than God these days! Sad!
It is amazing how many people imagine that Heaven’s messages are something optional―that we can freely take or leave aside! Equally amazing is the number of people who look upon the Miracle of the Sun as something that belongs to the past and has no relevance today! If God chose to work one of the greatest miracles in history through the Blessed Virgin Mary, then we had better pay attention and analyze the importance of the event and all that surrounded it―namely, all the aspects of the Fatima message―and then to put those things into practice.
(1) What Our Lady Says and Promises―Comes True
The first thing to draw from the Miracle of the Sun is the fact that what Our Lady promised ended up happening―in other words, she told the truth when she promised in July of 1917, that she would perform a miracle for all to see in October of 1917. All that Our Lady says is true―whether it be at Fatima, or any other legitimate and Church accepted apparition of Our Lady. That should fill us with both confidence and fear―with confidence if we are living a true Catholic life in a state of sanctifying grace; but with fear if our Catholic life is not up to scratch. Our Lady’s apparitions are always filled with proverbial “good news and bad news.” She says: “In the end my Immaculate will triumph” (Fatima) … “There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration … when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet and fettering him in the infernal abyss” (Quito) … “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved” (Akita) … “God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will” (La Salette).
Yet, at the same time, Our Lady tells us of the negative and painful things that will happen if we―as a whole―choose to remain in sin: “The evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government, will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities! … The small number of souls, who will preserve the treasures of the Faith, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom! … How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … “Impurity and luxury will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … the spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! … Woe to the children of these times!” (Quito 1600s) … “The leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance! … People will think of nothing but amusement … The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin! … and men will become more and more perverted! ... Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! … God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle! … The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis!” (La Salette 1846) … “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out! … God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church! … Russia will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred! … Various nations will be annihilated!” (Fatima 1917) … “Many men in this world afflict the Lord! ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … The Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful!” (Akita 1973).
(2) There is a God―and He is Almighty
Today, increasing numbers of people look upon science like a god. They idolize the power of science. Science has become the religion of our day. More people trust in science than trust in religion. We believe that science has all of the answers for us. We believe that if science confirms something to be true, it must be true—despite the fact that science changes all the time depending on recent findings. We trust that science will give us the solutions to all the plagues that face humanity. Science certainly does benefit us greatly. We enjoy the benefits of technology and medicine and physics every moment of every day. But if we think that science is the one hope for mankind we are fooling ourselves. Mankind cannot save itself.
Modern medicine is a miracle, we’re told. Landing rovers on Mars, or on distant asteroids, requires a miraculous degree of technological sophistication. Marvels—miracles’ kid brothers—are a dime a dozen in 2023. Video phones, space telescopes, ChatGPT. Look at the dawning ‘miracles’ that AI (Artificial Intelligence) is beginning to work! Wow! Aren’t we human beings special to invent something like that? Miraculous, even! Modern miracle workers worship themselves. This has its origin in the Garden of Eden where Satan tempted Eve to eat of the tree with the words “you will be like God” (Genesis 3:5). This has been man’s desire ever since—to be god and, as we have seen, the worship of self is the basis of all modern idolatry. This is the great lie and the same one Satan has been telling since he first lied to Adam and Eve. Sadly, we are still falling for it.
People are turning to the wrongs things for hope. They are trusting in false gods that cannot deliver them. In that sense, we are lost. Humanity needs intervention from the outside. We need help and deliverance by a force more powerful than we. God is our only hope. He alone is the real God of this universe. As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). We are on a never-ending cycle of chaos. The only way we will ever escape this mess is stop turning to gods that can do nothing but eventually let us down.
The word “science” comes from the Latin word “scientia” which means “knowledge” and which, in turn, is derived from the present participle of the Latin verb “scire” ― meaning “to know”. Modern science pretends it knows what happened at Fatima with the Miracle of the Sun―but it is frantically clutching at straws because it cannot stand the thought that there exists a power greater than science; it cannot stand the thought of an all-powerful, almighty, omnipotent God! Hence it has always sought to disprove the existence of God and rejected the fact that God created the universe in the very beginning of time. “He that dwells in Heaven shall laugh at them; and the Lord shall deride them!” (Psalm 2:4). “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God” (1 Corinthians 3:19). The power of man is incomparable with the power of God―as Jesus Himself said: “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27).
Our Lady of Fatima revealed that the Miracle of the Sun would have been even more astounding and stupendous if the Masonic local Mayor of Ourem had not kidnapped and imprisoned Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta in August. In 1973, at Akita in Japan, Our Lady also spoke of the tremendous power of God that will manifest itself in the form of a worldwide punishment for sin: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad!” It seems like we are destined to learn the hard way―having ignored Our Lady’s advice and requests!
(3) There is a Hell―and it is Densely Populated
Since the Miracle of the Sun confirmed that Our Lady was a “truth-teller”, we need to also pay attention to another truth that she revealed at Fatima―which is that Hell exists and many souls go there: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell!” It is not a case of just non-Catholic souls going to Hell―but, as the Saints, Blesseds, Venerables and Popes tell us, MOST Catholics go to Hell! Does that terrify you? It should! The vision of Hell that Our Lady showed Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta (aged 10, 9 and 6 at the time) certainly terrified them.
Lucia later says: “Our Lady showed us a great sea of fire which seemed to be under the Earth. Plunged in this fire were demons and souls in human form, like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, floating about in the conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames that issued from within themselves together with great clouds of smoke, now falling back on every side like sparks in a huge fire, without weight or equilibrium, and amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fear. The demons could be distinguished by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, all black and transparent. This vision lasted but an instant. How can we ever be grateful enough to our kind heavenly Mother, who had already prepared us by promising, in the first Apparition, to take us to Heaven. Otherwise, I think we would have died of fear and terror!”
Most Catholics live as if there was no Hell! Or, if they believe in a Hell, they also imagine that they are destined for Heaven no matter what they think, say or do in this life. In fact, you will find very few persons in Hell who realized that they were going to end up in Hell! Yet we hear very few sermons on Hell. We read very little on Hell. We hardly ever speak about Hell. That is how Satan likes it! Out of sight, out of mind! Our Lady was not afraid to frighten three little children aged 10, 9 and 7 with regard to Hell. She did not just speak about Hell to them―she SHOWED THEM HELL ITSELF IN A TERRIFYING VISION! Modern-day America would classify that as “child-abuse” and would seek to sue her in court and even have her imprisoned!
(4) The Sinful World can be Converted
Fatima is all about conversion. Our Lady comes to saves souls. She laments that “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: ‘O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.’ … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
Our Lady holds out hope of conversion when she says: “If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” Sadly, what Our Lady has said to us has not been done―or has been done sufficiently in both quality and quantity. Canon Law states “the supreme law is the salvation of souls” ― “lex suprema salus animarum.” That statement is based upon Our Lord’s words: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world but suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Our Lord Himself said: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). The fact that Our Lady has to draw our attention to the great loss of souls to Hell and the need to work for the salvation of souls, is because we have forgotten and neglected the “supreme law” ― we don’t really give a damn about the damned!
(5) The Sinful World can be Punished
God is not to be toyed with! We cannot sin with impunity―imagining that there will be no punishment for our sinfulness. “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Most of what Our Lady has said at her apparitions has concerned the imminent punishment for sin. Yet the world pays little or no attention to her. Sister Lucia of Fatima stated: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, ignoring the message, keep following the road of evil, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
If we refuse to change, then we will pay a great price―Our Lady has frequently said that: “Nature is asking for vengeance on account of men, and she trembles, with dread, at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime! ... The fire of Heaven will fall and consume cities. All the universe will be struck with terror and many will let themselves be led astray, because they have not worshiped the true Christ … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … God will strike in an unprecedented way! … They will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations! … All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and discord will be seen, without love for country or family ... Men will kill and massacre each other, even in their homes … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. Then a general war will follow which will be appalling. If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful ... Many nations will be annihilated! … The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Compilation of quotes by Our Lady of Good Success, La Salette, Fatima and Akita).
(6) Conversion Will Not Happen Without God’s Grace and Our Efforts
Politics and Social measures will convert nobody without God’s grace. As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). St. Thomas Aquinas clearly lays down the truth about our total dependence on the grace of God, without which we can do nothing good, except sin. Here is a brief compilation of St. Thomas’ chief quotes on the subject:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For to many persons grace is given to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
We need to take the necessary means that will draw down the grace of God upon ourselves and upon others. Imagining that we can solve the problems of today without grace is like jumping out of a plane without a parachute imagining that by yourself you can safely float down to the ground! Nothing but stupidity!
(7) The Rosary is a Chief Weapon
Our Lady could not have been more clear about the need for the Holy Rosary as a weapon in fighting evil in the world today and bring about the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. At each Fatima apparition she relentlessly insisted upon the need for praying the Rosary daily: “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war!” (May 1917) … “Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war … (June 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted!” (July 1917) … “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (August 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war!” (September 1917) … “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” (October 1917).
Sister Lucia of Fatima said: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
● The Miracle of the Sun at Fatima, 1917 ― The most well known miracle which is associated with the Rosary is the miracle related to the appearances of the Virgin Mary in Fatima, Portugal in 1917. Here three children claimed a lady appeared to them on multiple occasions, referring to herself as the "Lady of the Rosary", asking that they "pray the Rosary every day" and asking the three children to give other messages to the people of the world. Since people would most likely not believe the children regarding these appearances, the "Lady of the Rosary" promised to perform a public miracle as proof. At her final appearance to the children in October 1917, over 70,000 people gathered at the site of the appearances in expectation of the miracle the children mentioned she would perform. That afternoon, an unexplainable miracle of the sun was experienced by over 70,000 people. This was printed in Fatima newspapers the following day which gave credence to the message the Virgin Mary gave to the three children. These appearances are very well documented should anyone like to read the incredible interviews with the people who were there. Newspaper articles and accounts from some of the people there the day of the miracle (including skeptics!) can be seen here.
● Communist Russia Pulls Out of Austria, 1948 ― After World War ll. the Allies turned over Catholic Austria to Communist Russia. For three years the Austrian people endured this tyranny. Then, a Franciscan priest, Father Petrus Pavlicek, remembered how the Christians although greatly outnumbered had defeated the Turks at the Battle of Lepanto through the Rosary, and he launched a Rosary crusade. Through it 700,000 people, one tenth of the Austrian population, pledged to say the Rosary daily for the Soviets to leave their country. Austria was valuable to the Russians because of its strategic location, rich mineral deposits and oil reserves. Yet on May 13th, 1955, the anniversary of the first apparition of Our Lady at Fatima, the Russians signed the agreement to leave Austria, and they did so without one person being killed and without one shot being fired. It is the only time that the militant atheistic forces of Marxism have ever peacefully left a country in which they held power. Military strategists and historians are baffled as to why the Russians pulled out. But we are not ― it was the power of the Rosary. This is just one of countless stories about the power of the Rosary!
● Rosary Miracle at Hiroshima ― August 6th, 1945 ― There was a home eight blocks (about 1 kilometer) from where the A-Bomb went off in Hiroshima Japan. This home had a church attached to it which was completely destroyed, but the home survived, and so did the eight German Jesuit missionaries who prayed the rosary in that house faithfully every day. See Miracle of the Rosary at Hiroshima.
● Brazil Thwarted a Communist Takeover Through the Rosary ― In 1962 there was a looming threat of Communist takeover in Brazil. A woman there named Dona Amelia Bastos was known to have formed a Rosary rally among the Brazilian women there to do their part in opposing the looming threat. Their goal was simply to pray the Rosary in large groups asking the Virgin Mary for help in opposing the Communist takeover which the President of Brazil was leaning toward at the time. In Belo Horizonte 20,000 women reciting the Rosary aloud broke up a Communist rally. In Sao Paulo, 600,000 women praying the Rosary in one of the most moving demonstrations in Brazilian history, caused the President of Brazil to flee the country and not a single death was encountered, sparing the country from Communist takeover.
Battle of Lepanto, 1571 ― Before a large scale attack by the Ottoman Turks on an army of Christians in 1571, where the Christians were outnumbered three to one, the Rosary was prayed by all of the Christian soldiers and the Turks were miraculously defeated in the battle. To this day this victory has been attributed to the praying of the Rosary. [Read more here].
(8) The Scapular is Our Shield
On the day of the Miracle of the Sun at Fatima, Our Lady held out her Scapular towards the world as she disappeared into the skies at her very last appearance at Fatima. Lucia explained that Our Lady did so because “she wants everyone to wear it!” Lucia further said: “The Rosary and the Scapular are inseparable” and that the reason for wearing the Scapular is because it is our “Sign of consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.”
If you wear Mary’s Brown Scapular you should know something about St. Simon Stock, because you have worn his picture along with Our Lady’s picture on your Scapular. It was to him—St. Simon of England—that Our Blessed Mother gave the great Scapular Promise, in 1251, saying, “Whosoever dies wearing this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire.” When a priest enrolled you in the Scapular he said, “Receive this blessed Scapular and ask the most Holy Virgin that, by her merits, it may be worn with no stain of sin and may protect you from all harm and bring you into everlasting life.” This idea of “protection” makes the Scapular like a shield. We could apply the words of Scripture to Scapular: “In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:16).
In 1845, the English ship, King of the Ocean, was lashed by a wild hurricane. The Rev. Fisher, a Protestant minister, together with his wife and children and other passengers, struggled to the deck to pray for mercy and forgiveness, as the end seemed at hand. Among the crew was a young Irishman, John McAuliffe. He opened his shirt—took off his Scapular—made the Sign of the Cross over the angry waves, then threw the Scapular into the ocean. At that very moment the wind and the sea calmed―apart from only one more wave that washed over the deck, bringing with it the Scapular which landed at the boy’s feet. The Rev. Fisher and his family had observed what he had done and miraculous consequences. They questioned the boy. He told them about the Virgin and her Scapular and her Promise of protection in time of danger. So impressed were they that they determined to enter the Church and enjoy a like protection―which is what they did once the ship arrived in Australia.
Let us not conclude, however, that the Scapular is endowed with some kind of supernatural power, which will save us, no matter what we do, or how much we sin. We might apply here what St. Alphonsus says about devotion to Mary in general: “When we declare that it is impossible for a servant of Mary to be lost, we do not mean those who, by their devotion to Mary, think themselves warranted to sin freely. We state that these reckless people, because of their presumption, deserve to be treated with rigor and not with kindness. We speak here of the servants of Mary who, to the fidelity with which they honor and invoke her, join the desire to amend their lives. I hold it morally impossible that these be lost.” It is clear, from the words of St. Alphonsus, that a certain measure of fidelity is required on the part of those who wish to gain the special love and protection of Our Lady.
The October 13th, 1917, Miracle of the Sun should have great significance for the entire world and for each one us personally. It is surprising that this great miracle―arguably the greatest miracle since the Resurrection―is little known and even less appreciated in the world at large. It should shake the very world itself. It should shake our governments; it should shake our media; it should shake our own souls; it should shake us awake! Yet how many are shaken by it? How many are awakened by it? How any adjust or change their lives because of it?
Miracles are not a way for God to “show-off” in these sense of “Look what I can do!” Miracles are meant to authenticate God’s presence, God’s intervention and God’s messages. Miracles are like a litmus test that proves something comes from God. Miracles are a sure sign of a revelation coming from God. That is why nobody can be beatified (“Blessed”) or canonized (“Saint”) by the Church, without the authentication of miracles happening through praying to the person to be beatified or canonized. A miracle is not required prior to a martyr's beatification, but one miracle is required before the beatified person can be canonized.
If God chooses to endorse something with a miracle, then it is a clear indication that He wants us to pay attention to what He is endorsing. The tremendous miracle―and it was tremendous if it fails to register with us―the tremendous Miracle of the Sun at Fatima is an endorsement of Our Lady’s Fatima messages. Yet, sadly―not just for Our Lady, but also sadly for us as regards the consequences―very few people have paid attention to her messages, and even fewer have put her requests into practice. As Sister Lucia of Fatima said: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message and uniting their lives to the Message of Fatima. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil while ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
Our Lady could quite rightly use the words of Our Lord and say: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) … “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” Matthew 13:15).
The Fatima Message is not an optional message―it is, in essence, the message of the Gospels and we ignore it at our own peril. The purpose of Divine Private Revelation is not to add new truths to the Faith―but to draw our attention to existing truths in Divine Public Revelation that have either forgotten, neglected or outright refused. It is like alarm bells that sound a warning―which, if it not heeded and attended to―can lead to great harm and destruction. Hence it is that Our Lady said: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell!” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
A 2023 survey showed the most common types of goals Americans set for themselves―persons were not limited to stating only one goal, they could choose multiple goals. Personal health or fitness goals were the most common goals, mentioned by 56% of all Americans. Financial goals were next at 48% among U.S. adults. Personal development goals were chosen by 41% of Americans. Work or career goals were next with 35%. Then came relationship or social life goals at 30%. Religious or spiritual goals were chosen by only 23%. Our Lord’s words ― “Seek first the kingdom of God” and “Love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind” (Matthew 6:33; 22:37) ― have no place in the mind and heart of most modern folk. There are better and more exciting things to love than God these days! Sad!
It is amazing how many people imagine that Heaven’s messages are something optional―that we can freely take or leave aside! Equally amazing is the number of people who look upon the Miracle of the Sun as something that belongs to the past and has no relevance today! If God chose to work one of the greatest miracles in history through the Blessed Virgin Mary, then we had better pay attention and analyze the importance of the event and all that surrounded it―namely, all the aspects of the Fatima message―and then to put those things into practice.
(1) What Our Lady Says and Promises―Comes True
The first thing to draw from the Miracle of the Sun is the fact that what Our Lady promised ended up happening―in other words, she told the truth when she promised in July of 1917, that she would perform a miracle for all to see in October of 1917. All that Our Lady says is true―whether it be at Fatima, or any other legitimate and Church accepted apparition of Our Lady. That should fill us with both confidence and fear―with confidence if we are living a true Catholic life in a state of sanctifying grace; but with fear if our Catholic life is not up to scratch. Our Lady’s apparitions are always filled with proverbial “good news and bad news.” She says: “In the end my Immaculate will triumph” (Fatima) … “There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration … when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet and fettering him in the infernal abyss” (Quito) … “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved” (Akita) … “God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will” (La Salette).
Yet, at the same time, Our Lady tells us of the negative and painful things that will happen if we―as a whole―choose to remain in sin: “The evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government, will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities! … The small number of souls, who will preserve the treasures of the Faith, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom! … How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … “Impurity and luxury will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … the spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! … Woe to the children of these times!” (Quito 1600s) … “The leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance! … People will think of nothing but amusement … The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin! … and men will become more and more perverted! ... Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! … God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little! … All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle! … The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis!” (La Salette 1846) … “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out! … God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church! … Russia will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred! … Various nations will be annihilated!” (Fatima 1917) … “Many men in this world afflict the Lord! ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … The Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful!” (Akita 1973).
(2) There is a God―and He is Almighty
Today, increasing numbers of people look upon science like a god. They idolize the power of science. Science has become the religion of our day. More people trust in science than trust in religion. We believe that science has all of the answers for us. We believe that if science confirms something to be true, it must be true—despite the fact that science changes all the time depending on recent findings. We trust that science will give us the solutions to all the plagues that face humanity. Science certainly does benefit us greatly. We enjoy the benefits of technology and medicine and physics every moment of every day. But if we think that science is the one hope for mankind we are fooling ourselves. Mankind cannot save itself.
Modern medicine is a miracle, we’re told. Landing rovers on Mars, or on distant asteroids, requires a miraculous degree of technological sophistication. Marvels—miracles’ kid brothers—are a dime a dozen in 2023. Video phones, space telescopes, ChatGPT. Look at the dawning ‘miracles’ that AI (Artificial Intelligence) is beginning to work! Wow! Aren’t we human beings special to invent something like that? Miraculous, even! Modern miracle workers worship themselves. This has its origin in the Garden of Eden where Satan tempted Eve to eat of the tree with the words “you will be like God” (Genesis 3:5). This has been man’s desire ever since—to be god and, as we have seen, the worship of self is the basis of all modern idolatry. This is the great lie and the same one Satan has been telling since he first lied to Adam and Eve. Sadly, we are still falling for it.
People are turning to the wrongs things for hope. They are trusting in false gods that cannot deliver them. In that sense, we are lost. Humanity needs intervention from the outside. We need help and deliverance by a force more powerful than we. God is our only hope. He alone is the real God of this universe. As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). We are on a never-ending cycle of chaos. The only way we will ever escape this mess is stop turning to gods that can do nothing but eventually let us down.
The word “science” comes from the Latin word “scientia” which means “knowledge” and which, in turn, is derived from the present participle of the Latin verb “scire” ― meaning “to know”. Modern science pretends it knows what happened at Fatima with the Miracle of the Sun―but it is frantically clutching at straws because it cannot stand the thought that there exists a power greater than science; it cannot stand the thought of an all-powerful, almighty, omnipotent God! Hence it has always sought to disprove the existence of God and rejected the fact that God created the universe in the very beginning of time. “He that dwells in Heaven shall laugh at them; and the Lord shall deride them!” (Psalm 2:4). “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God” (1 Corinthians 3:19). The power of man is incomparable with the power of God―as Jesus Himself said: “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27).
Our Lady of Fatima revealed that the Miracle of the Sun would have been even more astounding and stupendous if the Masonic local Mayor of Ourem had not kidnapped and imprisoned Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta in August. In 1973, at Akita in Japan, Our Lady also spoke of the tremendous power of God that will manifest itself in the form of a worldwide punishment for sin: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad!” It seems like we are destined to learn the hard way―having ignored Our Lady’s advice and requests!
(3) There is a Hell―and it is Densely Populated
Since the Miracle of the Sun confirmed that Our Lady was a “truth-teller”, we need to also pay attention to another truth that she revealed at Fatima―which is that Hell exists and many souls go there: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell!” It is not a case of just non-Catholic souls going to Hell―but, as the Saints, Blesseds, Venerables and Popes tell us, MOST Catholics go to Hell! Does that terrify you? It should! The vision of Hell that Our Lady showed Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta (aged 10, 9 and 6 at the time) certainly terrified them.
Lucia later says: “Our Lady showed us a great sea of fire which seemed to be under the Earth. Plunged in this fire were demons and souls in human form, like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, floating about in the conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames that issued from within themselves together with great clouds of smoke, now falling back on every side like sparks in a huge fire, without weight or equilibrium, and amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fear. The demons could be distinguished by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, all black and transparent. This vision lasted but an instant. How can we ever be grateful enough to our kind heavenly Mother, who had already prepared us by promising, in the first Apparition, to take us to Heaven. Otherwise, I think we would have died of fear and terror!”
Most Catholics live as if there was no Hell! Or, if they believe in a Hell, they also imagine that they are destined for Heaven no matter what they think, say or do in this life. In fact, you will find very few persons in Hell who realized that they were going to end up in Hell! Yet we hear very few sermons on Hell. We read very little on Hell. We hardly ever speak about Hell. That is how Satan likes it! Out of sight, out of mind! Our Lady was not afraid to frighten three little children aged 10, 9 and 7 with regard to Hell. She did not just speak about Hell to them―she SHOWED THEM HELL ITSELF IN A TERRIFYING VISION! Modern-day America would classify that as “child-abuse” and would seek to sue her in court and even have her imprisoned!
(4) The Sinful World can be Converted
Fatima is all about conversion. Our Lady comes to saves souls. She laments that “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: ‘O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.’ … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
Our Lady holds out hope of conversion when she says: “If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” Sadly, what Our Lady has said to us has not been done―or has been done sufficiently in both quality and quantity. Canon Law states “the supreme law is the salvation of souls” ― “lex suprema salus animarum.” That statement is based upon Our Lord’s words: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world but suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Our Lord Himself said: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). The fact that Our Lady has to draw our attention to the great loss of souls to Hell and the need to work for the salvation of souls, is because we have forgotten and neglected the “supreme law” ― we don’t really give a damn about the damned!
(5) The Sinful World can be Punished
God is not to be toyed with! We cannot sin with impunity―imagining that there will be no punishment for our sinfulness. “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Most of what Our Lady has said at her apparitions has concerned the imminent punishment for sin. Yet the world pays little or no attention to her. Sister Lucia of Fatima stated: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, ignoring the message, keep following the road of evil, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
If we refuse to change, then we will pay a great price―Our Lady has frequently said that: “Nature is asking for vengeance on account of men, and she trembles, with dread, at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime! ... The fire of Heaven will fall and consume cities. All the universe will be struck with terror and many will let themselves be led astray, because they have not worshiped the true Christ … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … God will strike in an unprecedented way! … They will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations! … All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and discord will be seen, without love for country or family ... Men will kill and massacre each other, even in their homes … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. Then a general war will follow which will be appalling. If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful ... Many nations will be annihilated! … The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!” (Compilation of quotes by Our Lady of Good Success, La Salette, Fatima and Akita).
(6) Conversion Will Not Happen Without God’s Grace and Our Efforts
Politics and Social measures will convert nobody without God’s grace. As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). St. Thomas Aquinas clearly lays down the truth about our total dependence on the grace of God, without which we can do nothing good, except sin. Here is a brief compilation of St. Thomas’ chief quotes on the subject:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For to many persons grace is given to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
We need to take the necessary means that will draw down the grace of God upon ourselves and upon others. Imagining that we can solve the problems of today without grace is like jumping out of a plane without a parachute imagining that by yourself you can safely float down to the ground! Nothing but stupidity!
(7) The Rosary is a Chief Weapon
Our Lady could not have been more clear about the need for the Holy Rosary as a weapon in fighting evil in the world today and bring about the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. At each Fatima apparition she relentlessly insisted upon the need for praying the Rosary daily: “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war!” (May 1917) … “Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war … (June 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted!” (July 1917) … “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (August 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war!” (September 1917) … “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” (October 1917).
Sister Lucia of Fatima said: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
● The Miracle of the Sun at Fatima, 1917 ― The most well known miracle which is associated with the Rosary is the miracle related to the appearances of the Virgin Mary in Fatima, Portugal in 1917. Here three children claimed a lady appeared to them on multiple occasions, referring to herself as the "Lady of the Rosary", asking that they "pray the Rosary every day" and asking the three children to give other messages to the people of the world. Since people would most likely not believe the children regarding these appearances, the "Lady of the Rosary" promised to perform a public miracle as proof. At her final appearance to the children in October 1917, over 70,000 people gathered at the site of the appearances in expectation of the miracle the children mentioned she would perform. That afternoon, an unexplainable miracle of the sun was experienced by over 70,000 people. This was printed in Fatima newspapers the following day which gave credence to the message the Virgin Mary gave to the three children. These appearances are very well documented should anyone like to read the incredible interviews with the people who were there. Newspaper articles and accounts from some of the people there the day of the miracle (including skeptics!) can be seen here.
● Communist Russia Pulls Out of Austria, 1948 ― After World War ll. the Allies turned over Catholic Austria to Communist Russia. For three years the Austrian people endured this tyranny. Then, a Franciscan priest, Father Petrus Pavlicek, remembered how the Christians although greatly outnumbered had defeated the Turks at the Battle of Lepanto through the Rosary, and he launched a Rosary crusade. Through it 700,000 people, one tenth of the Austrian population, pledged to say the Rosary daily for the Soviets to leave their country. Austria was valuable to the Russians because of its strategic location, rich mineral deposits and oil reserves. Yet on May 13th, 1955, the anniversary of the first apparition of Our Lady at Fatima, the Russians signed the agreement to leave Austria, and they did so without one person being killed and without one shot being fired. It is the only time that the militant atheistic forces of Marxism have ever peacefully left a country in which they held power. Military strategists and historians are baffled as to why the Russians pulled out. But we are not ― it was the power of the Rosary. This is just one of countless stories about the power of the Rosary!
● Rosary Miracle at Hiroshima ― August 6th, 1945 ― There was a home eight blocks (about 1 kilometer) from where the A-Bomb went off in Hiroshima Japan. This home had a church attached to it which was completely destroyed, but the home survived, and so did the eight German Jesuit missionaries who prayed the rosary in that house faithfully every day. See Miracle of the Rosary at Hiroshima.
● Brazil Thwarted a Communist Takeover Through the Rosary ― In 1962 there was a looming threat of Communist takeover in Brazil. A woman there named Dona Amelia Bastos was known to have formed a Rosary rally among the Brazilian women there to do their part in opposing the looming threat. Their goal was simply to pray the Rosary in large groups asking the Virgin Mary for help in opposing the Communist takeover which the President of Brazil was leaning toward at the time. In Belo Horizonte 20,000 women reciting the Rosary aloud broke up a Communist rally. In Sao Paulo, 600,000 women praying the Rosary in one of the most moving demonstrations in Brazilian history, caused the President of Brazil to flee the country and not a single death was encountered, sparing the country from Communist takeover.
Battle of Lepanto, 1571 ― Before a large scale attack by the Ottoman Turks on an army of Christians in 1571, where the Christians were outnumbered three to one, the Rosary was prayed by all of the Christian soldiers and the Turks were miraculously defeated in the battle. To this day this victory has been attributed to the praying of the Rosary. [Read more here].
(8) The Scapular is Our Shield
On the day of the Miracle of the Sun at Fatima, Our Lady held out her Scapular towards the world as she disappeared into the skies at her very last appearance at Fatima. Lucia explained that Our Lady did so because “she wants everyone to wear it!” Lucia further said: “The Rosary and the Scapular are inseparable” and that the reason for wearing the Scapular is because it is our “Sign of consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.”
If you wear Mary’s Brown Scapular you should know something about St. Simon Stock, because you have worn his picture along with Our Lady’s picture on your Scapular. It was to him—St. Simon of England—that Our Blessed Mother gave the great Scapular Promise, in 1251, saying, “Whosoever dies wearing this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire.” When a priest enrolled you in the Scapular he said, “Receive this blessed Scapular and ask the most Holy Virgin that, by her merits, it may be worn with no stain of sin and may protect you from all harm and bring you into everlasting life.” This idea of “protection” makes the Scapular like a shield. We could apply the words of Scripture to Scapular: “In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:16).
In 1845, the English ship, King of the Ocean, was lashed by a wild hurricane. The Rev. Fisher, a Protestant minister, together with his wife and children and other passengers, struggled to the deck to pray for mercy and forgiveness, as the end seemed at hand. Among the crew was a young Irishman, John McAuliffe. He opened his shirt—took off his Scapular—made the Sign of the Cross over the angry waves, then threw the Scapular into the ocean. At that very moment the wind and the sea calmed―apart from only one more wave that washed over the deck, bringing with it the Scapular which landed at the boy’s feet. The Rev. Fisher and his family had observed what he had done and miraculous consequences. They questioned the boy. He told them about the Virgin and her Scapular and her Promise of protection in time of danger. So impressed were they that they determined to enter the Church and enjoy a like protection―which is what they did once the ship arrived in Australia.
Let us not conclude, however, that the Scapular is endowed with some kind of supernatural power, which will save us, no matter what we do, or how much we sin. We might apply here what St. Alphonsus says about devotion to Mary in general: “When we declare that it is impossible for a servant of Mary to be lost, we do not mean those who, by their devotion to Mary, think themselves warranted to sin freely. We state that these reckless people, because of their presumption, deserve to be treated with rigor and not with kindness. We speak here of the servants of Mary who, to the fidelity with which they honor and invoke her, join the desire to amend their lives. I hold it morally impossible that these be lost.” It is clear, from the words of St. Alphonsus, that a certain measure of fidelity is required on the part of those who wish to gain the special love and protection of Our Lady.
Article 9
Sunday, October 13th
The Miracle of the Sun - October 13th, 1917, Fatima
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, October 13th
The Miracle of the Sun - October 13th, 1917, Fatima
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
God Does Not Waste Miracles!
Throughout salvation history—from Noe to Moses, from Josue to Elias and the other prophets, from the Machabees to the twelve Apostles, to the saints of the Catholic Church down through the centuries to our present day―God has granted miracles for one overriding purpose: to serve as a divine credential for a human witness who invokes the miracle in God’s name. When God chooses a witness, and then associates an authentic miracle with the testimony of that witness, we know for certain that the witness is worthy of belief. God does not grant miracles to vouch for unreliable witnesses; God does not choose unreliable witnesses.
No, God does not waste miracles. Much less does God waste a public miracle witnessed by 70,000 people, believers and non-believers alike, which occurred at precisely the moment predicted three months earlier by three witnesses whose testimony had been doubted: Lucia dos Santos (known to the world as Lucy of Fatima) and her cousins, Francisco and Jacinta Marto. On October 13th, 1917, in the middle of nowhere, in a humble field known as the Cova da Iria in Fatima, over 70,000 people―believers and non-believers―assembled to await the happening of a miracle that had already been foretold three months in advance! This in itself is astounding. Never before in salvation history had a visionary predicted three months in advance that a public miracle would occur at a precise time and place. Never before had such a vast crowd assembled to witness a predicted public miracle. Yet that is exactly what happened 107 years ago, on this very day of October 13th.
The Number 13
Superstitious people hold the number 13 to be an unlucky number! Our Lady chose the 13th day of each month for her apparitions at Fatima. Some people look upon Friday the 13th as being an unlucky day―but Our Lady chose to appear at Fatima on Friday, July 13th, 1917.
Why this day? Why the thirteenth? Lucia dos Santos and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta had been receiving apparitions from “the Lady” on the thirteenth of each month since the previous May―apart from August, when the Masonic Mayor of the town had the children imprisoned and they could make their ‘appointment’ with Our Lady on the 13th of the month. Was there any significance to Our Lady appearing on the 13th of the other five months? Of course. Heaven doesn’t do things without a purpose. We might not know every single reason at the moment, but there are major connections of that number that weave into the Fatima story and can be taken as yet another way to enrich its significance and meaning.
First, keep in mind that certain numbers have great significance and symbolism for the Jewish people and for us. It’s clearly biblical. There were mystical meanings and sacredness attached to particular numbers in the Old Testament which continued into the New and carried on by the Fathers of the Church. The number 13 has symbolic significance.
● Hebrew word ahava: The Hebrew word ahava, which means “love”, has a numerical value of 13.
● The letter “M” for Mary is the 13th letter of the English alphabet.
● May 13th, the date of Mary’s first appearance at Fatima, was the original date for the feast of Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament. Surely this date was not randomly chosen but was purposely pointing to the Holy Eucharist.
● Trinitarian Significance: The number 13, or the digits 1 and 3, represent 1 God in 3 Persons.
● In the Old Testament, Queen Esther saved the Jewish people from massacre on the 13th day of Adar (the 12th month)
● In the Old Testament, the Machabees won a major battle on 13th day of Adar: “The armies joined battle on the thirteenth day of the month Adar―and the army of Nicanor was defeated, and he himself was first slain in the battle” (1 Machabees 7:43).
● In the Old Testament, we see that the Patriarch Jacob was the father of twelve sons―which gives us a total of 13.
● Our Lord, together with His Twelve Apostles give a total of 13 persons.
● Our Lady entrusted the Rosary to St Dominic in the 13th century.
● Our Lady gave the Brown Scapular to St. Simon Stock in the 13th century.
● Pope John Paul II was shot three times by Mehmet Ali Agca on May 13th, 1981. Unlucky, huh? Luckily for him he survived.
The Backdrop to the Miracle of the Sun
October 13th, 1917, was the last of six apparitions of Our Lady in Fatima and the day on which thousands of people―believers and non-believers, the secular newspapers and even Freemasons―bore witness to the miracle of the dancing sun—a miracle that shattered the prevalent belief at the time that God was no longer relevant. If one were to open philosophy books during that period, he or she would likely read something akin to the concept conceived by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, who boldly asserted in the late 1800s that “God is dead.”
Also, in 1917 Portugal, Over 30 nations were involved in the First World War between 1914 and 1918. As the war raged throughout Europe, Portugal found itself unable to maintain its initial neutrality and joined forces with the Allies. More than 220,000 Portuguese civilians died during the war, thousands due to food shortages and thousands more from the Spanish flu.
A few years before the commencement of the First World War, a revolution in Portugal had led to the establishment of the First Portuguese Republic in 1910 and a new Liberal constitution was drafted under the influence of Freemasonry, which sought to suppress the Catholic Faith from public life. Catholic churches and schools were seized by the government. Furthermore, the wearing of priestly clothing or religious habits in public, also the ringing of church bells, and the celebration of public religious festivals―were all banned. Between 1911 and 1916, nearly 2,000 priests, monks, and nuns were killed by anti-Christian groups.
This was the backdrop against which, in 1917, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to three shepherd children—Lucia dos Santos, 10, and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta Marto, 9 and 7—in a field in Fatima, Portugal, bringing with her requests for the recitation of the Rosary; the performance of sacrifices on behalf of sinners; and a secret regarding the fate of the world.
To prove that the apparitions were true, “the Lady” promised the children that during the last of her six appearances, she would provide a sign so people would believe in the apparitions and in her message. What happened on that day—October 13th, 1917—has come to be known as the “Miracle of the Sun,” or “the day the sun danced.”
Showdown at Fatima
While many people believed the children had actually seen the Blessed Virgin, many others discounted the children’s story as an invention of their imagination―thus subjecting them to much mockery and ridicule. Lucia had asked Our Lady to work a miracle “so that everybody will believe you are appearing to us” during the July 13th 1917 apparition. To prove that the apparitions were true, and to provide a sign so that people would believe in the apparitions and in her message, Our Lady promised a miracle at Fatima as follows: “In October, I will tell you who I am and what I want, and I will perform a miracle for all to see and believe!” This prophesy of a miracle became well known throughout Portugal―and when it became known “the Lady” would visit the children for the last time on October 13th, 1917, and that she had promised a sign that would convince the world she had truly appeared, many pilgrims made plans to attend.
How many people attended? The maximum estimate was from Dr. Almeida Garrett, and was proposed some months after the event. It estimates the spectators at more than one hundred thousand. In “O Seculo” of October 15th, Avelino de Almeida wrote: “The crowd, by the unprejudiced calculations of cultivated persons very new to mystical influences, was estimated at thirty or forty thousand people.” In his article of October 29th, he corrected his first estimate: “On October 13th, according to the calculations established by people free from every prejudice, some fifty thousand people were gathered on the moor of Fatima.” A neutral newspaper, the “Primeiro de Janeiro”, also estimated the crowd at fifty thousand individuals. We can therefore say, with a quasi-certainty, that this figure is a minimum; that is why the majority of historians propose as probable the presence of a crowd of 70,000 witnesses.
Though the region had been subjected to three days of torrential downpour, nearly 70,000 people — believers and skeptics alike — journeyed through the heavy rain and mud to the place of the previous apparitions to witness the predicted miracle. Many were scornful, unbelievers whose sole intent was to discredit the children’s stories.
The local newspaper reported that Saturday, October 13th, begins for the pilgrims, as a walk of penance because it had rained the whole preceding night. Now, this “almost sudden change of weather, with the dusty roads transformed into muddy quagmires by a pelting rain, causing to replace abruptly, for a day, the sweetness of autumn with the biting rigors of winter, did not succeed in moving them, to make them give up or despair. From dawn, our reporter relates, visibly impressed by that calm courage, groups looming up again, intrepid individuals who pass through, without stopping for a moment, the small town, whose silence is broken by the chant of hymns intoned by feminine voices in harmony which contrasts with the roughness of the men... The sun rises, but the aspect of the sky is threatening. Some black clouds accumulate, precisely from the Fatima side. Nothing however holds back the pilgrims who, from all roads and by all means of locomotion, flock in that direction... Some small bells on a chain tinkle; we see here and there a cart decorated with palms. However, the festive atmosphere is discreet; the general manner is grave, the order perfect ... Towards ten o’clock, the sky is covered completely and a heavy rain begins to fall. The downpour, whipped by a bitter wind, beating against the face, inundates the gravel roads, and pierces to the bone those who did not take the precaution of carrying an umbrella or some other means of protection from the bad weather. But no one becomes impatient, nor gives up following the road.”
The rainy sky cleared up, the clouds separated and the sun appeared between them in the clear blue, and the ground, which had been wet and muddy from three days of rain, had suddenly dried up in an instant. Lucia then cried out “Look at the sun!” and the vast crowd saw a true miracle. All eyes turned skyward to see the black clouds parting and the sun, looking like a dull grey disc, like a disk of white fire, become visible. A transparent veil came over the sun, making it easy to look at, and multicolored lights were strewn across the landscape. The people could look at the sun without blinking and while they gazed upward, the huge ball began to “dance”―it began to spin, twirling in the sky. The huge fireball whirled rapidly with dizzy and sickening speed, flinging out all sorts of brilliant colors that reflected on the faces of the crowds. The fiery ball continued to gyrate in this manner three times, then seemed to tremble and shudder, and plunge in a mighty zigzag course toward the Earth. The crowd was terrified, fearing this was the end of the world. However, the sun reversed course and, retracing its zigzagging course, returned to its normal place in the heavens. All of this transpired in approximately ten minutes. After realizing they were not doomed, the crowd began ecstatically laughing, crying, shouting and weeping. Many discovered their previously drenched clothing to be perfectly dry.
The stunning event was a direct and very convincing contradiction to the atheistic regimes at the time, which is evidenced by the fact that the first newspaper to report on the miracle on a full front page was an anti-Catholic, Masonic newspaper in Lisbon called O Seculo. The miracle of the sun was understood by the people to be “the seal, the guarantee, that in fact those three children were telling the truth,” Duarte said.
Testimonies of Believers, Skeptics and Non-Believers
The SECULAR LISBON DAILY NEWSPAPER, O DIA, in its edition of October 17th, 1917, reported: ““At one o’clock in the afternoon―midday by the sun―the rain stopped. The sky, pearly grey in color, illuminated the vast arid landscape with a strange light. The sun had a transparent gauzy veil so that the eyes could easily be fixed upon it. The grey mother-of-pearl tone turned into a sheet of silver which broke up as the clouds were torn apart and the silver sun, enveloped in the same gauzy grey light, was seen to whirl and turn in the circle of broken clouds. A cry went up from every mouth and the people fell on their knees on the muddy ground. … The light turned a beautiful blue, as if it had come through the stained-glass windows of a cathedral, and spread itself over the people who knelt with outstretched hands. The blue faded slowly, and then the light seemed to pass through yellow glass. Yellow stains fell against white handkerchiefs, against the dark skirts of the women. They were repeated on the trees, on the stones and on the serra. People wept and prayed with uncovered heads, in the presence of a miracle they had awaited. The seconds seemed like hours, so vivid were they” (Lisbon newspaper, O Dia).
In O SECULO, another government, anti-clerical, Lisbon daily newspaper, AVELINO DE ALMEIDA adopted a very different tone from a previous satirical article on Fatima, going into even more detail: “From the road, where the vehicles were parked and where hundreds of people who had not dared to brave the mud were congregated, one could see the immense multitude turn towards the sun, which appeared free from clouds and at its zenith. It looked like a plaque of dull silver and it was possible to look at it without the least discomfort. It might have been an eclipse which was taking place. But at that moment a great shout went up and one could hear the spectators nearest at hand shouting: «A miracle! A miracle!» Before the astonished eyes of the crowd, whose aspect was Biblical as they stood bareheaded, eagerly searching the sky, the sun trembled, made sudden incredible movements outside all cosmic laws—the sun “danced” according to the typical expression of the people. …
“Standing at the step of an omnibus was an old man. With his face turned to the sun, he recited the Credo in a loud voice. I asked who he was and was told he was Senhor Joao da Cunha Vasconcelos. I saw him afterwards going up to those around him who still had their hats on, and vehemently imploring them to uncover before such an extraordinary demonstration of the existence of God. Identical scenes were repeated elsewhere, and in one place a woman cried out: «How terrible! There are even men who do not uncover before such a stupendous miracle!»
People then began to ask each other what they had seen. The great majority admitted to having seen the trembling and dancing of the sun; others affirmed that they saw the face of the Blessed Virgin; others, again, swore that the sun whirled on itself like a giant Catherine wheel and that it lowered itself to the Earth as if to burn it with its rays. Some said they saw it change colors successively.” (Avelino De Almeida, in O Secula)
Another important witness was, DR. GONÇALO DE ALMEIDA GARRETT, Ph.D., Professor of Natural Sciences at Coimbra University, who wrote to the priest who had interviewed the children, Fr. Formigão, describing what he had seen: “I was looking at the place of the apparitions in a serene, if cold, expectation of something happening, and with diminishing curiosity, because a long time had passed without anything to excite my attention. Then I heard a shout from thousands of voices and saw the multitude suddenly turn its back and shoulders away from the point toward which up to now it had directed its attention, and turn to look at the sky on the opposite side. It must have been nearly two o’clock by the legal time and about midday by the sun. The sun, a few moments before, had broken through the thick layers of clouds which hid it and shone clearly and intensely ...
“Suddenly I heard the uproar of thousands of voices, and I saw the whole multitude spread out in that vast space at my feet ... turn their backs to that spot where, until then, all their expectations focused, and look at the sun on the other side ... I turned around, too, toward the point commanding their gazes, and I could see the sun, like a disc with a clean-cut rim, luminous and shining, but which did not hurt the eyes. I do not agree with the comparison which I have heard made in Fatima―that of a dull silver disc. It was a clearer, richer, brighter color, having something of the luster of a pearl. It did not in the least resemble the moon on a clear night―because one saw it and felt it to be a living body. It was not spheric like the moon, nor did it have the same color, tone, or shading. It looked like a glazed wheel made of mother-of-pearl. It could not be confused, either, with the sun seen through fog―for there was no fog at the time―and because it was not opaque, diffused or veiled. In Fatima it gave light and heat and appeared clear-cut with a well-defined, sharp-eddged rim.
“The sky was mottled with light cirrus clouds with the blue coming through here and there, but sometimes the sun stood out in patches of clear sky. The clouds passed from west to east and did not obscure the light of the sun, giving the impression of passing behind it, though sometimes these flecks of white took on tones of pink or diaphanous blue as they passed before the sun. The impression was not that of an eclipse, and while looking at the sun I noticed that the atmosphere had cleared.
“The most astonishing thing was to be able to stare at the solar disc for a long time, brilliant with light and heat, without hurting the eyes, or damaging the retina. The phenomenon, except for two interruptions when the sun seemed to send out rays of refulgent heat which obliged us to look away, must have lasted about ten minutes. The sun’s disc did not remain immobile. This was not the sparkling of a heavenly body for it spun round on itself in a mad whirl. Then, suddenly, one heard a clamor, a cry of anguish breaking from all the people. The sun, whirling wildly, seemed to loosen itself from the firmament and advance threateningly upon the Earth as if to crush us with its huge and fiery weight. The sensation during those moments was terrible. During the solar phenomenon … there were changes of color in the atmosphere. … I saw everything an amethyst [purple] color. Objects around me, the sky and the atmosphere, were of the same color. An oak tree nearby threw a shadow of this color on the ground. Fearing that I was suffering from an affection of the retina, an improbable explanation because in that case one could not see things purple-colored, I turned away and shut my eyes, keeping my hands before them to intercept the light. With my back still turned, I opened my eyes and saw that the landscape was the same purple color as before. Soon after I heard a peasant who was near me shout out in tones of astonishment: «Look, that lady is all yellow!» And in fact everything, both near and far, had changed, taking on the color of old yellow damask. People looked as if they were suffering from jaundice, and I recall a sensation of amusement at seeing them look so ugly and unattractive. My own hand was the same color. All the phenomena which I have described were observed by me in a calm and serene state of mind and without any emotional disturbance. It is for others to interpret and explain them.” (Dr. Gonçalo de Almeida Garrett, Ph.D., Professor of Natural Sciences at Coimbra University).
DR. DOMINGOS COELHO ― as reported in the newspaper Ordem ― stated: “The sun, at one moment surrounded with scarlet flame, at another aureoled in yellow and deep purple, seemed to be in an exceedingly fast and whirling movement, at times appearing to be loosened from the sky and to be approaching the Earth, strongly radiating heat.” (Dr. Domingos Coelho).
Other witnesses too, such as MARIA CARREIRA, testified to the terrifying nature of the solar miracle: “It turned everything different colors, yellow, blue, white, and it shook and trembled; it seemed like a wheel of fire which was going to fall on the people. They cried out: «We shall all be killed, we shall all be killed!» Others called on Our Lady to save them and recited acts of contrition. One woman began to confess her sins aloud, saying that she had done this and that. … At last the sun stopped moving and we all breathed a sigh of relief. We were still alive and the miracle which the children had foretold had taken place.” (Maria Carreira).
ALFREDO DA SILVA SANTOS (Lisbon) stated: “We made our arrangements, and went in three motor cars on the early morning of the 13th. There was a thick mist, and the car which went in front mistook the way so that we were all lost for a time and only arrived at the Cova da Iria at midday by the sun. It was absolutely full of people, but for my part I felt devoid of any religious feeling. When Lucia called out: “Look at the sun!” the whole multitude repeated: “Attention to the sun!” It was a day of incessant drizzle but a few moments before the miracle it stopped raining. I can hardly find words to describe what followed. The sun began to move, and at a certain moment appeared to be detached from the sky and about to hurtle upon us like a wheel of flame. My wife―we had been married only a short time―fainted, and I was too upset to attend to her, and my brother-in-law, Joao Vassalo, supported her on his arm. I fell on my knees, oblivious of everything, and when I got up I don’t know what I said. I think I began to cry out like the others. An old man with a white beard began to attack the atheists aloud and challenged them to say whether or not something supernatural had occurred.” (Alfredo Da Silva Santos).
These are powerful testimonies, but perhaps one of the most interesting witnesses was an Englishwoman, MABEL NORTON, who was a Protestant. She had been living in Portugal for seven years and was spending some time at the home of a Marchioness, speaking English with her children. She did not see the miracle in as much detail, perhaps because she was not a Catholic, and indeed was somewhat disappointed when she realized what other people had seen, but nevertheless, her account is very important, especially as she had not really been expecting anything to happen.
Mabel went with the family to Fatima early on the morning of October 13th, arriving at the Cova at about midday, just in time for the miracle. She describes how Lucia’s cry ― “Look at the sun!” ― was taken up by the people until it rolled from the center to the edges of the crowd as a “great wave of sound,” and is careful to note that this was the first indication of the kind of miracle that could be expected, that is, that it was something to do with the sun. Then the rain suddenly stopped and she found she could look at the sun, which appeared as a “luminous disc, on which it was possible to gaze without blinking.”
Mabel is emphatic about the speed with which the rain stopped, and is clear in her description of events: “I saw the rain cease, suddenly, not as rain usually ends. Then the clouds were pushed back from the sun in every direction, as if by invisible hands, and the sun appeared, in color like the blade of a knife, luminous but not dazzling. Then, as I looked, the sun described a swift circle, paused; described another, paused; described yet a third. And then the clouds began to sweep over it again.” (Mabel Norton).
MARIA DE CAPELINHA―one of the earliest believers―said: “The sun turned everything to different colors―yellow, blue and white. Then it shook and trembled. It looked like a wheel of fire that was going to fall on the people. They began to cry out: «We shall all be killed!» Others called to Our Lady to save them. They recited acts of contrition. One woman began to confess her sins aloud, advertising that she had done this and that! ... When at last the sun stopped leaping and moving, we all breathed our relief! We were still alive, and the miracle which the children had foretold, had been seen by everyone.” (Maria de Capelinha).
Other people witnessed the solar miracle from a distance, thus ruling out the possibility of any sort of collective hallucination, as in the case of the poet ALFONSO LOPES VIEIRA who lived over thirty miles away from Fatima: “On that day, October 13th, 1917, without remembering the predictions of the children, I was enchanted by a remarkable spectacle in the sky of a kind I had never seen before.”
FR. MANUEL PEREIRA DA SILVA ― in a letter to a friend ― wrote: “The sun appeared with its circumference well defined. It came down as if to the height of the clouds and began to whirl giddily upon itself like a captive ball of fire. With some interruptions, this lasted about eight minutes. The atmosphere darkened and the features of each became yellow. Everyone knelt even in the mud.” (Fr. Manuel Pereira da Silva).
INÁCIO LOURENÇO―who was to become a priest―was a school child of nine when he saw the miracle in Alburitel, a village about 12 miles from Fatima. He described how the children and their teachers were attracted outside by a commotion in front of the school to see the miracle of the sun: “I was only nine years old at this time, and I went to the local village school. At about midday we were surprised by the shouts and cries of some men and women who were passing in the street in front of the school. The teacher, a good, pious woman, though nervous and impressionable, was the first to run into the road, with the children after her.
“Outside, the people were shouting and weeping and pointing to the sun, ignoring the agitated questions of the schoolmistress. It was the great Miracle, which one could see quite distinctly from the top of the hill where my village was situated―the Miracle of the sun, accompanied by all its extraordinary phenomena. I feel incapable of describing what I saw and felt. I looked fixedly at the sun, which seemed pale and did not hurt the eyes. Looking like a ball of snow revolving on itself, it suddenly seemed to come down in a zig-zag, menacing the Earth. Terrified, I ran and hid myself among the people, who were weeping and expecting the end of the world at any moment.
“Near us was an unbeliever, who had spent the morning mocking at the simpletons who had gone off to Fatima just to see an ordinary girl. He now seemed to be paralyzed, his eyes fixed on the sun. Afterwards he trembled from head to foot and lifting up his arms fell on his knees in the mud, crying out to Our Lady.
“Meanwhile the people continued to cry out and to weep, asking God to pardon their sins. We all ran to the two chapels in the village, which were soon filled to overflowing. During those long moments of the solar prodigy, objects around us turned all the colors of the rainbow. We saw ourselves blue, yellow, red, etc. All these strange phenomena increased the fears of the people. After about ten minutes the sun, now dull and pallid, returned to its place. When the people realized that the danger was over, there was an explosion of joy, and everyone joined in thanksgiving and praise to Our Lady.”
(Fr. Inácio Lourenço).
ALFONSO LOPES VIEIRA observed the display from a distance of nearly 25 miles: “On that day of October 13th, 1917, without remembering the predictions of the children, I was enchanted by a remarkable spectacle in the sky of a kind I had never seen before. I saw it from this veranda.” (Alfonso Lopes Vieira).
TI MARTO (father of Jacinta and Francisco) said: “We looked easily at the sun, which for some reason did not blind us. It seemed to flicker on and off, first one way, then another. It cast its rays in many directions and painted everything in different colors--- the trees, the people, the air and the ground. But what was most extraordinary, I thought, was that the sun did not hurt our eyes. Everything was still and quiet, and everyone was looking up. Then at a certain moment, the sun appeared to stop spinning. It then began again to dance, to spin; it stopped again, and then began again to dance in the sky, until it seemed to detach itself from its place and fall upon us. It was a terrible moment!” (Ti Marto, father of Francisco and Jacinta Marto).
Another witness, who was aware of the dangers of possible hallucination, the BARON OF ALVAIÁZERE, was certainly not expecting a miracle, and took precautions to ensure that he was not affected by “suggestion.” But in his deposition to the canonical committee which investigated Fatima, he made the following statement: “An indescribable impression overtook me. I only know that I cried out: ‘I believe! I believe! I believe!’ And tears ran from my eyes. I was amazed, in ecstasy before the demonstration of divine power … converted in that moment.” (Baron Of Alvaiázere).
Other brief extracts of testimonies from witnesses are as follows:
“And then we witnessed a unique spectacle, the reporter of “O Seculo” remarked in similar vein, an incredible spectacle, unbelievable if you did not witness it. From above the road ... We see the immense crowd turn towards the sun, which appeared at its zenith, clear of the clouds. It looked like a plate of dull silver, and it was possible to stare at it without the least discomfort. It did not burn the eyes. It did not blind. One might say that an eclipse had occurred.” (Newspaper article of October 15th, 1917). “The people could look at the sun as we look at the moon.” (Maria do Carmo).
“The sun turned like a fire wheel, taking on all the colors of the rainbow.” (Maria do Carmo).
“It appeared like a globe of snow turning on itself.” (Father Ignacio Lourenço).
“The pearl-like disc had a giddy motion. This was not the twinkling of a star in all its brilliance. It turned on itself with impetuous speed.” (Dr. Gonçalo de Almeida Garrett, Ph.D., Professor of Natural Sciences at Coimbra University).
“The sun took on all the colors of the rainbow. Everything assumed those same colors: our faces, our clothes, the earth itself.” (Maria do Carmo).
“A light, whose colors changed from one moment to the next, was reflected on the people and on things” (Dr. Pereira Gens).
“We suddenly heard a clamor, like a cry of anguish of that entire crowd. The sun, in fact, keeping its rapid movement of rotation, seemed to free itself from the firmament and blood-red, to plunge towards the Earth, threatening to crush us with its fiery mass. Those were some terrifying seconds.” (Dr. Gonçalo de Almeida Garrett, Ph.D., Professor of Natural Sciences at Coimbra University).
“I saw the sun turn and it seemed to descend. It was like a bicycle wheel.” (John Carreira).
“The sun began to dance and, at a certain moment, it appeared to detach itself from the firmament and to rush forward on us, like a fire wheel.” (Alfredo da Silva Santos).
“I saw it perfectly descending as if it came to crash on the Earth. It seemed to detach itself from the sky and rush toward us. It maintained itself at a short distance above our heads; but that sort of attack was of very short duration ... It seemed very near the people and it continued to turn in the opposite direction.” (Maria do Carmo).
“From those thousands of mouths, I heard shouts of joy and love to the Most Holy Virgin. And then I believed. I had the certainty of not having been the victim of a suggestion. I had seen the sun as I would never see it again.” (Mario Godinho).
A final intriguing point was that many people reported that the heat of the sun, as it descended to the Earth, also had the effect of drying their clothes and the ground, so that they went from being completely soaked to being dry in about ten minutes.
The BISHOP OF LEIRIA in his pastoral letter of October 13th, 1930, in which he declared the visions of the children worthy of credence, and permitted the cult of Our Lady of Fatima, wrote as follows about the miracle: “The phenomenon of the Sun on October 13th, 1917, described in newspapers of the time, was simply marvelous and caused the greatest impression on those who had the happiness to witness it. The children predetermined the day and the hour that it was going to happen. The news spread like wildfire throughout Portugal and in spite of the day being severe, raining heavily, thousands and thousands of people gathered, who at the hour of the final apparition, witnessed all the manifestations of the King of the Planets, in paying homage to the Queen of Heaven and Earth, who surpasses the sun in brilliance even at its best. This phenomenon, which went unnoticed by astronomers, and hence was something unnatural, was witnessed by people of all sorts and social classes—believers and unbelievers, journalists of the principal Portuguese daily newspapers, and even by individuals who were miles away; which destroys all explanations of collective illusion.”
The Fatima author FRANCIS JOHNSTON wrote that this was only the third time in history that God had used the sun to perform a miracle, a reference to Josue 10:12-14 and 2 Kings 20:8-11 (Fatima the Great Sign, p. 54). Francis Johnston also cited the work of Fr. Pio Sciatizzi, S.J., who was professor of algebra and trigonometry at the Gregorian University, an outstanding mathematician and astronomer, and highly esteemed in the Italian scientific world, who wrote an exhaustive study of the Miracle of the Sun, published in the 1940s, in which he concluded: “It was outside and against known laws, as can be proved by certain simple scientific considerations … Given the indubitable reference to God and the general context of the event, it seems that we must attribute to Him alone the most obvious and colossal miracle of history!” (Fatima the Great Sign, p. 66).
The Effect on the Miracle of the Sin of One Single Man
According to SR. LUCIA OF FATIMA, the Blessed Virgin Mary said that the Miracle of the Sun would have been even more spectacular if the children had not been prevented from going to the apparition site on August 13th, when they were kidnapped and imprisoned on August 13th by the local Masonic Mayor of nearby Ourem, Artur Santos. They were eventually released after two days later, on August 15th and Our Lady appeared to the children later that month on the 19th. During this brief delayed apparition, Our Lady to the coming miracle she was to perform in October, saying: “If they had not taken you to Ourem, the miracle would be even greater.”
The Miracle of the Sun dazzled and astounded everyone ― believers and non-believers alike, Catholics and atheists, peasants and doctors, laity and priests ― with its supernatural character and the monumental movements of the sun. It exceeded all imagination. It was terrifying, yet magnificent. Those who witnessed the miracle experienced special graces, healings and conversions—even when many miles away.
As great as this miracle was, it was supposed to be yet more magnificent. However, the actions of the Masonic Mayor of Ourem, Artur Santos, and his accomplices, caused the diminishing of the miracle. Thus, many miraculous healings and conversions did not take place because of this man. The actions of one or a few can have an impact on what Our Lady decides to do. When we sin, we offend God, Who can choose to withhold His graces from the world. If the single evil action of the Mayor of Ourem had such an effect on heaven, we can imagine the impact of sacrilege, blasphemy, contraception, abortion, adultery, fornication, homosexuality and same-sex “marriage.” Every sin offends God; we must also consider the billions of grave mortal sins thrown in the face of God every single day. These offences merit unimaginable chastisements in due proportion.
We must also consider that Our Lady complained about the sins of the early 20th century. Marriages and families at that time were still largely intact. Divorce, abortion, fornication, sodomy and other behaviors were illegal then. However, Our Lady still was incredibly saddened by the sins of that time. Today, she must be much more saddened. We see this in the words she spoke to Blessed Elena Aiello in the 1950s: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! That scourge, like the shadow of a dark cloud, is now moving across mankind―only my power, as Mother of God, is preventing the outbreak of the storm.” (Words of Our Lady, December 8th, 1956).
It is no exaggeration when Our Lord and Our Lady say that Mary’s Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart is pierced “at every moment.” In fact, it is pierced thousands of times each and every second of the day and night! If you take the world’s population of almost 8,000 million people (8 billion) and divide that number by the total number of seconds that there are in 24 hours―which is 86,400 seconds―then you get over 92,000 (92,592) persons for each second of the day. If every person in the world would only commit ONE SINGLE SIN A DAY and no more, then Our Lady’s Sorrowful Heart is being pierced over 92,000 times per second. If every person would ONLY COMMIT TEN SINS PER DAY, then Our Lady’s Sorrowful Heart would be pierced almost 1 million times per second (925,920 times per second). Yet are ten sins per day the average? No, it is much more than that―it is easy to commit 10 sins per hour!
Throughout salvation history—from Noe to Moses, from Josue to Elias and the other prophets, from the Machabees to the twelve Apostles, to the saints of the Catholic Church down through the centuries to our present day―God has granted miracles for one overriding purpose: to serve as a divine credential for a human witness who invokes the miracle in God’s name. When God chooses a witness, and then associates an authentic miracle with the testimony of that witness, we know for certain that the witness is worthy of belief. God does not grant miracles to vouch for unreliable witnesses; God does not choose unreliable witnesses.
No, God does not waste miracles. Much less does God waste a public miracle witnessed by 70,000 people, believers and non-believers alike, which occurred at precisely the moment predicted three months earlier by three witnesses whose testimony had been doubted: Lucia dos Santos (known to the world as Lucy of Fatima) and her cousins, Francisco and Jacinta Marto. On October 13th, 1917, in the middle of nowhere, in a humble field known as the Cova da Iria in Fatima, over 70,000 people―believers and non-believers―assembled to await the happening of a miracle that had already been foretold three months in advance! This in itself is astounding. Never before in salvation history had a visionary predicted three months in advance that a public miracle would occur at a precise time and place. Never before had such a vast crowd assembled to witness a predicted public miracle. Yet that is exactly what happened 107 years ago, on this very day of October 13th.
The Number 13
Superstitious people hold the number 13 to be an unlucky number! Our Lady chose the 13th day of each month for her apparitions at Fatima. Some people look upon Friday the 13th as being an unlucky day―but Our Lady chose to appear at Fatima on Friday, July 13th, 1917.
Why this day? Why the thirteenth? Lucia dos Santos and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta had been receiving apparitions from “the Lady” on the thirteenth of each month since the previous May―apart from August, when the Masonic Mayor of the town had the children imprisoned and they could make their ‘appointment’ with Our Lady on the 13th of the month. Was there any significance to Our Lady appearing on the 13th of the other five months? Of course. Heaven doesn’t do things without a purpose. We might not know every single reason at the moment, but there are major connections of that number that weave into the Fatima story and can be taken as yet another way to enrich its significance and meaning.
First, keep in mind that certain numbers have great significance and symbolism for the Jewish people and for us. It’s clearly biblical. There were mystical meanings and sacredness attached to particular numbers in the Old Testament which continued into the New and carried on by the Fathers of the Church. The number 13 has symbolic significance.
● Hebrew word ahava: The Hebrew word ahava, which means “love”, has a numerical value of 13.
● The letter “M” for Mary is the 13th letter of the English alphabet.
● May 13th, the date of Mary’s first appearance at Fatima, was the original date for the feast of Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament. Surely this date was not randomly chosen but was purposely pointing to the Holy Eucharist.
● Trinitarian Significance: The number 13, or the digits 1 and 3, represent 1 God in 3 Persons.
● In the Old Testament, Queen Esther saved the Jewish people from massacre on the 13th day of Adar (the 12th month)
● In the Old Testament, the Machabees won a major battle on 13th day of Adar: “The armies joined battle on the thirteenth day of the month Adar―and the army of Nicanor was defeated, and he himself was first slain in the battle” (1 Machabees 7:43).
● In the Old Testament, we see that the Patriarch Jacob was the father of twelve sons―which gives us a total of 13.
● Our Lord, together with His Twelve Apostles give a total of 13 persons.
● Our Lady entrusted the Rosary to St Dominic in the 13th century.
● Our Lady gave the Brown Scapular to St. Simon Stock in the 13th century.
● Pope John Paul II was shot three times by Mehmet Ali Agca on May 13th, 1981. Unlucky, huh? Luckily for him he survived.
The Backdrop to the Miracle of the Sun
October 13th, 1917, was the last of six apparitions of Our Lady in Fatima and the day on which thousands of people―believers and non-believers, the secular newspapers and even Freemasons―bore witness to the miracle of the dancing sun—a miracle that shattered the prevalent belief at the time that God was no longer relevant. If one were to open philosophy books during that period, he or she would likely read something akin to the concept conceived by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, who boldly asserted in the late 1800s that “God is dead.”
Also, in 1917 Portugal, Over 30 nations were involved in the First World War between 1914 and 1918. As the war raged throughout Europe, Portugal found itself unable to maintain its initial neutrality and joined forces with the Allies. More than 220,000 Portuguese civilians died during the war, thousands due to food shortages and thousands more from the Spanish flu.
A few years before the commencement of the First World War, a revolution in Portugal had led to the establishment of the First Portuguese Republic in 1910 and a new Liberal constitution was drafted under the influence of Freemasonry, which sought to suppress the Catholic Faith from public life. Catholic churches and schools were seized by the government. Furthermore, the wearing of priestly clothing or religious habits in public, also the ringing of church bells, and the celebration of public religious festivals―were all banned. Between 1911 and 1916, nearly 2,000 priests, monks, and nuns were killed by anti-Christian groups.
This was the backdrop against which, in 1917, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to three shepherd children—Lucia dos Santos, 10, and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta Marto, 9 and 7—in a field in Fatima, Portugal, bringing with her requests for the recitation of the Rosary; the performance of sacrifices on behalf of sinners; and a secret regarding the fate of the world.
To prove that the apparitions were true, “the Lady” promised the children that during the last of her six appearances, she would provide a sign so people would believe in the apparitions and in her message. What happened on that day—October 13th, 1917—has come to be known as the “Miracle of the Sun,” or “the day the sun danced.”
Showdown at Fatima
While many people believed the children had actually seen the Blessed Virgin, many others discounted the children’s story as an invention of their imagination―thus subjecting them to much mockery and ridicule. Lucia had asked Our Lady to work a miracle “so that everybody will believe you are appearing to us” during the July 13th 1917 apparition. To prove that the apparitions were true, and to provide a sign so that people would believe in the apparitions and in her message, Our Lady promised a miracle at Fatima as follows: “In October, I will tell you who I am and what I want, and I will perform a miracle for all to see and believe!” This prophesy of a miracle became well known throughout Portugal―and when it became known “the Lady” would visit the children for the last time on October 13th, 1917, and that she had promised a sign that would convince the world she had truly appeared, many pilgrims made plans to attend.
How many people attended? The maximum estimate was from Dr. Almeida Garrett, and was proposed some months after the event. It estimates the spectators at more than one hundred thousand. In “O Seculo” of October 15th, Avelino de Almeida wrote: “The crowd, by the unprejudiced calculations of cultivated persons very new to mystical influences, was estimated at thirty or forty thousand people.” In his article of October 29th, he corrected his first estimate: “On October 13th, according to the calculations established by people free from every prejudice, some fifty thousand people were gathered on the moor of Fatima.” A neutral newspaper, the “Primeiro de Janeiro”, also estimated the crowd at fifty thousand individuals. We can therefore say, with a quasi-certainty, that this figure is a minimum; that is why the majority of historians propose as probable the presence of a crowd of 70,000 witnesses.
Though the region had been subjected to three days of torrential downpour, nearly 70,000 people — believers and skeptics alike — journeyed through the heavy rain and mud to the place of the previous apparitions to witness the predicted miracle. Many were scornful, unbelievers whose sole intent was to discredit the children’s stories.
The local newspaper reported that Saturday, October 13th, begins for the pilgrims, as a walk of penance because it had rained the whole preceding night. Now, this “almost sudden change of weather, with the dusty roads transformed into muddy quagmires by a pelting rain, causing to replace abruptly, for a day, the sweetness of autumn with the biting rigors of winter, did not succeed in moving them, to make them give up or despair. From dawn, our reporter relates, visibly impressed by that calm courage, groups looming up again, intrepid individuals who pass through, without stopping for a moment, the small town, whose silence is broken by the chant of hymns intoned by feminine voices in harmony which contrasts with the roughness of the men... The sun rises, but the aspect of the sky is threatening. Some black clouds accumulate, precisely from the Fatima side. Nothing however holds back the pilgrims who, from all roads and by all means of locomotion, flock in that direction... Some small bells on a chain tinkle; we see here and there a cart decorated with palms. However, the festive atmosphere is discreet; the general manner is grave, the order perfect ... Towards ten o’clock, the sky is covered completely and a heavy rain begins to fall. The downpour, whipped by a bitter wind, beating against the face, inundates the gravel roads, and pierces to the bone those who did not take the precaution of carrying an umbrella or some other means of protection from the bad weather. But no one becomes impatient, nor gives up following the road.”
The rainy sky cleared up, the clouds separated and the sun appeared between them in the clear blue, and the ground, which had been wet and muddy from three days of rain, had suddenly dried up in an instant. Lucia then cried out “Look at the sun!” and the vast crowd saw a true miracle. All eyes turned skyward to see the black clouds parting and the sun, looking like a dull grey disc, like a disk of white fire, become visible. A transparent veil came over the sun, making it easy to look at, and multicolored lights were strewn across the landscape. The people could look at the sun without blinking and while they gazed upward, the huge ball began to “dance”―it began to spin, twirling in the sky. The huge fireball whirled rapidly with dizzy and sickening speed, flinging out all sorts of brilliant colors that reflected on the faces of the crowds. The fiery ball continued to gyrate in this manner three times, then seemed to tremble and shudder, and plunge in a mighty zigzag course toward the Earth. The crowd was terrified, fearing this was the end of the world. However, the sun reversed course and, retracing its zigzagging course, returned to its normal place in the heavens. All of this transpired in approximately ten minutes. After realizing they were not doomed, the crowd began ecstatically laughing, crying, shouting and weeping. Many discovered their previously drenched clothing to be perfectly dry.
The stunning event was a direct and very convincing contradiction to the atheistic regimes at the time, which is evidenced by the fact that the first newspaper to report on the miracle on a full front page was an anti-Catholic, Masonic newspaper in Lisbon called O Seculo. The miracle of the sun was understood by the people to be “the seal, the guarantee, that in fact those three children were telling the truth,” Duarte said.
Testimonies of Believers, Skeptics and Non-Believers
The SECULAR LISBON DAILY NEWSPAPER, O DIA, in its edition of October 17th, 1917, reported: ““At one o’clock in the afternoon―midday by the sun―the rain stopped. The sky, pearly grey in color, illuminated the vast arid landscape with a strange light. The sun had a transparent gauzy veil so that the eyes could easily be fixed upon it. The grey mother-of-pearl tone turned into a sheet of silver which broke up as the clouds were torn apart and the silver sun, enveloped in the same gauzy grey light, was seen to whirl and turn in the circle of broken clouds. A cry went up from every mouth and the people fell on their knees on the muddy ground. … The light turned a beautiful blue, as if it had come through the stained-glass windows of a cathedral, and spread itself over the people who knelt with outstretched hands. The blue faded slowly, and then the light seemed to pass through yellow glass. Yellow stains fell against white handkerchiefs, against the dark skirts of the women. They were repeated on the trees, on the stones and on the serra. People wept and prayed with uncovered heads, in the presence of a miracle they had awaited. The seconds seemed like hours, so vivid were they” (Lisbon newspaper, O Dia).
In O SECULO, another government, anti-clerical, Lisbon daily newspaper, AVELINO DE ALMEIDA adopted a very different tone from a previous satirical article on Fatima, going into even more detail: “From the road, where the vehicles were parked and where hundreds of people who had not dared to brave the mud were congregated, one could see the immense multitude turn towards the sun, which appeared free from clouds and at its zenith. It looked like a plaque of dull silver and it was possible to look at it without the least discomfort. It might have been an eclipse which was taking place. But at that moment a great shout went up and one could hear the spectators nearest at hand shouting: «A miracle! A miracle!» Before the astonished eyes of the crowd, whose aspect was Biblical as they stood bareheaded, eagerly searching the sky, the sun trembled, made sudden incredible movements outside all cosmic laws—the sun “danced” according to the typical expression of the people. …
“Standing at the step of an omnibus was an old man. With his face turned to the sun, he recited the Credo in a loud voice. I asked who he was and was told he was Senhor Joao da Cunha Vasconcelos. I saw him afterwards going up to those around him who still had their hats on, and vehemently imploring them to uncover before such an extraordinary demonstration of the existence of God. Identical scenes were repeated elsewhere, and in one place a woman cried out: «How terrible! There are even men who do not uncover before such a stupendous miracle!»
People then began to ask each other what they had seen. The great majority admitted to having seen the trembling and dancing of the sun; others affirmed that they saw the face of the Blessed Virgin; others, again, swore that the sun whirled on itself like a giant Catherine wheel and that it lowered itself to the Earth as if to burn it with its rays. Some said they saw it change colors successively.” (Avelino De Almeida, in O Secula)
Another important witness was, DR. GONÇALO DE ALMEIDA GARRETT, Ph.D., Professor of Natural Sciences at Coimbra University, who wrote to the priest who had interviewed the children, Fr. Formigão, describing what he had seen: “I was looking at the place of the apparitions in a serene, if cold, expectation of something happening, and with diminishing curiosity, because a long time had passed without anything to excite my attention. Then I heard a shout from thousands of voices and saw the multitude suddenly turn its back and shoulders away from the point toward which up to now it had directed its attention, and turn to look at the sky on the opposite side. It must have been nearly two o’clock by the legal time and about midday by the sun. The sun, a few moments before, had broken through the thick layers of clouds which hid it and shone clearly and intensely ...
“Suddenly I heard the uproar of thousands of voices, and I saw the whole multitude spread out in that vast space at my feet ... turn their backs to that spot where, until then, all their expectations focused, and look at the sun on the other side ... I turned around, too, toward the point commanding their gazes, and I could see the sun, like a disc with a clean-cut rim, luminous and shining, but which did not hurt the eyes. I do not agree with the comparison which I have heard made in Fatima―that of a dull silver disc. It was a clearer, richer, brighter color, having something of the luster of a pearl. It did not in the least resemble the moon on a clear night―because one saw it and felt it to be a living body. It was not spheric like the moon, nor did it have the same color, tone, or shading. It looked like a glazed wheel made of mother-of-pearl. It could not be confused, either, with the sun seen through fog―for there was no fog at the time―and because it was not opaque, diffused or veiled. In Fatima it gave light and heat and appeared clear-cut with a well-defined, sharp-eddged rim.
“The sky was mottled with light cirrus clouds with the blue coming through here and there, but sometimes the sun stood out in patches of clear sky. The clouds passed from west to east and did not obscure the light of the sun, giving the impression of passing behind it, though sometimes these flecks of white took on tones of pink or diaphanous blue as they passed before the sun. The impression was not that of an eclipse, and while looking at the sun I noticed that the atmosphere had cleared.
“The most astonishing thing was to be able to stare at the solar disc for a long time, brilliant with light and heat, without hurting the eyes, or damaging the retina. The phenomenon, except for two interruptions when the sun seemed to send out rays of refulgent heat which obliged us to look away, must have lasted about ten minutes. The sun’s disc did not remain immobile. This was not the sparkling of a heavenly body for it spun round on itself in a mad whirl. Then, suddenly, one heard a clamor, a cry of anguish breaking from all the people. The sun, whirling wildly, seemed to loosen itself from the firmament and advance threateningly upon the Earth as if to crush us with its huge and fiery weight. The sensation during those moments was terrible. During the solar phenomenon … there were changes of color in the atmosphere. … I saw everything an amethyst [purple] color. Objects around me, the sky and the atmosphere, were of the same color. An oak tree nearby threw a shadow of this color on the ground. Fearing that I was suffering from an affection of the retina, an improbable explanation because in that case one could not see things purple-colored, I turned away and shut my eyes, keeping my hands before them to intercept the light. With my back still turned, I opened my eyes and saw that the landscape was the same purple color as before. Soon after I heard a peasant who was near me shout out in tones of astonishment: «Look, that lady is all yellow!» And in fact everything, both near and far, had changed, taking on the color of old yellow damask. People looked as if they were suffering from jaundice, and I recall a sensation of amusement at seeing them look so ugly and unattractive. My own hand was the same color. All the phenomena which I have described were observed by me in a calm and serene state of mind and without any emotional disturbance. It is for others to interpret and explain them.” (Dr. Gonçalo de Almeida Garrett, Ph.D., Professor of Natural Sciences at Coimbra University).
DR. DOMINGOS COELHO ― as reported in the newspaper Ordem ― stated: “The sun, at one moment surrounded with scarlet flame, at another aureoled in yellow and deep purple, seemed to be in an exceedingly fast and whirling movement, at times appearing to be loosened from the sky and to be approaching the Earth, strongly radiating heat.” (Dr. Domingos Coelho).
Other witnesses too, such as MARIA CARREIRA, testified to the terrifying nature of the solar miracle: “It turned everything different colors, yellow, blue, white, and it shook and trembled; it seemed like a wheel of fire which was going to fall on the people. They cried out: «We shall all be killed, we shall all be killed!» Others called on Our Lady to save them and recited acts of contrition. One woman began to confess her sins aloud, saying that she had done this and that. … At last the sun stopped moving and we all breathed a sigh of relief. We were still alive and the miracle which the children had foretold had taken place.” (Maria Carreira).
ALFREDO DA SILVA SANTOS (Lisbon) stated: “We made our arrangements, and went in three motor cars on the early morning of the 13th. There was a thick mist, and the car which went in front mistook the way so that we were all lost for a time and only arrived at the Cova da Iria at midday by the sun. It was absolutely full of people, but for my part I felt devoid of any religious feeling. When Lucia called out: “Look at the sun!” the whole multitude repeated: “Attention to the sun!” It was a day of incessant drizzle but a few moments before the miracle it stopped raining. I can hardly find words to describe what followed. The sun began to move, and at a certain moment appeared to be detached from the sky and about to hurtle upon us like a wheel of flame. My wife―we had been married only a short time―fainted, and I was too upset to attend to her, and my brother-in-law, Joao Vassalo, supported her on his arm. I fell on my knees, oblivious of everything, and when I got up I don’t know what I said. I think I began to cry out like the others. An old man with a white beard began to attack the atheists aloud and challenged them to say whether or not something supernatural had occurred.” (Alfredo Da Silva Santos).
These are powerful testimonies, but perhaps one of the most interesting witnesses was an Englishwoman, MABEL NORTON, who was a Protestant. She had been living in Portugal for seven years and was spending some time at the home of a Marchioness, speaking English with her children. She did not see the miracle in as much detail, perhaps because she was not a Catholic, and indeed was somewhat disappointed when she realized what other people had seen, but nevertheless, her account is very important, especially as she had not really been expecting anything to happen.
Mabel went with the family to Fatima early on the morning of October 13th, arriving at the Cova at about midday, just in time for the miracle. She describes how Lucia’s cry ― “Look at the sun!” ― was taken up by the people until it rolled from the center to the edges of the crowd as a “great wave of sound,” and is careful to note that this was the first indication of the kind of miracle that could be expected, that is, that it was something to do with the sun. Then the rain suddenly stopped and she found she could look at the sun, which appeared as a “luminous disc, on which it was possible to gaze without blinking.”
Mabel is emphatic about the speed with which the rain stopped, and is clear in her description of events: “I saw the rain cease, suddenly, not as rain usually ends. Then the clouds were pushed back from the sun in every direction, as if by invisible hands, and the sun appeared, in color like the blade of a knife, luminous but not dazzling. Then, as I looked, the sun described a swift circle, paused; described another, paused; described yet a third. And then the clouds began to sweep over it again.” (Mabel Norton).
MARIA DE CAPELINHA―one of the earliest believers―said: “The sun turned everything to different colors―yellow, blue and white. Then it shook and trembled. It looked like a wheel of fire that was going to fall on the people. They began to cry out: «We shall all be killed!» Others called to Our Lady to save them. They recited acts of contrition. One woman began to confess her sins aloud, advertising that she had done this and that! ... When at last the sun stopped leaping and moving, we all breathed our relief! We were still alive, and the miracle which the children had foretold, had been seen by everyone.” (Maria de Capelinha).
Other people witnessed the solar miracle from a distance, thus ruling out the possibility of any sort of collective hallucination, as in the case of the poet ALFONSO LOPES VIEIRA who lived over thirty miles away from Fatima: “On that day, October 13th, 1917, without remembering the predictions of the children, I was enchanted by a remarkable spectacle in the sky of a kind I had never seen before.”
FR. MANUEL PEREIRA DA SILVA ― in a letter to a friend ― wrote: “The sun appeared with its circumference well defined. It came down as if to the height of the clouds and began to whirl giddily upon itself like a captive ball of fire. With some interruptions, this lasted about eight minutes. The atmosphere darkened and the features of each became yellow. Everyone knelt even in the mud.” (Fr. Manuel Pereira da Silva).
INÁCIO LOURENÇO―who was to become a priest―was a school child of nine when he saw the miracle in Alburitel, a village about 12 miles from Fatima. He described how the children and their teachers were attracted outside by a commotion in front of the school to see the miracle of the sun: “I was only nine years old at this time, and I went to the local village school. At about midday we were surprised by the shouts and cries of some men and women who were passing in the street in front of the school. The teacher, a good, pious woman, though nervous and impressionable, was the first to run into the road, with the children after her.
“Outside, the people were shouting and weeping and pointing to the sun, ignoring the agitated questions of the schoolmistress. It was the great Miracle, which one could see quite distinctly from the top of the hill where my village was situated―the Miracle of the sun, accompanied by all its extraordinary phenomena. I feel incapable of describing what I saw and felt. I looked fixedly at the sun, which seemed pale and did not hurt the eyes. Looking like a ball of snow revolving on itself, it suddenly seemed to come down in a zig-zag, menacing the Earth. Terrified, I ran and hid myself among the people, who were weeping and expecting the end of the world at any moment.
“Near us was an unbeliever, who had spent the morning mocking at the simpletons who had gone off to Fatima just to see an ordinary girl. He now seemed to be paralyzed, his eyes fixed on the sun. Afterwards he trembled from head to foot and lifting up his arms fell on his knees in the mud, crying out to Our Lady.
“Meanwhile the people continued to cry out and to weep, asking God to pardon their sins. We all ran to the two chapels in the village, which were soon filled to overflowing. During those long moments of the solar prodigy, objects around us turned all the colors of the rainbow. We saw ourselves blue, yellow, red, etc. All these strange phenomena increased the fears of the people. After about ten minutes the sun, now dull and pallid, returned to its place. When the people realized that the danger was over, there was an explosion of joy, and everyone joined in thanksgiving and praise to Our Lady.”
(Fr. Inácio Lourenço).
ALFONSO LOPES VIEIRA observed the display from a distance of nearly 25 miles: “On that day of October 13th, 1917, without remembering the predictions of the children, I was enchanted by a remarkable spectacle in the sky of a kind I had never seen before. I saw it from this veranda.” (Alfonso Lopes Vieira).
TI MARTO (father of Jacinta and Francisco) said: “We looked easily at the sun, which for some reason did not blind us. It seemed to flicker on and off, first one way, then another. It cast its rays in many directions and painted everything in different colors--- the trees, the people, the air and the ground. But what was most extraordinary, I thought, was that the sun did not hurt our eyes. Everything was still and quiet, and everyone was looking up. Then at a certain moment, the sun appeared to stop spinning. It then began again to dance, to spin; it stopped again, and then began again to dance in the sky, until it seemed to detach itself from its place and fall upon us. It was a terrible moment!” (Ti Marto, father of Francisco and Jacinta Marto).
Another witness, who was aware of the dangers of possible hallucination, the BARON OF ALVAIÁZERE, was certainly not expecting a miracle, and took precautions to ensure that he was not affected by “suggestion.” But in his deposition to the canonical committee which investigated Fatima, he made the following statement: “An indescribable impression overtook me. I only know that I cried out: ‘I believe! I believe! I believe!’ And tears ran from my eyes. I was amazed, in ecstasy before the demonstration of divine power … converted in that moment.” (Baron Of Alvaiázere).
Other brief extracts of testimonies from witnesses are as follows:
“And then we witnessed a unique spectacle, the reporter of “O Seculo” remarked in similar vein, an incredible spectacle, unbelievable if you did not witness it. From above the road ... We see the immense crowd turn towards the sun, which appeared at its zenith, clear of the clouds. It looked like a plate of dull silver, and it was possible to stare at it without the least discomfort. It did not burn the eyes. It did not blind. One might say that an eclipse had occurred.” (Newspaper article of October 15th, 1917). “The people could look at the sun as we look at the moon.” (Maria do Carmo).
“The sun turned like a fire wheel, taking on all the colors of the rainbow.” (Maria do Carmo).
“It appeared like a globe of snow turning on itself.” (Father Ignacio Lourenço).
“The pearl-like disc had a giddy motion. This was not the twinkling of a star in all its brilliance. It turned on itself with impetuous speed.” (Dr. Gonçalo de Almeida Garrett, Ph.D., Professor of Natural Sciences at Coimbra University).
“The sun took on all the colors of the rainbow. Everything assumed those same colors: our faces, our clothes, the earth itself.” (Maria do Carmo).
“A light, whose colors changed from one moment to the next, was reflected on the people and on things” (Dr. Pereira Gens).
“We suddenly heard a clamor, like a cry of anguish of that entire crowd. The sun, in fact, keeping its rapid movement of rotation, seemed to free itself from the firmament and blood-red, to plunge towards the Earth, threatening to crush us with its fiery mass. Those were some terrifying seconds.” (Dr. Gonçalo de Almeida Garrett, Ph.D., Professor of Natural Sciences at Coimbra University).
“I saw the sun turn and it seemed to descend. It was like a bicycle wheel.” (John Carreira).
“The sun began to dance and, at a certain moment, it appeared to detach itself from the firmament and to rush forward on us, like a fire wheel.” (Alfredo da Silva Santos).
“I saw it perfectly descending as if it came to crash on the Earth. It seemed to detach itself from the sky and rush toward us. It maintained itself at a short distance above our heads; but that sort of attack was of very short duration ... It seemed very near the people and it continued to turn in the opposite direction.” (Maria do Carmo).
“From those thousands of mouths, I heard shouts of joy and love to the Most Holy Virgin. And then I believed. I had the certainty of not having been the victim of a suggestion. I had seen the sun as I would never see it again.” (Mario Godinho).
A final intriguing point was that many people reported that the heat of the sun, as it descended to the Earth, also had the effect of drying their clothes and the ground, so that they went from being completely soaked to being dry in about ten minutes.
The BISHOP OF LEIRIA in his pastoral letter of October 13th, 1930, in which he declared the visions of the children worthy of credence, and permitted the cult of Our Lady of Fatima, wrote as follows about the miracle: “The phenomenon of the Sun on October 13th, 1917, described in newspapers of the time, was simply marvelous and caused the greatest impression on those who had the happiness to witness it. The children predetermined the day and the hour that it was going to happen. The news spread like wildfire throughout Portugal and in spite of the day being severe, raining heavily, thousands and thousands of people gathered, who at the hour of the final apparition, witnessed all the manifestations of the King of the Planets, in paying homage to the Queen of Heaven and Earth, who surpasses the sun in brilliance even at its best. This phenomenon, which went unnoticed by astronomers, and hence was something unnatural, was witnessed by people of all sorts and social classes—believers and unbelievers, journalists of the principal Portuguese daily newspapers, and even by individuals who were miles away; which destroys all explanations of collective illusion.”
The Fatima author FRANCIS JOHNSTON wrote that this was only the third time in history that God had used the sun to perform a miracle, a reference to Josue 10:12-14 and 2 Kings 20:8-11 (Fatima the Great Sign, p. 54). Francis Johnston also cited the work of Fr. Pio Sciatizzi, S.J., who was professor of algebra and trigonometry at the Gregorian University, an outstanding mathematician and astronomer, and highly esteemed in the Italian scientific world, who wrote an exhaustive study of the Miracle of the Sun, published in the 1940s, in which he concluded: “It was outside and against known laws, as can be proved by certain simple scientific considerations … Given the indubitable reference to God and the general context of the event, it seems that we must attribute to Him alone the most obvious and colossal miracle of history!” (Fatima the Great Sign, p. 66).
The Effect on the Miracle of the Sin of One Single Man
According to SR. LUCIA OF FATIMA, the Blessed Virgin Mary said that the Miracle of the Sun would have been even more spectacular if the children had not been prevented from going to the apparition site on August 13th, when they were kidnapped and imprisoned on August 13th by the local Masonic Mayor of nearby Ourem, Artur Santos. They were eventually released after two days later, on August 15th and Our Lady appeared to the children later that month on the 19th. During this brief delayed apparition, Our Lady to the coming miracle she was to perform in October, saying: “If they had not taken you to Ourem, the miracle would be even greater.”
The Miracle of the Sun dazzled and astounded everyone ― believers and non-believers alike, Catholics and atheists, peasants and doctors, laity and priests ― with its supernatural character and the monumental movements of the sun. It exceeded all imagination. It was terrifying, yet magnificent. Those who witnessed the miracle experienced special graces, healings and conversions—even when many miles away.
As great as this miracle was, it was supposed to be yet more magnificent. However, the actions of the Masonic Mayor of Ourem, Artur Santos, and his accomplices, caused the diminishing of the miracle. Thus, many miraculous healings and conversions did not take place because of this man. The actions of one or a few can have an impact on what Our Lady decides to do. When we sin, we offend God, Who can choose to withhold His graces from the world. If the single evil action of the Mayor of Ourem had such an effect on heaven, we can imagine the impact of sacrilege, blasphemy, contraception, abortion, adultery, fornication, homosexuality and same-sex “marriage.” Every sin offends God; we must also consider the billions of grave mortal sins thrown in the face of God every single day. These offences merit unimaginable chastisements in due proportion.
We must also consider that Our Lady complained about the sins of the early 20th century. Marriages and families at that time were still largely intact. Divorce, abortion, fornication, sodomy and other behaviors were illegal then. However, Our Lady still was incredibly saddened by the sins of that time. Today, she must be much more saddened. We see this in the words she spoke to Blessed Elena Aiello in the 1950s: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! That scourge, like the shadow of a dark cloud, is now moving across mankind―only my power, as Mother of God, is preventing the outbreak of the storm.” (Words of Our Lady, December 8th, 1956).
It is no exaggeration when Our Lord and Our Lady say that Mary’s Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart is pierced “at every moment.” In fact, it is pierced thousands of times each and every second of the day and night! If you take the world’s population of almost 8,000 million people (8 billion) and divide that number by the total number of seconds that there are in 24 hours―which is 86,400 seconds―then you get over 92,000 (92,592) persons for each second of the day. If every person in the world would only commit ONE SINGLE SIN A DAY and no more, then Our Lady’s Sorrowful Heart is being pierced over 92,000 times per second. If every person would ONLY COMMIT TEN SINS PER DAY, then Our Lady’s Sorrowful Heart would be pierced almost 1 million times per second (925,920 times per second). Yet are ten sins per day the average? No, it is much more than that―it is easy to commit 10 sins per hour!
Article 8
Thursday to Saturday, October 10th to 12th
You Have Been Chosen and Elected
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Thursday to Saturday, October 10th to 12th
You Have Been Chosen and Elected
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Did You Know You Were Chosen and Elected?
In this current season of choosing candidates to run for U.S. President and electing one of those candidates as President―we do well remind ourselves of our own election to the ranks of God’s Chosen People. The terms “Chosen People” and the “Elect of God” were applied to the Israelites in the Old Testament, but now, in the New Testament, are applied to members of the Church founded by Christ―the Catholic Church.
In case nobody ever told you―you have been called and elected to be the light of the world! Thus it is the Our Lord, speaking to the multitude and just one or two persons, says: “You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hidden! Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bucket, but upon a candlestick, so that it may shine and give light to all that are in the house! So let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:14-16).
St. Paul was chosen by God to a “vessel of election” for God: “And the Lord said to Ananias: ‘Go thy way! For this man [Saul/Paul] is a vessel of election to Me, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel!’” (Acts 9:15). That same St. Paul writes to us: “Beloved brethren of God―know your election!” (1 Thessalonians 1:4). “He has delivered us and called us by His holy calling―not according to our works, but according to His own purpose” (2 Timothy 1:9). “He chose us before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight in charity” (Ephesians 1:4). “By good works, make sure your calling and election!” (2 Peter 1:10).
St. Louis de Montfort takes up this idea of a “calling” or “vocation” (which actually means “a calling” ― “vocare” is the Latin verb meaning “to call”) in his book, The Secret of Mary, wherein he refers to us as “Chosen Souls”. St. Louis writes:
“Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next (Matthew 5:48). It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say «not in the same measure» because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
The “Chosen People” Includes YOU!
The OLD TESTAMENT speaks of the “elect” of God and applies the term “elect”, or “chosen”, not to every single Israelite, but only to the Israelites who are called to be the people of God, and are faithful to their Divine call―Our Lord would later indicate this necessity for faithfulness to God: “Many are called, but few are chosen! ... Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father! … Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Matthew 22:14; 7:21; Luke 6:46). In Psalm 104:6 and 43 and 105:5, the Chosen Ones are the Hebrew people, in as far as they are the recipients of God’s temporal and spiritual blessings; in Isaias: “My elect shall inherit it, and My servants shall dwell there” (65:9), “My elect” (65:15) and “My elect shall not labor in vain” (65:23), they are shown to be the repentant Israelites, who were few in number. In Tobias, 13:10, they are the Israelites who remained faithful during their Babylonian Captivity. In Wisdom, 3:9, and 4:15, they are God’s true servants. In Ecclesiasticus: “the multitude of the elect” (24:4), “take root in my elect” (24:13) and “the elect of God” (46:2), these “elect” who belong to the Chosen People are the faithful and true servants of God, who keep His commandments and do His will.
The NEW TESTAMENT transfers the meaning of the term from its connection with the people of Israel to the members of the Church of Christ―that is to say, the Catholic Church. St. Peter writes to the members of the Church, saying: “You are a chosen generation, a kingly priesthood, a holy nation, a purchased people―in order that you may declare His virtues, Who had called you out of darkness into His marvelous light!” (1 Peter 2:9). St. Paul also speaks of the members of the Church as being “…the elect of God…” (Romans 8:33). He returns to the idea gain and again: “God has chosen you” (2 Thessalonians 2:12); “…the elect of God, holy, and beloved…” (Colossians 3:12); “…the elect of God…” (Titus 1:1); “(2 Timothy 2:10). St. John gives the title of elect to those who fight on the side of the Lamb against the powers of darkness “they that are with him are called, and elect, and faithful” (Apocalypse 17:14). According to, God hears the cries of his elect for vengeance: “Will not God revenge His elect, who cry to Him day and night?” (Luke 18:7); according to the first two Evangelists he will shorten the terrible chastisements of the Last Days for the sake of the elect: “Unless those days be shortened, no flesh would be saved―but, for the sake of the elect, those days shall be shortened! … For there shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders, insomuch as to deceive―if possible―even the elect … And He shall send His angels and they shall gather together His elect!” (Matthew 24:22, 24, 31); “And unless the Lord had shortened the days, no flesh should be saved―but for the sake of the elect, which He has chosen, He has shortened the days … For there will rise up false Christs and false prophets, and they shall show signs and wonders, to seduce―if it were possible―even the elect … And then shall He send his angels, and shall gather together His elect from the uttermost part of the Earth” (Mark 13:20, 22, 27).
Many Are Called! Few Are Chosen!
Our Lord tells us in Holy Scripture: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). Being called by God is no guarantee to being saved! As already stated above, Our Lord warns: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). Everyone is called to salvation―but few attain salvation. “God will [wants to] have all men to be saved” (1 Timothy 2:4) … “He spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all” (Romans 8:32) … “Christ died for all” (2 Corinthians 5:15) … “Who gave Himself a redemption for all” (1 Timothy 2:6) … “Jesus, through the grace of God, came for the suffering of death, so that He might taste death for all” (Hebrews 2:9) …
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, said: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls! ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! … Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation!”
Our Lord Himself said: “Wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Why don’t they find it? Some don’t find it because of a sinful presumption and fanciful imagination that makes them think that they are entitled to Heaven and that they can attain Heaven without doing anything on their part to attain it. Our Lady rebukes such persons: “Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son! As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation!” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Everyone Wants to be Chosen―Few Like the Terms of Contract
If we wish to be one of the “Chosen People of God”―if we wish to be numbered among “the Elect of God”―then we must abide by the terms of the contract that God has drawn up. In philosophy it says: “He who desires an end (a goal, target, an achievement), must also necessarily desire the means that lead to that end.” If you want to be intelligent, then you have to learn things. If you wish to be healthy, then you must eat correctly and exercise correctly. If you wish to be muscular, then you have exercise your muscles. If you want to be successful, then you have work at being successful. If you want to get to Heaven, then you must work at those things that lead you to Heaven. Hence Holy Scripture says: “Work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12) … “Fight the good fight of faith and lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). That is the contract that Our Lord has drawn up! The cross is not pleasant! The cross is a penance! Yet, as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5).
Everyone wants to be chosen to be one of the elect and get to Heaven―but few there are who like and abide by the terms of the contract. As Our Lady said: “Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! They do not seek the medicine of suffering! Why then will mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Worldlings in their lethargy are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! … It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should abhor suffering, even after my most holy Son did suffer for them … In many of the faithful this ignorance goes still farther―for some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored! Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion!” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
You can moan and groan, kick and scream―the terms of the contract will never change. It is we have that have to change and not the contract that has to change. “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) ― because few choose to carry the cross. They throw away each cross as it comes to them―yet they are throwing away the key to salvation. Our Lord and Our Lady will not change the contract, instead, as Our Lady says: “Our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation!” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Comfort vs. Cross
The world―especially these days―is focused on comfort, ease, fun, joy and wealth. ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT paints a very true picture of this in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, where he describes the worldly folk thus: “Do you really know the voice of God and grace from the voice of the world and human nature? Do you distinctly hear the voice of God, our kind Father, pronouncing His threefold curse upon everyone who follows the world in its concupiscence: «Woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the Earth» (Apocalypse 8:13) and then appealing to you with outstretched arms: «Be separated, My chosen people!» (Isaias 48:20; 52:11; Jeremias 50:8; 51:6), «Beloved Friends of the Cross of My Son, be separated from those worldlings, for they are accursed by My Majesty, repudiated by My Son!» (John 17:9). «Do not sit in their chair of pestilence, take no part in their gatherings; do not even step along their highways!» (Psalm 1:1). «Listen only to the voice of My Beloved Son; follow only in His footprints; for He is the One I have given to be your Way, Truth, Life» (John 14:6) and Model: «Hear ye Him!» (Matthew 17:5; Luke 9:35; Mark 9:6; 2 Peter 1:17).
“There are two groups that appear before you each day―the followers of Christ and the followers of the world ... The world’s group―the devil’s in fact―which is far superior in number and seemingly far more colorful and splendid in dress. Fashionable folk are all in a hurry to enlist, the highways are overcrowded, although they are broad and ever broadening with the crowds that flow through in a torrent. These roads are strewn with flowers, bordered with all kinds of amusements and attractions and paved with gold and silver (Matthew 7:13-14) ... Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. «Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!» they shout, «Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat! Let us drink! Let us sing! Let us dance! Let us play! God is good! He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!» And so they continue.
“Our beloved Jesus has His eyes upon you at this moment, addressing you individually: «Will you also leave Me?» (John 6:68). «Will you also forsake Me and flee from My Cross, like the worldlings, who are acting as so many Anti-Christs?» (1 John 2:12). «Will you subscribe to the standards of the day?» (Romans 12:2), «despise the poverty of My Cross and go in quest of riches; shun the sufferings connected with My Cross to run after pleasure; and spurn the humiliations that must be borne with My Cross and pursue worldly honors? There are many who pretend that they are friends of Mine and love Me―but, in reality, they hate Me, because they have no love for My Cross. I have many friends of My table, but few indeed of My Cross» (Imitation of Jesus Christ, Book 2, Chap. 11). In answer to the gracious invitation which Jesus extends, let us rise above ourselves. Let us flee from the corrupting concupiscence and enticements of a corrupt world (2 Peter 1:4). Let us love Jesus in the right way, standing by Him through the heaviest of crosses ... The elect―who are willing to be made conformable to the crucified Christ by carrying their cross―are few in number. It would cause us to faint away from grief to learn how surprisingly small is their number ... Both elect and reprobate must bear their cross here, either willingly or unwillingly. Remember these words:
“Three crosses stand on Calvary’s height!
One must be chosen so choose aright!
Like a saint you must suffer, or a penitent thief!
Or like a reprobate, in endless grief.”
“It is not given to all men to understand this mystery (Matthew 13:11). In fact, only a privileged number of men receive this practical knowledge of the mystery of the Cross. For that man who climbs up to Calvary and lets himself be nailed on the Cross with Jesus in the heart of his own country must be a brave man, a hero, a resolute man, one who is lifted up in God, who treats as muck both the world and Hell, as well as his very body and his own will. He must be resolved to relinquish all things, to undertake anything and to suffer everything for Jesus. Understand this―should there be anyone among you who has not this firm resolve, then he is just limping along on one foot, flying with one wing, and is undeserving of your company. He is not worthy to be called a Friend of the Cross! That kind of half-hearted will is enough to spoil the whole flock, like a sheep with the scurvy. If any such one has slipped into your fold through the contaminated door of the world, then, in the Name of the crucified Christ, drive him out as you would a wolf from your sheepfold!”
“Keep far away from those who pride themselves in suffering; the worldly-wise elated geniuses and self-conceited individuals who are stubborn and puffed-up with their lights and talents. Far be they from us, those endless talkers who make plenty of noise, but bring forth no other fruit than vainglory! Far from us those high-browed devotees, everywhere displaying the self-sufficient pride of Lucifer: «I am not like the rest!» (Luke 18:11). Far be from us those who must always justify themselves when blamed; resist when attacked; and exalt themselves when humbled. Be careful not to admit into your fellowship those frail, sensitive persons who are afraid of the slightest pinprick; who sob and sigh when faced with the lightest suffering; who have never experienced a hair-shirt, a whip or any other penitential instrument, and who, with their fashionable devotions, mingle the most artful delicacy with the most refined lack of mortification!” St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
OUR LADY says that it is predominantly a lack of prayer and penance that damns most souls. “Laborious exertions are very painful and averse to human nature according to the flesh; and the fruits of the spirit are more hidden and few guide themselves by the light … If passing labors and sufferings are accepted with joy and with serenity of heart, then they spiritualize the creature, they elevate it and furnish it with a divine insight―by which the soul begins to appreciate and esteem affliction at its proper value, and soon finds consolation in the blessings of mortification and finds freedom from disorderly passions … When the occasion of tasting the Chalice and the Cross of suffering is at hand, you must not turn away in sorrow and affliction from the sufferings, by which the sincerity of a loving and affectionate heart is to be tried ... The divine influence will urge and draw you on to desire of being despised by creatures, to joyful suffering, to a love of the Cross and an earnest and generous acceptation of it; it will move you to seek the last place, to love those that persecute you, to fear and abhor sin―even the slightest sin―seeking only to love and to suffer! … Be willing to bear and suffer, forgive and love all who offend you … When gold is untouched by the furnace-heat, the iron by the file, the grain by the grinding stone or flail, the grapes by the winepress, they are all useless and will not attain the end for which they are created … You cannot follow Christ, if you refuse to embrace the Cross and rejoice in it! Understand the ignorance and error of mortals―nearly all of them strive to avoid labor and suffering and are frightened by the royal and secure road of mortification and the Cross! Full of this deceitful ignorance, they not only abhor resemblance to Christ’s suffering, but they make their recovery impossible―since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering … The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss!” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
The “Elect” Explained
What does it mean to be one of the “elect”? It means being a saint―for the “elect” are elected to Heaven―and it is only saints go to Heaven. “There shall not enter into it anything defiled, or that works abomination or makes a lie―but they that are written in the book of life of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 21:27). Your “election” is to perfection. God demands perfection and Our Lord demands perfection: “I am the Almighty God! Walk before Me and be perfect!” (Genesis 17:1) ... “Thou shalt be perfect and without spot before the Lord thy God!” (Deuteronomy 18:13) … “Be you perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” adds Our Lord (Matthew 5:48). “How on earth can I be perfect like God?” you will ask.
Perfection is proportionate. Perfection means operating at the peak of one’s capabilities and potential. Look at it this way―you have 400 gallon tank, a 5 gallon bottle, a 1 gallon bottle, a 1 pint bottle, a cup and a thimble. They will all be perfectly filled when they are filled to their capacity―each will be perfect, but with different quantities. Only God is infinitely perfect―yet each one of us has been made by God with a certain assigned capacity and potential for holiness: “Without holiness no man shall see God” (Hebrews 12:14). You might by the 5 gallon bottle, or the 1 gallon bottle, or even the little thimble―what God expects is that you be filled with holiness according to your God-given capacity. Our capacities might be different, but the demand for holiness applies to every capacity: “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2). “You shall be holy, because I am holy!” (Leviticus 11:46).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange speaks of this need to put sanctity above everything else in our life―he calls it “the one thing necessary.” In his book, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, he writes: “The one thing necessary—which Jesus spoke of to Martha and Mary—consists in hearing the word of God and living by it. St. Alphonsus Liguori, in The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, writes: «One thing is necessary! The salvation of our souls. It is not necessary to be great, noble, or rich in this world, or to enjoy uninterrupted health; but it is necessary to save our souls, For this has God placed us here: not to acquire honors, riches, or pleasures, but to acquire by our good works that eternal kingdom which is prepared for those who, during this present life, fight against and overcome the enemies of their eternal salvation» (The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, Part 1, Meditation 17).
“The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, more profound than artistic or literary life, more profound than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Your Calling! Your Election!
If you have been chosen to be one of the elect, then you have been chosen to be saint. Sanctity is the result of a life-long apprenticeship in the school of knocks, temptations, sufferings and persecution. Just like being a soldier is not playing at soldiers like children do, but it means going through the knocks, physical pain, sufferings and humiliations of boot-camp and then facing the enemy on a real battlefield. “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). “The friendship of this world is the enemy of God. Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “To save our soul, one thing alone is necessary ― to hear the word of God and to live by it.” Practice makes perfect―practicing the Faith, as should it be practiced, inevitably perfects the soul. It is like walking and talking. Nobody was born with the ability to walk and talk―each baby had to spend much time in learning to walk and talk. With each passing week, month and year, the ability to walk and talk was gradually perfected―and finally the child could walk and talk perfectly. The same is true for knowledge, understanding and intelligence―they are perfected with time, and they never cease to be perfected―if we work at it!
In this current season of choosing candidates to run for U.S. President and electing one of those candidates as President―we do well remind ourselves of our own election to the ranks of God’s Chosen People. The terms “Chosen People” and the “Elect of God” were applied to the Israelites in the Old Testament, but now, in the New Testament, are applied to members of the Church founded by Christ―the Catholic Church.
In case nobody ever told you―you have been called and elected to be the light of the world! Thus it is the Our Lord, speaking to the multitude and just one or two persons, says: “You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hidden! Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bucket, but upon a candlestick, so that it may shine and give light to all that are in the house! So let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:14-16).
St. Paul was chosen by God to a “vessel of election” for God: “And the Lord said to Ananias: ‘Go thy way! For this man [Saul/Paul] is a vessel of election to Me, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel!’” (Acts 9:15). That same St. Paul writes to us: “Beloved brethren of God―know your election!” (1 Thessalonians 1:4). “He has delivered us and called us by His holy calling―not according to our works, but according to His own purpose” (2 Timothy 1:9). “He chose us before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight in charity” (Ephesians 1:4). “By good works, make sure your calling and election!” (2 Peter 1:10).
St. Louis de Montfort takes up this idea of a “calling” or “vocation” (which actually means “a calling” ― “vocare” is the Latin verb meaning “to call”) in his book, The Secret of Mary, wherein he refers to us as “Chosen Souls”. St. Louis writes:
“Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next (Matthew 5:48). It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say «not in the same measure» because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
The “Chosen People” Includes YOU!
The OLD TESTAMENT speaks of the “elect” of God and applies the term “elect”, or “chosen”, not to every single Israelite, but only to the Israelites who are called to be the people of God, and are faithful to their Divine call―Our Lord would later indicate this necessity for faithfulness to God: “Many are called, but few are chosen! ... Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father! … Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Matthew 22:14; 7:21; Luke 6:46). In Psalm 104:6 and 43 and 105:5, the Chosen Ones are the Hebrew people, in as far as they are the recipients of God’s temporal and spiritual blessings; in Isaias: “My elect shall inherit it, and My servants shall dwell there” (65:9), “My elect” (65:15) and “My elect shall not labor in vain” (65:23), they are shown to be the repentant Israelites, who were few in number. In Tobias, 13:10, they are the Israelites who remained faithful during their Babylonian Captivity. In Wisdom, 3:9, and 4:15, they are God’s true servants. In Ecclesiasticus: “the multitude of the elect” (24:4), “take root in my elect” (24:13) and “the elect of God” (46:2), these “elect” who belong to the Chosen People are the faithful and true servants of God, who keep His commandments and do His will.
The NEW TESTAMENT transfers the meaning of the term from its connection with the people of Israel to the members of the Church of Christ―that is to say, the Catholic Church. St. Peter writes to the members of the Church, saying: “You are a chosen generation, a kingly priesthood, a holy nation, a purchased people―in order that you may declare His virtues, Who had called you out of darkness into His marvelous light!” (1 Peter 2:9). St. Paul also speaks of the members of the Church as being “…the elect of God…” (Romans 8:33). He returns to the idea gain and again: “God has chosen you” (2 Thessalonians 2:12); “…the elect of God, holy, and beloved…” (Colossians 3:12); “…the elect of God…” (Titus 1:1); “(2 Timothy 2:10). St. John gives the title of elect to those who fight on the side of the Lamb against the powers of darkness “they that are with him are called, and elect, and faithful” (Apocalypse 17:14). According to, God hears the cries of his elect for vengeance: “Will not God revenge His elect, who cry to Him day and night?” (Luke 18:7); according to the first two Evangelists he will shorten the terrible chastisements of the Last Days for the sake of the elect: “Unless those days be shortened, no flesh would be saved―but, for the sake of the elect, those days shall be shortened! … For there shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders, insomuch as to deceive―if possible―even the elect … And He shall send His angels and they shall gather together His elect!” (Matthew 24:22, 24, 31); “And unless the Lord had shortened the days, no flesh should be saved―but for the sake of the elect, which He has chosen, He has shortened the days … For there will rise up false Christs and false prophets, and they shall show signs and wonders, to seduce―if it were possible―even the elect … And then shall He send his angels, and shall gather together His elect from the uttermost part of the Earth” (Mark 13:20, 22, 27).
Many Are Called! Few Are Chosen!
Our Lord tells us in Holy Scripture: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). Being called by God is no guarantee to being saved! As already stated above, Our Lord warns: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). Everyone is called to salvation―but few attain salvation. “God will [wants to] have all men to be saved” (1 Timothy 2:4) … “He spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all” (Romans 8:32) … “Christ died for all” (2 Corinthians 5:15) … “Who gave Himself a redemption for all” (1 Timothy 2:6) … “Jesus, through the grace of God, came for the suffering of death, so that He might taste death for all” (Hebrews 2:9) …
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, said: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls! ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! … Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation!”
Our Lord Himself said: “Wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Why don’t they find it? Some don’t find it because of a sinful presumption and fanciful imagination that makes them think that they are entitled to Heaven and that they can attain Heaven without doing anything on their part to attain it. Our Lady rebukes such persons: “Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son! As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation!” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Everyone Wants to be Chosen―Few Like the Terms of Contract
If we wish to be one of the “Chosen People of God”―if we wish to be numbered among “the Elect of God”―then we must abide by the terms of the contract that God has drawn up. In philosophy it says: “He who desires an end (a goal, target, an achievement), must also necessarily desire the means that lead to that end.” If you want to be intelligent, then you have to learn things. If you wish to be healthy, then you must eat correctly and exercise correctly. If you wish to be muscular, then you have exercise your muscles. If you want to be successful, then you have work at being successful. If you want to get to Heaven, then you must work at those things that lead you to Heaven. Hence Holy Scripture says: “Work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12) … “Fight the good fight of faith and lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). That is the contract that Our Lord has drawn up! The cross is not pleasant! The cross is a penance! Yet, as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5).
Everyone wants to be chosen to be one of the elect and get to Heaven―but few there are who like and abide by the terms of the contract. As Our Lady said: “Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! They do not seek the medicine of suffering! Why then will mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Worldlings in their lethargy are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! … It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should abhor suffering, even after my most holy Son did suffer for them … In many of the faithful this ignorance goes still farther―for some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored! Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion!” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
You can moan and groan, kick and scream―the terms of the contract will never change. It is we have that have to change and not the contract that has to change. “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) ― because few choose to carry the cross. They throw away each cross as it comes to them―yet they are throwing away the key to salvation. Our Lord and Our Lady will not change the contract, instead, as Our Lady says: “Our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation!” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Comfort vs. Cross
The world―especially these days―is focused on comfort, ease, fun, joy and wealth. ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT paints a very true picture of this in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, where he describes the worldly folk thus: “Do you really know the voice of God and grace from the voice of the world and human nature? Do you distinctly hear the voice of God, our kind Father, pronouncing His threefold curse upon everyone who follows the world in its concupiscence: «Woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the Earth» (Apocalypse 8:13) and then appealing to you with outstretched arms: «Be separated, My chosen people!» (Isaias 48:20; 52:11; Jeremias 50:8; 51:6), «Beloved Friends of the Cross of My Son, be separated from those worldlings, for they are accursed by My Majesty, repudiated by My Son!» (John 17:9). «Do not sit in their chair of pestilence, take no part in their gatherings; do not even step along their highways!» (Psalm 1:1). «Listen only to the voice of My Beloved Son; follow only in His footprints; for He is the One I have given to be your Way, Truth, Life» (John 14:6) and Model: «Hear ye Him!» (Matthew 17:5; Luke 9:35; Mark 9:6; 2 Peter 1:17).
“There are two groups that appear before you each day―the followers of Christ and the followers of the world ... The world’s group―the devil’s in fact―which is far superior in number and seemingly far more colorful and splendid in dress. Fashionable folk are all in a hurry to enlist, the highways are overcrowded, although they are broad and ever broadening with the crowds that flow through in a torrent. These roads are strewn with flowers, bordered with all kinds of amusements and attractions and paved with gold and silver (Matthew 7:13-14) ... Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. «Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!» they shout, «Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat! Let us drink! Let us sing! Let us dance! Let us play! God is good! He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!» And so they continue.
“Our beloved Jesus has His eyes upon you at this moment, addressing you individually: «Will you also leave Me?» (John 6:68). «Will you also forsake Me and flee from My Cross, like the worldlings, who are acting as so many Anti-Christs?» (1 John 2:12). «Will you subscribe to the standards of the day?» (Romans 12:2), «despise the poverty of My Cross and go in quest of riches; shun the sufferings connected with My Cross to run after pleasure; and spurn the humiliations that must be borne with My Cross and pursue worldly honors? There are many who pretend that they are friends of Mine and love Me―but, in reality, they hate Me, because they have no love for My Cross. I have many friends of My table, but few indeed of My Cross» (Imitation of Jesus Christ, Book 2, Chap. 11). In answer to the gracious invitation which Jesus extends, let us rise above ourselves. Let us flee from the corrupting concupiscence and enticements of a corrupt world (2 Peter 1:4). Let us love Jesus in the right way, standing by Him through the heaviest of crosses ... The elect―who are willing to be made conformable to the crucified Christ by carrying their cross―are few in number. It would cause us to faint away from grief to learn how surprisingly small is their number ... Both elect and reprobate must bear their cross here, either willingly or unwillingly. Remember these words:
“Three crosses stand on Calvary’s height!
One must be chosen so choose aright!
Like a saint you must suffer, or a penitent thief!
Or like a reprobate, in endless grief.”
“It is not given to all men to understand this mystery (Matthew 13:11). In fact, only a privileged number of men receive this practical knowledge of the mystery of the Cross. For that man who climbs up to Calvary and lets himself be nailed on the Cross with Jesus in the heart of his own country must be a brave man, a hero, a resolute man, one who is lifted up in God, who treats as muck both the world and Hell, as well as his very body and his own will. He must be resolved to relinquish all things, to undertake anything and to suffer everything for Jesus. Understand this―should there be anyone among you who has not this firm resolve, then he is just limping along on one foot, flying with one wing, and is undeserving of your company. He is not worthy to be called a Friend of the Cross! That kind of half-hearted will is enough to spoil the whole flock, like a sheep with the scurvy. If any such one has slipped into your fold through the contaminated door of the world, then, in the Name of the crucified Christ, drive him out as you would a wolf from your sheepfold!”
“Keep far away from those who pride themselves in suffering; the worldly-wise elated geniuses and self-conceited individuals who are stubborn and puffed-up with their lights and talents. Far be they from us, those endless talkers who make plenty of noise, but bring forth no other fruit than vainglory! Far from us those high-browed devotees, everywhere displaying the self-sufficient pride of Lucifer: «I am not like the rest!» (Luke 18:11). Far be from us those who must always justify themselves when blamed; resist when attacked; and exalt themselves when humbled. Be careful not to admit into your fellowship those frail, sensitive persons who are afraid of the slightest pinprick; who sob and sigh when faced with the lightest suffering; who have never experienced a hair-shirt, a whip or any other penitential instrument, and who, with their fashionable devotions, mingle the most artful delicacy with the most refined lack of mortification!” St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
OUR LADY says that it is predominantly a lack of prayer and penance that damns most souls. “Laborious exertions are very painful and averse to human nature according to the flesh; and the fruits of the spirit are more hidden and few guide themselves by the light … If passing labors and sufferings are accepted with joy and with serenity of heart, then they spiritualize the creature, they elevate it and furnish it with a divine insight―by which the soul begins to appreciate and esteem affliction at its proper value, and soon finds consolation in the blessings of mortification and finds freedom from disorderly passions … When the occasion of tasting the Chalice and the Cross of suffering is at hand, you must not turn away in sorrow and affliction from the sufferings, by which the sincerity of a loving and affectionate heart is to be tried ... The divine influence will urge and draw you on to desire of being despised by creatures, to joyful suffering, to a love of the Cross and an earnest and generous acceptation of it; it will move you to seek the last place, to love those that persecute you, to fear and abhor sin―even the slightest sin―seeking only to love and to suffer! … Be willing to bear and suffer, forgive and love all who offend you … When gold is untouched by the furnace-heat, the iron by the file, the grain by the grinding stone or flail, the grapes by the winepress, they are all useless and will not attain the end for which they are created … You cannot follow Christ, if you refuse to embrace the Cross and rejoice in it! Understand the ignorance and error of mortals―nearly all of them strive to avoid labor and suffering and are frightened by the royal and secure road of mortification and the Cross! Full of this deceitful ignorance, they not only abhor resemblance to Christ’s suffering, but they make their recovery impossible―since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering … The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss!” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
The “Elect” Explained
What does it mean to be one of the “elect”? It means being a saint―for the “elect” are elected to Heaven―and it is only saints go to Heaven. “There shall not enter into it anything defiled, or that works abomination or makes a lie―but they that are written in the book of life of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 21:27). Your “election” is to perfection. God demands perfection and Our Lord demands perfection: “I am the Almighty God! Walk before Me and be perfect!” (Genesis 17:1) ... “Thou shalt be perfect and without spot before the Lord thy God!” (Deuteronomy 18:13) … “Be you perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” adds Our Lord (Matthew 5:48). “How on earth can I be perfect like God?” you will ask.
Perfection is proportionate. Perfection means operating at the peak of one’s capabilities and potential. Look at it this way―you have 400 gallon tank, a 5 gallon bottle, a 1 gallon bottle, a 1 pint bottle, a cup and a thimble. They will all be perfectly filled when they are filled to their capacity―each will be perfect, but with different quantities. Only God is infinitely perfect―yet each one of us has been made by God with a certain assigned capacity and potential for holiness: “Without holiness no man shall see God” (Hebrews 12:14). You might by the 5 gallon bottle, or the 1 gallon bottle, or even the little thimble―what God expects is that you be filled with holiness according to your God-given capacity. Our capacities might be different, but the demand for holiness applies to every capacity: “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2). “You shall be holy, because I am holy!” (Leviticus 11:46).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange speaks of this need to put sanctity above everything else in our life―he calls it “the one thing necessary.” In his book, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, he writes: “The one thing necessary—which Jesus spoke of to Martha and Mary—consists in hearing the word of God and living by it. St. Alphonsus Liguori, in The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, writes: «One thing is necessary! The salvation of our souls. It is not necessary to be great, noble, or rich in this world, or to enjoy uninterrupted health; but it is necessary to save our souls, For this has God placed us here: not to acquire honors, riches, or pleasures, but to acquire by our good works that eternal kingdom which is prepared for those who, during this present life, fight against and overcome the enemies of their eternal salvation» (The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, Part 1, Meditation 17).
“The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, more profound than artistic or literary life, more profound than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Your Calling! Your Election!
If you have been chosen to be one of the elect, then you have been chosen to be saint. Sanctity is the result of a life-long apprenticeship in the school of knocks, temptations, sufferings and persecution. Just like being a soldier is not playing at soldiers like children do, but it means going through the knocks, physical pain, sufferings and humiliations of boot-camp and then facing the enemy on a real battlefield. “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). “The friendship of this world is the enemy of God. Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “To save our soul, one thing alone is necessary ― to hear the word of God and to live by it.” Practice makes perfect―practicing the Faith, as should it be practiced, inevitably perfects the soul. It is like walking and talking. Nobody was born with the ability to walk and talk―each baby had to spend much time in learning to walk and talk. With each passing week, month and year, the ability to walk and talk was gradually perfected―and finally the child could walk and talk perfectly. The same is true for knowledge, understanding and intelligence―they are perfected with time, and they never cease to be perfected―if we work at it!
Article 7
Monday & Tuesday, October 7th & 8th
The Rosary, You & Salvation
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday & Tuesday, October 7th & 8th
The Rosary, You & Salvation
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Do You Want to Be Saved?
Do you want to go to Heaven? Hopefully, your answer is: “Yes! Of course!” Most people want to go to Heaven. Most people expect to get to Heaven. So why is it that most souls are damned? Our Lord Himself tells us that: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
Our Lady of Fatima said that many souls go to Hell―and Our Lady revealed to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Fear the danger of not paying attention to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!”
The Saints echo those words of Our Lord and Our Lady. It is important to take note of their warnings―otherwise we run a very grave and likely risk of eventually falling on the side of the vast majority of souls that end up being damned. The Church does not warn us because the Church loves to scare people! The Church warns us because the Church loves souls and seeks to save them. To ignore the reality of most souls being damned and failing to inform and warn the faithful of this danger, would make the Church guilty of a callous and terrible crime! Here is what the saints say―ignore them at your own peril. Burying your head in the sand will not make the truth go away!
Pope St. Gregory the Great (540-604): “There are many who arrive at the Faith, but few who are led into the heavenly kingdom.”
St. Justin Martyr (100-165), Father of the Church: “The majority of men shall not see God!”
St. Jerome (347-420), Doctor and Father of the Church: “How few the Elect are! Notice that Christ did not say that those who walked along the path to Heaven are few in number―but that there were few who found that narrow way … Many begin well, but there are few who persevere!”
St. John Chrysostom (347-407), Doctor and Father of the Church: “What do you think? How many of the inhabitants of this city may perhaps be saved? What I am about to tell you is very terrible, yet I will not conceal it from you. Out of this thickly populated city with its thousands of inhabitants not one hundred people will be saved. I even doubt whether there will be as many as that!”
St. Augustine (354-430), Doctor and Father of the Church: “It is certain that few are saved! … If you wish to imitate the multitude, then you shall not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow gate! … Not all, nor even a majority, are saved!”
St. Anselm (1033-1109), Doctor of the Church: “If thou wouldst be certain of being in the number of the elect, strive to be one of the few, not of the many! And if thou wouldst be quite sure of thy salvation, strive to be among the fewest of the few! … Do not follow the great majority of mankind, but follow those who enter upon the narrow way, who renounce the world, who give themselves to prayer, and who never relax their efforts by day or by night, that they may attain everlasting blessedness!”
St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), Doctor of the Church: “There are a select few who are saved! … Those who are saved are in the minority!”
St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori (1696-1787), Doctor of the Church: “In the Great Deluge in the days of Noe, nearly all mankind perished―eight persons alone being saved in the Ark. In our days a deluge―not of water but of sins―continually floods the Earth, and out of this flood very few escape. Scarcely anyone is saved! Everyone desires to be saved, but the greater part is lost! … The saints are few, but we must live with the few if we would be saved with the few!”
St. John of the Cross (1524-1591), Doctor of the Church: “Behold how many there are who are called, and how few who are chosen!
St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), Doctor of the Church: “Many souls condemn themselves to Hell! ... I saw souls falling into Hell like snowflakes!”
St. Francis Xavier (1506-1552): “Ah, how many souls lose Heaven and are cast into Hell!” (Francis: Letters and Shorter Works)
St. Vincent de Paul (1580-1660): “Ah! A great many persons live constantly in the state of damnation!” Vincent: cf. Voice of the Saints, (Francis W. Johnston, London: Burnes and Oats, 1965.)
St. Louis Marie de Montfort (1673-1716): “Be one of the small number who find the way to life, and enter by the narrow gate into Heaven. Take care not to follow the majority and the common herd, so many of whom are lost ... The number of the elect is so small ― so small ― that, were we to know how small it is, we would faint away with grief!”
St. Benedict Joseph of Labre (1748-1783): “Yes, indeed, many will be damned; few will be saved!”
St. John Marie Vianney (1786-1859): “The number of the saved is as few as the number of grapes left after the vineyard-pickers have passed!”
Blessed Anna Maria Taigi, (1769-1837): “The greater number of Christians today are damned!”
Ven. Louis de Granada (1505-1588): “A greater number is lost through false confidence than through excessive fear!”
Lucia Santos of Fatima (1907-1958?): “Taking into account the behavior of mankind, only a small part of the human race will be saved! … Many will be lost!”
St. Jacinta Marto of Fatima (1910-1920): “So many people are going to die. And almost all of them are going to Hell!”
Scary Thoughts, Huh?
All of that is serious, sobering and scary! So it should be! Fear is not a bad thing―otherwise God would not have put the passion of fear within us when He us.
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 110:10) … “By the fear of the Lord men depart from evil” (Proverbs 16:6) … “The fear of the Lord drives out sin” (Ecclesiasticus 1:27) … “It shall be well with them that fear God, who dread His face!” (Ecclesiastes 8:12) … “Let thy glory be in the fear of God!” (Ecclesiasticus 9:22). If only there was more fear of God, then there would proportionately be less sin in the world and in our own lives.
Nevertheless, fear is a platform or a foundation upon which we must build―fear is not an end in itself, but a means to advance to greater things, greater virtues. The ultimate virtue is charity―but charity includes filial fear. What is filial fear? Filial fear is the love a child has for its loving parents and it that love of parents that gives the child a fear of offending such loving parents―not out of fear of punishment (even though punishment is something just), but a fear of hurting the loving relationship with its parents.
It is similar in our relationship with God. Yes―we should fear God’s punishments! However, we should have a greater fear of offending a loving heavenly Father! We should fear and tremble at the thought of weakening and even breaking our relationship with a loving God―hence Holy Scripture states: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Nevertheless―just as in the life of an infant―it first of all a fear of punishments that dictates behavior. Love for parents―a true love, not a selfish one of getting all that you can from them―is something that grows gradually in proportion to the child being able to reason and love, which only comes with time. The child gradually understands the two sides of love―one being a love that gives and rewards; the other being a love that takes away and punishes. Both are flip sides of the same coin of love. “He that loves his son, frequently chastises him” (Ecclesiasticus 30:1). “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises―and, as a father in the son, He pleases Himself” (Proverbs 3:12).
Heaven is No Freebie
Heaven is not a “freebie”! Heaven is not an entitlement! Heaven is not a right that you born with! Heaven is not a guarantee! Our Lord warns us: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) … “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21).
Rather than being a freebie, Heaven requires much work and suffering: “Work out your salvation in fear and trembling!” (Philippians 2:12). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with worldly things; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4).
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, refers to this need for effort in attaining eternal life: “Whatever can be obtained by human efforts, is not to be expected by a miracle, nor must one try to exempt himself from labor in the hope of a supernatural intervention on the part of God … Eternal life is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! … Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Worldlings, in their lethargy, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings!”
The Rosary―A Lesson in Life
The Rosary is meant to be much more than a mere mechanical mindless mumbling of Our Fathers and Hail Marys! The Rosary is a school in itself―full of lessons on how to live life on Earth so as to attain eternal salvation in Heaven. We neglect those lessons at our own peril by refusing to consider, contemplate and meditate the immense pearls of wisdom found in each and every mystery. If the devils cannot prevent from saying the Rosary, then they will try to ensure that we “SAY” it and don’t “PRAY” it. Merely SAYING it involves the mechanical recitation of the vocal prayers of the Rosary―the Our Father, the Hail Mary and the Glory Be. To PRAY the Rosary we must do something more―we must pay attention to the mysteries and their content; we must dig for the gold that is undoubtedly present in large quantities in each Rosary mystery; then we must consider on what we learn from these treasures of wisdom for our own personal lives; and then―most importantly―put into practice what we have uncovered and learnt.
St. Louis de Montfort, in his book The Secret of the Rosary, speaks of this need to meditate the Rosary and not just say the Rosary: “The Rosary is made up of two things: mental prayer and vocal prayer. In the Rosary mental prayer is none other than meditation of the chief mysteries of the life, death and glory of Jesus Christ and of His blessed Mother. Vocal prayer consists in saying fifteen decades of the Hail Mary, each decade headed by an Our Father, while at the same time meditating on and contemplating the fifteen principal virtues which Jesus and Mary practiced in the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary … So the Rosary is a blessed blending of mental and vocal prayer by which we honor and learn to imitate the mysteries and the virtues of the life, death, Passion and glory of Jesus and Mary … Our Lady taught Saint Dominic this excellent method of praying and ordered him to preach it far and wide so as to reawaken the fervor of Christians and to revive in their hearts a love for our Blessed Lord. She also taught it to Blessed Alan de la Roche and said to him in a vision, «When people say 150 Hail Marys, that prayer is very helpful to them and a most pleasing tribute to me. But they will do better still and will please me more if they say these salutations while meditating on the life, death, and Passion of Jesus Christ, for this meditation is the soul of this prayer.» For the Rosary said without the meditation on the sacred mysteries of our salvation would almost be a body without a soul, excellent matter, but without the form, which is the meditation, and which distinguishes it from other devotions.”
“The chief concern of the Christian should be to tend to perfection. ‘Be faithful imitators of God, as His well‑beloved children!’ the great Apostle [St. Paul] tells us ... It was because Our Lady wanted to help us in the great task of working out our salvation that she ordered Saint Dominic to teach the faithful to meditate upon the sacred mysteries of the life of Jesus Christ … Children copy their parents through watching them and talking to them, and they learn their own language through hearing them speak. An apprentice learns his trade through watching his master at work; in the same way the faithful can become like their divine Master if they reverently study and imitate the virtues of Jesus which are shown in the fifteen mysteries of His life … A Christian who does not meditate on the mysteries of the Rosary is very ungrateful to Our Lord and shows how little he cares for all that our divine Savior has suffered to save the world. This attitude seems to show that he knows little or nothing of the life of Jesus Christ, and that he has never taken the trouble to find out what He has done and what He went through in order to save us. A Christian of that kind ought to fear that, not having known Jesus Christ or having put Him out of his mind, Jesus will reject him on the Day of Judgment with the reproach: ‘I tell you solemnly, I do not know you!’ Let us meditate, then, on the life and sufferings of our Savior by means of the Holy Rosary; let us learn to know Him well and to be grateful for all His blessings, so that, on the Day of Judgment, He may number us among His children and His friends!
“The saints made Our Lord’s life the principal object of their study; they meditated on His virtues and His sufferings, and in this way arrived at Christian perfection ... During her whole life, our Savior’s holy Mother was occupied in meditating on the virtues and the sufferings of her Son … It is a great mistake to think that only priests and religious and those who have withdrawn from the turmoil of the world are supposed to meditate upon the truths of our Faith and the mysteries of the life of Christ … The same obligation falls just as much on the laity, because of the fact that every day they meet with spiritual dangers which might cause them to lose their souls … What better weapon could we use than meditation on the life and Passion of Jesus Christ? … Ever since the devil was crushed by the humility and the Passion of Jesus Christ, he has been practically unable to attack a soul that is armed with meditation on the mysteries of Our Lord’s life, and, if he does trouble such a soul, he is sure to be shamefully defeated … Therefore they should arm themselves with the frequent meditation on the life, virtues, and sufferings of our Blessed Lord, which are presented to us in the fifteen mysteries of the Holy Rosary … This meditation on the mysteries of the life and death of Our Lord Jesus Christ is the source of the most wonderful fruits for those who make use of it … The meditation on the mysteries and prayers of the Rosary is the easiest of all prayers, because the diversity of the virtues of Our Lord and the different situations of His life which we study, refresh and fortify our mind in a wonderful way … I should like to add that the Rosary recited with the meditation of the mysteries brings about the following marvelous results:
(1) It gradually brings us a perfect knowledge of Jesus Christ;
(2) It purifies our souls from sin;
(3) It gives us victory over all our enemies;
(4) It makes the practice of virtue easy;
(5) It sets us on fire with the love of Our Lord;
(6) It enriches us with graces and merits;
(7) It supplies us with what is needed to pay all our debts to God and to our fellow‑men,
(8) And, finally, it obtains all kinds of graces from God.
“Let us turn, then, to the Holy Rosary in all our needs, and we shall infallibly obtain the graces we ask for from God to attain our salvation! … Our Lady appeared to the Venerable Dominic, a Carthusian devoted to the Holy Rosary, who lived at Treves, and said to him: «Whenever one of the faithful, in a state of grace, says the Rosary while meditating on the mysteries of the life and Passion of Christ, he obtains full and entire remission of all his sins!» … Confessors ought to ask their penitents to say the Rosary with meditation on the sacred mysteries, rather than giving them other penances which are less meritorious and less pleasing to God, less likely to help them to advance in virtue, and not as efficacious in helping them to avoid sin … During an exorcism by St. Dominic, the devils began to scream: «Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!» … The devils have an overwhelming fear of the Rosary. St. Bernard says that it puts them to flight and makes all Hell tremble. Blessed Alan de la Roche assures us that he has seen several people delivered from Satan’s bondage after taking up the Holy Rosary, even though they had previously sold themselves to him, body and soul … Marvelous conversions are brought about by this wonderful devotion. Great sinners, both men and women, have been converted after twenty, thirty or forty years of sin and unspeakable vice …
“It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches his heart. A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly. Most Catholics say the Rosary, either the whole fifteen mysteries or five of them, or at least a few decades. Why is it then that so few of them give up their sins and make progress in virtue, if not because they are not saying them as they should! … To say the Holy Rosary with advantage one must firstly be in a state of grace or at least be fully determined to give up sin … In order to pray well, it is not enough to say the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention … How can we expect God to listen to us if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? … A fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible! ... It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words! … Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!
“Before beginning a decade, pause for a moment or two, depending on how much time you have, and contemplate the mystery that you are about to honor in that decade … I would like to add that the Rosary ought to be said reverently, that is to say, it ought to be said as much as possible, kneeling, with hands joined, clasping the Rosary ... I advise you to divide up your Rosary into three parts and to say each group of five decades at different times of the day. This is much better than saying the whole fifteen decades at once. If you cannot find the time to say five decades all together, say a decade here and a decade there; you will thus be able, in spite of your work and the calls upon your time, to complete the whole Rosary [fifteen decades] before going to bed.
“We read in the life of Blessed Hermann of the Order of the Premonstratensians, that at one time when he used to say the Rosary attentively and devoutly while meditating on the mysteries, Our Lady used to appear to him resplendent in breathtaking majesty and beauty. But, as time went on, his fervor cooled and he fell into the way of saying his Rosary hurriedly and without giving it his full attention. Then one day Our Lady appeared to him again, but this time she was far from beautiful, and her face was furrowed and drawn with sadness. Blessed Hermann was appalled at the change in her, and Our Lady explained: «This is how I look to you, Hermann, because this is how you are treating me; as a woman to be despised and of no importance! Why do you no longer greet me with respect and attention while meditating on my mysteries and praising my privileges?»
“People of God, cut yourselves adrift from those who are damning themselves by their impious lives, laziness and lack of devotion without delay, and say the Rosary often with Faith, humility, confidence and perseverance … If you do not keep up your prayers, you will fall! … But if you want to lead a true Christian life and genuinely want to save your soul and walk in the footsteps of the saints and not fall into serious sin; if you wish to break all the snares of the devil and extinguish all his flaming darts, then you must pray always as Our Lord taught and commanded you to do … If you want to live and die without sin―at least without serious sin―then pray always; say your [fifteen decade] Rosary every day! … Even if you suffer from dryness of soul, distaste for prayer and interior discouragement―never give up the least part of your Rosary!” (A compilation of extracts from St. Louis de Montfort’s The Secret of the Rosary).
Do you want to go to Heaven? Hopefully, your answer is: “Yes! Of course!” Most people want to go to Heaven. Most people expect to get to Heaven. So why is it that most souls are damned? Our Lord Himself tells us that: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
Our Lady of Fatima said that many souls go to Hell―and Our Lady revealed to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Fear the danger of not paying attention to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!”
The Saints echo those words of Our Lord and Our Lady. It is important to take note of their warnings―otherwise we run a very grave and likely risk of eventually falling on the side of the vast majority of souls that end up being damned. The Church does not warn us because the Church loves to scare people! The Church warns us because the Church loves souls and seeks to save them. To ignore the reality of most souls being damned and failing to inform and warn the faithful of this danger, would make the Church guilty of a callous and terrible crime! Here is what the saints say―ignore them at your own peril. Burying your head in the sand will not make the truth go away!
Pope St. Gregory the Great (540-604): “There are many who arrive at the Faith, but few who are led into the heavenly kingdom.”
St. Justin Martyr (100-165), Father of the Church: “The majority of men shall not see God!”
St. Jerome (347-420), Doctor and Father of the Church: “How few the Elect are! Notice that Christ did not say that those who walked along the path to Heaven are few in number―but that there were few who found that narrow way … Many begin well, but there are few who persevere!”
St. John Chrysostom (347-407), Doctor and Father of the Church: “What do you think? How many of the inhabitants of this city may perhaps be saved? What I am about to tell you is very terrible, yet I will not conceal it from you. Out of this thickly populated city with its thousands of inhabitants not one hundred people will be saved. I even doubt whether there will be as many as that!”
St. Augustine (354-430), Doctor and Father of the Church: “It is certain that few are saved! … If you wish to imitate the multitude, then you shall not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow gate! … Not all, nor even a majority, are saved!”
St. Anselm (1033-1109), Doctor of the Church: “If thou wouldst be certain of being in the number of the elect, strive to be one of the few, not of the many! And if thou wouldst be quite sure of thy salvation, strive to be among the fewest of the few! … Do not follow the great majority of mankind, but follow those who enter upon the narrow way, who renounce the world, who give themselves to prayer, and who never relax their efforts by day or by night, that they may attain everlasting blessedness!”
St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), Doctor of the Church: “There are a select few who are saved! … Those who are saved are in the minority!”
St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori (1696-1787), Doctor of the Church: “In the Great Deluge in the days of Noe, nearly all mankind perished―eight persons alone being saved in the Ark. In our days a deluge―not of water but of sins―continually floods the Earth, and out of this flood very few escape. Scarcely anyone is saved! Everyone desires to be saved, but the greater part is lost! … The saints are few, but we must live with the few if we would be saved with the few!”
St. John of the Cross (1524-1591), Doctor of the Church: “Behold how many there are who are called, and how few who are chosen!
St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), Doctor of the Church: “Many souls condemn themselves to Hell! ... I saw souls falling into Hell like snowflakes!”
St. Francis Xavier (1506-1552): “Ah, how many souls lose Heaven and are cast into Hell!” (Francis: Letters and Shorter Works)
St. Vincent de Paul (1580-1660): “Ah! A great many persons live constantly in the state of damnation!” Vincent: cf. Voice of the Saints, (Francis W. Johnston, London: Burnes and Oats, 1965.)
St. Louis Marie de Montfort (1673-1716): “Be one of the small number who find the way to life, and enter by the narrow gate into Heaven. Take care not to follow the majority and the common herd, so many of whom are lost ... The number of the elect is so small ― so small ― that, were we to know how small it is, we would faint away with grief!”
St. Benedict Joseph of Labre (1748-1783): “Yes, indeed, many will be damned; few will be saved!”
St. John Marie Vianney (1786-1859): “The number of the saved is as few as the number of grapes left after the vineyard-pickers have passed!”
Blessed Anna Maria Taigi, (1769-1837): “The greater number of Christians today are damned!”
Ven. Louis de Granada (1505-1588): “A greater number is lost through false confidence than through excessive fear!”
Lucia Santos of Fatima (1907-1958?): “Taking into account the behavior of mankind, only a small part of the human race will be saved! … Many will be lost!”
St. Jacinta Marto of Fatima (1910-1920): “So many people are going to die. And almost all of them are going to Hell!”
Scary Thoughts, Huh?
All of that is serious, sobering and scary! So it should be! Fear is not a bad thing―otherwise God would not have put the passion of fear within us when He us.
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 110:10) … “By the fear of the Lord men depart from evil” (Proverbs 16:6) … “The fear of the Lord drives out sin” (Ecclesiasticus 1:27) … “It shall be well with them that fear God, who dread His face!” (Ecclesiastes 8:12) … “Let thy glory be in the fear of God!” (Ecclesiasticus 9:22). If only there was more fear of God, then there would proportionately be less sin in the world and in our own lives.
Nevertheless, fear is a platform or a foundation upon which we must build―fear is not an end in itself, but a means to advance to greater things, greater virtues. The ultimate virtue is charity―but charity includes filial fear. What is filial fear? Filial fear is the love a child has for its loving parents and it that love of parents that gives the child a fear of offending such loving parents―not out of fear of punishment (even though punishment is something just), but a fear of hurting the loving relationship with its parents.
It is similar in our relationship with God. Yes―we should fear God’s punishments! However, we should have a greater fear of offending a loving heavenly Father! We should fear and tremble at the thought of weakening and even breaking our relationship with a loving God―hence Holy Scripture states: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Nevertheless―just as in the life of an infant―it first of all a fear of punishments that dictates behavior. Love for parents―a true love, not a selfish one of getting all that you can from them―is something that grows gradually in proportion to the child being able to reason and love, which only comes with time. The child gradually understands the two sides of love―one being a love that gives and rewards; the other being a love that takes away and punishes. Both are flip sides of the same coin of love. “He that loves his son, frequently chastises him” (Ecclesiasticus 30:1). “For whom the Lord loves, He chastises―and, as a father in the son, He pleases Himself” (Proverbs 3:12).
Heaven is No Freebie
Heaven is not a “freebie”! Heaven is not an entitlement! Heaven is not a right that you born with! Heaven is not a guarantee! Our Lord warns us: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) … “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21).
Rather than being a freebie, Heaven requires much work and suffering: “Work out your salvation in fear and trembling!” (Philippians 2:12). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with worldly things; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4).
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, refers to this need for effort in attaining eternal life: “Whatever can be obtained by human efforts, is not to be expected by a miracle, nor must one try to exempt himself from labor in the hope of a supernatural intervention on the part of God … Eternal life is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! … Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Worldlings, in their lethargy, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings!”
The Rosary―A Lesson in Life
The Rosary is meant to be much more than a mere mechanical mindless mumbling of Our Fathers and Hail Marys! The Rosary is a school in itself―full of lessons on how to live life on Earth so as to attain eternal salvation in Heaven. We neglect those lessons at our own peril by refusing to consider, contemplate and meditate the immense pearls of wisdom found in each and every mystery. If the devils cannot prevent from saying the Rosary, then they will try to ensure that we “SAY” it and don’t “PRAY” it. Merely SAYING it involves the mechanical recitation of the vocal prayers of the Rosary―the Our Father, the Hail Mary and the Glory Be. To PRAY the Rosary we must do something more―we must pay attention to the mysteries and their content; we must dig for the gold that is undoubtedly present in large quantities in each Rosary mystery; then we must consider on what we learn from these treasures of wisdom for our own personal lives; and then―most importantly―put into practice what we have uncovered and learnt.
St. Louis de Montfort, in his book The Secret of the Rosary, speaks of this need to meditate the Rosary and not just say the Rosary: “The Rosary is made up of two things: mental prayer and vocal prayer. In the Rosary mental prayer is none other than meditation of the chief mysteries of the life, death and glory of Jesus Christ and of His blessed Mother. Vocal prayer consists in saying fifteen decades of the Hail Mary, each decade headed by an Our Father, while at the same time meditating on and contemplating the fifteen principal virtues which Jesus and Mary practiced in the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary … So the Rosary is a blessed blending of mental and vocal prayer by which we honor and learn to imitate the mysteries and the virtues of the life, death, Passion and glory of Jesus and Mary … Our Lady taught Saint Dominic this excellent method of praying and ordered him to preach it far and wide so as to reawaken the fervor of Christians and to revive in their hearts a love for our Blessed Lord. She also taught it to Blessed Alan de la Roche and said to him in a vision, «When people say 150 Hail Marys, that prayer is very helpful to them and a most pleasing tribute to me. But they will do better still and will please me more if they say these salutations while meditating on the life, death, and Passion of Jesus Christ, for this meditation is the soul of this prayer.» For the Rosary said without the meditation on the sacred mysteries of our salvation would almost be a body without a soul, excellent matter, but without the form, which is the meditation, and which distinguishes it from other devotions.”
“The chief concern of the Christian should be to tend to perfection. ‘Be faithful imitators of God, as His well‑beloved children!’ the great Apostle [St. Paul] tells us ... It was because Our Lady wanted to help us in the great task of working out our salvation that she ordered Saint Dominic to teach the faithful to meditate upon the sacred mysteries of the life of Jesus Christ … Children copy their parents through watching them and talking to them, and they learn their own language through hearing them speak. An apprentice learns his trade through watching his master at work; in the same way the faithful can become like their divine Master if they reverently study and imitate the virtues of Jesus which are shown in the fifteen mysteries of His life … A Christian who does not meditate on the mysteries of the Rosary is very ungrateful to Our Lord and shows how little he cares for all that our divine Savior has suffered to save the world. This attitude seems to show that he knows little or nothing of the life of Jesus Christ, and that he has never taken the trouble to find out what He has done and what He went through in order to save us. A Christian of that kind ought to fear that, not having known Jesus Christ or having put Him out of his mind, Jesus will reject him on the Day of Judgment with the reproach: ‘I tell you solemnly, I do not know you!’ Let us meditate, then, on the life and sufferings of our Savior by means of the Holy Rosary; let us learn to know Him well and to be grateful for all His blessings, so that, on the Day of Judgment, He may number us among His children and His friends!
“The saints made Our Lord’s life the principal object of their study; they meditated on His virtues and His sufferings, and in this way arrived at Christian perfection ... During her whole life, our Savior’s holy Mother was occupied in meditating on the virtues and the sufferings of her Son … It is a great mistake to think that only priests and religious and those who have withdrawn from the turmoil of the world are supposed to meditate upon the truths of our Faith and the mysteries of the life of Christ … The same obligation falls just as much on the laity, because of the fact that every day they meet with spiritual dangers which might cause them to lose their souls … What better weapon could we use than meditation on the life and Passion of Jesus Christ? … Ever since the devil was crushed by the humility and the Passion of Jesus Christ, he has been practically unable to attack a soul that is armed with meditation on the mysteries of Our Lord’s life, and, if he does trouble such a soul, he is sure to be shamefully defeated … Therefore they should arm themselves with the frequent meditation on the life, virtues, and sufferings of our Blessed Lord, which are presented to us in the fifteen mysteries of the Holy Rosary … This meditation on the mysteries of the life and death of Our Lord Jesus Christ is the source of the most wonderful fruits for those who make use of it … The meditation on the mysteries and prayers of the Rosary is the easiest of all prayers, because the diversity of the virtues of Our Lord and the different situations of His life which we study, refresh and fortify our mind in a wonderful way … I should like to add that the Rosary recited with the meditation of the mysteries brings about the following marvelous results:
(1) It gradually brings us a perfect knowledge of Jesus Christ;
(2) It purifies our souls from sin;
(3) It gives us victory over all our enemies;
(4) It makes the practice of virtue easy;
(5) It sets us on fire with the love of Our Lord;
(6) It enriches us with graces and merits;
(7) It supplies us with what is needed to pay all our debts to God and to our fellow‑men,
(8) And, finally, it obtains all kinds of graces from God.
“Let us turn, then, to the Holy Rosary in all our needs, and we shall infallibly obtain the graces we ask for from God to attain our salvation! … Our Lady appeared to the Venerable Dominic, a Carthusian devoted to the Holy Rosary, who lived at Treves, and said to him: «Whenever one of the faithful, in a state of grace, says the Rosary while meditating on the mysteries of the life and Passion of Christ, he obtains full and entire remission of all his sins!» … Confessors ought to ask their penitents to say the Rosary with meditation on the sacred mysteries, rather than giving them other penances which are less meritorious and less pleasing to God, less likely to help them to advance in virtue, and not as efficacious in helping them to avoid sin … During an exorcism by St. Dominic, the devils began to scream: «Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!» … The devils have an overwhelming fear of the Rosary. St. Bernard says that it puts them to flight and makes all Hell tremble. Blessed Alan de la Roche assures us that he has seen several people delivered from Satan’s bondage after taking up the Holy Rosary, even though they had previously sold themselves to him, body and soul … Marvelous conversions are brought about by this wonderful devotion. Great sinners, both men and women, have been converted after twenty, thirty or forty years of sin and unspeakable vice …
“It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches his heart. A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly. Most Catholics say the Rosary, either the whole fifteen mysteries or five of them, or at least a few decades. Why is it then that so few of them give up their sins and make progress in virtue, if not because they are not saying them as they should! … To say the Holy Rosary with advantage one must firstly be in a state of grace or at least be fully determined to give up sin … In order to pray well, it is not enough to say the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention … How can we expect God to listen to us if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? … A fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible! ... It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words! … Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!
“Before beginning a decade, pause for a moment or two, depending on how much time you have, and contemplate the mystery that you are about to honor in that decade … I would like to add that the Rosary ought to be said reverently, that is to say, it ought to be said as much as possible, kneeling, with hands joined, clasping the Rosary ... I advise you to divide up your Rosary into three parts and to say each group of five decades at different times of the day. This is much better than saying the whole fifteen decades at once. If you cannot find the time to say five decades all together, say a decade here and a decade there; you will thus be able, in spite of your work and the calls upon your time, to complete the whole Rosary [fifteen decades] before going to bed.
“We read in the life of Blessed Hermann of the Order of the Premonstratensians, that at one time when he used to say the Rosary attentively and devoutly while meditating on the mysteries, Our Lady used to appear to him resplendent in breathtaking majesty and beauty. But, as time went on, his fervor cooled and he fell into the way of saying his Rosary hurriedly and without giving it his full attention. Then one day Our Lady appeared to him again, but this time she was far from beautiful, and her face was furrowed and drawn with sadness. Blessed Hermann was appalled at the change in her, and Our Lady explained: «This is how I look to you, Hermann, because this is how you are treating me; as a woman to be despised and of no importance! Why do you no longer greet me with respect and attention while meditating on my mysteries and praising my privileges?»
“People of God, cut yourselves adrift from those who are damning themselves by their impious lives, laziness and lack of devotion without delay, and say the Rosary often with Faith, humility, confidence and perseverance … If you do not keep up your prayers, you will fall! … But if you want to lead a true Christian life and genuinely want to save your soul and walk in the footsteps of the saints and not fall into serious sin; if you wish to break all the snares of the devil and extinguish all his flaming darts, then you must pray always as Our Lord taught and commanded you to do … If you want to live and die without sin―at least without serious sin―then pray always; say your [fifteen decade] Rosary every day! … Even if you suffer from dryness of soul, distaste for prayer and interior discouragement―never give up the least part of your Rosary!” (A compilation of extracts from St. Louis de Montfort’s The Secret of the Rosary).
Article 6
Sunday October 6th
THE Weapon
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday October 6th
THE Weapon
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Don’t Doubt!
Sometimes you may find it hard to believe that such a little simple thing like the Rosary can be called a weapon. Yet that is what the Popes and Saints of the Church tell us. Perhaps it is our scientific, materialistic, skeptical age that influences our way of thinking, or it may be that we are a “Doubting Thomas”, who hasn’t personally witnessed any Rosary miracles, and so we think to ourselves: “Unless I experience or see a miracle myself, I will not believe!” Yet, we can be sure, those miracles happen more often than we imagine throughout the world of devout Rosary clients. Most are perhaps miracles of grace, some will be physical miracles. Let us not think for one moment that our skepticism limits the power in any way.
Popes on the Rosary
Many popes have spoken about the power of the Rosary:
POPE ADRIAN VI (reigned 1522-1523): “The Rosary is the scourge of the devil!”
POPE BLESSED PIUS IX (reigned 1846-1878): “Give me an army saying the Rosary and I will conquer the world.”
POPE LEO XIII (reigned 1878-1903): “The Rosary is the most excellent form of prayer and the most efficacious means of attaining eternal life. It is the remedy for all our evils, the root of all our blessings. There is no more excellent way of praying … When the heretical Albigensian sect brought many a nation to its utter ruin, the Church fought against it, not with troops and arms, but chiefly with the power of the most holy Rosary … By this means the Church triumphed magnificently over every obstacle and provided for the salvation of her children―not only in that trial, but in others like it afterward, always with the same glorious success.”
POPE ST. PIUS X (reigned 1903-1914): “If there were one million families praying the Rosary every day, the entire world would be saved!”
POPE BENEDICT XV (reigned 1914-1922): “The prayer of the Rosary is perfect, because of the graces it obtains, and the victories it achieves … We wish the spread and frequent use of the Rosary among Christian people. We make this exhortation in these troublous times!”
POPE PIUS XI (reigned 1922-1939): “The Rosary is a powerful weapon to put the demons to flight and a most powerful weapon to overcome the devil ... and to keep oneself from sin … It serves admirably to overcome the enemies of God and of religion!
POPE PIUS XII (reigned 1939-1958): “We put great confidence in the Holy Rosary for the healing of evils which afflict our times!”
St. Padre Pio on the Rosary
St. Padre Pio used to say that “The Rosary is the weapon!” Concerning the Rosary, Our Lady herself said to Padre Pio: “With this weapon you will win.” Later, to Padre Onorato Marcucci, grabbing the Rosary that he had put on the nightstand for a few seconds, Padre Pio said: “With this—one wins the battles!” Convinced of the power of the Rosary, Padre Pio always held the Rosary in his hands. He used to carry, permanently, a Rosary in his hands and would pray it many times a day. Padre Marcellino testified that he had to help Padre Pio wash his hands one at a time, “because he didn’t want to let go of the Rosary beads, and passed the Rosary from one hand to the other.” Padre Pio always wore the Rosary around his arm at night. A few days before his death, as Padre Pio was getting into bed, he said to the friars who were in his room: “Give me my weapon!” And the friars, surprised and curious, asked him: “Where is the weapon? We cannot see anything!” Padre Pio replied: “It is in my habit, which you have just hung up!” After having gone through the pockets of his religious habit, the friars said to him: “Padre, there is no weapon in your habit! . . . We can only find your Rosary beads there!” Padre Pio immediately said: “And is this not a weapon? ... The true weapon?!”
On another occasion, Padre Pio said: “Some people are so foolish that they think they can go through life without the help of the Blessed Mother. Love the Madonna and pray the Rosary―for her Rosary is the weapon against the evils of the world today! All graces given by God pass through the Blessed Mother!”
Sister Lucia of Fatima on the Rosary
In a letter to Dom Umberto Maria Pasquale, an Italian Salesian priest, Sister Lucia of Fatima wrote: “The decadence which exists in the world is without doubt the consequence of a lack the spirit of prayer. It was in anticipation of this confusion that the Blessed Virgin recommended the recitation of the Rosary with such insistence. The most holy Virgin―in these last times in which we live―has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is―whether temporal or spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us―that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves; we will sanctify ourselves; we will console our Lord, and obtain the salvation of many souls.
“And, as the Rosary is, after the Mass, the most appropriate prayer for preserving the Faith in souls, the devil has unleashed his struggle against it. Unfortunately, we see the disasters he has caused ... We must defend souls against errors which can make them stray from the good road. I cannot help them other than by my poor and humble prayers and my sacrifices; but you, Fr. Umberto, you have a much more extended field of action to develop your apostolate. We cannot and we must not stop ourselves, nor allow, as Our Lord says, the sons of darkness to be more wise than the children of Light ... The Rosary is the most powerful weapon for defending ourselves on the field of battle.”
The Saints on the Rosary
ST. DOMINIC: “The Rosary is a fortress against evil! It is a sign to Satan that you belong to Our Lady!”
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT: “The Hail Mary well said—that is, with attention, devotion, and modesty—is, according to the saints, the enemy of the devil which puts him to flight, and the hammer which crushes him! … If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins, you shall receive a never fading crown of glory. For even if you are now on the brink of damnation, even if you have one foot in Hell, even if you have sold your soul to the devil ― sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and save your soul.” (True Devotion to Mary and The Secret of the Rosary).
ST. FRANCIS DE SALES: “The greatest method of praying is to pray the Rosary!”
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI: “The salvation of my soul depends on saying the Rosary! He who prays will be saved! He who does not pray will be damned!”
Rosary Prophecy
St. Angelo of Jerusalem was preaching in the Basilica of Saint John Lateran in Rome, after which he met, by chance, at a street corner in Rome, both St. Francis of Assisi and St. Dominic, who congratulated Angelo for his excellent preaching. St. Dominic Guzman was the founder of the Order of Preachers (known also as “The Dominicans”). St. Francis of Assisi was founder of the Order of Friars Minor (also known as “The Franciscans”). St. Angelo of Jerusalem, was the protomartyr of the Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel (also known as “The Carmelites”). Though the encounter took place by chance, they spoke with each other and spent the night together in prayer―during which they prophesied to each other. St. Angelo foretold St. Francis’s stigmata, St. Francis foretold the martyrdom of St. Angelo and St. Dominic foretelling the promulgation of the Rosary and the Scapular. Dominic said: “One day, Brother Angelo, to your Order of Carmel, the Most Blessed Virgin Mary will give a devotion to be known as the Brown Scapular; and to my Order of Preachers, she will give a devotion to be known as the Rosary. One day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, she will save the world.” In later years, a chapel was built on the location of that fortuitous meeting. (Prophecy of St. Dominic to St. Francis of Assisi and St. Angelo of Jerusalem, O.Carm.,).
Theologians on the Rosary
DOM COLUMBA MARMION (1825-1897), in his book Christ, the Ideal of the Priest, writes: “Do you remember the story of David who vanquished Goliath? What steps did the young Israelite take to overthrow the giant? He struck him in the middle of the forehead with a pebble from his sling. If we regard the Philistine as representing evil and all its powers: heresy, impurity, pride, then we can consider the little stones from the sling capable of overthrowing the enemy as symbolizing the Aves of the Rosary.”
FR. MICHAEL MULLER, C.SS.R. (1825-1897), in his book The Devotion of the Holy Rosary and Five Scapulars, writes: “Number those―if you can―who, through the devotion of the Rosary, have recovered from sickness; how many captives have been set at liberty! How many have been delivered by Mary who were in danger of perishing by fire, in danger of shipwreck, in danger of war and pestilence? Go to the sanctuaries of Our Blessed Lady, and see there the many votive offerings, ornaments of gold and silver and precious stones, in commemoration of miraculous cures or other extraordinary favors obtained though the devotion of the Rosary―for in these sanctuaries of the Blessed Virgin, the blind are restored to sight, the lame walk, the demons are expelled from the bodies of men. These are authentic facts, attested not only by persons of note who have heard them from others, but by thousands of eyewitnesses whose sincerity we cannot doubt―facts so numerous that, if they were all written, it would take years to read them. What favor and blessing is there that cannot be obtained by the devotion of the Rosary? … Dear Christian, there is no valid excuse for not practicing the daily devotion of the Rosary, and for the most part, those who make these objections and excuses are influenced by a secret unwillingness to lead a Christian life in good earnest. They are unwilling to practice retirement, detachment from creatures, and self-denial. They omit saying the beads in order to avoid the rebuke of their conscience for their sensuality, price, vanity, uncharitableness, and sloth. Miserable are the consequences of such a course of conduct. Not being willing to seek true peace of heart in religion, such men try to find their consolation in exterior things; they multiply faults and imperfections in proportion as they withdraw from God … Next to the holy sacrifice of the Mass, there is, indeed, nothing more terrifying to [the devil], nor does he bear a more implacable hatred to anything than to the devotion of the Rosary!” (Fr. Michael Muller, 1825-1897, C.SS.R., The Devotion of the Holy Rosary and Five Scapulars).
Sometimes you may find it hard to believe that such a little simple thing like the Rosary can be called a weapon. Yet that is what the Popes and Saints of the Church tell us. Perhaps it is our scientific, materialistic, skeptical age that influences our way of thinking, or it may be that we are a “Doubting Thomas”, who hasn’t personally witnessed any Rosary miracles, and so we think to ourselves: “Unless I experience or see a miracle myself, I will not believe!” Yet, we can be sure, those miracles happen more often than we imagine throughout the world of devout Rosary clients. Most are perhaps miracles of grace, some will be physical miracles. Let us not think for one moment that our skepticism limits the power in any way.
Popes on the Rosary
Many popes have spoken about the power of the Rosary:
POPE ADRIAN VI (reigned 1522-1523): “The Rosary is the scourge of the devil!”
POPE BLESSED PIUS IX (reigned 1846-1878): “Give me an army saying the Rosary and I will conquer the world.”
POPE LEO XIII (reigned 1878-1903): “The Rosary is the most excellent form of prayer and the most efficacious means of attaining eternal life. It is the remedy for all our evils, the root of all our blessings. There is no more excellent way of praying … When the heretical Albigensian sect brought many a nation to its utter ruin, the Church fought against it, not with troops and arms, but chiefly with the power of the most holy Rosary … By this means the Church triumphed magnificently over every obstacle and provided for the salvation of her children―not only in that trial, but in others like it afterward, always with the same glorious success.”
POPE ST. PIUS X (reigned 1903-1914): “If there were one million families praying the Rosary every day, the entire world would be saved!”
POPE BENEDICT XV (reigned 1914-1922): “The prayer of the Rosary is perfect, because of the graces it obtains, and the victories it achieves … We wish the spread and frequent use of the Rosary among Christian people. We make this exhortation in these troublous times!”
POPE PIUS XI (reigned 1922-1939): “The Rosary is a powerful weapon to put the demons to flight and a most powerful weapon to overcome the devil ... and to keep oneself from sin … It serves admirably to overcome the enemies of God and of religion!
POPE PIUS XII (reigned 1939-1958): “We put great confidence in the Holy Rosary for the healing of evils which afflict our times!”
St. Padre Pio on the Rosary
St. Padre Pio used to say that “The Rosary is the weapon!” Concerning the Rosary, Our Lady herself said to Padre Pio: “With this weapon you will win.” Later, to Padre Onorato Marcucci, grabbing the Rosary that he had put on the nightstand for a few seconds, Padre Pio said: “With this—one wins the battles!” Convinced of the power of the Rosary, Padre Pio always held the Rosary in his hands. He used to carry, permanently, a Rosary in his hands and would pray it many times a day. Padre Marcellino testified that he had to help Padre Pio wash his hands one at a time, “because he didn’t want to let go of the Rosary beads, and passed the Rosary from one hand to the other.” Padre Pio always wore the Rosary around his arm at night. A few days before his death, as Padre Pio was getting into bed, he said to the friars who were in his room: “Give me my weapon!” And the friars, surprised and curious, asked him: “Where is the weapon? We cannot see anything!” Padre Pio replied: “It is in my habit, which you have just hung up!” After having gone through the pockets of his religious habit, the friars said to him: “Padre, there is no weapon in your habit! . . . We can only find your Rosary beads there!” Padre Pio immediately said: “And is this not a weapon? ... The true weapon?!”
On another occasion, Padre Pio said: “Some people are so foolish that they think they can go through life without the help of the Blessed Mother. Love the Madonna and pray the Rosary―for her Rosary is the weapon against the evils of the world today! All graces given by God pass through the Blessed Mother!”
Sister Lucia of Fatima on the Rosary
In a letter to Dom Umberto Maria Pasquale, an Italian Salesian priest, Sister Lucia of Fatima wrote: “The decadence which exists in the world is without doubt the consequence of a lack the spirit of prayer. It was in anticipation of this confusion that the Blessed Virgin recommended the recitation of the Rosary with such insistence. The most holy Virgin―in these last times in which we live―has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is―whether temporal or spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us―that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves; we will sanctify ourselves; we will console our Lord, and obtain the salvation of many souls.
“And, as the Rosary is, after the Mass, the most appropriate prayer for preserving the Faith in souls, the devil has unleashed his struggle against it. Unfortunately, we see the disasters he has caused ... We must defend souls against errors which can make them stray from the good road. I cannot help them other than by my poor and humble prayers and my sacrifices; but you, Fr. Umberto, you have a much more extended field of action to develop your apostolate. We cannot and we must not stop ourselves, nor allow, as Our Lord says, the sons of darkness to be more wise than the children of Light ... The Rosary is the most powerful weapon for defending ourselves on the field of battle.”
The Saints on the Rosary
ST. DOMINIC: “The Rosary is a fortress against evil! It is a sign to Satan that you belong to Our Lady!”
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT: “The Hail Mary well said—that is, with attention, devotion, and modesty—is, according to the saints, the enemy of the devil which puts him to flight, and the hammer which crushes him! … If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins, you shall receive a never fading crown of glory. For even if you are now on the brink of damnation, even if you have one foot in Hell, even if you have sold your soul to the devil ― sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and save your soul.” (True Devotion to Mary and The Secret of the Rosary).
ST. FRANCIS DE SALES: “The greatest method of praying is to pray the Rosary!”
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI: “The salvation of my soul depends on saying the Rosary! He who prays will be saved! He who does not pray will be damned!”
Rosary Prophecy
St. Angelo of Jerusalem was preaching in the Basilica of Saint John Lateran in Rome, after which he met, by chance, at a street corner in Rome, both St. Francis of Assisi and St. Dominic, who congratulated Angelo for his excellent preaching. St. Dominic Guzman was the founder of the Order of Preachers (known also as “The Dominicans”). St. Francis of Assisi was founder of the Order of Friars Minor (also known as “The Franciscans”). St. Angelo of Jerusalem, was the protomartyr of the Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel (also known as “The Carmelites”). Though the encounter took place by chance, they spoke with each other and spent the night together in prayer―during which they prophesied to each other. St. Angelo foretold St. Francis’s stigmata, St. Francis foretold the martyrdom of St. Angelo and St. Dominic foretelling the promulgation of the Rosary and the Scapular. Dominic said: “One day, Brother Angelo, to your Order of Carmel, the Most Blessed Virgin Mary will give a devotion to be known as the Brown Scapular; and to my Order of Preachers, she will give a devotion to be known as the Rosary. One day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, she will save the world.” In later years, a chapel was built on the location of that fortuitous meeting. (Prophecy of St. Dominic to St. Francis of Assisi and St. Angelo of Jerusalem, O.Carm.,).
Theologians on the Rosary
DOM COLUMBA MARMION (1825-1897), in his book Christ, the Ideal of the Priest, writes: “Do you remember the story of David who vanquished Goliath? What steps did the young Israelite take to overthrow the giant? He struck him in the middle of the forehead with a pebble from his sling. If we regard the Philistine as representing evil and all its powers: heresy, impurity, pride, then we can consider the little stones from the sling capable of overthrowing the enemy as symbolizing the Aves of the Rosary.”
FR. MICHAEL MULLER, C.SS.R. (1825-1897), in his book The Devotion of the Holy Rosary and Five Scapulars, writes: “Number those―if you can―who, through the devotion of the Rosary, have recovered from sickness; how many captives have been set at liberty! How many have been delivered by Mary who were in danger of perishing by fire, in danger of shipwreck, in danger of war and pestilence? Go to the sanctuaries of Our Blessed Lady, and see there the many votive offerings, ornaments of gold and silver and precious stones, in commemoration of miraculous cures or other extraordinary favors obtained though the devotion of the Rosary―for in these sanctuaries of the Blessed Virgin, the blind are restored to sight, the lame walk, the demons are expelled from the bodies of men. These are authentic facts, attested not only by persons of note who have heard them from others, but by thousands of eyewitnesses whose sincerity we cannot doubt―facts so numerous that, if they were all written, it would take years to read them. What favor and blessing is there that cannot be obtained by the devotion of the Rosary? … Dear Christian, there is no valid excuse for not practicing the daily devotion of the Rosary, and for the most part, those who make these objections and excuses are influenced by a secret unwillingness to lead a Christian life in good earnest. They are unwilling to practice retirement, detachment from creatures, and self-denial. They omit saying the beads in order to avoid the rebuke of their conscience for their sensuality, price, vanity, uncharitableness, and sloth. Miserable are the consequences of such a course of conduct. Not being willing to seek true peace of heart in religion, such men try to find their consolation in exterior things; they multiply faults and imperfections in proportion as they withdraw from God … Next to the holy sacrifice of the Mass, there is, indeed, nothing more terrifying to [the devil], nor does he bear a more implacable hatred to anything than to the devotion of the Rosary!” (Fr. Michael Muller, 1825-1897, C.SS.R., The Devotion of the Holy Rosary and Five Scapulars).
Article 5
Saturday October 5th
Praying the Rosary Well and Avoiding Hell
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Saturday October 5th
Praying the Rosary Well and Avoiding Hell
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Present Day Power of the Rosary
Today we celebrate the beautiful feast of Our Lady of the Rosary! As Sister Lucia of Fatima has said “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary. She has given this efficacy to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary we will save ourselves. We will sanctify ourselves. We will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls” (December 26th, 1957).
However, any weapon or tool depends upon the attention, effort and skill of the person using it. As we said yesterday, the praying of the Rosary, is primarily a matter of heart. “Whatsoever you do, do it from the heart” (Colossians 3:23). A true heart goes beyond a Rosary lip-service or lip-recitation, and seeks out a ‘heart-meditation’. Our Lady said that the soul of the Rosary is the meditation, not the vocal prayers. If our heart is not in it, then we shall fall under the condemnation of Our Lord’s own words “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8).
Our Lady also said to Blessed Alan de la Roche, in a vision, “When people say 150 Hail Marys, that prayer is very helpful to them and a most pleasing tribute to me. But they will do better still and will please me more if they say these salutations while meditating on the life, death, and passion of Jesus Christ, for this meditation is the soul of this prayer.” For the Rosary said without the meditation on the mysteries, would almost be a body without a soul, excellent matter, but without the form, which is the meditation. A Christian who does not meditate on the mysteries of the Rosary is very ungrateful to Our Lord and shows how little he cares for all that our divine Savior has suffered to save the world. (The Secret of the Rosary).
Having said that, it is, nevertheless, important that the “whole package” be in perfect order. We should try our best to focus (and probably often refocus) our mind on the prayers that we are saying. While the mind may meditate on the mystery, the vocal prayers (Our Fathers, Hail Marys, etc.) should be prayed respectfully and with dignity.
The Devil and the Rosary
If the devil cannot prevent you from praying your Rosary, then he will, at least, try to make sure that you pray it badly. He has centuries of experience, and also quite a lot of success—as we all know from our personal experiences ... “...then the devil cometh, and taketh the word out of their heart, lest, believing, they should be saved.” (Luke 8:12).
Being human, we easily become tired and slipshod, but the devil makes these difficulties worse when we are saying the Rosary. Before we even begin, he makes us feel bored, distracted, or exhausted; and when we have started praying, he oppresses us from all sides, and when after much difficulty and many distractions, we have finished, he whispers to us,
“What you have just said is worthless. It is useless for you to say the Rosary. You had better get on with other things. It is only a waste of time to pray without paying attention to what you are saying; half‑an‑hour’s meditation or some spiritual reading would be much better. Tomorrow, when you are not feeling so sluggish, you’ll pray better; leave the rest of your Rosary till then.” By tricks of this kind the devil gets us to give up the Rosary altogether, or to say it less often, and we keep putting it off, or change to some other devotion. (The Secret of the Rosary).
The holy and learned Jesuit, Father Suarez, was so deeply aware of the value of the Angelic Salutation that he said he would gladly give all his learning for the price of one Hail Mary well said. (The Secret of the Rosary).
It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches his heart. A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly. Most Catholics say the Rosary, either the whole fifteen mysteries or five of them, or at least a few decades. Why is it then that so few of them give up their sins and make progress in virtue, if not because they are not saying them as they should. It is a good thing to think over how we should pray if we want to please God and become more holy. (The Secret of the Rosary).
Most of the world prays badly (or not at all)!
In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. How can we expect God to listen to us, if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? (The Secret of the Rosary).
Before beginning a decade, pause for a moment or two, depending on how much time you have, and contemplate the mystery that you are about to honour in that decade. Always be sure to ask, by this mystery and through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, for one of the virtues that shines forth most in this mystery or one of which you are in particular need. (The Secret of the Rosary).
A fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before. (The Secret of the Rosary).
“I beg you to restrain your natural precipitation when saying your Rosary, and make some pauses in the middle of the Our Father and Hail Mary, and a smaller one after the words of the Our Father and Hail Mary which I have marked with a cross, as follows (The Secret of the Rosary).:
St. Louis de Montfort’s ideal Our Father and Hail Mary
Our Father who art in Heaven, + hallowed by thy name, + thy kingdom come, + thy will be done + on earth as it is in Heaven. + Give us this day + our daily bread, +and forgive us our trespasses + as we forgive those who trespass against us, +and lead us not into temptation, + but deliver us from evil. Amen.
Hail, Mary, full of grace, + the Lord is with thee, + blessed art thou among women,+ and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. + Holy Mary, Mother of God, + pray for us sinners, now + and at the hour of our death. Amen.
At first, you may find it difficult to make these pauses because of your bad habit of saying prayers in a hurry; but a decade said recollectedly in this way will be worth more than thousands of Rosaries said in a hurry, without pausing or reflecting. (The Secret of the Rosary).
An example of what a slow, well-said Hail Mary can do is recounted by St. Louis:”Then St. Dominic had all the people say the Rosary very slowly and with great devotion, and a wonderful thing happened: at each Hail Mary which he and the people said, a large number of devils issued forth from the wretched man’s body under the guise of red‑hot coals.” (The Secret of the Rosary).
However, in case we think the Rosary is just about quality, with no regard for quantity, let us remind ourselves of Our Lady’s words at Fatima, regarding little 9-year-old Francisco, of whom she said that he would not go to Heaven until he had said many Rosaries. One day Saint Gertrude had a vision of Our Lord counting gold coins. She summoned the courage to ask Him what he was doing, and He answered, “I am counting the Hail Marys that you have said; this is the money with which you purchase Heaven.”
“If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins, you shall receive a never‑fading crown of glory. Even if you are on the brink of damnation, even if you have one foot in Hell, even if you have sold your soul to the devil as sorcerers do who practice black magic, and even if you are a heretic as obstinate as a devil, sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and save your soul, if—and mark well what I say—if you say the Rosary devoutly every day until death for the purpose of knowing the truth and obtaining contrition and pardon for your sins.” (The Secret of the Rosary).
Are You Underpraying?
Too many people “underpray” their Rosary! What do we mean by that? We are quite simply saying that we are all capable of far more than we think! Many souls wait for a perfect moment to pray their Rosary: “Oh, I’ll wait until I get home tonight!” “I just can’t seem to find the time to say it!” “Wow! What a busy day, I don’t even have time to pray!”
What is the perfect time to pray? Anytime and all the time! St. Paul tells us “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) ... which is just what Jesus said “we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1).
“You must be joking!” you say, “That’s insanity! That’s just not possible!” Well, not really. As Scripture says, “Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible.’“ (Matthew 19:26). Besides, we are taught that God never commands the impossible. But Jesus commands we ought always to pray. Therefore it must be possible. But how? And especially, how can that be possible for the Rosary?
First of all let us analyze ourselves. When we really think about it, there is not one moment of the day that we stop thinking! It might be thinking about whether or not to get out of bed, or hit the snooze button; it may be thinking about what we are going to have for breakfast and what we have to do today; it may be thinking as we read, as we drive, or as we observe others; it might be thinking during Mass and Thanksgiving; thinking about our immediate duties at work or at home—we are thinking, thinking, thinking all day long! We even think in bed as we fall asleep! Arguably, you could say we ‘think’ throughout our dreams!!!
Nobody complains about not having time to think, do they? Now, what is prayer? The Church and the saints teach us that “Prayer is the raising of the mind and heart to God.” In other words, prayer is thinking about God!
The next thing we have to do is convince ourselves that there nothing better, or more important, or more profitable for us than to think about God. This is merely saying in another way what Our Lord said “Seek ye first the kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31) and “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind” (Luke 10:27).
There is More Time in the Day than You Think!
Plug the sink. Turn the tap on so that it barely drips. Go you own way and come back at the end of the day and see how much water is collected by little drips.
We should “Drip Our Rosaries” in the same way. You may not be able to say five decades at any given moment throughout the day, but one decade will most likely be possible. All it takes is about three minutes! Walking from one office to another. Tea or coffee break. Walking to and back from the restroom. Sweeping the floor. Loading the washing machine. Doing the dishes. Taking out the trash. The list is endless. It is just a question of prioritizing and creating a habit.
If Jesus said that we ought always to pray, then He knows that this must entail praying as we work and live out our daily lives. Jesus and Mary do not mind that. In fact, it shows and proves that we love them.
You will be amazed at how many decades you manage to get through in a day, using that principle. And don’t worry if you lose count of your Hail Marys or decades. Jesus and Mary know, and that is all that matters. Numbers can lead to pride or routine. Leave the numbers to God.
Another thing that you may find helpful, is to avoid worrying about meditating all five or all fifteen decades in a day. That is not necessary. Take one decade a day if you like. Dwell upon the mystery while you shower, eat, drive, work, etc. Again, it is not abnormal, because we all think without ceasing every day. Just think about the mystery you have chosen as often as you can. Sandwich it in between decades of the Rosary. It is like a daily project, where you at the mystery from all angles throughout the day.
If the mystery turns out to be really fruitful, continue the same mystery the next day, and the next, and the next—if it is still working for you. If not, move onto another. In this way the Rosary becomes something deeper, more personal, more meaningful and less boring, less monotonous, less burdensome.
Today we celebrate the beautiful feast of Our Lady of the Rosary! As Sister Lucia of Fatima has said “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary. She has given this efficacy to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary we will save ourselves. We will sanctify ourselves. We will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls” (December 26th, 1957).
However, any weapon or tool depends upon the attention, effort and skill of the person using it. As we said yesterday, the praying of the Rosary, is primarily a matter of heart. “Whatsoever you do, do it from the heart” (Colossians 3:23). A true heart goes beyond a Rosary lip-service or lip-recitation, and seeks out a ‘heart-meditation’. Our Lady said that the soul of the Rosary is the meditation, not the vocal prayers. If our heart is not in it, then we shall fall under the condemnation of Our Lord’s own words “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8).
Our Lady also said to Blessed Alan de la Roche, in a vision, “When people say 150 Hail Marys, that prayer is very helpful to them and a most pleasing tribute to me. But they will do better still and will please me more if they say these salutations while meditating on the life, death, and passion of Jesus Christ, for this meditation is the soul of this prayer.” For the Rosary said without the meditation on the mysteries, would almost be a body without a soul, excellent matter, but without the form, which is the meditation. A Christian who does not meditate on the mysteries of the Rosary is very ungrateful to Our Lord and shows how little he cares for all that our divine Savior has suffered to save the world. (The Secret of the Rosary).
Having said that, it is, nevertheless, important that the “whole package” be in perfect order. We should try our best to focus (and probably often refocus) our mind on the prayers that we are saying. While the mind may meditate on the mystery, the vocal prayers (Our Fathers, Hail Marys, etc.) should be prayed respectfully and with dignity.
The Devil and the Rosary
If the devil cannot prevent you from praying your Rosary, then he will, at least, try to make sure that you pray it badly. He has centuries of experience, and also quite a lot of success—as we all know from our personal experiences ... “...then the devil cometh, and taketh the word out of their heart, lest, believing, they should be saved.” (Luke 8:12).
Being human, we easily become tired and slipshod, but the devil makes these difficulties worse when we are saying the Rosary. Before we even begin, he makes us feel bored, distracted, or exhausted; and when we have started praying, he oppresses us from all sides, and when after much difficulty and many distractions, we have finished, he whispers to us,
“What you have just said is worthless. It is useless for you to say the Rosary. You had better get on with other things. It is only a waste of time to pray without paying attention to what you are saying; half‑an‑hour’s meditation or some spiritual reading would be much better. Tomorrow, when you are not feeling so sluggish, you’ll pray better; leave the rest of your Rosary till then.” By tricks of this kind the devil gets us to give up the Rosary altogether, or to say it less often, and we keep putting it off, or change to some other devotion. (The Secret of the Rosary).
The holy and learned Jesuit, Father Suarez, was so deeply aware of the value of the Angelic Salutation that he said he would gladly give all his learning for the price of one Hail Mary well said. (The Secret of the Rosary).
It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches his heart. A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly. Most Catholics say the Rosary, either the whole fifteen mysteries or five of them, or at least a few decades. Why is it then that so few of them give up their sins and make progress in virtue, if not because they are not saying them as they should. It is a good thing to think over how we should pray if we want to please God and become more holy. (The Secret of the Rosary).
Most of the world prays badly (or not at all)!
In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. How can we expect God to listen to us, if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? (The Secret of the Rosary).
Before beginning a decade, pause for a moment or two, depending on how much time you have, and contemplate the mystery that you are about to honour in that decade. Always be sure to ask, by this mystery and through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, for one of the virtues that shines forth most in this mystery or one of which you are in particular need. (The Secret of the Rosary).
A fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before. (The Secret of the Rosary).
“I beg you to restrain your natural precipitation when saying your Rosary, and make some pauses in the middle of the Our Father and Hail Mary, and a smaller one after the words of the Our Father and Hail Mary which I have marked with a cross, as follows (The Secret of the Rosary).:
St. Louis de Montfort’s ideal Our Father and Hail Mary
Our Father who art in Heaven, + hallowed by thy name, + thy kingdom come, + thy will be done + on earth as it is in Heaven. + Give us this day + our daily bread, +and forgive us our trespasses + as we forgive those who trespass against us, +and lead us not into temptation, + but deliver us from evil. Amen.
Hail, Mary, full of grace, + the Lord is with thee, + blessed art thou among women,+ and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. + Holy Mary, Mother of God, + pray for us sinners, now + and at the hour of our death. Amen.
At first, you may find it difficult to make these pauses because of your bad habit of saying prayers in a hurry; but a decade said recollectedly in this way will be worth more than thousands of Rosaries said in a hurry, without pausing or reflecting. (The Secret of the Rosary).
An example of what a slow, well-said Hail Mary can do is recounted by St. Louis:”Then St. Dominic had all the people say the Rosary very slowly and with great devotion, and a wonderful thing happened: at each Hail Mary which he and the people said, a large number of devils issued forth from the wretched man’s body under the guise of red‑hot coals.” (The Secret of the Rosary).
However, in case we think the Rosary is just about quality, with no regard for quantity, let us remind ourselves of Our Lady’s words at Fatima, regarding little 9-year-old Francisco, of whom she said that he would not go to Heaven until he had said many Rosaries. One day Saint Gertrude had a vision of Our Lord counting gold coins. She summoned the courage to ask Him what he was doing, and He answered, “I am counting the Hail Marys that you have said; this is the money with which you purchase Heaven.”
“If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins, you shall receive a never‑fading crown of glory. Even if you are on the brink of damnation, even if you have one foot in Hell, even if you have sold your soul to the devil as sorcerers do who practice black magic, and even if you are a heretic as obstinate as a devil, sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and save your soul, if—and mark well what I say—if you say the Rosary devoutly every day until death for the purpose of knowing the truth and obtaining contrition and pardon for your sins.” (The Secret of the Rosary).
Are You Underpraying?
Too many people “underpray” their Rosary! What do we mean by that? We are quite simply saying that we are all capable of far more than we think! Many souls wait for a perfect moment to pray their Rosary: “Oh, I’ll wait until I get home tonight!” “I just can’t seem to find the time to say it!” “Wow! What a busy day, I don’t even have time to pray!”
What is the perfect time to pray? Anytime and all the time! St. Paul tells us “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) ... which is just what Jesus said “we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1).
“You must be joking!” you say, “That’s insanity! That’s just not possible!” Well, not really. As Scripture says, “Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible.’“ (Matthew 19:26). Besides, we are taught that God never commands the impossible. But Jesus commands we ought always to pray. Therefore it must be possible. But how? And especially, how can that be possible for the Rosary?
First of all let us analyze ourselves. When we really think about it, there is not one moment of the day that we stop thinking! It might be thinking about whether or not to get out of bed, or hit the snooze button; it may be thinking about what we are going to have for breakfast and what we have to do today; it may be thinking as we read, as we drive, or as we observe others; it might be thinking during Mass and Thanksgiving; thinking about our immediate duties at work or at home—we are thinking, thinking, thinking all day long! We even think in bed as we fall asleep! Arguably, you could say we ‘think’ throughout our dreams!!!
Nobody complains about not having time to think, do they? Now, what is prayer? The Church and the saints teach us that “Prayer is the raising of the mind and heart to God.” In other words, prayer is thinking about God!
The next thing we have to do is convince ourselves that there nothing better, or more important, or more profitable for us than to think about God. This is merely saying in another way what Our Lord said “Seek ye first the kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31) and “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind” (Luke 10:27).
There is More Time in the Day than You Think!
Plug the sink. Turn the tap on so that it barely drips. Go you own way and come back at the end of the day and see how much water is collected by little drips.
We should “Drip Our Rosaries” in the same way. You may not be able to say five decades at any given moment throughout the day, but one decade will most likely be possible. All it takes is about three minutes! Walking from one office to another. Tea or coffee break. Walking to and back from the restroom. Sweeping the floor. Loading the washing machine. Doing the dishes. Taking out the trash. The list is endless. It is just a question of prioritizing and creating a habit.
If Jesus said that we ought always to pray, then He knows that this must entail praying as we work and live out our daily lives. Jesus and Mary do not mind that. In fact, it shows and proves that we love them.
You will be amazed at how many decades you manage to get through in a day, using that principle. And don’t worry if you lose count of your Hail Marys or decades. Jesus and Mary know, and that is all that matters. Numbers can lead to pride or routine. Leave the numbers to God.
Another thing that you may find helpful, is to avoid worrying about meditating all five or all fifteen decades in a day. That is not necessary. Take one decade a day if you like. Dwell upon the mystery while you shower, eat, drive, work, etc. Again, it is not abnormal, because we all think without ceasing every day. Just think about the mystery you have chosen as often as you can. Sandwich it in between decades of the Rosary. It is like a daily project, where you at the mystery from all angles throughout the day.
If the mystery turns out to be really fruitful, continue the same mystery the next day, and the next, and the next—if it is still working for you. If not, move onto another. In this way the Rosary becomes something deeper, more personal, more meaningful and less boring, less monotonous, less burdensome.
Article 4
Friday October 4th
It is a Fake World!
Friday October 4th
It is a Fake World!
Quality Before Quantity
As St. Louis de Montfort writes “It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches his heart. A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly” (The Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-First Rose”). The devil knows this too, and, so, it is in his best interests to make sure that our Hail Mary or our Rosary is not said properly. This is a perennial battle that everyone has to face—whether it be pope, bishop or priest, or man, woman and child—it will be so to our dying day.
Fake Things Come Cheap
Unfortunately, in our modern-day existence, quantity and speed have replaced the ancient values placed on quality and thoroughness. Not that quality is totally disregarded, but it often comes second to quantity. A bottom-line principle that can be seen in the lives of many people is that they want to pay less for things, so that they can afford to buy lots of different things. Now of course, one’s income obviously plays a large part in this, but many of the rich even play the same game. Manufacturers are often more focused on the quantity they can produce, more so than on the quality. If they can make something “look real” then there is no point spending extra money making the real thing. So we have fake stone or brick facades for houses; we have fake furs; fake foods; fake wood; fake gold; fake marble; fake candles; fake glass, etc., etc. We are living in a fake world!
Fake Piety
The sad part is that this over-spills into our intellectual, moral and spiritual lives. We fake knowledge, we fake behavior, and we fake piety. We learn superficially—just enough to be able to make it look like we know a lot. Trivia becomes more popular than in-depth knowledge. We become a race of “Tips-and Tricks”—but we are only tricking ourselves. Morally, the world has never been as sinful as it is today, yet we put on a kind of ‘moral-make-up’ to hide the sinfulness and focus on the sins of others to make us feel better in our own miserable state. Spiritually, we cover the facade of our Temple of the Holy Ghost (which St Paul says we are), with pseudo-gold bricks’. Financially, we are prepared to fall into serious debt, in order to appear, to the world around us, as something that we are not, but simply want to be. I guess that would make us “fake wannabees”!
Hypocrisy of the Pharisees
The Pharisees were a bit like this in their day, and this brought down upon them the wrath of Jesus—the whole of chapter 23 of Matthew is dedicated to Our Lord venting against the Pharisees, which is something unparalleled in the whole of Scripture. Jesus says of them “All their works they do for to be seen of men ... they love the first places at feasts, and the first chairs in the synagogues ... Ye foolish and blind; for which is greater, the gold, or the temple that sanctifies the gold? ... Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness. Thou blind Pharisee, first make clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, that the outside may become clean. Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you are like to whitened sepulchers, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men’ s bones, and of all filthiness. So you also outwardly indeed appear to men just; but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.”
Sincere Sinner
Yet at the same time, Jesus shows quite the opposite attitude to a sinner, who, objectively speaking, was far, far worse than the Pharisees—Mary Magdalen. She was a whore; she was possessed by seven devils (symbolic of all the seven capital sins) and had been caught in adultery. Jesus’ response to her was the exact opposite of the “Woes” that he pronounced against the Pharisees. In fact, Jesus said of her “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much. But to whom less is forgiven, he loveth less” (Luke 7:47).
The Secret to Spiritual Power
There is the answer! There is the secret! There is the clue to what we need to change the power of our prayers. From being ridiculous to reverential; from puny to powerful; from being farcical to frightening. Wouldn’t you like your prayers to be so powerful that would be almost infallibly heard and answered? The key element, or trunk or root, to that problem is the virtue of charity or love. The degree of one’s charity can change the prayer from being a mere firework (a passing flash in the sky) to an atom-bomb or a nuclear bomb. If you’ve seen the size of the atom-bomb dropped on Hiroshima, you will notice that it relatively small in relation to the power that it packs―in fact, the part that does the damage is a very small part within the large casing.
It can be so with our prayers, and that is why St. Louis de Montfort says “It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches his heart. A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly.” The charity or love that we say our prayers with, greatly increase their value and power. Our Lady had such a great and sincere love of God, that the slightest prayer of hers was capable of moving mountains. This is why the devils themselves admitted to the power of her prayers during an exorcism: “We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us; one single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints.” (The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”). Let us spend this month of October examining and improving our manner of praying, and the first thing to do is to restore the primacy of QUALITY over mere quantity.
No Quick Fix to Salvation
We saw how Jesus rejected the zealous, but fake, Pharisees, yet accepted the sinful, yet sincere, Mary Magdalen. Now, of course, this does not mean that Jesus accepts and condones sin—far from it—on the contrary, He preached and fought against sin all His life, but it was for the purpose of bringing the lost sinner back to God “the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” (Luke 19:10) ... “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32) and “I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance” (Luke 15:7).
Both Mary Magdalen and the Pharisees were sinners―“Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). Mary listened to the call to conversion, the Pharisees ignored and rejected the call. As you sow, so shall you reap! Therefore, Jesus accepted the ‘accepting Mary’, but rejected the ‘rejecting Pharisees’. Of Mary He says “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much. But to whom less is forgiven, he loveth less” (Luke 7:47). Yet, of the Pharisees He says “Therefore I said to you, that you shall die in your sins. For if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sin.” (John 8:24). Jesus had won over Mary’s heart, but the Pharisees closed their hearts to Him. It is all a matter of heart—especially in our prayer life, and more so in praying the Rosary.
The Heart is the Heart of the Matter
For the heart plays a major role with God. We are told love God with our whole heart (mind, soul, strength). He detests a lukewarm heart “Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth.” (Apocalypse 3:16). We are told to “fear the Lord, and serve Him with a perfect and most sincere heart” (Josue 24:14). Jesus complains of the lack of heart in prayer: “This people honor Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). We beg of the Holy Ghost to enkindle in our hearts the fire of His love. Jesus wants to be especially honored in His Sacred Heart. He also wants the world to show devotion, with their hearts, to both the Sorrowful Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary. We cannot serve God and the world and “where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also.” (Matthew 6:21). If the world and its amusements is our treasure, then we will have little heart for prayer; but if our heart is in God, then we will have little love in our hearts for the world. We cannot have both. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God.” (James 4:4).
Our prayer life, and therefore our Rosary, is primarily a matter of heart. “Whatsoever you do, do it from the heart” (Colossians 3:23). “But Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart.” (Luke 2:19). It is the heart that loves and prayer is meant to be a communication with the One we love.
“I went to the Lord, and besought Him, and said with my whole heart...” (Wisdom 8:21). “I entreated Thy face with all my heart” (Psalm 118:58). “You shall seek Me, and shall find Me: when you shall seek Me with all your heart.” (Jeremias 29:13). God was moved to action only when “they all begged of God with all their heart” (Judith 4:16). “With his whole heart he praised the Lord, and loved God that made him: and He gave him power against his enemies” (Ecclesiasticus 47:10). So, “let us draw near with a true heart” (Hebrews 10:22).
That true heart goes beyond a Rosary lip-service or lip-recitation, and seeks out a ‘heart-meditation’. Our Lady said that the soul of the Rosary is the meditation, not the vocal prayers. “I am the Lord who searches the heart” (Jeremias 17:10). “He should be loved with the whole heart” (Mark 12:33). “My heart grew hot within me: and, in my meditation, a fire shall flame out” (Psalm 38:4). “And they said one to the other: ‘Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in this way, and opened to us the Scriptures?’“ (Luke 24:32) “...then the devil cometh, and taketh the word out of their heart, lest, believing, they should be saved.” (Luke 8:12).
Divided Hearts
Sadly, especially today, too many pray with a divided heart. They want to love God, but they also want to love the world. They want to be loved by God, and they also want to be loved by the world. It cannot be! “A heart that goeth two ways shall not have success” (Ecclesiasticus 3:28). Such a divided heart will be rejected by God “The perverse heart did not cleave to Me: and the malignant, that turned aside from Me, I would not know” (Psalm 100:4). “Their heart is divided: now they shall perish: He shall break down their idols, He shall destroy their altars.” (Osee 10:2). “That the house of Israel may be caught in their own heart, with which they have departed from me through all their idols” (Ezechiel 14:5).
Most of the world prays badly (or not at all)! Do not be like most of the world―“Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Make this month of October the month when you reform your habits of prayer in general, and your habits of praying the Rosary in particular. Think more about the aspect of love and try ensure the presence of love in your prayers, for it love that which makes the prayer powerful—dare we even say infallible. That is why a short, simple perfect act of contrition (whose motive is a love of God, not a fear of God) can wipe away the gravest and the most numerous sins, as in the case of Mary Magdalen, who loved much. Yet that love has to be real and not fake; sincere and not hypocritical.
As St. Louis de Montfort writes “It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches his heart. A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly” (The Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-First Rose”). The devil knows this too, and, so, it is in his best interests to make sure that our Hail Mary or our Rosary is not said properly. This is a perennial battle that everyone has to face—whether it be pope, bishop or priest, or man, woman and child—it will be so to our dying day.
Fake Things Come Cheap
Unfortunately, in our modern-day existence, quantity and speed have replaced the ancient values placed on quality and thoroughness. Not that quality is totally disregarded, but it often comes second to quantity. A bottom-line principle that can be seen in the lives of many people is that they want to pay less for things, so that they can afford to buy lots of different things. Now of course, one’s income obviously plays a large part in this, but many of the rich even play the same game. Manufacturers are often more focused on the quantity they can produce, more so than on the quality. If they can make something “look real” then there is no point spending extra money making the real thing. So we have fake stone or brick facades for houses; we have fake furs; fake foods; fake wood; fake gold; fake marble; fake candles; fake glass, etc., etc. We are living in a fake world!
Fake Piety
The sad part is that this over-spills into our intellectual, moral and spiritual lives. We fake knowledge, we fake behavior, and we fake piety. We learn superficially—just enough to be able to make it look like we know a lot. Trivia becomes more popular than in-depth knowledge. We become a race of “Tips-and Tricks”—but we are only tricking ourselves. Morally, the world has never been as sinful as it is today, yet we put on a kind of ‘moral-make-up’ to hide the sinfulness and focus on the sins of others to make us feel better in our own miserable state. Spiritually, we cover the facade of our Temple of the Holy Ghost (which St Paul says we are), with pseudo-gold bricks’. Financially, we are prepared to fall into serious debt, in order to appear, to the world around us, as something that we are not, but simply want to be. I guess that would make us “fake wannabees”!
Hypocrisy of the Pharisees
The Pharisees were a bit like this in their day, and this brought down upon them the wrath of Jesus—the whole of chapter 23 of Matthew is dedicated to Our Lord venting against the Pharisees, which is something unparalleled in the whole of Scripture. Jesus says of them “All their works they do for to be seen of men ... they love the first places at feasts, and the first chairs in the synagogues ... Ye foolish and blind; for which is greater, the gold, or the temple that sanctifies the gold? ... Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness. Thou blind Pharisee, first make clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, that the outside may become clean. Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you are like to whitened sepulchers, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men’ s bones, and of all filthiness. So you also outwardly indeed appear to men just; but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.”
Sincere Sinner
Yet at the same time, Jesus shows quite the opposite attitude to a sinner, who, objectively speaking, was far, far worse than the Pharisees—Mary Magdalen. She was a whore; she was possessed by seven devils (symbolic of all the seven capital sins) and had been caught in adultery. Jesus’ response to her was the exact opposite of the “Woes” that he pronounced against the Pharisees. In fact, Jesus said of her “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much. But to whom less is forgiven, he loveth less” (Luke 7:47).
The Secret to Spiritual Power
There is the answer! There is the secret! There is the clue to what we need to change the power of our prayers. From being ridiculous to reverential; from puny to powerful; from being farcical to frightening. Wouldn’t you like your prayers to be so powerful that would be almost infallibly heard and answered? The key element, or trunk or root, to that problem is the virtue of charity or love. The degree of one’s charity can change the prayer from being a mere firework (a passing flash in the sky) to an atom-bomb or a nuclear bomb. If you’ve seen the size of the atom-bomb dropped on Hiroshima, you will notice that it relatively small in relation to the power that it packs―in fact, the part that does the damage is a very small part within the large casing.
It can be so with our prayers, and that is why St. Louis de Montfort says “It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches his heart. A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly.” The charity or love that we say our prayers with, greatly increase their value and power. Our Lady had such a great and sincere love of God, that the slightest prayer of hers was capable of moving mountains. This is why the devils themselves admitted to the power of her prayers during an exorcism: “We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us; one single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints.” (The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”). Let us spend this month of October examining and improving our manner of praying, and the first thing to do is to restore the primacy of QUALITY over mere quantity.
No Quick Fix to Salvation
We saw how Jesus rejected the zealous, but fake, Pharisees, yet accepted the sinful, yet sincere, Mary Magdalen. Now, of course, this does not mean that Jesus accepts and condones sin—far from it—on the contrary, He preached and fought against sin all His life, but it was for the purpose of bringing the lost sinner back to God “the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” (Luke 19:10) ... “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32) and “I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance” (Luke 15:7).
Both Mary Magdalen and the Pharisees were sinners―“Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). Mary listened to the call to conversion, the Pharisees ignored and rejected the call. As you sow, so shall you reap! Therefore, Jesus accepted the ‘accepting Mary’, but rejected the ‘rejecting Pharisees’. Of Mary He says “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much. But to whom less is forgiven, he loveth less” (Luke 7:47). Yet, of the Pharisees He says “Therefore I said to you, that you shall die in your sins. For if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sin.” (John 8:24). Jesus had won over Mary’s heart, but the Pharisees closed their hearts to Him. It is all a matter of heart—especially in our prayer life, and more so in praying the Rosary.
The Heart is the Heart of the Matter
For the heart plays a major role with God. We are told love God with our whole heart (mind, soul, strength). He detests a lukewarm heart “Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth.” (Apocalypse 3:16). We are told to “fear the Lord, and serve Him with a perfect and most sincere heart” (Josue 24:14). Jesus complains of the lack of heart in prayer: “This people honor Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). We beg of the Holy Ghost to enkindle in our hearts the fire of His love. Jesus wants to be especially honored in His Sacred Heart. He also wants the world to show devotion, with their hearts, to both the Sorrowful Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary. We cannot serve God and the world and “where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also.” (Matthew 6:21). If the world and its amusements is our treasure, then we will have little heart for prayer; but if our heart is in God, then we will have little love in our hearts for the world. We cannot have both. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God.” (James 4:4).
Our prayer life, and therefore our Rosary, is primarily a matter of heart. “Whatsoever you do, do it from the heart” (Colossians 3:23). “But Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart.” (Luke 2:19). It is the heart that loves and prayer is meant to be a communication with the One we love.
“I went to the Lord, and besought Him, and said with my whole heart...” (Wisdom 8:21). “I entreated Thy face with all my heart” (Psalm 118:58). “You shall seek Me, and shall find Me: when you shall seek Me with all your heart.” (Jeremias 29:13). God was moved to action only when “they all begged of God with all their heart” (Judith 4:16). “With his whole heart he praised the Lord, and loved God that made him: and He gave him power against his enemies” (Ecclesiasticus 47:10). So, “let us draw near with a true heart” (Hebrews 10:22).
That true heart goes beyond a Rosary lip-service or lip-recitation, and seeks out a ‘heart-meditation’. Our Lady said that the soul of the Rosary is the meditation, not the vocal prayers. “I am the Lord who searches the heart” (Jeremias 17:10). “He should be loved with the whole heart” (Mark 12:33). “My heart grew hot within me: and, in my meditation, a fire shall flame out” (Psalm 38:4). “And they said one to the other: ‘Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in this way, and opened to us the Scriptures?’“ (Luke 24:32) “...then the devil cometh, and taketh the word out of their heart, lest, believing, they should be saved.” (Luke 8:12).
Divided Hearts
Sadly, especially today, too many pray with a divided heart. They want to love God, but they also want to love the world. They want to be loved by God, and they also want to be loved by the world. It cannot be! “A heart that goeth two ways shall not have success” (Ecclesiasticus 3:28). Such a divided heart will be rejected by God “The perverse heart did not cleave to Me: and the malignant, that turned aside from Me, I would not know” (Psalm 100:4). “Their heart is divided: now they shall perish: He shall break down their idols, He shall destroy their altars.” (Osee 10:2). “That the house of Israel may be caught in their own heart, with which they have departed from me through all their idols” (Ezechiel 14:5).
Most of the world prays badly (or not at all)! Do not be like most of the world―“Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Make this month of October the month when you reform your habits of prayer in general, and your habits of praying the Rosary in particular. Think more about the aspect of love and try ensure the presence of love in your prayers, for it love that which makes the prayer powerful—dare we even say infallible. That is why a short, simple perfect act of contrition (whose motive is a love of God, not a fear of God) can wipe away the gravest and the most numerous sins, as in the case of Mary Magdalen, who loved much. Yet that love has to be real and not fake; sincere and not hypocritical.
Article 3
Thursday October 3rd
Listen to the Devil and Learn!
Thursday October 3rd
Listen to the Devil and Learn!
No Beating About the Bush
In the opening article for October’s Daily Thoughts, we spoke of the simplicity with which God seems to prefer to do His work. We listed miracle after miracle, wherein God “went straight for it” without any fuss or “beating about the bush”:
“Jesus stretching forth His hand, touched him, saying: ‘I will, be thou made clean!’ And forthwith his leprosy was cleansed.” … “And Jesus having compassion on them, touched their eyes. And immediately they saw” … “He saith to the man: ‘Stretch forth thy hand!’ And he stretched it forth: and his hand was restored unto him.” Simple, but powerful!
The same happens in the giving of the Sacraments, just a few words are spoken and marvelous, miraculous results occur “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost … This is My Body … This is My Blood … I absolve you from your sins, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen”
The Rosary, too, consists of a few very short prayers, but they have a most powerful effect. The Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Glory Be form the backbone and are the essence of the Rosary. If these simple prayers are used well—and are prayed slowly and with devotion—then marvelous results can flow forth. But mark well the words “prayed slowly and with devotion”! That can be a real challenge, even for the best of folk! God is not mocked, and, therefore, we should pray in a manner that manifests our seriousness about what we are doing, and shows that we really want to pray, thereby, saying what we mean, and meaning what we say! Then, a simple prayer can be powerful and will simply produce powerful results. I think that the power of the simple Rosary is beautifully shown by St. Louis de Montfort, when he relates an wonderful incident in his book, The Secret of the Rosary, in the chapter entitled “Thirty-Third Rose” :
Listen to the Devil and Learn!
When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone, France, an Albigensian was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people; it appears that over twelve thousand had come to hear him speak. The devils, who were in possession of this wretched man, were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions, in spite of themselves. They said:
(1) That there were fifteen thousand of them in the body of that poor man, because he had attacked the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary;
(2) That by the Rosary which he preached, he put fear and horror into the depths of Hell, and that he was the man they hated most throughout the world because of the souls he snatched from them by the devotion of the Rosary.
(3) They revealed several other things.
St. Dominic put his Rosary around the neck of the possessed man and asked them who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most, who should, therefore, be the most loved and revered by men.
At this, they let out such unearthly screams, that most of the people fell to the ground, seized with fear. Then, using all their cunning so as not to answer, the devils wept and wailed in such a pitiful way, that many of the people wept also, out of pure natural pity. The devils, speaking through the mouth of the Albigensian, pleaded in a heart‑rending voice,
“Dominic, Dominic, have pity on us, we promise you we will never harm you. You have always had compassion for sinners and those in distress; have pity on us, for we are in grievous straits. We are suffering so much already! Why do you delight in increasing our pains? Can’t you be satisfied with the pains we now endure? Have mercy on us, have mercy on us!”
St. Dominic was not in the least moved by the pathetic words of those wretched spirits, and told them he would not let them alone until they had answered his question. Then they said they would whisper the answer, in such a way, that only St. Dominic would be able to hear. The latter firmly insisted upon their answering clearly and audibly. Then the devils kept quiet and would not say another word, completely disregarding St. Dominic’s orders.
So he knelt down and said this prayer to Our Lady “Oh, most glorious Virgin Mary, I implore you by the power of the holy Rosary command these enemies of the human race to answer my question.”
Devilish Liars Forced to Tell the Truth
No sooner had he said this prayer than a glowing flame leaped out of the ears, nostrils and mouth of the possessed man. Everyone shook with fear, but the fire did not hurt anyone. Then the devils cried, “Dominic, we beseech you, by the passion of Jesus Christ and the merits of his holy Mother and of all the saints, let us leave the body of this man without speaking further; for the angels will answer your question whenever you wish. After all, are we not liars –so why should you want to believe us? Do not torment us any more, have pity on us.”
“Woe to you, wretched spirits, who do not deserve to be heard,” St. Dominic said, and kneeling down he prayed to the Blessed Virgin “O most worthy Mother of Wisdom, I am praying for the people assembled here, who have already learned how to say the Angelic Salutation properly. I beg you, for the salvation of those here present, compel these adversaries of yours to proclaim the whole truth here and now before the people.”
St. Dominic had scarcely finished this prayer when he saw the Blessed Virgin near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod, that she held, and said, “Answer my servant Dominic at once.” (It must be noted that the people neither saw nor heard Our Lady, only St. Dominic.)
Then the devils started screaming:
“Oh, you who are enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven, must we, in spite of ourselves, tell the whole truth and confess before everyone who it is who is the cause of our shame and our ruin? Oh, woe to us, princes of darkness.
“Then listen, you Christians. This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell. She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety. It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective.
“We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us; one single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints. We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants.
“Many Christians, who call on her at the hour of death, and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards, are saved by her intercession. And if that Marietta (it is thus in their fury they called her) did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity.
“Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains, for her servants, the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy.”
Then St. Dominic had all the people say the Rosary very slowly and with great devotion, and a wonderful thing happened: at each Hail Mary, which he and the people said, a large number of devils issued forth from the wretched man’s body, under the guise of red‑hot coals. When the devils had all been expelled and the heretic completely delivered from them, Our Lady, although invisible, gave her blessing to the assembled company, and they were filled with joy. (The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
Learn to Pray Better
Let us take heart from this wonderful incident, and make a resolution to reform ourselves by praying our Rosaries better. Let us pray them more slowly, more deliberately, and with more devotion.
Unfortunately, we do not always pray the Rosary well! We have all heard of the saying “Familiarity breeds contempt.” The more we become used to something, then the chances are that we will gradually—perhaps even imperceptibly—lose our estimation and respect for it. Marriage is a wonderful (or should we say “terrible”) example of this. The respect, patience, efforts and love, spent in winning-over the future spouse, can very quickly evaporate over the years and give place to their opposites. The same applies to newly bought items—at first we take such great care over them, handle them gently, keep them sparkling clean, etc. However, over time, all that is forgotten and we can even give way to misuse and abuse.
The same can be said of prayer—whether it be the supreme prayer of the Sacrifice of the Mass, or the Divine Office, or the Holy Rosary. If we are not careful, our assistance at Mass will degenerate with relative ease, and our Rosaries and other prayers will slide comfortably into a daily mechanical routine that we apply to so many other things and chores of life. The saints warn us against this:
St. Augustine says “What more excellent than prayer? What more useful and profitable? What sweeter and more delicious? What higher and more exalted in the whole scheme of our Christian religion?”
St. Bernard says that the angels receive our prayers and present them before God―as the angel said to Tobias “When thou didst pray with tears, I offered thy prayer to God” (Tobias 12:12). St. Hilary says the same “The angels preside over the prayers of the saints and offer them each day to God.”
When we pray, we enter into the presence of the majesty of God. St. John Chrysostom warns us “Consider the height, dignity and glory to which the Lord has raised you.”
At Lourdes, it was noticed that Our Lady prayed the Rosary, with St. Bernadette, SLOWLY and RESPECTFULLY. At La Salette, Our Lady asked the two children if they said their prayers well—which startled them and they had to embarrassingly reply “Oh! No, not so much!” St. Louis de Montfort, in his The Secret of the Rosary, writes “It is a good thing to think over how we should pray if we want to please God and become more holy.”
Then, a little further, he continues: “In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions, by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us, if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? … People who do that forfeit God’s blessing, which is changed into a curse, for having treated the things of God disrespectfully: “Cursed be the one who does God’s work negligently.” (Jeremias 48:10).”
Pathetic Prayers
St. Louis laments at the way most people pray (or not pray but merely say) their Rosary: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly … Being human, we easily become tired and slipshod, but the devil makes these difficulties worse when we are saying the Rosary … Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin. The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said, especially when we have promised to say it regularly or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
In the opening article for October’s Daily Thoughts, we spoke of the simplicity with which God seems to prefer to do His work. We listed miracle after miracle, wherein God “went straight for it” without any fuss or “beating about the bush”:
“Jesus stretching forth His hand, touched him, saying: ‘I will, be thou made clean!’ And forthwith his leprosy was cleansed.” … “And Jesus having compassion on them, touched their eyes. And immediately they saw” … “He saith to the man: ‘Stretch forth thy hand!’ And he stretched it forth: and his hand was restored unto him.” Simple, but powerful!
The same happens in the giving of the Sacraments, just a few words are spoken and marvelous, miraculous results occur “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost … This is My Body … This is My Blood … I absolve you from your sins, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen”
The Rosary, too, consists of a few very short prayers, but they have a most powerful effect. The Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Glory Be form the backbone and are the essence of the Rosary. If these simple prayers are used well—and are prayed slowly and with devotion—then marvelous results can flow forth. But mark well the words “prayed slowly and with devotion”! That can be a real challenge, even for the best of folk! God is not mocked, and, therefore, we should pray in a manner that manifests our seriousness about what we are doing, and shows that we really want to pray, thereby, saying what we mean, and meaning what we say! Then, a simple prayer can be powerful and will simply produce powerful results. I think that the power of the simple Rosary is beautifully shown by St. Louis de Montfort, when he relates an wonderful incident in his book, The Secret of the Rosary, in the chapter entitled “Thirty-Third Rose” :
Listen to the Devil and Learn!
When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone, France, an Albigensian was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people; it appears that over twelve thousand had come to hear him speak. The devils, who were in possession of this wretched man, were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions, in spite of themselves. They said:
(1) That there were fifteen thousand of them in the body of that poor man, because he had attacked the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary;
(2) That by the Rosary which he preached, he put fear and horror into the depths of Hell, and that he was the man they hated most throughout the world because of the souls he snatched from them by the devotion of the Rosary.
(3) They revealed several other things.
St. Dominic put his Rosary around the neck of the possessed man and asked them who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most, who should, therefore, be the most loved and revered by men.
At this, they let out such unearthly screams, that most of the people fell to the ground, seized with fear. Then, using all their cunning so as not to answer, the devils wept and wailed in such a pitiful way, that many of the people wept also, out of pure natural pity. The devils, speaking through the mouth of the Albigensian, pleaded in a heart‑rending voice,
“Dominic, Dominic, have pity on us, we promise you we will never harm you. You have always had compassion for sinners and those in distress; have pity on us, for we are in grievous straits. We are suffering so much already! Why do you delight in increasing our pains? Can’t you be satisfied with the pains we now endure? Have mercy on us, have mercy on us!”
St. Dominic was not in the least moved by the pathetic words of those wretched spirits, and told them he would not let them alone until they had answered his question. Then they said they would whisper the answer, in such a way, that only St. Dominic would be able to hear. The latter firmly insisted upon their answering clearly and audibly. Then the devils kept quiet and would not say another word, completely disregarding St. Dominic’s orders.
So he knelt down and said this prayer to Our Lady “Oh, most glorious Virgin Mary, I implore you by the power of the holy Rosary command these enemies of the human race to answer my question.”
Devilish Liars Forced to Tell the Truth
No sooner had he said this prayer than a glowing flame leaped out of the ears, nostrils and mouth of the possessed man. Everyone shook with fear, but the fire did not hurt anyone. Then the devils cried, “Dominic, we beseech you, by the passion of Jesus Christ and the merits of his holy Mother and of all the saints, let us leave the body of this man without speaking further; for the angels will answer your question whenever you wish. After all, are we not liars –so why should you want to believe us? Do not torment us any more, have pity on us.”
“Woe to you, wretched spirits, who do not deserve to be heard,” St. Dominic said, and kneeling down he prayed to the Blessed Virgin “O most worthy Mother of Wisdom, I am praying for the people assembled here, who have already learned how to say the Angelic Salutation properly. I beg you, for the salvation of those here present, compel these adversaries of yours to proclaim the whole truth here and now before the people.”
St. Dominic had scarcely finished this prayer when he saw the Blessed Virgin near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod, that she held, and said, “Answer my servant Dominic at once.” (It must be noted that the people neither saw nor heard Our Lady, only St. Dominic.)
Then the devils started screaming:
“Oh, you who are enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven, must we, in spite of ourselves, tell the whole truth and confess before everyone who it is who is the cause of our shame and our ruin? Oh, woe to us, princes of darkness.
“Then listen, you Christians. This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell. She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety. It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective.
“We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us; one single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints. We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants.
“Many Christians, who call on her at the hour of death, and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards, are saved by her intercession. And if that Marietta (it is thus in their fury they called her) did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity.
“Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains, for her servants, the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy.”
Then St. Dominic had all the people say the Rosary very slowly and with great devotion, and a wonderful thing happened: at each Hail Mary, which he and the people said, a large number of devils issued forth from the wretched man’s body, under the guise of red‑hot coals. When the devils had all been expelled and the heretic completely delivered from them, Our Lady, although invisible, gave her blessing to the assembled company, and they were filled with joy. (The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
Learn to Pray Better
Let us take heart from this wonderful incident, and make a resolution to reform ourselves by praying our Rosaries better. Let us pray them more slowly, more deliberately, and with more devotion.
Unfortunately, we do not always pray the Rosary well! We have all heard of the saying “Familiarity breeds contempt.” The more we become used to something, then the chances are that we will gradually—perhaps even imperceptibly—lose our estimation and respect for it. Marriage is a wonderful (or should we say “terrible”) example of this. The respect, patience, efforts and love, spent in winning-over the future spouse, can very quickly evaporate over the years and give place to their opposites. The same applies to newly bought items—at first we take such great care over them, handle them gently, keep them sparkling clean, etc. However, over time, all that is forgotten and we can even give way to misuse and abuse.
The same can be said of prayer—whether it be the supreme prayer of the Sacrifice of the Mass, or the Divine Office, or the Holy Rosary. If we are not careful, our assistance at Mass will degenerate with relative ease, and our Rosaries and other prayers will slide comfortably into a daily mechanical routine that we apply to so many other things and chores of life. The saints warn us against this:
St. Augustine says “What more excellent than prayer? What more useful and profitable? What sweeter and more delicious? What higher and more exalted in the whole scheme of our Christian religion?”
St. Bernard says that the angels receive our prayers and present them before God―as the angel said to Tobias “When thou didst pray with tears, I offered thy prayer to God” (Tobias 12:12). St. Hilary says the same “The angels preside over the prayers of the saints and offer them each day to God.”
When we pray, we enter into the presence of the majesty of God. St. John Chrysostom warns us “Consider the height, dignity and glory to which the Lord has raised you.”
At Lourdes, it was noticed that Our Lady prayed the Rosary, with St. Bernadette, SLOWLY and RESPECTFULLY. At La Salette, Our Lady asked the two children if they said their prayers well—which startled them and they had to embarrassingly reply “Oh! No, not so much!” St. Louis de Montfort, in his The Secret of the Rosary, writes “It is a good thing to think over how we should pray if we want to please God and become more holy.”
Then, a little further, he continues: “In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions, by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us, if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? … People who do that forfeit God’s blessing, which is changed into a curse, for having treated the things of God disrespectfully: “Cursed be the one who does God’s work negligently.” (Jeremias 48:10).”
Pathetic Prayers
St. Louis laments at the way most people pray (or not pray but merely say) their Rosary: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly … Being human, we easily become tired and slipshod, but the devil makes these difficulties worse when we are saying the Rosary … Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin. The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said, especially when we have promised to say it regularly or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
Article 2
Wednesday October 2nd, the feast of the Holy Guardian Angels
Padre Pio & Guardian Angels
Wednesday October 2nd, the feast of the Holy Guardian Angels
Padre Pio & Guardian Angels
Neglect Your Angel At Your Peril!
We are living in a world that is leagued against Christ and that seeks our damnation. Our Lord is not of this world, nor are we supposed to be of this world. The world belongs to the prince of this world—the devil. Whoever loves this world is an enemy of God and is in danger of losing their own soul. Don’t believe it? Let Holy Scripture clarify the matter for you:
The World Belongs To Satan
Our Lord “was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew him not” (John 1:10). He Himself said: “I am the light of the world”, but “I am not of this world” (John 8:12; 8:23) … “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5), but “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36). “Yet a little while: and the world seeth Me no more” (John 14:19). “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you” (John 15:19). “He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal” (John 12:25). “We know that we are of God, and the whole world is seated in wickedness” (1 John 5:19).
Our Lord Himself points out the “prince of this world” and says that He has nothing to do with him: “Now is the judgment of the world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31) … “The prince of this world is already judged” (John 16:11) … “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing” (John 14:30). This is seen to be the case when the “prince of this world” tried to tempt Our Lord: “The devil took him up into a very high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus saith to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written: “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him; and behold angels came and ministered to Him” (Matthew 4:8-10).
What Do You Love?
This is why the Apostles tell us: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” ( 1 John 2:15-16). “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God … For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God …Therefore I say, brethren; the time is short; it remaineth, that they that use this world, should use it as if they used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away” (1 Corinthians 2:12; 3:19; 7:29-31). “Be dead with Christ from the elements of this world” (Colossians 2:20). “Denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world” (Titus 2:12). “Flying from the pollutions of the world”( 2 Peter 2:20). “For we brought nothing into this world: and certainly we can carry nothing out” (1 Timothy 6:7). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
We were once of the world, but should no longer be of the world, as St. Paul writes: “And you, when you were dead in your offences, and sins, wherein in time past you walked, according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit that now worketh on the children of unbelief. In which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest” (Ephesians 2:1-3). As Our Lord points out: “For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
To Fight Satan and the World, We Need the Angels of God
If we expect to overcome the world and its prince by ourselves, then we are grossly mistaken and dangerously complacent. If we think we can make a friend of this world, then we call God a liar—you cannot serve God and mammon. “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). As the saying goes: “You must fight fire with fire!” Similarly, we can only fight the fires of Hell and overcome the fiery darts of the devil, through the fires of love and fiery love of God’s angelic spirits—the angels.
Fire is Needed
Our Lord says: “I am come to cast fire on the earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49) and we say to God: “Come, O Holy Ghost, … enkindle in us the fire of Thy love”, so that we “may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one” (Ephesians 6:16). There is biblical connection between angels and fire. We read that “He maketh His angels spirits, and His ministers a flame of fire” (Hebrews 1:7), and that “there appeared to Moses, in the desert of Mount Sinai, an angel in a flame of fire in a bush” (Acts 7:30) ... “And another angel came out from the altar, who had power over fire … And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun, and it was given unto him to afflict men with heat and fire … And I saw another mighty angel come down from Heaven, and his face was as the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire” (Apocalypse 14:18; 16:8; 10:1). In Genesis (3:24), we read of Cherubims with flaming swords of fire. To be able to fight the evil angels with their fiery darts, we need the good angels with their fiery swords. Otherwise, we are out of our league!
Angelic Authority
If there was ever an earthly authority on Angels, it was St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina. He talked to them regularly as you and I talk with our family and friends. He sent them all over the world on “missions” to his spiritual children, and received messages back via the angels as often as we receive mail. Here are a few of his thoughts on these magnificent heavenly beings.
St. Padre Pio and His Guardian Angel
St. Padre Pio had the privilege of having his Guardian Angel visibly beside him all his life. He played with him when he was a child, and the Guardian Angel sang for him when he was sad. St. Padre Pio, speaking of his Guardian Angel, said: “My Guardian Angel has been my friend since my infancy. Little companion of my infancy, ‘angiolino’, ‘angioletto’, my secretary, inseparable companion, celestial person, celestial messenger, brother, friend, prevents danger, one of the family, translates for me the letters in other languages, I send him to console people suffering, prevents from stumbling, never lives us alone for an instant, from the cradle to the grave, even when we are sinning.”
Companion in Prayer
When Padre Pio was a young friar, he wrote a letter to his confessor in which he said: “When I close my eyes and the night comes, I can see the Heaven that appears in front of me. I am encouraged by this vision so I can sleep with a sweet smile on the lips and with a perfect calm on the forehead, waiting my small companion of my infancy came to wake up me and start praying together prayers to the beloved of our hearts.” The Angel would keep Padre Pio up at night, so that they could both chant God’s praises.
Faithful Secretary
Padre Pio lived in close contact with his Guardian Angel, who taught him to translate letters in French and Greek. He said: “If the mission of our Guardian Angel is a great mission, the mission of mine is for sure greater than the others, because he has to be a teacher and explain to me other languages” … “The mission of my Guardian Angel includes explaining me other languages.” When asked: “How do you take care of the so many letters you receive?” The good Padre replied: “The Angel does his job.”
After Taking A Beating!
St. Padre Pio’s Angel would also ease the pain that he suffered from the beatings he received from demons. St. Padre Pio wrote the following to his spiritual director on November 5th, 1912: “I cannot tell you the way these scoundrels [the demons] beat me. Sometimes I feel I am about to die. On Saturday, it seemed to me that they intended to put an end to me and I did not know what saint to invoke. I turned to my Angel and, after he had kept me waiting a while, there he was hovering close to me, singing hymns to the divine Majesty in his angelic voice . . . I rebuked him bitterly for having kept me waiting so long when I had not failed to call him to my assistance. To punish him, I did not want to look him in the face; I wanted to get away, to escape from him. But he, poor creature, caught up with me almost in tears and held me, until I raised my eyes to his face and found him all upset. Then he said: ‘I am always close to you, my beloved young man!’”
A Companion in Need is a Companion Indeed
One winter, a spiritual daughter of Padre Pio was walking along a country road to the Convent where the good Padre was waiting for her. The road was so heavily covered with snow, in which it was even difficult to walk, that she was uncertain if she would reach the Convent in time for the appointment. Full of faith, she prayed to her Guardian Angel to tell Padre Pio she would have to arrive late, because of the snow. When she finally reached the convent, she saw Padre Pio smiling, waiting for her behind a window. The Guardian Angel had done his job!
A woman was sitting in the square of the church of the Capuchins. The Church was closed. It was late and she prayed with the thought, and repeated with the heart: “Padre Pio, help me! Guardian Angel, please, go to tell Padre Pio to help me, otherwise my sister will die!” From the window, above her, came St. Padre Pio’s voice: “Who is calling me at this time? What is the problem?” The woman told him about her sister’s illness. St. Padre Pio bilocated, went to the sick woman and healed her.
Here are some other things that St. Padre Pio said about the Angels:
Angelic Assistance At Mass
We cannot imagine the number of Angels that assist at each Holy Sacrifice of the Mass—and with such devotion, that we would blush for shame if we could only witness it. Perhaps we need to ask our Guardian Angels to obtain for us the grace of “cleaning-up our act” and assistance and the greatest Event on Earth in a more fitting and fervent manner!
● “Oh, if all men could understand this great gift that God, assigned to us; this celestial spirit.”
● “All of Paradise is close to the altar when I say Mass.”
● “The angels attend my Mass In legions.”
● “The angels around the altar adore and love.”
Acquiring An Angelic Attitude
We are so caught up in ourselves that we forget our best friend—outside of Jesus and Mary. Our Guardian Angel has done so much for us and all he gets is perhaps a mechanical and routine, 5-second prayer… “Angel of God, my Guardian dear, to whom God’s love commits me here. Ever this day (night) be at my side, to light, to guard, to rule, to guide. Amen.” Or perhaps he doesn’t even get that! St. Padre Pio has these words to say on the subject:
● “Do not forget this invisible companion, always present to listen to you; always ready to console you.”
● “Your Guardian Angel prays for you; offers to God all the good works you accomplish; your holy and pure desires.”
● “Invoke your Guardian Angel that he will illuminate you and will guide you. God has given him to you for this reason. Therefore use him!”
● “Often remember his presence; thank him; pray to him; respect him; be in constant fear of offending the purity of his gaze.”
● “Our Guardian Angel never leaves us, even when we are disgusting God with our behavior!” Others may leave us, but our Guardian Angels don’t!
● “Oh if all men could understand this great gift that God assigned to us; this celestial spirit!”
Feeling Lonely?
For those who feel abandoned, lonely, isolated—St. Padre has this to say:
● “For people that live alone there is the Guardian Angel.”
● “When you seem to be alone, here a friendly soul to whom you can unburden yourself and in whom you can confide your sorrows.”
● “We will pray for your mother, so that the Guardian Angel will be with her in company.”
● “For whomever is alone, there is his Guardian Angel.”
● “Do not forget this invisible companion, always present to listen to you; always ready to console you.”
● One time, St. Padre Pio was asked: “With all those Angels around you—don’t they bother you?” He answered, “No. They are so obedient.”
Communication Problems?
For those who need to communicate, St. Padre Pio recommends using the Guardian Angels (not a bad idea in these of communications surveillance and Big-Brother watching and listening to you! Perhaps instead of e-mails or electronic mail, we can use a-mails, or angelic mail!). Padre Pio often recommended that, if people wanted to send him a message or a petition, they could send him their Guardian Angel. Fr. Dominic, who handled the American mail for Padre Pio, asked him: “Padre . . . a woman wants to know if she sends her Guardian Angel to you, does he come?” Padre Pio replied, “Tell her that her Angel is not like she is. Her Angel is very obedient—and when she sends him, he comes!” Here are some other comments of St. Padre Pio on this subject:
● “Pick a name for your Guardian Angel and call him by the name always. When you send him to me, he will come instantly.”
● “Send the Guardian Angel. He doesn’t pay a train ticket and doesn’t wear-out shoes.”
● “Don’t write to me because I cannot answer you. Send me your Guardian Angel and I will do everything.”
● “Your Guardian Angel has reported to me some sentences that have made me understand your mistrust.”
● Someone complained to St. Padre Pio: “Father, my income doesn’t allow me to come to see you as often as I’d like.” St. Padre Pio replied: “Who told you to come here? Don’t you have your Guardian Angel? Tell him what you want, send him here, and you will have an answer right away.”
● A person asked St. Padre Pio, “Father, are you able to hear what the Guardian Angels tell you?” And Padre Pio answered, “Of course! Do you think Angels are disobedient as you? Send me your Guardian Angel!”
● An Italian-American, from California, used to pray to his Guardian Angel to tell his needs to St. Padre Pio. One day, after confession, he asked St. Padre Pio if he really heard his Guardian Angel. “Do you think I am deaf?” And he repeated what he had told recently his Guardian Angel to tell St. Padre Pio.
● Padre Lino Barbati sent his Guardian Angel to ask of St. Padre Pio the healing of a person. That person was not getting better. He asked St. Padre Pio: “Could it be that at times the Guardian Angel doesn’t do what we ask him to do?” St. Padre Pio answered: “What? Are you thinking that he is disobedient like me and you?”
● One of the spiritual children of St. Padre Pio said: “It seems that Padre Pio always listens to everybody who calls him.” One evening, a group of friends arrived at San Giovanni Rotondo. They summarized the graces that they would like to ask of St. Padre Pio, and they asked their Guardian Angels to bring their requests to St. Padre Pio as soon as possible. The next day, after the Holy Mass, St. Padre Pio reproached them: “You do not leave me in peace even at night!” Watching Padre Pio’s smile, they understood their prayer had been accepted.
● Padre Alessio approached St. Padre Pio with some letters in his hand in order to ask him something but St. Padre Pio told him abruptly: “Boy! Leave me alone! Don’t you see that I am busy?” Padre Alessio went away mortified. Later, St. Padre Pio apologized and explained: “Didn’t you see all those Angels who were with me? They are the Guardian Angels of my spiritual children who brought me their messages. I had to report to them the answers they needed.”
● Padre Eusebio said: “I was going to London by plane, against Padre Pio’s suggestion not to use this mean of transport. When we were flying over the Channel, a violent storm put the plane in danger. Amid the general terror I prayed and, without knowing what to do, I sent my Guardian Angel to Padre Pio. When I went back to San Giovanni Rotondo, I met Padre Pio, who said to me: ‘Are you well? Is everything OK?’ I answered: ‘I thought I’d die!’ The saintly padre responded: ‘Then why don’t you obey?’ I responded: ‘But I have sent you my Guardian Angel!’ Padre Pio then said: ‘Fortunately, he arrived just in time!’”
Need Help?
The Guardian Angels are not just messengers, but helpers in the greatest degree! St. Padre Pio states:
● “Our Guardian Angel prays constantly for us.”
● “Let’s confide to Our Guardian Angel our pains and sorrows. He is like a friend, like a brother.”
● “The duty of the Guardian Angel is not only of spiritual guidance. He also prevents bodily harm for us.”
● An Italian Lawyer named Attilio De Sanctis, from Fano, Italy, was driving back home to Bologna with his wife and two children. During the trip he fell asleep at the wheel. He woke up a few miles from home. He said: “Who drove my car?” The wife said: “You were still, and didn’t answer to us, and you avoided several collisions at last second. Your driving was different from usual.” Two months later he visited Padre Pio, who told him from afar: “You were asleep and the Guardian Angel drove your car.” The mystery was solved.
Angel Envy?
With all that power, you would think that there is nothing that the angels could envy about humans. However, St. Padre Pio tells us: “The Angels envy us for one thing only: they cannot suffer for God.”
Dying to See our Guardian Angel
St. Padre Pio tells us that seeing our Guardian Angel at the moment of our death will be a truly stupendous sight to behod—if we die well and in the state of grace!
● “It will be a great joy when, at the moment of death, we will be able to see our Guardian Angel.”
● “What consolation when, at the moment of death, you will see this Angel, who accompanied you through life and was so generous in maternal care.”
● “May the desire to see this inseparable companion incite you to leave this body quickly.”
● “When we die, our Guardian Angel will take our soul to Heaven.”
Do Not Neglect Your Angel!
Woe to those who neglect to profit from their Guardian Angel in this life! Therefore St. Padre Pio encourages us:
● St. Padre Pio, in a letter, April 20th, 1915, wrote: “Often repeat the beautiful prayer: ‘Angel of God, my guardian to whom the goodness of the heavenly Father entrusts me, enlighten, protect and guide me now and forever.’”
● “Invoke often this Guardian Angel, and repeat the beautiful prayer: ‘Oh, Angel of God . . .’”
St. Padre Pio’s Daily Prayer to His Guardian Angel
Angel of God, my guardian, to whom the goodness of the Heavenly Father entrusts me. Enlighten, protect and guide me! Now and for ever! Amen.
St. Gemma Galgani and Her Guardian Angel
Another wonderful example of the role and influence of the Guardian Angel can be seen in the life of St. Gemma Galgani (1878-1903). She was called by God to be a victim soul, that is, to suffer for the conversion of sinners—which is essentially the message that Our Lady at Fatima, where she asked of all of us—not quite to be victim souls—but to pray and offer sacrifices for the conversion of sinners. God never demands the impossible, and, if He asked a great deal of Gemma Galgani, He also gave her great helps to achieve her calling. One of these great helps was the incredible assistance given to Gemma by her Guardian Angel.
The biographer of St. Gemma Galgani, the Venerable Father Germanus C.P., writes in his book, The Life of St. Gemma Galgani, that: “Gemma saw her guardian angel with her own eyes, touched him with her hand, as if he were a being of this world, and would talk to him as would one friend to another ... ‘Jesus’, she once said ‘has not left me alone; He makes my guardian angel stay with me always.’”
Spiritual Helper
The Venerable Father Germanus continues “He let her see him sometimes raised in the air with outspread wings, with his hands extended over her, or else hands joined in an attitude of prayer. At other times he would kneel beside her. If they were reciting vocal prayers or the Psalms, they did so alternately; if aspirations or prayers from the heart, ‘they rivaled one another’ [these are Gemma’s words] that is, they had a holy rivalry as to whom would say them with more fervor saying ‘Viva Gesu’ or ‘Benedetto di Dio’ and other such beautiful invocations. When it was time for meditation, the angel inspired her with sublimest ideas, and moved her affections so that the result of this holy exercise may be more perfect. The subject of these meditations was, for the most part, the Passion of Our Lord, the angel like a good master, laid open its profound mysteries to her soul. ‘Look’ he would exclaim, ‘at what Jesus suffered for men. Consider each of these wounds. It is love that has opened them all. See how horrible sin is, since to expiate it, so much pain and so much love have been necessary’. These and other such reflections went straight to the heart of the fervent Gemma.”
Angel and Mary
On another occasion she writes: “I was in bed suffering greatly, when, all of a sudden, I became absorbed in prayer. I joined my hands and, moved with heartfelt sorrow for my countless sins, I made an act of deep contrition. My mind was wholly plunged in this abyss of my crime against my God, when I beheld my Angel standing by my bed. I felt ashamed of being in his presence. He instead was more than courteous with me, and said, kindly: ‘Jesus loves thee greatly. Love Him greatly in return!’ Then he added: ‘Are you fond of Jesus’ Mother? Salute her very often, for she values such attention very much, and unfailingly returns the salutations offered to her; and if you do not sense this, know that she makes a proof of your unfailing trust.’ He blessed me and disappeared.”
Angelic Spiritual Adviser
In her Autobiography, Gemma writes “One evening, when I was suffering more than usual, I was complaining to Jesus and telling him that I would not have prayed so much, if I had known that He was not going to cure me, and I asked Him why I had to be sick this way. My Angel answered me as follows: ‘If Jesus afflicts you in your body, it is always to purify you in your soul. Be good!’ Oh, how many times during my long illness did I not experience such consoling words in my heart! But I never profited by them.” (We see, in these words, Gemma’s humility).
Ticked-Off Angel
“From the moment I got up from my sick bed, my Guardian Angel began to be my master and guide. He corrected me every time I did something wrong, and he taught me to speak but little, and only when I was spoken to. One day, when those in the house were speaking of some person, and were not speaking very well of her, I wanted to speak up, but the Angel gave me a severe rebuke. He taught me to keep my eyes cast down, and one time in Church he reproved me strongly saying to me: ‘Is this the way you conduct yourself in the presence of God?’ And another time he admonished me in this way ‘If you are not good, I will not let you see me anymore!’ He taught me many times how to act in the presence of God; that is, to adore Him in His infinite goodness, His infinite majesty, His mercy and in all His attributes.”
Once, Gemma’s Guardian Angel ordered her to write the following: “Remember daughter, that whoever truly loves Jesus speaks little and bears all things. I command thee, on behalf of Jesus, to always refrain from giving your own opinion, unless it is asked; always to prefer silence to upholding your own views. Whenever you have committed a fault, accuse yourself of it at once, and do not wait for others to accuse thee. Give full obedience to your confessor, and to those whom he commands thee to obey; and be always sincere with them. Remember to guard your eyes, and be assured that the eyes that are mortified, shall behold the beauties of Heaven.” To humble her, her guardian angel once said to her: “Poor child! How imperfect you are! How much you need others to keep a constant guard over thee. Oh, how much patience I must have with thee.”
Angelic Good Samaritan
Concerning this care that the Angel gave her, Father Germano writes: “Gemma had once been beaten cruelly by the devil during her evening prayer, and being unable to move, the Angel lifted her to her bed, and stood there watching by her pillow.”
Angelic Counselor
In her Autobiography she writes: “I recall very well one time I was given a gold watch and chain. Ambitious as I was, I could hardly wait to put it on and go out (an indication, dear Father, that my imagination was working on me). I did in fact go out with it on and when I returned home and started to take it off I saw an angel (whom I recognized immediately as my Guardian Angel) who said to me very seriously: ‘Remember that the precious jewelry, that adorns the spouse of the Crucified King, can only be thorns and the cross!’”
“I did not even tell my confessor about this. In fact, I tell it now for the first time. These words made me fear, as did the angel himself. But a little later, while reflecting on them without understanding them at all, I made this resolution: I resolve for the love of Jesus, and to please Him, never to wear the watch again, and not even to speak of things that savor of vanity. At the time I also had a ring on my finger. I took it off immediately and from then until now I have not worn such things”
Angelic Messenger
Another extraordinary angelic event is the fact that Gemma often sent her Guardian Angel on errands, to ask Jesus, Mary, or St. Gabriel Possenti, some permission or assistance. Later her Guardian Angel would return, with such a reply or permission as she requested.
Angelic Mailman
However, the most unusual angelic errands were the one’s that Father Germano writes about in Gemma’s biography. Gemma would write a letter to him (Father Germano) seeking some spiritual guidance, and then place it in a “Little Manger Shrine” that was in the Gianinni home (her “adopted” family), and because she had no money for stamps, she would request her angel to deliver the letter for her. Father Germanus, living several hundred miles away in Rome at the time, would soon “find” the letter unstamped on his desk, or another such place. (yet another reason for the angelic deliveries was the fact that Father Germanus travelled extensively in his preaching ministry, and Gemma never knew where to reach him)
Realizing how unusual this was, Father Germano asked Heaven for a sign that these “angelic deliveries” were it was in accord with God’s Will. Afterwards, while he was staying at the Passionist house in Corneto, Italy, a “young boy” knocked at the door asking for him. Father Germanus answered the door and the boy handed him a letter from Gemma, and ubruptly turned and left without saying a word. Who was the boy and how could Gemma have known that he was visiting at Corneto? He opened the letter and immediately realized that God answered his prayer as to the authenticity of these “angelic” deliveries. On most other occasions when these “angelic letter deliveries” occurred, Father Germanus would simply find Gemma’s unstamped letter on his desk, when he arrived in his office.
After Gemma’s death, he wrote: “I always received the angelic letters faithfully. The fact is unusual … I confess I do not understand it at all ...To how many tests did I not I submit this singular phenomenon, in order to convince myself that it took place through a supernatural intervention! And yet none of my tests ever failed; and thus I was convinced again and again that in this, like in many other extraordinary things in her life, Heaven was delighted in amusing itself, as it were, with this innocent and dear maiden.”
Angelic Correction
The Venerable Father Germanus writes: “When necessary, her Guardian Angel knew how to show severity. She one day told me this in the following words ‘My Angel is a little severe, but I am glad of it. During the last few days, he corrected me as often as three or four times a day!’”
Gemma writes “Yesterday while at table I raised my eyes and saw my Angel looking at me with frightening severity. Later, when I went to my room—Oh my God! How angry he was! I looked at him, but lowered my eyes immediately. He said: ‘Are you not ashamed to commit such faults in my presence?’ He cast such severe looks at me! And I did nothing but cry and recommend myself to my God and to my Blessed Mother, that they might take me away, because I could not bear it much longer. Every now and then he repeated: ‘I am ashamed of you!’ I prayed also that others might not see him so angry; for if they did, no one would come near me ... I did not have courage to say a word to him, for whenever I raised my eyes, he was looking at me severely!.... Yesterday evening, I found it impossible to sleep, and at last at about 2:00 am I saw him approach. He put his hand on my forehead saying: ‘Sleep my poor child!’— then he disappeared.”
Angelic Love
Her spiritual director Father Gemanus writes: “Gemma, seeing the great charity her angel lavished upon her, loved her angel immensely, and his name was always on her tongue as well as in her heart.
‘Dear Angel’ she would say ‘I love you so!’
‘And why’ the Angel asked.
‘Because you teach me how to be good, and to keep humble, and to please Jesus.’”
The Popes and Angels
Pope Pius XI (1922-1939) once told a certain group of visitors that he was faithful in praying to his Guardian Angel—every day, both morning and evening. Whenever he encountered difficulties, he would once again turn to his Guardian Angel for help. He added: “It is good for us to say this, also out of gratitude! We have always seen ourselves as wonderfully helped by our Guardian Angel. Very often, we feel that he is here, close by, ready to help us.” St. Bernard of Clairvaux had spoken of our obligation to show respect, love and trust towards our Guardian Angels. The counsels of St. Bernard had made a profound impression upon Pope Piuz XI, who revealed that he followed this advice since his earliest days of manhood. He added that his devotion to his Guardian Angel developed throughout time, to the point where it played a part in all and any good the pope did in his life.
The successor of Pius XI, Pope Pius XII (1939-1958), speaking to several hundred American visitors on October 3rd, 1958—the day after the feast of the Guardian Angels—just six days before his death on the 9th, described the role the Guardian Angels played in their lives: “Did Christ not say, speaking to little children, who were so loved by his pure and loving heart: ‘Their angels always behold the face of my Father Who is in Heaven’ (Matthew 18:10). When children become adults, do their Guardian Angels abandon them? Not at all! The hymn at first vespers in yesterday's liturgy told us: ‘Let us sing to the Guardian Angels of men, heavenly companions, given by the Father to our frail nature, lest we succumb to the enemies who threaten us.’ This same thinking is to be found time and time again in the writings of the Fathers of the Church. Everyone, no matter how humble he may be, has Angels to watch over him. They are heavenly, pure and splendid, and yet they have been given us to keep us company on our way: they have been given the task of keeping careful watch over you so that you do not become separated from Christ, their Lord. And not only do they want to protect you from the dangers which waylay you throughout your journey: they are actually by your side, helping your souls as you strive to go ever higher in your union with God through Christ.”
Whereas we are inclined sometimes to limit the role of the guardian angels to that of defending and protecting us, especially as regards the material side of things, Pius XII goes much further, in keeping with all Christian tradition: our Guardian Angel, he says actually promotes our spiritual improvement and helps develop our intimacy with God. He is a teacher of asceticism and mysticism, a guide who will lead us right to the summit.
Pius XII ends his address by exhorting the faithful to be on familiar terms, here and now, with their invisible traveling companions: “We do not want to take our leave of you ... without exhorting you to awaken, to revive, your sense of the invisible world which is all around us—because we look not to the things which are seen, but the things that are unseen (2 Corinthians 4:18)—and to have a certain familiarly with the Angels, who are forever solicitous for your salvation and your sanctification. If God wishes, you will spend a happy eternity with the angels: get to know them here, from now on.”
We are living in a world that is leagued against Christ and that seeks our damnation. Our Lord is not of this world, nor are we supposed to be of this world. The world belongs to the prince of this world—the devil. Whoever loves this world is an enemy of God and is in danger of losing their own soul. Don’t believe it? Let Holy Scripture clarify the matter for you:
The World Belongs To Satan
Our Lord “was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew him not” (John 1:10). He Himself said: “I am the light of the world”, but “I am not of this world” (John 8:12; 8:23) … “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5), but “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36). “Yet a little while: and the world seeth Me no more” (John 14:19). “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you” (John 15:19). “He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal” (John 12:25). “We know that we are of God, and the whole world is seated in wickedness” (1 John 5:19).
Our Lord Himself points out the “prince of this world” and says that He has nothing to do with him: “Now is the judgment of the world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31) … “The prince of this world is already judged” (John 16:11) … “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing” (John 14:30). This is seen to be the case when the “prince of this world” tried to tempt Our Lord: “The devil took him up into a very high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus saith to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written: “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him; and behold angels came and ministered to Him” (Matthew 4:8-10).
What Do You Love?
This is why the Apostles tell us: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” ( 1 John 2:15-16). “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God … For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God …Therefore I say, brethren; the time is short; it remaineth, that they that use this world, should use it as if they used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away” (1 Corinthians 2:12; 3:19; 7:29-31). “Be dead with Christ from the elements of this world” (Colossians 2:20). “Denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world” (Titus 2:12). “Flying from the pollutions of the world”( 2 Peter 2:20). “For we brought nothing into this world: and certainly we can carry nothing out” (1 Timothy 6:7). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
We were once of the world, but should no longer be of the world, as St. Paul writes: “And you, when you were dead in your offences, and sins, wherein in time past you walked, according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit that now worketh on the children of unbelief. In which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest” (Ephesians 2:1-3). As Our Lord points out: “For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
To Fight Satan and the World, We Need the Angels of God
If we expect to overcome the world and its prince by ourselves, then we are grossly mistaken and dangerously complacent. If we think we can make a friend of this world, then we call God a liar—you cannot serve God and mammon. “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). As the saying goes: “You must fight fire with fire!” Similarly, we can only fight the fires of Hell and overcome the fiery darts of the devil, through the fires of love and fiery love of God’s angelic spirits—the angels.
Fire is Needed
Our Lord says: “I am come to cast fire on the earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49) and we say to God: “Come, O Holy Ghost, … enkindle in us the fire of Thy love”, so that we “may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one” (Ephesians 6:16). There is biblical connection between angels and fire. We read that “He maketh His angels spirits, and His ministers a flame of fire” (Hebrews 1:7), and that “there appeared to Moses, in the desert of Mount Sinai, an angel in a flame of fire in a bush” (Acts 7:30) ... “And another angel came out from the altar, who had power over fire … And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun, and it was given unto him to afflict men with heat and fire … And I saw another mighty angel come down from Heaven, and his face was as the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire” (Apocalypse 14:18; 16:8; 10:1). In Genesis (3:24), we read of Cherubims with flaming swords of fire. To be able to fight the evil angels with their fiery darts, we need the good angels with their fiery swords. Otherwise, we are out of our league!
Angelic Authority
If there was ever an earthly authority on Angels, it was St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina. He talked to them regularly as you and I talk with our family and friends. He sent them all over the world on “missions” to his spiritual children, and received messages back via the angels as often as we receive mail. Here are a few of his thoughts on these magnificent heavenly beings.
St. Padre Pio and His Guardian Angel
St. Padre Pio had the privilege of having his Guardian Angel visibly beside him all his life. He played with him when he was a child, and the Guardian Angel sang for him when he was sad. St. Padre Pio, speaking of his Guardian Angel, said: “My Guardian Angel has been my friend since my infancy. Little companion of my infancy, ‘angiolino’, ‘angioletto’, my secretary, inseparable companion, celestial person, celestial messenger, brother, friend, prevents danger, one of the family, translates for me the letters in other languages, I send him to console people suffering, prevents from stumbling, never lives us alone for an instant, from the cradle to the grave, even when we are sinning.”
Companion in Prayer
When Padre Pio was a young friar, he wrote a letter to his confessor in which he said: “When I close my eyes and the night comes, I can see the Heaven that appears in front of me. I am encouraged by this vision so I can sleep with a sweet smile on the lips and with a perfect calm on the forehead, waiting my small companion of my infancy came to wake up me and start praying together prayers to the beloved of our hearts.” The Angel would keep Padre Pio up at night, so that they could both chant God’s praises.
Faithful Secretary
Padre Pio lived in close contact with his Guardian Angel, who taught him to translate letters in French and Greek. He said: “If the mission of our Guardian Angel is a great mission, the mission of mine is for sure greater than the others, because he has to be a teacher and explain to me other languages” … “The mission of my Guardian Angel includes explaining me other languages.” When asked: “How do you take care of the so many letters you receive?” The good Padre replied: “The Angel does his job.”
After Taking A Beating!
St. Padre Pio’s Angel would also ease the pain that he suffered from the beatings he received from demons. St. Padre Pio wrote the following to his spiritual director on November 5th, 1912: “I cannot tell you the way these scoundrels [the demons] beat me. Sometimes I feel I am about to die. On Saturday, it seemed to me that they intended to put an end to me and I did not know what saint to invoke. I turned to my Angel and, after he had kept me waiting a while, there he was hovering close to me, singing hymns to the divine Majesty in his angelic voice . . . I rebuked him bitterly for having kept me waiting so long when I had not failed to call him to my assistance. To punish him, I did not want to look him in the face; I wanted to get away, to escape from him. But he, poor creature, caught up with me almost in tears and held me, until I raised my eyes to his face and found him all upset. Then he said: ‘I am always close to you, my beloved young man!’”
A Companion in Need is a Companion Indeed
One winter, a spiritual daughter of Padre Pio was walking along a country road to the Convent where the good Padre was waiting for her. The road was so heavily covered with snow, in which it was even difficult to walk, that she was uncertain if she would reach the Convent in time for the appointment. Full of faith, she prayed to her Guardian Angel to tell Padre Pio she would have to arrive late, because of the snow. When she finally reached the convent, she saw Padre Pio smiling, waiting for her behind a window. The Guardian Angel had done his job!
A woman was sitting in the square of the church of the Capuchins. The Church was closed. It was late and she prayed with the thought, and repeated with the heart: “Padre Pio, help me! Guardian Angel, please, go to tell Padre Pio to help me, otherwise my sister will die!” From the window, above her, came St. Padre Pio’s voice: “Who is calling me at this time? What is the problem?” The woman told him about her sister’s illness. St. Padre Pio bilocated, went to the sick woman and healed her.
Here are some other things that St. Padre Pio said about the Angels:
Angelic Assistance At Mass
We cannot imagine the number of Angels that assist at each Holy Sacrifice of the Mass—and with such devotion, that we would blush for shame if we could only witness it. Perhaps we need to ask our Guardian Angels to obtain for us the grace of “cleaning-up our act” and assistance and the greatest Event on Earth in a more fitting and fervent manner!
● “Oh, if all men could understand this great gift that God, assigned to us; this celestial spirit.”
● “All of Paradise is close to the altar when I say Mass.”
● “The angels attend my Mass In legions.”
● “The angels around the altar adore and love.”
Acquiring An Angelic Attitude
We are so caught up in ourselves that we forget our best friend—outside of Jesus and Mary. Our Guardian Angel has done so much for us and all he gets is perhaps a mechanical and routine, 5-second prayer… “Angel of God, my Guardian dear, to whom God’s love commits me here. Ever this day (night) be at my side, to light, to guard, to rule, to guide. Amen.” Or perhaps he doesn’t even get that! St. Padre Pio has these words to say on the subject:
● “Do not forget this invisible companion, always present to listen to you; always ready to console you.”
● “Your Guardian Angel prays for you; offers to God all the good works you accomplish; your holy and pure desires.”
● “Invoke your Guardian Angel that he will illuminate you and will guide you. God has given him to you for this reason. Therefore use him!”
● “Often remember his presence; thank him; pray to him; respect him; be in constant fear of offending the purity of his gaze.”
● “Our Guardian Angel never leaves us, even when we are disgusting God with our behavior!” Others may leave us, but our Guardian Angels don’t!
● “Oh if all men could understand this great gift that God assigned to us; this celestial spirit!”
Feeling Lonely?
For those who feel abandoned, lonely, isolated—St. Padre has this to say:
● “For people that live alone there is the Guardian Angel.”
● “When you seem to be alone, here a friendly soul to whom you can unburden yourself and in whom you can confide your sorrows.”
● “We will pray for your mother, so that the Guardian Angel will be with her in company.”
● “For whomever is alone, there is his Guardian Angel.”
● “Do not forget this invisible companion, always present to listen to you; always ready to console you.”
● One time, St. Padre Pio was asked: “With all those Angels around you—don’t they bother you?” He answered, “No. They are so obedient.”
Communication Problems?
For those who need to communicate, St. Padre Pio recommends using the Guardian Angels (not a bad idea in these of communications surveillance and Big-Brother watching and listening to you! Perhaps instead of e-mails or electronic mail, we can use a-mails, or angelic mail!). Padre Pio often recommended that, if people wanted to send him a message or a petition, they could send him their Guardian Angel. Fr. Dominic, who handled the American mail for Padre Pio, asked him: “Padre . . . a woman wants to know if she sends her Guardian Angel to you, does he come?” Padre Pio replied, “Tell her that her Angel is not like she is. Her Angel is very obedient—and when she sends him, he comes!” Here are some other comments of St. Padre Pio on this subject:
● “Pick a name for your Guardian Angel and call him by the name always. When you send him to me, he will come instantly.”
● “Send the Guardian Angel. He doesn’t pay a train ticket and doesn’t wear-out shoes.”
● “Don’t write to me because I cannot answer you. Send me your Guardian Angel and I will do everything.”
● “Your Guardian Angel has reported to me some sentences that have made me understand your mistrust.”
● Someone complained to St. Padre Pio: “Father, my income doesn’t allow me to come to see you as often as I’d like.” St. Padre Pio replied: “Who told you to come here? Don’t you have your Guardian Angel? Tell him what you want, send him here, and you will have an answer right away.”
● A person asked St. Padre Pio, “Father, are you able to hear what the Guardian Angels tell you?” And Padre Pio answered, “Of course! Do you think Angels are disobedient as you? Send me your Guardian Angel!”
● An Italian-American, from California, used to pray to his Guardian Angel to tell his needs to St. Padre Pio. One day, after confession, he asked St. Padre Pio if he really heard his Guardian Angel. “Do you think I am deaf?” And he repeated what he had told recently his Guardian Angel to tell St. Padre Pio.
● Padre Lino Barbati sent his Guardian Angel to ask of St. Padre Pio the healing of a person. That person was not getting better. He asked St. Padre Pio: “Could it be that at times the Guardian Angel doesn’t do what we ask him to do?” St. Padre Pio answered: “What? Are you thinking that he is disobedient like me and you?”
● One of the spiritual children of St. Padre Pio said: “It seems that Padre Pio always listens to everybody who calls him.” One evening, a group of friends arrived at San Giovanni Rotondo. They summarized the graces that they would like to ask of St. Padre Pio, and they asked their Guardian Angels to bring their requests to St. Padre Pio as soon as possible. The next day, after the Holy Mass, St. Padre Pio reproached them: “You do not leave me in peace even at night!” Watching Padre Pio’s smile, they understood their prayer had been accepted.
● Padre Alessio approached St. Padre Pio with some letters in his hand in order to ask him something but St. Padre Pio told him abruptly: “Boy! Leave me alone! Don’t you see that I am busy?” Padre Alessio went away mortified. Later, St. Padre Pio apologized and explained: “Didn’t you see all those Angels who were with me? They are the Guardian Angels of my spiritual children who brought me their messages. I had to report to them the answers they needed.”
● Padre Eusebio said: “I was going to London by plane, against Padre Pio’s suggestion not to use this mean of transport. When we were flying over the Channel, a violent storm put the plane in danger. Amid the general terror I prayed and, without knowing what to do, I sent my Guardian Angel to Padre Pio. When I went back to San Giovanni Rotondo, I met Padre Pio, who said to me: ‘Are you well? Is everything OK?’ I answered: ‘I thought I’d die!’ The saintly padre responded: ‘Then why don’t you obey?’ I responded: ‘But I have sent you my Guardian Angel!’ Padre Pio then said: ‘Fortunately, he arrived just in time!’”
Need Help?
The Guardian Angels are not just messengers, but helpers in the greatest degree! St. Padre Pio states:
● “Our Guardian Angel prays constantly for us.”
● “Let’s confide to Our Guardian Angel our pains and sorrows. He is like a friend, like a brother.”
● “The duty of the Guardian Angel is not only of spiritual guidance. He also prevents bodily harm for us.”
● An Italian Lawyer named Attilio De Sanctis, from Fano, Italy, was driving back home to Bologna with his wife and two children. During the trip he fell asleep at the wheel. He woke up a few miles from home. He said: “Who drove my car?” The wife said: “You were still, and didn’t answer to us, and you avoided several collisions at last second. Your driving was different from usual.” Two months later he visited Padre Pio, who told him from afar: “You were asleep and the Guardian Angel drove your car.” The mystery was solved.
Angel Envy?
With all that power, you would think that there is nothing that the angels could envy about humans. However, St. Padre Pio tells us: “The Angels envy us for one thing only: they cannot suffer for God.”
Dying to See our Guardian Angel
St. Padre Pio tells us that seeing our Guardian Angel at the moment of our death will be a truly stupendous sight to behod—if we die well and in the state of grace!
● “It will be a great joy when, at the moment of death, we will be able to see our Guardian Angel.”
● “What consolation when, at the moment of death, you will see this Angel, who accompanied you through life and was so generous in maternal care.”
● “May the desire to see this inseparable companion incite you to leave this body quickly.”
● “When we die, our Guardian Angel will take our soul to Heaven.”
Do Not Neglect Your Angel!
Woe to those who neglect to profit from their Guardian Angel in this life! Therefore St. Padre Pio encourages us:
● St. Padre Pio, in a letter, April 20th, 1915, wrote: “Often repeat the beautiful prayer: ‘Angel of God, my guardian to whom the goodness of the heavenly Father entrusts me, enlighten, protect and guide me now and forever.’”
● “Invoke often this Guardian Angel, and repeat the beautiful prayer: ‘Oh, Angel of God . . .’”
St. Padre Pio’s Daily Prayer to His Guardian Angel
Angel of God, my guardian, to whom the goodness of the Heavenly Father entrusts me. Enlighten, protect and guide me! Now and for ever! Amen.
St. Gemma Galgani and Her Guardian Angel
Another wonderful example of the role and influence of the Guardian Angel can be seen in the life of St. Gemma Galgani (1878-1903). She was called by God to be a victim soul, that is, to suffer for the conversion of sinners—which is essentially the message that Our Lady at Fatima, where she asked of all of us—not quite to be victim souls—but to pray and offer sacrifices for the conversion of sinners. God never demands the impossible, and, if He asked a great deal of Gemma Galgani, He also gave her great helps to achieve her calling. One of these great helps was the incredible assistance given to Gemma by her Guardian Angel.
The biographer of St. Gemma Galgani, the Venerable Father Germanus C.P., writes in his book, The Life of St. Gemma Galgani, that: “Gemma saw her guardian angel with her own eyes, touched him with her hand, as if he were a being of this world, and would talk to him as would one friend to another ... ‘Jesus’, she once said ‘has not left me alone; He makes my guardian angel stay with me always.’”
Spiritual Helper
The Venerable Father Germanus continues “He let her see him sometimes raised in the air with outspread wings, with his hands extended over her, or else hands joined in an attitude of prayer. At other times he would kneel beside her. If they were reciting vocal prayers or the Psalms, they did so alternately; if aspirations or prayers from the heart, ‘they rivaled one another’ [these are Gemma’s words] that is, they had a holy rivalry as to whom would say them with more fervor saying ‘Viva Gesu’ or ‘Benedetto di Dio’ and other such beautiful invocations. When it was time for meditation, the angel inspired her with sublimest ideas, and moved her affections so that the result of this holy exercise may be more perfect. The subject of these meditations was, for the most part, the Passion of Our Lord, the angel like a good master, laid open its profound mysteries to her soul. ‘Look’ he would exclaim, ‘at what Jesus suffered for men. Consider each of these wounds. It is love that has opened them all. See how horrible sin is, since to expiate it, so much pain and so much love have been necessary’. These and other such reflections went straight to the heart of the fervent Gemma.”
Angel and Mary
On another occasion she writes: “I was in bed suffering greatly, when, all of a sudden, I became absorbed in prayer. I joined my hands and, moved with heartfelt sorrow for my countless sins, I made an act of deep contrition. My mind was wholly plunged in this abyss of my crime against my God, when I beheld my Angel standing by my bed. I felt ashamed of being in his presence. He instead was more than courteous with me, and said, kindly: ‘Jesus loves thee greatly. Love Him greatly in return!’ Then he added: ‘Are you fond of Jesus’ Mother? Salute her very often, for she values such attention very much, and unfailingly returns the salutations offered to her; and if you do not sense this, know that she makes a proof of your unfailing trust.’ He blessed me and disappeared.”
Angelic Spiritual Adviser
In her Autobiography, Gemma writes “One evening, when I was suffering more than usual, I was complaining to Jesus and telling him that I would not have prayed so much, if I had known that He was not going to cure me, and I asked Him why I had to be sick this way. My Angel answered me as follows: ‘If Jesus afflicts you in your body, it is always to purify you in your soul. Be good!’ Oh, how many times during my long illness did I not experience such consoling words in my heart! But I never profited by them.” (We see, in these words, Gemma’s humility).
Ticked-Off Angel
“From the moment I got up from my sick bed, my Guardian Angel began to be my master and guide. He corrected me every time I did something wrong, and he taught me to speak but little, and only when I was spoken to. One day, when those in the house were speaking of some person, and were not speaking very well of her, I wanted to speak up, but the Angel gave me a severe rebuke. He taught me to keep my eyes cast down, and one time in Church he reproved me strongly saying to me: ‘Is this the way you conduct yourself in the presence of God?’ And another time he admonished me in this way ‘If you are not good, I will not let you see me anymore!’ He taught me many times how to act in the presence of God; that is, to adore Him in His infinite goodness, His infinite majesty, His mercy and in all His attributes.”
Once, Gemma’s Guardian Angel ordered her to write the following: “Remember daughter, that whoever truly loves Jesus speaks little and bears all things. I command thee, on behalf of Jesus, to always refrain from giving your own opinion, unless it is asked; always to prefer silence to upholding your own views. Whenever you have committed a fault, accuse yourself of it at once, and do not wait for others to accuse thee. Give full obedience to your confessor, and to those whom he commands thee to obey; and be always sincere with them. Remember to guard your eyes, and be assured that the eyes that are mortified, shall behold the beauties of Heaven.” To humble her, her guardian angel once said to her: “Poor child! How imperfect you are! How much you need others to keep a constant guard over thee. Oh, how much patience I must have with thee.”
Angelic Good Samaritan
Concerning this care that the Angel gave her, Father Germano writes: “Gemma had once been beaten cruelly by the devil during her evening prayer, and being unable to move, the Angel lifted her to her bed, and stood there watching by her pillow.”
Angelic Counselor
In her Autobiography she writes: “I recall very well one time I was given a gold watch and chain. Ambitious as I was, I could hardly wait to put it on and go out (an indication, dear Father, that my imagination was working on me). I did in fact go out with it on and when I returned home and started to take it off I saw an angel (whom I recognized immediately as my Guardian Angel) who said to me very seriously: ‘Remember that the precious jewelry, that adorns the spouse of the Crucified King, can only be thorns and the cross!’”
“I did not even tell my confessor about this. In fact, I tell it now for the first time. These words made me fear, as did the angel himself. But a little later, while reflecting on them without understanding them at all, I made this resolution: I resolve for the love of Jesus, and to please Him, never to wear the watch again, and not even to speak of things that savor of vanity. At the time I also had a ring on my finger. I took it off immediately and from then until now I have not worn such things”
Angelic Messenger
Another extraordinary angelic event is the fact that Gemma often sent her Guardian Angel on errands, to ask Jesus, Mary, or St. Gabriel Possenti, some permission or assistance. Later her Guardian Angel would return, with such a reply or permission as she requested.
Angelic Mailman
However, the most unusual angelic errands were the one’s that Father Germano writes about in Gemma’s biography. Gemma would write a letter to him (Father Germano) seeking some spiritual guidance, and then place it in a “Little Manger Shrine” that was in the Gianinni home (her “adopted” family), and because she had no money for stamps, she would request her angel to deliver the letter for her. Father Germanus, living several hundred miles away in Rome at the time, would soon “find” the letter unstamped on his desk, or another such place. (yet another reason for the angelic deliveries was the fact that Father Germanus travelled extensively in his preaching ministry, and Gemma never knew where to reach him)
Realizing how unusual this was, Father Germano asked Heaven for a sign that these “angelic deliveries” were it was in accord with God’s Will. Afterwards, while he was staying at the Passionist house in Corneto, Italy, a “young boy” knocked at the door asking for him. Father Germanus answered the door and the boy handed him a letter from Gemma, and ubruptly turned and left without saying a word. Who was the boy and how could Gemma have known that he was visiting at Corneto? He opened the letter and immediately realized that God answered his prayer as to the authenticity of these “angelic” deliveries. On most other occasions when these “angelic letter deliveries” occurred, Father Germanus would simply find Gemma’s unstamped letter on his desk, when he arrived in his office.
After Gemma’s death, he wrote: “I always received the angelic letters faithfully. The fact is unusual … I confess I do not understand it at all ...To how many tests did I not I submit this singular phenomenon, in order to convince myself that it took place through a supernatural intervention! And yet none of my tests ever failed; and thus I was convinced again and again that in this, like in many other extraordinary things in her life, Heaven was delighted in amusing itself, as it were, with this innocent and dear maiden.”
Angelic Correction
The Venerable Father Germanus writes: “When necessary, her Guardian Angel knew how to show severity. She one day told me this in the following words ‘My Angel is a little severe, but I am glad of it. During the last few days, he corrected me as often as three or four times a day!’”
Gemma writes “Yesterday while at table I raised my eyes and saw my Angel looking at me with frightening severity. Later, when I went to my room—Oh my God! How angry he was! I looked at him, but lowered my eyes immediately. He said: ‘Are you not ashamed to commit such faults in my presence?’ He cast such severe looks at me! And I did nothing but cry and recommend myself to my God and to my Blessed Mother, that they might take me away, because I could not bear it much longer. Every now and then he repeated: ‘I am ashamed of you!’ I prayed also that others might not see him so angry; for if they did, no one would come near me ... I did not have courage to say a word to him, for whenever I raised my eyes, he was looking at me severely!.... Yesterday evening, I found it impossible to sleep, and at last at about 2:00 am I saw him approach. He put his hand on my forehead saying: ‘Sleep my poor child!’— then he disappeared.”
Angelic Love
Her spiritual director Father Gemanus writes: “Gemma, seeing the great charity her angel lavished upon her, loved her angel immensely, and his name was always on her tongue as well as in her heart.
‘Dear Angel’ she would say ‘I love you so!’
‘And why’ the Angel asked.
‘Because you teach me how to be good, and to keep humble, and to please Jesus.’”
The Popes and Angels
Pope Pius XI (1922-1939) once told a certain group of visitors that he was faithful in praying to his Guardian Angel—every day, both morning and evening. Whenever he encountered difficulties, he would once again turn to his Guardian Angel for help. He added: “It is good for us to say this, also out of gratitude! We have always seen ourselves as wonderfully helped by our Guardian Angel. Very often, we feel that he is here, close by, ready to help us.” St. Bernard of Clairvaux had spoken of our obligation to show respect, love and trust towards our Guardian Angels. The counsels of St. Bernard had made a profound impression upon Pope Piuz XI, who revealed that he followed this advice since his earliest days of manhood. He added that his devotion to his Guardian Angel developed throughout time, to the point where it played a part in all and any good the pope did in his life.
The successor of Pius XI, Pope Pius XII (1939-1958), speaking to several hundred American visitors on October 3rd, 1958—the day after the feast of the Guardian Angels—just six days before his death on the 9th, described the role the Guardian Angels played in their lives: “Did Christ not say, speaking to little children, who were so loved by his pure and loving heart: ‘Their angels always behold the face of my Father Who is in Heaven’ (Matthew 18:10). When children become adults, do their Guardian Angels abandon them? Not at all! The hymn at first vespers in yesterday's liturgy told us: ‘Let us sing to the Guardian Angels of men, heavenly companions, given by the Father to our frail nature, lest we succumb to the enemies who threaten us.’ This same thinking is to be found time and time again in the writings of the Fathers of the Church. Everyone, no matter how humble he may be, has Angels to watch over him. They are heavenly, pure and splendid, and yet they have been given us to keep us company on our way: they have been given the task of keeping careful watch over you so that you do not become separated from Christ, their Lord. And not only do they want to protect you from the dangers which waylay you throughout your journey: they are actually by your side, helping your souls as you strive to go ever higher in your union with God through Christ.”
Whereas we are inclined sometimes to limit the role of the guardian angels to that of defending and protecting us, especially as regards the material side of things, Pius XII goes much further, in keeping with all Christian tradition: our Guardian Angel, he says actually promotes our spiritual improvement and helps develop our intimacy with God. He is a teacher of asceticism and mysticism, a guide who will lead us right to the summit.
Pius XII ends his address by exhorting the faithful to be on familiar terms, here and now, with their invisible traveling companions: “We do not want to take our leave of you ... without exhorting you to awaken, to revive, your sense of the invisible world which is all around us—because we look not to the things which are seen, but the things that are unseen (2 Corinthians 4:18)—and to have a certain familiarly with the Angels, who are forever solicitous for your salvation and your sanctification. If God wishes, you will spend a happy eternity with the angels: get to know them here, from now on.”
Article 1
Tuesday October 1st
Don’t Drive With the Devil―Drive the Devil Out!
Tuesday October 1st
Don’t Drive With the Devil―Drive the Devil Out!
This Is Where We Are!
We are in a mess! The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome for over 30 years, said: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican! Legions of demons have lodged there! I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office!”
Our Lady herself had already warned: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God” (Our Lady of La Salette) ... “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that the devil is about to wage a decisive battle with the Virgin, and a decisive battle is a final battle, in which one side wins, the other side loses. Also, starting with the present time, we belong either to God, or we belong to the demon—there is no middle ground” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima).
“The devil knows what it is that most offends God and which, in a short space of time, will gain for him the greatest number of souls. Thus the devil does everything to overcome souls consecrated to God, because in this way the devil will succeed in leaving the souls of the faithful abandoned by their leaders, thereby the more easily will he seize them” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima) … “The Sacred Sacrament of Holy Orders will be ridiculed, oppressed and despised. ...The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor with cruel and subtle astuteness to deviate them from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them” (Our Lady of Good Success). “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres. Churches and altars will be sacked; the Church will be full of those who accept compromises … The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God ... and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord” (Our Lady of Akita).
“The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish” (Our Lady of La Salette) ... “In convents, the flowers of the Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts. May those in charge of religious communities be on their guard against the people they must receive, for the devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin” (Our Lady of La Salette) … “Others, impelled by the malice of the devil, will themselves rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church” … “Often during this epoch, the enemies of Jesus Christ, instigated by the demon, will steal consecrated hosts from the churches, so that they might profane the Eucharistic Species. My Most Holy Son will see Himself cast upon the ground and trampled upon by irreverent feet ...Making use of persons in positions of authority, the devil will assiduously try to destroy the Sacrament of Confession”(Our Lady of Good Success).
Folks—we are there already, though the degree, intensity, frequency and quantity has still much room for increase, and is increasing. As Our Lady said: “This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings to the good Pastors of the Church” (Good Success); though it must be said that we are not yet at the stage when “People will believe that all is lost” (La Salette)... “all will seem to be lost and paralyzed” (Good Success).
What Can Be Done Against Satan’s Apparent Triumph?
Our Lady of Good Success says that “when all will seem to be lost and paralyzed. This, then, will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration” ... “This, however, will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet and fettering him in the infernal abyss. Thus the Church and this country will be finally free of his cruel tyranny!” Just as Our Lady of Fatima promises: “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph.”
The Humble Heel
Yet, we are not supposed to be spectators in that triumph of the Immaculate Heart, when she tramples Satan under her feet, which will fulfill the prophecy in Genesis 3:15, where God, in speaking to devil, said: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.” Just as Christ is the Head (the mind or intellect) of the Mystical Body, Mary could be said to be the Heart (the will) of that Mystical Body, and she will command the Mystical Body in its battle with Satan. The heel, the lowest or most humble part of the body, is the one that will crush Satan. This is synonymous with the virtue of humility—a virtue that Satan detests, for he does not have one ounce or a speck of humility within him. In fact, humility is like “kryptonite” both to Satan and God—to Satan it is detestable and fatal, to God is it wonderful and admirable. Both Satan and God are ‘overpowered’ by humility—Satan is driven away by it, whereas God is attracted by it.
The Humble Heart
Fr. Cajetan da Bergamo (1672-1753) writes: “In Paradise there are many Saints who never gave alms on Earth: their poverty justified them. There are many Saints who never mortified their bodies by fasting, or wearing hair shirts: their bodily infirmities excused them. There are many Saints too who were not virgins: their vocation was otherwise. But in Paradise there is no Saint who was not humble. God banished Angels from Heaven for their pride; therefore, how can we pretend to enter therein, if we do not keep ourselves in a state of humility? Without humility, says St. Peter Damian (Sermon 45), not even the Virgin Mary herself, with her incomparable virginity, could have entered into the glory of Christ, and we ought to be convinced of this truth that, though destitute of some of the other virtues, we may yet be saved, but never without humility” (Fr. Cajetan da Bergamo, Humility of Heart).
“Jesus Christ calls us all into His school to learn, not to work miracles nor to astonish the world by marvelous enterprises, but to be humble of heart. ‘Learn of Me, because I am meek and humble of heart’ (Matthew 11:29) ... The Savior might have said: 'Learn of Me to be chaste, humble, prudent, just, wise, abstemious, etc.’ But He only says: ‘Learn of Me, because I am meek and humble of heart’; and, in humility alone, He includes all things, because, as St. Thomas Aquinas so truly says: ‘Acquired humility is in a certain sense the greatest good.' Therefore whoever possesses this virtue may be said to possess all virtues, and he who lacks it, lacks all” (Fr. Cajetan da Bergamo, Humility of Heart).
Humility Hated
One of the Desert Fathers, “Abba Daniel said: ‘At Babylon the daughter of an important person was possessed by a devil. A monk for whom her father had a great affection said to him: ‘No-one can heal your daughter except some anchorites whom I know; but if you ask them to do so, they will not agree because of their humility. Let us therefore do this: when they come to the market, look as though you want to buy their goods and when they come to receive the price, we will ask them to say a prayer and I believe she will be healed.’ When they came to the market they found a disciple of the old men setting there selling their goods and they led him away with the baskets, so that he should receive the price of them. But when the monk reached the house, the woman possessed with the devil came and slapped him. But he only turned the other cheek, according to the Lord's Command (Matthew 5:39). The devil, tortured by this act of humility, cried out: ‘What violence! The commandment of Jesus drives me out!’ Immediately the woman was cleansed. When the old men came, they told them what had happened and they glorified God saying: ‘This is how the pride of the devil is brought low, through the humility of the commandment of Christ!’” (from The Saying of the Desert Fathers, by the Cistercians).
Humble Holy Rosary
Looking at mere Rosary beads, some may wonder how one earth St. Padre Pio could say: “The Rosary is the weapon!” The Rosary is simple, humble but powerful! In fact, when we look at how God works, it can be generally said that God acts simply, but powerfully. The magnificent act of Creation could not have been simpler—God simply said a few words and it happened! Not much fuss, just simple and powerful. “And God said: Be light made. And light was made” (Genesis 1:3) and so on throughout the remaining days of Creation. God simply said, and it happened.
The Humble, Simple Ways of God
Throughout the Old Testament we see God’s simple, yet powerful, way of acting.
► He has Moses simply strike a rock in the desert, and, miraculously, water flows forth. A seemingly insignificant action, but done with great Faith in God, produces miraculous results. Remember, this wasn’t merely a few gallons of water—Moses had around 2 million thirsty folk clamoring for water!
► God’s prophets also followed the same pattern. The Prophet Elias “stretched, and measured himself upon the child three times, and cried to the Lord, and said: ‘O Lord my God, let the soul of this child, I beseech thee, return into his body!’ And the Lord heard the voice of Elias: and the soul of the child returned into him, and he revived.” (3 Kings 21-22). A few simple words, said with great Faith, produces a miracle!
► Elias calls down fire from Heaven to confound the prophets of Baal. Another time, Elias again calls down fire from Heaven and burns to death a troop of 50 soldiers and their captain, who had and come to take him before the king—he then does a repeat performance with the next troop! An old man with a few words or prayers defeats over 50 trained soldiers! A few simple words, said with great Faith, produces a miracle!
► The Prophet Eliseus tells Naaman the leper, to simply wash seven times in the Jordan. Naaman thought this was ridiculously simplistic and was about to go home, until his servant persuaded him to try it—and lo and behold, he was cured (4 Kings 1-14).
► A mere boy, David, with a simple sling shot and one pebble, topples Goliath, whom the weapons and soldiers of the Israelites had failed to defeat.
The Humble, Simple Ways of Christ
We see God the Son act in the same simple, but powerful way, in the miracles that he performed. Not much fuss, just simple actions or simple commands:
► The leper said: “‘Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.’ And Jesus stretching forth His hand, touched him, saying: ‘I will, be thou made clean!’ And forthwith his leprosy was cleansed” (Matthew 8:2-3). Simple, but powerful!
► “Jesus said: ‘Give place, for the girl is not dead, but sleepeth!’ And they laughed Him to scorn. And when the multitude was put forth, He went in, and took her by the hand. And the maid arose” (Matthew 9:24-25). Simple, but powerful!
► “And when He was come to the house, the blind men came to Him. And Jesus saith to them, ‘Do you believe that I can do this unto you?’ They say to him, ‘Yes, Lord!’ Then He touched their eyes, saying, ‘According to your faith, be it done unto you!’ And their eyes were opened” (Matthew 9:28-30). Simple, but powerful!
► “Jesus rebuked him, and the devil went out of him, and the child was cured from that hour” (Matthew 17:17).
► “And behold two blind men, sitting by the way side, cried out, saying: O Lord, Thou son of David, have mercy on us .... And Jesus stood, and called them, and said: ‘What will ye that I do to you?’ They say to Him: ‘Lord, that our eyes be opened!’ And Jesus having compassion on them, touched their eyes. And immediately they saw, and followed Him” (Matthew 20:20-34). Simple, but powerful!
► “And Jesus entered again into the synagogue, and there was a man there who had a withered hand ... He saith to the man: ‘Stretch forth thy hand!’ And he stretched it forth: and his hand was restored unto him” (Mark 3:1-5). Simple, but powerful!
► “When Jesus had said these things, He cried with a loud voice: ‘Lazarus, come forth!’ And he, that had been dead, came forth, bound feet and hands with winding bands; and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus said to them: ‘Loose him, and let him go!’” (John 11:43:44). Simple, but powerful!
With God nothing is impossible! As the Archangel Gabriel said to Mary, at the Annunciation: “No word shall be impossible with God!” (Luke 1:37). Which was later echoed by Jesus, when He said: “With God all things are possible!” Matthew 19:26). With God, the impossible is simply possible—because God is God, and whatever He wants, happens!
Building High? Dig Deep!
Now what has thing long-winded, interminably dragging, endless article got to do with Our Lady, the Rosary or the month of October? Well, before you build a house upwards, you have to go in the opposite direction beforehand, namely, dig-out and lay the foundations.
The purpose of these endless examples of divine doings, has been to establish the principle (not just a rare occurrence) of how God usually works with mankind. It is quite simple and quite powerful at the same time. The Rosary is one of those simple things that Heaven has given to us. It is so simple, that some, like Naaman the Leper, think it is beneath them, and they are tempted to turn away from the Rosary and go their own way. They would be foolish to do so! We often seek complicated human solutions, when Heaven wants us to use simple divine solutions! Do we really think that Our Lady does not know what she is talking about, when she tells us to pray the Rosary daily? Only Jesus can explain why He wants it that way! For us, mere sinful mortals, it is enough to follow Mary’s simple, yet powerful, advice to the stewards at Cana: “Whatsoever He shall say to you, do ye” (John 2:5). Let us keep it simple, and leave the powerful stuff and miracles to God!
The Power of the Humble Rosary over the Proud Devil
The Rosary consists of a few very short uncomplicated humble prayers, but they have a most powerful effect. The Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Glory Be form the backbone and are the essence of the Rosary. If these simple prayers are used well—and are prayed slowly and with devotion—then marvelous results can flow forth. But mark well the words “prayed slowly and with devotion”! That can be a real challenge, even for the best of folk! God is not mocked, and, therefore, we should pray in a manner that manifests our seriousness about what we are doing, and shows that we really want to pray, thereby, saying what we mean, and meaning what we say! Then, a simple prayer can be powerful and will simply produce powerful results. I think that the power of the simple Rosary is beautifully shown by St. Louis de Montfort, when he relates a wonderful incident in his book, The Secret of the Rosary, in the chapter entitled “Thirty-Third Rose”:
Devils Speak on the Rosary
When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone, an Albigensian was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people; it appears that over twelve thousand had come to hear him speak. The devils, who were in possession of this wretched man, were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions, in spite of themselves. They said:
1. That there were fifteen thousand of them in the body of that poor man, because he had attacked the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary;
2. That by the Rosary which he preached, he put fear and horror into the depths of hell, and that he was the man they hated most throughout the world because of the souls he snatched from them by the devotion of the Rosary.
3. They revealed several other things.
St. Dominic put his Rosary around the neck of the possessed man and asked them who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most, who should, therefore, be the most loved and revered by men.
At this, they let out such unearthly screams, that most of the people fell to the ground, seized with fear. Then, using all their cunning so as not to answer, the devils wept and wailed in such a pitiful way, that many of the people wept also, out of pure natural pity. The devils, speaking through the mouth of the Albigensian, pleaded in a heart‑rending voice,
“Dominic, Dominic, have pity on us, we promise you we will never harm you. You have always had compassion for sinners and those in distress; have pity on us, for we are in grievous straits. We are suffering so much already! Why do you delight in increasing our pains? Can’t you be satisfied with the pains we now endure? Have mercy on us, have mercy on us!”
St. Dominic was not in the least moved by the pathetic words of those wretched spirits, and told them he would not let them alone until they had answered his question. Then they said they would whisper the answer, in such a way, that only St. Dominic would be able to hear. The latter firmly insisted upon their answering clearly and audibly. Then the devils kept quiet and would not say another word, completely disregarding St. Dominic’s orders. So he knelt down and said this prayer to Our Lady: “Oh, most glorious Virgin Mary, I implore you by the power of the holy Rosary command these enemies of the human race to answer my question.”
No sooner had he said this prayer than a glowing flame leaped out of the ears, nostrils and mouth of the possessed man. Everyone shook with fear, but the fire did not hurt anyone. Then the devils cried, “Dominic, we beseech you, by the passion of Jesus Christ and the merits of his holy Mother and of all the saints, let us leave the body of this man without speaking further; for the angels will answer your question whenever you wish. After all, are we not liars—so why should you want to believe us? Do not torment us any more, have pity on us.”
“Woe to you, wretched spirits, who do not deserve to be heard,” St. Dominic said, and kneeling down he prayed to the Blessed Virgin: “O most worthy Mother of Wisdom, I am praying for the people assembled here, who have already learned how to say the Angelic Salutation properly. I beg you, for the salvation of those here present, compel these adversaries of yours to proclaim the whole truth here and now before the people.”
St. Dominic had scarcely finished this prayer when he saw the Blessed Virgin near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod, that she held, and said, “Answer my servant Dominic at once!” (It must be noted that the people neither saw nor heard Our Lady, only St. Dominic.)
Then the devils started screaming: “O you who are enemy, our downfall and our destruction! Why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven, must we, in spite of ourselves, tell the whole truth and confess before everyone who it is who is the cause of our shame and our ruin? Oh, woe to us, princes of darkness!
“Then listen, you Christians! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell. She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety. It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective.
“We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us; one single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints. We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants.
“Many Christians, who call on her at the hour of death, and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards, are saved by her intercession. And if that Marietta (it is thus in their fury they called her) did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity.
“Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains, for her servants, the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy.”
Then St. Dominic had all the people say the Rosary very slowly and with great devotion, and a wonderful thing happened: at each Hail Mary, which he and the people said, a large number of devils issued forth from the wretched man’s body, under the guise of red‑hot coals. When the devils had all been expelled and the heretic completely delivered from them, Our Lady, although invisible, gave her blessing to the assembled company, and they were filled with joy. (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
Let us take heart from this wonderful incident, and make a resolution to reform ourselves by praying our Rosaries better. Thus reformed, our Rosaries will have even greater power in expelling the influence of Satan from the Church at large. Let us therefore pray them more slowly, more deliberately, and with more devotion. St. Padre is right―the Rosary is the weapon for today! But any weapon is only as good as the person using it. A person may have the best rifle in the world, but if his eyes can barely see anything, and his hands are so weak that he barely holds the rifle with his arms trembling, even if he has bullets to use, then the weapon is almost useless. The same is true of the Rosary.
We are in a mess! The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome for over 30 years, said: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican! Legions of demons have lodged there! I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office!”
Our Lady herself had already warned: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God” (Our Lady of La Salette) ... “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that the devil is about to wage a decisive battle with the Virgin, and a decisive battle is a final battle, in which one side wins, the other side loses. Also, starting with the present time, we belong either to God, or we belong to the demon—there is no middle ground” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima).
“The devil knows what it is that most offends God and which, in a short space of time, will gain for him the greatest number of souls. Thus the devil does everything to overcome souls consecrated to God, because in this way the devil will succeed in leaving the souls of the faithful abandoned by their leaders, thereby the more easily will he seize them” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima) … “The Sacred Sacrament of Holy Orders will be ridiculed, oppressed and despised. ...The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor with cruel and subtle astuteness to deviate them from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them” (Our Lady of Good Success). “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres. Churches and altars will be sacked; the Church will be full of those who accept compromises … The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God ... and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord” (Our Lady of Akita).
“The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish” (Our Lady of La Salette) ... “In convents, the flowers of the Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts. May those in charge of religious communities be on their guard against the people they must receive, for the devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin” (Our Lady of La Salette) … “Others, impelled by the malice of the devil, will themselves rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church” … “Often during this epoch, the enemies of Jesus Christ, instigated by the demon, will steal consecrated hosts from the churches, so that they might profane the Eucharistic Species. My Most Holy Son will see Himself cast upon the ground and trampled upon by irreverent feet ...Making use of persons in positions of authority, the devil will assiduously try to destroy the Sacrament of Confession”(Our Lady of Good Success).
Folks—we are there already, though the degree, intensity, frequency and quantity has still much room for increase, and is increasing. As Our Lady said: “This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings to the good Pastors of the Church” (Good Success); though it must be said that we are not yet at the stage when “People will believe that all is lost” (La Salette)... “all will seem to be lost and paralyzed” (Good Success).
What Can Be Done Against Satan’s Apparent Triumph?
Our Lady of Good Success says that “when all will seem to be lost and paralyzed. This, then, will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration” ... “This, however, will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet and fettering him in the infernal abyss. Thus the Church and this country will be finally free of his cruel tyranny!” Just as Our Lady of Fatima promises: “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph.”
The Humble Heel
Yet, we are not supposed to be spectators in that triumph of the Immaculate Heart, when she tramples Satan under her feet, which will fulfill the prophecy in Genesis 3:15, where God, in speaking to devil, said: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.” Just as Christ is the Head (the mind or intellect) of the Mystical Body, Mary could be said to be the Heart (the will) of that Mystical Body, and she will command the Mystical Body in its battle with Satan. The heel, the lowest or most humble part of the body, is the one that will crush Satan. This is synonymous with the virtue of humility—a virtue that Satan detests, for he does not have one ounce or a speck of humility within him. In fact, humility is like “kryptonite” both to Satan and God—to Satan it is detestable and fatal, to God is it wonderful and admirable. Both Satan and God are ‘overpowered’ by humility—Satan is driven away by it, whereas God is attracted by it.
The Humble Heart
Fr. Cajetan da Bergamo (1672-1753) writes: “In Paradise there are many Saints who never gave alms on Earth: their poverty justified them. There are many Saints who never mortified their bodies by fasting, or wearing hair shirts: their bodily infirmities excused them. There are many Saints too who were not virgins: their vocation was otherwise. But in Paradise there is no Saint who was not humble. God banished Angels from Heaven for their pride; therefore, how can we pretend to enter therein, if we do not keep ourselves in a state of humility? Without humility, says St. Peter Damian (Sermon 45), not even the Virgin Mary herself, with her incomparable virginity, could have entered into the glory of Christ, and we ought to be convinced of this truth that, though destitute of some of the other virtues, we may yet be saved, but never without humility” (Fr. Cajetan da Bergamo, Humility of Heart).
“Jesus Christ calls us all into His school to learn, not to work miracles nor to astonish the world by marvelous enterprises, but to be humble of heart. ‘Learn of Me, because I am meek and humble of heart’ (Matthew 11:29) ... The Savior might have said: 'Learn of Me to be chaste, humble, prudent, just, wise, abstemious, etc.’ But He only says: ‘Learn of Me, because I am meek and humble of heart’; and, in humility alone, He includes all things, because, as St. Thomas Aquinas so truly says: ‘Acquired humility is in a certain sense the greatest good.' Therefore whoever possesses this virtue may be said to possess all virtues, and he who lacks it, lacks all” (Fr. Cajetan da Bergamo, Humility of Heart).
Humility Hated
One of the Desert Fathers, “Abba Daniel said: ‘At Babylon the daughter of an important person was possessed by a devil. A monk for whom her father had a great affection said to him: ‘No-one can heal your daughter except some anchorites whom I know; but if you ask them to do so, they will not agree because of their humility. Let us therefore do this: when they come to the market, look as though you want to buy their goods and when they come to receive the price, we will ask them to say a prayer and I believe she will be healed.’ When they came to the market they found a disciple of the old men setting there selling their goods and they led him away with the baskets, so that he should receive the price of them. But when the monk reached the house, the woman possessed with the devil came and slapped him. But he only turned the other cheek, according to the Lord's Command (Matthew 5:39). The devil, tortured by this act of humility, cried out: ‘What violence! The commandment of Jesus drives me out!’ Immediately the woman was cleansed. When the old men came, they told them what had happened and they glorified God saying: ‘This is how the pride of the devil is brought low, through the humility of the commandment of Christ!’” (from The Saying of the Desert Fathers, by the Cistercians).
Humble Holy Rosary
Looking at mere Rosary beads, some may wonder how one earth St. Padre Pio could say: “The Rosary is the weapon!” The Rosary is simple, humble but powerful! In fact, when we look at how God works, it can be generally said that God acts simply, but powerfully. The magnificent act of Creation could not have been simpler—God simply said a few words and it happened! Not much fuss, just simple and powerful. “And God said: Be light made. And light was made” (Genesis 1:3) and so on throughout the remaining days of Creation. God simply said, and it happened.
The Humble, Simple Ways of God
Throughout the Old Testament we see God’s simple, yet powerful, way of acting.
► He has Moses simply strike a rock in the desert, and, miraculously, water flows forth. A seemingly insignificant action, but done with great Faith in God, produces miraculous results. Remember, this wasn’t merely a few gallons of water—Moses had around 2 million thirsty folk clamoring for water!
► God’s prophets also followed the same pattern. The Prophet Elias “stretched, and measured himself upon the child three times, and cried to the Lord, and said: ‘O Lord my God, let the soul of this child, I beseech thee, return into his body!’ And the Lord heard the voice of Elias: and the soul of the child returned into him, and he revived.” (3 Kings 21-22). A few simple words, said with great Faith, produces a miracle!
► Elias calls down fire from Heaven to confound the prophets of Baal. Another time, Elias again calls down fire from Heaven and burns to death a troop of 50 soldiers and their captain, who had and come to take him before the king—he then does a repeat performance with the next troop! An old man with a few words or prayers defeats over 50 trained soldiers! A few simple words, said with great Faith, produces a miracle!
► The Prophet Eliseus tells Naaman the leper, to simply wash seven times in the Jordan. Naaman thought this was ridiculously simplistic and was about to go home, until his servant persuaded him to try it—and lo and behold, he was cured (4 Kings 1-14).
► A mere boy, David, with a simple sling shot and one pebble, topples Goliath, whom the weapons and soldiers of the Israelites had failed to defeat.
The Humble, Simple Ways of Christ
We see God the Son act in the same simple, but powerful way, in the miracles that he performed. Not much fuss, just simple actions or simple commands:
► The leper said: “‘Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.’ And Jesus stretching forth His hand, touched him, saying: ‘I will, be thou made clean!’ And forthwith his leprosy was cleansed” (Matthew 8:2-3). Simple, but powerful!
► “Jesus said: ‘Give place, for the girl is not dead, but sleepeth!’ And they laughed Him to scorn. And when the multitude was put forth, He went in, and took her by the hand. And the maid arose” (Matthew 9:24-25). Simple, but powerful!
► “And when He was come to the house, the blind men came to Him. And Jesus saith to them, ‘Do you believe that I can do this unto you?’ They say to him, ‘Yes, Lord!’ Then He touched their eyes, saying, ‘According to your faith, be it done unto you!’ And their eyes were opened” (Matthew 9:28-30). Simple, but powerful!
► “Jesus rebuked him, and the devil went out of him, and the child was cured from that hour” (Matthew 17:17).
► “And behold two blind men, sitting by the way side, cried out, saying: O Lord, Thou son of David, have mercy on us .... And Jesus stood, and called them, and said: ‘What will ye that I do to you?’ They say to Him: ‘Lord, that our eyes be opened!’ And Jesus having compassion on them, touched their eyes. And immediately they saw, and followed Him” (Matthew 20:20-34). Simple, but powerful!
► “And Jesus entered again into the synagogue, and there was a man there who had a withered hand ... He saith to the man: ‘Stretch forth thy hand!’ And he stretched it forth: and his hand was restored unto him” (Mark 3:1-5). Simple, but powerful!
► “When Jesus had said these things, He cried with a loud voice: ‘Lazarus, come forth!’ And he, that had been dead, came forth, bound feet and hands with winding bands; and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus said to them: ‘Loose him, and let him go!’” (John 11:43:44). Simple, but powerful!
With God nothing is impossible! As the Archangel Gabriel said to Mary, at the Annunciation: “No word shall be impossible with God!” (Luke 1:37). Which was later echoed by Jesus, when He said: “With God all things are possible!” Matthew 19:26). With God, the impossible is simply possible—because God is God, and whatever He wants, happens!
Building High? Dig Deep!
Now what has thing long-winded, interminably dragging, endless article got to do with Our Lady, the Rosary or the month of October? Well, before you build a house upwards, you have to go in the opposite direction beforehand, namely, dig-out and lay the foundations.
The purpose of these endless examples of divine doings, has been to establish the principle (not just a rare occurrence) of how God usually works with mankind. It is quite simple and quite powerful at the same time. The Rosary is one of those simple things that Heaven has given to us. It is so simple, that some, like Naaman the Leper, think it is beneath them, and they are tempted to turn away from the Rosary and go their own way. They would be foolish to do so! We often seek complicated human solutions, when Heaven wants us to use simple divine solutions! Do we really think that Our Lady does not know what she is talking about, when she tells us to pray the Rosary daily? Only Jesus can explain why He wants it that way! For us, mere sinful mortals, it is enough to follow Mary’s simple, yet powerful, advice to the stewards at Cana: “Whatsoever He shall say to you, do ye” (John 2:5). Let us keep it simple, and leave the powerful stuff and miracles to God!
The Power of the Humble Rosary over the Proud Devil
The Rosary consists of a few very short uncomplicated humble prayers, but they have a most powerful effect. The Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Glory Be form the backbone and are the essence of the Rosary. If these simple prayers are used well—and are prayed slowly and with devotion—then marvelous results can flow forth. But mark well the words “prayed slowly and with devotion”! That can be a real challenge, even for the best of folk! God is not mocked, and, therefore, we should pray in a manner that manifests our seriousness about what we are doing, and shows that we really want to pray, thereby, saying what we mean, and meaning what we say! Then, a simple prayer can be powerful and will simply produce powerful results. I think that the power of the simple Rosary is beautifully shown by St. Louis de Montfort, when he relates a wonderful incident in his book, The Secret of the Rosary, in the chapter entitled “Thirty-Third Rose”:
Devils Speak on the Rosary
When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone, an Albigensian was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people; it appears that over twelve thousand had come to hear him speak. The devils, who were in possession of this wretched man, were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions, in spite of themselves. They said:
1. That there were fifteen thousand of them in the body of that poor man, because he had attacked the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary;
2. That by the Rosary which he preached, he put fear and horror into the depths of hell, and that he was the man they hated most throughout the world because of the souls he snatched from them by the devotion of the Rosary.
3. They revealed several other things.
St. Dominic put his Rosary around the neck of the possessed man and asked them who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most, who should, therefore, be the most loved and revered by men.
At this, they let out such unearthly screams, that most of the people fell to the ground, seized with fear. Then, using all their cunning so as not to answer, the devils wept and wailed in such a pitiful way, that many of the people wept also, out of pure natural pity. The devils, speaking through the mouth of the Albigensian, pleaded in a heart‑rending voice,
“Dominic, Dominic, have pity on us, we promise you we will never harm you. You have always had compassion for sinners and those in distress; have pity on us, for we are in grievous straits. We are suffering so much already! Why do you delight in increasing our pains? Can’t you be satisfied with the pains we now endure? Have mercy on us, have mercy on us!”
St. Dominic was not in the least moved by the pathetic words of those wretched spirits, and told them he would not let them alone until they had answered his question. Then they said they would whisper the answer, in such a way, that only St. Dominic would be able to hear. The latter firmly insisted upon their answering clearly and audibly. Then the devils kept quiet and would not say another word, completely disregarding St. Dominic’s orders. So he knelt down and said this prayer to Our Lady: “Oh, most glorious Virgin Mary, I implore you by the power of the holy Rosary command these enemies of the human race to answer my question.”
No sooner had he said this prayer than a glowing flame leaped out of the ears, nostrils and mouth of the possessed man. Everyone shook with fear, but the fire did not hurt anyone. Then the devils cried, “Dominic, we beseech you, by the passion of Jesus Christ and the merits of his holy Mother and of all the saints, let us leave the body of this man without speaking further; for the angels will answer your question whenever you wish. After all, are we not liars—so why should you want to believe us? Do not torment us any more, have pity on us.”
“Woe to you, wretched spirits, who do not deserve to be heard,” St. Dominic said, and kneeling down he prayed to the Blessed Virgin: “O most worthy Mother of Wisdom, I am praying for the people assembled here, who have already learned how to say the Angelic Salutation properly. I beg you, for the salvation of those here present, compel these adversaries of yours to proclaim the whole truth here and now before the people.”
St. Dominic had scarcely finished this prayer when he saw the Blessed Virgin near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod, that she held, and said, “Answer my servant Dominic at once!” (It must be noted that the people neither saw nor heard Our Lady, only St. Dominic.)
Then the devils started screaming: “O you who are enemy, our downfall and our destruction! Why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven, must we, in spite of ourselves, tell the whole truth and confess before everyone who it is who is the cause of our shame and our ruin? Oh, woe to us, princes of darkness!
“Then listen, you Christians! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell. She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety. It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective.
“We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us; one single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints. We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants.
“Many Christians, who call on her at the hour of death, and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards, are saved by her intercession. And if that Marietta (it is thus in their fury they called her) did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity.
“Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains, for her servants, the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy.”
Then St. Dominic had all the people say the Rosary very slowly and with great devotion, and a wonderful thing happened: at each Hail Mary, which he and the people said, a large number of devils issued forth from the wretched man’s body, under the guise of red‑hot coals. When the devils had all been expelled and the heretic completely delivered from them, Our Lady, although invisible, gave her blessing to the assembled company, and they were filled with joy. (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
Let us take heart from this wonderful incident, and make a resolution to reform ourselves by praying our Rosaries better. Thus reformed, our Rosaries will have even greater power in expelling the influence of Satan from the Church at large. Let us therefore pray them more slowly, more deliberately, and with more devotion. St. Padre is right―the Rosary is the weapon for today! But any weapon is only as good as the person using it. A person may have the best rifle in the world, but if his eyes can barely see anything, and his hands are so weak that he barely holds the rifle with his arms trembling, even if he has bullets to use, then the weapon is almost useless. The same is true of the Rosary.
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR SEPTEMBER 2024
THE MONTH OF THE SORROWFUL HEART OF MARY
THE MONTH OF THE SORROWFUL HEART OF MARY
Article 13
Sunday, September 29th, Feast of St. Michael the Archangel & Monday September 30th
St. Michael the Archangel and the End Times
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, September 29th, Feast of St. Michael the Archangel & Monday September 30th
St. Michael the Archangel and the End Times
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
You Are Going to Need Help!
Sister Lucia of Fatima said that Our Lady had revealed to her that we have already entered the so-called “End-Times” or “Last Days.” In an interview with Fr. Fuentes on December 26th, 1957, Sister Lucia said: “Father, the Blessed Virgin did not tell me [explicitly] that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this [implicitly] for three reasons:
“The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground.
“The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others.
“And the third reason is because, in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation―His Blessed Mother. If we despise and reject this last means, Heaven will no longer pardon us!”
When Sister Lucia refers to the “last times of the world”, this does not mean that the world is going to end any time soon―for we must first of all pass through what is called a “Minor Apostasy” (which will not really be “minor” but massive―it is only called “minor” in relation to an even worse apostasy that will occur later, called “The Great Apostasy”). After this “Minor Apostasy”―with its accompanying punishment of wars, persecutions, plagues, famines, bloodshed and death―there will come the “Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary”, resulting in widespread and massive conversions to the Catholic Faith, followed by short period of great worldwide holiness and peace, after which will come “The Great Apostasy” in the time of the emerging Antichrist.
Nevertheless―even though we are not talking about the end of the world―we are talking about terrible, painful, frightening times that at some point soon, will proverbially “come around the corner” and “hit us in the face.” Our Lady is not someone who exaggerates and uses hyperbole, so when Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette says of our times: “Woe to the world! … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth … Woe to the children of these times! … Woe to the Princes of the Church! … Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God!” ― then Our Lady means “Woe” in a big way!
Ever since Our Lady of Fatima gave her warnings in 1917, we have witnessed horrifying warfare, death tolls in the hundreds of millions; abortion on demand with death tolls far greater than those of wars; the destruction of marriage and the family with divorce on a massive scale; sexual confusion with legalized and protected homosexuality and transgenderism; sexual misbehavior with pornography, contraception and cohabitation; and, in general, the rise of the culture of death with the demand for the right to die by euthanasia and the right to kill as in abortion. Indeed, Christendom in the West is in the middle of an unprecedented collapse on a massive scale―being lukewarm and compromised in matters of Faith; with only a tiny minority attending Mass; and the growth of militant secularism and materialism which are worshiped in place of God. Who among us can deny that the Church, especially in the affluent West, has been and still is under attack. Yet we have preferred to sleep through most of it and make one compromise after another, rationalizing away our obligations and guilt with one excuse after another.
Queen of Angels
At Fatima in 1917, Our Lady―speaking of herself in the “third person singular”―said: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” (July 1917). At Akita in 1973, Our Lady echoed that message, saying: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach!” Yet that does not mean that Our Lady will roll-up-her-sleeves and do all the work by herself, while we lazily watch and Heaven gazes admiringly! Our Lady―among many other things―is the Queen of Angels. Like any business leader, Our Lady uses her “staff members” to carry-out and fulfill her commands and objectives. What’s the point of employing staff members if you don’t use them? The Holy Angels are members of that “staff” and they “work” for Our Lady.
The word “angel” comes from the Greek word “angelos”, which translates to the Hebrew word “mal’akh”, both meaning “messenger.” Thus, angels are messengers ― messengers from God to mankind. What messages are they bringing to us? Is it the latest gossip from Heaven? No! The messages they bring are meant to help us in striving for salvation. Thus, indirectly and consequentially, we can also say that angels are “helpers” who seek to help us attain salvation and eternal life in Heaven.
St. Michael the Helper
“The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). Therefore, you must “fight the good fight of Faith and lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). St. Michael is a fighter and we need an angelic fighter on our side to fight the evil angelic spirits that surround us―for a human is no match for angel: “And there was a battle in Heaven; Michael and his angels battled with the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels” (Apocalypse 12:7). It is not for nothing that St. Michael the Archangel is the patron saint of police officers, the military and chivalry―among other things! This patronage can be shown by real-life experiences. We see an outstanding case of St. Michael’s military patronage in the following story of St. Michael and U.S. Marine named Michael. Before going further with this article, let us revisit that story and draw confidence and courage from it.
Below you will find a letter written by a young marine to his mother, after being wounded on a Korean battlefield in 1950. The Navy chaplain, Father Walter Muddy, to whom the letter was shown, thoroughly checked the facts with the young Marine and the sergeant in whose patrol he had served. Having concluded that that the facts mentioned in the letter had actually occurred, Father Muddy made the letter public, in 1951, before a gathering of over 5,000 Marines at the Naval base in San Diego, California. Since then the letter has been published in newspapers and magazines, read on the radio and television, all over the world:
Dear Mom,
I wouldn’t dare write this letter to anyone but you because no one else would believe it. Maybe even you will find it hard but I have got to tell somebody.
First off, I am in a hospital! Now don’t worry, do you hear me, don’t worry! I was wounded, but I am okay—you understand. Okay! The doctor says that I will be up and around in a month. But that is not what I want to tell you.
Remember when I joined the Marines last year; remember when I left, how you told me to say a prayer to St. Michael every day. You really didn’t have to tell me that. Ever since I can remember, you always told me to pray to St. Michael the Archangel. You even named me after him. Well I always have.
When I got to Korea, I prayed even harder. Remember the prayer that you taught me?
“Michael, Michael of the morning fresh crop of Heaven adorning,” you know the rest of it. Well I said it every day. Sometimes when I was marching, or sometimes resting. But always before I went to sleep. I even got some of the other fellas to say it.
Well, one day I was with an advance detail, way up over the front lines. We were scouting for the Commies. I was plodding along in the bitter cold, my breath was like cigar smoke.
I thought I knew every guy in the patrol, when along side of me comes another Marine I never met before. He was bigger than any other Marine I’d ever seen. He must have been 6 feet 4 inches and built in proportion. It gave me a feeling of security to have such a body near.
Anyway, there we were trudging along. The rest of the patrol spread out. Just to start a conversation I said, “Cold ain’t it.” And then I laughed. Here I was with a good chance of getting killed any minute and I am talking about the weather.
My companion seemed to understand. I heard him laugh softly.
I looked at him and said: “I have never seen you before! I thought I knew every man in the outfit!”
“I just joined at the last minute”, he replied. “The name is Michael.”
“Is that so!” I said surprised. “That is my name too!”
“I know,” he said and then went on, “Michael, Michael of the morning . . .”
I was too amazed to say anything for a minute. How did he know my name, and a prayer that you had taught me? Then I smiled to myself, every guy in the outfit knew about me. Hadn’t I taught the prayer to anybody who would listen. Why, now and then, they even referred to me as St. Michael.
Neither of us spoke for a time and then he broke the silence. “We are going to have some trouble up ahead.”
He must have been in fine physical shape, or he was breathing so lightly, for I couldn’t see his breath. Mine poured out in great clouds. There was no smile on his face now. “Trouble ahead,” I thought to myself, “Well, with the Commies all around us, that is no great revelation!”
Snow began to fall in great thick globs. In a brief moment the whole countryside was blotted out. And I was marching in a white fog of wet sticky particles. My companion disappeared.
“Michael!” I shouted in sudden alarm.
I felt his hand on my arm, his voice was rich and strong: “This will stop shortly!”
His prophecy proved to be correct. In a few minutes the snow stopped as abruptly as it had begun. The sun was a hard shining disc.
I looked back for the rest of the patrol, there was no one in sight. We lost them in that heavy fall of snow. I looked ahead as we came over a little rise.
Mom, my heart stopped. There were seven of them. Seven Commies in their padded pants and jackets and their funny hats. Only there wasn’t anything funny about them now. Seven rifles were aimed at us.
“Down Michael!” I screamed and hit the frozen earth.
I heard those rifles fire almost as one. I heard the bullets. There was Michael still standing.
Mom, those guys couldn’t have missed, not at that range. I expected to see him literally blown to bits.
But there he stood, making no effort to fire himself. He was paralyzed with fear. It happens sometimes, Mom, even to the bravest. He was like a bird fascinated by a snake.
At least, that was what I thought then. I jumped up to pull him down and that was when I got mine. I felt a sudden flame in my chest. I often wondered what it felt like to be hit—now I know.
I remember feeling strong arms about me, arms that laid me ever so gently on a pillow of snow. I opened my eyes, for one last look. I was dying. Maybe I was even dead, I remember thinking: “Well, this is not so bad!”
Maybe I was looking into the sun. Maybe I was in shock. But it seemed I saw Michael standing erect again, only this time his face was shining with a terrible splendor.
As I say, maybe it was the sun in my eyes, but he seemed to change as I watched him. He grew bigger, his arms stretched out wide—maybe it was the snow falling again—but there was a brightness around him, like the wings of an Angel. In his hand was a sword! A sword that flashed with a million lights!
Well, that is the last thing I remember, until the rest of the fellas came up and found me. I do not know how much time had passed. Now and then I had but a moment’s rest from the pain and fever. I remember telling them of the enemy just ahead.
“Where is Michael?” I asked.
I saw them look at one another. “Where’s who?” asked one.
I said: “Michael! — Michael that big Marine I was walking with just before the snow squall hit us!”
“Kid,” said the sergeant, “You weren’t walking with anyone. I had my eyes on you the whole time. You were getting too far out. I was just going to call you in when you disappeared in the snow.”
He looked at me, curiously. “How did you do it kid?”
“How’d I do what?” I asked half angry despite my wound. “This marine named Michael and I were just . . .”
“Son,” said the sergeant kindly, “I picked this outfit myself and there just ain’t another Michael in it. You are the only Mike in it.”
He paused for a minute, “Just how did you do it kid? We heard shots. There hasn’t been a shot fired from your rifle. And there isn’t a bit of lead in them seven bodies over the hill there!”
I didn’t say anything, what could I say. I could only look open-mouthed with amazement. It was then the sergeant spoke again, “Kid,” he said gently, “everyone of those seven Commies was killed by a sword stroke!”
That is all I can tell you Mom. As I say, it may have been the sun in my eyes, it may have been the cold or the pain. But that is what happened.
Love, Michael
Easier Than Blinking
Having read the above account, we might be saying: “Wow!” Yet that is not even a kindergartener level for an angel! Even for “an infant angel in his diapers” ― so to speak ― getting rid of “Seven Commies” is “a piece of cake”! We forget―or are not even aware of―the power of angels. One single angel could destroy the entire universe! However, no angel can do what God won’t let him do. Angels use their power in accordance with God’s will. Since they act as agents of God, they can be immensely powerful. God actually has used angels as avengers against His enemies and the enemies of His Chosen People. The amazing swiftness of their movements, the devastating power of destruction which they manifest when God employs them as avenging Angels, are in reality ordinary exploits of the Angelic nature; yet they appear like miracles to us.
Avenging Angels
A classical example of Angelic avenging power has been recorded in the Bible. One single Angel of the Lord wiped out a whole army of Assyrian warriors in one night. Led by King Sennacherib, the Assyrians had come to take Jerusalem in the days of King Ezechias. At the prayers of the devout King Ezechias, the Lord promised to protect the city of Jerusalem and not to permit the Assyrians to shoot a single arrow into the city. The Lord gave the avenging mission to one of His Angels. “And it came to pass that night, that an angel of the Lord came, and slew in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and eighty-five thousand. And when he arose early in the morning, he saw all the bodies of the dead. And Sennacherib, King of the Assyrians, departing went away” (4 Kings 19:35-36; Tobias 1:21; Ecclesiasticus 48:24; Isaias 37:36). This extraordinary historical event is recorded in four different books of the Scripture and finds its confirmation in the history books of Josephus Flavius and of Herodotus.
Another case of avenging angels is when God sent His angel to kill all the first-born in Egypt because of the Pharao’s refusal to allow the Israelites―who were slaves in Egypt―to leave Egypt as God commanded Moses: “And the Lord said to Moses: ‘Yet one plague more will I bring upon Pharao and Egypt, and after that he shall let you go! … At midnight I will enter into Egypt. And every firstborn in the land of the Egyptians shall die, from the firstborn of Pharao who sits on his throne, even to the first born of the handmaid that is at the mill, and all the firstborn of beasts!’ … And it came to pass at midnight, the Lord slew every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharao, who sat on his throne, unto the firstborn of the captive woman that was in the prison, and all the firstborn of cattle” (Exodus 11:1-5; 12:29).
“The angel of the Lord had stretched out his hand over Jerusalem to destroy it” (2 Kings 24:16) … “The angel of the Lord destroying in all the coasts of Israel” (1 Paralipomenon 21:12) … “The angel of the Lord standing between Heaven and Earth, with a drawn sword in his hand, turned against Jerusalem” (1 Paralipomenon 21:16) … “He was seized with an exceedingly great fear, seeing the sword of the angel of the Lord” (1 Paralipomenon 21:30) … “Let the angel of the Lord pursue them!” (Psalm 34:6) … “The angel of the Lord destroyed them” (Ecclesiasticus 48:24) … “The angel of the Lord went out and slew a hundred and eighty-five thousand in the camp of the Assyrians” (Isaias 37:36) … “The angel of the Lord waits with a sword to cut thee in two, and to destroy you!” (Daniel 13:59) … “An angel of the Lord struck him, and he gave up the ghost” (Acts 12:23) … “He saw the angel standing in the way with a drawn sword” (Numbers 22:31) … “He saw the angel striking the people” (2 Kings 24:17) … “I saw another angel to whom it was given to hurt the Earth” (Apocalypse 7:2) … “The angel thrust in his sharp sickle into the Earth and cast it into the great press of the wrath of God” (Apocalypse 14:19).
The Avenging Angels of the Last Days
In the Book of the Apocalypse, we especially see mention of the seven avenging angels that are foretold for the last days of mankind:
“And the seven angels, who had the seven trumpets, prepared themselves to sound the trumpet. And the first angel sounded the trumpet and there followed hail and fire, mingled with blood, and it was cast on the earth, and the third part of the earth was burnt up …
“And the second angel sounded the trumpet and a great mountain, burning with fire, was cast into the sea, and the third part of the sea became blood, and the third part of those creatures died, which had life in the sea, and the third part of the ships was destroyed.
“And the third angel sounded the trumpet and a great star fell from heaven, burning as it were a torch, and it fell on the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters; and many men died of the waters.
“And the fourth angel sounded the trumpet and the third part of the sun was smitten, and the third part of the moon, and the third part of the stars, so that the third part of them was darkened, and the day did not shine for a third part of it, and the night in like manner. And I heard the voice of one flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice: ‘Woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! By reason of the rest of the voices of the three angels who are yet to sound the trumpet!’
“And the fifth angel sounded the trumpet and I saw a star fall from Heaven upon the Earth, and there was given to him the key of the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit: and the smoke of the pit arose like the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke of the pit. And from the smoke of the pit there came out locusts upon the earth. And it was commanded to them that they should not kill the men who have not the sign of God on their foreheads, but that they should torment them for five months and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion when he strikes a man.
“And the sixth angel sounded the trumpet and I heard a voice from the great altar which is before the eyes of God, saying to the sixth angel, who had the trumpet: ‘Let loose the four angels!’ And the four angels were loose to kill the third part of men. And by three plagues was slain the third part of men, by the fire and by the smoke and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths. And the rest of the men, who were not slain by these plagues, did not do penance from the works of their hands by which they adored devils, gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and wood. Neither did they penance from their murders, nor from their sorceries, nor from their fornication, nor from their thefts.
“And I saw another mighty angel, the seventh angel, come down from Heaven, and he cried with a loud voice as when a lion roars. And when he had cried, seven thunders uttered their voices. And when the seven thunders had uttered their voices, the angel lifted up his hand to heaven, and swore that time shall be no longer. In the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound the trumpet, the mystery of God shall be finished” (Apocalypse 8:6-13; 9:1-21; 10:1-7).
“The first angel poured out his vial upon the Earth, and there fell a sore and grievous wound upon men, who had the character of the beast; and upon them that adored the image thereof” (Apocalypse 16:2).
“The second angel poured out his vial upon the sea, and there came blood as it were of a dead man, and every living soul died in the sea” (Apocalypse 16:3).
“The third angel poured out his vial upon the rivers and the fountains of waters, and there was made blood” ” (Apocalypse 16:4).
“The fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun, and it was given unto him to afflict men with heat and fire, and men were scorched with great heat” (Apocalypse 16:8-9).
“The fifth angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast and his kingdom became dark, and they gnawed their tongues for pain” (Apocalypse 16:10).
“The sixth angel poured out his vial upon that great river Euphrates and dried up the water thereof” (Apocalypse 16:12).
“The seventh angel poured out his vial upon the air, and there came a great voice out of the temple from the throne, saying: ‘It is done!’ And there were lightnings, and voices, and thunders, and there was a great earthquake, so great such as never had been since men were upon the Earth” (Apocalypse 16:17-18).
Avenging Angels in Prophecy
● Our Lady of La Salette speaks of avenging angels who will bring an end to the terrible times to come: “Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death.”
● To Blessed Elena Aiello, Our Lady speaks of “fire will fall from the skies, which is not from the hands of men, but will be hurled directly from the angels!”
● To St. Padre Pio, Our Lord said: “My angels, who are to be the executioners of this work, are ready with their pointed swords! They will take special care to annihilate all those who mocked Me and would not believe in My revelations!”
● In 1944, Sister Lucia of Fatima wrote a letter to the Bishop of Leiria describing a vision that the three children of Fatima had been given. Lucia writes: “At the left of Our Lady and a little above, we saw an Angel with a flaming sword in his left hand―flashing, it gave out flames that looked as though they would set the world on fire! Pointing to the Earth with his right hand, the Angel cried out in a loud voice: ‘Penance, Penance, Penance!’”
● Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich was granted a vision concerning our times where “St. Michael came down threatening a number of unworthy pastors with his sword.”
● St. Francis de Paul speaks of Christendom amassing “a grand army, and the angels shall fight for them; and they shall kill all God’s enemies.”
Sister Lucia of Fatima said that Our Lady had revealed to her that we have already entered the so-called “End-Times” or “Last Days.” In an interview with Fr. Fuentes on December 26th, 1957, Sister Lucia said: “Father, the Blessed Virgin did not tell me [explicitly] that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this [implicitly] for three reasons:
“The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground.
“The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others.
“And the third reason is because, in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation―His Blessed Mother. If we despise and reject this last means, Heaven will no longer pardon us!”
When Sister Lucia refers to the “last times of the world”, this does not mean that the world is going to end any time soon―for we must first of all pass through what is called a “Minor Apostasy” (which will not really be “minor” but massive―it is only called “minor” in relation to an even worse apostasy that will occur later, called “The Great Apostasy”). After this “Minor Apostasy”―with its accompanying punishment of wars, persecutions, plagues, famines, bloodshed and death―there will come the “Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary”, resulting in widespread and massive conversions to the Catholic Faith, followed by short period of great worldwide holiness and peace, after which will come “The Great Apostasy” in the time of the emerging Antichrist.
Nevertheless―even though we are not talking about the end of the world―we are talking about terrible, painful, frightening times that at some point soon, will proverbially “come around the corner” and “hit us in the face.” Our Lady is not someone who exaggerates and uses hyperbole, so when Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette says of our times: “Woe to the world! … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth … Woe to the children of these times! … Woe to the Princes of the Church! … Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God!” ― then Our Lady means “Woe” in a big way!
Ever since Our Lady of Fatima gave her warnings in 1917, we have witnessed horrifying warfare, death tolls in the hundreds of millions; abortion on demand with death tolls far greater than those of wars; the destruction of marriage and the family with divorce on a massive scale; sexual confusion with legalized and protected homosexuality and transgenderism; sexual misbehavior with pornography, contraception and cohabitation; and, in general, the rise of the culture of death with the demand for the right to die by euthanasia and the right to kill as in abortion. Indeed, Christendom in the West is in the middle of an unprecedented collapse on a massive scale―being lukewarm and compromised in matters of Faith; with only a tiny minority attending Mass; and the growth of militant secularism and materialism which are worshiped in place of God. Who among us can deny that the Church, especially in the affluent West, has been and still is under attack. Yet we have preferred to sleep through most of it and make one compromise after another, rationalizing away our obligations and guilt with one excuse after another.
Queen of Angels
At Fatima in 1917, Our Lady―speaking of herself in the “third person singular”―said: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” (July 1917). At Akita in 1973, Our Lady echoed that message, saying: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach!” Yet that does not mean that Our Lady will roll-up-her-sleeves and do all the work by herself, while we lazily watch and Heaven gazes admiringly! Our Lady―among many other things―is the Queen of Angels. Like any business leader, Our Lady uses her “staff members” to carry-out and fulfill her commands and objectives. What’s the point of employing staff members if you don’t use them? The Holy Angels are members of that “staff” and they “work” for Our Lady.
The word “angel” comes from the Greek word “angelos”, which translates to the Hebrew word “mal’akh”, both meaning “messenger.” Thus, angels are messengers ― messengers from God to mankind. What messages are they bringing to us? Is it the latest gossip from Heaven? No! The messages they bring are meant to help us in striving for salvation. Thus, indirectly and consequentially, we can also say that angels are “helpers” who seek to help us attain salvation and eternal life in Heaven.
St. Michael the Helper
“The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). Therefore, you must “fight the good fight of Faith and lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). St. Michael is a fighter and we need an angelic fighter on our side to fight the evil angelic spirits that surround us―for a human is no match for angel: “And there was a battle in Heaven; Michael and his angels battled with the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels” (Apocalypse 12:7). It is not for nothing that St. Michael the Archangel is the patron saint of police officers, the military and chivalry―among other things! This patronage can be shown by real-life experiences. We see an outstanding case of St. Michael’s military patronage in the following story of St. Michael and U.S. Marine named Michael. Before going further with this article, let us revisit that story and draw confidence and courage from it.
Below you will find a letter written by a young marine to his mother, after being wounded on a Korean battlefield in 1950. The Navy chaplain, Father Walter Muddy, to whom the letter was shown, thoroughly checked the facts with the young Marine and the sergeant in whose patrol he had served. Having concluded that that the facts mentioned in the letter had actually occurred, Father Muddy made the letter public, in 1951, before a gathering of over 5,000 Marines at the Naval base in San Diego, California. Since then the letter has been published in newspapers and magazines, read on the radio and television, all over the world:
Dear Mom,
I wouldn’t dare write this letter to anyone but you because no one else would believe it. Maybe even you will find it hard but I have got to tell somebody.
First off, I am in a hospital! Now don’t worry, do you hear me, don’t worry! I was wounded, but I am okay—you understand. Okay! The doctor says that I will be up and around in a month. But that is not what I want to tell you.
Remember when I joined the Marines last year; remember when I left, how you told me to say a prayer to St. Michael every day. You really didn’t have to tell me that. Ever since I can remember, you always told me to pray to St. Michael the Archangel. You even named me after him. Well I always have.
When I got to Korea, I prayed even harder. Remember the prayer that you taught me?
“Michael, Michael of the morning fresh crop of Heaven adorning,” you know the rest of it. Well I said it every day. Sometimes when I was marching, or sometimes resting. But always before I went to sleep. I even got some of the other fellas to say it.
Well, one day I was with an advance detail, way up over the front lines. We were scouting for the Commies. I was plodding along in the bitter cold, my breath was like cigar smoke.
I thought I knew every guy in the patrol, when along side of me comes another Marine I never met before. He was bigger than any other Marine I’d ever seen. He must have been 6 feet 4 inches and built in proportion. It gave me a feeling of security to have such a body near.
Anyway, there we were trudging along. The rest of the patrol spread out. Just to start a conversation I said, “Cold ain’t it.” And then I laughed. Here I was with a good chance of getting killed any minute and I am talking about the weather.
My companion seemed to understand. I heard him laugh softly.
I looked at him and said: “I have never seen you before! I thought I knew every man in the outfit!”
“I just joined at the last minute”, he replied. “The name is Michael.”
“Is that so!” I said surprised. “That is my name too!”
“I know,” he said and then went on, “Michael, Michael of the morning . . .”
I was too amazed to say anything for a minute. How did he know my name, and a prayer that you had taught me? Then I smiled to myself, every guy in the outfit knew about me. Hadn’t I taught the prayer to anybody who would listen. Why, now and then, they even referred to me as St. Michael.
Neither of us spoke for a time and then he broke the silence. “We are going to have some trouble up ahead.”
He must have been in fine physical shape, or he was breathing so lightly, for I couldn’t see his breath. Mine poured out in great clouds. There was no smile on his face now. “Trouble ahead,” I thought to myself, “Well, with the Commies all around us, that is no great revelation!”
Snow began to fall in great thick globs. In a brief moment the whole countryside was blotted out. And I was marching in a white fog of wet sticky particles. My companion disappeared.
“Michael!” I shouted in sudden alarm.
I felt his hand on my arm, his voice was rich and strong: “This will stop shortly!”
His prophecy proved to be correct. In a few minutes the snow stopped as abruptly as it had begun. The sun was a hard shining disc.
I looked back for the rest of the patrol, there was no one in sight. We lost them in that heavy fall of snow. I looked ahead as we came over a little rise.
Mom, my heart stopped. There were seven of them. Seven Commies in their padded pants and jackets and their funny hats. Only there wasn’t anything funny about them now. Seven rifles were aimed at us.
“Down Michael!” I screamed and hit the frozen earth.
I heard those rifles fire almost as one. I heard the bullets. There was Michael still standing.
Mom, those guys couldn’t have missed, not at that range. I expected to see him literally blown to bits.
But there he stood, making no effort to fire himself. He was paralyzed with fear. It happens sometimes, Mom, even to the bravest. He was like a bird fascinated by a snake.
At least, that was what I thought then. I jumped up to pull him down and that was when I got mine. I felt a sudden flame in my chest. I often wondered what it felt like to be hit—now I know.
I remember feeling strong arms about me, arms that laid me ever so gently on a pillow of snow. I opened my eyes, for one last look. I was dying. Maybe I was even dead, I remember thinking: “Well, this is not so bad!”
Maybe I was looking into the sun. Maybe I was in shock. But it seemed I saw Michael standing erect again, only this time his face was shining with a terrible splendor.
As I say, maybe it was the sun in my eyes, but he seemed to change as I watched him. He grew bigger, his arms stretched out wide—maybe it was the snow falling again—but there was a brightness around him, like the wings of an Angel. In his hand was a sword! A sword that flashed with a million lights!
Well, that is the last thing I remember, until the rest of the fellas came up and found me. I do not know how much time had passed. Now and then I had but a moment’s rest from the pain and fever. I remember telling them of the enemy just ahead.
“Where is Michael?” I asked.
I saw them look at one another. “Where’s who?” asked one.
I said: “Michael! — Michael that big Marine I was walking with just before the snow squall hit us!”
“Kid,” said the sergeant, “You weren’t walking with anyone. I had my eyes on you the whole time. You were getting too far out. I was just going to call you in when you disappeared in the snow.”
He looked at me, curiously. “How did you do it kid?”
“How’d I do what?” I asked half angry despite my wound. “This marine named Michael and I were just . . .”
“Son,” said the sergeant kindly, “I picked this outfit myself and there just ain’t another Michael in it. You are the only Mike in it.”
He paused for a minute, “Just how did you do it kid? We heard shots. There hasn’t been a shot fired from your rifle. And there isn’t a bit of lead in them seven bodies over the hill there!”
I didn’t say anything, what could I say. I could only look open-mouthed with amazement. It was then the sergeant spoke again, “Kid,” he said gently, “everyone of those seven Commies was killed by a sword stroke!”
That is all I can tell you Mom. As I say, it may have been the sun in my eyes, it may have been the cold or the pain. But that is what happened.
Love, Michael
Easier Than Blinking
Having read the above account, we might be saying: “Wow!” Yet that is not even a kindergartener level for an angel! Even for “an infant angel in his diapers” ― so to speak ― getting rid of “Seven Commies” is “a piece of cake”! We forget―or are not even aware of―the power of angels. One single angel could destroy the entire universe! However, no angel can do what God won’t let him do. Angels use their power in accordance with God’s will. Since they act as agents of God, they can be immensely powerful. God actually has used angels as avengers against His enemies and the enemies of His Chosen People. The amazing swiftness of their movements, the devastating power of destruction which they manifest when God employs them as avenging Angels, are in reality ordinary exploits of the Angelic nature; yet they appear like miracles to us.
Avenging Angels
A classical example of Angelic avenging power has been recorded in the Bible. One single Angel of the Lord wiped out a whole army of Assyrian warriors in one night. Led by King Sennacherib, the Assyrians had come to take Jerusalem in the days of King Ezechias. At the prayers of the devout King Ezechias, the Lord promised to protect the city of Jerusalem and not to permit the Assyrians to shoot a single arrow into the city. The Lord gave the avenging mission to one of His Angels. “And it came to pass that night, that an angel of the Lord came, and slew in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and eighty-five thousand. And when he arose early in the morning, he saw all the bodies of the dead. And Sennacherib, King of the Assyrians, departing went away” (4 Kings 19:35-36; Tobias 1:21; Ecclesiasticus 48:24; Isaias 37:36). This extraordinary historical event is recorded in four different books of the Scripture and finds its confirmation in the history books of Josephus Flavius and of Herodotus.
Another case of avenging angels is when God sent His angel to kill all the first-born in Egypt because of the Pharao’s refusal to allow the Israelites―who were slaves in Egypt―to leave Egypt as God commanded Moses: “And the Lord said to Moses: ‘Yet one plague more will I bring upon Pharao and Egypt, and after that he shall let you go! … At midnight I will enter into Egypt. And every firstborn in the land of the Egyptians shall die, from the firstborn of Pharao who sits on his throne, even to the first born of the handmaid that is at the mill, and all the firstborn of beasts!’ … And it came to pass at midnight, the Lord slew every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharao, who sat on his throne, unto the firstborn of the captive woman that was in the prison, and all the firstborn of cattle” (Exodus 11:1-5; 12:29).
“The angel of the Lord had stretched out his hand over Jerusalem to destroy it” (2 Kings 24:16) … “The angel of the Lord destroying in all the coasts of Israel” (1 Paralipomenon 21:12) … “The angel of the Lord standing between Heaven and Earth, with a drawn sword in his hand, turned against Jerusalem” (1 Paralipomenon 21:16) … “He was seized with an exceedingly great fear, seeing the sword of the angel of the Lord” (1 Paralipomenon 21:30) … “Let the angel of the Lord pursue them!” (Psalm 34:6) … “The angel of the Lord destroyed them” (Ecclesiasticus 48:24) … “The angel of the Lord went out and slew a hundred and eighty-five thousand in the camp of the Assyrians” (Isaias 37:36) … “The angel of the Lord waits with a sword to cut thee in two, and to destroy you!” (Daniel 13:59) … “An angel of the Lord struck him, and he gave up the ghost” (Acts 12:23) … “He saw the angel standing in the way with a drawn sword” (Numbers 22:31) … “He saw the angel striking the people” (2 Kings 24:17) … “I saw another angel to whom it was given to hurt the Earth” (Apocalypse 7:2) … “The angel thrust in his sharp sickle into the Earth and cast it into the great press of the wrath of God” (Apocalypse 14:19).
The Avenging Angels of the Last Days
In the Book of the Apocalypse, we especially see mention of the seven avenging angels that are foretold for the last days of mankind:
“And the seven angels, who had the seven trumpets, prepared themselves to sound the trumpet. And the first angel sounded the trumpet and there followed hail and fire, mingled with blood, and it was cast on the earth, and the third part of the earth was burnt up …
“And the second angel sounded the trumpet and a great mountain, burning with fire, was cast into the sea, and the third part of the sea became blood, and the third part of those creatures died, which had life in the sea, and the third part of the ships was destroyed.
“And the third angel sounded the trumpet and a great star fell from heaven, burning as it were a torch, and it fell on the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters; and many men died of the waters.
“And the fourth angel sounded the trumpet and the third part of the sun was smitten, and the third part of the moon, and the third part of the stars, so that the third part of them was darkened, and the day did not shine for a third part of it, and the night in like manner. And I heard the voice of one flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice: ‘Woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! By reason of the rest of the voices of the three angels who are yet to sound the trumpet!’
“And the fifth angel sounded the trumpet and I saw a star fall from Heaven upon the Earth, and there was given to him the key of the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit: and the smoke of the pit arose like the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke of the pit. And from the smoke of the pit there came out locusts upon the earth. And it was commanded to them that they should not kill the men who have not the sign of God on their foreheads, but that they should torment them for five months and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion when he strikes a man.
“And the sixth angel sounded the trumpet and I heard a voice from the great altar which is before the eyes of God, saying to the sixth angel, who had the trumpet: ‘Let loose the four angels!’ And the four angels were loose to kill the third part of men. And by three plagues was slain the third part of men, by the fire and by the smoke and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths. And the rest of the men, who were not slain by these plagues, did not do penance from the works of their hands by which they adored devils, gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and wood. Neither did they penance from their murders, nor from their sorceries, nor from their fornication, nor from their thefts.
“And I saw another mighty angel, the seventh angel, come down from Heaven, and he cried with a loud voice as when a lion roars. And when he had cried, seven thunders uttered their voices. And when the seven thunders had uttered their voices, the angel lifted up his hand to heaven, and swore that time shall be no longer. In the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound the trumpet, the mystery of God shall be finished” (Apocalypse 8:6-13; 9:1-21; 10:1-7).
“The first angel poured out his vial upon the Earth, and there fell a sore and grievous wound upon men, who had the character of the beast; and upon them that adored the image thereof” (Apocalypse 16:2).
“The second angel poured out his vial upon the sea, and there came blood as it were of a dead man, and every living soul died in the sea” (Apocalypse 16:3).
“The third angel poured out his vial upon the rivers and the fountains of waters, and there was made blood” ” (Apocalypse 16:4).
“The fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun, and it was given unto him to afflict men with heat and fire, and men were scorched with great heat” (Apocalypse 16:8-9).
“The fifth angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast and his kingdom became dark, and they gnawed their tongues for pain” (Apocalypse 16:10).
“The sixth angel poured out his vial upon that great river Euphrates and dried up the water thereof” (Apocalypse 16:12).
“The seventh angel poured out his vial upon the air, and there came a great voice out of the temple from the throne, saying: ‘It is done!’ And there were lightnings, and voices, and thunders, and there was a great earthquake, so great such as never had been since men were upon the Earth” (Apocalypse 16:17-18).
Avenging Angels in Prophecy
● Our Lady of La Salette speaks of avenging angels who will bring an end to the terrible times to come: “Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death.”
● To Blessed Elena Aiello, Our Lady speaks of “fire will fall from the skies, which is not from the hands of men, but will be hurled directly from the angels!”
● To St. Padre Pio, Our Lord said: “My angels, who are to be the executioners of this work, are ready with their pointed swords! They will take special care to annihilate all those who mocked Me and would not believe in My revelations!”
● In 1944, Sister Lucia of Fatima wrote a letter to the Bishop of Leiria describing a vision that the three children of Fatima had been given. Lucia writes: “At the left of Our Lady and a little above, we saw an Angel with a flaming sword in his left hand―flashing, it gave out flames that looked as though they would set the world on fire! Pointing to the Earth with his right hand, the Angel cried out in a loud voice: ‘Penance, Penance, Penance!’”
● Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich was granted a vision concerning our times where “St. Michael came down threatening a number of unworthy pastors with his sword.”
● St. Francis de Paul speaks of Christendom amassing “a grand army, and the angels shall fight for them; and they shall kill all God’s enemies.”
Article 12
Thursday & Friday, September 26th & 27th
Mary Needs You to Save You!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Thursday & Friday, September 26th & 27th
Mary Needs You to Save You!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Huh? Mary Needs You?
What’s all this? Mary needs you? Isn’t it the other way round―that you need Mary and not that she needs you? Outside of Holy Trinity, Mary is the powerful of all creatures! St. Louis de Montfort writes: “Mary is the excellent masterpiece of the Most High … where God dwells more magnificently and more divinely than in any other place in the universe! … She is the grand and divine world of God, where there are beauties and treasures unspeakable. She is the magnificence of the Most High! … Oh, what grand and hidden things that mighty God has wrought in this admirable creature! … The saints have said admirable things of this holy city of God; and, as they themselves avow, they were never more eloquent and more content than when they spoke of her. Yet, after all they have said, they cry out that her merits cannot be fully seen; that her charity is immeasurable; that her power is incomprehensible; and finally, that her virtues and graces are an abyss which never can be sounded. O height incomprehensible! O breadth unspeakable! O length immeasurable! O abyss impenetrable! … Nay, the very devils in Hell respect her while they fear her! They fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints, and one of her threats against them more than all other torments. After that, we must cry out with the saints: ‘De Maria numquam satis!’—‘Of Mary there is never enough!’ We have not yet praised, exalted, honored, loved and served Mary as we ought! She deserves still more praise, still more respect, still more love, and still more service!”
After all that being said, how can it be said that “Mary needs you to save you”? Is it not, rather, that you need Mary in order to be saved? Isn’t that what many of the saints have said? For example, St. Bernardine of Sienna addresses these words to the Blessed Virgin Mary: “O Lady, thou art the dispenser of all graces, and since the grace of salvation can only come through thy hands, our salvation depends on thee!” St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation!” St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.” St. Anselm (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost!” St. Antonine is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified.” So how can it be said that Mary needs you to save you? Isn’t that an erroneous statement? Isn’t that prideful?
St. Augustine―a Father and Doctor of the Church―throws some light on the subject when he writes: “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us!” Some translate the Latin into the singular: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, and God could save you by Himself without you doing anything―but God will not save you without your cooperation. If you wish to be saved, then God needs you to cooperate with Him―for that proves that you truly wish to be saved.
It is similar to what St. Louis de Montfort writes about the interaction between God and Mary: “Mary, being a mere creature that has come from the hands of the Most High, is in comparison with His Infinite Majesty less than an atom; or rather, she is nothing at all, because only He is ‘He who is’ (Exodus 3:14); consequently, that grand Lord, always independent and sufficient to Himself, never had, and has not now, any absolute need of the holy Virgin for the accomplishment of His will and for the manifestation of His glory. He has but to will in order to do everything. Nevertheless, things being as they are now—that is to say, God having willed to commence and to complete His greatest works by the most holy Virgin ever since He created her—we may well think He will not change His conduct in the eternal ages; for He is God, and He changes not, either in His sentiments, or in His conduct” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Your God-Given Gift of Free-Will
God has given us a gift that is―at one and the same time―beautiful, powerful and dangerous. That gift is the gift of free-will. We can either use it as it is meant to be used―and thereby render our salvation more likely. Or we can use it in a way that is was not meant to be used―and thereby render our damnation more likely. God will not violate our free-will by forcing us to do something against our will. Nevertheless, if we love God, then our wills should be aligned and conformed to God’s will―for, as St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Love is a union of wills.” As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) ― and without the assistance of the grace of God, our free-will can do nothing good and risks leading us into sin through a weak-willed resistance to the enemies of our soul: (a) the devil, (b) the world, and (c) our own flesh with its passions, lusts and concupiscence.
We have been given the gift of free-will to freely choose what is good―rather than being forced to do what is good against our will. “Turn away from evil and do good!” (Psalm 33:15). “Hate evil and love good … Seek ye what is good, and not evil, so that you may live!” (Amos 5:14-15) … “For the wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “Be not overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good!” (Romans 12:21).
St. Paul speaks of this struggle of our free-will in trying to do good and avoid evil: “I lived for some time without the law. But when the commandment of God came, sin revived … For sin seduced me and killed me ... The law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold under sin … For I do not do that good which I will; but I do the evil which I hate! … For the ability to will is present with me; but to accomplish that which is good, I find not. For the good which my will wants to do, I do not; but the evil which my will does not want, that I do ... I find, then, a law, that when I have a will to do good, evil is present with me. For I am delighted with the law of God, according to the inward man―but I see another law in myself, the law of sin, fighting against the law of my mind and captivating me in sin. Unhappy man that I am―who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God, by Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:9-225).
Our free-will is not meant to be free to choose evil―that is an abuse of free-will and an abuse of God. “Refuse the evil, and choose the good! … Know to refuse the evil, and to choose the good!” (Isaias 7:15-16). “Blessed is he that could have transgressed, and has not transgressed; and who could do evil things, and has not done them!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:10).
The Slavery of Free-Will
Giving ourselves entirely to Mary―through the True Devotion Consecration to Mary―we make ourselves “slaves” of Our Lady and entrust all that we have to her. St. Louis de Montfort says: “They will consecrate themselves entirely to her service as subjects and slaves of love.” We act with her, through her, in her and for her―thus, we unite ourselves totally to her, our free-will being included, so that our free-will wants what she wants in all things. Our Lady needs you free-will to help ensure your salvation.
St. Louis de Montfort explains this notion of spiritual slavery: “Before Baptism we belonged to the devil, as his slaves; but Baptism has made us true slaves of Jesus Christ … We ought to serve Him, not as servants for wages, but as slaves of love … Here on Earth there are two ways of belonging to another and of depending on his authority: namely, simple service and slavery, whence we derive the words ‘servant’ and ‘slave.’ By common service among Christians a man engages himself to serve another during a certain time, at a certain rate of wages or of recompense. By slavery a man is entirely dependent on another during his whole life, and must serve his master without claiming any wages or reward, just as one of his beasts, over which he has the right of life and death.
“There are three sorts of slavery: (1) a slavery of nature, (2) a slavery of constraint and (3) a slavery of will. All creatures are slaves of God in the first sense: ‘The Earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof’ (Psalm 23:1); the demons and the damned are slaves in the second sense; and the just and the saints in the third sense. Because by slavery of the will [our free-will], we make choice of God and His service above all things, even though nature did not oblige us to do so, slavery of the will is the most perfect and most glorious to God, who beholds the heart (1 Kings 16:7), claims the heart (Proverbs 23:26), and calls Himself the God of the heart (Psalm 72:26), that is, of the loving will.
“There is an entire difference between a servant and a slave:
(1) A servant does not give all he is, all he has and all he can acquire, by himself or by another, to his master; but the slave gives himself whole and entire to his master, all he has and all he can acquire, without any exception.
(2) The servant demands wages for the services which he performs for his master; but the slave can demand nothing, whatever assiduity, whatever industry, whatever energy he may have at his work.
(3) The servant can leave his master when he pleases, or at least when the time of his service expires; but the slave has no right to quit his master at will.
(4) The master of the servant has no right of life and death over him, so that if he should kill him like one of his beasts of burden, he would commit an unjust homicide; but the master of the slave has by law a right of life and death over him,6 so that he may sell him to anybody he likes, or kill him as if he stood on the same level as one of his horses.
(5) Lastly, the servant is only for a time in his master’s service; the slave, always.
“There is nothing among men which makes us belong to another more than slavery. There is nothing among Christians which makes us more absolutely belong to Jesus Christ and His holy Mother than the slavery of the will, according to the example of Jesus Christ Himself, who took on Himself the form of a slave for love of us (Philippians 2:7); and also according to the example of the holy Virgin, who called herself the servant and slave of the Lord. (Luke 1:38). The Apostle calls himself, as by a title of honor, ‘the slave of Christ.’ Christians are often so called in the Holy Scriptures; and the word for the designation, ‘servus’ signified in olden times a slave in the completest sense, because there were no servants back then like those of the present day. Masters were served only by slaves or freedmen. This is what the Catechism of the holy Council of Trent, in order to leave no doubt about our being slaves of Jesus Christ, expresses by an unequivocal term, in calling us ‘mancipia Christi’, ‘slaves of Jesus Christ.’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Investing with Mary―Investing in Mary
When you invest, you make choices about what to do with your financial assets. The biggest difference between saving money and investing money is the level of risk taken. Saving typically results in you earning a lower return, but with virtually no risk. In contrast, investing allows you the opportunity to earn a higher return, but you also take on the risk of potential loss in order to do so. You’ve heard of this popular saying: “You need to spend money to make money.” The principle holds true for investment advice. The market can be volatile, and emotions can cloud your judgment. Advisors can help you stay objective and avoid making impulsive decisions based on fear or greed. A professional investment advisor will assess your initial financial position; they can manage your portfolio and oversee your investments; make investment decisions based on sound data and analysis rather than merely guessing; can assist you in avoiding unwarranted risks; guide you on the best methods to reach your objectives. Entrusting your hard-earned money to a professional investment advisor is better than “going it alone.” When you work with a professional investment advisor, you avoid making these mistakes and protect your money, while building wealth for your future.
Mary is that “professional investment advisor” to whom “God has made treasurer of His treasures, dispenser of His graces … the Most High has made her the sole treasurer of His treasures and the sole dispenser of His graces―to ennoble, to exalt and to enrich whom she wishes; to give entry to whom she wills into the narrow way of Heaven; to bring whom she wills, and in spite of all obstacles, through the narrow gate of life; and to give the throne, the scepter and the crown of king to whom she wills. God the Son has communicated all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has of beauty and splendor, of rarity and preciousness― and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). Mary is that “professional investment advisor” who will help you, not so much to save money as to save your soul―which is something that money cannot buy. As Our Lord says: “What shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). It is grace that saves the soul and Mary is the Treasurer and Mediatrix of all Grace―invest with Mary and invest in Mary and you will unlock the Treasure Chest of Grace.
Mary Needs Your 'Money'―Your Spiritual 'Money'
However, Mary needs your ‘money’ so that she can invest it in the best possible way to ensure your salvation―that is to say, she needs the ‘money’ or treasures of you all your thoughts, words and actions; your state of sanctifying grace; all that is good and holy within you. St. Louis writes: “Sad experience teaches me that I carry this treasure in a very frail vessel, and that I am too weak and too miserable to keep it safely of myself! … Leave not your gold and silver in your coffers, which have already been broken open by the evil spirits who have robbed you. These coffers are too little, too weak, too old, to hold a treasure so precious and so great … Trust not the gold of your charity, the silver of your purity, the waters of your heavenly graces, nor the wines of your merits and virtues, to a torn sack, an old and broken coffer, a spoilt and corrupted vessel, like yourselves, else you will be stripped by the robbers—that is to say, the demons—who are seeking and watching night and day for the right time to do it; and you will infect by your own bad odor of self-love, self-confidence and self-will, every most pure thing which God has given you.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“Considering our weakness and frailty, it is very difficult, to preserve in ourselves the graces and treasures which we have received from God, because we have this treasure, in frail vessels, i.e., in a corruptible body and in a weak and inconstant soul, which a mere nothing disturbs and dejects: ‘We have this treasure in earthen vessels’ (2 Corinthians 4:7). Man is so corrupt, so feeble and so inconstant, and yet trusts in himself, relies on his own strength and believes himself capable of safeguarding the treasure of his graces, virtues and merits. The devils, who are skillful thieves, wish to surprise us unawares, and to strip us of these graces and treasures. They watch day and night for the favorable moment. For that end they go round about us incessantly to devour us and to snatch from us in one moment, by a sin, all the graces and merits we have gained for many years. Their malice, their experience, their stratagems and their number ought to make us fear this misfortune immensely, especially when we see how many persons fuller of grace than we are, richer in virtues, better founded in experience and far higher exalted in sanctity, have been surprised, robbed and unhappily pillaged. Ah! How many have we not seen fall miserably, and in the twinkling of an eye lose all!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“From where comes that sad and curious change? It was not for lack of grace, but it was due to a lack of humility. They thought themselves capable of guarding their own treasures. They trusted in themselves, relied upon themselves. They thought their house secure enough, and their coffers strong enough, to keep the precious treasure of grace. It is because of that scarcely noticeable reliance upon themselves, though all the time it seemed to them that they were relying only on the grace of God, that the most just Lord permitted them to be robbed by leaving them to themselves. Alas! If only they would have confided their treasure to a Virgin powerful and faithful, who would have kept it for them as if it had been her own possession! It is difficult to persevere in justice because of the strange corruption of the world. The world is now so corrupt it seems inevitable that religious hearts should be soiled, if not by its mud, at least by its dust; so that it has become a kind of miracle for anyone to remain in the midst of that impetuous torrent without being drawn in by it, in the midst of that stormy sea without being drowned in it or stripped by pirates, in the midst of that pestilent air without being infected by it. It is the Virgin, alone faithful, in whom the serpent has never had part, who works this miracle for those who serve her.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“Pour, pour into the bosom and the heart of Mary all your treasures, all your graces, all your virtues. This good Mother always receives whatever we deposit with her—and what she has once received as depositary, she is obliged in justice to keep safe for us; just as a person with whom I had left a thousand dollars in trust would be under the obligation of keeping them safe for me, so that if, by his negligence, they were lost, he would in justice be responsible to me for them. But the faithful Mary cannot let anything which has been entrusted to her be lost through her negligence. Heaven and Earth could pass away sooner than that she could be negligent and faithless to those who trust in her. Happy is the man who has given everything to Mary, and has entrusted himself to Mary!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“A man no longer―as before―relies on his own dispositions, intentions, merits, virtues and good works; because, having made an entire sacrifice of them to Jesus Christ by that good Mother, he has but one treasure now, where all his goods are laid up, and that is no longer in himself, for his treasure is laid up Mary ... The Blessed Virgin retains and keeps the saints in their plenitude, so that it may not diminish. She prevents their virtues from being dissipated, their merits from perishing, their graces from being lost, prevents the devil from harming them, and even keeps Our Lord from punishing them when they sin. It is to her that the saints―who have saved themselves―have been the most attached and have done their best to attach others, in order to persevere in virtue. Happy, then, a thousand times happy, are the Christians who are now fastened faithfully and entirely to her, as to a firm anchor! The violence of the storms of this world will not make them founder, nor sink their heavenly treasures!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Growing Rich in Mary
“A man will soon become exceedingly rich, because he is every day amassing treasures by the secret of that touchstone: ‘He who honors his mother is as one who lays up a treasure’ (Ecclesiasticus 3:5) … We entrust all that we possess to the Blessed Virgin; we take her for the universal depositary of all our goods of nature and of grace ... in order that she may preserve and augment our virtues and merits, in spite of the devil, the world and the flesh, who put forth all their efforts to take them from us … By this practice we give to Our Lord, by His Mother’s hands, all our good works, that good Mother purifies them, embellishes them and makes them acceptable to her Son. She purifies them of all the stain of self-love, and of that imperceptible attachment to created things which slips unnoticed into our best actions. As soon as they are in her most pure and fruitful hands, those same hands, which have never been sullied or idle and which purify whatever they touch, take away from the present which we give her all that was spoiled or imperfect about it.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“She embellishes our works, adorning them with her own merits and virtues. It is as if a peasant, wishing to gain the friendship and benevolence of the king, went to the queen and presented her with a fruit which was his whole revenue, in order that she might present it to the king. The queen, having accepted the poor little offering from the peasant, would place the fruit on a large and beautiful dish of gold, and so, on the peasant’s behalf, would present it to the king. Then the fruit, however unworthy in itself to be a king’s present, would become worthy of his majesty because of the dish of gold on which it rested and the person who presented it. She presents these good works to Jesus Christ; for she keeps nothing of what is given her for herself, as if she were our last end. She faithfully passes it all on to Jesus. If we give to her, we give necessarily to Jesus. If we praise her or glorify her, she immediately praises and glorifies Jesus.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“She persuades Jesus to accept these good works, however little and poor the present may be for that Saint of Saints and that King of Kings. When we present anything to Jesus by ourselves, and relying on our own efforts and dispositions, Jesus examines the offering, and often rejects it because of the stains it has contracted through self-love, just as of old He rejected the sacrifices of the Jews when they were full of their own will. But when we present Him anything by the pure and virginal hands of His well-beloved, we take Him by His weak side, if it is allowable to use such a term. He does not consider so much the thing that is given Him as the Mother who presents it. He does not consider so much whence the offering comes, as by whom it comes. Thus Mary―who is never repelled, but is always well received by her Son―makes everything she presents to Him, whether great or small, acceptable to His Majesty. Mary has but to present it for Jesus to accept it and be pleased with it. St. Bernard used to give to those whom he conducted to perfection this great counsel: ‘When you want to offer anything to God, take care to offer it by the most agreeable and worthy hands of Mary, unless you wish to have it rejected.’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
God is the Boss―He Must be Obeyed!
God is in charge! God is the Boss! God gives the orders! It is either God’s way to Heaven or the highway to Hell! “You are not your own!” (1 Corinthians 6:1). Your soul―which gives life to your body―was personally created by God. “For in God were all things created in Heaven and on Earth, all things were created by Him and in Him” (Colossians 1:16). “All things were made by Him and without Him was made nothing that was made” (John 1:3). “The Lord has made all things for Himself” (Proverbs 16:4). “Thou hast created all things; and for Thy will they were and have been created” (Apocalypse 4:11). “Heaven is the Lord’s and the Earth and all things that are therein!” (Deuteronomy 10:14). “All that is in Heaven and in Earth, is Thine! Thou hast dominion over all!” (1 Paralipomenon 29:11-12). “All the Earth is Mine” (Exodus 19:5). “All souls are Mine―as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is Mine!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “All the beasts of the woods, the cattle on the hills and the oxen; all the birds of the air―all are mine; the world is mine, and the fullness thereof!” (Psalm 49:10-12). “‘The silver is mine, and the gold is mine!’ saith the Lord of hosts” (Aggeus 2:9). God is the Boss! God is the Landlord! God owns everything! We simply share in God’s possessions! We are mere tenants in God’s world! “We brought nothing into this world and certainly we can carry nothing out!” (1 Timothy 6:7). “What have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away―as it has pleased the Lord, so is it done!” (Job 1:21).
The logical consequence of God being the creator of all things, is that God must be obeyed in all things: “Be subject, therefore, to God” (James 4:7). “We ought to obey God!” (Acts 5:29). “It is good to obey the holy God” (Ecclesiasticus 46:12). “Love the Lord thy God and obey His voice!” (Deuteronomy 30:20). Our Lord Himself says: … “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words” (John 14:23-24) ... “You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 15:14). “Obey My words!’ saith the Lord” (Jeremias 35:13). “Keep all My commandments at all times!” (Deuteronomy 5:29). “Do what I shall command thee!” (Numbers 22:20). “All that I command thee, take great care to observe!” (Deuteronomy 8:1). “These words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thy heart!” (Deuteronomy 6:6). “Behold I set forth in your sight this day a blessing and a curse! A blessing if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God! A curse, if you revolt and obey not the commandments of the Lord your God!” (Deuteronomy 11:28). “If you will not hear the voice of the Lord your God, to keep and to do all His commandments, all these curses shall come upon you, and overtake you!” (Deuteronomy 28:1).
Devotion to Mary is God’s Command―Are We Obeying that Command?
Among the many things that God has commanded, is His desire for the whole world to be devoted to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Our Lady herself revealed this at Fatima: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” (June 13th & July 13th, 1917).
If devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary is established throughout the world, then MANY SOULS WILL BE SAVED. If you establish a devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in your soul, then YOUR SOUL WILL BE SAVED TOO! Yet that devotion has to come from you―you have work at building up such a devotion. More often than not, what we might imagine to be a devotion is not a real devotion, not a true devotion, but merely an imaginary devotion. There are many souls who have a false devotion to Mary or her Immaculate Heart―a false devotion is not a good devotion, it is a bad devotion―and it will not bear good fruit: “By their fruits you shall know them! Every good tree [true devotion] brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree [false devotion] brings forth evil fruit! A good tree [true devotion] cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree [false devotion] bring forth good fruit. Every tree [devotion] that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20).
Souls Damned Due to Neglecting Mary
If God demands devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, then what will be His reaction towards those who refuse or neglect to fulfill His demands? As St. Louis de Montfort says―God has no need of Mary for God Himself is omnipotent. Yet despite that fact, God has made Mary to be His masterpiece; He chooses to dispense all His graces through that masterpiece; and He wants us to go to Him through that masterpiece: “Mary is the excellent masterpiece of the Most High … Mary is the sanctuary and the repose of the Holy Trinity … Mary, being a mere creature that has come from the hands of the Most High, is in comparison with His Infinite Majesty less than an atom; or rather, she is nothing at all. Consequently, God, always independent and sufficient to Himself, never had, and has not now, any absolute need of the holy Virgin for the accomplishment of His will and for the manifestation of His glory. He has but to will in order to do everything. Nevertheless, God, having willed to commence and to complete His greatest works by the most holy Virgin, we may well think He will not change His conduct; for He is God, and He changes not, either in His sentiments, or in His conduct. God the Father made an assemblage of all His graces, a most rich treasury―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary. God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him. It is by her that He applies His merits and communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. God the Holy Ghost has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
We neglect Mary at our own peril! Who are we to refuse the economy of salvation that God has set up? It has to be God’s way to Heaven, or the highway to Hell! St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish!” St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins!” St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.” St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church), in his book, The Glories of Mary, says: “The intercession of Mary is even necessary to salvation. This necessity proceeds from the will itself of God, that all graces that He dispenses should pass by the hands of Mary, according to the opinion of St. Bernard.”
To Save You, Mary Needs Your Love and Devotion
God could anyone and everyone―but He doesn’t. Our Lady―being empowered by God―could also save anyone and everyone―but she doesn’t. This would not be just. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). Most souls are not even saved! As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Fear the danger of not listening and responding to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!” One of those “divine calls” is the call to devotion to Our Lady in general and the Immaculate Heart of Mary in particular.
Holy Mother Church applies the following words to Our Lady: “I am the Mother of fair love … In me is all grace of the way and in me is all hope of life … Come over to me, all ye that desire me, and be filled with my fruits … For my spirit is sweet above honey! … Blessed are they that keep my ways! Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not! Blessed is the man that hears me, and that watches daily at my gates, and waits at the posts of my doors. He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord … They that explain me shall have life everlasting … But he that shall sin against me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate me love death!” (Ecclesiasticus 24:24-31; Proverbs 8:36).
The Blessed Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
As we sow so shall we reap. The more you invest in Mary, the greater returns you will get. Give little to Mary and you will receive little in return.
What’s all this? Mary needs you? Isn’t it the other way round―that you need Mary and not that she needs you? Outside of Holy Trinity, Mary is the powerful of all creatures! St. Louis de Montfort writes: “Mary is the excellent masterpiece of the Most High … where God dwells more magnificently and more divinely than in any other place in the universe! … She is the grand and divine world of God, where there are beauties and treasures unspeakable. She is the magnificence of the Most High! … Oh, what grand and hidden things that mighty God has wrought in this admirable creature! … The saints have said admirable things of this holy city of God; and, as they themselves avow, they were never more eloquent and more content than when they spoke of her. Yet, after all they have said, they cry out that her merits cannot be fully seen; that her charity is immeasurable; that her power is incomprehensible; and finally, that her virtues and graces are an abyss which never can be sounded. O height incomprehensible! O breadth unspeakable! O length immeasurable! O abyss impenetrable! … Nay, the very devils in Hell respect her while they fear her! They fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints, and one of her threats against them more than all other torments. After that, we must cry out with the saints: ‘De Maria numquam satis!’—‘Of Mary there is never enough!’ We have not yet praised, exalted, honored, loved and served Mary as we ought! She deserves still more praise, still more respect, still more love, and still more service!”
After all that being said, how can it be said that “Mary needs you to save you”? Is it not, rather, that you need Mary in order to be saved? Isn’t that what many of the saints have said? For example, St. Bernardine of Sienna addresses these words to the Blessed Virgin Mary: “O Lady, thou art the dispenser of all graces, and since the grace of salvation can only come through thy hands, our salvation depends on thee!” St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation!” St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.” St. Anselm (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost!” St. Antonine is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified.” So how can it be said that Mary needs you to save you? Isn’t that an erroneous statement? Isn’t that prideful?
St. Augustine―a Father and Doctor of the Church―throws some light on the subject when he writes: “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us!” Some translate the Latin into the singular: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, and God could save you by Himself without you doing anything―but God will not save you without your cooperation. If you wish to be saved, then God needs you to cooperate with Him―for that proves that you truly wish to be saved.
It is similar to what St. Louis de Montfort writes about the interaction between God and Mary: “Mary, being a mere creature that has come from the hands of the Most High, is in comparison with His Infinite Majesty less than an atom; or rather, she is nothing at all, because only He is ‘He who is’ (Exodus 3:14); consequently, that grand Lord, always independent and sufficient to Himself, never had, and has not now, any absolute need of the holy Virgin for the accomplishment of His will and for the manifestation of His glory. He has but to will in order to do everything. Nevertheless, things being as they are now—that is to say, God having willed to commence and to complete His greatest works by the most holy Virgin ever since He created her—we may well think He will not change His conduct in the eternal ages; for He is God, and He changes not, either in His sentiments, or in His conduct” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Your God-Given Gift of Free-Will
God has given us a gift that is―at one and the same time―beautiful, powerful and dangerous. That gift is the gift of free-will. We can either use it as it is meant to be used―and thereby render our salvation more likely. Or we can use it in a way that is was not meant to be used―and thereby render our damnation more likely. God will not violate our free-will by forcing us to do something against our will. Nevertheless, if we love God, then our wills should be aligned and conformed to God’s will―for, as St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Love is a union of wills.” As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) ― and without the assistance of the grace of God, our free-will can do nothing good and risks leading us into sin through a weak-willed resistance to the enemies of our soul: (a) the devil, (b) the world, and (c) our own flesh with its passions, lusts and concupiscence.
We have been given the gift of free-will to freely choose what is good―rather than being forced to do what is good against our will. “Turn away from evil and do good!” (Psalm 33:15). “Hate evil and love good … Seek ye what is good, and not evil, so that you may live!” (Amos 5:14-15) … “For the wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “Be not overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good!” (Romans 12:21).
St. Paul speaks of this struggle of our free-will in trying to do good and avoid evil: “I lived for some time without the law. But when the commandment of God came, sin revived … For sin seduced me and killed me ... The law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold under sin … For I do not do that good which I will; but I do the evil which I hate! … For the ability to will is present with me; but to accomplish that which is good, I find not. For the good which my will wants to do, I do not; but the evil which my will does not want, that I do ... I find, then, a law, that when I have a will to do good, evil is present with me. For I am delighted with the law of God, according to the inward man―but I see another law in myself, the law of sin, fighting against the law of my mind and captivating me in sin. Unhappy man that I am―who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God, by Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:9-225).
Our free-will is not meant to be free to choose evil―that is an abuse of free-will and an abuse of God. “Refuse the evil, and choose the good! … Know to refuse the evil, and to choose the good!” (Isaias 7:15-16). “Blessed is he that could have transgressed, and has not transgressed; and who could do evil things, and has not done them!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:10).
The Slavery of Free-Will
Giving ourselves entirely to Mary―through the True Devotion Consecration to Mary―we make ourselves “slaves” of Our Lady and entrust all that we have to her. St. Louis de Montfort says: “They will consecrate themselves entirely to her service as subjects and slaves of love.” We act with her, through her, in her and for her―thus, we unite ourselves totally to her, our free-will being included, so that our free-will wants what she wants in all things. Our Lady needs you free-will to help ensure your salvation.
St. Louis de Montfort explains this notion of spiritual slavery: “Before Baptism we belonged to the devil, as his slaves; but Baptism has made us true slaves of Jesus Christ … We ought to serve Him, not as servants for wages, but as slaves of love … Here on Earth there are two ways of belonging to another and of depending on his authority: namely, simple service and slavery, whence we derive the words ‘servant’ and ‘slave.’ By common service among Christians a man engages himself to serve another during a certain time, at a certain rate of wages or of recompense. By slavery a man is entirely dependent on another during his whole life, and must serve his master without claiming any wages or reward, just as one of his beasts, over which he has the right of life and death.
“There are three sorts of slavery: (1) a slavery of nature, (2) a slavery of constraint and (3) a slavery of will. All creatures are slaves of God in the first sense: ‘The Earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof’ (Psalm 23:1); the demons and the damned are slaves in the second sense; and the just and the saints in the third sense. Because by slavery of the will [our free-will], we make choice of God and His service above all things, even though nature did not oblige us to do so, slavery of the will is the most perfect and most glorious to God, who beholds the heart (1 Kings 16:7), claims the heart (Proverbs 23:26), and calls Himself the God of the heart (Psalm 72:26), that is, of the loving will.
“There is an entire difference between a servant and a slave:
(1) A servant does not give all he is, all he has and all he can acquire, by himself or by another, to his master; but the slave gives himself whole and entire to his master, all he has and all he can acquire, without any exception.
(2) The servant demands wages for the services which he performs for his master; but the slave can demand nothing, whatever assiduity, whatever industry, whatever energy he may have at his work.
(3) The servant can leave his master when he pleases, or at least when the time of his service expires; but the slave has no right to quit his master at will.
(4) The master of the servant has no right of life and death over him, so that if he should kill him like one of his beasts of burden, he would commit an unjust homicide; but the master of the slave has by law a right of life and death over him,6 so that he may sell him to anybody he likes, or kill him as if he stood on the same level as one of his horses.
(5) Lastly, the servant is only for a time in his master’s service; the slave, always.
“There is nothing among men which makes us belong to another more than slavery. There is nothing among Christians which makes us more absolutely belong to Jesus Christ and His holy Mother than the slavery of the will, according to the example of Jesus Christ Himself, who took on Himself the form of a slave for love of us (Philippians 2:7); and also according to the example of the holy Virgin, who called herself the servant and slave of the Lord. (Luke 1:38). The Apostle calls himself, as by a title of honor, ‘the slave of Christ.’ Christians are often so called in the Holy Scriptures; and the word for the designation, ‘servus’ signified in olden times a slave in the completest sense, because there were no servants back then like those of the present day. Masters were served only by slaves or freedmen. This is what the Catechism of the holy Council of Trent, in order to leave no doubt about our being slaves of Jesus Christ, expresses by an unequivocal term, in calling us ‘mancipia Christi’, ‘slaves of Jesus Christ.’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Investing with Mary―Investing in Mary
When you invest, you make choices about what to do with your financial assets. The biggest difference between saving money and investing money is the level of risk taken. Saving typically results in you earning a lower return, but with virtually no risk. In contrast, investing allows you the opportunity to earn a higher return, but you also take on the risk of potential loss in order to do so. You’ve heard of this popular saying: “You need to spend money to make money.” The principle holds true for investment advice. The market can be volatile, and emotions can cloud your judgment. Advisors can help you stay objective and avoid making impulsive decisions based on fear or greed. A professional investment advisor will assess your initial financial position; they can manage your portfolio and oversee your investments; make investment decisions based on sound data and analysis rather than merely guessing; can assist you in avoiding unwarranted risks; guide you on the best methods to reach your objectives. Entrusting your hard-earned money to a professional investment advisor is better than “going it alone.” When you work with a professional investment advisor, you avoid making these mistakes and protect your money, while building wealth for your future.
Mary is that “professional investment advisor” to whom “God has made treasurer of His treasures, dispenser of His graces … the Most High has made her the sole treasurer of His treasures and the sole dispenser of His graces―to ennoble, to exalt and to enrich whom she wishes; to give entry to whom she wills into the narrow way of Heaven; to bring whom she wills, and in spite of all obstacles, through the narrow gate of life; and to give the throne, the scepter and the crown of king to whom she wills. God the Son has communicated all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has of beauty and splendor, of rarity and preciousness― and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). Mary is that “professional investment advisor” who will help you, not so much to save money as to save your soul―which is something that money cannot buy. As Our Lord says: “What shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). It is grace that saves the soul and Mary is the Treasurer and Mediatrix of all Grace―invest with Mary and invest in Mary and you will unlock the Treasure Chest of Grace.
Mary Needs Your 'Money'―Your Spiritual 'Money'
However, Mary needs your ‘money’ so that she can invest it in the best possible way to ensure your salvation―that is to say, she needs the ‘money’ or treasures of you all your thoughts, words and actions; your state of sanctifying grace; all that is good and holy within you. St. Louis writes: “Sad experience teaches me that I carry this treasure in a very frail vessel, and that I am too weak and too miserable to keep it safely of myself! … Leave not your gold and silver in your coffers, which have already been broken open by the evil spirits who have robbed you. These coffers are too little, too weak, too old, to hold a treasure so precious and so great … Trust not the gold of your charity, the silver of your purity, the waters of your heavenly graces, nor the wines of your merits and virtues, to a torn sack, an old and broken coffer, a spoilt and corrupted vessel, like yourselves, else you will be stripped by the robbers—that is to say, the demons—who are seeking and watching night and day for the right time to do it; and you will infect by your own bad odor of self-love, self-confidence and self-will, every most pure thing which God has given you.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“Considering our weakness and frailty, it is very difficult, to preserve in ourselves the graces and treasures which we have received from God, because we have this treasure, in frail vessels, i.e., in a corruptible body and in a weak and inconstant soul, which a mere nothing disturbs and dejects: ‘We have this treasure in earthen vessels’ (2 Corinthians 4:7). Man is so corrupt, so feeble and so inconstant, and yet trusts in himself, relies on his own strength and believes himself capable of safeguarding the treasure of his graces, virtues and merits. The devils, who are skillful thieves, wish to surprise us unawares, and to strip us of these graces and treasures. They watch day and night for the favorable moment. For that end they go round about us incessantly to devour us and to snatch from us in one moment, by a sin, all the graces and merits we have gained for many years. Their malice, their experience, their stratagems and their number ought to make us fear this misfortune immensely, especially when we see how many persons fuller of grace than we are, richer in virtues, better founded in experience and far higher exalted in sanctity, have been surprised, robbed and unhappily pillaged. Ah! How many have we not seen fall miserably, and in the twinkling of an eye lose all!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“From where comes that sad and curious change? It was not for lack of grace, but it was due to a lack of humility. They thought themselves capable of guarding their own treasures. They trusted in themselves, relied upon themselves. They thought their house secure enough, and their coffers strong enough, to keep the precious treasure of grace. It is because of that scarcely noticeable reliance upon themselves, though all the time it seemed to them that they were relying only on the grace of God, that the most just Lord permitted them to be robbed by leaving them to themselves. Alas! If only they would have confided their treasure to a Virgin powerful and faithful, who would have kept it for them as if it had been her own possession! It is difficult to persevere in justice because of the strange corruption of the world. The world is now so corrupt it seems inevitable that religious hearts should be soiled, if not by its mud, at least by its dust; so that it has become a kind of miracle for anyone to remain in the midst of that impetuous torrent without being drawn in by it, in the midst of that stormy sea without being drowned in it or stripped by pirates, in the midst of that pestilent air without being infected by it. It is the Virgin, alone faithful, in whom the serpent has never had part, who works this miracle for those who serve her.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“Pour, pour into the bosom and the heart of Mary all your treasures, all your graces, all your virtues. This good Mother always receives whatever we deposit with her—and what she has once received as depositary, she is obliged in justice to keep safe for us; just as a person with whom I had left a thousand dollars in trust would be under the obligation of keeping them safe for me, so that if, by his negligence, they were lost, he would in justice be responsible to me for them. But the faithful Mary cannot let anything which has been entrusted to her be lost through her negligence. Heaven and Earth could pass away sooner than that she could be negligent and faithless to those who trust in her. Happy is the man who has given everything to Mary, and has entrusted himself to Mary!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“A man no longer―as before―relies on his own dispositions, intentions, merits, virtues and good works; because, having made an entire sacrifice of them to Jesus Christ by that good Mother, he has but one treasure now, where all his goods are laid up, and that is no longer in himself, for his treasure is laid up Mary ... The Blessed Virgin retains and keeps the saints in their plenitude, so that it may not diminish. She prevents their virtues from being dissipated, their merits from perishing, their graces from being lost, prevents the devil from harming them, and even keeps Our Lord from punishing them when they sin. It is to her that the saints―who have saved themselves―have been the most attached and have done their best to attach others, in order to persevere in virtue. Happy, then, a thousand times happy, are the Christians who are now fastened faithfully and entirely to her, as to a firm anchor! The violence of the storms of this world will not make them founder, nor sink their heavenly treasures!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Growing Rich in Mary
“A man will soon become exceedingly rich, because he is every day amassing treasures by the secret of that touchstone: ‘He who honors his mother is as one who lays up a treasure’ (Ecclesiasticus 3:5) … We entrust all that we possess to the Blessed Virgin; we take her for the universal depositary of all our goods of nature and of grace ... in order that she may preserve and augment our virtues and merits, in spite of the devil, the world and the flesh, who put forth all their efforts to take them from us … By this practice we give to Our Lord, by His Mother’s hands, all our good works, that good Mother purifies them, embellishes them and makes them acceptable to her Son. She purifies them of all the stain of self-love, and of that imperceptible attachment to created things which slips unnoticed into our best actions. As soon as they are in her most pure and fruitful hands, those same hands, which have never been sullied or idle and which purify whatever they touch, take away from the present which we give her all that was spoiled or imperfect about it.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“She embellishes our works, adorning them with her own merits and virtues. It is as if a peasant, wishing to gain the friendship and benevolence of the king, went to the queen and presented her with a fruit which was his whole revenue, in order that she might present it to the king. The queen, having accepted the poor little offering from the peasant, would place the fruit on a large and beautiful dish of gold, and so, on the peasant’s behalf, would present it to the king. Then the fruit, however unworthy in itself to be a king’s present, would become worthy of his majesty because of the dish of gold on which it rested and the person who presented it. She presents these good works to Jesus Christ; for she keeps nothing of what is given her for herself, as if she were our last end. She faithfully passes it all on to Jesus. If we give to her, we give necessarily to Jesus. If we praise her or glorify her, she immediately praises and glorifies Jesus.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“She persuades Jesus to accept these good works, however little and poor the present may be for that Saint of Saints and that King of Kings. When we present anything to Jesus by ourselves, and relying on our own efforts and dispositions, Jesus examines the offering, and often rejects it because of the stains it has contracted through self-love, just as of old He rejected the sacrifices of the Jews when they were full of their own will. But when we present Him anything by the pure and virginal hands of His well-beloved, we take Him by His weak side, if it is allowable to use such a term. He does not consider so much the thing that is given Him as the Mother who presents it. He does not consider so much whence the offering comes, as by whom it comes. Thus Mary―who is never repelled, but is always well received by her Son―makes everything she presents to Him, whether great or small, acceptable to His Majesty. Mary has but to present it for Jesus to accept it and be pleased with it. St. Bernard used to give to those whom he conducted to perfection this great counsel: ‘When you want to offer anything to God, take care to offer it by the most agreeable and worthy hands of Mary, unless you wish to have it rejected.’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
God is the Boss―He Must be Obeyed!
God is in charge! God is the Boss! God gives the orders! It is either God’s way to Heaven or the highway to Hell! “You are not your own!” (1 Corinthians 6:1). Your soul―which gives life to your body―was personally created by God. “For in God were all things created in Heaven and on Earth, all things were created by Him and in Him” (Colossians 1:16). “All things were made by Him and without Him was made nothing that was made” (John 1:3). “The Lord has made all things for Himself” (Proverbs 16:4). “Thou hast created all things; and for Thy will they were and have been created” (Apocalypse 4:11). “Heaven is the Lord’s and the Earth and all things that are therein!” (Deuteronomy 10:14). “All that is in Heaven and in Earth, is Thine! Thou hast dominion over all!” (1 Paralipomenon 29:11-12). “All the Earth is Mine” (Exodus 19:5). “All souls are Mine―as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is Mine!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “All the beasts of the woods, the cattle on the hills and the oxen; all the birds of the air―all are mine; the world is mine, and the fullness thereof!” (Psalm 49:10-12). “‘The silver is mine, and the gold is mine!’ saith the Lord of hosts” (Aggeus 2:9). God is the Boss! God is the Landlord! God owns everything! We simply share in God’s possessions! We are mere tenants in God’s world! “We brought nothing into this world and certainly we can carry nothing out!” (1 Timothy 6:7). “What have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away―as it has pleased the Lord, so is it done!” (Job 1:21).
The logical consequence of God being the creator of all things, is that God must be obeyed in all things: “Be subject, therefore, to God” (James 4:7). “We ought to obey God!” (Acts 5:29). “It is good to obey the holy God” (Ecclesiasticus 46:12). “Love the Lord thy God and obey His voice!” (Deuteronomy 30:20). Our Lord Himself says: … “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words” (John 14:23-24) ... “You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 15:14). “Obey My words!’ saith the Lord” (Jeremias 35:13). “Keep all My commandments at all times!” (Deuteronomy 5:29). “Do what I shall command thee!” (Numbers 22:20). “All that I command thee, take great care to observe!” (Deuteronomy 8:1). “These words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thy heart!” (Deuteronomy 6:6). “Behold I set forth in your sight this day a blessing and a curse! A blessing if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God! A curse, if you revolt and obey not the commandments of the Lord your God!” (Deuteronomy 11:28). “If you will not hear the voice of the Lord your God, to keep and to do all His commandments, all these curses shall come upon you, and overtake you!” (Deuteronomy 28:1).
Devotion to Mary is God’s Command―Are We Obeying that Command?
Among the many things that God has commanded, is His desire for the whole world to be devoted to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Our Lady herself revealed this at Fatima: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” (June 13th & July 13th, 1917).
If devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary is established throughout the world, then MANY SOULS WILL BE SAVED. If you establish a devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in your soul, then YOUR SOUL WILL BE SAVED TOO! Yet that devotion has to come from you―you have work at building up such a devotion. More often than not, what we might imagine to be a devotion is not a real devotion, not a true devotion, but merely an imaginary devotion. There are many souls who have a false devotion to Mary or her Immaculate Heart―a false devotion is not a good devotion, it is a bad devotion―and it will not bear good fruit: “By their fruits you shall know them! Every good tree [true devotion] brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree [false devotion] brings forth evil fruit! A good tree [true devotion] cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree [false devotion] bring forth good fruit. Every tree [devotion] that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20).
Souls Damned Due to Neglecting Mary
If God demands devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, then what will be His reaction towards those who refuse or neglect to fulfill His demands? As St. Louis de Montfort says―God has no need of Mary for God Himself is omnipotent. Yet despite that fact, God has made Mary to be His masterpiece; He chooses to dispense all His graces through that masterpiece; and He wants us to go to Him through that masterpiece: “Mary is the excellent masterpiece of the Most High … Mary is the sanctuary and the repose of the Holy Trinity … Mary, being a mere creature that has come from the hands of the Most High, is in comparison with His Infinite Majesty less than an atom; or rather, she is nothing at all. Consequently, God, always independent and sufficient to Himself, never had, and has not now, any absolute need of the holy Virgin for the accomplishment of His will and for the manifestation of His glory. He has but to will in order to do everything. Nevertheless, God, having willed to commence and to complete His greatest works by the most holy Virgin, we may well think He will not change His conduct; for He is God, and He changes not, either in His sentiments, or in His conduct. God the Father made an assemblage of all His graces, a most rich treasury―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary. God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him. It is by her that He applies His merits and communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. God the Holy Ghost has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
We neglect Mary at our own peril! Who are we to refuse the economy of salvation that God has set up? It has to be God’s way to Heaven, or the highway to Hell! St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish!” St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins!” St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.” St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church), in his book, The Glories of Mary, says: “The intercession of Mary is even necessary to salvation. This necessity proceeds from the will itself of God, that all graces that He dispenses should pass by the hands of Mary, according to the opinion of St. Bernard.”
To Save You, Mary Needs Your Love and Devotion
God could anyone and everyone―but He doesn’t. Our Lady―being empowered by God―could also save anyone and everyone―but she doesn’t. This would not be just. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). Most souls are not even saved! As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Fear the danger of not listening and responding to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!” One of those “divine calls” is the call to devotion to Our Lady in general and the Immaculate Heart of Mary in particular.
Holy Mother Church applies the following words to Our Lady: “I am the Mother of fair love … In me is all grace of the way and in me is all hope of life … Come over to me, all ye that desire me, and be filled with my fruits … For my spirit is sweet above honey! … Blessed are they that keep my ways! Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not! Blessed is the man that hears me, and that watches daily at my gates, and waits at the posts of my doors. He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord … They that explain me shall have life everlasting … But he that shall sin against me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate me love death!” (Ecclesiasticus 24:24-31; Proverbs 8:36).
The Blessed Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
As we sow so shall we reap. The more you invest in Mary, the greater returns you will get. Give little to Mary and you will receive little in return.
Article 11
Tuesday & Wednesday, September 24th & 25th
Do Your Boot Camp Now or Be Booted into Purgatory or Hell!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Tuesday & Wednesday, September 24th & 25th
Do Your Boot Camp Now or Be Booted into Purgatory or Hell!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
God Wants Fighters
God wants fighters because “the life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). God wants fighters because it is only fighters who have the best chance of attaining Heaven: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood―striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4). God does not want “armchair warriors” or “keyboard warriors”, but real warriors who heart is in the fight: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
The Weapons for the Fight
“They came up, and laid hands on Jesus and arrested Him. And behold one of them that were with Jesus, stretching forth his hand, drew out his sword and striking the servant of the high priest, cut off his ear. Then Jesus said to him: ‘Put your sword back into its place―for all that take the sword, shall perish with the sword!’” (Matthew 26:50-52). “Take the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God!” (Ephesians 6:17). “For the word of God is living and effectual, and more piercing than any two edged sword” (Hebrews 4:12). “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty to God unto the pulling down of fortifications, destroying counsels!” (2 Corinthians 10:4).
As we read above, St. Peter wanted to fight with physical, material weapons―he put his trust in human weapons rather than heavenly weapons. We are more or less the same―we trust more in human, physical, material things rather than trusting in divine, spiritual and supernatural things. If ever there was a quote to puncture that proud inflated balloon of self-sufficiency, then it is Our Lord’s words: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Holy Scripture adds: “We should not trust in ourselves, but in God!” (2 Corinthians 1:9). “Put not your trust in princes!” (Psalm 145:2) … “It is good to confide in the Lord, rather than to have confidence in man! It is good to trust in the Lord, rather than to trust in princes!” (Psalm 117:8-9). God is my strong one and my shield―in Him will I trust! … God is the shield of all that trust in Him!” (2 Kings 22:3, 31). “Some trust in chariots, and some in horses―but we will call upon the Name of the Lord our God!” (Psalm 19:8). “They trust in their weapons and in their boldness―but we trust in the Almighty Lord, Who in a single moment can utterly destroy both them that come against us, and the whole world!” (2 Machabees 8:18). “They that trust in their own strength and glory in the multitude of their riches―no one can redeem, nor shall redeem!” (Psalm 48:7-8). “Blessed is the man that has not gone after gold, nor put his trust in money, nor in treasures!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:8). “Trust not in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God―Who gives to us all things abundantly!” (1 Timothy 6:17). “How hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God!” (Mark 10:24). “He that holds the bow shall not stand; and the swift of foot shall not escape; neither shall the rider of the horse save his life!” (Amos 2:15). “I will not trust in my bow; neither shall my sword save me!” (Psalm 43:7). “Lift up thy arm, O Lord, and crush their power with Thy power, those who trust in their numbers, and in their chariots, and in their spears, and in their shields, and in their arrows, and glory in their spears!” (Judith 9:9-11).
Which Creed Do You Believe?
Have you ever heard of The Rifleman’s Creed? Most probably not! The Rifleman's Creed (also known as My Rifle and The Creed of the United States Marine) is a part of basic United States Marine Corps doctrine. Major General William H. Rupertus wrote it during the Second World War between late 1941 and early 1942, following the attack on Pearl Harbor. His reasoning for writing the Creed is believed to be that he felt that his men had to understand the concept “that the only weapon which stands between them and death is the rifle. They must understand that their rifle is their life!” Here is the text of The Rifleman's Creed (or The Creed of the United States Marine):
“This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
My rifle is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life.
Without me, my rifle is useless. Without my rifle, I am useless. I must fire my rifle true. I must shoot straighter than my enemy who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me. I will!
My rifle and I know that what counts in war is not the rounds we fire, the noise of our burst, nor the smoke we make. We know that it is the hits that count. We will hit!
My rifle is human, even as I [am human], because it is my life. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strength, its parts, its accessories, its sights and its barrel. I will keep my rifle clean and ready, even as I am clean and ready. We will become part of each other. We will!
Before God, I swear this creed. My rifle and I are the defenders of my country. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life.
So be it, until victory is America's and there is no enemy, but peace!”
In the past, all enlisted Marines would learn the Creed at recruit training in boot camp. However, in recent years the Creed has been relegated to the back pages of the standard recruit training guide book, and its memorization is no longer required for recruits―nevertheless, its significance is still passed on through drill instructors to their recruits throughout each training cycle. The Rifleman's Creed continues to stand as a pillar concerning the ethos of the Marine Corps. In recruit training for enlisted Marines and Officer Candidates School for commissioned officers the Rifleman's Creed is inescapable. While its continued recitation might vary from company to company, platoon to platoon, its presence is assured during the period of recruit training at boot camp. The Rifleman’s Creed is one of the keystones of the United States Marine Corps doctrine and helps designate that every Marine is, first and foremost, a Rifleman. The last page of the data book reinforces this ideology with the quote from General Alfred M. Gray Jr., the 29th Commandant of the Marine Corps: “Every Marine is, first and foremost, a rifleman. All other conditions are secondary.” The Creed seeks to coerce Marines into seeing their rifle as more than a simple tool of war. This sense of almost familial attachment that a Marine feels towards their rifle is paramount, as a Marine would never leave a man behind, they would also not leave their rifle behind.
The Rosary Rifle
What has been said of the Marine and his Rifle, can and should be said of the Catholic Soldier of Christ and his Rosary. The Rosary is the key and foremost weapon of every Catholic. St. Padre Pio used to say: “The Rosary is THE weapon!” Sister Lucia of Fatima tells us: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
The Rosary Creed
You could take the above Rifleman’s Creed and transform it into a Rosary Creed. For example:
“This is my Rosary. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
My Rosary is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life.
Without me, my Rosary is useless. Without my Rosary, I am useless. I must pray my Rosary correctly. I must shoot my beads straight at my enemy who is trying to seduce and damn me. I must overcome him before he overcomes me. I will!
My Rosary and I know that what counts in spiritual warfare is not how many Rosaries we say, how loud we say them, nor show we make. One Hail Mary prayed well is better than hundreds said badly. We know that it is the hits that count. We will hit!
My Rosary is a part of me, because it is my life and leads me to eternal life. Thus, I will learn and get to know it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strength, its parts, its accessories, its sights and its meditations. I will keep my Rosary clean and ready, even as I am clean and ready. We will become part of each other. We will!
Before God, I swear this creed. My Rosary and I are the defenders of the Church, my Faith and my country. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life and soul and lives and souls of others!
So be it, until victory is Church’s through the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and there is no longer an enemy, but only peace on Earth!”
Hence it is that Our Lady of Fatima, at every apparition, constantly and insistently demanded that we pray we Rosary daily and often: “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war!” (May 1917) … “Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war … (June 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted!” (July 1917) … “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (August 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war!” (September 1917) … “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” (October 1917).
Weapons Depend Upon Users
U.S. Marine training at boot camp naturally focuses on weapon training. The Rosary is, without doubt, a weapon. Our Lady of Akita refers to the Rosary as being a weapon: “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son!” Pope Pius XI wrote that “The Rosary is a powerful weapon to put the demons to flight and a most powerful weapon to overcome the devil ... It serves admirably to overcome the enemies of God and of religion.” St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina said: “The Rosary is THE weapon.” Padre Pio always wore the Rosary around his arm at night. A few days before his death, as Padre Pio was getting into bed, he said to the friars who were in his room: “Give me my weapon!” And the friars, surprised and curious, asked him: “Where is the weapon? We cannot see anything!” Padre Pio replied: “It is in my habit, which you have just hung up!” After having gone through the pockets of his religious habit, the friars said to him: “Padre, there is no weapon in your habit! . . . We can only find your Rosary beads there!” Padre Pio immediately said: “And is this not a weapon? ... The true weapon?!” Concerning the Rosary, Our Lady herself said to Padre Pio: “With this weapon you will win!”
A weapon is only as good as the person using it. One quote says: “A sword is only as good as the man who wields it.” We can say: “The Rosary is only as good as person who prays it.” Hence it is that St. Louis de Montfort warns: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly! … It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words! … Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!”
And we need to be better than we are if we want to get to Heaven ― “For broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat!” warns Our Lord (Matthew 7:13). St. Padre Pio speaks of the Rosary being a weapon than leads to salvation: “The Rosary is the weapon of defense and salvation.” Pope Leo XIII wrote: “By the power of the most holy Rosary the Church triumphed magnificently over every obstacle and provided for the salvation of her children … This form of prayer was most powerful and particularly efficacious for attaining eternal life” (Magnae Dei Matris & Diuturni Temporis). Hence the Doctor of the Church, St. Alphonsus Liguori, said: “Know that the salvation of my soul depends on saying the Rosary.” As Sister Lucia of Fatima said to Fr. Fuentes in 1957: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary … With the Holy Rosary, we will sanctify ourselves and we will save ourselves!” To which Blessed Alan de la Roche adds: “If you persevere in reciting the Rosary, this will be a most probable sign of your eternal salvation!” St. Louis de Montfort, in his book The Secret of the Rosary, quotes the devils being forced to speak by Our Lady―they said: “Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!”
Soldiers Trained to Survive, Not Die
Soldiers are trained to fight and win, not fight and die―even though it is known that some will end up being killed in action. Catholics are baptized in order to get to Heaven, not Hell―though it is known that the majority of Catholics end up being damned. Why is that? The reasons are many―but the chief reasons are similar to why some soldiers end up being poor soldiers: (1) lack of training, (2) lack of knowledge and (3) lack of a proper attitude and seriousness. Whether it be on a battlefield during war, or on the spiritual battlefield of life―if you are not sufficiently trained for the fight; if you little or knowledge about weapons and their use, warfare and its tactics; if you have no real desire to fight―then your risks of being lost are immensely high.
Our Lady has indicated the same thing to us in her various apparitions―pointing out our deficiencies and lack of seriousness about the Faith and the salvation of our souls. She says that we have “have neglected prayer and penance” … “Many hearts consecrated to God in the priestly and religious state fall into lukewarmness” … “The true Faith is forgotten” … “The Gospel of Jesus Christ has been forgotten” … There is “a universal slackening in everything that concerns the service of God” … “The Church is full of those who accept compromises!” … “The devil has bedimmed their intelligence” … “The Holy Eucharist is subject to many horrible sacrileges and profanations” … “The Sacrament of Penance is forgotten” … “The Sacrament of Matrimony is attacked and profaned” … “Members of religious orders break away from the true religion” … “Many priests lose their spirit” … “The Christian spirit is decaying rapidly, extinguishing the precious light of Faith” … “Many abandon the Faith” … “They are attached to wealth and riches” and “careless in their religious duties” … “People think of amusements” … “Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures is spread all over the Earth” … “All order and all justice are trampled underfoot” … “Men become more and more perverted” … “living faithless and wicked lives” … “Unbridled luxury and impurity conquers innumerable frivolous souls” … “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” … “There are no more generous souls!” … “There is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people!” … “If only human beings and religious knew what Heaven is and what it is to possess God, how differently they would live, sparing no sacrifice in order to enter more fully into possession of it!” … “No one on the face of the Earth is aware from where comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers!” (Words of Our Lady of Good Success, La Salette, Fatima & Akita).
Our Lady further adds, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, that all of this results in massive and uncountable numbers of souls being damned through their indifference and negligence: “How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation.”
This unimaginable number of lost souls grieves Our Lady because of their negligence in seeking out her help: “So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing―because the wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... As the Mother of clemency, it is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, for failing to call upon me, so many souls should be lost! ... This is a sorrow beyond all sorrows, and a misfortune without equal and without remedy!”
The Blessed Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
God wants fighters because “the life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). God wants fighters because it is only fighters who have the best chance of attaining Heaven: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood―striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4). God does not want “armchair warriors” or “keyboard warriors”, but real warriors who heart is in the fight: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
The Weapons for the Fight
“They came up, and laid hands on Jesus and arrested Him. And behold one of them that were with Jesus, stretching forth his hand, drew out his sword and striking the servant of the high priest, cut off his ear. Then Jesus said to him: ‘Put your sword back into its place―for all that take the sword, shall perish with the sword!’” (Matthew 26:50-52). “Take the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God!” (Ephesians 6:17). “For the word of God is living and effectual, and more piercing than any two edged sword” (Hebrews 4:12). “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty to God unto the pulling down of fortifications, destroying counsels!” (2 Corinthians 10:4).
As we read above, St. Peter wanted to fight with physical, material weapons―he put his trust in human weapons rather than heavenly weapons. We are more or less the same―we trust more in human, physical, material things rather than trusting in divine, spiritual and supernatural things. If ever there was a quote to puncture that proud inflated balloon of self-sufficiency, then it is Our Lord’s words: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Holy Scripture adds: “We should not trust in ourselves, but in God!” (2 Corinthians 1:9). “Put not your trust in princes!” (Psalm 145:2) … “It is good to confide in the Lord, rather than to have confidence in man! It is good to trust in the Lord, rather than to trust in princes!” (Psalm 117:8-9). God is my strong one and my shield―in Him will I trust! … God is the shield of all that trust in Him!” (2 Kings 22:3, 31). “Some trust in chariots, and some in horses―but we will call upon the Name of the Lord our God!” (Psalm 19:8). “They trust in their weapons and in their boldness―but we trust in the Almighty Lord, Who in a single moment can utterly destroy both them that come against us, and the whole world!” (2 Machabees 8:18). “They that trust in their own strength and glory in the multitude of their riches―no one can redeem, nor shall redeem!” (Psalm 48:7-8). “Blessed is the man that has not gone after gold, nor put his trust in money, nor in treasures!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:8). “Trust not in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God―Who gives to us all things abundantly!” (1 Timothy 6:17). “How hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God!” (Mark 10:24). “He that holds the bow shall not stand; and the swift of foot shall not escape; neither shall the rider of the horse save his life!” (Amos 2:15). “I will not trust in my bow; neither shall my sword save me!” (Psalm 43:7). “Lift up thy arm, O Lord, and crush their power with Thy power, those who trust in their numbers, and in their chariots, and in their spears, and in their shields, and in their arrows, and glory in their spears!” (Judith 9:9-11).
Which Creed Do You Believe?
Have you ever heard of The Rifleman’s Creed? Most probably not! The Rifleman's Creed (also known as My Rifle and The Creed of the United States Marine) is a part of basic United States Marine Corps doctrine. Major General William H. Rupertus wrote it during the Second World War between late 1941 and early 1942, following the attack on Pearl Harbor. His reasoning for writing the Creed is believed to be that he felt that his men had to understand the concept “that the only weapon which stands between them and death is the rifle. They must understand that their rifle is their life!” Here is the text of The Rifleman's Creed (or The Creed of the United States Marine):
“This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
My rifle is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life.
Without me, my rifle is useless. Without my rifle, I am useless. I must fire my rifle true. I must shoot straighter than my enemy who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me. I will!
My rifle and I know that what counts in war is not the rounds we fire, the noise of our burst, nor the smoke we make. We know that it is the hits that count. We will hit!
My rifle is human, even as I [am human], because it is my life. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strength, its parts, its accessories, its sights and its barrel. I will keep my rifle clean and ready, even as I am clean and ready. We will become part of each other. We will!
Before God, I swear this creed. My rifle and I are the defenders of my country. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life.
So be it, until victory is America's and there is no enemy, but peace!”
In the past, all enlisted Marines would learn the Creed at recruit training in boot camp. However, in recent years the Creed has been relegated to the back pages of the standard recruit training guide book, and its memorization is no longer required for recruits―nevertheless, its significance is still passed on through drill instructors to their recruits throughout each training cycle. The Rifleman's Creed continues to stand as a pillar concerning the ethos of the Marine Corps. In recruit training for enlisted Marines and Officer Candidates School for commissioned officers the Rifleman's Creed is inescapable. While its continued recitation might vary from company to company, platoon to platoon, its presence is assured during the period of recruit training at boot camp. The Rifleman’s Creed is one of the keystones of the United States Marine Corps doctrine and helps designate that every Marine is, first and foremost, a Rifleman. The last page of the data book reinforces this ideology with the quote from General Alfred M. Gray Jr., the 29th Commandant of the Marine Corps: “Every Marine is, first and foremost, a rifleman. All other conditions are secondary.” The Creed seeks to coerce Marines into seeing their rifle as more than a simple tool of war. This sense of almost familial attachment that a Marine feels towards their rifle is paramount, as a Marine would never leave a man behind, they would also not leave their rifle behind.
The Rosary Rifle
What has been said of the Marine and his Rifle, can and should be said of the Catholic Soldier of Christ and his Rosary. The Rosary is the key and foremost weapon of every Catholic. St. Padre Pio used to say: “The Rosary is THE weapon!” Sister Lucia of Fatima tells us: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
The Rosary Creed
You could take the above Rifleman’s Creed and transform it into a Rosary Creed. For example:
“This is my Rosary. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
My Rosary is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life.
Without me, my Rosary is useless. Without my Rosary, I am useless. I must pray my Rosary correctly. I must shoot my beads straight at my enemy who is trying to seduce and damn me. I must overcome him before he overcomes me. I will!
My Rosary and I know that what counts in spiritual warfare is not how many Rosaries we say, how loud we say them, nor show we make. One Hail Mary prayed well is better than hundreds said badly. We know that it is the hits that count. We will hit!
My Rosary is a part of me, because it is my life and leads me to eternal life. Thus, I will learn and get to know it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strength, its parts, its accessories, its sights and its meditations. I will keep my Rosary clean and ready, even as I am clean and ready. We will become part of each other. We will!
Before God, I swear this creed. My Rosary and I are the defenders of the Church, my Faith and my country. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life and soul and lives and souls of others!
So be it, until victory is Church’s through the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and there is no longer an enemy, but only peace on Earth!”
Hence it is that Our Lady of Fatima, at every apparition, constantly and insistently demanded that we pray we Rosary daily and often: “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war!” (May 1917) … “Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war … (June 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted!” (July 1917) … “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (August 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war!” (September 1917) … “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” (October 1917).
Weapons Depend Upon Users
U.S. Marine training at boot camp naturally focuses on weapon training. The Rosary is, without doubt, a weapon. Our Lady of Akita refers to the Rosary as being a weapon: “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son!” Pope Pius XI wrote that “The Rosary is a powerful weapon to put the demons to flight and a most powerful weapon to overcome the devil ... It serves admirably to overcome the enemies of God and of religion.” St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina said: “The Rosary is THE weapon.” Padre Pio always wore the Rosary around his arm at night. A few days before his death, as Padre Pio was getting into bed, he said to the friars who were in his room: “Give me my weapon!” And the friars, surprised and curious, asked him: “Where is the weapon? We cannot see anything!” Padre Pio replied: “It is in my habit, which you have just hung up!” After having gone through the pockets of his religious habit, the friars said to him: “Padre, there is no weapon in your habit! . . . We can only find your Rosary beads there!” Padre Pio immediately said: “And is this not a weapon? ... The true weapon?!” Concerning the Rosary, Our Lady herself said to Padre Pio: “With this weapon you will win!”
A weapon is only as good as the person using it. One quote says: “A sword is only as good as the man who wields it.” We can say: “The Rosary is only as good as person who prays it.” Hence it is that St. Louis de Montfort warns: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly! … It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words! … Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!”
And we need to be better than we are if we want to get to Heaven ― “For broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat!” warns Our Lord (Matthew 7:13). St. Padre Pio speaks of the Rosary being a weapon than leads to salvation: “The Rosary is the weapon of defense and salvation.” Pope Leo XIII wrote: “By the power of the most holy Rosary the Church triumphed magnificently over every obstacle and provided for the salvation of her children … This form of prayer was most powerful and particularly efficacious for attaining eternal life” (Magnae Dei Matris & Diuturni Temporis). Hence the Doctor of the Church, St. Alphonsus Liguori, said: “Know that the salvation of my soul depends on saying the Rosary.” As Sister Lucia of Fatima said to Fr. Fuentes in 1957: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary … With the Holy Rosary, we will sanctify ourselves and we will save ourselves!” To which Blessed Alan de la Roche adds: “If you persevere in reciting the Rosary, this will be a most probable sign of your eternal salvation!” St. Louis de Montfort, in his book The Secret of the Rosary, quotes the devils being forced to speak by Our Lady―they said: “Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!”
Soldiers Trained to Survive, Not Die
Soldiers are trained to fight and win, not fight and die―even though it is known that some will end up being killed in action. Catholics are baptized in order to get to Heaven, not Hell―though it is known that the majority of Catholics end up being damned. Why is that? The reasons are many―but the chief reasons are similar to why some soldiers end up being poor soldiers: (1) lack of training, (2) lack of knowledge and (3) lack of a proper attitude and seriousness. Whether it be on a battlefield during war, or on the spiritual battlefield of life―if you are not sufficiently trained for the fight; if you little or knowledge about weapons and their use, warfare and its tactics; if you have no real desire to fight―then your risks of being lost are immensely high.
Our Lady has indicated the same thing to us in her various apparitions―pointing out our deficiencies and lack of seriousness about the Faith and the salvation of our souls. She says that we have “have neglected prayer and penance” … “Many hearts consecrated to God in the priestly and religious state fall into lukewarmness” … “The true Faith is forgotten” … “The Gospel of Jesus Christ has been forgotten” … There is “a universal slackening in everything that concerns the service of God” … “The Church is full of those who accept compromises!” … “The devil has bedimmed their intelligence” … “The Holy Eucharist is subject to many horrible sacrileges and profanations” … “The Sacrament of Penance is forgotten” … “The Sacrament of Matrimony is attacked and profaned” … “Members of religious orders break away from the true religion” … “Many priests lose their spirit” … “The Christian spirit is decaying rapidly, extinguishing the precious light of Faith” … “Many abandon the Faith” … “They are attached to wealth and riches” and “careless in their religious duties” … “People think of amusements” … “Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures is spread all over the Earth” … “All order and all justice are trampled underfoot” … “Men become more and more perverted” … “living faithless and wicked lives” … “Unbridled luxury and impurity conquers innumerable frivolous souls” … “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” … “There are no more generous souls!” … “There is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people!” … “If only human beings and religious knew what Heaven is and what it is to possess God, how differently they would live, sparing no sacrifice in order to enter more fully into possession of it!” … “No one on the face of the Earth is aware from where comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers!” (Words of Our Lady of Good Success, La Salette, Fatima & Akita).
Our Lady further adds, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, that all of this results in massive and uncountable numbers of souls being damned through their indifference and negligence: “How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation.”
This unimaginable number of lost souls grieves Our Lady because of their negligence in seeking out her help: “So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing―because the wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... As the Mother of clemency, it is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, for failing to call upon me, so many souls should be lost! ... This is a sorrow beyond all sorrows, and a misfortune without equal and without remedy!”
The Blessed Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
Article 10
Saturday & Sunday & Monday, September 21st & 22nd & 23rd
Mary's Boot Camp
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Saturday & Sunday & Monday, September 21st & 22nd & 23rd
Mary's Boot Camp
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Heels and Boots
We often associate soldiers with military boots and fighting. But do we associate the heel with soldiers and fighting. In a sense, God ‘canonizes’ the heel for fighting when He tells “the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan” (Apocalypse 20:2) that Our Lady will crush him with her heel: “And the Lord God said to the serpent: ‘Because thou hast done this thing, thou art cursed among all cattle and beasts of the Earth! Upon thy breast shalt thou go, and earth shalt thou eat all the days of thy life! I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed! She shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!” (Genesis 3:14-15).
In a sense, the heel is humblest or lowest part of the body. The heel is more than just the back part of your foot; it’s a complex structure comprising various bones, muscles, ligaments, and tendons. It serves as the foundation for the rear part of the foot and plays a crucial role in walking and running by helping to absorb the impact and pressure, while bearing most of our body weight when walking or running. The heel is also used in a variety of ways in fighting techniques. It is commonly used in the martial arts―such as Taekwando, Judo, Karate and Kung-Fu.
The fact that the heel is the weight-bearing foundation for the body, brings to mind the need for every Catholic to carry and bear the weight of the cross: “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross to come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that will not take up his cross and follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). Furthermore, the burden and weight of protecting a country falls far heavier on the shoulders of its soldiers, more so than upon the civilians―and, through the Sacrament of Confirmation, we have all been made Soldiers of Christ.
Heels Against Hell
The Legion of Mary calls itself the heel of Mary: “The Immaculate Conception is referred to by God in the same sentence in which Mary herself is first promised to us. The privilege is part of Mary: Mary is the Immaculate Conception; and, together with the privilege, prophecy is made of its heavenly sequel: the Divine Maternity, the crushing of the Serpent’s head in Redemption, and Mary’s Motherhood of men. ‘I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: She shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!’ (Genesis 3:15). To these words―addressed to Satan by Almighty God―the Legion turns as the source of its confidence and strength in its warfare with sin. It aims with all its heart to become in fullness the seed, the children of Mary, for there is the pledge of victory. In the measure that it makes her more and more its Mother, is the Legion’s enmity with the powers of evil intensified and victory made more complete. In the actual exercise of our apostolate, our great means of action consists in depending upon Mary, in keeping ourselves so closely united to Mary that in all things and everywhere we act as instruments of Mary and are, as it were, the ‘heel’ of that Immaculate Virgin.” (Official Handbook of the Legion of Mary).
The Legion of Mary is the Army of Mary
In the ancient Roman Army the term Praesidium was applied to a part of the battle-line or to a detachment performing special duty, such as holding a post in the midst of a hostile people. Appropriately, the Legion of Mary gives the same title to each of its units or branches. For they are outposts or garrisons on active service, fighting the good fight of the Faith for Christ, under the special patronage and direction of Mary, His Mother. The Praesidium is a group consisting of ‘officers’ and ‘soldiers’. Its officers are the spiritual director, the president, secretary, treasurer, and vice-president. The soldiers are the remaining members of the Praesidium. All are one army; the priests are the officers, the lay people non-commissioned officers and private soldiers. The purpose of the Praesidium is two-fold―spiritual formation and apostolate. The members come into the Praesidium to pray, to plan, and to act. The Legion of Mary is engaged in steady and unspectacular work for the salvation of souls in a wide variety of ways.
The stamp of thoroughness, attention to detail, and army-like discipline is a characteristic of the Legion, as it was of the Roman Army, from which it borrows its names. This perfection of organization results in strength and permanence. Every detail of the system is formative, seeking discipline and efficiency as a means to virtue, and unifying all in its own devotional outlook and spirit. You could say that the Legion of Mary is the religious order idea applied to the lay apostolate. The Legion does not seek to be equivalent to a new religious order ― the aim is to draw into efficient organization great numbers of lay people living their ordinary life in the world and to provide them with a rule and mode of action that is within their capacity to observe, while being sufficiently demanding so as to be a means of perfection.
Just as an army, no matter how well organized, must have its commissariat, so Mary’s army, the Legion, depends upon the support of a strong body of auxiliary members, assisting each Praesidium and forming part of its organization. An auxiliary member of the Legion is one who, being unable or unwilling to assume the obligations of active membership, nevertheless undertakes to supply the active units, as it were, with ammunition by saying the five decades of the Rosary and other specified prayers every day for the intentions of Mary. By its ever-growing auxiliary membership, the Legion tries to make its own the confident words of Pius X: “I could conquer the world if I had an army to say the Rosary!”
The legionary is a soldier of Christ. To Christ, His King, the legionary swears allegiance, but to do so, he must swear allegiance to the head of the army, Mary. In waging her war on the devil, in crushing, the head of the serpent, to advance the reign of Christ she has raised up an Army, a Legion. That Legion, has pledged loyalty and devotion to her, who is “Terrible as an army, set in battle array” (Antiphon from Lauds on the feast of the Assumption of Our Lady; Canticle of Canticles 6:9). As an army, it develops through its system all those virtues of loyalty, courage, blind obedience and perseverance―which are essential for victory.
In addition, there has been found in the soldiers of all the great armies of history a devotion of a passionate sort to their leader, intensifying union with him and rendering easy the sacrifices which the execution of his plan called for; and so it is in Mary’s army, for she instills into every soldier of it an idealism which burns within them. She has become the leader and ideal of a Christian chivalry such as the Middle-Ages never knew. Under her standard they advance, invincible and irresistible, for they are efficient in organization as no army has been before, and within their hearts burns the flame of divine love and in their minds the torch of the knowledge which is of God. He, Who is mighty, hath done great things to her, and will continue to do great things to her through her army, for He hath regarded her humility and fortified those who most passionately have called her blessed.
Her army will advance until the “Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary”, or the reign of Mary foretold by St. Louis de Montfort, will finally arrive. That triumph and that reign will come, for Mary, even though the battle of life is over for her on Earth, she nevertheless continues the battle from Heaven, by forming and inspiring the Soldiers of the Christ on Earth. As St. Louis de Montfort writes: “The power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But, in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
We Fail to See Mary as a Fighter
There are many titles given to Our Lady that risk giving us a one-sided view of her as being sweet and merciful and nothing else. Sweet and merciful she most surely is―just like God: “The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:9). Nevertheless, God is also a fighter: “The Lord is like a man of war” (Exodus 15:3) … “The Lord is mighty in battle!” (Psalms 23:8) … “The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man, as a man of war shall he stir up zeal! He shall shout and cry; He shall prevail against His enemies!” (Isaias 42:13) ... “The Lord thy God has destroyed the nations” (Deuteronomy 19:1) … “The Lord your God will fight for you!” (Deuteronomy 3:22) … “Blessed be the Lord my God, Who teaches my hands to fight, and my fingers to war!” (Psalm 143:1).
Likewise, Our Lady is also a fighter, whom God has placed at the head of all His armies: “The will of the Most High has made the humble Mary general of His armies and the exterminator of the enemies of God, and companion in His triumphs! … The very devils in Hell fear her! … They fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints! … The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel, that he fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). Mary is “terrible [terrifying] as an army, set in battle array!” (Antiphon from Lauds on the feast of the Assumption of Our Lady; Canticle of Canticles 6:9) … “Let the faithful servants of the Blessed Virgin say boldly with St. John Damascene: ‘Having confidence in you, O Mother of God, I shall be saved being under your protection; I shall fear nothing; with your help I shall give battle to my enemies and put them to flight!’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). Our Lady affirms this fighting side of her when she says at her apparition at La Salette: “Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends! … I shall fight at their side!”
Are You Ready for Mary’s Boot Camp? Will You Enlist?
Mary is a warrior for God and she seeks to enlist and train warriors for her army. St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this in his book True Devotion to Mary: “The Most High, with His holy Mother, has to form for Himself great saints, who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady … They shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple and the mystical city of God―that is to say, the most holy Virgin, who is called by the Fathers the “Temple of Solomon” and the ‘City of God.’ By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone.
“Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times―in mercy, to bring back and receive the poor strayed sinners, who shall be converted and shall return to the Catholic Church; in might, against the enemies of God, idolaters, schismatics, Mahometans, Jews and souls hardened in impiety, who shall rise in terrible revolt against God to seduce all those who shall oppose them and to try make them fall by promises and threats; and, finally, she must shine forth in grace, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ, who shall battle for His interests. And lastly, Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
You are called to the fight―whether you like it or not. Through the Sacrament of Confirmation, you are a Soldier of Christ―not a tin or toy soldier; not an ornament soldier sitting on a mantelpiece; not an armchair soldier; not a soldier in the figment of your imagination―but a real soldier. Real soldiers fight―otherwise they are guilty of cowardice. Real soldiers do not fraternize with the enemy (the world)―for that is treason: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). As Holy Scripture says: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4) ― how well do you know your Faith? How well do you live and practice your Faith? What are the works and fruits of your Faith: “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4). “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12).
Seduced Soldiers
Our problem today is that Satan ― “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― has helped create such technologically and materially alluring world that has attracted and seduced innumerable Catholics to the point of not wanting to fight the enemy (the world) at all. “Whosoever will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Holy Scripture warns: “That old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, seduces the whole world” (Apocalypse 12:9). Even the enemies of Church have realized that seducing Catholics is more successful than persecuting them. Today, the world (and Satan) has Catholics eating out of their hands and begging for more! They no longer pray but play! Instead of practicing mortification, they practice self-gratification! Instead of fighting the world, they love the world! As Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette warned: “All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost!”
Already back in 1957, Pope Pius XII lamented the fact that society was increasingly obsessed with material things, leading to a degradation in the value of human life. In his encyclical Pilgrimage of Lourdes, written in preparation for the centenary anniversary (1858-1958) of Our Lady’s apparitions at Lourdes, Pope Pius XII condemned and warned of the dangers of the ever increasing materialism in the world: “This materialism rages also in a love of money which creates ever greater havoc as modern enterprises expand, and which, unfortunately, determines many of the decisions which weigh heavy on the life of the people. It finds expression in the cult of the body, in excessive desire for comforts, and in flight from all the austerities of life. It encourages scorn for human life, even for life which is destroyed before seeing the light of day. This materialism is present in the unrestrained search for pleasure, which flaunts itself shamelessly and tries, through reading matter and entertainments, to seduce souls which are still pure. It shows itself in lack of interest in one’s neighbor, in selfishness which crushes him, in justice which deprives him of his rights ― in a word, in that concept of life which regulates everything exclusively in terms of material prosperity and earthly satisfactions.”
Our Lord had already warned us against materialism when He said: “What shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36) … “What advantage is it to a man, if he gains the whole world and loses himself, and casts himself away?” (Luke 9:25) … The cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word of God, and it becomes fruitless!” (Matthew 13:22) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures and treasures of this world (Matthew 6:19-24). Our Lord invited the rich young man to sell all that he had, to give the money to the poor, and then to come and follow Him―but the rich young man turned and went away sad, because he had many and great possessions (Matthew 19:16-22) … “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23-24).
Which is why Holy Scripture adds: “Woe to you that are rich!” (Luke 6:24). “Do not trust in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God!” (1 Timothy 6:17) … “He that trusts in his riches shall fall!” (Proverbs 11:28) … “You say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and you know not that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!” (Apocalypse 3:17) ... “Labor not to be rich!” (Proverbs 23:4) … “For gold and silver hath destroyed many!” (Ecclesiasticus 8:3) ... “If you are rich, you shall not be free from sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 11:10) … “For they that will become rich, fall into temptation, and into the snares of the devil, and into many unprofitable and hurtful desires, which drown men into destruction and perdition!” (1 Timothy 6:9) … “Go now, you rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted! Your gold and silver is cankered―and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
In her Magnificat, Our Lady says of God: “The rich He hath sent empty away!” (Luke 1:53). Our Lady wants us to be spiritually rich, not materially rich! “Better is the poor man than a rich man” (Proverbs 19:1) … Our Lady seeks “men rich in virtue” (Ecclesiasticus 44:6) … “rich in good works” (1 Timothy 6:18) … “rich towards God” (Luke 12:21) … those who “seek first the Kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31).
Earthly Boot Camp vs. Heavenly Boot Camp
Basic Training — often called Boot Camp — prepares recruits for all elements of military service: physical, mental and emotional. It gives persons the basic tools necessary to perform the roles that will be assigned to them if they manage to pass the testing training. Each of the Services has its own training program, tailoring the curriculum to the specialized nature of its role in the Military. The U.S. Marine Corps are known for being the most elite and intense branch of the U.S. Military. Marine Corps Basic Recruit Training―also known as boot camp― is a 13-week program which is longer than the other branches and is considered by many to be the most physically and mentally demanding in the U.S. military. The Marines focus more on physical fitness than other branches. Their training program is known for its rigorous physical demands, high standards for physical fitness, and the intensity of the drills.
Lower-ranking Marines are paid an annual base salary of around $24,000 (around $460 per week) to $32,000 a year ($615 per week). As of September 12th, 2024, the average hourly pay for a Marine is $27.86 (this includes the highest earners and the lowest earners), while the average hourly pay for a civilian is $68.60. The average hourly pay for a supermarket worker in the United States is $23.60 per hour as of September 2024. The average annual garbage or trash collectors far exceeds what the lowest-ranking Marine gets paid. New York pays trash collectors the most, with an average salary of $64,320; Washington pays $59,870; Illinois pays $58,210; California pays $57,720. The lowest-ranking mail delivery men earn on average around $24,000 per year―the same as the lowest-ranking Marine. The average annual average salary in the U.S. is $63,795. So from these few comparisons you can see that the U.S. Marine is not in it for the money! The Marine Corps has never been heavy on bonuses, and General Eric Smith, the assistant commandant of the Marine Corps, summed it up well by saying, “Your bonus is that you get to call yourself a Marine. That’s your bonus! There’s no dollar amount that goes with that!” The Marine Corps is all about winning battles and killing the enemies of the United States. That doesn’t appeal to everyone as a career field, but it appeals to the people the Marine Corps wants to recruit. No one knows where a fighting spirit comes from, why some have it, and some don’t―but the Marine Corps chases the people who possess such a spirit.
Heaven’s ‘Marines’, likewise, should not be Soldiers of Christ for any temporal gain. As Our Lord said to the rich young man who wanted to be perfect: “A certain rich young man, a ruler, asked Him: ‘What shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
Just as the US military Marine boot camp is regarded as the longest, toughest and most demanding of all boot camps—so too the Catholic Faith is (or should be) among other religions. In a certain sense, a true Catholic life should be one-long-lifetime-boot-camp! As most Marines will tell you―boot camp is Hell on Earth to a certain degree. One burden follows another all day long for 13 weeks. A Catholic boot camp imposes burdens every day for life. Our Lord Himself said: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross to come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
Mary’s Boot Camp of Suffering
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, speaks along the same lines: “Because mortals never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or reckoning of it. How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! Under the outwardly good intention, are often hidden the earthly passions and inclinations, which dominate the heart! ... There are so few who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption! … How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular ... Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! … Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace of sorrows? … These worldlings abhor everything that is painful! …
“My most holy Son and myself are trying to find some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science of suffering and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which souls, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If you wish to be Our disciple, then enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the Cross … Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation … The Lord and I suffered and endured such bitter sorrows, in order that mortals might be encouraged not to refuse less severe sufferings for their own eternal good. Therefore let mortals show themselves thankful, and willingly enter upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, and to carry it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
Our Faith is a demanding Faith―it requires that we fight for the Faith. We must fight to preserve our own Faith against constant attack, and we must fight to build and spread the Faith at the same time: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “But what shall it profit if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself.” (James 2:14-17). “Go teach all nations … teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:20). “Let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works!” (Matthew 5:16). “They will persecute you for My Name’s sake!” (Luke 21:12). “If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you! … If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before you! … It hates Me because I give testimony of it that the works of the world are evil” (John 15:20; 7:10).
We speak of the “Church Militant”―which means the “Fighting Church”, of which Mary can be said to be both a Mother and a Warrior-Queen. The “Church Militant” echoes the word “Military” and is the Catholic Church on Earth engaged in a constant warfare against its enemies. We, ourselves, once we have received the Sacrament of Confirmation, are made to be Soldiers of Christ. Our Lord Himself encourages to the fight when He says: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood―striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4).
Holy Scripture tells us to prepare for battle with the world and its satanic prince by putting on the armor of God: “Put you on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace! And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God! In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:11-17).
St. Louis de Montfort, in his True Devotion to Mary, echoes those words: “Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army arranged in battle―principally in these latter times―because the devil, knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls, will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others.” In this same vein, Sr. Lucia of Fatima speaks of Satan fighting a final battle with Our Lady: “Our Lady told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Our Lady further speaks to the Venerable Mary of Agreda of recruiting souls for fight: “My Son and I continue to look for souls to defend the glory and honor of God and fight the battles against Hell, for the confusion and crushing of the demons ... Dispose yourself by divine grace for this battle … The Most High will lend you His strength, so that you can fight His battles against His and your enemies … Fight as if you were fighting at the side of the Lord Himself; for there is no doubt that His Majesty assists all those that enter loyally into His battles. The powerful arms for battling against those who make war on thee, must be the doctrines of the Catholic Faith―for the firm belief in them and the continual exercise of them, the incessant meditation and remembrance of them, enlightens souls, drives away errors, discloses the deceits of Satan and disperses his falsehoods just as the rays of the sun dispel the dark clouds. Moreover, all these exercises serve as substantial nourishment of the spirit to strengthen the soul for the battles of the Lord … You are not strong and are in great danger from fellow creatures! … Learn the lesson taught by the example of Peter’s denial of Jesus, for you are not stronger than he―the Apostle of Christ! … The most skillful battle tactic of the sons of God consists in fleeing farthest possible from all evil ... Flee from and avoid all that is imperfect, dangerous or alien to the virtues and perfections of the soul” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
We often associate soldiers with military boots and fighting. But do we associate the heel with soldiers and fighting. In a sense, God ‘canonizes’ the heel for fighting when He tells “the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan” (Apocalypse 20:2) that Our Lady will crush him with her heel: “And the Lord God said to the serpent: ‘Because thou hast done this thing, thou art cursed among all cattle and beasts of the Earth! Upon thy breast shalt thou go, and earth shalt thou eat all the days of thy life! I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed! She shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!” (Genesis 3:14-15).
In a sense, the heel is humblest or lowest part of the body. The heel is more than just the back part of your foot; it’s a complex structure comprising various bones, muscles, ligaments, and tendons. It serves as the foundation for the rear part of the foot and plays a crucial role in walking and running by helping to absorb the impact and pressure, while bearing most of our body weight when walking or running. The heel is also used in a variety of ways in fighting techniques. It is commonly used in the martial arts―such as Taekwando, Judo, Karate and Kung-Fu.
The fact that the heel is the weight-bearing foundation for the body, brings to mind the need for every Catholic to carry and bear the weight of the cross: “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross to come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that will not take up his cross and follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). Furthermore, the burden and weight of protecting a country falls far heavier on the shoulders of its soldiers, more so than upon the civilians―and, through the Sacrament of Confirmation, we have all been made Soldiers of Christ.
Heels Against Hell
The Legion of Mary calls itself the heel of Mary: “The Immaculate Conception is referred to by God in the same sentence in which Mary herself is first promised to us. The privilege is part of Mary: Mary is the Immaculate Conception; and, together with the privilege, prophecy is made of its heavenly sequel: the Divine Maternity, the crushing of the Serpent’s head in Redemption, and Mary’s Motherhood of men. ‘I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: She shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!’ (Genesis 3:15). To these words―addressed to Satan by Almighty God―the Legion turns as the source of its confidence and strength in its warfare with sin. It aims with all its heart to become in fullness the seed, the children of Mary, for there is the pledge of victory. In the measure that it makes her more and more its Mother, is the Legion’s enmity with the powers of evil intensified and victory made more complete. In the actual exercise of our apostolate, our great means of action consists in depending upon Mary, in keeping ourselves so closely united to Mary that in all things and everywhere we act as instruments of Mary and are, as it were, the ‘heel’ of that Immaculate Virgin.” (Official Handbook of the Legion of Mary).
The Legion of Mary is the Army of Mary
In the ancient Roman Army the term Praesidium was applied to a part of the battle-line or to a detachment performing special duty, such as holding a post in the midst of a hostile people. Appropriately, the Legion of Mary gives the same title to each of its units or branches. For they are outposts or garrisons on active service, fighting the good fight of the Faith for Christ, under the special patronage and direction of Mary, His Mother. The Praesidium is a group consisting of ‘officers’ and ‘soldiers’. Its officers are the spiritual director, the president, secretary, treasurer, and vice-president. The soldiers are the remaining members of the Praesidium. All are one army; the priests are the officers, the lay people non-commissioned officers and private soldiers. The purpose of the Praesidium is two-fold―spiritual formation and apostolate. The members come into the Praesidium to pray, to plan, and to act. The Legion of Mary is engaged in steady and unspectacular work for the salvation of souls in a wide variety of ways.
The stamp of thoroughness, attention to detail, and army-like discipline is a characteristic of the Legion, as it was of the Roman Army, from which it borrows its names. This perfection of organization results in strength and permanence. Every detail of the system is formative, seeking discipline and efficiency as a means to virtue, and unifying all in its own devotional outlook and spirit. You could say that the Legion of Mary is the religious order idea applied to the lay apostolate. The Legion does not seek to be equivalent to a new religious order ― the aim is to draw into efficient organization great numbers of lay people living their ordinary life in the world and to provide them with a rule and mode of action that is within their capacity to observe, while being sufficiently demanding so as to be a means of perfection.
Just as an army, no matter how well organized, must have its commissariat, so Mary’s army, the Legion, depends upon the support of a strong body of auxiliary members, assisting each Praesidium and forming part of its organization. An auxiliary member of the Legion is one who, being unable or unwilling to assume the obligations of active membership, nevertheless undertakes to supply the active units, as it were, with ammunition by saying the five decades of the Rosary and other specified prayers every day for the intentions of Mary. By its ever-growing auxiliary membership, the Legion tries to make its own the confident words of Pius X: “I could conquer the world if I had an army to say the Rosary!”
The legionary is a soldier of Christ. To Christ, His King, the legionary swears allegiance, but to do so, he must swear allegiance to the head of the army, Mary. In waging her war on the devil, in crushing, the head of the serpent, to advance the reign of Christ she has raised up an Army, a Legion. That Legion, has pledged loyalty and devotion to her, who is “Terrible as an army, set in battle array” (Antiphon from Lauds on the feast of the Assumption of Our Lady; Canticle of Canticles 6:9). As an army, it develops through its system all those virtues of loyalty, courage, blind obedience and perseverance―which are essential for victory.
In addition, there has been found in the soldiers of all the great armies of history a devotion of a passionate sort to their leader, intensifying union with him and rendering easy the sacrifices which the execution of his plan called for; and so it is in Mary’s army, for she instills into every soldier of it an idealism which burns within them. She has become the leader and ideal of a Christian chivalry such as the Middle-Ages never knew. Under her standard they advance, invincible and irresistible, for they are efficient in organization as no army has been before, and within their hearts burns the flame of divine love and in their minds the torch of the knowledge which is of God. He, Who is mighty, hath done great things to her, and will continue to do great things to her through her army, for He hath regarded her humility and fortified those who most passionately have called her blessed.
Her army will advance until the “Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary”, or the reign of Mary foretold by St. Louis de Montfort, will finally arrive. That triumph and that reign will come, for Mary, even though the battle of life is over for her on Earth, she nevertheless continues the battle from Heaven, by forming and inspiring the Soldiers of the Christ on Earth. As St. Louis de Montfort writes: “The power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But, in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
We Fail to See Mary as a Fighter
There are many titles given to Our Lady that risk giving us a one-sided view of her as being sweet and merciful and nothing else. Sweet and merciful she most surely is―just like God: “The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:9). Nevertheless, God is also a fighter: “The Lord is like a man of war” (Exodus 15:3) … “The Lord is mighty in battle!” (Psalms 23:8) … “The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man, as a man of war shall he stir up zeal! He shall shout and cry; He shall prevail against His enemies!” (Isaias 42:13) ... “The Lord thy God has destroyed the nations” (Deuteronomy 19:1) … “The Lord your God will fight for you!” (Deuteronomy 3:22) … “Blessed be the Lord my God, Who teaches my hands to fight, and my fingers to war!” (Psalm 143:1).
Likewise, Our Lady is also a fighter, whom God has placed at the head of all His armies: “The will of the Most High has made the humble Mary general of His armies and the exterminator of the enemies of God, and companion in His triumphs! … The very devils in Hell fear her! … They fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints! … The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel, that he fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). Mary is “terrible [terrifying] as an army, set in battle array!” (Antiphon from Lauds on the feast of the Assumption of Our Lady; Canticle of Canticles 6:9) … “Let the faithful servants of the Blessed Virgin say boldly with St. John Damascene: ‘Having confidence in you, O Mother of God, I shall be saved being under your protection; I shall fear nothing; with your help I shall give battle to my enemies and put them to flight!’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). Our Lady affirms this fighting side of her when she says at her apparition at La Salette: “Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends! … I shall fight at their side!”
Are You Ready for Mary’s Boot Camp? Will You Enlist?
Mary is a warrior for God and she seeks to enlist and train warriors for her army. St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this in his book True Devotion to Mary: “The Most High, with His holy Mother, has to form for Himself great saints, who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady … They shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple and the mystical city of God―that is to say, the most holy Virgin, who is called by the Fathers the “Temple of Solomon” and the ‘City of God.’ By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone.
“Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times―in mercy, to bring back and receive the poor strayed sinners, who shall be converted and shall return to the Catholic Church; in might, against the enemies of God, idolaters, schismatics, Mahometans, Jews and souls hardened in impiety, who shall rise in terrible revolt against God to seduce all those who shall oppose them and to try make them fall by promises and threats; and, finally, she must shine forth in grace, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ, who shall battle for His interests. And lastly, Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
You are called to the fight―whether you like it or not. Through the Sacrament of Confirmation, you are a Soldier of Christ―not a tin or toy soldier; not an ornament soldier sitting on a mantelpiece; not an armchair soldier; not a soldier in the figment of your imagination―but a real soldier. Real soldiers fight―otherwise they are guilty of cowardice. Real soldiers do not fraternize with the enemy (the world)―for that is treason: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). As Holy Scripture says: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4) ― how well do you know your Faith? How well do you live and practice your Faith? What are the works and fruits of your Faith: “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4). “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12).
Seduced Soldiers
Our problem today is that Satan ― “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― has helped create such technologically and materially alluring world that has attracted and seduced innumerable Catholics to the point of not wanting to fight the enemy (the world) at all. “Whosoever will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Holy Scripture warns: “That old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, seduces the whole world” (Apocalypse 12:9). Even the enemies of Church have realized that seducing Catholics is more successful than persecuting them. Today, the world (and Satan) has Catholics eating out of their hands and begging for more! They no longer pray but play! Instead of practicing mortification, they practice self-gratification! Instead of fighting the world, they love the world! As Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette warned: “All the civil governments will have the same objective, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritism and vice of all kinds … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost!”
Already back in 1957, Pope Pius XII lamented the fact that society was increasingly obsessed with material things, leading to a degradation in the value of human life. In his encyclical Pilgrimage of Lourdes, written in preparation for the centenary anniversary (1858-1958) of Our Lady’s apparitions at Lourdes, Pope Pius XII condemned and warned of the dangers of the ever increasing materialism in the world: “This materialism rages also in a love of money which creates ever greater havoc as modern enterprises expand, and which, unfortunately, determines many of the decisions which weigh heavy on the life of the people. It finds expression in the cult of the body, in excessive desire for comforts, and in flight from all the austerities of life. It encourages scorn for human life, even for life which is destroyed before seeing the light of day. This materialism is present in the unrestrained search for pleasure, which flaunts itself shamelessly and tries, through reading matter and entertainments, to seduce souls which are still pure. It shows itself in lack of interest in one’s neighbor, in selfishness which crushes him, in justice which deprives him of his rights ― in a word, in that concept of life which regulates everything exclusively in terms of material prosperity and earthly satisfactions.”
Our Lord had already warned us against materialism when He said: “What shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36) … “What advantage is it to a man, if he gains the whole world and loses himself, and casts himself away?” (Luke 9:25) … The cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word of God, and it becomes fruitless!” (Matthew 13:22) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” being the pleasures and treasures of this world (Matthew 6:19-24). Our Lord invited the rich young man to sell all that he had, to give the money to the poor, and then to come and follow Him―but the rich young man turned and went away sad, because he had many and great possessions (Matthew 19:16-22) … “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23-24).
Which is why Holy Scripture adds: “Woe to you that are rich!” (Luke 6:24). “Do not trust in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God!” (1 Timothy 6:17) … “He that trusts in his riches shall fall!” (Proverbs 11:28) … “You say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and you know not that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!” (Apocalypse 3:17) ... “Labor not to be rich!” (Proverbs 23:4) … “For gold and silver hath destroyed many!” (Ecclesiasticus 8:3) ... “If you are rich, you shall not be free from sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 11:10) … “For they that will become rich, fall into temptation, and into the snares of the devil, and into many unprofitable and hurtful desires, which drown men into destruction and perdition!” (1 Timothy 6:9) … “Go now, you rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted! Your gold and silver is cankered―and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
In her Magnificat, Our Lady says of God: “The rich He hath sent empty away!” (Luke 1:53). Our Lady wants us to be spiritually rich, not materially rich! “Better is the poor man than a rich man” (Proverbs 19:1) … Our Lady seeks “men rich in virtue” (Ecclesiasticus 44:6) … “rich in good works” (1 Timothy 6:18) … “rich towards God” (Luke 12:21) … those who “seek first the Kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31).
Earthly Boot Camp vs. Heavenly Boot Camp
Basic Training — often called Boot Camp — prepares recruits for all elements of military service: physical, mental and emotional. It gives persons the basic tools necessary to perform the roles that will be assigned to them if they manage to pass the testing training. Each of the Services has its own training program, tailoring the curriculum to the specialized nature of its role in the Military. The U.S. Marine Corps are known for being the most elite and intense branch of the U.S. Military. Marine Corps Basic Recruit Training―also known as boot camp― is a 13-week program which is longer than the other branches and is considered by many to be the most physically and mentally demanding in the U.S. military. The Marines focus more on physical fitness than other branches. Their training program is known for its rigorous physical demands, high standards for physical fitness, and the intensity of the drills.
Lower-ranking Marines are paid an annual base salary of around $24,000 (around $460 per week) to $32,000 a year ($615 per week). As of September 12th, 2024, the average hourly pay for a Marine is $27.86 (this includes the highest earners and the lowest earners), while the average hourly pay for a civilian is $68.60. The average hourly pay for a supermarket worker in the United States is $23.60 per hour as of September 2024. The average annual garbage or trash collectors far exceeds what the lowest-ranking Marine gets paid. New York pays trash collectors the most, with an average salary of $64,320; Washington pays $59,870; Illinois pays $58,210; California pays $57,720. The lowest-ranking mail delivery men earn on average around $24,000 per year―the same as the lowest-ranking Marine. The average annual average salary in the U.S. is $63,795. So from these few comparisons you can see that the U.S. Marine is not in it for the money! The Marine Corps has never been heavy on bonuses, and General Eric Smith, the assistant commandant of the Marine Corps, summed it up well by saying, “Your bonus is that you get to call yourself a Marine. That’s your bonus! There’s no dollar amount that goes with that!” The Marine Corps is all about winning battles and killing the enemies of the United States. That doesn’t appeal to everyone as a career field, but it appeals to the people the Marine Corps wants to recruit. No one knows where a fighting spirit comes from, why some have it, and some don’t―but the Marine Corps chases the people who possess such a spirit.
Heaven’s ‘Marines’, likewise, should not be Soldiers of Christ for any temporal gain. As Our Lord said to the rich young man who wanted to be perfect: “A certain rich young man, a ruler, asked Him: ‘What shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
Just as the US military Marine boot camp is regarded as the longest, toughest and most demanding of all boot camps—so too the Catholic Faith is (or should be) among other religions. In a certain sense, a true Catholic life should be one-long-lifetime-boot-camp! As most Marines will tell you―boot camp is Hell on Earth to a certain degree. One burden follows another all day long for 13 weeks. A Catholic boot camp imposes burdens every day for life. Our Lord Himself said: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross to come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
Mary’s Boot Camp of Suffering
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, speaks along the same lines: “Because mortals never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or reckoning of it. How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! Under the outwardly good intention, are often hidden the earthly passions and inclinations, which dominate the heart! ... There are so few who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption! … How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular ... Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! … Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace of sorrows? … These worldlings abhor everything that is painful! …
“My most holy Son and myself are trying to find some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science of suffering and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which souls, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If you wish to be Our disciple, then enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the Cross … Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation … The Lord and I suffered and endured such bitter sorrows, in order that mortals might be encouraged not to refuse less severe sufferings for their own eternal good. Therefore let mortals show themselves thankful, and willingly enter upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, and to carry it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
Our Faith is a demanding Faith―it requires that we fight for the Faith. We must fight to preserve our own Faith against constant attack, and we must fight to build and spread the Faith at the same time: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “But what shall it profit if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself.” (James 2:14-17). “Go teach all nations … teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:20). “Let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works!” (Matthew 5:16). “They will persecute you for My Name’s sake!” (Luke 21:12). “If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you! … If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before you! … It hates Me because I give testimony of it that the works of the world are evil” (John 15:20; 7:10).
We speak of the “Church Militant”―which means the “Fighting Church”, of which Mary can be said to be both a Mother and a Warrior-Queen. The “Church Militant” echoes the word “Military” and is the Catholic Church on Earth engaged in a constant warfare against its enemies. We, ourselves, once we have received the Sacrament of Confirmation, are made to be Soldiers of Christ. Our Lord Himself encourages to the fight when He says: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood―striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4).
Holy Scripture tells us to prepare for battle with the world and its satanic prince by putting on the armor of God: “Put you on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace! And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God! In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:11-17).
St. Louis de Montfort, in his True Devotion to Mary, echoes those words: “Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army arranged in battle―principally in these latter times―because the devil, knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls, will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others.” In this same vein, Sr. Lucia of Fatima speaks of Satan fighting a final battle with Our Lady: “Our Lady told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Our Lady further speaks to the Venerable Mary of Agreda of recruiting souls for fight: “My Son and I continue to look for souls to defend the glory and honor of God and fight the battles against Hell, for the confusion and crushing of the demons ... Dispose yourself by divine grace for this battle … The Most High will lend you His strength, so that you can fight His battles against His and your enemies … Fight as if you were fighting at the side of the Lord Himself; for there is no doubt that His Majesty assists all those that enter loyally into His battles. The powerful arms for battling against those who make war on thee, must be the doctrines of the Catholic Faith―for the firm belief in them and the continual exercise of them, the incessant meditation and remembrance of them, enlightens souls, drives away errors, discloses the deceits of Satan and disperses his falsehoods just as the rays of the sun dispel the dark clouds. Moreover, all these exercises serve as substantial nourishment of the spirit to strengthen the soul for the battles of the Lord … You are not strong and are in great danger from fellow creatures! … Learn the lesson taught by the example of Peter’s denial of Jesus, for you are not stronger than he―the Apostle of Christ! … The most skillful battle tactic of the sons of God consists in fleeing farthest possible from all evil ... Flee from and avoid all that is imperfect, dangerous or alien to the virtues and perfections of the soul” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Article 9
Wednesday to Friday, September 18th to 20th
The La Salette Prophecies
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Wednesday to Friday, September 18th to 20th
The La Salette Prophecies
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Do You Have a Spiritual Sweet-Tooth?
We tend to prefer sweet things more than bitter things! That is not only true of food, but it is also true of many other aspects of life. We prefer easy things more than hard things. We prefer good news rather than bad news. We want a Catholic Faith that is sweet and not bitter. After all―does not Holy Scripture say: “O taste, and see that the Lord is sweet!” (Psalm 33:9). “The Lord is sweet and righteous!” (Psalm 24:8). “The Lord is sweet to all!” (Psalm 144:9). “Thou, O Lord, art sweet and mild!” (Psalm 85:5). “Sweet is Thy spirit, O Lord, in all things!” (Wisdom 12:1). “How sweet are Thy words to my palate!” (Psalm 118:103).
Not only is the Lord said to be sweet―but Our Lady is also said to be sweet. We end the prayer, Salve Regina (Hail Holy Queen) with the words: “O sweet Virgin Mary!” Holy Mother Church assigns the following words to Our Lady: “My spirit is sweet above honey!” (Ecclesiasticus 24:27). Yet when we look at the modern-day apparitions of Our Lady, and examine the content of her messages, then what we find seems to very far from being sweet and in fact tastes very bitter! This is especially true of Our Lady’s message at La Salette in France, where she appeared only once―on September 19th, 1846.
The modern-day Church―and even some Traditionalists and Conservatives―has tried to “sanitize” and “sweeten” the very bitter message that Our Lady gave at La Salette. However, that must be an insult to Our Lady, who, like any good doctor, seeks to cure the sinful sickness of her children with bitter medicine―for, as they say, “bitter is better” and many a medicine is bitter to take, but sweet in its healthful effects.
If you pay careful attention to most of Our Lady’s modern-day apparitions (from the 1600s onwards), you will find far more bitter medicine than sweet medicine. This is true of Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Lourdes, Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Akita. In all of those apparitions there is far more bitter medicine than sweet medicine―far more bitter messages than sweet messages. Let us then do Our Lady the honor of examining them―and we will notice that there are certain points that re-occur from one apparition to another.
What most people tend to forget―or are totally ignorant of in the first place―is the fact that in many apparitions Our Lady did not appear as a sweet-smiling Lady, but as a sad and sorrowful Lady. At La Salette she shows herself to be weeping. At Fatima, Sister Lucia says that Our Lady never smiled once at the children. At Akita, Our Lady’s statue miraculously wept tears of blood. There is a reason for all of this―and this we will uncover as we uncover the words of her “bitter” messages addressed to mankind.
Sweet or Bitter Food?
The above quotes about God being sweet are true―but God is not one-dimensional. God is―at the same time―merciful and just. He can be peaceable towards us, or He can be angry towards us. He can take us to Heaven or send us to Hell. God Himself tells us of the two “foods” that we can expect to receive from His hands―food that is sweet and food that is bitter. God clearly states that in the Book of Leviticus:
“I am the Lord your God. Keep My Sabbaths! If you walk in My precepts and keep My commandments and do them … then I will look on you, and make you increase! … My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people! But if you walk contrary to Me, and will not listen to Me; if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments; if you despise My laws and My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, then I also will do these things to you: I will set My face against you … I will chastise you seven times more for your sins! I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins! I will break the pride of your stubbornness! … I will quickly visit you with poverty and burning heat, which shall consume your lives! … You shall fall down before your enemies! … You shall sow your seed in vain! … Your labor shall be spent in vain, the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit. And I will send in upon you the beasts of the field, to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number, and that your highways may be desolate. And if, despite this, you will not amend, but will walk contrary to Me―then I also will walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins. And I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge Me! When you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies … But if, despite all this, you will not listen to Me, but will walk against Me―then I will also go against you with opposite fury! … I will bring your cities to be a wilderness! … I will destroy your land! … I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed … You shall perish among the Gentiles! And if some remain, then they shall pine away in their iniquities in the land of their enemies―until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, whereby they have transgressed Me, and walked contrary unto Me … They shall pray for their sins, because they rejected My judgments, and despised My laws!” (Leviticus 26:1-43).
Those words pretty much sum up what Our Lady has been saying at her modern-day apparitions. Prophecy does not simply seek to predict the future, but to change the present. Our Lady―whom we address in the Salve Regina (Hail Holy Queen) as “O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary!”―tells us in her apparitions that if we continue to sin, then that clemency will bring down justice; that love will bring down anger instead; and that any sweetness we have had will turn into bitterness.
OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846) said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves [to the laws, commandments and desires of God], then I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! … God will strike in an unprecedented way! The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His anger upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together!” Our Lady then goes on to speak of Rome losing the Faith; many of clergy and religious orders losing or departing from the true Faith; of light of Faith being gradually extinguished among the faithful, who will be preoccupied with amusements; of natural disasters such as floods, earthquakes, pestilence and plagues; of many civil wars followed by massive world war; of unprecedented bloodshed even among civilians in their homes, etc. More on these things further below. Does all this sound like something “sweet” or something “bitter”?
For those who refuse to accept the “bitter” side of La Salette and question its authenticity, then listen to what Our Lady has said about the “bitter fruits” that will be on our plate if we do not change:
OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS (1600s) said: “From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. These years, during which the evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government, will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities … Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective of making it easy for everyone to live in sin. The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals … calling down in turn every type of chastisement, such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy, the cause of the perdition of so many souls … The vices of impurity, blasphemy and sacrilege will dominate in this time of depraved desolation. In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost. During these unfortunate times, evil will invade childhood innocence. Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women. Under the appearance of virtue and bad-spirited zeal, Catholics will turn upon the Religion, which nourished them at her breast! They will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private.”
OUR LADY OF LOURDES (1858), appearing 12 years after La Salette, was brief but very clear in stating that life in this world is not meant to sweet―such sweetness is reserved for the next life in Heaven: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next world!” She further spoke of the necessity of our doing penance for sinners, demanding: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” Telling us to “Pray for sinners” and do “penance for sinners.” St. Bernadette relates: “She told me to go, drink of the spring (….) I only found a little muddy water. At the fourth attempt I was able to drink. She also made me eat the bitter herbs that were found near the spring, and then the vision left and went away.” In front of the crowd that was asking “Do you think that she is mad doing things like that?” Bernadette replied: “It is for sinners!”
OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1917) said: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … People must amend their lives and ask pardon for their sins … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! ... Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out! … God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father! … To prevent this, I shall come to ask for the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, and the Communion of Reparation on the First Saturdays. If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace; if not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, and many nations will be annihilated.
Regarding the annihilation of nations: it is important to note that during the Father Fuentes interview, Sister Lucia said that Our Blessed Mother had told herself, Jacinta and Francisco “many times ... that many nations will disappear from the face of the Earth.” We only have the one recorded instance in July 1917, but Lucia said Our Lady spoke many times of the annihilation of many nations―she said this not just once, but she said it “many times!” (Frère François, Tragedy and Triumph, [Buffalo: Immaculate Heart Publications, 1994], p. 27).
OUR LADY TO BLESSED ELENA AIELLO (1950s) said: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! See how the souls are falling into Hell! These are grave times! Tremendous will be the upheaval of the whole world, because men — as at the time of the Deluge — have lost God’s way, and are ruled by the spirit of Satan! Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls! … The justice of the Father requires reparation — otherwise many will be lost! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God! They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … The Church is opposed, and the priests are despised because of the bad ones who give scandal. Help Me by suffering, to repair for so many offenses, and thus save, at least in part, humanity precipitated in a swamp of corruption and death … The world has lowered itself in overflowing corruption ... The justice of our Father is most offended. Men live in their obstinacy of sin. The wrath of God is near. Soon the world will be afflicted with great calamities, bloody revolutions, frightful hurricanes, and the overflowing of rivers and the seas … Clouds with lightning flashes of fire in the sky, and a tempest of fire shall fall upon the world. This terrible scourge, never before seen in the history of humanity, will result in godless persons being crushed and wiped out. Many will be lost because they remain in their obstinacy of sin. Then shall the power of light be seen to triumph over the power of darkness! … Prayers and penances are necessary because men must return to God and to my Immaculate Heart—and thus the world will, at least in part, be saved … Let this be known to all, because it will help save many souls, and prevent much destruction in the Church and in the world!”
OUR LADY OF AKITA (1973) said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord. In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge [the Great Flood in Noe’s time], such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!”
What Seems Bitter is Merciful
So, as you can see, Our Lady’s messages are essentially the same throughout all her modern-day apparitions―in some cases she enters into great detail, in other cases there is much less detail. If we reject La Salette for whatever reason, then the other apparitions simply take its place and give the same message. To some persons, the above messages of Our Lady may seem to be too “bitter” ― but bear in mind that Hell is a helluva lot more bitter and the chastisements that Our Lady speaks about are not vengeful acts where God “blows His top”, “loses it”, and blindly wreaks havoc on the world in a mindless fashion! Those promised or threatened chastisements are merely medicinal measures that seek to bring about conversions before it is too late and countless souls end up being damned. It is like a doctor seeking to save the life of his patient―first he tries consumable medicines that can be swallowed or injected; if these have no effect, then the doctor will seek to amputate a gangrenous limb, or surgically remove a cancerous part of the body as a last resort to saving the patient’s life. If Our Lady’s “oral medicine” (the words and warnings of her messages) fail to being about a change in us “sinful patients”, then something more severe is required. . As Our Lady of La Salette said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves [to the laws, commandments and desires of God], then I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it!”
Let us now take a greater look at Our Lady’s prophecies that she made at La Salette and evaluate their importance for our present day and our own salvation.
The La Salette prophecies cover an undetermined period of time―undetermined as to when exactly most of the prophecies will take place; and undetermined as to how this period of time will last. When we compare La Salette to other apparitions of Our Lady, then we can conclude with a reasonable amount of certainty that Our Lady is speaking of terrible times that will occur before the coming of the Antichrist and another period of terrible times that will occur after the coming of the Antichrist. Relying on what Sister Lucia of Fatima was told by Our Lady, we can be certain that we have entered what is popularly called “The End Times” or “The Last Days” ― even though that period of time can be quite long. Some people mistakenly imagine that “The End Times” or “The Last Days” mean that we are on the verge of world ending―which is false. Our Lady speaks of the Triumph of her Immaculate Heart as bringing to an end the first period of terrible times―after which there will be an undetermined period of peace prior to the coming of the Antichrist. At that point the terrible times will recommence until the Antichrist is defeated.
La Salette is Part of a Whole
Our Lady’s apparition at La Salette―or any Private Divine Revelation for that matter―is not a “stand-alone” totally independent event. All Divine Private Revelation must bow down to Divine Public Revelation. What is the difference between the two?
● Divine Public Revelation is a universal revelation (meaning that it is meant for everybody) which is contained in the Bible, or in the deposit of teachings coming from Apostolic Tradition, and transmitted down through the ages by the Church. Divine Public Revelation ended with the preaching of the Apostles, the last of whom (St. John) died in the early 100s A.D., and this Divine Public Revelation must be believed by everyone.
● Divine Private Revelation consists of private and particular revelations, which are constantly occurring among Christians. They are not contained in the Bible, nor in the deposit of Apostolic Tradition. The Church does not oblige us to believe in them, but it is prudent not to reject them lightly when they are affirmed by saints―for it is through Divine Private Revelation that we have been given the Sacred Heart Devotion; the Immaculate Heart Devotion; the Sorrowful Heart of Mary Devotion; the Holy Rosary; the Brown Scapular, and many more such like things. The function of Divine Private Revelation is merely re-focus our minds on what is contained in Divine Public Revelation. Private revelations may make us do something that we should be doing, but are no longer doing; or it may command us to cease doing what we should not be doing, but have started to do through either malice or weakness. Thus at La Salette, Lourdes, Fatima and Akita, Our Lady reminds us by Divine Private Revelation, what is already contained in Divine Public Revelation―namely, the need for prayer and penance: “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) … “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1) … “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). Therefore, Our Lady is adding nothing new, but simply reminding us what is commanded by Divine Public Revelation, in this case in the form of Holy Scripture.
The same is true of the chastisements that are foretold by Divine Private Revelations―these chastisements are mentioned in Holy Scripture, but without the greater details furnished in future centuries by Divine Private Revelation:
● St. Matthew’s Gospel states: “You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that ye be not troubled. For these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; and there shall be pestilences, and famines, and earthquakes in places. Now all these are the beginnings of sorrows. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death; and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake. And then shall many be scandalized, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And many false prophets shall rise, and shall seduce many … For there shall be then great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be. And unless those days had been shortened, no flesh should be saved―but for the sake of the elect those days shall be shortened!” (Matthew 24:6-22).
● St. Mark’s Gospel states: “You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars, fear ye not. For such things must needs be, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom, and there shall be earthquakes in diverse places, and famines. These things are the beginning of sorrows … They shall deliver you up to councils, and in the synagogues you shall be beaten, and you shall stand before governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony unto them … And the brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake! … For in those days shall be such tribulations, as were not from the beginning of the creation which God created until now, neither shall be. And unless the Lord had shortened the days, no flesh should be saved: but for the sake of the elect which he hath chosen, he hath shortened the days … Take heed therefore! Behold I have foretold you all things. But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light. And the stars of heaven shall be falling down, and the powers that are in heaven, shall be moved.” (Mark 13:7-25).
● St. Luke’s Gospel states: “You shall hear of wars and seditions―be not terrified, for these things must first come to pass; but the end is not yet presently! Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there shall be great earthquakes in diverse places, and pestilences, and famines, and terrors from Heaven; and there shall be great signs. But before all these things, they will lay their hands upon you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors, for My Name’s sake! … And you shall be betrayed by your parents and brethren, and kinsmen and friends; and some of you they will put to death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake! … For these are the days of vengeance, that all things may be fulfilled, that are written! And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, by reason of the confusion of the roaring of the sea and of the waves―men withering away from fear and expectation of what shall come upon the whole world. For the powers of heaven shall be moved! … When you shall see these things come to pass, know that the kingdom of God is at hand! … Take heed to yourselves, lest perhaps you be overcome with overindulging and drunkenness, and the cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly! For as a snare shall it come upon all that sit upon the face of the whole Earth! Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times, that you may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that are to come and to stand before the Son of man! … The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 21:10-36; 18:8).
● St. John’s Gospel sums it all up, saying: “Because I have spoken these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart … Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman, when she is in labor, hath sorrow, because her hour is come; but when she hath brought forth the child, she remembers no more the anguish, because of her joy that a man is born into the world. So also you now indeed have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you ... In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world!” (John 16:6; 16:20-22; 6:33).
Compare the above Gospel accounts to Our Lady’s message at La Salette, and you will clearly see that they are all essentially the same. Our Lady merely goes into more detail concerning the chastisements. Here are the key prophecies from Our Lady of La Salette’s message:
● Our Lady of La Salette said: “Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! … God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish. God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family. Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other for years.
“The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis. Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned. Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening in everything that concerns the service of God … Rome will lose the Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist … The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay ... The righteous will suffer greatly ... The true Faith to the Lord will be forgotten … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin … and men will become more and more perverted.
“But the children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God! God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will. I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son! Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world! Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days! May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
The above examples are clear and incontestable―for prayer and penance are both clearly mentioned and commanded in the pages of Holy Scripture. Likewise, the terrible chastisements for the “End Times” are also foretold in the pages of Holy Scripture.
LA SALETTE: “Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! … God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together!”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Thou shalt rule them with a rod of iron, and shalt break them in pieces like a potter’s vessel!” (Psalms 2:9). “Thou shalt beat him with the rod and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:14). “I will visit their iniquities with a rod; and their sins with stripes!” (Psalm 88:33). “I will correct him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men” (2 Kings 7:14). “She brought forth a Man-Child, who was to rule all nations with an iron rod” (Apocalypse 12:5). “He shall rule them with a rod of iron, and as the vessel of a potter they shall be broken!” (Apocalypse 2:27). “And out of His mouth proceeds a sharp two-edged sword; that with it He may strike the nations. And He shall rule them with a rod of iron and the fierceness of the wrath of God the Almighty!” (Apocalypse 19:15).
LA SALETTE: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go forth and seduce the nations, which are over the four quarters of the Earth” (Apocalypse 20:7). “And He sent upon them the wrath of His indignation―indignation and wrath and trouble, which He sent by evil angels” (Psalm 77:49).
LA SALETTE: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). “Let him do penance for his sin!” (Leviticus 5:5). “Do penance for all your iniquities and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:30). “I came to call sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “Penance and remission of sins should be preached in his name, unto all nations” (Luke 24:47). “Jesus began to upbraid the cities wherein were done the most of His miracles, because that they had not done penance” (Matthew 11:20). “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21). “There is none that does penance for his sin” (Jeremias 8:6). “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you: except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5).
LA SALETTE: “God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: Lucifer caused division among the angels by his rebellion against God: “There was a great battle in Heaven―Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels. And they prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in Heaven. And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; and he was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him” (Apocalypse 12:7-9). “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, who didst rise in the morning? How art thou fallen to the Earth, thou that didst wound the nations?” (Isaias 14:12). “And there was a division among them” (John 9:16). “Their heart is divided―now they shall perish!” (Osee 10:2). “Your iniquities have caused division between you and your God” (Isaias 59:2). Satan caused division between Adam and Eve and God, by seducing them to sin (Genesis 3). Satan has continued to cause division ever since―making people rebel against God. That is why Our Lord says: “There shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law!” (Luke 12:52-53). “The multitude of the city was divided― some of them sided with the Jews, but some with the Apostles” (Acts 14:4). Hence we are warned: “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). How does the lion or wolf catch the sheep? By driving them and dividing them away from the rest of the flock, before pouncing on them and devouring them. Hence we say that “Satan seeks to divide and conquer.”
LA SALETTE: “Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other for years.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; and there shall be pestilences, and famines, and earthquakes in places ... And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, by reason of the confusion of the roaring of the sea and of the waves―men withering away from fear and expectation of what shall come upon the whole world. For the powers of heaven shall be moved! … For there shall be then great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be!” (Matthew 24:6-22; Mark 13:7-25; Luke 21:10-36).
LA SALETTE: “The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis. Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Many shall betray one another, and shall hate one another! … You shall be betrayed by your parents and brethren, and kinsmen and friends … And the brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death! … They shall deliver you up to be afflicted … They shall deliver you up to councils, and in the synagogues you shall be beaten, and they shall put you to death; and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake. And then shall many be scandalized, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another” (Matthew 24:6-22; Mark 13:7-25; Luke 21:10-36).
LA SALETTE: “Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening in everything that concerns the service of God … Rome will lose the Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times! Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God! Having an appearance indeed of godliness―but denying the power thereof!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5). “Because iniquity will have abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). “Let no man deceive you by any means, for unless there come a revolt first, and the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and is lifted up above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he sits in the temple of God, showing himself as if he were God! … Whose coming is according to the working of Satan, in all power, and signs, and lying wonders, and in all seduction of iniquity to them that perish―because they receive not the love of the truth, so that they might be saved. Therefore God shall send them the operation of error, to believe lying!” (2 Thessalonians 2:3-10).
LA SALETTE: “The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay ... The righteous will suffer greatly ... The true Faith to the Lord will be forgotten.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “There shall be then great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be!” (Matthew 24:21) … “There shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, by reason of the confusion of the roaring of the sea and of the waves. Men withering away from the fear and expectation of what shall come upon the whole world!” (Luke 21:25-26) … “You shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful!” (John 16:20) … “Now all these are the beginnings of sorrows. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death; and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake. And then shall many be scandalized, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another” (Matthew 24:8-10). “Faith is lost, and is carried away” (Jeremias 7:28).
LA SALETTE: “People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin … and men will become more and more perverted.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Never have I joined myself with them that play” (Tobias 3:17). “Laughter I counted as an error; and to mirth I said: ‘Why art thou vainly deceived?’” (Ecclesiastes 2:2). “Laughter shall be mingled with sorrow” (Proverbs 14:13). “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child” (1 Corinthians 13:11). “The childish shall possess folly” (Proverbs 14:18). “Do not become idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play!’ For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; and all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud and in the sea; and did all eat the same spiritual food; and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them―and the rock was Christ―but with most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:1-7).
LA SALETTE: “God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Fear not, for I am with thee! Turn not aside, for I am thy God! I have strengthened thee, and have helped thee, and the right hand of My just one has upheld thee! Behold, all that fight against thee shall be confounded and ashamed, they shall be as nothing, and the men that strive against thee shall perish!” (Isaias 41:10-11).
LA SALETTE: “I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son! Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world! The children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God!”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “I beseech you therefore, brethren, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God, your reasonable service! And be not conformed to this world―but be reformed in the newness of your mind, that you may prove what is the good and the acceptable and the perfect will of God! (Romans 12:1-2). “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
LA SALETTE: “Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “God now declares unto men, that all should everywhere do penance!” (Acts 17:30) ... “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9) … “Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:30) ... “Do penance and pray to God, that perhaps you may be forgiven!” (Acts 8:22) ... “If My people― being converted―shall pray to Me and seek out My face, and do penance for their most wicked ways―then will I hear from Heaven and will forgive their sins and will heal their land!” (2 Paralipomenon 7:14).
LA SALETTE: “It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days! May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4). “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12).
Many more Scriptural quotes are available to back-up and affirm each of the La Salette quotes above. They have not been used because it would have greatly increased the length of this article. Nevertheless, from the Scriptural quotes used above, we can clearly see that Our Lady of La Salette is saying nothing new in her Private Revelation―she is merely echoing the words and ideas already found in Divine Public Revelation. The whole purpose of Our Lady saying these things is our lack of attention or neglect in doing what we should be doing―hence the reminder and the warning of what will happen if we ignore her message. As Divine Public Revelation says in Holy Scripture: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). Our Lady could use the words of Our Lord with regard to her messages: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
We tend to prefer sweet things more than bitter things! That is not only true of food, but it is also true of many other aspects of life. We prefer easy things more than hard things. We prefer good news rather than bad news. We want a Catholic Faith that is sweet and not bitter. After all―does not Holy Scripture say: “O taste, and see that the Lord is sweet!” (Psalm 33:9). “The Lord is sweet and righteous!” (Psalm 24:8). “The Lord is sweet to all!” (Psalm 144:9). “Thou, O Lord, art sweet and mild!” (Psalm 85:5). “Sweet is Thy spirit, O Lord, in all things!” (Wisdom 12:1). “How sweet are Thy words to my palate!” (Psalm 118:103).
Not only is the Lord said to be sweet―but Our Lady is also said to be sweet. We end the prayer, Salve Regina (Hail Holy Queen) with the words: “O sweet Virgin Mary!” Holy Mother Church assigns the following words to Our Lady: “My spirit is sweet above honey!” (Ecclesiasticus 24:27). Yet when we look at the modern-day apparitions of Our Lady, and examine the content of her messages, then what we find seems to very far from being sweet and in fact tastes very bitter! This is especially true of Our Lady’s message at La Salette in France, where she appeared only once―on September 19th, 1846.
The modern-day Church―and even some Traditionalists and Conservatives―has tried to “sanitize” and “sweeten” the very bitter message that Our Lady gave at La Salette. However, that must be an insult to Our Lady, who, like any good doctor, seeks to cure the sinful sickness of her children with bitter medicine―for, as they say, “bitter is better” and many a medicine is bitter to take, but sweet in its healthful effects.
If you pay careful attention to most of Our Lady’s modern-day apparitions (from the 1600s onwards), you will find far more bitter medicine than sweet medicine. This is true of Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Lourdes, Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Akita. In all of those apparitions there is far more bitter medicine than sweet medicine―far more bitter messages than sweet messages. Let us then do Our Lady the honor of examining them―and we will notice that there are certain points that re-occur from one apparition to another.
What most people tend to forget―or are totally ignorant of in the first place―is the fact that in many apparitions Our Lady did not appear as a sweet-smiling Lady, but as a sad and sorrowful Lady. At La Salette she shows herself to be weeping. At Fatima, Sister Lucia says that Our Lady never smiled once at the children. At Akita, Our Lady’s statue miraculously wept tears of blood. There is a reason for all of this―and this we will uncover as we uncover the words of her “bitter” messages addressed to mankind.
Sweet or Bitter Food?
The above quotes about God being sweet are true―but God is not one-dimensional. God is―at the same time―merciful and just. He can be peaceable towards us, or He can be angry towards us. He can take us to Heaven or send us to Hell. God Himself tells us of the two “foods” that we can expect to receive from His hands―food that is sweet and food that is bitter. God clearly states that in the Book of Leviticus:
“I am the Lord your God. Keep My Sabbaths! If you walk in My precepts and keep My commandments and do them … then I will look on you, and make you increase! … My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people! But if you walk contrary to Me, and will not listen to Me; if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments; if you despise My laws and My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, then I also will do these things to you: I will set My face against you … I will chastise you seven times more for your sins! I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins! I will break the pride of your stubbornness! … I will quickly visit you with poverty and burning heat, which shall consume your lives! … You shall fall down before your enemies! … You shall sow your seed in vain! … Your labor shall be spent in vain, the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit. And I will send in upon you the beasts of the field, to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number, and that your highways may be desolate. And if, despite this, you will not amend, but will walk contrary to Me―then I also will walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins. And I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge Me! When you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies … But if, despite all this, you will not listen to Me, but will walk against Me―then I will also go against you with opposite fury! … I will bring your cities to be a wilderness! … I will destroy your land! … I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed … You shall perish among the Gentiles! And if some remain, then they shall pine away in their iniquities in the land of their enemies―until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, whereby they have transgressed Me, and walked contrary unto Me … They shall pray for their sins, because they rejected My judgments, and despised My laws!” (Leviticus 26:1-43).
Those words pretty much sum up what Our Lady has been saying at her modern-day apparitions. Prophecy does not simply seek to predict the future, but to change the present. Our Lady―whom we address in the Salve Regina (Hail Holy Queen) as “O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary!”―tells us in her apparitions that if we continue to sin, then that clemency will bring down justice; that love will bring down anger instead; and that any sweetness we have had will turn into bitterness.
OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846) said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves [to the laws, commandments and desires of God], then I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! … God will strike in an unprecedented way! The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His anger upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together!” Our Lady then goes on to speak of Rome losing the Faith; many of clergy and religious orders losing or departing from the true Faith; of light of Faith being gradually extinguished among the faithful, who will be preoccupied with amusements; of natural disasters such as floods, earthquakes, pestilence and plagues; of many civil wars followed by massive world war; of unprecedented bloodshed even among civilians in their homes, etc. More on these things further below. Does all this sound like something “sweet” or something “bitter”?
For those who refuse to accept the “bitter” side of La Salette and question its authenticity, then listen to what Our Lady has said about the “bitter fruits” that will be on our plate if we do not change:
OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS (1600s) said: “From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. These years, during which the evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government, will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities … Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective of making it easy for everyone to live in sin. The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals … calling down in turn every type of chastisement, such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy, the cause of the perdition of so many souls … The vices of impurity, blasphemy and sacrilege will dominate in this time of depraved desolation. In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost. During these unfortunate times, evil will invade childhood innocence. Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women. Under the appearance of virtue and bad-spirited zeal, Catholics will turn upon the Religion, which nourished them at her breast! They will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private.”
OUR LADY OF LOURDES (1858), appearing 12 years after La Salette, was brief but very clear in stating that life in this world is not meant to sweet―such sweetness is reserved for the next life in Heaven: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next world!” She further spoke of the necessity of our doing penance for sinners, demanding: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” Telling us to “Pray for sinners” and do “penance for sinners.” St. Bernadette relates: “She told me to go, drink of the spring (….) I only found a little muddy water. At the fourth attempt I was able to drink. She also made me eat the bitter herbs that were found near the spring, and then the vision left and went away.” In front of the crowd that was asking “Do you think that she is mad doing things like that?” Bernadette replied: “It is for sinners!”
OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1917) said: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … People must amend their lives and ask pardon for their sins … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! ... Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out! … God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father! … To prevent this, I shall come to ask for the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, and the Communion of Reparation on the First Saturdays. If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace; if not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, and many nations will be annihilated.
Regarding the annihilation of nations: it is important to note that during the Father Fuentes interview, Sister Lucia said that Our Blessed Mother had told herself, Jacinta and Francisco “many times ... that many nations will disappear from the face of the Earth.” We only have the one recorded instance in July 1917, but Lucia said Our Lady spoke many times of the annihilation of many nations―she said this not just once, but she said it “many times!” (Frère François, Tragedy and Triumph, [Buffalo: Immaculate Heart Publications, 1994], p. 27).
OUR LADY TO BLESSED ELENA AIELLO (1950s) said: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! See how the souls are falling into Hell! These are grave times! Tremendous will be the upheaval of the whole world, because men — as at the time of the Deluge — have lost God’s way, and are ruled by the spirit of Satan! Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls! … The justice of the Father requires reparation — otherwise many will be lost! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God! They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … The Church is opposed, and the priests are despised because of the bad ones who give scandal. Help Me by suffering, to repair for so many offenses, and thus save, at least in part, humanity precipitated in a swamp of corruption and death … The world has lowered itself in overflowing corruption ... The justice of our Father is most offended. Men live in their obstinacy of sin. The wrath of God is near. Soon the world will be afflicted with great calamities, bloody revolutions, frightful hurricanes, and the overflowing of rivers and the seas … Clouds with lightning flashes of fire in the sky, and a tempest of fire shall fall upon the world. This terrible scourge, never before seen in the history of humanity, will result in godless persons being crushed and wiped out. Many will be lost because they remain in their obstinacy of sin. Then shall the power of light be seen to triumph over the power of darkness! … Prayers and penances are necessary because men must return to God and to my Immaculate Heart—and thus the world will, at least in part, be saved … Let this be known to all, because it will help save many souls, and prevent much destruction in the Church and in the world!”
OUR LADY OF AKITA (1973) said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord. In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge [the Great Flood in Noe’s time], such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!”
What Seems Bitter is Merciful
So, as you can see, Our Lady’s messages are essentially the same throughout all her modern-day apparitions―in some cases she enters into great detail, in other cases there is much less detail. If we reject La Salette for whatever reason, then the other apparitions simply take its place and give the same message. To some persons, the above messages of Our Lady may seem to be too “bitter” ― but bear in mind that Hell is a helluva lot more bitter and the chastisements that Our Lady speaks about are not vengeful acts where God “blows His top”, “loses it”, and blindly wreaks havoc on the world in a mindless fashion! Those promised or threatened chastisements are merely medicinal measures that seek to bring about conversions before it is too late and countless souls end up being damned. It is like a doctor seeking to save the life of his patient―first he tries consumable medicines that can be swallowed or injected; if these have no effect, then the doctor will seek to amputate a gangrenous limb, or surgically remove a cancerous part of the body as a last resort to saving the patient’s life. If Our Lady’s “oral medicine” (the words and warnings of her messages) fail to being about a change in us “sinful patients”, then something more severe is required. . As Our Lady of La Salette said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves [to the laws, commandments and desires of God], then I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it!”
Let us now take a greater look at Our Lady’s prophecies that she made at La Salette and evaluate their importance for our present day and our own salvation.
The La Salette prophecies cover an undetermined period of time―undetermined as to when exactly most of the prophecies will take place; and undetermined as to how this period of time will last. When we compare La Salette to other apparitions of Our Lady, then we can conclude with a reasonable amount of certainty that Our Lady is speaking of terrible times that will occur before the coming of the Antichrist and another period of terrible times that will occur after the coming of the Antichrist. Relying on what Sister Lucia of Fatima was told by Our Lady, we can be certain that we have entered what is popularly called “The End Times” or “The Last Days” ― even though that period of time can be quite long. Some people mistakenly imagine that “The End Times” or “The Last Days” mean that we are on the verge of world ending―which is false. Our Lady speaks of the Triumph of her Immaculate Heart as bringing to an end the first period of terrible times―after which there will be an undetermined period of peace prior to the coming of the Antichrist. At that point the terrible times will recommence until the Antichrist is defeated.
La Salette is Part of a Whole
Our Lady’s apparition at La Salette―or any Private Divine Revelation for that matter―is not a “stand-alone” totally independent event. All Divine Private Revelation must bow down to Divine Public Revelation. What is the difference between the two?
● Divine Public Revelation is a universal revelation (meaning that it is meant for everybody) which is contained in the Bible, or in the deposit of teachings coming from Apostolic Tradition, and transmitted down through the ages by the Church. Divine Public Revelation ended with the preaching of the Apostles, the last of whom (St. John) died in the early 100s A.D., and this Divine Public Revelation must be believed by everyone.
● Divine Private Revelation consists of private and particular revelations, which are constantly occurring among Christians. They are not contained in the Bible, nor in the deposit of Apostolic Tradition. The Church does not oblige us to believe in them, but it is prudent not to reject them lightly when they are affirmed by saints―for it is through Divine Private Revelation that we have been given the Sacred Heart Devotion; the Immaculate Heart Devotion; the Sorrowful Heart of Mary Devotion; the Holy Rosary; the Brown Scapular, and many more such like things. The function of Divine Private Revelation is merely re-focus our minds on what is contained in Divine Public Revelation. Private revelations may make us do something that we should be doing, but are no longer doing; or it may command us to cease doing what we should not be doing, but have started to do through either malice or weakness. Thus at La Salette, Lourdes, Fatima and Akita, Our Lady reminds us by Divine Private Revelation, what is already contained in Divine Public Revelation―namely, the need for prayer and penance: “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) … “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1) … “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). Therefore, Our Lady is adding nothing new, but simply reminding us what is commanded by Divine Public Revelation, in this case in the form of Holy Scripture.
The same is true of the chastisements that are foretold by Divine Private Revelations―these chastisements are mentioned in Holy Scripture, but without the greater details furnished in future centuries by Divine Private Revelation:
● St. Matthew’s Gospel states: “You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that ye be not troubled. For these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; and there shall be pestilences, and famines, and earthquakes in places. Now all these are the beginnings of sorrows. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death; and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake. And then shall many be scandalized, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And many false prophets shall rise, and shall seduce many … For there shall be then great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be. And unless those days had been shortened, no flesh should be saved―but for the sake of the elect those days shall be shortened!” (Matthew 24:6-22).
● St. Mark’s Gospel states: “You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars, fear ye not. For such things must needs be, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom, and there shall be earthquakes in diverse places, and famines. These things are the beginning of sorrows … They shall deliver you up to councils, and in the synagogues you shall be beaten, and you shall stand before governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony unto them … And the brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake! … For in those days shall be such tribulations, as were not from the beginning of the creation which God created until now, neither shall be. And unless the Lord had shortened the days, no flesh should be saved: but for the sake of the elect which he hath chosen, he hath shortened the days … Take heed therefore! Behold I have foretold you all things. But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light. And the stars of heaven shall be falling down, and the powers that are in heaven, shall be moved.” (Mark 13:7-25).
● St. Luke’s Gospel states: “You shall hear of wars and seditions―be not terrified, for these things must first come to pass; but the end is not yet presently! Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there shall be great earthquakes in diverse places, and pestilences, and famines, and terrors from Heaven; and there shall be great signs. But before all these things, they will lay their hands upon you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors, for My Name’s sake! … And you shall be betrayed by your parents and brethren, and kinsmen and friends; and some of you they will put to death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake! … For these are the days of vengeance, that all things may be fulfilled, that are written! And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, by reason of the confusion of the roaring of the sea and of the waves―men withering away from fear and expectation of what shall come upon the whole world. For the powers of heaven shall be moved! … When you shall see these things come to pass, know that the kingdom of God is at hand! … Take heed to yourselves, lest perhaps you be overcome with overindulging and drunkenness, and the cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly! For as a snare shall it come upon all that sit upon the face of the whole Earth! Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times, that you may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that are to come and to stand before the Son of man! … The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 21:10-36; 18:8).
● St. John’s Gospel sums it all up, saying: “Because I have spoken these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart … Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman, when she is in labor, hath sorrow, because her hour is come; but when she hath brought forth the child, she remembers no more the anguish, because of her joy that a man is born into the world. So also you now indeed have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you ... In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world!” (John 16:6; 16:20-22; 6:33).
Compare the above Gospel accounts to Our Lady’s message at La Salette, and you will clearly see that they are all essentially the same. Our Lady merely goes into more detail concerning the chastisements. Here are the key prophecies from Our Lady of La Salette’s message:
● Our Lady of La Salette said: “Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! … God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish. God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family. Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other for years.
“The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis. Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned. Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening in everything that concerns the service of God … Rome will lose the Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist … The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay ... The righteous will suffer greatly ... The true Faith to the Lord will be forgotten … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin … and men will become more and more perverted.
“But the children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God! God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will. I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son! Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world! Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days! May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
The above examples are clear and incontestable―for prayer and penance are both clearly mentioned and commanded in the pages of Holy Scripture. Likewise, the terrible chastisements for the “End Times” are also foretold in the pages of Holy Scripture.
LA SALETTE: “Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! … God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together!”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Thou shalt rule them with a rod of iron, and shalt break them in pieces like a potter’s vessel!” (Psalms 2:9). “Thou shalt beat him with the rod and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:14). “I will visit their iniquities with a rod; and their sins with stripes!” (Psalm 88:33). “I will correct him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men” (2 Kings 7:14). “She brought forth a Man-Child, who was to rule all nations with an iron rod” (Apocalypse 12:5). “He shall rule them with a rod of iron, and as the vessel of a potter they shall be broken!” (Apocalypse 2:27). “And out of His mouth proceeds a sharp two-edged sword; that with it He may strike the nations. And He shall rule them with a rod of iron and the fierceness of the wrath of God the Almighty!” (Apocalypse 19:15).
LA SALETTE: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go forth and seduce the nations, which are over the four quarters of the Earth” (Apocalypse 20:7). “And He sent upon them the wrath of His indignation―indignation and wrath and trouble, which He sent by evil angels” (Psalm 77:49).
LA SALETTE: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). “Let him do penance for his sin!” (Leviticus 5:5). “Do penance for all your iniquities and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:30). “I came to call sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “Penance and remission of sins should be preached in his name, unto all nations” (Luke 24:47). “Jesus began to upbraid the cities wherein were done the most of His miracles, because that they had not done penance” (Matthew 11:20). “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21). “There is none that does penance for his sin” (Jeremias 8:6). “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you: except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5).
LA SALETTE: “God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: Lucifer caused division among the angels by his rebellion against God: “There was a great battle in Heaven―Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels. And they prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in Heaven. And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; and he was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him” (Apocalypse 12:7-9). “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, who didst rise in the morning? How art thou fallen to the Earth, thou that didst wound the nations?” (Isaias 14:12). “And there was a division among them” (John 9:16). “Their heart is divided―now they shall perish!” (Osee 10:2). “Your iniquities have caused division between you and your God” (Isaias 59:2). Satan caused division between Adam and Eve and God, by seducing them to sin (Genesis 3). Satan has continued to cause division ever since―making people rebel against God. That is why Our Lord says: “There shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law!” (Luke 12:52-53). “The multitude of the city was divided― some of them sided with the Jews, but some with the Apostles” (Acts 14:4). Hence we are warned: “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). How does the lion or wolf catch the sheep? By driving them and dividing them away from the rest of the flock, before pouncing on them and devouring them. Hence we say that “Satan seeks to divide and conquer.”
LA SALETTE: “Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other for years.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; and there shall be pestilences, and famines, and earthquakes in places ... And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, by reason of the confusion of the roaring of the sea and of the waves―men withering away from fear and expectation of what shall come upon the whole world. For the powers of heaven shall be moved! … For there shall be then great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be!” (Matthew 24:6-22; Mark 13:7-25; Luke 21:10-36).
LA SALETTE: “The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis. Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Many will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... A number of religious institutions will lose all Faith and will cause many souls to be damned.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Many shall betray one another, and shall hate one another! … You shall be betrayed by your parents and brethren, and kinsmen and friends … And the brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death! … They shall deliver you up to be afflicted … They shall deliver you up to councils, and in the synagogues you shall be beaten, and they shall put you to death; and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake. And then shall many be scandalized, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another” (Matthew 24:6-22; Mark 13:7-25; Luke 21:10-36).
LA SALETTE: “Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening in everything that concerns the service of God … Rome will lose the Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times! Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God! Having an appearance indeed of godliness―but denying the power thereof!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5). “Because iniquity will have abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). “Let no man deceive you by any means, for unless there come a revolt first, and the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and is lifted up above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he sits in the temple of God, showing himself as if he were God! … Whose coming is according to the working of Satan, in all power, and signs, and lying wonders, and in all seduction of iniquity to them that perish―because they receive not the love of the truth, so that they might be saved. Therefore God shall send them the operation of error, to believe lying!” (2 Thessalonians 2:3-10).
LA SALETTE: “The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay ... The righteous will suffer greatly ... The true Faith to the Lord will be forgotten.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “There shall be then great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be!” (Matthew 24:21) … “There shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, by reason of the confusion of the roaring of the sea and of the waves. Men withering away from the fear and expectation of what shall come upon the whole world!” (Luke 21:25-26) … “You shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful!” (John 16:20) … “Now all these are the beginnings of sorrows. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death; and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake. And then shall many be scandalized, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another” (Matthew 24:8-10). “Faith is lost, and is carried away” (Jeremias 7:28).
LA SALETTE: “People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin … and men will become more and more perverted.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Never have I joined myself with them that play” (Tobias 3:17). “Laughter I counted as an error; and to mirth I said: ‘Why art thou vainly deceived?’” (Ecclesiastes 2:2). “Laughter shall be mingled with sorrow” (Proverbs 14:13). “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child” (1 Corinthians 13:11). “The childish shall possess folly” (Proverbs 14:18). “Do not become idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play!’ For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; and all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud and in the sea; and did all eat the same spiritual food; and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them―and the rock was Christ―but with most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:1-7).
LA SALETTE: “God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “Fear not, for I am with thee! Turn not aside, for I am thy God! I have strengthened thee, and have helped thee, and the right hand of My just one has upheld thee! Behold, all that fight against thee shall be confounded and ashamed, they shall be as nothing, and the men that strive against thee shall perish!” (Isaias 41:10-11).
LA SALETTE: “I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son! Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world! The children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God!”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “I beseech you therefore, brethren, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God, your reasonable service! And be not conformed to this world―but be reformed in the newness of your mind, that you may prove what is the good and the acceptable and the perfect will of God! (Romans 12:1-2). “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
LA SALETTE: “Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession.”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “God now declares unto men, that all should everywhere do penance!” (Acts 17:30) ... “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9) … “Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:30) ... “Do penance and pray to God, that perhaps you may be forgiven!” (Acts 8:22) ... “If My people― being converted―shall pray to Me and seek out My face, and do penance for their most wicked ways―then will I hear from Heaven and will forgive their sins and will heal their land!” (2 Paralipomenon 7:14).
LA SALETTE: “It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days! May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
HOLY SCRIPTURE: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4). “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12).
Many more Scriptural quotes are available to back-up and affirm each of the La Salette quotes above. They have not been used because it would have greatly increased the length of this article. Nevertheless, from the Scriptural quotes used above, we can clearly see that Our Lady of La Salette is saying nothing new in her Private Revelation―she is merely echoing the words and ideas already found in Divine Public Revelation. The whole purpose of Our Lady saying these things is our lack of attention or neglect in doing what we should be doing―hence the reminder and the warning of what will happen if we ignore her message. As Divine Public Revelation says in Holy Scripture: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). Our Lady could use the words of Our Lord with regard to her messages: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Article 8
Monday & Tuesday, September 16th & 17th
Learning Our Lesson from La Salette
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday & Tuesday, September 16th & 17th
Learning Our Lesson from La Salette
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
False Sense of Security
Our Lady’s La Salette messages―on September 19th, 1846―are messages for our times. Yet nobody seems to care and very few worry about what she said. The words spoken by Sister Lucia of Fatima concerning Our Lady’s later messages at Fatima in 1917, are words that are also appropriately applicable to Our Lady’s messages at La Salette. Sister Lucia said: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Our reaction might be: “Heck! Those warnings were given around 180 years and 110 years ago―and nothing has happened! Why worry?” Yet our idea of time is not quite God’s idea of time: “Of this one thing be not ignorant, my beloved, that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day!” (2 Peter 3:8). If Our Lady’s warnings at La Salette in 1846 are “out-of-date” and have passed their “sell-by-date” ― then why did Our Lady more or less repeat the same warnings at Fatima in 1917 and at Akita in 1973? Holy Scripture speaks of our presumptuous complacency when it says: “Because sentence is not speedily pronounced against the evil, the children of men commit evils without any fear” (Ecclesiastes 8:11). But St. Peter reminds us: “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9).
Scripture further warns: “Say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great! He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’ For mercy and wrath quickly come from Him; and His wrath looks upon sinners! Delay not to be converted to the Lord, and defer it not from day to day! For His wrath shall come on all of a sudden, and in the time of vengeance He will destroy thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:6-9). In essence, that is what Our Lady has been saying all along―in all of her modern-day apparitions.
St. Alphonsus Liguori, a Doctor of the Church, says in his sermon for the 12th Sunday after Pentecost: “If there be any among you who, though wounded by sin, continually aggravate the wounds by new sins, and thus abuse the mercy of God, I say to you: ‘Take care of your souls, which are in a very bad state! “Have pity on thy own soul” (Ecclesiasticus 30: 24). Your souls are sick, and, what is worse they are near the eternal death of Hell―for he who abuses to excess the divine mercy, is on the point of being abandoned by the mercy of God!’ … When you intend to commit sin, who, I ask, promises you mercy from God? Certainly God does not promise it. It is the devil that promises it, so that you may lose God and be damned! … God promises pardon to all who repent of the evil they have done. But if you intend to continue in your sinful course, tremble lest God should wait no longer for you, but cast you into Hell. Why does God wait for sinners? Is it that they may continue to insult Him? No; He waits for them that they may renounce sin, and that thus He may have pity on them, and forgive them. But when He sees that the time—which He gave them to weep over their past iniquities—is spent in multiplying their sins, He begins to inflict chastisement, and He cuts them off in the state of sin, that, by dying, they may cease to offend Him. Some rash sinners will say: ‘God has so far shown me so many mercies! Why should He not here after treat me with the same mercy?’ I answer: He will show you mercy if you wish to change your life―but if you intend to continue to offend Him, then He tells you that He will take vengeance on your sins by casting you into Hell!”” Once again, it has to be said, that Our Lady has more or less said the same thing in her most recent apparitions as Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Akita.
St. Basil, a Father and Doctor of the Church, says that sinners only consider God as merciful and ready to pardon, but they do not consider God as just and prepared to inflict punishment. St. Bernard, a Doctor of the Church, says that the confidence which sinners have in God’s goodness when they commit sin, procures for them, not a blessing, but a malediction from the Lord. Of this Our Lord complained one day to St. Bridget: “I am just and merciful: sinners regard me only as merciful.” St. Augustine, a Father and Doctor of the Church, states: “Sinners, trusting in God’s goodness, insult Him, and say: ‘God is good! I will do what I please!’ But, alas! How many has this vain hope deluded! They who have been deceived by this shadow of vain hope cannot be numbered!” Which is more or less what Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda―and which is echoed at La Salette: “Fear the danger of not pay attention to the divine calls and warnings―for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls! … ... Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies … Men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature! Anything that is interior seems harmless in their estimation! … The wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular! So many insane and thankless souls are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation!”
Why are we so indifferent to these warnings? Why are we so negligent or lukewarm in carrying-out the commands of Our Lady? Why do we fail to take the measures that could avert the terrible times that are dawning and creeping upon us from all sides? Why do we expect Heaven to do everything and for ourselves to do little or nothing?
Covering Our Eyes or Burying Our Heads in the Sand
There are many who seek to discredit the messages of Our Lady at La Salette, saying that the seers have embellished and added their own words to those of Our Lady. Yet the parts of the message that are questioned nevertheless dovetail with what Our Lady has stated in her other apparitions elsewhere―for example, Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of Fatima, Our Lady of Akita and the words she spoke to Blessed Elena Aiello in the 1950s; not to mention what has been stated in many prophecies of the saints over many centuries. Maybe we should trash all of that? There are not a few who cast doubts over Fatima and Akita. As for the rest, the common mantra is: “It’s only private revelation! Nobody is obliged to believe private revelations!” Such a mentality is often based upon a predisposition that does not want to “go the extra mile” and fulfill the requests for extra prayers, penances and sacrifices that those messages often entail. Some seek to “bury their heads in the sand” and refuse to see and acknowledge the chastisements that this ever-increasingly sinful world is meriting and approaching. They prefer to remain in their own personal “comfort-zone” and personally designed “virtual reality” that takes no notice of “real-reality”!
Such attitudes are aptly summed up by the words of Sister Lucia concerning the Fatima messages―which were quoted above, but lose nothing by being repeated here: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957). In other words: “Stuff the message! I am going to do what I want to do! And to Hell with consequences!”
Such an attitude is often based upon a false sense of security that sees the majority doing nothing with regard to Our Lady’s warnings and requests―therefore it must be safe to do nothing by following the majority. Such foolish attitudes should learn a lesson from the fact that the majority of souls end up being damned―is it therefore safe to imitate the lifestyle of that majority? Most people are like the three children at Fatima―Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta―who preferred to play rather than play, until they were scolded, rebuked and corrected by the angel that appeared to them saying: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers unceasingly and sacrifice yourselves to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners! In this way, you will draw peace upon your country. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!” Lucia later admitted that they had developed a speedy way of saying the Rosary in order to give themselves more time to play―for each Hail Mary they would shorten it to: “Hail Mary! Amen!” The words of Our Lady of La Salette―spoken around 70 years earlier―come to mind: “Do you say your prayers well, my children?” Melanie and Maximin replied: “No, not well!” To which Our Lady said: “You must say your prayers well!”
We Are Losing It―Or Have Already Lost It!
We have lost the appetite for prayer―there are too many better things to preoccupy our minds in this age of electronic gizmos and appliances. We have also lost the sense of sin―and thus we see little need for penances and sacrifices. Yet prayer, penance and sacrifice are the essential weapons which Heaven requires that we use to get out of this moral mess that we find ourselves in. For most people, sin is no big deal―everyone does it and everyone seems to get away with it! There are no lightning bolts coming from Heaven to strike down sinners! “Because sentence is not speedily pronounced against the evil, the children of men commit evils without any fear” (Ecclesiastes 8:11).
One pope after another―whether Conservative, Liberal or Modernist―acknowledges that the world has lost the sense of sin. Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!” Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!” Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many!” Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost!” The true sense of sin should see sin as the greatest evil in the world―which is what it really is. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127). The greatest crimes demand the greatest punishments―if both mortal and venial sin are the greatest evils in the world, then they merit the greatest punishments. Yet we fail to see and acknowledge that truth―or we totally reject that truth. Our failure to accept that truth does not mean that God will fail to punish us. “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9).
That is what Our Lady―whether at Quito, La Salette, Lourdes, Fatima or Akita―has been trying to tell us: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance!” (La Salette) … “Penance! Penance! Penance!” (Lourdes) … “Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger” (Akita) … “Communities can only be preserved ― while they exist ― at the cost of much penance!” (Quito) … “Will you sacrifice yourself for the people of this time? … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners?” (Fatima) … “Prayers, penances and tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession” (Quito).
To Blessed Elena Aiello, Our Lady said the same thing in the 1950s: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! See how the souls are falling into Hell! These are grave times! Tremendous will be the upheaval of the whole world, because men — as at the time of the Deluge — have lost God’s way, and are ruled by the spirit of Satan! Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God! They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls! … Prayers and penances are necessary because men must return to God … If men do not return to God with prayers and penances, the world will be overturned in a new and terrible war. Arms most deadly will destroy peoples and nations! … If men do not amend their ways, a terrifying scourge of fire will come down from Heaven upon all the nations of the world, and men will be punished according to the debts contracted with Divine justice. There will be frightful moments for all, because Heaven will be joined with the Earth, and all the un-Godly people will be destroyed, some nations will be purified, while others will disappear entirely. Through prayer and penance, my mercy will be able to hold back the hand of God’s justice … In these tragic hours, the world has need of prayers and penance … The only valid means for placating Divine Justice is to pray and do penance, returning to God with sincere sorrow for the faults committed, and then the chastisement of Divine Justice will be mitigated by mercy … My heart―as Mother and Mediatrix of men, being close to the mercy of God―invites, with many manifestations and many signs, the people to penance and to pardon. But they respond with a storm of hate, blasphemies and sacrilegious profanations, as if blinded by an infernal rage. I wish prayers and penance, in order that I may again obtain mercy and salvation for many souls — otherwise they will be lost … You are to transmit these warnings to all, in order that the new generation will know that men had been warned in time to turn to God by doing penance, and thus could have avoided these punishments … Launch at once a message into the world, to advise men to return to God by prayers and penances, and to come with confidence to my Immaculate Heart!”
In the next article, we shall examine in detail Our Lady's prophecies at La Salette and compare them to her other prophecies from her other apparitions.
Our Lady’s La Salette messages―on September 19th, 1846―are messages for our times. Yet nobody seems to care and very few worry about what she said. The words spoken by Sister Lucia of Fatima concerning Our Lady’s later messages at Fatima in 1917, are words that are also appropriately applicable to Our Lady’s messages at La Salette. Sister Lucia said: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Our reaction might be: “Heck! Those warnings were given around 180 years and 110 years ago―and nothing has happened! Why worry?” Yet our idea of time is not quite God’s idea of time: “Of this one thing be not ignorant, my beloved, that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day!” (2 Peter 3:8). If Our Lady’s warnings at La Salette in 1846 are “out-of-date” and have passed their “sell-by-date” ― then why did Our Lady more or less repeat the same warnings at Fatima in 1917 and at Akita in 1973? Holy Scripture speaks of our presumptuous complacency when it says: “Because sentence is not speedily pronounced against the evil, the children of men commit evils without any fear” (Ecclesiastes 8:11). But St. Peter reminds us: “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9).
Scripture further warns: “Say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great! He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’ For mercy and wrath quickly come from Him; and His wrath looks upon sinners! Delay not to be converted to the Lord, and defer it not from day to day! For His wrath shall come on all of a sudden, and in the time of vengeance He will destroy thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:6-9). In essence, that is what Our Lady has been saying all along―in all of her modern-day apparitions.
St. Alphonsus Liguori, a Doctor of the Church, says in his sermon for the 12th Sunday after Pentecost: “If there be any among you who, though wounded by sin, continually aggravate the wounds by new sins, and thus abuse the mercy of God, I say to you: ‘Take care of your souls, which are in a very bad state! “Have pity on thy own soul” (Ecclesiasticus 30: 24). Your souls are sick, and, what is worse they are near the eternal death of Hell―for he who abuses to excess the divine mercy, is on the point of being abandoned by the mercy of God!’ … When you intend to commit sin, who, I ask, promises you mercy from God? Certainly God does not promise it. It is the devil that promises it, so that you may lose God and be damned! … God promises pardon to all who repent of the evil they have done. But if you intend to continue in your sinful course, tremble lest God should wait no longer for you, but cast you into Hell. Why does God wait for sinners? Is it that they may continue to insult Him? No; He waits for them that they may renounce sin, and that thus He may have pity on them, and forgive them. But when He sees that the time—which He gave them to weep over their past iniquities—is spent in multiplying their sins, He begins to inflict chastisement, and He cuts them off in the state of sin, that, by dying, they may cease to offend Him. Some rash sinners will say: ‘God has so far shown me so many mercies! Why should He not here after treat me with the same mercy?’ I answer: He will show you mercy if you wish to change your life―but if you intend to continue to offend Him, then He tells you that He will take vengeance on your sins by casting you into Hell!”” Once again, it has to be said, that Our Lady has more or less said the same thing in her most recent apparitions as Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Akita.
St. Basil, a Father and Doctor of the Church, says that sinners only consider God as merciful and ready to pardon, but they do not consider God as just and prepared to inflict punishment. St. Bernard, a Doctor of the Church, says that the confidence which sinners have in God’s goodness when they commit sin, procures for them, not a blessing, but a malediction from the Lord. Of this Our Lord complained one day to St. Bridget: “I am just and merciful: sinners regard me only as merciful.” St. Augustine, a Father and Doctor of the Church, states: “Sinners, trusting in God’s goodness, insult Him, and say: ‘God is good! I will do what I please!’ But, alas! How many has this vain hope deluded! They who have been deceived by this shadow of vain hope cannot be numbered!” Which is more or less what Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda―and which is echoed at La Salette: “Fear the danger of not pay attention to the divine calls and warnings―for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls! … ... Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies … Men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature! Anything that is interior seems harmless in their estimation! … The wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular! So many insane and thankless souls are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation!”
Why are we so indifferent to these warnings? Why are we so negligent or lukewarm in carrying-out the commands of Our Lady? Why do we fail to take the measures that could avert the terrible times that are dawning and creeping upon us from all sides? Why do we expect Heaven to do everything and for ourselves to do little or nothing?
Covering Our Eyes or Burying Our Heads in the Sand
There are many who seek to discredit the messages of Our Lady at La Salette, saying that the seers have embellished and added their own words to those of Our Lady. Yet the parts of the message that are questioned nevertheless dovetail with what Our Lady has stated in her other apparitions elsewhere―for example, Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of Fatima, Our Lady of Akita and the words she spoke to Blessed Elena Aiello in the 1950s; not to mention what has been stated in many prophecies of the saints over many centuries. Maybe we should trash all of that? There are not a few who cast doubts over Fatima and Akita. As for the rest, the common mantra is: “It’s only private revelation! Nobody is obliged to believe private revelations!” Such a mentality is often based upon a predisposition that does not want to “go the extra mile” and fulfill the requests for extra prayers, penances and sacrifices that those messages often entail. Some seek to “bury their heads in the sand” and refuse to see and acknowledge the chastisements that this ever-increasingly sinful world is meriting and approaching. They prefer to remain in their own personal “comfort-zone” and personally designed “virtual reality” that takes no notice of “real-reality”!
Such attitudes are aptly summed up by the words of Sister Lucia concerning the Fatima messages―which were quoted above, but lose nothing by being repeated here: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957). In other words: “Stuff the message! I am going to do what I want to do! And to Hell with consequences!”
Such an attitude is often based upon a false sense of security that sees the majority doing nothing with regard to Our Lady’s warnings and requests―therefore it must be safe to do nothing by following the majority. Such foolish attitudes should learn a lesson from the fact that the majority of souls end up being damned―is it therefore safe to imitate the lifestyle of that majority? Most people are like the three children at Fatima―Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta―who preferred to play rather than play, until they were scolded, rebuked and corrected by the angel that appeared to them saying: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers unceasingly and sacrifice yourselves to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners! In this way, you will draw peace upon your country. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!” Lucia later admitted that they had developed a speedy way of saying the Rosary in order to give themselves more time to play―for each Hail Mary they would shorten it to: “Hail Mary! Amen!” The words of Our Lady of La Salette―spoken around 70 years earlier―come to mind: “Do you say your prayers well, my children?” Melanie and Maximin replied: “No, not well!” To which Our Lady said: “You must say your prayers well!”
We Are Losing It―Or Have Already Lost It!
We have lost the appetite for prayer―there are too many better things to preoccupy our minds in this age of electronic gizmos and appliances. We have also lost the sense of sin―and thus we see little need for penances and sacrifices. Yet prayer, penance and sacrifice are the essential weapons which Heaven requires that we use to get out of this moral mess that we find ourselves in. For most people, sin is no big deal―everyone does it and everyone seems to get away with it! There are no lightning bolts coming from Heaven to strike down sinners! “Because sentence is not speedily pronounced against the evil, the children of men commit evils without any fear” (Ecclesiastes 8:11).
One pope after another―whether Conservative, Liberal or Modernist―acknowledges that the world has lost the sense of sin. Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!” Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!” Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many!” Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost!” The true sense of sin should see sin as the greatest evil in the world―which is what it really is. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127). The greatest crimes demand the greatest punishments―if both mortal and venial sin are the greatest evils in the world, then they merit the greatest punishments. Yet we fail to see and acknowledge that truth―or we totally reject that truth. Our failure to accept that truth does not mean that God will fail to punish us. “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9).
That is what Our Lady―whether at Quito, La Salette, Lourdes, Fatima or Akita―has been trying to tell us: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance!” (La Salette) … “Penance! Penance! Penance!” (Lourdes) … “Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger” (Akita) … “Communities can only be preserved ― while they exist ― at the cost of much penance!” (Quito) … “Will you sacrifice yourself for the people of this time? … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners?” (Fatima) … “Prayers, penances and tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession” (Quito).
To Blessed Elena Aiello, Our Lady said the same thing in the 1950s: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! See how the souls are falling into Hell! These are grave times! Tremendous will be the upheaval of the whole world, because men — as at the time of the Deluge — have lost God’s way, and are ruled by the spirit of Satan! Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God! They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls! … Prayers and penances are necessary because men must return to God … If men do not return to God with prayers and penances, the world will be overturned in a new and terrible war. Arms most deadly will destroy peoples and nations! … If men do not amend their ways, a terrifying scourge of fire will come down from Heaven upon all the nations of the world, and men will be punished according to the debts contracted with Divine justice. There will be frightful moments for all, because Heaven will be joined with the Earth, and all the un-Godly people will be destroyed, some nations will be purified, while others will disappear entirely. Through prayer and penance, my mercy will be able to hold back the hand of God’s justice … In these tragic hours, the world has need of prayers and penance … The only valid means for placating Divine Justice is to pray and do penance, returning to God with sincere sorrow for the faults committed, and then the chastisement of Divine Justice will be mitigated by mercy … My heart―as Mother and Mediatrix of men, being close to the mercy of God―invites, with many manifestations and many signs, the people to penance and to pardon. But they respond with a storm of hate, blasphemies and sacrilegious profanations, as if blinded by an infernal rage. I wish prayers and penance, in order that I may again obtain mercy and salvation for many souls — otherwise they will be lost … You are to transmit these warnings to all, in order that the new generation will know that men had been warned in time to turn to God by doing penance, and thus could have avoided these punishments … Launch at once a message into the world, to advise men to return to God by prayers and penances, and to come with confidence to my Immaculate Heart!”
In the next article, we shall examine in detail Our Lady's prophecies at La Salette and compare them to her other prophecies from her other apparitions.
Article 7
Sunday, September 15th, Feast of the Seven Sorrows of Our Lady
Soul to Soul! Heart to Heart!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, September 15th, Feast of the Seven Sorrows of Our Lady
Soul to Soul! Heart to Heart!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Soul to Soul with Our Sorrowful Mother
On this feast of the Seven Sorrows, it might be a good idea to have a ‘soul to soul’ conversation with our Sorrowful Mother, and let her tell us some of the things that cause her pain. We speak of the Seven Swords of Sorrow that pierced her Sorrowful Heart, but there are not only Seven Sorrows, they must be as innumerable as the grains of sand on the beach or the stars in the sky. We often say, “A problem shared is a problem halved!” Perhaps Our Lady will share some of her anxieties and sufferings with us! We will take her at her word by the words she spoke to the Venerable Mary of Agreda—whose body still lies incorrupt today, just as Our Lady’s words are still as incorrupt today as they were back in the 1600’s.
Holy Soul
The physical body of the Venerable Mary of Agreda is incorruptible, that is, not subject to rot and decay after death. During an opening of her casket in 1909, a cursory scientific examination was performed on the body. In 1989, a Spanish physician, named Andreas Medina, participated in another examination of Sister María de Jesús de Ágreda, as she lay in the convent of the Conceptionist nuns, the same monastery where she had lived in the 17th century. Dr. Medina told investigative journalist Javier Sierra, in 1991: “What most surprised me about that case is that when we compared the state of the body, as it was described in the medical report from 1909, with how it appeared in 1989, we realized it had absolutely not deteriorated at all in the last eighty years.” Complete photographic and other evidence was obtained by investigators before her casket was re-sealed. Now, her incorrupt body can be visited in the Church of the Convent of Ágreda.
The words that follow are almost exclusively the words of Our Lady, as she dictated them to the Venerable Sister María de Jesús de Ágreda. A short comment or liasing phrase may be inserted here or there. The subtitles are, of course, added to give or create a uniformity of thought.
Backward Souls
“Many other souls have reached the heights of perfection and have then fallen most unfortunately, arriving at a state in which they almost despaired, or found themselves incapable of rising. This sad state causes many things. The first is the dismay and endless confusion of one who feels that he has fallen from an exalted state of virtue; for he knows that he has not only lost great blessings, but now he does not expect to obtain greater ones than those of the past and those he has lost; nor can he guarantee more firmness with himself in keeping those he can obtain, through renewed efforts, than he has shown in the past with those blessings he acquired but has now lost through his ingratitude” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Hopeless Souls
“From this dangerous distrust of self, in not knowing if he will do better in the future, originates lukewarmness, lack of fervor and diligence, absence of zeal and devotion; such a heavy and distrustful heart extinguishes all these in the soul, just as the opposite, the liveliness of ardent hope, overcomes many difficulties, and strengthens weak human creatures to undertake great works” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Negligent Irreverent Souls
“Another obstacle there is, not less formidable, namely: that the souls accustomed to the blessings of God, either through their office—as priests and religious—or by the exercise of virtues and the abundance of divine favors—as spiritual minded persons—these souls usually aggravate their sins by a certain contempt of these very blessings and a certain abuse of divine things. For, because of the abundance of the divine favors, they fall into a dangerous dullness of mind. They begin to think little of the divine favors and become irreverent. Thus failing to cooperate with God’s grace, they hinder its effect. They lose the grace of holy fear of the Lord, which arouses and stimulates the will to obey the divine commandments and to be alert in the avoidance of sin and pursuit of eternal life in the friendship of God” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Lukewarm Souls
“This is an evident danger for lukewarm priests, who frequent the Holy Eucharist and other Sacraments, without fear and reverence; also for the souls of the learned and wise, as well as those who hold some power in this world, who are so reluctant to correct and amend their lives. They have lost the appreciation and veneration of the remedial helps of the Church, namely, the Sacraments, preaching and instruction. Thus, these medicines, which for other sinners are so salutary and counteract ignorance, end up weakening those who are the physicians of the spiritual life” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
“The worldlings in their lukewarmness are moved, neither by the duty of conforming to their Father and Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Sinful Souls
“Ordinarily the demons have no power over souls, unless they gain entrance by some venial or mortal fault. Mortal sin gives them a sort of direct right over those who commit it; while venial sin weakens the strength of the soul and invites their attacks. Weep in deepest sorrow over the ruin of so many souls absorbed in such dangerous lukewarmness” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Careless Neglectful Souls
“The same enemy instills into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and he incites the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Unrestrained Souls
They live amid the darkness of their passions and depraved inclinations, forgetful of the danger, unmoved by their losses, and heedless of their dealings. Instead of fearing and avoiding the occasions of evil, they encounter and seek for them in blind ignorance. In senseless fury they follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and show no care for where they walk, even if it is to the most dangerous precipices” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Tormented Souls
“Imagine what ought to be the grief of losing God really by sin! But this wisdom seems far from the mind of carnal men: with a most perverse blindness they continue to acquire and make much of the visible and fictitious goods of the world, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them. Because they never taste, or recognize, the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or reckoning of It. O sorrow, how easily Charity [which is a love of God, first and foremost] is wasted and set aside for any kind of pleasure, and how often Faith remains without any fruit and is involved in death!” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Faithless Souls
“If the faithful do not feel these and even more wonderful effects of Faith, it is not because Faith has not the strength and efficacy to produce them, but it is because some of the faithful are so forgetting and negligent, while others give themselves up so much to a carnal and bestial life and thereby counteract the blessing of Faith. They think so rarely of it, that they might as well not have received it at all. As they live like the infidels, who have never enjoyed its advantages, and, as they gradually become conscious of their unhappy infidelity, they fall into greater wickedness than the unbelievers. For such is the result of their abominable ingratitude and contempt for this exalted and sovereign gift of their Faith” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Unhappy Souls
“Hence thou canst judge of the blind ignorance with which their deadly enemies have fascinated mortals, since all men, in the inordinate desire and pursuit of happiness, neglect the divine law, where alone it can be found; and hence few really attain happiness” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Pleasure-Seeking Souls
“Consider then, whether anything deserves greater pity, than to see so many men misled into danger and made forgetful of it; how some of them cast themselves into it, on account of their lightheartedness, some of them for trivial reasons, others for a short and instantaneous pleasure, others through negligence, and yet others on account of their inordinate appetites” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Fearless Souls
“In this life, any punishment or tribulation fills mortals with fear and dread, but the guilt of sin does not fill them with dread. Men are entirely taken up by that which is visible, and they therefore do not look upon the ultimate consequences of sin, which is the eternal punishment of Hell. The human heart becomes so forgetful that it remains, as if it were stupefied, in its wickedness, because it does not feel it present in its senses. Though it could see and feel it by Faith, its Faith is itself listless and dead” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Blind Souls
“O most unhappy blindness of mortals! O lukewarm negligence, that holds so many souls in deceit! There are not words or sentences sufficient to describe this terrible and tremendous danger. Fear and flee such an unhappy state, and deliver thyself up to all the troubles and torments of life, which pass soon, rather than incur such a danger; for nothing will be lacking to thee, if thou do not lose God. Be convinced that there are no small faults! Fear greatly the small things, for in despising small faults the Most High knows, that the human heart invites other greater ones” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Preoccupied Souls
“In conversing with or worshiping the Most High, they fail to form a worthy concept of His infinite greatness, and fail to free themselves from thoughts of their earthly occupations, which thus make them lukewarm and carnal, unworthy and unfit for the magnificent communication with God [through prayer]. And this ill-bred coarseness entails another disorder: namely, that whenever they talk with their neighbors, they do it without order, measure or discretion; they become entangled in their outward actions, and losing the memory and presence of God in the excitement of their passions, and become completely entangled in what is earthly” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Thankless Souls
“If the children of the Holy Church would pause in their vain occupations and be ashamed of their lukewarm forgetfulness and repudiate their vile ingratitude. Let them be undeceived, for most terrible punishments await them” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Lost Souls
“They are surrounded by innumerable enemies [the invisible devils], who pursue them with diabolical treachery, unceasing vigilance, unquenchable wrath and restless diligence. What wonder then, that from such extremes, or rather from such unequal combat, irreparable defeats should arise among the mortals? And that, since the number of fools is infinite, the number of the damned should also be uncountable, and that the demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men? May God preserve thee from such a misfortune; and do thou weep and deplore the misfortunes of thy brethren, continually asking for their salvation, as far as is possible” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Fervent Souls
“The fulfillment of the precepts of the Lord must not be cold and lukewarm, but most fervent and devoted” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
“Thou must continue without intervals of lukewarmness, lest thou disgust Him. At all times and in all places, occupations and operations, thou must keep God in sight. I command thee to treat Him with a magnanimous heart, with decorum and reverence, with deep felt fear of the soul. And whatever pertains to His divine worship, I desire that thou handle with all attention and care. Above all, in order to enter into His presence by prayer and petitions, free thyself from all sensible and earthly images” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
“It is necessary, that thou live retired within thyself, forgetful of all the visible and terrestrial things, most attentive to the divine light, which assists thee and protects thy sensible faculties with double vestments against the influences of lukewarmness and coldness on the way of perfection; and it is necessary, that thou resist the incitements of thy unruly passions” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Abandoned Souls
“Receive knowledge and enlightenment for avoiding such dangerous and gross lukewarmness. Jesus withdraws from the lukewarm and negligent souls, or deals with them only according to the general rules of His divine Providence … [which will then bring about] “the losses sustained by them through their lukewarmness and negligence” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Reformed Souls
Let us take these words to heart and reform our souls! Who is there, among us, who can say: “I am good enough! I have no need to change anything in my life! I have nobody else to reach and convert! I have paid all my debts for past sin! I will go straight to Heaven with no fear of Purgatory or Hell!” If there is someone like that out there reading this—then please pray for the rest of us!!
Our Lord Wants…
Today being the feast of the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary, it is only fitting that we let our Sorrowful Mother and her Sorrowful Son—the Man of Sorrows—do most of the talking, while we, like Mary Magdalen place ourselves at their feet—either listening attentively to their words, or weeping sincerely over their feet for our may sins.
Our Lord commands: “Teach souls to love the Heart of My Mother pierced with sorrow that transfixed My Own Heart.”
“My Mother’s Heart has the right to the title of Sorrowful. I desire that it be set before her title of Immaculate, because she herself has won it. The Church has recognized what I Myself did for My Mother: her Immaculate Conception. Now it is necessary, and it is My wish, that this title, which is, by right, My Mother’s, should be understood and recognized. This title she earned by her identification with all My sufferings, by her sorrow, her sacrifice, her immolation on Calvary, and indeed for the salvation of mankind.”
“My desire flows from My love on Calvary. In giving John to My Mother as a son, I entrusted the whole world to her Sorrowful Motherhood.”
“The title of Immaculate belongs to the whole being of My Mother and not specially to her Heart. The title flows from my gratuitous gift to the Virgin, who was to give Me birth. My Mother has acquired, from her Heart, the title of ‘Sorrowful’ by sharing generously in all the sufferings of My Heart and My Body—from the crib to the cross. There is not one of these Sorrows which did not pierce the Heart of My Mother. Living image of My crucified Body, her virginal flesh bore the invisible marks of My wounds, as her Heart felt the Sorrows of My own. Nothing could ever tarnish the incorruptibility of her Immaculate Heart. The title of ‘Sorrowful’ belongs, therefore, to the Heart of My Mother, and more than any other, this title is dear to her, because it springs from the union of her Heart with Mine in the redemption of humanity. This title has been acquired by her through her full participation in My Calvary, and it precedes the gratuitous title ‘Immaculate’ which My love bestowed upon her by a singular privilege.”
“The time is now ripe and I wish mankind to turn to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother. Let this prayer be uttered by every soul: ‘Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us.’ Let this prayer dictated by My Love as a supreme succor be approved and indulgenced, no longer partially and for a small portion of My flock, but for the whole universe, so that it may spread as a refreshing and purifying balm of reparation that will appease My anger. This Devotion to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother will restore faith and hope to broken hearts and to ruined families: it will help to repair the destruction: it will sweeten sorrow. It will be a new strength for My Church, bringing souls, not only to confidence in My Heart, but also to abandonment to the Sorrowful Heart of My Mother.”
“It is hearts that must be changed. This will be accomplished only by the Devotion proclaimed, explained, preached and recommended everywhere. Recourse to My Mother under the title I wish for her universally, is the last help I shall give before the end of time.”
“This is the last help which I give before the end of time: the recourse to My Mother under the title which I desire shall be hers throughout the whole world.”
“In the hour of triumph” Our Lord said to Berthe one day “it will be made clearly manifest that I Myself have inspired, in those whom I have freely chosen, a devotion similar to that given to My own Heart. It is as a Son that I have conceived this devotion for My Mother. It is as God that I impose it.”
“Let every soul cry out: Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us.”
Fatima and the Sorrowful Heart of Mary
Our Lady explicitly spoke of her Sorrowful Heart at her fifth apparition at Fatima: “Continue to pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war. In October Our Lord will come, as well as Our Lady of Sorrows and Our Lady of Carmel” (Our Lady at Fatima, September 13th).
By 1925, Lucia, who was now 18, had become a postulant with the Sisters of St. Dorothy at Pontevedra in Spain, and on Thursday, December 10th, 1925, the Blessed Virgin, accompanied by the Child Jesus on a little cloud, appeared to her in her cell. Lucia recounted that Mary rested her hand on her shoulder, while showing her a Heart encircled by thorns in her other hand. The Child Jesus spoke first: “Have pity on the Heart of your Most Holy Mother. It is covered with the thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to remove them with an act of reparation.”
Then Mary said: “My daughter, look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console me, and say that I promise to assist at the hour of death, with all the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months go to confession and receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary and keep me company for a quarter of an hour while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me.”
Listen to Your Mother
The following passages are all excerpts taken from the words spoken by Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, as recounted in her book, Thy Mystical City of God.
Many Called, Few Chosen…Why?
“By the divine teaching, thou knowest the mysteries of the Passion and Death of Christ and the one true way of life, which is the Cross; and thou knowest that not all who are called, are chosen. Many there are who wish to follow Christ, but very few truly dispose themselves to imitate Him; for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross they cast it aside. Laborious exertions are very painful and averse to human nature according to the flesh. On this account there are so many among mortals, who seek the flesh and the continual indulgence of its pleasures. They ardently seek honors and fly from injuries: they strive after riches, and despise poverty; they long after pleasure and dread mortification. All these are enemies of the Cross of Christ and with dreadful aversion they fly from it” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Deluded Christians Fooling Themselves
“Another deceit has spread through the world: many imagine that they are following Christ their Master, though they neither suffer affliction nor engage in any exertion or labor. They are content with avoiding boldness in committing sins, and place all their perfection in a certain prudence or hollow self-love, which prevents them from denying anything to their will and from practicing any virtues at the cost of their flesh. They would easily escape this deception, if they would consider that my Son, although He well could do it, He chose not a life of softness and ease for the flesh, but one full of labors and pains; for He judged his instructions to be incomplete and insufficient, if He failed to teach them how to overcome the demon, the flesh and their own self. He wished to inculcate, that this magnificent victory is gained by the Cross, by labors, penances, mortifications and the acceptance of contempt: all of which are the trademarks and evidences of true love and the special watchwords of the predestined” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Giving “Bottom-Dollar’ for Heaven
“Tell me then, my daughter: if my Lord and Master has made Himself the Life and the Way for men through His Passion and Death, is it not evident that, in order to go that way and live up to this Truth, they must follow Christ crucified, afflicted, scourged and affronted? Consider the ignorance of men who wish to come to the Father without following Christ, since they expect to reign with God without suffering, or imitating His Passion, without even a thought of accepting any part of His Suffering and Death, or of thanking Him for it. They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as those of Eternal Life, while Christ their Creator has suffered the most bitter pains and torments, in order to enter Heaven and to show them, by His example, how they are to find the Way of Light” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Our Lady is Angry and Incensed!
“All the faithful in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness, when they have the Passion and Death of my Divine Son before their eyes. What then are the thoughts of the Angels and Saints, and what are my thoughts, in beholding this world and the small return made by heartless and ungrateful men for all our pains; and the lack of attention displayed by mortals through their lukewarmness and negligence? I am much incensed to find so few who console me and who try to console my Son in His sorrows. This hardness of heart will cause great confusion to them, on the Day of Judgment; since they will then see, with irreparable sorrow, not only that they were ungrateful, but were also inhuman and cruel towards my Divine Son, towards me and towards themselves” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
“I tell thee truly, only my intercession and the merits of His, Son, which I offer to the Eternal Father, can delay the punishment and placate His wrath, and delay the destruction of the world and the severe chastisement of the children of the Church, who know His will and fail to fulfill it” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
False and Fake Piety
“Weigh in thy heart, how much it cost my Lord to reconcile mankind to the Eternal Father and regain for them His friendship. Weep and afflict thyself that so many should live in such forgetfulness! And that so many should labor, with all their might, at destroying and losing what was bought by the Blood of God. Awaken in thy heart the deepest grief, that, in His Holy Church, there should be many followers of the hypocritical and sacrilegious priests who, under cover of a false piety, still condemn Christ; that pride and sumptuousness, with other grave vices, should be placed in authority and exalted, while humility, truth, justice and all virtues be so oppressed and debased, while avarice and vanity should prevail. Few know the poverty of Christ, and fewer embrace it. Holy Faith is hindered, and is not spread among the nations, on account of the boundless ambition of the mighty of this earth. The Faith, in many Catholics, is inactive and dead, and, what should be living, is near to death and to eternal perdition. The counsels of the Gospel are forgotten, its precepts trodden under foot, true charity is almost extinct” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
The Science of Saints
“My daughter, in all that thou art made to understand and write concerning these mysteries, thou drawest upon thyself, and upon mortals, a severe judgment, if thou dost not overcome thy pusillanimity, ingratitude and baseness, by meditating day and night on the Passion and Death of Jesus crucified. This is the great Science of the Saints, so little heeded by the worldly, it is the Bread of Life and the Spiritual Food of the little ones, which gives Wisdom to them and the lack of which starves the lovers of this proud world . In this science I wish thee to be studious and wise, for with it thou canst buy thyself all good things. My Son and Lord taught us this Science when He said: ‘I am the Way, the Truth and the Life: no one cometh to My Father except through Me’ (John 14:6).” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
The School of Saints
“My most holy Son and myself are trying to find, among those who have arrived at the Way of the Cross, some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine Science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If thou wishest to be our disciple enter into this school, in which alone is taught the Doctrine of the Cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights. With this wisdom, the earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the bleary-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors, and so full of ignorant admiration for costly grandeur” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
“By such standards must thou measure the value of suffering, which the worldly will not understand. Since they are unworthy of heavenly knowledge, they despise it in proportion to their ignorance. Rejoice and congratulate thyself in thy sufferings, and whenever the Almighty deigns to send thee any, hasten to meet it and welcome it as one of his blessings and pledges of his glorious love” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Don’t Just Listen ... Do Something
“With meekness receive the ingrafted word, which is able to save your souls. But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if a man be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he shall be compared to a man beholding his own countenance in a glass. For he beheld himself, and went his way, and presently forgot what manner of man he was” (James 1:21-24).
On this feast of the Seven Sorrows, it might be a good idea to have a ‘soul to soul’ conversation with our Sorrowful Mother, and let her tell us some of the things that cause her pain. We speak of the Seven Swords of Sorrow that pierced her Sorrowful Heart, but there are not only Seven Sorrows, they must be as innumerable as the grains of sand on the beach or the stars in the sky. We often say, “A problem shared is a problem halved!” Perhaps Our Lady will share some of her anxieties and sufferings with us! We will take her at her word by the words she spoke to the Venerable Mary of Agreda—whose body still lies incorrupt today, just as Our Lady’s words are still as incorrupt today as they were back in the 1600’s.
Holy Soul
The physical body of the Venerable Mary of Agreda is incorruptible, that is, not subject to rot and decay after death. During an opening of her casket in 1909, a cursory scientific examination was performed on the body. In 1989, a Spanish physician, named Andreas Medina, participated in another examination of Sister María de Jesús de Ágreda, as she lay in the convent of the Conceptionist nuns, the same monastery where she had lived in the 17th century. Dr. Medina told investigative journalist Javier Sierra, in 1991: “What most surprised me about that case is that when we compared the state of the body, as it was described in the medical report from 1909, with how it appeared in 1989, we realized it had absolutely not deteriorated at all in the last eighty years.” Complete photographic and other evidence was obtained by investigators before her casket was re-sealed. Now, her incorrupt body can be visited in the Church of the Convent of Ágreda.
The words that follow are almost exclusively the words of Our Lady, as she dictated them to the Venerable Sister María de Jesús de Ágreda. A short comment or liasing phrase may be inserted here or there. The subtitles are, of course, added to give or create a uniformity of thought.
Backward Souls
“Many other souls have reached the heights of perfection and have then fallen most unfortunately, arriving at a state in which they almost despaired, or found themselves incapable of rising. This sad state causes many things. The first is the dismay and endless confusion of one who feels that he has fallen from an exalted state of virtue; for he knows that he has not only lost great blessings, but now he does not expect to obtain greater ones than those of the past and those he has lost; nor can he guarantee more firmness with himself in keeping those he can obtain, through renewed efforts, than he has shown in the past with those blessings he acquired but has now lost through his ingratitude” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Hopeless Souls
“From this dangerous distrust of self, in not knowing if he will do better in the future, originates lukewarmness, lack of fervor and diligence, absence of zeal and devotion; such a heavy and distrustful heart extinguishes all these in the soul, just as the opposite, the liveliness of ardent hope, overcomes many difficulties, and strengthens weak human creatures to undertake great works” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Negligent Irreverent Souls
“Another obstacle there is, not less formidable, namely: that the souls accustomed to the blessings of God, either through their office—as priests and religious—or by the exercise of virtues and the abundance of divine favors—as spiritual minded persons—these souls usually aggravate their sins by a certain contempt of these very blessings and a certain abuse of divine things. For, because of the abundance of the divine favors, they fall into a dangerous dullness of mind. They begin to think little of the divine favors and become irreverent. Thus failing to cooperate with God’s grace, they hinder its effect. They lose the grace of holy fear of the Lord, which arouses and stimulates the will to obey the divine commandments and to be alert in the avoidance of sin and pursuit of eternal life in the friendship of God” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Lukewarm Souls
“This is an evident danger for lukewarm priests, who frequent the Holy Eucharist and other Sacraments, without fear and reverence; also for the souls of the learned and wise, as well as those who hold some power in this world, who are so reluctant to correct and amend their lives. They have lost the appreciation and veneration of the remedial helps of the Church, namely, the Sacraments, preaching and instruction. Thus, these medicines, which for other sinners are so salutary and counteract ignorance, end up weakening those who are the physicians of the spiritual life” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
“The worldlings in their lukewarmness are moved, neither by the duty of conforming to their Father and Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Sinful Souls
“Ordinarily the demons have no power over souls, unless they gain entrance by some venial or mortal fault. Mortal sin gives them a sort of direct right over those who commit it; while venial sin weakens the strength of the soul and invites their attacks. Weep in deepest sorrow over the ruin of so many souls absorbed in such dangerous lukewarmness” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Careless Neglectful Souls
“The same enemy instills into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and he incites the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Unrestrained Souls
They live amid the darkness of their passions and depraved inclinations, forgetful of the danger, unmoved by their losses, and heedless of their dealings. Instead of fearing and avoiding the occasions of evil, they encounter and seek for them in blind ignorance. In senseless fury they follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and show no care for where they walk, even if it is to the most dangerous precipices” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Tormented Souls
“Imagine what ought to be the grief of losing God really by sin! But this wisdom seems far from the mind of carnal men: with a most perverse blindness they continue to acquire and make much of the visible and fictitious goods of the world, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them. Because they never taste, or recognize, the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or reckoning of It. O sorrow, how easily Charity [which is a love of God, first and foremost] is wasted and set aside for any kind of pleasure, and how often Faith remains without any fruit and is involved in death!” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Faithless Souls
“If the faithful do not feel these and even more wonderful effects of Faith, it is not because Faith has not the strength and efficacy to produce them, but it is because some of the faithful are so forgetting and negligent, while others give themselves up so much to a carnal and bestial life and thereby counteract the blessing of Faith. They think so rarely of it, that they might as well not have received it at all. As they live like the infidels, who have never enjoyed its advantages, and, as they gradually become conscious of their unhappy infidelity, they fall into greater wickedness than the unbelievers. For such is the result of their abominable ingratitude and contempt for this exalted and sovereign gift of their Faith” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Unhappy Souls
“Hence thou canst judge of the blind ignorance with which their deadly enemies have fascinated mortals, since all men, in the inordinate desire and pursuit of happiness, neglect the divine law, where alone it can be found; and hence few really attain happiness” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Pleasure-Seeking Souls
“Consider then, whether anything deserves greater pity, than to see so many men misled into danger and made forgetful of it; how some of them cast themselves into it, on account of their lightheartedness, some of them for trivial reasons, others for a short and instantaneous pleasure, others through negligence, and yet others on account of their inordinate appetites” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Fearless Souls
“In this life, any punishment or tribulation fills mortals with fear and dread, but the guilt of sin does not fill them with dread. Men are entirely taken up by that which is visible, and they therefore do not look upon the ultimate consequences of sin, which is the eternal punishment of Hell. The human heart becomes so forgetful that it remains, as if it were stupefied, in its wickedness, because it does not feel it present in its senses. Though it could see and feel it by Faith, its Faith is itself listless and dead” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Blind Souls
“O most unhappy blindness of mortals! O lukewarm negligence, that holds so many souls in deceit! There are not words or sentences sufficient to describe this terrible and tremendous danger. Fear and flee such an unhappy state, and deliver thyself up to all the troubles and torments of life, which pass soon, rather than incur such a danger; for nothing will be lacking to thee, if thou do not lose God. Be convinced that there are no small faults! Fear greatly the small things, for in despising small faults the Most High knows, that the human heart invites other greater ones” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Preoccupied Souls
“In conversing with or worshiping the Most High, they fail to form a worthy concept of His infinite greatness, and fail to free themselves from thoughts of their earthly occupations, which thus make them lukewarm and carnal, unworthy and unfit for the magnificent communication with God [through prayer]. And this ill-bred coarseness entails another disorder: namely, that whenever they talk with their neighbors, they do it without order, measure or discretion; they become entangled in their outward actions, and losing the memory and presence of God in the excitement of their passions, and become completely entangled in what is earthly” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Thankless Souls
“If the children of the Holy Church would pause in their vain occupations and be ashamed of their lukewarm forgetfulness and repudiate their vile ingratitude. Let them be undeceived, for most terrible punishments await them” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Lost Souls
“They are surrounded by innumerable enemies [the invisible devils], who pursue them with diabolical treachery, unceasing vigilance, unquenchable wrath and restless diligence. What wonder then, that from such extremes, or rather from such unequal combat, irreparable defeats should arise among the mortals? And that, since the number of fools is infinite, the number of the damned should also be uncountable, and that the demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men? May God preserve thee from such a misfortune; and do thou weep and deplore the misfortunes of thy brethren, continually asking for their salvation, as far as is possible” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Fervent Souls
“The fulfillment of the precepts of the Lord must not be cold and lukewarm, but most fervent and devoted” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
“Thou must continue without intervals of lukewarmness, lest thou disgust Him. At all times and in all places, occupations and operations, thou must keep God in sight. I command thee to treat Him with a magnanimous heart, with decorum and reverence, with deep felt fear of the soul. And whatever pertains to His divine worship, I desire that thou handle with all attention and care. Above all, in order to enter into His presence by prayer and petitions, free thyself from all sensible and earthly images” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
“It is necessary, that thou live retired within thyself, forgetful of all the visible and terrestrial things, most attentive to the divine light, which assists thee and protects thy sensible faculties with double vestments against the influences of lukewarmness and coldness on the way of perfection; and it is necessary, that thou resist the incitements of thy unruly passions” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Abandoned Souls
“Receive knowledge and enlightenment for avoiding such dangerous and gross lukewarmness. Jesus withdraws from the lukewarm and negligent souls, or deals with them only according to the general rules of His divine Providence … [which will then bring about] “the losses sustained by them through their lukewarmness and negligence” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Reformed Souls
Let us take these words to heart and reform our souls! Who is there, among us, who can say: “I am good enough! I have no need to change anything in my life! I have nobody else to reach and convert! I have paid all my debts for past sin! I will go straight to Heaven with no fear of Purgatory or Hell!” If there is someone like that out there reading this—then please pray for the rest of us!!
Our Lord Wants…
Today being the feast of the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary, it is only fitting that we let our Sorrowful Mother and her Sorrowful Son—the Man of Sorrows—do most of the talking, while we, like Mary Magdalen place ourselves at their feet—either listening attentively to their words, or weeping sincerely over their feet for our may sins.
Our Lord commands: “Teach souls to love the Heart of My Mother pierced with sorrow that transfixed My Own Heart.”
“My Mother’s Heart has the right to the title of Sorrowful. I desire that it be set before her title of Immaculate, because she herself has won it. The Church has recognized what I Myself did for My Mother: her Immaculate Conception. Now it is necessary, and it is My wish, that this title, which is, by right, My Mother’s, should be understood and recognized. This title she earned by her identification with all My sufferings, by her sorrow, her sacrifice, her immolation on Calvary, and indeed for the salvation of mankind.”
“My desire flows from My love on Calvary. In giving John to My Mother as a son, I entrusted the whole world to her Sorrowful Motherhood.”
“The title of Immaculate belongs to the whole being of My Mother and not specially to her Heart. The title flows from my gratuitous gift to the Virgin, who was to give Me birth. My Mother has acquired, from her Heart, the title of ‘Sorrowful’ by sharing generously in all the sufferings of My Heart and My Body—from the crib to the cross. There is not one of these Sorrows which did not pierce the Heart of My Mother. Living image of My crucified Body, her virginal flesh bore the invisible marks of My wounds, as her Heart felt the Sorrows of My own. Nothing could ever tarnish the incorruptibility of her Immaculate Heart. The title of ‘Sorrowful’ belongs, therefore, to the Heart of My Mother, and more than any other, this title is dear to her, because it springs from the union of her Heart with Mine in the redemption of humanity. This title has been acquired by her through her full participation in My Calvary, and it precedes the gratuitous title ‘Immaculate’ which My love bestowed upon her by a singular privilege.”
“The time is now ripe and I wish mankind to turn to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother. Let this prayer be uttered by every soul: ‘Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us.’ Let this prayer dictated by My Love as a supreme succor be approved and indulgenced, no longer partially and for a small portion of My flock, but for the whole universe, so that it may spread as a refreshing and purifying balm of reparation that will appease My anger. This Devotion to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother will restore faith and hope to broken hearts and to ruined families: it will help to repair the destruction: it will sweeten sorrow. It will be a new strength for My Church, bringing souls, not only to confidence in My Heart, but also to abandonment to the Sorrowful Heart of My Mother.”
“It is hearts that must be changed. This will be accomplished only by the Devotion proclaimed, explained, preached and recommended everywhere. Recourse to My Mother under the title I wish for her universally, is the last help I shall give before the end of time.”
“This is the last help which I give before the end of time: the recourse to My Mother under the title which I desire shall be hers throughout the whole world.”
“In the hour of triumph” Our Lord said to Berthe one day “it will be made clearly manifest that I Myself have inspired, in those whom I have freely chosen, a devotion similar to that given to My own Heart. It is as a Son that I have conceived this devotion for My Mother. It is as God that I impose it.”
“Let every soul cry out: Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us.”
Fatima and the Sorrowful Heart of Mary
Our Lady explicitly spoke of her Sorrowful Heart at her fifth apparition at Fatima: “Continue to pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war. In October Our Lord will come, as well as Our Lady of Sorrows and Our Lady of Carmel” (Our Lady at Fatima, September 13th).
By 1925, Lucia, who was now 18, had become a postulant with the Sisters of St. Dorothy at Pontevedra in Spain, and on Thursday, December 10th, 1925, the Blessed Virgin, accompanied by the Child Jesus on a little cloud, appeared to her in her cell. Lucia recounted that Mary rested her hand on her shoulder, while showing her a Heart encircled by thorns in her other hand. The Child Jesus spoke first: “Have pity on the Heart of your Most Holy Mother. It is covered with the thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to remove them with an act of reparation.”
Then Mary said: “My daughter, look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console me, and say that I promise to assist at the hour of death, with all the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months go to confession and receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary and keep me company for a quarter of an hour while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me.”
Listen to Your Mother
The following passages are all excerpts taken from the words spoken by Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, as recounted in her book, Thy Mystical City of God.
Many Called, Few Chosen…Why?
“By the divine teaching, thou knowest the mysteries of the Passion and Death of Christ and the one true way of life, which is the Cross; and thou knowest that not all who are called, are chosen. Many there are who wish to follow Christ, but very few truly dispose themselves to imitate Him; for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross they cast it aside. Laborious exertions are very painful and averse to human nature according to the flesh. On this account there are so many among mortals, who seek the flesh and the continual indulgence of its pleasures. They ardently seek honors and fly from injuries: they strive after riches, and despise poverty; they long after pleasure and dread mortification. All these are enemies of the Cross of Christ and with dreadful aversion they fly from it” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Deluded Christians Fooling Themselves
“Another deceit has spread through the world: many imagine that they are following Christ their Master, though they neither suffer affliction nor engage in any exertion or labor. They are content with avoiding boldness in committing sins, and place all their perfection in a certain prudence or hollow self-love, which prevents them from denying anything to their will and from practicing any virtues at the cost of their flesh. They would easily escape this deception, if they would consider that my Son, although He well could do it, He chose not a life of softness and ease for the flesh, but one full of labors and pains; for He judged his instructions to be incomplete and insufficient, if He failed to teach them how to overcome the demon, the flesh and their own self. He wished to inculcate, that this magnificent victory is gained by the Cross, by labors, penances, mortifications and the acceptance of contempt: all of which are the trademarks and evidences of true love and the special watchwords of the predestined” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Giving “Bottom-Dollar’ for Heaven
“Tell me then, my daughter: if my Lord and Master has made Himself the Life and the Way for men through His Passion and Death, is it not evident that, in order to go that way and live up to this Truth, they must follow Christ crucified, afflicted, scourged and affronted? Consider the ignorance of men who wish to come to the Father without following Christ, since they expect to reign with God without suffering, or imitating His Passion, without even a thought of accepting any part of His Suffering and Death, or of thanking Him for it. They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as those of Eternal Life, while Christ their Creator has suffered the most bitter pains and torments, in order to enter Heaven and to show them, by His example, how they are to find the Way of Light” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Our Lady is Angry and Incensed!
“All the faithful in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness, when they have the Passion and Death of my Divine Son before their eyes. What then are the thoughts of the Angels and Saints, and what are my thoughts, in beholding this world and the small return made by heartless and ungrateful men for all our pains; and the lack of attention displayed by mortals through their lukewarmness and negligence? I am much incensed to find so few who console me and who try to console my Son in His sorrows. This hardness of heart will cause great confusion to them, on the Day of Judgment; since they will then see, with irreparable sorrow, not only that they were ungrateful, but were also inhuman and cruel towards my Divine Son, towards me and towards themselves” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
“I tell thee truly, only my intercession and the merits of His, Son, which I offer to the Eternal Father, can delay the punishment and placate His wrath, and delay the destruction of the world and the severe chastisement of the children of the Church, who know His will and fail to fulfill it” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
False and Fake Piety
“Weigh in thy heart, how much it cost my Lord to reconcile mankind to the Eternal Father and regain for them His friendship. Weep and afflict thyself that so many should live in such forgetfulness! And that so many should labor, with all their might, at destroying and losing what was bought by the Blood of God. Awaken in thy heart the deepest grief, that, in His Holy Church, there should be many followers of the hypocritical and sacrilegious priests who, under cover of a false piety, still condemn Christ; that pride and sumptuousness, with other grave vices, should be placed in authority and exalted, while humility, truth, justice and all virtues be so oppressed and debased, while avarice and vanity should prevail. Few know the poverty of Christ, and fewer embrace it. Holy Faith is hindered, and is not spread among the nations, on account of the boundless ambition of the mighty of this earth. The Faith, in many Catholics, is inactive and dead, and, what should be living, is near to death and to eternal perdition. The counsels of the Gospel are forgotten, its precepts trodden under foot, true charity is almost extinct” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
The Science of Saints
“My daughter, in all that thou art made to understand and write concerning these mysteries, thou drawest upon thyself, and upon mortals, a severe judgment, if thou dost not overcome thy pusillanimity, ingratitude and baseness, by meditating day and night on the Passion and Death of Jesus crucified. This is the great Science of the Saints, so little heeded by the worldly, it is the Bread of Life and the Spiritual Food of the little ones, which gives Wisdom to them and the lack of which starves the lovers of this proud world . In this science I wish thee to be studious and wise, for with it thou canst buy thyself all good things. My Son and Lord taught us this Science when He said: ‘I am the Way, the Truth and the Life: no one cometh to My Father except through Me’ (John 14:6).” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
The School of Saints
“My most holy Son and myself are trying to find, among those who have arrived at the Way of the Cross, some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine Science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If thou wishest to be our disciple enter into this school, in which alone is taught the Doctrine of the Cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights. With this wisdom, the earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the bleary-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors, and so full of ignorant admiration for costly grandeur” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
“By such standards must thou measure the value of suffering, which the worldly will not understand. Since they are unworthy of heavenly knowledge, they despise it in proportion to their ignorance. Rejoice and congratulate thyself in thy sufferings, and whenever the Almighty deigns to send thee any, hasten to meet it and welcome it as one of his blessings and pledges of his glorious love” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Don’t Just Listen ... Do Something
“With meekness receive the ingrafted word, which is able to save your souls. But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if a man be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he shall be compared to a man beholding his own countenance in a glass. For he beheld himself, and went his way, and presently forgot what manner of man he was” (James 1:21-24).
Article 6
Saturday, September 14th, Feast of the Exalation of the Holy Cross
Your Key to Heaven! Don't Throw it Away!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Saturday, September 14th, Feast of the Exalation of the Holy Cross
Your Key to Heaven! Don't Throw it Away!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Sign of the Cross
The “Sign of the Cross” is not a sign of our times. Rather than make the Sign of the Cross, most Catholics prefer to sign into their social media account, or sign into their e-mail account, or sign into some website they subscribe to, etc. They get more of a “buzz” and more of “a kick out of that” than they get out of signing into God’s “site” with a Sign of a Cross.
The Sign of the Cross used to be made numerous times every day―nowadays there are some Catholics who don’t even make it once a day, or, at best, only a few times a day. For a true Catholic, the very first moment of the day would (should) begin with the making of the Sign of Cross at the very first moment of waking―after which they would hit the floor with their knees and “post” a few prayers on God’s “website” (Heaven) or “e-mail” God those prayers. Nowadays, it is the new god on the block―the smartphone―that gets that privilege, with an overwhelming number of persons admitting that the first thing they do upon rising is check and/or use their smartphone for one reason or another―if nothing other than to simply turn off the alarm that woke them, but that often leads to a brief check for this, that or the other―text messages, e-mail, weather, etc.
The true Catholic―if they didn’t make several additional Signs of the Cross during morning prayers (which some prayers might include as part of the prayer)―would end their morning prayers with another Sign of the Cross. The Sign of the Cross would next be met at the breakfast table or just before eating, when the Sign of Cross would be made before and after saying “Grace Before Meals”―and repeated twice again once the meal was finished by making the Sign of the Cross before and after “Grace After Meals.”
Soon after that, before driving to work or school, two more Signs of the Cross would be made―before and after saying a “Prayer for the Road.” At school, the Sign of the Cross would be made numerous times―at several times at morning assembly prayers, before and after each class of the day, before and after the noontime Angelus (during which we specifically mention the Cross: “we may by His Passion and Cross be brought to the glory of His resurrection,” etc.), and made around 60 times at each weekday Mass, which used to be a daily occurrence in Catholic schools. On that note, please note that during a Mass (the Latin Mass), the Sign of the Cross is made over 50 times. More Signs of the Cross would follow at lunch and the afternoon classes. More Signs of the Cross would come on the drive back home and even more Signs of the Cross would occur at the evening meal, the family Rosary, night prayers, and a final Sign of the Cross before falling asleep.
The Symbol Remains―The Sincerity Has Disappeared―Superficiality Replaces It
Today, however, such a description, as stated above, rarely exists in reality―the norm is quite the opposite. Very few would disagree and argue with the statement that most of the world is superficial. Superficiality has almost become the DNA of the world. We see it in politics, in business, in social life, in the depth of knowledge, in the conveyance of feelings, in casual day-to-day conversation, even in home and family life. The obvious and inevitable offshoot of all this superficiality is that we become superficial in our religion, in our Faith, in our spiritual life, and with God. The externals are still there―the Crucifixes, the Rosary Beads, the Medals, the Mass, etc. ― but the life or soul of these things is missing, the sincerity has disappeared, superficiality has appeared, and all these external signs are reduced to quasi-superstitious symbols―even though nobody would dare to call them that or admit to having that attitude.
Here is an interesting observation from a USA Catholic visiting the largest Catholic country in the world―Brazil: “An interesting choreography, of sorts, can be seen during rush hour, in front of the church Nossa Senhora da Paz, in Ipanema, Rio de Janeiro. There, among the evening stream of pedestrians, cars, and buses, many people, both outside and inside vehicles, face the church when passing in front of it and do the sign of the cross in a perfectly timed and almost automatic movement. For an outsider, this would appear to be a natural occurrence in the world’s largest Catholic nation―but, as some Brazilians will readily admit, such displays should not be considered signs of a devoted Catholic population, but superficial manifestations. ‘Everybody says they are Catholic, but nobody really is,’ a local friend told me. ‘Futebol (soccer) is more of a religion than Catholicism.’ … Should we take this as the modern pretense we see elsewhere? … Religious practices in the country, starting with Catholicism, have all incorporated, and even been created from, interactions with practices and traditions from all the others … It is true that many people who identify as Catholics are not practicing Catholics. But then, like my friend admitted, almost nobody really is.”
How often do we forget why we are attending the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and become concerned only over whether other people see how much we give in the Offertory collection, or how well we sing hymns, or how seemingly devout we appear during Mass? For most persons, their mind and heart is not fully engaged in the Holy Sacrifice―the mind and heart wander and the Holy Sacrifice quickly becomes a superficial sacrifice. The same is often true for Holy Communion. The same is often true for our confessions. The same can be said of our prayers and (if we even make any) meditations. They are mechanical, routine, automatic, with little or no supernatural feelings or desires. They are more of a chore than an enthusiastic passion. Instead of passionately waiting for them to happen or begin, we passionately can’t wait until they are over and done with!
We see this superficiality manifested by rushed, inattentive, half-made genuflections before the Blessed Sacrament; or hasty, half-made Signs of the Cross; or rushed, distracted prayers and Rosaries; speedy, fast-track Masses; express-lane Communions; micro-waved vague confessions; soulless and heartless hymns―all of which is closer to being a “Catholic-Assembly-Line” that a true spiritual living of the Faith. We kneel, we join our hands in prayer, we bow, we genuflect, we make signs of the cross, we carry Rosaries, we wear scapulars, we say prayers, we go to Mass, we receive Holy Communion, etc. ― but all of these things are mere externals, ecclesiastical etiquette, but these actions are merely like feathers without a bird underneath them. There is little thought and little understanding of the purpose, significance, symbolism and spirituality of these things―they are mere externals that smugly satisfy our superficial Faith. A five-year-old child is taught to make a sign of the cross, to say a certain prayer, to use holy water, to answer a catechism question―such as “What is God? God is a spirit!”―without really knowing or understanding all that these things mean, represent, symbolize and effect. For a five-year-old child, this is fine, it is only a beginning―but we should not remain in the childish state of knowledge and understanding―it is only skin deep, superficial. It is of such a superficiality and immaturity that Our Lord speaks, when He says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoreth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Most Catholics today are “lip-service” Catholics living in a spiritual “express-lane” in their prayer life, and using the “fast-check-out-lane” after Holy Communion and Mass.
That is classic immaturity―to perform the externals (looking to be mature), while interiorly we are distracted, disconnected, disorientated―like an immature child, who is told to apologize and begrudgingly spits out the words “I’m sorry!!!” when it is clear that those words come only from the lips and not the heart. Part of maturity is acceptance of responsibility―immature people are always making excuses, “passing-the-buck”, pointing the finger at others and blaming someone or something else other than themselves. In confession, they will ‘confess’ or tell the sins of others as much (or even more than) their own sins―all of this comes from a lack of maturity or lack of an ability to accept responsibility.
The Superficiality of Immaturity and the Immaturity of Superficiality
We often neglect to dig deeper, to think more, to reflect on what is going on inside us and around us and are too busy to slow down to be with God. As a result, we run the high risk of remaining stuck as spiritual infants, failing to develop into spiritually/emotionally mature adults in Christ. As St. Paul writes: “Brethren, do not become children in sense: but in malice be children, and in sense be perfect” (1 Corinthians 14:20). In other words, St. Paul is saying: “Do not think like mere children, but if you are going to imitate children, then imitate their lack of maliciousness that comes from their thoughtlessness―but in your own thoughts, be mature and not childish!” Elsewhere St. Paul adds: “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child” (1 Corinthians 13:11). Nowadays, adults still act like children, want to play like children, react to disappointments like children and make excuses like children. The side-effect of this is a neglect of the Cross of Christ―for children are usually more protected from difficulties, stresses, strains and are usually exempt or excused from heavy and hard labor.
Taking the above quote from St. Paul about being a child―you could add to it another quote or two from St. Paul, so that it reads thus: “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child” (1 Corinthians 13:11) “so that I may live for God―with Christ I am nailed to the Cross” (Galatians 2:19) … “God forbid that I should glory, except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by Whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world” (Galatians 6:14) … “The Jews require signs, and the Greeks seek after wisdom! But we preach Christ crucified―which, unto the Jews, indeed is a stumbling-block, and unto the Gentiles it is foolishness” (1 Corinthians 1:22-23) ... “Be ye followers of me, brethren … For many walk, of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping, that they are enemies of the Cross of Christ―whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Philippians 3:17-19).
When you care for earthly things, worldly pleasures, comfort and ease, fun and entertainment, then you instinctively develop a dislike for the cross and suffering, or even a detestation for the cross and suffering. In this age of technology and comfort, we have become a generation of cross avoiders and cross voiders. We run from the cross, and, if we cannot escape it, we make it void by our complaints, whines, moans and groans. This reminds us a little of St. Simon of Cyrene, who didn’t want to carry Jesus’ cross, but was forced to do so: “And going out, they found a man of Cyrene, named Simon―him they forced to take up His [Jesus’] cross” (Matthew 27:32). Most people in this world do not want the cross―and so God forces the cross upon them by His Divine Providence. But what is God forcing them to take? Poison? No, the cross is not poison, but healthy medicine―even though it tastes bitter. But many medicines do taste bitter―even natural medicines in the form of food―for as they say: “Bitter is better” in many if not most cases. Garlic is bitter, cayenne is sharp, lemon is bitter, ginger is sharp, many herbs are bitter―yet they are among the best medicines that we have. Yet, the “thoughts and ways of the Lord” (Isaias 55:8-9) become abhorrent, unfair, too difficult, too demanding, too bitter, too sharp―to the point that we are tempted to cry out with the Chosen People of old: “The way of the Lord is not right!” (Ezechiel 18:25)―to which God answers: “Hear ye, therefore, O house of Israel! Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse?”
Hence the liturgy for the Mass of the Exaltation of Holy Cross, states: “It behooves us to glory in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ: in Whom is our salvation, life, and resurrection: by Whom we are saved, and delivered” (Entrance Hymn or Introit) … “Through the sign of the Holy Cross protect Thy people, O Lord, from the snares of all their enemies” (Offertory Verse) … “O holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God, Who didst establish the salvation of mankind on the tree of the Cross” (Preface) … “Deliver us from our enemies, O our God, through the sign of the Cross” (Communion Verse).
Don’t Bury Your Talent―Don't Bury Your Cross!
Undoubtedly you know the Parable of the Talents, where the Lord gives to each of his servants a number of talents according to the capabilities, expecting them to use and work with what they have been given in order to show some profit―to one the Lord gives 5 talents, to another 2 talents and to a third only 1 talent. The one who received 5 talents produced a profit of an additional 5 talents; the one with two talents produced 2 more talents; but the servant who was given 1 talent, buried it in the ground and was profitless (Matthew 25:14-30). You could just as well substitute the word “Cross” for the word “Talent”―for God gives everyone crosses of different types and numbers according to their capabilities, just as the Lord gave his servants differing numbers of talents according to their capabilities. Are we “working” on our crosses, are we “profiting” from our crosses, or are we “burying” our crosses―that is to say, are we throwing them away, getting rid of them, burying them?
Without that Cross of Christ there is no salvation—hence the liturgy gives us phrases such as: “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”). One day―as has been prophesied―you may not have the Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion available to you, because it will have been “taken away”—but the cross will never be taken away, it is always available to you and always will be available to you until the day you die (whether you want that cross or not). If you bury your cross—like the man who buried his talent in the ground (Matthew 25:14-30)—then your salvation is dead and buried! Just like that man, who buried the talent, we risk hearing the words: “And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant, you knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewed! You should, therefore, have committed my money to the bankers, and at my coming I should have received back my own money with additional usury! Take away, therefore, the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has, shall be given more, and he shall abound; but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have, shall be taken away. And the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:26-30).
Our crosses are far more precious than any talents (money) that we have―the talents, spoken of in the Gospel, denote money and not skills or abilities. We cannot buy our way into Heaven with money (except by giving alms), but we can buy Heaven with the cross. God is not going to “wave a magic wand” and make us effortlessly attain our salvation. He will, however, help us by His grace and inspirations to carry our cross to our salvation. “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23). “And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). The cross is the “good tree” that Jesus looks for in our lives―and the pains, sacrifices, mortifications and sufferings of the cross are the “good fruits” that Jesus wants to find on that “good tree” of the cross. If you like, you could call those “fruits” of the “good tree” by another name―the “spoils of war” or the “legitimate prizes of war.”
This is why Our Lord says emphatically: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23) … “And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). There is absolutely no “wiggle-room” in those words—no loophole, no escape clause, no compromise—it is a “non-negotiable” fact. There is no salvation outside Christ and He is to be found on the Cross—that is why we have the Crucifix overlooking every altar and the Stations of the Cross peering down upon us from all sides—in season and out of season, during Lent and outside of Lent, before Good Friday, during Good Friday and after Good Friday―the message is ever the same: “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”). Yet we must be aware of the danger that St. Augustine speaks of― St. Augustine tells us that the same crosses lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. By this he means that some souls accept their crosses and sufferings—like the ‘Good Thief’ on the cross; whereas others refuse their crosses and sufferings and seek to escape them—like the ‘Bad Thief’ on the cross. The ‘Good Thief’ ended up in Paradise, the ‘Bad Thief’ did not! Likewise, the same temptations will lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. It depends upon whether the temptation is powerfully rejected or gladly accepted.
It’s a Cross to Put God First
It is not easy putting God first in our lives. In fact, it is hard to consistently put God first in our lives. In other words, it is a cross to put God first in our lives. Most Catholics are slowly slipping down the slippery slope away from God. They no longer treasured the divine and have replaced it with the human. Now we are even slowly slipping down the slippery slope away from the human aspect of life and leave it behind for mere material things, i.e. our job, our hobbies, the smartphone, the computer, etc. It is amazing to see those who have first of all abandoned God for the large part of their lives, now also abandoning their family and friends for their material electronic parent-teacher-and-buddy-all-rolled-into-one, which is their smartphone and its ever growing Artificial Intelligence. We leave the feet of God to sit at the feet of mere people; and then leave them to play with things—and sometimes sinful things. We hate being Marys and so we become Marthas: “Now it came to pass, as they went, that Jesus entered into a certain town: and a certain woman named Martha, received Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sitting also at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Who stood and said: ‘Lord! Hast thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! Thou art careful, and art troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary! Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!” (Luke 10:38-42).
Morning Cross or Morning Coffee?
We used to be taught to make a Sign of the Cross upon waking up and then to hit the floor on our knees for a few short prayers, before our habitual morning routine which would include even more prayers, once we were dressed. It would be interesting to see what the statistics would show on prayers being said upon our first moment of waking. If we can manage a mumbled, half-asleep, “Morning, honey!” to the beloved spouse, then we can surely manage a “Morning, Lord!” to our beloved Maker and Provider. Our reaction or action towards God, first thing in the morning, may not be an all-defining moment that measures our spiritual attitude, but it certainly does reveal a lot. If we are not in the habit of greeting God first thing in the morning, then we will probably feel awkward or hypocritical starting now—but we have to start somewhere! When you have fallen-out with someone, the first words of reconciliation might not be very endearing or even believable—but I guess it’s much like going to Confession and telling God we’re sorry for some sin—for the 100th time! If we begin the new habit, however clumsily or awkwardly, it will soon start to make us feel a little different. Above all, try not to put the refrigerator, coffee machine, TV, radio, computer, or bar of soap, before God. It might not mean a lot to you now, but when you die, you’ll be glad you did. If God is to come first in our lives, then it is only natural (or supernatural) that He comes first “first thing in the morning”!
Don’t Fit God Around Your Schedule—Fit Your Schedule Around God
This is another “biggie” where we show that our practice is not aligned with our theory about putting God first. So many people do what THEY want to do first, and fit God in somewhere—almost as if they were doing God a favor by fitting Him in! Fitting God into the schedule can be a pain and a cross for most people. Whenever they do throw God some crumbs (few minutes) from the many hours in their day, they say or think in effect: “Hey, God! Aren’t I good? See! I can fit you into my busy schedule!” The modern-day person is sometimes big on scheduling—computers and smart-phones have all the apps you need to schedule everything: they have the thing beeping a warning ‘x’ number of minutes in advance; pop-ups on the screen reminding you of your appointments, multiple alarm functions that allow to set tens and tens of alarms each day, or repeated weekly, etc. You would think that people would program in an alarm to ring in time for the Angelus three times a day; or perhaps a beep on the hour, every hour, for a prayer ejaculation honoring God; or set alarms that remind everyone that a certain time each day is Rosary time; or select as a tune for the phone ringer that is perhaps a hymn (it can be done) and so raise the mind to Heaven each time the phone rings. What we are trying to say is that God should be scheduled into the day at fixed times, rather than have Him hang around to see if you can “fit Him in somewhere between appointments or clients.”
We have set times, some of which are inflexible, but when it comes to God, there is no set time for God—we’ll just get round to Him when we can. Can you imagine Sunday Mass only starting when everyone in the parish manages to get there? Sunday Mass has a certain time—and you have to arrange the rest of your schedule to fit in with that time. God’s time will not change from Sunday to Sunday. When we fail to give God a fixed time ourselves, but leave it flux, it is another clear sign that God does not really come first in practice, even though we insist He is first, in theory. We need to nail ourselves to God like Christ was nailed to His Cross―but that would make too many people angry and cross, which would cross the boundaries they have laid down for the presence of God in their lives―only so much of God and no more! How many people want a LONGER sermon during Mass? Most people want a shorter sermon! How many people want to spend quite a bit more time praying the Rosary by inserting a few minutes of meditation before each decade? No way! Let’s get it over and done with as fast as we can!
Don’t Bother Going to Find the Cross―Stay Where You Are and It Will Find You!
You don’t have to go anywhere special to find a cross―the cross will find you. It is as though God has programmed the cross to say: “Don’t call us―we will call on you! Don’t come looking for us―we will find you, we will come to you, we will come to your home!” The following passage from The Imitation of Christ indicates this in speaking of temptations―that there is no escape from them. Here is that passage―except the word “CROSS” has been inserted in place of the word “TEMPTATION”, which is not wrong in itself, for all temptations are but just one kind of many crosses that we have to endure and put up with:
“So long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and the cross. Whence it is written in Job: ‘The life of man upon Earth is a warfare.’ No one is so perfect or so holy as not to have a cross to carry; man cannot be altogether free of the cross. Yet crosses, though troublesome and heavy, are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many crosses and trials to profit by them, while those who would not carry them, became reprobate and fell away. There is no state so holy, no place so secret that crosses and trials will not come. Man is never safe from them as long as he lives, for they come from within us — in sin we were born. When one cross or trial passes, another comes; we shall always have something to suffer because we have lost the state of original blessedness. Many people try to escape crosses, only to find greater ones. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but by patience and true humility we become stronger than all our enemies. Little by little, in patience and long-suffering you will get used to them and be able to carry them―but only by the help of God rather than by your own strength. Often take counsel when burdened with a cross; and do not be harsh with others who fall under the cross, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled. Often we do not know what we can stand, but the cross shows us what we are. Some have great crosses in the beginning of their conversion, others toward the end, while some are troubled almost constantly throughout their life. Others, again, are given only light crosses, according to the wisdom and justice of Divine Providence Who weighs the status and merit of each and prepares all for the salvation of His elect. We should not despair, therefore, when we are under a cross, but pray to God the more fervently that He may see fit to help us, for according to the word of Paul, He will make issue with it that we may be able to bear it. Let us humble our souls under the hand of God in every trial and cross for He will save and exalt the humble in spirit. In crosses and trials the progress of a man is measured; in them opportunity for merit and virtue is made more manifest. When a man has no cross to carry, it is not hard for him to be fervent and devout, but if he bears up patiently in time of adversity, there is hope for great progress. Some are frequently overcome by small crosses in order that, humbled by their weakness in small trials, they may not presume on their own strength in great ones” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 13).
In another chapter, The Imitation of Christ adds:
“If you do not steadily set your heart on Me, with a firm will to suffer everything for My sake, you will not be able to bear the heat of this battle or to win the crown of the blessed. You ought, therefore, to pass through all these things bravely and to oppose a strong hand to whatever stands in your way. For to him who triumphs, heavenly bread is given; while for him who is too lazy to fight, there remains much misery. If you look for rest in this life, how will you attain to everlasting rest? Dispose yourself, then, not for much rest, but for great patience. Seek true peace, not on Earth, but in Heaven; not in men or in other creatures, but in God alone. For the love of God you should undergo all things [crosses] cheerfully, all labors and sorrows, temptations and trials, anxieties, weaknesses, necessities, injuries, slanders, rebukes, humiliations, confusions, corrections, and contempt. For these are helps to virtue. These are the trials of Christ’s recruit. These form the heavenly crown. For a little brief labor, I will give an everlasting crown; and for passing confusion, I will give glory that is eternal. Do you think that you will always have spiritual consolations as you desire? My saints did not always have them. Instead, they had many afflictions, temptations of various kinds, and great desolation. Yet they bore them all patiently. They placed their confidence in God rather than in themselves, knowing that the sufferings of this life are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to come. And you — do you wish to have immediately that which others have scarcely obtained after many tears and great labors? Wait for the Lord, act bravely, and have courage! Do not lose trust! Do not turn back but devote your body and soul constantly to God’s glory! I will reward you most plentifully! I will be with you in every tribulation!” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 35).
In a similar vein, you could take the words of Our Lady, as revealed to Venerable Mary of Agreda: “My most holy Son and myself are trying to find among those who have arrived at the way of the cross, some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If you wish to be our disciple, then enter into this school, in which alone is taught the doctrine of the cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights. Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with this wisdom; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the bleary-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors, and so full of ignorant admiration for costly grandeur. If this doctrine were not most valuable and secure, We would not have taught it by word and example. This is the light, which shines in the darkness (John 1:7), loved by the elect and abhorred by the reprobate” (Our Lady to Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
On that point, let us end the section with the wise words of The Imitation of Christ, from that inimitable chapter entitled “The Royal Road of the Cross”, wherein it says:
“To many souls, the saying, ‘Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow Me,’ seems hard, but it will be much harder to hear that final word: ‘Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire.’ Those who hear the word of the cross and follow it willingly now, need not fear that they will hear of eternal damnation on the Day of Judgment. This sign of the cross will be in the heavens when the Lord comes to judge. Then all the servants of the cross, who during life made themselves one with the Crucified, will draw near with great trust to Christ, the judge. Why, then, do you fear to take up the cross when through it you can win a kingdom? In the cross is salvation, in the cross is life, in the cross is protection from enemies, in the cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness, in the cross is strength of mind, in the cross is joy of spirit, in the cross is highest virtue, in the cross is perfect holiness. There is no salvation of soul nor hope of everlasting life, except in the cross.
“Take up your cross, therefore, and follow Jesus, and you shall enter eternal life. He Himself opened the way before you in carrying His cross, and upon it He died for you, that you, too, might take up your cross and long to die upon it. If you die with Him, you shall also live with Him, and if you share His suffering, you shall also share His glory. Behold, in the cross is everything, and upon your dying on the cross everything depends. There is no other way to life and to true inward peace than the way of the holy cross and daily mortification. Go where you will, seek what you will, you will not find a higher way, nor a less exalted but safer way, than the way of the holy cross. Arrange and order everything to suit your will and judgment, and still you will find that some suffering must always be borne, willingly or unwillingly, and thus you will always find the cross. Either you will experience bodily pain or you will undergo tribulation of spirit in your soul. At times you will be forsaken by God, at times troubled by those about you and, what is worse, you will often grow weary of yourself.
“You cannot escape, you cannot be relieved by any remedy or comfort but must bear with it as long as God wills. For He wishes you to learn to bear trial without consolation, to submit yourself wholly to Him that you may become more humble through suffering. No one understands the passion of Christ so thoroughly or heartily as the man whose lot it is to suffer the like himself. The cross, therefore, is always ready; it awaits you everywhere. No matter where you may go, you cannot escape it, for wherever you go you take yourself with you and shall always find yourself. Turn where you will — above, below, without, or within — you will find a cross in everything, and everywhere you must have patience if you would have peace within and merit an eternal crown.
“If you carry the cross willingly, it will carry and lead you to the desired goal where indeed there shall be no more suffering, but here there shall be. If you carry it unwillingly, you create a burden for yourself and increase the load, though still you have to bear it. If you cast away one cross, you will find another and perhaps a heavier one. Do you expect to escape what no mortal man can ever avoid? Which of the saints was without a cross or trial on this Earth? Not even Jesus Christ, our Lord, Whose every hour on earth knew the pain of His passion. ‘It behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise again from the dead ... and so enter into His glory.’ How is it that you look for another way than this, the royal way of the holy cross?” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 2, Chapter 12, “The Royal Road of the Cross”).
Your Nearest Station of the Cross is Your Nearest and Dearest
As said above―you don’t have to go anywhere to find the cross―not that there are many seekers of the cross in the first place! There are wore who seek to flee the cross than those who seek to find the cross! Nevertheless, even those who flee the cross, find that they have failed miserably―for God’s Providence sees to it that everyone is planted in the soil of the cross, no matter who they are, or where they are, or what they are. The nearest cross that you will find is in your nearest and dearest―that is to say, your own family. If, as The Imitation of Christ says, each man is a cross unto himself, then likewise is it true that each family is a cross to each family member. Our Lord even indicated this when He said:
You are probably like most families—where there are some who want to put the spiritual first and some do don’t; where some will try improve their spiritual life and some who won’t. That’s nothing to get embarrassed about, or to try and sweep under the carpet—it’s par for the course and Our Lord foretold it:
“Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law!” (Luke 12:51-53).
“Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! ... And the brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death! And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake! ... He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:35-38; Mark 13:12-13).
It is a cross to battle one’s own family members, or relatives, or friends, or colleagues—but it has to be done, for we cannot love them more than God, and we cannot follow their mistaken way over God’s true narrow path. The above quote of Our Lord’s cannot be too often repeated in these day of Liberal compromise, which preaches the very opposite of what Our Lord preaches.
Reflect on Our Lord’s words again: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, no; but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man's enemies shall be they of his own household” (Matthew 10:34-36; Luke 12:51-53). “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37-38).
It is the carrying of the Cross that saves us―not the carrying of a feather. Our Lord says that we will be hated for His Name’s sake, whereas He could have had it that we would be loved for His Name’s sake. He could have said that all households would be united because of His teachings, but He said that all households would be divided. In having to stand up for and confess someone, it has to be Him that we stand up for and confess, even if it means hurting the feelings of family—for He has said that anyone who loves family more than Him, is not worthy of Him.
But, but, but… I don’t want to ... I can’t divide the family!
Your family will be divided anyway—probably is already, and most are possibly/probably on the wrong side of the line: the side of lukewarmness, indifference, worldliness and spiritual negligence. At least that’s the opinion of most of the spiritual masters! Why else are most souls lost? “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household” (Matthew 10:34-36; Luke 12:51-53). “He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37-38). Who do you want please? God or your family? If your family does not please God as much as it ought, will you also displease God by allowing your family to remain displeasing, just so that they will be pleased by not being made to please God more? Pleeeease!!
Peace with God or Men?
We all want to live in peace with those around us—but that peace has to take second place to our being at peace with God. Sin—whether it be Mortal or Venial—is not being at peace with God, for both those sins are punishable in the own way and in different degrees. Both those sins—even Venial Sin—are the two greatest evils in the world and are offensive to God. If we make peace with sin—even Venial Sin—then we are at peace with offending God and at peace with committing the greatest evils in the world. Lukewarmness is, by definition, peace with Venial Sin. If we, and if our family members, are committing Venial Sins but are actively and currently fighting those sins, then that is a good sign; but if we or they are at peace with Venial Sin and make no efforts to lessen, eradicate and destroy Venial Sin, then we are not at peace with God, but at enmity with God. If we, and our family members, are fighting the worldly spirit, then it is a good sign; but if we have made peace with certain aspects of worldliness, then we are at enmity with God, because “whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
The “Sign of the Cross” is not a sign of our times. Rather than make the Sign of the Cross, most Catholics prefer to sign into their social media account, or sign into their e-mail account, or sign into some website they subscribe to, etc. They get more of a “buzz” and more of “a kick out of that” than they get out of signing into God’s “site” with a Sign of a Cross.
The Sign of the Cross used to be made numerous times every day―nowadays there are some Catholics who don’t even make it once a day, or, at best, only a few times a day. For a true Catholic, the very first moment of the day would (should) begin with the making of the Sign of Cross at the very first moment of waking―after which they would hit the floor with their knees and “post” a few prayers on God’s “website” (Heaven) or “e-mail” God those prayers. Nowadays, it is the new god on the block―the smartphone―that gets that privilege, with an overwhelming number of persons admitting that the first thing they do upon rising is check and/or use their smartphone for one reason or another―if nothing other than to simply turn off the alarm that woke them, but that often leads to a brief check for this, that or the other―text messages, e-mail, weather, etc.
The true Catholic―if they didn’t make several additional Signs of the Cross during morning prayers (which some prayers might include as part of the prayer)―would end their morning prayers with another Sign of the Cross. The Sign of the Cross would next be met at the breakfast table or just before eating, when the Sign of Cross would be made before and after saying “Grace Before Meals”―and repeated twice again once the meal was finished by making the Sign of the Cross before and after “Grace After Meals.”
Soon after that, before driving to work or school, two more Signs of the Cross would be made―before and after saying a “Prayer for the Road.” At school, the Sign of the Cross would be made numerous times―at several times at morning assembly prayers, before and after each class of the day, before and after the noontime Angelus (during which we specifically mention the Cross: “we may by His Passion and Cross be brought to the glory of His resurrection,” etc.), and made around 60 times at each weekday Mass, which used to be a daily occurrence in Catholic schools. On that note, please note that during a Mass (the Latin Mass), the Sign of the Cross is made over 50 times. More Signs of the Cross would follow at lunch and the afternoon classes. More Signs of the Cross would come on the drive back home and even more Signs of the Cross would occur at the evening meal, the family Rosary, night prayers, and a final Sign of the Cross before falling asleep.
The Symbol Remains―The Sincerity Has Disappeared―Superficiality Replaces It
Today, however, such a description, as stated above, rarely exists in reality―the norm is quite the opposite. Very few would disagree and argue with the statement that most of the world is superficial. Superficiality has almost become the DNA of the world. We see it in politics, in business, in social life, in the depth of knowledge, in the conveyance of feelings, in casual day-to-day conversation, even in home and family life. The obvious and inevitable offshoot of all this superficiality is that we become superficial in our religion, in our Faith, in our spiritual life, and with God. The externals are still there―the Crucifixes, the Rosary Beads, the Medals, the Mass, etc. ― but the life or soul of these things is missing, the sincerity has disappeared, superficiality has appeared, and all these external signs are reduced to quasi-superstitious symbols―even though nobody would dare to call them that or admit to having that attitude.
Here is an interesting observation from a USA Catholic visiting the largest Catholic country in the world―Brazil: “An interesting choreography, of sorts, can be seen during rush hour, in front of the church Nossa Senhora da Paz, in Ipanema, Rio de Janeiro. There, among the evening stream of pedestrians, cars, and buses, many people, both outside and inside vehicles, face the church when passing in front of it and do the sign of the cross in a perfectly timed and almost automatic movement. For an outsider, this would appear to be a natural occurrence in the world’s largest Catholic nation―but, as some Brazilians will readily admit, such displays should not be considered signs of a devoted Catholic population, but superficial manifestations. ‘Everybody says they are Catholic, but nobody really is,’ a local friend told me. ‘Futebol (soccer) is more of a religion than Catholicism.’ … Should we take this as the modern pretense we see elsewhere? … Religious practices in the country, starting with Catholicism, have all incorporated, and even been created from, interactions with practices and traditions from all the others … It is true that many people who identify as Catholics are not practicing Catholics. But then, like my friend admitted, almost nobody really is.”
How often do we forget why we are attending the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and become concerned only over whether other people see how much we give in the Offertory collection, or how well we sing hymns, or how seemingly devout we appear during Mass? For most persons, their mind and heart is not fully engaged in the Holy Sacrifice―the mind and heart wander and the Holy Sacrifice quickly becomes a superficial sacrifice. The same is often true for Holy Communion. The same is often true for our confessions. The same can be said of our prayers and (if we even make any) meditations. They are mechanical, routine, automatic, with little or no supernatural feelings or desires. They are more of a chore than an enthusiastic passion. Instead of passionately waiting for them to happen or begin, we passionately can’t wait until they are over and done with!
We see this superficiality manifested by rushed, inattentive, half-made genuflections before the Blessed Sacrament; or hasty, half-made Signs of the Cross; or rushed, distracted prayers and Rosaries; speedy, fast-track Masses; express-lane Communions; micro-waved vague confessions; soulless and heartless hymns―all of which is closer to being a “Catholic-Assembly-Line” that a true spiritual living of the Faith. We kneel, we join our hands in prayer, we bow, we genuflect, we make signs of the cross, we carry Rosaries, we wear scapulars, we say prayers, we go to Mass, we receive Holy Communion, etc. ― but all of these things are mere externals, ecclesiastical etiquette, but these actions are merely like feathers without a bird underneath them. There is little thought and little understanding of the purpose, significance, symbolism and spirituality of these things―they are mere externals that smugly satisfy our superficial Faith. A five-year-old child is taught to make a sign of the cross, to say a certain prayer, to use holy water, to answer a catechism question―such as “What is God? God is a spirit!”―without really knowing or understanding all that these things mean, represent, symbolize and effect. For a five-year-old child, this is fine, it is only a beginning―but we should not remain in the childish state of knowledge and understanding―it is only skin deep, superficial. It is of such a superficiality and immaturity that Our Lord speaks, when He says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoreth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Most Catholics today are “lip-service” Catholics living in a spiritual “express-lane” in their prayer life, and using the “fast-check-out-lane” after Holy Communion and Mass.
That is classic immaturity―to perform the externals (looking to be mature), while interiorly we are distracted, disconnected, disorientated―like an immature child, who is told to apologize and begrudgingly spits out the words “I’m sorry!!!” when it is clear that those words come only from the lips and not the heart. Part of maturity is acceptance of responsibility―immature people are always making excuses, “passing-the-buck”, pointing the finger at others and blaming someone or something else other than themselves. In confession, they will ‘confess’ or tell the sins of others as much (or even more than) their own sins―all of this comes from a lack of maturity or lack of an ability to accept responsibility.
The Superficiality of Immaturity and the Immaturity of Superficiality
We often neglect to dig deeper, to think more, to reflect on what is going on inside us and around us and are too busy to slow down to be with God. As a result, we run the high risk of remaining stuck as spiritual infants, failing to develop into spiritually/emotionally mature adults in Christ. As St. Paul writes: “Brethren, do not become children in sense: but in malice be children, and in sense be perfect” (1 Corinthians 14:20). In other words, St. Paul is saying: “Do not think like mere children, but if you are going to imitate children, then imitate their lack of maliciousness that comes from their thoughtlessness―but in your own thoughts, be mature and not childish!” Elsewhere St. Paul adds: “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child” (1 Corinthians 13:11). Nowadays, adults still act like children, want to play like children, react to disappointments like children and make excuses like children. The side-effect of this is a neglect of the Cross of Christ―for children are usually more protected from difficulties, stresses, strains and are usually exempt or excused from heavy and hard labor.
Taking the above quote from St. Paul about being a child―you could add to it another quote or two from St. Paul, so that it reads thus: “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child” (1 Corinthians 13:11) “so that I may live for God―with Christ I am nailed to the Cross” (Galatians 2:19) … “God forbid that I should glory, except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by Whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world” (Galatians 6:14) … “The Jews require signs, and the Greeks seek after wisdom! But we preach Christ crucified―which, unto the Jews, indeed is a stumbling-block, and unto the Gentiles it is foolishness” (1 Corinthians 1:22-23) ... “Be ye followers of me, brethren … For many walk, of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping, that they are enemies of the Cross of Christ―whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Philippians 3:17-19).
When you care for earthly things, worldly pleasures, comfort and ease, fun and entertainment, then you instinctively develop a dislike for the cross and suffering, or even a detestation for the cross and suffering. In this age of technology and comfort, we have become a generation of cross avoiders and cross voiders. We run from the cross, and, if we cannot escape it, we make it void by our complaints, whines, moans and groans. This reminds us a little of St. Simon of Cyrene, who didn’t want to carry Jesus’ cross, but was forced to do so: “And going out, they found a man of Cyrene, named Simon―him they forced to take up His [Jesus’] cross” (Matthew 27:32). Most people in this world do not want the cross―and so God forces the cross upon them by His Divine Providence. But what is God forcing them to take? Poison? No, the cross is not poison, but healthy medicine―even though it tastes bitter. But many medicines do taste bitter―even natural medicines in the form of food―for as they say: “Bitter is better” in many if not most cases. Garlic is bitter, cayenne is sharp, lemon is bitter, ginger is sharp, many herbs are bitter―yet they are among the best medicines that we have. Yet, the “thoughts and ways of the Lord” (Isaias 55:8-9) become abhorrent, unfair, too difficult, too demanding, too bitter, too sharp―to the point that we are tempted to cry out with the Chosen People of old: “The way of the Lord is not right!” (Ezechiel 18:25)―to which God answers: “Hear ye, therefore, O house of Israel! Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse?”
Hence the liturgy for the Mass of the Exaltation of Holy Cross, states: “It behooves us to glory in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ: in Whom is our salvation, life, and resurrection: by Whom we are saved, and delivered” (Entrance Hymn or Introit) … “Through the sign of the Holy Cross protect Thy people, O Lord, from the snares of all their enemies” (Offertory Verse) … “O holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God, Who didst establish the salvation of mankind on the tree of the Cross” (Preface) … “Deliver us from our enemies, O our God, through the sign of the Cross” (Communion Verse).
Don’t Bury Your Talent―Don't Bury Your Cross!
Undoubtedly you know the Parable of the Talents, where the Lord gives to each of his servants a number of talents according to the capabilities, expecting them to use and work with what they have been given in order to show some profit―to one the Lord gives 5 talents, to another 2 talents and to a third only 1 talent. The one who received 5 talents produced a profit of an additional 5 talents; the one with two talents produced 2 more talents; but the servant who was given 1 talent, buried it in the ground and was profitless (Matthew 25:14-30). You could just as well substitute the word “Cross” for the word “Talent”―for God gives everyone crosses of different types and numbers according to their capabilities, just as the Lord gave his servants differing numbers of talents according to their capabilities. Are we “working” on our crosses, are we “profiting” from our crosses, or are we “burying” our crosses―that is to say, are we throwing them away, getting rid of them, burying them?
Without that Cross of Christ there is no salvation—hence the liturgy gives us phrases such as: “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”). One day―as has been prophesied―you may not have the Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion available to you, because it will have been “taken away”—but the cross will never be taken away, it is always available to you and always will be available to you until the day you die (whether you want that cross or not). If you bury your cross—like the man who buried his talent in the ground (Matthew 25:14-30)—then your salvation is dead and buried! Just like that man, who buried the talent, we risk hearing the words: “And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant, you knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewed! You should, therefore, have committed my money to the bankers, and at my coming I should have received back my own money with additional usury! Take away, therefore, the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has, shall be given more, and he shall abound; but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have, shall be taken away. And the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:26-30).
Our crosses are far more precious than any talents (money) that we have―the talents, spoken of in the Gospel, denote money and not skills or abilities. We cannot buy our way into Heaven with money (except by giving alms), but we can buy Heaven with the cross. God is not going to “wave a magic wand” and make us effortlessly attain our salvation. He will, however, help us by His grace and inspirations to carry our cross to our salvation. “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23). “And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). The cross is the “good tree” that Jesus looks for in our lives―and the pains, sacrifices, mortifications and sufferings of the cross are the “good fruits” that Jesus wants to find on that “good tree” of the cross. If you like, you could call those “fruits” of the “good tree” by another name―the “spoils of war” or the “legitimate prizes of war.”
This is why Our Lord says emphatically: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23) … “And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). There is absolutely no “wiggle-room” in those words—no loophole, no escape clause, no compromise—it is a “non-negotiable” fact. There is no salvation outside Christ and He is to be found on the Cross—that is why we have the Crucifix overlooking every altar and the Stations of the Cross peering down upon us from all sides—in season and out of season, during Lent and outside of Lent, before Good Friday, during Good Friday and after Good Friday―the message is ever the same: “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”). Yet we must be aware of the danger that St. Augustine speaks of― St. Augustine tells us that the same crosses lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. By this he means that some souls accept their crosses and sufferings—like the ‘Good Thief’ on the cross; whereas others refuse their crosses and sufferings and seek to escape them—like the ‘Bad Thief’ on the cross. The ‘Good Thief’ ended up in Paradise, the ‘Bad Thief’ did not! Likewise, the same temptations will lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. It depends upon whether the temptation is powerfully rejected or gladly accepted.
It’s a Cross to Put God First
It is not easy putting God first in our lives. In fact, it is hard to consistently put God first in our lives. In other words, it is a cross to put God first in our lives. Most Catholics are slowly slipping down the slippery slope away from God. They no longer treasured the divine and have replaced it with the human. Now we are even slowly slipping down the slippery slope away from the human aspect of life and leave it behind for mere material things, i.e. our job, our hobbies, the smartphone, the computer, etc. It is amazing to see those who have first of all abandoned God for the large part of their lives, now also abandoning their family and friends for their material electronic parent-teacher-and-buddy-all-rolled-into-one, which is their smartphone and its ever growing Artificial Intelligence. We leave the feet of God to sit at the feet of mere people; and then leave them to play with things—and sometimes sinful things. We hate being Marys and so we become Marthas: “Now it came to pass, as they went, that Jesus entered into a certain town: and a certain woman named Martha, received Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sitting also at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Who stood and said: ‘Lord! Hast thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! Thou art careful, and art troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary! Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!” (Luke 10:38-42).
Morning Cross or Morning Coffee?
We used to be taught to make a Sign of the Cross upon waking up and then to hit the floor on our knees for a few short prayers, before our habitual morning routine which would include even more prayers, once we were dressed. It would be interesting to see what the statistics would show on prayers being said upon our first moment of waking. If we can manage a mumbled, half-asleep, “Morning, honey!” to the beloved spouse, then we can surely manage a “Morning, Lord!” to our beloved Maker and Provider. Our reaction or action towards God, first thing in the morning, may not be an all-defining moment that measures our spiritual attitude, but it certainly does reveal a lot. If we are not in the habit of greeting God first thing in the morning, then we will probably feel awkward or hypocritical starting now—but we have to start somewhere! When you have fallen-out with someone, the first words of reconciliation might not be very endearing or even believable—but I guess it’s much like going to Confession and telling God we’re sorry for some sin—for the 100th time! If we begin the new habit, however clumsily or awkwardly, it will soon start to make us feel a little different. Above all, try not to put the refrigerator, coffee machine, TV, radio, computer, or bar of soap, before God. It might not mean a lot to you now, but when you die, you’ll be glad you did. If God is to come first in our lives, then it is only natural (or supernatural) that He comes first “first thing in the morning”!
Don’t Fit God Around Your Schedule—Fit Your Schedule Around God
This is another “biggie” where we show that our practice is not aligned with our theory about putting God first. So many people do what THEY want to do first, and fit God in somewhere—almost as if they were doing God a favor by fitting Him in! Fitting God into the schedule can be a pain and a cross for most people. Whenever they do throw God some crumbs (few minutes) from the many hours in their day, they say or think in effect: “Hey, God! Aren’t I good? See! I can fit you into my busy schedule!” The modern-day person is sometimes big on scheduling—computers and smart-phones have all the apps you need to schedule everything: they have the thing beeping a warning ‘x’ number of minutes in advance; pop-ups on the screen reminding you of your appointments, multiple alarm functions that allow to set tens and tens of alarms each day, or repeated weekly, etc. You would think that people would program in an alarm to ring in time for the Angelus three times a day; or perhaps a beep on the hour, every hour, for a prayer ejaculation honoring God; or set alarms that remind everyone that a certain time each day is Rosary time; or select as a tune for the phone ringer that is perhaps a hymn (it can be done) and so raise the mind to Heaven each time the phone rings. What we are trying to say is that God should be scheduled into the day at fixed times, rather than have Him hang around to see if you can “fit Him in somewhere between appointments or clients.”
We have set times, some of which are inflexible, but when it comes to God, there is no set time for God—we’ll just get round to Him when we can. Can you imagine Sunday Mass only starting when everyone in the parish manages to get there? Sunday Mass has a certain time—and you have to arrange the rest of your schedule to fit in with that time. God’s time will not change from Sunday to Sunday. When we fail to give God a fixed time ourselves, but leave it flux, it is another clear sign that God does not really come first in practice, even though we insist He is first, in theory. We need to nail ourselves to God like Christ was nailed to His Cross―but that would make too many people angry and cross, which would cross the boundaries they have laid down for the presence of God in their lives―only so much of God and no more! How many people want a LONGER sermon during Mass? Most people want a shorter sermon! How many people want to spend quite a bit more time praying the Rosary by inserting a few minutes of meditation before each decade? No way! Let’s get it over and done with as fast as we can!
Don’t Bother Going to Find the Cross―Stay Where You Are and It Will Find You!
You don’t have to go anywhere special to find a cross―the cross will find you. It is as though God has programmed the cross to say: “Don’t call us―we will call on you! Don’t come looking for us―we will find you, we will come to you, we will come to your home!” The following passage from The Imitation of Christ indicates this in speaking of temptations―that there is no escape from them. Here is that passage―except the word “CROSS” has been inserted in place of the word “TEMPTATION”, which is not wrong in itself, for all temptations are but just one kind of many crosses that we have to endure and put up with:
“So long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and the cross. Whence it is written in Job: ‘The life of man upon Earth is a warfare.’ No one is so perfect or so holy as not to have a cross to carry; man cannot be altogether free of the cross. Yet crosses, though troublesome and heavy, are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many crosses and trials to profit by them, while those who would not carry them, became reprobate and fell away. There is no state so holy, no place so secret that crosses and trials will not come. Man is never safe from them as long as he lives, for they come from within us — in sin we were born. When one cross or trial passes, another comes; we shall always have something to suffer because we have lost the state of original blessedness. Many people try to escape crosses, only to find greater ones. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but by patience and true humility we become stronger than all our enemies. Little by little, in patience and long-suffering you will get used to them and be able to carry them―but only by the help of God rather than by your own strength. Often take counsel when burdened with a cross; and do not be harsh with others who fall under the cross, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled. Often we do not know what we can stand, but the cross shows us what we are. Some have great crosses in the beginning of their conversion, others toward the end, while some are troubled almost constantly throughout their life. Others, again, are given only light crosses, according to the wisdom and justice of Divine Providence Who weighs the status and merit of each and prepares all for the salvation of His elect. We should not despair, therefore, when we are under a cross, but pray to God the more fervently that He may see fit to help us, for according to the word of Paul, He will make issue with it that we may be able to bear it. Let us humble our souls under the hand of God in every trial and cross for He will save and exalt the humble in spirit. In crosses and trials the progress of a man is measured; in them opportunity for merit and virtue is made more manifest. When a man has no cross to carry, it is not hard for him to be fervent and devout, but if he bears up patiently in time of adversity, there is hope for great progress. Some are frequently overcome by small crosses in order that, humbled by their weakness in small trials, they may not presume on their own strength in great ones” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 13).
In another chapter, The Imitation of Christ adds:
“If you do not steadily set your heart on Me, with a firm will to suffer everything for My sake, you will not be able to bear the heat of this battle or to win the crown of the blessed. You ought, therefore, to pass through all these things bravely and to oppose a strong hand to whatever stands in your way. For to him who triumphs, heavenly bread is given; while for him who is too lazy to fight, there remains much misery. If you look for rest in this life, how will you attain to everlasting rest? Dispose yourself, then, not for much rest, but for great patience. Seek true peace, not on Earth, but in Heaven; not in men or in other creatures, but in God alone. For the love of God you should undergo all things [crosses] cheerfully, all labors and sorrows, temptations and trials, anxieties, weaknesses, necessities, injuries, slanders, rebukes, humiliations, confusions, corrections, and contempt. For these are helps to virtue. These are the trials of Christ’s recruit. These form the heavenly crown. For a little brief labor, I will give an everlasting crown; and for passing confusion, I will give glory that is eternal. Do you think that you will always have spiritual consolations as you desire? My saints did not always have them. Instead, they had many afflictions, temptations of various kinds, and great desolation. Yet they bore them all patiently. They placed their confidence in God rather than in themselves, knowing that the sufferings of this life are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to come. And you — do you wish to have immediately that which others have scarcely obtained after many tears and great labors? Wait for the Lord, act bravely, and have courage! Do not lose trust! Do not turn back but devote your body and soul constantly to God’s glory! I will reward you most plentifully! I will be with you in every tribulation!” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 35).
In a similar vein, you could take the words of Our Lady, as revealed to Venerable Mary of Agreda: “My most holy Son and myself are trying to find among those who have arrived at the way of the cross, some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If you wish to be our disciple, then enter into this school, in which alone is taught the doctrine of the cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights. Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with this wisdom; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the bleary-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors, and so full of ignorant admiration for costly grandeur. If this doctrine were not most valuable and secure, We would not have taught it by word and example. This is the light, which shines in the darkness (John 1:7), loved by the elect and abhorred by the reprobate” (Our Lady to Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
On that point, let us end the section with the wise words of The Imitation of Christ, from that inimitable chapter entitled “The Royal Road of the Cross”, wherein it says:
“To many souls, the saying, ‘Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow Me,’ seems hard, but it will be much harder to hear that final word: ‘Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire.’ Those who hear the word of the cross and follow it willingly now, need not fear that they will hear of eternal damnation on the Day of Judgment. This sign of the cross will be in the heavens when the Lord comes to judge. Then all the servants of the cross, who during life made themselves one with the Crucified, will draw near with great trust to Christ, the judge. Why, then, do you fear to take up the cross when through it you can win a kingdom? In the cross is salvation, in the cross is life, in the cross is protection from enemies, in the cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness, in the cross is strength of mind, in the cross is joy of spirit, in the cross is highest virtue, in the cross is perfect holiness. There is no salvation of soul nor hope of everlasting life, except in the cross.
“Take up your cross, therefore, and follow Jesus, and you shall enter eternal life. He Himself opened the way before you in carrying His cross, and upon it He died for you, that you, too, might take up your cross and long to die upon it. If you die with Him, you shall also live with Him, and if you share His suffering, you shall also share His glory. Behold, in the cross is everything, and upon your dying on the cross everything depends. There is no other way to life and to true inward peace than the way of the holy cross and daily mortification. Go where you will, seek what you will, you will not find a higher way, nor a less exalted but safer way, than the way of the holy cross. Arrange and order everything to suit your will and judgment, and still you will find that some suffering must always be borne, willingly or unwillingly, and thus you will always find the cross. Either you will experience bodily pain or you will undergo tribulation of spirit in your soul. At times you will be forsaken by God, at times troubled by those about you and, what is worse, you will often grow weary of yourself.
“You cannot escape, you cannot be relieved by any remedy or comfort but must bear with it as long as God wills. For He wishes you to learn to bear trial without consolation, to submit yourself wholly to Him that you may become more humble through suffering. No one understands the passion of Christ so thoroughly or heartily as the man whose lot it is to suffer the like himself. The cross, therefore, is always ready; it awaits you everywhere. No matter where you may go, you cannot escape it, for wherever you go you take yourself with you and shall always find yourself. Turn where you will — above, below, without, or within — you will find a cross in everything, and everywhere you must have patience if you would have peace within and merit an eternal crown.
“If you carry the cross willingly, it will carry and lead you to the desired goal where indeed there shall be no more suffering, but here there shall be. If you carry it unwillingly, you create a burden for yourself and increase the load, though still you have to bear it. If you cast away one cross, you will find another and perhaps a heavier one. Do you expect to escape what no mortal man can ever avoid? Which of the saints was without a cross or trial on this Earth? Not even Jesus Christ, our Lord, Whose every hour on earth knew the pain of His passion. ‘It behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise again from the dead ... and so enter into His glory.’ How is it that you look for another way than this, the royal way of the holy cross?” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 2, Chapter 12, “The Royal Road of the Cross”).
Your Nearest Station of the Cross is Your Nearest and Dearest
As said above―you don’t have to go anywhere to find the cross―not that there are many seekers of the cross in the first place! There are wore who seek to flee the cross than those who seek to find the cross! Nevertheless, even those who flee the cross, find that they have failed miserably―for God’s Providence sees to it that everyone is planted in the soil of the cross, no matter who they are, or where they are, or what they are. The nearest cross that you will find is in your nearest and dearest―that is to say, your own family. If, as The Imitation of Christ says, each man is a cross unto himself, then likewise is it true that each family is a cross to each family member. Our Lord even indicated this when He said:
You are probably like most families—where there are some who want to put the spiritual first and some do don’t; where some will try improve their spiritual life and some who won’t. That’s nothing to get embarrassed about, or to try and sweep under the carpet—it’s par for the course and Our Lord foretold it:
“Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law!” (Luke 12:51-53).
“Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! ... And the brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death! And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake! ... He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:35-38; Mark 13:12-13).
It is a cross to battle one’s own family members, or relatives, or friends, or colleagues—but it has to be done, for we cannot love them more than God, and we cannot follow their mistaken way over God’s true narrow path. The above quote of Our Lord’s cannot be too often repeated in these day of Liberal compromise, which preaches the very opposite of what Our Lord preaches.
Reflect on Our Lord’s words again: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, no; but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man's enemies shall be they of his own household” (Matthew 10:34-36; Luke 12:51-53). “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37-38).
It is the carrying of the Cross that saves us―not the carrying of a feather. Our Lord says that we will be hated for His Name’s sake, whereas He could have had it that we would be loved for His Name’s sake. He could have said that all households would be united because of His teachings, but He said that all households would be divided. In having to stand up for and confess someone, it has to be Him that we stand up for and confess, even if it means hurting the feelings of family—for He has said that anyone who loves family more than Him, is not worthy of Him.
But, but, but… I don’t want to ... I can’t divide the family!
Your family will be divided anyway—probably is already, and most are possibly/probably on the wrong side of the line: the side of lukewarmness, indifference, worldliness and spiritual negligence. At least that’s the opinion of most of the spiritual masters! Why else are most souls lost? “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household” (Matthew 10:34-36; Luke 12:51-53). “He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that does not take up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37-38). Who do you want please? God or your family? If your family does not please God as much as it ought, will you also displease God by allowing your family to remain displeasing, just so that they will be pleased by not being made to please God more? Pleeeease!!
Peace with God or Men?
We all want to live in peace with those around us—but that peace has to take second place to our being at peace with God. Sin—whether it be Mortal or Venial—is not being at peace with God, for both those sins are punishable in the own way and in different degrees. Both those sins—even Venial Sin—are the two greatest evils in the world and are offensive to God. If we make peace with sin—even Venial Sin—then we are at peace with offending God and at peace with committing the greatest evils in the world. Lukewarmness is, by definition, peace with Venial Sin. If we, and if our family members, are committing Venial Sins but are actively and currently fighting those sins, then that is a good sign; but if we or they are at peace with Venial Sin and make no efforts to lessen, eradicate and destroy Venial Sin, then we are not at peace with God, but at enmity with God. If we, and our family members, are fighting the worldly spirit, then it is a good sign; but if we have made peace with certain aspects of worldliness, then we are at enmity with God, because “whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
Article 5
Thursday & Friday, September 12th & 13th
The Danger of Catholicism!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Thursday & Friday, September 12th & 13th
The Danger of Catholicism!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Is Catholicism a Danger?
That is an interesting question! Is Catholicism a danger? What kind of danger? A danger to whom or what? It is a question that is rarely pondered―resulting in its implications being squandered! To answer the question―Catholicism is a danger, a great danger, a danger to be greatly feared! But by whom? Quite simply―everybody! Catholicism is a danger to the enemies of the Church; it is a danger to devils and Hell; and, perhaps surprisingly, it is also a great danger to those who possess it! At the same time―while being a danger to others―Catholicism is also in danger from others!
Without Catholicism, you cannot be pleasing to God: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6) ― what “Faith”? The Catholic Faith of course! Similarly, Catholicism is the weapon that is meant to overcome Satan and the world: “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). What “Faith”? The Catholic Faith! That is why Satan and his henchmen in the world are constantly fighting against the Faith, seeking to drag those who have the Faith into apostasy: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). Strong in what Faith? The Catholic Faith, of course! “In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:16) ― the shield of the Catholic Faith, the shield of Catholicism.
Yet there is also a danger for us in that we can be guilty of presumption in having the Catholic Faith―thinking that we already have one foot in Heaven! Being given the grace of having the Faith is a tremendous gift and privilege that should be taken lightly, should not be undervalued, nor taken for granted! Holy Scripture warns us of the tremendous responsibility that comes with having the Faith. To whom more is given, more is expected! “That servant who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. But he that knew not, and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. And unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required; and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand all the more” (Luke 12:47-48).
That is why some of saints say that the deepest part of Hell is reserved for Catholics―for they have received far more than non-Catholics―and thus much more was expected of the Catholics than Protestants, Jews and pagans. The second deepest region of Hell is for the Jews―but the Catholics have the deepest.
The Danger of a Fruitless Faith
Our Lord punctures our presumption when He says: “Why call you Me: ‘Lord, Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) … “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). “I am the true vine and My Father is the farmer. I am the vine―you the branches! He that abided in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. Every branch in Me that bears not fruit, He will take away; and everyone that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit. In this is My Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit, and become My disciples. If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch and shall wither―and they shall gather him up and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 5:1-8).
Having the Faith is not enough―we have to DO something with that Faith, as Our Lord said. Hence Holy Scripture warns: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself. But some man will say: ‘You have Faith, and I have works!’ Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! You believe that there is one God. You do well―but the devils also believe and tremble! Will you know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead? … Do you see that a man is justified by works, and not by Faith only? For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
Squirrels need their sharp teeth not only for self-defense, but to crack open many of the foods they like to eat, such as hard shelled nuts and acorns. Their teeth never stop growing. They must continue gnawing to wear them down so that they can close their mouths and so their teeth don't grow into their skulls, eventually killing them. Humans were not made by God to sit around in chairs and car seats all day long―we were made for physical activity and if become sedentary and fail to exercise our bodies, then our bodies will “come back and bite us” with bad health and a shortened life. We must use our bodies in the way God intended them to be used―and we must use the Faith in the way that God intended the Faith to be used. Our Lord speaks of “Faith as a grain of mustard seed” (Matthew 17:19) and elsewhere He says: “The seed is the word of God” (Luke 8:11). A seed is meant to be planted and is meant to grow and bear fruit―if it does not, then it has failed its purpose. The Faith (Catholicism) is meant to be planted in souls and is meant to grow and bear fruit―if it does, then it has become unprofitable.
The Consequences of an Unprofitable Faith
Our Lord speaks of unprofitable Catholics when He says: “Cast out the unprofitable servant into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30). Those words were applied to the unprofitable servant who had buried the talent that his master gave him and failed to show any profit from it. How true that is of so many Catholics today, who show little or no profit from the Faith that has been given to them: “All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that doth good, no not one!” (Psalm 52:4). Rather than bringing them spiritual health, their unused Faith has become moldy, rotten and toxic. “Faith is lost and is carried away” (Jeremias 7:28).
Our Lady revealed to the Venerable Mary of Agreda the vast number of souls who damn themselves by neglecting their God-given Faith in favor passing, temporary, fictitious earthly goods and pleasures: “How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! Earthly passions and inclinations dominate the heart! Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with true wisdom! There are so few who are perfect and who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption. Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. There are those who think that the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be. Fear the danger of not paying attention to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... Who is so dull-minded and insipid as not to know the dangers of the worldly life, which is hampered by all the abominable and most wicked laws and customs introduced by the astuteness of the devil and the perversity of men? … Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. This dreadful carelessness arises from two causes: on the one hand men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. Anything that is interior seems harmless in their estimation. On the other hand, since the princes of darkness are invisible and unperceived―the result is that men forget the fear of them ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! … I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!”
The Positive and Negative Dangers of Catholicism
The positive dangers of Catholicism are those that thwart and defeat the enemies of Catholicism―namely, the devil, the world and our own flesh. The negative dangers of Catholicism are those that harm Catholicism (a.k.a. Faith) in ourselves or others. We need to nurture the positive dangers and stifle the negative dangers.
Our Lord praises positive Faith (positive Catholicism) and rebukes negative Faith (negative Catholicism):
► PRAISING: “According to your Faith, be it done unto you!” (Matthew 9:29) … “Jesus said to her: ‘O woman, great is your Faith! Be it done to you as you wish!’ And her daughter was cured from that hour” (Matthew 15:28). “Whose Faith when He saw, He said: ‘Man, thy sins are forgiven thee!’” (Luke 5:20). “And He said to the woman: ‘Thy Faith has made thee safe! Go in peace!’” (Luke 7:50). “And He said to him: ‘Arise! Go thy way! For thy Faith hath made thee whole!’” (Luke 17:19). “And Jesus said to the centurion: ‘Go, and as thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!’ And the servant was healed at the same hour” (Matthew 8:13). “There followed him two blind men crying out and saying: ‘Have mercy on us, O Son of David!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Do you believe that I can do this unto you?’ They say to Him: ‘Yes, Lord!’ Then He touched their eyes, saying: ‘According to your Faith, be it done unto you!’ And their eyes were opened” (Matthew 9:27-28). “Thy word preserves them that believe in Thee!” (Wisdom 16:26).
► REBUKING: “Woe to them that are fainthearted, who believe not God―they shall not be protected by Him” (Ecclesiasticus 2:15). Our Lord would rebuke a lack of Faith―as was the case with the Apostles who did not believe that He had risen from the dead: “He upbraided them with their incredulity and hardness of heart, because they did not believe them who had seen Him after He was risen again.” (Mark 16:9-14) ... “O you of little Faith! Why did you doubt?” (Matthew 14:31) … “Why are you fearful? Have you no Faith yet?” (Mark 4:40) ... “And He said to them: ‘Where is your Faith?’” (Luke 8:25) … “Be not faithless, but believing!” (John 20:27) ... “And the Apostles said to the Lord: ‘Increase our Faith!’” (Luke 17:5). “The father of the boy crying out, with tears said: ‘I do believe, Lord! Help my unbelief!’” (Mark 9:23).
Catholicism is Meant to Change the World
It cannot be said too often that, as Catholics, we are meant to be Soldiers of Christ―and, as Soldiers of Christ, we must “stand fast in one spirit, with one mind laboring together for the Faith of the Gospel” (Philippians 1:27), so that we can conquer the world for Christ the King and extend the Social Kingship of Christ throughout the world. This is what Christ―the Head of the Mystical Body―intends when He says: “All power is given to me in Heaven and in Earth. Go ye into the whole world, and preach the Gospel to every creature, teach ye all nations―baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost―teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:28-20; Mark 16:15) ― so that there be “one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism” (Ephesians 4:5). Yes―Catholics want a “one world government”―but it is Christ Who must govern the world and not a secret elite! The world is the princedom of Satan and neither Satan nor the world want to be under the yoke of Christ: “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes assembled together against the Lord and His Christ” (Acts of Apostles 4:26) … “saying: ‘We will not have this Man to reign over us!’” (Luke 19:14). “These shall fight with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them, because He is Lord of lords, and King of kings” (Apocalypse 17:14) … “He shall show them who is the Blessed One and the only Mighty One, the King of kings, and Lord of lords!” (1 Timothy 6:15).
Our Lord clearly stated the divide and drew the lines that separated Him from the world, and His followers from the followers of the world: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7) … “He that is not with Me, is against Me! … Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to bring peace upon Earth―I came not to bring peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:32-36). Concerning His true followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (Matthew 10:22; 24:9; John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
Thus we can see that Catholicism is in danger from its enemies. The world sees Catholicism as an enemy and Catholicism should see the world as an enemy. Hence Scripture says: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Christ versus Satan translates into the Church versus the world. Therefore, the Catholic conquest of the world for Christ will not be easy―it will be a fight―hence we are told: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “Put on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil ... Take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day … In all things taking the shield of Faith, with which you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one! … And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God!” (Ephesians 6:11-17).
Mary is a Danger to the Devil! We Need Mary to Win!
There is no escaping the fight! There is no avoiding the battle! Sister Lucia of Fatima tells what Our Lady revealed to her concerning this battle: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957). Our Lady of La Salette herself calls to the fight: “I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful! I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ! It is time they came out and filled the world with light! … Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! … I shall fight at their side! … For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!” As Our Lady of Fatima, she refers to her title as “Our Lady of Rosary” saying: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” At Akita, Japan, in 1973, she adds: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
The devil knows the danger of Catholicism and the weapons with which God has armed it ― the most powerful, outside of God, being Mary. It is Mary that gives Catholicism its power, because Mary is the Mediatrix of All Grace. St. Louid de Montfort says: “God the Father made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary. God has a most rich treasury―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich … God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly … God the Holy Ghost has communicated to Mary His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Her power―which she exercises even over God Himself―is incomprehensible! … Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary! … The will of the Most High is that Heaven, Earth and Hell bend to the commandments of the humble Mary, whom He has made sovereign of Heaven and Earth, the general of His armies, treasurer of His treasures, dispenser of His graces, worker of His greatest marvels, restorer of the human race, Mediatrix of men, the exterminator of the enemies of God, and the faithful companion of His grandeurs and triumphs!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The devil knows the power that Mary gives to Catholicism and the weapons with which God has armed it. If the devil ― who is “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― knows the danger of Catholicism to his worldly empire, then you can be sure that the devil has communicated this knowledge to his henchmen and followers in this world. Hence it is that Satan has continuously plotted, planned, perpetrated and provoked attacks against Catholicism since the very beginnings of the Church. St. Louis de Montfort, in his book True Devotion to Mary, has a very apt and applicable description of the ever ongoing battle between Mary and Satan, the Church and the world. Here are a few pertinent extracts:
Mary Will Produce the Great Saints of the End Times
“Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be—a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints who shall come at the end of the world are reserved for her … Mary has received from God a great domination over the souls of the elect … to form, nourish and bring them forth to eternal life, and have them as her inheritance and portion, and form them in Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ in them … At the end of the world, the greatest saints, the souls richest in graces and virtues, shall be the most assiduous in praying to our Blessed Lady … because the Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints, who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity …
“These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady―illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection―so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone.
“Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times―in mercy, to bring back and lovingly receive the poor strayed sinners, who shall be converted and shall return to the Catholic Church; in might, against the enemies of God, idolaters, schismatics, Mahometans, Jews and souls hardened in impiety, who shall rise in terrible revolt against God to seduce all those who shall oppose them and to make them fall by promises and threats; and, finally, she must shine forth in grace, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ, who shall battle for His interests.
“In the terrestrial paradise, God pronounced that first and celebrated prediction and curse against the serpent, the devil: ‘I will put enmities between thee and the woman and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!’ (Genesis 3:15). Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others. These cruel persecutions of the devil shall go on increasing daily till the reign of Antichrist … God has never made and formed but one enmity; but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end. It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, that the devil fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself.
“God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always, up to this time, persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will, in the future, persecute them more than ever; just as Cain, of old, persecuted his brother Abel, and Esau his brother Jacob―who are the figures of the reprobate and the predestinate. But the humble Mary will always have the victory over that proud spirit, and so great a victory that she will go so far as to crush his head, where his pride dwells. She will always discover the malice of the serpent. She will always lay bare his infernal plots and dissipate his diabolical councils, and even to the end of time will guard her faithful servants from his cruel claw.
“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But, in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be ‘like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful’ Mary to pierce her enemies. (Psalm 126:4). They shall be the sons of Levi, well purified by the fire of great tribulation, and closely adhering to God (1 Corinthians 6:17), who shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body. They shall be everywhere the good odor of Jesus Christ to the poor and to the little, while at the same time, they shall be an odor of death to the great, to the rich and to the proud worldlings.
“They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High.
“They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies. They shall sleep without gold or silver, and, what is more, without care, in the midst of the other priests, ecclesiastics, and clerics (Psalm 67:14); and yet they shall have the silvered wings of the dove to go, with the pure intention of the glory of God and the salvation of souls, wheresoever the Holy Ghost shall call them. Nor shall they leave behind them, in the places where they have preached, anything but the gold of charity, which is the fulfillment of the whole law. (Romans 13:10).
“In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior.
“These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious, the idolaters and the Mahometans. But when and how shall this be? God alone knows. As for us, we have but to hold our tongues, to pray, to sigh and to wait: ‘With expectation I have waited!’ ― Psalm 39:2.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
That is an interesting question! Is Catholicism a danger? What kind of danger? A danger to whom or what? It is a question that is rarely pondered―resulting in its implications being squandered! To answer the question―Catholicism is a danger, a great danger, a danger to be greatly feared! But by whom? Quite simply―everybody! Catholicism is a danger to the enemies of the Church; it is a danger to devils and Hell; and, perhaps surprisingly, it is also a great danger to those who possess it! At the same time―while being a danger to others―Catholicism is also in danger from others!
Without Catholicism, you cannot be pleasing to God: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6) ― what “Faith”? The Catholic Faith of course! Similarly, Catholicism is the weapon that is meant to overcome Satan and the world: “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). What “Faith”? The Catholic Faith! That is why Satan and his henchmen in the world are constantly fighting against the Faith, seeking to drag those who have the Faith into apostasy: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). Strong in what Faith? The Catholic Faith, of course! “In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one!” (Ephesians 6:16) ― the shield of the Catholic Faith, the shield of Catholicism.
Yet there is also a danger for us in that we can be guilty of presumption in having the Catholic Faith―thinking that we already have one foot in Heaven! Being given the grace of having the Faith is a tremendous gift and privilege that should be taken lightly, should not be undervalued, nor taken for granted! Holy Scripture warns us of the tremendous responsibility that comes with having the Faith. To whom more is given, more is expected! “That servant who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. But he that knew not, and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. And unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required; and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand all the more” (Luke 12:47-48).
That is why some of saints say that the deepest part of Hell is reserved for Catholics―for they have received far more than non-Catholics―and thus much more was expected of the Catholics than Protestants, Jews and pagans. The second deepest region of Hell is for the Jews―but the Catholics have the deepest.
The Danger of a Fruitless Faith
Our Lord punctures our presumption when He says: “Why call you Me: ‘Lord, Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) … “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). “I am the true vine and My Father is the farmer. I am the vine―you the branches! He that abided in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. Every branch in Me that bears not fruit, He will take away; and everyone that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit. In this is My Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit, and become My disciples. If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch and shall wither―and they shall gather him up and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 5:1-8).
Having the Faith is not enough―we have to DO something with that Faith, as Our Lord said. Hence Holy Scripture warns: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself. But some man will say: ‘You have Faith, and I have works!’ Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! You believe that there is one God. You do well―but the devils also believe and tremble! Will you know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead? … Do you see that a man is justified by works, and not by Faith only? For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
Squirrels need their sharp teeth not only for self-defense, but to crack open many of the foods they like to eat, such as hard shelled nuts and acorns. Their teeth never stop growing. They must continue gnawing to wear them down so that they can close their mouths and so their teeth don't grow into their skulls, eventually killing them. Humans were not made by God to sit around in chairs and car seats all day long―we were made for physical activity and if become sedentary and fail to exercise our bodies, then our bodies will “come back and bite us” with bad health and a shortened life. We must use our bodies in the way God intended them to be used―and we must use the Faith in the way that God intended the Faith to be used. Our Lord speaks of “Faith as a grain of mustard seed” (Matthew 17:19) and elsewhere He says: “The seed is the word of God” (Luke 8:11). A seed is meant to be planted and is meant to grow and bear fruit―if it does not, then it has failed its purpose. The Faith (Catholicism) is meant to be planted in souls and is meant to grow and bear fruit―if it does, then it has become unprofitable.
The Consequences of an Unprofitable Faith
Our Lord speaks of unprofitable Catholics when He says: “Cast out the unprofitable servant into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30). Those words were applied to the unprofitable servant who had buried the talent that his master gave him and failed to show any profit from it. How true that is of so many Catholics today, who show little or no profit from the Faith that has been given to them: “All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that doth good, no not one!” (Psalm 52:4). Rather than bringing them spiritual health, their unused Faith has become moldy, rotten and toxic. “Faith is lost and is carried away” (Jeremias 7:28).
Our Lady revealed to the Venerable Mary of Agreda the vast number of souls who damn themselves by neglecting their God-given Faith in favor passing, temporary, fictitious earthly goods and pleasures: “How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! Earthly passions and inclinations dominate the heart! Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with true wisdom! There are so few who are perfect and who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption. Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. There are those who think that the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be. Fear the danger of not paying attention to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... Who is so dull-minded and insipid as not to know the dangers of the worldly life, which is hampered by all the abominable and most wicked laws and customs introduced by the astuteness of the devil and the perversity of men? … Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. This dreadful carelessness arises from two causes: on the one hand men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. Anything that is interior seems harmless in their estimation. On the other hand, since the princes of darkness are invisible and unperceived―the result is that men forget the fear of them ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! … I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!”
The Positive and Negative Dangers of Catholicism
The positive dangers of Catholicism are those that thwart and defeat the enemies of Catholicism―namely, the devil, the world and our own flesh. The negative dangers of Catholicism are those that harm Catholicism (a.k.a. Faith) in ourselves or others. We need to nurture the positive dangers and stifle the negative dangers.
Our Lord praises positive Faith (positive Catholicism) and rebukes negative Faith (negative Catholicism):
► PRAISING: “According to your Faith, be it done unto you!” (Matthew 9:29) … “Jesus said to her: ‘O woman, great is your Faith! Be it done to you as you wish!’ And her daughter was cured from that hour” (Matthew 15:28). “Whose Faith when He saw, He said: ‘Man, thy sins are forgiven thee!’” (Luke 5:20). “And He said to the woman: ‘Thy Faith has made thee safe! Go in peace!’” (Luke 7:50). “And He said to him: ‘Arise! Go thy way! For thy Faith hath made thee whole!’” (Luke 17:19). “And Jesus said to the centurion: ‘Go, and as thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!’ And the servant was healed at the same hour” (Matthew 8:13). “There followed him two blind men crying out and saying: ‘Have mercy on us, O Son of David!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Do you believe that I can do this unto you?’ They say to Him: ‘Yes, Lord!’ Then He touched their eyes, saying: ‘According to your Faith, be it done unto you!’ And their eyes were opened” (Matthew 9:27-28). “Thy word preserves them that believe in Thee!” (Wisdom 16:26).
► REBUKING: “Woe to them that are fainthearted, who believe not God―they shall not be protected by Him” (Ecclesiasticus 2:15). Our Lord would rebuke a lack of Faith―as was the case with the Apostles who did not believe that He had risen from the dead: “He upbraided them with their incredulity and hardness of heart, because they did not believe them who had seen Him after He was risen again.” (Mark 16:9-14) ... “O you of little Faith! Why did you doubt?” (Matthew 14:31) … “Why are you fearful? Have you no Faith yet?” (Mark 4:40) ... “And He said to them: ‘Where is your Faith?’” (Luke 8:25) … “Be not faithless, but believing!” (John 20:27) ... “And the Apostles said to the Lord: ‘Increase our Faith!’” (Luke 17:5). “The father of the boy crying out, with tears said: ‘I do believe, Lord! Help my unbelief!’” (Mark 9:23).
Catholicism is Meant to Change the World
It cannot be said too often that, as Catholics, we are meant to be Soldiers of Christ―and, as Soldiers of Christ, we must “stand fast in one spirit, with one mind laboring together for the Faith of the Gospel” (Philippians 1:27), so that we can conquer the world for Christ the King and extend the Social Kingship of Christ throughout the world. This is what Christ―the Head of the Mystical Body―intends when He says: “All power is given to me in Heaven and in Earth. Go ye into the whole world, and preach the Gospel to every creature, teach ye all nations―baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost―teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:28-20; Mark 16:15) ― so that there be “one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism” (Ephesians 4:5). Yes―Catholics want a “one world government”―but it is Christ Who must govern the world and not a secret elite! The world is the princedom of Satan and neither Satan nor the world want to be under the yoke of Christ: “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes assembled together against the Lord and His Christ” (Acts of Apostles 4:26) … “saying: ‘We will not have this Man to reign over us!’” (Luke 19:14). “These shall fight with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them, because He is Lord of lords, and King of kings” (Apocalypse 17:14) … “He shall show them who is the Blessed One and the only Mighty One, the King of kings, and Lord of lords!” (1 Timothy 6:15).
Our Lord clearly stated the divide and drew the lines that separated Him from the world, and His followers from the followers of the world: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7) … “He that is not with Me, is against Me! … Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to bring peace upon Earth―I came not to bring peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:32-36). Concerning His true followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (Matthew 10:22; 24:9; John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
Thus we can see that Catholicism is in danger from its enemies. The world sees Catholicism as an enemy and Catholicism should see the world as an enemy. Hence Scripture says: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Christ versus Satan translates into the Church versus the world. Therefore, the Catholic conquest of the world for Christ will not be easy―it will be a fight―hence we are told: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “Put on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil ... Take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day … In all things taking the shield of Faith, with which you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one! … And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God!” (Ephesians 6:11-17).
Mary is a Danger to the Devil! We Need Mary to Win!
There is no escaping the fight! There is no avoiding the battle! Sister Lucia of Fatima tells what Our Lady revealed to her concerning this battle: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957). Our Lady of La Salette herself calls to the fight: “I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful! I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ! It is time they came out and filled the world with light! … Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! … I shall fight at their side! … For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!” As Our Lady of Fatima, she refers to her title as “Our Lady of Rosary” saying: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” At Akita, Japan, in 1973, she adds: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
The devil knows the danger of Catholicism and the weapons with which God has armed it ― the most powerful, outside of God, being Mary. It is Mary that gives Catholicism its power, because Mary is the Mediatrix of All Grace. St. Louid de Montfort says: “God the Father made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary. God has a most rich treasury―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich … God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly … God the Holy Ghost has communicated to Mary His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Her power―which she exercises even over God Himself―is incomprehensible! … Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary! … The will of the Most High is that Heaven, Earth and Hell bend to the commandments of the humble Mary, whom He has made sovereign of Heaven and Earth, the general of His armies, treasurer of His treasures, dispenser of His graces, worker of His greatest marvels, restorer of the human race, Mediatrix of men, the exterminator of the enemies of God, and the faithful companion of His grandeurs and triumphs!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The devil knows the power that Mary gives to Catholicism and the weapons with which God has armed it. If the devil ― who is “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― knows the danger of Catholicism to his worldly empire, then you can be sure that the devil has communicated this knowledge to his henchmen and followers in this world. Hence it is that Satan has continuously plotted, planned, perpetrated and provoked attacks against Catholicism since the very beginnings of the Church. St. Louis de Montfort, in his book True Devotion to Mary, has a very apt and applicable description of the ever ongoing battle between Mary and Satan, the Church and the world. Here are a few pertinent extracts:
Mary Will Produce the Great Saints of the End Times
“Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be—a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints who shall come at the end of the world are reserved for her … Mary has received from God a great domination over the souls of the elect … to form, nourish and bring them forth to eternal life, and have them as her inheritance and portion, and form them in Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ in them … At the end of the world, the greatest saints, the souls richest in graces and virtues, shall be the most assiduous in praying to our Blessed Lady … because the Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints, who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity …
“These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady―illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection―so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone.
“Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times―in mercy, to bring back and lovingly receive the poor strayed sinners, who shall be converted and shall return to the Catholic Church; in might, against the enemies of God, idolaters, schismatics, Mahometans, Jews and souls hardened in impiety, who shall rise in terrible revolt against God to seduce all those who shall oppose them and to make them fall by promises and threats; and, finally, she must shine forth in grace, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ, who shall battle for His interests.
“In the terrestrial paradise, God pronounced that first and celebrated prediction and curse against the serpent, the devil: ‘I will put enmities between thee and the woman and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!’ (Genesis 3:15). Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others. These cruel persecutions of the devil shall go on increasing daily till the reign of Antichrist … God has never made and formed but one enmity; but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end. It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, that the devil fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself.
“God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always, up to this time, persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will, in the future, persecute them more than ever; just as Cain, of old, persecuted his brother Abel, and Esau his brother Jacob―who are the figures of the reprobate and the predestinate. But the humble Mary will always have the victory over that proud spirit, and so great a victory that she will go so far as to crush his head, where his pride dwells. She will always discover the malice of the serpent. She will always lay bare his infernal plots and dissipate his diabolical councils, and even to the end of time will guard her faithful servants from his cruel claw.
“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But, in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be ‘like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful’ Mary to pierce her enemies. (Psalm 126:4). They shall be the sons of Levi, well purified by the fire of great tribulation, and closely adhering to God (1 Corinthians 6:17), who shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body. They shall be everywhere the good odor of Jesus Christ to the poor and to the little, while at the same time, they shall be an odor of death to the great, to the rich and to the proud worldlings.
“They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High.
“They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies. They shall sleep without gold or silver, and, what is more, without care, in the midst of the other priests, ecclesiastics, and clerics (Psalm 67:14); and yet they shall have the silvered wings of the dove to go, with the pure intention of the glory of God and the salvation of souls, wheresoever the Holy Ghost shall call them. Nor shall they leave behind them, in the places where they have preached, anything but the gold of charity, which is the fulfillment of the whole law. (Romans 13:10).
“In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior.
“These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious, the idolaters and the Mahometans. But when and how shall this be? God alone knows. As for us, we have but to hold our tongues, to pray, to sigh and to wait: ‘With expectation I have waited!’ ― Psalm 39:2.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Article 4
Monday & Tuesday, September 9th & 10th
Dangerous Thoughts!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Monday & Tuesday, September 9th & 10th
Dangerous Thoughts!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Life of the Mind
Ah! The invisible world of thoughts! Who can possibly count the thoughts we have thought? We have all heard the saying: “A penny for your thoughts!” If we were to receive a penny for a thought―we would be billionaires by now! What we say or do is only the “tip of the iceberg” of what we think. In other words, the vast majority of our life is more interior than it is exterior. Our thoughts vastly outnumber our words and our actions. Exteriorly, we only show a fraction of what is going on in the interior of our mind, soul and heart. We cease speaking after a while, we stop doing things after a while―but we never stop thinking and conversing with ourselves in the secrecy of our mind. “There are many thoughts in the heart of a man” (Proverbs 19:21).
Our thoughts are invisible and impenetrable to others―even though in various ways we may consciously or unconsciously betray our thoughts―but our thoughts are not invisible and impenetrable to God. “And when Jesus knew their thoughts, answering, He said to them: ‘What is it you think in your hearts?’” (Luke 5:22). “And Jesus seeing their thoughts, said: ‘Why do you think evil in your hearts?’” (Matthew 9:4). “But He knew their thoughts …” (Luke 6:8), “But Jesus seeing the thoughts of their heart …” (Luke 9:47), “But He, seeing their thoughts, said …” (Luke 11:17), etc. “For I know the thoughts of your heart!” (Ezechiel 11:5). “For the Lord searches all hearts, and understands all the thoughts of minds” (1 Paralipomenon 28:9). “The Lord knows the thoughts of men―that they are vain!” (Psalm 93:11). “The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain!” (1 Corinthians 3:20). “They became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened!” (Romans 1:21).
The word “vain” comes from the Latin word “vanus”―meaning empty. That is the truer sense of the word “vain” than our current understanding of the word “vain” as having or showing an excessively high opinion of one’s appearance, abilities, or worth―which, of course, is empty of truth, for as Our Lord says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) and “When you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done that which we ought to do!’” (Luke 17:10)―and, as Holy Scripture adds: “For who distinguishes thee? Or what have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7).
Scripture speaks of “vain thoughts” and “evil thoughts” ― as quoted above. Actually, there is a connection between “vain thoughts” and “evil thoughts.” As just explained above, “vain thoughts” are empty thoughts―thoughts that are more or less empty of truth. “Evil” is defined as “a lack of goodness in a person that is due or expected from that person.” Thus is it an emptiness of goodness, an absence of goodness in varying degrees, more or less great. Thus our “evil thoughts” are empty (sometimes more, or sometimes less) of a goodness that should be there in our thoughts.
Furthermore, there can often be a “divorce” or difference between what we say or do about a matter and what we REALLY think about a matter. “Deceit is in the heart of them that think evil things” (Proverbs 12:20). “Do you not judge within yourselves, and are become judges of unjust thoughts?” (James 2:4). “And Jesus knowing their thoughts, said to them: ‘Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate: and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand!’” (Matthew 12:25). If we lead a “divided life”, where our words and actions do match our real thoughts, then we are a “house divided against itself” which “shall not stand.” Though it is tough, we need to think more before we speak, and then say what we think―without any ambiguity, compromise, craftiness, subterfuge, or ulterior motives. For, as Holy Scripture says, “His spirit shall go forth, and he shall return into his earth―in that day all their thoughts shall perish!” (Psalm 145:4). “For the Lord searches all hearts, and understands all the thoughts of minds” (1 Paralipomenon 28:9). “Now very shortly I will pour out My wrath upon thee, and I will accomplish My anger in thee―and I will judge thee according to thy ways, and I will lay upon thee all thy crimes!” Ezechiel 7:8). “I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the Day of Judgment!” (Matthew 12:36). Do not think it is only very “idle word” that we will be judged upon―it will also be every “idle thought” too!
What Do We Think?
What do we think about? Well, as God tells us through Holy Scripture, we think empty (vain) things. Furthermore, since words and actions follow thoughts―we consequently say empty things and live empty lives! “For from within out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and defile a man!” (Mark 7:21-22). We do not think in a way that God would have us think―we think as we like to think and not as God would like us think. “For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9).
We think more about ourselves than we think of God―and that kind of attitude needs to be whipped out of us. “Who will set scourges over my thoughts, and the discipline of wisdom over my heart, that they spare me not in their ignorance, and that their sins may not appear” (Ecclesiasticus 23:2)―meaning, in simpler phrasing, “I wish I could be whipped for my thoughts, so that wisdom could discipline my mind. I would not want to be spared when I am wrong; I would not want a single sin to be overlooked!” or, “Who will set whips over my thoughts, and the discipline of wisdom over my mind, so as not to spare me in my errors, and not overlook my sins?”
Once again, as Holy Scripture says: “Let them see and remember all the commandments of the Lord, and not follow their own thoughts and eyes going astray after divers things” (Numbers 15:39). “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good―no, not one! They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together―there is none that does good; no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher; with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips. Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known; there is no fear of God before their eyes!” (Psalm 13:1-3).
Thinking is the Root of Our Problems
Most people think that they think well enough―yet their thoughts, and the resulting words and actions that come from those thoughts, lead most of them to their damnation. Today, many think that what used to be called “good” is actually evil; and that what used to be called “evil” is actually okay and good. We see this clearly in such things as cohabitation, fornication, contraception, abortion, divorce and remarriage, same-sex relationships and marriages, drug use, etc. ― all of these things are now looked upon as being ‘good’ by increasing numbers of people. Whereas calling sin a sin, and calling error as error, heresy as heresy, evil as evil―all of this has now become a “hate crime”, “hate speech” and “hate thoughts”! In the realm of religion, increasing numbers think that all religions lead to God, they think that everyone goes to Heaven; they think that sin―if there still is such a thing―is only a sin if spoken or performed by some action, but they think that their thoughts are harmless, regardless of what they might think about; they think that they themselves are the judges of good and evil―saying: “What is wrong for you, is right for me and is not wrong at all!” They who think this way, think wrong!
“And they said: ‘We will go after our own thoughts, and we will do every one according to the perverseness of his evil heart!’” (Jeremias 18:12)―which is exactly what we are doing today, following our own thoughts and opinions, our own personal preferences and desires. “Thus have you spoken, for I know the thoughts of your heart!” (Ezechiel 11:5). “They will not set their thoughts to return to their God―for the spirit of fornication is in the midst of them, and they have not known the Lord!” (Osee 5:4)―which is the case today, where, as Our Lady said, most marriages are not of God, cohabitation increases daily, and sexual sins have sky-rocketed―all of which underlines the truth of Our Lady’s words when she said the sin that damns most souls today is the sin of impurity―whether in thought, word or action. Yet most people think that all of these sins are nowadays acceptable, for times have changed and morals have changed with the times. They who think this way, think wrong!
Yet Holy Scripture has already condemned such thoughts, saying: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil―that put darkness for light, and light for darkness―that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20). “For the Holy Spirit of discipline will flee from the deceitful, and will withdraw himself from thoughts that are without understanding, and he shall not abide when iniquity comes in” (Wisdom 1:5). “Their thoughts are unprofitable thoughts!” (Isaias 59:7). “How long shall hurtful thoughts abide in thee?” (Jeremias 4:14). “The Lord will search out your thoughts!” (Wisdom 6:4). “Inquisition shall be made into the thoughts of the ungodly” (Wisdom 1:9). “Evil thoughts are an abomination to the Lord!” (Proverbs 15:26). “For perverse thoughts separate from God” (Wisdom 1:3).
What Does God Think of Our Thoughts?
There is so much focus on what we think about things personally, that the thoughts of God are largely or totally ignored: “When they knew God, they have not glorified Him as God, or given thanks―but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened!” (Romans 1:21). Yet it is what God thinks that is the most important―for God will be the judge of all our thoughts (and words and actions) one day―and our salvation and damnation will not depend upon what we think, but what God thinks. “Hear, O Earth! Behold I will bring evils upon this people―the fruits of their own thoughts―because they have not heard My words, and they have cast away My law” (Jeremias 6:19).
It is never too late to change our thinking! Holy Scripture points this out numerous times―let these brief quotes suffice and give a mere echo to the abundance of many more such quotes: “Let thy thoughts be upon the precepts of God, and meditate continually on His commandments: and He will give thee a heart” (Ecclesiasticus 6:37). “In all thy ways think on Him, and He will direct thy steps” (Proverbs 3:6). “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unjust man his thoughts, and let him return to the Lord, and He will have mercy on him, and return to our God―for He is bountiful to forgive! For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways―saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:7-9).
Think Not Above Your Station
Sometimes―or perhaps often―we think ourselves to above that station in which God has placed us, and we seek knowledge of things that are not our concern or that are beyond our abilities. This is sadly the plague of the modern world. Science is not satisfied with its own parameters and limits―but seeks to intrude into the field of religion and morality―pontificating as though it was God. This is true of many other domains of knowledge―politics intrudes into religious matters, dictating what is true and what is not true; what can and what cannot be done―whereas it is the Church that should be giving those principles to the State, and not the other way round. This disease trickles down to grass-roots levels, and thus the laity start to dictate to the clergy what should and should not be done; parents do the same to the school; children do the same to their parents; employees do likewise to their employers. It really has become a case of “power from below”―but if you look further below the “below”, then you descend down to Hell and see that it is the power of Satan―who is always seeking to reverse or inverse true values and godly principles―that is behind all of this “power from below” and “power to the people”, for, as Our Lord pointed out, all power should come from above and not below. “Jesus answered [Pilate]: ‘Thou shouldst not have any power against Me, unless it were given thee from above!’” (John 19:11)
Today, the devil has successfully tempted people into the pitfall that he successfully presented to Eve: “In what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened: and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!” (Genesis 3:5). Thus, in our own day and age, we can see that many have taken a big bite out “the tree of knowledge of good and evil” (Genesis 2:9). Having taken a bite of this “forbidden fruit” they know pretend to know everything, they inquire into everything, they judge everything―they have become as gods. O foolish people! “Seek not the things that are too high for thee, and search not into things above thy ability―but the things that God has commanded thee, think on them always, and in many of His works be not curious” (Ecclesiasticus 3:22).
Hence is it that we see so many “armchair popes”, or “keyboard cardinals”, or “anonymous Fathers and Doctors of the Church”―all of whom have done and completed their theological studies at the Online Pontifical Academy of Google. They are the modern self-styled and self-appointed Spanish Inquisition of the 21st century―they haul anyone and everyone, who might be suspect of anything, before their internet courts and endlessly torture and cross-examine them before the jury of the internet world.
Think Before You Think! Look Before You Leap!
Thinking can be bad for your health―your spiritual health! Thinking is like drinking―you can think good things or you can think bad things. Sometimes we think too much! Sometimes we think too little! Most people would profit from thinking more before they speak―thinking of the consequences of what they want to say! They, unfortunately, speak first and think afterwards! They would do well to remember the saying: “Measure twice, cut once!” The same is true for our thoughts―we should think twice before speaking once! Too many people are too impulsive―and they blurt out what they should have first of all carefully thought out! The first thing that comes to mind is not always the best thing! It is better to be a person of many thoughts and few words, than to be someone with few thoughts and many words.
The Ancient Chinese philosopher, Confucius (551-479 BC), said: “You are what you think!” In other words, your thoughts define the person that you are and make you the person that you are. Good thoughts tend to produce good people. Bad thoughts tend to produce bad people. Our Lord spoke along similar lines with His tree analogy: “By their fruits [thoughts] you shall know them! Every good tree [person] brings forth good fruit [thoughts], and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit! A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). “Either make the tree good and its fruit good; or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33). “As the dressing of a tree shows the fruit thereof, so does a word out of the thought of the heart of man” (Ecclesiasticus 27:7).
Think Your Way to Heaven or Think Your Way to Hell
How we think can determine whether we save our soul and gain eternal salvation, or whether we damn our soul and fall into eternal damnation. You could say that our thoughts are the seeds of salvation or damnation―a little like the Wheat and the Cockle in Our Lord’s parable. God seeks to sow good thoughts in our minds through the Word of God. Satan seeks to sow evil thoughts in our minds through the ‘Word of the World’ ― of which he is the prince (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). The Word of God produces godliness and the Word of the World produces worldliness. Just as Our Lord said we “cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24), likewise we cannot think in a godly way and a worldly way at the same time.
Holy Scripture underlines those truths. We are told to continually have God in our thoughts and before our eyes―for how else could you possibly accomplish the commandment to “the greatest and the first commandment … to love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Thus Scripture says: “Let the thought of God be in thy mind, and all thy discourse on the commandments of the Highest” (Ecclesiasticus 9:23). “Let thy thoughts be upon the precepts of God, and meditate continually on His commandments” (Ecclesiasticus 6:37). “Blessed is the man that, in his mind, shall think of the all seeing eye of God!” (Ecclesiasticus 14:22). “The things that God has commanded thee, think on them always!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:22). “God has given to me to conceive thoughts worthy of those things that are given me!” (Wisdom 7:15).
Satan, on the other hand, is “the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye, strong in Faith” (1 Peter 5:8-9), “lest perhaps a wicked thought steal in upon thee!” (Deuteronomy 15:9-10). Wicked thoughts lead to wicked words and wicked actions. “And they said: ‘We will go after our own thoughts, and we will do every one according to the perverseness of his evil heart!’” (Jeremias 18:12). “When they knew God, they have not glorified him as God, or given thanks; but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened” (Romans 1:20-21). As Our Lady warned, in speaking of our times: “In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost!” (Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette).
St. Ignatius of Loyola, in his Spiritual Exercises (a.k.a. The Ignatian Spiritual Retreat), speaks of the influence of Satan on our thoughts: “The good Angel, as well as the bad Angel, can influence the soul, for contrary ends―the good Angel for the profit of the soul, that it may grow and rise from good to better; and the evil Angel, to draw the soul to his damnable intention and wickedness by making it the soul go from bad to worse … The evil Angel, who disguises himself under the appearance of an angel of light, approaches the devout soul bringing with himself good and holy thoughts, conformable to feeling of such a just soul, and then, little by little, he aims at drawing the soul to his hidden deceits and perverse intentions … We ought to note well the course of the thoughts, and if the beginning, middle and end is all good, inclined to all good, it is a sign of the good Angel; but if in the course of the thoughts which he brings it ends in something bad, of a distracting tendency, or less good than what the soul had previously proposed to do, or if it weakens it or disquiets or disturbs the soul, taking away its peace, tranquility and quiet, which it had before, it is a clear sign that it proceeds from the evil spirit, enemy of our profit and eternal salvation” (St. Ignatius, Spiritual Exercises, §331 to §333, Rules for the Second Week, Rules 3, 4 & 5).
Learning to tell the difference between thoughts that come from ourselves or from the devil takes a lot of practice and discernment, and is best done with the help of a spiritual director. But a good starting point is to begin by learning what is of God, and what is not of God. When thoughts are from God―then they are gentle and peaceful, even though they may be condemnatory, reproachful and rebuking. If He chastises, He does so in a way that does not condemn but seeks to restore. Knowing your ‘root sin’ is also helpful in determining some of the reasons why your thoughts drift in certain patterns. Your roots produce your fruits. Your ‘root sins’ (= your predominant sins; your most frequent habitual sins) will obviously take up a large part of your thoughts. Once you do understand them and spot them, then you can work on changing them and uprooting them. It is also good to remember to look for the fruit of your thoughts. Are those fruits productive or did you just simply waste a lot of time on them with no fruit coming out of them? If you are just unproductively wasting time, then it is highly likely that the source of those thoughts is not good.
Fatal Sinful Thoughts
Who would imagine that a thought could send you to Hell? Yet that is the Gospel truth! Our Lord Himself says: “I say to you, that whosoever shall look on a woman to lust after her [in thoughts], has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28) ― to which Scripture adds: “Know you not that adulterers shall not possess the kingdom of God?” (1 Corinthians 6:9).
The Catholic Encyclopedia tells us: “Sin may be committed not only by outward deeds, but also by the inner activity of the mind without any external manifestation. This is plain from the precept of the Ten Commandments: ‘Thou shalt not covet’, and from Christ’s rebuke of the Scribes and Pharisees, whom He compares to ‘whitened sepulchers … full of all filthiness’ (Matthew 23:27). Hence the Council of Trent (Session XIV, c. v), in declaring that all mortal sins must be confessed, makes special mention of those that are most secret and that violate only the last two precepts of the Ten Commandments, adding that they ‘sometimes more grievously wound the soul and are more dangerous than sins which are openly committed.’
“Three kinds of internal sin are usually distinguished:
(1) The pleasure taken in a sinful thought or imagination even without desiring it.
(2) Dwelling with complacency on sins already committed.
(3) The desire for what is sinful. That is, one that includes the deliberate intention to realize or gratify the desire, has the same malice, mortal or venial, as the action which it has in view.”
Our thoughts can be good or bad; virtuous or sinful; godly or evil. Those sinful thoughts―just like sinful words and actions―can be divided into mortally sinful thoughts and venially sinful thoughts. Sadly and stupidly, we often make light of venial sin, thinking it to be trivial. That is not what the Church teaches. Even though venial sin will not send us to Hell, it will merit a lengthy reparation and purgation in the fires of Purgatory―which St. Thomas Aquinas says are the same fires as the fires of Hell, except that Purgatorial fires burn us temporarily, while the fires of Hell will burn us eternally. Why is there such a serious punishment for a “mere” venial sin? The Church teaches us that this is due to seriousness of both mortal sin and venial sin―even though one damns and the other doesn’t. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
St. Augustine, a Father and Doctor of the Church, teaches us: “If the mind takes pleasure in unlawful thoughts, which it should banish at their first appearance, then the mind evidently commits a sin―and this even when the mind does not propose to itself to carry out what it thought by words or actions.”
Ah! The invisible world of thoughts! Who can possibly count the thoughts we have thought? We have all heard the saying: “A penny for your thoughts!” If we were to receive a penny for a thought―we would be billionaires by now! What we say or do is only the “tip of the iceberg” of what we think. In other words, the vast majority of our life is more interior than it is exterior. Our thoughts vastly outnumber our words and our actions. Exteriorly, we only show a fraction of what is going on in the interior of our mind, soul and heart. We cease speaking after a while, we stop doing things after a while―but we never stop thinking and conversing with ourselves in the secrecy of our mind. “There are many thoughts in the heart of a man” (Proverbs 19:21).
Our thoughts are invisible and impenetrable to others―even though in various ways we may consciously or unconsciously betray our thoughts―but our thoughts are not invisible and impenetrable to God. “And when Jesus knew their thoughts, answering, He said to them: ‘What is it you think in your hearts?’” (Luke 5:22). “And Jesus seeing their thoughts, said: ‘Why do you think evil in your hearts?’” (Matthew 9:4). “But He knew their thoughts …” (Luke 6:8), “But Jesus seeing the thoughts of their heart …” (Luke 9:47), “But He, seeing their thoughts, said …” (Luke 11:17), etc. “For I know the thoughts of your heart!” (Ezechiel 11:5). “For the Lord searches all hearts, and understands all the thoughts of minds” (1 Paralipomenon 28:9). “The Lord knows the thoughts of men―that they are vain!” (Psalm 93:11). “The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain!” (1 Corinthians 3:20). “They became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened!” (Romans 1:21).
The word “vain” comes from the Latin word “vanus”―meaning empty. That is the truer sense of the word “vain” than our current understanding of the word “vain” as having or showing an excessively high opinion of one’s appearance, abilities, or worth―which, of course, is empty of truth, for as Our Lord says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) and “When you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done that which we ought to do!’” (Luke 17:10)―and, as Holy Scripture adds: “For who distinguishes thee? Or what have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7).
Scripture speaks of “vain thoughts” and “evil thoughts” ― as quoted above. Actually, there is a connection between “vain thoughts” and “evil thoughts.” As just explained above, “vain thoughts” are empty thoughts―thoughts that are more or less empty of truth. “Evil” is defined as “a lack of goodness in a person that is due or expected from that person.” Thus is it an emptiness of goodness, an absence of goodness in varying degrees, more or less great. Thus our “evil thoughts” are empty (sometimes more, or sometimes less) of a goodness that should be there in our thoughts.
Furthermore, there can often be a “divorce” or difference between what we say or do about a matter and what we REALLY think about a matter. “Deceit is in the heart of them that think evil things” (Proverbs 12:20). “Do you not judge within yourselves, and are become judges of unjust thoughts?” (James 2:4). “And Jesus knowing their thoughts, said to them: ‘Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate: and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand!’” (Matthew 12:25). If we lead a “divided life”, where our words and actions do match our real thoughts, then we are a “house divided against itself” which “shall not stand.” Though it is tough, we need to think more before we speak, and then say what we think―without any ambiguity, compromise, craftiness, subterfuge, or ulterior motives. For, as Holy Scripture says, “His spirit shall go forth, and he shall return into his earth―in that day all their thoughts shall perish!” (Psalm 145:4). “For the Lord searches all hearts, and understands all the thoughts of minds” (1 Paralipomenon 28:9). “Now very shortly I will pour out My wrath upon thee, and I will accomplish My anger in thee―and I will judge thee according to thy ways, and I will lay upon thee all thy crimes!” Ezechiel 7:8). “I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the Day of Judgment!” (Matthew 12:36). Do not think it is only very “idle word” that we will be judged upon―it will also be every “idle thought” too!
What Do We Think?
What do we think about? Well, as God tells us through Holy Scripture, we think empty (vain) things. Furthermore, since words and actions follow thoughts―we consequently say empty things and live empty lives! “For from within out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and defile a man!” (Mark 7:21-22). We do not think in a way that God would have us think―we think as we like to think and not as God would like us think. “For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9).
We think more about ourselves than we think of God―and that kind of attitude needs to be whipped out of us. “Who will set scourges over my thoughts, and the discipline of wisdom over my heart, that they spare me not in their ignorance, and that their sins may not appear” (Ecclesiasticus 23:2)―meaning, in simpler phrasing, “I wish I could be whipped for my thoughts, so that wisdom could discipline my mind. I would not want to be spared when I am wrong; I would not want a single sin to be overlooked!” or, “Who will set whips over my thoughts, and the discipline of wisdom over my mind, so as not to spare me in my errors, and not overlook my sins?”
Once again, as Holy Scripture says: “Let them see and remember all the commandments of the Lord, and not follow their own thoughts and eyes going astray after divers things” (Numbers 15:39). “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good―no, not one! They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together―there is none that does good; no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher; with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips. Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known; there is no fear of God before their eyes!” (Psalm 13:1-3).
Thinking is the Root of Our Problems
Most people think that they think well enough―yet their thoughts, and the resulting words and actions that come from those thoughts, lead most of them to their damnation. Today, many think that what used to be called “good” is actually evil; and that what used to be called “evil” is actually okay and good. We see this clearly in such things as cohabitation, fornication, contraception, abortion, divorce and remarriage, same-sex relationships and marriages, drug use, etc. ― all of these things are now looked upon as being ‘good’ by increasing numbers of people. Whereas calling sin a sin, and calling error as error, heresy as heresy, evil as evil―all of this has now become a “hate crime”, “hate speech” and “hate thoughts”! In the realm of religion, increasing numbers think that all religions lead to God, they think that everyone goes to Heaven; they think that sin―if there still is such a thing―is only a sin if spoken or performed by some action, but they think that their thoughts are harmless, regardless of what they might think about; they think that they themselves are the judges of good and evil―saying: “What is wrong for you, is right for me and is not wrong at all!” They who think this way, think wrong!
“And they said: ‘We will go after our own thoughts, and we will do every one according to the perverseness of his evil heart!’” (Jeremias 18:12)―which is exactly what we are doing today, following our own thoughts and opinions, our own personal preferences and desires. “Thus have you spoken, for I know the thoughts of your heart!” (Ezechiel 11:5). “They will not set their thoughts to return to their God―for the spirit of fornication is in the midst of them, and they have not known the Lord!” (Osee 5:4)―which is the case today, where, as Our Lady said, most marriages are not of God, cohabitation increases daily, and sexual sins have sky-rocketed―all of which underlines the truth of Our Lady’s words when she said the sin that damns most souls today is the sin of impurity―whether in thought, word or action. Yet most people think that all of these sins are nowadays acceptable, for times have changed and morals have changed with the times. They who think this way, think wrong!
Yet Holy Scripture has already condemned such thoughts, saying: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil―that put darkness for light, and light for darkness―that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20). “For the Holy Spirit of discipline will flee from the deceitful, and will withdraw himself from thoughts that are without understanding, and he shall not abide when iniquity comes in” (Wisdom 1:5). “Their thoughts are unprofitable thoughts!” (Isaias 59:7). “How long shall hurtful thoughts abide in thee?” (Jeremias 4:14). “The Lord will search out your thoughts!” (Wisdom 6:4). “Inquisition shall be made into the thoughts of the ungodly” (Wisdom 1:9). “Evil thoughts are an abomination to the Lord!” (Proverbs 15:26). “For perverse thoughts separate from God” (Wisdom 1:3).
What Does God Think of Our Thoughts?
There is so much focus on what we think about things personally, that the thoughts of God are largely or totally ignored: “When they knew God, they have not glorified Him as God, or given thanks―but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened!” (Romans 1:21). Yet it is what God thinks that is the most important―for God will be the judge of all our thoughts (and words and actions) one day―and our salvation and damnation will not depend upon what we think, but what God thinks. “Hear, O Earth! Behold I will bring evils upon this people―the fruits of their own thoughts―because they have not heard My words, and they have cast away My law” (Jeremias 6:19).
It is never too late to change our thinking! Holy Scripture points this out numerous times―let these brief quotes suffice and give a mere echo to the abundance of many more such quotes: “Let thy thoughts be upon the precepts of God, and meditate continually on His commandments: and He will give thee a heart” (Ecclesiasticus 6:37). “In all thy ways think on Him, and He will direct thy steps” (Proverbs 3:6). “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unjust man his thoughts, and let him return to the Lord, and He will have mercy on him, and return to our God―for He is bountiful to forgive! For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways―saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:7-9).
Think Not Above Your Station
Sometimes―or perhaps often―we think ourselves to above that station in which God has placed us, and we seek knowledge of things that are not our concern or that are beyond our abilities. This is sadly the plague of the modern world. Science is not satisfied with its own parameters and limits―but seeks to intrude into the field of religion and morality―pontificating as though it was God. This is true of many other domains of knowledge―politics intrudes into religious matters, dictating what is true and what is not true; what can and what cannot be done―whereas it is the Church that should be giving those principles to the State, and not the other way round. This disease trickles down to grass-roots levels, and thus the laity start to dictate to the clergy what should and should not be done; parents do the same to the school; children do the same to their parents; employees do likewise to their employers. It really has become a case of “power from below”―but if you look further below the “below”, then you descend down to Hell and see that it is the power of Satan―who is always seeking to reverse or inverse true values and godly principles―that is behind all of this “power from below” and “power to the people”, for, as Our Lord pointed out, all power should come from above and not below. “Jesus answered [Pilate]: ‘Thou shouldst not have any power against Me, unless it were given thee from above!’” (John 19:11)
Today, the devil has successfully tempted people into the pitfall that he successfully presented to Eve: “In what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened: and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!” (Genesis 3:5). Thus, in our own day and age, we can see that many have taken a big bite out “the tree of knowledge of good and evil” (Genesis 2:9). Having taken a bite of this “forbidden fruit” they know pretend to know everything, they inquire into everything, they judge everything―they have become as gods. O foolish people! “Seek not the things that are too high for thee, and search not into things above thy ability―but the things that God has commanded thee, think on them always, and in many of His works be not curious” (Ecclesiasticus 3:22).
Hence is it that we see so many “armchair popes”, or “keyboard cardinals”, or “anonymous Fathers and Doctors of the Church”―all of whom have done and completed their theological studies at the Online Pontifical Academy of Google. They are the modern self-styled and self-appointed Spanish Inquisition of the 21st century―they haul anyone and everyone, who might be suspect of anything, before their internet courts and endlessly torture and cross-examine them before the jury of the internet world.
Think Before You Think! Look Before You Leap!
Thinking can be bad for your health―your spiritual health! Thinking is like drinking―you can think good things or you can think bad things. Sometimes we think too much! Sometimes we think too little! Most people would profit from thinking more before they speak―thinking of the consequences of what they want to say! They, unfortunately, speak first and think afterwards! They would do well to remember the saying: “Measure twice, cut once!” The same is true for our thoughts―we should think twice before speaking once! Too many people are too impulsive―and they blurt out what they should have first of all carefully thought out! The first thing that comes to mind is not always the best thing! It is better to be a person of many thoughts and few words, than to be someone with few thoughts and many words.
The Ancient Chinese philosopher, Confucius (551-479 BC), said: “You are what you think!” In other words, your thoughts define the person that you are and make you the person that you are. Good thoughts tend to produce good people. Bad thoughts tend to produce bad people. Our Lord spoke along similar lines with His tree analogy: “By their fruits [thoughts] you shall know them! Every good tree [person] brings forth good fruit [thoughts], and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit! A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). “Either make the tree good and its fruit good; or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33). “As the dressing of a tree shows the fruit thereof, so does a word out of the thought of the heart of man” (Ecclesiasticus 27:7).
Think Your Way to Heaven or Think Your Way to Hell
How we think can determine whether we save our soul and gain eternal salvation, or whether we damn our soul and fall into eternal damnation. You could say that our thoughts are the seeds of salvation or damnation―a little like the Wheat and the Cockle in Our Lord’s parable. God seeks to sow good thoughts in our minds through the Word of God. Satan seeks to sow evil thoughts in our minds through the ‘Word of the World’ ― of which he is the prince (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). The Word of God produces godliness and the Word of the World produces worldliness. Just as Our Lord said we “cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24), likewise we cannot think in a godly way and a worldly way at the same time.
Holy Scripture underlines those truths. We are told to continually have God in our thoughts and before our eyes―for how else could you possibly accomplish the commandment to “the greatest and the first commandment … to love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Thus Scripture says: “Let the thought of God be in thy mind, and all thy discourse on the commandments of the Highest” (Ecclesiasticus 9:23). “Let thy thoughts be upon the precepts of God, and meditate continually on His commandments” (Ecclesiasticus 6:37). “Blessed is the man that, in his mind, shall think of the all seeing eye of God!” (Ecclesiasticus 14:22). “The things that God has commanded thee, think on them always!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:22). “God has given to me to conceive thoughts worthy of those things that are given me!” (Wisdom 7:15).
Satan, on the other hand, is “the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye, strong in Faith” (1 Peter 5:8-9), “lest perhaps a wicked thought steal in upon thee!” (Deuteronomy 15:9-10). Wicked thoughts lead to wicked words and wicked actions. “And they said: ‘We will go after our own thoughts, and we will do every one according to the perverseness of his evil heart!’” (Jeremias 18:12). “When they knew God, they have not glorified him as God, or given thanks; but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened” (Romans 1:20-21). As Our Lady warned, in speaking of our times: “In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost!” (Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette).
St. Ignatius of Loyola, in his Spiritual Exercises (a.k.a. The Ignatian Spiritual Retreat), speaks of the influence of Satan on our thoughts: “The good Angel, as well as the bad Angel, can influence the soul, for contrary ends―the good Angel for the profit of the soul, that it may grow and rise from good to better; and the evil Angel, to draw the soul to his damnable intention and wickedness by making it the soul go from bad to worse … The evil Angel, who disguises himself under the appearance of an angel of light, approaches the devout soul bringing with himself good and holy thoughts, conformable to feeling of such a just soul, and then, little by little, he aims at drawing the soul to his hidden deceits and perverse intentions … We ought to note well the course of the thoughts, and if the beginning, middle and end is all good, inclined to all good, it is a sign of the good Angel; but if in the course of the thoughts which he brings it ends in something bad, of a distracting tendency, or less good than what the soul had previously proposed to do, or if it weakens it or disquiets or disturbs the soul, taking away its peace, tranquility and quiet, which it had before, it is a clear sign that it proceeds from the evil spirit, enemy of our profit and eternal salvation” (St. Ignatius, Spiritual Exercises, §331 to §333, Rules for the Second Week, Rules 3, 4 & 5).
Learning to tell the difference between thoughts that come from ourselves or from the devil takes a lot of practice and discernment, and is best done with the help of a spiritual director. But a good starting point is to begin by learning what is of God, and what is not of God. When thoughts are from God―then they are gentle and peaceful, even though they may be condemnatory, reproachful and rebuking. If He chastises, He does so in a way that does not condemn but seeks to restore. Knowing your ‘root sin’ is also helpful in determining some of the reasons why your thoughts drift in certain patterns. Your roots produce your fruits. Your ‘root sins’ (= your predominant sins; your most frequent habitual sins) will obviously take up a large part of your thoughts. Once you do understand them and spot them, then you can work on changing them and uprooting them. It is also good to remember to look for the fruit of your thoughts. Are those fruits productive or did you just simply waste a lot of time on them with no fruit coming out of them? If you are just unproductively wasting time, then it is highly likely that the source of those thoughts is not good.
Fatal Sinful Thoughts
Who would imagine that a thought could send you to Hell? Yet that is the Gospel truth! Our Lord Himself says: “I say to you, that whosoever shall look on a woman to lust after her [in thoughts], has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28) ― to which Scripture adds: “Know you not that adulterers shall not possess the kingdom of God?” (1 Corinthians 6:9).
The Catholic Encyclopedia tells us: “Sin may be committed not only by outward deeds, but also by the inner activity of the mind without any external manifestation. This is plain from the precept of the Ten Commandments: ‘Thou shalt not covet’, and from Christ’s rebuke of the Scribes and Pharisees, whom He compares to ‘whitened sepulchers … full of all filthiness’ (Matthew 23:27). Hence the Council of Trent (Session XIV, c. v), in declaring that all mortal sins must be confessed, makes special mention of those that are most secret and that violate only the last two precepts of the Ten Commandments, adding that they ‘sometimes more grievously wound the soul and are more dangerous than sins which are openly committed.’
“Three kinds of internal sin are usually distinguished:
(1) The pleasure taken in a sinful thought or imagination even without desiring it.
(2) Dwelling with complacency on sins already committed.
(3) The desire for what is sinful. That is, one that includes the deliberate intention to realize or gratify the desire, has the same malice, mortal or venial, as the action which it has in view.”
Our thoughts can be good or bad; virtuous or sinful; godly or evil. Those sinful thoughts―just like sinful words and actions―can be divided into mortally sinful thoughts and venially sinful thoughts. Sadly and stupidly, we often make light of venial sin, thinking it to be trivial. That is not what the Church teaches. Even though venial sin will not send us to Hell, it will merit a lengthy reparation and purgation in the fires of Purgatory―which St. Thomas Aquinas says are the same fires as the fires of Hell, except that Purgatorial fires burn us temporarily, while the fires of Hell will burn us eternally. Why is there such a serious punishment for a “mere” venial sin? The Church teaches us that this is due to seriousness of both mortal sin and venial sin―even though one damns and the other doesn’t. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
St. Augustine, a Father and Doctor of the Church, teaches us: “If the mind takes pleasure in unlawful thoughts, which it should banish at their first appearance, then the mind evidently commits a sin―and this even when the mind does not propose to itself to carry out what it thought by words or actions.”
Article 3
Saturday & Sunday, September 7th & 8th, the Nativity of Our Lady
What Present Will You Give Mary on Her Birthday?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Saturday & Sunday, September 7th & 8th, the Nativity of Our Lady
What Present Will You Give Mary on Her Birthday?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
“Last-Minute Shopping” for Our Lady
On September 8th, we celebrate Our Lady’s birthday—the most important birthday in history, after that of Our Lord Jesus Christ (December 25th). Have you prepared for that “second-greatest-birthday-in-the-history-of-the-world”? Were you even aware that her birthday is just around the corner? A lot of people tend to be “last-minute” people―they leave everything to the “last-minute” thinking that they can still do a “good job” in “the blink of an eye” or “in a jiffy”! This is often seen to be case in the proverbial case―but true case―of the “Last Minute Christmas Shopper.” When you really stop and think about what is involved in “last-minute-shopping” and what it reveals―you have to admit that the message it sends is one of “Right now, I have much more important things to do than shop for this-or-that, or so-and-so!” In other words, you have put whoever or whatever you have to shop for, way down the list of your priorities―you want to do other things first before tackling the shopping business.
Nevertheless, if you are a “last-minute-shopper”, then there is still a chance for you to be successfully accepted by Our Lady with your “last-minute-present” ― just as Our Lord accepted the “last-minute” repentance of the Good Thief on the cross on Calvary, at the last moment of his life. The thief left it late―but still managed to save his soul!
Just Another Old Day!
What does Our Lady’s birthday mean to you? Will it be “just another day” that will passed doing “the same old things” with little or nothing to make that day special and important? Will everyone just “go their own way” doing the weekend things they like to do? Providentially, God has seen to it that this year Our Lady Our Lady’s birthday falls on a SUNDAY! A day when the vast majority of people do not have to work, a day that should already by a “religious day” since it is “The Lord’s Day.” It is also “a day of rest”―a day when many things are set aside. Therefore, God’s providence has already done most of the work for you this year―by seeing to it that the birthday of His Most Holy Mother falls on a day (Sunday) when you should have more time to honor her than if was some weekday and workday!
Raw-Deal Meal
Sometimes, even our earthly mothers get a “raw-deal” on their birthdays! O yes, sure, they get a birthday card, perhaps some flowers, an extra kiss and a hug, perhaps they are taken out for a meal―but often they end up cooking their own meal, looking after guests, doing the house-cleaning before the birthday and the clean-up after the birthday. Often the family and guests have more of a fun time than the beleaguered mother! Her birthday ends up being like a few fish thrown to the dolphin in the pool to the keep the dolphin happy! What scraps will we be throwing at Our Lady on her birthday?
Masterpiece Ignored
Will that day be an important day for you? Does Our Lady really matter to you? How important is she to you? Is she a central part of your life? Is she like “family”, or is she merely a “visitor”? St. Louis de Montfort says that she is God’s masterpiece― “Mary is the excellent masterpiece of the Most High … where God dwells more magnificently and more divinely than in any other place in the universe, … where there are beauties and treasures unspeakable. She is the magnificence of the Most High” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §5 & §6). If an artist paints a masterpiece and you ignore it, think little of it, are indifferent to it―then what an insult that is to the artist! Now when that “artist” is God―the insult becomes an infinite insult to God, because God is infinite!
It is highly likely that in most homes, Our Lady’s birthday will fare no better than Our Lord’s birthday fares at Christmas. It is sad to think that in most homes, Our Lady’s birthday, just like Christmas, will see less prayer and spiritual reading than usual—whereas the opposite should be the norm. How many homes will pray MORE on Our Lady’s birthday? For the 2% to 4% of Catholic American households who are thought to pray the Rosary daily―will they manage a full 15 decade Rosary, or at least another 5 decades on top of the norm? Of the 25% or so Catholics who are Sunday regulars at Mass, how many will carry the religious ceremonies and spirit home with them and inject it into the festivities that should be there on Our Lady’s birthday? There are many, many way we can sanctify Our Lady’s birthday—and we will look at these ways—but how many will have the courage to run the gauntlet of human respect and insist upon them with family, relatives and visitors? Yes, we should “lay on a spread”―that is to say, have something special on the food and drink menu for Our Lady’s birthday―but even that is done, unfortunately and sadly, the food, the drink, the entertainment, etc., will take precedence in most homes—and we are forced to ask the thorny question: “Whose birthday is it anyway?”
The Lady’s Lament
We would do well to DAILY ponder the following lament of Our Lady at La Salette: “I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
To the Venerable Mary of Agreda Our Lady said something similar: “I will also promise them my continual and efficacious intercession with my most holy Son, if they do not displease me! For this purpose thou shouldst exhort them to continual love and devotion toward me, engrafting it in their hearts; in being thus faithful they will attain all that thou wishest for them, and much more―for I will obtain it for them.”
Displeasing Our Lady
How do we “displease” Our Lady? By ignoring her words, by ignoring her commands, by ignoring her suggestions, by ignoring her messages. A child who acts in this manner cannot honestly say that it loves its mother. Obedience is an effect of love. Acting promptly is an effect of the presence of love.
The bottom line in the spiritual life is LOVE. Devotion is a child of love. St. Francis de Sales, in his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, writes: “Devotion consists in a high degree of real love … In fact, all true and living devotion presupposes the love of God―and indeed it is neither more nor less than a very real love of God, though not always of the same kind. In so far as divine love enriches us―it is called GRACE, which makes us pleasing to God. In so far as it gives us the strength to do good―it is called CHARITY. But when it grows to such a degree of perfection that it makes us not only to do good, but rather moves us to do it carefully, frequently and promptly―it is called DEVOTION … In short, devotion is simply a spiritual activity and liveliness by means of which Divine Love works in us, and causes us to work briskly and lovingly; and, just as charity leads us to a general practice of all God’s Commandments, so devotion leads us to practice them readily and diligently. Therefore, we cannot call him, who neglects to observe all God’s Commandments, either good or devout, because in order to be good, a man must be filled with love, and, to be devout, he must further be very ready and apt to perform the deeds of love … The difference between love and devotion is just that which exists between fire and flame―love being a spiritual fire, which becomes devotion when it is fanned into a flame―and what devotion adds to the fire of love, is that flame which makes love become eager, energetic and diligent, not merely in obeying God’s Commandments, but in fulfilling His Divine Counsels and inspirations” (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part 1, Chapter 1).
Likewise, therefore, the obedience in keeping the Commandments is also a child of love― “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them; he it is that loveth Me … If anyone love Me, he will keep My word … He that loveth Me not, keepeth not My words … If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love” (John 14:15, 14:21-24; 15:10). What is true of Our Lord is equally true of Our Lady. If we truly love her, we will keep her words, we will do what she says.
No Real Love―No Real Devotion
If there is little or no love, there cannot possibly be any devotion―or at least no true devotion―since, as St. Francis de Sales says: “Devotion consists in a high degree of real love ... all true and living devotion presupposes the love of God [or in this case, Our Lady]―and indeed it is neither more nor less than a very real love of God” [or Our Lady]. Faulty, or fake and false devotions are “ten-a-penny” and make-up the vast majority of “made-up” or “make-up” cosmetic devotion that hides the ugliness underneath. St. Louis de Montfort speaks of those false devotions to Our Lady―in his True Devotion to Mary―listing them as seven in number: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the interested devotees. All of these are faulty, false or fake. They are not true devotions for they come not from a true love of Mary, but from a love of self. Hence their love is not fervent, but lukewarm. Let us not be of those whom Our Lord condemns, saying: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8).
You can imagine the pain a mother feels when her children―even though they turn up at her birthday―nevertheless are glib, insincere, superficial and hypocritical in the “lip-service-only” congratulations on her birthday and likewise with their protestations of “I love you, mom!” It is merely the “politically correct” thing to say and do―without there being any real heart and sincerity behind what they are saying and doing. The mother knows that and she feels the pain in her motherly sensitivity but does not show it due to her heroic stoicity or stoicism. They say that the more perfect a person is, then the more sensitive they are―thus, Our Lord, who was the most perfect of all, was also the most sensitive of all. Our Lady comes second in perfection and sensitivity. Like her Son, she keenly and deeply feels our inconsideration to her, our neglect of her, our indifference towards her, our lack of real love and devotion in her regard. Is it not the time to put that right? Is it not time to try and give her what she deserves?
Time to Turn to Mary
In the same book, Introduction to the Devout Life, St. Francis de Sales makes a timely encouragement, as we approach the birthday of Our Lady, to devotedly turn to her AT ALL TIMES and in ALL OUR NEEDS: “With a special love, give honor, reverence and respect to the holy and glorious Virgin Mary. As the Mother of Jesus, our Brother, she is truly our mother. Let us therefore turn to her for help. We are her little children, so let us, with complete confidence, throw ourselves in her arms. At every moment, in every circumstance, let us call to this loving mother. Let us ask earnestly for her motherly love. With our hearts full of a true filial love for her, let us strive to imitate her virtues.”
In the case of a good person, it is only natural for a child to imitate the virtues of its mother―a bad child will imitate the vices of its mother. If you have ever read The Mystical City of God, by the Venerable Mary of Agreda, you will have noted that Our Lady continually insists that her example be imitated. The proverb― “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery” ― means that a person imitates someone else because they admire that person or value what that person is doing. Another version adds a phrase at the end of that proverb, saying: “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness!” ― and that sums up our self and Our Lady ― we are mediocrity personified and she is greatness personified. Much as Christ became man to make us like unto God―Our Lady wants to raise us out of our mediocrity and make us holy and acceptable to God. She was born to bring God to man―on this her upcoming birthday―let her be truly born in your life and soul, so that she can bring you to God.
What to Do and How to Prepare
► The first thing to do is to CONCRETELY, DEFINITELY, IRREVOCABLY, UNCHANGINGLY and ABSOLUTELY SET ASIDE SUNDAY SEPTEMBER 8TH FOR OUR LADY. It is the birthday of the Mother of God. It is the birthday of your spiritual mother. It is the birthday of her who has said: “I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
► The second thing to do is to tell everyone that everyone is staying at home (and perhaps invite other relatives and friends―as you would for any family member’s birthday―for Mary is “family” is she not? You hope to part of her “family” in Heaven, don’t you?). Make the phone calls, send the texts and e-mails THIS WEEKEND. Commit yourself! It is the best way to guarantee that it will happen―because other people have been told about and will expect it to happen.
► The third thing to do is to create some kind of loose schedule for Sunday, September 8th. Be “loose” and plan more generally than specifically―because you may get a better idea on what to actually do on the day as a result of who will accept and who refuses your invitation. Then you can plan more specifically based upon what you know of the persons who will be accept your invitation and will attend Our Lady’s birthday party.
► The fourth thing to do is to invite everyone to PREPARE SPIRITUALLY for Our Lady’s birthday. You could send out the link to the NOVENA IN PREPARATION FOR OUR LADY’S NATIVITY [click here]―you could start it on Our Lady’s birthday. Or you could ask them to pray an extra Rosary ― or even all fifteen mysteries of the Rosary ― in her honor; or pray the LITANY OF LORETO (the Litany of Our Lady); or some other prayers. The whole point is to PLACE THE SPIRITUAL PREPARATIONS ABOVE THE MATERIAL PREPARATIONS―for the spiritual is more important than the material, just as the soul is more important than the body, and the life and welfare of the soul is more important than the life and welfare of the body. Thus, both Our Lady and all the participants will appreciate and enjoy her birthday all the more if they will have prepared spiritually and prepared for a prolonged period of time. It will mean that you are honoring her more with your heart than your lips, more with your prayers than your belly.
► The fifth thing to do is to plan a balanced schedule for the day―and, as said above, make it general plan, much like giving “chapter headings” for what will take place, rather than listing things in “fine details”. With it being a Sunday, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass ends up, fortunately, being a “Shotgun-Mass”―meaning everyone is obliged to and bound to attend it. However, you could ask that everyone makes an Act of Consecration to Our Lady at some point during Mass―it could be before Mass, during Mass at the Offertory, or after the Consecration, or after Holy Communion, or after Mass at Our Lady’s side altar, statue or image―or, even better, multiple times: meaning before, during and after Mass―just as you would probably say “Happy Birthday” to somebody several times on the day of their birthday.
► The sixth thing to do would be ask everyone to make their Holy Communion, on September 8th, in honor of Our Lady. We will publish potential texts and examples of what to do and say later this coming week.
► The seventh thing to do is to prepare the “soil” of your mind and soul for Our Lady by “weeding-out” the world and “planting seeds” of Our Lady throughout this entire week that leads up to her birthday on Sunday, September 8th. You can do this in many different ways. First of all add some short little prayers to Our Lady onto your usual devotions and prayers. It might be the recitation of the Angelus (morning, noon and evening), or perhaps the Memorare prayer (Remember O most loving Virgin Mary, that never was it know that anyone who had recourse to …etc.), or it could be the daily singing of some hymn to Our Lady, etc. Another way to “plant seeds” of Our Lady would be to make a daily reading from anyone of the countless books that there are in print about Mary―many of which are available for free online; or take various extracts for your reading from other internet resources.
► The eighth thing to do is to focus on imitating the chief virtues of Our Lady, as listed by St. Louis de Montfort in his True Devotion to Mary: “particularly her profound humility, her lively Faith, her blind obedience, her continual prayer, her universal mortification, her divine purity, her ardent charity, her heroic patience, her angelic sweetness and her divine wisdom. These are the ten principal virtues of the most holy Virgin” (True Devotion to Mary, §108). You could divide up the chief ten virtues among family members―keeping the allocated virtue throughout the whole build-up to Our Lady’s birthday. Or you could pick “a virtue per day” if you wish. If you need help with these options, this website will give you some daily assistance, in the days that follow, by providing you with meditative material and spiritual readings on those then chief virtues as well as ideas on how to practice those virtues in multiple scenarios.
► The ninth thing to do is to prepare a little altar or oratory (place of prayer) for Our Lady’s birthday. It does not have to be an entire room, any dignified part of a room is acceptable if a separate exclusive room is not available. Decorate it with the best things that you have―cloth to cover the table; your best or favorite statue or image of Our Lady placed on it; candles and flowers to surround it; perhaps even have votive lights burning before it throughout the entire period, day and night, leading up to Our Lady’s birthday. As regards prayer―ensure that some prayers are guaranteed to be said before your little shrine or altar to Our Lady each and every day. Similarly, a little shrine could erected in your garden in readiness for her birthday.
► The tenth thing to do is to gradually finalize the actual schedule you will use on Our Lady’s birthday. Here is an example of what you could do―but your own imagination and ingenuity will most likely better these very basic ideas:
(1) Start the day of Sunday, September 18th, with a decent amount of FAMILY PRAYER before going to Sunday Mass―even if, or especially if, your family is not accustomed to saying morning prayers together as a family. This morning prayer session could include (a) the Daily Morning Offering, (b) an Act of Consecration to Our Lady, (c) at least one decade of the Rosary, but preferably all five decades of the Joyful Mysteries, for, on this day, you should aim at praying all 15 decades of the Rosary (or an extra 15 decades on top of the Rosaries you would normally pray) in honor of Our Lady and as present to her―otherwise you would not be giving her anything more than on every usual day, (d) make a short reading of one or a few paragraphs from anyone of the many books available on Our Lady, (e) follow the reading with the recitation or singing of the first Angelus of the day―morning, noon and evening―use bells if you have them, which are sounded during the invocations that precede each of the three Hail Marys, (f) finish with a hymn to Our Lady. All of this should take no more than around 30 minutes―give or take a few minutes.
(2) On the way to church for Sunday Mass, refrain from any worldly, trivial or vain talk and discussions, but sanctify the drive by either prayers being recited or someone reading something from a book on Our Lady―or even both. Alternatively, or additionally, you could have an informal discussion about Our Lady―which, if you have read a passage from a book, could be based upon that reading. The possibilities are really endless and go well beyond these meager suggestions.
(3) Arrange to do something special at church for Our Lady―either before, during or after Mass. You could recite, once more, your Act of Consecration to Our Lady as a family at her side altar. Or you could suggest that every family member write his or her own special prayer to Our Lady for her birthday―and then each of you could silently recite that personal prayer to Our Lady, either before, during or after Mass. Receive and offer your Holy Communions in honor of Our Lady. If the parish priest agrees and allows you, then you have a mini-hymn singing session to honor Our Lady after Mass. Or, even more daringly, get the priest to agree to Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament in honor of Our Lady, or even a little procession in her honor―though you might have to pay in advance for getting the priest’s agreement by doing lots of penance, fasting and praying beforehand.
(4) On the way home from Sunday Mass, perhaps there is a little shrine of Our Lady’s that you could visit on her birthday. If not, then perhaps there is a church somewhere nearby that is dedicated to Our Lady―meaning that it has Our Lady’s name or one of her many titles incorporated in the name of the church, e.g. Our Lady of the Rosary, Our Lady of Mount Carmel, Immaculate Conception, Queen of Angels, Queen of Peace, Our Lady of Fatima, etc. Make a short stop there and recite some prayers or sing some hymns in her honor―this could be an opportunity for praying the next 5 decades of the Rosary―-the Sorrowful Mysteries―or you could pray them later.
(5) Upon arriving home, it will probably be not too far from midday―which would allow you to pray the midday Angelus. Use the bells once again as you did during the morning Angelus. Remind everyone that this is Our Lady’s birthday and the focus is on her today. As a sacrifice for her, you could and should postpone all worldly activities for this one day―such as avoid watching worldly TV shows, listening to worldly music, going out to participate in worldly activities, etc.
(6) At some point you will have to eat lunch or dinner―make it a real banquet in honor of Our Lady. There are many possibilities by way of menus that could reflect a profound and beautiful symbolism of Our Lady, while also being delicious in the process. More on that later. Hopefully, without promising anything, the website might be able to present with a whole menu consisting of many courses, all of them symbolizing and reflecting Our Lady in some way―together with a print-out explanation of how and why the ingredients are symbolic of Our Lady. This is a mammoth task―thus no promises are made. Even if an entire multi-course menu might not be completed in time for Sunday―meaning designed and published several days before her birthday to allow for purchase of items and preparation of food―then at least some recipes will be available in good time.
(7) Get everyone involved in some way for preparing for an afternoon or evening with Our Lady. This coming week could be used productively in preparing a little family concert in her honor during her birthday. The concert could include hymns, songs, poetry, musical instruments (solo or as a group) or even recitations (speeches) about Our Lady’s miracles, interventions, apparitions, etc., or little thumbnail talks about certain saints who had a great devotion to Our Lady, recounting and relating how they showed their devotion to her.
(8) The concert could be followed by watching a movie about Our Lady. There are several available out there―but you need to plan early and act quickly to secure or rent one―unless you already have those movies in your library or possession.
(9) After the movie you could recite the remaining five EXTRA decades of the Rosary―the Glorious Mysteries―which should be additional to the decades you are accustomed to praying each day―otherwise where is the special present for Our Lady?). After the Rosary, you could recite or sing the evening Angelus―once again using bells in the manner described above.
(10) The evening meal could again contain foods that are symbolic of Our Lady―and this symbolism should be explained to those present at the meal, for they would otherwise be clueless and ignorant of the spiritual aspect of the meal.
(11) Finally, before retiring for the night, the night prayers (if you are used to saying them as a family) should have a very definite Marian flavor injected into them―to distinguish them and raise them a notch above the night prayers you are accustomed to praying. To finish night prayers, another short and inspiring reading from a book on Our Lady would be ideal as a last thought of the day. If you are accustomed to reading bedtime stories to the young ones before turning out the light, make sure you have a wonderful story based on Our Lady prepared.
All of the above constitutes the EXTERNAL ASPECTS of what is meant by TRUE DEVOTION to Our Lady, but these are mere pieces of firewood that need an interior flame of love to really set alight a true fire of devotion―for someone could perform all the above exteriorly or externally while having no real interior love or devotion while doing so. If you think the above is overwhelming, then realize that the word DEVOTION is a word that indicated a HIGH DEGREE of love and attention, as indicated above by St. Francis de Sales in his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, in which he speaks of and describes TRUE DEVOTION as follows:
“Devotion consists in a high degree of real love … In fact, all true and living devotion presupposes the love of God―and indeed it is neither more nor less than a very real love of God, though not always of the same kind. In so far as divine love enriches us―it is called GRACE, which makes us pleasing to God. In so far as it gives us the strength to do good―it is called CHARITY. But when it grows to such a degree of perfection that it makes us not only to do good, but rather moves us to do it carefully, frequently and promptly―it is called DEVOTION … In short, devotion is simply a spiritual activity and liveliness by means of which Divine Love works in us, and causes us to work briskly and lovingly; and, just as charity leads us to a general practice of all God’s Commandments, so devotion leads us to practice them readily and diligently. Therefore, we cannot call him, who neglects to observe all God’s Commandments, either good or devout, because in order to be good, a man must be filled with love, and to be devout, he must further be very ready and apt to perform the deeds of love … The difference between love and devotion is just that which exists between fire and flame―love being a spiritual fire, which becomes devotion when it is fanned into a flame―and what devotion adds to the fire of love, is that flame which makes love become eager, energetic and diligent, not merely in obeying God’s Commandments, but in fulfilling His Divine Counsels and inspirations” (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part 1, Chapter 1).
On September 8th, we celebrate Our Lady’s birthday—the most important birthday in history, after that of Our Lord Jesus Christ (December 25th). Have you prepared for that “second-greatest-birthday-in-the-history-of-the-world”? Were you even aware that her birthday is just around the corner? A lot of people tend to be “last-minute” people―they leave everything to the “last-minute” thinking that they can still do a “good job” in “the blink of an eye” or “in a jiffy”! This is often seen to be case in the proverbial case―but true case―of the “Last Minute Christmas Shopper.” When you really stop and think about what is involved in “last-minute-shopping” and what it reveals―you have to admit that the message it sends is one of “Right now, I have much more important things to do than shop for this-or-that, or so-and-so!” In other words, you have put whoever or whatever you have to shop for, way down the list of your priorities―you want to do other things first before tackling the shopping business.
Nevertheless, if you are a “last-minute-shopper”, then there is still a chance for you to be successfully accepted by Our Lady with your “last-minute-present” ― just as Our Lord accepted the “last-minute” repentance of the Good Thief on the cross on Calvary, at the last moment of his life. The thief left it late―but still managed to save his soul!
Just Another Old Day!
What does Our Lady’s birthday mean to you? Will it be “just another day” that will passed doing “the same old things” with little or nothing to make that day special and important? Will everyone just “go their own way” doing the weekend things they like to do? Providentially, God has seen to it that this year Our Lady Our Lady’s birthday falls on a SUNDAY! A day when the vast majority of people do not have to work, a day that should already by a “religious day” since it is “The Lord’s Day.” It is also “a day of rest”―a day when many things are set aside. Therefore, God’s providence has already done most of the work for you this year―by seeing to it that the birthday of His Most Holy Mother falls on a day (Sunday) when you should have more time to honor her than if was some weekday and workday!
Raw-Deal Meal
Sometimes, even our earthly mothers get a “raw-deal” on their birthdays! O yes, sure, they get a birthday card, perhaps some flowers, an extra kiss and a hug, perhaps they are taken out for a meal―but often they end up cooking their own meal, looking after guests, doing the house-cleaning before the birthday and the clean-up after the birthday. Often the family and guests have more of a fun time than the beleaguered mother! Her birthday ends up being like a few fish thrown to the dolphin in the pool to the keep the dolphin happy! What scraps will we be throwing at Our Lady on her birthday?
Masterpiece Ignored
Will that day be an important day for you? Does Our Lady really matter to you? How important is she to you? Is she a central part of your life? Is she like “family”, or is she merely a “visitor”? St. Louis de Montfort says that she is God’s masterpiece― “Mary is the excellent masterpiece of the Most High … where God dwells more magnificently and more divinely than in any other place in the universe, … where there are beauties and treasures unspeakable. She is the magnificence of the Most High” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §5 & §6). If an artist paints a masterpiece and you ignore it, think little of it, are indifferent to it―then what an insult that is to the artist! Now when that “artist” is God―the insult becomes an infinite insult to God, because God is infinite!
It is highly likely that in most homes, Our Lady’s birthday will fare no better than Our Lord’s birthday fares at Christmas. It is sad to think that in most homes, Our Lady’s birthday, just like Christmas, will see less prayer and spiritual reading than usual—whereas the opposite should be the norm. How many homes will pray MORE on Our Lady’s birthday? For the 2% to 4% of Catholic American households who are thought to pray the Rosary daily―will they manage a full 15 decade Rosary, or at least another 5 decades on top of the norm? Of the 25% or so Catholics who are Sunday regulars at Mass, how many will carry the religious ceremonies and spirit home with them and inject it into the festivities that should be there on Our Lady’s birthday? There are many, many way we can sanctify Our Lady’s birthday—and we will look at these ways—but how many will have the courage to run the gauntlet of human respect and insist upon them with family, relatives and visitors? Yes, we should “lay on a spread”―that is to say, have something special on the food and drink menu for Our Lady’s birthday―but even that is done, unfortunately and sadly, the food, the drink, the entertainment, etc., will take precedence in most homes—and we are forced to ask the thorny question: “Whose birthday is it anyway?”
The Lady’s Lament
We would do well to DAILY ponder the following lament of Our Lady at La Salette: “I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
To the Venerable Mary of Agreda Our Lady said something similar: “I will also promise them my continual and efficacious intercession with my most holy Son, if they do not displease me! For this purpose thou shouldst exhort them to continual love and devotion toward me, engrafting it in their hearts; in being thus faithful they will attain all that thou wishest for them, and much more―for I will obtain it for them.”
Displeasing Our Lady
How do we “displease” Our Lady? By ignoring her words, by ignoring her commands, by ignoring her suggestions, by ignoring her messages. A child who acts in this manner cannot honestly say that it loves its mother. Obedience is an effect of love. Acting promptly is an effect of the presence of love.
The bottom line in the spiritual life is LOVE. Devotion is a child of love. St. Francis de Sales, in his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, writes: “Devotion consists in a high degree of real love … In fact, all true and living devotion presupposes the love of God―and indeed it is neither more nor less than a very real love of God, though not always of the same kind. In so far as divine love enriches us―it is called GRACE, which makes us pleasing to God. In so far as it gives us the strength to do good―it is called CHARITY. But when it grows to such a degree of perfection that it makes us not only to do good, but rather moves us to do it carefully, frequently and promptly―it is called DEVOTION … In short, devotion is simply a spiritual activity and liveliness by means of which Divine Love works in us, and causes us to work briskly and lovingly; and, just as charity leads us to a general practice of all God’s Commandments, so devotion leads us to practice them readily and diligently. Therefore, we cannot call him, who neglects to observe all God’s Commandments, either good or devout, because in order to be good, a man must be filled with love, and, to be devout, he must further be very ready and apt to perform the deeds of love … The difference between love and devotion is just that which exists between fire and flame―love being a spiritual fire, which becomes devotion when it is fanned into a flame―and what devotion adds to the fire of love, is that flame which makes love become eager, energetic and diligent, not merely in obeying God’s Commandments, but in fulfilling His Divine Counsels and inspirations” (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part 1, Chapter 1).
Likewise, therefore, the obedience in keeping the Commandments is also a child of love― “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them; he it is that loveth Me … If anyone love Me, he will keep My word … He that loveth Me not, keepeth not My words … If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love” (John 14:15, 14:21-24; 15:10). What is true of Our Lord is equally true of Our Lady. If we truly love her, we will keep her words, we will do what she says.
No Real Love―No Real Devotion
If there is little or no love, there cannot possibly be any devotion―or at least no true devotion―since, as St. Francis de Sales says: “Devotion consists in a high degree of real love ... all true and living devotion presupposes the love of God [or in this case, Our Lady]―and indeed it is neither more nor less than a very real love of God” [or Our Lady]. Faulty, or fake and false devotions are “ten-a-penny” and make-up the vast majority of “made-up” or “make-up” cosmetic devotion that hides the ugliness underneath. St. Louis de Montfort speaks of those false devotions to Our Lady―in his True Devotion to Mary―listing them as seven in number: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the interested devotees. All of these are faulty, false or fake. They are not true devotions for they come not from a true love of Mary, but from a love of self. Hence their love is not fervent, but lukewarm. Let us not be of those whom Our Lord condemns, saying: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8).
You can imagine the pain a mother feels when her children―even though they turn up at her birthday―nevertheless are glib, insincere, superficial and hypocritical in the “lip-service-only” congratulations on her birthday and likewise with their protestations of “I love you, mom!” It is merely the “politically correct” thing to say and do―without there being any real heart and sincerity behind what they are saying and doing. The mother knows that and she feels the pain in her motherly sensitivity but does not show it due to her heroic stoicity or stoicism. They say that the more perfect a person is, then the more sensitive they are―thus, Our Lord, who was the most perfect of all, was also the most sensitive of all. Our Lady comes second in perfection and sensitivity. Like her Son, she keenly and deeply feels our inconsideration to her, our neglect of her, our indifference towards her, our lack of real love and devotion in her regard. Is it not the time to put that right? Is it not time to try and give her what she deserves?
Time to Turn to Mary
In the same book, Introduction to the Devout Life, St. Francis de Sales makes a timely encouragement, as we approach the birthday of Our Lady, to devotedly turn to her AT ALL TIMES and in ALL OUR NEEDS: “With a special love, give honor, reverence and respect to the holy and glorious Virgin Mary. As the Mother of Jesus, our Brother, she is truly our mother. Let us therefore turn to her for help. We are her little children, so let us, with complete confidence, throw ourselves in her arms. At every moment, in every circumstance, let us call to this loving mother. Let us ask earnestly for her motherly love. With our hearts full of a true filial love for her, let us strive to imitate her virtues.”
In the case of a good person, it is only natural for a child to imitate the virtues of its mother―a bad child will imitate the vices of its mother. If you have ever read The Mystical City of God, by the Venerable Mary of Agreda, you will have noted that Our Lady continually insists that her example be imitated. The proverb― “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery” ― means that a person imitates someone else because they admire that person or value what that person is doing. Another version adds a phrase at the end of that proverb, saying: “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness!” ― and that sums up our self and Our Lady ― we are mediocrity personified and she is greatness personified. Much as Christ became man to make us like unto God―Our Lady wants to raise us out of our mediocrity and make us holy and acceptable to God. She was born to bring God to man―on this her upcoming birthday―let her be truly born in your life and soul, so that she can bring you to God.
What to Do and How to Prepare
► The first thing to do is to CONCRETELY, DEFINITELY, IRREVOCABLY, UNCHANGINGLY and ABSOLUTELY SET ASIDE SUNDAY SEPTEMBER 8TH FOR OUR LADY. It is the birthday of the Mother of God. It is the birthday of your spiritual mother. It is the birthday of her who has said: “I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
► The second thing to do is to tell everyone that everyone is staying at home (and perhaps invite other relatives and friends―as you would for any family member’s birthday―for Mary is “family” is she not? You hope to part of her “family” in Heaven, don’t you?). Make the phone calls, send the texts and e-mails THIS WEEKEND. Commit yourself! It is the best way to guarantee that it will happen―because other people have been told about and will expect it to happen.
► The third thing to do is to create some kind of loose schedule for Sunday, September 8th. Be “loose” and plan more generally than specifically―because you may get a better idea on what to actually do on the day as a result of who will accept and who refuses your invitation. Then you can plan more specifically based upon what you know of the persons who will be accept your invitation and will attend Our Lady’s birthday party.
► The fourth thing to do is to invite everyone to PREPARE SPIRITUALLY for Our Lady’s birthday. You could send out the link to the NOVENA IN PREPARATION FOR OUR LADY’S NATIVITY [click here]―you could start it on Our Lady’s birthday. Or you could ask them to pray an extra Rosary ― or even all fifteen mysteries of the Rosary ― in her honor; or pray the LITANY OF LORETO (the Litany of Our Lady); or some other prayers. The whole point is to PLACE THE SPIRITUAL PREPARATIONS ABOVE THE MATERIAL PREPARATIONS―for the spiritual is more important than the material, just as the soul is more important than the body, and the life and welfare of the soul is more important than the life and welfare of the body. Thus, both Our Lady and all the participants will appreciate and enjoy her birthday all the more if they will have prepared spiritually and prepared for a prolonged period of time. It will mean that you are honoring her more with your heart than your lips, more with your prayers than your belly.
► The fifth thing to do is to plan a balanced schedule for the day―and, as said above, make it general plan, much like giving “chapter headings” for what will take place, rather than listing things in “fine details”. With it being a Sunday, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass ends up, fortunately, being a “Shotgun-Mass”―meaning everyone is obliged to and bound to attend it. However, you could ask that everyone makes an Act of Consecration to Our Lady at some point during Mass―it could be before Mass, during Mass at the Offertory, or after the Consecration, or after Holy Communion, or after Mass at Our Lady’s side altar, statue or image―or, even better, multiple times: meaning before, during and after Mass―just as you would probably say “Happy Birthday” to somebody several times on the day of their birthday.
► The sixth thing to do would be ask everyone to make their Holy Communion, on September 8th, in honor of Our Lady. We will publish potential texts and examples of what to do and say later this coming week.
► The seventh thing to do is to prepare the “soil” of your mind and soul for Our Lady by “weeding-out” the world and “planting seeds” of Our Lady throughout this entire week that leads up to her birthday on Sunday, September 8th. You can do this in many different ways. First of all add some short little prayers to Our Lady onto your usual devotions and prayers. It might be the recitation of the Angelus (morning, noon and evening), or perhaps the Memorare prayer (Remember O most loving Virgin Mary, that never was it know that anyone who had recourse to …etc.), or it could be the daily singing of some hymn to Our Lady, etc. Another way to “plant seeds” of Our Lady would be to make a daily reading from anyone of the countless books that there are in print about Mary―many of which are available for free online; or take various extracts for your reading from other internet resources.
► The eighth thing to do is to focus on imitating the chief virtues of Our Lady, as listed by St. Louis de Montfort in his True Devotion to Mary: “particularly her profound humility, her lively Faith, her blind obedience, her continual prayer, her universal mortification, her divine purity, her ardent charity, her heroic patience, her angelic sweetness and her divine wisdom. These are the ten principal virtues of the most holy Virgin” (True Devotion to Mary, §108). You could divide up the chief ten virtues among family members―keeping the allocated virtue throughout the whole build-up to Our Lady’s birthday. Or you could pick “a virtue per day” if you wish. If you need help with these options, this website will give you some daily assistance, in the days that follow, by providing you with meditative material and spiritual readings on those then chief virtues as well as ideas on how to practice those virtues in multiple scenarios.
► The ninth thing to do is to prepare a little altar or oratory (place of prayer) for Our Lady’s birthday. It does not have to be an entire room, any dignified part of a room is acceptable if a separate exclusive room is not available. Decorate it with the best things that you have―cloth to cover the table; your best or favorite statue or image of Our Lady placed on it; candles and flowers to surround it; perhaps even have votive lights burning before it throughout the entire period, day and night, leading up to Our Lady’s birthday. As regards prayer―ensure that some prayers are guaranteed to be said before your little shrine or altar to Our Lady each and every day. Similarly, a little shrine could erected in your garden in readiness for her birthday.
► The tenth thing to do is to gradually finalize the actual schedule you will use on Our Lady’s birthday. Here is an example of what you could do―but your own imagination and ingenuity will most likely better these very basic ideas:
(1) Start the day of Sunday, September 18th, with a decent amount of FAMILY PRAYER before going to Sunday Mass―even if, or especially if, your family is not accustomed to saying morning prayers together as a family. This morning prayer session could include (a) the Daily Morning Offering, (b) an Act of Consecration to Our Lady, (c) at least one decade of the Rosary, but preferably all five decades of the Joyful Mysteries, for, on this day, you should aim at praying all 15 decades of the Rosary (or an extra 15 decades on top of the Rosaries you would normally pray) in honor of Our Lady and as present to her―otherwise you would not be giving her anything more than on every usual day, (d) make a short reading of one or a few paragraphs from anyone of the many books available on Our Lady, (e) follow the reading with the recitation or singing of the first Angelus of the day―morning, noon and evening―use bells if you have them, which are sounded during the invocations that precede each of the three Hail Marys, (f) finish with a hymn to Our Lady. All of this should take no more than around 30 minutes―give or take a few minutes.
(2) On the way to church for Sunday Mass, refrain from any worldly, trivial or vain talk and discussions, but sanctify the drive by either prayers being recited or someone reading something from a book on Our Lady―or even both. Alternatively, or additionally, you could have an informal discussion about Our Lady―which, if you have read a passage from a book, could be based upon that reading. The possibilities are really endless and go well beyond these meager suggestions.
(3) Arrange to do something special at church for Our Lady―either before, during or after Mass. You could recite, once more, your Act of Consecration to Our Lady as a family at her side altar. Or you could suggest that every family member write his or her own special prayer to Our Lady for her birthday―and then each of you could silently recite that personal prayer to Our Lady, either before, during or after Mass. Receive and offer your Holy Communions in honor of Our Lady. If the parish priest agrees and allows you, then you have a mini-hymn singing session to honor Our Lady after Mass. Or, even more daringly, get the priest to agree to Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament in honor of Our Lady, or even a little procession in her honor―though you might have to pay in advance for getting the priest’s agreement by doing lots of penance, fasting and praying beforehand.
(4) On the way home from Sunday Mass, perhaps there is a little shrine of Our Lady’s that you could visit on her birthday. If not, then perhaps there is a church somewhere nearby that is dedicated to Our Lady―meaning that it has Our Lady’s name or one of her many titles incorporated in the name of the church, e.g. Our Lady of the Rosary, Our Lady of Mount Carmel, Immaculate Conception, Queen of Angels, Queen of Peace, Our Lady of Fatima, etc. Make a short stop there and recite some prayers or sing some hymns in her honor―this could be an opportunity for praying the next 5 decades of the Rosary―-the Sorrowful Mysteries―or you could pray them later.
(5) Upon arriving home, it will probably be not too far from midday―which would allow you to pray the midday Angelus. Use the bells once again as you did during the morning Angelus. Remind everyone that this is Our Lady’s birthday and the focus is on her today. As a sacrifice for her, you could and should postpone all worldly activities for this one day―such as avoid watching worldly TV shows, listening to worldly music, going out to participate in worldly activities, etc.
(6) At some point you will have to eat lunch or dinner―make it a real banquet in honor of Our Lady. There are many possibilities by way of menus that could reflect a profound and beautiful symbolism of Our Lady, while also being delicious in the process. More on that later. Hopefully, without promising anything, the website might be able to present with a whole menu consisting of many courses, all of them symbolizing and reflecting Our Lady in some way―together with a print-out explanation of how and why the ingredients are symbolic of Our Lady. This is a mammoth task―thus no promises are made. Even if an entire multi-course menu might not be completed in time for Sunday―meaning designed and published several days before her birthday to allow for purchase of items and preparation of food―then at least some recipes will be available in good time.
(7) Get everyone involved in some way for preparing for an afternoon or evening with Our Lady. This coming week could be used productively in preparing a little family concert in her honor during her birthday. The concert could include hymns, songs, poetry, musical instruments (solo or as a group) or even recitations (speeches) about Our Lady’s miracles, interventions, apparitions, etc., or little thumbnail talks about certain saints who had a great devotion to Our Lady, recounting and relating how they showed their devotion to her.
(8) The concert could be followed by watching a movie about Our Lady. There are several available out there―but you need to plan early and act quickly to secure or rent one―unless you already have those movies in your library or possession.
(9) After the movie you could recite the remaining five EXTRA decades of the Rosary―the Glorious Mysteries―which should be additional to the decades you are accustomed to praying each day―otherwise where is the special present for Our Lady?). After the Rosary, you could recite or sing the evening Angelus―once again using bells in the manner described above.
(10) The evening meal could again contain foods that are symbolic of Our Lady―and this symbolism should be explained to those present at the meal, for they would otherwise be clueless and ignorant of the spiritual aspect of the meal.
(11) Finally, before retiring for the night, the night prayers (if you are used to saying them as a family) should have a very definite Marian flavor injected into them―to distinguish them and raise them a notch above the night prayers you are accustomed to praying. To finish night prayers, another short and inspiring reading from a book on Our Lady would be ideal as a last thought of the day. If you are accustomed to reading bedtime stories to the young ones before turning out the light, make sure you have a wonderful story based on Our Lady prepared.
All of the above constitutes the EXTERNAL ASPECTS of what is meant by TRUE DEVOTION to Our Lady, but these are mere pieces of firewood that need an interior flame of love to really set alight a true fire of devotion―for someone could perform all the above exteriorly or externally while having no real interior love or devotion while doing so. If you think the above is overwhelming, then realize that the word DEVOTION is a word that indicated a HIGH DEGREE of love and attention, as indicated above by St. Francis de Sales in his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, in which he speaks of and describes TRUE DEVOTION as follows:
“Devotion consists in a high degree of real love … In fact, all true and living devotion presupposes the love of God―and indeed it is neither more nor less than a very real love of God, though not always of the same kind. In so far as divine love enriches us―it is called GRACE, which makes us pleasing to God. In so far as it gives us the strength to do good―it is called CHARITY. But when it grows to such a degree of perfection that it makes us not only to do good, but rather moves us to do it carefully, frequently and promptly―it is called DEVOTION … In short, devotion is simply a spiritual activity and liveliness by means of which Divine Love works in us, and causes us to work briskly and lovingly; and, just as charity leads us to a general practice of all God’s Commandments, so devotion leads us to practice them readily and diligently. Therefore, we cannot call him, who neglects to observe all God’s Commandments, either good or devout, because in order to be good, a man must be filled with love, and to be devout, he must further be very ready and apt to perform the deeds of love … The difference between love and devotion is just that which exists between fire and flame―love being a spiritual fire, which becomes devotion when it is fanned into a flame―and what devotion adds to the fire of love, is that flame which makes love become eager, energetic and diligent, not merely in obeying God’s Commandments, but in fulfilling His Divine Counsels and inspirations” (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part 1, Chapter 1).
Article 2
Thursday & Friday, September 5th & 6th
Mary's Army for the Laity
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Thursday & Friday, September 5th & 6th
Mary's Army for the Laity
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Unemployed Soldiers!
What is the point of owning a car if you never use it? What good is it having a computer or a cell-phone if they are never used? Why enroll your child in a school if you never send the child to that school? Why marry somebody if you do not intend to have children―because procreation is the primary purpose of marriage? Why purchase Rosary beads and a Brown Scapular if you never intend to pray the Rosary or wear the Scapular? Why become a soldier if you do not intend to fight? Why bother getting baptized if you do not intend to live a Catholic life? Why go to Confession and confess a particular mortal sin that you do not intend to give up and stop committing?
Similarly, the Sacrament of Confirmation makes us Soldiers of Christ. Why bother being confirmed if you do not intend to be a Soldier of Christ and fight for the Faith? It is probably true to say that the Sacrament of Confirmation is the least understood and most underrated Sacrament of them all.
The CATECHISM OF THE COUNCIL OF TRENT states: “If ever there was a time demanding the diligence of pastors in explaining the Sacrament of Confirmation, in these days certainly it requires special attention, when there are found in the Holy Church of God many by whom this Sacrament is altogether omitted; while very few seek to obtain from it the fruit of divine grace which they should derive from its participation … It is necessary to teach that this Sacrament is not so necessary as to be utterly essential to salvation. Although not essential, however, it ought to be omitted by no one … Confirmation perfects the grace of Baptism. For those who have been made Christians by Baptism, still have in some sort the tenderness and softness, as it were, of new-born infants, and afterwards become, by means of the Sacrament of chrism, stronger to resist all the assaults of the world, the flesh and the devil, while their minds are fully confirmed in faith to confess and glorify the name of our Lord Jesus Christ …
“Before receiving the Holy Ghost at Pentecost, the Apostles were so weak and timid before and even at the very time of the Passion, that no sooner was Our Lord arrested, that they instantly fled; and Peter, who had been designated the rock and foundation of the Church, and who had displayed unshaken constancy and exalted magnanimity, terrified at the voice of one weak woman, denied, not once nor twice only, but a third time, that he was a disciple of Jesus Christ; and after the Resurrection they all remained shut up at home for fear of the Jews. But, on the day of Pentecost, so great was the power of the Holy Ghost with which they were all filled that, while they boldly and freely disseminated the Gospel confided to them, not only through Judea, but throughout the world, they thought no greater happiness could await them than that of being accounted worthy to suffer contumely, chains, torments and crucifixion, for the name of Christ
“By Confirmation we are armed and arrayed as soldiers of Christ, publicly to profess and defend His name, to fight against our internal enemy and against the spiritual powers of wickedness in the high places … The person when anointed and confirmed next receives a slap on the cheek from the hand of the Bishop, to make him recollect that, as a valiant combatant, he should be prepared to endure with unconquered spirit all adversities for the name of Christ.” (Catechism of the Council of Trent).
The CATECHISM, MY CATHOLIC FAITH, states: “Confirmation is the Sacrament through which the Holy Spirit comes to us in a special way and enables us to profess our Faith as strong and perfect Christians and soldiers of Jesus Christ … Confirmation marks the Christian as a soldier in the army of Christ … When giving Confirmation, the bishop lays his hand on the head of the person he confirms, and anoints the forehead with holy chrism in the form of a cross … By anointing the forehead with chrism in the form of a cross is meant that the Catholic who is confirmed must always be ready to profess his Faith openly and to practice it fearlessly. The cross marked on our foreheads at Confirmation reminds us never to be ashamed to profess ourselves disciples of a crucified Savior … The bishop gives the person a blow on the cheek, to remind the person to be ready to suffer all things, even death, for his Faith ... Confirmation grants us the special grace by which our Faith is deepened and strengthened, and we become concerned not only for our own spiritual needs, but for those of others … The confirmed will no longer remain on the defensive fighting for his Faith when being attacked. He will go forth joyfully in the fulfillment of vocation of soldier of Christ. He will join the ranks of Catholic Action, he will start being a real soldier of Christ, he will be ‘another Christ’” (Catechism: My Catholic Faith).
ST. CYRIL OF JERUSALEM (347-350), a Father and Doctor of the Church, writes of Confirmation, saying: “By the coming of the Holy Spirit … having put on the full suit of armor of the Holy Spirit, you are to withstand the power of the adversary, and defeat him saying: ‘I am able to do all things in Christ, Who strengthens me!’ … Just as Christ, after His Baptism and the coming upon Him of the Holy Spirit, went forth and defeated the adversary, so also with you … “Forget not the Holy Spirit! He is ready to mark your soul with His seal.... He will give you the heavenly and divine seal which makes the devil tremble; He will arm you for the fight; He will give you strength!”
ST. EPHREM THE SYRIAN says of the Sacrament of Confirmation: “They are sealed and put on the armor of the Holy Spirit.”
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS, in his Summa Contra Gentiles, writes: “The perfection of spiritual strength consists properly on a man’s daring to confess the Faith of Christ in the presence of anyone at all, and in a man’s being not withdrawn therefrom either by confusion or by terror, for strength drives out inordinate terror. Therefore, the Sacrament of Confirmation, by which spiritual strength is conferred, makes him in some sense a front-line fighter for the Faith of Christ. And because fighters under a prince carry his insignia, they who receive the Sacrament of Confirmation are signed with the Sign of the Cross by which He fought and conquered. This sign they receive on the forehead as a sign that without a blush they publicly confess the Faith of Christ.”
POPE PIUS XII, writes: “By the chrism of Confirmation, the faithful are given added strength to protect and defend the Church and the Faith She has given them” (Mystici Corporis, 1943).
No Exemptions
Being a Soldier of Christ is not an option, not a choice, not a preference―it is an obligation. “Although this Sacrament [of Confirmation] is not necessary as a means of salvation, it is not permitted for anyone, when occasion arises, to neglect it” (1917 Code of Canon Law, canon 787; 1983 Code of Canon Law, canon 813). “This Sacrament is not so necessary as to be utterly essential to salvation. Although not essential, however, it ought to be omitted by no one” (Catechism of the Council of Trent). We are all called to be Soldiers of Christ―not passive soldiers of Christ who just sit around, but active soldiers who do something: “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). Thus, as the Catechism My Catholic Faith states, “He will go forth joyfully in the fulfillment of vocation of soldier of Christ. He will join the ranks of Catholic Action, he will start being a real soldier of Christ, he will be ‘another Christ.’”
POPE ST. PIUS X speaks of this “Catholic Action” in his encyclical Il Fermo Proposito, wherein he writes: “We wish to recall those numerous works of zeal for the good of the Church, society, and individuals under the general name of ‘Catholic Action’ … The field of Catholic Action is extremely vast. In itself it does not exclude anything, in any manner, direct or indirect, which pertains to the divine mission of the Church ... One can plainly see how necessary it is for everyone to cooperate in such an important work … They use every means in repairing the serious disorders and seek to restore Jesus Christ to the family, the school and society by re-establishing the authority of God. They strive, in a word, to make public laws conformable to justice and amend or suppress those which are not so. Finally, they defend and support, in a true Catholic spirit, the rights of God in all things and the no less sacred rights of the Church. All these works, sustained and promoted chiefly by lay Catholics and whose form varies according to the needs of each country, constitute what is generally known by a distinctive and surely a very noble name: ‘Catholic Action,’ or the ‘Action of Catholics.’ At all times it came to the aid of the Church, and the Church has always cherished and blessed such help … Catholic Action constitutes a real apostolate for the honor and glory of Christ Himself.”
Enjoying Your Day?
Are you comfortable? Did you enjoy your dinner? Are you having a good time? Are the children playing? Watching television? Surfing the internet or social media? Chatting on the phone? Out socializing? Out making most of the warm weather? It is not quite what Our Lady has in mind for us! Our Lady of Good Success warned of our “easy-going” times when she said: “Unbridled luxury and extravagance will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! O, if men only understood how to appreciate the time given to them and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!” … while Our Lady of La Salette further warned: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance … People will think of nothing but amusement!”
Heaven Might Not Be Enjoying Your Day!
Your day might not be Heaven’s day―your way might not be Heaven’s way: “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). We amass riches―Heaven says give away your riches: “Jesus said to the rich young man: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven―and then come follow Me!’” (Matthew 19:21).
Even the three little children of Fatima had fallen into this love for “amusements” ― which was criticized and rebuked by the Angel of Portugal when he appeared to them while they were playing. Hey! Little children are supposed play, aren’t they? Well, yes, but they should also pray and not just play―and, according to the Angel, pray more than play! The Angel appeared to the playing children and rebuked them, saying: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!” That is fighting talk!
Our Lady of Fatima, at her first appearance, would later back-up the Angel’s words by asking the children: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort!” Heck―today, in this modern over-sensitive prickly world, those words of Our Lady would be looked upon as a threat―and some would not hesitate to sue her for frightening little children! Furthermore, she even shows them a real vision of Hell to scare them even more―Lucia said they would have died on the spot out or terror, had not the grace of God kept them alive! Boy! They would have a field-day in the courts suing Our Lady for that!
Our Lady came looking―not for “armchair Catholics”, nor “couch-potato Catholics”, not “cafeteria Catholics”―but she came looking for “battlefield Catholics” who would fight and suffer for Our Lord, Our Lady and our Faith. As Sister Lucia of Fatima would later say: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle! It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground!” Those words make us recall what Our Lord said in the Gospels: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). You could paraphrase that and say: “He who does fight for Me, fights against Me!”
Our Lord Came to Fight
Our Lord did come to bring peace and comfort, fun and entertainment on this Earth―He came to call us to the fight! “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! ... Many shall betray one another and shall hate one another! … You shall be brought before governors and before kings for My sake! They will deliver you up in councils and they will scourge you in their synagogues. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted and shall put you to death! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death; and the father the son; and the children shall rise up against their parents and shall put them to death! But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:17-22, 34-36; 24:9-10; Luke 12:51-53).
Wrong Idea of Life
We have the wrong idea of life―we want our life to be easy and comfortable; we want our life to be fun and enjoyable; we want to be a rich as we can; we want to be accepted by the world and so we jump through all the hoops that the world places in front of us in order to get all these things. If that is our attitude, then we have the wrong idea of what is supposed to be about! Yes―St. Thomas Aquinas says that it is normal for every person to seek out happiness―but in what basket are we seeking that happiness? The basket of the world, or the basket of Heaven. Our Lord was pretty clear and unambiguous on the matter when He said: “He that loves his life [in this world] shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:25). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). “Blessed is the man that has not gone after gold, nor put his trust in money nor in treasures!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:8). “The cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke up the word [of God]!” (Matthew 13:22).
When you read the serious and acclaimed spiritual masters―which most people do not read―then you will see that the path to Heaven is a path of progressive detachment from persons, places and possessions. Life is not a case of “keeping-your-cake-and-eating-it”―which is impossible―for you either keep it or you eat it, not both. You cannot be with the world and against it―all at the same time. Our Lord is not on the side of the world―He came into this world to save us from slavery to the world, which is a slavery to sin and Satan―for Satan is “prince of this world” (John 12:31). “The prince of this world [the devil] cometh, and in Me he has not anything!” (John 14:30) … “My kingdom is not of this world! … My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). To those who wish to be part of the world, He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His true followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His true followers He points out: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
Hence Holy Scripture says: “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world! And this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Wonder not if the world hate you!” (1 John 3:13) ― for the world hates Christ and all that Christ stands for, which is summarized by the Catholic Faith. The Catholic Church has always been the enemy of the world―as Our Lord said above. The more that we follow the world and its attitudes, maxims, fashions, ideas, ways of operating, etc., then the more we become enemies of God and Christ. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life―which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27). “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world, and this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:2-4).
The Right Idea of Life
What, then, is the right idea of life? To save souls from the clutches of this world―of which Satan is the prince. Our Lord said: “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly!” (John 10:10). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). That is Christ’s battle plan! Is that our battle plan? We are the Soldiers of Christ―so how can we have different battle plan to that of our Head and Leader? Thus it is that that Canon Law says: “The supreme law is the salvation of souls.” This is why Our Lady of Fatima insisted that we work for the salvation of souls: “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: ‘O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.’ … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
Providentially the Legion of Mary was Born at the Same Time as Communism
At Fatima, in 1917, Our Lady asked that devotion to her in general, and devotion to her Immaculate Heart be spread throughout the world―it was something that God the Father and God the Son desired. The Legion of Mary answers that call―as we will see in a moment.
Our Lady of Fatima asked for prayers and sacrifices―especially the prayer of the Rosary―for the conversion of sinners. The Legion of Mary answers that call―as we see shortly.
Our Lord said that He had come to seek and save that which was lost. That is also what the Legion of Mary does―it seeks out conversions to the Faith and seeks to bring the fallen away and lapsed Catholics back to the Faith. More on that in a moment.
The Sacrament of Confirmation makes us Soldiers of Christ―the Legion of Mary is organized on a military basis, which is that of the Roman Legion of Ancient Rome―and it organizes its members in a soldierly way, so that they can fight to defend the Faith and fight to conquer for the Faith. Being a Soldier of Christ is not an option that you can decide to take or leave―it is an inescapable obligation that falls upon every Catholic who has received the Sacrament of Confirmation. “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6) … “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) … “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12) … “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
Those words of Holy Scripture should jolt the many “armchair soldiers” who do little or nothing as a Soldier of Christ. God wants fruit from Catholics―and that does not mean apples, bananas and oranges! “Bring forth fruit!” (Matthew 3:8). Jesus said: “In this is My Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit! … I am the true vine and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me [on My vine], that bears not fruit, He will take away! And every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit! … I have chosen you that you should go and should bring forth fruit!” [John 15:1-2, 8, 16). “He hears the word of God, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word, and he becomes fruitless! … The cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things, entering in choke the word of God and it is made fruitless! … They are choked with the cares and riches and pleasures of this life, and yield no fruit!” (Matthew 13:22; Mark 4:19; Luke 8:14). “Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:19).
To how many of us does the following parable apply? “Jesus also spoke this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for the last three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree―and I find none! Therefore, cut it down! Why does it encumber the ground?” But he answering, said to him: “Lord, leave it alone also this year, so that I can dig around it and dung it! And perhaps happily it bears fruit! But if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”’” (Luke 13:6-9). That was only a story―a parable―but, on another occasion, “when Jesus had seen, afar off, a fig tree having leaves, being hungry, He went to it that He might perhaps find something on it. And when He was come to it, He found nothing but leaves. And He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever! May no man, hereafter, eat fruit of thee any more for ever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19; Mark 11:13-21). How many “withered” Catholics do we have today? How many “fruitless” Catholics? How many Catholics in whom “the cares of the world, the deceitfulness of riches and the lusts after other things, entering in, have choked the word of God and made it fruitless”? If most Catholics end up being damned―which is what Our Lord, Our Lady, and many saints tell us―then you can imagine that most Catholics are “withered”, “fruitless”, “armchair soldiers”!
Our Lord came to fight ― to fight for the salvation of souls: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! … For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 12:51; Matthew 10:34; Luke 19:10). Yet judging by the behavior of many Catholics, you would think that they prefer to turn sword on each other and fight among themselves rather than fight for the salvation of souls! That kind of fighting was not the kind of fighting that Our Lord had in mind when He added to the above quotes: “I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. For they will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they shall persecute you in this city, flee into another!” (Matthew 10:17-22; 10:32-37; Luke 12:49-53). Our Lord is speaking about His doctrine dividing families and not petty squabbles based on passions, pride, jealousy, envy, covetousness, greed, revenge, etc!
The Legion of Mary is Fighting Army of Lay People
As the Official Handbook of the Legion of Mary states: “The Legion of Mary is an Association of Catholics who, with the sanction of the Church and under the powerful leadership of Mary Immaculate, Mediatrix of all Graces (who is fair as the moon, bright as the sun, and―to Satan and his legionaries―terrible as an army set in battle array), have formed themselves into a Legion for service in the warfare which is perpetually waged, by the Church, against the world and its evil powers … The Legion of Mary is therefore organized on the model of an army―principally on that of the army of ancient Rome, the terminology of which is adopted also. But the army and the arms of Legionaries of Mary are not of this world.” (Legion of Mary Handbook—Chapter 1—”Name and Origin”)
1917 was probably the most significant year for the Church in the 20th century. The First World War was devastating Europe and it seemed as though the end was not near. Lenin and his followers sparked the Communist Revolution in Russia which would soon set ablaze many parts of the world with the evils of Communism. It was also during 1917 that Our Lady was appearing at Fatima, offering peace to nations and aiding her children in the struggle against the growing Russian Revolution. During the same time that these pivotal events were occurring, Our Lady was beginning to raise an army of her own. This army, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin and having as its end spiritual goals, came from Ireland and was known as the Legion of Mary. It would not be long before this spiritual army of Our Lady would become a major enemy to the Communists in their revolutionary takeover of China during the 1950s. What the Legion of Mary achieved in the face of Communist persecution in China, the Legion of Mary (if properly organized and used correctly) can also achieve in the face of the persecutions that are yet to come.
During 1917 the foundations for the Legion of Mary were being laid. Frank Duff and other members of the St. Vincent de Paul Society were at that time holding monthly meetings and doing spiritual and corporal works of mercy. They continued this format for the next five years, and from this gathering of Catholics emerged the Legion of Mary. On the eve of the Feast of Our Lady’s Nativity, September 7th, 1921, a priest, together with Frank Duff and fifteen young women gathered together in a room in the poor section of Dublin. Kneeling before an image of Our Lady, the Holy Spirit was invoked and the Rosary recited. Afterwards, this small band discussed their proposed work of visiting cancer patients in South Dublin Union Hospital. From that day on the group performed weekly apostolic work assignments and attended the weekly Praesidium meeting (a Praesidium is the smallest cell of the Legion system. It has anywhere from a handful of members up to around 20 to 30 members).
The Legion of Mary Grows, Spreads and Fights
The membership soon grew to four Praesidia and on the Legion’s first anniversary there were almost 100 active members in Dublin. 1927 marked the first year that a branch was started outside Dublin, this being in Waterford, Ireland. In 1928 the Legion was taken to Glasgow, Scotland and the following year, to England and Wales. From there it spread to India, the United States, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. In 1934, the Legion came to the United States. From 1930 to 1950 over thirty full-time envoys were sent throughout the world to found and build up the Legion, During these years envoys labored in Central America, France, Egypt, Israel, Mexico, the Philippines, and China. The Legion of Mary was brought into China in 1937, but for the next nine years it was little known. However, 1946 marked the beginning of the spread of the Legion throughout China. By 1949, the Communists were in control of nearly all China and became aware of this rapidly growing Legion of Mary movement. They ordered Fr. McGrath to stop his Legion activities―but he protested saying that the Legion was a purely spiritual organization. He gave them a copy of the Legion of Mary Handbook and invited them to attend a meeting to see for themselves. This they did and afterwards returned the Handbook―their comment was: “This is a great organization, just like Communism!”
All remained fairly quiet during the first year of the Communist occupation―but then persecution of the Church began, when the Communists proclaimed their intention to establish “Patriotic Churches” which would be run by the Communist government and be separated from Rome. The first wave of persecution was directed first against foreign missionaries. Priests and sisters were arrested, falsely convicted and expelled from China. Many hundreds were sentenced to long prison terms. The Chinese Catholic hierarchy refused to support this new schismatic movement, and the Legion of Mary set to work informing and instructing the Catholic faithful about the issues at stake in this undermining plot.
When the Communists realized that the effort to separate Chinese Catholics from Rome was failing, they began a violent attack in the Communist press directed against the clergy and the Legion of Mary. Within a year, the Internuncio from Rome was expelled from China and most of the leading priests were jailed. The Legion came under very fierce attack by the press. The next Communist move was to try and suppress the Legion. Legionaries were ordered to register their names with the police. To register under these terms was equal to signing one’s death warrant, since revolt against the country and having contact with imperialism merited a punishment of death or life imprisonment. Only a handful signed the forms, and most of these later returned and withdrew their registrations. The Legionaries as a body refused to give up their membership. Some Legionaries wrote a letter, signed in their own blood, to the Bishop of Shanghai. “Monsignor, we will follow you wherever you go,” said the letter. “We are proud to live in this age of persecution and there can be no compromises.” The refusal of Legionaries to register led to the arrest of thousands. Soon, every Legion officer was in prison.
The Communists still pressed on, attempting to establish an independent Church from Rome. The Communists began winning over priests and bishops and by 1957 the Association of Patriotic Priests was founded. The next year, 1958, the Patriotic Church was formally established. Nevertheless, the Roman Catholic Church is still alive inside China although it is seldom able to communicate with Rome. These Catholics have no churches, but hear Mass in straw houses, and do not wish to have anything to do with the Chinese Patriotic Church. It seems that after most of the priests and bishops had been imprisoned in the 1950s, and after almost all of the foreign missionaries had been expelled, the Chinese laity held the Church together. For years the laity had very few priests but they continued to evangelize, instruct and baptize. Legion of Mary members were among these laity.
The above quoted words of Our Lord can very fittingly be applied to the plight of Catholics in China in general, and to the Legion of Mary in particular: “I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. For they will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they shall persecute you in this city, flee into another!” (Matthew 10:17-22; 10:32-37; Luke 12:49-53).
The plight and fate of Chinese Catholics show that those words of Our Lord were not meaningless words and were not spoken in vain―those words of Our Lord are the daily fare, the daily bread and butter of many Catholics in China in the 21st century. The following words of Scripture could well be applied to us in relation to our Catholic brethren in China: “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6).
What is the point of owning a car if you never use it? What good is it having a computer or a cell-phone if they are never used? Why enroll your child in a school if you never send the child to that school? Why marry somebody if you do not intend to have children―because procreation is the primary purpose of marriage? Why purchase Rosary beads and a Brown Scapular if you never intend to pray the Rosary or wear the Scapular? Why become a soldier if you do not intend to fight? Why bother getting baptized if you do not intend to live a Catholic life? Why go to Confession and confess a particular mortal sin that you do not intend to give up and stop committing?
Similarly, the Sacrament of Confirmation makes us Soldiers of Christ. Why bother being confirmed if you do not intend to be a Soldier of Christ and fight for the Faith? It is probably true to say that the Sacrament of Confirmation is the least understood and most underrated Sacrament of them all.
The CATECHISM OF THE COUNCIL OF TRENT states: “If ever there was a time demanding the diligence of pastors in explaining the Sacrament of Confirmation, in these days certainly it requires special attention, when there are found in the Holy Church of God many by whom this Sacrament is altogether omitted; while very few seek to obtain from it the fruit of divine grace which they should derive from its participation … It is necessary to teach that this Sacrament is not so necessary as to be utterly essential to salvation. Although not essential, however, it ought to be omitted by no one … Confirmation perfects the grace of Baptism. For those who have been made Christians by Baptism, still have in some sort the tenderness and softness, as it were, of new-born infants, and afterwards become, by means of the Sacrament of chrism, stronger to resist all the assaults of the world, the flesh and the devil, while their minds are fully confirmed in faith to confess and glorify the name of our Lord Jesus Christ …
“Before receiving the Holy Ghost at Pentecost, the Apostles were so weak and timid before and even at the very time of the Passion, that no sooner was Our Lord arrested, that they instantly fled; and Peter, who had been designated the rock and foundation of the Church, and who had displayed unshaken constancy and exalted magnanimity, terrified at the voice of one weak woman, denied, not once nor twice only, but a third time, that he was a disciple of Jesus Christ; and after the Resurrection they all remained shut up at home for fear of the Jews. But, on the day of Pentecost, so great was the power of the Holy Ghost with which they were all filled that, while they boldly and freely disseminated the Gospel confided to them, not only through Judea, but throughout the world, they thought no greater happiness could await them than that of being accounted worthy to suffer contumely, chains, torments and crucifixion, for the name of Christ
“By Confirmation we are armed and arrayed as soldiers of Christ, publicly to profess and defend His name, to fight against our internal enemy and against the spiritual powers of wickedness in the high places … The person when anointed and confirmed next receives a slap on the cheek from the hand of the Bishop, to make him recollect that, as a valiant combatant, he should be prepared to endure with unconquered spirit all adversities for the name of Christ.” (Catechism of the Council of Trent).
The CATECHISM, MY CATHOLIC FAITH, states: “Confirmation is the Sacrament through which the Holy Spirit comes to us in a special way and enables us to profess our Faith as strong and perfect Christians and soldiers of Jesus Christ … Confirmation marks the Christian as a soldier in the army of Christ … When giving Confirmation, the bishop lays his hand on the head of the person he confirms, and anoints the forehead with holy chrism in the form of a cross … By anointing the forehead with chrism in the form of a cross is meant that the Catholic who is confirmed must always be ready to profess his Faith openly and to practice it fearlessly. The cross marked on our foreheads at Confirmation reminds us never to be ashamed to profess ourselves disciples of a crucified Savior … The bishop gives the person a blow on the cheek, to remind the person to be ready to suffer all things, even death, for his Faith ... Confirmation grants us the special grace by which our Faith is deepened and strengthened, and we become concerned not only for our own spiritual needs, but for those of others … The confirmed will no longer remain on the defensive fighting for his Faith when being attacked. He will go forth joyfully in the fulfillment of vocation of soldier of Christ. He will join the ranks of Catholic Action, he will start being a real soldier of Christ, he will be ‘another Christ’” (Catechism: My Catholic Faith).
ST. CYRIL OF JERUSALEM (347-350), a Father and Doctor of the Church, writes of Confirmation, saying: “By the coming of the Holy Spirit … having put on the full suit of armor of the Holy Spirit, you are to withstand the power of the adversary, and defeat him saying: ‘I am able to do all things in Christ, Who strengthens me!’ … Just as Christ, after His Baptism and the coming upon Him of the Holy Spirit, went forth and defeated the adversary, so also with you … “Forget not the Holy Spirit! He is ready to mark your soul with His seal.... He will give you the heavenly and divine seal which makes the devil tremble; He will arm you for the fight; He will give you strength!”
ST. EPHREM THE SYRIAN says of the Sacrament of Confirmation: “They are sealed and put on the armor of the Holy Spirit.”
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS, in his Summa Contra Gentiles, writes: “The perfection of spiritual strength consists properly on a man’s daring to confess the Faith of Christ in the presence of anyone at all, and in a man’s being not withdrawn therefrom either by confusion or by terror, for strength drives out inordinate terror. Therefore, the Sacrament of Confirmation, by which spiritual strength is conferred, makes him in some sense a front-line fighter for the Faith of Christ. And because fighters under a prince carry his insignia, they who receive the Sacrament of Confirmation are signed with the Sign of the Cross by which He fought and conquered. This sign they receive on the forehead as a sign that without a blush they publicly confess the Faith of Christ.”
POPE PIUS XII, writes: “By the chrism of Confirmation, the faithful are given added strength to protect and defend the Church and the Faith She has given them” (Mystici Corporis, 1943).
No Exemptions
Being a Soldier of Christ is not an option, not a choice, not a preference―it is an obligation. “Although this Sacrament [of Confirmation] is not necessary as a means of salvation, it is not permitted for anyone, when occasion arises, to neglect it” (1917 Code of Canon Law, canon 787; 1983 Code of Canon Law, canon 813). “This Sacrament is not so necessary as to be utterly essential to salvation. Although not essential, however, it ought to be omitted by no one” (Catechism of the Council of Trent). We are all called to be Soldiers of Christ―not passive soldiers of Christ who just sit around, but active soldiers who do something: “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). Thus, as the Catechism My Catholic Faith states, “He will go forth joyfully in the fulfillment of vocation of soldier of Christ. He will join the ranks of Catholic Action, he will start being a real soldier of Christ, he will be ‘another Christ.’”
POPE ST. PIUS X speaks of this “Catholic Action” in his encyclical Il Fermo Proposito, wherein he writes: “We wish to recall those numerous works of zeal for the good of the Church, society, and individuals under the general name of ‘Catholic Action’ … The field of Catholic Action is extremely vast. In itself it does not exclude anything, in any manner, direct or indirect, which pertains to the divine mission of the Church ... One can plainly see how necessary it is for everyone to cooperate in such an important work … They use every means in repairing the serious disorders and seek to restore Jesus Christ to the family, the school and society by re-establishing the authority of God. They strive, in a word, to make public laws conformable to justice and amend or suppress those which are not so. Finally, they defend and support, in a true Catholic spirit, the rights of God in all things and the no less sacred rights of the Church. All these works, sustained and promoted chiefly by lay Catholics and whose form varies according to the needs of each country, constitute what is generally known by a distinctive and surely a very noble name: ‘Catholic Action,’ or the ‘Action of Catholics.’ At all times it came to the aid of the Church, and the Church has always cherished and blessed such help … Catholic Action constitutes a real apostolate for the honor and glory of Christ Himself.”
Enjoying Your Day?
Are you comfortable? Did you enjoy your dinner? Are you having a good time? Are the children playing? Watching television? Surfing the internet or social media? Chatting on the phone? Out socializing? Out making most of the warm weather? It is not quite what Our Lady has in mind for us! Our Lady of Good Success warned of our “easy-going” times when she said: “Unbridled luxury and extravagance will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! O, if men only understood how to appreciate the time given to them and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!” … while Our Lady of La Salette further warned: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance … People will think of nothing but amusement!”
Heaven Might Not Be Enjoying Your Day!
Your day might not be Heaven’s day―your way might not be Heaven’s way: “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). We amass riches―Heaven says give away your riches: “Jesus said to the rich young man: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven―and then come follow Me!’” (Matthew 19:21).
Even the three little children of Fatima had fallen into this love for “amusements” ― which was criticized and rebuked by the Angel of Portugal when he appeared to them while they were playing. Hey! Little children are supposed play, aren’t they? Well, yes, but they should also pray and not just play―and, according to the Angel, pray more than play! The Angel appeared to the playing children and rebuked them, saying: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!” That is fighting talk!
Our Lady of Fatima, at her first appearance, would later back-up the Angel’s words by asking the children: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort!” Heck―today, in this modern over-sensitive prickly world, those words of Our Lady would be looked upon as a threat―and some would not hesitate to sue her for frightening little children! Furthermore, she even shows them a real vision of Hell to scare them even more―Lucia said they would have died on the spot out or terror, had not the grace of God kept them alive! Boy! They would have a field-day in the courts suing Our Lady for that!
Our Lady came looking―not for “armchair Catholics”, nor “couch-potato Catholics”, not “cafeteria Catholics”―but she came looking for “battlefield Catholics” who would fight and suffer for Our Lord, Our Lady and our Faith. As Sister Lucia of Fatima would later say: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle! It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground!” Those words make us recall what Our Lord said in the Gospels: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). You could paraphrase that and say: “He who does fight for Me, fights against Me!”
Our Lord Came to Fight
Our Lord did come to bring peace and comfort, fun and entertainment on this Earth―He came to call us to the fight! “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! ... Many shall betray one another and shall hate one another! … You shall be brought before governors and before kings for My sake! They will deliver you up in councils and they will scourge you in their synagogues. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted and shall put you to death! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death; and the father the son; and the children shall rise up against their parents and shall put them to death! But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:17-22, 34-36; 24:9-10; Luke 12:51-53).
Wrong Idea of Life
We have the wrong idea of life―we want our life to be easy and comfortable; we want our life to be fun and enjoyable; we want to be a rich as we can; we want to be accepted by the world and so we jump through all the hoops that the world places in front of us in order to get all these things. If that is our attitude, then we have the wrong idea of what is supposed to be about! Yes―St. Thomas Aquinas says that it is normal for every person to seek out happiness―but in what basket are we seeking that happiness? The basket of the world, or the basket of Heaven. Our Lord was pretty clear and unambiguous on the matter when He said: “He that loves his life [in this world] shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:25). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). “Blessed is the man that has not gone after gold, nor put his trust in money nor in treasures!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:8). “The cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke up the word [of God]!” (Matthew 13:22).
When you read the serious and acclaimed spiritual masters―which most people do not read―then you will see that the path to Heaven is a path of progressive detachment from persons, places and possessions. Life is not a case of “keeping-your-cake-and-eating-it”―which is impossible―for you either keep it or you eat it, not both. You cannot be with the world and against it―all at the same time. Our Lord is not on the side of the world―He came into this world to save us from slavery to the world, which is a slavery to sin and Satan―for Satan is “prince of this world” (John 12:31). “The prince of this world [the devil] cometh, and in Me he has not anything!” (John 14:30) … “My kingdom is not of this world! … My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). To those who wish to be part of the world, He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His true followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His true followers He points out: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
Hence Holy Scripture says: “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world! And this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Wonder not if the world hate you!” (1 John 3:13) ― for the world hates Christ and all that Christ stands for, which is summarized by the Catholic Faith. The Catholic Church has always been the enemy of the world―as Our Lord said above. The more that we follow the world and its attitudes, maxims, fashions, ideas, ways of operating, etc., then the more we become enemies of God and Christ. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life―which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27). “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world, and this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:2-4).
The Right Idea of Life
What, then, is the right idea of life? To save souls from the clutches of this world―of which Satan is the prince. Our Lord said: “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly!” (John 10:10). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). That is Christ’s battle plan! Is that our battle plan? We are the Soldiers of Christ―so how can we have different battle plan to that of our Head and Leader? Thus it is that that Canon Law says: “The supreme law is the salvation of souls.” This is why Our Lady of Fatima insisted that we work for the salvation of souls: “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: ‘O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.’ … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
Providentially the Legion of Mary was Born at the Same Time as Communism
At Fatima, in 1917, Our Lady asked that devotion to her in general, and devotion to her Immaculate Heart be spread throughout the world―it was something that God the Father and God the Son desired. The Legion of Mary answers that call―as we will see in a moment.
Our Lady of Fatima asked for prayers and sacrifices―especially the prayer of the Rosary―for the conversion of sinners. The Legion of Mary answers that call―as we see shortly.
Our Lord said that He had come to seek and save that which was lost. That is also what the Legion of Mary does―it seeks out conversions to the Faith and seeks to bring the fallen away and lapsed Catholics back to the Faith. More on that in a moment.
The Sacrament of Confirmation makes us Soldiers of Christ―the Legion of Mary is organized on a military basis, which is that of the Roman Legion of Ancient Rome―and it organizes its members in a soldierly way, so that they can fight to defend the Faith and fight to conquer for the Faith. Being a Soldier of Christ is not an option that you can decide to take or leave―it is an inescapable obligation that falls upon every Catholic who has received the Sacrament of Confirmation. “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6) … “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) … “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12) … “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
Those words of Holy Scripture should jolt the many “armchair soldiers” who do little or nothing as a Soldier of Christ. God wants fruit from Catholics―and that does not mean apples, bananas and oranges! “Bring forth fruit!” (Matthew 3:8). Jesus said: “In this is My Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit! … I am the true vine and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me [on My vine], that bears not fruit, He will take away! And every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit! … I have chosen you that you should go and should bring forth fruit!” [John 15:1-2, 8, 16). “He hears the word of God, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word, and he becomes fruitless! … The cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things, entering in choke the word of God and it is made fruitless! … They are choked with the cares and riches and pleasures of this life, and yield no fruit!” (Matthew 13:22; Mark 4:19; Luke 8:14). “Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:19).
To how many of us does the following parable apply? “Jesus also spoke this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for the last three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree―and I find none! Therefore, cut it down! Why does it encumber the ground?” But he answering, said to him: “Lord, leave it alone also this year, so that I can dig around it and dung it! And perhaps happily it bears fruit! But if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”’” (Luke 13:6-9). That was only a story―a parable―but, on another occasion, “when Jesus had seen, afar off, a fig tree having leaves, being hungry, He went to it that He might perhaps find something on it. And when He was come to it, He found nothing but leaves. And He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever! May no man, hereafter, eat fruit of thee any more for ever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19; Mark 11:13-21). How many “withered” Catholics do we have today? How many “fruitless” Catholics? How many Catholics in whom “the cares of the world, the deceitfulness of riches and the lusts after other things, entering in, have choked the word of God and made it fruitless”? If most Catholics end up being damned―which is what Our Lord, Our Lady, and many saints tell us―then you can imagine that most Catholics are “withered”, “fruitless”, “armchair soldiers”!
Our Lord came to fight ― to fight for the salvation of souls: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! … For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 12:51; Matthew 10:34; Luke 19:10). Yet judging by the behavior of many Catholics, you would think that they prefer to turn sword on each other and fight among themselves rather than fight for the salvation of souls! That kind of fighting was not the kind of fighting that Our Lord had in mind when He added to the above quotes: “I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. For they will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they shall persecute you in this city, flee into another!” (Matthew 10:17-22; 10:32-37; Luke 12:49-53). Our Lord is speaking about His doctrine dividing families and not petty squabbles based on passions, pride, jealousy, envy, covetousness, greed, revenge, etc!
The Legion of Mary is Fighting Army of Lay People
As the Official Handbook of the Legion of Mary states: “The Legion of Mary is an Association of Catholics who, with the sanction of the Church and under the powerful leadership of Mary Immaculate, Mediatrix of all Graces (who is fair as the moon, bright as the sun, and―to Satan and his legionaries―terrible as an army set in battle array), have formed themselves into a Legion for service in the warfare which is perpetually waged, by the Church, against the world and its evil powers … The Legion of Mary is therefore organized on the model of an army―principally on that of the army of ancient Rome, the terminology of which is adopted also. But the army and the arms of Legionaries of Mary are not of this world.” (Legion of Mary Handbook—Chapter 1—”Name and Origin”)
1917 was probably the most significant year for the Church in the 20th century. The First World War was devastating Europe and it seemed as though the end was not near. Lenin and his followers sparked the Communist Revolution in Russia which would soon set ablaze many parts of the world with the evils of Communism. It was also during 1917 that Our Lady was appearing at Fatima, offering peace to nations and aiding her children in the struggle against the growing Russian Revolution. During the same time that these pivotal events were occurring, Our Lady was beginning to raise an army of her own. This army, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin and having as its end spiritual goals, came from Ireland and was known as the Legion of Mary. It would not be long before this spiritual army of Our Lady would become a major enemy to the Communists in their revolutionary takeover of China during the 1950s. What the Legion of Mary achieved in the face of Communist persecution in China, the Legion of Mary (if properly organized and used correctly) can also achieve in the face of the persecutions that are yet to come.
During 1917 the foundations for the Legion of Mary were being laid. Frank Duff and other members of the St. Vincent de Paul Society were at that time holding monthly meetings and doing spiritual and corporal works of mercy. They continued this format for the next five years, and from this gathering of Catholics emerged the Legion of Mary. On the eve of the Feast of Our Lady’s Nativity, September 7th, 1921, a priest, together with Frank Duff and fifteen young women gathered together in a room in the poor section of Dublin. Kneeling before an image of Our Lady, the Holy Spirit was invoked and the Rosary recited. Afterwards, this small band discussed their proposed work of visiting cancer patients in South Dublin Union Hospital. From that day on the group performed weekly apostolic work assignments and attended the weekly Praesidium meeting (a Praesidium is the smallest cell of the Legion system. It has anywhere from a handful of members up to around 20 to 30 members).
The Legion of Mary Grows, Spreads and Fights
The membership soon grew to four Praesidia and on the Legion’s first anniversary there were almost 100 active members in Dublin. 1927 marked the first year that a branch was started outside Dublin, this being in Waterford, Ireland. In 1928 the Legion was taken to Glasgow, Scotland and the following year, to England and Wales. From there it spread to India, the United States, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. In 1934, the Legion came to the United States. From 1930 to 1950 over thirty full-time envoys were sent throughout the world to found and build up the Legion, During these years envoys labored in Central America, France, Egypt, Israel, Mexico, the Philippines, and China. The Legion of Mary was brought into China in 1937, but for the next nine years it was little known. However, 1946 marked the beginning of the spread of the Legion throughout China. By 1949, the Communists were in control of nearly all China and became aware of this rapidly growing Legion of Mary movement. They ordered Fr. McGrath to stop his Legion activities―but he protested saying that the Legion was a purely spiritual organization. He gave them a copy of the Legion of Mary Handbook and invited them to attend a meeting to see for themselves. This they did and afterwards returned the Handbook―their comment was: “This is a great organization, just like Communism!”
All remained fairly quiet during the first year of the Communist occupation―but then persecution of the Church began, when the Communists proclaimed their intention to establish “Patriotic Churches” which would be run by the Communist government and be separated from Rome. The first wave of persecution was directed first against foreign missionaries. Priests and sisters were arrested, falsely convicted and expelled from China. Many hundreds were sentenced to long prison terms. The Chinese Catholic hierarchy refused to support this new schismatic movement, and the Legion of Mary set to work informing and instructing the Catholic faithful about the issues at stake in this undermining plot.
When the Communists realized that the effort to separate Chinese Catholics from Rome was failing, they began a violent attack in the Communist press directed against the clergy and the Legion of Mary. Within a year, the Internuncio from Rome was expelled from China and most of the leading priests were jailed. The Legion came under very fierce attack by the press. The next Communist move was to try and suppress the Legion. Legionaries were ordered to register their names with the police. To register under these terms was equal to signing one’s death warrant, since revolt against the country and having contact with imperialism merited a punishment of death or life imprisonment. Only a handful signed the forms, and most of these later returned and withdrew their registrations. The Legionaries as a body refused to give up their membership. Some Legionaries wrote a letter, signed in their own blood, to the Bishop of Shanghai. “Monsignor, we will follow you wherever you go,” said the letter. “We are proud to live in this age of persecution and there can be no compromises.” The refusal of Legionaries to register led to the arrest of thousands. Soon, every Legion officer was in prison.
The Communists still pressed on, attempting to establish an independent Church from Rome. The Communists began winning over priests and bishops and by 1957 the Association of Patriotic Priests was founded. The next year, 1958, the Patriotic Church was formally established. Nevertheless, the Roman Catholic Church is still alive inside China although it is seldom able to communicate with Rome. These Catholics have no churches, but hear Mass in straw houses, and do not wish to have anything to do with the Chinese Patriotic Church. It seems that after most of the priests and bishops had been imprisoned in the 1950s, and after almost all of the foreign missionaries had been expelled, the Chinese laity held the Church together. For years the laity had very few priests but they continued to evangelize, instruct and baptize. Legion of Mary members were among these laity.
The above quoted words of Our Lord can very fittingly be applied to the plight of Catholics in China in general, and to the Legion of Mary in particular: “I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. For they will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they shall persecute you in this city, flee into another!” (Matthew 10:17-22; 10:32-37; Luke 12:49-53).
The plight and fate of Chinese Catholics show that those words of Our Lord were not meaningless words and were not spoken in vain―those words of Our Lord are the daily fare, the daily bread and butter of many Catholics in China in the 21st century. The following words of Scripture could well be applied to us in relation to our Catholic brethren in China: “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6).
Article 1
Tuesday & Wedneday, September 3rd & 4th
What is the Point of Honoring the Sorrowful Heart of Mary?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Tuesday & Wedneday, September 3rd & 4th
What is the Point of Honoring the Sorrowful Heart of Mary?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Our Lord Demands!
Quite recently―in the 20th century―a particular aspect of devotion to Our Lady was revealed to a humble, saintly woman, Berthe Petit, who passed to her reward as recently as 1943. That particular aspect of devotion to Our Lady was focused upon her Sorrowful Heart. Our Lord Himself stated that He wanted the title “Sorrowful Heart” to be added to that of the “Immaculate Heart”.
Who was Berthe Petit? She was the third daughter of a well-to-do Catholic couple, was born at Enghien, in Belgium, in 1870. Her father was a notary. From her earliest childhood the little girl was in touch with Heaven. At four years old she had a vision of Our Lady. Somewhat later, in a Convent chapel she saw the tabernacle open and the Child Jesus, emerging, came towards her. As He made the sign of the Cross on her forehead, He said: “You will suffer always, but I shall be with you.” On her First Holy Communion day, when she was ten, her vocation of expiation and sorrow was revealed to her. “I must suffer a great deal,” she said to a nun, her teacher. “I must be like Jesus.”
“Who told you that?” the nun enquired.
“The little Host which was my Great Jesus,” was the child’s astonishing reply.
As the years passed, the fuller meaning of this suffering was made clear to her; and with full knowledge of what her sacrifice entailed, she offered herself to God “as a victim” for the salvation of souls and especially for the souls of priests.
For many years, this holy Franciscan Tertiary, while leading a life of hidden sufferings in the world, a voluntary victim for the expiation of sin, received repeated revelations from Our Lord of His desire that the whole world should be publicly dedicated to the SORROWFUL and Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Berthe Gains Church Approval
Berthe Petit, a Franciscan Tertiary (1870-1943), would gain the highest respect of Cardinals, Bishops, theologians and other members of the Church hierarchy at the time. In a letter, which contains an appreciation of Berthe Petit, Fr. Garrigou Lagrange, O.P., the renowned 20th century Thomistic theologian and professor of Ascetical and Mystical Theology at one of the most important seminaries of Rome, wrote:
“I cherish a vivid remembrance of Mademoiselle Berthe Petit, whom I met in Switzerland during the 1914-1918 war. I much appreciated the devotion to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary. I am of the same mind as Cardinals Mercier and Bourne that it recalls what the Blessed Virgin has received from God, both the grace of the Immaculate Conception as well as what she herself has done and suffered for us. This invocation of the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary seems very opportune in our days of universal suffering and trial, as appears by the Consecration to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary made by several Bishops in various Diocese of France and Belgium. The grace of the Immaculate Conception and the initial plenitude of her charity considerably increased in Mary her capacity for suffering from the greatest of all evils, which is sin. It is in proportion to one’s personal love of God that one suffers from sin, because of the offence given to God and the souls lost by it. Thus the Immaculate Heart of Mary was sorrowful in proportion to her purity and spotlessness, and in the measure of her initial charity, in which she grew every moment until the hour of her death. When we say ‘Immaculate Heart of Mary’ we recall what she received from God in the first instant of her conception. When we say ‘Sorrowful Heart’, we recall all that Mary has suffered and offered for us in union with her Son, from the words of holy Simeon to Calvary, and until her holy death.” (Fr. Garrigou Lagrange, O.P.)
Apparitions from Heaven Regarding the Sorrowful Heart
While attending Midnight Mass in 1909, she saw the wounded Heart of Jesus and closely adherent to it was the Heart of Mary pierced with a sword. Then she heard these words: “Cause My Mother’s Heart, transfixed by the sorrows that tore Mine, to be loved.”
Then on February 7th, 1910, she saw the Hearts of Jesus and Mary interpenetrating each other and hovering over the Hearts was a Dove. Jesus then spoke: “You must think of My Mother’s Heart as you think of Mine; live in this Heart as you seek to live in Mine; give yourself to this Heart as you give yourself to Mine. You must spread the love of this Heart so wholly united to Mine.” A few days later her mission was revealed to her. It was to obtain the consecration of the whole world to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary. For many years this holy Franciscan Tertiary, while leading a life of hidden suffering in the world, a voluntary victim for the expiation of sin, received repeated revelations from Our Lord of His desire that the whole world should be publicly consecrated to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart.
At that time Berthe’s visions were greatly multiplied. She received fresh revelations concerning the devotion almost daily, and each unfolded some further aspect of Our Lord’s desire. On one occasion, she saw the two Hearts emitting rays of light, while she heard these words: “I have told you the wish of My Heart concerning My Mother’s Heart: love it and cause it to be loved. This love will be the source of graces for you and for the world and will draw down great blessings upon you. Yield yourself to My love. My Heart’s wish will be confided to you.”
A few days later, while she was on a pilgrimage to St. Anne, in Alsace, this promise was fulfilled by the complete revelation of her Mission. It was to obtain the Consecration of the whole world to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary. Berthe was at that time on her way to Rome, accompanied by her Mother and the Fr. Decorsant. She broke her journey at Siena, where she had more than one vision. While assisting at the Father’s Mass in St. Catherine’s room, she saw the Divine Face under the Crown of thorns, in a great glory of light, at the moment of the Elevation. Our Lord said to her once more: “The world must be dedicated to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother, as it is dedicated to Mine. Fear nothing, no matter what suffering or obstacles you may meet. Think only of fulfilling My will.”
On Easter Sunday, 1910, at Rome, again at the Father Decorsant’s Mass, Berthe again saw the Hearts of Jesus and Mary, fused with one another under the wings of the Dove. This time she heard these words: “What I desire derives from what I did on Calvary. In giving John to My Mother for her son, I confided to her the Sorrowful and Immaculate Maternity of the whole world.” Our Lord then commanded her to make the drawing of the vision of the two Hearts, adding: “I will guide your hand.” A few months later, she received a further communication from Jesus: “I desire that the picture for which I guided your hand should be widely diffused as well as the invocation ‘Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us.’”
On September 8th, 1910, after receiving Holy Communion, Our Lord said to Berthe: “The Heart of My Mother has a right to be called Sorrowful and I wish this title to be placed before that of Immaculate because she has won it herself. The Church has defined in the case of My Mother what I Myself had ordained—her Immaculate Conception. This right which My Mother has to a title of justice is now, according to My express wish, to be known and universally accepted. She has earned it by her identification with My sorrows, by her sufferings, by her sacrifices and by her immolation on Calvary, endured in perfect correspondence with My grace for the salvation of mankind. In her co-redemption lies the nobility of My Mother and for this reason I ask for the invocation which I have demanded be approved and spread throughout the whole Church. It has already obtained many graces; it will obtain yet more when the Church will be exalted and the world renewed through its consecration to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother.”
Then nine days later, on September 17th, 1910, the Mother herself appeared to Berthe and revealed in a symbolic way the bodily martyrdom that she suffered at the foot of the Cross. Berthe saw her brow wounded and bleeding and her hands and heart pierced. She then said: “Now you can understand the sorrows which my Heart endured and the sufferings of my whole being for the salvation of the world.”
At a Holy Hour devotion during the night of March 24th-25th, 1912, the eve of the feast of the Annunciation, the Blessed Virgin spoke again to Berthe of her Sorrowful Heart: “I am called the Immaculate Conception. With you, I call myself the Mother of the Sorrowful Heart. This title that my Son wants is the dearest to me of all my titles and it is through it that shall be granted and spread everywhere, graces of mercy, spiritual renewal and salvation.”
The Sorrowful Heart and Politics
July 12th, 1912 marked the beginning of a different phase in the mystical experiences of Berthe Petit. Until that time her heavenly communications dealt solely with religious matters but on that day she received the first of several revelations concerning political events. They were similar to some of the messages of a political nature which were given by the Blessed Virgin Mary to St. Catherine Labouré in 1830, by the Virgin of La Salette to Melanie Calvat and Maximin Giraud in 1846 when she wept copiously.
On that day, Jesus told Berthe that the heir to the Catholic empire of Austria-Hungary would be assassinated: “A double murder will strike down the successor of the aged sovereign, so loyal to the Faith.” He was referring to Archduke Franz Josef I (1830-1916), who was 82 years old at the time. Jesus added: “It will be the first of those events (World Wars) full of sorrows, but from whence I shall still bring forth good and which will precede the chastisement.”
Heaven Announces War
This prophecy was fulfilled a little less than two years later on June 28th, 1914 when Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophia, the Duchess of Hohenburg, were assassinated by 19-year-old Gavrilo Princip, a Serbian nationalist. The following day, June 29th, Jesus said to Berthe: “Now begins the ascending curve of preliminary events, which will lead to the great manifestation of My justice.” Indeed that “preliminary event” in Sarajevo led to the First World War (1914-1918), which started about five weeks later on August 4th, 1914, when Germany violated Belgium’s neutrality, and by midnight Great Britain and Germany were at war. That war eventually led to the Second World War (1939-1945), which may well lead to and culminate in a Third World War in this nuclear age, with the possibility of the annihilation of several nations. Sister Lucia of Fatima stated: “The Blessed Virgin said repeatedly ― to my cousins Francisco and Jacinta as well as to me ― that many nations would disappear from the face of the Earth!”
According to Berthe Petit, when the Germans entered Brussels and violated Belgium’s neutrality, just as He harshly criticized the Pharisees, as recorded in the Gospels, Jesus had harsh words to say about the German invaders: “The proud race and its ambitious ruler (Kaiser William II) will be chastised on the very soil (Belgium) of their unjust conquest … The worst calamities which I predicted are unleashed. The time has now arrived when I wish mankind to turn to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother. Let this prayer be uttered by every soul: ‘Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us!’ so that it may spread as a refreshing and purifying balm of reparation that will appease My anger. This devotion to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother will restore faith and hope to broken hearts and to ruined families. It will help to repair the destruction. It will sweeten sorrow. It will be a new strength for My Church, bringing souls, not only to confidence in My Heart, but also to abandonment to the Sorrowful Heart of My Mother.”
Pope St. Pius X died on August 10th, 1914, soon after the First World War began, and he was succeeded by Pope Benedict XV. As Sir Nicholas Cheetham commented in his History of the Popes: “How ought the Holy See to react to a murderous conflict in which Catholic Austria-Hungary and partly-Catholic Germany stood initially opposed to an alliance of Catholic, but officially irreligious France, with Orthodox Russia and Protestant Great Britain?”
This indeed was the problem facing the Pope, shortly to be complicated by Italy’s entry into the war. In his first statement on September 8th, 1914, the feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, he mourned the bloodshed and pleaded for a quick end to the war just begun. He also denounced the war as a crime against religion, humanity and civilization, as it was perpetrated by Catholic countries.
In his first encyclical Ad Beatissimi Apostolorum, issued on November 1st, 1914, Pope Benedict XV criticized the warring Christian peoples: “Who could realize,” he wrote, “that they are the children of the same Father in Heaven?” He then closed with a call for a prayer to Christ and the Blessed Virgin Mary, “who bore the Prince of Peace.” Then the following year, on May 3rd, 1915, he sent a letter to the Dean of the Sacred College, Cardinal Venutelli, which concluded with the following recommendation addressed to all the bishops of the world: “Let us send up our prayers, more than ever ardent and frequent, to Him in whose Hands lie the destinies of all peoples, and let us appeal with confidence to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, the most gentle Mother of Jesus and ours, that by her powerful intercession she will obtain from her divine Son the speedy end of the war and the return of peace and tranquility.”
Two Cardinals Bring the Sorrowful Heart into the War
Berthe Petit spent the years of the First World War in Switzerland, where she was frequently told in advance of the calamities that would befall the Allies. However, the two Cardinals who cooperated most with her were Cardinal Desiré Mercier, Primate of Belgium, and Cardinal Francis Alphonsus Bourne, the Primate of England and Archbishop of Canterbury. Cardinal Bourne (1861-1935) became acclaimed for his patriotic speeches during the war and Cardinal Mercier (1851-1926) became the spokesman of Belgian opposition to the German occupation, for which the Germans placed him under house arrest. He was Berthe’s spiritual director for several years, was deeply impressed by her heavenly communications, and energetically promoted the devotion to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary in Belgium. In fact, he had also approached the predecessor of Pope Benedict XV, Pope St. Pius X (1903-1914), and attempted to win his approval for the worldwide devotion. Seventeen petitions were made to the Pope, however, sadly to say, the Pope did not find it appropriate to promote a new worldwide devotion at that time, but it was certainly never condemned on doctrinal grounds. However, like Pope St. Pius X, Pope Benedict XV also did not judge the time opportune for a worldwide devotion.
In February, 1915, Our Lord said to Berthe: “It is through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother that I will triumph, because having cooperated in the redemption of souls, this Heart has the right to share a similar cooperation in the manifestations of My justice and of My love. My Mother is noble in everything, but she is especially so in her wounded Heart, transfixed by the wound of Mine.”
Berthe, meanwhile, remained quietly patient in Switzerland awaiting God’s good pleasure and continued to receive heavenly communications. Our Lady later showed her in a vision an untold multitude of every race and color, sick and suffering, all praying with arms raised to Heaven. Some were physically healed, others, touched by grace, fell on their knees. “It seemed a regeneration of the whole world,” said Berthe.
Meanwhile, as the war continued, on March 7th, 1916, Belgium’s Cardinal Mercier (1851–1926) announced that during the Good Friday ceremonies he would dedicate his diocese and his beloved country Belgium to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, and in England Cardinal Bourne continued to rally the faithful towards this devotion. In a pastoral letter of September 3rd, 1916, he wrote:
“Nowhere in Christendom should honor be paid more readily to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary than here in England. In the days of united Faith (that is, before the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century), her purity and her sorrows were ever held in loving veneration. Throughout the realm, Our Blessed Lady, God’s Mother, were terms and titles dear to every English heart. England was, in very truth, Our Lady’s dowry. It is, therefore, not with the idea of introducing any new devotion, but rather in order to give fresh meaning and greater force to thoughts long cherished by us all and deep-rooted in the history of our race that we desire to consecrate with renewed effort the prayer, which the special circumstances of the moment so urgently demand, to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary…
“For these reasons, we desire and enjoin that in all the churches and public chapels of our diocese, Friday, September 15th, the feast of the Seven Sorrows of Our Lady, or on the following Sunday, during Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, the Stabat Mater be sung, to be followed by the recitation of three Hail Marys and the invocation (repeated after each Hail Mary) “Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us,” in order that, by this public homage, all our dioceses, and, insofar in us lies, our whole country and empire may be solemnly consecrated and dedicated to Our Blessed Lady under this special title.”
In 1917, in his Pastoral Letter of Quinquagesima Sunday, Cardinal Bourne, while exhorting the faithful of his diocese to earnest prayer accompanied by almsgiving, to obtain the mercy of God in such critical times, added this further recommendation:
“We place again our intercession under the care and protection of the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, and with this object we ordain that the Act of Consecration which we send herewith, be recited in all the churches and chapels of our Diocese, immediately after the “O Salutaris”, at the principal Benediction, on the first Sunday of Lent, and again recited at Benediction on Friday, March 30th, the feast of the Seven Sorrows of Our Blessed Lady. We commend to the clergy and faithful the daily recitation of this Act of Consecration, to which we have attached an indulgence of 200 days.”
Cardinal Bourne had requested Father Condamin to ask Berthe Petit, through the intermediary of her spiritual director, for the text of an act of consecration. “I have told Mademoiselle Petit,” replied the Father Decorsant, “to obtain this during one of her thanksgivings, after Holy Communion. She wrote down (in French) the following prayer, which she affirmed was dictated to her by Our Lord Himself.”
The Sorrowful Heart Leads British Troops to Victory
That day, September 15th, 1916, the feast of the Seven Sorrows of Our Lady, marked the greatest success of the British. In fact, each time public devotions were performed in England, the British armies swept forward to unexpected victories, so much so that Marshal Ferdinand Foch, the Commander in Chief of the Allied forces in France, observed in his “Memoires” that, strangely enough, the English seemed scarcely aware of how those successes could have come about. “I will never repeat it too often,” he wrote, “that the English fought in a most extraordinary way. They won victory upon victory. At the beginning of October they had broken the formidable Hindenburg line at its strongest point. But still more wonderful, these victories were won almost unknown to themselves.”
Among those notable successes of the war by the Allies was the capture of the village of Passchendaele by the Canadians ending the third battle of Ypres and the enemy then lost all hope of piercing the line to Calais. There was also the success of the Allies in driving back the Germans on the Marne, relieving the threat to Paris.
On August 15th, 1917, the feast of the Assumption of Our Lady into Heaven, Cardinal Bourne once more consecrated England to the Sorrowful Heart of Mary. This was later repeated solemnly on Christmas Day. On August 22nd, 1917, the feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Our Lord sent the following message through Berthe Petit to Cardinal Bourne:
“I ask My apostle Francis to exert an ever increasing activity in favor of the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother … Let him hasten what he calls his ‘first step’ so that a still more solemn consecration may be timed for the feast of the Sorrows of My Mother—that great feast of her Heart as Co-redemptrix. When the nation (England) of my apostle Francis will be entirely dedicated to this Heart he will see that he has not listened to My word in vain, for my providential intervention is reserved for all the people consecrated to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother. I wish thus to show the power of this Heart which is linked in everything with My own.”
When the tide of battle turned against the Allies in the dreadful spring of 1918, Jesus explained to Berthe: “It is a necessary trial for after My protection had helped them to conquer, they attributed the glory to their own prowess. Reverses are now showing these soldiers how human means alone are powerless to repel the surge of invasion.”
However, by mid-October 1918, the Germans were all but finished and desertions were skyrocketing. People had had enough. Governments fell and chaos prevailed over central Europe. Then on October 17th, 1918, Our Lord told Berthe:
“Were it not for My intervention, obtained by My apostle Francis through recourse to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother, the victory would have belonged to those who strained every nerve during so many years to prepare and organize a great war for the attainment of their own ambitions …. Material force would have overborne justice and right and this more especially so for your own country (Belgium). For why should I come to the help of a people in France intent on persecuting My Church? That is why trials will continue until the day when, humbly acknowledging her errors, this nation will render Me My rights and give full liberty to My Church.”
During that month Our Lord also warned Berthe: “The world is hanging on the edge of utter cataclysm. My justice cannot preside over the machination of those who work in their own interests to forward a peace totally unworthy of the name, and which can never be genuine except through My intervention.”
The War Ends―The Sorrowful Heart Wins
Three weeks later, after a most bloody conflict among the nations, and after ten million people had died and many more maimed and displaced, the greatest global war in known history at that time ended abruptly and gloriously in favor of the British. It was at eleven a.m. on the eleventh day of the eleventh month of 1918 when the Armistice took place. On May 24th, 1919, the Archbishop of Westminster again consecrated his country to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary in thanksgiving for the great victory in what was thought to be “the war to end all wars.”
In July, 1919, eight months after the Armistice (the stopping of open acts of warfare), Our Lord spoke as follows to Berthe:
“Internal strife is more rampant than ever in your country (Belgium). It is being fanned by the evil seed sown by the invader. It is fed by egoism, pride and jealousy—malevolent germs which can only generate moral ruin… Time will prove that a peace established without Me and without him who speaks in My name (referring to Pope Benedict XV) has no stability. The nation (Germany), which is considered to be vanquished but whose forces are only momentarily diminished, will remain a menace for your country and likewise for France. Confusion and terror will steadily spread through every nation. Because this peace is not Mine, wars will be rekindled on every side—civil war and racial war. What would have been so noble, so true, so beautiful, so lasting in its fulfillment is consequently delayed. Humanity is advancing towards a frightful scourge which will divide the nations more and more. It will reduce human schemes to nothingness. It will break the pride of the powers that be. It will show that nothing subsists without Me and that I remain the sole Master of the destinies of nations.”
“A peace totally unworthy of the name,” said Our Lord to Berthe. What is the history behind that rebuke. Pope Benedict XV had adopted a rigidly neutral position between the warring parties, and, while denouncing the war as a crime against religion, humanity and civilization, he had blamed both sides equally for allowing it to happen and to continue. However, neither side appreciated his attitude nor responded to his exhortations. In fact, it later transpired that one of Italy’s conditions for entering the war in 1915 with the Allies, was the exclusion of the Holy See from any eventual peace conference.
After his suggestion of a general Christmas truce in 1914 was totally ignored by the Allies, on August 1st, 1917, Pope Benedict XV issued a seven-point peace plan to each of the belligerent nations. Ignored by most powers, only Austria-Hungary regarded it with any degree of seriousness. However, the Pope strove continually and imperturbably for a negotiated peace as opposed to a dictated one, and, being barred from the Palace Peace Conference―which began in January 1919 in Paris―caused him to stigmatize the Treaty of Versailles (one of the most controversial armistice treaties in history) as a “consecration of hatred” and a “perpetuation of war.”
Now Germany had refused to acknowledge any sole guilt and responsibility for the war and the German people, having agreed to set about forming a democratic republican government, felt that they were entitled to a just peace. However, when the terms of the Versailles Treaty, laid down by the Allies without negotiation with Germany, were published in Berlin on May 7th, 1919, they came as a staggering blow to the German people. Germany was made to pay “reparations” far beyond her power of payment and in contravention of the plain understandings upon which she had surrendered. She was put in a position of economic serfdom.
Angry mass meetings were then organized throughout the country to protest against the treaty and to demand that Germany refuse to sign it. Indeed, the treaty was branded as “unreasonable and unbearable,” and intolerable for any nation, so much so that Phillipp Scheidemann, who had become the first Chancellor of the Weimar Assembly, exclaimed: “May the hand wither that signs this treaty!” In fact, Field Marshall von Hindenburg, President of Germany, came to the conclusion that he could not help feeling that it was better to perish honorably than accept a disgraceful peace.
However, the Treaty of Versailles was eventually signed in the Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles on June 28th, 1919 with objections from the German government, protesting that they did so “under the threat of force.” On that day Germany became a house divided. In fact, when he read the Peace Treaty, Marshall Foch burst out: “This is not peace! This is an armistice for twenty years.” Indeed, twenty years and sixty-seven days later, once more Great Britain and France declared war on a militant Germany! As Our Lord had said to Berthe Petit: “Time will prove that a peace established without Me and without him who speaks in My Name has no stability.”
Quite recently―in the 20th century―a particular aspect of devotion to Our Lady was revealed to a humble, saintly woman, Berthe Petit, who passed to her reward as recently as 1943. That particular aspect of devotion to Our Lady was focused upon her Sorrowful Heart. Our Lord Himself stated that He wanted the title “Sorrowful Heart” to be added to that of the “Immaculate Heart”.
Who was Berthe Petit? She was the third daughter of a well-to-do Catholic couple, was born at Enghien, in Belgium, in 1870. Her father was a notary. From her earliest childhood the little girl was in touch with Heaven. At four years old she had a vision of Our Lady. Somewhat later, in a Convent chapel she saw the tabernacle open and the Child Jesus, emerging, came towards her. As He made the sign of the Cross on her forehead, He said: “You will suffer always, but I shall be with you.” On her First Holy Communion day, when she was ten, her vocation of expiation and sorrow was revealed to her. “I must suffer a great deal,” she said to a nun, her teacher. “I must be like Jesus.”
“Who told you that?” the nun enquired.
“The little Host which was my Great Jesus,” was the child’s astonishing reply.
As the years passed, the fuller meaning of this suffering was made clear to her; and with full knowledge of what her sacrifice entailed, she offered herself to God “as a victim” for the salvation of souls and especially for the souls of priests.
For many years, this holy Franciscan Tertiary, while leading a life of hidden sufferings in the world, a voluntary victim for the expiation of sin, received repeated revelations from Our Lord of His desire that the whole world should be publicly dedicated to the SORROWFUL and Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Berthe Gains Church Approval
Berthe Petit, a Franciscan Tertiary (1870-1943), would gain the highest respect of Cardinals, Bishops, theologians and other members of the Church hierarchy at the time. In a letter, which contains an appreciation of Berthe Petit, Fr. Garrigou Lagrange, O.P., the renowned 20th century Thomistic theologian and professor of Ascetical and Mystical Theology at one of the most important seminaries of Rome, wrote:
“I cherish a vivid remembrance of Mademoiselle Berthe Petit, whom I met in Switzerland during the 1914-1918 war. I much appreciated the devotion to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary. I am of the same mind as Cardinals Mercier and Bourne that it recalls what the Blessed Virgin has received from God, both the grace of the Immaculate Conception as well as what she herself has done and suffered for us. This invocation of the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary seems very opportune in our days of universal suffering and trial, as appears by the Consecration to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary made by several Bishops in various Diocese of France and Belgium. The grace of the Immaculate Conception and the initial plenitude of her charity considerably increased in Mary her capacity for suffering from the greatest of all evils, which is sin. It is in proportion to one’s personal love of God that one suffers from sin, because of the offence given to God and the souls lost by it. Thus the Immaculate Heart of Mary was sorrowful in proportion to her purity and spotlessness, and in the measure of her initial charity, in which she grew every moment until the hour of her death. When we say ‘Immaculate Heart of Mary’ we recall what she received from God in the first instant of her conception. When we say ‘Sorrowful Heart’, we recall all that Mary has suffered and offered for us in union with her Son, from the words of holy Simeon to Calvary, and until her holy death.” (Fr. Garrigou Lagrange, O.P.)
Apparitions from Heaven Regarding the Sorrowful Heart
While attending Midnight Mass in 1909, she saw the wounded Heart of Jesus and closely adherent to it was the Heart of Mary pierced with a sword. Then she heard these words: “Cause My Mother’s Heart, transfixed by the sorrows that tore Mine, to be loved.”
Then on February 7th, 1910, she saw the Hearts of Jesus and Mary interpenetrating each other and hovering over the Hearts was a Dove. Jesus then spoke: “You must think of My Mother’s Heart as you think of Mine; live in this Heart as you seek to live in Mine; give yourself to this Heart as you give yourself to Mine. You must spread the love of this Heart so wholly united to Mine.” A few days later her mission was revealed to her. It was to obtain the consecration of the whole world to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary. For many years this holy Franciscan Tertiary, while leading a life of hidden suffering in the world, a voluntary victim for the expiation of sin, received repeated revelations from Our Lord of His desire that the whole world should be publicly consecrated to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart.
At that time Berthe’s visions were greatly multiplied. She received fresh revelations concerning the devotion almost daily, and each unfolded some further aspect of Our Lord’s desire. On one occasion, she saw the two Hearts emitting rays of light, while she heard these words: “I have told you the wish of My Heart concerning My Mother’s Heart: love it and cause it to be loved. This love will be the source of graces for you and for the world and will draw down great blessings upon you. Yield yourself to My love. My Heart’s wish will be confided to you.”
A few days later, while she was on a pilgrimage to St. Anne, in Alsace, this promise was fulfilled by the complete revelation of her Mission. It was to obtain the Consecration of the whole world to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary. Berthe was at that time on her way to Rome, accompanied by her Mother and the Fr. Decorsant. She broke her journey at Siena, where she had more than one vision. While assisting at the Father’s Mass in St. Catherine’s room, she saw the Divine Face under the Crown of thorns, in a great glory of light, at the moment of the Elevation. Our Lord said to her once more: “The world must be dedicated to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother, as it is dedicated to Mine. Fear nothing, no matter what suffering or obstacles you may meet. Think only of fulfilling My will.”
On Easter Sunday, 1910, at Rome, again at the Father Decorsant’s Mass, Berthe again saw the Hearts of Jesus and Mary, fused with one another under the wings of the Dove. This time she heard these words: “What I desire derives from what I did on Calvary. In giving John to My Mother for her son, I confided to her the Sorrowful and Immaculate Maternity of the whole world.” Our Lord then commanded her to make the drawing of the vision of the two Hearts, adding: “I will guide your hand.” A few months later, she received a further communication from Jesus: “I desire that the picture for which I guided your hand should be widely diffused as well as the invocation ‘Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us.’”
On September 8th, 1910, after receiving Holy Communion, Our Lord said to Berthe: “The Heart of My Mother has a right to be called Sorrowful and I wish this title to be placed before that of Immaculate because she has won it herself. The Church has defined in the case of My Mother what I Myself had ordained—her Immaculate Conception. This right which My Mother has to a title of justice is now, according to My express wish, to be known and universally accepted. She has earned it by her identification with My sorrows, by her sufferings, by her sacrifices and by her immolation on Calvary, endured in perfect correspondence with My grace for the salvation of mankind. In her co-redemption lies the nobility of My Mother and for this reason I ask for the invocation which I have demanded be approved and spread throughout the whole Church. It has already obtained many graces; it will obtain yet more when the Church will be exalted and the world renewed through its consecration to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother.”
Then nine days later, on September 17th, 1910, the Mother herself appeared to Berthe and revealed in a symbolic way the bodily martyrdom that she suffered at the foot of the Cross. Berthe saw her brow wounded and bleeding and her hands and heart pierced. She then said: “Now you can understand the sorrows which my Heart endured and the sufferings of my whole being for the salvation of the world.”
At a Holy Hour devotion during the night of March 24th-25th, 1912, the eve of the feast of the Annunciation, the Blessed Virgin spoke again to Berthe of her Sorrowful Heart: “I am called the Immaculate Conception. With you, I call myself the Mother of the Sorrowful Heart. This title that my Son wants is the dearest to me of all my titles and it is through it that shall be granted and spread everywhere, graces of mercy, spiritual renewal and salvation.”
The Sorrowful Heart and Politics
July 12th, 1912 marked the beginning of a different phase in the mystical experiences of Berthe Petit. Until that time her heavenly communications dealt solely with religious matters but on that day she received the first of several revelations concerning political events. They were similar to some of the messages of a political nature which were given by the Blessed Virgin Mary to St. Catherine Labouré in 1830, by the Virgin of La Salette to Melanie Calvat and Maximin Giraud in 1846 when she wept copiously.
On that day, Jesus told Berthe that the heir to the Catholic empire of Austria-Hungary would be assassinated: “A double murder will strike down the successor of the aged sovereign, so loyal to the Faith.” He was referring to Archduke Franz Josef I (1830-1916), who was 82 years old at the time. Jesus added: “It will be the first of those events (World Wars) full of sorrows, but from whence I shall still bring forth good and which will precede the chastisement.”
Heaven Announces War
This prophecy was fulfilled a little less than two years later on June 28th, 1914 when Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophia, the Duchess of Hohenburg, were assassinated by 19-year-old Gavrilo Princip, a Serbian nationalist. The following day, June 29th, Jesus said to Berthe: “Now begins the ascending curve of preliminary events, which will lead to the great manifestation of My justice.” Indeed that “preliminary event” in Sarajevo led to the First World War (1914-1918), which started about five weeks later on August 4th, 1914, when Germany violated Belgium’s neutrality, and by midnight Great Britain and Germany were at war. That war eventually led to the Second World War (1939-1945), which may well lead to and culminate in a Third World War in this nuclear age, with the possibility of the annihilation of several nations. Sister Lucia of Fatima stated: “The Blessed Virgin said repeatedly ― to my cousins Francisco and Jacinta as well as to me ― that many nations would disappear from the face of the Earth!”
According to Berthe Petit, when the Germans entered Brussels and violated Belgium’s neutrality, just as He harshly criticized the Pharisees, as recorded in the Gospels, Jesus had harsh words to say about the German invaders: “The proud race and its ambitious ruler (Kaiser William II) will be chastised on the very soil (Belgium) of their unjust conquest … The worst calamities which I predicted are unleashed. The time has now arrived when I wish mankind to turn to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother. Let this prayer be uttered by every soul: ‘Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us!’ so that it may spread as a refreshing and purifying balm of reparation that will appease My anger. This devotion to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother will restore faith and hope to broken hearts and to ruined families. It will help to repair the destruction. It will sweeten sorrow. It will be a new strength for My Church, bringing souls, not only to confidence in My Heart, but also to abandonment to the Sorrowful Heart of My Mother.”
Pope St. Pius X died on August 10th, 1914, soon after the First World War began, and he was succeeded by Pope Benedict XV. As Sir Nicholas Cheetham commented in his History of the Popes: “How ought the Holy See to react to a murderous conflict in which Catholic Austria-Hungary and partly-Catholic Germany stood initially opposed to an alliance of Catholic, but officially irreligious France, with Orthodox Russia and Protestant Great Britain?”
This indeed was the problem facing the Pope, shortly to be complicated by Italy’s entry into the war. In his first statement on September 8th, 1914, the feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, he mourned the bloodshed and pleaded for a quick end to the war just begun. He also denounced the war as a crime against religion, humanity and civilization, as it was perpetrated by Catholic countries.
In his first encyclical Ad Beatissimi Apostolorum, issued on November 1st, 1914, Pope Benedict XV criticized the warring Christian peoples: “Who could realize,” he wrote, “that they are the children of the same Father in Heaven?” He then closed with a call for a prayer to Christ and the Blessed Virgin Mary, “who bore the Prince of Peace.” Then the following year, on May 3rd, 1915, he sent a letter to the Dean of the Sacred College, Cardinal Venutelli, which concluded with the following recommendation addressed to all the bishops of the world: “Let us send up our prayers, more than ever ardent and frequent, to Him in whose Hands lie the destinies of all peoples, and let us appeal with confidence to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, the most gentle Mother of Jesus and ours, that by her powerful intercession she will obtain from her divine Son the speedy end of the war and the return of peace and tranquility.”
Two Cardinals Bring the Sorrowful Heart into the War
Berthe Petit spent the years of the First World War in Switzerland, where she was frequently told in advance of the calamities that would befall the Allies. However, the two Cardinals who cooperated most with her were Cardinal Desiré Mercier, Primate of Belgium, and Cardinal Francis Alphonsus Bourne, the Primate of England and Archbishop of Canterbury. Cardinal Bourne (1861-1935) became acclaimed for his patriotic speeches during the war and Cardinal Mercier (1851-1926) became the spokesman of Belgian opposition to the German occupation, for which the Germans placed him under house arrest. He was Berthe’s spiritual director for several years, was deeply impressed by her heavenly communications, and energetically promoted the devotion to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary in Belgium. In fact, he had also approached the predecessor of Pope Benedict XV, Pope St. Pius X (1903-1914), and attempted to win his approval for the worldwide devotion. Seventeen petitions were made to the Pope, however, sadly to say, the Pope did not find it appropriate to promote a new worldwide devotion at that time, but it was certainly never condemned on doctrinal grounds. However, like Pope St. Pius X, Pope Benedict XV also did not judge the time opportune for a worldwide devotion.
In February, 1915, Our Lord said to Berthe: “It is through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother that I will triumph, because having cooperated in the redemption of souls, this Heart has the right to share a similar cooperation in the manifestations of My justice and of My love. My Mother is noble in everything, but she is especially so in her wounded Heart, transfixed by the wound of Mine.”
Berthe, meanwhile, remained quietly patient in Switzerland awaiting God’s good pleasure and continued to receive heavenly communications. Our Lady later showed her in a vision an untold multitude of every race and color, sick and suffering, all praying with arms raised to Heaven. Some were physically healed, others, touched by grace, fell on their knees. “It seemed a regeneration of the whole world,” said Berthe.
Meanwhile, as the war continued, on March 7th, 1916, Belgium’s Cardinal Mercier (1851–1926) announced that during the Good Friday ceremonies he would dedicate his diocese and his beloved country Belgium to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, and in England Cardinal Bourne continued to rally the faithful towards this devotion. In a pastoral letter of September 3rd, 1916, he wrote:
“Nowhere in Christendom should honor be paid more readily to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary than here in England. In the days of united Faith (that is, before the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century), her purity and her sorrows were ever held in loving veneration. Throughout the realm, Our Blessed Lady, God’s Mother, were terms and titles dear to every English heart. England was, in very truth, Our Lady’s dowry. It is, therefore, not with the idea of introducing any new devotion, but rather in order to give fresh meaning and greater force to thoughts long cherished by us all and deep-rooted in the history of our race that we desire to consecrate with renewed effort the prayer, which the special circumstances of the moment so urgently demand, to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary…
“For these reasons, we desire and enjoin that in all the churches and public chapels of our diocese, Friday, September 15th, the feast of the Seven Sorrows of Our Lady, or on the following Sunday, during Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, the Stabat Mater be sung, to be followed by the recitation of three Hail Marys and the invocation (repeated after each Hail Mary) “Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us,” in order that, by this public homage, all our dioceses, and, insofar in us lies, our whole country and empire may be solemnly consecrated and dedicated to Our Blessed Lady under this special title.”
In 1917, in his Pastoral Letter of Quinquagesima Sunday, Cardinal Bourne, while exhorting the faithful of his diocese to earnest prayer accompanied by almsgiving, to obtain the mercy of God in such critical times, added this further recommendation:
“We place again our intercession under the care and protection of the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, and with this object we ordain that the Act of Consecration which we send herewith, be recited in all the churches and chapels of our Diocese, immediately after the “O Salutaris”, at the principal Benediction, on the first Sunday of Lent, and again recited at Benediction on Friday, March 30th, the feast of the Seven Sorrows of Our Blessed Lady. We commend to the clergy and faithful the daily recitation of this Act of Consecration, to which we have attached an indulgence of 200 days.”
Cardinal Bourne had requested Father Condamin to ask Berthe Petit, through the intermediary of her spiritual director, for the text of an act of consecration. “I have told Mademoiselle Petit,” replied the Father Decorsant, “to obtain this during one of her thanksgivings, after Holy Communion. She wrote down (in French) the following prayer, which she affirmed was dictated to her by Our Lord Himself.”
The Sorrowful Heart Leads British Troops to Victory
That day, September 15th, 1916, the feast of the Seven Sorrows of Our Lady, marked the greatest success of the British. In fact, each time public devotions were performed in England, the British armies swept forward to unexpected victories, so much so that Marshal Ferdinand Foch, the Commander in Chief of the Allied forces in France, observed in his “Memoires” that, strangely enough, the English seemed scarcely aware of how those successes could have come about. “I will never repeat it too often,” he wrote, “that the English fought in a most extraordinary way. They won victory upon victory. At the beginning of October they had broken the formidable Hindenburg line at its strongest point. But still more wonderful, these victories were won almost unknown to themselves.”
Among those notable successes of the war by the Allies was the capture of the village of Passchendaele by the Canadians ending the third battle of Ypres and the enemy then lost all hope of piercing the line to Calais. There was also the success of the Allies in driving back the Germans on the Marne, relieving the threat to Paris.
On August 15th, 1917, the feast of the Assumption of Our Lady into Heaven, Cardinal Bourne once more consecrated England to the Sorrowful Heart of Mary. This was later repeated solemnly on Christmas Day. On August 22nd, 1917, the feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Our Lord sent the following message through Berthe Petit to Cardinal Bourne:
“I ask My apostle Francis to exert an ever increasing activity in favor of the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother … Let him hasten what he calls his ‘first step’ so that a still more solemn consecration may be timed for the feast of the Sorrows of My Mother—that great feast of her Heart as Co-redemptrix. When the nation (England) of my apostle Francis will be entirely dedicated to this Heart he will see that he has not listened to My word in vain, for my providential intervention is reserved for all the people consecrated to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother. I wish thus to show the power of this Heart which is linked in everything with My own.”
When the tide of battle turned against the Allies in the dreadful spring of 1918, Jesus explained to Berthe: “It is a necessary trial for after My protection had helped them to conquer, they attributed the glory to their own prowess. Reverses are now showing these soldiers how human means alone are powerless to repel the surge of invasion.”
However, by mid-October 1918, the Germans were all but finished and desertions were skyrocketing. People had had enough. Governments fell and chaos prevailed over central Europe. Then on October 17th, 1918, Our Lord told Berthe:
“Were it not for My intervention, obtained by My apostle Francis through recourse to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of My Mother, the victory would have belonged to those who strained every nerve during so many years to prepare and organize a great war for the attainment of their own ambitions …. Material force would have overborne justice and right and this more especially so for your own country (Belgium). For why should I come to the help of a people in France intent on persecuting My Church? That is why trials will continue until the day when, humbly acknowledging her errors, this nation will render Me My rights and give full liberty to My Church.”
During that month Our Lord also warned Berthe: “The world is hanging on the edge of utter cataclysm. My justice cannot preside over the machination of those who work in their own interests to forward a peace totally unworthy of the name, and which can never be genuine except through My intervention.”
The War Ends―The Sorrowful Heart Wins
Three weeks later, after a most bloody conflict among the nations, and after ten million people had died and many more maimed and displaced, the greatest global war in known history at that time ended abruptly and gloriously in favor of the British. It was at eleven a.m. on the eleventh day of the eleventh month of 1918 when the Armistice took place. On May 24th, 1919, the Archbishop of Westminster again consecrated his country to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary in thanksgiving for the great victory in what was thought to be “the war to end all wars.”
In July, 1919, eight months after the Armistice (the stopping of open acts of warfare), Our Lord spoke as follows to Berthe:
“Internal strife is more rampant than ever in your country (Belgium). It is being fanned by the evil seed sown by the invader. It is fed by egoism, pride and jealousy—malevolent germs which can only generate moral ruin… Time will prove that a peace established without Me and without him who speaks in My name (referring to Pope Benedict XV) has no stability. The nation (Germany), which is considered to be vanquished but whose forces are only momentarily diminished, will remain a menace for your country and likewise for France. Confusion and terror will steadily spread through every nation. Because this peace is not Mine, wars will be rekindled on every side—civil war and racial war. What would have been so noble, so true, so beautiful, so lasting in its fulfillment is consequently delayed. Humanity is advancing towards a frightful scourge which will divide the nations more and more. It will reduce human schemes to nothingness. It will break the pride of the powers that be. It will show that nothing subsists without Me and that I remain the sole Master of the destinies of nations.”
“A peace totally unworthy of the name,” said Our Lord to Berthe. What is the history behind that rebuke. Pope Benedict XV had adopted a rigidly neutral position between the warring parties, and, while denouncing the war as a crime against religion, humanity and civilization, he had blamed both sides equally for allowing it to happen and to continue. However, neither side appreciated his attitude nor responded to his exhortations. In fact, it later transpired that one of Italy’s conditions for entering the war in 1915 with the Allies, was the exclusion of the Holy See from any eventual peace conference.
After his suggestion of a general Christmas truce in 1914 was totally ignored by the Allies, on August 1st, 1917, Pope Benedict XV issued a seven-point peace plan to each of the belligerent nations. Ignored by most powers, only Austria-Hungary regarded it with any degree of seriousness. However, the Pope strove continually and imperturbably for a negotiated peace as opposed to a dictated one, and, being barred from the Palace Peace Conference―which began in January 1919 in Paris―caused him to stigmatize the Treaty of Versailles (one of the most controversial armistice treaties in history) as a “consecration of hatred” and a “perpetuation of war.”
Now Germany had refused to acknowledge any sole guilt and responsibility for the war and the German people, having agreed to set about forming a democratic republican government, felt that they were entitled to a just peace. However, when the terms of the Versailles Treaty, laid down by the Allies without negotiation with Germany, were published in Berlin on May 7th, 1919, they came as a staggering blow to the German people. Germany was made to pay “reparations” far beyond her power of payment and in contravention of the plain understandings upon which she had surrendered. She was put in a position of economic serfdom.
Angry mass meetings were then organized throughout the country to protest against the treaty and to demand that Germany refuse to sign it. Indeed, the treaty was branded as “unreasonable and unbearable,” and intolerable for any nation, so much so that Phillipp Scheidemann, who had become the first Chancellor of the Weimar Assembly, exclaimed: “May the hand wither that signs this treaty!” In fact, Field Marshall von Hindenburg, President of Germany, came to the conclusion that he could not help feeling that it was better to perish honorably than accept a disgraceful peace.
However, the Treaty of Versailles was eventually signed in the Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles on June 28th, 1919 with objections from the German government, protesting that they did so “under the threat of force.” On that day Germany became a house divided. In fact, when he read the Peace Treaty, Marshall Foch burst out: “This is not peace! This is an armistice for twenty years.” Indeed, twenty years and sixty-seven days later, once more Great Britain and France declared war on a militant Germany! As Our Lord had said to Berthe Petit: “Time will prove that a peace established without Me and without him who speaks in My Name has no stability.”
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR AUGUST 2024
THE MONTH OF THE IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY
THE MONTH OF THE IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY
Article 15
Friday & Saturday, August 30th & 31st
What Will the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary Be Like?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Friday & Saturday, August 30th & 31st
What Will the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary Be Like?
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
What’s It All About?
Our Lady promised that “in the end my Immaculate Heart will triumph!” What does that mean? Of what does she speak? Triumph over what? When will it happen? How will it happen? Will we live to see it? Will we live through it? Will we survive and come out at the other end of it? These and many more questions are rarely thought about and rarely talked about. Is it because there are no answers? Nobody can claim to have all the answers, or even some of the answers, but if we look more closely, if we refer to what Our Lady has said in her other apparitions, if we consult some of the prophecies made by the Saints, Blesseds and Venerables―then we can see some kind of picture appear that will, at least, partially answer those questions. Only God and Our Lady know everything in full extent concerning the “what, when, how, where, etc.” of the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary―but God and Our Lady have given us certain clues and indications that lift some of the fog and help us have an approximate idea of many aspects of that triumph.
A dictionary will define “triumph” along the lines of: “the act, fact, or condition of being victorious or triumphant; a successful ending of a struggle or contest; victory; conquest; a very great success, achievement.” Triumph is not something that exists by itself. Triumph is not something that comes first. There has to be something―an enemy, an adversary―to triumph over, to conquer, to defeat. Triumph is usually associated with war and battles.
Fight Foretold
Whether it is the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary in particular, or the triumph of the Church as a whole, or our own personal triumph in the Faith and the spiritual life―the general picture is one of war, battles and fighting. Holy Scripture refers to this on many occasions: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4). “Fear them not―for the Lord your God will fight for you!” (Deuteronomy 3:22). “The Lord your God is in the midst of you, and will fight for you against your enemies, to deliver you from danger!” (Deuteronomy 20:4).
Speaking to the serpent (Satan), after he had seduced Eve into sinning against God, God foretells Satan’s defeat by Our Lady (“the Woman”) when He says: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!” (Genesis 3:15).
Our Lord Himself indicates the opposition between His heavenly Kingdom and Satan’s kingdom of the world: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―for where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! [mammon = the treasures and pleasures and power of this world]” (Matthew 6:19-24).
To those words of Our Lord, Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Our Lady Foretells the Fight
The Blessed Virgin Mary has also, on many occasions, foretold of the fight that is to come: “I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil rights, as well as ecclesiastical rights. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … Many will turn upon Religion! … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! …
“The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises! … The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... Churches will be locked up or desecrated … and altars will be sacked … Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death ... The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals]. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … This, in turn, will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
Perpetual Warfare
As you can see from the above quotes, Christians have been at war from the very beginning―as Our Lord said: “If the world hates you, then know that it has hated Me before you! If you had been of the world, then the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you!” [John 15:18-20). Through the Sacrament of Confirmation we have been made Soldiers of Christ. Are we fighting for Christ? Are we fighting for the Faith? Are we fighting against error? Are we fighting the world? Are we fighting sin?
► Our Lady of La Salette speaks of our need to fight―even though it is she who will bring about the triumph: I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son! Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world! Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days! May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
► Our Lady of Akita also implies that we need to go to battle and fight: “Pray in reparation for the sins of men! … Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men! … Pray very much for the Pope, Bishops, and Priests! … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops! … With my Son, I seek for souls who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful … Beloved souls who console Him forming a cohort of victim souls! … Be faithful and fervent in prayer to console the Master! … The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son.”
► Sister Lucia of Fatima relays to us what Our Lady of Fatima revealed to her: “Father, the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them! … A time will come when the decisive battle between the kingdom of Christ and Satan will be over marriage and the family. And those who will work for the good of the family will experience persecution and tribulation … We should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No―Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed! So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway. When God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies … God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others.”
Gone AWOL? Absent Without Leave?
Today’s modern Catholic has become increasingly self-centered and self-gratifying. Apart from the “nearest and dearest” (friends and family), there is little care for others in the world―and particularly little or no care for sinners! The bottom-line of Our Lady’s apparitions is a fight to try and save sinners from Hell. The bottom-line with most Catholics is that sinners can go to Hell if they want―and they use Cain’s vain excuse of: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). “If sinners want to sin―then that’s their problem! I can do nothing to stop them!” they vainly say. Too many Catholics fight among themselves rather than fight to save souls! They are “Armchair Warriors” or “Keyboard Warriors” but not real warriors. They prefer to play rather than pray. They practice self-gratification rather than mortification. They prefer to spend their time on their devices rather sacrifices.
Does it matter if they prefer to play more than pray; self-gratification more than mortification; devices more than sacrifices? Surely Our Lady does not need them to bring about the Triumph of her Immaculate Heart? The answer to that is along the lines of what St. Augustine said about God and our salvation. St. Augustine―a Father and Doctor of the Church―tells us that “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us!” Some translate the Latin into the singular: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, but God will not save you without your cooperation. Similarly, Our Lady could bring about the Triumph of her Immaculate Heart without us, but she will not do so. Heaven does not overindulge, baby, pamper or spoil anybody―not even Our Lady was pampered, babied, overindulged or spoilt, and she was the greatest of God’s creatures! As she said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda:
“My life was a continual suffering! ... The sorrow which I suffered is so little noticed by the living! … I suffered much more than the martyrs in all their torments! … I blessed the Lord to be able to suffer! … All that I suffered seemed little―and I continually longed to suffer still more! ... I suffered with eagerness! … This desire for suffering led me on in the way of suffering … thus permitting me to endure so much the greater sufferings! … I would have been ready to suffer the greatest torments of the world! … I desired to take upon myself the sufferings of all men … There is no torment, not even death itself, that I would have refused, if such had been necessary to save any of the damned ― and to save them, I would have esteemed all sufferings a sweet alleviation! ... I never presumed to ask the Lord anything for the sake of ridding myself of suffering! … My Son and I embraced the way of the Cross and suffering for the whole course of our natural life! … My Son and I suffered so much for creatures and for their salvation! … For them We suffered and endured such bitter sorrows! … What tribulations and hardships we suffered! … The Lord and I suffered and endured such bitter sorrows, in order that mortals might be encouraged not to refuse less severe sufferings for their own eternal good. Shall only Christ, our Lord, and I suffer all these hardships―while the guilt laden sinners throw themselves head over heels into the filth of their carnal inclinations? I do count anyone as a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son!”
We have to play some part in the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary―a bit part, a minor part, a secondary part―but a part nevertheless! The conversion of each and every sinner is a Triumph of the Immaculate Heart in miniature form―and Our Lady does not bring about the conversion of sinners without the sinner and others playing their part. That is why, at Fatima, she asked for prayers and sacrifices for the conversion of sinners: “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners!”
We cannot make the same lame excuse of Cain, who said to God: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). “Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is thy brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I know not! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to him: ‘What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth. Now, therefore, cursed shalt thou be upon the Earth!’” (Genesis 4:8-11). Similarly, we could apply that to ourselves in relation to the many souls that fall into Hell every single hour, partially due to our negligence in offering prayers and sacrifices for their conversion. “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” said Our Lady. “It’s not my fault! I am not their keeper! They choose to sin! I can do nothing about it!” you will say. There are many ways in which we can be guilty of the sins of others even though we ourselves do not actually commit the sins―one of those ways is “silence” and, in this case, a “silence” by not offering prayers and sacrifices to draw down from Heaven the graces necessary to prevent those sins and bring about conversions. “He that hath the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:17). We have the “substance” of that is necessary―the Faith and the state of sanctifying grace. We can clearly see our “brother in need” by the tsunami of sin that continually floods the world. How can we say that we love God if we refuse or neglect to save those lost sinners for whom Christ came to suffer and die: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10).
Whose Triumph Will It Be?
The Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary is not a case of: (1) Mary brings about the triumph by herself, while we just sand by and watch; or (2) we or some group of humans bring about the triumph for her, while she stands by and watches. It will be Our Lady’s triumph and we have to be the “paintbrushes”, “screwdrivers”, “spades” or “chisels” that Our Lady will use. A paintbrush is useless by itself―it needs the hand of the artist to pick it up and use it. A screwdriver is useless by itself―it needs someone to pick it up and use it. Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Likewise, Our Lady―who is the Mediatrix of all God’s graces―could also say: “Without me―you can do nothing!” As St. Thomas Aquinas states: “Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act!” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6). Without grace we can do nothing good―and therefore, without Our Lady the Mediatrix of all graces, we can do no good―especially no great good, which is what her Triumph will be.
When a battle is won, we often attribute the victory to the commander of the troops. Holy Scripture says: “David defeated the Philistines” (2 Kings 8:1) ― but it was not David on his own, but the Israelites under his leadership. Scripture does not mention or name all the individual soldiers in David’s army, but David alone. Likewise, when we say that General George Washington sought to defend New York from capture by British forces―we do not mean General Washington alone, but Washington with his army. When we speak of the Victory at the Battle of Lepanto, we speak of Our Lady and her Rosary as bringing the victory.
Thus the Church speaks of Our Lady as a warrior by applying to her these words of Holy Scripture: “Who is she that cometh forth as the morning rising, fair as the moon, bright as the sun, terrible as an army set in battle array?” (Canticles 6:9) ― words which the Legion of Mary utilize as part of their prayers. Hence Our Lady of La Salette invites and encourages us to fight the battle for the Faith: “I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ! … I shall fight at their side! … Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!” Sister Lucia of Fatima speaks of the final battle that Satan will wage against Our Lady: “The Blessed Virgin told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
We cannot stand idly by and watch the battle―we are necessarily included and involved in that battle. We are told “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4). “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). That last quote should remind us of the scolding that the Angel of Portugal gave to three children at Fatima (Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta) when he found them playing instead of praying: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
The Victory Belongs to God
God is the “Lord of all power” (Esther 14:12). When St. Michael the Archangel defeated Satan, it was ultimately by the power of God: “St. Michael the Archangel … do thou, O prince of the heavenly host, by the power of God, cast into Hell Satan and all evil spirits …” (Prayer to St. Michael).
During the Exodus from Egypt, when Moses killed the pursuing Egyptian army in the Red Sea by closing the parted waters so that they all drowned―it ultimately by the power of God: “And the Lord said to Moses: ‘Stretch forth thy hand over the sea, so that the waters may come again upon the Egyptians and upon their chariots and horsemen!’ And when Moses had stretched forth his hand towards the sea, it returned to its former place; and, as the Egyptians were fleeing away, the waters came upon them, and the Lord shut them up in the middle of the waves. And the waters returned, and covered the chariots and the horsemen of all the army of Pharao, who had come into the sea after them, neither did there so much as one of them remain” (Exodus 14:26-28).
God loves fighting against the odds! We see this disregard by God for the odds in the case of Gedeon. Gedeon―the fifth of the Judges who were the leaders of Israel at the time―found the Israelite army greatly outnumbered by the Madianites: with 135,000 Madianites against Gedeon’s army of 32,000—who were outnumbered by more than 4 to 1. What we might see as impossible odds to overcome―it is not so with God! He tells us: “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). “And Jesus looking on them, said: ‘With men it is impossible, but not with God―for all things are possible with God!’” (Mark 10:27).
Human wisdom and prudence, seeing oneself so sorely outnumbered, would see this as a time to go out and recruit more warriors. However, without God we can do nothing, and it might be that, after the victory that the Lord would give them, the soldiers might think it had been by their own strength and ability that they had won the victory: The Lord said to Gedeon: ‘The people that are with thee are many, and Madian shall not be delivered into their hands: lest Israel should glory against Me, and say: “I was delivered by my own strength!” (Judges 7:2-3). Therefore, God said that any soldier who felt fearful should go home―and so around 22,000 of the 32,000 departed. So, they went from being outnumbered by more than 4 to 1, to now being outnumbered by more than 13 to 1. “And the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘The people are still too many, bring them to the waters, and there I will test them!’” (Judges 7:4). At the site to which the Lord had directed Gideon’s army there was drinkable water. The army stopped to drink and 9,700 knelt down on their knees, so they might drink directly from the stream. The other 300 cupped their hands and took water into them, drinking it from their hands as a dog would lap water from his bowl. “By the 300 hundred men, that lapped water, I will save you, and deliver Madian into thy hand: but let all the rest of the people return to their place” (Judges 7:7).
And so it was! The result was that the 300 soldiers under Gedeon―by the grace and help of God―slew 120,000 Madianites and only 15,000 remained. With “Gedeon’s Three Hundred”, God kept increasing the odds against them―from being outnumbered by more than 4 to 1 (135,000 versus 32,000); to more than 13 to 1 (135,000 versus 10,000); and finally to a ridiculous and seemingly impossible situation of being outnumbered by 450 to 1 (135,000 versus 300). God wanted the Israelites to go into battle heavily outnumbered, so that God Himself could claim the eventual victory against those impossible odds. God could have just as easily slain them without using Gedeon and his 300 men―but God chose to use them while ensuring that they would not steal the glory for the victory from God and attribute to their own human efforts.
Holy Scripture puts us in our place: “All the inhabitants of the Earth are reputed as nothing before God!” (Daniel 4:32). “If any man thinks himself to be something, whereas he is nothing, then he deceives himself!” (Galatians 6:3). “What have you that you have not received? And if you have received, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). “So you also, when you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants―we have only done that which we ought to do!’” says Our Lord (Luke 17:10), and hitting the nail on the head by driving home the point: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
The Faithful Few
Our Lord and Our Lady also―giving us some indication of the circumstances preceding the Triumph of her Immaculate Heart―speaks of small numbers prior to her victory: “Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see!” (La Salette, France, 1846). “The practice of the virtues and of these doctrines will be found in only a few souls!” (Our Lord, Quito, Ecuador, 1600s). “Only a few go to Mass” (La Salette, France, 1846). “Only a few people really love the Church!” (Our Lady to Blessed Elena Aiello, 1950s). “With those that are zealous, God is most generous―but they are few in number! ... Very few trust in God .. Very few seek the Lord ... Few know the poverty of Christ, and fewer embrace it! … Few there are, who stop to consider this truth and example―and only the few will reap the fruit of these great mysteries!” (Our Lady to Venerable Mary of Agreda). “A small number of souls will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue!” (Our Lady, Quito, Ecuador, 1600s). “There are those who think that also the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be! … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him! … Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16) ... The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!” (Our Lady to Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Why so few? Because many will abandon the Faith due to the wiles of Satan and worldliness: “Lucifer, with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell. They will put an end to Faith, little by little … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay … Priests will become careless in their sacred duties ... Many priests will lose their spirit … and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion … Religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls!” says Our Lady (Quito, La Salette). All of this can be summed-up by the words of Our Lord referring to the latter days of the world: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
Many prophecies concerning our times, made over the course of centuries, corroborate and affirm the fewness of the faithful that will be found on Earth in the latter days of the world.
► BLESSED ANNE CATHERINE EMMERICH speaks of the fewness of faithful Catholic according to the visions shown to her by God: “I saw a long processions of bishops [The four different sessions of the Second Vatican Council, held from 1962 to 1965, had between 2,000 and 2,500 bishops in daily attendance] ... I saw what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world [the Second Vatican Council assembled all the bishops in the world], but only a small number were perfectly sound ... I saw a few good pious bishops; but they were weak and wavering, their cowardice often got the upper hand … The Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived ... Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence … only a few of them were still godly priests … They were building a large, strange, and extravagant church there in Rome … There was nothing holy in it and only very few attended it … Everyone was to be admitted in it in order to be united and have equal rights―Evangelicals, Catholics, sects of every description … Protestantism was gradually gaining the upper hand, and the Catholic religion fell into complete decadence … The Church is completely isolated and as if completely deserted. It seems that everyone is running away … In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few homes and in a few families which God has protected … Only a few fighters for the just cause survived, but the victory was to be theirs!”
Prophecies of the Great Apostasy
► ST. HIPPOLYTUS OF ROME, (170–235) prophesied as follows: “The Churches shall lament with a great lamentation, for there shall be offered no more oblation, nor incense, nor worship acceptable to God. The sacred buildings of the churches shall be as hovels; and the precious Body and Blood of Christ shall not be manifest in those days; the Liturgy shall be extinct; the chanting of psalms shall cease; the reading of Holy Scripture shall be heard no more. But there shall be upon men darkness, and mourning upon mourning, and woe upon woe.”
► RUDOLFO GILTHIER was a monk who lived in the 1700’s. “From the Middle of the Twentieth Century on, there will be uprisings in all parts of Europe. Hunger, epidemics and earthquakes will destroy numerous cities. Kings, the great, and priests will be killed and priests and nuns will leave their Cloister. Rome will lose its scepter through following false prophets. The Church will be held hostage, and after a short time there will be no more Pope … A Prince from the East with a great Army will move throughout Europe. He will be for God, and he will fight for the Christian teachings and the Orthodox Belief, and he will subjugate the kingdom of Mohammed. He will be a new Knight of the Faith, and peace will be regained in the world.”
► BLESSED REMBORDT (18th century) stated: “These things will come when they try to set up a new kingdom of Christ from which the true Faith will be banished.”
► LACTANTIUS (250–325), an early Christian apologist and adviser to the first Christian Roman Emperor, Constantine, predicted: “As the end of this world approaches, the condition of human affairs must undergo a change, and through the prevalence of wickedness, become worse … Impiousness, lust and lasciviousness will rule the world … All justice will be confounded and the laws will be destroyed … There will be no Faith among men.”
► ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI, shortly before he died, called together his followers and warned them of future troubles, saying: “There will be great trials and afflictions; perplexities and dissensions, both spiritual and temporal, will abound; the charity of many will grow cold, and the malice of the wicked will increase. In those days Jesus Christ will send them not a true pastor, but a destroyer. At the time of this tribulation, a man who will not be canonically elected, will be raised to the Pontificate, and by his cunning will endeavor to draw many into error and death. Then scandals will be multiplied, and many religious orders will be entirely destroyed, because they will consent to error instead of opposing it. Some preachers will keep silence about the truth, and others will trample it under foot and deny it. There will be such diversity of opinions and schisms among the people, the religious and the clergy, that, except those days were shortened, according to the words of the Gospel, even the elect would be led into error, were they not specially guided by the immense mercy of God amid such great confusion. Those who preserve their fervor and adhere to virtue with love and zeal for the truth, will suffer injuries and persecutions, being seen as rebels and schismatics. Their persecutors, urged on by the evil spirits, will say they are rendering a great service to God by destroying such pestilent men from the face of the Earth.”
► ST. ANTHONY OF THE DESERT made this prediction in the 4th century: “Men will surrender to the spirit of the age. They will say that the Church must be brought up to date and made meaningful to the day’s problems. When the Church and the world are one, then those days are at hand!” When in January of 1959, Pope John XXIII called for a Second Vatican Council (1962-65), he allegedly said that it was time to open the windows of the Church. Opening the windows would let in fresh air and fresh ideas. It would reinvigorate the Church. The famous quotation believed to be uttered by John XXIII was this: “I want to throw open the windows of the Church so that we can see out and the people can see in.” The problem was that those inside the Church liked the world that they saw through those opened windows―and over the years, the majority walked out of the Church to embrace the world! Today, less than 20% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday Mass at church. The Second Vatican Council (from 1962 to 1965) was all about the “aggiornamento” ― which means “bringing up to date; a modernization.” Pope John XXIII, in his opening speech at the Second Vatican Council, said: “Divine Providence is leading us to a new order … The Church must ever look to the present, to the new conditions and new forms of life introduced into the modern world which have opened new avenues to the Catholic apostolate … by bringing herself up-to-date where required … The Council now beginning rises in the Church like daybreak, a forerunner of most splendid light ... in order that the work of all may correspond to the modern expectations and needs of the various peoples of the world ... It is now only dawn ... The Second Vatican Ecumenical Council prepares and consolidates the path toward that unity of mankind which is required as a necessary foundation … in order that the earthly city may be brought to the resemblance of that heavenly city where truth reigns, charity is the law … The Church has always opposed errors. Frequently the Church has condemned them with the greatest severity. Nowadays, however, the Spouse of Christ prefers to make use of the medicine of mercy rather than that of severity.”
► ST. JOHN BOSCO (1815-1888), almost a century before the Second Vatican Council, prophesied about the great damage that “There will be an Ecumenical Council in the next century, after which there will be chaos in the Church. Tranquility will not return until the Pope succeeds in anchoring the boat of Peter between the twin pillars of Eucharistic Devotion and Devotion to Our Lady!” There was ONLY ONE Ecumenical Council in the 20th century―the Second Vatican Council!
► ST. COLUMBCILLE is a famous Irish saint and seer who lived between 521 and 597 AD. The following extracts from St. Columbcille’s prophecies seem to point to our present day and age: “Hearken, thou, until I relate things that shall come to pass in the latter ages of the world. Great carnage shall be made, justice shall be outraged, multitudinous evils, great suffering shall prevail, and many unjust laws will be administered. Judges will administer injustice, under the sanction of powerful rulers; the common people will adopt false principles. Churches will be held in bondage by the all-powerful men of the day.”
► POPE ST. PIUS X received the following vision in 1909: “I saw one of my successors taking to flight over the bodies of his brethren. He will take refuge in disguise somewhere and after a short retirement he will die a cruel death. The present wickedness of the world is only the beginning of the sorrows which must take place before the end of the world.”
► ST. NICHOLAS OF FLÜE (1417-1487), was a Swiss hermit, mystic and ascetic who is the patron saint of Switzerland. He is known for having fasted for over twenty years―he received enough nourishment to live on the Sacred Host which he received every day Holy Communion by assisting at daily Mass. He foretold: “The Church will be punished because the majority of its members—high and low—will become so perverted. The Church will sink still deeper until she will at last seem to be extinguished, and the succession of Peter and the other Apostles to have expired. After that she will be victoriously exalted in the sight of all doubters.”
► ST. METHODIUS OF PATARA was a bishop who was martyred in the 4th century. Following are some interesting excerpts from his prophecy: “In the last period of time, Christians will not appreciate the great grace of God. They will be very ungrateful, lead a sinful life, in pride, vanity, unchastity, frivolity, hatred, avarice, gluttony, and many other vices, that the sins of men will stink more than a pestilence before God. Many will doubt whether the Catholic Faith is the true and only saving one and whether the Jews are correct when they still expect the Messias. Many will be the false teachings and resultant bewilderment. The just God will, in consequence, give Lucifer and all his devils power to come on Earth and tempt his godless creatures. The enemies of Christ will boast: ‘We have subjected the Earth and all its inhabitants, and the Christians cannot escape our hands!’ Then a Great Monarch will arise in great fury against them ... Drawing his sword, he will fall upon the foes of Christianity and crush them. Then peace will reign on Earth.”
The Triumph of the Great Monarch and the Holy Pope
There are many prophecies which speak of a triumph during the time of the “Great Monarch” and the “Holy Pope.” One can logically think that this triumph is to part of the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
► MATHIAS LANG is also known as Stormberger in some prophecy circles. Lang was illiterate and had no education, yet he predicted many things like airplanes, telephones and much more. He lived in Bavaria between 1753 to 1820. He made the following prediction before World War One had even started: “Two or three decades after the First [World] War there will come one a Second [World] War which will be even larger. Almost all the nations of the world will be involved. Millions of men will die, without being soldiers. The fire will fall from the sky and many great cities will be destroyed. And after the end of the Second Great War, a third universal war will come, so that it will determine everything. There will be weapons totally new. In one day, more men will die than in all the previous wars. The battles will be accomplished with artificial weapons. Gigantic catastrophes will happen. With the open eyes, the nations of the planet will go through these catastrophes. They won’t know what is happening, and those that know and tell, will be silenced. Everything will be different from before, and in many places the Earth will be a great cemetery. The third war will be the end of many nations. Then, afterward, a good time will come, and holy men will do wonders. Once people have their Faith again, a long period of peace will follow. When women walk around in pants, and men have become effeminate, so that one will no longer be able to tell men from women, then the time of destruction is near. ”
► BLESSED ANNA MARIA TAIGI (died 1837): described the great ordeal ahead. Rome would be battered by revolutions. Millions of men would die by the sword in war and civil strife, many other millions would perish in unforeseen death. Then entire nations would return to the unity of the Church, and many Turks, Pagans and Jews would be converted and their fervor will cover with confusion the original Christians. She said that Our Lord intended to cleanse the world and His Church.
► VENERABLE MARY OF AGREDA (17th Century) stated: “It was revealed to me that through the intercession of the Mother of God, all heresies will disappear. This victory over heresies has been reserved by Christ for His Blessed Mother ... Before the Second Coming of Christ, Mary must, more than ever, shine in mercy, might and grace in order to bring unbelievers into the Catholic Faith.”
► SR. MARIE LATASTE gave a prophecy in the 1840’s about a period of devastation in France and the rest of the world. The she speaks of Our Lady’s triumph: “Peace shall return to the world, because the Blessed Virgin Mary will breathe over the storms and quell them. Her name will be praised, blessed and exalted forever. Prisoners or captives shall recover their liberty; exiles shall return to their country, and the unfortunate or unhappy shall be restored to peace and happiness.”
► RUDOLFO GILTHIER a monk in the 1700’s, wrote: “Rome will lose its scepter through following false prophets. The Church will be held hostage, and after a short time there will be no more Pope … A Prince from the East with a great Army will move throughout Europe. He will be for God, and he will fight for the Christian teachings and the Orthodox Belief, and he will subjugate the kingdom of Mohammed. He will be a new Knight of the Faith, and peace will be regained in the world.”
► ST. METHODIUS OF PATARA was a bishop who was martyred in the 4th century, wrote: “The enemies of Christ will boast: ‘We have subjected the Earth and all its inhabitants, and the Christians cannot escape our hands!’ Then a Great Monarch will arise in great fury against them ... Drawing his sword, he will fall upon the foes of Christianity and crush them. Then peace will reign on Earth.”
► ABBOT WERDIN D’ORANTE (12th Century) revealed: “The great monarch and the great Pope will precede Antichrist. The nations will be at war for four years and a great part of the world will be destroyed. The Pope will go over the sea carrying the sign of Redemption on his forehead. The great Monarch will come to restore peace and the Pope will share in the victory.”
► VENERABLE BARTHOLOMEW HOLZHAUSER was a parish priest, healer and an ecclesiastical writer, who was born in 1613 in Bavaria. He wrote: “After a world war will come a new period, in which two mighty ones will face each other. The wrangle between these two will begin in the second half of the twentieth century. It will overthrow mountains and silt up rivers. A great change will come to pass, such as no mortal man will have expected; Heaven and Hell will confront each other in this struggle, old states will perish and light and darkness will be pitted against each other with swords, but it will be swords of a different fashion. With these swords it will be possible to cut up the skies and split the Earth. A great lament will come over all mankind and only a small batch will survive the storm, the pestilence and the horror. And neither of the two adversaries will conquer nor be vanquished. Both mighty ones will lie on the ground, and a new mankind will come into existence. When everything has been ruined by war; when Catholics are hard pressed by traitorous co-religionists and heretics; when the Church and her servants are denied their rights, the monarchies have been abolished and their rulers murdered ... Then the Hand of Almighty God will work a marvelous change, something apparently impossible according to human understanding. There will rise a valiant Monarch anointed by God. The Great Monarch will have the special help of God and be unconquerable. He will rule supreme in temporal matters … The Pope will rule supreme in spiritual matters at the same time ... The great monarch of the world will create new laws for the new mankind and will cause a new age to begin. Persecution will cease and justice shall rule and there will be only one flock and one shepherd, and peace will be of long duration, for the glory of God in Heaven and on Earth. God possesses the key to everything.”
► BLESSED JOHANNES AMADEUS DA SILVA (d. 1482), was a Portuguese nobleman who became first a Hieronymite monk, then left that life to become a friar of the Franciscan Order. Later he became a reformer of that religious order. He prophesied as follows: “In the latter days there shall be great wars and bloodshed. The fury of the wars shall last a long time. Whole provinces shall be left desolate and uninhabited; many cities forsaken of people; the nobility slaughtered; principal persons ruined; great changes of kings, commonwealths and rulers. Germany and Spain will unite under a Great Monarch designated by God. After much slaughtering, the other nations will be forced to come into this union. There is no hope for the unbelievers until all Germany becomes converted―then all will happen quickly. Because of Germany’s unfaithfulness, the time will be prolonged until all countries unite under the Great Monarch. After this union, mass conversions will take place by the command of God, and peace and prosperity will follow.”
► ST. FRANCIS DE PAUL (1470), wrote of the Great Monarch and the military religious order he would create, with which he would repel the enemies of God and conquer the world: “The Great Monarch, the elect and the beloved of the Most High Lord, shall be like the sun amidst the stars. He shall be a first-born son; in his childhood he will be like a saint; in his youth, a great sinner; then he will be converted entirely to God and will do great penance; his sins will be forgiven him, and he shall become a great saint. He shall be the great founder and leader of a new religious order different from all the others―the Holy Militia of the Holy Spirit. He shall divide it into three classes, namely: (1) Military knights; (2) Solitary priests; (3) Most pious hospitallers. This shall be the last religious order in the Church, and it will do more good for our holy religion than all other religious institutes. These devout men shall wear on their breasts, and much more within their hearts, the sign of the living God, namely, the cross. He will gather a grand army, and the angels shall fight for them. Through the power of the Most High they shall kill all God’s enemies. By force of arms he shall destroy the sect of Mahomet, and shall annihilate all the heresies and tyrannies of the world. They shall overcome the world and shall bring the world to a holy mode of life. After this they shall turn their victorious arms against bad Christians, and shall destroy all the rebels against Jesus Christ. These holy Cross-bearers shall reign and dominate holily over the world and support the Church of God until the end of time. The Great Monarch shall He shall reform the Church of God by means of his followers, who shall be the best men upon Earth in holiness, in arms, in science, and in every virtue, because such is the will of the Most High. They shall obtain the dominion of the whole world, both temporal and spiritual, until the end of time.”
► ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT (1673-1716) echoes some of the above points made in the prophecy of St. Francis de Paul. In his True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis prophetically writes: “The power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times. She will raise up her humble slaves and her poor children to make war against Satan. They shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance, in union with Mary, that they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph. They shall be “like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful” Mary to pierce her enemies. They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew with their two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall be the true apostles of the latter times. They shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God according to the Holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior.”
► ST. CAESAR OF ARIES (469-543) prophesied: “When the entire world shall have been a prey to the greatest miseries and trials, then they provinces shall be succored by a prince. This prince shall extend his dominion over the entire world. At the same time there will be a great Pope, who will be most eminent in sanctity and most perfect in every quality. This Pope shall have with him the Great Monarch, a most virtuous man, who shall be a descendant of French kings. This Great Monarch will assist the Pope in the reformation of the whole Earth. Many princes and nations that are living in error and impiety shall be converted, and an admirable peace shall reign among men during many years, because the wrath of God shall be appeased through their repentance, penance, and good works. There will be one common law, one only Faith, one baptism, one religion. All nations shall recognize the Holy See of Rome, and shall pay homage to the Pope. But after some considerable time fervor shall cool, iniquity shall abound, and moral corruption shall become worse than ever, which shall bring upon mankind the last and worse persecution of Antichrist, and the end of the world.”
► ABBOT JOACHIM MERLIN, who died in 1541, made the following predictions about the Holy Pope: “After many prolonged sufferings endured by Christians, and after a too great effusion of innocent blood, the Lord shall give peace and happiness to the desolated nations. A remarkable pope will be seated on the pontifical throne, under the special protection of the angels. Before, however, being firmly and solidly established in the Holy See, there will be innumerable wars and violent conflicts during which the sacred throne shall be shaken. At the beginning of his papal reign, in order to achieve these happy results, having need of a powerful temporal assistance, this holy Pontiff will ask the cooperation of the generous monarch of France. At that time the monarch will come as a pilgrim to witness the splendor of this glorious pontiff. A temporal throne being vacant, the Pope shall place on it this king whose assistance he shall ask.
“This holy Pope shall be both pastor and reformer. Holy and full of gentleness, this Pope shall undo all wrong, he shall recover the states of the Church, and reunite the exiled temporal powers. The sanctity of this beneficent Pontiff will be so great that the highest rulers shall bow before his presence. He shall be revered by all people, and shall recover the kingdom of Jerusalem. As the only Pastor he shall reunite the Eastern to the Western Church, and thus only one Faith will be in vigor. Through him the East and West shall be in everlasting concord. This holy man shall crush the arrogance of religious schism and heresy. All men will return to the primitive Church, and there shall be only one pastor, one law, one master ― humble, modest, and fearing God. The true God of the Jews, our Lord Jesus Christ, will make everything prosper beyond all human hope, because God alone can and will pour down on the wounds of humanity the oily balm of sweetness. The city of Babylon shall then be the head and guide of the world. Rome, weakened in temporal power, shall forever preserve her spiritual dominion, and shall enjoy great peace.
“Six and a half years after this time the Pope will render his soul to God. The end of his days shall arrive in an arid province, situated between a river and a lake near the mountains ... A man of remarkable sanctity will be his successor in the Pontifical chair. Through him God will work so many prodigies that all men shall revere him, and no person will dare to oppose his holy precepts. He shall not allow the clergy to have many benefices. He will induce them to live by tithes and offerings of the faithful. He shall forbid pomp in dress, and all immorality in dance and songs. He will preach the Gospel in person, and exhort all honest ladies to appear in public without any ornament of gold or precious stones. After having occupied the Holy See for a long time, he shall happily return to the Lord. His three immediate successors shall also be men of exemplary holiness. One after the other will be models of virtue, and shall work miracles, confirming the teaching of their predecessors. Under their government the Church shall spread, and these popes shall be called the Angelic Pastors.”
Mary Can But Will Not Triumph Without Us
As stated above―Mary is the most powerful creature outside of God. Mary has no need of us in order to triumph over the Satan and the world. Yet―to avoid spoiling us and doing everything for us while we merely sit and watch―she requires that we roll-up our sleeves, show some sweat and effort, and play a token part in the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart.
As stated above―Mary is the most powerful creature outside of God. Mary has no need of us in order to triumph over the Satan and the world. Yet―to avoid spoiling us and doing everything for us while we merely sit and watch―she requires that we roll-up our sleeves, show some sweat and effort, and play a token part in the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart.
That is why Our Lady has said things like:
“It is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, for failing to call upon me” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda) ― without doubt Our Lady could act without being called upon, but she won’t, because she demands that we play a part in these things.
“I call on the true disciples of God! … I call on the true followers of Christ! … I call on my children, the true faithful! ... It is time they came out and filled the world with light! … Fight, children of light! … I shall fight at their side! … For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends! Their prayers, penances and tears will rise up to Heaven―and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession” (Our Lady of La Salette). Hey! Why bother with prayers, penances and tears? Our Lady should take care of everything without the need for those things!
“Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? Sacrifice yourselves for sinners!” (Our Lady of Fatima, May 1917). Our Lady, by herself, could obtain all the necessary graces to convert the entire world―but she will not do so, for she wants us play a part (a trivial part) in those conversions, just like a mother could do all the dishes by herself, but she makes her children help her in some way so as to avoid spoiling them.
“I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair for the sinners! … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger! ... Already souls who wish to pray are on the way to being gathered together! … Pray in reparation for the sins of men … Pray very much! Continue to pray very much—very much! I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!” (Our Lady of Akita).
In the realm of sports, we see how a team that has been failing under one coach, suddenly becomes “world-beaters” under a new coach with the very same squad of players. It is the coach that often makes the difference between losing and winning. Mary is our coach―she is our guide, our general, our God-given “go-to-person” through whom, with whom and by whom victory will achieved.
“Jesus wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it!” (Our Lady of Fatima, June 1917). “God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved” (Our Lady of Fatima, July 1917). Is that what we are doing in our own little way―among family, friends, relatives, neighbors, work colleagues? Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart can triumph without worldwide devotion to it―but that is not going to happen, because God wants a worldwide devotion to Mary’s Immaculate Heart, hence the words, “If what I say is done…”
“It is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, for failing to call upon me ... Eternal rest [likewise Mary’s future Triumph] is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment … Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others expect to be pardoned without penance, others expect to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain unless they willingly enter upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, and to carry it after Christ” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
“Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20). You might totally believe that the Triumph of the Immaculate will happen, but do nothing to help bring it about. Faith is not the “be-all-and-end-all” of things―just believe and do nothing. Faith is merely a beginning―a seed that has to sprout, grow and produce fruit. “Without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6) ― but you must do something with your Faith, otherwise you are burying and not using the “talent” that God gave you: “A man called his servants and to one he gave five talents, and to another two talents, and to another one talent … He that had received the five talents, went and gained other five. He that had received the two, gained other two. But he that had received the one, buried his talent into the earth and hid his lord’s money … After a long time the lord of those servants came and reckoned with them. He that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that thou art a hard man! Being afraid I went and hid thy talent in the earth! Behold the talent which is thine!’ And his lord said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You should have at least committed my money to the bankers, so at my coming I should have received my own with accrued interest!’ The Lord said to others: ‘Take away the talent from him! And cast this unprofitable servant out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-3). Have we ‘buried’ our Faith? Do we neglect to profit from it by working with it and producing fruits?
“Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). The Protestants say that our works are not needed for salvation, basing themselves on an exaggeration of the Scriptural verses: “Believe in the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved!” (Acts 16:31) and “You are saved through Faith, and not of yourselves” (Ephesians 2:8). “Faith without works is dead!” Trying to put “Faith” in opposition to “Works” is like arguing which blade in a pair of scissors is most necessary. The Council of Trent talks about how Faith is only the beginning of human salvation. It is the foundation and the root of all justification―and roots must grow and produce the tree which must produce fruits. The root of Faith or the foundation of Faith is invisible beneath the ground―the tree or the building are the visible part above the ground, just like works are visible elements that come forth from the invisible Faith in the soul. Similarly, devotion to Our Lady―if it is a true devotion―has to produce works and fruits, just like Faith has produce works and fruits. If “Jesus wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world” and if “God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart” (Our Lady of Fatima, June & July 1917), then we should be working hard to bring about that fruit of worldwide devotion, by our prayers, sacrifices, works and words.
The inspired words of Fr. Frederick Faber, in the Preface of his own personal translation from French to English, of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary, could very appropriately and fittingly be applied to what has to be done to propagate devotion to Mary in order to help bring about the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary:
“What is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady―but, remember, nothing short of an immense one! Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be. It has no faith in itself. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized. Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background. Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them. It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines. Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother. I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this particular devotion of the St. Louis de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ” [and the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary].
The Triumph Will Come―But When?
Since Our Lady didn’t give a specific time-frame for when her Immaculate Heart will triumph, we can only speculate on when it will occur. However, there are some clues that give an approximate indication. There are many who think that the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart could around 2029―which 100 years after the request from Heaven that Russia be consecrated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Why 2029? It was on June 13th, 1929, that was Lucia given another important apparition as she was making a Holy Hour in the convent chapel at Tuy in Spain. She heard Our Lady say: “The moment has come in which God asks the Holy Father, in union with all the Bishops in the world, to make the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, promising to save it by this means. Sacrifice yourself for this intention and pray.”
Lucia also said that later on Jesus had spoken to her as follows: “I want My whole Church to acknowledge that Consecration as a triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, so that it may extend its cult later on, and put the devotion to this Immaculate Heart beside the devotion to My Sacred Heart.”
Two years later, in 1931, Our Lord complained to Sister Lucia of the tardiness of His ministers who were delaying the Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. He said: “Make it known to My ministers, given that they follow the example of the King of France in delaying the execution of My requests, they will follow him into misfortune. It is never too late to have recourse to Jesus and Mary … They did not wish to heed My request! ... Like the King of France they will repent of it, and they will do it, but it will be late. Russia will have already spread its errors in the world, provoking wars and persecutions against the Church.”
On another occasion, Our Lord said: “They did not wish to heed My request. Like the king of France, they will repent and do it, but it will be late. Russia will have already spread her errors throughout the world, provoking wars and persecutions of the Church; the Holy Father will have much to suffer.”
Sister Lucia told Fr. Joachim Maria Alonso, the official historian of Fatima, in a little known response: “The final triumph of Mary’s Heart is certain, and it will be definitive. But it will take place ‘in the end’ ― that is to say, after a terrible purification of sinful mankind in a baptism of fire, blood and tears!”
The reference that Jesus made to the King of France needs to be explained. On June 17th, 1689 the Sacred Heart of Jesus manifested to Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque His command to the King of France, Louis XIV, that the King was to consecrate France to the Sacred Heart. For 100 years to the day the Kings of France delayed, and did not obey. The French Revolution broke out is 1789―which is 100 years after Jesus made His command to the King of France. Then, on June 17th, 1789, the King of France was stripped of his legislative authority by the revolutionary Third Estate, and four years later the soldiers of the French Revolution executed the King of France as if he were a criminal―for, in 1793, France sent its King, Louis XVI, to the guillotine. Louis XVI and his predecessors (Louis XIV and Louis XV) had failed to obey Our Lord’s request that France be consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and thus misfortune had befallen both the King and his country. However, it was not just France that fell into misfortune, but most of Europe―for the French Revolution quickly spread and conquered surrounding countries and deposed the kings in those countries.
Due to the fact that the French Revolution made the Kingdom of France fall exactly 100 days after Our Lord’s request that France be consecrated to His Sacred Heart; as well as the fact that King Louis XVI was deposed from the throne exactly 100 years to the very day (June 17th 1689 and June 17th 1789) from the time Our Lord’s request was made―it is from these facts that many people (and rightly so) think that the same thing could happen to the Church 100 years after Our Lord and Our Lady formally said, on June 13th, 1929, that the time had come to consecrate Russia to Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Summary
It is certain that Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary will come―regardless of whether or not this or that soul cooperates in bringing it about. As Our Lady emphatically said at Fatima: “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!” Nevertheless, the reticence or even refusal of the popes in consecrating Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in the exact manner as she had requested, means that we will have to endure, as a consequential punishment, some terrible times before her Immaculate Heart does triumph. Our Lady of Good Success and Our Lady of La Salette alluded to that when she said:
“From the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil rights, as well as ecclesiastical rights. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family ... The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... Churches will be locked up or desecrated … and altars will be sacked … Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Men will kill each other, massacre each other, even in their homes … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. A general war will follow which will be appalling. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy ... Blood will flow on all sides ... There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration … This will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet … Thus Church and country will be finally free of his cruel tyranny!”
The Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart will take place―but at what cost? As Our Lord said: “They will repent of it, and they will do it, but it will be late. Russia will have already spread its errors in the world, provoking wars and persecutions against the Church!” The Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart will take place―but our cooperation is demanded, even though it is not necessary, for Our Lord and Our Lady could easily do it without our cooperation. How many lives will have lost due to Catholic negligence? Even worse, how many souls will have been damned due to Catholic negligence? To whom more has been given, more is required! “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required; and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). “That servant who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes!” (Luke 12:47). “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). Sister Lucia of Fatima revealed: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
You cannot entirely blame the popes for not consecrating Russia to the Immaculate―though the chief responsibility for the failure is theirs. If Catholics had been praying sufficiently for the Consecration to happen, then grace would have inspired and moved one of the popes to comply with the command. That is why Our Lady said: “With the Rosary, pray for the Pope, the Bishops and Priests!”
Our Lady promised that “in the end my Immaculate Heart will triumph!” What does that mean? Of what does she speak? Triumph over what? When will it happen? How will it happen? Will we live to see it? Will we live through it? Will we survive and come out at the other end of it? These and many more questions are rarely thought about and rarely talked about. Is it because there are no answers? Nobody can claim to have all the answers, or even some of the answers, but if we look more closely, if we refer to what Our Lady has said in her other apparitions, if we consult some of the prophecies made by the Saints, Blesseds and Venerables―then we can see some kind of picture appear that will, at least, partially answer those questions. Only God and Our Lady know everything in full extent concerning the “what, when, how, where, etc.” of the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary―but God and Our Lady have given us certain clues and indications that lift some of the fog and help us have an approximate idea of many aspects of that triumph.
A dictionary will define “triumph” along the lines of: “the act, fact, or condition of being victorious or triumphant; a successful ending of a struggle or contest; victory; conquest; a very great success, achievement.” Triumph is not something that exists by itself. Triumph is not something that comes first. There has to be something―an enemy, an adversary―to triumph over, to conquer, to defeat. Triumph is usually associated with war and battles.
Fight Foretold
Whether it is the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary in particular, or the triumph of the Church as a whole, or our own personal triumph in the Faith and the spiritual life―the general picture is one of war, battles and fighting. Holy Scripture refers to this on many occasions: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4). “Fear them not―for the Lord your God will fight for you!” (Deuteronomy 3:22). “The Lord your God is in the midst of you, and will fight for you against your enemies, to deliver you from danger!” (Deuteronomy 20:4).
Speaking to the serpent (Satan), after he had seduced Eve into sinning against God, God foretells Satan’s defeat by Our Lady (“the Woman”) when He says: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel!” (Genesis 3:15).
Our Lord Himself indicates the opposition between His heavenly Kingdom and Satan’s kingdom of the world: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―for where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! [mammon = the treasures and pleasures and power of this world]” (Matthew 6:19-24).
To those words of Our Lord, Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Our Lady Foretells the Fight
The Blessed Virgin Mary has also, on many occasions, foretold of the fight that is to come: “I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil rights, as well as ecclesiastical rights. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … Many will turn upon Religion! … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! …
“The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises! … The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... Churches will be locked up or desecrated … and altars will be sacked … Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death ... The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals]. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury and impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … This, in turn, will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy!” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
Perpetual Warfare
As you can see from the above quotes, Christians have been at war from the very beginning―as Our Lord said: “If the world hates you, then know that it has hated Me before you! If you had been of the world, then the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you!” [John 15:18-20). Through the Sacrament of Confirmation we have been made Soldiers of Christ. Are we fighting for Christ? Are we fighting for the Faith? Are we fighting against error? Are we fighting the world? Are we fighting sin?
► Our Lady of La Salette speaks of our need to fight―even though it is she who will bring about the triumph: I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son! Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world! Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days! May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
► Our Lady of Akita also implies that we need to go to battle and fight: “Pray in reparation for the sins of men! … Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men! … Pray very much for the Pope, Bishops, and Priests! … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops! … With my Son, I seek for souls who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful … Beloved souls who console Him forming a cohort of victim souls! … Be faithful and fervent in prayer to console the Master! … The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son.”
► Sister Lucia of Fatima relays to us what Our Lady of Fatima revealed to her: “Father, the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them! … A time will come when the decisive battle between the kingdom of Christ and Satan will be over marriage and the family. And those who will work for the good of the family will experience persecution and tribulation … We should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No―Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed! So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway. When God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies … God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others.”
Gone AWOL? Absent Without Leave?
Today’s modern Catholic has become increasingly self-centered and self-gratifying. Apart from the “nearest and dearest” (friends and family), there is little care for others in the world―and particularly little or no care for sinners! The bottom-line of Our Lady’s apparitions is a fight to try and save sinners from Hell. The bottom-line with most Catholics is that sinners can go to Hell if they want―and they use Cain’s vain excuse of: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). “If sinners want to sin―then that’s their problem! I can do nothing to stop them!” they vainly say. Too many Catholics fight among themselves rather than fight to save souls! They are “Armchair Warriors” or “Keyboard Warriors” but not real warriors. They prefer to play rather than pray. They practice self-gratification rather than mortification. They prefer to spend their time on their devices rather sacrifices.
Does it matter if they prefer to play more than pray; self-gratification more than mortification; devices more than sacrifices? Surely Our Lady does not need them to bring about the Triumph of her Immaculate Heart? The answer to that is along the lines of what St. Augustine said about God and our salvation. St. Augustine―a Father and Doctor of the Church―tells us that “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us!” Some translate the Latin into the singular: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, but God will not save you without your cooperation. Similarly, Our Lady could bring about the Triumph of her Immaculate Heart without us, but she will not do so. Heaven does not overindulge, baby, pamper or spoil anybody―not even Our Lady was pampered, babied, overindulged or spoilt, and she was the greatest of God’s creatures! As she said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda:
“My life was a continual suffering! ... The sorrow which I suffered is so little noticed by the living! … I suffered much more than the martyrs in all their torments! … I blessed the Lord to be able to suffer! … All that I suffered seemed little―and I continually longed to suffer still more! ... I suffered with eagerness! … This desire for suffering led me on in the way of suffering … thus permitting me to endure so much the greater sufferings! … I would have been ready to suffer the greatest torments of the world! … I desired to take upon myself the sufferings of all men … There is no torment, not even death itself, that I would have refused, if such had been necessary to save any of the damned ― and to save them, I would have esteemed all sufferings a sweet alleviation! ... I never presumed to ask the Lord anything for the sake of ridding myself of suffering! … My Son and I embraced the way of the Cross and suffering for the whole course of our natural life! … My Son and I suffered so much for creatures and for their salvation! … For them We suffered and endured such bitter sorrows! … What tribulations and hardships we suffered! … The Lord and I suffered and endured such bitter sorrows, in order that mortals might be encouraged not to refuse less severe sufferings for their own eternal good. Shall only Christ, our Lord, and I suffer all these hardships―while the guilt laden sinners throw themselves head over heels into the filth of their carnal inclinations? I do count anyone as a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son!”
We have to play some part in the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary―a bit part, a minor part, a secondary part―but a part nevertheless! The conversion of each and every sinner is a Triumph of the Immaculate Heart in miniature form―and Our Lady does not bring about the conversion of sinners without the sinner and others playing their part. That is why, at Fatima, she asked for prayers and sacrifices for the conversion of sinners: “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners!”
We cannot make the same lame excuse of Cain, who said to God: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). “Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is thy brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I know not! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to him: ‘What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth. Now, therefore, cursed shalt thou be upon the Earth!’” (Genesis 4:8-11). Similarly, we could apply that to ourselves in relation to the many souls that fall into Hell every single hour, partially due to our negligence in offering prayers and sacrifices for their conversion. “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” said Our Lady. “It’s not my fault! I am not their keeper! They choose to sin! I can do nothing about it!” you will say. There are many ways in which we can be guilty of the sins of others even though we ourselves do not actually commit the sins―one of those ways is “silence” and, in this case, a “silence” by not offering prayers and sacrifices to draw down from Heaven the graces necessary to prevent those sins and bring about conversions. “He that hath the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:17). We have the “substance” of that is necessary―the Faith and the state of sanctifying grace. We can clearly see our “brother in need” by the tsunami of sin that continually floods the world. How can we say that we love God if we refuse or neglect to save those lost sinners for whom Christ came to suffer and die: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10).
Whose Triumph Will It Be?
The Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary is not a case of: (1) Mary brings about the triumph by herself, while we just sand by and watch; or (2) we or some group of humans bring about the triumph for her, while she stands by and watches. It will be Our Lady’s triumph and we have to be the “paintbrushes”, “screwdrivers”, “spades” or “chisels” that Our Lady will use. A paintbrush is useless by itself―it needs the hand of the artist to pick it up and use it. A screwdriver is useless by itself―it needs someone to pick it up and use it. Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Likewise, Our Lady―who is the Mediatrix of all God’s graces―could also say: “Without me―you can do nothing!” As St. Thomas Aquinas states: “Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act!” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6). Without grace we can do nothing good―and therefore, without Our Lady the Mediatrix of all graces, we can do no good―especially no great good, which is what her Triumph will be.
When a battle is won, we often attribute the victory to the commander of the troops. Holy Scripture says: “David defeated the Philistines” (2 Kings 8:1) ― but it was not David on his own, but the Israelites under his leadership. Scripture does not mention or name all the individual soldiers in David’s army, but David alone. Likewise, when we say that General George Washington sought to defend New York from capture by British forces―we do not mean General Washington alone, but Washington with his army. When we speak of the Victory at the Battle of Lepanto, we speak of Our Lady and her Rosary as bringing the victory.
Thus the Church speaks of Our Lady as a warrior by applying to her these words of Holy Scripture: “Who is she that cometh forth as the morning rising, fair as the moon, bright as the sun, terrible as an army set in battle array?” (Canticles 6:9) ― words which the Legion of Mary utilize as part of their prayers. Hence Our Lady of La Salette invites and encourages us to fight the battle for the Faith: “I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ! … I shall fight at their side! … Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!” Sister Lucia of Fatima speaks of the final battle that Satan will wage against Our Lady: “The Blessed Virgin told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
We cannot stand idly by and watch the battle―we are necessarily included and involved in that battle. We are told “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4). “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). That last quote should remind us of the scolding that the Angel of Portugal gave to three children at Fatima (Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta) when he found them playing instead of praying: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
The Victory Belongs to God
God is the “Lord of all power” (Esther 14:12). When St. Michael the Archangel defeated Satan, it was ultimately by the power of God: “St. Michael the Archangel … do thou, O prince of the heavenly host, by the power of God, cast into Hell Satan and all evil spirits …” (Prayer to St. Michael).
During the Exodus from Egypt, when Moses killed the pursuing Egyptian army in the Red Sea by closing the parted waters so that they all drowned―it ultimately by the power of God: “And the Lord said to Moses: ‘Stretch forth thy hand over the sea, so that the waters may come again upon the Egyptians and upon their chariots and horsemen!’ And when Moses had stretched forth his hand towards the sea, it returned to its former place; and, as the Egyptians were fleeing away, the waters came upon them, and the Lord shut them up in the middle of the waves. And the waters returned, and covered the chariots and the horsemen of all the army of Pharao, who had come into the sea after them, neither did there so much as one of them remain” (Exodus 14:26-28).
God loves fighting against the odds! We see this disregard by God for the odds in the case of Gedeon. Gedeon―the fifth of the Judges who were the leaders of Israel at the time―found the Israelite army greatly outnumbered by the Madianites: with 135,000 Madianites against Gedeon’s army of 32,000—who were outnumbered by more than 4 to 1. What we might see as impossible odds to overcome―it is not so with God! He tells us: “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). “And Jesus looking on them, said: ‘With men it is impossible, but not with God―for all things are possible with God!’” (Mark 10:27).
Human wisdom and prudence, seeing oneself so sorely outnumbered, would see this as a time to go out and recruit more warriors. However, without God we can do nothing, and it might be that, after the victory that the Lord would give them, the soldiers might think it had been by their own strength and ability that they had won the victory: The Lord said to Gedeon: ‘The people that are with thee are many, and Madian shall not be delivered into their hands: lest Israel should glory against Me, and say: “I was delivered by my own strength!” (Judges 7:2-3). Therefore, God said that any soldier who felt fearful should go home―and so around 22,000 of the 32,000 departed. So, they went from being outnumbered by more than 4 to 1, to now being outnumbered by more than 13 to 1. “And the Lord said to Gedeon: ‘The people are still too many, bring them to the waters, and there I will test them!’” (Judges 7:4). At the site to which the Lord had directed Gideon’s army there was drinkable water. The army stopped to drink and 9,700 knelt down on their knees, so they might drink directly from the stream. The other 300 cupped their hands and took water into them, drinking it from their hands as a dog would lap water from his bowl. “By the 300 hundred men, that lapped water, I will save you, and deliver Madian into thy hand: but let all the rest of the people return to their place” (Judges 7:7).
And so it was! The result was that the 300 soldiers under Gedeon―by the grace and help of God―slew 120,000 Madianites and only 15,000 remained. With “Gedeon’s Three Hundred”, God kept increasing the odds against them―from being outnumbered by more than 4 to 1 (135,000 versus 32,000); to more than 13 to 1 (135,000 versus 10,000); and finally to a ridiculous and seemingly impossible situation of being outnumbered by 450 to 1 (135,000 versus 300). God wanted the Israelites to go into battle heavily outnumbered, so that God Himself could claim the eventual victory against those impossible odds. God could have just as easily slain them without using Gedeon and his 300 men―but God chose to use them while ensuring that they would not steal the glory for the victory from God and attribute to their own human efforts.
Holy Scripture puts us in our place: “All the inhabitants of the Earth are reputed as nothing before God!” (Daniel 4:32). “If any man thinks himself to be something, whereas he is nothing, then he deceives himself!” (Galatians 6:3). “What have you that you have not received? And if you have received, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). “So you also, when you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants―we have only done that which we ought to do!’” says Our Lord (Luke 17:10), and hitting the nail on the head by driving home the point: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
The Faithful Few
Our Lord and Our Lady also―giving us some indication of the circumstances preceding the Triumph of her Immaculate Heart―speaks of small numbers prior to her victory: “Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see!” (La Salette, France, 1846). “The practice of the virtues and of these doctrines will be found in only a few souls!” (Our Lord, Quito, Ecuador, 1600s). “Only a few go to Mass” (La Salette, France, 1846). “Only a few people really love the Church!” (Our Lady to Blessed Elena Aiello, 1950s). “With those that are zealous, God is most generous―but they are few in number! ... Very few trust in God .. Very few seek the Lord ... Few know the poverty of Christ, and fewer embrace it! … Few there are, who stop to consider this truth and example―and only the few will reap the fruit of these great mysteries!” (Our Lady to Venerable Mary of Agreda). “A small number of souls will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue!” (Our Lady, Quito, Ecuador, 1600s). “There are those who think that also the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be! … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him! … Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16) ... The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!” (Our Lady to Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Why so few? Because many will abandon the Faith due to the wiles of Satan and worldliness: “Lucifer, with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell. They will put an end to Faith, little by little … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay … Priests will become careless in their sacred duties ... Many priests will lose their spirit … and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion … Religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls!” says Our Lady (Quito, La Salette). All of this can be summed-up by the words of Our Lord referring to the latter days of the world: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
Many prophecies concerning our times, made over the course of centuries, corroborate and affirm the fewness of the faithful that will be found on Earth in the latter days of the world.
► BLESSED ANNE CATHERINE EMMERICH speaks of the fewness of faithful Catholic according to the visions shown to her by God: “I saw a long processions of bishops [The four different sessions of the Second Vatican Council, held from 1962 to 1965, had between 2,000 and 2,500 bishops in daily attendance] ... I saw what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world [the Second Vatican Council assembled all the bishops in the world], but only a small number were perfectly sound ... I saw a few good pious bishops; but they were weak and wavering, their cowardice often got the upper hand … The Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived ... Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence … only a few of them were still godly priests … They were building a large, strange, and extravagant church there in Rome … There was nothing holy in it and only very few attended it … Everyone was to be admitted in it in order to be united and have equal rights―Evangelicals, Catholics, sects of every description … Protestantism was gradually gaining the upper hand, and the Catholic religion fell into complete decadence … The Church is completely isolated and as if completely deserted. It seems that everyone is running away … In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few homes and in a few families which God has protected … Only a few fighters for the just cause survived, but the victory was to be theirs!”
Prophecies of the Great Apostasy
► ST. HIPPOLYTUS OF ROME, (170–235) prophesied as follows: “The Churches shall lament with a great lamentation, for there shall be offered no more oblation, nor incense, nor worship acceptable to God. The sacred buildings of the churches shall be as hovels; and the precious Body and Blood of Christ shall not be manifest in those days; the Liturgy shall be extinct; the chanting of psalms shall cease; the reading of Holy Scripture shall be heard no more. But there shall be upon men darkness, and mourning upon mourning, and woe upon woe.”
► RUDOLFO GILTHIER was a monk who lived in the 1700’s. “From the Middle of the Twentieth Century on, there will be uprisings in all parts of Europe. Hunger, epidemics and earthquakes will destroy numerous cities. Kings, the great, and priests will be killed and priests and nuns will leave their Cloister. Rome will lose its scepter through following false prophets. The Church will be held hostage, and after a short time there will be no more Pope … A Prince from the East with a great Army will move throughout Europe. He will be for God, and he will fight for the Christian teachings and the Orthodox Belief, and he will subjugate the kingdom of Mohammed. He will be a new Knight of the Faith, and peace will be regained in the world.”
► BLESSED REMBORDT (18th century) stated: “These things will come when they try to set up a new kingdom of Christ from which the true Faith will be banished.”
► LACTANTIUS (250–325), an early Christian apologist and adviser to the first Christian Roman Emperor, Constantine, predicted: “As the end of this world approaches, the condition of human affairs must undergo a change, and through the prevalence of wickedness, become worse … Impiousness, lust and lasciviousness will rule the world … All justice will be confounded and the laws will be destroyed … There will be no Faith among men.”
► ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI, shortly before he died, called together his followers and warned them of future troubles, saying: “There will be great trials and afflictions; perplexities and dissensions, both spiritual and temporal, will abound; the charity of many will grow cold, and the malice of the wicked will increase. In those days Jesus Christ will send them not a true pastor, but a destroyer. At the time of this tribulation, a man who will not be canonically elected, will be raised to the Pontificate, and by his cunning will endeavor to draw many into error and death. Then scandals will be multiplied, and many religious orders will be entirely destroyed, because they will consent to error instead of opposing it. Some preachers will keep silence about the truth, and others will trample it under foot and deny it. There will be such diversity of opinions and schisms among the people, the religious and the clergy, that, except those days were shortened, according to the words of the Gospel, even the elect would be led into error, were they not specially guided by the immense mercy of God amid such great confusion. Those who preserve their fervor and adhere to virtue with love and zeal for the truth, will suffer injuries and persecutions, being seen as rebels and schismatics. Their persecutors, urged on by the evil spirits, will say they are rendering a great service to God by destroying such pestilent men from the face of the Earth.”
► ST. ANTHONY OF THE DESERT made this prediction in the 4th century: “Men will surrender to the spirit of the age. They will say that the Church must be brought up to date and made meaningful to the day’s problems. When the Church and the world are one, then those days are at hand!” When in January of 1959, Pope John XXIII called for a Second Vatican Council (1962-65), he allegedly said that it was time to open the windows of the Church. Opening the windows would let in fresh air and fresh ideas. It would reinvigorate the Church. The famous quotation believed to be uttered by John XXIII was this: “I want to throw open the windows of the Church so that we can see out and the people can see in.” The problem was that those inside the Church liked the world that they saw through those opened windows―and over the years, the majority walked out of the Church to embrace the world! Today, less than 20% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday Mass at church. The Second Vatican Council (from 1962 to 1965) was all about the “aggiornamento” ― which means “bringing up to date; a modernization.” Pope John XXIII, in his opening speech at the Second Vatican Council, said: “Divine Providence is leading us to a new order … The Church must ever look to the present, to the new conditions and new forms of life introduced into the modern world which have opened new avenues to the Catholic apostolate … by bringing herself up-to-date where required … The Council now beginning rises in the Church like daybreak, a forerunner of most splendid light ... in order that the work of all may correspond to the modern expectations and needs of the various peoples of the world ... It is now only dawn ... The Second Vatican Ecumenical Council prepares and consolidates the path toward that unity of mankind which is required as a necessary foundation … in order that the earthly city may be brought to the resemblance of that heavenly city where truth reigns, charity is the law … The Church has always opposed errors. Frequently the Church has condemned them with the greatest severity. Nowadays, however, the Spouse of Christ prefers to make use of the medicine of mercy rather than that of severity.”
► ST. JOHN BOSCO (1815-1888), almost a century before the Second Vatican Council, prophesied about the great damage that “There will be an Ecumenical Council in the next century, after which there will be chaos in the Church. Tranquility will not return until the Pope succeeds in anchoring the boat of Peter between the twin pillars of Eucharistic Devotion and Devotion to Our Lady!” There was ONLY ONE Ecumenical Council in the 20th century―the Second Vatican Council!
► ST. COLUMBCILLE is a famous Irish saint and seer who lived between 521 and 597 AD. The following extracts from St. Columbcille’s prophecies seem to point to our present day and age: “Hearken, thou, until I relate things that shall come to pass in the latter ages of the world. Great carnage shall be made, justice shall be outraged, multitudinous evils, great suffering shall prevail, and many unjust laws will be administered. Judges will administer injustice, under the sanction of powerful rulers; the common people will adopt false principles. Churches will be held in bondage by the all-powerful men of the day.”
► POPE ST. PIUS X received the following vision in 1909: “I saw one of my successors taking to flight over the bodies of his brethren. He will take refuge in disguise somewhere and after a short retirement he will die a cruel death. The present wickedness of the world is only the beginning of the sorrows which must take place before the end of the world.”
► ST. NICHOLAS OF FLÜE (1417-1487), was a Swiss hermit, mystic and ascetic who is the patron saint of Switzerland. He is known for having fasted for over twenty years―he received enough nourishment to live on the Sacred Host which he received every day Holy Communion by assisting at daily Mass. He foretold: “The Church will be punished because the majority of its members—high and low—will become so perverted. The Church will sink still deeper until she will at last seem to be extinguished, and the succession of Peter and the other Apostles to have expired. After that she will be victoriously exalted in the sight of all doubters.”
► ST. METHODIUS OF PATARA was a bishop who was martyred in the 4th century. Following are some interesting excerpts from his prophecy: “In the last period of time, Christians will not appreciate the great grace of God. They will be very ungrateful, lead a sinful life, in pride, vanity, unchastity, frivolity, hatred, avarice, gluttony, and many other vices, that the sins of men will stink more than a pestilence before God. Many will doubt whether the Catholic Faith is the true and only saving one and whether the Jews are correct when they still expect the Messias. Many will be the false teachings and resultant bewilderment. The just God will, in consequence, give Lucifer and all his devils power to come on Earth and tempt his godless creatures. The enemies of Christ will boast: ‘We have subjected the Earth and all its inhabitants, and the Christians cannot escape our hands!’ Then a Great Monarch will arise in great fury against them ... Drawing his sword, he will fall upon the foes of Christianity and crush them. Then peace will reign on Earth.”
The Triumph of the Great Monarch and the Holy Pope
There are many prophecies which speak of a triumph during the time of the “Great Monarch” and the “Holy Pope.” One can logically think that this triumph is to part of the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
► MATHIAS LANG is also known as Stormberger in some prophecy circles. Lang was illiterate and had no education, yet he predicted many things like airplanes, telephones and much more. He lived in Bavaria between 1753 to 1820. He made the following prediction before World War One had even started: “Two or three decades after the First [World] War there will come one a Second [World] War which will be even larger. Almost all the nations of the world will be involved. Millions of men will die, without being soldiers. The fire will fall from the sky and many great cities will be destroyed. And after the end of the Second Great War, a third universal war will come, so that it will determine everything. There will be weapons totally new. In one day, more men will die than in all the previous wars. The battles will be accomplished with artificial weapons. Gigantic catastrophes will happen. With the open eyes, the nations of the planet will go through these catastrophes. They won’t know what is happening, and those that know and tell, will be silenced. Everything will be different from before, and in many places the Earth will be a great cemetery. The third war will be the end of many nations. Then, afterward, a good time will come, and holy men will do wonders. Once people have their Faith again, a long period of peace will follow. When women walk around in pants, and men have become effeminate, so that one will no longer be able to tell men from women, then the time of destruction is near. ”
► BLESSED ANNA MARIA TAIGI (died 1837): described the great ordeal ahead. Rome would be battered by revolutions. Millions of men would die by the sword in war and civil strife, many other millions would perish in unforeseen death. Then entire nations would return to the unity of the Church, and many Turks, Pagans and Jews would be converted and their fervor will cover with confusion the original Christians. She said that Our Lord intended to cleanse the world and His Church.
► VENERABLE MARY OF AGREDA (17th Century) stated: “It was revealed to me that through the intercession of the Mother of God, all heresies will disappear. This victory over heresies has been reserved by Christ for His Blessed Mother ... Before the Second Coming of Christ, Mary must, more than ever, shine in mercy, might and grace in order to bring unbelievers into the Catholic Faith.”
► SR. MARIE LATASTE gave a prophecy in the 1840’s about a period of devastation in France and the rest of the world. The she speaks of Our Lady’s triumph: “Peace shall return to the world, because the Blessed Virgin Mary will breathe over the storms and quell them. Her name will be praised, blessed and exalted forever. Prisoners or captives shall recover their liberty; exiles shall return to their country, and the unfortunate or unhappy shall be restored to peace and happiness.”
► RUDOLFO GILTHIER a monk in the 1700’s, wrote: “Rome will lose its scepter through following false prophets. The Church will be held hostage, and after a short time there will be no more Pope … A Prince from the East with a great Army will move throughout Europe. He will be for God, and he will fight for the Christian teachings and the Orthodox Belief, and he will subjugate the kingdom of Mohammed. He will be a new Knight of the Faith, and peace will be regained in the world.”
► ST. METHODIUS OF PATARA was a bishop who was martyred in the 4th century, wrote: “The enemies of Christ will boast: ‘We have subjected the Earth and all its inhabitants, and the Christians cannot escape our hands!’ Then a Great Monarch will arise in great fury against them ... Drawing his sword, he will fall upon the foes of Christianity and crush them. Then peace will reign on Earth.”
► ABBOT WERDIN D’ORANTE (12th Century) revealed: “The great monarch and the great Pope will precede Antichrist. The nations will be at war for four years and a great part of the world will be destroyed. The Pope will go over the sea carrying the sign of Redemption on his forehead. The great Monarch will come to restore peace and the Pope will share in the victory.”
► VENERABLE BARTHOLOMEW HOLZHAUSER was a parish priest, healer and an ecclesiastical writer, who was born in 1613 in Bavaria. He wrote: “After a world war will come a new period, in which two mighty ones will face each other. The wrangle between these two will begin in the second half of the twentieth century. It will overthrow mountains and silt up rivers. A great change will come to pass, such as no mortal man will have expected; Heaven and Hell will confront each other in this struggle, old states will perish and light and darkness will be pitted against each other with swords, but it will be swords of a different fashion. With these swords it will be possible to cut up the skies and split the Earth. A great lament will come over all mankind and only a small batch will survive the storm, the pestilence and the horror. And neither of the two adversaries will conquer nor be vanquished. Both mighty ones will lie on the ground, and a new mankind will come into existence. When everything has been ruined by war; when Catholics are hard pressed by traitorous co-religionists and heretics; when the Church and her servants are denied their rights, the monarchies have been abolished and their rulers murdered ... Then the Hand of Almighty God will work a marvelous change, something apparently impossible according to human understanding. There will rise a valiant Monarch anointed by God. The Great Monarch will have the special help of God and be unconquerable. He will rule supreme in temporal matters … The Pope will rule supreme in spiritual matters at the same time ... The great monarch of the world will create new laws for the new mankind and will cause a new age to begin. Persecution will cease and justice shall rule and there will be only one flock and one shepherd, and peace will be of long duration, for the glory of God in Heaven and on Earth. God possesses the key to everything.”
► BLESSED JOHANNES AMADEUS DA SILVA (d. 1482), was a Portuguese nobleman who became first a Hieronymite monk, then left that life to become a friar of the Franciscan Order. Later he became a reformer of that religious order. He prophesied as follows: “In the latter days there shall be great wars and bloodshed. The fury of the wars shall last a long time. Whole provinces shall be left desolate and uninhabited; many cities forsaken of people; the nobility slaughtered; principal persons ruined; great changes of kings, commonwealths and rulers. Germany and Spain will unite under a Great Monarch designated by God. After much slaughtering, the other nations will be forced to come into this union. There is no hope for the unbelievers until all Germany becomes converted―then all will happen quickly. Because of Germany’s unfaithfulness, the time will be prolonged until all countries unite under the Great Monarch. After this union, mass conversions will take place by the command of God, and peace and prosperity will follow.”
► ST. FRANCIS DE PAUL (1470), wrote of the Great Monarch and the military religious order he would create, with which he would repel the enemies of God and conquer the world: “The Great Monarch, the elect and the beloved of the Most High Lord, shall be like the sun amidst the stars. He shall be a first-born son; in his childhood he will be like a saint; in his youth, a great sinner; then he will be converted entirely to God and will do great penance; his sins will be forgiven him, and he shall become a great saint. He shall be the great founder and leader of a new religious order different from all the others―the Holy Militia of the Holy Spirit. He shall divide it into three classes, namely: (1) Military knights; (2) Solitary priests; (3) Most pious hospitallers. This shall be the last religious order in the Church, and it will do more good for our holy religion than all other religious institutes. These devout men shall wear on their breasts, and much more within their hearts, the sign of the living God, namely, the cross. He will gather a grand army, and the angels shall fight for them. Through the power of the Most High they shall kill all God’s enemies. By force of arms he shall destroy the sect of Mahomet, and shall annihilate all the heresies and tyrannies of the world. They shall overcome the world and shall bring the world to a holy mode of life. After this they shall turn their victorious arms against bad Christians, and shall destroy all the rebels against Jesus Christ. These holy Cross-bearers shall reign and dominate holily over the world and support the Church of God until the end of time. The Great Monarch shall He shall reform the Church of God by means of his followers, who shall be the best men upon Earth in holiness, in arms, in science, and in every virtue, because such is the will of the Most High. They shall obtain the dominion of the whole world, both temporal and spiritual, until the end of time.”
► ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT (1673-1716) echoes some of the above points made in the prophecy of St. Francis de Paul. In his True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis prophetically writes: “The power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times. She will raise up her humble slaves and her poor children to make war against Satan. They shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance, in union with Mary, that they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph. They shall be “like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful” Mary to pierce her enemies. They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew with their two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall be the true apostles of the latter times. They shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God according to the Holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior.”
► ST. CAESAR OF ARIES (469-543) prophesied: “When the entire world shall have been a prey to the greatest miseries and trials, then they provinces shall be succored by a prince. This prince shall extend his dominion over the entire world. At the same time there will be a great Pope, who will be most eminent in sanctity and most perfect in every quality. This Pope shall have with him the Great Monarch, a most virtuous man, who shall be a descendant of French kings. This Great Monarch will assist the Pope in the reformation of the whole Earth. Many princes and nations that are living in error and impiety shall be converted, and an admirable peace shall reign among men during many years, because the wrath of God shall be appeased through their repentance, penance, and good works. There will be one common law, one only Faith, one baptism, one religion. All nations shall recognize the Holy See of Rome, and shall pay homage to the Pope. But after some considerable time fervor shall cool, iniquity shall abound, and moral corruption shall become worse than ever, which shall bring upon mankind the last and worse persecution of Antichrist, and the end of the world.”
► ABBOT JOACHIM MERLIN, who died in 1541, made the following predictions about the Holy Pope: “After many prolonged sufferings endured by Christians, and after a too great effusion of innocent blood, the Lord shall give peace and happiness to the desolated nations. A remarkable pope will be seated on the pontifical throne, under the special protection of the angels. Before, however, being firmly and solidly established in the Holy See, there will be innumerable wars and violent conflicts during which the sacred throne shall be shaken. At the beginning of his papal reign, in order to achieve these happy results, having need of a powerful temporal assistance, this holy Pontiff will ask the cooperation of the generous monarch of France. At that time the monarch will come as a pilgrim to witness the splendor of this glorious pontiff. A temporal throne being vacant, the Pope shall place on it this king whose assistance he shall ask.
“This holy Pope shall be both pastor and reformer. Holy and full of gentleness, this Pope shall undo all wrong, he shall recover the states of the Church, and reunite the exiled temporal powers. The sanctity of this beneficent Pontiff will be so great that the highest rulers shall bow before his presence. He shall be revered by all people, and shall recover the kingdom of Jerusalem. As the only Pastor he shall reunite the Eastern to the Western Church, and thus only one Faith will be in vigor. Through him the East and West shall be in everlasting concord. This holy man shall crush the arrogance of religious schism and heresy. All men will return to the primitive Church, and there shall be only one pastor, one law, one master ― humble, modest, and fearing God. The true God of the Jews, our Lord Jesus Christ, will make everything prosper beyond all human hope, because God alone can and will pour down on the wounds of humanity the oily balm of sweetness. The city of Babylon shall then be the head and guide of the world. Rome, weakened in temporal power, shall forever preserve her spiritual dominion, and shall enjoy great peace.
“Six and a half years after this time the Pope will render his soul to God. The end of his days shall arrive in an arid province, situated between a river and a lake near the mountains ... A man of remarkable sanctity will be his successor in the Pontifical chair. Through him God will work so many prodigies that all men shall revere him, and no person will dare to oppose his holy precepts. He shall not allow the clergy to have many benefices. He will induce them to live by tithes and offerings of the faithful. He shall forbid pomp in dress, and all immorality in dance and songs. He will preach the Gospel in person, and exhort all honest ladies to appear in public without any ornament of gold or precious stones. After having occupied the Holy See for a long time, he shall happily return to the Lord. His three immediate successors shall also be men of exemplary holiness. One after the other will be models of virtue, and shall work miracles, confirming the teaching of their predecessors. Under their government the Church shall spread, and these popes shall be called the Angelic Pastors.”
Mary Can But Will Not Triumph Without Us
As stated above―Mary is the most powerful creature outside of God. Mary has no need of us in order to triumph over the Satan and the world. Yet―to avoid spoiling us and doing everything for us while we merely sit and watch―she requires that we roll-up our sleeves, show some sweat and effort, and play a token part in the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart.
As stated above―Mary is the most powerful creature outside of God. Mary has no need of us in order to triumph over the Satan and the world. Yet―to avoid spoiling us and doing everything for us while we merely sit and watch―she requires that we roll-up our sleeves, show some sweat and effort, and play a token part in the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart.
That is why Our Lady has said things like:
“It is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, for failing to call upon me” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda) ― without doubt Our Lady could act without being called upon, but she won’t, because she demands that we play a part in these things.
“I call on the true disciples of God! … I call on the true followers of Christ! … I call on my children, the true faithful! ... It is time they came out and filled the world with light! … Fight, children of light! … I shall fight at their side! … For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends! Their prayers, penances and tears will rise up to Heaven―and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession” (Our Lady of La Salette). Hey! Why bother with prayers, penances and tears? Our Lady should take care of everything without the need for those things!
“Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? Sacrifice yourselves for sinners!” (Our Lady of Fatima, May 1917). Our Lady, by herself, could obtain all the necessary graces to convert the entire world―but she will not do so, for she wants us play a part (a trivial part) in those conversions, just like a mother could do all the dishes by herself, but she makes her children help her in some way so as to avoid spoiling them.
“I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair for the sinners! … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger! ... Already souls who wish to pray are on the way to being gathered together! … Pray in reparation for the sins of men … Pray very much! Continue to pray very much—very much! I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!” (Our Lady of Akita).
In the realm of sports, we see how a team that has been failing under one coach, suddenly becomes “world-beaters” under a new coach with the very same squad of players. It is the coach that often makes the difference between losing and winning. Mary is our coach―she is our guide, our general, our God-given “go-to-person” through whom, with whom and by whom victory will achieved.
“Jesus wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it!” (Our Lady of Fatima, June 1917). “God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved” (Our Lady of Fatima, July 1917). Is that what we are doing in our own little way―among family, friends, relatives, neighbors, work colleagues? Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart can triumph without worldwide devotion to it―but that is not going to happen, because God wants a worldwide devotion to Mary’s Immaculate Heart, hence the words, “If what I say is done…”
“It is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, for failing to call upon me ... Eternal rest [likewise Mary’s future Triumph] is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment … Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others expect to be pardoned without penance, others expect to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain unless they willingly enter upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, and to carry it after Christ” (Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda).
“Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20). You might totally believe that the Triumph of the Immaculate will happen, but do nothing to help bring it about. Faith is not the “be-all-and-end-all” of things―just believe and do nothing. Faith is merely a beginning―a seed that has to sprout, grow and produce fruit. “Without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6) ― but you must do something with your Faith, otherwise you are burying and not using the “talent” that God gave you: “A man called his servants and to one he gave five talents, and to another two talents, and to another one talent … He that had received the five talents, went and gained other five. He that had received the two, gained other two. But he that had received the one, buried his talent into the earth and hid his lord’s money … After a long time the lord of those servants came and reckoned with them. He that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that thou art a hard man! Being afraid I went and hid thy talent in the earth! Behold the talent which is thine!’ And his lord said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You should have at least committed my money to the bankers, so at my coming I should have received my own with accrued interest!’ The Lord said to others: ‘Take away the talent from him! And cast this unprofitable servant out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-3). Have we ‘buried’ our Faith? Do we neglect to profit from it by working with it and producing fruits?
“Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). The Protestants say that our works are not needed for salvation, basing themselves on an exaggeration of the Scriptural verses: “Believe in the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved!” (Acts 16:31) and “You are saved through Faith, and not of yourselves” (Ephesians 2:8). “Faith without works is dead!” Trying to put “Faith” in opposition to “Works” is like arguing which blade in a pair of scissors is most necessary. The Council of Trent talks about how Faith is only the beginning of human salvation. It is the foundation and the root of all justification―and roots must grow and produce the tree which must produce fruits. The root of Faith or the foundation of Faith is invisible beneath the ground―the tree or the building are the visible part above the ground, just like works are visible elements that come forth from the invisible Faith in the soul. Similarly, devotion to Our Lady―if it is a true devotion―has to produce works and fruits, just like Faith has produce works and fruits. If “Jesus wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world” and if “God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart” (Our Lady of Fatima, June & July 1917), then we should be working hard to bring about that fruit of worldwide devotion, by our prayers, sacrifices, works and words.
The inspired words of Fr. Frederick Faber, in the Preface of his own personal translation from French to English, of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary, could very appropriately and fittingly be applied to what has to be done to propagate devotion to Mary in order to help bring about the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary:
“What is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady―but, remember, nothing short of an immense one! Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be. It has no faith in itself. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized. Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background. Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them. It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines. Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother. I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this particular devotion of the St. Louis de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ” [and the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary].
The Triumph Will Come―But When?
Since Our Lady didn’t give a specific time-frame for when her Immaculate Heart will triumph, we can only speculate on when it will occur. However, there are some clues that give an approximate indication. There are many who think that the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart could around 2029―which 100 years after the request from Heaven that Russia be consecrated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Why 2029? It was on June 13th, 1929, that was Lucia given another important apparition as she was making a Holy Hour in the convent chapel at Tuy in Spain. She heard Our Lady say: “The moment has come in which God asks the Holy Father, in union with all the Bishops in the world, to make the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, promising to save it by this means. Sacrifice yourself for this intention and pray.”
Lucia also said that later on Jesus had spoken to her as follows: “I want My whole Church to acknowledge that Consecration as a triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, so that it may extend its cult later on, and put the devotion to this Immaculate Heart beside the devotion to My Sacred Heart.”
Two years later, in 1931, Our Lord complained to Sister Lucia of the tardiness of His ministers who were delaying the Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. He said: “Make it known to My ministers, given that they follow the example of the King of France in delaying the execution of My requests, they will follow him into misfortune. It is never too late to have recourse to Jesus and Mary … They did not wish to heed My request! ... Like the King of France they will repent of it, and they will do it, but it will be late. Russia will have already spread its errors in the world, provoking wars and persecutions against the Church.”
On another occasion, Our Lord said: “They did not wish to heed My request. Like the king of France, they will repent and do it, but it will be late. Russia will have already spread her errors throughout the world, provoking wars and persecutions of the Church; the Holy Father will have much to suffer.”
Sister Lucia told Fr. Joachim Maria Alonso, the official historian of Fatima, in a little known response: “The final triumph of Mary’s Heart is certain, and it will be definitive. But it will take place ‘in the end’ ― that is to say, after a terrible purification of sinful mankind in a baptism of fire, blood and tears!”
The reference that Jesus made to the King of France needs to be explained. On June 17th, 1689 the Sacred Heart of Jesus manifested to Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque His command to the King of France, Louis XIV, that the King was to consecrate France to the Sacred Heart. For 100 years to the day the Kings of France delayed, and did not obey. The French Revolution broke out is 1789―which is 100 years after Jesus made His command to the King of France. Then, on June 17th, 1789, the King of France was stripped of his legislative authority by the revolutionary Third Estate, and four years later the soldiers of the French Revolution executed the King of France as if he were a criminal―for, in 1793, France sent its King, Louis XVI, to the guillotine. Louis XVI and his predecessors (Louis XIV and Louis XV) had failed to obey Our Lord’s request that France be consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and thus misfortune had befallen both the King and his country. However, it was not just France that fell into misfortune, but most of Europe―for the French Revolution quickly spread and conquered surrounding countries and deposed the kings in those countries.
Due to the fact that the French Revolution made the Kingdom of France fall exactly 100 days after Our Lord’s request that France be consecrated to His Sacred Heart; as well as the fact that King Louis XVI was deposed from the throne exactly 100 years to the very day (June 17th 1689 and June 17th 1789) from the time Our Lord’s request was made―it is from these facts that many people (and rightly so) think that the same thing could happen to the Church 100 years after Our Lord and Our Lady formally said, on June 13th, 1929, that the time had come to consecrate Russia to Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Summary
It is certain that Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary will come―regardless of whether or not this or that soul cooperates in bringing it about. As Our Lady emphatically said at Fatima: “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!” Nevertheless, the reticence or even refusal of the popes in consecrating Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in the exact manner as she had requested, means that we will have to endure, as a consequential punishment, some terrible times before her Immaculate Heart does triumph. Our Lady of Good Success and Our Lady of La Salette alluded to that when she said:
“From the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil rights, as well as ecclesiastical rights. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family ... The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... Churches will be locked up or desecrated … and altars will be sacked … Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Men will kill each other, massacre each other, even in their homes … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. A general war will follow which will be appalling. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy ... Blood will flow on all sides ... There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration … This will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet … Thus Church and country will be finally free of his cruel tyranny!”
The Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart will take place―but at what cost? As Our Lord said: “They will repent of it, and they will do it, but it will be late. Russia will have already spread its errors in the world, provoking wars and persecutions against the Church!” The Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart will take place―but our cooperation is demanded, even though it is not necessary, for Our Lord and Our Lady could easily do it without our cooperation. How many lives will have lost due to Catholic negligence? Even worse, how many souls will have been damned due to Catholic negligence? To whom more has been given, more is required! “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required; and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). “That servant who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes!” (Luke 12:47). “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). Sister Lucia of Fatima revealed: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!”
You cannot entirely blame the popes for not consecrating Russia to the Immaculate―though the chief responsibility for the failure is theirs. If Catholics had been praying sufficiently for the Consecration to happen, then grace would have inspired and moved one of the popes to comply with the command. That is why Our Lady said: “With the Rosary, pray for the Pope, the Bishops and Priests!”
Article 14
Wednesday & Thursday, August 28th & 29th
The Immaculate Heart Seeks Out Stained Sinful Hearts
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Wednesday & Thursday, August 28th & 29th
The Immaculate Heart Seeks Out Stained Sinful Hearts
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Pinching the Nose to Stop the Smell and Stench!
We have all had to deal with a variety of smells, stenches and odors during the course of our lives―whether it be from persons, places or things. Bad breath, smelly feet and body odors can be quite unpleasant―but they are usually passing things, whereby we are in the proximity of the smell for only a limited period of time. Then there is the possibility of having to clean up mishaps that children and even adults may have regarding smelly urine, feces or vomit. Certain diseases that cause rotting flesh―such as gangrene, which is when blood flow to a part of the body is cut off, causing tissue to die and break down, giving off a foul smell of rotting flesh.
The soul is far more important than the body―yet we cannot see the soul, nor smell the soul. Nevertheless, the soul can―so to speak―stink to high Heaven! Sin―as in the case of gangrene―can cut off the supply of ‘blood’ (sanctifying grace) to the soul, which leads to a soul ‘stinking’ like a body that is rotting. We must NEVER lose sight of the fact that “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata). If both mortal sin and venial are the greatest evils in the world―then they must also give off the greatest spiritual stench and smell, so to speak. We are told to offer “a sweet odor of sacrifice to the Lord” (Leviticus 8:28). Virtuous souls “yield their sweet smell” (Canticles 2:13), but for sinners, “instead of a sweet smell, there shall be stench” (Isaias 3:24). “His stench shall ascend, and his rottenness shall go up, because he has acted proudly!” (Joel 2:20).
As Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello (1895-1961)―mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ― in an apparition on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th, 1956, said: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [The Deluge was the Great Flood in Noe’s time] All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!” Our Lady is speaking in the 1950s―which were much less sinful days than we seeing today! How many sins per day does our current world population of over 8 billion (8,000 million) commit? Who is there that does not sin? Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46).
On December 10th, 1925, the Blessed Virgin, accompanied by the Child Jesus, appeared to Lucia in her cell. The Child Jesus spoke first: “Have pity on the Heart of your Most Holy Mother. It is covered with the thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to remove them with an act of reparation.” Then Mary said: “My daughter, look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console me!”
It is no exaggeration when Our Lord and Our Lady say that Mary’s Heart is pierced “at every moment.” In fact, it is pierced thousands of times each and every second of the day and night! If you take the world’s population in 2024 of over 8,200 million people (8.2 billion) and divide that number by the total number of seconds that there are in 24 hours―which is 86,400 seconds―then you get almost 95,000 (94,907) persons for each second of the day. If every person in the world would ONLY COMMIT ONE SINGLE SIN A DAY and no more, then Our Lady’s Heart is being pierced around 95,000 times per second. If every person would ONLY COMMIT TEN SINS PER DAY, then Our Lady’s Heart would be pierced almost 1 million times per second (949,070 times per second). Yet are ten sins per day the average? No, it is much more than that―it is easy to commit 10 sins per hour!
How Much Could You Take?
What would be your reaction to being sinned against almost a million times per second? Sin is the greatest evil that there is―a greater evil than any physical disease or material suffering that could possibly occur. How much sin could you take from others? What would be your “breaking-point”? What would you do when you finally “snap”? We often blow-a-fuse and blow-up over one single offense committed against us!
If you were to see another person being insulted, beaten and gang-raped―would you just stand there and merely watch, or would you try to do something about it―either yourself, or by calling for the police and other bystanders to intervene and stop the assault?
On December 10th, 1925, the Blessed Virgin, accompanied by the Child Jesus, appeared to Sr. Lucia of Fatima in her cell. Lucia recounted that Mary showed her a Heart encircled by thorns. The Child Jesus spoke first: “Have pity on the Heart of your Most Holy Mother. It is covered with the thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to remove them with an act of reparation.” Then Mary said: “My daughter, look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console me! So numerous are the souls which the justice of God condemns for sins committed against me, that I come to ask for reparation. Sacrifice yourself for this intention and pray!”
Mary and the Tsunami of Sin and Its Stench
Scripture is quite clear on the consequences of sin: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8) … “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21) ... “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15) … “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4) … “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56).
Rather than kill and swat sinners into Hell for continuously offending her and her Son, Our Lady seeks to save those stinking sinners! Her attitude is the same as her Son’s, Who said of Himself: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56) … “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). Our Lady heroically and perfectly puts into practice the commands of God as stated in Holy Scripture: “Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!” (Matthew 5:44).
Our Lady is a refuge for sinners. She herself was preserved by God from Original Sin and was conceived immaculate―free from the stain of sin. Nor did she commit even one single venial sin during the course of her whole life. She is a lifeboat in this sea of sin that we are all swimming in. However, a sinner must want to get out of the sea of sin and must want refuge in that lifeboat. You cannot be in the sin-free lifeboat and the sin-full sea at the same time. “No man can serve two masters! … You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). Mary will not force anyone―just as God does not force anyone. We have our free-will―which both God and Mary respect, even if our free-will eventually leads us into Hell. When Mary stands as a refuge of sinners, it does not mean that she condones sin, or allows us to continue in sin. She is not there to protect us from God’s rightful justice, but to bring us to repentance, penance and to present us before His mercy. St. Alphonsus addresses her in the following words: “Thou canst relieve the most wretched and save the most abandoned!”
We not only call Our Lady the “Refuge of Sinners” but also “Health of the Sick”. To Mary, sin is a terrible sickness or disease and sinners are sick people. She is our spiritual Mother―since Christ gave her to all mankind in the person of St. John, when He was dying on His Cross on Calvary: “When Jesus had seen His Mother and the disciple standing whom He loved [St. John], He said to His Mother: ‘Woman, behold thy son!’ After that, He said to the disciple: ‘Behold thy Mother!’ And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own” (John 19:26-27). Every mother naturally loves each of her children―and she will take special care of them if they become seriously sick―and there is no greater sickness than the sickness of sin. On a spiritual level, Our Lady does the same: “Can a woman forget her infant, so as not to have pity on the son of her womb? And if she should forget her child, yet will not I forget thee!” (Isaias 49:15).
Her love embraces every sinful child of Adam and there is no power that will snatch a soul from her protecting love. She was made to be the Mother of mercy, and her mission on Earth and in Heaven is not to judge but to show mercy and to open her pierced Heart wider and wider to the poor banished children of Eve who cry to her for help. The Eternal Father made her “full of grace” that her love might bestow it where justice would deny it. As St. Bernard says: “She is impetuous in mercy, she is resistless in mercy. The duration of her mercy is unto the end of the sinner’s life. The broadness of her mercy is unto the limits of the Earth. The height of her mercy is unto Heaven. The depth of her mercy is unto the lowest abyss of sin and sorrow. She is always merciful. She is only merciful. She is our Mother of mercy.”
If it is the property of God to be merciful and to spare, surely it is also the very nature of the Mother of mercy to pour forth her mercy even where there are no merits. The quality of her mercy is never strained; and the devil, into whose heart a ray of hope can never shine, is the only one excluded from her love. She sees in every soul, even in that of the most wretched, the image of her Son, and, if necessary, she would become again the Queen of Martyrs to save the least of her children.
Big Question!
If Our Lady is so desirous of saving souls―and if Our Lady is so powerful as the saints tell us she is―then why are most souls damned? Is Our Lady failing in some way? The failure is not on the part of Our Lady―but the failure is on the part of sinners who will not cooperate with Our Lady and refuse to obey her instructions and commands. In a certain sense, salvation follows rules just like the sciences follow rules. The rules of science and the rules of salvation come from one and the same source―God. He does want our damnation―but He will not change His rules, nor will He forcefully change our minds and attitudes if we use our free-will to remain in sin. Just as Christ said: “No man can serve two masters! … You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24) ― so too you cannot serve God and sin, whether it be mortal sin or venial sin. Mortal sin will be eternally punished in the fires of Hell if we die unrepentant―and forgiven mortal sin and venial sin will be punished in the fires of Purgatory. These fires of Hell and Purgatory are not metaphorical fires or symbolic fires―they are real fires! When we speak of Our Lady being the “Mother of Mercy” and the “Refuge of Sinners”, this does not mean that God’s Justice is thrown into the trash can! God is BOTH merciful and just at one and the same time―He never exercises His Justice without including His Mercy; and He never exercises His Mercy without including His Justice.
Some souls, even though they have confessed their mortal sins, will spend centuries in the fires of Purgatory. One such example is that of Amelia―the 18-year old friend of the Fatima children, Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta―of whom Our Lady of Fatima said (over 100 years ago in 1917) that she would remain in the fires of Purgatory until the end of the world! How many mortal sins could she have committed in only 18 years? How much more have we perhaps committed in our much longer life on Earth? There are far too many Catholics who abuse the “Mother of Mercy” and the “Refuge of Sinners” by being attached to sin and presuming that just because they wear the Brown Scapular, Our Lady will take them to Heaven! St. Alphonsus Liguori, a Doctor of the Church, says: “When we declare that it is impossible for a servant of Mary to be lost, we do not mean those who by their devotion to Mary think themselves warranted to sin freely. We state that these reckless people, because of their presumption, deserve to be treated with rigor and not with kindness!”
We should take to heart the words of Our Lady of La Salette: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
Listen to Your Mother!
We should take to heart the words of Our Lady of La Salette: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!” Those words echo the fact that the mercy of God―though it is infinite in itself―is not shown infinitely towards mankind. God will only take so much before He exercises His Justice on sinners.
Our Lady spoke of God’s chastising Justice in her apparitions:
► OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS (1600s): “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay and the precious light of Faith will gradually be extinguished until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals! … Every type of vice will enter, calling down in turn every type of chastisement, such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy … There will be a formidable and frightful war, in which both native and foreign blood will flow, including that of secular and regular priests as well as that of other religious. This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed … The small number of souls, who will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom! … During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private … Offer sacrifices and prayers to shorten the duration of this terrible catastrophe! … I have need of valiant souls to save My Church and the sinful world!”
► OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846): “Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! God will send punishments which will follow one after the other! The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! The Earth will be struck by calamities of all kinds ― in addition to plague and famine which will be widespread. There will be a series of wars, until the last war! Blood will flow in the streets. A general war will follow which will be appalling! Men will kill each other, massacre each other, even in their homes! People will believe that all is lost! Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy! … There will be thunderstorms which will shake cities, earthquakes which will swallow up countries ... Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like!”
► OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1917): “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out! … God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father!”
► OUR LADY TO BLESSED ELENA AIELLO (1950s): “Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! … Men are offending God too much! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God. My Heart is so big for poor sinners, and I make use of every possible means that they may be saved. They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … Dark and frightful days are approaching as a result of the many grievous sins, which are almost covering the whole Earth The justice of the Father requires reparation—otherwise many will be lost! … The whole world will soon be at war, and all mankind will he plunged into sorrow, because the justice of God will not be delayed in fulfilling its course! … The justice of God is weighing upon the world. Mankind, defiled in the mire, soon will be washed in its own blood, by disease; by famine; by earthquakes; by cloudbursts, tornadoes, floods, and terrible storms; and by war ... If men do not amend their ways, a terrifying scourge of fire will come down from Heaven upon all the nations of the world, and men will be punished according to the debts contracted with Divine justice. There will be frightful moments for all, because Heaven will be joined with the Earth, and all the ungodly people will be destroyed, some nations will be purified, while others will disappear entirely! … The punishment of the impious will not be delayed. That day will be most fearful in the world! The Earth will tremble, all humanity will be shaken! The wicked and the obstinate will perish in the tremendous severity of the justice of the Lord! … Great calamities will come upon the world, which will bring confusion, tears, struggles and pain. Great earthquakes will swallow up entire cities and countries, and will bring epidemics, famine, and terrible destruction―especially where the sons of darkness are [pagan or anti-Christian nations] … The only valid means for placating Divine Justice is to pray and do penance, returning to God with sincere sorrow for the faults committed, and then the chastisement of Divine Justice will be mitigated by mercy.”
► OUR LADY OF AKITA (1973): “Many men in this world afflict the Lord! ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity! It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful! The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!”
Don’t Expect Mercy Without Justice, Nor Justice Without Mercy
Virtue stands in the middle between excess and neglect; it is balanced and not excessive nor insufficient. The same can be said of the Justice and Mercy of God―they balance each other. God never administers Justice without adding some of His Mercy. Nor does God exclusively show Mercy without adding some Justice to it.
We have all had to deal with a variety of smells, stenches and odors during the course of our lives―whether it be from persons, places or things. Bad breath, smelly feet and body odors can be quite unpleasant―but they are usually passing things, whereby we are in the proximity of the smell for only a limited period of time. Then there is the possibility of having to clean up mishaps that children and even adults may have regarding smelly urine, feces or vomit. Certain diseases that cause rotting flesh―such as gangrene, which is when blood flow to a part of the body is cut off, causing tissue to die and break down, giving off a foul smell of rotting flesh.
The soul is far more important than the body―yet we cannot see the soul, nor smell the soul. Nevertheless, the soul can―so to speak―stink to high Heaven! Sin―as in the case of gangrene―can cut off the supply of ‘blood’ (sanctifying grace) to the soul, which leads to a soul ‘stinking’ like a body that is rotting. We must NEVER lose sight of the fact that “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata). If both mortal sin and venial are the greatest evils in the world―then they must also give off the greatest spiritual stench and smell, so to speak. We are told to offer “a sweet odor of sacrifice to the Lord” (Leviticus 8:28). Virtuous souls “yield their sweet smell” (Canticles 2:13), but for sinners, “instead of a sweet smell, there shall be stench” (Isaias 3:24). “His stench shall ascend, and his rottenness shall go up, because he has acted proudly!” (Joel 2:20).
As Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello (1895-1961)―mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ― in an apparition on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th, 1956, said: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [The Deluge was the Great Flood in Noe’s time] All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!” Our Lady is speaking in the 1950s―which were much less sinful days than we seeing today! How many sins per day does our current world population of over 8 billion (8,000 million) commit? Who is there that does not sin? Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46).
On December 10th, 1925, the Blessed Virgin, accompanied by the Child Jesus, appeared to Lucia in her cell. The Child Jesus spoke first: “Have pity on the Heart of your Most Holy Mother. It is covered with the thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to remove them with an act of reparation.” Then Mary said: “My daughter, look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console me!”
It is no exaggeration when Our Lord and Our Lady say that Mary’s Heart is pierced “at every moment.” In fact, it is pierced thousands of times each and every second of the day and night! If you take the world’s population in 2024 of over 8,200 million people (8.2 billion) and divide that number by the total number of seconds that there are in 24 hours―which is 86,400 seconds―then you get almost 95,000 (94,907) persons for each second of the day. If every person in the world would ONLY COMMIT ONE SINGLE SIN A DAY and no more, then Our Lady’s Heart is being pierced around 95,000 times per second. If every person would ONLY COMMIT TEN SINS PER DAY, then Our Lady’s Heart would be pierced almost 1 million times per second (949,070 times per second). Yet are ten sins per day the average? No, it is much more than that―it is easy to commit 10 sins per hour!
How Much Could You Take?
What would be your reaction to being sinned against almost a million times per second? Sin is the greatest evil that there is―a greater evil than any physical disease or material suffering that could possibly occur. How much sin could you take from others? What would be your “breaking-point”? What would you do when you finally “snap”? We often blow-a-fuse and blow-up over one single offense committed against us!
If you were to see another person being insulted, beaten and gang-raped―would you just stand there and merely watch, or would you try to do something about it―either yourself, or by calling for the police and other bystanders to intervene and stop the assault?
On December 10th, 1925, the Blessed Virgin, accompanied by the Child Jesus, appeared to Sr. Lucia of Fatima in her cell. Lucia recounted that Mary showed her a Heart encircled by thorns. The Child Jesus spoke first: “Have pity on the Heart of your Most Holy Mother. It is covered with the thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to remove them with an act of reparation.” Then Mary said: “My daughter, look at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console me! So numerous are the souls which the justice of God condemns for sins committed against me, that I come to ask for reparation. Sacrifice yourself for this intention and pray!”
Mary and the Tsunami of Sin and Its Stench
Scripture is quite clear on the consequences of sin: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8) … “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21) ... “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15) … “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4) … “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56).
Rather than kill and swat sinners into Hell for continuously offending her and her Son, Our Lady seeks to save those stinking sinners! Her attitude is the same as her Son’s, Who said of Himself: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56) … “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). Our Lady heroically and perfectly puts into practice the commands of God as stated in Holy Scripture: “Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!” (Matthew 5:44).
Our Lady is a refuge for sinners. She herself was preserved by God from Original Sin and was conceived immaculate―free from the stain of sin. Nor did she commit even one single venial sin during the course of her whole life. She is a lifeboat in this sea of sin that we are all swimming in. However, a sinner must want to get out of the sea of sin and must want refuge in that lifeboat. You cannot be in the sin-free lifeboat and the sin-full sea at the same time. “No man can serve two masters! … You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). Mary will not force anyone―just as God does not force anyone. We have our free-will―which both God and Mary respect, even if our free-will eventually leads us into Hell. When Mary stands as a refuge of sinners, it does not mean that she condones sin, or allows us to continue in sin. She is not there to protect us from God’s rightful justice, but to bring us to repentance, penance and to present us before His mercy. St. Alphonsus addresses her in the following words: “Thou canst relieve the most wretched and save the most abandoned!”
We not only call Our Lady the “Refuge of Sinners” but also “Health of the Sick”. To Mary, sin is a terrible sickness or disease and sinners are sick people. She is our spiritual Mother―since Christ gave her to all mankind in the person of St. John, when He was dying on His Cross on Calvary: “When Jesus had seen His Mother and the disciple standing whom He loved [St. John], He said to His Mother: ‘Woman, behold thy son!’ After that, He said to the disciple: ‘Behold thy Mother!’ And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own” (John 19:26-27). Every mother naturally loves each of her children―and she will take special care of them if they become seriously sick―and there is no greater sickness than the sickness of sin. On a spiritual level, Our Lady does the same: “Can a woman forget her infant, so as not to have pity on the son of her womb? And if she should forget her child, yet will not I forget thee!” (Isaias 49:15).
Her love embraces every sinful child of Adam and there is no power that will snatch a soul from her protecting love. She was made to be the Mother of mercy, and her mission on Earth and in Heaven is not to judge but to show mercy and to open her pierced Heart wider and wider to the poor banished children of Eve who cry to her for help. The Eternal Father made her “full of grace” that her love might bestow it where justice would deny it. As St. Bernard says: “She is impetuous in mercy, she is resistless in mercy. The duration of her mercy is unto the end of the sinner’s life. The broadness of her mercy is unto the limits of the Earth. The height of her mercy is unto Heaven. The depth of her mercy is unto the lowest abyss of sin and sorrow. She is always merciful. She is only merciful. She is our Mother of mercy.”
If it is the property of God to be merciful and to spare, surely it is also the very nature of the Mother of mercy to pour forth her mercy even where there are no merits. The quality of her mercy is never strained; and the devil, into whose heart a ray of hope can never shine, is the only one excluded from her love. She sees in every soul, even in that of the most wretched, the image of her Son, and, if necessary, she would become again the Queen of Martyrs to save the least of her children.
Big Question!
If Our Lady is so desirous of saving souls―and if Our Lady is so powerful as the saints tell us she is―then why are most souls damned? Is Our Lady failing in some way? The failure is not on the part of Our Lady―but the failure is on the part of sinners who will not cooperate with Our Lady and refuse to obey her instructions and commands. In a certain sense, salvation follows rules just like the sciences follow rules. The rules of science and the rules of salvation come from one and the same source―God. He does want our damnation―but He will not change His rules, nor will He forcefully change our minds and attitudes if we use our free-will to remain in sin. Just as Christ said: “No man can serve two masters! … You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24) ― so too you cannot serve God and sin, whether it be mortal sin or venial sin. Mortal sin will be eternally punished in the fires of Hell if we die unrepentant―and forgiven mortal sin and venial sin will be punished in the fires of Purgatory. These fires of Hell and Purgatory are not metaphorical fires or symbolic fires―they are real fires! When we speak of Our Lady being the “Mother of Mercy” and the “Refuge of Sinners”, this does not mean that God’s Justice is thrown into the trash can! God is BOTH merciful and just at one and the same time―He never exercises His Justice without including His Mercy; and He never exercises His Mercy without including His Justice.
Some souls, even though they have confessed their mortal sins, will spend centuries in the fires of Purgatory. One such example is that of Amelia―the 18-year old friend of the Fatima children, Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta―of whom Our Lady of Fatima said (over 100 years ago in 1917) that she would remain in the fires of Purgatory until the end of the world! How many mortal sins could she have committed in only 18 years? How much more have we perhaps committed in our much longer life on Earth? There are far too many Catholics who abuse the “Mother of Mercy” and the “Refuge of Sinners” by being attached to sin and presuming that just because they wear the Brown Scapular, Our Lady will take them to Heaven! St. Alphonsus Liguori, a Doctor of the Church, says: “When we declare that it is impossible for a servant of Mary to be lost, we do not mean those who by their devotion to Mary think themselves warranted to sin freely. We state that these reckless people, because of their presumption, deserve to be treated with rigor and not with kindness!”
We should take to heart the words of Our Lady of La Salette: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
Listen to Your Mother!
We should take to heart the words of Our Lady of La Salette: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!” Those words echo the fact that the mercy of God―though it is infinite in itself―is not shown infinitely towards mankind. God will only take so much before He exercises His Justice on sinners.
Our Lady spoke of God’s chastising Justice in her apparitions:
► OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS (1600s): “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay and the precious light of Faith will gradually be extinguished until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals! … Every type of vice will enter, calling down in turn every type of chastisement, such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy … There will be a formidable and frightful war, in which both native and foreign blood will flow, including that of secular and regular priests as well as that of other religious. This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed … The small number of souls, who will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom! … During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private … Offer sacrifices and prayers to shorten the duration of this terrible catastrophe! … I have need of valiant souls to save My Church and the sinful world!”
► OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE (1846): “Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! God will send punishments which will follow one after the other! The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! The Earth will be struck by calamities of all kinds ― in addition to plague and famine which will be widespread. There will be a series of wars, until the last war! Blood will flow in the streets. A general war will follow which will be appalling! Men will kill each other, massacre each other, even in their homes! People will believe that all is lost! Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy! … There will be thunderstorms which will shake cities, earthquakes which will swallow up countries ... Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like!”
► OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1917): “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out! … God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father!”
► OUR LADY TO BLESSED ELENA AIELLO (1950s): “Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! … Men are offending God too much! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God. My Heart is so big for poor sinners, and I make use of every possible means that they may be saved. They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … Dark and frightful days are approaching as a result of the many grievous sins, which are almost covering the whole Earth The justice of the Father requires reparation—otherwise many will be lost! … The whole world will soon be at war, and all mankind will he plunged into sorrow, because the justice of God will not be delayed in fulfilling its course! … The justice of God is weighing upon the world. Mankind, defiled in the mire, soon will be washed in its own blood, by disease; by famine; by earthquakes; by cloudbursts, tornadoes, floods, and terrible storms; and by war ... If men do not amend their ways, a terrifying scourge of fire will come down from Heaven upon all the nations of the world, and men will be punished according to the debts contracted with Divine justice. There will be frightful moments for all, because Heaven will be joined with the Earth, and all the ungodly people will be destroyed, some nations will be purified, while others will disappear entirely! … The punishment of the impious will not be delayed. That day will be most fearful in the world! The Earth will tremble, all humanity will be shaken! The wicked and the obstinate will perish in the tremendous severity of the justice of the Lord! … Great calamities will come upon the world, which will bring confusion, tears, struggles and pain. Great earthquakes will swallow up entire cities and countries, and will bring epidemics, famine, and terrible destruction―especially where the sons of darkness are [pagan or anti-Christian nations] … The only valid means for placating Divine Justice is to pray and do penance, returning to God with sincere sorrow for the faults committed, and then the chastisement of Divine Justice will be mitigated by mercy.”
► OUR LADY OF AKITA (1973): “Many men in this world afflict the Lord! ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity! It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful! The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!”
Don’t Expect Mercy Without Justice, Nor Justice Without Mercy
Virtue stands in the middle between excess and neglect; it is balanced and not excessive nor insufficient. The same can be said of the Justice and Mercy of God―they balance each other. God never administers Justice without adding some of His Mercy. Nor does God exclusively show Mercy without adding some Justice to it.
Article 13
Sunday, Monday & Tuesday, August 25th, 26th & 27th
A Mediocre Devotion is No Guarantee of Salvation
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Sunday, Monday & Tuesday, August 25th, 26th & 27th
A Mediocre Devotion is No Guarantee of Salvation
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
What is Mediocrity and Mediocre?
The adjective “mediocre” and the noun “mediocrity” come to the English language via Middle-French, and from the Latin word “mediocris” ― which is a compound of two Latin words: “medial” meaning “middle,” and “ocris” meaning “rugged mountain”, therefore suggesting something that is “halfway to the top.” Thus we get the English definitions of “mediocre” and “mediocrity” as being “of medium size, moderate, middling, commonplace; the quality of being average or ordinary; of moderate, inferior or low quality, value, ability; not very good; neither good nor bad; barely adequate; of average quality which should be better than it is; not excellent nor outstanding, usually disappointingly so; not good enough.”
It brings to mind the children’s nursery rhyme, The Grand Old Duke of York, which goes as follows:
Oh, the grand old Duke of York,
He had ten thousand men.
He marched them up to the top of the hill
And he marched them down again.
And when they were up, they were up;
And when they were down, they were down;
And when they were only half-way up,
They were neither up nor down.
The Mountain, God, and You
God―as well as Our Lady―have both been depicted symbolically as being mountains.
● “Come into the mountain of the Lord” (Isaias 30:29) … “The mountain of God is a fat mountain!” (Psalm 67:16) ... “And the Lord of hosts shall make unto all people in this mountain, a feast of fat things, a feast of wine, of fat things full of marrow, of purified wine” (Isaias 25:6) … “Who shall ascend into the mountain of the Lord, or who shall stand in His holy place?” (Psalm 23:3) … “Go forth and stand upon the mount, before the Lord” (3 Kings 19:11) … “Great is the Lord, and exceedingly to be praised in His holy mountain” (Psalm 47:2) … “Exalt the Lord our God and adore at His holy mountain!” (Psalm 98:9) … “A mountain in which God is well pleased to dwell―for there the Lord shall dwell unto the end” (Psalm 67:17) … “In the last days, the mountain of the House of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills. And many people shall go, and say: ‘Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob, and He will teach us His ways, and we will walk in His paths: for the law shall come forth from [Mount] Sion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem!’” (Isaias 2:2-3) … “It shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the House of the Lord shall be prepared in the top of mountains, and high above the hills, and people shall flow to it!” (Micheas 4:1).
● God appears to Moses on a mountain: “Moses came to the mountain of God, Horeb. And the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush” (Exodus 3:1-2). During the Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt, they came to Mount Sinai, “and the Lord called unto Moses from the mountain, and Moses went up to God” (Exodus 19:3). On another occasion, we read: “And the glory of the Lord dwelt upon Sinai, covering it with a cloud for six days, and on the seventh day the Lord called Moses out of the midst of the cloud. And the sight of the glory of the Lord was like a burning fire upon the top of the mountain. The Lord said to Moses: ‘Come up to Me into the mountain and be there!’ And Moses, entering into the midst of the cloud, went up into the mountain―and he was there forty days, and forty nights” (Exodus 24:13-18).
● Moses prayed for victory on a mountain while the Israelites were engaged in battle with the Amalecite army below: “Moses said to Josue: ‘Choose out men and go out and fight against Amalec! Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill having the rod of God in my hand!’ Josue did as Moses had spoken, and he fought against Amalec―but Moses went up upon the top of the hill. And when Moses lifted up his hands, Israel overcame―but if he let them down a little, Amalec overcame” (Exodus 17:9-11).
● Noe’s Ark, after the Great Flood was receding, came to rest upon a mountain: “The flood was forty days upon the Earth … The waters prevailed beyond measure upon the Earth and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered … and the waters increased and lifted up the ark on high above the Earth … and destroyed all things from the Earth―and Noe only remained, and they that were with him in the ark” (Genesis 7:17-23).
● Jerusalem is built in the mountains, on Mount Sion ― “My holy mountain Jerusalem, saith the Lord” (Isaias 66:20) … “Thy city Jerusalem … Thy holy mountain … the holy mountain of My God” (Daniel 9:16, 20) ― and is surrounded by seven mountain peaks that are higher than the city. “In My holy mountain, in the high mountain of Israel, saith the Lord God, there shall all the house of Israel serve Me!” (Ezechiel 20:40). “I am the Lord your God, dwelling in Sion, My holy mountain; and Jerusalem shall be holy and strangers shall pass through it no more!” (Joel 3:17). “And Jerusalem shall be called ‘The City of Truth’, and ‘The Mountain of the Lord of hosts’, ‘The Sanctified Mountain’” (Zacharias 8:3). Incidentally, the boundaries of Ancient Rome encompass what we now call “The Seven Hills of Rome” ― and Rome today is the center of the Catholic world, being the residence of the pope, and with the Catholic Faith built on the “seven mountains” or “seven hills” of the Seven Sacraments. In Holy Scripture we read of this connection between God and Mount Sion: “I am appointed king, by the Lord, over Sion His holy mountain, preaching His commandment” (Psalm 2:6) and that is what the Pope in Rome should be doing―being appointed ‘king’ over the holy mountain of the Catholic Church and preaching His commandments.
● The mountain, since it is a symbol of God, is often a place of prayer: “David was come to the top of the mountain, where he was about to adore the Lord” (2 Kings 15:32). Jesus went up the mountain alone to pray: “Having dismissed the multitude, Jesus went into a mountain, alone, to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23).
● Jesus leads the people up into a mountain and then preaches the so-called “Sermon on the Mount” (chapters 5, 6, and 7 of St. Matthew’s Gospel): “And seeing the multitudes, Jesus went up into a mountain, and when He was sat down, His disciples came unto Him, and opening His mouth, He taught them” (Matthew 5:1-2).
● It is on the mountain that Jesus heals many: “And going up into a mountain, Jesus sat there. And there came to Him great multitudes, having with them the dumb, the blind, the lame, the maimed, and many others―and they cast them down at His feet, and He healed them” (Matthew 15:29-30).
● It was on a mountain that Jesus performed the miracle of the feeding of the 5,000 with a few loaves and fishes: “Jesus went up into a mountain, and a very great multitude came to Him. He said: ‘Where shall we buy bread, that these may eat?’ … One of His disciples, said to Him: ‘There is a boy here that has five barley loaves, and two fishes―but what are these among so many?’ Then Jesus said: ‘Make the men sit down. The men therefore sat down, in number about five thousand. And Jesus took the loaves, and when He had given thanks, He distributed to them that were set down. In like manner also of the fishes. When they were filled, He said to His disciples: ‘Gather up the fragments that remain!’ They gathered up and filled twelve baskets with the fragments of the five barley loaves, which remained over and above to them that had eaten” (John 6:3-13).
● It was to the mountains that Jesus fled when they tried to make Him king: “Jesus therefore, when he knew that they would come to take Him by force and make Him king, fled again into the mountain―Himself, alone” (John 6:15).
● The Transfiguration of Jesus takes place on a mountain: “And after six days Jesus took unto Him Peter and James, and John his brother, and brought them up into a high mountain, apart. And He was transfigured before them. And His face did shine as the sun; and His garments became white as snow” (Matthew 17:1-2).
● The Garden of Gethsemane, the scene of the Our Lord’s “Agony in the Garden”, was located on the Mount of Olives: “And when they had said an hymn, they went forth to the Mount of Olives … And they came to a farm called Gethsemane. And He said to His disciples: ‘Sit you here, while I pray!’ And He took Peter and James and John with Him; and He began to fear and to be heavy. And He said to them: ‘My soul is sorrowful even unto death! Stay you here and watch!’ And when He was gone forward a little, He fell flat on the ground; and He prayed, that if it might be, the hour might pass from Him … And being in an agony, He prayed the longer” (Mark 14:26-50; Luke 22:39-51).
● Jesus was crucified and died on a mountain―Mount Calvary. “And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, they crucified Him there” (Luke 23:33).
● After His resurrection from the dead, “the eleven Disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them” (Matthew 28:16).
● Speaking of the last days of the world, Jesus says to those who will be persecuted: “When you shall see the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place, then flee to the mountains!” (Matthew 24:15-16; Mark 13:14).
● “What has all this mountain stuff got to do with me?” you will say. Well, Jesus says that we should be like city on a mountain: “You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hidden!” (Matthew 5:14).
Mary and the Mountain
From all the above quotes, there is no doubt whatsoever about the association of God with the mountain. The same is true of Our Lady. In his commentary on the Books of Kings, Pope St. Gregory writes: “In Holy Scripture we read: ‘There was a man of Ramathaim-Sophim, of Mount Ephraim.’ The name of this mountain can be taken to designate the most Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God. She is a mountain in as much as, among chosen creatures, the dignity of her calling was above that of any others. Surely Mary was the highest of mountains―was she not―when she heaped up merits beyond all the choirs of Angels, to the very throne of God, that she might be worthy to conceive the eternal Word? It was this mountain whose supreme dignity Isaias was prophesying when he said: ‘In days to come, the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest mountain.’ Mary was indeed the highest mountain, since her summit gleamed above those of all the Saints” (Commentary of Pope St. Gregory on the Books of Kings―1 Kings, chapter 1).
Divine Providence has associated Our Lady with mountains throughout history. We have the Religious Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel; we have Our Lady appearing at La Salette upon a mountain; Our Lady appeared at Guadalupe, Mexico, upon a mountain;
Located on the top of the “Bulbul” mountain, around 6 miles from Ephesus (in today’s Turkey), where Our Lady after being entrusted to St. John the Apostle by the dying Christ on Mount Calvary: “When Jesus therefore had seen His Mother and the disciple standing whom He loved, He said to His mother: ‘Woman, behold thy son!’ After that, He said to the disciple: ‘Behold thy Mother!’ And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own” (John 19:26-27). This shrine of the Virgin Mary is the place where Mary may have spent her last days, together with St. John, who spent several years in the area to spread the Faith.
In South America, in Colombia, we have the devotion to Our Lady of the Mountain; in Bolivia we have the famous image of the Virgin of the Mountain, where the body of the Virgin Mary merges with the great silver-producing mountain of Potosí in Bolivia.
In North America, we have Our Lady of the Rockies is a 90-foot statue of Mary, that stands atop the Continental Divide overlooking Butte, Montana. The town of Estes Park, Colorado, has a parish named in honor of Our Lady of the Mountains.
In Europe, Slovenia has the shrine of Sveta Gora (meaning “Holy Mountain”) where Our Lady appeared in 1539 on Mount Skalnica―which is popularly called “The Holy Mountain.”
The Elevated Life in Mountains and Hills
We are all called to the summit of the spiritual life, which is the possession of God in Heaven. We have to scale the mountain of life that will to Heaven―and that mountain, a rugged mountain, is epitomized by Cross and Christ carrying His Cross up to Mount Calvary. Climbing any mountain is a cross and Our Lord calls us all to make that climb: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
As already stated above, the adjective “mediocre” and the noun “mediocrity” are a compound of two Latin words: “medial” meaning “middle,” and “ocris” meaning “rugged mountain”, therefore suggesting something that is “halfway to the top.” We are meant to carry our cross up the rugged mountain of life on Earth in order to reach Heaven―and as the aforementioned nursery rhyme stated: “And when they were only half-way up, they were neither up nor down.”
The Mediocre Catholic―Neither Up, Nor Down
It has to be as obvious as the nose on your face that most Catholics are Mediocre Catholics (or worse). Yet since we can barely see the nose on our face (unless we look in a mirror), then we probably don’t see the fact that most Catholics have sunk into the quicksand of mediocrity. Those who are mediocre actually think that they are quite good, or even very good! That is exactly what God is trying to say in Holy Scripture, when He addresses the lukewarm (which is just another name for mediocrity):
“I know thy works, that you are neither cold, nor hot. I would prefer that you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm―and neither cold, not hot―I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and do you not know that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I counsel you to buy of Me gold fire tried, so that you may be made rich; and may be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of your nakedness may not appear; and anoint your eyes with eye-salve, so that you may see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
Those words of God are striking and stinging―and they are addressed to the mediocre who are neither hot nor cold―“you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!” Father Frederick Faber, in his book Growth in Holiness, speaks of this in chapter on Lukewarmness:
“Either we are lukewarm, or we are fervent. There is nothing in the spiritual life which arrests our attention so forcibly as lukewarmness, because of the unusual language in which it has pleased God to express His ineffable disgust with it, and the startling doctrine which accompanies the declaration of His loathing, that coldness is less offensive to Him than tepidity. The diseases and evils of the body are in a great degree typical of the miseries and misfortunes of the soul. If we seek the correlative of lukewarmness, we shall find it in blindness. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself.
“This blindness is owing principally to three causes: (1) the frequency of venial sins; (2) the habitual dissipation of mind and (3) the ruling passion.
“The immediate results of this blindness are also three:
1. In the first place conscience becomes untrue. The body does not move confidently and in a straight line in the dark. Our conscience also must see in order to keep its balance. But if we falsify the truth, what is the consequence but error and corruption everywhere? If the light that is in us be darkness, says Our Lord, how great is that darkness!
(2) Bad instincts grow stronger. In proportion as conscience becomes dark, and so cold, and finally numb, in the same proportion the bad instincts of the human spirit lead us to avoid anything which will restore animation to the conscience. Thus they make us shrink from anything like vigorous spiritual direction. We suspect and fear that we shall be awakened, and driven and made to do good. So in hearing sermons, reading books, cultivating acquaintances, patronizing works of mercy, it draws back from everything that is likely to come too near or hit too hard.
(3) Out of the two preceding results flows a third, which is a profane use of the Sacraments. To go to Holy Communion when we are physically drowsy, yawning and half asleep, or to make our general confession half stupefied without serious preparation, would be some of the ways in which we profanely use the Sacraments. Thus frequent or even daily Communion seems to have only a negative effect upon us.
“There are seven chief symptoms of lukewarmness.
(1) The first mark is a great facility in omitting our exercises of piety, which is the exact contradictory of fervor.
(2) But we are not only easy in omitting exercises of piety, we are negligent in those which we do perform. We care more about the fact of going through them, than the manner or the spirit of it.
(3) The soul feels not altogether right with God. It does not exactly know what is wrong; but it is sure all is not right.
(4) A fourth symptom of lukewarmness is an habitual acting without any intention at all, good, bad or indifferent. We pray with no intention, just out of routine! We assist at Mass with no intention, just out of routine!
(5) A fifth is a carelessness about forming habits of virtue. There is no real commitment or method to the acquisition of virtue. Avoiding what we think are the worst sins is all we care about, and we are rarely serious about that!
(6) A sixth symptom is a contempt of little things and of daily opportunities. Divine inspirations are ignored. Genuflections or Signs of the Cross are made badly. We assist at Mass distractedly. We treat religious objects, scapulars, rosaries, medals, statues, etc. with less and less respect.
(7) The seventh and last symptom is a thinking rather of the good we have done than of the good we have left undone, resting on the past rather than striving for the future, loving to look at people below us rather than people above us. The lukewarm are ever calculating the sacrifices they have made, and fondly realizing to themselves the glory of their self‑devotion.
“I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who do not even suspect its presence. It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor at the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, but then, if we don’t get up―lost forever!” (Father Frederick Faber, Growth in Holiness, chapter on Lukewarmness).
A Mediocre World Mediocritizes Catholics
As they say: “You cannot leave clothes in a smoky room for long without them taking on the smell of smoke!” Or put it another, if you peel onions or garlic, then your hands will smell of onions or garlic. If you peel beets or turmeric, then your hands easily become stained with the crimson juice of the beet or the orange juice of the turmeric. If you take a hot frying pan off its flame on the stove top, and place it on a stainless steel counter top, then it will quickly lose its heat. Likewise, if you take an egg out of boiling water and place in bowl of cool water, the egg will quickly cool down. We live in a society in which mediocrity is the norm. The crowd is happy with mediocrity and mediocrity is a normal state. Anyone who ‘rebels’ against the norm and tries to rise above mediocrity is disliked, or ridiculed ― for the conscience of mediocrity hates being pricked and stung by those who excel.
Fr. Felix Sarda y Salvany, in his book Liberalism Is A Sin, speaks of the same principle ― for Liberalism is, in essence, mediocrity. Fr. Salvany writes:
“Physical science tells us that floating through the atmosphere are innumerable disease germs seeking a suitable nidus [a nest or breeding place] in which to settle and propagate and that we are constantly breathing these germs into the lungs. If the [immune] system be depleted or weakened, the dangerous microbe takes up its abode with us, and propagating its own kind with astonishing rapidity, undermines and ravages our health. It is equally true that we are subject to like infectious attacks in the spiritual order. Swarming in the atmosphere of our spiritual lives are innumerable deadly germs, ever ready to fasten upon the depleted and weakened soul and destroy the spiritual life.
“As we are addressing ourselves to those who live amidst the peculiar circumstances of our American life, and, as the spiritual and moral conditions, which obtain in this country, make up the moral and spiritual atmosphere in which we have our being, it is in the relation of our surroundings to ourselves, as well as of ourselves to our surroundings, that we shall find the answer to our question. Let us then consider these surroundings in a general way for the moment.
“First, as to some patent facts [the following numbers have been updated to match our present day circumstances]: The population of this country [USA] is at present something over 330 million [2020 estimates]. Of these, 70 million are Catholics, and according to their claim, 140 million are Protestants, leaving a population of 120 million or more who do not profess any form of Christianity at all [2020 estimates]. Amongst the 140 million Protestants, you will find every shade and variety of belief―from the belief in the Incarnation and Consubstantiation to the rejection of the Divinity of Christ altogether, in the empty creed of Unitarianism. In this scale of heresy, the adjustments of creeds are loose and easy. Lack of any decisive authority renders any exact standard of belief impossible. A Protestant may freely range from one end of the scale to the other and still be considered orthodox according to Protestant estimates. A loose indefinite belief in Christ, either as God redeeming the world, or even as a great ethical teacher, not God Himself, but sent by God, suffices to place the Protestant within the compass of his own standard of orthodoxy. Any specific expression of dogma, or of particular truths, bound up in the acceptance of Christianity, is not required; or, if required by any one sect, or denomination, can find no authoritative exaction, for the differences between the sects, in the last resort, become mere differences of private opinion, dependent upon nothing but the caprice or choice of the individual.
“Outside of these various bodies of loosely professed Christians stands a still larger mass of our population who are either absolutely indifferent to Christianity as a creed or positively reject it. In practice, the distinction is of little importance whether they hold themselves merely indifferent, or are positively hostile. In other words, we have here to reckon with a body, to all practical purposes, that is infidel. This mass comprises over 35% of our population, holding itself aloof from Christianity, and in some instances virulently antagonistic to it.
[When you add together the Protestants with the non-believers, it produces a total in excess of 78% of our population, but currently enhanced to an even more frightening percentage by the vast majority of Catholics today—2020—around 80% (or 56 million) of the 70 million Catholics, who either do not practice their Faith at all, or irregularly, or who are ignorant of its teachings (especially with regard to morality) or in practice simply disregard those teachings—bringing the total of practical non-believing and infidel people, including bad Catholics, to around 96%, if we can presume there to be today approximately 14 million believing, regularly practicing Catholics in the USA out of a population of 330 million (2020 stats)].
“In distinct religious opposition to this mass of infidelity (non-believers) and Protestantism―Catholics find themselves sharply and radically opposed. Heresy and infidelity are irreconcilable with Catholicity. “He that is not with me is against Me” (Matthew 12:30) are the words of Our Lord Himself, for denial of Catholic truth is the radical and common element of both heresy and infidelity. The difference between them is merely a matter of degree. One denies less, the other more. Protestantism, with its sliding scale of creeds, is simply an inclined plane into the abyss of positive unbelief. It is always virtual infidelity, its final outcome open infidelity, as the [2020 stats] 120 million unbelievers in this country stand witness.
“We live in the midst of this religious anarchy. Some [2020 stats] 260 million of our population can, in one sense or other, be considered anti-Catholic. From this mass—heretical and infidel—exhales an atmosphere filled with germs poisonous and fatal to Catholic life, if permitted to take root in the Catholic heart. The mere force of gravitation, which the larger mass ever exercises upon the smaller, is a power which the most energetic vigor alone can resist. Under this dangerous influence, a deadly inertia is apt to creep over the souls of the incautious and is only to be overcome by the liveliest exercise of Catholic Faith. To live without enervation amidst a heretical and infidel population requires a robust religious constitution. And to this danger we are daily exposed, ever coming into contact in a thousand ways, in almost every relation of life, with anti-Catholic thought and customs. But outside of this spiritual inertia, our non-Catholic surroundings—a danger rather passive than active in its influence—beget a still greater menace.
It is natural that Protestantism and infidelity should find public expression. What our [2020 stats] 260 million non-Catholic population thinks in these matters, naturally seeks and finds open expression. They have their organs and their literature where we find their current opinions publicly uttered. Their views upon religion, morality, politics, the constitution of society are perpetually marshaled before us. In the pulpit and in the press they are reiterated day after day. In magazine and newspaper they constantly speak from every line. Our literature is permeated and saturated with non-Catholic dogmatism. On all sides do we find this opposing spirit. We cannot escape from it. It enfolds and embraces us. Its breath is perpetually in our faces. It enters in by eye and ear. From birth to death, it enslaves us in its offensive garments. It now soothes and flatters, now hates and curses, now threatens, now praises. But it is most dangerous when it comes to us under the form of “liberality.” It is especially powerful for seduction in this guise. And it is under this aspect that we wish to consider it. For it is as Liberalism that Protestantism and Infidelity make their most devastating inroads upon the domain of the Faith. Out of these non-Catholic and anti-Catholic conditions thus predominating amongst us springs this monster of our times, Liberalism!”
The World’s Gospel of Mediocrity
Many people do as little as they can to get by. They don’t take pride in their work or in who they are. If somebody is watching, they may perform one way, but when nobody is watching they’ll cut corners and take the easy way out.
If you are not careful, you can be pulled into this same mentality where you think it is okay to show up late to work, to look less than your best, or to give less than your best. But God doesn’t bless mediocrity. God blesses excellence. As Our Lord said: “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). Mediocrity is despised by God, which is shown by the following Scriptural quotes: “Hypocrites! Well has Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘These people honor Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8) … “I know thy works, that you are neither cold, nor hot. I would prefer that you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm―and neither cold, not hot―I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
To the above words, Our Lord adds, in speaking to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “Alas! If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me! ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example ― for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
The adjective “mediocre” and the noun “mediocrity” come to the English language via Middle-French, and from the Latin word “mediocris” ― which is a compound of two Latin words: “medial” meaning “middle,” and “ocris” meaning “rugged mountain”, therefore suggesting something that is “halfway to the top.” Thus we get the English definitions of “mediocre” and “mediocrity” as being “of medium size, moderate, middling, commonplace; the quality of being average or ordinary; of moderate, inferior or low quality, value, ability; not very good; neither good nor bad; barely adequate; of average quality which should be better than it is; not excellent nor outstanding, usually disappointingly so; not good enough.”
It brings to mind the children’s nursery rhyme, The Grand Old Duke of York, which goes as follows:
Oh, the grand old Duke of York,
He had ten thousand men.
He marched them up to the top of the hill
And he marched them down again.
And when they were up, they were up;
And when they were down, they were down;
And when they were only half-way up,
They were neither up nor down.
The Mountain, God, and You
God―as well as Our Lady―have both been depicted symbolically as being mountains.
● “Come into the mountain of the Lord” (Isaias 30:29) … “The mountain of God is a fat mountain!” (Psalm 67:16) ... “And the Lord of hosts shall make unto all people in this mountain, a feast of fat things, a feast of wine, of fat things full of marrow, of purified wine” (Isaias 25:6) … “Who shall ascend into the mountain of the Lord, or who shall stand in His holy place?” (Psalm 23:3) … “Go forth and stand upon the mount, before the Lord” (3 Kings 19:11) … “Great is the Lord, and exceedingly to be praised in His holy mountain” (Psalm 47:2) … “Exalt the Lord our God and adore at His holy mountain!” (Psalm 98:9) … “A mountain in which God is well pleased to dwell―for there the Lord shall dwell unto the end” (Psalm 67:17) … “In the last days, the mountain of the House of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills. And many people shall go, and say: ‘Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob, and He will teach us His ways, and we will walk in His paths: for the law shall come forth from [Mount] Sion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem!’” (Isaias 2:2-3) … “It shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the House of the Lord shall be prepared in the top of mountains, and high above the hills, and people shall flow to it!” (Micheas 4:1).
● God appears to Moses on a mountain: “Moses came to the mountain of God, Horeb. And the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush” (Exodus 3:1-2). During the Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt, they came to Mount Sinai, “and the Lord called unto Moses from the mountain, and Moses went up to God” (Exodus 19:3). On another occasion, we read: “And the glory of the Lord dwelt upon Sinai, covering it with a cloud for six days, and on the seventh day the Lord called Moses out of the midst of the cloud. And the sight of the glory of the Lord was like a burning fire upon the top of the mountain. The Lord said to Moses: ‘Come up to Me into the mountain and be there!’ And Moses, entering into the midst of the cloud, went up into the mountain―and he was there forty days, and forty nights” (Exodus 24:13-18).
● Moses prayed for victory on a mountain while the Israelites were engaged in battle with the Amalecite army below: “Moses said to Josue: ‘Choose out men and go out and fight against Amalec! Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill having the rod of God in my hand!’ Josue did as Moses had spoken, and he fought against Amalec―but Moses went up upon the top of the hill. And when Moses lifted up his hands, Israel overcame―but if he let them down a little, Amalec overcame” (Exodus 17:9-11).
● Noe’s Ark, after the Great Flood was receding, came to rest upon a mountain: “The flood was forty days upon the Earth … The waters prevailed beyond measure upon the Earth and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered … and the waters increased and lifted up the ark on high above the Earth … and destroyed all things from the Earth―and Noe only remained, and they that were with him in the ark” (Genesis 7:17-23).
● Jerusalem is built in the mountains, on Mount Sion ― “My holy mountain Jerusalem, saith the Lord” (Isaias 66:20) … “Thy city Jerusalem … Thy holy mountain … the holy mountain of My God” (Daniel 9:16, 20) ― and is surrounded by seven mountain peaks that are higher than the city. “In My holy mountain, in the high mountain of Israel, saith the Lord God, there shall all the house of Israel serve Me!” (Ezechiel 20:40). “I am the Lord your God, dwelling in Sion, My holy mountain; and Jerusalem shall be holy and strangers shall pass through it no more!” (Joel 3:17). “And Jerusalem shall be called ‘The City of Truth’, and ‘The Mountain of the Lord of hosts’, ‘The Sanctified Mountain’” (Zacharias 8:3). Incidentally, the boundaries of Ancient Rome encompass what we now call “The Seven Hills of Rome” ― and Rome today is the center of the Catholic world, being the residence of the pope, and with the Catholic Faith built on the “seven mountains” or “seven hills” of the Seven Sacraments. In Holy Scripture we read of this connection between God and Mount Sion: “I am appointed king, by the Lord, over Sion His holy mountain, preaching His commandment” (Psalm 2:6) and that is what the Pope in Rome should be doing―being appointed ‘king’ over the holy mountain of the Catholic Church and preaching His commandments.
● The mountain, since it is a symbol of God, is often a place of prayer: “David was come to the top of the mountain, where he was about to adore the Lord” (2 Kings 15:32). Jesus went up the mountain alone to pray: “Having dismissed the multitude, Jesus went into a mountain, alone, to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23).
● Jesus leads the people up into a mountain and then preaches the so-called “Sermon on the Mount” (chapters 5, 6, and 7 of St. Matthew’s Gospel): “And seeing the multitudes, Jesus went up into a mountain, and when He was sat down, His disciples came unto Him, and opening His mouth, He taught them” (Matthew 5:1-2).
● It is on the mountain that Jesus heals many: “And going up into a mountain, Jesus sat there. And there came to Him great multitudes, having with them the dumb, the blind, the lame, the maimed, and many others―and they cast them down at His feet, and He healed them” (Matthew 15:29-30).
● It was on a mountain that Jesus performed the miracle of the feeding of the 5,000 with a few loaves and fishes: “Jesus went up into a mountain, and a very great multitude came to Him. He said: ‘Where shall we buy bread, that these may eat?’ … One of His disciples, said to Him: ‘There is a boy here that has five barley loaves, and two fishes―but what are these among so many?’ Then Jesus said: ‘Make the men sit down. The men therefore sat down, in number about five thousand. And Jesus took the loaves, and when He had given thanks, He distributed to them that were set down. In like manner also of the fishes. When they were filled, He said to His disciples: ‘Gather up the fragments that remain!’ They gathered up and filled twelve baskets with the fragments of the five barley loaves, which remained over and above to them that had eaten” (John 6:3-13).
● It was to the mountains that Jesus fled when they tried to make Him king: “Jesus therefore, when he knew that they would come to take Him by force and make Him king, fled again into the mountain―Himself, alone” (John 6:15).
● The Transfiguration of Jesus takes place on a mountain: “And after six days Jesus took unto Him Peter and James, and John his brother, and brought them up into a high mountain, apart. And He was transfigured before them. And His face did shine as the sun; and His garments became white as snow” (Matthew 17:1-2).
● The Garden of Gethsemane, the scene of the Our Lord’s “Agony in the Garden”, was located on the Mount of Olives: “And when they had said an hymn, they went forth to the Mount of Olives … And they came to a farm called Gethsemane. And He said to His disciples: ‘Sit you here, while I pray!’ And He took Peter and James and John with Him; and He began to fear and to be heavy. And He said to them: ‘My soul is sorrowful even unto death! Stay you here and watch!’ And when He was gone forward a little, He fell flat on the ground; and He prayed, that if it might be, the hour might pass from Him … And being in an agony, He prayed the longer” (Mark 14:26-50; Luke 22:39-51).
● Jesus was crucified and died on a mountain―Mount Calvary. “And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, they crucified Him there” (Luke 23:33).
● After His resurrection from the dead, “the eleven Disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them” (Matthew 28:16).
● Speaking of the last days of the world, Jesus says to those who will be persecuted: “When you shall see the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place, then flee to the mountains!” (Matthew 24:15-16; Mark 13:14).
● “What has all this mountain stuff got to do with me?” you will say. Well, Jesus says that we should be like city on a mountain: “You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hidden!” (Matthew 5:14).
Mary and the Mountain
From all the above quotes, there is no doubt whatsoever about the association of God with the mountain. The same is true of Our Lady. In his commentary on the Books of Kings, Pope St. Gregory writes: “In Holy Scripture we read: ‘There was a man of Ramathaim-Sophim, of Mount Ephraim.’ The name of this mountain can be taken to designate the most Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God. She is a mountain in as much as, among chosen creatures, the dignity of her calling was above that of any others. Surely Mary was the highest of mountains―was she not―when she heaped up merits beyond all the choirs of Angels, to the very throne of God, that she might be worthy to conceive the eternal Word? It was this mountain whose supreme dignity Isaias was prophesying when he said: ‘In days to come, the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest mountain.’ Mary was indeed the highest mountain, since her summit gleamed above those of all the Saints” (Commentary of Pope St. Gregory on the Books of Kings―1 Kings, chapter 1).
Divine Providence has associated Our Lady with mountains throughout history. We have the Religious Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel; we have Our Lady appearing at La Salette upon a mountain; Our Lady appeared at Guadalupe, Mexico, upon a mountain;
Located on the top of the “Bulbul” mountain, around 6 miles from Ephesus (in today’s Turkey), where Our Lady after being entrusted to St. John the Apostle by the dying Christ on Mount Calvary: “When Jesus therefore had seen His Mother and the disciple standing whom He loved, He said to His mother: ‘Woman, behold thy son!’ After that, He said to the disciple: ‘Behold thy Mother!’ And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own” (John 19:26-27). This shrine of the Virgin Mary is the place where Mary may have spent her last days, together with St. John, who spent several years in the area to spread the Faith.
In South America, in Colombia, we have the devotion to Our Lady of the Mountain; in Bolivia we have the famous image of the Virgin of the Mountain, where the body of the Virgin Mary merges with the great silver-producing mountain of Potosí in Bolivia.
In North America, we have Our Lady of the Rockies is a 90-foot statue of Mary, that stands atop the Continental Divide overlooking Butte, Montana. The town of Estes Park, Colorado, has a parish named in honor of Our Lady of the Mountains.
In Europe, Slovenia has the shrine of Sveta Gora (meaning “Holy Mountain”) where Our Lady appeared in 1539 on Mount Skalnica―which is popularly called “The Holy Mountain.”
The Elevated Life in Mountains and Hills
We are all called to the summit of the spiritual life, which is the possession of God in Heaven. We have to scale the mountain of life that will to Heaven―and that mountain, a rugged mountain, is epitomized by Cross and Christ carrying His Cross up to Mount Calvary. Climbing any mountain is a cross and Our Lord calls us all to make that climb: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
As already stated above, the adjective “mediocre” and the noun “mediocrity” are a compound of two Latin words: “medial” meaning “middle,” and “ocris” meaning “rugged mountain”, therefore suggesting something that is “halfway to the top.” We are meant to carry our cross up the rugged mountain of life on Earth in order to reach Heaven―and as the aforementioned nursery rhyme stated: “And when they were only half-way up, they were neither up nor down.”
The Mediocre Catholic―Neither Up, Nor Down
It has to be as obvious as the nose on your face that most Catholics are Mediocre Catholics (or worse). Yet since we can barely see the nose on our face (unless we look in a mirror), then we probably don’t see the fact that most Catholics have sunk into the quicksand of mediocrity. Those who are mediocre actually think that they are quite good, or even very good! That is exactly what God is trying to say in Holy Scripture, when He addresses the lukewarm (which is just another name for mediocrity):
“I know thy works, that you are neither cold, nor hot. I would prefer that you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm―and neither cold, not hot―I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and do you not know that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I counsel you to buy of Me gold fire tried, so that you may be made rich; and may be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of your nakedness may not appear; and anoint your eyes with eye-salve, so that you may see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
Those words of God are striking and stinging―and they are addressed to the mediocre who are neither hot nor cold―“you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!” Father Frederick Faber, in his book Growth in Holiness, speaks of this in chapter on Lukewarmness:
“Either we are lukewarm, or we are fervent. There is nothing in the spiritual life which arrests our attention so forcibly as lukewarmness, because of the unusual language in which it has pleased God to express His ineffable disgust with it, and the startling doctrine which accompanies the declaration of His loathing, that coldness is less offensive to Him than tepidity. The diseases and evils of the body are in a great degree typical of the miseries and misfortunes of the soul. If we seek the correlative of lukewarmness, we shall find it in blindness. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself.
“This blindness is owing principally to three causes: (1) the frequency of venial sins; (2) the habitual dissipation of mind and (3) the ruling passion.
“The immediate results of this blindness are also three:
1. In the first place conscience becomes untrue. The body does not move confidently and in a straight line in the dark. Our conscience also must see in order to keep its balance. But if we falsify the truth, what is the consequence but error and corruption everywhere? If the light that is in us be darkness, says Our Lord, how great is that darkness!
(2) Bad instincts grow stronger. In proportion as conscience becomes dark, and so cold, and finally numb, in the same proportion the bad instincts of the human spirit lead us to avoid anything which will restore animation to the conscience. Thus they make us shrink from anything like vigorous spiritual direction. We suspect and fear that we shall be awakened, and driven and made to do good. So in hearing sermons, reading books, cultivating acquaintances, patronizing works of mercy, it draws back from everything that is likely to come too near or hit too hard.
(3) Out of the two preceding results flows a third, which is a profane use of the Sacraments. To go to Holy Communion when we are physically drowsy, yawning and half asleep, or to make our general confession half stupefied without serious preparation, would be some of the ways in which we profanely use the Sacraments. Thus frequent or even daily Communion seems to have only a negative effect upon us.
“There are seven chief symptoms of lukewarmness.
(1) The first mark is a great facility in omitting our exercises of piety, which is the exact contradictory of fervor.
(2) But we are not only easy in omitting exercises of piety, we are negligent in those which we do perform. We care more about the fact of going through them, than the manner or the spirit of it.
(3) The soul feels not altogether right with God. It does not exactly know what is wrong; but it is sure all is not right.
(4) A fourth symptom of lukewarmness is an habitual acting without any intention at all, good, bad or indifferent. We pray with no intention, just out of routine! We assist at Mass with no intention, just out of routine!
(5) A fifth is a carelessness about forming habits of virtue. There is no real commitment or method to the acquisition of virtue. Avoiding what we think are the worst sins is all we care about, and we are rarely serious about that!
(6) A sixth symptom is a contempt of little things and of daily opportunities. Divine inspirations are ignored. Genuflections or Signs of the Cross are made badly. We assist at Mass distractedly. We treat religious objects, scapulars, rosaries, medals, statues, etc. with less and less respect.
(7) The seventh and last symptom is a thinking rather of the good we have done than of the good we have left undone, resting on the past rather than striving for the future, loving to look at people below us rather than people above us. The lukewarm are ever calculating the sacrifices they have made, and fondly realizing to themselves the glory of their self‑devotion.
“I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who do not even suspect its presence. It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor at the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, but then, if we don’t get up―lost forever!” (Father Frederick Faber, Growth in Holiness, chapter on Lukewarmness).
A Mediocre World Mediocritizes Catholics
As they say: “You cannot leave clothes in a smoky room for long without them taking on the smell of smoke!” Or put it another, if you peel onions or garlic, then your hands will smell of onions or garlic. If you peel beets or turmeric, then your hands easily become stained with the crimson juice of the beet or the orange juice of the turmeric. If you take a hot frying pan off its flame on the stove top, and place it on a stainless steel counter top, then it will quickly lose its heat. Likewise, if you take an egg out of boiling water and place in bowl of cool water, the egg will quickly cool down. We live in a society in which mediocrity is the norm. The crowd is happy with mediocrity and mediocrity is a normal state. Anyone who ‘rebels’ against the norm and tries to rise above mediocrity is disliked, or ridiculed ― for the conscience of mediocrity hates being pricked and stung by those who excel.
Fr. Felix Sarda y Salvany, in his book Liberalism Is A Sin, speaks of the same principle ― for Liberalism is, in essence, mediocrity. Fr. Salvany writes:
“Physical science tells us that floating through the atmosphere are innumerable disease germs seeking a suitable nidus [a nest or breeding place] in which to settle and propagate and that we are constantly breathing these germs into the lungs. If the [immune] system be depleted or weakened, the dangerous microbe takes up its abode with us, and propagating its own kind with astonishing rapidity, undermines and ravages our health. It is equally true that we are subject to like infectious attacks in the spiritual order. Swarming in the atmosphere of our spiritual lives are innumerable deadly germs, ever ready to fasten upon the depleted and weakened soul and destroy the spiritual life.
“As we are addressing ourselves to those who live amidst the peculiar circumstances of our American life, and, as the spiritual and moral conditions, which obtain in this country, make up the moral and spiritual atmosphere in which we have our being, it is in the relation of our surroundings to ourselves, as well as of ourselves to our surroundings, that we shall find the answer to our question. Let us then consider these surroundings in a general way for the moment.
“First, as to some patent facts [the following numbers have been updated to match our present day circumstances]: The population of this country [USA] is at present something over 330 million [2020 estimates]. Of these, 70 million are Catholics, and according to their claim, 140 million are Protestants, leaving a population of 120 million or more who do not profess any form of Christianity at all [2020 estimates]. Amongst the 140 million Protestants, you will find every shade and variety of belief―from the belief in the Incarnation and Consubstantiation to the rejection of the Divinity of Christ altogether, in the empty creed of Unitarianism. In this scale of heresy, the adjustments of creeds are loose and easy. Lack of any decisive authority renders any exact standard of belief impossible. A Protestant may freely range from one end of the scale to the other and still be considered orthodox according to Protestant estimates. A loose indefinite belief in Christ, either as God redeeming the world, or even as a great ethical teacher, not God Himself, but sent by God, suffices to place the Protestant within the compass of his own standard of orthodoxy. Any specific expression of dogma, or of particular truths, bound up in the acceptance of Christianity, is not required; or, if required by any one sect, or denomination, can find no authoritative exaction, for the differences between the sects, in the last resort, become mere differences of private opinion, dependent upon nothing but the caprice or choice of the individual.
“Outside of these various bodies of loosely professed Christians stands a still larger mass of our population who are either absolutely indifferent to Christianity as a creed or positively reject it. In practice, the distinction is of little importance whether they hold themselves merely indifferent, or are positively hostile. In other words, we have here to reckon with a body, to all practical purposes, that is infidel. This mass comprises over 35% of our population, holding itself aloof from Christianity, and in some instances virulently antagonistic to it.
[When you add together the Protestants with the non-believers, it produces a total in excess of 78% of our population, but currently enhanced to an even more frightening percentage by the vast majority of Catholics today—2020—around 80% (or 56 million) of the 70 million Catholics, who either do not practice their Faith at all, or irregularly, or who are ignorant of its teachings (especially with regard to morality) or in practice simply disregard those teachings—bringing the total of practical non-believing and infidel people, including bad Catholics, to around 96%, if we can presume there to be today approximately 14 million believing, regularly practicing Catholics in the USA out of a population of 330 million (2020 stats)].
“In distinct religious opposition to this mass of infidelity (non-believers) and Protestantism―Catholics find themselves sharply and radically opposed. Heresy and infidelity are irreconcilable with Catholicity. “He that is not with me is against Me” (Matthew 12:30) are the words of Our Lord Himself, for denial of Catholic truth is the radical and common element of both heresy and infidelity. The difference between them is merely a matter of degree. One denies less, the other more. Protestantism, with its sliding scale of creeds, is simply an inclined plane into the abyss of positive unbelief. It is always virtual infidelity, its final outcome open infidelity, as the [2020 stats] 120 million unbelievers in this country stand witness.
“We live in the midst of this religious anarchy. Some [2020 stats] 260 million of our population can, in one sense or other, be considered anti-Catholic. From this mass—heretical and infidel—exhales an atmosphere filled with germs poisonous and fatal to Catholic life, if permitted to take root in the Catholic heart. The mere force of gravitation, which the larger mass ever exercises upon the smaller, is a power which the most energetic vigor alone can resist. Under this dangerous influence, a deadly inertia is apt to creep over the souls of the incautious and is only to be overcome by the liveliest exercise of Catholic Faith. To live without enervation amidst a heretical and infidel population requires a robust religious constitution. And to this danger we are daily exposed, ever coming into contact in a thousand ways, in almost every relation of life, with anti-Catholic thought and customs. But outside of this spiritual inertia, our non-Catholic surroundings—a danger rather passive than active in its influence—beget a still greater menace.
It is natural that Protestantism and infidelity should find public expression. What our [2020 stats] 260 million non-Catholic population thinks in these matters, naturally seeks and finds open expression. They have their organs and their literature where we find their current opinions publicly uttered. Their views upon religion, morality, politics, the constitution of society are perpetually marshaled before us. In the pulpit and in the press they are reiterated day after day. In magazine and newspaper they constantly speak from every line. Our literature is permeated and saturated with non-Catholic dogmatism. On all sides do we find this opposing spirit. We cannot escape from it. It enfolds and embraces us. Its breath is perpetually in our faces. It enters in by eye and ear. From birth to death, it enslaves us in its offensive garments. It now soothes and flatters, now hates and curses, now threatens, now praises. But it is most dangerous when it comes to us under the form of “liberality.” It is especially powerful for seduction in this guise. And it is under this aspect that we wish to consider it. For it is as Liberalism that Protestantism and Infidelity make their most devastating inroads upon the domain of the Faith. Out of these non-Catholic and anti-Catholic conditions thus predominating amongst us springs this monster of our times, Liberalism!”
The World’s Gospel of Mediocrity
Many people do as little as they can to get by. They don’t take pride in their work or in who they are. If somebody is watching, they may perform one way, but when nobody is watching they’ll cut corners and take the easy way out.
If you are not careful, you can be pulled into this same mentality where you think it is okay to show up late to work, to look less than your best, or to give less than your best. But God doesn’t bless mediocrity. God blesses excellence. As Our Lord said: “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). Mediocrity is despised by God, which is shown by the following Scriptural quotes: “Hypocrites! Well has Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘These people honor Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8) … “I know thy works, that you are neither cold, nor hot. I would prefer that you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm―and neither cold, not hot―I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
To the above words, Our Lord adds, in speaking to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “Alas! If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me! ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example ― for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
Article 12
Saturday, August 24th
True Devotion Guarantees Salvation
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Saturday, August 24th
True Devotion Guarantees Salvation
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Prize of Salvation!
Holy Scripture says: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it! And every one that strives for the mastery, refrains himself from all things―and they, indeed, that they may receive a corruptible crown―but we an incorruptible one! I therefore so run―not as at an uncertainty! I so fight―not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection―lest, perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
Do you want to be saved? Do you want to get into Heaven? Of course you―unless you are an idiot or a Satanist! But will you be saved? Will you get into Heaven? That is another question and the answer is not as certain as the answer to the first two questions! It is not for nothing and not without good reason that Holy Scripture warns us: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). Why should we fear and tremble over our salvation? We should fear and tremble because Our Lord Himself pointed this out on several occasions:
“And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen! … Not everyone that says to Me: “Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: “Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name!” And then will I profess unto them: “I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!” ... When the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying: “Lord! Open to us!” And He, answering, shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are!” Then you shall begin to say: “We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!” There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out! … Why do you call Me, “Lord! Lord!” and do not the things which I say?’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:22-23; 22:14; Luke 6:46).
The Saints on Salvation
The above words can be disconcerting and discouraging! Things are not made any better by the quotes of many saints who echo those words of Our Lord.
“Despite assurances that God did not create any man for Hell, and that He wishes all men to be saved―it remains equally true that only few will be saved; that only few will go to Heaven; and that the greater part of mankind will be lost forever” (St. John Neumann).
“The number of the saved is as few as the number of grapes left after the vineyard-pickers have passed” (St. John Mary Vianney).
“I had the greatest sorrow for the many souls ... falling into Hell like snowflakes in a mid-winter blizzard” (St. Teresa of Avila).
“It is certain that few are saved” (St. Augustine).
“There are a select few who are saved” (St. Thomas Aquinas).
“There are many who arrive at the Faith, but few who are led into the heavenly kingdom!” (Pope St. Gregory the Great).
“Taking into account the behavior of mankind, only a small part of the human race will be saved” (Sister Lucia of Fatima).
“So many people are going to die, and almost all of them are going to Hell! So many people falling into Hell!” (St. Jacinta Marto of Fatima).
“A great many persons live constantly in the state of damnation!” (St. Vincent de Paul).
“The number of the damned is incalculable” (St. Veronica Giuliani).
“I was watching souls going down into the abyss as thick and fast as snowflakes falling in the winter mist” (Blessed Benedict Joseph Labre).
“Those who are saved are in the minority” (St. Thomas Aquinas).
“If you wish to imitate the multitude, then you shall not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow gate” (St. Augustine).
“So vast a number of miserable souls perish, and so comparatively few are saved!” (St. Philip Neri).
“Yes, indeed, many will be damned; few will be saved” (St. Benedict Joseph of Labre).
“I do not speak rashly, but as I feel and think. I do not think that many priests are saved, but that those who perish are far more numerous” (St. John Chrysostom).
“A great number of Christians are lost” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice).
“The greater number of Christians today are damned ... Those cast into Hell were as numerous as snowflakes in mid-winter” (Blessed Anna Maria Taigi).
“The common opinion is that the greater part of adults is lost” (St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori).
“If you wish to imitate the multitude, you shall then not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow way” (St. Augustine
“Ah, how many souls lose Heaven and are cast into Hell!” (St. Francis Xavier).
“All persons desire to be saved, but the greater part, because they will not adopt the means of being saved, fall into sin and are lost. [...] In fact, the Elect are much fewer than the damned, for the reprobate are much more numerous than the Elect” (St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori).
“Shall we all be saved? Shall we go to Heaven? Alas, my children, we do not know! But I tremble when I see so many souls lost these days. See, they fall into Hell as leaves fall from the trees at the approach of winter” (St. John Mary Vianney).
“The number of the elect is so small — so small — that, were we to know how small it is, we would faint away with grief: one here and there, scattered up and down the world! … Be one of the small number who find the way to life, and enter by the narrow gate into Heaven. Take care not to follow the majority and the common herd, so many of whom are lost. Do not be deceived; there are only two roads: one that leads to life and is narrow; the other that leads to death and is wide. There is no middle way” (St. Louis Marie de Montfort).
“Behold how many there are who are called, and how few who are chosen! And behold, if you have no care for yourself, then your perdition is more certain than your amendment, especially since the way that leads to eternal life is so narrow” (St. John of the Cross).
“The saints are few, but we must live with the few if we would be saved with the few. O God, too few indeed they are; yet among those few I wish to be!” (St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori).
“Meditate on the horrors of Hell which will last for eternity because of one easily-committed mortal sin. Try hard to be among the few who are chosen. Think of the eternal flames of Hell, and how few there are that are saved” (St. Benedict Joseph Labre).
“Many begin well, but there are few who persevere” (St. Jerome).
“They who are to be saved as Saints, but wish to be saved as imperfect souls, shall not be saved” (Pope St. Gregory the Great).
“If you want to be certain of being in the number of the Elect, strive to be one of the few, not one of the many. And if you would be quite sure of your salvation, strive to be among the fewest of the few; that is to say, do not follow the great majority of mankind, but follow those who enter upon the narrow way, who renounce the world, who give themselves to prayer, and who never relax their efforts by day or night, so that they may attain everlasting blessedness” (St. Anselm).
“Live with the few if you want to reign with the few” (St. John Climacus).
Need Help? Of Course You Do!
Wow! Phew! Are you one of the few? If not, what can you do? To whom can you turn? The answer, of course, is Mary! However just as Our Lord says: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! … Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Matthew 7:21-23; Luke 6:46), Our Lady could also say the same thing: “Not everyone that says to me: ‘Our Lady! Our Lady!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of the Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! … Why do you call me, ‘Our Lady! Our Lady!’ and do not the things which I say?”
Our Lady has told us at Fatima that God and Jesus want to establish devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary throughout the world! She promised salvation to those who would embrace it: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it!” (Our Lady of Fatima, June 13th, 1917) … “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” (Our Lady of Fatima, July 13th, 1917).
Unfortunately, little or nothing has been done in that regard. Sister Lucia of Fatima relayed to us Our Lady’s dissatisfaction with the lack of response to her messages and demands: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness―but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Do we see today a great devotion throughout the whole world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary? Of course not! We cannot even see it amongst Catholics! The mainstream Catholic media reported David Carollo, executive director of the World Apostolate of Fatima U.S.A., as saying: “The devotion of the Five First Saturdays was given to make up for the five blasphemies against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Those five offenses consist of: (1) offenses against Mary’s Immaculate Conception, by denial or ridicule; (2) offenses against her perpetual virginity; (3) offenses against her divine maternity, that is, refusing to accept her as the mother of all mankind; (4) offenses by those who implant in children’s hearts indifference toward, contempt for, and even hate of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and (5) insults or damage done purposefully to sacred images of Mary.” Carollo called the Five First Saturdays devotion the “unfulfilled part of the Fatima message.” He said that the fulfillment of the promises of Fatima “will come when we merit it … and we merit it primarily if enough people are fulfilling that Five First Saturdays devotion.”
The National Catholic Register reported, on May 4th, 2022: “Although interest in the devotion seems to be growing, those who commit to receiving Communion, going to confession, praying the Rosary and meditating for 15 minutes on one or more mysteries of the Rosary for five consecutive first Saturdays form a minority. Likewise, the number of parishes that offer First Saturday devotions remains somewhat sparse … Some say bishops, in their role as teachers, could be doing more to promote the First Saturdays devotion and that priests could help encourage laypeople by providing Communion and Confession on those days.”
Part of Our Lady’s requests at Fatima was the daily recitation of the Holy Rosary―at least five decades daily, but more if possible. Statistics indicate that around 4% of Catholics say the Rosary daily (but how many meditate the Rosary and don’t just “say” it?). That is not a very good response to Our Lady’s requests! Only 4 out of every 100 persons!
What Father Faber had written in the 1850s, in the Preface to his personal translation from French to English, of St. Louis de Montfort’s book True Devotion to Mary, was true when Our Lady appeared in 1917 and is still true today. Father Faber wrote:
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady―but, remember, nothing short of an immense one! Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It is frightened out of its wits by the sneers of heresy! It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that Protestants may feel at ease about her! Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be! It has no faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized!
Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines! Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother! I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable [St. Louis-Marie] Grignion de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ! Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!” (Father Frederick William Faber, the Preface to his translation from French to English, of St. Louis de Montfort’s book True Devotion to Mary).
Nevertheless, it is to Our Lady that we must turn and turn to her with devotion―not with a half-baked devotion, a lukewarm devotion, a mere lip-service devotion, a halfhearted devotion―but with a true devotion. Our Blessed Mother holds such a place in the economy of our redemption that some do not hesitate to state that devotion to her is a necessary condition of salvation.
“They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish!” (St. Albert the Great, Doctor of the Church).
“They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation!” (St. Bonaventure, Doctor of the Church)
“A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost!” (St. Ignatius of Antioch, Father of the Church).
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
“It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church).
“He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost!” (St. Anselm, Doctor of the Church).
“As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified!” (St. Antonine).
Our Lady herself said to St. Bridget of Sweden: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
Holy Scripture says: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it! And every one that strives for the mastery, refrains himself from all things―and they, indeed, that they may receive a corruptible crown―but we an incorruptible one! I therefore so run―not as at an uncertainty! I so fight―not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection―lest, perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
Do you want to be saved? Do you want to get into Heaven? Of course you―unless you are an idiot or a Satanist! But will you be saved? Will you get into Heaven? That is another question and the answer is not as certain as the answer to the first two questions! It is not for nothing and not without good reason that Holy Scripture warns us: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). Why should we fear and tremble over our salvation? We should fear and tremble because Our Lord Himself pointed this out on several occasions:
“And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen! … Not everyone that says to Me: “Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: “Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name!” And then will I profess unto them: “I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!” ... When the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying: “Lord! Open to us!” And He, answering, shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are!” Then you shall begin to say: “We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: “I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!” There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out! … Why do you call Me, “Lord! Lord!” and do not the things which I say?’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:22-23; 22:14; Luke 6:46).
The Saints on Salvation
The above words can be disconcerting and discouraging! Things are not made any better by the quotes of many saints who echo those words of Our Lord.
“Despite assurances that God did not create any man for Hell, and that He wishes all men to be saved―it remains equally true that only few will be saved; that only few will go to Heaven; and that the greater part of mankind will be lost forever” (St. John Neumann).
“The number of the saved is as few as the number of grapes left after the vineyard-pickers have passed” (St. John Mary Vianney).
“I had the greatest sorrow for the many souls ... falling into Hell like snowflakes in a mid-winter blizzard” (St. Teresa of Avila).
“It is certain that few are saved” (St. Augustine).
“There are a select few who are saved” (St. Thomas Aquinas).
“There are many who arrive at the Faith, but few who are led into the heavenly kingdom!” (Pope St. Gregory the Great).
“Taking into account the behavior of mankind, only a small part of the human race will be saved” (Sister Lucia of Fatima).
“So many people are going to die, and almost all of them are going to Hell! So many people falling into Hell!” (St. Jacinta Marto of Fatima).
“A great many persons live constantly in the state of damnation!” (St. Vincent de Paul).
“The number of the damned is incalculable” (St. Veronica Giuliani).
“I was watching souls going down into the abyss as thick and fast as snowflakes falling in the winter mist” (Blessed Benedict Joseph Labre).
“Those who are saved are in the minority” (St. Thomas Aquinas).
“If you wish to imitate the multitude, then you shall not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow gate” (St. Augustine).
“So vast a number of miserable souls perish, and so comparatively few are saved!” (St. Philip Neri).
“Yes, indeed, many will be damned; few will be saved” (St. Benedict Joseph of Labre).
“I do not speak rashly, but as I feel and think. I do not think that many priests are saved, but that those who perish are far more numerous” (St. John Chrysostom).
“A great number of Christians are lost” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice).
“The greater number of Christians today are damned ... Those cast into Hell were as numerous as snowflakes in mid-winter” (Blessed Anna Maria Taigi).
“The common opinion is that the greater part of adults is lost” (St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori).
“If you wish to imitate the multitude, you shall then not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow way” (St. Augustine
“Ah, how many souls lose Heaven and are cast into Hell!” (St. Francis Xavier).
“All persons desire to be saved, but the greater part, because they will not adopt the means of being saved, fall into sin and are lost. [...] In fact, the Elect are much fewer than the damned, for the reprobate are much more numerous than the Elect” (St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori).
“Shall we all be saved? Shall we go to Heaven? Alas, my children, we do not know! But I tremble when I see so many souls lost these days. See, they fall into Hell as leaves fall from the trees at the approach of winter” (St. John Mary Vianney).
“The number of the elect is so small — so small — that, were we to know how small it is, we would faint away with grief: one here and there, scattered up and down the world! … Be one of the small number who find the way to life, and enter by the narrow gate into Heaven. Take care not to follow the majority and the common herd, so many of whom are lost. Do not be deceived; there are only two roads: one that leads to life and is narrow; the other that leads to death and is wide. There is no middle way” (St. Louis Marie de Montfort).
“Behold how many there are who are called, and how few who are chosen! And behold, if you have no care for yourself, then your perdition is more certain than your amendment, especially since the way that leads to eternal life is so narrow” (St. John of the Cross).
“The saints are few, but we must live with the few if we would be saved with the few. O God, too few indeed they are; yet among those few I wish to be!” (St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori).
“Meditate on the horrors of Hell which will last for eternity because of one easily-committed mortal sin. Try hard to be among the few who are chosen. Think of the eternal flames of Hell, and how few there are that are saved” (St. Benedict Joseph Labre).
“Many begin well, but there are few who persevere” (St. Jerome).
“They who are to be saved as Saints, but wish to be saved as imperfect souls, shall not be saved” (Pope St. Gregory the Great).
“If you want to be certain of being in the number of the Elect, strive to be one of the few, not one of the many. And if you would be quite sure of your salvation, strive to be among the fewest of the few; that is to say, do not follow the great majority of mankind, but follow those who enter upon the narrow way, who renounce the world, who give themselves to prayer, and who never relax their efforts by day or night, so that they may attain everlasting blessedness” (St. Anselm).
“Live with the few if you want to reign with the few” (St. John Climacus).
Need Help? Of Course You Do!
Wow! Phew! Are you one of the few? If not, what can you do? To whom can you turn? The answer, of course, is Mary! However just as Our Lord says: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! … Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Matthew 7:21-23; Luke 6:46), Our Lady could also say the same thing: “Not everyone that says to me: ‘Our Lady! Our Lady!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of the Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! … Why do you call me, ‘Our Lady! Our Lady!’ and do not the things which I say?”
Our Lady has told us at Fatima that God and Jesus want to establish devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary throughout the world! She promised salvation to those who would embrace it: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it!” (Our Lady of Fatima, June 13th, 1917) … “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” (Our Lady of Fatima, July 13th, 1917).
Unfortunately, little or nothing has been done in that regard. Sister Lucia of Fatima relayed to us Our Lady’s dissatisfaction with the lack of response to her messages and demands: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness―but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Do we see today a great devotion throughout the whole world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary? Of course not! We cannot even see it amongst Catholics! The mainstream Catholic media reported David Carollo, executive director of the World Apostolate of Fatima U.S.A., as saying: “The devotion of the Five First Saturdays was given to make up for the five blasphemies against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Those five offenses consist of: (1) offenses against Mary’s Immaculate Conception, by denial or ridicule; (2) offenses against her perpetual virginity; (3) offenses against her divine maternity, that is, refusing to accept her as the mother of all mankind; (4) offenses by those who implant in children’s hearts indifference toward, contempt for, and even hate of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and (5) insults or damage done purposefully to sacred images of Mary.” Carollo called the Five First Saturdays devotion the “unfulfilled part of the Fatima message.” He said that the fulfillment of the promises of Fatima “will come when we merit it … and we merit it primarily if enough people are fulfilling that Five First Saturdays devotion.”
The National Catholic Register reported, on May 4th, 2022: “Although interest in the devotion seems to be growing, those who commit to receiving Communion, going to confession, praying the Rosary and meditating for 15 minutes on one or more mysteries of the Rosary for five consecutive first Saturdays form a minority. Likewise, the number of parishes that offer First Saturday devotions remains somewhat sparse … Some say bishops, in their role as teachers, could be doing more to promote the First Saturdays devotion and that priests could help encourage laypeople by providing Communion and Confession on those days.”
Part of Our Lady’s requests at Fatima was the daily recitation of the Holy Rosary―at least five decades daily, but more if possible. Statistics indicate that around 4% of Catholics say the Rosary daily (but how many meditate the Rosary and don’t just “say” it?). That is not a very good response to Our Lady’s requests! Only 4 out of every 100 persons!
What Father Faber had written in the 1850s, in the Preface to his personal translation from French to English, of St. Louis de Montfort’s book True Devotion to Mary, was true when Our Lady appeared in 1917 and is still true today. Father Faber wrote:
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady―but, remember, nothing short of an immense one! Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It is frightened out of its wits by the sneers of heresy! It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that Protestants may feel at ease about her! Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be! It has no faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized!
Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines! Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother! I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable [St. Louis-Marie] Grignion de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ! Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!” (Father Frederick William Faber, the Preface to his translation from French to English, of St. Louis de Montfort’s book True Devotion to Mary).
Nevertheless, it is to Our Lady that we must turn and turn to her with devotion―not with a half-baked devotion, a lukewarm devotion, a mere lip-service devotion, a halfhearted devotion―but with a true devotion. Our Blessed Mother holds such a place in the economy of our redemption that some do not hesitate to state that devotion to her is a necessary condition of salvation.
“They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish!” (St. Albert the Great, Doctor of the Church).
“They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation!” (St. Bonaventure, Doctor of the Church)
“A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost!” (St. Ignatius of Antioch, Father of the Church).
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
“It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church).
“He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost!” (St. Anselm, Doctor of the Church).
“As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified!” (St. Antonine).
Our Lady herself said to St. Bridget of Sweden: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
Article 11
Thursday, August 22nd, Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, & Friday August 23rd
Is This a Day for Fanatical Devotion?
Thursday, August 22nd, Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, & Friday August 23rd
Is This a Day for Fanatical Devotion?
Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary
Today we celebrate the feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary! It was at Fatima that Our Lady twice requested that we be devoted to her Immaculate Heart: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it!” (Our Lady of Fatima, June 13th, 1917) … “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” (Our Lady of Fatima, July 13th, 1917).
God intends or desires the same fate for each and every one of us―salvation―and we could all attain to that heavenly glory, being assumed into Heaven to be ever happy in the glory of God—if we would only cooperate with the will of God, if we would only bend our will to the will of God, instead of trying to bend God’s will to our will. Nobody is meant to go to Purgatory, and, even more so, nobody is meant to go to Hell. God has intended Heaven to be destination of every soul that has ever been created. God does not create souls with the express desire of sending them to Purgatory or Hell—nobody is predestined for Purgatory or Hell. Yet to reach God’s intended destination for us—Heaven—we have to cooperate with God’s grace and do what He wants to be done.
Additionally, we have these chiding words of Our Lady of Good Success: “O, if only human beings and religious knew what Heaven is and what it is to possess God, how differently they would live, sparing no sacrifice in order to enter more fully into possession of it! But some let themselves be dazzled by the false glamour of honors and human greatness, while others are blinded by self-love, not realizing that they are falling into lukewarmness, that immense evil which destroys their fervor!”
What is Devotion?
Salvation in exchange for being devoted to the Immaculate Heart of Mary! That is a spiritual bargain! But what exactly is devotion? Everyone has their own personal idea of what devotion is―as St. Francis de Sales says in his book, Introduction to the Devout Life. He states: “Small mistakes made at the beginning of any project grow infinitely great as it progresses, and in the end are almost impossible to correct. Hence you should know, before everything else, what is the virtue of devotion.
“There is only one true devotion while there is a very large number of false and meaningless ones. So if you cannot recognize true devotion, you could be deceived and waste time in following some devotion that is irrelevant and irrational. Each person represents devotion according to his liking and imagination. He who is in the habit of fasting will think that because he fasts he is very devout―even though his heart is filled with hatred. Another person will not take a sip of wine, or even of water, anxious about sobriety―but he has no scruples to sip the blood of his neighbor by speaking ill or by false statements. Another considers himself devout because of the very great number of prayers he recites every day―even though soon after this he speaks words that are annoying, full of pride and hurtful to those in his house and to his neighbors. Another very gladly opens his purse to give alms to the poor―but cannot take any gentleness from his heart to forgive his enemies. Yet another will forgive his enemies―but will not pay what he owes, unless he is legally forced to do so. All such persons are generally looked upon as devout whereas in fact they are not.
“When Saul’s soldiers came looking for David in his house, Michal placed a statue on a bed and covered it with David’s clothes and so made them believe that it was David himself asleep due to illness (1 Kings 19:11-16). In the same way, many people cover themselves with various external actions related to holy devotion. The world takes them for people who are truly devout and spiritual, whereas in reality they are nothing more than statues and illusions of devotion.
“Devotion that is true and living presupposes the love of God, rather it is nothing else than a true love of God. It is not, however, love as such. In so far as divine love enriches us―it is called grace, which makes us pleasing to God. In so far as it gives us the strength to do good―it is called charity. But when it grows to such a degree of perfection that it makes us not only to do good, but rather moves us to do it carefully, frequently and promptly―it is called devotion.
“Ostriches never fly, hens fly only awkwardly, quite low and rarely; but eagles, doves and swallows fly often, swiftly and very high. In the same way, sinners do not fly towards God, but rather all their movements are on the Earth and for the things of the Earth. People who are good, but have not yet progressed to devotion, fly towards God by their good deeds but rarely, slowly and with difficulty. Persons who are devout fly to God frequently, promptly and freely. In short, devotion is nothing else than a spiritual agility and liveliness, by means of which charity realizes its actions in us, or we do so by charity, promptly and lovingly.
“Just as it is the work of charity to make us keep all the commandments of God in general and without any exception, so it is the work of devotion to make us do so promptly and earnestly. Therefore, whoever does not keep all of God’s commandments cannot be considered either good or devout, because to be good one must have charity. To be devout one must, not only have charity, but a great liveliness and promptness in doing charitable actions. Since devotion is to be found at a certain level of charity that is extraordinary―it makes us prompt, active and earnest in keeping all of God’s commandments. But, more than this, it rouses us to do as many good works as we can, promptly and lovingly, even though they are in no way commanded, but rather only counseled or inspired.
“A man, who has recently recovered from some illness, walks only as much as he needs to, but slowly and with difficulty. So also, a sinner, healed of his sinfulness, moves ahead only to the extent that God commands him, and too slowly and with difficulty―until he acquires devotion. After that, like a man in good health he not only walks, but runs joyfully in the way of God’s commandments (Psalm 118:32). Even more, he moves ahead and runs in the paths of God’s counsels and inspirations.
“In conclusion, charity and devotion are not more different from each other than the flame from the fire―all the more so, because charity is a spiritual fire which, when it burns with intense flames, is called devotion. In fact, devotion adds to the fire of charity only the flame which makes charity prompt, active and diligent―not only to keep God’s commandments, but also to put into practice His counsels and inspirations.” (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Chapter 1).
Are we ostriches, chicken or eagles? Does our devotion never get off the ground? Or gets off the ground rarely and not very high? Or is our devotion reaching the heights?
More Than a Heart
If we are going to practice devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, then we had better get a clear idea on what that Heart is all about! The amount of help and grace we get could well depend upon it—much like someone trying to grow vegetables or fruits in the garden—the more you know about your subject, the better results you will get.
Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary is nothing other than a special form of devotion to person of Mary. The above Scriptural quotes partially show the breadth of meaning in the word “heart.” This is also true of devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, whereby we adore, not only the Heart of Jesus, but the whole Person that the Heart represents. Both elements—the Heart and the Person—must be present if the devotion is to be true. Honor is directed to the physical heart itself. However, this in itself is not sufficient; we must also see in this devotion, all that the human heart of Mary suggests, all of which it is the expressive symbol and the living reminder: namely, Mary’s interior life, her joys and sorrows, her virtues and hidden perfections, and, above all, her virginal love for her God, her maternal love for her Divine Son, and her motherly and compassionate love for her sinful and miserable children here below.
However, the Heart of Mary must not be ignored. A mere consideration of Mary’s interior life and the beauties of her soul, without any thought of her physical heart, does not constitute devotion to her Immaculate Heart; still less does devotion to her Immaculate Heart consist in the consideration of the Heart of Mary merely as a part of her virginal body. The two elements of (1) paying attention to her physical heart, and (2) paying attention to all the things that her Immaculate Heart represents, are both essential to the devotion, just as soul and body are necessary to the constitution of man.
Why the Heart?
We all know something about devotion to the Immaculate Heart—but why the heart in particular? In the case of Our Lord, there is, of course, the Sacred Heart—but we also have devotions to the Sacred Head; the Holy Face; the Five Wounds; the Precious Blood; the Infant Jesus; etc. Why then are we expected to honor Our Lady’s Heart in particular, instead of, let’s say, her head, her hand, her foot, etc.? Who on earth came up with the idea of the Immaculate Heart? The first mention of Mary’s Heart comes in the Scriptural account of the visitation of the shepherds to the cave of the Nativity:
“And it came to pass, that when they were there, her days were accomplished, that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped Him up in swaddling clothes, and laid Him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn. And there were in the same country shepherds watching, and keeping the night watches over their flock. And behold an angel of the Lord stood by them, and the brightness of God shone round about them; and they feared with a great fear. And the angel said to them: ‘Fear not; for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, that shall be to all the people! For, this day, is born to you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord, in the city of David! And this shall be a sign unto you. You shall find the infant wrapped in swaddling clothes, and laid in a manger.’ And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly army, praising God, and saying: ‘Glory to God in the highest; and on Earth peace to men of good will.’ And it came to pass, after the angels departed from them into Heaven, the shepherds said one to another: ‘Let us go over to Bethlehem, and let us see this word that is come to pass, which the Lord hath showed to us!’ And they came with haste; and they found Mary and Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger. And seeing, they understood of the word that had been spoken to them concerning this child. And all that heard, wondered; and at those things that were told them by the shepherds. But Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart” (Luke 2:6-19).
The Heart in the Temple
The second time that Our Lady’s Heart is mentioned is on the occasion of what we call “The Finding in the Temple”, where Mary and Joseph find Jesus once again, after having lost Him for three days. St. Luke is again the reporter:
“And when Jesus was twelve years old, they going up into Jerusalem, according to the custom of the feast, and having fulfilled the days, when they returned, the Child Jesus remained in Jerusalem; and His parents knew it not. And thinking that He was in the company, they came a day’s journey, and sought Him among their kinsfolk and acquaintance. And not finding Him, they returned into Jerusalem, seeking Him. And it came to pass, that, after three days, they found Him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, hearing them, and asking them questions. And all that heard Him were astonished at His wisdom and His answers. And seeing Him, they wondered. And His mother said to Him: ‘Son, why hast Thou done so to us? Behold Thy father and I have sought Thee sorrowing. And He said to them: ‘How is it that you sought Me? Did you not know, that I must be about My Father’s business?’ And they understood not the word that He spoke unto them. And He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them. And His mother kept all these words in her heart” (Luke 2:42-51).
Here, we see more than a passing thing—St. Luke says that “Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart.” This short phrase gives a long list of consequences. First of all, it obviously means that Mary kept these words in something else than her physical Heart—indicating that the word “heart” stands for more than just a physical heart. Scripture is full of similar references to the heart—in fact there are thousands of them, we will look at some to get a clear notion of what is meant by the word “heart”:
Qualities of Heart
PHYSICAL STRENGTH: “And I will set a morsel of bread, and strengthen ye your heart” (Genesis 18:5).
THOUGHTS AND WORDS: “And my heart thought with myself” (2 Esdras 5:7). “But Aman thinking in his heart” (Esther 6:6). “Anna spoke in her heart” (1 Kings 1:13).”Say not in thy heart...” (Deuteronomy 9:4). “Abraham fell upon his face, and laughed, saying in his heart...” (Genesis 17:17). “He hath opened his heart to me” (Judges 16:18). “My heart hath uttered a good word” (Psalm 44:2). “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Matthew 12:34).
VIRTUOUS LIVING: “The Lord hath sought him, a man according to His own heart” (1 Kings 13:14). “My words are from my upright heart, and my lips shall speak a pure sentence” (Job 33:3). “My help from the Lord: who saveth the upright of heart” (Psalm 7:11).
THE WILL BEHIND ACTION: “Strengthen the resolution in my heart” (Judith 9:18).
GOOD ACTIONS: “And I will raise me up a faithful priest, who shall do according to My heart” (1 Kings 2:35). “God said to him: And I know that thou didst it with a sincere heart” (Genesis 20:6).
EVIL THOUGHTS, DESIRES AND ACTIONS: “For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:21). “God seeing that the wickedness of men was great on the Earth, and that all the thought of their heart was bent upon evil, at all times” (Genesis 6:5). “For from the heart come forth evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false testimonies, blasphemies” (Matthew 15:19). “The imagination and thought of man’s heart are prone to evil from his youth” (Genesis 8:21). “And the heart of Holofernes was smitten, for he was burning with the desire of her” (Judith 12:16). “Whosoever shall look on a woman to lust after her, hath already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28). “I know thy pride, and the wickedness of thy heart” (1 Kings 17:28).
MEMORY: “Teach the children of Israel: that they may know it by heart” (Deuteronomy 31:19). “And His mother kept all these words in her heart” (Luke 2:51).
EMOTION: “His heart was moved upon his brother, and tears gushed out: and going into his chamber he wept” (Genesis 43:30). “Anna had her heart full of grief, she prayed to the Lord, shedding many tears” (1 Kings 1:10).
LOVE AND HATRED: “My heart loveth” (Judges 5:9). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart... Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself” (Matthew 22:37-38). “Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thy heart, but reprove him openly” (Leviticus 19:17). “Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he did not let the people go” (Exodus 9:7).
UNDERSTANDING AND IGNORANCE: “For they understood not concerning the loaves; for their heart was blinded” (Mark 6:52). “Do you not yet know nor understand? Have you still your heart blinded?” (Mark 8:17).
HUMILITY AND PRIDE: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart” (Matthew 11:29). “He hath scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart” (Luke 1:51). “That his heart be not lifted up with pride over his brethren” (Deuteronomy 17:20).
COURAGE AND FEAR: “The most valiant man whose heart is as the heart of a lion” (2 Kings 17:10). “Hear, O Israel, you join battle this day against your enemies, let not your heart be dismayed, be not afraid” (Deuteronomy 20:3). “We were affrighted, and our heart fainted away” (Josue 2:11). “The heart of the people was struck with fear, and melted like water” (Josue7:5). “...the fearfulness of thy heart, wherewith thou shalt be terrified” (Deuteronomy 28:67).
FAITHFULNESS AND INFIDELITY: “Beware lest perhaps your heart be deceived, and you depart from the Lord, and serve strange gods, and adore them” (Deuteronomy 11:16).
REPENTANCE AND SORROW: “If they do penance in their heart” (3 Kings 8:47).”Thou shalt be touched with repentance of thy heart” (Deuteronomy 30:1). “...and return to the Lord thy God with all thy heart” (Deuteronomy 30:10). “He hath sent Me to heal the contrite of heart” (Luke 4:18).
There are many, many more references that could be given, but these should be enough to show that the word “heart” goes much further than merely meaning the physical heart of a person.
Jesus Wishes To…
At Fatima, Our Lady clearly expressed the will of God when she said: “Jesus wants to use you to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it; these souls will be dear to God, like flowers put by me to adorn His throne.” (Our Lady of Fatima, June 13th, 1917).
But I’ve No Time!
Jesus wishes to, but do we wish to? Devotion sounds too much like hard work, especially if have other objects of devotion which are taking up a lot (or too much) of our time. Those other objects, however, cannot promise what Our Lady promises—“I promise salvation to whoever embraces it!” Devotion, by its very nature, demands much time and effort. It requires perseverance, for we may not be ‘feeling’ devoted at times, and the true steel and mettle of our devotion will be tested on those occasions. Living in the fast-food, fast-track, fast-service, fast-lane of today’s world, we shrink back from committing ourselves to things that take too much time or too much effort. We would prefer our devotion, and our spiritual life as a whole, to come in little ‘off-the-shelf’ packets, which we can quickly open, add water and stir for a quick ready-made meal—no washing, peeling, chopping, slicing, seasoning, cooking, and all the dirty utensils, pots and pans that go with it! Just open, add water, stir and eat! Spirituality off the shelf!
Second-Rate Offering
We dish-out to Heaven what we would not dream of dishing-out to guests whom we like! We spend more time preparing things for them, than we do for Our Lady. Such an ‘out-of-the-freezer-into-the-microwave-and-onto-the-plate’ spirituality might not get us to Heaven, and it is certainly not healthy for our spiritual life!
This is exactly what Cain tried to serve up in his sacrifice to God and God was not pleased with Cain’s sacrifice. It really was a sacrifice, but not an acceptable or palatable one to God. However, Abel gave his best and that sacrifice was pleasing to God.
Pedal Like Crazy!
Can you imagine a cyclist in a bike race! He has put in a mammoth effort all day long and is way ahead of everyone else in the race—or so he thinks! Alas, unbeknown to him, he has taken a wrong turn and is pedaling like crazy down the wrong road! Will he win the race? No way! But, but, but... But what about all the effort he has put into it!?!? Yep! A lot of effort—but down the wrong road, going in the wrong direction!
Where Do You Want Your Reward?
That is a little like us in our life here below. Many put much effort into many things, but rarely the right thing! They have sacrificed much time and money, effort and energy—but they have been pedaling down the wrong road, while thinking it was the right road! They are very devoted people. Paragons of industry. Yet the only reward they get will be short-lived, because their reward will be obtained in this world, which will one day end—sooner than they think—or the world will end for them upon their death. They are devoted, sure they are, but they are devoted to the wrong things—more often than not, worldly things and values. As Holy Scripture says: “Labor not to be rich” (Proverbs 23:4). “Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting” (John 6:27).
Our Lord said something similar of the Pharisees: “Take heed that you do not your justice before men, to be seen by them: otherwise you shall not have a reward of your Father Who is in Heaven. Therefore when thou dost an almsdeed, sound not a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be honored by men. Amen I say to you, they have received their reward. But when thou dost alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doth. That thy alms may be in secret, and thy Father Who seeth in secret will repay thee. And when ye pray, you shall not be as the hypocrites, that love to stand and pray in the synagogues and corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men: Amen I say to you, they have received their reward” (Matthew 6:1-5).
Where Do You Carry Your Devotion?
Some people are careful to show devotion in public, but, sadly, it is “just for show”! For when they are in private, when they are alone and nobody is there to notice them, their devotion takes a remarkable dip. There are many who show devotion to Our Lady, who, in reality, seek to impress others. Yet, while it seems as though they have a devotion to Our Lady, it is a mere lip service—a lip service that does not come from the heart, but the lips alone.
This kind of devotion is condemned by Our Lord, when He says: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8), which is nothing new and not just confined to our time, or the New Testament. It was also true of fake devotees in the Old Testament, which made God angrily say through His prophet, Isaias: “And the Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me, and they have feared Me with the commandment and doctrines of men” (Isaias 29:13). Our Lord merely repeats what His Father said through Isaias—and the same must be said today.
You Either Have It, Or You Don’t
There is an axiom of Philosophy that states: “You cannot give what you have not got!” If we do not have real devotion in our hearts, then we cannot show devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, which is what Heaven demands of us today. If I do not have a bike, I cannot enter a bike race—never mind thinking about winning it! If I cannot speak French or Spanish, then it is pointless trying to apply for a job as French or Spanish interpreter! It is pointless trying to bake a cake or bread, if I do not have an oven or fire.
By the same token, we could coin a phrase similar to the above one, which says: “There is no point acquiring devotion if I imagine that I already possess it!” In other words, I am not going to put the kettle on the stove if I have just done it several seconds ago! I am not going to take a shower if I have just finished taking one. I am not going to have dinner if I just finished it a minute ago. Here, the devil’s ploy is to make us mistakenly imagine that the feelings we have in our heart and the actions that we customarily perform are already proofs of devotion. It is like trying pass of counterfeit money for the real thing. The devil tells us: “You already have a devotion! What’s the point of trying to acquire one? It’s a waste of time!”
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this in his book, True Devotion to Mary, in relation to true and false devotees. He also speaks of those who are against being devoted to Our Lady. These two types—false devotees and anti-devotionalists—can be said to be the two chief dangers that we have to overcome if we are to fulfill God’s demands for a devotion to the Immaculate Heart. The false devotee is a danger that we all face within ourselves. The anti-devotionalist is a danger we face in either our family, relatives, friends, parishes, work places and in the world at large as a whole. Here is what St. Louis says of ‘anti-devotionalists’, of which there are plenty in the atmosphere around us—like imperceptible particles of dust that we inadvertently breathe in—and these are not just non-Catholics, but many within the fold of the Church.
Recognize the Duds and Throw Them Away
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this in his book, True Devotion to Mary, in relation to true and false devotees. “It is very important to recognize, first of all, false devotions to our Blessed Lady, in order to avoid them … I find seven kinds of false devotees and false devotions to Our Lady, namely: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the interested devotees.
Make Sure Your Car Works
Our devotion could be likened to a car—it is what will take us Heaven if it is in good working order. If it’s not, then it won’t! Most cars don’t make it! Our Lord said, speaking of the road they drive along: “Go ye not into the way of the Gentiles” (Matthew 10:5). “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Like a befuddled cyclist in a bike race, pedaling like crazy, who is ahead of the pack and thinks he is winning, but does not realize that he is on the wrong road, so too is most of the world on the wrong road—they have taken a path that they THINK will lead them to Heaven, they have a devotion that they THINK will lead to Heaven, but perhaps they (and perhaps we too) need to THINK AGAIN!
What’s Your Car Like?
Let us make sure we have the RIGHT CAR for the race, for as St. Paul says so truly—echoing Our Lord’s words about “few there are that find it” — “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain” (1 Corinthians 9:24). Or as St. Matthew says, quoting Our Lord’s own words: “For many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 24:14).
Can you imagine the depth and detail of inspection a racing-car goes through before it is taken out for the race! Likewise we should examine what we call our devotion to Our Lady, with the same depth and detail, and put right what may need repairing and fine-tune what looks to be a little off! We will quote the words of Fr. Faber, from his Preface in his personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary original French version into English:
Fiery Faber
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one. Here in England, Mary is not half enough preached. Devotion to her is low and thin and poor. It is frightened out of its wits by the sneers of heresy. It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that Protestants may feel at ease about her. Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy. It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be. It has no faith in itself. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized.
Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background. Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them. It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines. Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother. I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable [St. Louis] Grignion de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the Kingdom of Christ.” (Fr. Frederick Faber, Preface, True Devotion to Mary).
Love God with Whole Heart, Mind, Soul and Strength
‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). That is true devotion in a nutshell—whole soul, whole heart, whole mind, whole strength. We even admit that on a natural level. We will say of an outstanding worker or an outstanding athlete, that they put their whole soul, heart, mind and strength into the work/race/game. Let us not try water it down and give a second-rate love or devotion! In this way, devotion is not hard to understand—it means: everything, all, total, nothing held back. It is something “outstanding”, something “out of the ordinary”, something “above the ordinary”, something “extraordinary.”
Yet, an outstanding worker or athlete, an extraordinary musician or artist, did not start out being something outstanding or extraordinary—they worked their way up to that level. The same applies to us in our pursuit of true spiritual devotion. Nobody is made that way, they have to acquire it—and everyone CAN acquire it, if they really wish and try.
You Fanatic!
To those who love themselves, such an attitude will be denigrated as fanatical, ‘over-the-top’, extreme, or some other similar epithet. Yet this is exactly what God is! If God is perfection itself, then He is extreme—for perfection is something extremely good. We call people “fanatics” who blow themselves up, or burn themselves to death, for some earthly cause. “Christ also loved the Church, and delivered Himself up for it” (Ephesians 5:25). He could have saved us with one drop of His Precious Blood—the Circumcision would have been more than enough. Yet He was ‘fanatical’ about proving His love for us, and even called Peter “Satan” for trying to prevent Him from proving that love through His Passion and Crucifixion: “Who turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me: because thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:23).
Want to be a Fantastic Fanatic?
The word “fanatic” can be traced back, first to a mid-16th century French adjective, fanatique, which in turn owes its origins to the Latin, fanaticus, meaning “of a temple, inspired by a god,” which itself is based on the Latin word fanum, meaning “temple.” The adjective originally described behavior or speech that might result from possession by a god or demon—behavior or speech that we describe as “fantastic.” St. Paul says that we ought to be temples of the Holy Ghost—hence temples possessed by God, hence fantastic and fanatical in a good sense. “Know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you, whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 6:19). Sr. Lucia of Fatima echoes this: “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that … starting with the present time, we belong either to God, or we belong to the demon; there is no middle ground.” (Sr. Lucia, in 1957 to Fr. Augustine Fuentes). Which brings us back to Our Lord’s words to Sr. Josefa: “All I need is to possess your will, for this I cannot find a substitute.”
Many Fanatics Exist Today—But in the Wrong Way
In modern English, we have the word “fan” in the sense of a follower of some person, team or subject. The word “fan” is actually a shortening or abbreviation of the word “fanatic” — and each sport certainly has its fair share of “fanatical fans.” They are usually those who follow the team everywhere, not sparing a thought for time, effort or expense. They support their team through ‘thick-and-thin’, taking the ‘rough with the smooth’, not being turned-off or put-off by lack of success—in short, they are not what we call “fair-weather fans.” The same is true of the Faith—there are the “fair-weather Catholics” who like smooth sailing, calm waters, cloudless sunny skies, warm fuzzy temperatures and no crosses. Then there are the “‘blood-and-guts’ Catholics” who don’t care whether the weather is calm or stormy, or if it’s sunny or bleak, hot or cold—they are not put-off or discouraged by the ever-changing fortunes of life, and sail on resolutely despite all the adversity and all the crosses. These are the devoted ones—or, if you like, the fanatical ones. It is not hard to guess which ones Heaven prefers!
God Demands Devotion
We can very easily make mini-gods of the things that surround us—for our passions are always chomping-at-the-bit for something to expend their force upon. If our Faith—with the aid of supernatural grace, which in turn strengthens the will and intellect of our soul—does not control and tame these passions, then those mini-gods will take root and sprout and, before we know it, grow into trees that are nigh impossible to uproot!
This makes God angry: “Adore not any strange god. The Lord—His name is Jealous—He is a jealous God” (Exodus 34:14). “The Lord thy God is a consuming fire, a jealous God” (Deuteronomy 4:24). “I am the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt not have strange gods in my sight. Thou shalt not adore them, and thou shalt not serve them. For I am the Lord thy God, a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon their children unto the third and fourth generation, to them that hate Me, And showing mercy unto many thousands, to them that love Me, and keep My commandments” (Deuteronomy 5:6-10).
Perfect to an Extreme
God, being absolutely perfect, is extremely perfect—He is extreme in everything: extreme in mercy, yet extreme in justice; extreme in patience, yet extreme in anger; extreme in kindness, yet extreme in punishment (what can be more extreme than Hell? Or Heaven, too, for that matter!). This is something that we find hard to grasp completely. For us it is a case of either/or: we are either merciful or just; patient or impatiently angry; kind or not kind. That is because we are imperfect—imperfect in our understanding and imperfect in our actions. For us, the idea of being called an “extremist” or a “fanatic” is troublesome and we seek to avoid such labels. Yet, there again, we have a poor understanding of the meaning of the word, and we use it or take it badly. Originally, the word “fanatic” came from the Latin root-word “fanum”, which means, a sanctuary, shrine or temple, and the derivative word, “fanaticus”, means inspired; enthusiastic , frenzied. In the good sense, “fanatic” means something akin to holy, sacred, enthusiastic, highly fervent, inspired by God—which is along the lines of what “devotion” is, or should be.
Only Extreme Efforts Obtain Heaven
In a certain sense, we have to be ‘fanatical’ (in the good sense of the word) to be able to get to Heaven. Our Lord said to us: “Be you therefore perfect as you heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). That’s a bit extreme, isn’t it? But we have to be extreme to get to Heaven. “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). Violence is an extreme measure. If we are not extreme in this world, then those extremes will have to be reached in the extremely painful fires of Purgatory, where, as any saint or good Catholic book will tell you, souls suffer extremely, until they reach the extreme perfection required to enter Heaven. “There shall not enter into it anything defiled” (Apocalypse 21:27). “Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence, till thou repay the last farthing” (Matthew 5:26). Some writers, such as St. Thomas Aquinas, say that the fires of Purgatory are the same fires as those of Hell—now how’s that for extreme! Could we say ‘fanatical’?
The Extreme Attitude of God
God does not do things by halves. He can be extremely kind and loving, or extremely angry and vengeful. It all depends upon whether or not we are for Him or against Him; whether we obey Him or disobey Him. As we sow, so shall we reap. There is a passage that perfectly manifests these two extremes in God.
Extreme Rewards—Extreme Punishments
Towards the end of the Book of Leviticus, God lists His extreme rewards and extreme punishments. As Scripture says elsewhere—He rewards the good and punishes the evil. “I am the Lord your God: If you walk in My precepts, and keep My commandments, and do them, I will give you rain in due seasons. And the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit. The threshing of your harvest shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land without fear.
“I will give peace in your coasts: you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid. I will take away evil beasts: and the sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. Five of yours shall pursue a hundred others, and a hundred of you ten thousand: your enemies shall fall before you by the sword.
“I will look on you, and make you increase: you shall be multiplied, and I will establish My covenant with you. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people. I am the Lord your God: who have brought you out of the land of the Egyptians, that you should not serve them, and I have broken the chains on your necks, that you might go upright.” (Leviticus 26:1-13). Who wouldn’t want this? No shortage of food! Perfect seasons of the year! Peace in the land, with no threats from anywhere! If enemies arise, a guarantee of God’s help and protection—even if we are outnumbered! Guarantee of victory over all enemies! At peace with God! Wow! Extreme kindness!
But… Brace Yourself!
“But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws, and contemn My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, and to make void My covenant: I also will do these things to you: I will quickly visit you with poverty, and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes, and consume your lives. You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies. I will set My face against you, and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you, you shall flee when no man pursueth you.
“But if you will not yet for all this obey Me: I will chastise you seven times more for your sins, and I will break the pride of your stubbornness, and I will make to you the Heaven above as iron, and the Earth as brass: your labor shall be spent in vain, the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit. If you walk contrary to Me, and will not hearken to Me, I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins: and I will send in upon you the beasts of the field, to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number, and that your highways may be desolate.
“And if even so you will not amend, but will walk contrary to Me: I also will walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins. And I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge My covenant. And when you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies, after I shall have broken the staff of your bread: so that ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and give it out by weight: and you shall eat, and shall not be filled.
“But if you will not for all this hearken to Me, but will walk against Me: I will also go against you with opposite fury, and I will chastise you with seven plagues for your sins, so that you shall eat the flesh of your sons and of your daughters. I will destroy your high places, and break your idols. You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you. And I will destroy your land, and your enemies shall be astonished at it, when they shall be the inhabitants thereof. And I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed.
“And as to them that shall remain of you I will send fear in their hearts in the countries of their enemies, the sound of a flying leaf shall terrify them, and they shall flee as it were from the sword: they shall fall, when no man pursueth them, And they shall every one fall upon their brethren as fleeing from wars, none of you shall dare to resist your enemies. You shall perish among the Gentiles, and an enemy’s land shall consume you. And if of them also some remain, they shall pine away in their iniquities, in the land of their enemies, and they shall be afflicted for the sins of their fathers, and their own: until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, whereby they have transgressed me, and walked contrary unto Me.
“Therefore I also will bring them into their enemies’ land: then shall they pray for their sins. And I will remember My covenant, that I made with Jacob, and Isaac, and Abraham. But they shall pray for their sins, because they rejected My judgments, and despised My laws. And yet, for all that, when they were in the land of their enemies, I did not cast them off altogether, neither did I so despise them that they should be quite consumed, and I should make void My covenant with them. For I am the Lord their God. And I will remember My former covenant, when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, in the sight of the Gentiles, to be their God. I am the Lord. These are the judgments, and precepts, and laws, which the Lord gave between Him and the children of Israel in Mount Sinai by the hand of Moses” (Leviticus 26:14-45).
Our Lady’s messages at her modern day apparitions are along the same lines―do what I tell you and there will be peace; refuse to do what I tell you and you will be chastised with the whole world! It is time that we stopped giving Our Lady and Heaven a “half-baked” devotion and start going to extremes in our devotion. We go to extremes for the people that we love―do you love Our Lady? Prove it. Go to extremes. Prove it with an extremely fervent devotion instead of the customary “half-baked” devotion. If we are “fans” of Our Lady, then let our devotion be “fanatical” as stated and explained earlier in this article. The word “fan” is actually a shortening or abbreviation of the word “fanatic.” True love is always fanatical―how else would you describe the command: “Love God with your whole mind, your whole heart, your whole soul and your whole strength!” That is a command to love fanatically. That is also how we must love, not only God, but also Our Lady―especially under her title of “Immaculate Heart”―for that is the will of God and Christ for our present age.
Today we celebrate the feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary! It was at Fatima that Our Lady twice requested that we be devoted to her Immaculate Heart: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it!” (Our Lady of Fatima, June 13th, 1917) … “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” (Our Lady of Fatima, July 13th, 1917).
God intends or desires the same fate for each and every one of us―salvation―and we could all attain to that heavenly glory, being assumed into Heaven to be ever happy in the glory of God—if we would only cooperate with the will of God, if we would only bend our will to the will of God, instead of trying to bend God’s will to our will. Nobody is meant to go to Purgatory, and, even more so, nobody is meant to go to Hell. God has intended Heaven to be destination of every soul that has ever been created. God does not create souls with the express desire of sending them to Purgatory or Hell—nobody is predestined for Purgatory or Hell. Yet to reach God’s intended destination for us—Heaven—we have to cooperate with God’s grace and do what He wants to be done.
Additionally, we have these chiding words of Our Lady of Good Success: “O, if only human beings and religious knew what Heaven is and what it is to possess God, how differently they would live, sparing no sacrifice in order to enter more fully into possession of it! But some let themselves be dazzled by the false glamour of honors and human greatness, while others are blinded by self-love, not realizing that they are falling into lukewarmness, that immense evil which destroys their fervor!”
What is Devotion?
Salvation in exchange for being devoted to the Immaculate Heart of Mary! That is a spiritual bargain! But what exactly is devotion? Everyone has their own personal idea of what devotion is―as St. Francis de Sales says in his book, Introduction to the Devout Life. He states: “Small mistakes made at the beginning of any project grow infinitely great as it progresses, and in the end are almost impossible to correct. Hence you should know, before everything else, what is the virtue of devotion.
“There is only one true devotion while there is a very large number of false and meaningless ones. So if you cannot recognize true devotion, you could be deceived and waste time in following some devotion that is irrelevant and irrational. Each person represents devotion according to his liking and imagination. He who is in the habit of fasting will think that because he fasts he is very devout―even though his heart is filled with hatred. Another person will not take a sip of wine, or even of water, anxious about sobriety―but he has no scruples to sip the blood of his neighbor by speaking ill or by false statements. Another considers himself devout because of the very great number of prayers he recites every day―even though soon after this he speaks words that are annoying, full of pride and hurtful to those in his house and to his neighbors. Another very gladly opens his purse to give alms to the poor―but cannot take any gentleness from his heart to forgive his enemies. Yet another will forgive his enemies―but will not pay what he owes, unless he is legally forced to do so. All such persons are generally looked upon as devout whereas in fact they are not.
“When Saul’s soldiers came looking for David in his house, Michal placed a statue on a bed and covered it with David’s clothes and so made them believe that it was David himself asleep due to illness (1 Kings 19:11-16). In the same way, many people cover themselves with various external actions related to holy devotion. The world takes them for people who are truly devout and spiritual, whereas in reality they are nothing more than statues and illusions of devotion.
“Devotion that is true and living presupposes the love of God, rather it is nothing else than a true love of God. It is not, however, love as such. In so far as divine love enriches us―it is called grace, which makes us pleasing to God. In so far as it gives us the strength to do good―it is called charity. But when it grows to such a degree of perfection that it makes us not only to do good, but rather moves us to do it carefully, frequently and promptly―it is called devotion.
“Ostriches never fly, hens fly only awkwardly, quite low and rarely; but eagles, doves and swallows fly often, swiftly and very high. In the same way, sinners do not fly towards God, but rather all their movements are on the Earth and for the things of the Earth. People who are good, but have not yet progressed to devotion, fly towards God by their good deeds but rarely, slowly and with difficulty. Persons who are devout fly to God frequently, promptly and freely. In short, devotion is nothing else than a spiritual agility and liveliness, by means of which charity realizes its actions in us, or we do so by charity, promptly and lovingly.
“Just as it is the work of charity to make us keep all the commandments of God in general and without any exception, so it is the work of devotion to make us do so promptly and earnestly. Therefore, whoever does not keep all of God’s commandments cannot be considered either good or devout, because to be good one must have charity. To be devout one must, not only have charity, but a great liveliness and promptness in doing charitable actions. Since devotion is to be found at a certain level of charity that is extraordinary―it makes us prompt, active and earnest in keeping all of God’s commandments. But, more than this, it rouses us to do as many good works as we can, promptly and lovingly, even though they are in no way commanded, but rather only counseled or inspired.
“A man, who has recently recovered from some illness, walks only as much as he needs to, but slowly and with difficulty. So also, a sinner, healed of his sinfulness, moves ahead only to the extent that God commands him, and too slowly and with difficulty―until he acquires devotion. After that, like a man in good health he not only walks, but runs joyfully in the way of God’s commandments (Psalm 118:32). Even more, he moves ahead and runs in the paths of God’s counsels and inspirations.
“In conclusion, charity and devotion are not more different from each other than the flame from the fire―all the more so, because charity is a spiritual fire which, when it burns with intense flames, is called devotion. In fact, devotion adds to the fire of charity only the flame which makes charity prompt, active and diligent―not only to keep God’s commandments, but also to put into practice His counsels and inspirations.” (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Chapter 1).
Are we ostriches, chicken or eagles? Does our devotion never get off the ground? Or gets off the ground rarely and not very high? Or is our devotion reaching the heights?
More Than a Heart
If we are going to practice devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, then we had better get a clear idea on what that Heart is all about! The amount of help and grace we get could well depend upon it—much like someone trying to grow vegetables or fruits in the garden—the more you know about your subject, the better results you will get.
Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary is nothing other than a special form of devotion to person of Mary. The above Scriptural quotes partially show the breadth of meaning in the word “heart.” This is also true of devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, whereby we adore, not only the Heart of Jesus, but the whole Person that the Heart represents. Both elements—the Heart and the Person—must be present if the devotion is to be true. Honor is directed to the physical heart itself. However, this in itself is not sufficient; we must also see in this devotion, all that the human heart of Mary suggests, all of which it is the expressive symbol and the living reminder: namely, Mary’s interior life, her joys and sorrows, her virtues and hidden perfections, and, above all, her virginal love for her God, her maternal love for her Divine Son, and her motherly and compassionate love for her sinful and miserable children here below.
However, the Heart of Mary must not be ignored. A mere consideration of Mary’s interior life and the beauties of her soul, without any thought of her physical heart, does not constitute devotion to her Immaculate Heart; still less does devotion to her Immaculate Heart consist in the consideration of the Heart of Mary merely as a part of her virginal body. The two elements of (1) paying attention to her physical heart, and (2) paying attention to all the things that her Immaculate Heart represents, are both essential to the devotion, just as soul and body are necessary to the constitution of man.
Why the Heart?
We all know something about devotion to the Immaculate Heart—but why the heart in particular? In the case of Our Lord, there is, of course, the Sacred Heart—but we also have devotions to the Sacred Head; the Holy Face; the Five Wounds; the Precious Blood; the Infant Jesus; etc. Why then are we expected to honor Our Lady’s Heart in particular, instead of, let’s say, her head, her hand, her foot, etc.? Who on earth came up with the idea of the Immaculate Heart? The first mention of Mary’s Heart comes in the Scriptural account of the visitation of the shepherds to the cave of the Nativity:
“And it came to pass, that when they were there, her days were accomplished, that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped Him up in swaddling clothes, and laid Him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn. And there were in the same country shepherds watching, and keeping the night watches over their flock. And behold an angel of the Lord stood by them, and the brightness of God shone round about them; and they feared with a great fear. And the angel said to them: ‘Fear not; for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, that shall be to all the people! For, this day, is born to you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord, in the city of David! And this shall be a sign unto you. You shall find the infant wrapped in swaddling clothes, and laid in a manger.’ And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly army, praising God, and saying: ‘Glory to God in the highest; and on Earth peace to men of good will.’ And it came to pass, after the angels departed from them into Heaven, the shepherds said one to another: ‘Let us go over to Bethlehem, and let us see this word that is come to pass, which the Lord hath showed to us!’ And they came with haste; and they found Mary and Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger. And seeing, they understood of the word that had been spoken to them concerning this child. And all that heard, wondered; and at those things that were told them by the shepherds. But Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart” (Luke 2:6-19).
The Heart in the Temple
The second time that Our Lady’s Heart is mentioned is on the occasion of what we call “The Finding in the Temple”, where Mary and Joseph find Jesus once again, after having lost Him for three days. St. Luke is again the reporter:
“And when Jesus was twelve years old, they going up into Jerusalem, according to the custom of the feast, and having fulfilled the days, when they returned, the Child Jesus remained in Jerusalem; and His parents knew it not. And thinking that He was in the company, they came a day’s journey, and sought Him among their kinsfolk and acquaintance. And not finding Him, they returned into Jerusalem, seeking Him. And it came to pass, that, after three days, they found Him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, hearing them, and asking them questions. And all that heard Him were astonished at His wisdom and His answers. And seeing Him, they wondered. And His mother said to Him: ‘Son, why hast Thou done so to us? Behold Thy father and I have sought Thee sorrowing. And He said to them: ‘How is it that you sought Me? Did you not know, that I must be about My Father’s business?’ And they understood not the word that He spoke unto them. And He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them. And His mother kept all these words in her heart” (Luke 2:42-51).
Here, we see more than a passing thing—St. Luke says that “Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart.” This short phrase gives a long list of consequences. First of all, it obviously means that Mary kept these words in something else than her physical Heart—indicating that the word “heart” stands for more than just a physical heart. Scripture is full of similar references to the heart—in fact there are thousands of them, we will look at some to get a clear notion of what is meant by the word “heart”:
Qualities of Heart
PHYSICAL STRENGTH: “And I will set a morsel of bread, and strengthen ye your heart” (Genesis 18:5).
THOUGHTS AND WORDS: “And my heart thought with myself” (2 Esdras 5:7). “But Aman thinking in his heart” (Esther 6:6). “Anna spoke in her heart” (1 Kings 1:13).”Say not in thy heart...” (Deuteronomy 9:4). “Abraham fell upon his face, and laughed, saying in his heart...” (Genesis 17:17). “He hath opened his heart to me” (Judges 16:18). “My heart hath uttered a good word” (Psalm 44:2). “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Matthew 12:34).
VIRTUOUS LIVING: “The Lord hath sought him, a man according to His own heart” (1 Kings 13:14). “My words are from my upright heart, and my lips shall speak a pure sentence” (Job 33:3). “My help from the Lord: who saveth the upright of heart” (Psalm 7:11).
THE WILL BEHIND ACTION: “Strengthen the resolution in my heart” (Judith 9:18).
GOOD ACTIONS: “And I will raise me up a faithful priest, who shall do according to My heart” (1 Kings 2:35). “God said to him: And I know that thou didst it with a sincere heart” (Genesis 20:6).
EVIL THOUGHTS, DESIRES AND ACTIONS: “For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:21). “God seeing that the wickedness of men was great on the Earth, and that all the thought of their heart was bent upon evil, at all times” (Genesis 6:5). “For from the heart come forth evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false testimonies, blasphemies” (Matthew 15:19). “The imagination and thought of man’s heart are prone to evil from his youth” (Genesis 8:21). “And the heart of Holofernes was smitten, for he was burning with the desire of her” (Judith 12:16). “Whosoever shall look on a woman to lust after her, hath already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28). “I know thy pride, and the wickedness of thy heart” (1 Kings 17:28).
MEMORY: “Teach the children of Israel: that they may know it by heart” (Deuteronomy 31:19). “And His mother kept all these words in her heart” (Luke 2:51).
EMOTION: “His heart was moved upon his brother, and tears gushed out: and going into his chamber he wept” (Genesis 43:30). “Anna had her heart full of grief, she prayed to the Lord, shedding many tears” (1 Kings 1:10).
LOVE AND HATRED: “My heart loveth” (Judges 5:9). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart... Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself” (Matthew 22:37-38). “Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thy heart, but reprove him openly” (Leviticus 19:17). “Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he did not let the people go” (Exodus 9:7).
UNDERSTANDING AND IGNORANCE: “For they understood not concerning the loaves; for their heart was blinded” (Mark 6:52). “Do you not yet know nor understand? Have you still your heart blinded?” (Mark 8:17).
HUMILITY AND PRIDE: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart” (Matthew 11:29). “He hath scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart” (Luke 1:51). “That his heart be not lifted up with pride over his brethren” (Deuteronomy 17:20).
COURAGE AND FEAR: “The most valiant man whose heart is as the heart of a lion” (2 Kings 17:10). “Hear, O Israel, you join battle this day against your enemies, let not your heart be dismayed, be not afraid” (Deuteronomy 20:3). “We were affrighted, and our heart fainted away” (Josue 2:11). “The heart of the people was struck with fear, and melted like water” (Josue7:5). “...the fearfulness of thy heart, wherewith thou shalt be terrified” (Deuteronomy 28:67).
FAITHFULNESS AND INFIDELITY: “Beware lest perhaps your heart be deceived, and you depart from the Lord, and serve strange gods, and adore them” (Deuteronomy 11:16).
REPENTANCE AND SORROW: “If they do penance in their heart” (3 Kings 8:47).”Thou shalt be touched with repentance of thy heart” (Deuteronomy 30:1). “...and return to the Lord thy God with all thy heart” (Deuteronomy 30:10). “He hath sent Me to heal the contrite of heart” (Luke 4:18).
There are many, many more references that could be given, but these should be enough to show that the word “heart” goes much further than merely meaning the physical heart of a person.
Jesus Wishes To…
At Fatima, Our Lady clearly expressed the will of God when she said: “Jesus wants to use you to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it; these souls will be dear to God, like flowers put by me to adorn His throne.” (Our Lady of Fatima, June 13th, 1917).
But I’ve No Time!
Jesus wishes to, but do we wish to? Devotion sounds too much like hard work, especially if have other objects of devotion which are taking up a lot (or too much) of our time. Those other objects, however, cannot promise what Our Lady promises—“I promise salvation to whoever embraces it!” Devotion, by its very nature, demands much time and effort. It requires perseverance, for we may not be ‘feeling’ devoted at times, and the true steel and mettle of our devotion will be tested on those occasions. Living in the fast-food, fast-track, fast-service, fast-lane of today’s world, we shrink back from committing ourselves to things that take too much time or too much effort. We would prefer our devotion, and our spiritual life as a whole, to come in little ‘off-the-shelf’ packets, which we can quickly open, add water and stir for a quick ready-made meal—no washing, peeling, chopping, slicing, seasoning, cooking, and all the dirty utensils, pots and pans that go with it! Just open, add water, stir and eat! Spirituality off the shelf!
Second-Rate Offering
We dish-out to Heaven what we would not dream of dishing-out to guests whom we like! We spend more time preparing things for them, than we do for Our Lady. Such an ‘out-of-the-freezer-into-the-microwave-and-onto-the-plate’ spirituality might not get us to Heaven, and it is certainly not healthy for our spiritual life!
This is exactly what Cain tried to serve up in his sacrifice to God and God was not pleased with Cain’s sacrifice. It really was a sacrifice, but not an acceptable or palatable one to God. However, Abel gave his best and that sacrifice was pleasing to God.
Pedal Like Crazy!
Can you imagine a cyclist in a bike race! He has put in a mammoth effort all day long and is way ahead of everyone else in the race—or so he thinks! Alas, unbeknown to him, he has taken a wrong turn and is pedaling like crazy down the wrong road! Will he win the race? No way! But, but, but... But what about all the effort he has put into it!?!? Yep! A lot of effort—but down the wrong road, going in the wrong direction!
Where Do You Want Your Reward?
That is a little like us in our life here below. Many put much effort into many things, but rarely the right thing! They have sacrificed much time and money, effort and energy—but they have been pedaling down the wrong road, while thinking it was the right road! They are very devoted people. Paragons of industry. Yet the only reward they get will be short-lived, because their reward will be obtained in this world, which will one day end—sooner than they think—or the world will end for them upon their death. They are devoted, sure they are, but they are devoted to the wrong things—more often than not, worldly things and values. As Holy Scripture says: “Labor not to be rich” (Proverbs 23:4). “Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting” (John 6:27).
Our Lord said something similar of the Pharisees: “Take heed that you do not your justice before men, to be seen by them: otherwise you shall not have a reward of your Father Who is in Heaven. Therefore when thou dost an almsdeed, sound not a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be honored by men. Amen I say to you, they have received their reward. But when thou dost alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doth. That thy alms may be in secret, and thy Father Who seeth in secret will repay thee. And when ye pray, you shall not be as the hypocrites, that love to stand and pray in the synagogues and corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men: Amen I say to you, they have received their reward” (Matthew 6:1-5).
Where Do You Carry Your Devotion?
Some people are careful to show devotion in public, but, sadly, it is “just for show”! For when they are in private, when they are alone and nobody is there to notice them, their devotion takes a remarkable dip. There are many who show devotion to Our Lady, who, in reality, seek to impress others. Yet, while it seems as though they have a devotion to Our Lady, it is a mere lip service—a lip service that does not come from the heart, but the lips alone.
This kind of devotion is condemned by Our Lord, when He says: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8), which is nothing new and not just confined to our time, or the New Testament. It was also true of fake devotees in the Old Testament, which made God angrily say through His prophet, Isaias: “And the Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me, and they have feared Me with the commandment and doctrines of men” (Isaias 29:13). Our Lord merely repeats what His Father said through Isaias—and the same must be said today.
You Either Have It, Or You Don’t
There is an axiom of Philosophy that states: “You cannot give what you have not got!” If we do not have real devotion in our hearts, then we cannot show devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, which is what Heaven demands of us today. If I do not have a bike, I cannot enter a bike race—never mind thinking about winning it! If I cannot speak French or Spanish, then it is pointless trying to apply for a job as French or Spanish interpreter! It is pointless trying to bake a cake or bread, if I do not have an oven or fire.
By the same token, we could coin a phrase similar to the above one, which says: “There is no point acquiring devotion if I imagine that I already possess it!” In other words, I am not going to put the kettle on the stove if I have just done it several seconds ago! I am not going to take a shower if I have just finished taking one. I am not going to have dinner if I just finished it a minute ago. Here, the devil’s ploy is to make us mistakenly imagine that the feelings we have in our heart and the actions that we customarily perform are already proofs of devotion. It is like trying pass of counterfeit money for the real thing. The devil tells us: “You already have a devotion! What’s the point of trying to acquire one? It’s a waste of time!”
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this in his book, True Devotion to Mary, in relation to true and false devotees. He also speaks of those who are against being devoted to Our Lady. These two types—false devotees and anti-devotionalists—can be said to be the two chief dangers that we have to overcome if we are to fulfill God’s demands for a devotion to the Immaculate Heart. The false devotee is a danger that we all face within ourselves. The anti-devotionalist is a danger we face in either our family, relatives, friends, parishes, work places and in the world at large as a whole. Here is what St. Louis says of ‘anti-devotionalists’, of which there are plenty in the atmosphere around us—like imperceptible particles of dust that we inadvertently breathe in—and these are not just non-Catholics, but many within the fold of the Church.
Recognize the Duds and Throw Them Away
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this in his book, True Devotion to Mary, in relation to true and false devotees. “It is very important to recognize, first of all, false devotions to our Blessed Lady, in order to avoid them … I find seven kinds of false devotees and false devotions to Our Lady, namely: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the interested devotees.
Make Sure Your Car Works
Our devotion could be likened to a car—it is what will take us Heaven if it is in good working order. If it’s not, then it won’t! Most cars don’t make it! Our Lord said, speaking of the road they drive along: “Go ye not into the way of the Gentiles” (Matthew 10:5). “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Like a befuddled cyclist in a bike race, pedaling like crazy, who is ahead of the pack and thinks he is winning, but does not realize that he is on the wrong road, so too is most of the world on the wrong road—they have taken a path that they THINK will lead them to Heaven, they have a devotion that they THINK will lead to Heaven, but perhaps they (and perhaps we too) need to THINK AGAIN!
What’s Your Car Like?
Let us make sure we have the RIGHT CAR for the race, for as St. Paul says so truly—echoing Our Lord’s words about “few there are that find it” — “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain” (1 Corinthians 9:24). Or as St. Matthew says, quoting Our Lord’s own words: “For many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 24:14).
Can you imagine the depth and detail of inspection a racing-car goes through before it is taken out for the race! Likewise we should examine what we call our devotion to Our Lady, with the same depth and detail, and put right what may need repairing and fine-tune what looks to be a little off! We will quote the words of Fr. Faber, from his Preface in his personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary original French version into English:
Fiery Faber
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one. Here in England, Mary is not half enough preached. Devotion to her is low and thin and poor. It is frightened out of its wits by the sneers of heresy. It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that Protestants may feel at ease about her. Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy. It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be. It has no faith in itself. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized.
Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background. Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them. It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines. Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother. I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable [St. Louis] Grignion de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the Kingdom of Christ.” (Fr. Frederick Faber, Preface, True Devotion to Mary).
Love God with Whole Heart, Mind, Soul and Strength
‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). That is true devotion in a nutshell—whole soul, whole heart, whole mind, whole strength. We even admit that on a natural level. We will say of an outstanding worker or an outstanding athlete, that they put their whole soul, heart, mind and strength into the work/race/game. Let us not try water it down and give a second-rate love or devotion! In this way, devotion is not hard to understand—it means: everything, all, total, nothing held back. It is something “outstanding”, something “out of the ordinary”, something “above the ordinary”, something “extraordinary.”
Yet, an outstanding worker or athlete, an extraordinary musician or artist, did not start out being something outstanding or extraordinary—they worked their way up to that level. The same applies to us in our pursuit of true spiritual devotion. Nobody is made that way, they have to acquire it—and everyone CAN acquire it, if they really wish and try.
You Fanatic!
To those who love themselves, such an attitude will be denigrated as fanatical, ‘over-the-top’, extreme, or some other similar epithet. Yet this is exactly what God is! If God is perfection itself, then He is extreme—for perfection is something extremely good. We call people “fanatics” who blow themselves up, or burn themselves to death, for some earthly cause. “Christ also loved the Church, and delivered Himself up for it” (Ephesians 5:25). He could have saved us with one drop of His Precious Blood—the Circumcision would have been more than enough. Yet He was ‘fanatical’ about proving His love for us, and even called Peter “Satan” for trying to prevent Him from proving that love through His Passion and Crucifixion: “Who turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me: because thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:23).
Want to be a Fantastic Fanatic?
The word “fanatic” can be traced back, first to a mid-16th century French adjective, fanatique, which in turn owes its origins to the Latin, fanaticus, meaning “of a temple, inspired by a god,” which itself is based on the Latin word fanum, meaning “temple.” The adjective originally described behavior or speech that might result from possession by a god or demon—behavior or speech that we describe as “fantastic.” St. Paul says that we ought to be temples of the Holy Ghost—hence temples possessed by God, hence fantastic and fanatical in a good sense. “Know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you, whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 6:19). Sr. Lucia of Fatima echoes this: “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that … starting with the present time, we belong either to God, or we belong to the demon; there is no middle ground.” (Sr. Lucia, in 1957 to Fr. Augustine Fuentes). Which brings us back to Our Lord’s words to Sr. Josefa: “All I need is to possess your will, for this I cannot find a substitute.”
Many Fanatics Exist Today—But in the Wrong Way
In modern English, we have the word “fan” in the sense of a follower of some person, team or subject. The word “fan” is actually a shortening or abbreviation of the word “fanatic” — and each sport certainly has its fair share of “fanatical fans.” They are usually those who follow the team everywhere, not sparing a thought for time, effort or expense. They support their team through ‘thick-and-thin’, taking the ‘rough with the smooth’, not being turned-off or put-off by lack of success—in short, they are not what we call “fair-weather fans.” The same is true of the Faith—there are the “fair-weather Catholics” who like smooth sailing, calm waters, cloudless sunny skies, warm fuzzy temperatures and no crosses. Then there are the “‘blood-and-guts’ Catholics” who don’t care whether the weather is calm or stormy, or if it’s sunny or bleak, hot or cold—they are not put-off or discouraged by the ever-changing fortunes of life, and sail on resolutely despite all the adversity and all the crosses. These are the devoted ones—or, if you like, the fanatical ones. It is not hard to guess which ones Heaven prefers!
God Demands Devotion
We can very easily make mini-gods of the things that surround us—for our passions are always chomping-at-the-bit for something to expend their force upon. If our Faith—with the aid of supernatural grace, which in turn strengthens the will and intellect of our soul—does not control and tame these passions, then those mini-gods will take root and sprout and, before we know it, grow into trees that are nigh impossible to uproot!
This makes God angry: “Adore not any strange god. The Lord—His name is Jealous—He is a jealous God” (Exodus 34:14). “The Lord thy God is a consuming fire, a jealous God” (Deuteronomy 4:24). “I am the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt not have strange gods in my sight. Thou shalt not adore them, and thou shalt not serve them. For I am the Lord thy God, a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon their children unto the third and fourth generation, to them that hate Me, And showing mercy unto many thousands, to them that love Me, and keep My commandments” (Deuteronomy 5:6-10).
Perfect to an Extreme
God, being absolutely perfect, is extremely perfect—He is extreme in everything: extreme in mercy, yet extreme in justice; extreme in patience, yet extreme in anger; extreme in kindness, yet extreme in punishment (what can be more extreme than Hell? Or Heaven, too, for that matter!). This is something that we find hard to grasp completely. For us it is a case of either/or: we are either merciful or just; patient or impatiently angry; kind or not kind. That is because we are imperfect—imperfect in our understanding and imperfect in our actions. For us, the idea of being called an “extremist” or a “fanatic” is troublesome and we seek to avoid such labels. Yet, there again, we have a poor understanding of the meaning of the word, and we use it or take it badly. Originally, the word “fanatic” came from the Latin root-word “fanum”, which means, a sanctuary, shrine or temple, and the derivative word, “fanaticus”, means inspired; enthusiastic , frenzied. In the good sense, “fanatic” means something akin to holy, sacred, enthusiastic, highly fervent, inspired by God—which is along the lines of what “devotion” is, or should be.
Only Extreme Efforts Obtain Heaven
In a certain sense, we have to be ‘fanatical’ (in the good sense of the word) to be able to get to Heaven. Our Lord said to us: “Be you therefore perfect as you heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). That’s a bit extreme, isn’t it? But we have to be extreme to get to Heaven. “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). Violence is an extreme measure. If we are not extreme in this world, then those extremes will have to be reached in the extremely painful fires of Purgatory, where, as any saint or good Catholic book will tell you, souls suffer extremely, until they reach the extreme perfection required to enter Heaven. “There shall not enter into it anything defiled” (Apocalypse 21:27). “Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence, till thou repay the last farthing” (Matthew 5:26). Some writers, such as St. Thomas Aquinas, say that the fires of Purgatory are the same fires as those of Hell—now how’s that for extreme! Could we say ‘fanatical’?
The Extreme Attitude of God
God does not do things by halves. He can be extremely kind and loving, or extremely angry and vengeful. It all depends upon whether or not we are for Him or against Him; whether we obey Him or disobey Him. As we sow, so shall we reap. There is a passage that perfectly manifests these two extremes in God.
Extreme Rewards—Extreme Punishments
Towards the end of the Book of Leviticus, God lists His extreme rewards and extreme punishments. As Scripture says elsewhere—He rewards the good and punishes the evil. “I am the Lord your God: If you walk in My precepts, and keep My commandments, and do them, I will give you rain in due seasons. And the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit. The threshing of your harvest shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land without fear.
“I will give peace in your coasts: you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid. I will take away evil beasts: and the sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. Five of yours shall pursue a hundred others, and a hundred of you ten thousand: your enemies shall fall before you by the sword.
“I will look on you, and make you increase: you shall be multiplied, and I will establish My covenant with you. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people. I am the Lord your God: who have brought you out of the land of the Egyptians, that you should not serve them, and I have broken the chains on your necks, that you might go upright.” (Leviticus 26:1-13). Who wouldn’t want this? No shortage of food! Perfect seasons of the year! Peace in the land, with no threats from anywhere! If enemies arise, a guarantee of God’s help and protection—even if we are outnumbered! Guarantee of victory over all enemies! At peace with God! Wow! Extreme kindness!
But… Brace Yourself!
“But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws, and contemn My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, and to make void My covenant: I also will do these things to you: I will quickly visit you with poverty, and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes, and consume your lives. You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies. I will set My face against you, and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you, you shall flee when no man pursueth you.
“But if you will not yet for all this obey Me: I will chastise you seven times more for your sins, and I will break the pride of your stubbornness, and I will make to you the Heaven above as iron, and the Earth as brass: your labor shall be spent in vain, the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit. If you walk contrary to Me, and will not hearken to Me, I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins: and I will send in upon you the beasts of the field, to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number, and that your highways may be desolate.
“And if even so you will not amend, but will walk contrary to Me: I also will walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins. And I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge My covenant. And when you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies, after I shall have broken the staff of your bread: so that ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and give it out by weight: and you shall eat, and shall not be filled.
“But if you will not for all this hearken to Me, but will walk against Me: I will also go against you with opposite fury, and I will chastise you with seven plagues for your sins, so that you shall eat the flesh of your sons and of your daughters. I will destroy your high places, and break your idols. You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you. And I will destroy your land, and your enemies shall be astonished at it, when they shall be the inhabitants thereof. And I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed.
“And as to them that shall remain of you I will send fear in their hearts in the countries of their enemies, the sound of a flying leaf shall terrify them, and they shall flee as it were from the sword: they shall fall, when no man pursueth them, And they shall every one fall upon their brethren as fleeing from wars, none of you shall dare to resist your enemies. You shall perish among the Gentiles, and an enemy’s land shall consume you. And if of them also some remain, they shall pine away in their iniquities, in the land of their enemies, and they shall be afflicted for the sins of their fathers, and their own: until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, whereby they have transgressed me, and walked contrary unto Me.
“Therefore I also will bring them into their enemies’ land: then shall they pray for their sins. And I will remember My covenant, that I made with Jacob, and Isaac, and Abraham. But they shall pray for their sins, because they rejected My judgments, and despised My laws. And yet, for all that, when they were in the land of their enemies, I did not cast them off altogether, neither did I so despise them that they should be quite consumed, and I should make void My covenant with them. For I am the Lord their God. And I will remember My former covenant, when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, in the sight of the Gentiles, to be their God. I am the Lord. These are the judgments, and precepts, and laws, which the Lord gave between Him and the children of Israel in Mount Sinai by the hand of Moses” (Leviticus 26:14-45).
Our Lady’s messages at her modern day apparitions are along the same lines―do what I tell you and there will be peace; refuse to do what I tell you and you will be chastised with the whole world! It is time that we stopped giving Our Lady and Heaven a “half-baked” devotion and start going to extremes in our devotion. We go to extremes for the people that we love―do you love Our Lady? Prove it. Go to extremes. Prove it with an extremely fervent devotion instead of the customary “half-baked” devotion. If we are “fans” of Our Lady, then let our devotion be “fanatical” as stated and explained earlier in this article. The word “fan” is actually a shortening or abbreviation of the word “fanatic.” True love is always fanatical―how else would you describe the command: “Love God with your whole mind, your whole heart, your whole soul and your whole strength!” That is a command to love fanatically. That is also how we must love, not only God, but also Our Lady―especially under her title of “Immaculate Heart”―for that is the will of God and Christ for our present age.
Article 10
Tuesday & Wednesday, August 20th & 21st
Are You Really Devoted to the Immaculate Heart!
Tuesday & Wednesday, August 20th & 21st
Are You Really Devoted to the Immaculate Heart!
Devotion Demotion or Promotion?
In physics, the Second Law of Thermodynamics―otherwise known as the Law of Entropy―states that entropy, or the degree of disorder in a system, will always increase or remain the same in a closed system over time. Stated simply, it says that the more molecules can move around, the more heat they create, and the more entropy (or disorder) they create as a result. Or, in other words, everything is in a gradual state of deterioration and disorder. We see this in ourselves as we grow old. We see this in our houses as they grow old. We see this in our cars as they grow old. This law shows us that nothing in the universe is perfect. The only way this progressive disorder and degeneration of entropy can be halted is by some outside external intervention. The same is true for us human beings―the more we move around and the more and more things we take on board and try to juggle, the hotter we get under the collar and the more disordered we tend to become.
We see this to be true in the case of Martha―the sister of Mary Magdalen―who was busy, busy, busy with many things while Mary sat devotedly at the feet of Our Lord, listening to what He had to say: “A certain woman named Martha, received Jesus into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who, sitting at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving and said: ‘Lord! Do you not care that my sister has left me alone to serve? Speak to her therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha, Martha! You are concerned and are troubled about many things! But only one thing is necessary! Mary has chosen the best part and it shall not be taken away from her!” (Luke 10:38-42).
It is not in vain that God says in Holy Scripture: “Be still and see that I am God!” (Psalm 45:11) … “There comes a mighty wind―the Lord is not in the wind. And after the wind comes an earthquake―the Lord is not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake comes a fire―the Lord is not in the fire, and after the fire a whistling of a gentle air.” (3 Kings 19:11-12).
We all need grace, because we all have the tendency to be broken by sin and imperfection, becoming increasingly disordered in our spiritual life, and wearing ourselves down spiritually. We are all imperfect human beings, but the God of the universe offers his perfect love to all of us, doing his mighty work of healing and brining us into complete spiritual health by the workings of His grace―as Jesus implied on several occasions: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) … “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27) … “With men it is impossible; but not with God―for all things are possible with God!” (Mark 10:27) … “No word shall be impossible with God” (Luke 1:37).
Along those lines, neither does God command the impossible. Whatever God commands is achievable. What we imagine to be impossible, is actually possible with the assistance of God’s grace. Our Lady was asked by God―through the Archangel Gabriel―to become the Mother of God. “And Mary said to the angel: ‘How shall this be done? Because I know not man!’ And the angel answering, said to her: ‘The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee. And therefore also the Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God!’” (Luke 1:34-35). God commanded the seemingly impossible and the angel reassured Mary that God would deliver all that would be needed to obey the command. Hence, too, St. Paul says: “I can do all these things in Him who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13).
At Fatima, Our Lady stated that God and Jesus want to establish devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary throughout the entire world: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!”
Probably, or possibly, everyone will protest that they have a devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Yet―as stated above by Law of Entropy―our devotion risks deteriorating and falling into randomness and disorder. The problem with the devotion that most persons have towards the Immaculate Heart of Mary is that it is merely exterior―like feathers on a bird, or it can even be a wolf in the clothing of sheep. What you see on the outside is not always what is actually on the inside.
All Feathers―No Bird? All Leaves―No Fruit?
A bird is not just about feathers― as the proverb says: “Fine feathers do not make fine birds!” Feathers are the superficial covering for the bird―but feathers alone do not make a bird. Just like a tree is more than just leaves. A tree is a tree with or without leaves―but leaves are not part of a tree unless they are attached to a real tree. Some trees are meant to produce fruit―and they are imperfect trees unless they produce that fruit, no matter how many beautiful leaves they may have. Do you remember the incident where Our Lord went searching for some fruit to eat and came to a fig tree that was full of leaves, but no fruit? He cursed it and the whole tree immediately withered and died!
“When they came out from Bethany, Jesus was hungry. And when He had seen afar off a fig tree having leaves, He came if perhaps He might find anything on it. And when He was come to it, He found nothing but leaves. And He said to it: ‘May no man hereafter eat fruit of thee any more for ever!’ … And when evening was come, Jesus went forth out of the city and they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. And Peter remembering, said to him: ‘Rabbi, behold the fig tree, which thou didst curse, is withered away!’” (Mark 11:12-21). “And seeing a certain fig tree by the wayside, He came to it, and found nothing on it but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19).
Along the same lines, there is the parable about the unfruitful fig tree: “Jesus spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. So he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why is it encumbering the ground?” But the vinedresser answering, said to him: “Lord, leave it alone this year also, until I dig around it and dung it! Perhaps happily it bears fruit! But if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”’” (Luke 13:6-9).
“I am the true vine and My Father is the gardener. I am the vine and you are the branches! In this is my Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit, and become my disciples! I have chosen you and have appointed you, that you should go and should bring forth fruit! Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. And every branch that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit! Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. He that abides in me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit. If anyone does not abide in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch and shall wither, and they shall gather him up and cast him into the fire, and he will burn! If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, then you shall ask whatever you want and it shall be done unto you!” (John 15:1-8, 16).
Just as a fruit tree must produce fruit―so too must devotion produce fruit. “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20).
“But some man will say: ‘Thou hast Faith, and I have works!’ Show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith!” (James 2:18). Our Lord refers to devotion without fruit or works when He says to the Jews: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8). A cowboy hat does not make a cowboy―it is, as they say, “Big hat, but no cattle!” A gun with no ammunition is like a fruit tree with no fruit―useless. There are some who talk about devotion, but have no real devotion. We say of such folk: “All talk and no action!” or “All bark and no bite!” Holy Scripture alludes to this phenomenon in the Old Testament, where God complains of His watchmen lacking bark and bite: “His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant! Dumb dogs not able to bark, seeing vain things, sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10).
Fruitless Devotion?
Do those above things describe the kind of devotion we have to God in general and the Immaculate Heart of Mary in particular? Are we all talk and no action? Perhaps we don’t even talk! Don’t even pray! Don’t even read about God and Our Lady! “They have a mouth, but they speak not! They have eyes, but they see not!” (Psalms 134:16). At Fatima, Our Lady clearly said: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” So what are you doing about it? A lot? A little? Barely anything? Or nothing? “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary is “low, and thin, and poor” ― those are the words of Fr. Frederick William Faber, from the Preface of his own personal translation from the original French version of St. Louis de Montfort’s book, True Devotion to Mary. In that Preface―written in 1858, almost 60 years before Our Lady’s words at Fatima―Fr. Faber laments the poor state of devotion to Our Lady in the following words:
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one! Here in England, Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It is frightened out of its wits by the sneers of heresy! It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that Protestants may feel at ease about her! Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be! It has no faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized! Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines!
“Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother! I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable Grignion de Montfort! Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ! Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!” (From the Preface of Fr. Frederick William Faber, in his own personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s book, True Devotion to Mary).
Charity Begins at Home―Devotion Begins at Home
There is a proverb―not biblical―that says: “Charity begins at home!” What this means to say is that we should be learning how to be charitable from our very earliest years of existence in a loving, charitable environment that the family home should manifest. If the parents are charitable, then the children learn from that example to also be charitable. If the parents are uncharitable, then the children will imitate that uncharitableness. The secular proverb, “Like father, like son” is based upon the biblical proverb, “As the mother was, so also is her daughter” (Ezechiel 16:44). If “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), then so too should the family home be charitable.
Devotion is defined as being a high level of charity, the pinnacle of charity and love. Thus when Our Lady of Fatima says: “Jesus to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world!” and “God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart!” ― then Our Lady is not just speaking about a love for her Immaculate Heart, but she speaking about a high level of love, the pinnacle of love, which is shown by the word “devotion”.
There is absolutely no doubt that each and every household, each and every family, each and every family member is capable of the highest devotion―the problem is that they are devoted to the wrong things! They are devoted to things of this world―rather than being devoted to things of Heaven. “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” says Our Lord (Matthew 16:26). If you were the proverbial “fly-on-the-wall” in the homes of the world, you would witness astounding manifestations of devotion―but it would be for worldly things. People spend hours and hours watching television, browsing the internet, surfing social media, listening to music, chatting on the phone, playing sports, working on their pet projects, cooking, cleaning, making additions to the house, gardening, exercising, beautifying themselves, shopping and window shopping, gossiping, having barbecues and cookouts, socializing, etc. The time, energy and fervor given to God is ridiculously low and embarrassing when compared to the time, energy and fervor given to those pastimes and occupations! We certainly are capable of devotion―but we show nothing of it to God and Our Lady.
By simply doing this―and neglecting God―we are breaking the greatest commandment that there is! “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). What do you think the government and judiciary would do to you if you broke the greatest law of the land? There are still over 40 categories of Federal Law that carry the death penalty if they are broken. Yet we break God’s laws with ease, with complacency, with feelings of impunity―and the greatest of those laws is the law of love and devotion. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
A Divided City Shall Fall―A Divided Soul Shall Fall
We are made of body and soul―something spiritual and something physical. We apply our body and soul to everyday living―we do physical work with our body and we do intellectual work with our soul or mind. Both are put use and need to be used if we are to have any chance of living a normal life. Persons with crippled bodies or crippled minds cannot lead a normal life. Furthermore, there should be no “divorce” between our body and soul―that is to say, between things we think and the things we say; between the things we believe and the things we do; between how we talk and how we act. God is all about unity― “Be careful to keep the unity of the Spirit! One body and one Spirit. One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism!” (Ephesians 4:5). “If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand!” (Mark 3:24) … “Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate! And every city or house divided against itself shall not stand!” (Matthew 12:25). That is why Our Lord warns: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Hence Our Lord adds: “Every one therefore that hears these my words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these my words, and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthe7:24-27). Devotion is our rock―devotion to Our Lady is our rock in these turbulent times―as she herself said: Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” (Fatima, July 1917) … “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!” (Akita, 1973).
Our Lady of Fatima echoed the above words of Our Lord―Sister Lucia repeats what Our Lady said to her: “Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them!” (Sr. Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Optimism Bias ― Optimism By Asses
Do you think you are a better-than-average driver? Chances are you do. And do you know what? So do 80% to 90% of other drivers! Think about that for a second―not everyone can be above average. There are a variety of things in which we all think we are above average, including health, popularity, memory, attractiveness, and even academic and job performance. In fact, there are so many things that we think we are good at that there is name for it: optimism bias.
Optimism bias is the belief that each of us is more likely to experience good outcomes and less likely to experience bad outcomes. The key to optimism bias is that we disregard the reality of an overall situation because we think we are excluded from the potential negative effects. This is why warning labels don’t seem to work. You have probably seen warning labels spelling out the health consequences of cigarettes. But in spite of those labels, about 500,000 people die from using tobacco products every year. You have heard warnings about not driving while intoxicated. Yet about 10,000 people die every year in alcohol-related traffic accidents.
You might believe that World War Three is on the horizon, but you also probably think that you, personally, will be okay when someone drops the first nuke. That’s because around 80% of people, across all age groups and genders, suffer from what social psychologists call optimism bias. It’s that enduring, against-all-odds belief that things are going to work out on an individual level, and it’s a nice feeling―until the opposite happens! They believe that bad things won’t happen in the future, because nothing bad has happened in the past. It’s a form of denial and self-delusion.
We can also see that optimism bias at work in the Faith. Everyone thinks that they are a better Catholic than they really are! Think about this then―Our Lord said to one of His mystics (not just an average person like us): “If you could see yourself as I see you, then you would die in terror!” No room left for optimism bias there, huh? The modern-day Church has also taken on the optimism bias in the sense that most people seem to imagine that everyone who dies goes to Heaven! Our Lord, Our Lady, many saints and theologians say the opposite. It is a fair bet that everyone in Hell was guilty of optimism bias while still on Earth ― “Oh I’ll be alright! I won’t go to Hell!” Well guess where they are now!
Similarly with the matter of devotion. Almost everyone thinks that their devotion to God in general, and Our Lady or the Immaculate Heart of Mary in particular, is above average. How do we know that? Well because if you do not have enough of something, then you make efforts to get more of it. If you feel that you a short of devotion, then you would make efforts to increase your devotion. We do not see many―if any―making efforts to increase their devotion. Rather, it is a case of the same old, same old, same old―year after year. Yet when you look at those levels of devotion―you can clearly see that they are pretty low. There is little or no attempt to attend extra weekday Masses―being satisfied with the Sunday Mass; saying fast, hurried, distracted Rosaries and prayers; Rosary prayers merely said without the mysteries being meditated; little preparation before Holy Mass and Holy Communion, and most of it is done with little fervor or feeling, flying along on auto-pilot; rushed thanksgivings (or no thanksgivings) after Holy Communion and Mass as they rush off to do better, more important, more appealing things; little or no spiritual reading―especially the “heavyweight” kind that could really impact your life, with preference being given to the light fluffy stuff; no daily examination of conscience; no program for the acquisition and perfection of virtues―they just “wing-it”. The list could go on and on. All of this betrays a lack of devotion and shows a minimalist attitude to the Faith, God and Our Lady.
Re-Devotioning Our Devotionless Devotions!
You may have heard or read Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale about The Emperor’s New Clothes, wherein two tricksters pose as weavers and tailors of an invisible set of clothes. They tell the emperor that only intelligent people are able to see the invisible cloth and that it could not be seen by those who are stupid―by which ruse they manage to make the emperor believe that the clothes really exist, because the emperor did not want to appear to be stupid. He purchases the invisible cloth from them at a very high price, thinking that he could use it to see who was intelligent and who was stupid in his empire. Of course, in reality there was no invisible cloth and no invisible clothes―yet nobody was prepared to say the truth for fear of being thought to be stupid. The emperor, not wanting to thought of as stupid by others, but wanting to parade his new suit of (invisible) clothes to all the people, ended up going to the parade naked!
It is like that with our devotion or devotions. We imagine them to be what they are not and we imagine ourselves to be devoted when we are not. St. Francis de Sales has some words to say on this imaginary devotion issue in his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, wherein he writes: “There is only one true devotion while there is a very large number of false and meaningless ones. So if you cannot recognize true devotion, you could be deceived and waste time in following some devotion that is irrelevant and irrational. Each person represents devotion according to his liking and imagination. He who is in the habit of fasting will think that just because he fasts he is very devout―even though his heart is filled with hatred. He will not take a sip of wine, or even of water, anxious about sobriety―but he has no scruples to sip the blood of his neighbor by speaking ill or by false statements. Another considers himself devout because of the very great number of prayers he recites every day―even though soon after this he speaks words that are annoying, full of pride and hurtful to those in his house and to his neighbors. Another very gladly opens his purse to give alms to the poor―but cannot take any gentleness from his heart to forgive his enemies. Yet another will forgive his enemies―but will not pay what he owes unless he is legally forced to do so. All such persons are generally looked upon as devout whereas in fact they are not.”
What St. Francis de Sales is saying is that we all have a tendency to make mountains out of our molehills of devotion―while at the same time making our mountains of sins look like mere molehills! He further points out our tendency to pick and choose only those virtues that we like, while ignoring other virtues that we do not like or that will cost us too much―thus we mix virtue with sin. A glass of wine that only has a little poison in it, is nevertheless a poisonous drink―the poison does not have to be greater in proportion to the wine. Likewise, you don’t have to commit lots and lots of mortal sins in order to go to Hell―one single mortal sin will suffice, even if the rest of your life is virtuous! Similarly, you do not need to deny all the dogmas of the Catholic Church in order to become a heretic―denying just one dogma is enough for heresy!
Back to Kindergarten
What is the point of all this? It is to point out that the practice of devotion must be wholehearted and not halfhearted. It cannot be a service of both God and the world. Devotion is like sanctity―nobody is a saint when they first start out on the road to Heaven, but they had better become a saint before they die, for only saints go to Heaven. Those who choose not to try and achieve sanctity, will end up―not in Heaven―but in either Purgatory or Hell. Neither place is pleasant, but very painful. Devotion is a high level of charity and love. Mediocrity and devotion are opposites and cannot be reconciled. To try pass off mediocrity for devotion is hypocrisy. Thus the first step towards acquiring a true devotion is to humbly acknowledge that we have a long way to go and that we are in the kindergarten class or lower grades in the school of devotion. If we exaggerate our level of devotion, then God will let us fail and fall in our pride.
True Devotion Comes from a Humble Heart
Devotion to the immaculate Heart of Mary is primarily based upon the Sacred Scriptures. In the New Testament, there are two references to the Heart of Mary in the Gospel according to St. Luke: “Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart” (Luke 2:19) and again later, Luke writes: “His Mother kept all these words in her heart” (Luke 2:51). Likewise, for a true devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, you need to keep Mary in your mind and heart―you need to ponder Mary, to wonder about Mary, to listen to Mary, to obey her requests. It was the Heart of Mary which humbly expressed her “yes” or “fiat” to God: “Be it done unto me according to Thy word!” This was her humble response to the message sent through the angel at the Annunciation. By her humble loving consent, Mary first conceived Christ in her heart and then in her womb. The importance of the heart is often stressed by Holy Scripture. Our Lord demands not mere lip service, but service from the heart. He calls some of the Pharisees and Jews hypocrites for being content with mere lip-service: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). In the Book of Deuteronomy we are told, “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your strength” (Deuteronomy 6:5). When Our Lord Jesus Christ was asked which was the first commandment, He answered: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:29-30).
Nevertheless, fictional love, theoretical love, virtual love, lip-love is not what God and Our Lady want. Just as “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20), likewise love without works is dead. If Our Lord says: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” ― then Our Lady says the same thing: “Keep my requests and demands!” Just as Our Lord says: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46), Our Lady could say: “Why do you say to Me, ‘Hail Mary! Hail Mary!’ and do not the things which I say?” In her apparitions, Our Lady has not come to show-off her clothes, nor has she come for us to admire her beauty―she has come to be heard and we need to listen to her words and “keep all her words in our heart, pondering them in our heart.” Just as we digest and assimilate food so that it becomes a part of our body―so too must we digest and assimilate the words of Our Lady so that they become a part of our soul, a part of our spirit, making us “one heart and one soul” with Mary (Acts 4:32). Mary is not a statue that we bring out of the closet for a few minutes each day to pray and talk to her! Adapting St. Paul’s phrase about Christ, we should say: “I live, now not I; but Mary lives in me!” (Galatians 2:20). Once we have assimilated the spirit of Mary, then we can say that Mary lives in us.
If we can talk sports at home for hours on end, or talk about the television shows we’ve watched, or the music we’ve heard, or talk about our work and hobbies, trips and vacations, our relatives, friends and neighbors―then why can’t we talk about Mary for hours on end? One basic reason is that we know very little about Mary―apart from the superficial things that everyone is or should be acquainted with. You cannot talk about what you do not know―and you cannot love what you do not know. What is there to stop you learning something new about Mary each and every day? You could then communicate your new found knowledge to the rest of the family―and perhaps listen to their new found knowledge of Mary too! God is not going to download that information into your brain―you have go out and dig for the information. The better you know and understand Mary, the better will your prayers be and the more powerful will your prayers be―for you will start becoming “one heart and one soul” with Mary. So rather than just pray and pray and pray more and more and more to Mary―take time to know whom you are praying to and get to understand the mind and outlook of Mary. It will save you a lot of grief in the long run! We see an indication of this in the Catechism answer to the question as to why God made us―“God made us to know Him, Love Him and Serve Him.” Notice that knowledge comes first―it is not just a haphazard ordering―KNOW, LOVE, SERVE―but a logical ordering. For we must first know something before we can love it―and you are not likely to serve for very long someone whom you do not love. God has wired us to love what is good―thus by knowing Mary more (who the greatest good after God), we cannot but help loving her more.
There are multiple ways in which you and your family can grow in knowledge of Mary―the chief ways that any knowledge comes into our minds is by visual and auditory means, that is to say, what we see, what we read and what we hear. Some people love reading, others prefer listening, while others prefer visually watching something. With today’s modern technology, it is not hard to find Marian materials in your preferred medium―books, videos, books or sermons on tape/CD. There can be no real excuse for finding Marian materials, because they are everywhere and easily found on the internet. The only real reason for not doing so is not a lack of availability, but a lack of enthusiasm―most people are just not interested in Mary (unless they are trying to get something for themselves from her through prayer!). For most people, there are thousands of better, more interesting things to do than getting to know Mary! What an insult to the Mother of God! What an insult to God too! For Mary is His masterpiece―and we can’t be bothered to study His masterpiece!
The books and articles about Mary―whether hard-copies, digital books, or online―cover an immense variety of topics concerning Mary.
(1) You can read about her life as she has revealed to certain mystics;
(2) Or you can read about her apparitions and the messages she gave;
(3) Then you have her feasts―which are literally at least one feast for every day of the year. Our Calendar pages will set you off on that path with a brief overview for every day of the year, which you can then research and study further if you wish;
(4) There are countless sermons on Mary by Church Fathers, Saints, Blesseds, Venerables, popes and theologians.
(5) You also have papal encyclicals on Mary by various popes.
(6) Read about the lives of saints who were particularly devoted to Mary.
(7) There are materials available about the multitude of shrines to Our Lady throughout the world.
(8) You can also find lots of material on the various Sacramentals of Mary―her scapulars and medals and chaplets.
(9) Many books and articles are available that explain the many virtues and privileges of Mary.
(10) Also books on the role of Mary in the spiritual life. Spiritual theology ranks higher than Dogmatic and Moral theology.
(11) Books giving meditations on Mary―meditations often take the theological aspect and apply it to practical use.
(12) Books or articles that supply you with meditations for all the 15 Mysteries of the Holy Rosary.
(13) Numerous prayers dedicate to Mary―these are wonderful springboard for learning to compose your own prayers.
(14) Lots of hymns in honor of Mary―hymns are instructive and often express key teachings about their subject.
Don’t try and lamely say that after reading such things that your love and appreciation of Mary will not increase! Of course it will―but you have to make the effort to find and read these things! Nor try the lame excuse that you have no time to do these things! Mary plays a key role in a person’s salvation―are you saying you have no time to work on your salvation? Holy Mother Church puts these words in the mouth of Mary: “He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord!” (Proverbs 8:35; Epistle from the Mass of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th). Also: “Come over to me, all ye that desire me, and be filled with my fruits! For my spirit is sweet above honey, and my inheritance above honey and the honeycomb! My memory is unto everlasting generations. They that eat me, shall yet hunger: and they that drink me, shall yet thirst! He that listens to me, shall not be confounded; and they that work by me, shall not sin! They that explain me shall have life everlasting!” (Ecclesiasticus 24:26-31; Epistle from the Mass of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, July 16th).
Practical Aspect of Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary
St. Louis de Montfort, in his book True Devotion to Mary, has a section entitled: “Common Practices, both Interior and Exterior”, wherein he lists some practical ways in which we can show our devotion to Our Lady. Here are those suggestions:
“There are several INTERIOR PRACTICES of true devotion to the Blessed Virgin. Here are the principal ones, stated compendiously:
(1) to honor her as the worthy Mother of God, with the worship of hyperdulia; that is to say, to esteem her and honor her above all the other saints, as the masterpiece of grace, and the first after Jesus Christ, true God and true Man;
(2) to meditate on her virtues, her privileges and her actions;
(3) to contemplate her grandeurs;
(4) to make acts of love, of praise, of gratitude to her;
(5) to invoke her cordially;
(6) to offer ourselves to her and unite ourselves with her;
(7) to do all our actions with the view of pleasing her;
(8) to begin, to continue and to finish all our actions by her, in her, with her and for her, in order that we may do them by Jesus Christ, in Jesus Christ, with Jesus Christ and for Jesus Christ, our Last End. We will presently explain this last practice.
“True devotion to Our Lady also has several EXTERIOR PRACTICES, of which the following are the principal ones:
(1) to enroll ourselves in her confraternities and enter her congregations;
(2) to join the religious orders instituted in her honor;
(3) to proclaim her praises [by the written or the spoken word];
(4) to give alms, to fast and to undergo outward and inward mortifications in her honor;
(5) to wear her liveries, such as the Rosary, the Scapular or the little chain;
(6) to recite with attention, devotion and modesty the Holy Rosary.
(7) to say a chaplet of six or seven decades in honor of the years which we believe Our Lady lived on Earth;
(8) to recite the Little Crown of the Blessed Virgin, composed of three Our Fathers and twelve Hail Mary’s, in honor of her crown of twelve stars or privileges;
(9) to pray the Little Office of Our Lady, so universally received and recited in the Church;
(10) to say the Little Psalter of the holy Virgin, which St. Bonaventure composed in her honor;
(11) to pray fourteen Our Fathers and Hail Mary’s in honor of her fourteen joys;
(12) to recite some other prayers, hymns and canticles of the Church, such as the Salve Regina, the Alma, the Ave Regina Coelorum, or the Regina Coeli, according to the different seasons; or the Ave Maris Stella, the O Gloriosa Domina, the Magnificat, or some other practices of devotion, of which books are full;
(13) to sing, or have sung, spiritual canticles in her honor;
(14) to make a number of genuflections or reverences, while saying, for example, every morning, sixty or a hundred times, Ave Maria, Virgo Fidelis (“Hail Mary, Faithful Virgin”), to obtain from God through her the grace to be faithful to the graces of God during the day; and then again in the evening, Ave Maria, Mater Misericordiae (“Hail Mary, Mother of Mercy”) to ask pardon of God through her for the sins that we have committed during the day;
(15) to take care of her confraternities, to adorn her altars, to crown and ornament her images;
(16) to carry her images, or to have them carried, in procession, and to carry a picture or an image of her about our own persons, as a mighty arm against the evil spirit;
(17) to have copies of her name or picture made and placed in churches, or in houses, or on the gates and entrances into cities, churches and houses;
(18) to consecrate ourselves to her in a special and solemn manner.
(Taken from St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary, chapter 3, Article 2, Section 2: “Practices”).
In physics, the Second Law of Thermodynamics―otherwise known as the Law of Entropy―states that entropy, or the degree of disorder in a system, will always increase or remain the same in a closed system over time. Stated simply, it says that the more molecules can move around, the more heat they create, and the more entropy (or disorder) they create as a result. Or, in other words, everything is in a gradual state of deterioration and disorder. We see this in ourselves as we grow old. We see this in our houses as they grow old. We see this in our cars as they grow old. This law shows us that nothing in the universe is perfect. The only way this progressive disorder and degeneration of entropy can be halted is by some outside external intervention. The same is true for us human beings―the more we move around and the more and more things we take on board and try to juggle, the hotter we get under the collar and the more disordered we tend to become.
We see this to be true in the case of Martha―the sister of Mary Magdalen―who was busy, busy, busy with many things while Mary sat devotedly at the feet of Our Lord, listening to what He had to say: “A certain woman named Martha, received Jesus into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who, sitting at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving and said: ‘Lord! Do you not care that my sister has left me alone to serve? Speak to her therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha, Martha! You are concerned and are troubled about many things! But only one thing is necessary! Mary has chosen the best part and it shall not be taken away from her!” (Luke 10:38-42).
It is not in vain that God says in Holy Scripture: “Be still and see that I am God!” (Psalm 45:11) … “There comes a mighty wind―the Lord is not in the wind. And after the wind comes an earthquake―the Lord is not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake comes a fire―the Lord is not in the fire, and after the fire a whistling of a gentle air.” (3 Kings 19:11-12).
We all need grace, because we all have the tendency to be broken by sin and imperfection, becoming increasingly disordered in our spiritual life, and wearing ourselves down spiritually. We are all imperfect human beings, but the God of the universe offers his perfect love to all of us, doing his mighty work of healing and brining us into complete spiritual health by the workings of His grace―as Jesus implied on several occasions: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) … “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27) … “With men it is impossible; but not with God―for all things are possible with God!” (Mark 10:27) … “No word shall be impossible with God” (Luke 1:37).
Along those lines, neither does God command the impossible. Whatever God commands is achievable. What we imagine to be impossible, is actually possible with the assistance of God’s grace. Our Lady was asked by God―through the Archangel Gabriel―to become the Mother of God. “And Mary said to the angel: ‘How shall this be done? Because I know not man!’ And the angel answering, said to her: ‘The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee. And therefore also the Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God!’” (Luke 1:34-35). God commanded the seemingly impossible and the angel reassured Mary that God would deliver all that would be needed to obey the command. Hence, too, St. Paul says: “I can do all these things in Him who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13).
At Fatima, Our Lady stated that God and Jesus want to establish devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary throughout the entire world: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!”
Probably, or possibly, everyone will protest that they have a devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Yet―as stated above by Law of Entropy―our devotion risks deteriorating and falling into randomness and disorder. The problem with the devotion that most persons have towards the Immaculate Heart of Mary is that it is merely exterior―like feathers on a bird, or it can even be a wolf in the clothing of sheep. What you see on the outside is not always what is actually on the inside.
All Feathers―No Bird? All Leaves―No Fruit?
A bird is not just about feathers― as the proverb says: “Fine feathers do not make fine birds!” Feathers are the superficial covering for the bird―but feathers alone do not make a bird. Just like a tree is more than just leaves. A tree is a tree with or without leaves―but leaves are not part of a tree unless they are attached to a real tree. Some trees are meant to produce fruit―and they are imperfect trees unless they produce that fruit, no matter how many beautiful leaves they may have. Do you remember the incident where Our Lord went searching for some fruit to eat and came to a fig tree that was full of leaves, but no fruit? He cursed it and the whole tree immediately withered and died!
“When they came out from Bethany, Jesus was hungry. And when He had seen afar off a fig tree having leaves, He came if perhaps He might find anything on it. And when He was come to it, He found nothing but leaves. And He said to it: ‘May no man hereafter eat fruit of thee any more for ever!’ … And when evening was come, Jesus went forth out of the city and they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. And Peter remembering, said to him: ‘Rabbi, behold the fig tree, which thou didst curse, is withered away!’” (Mark 11:12-21). “And seeing a certain fig tree by the wayside, He came to it, and found nothing on it but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19).
Along the same lines, there is the parable about the unfruitful fig tree: “Jesus spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. So he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why is it encumbering the ground?” But the vinedresser answering, said to him: “Lord, leave it alone this year also, until I dig around it and dung it! Perhaps happily it bears fruit! But if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”’” (Luke 13:6-9).
“I am the true vine and My Father is the gardener. I am the vine and you are the branches! In this is my Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit, and become my disciples! I have chosen you and have appointed you, that you should go and should bring forth fruit! Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. And every branch that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit! Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. He that abides in me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit. If anyone does not abide in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch and shall wither, and they shall gather him up and cast him into the fire, and he will burn! If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, then you shall ask whatever you want and it shall be done unto you!” (John 15:1-8, 16).
Just as a fruit tree must produce fruit―so too must devotion produce fruit. “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20).
“But some man will say: ‘Thou hast Faith, and I have works!’ Show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith!” (James 2:18). Our Lord refers to devotion without fruit or works when He says to the Jews: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8). A cowboy hat does not make a cowboy―it is, as they say, “Big hat, but no cattle!” A gun with no ammunition is like a fruit tree with no fruit―useless. There are some who talk about devotion, but have no real devotion. We say of such folk: “All talk and no action!” or “All bark and no bite!” Holy Scripture alludes to this phenomenon in the Old Testament, where God complains of His watchmen lacking bark and bite: “His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant! Dumb dogs not able to bark, seeing vain things, sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10).
Fruitless Devotion?
Do those above things describe the kind of devotion we have to God in general and the Immaculate Heart of Mary in particular? Are we all talk and no action? Perhaps we don’t even talk! Don’t even pray! Don’t even read about God and Our Lady! “They have a mouth, but they speak not! They have eyes, but they see not!” (Psalms 134:16). At Fatima, Our Lady clearly said: “Jesus wants to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it―these souls will be dear to God! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” So what are you doing about it? A lot? A little? Barely anything? Or nothing? “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary is “low, and thin, and poor” ― those are the words of Fr. Frederick William Faber, from the Preface of his own personal translation from the original French version of St. Louis de Montfort’s book, True Devotion to Mary. In that Preface―written in 1858, almost 60 years before Our Lady’s words at Fatima―Fr. Faber laments the poor state of devotion to Our Lady in the following words:
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one! Here in England, Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It is frightened out of its wits by the sneers of heresy! It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that Protestants may feel at ease about her! Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be! It has no faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized! Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines!
“Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother! I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable Grignion de Montfort! Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ! Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!” (From the Preface of Fr. Frederick William Faber, in his own personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s book, True Devotion to Mary).
Charity Begins at Home―Devotion Begins at Home
There is a proverb―not biblical―that says: “Charity begins at home!” What this means to say is that we should be learning how to be charitable from our very earliest years of existence in a loving, charitable environment that the family home should manifest. If the parents are charitable, then the children learn from that example to also be charitable. If the parents are uncharitable, then the children will imitate that uncharitableness. The secular proverb, “Like father, like son” is based upon the biblical proverb, “As the mother was, so also is her daughter” (Ezechiel 16:44). If “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), then so too should the family home be charitable.
Devotion is defined as being a high level of charity, the pinnacle of charity and love. Thus when Our Lady of Fatima says: “Jesus to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world!” and “God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart!” ― then Our Lady is not just speaking about a love for her Immaculate Heart, but she speaking about a high level of love, the pinnacle of love, which is shown by the word “devotion”.
There is absolutely no doubt that each and every household, each and every family, each and every family member is capable of the highest devotion―the problem is that they are devoted to the wrong things! They are devoted to things of this world―rather than being devoted to things of Heaven. “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” says Our Lord (Matthew 16:26). If you were the proverbial “fly-on-the-wall” in the homes of the world, you would witness astounding manifestations of devotion―but it would be for worldly things. People spend hours and hours watching television, browsing the internet, surfing social media, listening to music, chatting on the phone, playing sports, working on their pet projects, cooking, cleaning, making additions to the house, gardening, exercising, beautifying themselves, shopping and window shopping, gossiping, having barbecues and cookouts, socializing, etc. The time, energy and fervor given to God is ridiculously low and embarrassing when compared to the time, energy and fervor given to those pastimes and occupations! We certainly are capable of devotion―but we show nothing of it to God and Our Lady.
By simply doing this―and neglecting God―we are breaking the greatest commandment that there is! “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). What do you think the government and judiciary would do to you if you broke the greatest law of the land? There are still over 40 categories of Federal Law that carry the death penalty if they are broken. Yet we break God’s laws with ease, with complacency, with feelings of impunity―and the greatest of those laws is the law of love and devotion. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
A Divided City Shall Fall―A Divided Soul Shall Fall
We are made of body and soul―something spiritual and something physical. We apply our body and soul to everyday living―we do physical work with our body and we do intellectual work with our soul or mind. Both are put use and need to be used if we are to have any chance of living a normal life. Persons with crippled bodies or crippled minds cannot lead a normal life. Furthermore, there should be no “divorce” between our body and soul―that is to say, between things we think and the things we say; between the things we believe and the things we do; between how we talk and how we act. God is all about unity― “Be careful to keep the unity of the Spirit! One body and one Spirit. One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism!” (Ephesians 4:5). “If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand!” (Mark 3:24) … “Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate! And every city or house divided against itself shall not stand!” (Matthew 12:25). That is why Our Lord warns: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Hence Our Lord adds: “Every one therefore that hears these my words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these my words, and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthe7:24-27). Devotion is our rock―devotion to Our Lady is our rock in these turbulent times―as she herself said: Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” (Fatima, July 1917) … “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!” (Akita, 1973).
Our Lady of Fatima echoed the above words of Our Lord―Sister Lucia repeats what Our Lady said to her: “Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them!” (Sr. Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Optimism Bias ― Optimism By Asses
Do you think you are a better-than-average driver? Chances are you do. And do you know what? So do 80% to 90% of other drivers! Think about that for a second―not everyone can be above average. There are a variety of things in which we all think we are above average, including health, popularity, memory, attractiveness, and even academic and job performance. In fact, there are so many things that we think we are good at that there is name for it: optimism bias.
Optimism bias is the belief that each of us is more likely to experience good outcomes and less likely to experience bad outcomes. The key to optimism bias is that we disregard the reality of an overall situation because we think we are excluded from the potential negative effects. This is why warning labels don’t seem to work. You have probably seen warning labels spelling out the health consequences of cigarettes. But in spite of those labels, about 500,000 people die from using tobacco products every year. You have heard warnings about not driving while intoxicated. Yet about 10,000 people die every year in alcohol-related traffic accidents.
You might believe that World War Three is on the horizon, but you also probably think that you, personally, will be okay when someone drops the first nuke. That’s because around 80% of people, across all age groups and genders, suffer from what social psychologists call optimism bias. It’s that enduring, against-all-odds belief that things are going to work out on an individual level, and it’s a nice feeling―until the opposite happens! They believe that bad things won’t happen in the future, because nothing bad has happened in the past. It’s a form of denial and self-delusion.
We can also see that optimism bias at work in the Faith. Everyone thinks that they are a better Catholic than they really are! Think about this then―Our Lord said to one of His mystics (not just an average person like us): “If you could see yourself as I see you, then you would die in terror!” No room left for optimism bias there, huh? The modern-day Church has also taken on the optimism bias in the sense that most people seem to imagine that everyone who dies goes to Heaven! Our Lord, Our Lady, many saints and theologians say the opposite. It is a fair bet that everyone in Hell was guilty of optimism bias while still on Earth ― “Oh I’ll be alright! I won’t go to Hell!” Well guess where they are now!
Similarly with the matter of devotion. Almost everyone thinks that their devotion to God in general, and Our Lady or the Immaculate Heart of Mary in particular, is above average. How do we know that? Well because if you do not have enough of something, then you make efforts to get more of it. If you feel that you a short of devotion, then you would make efforts to increase your devotion. We do not see many―if any―making efforts to increase their devotion. Rather, it is a case of the same old, same old, same old―year after year. Yet when you look at those levels of devotion―you can clearly see that they are pretty low. There is little or no attempt to attend extra weekday Masses―being satisfied with the Sunday Mass; saying fast, hurried, distracted Rosaries and prayers; Rosary prayers merely said without the mysteries being meditated; little preparation before Holy Mass and Holy Communion, and most of it is done with little fervor or feeling, flying along on auto-pilot; rushed thanksgivings (or no thanksgivings) after Holy Communion and Mass as they rush off to do better, more important, more appealing things; little or no spiritual reading―especially the “heavyweight” kind that could really impact your life, with preference being given to the light fluffy stuff; no daily examination of conscience; no program for the acquisition and perfection of virtues―they just “wing-it”. The list could go on and on. All of this betrays a lack of devotion and shows a minimalist attitude to the Faith, God and Our Lady.
Re-Devotioning Our Devotionless Devotions!
You may have heard or read Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale about The Emperor’s New Clothes, wherein two tricksters pose as weavers and tailors of an invisible set of clothes. They tell the emperor that only intelligent people are able to see the invisible cloth and that it could not be seen by those who are stupid―by which ruse they manage to make the emperor believe that the clothes really exist, because the emperor did not want to appear to be stupid. He purchases the invisible cloth from them at a very high price, thinking that he could use it to see who was intelligent and who was stupid in his empire. Of course, in reality there was no invisible cloth and no invisible clothes―yet nobody was prepared to say the truth for fear of being thought to be stupid. The emperor, not wanting to thought of as stupid by others, but wanting to parade his new suit of (invisible) clothes to all the people, ended up going to the parade naked!
It is like that with our devotion or devotions. We imagine them to be what they are not and we imagine ourselves to be devoted when we are not. St. Francis de Sales has some words to say on this imaginary devotion issue in his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, wherein he writes: “There is only one true devotion while there is a very large number of false and meaningless ones. So if you cannot recognize true devotion, you could be deceived and waste time in following some devotion that is irrelevant and irrational. Each person represents devotion according to his liking and imagination. He who is in the habit of fasting will think that just because he fasts he is very devout―even though his heart is filled with hatred. He will not take a sip of wine, or even of water, anxious about sobriety―but he has no scruples to sip the blood of his neighbor by speaking ill or by false statements. Another considers himself devout because of the very great number of prayers he recites every day―even though soon after this he speaks words that are annoying, full of pride and hurtful to those in his house and to his neighbors. Another very gladly opens his purse to give alms to the poor―but cannot take any gentleness from his heart to forgive his enemies. Yet another will forgive his enemies―but will not pay what he owes unless he is legally forced to do so. All such persons are generally looked upon as devout whereas in fact they are not.”
What St. Francis de Sales is saying is that we all have a tendency to make mountains out of our molehills of devotion―while at the same time making our mountains of sins look like mere molehills! He further points out our tendency to pick and choose only those virtues that we like, while ignoring other virtues that we do not like or that will cost us too much―thus we mix virtue with sin. A glass of wine that only has a little poison in it, is nevertheless a poisonous drink―the poison does not have to be greater in proportion to the wine. Likewise, you don’t have to commit lots and lots of mortal sins in order to go to Hell―one single mortal sin will suffice, even if the rest of your life is virtuous! Similarly, you do not need to deny all the dogmas of the Catholic Church in order to become a heretic―denying just one dogma is enough for heresy!
Back to Kindergarten
What is the point of all this? It is to point out that the practice of devotion must be wholehearted and not halfhearted. It cannot be a service of both God and the world. Devotion is like sanctity―nobody is a saint when they first start out on the road to Heaven, but they had better become a saint before they die, for only saints go to Heaven. Those who choose not to try and achieve sanctity, will end up―not in Heaven―but in either Purgatory or Hell. Neither place is pleasant, but very painful. Devotion is a high level of charity and love. Mediocrity and devotion are opposites and cannot be reconciled. To try pass off mediocrity for devotion is hypocrisy. Thus the first step towards acquiring a true devotion is to humbly acknowledge that we have a long way to go and that we are in the kindergarten class or lower grades in the school of devotion. If we exaggerate our level of devotion, then God will let us fail and fall in our pride.
True Devotion Comes from a Humble Heart
Devotion to the immaculate Heart of Mary is primarily based upon the Sacred Scriptures. In the New Testament, there are two references to the Heart of Mary in the Gospel according to St. Luke: “Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart” (Luke 2:19) and again later, Luke writes: “His Mother kept all these words in her heart” (Luke 2:51). Likewise, for a true devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, you need to keep Mary in your mind and heart―you need to ponder Mary, to wonder about Mary, to listen to Mary, to obey her requests. It was the Heart of Mary which humbly expressed her “yes” or “fiat” to God: “Be it done unto me according to Thy word!” This was her humble response to the message sent through the angel at the Annunciation. By her humble loving consent, Mary first conceived Christ in her heart and then in her womb. The importance of the heart is often stressed by Holy Scripture. Our Lord demands not mere lip service, but service from the heart. He calls some of the Pharisees and Jews hypocrites for being content with mere lip-service: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). In the Book of Deuteronomy we are told, “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your strength” (Deuteronomy 6:5). When Our Lord Jesus Christ was asked which was the first commandment, He answered: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:29-30).
Nevertheless, fictional love, theoretical love, virtual love, lip-love is not what God and Our Lady want. Just as “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20), likewise love without works is dead. If Our Lord says: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” ― then Our Lady says the same thing: “Keep my requests and demands!” Just as Our Lord says: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46), Our Lady could say: “Why do you say to Me, ‘Hail Mary! Hail Mary!’ and do not the things which I say?” In her apparitions, Our Lady has not come to show-off her clothes, nor has she come for us to admire her beauty―she has come to be heard and we need to listen to her words and “keep all her words in our heart, pondering them in our heart.” Just as we digest and assimilate food so that it becomes a part of our body―so too must we digest and assimilate the words of Our Lady so that they become a part of our soul, a part of our spirit, making us “one heart and one soul” with Mary (Acts 4:32). Mary is not a statue that we bring out of the closet for a few minutes each day to pray and talk to her! Adapting St. Paul’s phrase about Christ, we should say: “I live, now not I; but Mary lives in me!” (Galatians 2:20). Once we have assimilated the spirit of Mary, then we can say that Mary lives in us.
If we can talk sports at home for hours on end, or talk about the television shows we’ve watched, or the music we’ve heard, or talk about our work and hobbies, trips and vacations, our relatives, friends and neighbors―then why can’t we talk about Mary for hours on end? One basic reason is that we know very little about Mary―apart from the superficial things that everyone is or should be acquainted with. You cannot talk about what you do not know―and you cannot love what you do not know. What is there to stop you learning something new about Mary each and every day? You could then communicate your new found knowledge to the rest of the family―and perhaps listen to their new found knowledge of Mary too! God is not going to download that information into your brain―you have go out and dig for the information. The better you know and understand Mary, the better will your prayers be and the more powerful will your prayers be―for you will start becoming “one heart and one soul” with Mary. So rather than just pray and pray and pray more and more and more to Mary―take time to know whom you are praying to and get to understand the mind and outlook of Mary. It will save you a lot of grief in the long run! We see an indication of this in the Catechism answer to the question as to why God made us―“God made us to know Him, Love Him and Serve Him.” Notice that knowledge comes first―it is not just a haphazard ordering―KNOW, LOVE, SERVE―but a logical ordering. For we must first know something before we can love it―and you are not likely to serve for very long someone whom you do not love. God has wired us to love what is good―thus by knowing Mary more (who the greatest good after God), we cannot but help loving her more.
There are multiple ways in which you and your family can grow in knowledge of Mary―the chief ways that any knowledge comes into our minds is by visual and auditory means, that is to say, what we see, what we read and what we hear. Some people love reading, others prefer listening, while others prefer visually watching something. With today’s modern technology, it is not hard to find Marian materials in your preferred medium―books, videos, books or sermons on tape/CD. There can be no real excuse for finding Marian materials, because they are everywhere and easily found on the internet. The only real reason for not doing so is not a lack of availability, but a lack of enthusiasm―most people are just not interested in Mary (unless they are trying to get something for themselves from her through prayer!). For most people, there are thousands of better, more interesting things to do than getting to know Mary! What an insult to the Mother of God! What an insult to God too! For Mary is His masterpiece―and we can’t be bothered to study His masterpiece!
The books and articles about Mary―whether hard-copies, digital books, or online―cover an immense variety of topics concerning Mary.
(1) You can read about her life as she has revealed to certain mystics;
(2) Or you can read about her apparitions and the messages she gave;
(3) Then you have her feasts―which are literally at least one feast for every day of the year. Our Calendar pages will set you off on that path with a brief overview for every day of the year, which you can then research and study further if you wish;
(4) There are countless sermons on Mary by Church Fathers, Saints, Blesseds, Venerables, popes and theologians.
(5) You also have papal encyclicals on Mary by various popes.
(6) Read about the lives of saints who were particularly devoted to Mary.
(7) There are materials available about the multitude of shrines to Our Lady throughout the world.
(8) You can also find lots of material on the various Sacramentals of Mary―her scapulars and medals and chaplets.
(9) Many books and articles are available that explain the many virtues and privileges of Mary.
(10) Also books on the role of Mary in the spiritual life. Spiritual theology ranks higher than Dogmatic and Moral theology.
(11) Books giving meditations on Mary―meditations often take the theological aspect and apply it to practical use.
(12) Books or articles that supply you with meditations for all the 15 Mysteries of the Holy Rosary.
(13) Numerous prayers dedicate to Mary―these are wonderful springboard for learning to compose your own prayers.
(14) Lots of hymns in honor of Mary―hymns are instructive and often express key teachings about their subject.
Don’t try and lamely say that after reading such things that your love and appreciation of Mary will not increase! Of course it will―but you have to make the effort to find and read these things! Nor try the lame excuse that you have no time to do these things! Mary plays a key role in a person’s salvation―are you saying you have no time to work on your salvation? Holy Mother Church puts these words in the mouth of Mary: “He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord!” (Proverbs 8:35; Epistle from the Mass of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th). Also: “Come over to me, all ye that desire me, and be filled with my fruits! For my spirit is sweet above honey, and my inheritance above honey and the honeycomb! My memory is unto everlasting generations. They that eat me, shall yet hunger: and they that drink me, shall yet thirst! He that listens to me, shall not be confounded; and they that work by me, shall not sin! They that explain me shall have life everlasting!” (Ecclesiasticus 24:26-31; Epistle from the Mass of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, July 16th).
Practical Aspect of Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary
St. Louis de Montfort, in his book True Devotion to Mary, has a section entitled: “Common Practices, both Interior and Exterior”, wherein he lists some practical ways in which we can show our devotion to Our Lady. Here are those suggestions:
“There are several INTERIOR PRACTICES of true devotion to the Blessed Virgin. Here are the principal ones, stated compendiously:
(1) to honor her as the worthy Mother of God, with the worship of hyperdulia; that is to say, to esteem her and honor her above all the other saints, as the masterpiece of grace, and the first after Jesus Christ, true God and true Man;
(2) to meditate on her virtues, her privileges and her actions;
(3) to contemplate her grandeurs;
(4) to make acts of love, of praise, of gratitude to her;
(5) to invoke her cordially;
(6) to offer ourselves to her and unite ourselves with her;
(7) to do all our actions with the view of pleasing her;
(8) to begin, to continue and to finish all our actions by her, in her, with her and for her, in order that we may do them by Jesus Christ, in Jesus Christ, with Jesus Christ and for Jesus Christ, our Last End. We will presently explain this last practice.
“True devotion to Our Lady also has several EXTERIOR PRACTICES, of which the following are the principal ones:
(1) to enroll ourselves in her confraternities and enter her congregations;
(2) to join the religious orders instituted in her honor;
(3) to proclaim her praises [by the written or the spoken word];
(4) to give alms, to fast and to undergo outward and inward mortifications in her honor;
(5) to wear her liveries, such as the Rosary, the Scapular or the little chain;
(6) to recite with attention, devotion and modesty the Holy Rosary.
(7) to say a chaplet of six or seven decades in honor of the years which we believe Our Lady lived on Earth;
(8) to recite the Little Crown of the Blessed Virgin, composed of three Our Fathers and twelve Hail Mary’s, in honor of her crown of twelve stars or privileges;
(9) to pray the Little Office of Our Lady, so universally received and recited in the Church;
(10) to say the Little Psalter of the holy Virgin, which St. Bonaventure composed in her honor;
(11) to pray fourteen Our Fathers and Hail Mary’s in honor of her fourteen joys;
(12) to recite some other prayers, hymns and canticles of the Church, such as the Salve Regina, the Alma, the Ave Regina Coelorum, or the Regina Coeli, according to the different seasons; or the Ave Maris Stella, the O Gloriosa Domina, the Magnificat, or some other practices of devotion, of which books are full;
(13) to sing, or have sung, spiritual canticles in her honor;
(14) to make a number of genuflections or reverences, while saying, for example, every morning, sixty or a hundred times, Ave Maria, Virgo Fidelis (“Hail Mary, Faithful Virgin”), to obtain from God through her the grace to be faithful to the graces of God during the day; and then again in the evening, Ave Maria, Mater Misericordiae (“Hail Mary, Mother of Mercy”) to ask pardon of God through her for the sins that we have committed during the day;
(15) to take care of her confraternities, to adorn her altars, to crown and ornament her images;
(16) to carry her images, or to have them carried, in procession, and to carry a picture or an image of her about our own persons, as a mighty arm against the evil spirit;
(17) to have copies of her name or picture made and placed in churches, or in houses, or on the gates and entrances into cities, churches and houses;
(18) to consecrate ourselves to her in a special and solemn manner.
(Taken from St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary, chapter 3, Article 2, Section 2: “Practices”).
Article 9
Sunday & Monday, August 18th & 19th
Clean Out Your Heart for the Immaculate Heart!
Sunday & Monday, August 18th & 19th
Clean Out Your Heart for the Immaculate Heart!
The Queen of Grace on the Throne of Grace
In the Introit of the Mass of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, we read: “Let us come with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and may find grace.” (Hebrews 4:16). St. Louis de Montfort tells us that God has made Mary His treasury of grace: “God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (mare). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Maria) … God the Son has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He distributes His graces and makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly … To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has chosen her to be the dispenser of all His gifts and graces … The will of the Most High, has made Mary the treasurer of His treasures, and dispenser of His graces” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Grace is Everything―Everything is Grace
As Our Lord says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). All that is good is a grace of God and we cannot do anything good without the grace of God. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
Cleaned by Grace―Saved by Grace
Grace is essentially of two kinds―Sanctifying and Actual Grace (of which there are further subdivisions). We cannot get into Heaven without Sanctifying Grace and we cannot function correctly on Earth without Actual Grace. Sanctifying Grace is intended to be an habitual grace (habitually residing in the soul) unless we drive it out by Mortal Sin. Actual Grace is a temporary assisting and passing grace that helps us millions of different ways to do the things God wants us to do and helps us preserve Sanctifying Grace. There is nobody in Heaven without Sanctifying Grace in their soul―and there is nobody in Hell with Sanctifying Grace in their soul. Grace is everything―it is all that really matters. Grace cleanses the soul. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Baptismal water touches the body and cleanses the heart. But the heart is not cleansed except through grace” (IIIa, q. 62, art. 1).
One would imagine that most people would want to know all there is to know about grace―especially since there can no salvation without grace: “The grace of God [brings] life everlasting” (Romans 6:23) … “By grace you are saved, and not of yourselves, for it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8) … “By Christ’s grace you are saved!” (Ephesians 2:5). “Being justified by His grace, we may be heirs to life everlasting” (Titus 3:7). “Let us go therefore with confidence to the throne of grace―so that we may obtain mercy!” (Hebrews 4:16).
We Need Grace―We Need Mary
Consequently, in another of his books, The Secret of Mary, St. Louis de Montfort writes: “It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness! Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God. The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure, although He always gives sufficient grace to each. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God. Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person. It was Mary who gave existence and life to the author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the Mother of Grace. God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
We Need the Waters of Grace to Cleanse Us
The Fathers of the Church often speak of water as being the symbol of grace. Why? Because water cleanses form dirt and grace cleanses from sin. We all know that water cleanses the body when we wash ourselves with it―it also washes and cleanses many other objects: we wash our fruits and vegetables before eating them, “Everything unclean, and shall not be eaten! All that is clean, you shall eat!” (Deuteronomy 14:19-20). We wash our dishes, our clothes, our cars, our floors, our windows, etc. We want to be physically clean and want our possessions to be clean. The same is true of the soul and the spiritual life. “Let us draw near with a true heart in fullness of Faith, having our bodies washed with clean water and our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience!” (Hebrews 10:22). “All things are clean to the clean―but to them that are defiled, and to unbelievers, nothing is clean―but both their mind and their conscience are defiled!” (Titus 1:15). “He shall perish … because he was not sprinkled with the water of expiation! He shall be unclean and his uncleanness shall remain upon him!” (Numbers 19:13).
Humans tend to be superficial―they live by appearances; they want to appear as being good without really being good. Our Lord condemned this in the Scribes and Pharisees: “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! You make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside you are full of rapine and uncleanness. You blind Pharisee! First make clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside may become clean!” (Matthew 23:25-26). We live in a superficial world―a world of false appearances―a world that is not of God: “The land is an unclean land, according to the uncleanness of the people, with their abominations, who have filled it with their filth!” (1 Esdras 9:11). “Thy uncleanness is execrable―because I desired to cleanse thee, and thou art not cleansed from thy filthiness. Neither shalt thou be cleansed, before I cause my indignation to rest in thee!” (Ezechiel 24:13). “Every man … in whom there is uncleanness, shall perish before the Lord!” (Leviticus 22:3).
“Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin?’” (Proverbs 20:9). Our souls were made by God and God wants them to be clean: “Dung is swept away till all be clean!” (3 Kings 14:10) … “I will pour upon you clean water, and you shall be cleansed from all your filthiness and I will cleanse you from all your idols!” (Ezechiel 36:25) “Wash yourselves, be clean! Take away the evil of your devices from my eyes! Cease to do perversely!” (Isaias 1:16). “Walk clean and upright!” (Job 8:6) … “Who shall ascend into the mountain of the Lord; or who shall stand in His holy place? The innocent in hands and clean of heart!” (Psalm 23:4) … “Blessed are the clean of heart―for they shall see God!” (Matthew 5:8). “Lord, if You want, You can make me clean!” (Matthew 8:2). “Create a clean heart in me, O God!” (Psalm 50:12).
Leprosy was always looked upon as being a symbol of sin. The miraculous healing of lepers―by prophets in the Old Testament and Our Lord in the New Testament―was symbolic of the miraculous healing of the soul from its sins.
“And there came to Jesus, a leper beseeching Him and kneeling down said to Him: ‘If You want, You can make me clean!’ And Jesus, having compassion on him, stretched forth His hand and touching him, said to him: ‘I do want! May you be made clean!’ And when He had spoken, immediately the leprosy departed from him, and he was made clean” (Mark 1:40-42) … “And as Jesus entered into a certain town, there met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off, and, lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus! Master! Have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go and show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean” (Luke 17:12-14).
“Naaman, the general of the army of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master, and honorable―for by him the Lord gave deliverance to Syria. And he was a valiant man and rich―but a leper! A little maid, a captive out of the land of Israel, was a servant to Naaman’s wife. She said to her mistress: ‘I wish my master had been with the prophet that is in Samaria! He would certainly have healed him of the leprosy which he has!’ Then Naaman went in to his lord and told him, saying: ‘Thus and thus said the girl from the land of Israel!’ And the King of Syria said to him: ‘Go, and I will send a letter to the King of Israel!’ And he departed and took with him ten talents of silver, and six thousand pieces of gold, and ten changes of clothing, and brought the letter to the King of Israel, in these words: ‘When you shall receive this letter, know that I have sent to you Naaman my servant, so that you may heal him of his leprosy.’
“And when the King of Israel had read the letter, he tore his garments, and said: ‘Am I God, to be able to kill and give life, that this man has sent to me, to heal a man of his leprosy? Mark and see how he seeks to provoke occasions against me!’ And when Eliseus the man of God had heard that the King of Israel had torn his garments, he sent word to him, saying: ‘Why have you torn your garments? Let him come to me, and let him know that there is a prophet in Israel!’ So Naaman came with his horses and chariots, and stood at the door of the house of Eliseus. And Eliseus sent a messenger to him, saying: ‘Go and wash seven times in the Jordan, and your flesh shall recover health, and you shall be clean!’
“Naaman was angry and went away, saying: ‘I thought he would have come out to me, and, standing, would have invoked the name of the Lord his God, and touched with his hand the place of the leprosy, and healed me! Are not the Abana, and the Pharphar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel, that I may wash in them and be made clean?’ So as he turned, and was going away with indignation, his servants came to him, and said to him: ‘Father, if the prophet had commanded you to do some great and difficult thing, surely you would have done it! How much better is it that he now has said to you: “Wash, and you shall be clean?”’ Then Naaman went down and washed in the Jordan seven times―according to the word of the man of God―and his flesh was restored, like the flesh of a little child, and he was made clean. And returning to the man of God, he came and stood before him, and said: ‘In truth, I know there is no other God in all the Earth, but only in Israel!’” (4 Kings 5:1-15).
The Cleansing Waters of Baptism and Grace
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “The water of Baptism, in respect of its proper power, cleanses the body, and thereby, inasmuch as it is the instrument of the Divine power, it also cleanses the soul. And thus it is that Augustine says that water touches the body and cleanses the heart. Hence Augustine says in a sermon on the Epiphany: ‘Nor should you marvel if we say that the physical substance water, achieves the cleansing of the soul. It does indeed―and penetrates every secret hiding-place of the conscience. For subtle and clear as it is, the blessing of Christ makes it yet more subtle, so that it permeates into the very principles of life and searches the inner-most recesses of the heart.’ Augustine then says: ‘From where does water get so great a power, that it touches the body and cleanses the heart?’ And St. Bede says that ‘Our Lord conferred a power of regeneration on the waters by the contact of His most pure body.’” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIIa, q. 62, articles 1 & 4).
As Jesus washed the feet of His Apostles at the Last Supper, “He said: ‘He that is washed, only needs to wash his feet, for he is clean wholly. And you are clean, but not all!’ For He knew who he was that would betray Him―therefore He said: ‘You are not all clean!’” (John 13:10-11).
Be Clean!
“As regards fornication and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not so much as be named among you, as becomes saints!” (Ephesians 5:3) … “Therefore mortify your members from fornication, uncleanness, lust, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is the service of idols!” (Colossians 3:5) … “For God has not called us unto uncleanness, but unto sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:7) … “Blessed are they that wash their robes in the Blood of the Lamb―so that they may have a right to the tree of life, and may enter in by the gates into the city [of Heaven]” (Apocalypse 22:14) ... “There shall not enter into it anything defiled, or that works abomination or makes a lie!” (Apocalypse 21:27).
It is not by chance that God chose water to be the material for Baptism: “Be baptized and wash away thy sins!” (Acts 22:16). Water washes things clean and water fills things up. We cannot exist without water. The general consensus is that people can survive for only around three days without water, with estimates typically ranging from two days to a week, after that body organs start to dysfunction and shut-down. We are even made of water―our bodies are anywhere from 50% to 70% water. An average adult body is 50% to 60% water; a man’s body is 60% to 65% water; a woman’s body 50% to 60% percent; and infants 65% to 70% water. Water is vital to our health. It plays a key role in many of our body’s functions, including bringing nutrients to cells; protecting and moistening joints and organs; and maintaining body temperature; helps with digestion, breathing, metabolism and weight loss. Water even cleans our insides by getting rid of wastes and toxins from the body. It is hardly surprising that water is a symbol of the workings of grace in our souls! Just like we cannot survive without water, neither can we survive without grace.
Our Lady was created by God free from the stain of Original Sin and free from the stain of any and all sin throughout her entire life. She was made clean and she kept herself clean―because that is what God wants. It is no coincidence that at Lourdes, Our Lady announces herself to be the Immaculate Conception―while at the same place she miraculously produces the flow of a stream of water that still flows to this day. Water washes and grace cleanses―and water is a symbol of grace. Despite the countless number of lame, blind, deaf, disabled and sufferers of every kind who have been cured by the miraculous waters of Lourdes, the most beautiful miracle worked by the Blessed Virgin is the transformation of hearts. In fact, even more abundant than the miraculously cured from bodily illnesses, are those who have been “washed from within” and have had the love of God and the life of grace restored ― or even established ― in their souls.
Children Take After Their Parents
We all know the phrase “Like father, like son!” ― meaning that the son imitates his father. This saying is very ancient and can be found in Holy Scripture: “As the mother was, so also is her daughter!” (Ezechiel 16:44). If we profess, protest or pretend to be “children” of Mary due to our devotion to her, then are we imitating our heavenly Mother? If we speak of her Immaculate Heart and her Immaculate Conception―are we also immaculate and pure of heart? If sin is the greatest evil in world―whether it be mortal sin or even venial sin―then are we fighting sin with all our might, or are we at peace with doing some “venially” greatest evils in the world? Even though the Immaculate Heart is the Mother of Mercy and the Refuge of Sinners―she cannot accept, be at peace with, or tolerate sin in her spiritual children. For that would mean being at peace with God being offended―and there is just no way that Our Lady would do that! Just like God―she loves the poor pitiful sinner, but hates the evil of the sinner’s sin. In other words―are we true and faithful children of Mary with a true devotion to our Immaculate Mother? Or are false and faithless children of Mary with a fake devotion to her? St. Louis de Montfort speaks of seven chief kinds of false devotions to Mary, namely: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the interested devotees.
In the Introit of the Mass of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, we read: “Let us come with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and may find grace.” (Hebrews 4:16). St. Louis de Montfort tells us that God has made Mary His treasury of grace: “God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (mare). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Maria) … God the Son has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He distributes His graces and makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly … To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has chosen her to be the dispenser of all His gifts and graces … The will of the Most High, has made Mary the treasurer of His treasures, and dispenser of His graces” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Grace is Everything―Everything is Grace
As Our Lord says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). All that is good is a grace of God and we cannot do anything good without the grace of God. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
Cleaned by Grace―Saved by Grace
Grace is essentially of two kinds―Sanctifying and Actual Grace (of which there are further subdivisions). We cannot get into Heaven without Sanctifying Grace and we cannot function correctly on Earth without Actual Grace. Sanctifying Grace is intended to be an habitual grace (habitually residing in the soul) unless we drive it out by Mortal Sin. Actual Grace is a temporary assisting and passing grace that helps us millions of different ways to do the things God wants us to do and helps us preserve Sanctifying Grace. There is nobody in Heaven without Sanctifying Grace in their soul―and there is nobody in Hell with Sanctifying Grace in their soul. Grace is everything―it is all that really matters. Grace cleanses the soul. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Baptismal water touches the body and cleanses the heart. But the heart is not cleansed except through grace” (IIIa, q. 62, art. 1).
One would imagine that most people would want to know all there is to know about grace―especially since there can no salvation without grace: “The grace of God [brings] life everlasting” (Romans 6:23) … “By grace you are saved, and not of yourselves, for it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8) … “By Christ’s grace you are saved!” (Ephesians 2:5). “Being justified by His grace, we may be heirs to life everlasting” (Titus 3:7). “Let us go therefore with confidence to the throne of grace―so that we may obtain mercy!” (Hebrews 4:16).
We Need Grace―We Need Mary
Consequently, in another of his books, The Secret of Mary, St. Louis de Montfort writes: “It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness! Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God. The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure, although He always gives sufficient grace to each. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God. Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person. It was Mary who gave existence and life to the author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the Mother of Grace. God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
We Need the Waters of Grace to Cleanse Us
The Fathers of the Church often speak of water as being the symbol of grace. Why? Because water cleanses form dirt and grace cleanses from sin. We all know that water cleanses the body when we wash ourselves with it―it also washes and cleanses many other objects: we wash our fruits and vegetables before eating them, “Everything unclean, and shall not be eaten! All that is clean, you shall eat!” (Deuteronomy 14:19-20). We wash our dishes, our clothes, our cars, our floors, our windows, etc. We want to be physically clean and want our possessions to be clean. The same is true of the soul and the spiritual life. “Let us draw near with a true heart in fullness of Faith, having our bodies washed with clean water and our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience!” (Hebrews 10:22). “All things are clean to the clean―but to them that are defiled, and to unbelievers, nothing is clean―but both their mind and their conscience are defiled!” (Titus 1:15). “He shall perish … because he was not sprinkled with the water of expiation! He shall be unclean and his uncleanness shall remain upon him!” (Numbers 19:13).
Humans tend to be superficial―they live by appearances; they want to appear as being good without really being good. Our Lord condemned this in the Scribes and Pharisees: “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! You make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside you are full of rapine and uncleanness. You blind Pharisee! First make clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside may become clean!” (Matthew 23:25-26). We live in a superficial world―a world of false appearances―a world that is not of God: “The land is an unclean land, according to the uncleanness of the people, with their abominations, who have filled it with their filth!” (1 Esdras 9:11). “Thy uncleanness is execrable―because I desired to cleanse thee, and thou art not cleansed from thy filthiness. Neither shalt thou be cleansed, before I cause my indignation to rest in thee!” (Ezechiel 24:13). “Every man … in whom there is uncleanness, shall perish before the Lord!” (Leviticus 22:3).
“Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin?’” (Proverbs 20:9). Our souls were made by God and God wants them to be clean: “Dung is swept away till all be clean!” (3 Kings 14:10) … “I will pour upon you clean water, and you shall be cleansed from all your filthiness and I will cleanse you from all your idols!” (Ezechiel 36:25) “Wash yourselves, be clean! Take away the evil of your devices from my eyes! Cease to do perversely!” (Isaias 1:16). “Walk clean and upright!” (Job 8:6) … “Who shall ascend into the mountain of the Lord; or who shall stand in His holy place? The innocent in hands and clean of heart!” (Psalm 23:4) … “Blessed are the clean of heart―for they shall see God!” (Matthew 5:8). “Lord, if You want, You can make me clean!” (Matthew 8:2). “Create a clean heart in me, O God!” (Psalm 50:12).
Leprosy was always looked upon as being a symbol of sin. The miraculous healing of lepers―by prophets in the Old Testament and Our Lord in the New Testament―was symbolic of the miraculous healing of the soul from its sins.
“And there came to Jesus, a leper beseeching Him and kneeling down said to Him: ‘If You want, You can make me clean!’ And Jesus, having compassion on him, stretched forth His hand and touching him, said to him: ‘I do want! May you be made clean!’ And when He had spoken, immediately the leprosy departed from him, and he was made clean” (Mark 1:40-42) … “And as Jesus entered into a certain town, there met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off, and, lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus! Master! Have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go and show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean” (Luke 17:12-14).
“Naaman, the general of the army of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master, and honorable―for by him the Lord gave deliverance to Syria. And he was a valiant man and rich―but a leper! A little maid, a captive out of the land of Israel, was a servant to Naaman’s wife. She said to her mistress: ‘I wish my master had been with the prophet that is in Samaria! He would certainly have healed him of the leprosy which he has!’ Then Naaman went in to his lord and told him, saying: ‘Thus and thus said the girl from the land of Israel!’ And the King of Syria said to him: ‘Go, and I will send a letter to the King of Israel!’ And he departed and took with him ten talents of silver, and six thousand pieces of gold, and ten changes of clothing, and brought the letter to the King of Israel, in these words: ‘When you shall receive this letter, know that I have sent to you Naaman my servant, so that you may heal him of his leprosy.’
“And when the King of Israel had read the letter, he tore his garments, and said: ‘Am I God, to be able to kill and give life, that this man has sent to me, to heal a man of his leprosy? Mark and see how he seeks to provoke occasions against me!’ And when Eliseus the man of God had heard that the King of Israel had torn his garments, he sent word to him, saying: ‘Why have you torn your garments? Let him come to me, and let him know that there is a prophet in Israel!’ So Naaman came with his horses and chariots, and stood at the door of the house of Eliseus. And Eliseus sent a messenger to him, saying: ‘Go and wash seven times in the Jordan, and your flesh shall recover health, and you shall be clean!’
“Naaman was angry and went away, saying: ‘I thought he would have come out to me, and, standing, would have invoked the name of the Lord his God, and touched with his hand the place of the leprosy, and healed me! Are not the Abana, and the Pharphar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel, that I may wash in them and be made clean?’ So as he turned, and was going away with indignation, his servants came to him, and said to him: ‘Father, if the prophet had commanded you to do some great and difficult thing, surely you would have done it! How much better is it that he now has said to you: “Wash, and you shall be clean?”’ Then Naaman went down and washed in the Jordan seven times―according to the word of the man of God―and his flesh was restored, like the flesh of a little child, and he was made clean. And returning to the man of God, he came and stood before him, and said: ‘In truth, I know there is no other God in all the Earth, but only in Israel!’” (4 Kings 5:1-15).
The Cleansing Waters of Baptism and Grace
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “The water of Baptism, in respect of its proper power, cleanses the body, and thereby, inasmuch as it is the instrument of the Divine power, it also cleanses the soul. And thus it is that Augustine says that water touches the body and cleanses the heart. Hence Augustine says in a sermon on the Epiphany: ‘Nor should you marvel if we say that the physical substance water, achieves the cleansing of the soul. It does indeed―and penetrates every secret hiding-place of the conscience. For subtle and clear as it is, the blessing of Christ makes it yet more subtle, so that it permeates into the very principles of life and searches the inner-most recesses of the heart.’ Augustine then says: ‘From where does water get so great a power, that it touches the body and cleanses the heart?’ And St. Bede says that ‘Our Lord conferred a power of regeneration on the waters by the contact of His most pure body.’” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIIa, q. 62, articles 1 & 4).
As Jesus washed the feet of His Apostles at the Last Supper, “He said: ‘He that is washed, only needs to wash his feet, for he is clean wholly. And you are clean, but not all!’ For He knew who he was that would betray Him―therefore He said: ‘You are not all clean!’” (John 13:10-11).
Be Clean!
“As regards fornication and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not so much as be named among you, as becomes saints!” (Ephesians 5:3) … “Therefore mortify your members from fornication, uncleanness, lust, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is the service of idols!” (Colossians 3:5) … “For God has not called us unto uncleanness, but unto sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:7) … “Blessed are they that wash their robes in the Blood of the Lamb―so that they may have a right to the tree of life, and may enter in by the gates into the city [of Heaven]” (Apocalypse 22:14) ... “There shall not enter into it anything defiled, or that works abomination or makes a lie!” (Apocalypse 21:27).
It is not by chance that God chose water to be the material for Baptism: “Be baptized and wash away thy sins!” (Acts 22:16). Water washes things clean and water fills things up. We cannot exist without water. The general consensus is that people can survive for only around three days without water, with estimates typically ranging from two days to a week, after that body organs start to dysfunction and shut-down. We are even made of water―our bodies are anywhere from 50% to 70% water. An average adult body is 50% to 60% water; a man’s body is 60% to 65% water; a woman’s body 50% to 60% percent; and infants 65% to 70% water. Water is vital to our health. It plays a key role in many of our body’s functions, including bringing nutrients to cells; protecting and moistening joints and organs; and maintaining body temperature; helps with digestion, breathing, metabolism and weight loss. Water even cleans our insides by getting rid of wastes and toxins from the body. It is hardly surprising that water is a symbol of the workings of grace in our souls! Just like we cannot survive without water, neither can we survive without grace.
Our Lady was created by God free from the stain of Original Sin and free from the stain of any and all sin throughout her entire life. She was made clean and she kept herself clean―because that is what God wants. It is no coincidence that at Lourdes, Our Lady announces herself to be the Immaculate Conception―while at the same place she miraculously produces the flow of a stream of water that still flows to this day. Water washes and grace cleanses―and water is a symbol of grace. Despite the countless number of lame, blind, deaf, disabled and sufferers of every kind who have been cured by the miraculous waters of Lourdes, the most beautiful miracle worked by the Blessed Virgin is the transformation of hearts. In fact, even more abundant than the miraculously cured from bodily illnesses, are those who have been “washed from within” and have had the love of God and the life of grace restored ― or even established ― in their souls.
Children Take After Their Parents
We all know the phrase “Like father, like son!” ― meaning that the son imitates his father. This saying is very ancient and can be found in Holy Scripture: “As the mother was, so also is her daughter!” (Ezechiel 16:44). If we profess, protest or pretend to be “children” of Mary due to our devotion to her, then are we imitating our heavenly Mother? If we speak of her Immaculate Heart and her Immaculate Conception―are we also immaculate and pure of heart? If sin is the greatest evil in world―whether it be mortal sin or even venial sin―then are we fighting sin with all our might, or are we at peace with doing some “venially” greatest evils in the world? Even though the Immaculate Heart is the Mother of Mercy and the Refuge of Sinners―she cannot accept, be at peace with, or tolerate sin in her spiritual children. For that would mean being at peace with God being offended―and there is just no way that Our Lady would do that! Just like God―she loves the poor pitiful sinner, but hates the evil of the sinner’s sin. In other words―are we true and faithful children of Mary with a true devotion to our Immaculate Mother? Or are false and faithless children of Mary with a fake devotion to her? St. Louis de Montfort speaks of seven chief kinds of false devotions to Mary, namely: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the interested devotees.
Article 8
Friday & Saturday, August 16th & 17th
Will You Follow Mary to Heaven?
Friday & Saturday, August 16th & 17th
Will You Follow Mary to Heaven?
“Si Vis!” ― “If You Want!”
Looking at the Latin in Holy Scripture, the phrase “Si vis” crops up quite often. “Si vis!” is Latin for “If you want!” It comes from the Latin verb “velle” meaning “to want, wish, will, be willing.” The verb conjugation is not as simple as it is in English, e.g. I want, you want, he wants, we want, you want, they want. In Latin the singular and plural conjugations of the verb are volo (for I), vis (for you), vult (for he/she), volumus (for we), vultis (for you plural) and volunt (for they).
In Holy Scripture Our Lord says: “Quid tibi vis faciam?” ― “What do you want Me to do for you?” (Mark 10:51). What do you want from Our Lord? What do you want from God? God wants (Deus vult) your salvation. The Mother of God wants (Mater Dei vult) your salvation. You want (tu vis) your salvation―or at least it hoped that you want your salvation!
Heaven is yours―“Si vis!” (which is Latin for “If you want!”). The Latin phrase, “Si vis”, sounds much like the English expression, “See this!” Making a play on how words sound, you could say about Heaven: “See this! It’s yours, si vis!” Yet merely “wanting” is not enough! As the philosophical axiom states: “He who wants the end (goal, target, result, etc), must also necessarily want the means that lead to that end (goal, target, result, etc.).”
“Wanting” must evolve into Action
Hence it is that Our Lord said to the rich young man who had many possessions and wanted to attain to perfection and Heaven: “If you want to be perfect [si vis perfectus esse], go sell what you have and give to the poor, and you shall have a treasure in Heaven; and then come and follow Me!” (Matthew 19:2). As the philosophical axiom stated above: “He who wants the end (goal, target, result, etc), must also necessarily want the means that lead to that end (goal, target, result, etc.).” So Our Lord says―if you want the goal (perfection and Heaven), then take the means necessary to achieve your goal (sell your possessions, give away your riches, do not be attached to the things of this world and come follow Me). Wanting is not enough without action. Wanting is the blueprint and action is the building of what is on the blueprint. You can draw up a magnificent blueprint for the house that you want―but you cannot live in a blueprint, you have to go and build the house that is on your blueprint.
If you have Faith, but that Faith does not produce works, then your Faith is dead: “What shall it profit if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … But some man will say: ‘You have Faith, and I have works!’ Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! You believe that there is one God. You do well! But the devils also believe and tremble! Know, O vain man, know that Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-20).
In sports, merely wanting to win the trophy and be champions, is not enough―you have to work hard and train hard if you are going to have a chance of achieving what you want. Hence St. Paul writes: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain that prize! And everyone that strives for mastery in some thing, refrains himself from all things―and they indeed that they may receive a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible one! I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air―but I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection: lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
If you want to become a soldier with the U.S. Marines, then wanting is not enough―you have to go through an extremely tough boot camp and prove that you are good enough to be a Marine. The instructors will help you―but you have to the work! We are meant to be―through the Sacrament of Confirmation―Soldiers of Christ. We are meant to fight on the battlefield and not just theorize about fighting without getting out of our armchair! Soldiers are given arms for the fight, not armchairs! “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
Mary the Warrior Queen
Our Lady is now in Heaven. As St. Louis de Montfort says, “God has made her general of His armies .. and the exterminator of the enemies of God!” (True Devotion to Mary). Armies are not meant to sweep floors, clean windows, mow the lawn, and do the dishes―armies are trained to fight and Our Lady has no problems fighting and calling other to fight alongside her, so that they can one day be alongside her in Heaven.
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this role of Mary in the fight of Faith: “God has never made and formed but one enmity; but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end. It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her, even since the days of the earthly paradise—though she existed then only in His idea—with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel, that he fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself … God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always, up to this time, persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will, in the future, persecute them more than ever.
“She will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady―illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection―so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build (2 Esdras 4:7) the temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God, that is to say, the most holy Virgin, called by the Fathers the “Temple of Solomon” and the “City of God.” By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary.
“This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone ... The devil will raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others … Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times … She must shine forth in grace, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ, who shall battle for His interests … Mary will always have the victory over that proud spirit, and so great a victory that she will go so far as to crush his head, where his pride dwells. She will always discover the malice of the serpent. She will always lay bare his infernal plots and dissipate his diabolical councils, and even to the end of time will guard her faithful servants from his cruel claw.
“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But, in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. By their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be “like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful” Mary to pierce her enemies. (Psalm 126:4). They shall be the sons of Levi, well purified by the fire of great tribulation, and closely adhering to God (1 Corinthians 6:17), who shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body. They shall be everywhere the good odor of Jesus Christ to the poor and to the little, while at the same time, they shall be an odor of death to the great, to the rich and to the proud worldlings. They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High. They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies. They shall sleep without gold or silver, and, what is more, without care, in the midst of the other priests, ecclesiastics, and clerics (Psalm 67:14); and yet they shall have the silvered wings of the dove to go, with the pure intention of the glory of God and the salvation of souls, wheresoever the Holy Ghost shall call them. Nor shall they leave behind them, in the places where they have preached, anything but the gold of charity, which is the fulfillment of the whole law. (Romans 13:10).
“In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior. These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious and the idolaters.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Heaven is a Fight, Not a Freebie!
We live in a modern age of freebies and a sense of entitlement! We expect and want handouts and financial safety-nets. Free Schooling; Education Grants; Child Support; Food Stamps; Living Assistance; Unemployment Assistance; Healthcare and Medical Assistance; Loans; Social Security and Retirement Payments, etc. Some families, with both parents unemployed and two children to support, can receive the annualized equivalent of a six-figure income with no one working―for Washington State it is $122,000; for Massachusetts it is $117,000 and for New Jersey it is $108,000. In effect, you get paid for not working! It is not like that with Heaven! If you want to get to Heaven you must work and fight for Heaven! “Work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3-4) ... “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
Our Lady echoes the same message is her words to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Who is so dull-minded and stupid as not to know the dangers of the worldly life! … What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation? … The faithful are in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness! … In senseless fury they follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and care not where they walk, even if to the most dangerous precipices! ... Since the number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate should also be uncountable! … Let the countless numbers that have fallen into Hell with their burden, proclaim it! … Laborious exertions are very painful and averse to human nature according to the flesh … Hence it is that men do not find joy in their tribulations, nor rest in their labors, nor consolation in their sorrows, nor any peace in adversities ... How easily charity is wasted and set aside for any kind of pleasure, and how often Faith remains without any fruit! … For, being altogether different from the saints―who glory in tribulation as the fulfillment of their most earnest desires―these worldlings desire none of it and abhor everything that is painful ... Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment! … . I do not count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son! ...
“Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? … Through the ignorance and error of mortals, nearly all of them strive to avoid labor and suffering and are frightened by the royal and secure road of mortification and the Cross … In many of the faithful this ignorance goes still farther―for some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion … All their life they labor and exert themselves to become more and more entangled in the snares of their passions, to be consumed in deceitful vanities and to deliver themselves over to an inextinguishable fire, death and everlasting perdition in Hell, as if all were a mere joke! They want to procure for themselves the pleasures of this life as well as of eternal life … Full of this deceitful ignorance, they not only abhor resemblance to Christ’s suffering, but they make their recovery impossible―since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering … As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation … Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16) ... The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable! … Therefore let mortals show themselves thankful, and willingly entering upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, to bear it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
So Many Souls Are Lost Through Neglect―Especially a Neglect of Mary
The majority of souls end up being damned―but that seems to trouble nobody! Few souls are saved―and most people somehow imagine that they are bound to be among the few, so there is no need to fear or worry! Yet Our Lady says: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. Yet for this very reason they ought to be more attentive and careful, since invisible enemies are more cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day!”
“So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing―because the wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... As the Mother of clemency, it is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, for failing to call upon me, so many souls should be lost! ... Afflict yourself, lament and grieve without consolation over this ruin of so many souls!”
“The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation.”
“The result of this torpid insensibility to eternal damnation, and to the deceits of the devils in fastening it upon men, is dreadful. Without knowing upon what they rest their false security, the sinners are asleep and perfectly at ease as to their ruin, when they ought justly to fear and take heed of the swiftly approaching eternal death; or at least seek help by praying to the Lord, or to me, or the saints. But even this, which costs them so little, they do not know how to begin, until the time, in which the conditions of their salvation can be realized, has, for many of them, passed away. If for some of them I still procure salvation in the last agony, this privilege cannot be common to all. Hence are lost so many children of the Church, who in their ingratitude and foolishness despise the many and powerful helps given by the divine clemency in most opportune time. Therefore also it will increase their confusion, when they shall see, that, with the mercy of their God, my own kindest wishes to save them, and the charity of the saints before their eyes, they have robbed God of the glory of their conversion; and not afforded me or to the angels or saints the joy of saving them in answer to their heartfelt invocation.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
Mary is Today’s Key to Salvation
“Birds of a feather, flock together!” If you want to be part of Mary’s flock and fly to Heaven, then you need to have Mary’s feathers―in other words, you need to resemble Mary; you need to imitate Mary. That is what she said numerous times to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “The fact that you are called to imitate and follow me, is the greatest blessing, which you can ever desire! … I desire that you imitate me and be my companion! … Though you wish to imitate me as a legitimate daughter, I shall not recognize you as my child if you are not one in reality! … Be to me a faithful child, who imitates me fervently, and a disciple who listens to me and follows me with all your heart! ... Labor to imitate me with all diligence in all that I did; for I assure you that it is this exercise which the Most High desires and expects of you! … Follow me by imitating me, and walk in my footsteps! … In all things imitate and follow me! … Raise yourself to the imitation of me, copying in yourself, according to your capacity, the works and virtues manifested to you in my life ... Imitate me according to your strength using my doings as a mirror … For if you imitate me, you may rest secure, that you have me as a teacher, and the Lord as an assured possession of your soul … Imitate me faithfully by following the examples I have given you, without failing in the least point, from this day onward! … Imitate me in all that I teach you! … Keep forever in view my works and my footsteps for your imitation! … Imitate me as my disciple, as far as your powers go! … Work without ceasing to imitate me according to the assistance of divine grace! … Imitate me, as far as is possible with your weak forces aided by grace! … Imitate me with all your fervor and all your strength! ... In order to imitate me, you must deny yourself, forget yourself entirely! … In imitation of me, be so humble that, as far as you are concerned, you be persuaded and convinced of your entire worthlessness and incapability, not meriting to be considered even as a slave of the servants of Christ! … You must always be solicitous to imitate me―for to this I call and invite you … Occupy yourself entirely in the imitation of my life and in the continual contemplation of my virtues and works, in order that you may gain the desired victory over my and your enemies, and arrive at the summit of virtue and holiness.
“I desire especially that you imitate me interiorly, by showing reverence to the Sacramental Body and Blood of my Son, as coming from my womb and as having been nourished and grown from my milk. Ever keep up this devotion―for this consecrated Body really contains part of my own blood and substance. Deeply grieve to see the Sacred Body and Blood being ignominiously and sacrilegiously trampled underfoot; shed bitter tears at seeing so many children of the Church treat it with irreverence and without any fear or decorum. Weep then over this misfortune―weep, because there are few who weep over it. Just as in the primitive Church there were so many who were saved by it, now there are countless souls who damn themselves through it. I do not tell you what happens in this regard every day―for you would die of grief.
“I wish that you imitate me in three virtues―they are the virtues of prudence, charity and justice, so little taken notice of by mortals ... I desire that you follow me and imitate me in the virtue of charity―for this is the end and the crowning glory of all other virtues―and imitate me in all the other virtues … I desire that, in imitation of me, you work for the benefit and salvation of your neighbors … This you must do by praying and suffering for them, charitably admonishing those that you can … Imitating me, you will learn how to return blessings for injuries to all persons who commit them against you and those dear to you― just as I have done … A forgiving spirit, is powerful, not only for your own good, but also for the good of those that offend you―for the kind heart of my Son is easily moved, when He sees that creatures imitate Him in pardoning offenders and in praying for them … Imitate me closely in the contemplation and the exercises of the Passion―for thus must you keep alive the memory of the sufferings of my divine Son and satisfy for the injuries and blasphemies inflicted upon His divine Person by His enemies who crucified Him ... In imitation of my Son and of me, busy yourself especially with the poor and despised of this world … I want you to imitate me by helping those who are in danger of death by saying some prayers for them every day of your life, fervently asking the Almighty to disperse the deceits of the devils, to destroy the snares prepared against those who are on the verge of death, and that His right hand confound all the demons … I wish also that you imitate me in respecting the priests and ministers of the Lord, who in the new law hold a much higher dignity than in the old law … In imitation of me, always ask for their blessing, when you approach or leave them.
“Strive with all your powers to imitate me in an exercise in which I persevered during my whole life. Every day I prostrated myself in the presence of the Most High and gave Him thanks and praise for His infinite perfections, and for having created me out of nothing. I blessed and adored Him as the supreme Lord and Creator of myself and of all that exists. I offered myself with profound humility and resignation to Him and asking Him to dispose of me according to His will and to teach me to fulfill whatever would be to His greater pleasure.
“Imitate me in being very careful to practice poverty of spirit concerning the use of necessities and comforts― so that, with advancing years, you may find yourself more free, more detached and averted from visible things. I lived in the greatest constraint, in poverty and detached from earthly things ... In order that you may imitate me as I desire, separate yourself from all earthly things … Imitate me and follow my humble footsteps, by withdrawing your affections from all that is earthly, lifting your aspirations on high, despising and fleeing all human honors esteeming them as vanity … I desire of you to forget and blot out from your faculties all images and remembrances of mere creatures in order that you may be fit to receive my teaching and be capable of imitating me! … Imitate me and apply yourself, from now on, to a true resignation in the Divine Providence. If He sends you tribulations, sorrows and labors―accept and embrace them with tranquility of soul!
“I wish that you imitate and follow me in this sorrow that so many men should still damn themselves! My Son and I look with especial love upon those who imitate this sorrow and afflict themselves on account of the perdition of so many souls! … Nor be content with striving after the love of God and salvation of yourself alone―for if you would be perfect in imitating me and fulfilling all that the Gospel teaches, you must work for the salvation of other souls, imitating the Lord and me in our labors for the salvation of the world! … In order that you may imitate me so much the more closely, weep with me over the unhappy state of mortals! … Weep over the faults of your fellowmen because they are against the law of God―this is true charity toward the Lord and toward your neighbor. Sorrow over the afflictions of others as over your own, for thus you will imitate me.
“If other souls would dispose themselves in imitation of me, living not according to the flesh but according to the spirit, free and untouched by the earthly contagion, the Most High would show His fidelity to these souls as well and would not deny them His blessings and favors according to the equity of His divine Providence … If I was the model to be imitated in the way I responded to the coming of God into the soul and into the world by showing due reverence, worship, humility, and thankful love, it follows, that if you, and in the same way the rest of the souls, are solicitous in imitating me, the Most High will come and produce the same effects in you as He did in myself―though they may be not so great and efficacious.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
Devotion to Mary means Imitating Mary
Don’t fool yourself! Devotion to Mary means imitating Mary! How can you claim to be devoted to Mary if you fail to imitate her? Growth takes place by imitation. We imitate those whom we look up to and admire. Our devotion to Mary grows in proportion to our imitation of Mary. It is not enough to merely imagine, think or say that you are devoted to Mary―actions speak louder than words. Just as “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20), so too is devotion without imitation dead.
Mind and heart must be united and mind and heart must both contribute―the mind is usually associated with reason (thinking), while the heart is associated with willing (doing). Both have to be involved, otherwise we are like a person trying to walk with one leg instead of both legs. In our devotion to Mary, our minds study Our Lady and her virtues, whereas our hearts put into practice what we have studied and learnt. Failure to do so merits the words spoken by Our Lord: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Thinking about Mary is fine; reading about Mary is fine; speaking about Mary is fine; writing about is fine―but all of this is like firewood without the fire. What ignites all of this is imitating what we think about, read about, speak about, and write about―without that imitation, all is mere deadwood and firewood without the fire.
Our Lady could just as well say what Our Lord said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49) ― she comes to enkindle in us the fire of her love. At Fatima, Our Lady said: “God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart.” Devotion is all about love―and love is all about devotion. Furthermore, devotion is not disobedience, but devotion embraces obedience. If we love Our Lady, if we are devoted to Our Lady, then we will obey her. As Our Lord said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that does not love Me, does not keep My words … If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24; 15:10). To which He adds: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). Our Lady could say the same thing―for very few people are obeying her requests, as Sister Lucia of Fatima indicated: “Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!” (Sister Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
The Liturgy of Holy Mother Church
We can learn a lot from the texts and Scriptural readings that Holy Mother Church has selected for the Masses on the various feast days of Our Lady. Here are some examples. In the Introit of the Mass of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, we read: “Let us come with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and may find grace.” (Hebrews 4:16).
Holy Mother Church uses the same Epistle reading for several Masses of Our Lady―Immaculate Conception (December 8th), Holy Rosary (October 7th), Our Lady of Mount Carmel (July 16th), Immaculate Heart of Mary (August 22nd)―and places the following words of Scripture in Our Lady’s mouth: “Now, therefore, ye children, hear me! Blessed are they who keep my ways! Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not! Blessed is the man that hears me and who watches daily at my gates and sits at the posts of my doors! He that shall find me, shall find life―and shall have salvation from the Lord!” (Proverbs 8:32-35). Ominously, the next verse―which the Church omitted from the Epistle of Our Lady’s Mass―reads: “But he that shall sin against me, shall hurt his own soul! All that hate me love death!” (Proverbs 8:36).
For the Mass of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Holy Mother Church has the following as part of the Epistle reading which again is placed in the mouth of Our Lady: “I am the Mother of fair love, and of fear, and of knowledge, and of holy hope. In me is all grace of the way and of the truth, in me is all hope of life and of virtue. Come over to me, all of you that desire me, and be filled with my fruits! For my spirit is sweet above honey, and my inheritance above honey and the honeycomb. My memory is unto everlasting generations. They that eat me, shall yet hunger; and they that drink me, shall yet thirst! He that listens to me, shall not be confounded; and they that work by me, shall not sin! They that explain me shall have life everlasting!” (Ecclesiasticus 24:24-31).
Even the Devils Admit the Power of a Sincere Devotion to Our Lady
In his book, The Secret of the Rosary, St. Louis de Montfort mentions an instance where devils confessed to the power of a true and sincere devotion to Our Lady and her Rosary. Here is an abbreviated account of that passage:
“An Albigensian who was possessed by the devil was brought to St. Dominic while he was preaching on the Rosary. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of over twelve thousand people who had come to hear him speak. The devils who were in possession of this wretched man were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions in spite of themselves. They said that by the Rosary which Dominic preached, he put fear and horror into the depths of Hell, and that he was the man they hated most throughout the world because of the souls he snatched from them by the devotion of the Rosary. St. Dominic put his Rosary round the neck of the possessed man and asked the devils who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most and told them he would not let them alone until they had answered his question. The the devils kept quiet and completely disregarding St. Dominic’s orders. So he knelt down and asked Our Lady to command the devils to answer his question. St. Dominic had scarcely finished this prayer when he saw the Blessed Virgin near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod that she held and said: “Answer at once!”
Then the devils started screaming: “You are our enemy, our downfall and our destruction! … You snatch sinners from the very jaws of Hell! You are a most sure path to Heaven! … Listen, you Christians! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! One single sigh, that she offers to the Blessed Trinity, is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints! We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants! Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards are saved by her intercession! And if she did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity! Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
In an interview with H.M. Magazine (H.M. = Home of the Mother), the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome of more than 30 years, Fr. Gabriele Amorth said: “Mary helps greatly. The devil is terrified of Our Lady. He is terrified because Our Lady crushes his head. I have often been asked if Mary was tempted by the devil. Definitely! From her birth until her death! But she always conquered! And the devil, on certain occasions, has praised Mary, because God obliges him to say the truth. On one occasion an exorcist friend of mine asked the devil what most hurts him of Our Lady, what most annoys him. He responded: ‘That she is the purest of all creatures and that I am the filthiest; that she is the most obedient of all creatures and that I am the most rebellious; that she is the one who committed no sin and thus always conquered me.’” (H.M. Magazine, Issue No. 135, March/April 2007). On another occasion, Fr. Amorth said: “During an exorcism, Satan told me, through the possessed person: ‘Every Hail Mary of the Rosary is a blow to the head for me! If Christians knew the power of the Rosary, it would be the end of me!’”
Looking at the Latin in Holy Scripture, the phrase “Si vis” crops up quite often. “Si vis!” is Latin for “If you want!” It comes from the Latin verb “velle” meaning “to want, wish, will, be willing.” The verb conjugation is not as simple as it is in English, e.g. I want, you want, he wants, we want, you want, they want. In Latin the singular and plural conjugations of the verb are volo (for I), vis (for you), vult (for he/she), volumus (for we), vultis (for you plural) and volunt (for they).
In Holy Scripture Our Lord says: “Quid tibi vis faciam?” ― “What do you want Me to do for you?” (Mark 10:51). What do you want from Our Lord? What do you want from God? God wants (Deus vult) your salvation. The Mother of God wants (Mater Dei vult) your salvation. You want (tu vis) your salvation―or at least it hoped that you want your salvation!
Heaven is yours―“Si vis!” (which is Latin for “If you want!”). The Latin phrase, “Si vis”, sounds much like the English expression, “See this!” Making a play on how words sound, you could say about Heaven: “See this! It’s yours, si vis!” Yet merely “wanting” is not enough! As the philosophical axiom states: “He who wants the end (goal, target, result, etc), must also necessarily want the means that lead to that end (goal, target, result, etc.).”
“Wanting” must evolve into Action
Hence it is that Our Lord said to the rich young man who had many possessions and wanted to attain to perfection and Heaven: “If you want to be perfect [si vis perfectus esse], go sell what you have and give to the poor, and you shall have a treasure in Heaven; and then come and follow Me!” (Matthew 19:2). As the philosophical axiom stated above: “He who wants the end (goal, target, result, etc), must also necessarily want the means that lead to that end (goal, target, result, etc.).” So Our Lord says―if you want the goal (perfection and Heaven), then take the means necessary to achieve your goal (sell your possessions, give away your riches, do not be attached to the things of this world and come follow Me). Wanting is not enough without action. Wanting is the blueprint and action is the building of what is on the blueprint. You can draw up a magnificent blueprint for the house that you want―but you cannot live in a blueprint, you have to go and build the house that is on your blueprint.
If you have Faith, but that Faith does not produce works, then your Faith is dead: “What shall it profit if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … But some man will say: ‘You have Faith, and I have works!’ Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! You believe that there is one God. You do well! But the devils also believe and tremble! Know, O vain man, know that Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-20).
In sports, merely wanting to win the trophy and be champions, is not enough―you have to work hard and train hard if you are going to have a chance of achieving what you want. Hence St. Paul writes: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain that prize! And everyone that strives for mastery in some thing, refrains himself from all things―and they indeed that they may receive a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible one! I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air―but I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection: lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
If you want to become a soldier with the U.S. Marines, then wanting is not enough―you have to go through an extremely tough boot camp and prove that you are good enough to be a Marine. The instructors will help you―but you have to the work! We are meant to be―through the Sacrament of Confirmation―Soldiers of Christ. We are meant to fight on the battlefield and not just theorize about fighting without getting out of our armchair! Soldiers are given arms for the fight, not armchairs! “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
Mary the Warrior Queen
Our Lady is now in Heaven. As St. Louis de Montfort says, “God has made her general of His armies .. and the exterminator of the enemies of God!” (True Devotion to Mary). Armies are not meant to sweep floors, clean windows, mow the lawn, and do the dishes―armies are trained to fight and Our Lady has no problems fighting and calling other to fight alongside her, so that they can one day be alongside her in Heaven.
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this role of Mary in the fight of Faith: “God has never made and formed but one enmity; but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end. It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her, even since the days of the earthly paradise—though she existed then only in His idea—with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel, that he fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself … God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always, up to this time, persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will, in the future, persecute them more than ever.
“She will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady―illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection―so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build (2 Esdras 4:7) the temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God, that is to say, the most holy Virgin, called by the Fathers the “Temple of Solomon” and the “City of God.” By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary.
“This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone ... The devil will raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others … Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times … She must shine forth in grace, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ, who shall battle for His interests … Mary will always have the victory over that proud spirit, and so great a victory that she will go so far as to crush his head, where his pride dwells. She will always discover the malice of the serpent. She will always lay bare his infernal plots and dissipate his diabolical councils, and even to the end of time will guard her faithful servants from his cruel claw.
“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But, in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. By their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be “like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful” Mary to pierce her enemies. (Psalm 126:4). They shall be the sons of Levi, well purified by the fire of great tribulation, and closely adhering to God (1 Corinthians 6:17), who shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body. They shall be everywhere the good odor of Jesus Christ to the poor and to the little, while at the same time, they shall be an odor of death to the great, to the rich and to the proud worldlings. They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High. They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies. They shall sleep without gold or silver, and, what is more, without care, in the midst of the other priests, ecclesiastics, and clerics (Psalm 67:14); and yet they shall have the silvered wings of the dove to go, with the pure intention of the glory of God and the salvation of souls, wheresoever the Holy Ghost shall call them. Nor shall they leave behind them, in the places where they have preached, anything but the gold of charity, which is the fulfillment of the whole law. (Romans 13:10).
“In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior. These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious and the idolaters.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Heaven is a Fight, Not a Freebie!
We live in a modern age of freebies and a sense of entitlement! We expect and want handouts and financial safety-nets. Free Schooling; Education Grants; Child Support; Food Stamps; Living Assistance; Unemployment Assistance; Healthcare and Medical Assistance; Loans; Social Security and Retirement Payments, etc. Some families, with both parents unemployed and two children to support, can receive the annualized equivalent of a six-figure income with no one working―for Washington State it is $122,000; for Massachusetts it is $117,000 and for New Jersey it is $108,000. In effect, you get paid for not working! It is not like that with Heaven! If you want to get to Heaven you must work and fight for Heaven! “Work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3-4) ... “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
Our Lady echoes the same message is her words to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Who is so dull-minded and stupid as not to know the dangers of the worldly life! … What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation? … The faithful are in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness! … In senseless fury they follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and care not where they walk, even if to the most dangerous precipices! ... Since the number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate should also be uncountable! … Let the countless numbers that have fallen into Hell with their burden, proclaim it! … Laborious exertions are very painful and averse to human nature according to the flesh … Hence it is that men do not find joy in their tribulations, nor rest in their labors, nor consolation in their sorrows, nor any peace in adversities ... How easily charity is wasted and set aside for any kind of pleasure, and how often Faith remains without any fruit! … For, being altogether different from the saints―who glory in tribulation as the fulfillment of their most earnest desires―these worldlings desire none of it and abhor everything that is painful ... Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment! … . I do not count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son! ...
“Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? … Through the ignorance and error of mortals, nearly all of them strive to avoid labor and suffering and are frightened by the royal and secure road of mortification and the Cross … In many of the faithful this ignorance goes still farther―for some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion … All their life they labor and exert themselves to become more and more entangled in the snares of their passions, to be consumed in deceitful vanities and to deliver themselves over to an inextinguishable fire, death and everlasting perdition in Hell, as if all were a mere joke! They want to procure for themselves the pleasures of this life as well as of eternal life … Full of this deceitful ignorance, they not only abhor resemblance to Christ’s suffering, but they make their recovery impossible―since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering … As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation … Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16) ... The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable! … Therefore let mortals show themselves thankful, and willingly entering upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, to bear it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
So Many Souls Are Lost Through Neglect―Especially a Neglect of Mary
The majority of souls end up being damned―but that seems to trouble nobody! Few souls are saved―and most people somehow imagine that they are bound to be among the few, so there is no need to fear or worry! Yet Our Lady says: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. Yet for this very reason they ought to be more attentive and careful, since invisible enemies are more cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day!”
“So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing―because the wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... As the Mother of clemency, it is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, for failing to call upon me, so many souls should be lost! ... Afflict yourself, lament and grieve without consolation over this ruin of so many souls!”
“The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation.”
“The result of this torpid insensibility to eternal damnation, and to the deceits of the devils in fastening it upon men, is dreadful. Without knowing upon what they rest their false security, the sinners are asleep and perfectly at ease as to their ruin, when they ought justly to fear and take heed of the swiftly approaching eternal death; or at least seek help by praying to the Lord, or to me, or the saints. But even this, which costs them so little, they do not know how to begin, until the time, in which the conditions of their salvation can be realized, has, for many of them, passed away. If for some of them I still procure salvation in the last agony, this privilege cannot be common to all. Hence are lost so many children of the Church, who in their ingratitude and foolishness despise the many and powerful helps given by the divine clemency in most opportune time. Therefore also it will increase their confusion, when they shall see, that, with the mercy of their God, my own kindest wishes to save them, and the charity of the saints before their eyes, they have robbed God of the glory of their conversion; and not afforded me or to the angels or saints the joy of saving them in answer to their heartfelt invocation.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
Mary is Today’s Key to Salvation
“Birds of a feather, flock together!” If you want to be part of Mary’s flock and fly to Heaven, then you need to have Mary’s feathers―in other words, you need to resemble Mary; you need to imitate Mary. That is what she said numerous times to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “The fact that you are called to imitate and follow me, is the greatest blessing, which you can ever desire! … I desire that you imitate me and be my companion! … Though you wish to imitate me as a legitimate daughter, I shall not recognize you as my child if you are not one in reality! … Be to me a faithful child, who imitates me fervently, and a disciple who listens to me and follows me with all your heart! ... Labor to imitate me with all diligence in all that I did; for I assure you that it is this exercise which the Most High desires and expects of you! … Follow me by imitating me, and walk in my footsteps! … In all things imitate and follow me! … Raise yourself to the imitation of me, copying in yourself, according to your capacity, the works and virtues manifested to you in my life ... Imitate me according to your strength using my doings as a mirror … For if you imitate me, you may rest secure, that you have me as a teacher, and the Lord as an assured possession of your soul … Imitate me faithfully by following the examples I have given you, without failing in the least point, from this day onward! … Imitate me in all that I teach you! … Keep forever in view my works and my footsteps for your imitation! … Imitate me as my disciple, as far as your powers go! … Work without ceasing to imitate me according to the assistance of divine grace! … Imitate me, as far as is possible with your weak forces aided by grace! … Imitate me with all your fervor and all your strength! ... In order to imitate me, you must deny yourself, forget yourself entirely! … In imitation of me, be so humble that, as far as you are concerned, you be persuaded and convinced of your entire worthlessness and incapability, not meriting to be considered even as a slave of the servants of Christ! … You must always be solicitous to imitate me―for to this I call and invite you … Occupy yourself entirely in the imitation of my life and in the continual contemplation of my virtues and works, in order that you may gain the desired victory over my and your enemies, and arrive at the summit of virtue and holiness.
“I desire especially that you imitate me interiorly, by showing reverence to the Sacramental Body and Blood of my Son, as coming from my womb and as having been nourished and grown from my milk. Ever keep up this devotion―for this consecrated Body really contains part of my own blood and substance. Deeply grieve to see the Sacred Body and Blood being ignominiously and sacrilegiously trampled underfoot; shed bitter tears at seeing so many children of the Church treat it with irreverence and without any fear or decorum. Weep then over this misfortune―weep, because there are few who weep over it. Just as in the primitive Church there were so many who were saved by it, now there are countless souls who damn themselves through it. I do not tell you what happens in this regard every day―for you would die of grief.
“I wish that you imitate me in three virtues―they are the virtues of prudence, charity and justice, so little taken notice of by mortals ... I desire that you follow me and imitate me in the virtue of charity―for this is the end and the crowning glory of all other virtues―and imitate me in all the other virtues … I desire that, in imitation of me, you work for the benefit and salvation of your neighbors … This you must do by praying and suffering for them, charitably admonishing those that you can … Imitating me, you will learn how to return blessings for injuries to all persons who commit them against you and those dear to you― just as I have done … A forgiving spirit, is powerful, not only for your own good, but also for the good of those that offend you―for the kind heart of my Son is easily moved, when He sees that creatures imitate Him in pardoning offenders and in praying for them … Imitate me closely in the contemplation and the exercises of the Passion―for thus must you keep alive the memory of the sufferings of my divine Son and satisfy for the injuries and blasphemies inflicted upon His divine Person by His enemies who crucified Him ... In imitation of my Son and of me, busy yourself especially with the poor and despised of this world … I want you to imitate me by helping those who are in danger of death by saying some prayers for them every day of your life, fervently asking the Almighty to disperse the deceits of the devils, to destroy the snares prepared against those who are on the verge of death, and that His right hand confound all the demons … I wish also that you imitate me in respecting the priests and ministers of the Lord, who in the new law hold a much higher dignity than in the old law … In imitation of me, always ask for their blessing, when you approach or leave them.
“Strive with all your powers to imitate me in an exercise in which I persevered during my whole life. Every day I prostrated myself in the presence of the Most High and gave Him thanks and praise for His infinite perfections, and for having created me out of nothing. I blessed and adored Him as the supreme Lord and Creator of myself and of all that exists. I offered myself with profound humility and resignation to Him and asking Him to dispose of me according to His will and to teach me to fulfill whatever would be to His greater pleasure.
“Imitate me in being very careful to practice poverty of spirit concerning the use of necessities and comforts― so that, with advancing years, you may find yourself more free, more detached and averted from visible things. I lived in the greatest constraint, in poverty and detached from earthly things ... In order that you may imitate me as I desire, separate yourself from all earthly things … Imitate me and follow my humble footsteps, by withdrawing your affections from all that is earthly, lifting your aspirations on high, despising and fleeing all human honors esteeming them as vanity … I desire of you to forget and blot out from your faculties all images and remembrances of mere creatures in order that you may be fit to receive my teaching and be capable of imitating me! … Imitate me and apply yourself, from now on, to a true resignation in the Divine Providence. If He sends you tribulations, sorrows and labors―accept and embrace them with tranquility of soul!
“I wish that you imitate and follow me in this sorrow that so many men should still damn themselves! My Son and I look with especial love upon those who imitate this sorrow and afflict themselves on account of the perdition of so many souls! … Nor be content with striving after the love of God and salvation of yourself alone―for if you would be perfect in imitating me and fulfilling all that the Gospel teaches, you must work for the salvation of other souls, imitating the Lord and me in our labors for the salvation of the world! … In order that you may imitate me so much the more closely, weep with me over the unhappy state of mortals! … Weep over the faults of your fellowmen because they are against the law of God―this is true charity toward the Lord and toward your neighbor. Sorrow over the afflictions of others as over your own, for thus you will imitate me.
“If other souls would dispose themselves in imitation of me, living not according to the flesh but according to the spirit, free and untouched by the earthly contagion, the Most High would show His fidelity to these souls as well and would not deny them His blessings and favors according to the equity of His divine Providence … If I was the model to be imitated in the way I responded to the coming of God into the soul and into the world by showing due reverence, worship, humility, and thankful love, it follows, that if you, and in the same way the rest of the souls, are solicitous in imitating me, the Most High will come and produce the same effects in you as He did in myself―though they may be not so great and efficacious.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
Devotion to Mary means Imitating Mary
Don’t fool yourself! Devotion to Mary means imitating Mary! How can you claim to be devoted to Mary if you fail to imitate her? Growth takes place by imitation. We imitate those whom we look up to and admire. Our devotion to Mary grows in proportion to our imitation of Mary. It is not enough to merely imagine, think or say that you are devoted to Mary―actions speak louder than words. Just as “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20), so too is devotion without imitation dead.
Mind and heart must be united and mind and heart must both contribute―the mind is usually associated with reason (thinking), while the heart is associated with willing (doing). Both have to be involved, otherwise we are like a person trying to walk with one leg instead of both legs. In our devotion to Mary, our minds study Our Lady and her virtues, whereas our hearts put into practice what we have studied and learnt. Failure to do so merits the words spoken by Our Lord: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Thinking about Mary is fine; reading about Mary is fine; speaking about Mary is fine; writing about is fine―but all of this is like firewood without the fire. What ignites all of this is imitating what we think about, read about, speak about, and write about―without that imitation, all is mere deadwood and firewood without the fire.
Our Lady could just as well say what Our Lord said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49) ― she comes to enkindle in us the fire of her love. At Fatima, Our Lady said: “God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart.” Devotion is all about love―and love is all about devotion. Furthermore, devotion is not disobedience, but devotion embraces obedience. If we love Our Lady, if we are devoted to Our Lady, then we will obey her. As Our Lord said: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that does not love Me, does not keep My words … If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24; 15:10). To which He adds: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). Our Lady could say the same thing―for very few people are obeying her requests, as Sister Lucia of Fatima indicated: “Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!” (Sister Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
The Liturgy of Holy Mother Church
We can learn a lot from the texts and Scriptural readings that Holy Mother Church has selected for the Masses on the various feast days of Our Lady. Here are some examples. In the Introit of the Mass of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, we read: “Let us come with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and may find grace.” (Hebrews 4:16).
Holy Mother Church uses the same Epistle reading for several Masses of Our Lady―Immaculate Conception (December 8th), Holy Rosary (October 7th), Our Lady of Mount Carmel (July 16th), Immaculate Heart of Mary (August 22nd)―and places the following words of Scripture in Our Lady’s mouth: “Now, therefore, ye children, hear me! Blessed are they who keep my ways! Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not! Blessed is the man that hears me and who watches daily at my gates and sits at the posts of my doors! He that shall find me, shall find life―and shall have salvation from the Lord!” (Proverbs 8:32-35). Ominously, the next verse―which the Church omitted from the Epistle of Our Lady’s Mass―reads: “But he that shall sin against me, shall hurt his own soul! All that hate me love death!” (Proverbs 8:36).
For the Mass of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Holy Mother Church has the following as part of the Epistle reading which again is placed in the mouth of Our Lady: “I am the Mother of fair love, and of fear, and of knowledge, and of holy hope. In me is all grace of the way and of the truth, in me is all hope of life and of virtue. Come over to me, all of you that desire me, and be filled with my fruits! For my spirit is sweet above honey, and my inheritance above honey and the honeycomb. My memory is unto everlasting generations. They that eat me, shall yet hunger; and they that drink me, shall yet thirst! He that listens to me, shall not be confounded; and they that work by me, shall not sin! They that explain me shall have life everlasting!” (Ecclesiasticus 24:24-31).
Even the Devils Admit the Power of a Sincere Devotion to Our Lady
In his book, The Secret of the Rosary, St. Louis de Montfort mentions an instance where devils confessed to the power of a true and sincere devotion to Our Lady and her Rosary. Here is an abbreviated account of that passage:
“An Albigensian who was possessed by the devil was brought to St. Dominic while he was preaching on the Rosary. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of over twelve thousand people who had come to hear him speak. The devils who were in possession of this wretched man were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions in spite of themselves. They said that by the Rosary which Dominic preached, he put fear and horror into the depths of Hell, and that he was the man they hated most throughout the world because of the souls he snatched from them by the devotion of the Rosary. St. Dominic put his Rosary round the neck of the possessed man and asked the devils who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most and told them he would not let them alone until they had answered his question. The the devils kept quiet and completely disregarding St. Dominic’s orders. So he knelt down and asked Our Lady to command the devils to answer his question. St. Dominic had scarcely finished this prayer when he saw the Blessed Virgin near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod that she held and said: “Answer at once!”
Then the devils started screaming: “You are our enemy, our downfall and our destruction! … You snatch sinners from the very jaws of Hell! You are a most sure path to Heaven! … Listen, you Christians! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! One single sigh, that she offers to the Blessed Trinity, is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints! We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants! Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards are saved by her intercession! And if she did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity! Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
In an interview with H.M. Magazine (H.M. = Home of the Mother), the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome of more than 30 years, Fr. Gabriele Amorth said: “Mary helps greatly. The devil is terrified of Our Lady. He is terrified because Our Lady crushes his head. I have often been asked if Mary was tempted by the devil. Definitely! From her birth until her death! But she always conquered! And the devil, on certain occasions, has praised Mary, because God obliges him to say the truth. On one occasion an exorcist friend of mine asked the devil what most hurts him of Our Lady, what most annoys him. He responded: ‘That she is the purest of all creatures and that I am the filthiest; that she is the most obedient of all creatures and that I am the most rebellious; that she is the one who committed no sin and thus always conquered me.’” (H.M. Magazine, Issue No. 135, March/April 2007). On another occasion, Fr. Amorth said: “During an exorcism, Satan told me, through the possessed person: ‘Every Hail Mary of the Rosary is a blow to the head for me! If Christians knew the power of the Rosary, it would be the end of me!’”
Article 7
Thursday, August 15th
Assuming Your Assumption?
Thursday, August 15th
Assuming Your Assumption?
Assumption Presumption or Assumption Assumption?
Today we celebrate the Assumption of Our Lady into Heaven―which is the Church’s teaching that Our Lady, after finishing the course of her life on Earth, was assumed (taken up) body and soul into Heaven. It is assumed that everyone wants to be assumed into Heaven one day―at least we are presuming that this is your assumption! Do you assume that you are going to get to Heaven? Do you presume that you are going to get to Heaven? Is it your assumption that you will get to Heaven? Or is your presumption that you will get to Heaven? Are you confused with all this assuming and presuming; all these assumptions and presumptions? Do we really know what those words mean?
In the modern English, the two words “assume” and “presume” are nowadays basically used interchangeably―modern interpretation and usage implies that they mean the same thing. Though this is often the case, it is not always the case. “Presume” and “assume” are both verbs that sound similar―but they have thin line of difference. The words “presume” and “assume” both mean that you take something for granted as being true, but the difference is based on how certain you are. Where they differ is in the level of confidence you feel about how true that thing is.
When you “presume” something to be the case, then it is the acceptance of something as true, based upon some personal knowledge or experience―although it is not known for certain. When you “assume” something to be the case, you have no reason to believe what you are assuming or supposing―you have no prior experience, no knowledge of the situation. You are just going with your gut-feeling. “Presumption” is based on at least some facts, whereas “assumption” is totally not based on any facts or reality. If you are making an informed guess, based on reasonable evidence, then you are “presuming”. If you’re making a guess based on little or no evidence, then you are “assuming”. However, at the end of the day, neither “presume” and “assume” are totally based on facts― “presumption” is, at best, only partially based on facts; and “assumption” is not based on any fact or reality―it is mere conjecture, wishful-thinking, gratuitous reasoning, or gut-feeling.
Is Assuming Presuming?
So how does all that relate to your assumption or presumption that you will one day get to Heaven? Is your judgment based on fact and reality, or is it based on partial facts and partial reality, or no facts and no reality? On this day, when we celebrate Our Lady’s Assumption into Heaven, do we presume that we will be going to Heaven? Or is our presumption really an assumption―with no facts to back it up? We hope to get to Heaven―but can we assume that we will get to Heaven. Our assumption may well a presumption—based upon some partial facts and partial truth―but even presumption is a sin against the virtue of Hope. To assume―based on no facts and no reality―that we will get to Heaven is to believe in a “Fool’s Paradise” and, as Scripture says: “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). The reality is that we cannot stubbornly live in a state of mortal sin and then somehow, by the wave of merciful magical wand, find ourselves in Heaven! “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Your Assumption is a Presumption
Who better than Our Lady herself, can we find to speak of her assumption on this Feast of her Assumption into Heaven? Here are some passages from The City of God, by the Venerable Mary of Agreda, where Our Lady speaks of that great event and especially concerning its significance for us―always reminding us that we were not created by God and placed on Earth to seek out worldly riches, possessions and pleasures―but we were created and placed on Earth to work out salvation and reach Heaven. “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). So, on this great feast of Our Lady, let us listen to the Great Lady herself. What follows are the words of Our Lady.
Indifferent Worldly Humans
“Lamentable and inexcusable is the ignorance of men in so knowingly forgetting the eternal glory, which God has prepared for those who dispose themselves to merit it. Bitterly bewail and deplore this pernicious forgetfulness; for there is no doubt, that whoever wilfully forgets the eternal glory and happiness, is in evident danger of losing it. No one is free from this guilt―not only because men do not apply much labor or effort in seeking and this happiness; but they labor with all their powers in things that make them forget the end for which they were created. This forgetfulness arises from entangling themselves in the pride of life, the covetousness of the eyes, and the desires of the flesh―for, by employing all the forces and faculties of their soul on these things during the whole time of their life, they have no time, care or attention for the thoughts of eternal happiness!”
Humans Labor More For Hell Than Heaven
Our Lady adds: “How much easier is it for mortals―especially for the children of the Church― to avoid such perversity, since they have at hand the easy means of Faith and Hope for attaining the truth! Even if to gain eternal happiness were as difficult to obtain as honors and riches and no other apparent advantages, it would be very foolish to labor as much for the false worldly advantages as for the true heavenly advantages―which is to labor, in effect, for eternal punishment rather than eternal glory. But since most of the children of the Church live in forgetfulness of their final end, they will, just as much as those outside the Church, incur the eternal death.”
Fools!
Our Lady bemoans: “This is a sorrow beyond all sorrows, and a misfortune without equal and without remedy. Afflict yourself with the thought that, if men would not make themselves so unworthy of it, my charity would urge me to send forth a voice through the whole world exclaiming: ‘Mortal and deceived men! What are you doing? For what purpose are you living? Do you realize what it is like to see God face to face, and to participate in His eternal glory and share His company? Of what are you thinking? Who has thus disturbed and fascinated your judgment? What will you seek, if once you have lost this true blessing and happiness, since there is no other happiness? The labor is short, the reward is infinite glory, and the punishment is eternal!’”
Living According to False Principles
Our Lady warns: “In connection with this sorrow, which I am trying to rouse in you, seek to labor assiduously in order to escape the danger. You have a living example in my life, which was a continual suffering, such as you have known; but when I came to my reward, all suffering seemed as nothing, and I forgot all the suffering, as if it had not occurred. Follow me in my labor―and though your labor seems to exceed that of all the mortals, look upon it as most insignificant; let nothing seem to you as being difficult or hard, or bitter, even to passing through fire and sword. At the same time I wish you to be free from another error―which is that of men who say: ‘Let us secure salvation! Greater or less glory in Heaven does not matter! We shall all be together in that life in Heaven!’ By this false principle, eternal life is not made secure, but rather put in danger―since it arises from great foolishness and lack of a love of God. Whoever seeks to make such a bargain with God, offends Him, and tempts Him to permit such souls to live in continued danger of perdition. Human weakness always tends to do less good than it desires to do; and when this desire is small, then it will execute very little, and hence risks losing all!”
Aiming Too Low—Falling Even Lower
Our Lady points out that “He who contents himself with the mediocre or lowest in virtue, always leaves, in his will and in his inclinations, an opening for earthly affections and love of the passing temporary things of Earth. Such an opening is contrary to divine love and therefore unavoidably causes the loss of virtue and the ascendency of earthly affections. When the creature resolves to love God with all its heart and with all its powers―as God commands―then God overlooks its human defects and shortcomings, and is pleased with their resolve to reap the highest rewards. But to despise those graces or wilfully undervalue them, shows not the love of children or of true friends, but shows the base fear of slaves, who are content to live and be let alone. If the saints could return to merit some additional degree of glory, by suffering all possible torments until the Day of Judgment, they would without doubtl return to Earth to suffer―because they have a true and perfect knowledge of the value of the reward of suffering and because they love God with a perfect charity. My example confirms this truth. It also rebukes the foolishness of those, who, in order to avoid suffering and the cross of Christ, are looking for a smaller reward, one which is contrary to the inclination of God’s goodness and contrary to His desire of seeing souls multiply their merits and gain plentiful rewards in the eternal happiness.”
Mary Could Help—But Few Ask
Our Lady then says: “If anything could lessen the enjoyment of the highest happiness and glory which I possess, and if, in Heaven, I could be capable of any sorrow, then, without a doubt, I would be grieved to see the holy Church and the rest of the world in its present state of labor, in spite of the fact that men know me to be their Mother, Advocate and Protectress in Heaven, ready to guide and assist them to eternal life. In this state of affairs, when the Almighty has granted me so many privileges and placed so many sources of help in my hands solely for the benefit of mortals, it is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, due to a negligence in calling upon me, so many souls should be lost! But if I cannot anymore experience grief now in Heaven, I may still justly complain of men, that they load themselves with eternal damnation and refuse me the glory of saving their souls!
“The extent of my intercession and the power I have in Heaven, has never been hidden in the Church, for I have demonstrated my ability to save all, by so many thousands of miracles, prodigies and favors operated in behalf of those devoted to me. With those who have called upon me in their needs, I have always shown myself generous, and the Lord has shown Himself generous to them on my account. Yet, though many are the souls whom I have helped, they are few in comparison with those, whom I could and am willing to help.”
Humans Ignore What Christ Left Behind
Our Lady speaks of our great negligence, saying: “The world and the centuries are far advanced; while mortals are negligent in turning toward the knowledge of God; the children of the Church are involving themselves in the snares of Satan; sinners multiply and crimes increase, because charity is getting cold―even after God became incarnate; taught the world by His life and doctrine; redeemed it by His Passion and Death; established His evangelical law for the guidance of His creatures; performed so many miracles, enlightenments, blessings, favors in the Church and in its saints. In addition to all this God has. in His goodness, opened up His mercies through me and my intercession, by making me the Mother, Advocate, Protectress and Helper of all men―and, though I am most punctual and generous in fulfilling all these offices, the result is still inadequate. After all, since the crimes of men merit the chastisements, which threaten them and which they begin to feel, and since, under these circumstances, the malice of men has already reached the highest possible point, what wonder is it that divine Justice be irritated?
“Consider assiduously how ugly, abominable, horrible and monstrous the world is in the sight of God and the saints on account of the enormous abominations, which men commit. Look how some follow, like brutes, after the horrors of sensuality; how gluttony degrades others; how some follow after pleasures of play and vanity; how others are dominated by pride and presumption; how many are entangled in avarice and the desire of gain; how they all follow the impulse of passions; seeking in this life only pleasure; while, in the life to come, they pile up for themselves eternal torments and incur the loss of the beatific vision of their God and Lord!
“Remember that there are only two ways to eternity―the one, which leads to eternal death by contempt of virtue and ignorance of the Divinity; the other, which leads to eternal life by the profitable knowledge of the Most High; for this is eternal life, that men know the way to Him and to His Only begotten, whom He sent into the world. The way of death is trodden by innumerable wicked ones, who are unaware of their own ignorance, presumption and insipid pride.”
If Only Men Would Turn to Mary!
Our Lady then adds: “All this is true―but my kind and merciful love exceeds all this human malice, it holds back justice and still inclines the infinite Goodness toward men. The Most High still wishes to generously give of His infinite treasures and resolves to favor those who know how to gain my intercession before God. This is the secure way and the powerful means of advancing the Church, of improving the Catholic reigns, of spreading the Faith, of furthering the welfare of families and of states, of bringing the souls to grace and to the friendship of God.”
Why So Many Souls Are Lost
Our Lady continues: “That those who walk in the way of salvation are the smaller number, is due to the vice and depraved habits imbibed in youth and nourished in childhood. For that saying of Deuteronomy is very true: ‘As the days of thy youth, so also shall thy old age be!’ (Deuteronomy 33:25). Hence the demons gain courage and increase their tyrannical influence over souls in the early years of man’s life, hoping that they will be able to induce men to commit so much the greater and the more frequent sins in later years, because the more they have succeeded in drawing them into small and insignificant faults in their childhood. By these they draw these souls on to a state of blind presumption; for, with each sin committed, the soul loses more and more the power of resistance, subjects itself more and more to the demon, and falls under the sway of its tyrannical enemies. The miserable yoke of wickedness is more and more firmly fastened upon the soul; and the soul is urged onward, under the sway of the devil, from one precipice to another, from abyss to abyss―all this is a chastisement merited by all those, that allow themselves to be overcome by evildoing in the beginning.
“By these means Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls, and continues so to hurl them every day, rising up in his pride against the Almighty. In this manner has he been able to introduce into the world his tyrannical power, spreading among men forgetfulness of death, judgment, Heaven and Hell, and casting so many nations from abyss to abyss of darkness and bestial errors, such as are contained in the heresies and false sects of the infidels. Therefore beware of this terrible danger, and let not the memory of the law of your God, His precepts and commands, and the truths of the Catholic Church and the doctrines of the Gospels ever fail in your mind. Let not a day pass in which you do not spend much time in meditating upon all these things. For your enemy and adversary is laboring with ceaseless vigilance to darken your understanding in forgetfulness of the divine law, seeking to withdraw your will, which is a blind power, from the practice of justification.”
Our Lady on the Guilt of the Jews
Another common area of presumption is the assumption that the sins of the Jews, in rejecting and crucifying Christ, are worse than our sins today. Our Lady has this to say on the matter: “The faithful in the Church make much of the sin of the infidel Jews through taking away the life of their God and Master. They are right in doing so, for it was a most heinous crime and merited the punishments decreed against that people. But Catholics forget, that their own sins are rendered heinous by other elements of guilt surpassing that of the Jews; for although the error of the Jews was culpable, they esteemed it as truth in the end; then also the Lord delivered Himself up to them, allowing them to follow the counsels of Hell, by which they were oppressed for their sins. In our days the Catholics are not in ignorance, but in the fullness of the light, by which they know and understand the divine mysteries of the Incarnation and Redemption. The Holy Church has been founded, spread out, made illustrious by miracles, by saints, by holy writings, by the knowledge and proclamation of truths unknown to the Jews. In spite of all these multiplied advantages, blessings, truths and enlightenments, many Catholics live like infidels and as if they had not before their eyes so many inducements to draw them on and oblige them, nor so many chastisements to fill them with dread. How can Catholics then, under these circumstances, imagine that the sins of others were greater or more grievous than their own? How can they presume that their punishment shall not be more lamentable? O ponder well this doctrine, and be filled with a holy fear!”
With those words of warning in mind, let us ask ourselves this question: “Is it more serious a sin for the Jews to crucify Christ, Whom they failed to see and refused to accept as the Son of God; or is it more serious for Catholics, who believe Christ to be the Son of God, to receive Him in Holy Communion while in a state of mortal sin?” If you are not sure—Our Lady gives the answer above.
The False Assumption and Presumption That We Are Worthy
If we are tempted, for one reason or another, to presumptuously think that we are more worthy of God’s love, Our Lady has this to say: “All the doings of my most holy Son prove His divine love toward men and how different this love is from that which they have among themselves. Mortals are ordinarily so small-minded, niggardly, avaricious and sluggish, that they are usually not moved to love anyone unless they see some advantage in the objects of their love. Hence the love of creatures is founded upon the advantage thought to be in that which they love. But Divine Love does not seek the creature because it is worthy, but it loves creatures in order to make them worthy of His love. Therefore, no soul must despair of the divine goodness. Yet no one must on that account have a vain and presumptuous trust, expecting divine love to work in it effects of grace of which he is altogether unworthy.”
“Remember that the Lord very often shows great favors to the unworthy, in order to manifest His goodness and munificence. On the contrary let no one become inflated with pride, but let everyone acknowledge so much the more his unworthiness, using it as a medicine and treacle against the poison of presumption. Although God loves them all and wishes all to be saved, yet in the distribution of these gifts and effects of His love He undeniably applies a certain measure and weight in the way in which He dispenses them.
“Now, as man cannot penetrate or understand this secret way of God’s distribution of grace, he must take care not to forfeit or lose the first grace and first inspiration; for he does not know whether he will not lose the second grace by his ingratitude, and he can be certain of not losing the second only by making use of the first grace. The soul can know for certain only this: that grace will not be denied if the soul does not make itself unworthy. These workings of divine love in the soul are accompanied by interior enlightenment, so that in the presence of this light, men are reproved for their sins and convinced of their evil state and of the danger of eternal death.
“But human pride makes many of persons so foolish and base of heart, that they resist this light; others are hard to move and never fail to have some vain excuse for their negligence; and because of this they counteract the first effects of the love of God and make themselves unfit for future graces. Now, without the help of grace, men cannot avoid evil, nor can they do the good, or even know it; thus many cast themselves from abyss to abyss. For, since they counteract and repel grace, and thus are unworthy of further help, they inevitably draw upon themselves ruin by falling from sin to sin.”
The Presumptuous Assumption of the Gifts of God
Our Lady speaks of the ungrateful and presumptuous assumption of God’s gifts and graces, without using them as they should be used:
“I have a complaint against the human race, of which I have spoken to you at other times, and which applies to nearly all men: that they neglect and forget to inform themselves of what I and my most holy Son have done for them; that they do not weigh gratefully the blessings of each hour, nor seek to make a proper return. Without any excuse is the forgetfulness and negligence shown by each and every one of the children of the Church in regard to the spread and manifestation of the glory of their God by making known His Holy Name to all rational creatures.
“This negligence is much more blamable now, since the eternal Word became man in my womb, taught the world and redeemed it for this very purpose. With this end in view the Lord founded His Church, enriched it with blessings and spiritual treasures, assigned to it ministers and endowed it with temporal riches. All these gifts are intended not only to preserve the Church in its present state, but to extend it and draw others to the regeneration of the Catholic Faith. All should help in the spreading of the fruits of the Death of their Redeemer. Some can do it by prayer; others by almsgiving; others by diligent preaching; others by fervent works of charity.
“But if this forgetfulness and negligence is perhaps less blameworthy in the ignorant and the poor, who have none to encourage them; the rich and the powerful are far more guilty, especially in the ministers and prelates of the Church, whose particular duty is the advancement of the Church of God. Many of them, forgetting the terrible account which they will have to render, seek only their own vain honor instead of Christ’s. They waste their inheritance of the Blood of the Redeemer in undertakings and goals not even fit to mention; and, through their fault, they allow innumerable souls to perish, who by proper efforts could have been gained for the Holy Church. The same responsibility rests upon the rulers and the powerful of the world, who receive from the hands of God, honors, riches and temporal blessings for advancing the glory of God, and yet think less of this obligation than of any other” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The City of God).
The Presumption of Priests and the Presumption of the Laity in Dealing With Priests
Our Lady speaks of the presumption and complacency found in priests, and then she chastises the presumptive manner in which some of the laity deal with priests:
“Likewise it was proper that the dignity and honor of the priesthood should receive its due; for the Most High holds the priests in such esteem, that if He finds them in the right disposition, He exalts them and fills them with His Spirit in order that the world may venerate them as His chosen and anointed ones. Listen reverently, but also to the voice of His ministers, preachers and priests, whose words are the echoes of the Most High and the aqueducts through which the blessed doctrine of life and the perennial fountains of divine truth flow to the souls. In them God speaks and the voice of His Divine Law resounds; hear them with such reverence, so that you are unwilling to look for any error, nor presume to pass judgment on what they say. For you, all must appear wise and eloquent, and in every one of them hear only the voice of Christ, my Son and Lord. Be warned not to fall into the foolish presumption of the worldly, who with very reprehensible vanity and pride, most hateful in the sight of God, despise His ministers and preachers, because they do not speak in accordance with their depraved taste. When they go to hear the divine truth, they judge only of the expression and style, as if the word of God were not simple”
“Moreover the wonders of the Lord run less risk in priests, even when they are more openly revealed to them. If they live up to their dignity, their works in comparison with those of the other creatures, are like those of the angels and of the seraphim. Their countenance should be resplendent, like that of Moses, when he came forth from converse with the Lord (Exodus 34:29). At least they should deal with the rest of men in such a manner that they be honored and revered as next to God. I desire that you understand that the Most High is greatly incensed against the world in this matter―just as much against the priests as against laymen. God is greatly angered against the priests because, forgetting their exalted dignity, they debase themselves by a contemptible, degraded and scandalous life, giving bad example to the world by mixing up with it to the neglect of their sanctification. God is greatly angered against the laymen, because they act with a foolhardy presumption toward the anointed of the Lord, whom, even though they are of imperfect and blameworthy lives, they ought to honor and revere as taking the place or Christ, my most holy Son, on Earth.”
The Vanity of Seeking Earthly Praise
Our Lady warns against seeking and taking comfort in praise in this life: “Learn and understand how exalted are the judgments of the Lord and how far removed from all the thoughts of men. The Most High looks into the hearts of men and at the interior, while men look only at the exterior and at what is perceived by the senses. On this account the just and the chosen ones are highly esteemed by the Lord in their humiliation and self-abasement; while the proud are cast down and rejected by Him in their self-sufficiency. This truth is understood by few, and therefore the children of darkness do not know how to strive after any other honor or exaltation, other than that of the world. This worldly honor is vain and without substance, and does not have any more stability than the flowers, or grass of the field. As their conscience does not show them this, they seek after the false and deceitful applause and esteem of men. The world ordinarily and fraudulently misjudges true merit, lavishing its honors upon those who least deserve it, or upon those who know how to solicit and strive after it most cunningly and inconsiderately. Flee from this deceit, let the praise of men make no impression upon you; repel its flatteries and compliments. For the children of the world are very much blinded in their judgments.”
Humility the Antidote to Pride and Presumption
Our Lady then gives us some antidotes against the disease of worldliness and forgetfulness of God and salvation: “Let sinners admit their baseness and understand how they make of themselves monsters of Hell by imitating Lucifer in his pride. For pride found him beautiful and endowed with great gifts of grace and nature; and, although he wasted these blessings, he had nevertheless possessed them as his own. But man, who is mere slime―and, moreover, has sinned and is full of ugliness and baseness―is a monster if he bloats himself up in vain pride. By such absurdity he surpasses even the demon―because man neither possesses a nature so noble, nor was ever gifted with such grace and beauty as Lucifer. He and his hellish followers despise and laugh over men, who, being so inferior, swell up in pride; for they can well understand this vain and contemptible madness and delirium.
“Therefore, learn this lesson well, and humiliate yourself lower than the earth, showing just as little sense of injury as the dust, whenever the Lord, either Himself or through others, sends you humiliations. Never judge yourself injured by anyone, nor consider yourself to be offended. Do not attribute to creatures that which God brings about, in order to humiliate you or others, by affliction and tribulations―for this is protesting against mere instruments, while it is divine mercy which inflicts punishment upon men and their sins for their humiliation. This, if they would only understand, is really what is happening by the disposition of the Lord throughout the world. Humiliate yourself in the divine presence, for the sins of yourself and for all your fellowmen, in order to placate His wrath, just as if you alone were guilty; and as if you had never made any satisfaction―since, during mortal life, no one can ever know whether he has satisfied for his sins. Seek to appease Him as if you alone had offended Him; and in regard to the gifts and favors which you have received and still do receive, show yourself grateful as one who deserves much less and owes much more. By these considerations humiliate yourself more than all others, and labor without ceasing to correspond to the divine clemency, which has shown itself so generous towards you.”
“I desire that you attain the inestimable treasure of humility in all its fullness, and that you offer to the Most High a docile and yielding heart, in order that He may impress upon it, like on soft wax, the image of my own most humble activity. Profit from and lose not the least occasion of humiliation and advancing in this virtue. Neglect none of them, since you know how much I sought after humiliations―I, who was the Mother of God Himself, most pure and full of grace. The greater my prerogatives, so much the greater was my humility, because in my estimation they far exceeded my merits and only increased my obligations.
“All you children of Adam were conceived in sin, and there is none who has not sinned on his own account. If none can deny this infection of his nature, why should not all humiliate themselves before God and before men? Lowering themselves to the very dust and placing themselves in the last place is not such a great humiliation for those who have sinned, for even then they will always be more honored than they deserve. The truly humble must lower themselves beneath that which they have deserved. If all the creatures would despise and abhor them, or offend them; if they would consider themselves worthy of hellfire―they would only fulfill justice, but not the requirement of humility, since that would only be admitting their just desserts. But real, deep humility goes to the length of desiring a greater humiliation than that which is due to one’s self in justice. On this account, there is no mortal who can attain to the kind of humility which I practiced; but the Most High will be satisfied with and ready to reward the efforts of those who humble themselves as far as they can and as they deserve in justice.”
The Proud Presumptuous Herod and the Humble John the Baptist
Our Lady draws comparisons between St. John the Baptist and King Herod: “Notice well the great difference between the innocence and holiness of the Baptist, who was poor, afflicted, persecuted and imprisoned, and the abominable wickedness of Herod, the powerful king, who was flattered and served in the midst of his riches and base pleasures. Both were of the same human nature, but entirely different in the sight of God, according as they used ill or well their free will and the created things around them. The penance, poverty, humility, contempt, tribulations of Saint John, and his zeal for the glory of my divine Son, merited for him the singular favor of martyrdom. Herod, on the contrary, by his hollow pomp, his pride, vanity, tyranny and wickedness was punished in the eternal flames. Remember that the same happens now and always in the world; although men do not pay attention to it or fear it. They fear the vain strength of the world, not reflecting that it is but fleeting shadow and withering grass.
“Men think little of the ultimate end, and of the abyss, into which vices draw them―even in this world. Although the demon cannot take away man’s liberty, nor ever completely control his free will, yet, by leading them into so many and so grievous sins, he obtains such an influence over it, that he is enabled to use it as an instrument of the evil he proposes. In spite of witnessing so many and such terrible examples, men remain unmoved in regard to the fearful danger to which they expose themselves by their sins, in imitation of Herod and his adulterous concubine. In order to cast souls into this abyss of wickedness, Lucifer offers them the vain pride and honor of this world, with its base pleasures, representing them as alone being important and desirable. Thus the ignorant children of perdition loosen their bonds of reason, in order to follow the degrading pleasures of their flesh and be enslaved by their mortal enemy. I have taught the way of humility, of contempt, and tribulation. This is the royal road, on which we first walked, and of which we have set ourselves up as teachers. We are the protectors of all the afflicted and ill-used, ready to assist by miraculous and especial favors all those who call upon Us in their necessities. Of this assistance and protection the followers of this world and its vain pleasures deprive themselves, since they hate the way of the Cross.”
Those Who Presume Upon Being Shown Mercy, But Will Not Show Mercy
Our Lady addresses the presumption of mercy by those who will not show any mercy to their enemies: “In regard to your imitation of my behavior―especially how you should act toward those who hate and persecute you; how you should love them and bear with them in charity and patience; and how you should pray for them to the Lord with true zeal for their salvation, as I have done for the traitor Judas―I desire that you excel and distinguish yourself therein, and that you instruct others in this manner of acting. For, in view of the patience and meekness of my most holy Son and my own example, the wicked and all mortals shall be covered with unutterable confusion because they have not pardoned each other with fraternal charity. The sins of hate and vengeance shall be punished with greater severity than other sins on the Judgment Day; and, in this life, these vices will quickly drive away the infinite mercy of God and cause eternal punishment of men, unless they amend in sorrow. Those that are kind and sweet toward their enemies and persecutors, and who forget injuries, resemble on that account more particularly the incarnate Word―for Christ always went about seeking to pardon and to load with blessings those who were in sin. By imitating the charity and the meekness of the Lamb, the soul disposes itself to receive and maintain that noble spirit of charity and love of God and the neighbor, which makes it apt for all the influences of divine grace and benevolence.” (The words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
Today we celebrate the Assumption of Our Lady into Heaven―which is the Church’s teaching that Our Lady, after finishing the course of her life on Earth, was assumed (taken up) body and soul into Heaven. It is assumed that everyone wants to be assumed into Heaven one day―at least we are presuming that this is your assumption! Do you assume that you are going to get to Heaven? Do you presume that you are going to get to Heaven? Is it your assumption that you will get to Heaven? Or is your presumption that you will get to Heaven? Are you confused with all this assuming and presuming; all these assumptions and presumptions? Do we really know what those words mean?
In the modern English, the two words “assume” and “presume” are nowadays basically used interchangeably―modern interpretation and usage implies that they mean the same thing. Though this is often the case, it is not always the case. “Presume” and “assume” are both verbs that sound similar―but they have thin line of difference. The words “presume” and “assume” both mean that you take something for granted as being true, but the difference is based on how certain you are. Where they differ is in the level of confidence you feel about how true that thing is.
When you “presume” something to be the case, then it is the acceptance of something as true, based upon some personal knowledge or experience―although it is not known for certain. When you “assume” something to be the case, you have no reason to believe what you are assuming or supposing―you have no prior experience, no knowledge of the situation. You are just going with your gut-feeling. “Presumption” is based on at least some facts, whereas “assumption” is totally not based on any facts or reality. If you are making an informed guess, based on reasonable evidence, then you are “presuming”. If you’re making a guess based on little or no evidence, then you are “assuming”. However, at the end of the day, neither “presume” and “assume” are totally based on facts― “presumption” is, at best, only partially based on facts; and “assumption” is not based on any fact or reality―it is mere conjecture, wishful-thinking, gratuitous reasoning, or gut-feeling.
Is Assuming Presuming?
So how does all that relate to your assumption or presumption that you will one day get to Heaven? Is your judgment based on fact and reality, or is it based on partial facts and partial reality, or no facts and no reality? On this day, when we celebrate Our Lady’s Assumption into Heaven, do we presume that we will be going to Heaven? Or is our presumption really an assumption―with no facts to back it up? We hope to get to Heaven―but can we assume that we will get to Heaven. Our assumption may well a presumption—based upon some partial facts and partial truth―but even presumption is a sin against the virtue of Hope. To assume―based on no facts and no reality―that we will get to Heaven is to believe in a “Fool’s Paradise” and, as Scripture says: “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). The reality is that we cannot stubbornly live in a state of mortal sin and then somehow, by the wave of merciful magical wand, find ourselves in Heaven! “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Your Assumption is a Presumption
Who better than Our Lady herself, can we find to speak of her assumption on this Feast of her Assumption into Heaven? Here are some passages from The City of God, by the Venerable Mary of Agreda, where Our Lady speaks of that great event and especially concerning its significance for us―always reminding us that we were not created by God and placed on Earth to seek out worldly riches, possessions and pleasures―but we were created and placed on Earth to work out salvation and reach Heaven. “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). So, on this great feast of Our Lady, let us listen to the Great Lady herself. What follows are the words of Our Lady.
Indifferent Worldly Humans
“Lamentable and inexcusable is the ignorance of men in so knowingly forgetting the eternal glory, which God has prepared for those who dispose themselves to merit it. Bitterly bewail and deplore this pernicious forgetfulness; for there is no doubt, that whoever wilfully forgets the eternal glory and happiness, is in evident danger of losing it. No one is free from this guilt―not only because men do not apply much labor or effort in seeking and this happiness; but they labor with all their powers in things that make them forget the end for which they were created. This forgetfulness arises from entangling themselves in the pride of life, the covetousness of the eyes, and the desires of the flesh―for, by employing all the forces and faculties of their soul on these things during the whole time of their life, they have no time, care or attention for the thoughts of eternal happiness!”
Humans Labor More For Hell Than Heaven
Our Lady adds: “How much easier is it for mortals―especially for the children of the Church― to avoid such perversity, since they have at hand the easy means of Faith and Hope for attaining the truth! Even if to gain eternal happiness were as difficult to obtain as honors and riches and no other apparent advantages, it would be very foolish to labor as much for the false worldly advantages as for the true heavenly advantages―which is to labor, in effect, for eternal punishment rather than eternal glory. But since most of the children of the Church live in forgetfulness of their final end, they will, just as much as those outside the Church, incur the eternal death.”
Fools!
Our Lady bemoans: “This is a sorrow beyond all sorrows, and a misfortune without equal and without remedy. Afflict yourself with the thought that, if men would not make themselves so unworthy of it, my charity would urge me to send forth a voice through the whole world exclaiming: ‘Mortal and deceived men! What are you doing? For what purpose are you living? Do you realize what it is like to see God face to face, and to participate in His eternal glory and share His company? Of what are you thinking? Who has thus disturbed and fascinated your judgment? What will you seek, if once you have lost this true blessing and happiness, since there is no other happiness? The labor is short, the reward is infinite glory, and the punishment is eternal!’”
Living According to False Principles
Our Lady warns: “In connection with this sorrow, which I am trying to rouse in you, seek to labor assiduously in order to escape the danger. You have a living example in my life, which was a continual suffering, such as you have known; but when I came to my reward, all suffering seemed as nothing, and I forgot all the suffering, as if it had not occurred. Follow me in my labor―and though your labor seems to exceed that of all the mortals, look upon it as most insignificant; let nothing seem to you as being difficult or hard, or bitter, even to passing through fire and sword. At the same time I wish you to be free from another error―which is that of men who say: ‘Let us secure salvation! Greater or less glory in Heaven does not matter! We shall all be together in that life in Heaven!’ By this false principle, eternal life is not made secure, but rather put in danger―since it arises from great foolishness and lack of a love of God. Whoever seeks to make such a bargain with God, offends Him, and tempts Him to permit such souls to live in continued danger of perdition. Human weakness always tends to do less good than it desires to do; and when this desire is small, then it will execute very little, and hence risks losing all!”
Aiming Too Low—Falling Even Lower
Our Lady points out that “He who contents himself with the mediocre or lowest in virtue, always leaves, in his will and in his inclinations, an opening for earthly affections and love of the passing temporary things of Earth. Such an opening is contrary to divine love and therefore unavoidably causes the loss of virtue and the ascendency of earthly affections. When the creature resolves to love God with all its heart and with all its powers―as God commands―then God overlooks its human defects and shortcomings, and is pleased with their resolve to reap the highest rewards. But to despise those graces or wilfully undervalue them, shows not the love of children or of true friends, but shows the base fear of slaves, who are content to live and be let alone. If the saints could return to merit some additional degree of glory, by suffering all possible torments until the Day of Judgment, they would without doubtl return to Earth to suffer―because they have a true and perfect knowledge of the value of the reward of suffering and because they love God with a perfect charity. My example confirms this truth. It also rebukes the foolishness of those, who, in order to avoid suffering and the cross of Christ, are looking for a smaller reward, one which is contrary to the inclination of God’s goodness and contrary to His desire of seeing souls multiply their merits and gain plentiful rewards in the eternal happiness.”
Mary Could Help—But Few Ask
Our Lady then says: “If anything could lessen the enjoyment of the highest happiness and glory which I possess, and if, in Heaven, I could be capable of any sorrow, then, without a doubt, I would be grieved to see the holy Church and the rest of the world in its present state of labor, in spite of the fact that men know me to be their Mother, Advocate and Protectress in Heaven, ready to guide and assist them to eternal life. In this state of affairs, when the Almighty has granted me so many privileges and placed so many sources of help in my hands solely for the benefit of mortals, it is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals force me to remain idle, and that, due to a negligence in calling upon me, so many souls should be lost! But if I cannot anymore experience grief now in Heaven, I may still justly complain of men, that they load themselves with eternal damnation and refuse me the glory of saving their souls!
“The extent of my intercession and the power I have in Heaven, has never been hidden in the Church, for I have demonstrated my ability to save all, by so many thousands of miracles, prodigies and favors operated in behalf of those devoted to me. With those who have called upon me in their needs, I have always shown myself generous, and the Lord has shown Himself generous to them on my account. Yet, though many are the souls whom I have helped, they are few in comparison with those, whom I could and am willing to help.”
Humans Ignore What Christ Left Behind
Our Lady speaks of our great negligence, saying: “The world and the centuries are far advanced; while mortals are negligent in turning toward the knowledge of God; the children of the Church are involving themselves in the snares of Satan; sinners multiply and crimes increase, because charity is getting cold―even after God became incarnate; taught the world by His life and doctrine; redeemed it by His Passion and Death; established His evangelical law for the guidance of His creatures; performed so many miracles, enlightenments, blessings, favors in the Church and in its saints. In addition to all this God has. in His goodness, opened up His mercies through me and my intercession, by making me the Mother, Advocate, Protectress and Helper of all men―and, though I am most punctual and generous in fulfilling all these offices, the result is still inadequate. After all, since the crimes of men merit the chastisements, which threaten them and which they begin to feel, and since, under these circumstances, the malice of men has already reached the highest possible point, what wonder is it that divine Justice be irritated?
“Consider assiduously how ugly, abominable, horrible and monstrous the world is in the sight of God and the saints on account of the enormous abominations, which men commit. Look how some follow, like brutes, after the horrors of sensuality; how gluttony degrades others; how some follow after pleasures of play and vanity; how others are dominated by pride and presumption; how many are entangled in avarice and the desire of gain; how they all follow the impulse of passions; seeking in this life only pleasure; while, in the life to come, they pile up for themselves eternal torments and incur the loss of the beatific vision of their God and Lord!
“Remember that there are only two ways to eternity―the one, which leads to eternal death by contempt of virtue and ignorance of the Divinity; the other, which leads to eternal life by the profitable knowledge of the Most High; for this is eternal life, that men know the way to Him and to His Only begotten, whom He sent into the world. The way of death is trodden by innumerable wicked ones, who are unaware of their own ignorance, presumption and insipid pride.”
If Only Men Would Turn to Mary!
Our Lady then adds: “All this is true―but my kind and merciful love exceeds all this human malice, it holds back justice and still inclines the infinite Goodness toward men. The Most High still wishes to generously give of His infinite treasures and resolves to favor those who know how to gain my intercession before God. This is the secure way and the powerful means of advancing the Church, of improving the Catholic reigns, of spreading the Faith, of furthering the welfare of families and of states, of bringing the souls to grace and to the friendship of God.”
Why So Many Souls Are Lost
Our Lady continues: “That those who walk in the way of salvation are the smaller number, is due to the vice and depraved habits imbibed in youth and nourished in childhood. For that saying of Deuteronomy is very true: ‘As the days of thy youth, so also shall thy old age be!’ (Deuteronomy 33:25). Hence the demons gain courage and increase their tyrannical influence over souls in the early years of man’s life, hoping that they will be able to induce men to commit so much the greater and the more frequent sins in later years, because the more they have succeeded in drawing them into small and insignificant faults in their childhood. By these they draw these souls on to a state of blind presumption; for, with each sin committed, the soul loses more and more the power of resistance, subjects itself more and more to the demon, and falls under the sway of its tyrannical enemies. The miserable yoke of wickedness is more and more firmly fastened upon the soul; and the soul is urged onward, under the sway of the devil, from one precipice to another, from abyss to abyss―all this is a chastisement merited by all those, that allow themselves to be overcome by evildoing in the beginning.
“By these means Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls, and continues so to hurl them every day, rising up in his pride against the Almighty. In this manner has he been able to introduce into the world his tyrannical power, spreading among men forgetfulness of death, judgment, Heaven and Hell, and casting so many nations from abyss to abyss of darkness and bestial errors, such as are contained in the heresies and false sects of the infidels. Therefore beware of this terrible danger, and let not the memory of the law of your God, His precepts and commands, and the truths of the Catholic Church and the doctrines of the Gospels ever fail in your mind. Let not a day pass in which you do not spend much time in meditating upon all these things. For your enemy and adversary is laboring with ceaseless vigilance to darken your understanding in forgetfulness of the divine law, seeking to withdraw your will, which is a blind power, from the practice of justification.”
Our Lady on the Guilt of the Jews
Another common area of presumption is the assumption that the sins of the Jews, in rejecting and crucifying Christ, are worse than our sins today. Our Lady has this to say on the matter: “The faithful in the Church make much of the sin of the infidel Jews through taking away the life of their God and Master. They are right in doing so, for it was a most heinous crime and merited the punishments decreed against that people. But Catholics forget, that their own sins are rendered heinous by other elements of guilt surpassing that of the Jews; for although the error of the Jews was culpable, they esteemed it as truth in the end; then also the Lord delivered Himself up to them, allowing them to follow the counsels of Hell, by which they were oppressed for their sins. In our days the Catholics are not in ignorance, but in the fullness of the light, by which they know and understand the divine mysteries of the Incarnation and Redemption. The Holy Church has been founded, spread out, made illustrious by miracles, by saints, by holy writings, by the knowledge and proclamation of truths unknown to the Jews. In spite of all these multiplied advantages, blessings, truths and enlightenments, many Catholics live like infidels and as if they had not before their eyes so many inducements to draw them on and oblige them, nor so many chastisements to fill them with dread. How can Catholics then, under these circumstances, imagine that the sins of others were greater or more grievous than their own? How can they presume that their punishment shall not be more lamentable? O ponder well this doctrine, and be filled with a holy fear!”
With those words of warning in mind, let us ask ourselves this question: “Is it more serious a sin for the Jews to crucify Christ, Whom they failed to see and refused to accept as the Son of God; or is it more serious for Catholics, who believe Christ to be the Son of God, to receive Him in Holy Communion while in a state of mortal sin?” If you are not sure—Our Lady gives the answer above.
The False Assumption and Presumption That We Are Worthy
If we are tempted, for one reason or another, to presumptuously think that we are more worthy of God’s love, Our Lady has this to say: “All the doings of my most holy Son prove His divine love toward men and how different this love is from that which they have among themselves. Mortals are ordinarily so small-minded, niggardly, avaricious and sluggish, that they are usually not moved to love anyone unless they see some advantage in the objects of their love. Hence the love of creatures is founded upon the advantage thought to be in that which they love. But Divine Love does not seek the creature because it is worthy, but it loves creatures in order to make them worthy of His love. Therefore, no soul must despair of the divine goodness. Yet no one must on that account have a vain and presumptuous trust, expecting divine love to work in it effects of grace of which he is altogether unworthy.”
“Remember that the Lord very often shows great favors to the unworthy, in order to manifest His goodness and munificence. On the contrary let no one become inflated with pride, but let everyone acknowledge so much the more his unworthiness, using it as a medicine and treacle against the poison of presumption. Although God loves them all and wishes all to be saved, yet in the distribution of these gifts and effects of His love He undeniably applies a certain measure and weight in the way in which He dispenses them.
“Now, as man cannot penetrate or understand this secret way of God’s distribution of grace, he must take care not to forfeit or lose the first grace and first inspiration; for he does not know whether he will not lose the second grace by his ingratitude, and he can be certain of not losing the second only by making use of the first grace. The soul can know for certain only this: that grace will not be denied if the soul does not make itself unworthy. These workings of divine love in the soul are accompanied by interior enlightenment, so that in the presence of this light, men are reproved for their sins and convinced of their evil state and of the danger of eternal death.
“But human pride makes many of persons so foolish and base of heart, that they resist this light; others are hard to move and never fail to have some vain excuse for their negligence; and because of this they counteract the first effects of the love of God and make themselves unfit for future graces. Now, without the help of grace, men cannot avoid evil, nor can they do the good, or even know it; thus many cast themselves from abyss to abyss. For, since they counteract and repel grace, and thus are unworthy of further help, they inevitably draw upon themselves ruin by falling from sin to sin.”
The Presumptuous Assumption of the Gifts of God
Our Lady speaks of the ungrateful and presumptuous assumption of God’s gifts and graces, without using them as they should be used:
“I have a complaint against the human race, of which I have spoken to you at other times, and which applies to nearly all men: that they neglect and forget to inform themselves of what I and my most holy Son have done for them; that they do not weigh gratefully the blessings of each hour, nor seek to make a proper return. Without any excuse is the forgetfulness and negligence shown by each and every one of the children of the Church in regard to the spread and manifestation of the glory of their God by making known His Holy Name to all rational creatures.
“This negligence is much more blamable now, since the eternal Word became man in my womb, taught the world and redeemed it for this very purpose. With this end in view the Lord founded His Church, enriched it with blessings and spiritual treasures, assigned to it ministers and endowed it with temporal riches. All these gifts are intended not only to preserve the Church in its present state, but to extend it and draw others to the regeneration of the Catholic Faith. All should help in the spreading of the fruits of the Death of their Redeemer. Some can do it by prayer; others by almsgiving; others by diligent preaching; others by fervent works of charity.
“But if this forgetfulness and negligence is perhaps less blameworthy in the ignorant and the poor, who have none to encourage them; the rich and the powerful are far more guilty, especially in the ministers and prelates of the Church, whose particular duty is the advancement of the Church of God. Many of them, forgetting the terrible account which they will have to render, seek only their own vain honor instead of Christ’s. They waste their inheritance of the Blood of the Redeemer in undertakings and goals not even fit to mention; and, through their fault, they allow innumerable souls to perish, who by proper efforts could have been gained for the Holy Church. The same responsibility rests upon the rulers and the powerful of the world, who receive from the hands of God, honors, riches and temporal blessings for advancing the glory of God, and yet think less of this obligation than of any other” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The City of God).
The Presumption of Priests and the Presumption of the Laity in Dealing With Priests
Our Lady speaks of the presumption and complacency found in priests, and then she chastises the presumptive manner in which some of the laity deal with priests:
“Likewise it was proper that the dignity and honor of the priesthood should receive its due; for the Most High holds the priests in such esteem, that if He finds them in the right disposition, He exalts them and fills them with His Spirit in order that the world may venerate them as His chosen and anointed ones. Listen reverently, but also to the voice of His ministers, preachers and priests, whose words are the echoes of the Most High and the aqueducts through which the blessed doctrine of life and the perennial fountains of divine truth flow to the souls. In them God speaks and the voice of His Divine Law resounds; hear them with such reverence, so that you are unwilling to look for any error, nor presume to pass judgment on what they say. For you, all must appear wise and eloquent, and in every one of them hear only the voice of Christ, my Son and Lord. Be warned not to fall into the foolish presumption of the worldly, who with very reprehensible vanity and pride, most hateful in the sight of God, despise His ministers and preachers, because they do not speak in accordance with their depraved taste. When they go to hear the divine truth, they judge only of the expression and style, as if the word of God were not simple”
“Moreover the wonders of the Lord run less risk in priests, even when they are more openly revealed to them. If they live up to their dignity, their works in comparison with those of the other creatures, are like those of the angels and of the seraphim. Their countenance should be resplendent, like that of Moses, when he came forth from converse with the Lord (Exodus 34:29). At least they should deal with the rest of men in such a manner that they be honored and revered as next to God. I desire that you understand that the Most High is greatly incensed against the world in this matter―just as much against the priests as against laymen. God is greatly angered against the priests because, forgetting their exalted dignity, they debase themselves by a contemptible, degraded and scandalous life, giving bad example to the world by mixing up with it to the neglect of their sanctification. God is greatly angered against the laymen, because they act with a foolhardy presumption toward the anointed of the Lord, whom, even though they are of imperfect and blameworthy lives, they ought to honor and revere as taking the place or Christ, my most holy Son, on Earth.”
The Vanity of Seeking Earthly Praise
Our Lady warns against seeking and taking comfort in praise in this life: “Learn and understand how exalted are the judgments of the Lord and how far removed from all the thoughts of men. The Most High looks into the hearts of men and at the interior, while men look only at the exterior and at what is perceived by the senses. On this account the just and the chosen ones are highly esteemed by the Lord in their humiliation and self-abasement; while the proud are cast down and rejected by Him in their self-sufficiency. This truth is understood by few, and therefore the children of darkness do not know how to strive after any other honor or exaltation, other than that of the world. This worldly honor is vain and without substance, and does not have any more stability than the flowers, or grass of the field. As their conscience does not show them this, they seek after the false and deceitful applause and esteem of men. The world ordinarily and fraudulently misjudges true merit, lavishing its honors upon those who least deserve it, or upon those who know how to solicit and strive after it most cunningly and inconsiderately. Flee from this deceit, let the praise of men make no impression upon you; repel its flatteries and compliments. For the children of the world are very much blinded in their judgments.”
Humility the Antidote to Pride and Presumption
Our Lady then gives us some antidotes against the disease of worldliness and forgetfulness of God and salvation: “Let sinners admit their baseness and understand how they make of themselves monsters of Hell by imitating Lucifer in his pride. For pride found him beautiful and endowed with great gifts of grace and nature; and, although he wasted these blessings, he had nevertheless possessed them as his own. But man, who is mere slime―and, moreover, has sinned and is full of ugliness and baseness―is a monster if he bloats himself up in vain pride. By such absurdity he surpasses even the demon―because man neither possesses a nature so noble, nor was ever gifted with such grace and beauty as Lucifer. He and his hellish followers despise and laugh over men, who, being so inferior, swell up in pride; for they can well understand this vain and contemptible madness and delirium.
“Therefore, learn this lesson well, and humiliate yourself lower than the earth, showing just as little sense of injury as the dust, whenever the Lord, either Himself or through others, sends you humiliations. Never judge yourself injured by anyone, nor consider yourself to be offended. Do not attribute to creatures that which God brings about, in order to humiliate you or others, by affliction and tribulations―for this is protesting against mere instruments, while it is divine mercy which inflicts punishment upon men and their sins for their humiliation. This, if they would only understand, is really what is happening by the disposition of the Lord throughout the world. Humiliate yourself in the divine presence, for the sins of yourself and for all your fellowmen, in order to placate His wrath, just as if you alone were guilty; and as if you had never made any satisfaction―since, during mortal life, no one can ever know whether he has satisfied for his sins. Seek to appease Him as if you alone had offended Him; and in regard to the gifts and favors which you have received and still do receive, show yourself grateful as one who deserves much less and owes much more. By these considerations humiliate yourself more than all others, and labor without ceasing to correspond to the divine clemency, which has shown itself so generous towards you.”
“I desire that you attain the inestimable treasure of humility in all its fullness, and that you offer to the Most High a docile and yielding heart, in order that He may impress upon it, like on soft wax, the image of my own most humble activity. Profit from and lose not the least occasion of humiliation and advancing in this virtue. Neglect none of them, since you know how much I sought after humiliations―I, who was the Mother of God Himself, most pure and full of grace. The greater my prerogatives, so much the greater was my humility, because in my estimation they far exceeded my merits and only increased my obligations.
“All you children of Adam were conceived in sin, and there is none who has not sinned on his own account. If none can deny this infection of his nature, why should not all humiliate themselves before God and before men? Lowering themselves to the very dust and placing themselves in the last place is not such a great humiliation for those who have sinned, for even then they will always be more honored than they deserve. The truly humble must lower themselves beneath that which they have deserved. If all the creatures would despise and abhor them, or offend them; if they would consider themselves worthy of hellfire―they would only fulfill justice, but not the requirement of humility, since that would only be admitting their just desserts. But real, deep humility goes to the length of desiring a greater humiliation than that which is due to one’s self in justice. On this account, there is no mortal who can attain to the kind of humility which I practiced; but the Most High will be satisfied with and ready to reward the efforts of those who humble themselves as far as they can and as they deserve in justice.”
The Proud Presumptuous Herod and the Humble John the Baptist
Our Lady draws comparisons between St. John the Baptist and King Herod: “Notice well the great difference between the innocence and holiness of the Baptist, who was poor, afflicted, persecuted and imprisoned, and the abominable wickedness of Herod, the powerful king, who was flattered and served in the midst of his riches and base pleasures. Both were of the same human nature, but entirely different in the sight of God, according as they used ill or well their free will and the created things around them. The penance, poverty, humility, contempt, tribulations of Saint John, and his zeal for the glory of my divine Son, merited for him the singular favor of martyrdom. Herod, on the contrary, by his hollow pomp, his pride, vanity, tyranny and wickedness was punished in the eternal flames. Remember that the same happens now and always in the world; although men do not pay attention to it or fear it. They fear the vain strength of the world, not reflecting that it is but fleeting shadow and withering grass.
“Men think little of the ultimate end, and of the abyss, into which vices draw them―even in this world. Although the demon cannot take away man’s liberty, nor ever completely control his free will, yet, by leading them into so many and so grievous sins, he obtains such an influence over it, that he is enabled to use it as an instrument of the evil he proposes. In spite of witnessing so many and such terrible examples, men remain unmoved in regard to the fearful danger to which they expose themselves by their sins, in imitation of Herod and his adulterous concubine. In order to cast souls into this abyss of wickedness, Lucifer offers them the vain pride and honor of this world, with its base pleasures, representing them as alone being important and desirable. Thus the ignorant children of perdition loosen their bonds of reason, in order to follow the degrading pleasures of their flesh and be enslaved by their mortal enemy. I have taught the way of humility, of contempt, and tribulation. This is the royal road, on which we first walked, and of which we have set ourselves up as teachers. We are the protectors of all the afflicted and ill-used, ready to assist by miraculous and especial favors all those who call upon Us in their necessities. Of this assistance and protection the followers of this world and its vain pleasures deprive themselves, since they hate the way of the Cross.”
Those Who Presume Upon Being Shown Mercy, But Will Not Show Mercy
Our Lady addresses the presumption of mercy by those who will not show any mercy to their enemies: “In regard to your imitation of my behavior―especially how you should act toward those who hate and persecute you; how you should love them and bear with them in charity and patience; and how you should pray for them to the Lord with true zeal for their salvation, as I have done for the traitor Judas―I desire that you excel and distinguish yourself therein, and that you instruct others in this manner of acting. For, in view of the patience and meekness of my most holy Son and my own example, the wicked and all mortals shall be covered with unutterable confusion because they have not pardoned each other with fraternal charity. The sins of hate and vengeance shall be punished with greater severity than other sins on the Judgment Day; and, in this life, these vices will quickly drive away the infinite mercy of God and cause eternal punishment of men, unless they amend in sorrow. Those that are kind and sweet toward their enemies and persecutors, and who forget injuries, resemble on that account more particularly the incarnate Word―for Christ always went about seeking to pardon and to load with blessings those who were in sin. By imitating the charity and the meekness of the Lamb, the soul disposes itself to receive and maintain that noble spirit of charity and love of God and the neighbor, which makes it apt for all the influences of divine grace and benevolence.” (The words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
Article 6
Monday to Wednesday, August 12th & 14th
Mass Suffering Pays Well!
Monday to Wednesday, August 12th & 14th
Mass Suffering Pays Well!
Where is Your Treasure? What is Your Treasure? What do You Treasure?
“The Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in a field. Which a man having found, hid it, and for joy thereof goes, and sells all that he has, and buys that field” (Matthew 13:44). “There is a treasure to be desired” (Proverbs 21:20). Our Lord says: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust and moth consume, and where thieves break-in and steal! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither rust nor moth consume, and where thieves do not break-in and steal! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-21). “Seek and you shall find!” (Matthew 7:7). “The Lord will open His excellent treasure” (Deuteronomy 28:12). The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―with its Holy Eucharist―is “an infinite treasure to men―and they that use it, become the friends of God” (Wisdom 7:14). “In it thou shalt find a treasure!” (Ecclesiasticus 40:18). The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass “shall heap upon him a treasure of joy and gladness, and shall cause him to inherit an everlasting name!” (Ecclesiasticus 15:6). “A good man, out of a good treasure, brings forth good things” (Matthew 12:35) ― and out of the infinite treasure of the Holy Mass, we shall bring out many things that will eventually lead us to salvation and the treasures of Heaven!
Failing to Recognize Gold and Diamonds
Treasure chests are usually full of gold and jewels. Gold is one of the most expensive substances on Earth today. An ounce goes for about $2,500 (as of August 2024). Treasure hunters spend years looking for gold out in the wild, but only a fraction succeed. Gold in a rock can sometimes be a bit hard to distinguish from pyrite, or chalcopyrite, sulphide minerals that are often called “Fools Gold.” Telling the difference between “Fool’s Gold” and real gold can be challenging because they look very similar. This is especially true when you have an untrained eye and are unfamiliar with their properties.
Diamonds are one of the most sought-after gemstones in the world due to their durability, sparkle, and natural beauty. Not the most expensive, but the rarest colored diamond is the red diamond. There are only 20 to 30 red diamonds ever mined that are good enough to use in jewelry, which adds to its appeal and price tag. Red diamonds go for about $1 million per carat. The second most expensive gemstone is the pink diamond, coming in close at $1.2 million per carat. The blue diamond is the singular most expensive gemstone known to man. It is $3.93 million for every carat. In 2022, the most expensive blue diamond (15 carats) sold for $57 million in Hong Kong.
While recognizing an already “cut diamond” is fairly simple, identifying a “raw diamond” is challenging. Raw diamonds, also known as rough diamonds, are diamonds that have not been cut or polished. Someone who knows little about jewels and gemstones, would not recognize a raw diamond if they saw one―they would think it was a mere stone. Raw diamonds have an unpolished, rough surface that lacks the brilliant facets of cut diamonds. They are typically found in the form of a rough stone and can be any color, but the most common color is yellow or brown.
The Treasures of the Holy Mass and Holy Eucharist
The same can be said about the treasures of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist―they are the Gold among the other precious metals that are the other Sacraments. In the Old Testament we read of hundreds of instances where God demands that gold be used in the construction of His Temple in Jerusalem. We speak of “Hearts of Gold” and Charity is often symbolized by gold―and “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and Christ our God is in the Holy Eucharist. Hence the Church requires that the paten and the interior of the chalice used at Mass should be gold plated, and that the interior of the ciborium containing the Sacred Hosts in the tabernacle should also be gold plated.
The Mass and the Holy Eucharist are the Blue Diamonds among the other diamonds or Sacraments. These “Blue Diamonds”―the Mass and the Holy Eucharist―are the most expensive “Diamonds” because they cost Our Lord Jesus Christ His Precious Blood: “You were not redeemed with corruptible things as gold or silver―but with the Precious Blood of Christ!” (1 Peter 1:18-19). You could apply the following words to the Holy Eucharist, which is the fruit of the Mass: “My fruit is better than gold and the precious stone” (Proverbs 8:19) … “Neither did I compare unto it any precious stone―for all gold, in comparison to it, is as a little sand, and silver in respect to it shall be counted as clay!” (Wisdom 7:9). “It shall bring thee more profit than gold!” (Ecclesiasticus 29:14). The Holy Mass can ‘buy’ far more than gold can buy! Can gold purchase salvation? No! “You were not redeemed with gold or silver―but with the Precious Blood of Christ!” (1 Peter 1:18-19). That Precious Blood can only be obtained through the words of Consecration spoken by the priest at Mass. Can gold release souls from Purgatory? No! Yet Masses offered for the souls in Purgatory can alleviate their pain and also obtain their release. Can gold pay the debt for sin? No! But the Holy Sacrifice of Mass can pay the debt for sin. St. Lawrence Justinian (1381-1456) writes: “No human tongue can enumerate the favors that trace back to the Sacrifice of the Mass! The sinner is reconciled with God; the just man becomes more upright; sins are wiped away; vices are uprooted; virtue and merit increases; and the devil’s schemes are frustrated!”
Ignored Treasures
Unfortunately, the Church’s greatest treasures are being shown the greatest neglect and indifference! Only 64% of Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist, and only 17% of adult Catholics physically attend Mass at least once per week, according to a 2022 published survey from Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate. They shoot themselves in the foot by turning their backs on what could nourish them, strengthen them, and lead them to eternal life. The words Our Lord spoke concerning the multitude that had followed Him for several days, and led Him to perform the miraculous multiplication of loaves and fishes, could well be addressed to the multitude who DO NOT follow Him anymore: “I have compassion on the multitudes, because they continue with me now three days, and have not what to eat, and I will not send them away fasting, lest they faint in the way!” (Matthew 15:32). Yet this multitude of fallen-away Catholics and disbelieving Catholics choose not to partake of an even greater miracle than the multiplication of loaves and fishes―which is the transubstantiation of bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ! And so they faint and fall on the road that should lead to Heaven, but now potentially leads to Hell.
Let us not fall into the same trap! We have been given all that we need to get to Heaven! Let not the devil and the world distract from what really matters―our salvation and the means to that salvation: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). St. Ambrose, a Father and Doctor of the Church, says: “Those who perish, perish by their own negligence!” Let us then look more closely at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist to see how we can find, unpack and use the great treasure store of grace that they offer us.
The Blessing of the Cross―the Cross is a Blessing
Yes, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass can obtain many blessings and favors―even temporal blessings and favors―but the ultimate grace has to be salvation, which is the reason why Christ came to sacrifice Himself. It would be selfish and immature to place, seek and hope for any other grace more than the grace of salvation. The Sacrifice of the Mass―which is one and same thing as the Sacrifice of Christ on Calvary―should give birth to a spirit of sacrifice within us; it should initially produce in us an acceptance of the cross and should eventually lead to a love of the cross―for in the cross is salvation: “In cruce salus!” Or, as we pray in the Introit from the Mass of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on September 14th: “Nos autem gloriari oportet, in cruce Domini nostri Iesu Christi: in quo est salus, vita, et resurrectio nostra, per quem salvati et liberati sumus!” ― meaning: “We should glory in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, in whom is our salvation, life and resurrection, through whom we are saved and delivered!” ― which owes its origins to St. Paul: “God forbid that I should glory, except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14) ― which, in turn, owes it origins to the words of Our Lord Himself: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross and does not follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is all about the Cross of Christ and this can be seen from numerous times the Sign of the Cross is made during Mass. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass begins with the Sign of Cross and ends with Last Blessing giving in the form of the Sign of the Cross. In between the beginning and the end―depending upon what prayers are said or omitted (e.g., the Gloria in Excelsis Deo, the Creed, Sung Mass or Low Mass, etc.) the Sign of the Cross can be made as much as 60 times in a Low Mass (64 times in a High Sung Mass) with one altar server receiving Holy Communion. If the faithful also communicate, then the priest makes the Sign of the Cross with the Host over each single communicant―so you could add another 10, 20, 50, 100, 200, etc. additional Signs of the Cross during Holy Communion. On the point of Holy Communion, the fact that the priest makes the Sign of the Cross with the Host over each person receiving Holy Communion should eloquently speak to us as if saying: “With the Cross comes Jesus―No Cross, No Jesus!” which echoes the above words of Our Lord Himself: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “Whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “He that does not take up his cross and does not follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
Besides all the Signs of the Cross that are made during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, we are surrounded by crosses all throughout the church. Above the main altar you will see a very large cross. On the walls that surround you, there are the Fourteen Stations of the Cross. Before modern architecture destroyed things, churches used to be built in the form of a cross―so that when viewed from above, the shape of the cross would be apparent. When the church is consecrated by a bishop, small crosses are affixed to the interior walls of the church. The consecration of the church has the bishop making numerous Signs of the Cross throughout the long ceremony. All objects that are blessed by a priest, are blessed with the Sign of the Cross. The various vestments of the priest for Mass, usually have crosses embroidered upon them―and on the front and back of the priest’s chasuble you will usually see a large cross. The cross is everywhere―which should remind us that in our lives we will also find the cross everywhere!
This inescapable repetitive presence of the Cross all throughout the Mass―from beginning to end―should also remind us what was mentioned in the previous article, that is to say the inescapable and repetitive mentioning of sin, sinfulness and guilty all throughout the Mass. There is an obvious and clear link between these two things―sin and the cross. It is through His Sacrifice on the Cross that Christ pays for sin and redeems our souls―and it is through our own personal God-sent crosses that we are able to join ourselves to Christ’s Sacrifice and make reparation for our own personal sins. That attitude and approach should be at the very heart of our assistance and each and every Mass―ever deepening our sorrow for sin, and ever increasing our love of the cross. That should be the backbone of our Mass attendance to which everything else is connected. It should be the root out of which everything else grows and produces fruit―no roots, no fruits. Holy Mother Church sometimes even gives you a “head start” on the way of the cross! The Mass can be unbearably long for some weak Catholics; it can be even longer if it is a Sung Mass! It can be made all the heavier by a long sermon; heavier still if the sermon is boring; even more heavy if Mass is prolonged by hundreds receiving Holy Communion. Adding to weight of the burden could be the uncomfortable pews; the lack of air-conditioning, or lack of heating; the bad choir and bad choice of hymns, the crying babies, the persistent coughing/sneezing person next to you or near you, etc. See how much Holy Mother Church loves you and cares for you and you spiritual health and salvation!!! Don’t waste those golden opportunities! Don’t throw away those gems!
At the Crossroads! Which Way Will You Turn?
St. Augustine tells us that the very same cross can lead one soul to Heaven and another soul to Hell! What does he mean by that? He is talking about our reaction to the cross that comes our way―whether we gladly accept it or bitterly reject it. St. Augustine’s comments come in relation to the two thieves who were crucified alongside Christ on Calvary. The “Good Thief” accepted his cross and crucifixion as a just punishment for his sins: “And one of those robbers who were hanged, blasphemed Him, saying: ‘If Thou be Christ, save Thyself and us!’ But the other robber answering, rebuked him, saying: ‘Neither dost thou fear God, seeing thou art condemned under the same condemnation! And we, indeed, justly―for we receive the due reward of our deeds! But this Man hath done no evil!’” (Luke 23:39-41). The “Bad Thief” refused to accept his crucifixion as a just condemnation for his sins and crimes; whereas the “Good Thief” humbly accepted his punishment, admitting his guilt and declaring his punishment as being justly deserved. The “Bad Thief” wanted to get out of the situation and escape if possible―so He asks Christ to use His power and rescue both of them. The “Good Thief” is not desiring to escape the just punishment―instead he hopes that Christ will rescue him from eternal punishment in Hell, “And he said to Jesus: ‘Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to thee―this day thou shalt be with Me in paradise!’” (Luke 23:42-43).
Like the “Good Thief”, we should accept reality and not try to escape reality. The reality is that we are all sinners―and at one time or another, probably mortal sinners―and so we have been deserving of Hell. “Whosoever commits sin, is the servant of sin … He that commits sin is of the devil” (John 8:34; 1 John 3:8). “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD). We have committed the greatest evil in the world―goodness knows how many times! “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and do need the glory [mercy and grace) of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Coming back down to reality―we all know (or we should know) that most Catholic souls and non-Catholic souls end up being damned. You would think that this terrifying fact would make people figure out why that is and how on earth they can avoid it happening to them! But no! Most people are more or less indifferent to that fact and an even fewer people takes steps to try and avoid falling into the same pit! Priests, parents, teachers and those under their care, spend very little time trying to solve that damned puzzle! Our Lord says: “They are blind and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
College Courses on the Cross?
Do they teach the Cross at college? Our Lady would like to do that―as she revealed to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “My most holy Son and myself are trying to find some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science of the Cross and suffering. People with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If thou wish to be Our disciple, then enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the Cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights! … … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! … How persistently they forget, that their Teacher and Master has first accepted sufferings, and has honored and sanctified them in His own Person! … Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion! …
“The worldlings, in their lethargy, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should hate suffering, especially after all that my most holy Son suffered for them … Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation … The Lord and I suffered and endured such bitter sorrows, in order that mortals might be encouraged not to refuse less severe sufferings for their own eternal good. Therefore let mortals show themselves thankful, and willingly enter upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, and to carry it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
Suffering Saints!
The saints are unanimous on the need of suffering for salvation and that the depth of our love of God must be measured by the desire we have to suffer for His sake. Here are just a few quotes along those lines:
“Our Lord, Who saved the world through the Cross, will only work for the good of souls through the Cross.” (St. Madeleine Sophie Barat, 1779-1865).
“Let us understand that God is a Physician, and that suffering is a medicine for salvation, not a punishment for damnation.” (St. Augustine, 353-430).
“Suffering is the very best gift He has to give us. He gives it only to His chosen friends.” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“Often say to yourself: ‘If I wish to become a Saint, then I must suffer!’” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, 1696-1787).
“We must suffer in order to go to God. We forget this truth far too often.” (St. Madeleine Sophie Barat, 1779-1865).
“Sorrow and suffering is the way to glory, the way to the Kingdom.” (St. Bernard, 1090-1153).
“Suffering is the money with which one buys Heaven.” (St. Theophane Venard, 1829-1861).
“Your sufferings will provide the means to purchase Heaven. The things that are according to your liking won’t.” (St. Raphaela Mary, 1850-1925).
“Can you expect to go to Heaven for nothing? Did not our dear Savior track the whole way to it with His Blood and tears?” (St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, 1774-1821).
“One must suffer to gain Eternal Life.” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“The way of the cross by trials suffered for God, is the way to Heaven.” (St. Alphonsus Rodriguez, 1517-1571).
“If there be a true way that leads to the Everlasting Kingdom, it is most certainly that of suffering, patiently endured.” (St. Colette, 1381-1447).
“We can only go to Heaven through suffering, but not all that suffer find salvation. It is only those who suffer readily for the love of Christ.” (St. Vincent de Paul, 1580-1660).
“The greatness of our love of God must be tested by the desire we have of suffering for His sake.” (St. Philip Neri, 1515-1595).
“He who wishes to love God, does not truly love Him if he has not an ardent and constant desire to suffer for His sake.” (St. Aloysius Gonzaga, 1568-1591).
“The Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in a field. Which a man having found, hid it, and for joy thereof goes, and sells all that he has, and buys that field” (Matthew 13:44). “There is a treasure to be desired” (Proverbs 21:20). Our Lord says: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust and moth consume, and where thieves break-in and steal! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither rust nor moth consume, and where thieves do not break-in and steal! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-21). “Seek and you shall find!” (Matthew 7:7). “The Lord will open His excellent treasure” (Deuteronomy 28:12). The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―with its Holy Eucharist―is “an infinite treasure to men―and they that use it, become the friends of God” (Wisdom 7:14). “In it thou shalt find a treasure!” (Ecclesiasticus 40:18). The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass “shall heap upon him a treasure of joy and gladness, and shall cause him to inherit an everlasting name!” (Ecclesiasticus 15:6). “A good man, out of a good treasure, brings forth good things” (Matthew 12:35) ― and out of the infinite treasure of the Holy Mass, we shall bring out many things that will eventually lead us to salvation and the treasures of Heaven!
Failing to Recognize Gold and Diamonds
Treasure chests are usually full of gold and jewels. Gold is one of the most expensive substances on Earth today. An ounce goes for about $2,500 (as of August 2024). Treasure hunters spend years looking for gold out in the wild, but only a fraction succeed. Gold in a rock can sometimes be a bit hard to distinguish from pyrite, or chalcopyrite, sulphide minerals that are often called “Fools Gold.” Telling the difference between “Fool’s Gold” and real gold can be challenging because they look very similar. This is especially true when you have an untrained eye and are unfamiliar with their properties.
Diamonds are one of the most sought-after gemstones in the world due to their durability, sparkle, and natural beauty. Not the most expensive, but the rarest colored diamond is the red diamond. There are only 20 to 30 red diamonds ever mined that are good enough to use in jewelry, which adds to its appeal and price tag. Red diamonds go for about $1 million per carat. The second most expensive gemstone is the pink diamond, coming in close at $1.2 million per carat. The blue diamond is the singular most expensive gemstone known to man. It is $3.93 million for every carat. In 2022, the most expensive blue diamond (15 carats) sold for $57 million in Hong Kong.
While recognizing an already “cut diamond” is fairly simple, identifying a “raw diamond” is challenging. Raw diamonds, also known as rough diamonds, are diamonds that have not been cut or polished. Someone who knows little about jewels and gemstones, would not recognize a raw diamond if they saw one―they would think it was a mere stone. Raw diamonds have an unpolished, rough surface that lacks the brilliant facets of cut diamonds. They are typically found in the form of a rough stone and can be any color, but the most common color is yellow or brown.
The Treasures of the Holy Mass and Holy Eucharist
The same can be said about the treasures of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist―they are the Gold among the other precious metals that are the other Sacraments. In the Old Testament we read of hundreds of instances where God demands that gold be used in the construction of His Temple in Jerusalem. We speak of “Hearts of Gold” and Charity is often symbolized by gold―and “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and Christ our God is in the Holy Eucharist. Hence the Church requires that the paten and the interior of the chalice used at Mass should be gold plated, and that the interior of the ciborium containing the Sacred Hosts in the tabernacle should also be gold plated.
The Mass and the Holy Eucharist are the Blue Diamonds among the other diamonds or Sacraments. These “Blue Diamonds”―the Mass and the Holy Eucharist―are the most expensive “Diamonds” because they cost Our Lord Jesus Christ His Precious Blood: “You were not redeemed with corruptible things as gold or silver―but with the Precious Blood of Christ!” (1 Peter 1:18-19). You could apply the following words to the Holy Eucharist, which is the fruit of the Mass: “My fruit is better than gold and the precious stone” (Proverbs 8:19) … “Neither did I compare unto it any precious stone―for all gold, in comparison to it, is as a little sand, and silver in respect to it shall be counted as clay!” (Wisdom 7:9). “It shall bring thee more profit than gold!” (Ecclesiasticus 29:14). The Holy Mass can ‘buy’ far more than gold can buy! Can gold purchase salvation? No! “You were not redeemed with gold or silver―but with the Precious Blood of Christ!” (1 Peter 1:18-19). That Precious Blood can only be obtained through the words of Consecration spoken by the priest at Mass. Can gold release souls from Purgatory? No! Yet Masses offered for the souls in Purgatory can alleviate their pain and also obtain their release. Can gold pay the debt for sin? No! But the Holy Sacrifice of Mass can pay the debt for sin. St. Lawrence Justinian (1381-1456) writes: “No human tongue can enumerate the favors that trace back to the Sacrifice of the Mass! The sinner is reconciled with God; the just man becomes more upright; sins are wiped away; vices are uprooted; virtue and merit increases; and the devil’s schemes are frustrated!”
Ignored Treasures
Unfortunately, the Church’s greatest treasures are being shown the greatest neglect and indifference! Only 64% of Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist, and only 17% of adult Catholics physically attend Mass at least once per week, according to a 2022 published survey from Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate. They shoot themselves in the foot by turning their backs on what could nourish them, strengthen them, and lead them to eternal life. The words Our Lord spoke concerning the multitude that had followed Him for several days, and led Him to perform the miraculous multiplication of loaves and fishes, could well be addressed to the multitude who DO NOT follow Him anymore: “I have compassion on the multitudes, because they continue with me now three days, and have not what to eat, and I will not send them away fasting, lest they faint in the way!” (Matthew 15:32). Yet this multitude of fallen-away Catholics and disbelieving Catholics choose not to partake of an even greater miracle than the multiplication of loaves and fishes―which is the transubstantiation of bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ! And so they faint and fall on the road that should lead to Heaven, but now potentially leads to Hell.
Let us not fall into the same trap! We have been given all that we need to get to Heaven! Let not the devil and the world distract from what really matters―our salvation and the means to that salvation: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). St. Ambrose, a Father and Doctor of the Church, says: “Those who perish, perish by their own negligence!” Let us then look more closely at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist to see how we can find, unpack and use the great treasure store of grace that they offer us.
The Blessing of the Cross―the Cross is a Blessing
Yes, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass can obtain many blessings and favors―even temporal blessings and favors―but the ultimate grace has to be salvation, which is the reason why Christ came to sacrifice Himself. It would be selfish and immature to place, seek and hope for any other grace more than the grace of salvation. The Sacrifice of the Mass―which is one and same thing as the Sacrifice of Christ on Calvary―should give birth to a spirit of sacrifice within us; it should initially produce in us an acceptance of the cross and should eventually lead to a love of the cross―for in the cross is salvation: “In cruce salus!” Or, as we pray in the Introit from the Mass of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on September 14th: “Nos autem gloriari oportet, in cruce Domini nostri Iesu Christi: in quo est salus, vita, et resurrectio nostra, per quem salvati et liberati sumus!” ― meaning: “We should glory in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, in whom is our salvation, life and resurrection, through whom we are saved and delivered!” ― which owes its origins to St. Paul: “God forbid that I should glory, except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14) ― which, in turn, owes it origins to the words of Our Lord Himself: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross and does not follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is all about the Cross of Christ and this can be seen from numerous times the Sign of the Cross is made during Mass. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass begins with the Sign of Cross and ends with Last Blessing giving in the form of the Sign of the Cross. In between the beginning and the end―depending upon what prayers are said or omitted (e.g., the Gloria in Excelsis Deo, the Creed, Sung Mass or Low Mass, etc.) the Sign of the Cross can be made as much as 60 times in a Low Mass (64 times in a High Sung Mass) with one altar server receiving Holy Communion. If the faithful also communicate, then the priest makes the Sign of the Cross with the Host over each single communicant―so you could add another 10, 20, 50, 100, 200, etc. additional Signs of the Cross during Holy Communion. On the point of Holy Communion, the fact that the priest makes the Sign of the Cross with the Host over each person receiving Holy Communion should eloquently speak to us as if saying: “With the Cross comes Jesus―No Cross, No Jesus!” which echoes the above words of Our Lord Himself: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “Whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “He that does not take up his cross and does not follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
Besides all the Signs of the Cross that are made during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, we are surrounded by crosses all throughout the church. Above the main altar you will see a very large cross. On the walls that surround you, there are the Fourteen Stations of the Cross. Before modern architecture destroyed things, churches used to be built in the form of a cross―so that when viewed from above, the shape of the cross would be apparent. When the church is consecrated by a bishop, small crosses are affixed to the interior walls of the church. The consecration of the church has the bishop making numerous Signs of the Cross throughout the long ceremony. All objects that are blessed by a priest, are blessed with the Sign of the Cross. The various vestments of the priest for Mass, usually have crosses embroidered upon them―and on the front and back of the priest’s chasuble you will usually see a large cross. The cross is everywhere―which should remind us that in our lives we will also find the cross everywhere!
This inescapable repetitive presence of the Cross all throughout the Mass―from beginning to end―should also remind us what was mentioned in the previous article, that is to say the inescapable and repetitive mentioning of sin, sinfulness and guilty all throughout the Mass. There is an obvious and clear link between these two things―sin and the cross. It is through His Sacrifice on the Cross that Christ pays for sin and redeems our souls―and it is through our own personal God-sent crosses that we are able to join ourselves to Christ’s Sacrifice and make reparation for our own personal sins. That attitude and approach should be at the very heart of our assistance and each and every Mass―ever deepening our sorrow for sin, and ever increasing our love of the cross. That should be the backbone of our Mass attendance to which everything else is connected. It should be the root out of which everything else grows and produces fruit―no roots, no fruits. Holy Mother Church sometimes even gives you a “head start” on the way of the cross! The Mass can be unbearably long for some weak Catholics; it can be even longer if it is a Sung Mass! It can be made all the heavier by a long sermon; heavier still if the sermon is boring; even more heavy if Mass is prolonged by hundreds receiving Holy Communion. Adding to weight of the burden could be the uncomfortable pews; the lack of air-conditioning, or lack of heating; the bad choir and bad choice of hymns, the crying babies, the persistent coughing/sneezing person next to you or near you, etc. See how much Holy Mother Church loves you and cares for you and you spiritual health and salvation!!! Don’t waste those golden opportunities! Don’t throw away those gems!
At the Crossroads! Which Way Will You Turn?
St. Augustine tells us that the very same cross can lead one soul to Heaven and another soul to Hell! What does he mean by that? He is talking about our reaction to the cross that comes our way―whether we gladly accept it or bitterly reject it. St. Augustine’s comments come in relation to the two thieves who were crucified alongside Christ on Calvary. The “Good Thief” accepted his cross and crucifixion as a just punishment for his sins: “And one of those robbers who were hanged, blasphemed Him, saying: ‘If Thou be Christ, save Thyself and us!’ But the other robber answering, rebuked him, saying: ‘Neither dost thou fear God, seeing thou art condemned under the same condemnation! And we, indeed, justly―for we receive the due reward of our deeds! But this Man hath done no evil!’” (Luke 23:39-41). The “Bad Thief” refused to accept his crucifixion as a just condemnation for his sins and crimes; whereas the “Good Thief” humbly accepted his punishment, admitting his guilt and declaring his punishment as being justly deserved. The “Bad Thief” wanted to get out of the situation and escape if possible―so He asks Christ to use His power and rescue both of them. The “Good Thief” is not desiring to escape the just punishment―instead he hopes that Christ will rescue him from eternal punishment in Hell, “And he said to Jesus: ‘Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to thee―this day thou shalt be with Me in paradise!’” (Luke 23:42-43).
Like the “Good Thief”, we should accept reality and not try to escape reality. The reality is that we are all sinners―and at one time or another, probably mortal sinners―and so we have been deserving of Hell. “Whosoever commits sin, is the servant of sin … He that commits sin is of the devil” (John 8:34; 1 John 3:8). “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD). We have committed the greatest evil in the world―goodness knows how many times! “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and do need the glory [mercy and grace) of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Coming back down to reality―we all know (or we should know) that most Catholic souls and non-Catholic souls end up being damned. You would think that this terrifying fact would make people figure out why that is and how on earth they can avoid it happening to them! But no! Most people are more or less indifferent to that fact and an even fewer people takes steps to try and avoid falling into the same pit! Priests, parents, teachers and those under their care, spend very little time trying to solve that damned puzzle! Our Lord says: “They are blind and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
College Courses on the Cross?
Do they teach the Cross at college? Our Lady would like to do that―as she revealed to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “My most holy Son and myself are trying to find some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science of the Cross and suffering. People with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If thou wish to be Our disciple, then enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the Cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights! … … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! … How persistently they forget, that their Teacher and Master has first accepted sufferings, and has honored and sanctified them in His own Person! … Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion! …
“The worldlings, in their lethargy, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should hate suffering, especially after all that my most holy Son suffered for them … Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation … The Lord and I suffered and endured such bitter sorrows, in order that mortals might be encouraged not to refuse less severe sufferings for their own eternal good. Therefore let mortals show themselves thankful, and willingly enter upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, and to carry it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
Suffering Saints!
The saints are unanimous on the need of suffering for salvation and that the depth of our love of God must be measured by the desire we have to suffer for His sake. Here are just a few quotes along those lines:
“Our Lord, Who saved the world through the Cross, will only work for the good of souls through the Cross.” (St. Madeleine Sophie Barat, 1779-1865).
“Let us understand that God is a Physician, and that suffering is a medicine for salvation, not a punishment for damnation.” (St. Augustine, 353-430).
“Suffering is the very best gift He has to give us. He gives it only to His chosen friends.” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“Often say to yourself: ‘If I wish to become a Saint, then I must suffer!’” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, 1696-1787).
“We must suffer in order to go to God. We forget this truth far too often.” (St. Madeleine Sophie Barat, 1779-1865).
“Sorrow and suffering is the way to glory, the way to the Kingdom.” (St. Bernard, 1090-1153).
“Suffering is the money with which one buys Heaven.” (St. Theophane Venard, 1829-1861).
“Your sufferings will provide the means to purchase Heaven. The things that are according to your liking won’t.” (St. Raphaela Mary, 1850-1925).
“Can you expect to go to Heaven for nothing? Did not our dear Savior track the whole way to it with His Blood and tears?” (St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, 1774-1821).
“One must suffer to gain Eternal Life.” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“The way of the cross by trials suffered for God, is the way to Heaven.” (St. Alphonsus Rodriguez, 1517-1571).
“If there be a true way that leads to the Everlasting Kingdom, it is most certainly that of suffering, patiently endured.” (St. Colette, 1381-1447).
“We can only go to Heaven through suffering, but not all that suffer find salvation. It is only those who suffer readily for the love of Christ.” (St. Vincent de Paul, 1580-1660).
“The greatness of our love of God must be tested by the desire we have of suffering for His sake.” (St. Philip Neri, 1515-1595).
“He who wishes to love God, does not truly love Him if he has not an ardent and constant desire to suffer for His sake.” (St. Aloysius Gonzaga, 1568-1591).
Article 5
Saturday & Sunday, August 10th & 11th
Making the Most of the Mass―Getting the Most from the Mass
Saturday & Sunday, August 10th & 11th
Making the Most of the Mass―Getting the Most from the Mass
Focus on the Mass and Eucharist
In recent times, Heaven has tried to make us focus on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and its fruit, the Holy Eucharist.
In the 1600s, Our Lord, appearing to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (to whom Our Lady of Good Success also appeared), speaking of future times (our times) said that the ingratitude and betrayal of religious souls, so dear to His Heart, would compel Our Lord “to let My justice fall upon My beloved cloisters — and even over cities — when those so near to Me who belong to Me reject My Spirit, abandoning Me alone in Tabernacles, rarely remembering that I live there especially for love of them, even more than for the rest of the faithful.” Our Lady of Good Success added: “Making use of persons in positions of authority, the devil will assiduously try to destroy the Sacrament of Confession ... The same will happen with Holy Communion. How deeply I grieve upon manifesting to you the many and horrible sacrileges — both public and also secret — that will occur from profanations of the Holy Eucharist! Often during this epoch, the enemies of Jesus Christ, instigated by the demon, will steal consecrated hosts from the churches, so that they might profane the Eucharistic Species. My Most Holy Son will see Himself cast upon the ground and trampled upon by irreverent feet.”
At Fatima, during the third apparition of the angel, the three children were made to adore the Holy Eucharist. The children had started their prayers and were reciting the prayer the Angel had taught them, when above them an unknown light appeared, after which they saw the angel, who had in his hand a chalice over which hung a Host, from which fell in the chalice some drops of Blood. Lucia relates: “We got up again to see what was happening, and we saw the Angel again, who had in his left hand a Chalice over which was suspended a Host, from which some drops of Blood fell into the Chalice.” Leaving the Chalice and the Host suspended in the air, the angel knelt and prostrated himself down to the earth near the children and repeated a prayer three times: “Most Holy Trinity―Father, Son, and Holy Spirit―I adore thee profoundly. I offer thee the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the tabernacles in the world, in reparation for all the outrages, sacrileges and indifferences whereby he is offended. And through the infinite merits of His Most Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I beg of Thee the conversion of poor sinners.” Then he rose, took the Chalice and Host, and gave the Sacred Host to Lucia on her tongue. Then while giving the Precious Blood from the Chalice to Francisco and Jacinta, he said: “Take, eat and drink the Body and the Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly outraged by ungrateful men. Make reparation for their sins and comfort and console your God!” Then, prostrating himself on the ground he repeated with the children three times the same prayer: Most Holy Trinity, etc., and disappeared.
Along the same lines, on June 13th, 1929, Lucia saw another important apparition involving Mary as she was making a Holy Hour in the convent chapel at Tuy in Spain, as was her custom on Thursday nights from eleven to twelve. She was alone, praying the prayers of the Angel in the dim light of the sanctuary lamp when, “Suddenly the whole chapel was illumined by a supernatural light, and above the altar appeared a Cross of light, reaching to the ceiling. In a brighter light on the upper part of the Cross, could be seen the face of a man and his body as far as the waist; upon his breast was a dove of light; nailed to the Cross was the body of another man. A little below the waist, I could see a chalice and a large Host suspended in the air, onto which drops of blood were falling from the Face of Jesus Crucified and from the wound in His side. These drops ran down onto the Host and fell into the chalice. Beneath the right arm of the Cross was Our Lady and in her hand was her Immaculate Heart. (It was Our Lady of Fatima, with her Immaculate Heart in her left hand, without sword or roses, but with a crown of thorns and flames). Under the left arm of the Cross, large letters, as if of crystal clear water which ran down upon the altar, formed these words: ‘Grace and Mercy.’”
At Akita, Our Lady said: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises. The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son.” The “sign left by my Son” is most certainly the Sacrifice of her Son, the Sign of the Cross, the Sacrifice of the Cross―which is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist (for all Sacraments are “signs”, as the Church says: “A Sacrament is an outward sign of an inward [interior] grace.”
Our Greatest Treasure
The saints all agree that the greatest treasure that we possess here on Earth is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with its fruit―the Holy Eucharist. St. Leonard of Port Maurice writes: “The sole sacrifice which we have in our holy religion, that is to say, Holy Mass, is a sacrifice, holy, perfect, in every point complete, with which each one of the faithful nobly honors God … because it contains the Just One Himself, and the Saint of Saints, or rather justice and holiness themselves, and because it sanctifies souls by the infusion of grace and the affluence of gifts which it confers. Being, then, a sacrifice so holy―a sacrifice the most venerable and the most excellent of all―you [must] form a due conception of so great a treasure! … The principal excellence of the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass consists in being essentially, and in the very highest degree, identical with that which was offered on the Cross of Calvary: with this sole difference, that the Sacrifice on the Cross was bloody, and made once for all, and did on that one occasion satisfy fully for all the sins of the world; while the Sacrifice of the Altar is an unbloody sacrifice, which can be repeated an infinite number of times, and was instituted in order to apply in detail that universal ransom which Jesus paid for us on Calvary ... It seems to me impossible for a religious function to possess a prerogative more excellent than this of the Holy Sacrifice of Mass, that it is no mere copy, but one original with the Sacrifice of the Cross.” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice, The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass).
“Our Lord Jesus Christ is the primary offerer of every Mass … At every hour, then, in various parts of the world, this most perfectly holy Priest offers to the Father His Blood, His Soul, and His whole self for us―and all this He does as many times as there are Masses celebrated in the whole world. O boundless treasure! O mine of inestimable stores thus possessed by us in the Church of God! O happy we if we could but assist at all these Masses! What a store of reward would be thus acquired! What a heaping up of graces in this life, what a fund of glory in the other, would be the fruit of so loving an attendance! … I cannot restrain myself from exclaiming, O dull and incapable world, that understands nothing of mysteries so sublime! How is it possible that anyone should remain before the altar with a mind distracted and a heart dissipated at a time when the holy Angels stand there trembling and astonished at the contemplation of a work so stupendous?” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice, The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass).
The Amount of Grace You Get Depends on Your Devotion
We all know the phrase: “You get out of something what you put into it!” The phrase basically means that if you try hard, you will succeed, and if you don't try hard, you should expect to fail. You study hard for an exam and so you expect to pass the exam―but if you fail to study for the exam, then it can be expected that you will fail the exam. Holy Scripture puts it this way: “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange points out that the graces we will get from the Mass are in proportion to the devotion with which we assist at Mass: “The Mass, considered in itself, has infinite value, for it is the same in substance as the Sacrifice of the Cross, which has infinite value. Whereas the effects of the Mass that relate to us, are poured forth only in proportion to our interior dispositions … The Eucharistic Sacrifice has infinite value in itself … yet the effects it produces are always finite because of the limitations of creatures and our particular interior dispositions ... St. Thomas Aquinas says that the effect of each Mass is not limited by the will of Christ, but only by the devotion of those for whom it is offered up … The Mass is limited only by the capacity of the subjects who receive it … The limitation on merit is not Christ's doing, but stems from our lack of fervor or intention. As St. Thomas says, just as we receive more heat from a fireplace the closer we approach it, so we derive more benefit from the fruits of the Mass in the measure we attend with a spirit of faith, trust in god, love, and piety.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, Our Savior and His Love for Us).
“The Church teaches us that each Eucharistic Communion should increase our charity and make our hearts more like the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus. Every time we receive, our Communion should be substantially more fervent than the one before … At every Mass, when the priest raises the Precious Blood high above the altar, our Faith in its redemptive power and virtue ought to become greater and more intense! ” (Fr Garrigou-Lagrange, The Love of God, chapter “The Soul of the Mass”; also The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
We recall the words of Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824) on the Mass and the manner in which it is offered: “Mass, badly celebrated, is an enormous evil. It is not a matter of indifference how it is said! ... Our Lady said what is most painful for me to repeat―that if only one priest offered the unbloody Sacrifice as worthily and with the same sentiments as the Apostles, he could ward off all calamities from the Church!” The same principle can be applied to the assistance at Mass by the laity. How many evils in their own personal lives could they ward off by a much more devout, attentive, meditative, fervent, humble and grateful assistance at Mass? As St. Lawrence Justinian (1381-1456) says: “No human tongue can enumerate the favors that trace back to the Sacrifice of the Mass! The sinner is reconciled with God; the just man becomes more upright; sins are wiped away; vices are uprooted; virtue and merit increases; and the devil’s schemes are frustrated!” Which is why St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), Doctor of the Church, writes: “The celebration of Holy Mass is as valuable as the death of Jesus on the cross!”
The Foundation of Our Assistance at Mass
Why do you go to Mass? Do you go because you HAVE to go? Do you go because the Church obliges Sunday Mass attendance under pain of mortal sin? Do you go only because the rest of the family goes? Do you go out of habit, on auto-pilot, without thinking much about it? What is the purpose of Mass? What is it meant to do or achieve?
There are two aspects to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―much like there are two sides to a coin. One aspect is in relation to God; the other aspect is in relation to ourselves. With regard to God, the goal of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the same as the primary goal of our lives―to give glory to God. “The Lord has made all things for Himself” (Proverbs 16:4). God Himself says: “I have I have formed him, made him and created him for My glory!” (Isaias 43:7). Hence, at Bethlehem the angels sang: “Glory to God in the highest!” (Luke 2:14). “He that glories, let him glory in the Lord!” (2 Corinthians 10:17). “Let no man therefore glory in men!” (1 Corinthians 3:21). Let it not be said of us: “They loved the glory of men more than the glory of God!” (John 12:43). “If you will not lay it to heart, to give glory to My Name, saith the Lord of hosts, then I will send poverty upon you, and will curse your blessings! Yes I will curse them, because you have not laid it to heart!” (Malachias 2:2).
Hence it is that Holy Scripture adds: “Bring up sacrifice and give to the Lord glory to His Name! … Give ye glory to the Lord, for He is good!” (1 Paralipomenon 16:29, 34) … “Bring to the Lord glory and honor! Bring to the Lord glory to His Name! Adore the Lord in His holy court!” (Psalm 28:2) … “Bring up sacrifices, and come into His courts! Bring to the Lord glory unto His Name!” (Psalm 95:8) … “Go into His gates with praise, into His courts with hymns, and give glory to Him!” (Psalm 99:4) … “Give glory to the Lord God!” (Josue 7:19) … “You shall give glory to God!” (1 Kings 6:5) … “Bring ye to the Lord glory!” (1 Paralipomenon 16:28) … “Whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31).
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “The entire universe, with all its parts, is ordained towards God as its end … and to the glory of God! … The end of divine worship is that man may give glory to God, and submit to Him in mind and body” (Summa Theologica, Ia, q. 65, art.2; IIa-IIae, q. 93, art. 2).
We speak of “The Four Ends of Mass”―which are (1) Adoration, (2) Thanksgiving, (3) Petition, and (4) Atonement for Sin. All of these four ends give glory to God. We glorify God when we adore Him; we glorify God when we thank Him for all that He has done and is doing for us; we glorify God when we petition Him by turning to Him for all our needs, for without Him we can do nothing good; and we glorify God when atone for our sins by which we offended His glory.
The Mass, Sin and Humility
The foundation and chief purpose of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the same as that of the Sacrifice of Christ on Calvary―forgiveness of sin, redemption from sin. Christ paid the price for sin by His Passion and Death. Whose sin? Our sins! Your sins! The great evils that we have committed―that you have committed! “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD).
Christ came upon Earth for the sake of sinners: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and do need the glory [mercy and grace) of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
We have grown so accustomed to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass that we have lost sight of what it is all about―or at least our vision has become very blurred. All throughout the Mass there is either explicit or implicit reference to sin, its consequences and its removal. If you carefully study the Ordinary of the Mass (that is to say, the parts that are always present and never change―unlike the Gospel, Epistle, Collects, etc.), then you will see this omnipresent reference to sin.
We start the Mass with a Sign of the Cross―which should remind us the Passion and Death of Christ on Calvary for our sins. During the Prayers at the Foot of the Altar, the priest and the laity recite the Confiteor or “I Confess”―wherein both priest and laity admit to their sinfulness: “I confess to Almighty God … that I have sinned exceedingly in thought, word and deed! Through my fault! Through my fault! Through my most grievous fault! Therefore I beseech the blessed Mary, ever Virgin, blessed Michael the Archangel, blessed John the Baptist, the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, all the Saints, and you, brethren, to pray to the Lord our God for me!” After which both priest and laity pray for each other: “May Almighty God have mercy upon you, forgive you your sins, and bring you to life everlasting! … May the Almighty and merciful Lord grant us pardon, absolution, and remission of our sins!” Then, as the priest mounts the steps to the altar and kisses the altar, he prays: “Take away from us our iniquities, we entreat Thee, O Lord, that with pure minds we may worthily enter into the Holy of Holies! … We beseech Thee, O Lord, by the merits of Thy Saints, whose relics are here, and of all the Saints, that Thou wilt deign to pardon me all my sins!” The Mass has barely begun and there is an awful lot of humble admission to sin and sinfulness, as well as begging for forgiveness!
Then comes the Introit of the Mass, which may or may not have reference to sin. Immediately after the Introit, both priest and laity are admitting to being sinners when they beg multiple times: “Lord have mercy! Christ have mercy! Lord have mercy!” Have mercy for what? Mercy on our sins, of course! Whenever the Gloria in Excelsis Deo (“Glory to God in the Highest”) is said, then we again make reference to sin and sinfulness: “Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father, Who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us! Who takest away the sins of the world, receive our prayer! Who sittest at the right hand of the Father, have mercy on us!”
The readings―the Epistle and Gospel―may or may not make reference to sin and sinfulness. However, before reading the Gospel, the priest says: “Cleanse my heart and my lips, O almighty God, … through Thy gracious mercy, purify me, that I may worthily announce Thy holy Gospel” and after the Gospel he says: “By the words of the Gospel may our sins be blotted out!”
If the Creed is said, then once again there is reference to sin and sinfulness: “I believe in … Jesus Christ … Who, for us men, and for our salvation, came down from Heaven … He was crucified for us, suffered under Pontius Pilate, and was buried ... I confess one Baptism for the remission of sins.”
The Offertory prayers are full of references of sin and sinfulness. In offering the bread on the paten, the priest says: “Accept, O holy Father, almighty and eternal God, this unspotted host, which I, Thy unworthy servant, offer unto Thee for my innumerable sins, offenses, and negligences, and for all here present … that it may avail both me and them for salvation!” In offering the wine in the chalice, he says: “We offer unto Thee, O Lord, the chalice of salvation, beseeching Thy clemency … for our salvation, and for that of the whole world!” He then says: “Accept us, O Lord, in the spirit of humility and contrition of heart …”
During the Canon of the Mass, the priest again refers to sin, sinfulness and begs mercy: “We therefore, humbly pray and beseech Thee, most merciful Father … preserve us from eternal damnation … To us, Thy sinful servants, confiding in the multitude of Thy mercies, vouchsafe to grant fellowship with Thy holy Apostles and Martyrs and with all Thy Saints, into whose company we beseech Thee to admit us, not weighing our merits, but pardoning our offenses.”
Then during the Pater Noster (“Our Father”), he prays: “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” In the prayer immediately following, he adds: “Deliver us from all evils, past, present and to come, … that through the assistance of Thy mercy we may be always free from sin!”
Soon after there comes the Agnus Dei (“Lamb of God”), wherein the priest prays: “Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us! Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us! Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world, grant us peace!”
In the three prayers following the Agnus Dei, the priest again references sin, sinfulness and mercy: “Look not upon my sins, but the Faith of Thy Church … Deliver me from all my iniquities and from all evils by this Thy most sacred Body and Blood; and make me always cleave to Thy commandments, and never suffer me to be separated from Thee! … Let not the partaking of Thy Body, which I, though unworthy, presume to receive, turn to my judgment and condemnation; but let it, through Thy mercy, become a safeguard and remedy, both for soul and body!”
Before Holy Communion, the faithful will once again pray the Confiteor (“I Confess”) and once again admit their guilt and sinfulness: : “I confess to Almighty God … that I have sinned exceedingly in thought, word and deed! Through my fault! Through my fault! Through my most grievous fault!”
Then, at the Domine non sum dignus (“Lord I am not worthy”), the priest and afterwards the faithful will say multiple times: “Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof; say but the word, and my soul shall be healed!”
Humbling? It should be! It had better be humbling―for “God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble! Cleanse your hands, ye sinners, and purify your hearts” (James 4:6-8) … “for God resists the proud, but to the humble He gives grace!” (1 Peter 5:5). Let us not go to Mass with the spirit with which the Pharisee went to the Temple in one of Our Lord’s parables: “Two men went up into the Temple to pray―the one a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give Thee thanks that I am not like the rest of men―extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!’ And the Publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner! I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other―because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!” (Luke 18:10-14). Do you want an abundance of grace from the Masses that you attend? Then before anything else, lay a solid foundation―humble yourself, admit your sinfulness, don’t point the finger at others, and beg mercy for yourself and others! We easily forget―or never even realized―how great a virtue is the virtue of compunction, which is defined as “an ever abiding sorrow for sin”. We should always have an undercurrent of sorrow for our past sins―not to depress us or discourage us―but to keep us humble and contrite. The more sorry we are about something, then the less likely we are to repeat it.
Rather than being humble and contrite, how many people attend Mass in the following manner described by St. Leonard of Port Maurice: “Now, tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, do you thoroughly well consider that you are going up as it were to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer? If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued, with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers, what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball? But what shall be said if you profane those functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time, and in any place; but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God (Jeremias 48:10).” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice, The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass).
If the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with its Holy Eucharist is the greatest of all Sacraments, then it should be giving the greatest graces. As St. Leonard of Port Maurice writes in his book on the Mass―the Mass “sanctifies souls by the infusion of grace and the affluence of gifts which it confers. O boundless treasure! O mine of inestimable stores, thus possessed by us in the Church of God! … Consider the spiritual bewilderment of those who go in search of the quickest and least devoutly conducted Masses, and, what is worse, assist at them with little or no devotion! … What say you, then? Will you ever dare, from this time forward, to be at Mass sitting, talking, looking here and there, perhaps even sleeping, or content yourselves with reciting some vocal prayer? O dull and incapable world, that understands nothing of mysteries so sublime! How is it possible that anyone should remain before the altar with a mind distracted and a heart dissipated at a time when the holy Angels stand there trembling and astonished at the contemplation of a work so stupendous?” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice, The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass).
Unfortunately, “familiarity breeds contempt” as they say. The more we become used to something, the less respect we tend to show to that thing. Family life is sometimes―or often―a good example of this. The longer spouses are married, the less love, attention and devotion they risk showing to each other. Birthdays and anniversaries become routine, auto-pilot, superficial, lip-service things. The words “I love you!” are increasingly spoken without fervor, automatically and lukewarmly slipping from the lips. The same can be seen in progressive and increasing falling-away in the respect that many children have towards their parents with each passing year. Our Lord’s complaint comes to mind here: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). How true that is concerning the manner in which some priests offer the Mass and how the laity assist at Mass―it is mere “lip-service” with little or no heart to it.
We can get great graces from Sacramentals such as the Rosary and the Scapular or the Miraculous Medal―but these are only Sacramentals and not Sacraments. The Sacraments are far superior to Sacramentals and among the Sacraments, the Holy Eucharist (and, by connection, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass) are the greatest. Therefore, it stands to reason that the greatest graces should come from the greatest Sacrament. Yet all of that depends upon our disposition, our fervor, our attention, our respect, our adoration, etc. “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (2 Corinthians 9:6). Likewise, he who has little fervor gets little grace; he who pays little attention gets paid little in grace; he who fails to adore will fail to obtain grace; he who lacks respect will also be lacking in grace! You get out of the Mass what you decide to put into the Mass. Our spiritual poverty is not down to God being stingy, but it is down to our stinginess with God.
As Fr. Martin von Cochem (1634-1712), a German Capuchin theologian, writes in his book, Explanation of the Holy Mass: “What do you now think of Holy Mass, O Christian? Can it be supposed that in the whole world there is any other good work whereby so many graces and fruits are placed within our reach? It is no longer possible to question the truth of the words: ‘If Christians only knew how to profit by Holy Mass, they might acquire greater riches than are to be found in all the things God has created!’ We have indeed a precious storehouse in the Mass―happy he who can earn treasures so great at the cost of so little labor! Who would willingly miss Mass? Who would not delight in hearing it? Let us resolve never to lose an opportunity of hearing Mass, provided the duties of our state of life do not prevent us from doing so. To omit hearing Mass daily, merely from carelessness or laziness, would be a proof that we were either ignorant of, or indifferent to the Divine treasures it contains!”
You Cannot Love What You Do Not Know
There is a logical reason why the Catechism tells that were made to KNOW, LOVE and SERVE God. The order of those three things is not haphazard, but logical. We cannot love what we do not know―therefore knowledge must come first and love will follow. Likewise, we are not inclined to serve somebody whom we do not love. You could apply that to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Taking those three things backwards―we will serve poorly at Mass if we have little love for the Mass; and we will have little love for the Mass if we have little knowledge about the Mass. Therefore, to put things right, we have to first of all know much more about the Mass if we are to have any realistic hope of truly loving the Mass―and if we love the Mass, then we will want to attend as many Masses as we can and attend them with great love and devotion.
The problem is that spiritual work is not easy. St. Thomas Aquinas says there are three kinds of work―physical work, intellectual work and spiritual work. The easiest, he says, is physical work; the next hardest is intellectual work; but the hardest of all is spiritual work. The more abstract something is, the harder it is to master. That is why children prefer to play rather than pray. The devils will also play a part in all of this―they prefer much more that we focus on the physical and material side of things, rather than the spiritual and supernatural side of things. They work overtime to try and take us away from spiritual things and dangle the material things before our eyes and imagination. That is when we must courageously “fight the good fight of Faith, so as to lay hold of eternal life unto which we are called” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “For they that are according to the flesh, mind the things that are of the flesh; but they that are according to the spirit, mind the things that are of the spirit!” (Romans 8:5).
In recent times, Heaven has tried to make us focus on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and its fruit, the Holy Eucharist.
In the 1600s, Our Lord, appearing to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (to whom Our Lady of Good Success also appeared), speaking of future times (our times) said that the ingratitude and betrayal of religious souls, so dear to His Heart, would compel Our Lord “to let My justice fall upon My beloved cloisters — and even over cities — when those so near to Me who belong to Me reject My Spirit, abandoning Me alone in Tabernacles, rarely remembering that I live there especially for love of them, even more than for the rest of the faithful.” Our Lady of Good Success added: “Making use of persons in positions of authority, the devil will assiduously try to destroy the Sacrament of Confession ... The same will happen with Holy Communion. How deeply I grieve upon manifesting to you the many and horrible sacrileges — both public and also secret — that will occur from profanations of the Holy Eucharist! Often during this epoch, the enemies of Jesus Christ, instigated by the demon, will steal consecrated hosts from the churches, so that they might profane the Eucharistic Species. My Most Holy Son will see Himself cast upon the ground and trampled upon by irreverent feet.”
At Fatima, during the third apparition of the angel, the three children were made to adore the Holy Eucharist. The children had started their prayers and were reciting the prayer the Angel had taught them, when above them an unknown light appeared, after which they saw the angel, who had in his hand a chalice over which hung a Host, from which fell in the chalice some drops of Blood. Lucia relates: “We got up again to see what was happening, and we saw the Angel again, who had in his left hand a Chalice over which was suspended a Host, from which some drops of Blood fell into the Chalice.” Leaving the Chalice and the Host suspended in the air, the angel knelt and prostrated himself down to the earth near the children and repeated a prayer three times: “Most Holy Trinity―Father, Son, and Holy Spirit―I adore thee profoundly. I offer thee the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the tabernacles in the world, in reparation for all the outrages, sacrileges and indifferences whereby he is offended. And through the infinite merits of His Most Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I beg of Thee the conversion of poor sinners.” Then he rose, took the Chalice and Host, and gave the Sacred Host to Lucia on her tongue. Then while giving the Precious Blood from the Chalice to Francisco and Jacinta, he said: “Take, eat and drink the Body and the Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly outraged by ungrateful men. Make reparation for their sins and comfort and console your God!” Then, prostrating himself on the ground he repeated with the children three times the same prayer: Most Holy Trinity, etc., and disappeared.
Along the same lines, on June 13th, 1929, Lucia saw another important apparition involving Mary as she was making a Holy Hour in the convent chapel at Tuy in Spain, as was her custom on Thursday nights from eleven to twelve. She was alone, praying the prayers of the Angel in the dim light of the sanctuary lamp when, “Suddenly the whole chapel was illumined by a supernatural light, and above the altar appeared a Cross of light, reaching to the ceiling. In a brighter light on the upper part of the Cross, could be seen the face of a man and his body as far as the waist; upon his breast was a dove of light; nailed to the Cross was the body of another man. A little below the waist, I could see a chalice and a large Host suspended in the air, onto which drops of blood were falling from the Face of Jesus Crucified and from the wound in His side. These drops ran down onto the Host and fell into the chalice. Beneath the right arm of the Cross was Our Lady and in her hand was her Immaculate Heart. (It was Our Lady of Fatima, with her Immaculate Heart in her left hand, without sword or roses, but with a crown of thorns and flames). Under the left arm of the Cross, large letters, as if of crystal clear water which ran down upon the altar, formed these words: ‘Grace and Mercy.’”
At Akita, Our Lady said: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises. The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son.” The “sign left by my Son” is most certainly the Sacrifice of her Son, the Sign of the Cross, the Sacrifice of the Cross―which is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist (for all Sacraments are “signs”, as the Church says: “A Sacrament is an outward sign of an inward [interior] grace.”
Our Greatest Treasure
The saints all agree that the greatest treasure that we possess here on Earth is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with its fruit―the Holy Eucharist. St. Leonard of Port Maurice writes: “The sole sacrifice which we have in our holy religion, that is to say, Holy Mass, is a sacrifice, holy, perfect, in every point complete, with which each one of the faithful nobly honors God … because it contains the Just One Himself, and the Saint of Saints, or rather justice and holiness themselves, and because it sanctifies souls by the infusion of grace and the affluence of gifts which it confers. Being, then, a sacrifice so holy―a sacrifice the most venerable and the most excellent of all―you [must] form a due conception of so great a treasure! … The principal excellence of the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass consists in being essentially, and in the very highest degree, identical with that which was offered on the Cross of Calvary: with this sole difference, that the Sacrifice on the Cross was bloody, and made once for all, and did on that one occasion satisfy fully for all the sins of the world; while the Sacrifice of the Altar is an unbloody sacrifice, which can be repeated an infinite number of times, and was instituted in order to apply in detail that universal ransom which Jesus paid for us on Calvary ... It seems to me impossible for a religious function to possess a prerogative more excellent than this of the Holy Sacrifice of Mass, that it is no mere copy, but one original with the Sacrifice of the Cross.” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice, The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass).
“Our Lord Jesus Christ is the primary offerer of every Mass … At every hour, then, in various parts of the world, this most perfectly holy Priest offers to the Father His Blood, His Soul, and His whole self for us―and all this He does as many times as there are Masses celebrated in the whole world. O boundless treasure! O mine of inestimable stores thus possessed by us in the Church of God! O happy we if we could but assist at all these Masses! What a store of reward would be thus acquired! What a heaping up of graces in this life, what a fund of glory in the other, would be the fruit of so loving an attendance! … I cannot restrain myself from exclaiming, O dull and incapable world, that understands nothing of mysteries so sublime! How is it possible that anyone should remain before the altar with a mind distracted and a heart dissipated at a time when the holy Angels stand there trembling and astonished at the contemplation of a work so stupendous?” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice, The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass).
The Amount of Grace You Get Depends on Your Devotion
We all know the phrase: “You get out of something what you put into it!” The phrase basically means that if you try hard, you will succeed, and if you don't try hard, you should expect to fail. You study hard for an exam and so you expect to pass the exam―but if you fail to study for the exam, then it can be expected that you will fail the exam. Holy Scripture puts it this way: “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange points out that the graces we will get from the Mass are in proportion to the devotion with which we assist at Mass: “The Mass, considered in itself, has infinite value, for it is the same in substance as the Sacrifice of the Cross, which has infinite value. Whereas the effects of the Mass that relate to us, are poured forth only in proportion to our interior dispositions … The Eucharistic Sacrifice has infinite value in itself … yet the effects it produces are always finite because of the limitations of creatures and our particular interior dispositions ... St. Thomas Aquinas says that the effect of each Mass is not limited by the will of Christ, but only by the devotion of those for whom it is offered up … The Mass is limited only by the capacity of the subjects who receive it … The limitation on merit is not Christ's doing, but stems from our lack of fervor or intention. As St. Thomas says, just as we receive more heat from a fireplace the closer we approach it, so we derive more benefit from the fruits of the Mass in the measure we attend with a spirit of faith, trust in god, love, and piety.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, Our Savior and His Love for Us).
“The Church teaches us that each Eucharistic Communion should increase our charity and make our hearts more like the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus. Every time we receive, our Communion should be substantially more fervent than the one before … At every Mass, when the priest raises the Precious Blood high above the altar, our Faith in its redemptive power and virtue ought to become greater and more intense! ” (Fr Garrigou-Lagrange, The Love of God, chapter “The Soul of the Mass”; also The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
We recall the words of Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824) on the Mass and the manner in which it is offered: “Mass, badly celebrated, is an enormous evil. It is not a matter of indifference how it is said! ... Our Lady said what is most painful for me to repeat―that if only one priest offered the unbloody Sacrifice as worthily and with the same sentiments as the Apostles, he could ward off all calamities from the Church!” The same principle can be applied to the assistance at Mass by the laity. How many evils in their own personal lives could they ward off by a much more devout, attentive, meditative, fervent, humble and grateful assistance at Mass? As St. Lawrence Justinian (1381-1456) says: “No human tongue can enumerate the favors that trace back to the Sacrifice of the Mass! The sinner is reconciled with God; the just man becomes more upright; sins are wiped away; vices are uprooted; virtue and merit increases; and the devil’s schemes are frustrated!” Which is why St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), Doctor of the Church, writes: “The celebration of Holy Mass is as valuable as the death of Jesus on the cross!”
The Foundation of Our Assistance at Mass
Why do you go to Mass? Do you go because you HAVE to go? Do you go because the Church obliges Sunday Mass attendance under pain of mortal sin? Do you go only because the rest of the family goes? Do you go out of habit, on auto-pilot, without thinking much about it? What is the purpose of Mass? What is it meant to do or achieve?
There are two aspects to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―much like there are two sides to a coin. One aspect is in relation to God; the other aspect is in relation to ourselves. With regard to God, the goal of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the same as the primary goal of our lives―to give glory to God. “The Lord has made all things for Himself” (Proverbs 16:4). God Himself says: “I have I have formed him, made him and created him for My glory!” (Isaias 43:7). Hence, at Bethlehem the angels sang: “Glory to God in the highest!” (Luke 2:14). “He that glories, let him glory in the Lord!” (2 Corinthians 10:17). “Let no man therefore glory in men!” (1 Corinthians 3:21). Let it not be said of us: “They loved the glory of men more than the glory of God!” (John 12:43). “If you will not lay it to heart, to give glory to My Name, saith the Lord of hosts, then I will send poverty upon you, and will curse your blessings! Yes I will curse them, because you have not laid it to heart!” (Malachias 2:2).
Hence it is that Holy Scripture adds: “Bring up sacrifice and give to the Lord glory to His Name! … Give ye glory to the Lord, for He is good!” (1 Paralipomenon 16:29, 34) … “Bring to the Lord glory and honor! Bring to the Lord glory to His Name! Adore the Lord in His holy court!” (Psalm 28:2) … “Bring up sacrifices, and come into His courts! Bring to the Lord glory unto His Name!” (Psalm 95:8) … “Go into His gates with praise, into His courts with hymns, and give glory to Him!” (Psalm 99:4) … “Give glory to the Lord God!” (Josue 7:19) … “You shall give glory to God!” (1 Kings 6:5) … “Bring ye to the Lord glory!” (1 Paralipomenon 16:28) … “Whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31).
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “The entire universe, with all its parts, is ordained towards God as its end … and to the glory of God! … The end of divine worship is that man may give glory to God, and submit to Him in mind and body” (Summa Theologica, Ia, q. 65, art.2; IIa-IIae, q. 93, art. 2).
We speak of “The Four Ends of Mass”―which are (1) Adoration, (2) Thanksgiving, (3) Petition, and (4) Atonement for Sin. All of these four ends give glory to God. We glorify God when we adore Him; we glorify God when we thank Him for all that He has done and is doing for us; we glorify God when we petition Him by turning to Him for all our needs, for without Him we can do nothing good; and we glorify God when atone for our sins by which we offended His glory.
The Mass, Sin and Humility
The foundation and chief purpose of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the same as that of the Sacrifice of Christ on Calvary―forgiveness of sin, redemption from sin. Christ paid the price for sin by His Passion and Death. Whose sin? Our sins! Your sins! The great evils that we have committed―that you have committed! “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD).
Christ came upon Earth for the sake of sinners: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and do need the glory [mercy and grace) of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
We have grown so accustomed to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass that we have lost sight of what it is all about―or at least our vision has become very blurred. All throughout the Mass there is either explicit or implicit reference to sin, its consequences and its removal. If you carefully study the Ordinary of the Mass (that is to say, the parts that are always present and never change―unlike the Gospel, Epistle, Collects, etc.), then you will see this omnipresent reference to sin.
We start the Mass with a Sign of the Cross―which should remind us the Passion and Death of Christ on Calvary for our sins. During the Prayers at the Foot of the Altar, the priest and the laity recite the Confiteor or “I Confess”―wherein both priest and laity admit to their sinfulness: “I confess to Almighty God … that I have sinned exceedingly in thought, word and deed! Through my fault! Through my fault! Through my most grievous fault! Therefore I beseech the blessed Mary, ever Virgin, blessed Michael the Archangel, blessed John the Baptist, the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, all the Saints, and you, brethren, to pray to the Lord our God for me!” After which both priest and laity pray for each other: “May Almighty God have mercy upon you, forgive you your sins, and bring you to life everlasting! … May the Almighty and merciful Lord grant us pardon, absolution, and remission of our sins!” Then, as the priest mounts the steps to the altar and kisses the altar, he prays: “Take away from us our iniquities, we entreat Thee, O Lord, that with pure minds we may worthily enter into the Holy of Holies! … We beseech Thee, O Lord, by the merits of Thy Saints, whose relics are here, and of all the Saints, that Thou wilt deign to pardon me all my sins!” The Mass has barely begun and there is an awful lot of humble admission to sin and sinfulness, as well as begging for forgiveness!
Then comes the Introit of the Mass, which may or may not have reference to sin. Immediately after the Introit, both priest and laity are admitting to being sinners when they beg multiple times: “Lord have mercy! Christ have mercy! Lord have mercy!” Have mercy for what? Mercy on our sins, of course! Whenever the Gloria in Excelsis Deo (“Glory to God in the Highest”) is said, then we again make reference to sin and sinfulness: “Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father, Who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us! Who takest away the sins of the world, receive our prayer! Who sittest at the right hand of the Father, have mercy on us!”
The readings―the Epistle and Gospel―may or may not make reference to sin and sinfulness. However, before reading the Gospel, the priest says: “Cleanse my heart and my lips, O almighty God, … through Thy gracious mercy, purify me, that I may worthily announce Thy holy Gospel” and after the Gospel he says: “By the words of the Gospel may our sins be blotted out!”
If the Creed is said, then once again there is reference to sin and sinfulness: “I believe in … Jesus Christ … Who, for us men, and for our salvation, came down from Heaven … He was crucified for us, suffered under Pontius Pilate, and was buried ... I confess one Baptism for the remission of sins.”
The Offertory prayers are full of references of sin and sinfulness. In offering the bread on the paten, the priest says: “Accept, O holy Father, almighty and eternal God, this unspotted host, which I, Thy unworthy servant, offer unto Thee for my innumerable sins, offenses, and negligences, and for all here present … that it may avail both me and them for salvation!” In offering the wine in the chalice, he says: “We offer unto Thee, O Lord, the chalice of salvation, beseeching Thy clemency … for our salvation, and for that of the whole world!” He then says: “Accept us, O Lord, in the spirit of humility and contrition of heart …”
During the Canon of the Mass, the priest again refers to sin, sinfulness and begs mercy: “We therefore, humbly pray and beseech Thee, most merciful Father … preserve us from eternal damnation … To us, Thy sinful servants, confiding in the multitude of Thy mercies, vouchsafe to grant fellowship with Thy holy Apostles and Martyrs and with all Thy Saints, into whose company we beseech Thee to admit us, not weighing our merits, but pardoning our offenses.”
Then during the Pater Noster (“Our Father”), he prays: “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” In the prayer immediately following, he adds: “Deliver us from all evils, past, present and to come, … that through the assistance of Thy mercy we may be always free from sin!”
Soon after there comes the Agnus Dei (“Lamb of God”), wherein the priest prays: “Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us! Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us! Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world, grant us peace!”
In the three prayers following the Agnus Dei, the priest again references sin, sinfulness and mercy: “Look not upon my sins, but the Faith of Thy Church … Deliver me from all my iniquities and from all evils by this Thy most sacred Body and Blood; and make me always cleave to Thy commandments, and never suffer me to be separated from Thee! … Let not the partaking of Thy Body, which I, though unworthy, presume to receive, turn to my judgment and condemnation; but let it, through Thy mercy, become a safeguard and remedy, both for soul and body!”
Before Holy Communion, the faithful will once again pray the Confiteor (“I Confess”) and once again admit their guilt and sinfulness: : “I confess to Almighty God … that I have sinned exceedingly in thought, word and deed! Through my fault! Through my fault! Through my most grievous fault!”
Then, at the Domine non sum dignus (“Lord I am not worthy”), the priest and afterwards the faithful will say multiple times: “Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof; say but the word, and my soul shall be healed!”
Humbling? It should be! It had better be humbling―for “God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble! Cleanse your hands, ye sinners, and purify your hearts” (James 4:6-8) … “for God resists the proud, but to the humble He gives grace!” (1 Peter 5:5). Let us not go to Mass with the spirit with which the Pharisee went to the Temple in one of Our Lord’s parables: “Two men went up into the Temple to pray―the one a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give Thee thanks that I am not like the rest of men―extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!’ And the Publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner! I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other―because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!” (Luke 18:10-14). Do you want an abundance of grace from the Masses that you attend? Then before anything else, lay a solid foundation―humble yourself, admit your sinfulness, don’t point the finger at others, and beg mercy for yourself and others! We easily forget―or never even realized―how great a virtue is the virtue of compunction, which is defined as “an ever abiding sorrow for sin”. We should always have an undercurrent of sorrow for our past sins―not to depress us or discourage us―but to keep us humble and contrite. The more sorry we are about something, then the less likely we are to repeat it.
Rather than being humble and contrite, how many people attend Mass in the following manner described by St. Leonard of Port Maurice: “Now, tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, do you thoroughly well consider that you are going up as it were to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer? If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued, with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers, what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball? But what shall be said if you profane those functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time, and in any place; but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God (Jeremias 48:10).” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice, The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass).
If the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with its Holy Eucharist is the greatest of all Sacraments, then it should be giving the greatest graces. As St. Leonard of Port Maurice writes in his book on the Mass―the Mass “sanctifies souls by the infusion of grace and the affluence of gifts which it confers. O boundless treasure! O mine of inestimable stores, thus possessed by us in the Church of God! … Consider the spiritual bewilderment of those who go in search of the quickest and least devoutly conducted Masses, and, what is worse, assist at them with little or no devotion! … What say you, then? Will you ever dare, from this time forward, to be at Mass sitting, talking, looking here and there, perhaps even sleeping, or content yourselves with reciting some vocal prayer? O dull and incapable world, that understands nothing of mysteries so sublime! How is it possible that anyone should remain before the altar with a mind distracted and a heart dissipated at a time when the holy Angels stand there trembling and astonished at the contemplation of a work so stupendous?” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice, The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass).
Unfortunately, “familiarity breeds contempt” as they say. The more we become used to something, the less respect we tend to show to that thing. Family life is sometimes―or often―a good example of this. The longer spouses are married, the less love, attention and devotion they risk showing to each other. Birthdays and anniversaries become routine, auto-pilot, superficial, lip-service things. The words “I love you!” are increasingly spoken without fervor, automatically and lukewarmly slipping from the lips. The same can be seen in progressive and increasing falling-away in the respect that many children have towards their parents with each passing year. Our Lord’s complaint comes to mind here: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). How true that is concerning the manner in which some priests offer the Mass and how the laity assist at Mass―it is mere “lip-service” with little or no heart to it.
We can get great graces from Sacramentals such as the Rosary and the Scapular or the Miraculous Medal―but these are only Sacramentals and not Sacraments. The Sacraments are far superior to Sacramentals and among the Sacraments, the Holy Eucharist (and, by connection, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass) are the greatest. Therefore, it stands to reason that the greatest graces should come from the greatest Sacrament. Yet all of that depends upon our disposition, our fervor, our attention, our respect, our adoration, etc. “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (2 Corinthians 9:6). Likewise, he who has little fervor gets little grace; he who pays little attention gets paid little in grace; he who fails to adore will fail to obtain grace; he who lacks respect will also be lacking in grace! You get out of the Mass what you decide to put into the Mass. Our spiritual poverty is not down to God being stingy, but it is down to our stinginess with God.
As Fr. Martin von Cochem (1634-1712), a German Capuchin theologian, writes in his book, Explanation of the Holy Mass: “What do you now think of Holy Mass, O Christian? Can it be supposed that in the whole world there is any other good work whereby so many graces and fruits are placed within our reach? It is no longer possible to question the truth of the words: ‘If Christians only knew how to profit by Holy Mass, they might acquire greater riches than are to be found in all the things God has created!’ We have indeed a precious storehouse in the Mass―happy he who can earn treasures so great at the cost of so little labor! Who would willingly miss Mass? Who would not delight in hearing it? Let us resolve never to lose an opportunity of hearing Mass, provided the duties of our state of life do not prevent us from doing so. To omit hearing Mass daily, merely from carelessness or laziness, would be a proof that we were either ignorant of, or indifferent to the Divine treasures it contains!”
You Cannot Love What You Do Not Know
There is a logical reason why the Catechism tells that were made to KNOW, LOVE and SERVE God. The order of those three things is not haphazard, but logical. We cannot love what we do not know―therefore knowledge must come first and love will follow. Likewise, we are not inclined to serve somebody whom we do not love. You could apply that to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Taking those three things backwards―we will serve poorly at Mass if we have little love for the Mass; and we will have little love for the Mass if we have little knowledge about the Mass. Therefore, to put things right, we have to first of all know much more about the Mass if we are to have any realistic hope of truly loving the Mass―and if we love the Mass, then we will want to attend as many Masses as we can and attend them with great love and devotion.
The problem is that spiritual work is not easy. St. Thomas Aquinas says there are three kinds of work―physical work, intellectual work and spiritual work. The easiest, he says, is physical work; the next hardest is intellectual work; but the hardest of all is spiritual work. The more abstract something is, the harder it is to master. That is why children prefer to play rather than pray. The devils will also play a part in all of this―they prefer much more that we focus on the physical and material side of things, rather than the spiritual and supernatural side of things. They work overtime to try and take us away from spiritual things and dangle the material things before our eyes and imagination. That is when we must courageously “fight the good fight of Faith, so as to lay hold of eternal life unto which we are called” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “For they that are according to the flesh, mind the things that are of the flesh; but they that are according to the spirit, mind the things that are of the spirit!” (Romans 8:5).
Article 4
Wednesday to Friday, August 7th to 9th
Mass Destruction!
Wednesday to Friday, August 7th to 9th
Mass Destruction!
Mass Destruction from Two Opposite Viewpoints
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a weapon of mass destruction―that is to say, for the destruction of evil. The destructive power of the Mass against evil was revealed by Our Lady to Blessed Anne Emmerich, who tells us: “Mass, badly celebrated, is an enormous evil. Ah! It is not a matter of indifference how it is said! . . . I have had a great vision on the mystery of Holy Mass and I have seen that whatever good has existed since creation is owing to it … Our Lady said something that is most painful for me to repeat―that if only one priest offered the unbloody Sacrifice as worthily and with the same sentiments as the Apostles, he could ward off all calamities from the Church!” (Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, 1774-1824).
Satan―more than any of us―knows the power of the Holy Mass and how much it hinders his plots and plans against the Church. That is why Satan is engaged in his own version of mass destruction―whereby he is trying to destroy the Mass. As they say: “Little by little, one goes far!” ― and Satan has been chipping away the Holy Mass little by little in recent times, not just since the Second Vatican Council, but already in the decades before the Council. In the 1900s the Mass was reformed and shortened little by little. Then, in the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council, the Traditional Latin Mass was replaced by the Novus Ordo Missae (the New Order of Mass), which also kept introducing more and more changes, little by little. The period of incremental reform, from 1964, was one of constant change, experiments and liturgical abuses. Today, Francis has joined in this diabolical work and has, little by little, turned the screws more and more by limiting the Traditional Latin Mass and even trying to restrict and eliminate the Latin Mass.
Attempted Destruction of the Church and the Mass
Heaven already forewarned of this tactic by the revelations and visions granted to BLESSED ANN CATHERINE EMMERICH. Here are some relevant extracts that apply to this changing of the Mass and ultimately the changing of the Church:
“I had a vision of the great tribulation … A great devastation is now near at hand ... The nearer the time of the end, the more the darkness of Satan will spread on Earth … Among the strangest things that I saw, were long processions of bishops. Their thoughts and utterances were made known to me through images issuing from their mouths. Their faults towards religion were shown by external deformities. A few had only a body, with a dark cloud of fog instead of a head. Others had only a head, their bodies and hearts were like thick vapors. Some were lame; others were paralytics; others were asleep or staggering. I saw what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world [the Second Vatican Council was for all the bishops of the world], but only a small number were perfectly sound … The Church is in great danger … I have been told to pray much for the Church and the Pope …
“I now see that in this place (Rome) the (Catholic) Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived ... I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church … They all work for destruction, even the clergy … Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence ... I saw a strange church being built against every rule … In that church, nothing came from high above … There was only division and chaos. It is probably a church of human creation, following the latest fashion … All in this church belonged to the Earth, returned to the Earth. All was dead, the work of human skill, a church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention like the new heterodox church in Rome ... Everyone was to be admitted in it in order to be united and have equal rights: Evangelicals, Catholics sects of every description. Such was to be the new Church … It seems to me that a concession was demanded from the clergy which could not be granted. I saw many older priests, especially one, who wept bitterly. A few younger ones were also weeping. But others, and the lukewarm among them, readily did what was demanded. It was as if people were splitting into two camps … I saw how harmful would be the consequences of this false church. I saw it increase in size; heretics of every kind came into the city (of Rome) …
“All was made ready, many things finished; but, in place of an altar, were only abomination and desolation ... People were kneading bread in the crypt below ... but it would not rise, nor did they receive the Body of our Lord, but only bread. Those who were in error, through no fault of their own―and who piously and ardently longed for the Body of Jesus―were spiritually consoled, but not by their communion ... In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars!”
MARIE JULIE JAHENNY (1850-1941), the Breton Stigmatist, reported numerous mystical revelations to her local bishop. Like the apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Quito, La Salette, and Fatima, a dark time for the Roman Catholic Church and mankind is predicted. On November 27th, 1902, and May 10th, 1904, Our Lord and Our Lady announced the coming of the future New Mass: “I give you a warning! The disciples who are not of My Gospel, are now working hard to remake according to their ideas and, under the influence of the enemy of souls, make a Mass that contains words that are odious in my sight. When the fatal hour arrives when the Faith of my priests is put to the test, it will be [these texts of a New Mass] that will be celebrated in this second period ... The first period is [the one] of My Priesthood which exists since Me. The second is (the one) of the persecution when the enemies of the Faith and of Holy Religion [will impose their formulas] in the book of the second celebration [the New Rite of Mass] ... Many of My holy priests will refuse this book, sealed with the words of the abyss. Unfortunately, amongst them are those who will accept it and it will be used.”
POPE PIUS XII, still known as Msgr. Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli, prior to his elevation to the papacy in 1939, while still the Secretary of State under Pius XI, made the following astonishing prophecy about a coming upheaval in the Church: “Suppose, dear friend, that Communism [one of “the errors of Russia” mentioned in the Message of Fatima] was only the most visible of the instruments of subversion to be used against the Church and the traditions of Divine Revelation… I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul. … I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject Her ornaments and make Her feel remorse for Her historical past. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’”
Yes―as Pope Pius XII foresaw and foretold―the Faith has been altered in both the Church’s Liturgy and Theology. We can clearly see that with the changes present in the New Order of Mass (Novus Ordo Missae), and in most other Sacraments, in the Ritual Blessings of the Church, and in the Church’s Liturgical Calendar. Along the same lines, according to chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth (1925-2016), the New Rite of Exorcism has been increasingly rejected by exorcists, because it is in ineffective―they have gone back to using the Old Rite of Exorcism. Fr. Amorth says: “We exorcists, the ones who would have to use the New Rite of Exorcism, we took the opportunity to point out that, on a number of points, we were in disagreement with the New Ritual. This long-awaited Ritual has turned into a farce. An incredible obstacle that is likely to prevent us acting against the demon. They were looking to give us a blunt weapon. Efficacious prayers, prayers that had been in existence for twelve centuries, were suppressed and replaced by new ineffective prayers. We exorcists have all tried out the new prayers in the New Ritual and we have come to realize that they are absolutely ineffectual. But the Rite of Baptism for children has also been spoiled. It has been so drastically overhauled that the exorcism against Satan in the Rite of Baptism has virtually been eliminated. The declarations contained in the New Ritual are very serious and very damaging. They are the fruit of ignorance and inexperience. We are lucky that the old Ritual [pre-Vatican II] continues to be valid. I use it―otherwise I would have to quit my job!”
The Demon vs. the Holy Eucharist
The Holy Eucharist is the fruit of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―without the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with its words of consecration, there would be no Holy Eucharist. You could say that Holy Eucharist and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass reflect the time between the Last Supper and Crucifixion and Death of Christ on His Cross on Calvary. Just as Holy Eucharist is the fruit of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, so too is the defeat of Satan a fruit of the Holy Sacrifice of Mass―for the Mass is nothing other than a continuation and perpetuation of Christ’s Sacrifice on Calvary, and it was through that Sacrifice that Christ definitively defeated Satan.
Satan hates the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist. The satanic Black Mass is a ritual inversion and mockery of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass performed by Satanists. When Satanists want to mock a religious ritual, you can bet that it’s going to be the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass that they target―they do not target the religious rituals of any other religion. This Satanic targeting of the Mass anything new. As far back as the fourth century, St. Epiphanius of Salamis described a sect of Gnosticism performing a perverted mockery of Mass.
By Christ’s Passion, Satan was deprived of his power over men, a power that he exercised previous to the Passion. St. Thomas Aquinas says: “By Christ’s Passion man was delivered from the devil’s power, insofar as the Passion is the cause of the forgiveness of sins ... It freed us from the devil’s power, inasmuch as it reconciled us with God ... It delivered us from the devil, inasmuch as in Christ’s Passion the devil exceeded the limit of power assigned to him by God by conspiring to bring about Christ’s death, Who, being sinless, did not deserve to die” (Summa Theologica, IIIa, q. 49, art. 2). Thus, the more we associate with Christ’s Passion, the more we strive to be responsive to the fruits of the Passion, namely the graces flowing from the Savior from His Sacrifice on Calvary through the Sacrifice of the Mass, then the stronger we are going to be to withstand and to overcome the wiles of the devil.
St. John Chrysostom tells us that when the devil sees us returning from the Sacred Banquet of the Eucharist, he flees from us as if he has seen a lion “breathing forth flames from his mouth!” Why? Because in the precious Sacrament of the Eucharist, we consume the Lord’s Sacred Body and Blood with which He won our salvation His Cross on Calvary. When we receive the Holy Eucharist in the form of a host, we receive all of the Lord, His precious Body and Blood. St. John Chrysostom assures us that the Eucharist is the very same “blood-stained and pierced Body, out of which gushed the saving fountains of water and His Blood for all the world.” The devil is especially terrified of the Precious Blood of Jesus, for “the life of the flesh is in the blood” (Leviticus 17:11). In the precious Blood of Jesus, which we receive in the Holy Eucharist, the devil sees the infinite Life that, on the Cross, vanquished him who seeks only death for us.
During an exorcism session, a priest encountered a demon that had possessed a young girl for some years. The demon was tough and obstinate. He so resisted leaving the ‘temple’ he had taken over, that the priest was being tempted to despair of ever delivering the young girl from the demon. The praying team was already becoming demoralized and discouraged. But then a thought came to him: “Take him to the Eucharistic Jesus!” In the chapel, the Eucharistic Lord was brought out of the tabernacle and placed in the monstrance on the altar. The tide of events changed immediately.
The demon shouted at the top of his voice and with great fright: “Who is this! Who is this person?” For him, the Holy Eucharist is “who” and a “person,” and not “what” or a “thing.” We might be seeing a white round host, but the demons see a person, the Master in His glory. The demon saw the glory of God was dazed. He was now stuttering: “Let me go! I don’t want to see Him! Who brought me to His house? We don’t like each other! Take me out of this place!” When he saw that he had been cornered, he decided to engage Our Eucharistic Lord in a fight. His plan was to push Him down from the altar.
At first, the praying team tried to protect Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist in the monstrance on the altar from being pushed over and thrown down, but, after some thought, the priest felt that Our Lord should be allowed to fight for Himself and asked the praying team members to let the demon do what he wished. The demon then rushed with a terrific speed and force toward the altar. But just an inch away from the altar, he stopped with an automatic halt, as if controlled electronically. He tried again and repeated the attack―but again he was stopped in his tracks. He drew back the third time, mustered all his strength and courage and tried again. This time he succeeded in brushing against the altar cloth. It was then that hell was let loose on him. The demon was rattled. He was thrown up high in the air and dashed with a heavy thud on the hard floor and set into a bout of rolling, wriggling, and shouting until he begged to leave.
The Eucharistic Jesus is a mighty force against the devil. The devil sees in the Sanctissimum the crucified Jesus as He really is: “The devils also believe and tremble!” (James 2:19). To the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady revealed: “For the overthrow of Hell and for causing fear in the demons, all the holy Sacraments of the Church are most powerful means―but, above all, the Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist. This was one of the hidden purposes of the Lord my Son, in the institution of this sovereign mystery and of the other Sacraments. If in our time men do not ordinarily feel these powerful effects, it is because in the frequency of the reception of the Sacraments much of the veneration and estimation in receiving them has been lost. But souls who frequent the Sacraments with devotion and piety, are formidable to the demons and they exercise great power and dominion over the demons. In the same proportion as the demons fear the souls that worthily receive Holy Communion and other fortifying Sacraments, so they exert all their powers to cause those souls to fall and to hinder them from accumulating all this strength of the Lord against them.”
The Fatal Flaw―The Achilles Heel
If Satan cannot stop us from assisting at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and receiving Holy Communion―then the next best thing for him is to either make us attend Mass and receive Communion in a state of mortal sin, or, if he cannot achieve that, then he will try to make to attend Mass and receive Communion in a lukewarm state―for he knows Scripture better than we do, which says: “What things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap ... He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (Galatians 6:8; 2 Corinthians 9:6) … “Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16) … “Whosoever shall eat this Bread, or drink the Chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the Body and of the Blood of the Lord! … He that eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Body of the Lord!” (1 Corinthians 11:27-29).
The easiest way to a make a bad sacrilegious Communion is to make a bad sacrilegious Confession by hiding a mortal sin in Confession, or disguising it, or not confessing the correct number of times we have committed it―or better still, to commit mortal sin and not even go to Confession before going to Holy Communion. In this way Satan defuses and makes harmless the greatest weapon God has given us to fight Satan. He even makes us shoot ourselves in the foot! Our weapon blows up in our own face!
St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church and patron saint of moral theologians, is of the opinion that bad confessions are not a rare thing, but a common thing: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions―in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil not of rare occurrence, but is frequent―especially in small country districts―which consigns innumerable souls to Hell. Hence it is very useful to mention, from time to time, some example of souls that were damned by willfully concealing sins in confession.” Today, this is compounded and made much more frequent due to what recent popes have called “the loss of the sense of sin.”
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Lack of Devotion Brings Shortage of Graces
As already stated, the economics of God is what you give is what you get, you get as good as you give―Holy Scripture points that out on several occasions: “What things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap ... He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly! … With what measure you distribute, it shall be measured to you! … With the same measure that you shall measure out to others, it shall be measured back to you again! … They shall eat the fruit of their own way, and shall be filled with their own devices!” (Galatians 6:8; 2 Corinthians 9:6; Matthew 7:2; Luke 6:38; Proverbs 1:31).
Along similar lines, Our Lord complains about hypocritical lukewarmness: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me. And in vain do they worship Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-9) ― which is why God says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot! But, because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
In his little masterpiece of a book on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, entitled The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass, the author, St. Leonard of Port Maurice, writes: “It requires great patience to endure the language of careless livers, breathing atheism itself, and ruinous to devotion; as for instance, “A Mass more or less counts for little!” “It is no small thing to hear Mass on festivals!” “The Mass of this or that priest is for length like one in Holy Week―whenever he appears at the altar, I generally get out of church right away!” He who talks in this way lets it be known that he has little or no esteem for the thrice-Holy Sacrifice of the Mass: that Sacrifice is the sun of Christianity, the soul of Faith, the center of the Catholic religion …
“Tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, you thoroughly well consider that you are going up, as it were, to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer. If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued, with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers―what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you, who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball? What shall be said if you profane those functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time and in any place―but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God.
“What say you, then? Will you ever dare, from this time forward, to be at Mass sitting, talking, looking here and there, perhaps even sleeping, or content yourselves with reciting some vocal prayers. I cannot restrain myself from exclaiming, O dull and incapable world, that understands nothing of mysteries so sublime! How is it possible that anyone should remain before the altar with a mind distracted and a heart dissipated at a time when the holy Angels stand there trembling and astonished at the contemplation of a work so stupendous?” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice, The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass).
To Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (to whom Our Lady of Good Success appeared many times), Our Lord Himself revealed: If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me! ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example ― for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross! Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My Sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
What would Our Lord say of the New Mass and its terrible fruits? He tells us that everything should be judged by its fruits: “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known … There is no good tree that brings forth evil fruit; nor an evil tree that brings forth good fruit. For every tree is known by its fruit … By their fruits you shall know them. Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 12:33; Luke 6:43-44; Matthew 7:16-19).
The fruits of the New Mass are not good. Just look at the many abuses that it has produced―the so-called “Clown Masses” with priests and servers dressing up as clowns with clown faces; or the “Dance Masses” with women, and sometimes men, dancing around the sanctuary in body-clinging leotards or other indecent dress; or Masses with the priest using props such as canoes, balloons, snakes, etc. What would Our Lord say of such Masses? Any sane person knows the answer to that question! Does Our Lord grant an abundance of grace through such sacrilegious performances?
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a weapon of mass destruction―that is to say, for the destruction of evil. The destructive power of the Mass against evil was revealed by Our Lady to Blessed Anne Emmerich, who tells us: “Mass, badly celebrated, is an enormous evil. Ah! It is not a matter of indifference how it is said! . . . I have had a great vision on the mystery of Holy Mass and I have seen that whatever good has existed since creation is owing to it … Our Lady said something that is most painful for me to repeat―that if only one priest offered the unbloody Sacrifice as worthily and with the same sentiments as the Apostles, he could ward off all calamities from the Church!” (Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, 1774-1824).
Satan―more than any of us―knows the power of the Holy Mass and how much it hinders his plots and plans against the Church. That is why Satan is engaged in his own version of mass destruction―whereby he is trying to destroy the Mass. As they say: “Little by little, one goes far!” ― and Satan has been chipping away the Holy Mass little by little in recent times, not just since the Second Vatican Council, but already in the decades before the Council. In the 1900s the Mass was reformed and shortened little by little. Then, in the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council, the Traditional Latin Mass was replaced by the Novus Ordo Missae (the New Order of Mass), which also kept introducing more and more changes, little by little. The period of incremental reform, from 1964, was one of constant change, experiments and liturgical abuses. Today, Francis has joined in this diabolical work and has, little by little, turned the screws more and more by limiting the Traditional Latin Mass and even trying to restrict and eliminate the Latin Mass.
Attempted Destruction of the Church and the Mass
Heaven already forewarned of this tactic by the revelations and visions granted to BLESSED ANN CATHERINE EMMERICH. Here are some relevant extracts that apply to this changing of the Mass and ultimately the changing of the Church:
“I had a vision of the great tribulation … A great devastation is now near at hand ... The nearer the time of the end, the more the darkness of Satan will spread on Earth … Among the strangest things that I saw, were long processions of bishops. Their thoughts and utterances were made known to me through images issuing from their mouths. Their faults towards religion were shown by external deformities. A few had only a body, with a dark cloud of fog instead of a head. Others had only a head, their bodies and hearts were like thick vapors. Some were lame; others were paralytics; others were asleep or staggering. I saw what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world [the Second Vatican Council was for all the bishops of the world], but only a small number were perfectly sound … The Church is in great danger … I have been told to pray much for the Church and the Pope …
“I now see that in this place (Rome) the (Catholic) Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived ... I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church … They all work for destruction, even the clergy … Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence ... I saw a strange church being built against every rule … In that church, nothing came from high above … There was only division and chaos. It is probably a church of human creation, following the latest fashion … All in this church belonged to the Earth, returned to the Earth. All was dead, the work of human skill, a church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention like the new heterodox church in Rome ... Everyone was to be admitted in it in order to be united and have equal rights: Evangelicals, Catholics sects of every description. Such was to be the new Church … It seems to me that a concession was demanded from the clergy which could not be granted. I saw many older priests, especially one, who wept bitterly. A few younger ones were also weeping. But others, and the lukewarm among them, readily did what was demanded. It was as if people were splitting into two camps … I saw how harmful would be the consequences of this false church. I saw it increase in size; heretics of every kind came into the city (of Rome) …
“All was made ready, many things finished; but, in place of an altar, were only abomination and desolation ... People were kneading bread in the crypt below ... but it would not rise, nor did they receive the Body of our Lord, but only bread. Those who were in error, through no fault of their own―and who piously and ardently longed for the Body of Jesus―were spiritually consoled, but not by their communion ... In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars!”
MARIE JULIE JAHENNY (1850-1941), the Breton Stigmatist, reported numerous mystical revelations to her local bishop. Like the apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Quito, La Salette, and Fatima, a dark time for the Roman Catholic Church and mankind is predicted. On November 27th, 1902, and May 10th, 1904, Our Lord and Our Lady announced the coming of the future New Mass: “I give you a warning! The disciples who are not of My Gospel, are now working hard to remake according to their ideas and, under the influence of the enemy of souls, make a Mass that contains words that are odious in my sight. When the fatal hour arrives when the Faith of my priests is put to the test, it will be [these texts of a New Mass] that will be celebrated in this second period ... The first period is [the one] of My Priesthood which exists since Me. The second is (the one) of the persecution when the enemies of the Faith and of Holy Religion [will impose their formulas] in the book of the second celebration [the New Rite of Mass] ... Many of My holy priests will refuse this book, sealed with the words of the abyss. Unfortunately, amongst them are those who will accept it and it will be used.”
POPE PIUS XII, still known as Msgr. Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli, prior to his elevation to the papacy in 1939, while still the Secretary of State under Pius XI, made the following astonishing prophecy about a coming upheaval in the Church: “Suppose, dear friend, that Communism [one of “the errors of Russia” mentioned in the Message of Fatima] was only the most visible of the instruments of subversion to be used against the Church and the traditions of Divine Revelation… I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul. … I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject Her ornaments and make Her feel remorse for Her historical past. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’”
Yes―as Pope Pius XII foresaw and foretold―the Faith has been altered in both the Church’s Liturgy and Theology. We can clearly see that with the changes present in the New Order of Mass (Novus Ordo Missae), and in most other Sacraments, in the Ritual Blessings of the Church, and in the Church’s Liturgical Calendar. Along the same lines, according to chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth (1925-2016), the New Rite of Exorcism has been increasingly rejected by exorcists, because it is in ineffective―they have gone back to using the Old Rite of Exorcism. Fr. Amorth says: “We exorcists, the ones who would have to use the New Rite of Exorcism, we took the opportunity to point out that, on a number of points, we were in disagreement with the New Ritual. This long-awaited Ritual has turned into a farce. An incredible obstacle that is likely to prevent us acting against the demon. They were looking to give us a blunt weapon. Efficacious prayers, prayers that had been in existence for twelve centuries, were suppressed and replaced by new ineffective prayers. We exorcists have all tried out the new prayers in the New Ritual and we have come to realize that they are absolutely ineffectual. But the Rite of Baptism for children has also been spoiled. It has been so drastically overhauled that the exorcism against Satan in the Rite of Baptism has virtually been eliminated. The declarations contained in the New Ritual are very serious and very damaging. They are the fruit of ignorance and inexperience. We are lucky that the old Ritual [pre-Vatican II] continues to be valid. I use it―otherwise I would have to quit my job!”
The Demon vs. the Holy Eucharist
The Holy Eucharist is the fruit of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―without the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with its words of consecration, there would be no Holy Eucharist. You could say that Holy Eucharist and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass reflect the time between the Last Supper and Crucifixion and Death of Christ on His Cross on Calvary. Just as Holy Eucharist is the fruit of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, so too is the defeat of Satan a fruit of the Holy Sacrifice of Mass―for the Mass is nothing other than a continuation and perpetuation of Christ’s Sacrifice on Calvary, and it was through that Sacrifice that Christ definitively defeated Satan.
Satan hates the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist. The satanic Black Mass is a ritual inversion and mockery of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass performed by Satanists. When Satanists want to mock a religious ritual, you can bet that it’s going to be the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass that they target―they do not target the religious rituals of any other religion. This Satanic targeting of the Mass anything new. As far back as the fourth century, St. Epiphanius of Salamis described a sect of Gnosticism performing a perverted mockery of Mass.
By Christ’s Passion, Satan was deprived of his power over men, a power that he exercised previous to the Passion. St. Thomas Aquinas says: “By Christ’s Passion man was delivered from the devil’s power, insofar as the Passion is the cause of the forgiveness of sins ... It freed us from the devil’s power, inasmuch as it reconciled us with God ... It delivered us from the devil, inasmuch as in Christ’s Passion the devil exceeded the limit of power assigned to him by God by conspiring to bring about Christ’s death, Who, being sinless, did not deserve to die” (Summa Theologica, IIIa, q. 49, art. 2). Thus, the more we associate with Christ’s Passion, the more we strive to be responsive to the fruits of the Passion, namely the graces flowing from the Savior from His Sacrifice on Calvary through the Sacrifice of the Mass, then the stronger we are going to be to withstand and to overcome the wiles of the devil.
St. John Chrysostom tells us that when the devil sees us returning from the Sacred Banquet of the Eucharist, he flees from us as if he has seen a lion “breathing forth flames from his mouth!” Why? Because in the precious Sacrament of the Eucharist, we consume the Lord’s Sacred Body and Blood with which He won our salvation His Cross on Calvary. When we receive the Holy Eucharist in the form of a host, we receive all of the Lord, His precious Body and Blood. St. John Chrysostom assures us that the Eucharist is the very same “blood-stained and pierced Body, out of which gushed the saving fountains of water and His Blood for all the world.” The devil is especially terrified of the Precious Blood of Jesus, for “the life of the flesh is in the blood” (Leviticus 17:11). In the precious Blood of Jesus, which we receive in the Holy Eucharist, the devil sees the infinite Life that, on the Cross, vanquished him who seeks only death for us.
During an exorcism session, a priest encountered a demon that had possessed a young girl for some years. The demon was tough and obstinate. He so resisted leaving the ‘temple’ he had taken over, that the priest was being tempted to despair of ever delivering the young girl from the demon. The praying team was already becoming demoralized and discouraged. But then a thought came to him: “Take him to the Eucharistic Jesus!” In the chapel, the Eucharistic Lord was brought out of the tabernacle and placed in the monstrance on the altar. The tide of events changed immediately.
The demon shouted at the top of his voice and with great fright: “Who is this! Who is this person?” For him, the Holy Eucharist is “who” and a “person,” and not “what” or a “thing.” We might be seeing a white round host, but the demons see a person, the Master in His glory. The demon saw the glory of God was dazed. He was now stuttering: “Let me go! I don’t want to see Him! Who brought me to His house? We don’t like each other! Take me out of this place!” When he saw that he had been cornered, he decided to engage Our Eucharistic Lord in a fight. His plan was to push Him down from the altar.
At first, the praying team tried to protect Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist in the monstrance on the altar from being pushed over and thrown down, but, after some thought, the priest felt that Our Lord should be allowed to fight for Himself and asked the praying team members to let the demon do what he wished. The demon then rushed with a terrific speed and force toward the altar. But just an inch away from the altar, he stopped with an automatic halt, as if controlled electronically. He tried again and repeated the attack―but again he was stopped in his tracks. He drew back the third time, mustered all his strength and courage and tried again. This time he succeeded in brushing against the altar cloth. It was then that hell was let loose on him. The demon was rattled. He was thrown up high in the air and dashed with a heavy thud on the hard floor and set into a bout of rolling, wriggling, and shouting until he begged to leave.
The Eucharistic Jesus is a mighty force against the devil. The devil sees in the Sanctissimum the crucified Jesus as He really is: “The devils also believe and tremble!” (James 2:19). To the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady revealed: “For the overthrow of Hell and for causing fear in the demons, all the holy Sacraments of the Church are most powerful means―but, above all, the Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist. This was one of the hidden purposes of the Lord my Son, in the institution of this sovereign mystery and of the other Sacraments. If in our time men do not ordinarily feel these powerful effects, it is because in the frequency of the reception of the Sacraments much of the veneration and estimation in receiving them has been lost. But souls who frequent the Sacraments with devotion and piety, are formidable to the demons and they exercise great power and dominion over the demons. In the same proportion as the demons fear the souls that worthily receive Holy Communion and other fortifying Sacraments, so they exert all their powers to cause those souls to fall and to hinder them from accumulating all this strength of the Lord against them.”
The Fatal Flaw―The Achilles Heel
If Satan cannot stop us from assisting at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and receiving Holy Communion―then the next best thing for him is to either make us attend Mass and receive Communion in a state of mortal sin, or, if he cannot achieve that, then he will try to make to attend Mass and receive Communion in a lukewarm state―for he knows Scripture better than we do, which says: “What things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap ... He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (Galatians 6:8; 2 Corinthians 9:6) … “Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16) … “Whosoever shall eat this Bread, or drink the Chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the Body and of the Blood of the Lord! … He that eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Body of the Lord!” (1 Corinthians 11:27-29).
The easiest way to a make a bad sacrilegious Communion is to make a bad sacrilegious Confession by hiding a mortal sin in Confession, or disguising it, or not confessing the correct number of times we have committed it―or better still, to commit mortal sin and not even go to Confession before going to Holy Communion. In this way Satan defuses and makes harmless the greatest weapon God has given us to fight Satan. He even makes us shoot ourselves in the foot! Our weapon blows up in our own face!
St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church and patron saint of moral theologians, is of the opinion that bad confessions are not a rare thing, but a common thing: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions―in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil not of rare occurrence, but is frequent―especially in small country districts―which consigns innumerable souls to Hell. Hence it is very useful to mention, from time to time, some example of souls that were damned by willfully concealing sins in confession.” Today, this is compounded and made much more frequent due to what recent popes have called “the loss of the sense of sin.”
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Lack of Devotion Brings Shortage of Graces
As already stated, the economics of God is what you give is what you get, you get as good as you give―Holy Scripture points that out on several occasions: “What things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap ... He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly! … With what measure you distribute, it shall be measured to you! … With the same measure that you shall measure out to others, it shall be measured back to you again! … They shall eat the fruit of their own way, and shall be filled with their own devices!” (Galatians 6:8; 2 Corinthians 9:6; Matthew 7:2; Luke 6:38; Proverbs 1:31).
Along similar lines, Our Lord complains about hypocritical lukewarmness: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me. And in vain do they worship Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-9) ― which is why God says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot! But, because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
In his little masterpiece of a book on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, entitled The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass, the author, St. Leonard of Port Maurice, writes: “It requires great patience to endure the language of careless livers, breathing atheism itself, and ruinous to devotion; as for instance, “A Mass more or less counts for little!” “It is no small thing to hear Mass on festivals!” “The Mass of this or that priest is for length like one in Holy Week―whenever he appears at the altar, I generally get out of church right away!” He who talks in this way lets it be known that he has little or no esteem for the thrice-Holy Sacrifice of the Mass: that Sacrifice is the sun of Christianity, the soul of Faith, the center of the Catholic religion …
“Tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, you thoroughly well consider that you are going up, as it were, to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer. If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued, with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers―what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you, who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball? What shall be said if you profane those functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time and in any place―but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God.
“What say you, then? Will you ever dare, from this time forward, to be at Mass sitting, talking, looking here and there, perhaps even sleeping, or content yourselves with reciting some vocal prayers. I cannot restrain myself from exclaiming, O dull and incapable world, that understands nothing of mysteries so sublime! How is it possible that anyone should remain before the altar with a mind distracted and a heart dissipated at a time when the holy Angels stand there trembling and astonished at the contemplation of a work so stupendous?” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice, The Hidden Treasure: Holy Mass).
To Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (to whom Our Lady of Good Success appeared many times), Our Lord Himself revealed: If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me! ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example ― for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross! Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My Sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
What would Our Lord say of the New Mass and its terrible fruits? He tells us that everything should be judged by its fruits: “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known … There is no good tree that brings forth evil fruit; nor an evil tree that brings forth good fruit. For every tree is known by its fruit … By their fruits you shall know them. Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 12:33; Luke 6:43-44; Matthew 7:16-19).
The fruits of the New Mass are not good. Just look at the many abuses that it has produced―the so-called “Clown Masses” with priests and servers dressing up as clowns with clown faces; or the “Dance Masses” with women, and sometimes men, dancing around the sanctuary in body-clinging leotards or other indecent dress; or Masses with the priest using props such as canoes, balloons, snakes, etc. What would Our Lord say of such Masses? Any sane person knows the answer to that question! Does Our Lord grant an abundance of grace through such sacrilegious performances?
|
|
|
Prior to the changes to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass that came with the Novus Ordo Missae (New Order of Mass), there were no such abuses as you see pictured above. If the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the same Sacrifice as Christ’s Sacrifice on Calvary―then what would Christ say about being surrounded by clowns and dancers on Calvary? At the very best He would say: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do!” (Luke 23:34). At worst, He would apply to them the following words from Scripture: “I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities, and it shall take you away with it!” (Malachias 2:3). Truly, as Our Lord says, by their fruits you shall know them: “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known … There is no good tree that brings forth evil fruit; nor an evil tree that brings forth good fruit. For every tree is known by its fruit … By their fruits you shall know them. Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Luke 6:43-44; Matthew 7:16-19).
From Satan’s point of view, he must be exceedingly ‘happy’ (if anyone in Hell can even be happy), for he has managed to disable and remove (for the most part) our greatest weapon―the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as it was for centuries―and has replaced with something that is like a water-pistol compared to a rifle, or a grenade compared to a nuclear bomb! The fruits are frightening―in France, called the “Eldest Daughter of the Church”, only 8% of Catholics attend Mass; in Brazil, which is one of the largest Catholic nations of the world, only 8% of Catholics attend Mass; in the USA it is only 17% of Catholics; in Germany 14%; in Italy 34%; in Spain 27%; in Portugal 20%, and so on. Deliberate failure to attend Sunday Mass is a mortal sin which can only be removed by the Sacrament of Confession―yet very few Catholics go to Confession anymore!
St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751) says: “I believe that were it not for the Holy Mass, at this moment the world would be in the abyss, unable to bear up under the mighty load of its iniquities! Mass is the powerful prop that holds the world on its base!” That powerful prop has been replaced with a severely weakened prop, and the logical consequence is that the world will now be unable to bear up under the mighty load of its iniquities and is likely to fall into the abyss―which is what we are seeing all around us. Never before have we ever seen such worldwide iniquity and evil as we see today―and is only increasing. Those Catholics who no longer attend Mass (or should we say, a “weakened Mass”), have fallen into the abyss of accepting divorce, contraception, cohabitation, masturbation, same-sex relationships and same-sex marriages, pornography, immodesty, drunkenness, drug use, etc. Those same ‘Catholics’ are adamant that you can be a ‘good’ Catholic without attending Sunday Mass! Perhaps a really good Catholic would be someone who refuses to attend the New Mass and adamantly manifests a preference for the “Old” Mass that they are trying to eliminate altogether!
We once again turn back to the prophetic words of BLESSED ANN CATHERINE EMMERICH: “I had a vision of the great tribulation … A great devastation is now near at hand ... The Church is in great danger … The (Catholic) Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived ... I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church … They all work for destruction, even the clergy … Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence ... I saw a strange church being built against every rule … In that church, nothing came from high above … It is a church of human creation, following the latest fashion … All in this church belonged to the Earth, returned to the Earth. All was dead, the work of human skill, a church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention like the new heterodox church in Rome ... In place of an altar, were only abomination and desolation ... People were kneading bread in the crypt below ... but it would not rise, nor did they receive the Body of our Lord, but only bread. Those who were in error through no fault of their own―and who piously and ardently longed for the Body of Jesus―were spiritually consoled, but not by their communion ... In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars!”
Likewise, the prophecy of MARIE JULIE JAHENNY to whom Our Lord and Our Lady announced the coming of the future New Mass: “I give you a warning! The disciples who are not of My Gospel, are now working hard to remake according to their ideas and, under the influence of the enemy of souls, make a Mass that contains words that are odious in my sight. ... Many of My holy priests will refuse this book, sealed with the words of the abyss. Unfortunately, amongst them are those who will accept it and it will be used.”
And the words of POPE PIUS XII: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul. … All around me are innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject Her ornaments … A day will come when in our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’”
In this context, it is worth reading the prophecy made by ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI, who, shortly before he died in 1226, called together the members of his Religious Order, the Franciscans, and warned them of great tribulations that would befall the Church in the future, saying:
“The time is fast approaching in which there will be great trials and afflictions; perplexities and dissensions, both spiritual and temporal, will abound; the charity of many will grow cold, and the malice of the wicked will increase. The devils will have unusual power. At the time of this tribulation a man, not canonically elected, will be raised to the Pontificate, who, by his cunning, will endeavor to draw many into error and death. Then scandals will be multiplied, our Order will be divided, and many others will be entirely destroyed, because they will consent to error instead of opposing it. There will be such diversity of opinions and schisms among the people, the religious and the clergy, that, unless those days were shortened, according to the words of the Gospel, even the elect would be led into error, were they not specially guided, amid such great confusion, by the immense mercy of God. Those who preserve their fervor and adhere to virtue with love and zeal for the truth, will suffer injuries and, persecutions as rebels and schismatics; for their persecutors, urged on by the evil spirits, will say they are rendering a great service to God by destroying such pestilent men from the face of the Earth. Some preachers will keep silence about the truth, and others will trample it under foot and deny it. Sanctity of life will be held in derision even by those who outwardly profess it, for in those days Jesus Christ will send them not a true Pastor, but a destroyer.” (Works of the Seraphic Father St. Francis Of Assisi [London: R. Washbourne, 1882], pp. 248-250).
From Satan’s point of view, he must be exceedingly ‘happy’ (if anyone in Hell can even be happy), for he has managed to disable and remove (for the most part) our greatest weapon―the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as it was for centuries―and has replaced with something that is like a water-pistol compared to a rifle, or a grenade compared to a nuclear bomb! The fruits are frightening―in France, called the “Eldest Daughter of the Church”, only 8% of Catholics attend Mass; in Brazil, which is one of the largest Catholic nations of the world, only 8% of Catholics attend Mass; in the USA it is only 17% of Catholics; in Germany 14%; in Italy 34%; in Spain 27%; in Portugal 20%, and so on. Deliberate failure to attend Sunday Mass is a mortal sin which can only be removed by the Sacrament of Confession―yet very few Catholics go to Confession anymore!
St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751) says: “I believe that were it not for the Holy Mass, at this moment the world would be in the abyss, unable to bear up under the mighty load of its iniquities! Mass is the powerful prop that holds the world on its base!” That powerful prop has been replaced with a severely weakened prop, and the logical consequence is that the world will now be unable to bear up under the mighty load of its iniquities and is likely to fall into the abyss―which is what we are seeing all around us. Never before have we ever seen such worldwide iniquity and evil as we see today―and is only increasing. Those Catholics who no longer attend Mass (or should we say, a “weakened Mass”), have fallen into the abyss of accepting divorce, contraception, cohabitation, masturbation, same-sex relationships and same-sex marriages, pornography, immodesty, drunkenness, drug use, etc. Those same ‘Catholics’ are adamant that you can be a ‘good’ Catholic without attending Sunday Mass! Perhaps a really good Catholic would be someone who refuses to attend the New Mass and adamantly manifests a preference for the “Old” Mass that they are trying to eliminate altogether!
We once again turn back to the prophetic words of BLESSED ANN CATHERINE EMMERICH: “I had a vision of the great tribulation … A great devastation is now near at hand ... The Church is in great danger … The (Catholic) Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived ... I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church … They all work for destruction, even the clergy … Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence ... I saw a strange church being built against every rule … In that church, nothing came from high above … It is a church of human creation, following the latest fashion … All in this church belonged to the Earth, returned to the Earth. All was dead, the work of human skill, a church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention like the new heterodox church in Rome ... In place of an altar, were only abomination and desolation ... People were kneading bread in the crypt below ... but it would not rise, nor did they receive the Body of our Lord, but only bread. Those who were in error through no fault of their own―and who piously and ardently longed for the Body of Jesus―were spiritually consoled, but not by their communion ... In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars!”
Likewise, the prophecy of MARIE JULIE JAHENNY to whom Our Lord and Our Lady announced the coming of the future New Mass: “I give you a warning! The disciples who are not of My Gospel, are now working hard to remake according to their ideas and, under the influence of the enemy of souls, make a Mass that contains words that are odious in my sight. ... Many of My holy priests will refuse this book, sealed with the words of the abyss. Unfortunately, amongst them are those who will accept it and it will be used.”
And the words of POPE PIUS XII: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul. … All around me are innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject Her ornaments … A day will come when in our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’”
In this context, it is worth reading the prophecy made by ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI, who, shortly before he died in 1226, called together the members of his Religious Order, the Franciscans, and warned them of great tribulations that would befall the Church in the future, saying:
“The time is fast approaching in which there will be great trials and afflictions; perplexities and dissensions, both spiritual and temporal, will abound; the charity of many will grow cold, and the malice of the wicked will increase. The devils will have unusual power. At the time of this tribulation a man, not canonically elected, will be raised to the Pontificate, who, by his cunning, will endeavor to draw many into error and death. Then scandals will be multiplied, our Order will be divided, and many others will be entirely destroyed, because they will consent to error instead of opposing it. There will be such diversity of opinions and schisms among the people, the religious and the clergy, that, unless those days were shortened, according to the words of the Gospel, even the elect would be led into error, were they not specially guided, amid such great confusion, by the immense mercy of God. Those who preserve their fervor and adhere to virtue with love and zeal for the truth, will suffer injuries and, persecutions as rebels and schismatics; for their persecutors, urged on by the evil spirits, will say they are rendering a great service to God by destroying such pestilent men from the face of the Earth. Some preachers will keep silence about the truth, and others will trample it under foot and deny it. Sanctity of life will be held in derision even by those who outwardly profess it, for in those days Jesus Christ will send them not a true Pastor, but a destroyer.” (Works of the Seraphic Father St. Francis Of Assisi [London: R. Washbourne, 1882], pp. 248-250).
Article 3
Monday & Tuesday, August 5th & 6th
Use Them and Win―Abuse Them and Lose!
Monday & Tuesday, August 5th & 6th
Use Them and Win―Abuse Them and Lose!
Stupid, Slothful, Stubborn and Proud!
“Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). If we would only listen and do what Heaven tells us to do, then there would little or no problems here on Earth! But we don’t listen and we don’t do―and then we complain that things are terrible! What a nerve! What pride! God created Adam and Eve in a Paradise of Joy―it was sin that introduced misery.
God did not create us so that we could have a miserable life! “Joyfulness of the heart is the life of a man! … There is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:23; 30:16). “The Kingdom of God is peace and joy in the Holy Ghost! … May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace” (Romans 14:17; 15:13) … “The fruit of the Spirit is, charity, joy, peace…” (Galatians 5:22).
“Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). If we would only listen and do what Heaven tells us to do, then there would little or no problems here on Earth! But we don’t listen and we don’t do―and then we complain that things are terrible! What a nerve! What pride! God created Adam and Eve in a Paradise of Joy―it was sin that introduced misery.
God did not create us so that we could have a miserable life! “I know the thoughts that I think towards you―thoughts of peace, and not of affliction, saith the Lord” (Jeremias 29:11). “These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may be in you, and your joy may be filled!” (John 15:11). “Joyfulness of the heart is the life of a man! … There is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:23; 30:16). “The Kingdom of God is peace and joy in the Holy Ghost! … May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace” (Romans 14:17; 15:13) … “The fruit of the Spirit is, charity, joy, peace…” (Galatians 5:22).
Wrong Kind of Joy and Happiness
We are not simply told to rejoice―but to “rejoice in the Lord” (Philippians 4:4). As St. Thomas Aquinas says, true joy and happiness can only be found in God, not in things of this world. The world can, at best, only give temporary joy that will at one point end―but in God we can find eternal joy that never ends. If we are so stupid as to stubbornly ignore that truth, in our prideful desire to find an endless paradise of joy upon Earth, then we will live to regret it―if not already in this life, then most certainly in the next life.
Our Lord indicated, on many occasions, that we should be seeking the wrong kind of joy in this life: “Lay not up for yourselves treasures on Earth … but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters! … You cannot serve God and mammon [riches, treasures, pleasures of this world]. Be not anxious for your life and what you shall eat; nor for your body and what you shall wear … Therefore be not anxious, saying: ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ Your Father knows that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-33).
Along the same lines, Our Lord told the rich young man to leave his riches and to come and follow Him: “A certain rich young man, a ruler, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘What shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ Jesus said to him: ‘Keep the commandments!’ The young man said: ‘I have kept them from my youth! What is yet needed for me?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If you want to be perfect, go sell whatsoever you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven, and then come follow Me!’ When the young man heard this, he became sad and went away sorrowful―for he was very rich and had great possessions. Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
This is why Holy Scripture adds: “Go now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted: and your garments are moth-eaten! Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire! You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
World War III
Everyone is worried about a Third World War―but the war has already started and has been raging for a long time. This Third World War is not a war among nations―it is nations warring against God. Never before have the following words of Holy Scripture been as universally applicable as they are today: “The Lord looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good―no, not one! With their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6) … “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3).
In essence, the world has decided “to fight against God” (Acts 5:39). Obviously, to fight against God is a sin―and “t he wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). The sinful world discovered that truth in a way they had never imagined! God destroyed the sinful world with the Great Flood! Who ever thought that was coming!?! God had a standard for morality. Noe kept that standard―the rest of the world fought against it and drowned. If you thought that was drastic―then listen to Our Lady’s warnings about the terrible sinful state of the world in which find ourselves today:
“Many will turn upon Religion … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds … They will abolish civil rights, as well as ecclesiastical rights. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family … There will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects …
“In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost … They will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … Unbridled luxury and impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls, who will be lost! … This, in turn, will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy … Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts …
“The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! ... Many men in this world afflict the Lord! … Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God … If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! … Sins cry out towards Heaven and call for vengeance, and now vengeance is at their door… God will strike in an unprecedented way … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … If sins increase in number and gravity [which they have], there will be no longer pardon for them! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before.
“Fire will fall from the sky and will consume cities and wipe out a great part of humanity―the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead … All the universe will be struck with terror and many will let themselves be led astray, because they have not worshiped the true Christ. Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Akita).
This “Third World War” is nothing other than a war waged by Satan against God, Christ, Our Lady and the Church. This was revealed by Heaven to Sister Lucia of Fatima, who said: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time, is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them! … A time will come when the decisive battle between the kingdom of Christ and Satan will be over marriage and the family. And those who will work for the good of the family will experience persecution and tribulation … The final triumph of Mary’s Heart is certain, and it will be definitive. But it will take place ‘in the end,’ that is to say, after a terrible purification of sinful mankind in a baptism of fire, blood and tears!”
So there you have it! “A final decisive battle … From now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground! … The final triumph of Mary’s [Immaculate] Heart is certain … But it will take place ‘in the end,’ that is to say, after a terrible purification of sinful mankind in a baptism of fire, blood and tears!” Time to turn on the TV, grab a beer and a hot dog, or browse the internet or social media and get back to ‘normal’ everyday life! As Sister Lucia says:
“Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Not a Human War―Human Weapons Won’t Work
Even though it the evil of humans that we see everywhere around us, the war we have to fight is not merely a human war. “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). Evil human beings are merely puppets of Satan―“He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8) … “You do the works of your father ... You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do!” said Our Lord (John 8:41-44). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12).
Most Catholics―even those who clearly see the true state of affairs in both the Church and the world―are incredibly naïve and clueless as to how to fight the evil that is everywhere present. Talking about it does little or no good. Blogging about it, posting about it on the internet―does little or no good. “Keyboard warriors” need to do something more than merely shoot-out emails and posts. Knowledge is fine if it leads to action―but if it leads to information constipation, then it is useless, just like “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20).
When you look at some of the Catholic websites―those that actually have the number of posts listed that each member makes―it is amazing to see the thousands of posts by just one member alone. There are some around the 50,000 mark over a course of some 15 years of posting―which makes an average of 3,333 per year, or 9 per day. The time spent on nine posts per day does not simply consist of typing nine posts―it usually also includes time reading previous posts by others, time thinking about them, coming up with a comment/criticism/approval/rebuttal and then time posting it; and then time checking back to see what reaction there has been to what you posted. Some posts require much research, others do not. Nine posts is not a case of nine minutes―nine posts, with all that is involved (as just mentioned above) can easily go over 60 minutes or even more. How many Rosaries could be prayed in one hour? Attending a daily Holy Mass might take an hour or so―depending on how close you live to the church or chapel. The whole point of this is that we place far more value and importance on our human endeavors than we place upon spiritual endeavors. This can easily lead to either a subtle hidden pride or even an open brash pride―which is all too commonly seen. Yet it is the spiritual side of things, not the human side of things, that will eventually pay the price for the victory.
Heaven’s Weapons
In all of Our Lady’s apparitions, she always speaks of spiritual weapons and spiritual action―prayer, penance, sacrifices, suffering for God’s sake, etc. Rarely―if ever―has she spoken about mere human actions, such as fighting wars, holding demonstrations, signing petitions, writing books, using television or radio, etc.
● Our Lady of Good Success criticizes “those whose hearts are inflated with pride, pretending to know what they do not, or self-satisfied with empty knowledge” and says we must “pray, clamor insistently without tiring and weep with bitter tears, imploring our Celestial Father that He might take pity! … Sacrifice yourself for the people of this future time [she speaks of our present times] … No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers! … Offer your sacrifices and prayers to shorten the duration of this terrible catastrophe!”
● Our Lady of La Salette says: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance! … There is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There is no one left worthy of offering a spotless Sacrifice to the Eternal for the sake of the world. Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends! … I call on the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world, in prayer and in mortification … Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession … At the blood, the tears and prayers of the righteous, God will relent. Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like. And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed!” (Our Lady of La Salette).
● Our Lady of Lourdes also insists upon prayer and penance to reform the world: “Pray for sinners!” … “Penance! Penance! Penance!”
● Our Lady of Fatima repeats the same message, insisting that only spiritual weapons will change the world, end wars, bring peace and convert and save sinners: “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! ... Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners―for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace; if not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, various nations will be annihilated. In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!”
● Our Lady of Akita also insists upon the spiritual weapons to solve the crisis in both Church and world: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord. In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this! … The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the Rosary, pray for the Pope, the bishops and priests! ... Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary! I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
In addition to the above, we have the prophecy made by St. Dominic in the 13th century: “One day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, Our Lady will save the world!” There is no mention of human endeavor, human resources, human knowledge, human skill, human power, human weapons, etc. It is spiritual weapons that will play the key role. The bottom line is that God will be prime power and resource that will get us out of the mess that we find ourselves in―a mess that is getting messier and messier with each passing year! As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) … “With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible! … The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Matthew 19:26; Luke 18:27) and as St. Paul says: “I can do all these things in Him who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13).
God Deserves the Glory for Victory―Not Man
All glory is due to God, not to man. We can do nothing that is good without the grace of God. As St. Thérèse of Lisieux said: “Everything is grace!” St. Thomas Aquinas clearly states our absolute need and dependence upon the grace of God: “Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Man can do nothing unless moved by God!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6). To imagine that without the help and grace of God, we can turn around in any way―great or small―the current demise of the world, is the height of insanity and pride! God is prime mover and it is God who deserves the glory for any and all changes that improve or cure this evil world.
This is seen in the way that God acted with Gedeon, when the Israelites were threatened by the Madianites―with 135,000 Madianites against Gedeon’s army of only 32,000—who were thus outnumbered by more than 4 to 1. Human wisdom and prudence, seeing oneself so sorely outnumbered, would see this as a time to go out and recruit more warriors. However, without God we can do nothing, and it might be that, after the victory that the Lord would give them, the soldiers might think it had been by their own strength and ability that they had won the victory.
So, the Lord commanded Gedeon, not to recruit soldiers, but to further reduce the number under his command: “lest Israel should glory against me, and say: I was delivered by my own strength” (Judges 7:2). Any who were “afraid and trembling” were told they could go home. Some 22,000 departed, leaving only 10,000 to fight the 135,000 Madianites. So, they went from being outnumbered by more than 4 to 1, to now being outnumbered by more than 13 to 1.
No doubt Gedeon was surprised to hear what the Lord said next: “The people are still too many, bring them to the waters, and there I will try them” (Judges 7:4). At the site to which the Lord had directed Gideon’s army there was drinkable water. The army stopped to drink and 9,700 knelt down on their knees, so they might drink directly from the stream. The other 300 cupped their hands and took water into them, drinking it from their hands as a dog would lap water from his bowl. “By the 300 hundred men, that lapped water, I will save you, and deliver Madian into thy hand: but let all the rest of the people return to their place” (Judges 7:7). And so it was!
God likes to do with the minimum. He likes to have everything stacked against Him and His Chosen Ones. He delights in bringing off the seemingly impossible. With “Gedeon’s Three Hundred”, God kept increasing the odds against them―from being outnumbered by more than 4 to 1 (135,000 versus 32,000); to more than 13 to 1 (135,000 versus 10,000); and finally to a ridiculous and seemingly impossible situation of being outnumbered by 450 to 1 (135,000 versus 300). God wanted the Israelites to go into battle heavily outnumbered, so that God Himself could claim the eventual victory against those impossible odds.
When we at first look at the weapons that Heaven is proposing that we use to the fight the evils in the Church and the world, then we too might think: “This is just not going to work! What can the Mass, the Rosary and Scapular possibly do to turn back the tide of the terrible tsunami of evil that overflows us?” Our Lord gave the answer when He said: “Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?” (Matthew 9:28) … “With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible! … The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Matthew 19:26; Luke 18:27).
In the following articles we shall examine and see how this actually can be possible―but it all depends upon how well we use the weapons given to us and how much Faith we have in them!
“Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). If we would only listen and do what Heaven tells us to do, then there would little or no problems here on Earth! But we don’t listen and we don’t do―and then we complain that things are terrible! What a nerve! What pride! God created Adam and Eve in a Paradise of Joy―it was sin that introduced misery.
God did not create us so that we could have a miserable life! “Joyfulness of the heart is the life of a man! … There is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:23; 30:16). “The Kingdom of God is peace and joy in the Holy Ghost! … May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace” (Romans 14:17; 15:13) … “The fruit of the Spirit is, charity, joy, peace…” (Galatians 5:22).
“Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). If we would only listen and do what Heaven tells us to do, then there would little or no problems here on Earth! But we don’t listen and we don’t do―and then we complain that things are terrible! What a nerve! What pride! God created Adam and Eve in a Paradise of Joy―it was sin that introduced misery.
God did not create us so that we could have a miserable life! “I know the thoughts that I think towards you―thoughts of peace, and not of affliction, saith the Lord” (Jeremias 29:11). “These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may be in you, and your joy may be filled!” (John 15:11). “Joyfulness of the heart is the life of a man! … There is no pleasure above the joy of the heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:23; 30:16). “The Kingdom of God is peace and joy in the Holy Ghost! … May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace” (Romans 14:17; 15:13) … “The fruit of the Spirit is, charity, joy, peace…” (Galatians 5:22).
Wrong Kind of Joy and Happiness
We are not simply told to rejoice―but to “rejoice in the Lord” (Philippians 4:4). As St. Thomas Aquinas says, true joy and happiness can only be found in God, not in things of this world. The world can, at best, only give temporary joy that will at one point end―but in God we can find eternal joy that never ends. If we are so stupid as to stubbornly ignore that truth, in our prideful desire to find an endless paradise of joy upon Earth, then we will live to regret it―if not already in this life, then most certainly in the next life.
Our Lord indicated, on many occasions, that we should be seeking the wrong kind of joy in this life: “Lay not up for yourselves treasures on Earth … but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters! … You cannot serve God and mammon [riches, treasures, pleasures of this world]. Be not anxious for your life and what you shall eat; nor for your body and what you shall wear … Therefore be not anxious, saying: ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ Your Father knows that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-33).
Along the same lines, Our Lord told the rich young man to leave his riches and to come and follow Him: “A certain rich young man, a ruler, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘What shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ Jesus said to him: ‘Keep the commandments!’ The young man said: ‘I have kept them from my youth! What is yet needed for me?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If you want to be perfect, go sell whatsoever you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven, and then come follow Me!’ When the young man heard this, he became sad and went away sorrowful―for he was very rich and had great possessions. Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
This is why Holy Scripture adds: “Go now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted: and your garments are moth-eaten! Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire! You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
World War III
Everyone is worried about a Third World War―but the war has already started and has been raging for a long time. This Third World War is not a war among nations―it is nations warring against God. Never before have the following words of Holy Scripture been as universally applicable as they are today: “The Lord looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good―no, not one! With their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6) … “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3).
In essence, the world has decided “to fight against God” (Acts 5:39). Obviously, to fight against God is a sin―and “t he wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). The sinful world discovered that truth in a way they had never imagined! God destroyed the sinful world with the Great Flood! Who ever thought that was coming!?! God had a standard for morality. Noe kept that standard―the rest of the world fought against it and drowned. If you thought that was drastic―then listen to Our Lady’s warnings about the terrible sinful state of the world in which find ourselves today:
“Many will turn upon Religion … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds … They will abolish civil rights, as well as ecclesiastical rights. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family … There will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects …
“In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled luxury that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost … They will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … Unbridled luxury and impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls, who will be lost! … This, in turn, will call down every type of chastisement―such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy … Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts …
“The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! ... Many men in this world afflict the Lord! … Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God … If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! … Sins cry out towards Heaven and call for vengeance, and now vengeance is at their door… God will strike in an unprecedented way … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … If sins increase in number and gravity [which they have], there will be no longer pardon for them! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before.
“Fire will fall from the sky and will consume cities and wipe out a great part of humanity―the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead … All the universe will be struck with terror and many will let themselves be led astray, because they have not worshiped the true Christ. Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Akita).
This “Third World War” is nothing other than a war waged by Satan against God, Christ, Our Lady and the Church. This was revealed by Heaven to Sister Lucia of Fatima, who said: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time, is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them! … A time will come when the decisive battle between the kingdom of Christ and Satan will be over marriage and the family. And those who will work for the good of the family will experience persecution and tribulation … The final triumph of Mary’s Heart is certain, and it will be definitive. But it will take place ‘in the end,’ that is to say, after a terrible purification of sinful mankind in a baptism of fire, blood and tears!”
So there you have it! “A final decisive battle … From now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground! … The final triumph of Mary’s [Immaculate] Heart is certain … But it will take place ‘in the end,’ that is to say, after a terrible purification of sinful mankind in a baptism of fire, blood and tears!” Time to turn on the TV, grab a beer and a hot dog, or browse the internet or social media and get back to ‘normal’ everyday life! As Sister Lucia says:
“Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Not a Human War―Human Weapons Won’t Work
Even though it the evil of humans that we see everywhere around us, the war we have to fight is not merely a human war. “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). Evil human beings are merely puppets of Satan―“He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8) … “You do the works of your father ... You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do!” said Our Lord (John 8:41-44). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12).
Most Catholics―even those who clearly see the true state of affairs in both the Church and the world―are incredibly naïve and clueless as to how to fight the evil that is everywhere present. Talking about it does little or no good. Blogging about it, posting about it on the internet―does little or no good. “Keyboard warriors” need to do something more than merely shoot-out emails and posts. Knowledge is fine if it leads to action―but if it leads to information constipation, then it is useless, just like “Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:20).
When you look at some of the Catholic websites―those that actually have the number of posts listed that each member makes―it is amazing to see the thousands of posts by just one member alone. There are some around the 50,000 mark over a course of some 15 years of posting―which makes an average of 3,333 per year, or 9 per day. The time spent on nine posts per day does not simply consist of typing nine posts―it usually also includes time reading previous posts by others, time thinking about them, coming up with a comment/criticism/approval/rebuttal and then time posting it; and then time checking back to see what reaction there has been to what you posted. Some posts require much research, others do not. Nine posts is not a case of nine minutes―nine posts, with all that is involved (as just mentioned above) can easily go over 60 minutes or even more. How many Rosaries could be prayed in one hour? Attending a daily Holy Mass might take an hour or so―depending on how close you live to the church or chapel. The whole point of this is that we place far more value and importance on our human endeavors than we place upon spiritual endeavors. This can easily lead to either a subtle hidden pride or even an open brash pride―which is all too commonly seen. Yet it is the spiritual side of things, not the human side of things, that will eventually pay the price for the victory.
Heaven’s Weapons
In all of Our Lady’s apparitions, she always speaks of spiritual weapons and spiritual action―prayer, penance, sacrifices, suffering for God’s sake, etc. Rarely―if ever―has she spoken about mere human actions, such as fighting wars, holding demonstrations, signing petitions, writing books, using television or radio, etc.
● Our Lady of Good Success criticizes “those whose hearts are inflated with pride, pretending to know what they do not, or self-satisfied with empty knowledge” and says we must “pray, clamor insistently without tiring and weep with bitter tears, imploring our Celestial Father that He might take pity! … Sacrifice yourself for the people of this future time [she speaks of our present times] … No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers! … Offer your sacrifices and prayers to shorten the duration of this terrible catastrophe!”
● Our Lady of La Salette says: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance! … There is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There is no one left worthy of offering a spotless Sacrifice to the Eternal for the sake of the world. Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends! … I call on the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world, in prayer and in mortification … Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession … At the blood, the tears and prayers of the righteous, God will relent. Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like. And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed!” (Our Lady of La Salette).
● Our Lady of Lourdes also insists upon prayer and penance to reform the world: “Pray for sinners!” … “Penance! Penance! Penance!”
● Our Lady of Fatima repeats the same message, insisting that only spiritual weapons will change the world, end wars, bring peace and convert and save sinners: “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! ... Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners―for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace; if not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, various nations will be annihilated. In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!”
● Our Lady of Akita also insists upon the spiritual weapons to solve the crisis in both Church and world: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord. In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this! … The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the Rosary, pray for the Pope, the bishops and priests! ... Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary! I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
In addition to the above, we have the prophecy made by St. Dominic in the 13th century: “One day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, Our Lady will save the world!” There is no mention of human endeavor, human resources, human knowledge, human skill, human power, human weapons, etc. It is spiritual weapons that will play the key role. The bottom line is that God will be prime power and resource that will get us out of the mess that we find ourselves in―a mess that is getting messier and messier with each passing year! As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) … “With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible! … The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Matthew 19:26; Luke 18:27) and as St. Paul says: “I can do all these things in Him who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13).
God Deserves the Glory for Victory―Not Man
All glory is due to God, not to man. We can do nothing that is good without the grace of God. As St. Thérèse of Lisieux said: “Everything is grace!” St. Thomas Aquinas clearly states our absolute need and dependence upon the grace of God: “Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Man can do nothing unless moved by God!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6). To imagine that without the help and grace of God, we can turn around in any way―great or small―the current demise of the world, is the height of insanity and pride! God is prime mover and it is God who deserves the glory for any and all changes that improve or cure this evil world.
This is seen in the way that God acted with Gedeon, when the Israelites were threatened by the Madianites―with 135,000 Madianites against Gedeon’s army of only 32,000—who were thus outnumbered by more than 4 to 1. Human wisdom and prudence, seeing oneself so sorely outnumbered, would see this as a time to go out and recruit more warriors. However, without God we can do nothing, and it might be that, after the victory that the Lord would give them, the soldiers might think it had been by their own strength and ability that they had won the victory.
So, the Lord commanded Gedeon, not to recruit soldiers, but to further reduce the number under his command: “lest Israel should glory against me, and say: I was delivered by my own strength” (Judges 7:2). Any who were “afraid and trembling” were told they could go home. Some 22,000 departed, leaving only 10,000 to fight the 135,000 Madianites. So, they went from being outnumbered by more than 4 to 1, to now being outnumbered by more than 13 to 1.
No doubt Gedeon was surprised to hear what the Lord said next: “The people are still too many, bring them to the waters, and there I will try them” (Judges 7:4). At the site to which the Lord had directed Gideon’s army there was drinkable water. The army stopped to drink and 9,700 knelt down on their knees, so they might drink directly from the stream. The other 300 cupped their hands and took water into them, drinking it from their hands as a dog would lap water from his bowl. “By the 300 hundred men, that lapped water, I will save you, and deliver Madian into thy hand: but let all the rest of the people return to their place” (Judges 7:7). And so it was!
God likes to do with the minimum. He likes to have everything stacked against Him and His Chosen Ones. He delights in bringing off the seemingly impossible. With “Gedeon’s Three Hundred”, God kept increasing the odds against them―from being outnumbered by more than 4 to 1 (135,000 versus 32,000); to more than 13 to 1 (135,000 versus 10,000); and finally to a ridiculous and seemingly impossible situation of being outnumbered by 450 to 1 (135,000 versus 300). God wanted the Israelites to go into battle heavily outnumbered, so that God Himself could claim the eventual victory against those impossible odds.
When we at first look at the weapons that Heaven is proposing that we use to the fight the evils in the Church and the world, then we too might think: “This is just not going to work! What can the Mass, the Rosary and Scapular possibly do to turn back the tide of the terrible tsunami of evil that overflows us?” Our Lord gave the answer when He said: “Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?” (Matthew 9:28) … “With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible! … The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Matthew 19:26; Luke 18:27).
In the following articles we shall examine and see how this actually can be possible―but it all depends upon how well we use the weapons given to us and how much Faith we have in them!
Article 2
Saturday & Sunday, August 3rd & 4th
Be a Modern-Day Machabee
Saturday & Sunday, August 3rd & 4th
Be a Modern-Day Machabee
More Than A Story!
For many people (most people?), history is irrelevant―history is a story and that’s it! Sometimes interesting, sometimes boring―but of little or no use in our everyday life in the world today. “It is today that matters―not history!” they say. We study history because history doesn’t stay behind us. Studying history helps us understand how events in the past made things the way they are today and how things might be tomorrow.
History is the study of human actions and consequences. With lessons from the past, we avoid repeating past mistakes in the future. History gives us a better understanding of the world and how it operates. When you study a war, you learn more about how conflict escalates. You learn what dilemmas world leaders face and how they respond—and when those decisions lead to better or worse outcomes. Historical study shows you the warning signs of many kinds of disasters, from genocide to climate disasters. Understanding these patterns will make you a more informed and help you foresee things and help you take action effectively.
Hence the saying: “If we fail or neglect to study and learn history―then we will be forced to learn it by repeating the same mistakes that were made in history!” Or, as Spanish philosopher George Santayana once said: “Those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it.”
But there is more to history than the negative aspects of mistakes and failures. History can also teach us many positives. That is why we read about the lives of the saints―so that we can learn from them and imitate them to help save our souls and reach Heaven. On a secular level, there are many accounts of success, bravery, perseverance and heroism that can be gleaned from the annals of history and imitated in our present day lives.
Similarly with Bible―it is not just a spiritual book, but also a history book. It presents to us both good and evil and their consequences in relation to God. We learn to avoid imitating and repeating the evil that we read about; and we are encouraged to imitate the good that we see.
As Holy Scripture says: “Nothing under the sun is new, neither is any man able to say: ‘Behold, this is new!’ ― for it has already gone before in the ages that were before us” (Ecclesiastes 1:10). Circumstances might change―but human nature never changes; the tactics of Satan never change; and the workings of God never change: “God is not a man, that He should be changed” (Numbers 23:19). “With God there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (James 1:17).
God is Not Afraid of a Fight!
God is not one to back out of a fight! “The Lord is as a man of war!” (Exodus 15:3) … “The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man, as a man of war shall He stir up zeal! He shall shout and cry-out; and He shall prevail against His enemies!” (Isaias 42:13) … “The Lord will fight for you!” (Exodus 14:14) … “The Lord will destroy all these nations!” (Deuteronomy 11:23) … “In Thy hand, O Lord, is strength and power, and no one can resist Thee!” (2 Paralipomenon 20:6) … “May the nations know His power―that it is not easy to fight against God!” (Ecclesiasticus 46:8) … “He struck many nations and slew mighty kings!” (Psalm 134:10) … “The indignation of the Lord is upon all nations, and His fury upon all their armies! He has killed them and delivered them to slaughter!” (Isaias 34:2) ... “He will humble all the nations that shall rise up against us, and bring them to disgrace!” (Judith 8:20) … “He multiplies nations, and destroys them, and restores them again after they were overthrown!” (Job 12:23). We have seen God as a warrior many times in Holy Scripture―one of those times was in the case of the Machabees.
Already from the time of Moses and the Exodus of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt and their journey to the Promised Land, God showed Himself as not being averse to destroying other nations in His protection of His Chosen People. The Book of Deuteronomy says: “When the Lord your God shall have brought you into the land which you are going to possess, the Lord shall have destroyed many nations before your face―the Hethite, and the Gergezite, and the Amorrhite, and the Chanaanite, and the Pherezite, and the Hevite, and the Jebusite―seven nations much more numerous than you are, and stronger than you. And when the Lord God shall have delivered them to you, you shall utterly destroy them. You shall make no agreement with them, nor show mercy to them! Neither shall you make marriages with them! You shall not give your daughter to their son, nor take their daughter for your son―for she will turn away your son from following Me, so that he may rather serve strange gods, and then the wrath of the Lord will be kindled and will quickly destroy you! Thus shall you deal with them―destroy their altars, break their statues, cut down their groves, and burn their graven things―because you are a holy people to the Lord your God! The Lord your God has chosen you to be His particular people of all peoples that are upon the Earth. The Lord is joined unto you and has chosen you―not because you surpass all nations in number, for you are the fewest of any people―but because the Lord has loved you and has kept His oath, which He swore to your fathers; and has brought you out with a strong hand, and redeemed you from the house of bondage, out of the hand of Pharao, the king of Egypt!” (Deuteronomy 7:1-8).
“If at any time you come to fight against a city, you shalt first offer it peace. If they receive it, and open the gates to you, then all the people that are therein, shall be saved and shall serve you by paying tribute. But if they will not make peace, and shall begin war against you, then you shall besiege it. And when the Lord your God shall deliver the city into your hands, you shall slay all that are therein of the male sex, with the edge of the sword―except for women and children, cattle and other things, that are in the city. And you shall divide all the prey to the army, and you shalt eat the spoils of your enemies, which the Lord your God shall give you! So shall you do [that is to say, first offer peace] to all cities that are at a great distance from you and are not of these cities which you shalt receive in possession. But of those cities that shall be given to you, you shall suffer none at all to live―but shall kill them with the edge of the sword, that is to say: the Hethite, and the Amorrhite, and the Chanaanite, the Pherezite, and the Hevite, and the Jebusite, as the Lord your God has commanded you, lest they teach you to do all the abominations which they have done to their gods, and you should sin against the Lord your God!” (Deuteronomy 20:10-18).
God commanded the Israelites to “destroy all the inhabitants of the land” of Canaan (Josue 9:24). They were to conquer, kill, and cast out the Hethites, Gergezites, Amorrhites, Chanaanites, Pherezites, Hevites, and Jebusites (Exodus 23:23; Deuteronomy 7:1-2; Josue 3:10).
After crossing the Jordan River, we learn in the book of Josue that the Israelites “killed all that were in [the city of Jericho], man and woman, young and old. The oxen also and the sheep, and the asses, they slew with the edge of the sword … They burned the city, and all things that were therein” (Josue 6:21, 24).
As for the city of Hai, “Josue going to the city, took it and set it on fire, and all the inhabitants of Hai were slain” (Josue 8:19-26), killing 12,000 men and women and hanging their king (8:25, 29).
Josue and the Israelites “took Maceda and destroyed it, with the edge of the sword, and killed the king and all the inhabitants thereof―he left not in it the least remains. And he did to the King of Maceda, as he had done to the King of Jericho” (Josue 10:28).
“And Josue, with all Israel, passed from Maceda to Lebna, and fought against it. And the Lord delivered it with the king thereof into the hands of Israel―and they destroyed the city with the edge of the sword, and all the inhabitants thereof. They left not in it any remains. And they did to the King of Lebna, as they had done to the King of Jericho” (Josue 10:29-30).
They then struck Lachis: “From Lebna he passed unto Lachis, with all Israel: and investing it with his army, besieged it. And the Lord delivered Lachis into the hands of Israel, and Josue took it the following day, and put it to the sword, and every soul that was in it, as he had done to Lebna. At that time Horam king of Gazer, came up to help Lachis―and Josue slew him with all his people, so as to leave none alive.” (Josue 10:31-33).
The Israelites then conquered Gazer, Eglon, Hebron, Dabir, and Asor: “At that time Horam king of Gazer, came up to help Lachis―and Josue slew him with all his people, so as to leave none alive. And he passed from Lachis to Eglon, and surrounded it, and took it the same day: and put to the sword all the souls that were in it, according to all that he had done to Lachis.
“He went up also with all Israel from Eglon to Hebron, and fought against it, took it, and destroyed it with the edge of the sword―also the king thereof, and all the towns of that country, and all the souls that dwelt in it. He left not therein any remains―as he had done to Eglon, so did he also to Hebron―putting to the sword all that he found in it.
“Returning from Hebron to Dabir, Josue took it and destroyed it―also the king of Dabir and all the towns round about, he destroyed with the edge of the sword. He left not in it any remains. As he had done to Hebron and Lebna and to their kings, so did he to Dabir and to the king thereof. So Josue conquered all the hill country, and the south and of the plain, and of Asedoth, with their kings―he left not any remains therein, but slew all that breathed, as the Lord the God of Israel had commanded him―from Cadesbarne even to Gaza. All the land of Gosen even to Gabaon, and all their kings, and their lands he took and wasted―for the Lord the God of Israel fought for him.” (Josue 10:33-42).
“And when Jabin king of Asor had heard these things, he sent to Jobab, King of Madon; and to the King of Semeron; and to the King of Achsaph; and to the kings of the north, that dwelt in the mountains and in the plains; and to the Chanaanites, Amorrhites, Hethites, Pherezites, Jebusites; and Hevites. And they all came out with their troops, a people exceeding numerous as the sand that is on the sea shore, their horses also and chariots a very great multitude. And all these kings assembled together to fight against Israel. And the Lord said to Josue: ‘Fear them not! For tomorrow I will deliver all these to be slain in the sight of Israel! You shall hamstring their horses, and you shall burn their chariots with fire!’ And Josue came, and all the army with him, against them―and, all of a sudden, fell upon them. And the Lord delivered them into the hands of Israel. And they defeated them and chased them. He slew them all, so as to leave no remains of them―and did as the Lord had commanded him, he hamstringed their horses and burned their chariots.
“Then, turning back, Josue took the city of Asor and slew the king with the sword. He cut off all the souls that lived there and left not in it any remains, but utterly destroyed all, and burned the city itself with fire. And he took and put to the sword and destroyed all the cities round about, and their kings―as Moses the servant of God had commanded him―except the cities that were on hills and high places―the rest Israel burned. Only Asor, which was very strong, Josue consumed with fire. And the children of Israel divided among themselves all the spoil of these cities and the cattle, killing all the men―as the Lord had commanded Moses His servant; so did Moses command Josue, and he accomplished all. He left not one thing undone of all the commandments which the Lord had commanded Moses” (11:1-15).
How Can a Loving God Command Killing?
There are many folk―especially in this modern age―who have a problem with a God of Love killing people. After all, does not God Himself command in one of His Ten Commandments: “Thou shalt not kill!” (Exodus 20:13) and elsewhere God says: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). Therefore many have a problem getting their around the fact that if “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “God so loved the world as to give His only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16); also, “God loves mercy!” (Psalm 83:12); furthermore, Jesus Himself said: “Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you!” (Matthew 5:44) ― how is it then that God kills people?
Yes―without doubt―“God is charity” (1 John 4:8). Yes―He is “the God of peace and of love” (2 Corinthians 13:11). Yes― “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy! The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). Yes―“God will not leave off His mercy, and He will not destroy, nor abolish his own works” (Ecclesiasticus 47:24).
Nevertheless, we must not forget that Jesus also said: “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). “The Lord will render to every man according to his works!” (Psalm 61:13). “God will not condemn without cause” (Job 34:12). “He that does wrong, shall receive punishment for that which he has done wrongfully― there is no respect of persons with God!” (Colossians 3:25). “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God!” (Hebrews 10:31). “The Lord loves judgment. The unjust shall be punished and the seed of the wicked shall perish!” (Psalm 36:28). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “The soul that sins shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:20). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “The pursuing of evil things brings death!” (Proverbs 11:19). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall perish!” (Luke 13:3). “Fear not them that kill the body and are not able to kill the soul―but rather fear Him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell!” (Matthew 10:28).
“The wrath of God is revealed from Heaven against all ungodliness and injustice” (Romans 1:18). “The Lord is a revenger, and has wrath! The Lord taketh vengeance on His adversaries, and He is angry with His enemies!” (Nahum 1:2). “The Lord will come to visit the iniquity of the inhabitants of the Earth against Him―and the Earth shall disclose her blood!” (Isaias 26:21). “Thus says the Lord God: ‘Behold I will stretch forth My hand and will kill the killers, and I will execute great vengeance upon them, rebuking them in fury―and they shall know that I am the Lord when I shall lay My vengeance upon them!’” (Ezechiel 25:16-17).
The entire 26th chapter of the Book of Leviticus is dedicated to God’s way of acting with the virtuous and with sinners―here is an abbreviated extract (though it is worth reading the entire chapter): “I am the Lord your God. Keep My Sabbaths! Walk in My precepts! Keep My commandments and do them! … I will look on you, and make you increase! … My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people! But if you walk contrary to Me, and will not listen to Me; if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments; if you despise My laws and My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, then I also will do these things to you: I will set My face against you … I will chastise you seven times more for your sins! I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins! I will break the pride of your stubbornness! … I will quickly visit you with poverty and burning heat, which shall consume your lives! … You shall fall down before your enemies! … You shall sow your seed in vain! … Your labor shall be spent in vain, the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit. And I will send in upon you the beasts of the field, to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number, and that your highways may be desolate. And if, despite this, you will not amend, but will walk contrary to Me―then I also will walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins. And I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge Me! When you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies … But if, despite all this, you will not listen to Me, but will walk against Me―then I will also go against you with opposite fury! … I will bring your cities to be a wilderness! … I will destroy your land! … I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed … You shall perish among the Gentiles! And if some remain, then they shall pine away in their iniquities in the land of their enemies―until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, whereby they have transgressed Me, and walked contrary unto Me … They shall pray for their sins, because they rejected My judgments, and despised My laws!” (Leviticus 26:1-43).
God Means Business
It is absolutely insane to imagine that the God of Love ― “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) ― cannot be the God of Justice. As Holy Scripture says: “To the Lord our God belongs justice!” (Baruch 1:15) … “The Heavens shall declare His justice―for God is judge!” (Psalm 49:6) … “The Lord shall be exalted in judgment, and the God shall be sanctified in justice!” (Isaias 5:16) … “I am the Lord that speaks justice, that declares right things!” (Isaias 45:19) … “They think they can escape the justice of God Who sees all things!” (Esther 16:4) … “If our injustice requires the justice of God, what shall we say? Is God unjust because He manifests His wrath?” (Romans 3:5) ... “For him that passes over from justice to sin, God has prepared the sword!” (Ecclesiasticus 26:27).
As already stated: “God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:7). If we have lost the sense of sin, then we also lose the sense of what is a just and fair punishment for sin. The Church teaches that sin is the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
What should be expected for having committed the greatest evil or greatest crime in the world? What is the greatest punishment in this life that could be inflicted? Death, of course! Death, for us, is the greatest physical evil we can imagine. Thus it is that God inflicts death for sin in many instances―not only on His enemies, but also His Chosen People. Some of the chief occasions of this punishment have been:
● The death sentence for Adam and Eve for having sinned by eating the forbidden fruit.
● The Great Flood, with water, killed all persons in the world, except for Noe and his family.
● The fire and brimstone falling from Heaven killed all those in the terribly sinful cities of Sodom and Gomorrha.
● The 40 years of desert wilderness with Moses, until all the Israelite adults, who had left Egypt in the Exodus, had died as a punishment for their perpetual complaining and disobedience towards God.
● The annihilation of the Ten of the Twelve Tribes of Israel due to their idolatry.
● The destruction of Jerusalem and its Temple of God, in 586 BC, by Nabuchodonosor, the King of Babylon, when he conquered and destroyed Jerusalem.
It is hardly surprising that Our Lady of Fatima revealed that wars are a punishment for sin: “God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church! … Russia will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions! … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out! … Various nations will be annihilated!” One of the three seers at Fatima―St. Jacinta Marto―stated: “Our Lady said that there are many wars and discords in the world. Wars are only punishments for the sins of the world.”
Over the last few centuries, Our Lady has repeatedly appeared with messages from the “God of Love” about the imminent punishments about to befall us from the “God of Justice.” If you compile her key statements, they fit in perfectly with all of the above. Here are just some extracts from her messages as Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Akita:
“Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times making it easy for everyone to live in sin … Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … Unbridled luxury and impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … Many men in this world afflict the Lord … Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … Nature is asking for vengeance because of man, and she trembles, with dread, at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime! ...
“Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … God will strike in an unprecedented way. God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Physical and moral agonies will be suffered ... The seasons will be altered, the Earth, the stars will lose their regular motion, the moon will only reflect a faint reddish glow. Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains, cities, etc ... Paris will burn and Marseilles will be engulfed. Several cities will be shaken down and swallowed up by earthquakes ... Nations will be annihilated … Fire will fall from the sky and consume cities and will wipe out a great part of humanity―the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!
“There will be bloody wars and famines, plagues and infectious diseases … Men will kill each other, massacre each other, even in their homes … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. A general war will follow which will be appalling. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy ... Blood will flow on all sides ... There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. People will believe that all is lost! … For a time, God will cease to remember France and Italy, because the Gospel of Jesus Christ has been forgotten.” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
We Were Made to Fight!
“The God of peace and of love” has created us for the battlefield ― “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). The Sacrament of Confirmation makes us Soldiers of Christ ― and soldiers are made for the battlefield, not the armchair: “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4), we often spend more time fighting among ourselves than fighting the enemies of God and the Church!
The Church has been infiltrated―as stated by Our Lady of Akita―and Communism (nowadays often disguised as a wolf in the clothing of sheep) has spread its errors throughout the world―as foretold by Our Lady of Fatima. As Sister Lucia of Fatima stated: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!
“The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them! … For this reason, Father, it is my mission not just to speak about the material punishments, that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to also tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin.
“We should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No―Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed! So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway.” (Sr. Lucia in an interview with Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Our Lady of La Salette called on all persons of good will to come to the fight: I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son! Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world! Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days! May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
As Catholics―who have been made Soldiers of Christ through the Sacrament of Confirmation―we have a grave obligation to fight for the Church and to fight for the Faith. We are, if you like, modern-day Machabees who have to fight not only those outside the Church, but also the Modernists, Liberals and worldly Catholics inside the Church (not to mention the infiltrators). You sit on your sofa or sit on the fence at your own risk! As Our Lady of Fatima said―many souls go to Hell because there is nobody to pray and offer sacrifices for them. We are busy playing, not praying―as the Angel warned the three children of Fatima, whom he found playing. The Angel scolded the children who were playing: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
What would that Angel say to us today? Are we praying or playing? Are we practicing mortification or self-gratification? Are we making sacrifices or are too busy with our electronic devices? Are we prepared for a martyrdom or do we want to remain in spiritual boredom? Are we militant Catholics or indolent Catholics? Will we fight or will we take flight? “This is the victory which overcomes the world, our Faith!” (1 John 5:4) but “Faith without works is dead?” (James 2:20). Is your Faith dead and buried? Is your Faith akin to the walking dead? Is it time to resurrect your Faith and do something with it?
Fight with Who? Fight with What?
Ultimately―regardless of the person, the uniform, the nationality, the politics, the religion, the organization, the creed, the “-ism”, the agenda―ultimately our fight is with Satan and Hell: “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12). Our Lord speaks of “the prince of world” and that “prince” has real power in this world: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not anything! … The prince of this world is already judged! ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30).
The recently deceased (2016) former chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, stated: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican ... Legions of demons have lodged there! … In the Vatican there are members of Satanic cults―there are priests, monsignors and even cardinals! I know from people who reported to me how they got to know this directly. It is also something, that has been “confessed” several times by the Devil, himself, under obedience during the exorcisms … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office!”
We Have the Weapons―But Use Them Badly
The ultimate weapon―the one that defeated Satan on Calvary―is the Sacrifice of Christ perpetuated in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. The other immensely powerful weapon is the Holy Rosary. Our Lady of Akita referred to these when she said: “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son!”
► THE HOLY SACRIFICE OF THE MASS: The saints have often indicated to us the immense power of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
● St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), Doctor of the Church said: “The celebration of Holy Mass is as valuable as the death of Jesus on the cross!”
● Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824) adds: “Mass, badly celebrated, is an enormous evil. It is not a matter of indifference how it is said! ... I have had a great vision on the mystery of Holy Mass and I have seen that whatever good has existed since creation is owing to it … Our Lady said what is most painful for me to repeat―that if only one priest offered the unbloody Sacrifice as worthily and with the same sentiments as the Apostles, he could ward off all calamities from the Church!”
● Pope St. Gregory the Great (reigned 590-604), Doctor of the Church, tells us: “It is most true that he who attends Holy Mass shall be freed from many evils and from many dangers, both seen and unseen!”
● St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153), Doctor of the Church, tells us: “You will gain more from one single Mass than you would from distributing all your goods to the poor or making pilgrimages to all the most holy shrines in Christendom.”
● St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751) adds: “Were it not for the Holy Mass, at this moment the world would be in the abyss, unable to bear up under the mighty load of its iniquities! Mass is the powerful prop that holds the world on its base! What graces, gifts and virtues the Holy Mass calls down! Repentance for sin ... victory over temptation ... holy inspirations which dispositions to shake off tepidity ... the grace of final perseverance, upon which depends our salvation ... temporal blessings, such as peace, abundance and health!”
► THE HOLY ROSARY: Our Lady has often asked that we pray the Rosary and that we pray the Rosary often. Many saints and popes have added their testimonies as to the power of the Rosary. Exorcists have witnessed devils confirm this power of the Rosary. Yet despite all this, the Rosary is currently prayed daily by less than 4% of the Catholic population.
● Our Lady herself has said: “You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary.” (Our Lady to Blessed Alan de la Roche). “Pray and let the Rosary always be in your hands as a sign to Satan that you belong to me.” (Our Lady to St. Simon Stock). “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war! … Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day! … Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (Our Lady of Fatima, August 1917). “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able to save you from the calamities which approach!” (Our Lady in Akita, Japan).
● Our Lady herself has said: “You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary.” (Our Lady to Blessed Alan de la Roche). “Pray and let the Rosary always be in your hands as a sign to Satan that you belong to me.” (Our Lady to St. Simon Stock). “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war! … Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day! … Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (Our Lady of Fatima). “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able to save you from the calamities which approach!” (Our Lady in Akita, Japan).
● Pope Adrian VI said: “The Rosary is the scourge of the devil!”
● Pope Leo XIII wrote: “The Rosary is the most excellent form of prayer and the most efficacious means of attaining eternal life. It is the remedy for all our evils, the root of all our blessings. There is no more excellent way of praying!”
● Blessed Pope Pius IX said: “Give me an army saying the Rosary and I will conquer the world!”
● Pope St. Pius X said the following: “If there were one million families praying the Rosary every day, the entire world would be saved.”
● Pope Pius XI wrote that “The Rosary is a powerful weapon to put the demons to flight and a most powerful weapon to overcome the devil ... It serves admirably to overcome the enemies of God and of religion.”
● St. Dominic said: “The Rosary is a fortress against evil. It is a sign to Satan that you belong to Our Lady … One day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, she will save the world!”
● St. Louis de Montfort adds: “When the Holy Rosary is said well, it gives Jesus and Mary more glory and is more meritorious than any other prayer … Never will anyone, who says his Rosary every day, become a formal heretic, or be led astray by the devil. This is a statement which I would sign with my blood!”
● St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina states: “The Rosary is the weapon for these times … The Rosary is the weapon against the evils of the world today … The Rosary is THE weapon!” (St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina).
● Fr. Gabriele Amorth states: “The Rosary, being the prayer most appreciated by Our Lady, is an extremely powerful arm against the devil! During an exorcism, Satan told me, through the possessed person: ‘Every Hail Mary of the Rosary is a blow to the head for me! If Christians knew the power of the Rosary, it would be the end of me!’””
Using Our Weapons Badly
At La Salette, Our Lady said: “If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! … They have neglected prayer and penance … In vain you will pray! … Do you say your prayers properly?” Yes―how many people say their prayers PROPERLY? Sister Lucia of Fatima admitted that, prior to the apparitions, she and the other two children―Francisco and Jacinta―DID NOT say their prayers properly. Sister Lucia recalls: “We had been told to say the Rosary after our lunch, but as the whole day seemed too short for our play, we worked out a fine way of getting through it quickly. We simply passed the beads through our fingers, saying nothing but ‘Hail Mary, Hail Mary, Hail Mary...’ At the end of each mystery, we paused awhile, then simply said ‘Our Father’ and so, in the twinkling of an eye, as they say, we had our Rosary finished!”
St. Louis de Montfort, on the topic of the Holy Rosary, writes: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly. Most Catholics say the Rosary, either the whole fifteen mysteries or five of them, or at least a few decades. Why is it then that so few of them give up their sins and make progress in virtue, if not because they are not saying them as they should … In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. People who do that forfeit God’s blessing, which is changed into a curse for having treated the things of God disrespectfully: “Cursed be the one who does God’s work negligently” (Jeremias 48:10).
“Our Lady also taught it to Blessed Alan de la Roche and said to him in a vision, that meditation is the soul of this prayer. For the Rosary said without the meditation on the sacred mysteries of our salvation would almost be a body without a soul, excellent matter, but without the form, which is the meditation. In addition to this, take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary.
“The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin.
“The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said, especially when we have promised to say it regularly or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
That is why the enemies of the Church and mankind are increasingly getting the upper-hand throughout the world over the last few centuries―Catholics (who are, let us not forget, Soldiers of Christ) have gone AWOL (absent without leave) and are not at their posts manning their spiritual weapons. Those who remain at their posts, are using their spiritual weapons badly―just like a soldier who blindly sprays his bullets from his machine gun without carefully aiming at the target!
The same is true for the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―which is an even more powerful weapon than the Holy Rosary. How sad and tragic it is to see priests rush through Mass as if they were trying to set a world record and get a gold medal for the fastest Mass in history! “Fast-tracking” things and taking “express-lanes” seems to be the modern way―yet that should be the case when it comes to the Mass and prayer! Our Lord could well address the speedsters with these words with which He rebuked St. Peter: “Go behind Me, Satan! You art a scandal unto Me! Because you savor not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!” (Matthew 16:23). “I will cast the shoulder to you and I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities!” (Malachias 2:3).
Many people like and want a short Mass―it was not like that for Christ! He spent three hours suffering and dying on His cross―and we cannot endure one hour of being “nailed” to the pew? “What? Could you not watch one hour with Me?” said Our Lord to Peter, James and John in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:40) ― and He can rightfully say that about our attendance at Mass: “Could you not watch and pray for one hour with Me?” Mass is not about you and your preferences―it is all about God and reverence. Reverence cannot be seen when you rush through Mass at breakneck speed!
The Mass is called “The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass” for a reason. Christ sacrificed Himself for us on the cross out of His love and compassion for sinners. You would think that we sinners would be willing to sacrifice some time to attend Mass and be “nailed” to the wood of the pew for an hour or so! The Mass is not about fun and laughter―it is about the cross and suffering. We do not go to Mass to be entertained―we go to Mass to be redeemed. We go for an hour or so―but it could buy eternity for us! Attend and assist well―and it could be an eternity in Heaven. Fail to attend and assist badly―and it could be an eternity in Hell, or what seems like an ‘eternity’ in the fires of Purgatory!
Only One Solution
There is only one solution to the current crisis in the Church and the crisis in the world at large. It is not a natural solution, but a supernatural solution―because at the root of all the problems are Satan and the other devils, whose powers far exceed that of any human being. Nevertheless, if we ‘clothe’ ourselves with the supernatural, then there is no way Satan and his demons can overcome us―but is that what we are doing, or we being too naturalistic about things? The more that we rely on God, the more powerful we are in resisting Satan and overcoming the world, of which he is the prince. Our Lord clearly said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). So why are trying to solve things in a human way? St. Paul says: “I can do all these things in Him who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13). So why are we relying so much on our own knowledge, skill and strength?
Judas Machabeus was successful in his war against the Greek-Seleucid Empire―despite being outnumbered by just over 8 to 1 (7,000 Machabeans versus 60,000 Seleucans), which is a worse than the just under 5 to 1 ratio by which Catholics are outnumbered by non-Catholics and pagans in the world today (1.4 billion Catholics versus 6.6 non-Catholics). The success of Judas Machabeus and his army was not due to the skill and strength―but it was due to the intervention and protection of God. We see many references to this in the Books of the Machabees:
“Judas Machabeus, and they that were with him, went privately into the towns, and calling together their kinsmen and friends who still continued in the Jews’ religion, they assembled 6,000. And they called upon the Lord that He would look upon His trodden down people and the Temple, that was defiled by the wicked; that He would have pity upon the city that was destroyed, and would hear the voice of the blood of the most unjust deaths of innocent children that cried to Him; and the blasphemies offered to His Name, and would show His indignation on this occasion” (2 Machabees 8:1-4).
“Machabeus calling together seven thousand that were with him, exhorted them not to be reconciled to the enemies, nor to fear the multitude of the enemies who came wrongfully against them, but to fight manfully. For, said he, they trust in their weapons, and in their boldness―but we trust in the Almighty Lord, who can utterly destroy both them that come against us, and the whole world. He reminded them of the helps their fathers had received from God, and how, under Sennacherib, 185,000 had been destroyed. And of the battle that they had fought against the Galatians in Babylonia, how they, being only 6,000, slew a 120,000, because of the help they had from Heaven. With these words they were greatly encouraged, and disposed even to die for the laws and their country … And the Almighty being their helper, they slew above nine thousand men: and having wounded and disabled the greater part of Nicanor's army, they obliged them to flee” (2 Machabees 8:16-21).
“Machabeus, and they that were with him, by the protection of the Lord, recovered the Temple and the city [of Jerusalem] again. He threw down the altars, which the heathens had set up in the streets, as also the temples of the idols. And having purified the Temple, they made another altar and offered sacrifices after two years. And when they had done these things, they beseeched the Lord, lying prostrate on the ground, that they might no more fall into such evils” (2 Machabees 10:1-4).
“Then they that were with Machabeus, beseeching the Lord by prayers to be their helper, made a strong attack upon the strongholds of the Idumeans. And attacking them with great force, won the strongholds and slew altogether no fewer than 20,000” (2 Machabees 10:16-17).
“But Timotheus, who had been overcome by the Jews, called together a multitude of foreign troops and assembled horsemen out of Asia, and came to take Judea by force of arms. When he drew near, Machabeus and they that were with him, prayed to the Lord, sprinkling earth upon their heads and girding their loins with haircloth and lying prostrate at the foot of the altar, beseeched the Lord to be merciful to them and to be an enemy to their enemies. As soon as the sun was risen both sides joined battle―the one part having the Lord for a surety of victory and success, but the other side making their rage their leader in battle. When they were in the heat of the battle, there appeared to the enemies five men upon horses from Heaven, leading the Jews. Two of them took Machabeus between them, and covered him on every side with their arms, and kept him safe, while casting darts and fireballs against the enemy, so that they fell down, being confounded with blindness. And there were slain 20,500 enemy soldiers, and 600 horsemen. Timotheus fled into Gazara. And when this was done, they blessed the Lord with hymns and thanksgiving, who had done great things in Israel, and given them the victory.” (2 Machabees 10:24-38).
“A short time after this Lysias, being greatly displeased with what had happened, gathered together 80,000 men and all the horsemen, and came to fight against the Jews, thinking to take the city, and make it a habitation of the Gentiles and to make a gain of the Temple. Never considering the power of God―but puffed up in his own mind and trusting in the multitude of his foot soldiers, and the thousands of horsemen, and his 80 elephants―he came into Judea. When Machabeus and they that were with him, understood that the strong holds were besieged, they and all the people beseeched the Lord with lamentations and tears, that He would send a good angel to save Israel. Then Machabeus exhorted the rest to come with him to help their brethren. And as they were going forth together, there appeared at Jerusalem a horseman going before them, in white clothing, with golden armor, shaking a spear. Then they all together blessed the merciful Lord, and took great courage, being ready to break through not only men, but also the fiercest beasts, and walls of iron. So they went on courageously, having a helper from Heaven, and the Lord who showed mercy to them. And rushing violently upon the enemy, like lions, they slew 11,000 footmen, and 1,600 horsemen, and put all the rest to flight. Lysias fled away shamefully, and escaped. As he was a man of understanding, while reflecting on the loss he had suffered, he understood that the Hebrews could not be overcome because they relied upon the help sent to them by the Almighty God” (2 Machabees 11:1-13).
When faced by the massive Seleucan army of over 60,000 soldiers, “Machabeus―considering the coming of the multitude, and the different preparations of armor, and the fierceness of the beasts―stretching out his hands to Heaven, called upon the Lord, that works wonders, Who gives victory to them that are worthy―not according to the power of their weapons, but according as it seems good to Him. And his prayer was said in this manner: ‘Thou, O Lord, Who didst send Thy angel in the time of Ezechias, King of Juda, and didst kill 185,000 of the army of Sennacherib―send now also, O Lord of Heaven, Thy good angel before us, for the fear and dread of the greatness of Thy arm! So that they may be afraid, who come with blasphemy against Thy holy people!’ And thus he concluded his prayer … So fighting with their hands, but praying to the Lord with their hearts, they slew no less than thirty-five thousand, being greatly cheered with the presence of God” (2 Machabees 15:21-27).
Make no mistake about it―you are called to the fight! It does not matter whether you are young or old―a child of 7 or an old-age pensioner of 77. Man or woman; healthy or sick; rich or poor; educated or uneducated; full of courage or cowardice; full of zeal or full of excuse; whether you want to or not―you are called to the fight! Since the chief weapons are the Holy Mass and the Holy Rosary―you can fight from any location in the world and in any condition that you find yourself in―healthy or sick; rich or poor; educated or uneducated. In fact the sicker and poorer you are, the more powerful your prayers can be―for you have an added sacrifice to your prayer.
For many people (most people?), history is irrelevant―history is a story and that’s it! Sometimes interesting, sometimes boring―but of little or no use in our everyday life in the world today. “It is today that matters―not history!” they say. We study history because history doesn’t stay behind us. Studying history helps us understand how events in the past made things the way they are today and how things might be tomorrow.
History is the study of human actions and consequences. With lessons from the past, we avoid repeating past mistakes in the future. History gives us a better understanding of the world and how it operates. When you study a war, you learn more about how conflict escalates. You learn what dilemmas world leaders face and how they respond—and when those decisions lead to better or worse outcomes. Historical study shows you the warning signs of many kinds of disasters, from genocide to climate disasters. Understanding these patterns will make you a more informed and help you foresee things and help you take action effectively.
Hence the saying: “If we fail or neglect to study and learn history―then we will be forced to learn it by repeating the same mistakes that were made in history!” Or, as Spanish philosopher George Santayana once said: “Those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it.”
But there is more to history than the negative aspects of mistakes and failures. History can also teach us many positives. That is why we read about the lives of the saints―so that we can learn from them and imitate them to help save our souls and reach Heaven. On a secular level, there are many accounts of success, bravery, perseverance and heroism that can be gleaned from the annals of history and imitated in our present day lives.
Similarly with Bible―it is not just a spiritual book, but also a history book. It presents to us both good and evil and their consequences in relation to God. We learn to avoid imitating and repeating the evil that we read about; and we are encouraged to imitate the good that we see.
As Holy Scripture says: “Nothing under the sun is new, neither is any man able to say: ‘Behold, this is new!’ ― for it has already gone before in the ages that were before us” (Ecclesiastes 1:10). Circumstances might change―but human nature never changes; the tactics of Satan never change; and the workings of God never change: “God is not a man, that He should be changed” (Numbers 23:19). “With God there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (James 1:17).
God is Not Afraid of a Fight!
God is not one to back out of a fight! “The Lord is as a man of war!” (Exodus 15:3) … “The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man, as a man of war shall He stir up zeal! He shall shout and cry-out; and He shall prevail against His enemies!” (Isaias 42:13) … “The Lord will fight for you!” (Exodus 14:14) … “The Lord will destroy all these nations!” (Deuteronomy 11:23) … “In Thy hand, O Lord, is strength and power, and no one can resist Thee!” (2 Paralipomenon 20:6) … “May the nations know His power―that it is not easy to fight against God!” (Ecclesiasticus 46:8) … “He struck many nations and slew mighty kings!” (Psalm 134:10) … “The indignation of the Lord is upon all nations, and His fury upon all their armies! He has killed them and delivered them to slaughter!” (Isaias 34:2) ... “He will humble all the nations that shall rise up against us, and bring them to disgrace!” (Judith 8:20) … “He multiplies nations, and destroys them, and restores them again after they were overthrown!” (Job 12:23). We have seen God as a warrior many times in Holy Scripture―one of those times was in the case of the Machabees.
Already from the time of Moses and the Exodus of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt and their journey to the Promised Land, God showed Himself as not being averse to destroying other nations in His protection of His Chosen People. The Book of Deuteronomy says: “When the Lord your God shall have brought you into the land which you are going to possess, the Lord shall have destroyed many nations before your face―the Hethite, and the Gergezite, and the Amorrhite, and the Chanaanite, and the Pherezite, and the Hevite, and the Jebusite―seven nations much more numerous than you are, and stronger than you. And when the Lord God shall have delivered them to you, you shall utterly destroy them. You shall make no agreement with them, nor show mercy to them! Neither shall you make marriages with them! You shall not give your daughter to their son, nor take their daughter for your son―for she will turn away your son from following Me, so that he may rather serve strange gods, and then the wrath of the Lord will be kindled and will quickly destroy you! Thus shall you deal with them―destroy their altars, break their statues, cut down their groves, and burn their graven things―because you are a holy people to the Lord your God! The Lord your God has chosen you to be His particular people of all peoples that are upon the Earth. The Lord is joined unto you and has chosen you―not because you surpass all nations in number, for you are the fewest of any people―but because the Lord has loved you and has kept His oath, which He swore to your fathers; and has brought you out with a strong hand, and redeemed you from the house of bondage, out of the hand of Pharao, the king of Egypt!” (Deuteronomy 7:1-8).
“If at any time you come to fight against a city, you shalt first offer it peace. If they receive it, and open the gates to you, then all the people that are therein, shall be saved and shall serve you by paying tribute. But if they will not make peace, and shall begin war against you, then you shall besiege it. And when the Lord your God shall deliver the city into your hands, you shall slay all that are therein of the male sex, with the edge of the sword―except for women and children, cattle and other things, that are in the city. And you shall divide all the prey to the army, and you shalt eat the spoils of your enemies, which the Lord your God shall give you! So shall you do [that is to say, first offer peace] to all cities that are at a great distance from you and are not of these cities which you shalt receive in possession. But of those cities that shall be given to you, you shall suffer none at all to live―but shall kill them with the edge of the sword, that is to say: the Hethite, and the Amorrhite, and the Chanaanite, the Pherezite, and the Hevite, and the Jebusite, as the Lord your God has commanded you, lest they teach you to do all the abominations which they have done to their gods, and you should sin against the Lord your God!” (Deuteronomy 20:10-18).
God commanded the Israelites to “destroy all the inhabitants of the land” of Canaan (Josue 9:24). They were to conquer, kill, and cast out the Hethites, Gergezites, Amorrhites, Chanaanites, Pherezites, Hevites, and Jebusites (Exodus 23:23; Deuteronomy 7:1-2; Josue 3:10).
After crossing the Jordan River, we learn in the book of Josue that the Israelites “killed all that were in [the city of Jericho], man and woman, young and old. The oxen also and the sheep, and the asses, they slew with the edge of the sword … They burned the city, and all things that were therein” (Josue 6:21, 24).
As for the city of Hai, “Josue going to the city, took it and set it on fire, and all the inhabitants of Hai were slain” (Josue 8:19-26), killing 12,000 men and women and hanging their king (8:25, 29).
Josue and the Israelites “took Maceda and destroyed it, with the edge of the sword, and killed the king and all the inhabitants thereof―he left not in it the least remains. And he did to the King of Maceda, as he had done to the King of Jericho” (Josue 10:28).
“And Josue, with all Israel, passed from Maceda to Lebna, and fought against it. And the Lord delivered it with the king thereof into the hands of Israel―and they destroyed the city with the edge of the sword, and all the inhabitants thereof. They left not in it any remains. And they did to the King of Lebna, as they had done to the King of Jericho” (Josue 10:29-30).
They then struck Lachis: “From Lebna he passed unto Lachis, with all Israel: and investing it with his army, besieged it. And the Lord delivered Lachis into the hands of Israel, and Josue took it the following day, and put it to the sword, and every soul that was in it, as he had done to Lebna. At that time Horam king of Gazer, came up to help Lachis―and Josue slew him with all his people, so as to leave none alive.” (Josue 10:31-33).
The Israelites then conquered Gazer, Eglon, Hebron, Dabir, and Asor: “At that time Horam king of Gazer, came up to help Lachis―and Josue slew him with all his people, so as to leave none alive. And he passed from Lachis to Eglon, and surrounded it, and took it the same day: and put to the sword all the souls that were in it, according to all that he had done to Lachis.
“He went up also with all Israel from Eglon to Hebron, and fought against it, took it, and destroyed it with the edge of the sword―also the king thereof, and all the towns of that country, and all the souls that dwelt in it. He left not therein any remains―as he had done to Eglon, so did he also to Hebron―putting to the sword all that he found in it.
“Returning from Hebron to Dabir, Josue took it and destroyed it―also the king of Dabir and all the towns round about, he destroyed with the edge of the sword. He left not in it any remains. As he had done to Hebron and Lebna and to their kings, so did he to Dabir and to the king thereof. So Josue conquered all the hill country, and the south and of the plain, and of Asedoth, with their kings―he left not any remains therein, but slew all that breathed, as the Lord the God of Israel had commanded him―from Cadesbarne even to Gaza. All the land of Gosen even to Gabaon, and all their kings, and their lands he took and wasted―for the Lord the God of Israel fought for him.” (Josue 10:33-42).
“And when Jabin king of Asor had heard these things, he sent to Jobab, King of Madon; and to the King of Semeron; and to the King of Achsaph; and to the kings of the north, that dwelt in the mountains and in the plains; and to the Chanaanites, Amorrhites, Hethites, Pherezites, Jebusites; and Hevites. And they all came out with their troops, a people exceeding numerous as the sand that is on the sea shore, their horses also and chariots a very great multitude. And all these kings assembled together to fight against Israel. And the Lord said to Josue: ‘Fear them not! For tomorrow I will deliver all these to be slain in the sight of Israel! You shall hamstring their horses, and you shall burn their chariots with fire!’ And Josue came, and all the army with him, against them―and, all of a sudden, fell upon them. And the Lord delivered them into the hands of Israel. And they defeated them and chased them. He slew them all, so as to leave no remains of them―and did as the Lord had commanded him, he hamstringed their horses and burned their chariots.
“Then, turning back, Josue took the city of Asor and slew the king with the sword. He cut off all the souls that lived there and left not in it any remains, but utterly destroyed all, and burned the city itself with fire. And he took and put to the sword and destroyed all the cities round about, and their kings―as Moses the servant of God had commanded him―except the cities that were on hills and high places―the rest Israel burned. Only Asor, which was very strong, Josue consumed with fire. And the children of Israel divided among themselves all the spoil of these cities and the cattle, killing all the men―as the Lord had commanded Moses His servant; so did Moses command Josue, and he accomplished all. He left not one thing undone of all the commandments which the Lord had commanded Moses” (11:1-15).
How Can a Loving God Command Killing?
There are many folk―especially in this modern age―who have a problem with a God of Love killing people. After all, does not God Himself command in one of His Ten Commandments: “Thou shalt not kill!” (Exodus 20:13) and elsewhere God says: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). Therefore many have a problem getting their around the fact that if “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “God so loved the world as to give His only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16); also, “God loves mercy!” (Psalm 83:12); furthermore, Jesus Himself said: “Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you!” (Matthew 5:44) ― how is it then that God kills people?
Yes―without doubt―“God is charity” (1 John 4:8). Yes―He is “the God of peace and of love” (2 Corinthians 13:11). Yes― “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy! The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). Yes―“God will not leave off His mercy, and He will not destroy, nor abolish his own works” (Ecclesiasticus 47:24).
Nevertheless, we must not forget that Jesus also said: “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). “The Lord will render to every man according to his works!” (Psalm 61:13). “God will not condemn without cause” (Job 34:12). “He that does wrong, shall receive punishment for that which he has done wrongfully― there is no respect of persons with God!” (Colossians 3:25). “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God!” (Hebrews 10:31). “The Lord loves judgment. The unjust shall be punished and the seed of the wicked shall perish!” (Psalm 36:28). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “The soul that sins shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:20). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “The pursuing of evil things brings death!” (Proverbs 11:19). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall perish!” (Luke 13:3). “Fear not them that kill the body and are not able to kill the soul―but rather fear Him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell!” (Matthew 10:28).
“The wrath of God is revealed from Heaven against all ungodliness and injustice” (Romans 1:18). “The Lord is a revenger, and has wrath! The Lord taketh vengeance on His adversaries, and He is angry with His enemies!” (Nahum 1:2). “The Lord will come to visit the iniquity of the inhabitants of the Earth against Him―and the Earth shall disclose her blood!” (Isaias 26:21). “Thus says the Lord God: ‘Behold I will stretch forth My hand and will kill the killers, and I will execute great vengeance upon them, rebuking them in fury―and they shall know that I am the Lord when I shall lay My vengeance upon them!’” (Ezechiel 25:16-17).
The entire 26th chapter of the Book of Leviticus is dedicated to God’s way of acting with the virtuous and with sinners―here is an abbreviated extract (though it is worth reading the entire chapter): “I am the Lord your God. Keep My Sabbaths! Walk in My precepts! Keep My commandments and do them! … I will look on you, and make you increase! … My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people! But if you walk contrary to Me, and will not listen to Me; if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments; if you despise My laws and My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, then I also will do these things to you: I will set My face against you … I will chastise you seven times more for your sins! I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins! I will break the pride of your stubbornness! … I will quickly visit you with poverty and burning heat, which shall consume your lives! … You shall fall down before your enemies! … You shall sow your seed in vain! … Your labor shall be spent in vain, the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit. And I will send in upon you the beasts of the field, to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number, and that your highways may be desolate. And if, despite this, you will not amend, but will walk contrary to Me―then I also will walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins. And I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge Me! When you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies … But if, despite all this, you will not listen to Me, but will walk against Me―then I will also go against you with opposite fury! … I will bring your cities to be a wilderness! … I will destroy your land! … I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed … You shall perish among the Gentiles! And if some remain, then they shall pine away in their iniquities in the land of their enemies―until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, whereby they have transgressed Me, and walked contrary unto Me … They shall pray for their sins, because they rejected My judgments, and despised My laws!” (Leviticus 26:1-43).
God Means Business
It is absolutely insane to imagine that the God of Love ― “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) ― cannot be the God of Justice. As Holy Scripture says: “To the Lord our God belongs justice!” (Baruch 1:15) … “The Heavens shall declare His justice―for God is judge!” (Psalm 49:6) … “The Lord shall be exalted in judgment, and the God shall be sanctified in justice!” (Isaias 5:16) … “I am the Lord that speaks justice, that declares right things!” (Isaias 45:19) … “They think they can escape the justice of God Who sees all things!” (Esther 16:4) … “If our injustice requires the justice of God, what shall we say? Is God unjust because He manifests His wrath?” (Romans 3:5) ... “For him that passes over from justice to sin, God has prepared the sword!” (Ecclesiasticus 26:27).
As already stated: “God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:7). If we have lost the sense of sin, then we also lose the sense of what is a just and fair punishment for sin. The Church teaches that sin is the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
What should be expected for having committed the greatest evil or greatest crime in the world? What is the greatest punishment in this life that could be inflicted? Death, of course! Death, for us, is the greatest physical evil we can imagine. Thus it is that God inflicts death for sin in many instances―not only on His enemies, but also His Chosen People. Some of the chief occasions of this punishment have been:
● The death sentence for Adam and Eve for having sinned by eating the forbidden fruit.
● The Great Flood, with water, killed all persons in the world, except for Noe and his family.
● The fire and brimstone falling from Heaven killed all those in the terribly sinful cities of Sodom and Gomorrha.
● The 40 years of desert wilderness with Moses, until all the Israelite adults, who had left Egypt in the Exodus, had died as a punishment for their perpetual complaining and disobedience towards God.
● The annihilation of the Ten of the Twelve Tribes of Israel due to their idolatry.
● The destruction of Jerusalem and its Temple of God, in 586 BC, by Nabuchodonosor, the King of Babylon, when he conquered and destroyed Jerusalem.
It is hardly surprising that Our Lady of Fatima revealed that wars are a punishment for sin: “God is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church! … Russia will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions! … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out! … Various nations will be annihilated!” One of the three seers at Fatima―St. Jacinta Marto―stated: “Our Lady said that there are many wars and discords in the world. Wars are only punishments for the sins of the world.”
Over the last few centuries, Our Lady has repeatedly appeared with messages from the “God of Love” about the imminent punishments about to befall us from the “God of Justice.” If you compile her key statements, they fit in perfectly with all of the above. Here are just some extracts from her messages as Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Akita:
“Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times making it easy for everyone to live in sin … Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … Unbridled luxury and impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … Many men in this world afflict the Lord … Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … Nature is asking for vengeance because of man, and she trembles, with dread, at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime! ...
“Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … God will strike in an unprecedented way. God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Physical and moral agonies will be suffered ... The seasons will be altered, the Earth, the stars will lose their regular motion, the moon will only reflect a faint reddish glow. Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains, cities, etc ... Paris will burn and Marseilles will be engulfed. Several cities will be shaken down and swallowed up by earthquakes ... Nations will be annihilated … Fire will fall from the sky and consume cities and will wipe out a great part of humanity―the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead!
“There will be bloody wars and famines, plagues and infectious diseases … Men will kill each other, massacre each other, even in their homes … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. A general war will follow which will be appalling. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of weapons and blasphemy ... Blood will flow on all sides ... There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. People will believe that all is lost! … For a time, God will cease to remember France and Italy, because the Gospel of Jesus Christ has been forgotten.” (Our Lady of Good Success, at Quito in Ecuador, Our Lady of La Salette, France; Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal; Our Lady of Akita, Japan).
We Were Made to Fight!
“The God of peace and of love” has created us for the battlefield ― “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). The Sacrament of Confirmation makes us Soldiers of Christ ― and soldiers are made for the battlefield, not the armchair: “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4), we often spend more time fighting among ourselves than fighting the enemies of God and the Church!
The Church has been infiltrated―as stated by Our Lady of Akita―and Communism (nowadays often disguised as a wolf in the clothing of sheep) has spread its errors throughout the world―as foretold by Our Lady of Fatima. As Sister Lucia of Fatima stated: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!
“The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them! … For this reason, Father, it is my mission not just to speak about the material punishments, that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to also tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin.
“We should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No―Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed! So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway.” (Sr. Lucia in an interview with Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Our Lady of La Salette called on all persons of good will to come to the fight: I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son! Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world! Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days! May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
As Catholics―who have been made Soldiers of Christ through the Sacrament of Confirmation―we have a grave obligation to fight for the Church and to fight for the Faith. We are, if you like, modern-day Machabees who have to fight not only those outside the Church, but also the Modernists, Liberals and worldly Catholics inside the Church (not to mention the infiltrators). You sit on your sofa or sit on the fence at your own risk! As Our Lady of Fatima said―many souls go to Hell because there is nobody to pray and offer sacrifices for them. We are busy playing, not praying―as the Angel warned the three children of Fatima, whom he found playing. The Angel scolded the children who were playing: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!”
What would that Angel say to us today? Are we praying or playing? Are we practicing mortification or self-gratification? Are we making sacrifices or are too busy with our electronic devices? Are we prepared for a martyrdom or do we want to remain in spiritual boredom? Are we militant Catholics or indolent Catholics? Will we fight or will we take flight? “This is the victory which overcomes the world, our Faith!” (1 John 5:4) but “Faith without works is dead?” (James 2:20). Is your Faith dead and buried? Is your Faith akin to the walking dead? Is it time to resurrect your Faith and do something with it?
Fight with Who? Fight with What?
Ultimately―regardless of the person, the uniform, the nationality, the politics, the religion, the organization, the creed, the “-ism”, the agenda―ultimately our fight is with Satan and Hell: “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12). Our Lord speaks of “the prince of world” and that “prince” has real power in this world: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not anything! … The prince of this world is already judged! ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30).
The recently deceased (2016) former chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, stated: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican ... Legions of demons have lodged there! … In the Vatican there are members of Satanic cults―there are priests, monsignors and even cardinals! I know from people who reported to me how they got to know this directly. It is also something, that has been “confessed” several times by the Devil, himself, under obedience during the exorcisms … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office!”
We Have the Weapons―But Use Them Badly
The ultimate weapon―the one that defeated Satan on Calvary―is the Sacrifice of Christ perpetuated in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. The other immensely powerful weapon is the Holy Rosary. Our Lady of Akita referred to these when she said: “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son!”
► THE HOLY SACRIFICE OF THE MASS: The saints have often indicated to us the immense power of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
● St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), Doctor of the Church said: “The celebration of Holy Mass is as valuable as the death of Jesus on the cross!”
● Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824) adds: “Mass, badly celebrated, is an enormous evil. It is not a matter of indifference how it is said! ... I have had a great vision on the mystery of Holy Mass and I have seen that whatever good has existed since creation is owing to it … Our Lady said what is most painful for me to repeat―that if only one priest offered the unbloody Sacrifice as worthily and with the same sentiments as the Apostles, he could ward off all calamities from the Church!”
● Pope St. Gregory the Great (reigned 590-604), Doctor of the Church, tells us: “It is most true that he who attends Holy Mass shall be freed from many evils and from many dangers, both seen and unseen!”
● St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153), Doctor of the Church, tells us: “You will gain more from one single Mass than you would from distributing all your goods to the poor or making pilgrimages to all the most holy shrines in Christendom.”
● St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751) adds: “Were it not for the Holy Mass, at this moment the world would be in the abyss, unable to bear up under the mighty load of its iniquities! Mass is the powerful prop that holds the world on its base! What graces, gifts and virtues the Holy Mass calls down! Repentance for sin ... victory over temptation ... holy inspirations which dispositions to shake off tepidity ... the grace of final perseverance, upon which depends our salvation ... temporal blessings, such as peace, abundance and health!”
► THE HOLY ROSARY: Our Lady has often asked that we pray the Rosary and that we pray the Rosary often. Many saints and popes have added their testimonies as to the power of the Rosary. Exorcists have witnessed devils confirm this power of the Rosary. Yet despite all this, the Rosary is currently prayed daily by less than 4% of the Catholic population.
● Our Lady herself has said: “You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary.” (Our Lady to Blessed Alan de la Roche). “Pray and let the Rosary always be in your hands as a sign to Satan that you belong to me.” (Our Lady to St. Simon Stock). “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war! … Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day! … Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (Our Lady of Fatima, August 1917). “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able to save you from the calamities which approach!” (Our Lady in Akita, Japan).
● Our Lady herself has said: “You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary.” (Our Lady to Blessed Alan de la Roche). “Pray and let the Rosary always be in your hands as a sign to Satan that you belong to me.” (Our Lady to St. Simon Stock). “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war! … Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day! … Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (Our Lady of Fatima). “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able to save you from the calamities which approach!” (Our Lady in Akita, Japan).
● Pope Adrian VI said: “The Rosary is the scourge of the devil!”
● Pope Leo XIII wrote: “The Rosary is the most excellent form of prayer and the most efficacious means of attaining eternal life. It is the remedy for all our evils, the root of all our blessings. There is no more excellent way of praying!”
● Blessed Pope Pius IX said: “Give me an army saying the Rosary and I will conquer the world!”
● Pope St. Pius X said the following: “If there were one million families praying the Rosary every day, the entire world would be saved.”
● Pope Pius XI wrote that “The Rosary is a powerful weapon to put the demons to flight and a most powerful weapon to overcome the devil ... It serves admirably to overcome the enemies of God and of religion.”
● St. Dominic said: “The Rosary is a fortress against evil. It is a sign to Satan that you belong to Our Lady … One day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, she will save the world!”
● St. Louis de Montfort adds: “When the Holy Rosary is said well, it gives Jesus and Mary more glory and is more meritorious than any other prayer … Never will anyone, who says his Rosary every day, become a formal heretic, or be led astray by the devil. This is a statement which I would sign with my blood!”
● St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina states: “The Rosary is the weapon for these times … The Rosary is the weapon against the evils of the world today … The Rosary is THE weapon!” (St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina).
● Fr. Gabriele Amorth states: “The Rosary, being the prayer most appreciated by Our Lady, is an extremely powerful arm against the devil! During an exorcism, Satan told me, through the possessed person: ‘Every Hail Mary of the Rosary is a blow to the head for me! If Christians knew the power of the Rosary, it would be the end of me!’””
Using Our Weapons Badly
At La Salette, Our Lady said: “If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! … They have neglected prayer and penance … In vain you will pray! … Do you say your prayers properly?” Yes―how many people say their prayers PROPERLY? Sister Lucia of Fatima admitted that, prior to the apparitions, she and the other two children―Francisco and Jacinta―DID NOT say their prayers properly. Sister Lucia recalls: “We had been told to say the Rosary after our lunch, but as the whole day seemed too short for our play, we worked out a fine way of getting through it quickly. We simply passed the beads through our fingers, saying nothing but ‘Hail Mary, Hail Mary, Hail Mary...’ At the end of each mystery, we paused awhile, then simply said ‘Our Father’ and so, in the twinkling of an eye, as they say, we had our Rosary finished!”
St. Louis de Montfort, on the topic of the Holy Rosary, writes: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly. Most Catholics say the Rosary, either the whole fifteen mysteries or five of them, or at least a few decades. Why is it then that so few of them give up their sins and make progress in virtue, if not because they are not saying them as they should … In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. People who do that forfeit God’s blessing, which is changed into a curse for having treated the things of God disrespectfully: “Cursed be the one who does God’s work negligently” (Jeremias 48:10).
“Our Lady also taught it to Blessed Alan de la Roche and said to him in a vision, that meditation is the soul of this prayer. For the Rosary said without the meditation on the sacred mysteries of our salvation would almost be a body without a soul, excellent matter, but without the form, which is the meditation. In addition to this, take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary.
“The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin.
“The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said, especially when we have promised to say it regularly or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
That is why the enemies of the Church and mankind are increasingly getting the upper-hand throughout the world over the last few centuries―Catholics (who are, let us not forget, Soldiers of Christ) have gone AWOL (absent without leave) and are not at their posts manning their spiritual weapons. Those who remain at their posts, are using their spiritual weapons badly―just like a soldier who blindly sprays his bullets from his machine gun without carefully aiming at the target!
The same is true for the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―which is an even more powerful weapon than the Holy Rosary. How sad and tragic it is to see priests rush through Mass as if they were trying to set a world record and get a gold medal for the fastest Mass in history! “Fast-tracking” things and taking “express-lanes” seems to be the modern way―yet that should be the case when it comes to the Mass and prayer! Our Lord could well address the speedsters with these words with which He rebuked St. Peter: “Go behind Me, Satan! You art a scandal unto Me! Because you savor not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!” (Matthew 16:23). “I will cast the shoulder to you and I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities!” (Malachias 2:3).
Many people like and want a short Mass―it was not like that for Christ! He spent three hours suffering and dying on His cross―and we cannot endure one hour of being “nailed” to the pew? “What? Could you not watch one hour with Me?” said Our Lord to Peter, James and John in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:40) ― and He can rightfully say that about our attendance at Mass: “Could you not watch and pray for one hour with Me?” Mass is not about you and your preferences―it is all about God and reverence. Reverence cannot be seen when you rush through Mass at breakneck speed!
The Mass is called “The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass” for a reason. Christ sacrificed Himself for us on the cross out of His love and compassion for sinners. You would think that we sinners would be willing to sacrifice some time to attend Mass and be “nailed” to the wood of the pew for an hour or so! The Mass is not about fun and laughter―it is about the cross and suffering. We do not go to Mass to be entertained―we go to Mass to be redeemed. We go for an hour or so―but it could buy eternity for us! Attend and assist well―and it could be an eternity in Heaven. Fail to attend and assist badly―and it could be an eternity in Hell, or what seems like an ‘eternity’ in the fires of Purgatory!
Only One Solution
There is only one solution to the current crisis in the Church and the crisis in the world at large. It is not a natural solution, but a supernatural solution―because at the root of all the problems are Satan and the other devils, whose powers far exceed that of any human being. Nevertheless, if we ‘clothe’ ourselves with the supernatural, then there is no way Satan and his demons can overcome us―but is that what we are doing, or we being too naturalistic about things? The more that we rely on God, the more powerful we are in resisting Satan and overcoming the world, of which he is the prince. Our Lord clearly said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). So why are trying to solve things in a human way? St. Paul says: “I can do all these things in Him who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13). So why are we relying so much on our own knowledge, skill and strength?
Judas Machabeus was successful in his war against the Greek-Seleucid Empire―despite being outnumbered by just over 8 to 1 (7,000 Machabeans versus 60,000 Seleucans), which is a worse than the just under 5 to 1 ratio by which Catholics are outnumbered by non-Catholics and pagans in the world today (1.4 billion Catholics versus 6.6 non-Catholics). The success of Judas Machabeus and his army was not due to the skill and strength―but it was due to the intervention and protection of God. We see many references to this in the Books of the Machabees:
“Judas Machabeus, and they that were with him, went privately into the towns, and calling together their kinsmen and friends who still continued in the Jews’ religion, they assembled 6,000. And they called upon the Lord that He would look upon His trodden down people and the Temple, that was defiled by the wicked; that He would have pity upon the city that was destroyed, and would hear the voice of the blood of the most unjust deaths of innocent children that cried to Him; and the blasphemies offered to His Name, and would show His indignation on this occasion” (2 Machabees 8:1-4).
“Machabeus calling together seven thousand that were with him, exhorted them not to be reconciled to the enemies, nor to fear the multitude of the enemies who came wrongfully against them, but to fight manfully. For, said he, they trust in their weapons, and in their boldness―but we trust in the Almighty Lord, who can utterly destroy both them that come against us, and the whole world. He reminded them of the helps their fathers had received from God, and how, under Sennacherib, 185,000 had been destroyed. And of the battle that they had fought against the Galatians in Babylonia, how they, being only 6,000, slew a 120,000, because of the help they had from Heaven. With these words they were greatly encouraged, and disposed even to die for the laws and their country … And the Almighty being their helper, they slew above nine thousand men: and having wounded and disabled the greater part of Nicanor's army, they obliged them to flee” (2 Machabees 8:16-21).
“Machabeus, and they that were with him, by the protection of the Lord, recovered the Temple and the city [of Jerusalem] again. He threw down the altars, which the heathens had set up in the streets, as also the temples of the idols. And having purified the Temple, they made another altar and offered sacrifices after two years. And when they had done these things, they beseeched the Lord, lying prostrate on the ground, that they might no more fall into such evils” (2 Machabees 10:1-4).
“Then they that were with Machabeus, beseeching the Lord by prayers to be their helper, made a strong attack upon the strongholds of the Idumeans. And attacking them with great force, won the strongholds and slew altogether no fewer than 20,000” (2 Machabees 10:16-17).
“But Timotheus, who had been overcome by the Jews, called together a multitude of foreign troops and assembled horsemen out of Asia, and came to take Judea by force of arms. When he drew near, Machabeus and they that were with him, prayed to the Lord, sprinkling earth upon their heads and girding their loins with haircloth and lying prostrate at the foot of the altar, beseeched the Lord to be merciful to them and to be an enemy to their enemies. As soon as the sun was risen both sides joined battle―the one part having the Lord for a surety of victory and success, but the other side making their rage their leader in battle. When they were in the heat of the battle, there appeared to the enemies five men upon horses from Heaven, leading the Jews. Two of them took Machabeus between them, and covered him on every side with their arms, and kept him safe, while casting darts and fireballs against the enemy, so that they fell down, being confounded with blindness. And there were slain 20,500 enemy soldiers, and 600 horsemen. Timotheus fled into Gazara. And when this was done, they blessed the Lord with hymns and thanksgiving, who had done great things in Israel, and given them the victory.” (2 Machabees 10:24-38).
“A short time after this Lysias, being greatly displeased with what had happened, gathered together 80,000 men and all the horsemen, and came to fight against the Jews, thinking to take the city, and make it a habitation of the Gentiles and to make a gain of the Temple. Never considering the power of God―but puffed up in his own mind and trusting in the multitude of his foot soldiers, and the thousands of horsemen, and his 80 elephants―he came into Judea. When Machabeus and they that were with him, understood that the strong holds were besieged, they and all the people beseeched the Lord with lamentations and tears, that He would send a good angel to save Israel. Then Machabeus exhorted the rest to come with him to help their brethren. And as they were going forth together, there appeared at Jerusalem a horseman going before them, in white clothing, with golden armor, shaking a spear. Then they all together blessed the merciful Lord, and took great courage, being ready to break through not only men, but also the fiercest beasts, and walls of iron. So they went on courageously, having a helper from Heaven, and the Lord who showed mercy to them. And rushing violently upon the enemy, like lions, they slew 11,000 footmen, and 1,600 horsemen, and put all the rest to flight. Lysias fled away shamefully, and escaped. As he was a man of understanding, while reflecting on the loss he had suffered, he understood that the Hebrews could not be overcome because they relied upon the help sent to them by the Almighty God” (2 Machabees 11:1-13).
When faced by the massive Seleucan army of over 60,000 soldiers, “Machabeus―considering the coming of the multitude, and the different preparations of armor, and the fierceness of the beasts―stretching out his hands to Heaven, called upon the Lord, that works wonders, Who gives victory to them that are worthy―not according to the power of their weapons, but according as it seems good to Him. And his prayer was said in this manner: ‘Thou, O Lord, Who didst send Thy angel in the time of Ezechias, King of Juda, and didst kill 185,000 of the army of Sennacherib―send now also, O Lord of Heaven, Thy good angel before us, for the fear and dread of the greatness of Thy arm! So that they may be afraid, who come with blasphemy against Thy holy people!’ And thus he concluded his prayer … So fighting with their hands, but praying to the Lord with their hearts, they slew no less than thirty-five thousand, being greatly cheered with the presence of God” (2 Machabees 15:21-27).
Make no mistake about it―you are called to the fight! It does not matter whether you are young or old―a child of 7 or an old-age pensioner of 77. Man or woman; healthy or sick; rich or poor; educated or uneducated; full of courage or cowardice; full of zeal or full of excuse; whether you want to or not―you are called to the fight! Since the chief weapons are the Holy Mass and the Holy Rosary―you can fight from any location in the world and in any condition that you find yourself in―healthy or sick; rich or poor; educated or uneducated. In fact the sicker and poorer you are, the more powerful your prayers can be―for you have an added sacrifice to your prayer.
Article 1
Friday, August 2nd
Wannabe a Machabee?
Friday, August 2nd
Wannabe a Machabee?
Mac Who?
We all know about McDonalds, McNuggets and Big Macs--but who are or what on earth are Machabees? Is that a new item on the menu? Sadly, for most people today, that would be the reasoning! Our minds have been systematically dumbed-down by modern education systems and the entertainment industry, with the result that our knowledge base is sketchy and superficial, and our grasp of history barely remembers a loved one’s birthday, never mind key historical dates, events and their causes.
The history we do know is often “revisionist history’ or twisted history, or what we could call a “Hollywoodized history.” Yet, as the famous axiom goes: “Those who do not know their history, will learn by repeating it!” There is so much from the past that serves as a lesson for today. If we have little knowledge of the past, then we will fall for the tricks and deceptions of bygone years and make the same mistakes today. We will begin with end of Alexander the Great’s empire--all good things come to an end!
The Jews are Ruled by the Greeks
The Jews lived under the Persian supremacy in peace and quiet. This lasted till 329 BC. In that year, Alexander the Great, who had conquered the Persian Empire, took possession of Judaea and Jerusalem; but he was favorable to the Jews and allowed them to practice their religion, for which he had a great respect.
It had been Alexander’s dream to found a world kingdom which would be held together not only through the person and power of the ruler, but through unity of language, customs, and mental outlook. He endeavored to effect a marriage between Greek and Oriental culture, with the Greek element dominant. In the wake of the army came Macedonian and Greek colonists who settled in the cities, and new cities were founded peopled by Greeks. Everywhere throughout the empire the colonists spoke Greek. These colonists spread the Greek pagan ideas and customs. In the culture which was developing quickly, Greek wisdom and knowledge formed the basis. The Greeks pointed with pride to their gymnasia, baths, theaters, temples. The Jews could not isolate themselves from this new movement.
When Alexander died (323 BC), his four principal generals divided his vast empire; and the Jews lived for a hundred years under the Egyptian rule, which was in no way oppressive.
Change of Boss
But, in the year 200 BC, Judaea fell under the domination of the kings of Syria—known as the Seleucids or Syrian Greeks, under whom the Jews experienced the pressure of Greek civilization in a much stronger degree. The influential circles among the Jews inclined toward the Seleucids and manifested a willingness to cooperate with their plans—which shows how far Hellenization (i.e., being overcome by Greek culture) had already progressed among them. Thus arose two opposing groups: the pious Jews who adhered to the morality and religion of their fathers, and the liberals who befriended the Greeks and were lukewarm in matters of religion.
Pagan Seeds Sprout
Gradually the foreign seed of paganism began to sprout even in the theocracy of Judaea. The influence of the Greek attitude of mind, attitudes and customs, which had been infiltrating Judaea since Alexander’s victorious campaigns, became more and more apparent. Soon the educated Jew understood Greek, and for merchants the knowledge of this language was indispensable. Some too were inclined to accept Greek culture out of political considerations. Some Jews grecized their names, e.g., Josue and Jesus became Jason.
Jason the Compromiser
The leader of this compromising party was Josue, better known by his Greek name, Jason, the unworthy brother of the worthy high-priest, Onias III. Soon after Antiochus IV (215-164 BC) had assumed power in 175 BC, Jason, the unworthy brother of the worthy High Priest Onias, offered the king a large sum of money in return for the office of High Priest, which meant the removal of his brother Onias, and requested permission to build a gymnasium in Jerusalem in order to rear youths in Hellenistic fashion. Antiochus was only too happy to agree to a proposal by which the High Priest would work for the Hellenization of the Jews and, moreover, pay money to do it. How popular among the priests Jason’s ideas were soon became manifest when many neglected the services to attend the games. Amazing how “little by little one goes very far!” The same thing is happening today in both the Church and the world―there are millions of “Jason compromisers.” As Our Lady of Akita warned: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that … the Church will be full of those who accept compromises!”
Corruption Begins
As soon as he was installed as High Priest (174 BC), he began the work of Hellenizing (imposing the Greek culture on everyone) and carried it on with considerable success. A gymnasium was built below the Acra (citadel), in close proximity to the Temple, where the youths of Jerusalem were taught Greek sports. Even priests became addicted to the games and neglected the altar for the gymnasium. Many, ashamed of what a true Jew gloried in, had the marks of circumcision removed, so as to avoid being recognized as Jews when naked in the baths, or the gymnasium.
Jason himself went so far as to send money for the games celebrated at Tyre in honor of Hercules (1 Machabees 1:11-16; 2 Machabees 4:7-20). After three years, Jason was forced to yield the pontificate to Menelaus, his agent with the king in money matters, who secured the office by outbidding his employer, Jason. To satisfy his obligations to the king, the man Menelaus, who was a Jew only in name, appropriated sacred vessels, and when the former high-priest Onias protested against the sacrilege he procured his assassination.
When “Antiochus surnamed Epiphanes ... reigned in the hundred and thirty and seventh year of the kingdom of the Greeks” (1 Machabees 1:10) and “Jason ... labored underhand to be High Priest ... he forthwith brought his own nation to the Greek fashion. ... For he built gladly a place of exercise under the tower itself, and brought the chief young men under his subjection. ... Now such was the height of Greek fashions, and increase of heathenish manners through the exceeding profaneness of Jason, that ungodly wretch and no High Priest; that the priests had no courage to serve any more at the altar, but despising the temple, and neglecting the sacrifices, hastened to be partakers of the unlawful allowance in the place of exercise, after the game of Discus called them forth” (2 Machabees 4:7-14).
Why then so much excitement over a sports ground? Gymnastics in Jerusalem—discus throwers and sprinters in the Holy City—it sounds perhaps unusually progressive, but why should God be displeased at it? How could a High Priest be denounced as ungodly on that account? Such was the Liberal thinking back then―and such is the Liberal thinking today!
The Naked Truth
Between the method of playing games today and playing games in those days there is a slight but very essential difference. It has nothing to do with the exercises themselves, which have remained practically the same for more than 2,000 years. The difference lies in dress. True to the pagan Olympic pattern, games were played completely naked. The body could be “covered” only with a thin coat of oil. Likewise, the baths promoted nudity.
Nakedness itself must have been regarded by all orthodox believers in Judaea as a serious challenge. They firmly believed in the corruption of human nature from youth onward and in the sinfulness of the body. It is impossible that athletics in full view of the Temple, only a few steps from the Holy of Holies, should not have been regarded as an outrageous insult or that it should not have given rise to vigorous opposition. According to contemporary sources the High Priest, Jason, had located the stadium in the heart of Jerusalem, in the valley which bordered the Temple hill.
But that was not the end of the scandal. It was not long before Jewish athletes were guilty of a serious crime against the Jewish Law—they “made themselves uncircumcised” (1 Machabees 1:15). The Greek conception of beauty and the circumcision of Jewish athletes displayed in full view of the public eye were two irreconcilable things. Jewish teams—not in Jerusalem among their own people naturally—met with scorn and ridicule, and even aversion, as soon as they appeared in contests away from home. The Bible speaks of “the game that ... every fifth year was kept at Tyrus” (2 Machabees 4:18). Many of them must have suffered so much from the disgust that they encountered that they sought a remedy. Other translations refer to a surgical operation which restored the natural state.
Nakedness had come for a second time to be Judaea’s great temptation. Nakedness had been the outstanding characteristic of the fertility goddesses of Canaan; nakedness was now paraded by the athletes in the sports grounds that had sprung up all over the country. In those days a much deeper significance was attached to athletics than to sport in the modern sense. They were religious exercises, dedicated to the foreign Greek gods Zeus and Apollo.
Persecutions Begin Under the Syrian Greeks (Seleucids)
The earlier Seleucid (Syrian Greek) kings―Antiochus III and Seleucus IV―were somewhat diplomatic with the Jews, but the most terrible trial and a terrible persecution which the Jews had to undergo was that which came upon them at the time when they were made subject to the proud and cruel Antiochus IV, King of Syria. He was one of the successors of Antiochus the Great, and he was proudly nicknamed “Epiphanes” (meaning “god manifest”).
First Attack and Capture of Jerusalem
While waging war against Egypt, Antiochus IV Epiphanes stormed Jerusalem in 169 BC with a large army. He killed 40,000 inhabitants, plundered and desecrated the Temple. He proclaimed Greek paganism to be the religion of the state. Upon leaving, he took many of the Jewish women and children captive, or sold them as slaves.
All the Jews were forbidden, under pain of death, to practice any religion apart from the religion of the state. They did not dare to circumcise their male children, or observe their Sabbaths and festivals, or offer sacrifice to the true God. The king ordered the Holy Books to be torn and burnt; he profaned the Temple, and forbade the observance of the divine laws under the penalty of death. Antiochus was determined to break down the loyalty of the Jews to their nation and to their religion.
Second Attack and Capture of Jerusalem
Two years after his first attack upon the city, he returned and again took possession of it in 168 BC. He destroyed many houses and the city’s walls. He made. Antiochus forbade the Jews to offer sacrifices to their God. He tried to force them to worship the gods of the Greeks. Pagans went to the Temple to adore their gods. In all the cities of Judea, pagan altars were set up and pagan worship was commanded. Great numbers of the Jews fled from the cities. Others were sold into slavery. Strangers from other countries were brought into Jerusalem to populate it and take the place of the scattered Jews.
However, the treasures of the Temple were not enough for the Seleucid king. In 168 B.C. Antiochus undertook a second campaign against Egypt, but was stopped in his victorious progress by an ultimatum of the Roman Senate. He vented his rage on the Jews, and began a war of extermination against their religion. Apollonius his chief tax collector, was sent with an armed force to Jerusalem, under orders to Hellenize Jerusalem to eliminate the native Jewish population and to people the city with strangers.
The unsuspecting inhabitants of Jerusalem were attacked on the Sabbath, when they would offer no defense; the men were slaughtered, the women and children sold into slavery. The city itself was laid waste and its walls demolished. A fort was built on Mount Sion for the occupying Syrian troops.
Abolishing the Jewish Religion
An order was next issued abolishing Jewish worship and forbidding the observance of Jewish rites under pain of death. The Temple of the true God was made the temple of the pagan gods. A heathen altar was built on the altar of holocausts, where sacrifices were offered to Olympic Jupiter (Zeus), and the Temple was profaned by pagan orgies. Altars were also set up throughout the country, at which the Jews were to sacrifice to the king’s pagan gods.
This man, “when he had taken the spoils of the city, (he) set it on fire, and pulled down the houses and walls thereof on every side. But the women and children took they captive, and possessed the cattle” (1 Machabees 1:29-32; 2 Machabees 5:24 ff).
You Think You’ve Won, Eh?
But, contrary to what Antiochus wanted, all these persecutions made the Jews strong. Though many conformed to these orders, the majority remained faithful and, rather than violate the law of their fathers, they became more devoted to the customs of Judea and to the worship of the true God. Their heroism was great, and a number of them laid down their lives and suffered martyrdom. The Second Book of Machabees narrates at length the heroic death of an old man, named Eleazar, and of seven brothers with their mother. (1 Machabees 1:30-67; 2 Machabees 5:24-7:41)
The Martyrdom of Eleazar
Eleazar, was an old man, ninety-nine years of age, one of the important men of Judea who was renowned as a doctor of the law. He was brought before the governor of Antiochus. He was accused of illegally keeping the laws of the Jews. The governor commanded him to eat the meat of a pig. Of course, as we know, such meat was forbidden to the Jews by the Law of Moses. Unhappily, many of the Jews, yielding to a guilty fear, obeyed the king’s order; but many more refused to comply with the impious mandate, and chose to die rather than violate the holy precept of God.
When Eleazar refused to eat swine’s flesh, they opened his mouth by force to compel him to eat. But he still refused, and declared that he would undergo any torment that might be inflicted on him, rather than stain his soul with sin, by a violation of the commandment of God. Then some of those who stood by, pitying the good old man, advised him to eat some other meat which was not forbidden to the Jews, but to pretend that it was pig-meat that he was eating, and so bring about a “win-win” situation by feigning compliance with the king’s command.
Eleazar refused to follow their advice and would not use deceit even to save his life. He told the people that men can deceive their kings, but they cannot deceive God. He replied: “It does not become our age to feign and fake.” He then explained to these false friends that even if he made a mere pretense of complying with the king’s orders in this matter (by pretending to eat the meat without actually eating it), the young men of his nation might be tempted to follow his example, saying: ‘‘The aged Eleazar has become a pagan, why may not we do the same?” Moreover, he exclaimed: “Though for the present time I should be delivered from the punishment of men, yet should I not escape the hand of the Almighty, neither alive nor dead.”
Having thus spoken, the holy old man was dragged to the place of execution, where he suffered a glorious death. In the midst of his torments he cried out: “Lord, Thou knowest I suffer grievous pains, but I am not afraid to suffer these things, because I fear Thee.” For his faith and obedience to God, he was beaten to death.
Martyrdom of the Seven Brothers
Another example of steadfast faith in God during these troubled times was given by seven young men and their widowed mother. These seven brothers, together with their mother, were accused of disobedience to the king’s law. They were ordered to eat the meat of a pig and they refused. They were then told that they would be beaten with whips and scourges, but the eldest of them spoke for the others and told the persecutors that they were ready to die rather than to disobey the laws of God.
After this confession of faith in God, each brother in turn was grilled alive over a fire, even to the youngest who was also not afraid to die for his faith. Their mother stood by and watched each of her sons in their sufferings, encouraging them to be brave and not to give in to the king’s demands. Then she, too, was put to death.
Events That Spark the Revolt of Mathathias
The rising under Mathathias was caused by these impious attempts of Antiochus IV to force Greek paganism on his Jewish subjects and to eradicate their religion—the climax of a movement to Hellenize the Jews (i.e., absorbing them into the pagan Greek culture), begun with the king’s approval by a political party among the Jewish aristocracy, who were in favor of breaking down the wall of separation between Jew and Gentile and of adopting Greek customs.
The persecution proved a blessing in disguise; it exasperated even the moderate Hellenists, and prepared a rebellion which freed the country from the corrupting influences of the extreme Hellenist party. The worship of Olympian Jupiter (Zeus) was set up in the Temple of Jerusalem. For taking part in any Jewish religious ceremonies—the traditional sacrifices, the Sabbath, or circumcision—the penalty was death. The holy scriptures were destroyed. This was the first thoroughgoing religious persecution in history. There were of course even in those days weak characters who chose the way of least resistance. Nevertheless many “... chose rather to die, that they might not be defiled” (1 Machabees 1:63). But it was the resolute and fervent faith of an old man that first kindled the torch of revolt in the land.
Mathathias & Sons
Among the families that fled from Jerusalem during the days of the persecution of Antiochus was that of Mathathias. Modin was the name of a small village twenty miles from Jerusalem, on the western fringe of the highlands of Judaea. Here lived the priest Mathathias with his five sons: John, Simon, Judas Machabeus, Eleazar, and Jonathan. Mathathias, was a priest of the order of Joarib (cf. 1 Paralipomenon 24:7), who, to avoid the persecution, had fled from Jerusalem to Modin, near Lydda.
Resistance Sparked
When Antiochus’ officers came to Modin to force the inhabitants to “forsake the law,” to offer sacrifices and to burn incense, Mathathias steadfastly refused to obey the order—even when solicited by a royal officer to sacrifice to the gods, and promised rich rewards and the king’s favor, he firmly refused. When a fellow Jew approached the pagan altar to sacrifice, he killed him together with the king’s officer, and destroyed the altar. For he could not “forbear to show his anger according to judgment: wherefore he ran and slew him upon the altar. Also the king’s commissioner, who compelled men to sacrifice, he killed at that time, and the altar he pulled down” (1 Machabees. 2:1-25). This act was the signal for open resistance, for a life-and-death struggle for preservation of religion—the Wars of the Machabees. He and his sons then fled to the mountains, where they were followed by many of those who remained attached to their religion.
Guerilla Warfare
In their secret haunts in the mountains and in caves, they gathered around them a band of those who shared their beliefs, and this small army of fugitives harassed Antiochus and his army, waging bitter guerrilla warfare against the occupying Syrian Greek power. They attacked various towns and drove out the forces of Antiochus.
It was in the highlands of Judaea that the rebels achieved their first successes. Their achievements were indeed remarkable. This small untrained and badly equipped band, mastered the well-drilled and numerically superior occupation troops. Three towns were re-captured. The Seleucids had to retreat until reinforcements arrived from Antioch. Gradually, Mathathias and his followers overran the country, destroying heathen altars, circumcising children, driving off aliens and apostate Jews, and gathering in new recruits. After a year of this kind of warfare, Mathathias died.
In 166 BC, at his death, he exhorted his sons to carry on the fight for their religion, and he gave the command of his army to his son, Judas, with Simon as adviser. Judas was called Machabeus, which means hammer in Hebrew, for Judas was a brilliant general who “hammered” at the armies of Antiochus. Mathathias was buried at Modin amid great lamentations (1 Machabees, ch. 2).
The Resistance Continues With Judas Machabeus
Judas Machabeus continued the warfare begun by his father. In the beginning the Syrians expected the troops stationed in Palestine to restore peace; but Apollonius and Seron, the Syrian leaders, were defeated with great loss north of Jerusalem. Then Antiochus IV, who was in the midst of preparations for an expedition against the Parthians, commissioned Lysias to govern the western half of the kingdom during his absence, and to break the Jewish rebellion, and also rear his son, Antiochus.
Early in the summer of 165 Lysias sent generals Nicanor and Gorgias with a strong army southward. Gorgias planned a surprise attack upon the Jewish camp with part of his army, but found the site deserted. Meanwhile Judas was routing the forces of Nicanor. Nicanor fled and Gorgias returned to Syria in failure. In the following year, 164, Lysias himself was defeated at Bethsura, south of Jerusalem. Judas then campaigned against Timotheus and Bacchides in Ammonite territory with notable success. Though his army was small, he had conquered the generals of Antiochus in four battles. After the fourth victory the Jews enjoyed peace for a while.
Judas Machabeus liberated Jerusalem in 164 BC. They found the Temple desecrated, the altar violated, the doors burned; in the forecourts weeds were growing, and the chambers (of the Temple) were in a dilapidated condition. They purified the Temple, which had been used for heathen purposes. Immediately the altar to Zeus was removed and a new one constructed. Sacred vessels were supplied and priests faithful to the Law were installed. Then sacrifices and worship to God were offered as in former times. On the 25th of Chislev (December 164 BC), sacrifices were again offered regularly after a three year interval. In memory of the occasion the feast of the Dedication of the Temple or Hanukkah was added to the calendar. Then Judas fortified the temple hill it a stronghold. (1 Machabees 4:36 ff).
In the course of military expeditions, which took him more and more across the frontiers of the province of Judaea, Judas Machabeus entered Galilee and Transjordan and wherever else there were Israelites who remained true to the old faith. On the way to Idumaea, the old town of Hebron, in southern Judaea, was besieged and destroyed.
Antiochus was in Syria when he heard that his army had been defeated by Judas Machabeus and Jerusalem retaken. He himself had just been defeated in a battle with an enemy king. He determined to take revenge on the Jews and so started out for Jerusalem. On the way he contracted a disease. He was in great pain, yet he tried to go on. He continued his journey until one day he fell from his chariot and, due to the injuries sustained, he could go no farther. He died a miserable death in a strange country. When at the point of death he designated his youthful friend Philip as regent of the whole kingdom and as guardian of his son. Refusing to honor this arrangement, Lysias immediately installed Antiochus IV’s son, also named Antiochus, upon the throne and gave him the name Eupator (163-162 BC). He became thus Antiochus V Eupator.
Antiochus V sent his ablest generals, with mighty armies, to take Judea and Jerusalem again. Judas Machabeus and his small army, seeing the hosts that were marching against them, had recourse to God in humble prayer. Then they took up their arms and advanced to meet the enemy, trusting in God alone.
In the midst of the combat five horsemen, in shining armor, were seen by the enemy in the air above, fighting for the Jews. Two of these heavenly warriors were with Judas Machabeus, as it were shielding him from danger, while the other three cast darts from on high against the Syrian host. Seeing this strange sight the enemy were seized with terror, and fled in confusion, leaving thirty thousand of their number dead on the field.
Thus favored by divine assistance, Judas Machabeus defeated the Syrians in many other bloody engagements. But it happened in one of these that some of the Jews were slain, and on the following day, when Judas and his soldiers came to bury them, they found under their tunics certain heathen charms, or amulets, which it was not allowable even to touch.
This continuing good fortune of Judas Machabeus in battle compelled King Antiochus V Eupator, son of Antiochus IV Epiphanes, to intervene with another large armed force. In this decisive battle, the Seleucids employed elephants, flanked by detachments of cavalry. The Machabees were unable to cope with this colossal superiority and were defeated. However, dissension among the victorious Seleucids led them to make peace with surprisingly favorable terms for the Machabees. The decrees of Antiochus IV Epiphanes of 167 BC were rescinded; liberty of worship was guaranteed; and the religious community at Jerusalem was once more recognized. (1 Machabees 6:30 ff, 58 ff).
During these troubles, a number of the Jews had fled to neighboring nations for protection, but they were not welcome, and these nations began to persecute them. Judas came to their rescue. He defeated the Edomites, the Ammonites, and the Philistines, and brought the refugees back to Jerusalem.
After one of the battles with the Edomites, Judas discovered that some of his soldiers, who had been killed in battle, had carried away, under their clothes, offerings which they had stolen from one of the heathen temples. They had been forbidden to touch any of these things, and Judas felt that they had been slain for their disobedience. Yet he knew that they had been good and brave soldiers and that they had sinned through human weakness. Therefore, he ordered that a large sum of money be sent to Jerusalem in order that sacrifice might be offered for the sins of the dead, for he said, “It is a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sin” (2 Machabees 12:46).
The Jews Win, Then Lose Their Independence
In the year 160 BC, Judas Machabeus was killed in battle. Leadership passed first to his brother Jonathan; later to his brother Simon. Both of them continued the wars against the Greek Syrian kings. Eventually opposition from Syria died out, but peace did not come to the Jews. Hyrcanus II and Aristobulus II, descendants of Mathathias, fought one another for power to rule.
The devil never sleeps, nor rests, nor tires. It is men who sleep and tire of the fight. Though Judas Machabeus was dead, the fight would go on. Yet, much like the Law of Entropy, the longer a thing goes on, the more it deteriorates unless there is outside intervention. God is our ultimate “outside intervention”, for as Jesus said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). The devil is prepared to lose some battles if he can win the war. The Machabees had won some battles, but, the war was not really won— “For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
At the time of death of Judas Machabeus, the aims of the Jewish rebellion had been partially achieved. Not content with that, the Machabees wanted political independence as well as freedom for the religion of the one true God. The successors of Judas Machabeus, his brothers Jonathan and Simon, began the struggle anew. It ended in 142 BC, under Simon, with Syria granting them also political freedom (1 Machabees 15: ff).
We all know about McDonalds, McNuggets and Big Macs--but who are or what on earth are Machabees? Is that a new item on the menu? Sadly, for most people today, that would be the reasoning! Our minds have been systematically dumbed-down by modern education systems and the entertainment industry, with the result that our knowledge base is sketchy and superficial, and our grasp of history barely remembers a loved one’s birthday, never mind key historical dates, events and their causes.
The history we do know is often “revisionist history’ or twisted history, or what we could call a “Hollywoodized history.” Yet, as the famous axiom goes: “Those who do not know their history, will learn by repeating it!” There is so much from the past that serves as a lesson for today. If we have little knowledge of the past, then we will fall for the tricks and deceptions of bygone years and make the same mistakes today. We will begin with end of Alexander the Great’s empire--all good things come to an end!
The Jews are Ruled by the Greeks
The Jews lived under the Persian supremacy in peace and quiet. This lasted till 329 BC. In that year, Alexander the Great, who had conquered the Persian Empire, took possession of Judaea and Jerusalem; but he was favorable to the Jews and allowed them to practice their religion, for which he had a great respect.
It had been Alexander’s dream to found a world kingdom which would be held together not only through the person and power of the ruler, but through unity of language, customs, and mental outlook. He endeavored to effect a marriage between Greek and Oriental culture, with the Greek element dominant. In the wake of the army came Macedonian and Greek colonists who settled in the cities, and new cities were founded peopled by Greeks. Everywhere throughout the empire the colonists spoke Greek. These colonists spread the Greek pagan ideas and customs. In the culture which was developing quickly, Greek wisdom and knowledge formed the basis. The Greeks pointed with pride to their gymnasia, baths, theaters, temples. The Jews could not isolate themselves from this new movement.
When Alexander died (323 BC), his four principal generals divided his vast empire; and the Jews lived for a hundred years under the Egyptian rule, which was in no way oppressive.
Change of Boss
But, in the year 200 BC, Judaea fell under the domination of the kings of Syria—known as the Seleucids or Syrian Greeks, under whom the Jews experienced the pressure of Greek civilization in a much stronger degree. The influential circles among the Jews inclined toward the Seleucids and manifested a willingness to cooperate with their plans—which shows how far Hellenization (i.e., being overcome by Greek culture) had already progressed among them. Thus arose two opposing groups: the pious Jews who adhered to the morality and religion of their fathers, and the liberals who befriended the Greeks and were lukewarm in matters of religion.
Pagan Seeds Sprout
Gradually the foreign seed of paganism began to sprout even in the theocracy of Judaea. The influence of the Greek attitude of mind, attitudes and customs, which had been infiltrating Judaea since Alexander’s victorious campaigns, became more and more apparent. Soon the educated Jew understood Greek, and for merchants the knowledge of this language was indispensable. Some too were inclined to accept Greek culture out of political considerations. Some Jews grecized their names, e.g., Josue and Jesus became Jason.
Jason the Compromiser
The leader of this compromising party was Josue, better known by his Greek name, Jason, the unworthy brother of the worthy high-priest, Onias III. Soon after Antiochus IV (215-164 BC) had assumed power in 175 BC, Jason, the unworthy brother of the worthy High Priest Onias, offered the king a large sum of money in return for the office of High Priest, which meant the removal of his brother Onias, and requested permission to build a gymnasium in Jerusalem in order to rear youths in Hellenistic fashion. Antiochus was only too happy to agree to a proposal by which the High Priest would work for the Hellenization of the Jews and, moreover, pay money to do it. How popular among the priests Jason’s ideas were soon became manifest when many neglected the services to attend the games. Amazing how “little by little one goes very far!” The same thing is happening today in both the Church and the world―there are millions of “Jason compromisers.” As Our Lady of Akita warned: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that … the Church will be full of those who accept compromises!”
Corruption Begins
As soon as he was installed as High Priest (174 BC), he began the work of Hellenizing (imposing the Greek culture on everyone) and carried it on with considerable success. A gymnasium was built below the Acra (citadel), in close proximity to the Temple, where the youths of Jerusalem were taught Greek sports. Even priests became addicted to the games and neglected the altar for the gymnasium. Many, ashamed of what a true Jew gloried in, had the marks of circumcision removed, so as to avoid being recognized as Jews when naked in the baths, or the gymnasium.
Jason himself went so far as to send money for the games celebrated at Tyre in honor of Hercules (1 Machabees 1:11-16; 2 Machabees 4:7-20). After three years, Jason was forced to yield the pontificate to Menelaus, his agent with the king in money matters, who secured the office by outbidding his employer, Jason. To satisfy his obligations to the king, the man Menelaus, who was a Jew only in name, appropriated sacred vessels, and when the former high-priest Onias protested against the sacrilege he procured his assassination.
When “Antiochus surnamed Epiphanes ... reigned in the hundred and thirty and seventh year of the kingdom of the Greeks” (1 Machabees 1:10) and “Jason ... labored underhand to be High Priest ... he forthwith brought his own nation to the Greek fashion. ... For he built gladly a place of exercise under the tower itself, and brought the chief young men under his subjection. ... Now such was the height of Greek fashions, and increase of heathenish manners through the exceeding profaneness of Jason, that ungodly wretch and no High Priest; that the priests had no courage to serve any more at the altar, but despising the temple, and neglecting the sacrifices, hastened to be partakers of the unlawful allowance in the place of exercise, after the game of Discus called them forth” (2 Machabees 4:7-14).
Why then so much excitement over a sports ground? Gymnastics in Jerusalem—discus throwers and sprinters in the Holy City—it sounds perhaps unusually progressive, but why should God be displeased at it? How could a High Priest be denounced as ungodly on that account? Such was the Liberal thinking back then―and such is the Liberal thinking today!
The Naked Truth
Between the method of playing games today and playing games in those days there is a slight but very essential difference. It has nothing to do with the exercises themselves, which have remained practically the same for more than 2,000 years. The difference lies in dress. True to the pagan Olympic pattern, games were played completely naked. The body could be “covered” only with a thin coat of oil. Likewise, the baths promoted nudity.
Nakedness itself must have been regarded by all orthodox believers in Judaea as a serious challenge. They firmly believed in the corruption of human nature from youth onward and in the sinfulness of the body. It is impossible that athletics in full view of the Temple, only a few steps from the Holy of Holies, should not have been regarded as an outrageous insult or that it should not have given rise to vigorous opposition. According to contemporary sources the High Priest, Jason, had located the stadium in the heart of Jerusalem, in the valley which bordered the Temple hill.
But that was not the end of the scandal. It was not long before Jewish athletes were guilty of a serious crime against the Jewish Law—they “made themselves uncircumcised” (1 Machabees 1:15). The Greek conception of beauty and the circumcision of Jewish athletes displayed in full view of the public eye were two irreconcilable things. Jewish teams—not in Jerusalem among their own people naturally—met with scorn and ridicule, and even aversion, as soon as they appeared in contests away from home. The Bible speaks of “the game that ... every fifth year was kept at Tyrus” (2 Machabees 4:18). Many of them must have suffered so much from the disgust that they encountered that they sought a remedy. Other translations refer to a surgical operation which restored the natural state.
Nakedness had come for a second time to be Judaea’s great temptation. Nakedness had been the outstanding characteristic of the fertility goddesses of Canaan; nakedness was now paraded by the athletes in the sports grounds that had sprung up all over the country. In those days a much deeper significance was attached to athletics than to sport in the modern sense. They were religious exercises, dedicated to the foreign Greek gods Zeus and Apollo.
Persecutions Begin Under the Syrian Greeks (Seleucids)
The earlier Seleucid (Syrian Greek) kings―Antiochus III and Seleucus IV―were somewhat diplomatic with the Jews, but the most terrible trial and a terrible persecution which the Jews had to undergo was that which came upon them at the time when they were made subject to the proud and cruel Antiochus IV, King of Syria. He was one of the successors of Antiochus the Great, and he was proudly nicknamed “Epiphanes” (meaning “god manifest”).
First Attack and Capture of Jerusalem
While waging war against Egypt, Antiochus IV Epiphanes stormed Jerusalem in 169 BC with a large army. He killed 40,000 inhabitants, plundered and desecrated the Temple. He proclaimed Greek paganism to be the religion of the state. Upon leaving, he took many of the Jewish women and children captive, or sold them as slaves.
All the Jews were forbidden, under pain of death, to practice any religion apart from the religion of the state. They did not dare to circumcise their male children, or observe their Sabbaths and festivals, or offer sacrifice to the true God. The king ordered the Holy Books to be torn and burnt; he profaned the Temple, and forbade the observance of the divine laws under the penalty of death. Antiochus was determined to break down the loyalty of the Jews to their nation and to their religion.
Second Attack and Capture of Jerusalem
Two years after his first attack upon the city, he returned and again took possession of it in 168 BC. He destroyed many houses and the city’s walls. He made. Antiochus forbade the Jews to offer sacrifices to their God. He tried to force them to worship the gods of the Greeks. Pagans went to the Temple to adore their gods. In all the cities of Judea, pagan altars were set up and pagan worship was commanded. Great numbers of the Jews fled from the cities. Others were sold into slavery. Strangers from other countries were brought into Jerusalem to populate it and take the place of the scattered Jews.
However, the treasures of the Temple were not enough for the Seleucid king. In 168 B.C. Antiochus undertook a second campaign against Egypt, but was stopped in his victorious progress by an ultimatum of the Roman Senate. He vented his rage on the Jews, and began a war of extermination against their religion. Apollonius his chief tax collector, was sent with an armed force to Jerusalem, under orders to Hellenize Jerusalem to eliminate the native Jewish population and to people the city with strangers.
The unsuspecting inhabitants of Jerusalem were attacked on the Sabbath, when they would offer no defense; the men were slaughtered, the women and children sold into slavery. The city itself was laid waste and its walls demolished. A fort was built on Mount Sion for the occupying Syrian troops.
Abolishing the Jewish Religion
An order was next issued abolishing Jewish worship and forbidding the observance of Jewish rites under pain of death. The Temple of the true God was made the temple of the pagan gods. A heathen altar was built on the altar of holocausts, where sacrifices were offered to Olympic Jupiter (Zeus), and the Temple was profaned by pagan orgies. Altars were also set up throughout the country, at which the Jews were to sacrifice to the king’s pagan gods.
This man, “when he had taken the spoils of the city, (he) set it on fire, and pulled down the houses and walls thereof on every side. But the women and children took they captive, and possessed the cattle” (1 Machabees 1:29-32; 2 Machabees 5:24 ff).
You Think You’ve Won, Eh?
But, contrary to what Antiochus wanted, all these persecutions made the Jews strong. Though many conformed to these orders, the majority remained faithful and, rather than violate the law of their fathers, they became more devoted to the customs of Judea and to the worship of the true God. Their heroism was great, and a number of them laid down their lives and suffered martyrdom. The Second Book of Machabees narrates at length the heroic death of an old man, named Eleazar, and of seven brothers with their mother. (1 Machabees 1:30-67; 2 Machabees 5:24-7:41)
The Martyrdom of Eleazar
Eleazar, was an old man, ninety-nine years of age, one of the important men of Judea who was renowned as a doctor of the law. He was brought before the governor of Antiochus. He was accused of illegally keeping the laws of the Jews. The governor commanded him to eat the meat of a pig. Of course, as we know, such meat was forbidden to the Jews by the Law of Moses. Unhappily, many of the Jews, yielding to a guilty fear, obeyed the king’s order; but many more refused to comply with the impious mandate, and chose to die rather than violate the holy precept of God.
When Eleazar refused to eat swine’s flesh, they opened his mouth by force to compel him to eat. But he still refused, and declared that he would undergo any torment that might be inflicted on him, rather than stain his soul with sin, by a violation of the commandment of God. Then some of those who stood by, pitying the good old man, advised him to eat some other meat which was not forbidden to the Jews, but to pretend that it was pig-meat that he was eating, and so bring about a “win-win” situation by feigning compliance with the king’s command.
Eleazar refused to follow their advice and would not use deceit even to save his life. He told the people that men can deceive their kings, but they cannot deceive God. He replied: “It does not become our age to feign and fake.” He then explained to these false friends that even if he made a mere pretense of complying with the king’s orders in this matter (by pretending to eat the meat without actually eating it), the young men of his nation might be tempted to follow his example, saying: ‘‘The aged Eleazar has become a pagan, why may not we do the same?” Moreover, he exclaimed: “Though for the present time I should be delivered from the punishment of men, yet should I not escape the hand of the Almighty, neither alive nor dead.”
Having thus spoken, the holy old man was dragged to the place of execution, where he suffered a glorious death. In the midst of his torments he cried out: “Lord, Thou knowest I suffer grievous pains, but I am not afraid to suffer these things, because I fear Thee.” For his faith and obedience to God, he was beaten to death.
Martyrdom of the Seven Brothers
Another example of steadfast faith in God during these troubled times was given by seven young men and their widowed mother. These seven brothers, together with their mother, were accused of disobedience to the king’s law. They were ordered to eat the meat of a pig and they refused. They were then told that they would be beaten with whips and scourges, but the eldest of them spoke for the others and told the persecutors that they were ready to die rather than to disobey the laws of God.
After this confession of faith in God, each brother in turn was grilled alive over a fire, even to the youngest who was also not afraid to die for his faith. Their mother stood by and watched each of her sons in their sufferings, encouraging them to be brave and not to give in to the king’s demands. Then she, too, was put to death.
Events That Spark the Revolt of Mathathias
The rising under Mathathias was caused by these impious attempts of Antiochus IV to force Greek paganism on his Jewish subjects and to eradicate their religion—the climax of a movement to Hellenize the Jews (i.e., absorbing them into the pagan Greek culture), begun with the king’s approval by a political party among the Jewish aristocracy, who were in favor of breaking down the wall of separation between Jew and Gentile and of adopting Greek customs.
The persecution proved a blessing in disguise; it exasperated even the moderate Hellenists, and prepared a rebellion which freed the country from the corrupting influences of the extreme Hellenist party. The worship of Olympian Jupiter (Zeus) was set up in the Temple of Jerusalem. For taking part in any Jewish religious ceremonies—the traditional sacrifices, the Sabbath, or circumcision—the penalty was death. The holy scriptures were destroyed. This was the first thoroughgoing religious persecution in history. There were of course even in those days weak characters who chose the way of least resistance. Nevertheless many “... chose rather to die, that they might not be defiled” (1 Machabees 1:63). But it was the resolute and fervent faith of an old man that first kindled the torch of revolt in the land.
Mathathias & Sons
Among the families that fled from Jerusalem during the days of the persecution of Antiochus was that of Mathathias. Modin was the name of a small village twenty miles from Jerusalem, on the western fringe of the highlands of Judaea. Here lived the priest Mathathias with his five sons: John, Simon, Judas Machabeus, Eleazar, and Jonathan. Mathathias, was a priest of the order of Joarib (cf. 1 Paralipomenon 24:7), who, to avoid the persecution, had fled from Jerusalem to Modin, near Lydda.
Resistance Sparked
When Antiochus’ officers came to Modin to force the inhabitants to “forsake the law,” to offer sacrifices and to burn incense, Mathathias steadfastly refused to obey the order—even when solicited by a royal officer to sacrifice to the gods, and promised rich rewards and the king’s favor, he firmly refused. When a fellow Jew approached the pagan altar to sacrifice, he killed him together with the king’s officer, and destroyed the altar. For he could not “forbear to show his anger according to judgment: wherefore he ran and slew him upon the altar. Also the king’s commissioner, who compelled men to sacrifice, he killed at that time, and the altar he pulled down” (1 Machabees. 2:1-25). This act was the signal for open resistance, for a life-and-death struggle for preservation of religion—the Wars of the Machabees. He and his sons then fled to the mountains, where they were followed by many of those who remained attached to their religion.
Guerilla Warfare
In their secret haunts in the mountains and in caves, they gathered around them a band of those who shared their beliefs, and this small army of fugitives harassed Antiochus and his army, waging bitter guerrilla warfare against the occupying Syrian Greek power. They attacked various towns and drove out the forces of Antiochus.
It was in the highlands of Judaea that the rebels achieved their first successes. Their achievements were indeed remarkable. This small untrained and badly equipped band, mastered the well-drilled and numerically superior occupation troops. Three towns were re-captured. The Seleucids had to retreat until reinforcements arrived from Antioch. Gradually, Mathathias and his followers overran the country, destroying heathen altars, circumcising children, driving off aliens and apostate Jews, and gathering in new recruits. After a year of this kind of warfare, Mathathias died.
In 166 BC, at his death, he exhorted his sons to carry on the fight for their religion, and he gave the command of his army to his son, Judas, with Simon as adviser. Judas was called Machabeus, which means hammer in Hebrew, for Judas was a brilliant general who “hammered” at the armies of Antiochus. Mathathias was buried at Modin amid great lamentations (1 Machabees, ch. 2).
The Resistance Continues With Judas Machabeus
Judas Machabeus continued the warfare begun by his father. In the beginning the Syrians expected the troops stationed in Palestine to restore peace; but Apollonius and Seron, the Syrian leaders, were defeated with great loss north of Jerusalem. Then Antiochus IV, who was in the midst of preparations for an expedition against the Parthians, commissioned Lysias to govern the western half of the kingdom during his absence, and to break the Jewish rebellion, and also rear his son, Antiochus.
Early in the summer of 165 Lysias sent generals Nicanor and Gorgias with a strong army southward. Gorgias planned a surprise attack upon the Jewish camp with part of his army, but found the site deserted. Meanwhile Judas was routing the forces of Nicanor. Nicanor fled and Gorgias returned to Syria in failure. In the following year, 164, Lysias himself was defeated at Bethsura, south of Jerusalem. Judas then campaigned against Timotheus and Bacchides in Ammonite territory with notable success. Though his army was small, he had conquered the generals of Antiochus in four battles. After the fourth victory the Jews enjoyed peace for a while.
Judas Machabeus liberated Jerusalem in 164 BC. They found the Temple desecrated, the altar violated, the doors burned; in the forecourts weeds were growing, and the chambers (of the Temple) were in a dilapidated condition. They purified the Temple, which had been used for heathen purposes. Immediately the altar to Zeus was removed and a new one constructed. Sacred vessels were supplied and priests faithful to the Law were installed. Then sacrifices and worship to God were offered as in former times. On the 25th of Chislev (December 164 BC), sacrifices were again offered regularly after a three year interval. In memory of the occasion the feast of the Dedication of the Temple or Hanukkah was added to the calendar. Then Judas fortified the temple hill it a stronghold. (1 Machabees 4:36 ff).
In the course of military expeditions, which took him more and more across the frontiers of the province of Judaea, Judas Machabeus entered Galilee and Transjordan and wherever else there were Israelites who remained true to the old faith. On the way to Idumaea, the old town of Hebron, in southern Judaea, was besieged and destroyed.
Antiochus was in Syria when he heard that his army had been defeated by Judas Machabeus and Jerusalem retaken. He himself had just been defeated in a battle with an enemy king. He determined to take revenge on the Jews and so started out for Jerusalem. On the way he contracted a disease. He was in great pain, yet he tried to go on. He continued his journey until one day he fell from his chariot and, due to the injuries sustained, he could go no farther. He died a miserable death in a strange country. When at the point of death he designated his youthful friend Philip as regent of the whole kingdom and as guardian of his son. Refusing to honor this arrangement, Lysias immediately installed Antiochus IV’s son, also named Antiochus, upon the throne and gave him the name Eupator (163-162 BC). He became thus Antiochus V Eupator.
Antiochus V sent his ablest generals, with mighty armies, to take Judea and Jerusalem again. Judas Machabeus and his small army, seeing the hosts that were marching against them, had recourse to God in humble prayer. Then they took up their arms and advanced to meet the enemy, trusting in God alone.
In the midst of the combat five horsemen, in shining armor, were seen by the enemy in the air above, fighting for the Jews. Two of these heavenly warriors were with Judas Machabeus, as it were shielding him from danger, while the other three cast darts from on high against the Syrian host. Seeing this strange sight the enemy were seized with terror, and fled in confusion, leaving thirty thousand of their number dead on the field.
Thus favored by divine assistance, Judas Machabeus defeated the Syrians in many other bloody engagements. But it happened in one of these that some of the Jews were slain, and on the following day, when Judas and his soldiers came to bury them, they found under their tunics certain heathen charms, or amulets, which it was not allowable even to touch.
This continuing good fortune of Judas Machabeus in battle compelled King Antiochus V Eupator, son of Antiochus IV Epiphanes, to intervene with another large armed force. In this decisive battle, the Seleucids employed elephants, flanked by detachments of cavalry. The Machabees were unable to cope with this colossal superiority and were defeated. However, dissension among the victorious Seleucids led them to make peace with surprisingly favorable terms for the Machabees. The decrees of Antiochus IV Epiphanes of 167 BC were rescinded; liberty of worship was guaranteed; and the religious community at Jerusalem was once more recognized. (1 Machabees 6:30 ff, 58 ff).
During these troubles, a number of the Jews had fled to neighboring nations for protection, but they were not welcome, and these nations began to persecute them. Judas came to their rescue. He defeated the Edomites, the Ammonites, and the Philistines, and brought the refugees back to Jerusalem.
After one of the battles with the Edomites, Judas discovered that some of his soldiers, who had been killed in battle, had carried away, under their clothes, offerings which they had stolen from one of the heathen temples. They had been forbidden to touch any of these things, and Judas felt that they had been slain for their disobedience. Yet he knew that they had been good and brave soldiers and that they had sinned through human weakness. Therefore, he ordered that a large sum of money be sent to Jerusalem in order that sacrifice might be offered for the sins of the dead, for he said, “It is a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sin” (2 Machabees 12:46).
The Jews Win, Then Lose Their Independence
In the year 160 BC, Judas Machabeus was killed in battle. Leadership passed first to his brother Jonathan; later to his brother Simon. Both of them continued the wars against the Greek Syrian kings. Eventually opposition from Syria died out, but peace did not come to the Jews. Hyrcanus II and Aristobulus II, descendants of Mathathias, fought one another for power to rule.
The devil never sleeps, nor rests, nor tires. It is men who sleep and tire of the fight. Though Judas Machabeus was dead, the fight would go on. Yet, much like the Law of Entropy, the longer a thing goes on, the more it deteriorates unless there is outside intervention. God is our ultimate “outside intervention”, for as Jesus said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). The devil is prepared to lose some battles if he can win the war. The Machabees had won some battles, but, the war was not really won— “For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
At the time of death of Judas Machabeus, the aims of the Jewish rebellion had been partially achieved. Not content with that, the Machabees wanted political independence as well as freedom for the religion of the one true God. The successors of Judas Machabeus, his brothers Jonathan and Simon, began the struggle anew. It ended in 142 BC, under Simon, with Syria granting them also political freedom (1 Machabees 15: ff).
DAILY THOUGHTS
FOR THE MONTH OF THE PRECIOUS BLOOD 2024
FOR THE MONTH OF THE PRECIOUS BLOOD 2024
Article 17
Wednesday, July 31st & Thursday, August 1st
Wash Your Bloody Hands in Blood!
Wednesday, July 31st & Thursday, August 1st
Wash Your Bloody Hands in Blood!
Bloody Hands!
Do you have bloody hands? Are your hands bloodied with sin? Of course they are! “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “There is no man who sins not!” (3 Kings 8:46). “Your hands are full of blood!” (Isaias 1:15). “Your hands are defiled with blood and your fingers with iniquity!” (Isaias 59:3). “Blood is in their hands, because they have committed adultery and they have committed fornication” (Ezechiel 23:37). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us! … If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him [God] a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
“John [the Baptist] saw Jesus coming to him, and he said: ‘Behold the Lamb of God! Behold Him Who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29). “He shall be led as a sheep to the slaughter, and shall be dumb as a lamb before His shearer, and He shall not open His mouth! … He shall lay down His life for sin! … He was offered because it was His own will! … He was wounded for our iniquities, He was bruised for our sins! The chastisement was upon Him, and by His bruises we are healed!” says the Old Testament prophecy about the future Christ (Isaias 53:5-7, 10). ). “In Whom we have redemption through His blood, the remission of sins!” (Colossians 1:14).
We have a chance to wash away the worthless blood of sin with the Precious Blood of Christ. Our Lord Himself said: “This is My Blood, of the New Testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!” (Matthew 26:28) ... “He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, has everlasting life, and I will raise him up in the last day!” (John 6:55). “The Blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin!” (1 John 1:7). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be made white as wool!” (Isaias 1:18). “Jesus Christ has washed us from our sins in His own Blood!” (Apocalypse 1:5). “You, who at some time were afar off [in your sins], are now made nigh by the Blood of Christ!” (Ephesians 2:13). “You were not redeemed with corruptible things, such as gold or silver, but with the Precious Blood of Christ, as of a Lamb unspotted and undefiled!” (1 Peter 1:19). “They overcame him [Satan] by the Blood of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 12:11). “They have washed their robes and have made them white in the Blood of the Lamb!” (Apocalypse 7:14). “Blessed are they that wash their robes in the Blood of the Lamb―so that they may have a right to the tree of life, and may enter in by the gates into the [heavenly] city!” (Apocalypse 22:14). “We have redemption and the remission of sins through His Blood” (Ephesians 1:7).
Sprinkled with Blood
To a large degree the Old Testament prefigures the New Testament, and many things and ceremonies of the Old Testament foreshadow and represent things and ceremonies of the New Testament that would fulfill and complete what was symbolized. It is remarkable and outstanding to see the hundreds of references to blood sacrifices of the lamb and other animals and birds that God demanded in the Old Testament. The blood of these creatures was meant to be shed and offered to God as a reparation for a whole host of sins. The blood was also meant to be a protection from harm―as we see in case of the institution of the Paschal Lamb when the Hebrews were still slaves in Egypt.
“And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: ‘Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: “On the tenth day of this month let every man take a lamb for their families and houses. It shall be a lamb without blemish, a male, of one year … And you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month, and the whole multitude of the children of Israel shall sacrifice it in the evening. And they shall take of the blood of the lamb and put it upon both the side posts, and on the upper door posts of the houses, wherein they shall eat it … And I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and will kill every firstborn in the land of Egypt both man and beast ... And the blood shall be unto you for a sign in the houses where you shall be―and I shall see the blood, and shall pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I shall strike the land of Egypt!”’ ... And Moses called all the ancients of the children of Israel, and said to them: ‘Go take a lamb by your families, and sacrifice it. And dip a bunch of hyssop in the blood that is at the door, and sprinkle the transom of the door therewith, and both the door cheeks! Let none of you go out of the door of his house till morning! For the Lord will pass through, striking the Egyptians―and when He shall see the blood on the transom, and on both the posts, He will pass over the door of the house, and not suffer the destroyer to come into your houses and to hurt you!’ … And the children of Israel going forth did as the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron. And it came to pass at midnight, the Lord slew every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharao, who sat on his throne, unto the firstborn of the captive woman that was in the prison, and all the firstborn of cattle. And Pharao arose in the night, and all his servants, and all Egypt―for there was not a house wherein there lay not one dead” (Exodus 12:1-30).
The blood of the lamb that was sprinkled on the wooden doorposts was symbolic of the Blood of Christ that would be sprinkled on the wooden cross on Calvary. The shedding of blood in sacrifice goes back even further to the time of Adam and Eve―where Abel, by shedding the blood of a first born lamb, offered a pleasing and acceptable sacrifice to God: “Abel was a shepherd, and it came to pass after many days, that Abel offered of the firstlings of his flock, and of their fat: and the Lord had respect to Abel, and to his offerings” (Genesis 4:2-4). This sacrifice by Abel was to be a type, or prefiguration, or forerunner of both the Paschal Lamb in the time of Moses, and of the Lamb of God, Our Lord Jesus Christ, Who would shed His blood for our salvation. Abel himself would also have his own blood shed due to the envy and anger of his brother Cain, who slew Abel because God had accepted Abel’s sacrifice, but rejected Cain’s―thus Abel also became a type, or prefiguration, or forerunner of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the shedding of his blood by family, as Jesus was killed by ‘family’ (His own nation).
Forgiveness Comes Through the Blood of Christ
The early Church Fathers say that the Church was born from the pierced side of Christ, and that the Sacraments were brought forth through His Blood. Thus, in the Sacrament of Confession, it is by the power of the Precious Blood of Jesus that you are cleansed, forgiven and restored to friendship with God. “Jesus Christ washed us from our sins in His own Blood” (Apocalypse 1:5). “The Blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin!” (1 John 1:7). “They have washed their robes and have made them white in the Blood of the Lamb!” (Apocalypse 7:14). “We have redemption and the remission of sins through His Blood” (Ephesians 1:7). “Blessed are they that wash their robes in the Blood of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 22:14).
Our Lord said to St. Mechtilde: “I show these bleeding wounds to My Father, to appease His wrath. He pardons when He sees the Blood.” Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Let your heart be torn in sorrow! … Sorrowfully satisfy for your own faults in sorrow and penance! … Purify your soul by many acts of sorrow for having offended Him! … Do not delay, even for one instant! Have sorrow for your sins and a firm purpose of confessing them as soon as you find yourself guilty of any sin, and of amending the least of your imperfections! … Humbly and sorrowfully confess your faults with a heartfelt sorrow for your sins! … Wash and purify yourself in the Blood of your Redeemer, Christ, by a truly sorrowful confession and apply this cleansing many times by renewing your loving sorrow for your sins!”
How casual, nonchalant, indifferent and presumptuous we are in the way we approach the Sacrament of Confession! There are many things that we undervalue in regard to this Sacrament. First of all―we rarely (or never) grasp the fact that we are being forgiven our sins because Jesus chose to give up His life, undergo torture and death, so that we might be forgiven! In a certain sense, we―not Jesus―should be tortured and crucified each time we sin (especially mortally). We fail to realize this because―and this is the second point―we are oblivious and blind to the fact that each and every sin we commit, whether it is mortal or venial, is the greatest evil in the world! The Church teaches this in Her catechisms: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Are You Not Frightened?
There is so much talk about God’s love for us that we have lost (or are in the process of losing) any fear towards God. The more our fear subsides, then proportionately our fear of sin and sinning also subsides. Since the Second World War, most of the popes―even the Liberal and Modernist popes―have lamented the fact that we have lost the sense of sin. Yes―“God is charity” (1 John 4:8), but “be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall he reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). Sin should frighten us. If it doesn’t, then that speaks volumes as to how low we have fallen.
Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “You are full of fear of losing the grace and friendship of the Lord; and with good reason do you fear. Your fear must exert itself in watching over your treasure of grace. Fear and abhor sin―even the slightest! Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16)―fear this sentence and renew in your heart the care and zeal for your salvation! So many souls are absorbed in dangerous tepidity and live in the darkness of their passions and depraved inclinations, forgetful of the danger, unmoved by their losses, and heedless of their dealings. The Blood of Christ is trodden under foot, the fruits of the Redemption are held in contempt; no one wishes to risk his own comfort or interest in order to save what has cost the Savior His Blood and life. Instead of fearing and avoiding the occasions of evil, they encounter and seek for them in blind ignorance. In senseless fury they follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and care not where they walk, even if to the most dangerous precipices. How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! I will not tell you how many souls are lost, in order to not cause you to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told you that the number of those, foreknown as doomed, is so great; and that the number of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!”
Confession the Medicine and Remedy for Sin
Perhaps we need to revisit FEAR in order to help our soul along its path to salvation. “His salvation is near to them that fear Him” (Psalm 84:10). Some people insist that fear is not a virtue―they will quote the following Scripture verse: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear―because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity!” (1 John 4:18). Yes―but Scripture also says: “Fear the Lord thy God! I am the Lord!” (Leviticus 19:32). “The fear of the Lord is holy!” (Psalm 18:10). If fear is not a virtue―or a good thing―then why does Holy Scripture refer to FEAR so many times. Here is just the tip of the iceberg of quotes available:
“There is no fear of God before their eyes!” (Psalm 13:3). “Learn to fear the Lord thy God at all times!” (Deuteronomy 14:23). “Fear God, and depart from evil!” (Proverbs 3:7). “The fear of the Lord hates evil” (Proverbs 8:13). “By the fear of the Lord men depart from evil” (Proverbs 16:6). “The fear of the Lord drives out sin” (Ecclesiasticus 1:27). “When you come to the service of God, stand in justice and in fear, and prepare your soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1).
“Come, children, listen to me―I will teach you the fear of the Lord!” (Psalm 33:12). “From his infancy he taught him to fear God and to abstain from all sin” (Tobias 1:10). “The fear of the Lord is the lesson of wisdom” (Proverbs 15:33). “The root of wisdom is to fear the Lord!” (Ecclesiasticus 1:25). “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Ecclesiasticus 1:16). “For the fear of the Lord is wisdom and discipline” (Ecclesiasticus 1:34). “To fear God is the fullness of wisdom” (Ecclesiasticus 1:20). “The fear of the Lord is a crown of wisdom” (Ecclesiasticus 1:22). “Let all the Earth fear the Lord!” (Psalm 32:8).
“Fear God, and keep His commandments―for this is all [the duty and business of) man” (Ecclesiastes 12:13). “Fear the Lord and serve Him in truth and with your whole heart” (1 Kings 12:24). “The Lord commanded that we should fear the Lord our God, that it might be well with us all the days of our life” (Deuteronomy 6:24). “It shall be well with them that fear God, who dread His face!” (Ecclesiastes 8:12). “The fear of the Lord is like a paradise of blessing” (Ecclesiasticus 40:28). “The fear of the Lord shall delight the heart, and shall give joy, and gladness, and length of days” (Ecclesiasticus 1:12). “We shall have many good things if we fear God, and depart from all sin, and do that which is good!” (Tobias 4:23). “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). “Fear not them that kill the body and are not able to kill the soul―but rather fear Him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell” (Matthew 10:28). “The Lord has compassion on them that fear Him” (Psalm 102:13). “The mercy of the Lord is upon them that fear Him!” (Psalm 102:17).
Fear is not the enemy―but a real, legitimate and very useful emotion! Those who declare that they have NO FEAR―as sometimes seen on T-shirts―are nothing but idiots! God has placed the emotion or passion of fear within us to be like an alarm bell or smoke detector that warns us of possible dangers in both the natural and supernatural sphere. We can sin be being excessively or unreasonably fearful, just as we sin by not having enough fear.
Fear and Charity
Yes, it is true that “fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear―because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity!” (1 John 4:18). However, fear and love do not mutually exclude each other―for Holy Scripture commands that we do both things: fear God and love God. “Fear the Lord and walk in His ways, and love Him with all thy heart and with all thy soul!” (Deuteronomy 10:12). The Church teaches that a perfect act of contrition―which is based upon the love of God rather than the fear of God―can remove all guilt and all punishment due to sin. But how many people have such a level of charity―especially in these days, “because iniquity has abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). That is why there are two basic classifications of sorrow for sin―ATTRITION and CONTRITION.
Attrition is defined as being “sorrow for one’s sins based on the fear of punishment.” Whereas Contrition is defined as being “sorrow for one’s sins based on the selfless motive of love for God and sorrow for having offended him.” For someone in the state of mortal sin, either kind of sorrow―Attrition or Contrition (and both can exist together)―suffices to bring about forgiveness and reconciliation with God in Confession. Perfect contrition necessarily includes the resolution to confess one’s mortal sins to a priest in the Sacrament of Confession, but it brings God’s forgiveness even before the penitent receives absolution from a priest. Attrition is insufficient to bring about forgiveness outside the Sacrament of Confession.
Attrition is defined as being “sorrow for one’s sins based on the fear of punishment.” Whereas Contrition is defined as being “sorrow for one’s sins based on the selfless motive of love for God and sorrow for having offended him.” For someone in the state of mortal sin, either kind of sorrow―Attrition or Contrition (and both can exist together)―suffices to bring about forgiveness and reconciliation with God in Confession. Perfect contrition necessarily includes the resolution to confess one’s mortal sins to a priest in the Sacrament of Confession, but it brings God’s forgiveness even before the penitent receives absolution from a priest. Attrition is insufficient to bring about forgiveness outside the Sacrament of Confession.
Confession the Medicine and Remedy for Sin
The medicine and remedy for sin stares us in the face―yet we fail to use it, or if we do use it, then we use it badly. Just sit down and think about this for a minute―it is impossible to be damned if you make good confessions. Confession is the Sacrament that restores sanctifying grace to the soul if it has been lost through mortal sin. You cannot go to Hell if you have sanctifying grace in your soul―Purgatory yes, but not Hell. So why is it that most Catholics, all throughout the history of the Church [read about it here] have ended up in Hell? It has to be because they did not confess correctly! There is no other answer. A baptized soul that ends up in Hell, goes there because they failed to remove mortal sin from the soul through the Sacrament of Confession! It is as simple (and tragic) as that!
“See and contemplate the grandeur of this restoring and life-giving Sacrament of Penance―so forgotten and even scorned by ungrateful men. In their foolish madness, they do not realize that it is the only sure means of salvation after one has lost baptismal innocence. What is most grievous, is that even the ministers of my Most Holy Son do not give to this Sacrament the value that they should. Many view with cold indifference this valuable and precious treasure, which has been placed in their hands for the restoration of souls redeemed by the Blood of the Redeemer!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Bad Confessions Mean Bad News―Hell
St. Alphonsus Liguori warns of bad confessions: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions―in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil not of rare occurrence, but is frequent―especially in small country districts―which consigns innumerable souls to Hell. Hence it is very useful to mention, from time to time, some example of souls that were damned by willfully concealing sins in confession.” Today, this is compounded and made much more frequent due to what recent popes have called “the loss of the sense of sin.”
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Not only do “we let the Kingdom of God crumble”, but we also let our state of sanctifying grace crumble due to our warped notions of what is sinful and what is not sinful! The demons are unbelievably intelligent, and so when the demons coax us into making bad (invalid) confessions they do so in a very subtle way―they do not advertize it, nor blow trumpets, nor wave the fact before our eyes. The perfect “con” is to “con” somebody and leave them oblivious to the fact that they have been conned. So when it comes to “conned” confessions, the demons want to have us thinking that we have confessed sufficiently well, whereas we have “botched” our confession and confessed badly (invalidly).
What is it, then, that makes a confession invalid? A confession can be bad (invalid) in a variety of different ways, with each way having its own nuances or shades. Any and every Catholic should (but they don’t) know the conditions for a valid confession. The demons are only too happy to make forget or at least misinterpret those conditions. So what are those mysterious, half-forgotten, misinterpreted and twisted notions of the required conditions for a good (valid) confession? Do we even know how many conditions there are? The act of simply going to Confession and mentioning sins without having sorrow, or without having the intention to avoid those sins in the future, makes the confession invalid!
The good old Baltimore Catechism, for children making their First Holy Communion, taught us that the steps to a good confession are: (1) find out my sins; (2) be sorry for my sins; (3) make up my mind not to sin again; (4) tell my sins to the priest; (5) do the penance the priest gives me. Those are still the right conditions today, even for adults―even though the adult catechism explains it more thoroughly. Here is a more thorough explanation of each of those five conditions:
(1) EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE ― Most people “do things by halves” ― meaning that do things partially, halfheartedly, incompletely, doing as little as they can to get by. Such persons are Satan’s dream when it comes to the Sacrament of Confession! Examinations of conscience are on “fast-track” mode; knowledge of what is mortal and venial is “half-baked” at best; memory is selective as to what they want to remember and what they want to forget; they restrict the time for examining their conscience to the moment they join the confessional line―the shorter the line, the shorter the examination; or if there is no confessional line then they just dive in to the confessional without any time to examine their conscience and just “wing-it”. Some persons are so caught up with petty details about their venial sins that risk forgetting all their mortal sins―and this is more easily done if they have lost the sense of sin as to what is mortal and what is venial, whereby they rely on their subjective feelings on the seriousness of sin, rather than the objective teaching of the Church as to what is mortal. Hence, today, you have Catholics who insist that they can still be good Catholics without any need to attend Sunday Mass; or those who feel masturbation is not a mortal sin; or that cohabitation is acceptable these days, etc.
Normally speaking, a person should be aware if they are frequent mortal sinner; an occasional mortal sinner; or a rare mortal sinner. It stands to reason that a person who frequently commits mortal sins would have to spend more time examining the conscience to recall all the many mortal sins they have committed―it takes less time to count a teaspoon of peas rather than a bagful of peas! In confessing any and all mortal sins―you have to name the number of sins, and so that, too, takes more time to cover and remember. If the frequent mortal sinner only dedicates the time that he is standing in line at the confessional to his examination of conscience―then he risks missing some mortal sins. Furthermore, it also takes away valuable time from trying to deepen our sorrow for our sins―the greater the sorrow, the less temporal punishment there will be.
Ideally, your examination of conscience should be made at home before you even go to church―just like a shopping list is made at home before we go to the store. Begin with a prayer asking for God’s help―because you will need all the help you can get to overcome the usual satanic interference that comes along every time we want to confess our sins. Satan will try to do all he can to produce a bad (invalid) confession one way or another―and if he cannot achieve that, then he will at least try to reduce the efficacity and fruits of any good (valid) confession. The chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, used to say that demons prefer not to be detected―well, the same applies to our sins―demons prefer that we fail to detect our sins!
There are many examinations of conscience books/leaflets/flyers floating around―and these are very useful in several ways: (1) to remind and show us the breadth of sin that exists, which serves to prevent a loss of the sense of sin, (2) it jogs our memory and conscience about sins we may have forgotten―especially if our confessions are not weekly; (3) it educates us on the different kinds of sins that we should watch out for and avoid. Do not skimp on time dedicated to the examination of your conscience! Spiritual writes recommend that a nightly examination of conscience is a powerful tool in our battle against sin and Satan―even if you have already quit mortal sin and only commit venial sins―for all sin, whether mortal or venial, is the greatest evil in the world. A person cannot be content with merely not committing mortal sins―they must also strive to eliminate all venial sins. Just reflect on the truth of Purgatory, where many souls are burning and being purified from their venial sins which they did not root out while still living on Earth!
(2) SUFFICIENT SORROW FOR YOUR SINS ― We have all encountered the child who is told by its parents to say “Sorry!” to someone they have hurt―the child reluctantly and begrudgingly says “Sorry!” but you can tell that it is just coming from the lips and not the heart. As Our Lord said: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8) ― the same is true in the confessional: people want to be forgiven, but they are not really sorry for their sins. When they say the Act of Contrition, one has to wonder how much is coming from the lips and how much from the heart!
How much sorrow is sorrow? Sorrow―like so many other things in life, such as intelligence or love―ranges from minimal sorrow to maximum sorrow. Not wishing that any soul be damned (though most souls still manage to damn themselves), God is willing to accept a minimal sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession. This minimal sorrow is called “attrition.” The maximum sorrow is called “contrition”. The earliest meaning of the English word “attrition” that relates to spiritual repentance, was borrowed from the figurative meaning of the medieval Latin “attrition”, meaning “hardship, tribulation.” Thus “attrition” for sin is the sorrow that is based upon fear of the “hardships and tribulations” that are a punishment for sin. Hence the Act of Contrition begins by saying: “O my God, I am sorry for having offended Thee because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell.” God is willing to accept this minimal sorrow that fears God and His punishments―but we were created not just to fear God, but more importantly to love God! “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). That is why the Act of Contrition evolves from being sorry “because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell” into saying: “But most of all because they [my sins] offend Thee, my God, Who art all good and deserving of all my love.”
Our relationship with God should grow from an initial fear of God to a love of God: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18). You can take this a stage further and say: “Perfect charity casts out mortal and venial sin―and all the punishments that are due to those sins.” Perfect contrition springs from the perfect love of God. When our love is imperfect, then we think principally of ourselves; whereas, if it is perfect, we think principally of God. Our contrition will be perfect when we repent of our sins through the perfect love of God. Much the same way as a child is imperfectly sorry for some fault when it fears a thrashing. Whereas a child repenting of a fault can be said to have perfect sorrow when it grieves at having offended its parents, who are so good and loving, and have done so much for it.
After St. Peter denied Jesus, he thought of his sin, and, “going out, wept bitterly.” Why did he weep? Perhaps for the shame he would feel in front of the other Apostles? If this was the reason, then his sorrow was purely natural and without merit for Heaven. Perhaps he feared being deprived of his dignity as an Apostle and Prince of the Apostles, or perhaps he feared losing Heaven. These certainly would be more worthy motives, but still his sorrow would be imperfect. No! Peter wept and repented because he had offended his beloved Master, Who was so good, so holy, so worthy of his love; he wept because he had repaid that love with the blackest ingratitude―and, as a consequence, his contrition was perfect, his sin was forgiven. With this golden key of perfect contrition he had again reopened the doors of Heaven, which he had closed a moment before by his triple denial.
The word “contrition” comes from the Latin “contritus”, meaning “to grind, to crush, to pound to pieces” ― in this sense, true sorrow, maximum sorrow, the best sorrow is one that is based upon love, not fear―a love that sees the heart “crushed” and “pounded into pieces” because of its sins against God and neighbor. We speak of “a perfect act of contrition” ― but we must not naively imagine that there is only one single degree of perfect contrition. To better understand this, you can compare perfect contrition to the saints―all the saints are perfect for they are in Heaven, and you only get to go to Heaven when you have been perfected―either while living on Earth, or in the fires of Purgatory. Yet none of the saints have the same degree of perfection―even though all are perfect! So you can always improve your perfect act of contrition because you can always grow in love and grow in sanctifying grace. There comes a point when your perfect act of contrition becomes so perfect that it takes away, not only all guilt for sin (which is what Confession does), but it will also take away all temporal punishment due to sin―so that if you die having made a perfect act of contrition, then you would go straight to Heaven, totally bypassing Purgatory!
Satan despises sorrow for sin―especially sorrow for sin out of love for God. The reason is that demons have no sorrow for their sin and they have no love for God―and they despise seeing us reconciled with God by sorrow for sin, especially a sorrow for sin based upon love. They will do all they can to prevent from having the right kind of sorrow for sin―and will try lead us down the path of counterfeit contrition and false sorrow―which ultimately is path to Hell. This is perhaps one of the most common failures that lead to invalid confessions. Sorrow for sin must be supernatural. It is insufficient to be sorry because we have be “found out”; or because we now “look bad” in the eyes of others; or have lost our reputation; lost our job; lost privileges; lost friendships; etc. All these are natural motives that fall short of the supernatural motives required for sorrow―the bare minimum being fear of God’s just punishments.
(3) A FIRM PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT ― This is another “stumbling-block” or “pit-fall” in making good (valid) confessions. There are too many Catholics who use the confessional like a revolving door―always going and coming out, going back in and coming back out, in again and out again, confessing the same old mortal sins time and time again! If a person does not take practical steps to avoid falling back into the mortal sins they have confessed, then the confession is invalid due to presumed lack of FIRM purpose of amendment. When a particular kind of mortal sin becomes increasingly repetitive and habitual, then one has to question whether or not there is a FIRM purpose of amendment. A FIRM purpose of amendment is far superior to a VAGUE purpose of amendment. A VAGUE purpose of amendment will merely say: “Oh, I’ve really got to stop doing this!” and will go no further. Whereas a FIRM purpose of amendment will go beyond saying: “I’ve got to stop doing this!” and will carefully analyze why these sins are being committed and will take concrete measures and practical plans to avoid the occasions of that particular sin―it goes beyond mere wishful thinking. The VAGUE purpose of amendment resides in the mind or intellect alone. The FIRM purpose of amendment is not only in the mind or intellect, but it then transfers itself to the heart or will, and puts the plans of the mind into practice.
(4) CONFESSING YOUR SINS ― Here is another dangerous area which abounds with demonic interference. The bottom line in this area is this ― if the demons cannot prevent you from going to Confession, then they will try and make you confess your sins in a way that makes the confession invalid. The most common pathways are (1) hiding a mortal sin in confession through shame, (2) fudging, obfuscating, twisting, cosmetically coating, misrepresenting, leaving out details, cloaking the mortal sin in such a way as make a mortal sin seem like a serious venial sin; (3) not stating the correct number of times that you committed the sin―for example, saying “a few times” instead of saying “ten times”. Ten is much more than “a few”; or simply saying: “I’ve stolen things” without saying what value of things and how many times you stole; (4) or not being specific as to the KIND of sin you committed―for example, merely saying: “I’ve been impure!” hides the kind of impurity―for there are increasing degrees of gravity in impurity: (a) impure with oneself; (b) impure with another person; (c) impure with animals. As regards impurity with other persons, you have to make distinctions: (a) are you married or single; (b) was the other person married or single; (c) was the other person of the same sex or the opposite sex; (d) was the other person a minor/child; (e) was the other person a religious―monk, nun, etc.
There are certain sins that can the added gravity of being a sacrilege―for example stealing from a store is different to stealing from the church; impurity with a religious adds a sacrilegious aspect to the sin. Another “tactic” is trying to hide your mortal among a whole bunch of venial sins that you quickly rattle off. These are just some of the ways that the actual confessing of sins can lead to invalid confessions. Always be honest in confession―you might fool the priest; you might fool yourself; but you cannot fool God. God knows all about your sin―He wants YOU to know YOUR sins as they really are so that you can get to work at uprooting them from your life.
(5) COMPLETING THE PENANCE THE PRIEST ASSIGNS TO YOU ― Listen carefully and take note of the penance that the priest assigns to you. Sometimes the instructions are general―such as: “Pray a Rosary!” This does not specify when to pray the Rosary; nor does it specify whether or not you have to pray all five decades at once, or whether you can divide it up into sections; nor does it specify which mysteries of the Rosary to pray; nor does it specify if you also have meditate the mysteries instead just saying the Our Fathers and Hail Marys. Therefore all these variations are left up to you.
Other penances might be more precise―such as: “Make the Stations of the Cross in church on a Friday!” If this is impossible for you, then you must mention that to the priest and give the reason why. He might change some aspect, such as allowing you to make the Stations at home, or make them the next time you go to church, etc.
Priests are obliged―under the pain of sin―to give serious penances for mortal sins: for example, five decades of the Rosary, or the Stations of the Cross, are regarded as the minimum in the class of serious penances. However, if you feel you can more―then tell the priest that you are willing to do more. The reason being is that a penance imposed in the Sacrament of Confession has more power and value than the same penance done by your personal choice―so a Rosary given as penance in Confession has more value than a Rosary prayed by your own free choice.
The best way to ensure that the penance is done and not forgotten, is to fulfill the penance as soon as it practical. For example, if the penance is in the form of a prayer―then try say that prayer after Confession, or say it after Mass has finished, or after your thanksgiving, etc. Forgetting to do the penance does not make your confession invalid―but if you refuse to do the penance, then that does make your confession invalid. If you forgot what the penance was, then you could approach the priest and ask him, or do a penance that the priest usually gives you for the same kind of sins you confessed in the past.
Penance is essential―as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
Do you have bloody hands? Are your hands bloodied with sin? Of course they are! “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “There is no man who sins not!” (3 Kings 8:46). “Your hands are full of blood!” (Isaias 1:15). “Your hands are defiled with blood and your fingers with iniquity!” (Isaias 59:3). “Blood is in their hands, because they have committed adultery and they have committed fornication” (Ezechiel 23:37). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us! … If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him [God] a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
“John [the Baptist] saw Jesus coming to him, and he said: ‘Behold the Lamb of God! Behold Him Who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29). “He shall be led as a sheep to the slaughter, and shall be dumb as a lamb before His shearer, and He shall not open His mouth! … He shall lay down His life for sin! … He was offered because it was His own will! … He was wounded for our iniquities, He was bruised for our sins! The chastisement was upon Him, and by His bruises we are healed!” says the Old Testament prophecy about the future Christ (Isaias 53:5-7, 10). ). “In Whom we have redemption through His blood, the remission of sins!” (Colossians 1:14).
We have a chance to wash away the worthless blood of sin with the Precious Blood of Christ. Our Lord Himself said: “This is My Blood, of the New Testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!” (Matthew 26:28) ... “He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, has everlasting life, and I will raise him up in the last day!” (John 6:55). “The Blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin!” (1 John 1:7). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be made white as wool!” (Isaias 1:18). “Jesus Christ has washed us from our sins in His own Blood!” (Apocalypse 1:5). “You, who at some time were afar off [in your sins], are now made nigh by the Blood of Christ!” (Ephesians 2:13). “You were not redeemed with corruptible things, such as gold or silver, but with the Precious Blood of Christ, as of a Lamb unspotted and undefiled!” (1 Peter 1:19). “They overcame him [Satan] by the Blood of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 12:11). “They have washed their robes and have made them white in the Blood of the Lamb!” (Apocalypse 7:14). “Blessed are they that wash their robes in the Blood of the Lamb―so that they may have a right to the tree of life, and may enter in by the gates into the [heavenly] city!” (Apocalypse 22:14). “We have redemption and the remission of sins through His Blood” (Ephesians 1:7).
Sprinkled with Blood
To a large degree the Old Testament prefigures the New Testament, and many things and ceremonies of the Old Testament foreshadow and represent things and ceremonies of the New Testament that would fulfill and complete what was symbolized. It is remarkable and outstanding to see the hundreds of references to blood sacrifices of the lamb and other animals and birds that God demanded in the Old Testament. The blood of these creatures was meant to be shed and offered to God as a reparation for a whole host of sins. The blood was also meant to be a protection from harm―as we see in case of the institution of the Paschal Lamb when the Hebrews were still slaves in Egypt.
“And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: ‘Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: “On the tenth day of this month let every man take a lamb for their families and houses. It shall be a lamb without blemish, a male, of one year … And you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month, and the whole multitude of the children of Israel shall sacrifice it in the evening. And they shall take of the blood of the lamb and put it upon both the side posts, and on the upper door posts of the houses, wherein they shall eat it … And I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and will kill every firstborn in the land of Egypt both man and beast ... And the blood shall be unto you for a sign in the houses where you shall be―and I shall see the blood, and shall pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I shall strike the land of Egypt!”’ ... And Moses called all the ancients of the children of Israel, and said to them: ‘Go take a lamb by your families, and sacrifice it. And dip a bunch of hyssop in the blood that is at the door, and sprinkle the transom of the door therewith, and both the door cheeks! Let none of you go out of the door of his house till morning! For the Lord will pass through, striking the Egyptians―and when He shall see the blood on the transom, and on both the posts, He will pass over the door of the house, and not suffer the destroyer to come into your houses and to hurt you!’ … And the children of Israel going forth did as the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron. And it came to pass at midnight, the Lord slew every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharao, who sat on his throne, unto the firstborn of the captive woman that was in the prison, and all the firstborn of cattle. And Pharao arose in the night, and all his servants, and all Egypt―for there was not a house wherein there lay not one dead” (Exodus 12:1-30).
The blood of the lamb that was sprinkled on the wooden doorposts was symbolic of the Blood of Christ that would be sprinkled on the wooden cross on Calvary. The shedding of blood in sacrifice goes back even further to the time of Adam and Eve―where Abel, by shedding the blood of a first born lamb, offered a pleasing and acceptable sacrifice to God: “Abel was a shepherd, and it came to pass after many days, that Abel offered of the firstlings of his flock, and of their fat: and the Lord had respect to Abel, and to his offerings” (Genesis 4:2-4). This sacrifice by Abel was to be a type, or prefiguration, or forerunner of both the Paschal Lamb in the time of Moses, and of the Lamb of God, Our Lord Jesus Christ, Who would shed His blood for our salvation. Abel himself would also have his own blood shed due to the envy and anger of his brother Cain, who slew Abel because God had accepted Abel’s sacrifice, but rejected Cain’s―thus Abel also became a type, or prefiguration, or forerunner of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the shedding of his blood by family, as Jesus was killed by ‘family’ (His own nation).
Forgiveness Comes Through the Blood of Christ
The early Church Fathers say that the Church was born from the pierced side of Christ, and that the Sacraments were brought forth through His Blood. Thus, in the Sacrament of Confession, it is by the power of the Precious Blood of Jesus that you are cleansed, forgiven and restored to friendship with God. “Jesus Christ washed us from our sins in His own Blood” (Apocalypse 1:5). “The Blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin!” (1 John 1:7). “They have washed their robes and have made them white in the Blood of the Lamb!” (Apocalypse 7:14). “We have redemption and the remission of sins through His Blood” (Ephesians 1:7). “Blessed are they that wash their robes in the Blood of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 22:14).
Our Lord said to St. Mechtilde: “I show these bleeding wounds to My Father, to appease His wrath. He pardons when He sees the Blood.” Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Let your heart be torn in sorrow! … Sorrowfully satisfy for your own faults in sorrow and penance! … Purify your soul by many acts of sorrow for having offended Him! … Do not delay, even for one instant! Have sorrow for your sins and a firm purpose of confessing them as soon as you find yourself guilty of any sin, and of amending the least of your imperfections! … Humbly and sorrowfully confess your faults with a heartfelt sorrow for your sins! … Wash and purify yourself in the Blood of your Redeemer, Christ, by a truly sorrowful confession and apply this cleansing many times by renewing your loving sorrow for your sins!”
How casual, nonchalant, indifferent and presumptuous we are in the way we approach the Sacrament of Confession! There are many things that we undervalue in regard to this Sacrament. First of all―we rarely (or never) grasp the fact that we are being forgiven our sins because Jesus chose to give up His life, undergo torture and death, so that we might be forgiven! In a certain sense, we―not Jesus―should be tortured and crucified each time we sin (especially mortally). We fail to realize this because―and this is the second point―we are oblivious and blind to the fact that each and every sin we commit, whether it is mortal or venial, is the greatest evil in the world! The Church teaches this in Her catechisms: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Are You Not Frightened?
There is so much talk about God’s love for us that we have lost (or are in the process of losing) any fear towards God. The more our fear subsides, then proportionately our fear of sin and sinning also subsides. Since the Second World War, most of the popes―even the Liberal and Modernist popes―have lamented the fact that we have lost the sense of sin. Yes―“God is charity” (1 John 4:8), but “be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall he reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). Sin should frighten us. If it doesn’t, then that speaks volumes as to how low we have fallen.
Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “You are full of fear of losing the grace and friendship of the Lord; and with good reason do you fear. Your fear must exert itself in watching over your treasure of grace. Fear and abhor sin―even the slightest! Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16)―fear this sentence and renew in your heart the care and zeal for your salvation! So many souls are absorbed in dangerous tepidity and live in the darkness of their passions and depraved inclinations, forgetful of the danger, unmoved by their losses, and heedless of their dealings. The Blood of Christ is trodden under foot, the fruits of the Redemption are held in contempt; no one wishes to risk his own comfort or interest in order to save what has cost the Savior His Blood and life. Instead of fearing and avoiding the occasions of evil, they encounter and seek for them in blind ignorance. In senseless fury they follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and care not where they walk, even if to the most dangerous precipices. How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! I will not tell you how many souls are lost, in order to not cause you to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told you that the number of those, foreknown as doomed, is so great; and that the number of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!”
Confession the Medicine and Remedy for Sin
Perhaps we need to revisit FEAR in order to help our soul along its path to salvation. “His salvation is near to them that fear Him” (Psalm 84:10). Some people insist that fear is not a virtue―they will quote the following Scripture verse: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear―because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity!” (1 John 4:18). Yes―but Scripture also says: “Fear the Lord thy God! I am the Lord!” (Leviticus 19:32). “The fear of the Lord is holy!” (Psalm 18:10). If fear is not a virtue―or a good thing―then why does Holy Scripture refer to FEAR so many times. Here is just the tip of the iceberg of quotes available:
“There is no fear of God before their eyes!” (Psalm 13:3). “Learn to fear the Lord thy God at all times!” (Deuteronomy 14:23). “Fear God, and depart from evil!” (Proverbs 3:7). “The fear of the Lord hates evil” (Proverbs 8:13). “By the fear of the Lord men depart from evil” (Proverbs 16:6). “The fear of the Lord drives out sin” (Ecclesiasticus 1:27). “When you come to the service of God, stand in justice and in fear, and prepare your soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1).
“Come, children, listen to me―I will teach you the fear of the Lord!” (Psalm 33:12). “From his infancy he taught him to fear God and to abstain from all sin” (Tobias 1:10). “The fear of the Lord is the lesson of wisdom” (Proverbs 15:33). “The root of wisdom is to fear the Lord!” (Ecclesiasticus 1:25). “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Ecclesiasticus 1:16). “For the fear of the Lord is wisdom and discipline” (Ecclesiasticus 1:34). “To fear God is the fullness of wisdom” (Ecclesiasticus 1:20). “The fear of the Lord is a crown of wisdom” (Ecclesiasticus 1:22). “Let all the Earth fear the Lord!” (Psalm 32:8).
“Fear God, and keep His commandments―for this is all [the duty and business of) man” (Ecclesiastes 12:13). “Fear the Lord and serve Him in truth and with your whole heart” (1 Kings 12:24). “The Lord commanded that we should fear the Lord our God, that it might be well with us all the days of our life” (Deuteronomy 6:24). “It shall be well with them that fear God, who dread His face!” (Ecclesiastes 8:12). “The fear of the Lord is like a paradise of blessing” (Ecclesiasticus 40:28). “The fear of the Lord shall delight the heart, and shall give joy, and gladness, and length of days” (Ecclesiasticus 1:12). “We shall have many good things if we fear God, and depart from all sin, and do that which is good!” (Tobias 4:23). “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). “Fear not them that kill the body and are not able to kill the soul―but rather fear Him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell” (Matthew 10:28). “The Lord has compassion on them that fear Him” (Psalm 102:13). “The mercy of the Lord is upon them that fear Him!” (Psalm 102:17).
Fear is not the enemy―but a real, legitimate and very useful emotion! Those who declare that they have NO FEAR―as sometimes seen on T-shirts―are nothing but idiots! God has placed the emotion or passion of fear within us to be like an alarm bell or smoke detector that warns us of possible dangers in both the natural and supernatural sphere. We can sin be being excessively or unreasonably fearful, just as we sin by not having enough fear.
Fear and Charity
Yes, it is true that “fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear―because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity!” (1 John 4:18). However, fear and love do not mutually exclude each other―for Holy Scripture commands that we do both things: fear God and love God. “Fear the Lord and walk in His ways, and love Him with all thy heart and with all thy soul!” (Deuteronomy 10:12). The Church teaches that a perfect act of contrition―which is based upon the love of God rather than the fear of God―can remove all guilt and all punishment due to sin. But how many people have such a level of charity―especially in these days, “because iniquity has abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). That is why there are two basic classifications of sorrow for sin―ATTRITION and CONTRITION.
Attrition is defined as being “sorrow for one’s sins based on the fear of punishment.” Whereas Contrition is defined as being “sorrow for one’s sins based on the selfless motive of love for God and sorrow for having offended him.” For someone in the state of mortal sin, either kind of sorrow―Attrition or Contrition (and both can exist together)―suffices to bring about forgiveness and reconciliation with God in Confession. Perfect contrition necessarily includes the resolution to confess one’s mortal sins to a priest in the Sacrament of Confession, but it brings God’s forgiveness even before the penitent receives absolution from a priest. Attrition is insufficient to bring about forgiveness outside the Sacrament of Confession.
Attrition is defined as being “sorrow for one’s sins based on the fear of punishment.” Whereas Contrition is defined as being “sorrow for one’s sins based on the selfless motive of love for God and sorrow for having offended him.” For someone in the state of mortal sin, either kind of sorrow―Attrition or Contrition (and both can exist together)―suffices to bring about forgiveness and reconciliation with God in Confession. Perfect contrition necessarily includes the resolution to confess one’s mortal sins to a priest in the Sacrament of Confession, but it brings God’s forgiveness even before the penitent receives absolution from a priest. Attrition is insufficient to bring about forgiveness outside the Sacrament of Confession.
Confession the Medicine and Remedy for Sin
The medicine and remedy for sin stares us in the face―yet we fail to use it, or if we do use it, then we use it badly. Just sit down and think about this for a minute―it is impossible to be damned if you make good confessions. Confession is the Sacrament that restores sanctifying grace to the soul if it has been lost through mortal sin. You cannot go to Hell if you have sanctifying grace in your soul―Purgatory yes, but not Hell. So why is it that most Catholics, all throughout the history of the Church [read about it here] have ended up in Hell? It has to be because they did not confess correctly! There is no other answer. A baptized soul that ends up in Hell, goes there because they failed to remove mortal sin from the soul through the Sacrament of Confession! It is as simple (and tragic) as that!
“See and contemplate the grandeur of this restoring and life-giving Sacrament of Penance―so forgotten and even scorned by ungrateful men. In their foolish madness, they do not realize that it is the only sure means of salvation after one has lost baptismal innocence. What is most grievous, is that even the ministers of my Most Holy Son do not give to this Sacrament the value that they should. Many view with cold indifference this valuable and precious treasure, which has been placed in their hands for the restoration of souls redeemed by the Blood of the Redeemer!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Bad Confessions Mean Bad News―Hell
St. Alphonsus Liguori warns of bad confessions: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions―in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil not of rare occurrence, but is frequent―especially in small country districts―which consigns innumerable souls to Hell. Hence it is very useful to mention, from time to time, some example of souls that were damned by willfully concealing sins in confession.” Today, this is compounded and made much more frequent due to what recent popes have called “the loss of the sense of sin.”
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Not only do “we let the Kingdom of God crumble”, but we also let our state of sanctifying grace crumble due to our warped notions of what is sinful and what is not sinful! The demons are unbelievably intelligent, and so when the demons coax us into making bad (invalid) confessions they do so in a very subtle way―they do not advertize it, nor blow trumpets, nor wave the fact before our eyes. The perfect “con” is to “con” somebody and leave them oblivious to the fact that they have been conned. So when it comes to “conned” confessions, the demons want to have us thinking that we have confessed sufficiently well, whereas we have “botched” our confession and confessed badly (invalidly).
What is it, then, that makes a confession invalid? A confession can be bad (invalid) in a variety of different ways, with each way having its own nuances or shades. Any and every Catholic should (but they don’t) know the conditions for a valid confession. The demons are only too happy to make forget or at least misinterpret those conditions. So what are those mysterious, half-forgotten, misinterpreted and twisted notions of the required conditions for a good (valid) confession? Do we even know how many conditions there are? The act of simply going to Confession and mentioning sins without having sorrow, or without having the intention to avoid those sins in the future, makes the confession invalid!
The good old Baltimore Catechism, for children making their First Holy Communion, taught us that the steps to a good confession are: (1) find out my sins; (2) be sorry for my sins; (3) make up my mind not to sin again; (4) tell my sins to the priest; (5) do the penance the priest gives me. Those are still the right conditions today, even for adults―even though the adult catechism explains it more thoroughly. Here is a more thorough explanation of each of those five conditions:
(1) EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE ― Most people “do things by halves” ― meaning that do things partially, halfheartedly, incompletely, doing as little as they can to get by. Such persons are Satan’s dream when it comes to the Sacrament of Confession! Examinations of conscience are on “fast-track” mode; knowledge of what is mortal and venial is “half-baked” at best; memory is selective as to what they want to remember and what they want to forget; they restrict the time for examining their conscience to the moment they join the confessional line―the shorter the line, the shorter the examination; or if there is no confessional line then they just dive in to the confessional without any time to examine their conscience and just “wing-it”. Some persons are so caught up with petty details about their venial sins that risk forgetting all their mortal sins―and this is more easily done if they have lost the sense of sin as to what is mortal and what is venial, whereby they rely on their subjective feelings on the seriousness of sin, rather than the objective teaching of the Church as to what is mortal. Hence, today, you have Catholics who insist that they can still be good Catholics without any need to attend Sunday Mass; or those who feel masturbation is not a mortal sin; or that cohabitation is acceptable these days, etc.
Normally speaking, a person should be aware if they are frequent mortal sinner; an occasional mortal sinner; or a rare mortal sinner. It stands to reason that a person who frequently commits mortal sins would have to spend more time examining the conscience to recall all the many mortal sins they have committed―it takes less time to count a teaspoon of peas rather than a bagful of peas! In confessing any and all mortal sins―you have to name the number of sins, and so that, too, takes more time to cover and remember. If the frequent mortal sinner only dedicates the time that he is standing in line at the confessional to his examination of conscience―then he risks missing some mortal sins. Furthermore, it also takes away valuable time from trying to deepen our sorrow for our sins―the greater the sorrow, the less temporal punishment there will be.
Ideally, your examination of conscience should be made at home before you even go to church―just like a shopping list is made at home before we go to the store. Begin with a prayer asking for God’s help―because you will need all the help you can get to overcome the usual satanic interference that comes along every time we want to confess our sins. Satan will try to do all he can to produce a bad (invalid) confession one way or another―and if he cannot achieve that, then he will at least try to reduce the efficacity and fruits of any good (valid) confession. The chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, used to say that demons prefer not to be detected―well, the same applies to our sins―demons prefer that we fail to detect our sins!
There are many examinations of conscience books/leaflets/flyers floating around―and these are very useful in several ways: (1) to remind and show us the breadth of sin that exists, which serves to prevent a loss of the sense of sin, (2) it jogs our memory and conscience about sins we may have forgotten―especially if our confessions are not weekly; (3) it educates us on the different kinds of sins that we should watch out for and avoid. Do not skimp on time dedicated to the examination of your conscience! Spiritual writes recommend that a nightly examination of conscience is a powerful tool in our battle against sin and Satan―even if you have already quit mortal sin and only commit venial sins―for all sin, whether mortal or venial, is the greatest evil in the world. A person cannot be content with merely not committing mortal sins―they must also strive to eliminate all venial sins. Just reflect on the truth of Purgatory, where many souls are burning and being purified from their venial sins which they did not root out while still living on Earth!
(2) SUFFICIENT SORROW FOR YOUR SINS ― We have all encountered the child who is told by its parents to say “Sorry!” to someone they have hurt―the child reluctantly and begrudgingly says “Sorry!” but you can tell that it is just coming from the lips and not the heart. As Our Lord said: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8) ― the same is true in the confessional: people want to be forgiven, but they are not really sorry for their sins. When they say the Act of Contrition, one has to wonder how much is coming from the lips and how much from the heart!
How much sorrow is sorrow? Sorrow―like so many other things in life, such as intelligence or love―ranges from minimal sorrow to maximum sorrow. Not wishing that any soul be damned (though most souls still manage to damn themselves), God is willing to accept a minimal sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession. This minimal sorrow is called “attrition.” The maximum sorrow is called “contrition”. The earliest meaning of the English word “attrition” that relates to spiritual repentance, was borrowed from the figurative meaning of the medieval Latin “attrition”, meaning “hardship, tribulation.” Thus “attrition” for sin is the sorrow that is based upon fear of the “hardships and tribulations” that are a punishment for sin. Hence the Act of Contrition begins by saying: “O my God, I am sorry for having offended Thee because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell.” God is willing to accept this minimal sorrow that fears God and His punishments―but we were created not just to fear God, but more importantly to love God! “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). That is why the Act of Contrition evolves from being sorry “because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell” into saying: “But most of all because they [my sins] offend Thee, my God, Who art all good and deserving of all my love.”
Our relationship with God should grow from an initial fear of God to a love of God: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18). You can take this a stage further and say: “Perfect charity casts out mortal and venial sin―and all the punishments that are due to those sins.” Perfect contrition springs from the perfect love of God. When our love is imperfect, then we think principally of ourselves; whereas, if it is perfect, we think principally of God. Our contrition will be perfect when we repent of our sins through the perfect love of God. Much the same way as a child is imperfectly sorry for some fault when it fears a thrashing. Whereas a child repenting of a fault can be said to have perfect sorrow when it grieves at having offended its parents, who are so good and loving, and have done so much for it.
After St. Peter denied Jesus, he thought of his sin, and, “going out, wept bitterly.” Why did he weep? Perhaps for the shame he would feel in front of the other Apostles? If this was the reason, then his sorrow was purely natural and without merit for Heaven. Perhaps he feared being deprived of his dignity as an Apostle and Prince of the Apostles, or perhaps he feared losing Heaven. These certainly would be more worthy motives, but still his sorrow would be imperfect. No! Peter wept and repented because he had offended his beloved Master, Who was so good, so holy, so worthy of his love; he wept because he had repaid that love with the blackest ingratitude―and, as a consequence, his contrition was perfect, his sin was forgiven. With this golden key of perfect contrition he had again reopened the doors of Heaven, which he had closed a moment before by his triple denial.
The word “contrition” comes from the Latin “contritus”, meaning “to grind, to crush, to pound to pieces” ― in this sense, true sorrow, maximum sorrow, the best sorrow is one that is based upon love, not fear―a love that sees the heart “crushed” and “pounded into pieces” because of its sins against God and neighbor. We speak of “a perfect act of contrition” ― but we must not naively imagine that there is only one single degree of perfect contrition. To better understand this, you can compare perfect contrition to the saints―all the saints are perfect for they are in Heaven, and you only get to go to Heaven when you have been perfected―either while living on Earth, or in the fires of Purgatory. Yet none of the saints have the same degree of perfection―even though all are perfect! So you can always improve your perfect act of contrition because you can always grow in love and grow in sanctifying grace. There comes a point when your perfect act of contrition becomes so perfect that it takes away, not only all guilt for sin (which is what Confession does), but it will also take away all temporal punishment due to sin―so that if you die having made a perfect act of contrition, then you would go straight to Heaven, totally bypassing Purgatory!
Satan despises sorrow for sin―especially sorrow for sin out of love for God. The reason is that demons have no sorrow for their sin and they have no love for God―and they despise seeing us reconciled with God by sorrow for sin, especially a sorrow for sin based upon love. They will do all they can to prevent from having the right kind of sorrow for sin―and will try lead us down the path of counterfeit contrition and false sorrow―which ultimately is path to Hell. This is perhaps one of the most common failures that lead to invalid confessions. Sorrow for sin must be supernatural. It is insufficient to be sorry because we have be “found out”; or because we now “look bad” in the eyes of others; or have lost our reputation; lost our job; lost privileges; lost friendships; etc. All these are natural motives that fall short of the supernatural motives required for sorrow―the bare minimum being fear of God’s just punishments.
(3) A FIRM PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT ― This is another “stumbling-block” or “pit-fall” in making good (valid) confessions. There are too many Catholics who use the confessional like a revolving door―always going and coming out, going back in and coming back out, in again and out again, confessing the same old mortal sins time and time again! If a person does not take practical steps to avoid falling back into the mortal sins they have confessed, then the confession is invalid due to presumed lack of FIRM purpose of amendment. When a particular kind of mortal sin becomes increasingly repetitive and habitual, then one has to question whether or not there is a FIRM purpose of amendment. A FIRM purpose of amendment is far superior to a VAGUE purpose of amendment. A VAGUE purpose of amendment will merely say: “Oh, I’ve really got to stop doing this!” and will go no further. Whereas a FIRM purpose of amendment will go beyond saying: “I’ve got to stop doing this!” and will carefully analyze why these sins are being committed and will take concrete measures and practical plans to avoid the occasions of that particular sin―it goes beyond mere wishful thinking. The VAGUE purpose of amendment resides in the mind or intellect alone. The FIRM purpose of amendment is not only in the mind or intellect, but it then transfers itself to the heart or will, and puts the plans of the mind into practice.
(4) CONFESSING YOUR SINS ― Here is another dangerous area which abounds with demonic interference. The bottom line in this area is this ― if the demons cannot prevent you from going to Confession, then they will try and make you confess your sins in a way that makes the confession invalid. The most common pathways are (1) hiding a mortal sin in confession through shame, (2) fudging, obfuscating, twisting, cosmetically coating, misrepresenting, leaving out details, cloaking the mortal sin in such a way as make a mortal sin seem like a serious venial sin; (3) not stating the correct number of times that you committed the sin―for example, saying “a few times” instead of saying “ten times”. Ten is much more than “a few”; or simply saying: “I’ve stolen things” without saying what value of things and how many times you stole; (4) or not being specific as to the KIND of sin you committed―for example, merely saying: “I’ve been impure!” hides the kind of impurity―for there are increasing degrees of gravity in impurity: (a) impure with oneself; (b) impure with another person; (c) impure with animals. As regards impurity with other persons, you have to make distinctions: (a) are you married or single; (b) was the other person married or single; (c) was the other person of the same sex or the opposite sex; (d) was the other person a minor/child; (e) was the other person a religious―monk, nun, etc.
There are certain sins that can the added gravity of being a sacrilege―for example stealing from a store is different to stealing from the church; impurity with a religious adds a sacrilegious aspect to the sin. Another “tactic” is trying to hide your mortal among a whole bunch of venial sins that you quickly rattle off. These are just some of the ways that the actual confessing of sins can lead to invalid confessions. Always be honest in confession―you might fool the priest; you might fool yourself; but you cannot fool God. God knows all about your sin―He wants YOU to know YOUR sins as they really are so that you can get to work at uprooting them from your life.
(5) COMPLETING THE PENANCE THE PRIEST ASSIGNS TO YOU ― Listen carefully and take note of the penance that the priest assigns to you. Sometimes the instructions are general―such as: “Pray a Rosary!” This does not specify when to pray the Rosary; nor does it specify whether or not you have to pray all five decades at once, or whether you can divide it up into sections; nor does it specify which mysteries of the Rosary to pray; nor does it specify if you also have meditate the mysteries instead just saying the Our Fathers and Hail Marys. Therefore all these variations are left up to you.
Other penances might be more precise―such as: “Make the Stations of the Cross in church on a Friday!” If this is impossible for you, then you must mention that to the priest and give the reason why. He might change some aspect, such as allowing you to make the Stations at home, or make them the next time you go to church, etc.
Priests are obliged―under the pain of sin―to give serious penances for mortal sins: for example, five decades of the Rosary, or the Stations of the Cross, are regarded as the minimum in the class of serious penances. However, if you feel you can more―then tell the priest that you are willing to do more. The reason being is that a penance imposed in the Sacrament of Confession has more power and value than the same penance done by your personal choice―so a Rosary given as penance in Confession has more value than a Rosary prayed by your own free choice.
The best way to ensure that the penance is done and not forgotten, is to fulfill the penance as soon as it practical. For example, if the penance is in the form of a prayer―then try say that prayer after Confession, or say it after Mass has finished, or after your thanksgiving, etc. Forgetting to do the penance does not make your confession invalid―but if you refuse to do the penance, then that does make your confession invalid. If you forgot what the penance was, then you could approach the priest and ask him, or do a penance that the priest usually gives you for the same kind of sins you confessed in the past.
Penance is essential―as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
Article 16
Monday & Tuesday, July 29th & 30th
Do You Have Blood On Your Hands?
Monday & Tuesday, July 29th & 30th
Do You Have Blood On Your Hands?
Share or Shed?
Do you share blood or shed blood? Are you a benefactor of blood or a malefactor of blood? Have you given someone blood or have you taken someone’s blood? Cain took someone’s blood―the blood of his innocent brother, Abel―he shed Abel’s blood and thus became a malefactor. Christ shared His Blood―He gave His Blood for the redemption of guilty sinners―thus becoming our benefactor. The shedding of blood can lead to death and it can also lead to life. Sinners shed the blood of others and it can lead to eternal ‘death’ in Hell. Christ shed His own Blood and it can lead sinners to eternal life. “Your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity” (Isaias 59:3). “The Lord hates hands that shed innocent blood” (Proverbs 6:17). “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). “Jesus Christ washed us from our sins in His own Blood” (Apocalypse 1:5).
Blood-Shedding Curse
“The Lord hates hands that shed innocent blood” (Proverbs 6:17). The very first act of bloodshed brought about a curse from God. Cain’s killing of his innocent brother Abel, led to God putting a curse upon Cain for the duration of his life: “And it came to pass after many days, that Cain offered, of the fruits of the earth, gifts to the Lord. Abel also offered of the firstlings of his flock, and of their fat. And the Lord had respect to Abel, and to his offerings―but to Cain and his offerings He had no respect. And Cain was exceedingly angry and his countenance fell. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Why art thou angry? And why is thy countenance fallen? If thou do well, shalt thou not receive? But if ill, shall not sin forthwith be present at the door? But the lust thereof shall be under thee, and thou shalt have dominion over it!’ And Cain said to Abel his brother: ‘Let us go forth abroad!’ And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is thy brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I know not! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to Cain: ‘What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth! Now, therefore, cursed shalt thou be upon the Earth, which has opened her mouth and received the blood of thy brother at thy hand!’” (Genesis 4:3-11).
We again see the curse of bloodshed in the New Testament. The term “blood curse” refers to a New Testament passage from the Gospel of Matthew, which describes events taking place in Pilate’s court before the crucifixion of Jesus, and specifically the willingness of the Jewish crowd to accept liability when screaming for Jesus’ Blood and death through crucifixion: “Pilate said to them: ‘What shall I do then with Jesus that is called Christ?’ They all said: ‘Let Him be crucified!’ The governor said to them: ‘Why? What evil has He done? But they cried out the more, saying: ‘Let Him be crucified!’ And Pilate seeing that he prevailed nothing, but that rather a tumult was made; taking water washed his hands before the people, saying: ‘I am innocent of the Blood of this just Man―look you to it!’ And the whole people answering, said: ‘His Blood be upon us and our children!’” (Matthew 27:22-25).
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Catena Aurea, quotes St. John Chrysostom as saying: “Behold the insanity of the Jews! Their passion and pertinacious obstinacy will not suffer them to see and understand, and they curse themselves, saying: ‘His blood be upon us and upon our children!’ Yet the merciful God did not ratify this sentence and did not literally comply with their impious prayer, but accepted any of them and of their children who repented; for Paul was of them, and many thousands of those who in Jerusalem were converted and believed.”
Biblically, to “have blood on your hands” means to be guilty of offending someone, or doing something wrong to them―not just literally killing them. Hence Jesus said: “He that shall scandalize one of these little ones that believe in Me, it would be better for him that a millstone be hung around his neck, and he be cast into the sea, so that he be drowned in the depth of the sea rather than he scandalize one of these little ones!’” (Matthew 18:6; Mark 9:41; Luke 17:1-2).
Is There a Blood-Curse on Abortions?
You could say that abortion often brings a curse upon the persons aborting the unborn babies―mother and abortionist alike. Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) Chief Exorcist of Rome, says that often women, who have had an abortion, end up being possessed by the devil: “Many times I have dealt with women whose sins included the crime of abortion.”
Monsignor Stephen Rossetti, the Chief Exorcist of the Archdiocese of Washington for over 13 years, in his book, Diary of an American Exorcist, writes: “‘Lucy’ [not her real name] is possessed and being tortured nightly by the demons. They taunt her, mark her body with scratches and burns, claim that they own her, and often twist her bad leg, which is excruciating for her. Demons are merciless and relentless. After a number of intense exorcism sessions, the demons were weakening. It seemed to me that they just might be weak enough to be compelled, by the power of Jesus, to reveal their names. Having their demonic names gives additional power to cast them out and suggests that the time of their exit is approaching. So I demanded again and again and again: “Dicas mihi nomen tuum” (“Tell me your name”). This line is a direct quote from the traditional Rite of Exorcism. The demon resisted mightily. Finally, with great reluctance, it gave up its name, “Abyzou.” I looked it up. Several sources concur: Abyzou (also spelled Abizou, Obizu, Obizuth, Obyzouth, Byzou) is the name of a demon in the Near East blamed for miscarriages and infant mortality.
“It made perfect sense. Sadly, Lucy had had an abortion. She sincerely repented, went to confession, and remained very contrite. While any and all sins are forgiven in the sacrament, this does not mean that associated demons are immediately cast out. Often, a time of purgation is necessary. Given the gravity of the sin and the resulting tragic child’s death, it was going to be a fight to cast out this demon. Abyzou taunted Lucy for having had an abortion. The demon told her she could never be forgiven. It played on her deep sense of guilt and attempted to drag her into the darkness of hopelessness and despair. This is typical demonic behavior. Demons not only tempt you to commit sin but then if you do, they taunt you and shame you for doing so. We assured Lucy that her sin was truly forgiven and said a prayer for her baby. Lucy may also need post-abortion counseling and/or work with post-abortion healing groups. In the midst of the session, one of the exorcists was inspired to hold up an icon of Our Lady of Guadalupe. The demon went into a huge convulsion. So, repeatedly we invoked Our Lady under this title and the demon convulsed every time the icon was held up. The effectiveness of this holy image is no accident. The icon of Our Lady of Guadalupe reveals Mary as a pregnant woman and she is often invoked under this title for unborn children. Moreover, under her feet is a symbol of the moon and darkness, a reference to the devil. Juan Diego, upon whose tilma the image appeared, referred to her in his native language as: “Te Coatlazopeuh” – “she who crushes the serpent.” An abortion is a grievous sin. But Lucy and all should know that there is a Divine source of healing and peace. We have a tremendous advocate in Our Lady of Guadalupe who treads upon Abyzou and brings God’s healing.” (Monsignor Stephen Rossetti, Diary of an American Exorcist).
Habitual Mortal Sin Merits Demonic Possession
In fact, the exorcists tell us that anyone who habitually lives in a state of mortal sin for a prolonged period is liable and worthy of demonic possession―but the mercy of God prevents that from happening in many cases. The exorcist, Fr. Gabriel Amorth says that participation in the act of abortion is an act that will leave a person open to demonic influence, if not outright demonic possession: “I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. Many times I have dealt with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. With time, the person is ‘hardened’ in sin and evil takes root. In all these stages, the way to healing can begin only with a sincere conversion.”
“The most common cause for Satanic attacks is the curse or spell. Around 90% of the cases that I deal with are precisely spells. The effects of the curse do not depend on the morality or immorality of the person who is the target of the curse―the one who unknowingly receives the curse. Suppose, for example, that someone you work with is envious of you and has a spell cast on you. You would get sick. A curse is an appeal to the devil for harm to come to someone or something. It is done by ‘mediums’ who are in contact with the devil. It is possible for a person to go to a magician, a witch or someone related to the devil and pay him to call a curse down upon a certain person. Both the person who orders or asks for a curse to placed on someone or something, and the ‘medium’ who does it, are guilty of this sin. If the person is in the state of grace and prays, it is difficult for the curse to take effect. But if the person is less protected from the spiritual point of view [= not in a state of grace], it is easier for the curse to affect him.”
Human Sacrifice
Human sacrifice appears to be as old as humanity itself. From prehistory to the 21st century, human sacrifice has been practiced on a number of different occasions all throughout the world by numerous cultures in Europe, the Americas, Asia, Africa, and Oceania―among them being the Chinese, Japanese, Incas, Mayas, Aztecs, Egyptians, Hawaiians, Celts, Druids, Greeks, Romans, Gauls, Danes, Vikings, Germans, Russians, many African cultures, etc. Archaeologists have found evidence of it at sites across the globe.
The various reasons behind human sacrifice are the same that motivate religious sacrifice in general. Human sacrifice is typically intended to bring good fortune and to pacify the gods. Human sacrifice is the act of killing one or more humans as part of a ritual, which is usually intended to bring good fortune, to please or appease gods, a human ruler, an authoritative/priestly figure or spirits of dead ancestors, or as an act of public justice by capital punishment, or as a retainer sacrifice, wherein a monarch's servants are killed in order for them to continue to serve their master in the next life.
In 1487, the great Templo Mayor was dedicated in the main Aztec city of Tenochtitlan with a four-day celebration. How many were sacrificed during that time is a subject of scholarly speculation: some put the figure as low as 10,000 or 20,000, several others put it as high as 80,400 people sacrificed during those four days. Many reputable scholars today put the number as high as 250,000 human sacrifices per year for the whole Aztec Empire. All Aztecs cities contained temples dedicated to their gods and all of them saw human sacrifices. This is just one instance from thousands or more such sacrifices throughout the history of the world.
Holy Scripture clearly condemns such satanic practices:
“They have done to their gods all the abominations which the Lord abhors, offering their sons and daughters, and burning them with fire! You shall not do in like manner to the Lord your God!” (Deuteronomy 12:31). “All the gods of the Gentiles are devils!” (Psalm 95:5) ... “They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils. They shed innocent blood―the blood of their sons and of their daughters which they sacrificed to the idols!” (Psalm 105:37-41). “The things which the heathens sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God. And I would not that you should be made partakers with devils” (1 Corinthians 10:20) ... “They sacrificed to devils and not to God!” (Deuteronomy 32:17) ... “They shall no more sacrifice their victims to devils” (Leviticus 17:7) … “You shall not give any of your children to be consecrated to the idol Moloch, nor defile the name of thy God!” (Leviticus 18:21). “All the gods of the Gentiles are devils!” (Psalm 95:5)
“And they sacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils. They shed innocent blood―the blood of their sons and of their daughters which they sacrificed to the idols of Chanaan. And the land was polluted with blood and was defiled with their works! And the Lord was exceedingly angry with His people and He abhorred His inheritance! And He delivered them into the hands of the nations and those that hated them had dominion over them!” (Psalm 105:37-41).
“King Manasses made his son pass through fire, and he used divination, and observed omens, and appointed pythons, and multiplied soothsayers to do evil before the Lord, and to provoke Him” (4 Kings 21:6).
“The king of Moab took his eldest son and offered him for a burnt offering. And there was great indignation in Israel, they departed from him” (4 Kings 3:27).
“King Achaz consecrated his son, making him pass through the fire―according to the idols of the nations, which the Lord destroyed” (4 Kings 16:3).
“And you, says the Lord God, have taken your sons and your daughters, whom you have borne to Me, and have sacrificed the same to them to be devoured. You have sacrificed and given My children to them, consecrating them by fire! … Blood is on their hands―they have committed fornication with their idols, and their children, whom they bore to Me, they have offered to them to be devoured!” (Ezechiel 16:20-21; 23:37).
“Beware lest you have a mind to imitate the abominations of those nations! Neither let there be found among you any one that shall expiate his son or daughter, making them to pass through the fire, or anyone that consults soothsayers, or observes dreams and omens, neither let there be any wizard, nor charmer, nor any one that consults pythonic spirits, or fortune tellers, or that seek the truth from the dead. For the Lord abhors all these things, and for these abominations He will destroy them!” (Deuteronomy 18:9-12).
Satanic Sacrifices Continue Today
Satan likes to “ape” God whenever he can. Thus he “apes” God by his satanic churches, his satanic rituals, and his satanic sacrifices. Even today, the satanic ritual of human sacrifice―of men, women and children―continues in shrouded secrecy. The mainstream media will never call it “satanic” and merely groups such human sacrifices with “murders” or “killings.” Likewise the sexual abuse of, not only children, but also adults―often culminating with the ‘sacrifice’ of their lives.
Another form of satanic sacrifice―even though it is indirect―is that of abortion. The child sacrifices in earlier centuries are a mere shadow or “a drop in the ocean” compared to satanic slaying of babies today. In the USA, it has varied from over 1,300,000 (1.3 million) to 900,000 in the last 25 years. Since 1980, there have been over 1,700 million abortions worldwide. The current worldwide rate is around 56 million babies per year or around 100 babies per minute, which is almost 2 babies per every single second of the day. That is one hell of a bloodbath!
Abortion pills are now responsible for 63% of all abortions in the United States. The abortion pill RU-486, also known by several other names such Mifepristone, Mifeprex, and Mifegyne―was developed by a Jewish scientist, who was born Étienne Blum, in Strasbourg, in 1926, and later took the name Émile Baulieu. He is known as the father of the abortion pill. It was first introduced in the ‘Catholic’ country of France in 1987. ‘Great’ Britain legally allowed its use in 1991; and in Sweden in 1992. Soon after becoming U.S. President in 1993, Bill Clinton ordered the U.S. Health and Human Services Department to investigate Mifepristone’s potential as an abortion medication, and also pressured Hoeschst (the manufacturer) to make the RU-486 medication available in the United States. It was eventually introduced in the USA in 2000. Popularity for the abortion pill (medicated abortions) grew from year to year in the USA. Medication abortions voluntarily reported by 33 U.S. states have increased as a percentage of total abortions every year since the approval of Mifepristone: 1.0% in 2000; 2.9% in 2001; 5.2% in 2002; 7.9% in 2003; 9.3% in 2004; 9.9% in 2005; 10.6% in 2006; 13.1% in 2007; 17% in 2008; 24% in 2011; 31% in 2014; 39% in 2017; 54% in 2020; and 63% in 2023.
During the recent Covid pandemic, the F.D.A. suspended a rule requiring health-care professionals to dispense the medication in person—a change that the agency has since made permanent. Though a prescription is needed, any pharmacy can now issue abortion pills. Abortion pills can be taken at home, so those who need them may not require transportation, child care, or significant time away from work or school. They are safe, effective, and can be mailed or passed around, making them relatively difficult for authorities to trace and therefore they fly by as unknown and unreported abortions.
Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
Most people have become and are becoming increasingly indifferent, tolerant or even favorable to abortion. Amongst those who disagree with abortion, there is nevertheless a growing attitude of “It’s not my problem! I don’t do it! I don’t advocate it! I can’t do anything about it!” But is that really true? Can we do something about it? “Am I my brother’s keeper?” was Cain’s lame excuse when asked by God as to the whereabouts of his brother Abel, whom he had killed (Genesis 4:9). It is not only by direct killing that we are guilty of robbing someone of his or her life. We can also be guilty by seeing someone in grave need and doing nothing about it.
Our Lord’s parable about the sheep and the goats point out the sins of indifference and negligence with regard to the needs of others: “And when the Son of man shall come in His majesty, and all the angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the seat of His majesty and all nations shall be gathered together before Him. And He shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on His left. Then shall the King say to them that shall be on His right hand: ‘Come, ye blessed of My Father, possess the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world! For I was hungry and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; I was naked and you covered Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me!’ Then shall the just answer him, saying: ‘Lord! When did we see Thee hungry and fed Thee; thirsty and gave Thee drink? And when did we see Thee a stranger and took Thee in? Or naked and covered thee? Or when did we see Thee sick or in prison and came to Thee? And the King answering, shall say to them: ‘Amen I say to you―as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!’
“Then He shall say to them that shall be on His left hand: ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels! For I was hungry and you gave me not to eat; I was thirsty and you gave Me not to drink; I was a stranger and you took Me not in; naked and you covered Me not; sick and in prison and you did not visit Me!’ Then they also shall answer him, saying: ‘Lord! When did we see Thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to Thee?’ Then He shall answer them, saying: ‘Amen I say to you―as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!’ And these shall go into everlasting punishment; but the just shall go into life everlasting” (Matthew 25:31-46).
The parable of the Good Samaritan dovetails perfectly with the above parable: “A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, who also stripped him, and having wounded him went away, leaving him half dead. And it chanced, that a certain priest went down the same way: and seeing him, passed by. In like manner also a Levite, when he was near the place and saw him, passed by. But a certain Samaritan being on his journey, came near him; and seeing him, was moved with compassion. And going up to him, bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine: and setting him upon his own beast, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And the next day he took out two pence, and gave to the host, and said: ‘Take care of him; and whatsoever thou shalt spend over and above, I, at my return, will repay thee!’ Which of these three, in thy opinion, was neighbor to him that fell among the robbers?’ But he said: ‘He that showed mercy to him.’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Go, and do thou in like manner!’” (Luke 10:30-37).
Parable in Real Life
Back in July of 2017, five teenagers taunted a drowning man as they recorded his death in Florida. In a video recorded and posted on YouTube by the teens – ages 14 to 19 – they are laughing as Jamel Dunn, 31, struggled to stay afloat in a pond near his family’s home in Cocoa. They stood by for 10 minutes without rendering aid while he was drowning. The teens taunted the man that he was “going to die” and said they were not going to help him. Instead, the teens chuckled as they recorded the victim’s final moments. During a subsequent police interview the teens admitted they were “smoking weed.”
The Cocoa Police Department had recommended to the state attorney’s office that the group face charges of failure to report a death. But the State Attorney’s office announced that the group would not be criminally prosecuted. Todd Brown, a spokesman for the Office of the State Attorney, stated: “As previously acknowledged by the Cocoa Police Department and this office, there is no Florida law that requires a person to provide emergency assistance under the facts of this case. A law intended to address this type of situation was proposed during this year’s legislative session, but failed to receive sufficient support to pass.”
State Attorney Phil Archer of the 18th Judicial Circuit, said: “Unfortunately, Florida law does not address this behavior and we are ethically restrained from pursuing criminal charges without a reasonable belief of proving a crime beyond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt. I know that everyone was sickened by the callous disregard for human life exhibited by these young people. We can only hope that this was an isolated and rare circumstance that will never happen again!”
Jamel Dunn’s sister, Simone McIntosh, said: “All it took is one call, one second, and a life could have been saved! He clearly screamed for help not once, not twice, but three times.”
Some states have so-called ‘good Samaritan’ laws that protect people who do take action. But only a few states actually have laws requiring residents to act if they see a crime. In Minnesota, for example, there’s a “duty to assist” provision. According to the law, anyone “at the scene of an emergency” who knows that someone “has suffered grave physical harm, or could be hurt” must provide “reasonable assistance.” Minnesota lawmakers define reasonable assistance as calling or attempting to call police or medical personnel, according to state statute. Many foreign countries―including Denmark, Germany and France―have “duty to assist” statues or similar laws.
Guilty of the Sins of Others?
All of the above should remind of what the Church teaches about sharing in the guilt of the sins of other people. Holy Scripture warns us: “Be not a partaker of other men’s sins!” (1 Timothy 5:22). There are nine chief ways to be guilty of the sin of another: (1) by consent; (2) by concealment; (3) by command; (4) by counsel; (5) by partaking; (6) by provocation; (7) by praise or flattery; (8) by defense of the ill done; (9) by silence.
Let us apply the above to some present-day scenarios and see if our hands are bloodied by the sins of others―whether it is family, workplace, community or even nationally and internationally―and examine our personal reactions to them.
(1) GUILT BY CONSENT:
In Holy Scripture we Adam consent to Eve’s offer to eat the “forbidden fruit” that she herself had just tasted and eaten. Then God said to Adam: “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you that you should not eat, then cursed is the earth in your work; with labor and toil you shall eat thereof all the days of thy life!” (Genesis 3:17).
In the Acts of the Apostles, we see that Saul (who would become St. Paul) consented to the stoning of St. Stephen: “And casting him forth without the city, they stoned him; and the witnesses laid down their garments at the feet of a young man, whose name was Saul. And they stoned Stephen, who invoked and said: ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!’ And falling on his knees, he cried with a loud voice, saying: ‘Lord, lay not this sin to their charge!’ And when he had said this, he fell asleep in the Lord. And Saul was consenting to his death” (Acts 7:57-59).
Consent to the sins of others can be explicit consent or implicit consent. We can explicitly consent by saying something that indicates our agreement to what has been done, is being done, or will be done. Or we implicitly give consent in a multitude of ways―such as nodding in agreement; smiling or laughing; applauding; showing no disgust or disapproval, etc. When a child sees that its parents do or say nothing concerning the child’s bad behavior, he takes it as implicit consent. Another example would be if someone were to do something sinful and we just stood by and watched.
(2) GUILT BY CONCEALMENT:
“Don’t worry! I won’t tell anyone that you did it!” How many sins have been enabled by such a statement? In Genesis, chapter 37, when Jacob’s sons sold Joseph as a slave and then concealed and lied to their father about what happened:
“Joseph went after his brothers and found them in Dothain. And when they saw him afar off, before he came near them, they thought to kill him, and said one to another: ‘Behold the dreamer is coming! Come, let us kill him, and cast him into some old pit! And we will say: “Some evil beast has devoured him!”’ And Ruben, hearing this, endeavored to deliver him out of their hands, and said: ‘Do not take away his life, nor shed his blood―but cast him into this pit, that is in the wilderness, and keep your hands harmless!’ Now he said this, being desirous to deliver Joseph out of their hands and to restore him to his father. As soon as Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his outside coat of many colors and cast him into an old pit, where there was no water. They saw some Ismaelites on their way coming from Galaad, with their camels, carrying spices, and balm, and myrrh to Egypt. And Juda said to his brothers: ‘What will it profit us to kill our brother, and conceal his blood? It is better that he be sold to the Ismaelites, and that our hands be not defiled―for he is our brother and our flesh!’ His brethren agreed to his words and sold him to the Ismaelites, for twenty pieces of silver and they led him into Egypt. And Ruben, later returning to the pit, could not find Joseph. And the brothers took Joseph’s coat and dipped it in the blood of a goat, which they had killed―so as to carry it to their father, and to say: ‘This we have found! See whether it be your son’s coat, or not!’ And the father acknowledging it, said: ‘It is my son’s coat! An evil wild beast has eaten him! A beast has devoured Joseph! And tearing his garments, he put on sackcloth, mourning for his son a long time” (Genesis 37:17-34).
Ruben ― the eldest ― should have said something to his father, Jacob, and a rescue attempt would have been possible. By the very fact that Ruben didn’t say anything to his father and concealed what happened to Joseph ― so even though Ruben did not consent to the sin of his brothers, this was a sin as well due to his concealment of the truth about the fate and the whereabouts of Joseph.
How many times have we hidden the sins of others when we could have helped them more by revealing the sin. This is especially so in many a court case, where we commit perjury when asked about the crime of another person―and we answer that we know nothing, when in fact we know everything. In such circumstances, when we hide a serious sin of someone else who has a right to know (judge, jury), then this is a sin as well and we become accomplices in the crime we are hiding.
However, not everyone has a right to know about the sins of others. We are not obliged to reveal the sins of other to every Tom, Dick or Harry who may ask! As Moral Theology states―even a sinner has right to good name and reputation. Being forced to reveal everyone’s sin to everyone else would make life intolerable and unlivable. That is why the Church has the “Seal of Confession” which forbids the priest, under pain of excommunication, from revealing the sins of his penitents.
(3) GUILT BY COMMAND:
“You have departed out of the way, and have caused many to stumble at the law!” (Malachias 2:8).
“He that shall scandalize [=make someone sin] one of these little ones that believe in Me, it were better for him that a millstone should be hung around his neck, and that he should be drowned in the depth of the sea!” (Matthew 18:6-7).
If we command someone to do something sinful, that command is sinful. A Biblical example is in 2 Kings, chapter 11.
While King David’s army was at war, David commits adultery with one of the soldier’s wives. The soldier’s name is Uriah and the woman is Bethsheba. Well, Bathsheba soon finds herself pregnant, and so Uriah is called to take a break from the war. He refuses to spend any time with his wife. So David sends him back to the war with a letter that Uriah is to be put in the hardest place in the battle, and at a certain time all the men would retreat but Uriah, exposing him to death. This command, and the following of it was a sin.
“Israel went to war and and besieged Rabba―but David remained in Jerusalem. In the mean time it happened that David arose from his bed after noon, and walked upon the roof of the king’s house. And he saw from the roof of his house a woman washing herself, and the woman was very beautiful. And the king sent and inquired who the woman was. And it was told him, that she was Bethsabee, the wife of Urias the Hethite. And David sent messengers and took her, and she came in to him, and he slept with her and she returned to her house having conceived a child. And she sent word and told David, and said: ‘I have conceived!’
“And David sent to Joab [on the battlefield], saying: ‘Send me Urias the Hethite!’ And Joab sent Urias to David. And David asked Urias how Joab was doing, and how the war was carried on. And David said to Urias: ‘Go into your house, and wash your feet!’ And Urias went out from the king’s house, but Urias slept outside the gate of the king's house, with the other servants of his lord, and went not down to his own house. And David was told by someone: ‘Urias went not to his house!’ And David said for Urias and asked: ‘Did you not come from your journey? Why did you not go down to your house?’ And Urias said to David: ‘The ark of God and Israel and Juda dwell in tents, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord abide upon the face of the earth: and you want me to go into my house, to eat and to drink, and to sleep with my wife? I will not do this thing!’ Then David said to Urias: ‘Stay here today and tomorrow I will send you back to the war!’ Urias stayed in Jerusalem that day and the next. And David called him to eat and to drink with him, and he made him drunk [in the hope that he could persuade Urias to go his house and sleep with his wife]. But Urias went out in the evening and slept on his couch with the servants of David, and did not go down into his house.
“And when the morning was come, David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Urias. David wrote in the letter: ‘Send Urias to the front of the battle, where the fight is strongest: and leave him there, so that he may be wounded and die!’ Wherefore as Joab was besieging the city, he put Urias in the place where he knew the bravest men were. And the men coming out of the city, fought against Joab, and there fell some of the people of the servants of David, and Urias the Hethite was killed also.” (2 Kings 11:1-17).
This command of David to have Urias killed, and the obeying of that command, was a sin to all parties involved in it. How many times have we commanded a sin to be committed? Perhaps at work―an employer telling an employee to lie, or fiddle the accounts, or hide a crime under threat of sacking/firing them the employee if they refuse to obey. Similarly, parents with children. Husbands with wives; or wives with husbands: “Do this―or else I will [enter whatever threat you choose]!” Or perhaps forcing someone to sin by saying something along the lines: “If you want this job, you are going to have to [enter whatever sin you choose]!”
(4) GUILT BY COUNSEL:
“The counsels of the wicked are deceitful!” (Proverbs 12:5).
“They deceived the children and made you transgress against the Lord” (Numbers 31:16).
You can participate in sin by counseling others to sin―they commit the sin, but you counseled it. We see in the Third Book of Kings, King Roboam asking his father’s advisors (his father is King Solomon) if he should be harder on the people or more lenient. King Solomon’s advisors fear that the people may revolt because of difficulties with the King and they suggest more leniency. But Roboam’s young advisors see that they might profit if the King is more harsh. So taking the bad advice of his young advisors to be more harsh on the people causes the nation of Israel to split and the eventual downfall of both nations.
“The multitude of Israel came and spoke to Roboam, saying: ‘Your father laid a grievous yoke upon us: now, therefore, take off a little of the grievous service of your father and of his most heavy yoke, which he put upon us, and we will serve you!’ And he said to them: ‘Go away till the third day, and then come to me again!’ And when the people was gone, King Roboam took counsel with the old men, that stood before King Solomon his father while he yet lived, and he said: ‘What counsel do you give me, that I may answer this people?’ They said to him: ‘If you will yield to this people today, and condescend to them, and grant their petition, and will speak gentle words to them, then they will be your servants always!’
“But he left the counsel of the old men, which they had given him, and consulted with the young men, that had been brought up with him, and stood before him. And he said to them: ‘What counsel do you give me, that I may answer this people, who have said to me: “Make the yoke which thy father put upon us lighter”? And the young men that had been brought up with him, said: ‘Thus shall you speak to this people, who have spoken to you, saying: “Your father made our yoke heavy, now ease it for us!” Thou shalt say to them: “My little finger is thicker than the back of my father! And now my father put a heavy yoke upon you―but I will add to your yoke! My father beat you with whips, but I will beat you with scorpions!”’
“So all the people came to Roboam the third day, as the king had appointed, saying: ‘Come to me again the third day.’ And the king answered the people roughly, leaving the counsel of the old men, which they had given him, and he spoke to them according to the counsel of the young men, saying: ‘My father made your yoke heavy, but I will add to your yoke! My father beat you with whips, but I will beat you with scorpions!’ And the king condescended not to the people” (3 Kings 12:1-15).
If we counsel someone to do something sinful, we participate in the sin that is committed.
(5) GUILT BY PARTAKING:
“Be ye not therefore partakers with the children of unbelief” (Ephesians 5:7).
“If thou didst see a thief thou didst run with him―and with adulterers thou hast been a partaker!” (Psalm 49:18).
We can clearly see the participation between Judas Iscariot, the Chief Priests, the Scribes and Pharisees, Pontius Pilate and Jewish crowd in the betrayal, arrest, trial, condemnation, sentencing and crucifixion of Our Lord (Matthew 26:14-16; 26:47-66; 27:11-26; Mark 14:43-49; 14:55-65; 15:1-15; Luke 22:2-6; 22:47-54; 22:63-71; 23:1-25; John 18:1-15; 18:19-24; 18:28-40; 19:1-16).
If you are conspiring in a sin, you are one of the sinners―even if you only play a minor role. For example, you might be “get-away-car-driver” in a bank robbery; or the “lookout” while some crime is committed. The modern world calls it “A partner in crime” or “a criminal accomplice.” This includes things like buying ‘fenced’ goods from a disreputable source, or buying stolen goods. It might involve supplying things to help a person commit a sin or crime.
(6) GUILT BY PROVOCATION:
In Genesis, chapter 39, we see Putiphar’s wife trying to tempt Joseph into committing adultery with her. He refuses and as a result is accused of rape and thrown into prison: “And Joseph was brought into Egypt, and Putiphar―a eunuch of Pharao, chief captain of the army, an Egyptian―bought him from the Ismaelites, by whom he was brought into Egypt. And Joseph found favor in the sight of his new master and ministered to him. And the Lord blessed the house of the Egyptian for Joseph's sake, and multiplied all his substance, both at home, and in the fields.
“Joseph was of a beautiful countenance, and handsome to behold. And after many days his mistress cast her eyes on Joseph, and said: ‘Sleep with me!’ But he, in no way consenting to that wicked act, said to her: ‘Behold, my master has delivered all things to me! Neither is there anything which is not in my power, or that he has not delivered to me! But you, who are his wife―how then can I do this wicked thing, and sin against my God?’ With such words as these―day by day―both the woman was importunate with the young man, and he refused the adultery.
“Now it happened on a certain day, that Joseph went into the house, and was doing some business without any man with Joseph. And she catching part of his garment, said: “Sleep with me!” But he leaving the garment in her hand, fled, and went out. And when the woman saw the garment in her hands, and herself disregarded, she called to her the men of her house, and said to them: ‘See! He has brought in a Hebrew, to abuse us! He came in to me, to sleep with me! And when I cried out, and he heard my voice, he left the garment that I held, and got himself out!’
“For a proof of her fidelity, she kept the garment, and showed it to her husband when he returned home. And she said to him: ‘The Hebrew servant, whom you brought, came to me to abuse me! And when he heard me cry out, he left the garment which I held, and fled out!’ His master hearing these things, and giving too much credit to his wife’s words, was very angry. And cast Joseph into the prison, where the king’s prisoners were kept, and he was there shut up” (Genesis 39:1-20).
Seduction is a provocation to sin. Taunting somebody can be a provocation for the sin of violence. Blackmail can be a provocation to the sin of suicide. Adultery can be a provocation to murder. We can provoke people to sin by telling lies about them; even telling embarrassing truths about them; we can provoke them to drunkenness, fighting, and a host of other sins. As Moral Theology tells us―the provoker is sometimes more guilty than the person who is provoked to sin.
(7) GUILT BY PRAISE OR FLATTERY:
“A man that speaketh to his friend with flattering and dissembling words, spreads a net for his feet” (Proverbs 29:5).
“She entangled him with many words, and drew him away with the flattery of her lips” (Proverbs 7:21).
“For they that are such, serve not Christ our Lord, but by pleasing speeches and good words, seduce the hearts of the innocent” (Romans 16:18).
“For there is no truth in their mouth; their heart is vain. They dealt deceitfully with their tongues!” (Psalm 5:10-11).
“They flattered him with their mouth and with their tongue they lied unto him!” (Psalm 77:36).
“He that rebukes a man shall afterward find favor with him, more than he that by a flattering tongue deceives him!” (Proverbs 28:23).
“We speak, not as pleasing men, but God! Neither have we used, at any time, the speech of flattery!” (1 Thessalonians 2:4-5).
Flattery does not, in itself, evoke an idea of sin―but it is. In essence, flattery is a lie. It is an exaggeration―and exaggerations are a distortion of truth. Furthermore, if we praise or flatter someone else’s sinful words or actions, then we make ourselves guilty of that sin―for we are praising the sin.
(8) GUILT BY DEFENSE OF THE ILL DONE:
“Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil! That put darkness for light, and light for darkness! That put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
We have all heard it―perhaps we have also said it! “He deserved to have it stolen!” … “It’s about time somebody beat him up―he had it coming!” … “Hey! You’re on hard times and he is so rich and stingy ― I can’t blame you for taking those few hundred dollars!” … and a thousand similar excuses for someone else’s sin ― especially when we don’t like the person or organization that was sinned against!
Yes―there are evil people in the world―but we cannot play at being God by imposing our “human providence” on them by defending sins against them. Two wrongs do not make a right. Nobody is allowed to commit sin so that some perceived ‘good’ can come out of it. Sin is indefensible and you cannot defend the indefensible.
(9) GUILT BY SILENCE:
This is “biggie” and easiest of all the sins to commit―SILENCE. “See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil!” … “Sit down and don’t rock the boat!” … “Who am I to judge?” … and thousands of other phrases that encourage us to keep silent about the sins of others. That does not mean that we should be revealing all the sins of everyone we know―but that we should not stand by and allow another person to sin without trying to correct that person and dissuade them from sinning.
“Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thy heart, but reprove him openly, lest thou incur sin through him!” (Leviticus 19:17).
“If a person be overtaken in any fault, you, who are spiritual, instruct such a person in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted!” (Galatians 6:1).
“If thy brother shall offend against thee, go, and rebuke him between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain thy brother. And if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, so that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may stand. And if he will not hear them, then tell the church. And if he will not hear the church, let him be to thee as the heathen and publican!” (Matthew 18:15-17).
“If any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and do not keep company with him, so that he may be ashamed. Yet do not esteem him as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother!” (2 Thessalonians 3:14-15).
“Reprove them that sin before all―that the rest also may have fear!” (1 Timothy 5:20).
“If thy brother sins against thee, reprove him; and if he do penance, forgive him. And if he sins against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day be converted unto thee, saying: ‘I repent!’ then forgive him” (Luke 17:3-4).
“If any of you err from the truth, and one convert him―he must know that he who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his own soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins!” (James 5:19-20).
Prudence―the Queen of all virtues―should be the virtue that dictates when we should admonish, warn, correct, instruct or rebuke, and when it is more prudent to remain silent. This is a really tough one! We are surrounded by institutional and individual sin, corruption, scandal, and bad influence. When you do speak the truth, you risk alienating people and worse. But when you don’t speak against sin, you risk your own spiritual well-being. St. Dominic Savio―whose First Holy Communion resolutions included: “Death rather than sin!”―gives us an example of when to speak out and when to keep silence. The following extracts are from the book on St. Dominic Savio by his teacher and mentor, St. John Bosco:
“He had a particular horror of anything in the nature of blasphemy or taking the name of God in vain; in fact, it worked upon him to such a degree that his health was quite affected by it. If he heard any words of that nature, as he passed along the streets, he would look down as though in sorrow, and make some pious ejaculation. A companion had often noticed him raise his cap and utter a few words of prayer when these blasphemies had been uttered. On another occasion, as he returned from school to the Oratory, he heard an elderly man utter some very blasphemous words. Dominic shuddered, and immediately offered up his pious ejaculation is reparation. But he was satisfied neither, nor disposed to let it pass.
Summoning all his courage, and not at all affected by human respect, he went up to the man and asked him to direct him to the Oratory. The boy’s gentle manner immediately softened the man’s anger, and he replied, very affably: “No, I am sorry, I don’t know where it is.”
“Then there is another favor you can do me,” said Dominic.
“Oh, what is it?”
The boy then came nearer and said in a low voice, only audible to the man in question: “It would be a great pleasure to me, if, when you are angry again, you would use words that are not blasphemous.”
The man was naturally astonished at such a request from a boy, but there was something of admiration in his surprise; he replied: “Well done, you are right, it is a very bad habit, that I am determined to overcome!”
“But Dominic’s manner with young offenders was different. He once heard two little boys quarrelling at their games outside the house, and one of them in his boyish anger used the Holy Name. Dominic was pained, as he always was when this occurred, so he stepped between the two boys and made them patch up their quarrel. Then he turned to the one that he had heard utter the name of God and said to him: “Come with me, there is something to be done, with which you will be pleased!” He took him off to a nearby church, and both went up to the altar. There he made the boy kneel down and ask pardon for his profane use of the Holy Name. The boy did not know the act of contrition, so Dominic made him say it after him, and added to it some pious ejaculations, to atone for the irreverence offered to God.
“Once when the boys were at play in an open space, a man came up and joined in the conversation. He was amusing at first, and had a story or two that suited the curiosity of young people. But when he had made himself at home a little; he went on to speak of religious subjects and priests and the like, and treated them with ridicule and disrespect. Many of the boys noticed the change in his conversation and went off to play; others stayed on. But then Dominic arrived. He stopped for a moment to listen, but immediately saw what the man was about, and without any hesitation said to the boys round him:
“Don’t stay here listening to such a degraded man! He is only trying to corrupt souls!”
“The boys were accustomed to Dominic’s influence in regard to such things, and all moved away, leaving the man alone. The latter retired discomfited, and never tried his persuasive arts in that neighborhood again.
“Dominic’s life gives us an incident full of heroism, and which is the more remarkable when his youth is taken into consideration, for he was only fourteen when he came to the Oratory. The occurrence in question concerns two of his school fellows, between whom a fierce quarrel had arisen, on account of some remarks on a point of family honor. The quarrel proceeded from the exchanging of insults to the giving of blows and stone throwing. Dominic came to hear of this quarrel, but he saw the difficulty of trying to interfere, for both boys were older and bigger than he was.
“However he found means for approaching each in turn, urged them to give up their hatred, and pointed out that anger and revenge were against the commandments of God; he wrote to each of them, threatening to acquaint their parents and their master, but the headstrong boys were not to be influenced; their minds had become so embittered that all entreaties were in vain. Apart from the risk of bodily injury to themselves, Dominic was most concerned with the offence against God, and he was eager to find some means of effectually interfering, but was perplexed as to the manner of doing so.
“He then seemed to have an inspiration. He waited for the boys after school, and contriving to speak to each alone, he said: “Since you will persist in this insane and sinful quarrel I ask you to accept one condition.” Each agreed, provided it did not interfere with their challenge of a fight with stones, and indulged in some very unbecoming language in reference to his enemy. The very language was enough to make Savio shudder, but desirous of preventing a greater evil he said: “The condition I wish to impose does not interfere with the challenge!”
“Then what is it?”
“I shall not tell you till you meet for the duel.”
“They thought he was making game of them, but Savio insisted that he was quite serious and that he would be on the scene. Neither could conjecture what his plan was.
“The place for the fight was a lonely spot outside the town. The boys, getting more and more incensed, were almost going to fight on the way, but Dominic managed to prevent them. The scene of action was reached, and the boys took up their positions at a little distance from each other, and had by them the stones they were to hurl. Now was Dominic’s time for mediation. He stepped in the middle and said:
“Before you commence to fight you must fulfill the condition you agreed upon.”
“So saying he drew out of his coat pocket a crucifix and held it up in the air. “I desire,” he said, “that each of you should look on this crucifix, and then if you will throw, you must throw the stone at me and say:
“Our Savior died pardoning his very persecutors; I, a sinner, am about to offend Him by an act of open revenge.”
“Having said this, he threw himself on his knees before the one who seemed most enraged, and said: “Throw your stone at me! Let me have the first blow!”
“A shiver seemed to go through the boy thus addressed. “No!” he exclaimed, “I couldn’t do it! I am not so mean as that! I have nothing against you!”
“On hearing this Dominic turned to the other boy, who had been watching in amazement, and made the same proposal to him. He too refused such a cowardly act.
“Then Dominic got up and said, with great earnestness: “You are both ashamed to commit this act of brutality against me―and yet you would commit it against God and lose your soul by grievous sin!” And he held up the crucifix again.
“This proved too much for the two boys; they were moved by his true Christian charity and his courage. One of them confessed that he felt a cold shiver, and felt thoroughly ashamed that he had forced a friend of Savio’s character to take such extreme measures. Wishing to make him some amends, he forgave entirely the boy with whom he had quarreled and promised to go to Confession at once. Thus Dominic secured a victory for charity and taught the boys a lesson.”
Hopefully those extracts from St. John Bosco’s book on St. Dominic Savio will give you some understanding on the prudence required in knowing when to be silent and when to speak out; and if it is necessary to speak out, then prudence again guides on how to speak out, what words to say and what other auxiliary actions to take.
Do you share blood or shed blood? Are you a benefactor of blood or a malefactor of blood? Have you given someone blood or have you taken someone’s blood? Cain took someone’s blood―the blood of his innocent brother, Abel―he shed Abel’s blood and thus became a malefactor. Christ shared His Blood―He gave His Blood for the redemption of guilty sinners―thus becoming our benefactor. The shedding of blood can lead to death and it can also lead to life. Sinners shed the blood of others and it can lead to eternal ‘death’ in Hell. Christ shed His own Blood and it can lead sinners to eternal life. “Your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity” (Isaias 59:3). “The Lord hates hands that shed innocent blood” (Proverbs 6:17). “Greater love than this no man has―that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). “Jesus Christ washed us from our sins in His own Blood” (Apocalypse 1:5).
Blood-Shedding Curse
“The Lord hates hands that shed innocent blood” (Proverbs 6:17). The very first act of bloodshed brought about a curse from God. Cain’s killing of his innocent brother Abel, led to God putting a curse upon Cain for the duration of his life: “And it came to pass after many days, that Cain offered, of the fruits of the earth, gifts to the Lord. Abel also offered of the firstlings of his flock, and of their fat. And the Lord had respect to Abel, and to his offerings―but to Cain and his offerings He had no respect. And Cain was exceedingly angry and his countenance fell. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Why art thou angry? And why is thy countenance fallen? If thou do well, shalt thou not receive? But if ill, shall not sin forthwith be present at the door? But the lust thereof shall be under thee, and thou shalt have dominion over it!’ And Cain said to Abel his brother: ‘Let us go forth abroad!’ And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is thy brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I know not! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to Cain: ‘What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth! Now, therefore, cursed shalt thou be upon the Earth, which has opened her mouth and received the blood of thy brother at thy hand!’” (Genesis 4:3-11).
We again see the curse of bloodshed in the New Testament. The term “blood curse” refers to a New Testament passage from the Gospel of Matthew, which describes events taking place in Pilate’s court before the crucifixion of Jesus, and specifically the willingness of the Jewish crowd to accept liability when screaming for Jesus’ Blood and death through crucifixion: “Pilate said to them: ‘What shall I do then with Jesus that is called Christ?’ They all said: ‘Let Him be crucified!’ The governor said to them: ‘Why? What evil has He done? But they cried out the more, saying: ‘Let Him be crucified!’ And Pilate seeing that he prevailed nothing, but that rather a tumult was made; taking water washed his hands before the people, saying: ‘I am innocent of the Blood of this just Man―look you to it!’ And the whole people answering, said: ‘His Blood be upon us and our children!’” (Matthew 27:22-25).
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Catena Aurea, quotes St. John Chrysostom as saying: “Behold the insanity of the Jews! Their passion and pertinacious obstinacy will not suffer them to see and understand, and they curse themselves, saying: ‘His blood be upon us and upon our children!’ Yet the merciful God did not ratify this sentence and did not literally comply with their impious prayer, but accepted any of them and of their children who repented; for Paul was of them, and many thousands of those who in Jerusalem were converted and believed.”
Biblically, to “have blood on your hands” means to be guilty of offending someone, or doing something wrong to them―not just literally killing them. Hence Jesus said: “He that shall scandalize one of these little ones that believe in Me, it would be better for him that a millstone be hung around his neck, and he be cast into the sea, so that he be drowned in the depth of the sea rather than he scandalize one of these little ones!’” (Matthew 18:6; Mark 9:41; Luke 17:1-2).
Is There a Blood-Curse on Abortions?
You could say that abortion often brings a curse upon the persons aborting the unborn babies―mother and abortionist alike. Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) Chief Exorcist of Rome, says that often women, who have had an abortion, end up being possessed by the devil: “Many times I have dealt with women whose sins included the crime of abortion.”
Monsignor Stephen Rossetti, the Chief Exorcist of the Archdiocese of Washington for over 13 years, in his book, Diary of an American Exorcist, writes: “‘Lucy’ [not her real name] is possessed and being tortured nightly by the demons. They taunt her, mark her body with scratches and burns, claim that they own her, and often twist her bad leg, which is excruciating for her. Demons are merciless and relentless. After a number of intense exorcism sessions, the demons were weakening. It seemed to me that they just might be weak enough to be compelled, by the power of Jesus, to reveal their names. Having their demonic names gives additional power to cast them out and suggests that the time of their exit is approaching. So I demanded again and again and again: “Dicas mihi nomen tuum” (“Tell me your name”). This line is a direct quote from the traditional Rite of Exorcism. The demon resisted mightily. Finally, with great reluctance, it gave up its name, “Abyzou.” I looked it up. Several sources concur: Abyzou (also spelled Abizou, Obizu, Obizuth, Obyzouth, Byzou) is the name of a demon in the Near East blamed for miscarriages and infant mortality.
“It made perfect sense. Sadly, Lucy had had an abortion. She sincerely repented, went to confession, and remained very contrite. While any and all sins are forgiven in the sacrament, this does not mean that associated demons are immediately cast out. Often, a time of purgation is necessary. Given the gravity of the sin and the resulting tragic child’s death, it was going to be a fight to cast out this demon. Abyzou taunted Lucy for having had an abortion. The demon told her she could never be forgiven. It played on her deep sense of guilt and attempted to drag her into the darkness of hopelessness and despair. This is typical demonic behavior. Demons not only tempt you to commit sin but then if you do, they taunt you and shame you for doing so. We assured Lucy that her sin was truly forgiven and said a prayer for her baby. Lucy may also need post-abortion counseling and/or work with post-abortion healing groups. In the midst of the session, one of the exorcists was inspired to hold up an icon of Our Lady of Guadalupe. The demon went into a huge convulsion. So, repeatedly we invoked Our Lady under this title and the demon convulsed every time the icon was held up. The effectiveness of this holy image is no accident. The icon of Our Lady of Guadalupe reveals Mary as a pregnant woman and she is often invoked under this title for unborn children. Moreover, under her feet is a symbol of the moon and darkness, a reference to the devil. Juan Diego, upon whose tilma the image appeared, referred to her in his native language as: “Te Coatlazopeuh” – “she who crushes the serpent.” An abortion is a grievous sin. But Lucy and all should know that there is a Divine source of healing and peace. We have a tremendous advocate in Our Lady of Guadalupe who treads upon Abyzou and brings God’s healing.” (Monsignor Stephen Rossetti, Diary of an American Exorcist).
Habitual Mortal Sin Merits Demonic Possession
In fact, the exorcists tell us that anyone who habitually lives in a state of mortal sin for a prolonged period is liable and worthy of demonic possession―but the mercy of God prevents that from happening in many cases. The exorcist, Fr. Gabriel Amorth says that participation in the act of abortion is an act that will leave a person open to demonic influence, if not outright demonic possession: “I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. Many times I have dealt with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. With time, the person is ‘hardened’ in sin and evil takes root. In all these stages, the way to healing can begin only with a sincere conversion.”
“The most common cause for Satanic attacks is the curse or spell. Around 90% of the cases that I deal with are precisely spells. The effects of the curse do not depend on the morality or immorality of the person who is the target of the curse―the one who unknowingly receives the curse. Suppose, for example, that someone you work with is envious of you and has a spell cast on you. You would get sick. A curse is an appeal to the devil for harm to come to someone or something. It is done by ‘mediums’ who are in contact with the devil. It is possible for a person to go to a magician, a witch or someone related to the devil and pay him to call a curse down upon a certain person. Both the person who orders or asks for a curse to placed on someone or something, and the ‘medium’ who does it, are guilty of this sin. If the person is in the state of grace and prays, it is difficult for the curse to take effect. But if the person is less protected from the spiritual point of view [= not in a state of grace], it is easier for the curse to affect him.”
Human Sacrifice
Human sacrifice appears to be as old as humanity itself. From prehistory to the 21st century, human sacrifice has been practiced on a number of different occasions all throughout the world by numerous cultures in Europe, the Americas, Asia, Africa, and Oceania―among them being the Chinese, Japanese, Incas, Mayas, Aztecs, Egyptians, Hawaiians, Celts, Druids, Greeks, Romans, Gauls, Danes, Vikings, Germans, Russians, many African cultures, etc. Archaeologists have found evidence of it at sites across the globe.
The various reasons behind human sacrifice are the same that motivate religious sacrifice in general. Human sacrifice is typically intended to bring good fortune and to pacify the gods. Human sacrifice is the act of killing one or more humans as part of a ritual, which is usually intended to bring good fortune, to please or appease gods, a human ruler, an authoritative/priestly figure or spirits of dead ancestors, or as an act of public justice by capital punishment, or as a retainer sacrifice, wherein a monarch's servants are killed in order for them to continue to serve their master in the next life.
In 1487, the great Templo Mayor was dedicated in the main Aztec city of Tenochtitlan with a four-day celebration. How many were sacrificed during that time is a subject of scholarly speculation: some put the figure as low as 10,000 or 20,000, several others put it as high as 80,400 people sacrificed during those four days. Many reputable scholars today put the number as high as 250,000 human sacrifices per year for the whole Aztec Empire. All Aztecs cities contained temples dedicated to their gods and all of them saw human sacrifices. This is just one instance from thousands or more such sacrifices throughout the history of the world.
Holy Scripture clearly condemns such satanic practices:
“They have done to their gods all the abominations which the Lord abhors, offering their sons and daughters, and burning them with fire! You shall not do in like manner to the Lord your God!” (Deuteronomy 12:31). “All the gods of the Gentiles are devils!” (Psalm 95:5) ... “They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils. They shed innocent blood―the blood of their sons and of their daughters which they sacrificed to the idols!” (Psalm 105:37-41). “The things which the heathens sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God. And I would not that you should be made partakers with devils” (1 Corinthians 10:20) ... “They sacrificed to devils and not to God!” (Deuteronomy 32:17) ... “They shall no more sacrifice their victims to devils” (Leviticus 17:7) … “You shall not give any of your children to be consecrated to the idol Moloch, nor defile the name of thy God!” (Leviticus 18:21). “All the gods of the Gentiles are devils!” (Psalm 95:5)
“And they sacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils. They shed innocent blood―the blood of their sons and of their daughters which they sacrificed to the idols of Chanaan. And the land was polluted with blood and was defiled with their works! And the Lord was exceedingly angry with His people and He abhorred His inheritance! And He delivered them into the hands of the nations and those that hated them had dominion over them!” (Psalm 105:37-41).
“King Manasses made his son pass through fire, and he used divination, and observed omens, and appointed pythons, and multiplied soothsayers to do evil before the Lord, and to provoke Him” (4 Kings 21:6).
“The king of Moab took his eldest son and offered him for a burnt offering. And there was great indignation in Israel, they departed from him” (4 Kings 3:27).
“King Achaz consecrated his son, making him pass through the fire―according to the idols of the nations, which the Lord destroyed” (4 Kings 16:3).
“And you, says the Lord God, have taken your sons and your daughters, whom you have borne to Me, and have sacrificed the same to them to be devoured. You have sacrificed and given My children to them, consecrating them by fire! … Blood is on their hands―they have committed fornication with their idols, and their children, whom they bore to Me, they have offered to them to be devoured!” (Ezechiel 16:20-21; 23:37).
“Beware lest you have a mind to imitate the abominations of those nations! Neither let there be found among you any one that shall expiate his son or daughter, making them to pass through the fire, or anyone that consults soothsayers, or observes dreams and omens, neither let there be any wizard, nor charmer, nor any one that consults pythonic spirits, or fortune tellers, or that seek the truth from the dead. For the Lord abhors all these things, and for these abominations He will destroy them!” (Deuteronomy 18:9-12).
Satanic Sacrifices Continue Today
Satan likes to “ape” God whenever he can. Thus he “apes” God by his satanic churches, his satanic rituals, and his satanic sacrifices. Even today, the satanic ritual of human sacrifice―of men, women and children―continues in shrouded secrecy. The mainstream media will never call it “satanic” and merely groups such human sacrifices with “murders” or “killings.” Likewise the sexual abuse of, not only children, but also adults―often culminating with the ‘sacrifice’ of their lives.
Another form of satanic sacrifice―even though it is indirect―is that of abortion. The child sacrifices in earlier centuries are a mere shadow or “a drop in the ocean” compared to satanic slaying of babies today. In the USA, it has varied from over 1,300,000 (1.3 million) to 900,000 in the last 25 years. Since 1980, there have been over 1,700 million abortions worldwide. The current worldwide rate is around 56 million babies per year or around 100 babies per minute, which is almost 2 babies per every single second of the day. That is one hell of a bloodbath!
Abortion pills are now responsible for 63% of all abortions in the United States. The abortion pill RU-486, also known by several other names such Mifepristone, Mifeprex, and Mifegyne―was developed by a Jewish scientist, who was born Étienne Blum, in Strasbourg, in 1926, and later took the name Émile Baulieu. He is known as the father of the abortion pill. It was first introduced in the ‘Catholic’ country of France in 1987. ‘Great’ Britain legally allowed its use in 1991; and in Sweden in 1992. Soon after becoming U.S. President in 1993, Bill Clinton ordered the U.S. Health and Human Services Department to investigate Mifepristone’s potential as an abortion medication, and also pressured Hoeschst (the manufacturer) to make the RU-486 medication available in the United States. It was eventually introduced in the USA in 2000. Popularity for the abortion pill (medicated abortions) grew from year to year in the USA. Medication abortions voluntarily reported by 33 U.S. states have increased as a percentage of total abortions every year since the approval of Mifepristone: 1.0% in 2000; 2.9% in 2001; 5.2% in 2002; 7.9% in 2003; 9.3% in 2004; 9.9% in 2005; 10.6% in 2006; 13.1% in 2007; 17% in 2008; 24% in 2011; 31% in 2014; 39% in 2017; 54% in 2020; and 63% in 2023.
During the recent Covid pandemic, the F.D.A. suspended a rule requiring health-care professionals to dispense the medication in person—a change that the agency has since made permanent. Though a prescription is needed, any pharmacy can now issue abortion pills. Abortion pills can be taken at home, so those who need them may not require transportation, child care, or significant time away from work or school. They are safe, effective, and can be mailed or passed around, making them relatively difficult for authorities to trace and therefore they fly by as unknown and unreported abortions.
Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
Most people have become and are becoming increasingly indifferent, tolerant or even favorable to abortion. Amongst those who disagree with abortion, there is nevertheless a growing attitude of “It’s not my problem! I don’t do it! I don’t advocate it! I can’t do anything about it!” But is that really true? Can we do something about it? “Am I my brother’s keeper?” was Cain’s lame excuse when asked by God as to the whereabouts of his brother Abel, whom he had killed (Genesis 4:9). It is not only by direct killing that we are guilty of robbing someone of his or her life. We can also be guilty by seeing someone in grave need and doing nothing about it.
Our Lord’s parable about the sheep and the goats point out the sins of indifference and negligence with regard to the needs of others: “And when the Son of man shall come in His majesty, and all the angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the seat of His majesty and all nations shall be gathered together before Him. And He shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on His left. Then shall the King say to them that shall be on His right hand: ‘Come, ye blessed of My Father, possess the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world! For I was hungry and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; I was naked and you covered Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me!’ Then shall the just answer him, saying: ‘Lord! When did we see Thee hungry and fed Thee; thirsty and gave Thee drink? And when did we see Thee a stranger and took Thee in? Or naked and covered thee? Or when did we see Thee sick or in prison and came to Thee? And the King answering, shall say to them: ‘Amen I say to you―as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!’
“Then He shall say to them that shall be on His left hand: ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels! For I was hungry and you gave me not to eat; I was thirsty and you gave Me not to drink; I was a stranger and you took Me not in; naked and you covered Me not; sick and in prison and you did not visit Me!’ Then they also shall answer him, saying: ‘Lord! When did we see Thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to Thee?’ Then He shall answer them, saying: ‘Amen I say to you―as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!’ And these shall go into everlasting punishment; but the just shall go into life everlasting” (Matthew 25:31-46).
The parable of the Good Samaritan dovetails perfectly with the above parable: “A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, who also stripped him, and having wounded him went away, leaving him half dead. And it chanced, that a certain priest went down the same way: and seeing him, passed by. In like manner also a Levite, when he was near the place and saw him, passed by. But a certain Samaritan being on his journey, came near him; and seeing him, was moved with compassion. And going up to him, bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine: and setting him upon his own beast, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And the next day he took out two pence, and gave to the host, and said: ‘Take care of him; and whatsoever thou shalt spend over and above, I, at my return, will repay thee!’ Which of these three, in thy opinion, was neighbor to him that fell among the robbers?’ But he said: ‘He that showed mercy to him.’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Go, and do thou in like manner!’” (Luke 10:30-37).
Parable in Real Life
Back in July of 2017, five teenagers taunted a drowning man as they recorded his death in Florida. In a video recorded and posted on YouTube by the teens – ages 14 to 19 – they are laughing as Jamel Dunn, 31, struggled to stay afloat in a pond near his family’s home in Cocoa. They stood by for 10 minutes without rendering aid while he was drowning. The teens taunted the man that he was “going to die” and said they were not going to help him. Instead, the teens chuckled as they recorded the victim’s final moments. During a subsequent police interview the teens admitted they were “smoking weed.”
The Cocoa Police Department had recommended to the state attorney’s office that the group face charges of failure to report a death. But the State Attorney’s office announced that the group would not be criminally prosecuted. Todd Brown, a spokesman for the Office of the State Attorney, stated: “As previously acknowledged by the Cocoa Police Department and this office, there is no Florida law that requires a person to provide emergency assistance under the facts of this case. A law intended to address this type of situation was proposed during this year’s legislative session, but failed to receive sufficient support to pass.”
State Attorney Phil Archer of the 18th Judicial Circuit, said: “Unfortunately, Florida law does not address this behavior and we are ethically restrained from pursuing criminal charges without a reasonable belief of proving a crime beyond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt. I know that everyone was sickened by the callous disregard for human life exhibited by these young people. We can only hope that this was an isolated and rare circumstance that will never happen again!”
Jamel Dunn’s sister, Simone McIntosh, said: “All it took is one call, one second, and a life could have been saved! He clearly screamed for help not once, not twice, but three times.”
Some states have so-called ‘good Samaritan’ laws that protect people who do take action. But only a few states actually have laws requiring residents to act if they see a crime. In Minnesota, for example, there’s a “duty to assist” provision. According to the law, anyone “at the scene of an emergency” who knows that someone “has suffered grave physical harm, or could be hurt” must provide “reasonable assistance.” Minnesota lawmakers define reasonable assistance as calling or attempting to call police or medical personnel, according to state statute. Many foreign countries―including Denmark, Germany and France―have “duty to assist” statues or similar laws.
Guilty of the Sins of Others?
All of the above should remind of what the Church teaches about sharing in the guilt of the sins of other people. Holy Scripture warns us: “Be not a partaker of other men’s sins!” (1 Timothy 5:22). There are nine chief ways to be guilty of the sin of another: (1) by consent; (2) by concealment; (3) by command; (4) by counsel; (5) by partaking; (6) by provocation; (7) by praise or flattery; (8) by defense of the ill done; (9) by silence.
Let us apply the above to some present-day scenarios and see if our hands are bloodied by the sins of others―whether it is family, workplace, community or even nationally and internationally―and examine our personal reactions to them.
(1) GUILT BY CONSENT:
In Holy Scripture we Adam consent to Eve’s offer to eat the “forbidden fruit” that she herself had just tasted and eaten. Then God said to Adam: “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you that you should not eat, then cursed is the earth in your work; with labor and toil you shall eat thereof all the days of thy life!” (Genesis 3:17).
In the Acts of the Apostles, we see that Saul (who would become St. Paul) consented to the stoning of St. Stephen: “And casting him forth without the city, they stoned him; and the witnesses laid down their garments at the feet of a young man, whose name was Saul. And they stoned Stephen, who invoked and said: ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!’ And falling on his knees, he cried with a loud voice, saying: ‘Lord, lay not this sin to their charge!’ And when he had said this, he fell asleep in the Lord. And Saul was consenting to his death” (Acts 7:57-59).
Consent to the sins of others can be explicit consent or implicit consent. We can explicitly consent by saying something that indicates our agreement to what has been done, is being done, or will be done. Or we implicitly give consent in a multitude of ways―such as nodding in agreement; smiling or laughing; applauding; showing no disgust or disapproval, etc. When a child sees that its parents do or say nothing concerning the child’s bad behavior, he takes it as implicit consent. Another example would be if someone were to do something sinful and we just stood by and watched.
(2) GUILT BY CONCEALMENT:
“Don’t worry! I won’t tell anyone that you did it!” How many sins have been enabled by such a statement? In Genesis, chapter 37, when Jacob’s sons sold Joseph as a slave and then concealed and lied to their father about what happened:
“Joseph went after his brothers and found them in Dothain. And when they saw him afar off, before he came near them, they thought to kill him, and said one to another: ‘Behold the dreamer is coming! Come, let us kill him, and cast him into some old pit! And we will say: “Some evil beast has devoured him!”’ And Ruben, hearing this, endeavored to deliver him out of their hands, and said: ‘Do not take away his life, nor shed his blood―but cast him into this pit, that is in the wilderness, and keep your hands harmless!’ Now he said this, being desirous to deliver Joseph out of their hands and to restore him to his father. As soon as Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his outside coat of many colors and cast him into an old pit, where there was no water. They saw some Ismaelites on their way coming from Galaad, with their camels, carrying spices, and balm, and myrrh to Egypt. And Juda said to his brothers: ‘What will it profit us to kill our brother, and conceal his blood? It is better that he be sold to the Ismaelites, and that our hands be not defiled―for he is our brother and our flesh!’ His brethren agreed to his words and sold him to the Ismaelites, for twenty pieces of silver and they led him into Egypt. And Ruben, later returning to the pit, could not find Joseph. And the brothers took Joseph’s coat and dipped it in the blood of a goat, which they had killed―so as to carry it to their father, and to say: ‘This we have found! See whether it be your son’s coat, or not!’ And the father acknowledging it, said: ‘It is my son’s coat! An evil wild beast has eaten him! A beast has devoured Joseph! And tearing his garments, he put on sackcloth, mourning for his son a long time” (Genesis 37:17-34).
Ruben ― the eldest ― should have said something to his father, Jacob, and a rescue attempt would have been possible. By the very fact that Ruben didn’t say anything to his father and concealed what happened to Joseph ― so even though Ruben did not consent to the sin of his brothers, this was a sin as well due to his concealment of the truth about the fate and the whereabouts of Joseph.
How many times have we hidden the sins of others when we could have helped them more by revealing the sin. This is especially so in many a court case, where we commit perjury when asked about the crime of another person―and we answer that we know nothing, when in fact we know everything. In such circumstances, when we hide a serious sin of someone else who has a right to know (judge, jury), then this is a sin as well and we become accomplices in the crime we are hiding.
However, not everyone has a right to know about the sins of others. We are not obliged to reveal the sins of other to every Tom, Dick or Harry who may ask! As Moral Theology states―even a sinner has right to good name and reputation. Being forced to reveal everyone’s sin to everyone else would make life intolerable and unlivable. That is why the Church has the “Seal of Confession” which forbids the priest, under pain of excommunication, from revealing the sins of his penitents.
(3) GUILT BY COMMAND:
“You have departed out of the way, and have caused many to stumble at the law!” (Malachias 2:8).
“He that shall scandalize [=make someone sin] one of these little ones that believe in Me, it were better for him that a millstone should be hung around his neck, and that he should be drowned in the depth of the sea!” (Matthew 18:6-7).
If we command someone to do something sinful, that command is sinful. A Biblical example is in 2 Kings, chapter 11.
While King David’s army was at war, David commits adultery with one of the soldier’s wives. The soldier’s name is Uriah and the woman is Bethsheba. Well, Bathsheba soon finds herself pregnant, and so Uriah is called to take a break from the war. He refuses to spend any time with his wife. So David sends him back to the war with a letter that Uriah is to be put in the hardest place in the battle, and at a certain time all the men would retreat but Uriah, exposing him to death. This command, and the following of it was a sin.
“Israel went to war and and besieged Rabba―but David remained in Jerusalem. In the mean time it happened that David arose from his bed after noon, and walked upon the roof of the king’s house. And he saw from the roof of his house a woman washing herself, and the woman was very beautiful. And the king sent and inquired who the woman was. And it was told him, that she was Bethsabee, the wife of Urias the Hethite. And David sent messengers and took her, and she came in to him, and he slept with her and she returned to her house having conceived a child. And she sent word and told David, and said: ‘I have conceived!’
“And David sent to Joab [on the battlefield], saying: ‘Send me Urias the Hethite!’ And Joab sent Urias to David. And David asked Urias how Joab was doing, and how the war was carried on. And David said to Urias: ‘Go into your house, and wash your feet!’ And Urias went out from the king’s house, but Urias slept outside the gate of the king's house, with the other servants of his lord, and went not down to his own house. And David was told by someone: ‘Urias went not to his house!’ And David said for Urias and asked: ‘Did you not come from your journey? Why did you not go down to your house?’ And Urias said to David: ‘The ark of God and Israel and Juda dwell in tents, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord abide upon the face of the earth: and you want me to go into my house, to eat and to drink, and to sleep with my wife? I will not do this thing!’ Then David said to Urias: ‘Stay here today and tomorrow I will send you back to the war!’ Urias stayed in Jerusalem that day and the next. And David called him to eat and to drink with him, and he made him drunk [in the hope that he could persuade Urias to go his house and sleep with his wife]. But Urias went out in the evening and slept on his couch with the servants of David, and did not go down into his house.
“And when the morning was come, David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Urias. David wrote in the letter: ‘Send Urias to the front of the battle, where the fight is strongest: and leave him there, so that he may be wounded and die!’ Wherefore as Joab was besieging the city, he put Urias in the place where he knew the bravest men were. And the men coming out of the city, fought against Joab, and there fell some of the people of the servants of David, and Urias the Hethite was killed also.” (2 Kings 11:1-17).
This command of David to have Urias killed, and the obeying of that command, was a sin to all parties involved in it. How many times have we commanded a sin to be committed? Perhaps at work―an employer telling an employee to lie, or fiddle the accounts, or hide a crime under threat of sacking/firing them the employee if they refuse to obey. Similarly, parents with children. Husbands with wives; or wives with husbands: “Do this―or else I will [enter whatever threat you choose]!” Or perhaps forcing someone to sin by saying something along the lines: “If you want this job, you are going to have to [enter whatever sin you choose]!”
(4) GUILT BY COUNSEL:
“The counsels of the wicked are deceitful!” (Proverbs 12:5).
“They deceived the children and made you transgress against the Lord” (Numbers 31:16).
You can participate in sin by counseling others to sin―they commit the sin, but you counseled it. We see in the Third Book of Kings, King Roboam asking his father’s advisors (his father is King Solomon) if he should be harder on the people or more lenient. King Solomon’s advisors fear that the people may revolt because of difficulties with the King and they suggest more leniency. But Roboam’s young advisors see that they might profit if the King is more harsh. So taking the bad advice of his young advisors to be more harsh on the people causes the nation of Israel to split and the eventual downfall of both nations.
“The multitude of Israel came and spoke to Roboam, saying: ‘Your father laid a grievous yoke upon us: now, therefore, take off a little of the grievous service of your father and of his most heavy yoke, which he put upon us, and we will serve you!’ And he said to them: ‘Go away till the third day, and then come to me again!’ And when the people was gone, King Roboam took counsel with the old men, that stood before King Solomon his father while he yet lived, and he said: ‘What counsel do you give me, that I may answer this people?’ They said to him: ‘If you will yield to this people today, and condescend to them, and grant their petition, and will speak gentle words to them, then they will be your servants always!’
“But he left the counsel of the old men, which they had given him, and consulted with the young men, that had been brought up with him, and stood before him. And he said to them: ‘What counsel do you give me, that I may answer this people, who have said to me: “Make the yoke which thy father put upon us lighter”? And the young men that had been brought up with him, said: ‘Thus shall you speak to this people, who have spoken to you, saying: “Your father made our yoke heavy, now ease it for us!” Thou shalt say to them: “My little finger is thicker than the back of my father! And now my father put a heavy yoke upon you―but I will add to your yoke! My father beat you with whips, but I will beat you with scorpions!”’
“So all the people came to Roboam the third day, as the king had appointed, saying: ‘Come to me again the third day.’ And the king answered the people roughly, leaving the counsel of the old men, which they had given him, and he spoke to them according to the counsel of the young men, saying: ‘My father made your yoke heavy, but I will add to your yoke! My father beat you with whips, but I will beat you with scorpions!’ And the king condescended not to the people” (3 Kings 12:1-15).
If we counsel someone to do something sinful, we participate in the sin that is committed.
(5) GUILT BY PARTAKING:
“Be ye not therefore partakers with the children of unbelief” (Ephesians 5:7).
“If thou didst see a thief thou didst run with him―and with adulterers thou hast been a partaker!” (Psalm 49:18).
We can clearly see the participation between Judas Iscariot, the Chief Priests, the Scribes and Pharisees, Pontius Pilate and Jewish crowd in the betrayal, arrest, trial, condemnation, sentencing and crucifixion of Our Lord (Matthew 26:14-16; 26:47-66; 27:11-26; Mark 14:43-49; 14:55-65; 15:1-15; Luke 22:2-6; 22:47-54; 22:63-71; 23:1-25; John 18:1-15; 18:19-24; 18:28-40; 19:1-16).
If you are conspiring in a sin, you are one of the sinners―even if you only play a minor role. For example, you might be “get-away-car-driver” in a bank robbery; or the “lookout” while some crime is committed. The modern world calls it “A partner in crime” or “a criminal accomplice.” This includes things like buying ‘fenced’ goods from a disreputable source, or buying stolen goods. It might involve supplying things to help a person commit a sin or crime.
(6) GUILT BY PROVOCATION:
In Genesis, chapter 39, we see Putiphar’s wife trying to tempt Joseph into committing adultery with her. He refuses and as a result is accused of rape and thrown into prison: “And Joseph was brought into Egypt, and Putiphar―a eunuch of Pharao, chief captain of the army, an Egyptian―bought him from the Ismaelites, by whom he was brought into Egypt. And Joseph found favor in the sight of his new master and ministered to him. And the Lord blessed the house of the Egyptian for Joseph's sake, and multiplied all his substance, both at home, and in the fields.
“Joseph was of a beautiful countenance, and handsome to behold. And after many days his mistress cast her eyes on Joseph, and said: ‘Sleep with me!’ But he, in no way consenting to that wicked act, said to her: ‘Behold, my master has delivered all things to me! Neither is there anything which is not in my power, or that he has not delivered to me! But you, who are his wife―how then can I do this wicked thing, and sin against my God?’ With such words as these―day by day―both the woman was importunate with the young man, and he refused the adultery.
“Now it happened on a certain day, that Joseph went into the house, and was doing some business without any man with Joseph. And she catching part of his garment, said: “Sleep with me!” But he leaving the garment in her hand, fled, and went out. And when the woman saw the garment in her hands, and herself disregarded, she called to her the men of her house, and said to them: ‘See! He has brought in a Hebrew, to abuse us! He came in to me, to sleep with me! And when I cried out, and he heard my voice, he left the garment that I held, and got himself out!’
“For a proof of her fidelity, she kept the garment, and showed it to her husband when he returned home. And she said to him: ‘The Hebrew servant, whom you brought, came to me to abuse me! And when he heard me cry out, he left the garment which I held, and fled out!’ His master hearing these things, and giving too much credit to his wife’s words, was very angry. And cast Joseph into the prison, where the king’s prisoners were kept, and he was there shut up” (Genesis 39:1-20).
Seduction is a provocation to sin. Taunting somebody can be a provocation for the sin of violence. Blackmail can be a provocation to the sin of suicide. Adultery can be a provocation to murder. We can provoke people to sin by telling lies about them; even telling embarrassing truths about them; we can provoke them to drunkenness, fighting, and a host of other sins. As Moral Theology tells us―the provoker is sometimes more guilty than the person who is provoked to sin.
(7) GUILT BY PRAISE OR FLATTERY:
“A man that speaketh to his friend with flattering and dissembling words, spreads a net for his feet” (Proverbs 29:5).
“She entangled him with many words, and drew him away with the flattery of her lips” (Proverbs 7:21).
“For they that are such, serve not Christ our Lord, but by pleasing speeches and good words, seduce the hearts of the innocent” (Romans 16:18).
“For there is no truth in their mouth; their heart is vain. They dealt deceitfully with their tongues!” (Psalm 5:10-11).
“They flattered him with their mouth and with their tongue they lied unto him!” (Psalm 77:36).
“He that rebukes a man shall afterward find favor with him, more than he that by a flattering tongue deceives him!” (Proverbs 28:23).
“We speak, not as pleasing men, but God! Neither have we used, at any time, the speech of flattery!” (1 Thessalonians 2:4-5).
Flattery does not, in itself, evoke an idea of sin―but it is. In essence, flattery is a lie. It is an exaggeration―and exaggerations are a distortion of truth. Furthermore, if we praise or flatter someone else’s sinful words or actions, then we make ourselves guilty of that sin―for we are praising the sin.
(8) GUILT BY DEFENSE OF THE ILL DONE:
“Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil! That put darkness for light, and light for darkness! That put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
We have all heard it―perhaps we have also said it! “He deserved to have it stolen!” … “It’s about time somebody beat him up―he had it coming!” … “Hey! You’re on hard times and he is so rich and stingy ― I can’t blame you for taking those few hundred dollars!” … and a thousand similar excuses for someone else’s sin ― especially when we don’t like the person or organization that was sinned against!
Yes―there are evil people in the world―but we cannot play at being God by imposing our “human providence” on them by defending sins against them. Two wrongs do not make a right. Nobody is allowed to commit sin so that some perceived ‘good’ can come out of it. Sin is indefensible and you cannot defend the indefensible.
(9) GUILT BY SILENCE:
This is “biggie” and easiest of all the sins to commit―SILENCE. “See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil!” … “Sit down and don’t rock the boat!” … “Who am I to judge?” … and thousands of other phrases that encourage us to keep silent about the sins of others. That does not mean that we should be revealing all the sins of everyone we know―but that we should not stand by and allow another person to sin without trying to correct that person and dissuade them from sinning.
“Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thy heart, but reprove him openly, lest thou incur sin through him!” (Leviticus 19:17).
“If a person be overtaken in any fault, you, who are spiritual, instruct such a person in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted!” (Galatians 6:1).
“If thy brother shall offend against thee, go, and rebuke him between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain thy brother. And if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, so that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may stand. And if he will not hear them, then tell the church. And if he will not hear the church, let him be to thee as the heathen and publican!” (Matthew 18:15-17).
“If any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and do not keep company with him, so that he may be ashamed. Yet do not esteem him as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother!” (2 Thessalonians 3:14-15).
“Reprove them that sin before all―that the rest also may have fear!” (1 Timothy 5:20).
“If thy brother sins against thee, reprove him; and if he do penance, forgive him. And if he sins against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day be converted unto thee, saying: ‘I repent!’ then forgive him” (Luke 17:3-4).
“If any of you err from the truth, and one convert him―he must know that he who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his own soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins!” (James 5:19-20).
Prudence―the Queen of all virtues―should be the virtue that dictates when we should admonish, warn, correct, instruct or rebuke, and when it is more prudent to remain silent. This is a really tough one! We are surrounded by institutional and individual sin, corruption, scandal, and bad influence. When you do speak the truth, you risk alienating people and worse. But when you don’t speak against sin, you risk your own spiritual well-being. St. Dominic Savio―whose First Holy Communion resolutions included: “Death rather than sin!”―gives us an example of when to speak out and when to keep silence. The following extracts are from the book on St. Dominic Savio by his teacher and mentor, St. John Bosco:
“He had a particular horror of anything in the nature of blasphemy or taking the name of God in vain; in fact, it worked upon him to such a degree that his health was quite affected by it. If he heard any words of that nature, as he passed along the streets, he would look down as though in sorrow, and make some pious ejaculation. A companion had often noticed him raise his cap and utter a few words of prayer when these blasphemies had been uttered. On another occasion, as he returned from school to the Oratory, he heard an elderly man utter some very blasphemous words. Dominic shuddered, and immediately offered up his pious ejaculation is reparation. But he was satisfied neither, nor disposed to let it pass.
Summoning all his courage, and not at all affected by human respect, he went up to the man and asked him to direct him to the Oratory. The boy’s gentle manner immediately softened the man’s anger, and he replied, very affably: “No, I am sorry, I don’t know where it is.”
“Then there is another favor you can do me,” said Dominic.
“Oh, what is it?”
The boy then came nearer and said in a low voice, only audible to the man in question: “It would be a great pleasure to me, if, when you are angry again, you would use words that are not blasphemous.”
The man was naturally astonished at such a request from a boy, but there was something of admiration in his surprise; he replied: “Well done, you are right, it is a very bad habit, that I am determined to overcome!”
“But Dominic’s manner with young offenders was different. He once heard two little boys quarrelling at their games outside the house, and one of them in his boyish anger used the Holy Name. Dominic was pained, as he always was when this occurred, so he stepped between the two boys and made them patch up their quarrel. Then he turned to the one that he had heard utter the name of God and said to him: “Come with me, there is something to be done, with which you will be pleased!” He took him off to a nearby church, and both went up to the altar. There he made the boy kneel down and ask pardon for his profane use of the Holy Name. The boy did not know the act of contrition, so Dominic made him say it after him, and added to it some pious ejaculations, to atone for the irreverence offered to God.
“Once when the boys were at play in an open space, a man came up and joined in the conversation. He was amusing at first, and had a story or two that suited the curiosity of young people. But when he had made himself at home a little; he went on to speak of religious subjects and priests and the like, and treated them with ridicule and disrespect. Many of the boys noticed the change in his conversation and went off to play; others stayed on. But then Dominic arrived. He stopped for a moment to listen, but immediately saw what the man was about, and without any hesitation said to the boys round him:
“Don’t stay here listening to such a degraded man! He is only trying to corrupt souls!”
“The boys were accustomed to Dominic’s influence in regard to such things, and all moved away, leaving the man alone. The latter retired discomfited, and never tried his persuasive arts in that neighborhood again.
“Dominic’s life gives us an incident full of heroism, and which is the more remarkable when his youth is taken into consideration, for he was only fourteen when he came to the Oratory. The occurrence in question concerns two of his school fellows, between whom a fierce quarrel had arisen, on account of some remarks on a point of family honor. The quarrel proceeded from the exchanging of insults to the giving of blows and stone throwing. Dominic came to hear of this quarrel, but he saw the difficulty of trying to interfere, for both boys were older and bigger than he was.
“However he found means for approaching each in turn, urged them to give up their hatred, and pointed out that anger and revenge were against the commandments of God; he wrote to each of them, threatening to acquaint their parents and their master, but the headstrong boys were not to be influenced; their minds had become so embittered that all entreaties were in vain. Apart from the risk of bodily injury to themselves, Dominic was most concerned with the offence against God, and he was eager to find some means of effectually interfering, but was perplexed as to the manner of doing so.
“He then seemed to have an inspiration. He waited for the boys after school, and contriving to speak to each alone, he said: “Since you will persist in this insane and sinful quarrel I ask you to accept one condition.” Each agreed, provided it did not interfere with their challenge of a fight with stones, and indulged in some very unbecoming language in reference to his enemy. The very language was enough to make Savio shudder, but desirous of preventing a greater evil he said: “The condition I wish to impose does not interfere with the challenge!”
“Then what is it?”
“I shall not tell you till you meet for the duel.”
“They thought he was making game of them, but Savio insisted that he was quite serious and that he would be on the scene. Neither could conjecture what his plan was.
“The place for the fight was a lonely spot outside the town. The boys, getting more and more incensed, were almost going to fight on the way, but Dominic managed to prevent them. The scene of action was reached, and the boys took up their positions at a little distance from each other, and had by them the stones they were to hurl. Now was Dominic’s time for mediation. He stepped in the middle and said:
“Before you commence to fight you must fulfill the condition you agreed upon.”
“So saying he drew out of his coat pocket a crucifix and held it up in the air. “I desire,” he said, “that each of you should look on this crucifix, and then if you will throw, you must throw the stone at me and say:
“Our Savior died pardoning his very persecutors; I, a sinner, am about to offend Him by an act of open revenge.”
“Having said this, he threw himself on his knees before the one who seemed most enraged, and said: “Throw your stone at me! Let me have the first blow!”
“A shiver seemed to go through the boy thus addressed. “No!” he exclaimed, “I couldn’t do it! I am not so mean as that! I have nothing against you!”
“On hearing this Dominic turned to the other boy, who had been watching in amazement, and made the same proposal to him. He too refused such a cowardly act.
“Then Dominic got up and said, with great earnestness: “You are both ashamed to commit this act of brutality against me―and yet you would commit it against God and lose your soul by grievous sin!” And he held up the crucifix again.
“This proved too much for the two boys; they were moved by his true Christian charity and his courage. One of them confessed that he felt a cold shiver, and felt thoroughly ashamed that he had forced a friend of Savio’s character to take such extreme measures. Wishing to make him some amends, he forgave entirely the boy with whom he had quarreled and promised to go to Confession at once. Thus Dominic secured a victory for charity and taught the boys a lesson.”
Hopefully those extracts from St. John Bosco’s book on St. Dominic Savio will give you some understanding on the prudence required in knowing when to be silent and when to speak out; and if it is necessary to speak out, then prudence again guides on how to speak out, what words to say and what other auxiliary actions to take.
Article 15
Saturday & Sunday, July 27th & 28th
More Changes On The Way!
Saturday & Sunday, July 27th & 28th
More Changes On The Way!
Constant Change
Life, in many areas, is constantly changing―for the worse or for the better. We are born into this world and we are constantly changing. We do not remain babies, but constantly change as we pass through infancy, childhood, adolescence, early adulthood, middle-age, and old age. When we are buried, our bodies keep on changing as they gradually decompose: “Remember man, that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return!” says the priest on Ash Wednesday as he imposes ashes on our forehead. Looking at the photos of a person in childhood and in old age, the difference is like chalk and cheese―they have changed so much that there are no similarities that can be seen.
Similarly, when you look at the breadth and depth of knowledge of a person in childhood compared to their knowledge in adulthood, the difference is enormous. The child has gone from Kindergarten, through Lower School, Middle School, High School and perhaps College or University―increasing its knowledge base all along the way. The breadth and depth of knowledge, understanding, memory and reasoning skills being increased and enhanced throughout all that time.
In the spiritual life, the same is true―we need to be in a state of constant change. God expects us to change more and more for the better―that is to say, in growing and growing in the virtues and holiness. Satan seeks to make us change for the worse―by becoming more and more sinful. The spiritual masters tell us that, in the spiritual life, there can be no standing still―we are either going forwards or backwards. FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE points out: “The beginner who fails to become a proficient, either turns to sin or else presents an example of arrested spiritual development. Here, too, it is true that ‘he who makes no progress loses ground,’ as the Fathers of the Church have so often pointed out. Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child but becomes an idiot, so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls! At what stage are we ourselves?” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life [formerly entitled The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life] ).
HOLY SCRIPTURE speaks of the same need for change―that is to say, a change for the better: “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child!” [=change] (1 Corinthians 13:11). “Put off the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error, and put on the new man, who is created in justice and holiness of truth!” [=change] (Ephesians 4:22-24). “Be a new creature in Christ―the old things are passed away, behold all things are made new!” [=change] (2 Corinthians 5:17) … “Stripping yourselves of the old man with his deeds, and putting on the new man, him who is renewed according to the image of Him that created him!” [=change] (Colossians 3:9-10) … “Our outward man is corrupted, yet the inward man is renewed day by day” [=change] (2 Corinthians 4:16) … “Be reformed in the newness of your mind” [=change] (Romans 12:2) … “The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” [=change] (2 Peter 3:9) … “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” [=change] (Luke 13:3).
OUR LADY also speaks of our need to change: “Fear the danger of not paying attention to the Divine calls―for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls! ... This dreadful carelessness arises from men being so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel or fear any other evils! … The result of this insensibility to eternal damnation is dreadful. In their false security, sinners are asleep and perfectly at ease as to their ruin, when they ought justly to fear and take heed of the swiftly approaching eternal death! ... Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! … Hence are lost so many children of the Church, who, in their ingratitude and foolishness, despise the many and powerful helps given by God’s divine clemency! ... What foolishness it is for men pursue so blindly the deceitful and vile delights of the senses! … This blindness robs them of a remembrance and an affection toward higher spiritual things, which could raise them above their worldliness! … At the end of their life they shall see, that―despite the mercy of their God, my own kindest wishes to save them, and the charity of the saints before their eyes―they have robbed God of the glory of their conversion.
“How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! The faithful debase themselves to the level of worthless creatures amidst the dangers of the worldly life. Their inclinations and their blind love of visible things, hold them back. The sons of the world are ignorant because they are lovers of earthly riches. Those who have riches, trust in them―and those who have none, greedily chase after them! This deceitful error has filled the Earth with lovers of the world; it has filled the world with avarice and concupiscence; it has made men insane in their desires―for all of them commonly chase after riches and earthly possessions; claiming, thereby, merely to satisfy their needs―which is only a lame pretext for hiding their lack of interest in higher things, spiritual things. In reality they are abominously lying to themselves, since they are seeking superfluous things which they do not really need, rather than what is really necessary. The lovers of this world consider themselves fortunate whenever they attain all that they desire according to their earthly inclinations. This only hastens their greater misfortune―for they having received their reward in this life, they cannot expect any reward in the eternal life.
“Under the outwardly good intention, the earthly passions and inclinations dominate the heart. The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. They so reluctantly correct and amend their lives. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! … So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing―because the wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... It is a great shame―even a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should hate suffering, especially after all that my most holy Son suffered for them! … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! … They make their recovery impossible―since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering! … Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace of sorrows? Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love; others expect to be pardoned without penance; others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion! … Let mortals show themselves thankful, and willingly enter upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, and to carry it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness!” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT also speaks of this need for change: “Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next (Matthew 5:48). It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
The Graces and Helps We Get Depend on the Changes We Make
God is perfect in all things―and especially so in His Justice. The virtue of Justice is all about giving to others what they deserve. The bottom-line is: “No work, no pay!” Or, in the spiritual realm, you could also say: “No change, no grace!” The more we change for the better, the more graces God will send us. God is not going to reward sin and evil. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (2 Corinthians 9:6). “O Lord, Thou will render to every man according to his works!” (Psalm 61:13). Nevertheless, the Church teaches that God’s Justice is always tempered by God’s Mercy―and, conversely, the Mercy of God is always exercised in tandem with the Justice of God. Hence, God is never ONLY merciful, and never ONLY just―He is, at the same time, merciful and just to everyone. “The Lord is compassionate and merciful―longsuffering and plenteous in mercy! … He has not dealt with us according to our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities” (Psalm 102:8-10). “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy! The Lord is sweet to all―and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). Even the vast multitudes in Hell are beneficiaries of both His Justice and Mercy―in Justice they are rightfully damned; yet in Mercy nobody is punished as much as he or she really deserves.
Modern-Day Stupidity
The modern-day heresy is that most Catholics imagine that they will be saved by merely believing and will be rewarded for doing next to nothing and not changing for the better. Some even imagine that they can do the exact opposite to what God commands and still be saved! That is why today you see the majority of Catholics holding beliefs that are directly opposed to God’s Law, such as acceptance of contraception, abortion, fornication, adultery, same-sex relationships, same-sex marriage, immodesty, sexual fantasizing, lustful looks, etc.
It is no wonder Our Lady of Fatima warned BACK IN 1917 that most souls are damned for sins of the flesh of one kind or another, in thought, word or deed. Her warning was in 1917―at a time when the modern-day brazen immodesty and impurity was not even imaginable! Even in the 1600s, Our Lady of Good Success warned of future time―our present day times―saying: “The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! Unbridled impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost!”
The world with its worldliness is a seductive magnet for most people―yet Our Lord and Holy Scripture tells us that we are not of this world and must not be seduced by this world: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Parental Neglect―Parents Must Change
Parents are the first and most important teachers of their children―but too many parents do not take their God-given responsibilities seriously. They seem more intent on being a “buddy” to their children rather than a teacher and disciplinarian. They prefer to give their children lots of fun rather than teaching them the “way of the Lord.” Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, has this to say on the subject: “It is an act of justice, due to the eternal God, that every child, coming to the use of reason, direct its very first movement toward God. By knowing, it should begin to love Him, reverence Him and adore Him as its Creator and only true Lord. The parents are naturally bound to instruct their children, from their infancy, in this knowledge of God and to direct them with solicitous care, so that they may at once see their ultimate end, and seek it in their first acts of the intellect and will. They should with great watchfulness withdraw them from the childishness and puerile trickery and deceitfulness, to which depraved nature will incline them, if left without direction. The demons instill into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and they incite the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition. If the fathers and mothers would be solicitous to prevent these vanities and perverted habits of their children, and would instruct them from their infancy in the knowledge of their God and Creator, then they would afterwards easily accustom them to know and adore Him. Parents must learn to love their children, help them, nourish them, exhort them, correct them and lead them on in the way of salvation without remissness or carelessness!”
Parents should realize that their children are primarily God’s children―for it God that gave them life by creating the child’s soul. “Fathers and mothers of families should bring up their children virtuously, looking at them rather as God’s children rather than their own” (St. Philip Neri).
St. Alphonsus Liguori's Advice to Parents
Saint Alphonsus Liguori writes: “Fathers and mothers, remember what I now say to you, for on it depends the eternal salvation of your own souls, and of the souls of your children! It is certain that a child’s future good or bad conduct depends on his being brought up well or poorly. The Gospel tells us, that a good plant cannot produce bad fruit, and that a bad one cannot produce good fruit. We learn from this, that a good father brings up good children. But, if the parents are wicked [worldly], how can the children be virtuous? Our Lord says, in the same Gospel: ‘Do men gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles?’ (Matthew 7:16). So, it is impossible, or rather very difficult, to find children virtuous, who are brought up by immoral [worldly] parents. If you wish to marry, learn the obligations which you contract with regard to the education of your children, and learn also, that if you do not fulfill them, you shall bring yourselves and all your children to damnation. God gives children to parents, not that they may assist the family, but that they may be brought up in the fear of God, and be directed in the way of eternal salvation. Children have not been given to parents as a present, which they may dispose of as they please, but as a trust, for which, if lost through their negligence, they must render an account to God. One of the great Fathers of the Church says that, on the Day of Judgment, parents will have to render an account for all the sins of their children.
“Even if fathers or mothers were to lead a life of piety and continual prayer, and to communicate every day at Mass, they would be damned if they neglected the care of their children. Saint John Chrysostom that by the bad education which parents give to their offspring, they cause their children to rush into many grievous vices. Great indeed is the misfortune of the child that has sinful and negligent parents, who are incapable of bringing up their children in the fear of God, and who, when they see their children engage in dangerous friendships and in quarrels, instead of correcting and chastising them, they take compassion on them, and say: ‘What can I do? They are young! Hopefully they will grow out of it!’ What wicked words, what a cruel education! Do you hope that when your children grow up, they will become saints? Listen to what Holy Scripture says: ‘A young man, according to his way [during youth], even when he is old, he will not depart from it’ (Proverbs 22:6). A young man, who has contracted a habit of sin, will not abandon it even in his old age. It is very easy, when they are small, to train children, to habits of virtue―but, when they have come to adulthood, it is equally difficult to correct them, if they have learned habits of vice.
“Saint Paul teaches sufficiently, in a few words, in what the proper education of children consists. He says that it consists in discipline and correction. Discipline implies an obligation of educating them in habits of virtue by word and example. First, by words: good parents should often assemble their children, and instill into them the holy fear of God. It was in this manner that Tobias brought up his little son. The father taught him from his childhood to fear the Lord and to flee from sin. ‘And from infancy he taught him to fear God and abstain from sin’ (Tobias 1:10). As a well instructed son is the delight of his parents’ soul, so too is an ignorant child a source of sorrow to their heart, for the ignorance of his obligations as a Christian is always accompanied with a bad life. Parents ought to instruct their children in the truths of the Faith. Should a father or mother say: ‘I myself do not know the Faith very well!’ ― can such an excuse be admitted? Can one sin excuse another? If you are ignorant of the Faith, then you are obliged to learn it, and afterwards to teach it to your children. What a miserable thing to see so many fathers and mothers, who are unable to instruct their children in the most necessary truths of the Faith!
“Do you have children? Instruct them and bow down their neck from their childhood (Ecclesiasticus 7:25). Endeavor to train them from their infancy to these religious habits, and when they grow up, they will persevere in them. It is also very useful to infuse good maxims into the infant minds of children. What ruin is brought upon children by parents who teaches them worldly maxims! Some parents say to their children: ‘God is merciful―He takes compassion on certain sins!’ Good parents teach very different maxims to their children. Queen Blanche, the mother of Saint Louis, King of France, used to say to him: ‘My son, I would rather see you dead in my arms, than in the state of sin!’ So then, let it be your practice to infuse into your children certain maxims of salvation, such as: ‘What will it profit us to gain the whole world, if we lose our own souls?’ Everything on this Earth has an end, but eternity never ends―be it in Hell or in Heaven. Let all be lost, provided God is not lost. One of these maxims well impressed on the mind of a young person, will preserve him always in the grace of God.
“But parents are obliged to instruct their children in the practice of virtue, not only by words, but still more by example. If you give your children bad example, how can you expect that they will lead good lives? When a misbehaving child is corrected for a fault, the child answers: ‘Why do you correct me when my father does even worse things?’ How is it possible for a child to be moral and religious, when he has had the example of a parent who uttered blasphemies and obscenities; or who spends much time in games, gossip, drunkenness, cursing and swearing, lying and cheating? Do you expect your child to go frequently to confession, when you yourself approach the confessional scarcely once a year? This is what happens to the parent who gives bad example. Hence, they have not even courage to correct their children for the sins which they themselves commit. According to Saint Thomas Aquinas, scandalous parents compel, in a certain manner, their children to lead a bad life. Saint Bernard says that they are not parents, but murderers, they kill, not the bodies, but the souls of their children. It is useless for parents to say: ‘My children have been born with bad dispositions!’ This is not true! Vices are not born with your children, but have been communicated to them by the bad example of the parents. If you had given good example to your children, they would not be so bad as they are. Therefore parents―go frequently to the Sacraments; listen and learn from sermons and books; recite the Rosary every day; abstain from all obscene language, from detraction, and from quarrels―and you will see that your children follow your example. It is particularly necessary to train children to virtue in their infancy, Bow down their neck from their childhood, for when they have grown up, and contracted bad habits, it will be very difficult for you to bring about any amendment in their lives.
“To bring up children in the discipline of the Lord, it is also necessary to take away from them the occasions of doing evil. Parents must forbid their children to go or be out late at night; or to go to a house in which their virtue might be exposed to danger; or to keep bad company. Bad companions are the ruin of young persons. Parents should not only remove the evil which they see and notice, but the parents are also bound to inquire about the conduct of the children when they are away from the watchful parental eye, and to seek information from family, relatives and from outsiders regarding the places which the children frequent when they leave home, their occupations, companions and behavior. Parents should prohibit their children from all games and activities, which bring destruction on their families and on their own souls, and also dances, suggestive entertainment, and certain dangerous conversations and parties of pleasures. Parents should remove from their house books which pervert young persons, and all bad books which contain pernicious maxims, tales of obscenity, or of profane love. Parents should not permit their daughters to be alone with men, whether young or old. But some will say: ‘But this man tutors my daughter―he is a saint!’ The saints are in Heaven, but the saints that are on Earth are flesh, and by proximate occasions of temptations, they may become devils.
“Another obligation of parents is to correct the faults of the family. Holy Scripture says: ‘Bring them up in the discipline and correction of the Lord.’ There are fathers and mothers who witness faults in the family and remain silent. Through fear of displeasing their children, some parents neglect to correct them, but if you saw your child falling into a pool of water, and in danger of being drowned, would it not be savage cruelty not to catch him by the hair, and save his life? ‘He that spares the rod, hates his son!’ (Proverbs 13:24). If you love your children, correct them, and while they are growing up, chastise them, even with the rod, as often as it may be necessary. But you must correct them like a father, and not like a prison guard. You must be careful not to beat them when you are in a passion, for you will then be in danger of beating them with too much severity, and the correction will be without fruit, for then they believe that the chastisement is the effect of anger, and not of a desire on your part to see them amend their lives. Correct them while they are growing up, for when they arrive at adulthood, your correction will be of little use. What use is it to correct children with injurious words, bad language and with cursing? Instead, deprive them of something they like, deprive them of some part of their meals, of certain articles of dress, or shut them up in their room. Draw from this discourse the conclusion, that he who has brought up his children badly, will be severely punished, and that he who has trained them in the habits of virtue, will receive a great reward.” (Saint Alphonsus Liguori, Advice to Parents).
Time to Change!
It is time for Catholics to wake up from their devil-inspired dreams and hallucinations that tell them that they will get to Heaven no matter what they do! Don’t fool yourself! Most souls end up being damned! Our Lord said so: “For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14). Our Lady of Fatima said the same: “Many souls go to Hell!” Our Lady also said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! … The number of those doomed is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!”
Numerous saints have said the same thing―here is mere handful of quotes [read more here]:
● Pope St. Gregory the Great (540-604): “There are many who arrive at the Faith, but few who are led into the heavenly kingdom!”
● St. Justin Martyr (100-165), Father of the Church: “The majority of men shall not see God!”
● St. John Chrysostom (347-407), Doctor and Father of the Church: “Those who perish are far more numerous.”
● St. Augustine (354-430), Doctor and Father of the Church: “It is certain that few are saved! If you wish to imitate the multitude, then you shall not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow gate!”
● St. Bede the Venerable (673-735), Doctor and Father of the Church: “Christ's flock is called ‘little’ (Luke 12:32) in comparison with the greater number of the reprobates.”
● St. Thomas Aquinas (1235-1274), Doctor of the Church: “There are a select few who are saved! Those who are saved are in the minority!”
● St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori (1696-1787), Doctor of the Church: “Everyone desires to be saved but the greater part is lost.”
● St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), Doctor of the Church: “I saw souls falling into Hell like snowflakes!”
St. John Vianney (1786-1859): “I tremble when I see so many souls lost these days. See, they fall into Hell as leaves fall from the trees at the approach of winter.”
● St. Benedict Joseph of Labre (1748-1783): “I was watching souls falling down into Hell like snowflakes falling thick and fast in the winter!”
● St. John Neumann (1811-1860): “Despite assurances that God did not create any man for Hell, and that He wishes all men to be saved, it remains equally true that only few will be saved; that only few will go to Heaven; and that the greater part of mankind will be lost forever.”
It has always been the practice of the Catholic Church to recommend to her spiritual children the meditation on man’s Four Last Things―Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell. By keeping these sobering aspects of human destiny always before our eyes, we will be that much less likely to fall into mortal sin and be lost eternally. They are often commended as a topic for meditation. St. Philip Neri wrote: “Beginners in religion ought to exercise themselves principally in meditation on the Four Last Things!” Traditionally, the sermons preached on the four Sundays of Advent were on the Four Last Things. These things should not frighten us, but should make us realize that Death, Judgment, Heaven [or Heaven via Purgatory], and Hell are all very, very real. What is our ultimate concern? What is our ultimate goal in life? What is our greatest focus in life? If it is not the salvation of our immortal soul, then we need to seriously re-evaluate our lives! As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day, spreading among men forgetfulness of Death, Judgment, Heaven and Hell!”
St. John Vianney would often preach on Hell―either dedicating a whole sermon to Hell, or by bringing Hell into the picture when preaching on other topics. We already mentioned Queen Blanche, the mother of St. Louis, King of France, who would often say to him: “My son, I would rather see you dead in my arms, than in the state of sin!” Our Lady of Fatima did not just speak about Hell―she actually gave the children a vision of the real Hell―of which Sister Lucia said that they were so terrified that they would have died on the spot if it had not been for the grace of God that kept them alive. The saint, Michel [Michael] Garicoïts (1797-1863), was of a fiery temperament and rebellious nature as a child―often falling into trouble. His mother, noting all this bad behavior, would often sit him down by the fireside and preach to him on Hell and its pains, saying: “Do you see this fire? The fire of Hell is much worse … and that is where little boys who commit mortal sins go!” Later in life, he attributed his mother’s preaching on Hell to his hatred of sin and gratefully admitted: “Without my mother, I think I would have become a bandit! After God, I owe everything I am to her!”
Sadly, today, Hell is less and less mentioned and rarely preached―to the delight of both the congregation and Satan! The less Hell is mentioned, the more people go there! Today, God is nothing but love and mercy! His justice and punishments have been thrown in the trash-can as being out-of-date and too negative. How many times, over the last few years, have you heard a sermon on Hell? One priest, ordained in a seminary of the modern Catholic Church, admitted that during his seminary formation, his professors had not taught about Hell―not even once! How many conversations about Hell have you had in the family? Heck! Hell is the greatest danger that threatens us! We talk more about Covid than we talk about Hell!
Our Lady complained to the Venerable Mary of Agreda that “the cunning of Satan sees that from the very moment in which mortals begin to have the use of their reason, each one of them is followed by many watchful and relentless demons. For as soon as the souls are in a position to raise their thoughts to the knowledge of their God and commence the practice of the virtues, these demons, with incredible fury and astuteness, seek to root out the divine seed; and if they cannot succeed in this, they try to hinder its growth, and prevent it from bringing forth fruit by engaging men in vicious, useless, or trifling things. They divert their thoughts from Faith and Hope, and from the pursuit of other virtues, leading them to forget that they are Christians and divert their attention from the knowledge of God. Moreover, the demons instill into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and they incite the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition.”
Cannot Change Without Grace
The main reason why people do not change or cannot change, is a lack of cooperation with God’s grace or a lack of reliance upon God’s grace. As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). The modern-day Catholic either ignores the promptings of God’s grace, or imagines that things can be achieved independently of God’s grace. The inevitable result is failure to change and improve. Too many people think that their own personal efforts and words will bring about changes in their family life and personal life, or even in public life. God is not going to reward independence. God is not going to take kindly to being excluded and given a back seat. God’s grace is required for lasting success. St. Thérèse of Lisieux says: “Everything is grace!” ― and you could add to that: “Grace is everything!”
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his treatise on grace in his Summa Theologica and his Quaestiones quodlibetales, clearly states our absolute need and dependence upon the grace of God: “Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace perfects nature … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For to many persons grace is given, to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
If You Need the Help of Grace, You Must Ask
One of the chief sources of grace―aside from the Sacraments―is PRAYER. Not just any old kind of prayer―but good prayer, fervent prayer, assiduous prayer, persevering prayer, confident prayer. If we need things, then we need to ask God―as Our Lord said: “Ask, and it shall be given you! Seek, and you shall find! Knock, and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7). But we need to ask with our hearts and not just our lips: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). The saints all agree upon the supreme importance of prayer.
● “The power of prayer is really tremendous” (St. Therese of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
● “He knows how to live well who knows how to pray well … As our body cannot live without nourishment, so our soul cannot spiritually be kept alive without prayer” (St. Augustine (354-430).
● “Prayer is to our soul what rain is to the soil. Fertilize the soil ever so richly, it will remain barren unless fed by frequent rains” (St. John Vianney, 1786-1859).
● “It is simply impossible to lead a virtuous life without the aid of prayer,” (St. John Chrysostom (347-407).
● “The whole lives of the Saints have been one of meditation and prayer. All the graces, by means of which they have become Saints, were received by them in answer to their prayers. If we want to be saved and become Saints, then we should always beg and pray for all that we need! He who prays most receives most!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, 1696-1787).
● “We should have frequent recourse to prayer, and persevere a long time in it. God wishes to be solicited. He is not weary of hearing us. The treasure of His graces is infinite. We can do nothing more pleasing to Him than to beg incessantly that He bestow them upon us” (St. John Baptist de la Salle, 1651-1719).
● “Only he will receive, will find, and will enter, who perseveres in asking, seeking and knocking” (St. Louis de Montfort, 1673-1716).
● “It is essential to begin the practice of prayer with a firm resolution of persevering in it” (St. Teresa of Avila, 1515-1582).
● “The reason why sometimes you have asked and not received, is because you have asked amiss―either inconsistently, or lightly, or because you have asked for what was not good for you, or because you have ceased asking!” (St. Basil, 329-379).
Life, in many areas, is constantly changing―for the worse or for the better. We are born into this world and we are constantly changing. We do not remain babies, but constantly change as we pass through infancy, childhood, adolescence, early adulthood, middle-age, and old age. When we are buried, our bodies keep on changing as they gradually decompose: “Remember man, that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return!” says the priest on Ash Wednesday as he imposes ashes on our forehead. Looking at the photos of a person in childhood and in old age, the difference is like chalk and cheese―they have changed so much that there are no similarities that can be seen.
Similarly, when you look at the breadth and depth of knowledge of a person in childhood compared to their knowledge in adulthood, the difference is enormous. The child has gone from Kindergarten, through Lower School, Middle School, High School and perhaps College or University―increasing its knowledge base all along the way. The breadth and depth of knowledge, understanding, memory and reasoning skills being increased and enhanced throughout all that time.
In the spiritual life, the same is true―we need to be in a state of constant change. God expects us to change more and more for the better―that is to say, in growing and growing in the virtues and holiness. Satan seeks to make us change for the worse―by becoming more and more sinful. The spiritual masters tell us that, in the spiritual life, there can be no standing still―we are either going forwards or backwards. FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE points out: “The beginner who fails to become a proficient, either turns to sin or else presents an example of arrested spiritual development. Here, too, it is true that ‘he who makes no progress loses ground,’ as the Fathers of the Church have so often pointed out. Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child but becomes an idiot, so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls! At what stage are we ourselves?” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life [formerly entitled The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life] ).
HOLY SCRIPTURE speaks of the same need for change―that is to say, a change for the better: “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child!” [=change] (1 Corinthians 13:11). “Put off the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error, and put on the new man, who is created in justice and holiness of truth!” [=change] (Ephesians 4:22-24). “Be a new creature in Christ―the old things are passed away, behold all things are made new!” [=change] (2 Corinthians 5:17) … “Stripping yourselves of the old man with his deeds, and putting on the new man, him who is renewed according to the image of Him that created him!” [=change] (Colossians 3:9-10) … “Our outward man is corrupted, yet the inward man is renewed day by day” [=change] (2 Corinthians 4:16) … “Be reformed in the newness of your mind” [=change] (Romans 12:2) … “The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” [=change] (2 Peter 3:9) … “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” [=change] (Luke 13:3).
OUR LADY also speaks of our need to change: “Fear the danger of not paying attention to the Divine calls―for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls! ... This dreadful carelessness arises from men being so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel or fear any other evils! … The result of this insensibility to eternal damnation is dreadful. In their false security, sinners are asleep and perfectly at ease as to their ruin, when they ought justly to fear and take heed of the swiftly approaching eternal death! ... Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! … Hence are lost so many children of the Church, who, in their ingratitude and foolishness, despise the many and powerful helps given by God’s divine clemency! ... What foolishness it is for men pursue so blindly the deceitful and vile delights of the senses! … This blindness robs them of a remembrance and an affection toward higher spiritual things, which could raise them above their worldliness! … At the end of their life they shall see, that―despite the mercy of their God, my own kindest wishes to save them, and the charity of the saints before their eyes―they have robbed God of the glory of their conversion.
“How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! The faithful debase themselves to the level of worthless creatures amidst the dangers of the worldly life. Their inclinations and their blind love of visible things, hold them back. The sons of the world are ignorant because they are lovers of earthly riches. Those who have riches, trust in them―and those who have none, greedily chase after them! This deceitful error has filled the Earth with lovers of the world; it has filled the world with avarice and concupiscence; it has made men insane in their desires―for all of them commonly chase after riches and earthly possessions; claiming, thereby, merely to satisfy their needs―which is only a lame pretext for hiding their lack of interest in higher things, spiritual things. In reality they are abominously lying to themselves, since they are seeking superfluous things which they do not really need, rather than what is really necessary. The lovers of this world consider themselves fortunate whenever they attain all that they desire according to their earthly inclinations. This only hastens their greater misfortune―for they having received their reward in this life, they cannot expect any reward in the eternal life.
“Under the outwardly good intention, the earthly passions and inclinations dominate the heart. The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. They so reluctantly correct and amend their lives. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! … So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing―because the wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... It is a great shame―even a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should hate suffering, especially after all that my most holy Son suffered for them! … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! … They make their recovery impossible―since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering! … Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace of sorrows? Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love; others expect to be pardoned without penance; others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion! … Let mortals show themselves thankful, and willingly enter upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, and to carry it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness!” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT also speaks of this need for change: “Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next (Matthew 5:48). It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
The Graces and Helps We Get Depend on the Changes We Make
God is perfect in all things―and especially so in His Justice. The virtue of Justice is all about giving to others what they deserve. The bottom-line is: “No work, no pay!” Or, in the spiritual realm, you could also say: “No change, no grace!” The more we change for the better, the more graces God will send us. God is not going to reward sin and evil. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly!” (2 Corinthians 9:6). “O Lord, Thou will render to every man according to his works!” (Psalm 61:13). Nevertheless, the Church teaches that God’s Justice is always tempered by God’s Mercy―and, conversely, the Mercy of God is always exercised in tandem with the Justice of God. Hence, God is never ONLY merciful, and never ONLY just―He is, at the same time, merciful and just to everyone. “The Lord is compassionate and merciful―longsuffering and plenteous in mercy! … He has not dealt with us according to our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities” (Psalm 102:8-10). “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy! The Lord is sweet to all―and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). Even the vast multitudes in Hell are beneficiaries of both His Justice and Mercy―in Justice they are rightfully damned; yet in Mercy nobody is punished as much as he or she really deserves.
Modern-Day Stupidity
The modern-day heresy is that most Catholics imagine that they will be saved by merely believing and will be rewarded for doing next to nothing and not changing for the better. Some even imagine that they can do the exact opposite to what God commands and still be saved! That is why today you see the majority of Catholics holding beliefs that are directly opposed to God’s Law, such as acceptance of contraception, abortion, fornication, adultery, same-sex relationships, same-sex marriage, immodesty, sexual fantasizing, lustful looks, etc.
It is no wonder Our Lady of Fatima warned BACK IN 1917 that most souls are damned for sins of the flesh of one kind or another, in thought, word or deed. Her warning was in 1917―at a time when the modern-day brazen immodesty and impurity was not even imaginable! Even in the 1600s, Our Lady of Good Success warned of future time―our present day times―saying: “The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! Unbridled impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost!”
The world with its worldliness is a seductive magnet for most people―yet Our Lord and Holy Scripture tells us that we are not of this world and must not be seduced by this world: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Parental Neglect―Parents Must Change
Parents are the first and most important teachers of their children―but too many parents do not take their God-given responsibilities seriously. They seem more intent on being a “buddy” to their children rather than a teacher and disciplinarian. They prefer to give their children lots of fun rather than teaching them the “way of the Lord.” Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, has this to say on the subject: “It is an act of justice, due to the eternal God, that every child, coming to the use of reason, direct its very first movement toward God. By knowing, it should begin to love Him, reverence Him and adore Him as its Creator and only true Lord. The parents are naturally bound to instruct their children, from their infancy, in this knowledge of God and to direct them with solicitous care, so that they may at once see their ultimate end, and seek it in their first acts of the intellect and will. They should with great watchfulness withdraw them from the childishness and puerile trickery and deceitfulness, to which depraved nature will incline them, if left without direction. The demons instill into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and they incite the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition. If the fathers and mothers would be solicitous to prevent these vanities and perverted habits of their children, and would instruct them from their infancy in the knowledge of their God and Creator, then they would afterwards easily accustom them to know and adore Him. Parents must learn to love their children, help them, nourish them, exhort them, correct them and lead them on in the way of salvation without remissness or carelessness!”
Parents should realize that their children are primarily God’s children―for it God that gave them life by creating the child’s soul. “Fathers and mothers of families should bring up their children virtuously, looking at them rather as God’s children rather than their own” (St. Philip Neri).
St. Alphonsus Liguori's Advice to Parents
Saint Alphonsus Liguori writes: “Fathers and mothers, remember what I now say to you, for on it depends the eternal salvation of your own souls, and of the souls of your children! It is certain that a child’s future good or bad conduct depends on his being brought up well or poorly. The Gospel tells us, that a good plant cannot produce bad fruit, and that a bad one cannot produce good fruit. We learn from this, that a good father brings up good children. But, if the parents are wicked [worldly], how can the children be virtuous? Our Lord says, in the same Gospel: ‘Do men gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles?’ (Matthew 7:16). So, it is impossible, or rather very difficult, to find children virtuous, who are brought up by immoral [worldly] parents. If you wish to marry, learn the obligations which you contract with regard to the education of your children, and learn also, that if you do not fulfill them, you shall bring yourselves and all your children to damnation. God gives children to parents, not that they may assist the family, but that they may be brought up in the fear of God, and be directed in the way of eternal salvation. Children have not been given to parents as a present, which they may dispose of as they please, but as a trust, for which, if lost through their negligence, they must render an account to God. One of the great Fathers of the Church says that, on the Day of Judgment, parents will have to render an account for all the sins of their children.
“Even if fathers or mothers were to lead a life of piety and continual prayer, and to communicate every day at Mass, they would be damned if they neglected the care of their children. Saint John Chrysostom that by the bad education which parents give to their offspring, they cause their children to rush into many grievous vices. Great indeed is the misfortune of the child that has sinful and negligent parents, who are incapable of bringing up their children in the fear of God, and who, when they see their children engage in dangerous friendships and in quarrels, instead of correcting and chastising them, they take compassion on them, and say: ‘What can I do? They are young! Hopefully they will grow out of it!’ What wicked words, what a cruel education! Do you hope that when your children grow up, they will become saints? Listen to what Holy Scripture says: ‘A young man, according to his way [during youth], even when he is old, he will not depart from it’ (Proverbs 22:6). A young man, who has contracted a habit of sin, will not abandon it even in his old age. It is very easy, when they are small, to train children, to habits of virtue―but, when they have come to adulthood, it is equally difficult to correct them, if they have learned habits of vice.
“Saint Paul teaches sufficiently, in a few words, in what the proper education of children consists. He says that it consists in discipline and correction. Discipline implies an obligation of educating them in habits of virtue by word and example. First, by words: good parents should often assemble their children, and instill into them the holy fear of God. It was in this manner that Tobias brought up his little son. The father taught him from his childhood to fear the Lord and to flee from sin. ‘And from infancy he taught him to fear God and abstain from sin’ (Tobias 1:10). As a well instructed son is the delight of his parents’ soul, so too is an ignorant child a source of sorrow to their heart, for the ignorance of his obligations as a Christian is always accompanied with a bad life. Parents ought to instruct their children in the truths of the Faith. Should a father or mother say: ‘I myself do not know the Faith very well!’ ― can such an excuse be admitted? Can one sin excuse another? If you are ignorant of the Faith, then you are obliged to learn it, and afterwards to teach it to your children. What a miserable thing to see so many fathers and mothers, who are unable to instruct their children in the most necessary truths of the Faith!
“Do you have children? Instruct them and bow down their neck from their childhood (Ecclesiasticus 7:25). Endeavor to train them from their infancy to these religious habits, and when they grow up, they will persevere in them. It is also very useful to infuse good maxims into the infant minds of children. What ruin is brought upon children by parents who teaches them worldly maxims! Some parents say to their children: ‘God is merciful―He takes compassion on certain sins!’ Good parents teach very different maxims to their children. Queen Blanche, the mother of Saint Louis, King of France, used to say to him: ‘My son, I would rather see you dead in my arms, than in the state of sin!’ So then, let it be your practice to infuse into your children certain maxims of salvation, such as: ‘What will it profit us to gain the whole world, if we lose our own souls?’ Everything on this Earth has an end, but eternity never ends―be it in Hell or in Heaven. Let all be lost, provided God is not lost. One of these maxims well impressed on the mind of a young person, will preserve him always in the grace of God.
“But parents are obliged to instruct their children in the practice of virtue, not only by words, but still more by example. If you give your children bad example, how can you expect that they will lead good lives? When a misbehaving child is corrected for a fault, the child answers: ‘Why do you correct me when my father does even worse things?’ How is it possible for a child to be moral and religious, when he has had the example of a parent who uttered blasphemies and obscenities; or who spends much time in games, gossip, drunkenness, cursing and swearing, lying and cheating? Do you expect your child to go frequently to confession, when you yourself approach the confessional scarcely once a year? This is what happens to the parent who gives bad example. Hence, they have not even courage to correct their children for the sins which they themselves commit. According to Saint Thomas Aquinas, scandalous parents compel, in a certain manner, their children to lead a bad life. Saint Bernard says that they are not parents, but murderers, they kill, not the bodies, but the souls of their children. It is useless for parents to say: ‘My children have been born with bad dispositions!’ This is not true! Vices are not born with your children, but have been communicated to them by the bad example of the parents. If you had given good example to your children, they would not be so bad as they are. Therefore parents―go frequently to the Sacraments; listen and learn from sermons and books; recite the Rosary every day; abstain from all obscene language, from detraction, and from quarrels―and you will see that your children follow your example. It is particularly necessary to train children to virtue in their infancy, Bow down their neck from their childhood, for when they have grown up, and contracted bad habits, it will be very difficult for you to bring about any amendment in their lives.
“To bring up children in the discipline of the Lord, it is also necessary to take away from them the occasions of doing evil. Parents must forbid their children to go or be out late at night; or to go to a house in which their virtue might be exposed to danger; or to keep bad company. Bad companions are the ruin of young persons. Parents should not only remove the evil which they see and notice, but the parents are also bound to inquire about the conduct of the children when they are away from the watchful parental eye, and to seek information from family, relatives and from outsiders regarding the places which the children frequent when they leave home, their occupations, companions and behavior. Parents should prohibit their children from all games and activities, which bring destruction on their families and on their own souls, and also dances, suggestive entertainment, and certain dangerous conversations and parties of pleasures. Parents should remove from their house books which pervert young persons, and all bad books which contain pernicious maxims, tales of obscenity, or of profane love. Parents should not permit their daughters to be alone with men, whether young or old. But some will say: ‘But this man tutors my daughter―he is a saint!’ The saints are in Heaven, but the saints that are on Earth are flesh, and by proximate occasions of temptations, they may become devils.
“Another obligation of parents is to correct the faults of the family. Holy Scripture says: ‘Bring them up in the discipline and correction of the Lord.’ There are fathers and mothers who witness faults in the family and remain silent. Through fear of displeasing their children, some parents neglect to correct them, but if you saw your child falling into a pool of water, and in danger of being drowned, would it not be savage cruelty not to catch him by the hair, and save his life? ‘He that spares the rod, hates his son!’ (Proverbs 13:24). If you love your children, correct them, and while they are growing up, chastise them, even with the rod, as often as it may be necessary. But you must correct them like a father, and not like a prison guard. You must be careful not to beat them when you are in a passion, for you will then be in danger of beating them with too much severity, and the correction will be without fruit, for then they believe that the chastisement is the effect of anger, and not of a desire on your part to see them amend their lives. Correct them while they are growing up, for when they arrive at adulthood, your correction will be of little use. What use is it to correct children with injurious words, bad language and with cursing? Instead, deprive them of something they like, deprive them of some part of their meals, of certain articles of dress, or shut them up in their room. Draw from this discourse the conclusion, that he who has brought up his children badly, will be severely punished, and that he who has trained them in the habits of virtue, will receive a great reward.” (Saint Alphonsus Liguori, Advice to Parents).
Time to Change!
It is time for Catholics to wake up from their devil-inspired dreams and hallucinations that tell them that they will get to Heaven no matter what they do! Don’t fool yourself! Most souls end up being damned! Our Lord said so: “For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14). Our Lady of Fatima said the same: “Many souls go to Hell!” Our Lady also said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! … The number of those doomed is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular!”
Numerous saints have said the same thing―here is mere handful of quotes [read more here]:
● Pope St. Gregory the Great (540-604): “There are many who arrive at the Faith, but few who are led into the heavenly kingdom!”
● St. Justin Martyr (100-165), Father of the Church: “The majority of men shall not see God!”
● St. John Chrysostom (347-407), Doctor and Father of the Church: “Those who perish are far more numerous.”
● St. Augustine (354-430), Doctor and Father of the Church: “It is certain that few are saved! If you wish to imitate the multitude, then you shall not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow gate!”
● St. Bede the Venerable (673-735), Doctor and Father of the Church: “Christ's flock is called ‘little’ (Luke 12:32) in comparison with the greater number of the reprobates.”
● St. Thomas Aquinas (1235-1274), Doctor of the Church: “There are a select few who are saved! Those who are saved are in the minority!”
● St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori (1696-1787), Doctor of the Church: “Everyone desires to be saved but the greater part is lost.”
● St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), Doctor of the Church: “I saw souls falling into Hell like snowflakes!”
St. John Vianney (1786-1859): “I tremble when I see so many souls lost these days. See, they fall into Hell as leaves fall from the trees at the approach of winter.”
● St. Benedict Joseph of Labre (1748-1783): “I was watching souls falling down into Hell like snowflakes falling thick and fast in the winter!”
● St. John Neumann (1811-1860): “Despite assurances that God did not create any man for Hell, and that He wishes all men to be saved, it remains equally true that only few will be saved; that only few will go to Heaven; and that the greater part of mankind will be lost forever.”
It has always been the practice of the Catholic Church to recommend to her spiritual children the meditation on man’s Four Last Things―Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell. By keeping these sobering aspects of human destiny always before our eyes, we will be that much less likely to fall into mortal sin and be lost eternally. They are often commended as a topic for meditation. St. Philip Neri wrote: “Beginners in religion ought to exercise themselves principally in meditation on the Four Last Things!” Traditionally, the sermons preached on the four Sundays of Advent were on the Four Last Things. These things should not frighten us, but should make us realize that Death, Judgment, Heaven [or Heaven via Purgatory], and Hell are all very, very real. What is our ultimate concern? What is our ultimate goal in life? What is our greatest focus in life? If it is not the salvation of our immortal soul, then we need to seriously re-evaluate our lives! As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day, spreading among men forgetfulness of Death, Judgment, Heaven and Hell!”
St. John Vianney would often preach on Hell―either dedicating a whole sermon to Hell, or by bringing Hell into the picture when preaching on other topics. We already mentioned Queen Blanche, the mother of St. Louis, King of France, who would often say to him: “My son, I would rather see you dead in my arms, than in the state of sin!” Our Lady of Fatima did not just speak about Hell―she actually gave the children a vision of the real Hell―of which Sister Lucia said that they were so terrified that they would have died on the spot if it had not been for the grace of God that kept them alive. The saint, Michel [Michael] Garicoïts (1797-1863), was of a fiery temperament and rebellious nature as a child―often falling into trouble. His mother, noting all this bad behavior, would often sit him down by the fireside and preach to him on Hell and its pains, saying: “Do you see this fire? The fire of Hell is much worse … and that is where little boys who commit mortal sins go!” Later in life, he attributed his mother’s preaching on Hell to his hatred of sin and gratefully admitted: “Without my mother, I think I would have become a bandit! After God, I owe everything I am to her!”
Sadly, today, Hell is less and less mentioned and rarely preached―to the delight of both the congregation and Satan! The less Hell is mentioned, the more people go there! Today, God is nothing but love and mercy! His justice and punishments have been thrown in the trash-can as being out-of-date and too negative. How many times, over the last few years, have you heard a sermon on Hell? One priest, ordained in a seminary of the modern Catholic Church, admitted that during his seminary formation, his professors had not taught about Hell―not even once! How many conversations about Hell have you had in the family? Heck! Hell is the greatest danger that threatens us! We talk more about Covid than we talk about Hell!
Our Lady complained to the Venerable Mary of Agreda that “the cunning of Satan sees that from the very moment in which mortals begin to have the use of their reason, each one of them is followed by many watchful and relentless demons. For as soon as the souls are in a position to raise their thoughts to the knowledge of their God and commence the practice of the virtues, these demons, with incredible fury and astuteness, seek to root out the divine seed; and if they cannot succeed in this, they try to hinder its growth, and prevent it from bringing forth fruit by engaging men in vicious, useless, or trifling things. They divert their thoughts from Faith and Hope, and from the pursuit of other virtues, leading them to forget that they are Christians and divert their attention from the knowledge of God. Moreover, the demons instill into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and they incite the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition.”
Cannot Change Without Grace
The main reason why people do not change or cannot change, is a lack of cooperation with God’s grace or a lack of reliance upon God’s grace. As Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). The modern-day Catholic either ignores the promptings of God’s grace, or imagines that things can be achieved independently of God’s grace. The inevitable result is failure to change and improve. Too many people think that their own personal efforts and words will bring about changes in their family life and personal life, or even in public life. God is not going to reward independence. God is not going to take kindly to being excluded and given a back seat. God’s grace is required for lasting success. St. Thérèse of Lisieux says: “Everything is grace!” ― and you could add to that: “Grace is everything!”
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his treatise on grace in his Summa Theologica and his Quaestiones quodlibetales, clearly states our absolute need and dependence upon the grace of God: “Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace perfects nature … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For to many persons grace is given, to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
If You Need the Help of Grace, You Must Ask
One of the chief sources of grace―aside from the Sacraments―is PRAYER. Not just any old kind of prayer―but good prayer, fervent prayer, assiduous prayer, persevering prayer, confident prayer. If we need things, then we need to ask God―as Our Lord said: “Ask, and it shall be given you! Seek, and you shall find! Knock, and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7). But we need to ask with our hearts and not just our lips: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). The saints all agree upon the supreme importance of prayer.
● “The power of prayer is really tremendous” (St. Therese of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
● “He knows how to live well who knows how to pray well … As our body cannot live without nourishment, so our soul cannot spiritually be kept alive without prayer” (St. Augustine (354-430).
● “Prayer is to our soul what rain is to the soil. Fertilize the soil ever so richly, it will remain barren unless fed by frequent rains” (St. John Vianney, 1786-1859).
● “It is simply impossible to lead a virtuous life without the aid of prayer,” (St. John Chrysostom (347-407).
● “The whole lives of the Saints have been one of meditation and prayer. All the graces, by means of which they have become Saints, were received by them in answer to their prayers. If we want to be saved and become Saints, then we should always beg and pray for all that we need! He who prays most receives most!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, 1696-1787).
● “We should have frequent recourse to prayer, and persevere a long time in it. God wishes to be solicited. He is not weary of hearing us. The treasure of His graces is infinite. We can do nothing more pleasing to Him than to beg incessantly that He bestow them upon us” (St. John Baptist de la Salle, 1651-1719).
● “Only he will receive, will find, and will enter, who perseveres in asking, seeking and knocking” (St. Louis de Montfort, 1673-1716).
● “It is essential to begin the practice of prayer with a firm resolution of persevering in it” (St. Teresa of Avila, 1515-1582).
● “The reason why sometimes you have asked and not received, is because you have asked amiss―either inconsistently, or lightly, or because you have asked for what was not good for you, or because you have ceased asking!” (St. Basil, 329-379).
Article 14
Wednesday, Thursday & Friday, July 24th, 25th, 26th
Looking After and Caring for Your Weapon
Wednesday, Thursday & Friday, July 24th, 25th, 26th
Looking After and Caring for Your Weapon
Fight! Fight! Fight!
The recent alleged ‘assassination attempt’ of Donald Trump saw Trump rise after being ‘shot’ with his fist pumping the air while shouting “Fight! Fight! Fight!” What does he mean? Fight who? Our Lord―Who was actually killed―also tells us to fight. We are told to fight the devil and the world―Satan is the prince of this world and the world is his princedom. Our Lord says: “My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36). “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not anything! … The prince of this world is already judged! ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). We too must cast out the prince of this world and the worldly influence that prince uses to seduce us into worldliness. “And there was a great battle in Heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought. And they prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in Heaven. And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world, and he was cast onto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him” (Apocalypse 12:7-9).
Holy Scripture adds: “Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect!” (Ephesians 6:11-13).
“What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Secular Soldiers and Spiritual Soldiers
As with most things, there are lots of analogies that can be drawn in comparisons between the secular physical life and the religious spiritual life. One such analogy is that of secular soldiers and spiritual soldiers―a nation’s military and the Soldiers of Christ. All Catholics―who have received the Sacrament of Confirmation―have been made Soldiers of Christ. They have a responsibility to fight for the Faith, to defend the Faith and to conquer for the Faith (conversions to the Faith). Holy Scripture is clear on this point: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Weapons
All soldiers are issued with weapons that they must use in combat―and the same is true for the Soldiers of Christ. Before we look at Heaven’s Weapons, let us spend a brief moment examining the importance that the military assigns to weapons. The following is taken from the United States Marine Corps.
The Creed of a United States Marine
The following ‘creed’ is accredited to Major General William H. Rupertus, USMC (United States Marine Corps), and is still taught to Marines undergoing Basic Training at the Recruit Depots at San Diego and Parris Island. It was first published in the San Diego Marine Corps Chevron March 14th, 1942.
(1) This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
(2) My rifle is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life.
(3) My rifle, without me, is useless. Without my rifle, I am useless. I must fire my rifle true. I must shoot straighter than my enemy who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me. I will …
(4) My rifle and myself know that what counts in this war is not the rounds we fire, the noise of our burst, nor the smoke we make. We know that it is the hits that count. We will hit….
(5) My rifle is human, even as I, because it is my life. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strength, its parts, its accessories, its sights and its barrel. I will ever guard it against the ravages of weather and damage as I will ever guard my legs, my arms, my eyes and my heart against damage. I will keep my rifle clean and ready. We will become part of each other. We will ….
(6) Before God, I swear this creed. My rifle and myself are the defenders of my country. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life.
(7) So be it, until victory is America’s and there is no enemy, but peace!!
The Creed of a Soldier of Christ
We speak of the “Church Militant”―which means the “Fighting Church.” The lay organization, “Legion of Mary”, specifically chooses the Roman Legion of old as its prototype and example―remember that the word “Legion” means “Army” as in the Roman armies/Roman legions of old. St. Louis de Montfort even refers to Mary as the chief general of God’s armies: “He has made Mary sovereign of Heaven and Earth, and general of His armies!” (True Devotion to Mary). (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). Make no mistake about it―as Catholics we are all conscripted for the fight!
The above “Creed of a United States Marine” speaks of the “rifle” of the Marine as being a prop, a friend, a brother, and as a part of the Marine himself. Likewise, we can speak of the Holy Rosary and the Brown Scapular as being our Heaven sent weapons for the perpetual fight that we find ourselves in. Holy Scripture speaks of weapons for the fight when it says: “Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect! Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth; and having on the breastplate of justice; and your feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace! In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one! And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God. By all prayer and supplication, praying at all times in the spirit!” (Ephesians 6:13-18).
The above Scriptural passage was written many centuries before Our Lady gave us the weapons of the Holy Rosary and the Brown Scapular in the 13th century. You could well insert the Rosary and the Scapular into the above quote―the Scapular being, in a certain sense, the protective armor of the “breastplate” and the “shield”; with the Rosary being the “sword of the Spirit” that we should be “praying at all times”.
In the same 13th century, we recall a famous prophecy made about the Rosary and Scapular. In the pages of an ancient history of the Carmelite Order (written in mediaeval Latin by a forgotten writer named Ventimiglia) the author of this book found the following account: “Three famous men of God met on a street corner in Rome. They were Friar Dominic, busy gathering recruits to a new Religious Order of Preachers; Brother Francis, the friend of birds and beasts and especially dear to the poor; and Angelus, who had been invited to Rome from Mount Carmel, in Palestine, because of his fame as a preacher. At their chance meeting, by the light of the Holy Spirit each of the three men recognized each other and, in the course of their conversation (as recorded by various followers who were present), they made prophecies to each other. Saint Angelus foretold the stigmata of Saint Francis, and Saint Dominic said: ‘One day, Brother Angelus, to your Order of Carmel, the Most Blessed Virgin Mary will give a devotion to be known as the Brown Scapular, and to my Order of Preachers she will give a devotion to be known as the Rosary. And one day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, she will save the world.’”
Hence, the Soldier of Christ has his own Creed which consists is cherishing and using the Holy Rosary and the Brown Scapular …
(1) This is my shield and my sword ― more powerful than any earthly shield or weapon.
(2) My Scapular and Rosary are my best friends. They preserve my life of grace.
(3) My Scapular and Rosary, without me, serve no purpose. Without my Scapular and Rosary, I am useless. They are my shield and sword to fight evil. With them I will obtain graces to overcome my enemies before they overcome me!
(4) I know that what counts in this war is not the rounds we fire, nor the prayers we say―but what matters is that we hit the target―like David’s pebble hit the target of Goliath’s forehead. One prayer said well is better than hundreds said badly. I will pray well!
(5) My armor and weapons are not human and natural―they are superhuman and supernatural.
(6) Before God, as a Soldier of Christ, I swear this creed. My Scapular and Rosary are the defenders of my soul and my Faith. They are the masters of our enemies. They can be the saviors of my soul if I use them correctly.
(7) So be it, until victory is the Church’s and there is no enemy, but peace and unity under the Kingship of Christ!
Armor and Weapon
The above prophecy says: “One day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, she will save the world!” Yet at Akita, Japan, in 1973, Our Lady said: “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son!” Are these not contradictory statements? At Akita, Our Lady makes no mention of the Brown Scapular as being one of “the only weapons which will remain for you”, but mentions “the Sign left by my Son” instead. How can this be?
Well, the answer is quite simple. The Brown Scapular is more of a piece of spiritual armor than a spiritual weapon. Armor and weapons are two different things―we use armor to protect against attack; whereas a weapon is instrument with which we attack. If you read the prayers said by the priest as he clothes and enrolls someone with the Brown Scapular, then you will clearly see the defensive and protective powers of the Brown Scapular mentioned:
“Save Thy servant, who trusts in Thee, my God. Lord, send him (her) aid from Thy holy place, and watch over him (her) from Sion. Let the enemy have no power over him (her), and the son of iniquity be powerless to harm him (her) … O Lord, let Thy gracious blessing come upon this garment, in which Thy servant is to be clothed. May it be blessed and endowed with Thy power to repel all vicious assaults of our visible and invisible enemies ... Take, dear brother (sister), this blessed garment, and call on the most Holy Virgin, that, by her merits, you may keep it spotless, be shielded by her from all adversity … Protect Thy servant, Lord, with the saving grace of peace; and as he (she) confides himself (herself) to the patronage of Blessed Mary, ever a Virgin, let him (her) be safe from all adversaries.” (Prayers from the ceremony of the blessing of and investiture with the Brown Scapular).
The prayers used for the blessing of the Rosary also have some reference to protection, but not as much as the Scapular: “Almighty and merciful God, we humbly beg you to sanctify these Rosaries (or this Rosary) … that whoever carries one on his person, or reverently keeps one (or it) in his home, … may he always and everywhere in this life be shielded from all enemies, visible and invisible.” The Church, for the most part, refers to the Rosary―not as a means of defense, but as means of attack.
“The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son!” (Our Lady in Akita, Japan).
“Give me an army saying the Rosary and I will conquer the world!” (Blessed Pope Pius IX).
“The Rosary is the scourge of the devil!” (Pope Adrian VI).
“The Rosary is a powerful weapon to put the demons to flight and a most powerful weapon to overcome the devil ... It serves admirably to overcome the enemies of God and of religion.” (Pope Pius XI).
“The most saintly men of every age and of every condition have not only recited the Rosary, but have also used it at all times as a most powerful weapon to overcome the devil” (Pope Pius XI).
“The Church fought, not with troops and arms, but chiefly with the power of the most Holy Rosary … By this means the Church triumphed magnificently over every obstacle” (Pope Leo XIII).
“The Hail Mary well said—that is, with attention, devotion, and modesty—is, according to the saints, the enemy of the devil which puts him to flight, and the hammer which crushes him!” (St. Louis de Montfort).
“The Rosary is the weapon for these times” (St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina).
“The Most Holy Virgin in these last times in which we live has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families…that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary.” (Sister Lucia dos Santos of Fatima).
“Do you remember the story of David who vanquished Goliath. What steps did the young Israelite take to overthrow the giant? He struck him in the middle of the forehead with a pebble from his sling. If we regard the Philistine as representing evil and all its powers―heresy, impurity, pride―then we can consider the little stones from the sling capable of overthrowing the enemy as symbolizing the Aves of the Rosary.” (Dom Columba Marmion, Christ, the Ideal of the Priest).
As Padre Pio was getting into bed, he said to the friars who were in his room: “Give me my weapon!” And the friars, surprised and curious, asked him: “Where is the weapon? We cannot see anything!” Padre Pio replied: “It is in my habit, which you have just hung up!” After having gone through the pockets of his religious habit, the friars said to him: “Padre, there is no weapon in your habit! . . . We can only find your Rosary beads there!” Padre Pio immediately said: “And is this not a weapon? ... The true weapon?!”
Concerning the Rosary, Our Lady herself said to Padre Pio: “With this weapon you will win.” Later, to Fr. Onorato Marcucci, grabbing the Rosary that he had put on the nightstand for a few seconds, Padre Pio said: “With this—one wins the battles.”
Taking Care of Your Armor and Weapon
Let us first of all look at the natural and physical side of caring for weaponry and then draw some conclusions on the spiritual side of things. It’s impossible to say precisely how often you should clean your guns. Ask ten different hunters how often they clean their guns, and you’re liable to get ten different answers. In a combat situation, the frequency of weapon cleaning can vary depending on a variety of factors such as the type of weapon, the environmental conditions, the intensity of combat operations, and the specific protocols or directives in place by the military unit, etc. However, it is a standard practice for soldiers to regularly clean and maintain their weapons to ensure they are functioning properly and to prevent malfunctions that could compromise their effectiveness in combat.
Generally, soldiers are trained to clean their weapons after each use or at least daily if they are in an active combat environment. Weapons can quickly accumulate dirt, debris, moisture and fouling from firing, which can lead to malfunctions if not properly cleaned and maintained. Regular cleaning also helps prevent corrosion and ensures that the weapon is ready for use when needed. In some situations where soldiers are engaged in prolonged combat operations or operating in harsh environmental conditions (such as deserts or jungles), they may need to clean their weapons more frequently to prevent malfunctions and ensure reliable performance.
A former German Army Paratrooper writes: “On the battlefield, you only clean your weapon if you really have to. This might be every half an hour or never, depending where you fight, how much you shoot and of course, the type of your weapon. Most of the times, I was fighting with an AK 47 Kalashnikov and with this type of gun there isn’t really a need to clean it very often. During the Kosovo war, I carried an Austrian-made version of the Belgian FAL rifle and unlike the Kalashnikov, you had to keep it spotless, otherwise, it didn’t work.”
An American soldier states: “If your rifle collects a lot of rain―in an area such as the Midwest―your gun passively cleans itself. But before turning it in, the weapon must be dried off. If you’re deployed off into a sandy area, the cleaning is going to be 20-times harder. It’s rough to try and clean every bit of sand from a weapon with countless holes and compartments. Never have my hands hurt so bad doing a single task for three hours. Cleaning sand out of a rifle is like an intense version of arts and crafts.”
When the weapon receives little or no use, the Army states: “No matter if it’s a pistol, rifle or machine gun, it needs to be cleaned and lubed at least every 90 days, whether it’s been fired or not. And that goes for every Army unit: Active, Reserves and National Guard. But particularly in very humid areas where corrosion is more of a problem, cleaning and lubing will need to be done more often. If you wait until 90 days are up, you may find corrosion has ruined the weapon.”
Those who are not in the military, also chime-in with their opinion. Here is one such person, who is a gun-trainer at an indoor shooting range: “Like many things in life, there are different opinions on this topic. In the military, it’s generally taught that the gun must be cleaned every time it is used. The advice we often give regarding how often you should clean your gun comes down to the answer to one question: how important is it that your gun operates? Of course, everyone wants the gun to work whenever you pull the trigger, but most people would recognize that it’s more important for the weapon to function properly when it’s being used in defense than it is when you’re just practicing or having fun at the range. My opinion is that if I’m going to count on a gun for defense (be it personal carry, or even accessible for home defense), then I want to leave NOTHING to chance. If I fire even just one single round through my ‘carry’ gun (same for a home defense gun), then I clean it. If or when that time comes that I must use that weapon in defense of myself or my family, then that gun MUST fire, and I’m not willing to take even the slightest chance that it won’t. Modern firearms are reliable enough that they nearly always fire even if fairly dirty, but my life and my family’s lives are worth enough to me that I will take the 5-10 minutes it takes to clean my weapon, every time.
“On the other hand, with guns that I use only for shooting-range use, I’m willing to be just a little more casual about how often I clean them. In the unlikely chance that those guns suffer a malfunction because I didn’t clean it, it’s not that big of a problem; nobody’s life is in danger. I can simply take my time, fix the problem, and move on. So, guns that I only use for fun at the shooting-range, I may clean every 2-3 times that I fire them―provided that it won’t be too long between shooting-range sessions. Neglecting maintenance on a gun for an extended period can lead to corrosion and excessive wear potentially reduce its service life. That being the case, it’s a good idea to clean and lubricate a gun if it won’t be used again for 2-3 weeks―even if it’s only been used in one shooting session with limited rounds. How you store the guns is also a consideration; if they are stored in a humid or dusty environment, they should be cleaned more often, just to preserve them. They say that since a rifle can show signs of decreased accuracy after as few as 30 rounds, a gun should be cleaned around that point.”
Dirty barrels are probably the number one reason that otherwise good shooting rifles turn bad. Depending on your gun, that could happen every ten shots or every hundred shots. If you want to be on the safe side, clean your rifle after every trip to the range, assuming that you shoot a couple dozen rounds. Clean your barrel when accuracy starts to degrade or once a year, but clean the other components after every trip to the range. Above all else, make sure you wipe away moisture from both outside and inside the gun. If you stick to those three rules of thumb, your gun will stay accurate and functioning as long as you own it.
Weatherby, Inc. ― an American gun manufacturer ― recommends cleaning your rifle after every single trip to the range or the field. They say that since a rifle can show signs of decreased accuracy after as few as 30 rounds, a gun should be cleaned around that point. Accuracy is of great importance and most gunsmiths and gun-owners agree on this point. As one instructor says: “Once you start seeing your accuracy drop, I always clean out my bore. Rust prevention is my primary concern. Do whatever it takes to mitigate moisture accumulation. Most of my gun care happens after the gun has experienced heavy moisture. At the minimum, the gun will be wiped down and oiled, but preferably I'd take apart the action and make sure all moisture is wiped away. I’ll also run a bore-snake down the barrel to remove any moisture”
Taking Care of Your Spiritual Armor and Weapons
Let us now draw some analogies from the above natural field with the supernatural field. As stated above: “It is a standard practice for soldiers to regularly clean and maintain their weapons to ensure they are functioning properly and to prevent malfunctions that could compromise their effectiveness in combat … Weapons can quickly accumulate dirt, debris, moisture and fouling from firing, which can lead to malfunctions if not properly cleaned and maintained. Regular cleaning helps prevent corrosion and ensures that the weapon is ready for use when needed. In some situations where soldiers are engaged in prolonged combat operations or in harsh conditions, they may need to clean their weapons more frequently to prevent malfunctions and ensure reliable performance ... Dirty barrels are probably the number one reason that otherwise good shooting rifles turn bad.”
What weakens or even destroys the power of our spiritual weapons is the dirt of sin. Venial sin reduces the power of weapons and reduces their reliability and accuracy. Mortal sin will make them useless. When we are in a state of mortal sin, whatever prayers we might say for others or for some cause―those prayers are rendered ineffective and impotent until the time we clean everything by a good Confession and restore the power of sanctifying grace to our soul.
On the other hand, the more devotion, zeal and intensity we show in using our spiritual weapons, then the more powerful, effective and accurate they become. As St. Louis de Montfort writes: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly. To say the Holy Rosary with advantage, one must be in a state of sanctifying grace, or at least be fully determined to give up sin, for all our good works and prayers are dead works if they are done in a state of mortal sin. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? The Rosary said without the meditation on the sacred mysteries of our salvation would almost be a body without a soul!
“Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin. The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said, especially when we have promised to say it regularly, or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
In the spiritual life, it is grace that does everything. Sacramentals, such as the Rosary or the Scapular, are merely magnets or channels for grace―not Sanctifying Grace, but Actual Grace. Sacramentals obtain favors [Actual Graces] from God through the prayers of the Church offered for those who make use of Sacramentals, and through the devotion that Sacramentals inspire. When Our Lady showed St. Catherine Labouré the design of the Miraculous Medal that she wanted to have made―she said that those who would wear the medal around the necks would receive great graces [Actual Graces].
When we speak of “being in a state of grace” we are speaking of “Sanctifying Grace” which resides in the soul ― without which we cannot enter Heaven. When we speak of “Actual Grace” we are speaking about a passing or temporary grace (not a grace that habitually resides in the soul) which is meant to help us in one way or another in millions of different ways. Sacramentals are holy things or actions of which the Church makes use to obtain for us from God spiritual and temporal favors [which are Actual Graces]. Sacramentals are similar to the seven Sacraments in that they are channels of grace. One major difference between Sacraments and Sacramentals is that Sacraments do not produce Sanctifying Grace, a power that belongs to Sacraments alone. Sacramentals can obtain for us the following benefits:
(1) Actual Graces
(2) Forgiveness of venial sins
(3) Remission of temporal punishment
(4) Health of body and material blessings
(5) Protection from evil spirits
Actual Graces are intended to inspire us to draw closer to God; to withdraw more and more from sin and worldliness; to repent of our sins; to do good and avoid evil; to have courage rather than fear; to do or say the right thing in any given circumstance; etc. God sends Actual Graces to every human being―whether they are Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, pagans or atheists: “God makes His sun rise and rain fall upon the good and bad, upon the just and the unjust!” (Matthew 5:45). “God wants all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth … in the unity of the Holy Spirit … One body and one Spirit … One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism” (1 Timothy 2:4; Ephesians 4:5). Without the grace of God we can do nothing and are nothing: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” says Our Lord (John 15:5). St. Paul adds: “What have you that you have not received?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). Scripture states: “Good things and evil things, life and death, poverty and riches, are from God” ― some as a reward, others as a punishment (Ecclesiasticus 11:14). Thus St. Thérèse of Lisieux says: “Everything is grace!” ― and you could add to that: “Grace is everything!”
Our total and absolute reliance upon the grace of God is clearly shown by these extracts from St. Thomas Aquinas’ treatise on grace in his Summa Theologica and his Quaestiones quodlibetales: “Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace perfects nature … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For to many persons grace is given, to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
The Rosary and Scapular ― Sources of Great Graces
If grace is so important, then the Holy Rosary and the Brown Scapular are important sources of grace. Here are the FIFTEEN ROSARY PROMISES made by Our Lady, which indicate the tremendous graces she offers through the Holy Rosary. We have underlined the chief graces promised and placed in bold-print the dispositions we should have to get those graces:
1. Whoever shall faithfully serve me by the recitation of the Rosary, shall receive signal graces.
2. I promise my special protection and the greatest graces to all who shall recite the Rosary.
3. The Rosary shall be a powerful armor against Hell, it will destroy vice, decrease sin, and defeat heresies.
4. It will cause virtue and good works to flourish; it will obtain for souls the abundant mercy of God; it will withdraw the hearts of men from the love of the world and its vanities, and will lift them to the desire of eternal things. Oh, that souls would sanctify themselves by this means.
5. The soul which recommends itself to me by the recitation of the Rosary, shall not perish.
6. Whoever shall recite the Rosary devoutly, applying himself to the consideration of its sacred mysteries, shall never be conquered by misfortune. God will not chastise him in His justice, he shall not perish by an unprovided death; if he be just he shall remain in the grace of God, and become worthy of eternal life.
7. Whoever shall have a true devotion for the Rosary shall not die without the Sacraments of the Church.
8. Those who are faithful in reciting the Rosary shall have during their life and at their death the light of God and the plenitude of His graces; at the moment of death they shall participate in the merits of the saints in paradise.
9. I shall deliver from Purgatory, those who have been devoted to the Rosary.
10. The faithful children of the Rosary shall merit a high degree of glory in Heaven.
11. You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary.
12. All those who propagate the Holy Rosary shall be aided by me in their necessities.
13. I have obtained from my Divine Son, that all the advocates of the Rosary shall have the entire celestial court for intercessors, during their life and at the hour of death.
14. All who recite the Rosary are my sons, and brothers of my only son Jesus Christ.
15. Devotion to my Rosary is a great sign of predestination.
Similarly, the BROWN SCAPULAR PROMISES indicate the reception of great graces―and there is no greater grace than final perseverance and salvation. Our Lady promised this to those who would faithfully wear the Brown Scapular: “Take this Scapular. Whosoever dies wearing this scapular shall not suffer eternal fire. It is a sign of salvation, a sure safeguard in danger, and a pledge of peace and my special protection until the end of the ages!” No special prayers or actions are required after being blessed and clothed with the blessed Brown Scapular. This is why wearing it is called “the silent prayer.” Wearing it is the prayer.
By decree of the Catholic Church, with the blessing of popes, by becoming invested [clothed] with the Brown Scapular, you automatically become a member of the Confraternity of the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. This means that you now belong to a spiritual family whereby you are permanently affiliated with the Carmelite Order in addition to receiving the promise of Our Lady by wearing the Brown Scapular. That means that you share in all the Masses, prayers and sacrifices offered by the Carmelites. It is, in a loose sense, like having a joint bank-account ― but the onus and responsibility is on you to “withdraw” those graces from the joint “bank-account.” You have to ask Heaven to send those graces to you for whatever needs you may have ― “Ask and it shall be given you! Seek and you shall find! Knock and it shall be opened to you!” (Luke 11:9). The reverse is also true―if you don’t ask and you won’t receive; if you don’t seek and you won’t find; and if you don’t knock then nobody will come to you!
A Weapon is Only as Good as the Soldier Using It
As the so-called “Creed of a United States Marine” stated: “My rifle, without me, is useless. Without my rifle, I am useless. I must fire my rifle true. I must shoot straighter than my enemy who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me.” A weapon depends a lot upon the skill of the person using it. An incredible weapon can become almost useless if the person using it is clueless on how to best use it. The same is true for our spiritual weapons―hence St. Louis de Montfort wrote: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly.” A trained sniper will hit a distant target with one bullet, while an untrained shooter might never hit that target no matter how many bullets he uses. In the spiritual realm, if we pray without fervor and attention, we are less likely to “hit the target” with our prayers and therefore less likely to get what we are praying for―as Our Lord said: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me! In vain do they worship Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-9).
Likewise, Our Lady said to Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich that one single Mass, offered with the level of devotion that the Apostles offered Mass, would drive away all the calamities besieging the Church. Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich states: “Mass, badly celebrated, is an enormous evil. Ah! It is not a matter of indifference how it is said! . . . I have had a great vision on the mystery of Holy Mass and I have seen that whatever good has existed since creation is owing to it … Our Lady said what is most painful for me to repeat―that if only one priest offered the unbloody Sacrifice as worthily and with the same sentiments as the Apostles, he could ward off all calamities from the Church!” Those words not only apply to the priest who is offering Mass, but also to all the faithful assisting at Mass―what tremendous and enormous graces would they not receive if they would only assist at Mass with great devotion, much like that of the Apostles or the early Christians!
Let us then look at some ways in which we can improve in the use of our spiritual weapons―especially the Rosary and the Scapular. Improving our skills may well greatly improve our lives, and improve the results of our prayers by getting more from God―so that we don’t fall into the category condemned by St. Louis de Montfort: “Most prayers seem to bear no fruit, and after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!”
Nothing Better is Needed―Just a Better Use of What We Have
You know the proverb: “A bad workman always blames his tools.” You could also change that to: “A bad marksman always blames his weapon.” The tools or weapons that God has given us are perfectly suited to the task at hand―God is perfect and all He does is perfect. Imperfection is found on the side of man―not on the side of God.
“He that is hasty with his feet shall stumble” (Proverbs 19:2). Likewise, you could say: “He that is hasty in his prayers will only mumble and stumble.” You may have heard the saying: “Haste kills all devotion” ― let us not allow that murderer into our souls! In the Book of Proverbs we read: “Let not thy heart be hasty to utter a word before God!” (Ecclesiastes 5:1). Another proverb tells us to “Make haste slowly!” It is a very old expression that means when you take your time to do a task or strive to achieve a goal, you will make fewer mistakes and will be more likely to succeed that if you rushed through things. Soldiers are told to take aim carefully ― “Haste makes waste!” ― one well-aimed bullet that hits the target is worth more than a thousand hastily fired bullets that miss the target. There are snipers, and then there are Marine Corps Snipers. Marine Snipers are the best of the best, the elite, trained to shoot as little as possible. One shot, one kill.
St. Francis de Sales, in his book Introduction to the Devout Life, writes: “The rivers flowing gently through the plains carry along large boats and rich merchandise. Rains falling gently on fields make them plentiful in grass and grain. But streams and rivers with strong currents rush through the land, ruin their neighborhood and are useless for navigation. Likewise heavy showers and tempests ravage fields and meadows. Never was work done well with vehemence and in a hurry. As the ancient proverb has it, we must hasten gently. He who hurries up, says Solomon, runs the risk of stumbling and hurting his feet (Proverbs 19:2) ... Do not hurry in order to say many prayers but take care to say those that you do say from the heart. One Our Father said earnestly is of greater value than many recited quickly and in a hurry. Beware of haste, for it is a deadly enemy of true devotion; and anything done with haste is never done well.”
St. Louis de Montfort writes: “Devotions are a wonderful help for souls seeking holiness provided they are performed in a worthy manner, that is: (1) With the right intention of pleasing God alone; (2) With attention, avoiding willful distractions; (3) With devotion, avoiding haste and negligence; and (4) With decorum and respectful bodily posture. ... Superficial devotees to Our Lady have no interior spirit. They say many Rosaries with great haste and assist at many Masses distractedly … without inner fervor ... It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary ... Saying the Rosary with no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible ... They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words ... A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, also The Secret of the Rosary).
In our heart of hearts, we no doubt always knew the above to be true. Unfortunately, what we know is not always what we do! Sadly, most people pray badly―if they even pray at all! To change life-long bad habits is easier said than done! As they say: “You cannot teach an old dog new tricks!” But maybe you can teach the old dog to bark more slowly! Change is usually painful. Yet if change is needed, then change we must. Satan will no doubt try to throw his satanic spanner into the works and foil and spoil anything we might try to improve. So be ready for a roller-coaster ride!
If you are praying your five-decade Rosary “all in one go” ― then you might consider breaking those five decades into several parts. For example, sacrifice ten minutes to just one decade so that you can have a serious meditation on that decade. Secondly, slow down your prayers―we rarely speak to people with the verbal diarrhea speed with which we pour out a Hail Mary: HailMaryfullofgracetheLordiswiththeeblessedartthouamongwomenandblessedisthefruitofthywombJesus! [draw a breath, then resume] HolyMaryMotherofGodprayforussinnersnowandatthehourofourdeathAmen!
St. Louis de Montfort recommends praying the Rosary in the following manner: “I beg you to restrain your natural precipitation when saying your Rosary, and make some pauses in the middle of the Our Father and Hail Mary, and a smaller one after the words of the Our Father and Hail Mary which I have marked with a cross, as follows:
Our Father, Who art in Heaven, † hallowed by Thy Name, † Thy kingdom come, † Thy will be done † on Earth as it is in Heaven. † Give us this day † our daily bread, † and forgive us our trespasses † as we forgive those who trespass against us, † and lead us not into temptation, † but deliver us from evil. † Amen.
Hail, Mary, full of grace, † the Lord is with thee, † blessed art thou among women, † and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. † Holy Mary, Mother of God, † pray for us sinners, now † and at the hour of our death. † Amen.
Glory be to the Father † and to the Son † and to the Holy Ghost, † as it was in the beginning, † is now and ever shall be, † world without end. † Amen.
“At first, you may find it difficult to make these pauses because of your bad habit of saying prayers in a hurry; but a decade said recollectedly in this way will be worth more than thousands of Rosaries said in a hurry, without pausing or reflecting.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
The above principle can be applied to any prayer and every prayer that we say. Yet the period of transition from our customary haste to a more respectful pace will seem like “Hell on Earth” ― and Satan will do all that he can to make you fail. He knows the incredible benefits that will come to those who successfully manage to eliminate haste in their prayers. Your spouse will hate the changes; the children will hate the changes; the students will hate the changes; parishioners will hate the changes―even you will hate the changes! Yet change we must if we wish to honor God, Our Lord and Our Lady with our hearts and not just our lips.
The recent alleged ‘assassination attempt’ of Donald Trump saw Trump rise after being ‘shot’ with his fist pumping the air while shouting “Fight! Fight! Fight!” What does he mean? Fight who? Our Lord―Who was actually killed―also tells us to fight. We are told to fight the devil and the world―Satan is the prince of this world and the world is his princedom. Our Lord says: “My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36). “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not anything! … The prince of this world is already judged! ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). We too must cast out the prince of this world and the worldly influence that prince uses to seduce us into worldliness. “And there was a great battle in Heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought. And they prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in Heaven. And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world, and he was cast onto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him” (Apocalypse 12:7-9).
Holy Scripture adds: “Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect!” (Ephesians 6:11-13).
“What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Secular Soldiers and Spiritual Soldiers
As with most things, there are lots of analogies that can be drawn in comparisons between the secular physical life and the religious spiritual life. One such analogy is that of secular soldiers and spiritual soldiers―a nation’s military and the Soldiers of Christ. All Catholics―who have received the Sacrament of Confirmation―have been made Soldiers of Christ. They have a responsibility to fight for the Faith, to defend the Faith and to conquer for the Faith (conversions to the Faith). Holy Scripture is clear on this point: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Be of good courage, and let us fight for the city of our God!” (2 Kings 10:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Weapons
All soldiers are issued with weapons that they must use in combat―and the same is true for the Soldiers of Christ. Before we look at Heaven’s Weapons, let us spend a brief moment examining the importance that the military assigns to weapons. The following is taken from the United States Marine Corps.
The Creed of a United States Marine
The following ‘creed’ is accredited to Major General William H. Rupertus, USMC (United States Marine Corps), and is still taught to Marines undergoing Basic Training at the Recruit Depots at San Diego and Parris Island. It was first published in the San Diego Marine Corps Chevron March 14th, 1942.
(1) This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
(2) My rifle is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life.
(3) My rifle, without me, is useless. Without my rifle, I am useless. I must fire my rifle true. I must shoot straighter than my enemy who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me. I will …
(4) My rifle and myself know that what counts in this war is not the rounds we fire, the noise of our burst, nor the smoke we make. We know that it is the hits that count. We will hit….
(5) My rifle is human, even as I, because it is my life. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strength, its parts, its accessories, its sights and its barrel. I will ever guard it against the ravages of weather and damage as I will ever guard my legs, my arms, my eyes and my heart against damage. I will keep my rifle clean and ready. We will become part of each other. We will ….
(6) Before God, I swear this creed. My rifle and myself are the defenders of my country. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life.
(7) So be it, until victory is America’s and there is no enemy, but peace!!
The Creed of a Soldier of Christ
We speak of the “Church Militant”―which means the “Fighting Church.” The lay organization, “Legion of Mary”, specifically chooses the Roman Legion of old as its prototype and example―remember that the word “Legion” means “Army” as in the Roman armies/Roman legions of old. St. Louis de Montfort even refers to Mary as the chief general of God’s armies: “He has made Mary sovereign of Heaven and Earth, and general of His armies!” (True Devotion to Mary). (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). Make no mistake about it―as Catholics we are all conscripted for the fight!
The above “Creed of a United States Marine” speaks of the “rifle” of the Marine as being a prop, a friend, a brother, and as a part of the Marine himself. Likewise, we can speak of the Holy Rosary and the Brown Scapular as being our Heaven sent weapons for the perpetual fight that we find ourselves in. Holy Scripture speaks of weapons for the fight when it says: “Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect! Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth; and having on the breastplate of justice; and your feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace! In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one! And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God. By all prayer and supplication, praying at all times in the spirit!” (Ephesians 6:13-18).
The above Scriptural passage was written many centuries before Our Lady gave us the weapons of the Holy Rosary and the Brown Scapular in the 13th century. You could well insert the Rosary and the Scapular into the above quote―the Scapular being, in a certain sense, the protective armor of the “breastplate” and the “shield”; with the Rosary being the “sword of the Spirit” that we should be “praying at all times”.
In the same 13th century, we recall a famous prophecy made about the Rosary and Scapular. In the pages of an ancient history of the Carmelite Order (written in mediaeval Latin by a forgotten writer named Ventimiglia) the author of this book found the following account: “Three famous men of God met on a street corner in Rome. They were Friar Dominic, busy gathering recruits to a new Religious Order of Preachers; Brother Francis, the friend of birds and beasts and especially dear to the poor; and Angelus, who had been invited to Rome from Mount Carmel, in Palestine, because of his fame as a preacher. At their chance meeting, by the light of the Holy Spirit each of the three men recognized each other and, in the course of their conversation (as recorded by various followers who were present), they made prophecies to each other. Saint Angelus foretold the stigmata of Saint Francis, and Saint Dominic said: ‘One day, Brother Angelus, to your Order of Carmel, the Most Blessed Virgin Mary will give a devotion to be known as the Brown Scapular, and to my Order of Preachers she will give a devotion to be known as the Rosary. And one day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, she will save the world.’”
Hence, the Soldier of Christ has his own Creed which consists is cherishing and using the Holy Rosary and the Brown Scapular …
(1) This is my shield and my sword ― more powerful than any earthly shield or weapon.
(2) My Scapular and Rosary are my best friends. They preserve my life of grace.
(3) My Scapular and Rosary, without me, serve no purpose. Without my Scapular and Rosary, I am useless. They are my shield and sword to fight evil. With them I will obtain graces to overcome my enemies before they overcome me!
(4) I know that what counts in this war is not the rounds we fire, nor the prayers we say―but what matters is that we hit the target―like David’s pebble hit the target of Goliath’s forehead. One prayer said well is better than hundreds said badly. I will pray well!
(5) My armor and weapons are not human and natural―they are superhuman and supernatural.
(6) Before God, as a Soldier of Christ, I swear this creed. My Scapular and Rosary are the defenders of my soul and my Faith. They are the masters of our enemies. They can be the saviors of my soul if I use them correctly.
(7) So be it, until victory is the Church’s and there is no enemy, but peace and unity under the Kingship of Christ!
Armor and Weapon
The above prophecy says: “One day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, she will save the world!” Yet at Akita, Japan, in 1973, Our Lady said: “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son!” Are these not contradictory statements? At Akita, Our Lady makes no mention of the Brown Scapular as being one of “the only weapons which will remain for you”, but mentions “the Sign left by my Son” instead. How can this be?
Well, the answer is quite simple. The Brown Scapular is more of a piece of spiritual armor than a spiritual weapon. Armor and weapons are two different things―we use armor to protect against attack; whereas a weapon is instrument with which we attack. If you read the prayers said by the priest as he clothes and enrolls someone with the Brown Scapular, then you will clearly see the defensive and protective powers of the Brown Scapular mentioned:
“Save Thy servant, who trusts in Thee, my God. Lord, send him (her) aid from Thy holy place, and watch over him (her) from Sion. Let the enemy have no power over him (her), and the son of iniquity be powerless to harm him (her) … O Lord, let Thy gracious blessing come upon this garment, in which Thy servant is to be clothed. May it be blessed and endowed with Thy power to repel all vicious assaults of our visible and invisible enemies ... Take, dear brother (sister), this blessed garment, and call on the most Holy Virgin, that, by her merits, you may keep it spotless, be shielded by her from all adversity … Protect Thy servant, Lord, with the saving grace of peace; and as he (she) confides himself (herself) to the patronage of Blessed Mary, ever a Virgin, let him (her) be safe from all adversaries.” (Prayers from the ceremony of the blessing of and investiture with the Brown Scapular).
The prayers used for the blessing of the Rosary also have some reference to protection, but not as much as the Scapular: “Almighty and merciful God, we humbly beg you to sanctify these Rosaries (or this Rosary) … that whoever carries one on his person, or reverently keeps one (or it) in his home, … may he always and everywhere in this life be shielded from all enemies, visible and invisible.” The Church, for the most part, refers to the Rosary―not as a means of defense, but as means of attack.
“The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son!” (Our Lady in Akita, Japan).
“Give me an army saying the Rosary and I will conquer the world!” (Blessed Pope Pius IX).
“The Rosary is the scourge of the devil!” (Pope Adrian VI).
“The Rosary is a powerful weapon to put the demons to flight and a most powerful weapon to overcome the devil ... It serves admirably to overcome the enemies of God and of religion.” (Pope Pius XI).
“The most saintly men of every age and of every condition have not only recited the Rosary, but have also used it at all times as a most powerful weapon to overcome the devil” (Pope Pius XI).
“The Church fought, not with troops and arms, but chiefly with the power of the most Holy Rosary … By this means the Church triumphed magnificently over every obstacle” (Pope Leo XIII).
“The Hail Mary well said—that is, with attention, devotion, and modesty—is, according to the saints, the enemy of the devil which puts him to flight, and the hammer which crushes him!” (St. Louis de Montfort).
“The Rosary is the weapon for these times” (St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina).
“The Most Holy Virgin in these last times in which we live has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families…that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary.” (Sister Lucia dos Santos of Fatima).
“Do you remember the story of David who vanquished Goliath. What steps did the young Israelite take to overthrow the giant? He struck him in the middle of the forehead with a pebble from his sling. If we regard the Philistine as representing evil and all its powers―heresy, impurity, pride―then we can consider the little stones from the sling capable of overthrowing the enemy as symbolizing the Aves of the Rosary.” (Dom Columba Marmion, Christ, the Ideal of the Priest).
As Padre Pio was getting into bed, he said to the friars who were in his room: “Give me my weapon!” And the friars, surprised and curious, asked him: “Where is the weapon? We cannot see anything!” Padre Pio replied: “It is in my habit, which you have just hung up!” After having gone through the pockets of his religious habit, the friars said to him: “Padre, there is no weapon in your habit! . . . We can only find your Rosary beads there!” Padre Pio immediately said: “And is this not a weapon? ... The true weapon?!”
Concerning the Rosary, Our Lady herself said to Padre Pio: “With this weapon you will win.” Later, to Fr. Onorato Marcucci, grabbing the Rosary that he had put on the nightstand for a few seconds, Padre Pio said: “With this—one wins the battles.”
Taking Care of Your Armor and Weapon
Let us first of all look at the natural and physical side of caring for weaponry and then draw some conclusions on the spiritual side of things. It’s impossible to say precisely how often you should clean your guns. Ask ten different hunters how often they clean their guns, and you’re liable to get ten different answers. In a combat situation, the frequency of weapon cleaning can vary depending on a variety of factors such as the type of weapon, the environmental conditions, the intensity of combat operations, and the specific protocols or directives in place by the military unit, etc. However, it is a standard practice for soldiers to regularly clean and maintain their weapons to ensure they are functioning properly and to prevent malfunctions that could compromise their effectiveness in combat.
Generally, soldiers are trained to clean their weapons after each use or at least daily if they are in an active combat environment. Weapons can quickly accumulate dirt, debris, moisture and fouling from firing, which can lead to malfunctions if not properly cleaned and maintained. Regular cleaning also helps prevent corrosion and ensures that the weapon is ready for use when needed. In some situations where soldiers are engaged in prolonged combat operations or operating in harsh environmental conditions (such as deserts or jungles), they may need to clean their weapons more frequently to prevent malfunctions and ensure reliable performance.
A former German Army Paratrooper writes: “On the battlefield, you only clean your weapon if you really have to. This might be every half an hour or never, depending where you fight, how much you shoot and of course, the type of your weapon. Most of the times, I was fighting with an AK 47 Kalashnikov and with this type of gun there isn’t really a need to clean it very often. During the Kosovo war, I carried an Austrian-made version of the Belgian FAL rifle and unlike the Kalashnikov, you had to keep it spotless, otherwise, it didn’t work.”
An American soldier states: “If your rifle collects a lot of rain―in an area such as the Midwest―your gun passively cleans itself. But before turning it in, the weapon must be dried off. If you’re deployed off into a sandy area, the cleaning is going to be 20-times harder. It’s rough to try and clean every bit of sand from a weapon with countless holes and compartments. Never have my hands hurt so bad doing a single task for three hours. Cleaning sand out of a rifle is like an intense version of arts and crafts.”
When the weapon receives little or no use, the Army states: “No matter if it’s a pistol, rifle or machine gun, it needs to be cleaned and lubed at least every 90 days, whether it’s been fired or not. And that goes for every Army unit: Active, Reserves and National Guard. But particularly in very humid areas where corrosion is more of a problem, cleaning and lubing will need to be done more often. If you wait until 90 days are up, you may find corrosion has ruined the weapon.”
Those who are not in the military, also chime-in with their opinion. Here is one such person, who is a gun-trainer at an indoor shooting range: “Like many things in life, there are different opinions on this topic. In the military, it’s generally taught that the gun must be cleaned every time it is used. The advice we often give regarding how often you should clean your gun comes down to the answer to one question: how important is it that your gun operates? Of course, everyone wants the gun to work whenever you pull the trigger, but most people would recognize that it’s more important for the weapon to function properly when it’s being used in defense than it is when you’re just practicing or having fun at the range. My opinion is that if I’m going to count on a gun for defense (be it personal carry, or even accessible for home defense), then I want to leave NOTHING to chance. If I fire even just one single round through my ‘carry’ gun (same for a home defense gun), then I clean it. If or when that time comes that I must use that weapon in defense of myself or my family, then that gun MUST fire, and I’m not willing to take even the slightest chance that it won’t. Modern firearms are reliable enough that they nearly always fire even if fairly dirty, but my life and my family’s lives are worth enough to me that I will take the 5-10 minutes it takes to clean my weapon, every time.
“On the other hand, with guns that I use only for shooting-range use, I’m willing to be just a little more casual about how often I clean them. In the unlikely chance that those guns suffer a malfunction because I didn’t clean it, it’s not that big of a problem; nobody’s life is in danger. I can simply take my time, fix the problem, and move on. So, guns that I only use for fun at the shooting-range, I may clean every 2-3 times that I fire them―provided that it won’t be too long between shooting-range sessions. Neglecting maintenance on a gun for an extended period can lead to corrosion and excessive wear potentially reduce its service life. That being the case, it’s a good idea to clean and lubricate a gun if it won’t be used again for 2-3 weeks―even if it’s only been used in one shooting session with limited rounds. How you store the guns is also a consideration; if they are stored in a humid or dusty environment, they should be cleaned more often, just to preserve them. They say that since a rifle can show signs of decreased accuracy after as few as 30 rounds, a gun should be cleaned around that point.”
Dirty barrels are probably the number one reason that otherwise good shooting rifles turn bad. Depending on your gun, that could happen every ten shots or every hundred shots. If you want to be on the safe side, clean your rifle after every trip to the range, assuming that you shoot a couple dozen rounds. Clean your barrel when accuracy starts to degrade or once a year, but clean the other components after every trip to the range. Above all else, make sure you wipe away moisture from both outside and inside the gun. If you stick to those three rules of thumb, your gun will stay accurate and functioning as long as you own it.
Weatherby, Inc. ― an American gun manufacturer ― recommends cleaning your rifle after every single trip to the range or the field. They say that since a rifle can show signs of decreased accuracy after as few as 30 rounds, a gun should be cleaned around that point. Accuracy is of great importance and most gunsmiths and gun-owners agree on this point. As one instructor says: “Once you start seeing your accuracy drop, I always clean out my bore. Rust prevention is my primary concern. Do whatever it takes to mitigate moisture accumulation. Most of my gun care happens after the gun has experienced heavy moisture. At the minimum, the gun will be wiped down and oiled, but preferably I'd take apart the action and make sure all moisture is wiped away. I’ll also run a bore-snake down the barrel to remove any moisture”
Taking Care of Your Spiritual Armor and Weapons
Let us now draw some analogies from the above natural field with the supernatural field. As stated above: “It is a standard practice for soldiers to regularly clean and maintain their weapons to ensure they are functioning properly and to prevent malfunctions that could compromise their effectiveness in combat … Weapons can quickly accumulate dirt, debris, moisture and fouling from firing, which can lead to malfunctions if not properly cleaned and maintained. Regular cleaning helps prevent corrosion and ensures that the weapon is ready for use when needed. In some situations where soldiers are engaged in prolonged combat operations or in harsh conditions, they may need to clean their weapons more frequently to prevent malfunctions and ensure reliable performance ... Dirty barrels are probably the number one reason that otherwise good shooting rifles turn bad.”
What weakens or even destroys the power of our spiritual weapons is the dirt of sin. Venial sin reduces the power of weapons and reduces their reliability and accuracy. Mortal sin will make them useless. When we are in a state of mortal sin, whatever prayers we might say for others or for some cause―those prayers are rendered ineffective and impotent until the time we clean everything by a good Confession and restore the power of sanctifying grace to our soul.
On the other hand, the more devotion, zeal and intensity we show in using our spiritual weapons, then the more powerful, effective and accurate they become. As St. Louis de Montfort writes: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly. To say the Holy Rosary with advantage, one must be in a state of sanctifying grace, or at least be fully determined to give up sin, for all our good works and prayers are dead works if they are done in a state of mortal sin. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? The Rosary said without the meditation on the sacred mysteries of our salvation would almost be a body without a soul!
“Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin. The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said, especially when we have promised to say it regularly, or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
In the spiritual life, it is grace that does everything. Sacramentals, such as the Rosary or the Scapular, are merely magnets or channels for grace―not Sanctifying Grace, but Actual Grace. Sacramentals obtain favors [Actual Graces] from God through the prayers of the Church offered for those who make use of Sacramentals, and through the devotion that Sacramentals inspire. When Our Lady showed St. Catherine Labouré the design of the Miraculous Medal that she wanted to have made―she said that those who would wear the medal around the necks would receive great graces [Actual Graces].
When we speak of “being in a state of grace” we are speaking of “Sanctifying Grace” which resides in the soul ― without which we cannot enter Heaven. When we speak of “Actual Grace” we are speaking about a passing or temporary grace (not a grace that habitually resides in the soul) which is meant to help us in one way or another in millions of different ways. Sacramentals are holy things or actions of which the Church makes use to obtain for us from God spiritual and temporal favors [which are Actual Graces]. Sacramentals are similar to the seven Sacraments in that they are channels of grace. One major difference between Sacraments and Sacramentals is that Sacraments do not produce Sanctifying Grace, a power that belongs to Sacraments alone. Sacramentals can obtain for us the following benefits:
(1) Actual Graces
(2) Forgiveness of venial sins
(3) Remission of temporal punishment
(4) Health of body and material blessings
(5) Protection from evil spirits
Actual Graces are intended to inspire us to draw closer to God; to withdraw more and more from sin and worldliness; to repent of our sins; to do good and avoid evil; to have courage rather than fear; to do or say the right thing in any given circumstance; etc. God sends Actual Graces to every human being―whether they are Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, pagans or atheists: “God makes His sun rise and rain fall upon the good and bad, upon the just and the unjust!” (Matthew 5:45). “God wants all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth … in the unity of the Holy Spirit … One body and one Spirit … One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism” (1 Timothy 2:4; Ephesians 4:5). Without the grace of God we can do nothing and are nothing: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” says Our Lord (John 15:5). St. Paul adds: “What have you that you have not received?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). Scripture states: “Good things and evil things, life and death, poverty and riches, are from God” ― some as a reward, others as a punishment (Ecclesiasticus 11:14). Thus St. Thérèse of Lisieux says: “Everything is grace!” ― and you could add to that: “Grace is everything!”
Our total and absolute reliance upon the grace of God is clearly shown by these extracts from St. Thomas Aquinas’ treatise on grace in his Summa Theologica and his Quaestiones quodlibetales: “Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do men know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God ... Man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … Grace perfects nature … Man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … It is heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … Man needs grace to entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Even a man who already possesses grace needs a further assistance of grace in order to live righteously … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For to many persons grace is given, to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114; Quaestiones quodlibetales, 4, 6).
The Rosary and Scapular ― Sources of Great Graces
If grace is so important, then the Holy Rosary and the Brown Scapular are important sources of grace. Here are the FIFTEEN ROSARY PROMISES made by Our Lady, which indicate the tremendous graces she offers through the Holy Rosary. We have underlined the chief graces promised and placed in bold-print the dispositions we should have to get those graces:
1. Whoever shall faithfully serve me by the recitation of the Rosary, shall receive signal graces.
2. I promise my special protection and the greatest graces to all who shall recite the Rosary.
3. The Rosary shall be a powerful armor against Hell, it will destroy vice, decrease sin, and defeat heresies.
4. It will cause virtue and good works to flourish; it will obtain for souls the abundant mercy of God; it will withdraw the hearts of men from the love of the world and its vanities, and will lift them to the desire of eternal things. Oh, that souls would sanctify themselves by this means.
5. The soul which recommends itself to me by the recitation of the Rosary, shall not perish.
6. Whoever shall recite the Rosary devoutly, applying himself to the consideration of its sacred mysteries, shall never be conquered by misfortune. God will not chastise him in His justice, he shall not perish by an unprovided death; if he be just he shall remain in the grace of God, and become worthy of eternal life.
7. Whoever shall have a true devotion for the Rosary shall not die without the Sacraments of the Church.
8. Those who are faithful in reciting the Rosary shall have during their life and at their death the light of God and the plenitude of His graces; at the moment of death they shall participate in the merits of the saints in paradise.
9. I shall deliver from Purgatory, those who have been devoted to the Rosary.
10. The faithful children of the Rosary shall merit a high degree of glory in Heaven.
11. You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary.
12. All those who propagate the Holy Rosary shall be aided by me in their necessities.
13. I have obtained from my Divine Son, that all the advocates of the Rosary shall have the entire celestial court for intercessors, during their life and at the hour of death.
14. All who recite the Rosary are my sons, and brothers of my only son Jesus Christ.
15. Devotion to my Rosary is a great sign of predestination.
Similarly, the BROWN SCAPULAR PROMISES indicate the reception of great graces―and there is no greater grace than final perseverance and salvation. Our Lady promised this to those who would faithfully wear the Brown Scapular: “Take this Scapular. Whosoever dies wearing this scapular shall not suffer eternal fire. It is a sign of salvation, a sure safeguard in danger, and a pledge of peace and my special protection until the end of the ages!” No special prayers or actions are required after being blessed and clothed with the blessed Brown Scapular. This is why wearing it is called “the silent prayer.” Wearing it is the prayer.
By decree of the Catholic Church, with the blessing of popes, by becoming invested [clothed] with the Brown Scapular, you automatically become a member of the Confraternity of the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. This means that you now belong to a spiritual family whereby you are permanently affiliated with the Carmelite Order in addition to receiving the promise of Our Lady by wearing the Brown Scapular. That means that you share in all the Masses, prayers and sacrifices offered by the Carmelites. It is, in a loose sense, like having a joint bank-account ― but the onus and responsibility is on you to “withdraw” those graces from the joint “bank-account.” You have to ask Heaven to send those graces to you for whatever needs you may have ― “Ask and it shall be given you! Seek and you shall find! Knock and it shall be opened to you!” (Luke 11:9). The reverse is also true―if you don’t ask and you won’t receive; if you don’t seek and you won’t find; and if you don’t knock then nobody will come to you!
A Weapon is Only as Good as the Soldier Using It
As the so-called “Creed of a United States Marine” stated: “My rifle, without me, is useless. Without my rifle, I am useless. I must fire my rifle true. I must shoot straighter than my enemy who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me.” A weapon depends a lot upon the skill of the person using it. An incredible weapon can become almost useless if the person using it is clueless on how to best use it. The same is true for our spiritual weapons―hence St. Louis de Montfort wrote: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly.” A trained sniper will hit a distant target with one bullet, while an untrained shooter might never hit that target no matter how many bullets he uses. In the spiritual realm, if we pray without fervor and attention, we are less likely to “hit the target” with our prayers and therefore less likely to get what we are praying for―as Our Lord said: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me! In vain do they worship Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-9).
Likewise, Our Lady said to Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich that one single Mass, offered with the level of devotion that the Apostles offered Mass, would drive away all the calamities besieging the Church. Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich states: “Mass, badly celebrated, is an enormous evil. Ah! It is not a matter of indifference how it is said! . . . I have had a great vision on the mystery of Holy Mass and I have seen that whatever good has existed since creation is owing to it … Our Lady said what is most painful for me to repeat―that if only one priest offered the unbloody Sacrifice as worthily and with the same sentiments as the Apostles, he could ward off all calamities from the Church!” Those words not only apply to the priest who is offering Mass, but also to all the faithful assisting at Mass―what tremendous and enormous graces would they not receive if they would only assist at Mass with great devotion, much like that of the Apostles or the early Christians!
Let us then look at some ways in which we can improve in the use of our spiritual weapons―especially the Rosary and the Scapular. Improving our skills may well greatly improve our lives, and improve the results of our prayers by getting more from God―so that we don’t fall into the category condemned by St. Louis de Montfort: “Most prayers seem to bear no fruit, and after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!”
Nothing Better is Needed―Just a Better Use of What We Have
You know the proverb: “A bad workman always blames his tools.” You could also change that to: “A bad marksman always blames his weapon.” The tools or weapons that God has given us are perfectly suited to the task at hand―God is perfect and all He does is perfect. Imperfection is found on the side of man―not on the side of God.
“He that is hasty with his feet shall stumble” (Proverbs 19:2). Likewise, you could say: “He that is hasty in his prayers will only mumble and stumble.” You may have heard the saying: “Haste kills all devotion” ― let us not allow that murderer into our souls! In the Book of Proverbs we read: “Let not thy heart be hasty to utter a word before God!” (Ecclesiastes 5:1). Another proverb tells us to “Make haste slowly!” It is a very old expression that means when you take your time to do a task or strive to achieve a goal, you will make fewer mistakes and will be more likely to succeed that if you rushed through things. Soldiers are told to take aim carefully ― “Haste makes waste!” ― one well-aimed bullet that hits the target is worth more than a thousand hastily fired bullets that miss the target. There are snipers, and then there are Marine Corps Snipers. Marine Snipers are the best of the best, the elite, trained to shoot as little as possible. One shot, one kill.
St. Francis de Sales, in his book Introduction to the Devout Life, writes: “The rivers flowing gently through the plains carry along large boats and rich merchandise. Rains falling gently on fields make them plentiful in grass and grain. But streams and rivers with strong currents rush through the land, ruin their neighborhood and are useless for navigation. Likewise heavy showers and tempests ravage fields and meadows. Never was work done well with vehemence and in a hurry. As the ancient proverb has it, we must hasten gently. He who hurries up, says Solomon, runs the risk of stumbling and hurting his feet (Proverbs 19:2) ... Do not hurry in order to say many prayers but take care to say those that you do say from the heart. One Our Father said earnestly is of greater value than many recited quickly and in a hurry. Beware of haste, for it is a deadly enemy of true devotion; and anything done with haste is never done well.”
St. Louis de Montfort writes: “Devotions are a wonderful help for souls seeking holiness provided they are performed in a worthy manner, that is: (1) With the right intention of pleasing God alone; (2) With attention, avoiding willful distractions; (3) With devotion, avoiding haste and negligence; and (4) With decorum and respectful bodily posture. ... Superficial devotees to Our Lady have no interior spirit. They say many Rosaries with great haste and assist at many Masses distractedly … without inner fervor ... It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary ... Saying the Rosary with no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible ... They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words ... A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, also The Secret of the Rosary).
In our heart of hearts, we no doubt always knew the above to be true. Unfortunately, what we know is not always what we do! Sadly, most people pray badly―if they even pray at all! To change life-long bad habits is easier said than done! As they say: “You cannot teach an old dog new tricks!” But maybe you can teach the old dog to bark more slowly! Change is usually painful. Yet if change is needed, then change we must. Satan will no doubt try to throw his satanic spanner into the works and foil and spoil anything we might try to improve. So be ready for a roller-coaster ride!
If you are praying your five-decade Rosary “all in one go” ― then you might consider breaking those five decades into several parts. For example, sacrifice ten minutes to just one decade so that you can have a serious meditation on that decade. Secondly, slow down your prayers―we rarely speak to people with the verbal diarrhea speed with which we pour out a Hail Mary: HailMaryfullofgracetheLordiswiththeeblessedartthouamongwomenandblessedisthefruitofthywombJesus! [draw a breath, then resume] HolyMaryMotherofGodprayforussinnersnowandatthehourofourdeathAmen!
St. Louis de Montfort recommends praying the Rosary in the following manner: “I beg you to restrain your natural precipitation when saying your Rosary, and make some pauses in the middle of the Our Father and Hail Mary, and a smaller one after the words of the Our Father and Hail Mary which I have marked with a cross, as follows:
Our Father, Who art in Heaven, † hallowed by Thy Name, † Thy kingdom come, † Thy will be done † on Earth as it is in Heaven. † Give us this day † our daily bread, † and forgive us our trespasses † as we forgive those who trespass against us, † and lead us not into temptation, † but deliver us from evil. † Amen.
Hail, Mary, full of grace, † the Lord is with thee, † blessed art thou among women, † and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. † Holy Mary, Mother of God, † pray for us sinners, now † and at the hour of our death. † Amen.
Glory be to the Father † and to the Son † and to the Holy Ghost, † as it was in the beginning, † is now and ever shall be, † world without end. † Amen.
“At first, you may find it difficult to make these pauses because of your bad habit of saying prayers in a hurry; but a decade said recollectedly in this way will be worth more than thousands of Rosaries said in a hurry, without pausing or reflecting.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
The above principle can be applied to any prayer and every prayer that we say. Yet the period of transition from our customary haste to a more respectful pace will seem like “Hell on Earth” ― and Satan will do all that he can to make you fail. He knows the incredible benefits that will come to those who successfully manage to eliminate haste in their prayers. Your spouse will hate the changes; the children will hate the changes; the students will hate the changes; parishioners will hate the changes―even you will hate the changes! Yet change we must if we wish to honor God, Our Lord and Our Lady with our hearts and not just our lips.
Article 13
Tuesday, July 23rd
Can YOU Get a Scapular Miracle?
Tuesday, July 23rd
Can YOU Get a Scapular Miracle?
Trumps Survival Claimed to be a Miracle
The recent ‘assassination attempt’ on Donald Trump has been acclaimed as miracle by Trump’s doctor, as well as Catholic priest. Trump said: “It was God alone Who prevented the unthinkable from happening!” and he posted the memo from Dr. Ronny L. Jackson―Trump’s physician during his time in the White House―where the doctor said of Trump’s survival: “It is an absolute miracle he wasn’t killed.” Catholic priest, Fr. Jason Charron, who was at the rally where the ‘assassination attempt’ took place, said: “We are seeing the invisible hand of God unfolding in history … This invisible hand of God that spared his life. There is no other way to explain it!” Thousands of social media posters echo the claim of a miracle. For those who believe that the ‘assassination attempt’ was pure theater, rigged and acted out for some hidden agenda or another―the miracle is that the actors got away with it!
Regardless of which side of the fence you prefer to place yourself, it is an appropriate time to have a look at miracles and even look at the possibility of miracles in our own lives. In the Middle-Ages, one of Our Lord’s saints and mystics asked Our Lord why we no longer see the phenomenal miracles that were witnessed in the early days of the Church; and why there were so few miracles at that time (Middle-Ages). Our Lord said to her that the chief reason was a lack of faith in God and His power.
Do You Need A Miracle?
Everybody, of course, wouldn’t mind a miracle or two, or more! Yet very few, if any, feel confident or worthy of a miracle! Does that describe you, more or less? Of course it does! There are many problems that we experience—whether personally, among family, relatives, friends or neighbors, in the parish, at work or at school, or just in the world in general—that we would love to solve with a miracle.
We are no different to people throughout history. Just going back to Lourdes or Fatima, we see many people hoping for a miracle. Some got their miracle, most did not. Why?
Basic Conditions For A Miracle
First of all, let us look at what will NOT get a miracle. Who gets most of your attention? Who are you likely to help the most? Your friends or your enemies? The answer is pretty obvious! Well, it’s also pretty obvious that God is not going be putting His enemies above His friends on His “To Do List”! If you doubt this, then read the entire 26th chapter of the Book of Leviticus—even if you don’t doubt this, reading that chapter will do you no harm, but will only serve to make sure that you put God first and stray not from His Commandments! Too scared to read it? Okay—here are just a few extracts:
Sin Will Not Obtain Miracles
“But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws, and contemn My judgments, so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, and to make void My covenant―then I also will do these things to you: I will quickly visit you with poverty and burning heat, … and consume your lives ... I will set My face against you, and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you … I will break the pride of your stubbornness … I will walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins. And I will bring in upon you the sword … I will send the pestilence in the midst of you … I will destroy your high places, and break your idols. You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you. And I will destroy your land, and your enemies shall be astonished at it, when they shall be the inhabitants thereof. And I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed … None of you shall dare to resist your enemies. You shall perish among the Gentiles … Then shall they pray for their sins ... They shall pray for their sins, because they rejected My judgments, and despised My laws” (Leviticus 26:14-45). However, the whole chapter makes for the most salutary reading. Do take the time to read it—it may well end up plugging a few leaks!
The only kind of miracles that sin obtains are miracles of punishment. This has been seen numerous times in Holy Scripture. The Great Flood in the time of Noe. The fire and brimstone that fell upon Sodom and Gomorrha. The Ten Plagues of punishment sent by God upon Pharao and Egypt in the time of Moses, just before the Exodus. The miracle of the parting of the waters of the Red Sea, which then drowned Pharao’s pursuing army. The earthquakes, fires and plagues that punished the dissenters and idolaters among the Israelites during the Exodus and forty-years in the desert. The mega-hailstorm that destroys the Amorite army in a battle with Josue. God giving Samson the strength to dislodge the pillars of the Philistine palace, by which he killed more Philistines than he had ever killed in battle. The 42 months of drought in response Elias’ prayer, which punished the idolatry of the Chosen People. The fire Elias called down from Heaven to devour King Ochozias’ captain and fifty soldiers (on two different occasions). Sennacherib’s Assyrian army of 5,180 killed overnight by an angel near Jerusalem.
The Punishing Miracles Still Exist
Nothing has changed, as Our Lady points out in her dire warnings of miraculous punishments for our extremely sinful age: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord” (Akita) … “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended” (Fatima) … “If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind ... If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful” (Akita) … “God will strike in an unprecedented way. Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God” (La Salette).
So you see, even sin can attract miracles, but not the kind of miracles that we really want! Sin does not pay! Or if it does, then it pays us back for our sins and doesn’t give the kind of wages that we want: “For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Sin puts us at enmity with God! The only kind of miracles we’ll get in that state, are punitive or punishing miracles.
Lukewarmness Will Not Obtain Miracles
If you think that half-heartedness, tepidity, laziness and negligence will obtain miracles, then you have been reading the wrong books. Let the Book of books put that right: “I know thy works, that you are neither cold, nor hot. I would prefer that you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm―and neither cold, not hot―I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and do you not know that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel you to buy of Me gold fire tried, so that you may be made rich; and may be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of your nakedness may not appear; and anoint your eyes with eye-salve, so that you may see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19). Feel rebuked? Good! God must love you! If you want a miracle, then remember those words: “Because you are lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth!” Ouch! That warms us up just by reading it!
Our Lord, speaking to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (to whom Our Lady of Good Success also appeared) said: “If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small inveterate imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
Why would Jesus say things like this? Because He loves us and He understands the evil and damage of sin in a way that we cannot see in our blindness and lukewarmness. He says this as a loving rebuke, which is meant to bring about a change of direction and lead to a more serious and fervent spiritual life, which would then deflect and avoid His just punishments—both here below in this life, and in the life to come.
Clear the Ground for Miracles—Clear-Out Sin
Therefore, by looking at the negative aspects first, we clearly see that we have to clear-out sin if we are to have hope of any miracles. This highlights and underlines those salutary quotes from Holy Scripture: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32) and “I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance!” (Luke 15:7).
Our Lady is in solidarity with Our Lord and Holy Scripture on this, saying: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance” (La Salette, 1846) and therefore we, too, neglect penance. At Lourdes (1854), eight years later, we have Our Lady’s insistence upon “Penance! Penance! Penance!” At Fatima (1917), we essentially have the same message: “pray and sacrifice for sinners” (which we also are).
Prayer and Penance—the Foundation for Miracles
The groundwork for miracles is quite simple—it is no “rocket science”—even a child can understand it. It is quite simply the good old remedy of “prayer and penance”! But not just any old prayer or penance! It has to have some “oomph” to it and some faith and confidence mixed-in with the “oomph”.
Casting out a devil might seem to be something extraordinary, something miraculous—yet even Our Lord’s chosen Apostles failed to do so at times, even though they had been given the power to do so. We read of one account in Holy Scripture: “And when Jesus was come to the multitude, there came to Him a man falling down on his knees before Him, saying: ‘Lord! Have pity on my son, for he is a lunatic, and suffereth much! For he falls often into the fire, and often into the water. And I brought him to Thy disciples, and they could not cure him!’ Then Jesus answered and said: ‘O unbelieving and perverse generation! How long shall I be with you? How long shall I suffer you? Bring him here to Me!’ And Jesus rebuked him, and the devil went out of him, and the child was cured from that hour. Then came the disciples to Jesus secretly, and said: ‘Why could not we cast him out?’ Jesus said to them: ‘Because of your unbelief! For, amen I say to you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain: ‘Remove from hence hither!” and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you. But this kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!’” (Matthew 17:14-20).
Our Lady also points this out, that prayer and penance will draw down miracles from Heaven—both miracles of grace and physical material miracles: “The righteous will suffer greatly. Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. And then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish [miraculously] and the Earth will become desert-like. And then peace will be made, and man will be reconciled with God” (Our Lady of La Salette). Yet this miracle requires that we “beg” and “plead”! How many of our prayers could be said to fall into that intense category?
Sister Lucia said: “Father, we should not wait for an appeal to the world to come from Rome on the part of the Holy Father, to do penance. Nor should we wait for the call from our bishops in our dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No! Our Lord has already, very often, used these means and the world has not paid attention. That is why now it is necessary for each one of us to begin to reform ourselves spiritually. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also the souls that God has placed on our path.”
Praying and Trying and Getting Nowhere Fast?
We may be really trying, or at least we imagine we are really trying. Do you ever get the feeling that your prayers are getting you nowhere fast? You pray, day-in-day-out, but nothing seems to happen; nobody appears to be listening; there is no answer at the other end! Has everyone in Heaven gone on vacation? Is there nobody left to answer the ‘prayer-phones’? I keep trying to call, but I get no answer! What on Earth (or what in Heaven) is going on? Didn’t Our Lady, in her Fifteen Promises to those who recite the Rosary, say things like:
“Whoever shall faithfully serve me by the recitation of the Rosary, shall receive signal graces ... I promise the greatest graces to all who shall recite the Rosary … The Rosary shall destroy vice and decrease sin … It will cause virtue and good works to flourish; it will obtain for souls the abundant mercy of God; it will withdraw the hearts of men from the love of the world and its vanities, and will lift them to the desire of eternal things ... You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary.”
Didn’t Sr. Lucia of Fatima say, even more recently, “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary—to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
You will be tempted to say: “Well, those things don’t seem to be happening in my life! Did she really mean those things? Were they applicable only to some and not all people? Why doesn’t the Rosary do those things for me? Why don’t I ever get any miracles?”
St. Augustine puts it in a nutshell when speaking of the problem of seemingly ‘unanswered’ or ‘sterile’ prayers―and which can be readily applied to obtaining miracles or not obtaining miracles. He says that our prayers are unanswered because (1) we ask for things that will be bad for us, (2) we ask badly, or (3) we ourselves are bad. It could be one, two, or all three of these things that are behind our unanswered prayers.
(1) We Ask For Things That Are Bad For Us
In this regard, we can take the thoughts of St. Thomas Aquinas on prayer to clarify the matter, when he says that prayer will never change the mind or will of God; but prayer is meant to bend our mind and our will to the mind and will of God: “Our motive in praying is, not that we may change the Divine disposition, but that, by our prayers, we may obtain what God has appointed” (Summa Theologica, II-IIae, question 83, article 2). Again, in a nutshell, God’s words to the prophet Isaias sum it up perfectly:
“For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts. So shall My word be, which shall go forth from My mouth―it shall not return to Me void, but it shall do whatsoever I please, and shall prosper in the things for which I sent it” (Isaias 55:8-11).
We must understand and acknowledge that our own wishes and desires are—more often than not—quite different than God’s wishes and desires for us. In this life, we are incapable of fully seeing or understanding God’s will, and that is why—in good faith—we often pray for something that is opposed to God’s will for us. We even see this in case of Our Lord Himself.
In His agony, in the Garden of Gethsemane, two opposing wills emerge—that of Our Lord and that of His Father. Our Lord says to His Father: “My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from Me. Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt ... Again the second time, He went and prayed, saying: ‘My Father, if this chalice may not pass away, but I must drink it, Thy will be done!’ … And He prayed the third time, saying the self-same word” (Matthew 26:39-44).
The Saints also show us how “man proposes, but God disposes.” After much persuasion by the faithful of Rome, St. Peter thought it best to flee Rome during the severe Roman persecution, but he meets Our Lord on the road out of Rome. He asks Our Lord where He is going, and Our Lord replies that He is going to Rome to be crucified in Peter’s place. Peter no doubt had prayed upon what to do, and followed the path that seemed best to him, but it was a different path to what Our Lord wanted for him.
This means that when we pray for something that we think is good for us, we must always be prepared to admit that something else might be better for us, and end our request for what we want with the words of Our Lord from Gethsemane: “Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt!”
So when we pray for a specific intention, God will arrange things according to His holy will—whether it be in union with our desires and intentions, or not. In this way He always answers our prayers—but not always in the way we had hoped for. Why so? Because God, in His all-perfect wisdom, always does what is best for our souls, most particularly for the salvation of our souls, and He will not grant any prayer that will harm our souls, or the souls of those whom we pray for.
St. Padre Pio said that “every grace must be paid for” ― which means that great graces have great prices; and that price is usually paid by suffering or sacrifices. In His agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, Our Lord, in His humanity, did not quite like the idea of having to go through the suffering that was laid in store for Him. The fact that He eventually did go through with it, was one of the reasons why the graces He earned were so extraordinarily powerful.
If, in our weakness, we cannot handle great sacrifices or sufferings, or if great sufferings would draw us away from Jesus instead of closer to Him, then of course He will not grant the great grace(s) that we are asking for, because it is not beneficial for our souls. Heaven rarely gives anything away for free—if we don’t pay beforehand, we must pay afterwards.
Heaven listens to all the prayers that come in, even we only get to mention them on Heaven’s ‘voice-mail’ or Heaven’s ‘answering-machine.’ God hears all of our prayers and He arranges things in our lives (more often quietly and without our being aware of it) according to His holy will and what is best for our souls. And looking over our lives, if we are attentive we will see His actions in the small, little everyday things. He opens a door here, and He closes another door there—all for the good of our souls.
Rarely in our lives will Jesus work extraordinary miracles or give us extraordinary graces, because we cannot handle the extraordinary sufferings or sacrifices that often accompany them as a necessary payment for them—which is what St. Padre Pio stated, when pointing out that extraordinary graces—such as miraculous cures or conversions—have to be “paid” for through much suffering.
But God, Our Lord and Our Lady are always there alongside us, to help us, encourage us and watch over us, although we do not see them, nor recognize their work and action in our daily lives.
Our problem is that our view of things and judgment of things, is far too worldly and human. We fail to see grace where grace exists. We expect grace to be human instead of the supernatural entity that is really is. Perhaps the words of Our Lord from Scripture could be applied here: “You have not known the time of your visitation!” (Luke 19:44).
(2) We Ask Badly
Even if our will was aligned to the will of God, and the thing that we are praying for is something that God is willing to grant, we still have the duty to ask in a correct, fitting, reverential and persevering manner. In practice, people too often ask in a manner that makes it look as though they are telling God what to do, rather than humbly asking Him to do something.
They pray too quickly, too distractedly, too half-heartedly, too superficially, too proudly—as Our Lord says: “This people honoureth Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). People pray more with our lips than with their heart! Or, if they ask correctly and reverentially, they do not ask perseveringly, and give up after a relatively short time—discouraged and convinced that God will not answer their prayers; an attitude that we must criticize, quoting the words of Our Lord Himself: “As you have believed, so be it done to thee” (Matthew 8:13).
Jesus gives us an example of that perseverance in the parable of the widow who ceaselessly begged a judge to intervene against one of her adversaries. Jesus “spoke a parable to them, that we ought always to pray, and not to faint, saying: ‘There was a judge in a certain city, who feared not God, nor regarded man. And there was a certain widow in that city, and she came to him, saying: ‘Avenge me of my adversary!’ And he would not for a long time. But afterwards he said within himself: ‘Although I fear not God, nor regard man; yet, because this widow is troublesome to me, I will avenge her, lest continually coming she weary me!’” (Luke 18:1-5).
“And Jesus said to them: ‘Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go to him at midnight, and shall say to him: “Friend, lend me three loaves, because a friend of mine is come off his journey to me, and I have not what to set before him!” And he, from within, should answer, and say: “Trouble me not, the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give to thee!” Yet if he shall continue knocking, I say to you, although he will not rise and give him because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise, and give him as much as he needs. And I say to you, “Ask, and it shall be given you! Seek, and you shall find! Knock, and it shall be opened to you!” For every one that asks, receives; and he that seeks, finds; and to him that knocks, it shall be opened!’” (Luke 11:5-10).
St. Monica prayed for many years before she obtained from God the conversion of her son, the future St. Augustine (though he was far from being a saint at that time). He was living with a mistress with whom he had fathered a child. Yet, despite all contrary indications and temptations to discouragement, St. Monica continued to pray with perseverance and confidence. Her prayer was granted in a manner that must have ‘blown her mind’ and which went beyond her wildest expectations—Augustine would not only convert, but he would be become a priest, a bishop, a saint and a Doctor of the Church!
(3) We Ourselves Are Bad (Or At Least Not Good Enough)
“We know that God doth not hear sinners: but if a man be a server of God, and doth His will, him He heareth.” (John 9:31). God will not answer the prayers of His enemies, nor succumb to their wishes and grant their requests: “He that turneth away his ears from hearing the law, his prayer shall be an abomination” (Proverbs 28:9).
However, St. Augustine says: “If God were not to hear sinners, the publican would have vainly said: ‘Lord, be merciful to me a sinner’!” And St. John Chrysostom says: “Everyone that asketh shall receive, that is to say whether he be righteous or sinful.”
St. Thomas Aquinas steps in here and says: “I answer that, in the sinner, two things are to be considered: (1) his nature, which God loves, and (2) the sin, which God hates. Therefore, when a sinner prays for something as sinner, that is to say, in accordance with a sinful desire, God hears him, not through mercy, but sometimes through vengeance, as in the case when He allows the sinner to fall yet deeper into sin. For “God refuses in mercy what He grants in anger,” as St. Augustine declares. On the other hand, God hears the sinner’s prayer if it proceed from a good natural desire, not out of justice—because in justice the sinner does not merit to be heard—but out of pure mercy, provided, however, that the sinner fulfill the four conditions given above, namely, that (1) he beseech for himself, (2) things necessary for salvation, (3) piously and (4) perseveringly” (Summa Theologica, II-IIae, question 83, article 16).
Therefore, the sinner’s prayers will be heard for himself only and for his own salvation—in other words, for his conversion, for only through conversion can he be saved. God does not wish the death of a sinner, but that be converted and live:
“The soul that sins, the same shall die … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins, which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment, and justice―then living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live. Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? But if the just man turns himself away from his justice, and does iniquity according to all the abominations which the wicked man uses to work, shall he live? All his justices, which he has done, shall not be remembered―in the prevarication, by which he has prevaricated, and in his sin, which he has committed, in them he shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:20-23).
God, thereby, hears the sinner’s prayers out of mercy, for, in justice, the sinner does not deserve to be heard, since, by sin, he has declared himself to be an enemy of God’s. If he does not wish to be extracted from his sins and leave them behind, then he remains an enemy of God. But once he is converted and brought or restored to a state of sanctifying grace, then his prayers are efficacious for others and for causes and persons other than himself.
As Our Lord said at the Last Supper: “If you love Me, keep My commandments ... He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me. And he that loves Me, shall be loved of My Father … If anyone love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make our abode with him. He that loves Me not, keeps not My words.” (John 14:15; 14:21; 14:23).
Let us therefore pray for what we think is good, but ever resigned to God’s will, which sees beyond the limits of our weak-sighted desires and humble ourselves before his all-wise Providence.
Let us ask with great humility; with great charity; with great faith; with great confidence; with great respect and with great perseverance.
Finally, let us improve our lives and cast aside, not only mortal sin, but also deliberate venial sin.
Then our prayers will take on a new look, a new power and a new efficacy, as they pierce the vaults of Heaven and penetrate the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of His most Holy Mother! Then miracles of grace and perhaps even physical miracles will start to happen around us.
But let us also remember the words of Our Lady concerning some folk who were passing on messages to Our Lady through the three children at Fatima, asking for miracles and cures. With reference to one particular sick person, Our Lady said: “If he is converted, he will be cured during the year.” Lucia made some requests for sick people, to which Mary replied that she would cure some but not others; that people must amend their lives and ask forgiveness of their sins if they wanted healings or conversions; and that all must say the Rosary to obtain such graces: “I have come to warn the faithful to amend their lives and ask for pardon for their sins … People must say the Rosary. Let them continue saying it every day”
The recent ‘assassination attempt’ on Donald Trump has been acclaimed as miracle by Trump’s doctor, as well as Catholic priest. Trump said: “It was God alone Who prevented the unthinkable from happening!” and he posted the memo from Dr. Ronny L. Jackson―Trump’s physician during his time in the White House―where the doctor said of Trump’s survival: “It is an absolute miracle he wasn’t killed.” Catholic priest, Fr. Jason Charron, who was at the rally where the ‘assassination attempt’ took place, said: “We are seeing the invisible hand of God unfolding in history … This invisible hand of God that spared his life. There is no other way to explain it!” Thousands of social media posters echo the claim of a miracle. For those who believe that the ‘assassination attempt’ was pure theater, rigged and acted out for some hidden agenda or another―the miracle is that the actors got away with it!
Regardless of which side of the fence you prefer to place yourself, it is an appropriate time to have a look at miracles and even look at the possibility of miracles in our own lives. In the Middle-Ages, one of Our Lord’s saints and mystics asked Our Lord why we no longer see the phenomenal miracles that were witnessed in the early days of the Church; and why there were so few miracles at that time (Middle-Ages). Our Lord said to her that the chief reason was a lack of faith in God and His power.
Do You Need A Miracle?
Everybody, of course, wouldn’t mind a miracle or two, or more! Yet very few, if any, feel confident or worthy of a miracle! Does that describe you, more or less? Of course it does! There are many problems that we experience—whether personally, among family, relatives, friends or neighbors, in the parish, at work or at school, or just in the world in general—that we would love to solve with a miracle.
We are no different to people throughout history. Just going back to Lourdes or Fatima, we see many people hoping for a miracle. Some got their miracle, most did not. Why?
Basic Conditions For A Miracle
First of all, let us look at what will NOT get a miracle. Who gets most of your attention? Who are you likely to help the most? Your friends or your enemies? The answer is pretty obvious! Well, it’s also pretty obvious that God is not going be putting His enemies above His friends on His “To Do List”! If you doubt this, then read the entire 26th chapter of the Book of Leviticus—even if you don’t doubt this, reading that chapter will do you no harm, but will only serve to make sure that you put God first and stray not from His Commandments! Too scared to read it? Okay—here are just a few extracts:
Sin Will Not Obtain Miracles
“But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws, and contemn My judgments, so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, and to make void My covenant―then I also will do these things to you: I will quickly visit you with poverty and burning heat, … and consume your lives ... I will set My face against you, and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you … I will break the pride of your stubbornness … I will walk contrary to you, and will strike you seven times for your sins. And I will bring in upon you the sword … I will send the pestilence in the midst of you … I will destroy your high places, and break your idols. You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you. And I will destroy your land, and your enemies shall be astonished at it, when they shall be the inhabitants thereof. And I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed … None of you shall dare to resist your enemies. You shall perish among the Gentiles … Then shall they pray for their sins ... They shall pray for their sins, because they rejected My judgments, and despised My laws” (Leviticus 26:14-45). However, the whole chapter makes for the most salutary reading. Do take the time to read it—it may well end up plugging a few leaks!
The only kind of miracles that sin obtains are miracles of punishment. This has been seen numerous times in Holy Scripture. The Great Flood in the time of Noe. The fire and brimstone that fell upon Sodom and Gomorrha. The Ten Plagues of punishment sent by God upon Pharao and Egypt in the time of Moses, just before the Exodus. The miracle of the parting of the waters of the Red Sea, which then drowned Pharao’s pursuing army. The earthquakes, fires and plagues that punished the dissenters and idolaters among the Israelites during the Exodus and forty-years in the desert. The mega-hailstorm that destroys the Amorite army in a battle with Josue. God giving Samson the strength to dislodge the pillars of the Philistine palace, by which he killed more Philistines than he had ever killed in battle. The 42 months of drought in response Elias’ prayer, which punished the idolatry of the Chosen People. The fire Elias called down from Heaven to devour King Ochozias’ captain and fifty soldiers (on two different occasions). Sennacherib’s Assyrian army of 5,180 killed overnight by an angel near Jerusalem.
The Punishing Miracles Still Exist
Nothing has changed, as Our Lady points out in her dire warnings of miraculous punishments for our extremely sinful age: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord” (Akita) … “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended” (Fatima) … “If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind ... If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful” (Akita) … “God will strike in an unprecedented way. Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God” (La Salette).
So you see, even sin can attract miracles, but not the kind of miracles that we really want! Sin does not pay! Or if it does, then it pays us back for our sins and doesn’t give the kind of wages that we want: “For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Sin puts us at enmity with God! The only kind of miracles we’ll get in that state, are punitive or punishing miracles.
Lukewarmness Will Not Obtain Miracles
If you think that half-heartedness, tepidity, laziness and negligence will obtain miracles, then you have been reading the wrong books. Let the Book of books put that right: “I know thy works, that you are neither cold, nor hot. I would prefer that you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm―and neither cold, not hot―I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and do you not know that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel you to buy of Me gold fire tried, so that you may be made rich; and may be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of your nakedness may not appear; and anoint your eyes with eye-salve, so that you may see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19). Feel rebuked? Good! God must love you! If you want a miracle, then remember those words: “Because you are lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth!” Ouch! That warms us up just by reading it!
Our Lord, speaking to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (to whom Our Lady of Good Success also appeared) said: “If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small inveterate imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
Why would Jesus say things like this? Because He loves us and He understands the evil and damage of sin in a way that we cannot see in our blindness and lukewarmness. He says this as a loving rebuke, which is meant to bring about a change of direction and lead to a more serious and fervent spiritual life, which would then deflect and avoid His just punishments—both here below in this life, and in the life to come.
Clear the Ground for Miracles—Clear-Out Sin
Therefore, by looking at the negative aspects first, we clearly see that we have to clear-out sin if we are to have hope of any miracles. This highlights and underlines those salutary quotes from Holy Scripture: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32) and “I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance!” (Luke 15:7).
Our Lady is in solidarity with Our Lord and Holy Scripture on this, saying: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance” (La Salette, 1846) and therefore we, too, neglect penance. At Lourdes (1854), eight years later, we have Our Lady’s insistence upon “Penance! Penance! Penance!” At Fatima (1917), we essentially have the same message: “pray and sacrifice for sinners” (which we also are).
Prayer and Penance—the Foundation for Miracles
The groundwork for miracles is quite simple—it is no “rocket science”—even a child can understand it. It is quite simply the good old remedy of “prayer and penance”! But not just any old prayer or penance! It has to have some “oomph” to it and some faith and confidence mixed-in with the “oomph”.
Casting out a devil might seem to be something extraordinary, something miraculous—yet even Our Lord’s chosen Apostles failed to do so at times, even though they had been given the power to do so. We read of one account in Holy Scripture: “And when Jesus was come to the multitude, there came to Him a man falling down on his knees before Him, saying: ‘Lord! Have pity on my son, for he is a lunatic, and suffereth much! For he falls often into the fire, and often into the water. And I brought him to Thy disciples, and they could not cure him!’ Then Jesus answered and said: ‘O unbelieving and perverse generation! How long shall I be with you? How long shall I suffer you? Bring him here to Me!’ And Jesus rebuked him, and the devil went out of him, and the child was cured from that hour. Then came the disciples to Jesus secretly, and said: ‘Why could not we cast him out?’ Jesus said to them: ‘Because of your unbelief! For, amen I say to you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain: ‘Remove from hence hither!” and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you. But this kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!’” (Matthew 17:14-20).
Our Lady also points this out, that prayer and penance will draw down miracles from Heaven—both miracles of grace and physical material miracles: “The righteous will suffer greatly. Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. And then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish [miraculously] and the Earth will become desert-like. And then peace will be made, and man will be reconciled with God” (Our Lady of La Salette). Yet this miracle requires that we “beg” and “plead”! How many of our prayers could be said to fall into that intense category?
Sister Lucia said: “Father, we should not wait for an appeal to the world to come from Rome on the part of the Holy Father, to do penance. Nor should we wait for the call from our bishops in our dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No! Our Lord has already, very often, used these means and the world has not paid attention. That is why now it is necessary for each one of us to begin to reform ourselves spiritually. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also the souls that God has placed on our path.”
Praying and Trying and Getting Nowhere Fast?
We may be really trying, or at least we imagine we are really trying. Do you ever get the feeling that your prayers are getting you nowhere fast? You pray, day-in-day-out, but nothing seems to happen; nobody appears to be listening; there is no answer at the other end! Has everyone in Heaven gone on vacation? Is there nobody left to answer the ‘prayer-phones’? I keep trying to call, but I get no answer! What on Earth (or what in Heaven) is going on? Didn’t Our Lady, in her Fifteen Promises to those who recite the Rosary, say things like:
“Whoever shall faithfully serve me by the recitation of the Rosary, shall receive signal graces ... I promise the greatest graces to all who shall recite the Rosary … The Rosary shall destroy vice and decrease sin … It will cause virtue and good works to flourish; it will obtain for souls the abundant mercy of God; it will withdraw the hearts of men from the love of the world and its vanities, and will lift them to the desire of eternal things ... You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary.”
Didn’t Sr. Lucia of Fatima say, even more recently, “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary—to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
You will be tempted to say: “Well, those things don’t seem to be happening in my life! Did she really mean those things? Were they applicable only to some and not all people? Why doesn’t the Rosary do those things for me? Why don’t I ever get any miracles?”
St. Augustine puts it in a nutshell when speaking of the problem of seemingly ‘unanswered’ or ‘sterile’ prayers―and which can be readily applied to obtaining miracles or not obtaining miracles. He says that our prayers are unanswered because (1) we ask for things that will be bad for us, (2) we ask badly, or (3) we ourselves are bad. It could be one, two, or all three of these things that are behind our unanswered prayers.
(1) We Ask For Things That Are Bad For Us
In this regard, we can take the thoughts of St. Thomas Aquinas on prayer to clarify the matter, when he says that prayer will never change the mind or will of God; but prayer is meant to bend our mind and our will to the mind and will of God: “Our motive in praying is, not that we may change the Divine disposition, but that, by our prayers, we may obtain what God has appointed” (Summa Theologica, II-IIae, question 83, article 2). Again, in a nutshell, God’s words to the prophet Isaias sum it up perfectly:
“For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts. So shall My word be, which shall go forth from My mouth―it shall not return to Me void, but it shall do whatsoever I please, and shall prosper in the things for which I sent it” (Isaias 55:8-11).
We must understand and acknowledge that our own wishes and desires are—more often than not—quite different than God’s wishes and desires for us. In this life, we are incapable of fully seeing or understanding God’s will, and that is why—in good faith—we often pray for something that is opposed to God’s will for us. We even see this in case of Our Lord Himself.
In His agony, in the Garden of Gethsemane, two opposing wills emerge—that of Our Lord and that of His Father. Our Lord says to His Father: “My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from Me. Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt ... Again the second time, He went and prayed, saying: ‘My Father, if this chalice may not pass away, but I must drink it, Thy will be done!’ … And He prayed the third time, saying the self-same word” (Matthew 26:39-44).
The Saints also show us how “man proposes, but God disposes.” After much persuasion by the faithful of Rome, St. Peter thought it best to flee Rome during the severe Roman persecution, but he meets Our Lord on the road out of Rome. He asks Our Lord where He is going, and Our Lord replies that He is going to Rome to be crucified in Peter’s place. Peter no doubt had prayed upon what to do, and followed the path that seemed best to him, but it was a different path to what Our Lord wanted for him.
This means that when we pray for something that we think is good for us, we must always be prepared to admit that something else might be better for us, and end our request for what we want with the words of Our Lord from Gethsemane: “Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt!”
So when we pray for a specific intention, God will arrange things according to His holy will—whether it be in union with our desires and intentions, or not. In this way He always answers our prayers—but not always in the way we had hoped for. Why so? Because God, in His all-perfect wisdom, always does what is best for our souls, most particularly for the salvation of our souls, and He will not grant any prayer that will harm our souls, or the souls of those whom we pray for.
St. Padre Pio said that “every grace must be paid for” ― which means that great graces have great prices; and that price is usually paid by suffering or sacrifices. In His agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, Our Lord, in His humanity, did not quite like the idea of having to go through the suffering that was laid in store for Him. The fact that He eventually did go through with it, was one of the reasons why the graces He earned were so extraordinarily powerful.
If, in our weakness, we cannot handle great sacrifices or sufferings, or if great sufferings would draw us away from Jesus instead of closer to Him, then of course He will not grant the great grace(s) that we are asking for, because it is not beneficial for our souls. Heaven rarely gives anything away for free—if we don’t pay beforehand, we must pay afterwards.
Heaven listens to all the prayers that come in, even we only get to mention them on Heaven’s ‘voice-mail’ or Heaven’s ‘answering-machine.’ God hears all of our prayers and He arranges things in our lives (more often quietly and without our being aware of it) according to His holy will and what is best for our souls. And looking over our lives, if we are attentive we will see His actions in the small, little everyday things. He opens a door here, and He closes another door there—all for the good of our souls.
Rarely in our lives will Jesus work extraordinary miracles or give us extraordinary graces, because we cannot handle the extraordinary sufferings or sacrifices that often accompany them as a necessary payment for them—which is what St. Padre Pio stated, when pointing out that extraordinary graces—such as miraculous cures or conversions—have to be “paid” for through much suffering.
But God, Our Lord and Our Lady are always there alongside us, to help us, encourage us and watch over us, although we do not see them, nor recognize their work and action in our daily lives.
Our problem is that our view of things and judgment of things, is far too worldly and human. We fail to see grace where grace exists. We expect grace to be human instead of the supernatural entity that is really is. Perhaps the words of Our Lord from Scripture could be applied here: “You have not known the time of your visitation!” (Luke 19:44).
(2) We Ask Badly
Even if our will was aligned to the will of God, and the thing that we are praying for is something that God is willing to grant, we still have the duty to ask in a correct, fitting, reverential and persevering manner. In practice, people too often ask in a manner that makes it look as though they are telling God what to do, rather than humbly asking Him to do something.
They pray too quickly, too distractedly, too half-heartedly, too superficially, too proudly—as Our Lord says: “This people honoureth Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). People pray more with our lips than with their heart! Or, if they ask correctly and reverentially, they do not ask perseveringly, and give up after a relatively short time—discouraged and convinced that God will not answer their prayers; an attitude that we must criticize, quoting the words of Our Lord Himself: “As you have believed, so be it done to thee” (Matthew 8:13).
Jesus gives us an example of that perseverance in the parable of the widow who ceaselessly begged a judge to intervene against one of her adversaries. Jesus “spoke a parable to them, that we ought always to pray, and not to faint, saying: ‘There was a judge in a certain city, who feared not God, nor regarded man. And there was a certain widow in that city, and she came to him, saying: ‘Avenge me of my adversary!’ And he would not for a long time. But afterwards he said within himself: ‘Although I fear not God, nor regard man; yet, because this widow is troublesome to me, I will avenge her, lest continually coming she weary me!’” (Luke 18:1-5).
“And Jesus said to them: ‘Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go to him at midnight, and shall say to him: “Friend, lend me three loaves, because a friend of mine is come off his journey to me, and I have not what to set before him!” And he, from within, should answer, and say: “Trouble me not, the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give to thee!” Yet if he shall continue knocking, I say to you, although he will not rise and give him because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise, and give him as much as he needs. And I say to you, “Ask, and it shall be given you! Seek, and you shall find! Knock, and it shall be opened to you!” For every one that asks, receives; and he that seeks, finds; and to him that knocks, it shall be opened!’” (Luke 11:5-10).
St. Monica prayed for many years before she obtained from God the conversion of her son, the future St. Augustine (though he was far from being a saint at that time). He was living with a mistress with whom he had fathered a child. Yet, despite all contrary indications and temptations to discouragement, St. Monica continued to pray with perseverance and confidence. Her prayer was granted in a manner that must have ‘blown her mind’ and which went beyond her wildest expectations—Augustine would not only convert, but he would be become a priest, a bishop, a saint and a Doctor of the Church!
(3) We Ourselves Are Bad (Or At Least Not Good Enough)
“We know that God doth not hear sinners: but if a man be a server of God, and doth His will, him He heareth.” (John 9:31). God will not answer the prayers of His enemies, nor succumb to their wishes and grant their requests: “He that turneth away his ears from hearing the law, his prayer shall be an abomination” (Proverbs 28:9).
However, St. Augustine says: “If God were not to hear sinners, the publican would have vainly said: ‘Lord, be merciful to me a sinner’!” And St. John Chrysostom says: “Everyone that asketh shall receive, that is to say whether he be righteous or sinful.”
St. Thomas Aquinas steps in here and says: “I answer that, in the sinner, two things are to be considered: (1) his nature, which God loves, and (2) the sin, which God hates. Therefore, when a sinner prays for something as sinner, that is to say, in accordance with a sinful desire, God hears him, not through mercy, but sometimes through vengeance, as in the case when He allows the sinner to fall yet deeper into sin. For “God refuses in mercy what He grants in anger,” as St. Augustine declares. On the other hand, God hears the sinner’s prayer if it proceed from a good natural desire, not out of justice—because in justice the sinner does not merit to be heard—but out of pure mercy, provided, however, that the sinner fulfill the four conditions given above, namely, that (1) he beseech for himself, (2) things necessary for salvation, (3) piously and (4) perseveringly” (Summa Theologica, II-IIae, question 83, article 16).
Therefore, the sinner’s prayers will be heard for himself only and for his own salvation—in other words, for his conversion, for only through conversion can he be saved. God does not wish the death of a sinner, but that be converted and live:
“The soul that sins, the same shall die … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins, which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment, and justice―then living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live. Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? But if the just man turns himself away from his justice, and does iniquity according to all the abominations which the wicked man uses to work, shall he live? All his justices, which he has done, shall not be remembered―in the prevarication, by which he has prevaricated, and in his sin, which he has committed, in them he shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:20-23).
God, thereby, hears the sinner’s prayers out of mercy, for, in justice, the sinner does not deserve to be heard, since, by sin, he has declared himself to be an enemy of God’s. If he does not wish to be extracted from his sins and leave them behind, then he remains an enemy of God. But once he is converted and brought or restored to a state of sanctifying grace, then his prayers are efficacious for others and for causes and persons other than himself.
As Our Lord said at the Last Supper: “If you love Me, keep My commandments ... He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me. And he that loves Me, shall be loved of My Father … If anyone love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make our abode with him. He that loves Me not, keeps not My words.” (John 14:15; 14:21; 14:23).
Let us therefore pray for what we think is good, but ever resigned to God’s will, which sees beyond the limits of our weak-sighted desires and humble ourselves before his all-wise Providence.
Let us ask with great humility; with great charity; with great faith; with great confidence; with great respect and with great perseverance.
Finally, let us improve our lives and cast aside, not only mortal sin, but also deliberate venial sin.
Then our prayers will take on a new look, a new power and a new efficacy, as they pierce the vaults of Heaven and penetrate the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of His most Holy Mother! Then miracles of grace and perhaps even physical miracles will start to happen around us.
But let us also remember the words of Our Lady concerning some folk who were passing on messages to Our Lady through the three children at Fatima, asking for miracles and cures. With reference to one particular sick person, Our Lady said: “If he is converted, he will be cured during the year.” Lucia made some requests for sick people, to which Mary replied that she would cure some but not others; that people must amend their lives and ask forgiveness of their sins if they wanted healings or conversions; and that all must say the Rosary to obtain such graces: “I have come to warn the faithful to amend their lives and ask for pardon for their sins … People must say the Rosary. Let them continue saying it every day”
Article 12
Saturday & Sunday, July 20th & 21st
Do You Use or Abuse Your Scapular?
Saturday & Sunday, July 20th & 21st
Do You Use or Abuse Your Scapular?
Respect for Religious Things
Speaking of respect due to religious things, Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Bear in mind with what reverence you must handle all the things consecrated and devoted to the divine service; and at the same time estimate how reprehensible is the irreverence by which many offend in their disregard for the sacred objects. They should not forget the indignation of His Majesty against them for this gross discourtesy and ingratitude, which they ordinarily show by handling the sacred ornaments and objects without attention and respect. Although not all offend in this, yet there are many; and few distinguish themselves by showing outward respect and care in treating sacred objects with due reverence. This fault is little thought of and recognized!”
By being blessed, the Scapular becomes something that is to be set apart from worldly things. It becomes sacred, holy. The Scapular is no longer ordinary, but becomes something extraordinary and a sacramental. For a thing to be blessed means that it becomes holy. In fact, we often use those two words interchangeably―”blessed” and “holy”. “Whatsoever is once consecrated [blessed] shall be holy to the Lord” (Leviticus 27:28). They convey the same sense of being “set apart.” This particular sense of holiness highlights the “otherness” of someone who or something which is blessed. It is no longer ordinary, but has been “set apart.”
In the Old Testament, God calls his people to be holy: “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, so that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26). Or God tells them that the Sabbath day will be set apart from the other days so that it can be “holy unto the Lord.” “Observe the day of the Sabbath, to sanctify it!” (Deuteronomy 5:12). “Keep My Sabbath―for it is holy unto you! He that shall profane it, shall be put to death! He that shall do any work in it, his soul shall perish out of the midst of his people!” (Exodus 31:14).
Child Abuse
Most people know―or at least have a gut feeling― that when an object is blessed it becomes different from other objects. They realize―or should realize―that the blessing sets the object apart from other things. It becomes sacred, holy. The object is no longer ordinary, but becomes extraordinary and sacramental. That is what should be taught, instilled and cemented into the minds of children from their very earliest days. Parents should not passively watch, smile, chuckle or laugh when their toddler decides to chew on the Rosary beads or its crucifix; or when it throw away or throws to the ground a blessed picture, a holy card or blessed statue. Blessed religious objects are not playthings or toys! Such child abuse should not be allowed. By passively allowing such behavior―even though the child has not yet reached the age of reason and does not fully understand what it is doing―it nevertheless sows the seeds of potential abuse of religious objects in the future―or at least an indifference or lack of respect for them. Parents should use every means possible to avoid such behavior and counter it by themselves showing a great respect for such items―for example reverently kissing them; reverently holding and using them. Little things can a say a lot! And actions often speak louder than words!
Likewise, where we keep religious objects speaks volumes concerning the degree of respect we have for them. Blessed statues or other religious objects, that are surrounded by all kinds of worldly paraphernalia does not manifest a great deal of respect on our part. The same applies to dusty or even cob-webbed statues and pictures and crucifixes; cracked glass on picture frames; chipped statues; tarnished medals and metal crucifixes; etc. If you have children at home, then they will subconsciously notice these things and that will impact the degree of respect or lack of respect that they will have for blessed objects. If you do not have children at home to notice these things―then Heaven most certainly notices!
The Power of Holy Garments
The spiritual significance of a simple garment is, perhaps, as old as human society itself. A garment has always signified something more important than itself. After the Fall, God clothed our first parents, Adam and Eve, and the garments He gave them were the sign of His forgiveness. Jacob made a coat of diverse colors for his favorite son, Joseph, and Anna also made a coat for her son, Samuel. A garment was also the mark of that extraordinary friendship which knit the souls of Jonathan and David: “Jonathan stripped himself of the coat with which he was clothed, and gave it to David, and the rest of his garments” (1 Kings 18:4). The priestly vestments, designed by God, were an outward sign of the high office entrusted to the priests of the Old Law.
From the time of Elias the Prophet, a garment has had tremendous significance in Carmel. When the time came for the great prophet to retire from the spiritual combat of his day, God sent him to anoint Eliseus to be prophet in his place. And when Elias came to him, he cast his mantle upon him. Eliseus immediately understood the significance of the gesture for the sacred text adds: “when Elias came up to him, he cast his mantle upon him … and rising up he went away, followed Elias and ministered to him” (3 Kings 19:21).
When the time came for the ascent of Elias into the Heaven in the fiery chariot, Eliseus, his successor, asked him to leave him his double spirit. Elias informed him that he had asked for a very difficult thing, but promised it would be his, and, as he ascended into the clouds, his mantle fell upon Eliseus, bringing him the double spirit of his master: “And as Elias and Eliseus went on, walking and talking together, behold a fiery chariot, and fiery horses parted them both asunder: and Elias went up by a whirlwind into Heaven. And Eliseus saw him, and cried: ‘My father! My father! The chariot of Israel, and the driver thereof!’ And he saw him no more and he took hold of his own garments, and tore them in two pieces. And he took up the mantle of Elias that fell from him, and, going back, he stood upon the bank of the Jordan. And he struck the waters with the mantle of Elias, that had fallen from him, and they were not divided. And he said: ‘Where is now the God of Elias?’ And he struck the waters again, and they were divided, hither and thither, and Eliseus passed over the Jordan. And the sons of the prophets at Jericho, who were standing over against him, seeing it said: ‘The spirit of Elias has rested upon Eliseus!’ And coming to meet him, and falling to the ground they worshipped him” (4 Kings 2:11-15).
St. Paul does not hesitate to call the human nature of Christ a Habit. Our Lord compared grace to a wedding-garment (Matthew 22:11-12), and St. Paul loved to use the same metaphor of a garment when exhorting us to put on Christ and to clothe ourselves with His virtues: “For as many of you as have been baptized in Christ, have put on Christ” (Galatians 3:27) “Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 13:14).
The garment, perhaps, that has the greatest significance for us, is the one made by the Blessed Mother for the Infant Jesus. We can easily imagine our Blessed Mother making the swaddling clothes, in preparation for the birth of her Son; and when she set out for Bethlehem, she made sure to bring them with her, that she might wrap Him up and lay Him in the manger. Later, during the quiet hours of Nazareth, she prepared the seamless garment that He wore to Calvary. She was always mindful of her duty to clothe her Child, and we may be sure that Christ's eye never fell upon the garments his Mother made for Him without Him thinking of the love and the solicitude she had for Him.
We see miracles performed through garments. “And behold a woman, who was troubled with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind Jesus and touched the hem of His garment. For she said within herself: ‘If I shall touch only His garment, I shall be healed!’ But Jesus, turning and seeing her, said: ‘Be of good heart, daughter! Thy faith hath made thee whole!’ And the woman was healed from that hour” (Matthew 9:20-22; Luke 8:43-48).
“Jesus came into the land of Genezareth and immediately they knew Him. And running through that whole country, they began to carry about in beds those that were sick, and they brought to Him all that were diseased from all the surrounding countryside to where they heard He was. And wherever He entered, into towns or into villages or cities, they laid the sick in the streets, and begged Him that they might touch but the hem of His garment. And as many as touched, were healed” (Matthew 14:34-36; Mark 6:53-56).
“God wrought more than common miracles by the hand of Paul. So that even when there were brought to the sick, handkerchiefs and aprons from his body, the diseases departed from them, and the wicked spirits went out of them” (Acts 19:11-12).
The Scapular―A Garment of Grace
It is a great grace to be enrolled in and to wear the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. More grace is given to those who love more―but we cannot love what we do not know; and we will love only a little if we only know a little. That is why St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Jesus is so little loved because He is so little known!” We could also say that the Brown Scapular is also so little loved because it is so little known! So let us take some time to delve into the Scapular and learn and know more about the Scapular.
The tiny miniature-size Brown Scapular that we are accustomed to wearing today, represents the full-size scapular of the monk which was worn over the monk’s habit. A scapular is part of a monk’s or nun’s habit. It is a strip of fabric, about shoulder width, protecting front and back of their habit. A hole is cut in the middle so that it could be put over the head and hang down over the shoulders but is open on the sides, reaching almost down to the feet. It got its name from the Latin “scapula”, meaning “shoulder” ― appropriately so-called since it is shoulder width and worn over the shoulders. It is on the shoulders that Christ carried His cross and so the scapular came to symbolize the gentle yoke of Christ―and it the Cross of Christ that brings us the grace of Christ. The Scapular―being symbolic of the Cross of Christ―reminds us that we must carry the cross if we wish to be saved: “Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23).
In the Middle-Ages, a habit was an essential part of the identity of members of Religious Orders. To remove one’s habit was tantamount to leaving the monastic state. The Carmelite Constitution of 1369 stipulates automatic excommunication for Carmelites who say Mass without wearing their Scapular, while the Constitutions of 1324 and 1294 consider it a serious fault to sleep without wearing the Scapular.
Religious Orders that arose in the 12th-13th centuries often had a “First Order” (the male religious, who were generally the first established); later on, came the “Second Order” (nuns, established second), and then, even later on, the “Third Order” of laity who were established third. The most well-known Third Orders are the Carmelites, Dominicans and Franciscans. A Third Order is typically an association of the lay faithful who try to live the spirit of a particular Religious Order. Third Orders refer to the lay members of Religious Orders who follow the rules for the Religious Oder and undertake their charism or characteristics―but they do not live in a monastery or convent. Any Catholic can join a Third Order, but you can only be a member of one and you cannot leave without grave reason. As an association of the faithful, the members of a Third Order can be male or female, married or single, young or old, but they at least must be a practicing Catholic, and they live at home and not in the convent or monastery, and work in the most diverse occupations as is fitting to their state as laypeople.
Since the Third Orders are linked to Religious Orders, sometimes the members will distinguish themselves from ordinary laypeople by the garb or insignia they wear, or even by the letters after their name, as is common with members of Religious Order―for example TOC which stands for Third Order Carmelite. Their members, known as tertiaries, do not necessarily live in a religious community and yet can claim the right to wear the religious habit and participate in the good works of some great Religious Order. Typically, members of Third Orders group themselves by region and participate in formative or devotional activities on a periodic basis for the edification of their spiritual life. Normally, a member of the sponsoring Religious Order would lead these reunions.
Down through the ages many great saints were members of Third Orders, such as St. Catherine of Siena (d. 1380), a Third Order Dominican, and St. Louis IX of France (d. 1270), a Third Order Franciscan.
Confraternity of the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel
There is also a Confraternity of the Brown Scapular. This is, strictly speaking, not part of the three levels (First-, Second-, Third-Order) of a Religious Order, but are affiliated to the Religious Order and share in the prayers, good works and merits of the Religious Order. In a very loose and broad sense, you could say that the members of the Confraternity of the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel are like adopted children in the family of Carmel, whereas the First-Order, Second-Order, and Third-Order members are like the first born, second born and third born children in the family of Carmel. According to the rite of enrollment, “The Scapular Confraternity of Carmel is an association of the faithful who strive for the perfection of charity in the world in the spirit of the Carmelite Order, participate in the life of the Order and its spiritual benefits in an intimate communion of thought, ideals, and works together with Mary.” Furthermore, the current rules for starting a canonical local confraternity are given:
“The supreme moderator of the Carmelite Order is the competent authority for the canonically established of a confraternity. For churches belonging to the Order, the consent given by the local ordinary [bishop] for the canonical establishment of the religious house, is also valid for the canonical establishment of the confraternity. However, for the canonical establishment of the confraternity in other churches or places, the written consent of the local ordinary is required. … Members are bound to set aside regularly time to be with God in prayer, frequent participation in the Eucharist, daily recitation of one of the hours of the liturgy or of some psalms or the rosary or other equivalent prayers. If possible, they will meet periodically to build up the sense of fraternity, to study the spirit of Carmel, to care for brothers and sisters in need, all in union with Mary. They may gain plenary indulgences, provided they fulfill the usual conditions, on the day they join the confraternity and on the following feasts: Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel (July 16th), St. Elias, prophet (July 20th), St. Simon Stock (May 16th), St. Therese of the Child Jesus (October 3rd, modern Church October 1st), St. Teresa of Jesus (October 15th), all the Carmelite Saints (November 14th), and St. John of the Cross (traditional date November 24th, modern Church December 14th).”
The Scapular Confraternity of Carmel is an association of the faithful who strive for the perfection of charity in the world in the spirit of the Carmelite Order. Through their free commitment, they participate in the life of the Order and its spiritual benefits in an intimate communion of thought, ideals and works, together with Mary. The competent authority for the canonical erection of a Confraternity is the Prior General of the Carmelite Order. For churches belonging to the Order, the consent given by the bishop for the setting up of the religious house is also valid for the setting up of the Confraternity. However, for the erection of the Confraternity in other churches or places, the written consent of the bishop is required.
The current rite of enrollment in the Brown Scapular also permits for persons to be enrolled in the scapular without joining a group. Reception into the Confraternity of the Scapular of Carmel is the prerogative of an authorized person who acts in the name of the Order. The reception takes place according to the proper rite approved by the Holy See, by means of enrolment in the Scapular.
Confraternity members may gain plenary indulgences on the day they join the Confraternity and on the following feasts: Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel (July 16th), St. Elias, prophet (July 20th), St. Simon Stock (May 16th), St. Therese of the Child Jesus (October 3rd, modern Church October 1st), St. Teresa of Jesus (October 15th), all the Carmelite Saints (November 14th), and St. John of the Cross (traditional date November 24th, modern Church December 14th), provided they fulfill the usual conditions: going to confession and communion, saying a prayer for the intentions of the Pope and renewing the promise to observe the commitments to the Confraternity.
Through our enrollment and clothing with the Brown Scapular, we enter the family of Mary―the Religious Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. The scapular is a Marian garment. It is a sign of belonging to Mary; and pledge of her motherly protection in life and in death. As a sign, it joins three elements joined together―first, belonging to a family dear to the Blessed Virgin, the Carmelite Order; second, consecration to our Lady; finally a stimulus to imitate Mary through growth in virtue, especially humility, chastity, and prayer. According to the Church, the Brown Scapular is “an external sign of the filial relationship established between the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother and Queen of Mount Carmel, and the faithful who entrust themselves totally to her protection, who have recourse to her maternal intercession, who are mindful of the primacy of the spiritual life and the need for prayer.” The Scapular should be worn always. It certainly should not be removed for reasons of vanity of fear of human respect. As Our Lord said: “For he that shall be ashamed of Me and of My words, then the Son of man also will be ashamed of him, when he shall come in the glory of his Father with the holy angels!” (Mark 8:38).
Sister Lucia of Fatima―a Carmelite―Speaks of the Scapular
At the end of the 1940s, while conversing with three Carmelite priests, Father Donald O’Callaghan, Father Albert Ward and Father Luis Gonzaga de Oliveira, Sister Maria-Lucia of the Immaculate Heart (known as Sister Lucia of Fatima) recalled that the Blessed Virgin Mary wished that the devotion of the Brown Scapular be propagated. If Our Lady, during her last public apparition, was dressed as Our Lady of Mount Carmel and held the Scapular in her hands―holding it out towards the crowd―then it was obviously to urge us to wear it.
The Carmelite priest, Fr. Howard Rafferty, in the name of the Father General of the Carmelites, spoke with Sister Lucia on August 15th, 1950, regarding the 1917 Fatima message and its connection with the Brown Scapular. Sister Lucia told the Carmelite priest that “Our Lady held the Scapular in her hands [in the Fatima apparition of October 13th, 1917] because she wants us all to wear it ... Everyone seems to think that there are only four conditions of the Fatima Message ...there is one more condition - the wearing of the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.” Fr. Rafferty asked: “You mean that if one did all four things, but did not wear the Scapular [of Mount Carmel], then he/she would not fulfill what Our Lady asked for at Fatima? Do you mean to say that the wearing of the Brown Scapular is not just something Our Lady would like us to do, but that it is essential to the Message?” Sister Lucia replied: “Exactly! One could not follow the Message of Fatima unless he/she fulfilled the five conditions―one of which is the wearing of the Brown Scapular all the time, day and night. He could not fulfill what the Blessed Mother asked for at Fatima if he refused to wear the Brown Scapular!” Fr. Rafferty asked her: “Which is more important the saying of the daily Rosary or the wearing of the Scapular all of the time?” Sr. Lucia replied: “Father, the Rosary and the Scapular are inseparable. You cannot have one without having the other.”
“Because all the forms of our love for the Blessed Virgin and all its various modes of expression cannot be equally pleasing to her, and so do not assist us in the same degree to reach Heaven, I say, without a moment’s hesitation, the Brown Scapular is the most favored of all!” (St. Claude de la Colombière, S.J., 1641-1682 ― the confessor of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque).
“Let it [the Brown Scapular] be your sign of consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, which we are particularly urging in these perilous times!” (Venerable Pope Pius XII, 1876-1958).
Do Not Take the Scapular Lightly!
All of the above should have imparted to your soul the great importance and great relevance of the Brown Scapular to the task of your salvation. We place more importance and higher value to many things of this world than we do the Brown Scapular―yet, as Our Lord says: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). What is more important than eternal salvation? Since the Brown Scapular directly concerns the matter of our salvation, why is it that we attach so little importance to it and spend so little time in reading more about it and kindling our love for it? “If thou didst know the gift of God!” (John 4:10). “Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). “Thanks be to God for His unspeakable gift!” (2 Corinthians 9:15). Let us apply the following words of Our Lord to the Brown Scapular: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in a field. Which a man having found, hid it, and, for joy thereof, goes and sells all that he has, and buys that field! The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a merchant seeking good pearls―who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went his way and sold all that he had, and bought it” (Matthew 13:44-46). The Brown Scapular is truly a treasure of grace and a pearl of salvation that wins for us the Kingdom of Heaven! Do not let the following words of Our Lord apply to you and your attitude towards and treatment of Our Lady’s Brown Scapular: “Give not that which is holy to dogs; neither cast ye your pearls before swine―lest perhaps they trample them under their feet!” (Matthew 7:6).
Speaking of respect due to religious things, Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Bear in mind with what reverence you must handle all the things consecrated and devoted to the divine service; and at the same time estimate how reprehensible is the irreverence by which many offend in their disregard for the sacred objects. They should not forget the indignation of His Majesty against them for this gross discourtesy and ingratitude, which they ordinarily show by handling the sacred ornaments and objects without attention and respect. Although not all offend in this, yet there are many; and few distinguish themselves by showing outward respect and care in treating sacred objects with due reverence. This fault is little thought of and recognized!”
By being blessed, the Scapular becomes something that is to be set apart from worldly things. It becomes sacred, holy. The Scapular is no longer ordinary, but becomes something extraordinary and a sacramental. For a thing to be blessed means that it becomes holy. In fact, we often use those two words interchangeably―”blessed” and “holy”. “Whatsoever is once consecrated [blessed] shall be holy to the Lord” (Leviticus 27:28). They convey the same sense of being “set apart.” This particular sense of holiness highlights the “otherness” of someone who or something which is blessed. It is no longer ordinary, but has been “set apart.”
In the Old Testament, God calls his people to be holy: “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, so that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26). Or God tells them that the Sabbath day will be set apart from the other days so that it can be “holy unto the Lord.” “Observe the day of the Sabbath, to sanctify it!” (Deuteronomy 5:12). “Keep My Sabbath―for it is holy unto you! He that shall profane it, shall be put to death! He that shall do any work in it, his soul shall perish out of the midst of his people!” (Exodus 31:14).
Child Abuse
Most people know―or at least have a gut feeling― that when an object is blessed it becomes different from other objects. They realize―or should realize―that the blessing sets the object apart from other things. It becomes sacred, holy. The object is no longer ordinary, but becomes extraordinary and sacramental. That is what should be taught, instilled and cemented into the minds of children from their very earliest days. Parents should not passively watch, smile, chuckle or laugh when their toddler decides to chew on the Rosary beads or its crucifix; or when it throw away or throws to the ground a blessed picture, a holy card or blessed statue. Blessed religious objects are not playthings or toys! Such child abuse should not be allowed. By passively allowing such behavior―even though the child has not yet reached the age of reason and does not fully understand what it is doing―it nevertheless sows the seeds of potential abuse of religious objects in the future―or at least an indifference or lack of respect for them. Parents should use every means possible to avoid such behavior and counter it by themselves showing a great respect for such items―for example reverently kissing them; reverently holding and using them. Little things can a say a lot! And actions often speak louder than words!
Likewise, where we keep religious objects speaks volumes concerning the degree of respect we have for them. Blessed statues or other religious objects, that are surrounded by all kinds of worldly paraphernalia does not manifest a great deal of respect on our part. The same applies to dusty or even cob-webbed statues and pictures and crucifixes; cracked glass on picture frames; chipped statues; tarnished medals and metal crucifixes; etc. If you have children at home, then they will subconsciously notice these things and that will impact the degree of respect or lack of respect that they will have for blessed objects. If you do not have children at home to notice these things―then Heaven most certainly notices!
The Power of Holy Garments
The spiritual significance of a simple garment is, perhaps, as old as human society itself. A garment has always signified something more important than itself. After the Fall, God clothed our first parents, Adam and Eve, and the garments He gave them were the sign of His forgiveness. Jacob made a coat of diverse colors for his favorite son, Joseph, and Anna also made a coat for her son, Samuel. A garment was also the mark of that extraordinary friendship which knit the souls of Jonathan and David: “Jonathan stripped himself of the coat with which he was clothed, and gave it to David, and the rest of his garments” (1 Kings 18:4). The priestly vestments, designed by God, were an outward sign of the high office entrusted to the priests of the Old Law.
From the time of Elias the Prophet, a garment has had tremendous significance in Carmel. When the time came for the great prophet to retire from the spiritual combat of his day, God sent him to anoint Eliseus to be prophet in his place. And when Elias came to him, he cast his mantle upon him. Eliseus immediately understood the significance of the gesture for the sacred text adds: “when Elias came up to him, he cast his mantle upon him … and rising up he went away, followed Elias and ministered to him” (3 Kings 19:21).
When the time came for the ascent of Elias into the Heaven in the fiery chariot, Eliseus, his successor, asked him to leave him his double spirit. Elias informed him that he had asked for a very difficult thing, but promised it would be his, and, as he ascended into the clouds, his mantle fell upon Eliseus, bringing him the double spirit of his master: “And as Elias and Eliseus went on, walking and talking together, behold a fiery chariot, and fiery horses parted them both asunder: and Elias went up by a whirlwind into Heaven. And Eliseus saw him, and cried: ‘My father! My father! The chariot of Israel, and the driver thereof!’ And he saw him no more and he took hold of his own garments, and tore them in two pieces. And he took up the mantle of Elias that fell from him, and, going back, he stood upon the bank of the Jordan. And he struck the waters with the mantle of Elias, that had fallen from him, and they were not divided. And he said: ‘Where is now the God of Elias?’ And he struck the waters again, and they were divided, hither and thither, and Eliseus passed over the Jordan. And the sons of the prophets at Jericho, who were standing over against him, seeing it said: ‘The spirit of Elias has rested upon Eliseus!’ And coming to meet him, and falling to the ground they worshipped him” (4 Kings 2:11-15).
St. Paul does not hesitate to call the human nature of Christ a Habit. Our Lord compared grace to a wedding-garment (Matthew 22:11-12), and St. Paul loved to use the same metaphor of a garment when exhorting us to put on Christ and to clothe ourselves with His virtues: “For as many of you as have been baptized in Christ, have put on Christ” (Galatians 3:27) “Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 13:14).
The garment, perhaps, that has the greatest significance for us, is the one made by the Blessed Mother for the Infant Jesus. We can easily imagine our Blessed Mother making the swaddling clothes, in preparation for the birth of her Son; and when she set out for Bethlehem, she made sure to bring them with her, that she might wrap Him up and lay Him in the manger. Later, during the quiet hours of Nazareth, she prepared the seamless garment that He wore to Calvary. She was always mindful of her duty to clothe her Child, and we may be sure that Christ's eye never fell upon the garments his Mother made for Him without Him thinking of the love and the solicitude she had for Him.
We see miracles performed through garments. “And behold a woman, who was troubled with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind Jesus and touched the hem of His garment. For she said within herself: ‘If I shall touch only His garment, I shall be healed!’ But Jesus, turning and seeing her, said: ‘Be of good heart, daughter! Thy faith hath made thee whole!’ And the woman was healed from that hour” (Matthew 9:20-22; Luke 8:43-48).
“Jesus came into the land of Genezareth and immediately they knew Him. And running through that whole country, they began to carry about in beds those that were sick, and they brought to Him all that were diseased from all the surrounding countryside to where they heard He was. And wherever He entered, into towns or into villages or cities, they laid the sick in the streets, and begged Him that they might touch but the hem of His garment. And as many as touched, were healed” (Matthew 14:34-36; Mark 6:53-56).
“God wrought more than common miracles by the hand of Paul. So that even when there were brought to the sick, handkerchiefs and aprons from his body, the diseases departed from them, and the wicked spirits went out of them” (Acts 19:11-12).
The Scapular―A Garment of Grace
It is a great grace to be enrolled in and to wear the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. More grace is given to those who love more―but we cannot love what we do not know; and we will love only a little if we only know a little. That is why St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Jesus is so little loved because He is so little known!” We could also say that the Brown Scapular is also so little loved because it is so little known! So let us take some time to delve into the Scapular and learn and know more about the Scapular.
The tiny miniature-size Brown Scapular that we are accustomed to wearing today, represents the full-size scapular of the monk which was worn over the monk’s habit. A scapular is part of a monk’s or nun’s habit. It is a strip of fabric, about shoulder width, protecting front and back of their habit. A hole is cut in the middle so that it could be put over the head and hang down over the shoulders but is open on the sides, reaching almost down to the feet. It got its name from the Latin “scapula”, meaning “shoulder” ― appropriately so-called since it is shoulder width and worn over the shoulders. It is on the shoulders that Christ carried His cross and so the scapular came to symbolize the gentle yoke of Christ―and it the Cross of Christ that brings us the grace of Christ. The Scapular―being symbolic of the Cross of Christ―reminds us that we must carry the cross if we wish to be saved: “Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23).
In the Middle-Ages, a habit was an essential part of the identity of members of Religious Orders. To remove one’s habit was tantamount to leaving the monastic state. The Carmelite Constitution of 1369 stipulates automatic excommunication for Carmelites who say Mass without wearing their Scapular, while the Constitutions of 1324 and 1294 consider it a serious fault to sleep without wearing the Scapular.
Religious Orders that arose in the 12th-13th centuries often had a “First Order” (the male religious, who were generally the first established); later on, came the “Second Order” (nuns, established second), and then, even later on, the “Third Order” of laity who were established third. The most well-known Third Orders are the Carmelites, Dominicans and Franciscans. A Third Order is typically an association of the lay faithful who try to live the spirit of a particular Religious Order. Third Orders refer to the lay members of Religious Orders who follow the rules for the Religious Oder and undertake their charism or characteristics―but they do not live in a monastery or convent. Any Catholic can join a Third Order, but you can only be a member of one and you cannot leave without grave reason. As an association of the faithful, the members of a Third Order can be male or female, married or single, young or old, but they at least must be a practicing Catholic, and they live at home and not in the convent or monastery, and work in the most diverse occupations as is fitting to their state as laypeople.
Since the Third Orders are linked to Religious Orders, sometimes the members will distinguish themselves from ordinary laypeople by the garb or insignia they wear, or even by the letters after their name, as is common with members of Religious Order―for example TOC which stands for Third Order Carmelite. Their members, known as tertiaries, do not necessarily live in a religious community and yet can claim the right to wear the religious habit and participate in the good works of some great Religious Order. Typically, members of Third Orders group themselves by region and participate in formative or devotional activities on a periodic basis for the edification of their spiritual life. Normally, a member of the sponsoring Religious Order would lead these reunions.
Down through the ages many great saints were members of Third Orders, such as St. Catherine of Siena (d. 1380), a Third Order Dominican, and St. Louis IX of France (d. 1270), a Third Order Franciscan.
Confraternity of the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel
There is also a Confraternity of the Brown Scapular. This is, strictly speaking, not part of the three levels (First-, Second-, Third-Order) of a Religious Order, but are affiliated to the Religious Order and share in the prayers, good works and merits of the Religious Order. In a very loose and broad sense, you could say that the members of the Confraternity of the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel are like adopted children in the family of Carmel, whereas the First-Order, Second-Order, and Third-Order members are like the first born, second born and third born children in the family of Carmel. According to the rite of enrollment, “The Scapular Confraternity of Carmel is an association of the faithful who strive for the perfection of charity in the world in the spirit of the Carmelite Order, participate in the life of the Order and its spiritual benefits in an intimate communion of thought, ideals, and works together with Mary.” Furthermore, the current rules for starting a canonical local confraternity are given:
“The supreme moderator of the Carmelite Order is the competent authority for the canonically established of a confraternity. For churches belonging to the Order, the consent given by the local ordinary [bishop] for the canonical establishment of the religious house, is also valid for the canonical establishment of the confraternity. However, for the canonical establishment of the confraternity in other churches or places, the written consent of the local ordinary is required. … Members are bound to set aside regularly time to be with God in prayer, frequent participation in the Eucharist, daily recitation of one of the hours of the liturgy or of some psalms or the rosary or other equivalent prayers. If possible, they will meet periodically to build up the sense of fraternity, to study the spirit of Carmel, to care for brothers and sisters in need, all in union with Mary. They may gain plenary indulgences, provided they fulfill the usual conditions, on the day they join the confraternity and on the following feasts: Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel (July 16th), St. Elias, prophet (July 20th), St. Simon Stock (May 16th), St. Therese of the Child Jesus (October 3rd, modern Church October 1st), St. Teresa of Jesus (October 15th), all the Carmelite Saints (November 14th), and St. John of the Cross (traditional date November 24th, modern Church December 14th).”
The Scapular Confraternity of Carmel is an association of the faithful who strive for the perfection of charity in the world in the spirit of the Carmelite Order. Through their free commitment, they participate in the life of the Order and its spiritual benefits in an intimate communion of thought, ideals and works, together with Mary. The competent authority for the canonical erection of a Confraternity is the Prior General of the Carmelite Order. For churches belonging to the Order, the consent given by the bishop for the setting up of the religious house is also valid for the setting up of the Confraternity. However, for the erection of the Confraternity in other churches or places, the written consent of the bishop is required.
The current rite of enrollment in the Brown Scapular also permits for persons to be enrolled in the scapular without joining a group. Reception into the Confraternity of the Scapular of Carmel is the prerogative of an authorized person who acts in the name of the Order. The reception takes place according to the proper rite approved by the Holy See, by means of enrolment in the Scapular.
Confraternity members may gain plenary indulgences on the day they join the Confraternity and on the following feasts: Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel (July 16th), St. Elias, prophet (July 20th), St. Simon Stock (May 16th), St. Therese of the Child Jesus (October 3rd, modern Church October 1st), St. Teresa of Jesus (October 15th), all the Carmelite Saints (November 14th), and St. John of the Cross (traditional date November 24th, modern Church December 14th), provided they fulfill the usual conditions: going to confession and communion, saying a prayer for the intentions of the Pope and renewing the promise to observe the commitments to the Confraternity.
Through our enrollment and clothing with the Brown Scapular, we enter the family of Mary―the Religious Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. The scapular is a Marian garment. It is a sign of belonging to Mary; and pledge of her motherly protection in life and in death. As a sign, it joins three elements joined together―first, belonging to a family dear to the Blessed Virgin, the Carmelite Order; second, consecration to our Lady; finally a stimulus to imitate Mary through growth in virtue, especially humility, chastity, and prayer. According to the Church, the Brown Scapular is “an external sign of the filial relationship established between the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother and Queen of Mount Carmel, and the faithful who entrust themselves totally to her protection, who have recourse to her maternal intercession, who are mindful of the primacy of the spiritual life and the need for prayer.” The Scapular should be worn always. It certainly should not be removed for reasons of vanity of fear of human respect. As Our Lord said: “For he that shall be ashamed of Me and of My words, then the Son of man also will be ashamed of him, when he shall come in the glory of his Father with the holy angels!” (Mark 8:38).
Sister Lucia of Fatima―a Carmelite―Speaks of the Scapular
At the end of the 1940s, while conversing with three Carmelite priests, Father Donald O’Callaghan, Father Albert Ward and Father Luis Gonzaga de Oliveira, Sister Maria-Lucia of the Immaculate Heart (known as Sister Lucia of Fatima) recalled that the Blessed Virgin Mary wished that the devotion of the Brown Scapular be propagated. If Our Lady, during her last public apparition, was dressed as Our Lady of Mount Carmel and held the Scapular in her hands―holding it out towards the crowd―then it was obviously to urge us to wear it.
The Carmelite priest, Fr. Howard Rafferty, in the name of the Father General of the Carmelites, spoke with Sister Lucia on August 15th, 1950, regarding the 1917 Fatima message and its connection with the Brown Scapular. Sister Lucia told the Carmelite priest that “Our Lady held the Scapular in her hands [in the Fatima apparition of October 13th, 1917] because she wants us all to wear it ... Everyone seems to think that there are only four conditions of the Fatima Message ...there is one more condition - the wearing of the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.” Fr. Rafferty asked: “You mean that if one did all four things, but did not wear the Scapular [of Mount Carmel], then he/she would not fulfill what Our Lady asked for at Fatima? Do you mean to say that the wearing of the Brown Scapular is not just something Our Lady would like us to do, but that it is essential to the Message?” Sister Lucia replied: “Exactly! One could not follow the Message of Fatima unless he/she fulfilled the five conditions―one of which is the wearing of the Brown Scapular all the time, day and night. He could not fulfill what the Blessed Mother asked for at Fatima if he refused to wear the Brown Scapular!” Fr. Rafferty asked her: “Which is more important the saying of the daily Rosary or the wearing of the Scapular all of the time?” Sr. Lucia replied: “Father, the Rosary and the Scapular are inseparable. You cannot have one without having the other.”
“Because all the forms of our love for the Blessed Virgin and all its various modes of expression cannot be equally pleasing to her, and so do not assist us in the same degree to reach Heaven, I say, without a moment’s hesitation, the Brown Scapular is the most favored of all!” (St. Claude de la Colombière, S.J., 1641-1682 ― the confessor of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque).
“Let it [the Brown Scapular] be your sign of consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, which we are particularly urging in these perilous times!” (Venerable Pope Pius XII, 1876-1958).
Do Not Take the Scapular Lightly!
All of the above should have imparted to your soul the great importance and great relevance of the Brown Scapular to the task of your salvation. We place more importance and higher value to many things of this world than we do the Brown Scapular―yet, as Our Lord says: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). What is more important than eternal salvation? Since the Brown Scapular directly concerns the matter of our salvation, why is it that we attach so little importance to it and spend so little time in reading more about it and kindling our love for it? “If thou didst know the gift of God!” (John 4:10). “Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). “Thanks be to God for His unspeakable gift!” (2 Corinthians 9:15). Let us apply the following words of Our Lord to the Brown Scapular: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in a field. Which a man having found, hid it, and, for joy thereof, goes and sells all that he has, and buys that field! The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a merchant seeking good pearls―who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went his way and sold all that he had, and bought it” (Matthew 13:44-46). The Brown Scapular is truly a treasure of grace and a pearl of salvation that wins for us the Kingdom of Heaven! Do not let the following words of Our Lord apply to you and your attitude towards and treatment of Our Lady’s Brown Scapular: “Give not that which is holy to dogs; neither cast ye your pearls before swine―lest perhaps they trample them under their feet!” (Matthew 7:6).
Article 11
Thursday, July 18th
The Scapular ― Not a Loophole or a License to Sin
Thursday, July 18th
The Scapular ― Not a Loophole or a License to Sin
When is a Promise not a Promise?
On July 16th, 1251, Our Lady appeared to St. Simon Stock―the Superior General of the Religious Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel―and gave him the Scapular with the following promise: “Take this Scapular, it shall be a sign of salvation, a protection in danger and a pledge of peace. This shall be a sign to you and to all Carmelites: whosoever dies wearing this shall not suffer eternal fire.”
For a long time the Habit was the exclusive property of the Order, a sign of profession in it and of the life totally consecrated to her―but, in the 14th century, we find a bridge appearing between Carmel and the world. Devout people, living in the world, became anxious to live its Marian‑form life and to share in its spiritual treasury of prayer and good works; and as a visible sign of their affiliation to the Order they were given the Scapular. This was the beginning of the Third Order of Carmel and of the Confraternity. These good people were often generous benefactors and in return for their help the Order granted them a share in all its Masses, prayers and good works. With the lapse of time this participation was given without any financial assistance.
In a comparatively short time the wearing of the Scapular spread to the whole Church and became the unmistakable mark of the good Catholic. Popes, kings, princes, nobles and humble folk alike lived and died in the hope of the promise of avoiding Hell and gaining Heaven, which had been made to St. Simon Stock―and thus the Scapular devotion grew to be one of the leading devotions to the Mother of God.
Yet, as the Faith wanes and weakens throughout the centuries since the Protestant Reformation (or, more truly it should called the Protestant Rebellion), today less and less Catholics wear the Brown Scapular―and the millions (hopefully?) that are enrolled in it and wear it without really knowing what it should mean to them in their daily lives. The Scapular can easily degenerate into being some of “lucky charm” or “lucky rabbit’s foot”! Just wear it and you are saved! Much like the erroneous belief that salvation is based on Faith not on personal works, with the Protestant slogan: “Believe in Lord Jesus and you are saved!”
Our Lady’s promise―made to St. Simon Stock ―sounds great, doesn’t it? “Take this Scapular, it shall be a sign of salvation, a protection in danger and a pledge of peace. Whosoever dies wearing this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire.” Wow! What a great deal! Just wear the Scapular and you’re off to Heaven―no matter what!
Let us not imagine that the Scapular is endowed with some kind of supernatural power, which will save us, no matter what we do, or how much we sin. We might apply here what St. Alphonsus says about devotion to Mary in general―for the Scapular is one of the forms of devotion to Mary: “When we declare that it is impossible for a servant of Mary to be lost, we do not mean those who, by their devotion to Mary, think themselves warranted to sin freely. We state that these reckless people, because of their presumption, deserve to be treated with rigor and not with kindness. We speak here of the servants of Mary who, to the fidelity with which they honor and invoke her, join the desire to amend their lives. I hold it morally impossible that these be lost.” It is clear, from the words of St. Alphonsus, that a certain measure of fidelity is required on the part of those who wish to gain the special love and protection of Our Lady. The very wearing of the Scapular is, in itself, an act of devotion, and when it is done faithfully, it renders habitual homage to its Queen.
A perverse, sinful will can defeat the “suppliant omnipotence” of the Mother of mercy. Even Christ had to admit defeat, for He extended His crucified hands all day to an unbelieving and contradicting people, that refused to return to the forgiving embrace of His Sacred Heart. How often would He have gathered His chosen children into His Sacred Heart and they would not! But if we turn to Our Lady, she will turn her eyes of mercy towards us and show us the fruit of her womb.
Final Perseverance is Precious Grace
It is the teaching of our holy faith that no one can merit the gift of final perseverance. We have no lease upon the state of grace, no insurance against its loss. It does not follow that, because we are in the state of grace today, tomorrow will find us the friends of God and heirs to his Kingdom. We carry our treasure of divine grace in the earthen vessel of a fallen human nature which is easily broken. To continue the metaphor, one might say that this earthen vessel has been broken ever since the Fall and that our personal sins have weakened its powers of resistance.
Even though the Good Samaritan―Our Lord Jesus Christ―has left us his medicinal grace to heal the wounds left by sin, He has not restored to us the gift of immunity from concupiscence―a gift which Adam was given―and which insured the divine treasure of grace against loss. In our redeemed human nature, there is an inherent weakness which places sanctifying grace in constant danger of being lost. This moral weakness has led to the formation of bad habits and inclinations to sin which have their roots deep in our nature. Bad habits are not easily rooted out and, while they remain, the state of sanctifying grace is in peril.
Another factor that enters into final perseverance is that of the time of our death. We could never merit that death will come when we are in the state of sanctifying grace. The time of our death totally depends upon Divine Providence and is outside the order of merit. Strictly speaking, a person could live for years in the state of sanctifying grace and have the misfortune to fall into grievous sin. If death overtook him before he had a chance to go to confession, or to make an act of perfect contrition, he would be lost.
This doctrine of the Church disturbs our complacency and makes us throw ourselves more and more upon the mercy of God. He who made us, knows what is in man; He knows the clay of which we are formed and has promised that if we rely upon Him we shall not be tempted above our strength. Moreover, He has given His word that if we use the means of salvation, which He has left, the crowning grace of final perseverance will be ours. However, “be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21)
Mary is Key to Final Perseverance
One of the greatest means of final perseverance we have is devotion to our Blessed Mother. It is the constant teaching of the Church that devotion to God’s Mother is not only a means, but a pledge of eternal salvation. Many saints have taught this. If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination. For example:
St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.”
St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation.”
St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.”
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.”
St. Anselm (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost.”
St. Antonine is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified.”
St. John Damascene (a Doctor of the Church) says: “To be devout to you, O holy Virgin, is an arm of salvation which God gives to those whom He wishes to save.”
St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church), in his book, The Glories of Mary, says: “The intercession of Mary is even necessary to salvation. We say ‘necessary’, not absolutely, but morally. This necessity proceeds from the will itself of God, that all graces that He dispenses should pass by the hands of Mary, according to the opinion of St. Bernard.”
St. Louis de Montfort adds: “Devotion to our Blessed Lady is necessary to salvation, and that it is an infallible mark of reprobation to have no esteem and love for the holy Virgin; while on the other hand, it is an infallible mark of predestination to be entirely and truly devoted to her.”
St. Bernardine of Sienna addresses these words to the Blessed Virgin Mary: “O Lady, thou art the dispenser of all graces, and since the grace of salvation can only come through thy hands, our salvation depends on thee!”
Even the devils admit that devotion to Mary snatches souls from their clutches and damnation. St. Louis de Montfort writes: “When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone in France, an Albigensian was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people. St. Dominic put his Rosary round the neck of the possessed man and asked the devils who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most. At this they let out such unearthly screams and then used all their cunning so as not to answer. The Blessed Virgin was near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod that she held and said: “Answer my servant Dominic at once!” The devils who were in possession of this wretched man were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions in spite of themselves. They said: “Oh, you who are our enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! No soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! We have no success with her faithful servants! Many Christians who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards are saved by her intercession! We must also admit that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, 33rd Rose).
If it is the property of God to be merciful and to spare, surely it is also the very nature of the Mother of mercy to pour forth her mercy―even where there are no merits. The quality of her mercy is never strained; and the devil, into whose heart a ray of hope can never shine, is the only one excluded from her love. She sees in every soul, even in that of the most wretched, the image of her Son, and, if necessary, she would become again the Queen of Martyrs to save the least of her children.
A Sincere Devotion to Mary is Needed
Those who shelter their weakness in the motherly Heart of the Mother of our redemption “shall draw salvation from the Lord.” That Heart, into which the tenderest mother-love drew all the agony of the Passion and Death of our Redeemer, is a tower of strength for the weak. She is our life, our sweetness and our hope; in her we may find the beauty of eternal life.
To whom shall we go for an assurance of salvation if not to her who, in order to save us, offered both her Only-Begotten and herself to the cruel death of the Cross? “It is not near the Cross,” says St. Bernard, “that Mary is found but on it, nailed to its beams as Jesus is.” She loves us with the same love she has for her FirstBorn, and the double-edged sword that pierced his Heart, opened wide her Heart, that it might be the refuge to sinners to the end of time, and the gate to Heaven for those who hope in her. Her love embraces every child of Adam and there is no power that will snatch a soul from her protecting love.
She was made to be the Mother of mercy, and her mission, on Earth and in Heaven, is not to judge, but to show mercy and to open her pierced Heart wider and wider to the poor banished children of Eve, who cry to her for help. The Eternal Father made her “full of grace,” that her love might bestow it where justice would deny it. As St. Bernard says: “She is impetuous in mercy, she is resistless in mercy. The duration of her mercy is unto the end of the sinner’s life. The broadness of her mercy is unto the limits of the Earth. The height of her mercy is unto Heaven. The depth of her mercy is unto the lowest abyss of sin and sorrow―she is always merciful, she is only merciful. She is our Mother of mercy.”
The constant, daily practice of wearing the Scapular is, therefore, an act of faithful homage to Our Lady but, as St. Alphonsus adds, the desire to amend one’s life is also necessary, before we can be morally certain that she will be the cause of our eternal salvation. We should be careful not to place limits upon the mercy of her who is the refuge of sinners and the Mother of mercy. How few there are to whom she could say at the end of life: “Well done, thou good and faithful servant!”
There are countless souls in Heaven today, who owe their imperishable crowns to the special intercession of Our Lady. There is a wealth of theology in a little story Bishop Sheen loves to tell: “St. Peter approached Christ and complained that he found souls in Heaven who had no right to be there. The Savior looked at him and said: 'Peter, I am not blaming you, for no matter how well you guard the gate to Heaven, they get in―when you close the gate, my Mother opens the window!’”
In this age of measurement, we should beware of attempting to reduce our Blessed Mother’s love for sinners to fixed formulas. The burning love of her Heart cannot be caught within the narrow limits of any definition, or rule, or be expressed in the ordinary words of life. “One,” says Cardinal Newman, “would not give much for that love which is never extravagant.” Every mother’s love is extravagant, simply because it is what it is. How often does it happen that a mother has more love and affection in her heart for the afflicted child, or the black sheep, than she has for the children who need her less! If the father of the prodigal loved his wayward son so much, that he aroused the jealousy of the faithful one, why cannot our Blessed Mother love and save, where others would hate and condemn? If she is Mother for the sake of sinners, why can she not obtain from her Son that strong grace, which compels even the rebellious will and bends it at the last towards God?
St. Alphonsus addresses her in the following words: “Thou canst relieve the most wretched and save the most abandoned.” And St. Hilary says: “Even though one has been a sinner, if he has been devoted to Mary, he shall not perish for ever.” Spiritual writers tell us that it was the intercession of Mary that brought about the conversion of the good thief. Up to his last moments he lived in crime and sin, and, even on the cross, he filled up the measure of his iniquity by reproaching Jesus. What brought about his conversion? The prayer of Our Lady, standing at the foot of the Cross, won for him, not only forgiveness, but a place in Heaven that very day.
Not a License to Sin
Yet, as St. Alphonsus warns: “When we declare that it is impossible for a servant of Mary to be lost, we do not mean those who, by their devotion to Mary, think themselves warranted to sin freely. We state that these reckless people, because of their presumption, deserve to be treated with rigor and not with kindness. We speak here of the servants of Mary who, to the fidelity with which they honor and invoke her, join the desire to amend their lives. I hold it morally impossible that these be lost.” As St. Alphonsus says, the desire to amend one’s life is also necessary, before we can be morally certain that she will be the cause of our eternal salvation.
At times the Scapular has been preached as an easy way to Heaven, which has led to criticism of the devotion. The Carmelite priest, Fr. Hugh Clark, O.Carm, writes: “Too much stress has been placed on the promises of eternal salvation on an individual basis. At times the Scapular has been preached as an easy way to Heaven, guaranteed by Mary’s promise and intervention which softened the severity of God’s judgment. Any attempt to revive the true dimension of the Scapular devotion must take account of the reality that, by accepting the Scapular, the wearer is associated with the Religious Order of Carmel and pledges himself/herself to strive to live its ideals” ― and sinning is not part of those ideals! (Fr. Hugh Clarke, O.Carm., Mary and the Brown Scapular).
Devotees of the Brown Scapular have sometimes been accused of straying into superstition. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that Sacramentals, such as the Brown Scapular, “do not confer the grace of the Holy Spirit in the way that the sacraments do, but by the Church’s prayer, they prepare us to receive grace and dispose us to cooperate with it” (Catechism of the Catholic Church). Therefore, the Brown Scapular is not an infallible guarantee of salvation to anybody and everybody who wears it, but it guarantees salvation to those who COOPERATE WITH THE GRACES that will come from wearing it.
Believers in the traditional scapular promise sometimes argue that Mary’s intercession either grants conversion, final perseverance, and/or last rites to the wearer, to secure the assurances of the Scapular Promise. Another argument is that, in cases of stubborn unrepentant sinners, the scapular will somehow, miraculously or not, be taken off the wearer ― this was suggested by Saint Claude de la Colombière. (Australian Catholic Truth Society; Garment of Grace). How many times have we not seen Scapular-wearing hospital patients end up without their Scapular―which was removed for bathing, or some medical treatment and then never put back around the neck of the wearer!
St. Claude writes: “You ask―’What if I desire to die in my sins?’ I answer: ‘Then you will die in your sins but YOU WILL NOT DIE IN YOUR SCAPULAR.’” St. Claude tells the story of a man who tried to drown himself three times. He was rescued against his will. At last he realized that he was wearing his Scapular. Determined to take his life, he tore the Scapular from his neck and leaped into the water. Without Mary’s protective garment he accomplished his wish and died in his sins.
This same admonition or warning is also extended by St. Alphonsus Liguori, who says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.” Yet he also says elsewhere that those who willfully and sinfully abuse the Scapular, rather than use its sacramental power to help them avoid sin and grow in virtue, while thinking themselves to be safe from damnation in using the Scapular as a kind of ‘license to sin’ ― will, as a consequence, be all the more heavily punished in Hell.
Ven. Pope Pius XII called the Brown Scapular “a sign of consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary … The Scapular is not superstitious ... One is not saved from Hell merely by wearing it! No―for the Scapular is a sign that they must live their lives in total obedience to God and trust in Him, through and with the Immaculate Heart of Mary.”
On July 16th, 1251, Our Lady appeared to St. Simon Stock―the Superior General of the Religious Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel―and gave him the Scapular with the following promise: “Take this Scapular, it shall be a sign of salvation, a protection in danger and a pledge of peace. This shall be a sign to you and to all Carmelites: whosoever dies wearing this shall not suffer eternal fire.”
For a long time the Habit was the exclusive property of the Order, a sign of profession in it and of the life totally consecrated to her―but, in the 14th century, we find a bridge appearing between Carmel and the world. Devout people, living in the world, became anxious to live its Marian‑form life and to share in its spiritual treasury of prayer and good works; and as a visible sign of their affiliation to the Order they were given the Scapular. This was the beginning of the Third Order of Carmel and of the Confraternity. These good people were often generous benefactors and in return for their help the Order granted them a share in all its Masses, prayers and good works. With the lapse of time this participation was given without any financial assistance.
In a comparatively short time the wearing of the Scapular spread to the whole Church and became the unmistakable mark of the good Catholic. Popes, kings, princes, nobles and humble folk alike lived and died in the hope of the promise of avoiding Hell and gaining Heaven, which had been made to St. Simon Stock―and thus the Scapular devotion grew to be one of the leading devotions to the Mother of God.
Yet, as the Faith wanes and weakens throughout the centuries since the Protestant Reformation (or, more truly it should called the Protestant Rebellion), today less and less Catholics wear the Brown Scapular―and the millions (hopefully?) that are enrolled in it and wear it without really knowing what it should mean to them in their daily lives. The Scapular can easily degenerate into being some of “lucky charm” or “lucky rabbit’s foot”! Just wear it and you are saved! Much like the erroneous belief that salvation is based on Faith not on personal works, with the Protestant slogan: “Believe in Lord Jesus and you are saved!”
Our Lady’s promise―made to St. Simon Stock ―sounds great, doesn’t it? “Take this Scapular, it shall be a sign of salvation, a protection in danger and a pledge of peace. Whosoever dies wearing this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire.” Wow! What a great deal! Just wear the Scapular and you’re off to Heaven―no matter what!
Let us not imagine that the Scapular is endowed with some kind of supernatural power, which will save us, no matter what we do, or how much we sin. We might apply here what St. Alphonsus says about devotion to Mary in general―for the Scapular is one of the forms of devotion to Mary: “When we declare that it is impossible for a servant of Mary to be lost, we do not mean those who, by their devotion to Mary, think themselves warranted to sin freely. We state that these reckless people, because of their presumption, deserve to be treated with rigor and not with kindness. We speak here of the servants of Mary who, to the fidelity with which they honor and invoke her, join the desire to amend their lives. I hold it morally impossible that these be lost.” It is clear, from the words of St. Alphonsus, that a certain measure of fidelity is required on the part of those who wish to gain the special love and protection of Our Lady. The very wearing of the Scapular is, in itself, an act of devotion, and when it is done faithfully, it renders habitual homage to its Queen.
A perverse, sinful will can defeat the “suppliant omnipotence” of the Mother of mercy. Even Christ had to admit defeat, for He extended His crucified hands all day to an unbelieving and contradicting people, that refused to return to the forgiving embrace of His Sacred Heart. How often would He have gathered His chosen children into His Sacred Heart and they would not! But if we turn to Our Lady, she will turn her eyes of mercy towards us and show us the fruit of her womb.
Final Perseverance is Precious Grace
It is the teaching of our holy faith that no one can merit the gift of final perseverance. We have no lease upon the state of grace, no insurance against its loss. It does not follow that, because we are in the state of grace today, tomorrow will find us the friends of God and heirs to his Kingdom. We carry our treasure of divine grace in the earthen vessel of a fallen human nature which is easily broken. To continue the metaphor, one might say that this earthen vessel has been broken ever since the Fall and that our personal sins have weakened its powers of resistance.
Even though the Good Samaritan―Our Lord Jesus Christ―has left us his medicinal grace to heal the wounds left by sin, He has not restored to us the gift of immunity from concupiscence―a gift which Adam was given―and which insured the divine treasure of grace against loss. In our redeemed human nature, there is an inherent weakness which places sanctifying grace in constant danger of being lost. This moral weakness has led to the formation of bad habits and inclinations to sin which have their roots deep in our nature. Bad habits are not easily rooted out and, while they remain, the state of sanctifying grace is in peril.
Another factor that enters into final perseverance is that of the time of our death. We could never merit that death will come when we are in the state of sanctifying grace. The time of our death totally depends upon Divine Providence and is outside the order of merit. Strictly speaking, a person could live for years in the state of sanctifying grace and have the misfortune to fall into grievous sin. If death overtook him before he had a chance to go to confession, or to make an act of perfect contrition, he would be lost.
This doctrine of the Church disturbs our complacency and makes us throw ourselves more and more upon the mercy of God. He who made us, knows what is in man; He knows the clay of which we are formed and has promised that if we rely upon Him we shall not be tempted above our strength. Moreover, He has given His word that if we use the means of salvation, which He has left, the crowning grace of final perseverance will be ours. However, “be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21)
Mary is Key to Final Perseverance
One of the greatest means of final perseverance we have is devotion to our Blessed Mother. It is the constant teaching of the Church that devotion to God’s Mother is not only a means, but a pledge of eternal salvation. Many saints have taught this. If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination. For example:
St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.”
St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation.”
St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.”
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.”
St. Anselm (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost.”
St. Antonine is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified.”
St. John Damascene (a Doctor of the Church) says: “To be devout to you, O holy Virgin, is an arm of salvation which God gives to those whom He wishes to save.”
St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church), in his book, The Glories of Mary, says: “The intercession of Mary is even necessary to salvation. We say ‘necessary’, not absolutely, but morally. This necessity proceeds from the will itself of God, that all graces that He dispenses should pass by the hands of Mary, according to the opinion of St. Bernard.”
St. Louis de Montfort adds: “Devotion to our Blessed Lady is necessary to salvation, and that it is an infallible mark of reprobation to have no esteem and love for the holy Virgin; while on the other hand, it is an infallible mark of predestination to be entirely and truly devoted to her.”
St. Bernardine of Sienna addresses these words to the Blessed Virgin Mary: “O Lady, thou art the dispenser of all graces, and since the grace of salvation can only come through thy hands, our salvation depends on thee!”
Even the devils admit that devotion to Mary snatches souls from their clutches and damnation. St. Louis de Montfort writes: “When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone in France, an Albigensian was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people. St. Dominic put his Rosary round the neck of the possessed man and asked the devils who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most. At this they let out such unearthly screams and then used all their cunning so as not to answer. The Blessed Virgin was near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod that she held and said: “Answer my servant Dominic at once!” The devils who were in possession of this wretched man were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions in spite of themselves. They said: “Oh, you who are our enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! No soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! We have no success with her faithful servants! Many Christians who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards are saved by her intercession! We must also admit that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, 33rd Rose).
If it is the property of God to be merciful and to spare, surely it is also the very nature of the Mother of mercy to pour forth her mercy―even where there are no merits. The quality of her mercy is never strained; and the devil, into whose heart a ray of hope can never shine, is the only one excluded from her love. She sees in every soul, even in that of the most wretched, the image of her Son, and, if necessary, she would become again the Queen of Martyrs to save the least of her children.
A Sincere Devotion to Mary is Needed
Those who shelter their weakness in the motherly Heart of the Mother of our redemption “shall draw salvation from the Lord.” That Heart, into which the tenderest mother-love drew all the agony of the Passion and Death of our Redeemer, is a tower of strength for the weak. She is our life, our sweetness and our hope; in her we may find the beauty of eternal life.
To whom shall we go for an assurance of salvation if not to her who, in order to save us, offered both her Only-Begotten and herself to the cruel death of the Cross? “It is not near the Cross,” says St. Bernard, “that Mary is found but on it, nailed to its beams as Jesus is.” She loves us with the same love she has for her FirstBorn, and the double-edged sword that pierced his Heart, opened wide her Heart, that it might be the refuge to sinners to the end of time, and the gate to Heaven for those who hope in her. Her love embraces every child of Adam and there is no power that will snatch a soul from her protecting love.
She was made to be the Mother of mercy, and her mission, on Earth and in Heaven, is not to judge, but to show mercy and to open her pierced Heart wider and wider to the poor banished children of Eve, who cry to her for help. The Eternal Father made her “full of grace,” that her love might bestow it where justice would deny it. As St. Bernard says: “She is impetuous in mercy, she is resistless in mercy. The duration of her mercy is unto the end of the sinner’s life. The broadness of her mercy is unto the limits of the Earth. The height of her mercy is unto Heaven. The depth of her mercy is unto the lowest abyss of sin and sorrow―she is always merciful, she is only merciful. She is our Mother of mercy.”
The constant, daily practice of wearing the Scapular is, therefore, an act of faithful homage to Our Lady but, as St. Alphonsus adds, the desire to amend one’s life is also necessary, before we can be morally certain that she will be the cause of our eternal salvation. We should be careful not to place limits upon the mercy of her who is the refuge of sinners and the Mother of mercy. How few there are to whom she could say at the end of life: “Well done, thou good and faithful servant!”
There are countless souls in Heaven today, who owe their imperishable crowns to the special intercession of Our Lady. There is a wealth of theology in a little story Bishop Sheen loves to tell: “St. Peter approached Christ and complained that he found souls in Heaven who had no right to be there. The Savior looked at him and said: 'Peter, I am not blaming you, for no matter how well you guard the gate to Heaven, they get in―when you close the gate, my Mother opens the window!’”
In this age of measurement, we should beware of attempting to reduce our Blessed Mother’s love for sinners to fixed formulas. The burning love of her Heart cannot be caught within the narrow limits of any definition, or rule, or be expressed in the ordinary words of life. “One,” says Cardinal Newman, “would not give much for that love which is never extravagant.” Every mother’s love is extravagant, simply because it is what it is. How often does it happen that a mother has more love and affection in her heart for the afflicted child, or the black sheep, than she has for the children who need her less! If the father of the prodigal loved his wayward son so much, that he aroused the jealousy of the faithful one, why cannot our Blessed Mother love and save, where others would hate and condemn? If she is Mother for the sake of sinners, why can she not obtain from her Son that strong grace, which compels even the rebellious will and bends it at the last towards God?
St. Alphonsus addresses her in the following words: “Thou canst relieve the most wretched and save the most abandoned.” And St. Hilary says: “Even though one has been a sinner, if he has been devoted to Mary, he shall not perish for ever.” Spiritual writers tell us that it was the intercession of Mary that brought about the conversion of the good thief. Up to his last moments he lived in crime and sin, and, even on the cross, he filled up the measure of his iniquity by reproaching Jesus. What brought about his conversion? The prayer of Our Lady, standing at the foot of the Cross, won for him, not only forgiveness, but a place in Heaven that very day.
Not a License to Sin
Yet, as St. Alphonsus warns: “When we declare that it is impossible for a servant of Mary to be lost, we do not mean those who, by their devotion to Mary, think themselves warranted to sin freely. We state that these reckless people, because of their presumption, deserve to be treated with rigor and not with kindness. We speak here of the servants of Mary who, to the fidelity with which they honor and invoke her, join the desire to amend their lives. I hold it morally impossible that these be lost.” As St. Alphonsus says, the desire to amend one’s life is also necessary, before we can be morally certain that she will be the cause of our eternal salvation.
At times the Scapular has been preached as an easy way to Heaven, which has led to criticism of the devotion. The Carmelite priest, Fr. Hugh Clark, O.Carm, writes: “Too much stress has been placed on the promises of eternal salvation on an individual basis. At times the Scapular has been preached as an easy way to Heaven, guaranteed by Mary’s promise and intervention which softened the severity of God’s judgment. Any attempt to revive the true dimension of the Scapular devotion must take account of the reality that, by accepting the Scapular, the wearer is associated with the Religious Order of Carmel and pledges himself/herself to strive to live its ideals” ― and sinning is not part of those ideals! (Fr. Hugh Clarke, O.Carm., Mary and the Brown Scapular).
Devotees of the Brown Scapular have sometimes been accused of straying into superstition. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that Sacramentals, such as the Brown Scapular, “do not confer the grace of the Holy Spirit in the way that the sacraments do, but by the Church’s prayer, they prepare us to receive grace and dispose us to cooperate with it” (Catechism of the Catholic Church). Therefore, the Brown Scapular is not an infallible guarantee of salvation to anybody and everybody who wears it, but it guarantees salvation to those who COOPERATE WITH THE GRACES that will come from wearing it.
Believers in the traditional scapular promise sometimes argue that Mary’s intercession either grants conversion, final perseverance, and/or last rites to the wearer, to secure the assurances of the Scapular Promise. Another argument is that, in cases of stubborn unrepentant sinners, the scapular will somehow, miraculously or not, be taken off the wearer ― this was suggested by Saint Claude de la Colombière. (Australian Catholic Truth Society; Garment of Grace). How many times have we not seen Scapular-wearing hospital patients end up without their Scapular―which was removed for bathing, or some medical treatment and then never put back around the neck of the wearer!
St. Claude writes: “You ask―’What if I desire to die in my sins?’ I answer: ‘Then you will die in your sins but YOU WILL NOT DIE IN YOUR SCAPULAR.’” St. Claude tells the story of a man who tried to drown himself three times. He was rescued against his will. At last he realized that he was wearing his Scapular. Determined to take his life, he tore the Scapular from his neck and leaped into the water. Without Mary’s protective garment he accomplished his wish and died in his sins.
This same admonition or warning is also extended by St. Alphonsus Liguori, who says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.” Yet he also says elsewhere that those who willfully and sinfully abuse the Scapular, rather than use its sacramental power to help them avoid sin and grow in virtue, while thinking themselves to be safe from damnation in using the Scapular as a kind of ‘license to sin’ ― will, as a consequence, be all the more heavily punished in Hell.
Ven. Pope Pius XII called the Brown Scapular “a sign of consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary … The Scapular is not superstitious ... One is not saved from Hell merely by wearing it! No―for the Scapular is a sign that they must live their lives in total obedience to God and trust in Him, through and with the Immaculate Heart of Mary.”
Article 10
Tuesday, July 16th, Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel
The Scapular Will Save the World!
Tuesday, July 16th, Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel
The Scapular Will Save the World!
Our Hope
Every time we pray the Salve Regina or Hail Holy Queen, we call Mary “our hope”: “Hail, our Life, our Sweetness and our Hope!” Sr. Lucia, one of the three seers at Fatima, says that: “the last means God will give to the world for its salvation are the Holy Rosary and the devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.” Pope Pius XII, on the occasion of the seventh centenary of the Brown Scapular of Mount Carmel in 1950, in his letter to the Superior General of the Carmelites, wrote of the Brown Scapular, saying that it was a sign of devotion and consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and a hope of eternal salvation:
“There is no one who is not aware how greatly a love for the Blessed Virgin Mother of God contributes to the enlivening of the Catholic Faith and to the raising of the moral standard. These effects are especially secured by means of those devotions which, more than others, are seen to enlighten the mind with celestial doctrine and to excite souls to the practice of the Christian life. In the first rank of the most favored of these devotions that of the Holy Carmelite Scapular must be placed … For we are here concerned, not with a light or passing matter, but with the obtaining of eternal life itself … May they all see in this keepsake of the Virgin herself … a Sign of their Consecration to the Most sacred Heart of the Immaculate Virgin, which (consecration) in recent times we have so strongly recommended … But not for this reason, however, may they who wear the Scapular think that they can gain eternal salvation while remaining slothful and negligent of spirit, for the Apostle warns us: ‘In fear and trembling shall you work out your salvation’” (Philippians 2:12).
A Saving Scapular
We all know, of course, that eternal salvation and the avoidance of the fires of Hell, is a promise given to those who faithfully wear the Brown Scapular around their necks. The Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to St. Simon Stock, Superior General of the Carmelite Order, on July 16th, 1251, and in her hand she held the Brown Scapular and gave this promise: “Take this Scapular; it shall be a sign of salvation, a protection in danger and a pledge of peace. Whosoever dies wearing this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire.” Yet we should also remember the prophecy that “One day through the Rosary and the Scapular she will save the world!” In the pages of an ancient history of the Carmelite Order—written in medieval Latin by a priest named Fr. Marianus Ventimiglia, which was published in 1773 in Naples—we find this historical account:
“Three famous men of God met on a street corner in Rome. They were Friar Dominic, busy gathering recruits to a new Religious Order of Preachers; Brother Francis, the friend of birds and beasts and especially dear to the poor; and Angelus, who had been invited to Rome from Mount Carmel, in Palestine, because of his fame as a preacher. At their chance meeting, by the light of the Holy Spirit each of the three men recognized each other and, in the course of their conversation (as recorded by various followers who were present), they made prophecies to each other. St. Angelus foretold the stigmata of St. Francis, and St. Dominic said: ‘One day, Brother Angelus, to your Order of Carmel the Most Blessed Virgin Mary will give a devotion to be known as the Brown Scapular, and to my Order of Preachers she will give a devotion to be known as the Rosary. ONE DAY, THROUGH THE ROSARY AND THE SCAPULAR, SHE WILL SAVE THE WORLD.’”
Today, a chapel on that very street corner in Rome, commemorates the meeting of St. Dominic, St. Francis of Assisi, and St. Angelus.
Only She Can Help Us Now
On July 13th, 1917, Our Lady of Fatima—speaking of herself in the third person—said: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you.” Three months later, on October 13th, 1917, at her final appearance at Fatima during the miracle of the sun, she was first seen as being dressed in white and holding the Rosary, while St. Joseph, holding the Infant, stood at her side; then secondly, she was seen as dressed in blue, while Our Lord appeared at her side; thirdly and finally, dressed in the brown of Carmel, holding the Brown Scapular in her hands, while Our Lord, slowly raised His hand and blessed the great crowd in the Cova da Iria below. Sr. Lucia said that, of the three different consecutive appearances of Our Lady on October 13th, the most beautiful and resplendent was that of Our Lady dressed in the religious habit of Mount Carmel (Our Lady of Mount Carmel).
In 1946, in an interview lasting several hours, the present writer (John M. Haffert ) asked Sr. Lucia, then the sole survivor of the three children who saw Our Lady of Fatima, about that last apparition on October 13th of Our Lady of the Scapular. She confirmed what Archbishop Ryan and a few other early writers on the subject had said. But there had been found, especially among some of the so-called ‘authorities’ on Fatima in the United States, an inexplicable hostility to the inclusion of the Scapular in the Fatima message. We feel today that this was in the Providence of God because it led to an incontrovertible statement on the subject from Sr. Lucia on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15th, 1950.
It was in an interview which two Carmelite Fathers had with Sr. Lucia, who had herself become a Carmelite nun with the name, Sister Mary of the Immaculate Heart, in the Carmel of Coimbra, Portugal. The interrogator in the interview was the Very Rev. Howard Rafferty, O. Carm., Provincial Director of the Third Order Secular of the Carmelite Province of the Most Pure Heart of Mary in the United States. He began by remarking that most of the recent writers on Fatima (up to 1950) made no mention of the Scapular, and some even denied that the Scapular Devotion was a part of the Fatima message. “Oh, they are wrong!” Lucia exclaimed.
Shortly after the apparitions in 1917, Lucia told interrogators that the vision of Our Lady of the Scapular, on October 13th, “Looked just like the picture of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in the parish church.” This picture is the very old, universally-used portrayal of Our Lady in the Carmelite Habit, with the Infant Jesus holding the little Scapular in His Hands and Angels descending into Purgatory―apparently at Our Lady’s bidding―freeing souls from the flames. From an explanation which Lucia gave in 1946, it is apparent her reference in 1917 to this picture, referred only to the Habit and general appearance of Our Lady. In the Fatima vision Our Lady herself held the Scapular in her hands and, instead of the Infant in her arms, Our Lord stood at her side, in the fullness of manhood, blessing the crowd below. “Why do you think Our Lady appeared with the Scapular in this last vision?” Sr. Lucia was asked in 1950. Sr. Lucia replied, “Because she wants everyone to wear the Scapular.”
Don’t Take It For Granted
The Rosary and the Scapular are “Sacramentals” of the Church. A “sacramental” is not to be confused with a “Sacrament”—there are only seven Sacraments, but many more Sacramentals. What is a Sacramental? A Sacramental is anything set apart, or blessed, by the Church, which is meant to excite within us spiritual thoughts and to increase devotion, and, through these movements of the heart, to remit venial sin. Therefore, it is not the Sacramental itself that gives grace, but the devotion, the love of God, or sorrow for sin that it inspires within us.
When we receive the any one of the seven Sacraments, we always get the grace of the Sacraments if we are rightly disposed and in a state of sanctifying grace. The Sacrament gives us a minimal amount of grace that we automatically receive, whether or not we have devotion in our souls; but in using the Sacramentals, we do not automatically receive grace as we do with the Sacraments, but the grace given by the use of Sacramentals depends upon our having a pre-requisite devotion in our soul; and the more devotion we have., then the more grace we receive. With the Sacraments, even though we get a minimal amount of grace automatically, this can also be increased by a proportionate increase in our devotion. Ultimately, it comes to down to you reap what you sow: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap” (Galatians 6:8), which is only to be expected from God, Who is Justice Itself, and justice means giving to others according to their merit.
We must therefore avoid looking at the Sacramentals as though they were ‘spiritual good-luck charms’ that work automatically, regardless of what we think, feel, or do. There are some who wear the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, thinking that they will be saved from Hell, no matter how much they sin! St. Alphonsus Liguori warns such persons that they will receive an even more severe judgment that most other souls. On the contrary, the Sacramentals are like a flint that is there to create a spark that will set something on fire. In this case, the Sacramental is meant to give a spark to our devotion and set it afire. As Our Lord said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49), yet sadly, “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). If we knelt down before a plain white wall we would find it harder to pray with devotion than if we were kneeling before a Crucifix. We see the representation of the nails in the hands and feet, the blood on the side, the thorns on the head; and all these must make us think of Our Lord’s terrible sufferings. The picture of a friend, hanging on the wall before us, will often make us think of him when we would otherwise forget him. So also will the pictures of Our Lord and of the saints, keep them often in our minds, and therefore are more likely to spark a devotion within us. The Scapular is there to remind us of Our Lady, it is like wearing the uniform of Our Lady in her service and reminds us that we belong to her.
Miracles of the Brown Scapular
The devotion to the Brown Scapular was authorized by miracles. God uses miracles as a witness to the truth of His promises and those of His Mother. Miracles are used by God to confirm the solid foundation of the devotions that the Church proposes to the faithful. The greater the number of miracles obtained by a particular devotion, the more it draws our attention to this devotion and authenticates the truth that the practice is pleasing to God. Of all the devotions adopted by the Church, none has been confirmed by more authenticated miracles than that of the Brown Scapular.
What follows is a small sampling.
Miracles of Grace
A priest relates that one day in a town near Chicago he was called to the bedside of a man who had been away from the Sacraments for many years. “The man did not want to see me: he would not talk. Then I asked him to look at the little Scapular I was holding. ‘Will you wear this if I put it on you? I ask nothing more.’ He agreed to wear it, and within the hour he wanted to go to Confession and make his peace with God. This did not surprise me, because for over 700 years Our Lady has been working in this way through her Scapular.”
On the very day that Our Lady gave the Scapular to Saint Simon Stock, he was hurriedly called by Lord Peter of Linton: “Come quickly, Father, my brother is dying in despair!” Saint Simon Stock left at once for the bedside of the dying man. Upon arrival, he placed his large Scapular over the man, asking Our Blessed Mother to keep her promise. Immediately the man repented, and died in the grace of God. That night the dead man appeared to his brother and said, “I have been saved through the most powerful Queen and the habit of that man as a shield.”
Miracles Demonstrating Our Lady’s Promise of Protection
One day in 1944, a Carmelite missionary in the Holy Land was called to an internment camp to give the Last Rites. The Arab bus driver made the priest get off the bus four miles from the camp because the road was dangerously muddy. After two miles, the missionary found his feet sinking deeper and deeper into the mire. Trying to get solid footing, he slipped into a muddy pool. Sinking to his death in this desolate place, he thought of Our Lady and her Scapular.
He kissed his great Scapular — for he was wearing the full habit — and looked toward the holy mountain of Carmel, the birthplace of devotion to God’s Mother. He cried out, “Holy Mother of Carmel! Help me! Save me!” A moment later, he found himself on solid ground. Later he said, “I know I was saved by the Blessed Virgin through her Brown Scapular. My shoes were lost in the mud, and I was covered with it, but I walked the remaining two miles praising Mary.”
Saved from the Sea
Another Scapular miracle took place in 1845. In the late summer of that year, the English ship, King of the Ocean, on its way to Australia, not far from Cape Hope, found itself in the middle of a hurricane. As wind and sea mercilessly lashed the ship, a Protestant minister, with his wife and children and other passengers, struggled to the deck to pray for mercy and forgiveness, as the end seemed at hand. Among the crew was a young Irishman, John McAuliffe. On seeing the urgency of the situation, the youth opened his shirt, took off his Scapular, and, making the Sign of the Cross with it over the raging waves, tossed it into the ocean. At that very moment, the wind calmed. Only one more wave washed the deck, bringing with it the Scapular which came to rest at the young man’s feet. All the while the minister (a Mr. Fisher) had been carefully observing McAuliffe’s actions and the miraculous effect of those actions. Upon questioning the young man, he was told about the Holy Virgin and her Scapular. Mr. Fisher and his family became determined to enter the Catholic Church as soon as possible, and thereby enjoy the same protection of Our Lady’s Scapular. This they did shortly after landing in Australia.
Saved from Fire
In May of 1957, a Carmelite priest in Germany published the unusual story of how the Scapular saved a home from fire. An entire row of homes had caught fire in Westboden, Germany. The pious inhabitants of a home in the middle of this row, seeing the fire, immediately fastened a Scapular to the main door of the house. Sparks flew over it and around it, but the house remained unharmed. Within 5 hours, 22 homes had been reduced to ashes. The one structure which stood undamaged amidst the destruction was that which had the Scapular attached to its door. The hundreds of people who came to see the place Our Lady had saved are eyewitnesses to the power of the Scapular and the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Saved from an Explosion
In 1955, a miracle occurred in the mid-western part of the United States. A 3rd-grader stopped in a gasoline station to put air in his bicycle tires, and at that very moment an explosion occurred. The boy’s clothing was burned off, but his Brown Scapular remained unaffected: a symbol of Mary’s protection. Today, although he still bears a few scars from the explosion, this man has special reason to remember the Blessed Mother’s protection in time of danger.
Saved in a Plane Crash
A Jesuit missionary in Guatemala relayed the following incident of Our Lady’s Scapular protection. In November of 1955 a plane carrying 27 passengers crashed. All died except one young lady. When this girl saw the plane was going down, she took hold of her Scapular, and called on Mary for help. She suffered burns, her clothing was reduced to ashes, but her Scapular was not touched by the flames.
Saved from a Bullet
In France, the following was reported: As the town of Montpellier was in a state of siege, in 1622, there occurred a miracle in the sight of the entire army and under the eyes of the King of France, Louis XIII. In a general assault, one of his officers, Champrond de Beauregard, received a bullet wound in the chest. The wound should have been fatal, but the bullet, after piercing the clothing, flattened out against the Scapular, without doing the least bit of harm to the officer. Astonished by the miracle, the officer told all that were around him. Those who surrounded him, witnesses to this wonder, spread it through the army from rank to rank. Eventually news of the miracle reached the monarch’s ear. Louis XIII came forward to see this wonder that had been brought to his attention. He examined the facts very carefully, and after having convinced himself with his own eyes of the reality of the wonder, he wanted to dress himself in this heavenly armor, to receive the Scapular from the hands of the Carmelites and be enrolled as one of the members of the Confraternity.
Saved from Lightning
On August 27th, 1602 Barthelemi Lopez, a Spanish soldier, on duty in the Castle of Saint Elme, in Naples, was saying prayers in honor of Our Lady of Mount Carmel whose Scapular he was wearing, when all of a sudden lightning and thunder exploded above his head. The lightning bolt hit his shoulder, and without making any sort of injury, left on his shoulder the print of a cross — as a sign of salvation which demonstrates that it was to a special help from Heaven that he owed the favor of having been preserved from the terrible effects of the lightning.
Miracle of Grace
In 1834, an elderly soldier living in Angouleme, France, no longer able to bear certain sorrows, resolved to take his own life. He decided to kill himself with poison, thinking that he could more easily hide his crime from the public. Upon taking the poison, he did not have to wait long to suffer the effects. Immediately he went to the hospital and asked to spend the night, thinking that the cause of his death would be undiscovered and his name would not be blackened because of commission of the cowardly sin of suicide.
But the hospital supervisor would not allow him to be admitted without an administration pass — which would mean discovery of his impending death by his own hand. The unhappy soldier was forced to abandon the idea of spending the night in the hospital. While wondering what course of action to take, he suddenly heard a voice telling him to go to Saint Peter’s and confess to Father X. The soldier went to the designated church and asked Father X to hear his confession.
Father X, overcome with fatigue, told the man to wait — it was Lent and it was three o’clock in the afternoon and he had not yet had a bite to eat. The unhappy soldier made a new plea and assured the priest that there was not time to wait.
The priest entered the confessional and the penitent confessed that he had just poisoned himself. The confessor showed him his obligation before God, which included divulging the penitent’s secret.
The soldier, touched by this grace, gave the priest permission, and like the fire which burned his insides, the sufferings he felt threw him into a state of perfect hopelessness.
The charitable priest pulled him out of the confessional and took him to the hospital.
He immediately asked for an antidote, but while they were preparing it, he took the pulse of the sick man, and no longer found any: a deathly pale complexion, misty eyes — everything heralded the coming death.
His heart pierced with sadness, but full of confidence in the Divine Mercy, the fervent priest threw himself to his knees, and recited the Litany of the Blessed Virgin.
At the first invocation, he sensed the pulse of the dying man return, and a short time later he heard the soldier speak a few words. “O my good Father,” he said in a weak voice, “my Father, pray, pray some more!” And he let out a breath and said: “Holy Mary, pray for me!” And soon his consciousness returned. Father X, in his enthusiasm over such a marvelous change, asked the soldier if he hadn’t kept some pious practices — “No, my Father, I have not said any prayers in a long time.” But after having reflected for an instant, he showed a Scapular: “Here is the only sign of piety that I have preserved.” — “Ah! My friend,” notes the priest, “I am no longer surprised by the miracle which just occurred; it’s Mary who protected you, it’s to her that you owe being alive.” Nevertheless the doctor arrived, and after having heard the necessary details on the condition of the patient, he assured them that only a superior power could prolong his life for longer than two hours after having taken the poison, one of the most active that we know; and five hours had gone by since the fatal moment! The antidote became useless. The doctor proposed to record a statement to attest the truth of the miracle; but the humble priest, fearing that they would perhaps attribute the miracle to the fervor of his prayers, did not think about making the miracle public. It was told to me by others, that it may give you a new confidence in Mary. (Told by Father Michaud in The Month of Mary and recorded in the book Vertu Miraculeuse Du Scapulaire, 1869, pp. 30-32).
The full promise of Our Lady of Mount Carmel to Saint Simon Stock July 16th, 1251:
“Accept this Scapular. It shall be a sign of salvation, a protection in danger and a pledge of peace. Whosoever dies clothed in this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire.”
Food Provided in Time of Famine Through the Scapular
In the Fourteenth Century, Spain faced a deadly famine due to a shortage of all sorts of grains. A general procession was ordered, and in the area of Spain in which the Holy Scapular was triumphantly shown, immediately abundance returned and brought joy and consolation to the hearts of all.
In the 16th Century, in Sicily, a drought occurred like that which happened in the days of Elias the prophet. The people appealed to Our Lady, and the Brown Scapular was offered everywhere in the streets for veneration by the people; suddenly the sky opened, the rain came, and soon the people had their lofts full with abundance.
Miracles in Battle
In the year 1618, Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria and general of the imperial army in the war with Prague, in order to acquire God’s benediction on his armies, put himself under the protection of the Blessed Virgin by receiving the holy Scapular with his whole army. Full of confidence in this precious shield of the Queen of Heaven, he gave battle against prince Palatin, who had usurped the crown from Ferdinand II, and the Duke won a complete victory with very few losses of his own. The Emperor Ferdinand II, desirous of giving a public witness to Our Lady for her protection, received, along with the Queen and the princes, the Blessed Scapular from the hands of Father Dominique, a Discalced Carmelite.
Edward II, King of England, hearing about some miracles that were happening in all parts of his kingdom by virtue of the sacred habit, was one of the first princes to once again wear the Scapular, and he received with devotion this precious proof of Mary’s love; shortly thereafter, he experienced the effect of the protection of the Blessed Virgin, to Whom he was devoted. His army, which had already suffered two defeats, was on the verge of complete surrender. He invoked Mary and promised her that he would establish a monastery of the Order of Mount Carmel. Immediately, by a miraculous assistance, he won a complete victory over his enemies, who at that point thought they had already won the battle. Edward, wanting to perpetuate the memory of this powerful protection and to keep his vow, gave to the Carmelites his palace at Oxford to establish a monastery.
Protection Against the Devil
In 2005, a priest was giving a talk about the growth of satanic worship in the world and how adults and young children are becoming possessed by the devil because of the use of things such as the Ouija board, saying the incantations that open the door to the demonic in “children’s books” such as the Harry Potter series, and going to fortune tellers, etc.
When someone asked the priest how to protect oneself from the demonic, besides the obvious path of avoiding things that call upon Satan, the priest answered, “Wear the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel for protection from curses and the devil.”
One can understand why the devil works against those who promote the Scapular after hearing the story of Venerable Francis Ypes. One day his Scapular fell off. As he replaced it, the devil howled, “Take off the habit which snatches so many souls from us!” Then and there Francis made the devil admit that there are three things which the demons are most afraid of: the Holy Name of Jesus, the Holy Name of Mary, and the Holy Scapular of Carmel. To that list we could add the Holy Rosary.
One day a young woman, before entering the religious life, went to see the Curé of Ars, and during the conversation, he asked her, “Do you recall, my child, at the certain evening of dancing, where you were? There was a very young man, very pretty, unknown, distinguished, admired, and all the girls wanted to dance with him.” “Yes, I recall when he never came to ask me, I was sad, yet all the other girls were privileged to dance with that young man.” “You would have liked to dance with him, wouldn’t you?” “Yes.” “Do you recall, when that young man was leaving the dance hall, you saw under his feet two blue flames? And you thought it was an illusion of your eyes? When you saw that young man leave the dance hall, you saw fire under his feet! It was not an illusion of your eyes, my daughter. That man was a demon. And if he did not come to you to ask you to dance, it’s for one reason: you were wearing the vestment of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.”
Miracles of Conversion
We should even give the Scapular to non-Catholics, for Our Lady will bring conversions to those who will wear it and say one Hail Mary each day, as the following true story will show. An old man was rushed to the hospital in New York City, unconscious and dying. The nurse, seeing the Brown Scapular on the patient, called the priest. As the prayers were being said for the dying man, he became conscious and spoke up: “Father, I am not a Catholic.” “Then why are you wearing the Brown Scapular?” asked the priest. “I promised my friends to wear it ,” the patient explained, “and say one Hail Mary a day.” “You are dying,” the priest told him. “Do you want to become a Catholic?” “All my life I wanted to be one,” the dying man replied. He was baptized, received the Last Rites, and died in peace. Our Lady took another soul to Heaven under her mantle through her Scapular!
Some Modern Day Miracles
A priest relayed the following two accounts:
The first one occurred about 1980 in Ontario, Canada, in a small city near Toronto. “A woman whose son I had recently enrolled in the Brown Scapular relayed the following: she told me that she was very grateful because I had enrolled her son in the Scapular. That same day, after the enrollment, she went somewhere with her son.
“She had put him in the back seat and closed the door and drove away down the highway. But she didn’t close the door very well, and when she turned the corner the door opened and her son rolled out onto the highway. She was terrified and horrified and she came back to pick him up and discovered that he did not have a scratch on him. He was, of course, wearing his Scapular.”
“There was a man in Baltimore who told me this himself in about 1990. As he was driving down the highway, someone threw a rock through his window. He didn’t know where from. It knocked his glasses that were in his shirt-pocket onto the seat beside him. He didn’t need the glasses, so he left them where they landed. When he arrived home, he remembered his glasses. He went to pick them up to put them back in his pocket, but they wouldn’t go in. He thought it was because the rock was still in his pocket. So he pulled the rock out, but it wasn’t a rock. It was a bullet. He had been shot at. He was uninjured. He was wearing his Scapular.”
Every time we pray the Salve Regina or Hail Holy Queen, we call Mary “our hope”: “Hail, our Life, our Sweetness and our Hope!” Sr. Lucia, one of the three seers at Fatima, says that: “the last means God will give to the world for its salvation are the Holy Rosary and the devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.” Pope Pius XII, on the occasion of the seventh centenary of the Brown Scapular of Mount Carmel in 1950, in his letter to the Superior General of the Carmelites, wrote of the Brown Scapular, saying that it was a sign of devotion and consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and a hope of eternal salvation:
“There is no one who is not aware how greatly a love for the Blessed Virgin Mother of God contributes to the enlivening of the Catholic Faith and to the raising of the moral standard. These effects are especially secured by means of those devotions which, more than others, are seen to enlighten the mind with celestial doctrine and to excite souls to the practice of the Christian life. In the first rank of the most favored of these devotions that of the Holy Carmelite Scapular must be placed … For we are here concerned, not with a light or passing matter, but with the obtaining of eternal life itself … May they all see in this keepsake of the Virgin herself … a Sign of their Consecration to the Most sacred Heart of the Immaculate Virgin, which (consecration) in recent times we have so strongly recommended … But not for this reason, however, may they who wear the Scapular think that they can gain eternal salvation while remaining slothful and negligent of spirit, for the Apostle warns us: ‘In fear and trembling shall you work out your salvation’” (Philippians 2:12).
A Saving Scapular
We all know, of course, that eternal salvation and the avoidance of the fires of Hell, is a promise given to those who faithfully wear the Brown Scapular around their necks. The Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to St. Simon Stock, Superior General of the Carmelite Order, on July 16th, 1251, and in her hand she held the Brown Scapular and gave this promise: “Take this Scapular; it shall be a sign of salvation, a protection in danger and a pledge of peace. Whosoever dies wearing this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire.” Yet we should also remember the prophecy that “One day through the Rosary and the Scapular she will save the world!” In the pages of an ancient history of the Carmelite Order—written in medieval Latin by a priest named Fr. Marianus Ventimiglia, which was published in 1773 in Naples—we find this historical account:
“Three famous men of God met on a street corner in Rome. They were Friar Dominic, busy gathering recruits to a new Religious Order of Preachers; Brother Francis, the friend of birds and beasts and especially dear to the poor; and Angelus, who had been invited to Rome from Mount Carmel, in Palestine, because of his fame as a preacher. At their chance meeting, by the light of the Holy Spirit each of the three men recognized each other and, in the course of their conversation (as recorded by various followers who were present), they made prophecies to each other. St. Angelus foretold the stigmata of St. Francis, and St. Dominic said: ‘One day, Brother Angelus, to your Order of Carmel the Most Blessed Virgin Mary will give a devotion to be known as the Brown Scapular, and to my Order of Preachers she will give a devotion to be known as the Rosary. ONE DAY, THROUGH THE ROSARY AND THE SCAPULAR, SHE WILL SAVE THE WORLD.’”
Today, a chapel on that very street corner in Rome, commemorates the meeting of St. Dominic, St. Francis of Assisi, and St. Angelus.
Only She Can Help Us Now
On July 13th, 1917, Our Lady of Fatima—speaking of herself in the third person—said: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you.” Three months later, on October 13th, 1917, at her final appearance at Fatima during the miracle of the sun, she was first seen as being dressed in white and holding the Rosary, while St. Joseph, holding the Infant, stood at her side; then secondly, she was seen as dressed in blue, while Our Lord appeared at her side; thirdly and finally, dressed in the brown of Carmel, holding the Brown Scapular in her hands, while Our Lord, slowly raised His hand and blessed the great crowd in the Cova da Iria below. Sr. Lucia said that, of the three different consecutive appearances of Our Lady on October 13th, the most beautiful and resplendent was that of Our Lady dressed in the religious habit of Mount Carmel (Our Lady of Mount Carmel).
In 1946, in an interview lasting several hours, the present writer (John M. Haffert ) asked Sr. Lucia, then the sole survivor of the three children who saw Our Lady of Fatima, about that last apparition on October 13th of Our Lady of the Scapular. She confirmed what Archbishop Ryan and a few other early writers on the subject had said. But there had been found, especially among some of the so-called ‘authorities’ on Fatima in the United States, an inexplicable hostility to the inclusion of the Scapular in the Fatima message. We feel today that this was in the Providence of God because it led to an incontrovertible statement on the subject from Sr. Lucia on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15th, 1950.
It was in an interview which two Carmelite Fathers had with Sr. Lucia, who had herself become a Carmelite nun with the name, Sister Mary of the Immaculate Heart, in the Carmel of Coimbra, Portugal. The interrogator in the interview was the Very Rev. Howard Rafferty, O. Carm., Provincial Director of the Third Order Secular of the Carmelite Province of the Most Pure Heart of Mary in the United States. He began by remarking that most of the recent writers on Fatima (up to 1950) made no mention of the Scapular, and some even denied that the Scapular Devotion was a part of the Fatima message. “Oh, they are wrong!” Lucia exclaimed.
Shortly after the apparitions in 1917, Lucia told interrogators that the vision of Our Lady of the Scapular, on October 13th, “Looked just like the picture of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in the parish church.” This picture is the very old, universally-used portrayal of Our Lady in the Carmelite Habit, with the Infant Jesus holding the little Scapular in His Hands and Angels descending into Purgatory―apparently at Our Lady’s bidding―freeing souls from the flames. From an explanation which Lucia gave in 1946, it is apparent her reference in 1917 to this picture, referred only to the Habit and general appearance of Our Lady. In the Fatima vision Our Lady herself held the Scapular in her hands and, instead of the Infant in her arms, Our Lord stood at her side, in the fullness of manhood, blessing the crowd below. “Why do you think Our Lady appeared with the Scapular in this last vision?” Sr. Lucia was asked in 1950. Sr. Lucia replied, “Because she wants everyone to wear the Scapular.”
Don’t Take It For Granted
The Rosary and the Scapular are “Sacramentals” of the Church. A “sacramental” is not to be confused with a “Sacrament”—there are only seven Sacraments, but many more Sacramentals. What is a Sacramental? A Sacramental is anything set apart, or blessed, by the Church, which is meant to excite within us spiritual thoughts and to increase devotion, and, through these movements of the heart, to remit venial sin. Therefore, it is not the Sacramental itself that gives grace, but the devotion, the love of God, or sorrow for sin that it inspires within us.
When we receive the any one of the seven Sacraments, we always get the grace of the Sacraments if we are rightly disposed and in a state of sanctifying grace. The Sacrament gives us a minimal amount of grace that we automatically receive, whether or not we have devotion in our souls; but in using the Sacramentals, we do not automatically receive grace as we do with the Sacraments, but the grace given by the use of Sacramentals depends upon our having a pre-requisite devotion in our soul; and the more devotion we have., then the more grace we receive. With the Sacraments, even though we get a minimal amount of grace automatically, this can also be increased by a proportionate increase in our devotion. Ultimately, it comes to down to you reap what you sow: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap” (Galatians 6:8), which is only to be expected from God, Who is Justice Itself, and justice means giving to others according to their merit.
We must therefore avoid looking at the Sacramentals as though they were ‘spiritual good-luck charms’ that work automatically, regardless of what we think, feel, or do. There are some who wear the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, thinking that they will be saved from Hell, no matter how much they sin! St. Alphonsus Liguori warns such persons that they will receive an even more severe judgment that most other souls. On the contrary, the Sacramentals are like a flint that is there to create a spark that will set something on fire. In this case, the Sacramental is meant to give a spark to our devotion and set it afire. As Our Lord said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49), yet sadly, “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). If we knelt down before a plain white wall we would find it harder to pray with devotion than if we were kneeling before a Crucifix. We see the representation of the nails in the hands and feet, the blood on the side, the thorns on the head; and all these must make us think of Our Lord’s terrible sufferings. The picture of a friend, hanging on the wall before us, will often make us think of him when we would otherwise forget him. So also will the pictures of Our Lord and of the saints, keep them often in our minds, and therefore are more likely to spark a devotion within us. The Scapular is there to remind us of Our Lady, it is like wearing the uniform of Our Lady in her service and reminds us that we belong to her.
Miracles of the Brown Scapular
The devotion to the Brown Scapular was authorized by miracles. God uses miracles as a witness to the truth of His promises and those of His Mother. Miracles are used by God to confirm the solid foundation of the devotions that the Church proposes to the faithful. The greater the number of miracles obtained by a particular devotion, the more it draws our attention to this devotion and authenticates the truth that the practice is pleasing to God. Of all the devotions adopted by the Church, none has been confirmed by more authenticated miracles than that of the Brown Scapular.
What follows is a small sampling.
Miracles of Grace
A priest relates that one day in a town near Chicago he was called to the bedside of a man who had been away from the Sacraments for many years. “The man did not want to see me: he would not talk. Then I asked him to look at the little Scapular I was holding. ‘Will you wear this if I put it on you? I ask nothing more.’ He agreed to wear it, and within the hour he wanted to go to Confession and make his peace with God. This did not surprise me, because for over 700 years Our Lady has been working in this way through her Scapular.”
On the very day that Our Lady gave the Scapular to Saint Simon Stock, he was hurriedly called by Lord Peter of Linton: “Come quickly, Father, my brother is dying in despair!” Saint Simon Stock left at once for the bedside of the dying man. Upon arrival, he placed his large Scapular over the man, asking Our Blessed Mother to keep her promise. Immediately the man repented, and died in the grace of God. That night the dead man appeared to his brother and said, “I have been saved through the most powerful Queen and the habit of that man as a shield.”
Miracles Demonstrating Our Lady’s Promise of Protection
One day in 1944, a Carmelite missionary in the Holy Land was called to an internment camp to give the Last Rites. The Arab bus driver made the priest get off the bus four miles from the camp because the road was dangerously muddy. After two miles, the missionary found his feet sinking deeper and deeper into the mire. Trying to get solid footing, he slipped into a muddy pool. Sinking to his death in this desolate place, he thought of Our Lady and her Scapular.
He kissed his great Scapular — for he was wearing the full habit — and looked toward the holy mountain of Carmel, the birthplace of devotion to God’s Mother. He cried out, “Holy Mother of Carmel! Help me! Save me!” A moment later, he found himself on solid ground. Later he said, “I know I was saved by the Blessed Virgin through her Brown Scapular. My shoes were lost in the mud, and I was covered with it, but I walked the remaining two miles praising Mary.”
Saved from the Sea
Another Scapular miracle took place in 1845. In the late summer of that year, the English ship, King of the Ocean, on its way to Australia, not far from Cape Hope, found itself in the middle of a hurricane. As wind and sea mercilessly lashed the ship, a Protestant minister, with his wife and children and other passengers, struggled to the deck to pray for mercy and forgiveness, as the end seemed at hand. Among the crew was a young Irishman, John McAuliffe. On seeing the urgency of the situation, the youth opened his shirt, took off his Scapular, and, making the Sign of the Cross with it over the raging waves, tossed it into the ocean. At that very moment, the wind calmed. Only one more wave washed the deck, bringing with it the Scapular which came to rest at the young man’s feet. All the while the minister (a Mr. Fisher) had been carefully observing McAuliffe’s actions and the miraculous effect of those actions. Upon questioning the young man, he was told about the Holy Virgin and her Scapular. Mr. Fisher and his family became determined to enter the Catholic Church as soon as possible, and thereby enjoy the same protection of Our Lady’s Scapular. This they did shortly after landing in Australia.
Saved from Fire
In May of 1957, a Carmelite priest in Germany published the unusual story of how the Scapular saved a home from fire. An entire row of homes had caught fire in Westboden, Germany. The pious inhabitants of a home in the middle of this row, seeing the fire, immediately fastened a Scapular to the main door of the house. Sparks flew over it and around it, but the house remained unharmed. Within 5 hours, 22 homes had been reduced to ashes. The one structure which stood undamaged amidst the destruction was that which had the Scapular attached to its door. The hundreds of people who came to see the place Our Lady had saved are eyewitnesses to the power of the Scapular and the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Saved from an Explosion
In 1955, a miracle occurred in the mid-western part of the United States. A 3rd-grader stopped in a gasoline station to put air in his bicycle tires, and at that very moment an explosion occurred. The boy’s clothing was burned off, but his Brown Scapular remained unaffected: a symbol of Mary’s protection. Today, although he still bears a few scars from the explosion, this man has special reason to remember the Blessed Mother’s protection in time of danger.
Saved in a Plane Crash
A Jesuit missionary in Guatemala relayed the following incident of Our Lady’s Scapular protection. In November of 1955 a plane carrying 27 passengers crashed. All died except one young lady. When this girl saw the plane was going down, she took hold of her Scapular, and called on Mary for help. She suffered burns, her clothing was reduced to ashes, but her Scapular was not touched by the flames.
Saved from a Bullet
In France, the following was reported: As the town of Montpellier was in a state of siege, in 1622, there occurred a miracle in the sight of the entire army and under the eyes of the King of France, Louis XIII. In a general assault, one of his officers, Champrond de Beauregard, received a bullet wound in the chest. The wound should have been fatal, but the bullet, after piercing the clothing, flattened out against the Scapular, without doing the least bit of harm to the officer. Astonished by the miracle, the officer told all that were around him. Those who surrounded him, witnesses to this wonder, spread it through the army from rank to rank. Eventually news of the miracle reached the monarch’s ear. Louis XIII came forward to see this wonder that had been brought to his attention. He examined the facts very carefully, and after having convinced himself with his own eyes of the reality of the wonder, he wanted to dress himself in this heavenly armor, to receive the Scapular from the hands of the Carmelites and be enrolled as one of the members of the Confraternity.
Saved from Lightning
On August 27th, 1602 Barthelemi Lopez, a Spanish soldier, on duty in the Castle of Saint Elme, in Naples, was saying prayers in honor of Our Lady of Mount Carmel whose Scapular he was wearing, when all of a sudden lightning and thunder exploded above his head. The lightning bolt hit his shoulder, and without making any sort of injury, left on his shoulder the print of a cross — as a sign of salvation which demonstrates that it was to a special help from Heaven that he owed the favor of having been preserved from the terrible effects of the lightning.
Miracle of Grace
In 1834, an elderly soldier living in Angouleme, France, no longer able to bear certain sorrows, resolved to take his own life. He decided to kill himself with poison, thinking that he could more easily hide his crime from the public. Upon taking the poison, he did not have to wait long to suffer the effects. Immediately he went to the hospital and asked to spend the night, thinking that the cause of his death would be undiscovered and his name would not be blackened because of commission of the cowardly sin of suicide.
But the hospital supervisor would not allow him to be admitted without an administration pass — which would mean discovery of his impending death by his own hand. The unhappy soldier was forced to abandon the idea of spending the night in the hospital. While wondering what course of action to take, he suddenly heard a voice telling him to go to Saint Peter’s and confess to Father X. The soldier went to the designated church and asked Father X to hear his confession.
Father X, overcome with fatigue, told the man to wait — it was Lent and it was three o’clock in the afternoon and he had not yet had a bite to eat. The unhappy soldier made a new plea and assured the priest that there was not time to wait.
The priest entered the confessional and the penitent confessed that he had just poisoned himself. The confessor showed him his obligation before God, which included divulging the penitent’s secret.
The soldier, touched by this grace, gave the priest permission, and like the fire which burned his insides, the sufferings he felt threw him into a state of perfect hopelessness.
The charitable priest pulled him out of the confessional and took him to the hospital.
He immediately asked for an antidote, but while they were preparing it, he took the pulse of the sick man, and no longer found any: a deathly pale complexion, misty eyes — everything heralded the coming death.
His heart pierced with sadness, but full of confidence in the Divine Mercy, the fervent priest threw himself to his knees, and recited the Litany of the Blessed Virgin.
At the first invocation, he sensed the pulse of the dying man return, and a short time later he heard the soldier speak a few words. “O my good Father,” he said in a weak voice, “my Father, pray, pray some more!” And he let out a breath and said: “Holy Mary, pray for me!” And soon his consciousness returned. Father X, in his enthusiasm over such a marvelous change, asked the soldier if he hadn’t kept some pious practices — “No, my Father, I have not said any prayers in a long time.” But after having reflected for an instant, he showed a Scapular: “Here is the only sign of piety that I have preserved.” — “Ah! My friend,” notes the priest, “I am no longer surprised by the miracle which just occurred; it’s Mary who protected you, it’s to her that you owe being alive.” Nevertheless the doctor arrived, and after having heard the necessary details on the condition of the patient, he assured them that only a superior power could prolong his life for longer than two hours after having taken the poison, one of the most active that we know; and five hours had gone by since the fatal moment! The antidote became useless. The doctor proposed to record a statement to attest the truth of the miracle; but the humble priest, fearing that they would perhaps attribute the miracle to the fervor of his prayers, did not think about making the miracle public. It was told to me by others, that it may give you a new confidence in Mary. (Told by Father Michaud in The Month of Mary and recorded in the book Vertu Miraculeuse Du Scapulaire, 1869, pp. 30-32).
The full promise of Our Lady of Mount Carmel to Saint Simon Stock July 16th, 1251:
“Accept this Scapular. It shall be a sign of salvation, a protection in danger and a pledge of peace. Whosoever dies clothed in this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire.”
Food Provided in Time of Famine Through the Scapular
In the Fourteenth Century, Spain faced a deadly famine due to a shortage of all sorts of grains. A general procession was ordered, and in the area of Spain in which the Holy Scapular was triumphantly shown, immediately abundance returned and brought joy and consolation to the hearts of all.
In the 16th Century, in Sicily, a drought occurred like that which happened in the days of Elias the prophet. The people appealed to Our Lady, and the Brown Scapular was offered everywhere in the streets for veneration by the people; suddenly the sky opened, the rain came, and soon the people had their lofts full with abundance.
Miracles in Battle
In the year 1618, Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria and general of the imperial army in the war with Prague, in order to acquire God’s benediction on his armies, put himself under the protection of the Blessed Virgin by receiving the holy Scapular with his whole army. Full of confidence in this precious shield of the Queen of Heaven, he gave battle against prince Palatin, who had usurped the crown from Ferdinand II, and the Duke won a complete victory with very few losses of his own. The Emperor Ferdinand II, desirous of giving a public witness to Our Lady for her protection, received, along with the Queen and the princes, the Blessed Scapular from the hands of Father Dominique, a Discalced Carmelite.
Edward II, King of England, hearing about some miracles that were happening in all parts of his kingdom by virtue of the sacred habit, was one of the first princes to once again wear the Scapular, and he received with devotion this precious proof of Mary’s love; shortly thereafter, he experienced the effect of the protection of the Blessed Virgin, to Whom he was devoted. His army, which had already suffered two defeats, was on the verge of complete surrender. He invoked Mary and promised her that he would establish a monastery of the Order of Mount Carmel. Immediately, by a miraculous assistance, he won a complete victory over his enemies, who at that point thought they had already won the battle. Edward, wanting to perpetuate the memory of this powerful protection and to keep his vow, gave to the Carmelites his palace at Oxford to establish a monastery.
Protection Against the Devil
In 2005, a priest was giving a talk about the growth of satanic worship in the world and how adults and young children are becoming possessed by the devil because of the use of things such as the Ouija board, saying the incantations that open the door to the demonic in “children’s books” such as the Harry Potter series, and going to fortune tellers, etc.
When someone asked the priest how to protect oneself from the demonic, besides the obvious path of avoiding things that call upon Satan, the priest answered, “Wear the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel for protection from curses and the devil.”
One can understand why the devil works against those who promote the Scapular after hearing the story of Venerable Francis Ypes. One day his Scapular fell off. As he replaced it, the devil howled, “Take off the habit which snatches so many souls from us!” Then and there Francis made the devil admit that there are three things which the demons are most afraid of: the Holy Name of Jesus, the Holy Name of Mary, and the Holy Scapular of Carmel. To that list we could add the Holy Rosary.
One day a young woman, before entering the religious life, went to see the Curé of Ars, and during the conversation, he asked her, “Do you recall, my child, at the certain evening of dancing, where you were? There was a very young man, very pretty, unknown, distinguished, admired, and all the girls wanted to dance with him.” “Yes, I recall when he never came to ask me, I was sad, yet all the other girls were privileged to dance with that young man.” “You would have liked to dance with him, wouldn’t you?” “Yes.” “Do you recall, when that young man was leaving the dance hall, you saw under his feet two blue flames? And you thought it was an illusion of your eyes? When you saw that young man leave the dance hall, you saw fire under his feet! It was not an illusion of your eyes, my daughter. That man was a demon. And if he did not come to you to ask you to dance, it’s for one reason: you were wearing the vestment of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.”
Miracles of Conversion
We should even give the Scapular to non-Catholics, for Our Lady will bring conversions to those who will wear it and say one Hail Mary each day, as the following true story will show. An old man was rushed to the hospital in New York City, unconscious and dying. The nurse, seeing the Brown Scapular on the patient, called the priest. As the prayers were being said for the dying man, he became conscious and spoke up: “Father, I am not a Catholic.” “Then why are you wearing the Brown Scapular?” asked the priest. “I promised my friends to wear it ,” the patient explained, “and say one Hail Mary a day.” “You are dying,” the priest told him. “Do you want to become a Catholic?” “All my life I wanted to be one,” the dying man replied. He was baptized, received the Last Rites, and died in peace. Our Lady took another soul to Heaven under her mantle through her Scapular!
Some Modern Day Miracles
A priest relayed the following two accounts:
The first one occurred about 1980 in Ontario, Canada, in a small city near Toronto. “A woman whose son I had recently enrolled in the Brown Scapular relayed the following: she told me that she was very grateful because I had enrolled her son in the Scapular. That same day, after the enrollment, she went somewhere with her son.
“She had put him in the back seat and closed the door and drove away down the highway. But she didn’t close the door very well, and when she turned the corner the door opened and her son rolled out onto the highway. She was terrified and horrified and she came back to pick him up and discovered that he did not have a scratch on him. He was, of course, wearing his Scapular.”
“There was a man in Baltimore who told me this himself in about 1990. As he was driving down the highway, someone threw a rock through his window. He didn’t know where from. It knocked his glasses that were in his shirt-pocket onto the seat beside him. He didn’t need the glasses, so he left them where they landed. When he arrived home, he remembered his glasses. He went to pick them up to put them back in his pocket, but they wouldn’t go in. He thought it was because the rock was still in his pocket. So he pulled the rock out, but it wasn’t a rock. It was a bullet. He had been shot at. He was uninjured. He was wearing his Scapular.”
Article 9
Sunday & Monday, July 14th & 15th
They Don’t Call it a “Political Theater” for Nothing!
Sunday & Monday, July 14th & 15th
They Don’t Call it a “Political Theater” for Nothing!
What is Political Theater?
There are two definitions of “political theater” ― the one that applies to the realm of politics, and the one that applies to art. Political theater may refer to:
(1) Political posturing, political acts made only for the sake of appearance.
(2) Political stunts, a type of publicity stunt intended to sway public opinion on a political issue.
(3) Political drama, a theatrical play on politics or with a political undertone.
(4) Guerrilla theater, a type of political protest with a theatrical quality.
In this article, we are only concerned with political theater as it applies to political words and actions of politicians―the drama or theatrical production of plays about politics does not concern us here―even though you could say that many of today’s real life politicians are excellent dramatic actors on the stage of real life politics. In the public sphere, “political theater” is synonymous with “empty show.” It’s a superficial gesture. Posturing. Pretending. Grandstanding. Sound and fury that more often than not fails to communicate a genuine idea or practical solution, but is merely a play for power. Watching some of today’s politicians, you are tempted to ask the question: “Is this for real? Or is it all theater? A theatrical play put on for the purpose of fooling the people?”
Attempted Assassination of Trump
Strangely enough, as this article was about to unfold, there occurred the attempted assassination of Donald Trump at a political rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Saturday July 13th. The resulting explosion of opinions―within minutes of the incident―was a sight to behold, quickly escalating into many thousands of posts on the internet and social media and many millions of views.
The mainstream media quickly reacted with its usual all-across-the-board condemnations. Here is a mere smattering of the mainstream media indignation and mockery: “The attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump spawned a vast sea of claims — some outlandish, others contradictory — pushing out unverified or unsupported claims reflecting the frightening uncertainties of the moment as well as America’s fevered, polarized political climate. Conspiracy theories and misinformation about the incidents gained traction just minutes after the incident occurred. Many made unfounded, fantastical claims. As video of the incident ripped across the platform, quickly accumulating millions of views, the word “staged” became the second-highest trending topic immediately after “Trump.” Conspiracy theories, false claims and unsupported assertions exploded online Saturday after the assassination attempt on Donald Trump. The cloudburst of speculation, conjecture … and wild theories about the attack, ranging from speculation about who the shooter was to claims about whether or not incident was planned, quickly accumulated millions of views on social media. Fanatics claimed that the shooting was staged and a false flag operation.
Some conspiracy theorists claimed the Chinese were behind it, or that Antifa (a left-wing anti-fascist and anti-racist political movement) was behind it, or that the RNC (Republican National Committee) was behind it. There were claims that the incident was a Deep State (a secret shadow government in the USA) plot. Others claimed that the Biden administration did it―referring to a comment Biden made on July 8th, saying: “It’s time to put Trump in the bulls-eye!” Some said it was a false flag concocted by Trump, others said the Secret Service intentionally failed to protect Trump on the orders of the White House. Videos, showing Secret Service agents moving audience members away from Trump just before the shooting, were offered as evidence that it was an inside job. Images of Trump’s defiantly raised fist were used to make the opposite claim — that the whole event was staged by Trump. Others called the Secret Service agents “crisis actors,” alleging the shooting was planned by Trump himself to assist him in the polls.
After Trump was injured, he threw his fist in the air towards the crowd as Secret Service agents and local law enforcement tried to rush him off the stage. The image, now being touted as “iconic” by his supporters, seemed too good to be true for some trolls and doubters. “This is such a perfect photo it’s hard to believe it is not staged. Photo of the decade. Absolutely incredible,” one person tweeted. Another person posted a photo of red blood streaking down Trump’s face and suggested it may have been a “paintball attack.” Another claimed that Trump “bladed” — a professional wrestling term referring to purposely cutting oneself for effect — when Secret Service agents tackled him for cover. They called the shooting part of a “World Wrestling Entertainment script.” Another person posted: “There can be no way that they missed with that many shots―and just nicked his ear? And then the fist pump and all the pictures of him with the flag. This is propaganda!”
Politicians Speak Out
Senator J. D. Vance of Ohio wrote in a post on X: “Today is not just some isolated incident. The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric led directly to President Trump's attempted assassination.”
Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina said: “For years, Democrats, and their allies in the media, have recklessly stoked fears―calling President Trump and other Conservatives threats to democracy! Their inflammatory rhetoric puts lives at risk!”
Representative Greg Steube of Florida wrote on X (Twitter): “They tried to jail him and now they’ve tried to kill him!”
Representative Mike Collins of Georgia wrote on X: “Joe Biden sent the orders!” ― referring to a recent comment by Joe Biden when he said: “It’s time to put Trump in a bull’s-eye!”
Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia wrote on X: “The Democrats and the media are to blame for every drop of blood spilled today! For years and years, they’ve demonized him and his supporters. Today, someone finally tried to take out the leader of our America First and the greatest President of all time.”
Representative Ronny Jackson of Texas said: “Trump-deranged Left wing LUNATICS that parade around MSNBC and other FAKE NEWS ‘outlets’ demonizing Trump and calling him Hitler are DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE for this violent attack on President Trump’s life!! They have BLOOD on their hands!”
Alex Jones, the right-wing media host, said that this was the beginning of a much wider effort by the deep state to kill powerful figures in America. He posted a video posted on X, entitled: “Emergency! America Is Now Under Globalist Attack! More Assassination Attempts Imminent!” in which he says: “I’ve been saying for months, on air, they were gunna try to kill Trump … Then they’re going to go after everybody else that’s his top supporters … And they also will try to kill Biden and blame it on a Trump supporter.”
Some referenced comments made by the former FOX NEWS presenter, Tucker Carlson, back in May―when he said Trump “will win the election if he’s not killed first,” as corroboration of Alex Jones’ theory.
What is the Truth?
Jesus said to the Roman governor Pontius Pilate: “I came into the world to give testimony to the truth! Everyone that is of the truth, hears My voice!’ Pilate said to Jesus: ‘What is truth?’” (John 18:37-38). There are basically two kinds of people―those who believe and those who doubt. Each group may have varying degrees of believers and doubters―but it basically comes down to those two. You may say: “What about those who don’t know?” Those who don’t know are among the doubters―they have heard some statement and don’t know if it is true―that is a subsection among doubters. Our Lord, similarly, lays down two options―we are either with Him or against Him―he does not allow a third option: “I am Truth and Life!” (John 14:6). “The devil is a liar and a murderer from the beginning” (John 8:44). “He that is not with Me, is against Me―and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:3) … “Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 10:32-36).
Right now―with regard to the alleged attempted assassination of Donald Trump―most people do not know whether the mainstream narrative is the truth or a lie. Was it life or was it death (or near death). Homes and people are divided. They do not know what to believe or who to believe. Was it a real assassination attempt or was it a staged assassination attempt. Was it reality or was it theater? As regards the mainstream media―increasing numbers of Americans (at least those who can still think and have common sense―though common sense is no longer common) are distrustful of the mainstream media (not in everything they report, but in cases such this Trump incident). Many would like to apply the words of Our Lord to today’s mainstream media: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44). The devil could well say: “I will go forth, and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all His prophets!” (3 Kings 22:22) ― we can readily and appropriately substitute the word “prophet” with the word “media” ― for as the prophet announces the words of God to the His people, the media announces the words of “The Elite” to the world.
Truth or Lies? Reality or Theater?
Just as there are two kinds of persons―believers and doubters―so too there are two kinds of minds: the gullible and the astute. The gullible believe everything they are told―unquestionably. Whereas the astute do not automatically believe all that they are told―they probe and ask questions. Holy Scripture warns: “Believe not every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they be of God―because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1) … “Believe not every word!” (Ecclesiasticus 19:16) ... “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves!” (Matthew 7:15). The media can be said to be the false prophets in the world today―not that everything they say is false, but, by the same token, in glass of poisoned water, not every drop is poison―it could be 99% water and 1% poison―but the poison will kill you.
A 2022 survey showed that 34% of Americans trust the mass mainstream media to report the news fully, accurately and fairly. Within that 34%, just 7% of Americans have a great deal of trust and confidence in the media, and 27% only have a fair amount of trust and confidence. Meanwhile, 28% of U.S. adults say they do not have very much confidence and 38% have no trust or confidence at all in newspapers, TV and radio.
At his first White House performance with other senior officials of the incoming Reagan administration, freshly appointed (but veteran covert action operative) intelligence chief, William Casey, told President Reagan and the others assembled: “We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false.”
90% of the media in the United States is controlled by just six corporations: AT&T, CBS, Comcast, Disney, News-Corp and Viacom ― yet these corporations are not the “big-boys”, for there are four corporations that influence and dictate policy to AT&T, CBS, Comcast, Disney, News-Corp and Viacom. The “big-four” corporations are BlackRock, Vanguard, State Street, Berkshire Hathaway. They have an enormous influence in the vast majority of major corporations worldwide. In effect, these “big-four” corporations forgo taking large fees in exchange for having enormous ability to exert power and influence upon corporate boards and leadership. This power that is subject to little public awareness or accountability. Bloomberg has also referred to BlackRock as the “fourth branch of government,” due to its close relationship with the central banks. BlackRock actually lends money to the Central Bank, the Federal Reserve, and is their principal adviser. Dozens of BlackRock employees have held senior positions in the White House under the Bush, Obama and Biden administrations. BlackRock also developed the computer system that the Central Banks use.
Similarly, over 40% of Americans are tired of the two-party political system (Republicans vs. Democrats). As of April 2024, 23% of Americans say they trust the government in Washington to do what is right “just about always” (2%) or “most of the time” (21%). 67% do not trust the government. Despite all this―there are very few who look and see beyond the government, and realize that it is not really the government that governs them, but some higher entity that remains out of sight. “Conspiracy theory!” you will shout. No, not really―just the plain old truth! Listen to what some past American presidents and politicians say on this matter:
Who Really Rules?
► GEORGE WASHINGTON wrote that the Illuminati want to separate the People from their Government: “It was not my intention to doubt that the Doctrines of the Illuminati and principles of Jacobinism had not spread in the United States. On the contrary, no one is more truly satisfied of this fact than I am. The idea, that I meant to convey, was that I did not believe that the Lodges of Free Masons in this Country had, as Societies, endeavored to propagate the diabolical tenets of the first, or pernicious principles of the latter (if they are susceptible of separation). That Individuals of them may … actually had a separation of the People from their Government in view, is too evident to be questioned.” (George Washington, 1st President of the United States (1789-1797), from a letter that Washington wrote on October 24th, 1798, which can be found in the Library of Congress. For an analysis of Washington’s warning, see the article “Library of Congress: George Washington Warns of Illuminati”).
► THOMAS JEFFERSON wrote: “I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.” (Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States (1801-1809) and principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence (1776), in a letter written to John Taylor on May 28th, 1816).
► JOHN C. CALHOUN stated: “A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various powerful interests, combined in one mass, and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in banks.” (John C. Calhoun, Vice-President (1825-1832) and U.S. Senator, from a speech given on May 27th, 1836).
Note that it appears that Washington’s and Jefferson’s concerns regarding bankers and separation of the people from the government was realized by 1836. This fact was confirmed in a letter written by Franklyn D. Roosevelt in 1933 (see below) in which he wrote that “a financial element in the large centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” Jackson was the seventh president of the United States (1829-1837). Calhoun served as Jackson’s Vice-President from 1829-1832.
► THEODORE ROOSEVELT said: “Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day.” (Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, An Autobiography, 1913, Appendix B).
► WOODROW WILSON said: “A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is privately concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men … [W]e have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► WOODROW WILSON also said: “Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men’s views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► NEW YORK CITY MAYOR JOHN F. HYLAN stated: “The real menace of our Republic is the invisible government, which like a giant octopus sprawls its slimy legs over our cities, states and nation… The little coterie of powerful international bankers virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties, … and control the majority of the newspapers and magazines in this country. They use the columns of these papers to club into submission or drive out of office public officials who refuse to do the bidding of the powerful corrupt cliques which compose the invisible government. It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.” (New York City Mayor John F. Hylan, New York Times, March 26th, 1922).
► CONGRESSMAN LOUIS T. MCFADDEN said: “Mr. Chairman, we have in this country one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Banks. The Federal Reserve Board, a Government board, has cheated the Government of the United States and the people of the United States out of enough money to pay the national debt…Mr. Chairman, when the Federal Reserve act was passed, the people of the United States did not perceive that a world system was being set up here… and that this country was to supply financial power to an international superstate — a superstate controlled by international bankers and international industrialists acting together to enslave the world for their own pleasure.” (Congressman Louis T. McFadden, from a speech delivered to the House of Representatives on June 10th, 1932).
► FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT stated: “The real truth of the matter is―as you and I know―that a financial element, in the large centers, has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” (Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States (1933―1945), in a letter to Colonel Edward M. House, dated November 21st, 1933, as quoted in F.D.R. ― His Personal Letters, 1928-1945).
► SENATOR WILLIAM JENNER said: “Today the path to total dictatorship in the U.S. can be laid by strictly legal means … We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state … It operates secretly, silently, continuously to transform our Government … This ruthless power-seeking elite is a disease of our century… This group…is answerable neither to the President, the Congress, nor the courts. It is practically irremovable.” (Senator William Jenner, 1954 speech).
► J. EDGAR HOOVER stated: “The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous, he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent.” (J. Edgar Hoover, The Elks Magazine, 1956).
John F. Kennedy said: “The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are, as a people, inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings … Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe … No war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are awaiting a finding of “clear and present danger,” then I can only say that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent … For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy, that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence―on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources, into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine, that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.” (John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States, from a speech delivered to the American Newspaper Publishers Association on April 27th, 1961 and known as the “Secret Society” speech).
► CONGRESSMAN LARRY P. MCDONALD stated: “The Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world. Do I mean conspiracy? Yes, I do. I am convinced there is such a plot, international in scope, generations old in planning, and incredibly evil in intent.” (Congressman Larry P. McDonald, November 1975, from the introduction to a book titled The Rockefeller File).
► SENATOR DANIEL K. INOUYE said: “There exists a shadowy government with its own Air Force, its own Navy, its own fundraising mechanism, and the ability to pursue its own ideas of national interest, free from all checks and balances, and free from the law itself.” (Daniel K. Inouye, US Senator from Hawaii, testimony at the Iran Contra Hearings, 1986).
Politicians Are Just Heels!
The heel is the lowest part of the body―and you could say that politicians are the lowest part of the governing body. Many imagine politicians to be at the top of the governing ladder―but that is far from the truth. Take a look at the Pyramid of Power, shown below, and you will see how low politicians really are!
There are two definitions of “political theater” ― the one that applies to the realm of politics, and the one that applies to art. Political theater may refer to:
(1) Political posturing, political acts made only for the sake of appearance.
(2) Political stunts, a type of publicity stunt intended to sway public opinion on a political issue.
(3) Political drama, a theatrical play on politics or with a political undertone.
(4) Guerrilla theater, a type of political protest with a theatrical quality.
In this article, we are only concerned with political theater as it applies to political words and actions of politicians―the drama or theatrical production of plays about politics does not concern us here―even though you could say that many of today’s real life politicians are excellent dramatic actors on the stage of real life politics. In the public sphere, “political theater” is synonymous with “empty show.” It’s a superficial gesture. Posturing. Pretending. Grandstanding. Sound and fury that more often than not fails to communicate a genuine idea or practical solution, but is merely a play for power. Watching some of today’s politicians, you are tempted to ask the question: “Is this for real? Or is it all theater? A theatrical play put on for the purpose of fooling the people?”
Attempted Assassination of Trump
Strangely enough, as this article was about to unfold, there occurred the attempted assassination of Donald Trump at a political rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Saturday July 13th. The resulting explosion of opinions―within minutes of the incident―was a sight to behold, quickly escalating into many thousands of posts on the internet and social media and many millions of views.
The mainstream media quickly reacted with its usual all-across-the-board condemnations. Here is a mere smattering of the mainstream media indignation and mockery: “The attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump spawned a vast sea of claims — some outlandish, others contradictory — pushing out unverified or unsupported claims reflecting the frightening uncertainties of the moment as well as America’s fevered, polarized political climate. Conspiracy theories and misinformation about the incidents gained traction just minutes after the incident occurred. Many made unfounded, fantastical claims. As video of the incident ripped across the platform, quickly accumulating millions of views, the word “staged” became the second-highest trending topic immediately after “Trump.” Conspiracy theories, false claims and unsupported assertions exploded online Saturday after the assassination attempt on Donald Trump. The cloudburst of speculation, conjecture … and wild theories about the attack, ranging from speculation about who the shooter was to claims about whether or not incident was planned, quickly accumulated millions of views on social media. Fanatics claimed that the shooting was staged and a false flag operation.
Some conspiracy theorists claimed the Chinese were behind it, or that Antifa (a left-wing anti-fascist and anti-racist political movement) was behind it, or that the RNC (Republican National Committee) was behind it. There were claims that the incident was a Deep State (a secret shadow government in the USA) plot. Others claimed that the Biden administration did it―referring to a comment Biden made on July 8th, saying: “It’s time to put Trump in the bulls-eye!” Some said it was a false flag concocted by Trump, others said the Secret Service intentionally failed to protect Trump on the orders of the White House. Videos, showing Secret Service agents moving audience members away from Trump just before the shooting, were offered as evidence that it was an inside job. Images of Trump’s defiantly raised fist were used to make the opposite claim — that the whole event was staged by Trump. Others called the Secret Service agents “crisis actors,” alleging the shooting was planned by Trump himself to assist him in the polls.
After Trump was injured, he threw his fist in the air towards the crowd as Secret Service agents and local law enforcement tried to rush him off the stage. The image, now being touted as “iconic” by his supporters, seemed too good to be true for some trolls and doubters. “This is such a perfect photo it’s hard to believe it is not staged. Photo of the decade. Absolutely incredible,” one person tweeted. Another person posted a photo of red blood streaking down Trump’s face and suggested it may have been a “paintball attack.” Another claimed that Trump “bladed” — a professional wrestling term referring to purposely cutting oneself for effect — when Secret Service agents tackled him for cover. They called the shooting part of a “World Wrestling Entertainment script.” Another person posted: “There can be no way that they missed with that many shots―and just nicked his ear? And then the fist pump and all the pictures of him with the flag. This is propaganda!”
Politicians Speak Out
Senator J. D. Vance of Ohio wrote in a post on X: “Today is not just some isolated incident. The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric led directly to President Trump's attempted assassination.”
Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina said: “For years, Democrats, and their allies in the media, have recklessly stoked fears―calling President Trump and other Conservatives threats to democracy! Their inflammatory rhetoric puts lives at risk!”
Representative Greg Steube of Florida wrote on X (Twitter): “They tried to jail him and now they’ve tried to kill him!”
Representative Mike Collins of Georgia wrote on X: “Joe Biden sent the orders!” ― referring to a recent comment by Joe Biden when he said: “It’s time to put Trump in a bull’s-eye!”
Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia wrote on X: “The Democrats and the media are to blame for every drop of blood spilled today! For years and years, they’ve demonized him and his supporters. Today, someone finally tried to take out the leader of our America First and the greatest President of all time.”
Representative Ronny Jackson of Texas said: “Trump-deranged Left wing LUNATICS that parade around MSNBC and other FAKE NEWS ‘outlets’ demonizing Trump and calling him Hitler are DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE for this violent attack on President Trump’s life!! They have BLOOD on their hands!”
Alex Jones, the right-wing media host, said that this was the beginning of a much wider effort by the deep state to kill powerful figures in America. He posted a video posted on X, entitled: “Emergency! America Is Now Under Globalist Attack! More Assassination Attempts Imminent!” in which he says: “I’ve been saying for months, on air, they were gunna try to kill Trump … Then they’re going to go after everybody else that’s his top supporters … And they also will try to kill Biden and blame it on a Trump supporter.”
Some referenced comments made by the former FOX NEWS presenter, Tucker Carlson, back in May―when he said Trump “will win the election if he’s not killed first,” as corroboration of Alex Jones’ theory.
What is the Truth?
Jesus said to the Roman governor Pontius Pilate: “I came into the world to give testimony to the truth! Everyone that is of the truth, hears My voice!’ Pilate said to Jesus: ‘What is truth?’” (John 18:37-38). There are basically two kinds of people―those who believe and those who doubt. Each group may have varying degrees of believers and doubters―but it basically comes down to those two. You may say: “What about those who don’t know?” Those who don’t know are among the doubters―they have heard some statement and don’t know if it is true―that is a subsection among doubters. Our Lord, similarly, lays down two options―we are either with Him or against Him―he does not allow a third option: “I am Truth and Life!” (John 14:6). “The devil is a liar and a murderer from the beginning” (John 8:44). “He that is not with Me, is against Me―and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:3) … “Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 10:32-36).
Right now―with regard to the alleged attempted assassination of Donald Trump―most people do not know whether the mainstream narrative is the truth or a lie. Was it life or was it death (or near death). Homes and people are divided. They do not know what to believe or who to believe. Was it a real assassination attempt or was it a staged assassination attempt. Was it reality or was it theater? As regards the mainstream media―increasing numbers of Americans (at least those who can still think and have common sense―though common sense is no longer common) are distrustful of the mainstream media (not in everything they report, but in cases such this Trump incident). Many would like to apply the words of Our Lord to today’s mainstream media: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44). The devil could well say: “I will go forth, and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all His prophets!” (3 Kings 22:22) ― we can readily and appropriately substitute the word “prophet” with the word “media” ― for as the prophet announces the words of God to the His people, the media announces the words of “The Elite” to the world.
Truth or Lies? Reality or Theater?
Just as there are two kinds of persons―believers and doubters―so too there are two kinds of minds: the gullible and the astute. The gullible believe everything they are told―unquestionably. Whereas the astute do not automatically believe all that they are told―they probe and ask questions. Holy Scripture warns: “Believe not every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they be of God―because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1) … “Believe not every word!” (Ecclesiasticus 19:16) ... “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves!” (Matthew 7:15). The media can be said to be the false prophets in the world today―not that everything they say is false, but, by the same token, in glass of poisoned water, not every drop is poison―it could be 99% water and 1% poison―but the poison will kill you.
A 2022 survey showed that 34% of Americans trust the mass mainstream media to report the news fully, accurately and fairly. Within that 34%, just 7% of Americans have a great deal of trust and confidence in the media, and 27% only have a fair amount of trust and confidence. Meanwhile, 28% of U.S. adults say they do not have very much confidence and 38% have no trust or confidence at all in newspapers, TV and radio.
At his first White House performance with other senior officials of the incoming Reagan administration, freshly appointed (but veteran covert action operative) intelligence chief, William Casey, told President Reagan and the others assembled: “We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false.”
90% of the media in the United States is controlled by just six corporations: AT&T, CBS, Comcast, Disney, News-Corp and Viacom ― yet these corporations are not the “big-boys”, for there are four corporations that influence and dictate policy to AT&T, CBS, Comcast, Disney, News-Corp and Viacom. The “big-four” corporations are BlackRock, Vanguard, State Street, Berkshire Hathaway. They have an enormous influence in the vast majority of major corporations worldwide. In effect, these “big-four” corporations forgo taking large fees in exchange for having enormous ability to exert power and influence upon corporate boards and leadership. This power that is subject to little public awareness or accountability. Bloomberg has also referred to BlackRock as the “fourth branch of government,” due to its close relationship with the central banks. BlackRock actually lends money to the Central Bank, the Federal Reserve, and is their principal adviser. Dozens of BlackRock employees have held senior positions in the White House under the Bush, Obama and Biden administrations. BlackRock also developed the computer system that the Central Banks use.
Similarly, over 40% of Americans are tired of the two-party political system (Republicans vs. Democrats). As of April 2024, 23% of Americans say they trust the government in Washington to do what is right “just about always” (2%) or “most of the time” (21%). 67% do not trust the government. Despite all this―there are very few who look and see beyond the government, and realize that it is not really the government that governs them, but some higher entity that remains out of sight. “Conspiracy theory!” you will shout. No, not really―just the plain old truth! Listen to what some past American presidents and politicians say on this matter:
Who Really Rules?
► GEORGE WASHINGTON wrote that the Illuminati want to separate the People from their Government: “It was not my intention to doubt that the Doctrines of the Illuminati and principles of Jacobinism had not spread in the United States. On the contrary, no one is more truly satisfied of this fact than I am. The idea, that I meant to convey, was that I did not believe that the Lodges of Free Masons in this Country had, as Societies, endeavored to propagate the diabolical tenets of the first, or pernicious principles of the latter (if they are susceptible of separation). That Individuals of them may … actually had a separation of the People from their Government in view, is too evident to be questioned.” (George Washington, 1st President of the United States (1789-1797), from a letter that Washington wrote on October 24th, 1798, which can be found in the Library of Congress. For an analysis of Washington’s warning, see the article “Library of Congress: George Washington Warns of Illuminati”).
► THOMAS JEFFERSON wrote: “I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.” (Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States (1801-1809) and principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence (1776), in a letter written to John Taylor on May 28th, 1816).
► JOHN C. CALHOUN stated: “A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various powerful interests, combined in one mass, and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in banks.” (John C. Calhoun, Vice-President (1825-1832) and U.S. Senator, from a speech given on May 27th, 1836).
Note that it appears that Washington’s and Jefferson’s concerns regarding bankers and separation of the people from the government was realized by 1836. This fact was confirmed in a letter written by Franklyn D. Roosevelt in 1933 (see below) in which he wrote that “a financial element in the large centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” Jackson was the seventh president of the United States (1829-1837). Calhoun served as Jackson’s Vice-President from 1829-1832.
► THEODORE ROOSEVELT said: “Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day.” (Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, An Autobiography, 1913, Appendix B).
► WOODROW WILSON said: “A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is privately concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men … [W]e have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► WOODROW WILSON also said: “Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men’s views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.” (Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913).
► NEW YORK CITY MAYOR JOHN F. HYLAN stated: “The real menace of our Republic is the invisible government, which like a giant octopus sprawls its slimy legs over our cities, states and nation… The little coterie of powerful international bankers virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties, … and control the majority of the newspapers and magazines in this country. They use the columns of these papers to club into submission or drive out of office public officials who refuse to do the bidding of the powerful corrupt cliques which compose the invisible government. It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.” (New York City Mayor John F. Hylan, New York Times, March 26th, 1922).
► CONGRESSMAN LOUIS T. MCFADDEN said: “Mr. Chairman, we have in this country one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Banks. The Federal Reserve Board, a Government board, has cheated the Government of the United States and the people of the United States out of enough money to pay the national debt…Mr. Chairman, when the Federal Reserve act was passed, the people of the United States did not perceive that a world system was being set up here… and that this country was to supply financial power to an international superstate — a superstate controlled by international bankers and international industrialists acting together to enslave the world for their own pleasure.” (Congressman Louis T. McFadden, from a speech delivered to the House of Representatives on June 10th, 1932).
► FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT stated: “The real truth of the matter is―as you and I know―that a financial element, in the large centers, has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.” (Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States (1933―1945), in a letter to Colonel Edward M. House, dated November 21st, 1933, as quoted in F.D.R. ― His Personal Letters, 1928-1945).
► SENATOR WILLIAM JENNER said: “Today the path to total dictatorship in the U.S. can be laid by strictly legal means … We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state … It operates secretly, silently, continuously to transform our Government … This ruthless power-seeking elite is a disease of our century… This group…is answerable neither to the President, the Congress, nor the courts. It is practically irremovable.” (Senator William Jenner, 1954 speech).
► J. EDGAR HOOVER stated: “The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous, he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent.” (J. Edgar Hoover, The Elks Magazine, 1956).
John F. Kennedy said: “The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are, as a people, inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings … Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe … No war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are awaiting a finding of “clear and present danger,” then I can only say that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent … For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy, that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence―on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources, into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine, that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.” (John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States, from a speech delivered to the American Newspaper Publishers Association on April 27th, 1961 and known as the “Secret Society” speech).
► CONGRESSMAN LARRY P. MCDONALD stated: “The Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world. Do I mean conspiracy? Yes, I do. I am convinced there is such a plot, international in scope, generations old in planning, and incredibly evil in intent.” (Congressman Larry P. McDonald, November 1975, from the introduction to a book titled The Rockefeller File).
► SENATOR DANIEL K. INOUYE said: “There exists a shadowy government with its own Air Force, its own Navy, its own fundraising mechanism, and the ability to pursue its own ideas of national interest, free from all checks and balances, and free from the law itself.” (Daniel K. Inouye, US Senator from Hawaii, testimony at the Iran Contra Hearings, 1986).
Politicians Are Just Heels!
The heel is the lowest part of the body―and you could say that politicians are the lowest part of the governing body. Many imagine politicians to be at the top of the governing ladder―but that is far from the truth. Take a look at the Pyramid of Power, shown below, and you will see how low politicians really are!
Does Trump Really Matter? Does Biden Really Matter? Does Any Politician Really Matter?
Don’t be naïve! Don’t be gullible! Don’t believe the narrative of the world! Believe the narrative of Christ and Heaven. Our Lord Himself told us who rules the world―it is not presidents, politicians, prime-ministers or governors―it is Satan. He refers to Satan being “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― and princes rule, don’t they? “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not anything … The prince of this world is already judged ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). While he was tempting Christ in the desert, “the devil took him up into a very high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, and the glory of them― And he said to him: ‘To Thee will I give all this power, and the glory of them―for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them! If Thou wilt adore before me, all shall be Thine!” (Matthew 4:8; Luke 4:5-6).
Nothing has changed since the time of Our Lord. Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, said: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican! Legions of demons have lodged there! I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office!”
Does any politician have more powers than Satan? One single angel―of any rank―has more than enough power to destroy the entire universe (if God would allow it). Ruling the world is a “piece-of-cake” for Satan and his devils. How does Satan get “voted” in to office? By mortal sin. “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). The exorcists confirm this―they say that habitual mortal sin opens the door to the devil and satanic possession. It is by God’s mercy alone that everyone who habitually commits mortal sin is protected from satanic possession. Today, the vast majority of the world―the vast majority of Catholics―live in habitual mortal sin. They have all voted Satan in as their president―and Satan presides over their lives!
Don’t be naïve! Don’t be gullible! Don’t believe the narrative of the world! Believe the narrative of Christ and Heaven. Our Lord Himself told us who rules the world―it is not presidents, politicians, prime-ministers or governors―it is Satan. He refers to Satan being “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― and princes rule, don’t they? “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not anything … The prince of this world is already judged ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). While he was tempting Christ in the desert, “the devil took him up into a very high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, and the glory of them― And he said to him: ‘To Thee will I give all this power, and the glory of them―for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them! If Thou wilt adore before me, all shall be Thine!” (Matthew 4:8; Luke 4:5-6).
Nothing has changed since the time of Our Lord. Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, said: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican! Legions of demons have lodged there! I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office!”
Does any politician have more powers than Satan? One single angel―of any rank―has more than enough power to destroy the entire universe (if God would allow it). Ruling the world is a “piece-of-cake” for Satan and his devils. How does Satan get “voted” in to office? By mortal sin. “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). The exorcists confirm this―they say that habitual mortal sin opens the door to the devil and satanic possession. It is by God’s mercy alone that everyone who habitually commits mortal sin is protected from satanic possession. Today, the vast majority of the world―the vast majority of Catholics―live in habitual mortal sin. They have all voted Satan in as their president―and Satan presides over their lives!
Article 8
Friday & Saturday, July 12th & 13th
Only Heaven's Politics Will Win
Friday & Saturday, July 12th & 13th
Only Heaven's Politics Will Win
Is God a Politician?
To answer the question: “Is God a politician?” we first need to be clear on what politics is and what politicians are. There some quite funny satirical and humorous definitions that are worth looking and chuckling at―for politics can be a very serious and depressing subject! So, first of all, let have a chuckle before we get into the real definitions of politics and politicians.
► Definition of politics:
“The skill of making the truth look like a lie; and making a lie look like the truth.”
“The ability to make molehills look like mountains; and mountains look like molehills.”
“Politics is the art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich, by promising to protect each from the other.”
“It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first!” (President Ronald Reagan).
“I have come to the conclusion that politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians!” (Charles de Gaulle, French President).
“Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it wrongly and applying unsuitable remedies.” (Ernest Benn 1875–1954 English writer and political publicist).
► Definition of a politician:
“Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by being governed by those who are dumber” (Plato, Ancient Greek Philosopher).
“A politician is a person who is willing to lay your life on the line to improve his own life.”
“A politician is a fellow who will lay down your life for his country” (Texas Guinan)
“A politician is a person who has the skill of being able to talk a lot while saying nothing.”
“Some people compare an air-conditioner to a politician―because it makes a lot of noise but doesn’t work very well.”
“A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn’t happen” (Winston Churchill).
“The trouble with practical jokes is that they often get elected … A fool and his money are soon elected! … I don’t make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts!” (Will Rogers, actor, and humorous social commentator).
“Politicians and diapers must be changed often―and for the same reason!” (Mark Twain).
Talking of diapers―brings to mind the young child who asked his father: “What is politics?”
The father replied: “Let me put it in simple terms so that you will be able to understand. I am your father and provider―I work, earn and bring home the money―so I am the Capitalist. Your mother, she keeps all the money―so she is the government. You are what we call ‘the people’. Your baby brother is the future. The baby-sitter is the working class.”
That night, the same child hears his baby brother crying. He goes to investigate and sees that his baby brother has pooped and soiled his diaper. He goes to find his mother, but finds her asleep and decides not to disturb her. So he goes to find his father, whom he finds downstairs having sex with the baby-sitter―and decides not to disturb them. He goes back to bed.
In the morning, the father asks his child if he remembers what politics is and can he repeat the explanation in his own little words. The child says: “Politics is this. While the government is asleep, the capitalist screws the working class and the future gets all pooped-up.”
Yes―today politics is one big stinking mess all over the world. Whose fault is it? Well it is not God’s fault―so it must our fault! More on that in a moment―but first of all let us give a serious definition of politics and then see if God is a politician or not.
What is Politics?
Depending upon which dictionary you consult, you will find “politics” defined along the lines of the following dictionary definitions:
● the study of the ways in which a country is governed
● the art or science of government
● the art or science concerned with guiding or influencing governmental policy
● the art or science concerned with winning and holding control over a government
● the activities and affairs involved in managing a state or a government
● the activities of the government, members of law-making organizations, or people who try to influence the way a country is governed
● the fact of being involved in political activities and getting political power
● the job of holding a position of power in the government
● the relationships within a group or organization that allow particular people to have power over others
● the activities of the government, members of law-making organizations, or people who try to influence the way a country is governed
● a person’s politics are that person’s opinions about how a country should be governed
So, is God a Politician?
If we look at Holy Scripture and compare the references about God to the above definitions―then we should have the answer! Scripture says of God and Christ: “Thy kingdom is a kingdom of all ages and Thy dominion endures throughout all generations!” (Psalm 144:13). “The Lord has prepared His throne in Heaven and His Kingdom shall rule over all” (Psalm 102:19). “But in the days of those kingdoms, the God of Heaven will set up a Kingdom that shall never be destroyed, and His Kingdom shall not be delivered up to another people, and it shall break in pieces and shall consume all these other kingdoms, and itself shall stand for ever! … And all kings shall serve Him, and shall obey Him!” (Daniel 2:44; 7:27). “The Earth is the Lord’s and the world, and all that dwell therein!” (Psalms 23:1). “He takes away kingdoms and establishes them” (Daniel 2:21). “There is no power except from God―and those powers that are, are ordained by God” (Romans 13:1). “For the kingdom of God is not in speech, but in power!” (1 Corinthians 4:20). “God will rule all the ends of the Earth!” (Psalm 58:14). “And He shall rule from sea to sea, unto the ends of the Earth!” (Psalm 71:8). “Therefore, hear ye kings, and understand! Learn, ye that are judges of the ends of the Earth! Give ear, you that rule the people, and that please yourselves among multitudes of nations! For power is given you by the Lord, and strength is given by the most High, Who will examine your works and search out your thoughts!” (Wisdom 6:2-4).
Concerning Jesus, “the angel said to her: ‘Fear not, Mary! Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a Son; and thou shalt call His Name Jesus! He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High; and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of David His father; and He shall reign forever! And of His kingdom there shall be no end!’” (Luke 1:30-33). “He shall rise up to rule the Gentiles, in Him the Gentiles shall hope!” (Romans 15:12). “And all kings shall serve Him, and shall obey Him!” (Daniel 7:27). “And all kings of the Earth shall adore Him! All nations shall serve Him!” (Psalm 71:11). “All peoples, tribes and tongues shall serve Him! His power is an everlasting power that shall not be taken away, and His kingdom shall not be destroyed!”(Daniel 7:14). “And out of His mouth proceeds a sharp two edged sword; so that with it He may strike the nations. And He shall rule them with a rod of iron!” (Apocalypse 19:15). “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘All power is given to Me in Heaven and on Earth!’” (Matthew 28:18). “Jesus said to Peter: ‘Thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it! And I will give to thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind upon Earth, it shall be bound also in Heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loosen upon Earth, it shall be loosened also in Heaven!’” (Matthew 16:17-19).
So, yes, God is a politician. Christ is a politician. For they have a kingdom above all kingdoms and Christ is the King of kings, the Lord of lords: “The King of kings, and Lord of lords!” (1 Timothy 6:15) … “He is Lord of lords, and King of kings” (Apocalypse 17:14). “He takes away kingdoms and establishes them” (Daniel 2:21). His Kingdom shall stand for ever! … And all kings shall serve Him, and shall obey Him!” (Daniel 2:44). “All peoples, tribes and tongues shall serve Him! His kingdom shall not be destroyed!”(Daniel 7:14).
Christ the King
In his 1925 Encyclical, Quas Primas, Pope Pius XI established the feast of Christ the King. Each and every king is unavoidably immersed in politics. A part of politics is concerned with governing—and kings have to govern. Likewise, Christ governs. The Pope writes: “It has long been a common custom to give to Christ the metaphorical title of ‘King,’ because of the high degree of perfection whereby He excels all creatures.” It would be easy enough to stop there. But Pope Pius XI did not end the preceding paragraph there. He continued: “But if we ponder this matter more deeply, we cannot but see that the title and the power of King belongs to Christ as man in the strict and proper sense too. For it is only as man that he may be said to have received from the Father “power and glory and a kingdom,” since the Word of God and therefore has necessarily supreme and absolute dominion over all things created.”
“Supreme and absolute dominion over all things created.” This statement finds many objectors in the civic political sphere. But if Christ is indeed a king — The King of Kings — then surely, every nation on Earth must owe Him homage. This is precisely what Pope Pius XI asserts: “Thus the empire of our Redeemer embraces all men. His empire includes not only Catholic nations, not only baptized persons who, though of right belonging to the Church, have been led astray by error, or have been cut off from her by schism, but also all those who are outside the Christian Faith―so that truly the whole of mankind is subject to the power of Jesus Christ. Nor is there any difference in this matter between the individual and the family or the State―for all men, whether collectively or individually, are under the dominion of Christ. In him is the salvation of the individual, in him is the salvation of society. Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under Heaven given to men whereby we must be saved (Acts 4:12). He is the author of happiness and true prosperity for every man and for every nation. If, therefore, the rulers of nations wish to preserve their authority, to promote and increase the prosperity of their countries, they will not neglect the public duty of reverence and obedience to the rule of Christ. With God and Jesus Christ excluded from political life; with authority derived, not from God but from man; the very basis of that authority has been taken away. The result is that human society is tottering to its fall, because it has no longer a secure and solid foundation.”
“When men recognize, both in private and in public life, that Christ is King, then society will at last receive the great blessings of real liberty, well-ordered discipline, peace and harmony. If princes and magistrates, duly elected, are filled with the persuasion that they rule, not by their own right, but by the mandate and in the place of the Divine King, then they will exercise their authority piously and wisely, and they will make laws and administer them, having in view the common good and also the human dignity of their subjects. The result will be a stable peace and tranquility, for there will be no longer any cause of discontent. Men will see in their king or in their rulers men like themselves, perhaps unworthy or open to criticism, but they will not on that account refuse obedience if they see reflected in them the authority of Christ God and Man. Peace and harmony will result―for with the spread and the universal extent of the Kingdom of Christ men will become more and more conscious of the link that binds them together, and thus many conflicts will be either prevented entirely, or at least their bitterness will be diminished. Then will many evils be cured; then will the law regain its former authority; peace with all its blessings be restored. Men will sheathe their swords and lay down their arms when all freely acknowledge and obey the authority of Christ, and every tongue confesses that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father.” (Pope Pius XI, Encyclical Quas Primas).
Christ the Politician
In a democracy, the people elect Politicians to represent them in government, to act on their behalf and to protect their interests. Politicians are elected to represent the interests, concerns, and values of their constituents. A politician is someone who holds a government office or finds other ways to influence law and public policy. The primary duty of a politician is to propose, vote on and enact laws and policies that will determine how a government functions. “In war, you can only be killed once, but in politics, many times!” said Winston Churchill. Christ knew He would be killed: “The Jews sought to kill Him” (John 7:1) … “The Jews sought all the more to kill Him” (John 5:18) … “The Chief Priests and the Scribes and the rulers of the people sought to destroy Him” (Luke 19:47) … “The Chief Priests and the Scribes sought how they might by some trickery lay hold of Him, and kill Him” (Mark 14:1) … “They sought therefore to take him; but He escaped out of their hands” (John 10:39) … “They sought to lay hands on Him, but they feared the people” (Mark 12:12) … “The Chief Priests and the Scribes sought to lay hands on Him―but they feared the people” (Luke 20:19) … “They sought therefore to apprehend him―but no man laid hands on Him, because His hour was not yet come” (John 7:30).
Jesus knew that He would eventually be killed when “His hour was come.” He foretold His sufferings and death to His Apostles―who were saddened and scandalized upon hearing Jesus say this. “From that time Jesus began to show to His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and on the third day rise again. And Peter taking Jesus, began to rebuke Him, saying: ‘Lord, be it far from Thee! This shall not happen to Thee!’ Jesus, turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind Me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me―because thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:21-23).
Not only did Jesus know that He would be killed―He even came to be killed so that He could save souls, even the souls of His enemies: “When we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son” (Romans 5:10). How many politicians would say and do what Christ said and did: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you: ‘Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!’” (Matthew 5:43-44). “If you will forgive men their offences, your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences” (Matthew 6:15). As Christ was dying in the presence of His mocking accusers who had screamed for His crucifixion, He begged: “Father, forgive them―for they know not what they do!” (Luke 23:34).
Unlike most politicians, Christ was not seeking glory and power: “I seek not My own glory!” (John 8:50). When they sought to ‘promote’ Him and make Him king―He fled: “Jesus―when He knew that they would come to take Him by force and make Him king―fled again into the mountain Himself alone” (John 6:15). Jesus had come to serve and save―not to be served and praised: “The Son of man is not come to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a redemption for many!” (Matthew 20:28).
The Politics of Christ
Politics requires policies. Man requires a manifesto before deciding whether to follow and vote for a particular politician or political party. A manifesto is a public declaration of policy and aims; a statement declaring publicly the intentions, motives, or views of its issuer. Christ manifested His manifesto in the Gospels.
There are four main types of manifestos: (1) a Goal Manifesto; (2) a List Manifesto; (3) a Rules-Based Manifesto, and (4) a World Manifesto. (1) A Goal Manifesto is a public declaration of your intent. An intention is a goal―what you seek to achieve. A goal could be personal goal, community goal or a world goal. (2) A List Manifesto is usually a subset to the Goal Manifesto―which lists the means and measures that have to be taken to achieve the goal. (3) A Rules-Based Manifesto states the obligatory behavior required and values to be held in order to achieve the goal. (4) A World Manifesto states how you want the world to be. It’s a vision for a possible world future.
Earthly politicians often come out with vague, or over-optimistic, or unrealistic, unreasonable and unachievable manifestos. Election campaign speeches are unique in the sense that the same standards of accuracy, to which other forms of speech held, are not always strictly applied to campaign speeches―because in many cases political campaign speeches are largely political rhetoric (hot-air and fairytales). It is very difficult for ordinary citizens to seek legal recourse to hold politicians to account who make wild promises. Satan must be the patron-‘saint’ of untruthful political manifestos―for Christ said of Satan: “He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44) and in the same breath Christ says to the Scribes and Pharisees (politicians and legislators today): “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do!” (John 8:44) ― which is reinforced by Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, who says:
“The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world. Unfortunately, in the Church there are adherents to Satanic cults. And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican ... Legions of demons have lodged there! … In the Vatican there are members of Satanic cults―there are priests, monsignors and even cardinals! I know from people who reported to me how they got to know this directly. It is also something, that has been “confessed” several times by the devil, himself, under obedience during the exorcisms … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority―those of politics and industry. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office! The devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and ‘works’ on it … The most frequent weak points in man are always the same: pride, money, and lust!” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, chief exorcist of Rome).
Many politicians tell lies rather than the truth to the people because the truth will not win as many votes and the lie. They tell lies to the people, because the truth is often displeasing and hard to swallow, whereas the lie can be sugar-coated and made to be very pleasant and thus readily swallowed. “God is not a man that He should lie. Nor as the son of man that he should be changed. Has he said something, and then will he not do? Has He spoken and will He not fulfill what He said?” (Numbers 23:19). Eve was seduced by Satan’s false manifesto that promised her she would be like God if she ate the forbidden fruit―which was a downright lie―but Eve swallowed the lie and the fruit because of the way Satan sugar-coated his lie. Christ has no place for the devil and his lies: “What agreement does Christ have with Belial?” (2 Corinthians 6:15). “The prince of this world is coming, and in Me he has not anything … The prince of this world is already judged ... The prince of this world shall be cast out!” says Our Lord (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). Christ tells us: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life … The devil is a liar, and the father of lies!’” (John 14:6; 8:41-47). “I am the way, and the truth, and the life … But if I say the truth, you believe Me not! … If I say the truth to you, why do you not believe Me? … He that is of God, hears the words of God! Therefore you hear them not because you are not of God!” (John 8:46-47).
Christ’s Manifesto
As stated above―the manifesto of Christ is clearly laid-out in the Gospels. What are the chief points in Christ’s manifesto? The chief points can be said to be as follows:
► Love of God and Neighbor comes before everything. Charity is the motto and membership card for Christ’s Party. “Charity is of God. And every one that loves, is born of God, and knows God! He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:7-8). “God is charity―and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16). “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of me! And he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:37). “He that is not with Me, is against Me! … Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:32-33).
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and, without charity, whatever we might do is spiritually and supernaturally useless: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). “Let all your things be done in charity!” (1 Corinthians 16:14). “Let us not love in word, nor in tongue, but by deeds and in truth” (1 John 3:18).
“Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!” (Mark 12:30-31). “By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another” (John 13:35). “These things I command you, that you love one another” (John 15:17). “Love one another as I have loved you!” (John 13:34). “Whatever you did to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40). “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
► Salvation of the soul is the chief goal that everyone should aim at achieving. Life is short―the afterlife is eternal: “What is your life? It is a vapor which appears for a little while, and afterwards shall vanish away!” (James 4:15). “Man’s days are as grass, as the flower of the field so shall he flourish! But the spirit shall pass in him and he shall not be―and he shall know his place no more!” (Psalm 102:15-16). “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God!” (Mark 10:25). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice!” (Matthew 6:33).
► The Christ of War. The prophet Isaias refers to Christ as the “Prince of Peace” (Isaias 9:6), which of course He is ― but, the same prophet also tells us that He is also the Prince of War: “The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man―as a man of war shall He stir up zeal. He shall prevail against His enemies!” (Isaias 42:13). Sometimes politics involves war and politicians will be required to declare war and fight a war against the enemies of the country. The same is true for Heaven and Christ. He came to fight for sinful souls and to fight Satan and Hell in order to rescue and save the souls of sinners: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). He knows that some souls will not appreciate His efforts and will prefer to remain enslaved to the world―which is an enemy of God: “The Light is come into the world, but men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 3:19).
In the Old Testament, God Himself commanded His Chosen people to fight wars. In the time of Moses, God commanded Moses to wage war against those who would oppose the Chosen People on their way to the Promised Land. God even lays down laws for war. We read in the Book of Deuteronomy: “If you go out to war against your enemies, and see the numbers of the enemy’s army greater than yours, you shall not fear them―because the Lord thy God is with you! The Lord your God is in the midst of you, and will fight for you against your enemies, to deliver you from danger! … If at any time you come to fight against a city―you shalt first offer it peace. If they accept it and open the gates to you, all the people that are therein shall be saved and shall serve you by paying tribute. But if they will not make peace and shall begin war against you, then you shall besiege it. And when the Lord God shall deliver it into your hands, you shall slay all that are therein of the male sex, with the edge of the sword―except for women and children. So shall you do to all cities that are at a great distance from you … But of those cities that shall be given thee by the Lord, you shall suffer none at all to live, but shall kill them with the edge of the sword, as the Lord God has commanded you―lest they teach you to do all the abominations which they have done with their gods and you should sin against the Lord your God!” (Deuteronomy 20:1-20).
Just as God the Father was also a God of war, so too is God the Son a God of war: “The Lord is as a man of war!” (Exodus 15:3). “The Lord my God teaches my hands to fight and my fingers to war!” (Psalm 143:1). Christ Himself said: “Do not think that I came to bring peace upon Earth―I came not to bring peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 10:34-36). To which Holy Scripture adds: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) … “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6) ... “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold onto eternal life, to which you are called!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12) … “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Yet, though He is a Prince of War, He does not fail to show the side of Himself that is the Prince of Peace. As God says in the Old Testament, there is “a time of war and a time of peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:8). In the Garden of Gethsemane, when St. Peter pulls out his sword in a desire to protect Our Lord and fight to avoid His arrest, Our Lord tells Peter: “Put back thy sword into its place! For all that take the sword shall perish with the sword!” (Matthew 26:52). God, in the Old Testament, says: “If thy enemy be hungry, give him to eat: if he thirst, give him water to drink 22 For thou shalt heap hot coals upon his head” (Proverbs 25:21-22, which St. Paul repeats in Romans 12:20). During His sermon on the mount, Christ preached that we should seek peace, love our enemies and do good to them: “Blessed are the peacemakers―for they shall be called children of God! Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in Heaven―for so they persecuted the prophets that were before you! … You have heard that it has been said: ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth!’ But I say to you not to resist evil―but if one strike thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the other cheek!” (Matthew 5:9-12; 5:38-39).
Christ the Diplomat
A diplomat is a person appointed by a national government to conduct official negotiations and maintain political, economic, and social relations with another country or countries. The main functions of diplomats are: representation and protection of the interests and nationals of the country that sent the diplomat. A diplomat should be a person who is tactful and skillful in managing delicate situations, handling people, etc. Yet when the soft approach is not working, then the diplomat should be afraid of taking a progressive tougher approach.
Christ, God the Son, in this sense, is a heavenly diplomat sent to Earth by God the Father: “God did not send His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). But if the world refuses to make amends for its sins by doing penance, then the world will perish: “I came to call sinners to penance! … I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5). A doctor will try to save a gangrened leg with medicine―but if the patient does not respond, the doctor will have to amputate the leg.
We rarely win persons over to our side by being aggressive with them: “A mild answer breaks wrath―but a harsh word stirs up fury” (Proverbs 15:1)―gentleness and tact (diplomacy) are often better ways (at least in the beginning). St. Francis de Sales used to say: “A spoonful of honey attracts more flies than many barrels of vinegar!” The Scribes and Pharisees were indignant at seeing Jesus eating and drinking with sinners: “The Scribes and the Pharisees, seeing that he ate with publicans and sinners, said to His disciples: ‘Why does your master eat and drink with publicans and sinners?’ Jesus hearing this, said to them: ‘They that are healthy have no need of a physician, but they that are sick. For I came not to call the just, but sinners!’” (Mark 2:16-17).
We see this diplomatic approach to sinners in the case of the woman caught in adultery, whom the Scribes and Pharisees had brought before Our Lord to see how He would judge her. They wanted to stone her to death and asked if Jesus agreed: “The Scribes and the Pharisees brought unto Jesus a woman taken in adultery. They set her in the midst and said to Him: ‘Master, this woman was even now taken in adultery! Now Moses, in the law, commanded us to stone such a one. But what do you say?’ ― and this they said tempting Him, so that they might accuse Him. But Jesus, bowing Himself down, wrote with His finger on the ground. When, therefore, they continued asking Him, He lifted up Himself, and said to them: ‘He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!’ And again, stooping down, He wrote on the ground. But they, hearing this, went out one by one―beginning with the eldest. And Jesus alone remained, and the woman standing in the midst. Then Jesus, lifting Himself up, said to her: ‘Woman, where are they that accused you? Has no man condemned you?’ The woman said: ‘No man, Lord!’ And Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:3-11). O what supreme diplomacy!
We see the same diplomacy exercised with Zacheus the Publican. Publicans were tax collectors and were looked down upon with contempt. Ordinary taxes, such as land taxes, were collected by the Roman officials; but toll taxes for transporting goods were usually collected by Jews under contract with the Romans. These collectors, or publicans, made a large personal profit on the transactions. “Jesus entered and walked through Jericho. And behold, there was a man named Zacheus, who was the chief of the publicans, and he was rich. He wanted to see Jesus―who He was―but he could not because of the crowd, and he was small in height. So running ahead, he climbed up into a sycamore tree, so that he might see Him―for he was to pass that way. When Jesus came to that place, looking up, He saw him, and said to him: ‘Zacheus, make haste and come down! For this day I must abide in your house!’ And Zacheus made haste and came down; and received Him with joy. And when all saw it, they murmured, saying, that Jesus was going to be a guest of a man that was a sinner. But Zacheus, standing up, said to the Lord: ‘Behold, Lord! Half of my goods I will give to the poor; and if I have wronged any man of anything, I will restore him fourfold!’ Jesus said to him: ‘This day is salvation come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham! For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!’” (Luke 19:1-10).
We see the same diplomacy shown to the Apostles after the resurrection of Jesus―especially St. Peter who had betrayed Jesus and the others who had abandoned Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. To whom more is given, more is expected: “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” said Jesus (Luke 12:48). Peter had, in effect, been given the papacy―he was the leader of the Apostles. Therefore his betrayal of Christ was greater than the abandonment of Christ by the other Apostles. What did Our Lord do? He did not throw all kinds of angry and insulting words. He simply gave Peter a look―a look which cracked Peter up and brought him to repentance. After that, Jesus did not directly mention the betrayal ever again: “And apprehending Jesus, they led him to the high priest’s house―but Peter followed afar off. And when they had kindled a fire in the midst of the hall, and were sitting about it, Peter was in the midst of them. A certain servant maid had seen sitting at the light, and had earnestly watched Peter, and she said: ‘This man also was with Jesus!’ But Peter denied Jesus, saying: ‘Woman, I do not know Him!’ And after a little while, another seeing him, said: ‘You are also one of them!’ But Peter said: ‘O man, I am not!’ And, after the space around of one hour, another certain man also affirmed, saying: ‘Of a truth, this man was also with Jesus―for he is also a Galilean!’ And Peter said: ‘Man, I do not know what you are talking about!’ And immediately, as Peter was still speaking, the cock crew. And the Lord, turning towards him, looked at Peter. And Peter remembered the word of the Lord, as He had said: ‘Before the cock crows, you shall deny Me three times!’ And Peter going out, wept bitterly” (Luke 22:54-62). Jesus did need to show anger, or use recriminations or harsh words―He simply looked at Peter in a way that broke Peter’s heart!
Heaven’s Weapons
There are times when you have to go to war. How does Heaven want us to fight these wars. Without doubt, there will be times when we shall have to use physical force and material weapons. However, the principal enemy in all our wars is not the world―but the prince of the world, Satan and his devils. Nobody, as far we know, has ever defeated a devil with a gun, a rifle, a grenade, a bomb or even a nuclear weapon! Speaking of devils, Our Lord said: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20). As regards sinners―there are two basic things you can do: (1) kill the sinner, or (2) convert the sinner. God prefers the second option. He Himself says: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). Our Lady of Fatima comes―not asking for death of sinners―but for their conversion by our prayers and sacrifices.
A Protestant politician puts us to shame. The Republican Governor of Tennessee, Will Lee (William Byron Lee), has signed a bill calling for 30 days of prayer and fasting beginning July 1st, 2024. The resolution asks the people of the state “to seek God’s hand of mercy healing on Tennessee.” The authors of the resolution ask all to join them in the month of prayer and fasting as they can. The resolution reads:
WHEREAS, our State and Nation suffer from violence committed upon our citizens by our citizens; and
WHEREAS, our State and Nation suffer from violence committed upon our citizens by non-citizens; and
WHEREAS, acts of violent crime in our schools are unacceptable; and
WHEREAS, human trafficking is an unacceptable and violent evil in our State, enslaving lives and violating the core values of our Creator-endowed rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; and
WHEREAS, drug addiction overwhelms our families, our government finances, our workforce productivity, as well as our healthcare and our law enforcement resources; and
WHEREAS, deadly fentanyl flows uncontrollably across our southern U.S. border resulting in the deaths of Tennesseans; and
WHEREAS, Driving under the Influence, drunk driving, results in great pain and injury for Tennessee families; and
WHEREAS, we have approximately 9,000 children in need of foster care, indicating a brokenness in many Tennessee homes; and
WHEREAS, evidence of corruption in our federal government stands to impact every Tennessean; and
WHEREAS, our National and State Founders trusted in the omnipotent hand of Providence to guide and bless our land; and
WHEREAS, over decades, these leaders called our people to seek out the Creator’s favor by issuing proclamations like the one from John Adams on April 15th, 1799:
[This day] be observed throughout the United States of America as a day of solemn humiliation, fasting, and prayer; that the citizens on that day abstain, as far as may be, from their secular occupation, and devote the time to the sacred duties of religion, in public and in private; that they call to mind our numerous offenses against the most high God, confess them before Him with the sincerest penitence, implore his pardoning mercy, through the Great Mediator and Redeemer, for our past transgressions, and that through the grace of His Holy Spirit, we may be disposed and enabled to yield a more suitable obedience to his righteous requisitions in time to come; that He would interpose to arrest the progress of that impiety and licentiousness in principle and practice so offensive to Himself and so ruinous to mankind; that He would make us deeply sensible that “righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.” [Proverbs 14:34]; and
WHEREAS, we hold that our Founders correctly acknowledged Truth in their words; and
WHEREAS, we hold that “Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.” (Psalm 127:1); now, therefore, be it resolved by the House Of Representatives of the one hundred thirteenth General Assembly of the State of Tennessee, the Senate concurring, that the period of July 1st, 2024, through July 31st, 2024, be recognized as a time of prayer and fasting in Tennessee.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that we recognize that God, as Creator and King of all Glory, has both the authority to judge and to bless nations or states.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that we, as public servants in the Tennessee General Assembly, seek God’s Mercy upon our land and beseech Him to not withdraw His Hand of blessing from us.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that we recognize our sins and shortcomings before Him and humbly ask His Forgiveness.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that we ask the Lord Jesus to heal our land and remove the violence, human-trafficking, addiction, and corruption.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that we ask that the Holy Spirit fill our halls of government, our classrooms, our places of business, our churches, and our homes with peace, love, and joy.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that we call upon all those who are physically able and spiritually inclined to do so to join in a thirty-day season of prayer and intermittent fasting as we begin a new fiscal year as a means of seeking God’s blessing and humbling ourselves to receive His Grace and Mercy, transforming ourselves, our communities, our State, and our Nation. [END OF RESOLUTION]
Hmm! Why can’t a ‘Catholic’ President like Joe Biden do something similar? Why can’t the lapsed Catholic Prime Minister of Canada do the same thing? Why didn’t the Prime Minister of England, Boris Johnson, do something similar? Johnson was a baptized Catholic, who later joined the Anglican church, then came back to Catholicism. The list could go on and on―taking in governors of states and countries. Even more so―why can't the Catholic bishops do something similar in their dioceses? Why can't the Pope encourage the whole Catholic world to do the same? As stated earlier―the world has become increasingly secular and there is less and less room for God and God’s governing. We are now independent from God in most cases and places―apart from keeping up a lip service to God (like printing “In God We Trust” on the banknotes of the USA).
Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), but the world is continually trying to prove Him wrong. Nothing will come of it! The only thing that will come of this universal exclusion of God is a global chastisement by God. As they say: “He who laughs last, laughs longest!” God will have the last laugh! “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’ He that dwells in Heaven shall laugh at them: and the Lord shall deride them. Then shall He speak to them in His anger, and trouble them in His rage!” (Psalm 2:2-5).
To answer the question: “Is God a politician?” we first need to be clear on what politics is and what politicians are. There some quite funny satirical and humorous definitions that are worth looking and chuckling at―for politics can be a very serious and depressing subject! So, first of all, let have a chuckle before we get into the real definitions of politics and politicians.
► Definition of politics:
“The skill of making the truth look like a lie; and making a lie look like the truth.”
“The ability to make molehills look like mountains; and mountains look like molehills.”
“Politics is the art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich, by promising to protect each from the other.”
“It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first!” (President Ronald Reagan).
“I have come to the conclusion that politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians!” (Charles de Gaulle, French President).
“Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it wrongly and applying unsuitable remedies.” (Ernest Benn 1875–1954 English writer and political publicist).
► Definition of a politician:
“Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by being governed by those who are dumber” (Plato, Ancient Greek Philosopher).
“A politician is a person who is willing to lay your life on the line to improve his own life.”
“A politician is a fellow who will lay down your life for his country” (Texas Guinan)
“A politician is a person who has the skill of being able to talk a lot while saying nothing.”
“Some people compare an air-conditioner to a politician―because it makes a lot of noise but doesn’t work very well.”
“A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn’t happen” (Winston Churchill).
“The trouble with practical jokes is that they often get elected … A fool and his money are soon elected! … I don’t make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts!” (Will Rogers, actor, and humorous social commentator).
“Politicians and diapers must be changed often―and for the same reason!” (Mark Twain).
Talking of diapers―brings to mind the young child who asked his father: “What is politics?”
The father replied: “Let me put it in simple terms so that you will be able to understand. I am your father and provider―I work, earn and bring home the money―so I am the Capitalist. Your mother, she keeps all the money―so she is the government. You are what we call ‘the people’. Your baby brother is the future. The baby-sitter is the working class.”
That night, the same child hears his baby brother crying. He goes to investigate and sees that his baby brother has pooped and soiled his diaper. He goes to find his mother, but finds her asleep and decides not to disturb her. So he goes to find his father, whom he finds downstairs having sex with the baby-sitter―and decides not to disturb them. He goes back to bed.
In the morning, the father asks his child if he remembers what politics is and can he repeat the explanation in his own little words. The child says: “Politics is this. While the government is asleep, the capitalist screws the working class and the future gets all pooped-up.”
Yes―today politics is one big stinking mess all over the world. Whose fault is it? Well it is not God’s fault―so it must our fault! More on that in a moment―but first of all let us give a serious definition of politics and then see if God is a politician or not.
What is Politics?
Depending upon which dictionary you consult, you will find “politics” defined along the lines of the following dictionary definitions:
● the study of the ways in which a country is governed
● the art or science of government
● the art or science concerned with guiding or influencing governmental policy
● the art or science concerned with winning and holding control over a government
● the activities and affairs involved in managing a state or a government
● the activities of the government, members of law-making organizations, or people who try to influence the way a country is governed
● the fact of being involved in political activities and getting political power
● the job of holding a position of power in the government
● the relationships within a group or organization that allow particular people to have power over others
● the activities of the government, members of law-making organizations, or people who try to influence the way a country is governed
● a person’s politics are that person’s opinions about how a country should be governed
So, is God a Politician?
If we look at Holy Scripture and compare the references about God to the above definitions―then we should have the answer! Scripture says of God and Christ: “Thy kingdom is a kingdom of all ages and Thy dominion endures throughout all generations!” (Psalm 144:13). “The Lord has prepared His throne in Heaven and His Kingdom shall rule over all” (Psalm 102:19). “But in the days of those kingdoms, the God of Heaven will set up a Kingdom that shall never be destroyed, and His Kingdom shall not be delivered up to another people, and it shall break in pieces and shall consume all these other kingdoms, and itself shall stand for ever! … And all kings shall serve Him, and shall obey Him!” (Daniel 2:44; 7:27). “The Earth is the Lord’s and the world, and all that dwell therein!” (Psalms 23:1). “He takes away kingdoms and establishes them” (Daniel 2:21). “There is no power except from God―and those powers that are, are ordained by God” (Romans 13:1). “For the kingdom of God is not in speech, but in power!” (1 Corinthians 4:20). “God will rule all the ends of the Earth!” (Psalm 58:14). “And He shall rule from sea to sea, unto the ends of the Earth!” (Psalm 71:8). “Therefore, hear ye kings, and understand! Learn, ye that are judges of the ends of the Earth! Give ear, you that rule the people, and that please yourselves among multitudes of nations! For power is given you by the Lord, and strength is given by the most High, Who will examine your works and search out your thoughts!” (Wisdom 6:2-4).
Concerning Jesus, “the angel said to her: ‘Fear not, Mary! Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a Son; and thou shalt call His Name Jesus! He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High; and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of David His father; and He shall reign forever! And of His kingdom there shall be no end!’” (Luke 1:30-33). “He shall rise up to rule the Gentiles, in Him the Gentiles shall hope!” (Romans 15:12). “And all kings shall serve Him, and shall obey Him!” (Daniel 7:27). “And all kings of the Earth shall adore Him! All nations shall serve Him!” (Psalm 71:11). “All peoples, tribes and tongues shall serve Him! His power is an everlasting power that shall not be taken away, and His kingdom shall not be destroyed!”(Daniel 7:14). “And out of His mouth proceeds a sharp two edged sword; so that with it He may strike the nations. And He shall rule them with a rod of iron!” (Apocalypse 19:15). “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘All power is given to Me in Heaven and on Earth!’” (Matthew 28:18). “Jesus said to Peter: ‘Thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it! And I will give to thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind upon Earth, it shall be bound also in Heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loosen upon Earth, it shall be loosened also in Heaven!’” (Matthew 16:17-19).
So, yes, God is a politician. Christ is a politician. For they have a kingdom above all kingdoms and Christ is the King of kings, the Lord of lords: “The King of kings, and Lord of lords!” (1 Timothy 6:15) … “He is Lord of lords, and King of kings” (Apocalypse 17:14). “He takes away kingdoms and establishes them” (Daniel 2:21). His Kingdom shall stand for ever! … And all kings shall serve Him, and shall obey Him!” (Daniel 2:44). “All peoples, tribes and tongues shall serve Him! His kingdom shall not be destroyed!”(Daniel 7:14).
Christ the King
In his 1925 Encyclical, Quas Primas, Pope Pius XI established the feast of Christ the King. Each and every king is unavoidably immersed in politics. A part of politics is concerned with governing—and kings have to govern. Likewise, Christ governs. The Pope writes: “It has long been a common custom to give to Christ the metaphorical title of ‘King,’ because of the high degree of perfection whereby He excels all creatures.” It would be easy enough to stop there. But Pope Pius XI did not end the preceding paragraph there. He continued: “But if we ponder this matter more deeply, we cannot but see that the title and the power of King belongs to Christ as man in the strict and proper sense too. For it is only as man that he may be said to have received from the Father “power and glory and a kingdom,” since the Word of God and therefore has necessarily supreme and absolute dominion over all things created.”
“Supreme and absolute dominion over all things created.” This statement finds many objectors in the civic political sphere. But if Christ is indeed a king — The King of Kings — then surely, every nation on Earth must owe Him homage. This is precisely what Pope Pius XI asserts: “Thus the empire of our Redeemer embraces all men. His empire includes not only Catholic nations, not only baptized persons who, though of right belonging to the Church, have been led astray by error, or have been cut off from her by schism, but also all those who are outside the Christian Faith―so that truly the whole of mankind is subject to the power of Jesus Christ. Nor is there any difference in this matter between the individual and the family or the State―for all men, whether collectively or individually, are under the dominion of Christ. In him is the salvation of the individual, in him is the salvation of society. Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under Heaven given to men whereby we must be saved (Acts 4:12). He is the author of happiness and true prosperity for every man and for every nation. If, therefore, the rulers of nations wish to preserve their authority, to promote and increase the prosperity of their countries, they will not neglect the public duty of reverence and obedience to the rule of Christ. With God and Jesus Christ excluded from political life; with authority derived, not from God but from man; the very basis of that authority has been taken away. The result is that human society is tottering to its fall, because it has no longer a secure and solid foundation.”
“When men recognize, both in private and in public life, that Christ is King, then society will at last receive the great blessings of real liberty, well-ordered discipline, peace and harmony. If princes and magistrates, duly elected, are filled with the persuasion that they rule, not by their own right, but by the mandate and in the place of the Divine King, then they will exercise their authority piously and wisely, and they will make laws and administer them, having in view the common good and also the human dignity of their subjects. The result will be a stable peace and tranquility, for there will be no longer any cause of discontent. Men will see in their king or in their rulers men like themselves, perhaps unworthy or open to criticism, but they will not on that account refuse obedience if they see reflected in them the authority of Christ God and Man. Peace and harmony will result―for with the spread and the universal extent of the Kingdom of Christ men will become more and more conscious of the link that binds them together, and thus many conflicts will be either prevented entirely, or at least their bitterness will be diminished. Then will many evils be cured; then will the law regain its former authority; peace with all its blessings be restored. Men will sheathe their swords and lay down their arms when all freely acknowledge and obey the authority of Christ, and every tongue confesses that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father.” (Pope Pius XI, Encyclical Quas Primas).
Christ the Politician
In a democracy, the people elect Politicians to represent them in government, to act on their behalf and to protect their interests. Politicians are elected to represent the interests, concerns, and values of their constituents. A politician is someone who holds a government office or finds other ways to influence law and public policy. The primary duty of a politician is to propose, vote on and enact laws and policies that will determine how a government functions. “In war, you can only be killed once, but in politics, many times!” said Winston Churchill. Christ knew He would be killed: “The Jews sought to kill Him” (John 7:1) … “The Jews sought all the more to kill Him” (John 5:18) … “The Chief Priests and the Scribes and the rulers of the people sought to destroy Him” (Luke 19:47) … “The Chief Priests and the Scribes sought how they might by some trickery lay hold of Him, and kill Him” (Mark 14:1) … “They sought therefore to take him; but He escaped out of their hands” (John 10:39) … “They sought to lay hands on Him, but they feared the people” (Mark 12:12) … “The Chief Priests and the Scribes sought to lay hands on Him―but they feared the people” (Luke 20:19) … “They sought therefore to apprehend him―but no man laid hands on Him, because His hour was not yet come” (John 7:30).
Jesus knew that He would eventually be killed when “His hour was come.” He foretold His sufferings and death to His Apostles―who were saddened and scandalized upon hearing Jesus say this. “From that time Jesus began to show to His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and on the third day rise again. And Peter taking Jesus, began to rebuke Him, saying: ‘Lord, be it far from Thee! This shall not happen to Thee!’ Jesus, turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind Me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me―because thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:21-23).
Not only did Jesus know that He would be killed―He even came to be killed so that He could save souls, even the souls of His enemies: “When we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son” (Romans 5:10). How many politicians would say and do what Christ said and did: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy!’ But I say to you: ‘Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!’” (Matthew 5:43-44). “If you will forgive men their offences, your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences” (Matthew 6:15). As Christ was dying in the presence of His mocking accusers who had screamed for His crucifixion, He begged: “Father, forgive them―for they know not what they do!” (Luke 23:34).
Unlike most politicians, Christ was not seeking glory and power: “I seek not My own glory!” (John 8:50). When they sought to ‘promote’ Him and make Him king―He fled: “Jesus―when He knew that they would come to take Him by force and make Him king―fled again into the mountain Himself alone” (John 6:15). Jesus had come to serve and save―not to be served and praised: “The Son of man is not come to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a redemption for many!” (Matthew 20:28).
The Politics of Christ
Politics requires policies. Man requires a manifesto before deciding whether to follow and vote for a particular politician or political party. A manifesto is a public declaration of policy and aims; a statement declaring publicly the intentions, motives, or views of its issuer. Christ manifested His manifesto in the Gospels.
There are four main types of manifestos: (1) a Goal Manifesto; (2) a List Manifesto; (3) a Rules-Based Manifesto, and (4) a World Manifesto. (1) A Goal Manifesto is a public declaration of your intent. An intention is a goal―what you seek to achieve. A goal could be personal goal, community goal or a world goal. (2) A List Manifesto is usually a subset to the Goal Manifesto―which lists the means and measures that have to be taken to achieve the goal. (3) A Rules-Based Manifesto states the obligatory behavior required and values to be held in order to achieve the goal. (4) A World Manifesto states how you want the world to be. It’s a vision for a possible world future.
Earthly politicians often come out with vague, or over-optimistic, or unrealistic, unreasonable and unachievable manifestos. Election campaign speeches are unique in the sense that the same standards of accuracy, to which other forms of speech held, are not always strictly applied to campaign speeches―because in many cases political campaign speeches are largely political rhetoric (hot-air and fairytales). It is very difficult for ordinary citizens to seek legal recourse to hold politicians to account who make wild promises. Satan must be the patron-‘saint’ of untruthful political manifestos―for Christ said of Satan: “He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44) and in the same breath Christ says to the Scribes and Pharisees (politicians and legislators today): “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do!” (John 8:44) ― which is reinforced by Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, who says:
“The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world. Unfortunately, in the Church there are adherents to Satanic cults. And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican ... Legions of demons have lodged there! … In the Vatican there are members of Satanic cults―there are priests, monsignors and even cardinals! I know from people who reported to me how they got to know this directly. It is also something, that has been “confessed” several times by the devil, himself, under obedience during the exorcisms … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority―those of politics and industry. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office! The devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and ‘works’ on it … The most frequent weak points in man are always the same: pride, money, and lust!” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, chief exorcist of Rome).
Many politicians tell lies rather than the truth to the people because the truth will not win as many votes and the lie. They tell lies to the people, because the truth is often displeasing and hard to swallow, whereas the lie can be sugar-coated and made to be very pleasant and thus readily swallowed. “God is not a man that He should lie. Nor as the son of man that he should be changed. Has he said something, and then will he not do? Has He spoken and will He not fulfill what He said?” (Numbers 23:19). Eve was seduced by Satan’s false manifesto that promised her she would be like God if she ate the forbidden fruit―which was a downright lie―but Eve swallowed the lie and the fruit because of the way Satan sugar-coated his lie. Christ has no place for the devil and his lies: “What agreement does Christ have with Belial?” (2 Corinthians 6:15). “The prince of this world is coming, and in Me he has not anything … The prince of this world is already judged ... The prince of this world shall be cast out!” says Our Lord (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). Christ tells us: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life … The devil is a liar, and the father of lies!’” (John 14:6; 8:41-47). “I am the way, and the truth, and the life … But if I say the truth, you believe Me not! … If I say the truth to you, why do you not believe Me? … He that is of God, hears the words of God! Therefore you hear them not because you are not of God!” (John 8:46-47).
Christ’s Manifesto
As stated above―the manifesto of Christ is clearly laid-out in the Gospels. What are the chief points in Christ’s manifesto? The chief points can be said to be as follows:
► Love of God and Neighbor comes before everything. Charity is the motto and membership card for Christ’s Party. “Charity is of God. And every one that loves, is born of God, and knows God! He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:7-8). “God is charity―and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16). “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of me! And he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:37). “He that is not with Me, is against Me! … Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:32-33).
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and, without charity, whatever we might do is spiritually and supernaturally useless: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). “Let all your things be done in charity!” (1 Corinthians 16:14). “Let us not love in word, nor in tongue, but by deeds and in truth” (1 John 3:18).
“Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!” (Mark 12:30-31). “By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another” (John 13:35). “These things I command you, that you love one another” (John 15:17). “Love one another as I have loved you!” (John 13:34). “Whatever you did to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40). “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
► Salvation of the soul is the chief goal that everyone should aim at achieving. Life is short―the afterlife is eternal: “What is your life? It is a vapor which appears for a little while, and afterwards shall vanish away!” (James 4:15). “Man’s days are as grass, as the flower of the field so shall he flourish! But the spirit shall pass in him and he shall not be―and he shall know his place no more!” (Psalm 102:15-16). “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God!” (Mark 10:25). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice!” (Matthew 6:33).
► The Christ of War. The prophet Isaias refers to Christ as the “Prince of Peace” (Isaias 9:6), which of course He is ― but, the same prophet also tells us that He is also the Prince of War: “The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man―as a man of war shall He stir up zeal. He shall prevail against His enemies!” (Isaias 42:13). Sometimes politics involves war and politicians will be required to declare war and fight a war against the enemies of the country. The same is true for Heaven and Christ. He came to fight for sinful souls and to fight Satan and Hell in order to rescue and save the souls of sinners: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). He knows that some souls will not appreciate His efforts and will prefer to remain enslaved to the world―which is an enemy of God: “The Light is come into the world, but men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 3:19).
In the Old Testament, God Himself commanded His Chosen people to fight wars. In the time of Moses, God commanded Moses to wage war against those who would oppose the Chosen People on their way to the Promised Land. God even lays down laws for war. We read in the Book of Deuteronomy: “If you go out to war against your enemies, and see the numbers of the enemy’s army greater than yours, you shall not fear them―because the Lord thy God is with you! The Lord your God is in the midst of you, and will fight for you against your enemies, to deliver you from danger! … If at any time you come to fight against a city―you shalt first offer it peace. If they accept it and open the gates to you, all the people that are therein shall be saved and shall serve you by paying tribute. But if they will not make peace and shall begin war against you, then you shall besiege it. And when the Lord God shall deliver it into your hands, you shall slay all that are therein of the male sex, with the edge of the sword―except for women and children. So shall you do to all cities that are at a great distance from you … But of those cities that shall be given thee by the Lord, you shall suffer none at all to live, but shall kill them with the edge of the sword, as the Lord God has commanded you―lest they teach you to do all the abominations which they have done with their gods and you should sin against the Lord your God!” (Deuteronomy 20:1-20).
Just as God the Father was also a God of war, so too is God the Son a God of war: “The Lord is as a man of war!” (Exodus 15:3). “The Lord my God teaches my hands to fight and my fingers to war!” (Psalm 143:1). Christ Himself said: “Do not think that I came to bring peace upon Earth―I came not to bring peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 10:34-36). To which Holy Scripture adds: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) … “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6) ... “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold onto eternal life, to which you are called!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12) … “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Yet, though He is a Prince of War, He does not fail to show the side of Himself that is the Prince of Peace. As God says in the Old Testament, there is “a time of war and a time of peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:8). In the Garden of Gethsemane, when St. Peter pulls out his sword in a desire to protect Our Lord and fight to avoid His arrest, Our Lord tells Peter: “Put back thy sword into its place! For all that take the sword shall perish with the sword!” (Matthew 26:52). God, in the Old Testament, says: “If thy enemy be hungry, give him to eat: if he thirst, give him water to drink 22 For thou shalt heap hot coals upon his head” (Proverbs 25:21-22, which St. Paul repeats in Romans 12:20). During His sermon on the mount, Christ preached that we should seek peace, love our enemies and do good to them: “Blessed are the peacemakers―for they shall be called children of God! Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in Heaven―for so they persecuted the prophets that were before you! … You have heard that it has been said: ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth!’ But I say to you not to resist evil―but if one strike thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the other cheek!” (Matthew 5:9-12; 5:38-39).
Christ the Diplomat
A diplomat is a person appointed by a national government to conduct official negotiations and maintain political, economic, and social relations with another country or countries. The main functions of diplomats are: representation and protection of the interests and nationals of the country that sent the diplomat. A diplomat should be a person who is tactful and skillful in managing delicate situations, handling people, etc. Yet when the soft approach is not working, then the diplomat should be afraid of taking a progressive tougher approach.
Christ, God the Son, in this sense, is a heavenly diplomat sent to Earth by God the Father: “God did not send His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). But if the world refuses to make amends for its sins by doing penance, then the world will perish: “I came to call sinners to penance! … I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5). A doctor will try to save a gangrened leg with medicine―but if the patient does not respond, the doctor will have to amputate the leg.
We rarely win persons over to our side by being aggressive with them: “A mild answer breaks wrath―but a harsh word stirs up fury” (Proverbs 15:1)―gentleness and tact (diplomacy) are often better ways (at least in the beginning). St. Francis de Sales used to say: “A spoonful of honey attracts more flies than many barrels of vinegar!” The Scribes and Pharisees were indignant at seeing Jesus eating and drinking with sinners: “The Scribes and the Pharisees, seeing that he ate with publicans and sinners, said to His disciples: ‘Why does your master eat and drink with publicans and sinners?’ Jesus hearing this, said to them: ‘They that are healthy have no need of a physician, but they that are sick. For I came not to call the just, but sinners!’” (Mark 2:16-17).
We see this diplomatic approach to sinners in the case of the woman caught in adultery, whom the Scribes and Pharisees had brought before Our Lord to see how He would judge her. They wanted to stone her to death and asked if Jesus agreed: “The Scribes and the Pharisees brought unto Jesus a woman taken in adultery. They set her in the midst and said to Him: ‘Master, this woman was even now taken in adultery! Now Moses, in the law, commanded us to stone such a one. But what do you say?’ ― and this they said tempting Him, so that they might accuse Him. But Jesus, bowing Himself down, wrote with His finger on the ground. When, therefore, they continued asking Him, He lifted up Himself, and said to them: ‘He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!’ And again, stooping down, He wrote on the ground. But they, hearing this, went out one by one―beginning with the eldest. And Jesus alone remained, and the woman standing in the midst. Then Jesus, lifting Himself up, said to her: ‘Woman, where are they that accused you? Has no man condemned you?’ The woman said: ‘No man, Lord!’ And Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:3-11). O what supreme diplomacy!
We see the same diplomacy exercised with Zacheus the Publican. Publicans were tax collectors and were looked down upon with contempt. Ordinary taxes, such as land taxes, were collected by the Roman officials; but toll taxes for transporting goods were usually collected by Jews under contract with the Romans. These collectors, or publicans, made a large personal profit on the transactions. “Jesus entered and walked through Jericho. And behold, there was a man named Zacheus, who was the chief of the publicans, and he was rich. He wanted to see Jesus―who He was―but he could not because of the crowd, and he was small in height. So running ahead, he climbed up into a sycamore tree, so that he might see Him―for he was to pass that way. When Jesus came to that place, looking up, He saw him, and said to him: ‘Zacheus, make haste and come down! For this day I must abide in your house!’ And Zacheus made haste and came down; and received Him with joy. And when all saw it, they murmured, saying, that Jesus was going to be a guest of a man that was a sinner. But Zacheus, standing up, said to the Lord: ‘Behold, Lord! Half of my goods I will give to the poor; and if I have wronged any man of anything, I will restore him fourfold!’ Jesus said to him: ‘This day is salvation come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham! For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!’” (Luke 19:1-10).
We see the same diplomacy shown to the Apostles after the resurrection of Jesus―especially St. Peter who had betrayed Jesus and the others who had abandoned Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. To whom more is given, more is expected: “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” said Jesus (Luke 12:48). Peter had, in effect, been given the papacy―he was the leader of the Apostles. Therefore his betrayal of Christ was greater than the abandonment of Christ by the other Apostles. What did Our Lord do? He did not throw all kinds of angry and insulting words. He simply gave Peter a look―a look which cracked Peter up and brought him to repentance. After that, Jesus did not directly mention the betrayal ever again: “And apprehending Jesus, they led him to the high priest’s house―but Peter followed afar off. And when they had kindled a fire in the midst of the hall, and were sitting about it, Peter was in the midst of them. A certain servant maid had seen sitting at the light, and had earnestly watched Peter, and she said: ‘This man also was with Jesus!’ But Peter denied Jesus, saying: ‘Woman, I do not know Him!’ And after a little while, another seeing him, said: ‘You are also one of them!’ But Peter said: ‘O man, I am not!’ And, after the space around of one hour, another certain man also affirmed, saying: ‘Of a truth, this man was also with Jesus―for he is also a Galilean!’ And Peter said: ‘Man, I do not know what you are talking about!’ And immediately, as Peter was still speaking, the cock crew. And the Lord, turning towards him, looked at Peter. And Peter remembered the word of the Lord, as He had said: ‘Before the cock crows, you shall deny Me three times!’ And Peter going out, wept bitterly” (Luke 22:54-62). Jesus did need to show anger, or use recriminations or harsh words―He simply looked at Peter in a way that broke Peter’s heart!
Heaven’s Weapons
There are times when you have to go to war. How does Heaven want us to fight these wars. Without doubt, there will be times when we shall have to use physical force and material weapons. However, the principal enemy in all our wars is not the world―but the prince of the world, Satan and his devils. Nobody, as far we know, has ever defeated a devil with a gun, a rifle, a grenade, a bomb or even a nuclear weapon! Speaking of devils, Our Lord said: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20). As regards sinners―there are two basic things you can do: (1) kill the sinner, or (2) convert the sinner. God prefers the second option. He Himself says: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). Our Lady of Fatima comes―not asking for death of sinners―but for their conversion by our prayers and sacrifices.
A Protestant politician puts us to shame. The Republican Governor of Tennessee, Will Lee (William Byron Lee), has signed a bill calling for 30 days of prayer and fasting beginning July 1st, 2024. The resolution asks the people of the state “to seek God’s hand of mercy healing on Tennessee.” The authors of the resolution ask all to join them in the month of prayer and fasting as they can. The resolution reads:
WHEREAS, our State and Nation suffer from violence committed upon our citizens by our citizens; and
WHEREAS, our State and Nation suffer from violence committed upon our citizens by non-citizens; and
WHEREAS, acts of violent crime in our schools are unacceptable; and
WHEREAS, human trafficking is an unacceptable and violent evil in our State, enslaving lives and violating the core values of our Creator-endowed rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; and
WHEREAS, drug addiction overwhelms our families, our government finances, our workforce productivity, as well as our healthcare and our law enforcement resources; and
WHEREAS, deadly fentanyl flows uncontrollably across our southern U.S. border resulting in the deaths of Tennesseans; and
WHEREAS, Driving under the Influence, drunk driving, results in great pain and injury for Tennessee families; and
WHEREAS, we have approximately 9,000 children in need of foster care, indicating a brokenness in many Tennessee homes; and
WHEREAS, evidence of corruption in our federal government stands to impact every Tennessean; and
WHEREAS, our National and State Founders trusted in the omnipotent hand of Providence to guide and bless our land; and
WHEREAS, over decades, these leaders called our people to seek out the Creator’s favor by issuing proclamations like the one from John Adams on April 15th, 1799:
[This day] be observed throughout the United States of America as a day of solemn humiliation, fasting, and prayer; that the citizens on that day abstain, as far as may be, from their secular occupation, and devote the time to the sacred duties of religion, in public and in private; that they call to mind our numerous offenses against the most high God, confess them before Him with the sincerest penitence, implore his pardoning mercy, through the Great Mediator and Redeemer, for our past transgressions, and that through the grace of His Holy Spirit, we may be disposed and enabled to yield a more suitable obedience to his righteous requisitions in time to come; that He would interpose to arrest the progress of that impiety and licentiousness in principle and practice so offensive to Himself and so ruinous to mankind; that He would make us deeply sensible that “righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.” [Proverbs 14:34]; and
WHEREAS, we hold that our Founders correctly acknowledged Truth in their words; and
WHEREAS, we hold that “Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.” (Psalm 127:1); now, therefore, be it resolved by the House Of Representatives of the one hundred thirteenth General Assembly of the State of Tennessee, the Senate concurring, that the period of July 1st, 2024, through July 31st, 2024, be recognized as a time of prayer and fasting in Tennessee.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that we recognize that God, as Creator and King of all Glory, has both the authority to judge and to bless nations or states.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that we, as public servants in the Tennessee General Assembly, seek God’s Mercy upon our land and beseech Him to not withdraw His Hand of blessing from us.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that we recognize our sins and shortcomings before Him and humbly ask His Forgiveness.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that we ask the Lord Jesus to heal our land and remove the violence, human-trafficking, addiction, and corruption.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that we ask that the Holy Spirit fill our halls of government, our classrooms, our places of business, our churches, and our homes with peace, love, and joy.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that we call upon all those who are physically able and spiritually inclined to do so to join in a thirty-day season of prayer and intermittent fasting as we begin a new fiscal year as a means of seeking God’s blessing and humbling ourselves to receive His Grace and Mercy, transforming ourselves, our communities, our State, and our Nation. [END OF RESOLUTION]
Hmm! Why can’t a ‘Catholic’ President like Joe Biden do something similar? Why can’t the lapsed Catholic Prime Minister of Canada do the same thing? Why didn’t the Prime Minister of England, Boris Johnson, do something similar? Johnson was a baptized Catholic, who later joined the Anglican church, then came back to Catholicism. The list could go on and on―taking in governors of states and countries. Even more so―why can't the Catholic bishops do something similar in their dioceses? Why can't the Pope encourage the whole Catholic world to do the same? As stated earlier―the world has become increasingly secular and there is less and less room for God and God’s governing. We are now independent from God in most cases and places―apart from keeping up a lip service to God (like printing “In God We Trust” on the banknotes of the USA).
Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), but the world is continually trying to prove Him wrong. Nothing will come of it! The only thing that will come of this universal exclusion of God is a global chastisement by God. As they say: “He who laughs last, laughs longest!” God will have the last laugh! “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’ He that dwells in Heaven shall laugh at them: and the Lord shall deride them. Then shall He speak to them in His anger, and trouble them in His rage!” (Psalm 2:2-5).
Article 7
Tuesday & Wednesday, July 9th & 10th
Victory Through Dependence, Failure Through Independence
Tuesday & Wednesday, July 9th & 10th
Victory Through Dependence, Failure Through Independence
How Insane Can We Get?
O the insanity! “Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?” (Matthew 7:16). Do we expect godliness from godless politicians, or a better world from sinful rulers? “Many will come in My Name and they will seduce many!” said Our Lord (Matthew 24:5). He further warns: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves! By their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:15-16) ― and we have many politicians clothed as Christians, but their fruits are far from being Christian! These politicians (Biden and Trump included) invoke the name of God, the attend church services, Biden even claims to pray the Rosary―but do not fulfill the will or law of God in politics: “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
These politicians call Him “Lord! Lord!” and do not do the things that the Lord requires of them because they have a false spirit of independence which gives them a license to think what they want, say what they want, do what they want―without giving much thought to what God wants. Of such persons Our Lord says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. In vain do they worship Me―teaching doctrines and precepts of men!’ For leaving the commandments of God, you hold the traditions of men! You make void the commandments of God, that you may keep your own traditions!’’” (Mark 7:6-9). “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, but suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
All power―even political power―comes from God: “Power belongs to God” (Psalm 61:12) … “There is no power but from God” (Romans 13:1) … “It is God Who will give power” (Psalm 67:36) … “Power is from Heaven!” (Daniel 4:23). “Power always belonged to Thee alone, O Lord!” (Wisdom 11:22) … “The power of the Earth is in the hand of God, and in His time He will raise up a profitable ruler over it” (Ecclesiasticus 10:4). Jesus stressed that point to Pontius Pilate―a non-Christian governor: “You would not have any power unless it was given to you from above!” (John 19:11). Similarly with all the rulers and politicians of the world: “The God of Heaven gave them power” (Judith 5:19) … “Power is given to you by the Lord, Who will examine your works and search out your thoughts!” (Wisdom 6:4) … “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). Abuse of power risks the wrath of Lord and it must be remembered that “all power is of short life” (Ecclesiasticus 10:11) …“Power may be taken away, and be broken in pieces, and perish” (Daniel 7:26). “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away―as it has pleased the Lord so is it done!” (Job 1:21).
Power comes and goes―just as kings, rulers, presidents, prime-ministers, governors and politicians all come and go―they come into this life and they leave this life to judged upon how they used the power that God allowed them to possess: “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, but suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Public Opinion on Politics and Politicians
According to a 2023 Pew Research study: “Americans have long been critical of politicians and skeptical of the federal government. But today, Americans’ views of politics and elected officials are unrelentingly negative, with little hope of improvement on the horizon. Majorities say the political process is dominated by special interests, flooded with campaign cash and mired in partisan warfare. Elected officials are widely viewed as self-serving and ineffective. There is widespread criticism of the three branches of government, both political parties, as well as political leaders and candidates for office. Just 4% of U.S. adults say the political system is working extremely or very well; another 23% say it is working somewhat well. About six-in-ten (63%) express not too much or no confidence at all in the future of the U.S. political system. Positive views of many governmental and political institutions are at historic lows. Just 16% of the public say they trust the federal government always or most of the time. A growing share of the public dislikes both political parties. Nearly three-in-ten (28%) express unfavorable views of both parties. As the presidential campaign heats up, 63% of Americans say they are dissatisfied with the candidates who have emerged so far. Setting aside the presidential campaign, there has been a downward trend in views of the quality of all political candidates. Just 26% rate the quality of political candidates as very or somewhat good.
“Before the presidential election, nearly two-thirds of Americans (65%) say they always or often feel exhausted when thinking about politics, while 55% feel angry. By contrast, just 10% say they always or often feel hopeful about politics, and even fewer (4%) are excited. We also asked people to identify the strengths of the political system, as well as its weaknesses. It is telling that a majority of Americans are unable or unwilling to identify strong points of the nation’s political system. While about a third gave no answer, another 22% write “nothing” – meaning that in their view, the political system does not have any strengths. More than eight-in-ten Americans (86%) say the following is a good description of politics: “Republicans and Democrats are more focused on fighting each other than on solving problems.” These views and other negative sentiments are widely shared among older and younger Americans, White, Black, Hispanic and Asian adults, people who are highly engaged in politics and those who are less engaged.” (Pew Research Center, September, 2023, “Americans’ Dismal Views of the Nation’s Politics”).
Stupid False Hopes!
What on earth are we imagining will come out of present day America? Let us not be stupidly over-optimistic! Hell is full of stupidly over-optimistic souls! As the philosophical axiom states: “You cannot give what you have not got!” As Our Lord said: “Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?” (Matthew 7:16). The United States of America is, religiously speaking, nothing but thorns and thistles―for God’s religion (Catholicism) is not the religion of the America (even though the dollar bill displays the official motto of the United States: “In God we trust!”). That is at best an outdated statement―or perhaps it means that the dollar has become God and then it would be true to say: “In God we trust!” You could perhaps even modify that to read: “In God we trust that He will not interfere in the life of our country!” God is not a Protestant―or rather, Protestantism does not come from God. Protestantism comes from man, not God―and it originated as a protest against the religion that God had given to mankind through Jesus Christ: Catholicism. The word “Catholic” comes from the Greek word “catholikos”, meaning “universal.” The first use of the term “Catholic Church”― literally meaning “Universal Church” ― was by the early Church Father, St. Ignatius of Antioch (50–140 AD) in his Letter to the Smyrnaeans: “Where the bishop is to be seen, there let all his people be; just as wherever Jesus Christ is present, we have the Catholic Church.” St. Polycarp (69-155 AD), spoke of “the whole Catholic Church throughout the world.”
We call ourselves Catholic because it describes the worldwide scope of Christ’s saving mission. Christ died for the sins of the whole world, and His Church is meant to encompass members of every nation, kindred, tongue, region, generation, locale, race, gender, class, and culture. The Catholic Church is the “universal” Church founded by Jesus Christ, the savior of the whole world. “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting. God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:16-17). “I will give My Flesh for the life of the world!” says Jesus (John 6:52). “This is indeed the Savior of the world” (John 4:42). “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘I am the light of the world!’” (John 8:12). “He was the true Light, which enlighteneth every man that comes into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not” (John 1:9-10). Jesus “the Light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 3:16-17) ― which is why Jesus said: “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
O the insanity! “Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?” (Matthew 7:16). Do we expect godliness from godless politicians, or a better world from sinful rulers? “Many will come in My Name and they will seduce many!” said Our Lord (Matthew 24:5). He further warns: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves! By their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:15-16) ― and we have many politicians clothed as Christians, but their fruits are far from being Christian! These politicians (Biden and Trump included) invoke the name of God, the attend church services, Biden even claims to pray the Rosary―but do not fulfill the will or law of God in politics: “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
These politicians call Him “Lord! Lord!” and do not do the things that the Lord requires of them because they have a false spirit of independence which gives them a license to think what they want, say what they want, do what they want―without giving much thought to what God wants. Of such persons Our Lord says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. In vain do they worship Me―teaching doctrines and precepts of men!’ For leaving the commandments of God, you hold the traditions of men! You make void the commandments of God, that you may keep your own traditions!’’” (Mark 7:6-9). “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, but suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
All power―even political power―comes from God: “Power belongs to God” (Psalm 61:12) … “There is no power but from God” (Romans 13:1) … “It is God Who will give power” (Psalm 67:36) … “Power is from Heaven!” (Daniel 4:23). “Power always belonged to Thee alone, O Lord!” (Wisdom 11:22) … “The power of the Earth is in the hand of God, and in His time He will raise up a profitable ruler over it” (Ecclesiasticus 10:4). Jesus stressed that point to Pontius Pilate―a non-Christian governor: “You would not have any power unless it was given to you from above!” (John 19:11). Similarly with all the rulers and politicians of the world: “The God of Heaven gave them power” (Judith 5:19) … “Power is given to you by the Lord, Who will examine your works and search out your thoughts!” (Wisdom 6:4) … “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). Abuse of power risks the wrath of Lord and it must be remembered that “all power is of short life” (Ecclesiasticus 10:11) …“Power may be taken away, and be broken in pieces, and perish” (Daniel 7:26). “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away―as it has pleased the Lord so is it done!” (Job 1:21).
Power comes and goes―just as kings, rulers, presidents, prime-ministers, governors and politicians all come and go―they come into this life and they leave this life to judged upon how they used the power that God allowed them to possess: “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, but suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For whatever things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh he shall also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit he shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Public Opinion on Politics and Politicians
According to a 2023 Pew Research study: “Americans have long been critical of politicians and skeptical of the federal government. But today, Americans’ views of politics and elected officials are unrelentingly negative, with little hope of improvement on the horizon. Majorities say the political process is dominated by special interests, flooded with campaign cash and mired in partisan warfare. Elected officials are widely viewed as self-serving and ineffective. There is widespread criticism of the three branches of government, both political parties, as well as political leaders and candidates for office. Just 4% of U.S. adults say the political system is working extremely or very well; another 23% say it is working somewhat well. About six-in-ten (63%) express not too much or no confidence at all in the future of the U.S. political system. Positive views of many governmental and political institutions are at historic lows. Just 16% of the public say they trust the federal government always or most of the time. A growing share of the public dislikes both political parties. Nearly three-in-ten (28%) express unfavorable views of both parties. As the presidential campaign heats up, 63% of Americans say they are dissatisfied with the candidates who have emerged so far. Setting aside the presidential campaign, there has been a downward trend in views of the quality of all political candidates. Just 26% rate the quality of political candidates as very or somewhat good.
“Before the presidential election, nearly two-thirds of Americans (65%) say they always or often feel exhausted when thinking about politics, while 55% feel angry. By contrast, just 10% say they always or often feel hopeful about politics, and even fewer (4%) are excited. We also asked people to identify the strengths of the political system, as well as its weaknesses. It is telling that a majority of Americans are unable or unwilling to identify strong points of the nation’s political system. While about a third gave no answer, another 22% write “nothing” – meaning that in their view, the political system does not have any strengths. More than eight-in-ten Americans (86%) say the following is a good description of politics: “Republicans and Democrats are more focused on fighting each other than on solving problems.” These views and other negative sentiments are widely shared among older and younger Americans, White, Black, Hispanic and Asian adults, people who are highly engaged in politics and those who are less engaged.” (Pew Research Center, September, 2023, “Americans’ Dismal Views of the Nation’s Politics”).
Stupid False Hopes!
What on earth are we imagining will come out of present day America? Let us not be stupidly over-optimistic! Hell is full of stupidly over-optimistic souls! As the philosophical axiom states: “You cannot give what you have not got!” As Our Lord said: “Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?” (Matthew 7:16). The United States of America is, religiously speaking, nothing but thorns and thistles―for God’s religion (Catholicism) is not the religion of the America (even though the dollar bill displays the official motto of the United States: “In God we trust!”). That is at best an outdated statement―or perhaps it means that the dollar has become God and then it would be true to say: “In God we trust!” You could perhaps even modify that to read: “In God we trust that He will not interfere in the life of our country!” God is not a Protestant―or rather, Protestantism does not come from God. Protestantism comes from man, not God―and it originated as a protest against the religion that God had given to mankind through Jesus Christ: Catholicism. The word “Catholic” comes from the Greek word “catholikos”, meaning “universal.” The first use of the term “Catholic Church”― literally meaning “Universal Church” ― was by the early Church Father, St. Ignatius of Antioch (50–140 AD) in his Letter to the Smyrnaeans: “Where the bishop is to be seen, there let all his people be; just as wherever Jesus Christ is present, we have the Catholic Church.” St. Polycarp (69-155 AD), spoke of “the whole Catholic Church throughout the world.”
We call ourselves Catholic because it describes the worldwide scope of Christ’s saving mission. Christ died for the sins of the whole world, and His Church is meant to encompass members of every nation, kindred, tongue, region, generation, locale, race, gender, class, and culture. The Catholic Church is the “universal” Church founded by Jesus Christ, the savior of the whole world. “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting. God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:16-17). “I will give My Flesh for the life of the world!” says Jesus (John 6:52). “This is indeed the Savior of the world” (John 4:42). “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘I am the light of the world!’” (John 8:12). “He was the true Light, which enlighteneth every man that comes into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not” (John 1:9-10). Jesus “the Light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 3:16-17) ― which is why Jesus said: “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
|
False Hopes Built on a False Christianity
Thus it is clear that, in God’s eyes, the Catholic Faith is meant to be the religion of the world―and not just one religion among many―for “there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears, and will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 4:3-4). “There shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders, insomuch as to deceive (if possible) even the elect” (Matthew 24:24) … “Such false apostles are deceitful workmen, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ―and no wonder: for Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light!” (2 Corinthians 11:13-14) … “There were also false prophets among the people, even as there shall be among you―lying teachers, who shall bring in sects of perdition, and deny the Lord who bought them: bringing upon themselves swift destruction” (2 Peter 2:1) … “The Lord said to me: ‘The prophets prophesy falsely in My Name! I sent them not, neither have I commanded them, nor have I spoken to them! They prophesy unto you a lying vision, and divination and deceit, and the seduction of their own heart!” (Jeremias 14:14). That is what Protestantism is―a seduction of one’s own heart; it is not a God-made religion, but a man-made religion. Protestantism is basically a child of Rationalism―which thinks what it wants, believes what it wants, says what it wants, teaches what it wants and does what it wants―that is why you have thousands of flavors of Protestantism and only one flavor of Catholicism. God is one―He is not a splintered God of thousands of pieces. The American flavor of Christianity―from the very beginning―has been a Protestant version of Christianity, a man-made Christianity and therefore a false Christianity which picks and chooses what it wants and not what God wants. American Protestantism had already lost its way before the Declaration of Independence. It was on the wrong road, headed in the wrong direction―even though it claimed to be Christian, it was not leading souls to salvation and Heaven. A perfect con of Satan―who is always seeking to divide and conquer―and Protestantism is essentially division and not unity. There can be no success for such a deformed Christianity―for it depends more upon man than upon God. It is independent of God and not dependent upon God. Modern-day Liberal Catholicism (or Modernism) is increasingly becoming a modern-day Protestantism (a Catholic version of Protestantism), whereby you can believe what you want and teach what you want and do what you want. This is proved by the ever-increasing numbers of Catholics who no longer believe certain dogmas and teachings of the Church. The majority of modern-day Catholics no longer believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist (just like Protestants); the majority accepts divorce and remarriage (just like Protestants); the majority accepts contraception (just like Protestants); the majority no longer attend church on Sundays (just like the Protestants); the majority tolerate or accept homosexual relationships and same-sex marriages (just like Protestants)―the list could go on and on. |
The above list shows the religious affiliation of the members of the US Congress. Among its members there are 148 Catholics, which constitutes 27% of the entire Congress membership. In recent years large numbers of Catholic members of Congress have voted in favor of abortion. On June 24th, 2021, 60 Catholic members of the House of Representatives issued their ultimatum demanding access to the Holy Eucharist despite their pro-abortion politics. In March of 2022, in the U.S. Senate, 13 Catholic lawmakers voted in favor of an attempt to pass a sweeping new abortion law that threatened to override states’ pro-life laws and remove restrictions on abortion up to the point of birth, in some cases. Another Catholic, President Joe Biden, strongly supported the measure and would have signed it into law ― but the attempt fortunately failed. In May of 2022, when the draft of the upcoming Supreme Court ruling was leaked to the press in Roe v. Wade, that there is no federal constitutional right to abortion―among Catholic governors, congressmen and senators, there were 84 Catholic Democrats and 2 Catholic Republicans who expressed their dissatisfaction with the anticipated ruling overturning federal constitutional rights to abortion. Similarly, around 63% of American Catholics are in favor of abortion for those who seek it.
False Foundations Lead to an Inevitable Fall
Only a few decades ago, a Christian identity was so common among Americans that it could almost be taken for granted. Since the 1990s, large numbers of Americans have left Christianity to join the growing ranks of U.S. adults who describe their religious identity as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular.” As recently as the early 1990s, about 90% of U.S. adults identified as Christians. But today, less than two-thirds (63%) of adults are Christians. In 1990, 90% identified as Christian and 5% said they were religiously unaffiliated. In the next two decades, the share of “nones” or religiously unaffiliated numbers crept up slowly, reaching 9% in 1993. But then non-affiliation started speeding up ― in 1996, the share of unaffiliated Americans jumped to 12%, and two years later it was 14%. This growth has continued, and in 2021 almost one-third (29%) of Americans say they have “no religion.”
Is God going to bless America? Like hell He is! Holy Scripture is full of instances and warnings where God has severely punished those who fall away from Him. God lays down a principle that He has always followed and always will follow: “For I am the Lord, and I change not!” (Malachias 3:6). “God is not a man, that He should be changed” (Numbers 23:19). “With God there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (James 1:17). : Here is just one of those many instances and warnings. It is an abbreviated version of chapter 26 from the Book of Leviticus:
“If you walk in My precepts, and keep My commandments, and do them, then I will give you rain in due seasons. And the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit. The threshing of your harvest shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land without fear. I will give peace in your coasts―you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid. The sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. Five of yours shall pursue a hundred others, and a hundred of you ten thousand―your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. I will look on you, and make you increase―you shall be multiplied and I will establish My covenant with you. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people. But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws, and contemn My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, and to make void My covenant, then …” (Leviticus 26:3-14) … then, for not “paying the price” and not obeying all is commanded, God says:
“I will break the pride of your stubbornness! I will destroy and break your idols! You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you! I will quickly visit you with poverty and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes, and consume your lives. I will set My face against you, and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you. And when you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies! I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins! And I will bring in upon you the sword. I will bring your cities to be a wilderness. Your labor shall be spent in vain, the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit. You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies. And I will send in upon you beasts, to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number, and that your highways may be desolate. And I will destroy your land. And I will scatter you, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed. You shall perish among the Gentiles, and an enemy’s land shall consume you. And if some of them still remain, they shall pine away in their iniquities in the land of their enemies, and they shall be afflicted for the sins of their fathers, and their own―until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, by which they have sinned against Me, and walked contrary unto Me. Then shall they pray for their sins!” (Leviticus 26:16-41).
Our Lord echoes those words in the New Testament, when he warns what will happen to those who ignore His words and teachings: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Therefore, everyone that hears My words and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears My words and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27).
In recent centuries, Our Lady has echoed those Divine warnings and threats: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … There will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times making it easy for everyone to live in sin … Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … Unbridled luxury and impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … Many will turn upon Religion … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … Many men in this world afflict the Lord … Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … God will strike in an unprecedented way. God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … Physical and moral agonies will be suffered ... God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other. The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God.” (quotes from Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima, Our Lady of Akita).
False Foundations Lead to an Inevitable Fall
Only a few decades ago, a Christian identity was so common among Americans that it could almost be taken for granted. Since the 1990s, large numbers of Americans have left Christianity to join the growing ranks of U.S. adults who describe their religious identity as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular.” As recently as the early 1990s, about 90% of U.S. adults identified as Christians. But today, less than two-thirds (63%) of adults are Christians. In 1990, 90% identified as Christian and 5% said they were religiously unaffiliated. In the next two decades, the share of “nones” or religiously unaffiliated numbers crept up slowly, reaching 9% in 1993. But then non-affiliation started speeding up ― in 1996, the share of unaffiliated Americans jumped to 12%, and two years later it was 14%. This growth has continued, and in 2021 almost one-third (29%) of Americans say they have “no religion.”
Is God going to bless America? Like hell He is! Holy Scripture is full of instances and warnings where God has severely punished those who fall away from Him. God lays down a principle that He has always followed and always will follow: “For I am the Lord, and I change not!” (Malachias 3:6). “God is not a man, that He should be changed” (Numbers 23:19). “With God there is no change, nor shadow of alteration” (James 1:17). : Here is just one of those many instances and warnings. It is an abbreviated version of chapter 26 from the Book of Leviticus:
“If you walk in My precepts, and keep My commandments, and do them, then I will give you rain in due seasons. And the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit. The threshing of your harvest shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land without fear. I will give peace in your coasts―you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid. The sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. Five of yours shall pursue a hundred others, and a hundred of you ten thousand―your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. I will look on you, and make you increase―you shall be multiplied and I will establish My covenant with you. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people. But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws, and contemn My judgments so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, and to make void My covenant, then …” (Leviticus 26:3-14) … then, for not “paying the price” and not obeying all is commanded, God says:
“I will break the pride of your stubbornness! I will destroy and break your idols! You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you! I will quickly visit you with poverty and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes, and consume your lives. I will set My face against you, and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you. And when you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies! I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins! And I will bring in upon you the sword. I will bring your cities to be a wilderness. Your labor shall be spent in vain, the ground shall not bring forth her increase, nor the trees yield their fruit. You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies. And I will send in upon you beasts, to destroy you and your cattle, and make you few in number, and that your highways may be desolate. And I will destroy your land. And I will scatter you, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed. You shall perish among the Gentiles, and an enemy’s land shall consume you. And if some of them still remain, they shall pine away in their iniquities in the land of their enemies, and they shall be afflicted for the sins of their fathers, and their own―until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, by which they have sinned against Me, and walked contrary unto Me. Then shall they pray for their sins!” (Leviticus 26:16-41).
Our Lord echoes those words in the New Testament, when he warns what will happen to those who ignore His words and teachings: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Therefore, everyone that hears My words and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears My words and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27).
In recent centuries, Our Lady has echoed those Divine warnings and threats: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … There will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times making it easy for everyone to live in sin … Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … Unbridled luxury and impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … Many will turn upon Religion … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … Many men in this world afflict the Lord … Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … God will strike in an unprecedented way. God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … Physical and moral agonies will be suffered ... God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other. The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God.” (quotes from Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima, Our Lady of Akita).
Article 6
Sunday & Monday, July 7th & 8th
Independence Leads to In-Fighting & Tyranny
Sunday & Monday, July 7th & 8th
Independence Leads to In-Fighting & Tyranny
Dangers of Democracy and Independence
We can be independent in two chief ways―in what we think and what we do. For the intents and purposes of this article, we shall call it logical independence (think what you want to think, regardless of whether it is true or not) and political independence (say and do what you want to do, regardless of whether it is morally correct or not).
As an intellectual phenomenon, Logic is historically rooted in several civilizations, including ancient China, Greece, and India. As a scientific discipline, Aristotle was the first thinker to devise a logical system. In Ancient Athens, the birthplace of democracy, the democratic assembly was an arena filled with rhetoric that was not controlled by logic, facts or truth―just like we see today! Funny how some things never change, huh? Aristotle had not yet formalized the basic concepts and principles of logic, so those who sought influence learned from the so-called Sophists, who were teachers of rhetoric who focused on controlling the feelings and emotions of their listeners, rather than influencing their logical thinking. Therein lay the trap! Power belonged to anyone who could harness the collective will of the citizens directly by appealing to their feelings and emotions rather than using evidence, facts and logic to influence their minds―just like we see today! Funny how some things never change, huh?
Forms of Government
Aristotle argued that there were six general ways in which societies could be organized under political rule, depending on who ruled, and for whom they ruled.
We can be independent in two chief ways―in what we think and what we do. For the intents and purposes of this article, we shall call it logical independence (think what you want to think, regardless of whether it is true or not) and political independence (say and do what you want to do, regardless of whether it is morally correct or not).
As an intellectual phenomenon, Logic is historically rooted in several civilizations, including ancient China, Greece, and India. As a scientific discipline, Aristotle was the first thinker to devise a logical system. In Ancient Athens, the birthplace of democracy, the democratic assembly was an arena filled with rhetoric that was not controlled by logic, facts or truth―just like we see today! Funny how some things never change, huh? Aristotle had not yet formalized the basic concepts and principles of logic, so those who sought influence learned from the so-called Sophists, who were teachers of rhetoric who focused on controlling the feelings and emotions of their listeners, rather than influencing their logical thinking. Therein lay the trap! Power belonged to anyone who could harness the collective will of the citizens directly by appealing to their feelings and emotions rather than using evidence, facts and logic to influence their minds―just like we see today! Funny how some things never change, huh?
Forms of Government
Aristotle argued that there were six general ways in which societies could be organized under political rule, depending on who ruled, and for whom they ruled.
Those in the first row he referred to as “true forms” of government, while those in the second row were the “defective and perverted forms” of the first three. Aristotle writes: “The true forms of government, therefore, are those in which the one, or the few, or the many, govern with a view to the common interest; but governments which rule with a view to the private interest, whether to the one, or the few, or of the many, are perversions … Tyranny is a kind of monarchy which has in view the interest of the monarch only; oligarchy has in view the interest of the wealthy; democracy, of the needy: none of them the common good of all.”
Misleading speech is the essential element of tyrants and despots, because tyrants and despots need the support of the people. These demagogues (political agitators, rabble-rousers) manipulated the Athenian people and left a legacy of instability, bloodshed and genocidal warfare, described in The History of the Peloponnesian War, by the Greek historian Thucydides. Greece’s bloody history is also why Plato associated democracy with tyranny in Book VIII of The Republic. It was a democracy without constraint against the worst impulses of the majority. That record is why the philosopher of Ancient Greece, Socrates, before being sentenced to death by democratic vote, chastised the Athenian democracy for its elevation of mere popular opinion and feeling at the expense of facts and truth.
Another Ancient Greek philosopher, Plato, argued that the inevitable next step in political evolution after democracy is tyranny. Plato, one of the earliest thinkers and writers about democracy, predicted that letting people govern themselves would eventually lead the masses to support the rule of tyrants. Many political thinkers throughout history (e.g. Polybius, Machiavelli, John Adams) agreed with him.
In Book VIII of The Republic, Plato describes how democracy can arise from oligarchy and descend into tyranny. Starting with the oligarchical state, in which the rulers aim to become as wealthy as possible, Plato explains how oligarchy reduces many ordinary citizens to poverty. Eventually, the class of citizens who have been reduced to poverty become resentful of the rich and seize political power, distributing property and freedom equally among all citizens. However, just as an excessive desire for wealth leads to the downfall of oligarchy, an excessive desire for freedom leads to the downfall of democracy. In a democracy, citizens are free to indulge any appetite and live any kind of life they desire. These appetites begin to grow, and the democratic man begins to reject any principle which restricts his ability to satisfy his desires. He starts to chafe at the lightest touch of authority and ceases to care about any laws that interfere with his freedom. When he becomes unhappy with the democratic leaders, he accuses them of being “cursed oligarchs”, and trials and impeachments begin. The democratic city becomes disordered and chaotic, and the citizens look for a leader who can restore order. And so, with the support of the mob, the tyrant comes into power.
The Ancient Greek and Roman historian, Polybius, a native of Greece, wrote in the 140s and 130s BC in Rome. Today, in recent decades, he has become unfashionable ―but he used to be all the rage. To the Founding Fathers of the United States, he was the number one historian of Ancient Greece and Rome. Polybius concluded from his research that there is a sequence of regime types that a polity (which means a republic, commonwealth, country, nation, society, state, etc.) will cycle through if it is allowed to develop naturally over time―if it is not destroyed by a major disaster, or interfered with by powerful external forces. According to his historical model, which he calls anacyclosis, there are six archetypal regimes, of which all other regime types are merely variations of or combinations. And these six archetypes tend to arise in the following sequence: kingdom, tyranny, aristocracy, oligarchy, democracy, and finally ochlocracry, which means mob rule.
Kingship comes first because, well, virtually all countries in the world can trace their history back to a time when they were ruled by kings and queens. But over time, according to Polybius, a kingdom will gradually degenerate into tyranny. In reaction to that, the nobility may overthrow the tyrant and establish an aristocracy, i.e. a constitutional regime led by a small group of accomplished leaders. In time, this aristocracy will degenerate into an oligarchy, in which wealth becomes the sole criterion and measure for power. But if the middle class is galvanized, it may overthrow the oligarchs and establish a democracy. In due course, democracy degenerates into ochlocracy or “mob rule,” plagued by demagogues (political agitators and rabble-rousers) and factional strife. Finally, the state descends into civil war, which results in an autocrat taking power, thus bringing the cycle back to a form of one-man-rule.
Modern Democracies Evolving into Modern Tyrannies
John Adams was an American statesman, attorney, diplomat, writer, and Founding Father, who served as the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before his presidency, he was a leader of the American Revolution that achieved independence from Great Britain. In a letter to John Taylor, December 1814, he wrote: “Remember Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes exhausts and [destroys] itself. . .It is in vain to say that Democracy is … less proud, less selfish, less ambitious or less avaricious than Aristocracy or Monarchy. It is not true in fact and nowhere appears in history. Those passions are the same in all men under all forms of simple government, and when unchecked, produce the same effects of fraud, violence and cruelty.”
Benjamin Franklin, one of the foremost of the Founding Fathers, helped draft the Declaration of Independence and was one of its signers. He famously said: “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what they are going to have for lunch!”
The 19th century British politician, Auberon Herbert, had this to say concerning the morality of a direct democracy: “Five men are in a room. Because three men take one view and two another, have the three men any moral right to enforce their view on the other two men? What magical power comes over the three men that because they are one more in number than the two men, therefore they suddenly become possessors of the minds and bodies of these others? As long as they were two to two, so long we supposed each man remained master of his own mind and body; but from the moment that another man, acting Heaven only knows from what motives, has joined himself to one party or the other, that party has become straightaway possessed of the souls and bodies of the other party. Was there ever such a degrading and indefensible superstition?” (Auberon Herbert, The Right and Wrong of Compulsion by the State).
Or as Frank Karsten and Karel Beckman note in their book Beyond Democracy: “It is not ‘the will of the people’, but the will of politicians – prompted by groups of professional lobbyists, interest groups and activists – that reigns in a democracy.” (Frank Karsten and Karel Beckman, Beyond Democracy). Citizens becomes subjects, the state becomes the master, and even if we are still granted the right to vote, we are enslaved nonetheless, or as Lysander Spooner wrote: “A man is none the less a slave because he is allowed to choose a new master once in a term of years.” (Lysander Spooner, The Constitution of No Authority).
Perhaps the most insightful commentator on the newly emerging American democracy in the 19th century, was the young French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville, who is best known for his insightful commentary on American democracy found in De la démocratie en Amérique (Democracy in America). The French government sent Tocqueville to the United States to report on American prison reforms. He undertook a nine-month, seven-thousand-mile tour of the United States east of the Mississippi. Tocqueville marveled at the spirit of democracy that pervaded American life. However, much of what he saw of American democracy caused him concern.
In analyzing the democratic revolution in the United States, he wrote that the major benefit of democracy came in the form of equality before the law. A great deal of the social revolution of democracy, however, carried negative consequences. Tocqueville described a new type of tyranny, the tyranny of the majority, which overpowers the will of minorities and individuals and was, in his view, unleashed by democracy in the United States. The greatest danger Tocqueville saw was that public opinion would become an all-powerful force, and that the majority could tyrannize unpopular minorities and marginal individuals. Tocqueville’s experience led him to believe that democracy was an unstoppable force that would one day overthrow monarchy around the world. He wrote: “The authority of the majority possesses a power which is physical and moral at the same time. It acts upon the will of men as well as upon the actions of men―and it represses not only all contest, but all controversy. I know no country in which there is so little true independence of mind and freedom of discussion as in America.”
In the run-up to the 2016 US presidential election, an interesting article went viral. Part of what made it interesting was that it discussed a topic that rarely goes viral nowadays, namely Plato’s The Republic. The article was entitled “America Has Never Been So Ripe for Tyranny.” In it, the journalist Andrew Sullivan made the case that, based on what Plato had written in The Republic, America is showing all the signs of a late stage democracy that is sliding towards tyranny.
Andrew Sullivan states in his argument that America is looking more and more like the late-stage democracy Plato describes in books eight and nine of The Republic. Plato shows how, in Sullivan’s words, “a late-stage democracy, dripping with decadence and corruption, with elites dedicated primarily to enriching themselves, and a people well past any kind of civic virtue, morphs so easily into tyranny.” This is not hard to see in the rebellious absolute license to think, say and do what you want in the current late-stage democracy in politics today. As Sullivan writes:
“When Plato’s tyrant first comes to power — on a wave of populist hatred of the existing elites — there is a period of relative calm when he just gives away stuff: at first he promises much “in private and public, and grant[s] freedom from debts and distribute[s] land to the people and those around himself” (or, say, a trillion-dollar unfunded tax cut). He aims to please. But then, as he accustoms himself to power, and feels more comfortable, “he suspects certain men of having free thoughts and not putting up with his ruling … Some of those who helped in setting him up and are in power — the manliest among them — speak frankly to him and to one another, criticizing what is happening … Then the tyrant must gradually do away with all of them, if he’s going to rule, until he has left neither friend nor enemy of any worth whatsoever.”
Democracy, Independence & Protestantism
Most of us were born into a democracy, were raised in a democracy and know nothing else but a democracy. That is why a democracy has become the only form of government we know, believe in, and accept―much like Protestants only know their heretical version of Christianity and sincerely believe it and unquestionably accept it. In one sense, modern-day Democracies and Protestantism are alike in that they reject any authority outside of themselves ― independence is their common denominator, it is what they have in common. They think what they want, they say what they want, they do what they want, they eliminate what they do not like. This is especially true with reference to God and God’s Laws. Out of almost 200 countries worldwide, only 5 countries, besides the Vatican, have Catholicism (God’s established religion for the time after Christ) as the state religion―Costa Rica; Malta; Monaco; El Salvador; and Liechtenstein. Those 5 countries are not major powers, but tiny countries with tiny populations: Costa Rica (5 million); Malta (0.5 million); Monaco (0.03 million); El Salvador (6 million); and Liechtenstein (0.4 million) ― which is a total of around 12 million (a total that is below that of many metropolitan cities in the world). Outside of Costa Rica; Malta; Monaco; El Salvador and Liechtenstein the Catholic Faith is allowed, but the State declares itself independent of the Catholic Faith and merely gives it a status of being one of the many other false religions within the State.
As Our Lord says: “By their fruits you shall know them! Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit! A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). The fruits of modern-day independent democracies are not good! They favor and pass laws that tolerate and allow sins such as abortion, contraception, divorce, same-sex marriages, gender-change, pornography, etc. Sinners might call those “good” fruits―but God most certainly sees them as evil fruits. But when independence makes you imagine that you are independent of God and His laws―then anything goes! You can think, say and do anything you want! That is principle behind democracies, independence, Liberalism, Modernism, Protestantism, Atheism, Communism, etc. They make one hell of a stew and most people eat it!
Behind the Curtain of Democracy, Independence & Protestantism
Most people are truly oblivious to the true and ultimate causes behind Democracy, Independence and Protestantism. People have lost the art and skill of thinking deeply about things. This “fast-track” world conditions them to be a “trigger-happy”, superficial, skim-the-surface, “no-time-to-think”, no time for research, kind of people. Education―which is largely dictated by national policies―has helped greatly in “dumbing-down” people, making content less intellectually demanding and thus making students less intelligent. This deliberate oversimplification of intellectual content can be seen in education, literature, cinema, news, video games, culture, and even in religion. Most Catholics today are truly dumb when compared to Catholics of old. Most of them cannot even give the correct answers to a child’s First Holy Communion Catechism, never mind a more advanced Sacrament of Confirmation Catechism! For the most part, they cannot name all the Ten Commandments, nor the Six Chief Commandments of the Church, nor the conditions required for a mortal sin, nor the conditions required for making a good confession, nor the conditions required for making a good Holy Communion, etc. Because of this general intellectual degeneration, they fail to unearth the deeper reasons and causes behind our modern day problems―such as Independence, Democracy, Protestantism, Atheism, Communism, etc. The ultimate cause behind all these things is Satan―and Satan cannot be defeated by puny natural human means and methods.
Our Lord calls Satan “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― if Satan is the prince of this world, then that means that he rules or has enormous power in the world. When Satan tempted Jesus in the desert, he showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world, boasting that they had been given to him: “The devil led Jesus onto a high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. And he said to Jesus: ‘To thee will I give all this power and the glory of them―for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them! If Thou therefore wilt adore before me, all shall be Thine!’” (Luke 4:5-7). Satan most certainly has all the kingdoms of the world in his grasp today! Holy Scripture adds: “Be sober and watch! Because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). “Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go forth and seduce the nations, which are over the four quarters of the Earth” (Apocalypse 20:7). “Give not place to the devil!” (Ephesians 4:27). Unfortunately, the world in general and politics in particular, have given place to the devil and Satan has firmly placed himself in their midst!
Our Lady revealed: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little … Satan, making use of both the good and the evil, will engage in a fierce battle to destroy the Church … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church … The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God ... The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor, with cruel and subtle astuteness, to make them deviate from the spirit of their vocation … The demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the, corrupting many of them … The devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts … The devil will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed … This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings!” (Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Akita).
Sister Lucia of Fatima adds: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriel Amorth, said: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican ... Legions of demons have lodged there! … In the Vatican there are members of Satanic cults―there are priests, monsignors and even cardinals! I know from people who reported to me how they got to know this directly. It is also something, that has been “confessed” several times by the Devil, himself, under obedience during the exorcisms … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon especially tempts the authorities of the Church―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact!”
The following words of Our Lord are very applicable to the rulers and chief politicians of the world today: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44). You have to be an idiot not to see that today’s politics is largely founded upon lies, deceitfulness and divisiveness. That is the hallmark of Satan―as Our Lord said―and Satan’s ultimate ploy is to divide so that he conquer. “Satan has desired to have you, so that he may sift you as wheat!” says Our Lord (Luke 22:31). To “sift” means to separate or take out or isolate as in by putting something through a sieve to separate one thing from another. Satan is increasingly sifting the world today!
Modern day politics is extremely and increasingly divisive―50% of Americans expect a civil war (=division) to break out within 10 years and many say they would trade democracy for a strong leader! Who will that strong leader be? It will be Satan―using his puppet the Antichrist. Satan’s whole ploy is to use his stooges (whom we mistakenly imagine as being the rulers of the world―such as the so-called anonymous “Elites” or “Money-Men” or Masons or Jews) to discredit democracy, to discredit the leaders of the world, to create chaos, division, pandemonium and panic in the world so that they will accept Satan’s “messiah” or appointee with open arms. As Our Lord said: “Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate―and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand!” (Matthew 12:25). We are told to watch out for and to avoid those who create division, especially in divided us from the teaching of God: “Mark them who make divisions and cause offences contrary to the doctrine which you have learned, and avoid them! For they that are such, serve not Christ our Lord, and by pleasing speeches and good words, seduce the hearts of the innocent!” (Romans 16:17-18). “The Lord hates him that sows discord among brethren!” (Proverbs 6:16-19).
What is Lacking?
God, charity and grace are lacking in politics. It is fairly obvious that God is excluded from politics―just look at the vast number of sinful laws that all nations have passed which diametrically oppose the laws of God and protect sins like abortion, fornication, contraception, divorce, same-sex marriages, homosexuality, transgenderism, pornography, to name just a few.
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and He is be loved above all things: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). What does it mean “to love God” and how do we know that we are loving God? Our Lord tells us: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words … He that does not love Me, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24). “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Grace―sanctifying grace to be precise―can only exist in a baptized soul who has no unconfessed mortal sin on the soul. The vast majority of the world’s population is not baptized and the vast majority of Catholics no longer go to Confession, or go very rarely. A recipe for disaster and a guarantee of a lack of sanctifying grace. It is sanctifying grace that makes us pleasing to God―but very few care about sanctifying grace these days!
“The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon men [and politicians included], to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! There is none that does good―no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully, the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! There is no fear of God before their eyes” (Psalm 13:2-3). They are trying to “go-it-alone” but Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). We are told that whatever we do, we should do all things for the glory of God: “Whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31). Sadly, we do most things for our own glory!
Misleading speech is the essential element of tyrants and despots, because tyrants and despots need the support of the people. These demagogues (political agitators, rabble-rousers) manipulated the Athenian people and left a legacy of instability, bloodshed and genocidal warfare, described in The History of the Peloponnesian War, by the Greek historian Thucydides. Greece’s bloody history is also why Plato associated democracy with tyranny in Book VIII of The Republic. It was a democracy without constraint against the worst impulses of the majority. That record is why the philosopher of Ancient Greece, Socrates, before being sentenced to death by democratic vote, chastised the Athenian democracy for its elevation of mere popular opinion and feeling at the expense of facts and truth.
Another Ancient Greek philosopher, Plato, argued that the inevitable next step in political evolution after democracy is tyranny. Plato, one of the earliest thinkers and writers about democracy, predicted that letting people govern themselves would eventually lead the masses to support the rule of tyrants. Many political thinkers throughout history (e.g. Polybius, Machiavelli, John Adams) agreed with him.
In Book VIII of The Republic, Plato describes how democracy can arise from oligarchy and descend into tyranny. Starting with the oligarchical state, in which the rulers aim to become as wealthy as possible, Plato explains how oligarchy reduces many ordinary citizens to poverty. Eventually, the class of citizens who have been reduced to poverty become resentful of the rich and seize political power, distributing property and freedom equally among all citizens. However, just as an excessive desire for wealth leads to the downfall of oligarchy, an excessive desire for freedom leads to the downfall of democracy. In a democracy, citizens are free to indulge any appetite and live any kind of life they desire. These appetites begin to grow, and the democratic man begins to reject any principle which restricts his ability to satisfy his desires. He starts to chafe at the lightest touch of authority and ceases to care about any laws that interfere with his freedom. When he becomes unhappy with the democratic leaders, he accuses them of being “cursed oligarchs”, and trials and impeachments begin. The democratic city becomes disordered and chaotic, and the citizens look for a leader who can restore order. And so, with the support of the mob, the tyrant comes into power.
The Ancient Greek and Roman historian, Polybius, a native of Greece, wrote in the 140s and 130s BC in Rome. Today, in recent decades, he has become unfashionable ―but he used to be all the rage. To the Founding Fathers of the United States, he was the number one historian of Ancient Greece and Rome. Polybius concluded from his research that there is a sequence of regime types that a polity (which means a republic, commonwealth, country, nation, society, state, etc.) will cycle through if it is allowed to develop naturally over time―if it is not destroyed by a major disaster, or interfered with by powerful external forces. According to his historical model, which he calls anacyclosis, there are six archetypal regimes, of which all other regime types are merely variations of or combinations. And these six archetypes tend to arise in the following sequence: kingdom, tyranny, aristocracy, oligarchy, democracy, and finally ochlocracry, which means mob rule.
Kingship comes first because, well, virtually all countries in the world can trace their history back to a time when they were ruled by kings and queens. But over time, according to Polybius, a kingdom will gradually degenerate into tyranny. In reaction to that, the nobility may overthrow the tyrant and establish an aristocracy, i.e. a constitutional regime led by a small group of accomplished leaders. In time, this aristocracy will degenerate into an oligarchy, in which wealth becomes the sole criterion and measure for power. But if the middle class is galvanized, it may overthrow the oligarchs and establish a democracy. In due course, democracy degenerates into ochlocracy or “mob rule,” plagued by demagogues (political agitators and rabble-rousers) and factional strife. Finally, the state descends into civil war, which results in an autocrat taking power, thus bringing the cycle back to a form of one-man-rule.
Modern Democracies Evolving into Modern Tyrannies
John Adams was an American statesman, attorney, diplomat, writer, and Founding Father, who served as the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before his presidency, he was a leader of the American Revolution that achieved independence from Great Britain. In a letter to John Taylor, December 1814, he wrote: “Remember Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes exhausts and [destroys] itself. . .It is in vain to say that Democracy is … less proud, less selfish, less ambitious or less avaricious than Aristocracy or Monarchy. It is not true in fact and nowhere appears in history. Those passions are the same in all men under all forms of simple government, and when unchecked, produce the same effects of fraud, violence and cruelty.”
Benjamin Franklin, one of the foremost of the Founding Fathers, helped draft the Declaration of Independence and was one of its signers. He famously said: “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what they are going to have for lunch!”
The 19th century British politician, Auberon Herbert, had this to say concerning the morality of a direct democracy: “Five men are in a room. Because three men take one view and two another, have the three men any moral right to enforce their view on the other two men? What magical power comes over the three men that because they are one more in number than the two men, therefore they suddenly become possessors of the minds and bodies of these others? As long as they were two to two, so long we supposed each man remained master of his own mind and body; but from the moment that another man, acting Heaven only knows from what motives, has joined himself to one party or the other, that party has become straightaway possessed of the souls and bodies of the other party. Was there ever such a degrading and indefensible superstition?” (Auberon Herbert, The Right and Wrong of Compulsion by the State).
Or as Frank Karsten and Karel Beckman note in their book Beyond Democracy: “It is not ‘the will of the people’, but the will of politicians – prompted by groups of professional lobbyists, interest groups and activists – that reigns in a democracy.” (Frank Karsten and Karel Beckman, Beyond Democracy). Citizens becomes subjects, the state becomes the master, and even if we are still granted the right to vote, we are enslaved nonetheless, or as Lysander Spooner wrote: “A man is none the less a slave because he is allowed to choose a new master once in a term of years.” (Lysander Spooner, The Constitution of No Authority).
Perhaps the most insightful commentator on the newly emerging American democracy in the 19th century, was the young French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville, who is best known for his insightful commentary on American democracy found in De la démocratie en Amérique (Democracy in America). The French government sent Tocqueville to the United States to report on American prison reforms. He undertook a nine-month, seven-thousand-mile tour of the United States east of the Mississippi. Tocqueville marveled at the spirit of democracy that pervaded American life. However, much of what he saw of American democracy caused him concern.
In analyzing the democratic revolution in the United States, he wrote that the major benefit of democracy came in the form of equality before the law. A great deal of the social revolution of democracy, however, carried negative consequences. Tocqueville described a new type of tyranny, the tyranny of the majority, which overpowers the will of minorities and individuals and was, in his view, unleashed by democracy in the United States. The greatest danger Tocqueville saw was that public opinion would become an all-powerful force, and that the majority could tyrannize unpopular minorities and marginal individuals. Tocqueville’s experience led him to believe that democracy was an unstoppable force that would one day overthrow monarchy around the world. He wrote: “The authority of the majority possesses a power which is physical and moral at the same time. It acts upon the will of men as well as upon the actions of men―and it represses not only all contest, but all controversy. I know no country in which there is so little true independence of mind and freedom of discussion as in America.”
In the run-up to the 2016 US presidential election, an interesting article went viral. Part of what made it interesting was that it discussed a topic that rarely goes viral nowadays, namely Plato’s The Republic. The article was entitled “America Has Never Been So Ripe for Tyranny.” In it, the journalist Andrew Sullivan made the case that, based on what Plato had written in The Republic, America is showing all the signs of a late stage democracy that is sliding towards tyranny.
Andrew Sullivan states in his argument that America is looking more and more like the late-stage democracy Plato describes in books eight and nine of The Republic. Plato shows how, in Sullivan’s words, “a late-stage democracy, dripping with decadence and corruption, with elites dedicated primarily to enriching themselves, and a people well past any kind of civic virtue, morphs so easily into tyranny.” This is not hard to see in the rebellious absolute license to think, say and do what you want in the current late-stage democracy in politics today. As Sullivan writes:
“When Plato’s tyrant first comes to power — on a wave of populist hatred of the existing elites — there is a period of relative calm when he just gives away stuff: at first he promises much “in private and public, and grant[s] freedom from debts and distribute[s] land to the people and those around himself” (or, say, a trillion-dollar unfunded tax cut). He aims to please. But then, as he accustoms himself to power, and feels more comfortable, “he suspects certain men of having free thoughts and not putting up with his ruling … Some of those who helped in setting him up and are in power — the manliest among them — speak frankly to him and to one another, criticizing what is happening … Then the tyrant must gradually do away with all of them, if he’s going to rule, until he has left neither friend nor enemy of any worth whatsoever.”
Democracy, Independence & Protestantism
Most of us were born into a democracy, were raised in a democracy and know nothing else but a democracy. That is why a democracy has become the only form of government we know, believe in, and accept―much like Protestants only know their heretical version of Christianity and sincerely believe it and unquestionably accept it. In one sense, modern-day Democracies and Protestantism are alike in that they reject any authority outside of themselves ― independence is their common denominator, it is what they have in common. They think what they want, they say what they want, they do what they want, they eliminate what they do not like. This is especially true with reference to God and God’s Laws. Out of almost 200 countries worldwide, only 5 countries, besides the Vatican, have Catholicism (God’s established religion for the time after Christ) as the state religion―Costa Rica; Malta; Monaco; El Salvador; and Liechtenstein. Those 5 countries are not major powers, but tiny countries with tiny populations: Costa Rica (5 million); Malta (0.5 million); Monaco (0.03 million); El Salvador (6 million); and Liechtenstein (0.4 million) ― which is a total of around 12 million (a total that is below that of many metropolitan cities in the world). Outside of Costa Rica; Malta; Monaco; El Salvador and Liechtenstein the Catholic Faith is allowed, but the State declares itself independent of the Catholic Faith and merely gives it a status of being one of the many other false religions within the State.
As Our Lord says: “By their fruits you shall know them! Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit! A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). The fruits of modern-day independent democracies are not good! They favor and pass laws that tolerate and allow sins such as abortion, contraception, divorce, same-sex marriages, gender-change, pornography, etc. Sinners might call those “good” fruits―but God most certainly sees them as evil fruits. But when independence makes you imagine that you are independent of God and His laws―then anything goes! You can think, say and do anything you want! That is principle behind democracies, independence, Liberalism, Modernism, Protestantism, Atheism, Communism, etc. They make one hell of a stew and most people eat it!
Behind the Curtain of Democracy, Independence & Protestantism
Most people are truly oblivious to the true and ultimate causes behind Democracy, Independence and Protestantism. People have lost the art and skill of thinking deeply about things. This “fast-track” world conditions them to be a “trigger-happy”, superficial, skim-the-surface, “no-time-to-think”, no time for research, kind of people. Education―which is largely dictated by national policies―has helped greatly in “dumbing-down” people, making content less intellectually demanding and thus making students less intelligent. This deliberate oversimplification of intellectual content can be seen in education, literature, cinema, news, video games, culture, and even in religion. Most Catholics today are truly dumb when compared to Catholics of old. Most of them cannot even give the correct answers to a child’s First Holy Communion Catechism, never mind a more advanced Sacrament of Confirmation Catechism! For the most part, they cannot name all the Ten Commandments, nor the Six Chief Commandments of the Church, nor the conditions required for a mortal sin, nor the conditions required for making a good confession, nor the conditions required for making a good Holy Communion, etc. Because of this general intellectual degeneration, they fail to unearth the deeper reasons and causes behind our modern day problems―such as Independence, Democracy, Protestantism, Atheism, Communism, etc. The ultimate cause behind all these things is Satan―and Satan cannot be defeated by puny natural human means and methods.
Our Lord calls Satan “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― if Satan is the prince of this world, then that means that he rules or has enormous power in the world. When Satan tempted Jesus in the desert, he showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world, boasting that they had been given to him: “The devil led Jesus onto a high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. And he said to Jesus: ‘To thee will I give all this power and the glory of them―for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them! If Thou therefore wilt adore before me, all shall be Thine!’” (Luke 4:5-7). Satan most certainly has all the kingdoms of the world in his grasp today! Holy Scripture adds: “Be sober and watch! Because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). “Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go forth and seduce the nations, which are over the four quarters of the Earth” (Apocalypse 20:7). “Give not place to the devil!” (Ephesians 4:27). Unfortunately, the world in general and politics in particular, have given place to the devil and Satan has firmly placed himself in their midst!
Our Lady revealed: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little … Satan, making use of both the good and the evil, will engage in a fierce battle to destroy the Church … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church … The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God ... The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor, with cruel and subtle astuteness, to make them deviate from the spirit of their vocation … The demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the, corrupting many of them … The devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts … The devil will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed … This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings!” (Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Akita).
Sister Lucia of Fatima adds: “The Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriel Amorth, said: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican ... Legions of demons have lodged there! … In the Vatican there are members of Satanic cults―there are priests, monsignors and even cardinals! I know from people who reported to me how they got to know this directly. It is also something, that has been “confessed” several times by the Devil, himself, under obedience during the exorcisms … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon especially tempts the authorities of the Church―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Evil exists in politics―quite often in fact!”
The following words of Our Lord are very applicable to the rulers and chief politicians of the world today: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44). You have to be an idiot not to see that today’s politics is largely founded upon lies, deceitfulness and divisiveness. That is the hallmark of Satan―as Our Lord said―and Satan’s ultimate ploy is to divide so that he conquer. “Satan has desired to have you, so that he may sift you as wheat!” says Our Lord (Luke 22:31). To “sift” means to separate or take out or isolate as in by putting something through a sieve to separate one thing from another. Satan is increasingly sifting the world today!
Modern day politics is extremely and increasingly divisive―50% of Americans expect a civil war (=division) to break out within 10 years and many say they would trade democracy for a strong leader! Who will that strong leader be? It will be Satan―using his puppet the Antichrist. Satan’s whole ploy is to use his stooges (whom we mistakenly imagine as being the rulers of the world―such as the so-called anonymous “Elites” or “Money-Men” or Masons or Jews) to discredit democracy, to discredit the leaders of the world, to create chaos, division, pandemonium and panic in the world so that they will accept Satan’s “messiah” or appointee with open arms. As Our Lord said: “Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate―and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand!” (Matthew 12:25). We are told to watch out for and to avoid those who create division, especially in divided us from the teaching of God: “Mark them who make divisions and cause offences contrary to the doctrine which you have learned, and avoid them! For they that are such, serve not Christ our Lord, and by pleasing speeches and good words, seduce the hearts of the innocent!” (Romans 16:17-18). “The Lord hates him that sows discord among brethren!” (Proverbs 6:16-19).
What is Lacking?
God, charity and grace are lacking in politics. It is fairly obvious that God is excluded from politics―just look at the vast number of sinful laws that all nations have passed which diametrically oppose the laws of God and protect sins like abortion, fornication, contraception, divorce, same-sex marriages, homosexuality, transgenderism, pornography, to name just a few.
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and He is be loved above all things: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). What does it mean “to love God” and how do we know that we are loving God? Our Lord tells us: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words … He that does not love Me, keeps not My words!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24). “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Grace―sanctifying grace to be precise―can only exist in a baptized soul who has no unconfessed mortal sin on the soul. The vast majority of the world’s population is not baptized and the vast majority of Catholics no longer go to Confession, or go very rarely. A recipe for disaster and a guarantee of a lack of sanctifying grace. It is sanctifying grace that makes us pleasing to God―but very few care about sanctifying grace these days!
“The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon men [and politicians included], to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! There is none that does good―no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully, the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! There is no fear of God before their eyes” (Psalm 13:2-3). They are trying to “go-it-alone” but Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). We are told that whatever we do, we should do all things for the glory of God: “Whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31). Sadly, we do most things for our own glory!
Article 5
Friday & Saturday, July 5th & 6th
The Seeds & Fruits of Independence
Friday & Saturday, July 5th & 6th
The Seeds & Fruits of Independence
Be Careful!
As they say: “Be careful what you ask for! God might just give it to you!” ― and it might be more than you can handle! Our Lord’s parable about the Prodigal Son is a clear example of that. The Prodigal Son wanted independence―and so his father reluctantly gave him his independence and left him to himself. The worst thing God can do is to leave you to yourself! “A certain man had two sons ― and the younger of them said to his father: ‘Father, give me the portion of substance that falls to me!’ And he divided unto them his substance. And not many days after, the younger son, gathering all together, went abroad into a far country and there wasted his substance, living riotously. And after he had spent all his money, there came a mighty famine in that country; and he began to be in want and need. And he went and cleaved to one of the citizens of that country. And he sent him into his farm to feed swine. And he would have liked to fill his belly with the husks the swine were eating; but no man gave unto him. And returning to himself, he said: ‘How many hired servants in my father's house abound with bread, and I here perish with hunger!’” (Luke 15:11-17).
Why not listen to God, and submit to His Will and Providence? Even Our Lord was not independent of His Father, and said of Himself: “I came down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 6:38) … “I seek not My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 5:30) … “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 4:34) … “I do nothing of Myself, but as the Father has taught Me!” (John 8:28) … “Amen, amen, I say unto you, the Son cannot do anything of Himself, but what He sees the Father doing―for what things soever He does, these the Son also does in like manner” (John 5:19) … “The words that I speak to you, I speak not of Myself. But the Father, Who abides in Me, He does the works” (John 14:10). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) … “For whosoever shall do the will of God, he is My brother, and My sister, and mother!” (Mark 3:35) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord!’ Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Good and Bad Independence―Independence and “Sindependence”
There is a “good” independence and a “bad” independence. A “good” independence is one that makes us independent from sin. A “bad” independence is one that that seeks a sinful independence―an independence that is not wanted by God. Thus a “bad” independence or “sinful” independence is one that refuses to accept and obey lawful leaders who rule according to God’s laws: “They that have believing masters, let them not despise them, but serve them the rather, because they are faithful” (1 Timothy 6:2) … “Be ye subject to every human creature for God’s sake―whether it be to the king as excelling, or to governors as sent by God for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of the good !… Be subject to your masters with all fear, not only to the good and gentle, but also to the bad and difficult” (1 Peter 2:13-18). A “bad” independence or “sinful” independence would be wanting to be independent of the laws of the land (if they are not sinful laws, e.g. contraception, abortion, same-sex marriages, prohibition of public religious symbols or acts, etc.). A “bad” independence or “sinful” independence would be the case in seeking to be independent of some or all of the teachings of the Catholic Church―to the point whereby you become a heretic or even start your own church, as in the case of the many different Protestant sects.
The Seedy Seed of Independence Foretold
Holy Scripture gives several indications of growth of independence from God resulting in our present day malady, virus or pandemic of Independence―or “Sindependence” as you could rightly call it. Ultimately, Original Sin―which we are born with―is the root of all sinful independence. You could even argue that Satan is at the root of Original Sin―since he formulated the very first Declaration of Independence when he cried: “Non serviam! ― I will not serve!” in reference to God. Satan played an instrumental part in Adam and Eve’s “Declaration of Independence” from God by their decision to disobey God’s command forbidding them to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.
The Church teaches that Original Sin is essentially a sin of pride and disobedience. We are all born with this spiritual virus and we must spend our entire lives keeping it in check and under control. As Holy Scripture says: “A vain man is lifted up into pride and thinks himself born free” (Job 11:12). “Never suffer pride to reign in thy mind, or in thy words―for from it all perdition took its beginning” (Tobias 4:14). “Pride is the beginning of all sin. He that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions and it shall ruin him in the end!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Likewise, you could also say: “Pride is the beginning of all independence (or sindependence).” The Lord says: “Be not proud!” (Jeremias 13:15). “The proud one shall fall, he shall fall down, and there shall be none to lift him up!” (Jeremias 50:32). “Why is earth and ashes proud?” (Ecclesiasticus 10:9). “I hate arrogance and pride” (Proverbs 8:13). “From the beginning the proud have not been acceptable to Thee!” (Judith 9:16). “Every proud man is an abomination to the Lord” (Proverbs 16:5).
Hence Scripture also speaks of a general disobedience and independence from the laws of God in the End Times: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times! Men shall be lovers of themselves, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed-up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God. Having an appearance of godliness, but denying the power thereof … These also resist the truth, men corrupted in mind, reprobate concerning the Faith … Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-8). Why avoid them? Because “he that has fellowship with the proud, shall put on pride!” (Ecclesiasticus 13:1). If you mix with the proud, you will become proud. If you mix with the independently minded, you will become independently minded. “Evil men and seducers shall grow worse and worse―erring and driving others into error!” (2 Timothy 3:13). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord does Christ have with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Our Lord gives us the “end game” and end result of this ever growing independence from God, when He says: “The Son of man, when He comes [again], shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Our Lady merely echoes the words of her Son, concerning increasing “bad” independence, when she adds: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … One will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls … Many will turn upon Religion, who nourished them at her breast! Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent and be superior to others! … The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom!” (Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette). All of those above words of Our Lady could be said to refer a desire and a search for independence away from God and the Faith―and the consequences resulting from it.
Nearer our own times, in the 1950s, Our Lord told Blessed Elena Aiello: “The bad example of parents trains the family in scandal and infidelity, instead of virtue and prayer, which is almost dead on the lips of many. Stained and withered is the fountain of Faith and sanctity the home.” Our Lady added: “Men — just as at the time of the Deluge — have lost God’s way and are ruled by the spirit of Satan. The only valid means for placating Divine Justice is to pray and do penance, returning to God with sincere sorrow for the faults committed. How can the world be saved from the disaster that is about to crash down upon the misleading nations, if man does not repent of his errors and failings? The only salvation is a complete repentance and return to God, and a true devotion to my Immaculate Heart, particularly in the daily recitation of my Rosary.”
Lost the Sense of Sin―Accepted the Spirit of Independence
Unfortunately, mankind (and that includes Catholics) is not returning to God, but is increasingly distancing itself from God. We are living in an era of “Think what you want! Do what you want!” ― which is essentially the guiding principle behind Rationalism, Liberalism and Modernism. In both the religious and secular domains―in the Church and in the world―most people have bought into that erroneous and dangerous principle, and so they think what they want and do what they want.
This is reflected in the words of most of the popes since Pope Pius XII, who said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!” In 2005, Pope John Paul II wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!” Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin!” Even Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Losing the sense of sin and being independent go hand-in-hand, they are partners and bedfellows. The more we become independent from God and His laws, the more we lose the sense of sin. When pride enters our lives, it discourages us from dependence on anyone but ourselves; yet God says that we are to depend on Him alone: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” says Christ (John 15:5). Yet our pride fosters and increases our sense of independence and we falsely begin to think that there are some things that we CAN do without God―which then leads us to think that we can do MANY things without God, or even MOST things without God! “Pride is the beginning of all sin―and he that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions, and it shall ruin him in the end!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Man’s independence from God ultimately leads to man’s slavery to Satan in Hell. This false independence to think what you want and do what you want is behind our pandemics of pornography, immodesty, adultery, fornication, divorce, drunkenness, drug use, sexual abuse, physical abuse, rioting, looting, etc.
As Our Lord says: “Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit! A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit! Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:17-20). Today, unfortunately, there are many trees being cast into the fire―as Our Lady stated at Fatima: “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” In Hell, those souls find out that there was never such a thing a true and total independence―by seeking independence, they merely found themselves ultimately enslaved to Satan in Hell for eternity. Not even Christ sought independence―as stated above: Even Our Lord was not independent of His Father, and said of Himself: “I came down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 6:38) … “I seek not My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 5:30) … “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 4:34) … “I do nothing of Myself, but as the Father has taught Me!” (John 8:28). Why, then, do we seek independence, when Christ said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5)? We are but dust and ashes and to dust and ashes we will return one day, as we are told on Ash Wednesday as the priest imposes ashes on our foreheads whilst saying: “Remember man that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return!” Yes―that is all that we are: “I am dust and ashes!” (Genesis 18:27). “Why is earth and ashes proud?” (Ecclesiasticus 10:9).
Cast Out the Seeds of Pride and Independence―Sow the Seeds of Humility, Dependence and Interdependence
We all know the saying: “Like father, like son!” ― which is derived from Holy Scripture: “As the mother was, so also is her daughter!” (Ezechiel 16:44). Scripture tells us that a child will grow up and live as an adult according to the way he was accustomed to live like as a child: “A young man according to his way, even when he is old he will not depart from it!” (Proverbs 22:6). “By his inclinations a child is known” (Proverbs 20:11). “Instruct thy son, and he shall give delight to thy soul!” (Proverbs 29:1). “Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, and the rod of correction shall drive it away!” (Proverbs 22:15). “Chastise thy son, but to the killing of him set not thy soul” (Proverbs 19:18). “Fathers, provoke not your children to anger―but bring them up in the discipline and correction of the Lord!” (Ephesians 6:4). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell” (Proverbs 23:13).
Our Lady spoke of parenting to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “It is an act of justice, due to the eternal God, that every child, coming to the use of reason, direct its very first movement toward God. By knowing, it should begin to love Him, reverence Him and adore Him as its Creator and only true Lord. The parents are naturally bound to instruct their children, from their infancy, in this knowledge of God and to direct them with solicitous care, so that they may at once see their ultimate end, and seek it in their first acts of the intellect and will. They should with great watchfulness withdraw them from the childishness and puerile trickery and deceitfulness, to which depraved nature will incline them, if left without direction. The demons instill into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and they incite the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition. If the fathers and mothers would be solicitous to prevent these vanities and perverted habits of their children, and would instruct them from their infancy in the knowledge of their God and Creator, then they would afterwards easily accustom them to know and adore Him. Parents must learn to love their children, help them, nourish them, exhort them, correct them and lead them on in the way of salvation without remissness or carelessness!”
Today, ever increasingly so, parents stupidly foster independence and allow independence among their children. It can come to the point where children vehemently resist the authority of their parents, seeking instead to do what they want to do. Sadly, many parents do not combat these tendencies―or they fight them very weakly. In some families the children end up ruling the family! Often the cause is a negligence in instilling solid religious principles from the very earliest days of infancy. A child will more easily rebel and seek independence if it sees its parents rebelling and showing independence towards the Church and Church teachings. If parents refuse to take advice from priests, then it will not be long before children will refuse the advice of their parents. “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:8).
As they say: “Be careful what you ask for! God might just give it to you!” ― and it might be more than you can handle! Our Lord’s parable about the Prodigal Son is a clear example of that. The Prodigal Son wanted independence―and so his father reluctantly gave him his independence and left him to himself. The worst thing God can do is to leave you to yourself! “A certain man had two sons ― and the younger of them said to his father: ‘Father, give me the portion of substance that falls to me!’ And he divided unto them his substance. And not many days after, the younger son, gathering all together, went abroad into a far country and there wasted his substance, living riotously. And after he had spent all his money, there came a mighty famine in that country; and he began to be in want and need. And he went and cleaved to one of the citizens of that country. And he sent him into his farm to feed swine. And he would have liked to fill his belly with the husks the swine were eating; but no man gave unto him. And returning to himself, he said: ‘How many hired servants in my father's house abound with bread, and I here perish with hunger!’” (Luke 15:11-17).
Why not listen to God, and submit to His Will and Providence? Even Our Lord was not independent of His Father, and said of Himself: “I came down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 6:38) … “I seek not My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 5:30) … “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 4:34) … “I do nothing of Myself, but as the Father has taught Me!” (John 8:28) … “Amen, amen, I say unto you, the Son cannot do anything of Himself, but what He sees the Father doing―for what things soever He does, these the Son also does in like manner” (John 5:19) … “The words that I speak to you, I speak not of Myself. But the Father, Who abides in Me, He does the works” (John 14:10). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) … “For whosoever shall do the will of God, he is My brother, and My sister, and mother!” (Mark 3:35) … “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord!’ Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Good and Bad Independence―Independence and “Sindependence”
There is a “good” independence and a “bad” independence. A “good” independence is one that makes us independent from sin. A “bad” independence is one that that seeks a sinful independence―an independence that is not wanted by God. Thus a “bad” independence or “sinful” independence is one that refuses to accept and obey lawful leaders who rule according to God’s laws: “They that have believing masters, let them not despise them, but serve them the rather, because they are faithful” (1 Timothy 6:2) … “Be ye subject to every human creature for God’s sake―whether it be to the king as excelling, or to governors as sent by God for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of the good !… Be subject to your masters with all fear, not only to the good and gentle, but also to the bad and difficult” (1 Peter 2:13-18). A “bad” independence or “sinful” independence would be wanting to be independent of the laws of the land (if they are not sinful laws, e.g. contraception, abortion, same-sex marriages, prohibition of public religious symbols or acts, etc.). A “bad” independence or “sinful” independence would be the case in seeking to be independent of some or all of the teachings of the Catholic Church―to the point whereby you become a heretic or even start your own church, as in the case of the many different Protestant sects.
The Seedy Seed of Independence Foretold
Holy Scripture gives several indications of growth of independence from God resulting in our present day malady, virus or pandemic of Independence―or “Sindependence” as you could rightly call it. Ultimately, Original Sin―which we are born with―is the root of all sinful independence. You could even argue that Satan is at the root of Original Sin―since he formulated the very first Declaration of Independence when he cried: “Non serviam! ― I will not serve!” in reference to God. Satan played an instrumental part in Adam and Eve’s “Declaration of Independence” from God by their decision to disobey God’s command forbidding them to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.
The Church teaches that Original Sin is essentially a sin of pride and disobedience. We are all born with this spiritual virus and we must spend our entire lives keeping it in check and under control. As Holy Scripture says: “A vain man is lifted up into pride and thinks himself born free” (Job 11:12). “Never suffer pride to reign in thy mind, or in thy words―for from it all perdition took its beginning” (Tobias 4:14). “Pride is the beginning of all sin. He that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions and it shall ruin him in the end!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Likewise, you could also say: “Pride is the beginning of all independence (or sindependence).” The Lord says: “Be not proud!” (Jeremias 13:15). “The proud one shall fall, he shall fall down, and there shall be none to lift him up!” (Jeremias 50:32). “Why is earth and ashes proud?” (Ecclesiasticus 10:9). “I hate arrogance and pride” (Proverbs 8:13). “From the beginning the proud have not been acceptable to Thee!” (Judith 9:16). “Every proud man is an abomination to the Lord” (Proverbs 16:5).
Hence Scripture also speaks of a general disobedience and independence from the laws of God in the End Times: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times! Men shall be lovers of themselves, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed-up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God. Having an appearance of godliness, but denying the power thereof … These also resist the truth, men corrupted in mind, reprobate concerning the Faith … Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-8). Why avoid them? Because “he that has fellowship with the proud, shall put on pride!” (Ecclesiasticus 13:1). If you mix with the proud, you will become proud. If you mix with the independently minded, you will become independently minded. “Evil men and seducers shall grow worse and worse―erring and driving others into error!” (2 Timothy 3:13). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord does Christ have with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Our Lord gives us the “end game” and end result of this ever growing independence from God, when He says: “The Son of man, when He comes [again], shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Our Lady merely echoes the words of her Son, concerning increasing “bad” independence, when she adds: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … One will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls … Many will turn upon Religion, who nourished them at her breast! Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent and be superior to others! … The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom!” (Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette). All of those above words of Our Lady could be said to refer a desire and a search for independence away from God and the Faith―and the consequences resulting from it.
Nearer our own times, in the 1950s, Our Lord told Blessed Elena Aiello: “The bad example of parents trains the family in scandal and infidelity, instead of virtue and prayer, which is almost dead on the lips of many. Stained and withered is the fountain of Faith and sanctity the home.” Our Lady added: “Men — just as at the time of the Deluge — have lost God’s way and are ruled by the spirit of Satan. The only valid means for placating Divine Justice is to pray and do penance, returning to God with sincere sorrow for the faults committed. How can the world be saved from the disaster that is about to crash down upon the misleading nations, if man does not repent of his errors and failings? The only salvation is a complete repentance and return to God, and a true devotion to my Immaculate Heart, particularly in the daily recitation of my Rosary.”
Lost the Sense of Sin―Accepted the Spirit of Independence
Unfortunately, mankind (and that includes Catholics) is not returning to God, but is increasingly distancing itself from God. We are living in an era of “Think what you want! Do what you want!” ― which is essentially the guiding principle behind Rationalism, Liberalism and Modernism. In both the religious and secular domains―in the Church and in the world―most people have bought into that erroneous and dangerous principle, and so they think what they want and do what they want.
This is reflected in the words of most of the popes since Pope Pius XII, who said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!” In 2005, Pope John Paul II wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!” Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin!” Even Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Losing the sense of sin and being independent go hand-in-hand, they are partners and bedfellows. The more we become independent from God and His laws, the more we lose the sense of sin. When pride enters our lives, it discourages us from dependence on anyone but ourselves; yet God says that we are to depend on Him alone: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” says Christ (John 15:5). Yet our pride fosters and increases our sense of independence and we falsely begin to think that there are some things that we CAN do without God―which then leads us to think that we can do MANY things without God, or even MOST things without God! “Pride is the beginning of all sin―and he that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions, and it shall ruin him in the end!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Man’s independence from God ultimately leads to man’s slavery to Satan in Hell. This false independence to think what you want and do what you want is behind our pandemics of pornography, immodesty, adultery, fornication, divorce, drunkenness, drug use, sexual abuse, physical abuse, rioting, looting, etc.
As Our Lord says: “Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit! A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit! Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:17-20). Today, unfortunately, there are many trees being cast into the fire―as Our Lady stated at Fatima: “Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” In Hell, those souls find out that there was never such a thing a true and total independence―by seeking independence, they merely found themselves ultimately enslaved to Satan in Hell for eternity. Not even Christ sought independence―as stated above: Even Our Lord was not independent of His Father, and said of Himself: “I came down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 6:38) … “I seek not My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 5:30) … “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me!” (John 4:34) … “I do nothing of Myself, but as the Father has taught Me!” (John 8:28). Why, then, do we seek independence, when Christ said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5)? We are but dust and ashes and to dust and ashes we will return one day, as we are told on Ash Wednesday as the priest imposes ashes on our foreheads whilst saying: “Remember man that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return!” Yes―that is all that we are: “I am dust and ashes!” (Genesis 18:27). “Why is earth and ashes proud?” (Ecclesiasticus 10:9).
Cast Out the Seeds of Pride and Independence―Sow the Seeds of Humility, Dependence and Interdependence
We all know the saying: “Like father, like son!” ― which is derived from Holy Scripture: “As the mother was, so also is her daughter!” (Ezechiel 16:44). Scripture tells us that a child will grow up and live as an adult according to the way he was accustomed to live like as a child: “A young man according to his way, even when he is old he will not depart from it!” (Proverbs 22:6). “By his inclinations a child is known” (Proverbs 20:11). “Instruct thy son, and he shall give delight to thy soul!” (Proverbs 29:1). “Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, and the rod of correction shall drive it away!” (Proverbs 22:15). “Chastise thy son, but to the killing of him set not thy soul” (Proverbs 19:18). “Fathers, provoke not your children to anger―but bring them up in the discipline and correction of the Lord!” (Ephesians 6:4). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell” (Proverbs 23:13).
Our Lady spoke of parenting to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “It is an act of justice, due to the eternal God, that every child, coming to the use of reason, direct its very first movement toward God. By knowing, it should begin to love Him, reverence Him and adore Him as its Creator and only true Lord. The parents are naturally bound to instruct their children, from their infancy, in this knowledge of God and to direct them with solicitous care, so that they may at once see their ultimate end, and seek it in their first acts of the intellect and will. They should with great watchfulness withdraw them from the childishness and puerile trickery and deceitfulness, to which depraved nature will incline them, if left without direction. The demons instill into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and they incite the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition. If the fathers and mothers would be solicitous to prevent these vanities and perverted habits of their children, and would instruct them from their infancy in the knowledge of their God and Creator, then they would afterwards easily accustom them to know and adore Him. Parents must learn to love their children, help them, nourish them, exhort them, correct them and lead them on in the way of salvation without remissness or carelessness!”
Today, ever increasingly so, parents stupidly foster independence and allow independence among their children. It can come to the point where children vehemently resist the authority of their parents, seeking instead to do what they want to do. Sadly, many parents do not combat these tendencies―or they fight them very weakly. In some families the children end up ruling the family! Often the cause is a negligence in instilling solid religious principles from the very earliest days of infancy. A child will more easily rebel and seek independence if it sees its parents rebelling and showing independence towards the Church and Church teachings. If parents refuse to take advice from priests, then it will not be long before children will refuse the advice of their parents. “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:8).
Article 4
Thursday, July 4th, Independence Day in the USA
Independence, Sindependence or In Dependence?
Thursday, July 4th, Independence Day in the USA
Independence, Sindependence or In Dependence?
Our Lady Speaks of Dependence, Not Independence
In speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “It is very important for persons to allow themselves to be led by the hand of the Lord and leave all to the Divine disposition―for mortals are ignorant of their ways and of the goal to which they lead. In their ignorance they should not presume to choose, lest they make themselves guilty and incur the danger of damnation. But if they resign themselves with all their heart to the divine Providence of God, acknowledging Him as their Father and themselves as His children and creatures, His Majesty will constitute Himself as their Protector, Helper and Director. He considers it His affair to govern His own and direct those who trust and resign themselves into His hands. If God were capable of grief, then this grief would be aroused in Him by seeing creatures claiming a part in the providing for the welfare of souls and that souls should seek to acquire their necessities from other quarters independently of Him.
“If a soul entertains any desire of its own independently of God, then it will militate against the pleasure of the Lord. Likewise, you should neither admit of any movement, thought, desire of your own, nor fulfill your own will in anything independently of the will and direction of him who has charge of your soul; for the Lord sends him to you, just as He sent Ananias to Saint Paul. Consider then, how much reason you hast to die to your own desires and live only for the will of God, and that His will alone should give life to all your actions and operations. Cut short, therefore, all self-reflections, self-opinion and self-reliance and remember, that, even if you should have the wisdom of the most learned scholar, and the natural intelligence of the angels, you could not know how to execute His will more perfectly than by resigning and leaving all to His divine pleasure. He alone knows what is suitable for you and He chooses your ways and governs you in them. Permit yourself to be guided by His divine light!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda)
Go On! Try Being Truly Independent!
If you want independence, then go tell your doctor to get lost, tell your plumber, electrician, car mechanic that you will no longer need them―for you are independent of them and will no longer depend on them. Take you phone back to the phone company and cancel your account and have them shutdown your internet service―because you are independent of them and will no longer depend on them. Throw out your television, because you will not depend on anyone or anything for entertainment, since you are independent. Stop going to the stores for food, clothes, medicine and household goods―you are independent now, and you will be growing your own food, making your own clothes, and making all your households goods and furniture from scratch. Cut-off you gas, electricity and water supplies, for your now independent and you will find your own gas, make your electricity and find your own water. Cancel your trash collection contract and tell them that you are now independent and will be disposing of your own trash. Since you will have no running water coming out of your pipes, you will have to find alternative ways to wash the dishes, wash your laundry, wash yourself and dispose of your excrement and urine―because you are now independent. Take the children out of school and tell the teachers that you are independent now, and that you will no longer depend on them for the education of your children.
Wake-Up to Reality!
“Without Me, you can do nothing!” said Our Lord (John 5:15)―so where is independence to found in that statement? What is it about the word “nothing” that we do not understand? “Nothing” means “not-a-single-thing, zero, zilch, nichts, niets, nada, ništa, nic, nekas” ― or whatever other language may be your native tongue. When Our Lord says “Without Me―you can do nothing!” He means “You cannot be independent from Me!” As Scripture says: “For in Him we live, and move, and are!” (Acts 17:28).
“Jesus said: ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No man cometh to the Father, but by Me!’” (John 14:6)―to which Scripture adds: “There is no other name, under Heaven, given to men, whereby we must be saved!” (Acts 4:12). Jesus Himself said: “For if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sin!” (John 8:24). So how are you going to save your soul independently of Him?
All that we have comes from God―as Holy Scripture testifies many times: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God … All things were made by Him and without Him was made nothing that was made!” (John 1:1-3). All things were made by Him―where does man find independence in all of that? Nowhere! There is only dependence to be found―dependence upon God. As Scripture says: “Know ye that the Lord He is God! He made us, and not we ourselves!” (Psalm 99:3).
Again Scripture adds: “For who distinguishes thee? Or what have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights!” (James 1:17).
We Are Servants―Not Independent Operators
“A vain man is lifted up into pride and thinks himself born free” (Job 11:12). We are not independent, but we are servants or even slaves! We must choose whom we wish to serve―to serve God and Heaven, or to serve Satan and his princedom, the world. Our Lord speaks of us as being servants and not independent beings―telling us that, as servants, we cannot serve two masters: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16).
As Christians and Catholics, we should seek to be free and independent from the world, so that we can be servants or slaves of God―yet the worldly folk seek to be free and independent from God, so that they can be servants and slaves of the world. And who rules the world? Who is prince of this world? Satan. As Jesus said: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not anything!” … The prince of this world is already judged! … Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 14:30; 16:11; 12:31). Our Lord seeks to give us happiness in Heaven, not on Earth: “Know the difference between My service, and the service of a kingdom of the Earth!” (2 Paralipomenon 12:8) … “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world … but My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36).
Satan tempts us away from the service of God by dangling in front of us the power, pleasures and treasures that world can offer―Satan tried to tempt Our Lord the same way: “The devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down You will adore me!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written: “The Lord your God shall you adore, and Him only shall you serve!”’ Then the devil left Him” (Matthew 4:8-10). Yes, “Him only shall you serve” ― which rules out all independence. Likewise, in response to the questions “Who made you?” and “Why did God make you?” the Catechism answers: “God made me!” and “God made me to know Him, love Him and SERVE Him in this world!”
Yes, God made us! We did not make ourselves! “Know ye that the Lord, He is God! He made us, and not we ourselves! We are His people!” (Psalm 99:3). Having made us, He owns us―we are not independent of Him. We live in the world that He created―we did not create the world. We breathe the air that He created―we do make our own air. We drink the water that He created and continuously recycles―we cannot do that ourselves. He made the bodies that we walk around in―making them able to propagate. He made each and every soul that inhabits those bodies. He made the soil, the plants, the trees and all other things that supply our food. He made the sun that enables those things to grow.
We are SERVANTS of God and not independent operators. If we choose to become independent to God (which can never really happen anyway― except through the illusion and delusion of our illogical minds), then we automatically become servants or slaves of the world and its prince, Satan. Our Lord has clearly indicated that implication, by saying: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do! He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him! When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44).
Just as Our Lord says: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” ― we could apply that to the prayer, the Our Father, which we should be praying many times daily. “Why do you call Me ‘Father’ and why do you say to Me, ‘Thy will be done!’ and then go and ignore My will and fail to obey Me, your ‘Father’?” The Our Father is a prayer that admits dependence, pledges obedience and service―it is the very anti-thesis of independence.
Likewise with the Hail Mary―we shown our dependence upon Our Lady when we say: “Pray for us sinners!” Hey! If we are independent―then we have no need of Mary! But independently of her, we have little hope of mercy―for she is the Mother of Mercy, of whom the saints say the following. St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants [that is to say, “independent”, for a servant is dependent], O Mary, shall perish.” St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service [in other words, those who choose to be independent] of Mary shall die in their sins!” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation!” St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through [and not independently of] the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.”
The Liturgy of Dependence
A quick overview of the Liturgy of Holy Mother Church will clearly show a constant spirit of dependence upon God. Here are some excerpts―for brevity’s sake, they are only a line, even though many lines could have been quoted from each day.
“O Lord, come that we may be rescued by Thy protection from the threatening dangers” (1st Sunday Advent).
“Give ear, O Thou that rulest” (2nd Sunday Advent).
“Enlighten the darkness of our minds!” (3rd Sunday Advent).
“Grant us the help of Thy heavenly power!” (Ember Wednesday in Advent).
“O almighty God, Who dost govern all things!” (2nd Sunday after Epiphany).
“O almighty God, look mercifully upon our weakness and protect us!” (3rd Sunday after Epiphany).
“O God, Who knowest the frailty of our nature, grant us health of mind and body!” (4th Sunday after Epiphany).
“O Lord, keep safe Thy household, since their only hope is to lean on Thy grace!” (5th Sunday after Epiphany).
“Thou art a helper in time of tribulation!” (Septuagesima Sunday).
“We put not our trust in anything we do!” (Sexagesima Sunday).
“Be a protector and a house of refuge, O God!” (Quinquagesima Sunday).
“Grant us help, O Lord!” (Ash Wednesday).
“Cast thy care upon the Lord, and He will sustain thee!” (Thursday after Ash Wednesday).
“The Lord became my helper … Thou hast upheld me!” (Friday after Ash Wednesday).
“Serve the Lord with fear and embrace discipline!” (Saturday after Ash Wednesday).
“Abide under the protection of the God of Heaven!” (1st Sunday of Lent).
“Thou hast been our refuge!” (Tuesday after 1st Sunday of Lent).
“Deliver from all our necessities, O God! Forgive us our sins and guide our wayward hearts!” (Ember Wednesday of Lent).
“Deliver me from my necessities, O Lord!” (Ember Friday of Lent).
“O Lord, in Thee have I put my trust―save me!” (Ember Saturday of Lent).
“To Thee, O Lord, have I lifted up my soul! In Thee I put my trust!” (2nd Sunday of Lent).
“Be Thou my helper and deliver, O Lord!” (Monday after 2nd Sunday of Lent).
“Cast thy care upon the Lord and He shall sustain thee!” (Tuesday after 2nd Sunday of Lent).
“O Lord my God, do not depart from me, come and help me!” (Wednesday after 2nd Sunday of Lent).
“O God, come to my assistance! O Lord make haste to help me!” (Thursday after 2nd Sunday of Lent).
“In my trouble I cried to the Lord!” (Friday after 2nd Sunday of Lent).
“Pluck my feet out of the snare and have mercy on me―for I am alone and poor!” (3rd Sunday of Lent).
We will stop here―at the 3rd Sunday of Lent, which not even the halfway point of the Liturgical year. So where is INDEPENDENCE? Only in Hell! Well, not really―for in Hell you will be a slave of Satan! In Heaven there will only be TOTAL DEPENDENCE! So we had better start getting used to DEPENDENCE here below! What have been the fruits of independence? You would have to be a liar of gross proportions to try and pass-off independence as having many good fruits! Independence is a virus that creates more and more independence―thus breaking up more and more the unity that comes from God. Adam and Eve chose to be independent from God and rebelled against His commands―the result was that nature rebelled against Adam and Eve, and the harmony that once existed to perfection, was now seriously damaged. Parents rebel against authority, only to find that soon their children rebel against them. As you sow, so shall you reap!
The Mass of the Dependence
What is true of the Liturgy is also true of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which is daily offered as means of help to the independent and fallen human race. From the very beginning of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and right to the very end of Mass, we state our DEPENDENCE upon God. Here are just a few extracts from the Ordinary of the Mass:
“Thou, O God, art my strength!” (Prayers at the Foot of the Altar). If we were independent then we would not need God to give us strength―we would have sufficient strength of ourselves.
“Our help is in the Name of the Lord!” (Prayers at the Foot of the Altar). If you are independent, then you don’t need any help.
“Grant us pardon, absolution, and remission of our sins … and grant us Thy salvation” (The Confiteor or “I Confess to Almighty God”). The word “grant” implies dependence. An independent person would not depend upon God to grant these things. How can you obtain pardon, mercy and salvation independently of God?
“Lord have mercy, etc. Christ have mercy, etc. Lord have mercy, etc.” (The Kyrie Eleison or “Lord Have Mercy”). We depend on God’s compassion and mercy for our salvation―an independent person cannot forgive themselves and grant themselves mercy.
“We give Thee thanks…” (The Gloria or “Glory to God in the Highest”). We give thanks for having receive something we did not have and for something we need. We need God and we need His mercy, no matter how independent we think we are.
“I believe in one God, the Father almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth, and of all things, visible and invisible … Begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father, by whom all things were made. Who, for us men, and for our salvation, came down from Heaven.” (The Credo or “I Believe”). We live in a world that is God’s creation and not our own creation. All the things in the world that we use were ultimately made by God, or made by someone else who used the things that God had already made. That is called dependence upon God and not independence from God.
“Accept, almighty and eternal God, this unspotted host … for my innumerable sins, offenses, and negligences … that it may avail me for salvation unto life everlasting.” (Offertory). No matter how independent we may imagine ourselves to be, we cannot forgive our own sins, nor can we hope for salvation by our own independent efforts.
“Grant that … we may be made partakers of His divine nature” (Offertory). Once again the word “grant” implies a dependence and need for something we do not have.
“We offer Thee, O Lord, the chalice of salvation, beseeching Thy clemency … for our salvation!” (Offertory). What chalice? A chalice of our deeds and merits? No! The chalice of Christ’s Passion and Death which has earned for us a chance―not a guarantee―of salvation. Independently of Christ’s Passion and Death there is no salvation for us.
“Receive this oblation which we make to Thee, in memory of the Passion, Resurrection and Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ … that it may avail unto our salvation!” (Offertory). Once again―the “oblation” is not OUR oblation, but the oblation of Christ made on our behalf―which obviously points to dependence, not independence.
“Accept and bless these gifts, presents, holy unspotted Sacrifices, which in the first place we offer Thee for Thy holy Catholic Church to which vouchsafe to grant peace, as also to preserve, unite, and govern it throughout the world” (Canon of the Mass). Not even the Church is independent, but it is governed by God and is dependent upon God for peace and unity.
“That we may in all things be defended by the help of Thy protection … Dispose our days in Thy peace” (Canon of the Mass). An independent person needs no protection, especially not in “all things”! Asking God to “dispose” means asking Him to arrange things, which obviously means dependence.
“We offer unto Thy most excellent Majesty of Thine own gifts, bestowed upon us” (Canon of the Mass). Notice that we are not offering our own independent gifts, but gifts that God given us to offer―which, again, shows a dependence on God.
“Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven!” (The Our Father). We are saying that we prefer doing His will rather than doing our own independent will.
“Forgive us our trespasses!” (The Our Father). No matter how independent we think we are, we are incapable of forgiving ourselves.
“Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil … Deliver us, we beseech Thee, O Lord, from all evils, past, present, and to come! … Through the assistance of Thy mercy may we be always free from sin, and secure from all disturbance!”” (The Our Father and the prayer that follows it). Neither can we overcome temptation and evil without depending upon the help of God’s Providence and His grace.
“Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us!” (The Agnus Dei or “Lamb of God”). We cannot take away our own sins, even less so the sins of the whole world! It is upon Christ that we hope and depend upon for that mercy!
“Look not upon my sins, but the Faith of Thy Church … deliver me by this Thy most sacred Body and Blood, from all my iniquities and from all evils; and make me always cleave to Thy commandments, and suffer me never to be separated from Thee … Let not the partaking of Thy Body, O Lord, turn to my judgment and condemnation; but let it, through Thy mercy, become a safeguard and remedy, both for soul and body” (Prayers after the Agnus Dei or “Lamb of God”). These are not the words of an independent person, but of someone greatly dependent on God’s help and mercy.
“I confess to almighty God, to the blessed Mary ever Virgin, blessed Michael the Archangel, blessed John the Baptist, the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, to all the Saints, and to you, Father, that I have sinned exceedingly in thought, word, and deed, through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault!” (The Confiteor or “I Confess” before Communion). For the second time in the Mass we once again confess our guilt before God! For an independent person that is hard to do―for independence almost invariably is accompanied by pride, and pride is always deflecting blame and making excuses.
“Behold the Lamb of God, behold Him Who takes away the sins of the world!” (Before the Domine non sum dignus). Yes, the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ, takes away the sins of the world and not we ourselves. We are dependent upon Christ for forgiveness and mercy! When it comes to sin, that is what independence achieves by itself―all that we are capable of doing with God’s help and assistance and preservation is to sin, sin and sin again. That is ultimate fruit of “going it alone”.
Finally, the Last Gospel, is like a crowning moment as a reminder of our dependence upon God: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was made nothing that was made! In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men; and the Light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. He was the true Light, which enlightens every man that comes into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. But as many as received Him to them He gave power to become sons of God, to them that believe in His Name, who are born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”
Our Lord Wants Our Dependence
In that wonderful little book by Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love, which is a compilation of extracts from three other biographers of three mystic souls―Sr. Josefa Menendez (1890-1923), Sr. Mary of the Holy Trinity (1901-1942)and Sr. Consolata Betrone (1903-1946)―we read of Our Lord’s desire to be “center-stage” and being “allowed to act” in our lives, with ourselves taking a secondary role of just loving Him, suffering for Him, and allowing Him to run things according to His will and not our will. Here are some of those extracts:
“As you are very small, you must let yourself be controlled and guided by My fatherly hand which is powerful and infinitely strong .... I will mold you as is best for My glory and for souls .... Do not fear, for I am looking after you with jealous care, such care as the tenderest of mothers takes of her little child.” (Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 180).
“Rely on Me with closed eyes, without anxiety, content ... yes, like a babe sleeping in its mother’s arms. Are you not like babes carried in the arms of God?” (Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 265).
“Consolata, you know that I am thinking of everything, that I am providing for everything down to the smallest detail. Therefore, do not let one thought enter your mind, not one outside interest.... Have no fear! I am taking care of you! You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! … You see, Consolata, sanctity means self-forgetfulness in everything, in thoughts, desires, words ... You have only one duty―to obey Me. I require a docile will which permits Me to act … Let Me do everything! You will see that I will do everything, and do it well! … I delight to work in a soul. You see, I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me … Allow Me to do it all! I will do everything; but you should, at every moment, give Me what I ask for with much love!” (Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., pp. 109, 153-154).
“Do not worry, Josefa, about what you can and what you cannot do. You know very well that you can do nothing. But I am He who can and will do all. Yes, I will do all, even what seems to you impossible.... I will supply for all that you lack or cannot do. I ask you only for your liberty. All I need is to possess your will, for this I cannot find a substitute.” (Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 401, 1st ed.).
[Words of St. Madeleine-Sophie Barat to Josefa]: “I come to tell you this from Him ... Jesus Himself is arranging everything, and difficult as it may appear to creatures, He ordains each event in the way best for His plans.” (Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 433).
“I want what you do not want, but I can do what you cannot do. It is not for you to choose, but to surrender.” (Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 78).
“Remember this: Everything is a means in My Hands; I make all work together to fulfill My will.” (Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 132).
“Let Me act; you are not competent to do anything―it is not your province.” (Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 114).
“The most important work is not that which you do, it is that which you allow Me to do among you … Your value does not lie in your personal capabilities, however brilliant they may be, but in your capacity to receive your Creator and allow Him to live and shine through you! … “Oh, if you would leave Me to act; I would splendidly transform each one of your lives. But you oppose Me by your desires, your tastes, your resistance. My omnipotent Love is limited by the limit of your generosity! … All souls could rapidly attain to the plenitude of their sanctity if they allowed Me to act, without resisting! … Most religious give Me their work and their talents—I have sufficient talents at My disposal; what I desire is the soul, to make it My place of rest and of work, to live anew in it in humanity. Yes―My place of work―because a soul that would give herself to Me without reserve, how I would use her for the glory of God and of the Church, for the salvation of other souls, to a degree that you cannot imagine!” (Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., nos. 31, 90, 99, 608, 308).
In speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “It is very important for persons to allow themselves to be led by the hand of the Lord and leave all to the Divine disposition―for mortals are ignorant of their ways and of the goal to which they lead. In their ignorance they should not presume to choose, lest they make themselves guilty and incur the danger of damnation. But if they resign themselves with all their heart to the divine Providence of God, acknowledging Him as their Father and themselves as His children and creatures, His Majesty will constitute Himself as their Protector, Helper and Director. He considers it His affair to govern His own and direct those who trust and resign themselves into His hands. If God were capable of grief, then this grief would be aroused in Him by seeing creatures claiming a part in the providing for the welfare of souls and that souls should seek to acquire their necessities from other quarters independently of Him.
“If a soul entertains any desire of its own independently of God, then it will militate against the pleasure of the Lord. Likewise, you should neither admit of any movement, thought, desire of your own, nor fulfill your own will in anything independently of the will and direction of him who has charge of your soul; for the Lord sends him to you, just as He sent Ananias to Saint Paul. Consider then, how much reason you hast to die to your own desires and live only for the will of God, and that His will alone should give life to all your actions and operations. Cut short, therefore, all self-reflections, self-opinion and self-reliance and remember, that, even if you should have the wisdom of the most learned scholar, and the natural intelligence of the angels, you could not know how to execute His will more perfectly than by resigning and leaving all to His divine pleasure. He alone knows what is suitable for you and He chooses your ways and governs you in them. Permit yourself to be guided by His divine light!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda)
Go On! Try Being Truly Independent!
If you want independence, then go tell your doctor to get lost, tell your plumber, electrician, car mechanic that you will no longer need them―for you are independent of them and will no longer depend on them. Take you phone back to the phone company and cancel your account and have them shutdown your internet service―because you are independent of them and will no longer depend on them. Throw out your television, because you will not depend on anyone or anything for entertainment, since you are independent. Stop going to the stores for food, clothes, medicine and household goods―you are independent now, and you will be growing your own food, making your own clothes, and making all your households goods and furniture from scratch. Cut-off you gas, electricity and water supplies, for your now independent and you will find your own gas, make your electricity and find your own water. Cancel your trash collection contract and tell them that you are now independent and will be disposing of your own trash. Since you will have no running water coming out of your pipes, you will have to find alternative ways to wash the dishes, wash your laundry, wash yourself and dispose of your excrement and urine―because you are now independent. Take the children out of school and tell the teachers that you are independent now, and that you will no longer depend on them for the education of your children.
Wake-Up to Reality!
“Without Me, you can do nothing!” said Our Lord (John 5:15)―so where is independence to found in that statement? What is it about the word “nothing” that we do not understand? “Nothing” means “not-a-single-thing, zero, zilch, nichts, niets, nada, ništa, nic, nekas” ― or whatever other language may be your native tongue. When Our Lord says “Without Me―you can do nothing!” He means “You cannot be independent from Me!” As Scripture says: “For in Him we live, and move, and are!” (Acts 17:28).
“Jesus said: ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No man cometh to the Father, but by Me!’” (John 14:6)―to which Scripture adds: “There is no other name, under Heaven, given to men, whereby we must be saved!” (Acts 4:12). Jesus Himself said: “For if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sin!” (John 8:24). So how are you going to save your soul independently of Him?
All that we have comes from God―as Holy Scripture testifies many times: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God … All things were made by Him and without Him was made nothing that was made!” (John 1:1-3). All things were made by Him―where does man find independence in all of that? Nowhere! There is only dependence to be found―dependence upon God. As Scripture says: “Know ye that the Lord He is God! He made us, and not we ourselves!” (Psalm 99:3).
Again Scripture adds: “For who distinguishes thee? Or what have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you glory, as if you had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights!” (James 1:17).
We Are Servants―Not Independent Operators
“A vain man is lifted up into pride and thinks himself born free” (Job 11:12). We are not independent, but we are servants or even slaves! We must choose whom we wish to serve―to serve God and Heaven, or to serve Satan and his princedom, the world. Our Lord speaks of us as being servants and not independent beings―telling us that, as servants, we cannot serve two masters: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16).
As Christians and Catholics, we should seek to be free and independent from the world, so that we can be servants or slaves of God―yet the worldly folk seek to be free and independent from God, so that they can be servants and slaves of the world. And who rules the world? Who is prince of this world? Satan. As Jesus said: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not anything!” … The prince of this world is already judged! … Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 14:30; 16:11; 12:31). Our Lord seeks to give us happiness in Heaven, not on Earth: “Know the difference between My service, and the service of a kingdom of the Earth!” (2 Paralipomenon 12:8) … “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world … but My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36).
Satan tempts us away from the service of God by dangling in front of us the power, pleasures and treasures that world can offer―Satan tried to tempt Our Lord the same way: “The devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down You will adore me!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written: “The Lord your God shall you adore, and Him only shall you serve!”’ Then the devil left Him” (Matthew 4:8-10). Yes, “Him only shall you serve” ― which rules out all independence. Likewise, in response to the questions “Who made you?” and “Why did God make you?” the Catechism answers: “God made me!” and “God made me to know Him, love Him and SERVE Him in this world!”
Yes, God made us! We did not make ourselves! “Know ye that the Lord, He is God! He made us, and not we ourselves! We are His people!” (Psalm 99:3). Having made us, He owns us―we are not independent of Him. We live in the world that He created―we did not create the world. We breathe the air that He created―we do make our own air. We drink the water that He created and continuously recycles―we cannot do that ourselves. He made the bodies that we walk around in―making them able to propagate. He made each and every soul that inhabits those bodies. He made the soil, the plants, the trees and all other things that supply our food. He made the sun that enables those things to grow.
We are SERVANTS of God and not independent operators. If we choose to become independent to God (which can never really happen anyway― except through the illusion and delusion of our illogical minds), then we automatically become servants or slaves of the world and its prince, Satan. Our Lord has clearly indicated that implication, by saying: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do! He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him! When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44).
Just as Our Lord says: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” ― we could apply that to the prayer, the Our Father, which we should be praying many times daily. “Why do you call Me ‘Father’ and why do you say to Me, ‘Thy will be done!’ and then go and ignore My will and fail to obey Me, your ‘Father’?” The Our Father is a prayer that admits dependence, pledges obedience and service―it is the very anti-thesis of independence.
Likewise with the Hail Mary―we shown our dependence upon Our Lady when we say: “Pray for us sinners!” Hey! If we are independent―then we have no need of Mary! But independently of her, we have little hope of mercy―for she is the Mother of Mercy, of whom the saints say the following. St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants [that is to say, “independent”, for a servant is dependent], O Mary, shall perish.” St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service [in other words, those who choose to be independent] of Mary shall die in their sins!” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation!” St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through [and not independently of] the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.”
The Liturgy of Dependence
A quick overview of the Liturgy of Holy Mother Church will clearly show a constant spirit of dependence upon God. Here are some excerpts―for brevity’s sake, they are only a line, even though many lines could have been quoted from each day.
“O Lord, come that we may be rescued by Thy protection from the threatening dangers” (1st Sunday Advent).
“Give ear, O Thou that rulest” (2nd Sunday Advent).
“Enlighten the darkness of our minds!” (3rd Sunday Advent).
“Grant us the help of Thy heavenly power!” (Ember Wednesday in Advent).
“O almighty God, Who dost govern all things!” (2nd Sunday after Epiphany).
“O almighty God, look mercifully upon our weakness and protect us!” (3rd Sunday after Epiphany).
“O God, Who knowest the frailty of our nature, grant us health of mind and body!” (4th Sunday after Epiphany).
“O Lord, keep safe Thy household, since their only hope is to lean on Thy grace!” (5th Sunday after Epiphany).
“Thou art a helper in time of tribulation!” (Septuagesima Sunday).
“We put not our trust in anything we do!” (Sexagesima Sunday).
“Be a protector and a house of refuge, O God!” (Quinquagesima Sunday).
“Grant us help, O Lord!” (Ash Wednesday).
“Cast thy care upon the Lord, and He will sustain thee!” (Thursday after Ash Wednesday).
“The Lord became my helper … Thou hast upheld me!” (Friday after Ash Wednesday).
“Serve the Lord with fear and embrace discipline!” (Saturday after Ash Wednesday).
“Abide under the protection of the God of Heaven!” (1st Sunday of Lent).
“Thou hast been our refuge!” (Tuesday after 1st Sunday of Lent).
“Deliver from all our necessities, O God! Forgive us our sins and guide our wayward hearts!” (Ember Wednesday of Lent).
“Deliver me from my necessities, O Lord!” (Ember Friday of Lent).
“O Lord, in Thee have I put my trust―save me!” (Ember Saturday of Lent).
“To Thee, O Lord, have I lifted up my soul! In Thee I put my trust!” (2nd Sunday of Lent).
“Be Thou my helper and deliver, O Lord!” (Monday after 2nd Sunday of Lent).
“Cast thy care upon the Lord and He shall sustain thee!” (Tuesday after 2nd Sunday of Lent).
“O Lord my God, do not depart from me, come and help me!” (Wednesday after 2nd Sunday of Lent).
“O God, come to my assistance! O Lord make haste to help me!” (Thursday after 2nd Sunday of Lent).
“In my trouble I cried to the Lord!” (Friday after 2nd Sunday of Lent).
“Pluck my feet out of the snare and have mercy on me―for I am alone and poor!” (3rd Sunday of Lent).
We will stop here―at the 3rd Sunday of Lent, which not even the halfway point of the Liturgical year. So where is INDEPENDENCE? Only in Hell! Well, not really―for in Hell you will be a slave of Satan! In Heaven there will only be TOTAL DEPENDENCE! So we had better start getting used to DEPENDENCE here below! What have been the fruits of independence? You would have to be a liar of gross proportions to try and pass-off independence as having many good fruits! Independence is a virus that creates more and more independence―thus breaking up more and more the unity that comes from God. Adam and Eve chose to be independent from God and rebelled against His commands―the result was that nature rebelled against Adam and Eve, and the harmony that once existed to perfection, was now seriously damaged. Parents rebel against authority, only to find that soon their children rebel against them. As you sow, so shall you reap!
The Mass of the Dependence
What is true of the Liturgy is also true of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which is daily offered as means of help to the independent and fallen human race. From the very beginning of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and right to the very end of Mass, we state our DEPENDENCE upon God. Here are just a few extracts from the Ordinary of the Mass:
“Thou, O God, art my strength!” (Prayers at the Foot of the Altar). If we were independent then we would not need God to give us strength―we would have sufficient strength of ourselves.
“Our help is in the Name of the Lord!” (Prayers at the Foot of the Altar). If you are independent, then you don’t need any help.
“Grant us pardon, absolution, and remission of our sins … and grant us Thy salvation” (The Confiteor or “I Confess to Almighty God”). The word “grant” implies dependence. An independent person would not depend upon God to grant these things. How can you obtain pardon, mercy and salvation independently of God?
“Lord have mercy, etc. Christ have mercy, etc. Lord have mercy, etc.” (The Kyrie Eleison or “Lord Have Mercy”). We depend on God’s compassion and mercy for our salvation―an independent person cannot forgive themselves and grant themselves mercy.
“We give Thee thanks…” (The Gloria or “Glory to God in the Highest”). We give thanks for having receive something we did not have and for something we need. We need God and we need His mercy, no matter how independent we think we are.
“I believe in one God, the Father almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth, and of all things, visible and invisible … Begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father, by whom all things were made. Who, for us men, and for our salvation, came down from Heaven.” (The Credo or “I Believe”). We live in a world that is God’s creation and not our own creation. All the things in the world that we use were ultimately made by God, or made by someone else who used the things that God had already made. That is called dependence upon God and not independence from God.
“Accept, almighty and eternal God, this unspotted host … for my innumerable sins, offenses, and negligences … that it may avail me for salvation unto life everlasting.” (Offertory). No matter how independent we may imagine ourselves to be, we cannot forgive our own sins, nor can we hope for salvation by our own independent efforts.
“Grant that … we may be made partakers of His divine nature” (Offertory). Once again the word “grant” implies a dependence and need for something we do not have.
“We offer Thee, O Lord, the chalice of salvation, beseeching Thy clemency … for our salvation!” (Offertory). What chalice? A chalice of our deeds and merits? No! The chalice of Christ’s Passion and Death which has earned for us a chance―not a guarantee―of salvation. Independently of Christ’s Passion and Death there is no salvation for us.
“Receive this oblation which we make to Thee, in memory of the Passion, Resurrection and Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ … that it may avail unto our salvation!” (Offertory). Once again―the “oblation” is not OUR oblation, but the oblation of Christ made on our behalf―which obviously points to dependence, not independence.
“Accept and bless these gifts, presents, holy unspotted Sacrifices, which in the first place we offer Thee for Thy holy Catholic Church to which vouchsafe to grant peace, as also to preserve, unite, and govern it throughout the world” (Canon of the Mass). Not even the Church is independent, but it is governed by God and is dependent upon God for peace and unity.
“That we may in all things be defended by the help of Thy protection … Dispose our days in Thy peace” (Canon of the Mass). An independent person needs no protection, especially not in “all things”! Asking God to “dispose” means asking Him to arrange things, which obviously means dependence.
“We offer unto Thy most excellent Majesty of Thine own gifts, bestowed upon us” (Canon of the Mass). Notice that we are not offering our own independent gifts, but gifts that God given us to offer―which, again, shows a dependence on God.
“Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven!” (The Our Father). We are saying that we prefer doing His will rather than doing our own independent will.
“Forgive us our trespasses!” (The Our Father). No matter how independent we think we are, we are incapable of forgiving ourselves.
“Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil … Deliver us, we beseech Thee, O Lord, from all evils, past, present, and to come! … Through the assistance of Thy mercy may we be always free from sin, and secure from all disturbance!”” (The Our Father and the prayer that follows it). Neither can we overcome temptation and evil without depending upon the help of God’s Providence and His grace.
“Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us!” (The Agnus Dei or “Lamb of God”). We cannot take away our own sins, even less so the sins of the whole world! It is upon Christ that we hope and depend upon for that mercy!
“Look not upon my sins, but the Faith of Thy Church … deliver me by this Thy most sacred Body and Blood, from all my iniquities and from all evils; and make me always cleave to Thy commandments, and suffer me never to be separated from Thee … Let not the partaking of Thy Body, O Lord, turn to my judgment and condemnation; but let it, through Thy mercy, become a safeguard and remedy, both for soul and body” (Prayers after the Agnus Dei or “Lamb of God”). These are not the words of an independent person, but of someone greatly dependent on God’s help and mercy.
“I confess to almighty God, to the blessed Mary ever Virgin, blessed Michael the Archangel, blessed John the Baptist, the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, to all the Saints, and to you, Father, that I have sinned exceedingly in thought, word, and deed, through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault!” (The Confiteor or “I Confess” before Communion). For the second time in the Mass we once again confess our guilt before God! For an independent person that is hard to do―for independence almost invariably is accompanied by pride, and pride is always deflecting blame and making excuses.
“Behold the Lamb of God, behold Him Who takes away the sins of the world!” (Before the Domine non sum dignus). Yes, the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ, takes away the sins of the world and not we ourselves. We are dependent upon Christ for forgiveness and mercy! When it comes to sin, that is what independence achieves by itself―all that we are capable of doing with God’s help and assistance and preservation is to sin, sin and sin again. That is ultimate fruit of “going it alone”.
Finally, the Last Gospel, is like a crowning moment as a reminder of our dependence upon God: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was made nothing that was made! In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men; and the Light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. He was the true Light, which enlightens every man that comes into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. But as many as received Him to them He gave power to become sons of God, to them that believe in His Name, who are born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”
Our Lord Wants Our Dependence
In that wonderful little book by Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love, which is a compilation of extracts from three other biographers of three mystic souls―Sr. Josefa Menendez (1890-1923), Sr. Mary of the Holy Trinity (1901-1942)and Sr. Consolata Betrone (1903-1946)―we read of Our Lord’s desire to be “center-stage” and being “allowed to act” in our lives, with ourselves taking a secondary role of just loving Him, suffering for Him, and allowing Him to run things according to His will and not our will. Here are some of those extracts:
“As you are very small, you must let yourself be controlled and guided by My fatherly hand which is powerful and infinitely strong .... I will mold you as is best for My glory and for souls .... Do not fear, for I am looking after you with jealous care, such care as the tenderest of mothers takes of her little child.” (Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 180).
“Rely on Me with closed eyes, without anxiety, content ... yes, like a babe sleeping in its mother’s arms. Are you not like babes carried in the arms of God?” (Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 265).
“Consolata, you know that I am thinking of everything, that I am providing for everything down to the smallest detail. Therefore, do not let one thought enter your mind, not one outside interest.... Have no fear! I am taking care of you! You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! … You see, Consolata, sanctity means self-forgetfulness in everything, in thoughts, desires, words ... You have only one duty―to obey Me. I require a docile will which permits Me to act … Let Me do everything! You will see that I will do everything, and do it well! … I delight to work in a soul. You see, I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me … Allow Me to do it all! I will do everything; but you should, at every moment, give Me what I ask for with much love!” (Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., pp. 109, 153-154).
“Do not worry, Josefa, about what you can and what you cannot do. You know very well that you can do nothing. But I am He who can and will do all. Yes, I will do all, even what seems to you impossible.... I will supply for all that you lack or cannot do. I ask you only for your liberty. All I need is to possess your will, for this I cannot find a substitute.” (Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 401, 1st ed.).
[Words of St. Madeleine-Sophie Barat to Josefa]: “I come to tell you this from Him ... Jesus Himself is arranging everything, and difficult as it may appear to creatures, He ordains each event in the way best for His plans.” (Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 433).
“I want what you do not want, but I can do what you cannot do. It is not for you to choose, but to surrender.” (Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 78).
“Remember this: Everything is a means in My Hands; I make all work together to fulfill My will.” (Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 132).
“Let Me act; you are not competent to do anything―it is not your province.” (Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 114).
“The most important work is not that which you do, it is that which you allow Me to do among you … Your value does not lie in your personal capabilities, however brilliant they may be, but in your capacity to receive your Creator and allow Him to live and shine through you! … “Oh, if you would leave Me to act; I would splendidly transform each one of your lives. But you oppose Me by your desires, your tastes, your resistance. My omnipotent Love is limited by the limit of your generosity! … All souls could rapidly attain to the plenitude of their sanctity if they allowed Me to act, without resisting! … Most religious give Me their work and their talents—I have sufficient talents at My disposal; what I desire is the soul, to make it My place of rest and of work, to live anew in it in humanity. Yes―My place of work―because a soul that would give herself to Me without reserve, how I would use her for the glory of God and of the Church, for the salvation of other souls, to a degree that you cannot imagine!” (Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., nos. 31, 90, 99, 608, 308).
Article 3
Wednesday, July 3rd, the Eve of the Secular Independence Day
The ‘Heresy’ of Independence & Independence Day
Wednesday, July 3rd, the Eve of the Secular Independence Day
The ‘Heresy’ of Independence & Independence Day
Independence Revisited!
July―from a worldwide secular perspective―could be called “Independence Month.” There are several nations that ‘celebrate’ their independence during this month in one way or another. Every American, of course, knows that July 4th in America’s Independence Day—or perhaps the modern “dumbing-down” has been so successful that perhaps not all Americans are aware of the fact! Yet what most Americans do not realize is that July is choc-full of days of independence! The American Day of Independence of July 4th, is just one of twenty-two Days of Independence celebrated in the month of July.
On July 1st, Canada celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom in 1867.
On July 1st, Burundi, in Africa, celebrates its independence from Belgium in 1962.
On July 1st, Rwanda, in Africa, celebrates its independence from Belgium in 1962.
On July 3rd, Belarus celebrates its independence from the occupying German forces in 1944.
On July 4th, the United States celebrates its independence from Great Britain in 1776.
On July 5th, Venezuela celebrates its independence from Spain in 1811.
On July 5th, Algeria celebrates its independence from France in 1962.
On July 5th, Cape Verde celebrates its independence from Portugal in 1975.
On July 6th, Argentina celebrates its independence from Spain in 1816.
On July 6th, Malawi, in Africa, celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom in 1957.
On July 7th, the Solomon Islands celebrate independence from the United Kingdom in 1978.
On July 7th, South Sudan celebrates independence from Sudan in 2011.
On July 10th, the Bahamas celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom in 1973.
On July 12th, São Tomé and Príncipe, Africa, celebrates its independence from Portugal in 1975.
On July 12th, Kiribati, in Micronesia, celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom in 1979.
On July 14th, France celebrates Bastille Day and its revolutionary independence from the French monarchy in 1790.
On July 17th, Slovakia celebrates its independence from the Czechs in 1992.
On July 19th, Belgium celebrates its independence from the Netherlands in 1931.
On July 26th, Liberia celebrates its independence from American colonization in 1847.
On July 26th, Maldives, in Asia, celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom in 1965.
On July 28th, Peru celebrates its independence from Spain in 1821.
On July 30th, Vanuata, South Pacific, celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom and France in 1980.
Post-Revolutionary Independence
All-in-all, throughout the world in modern times (in the post-Revolutionary period following the American and French Revolutions and the advent and triumph of Liberalism) there have been around 170 declarations of independence, with 57 of them being independence from the United Kingdom. It is peculiarly providential that after England’s King Henry VIII (1491-1547) rebelled and separated himself and his country from the religious jurisdiction of the Catholic Church and the Pope in Rome, making himself the head of the church in England, the same fate later befell England as one country after another separated themselves from the massive English Empire throughout the world—that included, among others, America, Canada, Australia, India and large sections of Africa.
It brings to mind the fact that once Adam and Eve declared independence from God, then, as a punishment, all of nature rebelled against Adam and Eve, and was not a favorable and kind to them as the natural world was before their Original Sin. Just as nature―which was below or inferior―rebelled against the rebels Adam and Eve, so have many nations, who have rebelled and declared independence for one reason or another, have found that they, in turn, suffered rebellion from others. Yet Adam and Eve’s independence from God was not even the first declaration of independence! The first declaration of independence came from Satan, with his famous cry: “Non serviam!” ― “I will not serve!” The result was Hell! Likewise, the modern-day format of independence has followed the satanic suit and the result is the hell that we see around us―mainly due to the spirit of independence―more precisely, an independence from the laws and ways of God.
Modern-Day Independence is Independence From God
Let us not be fooled by the false mask of independence that is being worn in this post-revolutionary world, which cloaks a satanic independence behind the smiling Liberal mask of ‘benevolent’ independence. Yet, because most people have been dumbed-down and know very little history, they are duped by the Liberal mask of independence into believing the falsehoods of modern-day independence worshippers.
The ultimate goal behind the revolutionary dream of independence is an independence from God—which is what makes it satanic, for Satan’s cry was: “Non serviam!”—meaning: “I will not serve!” Satan made the first declaration of independence and he has been encouraging his brand of independence ever since that time. His first recruits were the fallen angels; his next recruits were Adam and Eve; and since that Original Sin (or Original Declaration of Independence) he has sold his brand of independence to billions of duped humans, who, by buying into his independence are now slaves in Hell. By blindfolding them with his blindfold of independence, and making them blindly follow his brand of independence, he has led them to the pit of Hell. As Our Lord said: “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). You could rephrase that to read: “Leave them alone, let them be independent! They are independent and leaders of the independent! And if the independent lead the others to independence, they will both fall into the pit!”
The following words of Holy Scripture are most appropriately applicable to today’s independently minded Liberals: “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes assembled together, against the Lord and His Christ” (Acts 4:26). “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3).
“The Lord looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. God has scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God has despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6).
By Their Independent Fruits You Shall Know Them
As Our Lord said: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate! For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them.
“Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone therefore that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And everyone that hears these My words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:14-27).
The following words of Our Lord shoots down the idea of independence from the very beginning: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). The truly Catholic life is one of DEPENDENCE and NOT INDEPENDENCE. The false Catholic life, the Liberal Catholic life, is one of INDEPENDENCE and NOT DEPENDENCE. By their fruits you shall know them. The way of DEPENDENCE ON GOD is straight and narrow, and few there are that find it, and even fewer are they that take it. The road of INDEPENDENCE FROM GOD is broad and wide, and many there are who find themselves upon it. Beware of the false prophets of Liberalism and Independence, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly are ravening wolves. The very first temptation offered by the ‘independent’ Satan ― “I will not serve!” ― was a temptation for independence:
“Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why has God commanded you that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ [the questioning of legitimate authority]. And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat! But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God has commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No, you shall not die the death! For God knows that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened―and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’” (Genesis 3:1-5). The enticement and allure to independence: “In what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as Gods”―in other words: “Disobey! Break away! You will see things differently! You don’t have to accept someone else’s point of view or authority! Be your own ruler! Be a law unto yourself! Don’t obey the laws of others―make your own laws!”
The Family of Independence
This independence of thought also shows itself through Naturalism and Humanism, which turns it back on the supernatural and the spiritual, and focuses on the world, nature and humanity, rather than Heaven, grace and the Divinity. This leads us to treasure the natural above the supernatural, things above grace, man above God.
It begets its children of Materialism (greed for things), Rationalism (think what you want in the Natural sphere—nobody tells me what to believe), Modernism (think what you want in the domain of Faith—nobody tells me what to believe about God) and Liberalism (do what you want in the Natural and Religious spheres—nobody tells me what to do, I will do what I want). This is the foundation for all the modern day Revolutions.
It also filters down into the family setting, where independence creeps into family life: the husband becomes more independent from outside authorities, the wife becomes more independent from her husband, the children become more independent from their parents—authority is accepted only if the subordinate agrees with the authority, otherwise there arises a spirit of independence, disobedience and rebellion.
The Illusion of Independence
The Illusion of Independence is exactly what it sounds like: it’s the false belief that we are, can be, or should be completely independent―even though it’s total and utter absurdity. Independence is celebrated everywhere; it is lifted up as a model and an ideal of how we should try to be, and so of course we all scramble to identify as being independent. Yet it is dangerous to believe we’re all independent and dangerous to seek to be independent. It’s really, really dangerous, and for several reasons.
The Shame and Danger of Independence
As they say, “If you do not know your history, then you will be forced to learn it by repeating the mistakes of history!” Most people DO NOT know their history―and so are sucked-into a superficial, sugared, suppressed, sentimentalized, sanitized, slanted and subversive version of history. A little history can save a lot of trouble. A little truth can avoid a lot of error! So here goes…
(1) Tracing independence back to its roots, we find that it is born of the devil, with his cry of “I will not serve!” Do we really want to have those kind of ‘family’ connections? Let us take to mind the words of Scripture: “Thy own wickedness shall reprove thee, and thy apostasy shall rebuke thee. Know thou, and see that it is an evil thing for thee, to have left the Lord thy God. Thou hast broken My yoke, thou hast burst My bands, and thou didst say: ‘I will not serve!’” (Jeremias 2:19-20). “So shall you also perish, if you be disobedient to the voice of the Lord your God!” (Deuteronomy 8:20).
(2) Adam and Eve chose the route of independence from God and thereby walked into the clutches of punishment and death. A fault and punishment that was repeated and received many times throughout history, as is clearly and frequently shown in Holy Scripture—proving, beyond doubt, that independence from God doesn’t pay!
(3) The Israelites, from the time of Moses, were a theocracy (theos is Greek for God, -cracy comes from the Greek kratos meaning “a rule, a regime”—meaning that they were ruled, guided and provided for by God. But then they wanted independence from God—they no longer wanted to be a theocracy, but a monarchy, whereby they would be ruled by a human king and not a divine God! “All the ancients of Israel being assembled, came to Samuel and they said to him: ‘Make us a king, to judge us, as all nations have!’ And the word was displeasing in the eyes of Samuel, that they should say: Give us a king, to judge us. And Samuel prayed to the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel: ‘Listen to the voice of the people! They have not rejected thee, but Me, that I should not reign over them!’” (1 Kings 8:4-7).
(4) The Jews rejected the Kingship of Christ to their folly and destruction, crying out to Pilate, when he asked them what he should with their King: “The chief priests answered: ‘We have no king but Caesar!’” (John 19:15).
Their desired king—Caesar—sent his son Titus, in 70 AD, as prophesied by Christ, to raze Jerusalem to the ground and slaughter all its inhabitants (over 1 million), because they rebelled against their own acknowledged “We have no king but Caesar!”—and sought independence from the Roman Emperor! An expensive price to pay for rejecting the Kingship of Christ in favor of the worldly kingship of Caesar—yet an even worse carnage awaits the world today for the same fault!
(5) Another theocracy (meaning God is king or ruler) was that of the Holy Roman Empire during the Middle Ages, which consisted of German-speaking peoples and Northern Italy. The Holy Roman Empire began in 800 AD, with the papal crowning of Charlemagne as emperor. The rulers of the Holy Roman Empire saw themselves as overseeing a theocracy (God’s kingdom) in the sense that the power of the government was welded or joined to that of the Roman Catholic Church—a union of Church and State, like a marriage between husband and wife. After Charlemagne died in 814, the imperial crown was disputed among the various Carolingian rulers of Western Francia and Eastern Francia, with first the western king (Charles the Bald) and then the eastern (Charles the Fat) attaining the prize. After the death of Charles the Fat in 888, however, the Carolingian (Charlemagne’s) Empire broke apart (independence), and was never restored. Around 900, autonomous (‘independent’) dukedoms or duchies re-emerged in East Francia―such as Franconia, Bavaria, Swabia, Saxony, and Lotharingia. According to Regino of Prüm, the independent parts of the realm “spewed forth kinglets,” and each independent part elected its own little kinglet “from its own bowels.” After the death of Charles the Fat, those crowned emperor by the pope controlled only territories in Italy, but not in the now ‘independent’ Francia.
East Francia did not turn to the Carolingian ruler of West Francia to take over the realm, but instead elected one of the dukes, Conrad of Franconia, as king of the Eastern Franks (independence). On his deathbed, Conrad yielded the crown to his main rival, Henry the Fowler of Saxony. Eventually Otto I became the Holy Roman Emperor. Otto I continued the work of unifying all German tribes into a single kingdom and greatly expanded the king’s powers, at the expense of the aristocracy, who found their powers reduced. Through strategic marriages and personal appointments, Otto installed members of his family in the kingdom’s most important duchies or dukedoms (independence and self-interest and self-advantage go hand-in-hand). Otto transformed the Roman Catholic Church in Germany, so as to benefit himself and to strengthen the royal office, subjecting the clergy to his personal control (a form of independence from the Church and God for sake of personal advantage). Otto’s later years were marked by conflicts with the papacy (independence) and struggles to stabilize his rule over Italy (others try to secure independence from Otto’s rule).
Eventually, the Holy Roman Empire was divided into dozens—eventually hundreds—of individual independent entities governed by kings, dukes, counts, bishops, abbots, and other rulers, collectively known as princes, who governed their land independently from the emperor, whose power was severely restricted by these various local leaders. Such are the fruits of mankind’s ceaseless struggle at securing increasing independence from God’s rule and God’s laws!
Science is Now Independent of God
Science today is the new god, having sought to replace the one true God in Heaven. It rises higher and higher each year with its achievements, and puts down more and more ‘alleged’ miracles of God. It increasingly dismisses much of what God has done as being mere fiction, exaggeration, imagination and legend. In its pride, science professes to know the age of the universe, it pretends that it can know what happened in the universe millions, or billions of years ago―according to the ‘gospel of science.’ Until recently, astronomers estimated that the (so-called) “Big Bang” occurred between 12 and 14 billion years ago―what’s a mere difference of only 2,000,000,000 (2,000 million) between friends? No big deal for “Big Bang” theorists!
To put this in perspective, the Solar System is thought to be 4.5 billion years old and humans have existed for only a few million years―what’s a “few million” years between friends, who cares about exactness in science? Yet science is normally proud of its “religious” adherence to exactness―it looks upon exactness as being one its “scientific commandments”―it proudly proclaims that it is exact to the “nth degree”! Yet these exacting sciences, just “turn-off” exactness when they feel like it! All of this is―do you not think?―very vague and presumptuous! The scientific theories have varied greatly over the last 200 years―and at every stage, with every age, every theory was deemed to be THE truth and almost everyone bowed-down before the god of science, saying “Credo” ― “I believe!” With stupid intelligences and dumb thought processes like that, maybe they did actually evolve out of monkeys after all! But in the end, God will laugh at them, as the following encounter with God and a scientist portrays:
God was sitting in Heaven one day, when a scientist shouted up to Him: “Hey, God! We don’t need You anymore. Science has finally figured out a way to create life out of nothing – in other words, we can now do what you did in the beginning.”
“Oh, is that so? Explain…” replies God.
“Yep! Sure is!” says the scientist, “We’ve now finally figured out how to take dirt and form it into the likeness of You and breathe life into it, thus creating man!”
“Well, that’s very interesting… show Me!”
So the scientist bends down to the Earth, digs up a wheelbarrow full of soil and starts to mold the soil into the shape of a man.
“No, no, no…! Nooooo you don’t!” interrupts God, “Put that soil down! Put it down right now! That’s my soil! I made it! You go make and get your own dirt!”
Hmmm! Who needs who? Who’s independent of whom?
We’re not independent. We are part of a larger system—many larger systems, in fact—that constantly impact our lives and the choices we make. And behind all those systems is Christ the King—who clearly told us: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Original (Independence) Sin
We have become increasingly independent, especially since the revolutions of independence in Europe and the Americas, beginning in the late 18th century and never having stopped since. The tendency for independence, which is a part of the package of Original Sin and all sin, is fed even more independence by the media and society. They make out independence to be a badge of honor that everyone should strive to obtain. Yet it flies and lies in the face of Jesus, Who said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Like Adam and Eve, we want to be our own gods—defining what is good and evil; choosing to do what we want, even if it is forbidden by God. We do not like to be told what to do—yet God is constantly telling us what to do: through His Church; our lawful superiors both at home and at work. When we think that our idea of things is better or more practical than God’s, then we have a problem—for ideas have consequences; and bad ideas have bad consequences! The ultimate bad consequence of the bad idea of independence is Hell—as the independently minded Lucifer and his independent minded angels found out.
“If thou wilt hear the voice of the Lord thy God, and do what is right before Him, and obey His commandments, and keep all His precepts [A GOOD IDEA, huh?), none of the evils that I laid upon Egypt, will I bring upon thee―for I am the Lord thy Healer!” (Exodus 15:26). “But if you will not yet for all this obey Me [A BAD IDEA], then I will chastise you seven times more for your sins” (Leviticus 26:18).
The Independence of Liberalism
Liberalism is independence and independence is Liberalism, or freedom from restraint—a freedom to think, believe, say and do what one likes. “It is the declaration of … the absolute independence of the individual and the social reason, [In other words, the opinion of society, or a group, or an individual, takes precedence over Church teaching]. In short it sets itself up as the measure and rule of Faith … It denies everything which it itself does not proclaim. It negates everything which it itself does not affirm. Such is the general negation uttered by Liberalism … Liberalism, in the order of action, is license; recognizing no principle or rule beyond itself” (Fr. Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin, Chapter 2).
“From the Baptized or even priestly Liberal, who boasts his breadth of mind in his easy toleration of error, to the avowed atheist, who hurls his open defiance against God, the difference is only one of degree. One simply stands on a higher rung of the same ladder than the other. Their common criterion is “liberality” and “independence of mind;” the degree of application will be measured by the individual disposition: … self-interest with one, temperament with another, education impeding a third … human respect may moderate another … family or school … Sometimes Liberalism stalks along in the careless trappings of an easygoing good nature, or a simplicity of character, which invites our affection and allays our suspicion. Its very candor in this guise is an aggression difficult to resist. It does not appear responsible and excites our compassion before it has awakened our aversion. We seem to forgive it before we accuse it. But all the greater is the danger when it appears least possible.” (Fr. Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin, Chapter 4).
“Liberalism is a world complete in itself … It is the world of Lucifer, disguised in our times under the name of Liberalism, in radical opposition and in perpetual warfare against that society composed of the Children of God, the Church of Jesus Christ … Liberalism strikes at the very foundations of Faith … It is the declaration of … the absolute independence of the individual and the social reason, [In other words, the opinion of society, or a group, or an individual, takes precedence over Church teaching]. In short it sets itself up as the measure and rule of Faith … It denies everything which it itself does not proclaim. It negates everything which it itself does not affirm. Such is the general negation uttered by Liberalism … Liberalism, in the order of action, is license; recognizing no principle or rule beyond itself.” (Fr. Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin, Chapter 2).
We see this “Do-As-You-Wantness” at all levels of society: Church, Politics, Finance, Legislation, Education, Social, Familial and Individual. Everyone has fostered an area of life where they decide what is right or wrong, what they feel okay about doing and what they won’t do—irrespective of what God, Church, Government, Society or Family say about it. All of this comes down to pride—which Holy Scripture says is the beginning of all sin (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Fr. Tanquerey, in The Spiritual Life, quotes Bossuet: “Pride, is a profound depravity; it is the worship of self; man becomes his own god through excessive self-love. Forgetful that God is his first beginning and his last end, he overrates himself; he considers himself the sovereign lord and master of those qualities, real or imaginary, which he possesses, without referring them to God. From this arises that spirit of independence, of self-sufficiency … (Fr. Tanquerey, in The Spiritual Life, §204).
Believe What You Want!
Hence, in the Church, in the domain of thought and belief, we see the majority of the laity no longer believing in the Real Presence, no longer believing that you have to go to Mass every Sunday, no longer believing that contraception is wrong, no longer believing that divorce and remarriage is wrong, no longer believing certain sexual behaviors to be wrong, etc. –and yet they still believe themselves to be “Catholics in good standing”!
Act As You Want!
This attitude of believe what you want, spills over into the domain of act as you want. People will come to church dress as they like—which is increasingly immodest dress. They will assist at Mass as they like—which is increasingly distracted and poor assistance. They will observe the Commandments of God and the Church to the degree that they like—which is less and less. They will mix with whomever they like—disregarding the fact the worldliness of these people may well be a danger to the Faith and salvation.
This is just the tip of the iceberg of behavior. It is the modern spirit of independence that is the soul of this kind of behavior, one which has as its motto: “Who are you to tell me what to do?” You see and hear it at home, at school, at work, in the parish, in politics, in finance, and in the general culture of society. “Do not interfere with the sinner! He has his rights! He is independent! We must respect that!” is the general theme of the Rights of Man. No coercion must exercised on wrong doers. Often, the victim even becomes the guilty party!
Sailing Wherever You Want or Sailing Where God Wants?
On the devil’s ship, SSS Seduction, you are totally independent and can do what you want and sail where you want! This is the way of modern independence! We think for ourselves! We accept only what we want to accept. We decide for ourselves! We act by ourselves! Only when things fail, do we go to God—and then we run out of patience with Him when He won’t give us what we tell Him to give us, in the time limit that we set for Him to answer our prayers! O what a mess we are! Rowing round and round frustratingly in circles, unwilling to unfurl our sails to allow God to blow us in the direction HE WANTS.
The, ship, SSS Seduction, sails on the seas of independence and is filled with empty, transitory pleasures that the devil promises will lead to true happiness and eternal independence—but those lies cover the reality of the destination of true and eternal sorrows and eternal slavery. Whereas on the Christ’s ship, the Ark of the Church, we sail where are told to sail, we are promised storms, temporary and painful sorrows that Our Lord says will lead to eternal joy and freedom. On the former ship, we can play now and pay later—on the latter ship, we labor now and rejoice later. The choice is one of instant gratification or eternal gratification; temporary pain or eternal pain; short-lived joy or eternal joy, independence and disobedience or dependence and obedience.
The Cure for Modern Independence is Christ’s Yoke of Dependence
As the famous religious axiom says: “Servire est Regnare” meaning “To Serve is to Reign”. The only real, lasting solution is to take up, once again, the yoke of Christ. “Take up My yoke upon you, and learn of Me, because I am meek, and humble of heart: and you shall find rest to your souls. For My yoke is sweet and My burden light” (Matthew 11:29-30). The ultimate yoke or dependence is that of the religious life (if properly lived) and Our Lady makes this clear to us: “Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils... No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents. O, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
The Glorification of Independence and Denigration of Dependence
INDEPENDENCE & THE CATHOLIC FAITH: It is difficult for us to grasp the concept of obedience because we have been educated in a tradition that glorifies independence. It is an alarming and disgusting fact that only 5 tiny nations still hold on to Catholicism as the official religion of the state:
► Costa Rica with a population 5,000,000 (5 million) of which 53% are Catholics (2,600,000).
► El Salvador with a population 7,000,000 (7 million) of which 81% are Catholics (2,700,000).
► Liechtenstein with a population 33,000 of which 53% are Catholics (26,000).
► Malta with a population 428,000 of which 84% are Catholics (361,000).
► Monaco with a population 36,000 of which 82% are Catholics (30,000).
In addition to these there are some cantons of Switzerland that have Catholicism as their official religion, and well Vatican City (population 842 and 100% Catholic).
The disgusting and shameful fact is that just over 12,000,000 (12 million) people―out of a world population of 7,800,000,000 (7.8 billion) live in a country which has Catholicism as the official religion of the state―which is 1 in every 650 people or 0.0015%.
INDEPENDENCE FROM CATHOLIC TEACHINGS: On top of that, the rates of falling-away from the Faith have increased dramatically in proportion to the sense of independence sown in matters of Faith by the Liberal and Modernist Catholic Church. There is an ever-increasing insistence of the dangerous principle of “Follow your own conscience!” ― which is nothing else but pure independence from the teachings of the Church. This has resulted in the present day phenomenon where most Catholics no longer accept some key teachings of the Church. For example:
77% of Catholics believe it is not necessary to attend Sunday Mass.
65% of Catholics believe Divorce and Remarriage is acceptable.
61% of Catholics believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases (22% all cases; 39% most cases).
74% of Catholics believe artificial birth control is acceptable.
66% of Catholics believe the Eucharist is only symbolic and not the Body and Blood of Christ.
77% of Catholics support LGBTQ+ Catholics receiving the Holy Eucharist.
57% of Catholics are in favor of same-sex marriages.
80% of Catholics no longer attend Sunday Mass on a regular basis (62% attend only a few times a year or less).
INDEPENDENCE & DIVORCE: Then you have the absolute disaster of independence within families―who imagine they are no longer tied and obliged by the laws of God and can do what they want to do! This modern-day Liberal independence has led to unprecedented divorce rates. In the USA today, it is estimated that almost 50% of all marriages in the United States will end in divorce or separation. Researchers estimate that 41% of all first marriages end in divorce; 60% of second marriages end in divorce; and 73% of all third marriages end in divorce.
INDEPENDENCE & FAMILY LIFE AND CIRCUMSTANCES: Below you will find a chart showing the various Catholic attitudes in relation to different family set-ups and circumstances, some of them being outright sinful.
July―from a worldwide secular perspective―could be called “Independence Month.” There are several nations that ‘celebrate’ their independence during this month in one way or another. Every American, of course, knows that July 4th in America’s Independence Day—or perhaps the modern “dumbing-down” has been so successful that perhaps not all Americans are aware of the fact! Yet what most Americans do not realize is that July is choc-full of days of independence! The American Day of Independence of July 4th, is just one of twenty-two Days of Independence celebrated in the month of July.
On July 1st, Canada celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom in 1867.
On July 1st, Burundi, in Africa, celebrates its independence from Belgium in 1962.
On July 1st, Rwanda, in Africa, celebrates its independence from Belgium in 1962.
On July 3rd, Belarus celebrates its independence from the occupying German forces in 1944.
On July 4th, the United States celebrates its independence from Great Britain in 1776.
On July 5th, Venezuela celebrates its independence from Spain in 1811.
On July 5th, Algeria celebrates its independence from France in 1962.
On July 5th, Cape Verde celebrates its independence from Portugal in 1975.
On July 6th, Argentina celebrates its independence from Spain in 1816.
On July 6th, Malawi, in Africa, celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom in 1957.
On July 7th, the Solomon Islands celebrate independence from the United Kingdom in 1978.
On July 7th, South Sudan celebrates independence from Sudan in 2011.
On July 10th, the Bahamas celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom in 1973.
On July 12th, São Tomé and Príncipe, Africa, celebrates its independence from Portugal in 1975.
On July 12th, Kiribati, in Micronesia, celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom in 1979.
On July 14th, France celebrates Bastille Day and its revolutionary independence from the French monarchy in 1790.
On July 17th, Slovakia celebrates its independence from the Czechs in 1992.
On July 19th, Belgium celebrates its independence from the Netherlands in 1931.
On July 26th, Liberia celebrates its independence from American colonization in 1847.
On July 26th, Maldives, in Asia, celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom in 1965.
On July 28th, Peru celebrates its independence from Spain in 1821.
On July 30th, Vanuata, South Pacific, celebrates its independence from the United Kingdom and France in 1980.
Post-Revolutionary Independence
All-in-all, throughout the world in modern times (in the post-Revolutionary period following the American and French Revolutions and the advent and triumph of Liberalism) there have been around 170 declarations of independence, with 57 of them being independence from the United Kingdom. It is peculiarly providential that after England’s King Henry VIII (1491-1547) rebelled and separated himself and his country from the religious jurisdiction of the Catholic Church and the Pope in Rome, making himself the head of the church in England, the same fate later befell England as one country after another separated themselves from the massive English Empire throughout the world—that included, among others, America, Canada, Australia, India and large sections of Africa.
It brings to mind the fact that once Adam and Eve declared independence from God, then, as a punishment, all of nature rebelled against Adam and Eve, and was not a favorable and kind to them as the natural world was before their Original Sin. Just as nature―which was below or inferior―rebelled against the rebels Adam and Eve, so have many nations, who have rebelled and declared independence for one reason or another, have found that they, in turn, suffered rebellion from others. Yet Adam and Eve’s independence from God was not even the first declaration of independence! The first declaration of independence came from Satan, with his famous cry: “Non serviam!” ― “I will not serve!” The result was Hell! Likewise, the modern-day format of independence has followed the satanic suit and the result is the hell that we see around us―mainly due to the spirit of independence―more precisely, an independence from the laws and ways of God.
Modern-Day Independence is Independence From God
Let us not be fooled by the false mask of independence that is being worn in this post-revolutionary world, which cloaks a satanic independence behind the smiling Liberal mask of ‘benevolent’ independence. Yet, because most people have been dumbed-down and know very little history, they are duped by the Liberal mask of independence into believing the falsehoods of modern-day independence worshippers.
The ultimate goal behind the revolutionary dream of independence is an independence from God—which is what makes it satanic, for Satan’s cry was: “Non serviam!”—meaning: “I will not serve!” Satan made the first declaration of independence and he has been encouraging his brand of independence ever since that time. His first recruits were the fallen angels; his next recruits were Adam and Eve; and since that Original Sin (or Original Declaration of Independence) he has sold his brand of independence to billions of duped humans, who, by buying into his independence are now slaves in Hell. By blindfolding them with his blindfold of independence, and making them blindly follow his brand of independence, he has led them to the pit of Hell. As Our Lord said: “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). You could rephrase that to read: “Leave them alone, let them be independent! They are independent and leaders of the independent! And if the independent lead the others to independence, they will both fall into the pit!”
The following words of Holy Scripture are most appropriately applicable to today’s independently minded Liberals: “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes assembled together, against the Lord and His Christ” (Acts 4:26). “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3).
“The Lord looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. God has scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God has despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6).
By Their Independent Fruits You Shall Know Them
As Our Lord said: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate! For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them.
“Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone therefore that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And everyone that hears these My words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:14-27).
The following words of Our Lord shoots down the idea of independence from the very beginning: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). The truly Catholic life is one of DEPENDENCE and NOT INDEPENDENCE. The false Catholic life, the Liberal Catholic life, is one of INDEPENDENCE and NOT DEPENDENCE. By their fruits you shall know them. The way of DEPENDENCE ON GOD is straight and narrow, and few there are that find it, and even fewer are they that take it. The road of INDEPENDENCE FROM GOD is broad and wide, and many there are who find themselves upon it. Beware of the false prophets of Liberalism and Independence, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly are ravening wolves. The very first temptation offered by the ‘independent’ Satan ― “I will not serve!” ― was a temptation for independence:
“Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why has God commanded you that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ [the questioning of legitimate authority]. And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat! But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God has commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No, you shall not die the death! For God knows that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened―and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’” (Genesis 3:1-5). The enticement and allure to independence: “In what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as Gods”―in other words: “Disobey! Break away! You will see things differently! You don’t have to accept someone else’s point of view or authority! Be your own ruler! Be a law unto yourself! Don’t obey the laws of others―make your own laws!”
The Family of Independence
This independence of thought also shows itself through Naturalism and Humanism, which turns it back on the supernatural and the spiritual, and focuses on the world, nature and humanity, rather than Heaven, grace and the Divinity. This leads us to treasure the natural above the supernatural, things above grace, man above God.
It begets its children of Materialism (greed for things), Rationalism (think what you want in the Natural sphere—nobody tells me what to believe), Modernism (think what you want in the domain of Faith—nobody tells me what to believe about God) and Liberalism (do what you want in the Natural and Religious spheres—nobody tells me what to do, I will do what I want). This is the foundation for all the modern day Revolutions.
It also filters down into the family setting, where independence creeps into family life: the husband becomes more independent from outside authorities, the wife becomes more independent from her husband, the children become more independent from their parents—authority is accepted only if the subordinate agrees with the authority, otherwise there arises a spirit of independence, disobedience and rebellion.
The Illusion of Independence
The Illusion of Independence is exactly what it sounds like: it’s the false belief that we are, can be, or should be completely independent―even though it’s total and utter absurdity. Independence is celebrated everywhere; it is lifted up as a model and an ideal of how we should try to be, and so of course we all scramble to identify as being independent. Yet it is dangerous to believe we’re all independent and dangerous to seek to be independent. It’s really, really dangerous, and for several reasons.
The Shame and Danger of Independence
As they say, “If you do not know your history, then you will be forced to learn it by repeating the mistakes of history!” Most people DO NOT know their history―and so are sucked-into a superficial, sugared, suppressed, sentimentalized, sanitized, slanted and subversive version of history. A little history can save a lot of trouble. A little truth can avoid a lot of error! So here goes…
(1) Tracing independence back to its roots, we find that it is born of the devil, with his cry of “I will not serve!” Do we really want to have those kind of ‘family’ connections? Let us take to mind the words of Scripture: “Thy own wickedness shall reprove thee, and thy apostasy shall rebuke thee. Know thou, and see that it is an evil thing for thee, to have left the Lord thy God. Thou hast broken My yoke, thou hast burst My bands, and thou didst say: ‘I will not serve!’” (Jeremias 2:19-20). “So shall you also perish, if you be disobedient to the voice of the Lord your God!” (Deuteronomy 8:20).
(2) Adam and Eve chose the route of independence from God and thereby walked into the clutches of punishment and death. A fault and punishment that was repeated and received many times throughout history, as is clearly and frequently shown in Holy Scripture—proving, beyond doubt, that independence from God doesn’t pay!
(3) The Israelites, from the time of Moses, were a theocracy (theos is Greek for God, -cracy comes from the Greek kratos meaning “a rule, a regime”—meaning that they were ruled, guided and provided for by God. But then they wanted independence from God—they no longer wanted to be a theocracy, but a monarchy, whereby they would be ruled by a human king and not a divine God! “All the ancients of Israel being assembled, came to Samuel and they said to him: ‘Make us a king, to judge us, as all nations have!’ And the word was displeasing in the eyes of Samuel, that they should say: Give us a king, to judge us. And Samuel prayed to the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel: ‘Listen to the voice of the people! They have not rejected thee, but Me, that I should not reign over them!’” (1 Kings 8:4-7).
(4) The Jews rejected the Kingship of Christ to their folly and destruction, crying out to Pilate, when he asked them what he should with their King: “The chief priests answered: ‘We have no king but Caesar!’” (John 19:15).
Their desired king—Caesar—sent his son Titus, in 70 AD, as prophesied by Christ, to raze Jerusalem to the ground and slaughter all its inhabitants (over 1 million), because they rebelled against their own acknowledged “We have no king but Caesar!”—and sought independence from the Roman Emperor! An expensive price to pay for rejecting the Kingship of Christ in favor of the worldly kingship of Caesar—yet an even worse carnage awaits the world today for the same fault!
(5) Another theocracy (meaning God is king or ruler) was that of the Holy Roman Empire during the Middle Ages, which consisted of German-speaking peoples and Northern Italy. The Holy Roman Empire began in 800 AD, with the papal crowning of Charlemagne as emperor. The rulers of the Holy Roman Empire saw themselves as overseeing a theocracy (God’s kingdom) in the sense that the power of the government was welded or joined to that of the Roman Catholic Church—a union of Church and State, like a marriage between husband and wife. After Charlemagne died in 814, the imperial crown was disputed among the various Carolingian rulers of Western Francia and Eastern Francia, with first the western king (Charles the Bald) and then the eastern (Charles the Fat) attaining the prize. After the death of Charles the Fat in 888, however, the Carolingian (Charlemagne’s) Empire broke apart (independence), and was never restored. Around 900, autonomous (‘independent’) dukedoms or duchies re-emerged in East Francia―such as Franconia, Bavaria, Swabia, Saxony, and Lotharingia. According to Regino of Prüm, the independent parts of the realm “spewed forth kinglets,” and each independent part elected its own little kinglet “from its own bowels.” After the death of Charles the Fat, those crowned emperor by the pope controlled only territories in Italy, but not in the now ‘independent’ Francia.
East Francia did not turn to the Carolingian ruler of West Francia to take over the realm, but instead elected one of the dukes, Conrad of Franconia, as king of the Eastern Franks (independence). On his deathbed, Conrad yielded the crown to his main rival, Henry the Fowler of Saxony. Eventually Otto I became the Holy Roman Emperor. Otto I continued the work of unifying all German tribes into a single kingdom and greatly expanded the king’s powers, at the expense of the aristocracy, who found their powers reduced. Through strategic marriages and personal appointments, Otto installed members of his family in the kingdom’s most important duchies or dukedoms (independence and self-interest and self-advantage go hand-in-hand). Otto transformed the Roman Catholic Church in Germany, so as to benefit himself and to strengthen the royal office, subjecting the clergy to his personal control (a form of independence from the Church and God for sake of personal advantage). Otto’s later years were marked by conflicts with the papacy (independence) and struggles to stabilize his rule over Italy (others try to secure independence from Otto’s rule).
Eventually, the Holy Roman Empire was divided into dozens—eventually hundreds—of individual independent entities governed by kings, dukes, counts, bishops, abbots, and other rulers, collectively known as princes, who governed their land independently from the emperor, whose power was severely restricted by these various local leaders. Such are the fruits of mankind’s ceaseless struggle at securing increasing independence from God’s rule and God’s laws!
Science is Now Independent of God
Science today is the new god, having sought to replace the one true God in Heaven. It rises higher and higher each year with its achievements, and puts down more and more ‘alleged’ miracles of God. It increasingly dismisses much of what God has done as being mere fiction, exaggeration, imagination and legend. In its pride, science professes to know the age of the universe, it pretends that it can know what happened in the universe millions, or billions of years ago―according to the ‘gospel of science.’ Until recently, astronomers estimated that the (so-called) “Big Bang” occurred between 12 and 14 billion years ago―what’s a mere difference of only 2,000,000,000 (2,000 million) between friends? No big deal for “Big Bang” theorists!
To put this in perspective, the Solar System is thought to be 4.5 billion years old and humans have existed for only a few million years―what’s a “few million” years between friends, who cares about exactness in science? Yet science is normally proud of its “religious” adherence to exactness―it looks upon exactness as being one its “scientific commandments”―it proudly proclaims that it is exact to the “nth degree”! Yet these exacting sciences, just “turn-off” exactness when they feel like it! All of this is―do you not think?―very vague and presumptuous! The scientific theories have varied greatly over the last 200 years―and at every stage, with every age, every theory was deemed to be THE truth and almost everyone bowed-down before the god of science, saying “Credo” ― “I believe!” With stupid intelligences and dumb thought processes like that, maybe they did actually evolve out of monkeys after all! But in the end, God will laugh at them, as the following encounter with God and a scientist portrays:
God was sitting in Heaven one day, when a scientist shouted up to Him: “Hey, God! We don’t need You anymore. Science has finally figured out a way to create life out of nothing – in other words, we can now do what you did in the beginning.”
“Oh, is that so? Explain…” replies God.
“Yep! Sure is!” says the scientist, “We’ve now finally figured out how to take dirt and form it into the likeness of You and breathe life into it, thus creating man!”
“Well, that’s very interesting… show Me!”
So the scientist bends down to the Earth, digs up a wheelbarrow full of soil and starts to mold the soil into the shape of a man.
“No, no, no…! Nooooo you don’t!” interrupts God, “Put that soil down! Put it down right now! That’s my soil! I made it! You go make and get your own dirt!”
Hmmm! Who needs who? Who’s independent of whom?
We’re not independent. We are part of a larger system—many larger systems, in fact—that constantly impact our lives and the choices we make. And behind all those systems is Christ the King—who clearly told us: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Original (Independence) Sin
We have become increasingly independent, especially since the revolutions of independence in Europe and the Americas, beginning in the late 18th century and never having stopped since. The tendency for independence, which is a part of the package of Original Sin and all sin, is fed even more independence by the media and society. They make out independence to be a badge of honor that everyone should strive to obtain. Yet it flies and lies in the face of Jesus, Who said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Like Adam and Eve, we want to be our own gods—defining what is good and evil; choosing to do what we want, even if it is forbidden by God. We do not like to be told what to do—yet God is constantly telling us what to do: through His Church; our lawful superiors both at home and at work. When we think that our idea of things is better or more practical than God’s, then we have a problem—for ideas have consequences; and bad ideas have bad consequences! The ultimate bad consequence of the bad idea of independence is Hell—as the independently minded Lucifer and his independent minded angels found out.
“If thou wilt hear the voice of the Lord thy God, and do what is right before Him, and obey His commandments, and keep all His precepts [A GOOD IDEA, huh?), none of the evils that I laid upon Egypt, will I bring upon thee―for I am the Lord thy Healer!” (Exodus 15:26). “But if you will not yet for all this obey Me [A BAD IDEA], then I will chastise you seven times more for your sins” (Leviticus 26:18).
The Independence of Liberalism
Liberalism is independence and independence is Liberalism, or freedom from restraint—a freedom to think, believe, say and do what one likes. “It is the declaration of … the absolute independence of the individual and the social reason, [In other words, the opinion of society, or a group, or an individual, takes precedence over Church teaching]. In short it sets itself up as the measure and rule of Faith … It denies everything which it itself does not proclaim. It negates everything which it itself does not affirm. Such is the general negation uttered by Liberalism … Liberalism, in the order of action, is license; recognizing no principle or rule beyond itself” (Fr. Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin, Chapter 2).
“From the Baptized or even priestly Liberal, who boasts his breadth of mind in his easy toleration of error, to the avowed atheist, who hurls his open defiance against God, the difference is only one of degree. One simply stands on a higher rung of the same ladder than the other. Their common criterion is “liberality” and “independence of mind;” the degree of application will be measured by the individual disposition: … self-interest with one, temperament with another, education impeding a third … human respect may moderate another … family or school … Sometimes Liberalism stalks along in the careless trappings of an easygoing good nature, or a simplicity of character, which invites our affection and allays our suspicion. Its very candor in this guise is an aggression difficult to resist. It does not appear responsible and excites our compassion before it has awakened our aversion. We seem to forgive it before we accuse it. But all the greater is the danger when it appears least possible.” (Fr. Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin, Chapter 4).
“Liberalism is a world complete in itself … It is the world of Lucifer, disguised in our times under the name of Liberalism, in radical opposition and in perpetual warfare against that society composed of the Children of God, the Church of Jesus Christ … Liberalism strikes at the very foundations of Faith … It is the declaration of … the absolute independence of the individual and the social reason, [In other words, the opinion of society, or a group, or an individual, takes precedence over Church teaching]. In short it sets itself up as the measure and rule of Faith … It denies everything which it itself does not proclaim. It negates everything which it itself does not affirm. Such is the general negation uttered by Liberalism … Liberalism, in the order of action, is license; recognizing no principle or rule beyond itself.” (Fr. Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin, Chapter 2).
We see this “Do-As-You-Wantness” at all levels of society: Church, Politics, Finance, Legislation, Education, Social, Familial and Individual. Everyone has fostered an area of life where they decide what is right or wrong, what they feel okay about doing and what they won’t do—irrespective of what God, Church, Government, Society or Family say about it. All of this comes down to pride—which Holy Scripture says is the beginning of all sin (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Fr. Tanquerey, in The Spiritual Life, quotes Bossuet: “Pride, is a profound depravity; it is the worship of self; man becomes his own god through excessive self-love. Forgetful that God is his first beginning and his last end, he overrates himself; he considers himself the sovereign lord and master of those qualities, real or imaginary, which he possesses, without referring them to God. From this arises that spirit of independence, of self-sufficiency … (Fr. Tanquerey, in The Spiritual Life, §204).
Believe What You Want!
Hence, in the Church, in the domain of thought and belief, we see the majority of the laity no longer believing in the Real Presence, no longer believing that you have to go to Mass every Sunday, no longer believing that contraception is wrong, no longer believing that divorce and remarriage is wrong, no longer believing certain sexual behaviors to be wrong, etc. –and yet they still believe themselves to be “Catholics in good standing”!
Act As You Want!
This attitude of believe what you want, spills over into the domain of act as you want. People will come to church dress as they like—which is increasingly immodest dress. They will assist at Mass as they like—which is increasingly distracted and poor assistance. They will observe the Commandments of God and the Church to the degree that they like—which is less and less. They will mix with whomever they like—disregarding the fact the worldliness of these people may well be a danger to the Faith and salvation.
This is just the tip of the iceberg of behavior. It is the modern spirit of independence that is the soul of this kind of behavior, one which has as its motto: “Who are you to tell me what to do?” You see and hear it at home, at school, at work, in the parish, in politics, in finance, and in the general culture of society. “Do not interfere with the sinner! He has his rights! He is independent! We must respect that!” is the general theme of the Rights of Man. No coercion must exercised on wrong doers. Often, the victim even becomes the guilty party!
Sailing Wherever You Want or Sailing Where God Wants?
On the devil’s ship, SSS Seduction, you are totally independent and can do what you want and sail where you want! This is the way of modern independence! We think for ourselves! We accept only what we want to accept. We decide for ourselves! We act by ourselves! Only when things fail, do we go to God—and then we run out of patience with Him when He won’t give us what we tell Him to give us, in the time limit that we set for Him to answer our prayers! O what a mess we are! Rowing round and round frustratingly in circles, unwilling to unfurl our sails to allow God to blow us in the direction HE WANTS.
The, ship, SSS Seduction, sails on the seas of independence and is filled with empty, transitory pleasures that the devil promises will lead to true happiness and eternal independence—but those lies cover the reality of the destination of true and eternal sorrows and eternal slavery. Whereas on the Christ’s ship, the Ark of the Church, we sail where are told to sail, we are promised storms, temporary and painful sorrows that Our Lord says will lead to eternal joy and freedom. On the former ship, we can play now and pay later—on the latter ship, we labor now and rejoice later. The choice is one of instant gratification or eternal gratification; temporary pain or eternal pain; short-lived joy or eternal joy, independence and disobedience or dependence and obedience.
The Cure for Modern Independence is Christ’s Yoke of Dependence
As the famous religious axiom says: “Servire est Regnare” meaning “To Serve is to Reign”. The only real, lasting solution is to take up, once again, the yoke of Christ. “Take up My yoke upon you, and learn of Me, because I am meek, and humble of heart: and you shall find rest to your souls. For My yoke is sweet and My burden light” (Matthew 11:29-30). The ultimate yoke or dependence is that of the religious life (if properly lived) and Our Lady makes this clear to us: “Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils... No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents. O, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
The Glorification of Independence and Denigration of Dependence
INDEPENDENCE & THE CATHOLIC FAITH: It is difficult for us to grasp the concept of obedience because we have been educated in a tradition that glorifies independence. It is an alarming and disgusting fact that only 5 tiny nations still hold on to Catholicism as the official religion of the state:
► Costa Rica with a population 5,000,000 (5 million) of which 53% are Catholics (2,600,000).
► El Salvador with a population 7,000,000 (7 million) of which 81% are Catholics (2,700,000).
► Liechtenstein with a population 33,000 of which 53% are Catholics (26,000).
► Malta with a population 428,000 of which 84% are Catholics (361,000).
► Monaco with a population 36,000 of which 82% are Catholics (30,000).
In addition to these there are some cantons of Switzerland that have Catholicism as their official religion, and well Vatican City (population 842 and 100% Catholic).
The disgusting and shameful fact is that just over 12,000,000 (12 million) people―out of a world population of 7,800,000,000 (7.8 billion) live in a country which has Catholicism as the official religion of the state―which is 1 in every 650 people or 0.0015%.
INDEPENDENCE FROM CATHOLIC TEACHINGS: On top of that, the rates of falling-away from the Faith have increased dramatically in proportion to the sense of independence sown in matters of Faith by the Liberal and Modernist Catholic Church. There is an ever-increasing insistence of the dangerous principle of “Follow your own conscience!” ― which is nothing else but pure independence from the teachings of the Church. This has resulted in the present day phenomenon where most Catholics no longer accept some key teachings of the Church. For example:
77% of Catholics believe it is not necessary to attend Sunday Mass.
65% of Catholics believe Divorce and Remarriage is acceptable.
61% of Catholics believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases (22% all cases; 39% most cases).
74% of Catholics believe artificial birth control is acceptable.
66% of Catholics believe the Eucharist is only symbolic and not the Body and Blood of Christ.
77% of Catholics support LGBTQ+ Catholics receiving the Holy Eucharist.
57% of Catholics are in favor of same-sex marriages.
80% of Catholics no longer attend Sunday Mass on a regular basis (62% attend only a few times a year or less).
INDEPENDENCE & DIVORCE: Then you have the absolute disaster of independence within families―who imagine they are no longer tied and obliged by the laws of God and can do what they want to do! This modern-day Liberal independence has led to unprecedented divorce rates. In the USA today, it is estimated that almost 50% of all marriages in the United States will end in divorce or separation. Researchers estimate that 41% of all first marriages end in divorce; 60% of second marriages end in divorce; and 73% of all third marriages end in divorce.
INDEPENDENCE & FAMILY LIFE AND CIRCUMSTANCES: Below you will find a chart showing the various Catholic attitudes in relation to different family set-ups and circumstances, some of them being outright sinful.
All of this shows the increasing influence of Prince of Independence ― Satan the “prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― has progressively achieved within Catholic families. As Sister Lucia of Fatima was told by Our Lady ― Satan would wage a final battle against the Blessed Virgin and his focus would be on the family. She said: “A time will come when the decisive battle between the Kingdom of Christ and Satan will be over marriage and the family. And those who will work for the good of the family will experience persecution and tribulation.”
True Independence, Not the False Independence
On this Independence Day we need to become independent of the hype, spin and lies of the world―that is the independence that we should be seeking and celebrating if we manage to achieve it! The world belongs to Satan―for, as Christ says, Satan is “the prince of this world and in Me he has not any thing” (John 14:30). “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters ... You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Hence Holy Scripture tells to separate ourselves from this world, separate ourselves from the worldlings and non-believers―for these are under the influence of the devil: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
“Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light!” (Romans 13:12).
That is the independence we should be seeking and celebrating―an independence from the seductions, snares, spin and lies of the world and its prince, Satan―as Our Lord says: “He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44).
True Independence, Not the False Independence
On this Independence Day we need to become independent of the hype, spin and lies of the world―that is the independence that we should be seeking and celebrating if we manage to achieve it! The world belongs to Satan―for, as Christ says, Satan is “the prince of this world and in Me he has not any thing” (John 14:30). “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters ... You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Hence Holy Scripture tells to separate ourselves from this world, separate ourselves from the worldlings and non-believers―for these are under the influence of the devil: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
“Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light!” (Romans 13:12).
That is the independence we should be seeking and celebrating―an independence from the seductions, snares, spin and lies of the world and its prince, Satan―as Our Lord says: “He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father of lies!” (John 8:44).
Article 2
Tuesday, July 2nd, Feast of the Visitation
Did You Miss Your Visitation?
Tuesday, July 2nd, Feast of the Visitation
Did You Miss Your Visitation?
“Blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord” said St. Elizabeth to Our Lady during the Visitation (Luke 1:45). The Visitation, when meditated as the Second Joyful Mystery of the Rosary, is traditionally looked upon from the perspective of fraternal charity or love of neighbor. Yet it is also a mystery that relates to having faith in God.
You’d Better Believe It!
“Without Faith it is impossible to please God. For he that cometh to God, must believe…” (Hebrews 11:6). “And Jesus saith to them: Why are you fearful, O ye of little faith?” (Matthew 8:26). “Jesus said to them: ‘If you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, “Remove from hence hither!” and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you!’” (Matthew 17:19).
Zachary Did Not Believe
“There was in the days of Herod, the king of Judea, a certain priest named Zachary, and his wife was Elizabeth. And they were both just before God, walking in all the commandments of the Lord without blame. And they had no son, for Elizabeth was barren, and they both were well advanced in years. And it came to pass, when he executed the priestly function before God to offer incense in the Temple of the Lord. And there appeared to him an Angel of the Lord, standing on the right side of the altar of incense.
“But the Angel said to him: ‘Fear not, Zachary, for thy prayer is heard; and thy wife Elizabeth shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name John!’ And Zachary said to the Angel: ‘Whereby shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years!’ And the angel answering, said to him: ‘I am Gabriel, who stand before God: and behold, thou shalt be dumb, and shalt not be able to speak until the day wherein these things shall come to pass, because thou hast not believed my words, which shall be fulfilled in their time!’” (Luke 1:5-20).
Apostles Did Not Believe
It was not just Zachary who did not believe—we see the Apostles disbelieving Our Lord’s resurrection: ““He appeared to the Eleven, as they were at table: and He upbraided them with their incredulity and hardness of heart, because they did not believe them who had seen him after He was risen again” (Mark 16:14).
Some Just Don’t Want to Believe!
“And as soon as it was day, the ancients of the people, and the chief priests and scribes, came together; and they brought Him into their council, saying: ‘If Thou be the Christ, tell us!’ And He saith to them: ‘If I shall tell you, you will not believe Me!’“ (Luke 22:66-67).
So it is today! Some will not believe because they do not want to believe, because believing would mean a massive change of life and massive sacrifices. So they concoct their own twisted modified version of religion, based quite a bit on human reasoning and compromising with human passions. They convince themselves of its value, but it is not of God and will not lead to God. Protestantism is a case in point, but there are also twisted and deformed versions of Catholicism that will also lead to perdition.
God or Man
A frightening lesson for us and a humiliating lesson for Zachary! “God is no respecter of persons!” (Acts 10:24). Zachary was a priest of God. He kept all the commandments without blame. Yet he was severely punished by God for simply doubting God, or being uncertain about how all this could happen—for he said to the angel: “I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years!”
He was only saying the truth! That is true! However, he was also thinking NATURALLY and that is a BIG MISTAKE with God. God’s ways are not our ways, nor are God’s thoughts our thoughts (Isaias 55:8-9). As Jesus said to His Apostles: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26), which is nothing else than what the Angel Gabriel said to Our Lady: “Because no word shall be impossible with God” (Luke 1:37).
Have Faith!
St. Elizabeth, the spouse of the unfortunate and disbelieving Zachary, praised the Faith of Our Lady, saying: “Blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord” (Luke 1:45). This echoes the words of Jesus to the two blind men: “Then he touched their eyes, saying, ‘According to your faith, be it done unto you!’” (Matthew 9:29).
Faith opened their eyes so that they could see—Faith will open our eyes also, so that we will see what others fail to see: “As it is written: ‘God hath given them the spirit of insensibility; eyes that they should not see; and ears that they should not hear, until this present day’” (Romans 11:8). But do we really want to see? Our Lord asked the blind men if they really believed He could perform the miracle they desired:
“Jesus passed from thence and there followed him two blind men, crying out and saying, ‘Have mercy on us, O Son of David!’ And when he was come to the house, the blind men came to Him. And Jesus said to them, ‘Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?’ They say to him, ‘Yes, Lord!’ Then Jesus touched their eyes, saying, ‘According to your faith, be it done unto you!’ And their eyes were opened” (Matthew 9:27-30).
They believed. Human reasoning did not come into it—human reason would have said, “This is impossible!” Faith, however, replies: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26).
Blinded by the World
For those who prefer to look for materialism and worldliness, rather than look to the things above—the things of Faith—God will “let their eyes be darkened, that they may not see” (Romans 11:10) and “He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart, that they should not see with their eyes, nor understand with their heart, and be converted” (John 12:40). They then become spiritually blind, of whom Our Lord says: “Let them alone: they are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit” (Matthew 15:14). As Our Lady speaks of the blindness to the Faith, that worldliness and lukewarmness bring, at La Salette:
Faithlessness Foretold
“The priests (the punished Zachary was a priest too) by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests are asking vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads. Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, is crucifying my Son again! … The devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars, which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell; several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls. Evil books will be abundant on earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God.”
To the Venenrable Mary of Agreda, speaking of the lack of Faith and reverence in the Holy Eucharist, Our Lady says: “I tell thee, that, just as in the primitive Church there were so many, who were saved by it [the Holy Eucharist], now there are countless souls, who damn themselves through it. This damage is done, because the children of the Faith are following darkness, love vanity, covet riches, and nearly all of them seek after vain and deceitful pleasure, which blinds and obscures the understanding and covers up the light with darkness, which knows no distinction between the good and the bad, and penetrates not the truths of the evangelical doctrine” (The Mystical City of God, Vol. 4, chapter 7).
Peter’s Lack of Faith
“God is no respecter of persons” says St. Peter (Acts 10:34) and Peter himself experienced this first hand, when he also was too natural in his thinking and tried to persuade Our Lord that suffering and dying was not the way to go:
“From that time, Jesus began to show to His disciples, that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and the third day rise again. And Peter, taking Jesus, began to rebuke Him, saying: ‘Lord, be it far from Thee, this shall not be unto Thee!’ Jesus, turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind Me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me: because thou severest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:21-23). God is no respecter of persons—even when it comes to those in the highest positions, as was the case with St. Peter.
Poor Peter!
Peter would again take the naturalistic and excessively human path on the night of Our Lord’s arrest in Gethsemane. He draws his sword and (fortunately) cuts-off the ear of Malchus—it’s a good job he was such a poor swordsman, missing at such close range, for he could have killed Malchus with a well-aimed blow! Hopefully he was a better fisherman than he was a swordsman!
Here again, Jesus publicly rebukes Peter: “Then Jesus said to him: ‘Put up again thy sword into its place: for all that take the sword shall perish with the sword! Thinkest thou that I cannot ask My Father, and He will give Me presently more than twelve legions of angels? How then shall the Scriptures be fulfilled, that so it must be done?’” (Matthew 26:52-54). Poor Peter… “Thinkest thou…?” He was thinking, but too naturally—he saw things, not with the eyes of Faith, but too humanly. Jesus was seeing things and thinking things through supernaturally; Peter was doing it naturally.
Grow in Faith
St. Peter had to learn how to grow in his Faith, for it let him down on many occasions. After the arrest of Jesus, comes Peter’s triple denial of Our Lord, which betrays lukewarmness and a weak Faith. Our Lord had earlier said: “Simon, Simon, behold Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy Faith fail not: and thou, being once converted, confirm thy brethren” (Luke 22:31-32).
Peter failed several times, but he recovered and went on to become the Abraham (our father in Faith) of the New Testament (the Rock of Faith).
Faithless World
“Without Faith it is impossible to please God. For he that cometh to God, must believe…” (Hebrews 11:6). “And Jesus saith to them: Why are you fearful, O ye of little faith?” (Matthew 8:26).
Let us make no bones about it—or Faith is weak! If it was strong, then we would not be experiencing the ever growing apostasy that we face today—which was also predicted by Our Lady at Quito, La Salette and Fatima. The Faith is the foundation of the rest of the Temple of God. Upon Faith rests Hope and Charity (a love of God). We cannot hope in things we know nothing about; nor can we love things we do not know. Today there is plenty of ‘faith’ in science, in medicine, in technology, in money, in skill and industry—but how much Faith is there in the soul? Jesus said: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8).
Human or Divine
Without Faith—no matter how much money you have, or how many possessions, or how much skill or human knowledge you have—you cannot please God!
Let us thank God for our Faith—when so many are losing it all around us! “For all men have not Faith” (2 Thessalonians 3:2). The best way to thank Him is to live the Faith; to use the gift He gave you and not put on the mantelpiece or bury it: “Watch ye, stand fast in the Faith” (1 Corinthians 16:13). “Try your own selves if you be in the Faith; prove ye yourselves” (2 Corinthians 13:5). “I have kept the Faith” (2 Timothy 4:7).
Let us nourish our Faith—by reading, listening and learning about the many different facets of the Faith! “Faith then cometh by hearing; and hearing by the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17).
Let us strengthen our Faith—by constantly begging, like the Apostles in Scripture, “And the Apostles said to the Lord: ‘Increase our Faith!’” and the man who cried out: “And immediately the father of the boy crying out, with tears said: “I do believe! Lord: help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:23).
Let us fight for the Faith and fight using our Faith: “Fight the good fight of Faith” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one” (Ephesians 6:16). “For whatsoever is born of God, overcometh the world: and this is the victory which overcometh the world, our Faith” (1 John 5:4). “Here is the patience of the saints, who keep the commandments of God, and the Faith of Jesus” (Apocalypse 14:12). “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the Faith” (2 Timothy 4:7).
Fight, Ye Children of Light!
Your Faith is your foundation! It needs maintenance! Maintenance takes time! Modern man has little or no time to maintain and strengthen his Faith. There are too many other things to attend to. Yet, as Scripture says, “Be not deceived, God is not mocked” (Galatians 6:7). “Without Faith it is impossible to please God.” (Hebrews 11:6). Jesus said: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8). “And Jesus said to them: ‘Where is your Faith?’” (Luke 8:25). Will we be able to say: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the Faith” (2 Timothy 4:7).
St. Louis de Montfort, speaking of the fight, writes: “At the end of the world … the Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady … They shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics, schismatics, idolaters and sinners. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God, that is to say, the most Holy Virgin. By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone” (True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis de Montfort, §47-§48).
Our Lady of La Salette, speaking of those devoted to her, says: “But the children of the Holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me ... God will take care of His faithful servants ... I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world. It is time they came out and filled the world with light. Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children. I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ. Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see. For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends.”
Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
You could say that we are living in a modern-day age of Our Lady’s Visitations―what some call “The Age of Mary”―whereby Our Lady has visited us through many apparitions to inform us of this present-day battle against Satan and the world. We are called to the fight because the spiritual carnage is terrible―souls are falling into Hell like snowflakes in a blizzard, as St. Teresa of Avila said: “I saw souls falling into Hell like snowflakes!” St. Benedict Joseph Labre adds: “I was watching souls falling down into the abyss like snowflakes falling thick and fast in the winter!”
We could wash our hands of it―like Pontius Pilate tried to wash his hands of the Blood of Jesus, saying: “I am innocent of the blood of this just man!” (Matthew 27:24)―or we could try Cain’s lame excuse after murdering his brother, Abel: “And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is thy brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: I know not! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to Cain: ‘What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to me from the earth!’” (Genesis 4:9-10). God could well say something similar to us: “What have you done?” (Or rather: “What have you not done?”) “There are many souls in Hell because you have done nothing to save them!” We might try Cain’s excuse: “Am I my brother’s keeper? It is their own fault―not my fault―that they are in Hell!” God has already answered that in Holy Scripture: “You should love one another. Not as Cain, who was of the wicked one, and killed his brother. He that loves not, abides in death. Whosoever hates his brother is a murderer. In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us―and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. He that has the substance of this world, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:11-17).
You’d Better Believe It!
“Without Faith it is impossible to please God. For he that cometh to God, must believe…” (Hebrews 11:6). “And Jesus saith to them: Why are you fearful, O ye of little faith?” (Matthew 8:26). “Jesus said to them: ‘If you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, “Remove from hence hither!” and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you!’” (Matthew 17:19).
Zachary Did Not Believe
“There was in the days of Herod, the king of Judea, a certain priest named Zachary, and his wife was Elizabeth. And they were both just before God, walking in all the commandments of the Lord without blame. And they had no son, for Elizabeth was barren, and they both were well advanced in years. And it came to pass, when he executed the priestly function before God to offer incense in the Temple of the Lord. And there appeared to him an Angel of the Lord, standing on the right side of the altar of incense.
“But the Angel said to him: ‘Fear not, Zachary, for thy prayer is heard; and thy wife Elizabeth shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name John!’ And Zachary said to the Angel: ‘Whereby shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years!’ And the angel answering, said to him: ‘I am Gabriel, who stand before God: and behold, thou shalt be dumb, and shalt not be able to speak until the day wherein these things shall come to pass, because thou hast not believed my words, which shall be fulfilled in their time!’” (Luke 1:5-20).
Apostles Did Not Believe
It was not just Zachary who did not believe—we see the Apostles disbelieving Our Lord’s resurrection: ““He appeared to the Eleven, as they were at table: and He upbraided them with their incredulity and hardness of heart, because they did not believe them who had seen him after He was risen again” (Mark 16:14).
Some Just Don’t Want to Believe!
“And as soon as it was day, the ancients of the people, and the chief priests and scribes, came together; and they brought Him into their council, saying: ‘If Thou be the Christ, tell us!’ And He saith to them: ‘If I shall tell you, you will not believe Me!’“ (Luke 22:66-67).
So it is today! Some will not believe because they do not want to believe, because believing would mean a massive change of life and massive sacrifices. So they concoct their own twisted modified version of religion, based quite a bit on human reasoning and compromising with human passions. They convince themselves of its value, but it is not of God and will not lead to God. Protestantism is a case in point, but there are also twisted and deformed versions of Catholicism that will also lead to perdition.
God or Man
A frightening lesson for us and a humiliating lesson for Zachary! “God is no respecter of persons!” (Acts 10:24). Zachary was a priest of God. He kept all the commandments without blame. Yet he was severely punished by God for simply doubting God, or being uncertain about how all this could happen—for he said to the angel: “I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years!”
He was only saying the truth! That is true! However, he was also thinking NATURALLY and that is a BIG MISTAKE with God. God’s ways are not our ways, nor are God’s thoughts our thoughts (Isaias 55:8-9). As Jesus said to His Apostles: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26), which is nothing else than what the Angel Gabriel said to Our Lady: “Because no word shall be impossible with God” (Luke 1:37).
Have Faith!
St. Elizabeth, the spouse of the unfortunate and disbelieving Zachary, praised the Faith of Our Lady, saying: “Blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord” (Luke 1:45). This echoes the words of Jesus to the two blind men: “Then he touched their eyes, saying, ‘According to your faith, be it done unto you!’” (Matthew 9:29).
Faith opened their eyes so that they could see—Faith will open our eyes also, so that we will see what others fail to see: “As it is written: ‘God hath given them the spirit of insensibility; eyes that they should not see; and ears that they should not hear, until this present day’” (Romans 11:8). But do we really want to see? Our Lord asked the blind men if they really believed He could perform the miracle they desired:
“Jesus passed from thence and there followed him two blind men, crying out and saying, ‘Have mercy on us, O Son of David!’ And when he was come to the house, the blind men came to Him. And Jesus said to them, ‘Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?’ They say to him, ‘Yes, Lord!’ Then Jesus touched their eyes, saying, ‘According to your faith, be it done unto you!’ And their eyes were opened” (Matthew 9:27-30).
They believed. Human reasoning did not come into it—human reason would have said, “This is impossible!” Faith, however, replies: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26).
Blinded by the World
For those who prefer to look for materialism and worldliness, rather than look to the things above—the things of Faith—God will “let their eyes be darkened, that they may not see” (Romans 11:10) and “He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart, that they should not see with their eyes, nor understand with their heart, and be converted” (John 12:40). They then become spiritually blind, of whom Our Lord says: “Let them alone: they are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit” (Matthew 15:14). As Our Lady speaks of the blindness to the Faith, that worldliness and lukewarmness bring, at La Salette:
Faithlessness Foretold
“The priests (the punished Zachary was a priest too) by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests are asking vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads. Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, is crucifying my Son again! … The devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars, which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell; several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls. Evil books will be abundant on earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God.”
To the Venenrable Mary of Agreda, speaking of the lack of Faith and reverence in the Holy Eucharist, Our Lady says: “I tell thee, that, just as in the primitive Church there were so many, who were saved by it [the Holy Eucharist], now there are countless souls, who damn themselves through it. This damage is done, because the children of the Faith are following darkness, love vanity, covet riches, and nearly all of them seek after vain and deceitful pleasure, which blinds and obscures the understanding and covers up the light with darkness, which knows no distinction between the good and the bad, and penetrates not the truths of the evangelical doctrine” (The Mystical City of God, Vol. 4, chapter 7).
Peter’s Lack of Faith
“God is no respecter of persons” says St. Peter (Acts 10:34) and Peter himself experienced this first hand, when he also was too natural in his thinking and tried to persuade Our Lord that suffering and dying was not the way to go:
“From that time, Jesus began to show to His disciples, that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and the third day rise again. And Peter, taking Jesus, began to rebuke Him, saying: ‘Lord, be it far from Thee, this shall not be unto Thee!’ Jesus, turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind Me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me: because thou severest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:21-23). God is no respecter of persons—even when it comes to those in the highest positions, as was the case with St. Peter.
Poor Peter!
Peter would again take the naturalistic and excessively human path on the night of Our Lord’s arrest in Gethsemane. He draws his sword and (fortunately) cuts-off the ear of Malchus—it’s a good job he was such a poor swordsman, missing at such close range, for he could have killed Malchus with a well-aimed blow! Hopefully he was a better fisherman than he was a swordsman!
Here again, Jesus publicly rebukes Peter: “Then Jesus said to him: ‘Put up again thy sword into its place: for all that take the sword shall perish with the sword! Thinkest thou that I cannot ask My Father, and He will give Me presently more than twelve legions of angels? How then shall the Scriptures be fulfilled, that so it must be done?’” (Matthew 26:52-54). Poor Peter… “Thinkest thou…?” He was thinking, but too naturally—he saw things, not with the eyes of Faith, but too humanly. Jesus was seeing things and thinking things through supernaturally; Peter was doing it naturally.
Grow in Faith
St. Peter had to learn how to grow in his Faith, for it let him down on many occasions. After the arrest of Jesus, comes Peter’s triple denial of Our Lord, which betrays lukewarmness and a weak Faith. Our Lord had earlier said: “Simon, Simon, behold Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy Faith fail not: and thou, being once converted, confirm thy brethren” (Luke 22:31-32).
Peter failed several times, but he recovered and went on to become the Abraham (our father in Faith) of the New Testament (the Rock of Faith).
Faithless World
“Without Faith it is impossible to please God. For he that cometh to God, must believe…” (Hebrews 11:6). “And Jesus saith to them: Why are you fearful, O ye of little faith?” (Matthew 8:26).
Let us make no bones about it—or Faith is weak! If it was strong, then we would not be experiencing the ever growing apostasy that we face today—which was also predicted by Our Lady at Quito, La Salette and Fatima. The Faith is the foundation of the rest of the Temple of God. Upon Faith rests Hope and Charity (a love of God). We cannot hope in things we know nothing about; nor can we love things we do not know. Today there is plenty of ‘faith’ in science, in medicine, in technology, in money, in skill and industry—but how much Faith is there in the soul? Jesus said: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8).
Human or Divine
Without Faith—no matter how much money you have, or how many possessions, or how much skill or human knowledge you have—you cannot please God!
Let us thank God for our Faith—when so many are losing it all around us! “For all men have not Faith” (2 Thessalonians 3:2). The best way to thank Him is to live the Faith; to use the gift He gave you and not put on the mantelpiece or bury it: “Watch ye, stand fast in the Faith” (1 Corinthians 16:13). “Try your own selves if you be in the Faith; prove ye yourselves” (2 Corinthians 13:5). “I have kept the Faith” (2 Timothy 4:7).
Let us nourish our Faith—by reading, listening and learning about the many different facets of the Faith! “Faith then cometh by hearing; and hearing by the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17).
Let us strengthen our Faith—by constantly begging, like the Apostles in Scripture, “And the Apostles said to the Lord: ‘Increase our Faith!’” and the man who cried out: “And immediately the father of the boy crying out, with tears said: “I do believe! Lord: help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:23).
Let us fight for the Faith and fight using our Faith: “Fight the good fight of Faith” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one” (Ephesians 6:16). “For whatsoever is born of God, overcometh the world: and this is the victory which overcometh the world, our Faith” (1 John 5:4). “Here is the patience of the saints, who keep the commandments of God, and the Faith of Jesus” (Apocalypse 14:12). “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the Faith” (2 Timothy 4:7).
Fight, Ye Children of Light!
Your Faith is your foundation! It needs maintenance! Maintenance takes time! Modern man has little or no time to maintain and strengthen his Faith. There are too many other things to attend to. Yet, as Scripture says, “Be not deceived, God is not mocked” (Galatians 6:7). “Without Faith it is impossible to please God.” (Hebrews 11:6). Jesus said: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8). “And Jesus said to them: ‘Where is your Faith?’” (Luke 8:25). Will we be able to say: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the Faith” (2 Timothy 4:7).
St. Louis de Montfort, speaking of the fight, writes: “At the end of the world … the Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady … They shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics, schismatics, idolaters and sinners. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God, that is to say, the most Holy Virgin. By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone” (True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis de Montfort, §47-§48).
Our Lady of La Salette, speaking of those devoted to her, says: “But the children of the Holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me ... God will take care of His faithful servants ... I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world. It is time they came out and filled the world with light. Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children. I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ. Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see. For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends.”
Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
You could say that we are living in a modern-day age of Our Lady’s Visitations―what some call “The Age of Mary”―whereby Our Lady has visited us through many apparitions to inform us of this present-day battle against Satan and the world. We are called to the fight because the spiritual carnage is terrible―souls are falling into Hell like snowflakes in a blizzard, as St. Teresa of Avila said: “I saw souls falling into Hell like snowflakes!” St. Benedict Joseph Labre adds: “I was watching souls falling down into the abyss like snowflakes falling thick and fast in the winter!”
We could wash our hands of it―like Pontius Pilate tried to wash his hands of the Blood of Jesus, saying: “I am innocent of the blood of this just man!” (Matthew 27:24)―or we could try Cain’s lame excuse after murdering his brother, Abel: “And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is thy brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: I know not! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to Cain: ‘What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to me from the earth!’” (Genesis 4:9-10). God could well say something similar to us: “What have you done?” (Or rather: “What have you not done?”) “There are many souls in Hell because you have done nothing to save them!” We might try Cain’s excuse: “Am I my brother’s keeper? It is their own fault―not my fault―that they are in Hell!” God has already answered that in Holy Scripture: “You should love one another. Not as Cain, who was of the wicked one, and killed his brother. He that loves not, abides in death. Whosoever hates his brother is a murderer. In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us―and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. He that has the substance of this world, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:11-17).
Article 1
Monday, July 1st
Does Your Heart Have Blood? Are You a Bleeding Heart?
Monday, July 1st
Does Your Heart Have Blood? Are You a Bleeding Heart?
Heart and Blood
The month of June is the month of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, while the month of July is the month of the Precious Blood of Jesus. June spills over into July, and July flows out of June like blood flows out of the heart. It is not by chance that we have these two dedicated months side-by-side. There is a wealth of doctrine and spiritual treasure that flows forth from the juxtapositioning of the Sacred Heart of Jesus next to the Precious Blood of Jesus.
What analogy or likeness can we put forth to show the intimate spiritual relationship that springs forth from this co-relation of the Heart and the Blood of Jesus? From a mere physical viewpoint, an immediate relationship jumps to mind—for own bodies testify to the close connection between heart and blood. The two go hand in hand, like body and soul, parents and children, etc. One needs the other; they work together.
The School of Blood
Without blood, we die! Blood is essential for life. Our bodies were designed and first made by God. We can learn much about God and the spiritual life by a simple observation and study of our bodies, just as we can learn about God and the spiritual life by studying God’s creation around us—which is what the early Church Fathers would do—for as Holy Scripture tells us: “For the invisible things of Him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made” (Romans 1:20). Let us them take a look at our blood and see what we learn from it about God and our spiritual life. For it not for nothing that God and His Holy Church wishes us to focus on the Precious Blood of Jesus during this month of July.
Blood is Precious!
The blood in our bodies is pumped by the heart through a network of arteries and veins. God is a wonderful designer and simply looking at blood shows His incredible designing skills. Blood is a combination of plasma (watery liquid) and cells (red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets) that float in it. It is a specialized bodily fluid that supplies essential substances and nutrients. Blood is essential for good health, because our body depends on a steady supply of fuel and oxygen to reach its billions of cells. Even our heart couldn’t survive without blood flowing through the vessels that bring nourishment to its muscular walls. Blood also carries waste away from our cells carbon dioxide and other waste materials to the lungs, kidneys, and digestive system; from there they are removed from the body. Without blood, we couldn’t keep warm or cool off, we couldn’t fight infections, and we couldn’t get rid of our own waste products.
Analogous to the Vine
At the Last Supper, Our Lord speaks of the Vine and the branches. We can link this to the role of blood and especially the role played by the Precious Blood of Jesus. In chapter fifteen of St. John’s Gospel, Our Lord says: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the gardener. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away―and everyone that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine: you the branches: he that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit: for, without Me, you can do nothing. If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn. If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you” (John 15:1-7).
Vine, Sap, Branches & Fruit
Our Lord, as always, has chosen a beautiful spiritual analogy between the growth of the vine and our growth in the spiritual life. The roots of the vine that are anchored in the soil (humus) and serve as the conduit where nutrients and water from the soil are absorbed, are indicative of our need to be anchored in spiritual soil, or humility (humus – humility). Pride contaminates all our nutrients and fruit (prayers and virtues). “Learn of Me, for I am humble of heart” said Our Lord (Matthew 11:29).
The vine is the main part of the grapevine, extending from the root system in the ground up to the cordons, or arms, of the vine. When the grapevine is young, the trunk is very pliable and must be supported by stakes. It is almost as though the grapevine is “tied to the wood of the cross” in a manner of speaking.
The Sap is the Blood of the Vine
The trunk is composed of sleeves of conductive tissue-most notably the phloem and xylem. The phloem tissues carry the Phloem sap from the leaves to the rest of the vine—it is two-directional, or “two-way traffic” sending sap wherever it’s needed. The phloem sap consists primarily of water, in addition to sugar, hormones, and mineral elements dissolved within it. Xylem tissues carry the Xylem sap from the roots to the branches, from the bottom to the top―it is one-directional, or “one-way traffic only.” The Xylem sap consists primarily of water, along with hormones, minerals, and nutrients.
Grapevine ‘Bleeding’
Grapevine ‘bleeding’ can occur at any time of active growth. ‘Bleeding’ can occur from several causes. One cause of ‘bleeding’ is by root pressure due to the reactivation of the roots in the early spring and the pruning that takes place.
The vast majority of water uptake by a grapevine is through the root system. From about February, vines are again in sap, the vine draws water with enormous force from as far as 100 feet below the surface of the soil. When the soil temperature reaches 45°F to 48°F, active root growth begins, leading to a surge in xylem activity. Removal of water from the soil by the roots and its being pushed into xylem tissues under pressure, will produce the phenomenon known as ‘bleeding.’ This water presses against the freshly cut surfaces which haven’t callused yet, and oozes from there. This “bleeding” may last up to 2 weeks, and occasionally it develops into small runlets along the stem. Bleeding contains sap that flows when the xylem tissues in the canes have been severed.
Also, late pruning of the vine towards the end of winter (early spring), as recommended for frosty regions, usually leads to “bleeding” of the cut surfaces or ‘wounds’, especially if heavy pruning is done. ‘Bleeding’ usually occurs during dormancy only if sufficient soil moisture is available to the root system. In dry years, vines might not ‘bleed’ when pruned. This could be due to insufficient water reserves (they have no excess liquid to ‘bleed’), or it could be due to severe cold damage to the xylem. The ‘bleeding’ liquid contains plant hormones, sugars, amino acids, and mineral nutrients.
This “bleeding” may last up to 2 weeks, and occasionally it develops into small runlets along the stem. However, this is not a negative process for the vine. There is no evidence that bleeding is harmful to the vine and is a normal process. In fact, it can push out air bubbles in the xylem that form during the winter. These air bubbles have the potential to disrupt water flow, in the xylem, that goes up to the shoots.
The “Need to Bleed”
Just as ‘bleeding’ is not harmful to the vine, neither is bleeding, or bloodletting, harmful to humans. Bloodletting is one of the oldest medical practices in history. The earliest records of it for health purposes come from 3,000-year-old Egyptian texts. We also have texts indicating that Ancient Hindus bled sick individuals in the hopes of healing them. Ancient Syrians were known to use leeches for bloodletting as well.
The practice was in fact common all over the world, right up until the late 19th century. Despite three-millennia of global popularity, these days bloodletting is commonly considered one of the world’s most assuredly outdated medical practices. It’s become the go-to reference for jokes about barbaric quackery that harms instead of heals. But what if it might be unwise to dismiss the practice of bloodletting completely? As wacky as it sounds, bloodletting might actually be good for people, especially for men. Below we cover a brief history of bloodletting, before taking a look at its potential real-life benefits.
A Bloody History
In Western medicine, bloodletting was based on the ancient Greek idea that the human body was composed of four humors (or bodily fluids): blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile, which corresponded to the four Greek classical elements of air, water, earth, and fire, respectively. All sickness was thought to be the result of an imbalance of the humors in the body and the job of the doctor was to bring them back into equilibrium. Inducing vomiting, ingesting diuretics, and draining the body of blood were thought to be effective ways to harmonize the four humors, or bodily fluids. The famous Greek physician Hippocrates believed that bloodletting was an externally-induced parallel to female menstruation, which functioned to “purge women of bad humors.” After likely being passed on from the Greeks, soon bloodletting became prevalent throughout both European and Arabic countries.
Bloodletting was thought to be beneficial in healing nearly every disease, from acne and asthma, to cancer and smallpox. Even the loss of blood from a wound was treated by removing more blood! Bloodletting the already-wounded was thought to reduce inflammation (which is why it was employed prior to surgery as well). Bloodletting wasn’t limited to curing disease either, but was also used as a preventive measure to avoid getting sick.
Bloodletting reached its peak in the 18th and 19th centuries. Doctors from that time often bled patients until they fainted, which to them was a sign that they removed just the right amount of blood. After a three-millennia run of being the go-to treatment for every ailment under the sun, the effectiveness of bloodletting was strongly questioned in the late 19th century, and had been almost completely abandoned by the medical establishment by the dawn of the 20th. We now laugh and roll our eyes at our forefathers for what we perceive to be a childish and barbaric naivety to think that purposely bleeding could heal sickness.
Bacteria need iron to cause infections. The body has defense mechanisms to make it harder for germs to suck iron out of someone’s blood or other tissues. But deadly germs can get around that so-called iron blockade, and understanding how might lead to better treatments. University of Chicago microbiologists report, in the journal Science, that the staph germ—a leading cause of pneumonia and other infections—fuels itself with iron in a previously unknown way. Early in staph infections, the germs blow open red blood cells. The Chicago researchers found staph then snatches their oxygen- and iron-carrying component, called heme, and discovered the genes that govern the process. When they weakened those genes, staph no longer sickened worms or mice, said lead researcher Dr. Eric P. Skaar. Next step is hunting drugs to block staph’s iron-stealing ability.
National Institutes of Health iron specialist Dr. Tracy Rouault, suggests that bloodletting, done early enough, may slow staph infections by starving germs of iron. Nobody’s suggesting bleeding staph patients today, which is derided as a nonsensical, if not barbaric custom. Bloodletting was abandoned in the mid-20th century after antibiotics were invented—but now more and more doctors and researchers are pointing out the disastrous effects of antibiotics, especially in their overuse and ubiquitous use as a cure-all—much like bloodletting was looked upon as a cure all in bygone years! What goes around, comes around! But the mystery persists: “How could a procedure popular for 2,500 years have really been completely worthless?” Dr. Rouault asked. Bloodletting was used for lots of reasons, many that “didn’t make good sense,” Dr. Roualt stressed. But, searching old medical texts, she found that starting in 18th-century France, certain physicians advised it only at the start of a high-fever illness. Even in 1942, medicine’s leading English-language textbook advised early bleeding for high-fever pneumonia.
Bloody Benefits
Yet, as it turns out, there might be some benefits to bloodletting after all. As genetic physician Dr. Sharon Moalem notes in his book Survival of the Sickest, “the notion that humans across the globe continued to practice [bloodletting] for thousands of years probably indicates that it produced some positive results. If everyone who was treated with bloodletting died, its practitioners would have been out of business pretty quickly.”
Well, recent research suggests our ancestors may have been on to something when they sliced each other open or stuck leeches on their faces, as controlled (emphasis on controlled) bloodletting potentially provides a myriad of health benefits. Most of the benefits of bloodletting are related to iron, so to understand bloodletting’s positive effect, you must first understand the role this mineral plays in our bodies.
Ironclad Health? Iron Constitution? Think Again!
Our bodies need iron for a whole host of metabolic processes. Its primary function is to help carry oxygen from our lungs through the bloodstream and release it to the body where needed. What’s more, iron helps enzymes in the body detoxify poisons and convert sugars into energy. When a person has anemia, or an iron deficiency, they look pale, feel fatigued, and are easily confused and disoriented.
Ironclad Bacteria!
But here’s the thing: Our bodies aren’t the only organisms that require iron to survive and thrive. Little tiny organisms, that can make us sick, also need this mineral. When bacteria, fungi, and protozoa enter our body, they immediately hunt for iron so they can survive and spread.
The connection between iron and bacteria growth was discovered accidently by a research assistant of scientist Eugene D. Weinberg. Weinberg was investigating whether diet could mitigate the effectiveness of antibiotics, so he and his team filled petri dishes with bacteria, an antibiotic, and an organic or elemental nutrient (that varied from dish to dish). A few days later, a research assistant noticed that one dish was so jam-packed with bacteria, that she thought she had forgotten to put in the antibiotic. So she created the dish again, making sure the antibiotic was in there, and sure enough when she came back a few days later, the dish was once again overloaded with bacteria. Can you guess which elemental nutrient was also in the dish? You got it―iron! The iron was such a boon to the bacteria that it completely counteracted the efficacy of the antibiotic.
The Benefits of Bloodletting
Researchers have found that the practice of removing blood could improve blood pressure, lower cholesterol and drop blood glucose in obese patients with metabolic syndrome. These are risk factors of coronary heart disease, stroke and type 2 diabetes. They found that patients who gave blood had a significant reduction in systolic blood pressure.
Recent studies also suggest, but do not prove conclusively, that regular blood donation may have other benefits, like cutting the risk of strokes, heart attacks or cancer. While our bodies need iron for nearly every function of our metabolism, an excess of this mineral can leave us more vulnerable to sickness and ill-health. In an age where a lot of our food is fortified with iron, many Westerners probably have too much of it floating around in their system, especially men. Since iron resides primarily in our blood, periodically letting some of it out may help bring balance back to our bodies―the ancient Greeks were on to something after all! Here are some of the possible health benefits of donating blood on a regular basis:
Reduces the Risk of Heart Attacks
Before menopause, women suffer only about half as many heart attacks as men of similar age do. But after menopause the statistics even out. Many medical researchers suspect that men might benefit by regularly donating blood. Dr. David Meyers, a cardiologist at Kansas University Medical Center, became interested in a possible link between blood loss and heart disease after reading about a Finnish study that found that men, with high levels of iron in their blood, had more than twice the risk of heart attacks than men with lower levels. He wondered whether the regular loss of blood, by depleting the body’s iron reserves, might reduce that risk.
To find out, Meyers studied a group of 3,855 men and women in the original survey, all of whom are now over 40, and noted how many went on to develop heart disease and how many had donated blood in the past decade. Meyers found that men who had donated blood at least once in the last three years were 30 percent less likely to have developed heart disease. He found no difference for women between donors and non-donors.
May Help Stave Off Illnesses
When you donate blood, you’re reducing the amount of iron in your body. Based on what we know about how infectious agents use iron to survive and grow, reducing iron levels through blood donation may theoretically help stave off illnesses. At least that’s what some researchers and doctors think. Dr. Sharon Moalem points to a few incidents to bolster this theory. The first was in a Somali refugee camp where diseases like malaria, tuberculosis, and brucellosis were present. Despite the prevalence of these diseases, very few of the refugees showed signs of infection.
A doctor, named John Murray, had a hunch that their low levels of iron, due to malnutrition, were contributing to the immunity of the refugees in the camp. To test his theory, he gave half of them iron supplements to treat the anemia they were all experiencing. The other half continued on their regular diets. Sure enough, the rates of infection went through the roof among the refugees who received the iron supplements. Something similar happened in New Zealand when doctors injected babies with iron supplements. Infections increased dramatically.
May Reduce Risk For Cancer
A few studies suggest there’s a connection between reducing iron through blood donation and reducing cancer risks. For example, one study found that individuals who underwent iron saw a decreased cancer risk. Researchers are still exploring the connection between blood donation, iron reduction, and cancer risk, and while the results aren’t definitive, if something as simple as donating blood has the possibility of reducing the risk, then it is no bad thing. Besides, giving blood is also helpful to others!
Having laid the natural foundation, by looking and man and his blood, and the vine and its sap, let us take this to the spiritual and supernatural level by seeing how we are being bled by God!
Blood and Symbol of Life and Love
We give blood that others may have life. There can be no life without blood—we even have the phrase: “This is my lifeblood!” The word “lifeblood” is defined by dictionaries as “the most important part of something: the part of something that provides its strength and energy.” We bring into this world babies whom we call “our own flesh and blood”―which is loosely linked to Adam’s words concerning the creation of Eve: “And Adam said: ‘This now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man!’” (Genesis 2:23).
Out of love for our fellow man, we try to avoid shedding his blood: “Whosoever shall shed man’s blood, his blood shall be shed: for man was made to the image of God” (Genesis 9:6). “Innocent blood may not be shed in the midst of the land which the Lord thy God will give thee to possess, lest thou be guilty of blood” (Deuteronomy 19:10). “And God said to Cain: ‘What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth!’” (Genesis 4:10).
Rather than shed our blood, Jesus, our brother through our adoption into God’s family, shed His own. This “love” and “life” is seen in the Agony in the Garden. Our Lord showed His “love” for us by His bloody sweat in Gethsemane, when He did not refuse to take the next step in winning eternal “life” for us sinners and the salvation of our souls. The German World War II general, Erwin Rommel, said: “Sweat saves blood, blood saves lives, and brains save both!” Our Lord’s bloody sweat and blood saved both our blood and our lives! He is the “brains” behind our salvation!
‘Blood Money’
In a certain sense blood is money. Christ bought us back―from the consequences of sin and slavery to the devil―by paying the price or ransom with His Precious Blood: “Knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things as gold or silver, but with the Precious Blood of Christ” (1 Peter 1:18-19).
We do not really appreciate this price of our redemption—unless, of course, we are one day placed in a similar position where we might have to bloodily lay down our lives for Christ and our sins, not to mention the sins of the world (of which we are partially guilty if we neglect to regularly pray and sacrifice, as Our Lady of Fatima asked, for the conversion of sinners).
When the Jews were seeking the death sentence for Jesus, “the whole people said: ‘His blood be upon us and our children!’” (Matthew 27:25). Words that they lived to regret, for they would pay for shedding the Blood of Jesus by having their own blood shed in the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 AD. Christ could have quoted the words of His prophet Jeremias against the Jews: “But know ye, and understand, that if you put me to death, you will shed innocent blood against your own selves, and against this city, and the inhabitants thereof. For in truth the Lord sent me to you, to speak all these words in your hearing” (Jeremias 16:15).
Jesus Himself prophesied: “Amen I say to you there shall not be left here a stone upon a stone that shall not be destroyed … For the days shall come upon thee, and thy enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and straiten thee on every side, and beat thee flat to the ground, and thy children who are in thee: and they shall not leave in thee a stone upon a stone: because thou hast not known the time of thy visitation” (Matthew 24:2; Luke 19:43-44).
Over one million Jews were bloodily slaughtered by the Romans in that fateful day of reckoning! Sin doesn’t come cheap—it is easy to commit, expensive in price! Forgiveness and salvation do not come cheap―“No one thinks of how much blood it costs” (Dante, Paradise).
Blood On Our Own Heads
God threatens falsehood! “Know that thou shalt be put to death! Thy blood shall be upon thy own head!” (3 Kings 2:37). The Israelites were leading very sinful lives—Isaias compares them to Sodom and Gomorrha. They were sacrificing in the Temple, but also leading lives of sin in the meantime.
This is pretty much the state of the Church and the world today. God is given lip-service, while the world is loved with all the heart. Hypocritically, we praise God to high Heaven while we sin like Hell! What God speaks to sinful Israel through Isaias, His prophet, He could well address to us today, saying:
“Israel has not known Me, and My people have not understood! Woe to the sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a wicked seed, ungracious children! They have forsaken the Lord, they have blasphemed the Holy One of Israel, they are gone away backwards! For what shall I strike you any more, you that increase transgression?
“The whole head is sick, and the whole heart is sad. From the sole of the foot unto the top of the head, there is no soundness therein! Wounds and bruises and swelling sores―they are not bound up, nor dressed, nor fomented with oil. Your land is desolate, your cities are burnt with fire, your country strangers devour before your face, and it shall be desolate as when wasted by enemies. And the daughter of Sion shall be left as a covert in a vineyard, and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, and as a city that is laid waste. Except the Lord of hosts had left us seed, we had been as Sodom, and we should have been like to Gomorrha. Hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers of Sodom, give ear to the law of our God, ye people of Gomorrha.
“To what purpose do you offer Me the multitude of your victims, saith the Lord? I am full―I desire not holocausts of rams, and fat of fatlings, and blood of calves, and lambs, and buck goats. When you came to appear before Me, who required these things at your hands, that you should walk in My courts? Offer sacrifice no more in vain―incense is an abomination to Me. The new moons, and the Sabbaths, and other festivals I will not abide―your assemblies are wicked. My soul hates your new moons, and your solemnities―they are become troublesome to Me, I am weary of bearing them! And when you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away My eyes from you―and when you multiply prayer, I will not hear―for your hands are full of blood.
“Wash yourselves, be clean, take away the evil of your devices from My eyes, cease to do perversely! Learn to do well―seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge for the fatherless, defend the widow. And then come, and accuse Me, saith the Lord. If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool. If you be willing, and will listen to Me, you shall eat the good things of the land. But if you will not, and if you will provoke Me to wrath―then the sword shall devour you, because the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it!” (Isaias 1:3-20).
Same old problem, eh? “If you be willing to listen to Me…!” Too busy having fun, no time to listen. “They have ears and hear not!” (Psalm 113:14). “And thy ears shall hear the word of one admonishing thee behind thy back” (Isaias 30:21). “And the Lord hath sent to you all his servants the prophets, rising early, and sending, and you have not hearkened, nor inclined your ears to hear” (Jeremias 25:4). But to those who are willing to listen― “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear!” (Matthew 11:15)―Our Lord and Our Lady speak out:
Anemic Souls Destroy Church’s Lifeblood
“Many hearts consecrated to God in the priestly and religious state will fall into lukewarmness ... The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance … The priests, ministers of my Son, the priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety in the celebration of the Holy Mysteries, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity. Yes, the priests are asking for vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads. Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! The sins of those dedicated to God cry out towards Heaven and call for vengeance, and now vengeance is at their door, for there is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There are no more generous souls, there is no one left worthy of offering a spotless Sacrifice to the Eternal for the sake of the world. God will strike in an unprecedented way” (Our Lady of Good Success & La Salette).
We Will Pay With Our Blood!
“In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind ... The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God. There will be a formidable and frightful war, in which both native and foreign blood will flow, including that of secular and regular priests as well as that of other religious ... blood will flow on all sides. Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death ... France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war ... Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian ... Blood will flow in the streets ... Men will kill each other, massacre each other even in their homes ... A general war will follow which will be appalling ... This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph ... all order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family … With my Son I have intervened so many times to appease the wrath of the Father. I have prevented the coming of calamities by offering Him the sufferings of the Son on the Cross, His Precious Blood, and beloved souls who console Him forming a cohort of victim souls. Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger” (Our Lady of Good Success, La Salette & Akita).
Why will all these horrendous things happen? Because, as Our Lord said of Jerusalem while He still walked the Earth, “because thou hast not known the time of thy visitation!” (Luke 19:44). Or, as Sr. Lucia of Fatima reports in 1957: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.” Truly, we have not known the hour of Our Lady’s visitation—so we shall be visited in another way!
Woe! Woe! Woe! Thrice Woe!
To the same Mother Mariana, to whom Our Lady of Good Success was appearing, Our Lord also warned Mother Mariana that the chastisement would be severe for those religious who squandered so many graces with their pride and vainglory to secure positions of power and rank. He especially condemned the lukewarm: “Alas! If men, and above all, priests and religious souls, would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small inveterate imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me.... But I will not tolerate this. Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me. I desire all or nothing — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
“The times will come,” He told her, “when doctrine will be commonly known among the learned and the ignorant. ... Many religious books will be written. But the practice of the virtues and of these doctrines will be found in only a few souls; for this reason, saints will become rare. And precisely for this reason, My priests and My religious will fall into a fatal indifference. Their coldness will extinguish the fire of divine love, afflicting My Loving Heart with these small thorns that you see ... Alas! If you could only know My intense interior suffering ... caused by the lack of correspondence to this deluge of graces with which I inundate My priests and religious and, as a consequence, by the sins that they commit!
Jesus continued: “Know, moreover, that Divine Justice releases terrible chastisements on entire nations, not only for the sins of the people, but especially for those of priests and religious persons. For the latter are called, by the perfection of their state, to be the salt of the Earth, the masters of truth and the deflectors of divine wrath. Straying from their divine mission, they degrade themselves in such a way that, before the eyes of God, they quicken the rigor of the punishments.”
Add to all this the blood shed in abortions. In the USA, since Roe vs. Wade in 1973, an estimated 58 million babies have been killed (aborted), Worldwide, since 1980, the number is an estimated 1,340 million babies killed. Their blood is upon the head of the world and we live in that world.
Add to the aborted babies the escalating shedding of blood through Christian persecution, civil violence and political wars—and you have not just a pool of blood crying out to Heaven for vengeance, but a veritable sea of blood!
Way Out of This Bloody Mess!
What Our Lady of Good Success said to Mother Mariana, she says to us today—if we can only break ourselves away from having fun and find time to listen and act upon what she says: “Clamor insistently without tiring and weep with bitter tears in the privacy of your heart, imploring our Celestial Father that, for love of the Eucharistic Heart of my Most Holy Son and His Precious Blood shed with such generosity and the profound bitterness and sufferings of His cruel Passion and Death, He might take pity on His ministers and bring to an end those ominous times and restore the spirit of the priests” (Our Lady of Good Success).
The Rosary, especially, has been given a power that Heaven wants to see us use. Sr. Lucia of Fatima says: The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
So...! What are we going to do? Click with the mouse and timidly go to the next page? Or click our fingers and ask for another beer, wine or soda? Or click the remote and turn on the TV? Or let something click in our heads that makes us get down on our knees and ‘click’ through the mysteries of the Rosary and ‘click’ on the car keys to open the car doors and drive off for an extra Mass or two, or three?
The month of June is the month of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, while the month of July is the month of the Precious Blood of Jesus. June spills over into July, and July flows out of June like blood flows out of the heart. It is not by chance that we have these two dedicated months side-by-side. There is a wealth of doctrine and spiritual treasure that flows forth from the juxtapositioning of the Sacred Heart of Jesus next to the Precious Blood of Jesus.
What analogy or likeness can we put forth to show the intimate spiritual relationship that springs forth from this co-relation of the Heart and the Blood of Jesus? From a mere physical viewpoint, an immediate relationship jumps to mind—for own bodies testify to the close connection between heart and blood. The two go hand in hand, like body and soul, parents and children, etc. One needs the other; they work together.
The School of Blood
Without blood, we die! Blood is essential for life. Our bodies were designed and first made by God. We can learn much about God and the spiritual life by a simple observation and study of our bodies, just as we can learn about God and the spiritual life by studying God’s creation around us—which is what the early Church Fathers would do—for as Holy Scripture tells us: “For the invisible things of Him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made” (Romans 1:20). Let us them take a look at our blood and see what we learn from it about God and our spiritual life. For it not for nothing that God and His Holy Church wishes us to focus on the Precious Blood of Jesus during this month of July.
Blood is Precious!
The blood in our bodies is pumped by the heart through a network of arteries and veins. God is a wonderful designer and simply looking at blood shows His incredible designing skills. Blood is a combination of plasma (watery liquid) and cells (red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets) that float in it. It is a specialized bodily fluid that supplies essential substances and nutrients. Blood is essential for good health, because our body depends on a steady supply of fuel and oxygen to reach its billions of cells. Even our heart couldn’t survive without blood flowing through the vessels that bring nourishment to its muscular walls. Blood also carries waste away from our cells carbon dioxide and other waste materials to the lungs, kidneys, and digestive system; from there they are removed from the body. Without blood, we couldn’t keep warm or cool off, we couldn’t fight infections, and we couldn’t get rid of our own waste products.
Analogous to the Vine
At the Last Supper, Our Lord speaks of the Vine and the branches. We can link this to the role of blood and especially the role played by the Precious Blood of Jesus. In chapter fifteen of St. John’s Gospel, Our Lord says: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the gardener. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away―and everyone that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine: you the branches: he that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit: for, without Me, you can do nothing. If anyone abides not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn. If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you” (John 15:1-7).
Vine, Sap, Branches & Fruit
Our Lord, as always, has chosen a beautiful spiritual analogy between the growth of the vine and our growth in the spiritual life. The roots of the vine that are anchored in the soil (humus) and serve as the conduit where nutrients and water from the soil are absorbed, are indicative of our need to be anchored in spiritual soil, or humility (humus – humility). Pride contaminates all our nutrients and fruit (prayers and virtues). “Learn of Me, for I am humble of heart” said Our Lord (Matthew 11:29).
The vine is the main part of the grapevine, extending from the root system in the ground up to the cordons, or arms, of the vine. When the grapevine is young, the trunk is very pliable and must be supported by stakes. It is almost as though the grapevine is “tied to the wood of the cross” in a manner of speaking.
The Sap is the Blood of the Vine
The trunk is composed of sleeves of conductive tissue-most notably the phloem and xylem. The phloem tissues carry the Phloem sap from the leaves to the rest of the vine—it is two-directional, or “two-way traffic” sending sap wherever it’s needed. The phloem sap consists primarily of water, in addition to sugar, hormones, and mineral elements dissolved within it. Xylem tissues carry the Xylem sap from the roots to the branches, from the bottom to the top―it is one-directional, or “one-way traffic only.” The Xylem sap consists primarily of water, along with hormones, minerals, and nutrients.
Grapevine ‘Bleeding’
Grapevine ‘bleeding’ can occur at any time of active growth. ‘Bleeding’ can occur from several causes. One cause of ‘bleeding’ is by root pressure due to the reactivation of the roots in the early spring and the pruning that takes place.
The vast majority of water uptake by a grapevine is through the root system. From about February, vines are again in sap, the vine draws water with enormous force from as far as 100 feet below the surface of the soil. When the soil temperature reaches 45°F to 48°F, active root growth begins, leading to a surge in xylem activity. Removal of water from the soil by the roots and its being pushed into xylem tissues under pressure, will produce the phenomenon known as ‘bleeding.’ This water presses against the freshly cut surfaces which haven’t callused yet, and oozes from there. This “bleeding” may last up to 2 weeks, and occasionally it develops into small runlets along the stem. Bleeding contains sap that flows when the xylem tissues in the canes have been severed.
Also, late pruning of the vine towards the end of winter (early spring), as recommended for frosty regions, usually leads to “bleeding” of the cut surfaces or ‘wounds’, especially if heavy pruning is done. ‘Bleeding’ usually occurs during dormancy only if sufficient soil moisture is available to the root system. In dry years, vines might not ‘bleed’ when pruned. This could be due to insufficient water reserves (they have no excess liquid to ‘bleed’), or it could be due to severe cold damage to the xylem. The ‘bleeding’ liquid contains plant hormones, sugars, amino acids, and mineral nutrients.
This “bleeding” may last up to 2 weeks, and occasionally it develops into small runlets along the stem. However, this is not a negative process for the vine. There is no evidence that bleeding is harmful to the vine and is a normal process. In fact, it can push out air bubbles in the xylem that form during the winter. These air bubbles have the potential to disrupt water flow, in the xylem, that goes up to the shoots.
The “Need to Bleed”
Just as ‘bleeding’ is not harmful to the vine, neither is bleeding, or bloodletting, harmful to humans. Bloodletting is one of the oldest medical practices in history. The earliest records of it for health purposes come from 3,000-year-old Egyptian texts. We also have texts indicating that Ancient Hindus bled sick individuals in the hopes of healing them. Ancient Syrians were known to use leeches for bloodletting as well.
The practice was in fact common all over the world, right up until the late 19th century. Despite three-millennia of global popularity, these days bloodletting is commonly considered one of the world’s most assuredly outdated medical practices. It’s become the go-to reference for jokes about barbaric quackery that harms instead of heals. But what if it might be unwise to dismiss the practice of bloodletting completely? As wacky as it sounds, bloodletting might actually be good for people, especially for men. Below we cover a brief history of bloodletting, before taking a look at its potential real-life benefits.
A Bloody History
In Western medicine, bloodletting was based on the ancient Greek idea that the human body was composed of four humors (or bodily fluids): blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile, which corresponded to the four Greek classical elements of air, water, earth, and fire, respectively. All sickness was thought to be the result of an imbalance of the humors in the body and the job of the doctor was to bring them back into equilibrium. Inducing vomiting, ingesting diuretics, and draining the body of blood were thought to be effective ways to harmonize the four humors, or bodily fluids. The famous Greek physician Hippocrates believed that bloodletting was an externally-induced parallel to female menstruation, which functioned to “purge women of bad humors.” After likely being passed on from the Greeks, soon bloodletting became prevalent throughout both European and Arabic countries.
Bloodletting was thought to be beneficial in healing nearly every disease, from acne and asthma, to cancer and smallpox. Even the loss of blood from a wound was treated by removing more blood! Bloodletting the already-wounded was thought to reduce inflammation (which is why it was employed prior to surgery as well). Bloodletting wasn’t limited to curing disease either, but was also used as a preventive measure to avoid getting sick.
Bloodletting reached its peak in the 18th and 19th centuries. Doctors from that time often bled patients until they fainted, which to them was a sign that they removed just the right amount of blood. After a three-millennia run of being the go-to treatment for every ailment under the sun, the effectiveness of bloodletting was strongly questioned in the late 19th century, and had been almost completely abandoned by the medical establishment by the dawn of the 20th. We now laugh and roll our eyes at our forefathers for what we perceive to be a childish and barbaric naivety to think that purposely bleeding could heal sickness.
Bacteria need iron to cause infections. The body has defense mechanisms to make it harder for germs to suck iron out of someone’s blood or other tissues. But deadly germs can get around that so-called iron blockade, and understanding how might lead to better treatments. University of Chicago microbiologists report, in the journal Science, that the staph germ—a leading cause of pneumonia and other infections—fuels itself with iron in a previously unknown way. Early in staph infections, the germs blow open red blood cells. The Chicago researchers found staph then snatches their oxygen- and iron-carrying component, called heme, and discovered the genes that govern the process. When they weakened those genes, staph no longer sickened worms or mice, said lead researcher Dr. Eric P. Skaar. Next step is hunting drugs to block staph’s iron-stealing ability.
National Institutes of Health iron specialist Dr. Tracy Rouault, suggests that bloodletting, done early enough, may slow staph infections by starving germs of iron. Nobody’s suggesting bleeding staph patients today, which is derided as a nonsensical, if not barbaric custom. Bloodletting was abandoned in the mid-20th century after antibiotics were invented—but now more and more doctors and researchers are pointing out the disastrous effects of antibiotics, especially in their overuse and ubiquitous use as a cure-all—much like bloodletting was looked upon as a cure all in bygone years! What goes around, comes around! But the mystery persists: “How could a procedure popular for 2,500 years have really been completely worthless?” Dr. Rouault asked. Bloodletting was used for lots of reasons, many that “didn’t make good sense,” Dr. Roualt stressed. But, searching old medical texts, she found that starting in 18th-century France, certain physicians advised it only at the start of a high-fever illness. Even in 1942, medicine’s leading English-language textbook advised early bleeding for high-fever pneumonia.
Bloody Benefits
Yet, as it turns out, there might be some benefits to bloodletting after all. As genetic physician Dr. Sharon Moalem notes in his book Survival of the Sickest, “the notion that humans across the globe continued to practice [bloodletting] for thousands of years probably indicates that it produced some positive results. If everyone who was treated with bloodletting died, its practitioners would have been out of business pretty quickly.”
Well, recent research suggests our ancestors may have been on to something when they sliced each other open or stuck leeches on their faces, as controlled (emphasis on controlled) bloodletting potentially provides a myriad of health benefits. Most of the benefits of bloodletting are related to iron, so to understand bloodletting’s positive effect, you must first understand the role this mineral plays in our bodies.
Ironclad Health? Iron Constitution? Think Again!
Our bodies need iron for a whole host of metabolic processes. Its primary function is to help carry oxygen from our lungs through the bloodstream and release it to the body where needed. What’s more, iron helps enzymes in the body detoxify poisons and convert sugars into energy. When a person has anemia, or an iron deficiency, they look pale, feel fatigued, and are easily confused and disoriented.
Ironclad Bacteria!
But here’s the thing: Our bodies aren’t the only organisms that require iron to survive and thrive. Little tiny organisms, that can make us sick, also need this mineral. When bacteria, fungi, and protozoa enter our body, they immediately hunt for iron so they can survive and spread.
The connection between iron and bacteria growth was discovered accidently by a research assistant of scientist Eugene D. Weinberg. Weinberg was investigating whether diet could mitigate the effectiveness of antibiotics, so he and his team filled petri dishes with bacteria, an antibiotic, and an organic or elemental nutrient (that varied from dish to dish). A few days later, a research assistant noticed that one dish was so jam-packed with bacteria, that she thought she had forgotten to put in the antibiotic. So she created the dish again, making sure the antibiotic was in there, and sure enough when she came back a few days later, the dish was once again overloaded with bacteria. Can you guess which elemental nutrient was also in the dish? You got it―iron! The iron was such a boon to the bacteria that it completely counteracted the efficacy of the antibiotic.
The Benefits of Bloodletting
Researchers have found that the practice of removing blood could improve blood pressure, lower cholesterol and drop blood glucose in obese patients with metabolic syndrome. These are risk factors of coronary heart disease, stroke and type 2 diabetes. They found that patients who gave blood had a significant reduction in systolic blood pressure.
Recent studies also suggest, but do not prove conclusively, that regular blood donation may have other benefits, like cutting the risk of strokes, heart attacks or cancer. While our bodies need iron for nearly every function of our metabolism, an excess of this mineral can leave us more vulnerable to sickness and ill-health. In an age where a lot of our food is fortified with iron, many Westerners probably have too much of it floating around in their system, especially men. Since iron resides primarily in our blood, periodically letting some of it out may help bring balance back to our bodies―the ancient Greeks were on to something after all! Here are some of the possible health benefits of donating blood on a regular basis:
Reduces the Risk of Heart Attacks
Before menopause, women suffer only about half as many heart attacks as men of similar age do. But after menopause the statistics even out. Many medical researchers suspect that men might benefit by regularly donating blood. Dr. David Meyers, a cardiologist at Kansas University Medical Center, became interested in a possible link between blood loss and heart disease after reading about a Finnish study that found that men, with high levels of iron in their blood, had more than twice the risk of heart attacks than men with lower levels. He wondered whether the regular loss of blood, by depleting the body’s iron reserves, might reduce that risk.
To find out, Meyers studied a group of 3,855 men and women in the original survey, all of whom are now over 40, and noted how many went on to develop heart disease and how many had donated blood in the past decade. Meyers found that men who had donated blood at least once in the last three years were 30 percent less likely to have developed heart disease. He found no difference for women between donors and non-donors.
May Help Stave Off Illnesses
When you donate blood, you’re reducing the amount of iron in your body. Based on what we know about how infectious agents use iron to survive and grow, reducing iron levels through blood donation may theoretically help stave off illnesses. At least that’s what some researchers and doctors think. Dr. Sharon Moalem points to a few incidents to bolster this theory. The first was in a Somali refugee camp where diseases like malaria, tuberculosis, and brucellosis were present. Despite the prevalence of these diseases, very few of the refugees showed signs of infection.
A doctor, named John Murray, had a hunch that their low levels of iron, due to malnutrition, were contributing to the immunity of the refugees in the camp. To test his theory, he gave half of them iron supplements to treat the anemia they were all experiencing. The other half continued on their regular diets. Sure enough, the rates of infection went through the roof among the refugees who received the iron supplements. Something similar happened in New Zealand when doctors injected babies with iron supplements. Infections increased dramatically.
May Reduce Risk For Cancer
A few studies suggest there’s a connection between reducing iron through blood donation and reducing cancer risks. For example, one study found that individuals who underwent iron saw a decreased cancer risk. Researchers are still exploring the connection between blood donation, iron reduction, and cancer risk, and while the results aren’t definitive, if something as simple as donating blood has the possibility of reducing the risk, then it is no bad thing. Besides, giving blood is also helpful to others!
Having laid the natural foundation, by looking and man and his blood, and the vine and its sap, let us take this to the spiritual and supernatural level by seeing how we are being bled by God!
Blood and Symbol of Life and Love
We give blood that others may have life. There can be no life without blood—we even have the phrase: “This is my lifeblood!” The word “lifeblood” is defined by dictionaries as “the most important part of something: the part of something that provides its strength and energy.” We bring into this world babies whom we call “our own flesh and blood”―which is loosely linked to Adam’s words concerning the creation of Eve: “And Adam said: ‘This now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man!’” (Genesis 2:23).
Out of love for our fellow man, we try to avoid shedding his blood: “Whosoever shall shed man’s blood, his blood shall be shed: for man was made to the image of God” (Genesis 9:6). “Innocent blood may not be shed in the midst of the land which the Lord thy God will give thee to possess, lest thou be guilty of blood” (Deuteronomy 19:10). “And God said to Cain: ‘What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth!’” (Genesis 4:10).
Rather than shed our blood, Jesus, our brother through our adoption into God’s family, shed His own. This “love” and “life” is seen in the Agony in the Garden. Our Lord showed His “love” for us by His bloody sweat in Gethsemane, when He did not refuse to take the next step in winning eternal “life” for us sinners and the salvation of our souls. The German World War II general, Erwin Rommel, said: “Sweat saves blood, blood saves lives, and brains save both!” Our Lord’s bloody sweat and blood saved both our blood and our lives! He is the “brains” behind our salvation!
‘Blood Money’
In a certain sense blood is money. Christ bought us back―from the consequences of sin and slavery to the devil―by paying the price or ransom with His Precious Blood: “Knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things as gold or silver, but with the Precious Blood of Christ” (1 Peter 1:18-19).
We do not really appreciate this price of our redemption—unless, of course, we are one day placed in a similar position where we might have to bloodily lay down our lives for Christ and our sins, not to mention the sins of the world (of which we are partially guilty if we neglect to regularly pray and sacrifice, as Our Lady of Fatima asked, for the conversion of sinners).
When the Jews were seeking the death sentence for Jesus, “the whole people said: ‘His blood be upon us and our children!’” (Matthew 27:25). Words that they lived to regret, for they would pay for shedding the Blood of Jesus by having their own blood shed in the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 AD. Christ could have quoted the words of His prophet Jeremias against the Jews: “But know ye, and understand, that if you put me to death, you will shed innocent blood against your own selves, and against this city, and the inhabitants thereof. For in truth the Lord sent me to you, to speak all these words in your hearing” (Jeremias 16:15).
Jesus Himself prophesied: “Amen I say to you there shall not be left here a stone upon a stone that shall not be destroyed … For the days shall come upon thee, and thy enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and straiten thee on every side, and beat thee flat to the ground, and thy children who are in thee: and they shall not leave in thee a stone upon a stone: because thou hast not known the time of thy visitation” (Matthew 24:2; Luke 19:43-44).
Over one million Jews were bloodily slaughtered by the Romans in that fateful day of reckoning! Sin doesn’t come cheap—it is easy to commit, expensive in price! Forgiveness and salvation do not come cheap―“No one thinks of how much blood it costs” (Dante, Paradise).
Blood On Our Own Heads
God threatens falsehood! “Know that thou shalt be put to death! Thy blood shall be upon thy own head!” (3 Kings 2:37). The Israelites were leading very sinful lives—Isaias compares them to Sodom and Gomorrha. They were sacrificing in the Temple, but also leading lives of sin in the meantime.
This is pretty much the state of the Church and the world today. God is given lip-service, while the world is loved with all the heart. Hypocritically, we praise God to high Heaven while we sin like Hell! What God speaks to sinful Israel through Isaias, His prophet, He could well address to us today, saying:
“Israel has not known Me, and My people have not understood! Woe to the sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a wicked seed, ungracious children! They have forsaken the Lord, they have blasphemed the Holy One of Israel, they are gone away backwards! For what shall I strike you any more, you that increase transgression?
“The whole head is sick, and the whole heart is sad. From the sole of the foot unto the top of the head, there is no soundness therein! Wounds and bruises and swelling sores―they are not bound up, nor dressed, nor fomented with oil. Your land is desolate, your cities are burnt with fire, your country strangers devour before your face, and it shall be desolate as when wasted by enemies. And the daughter of Sion shall be left as a covert in a vineyard, and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, and as a city that is laid waste. Except the Lord of hosts had left us seed, we had been as Sodom, and we should have been like to Gomorrha. Hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers of Sodom, give ear to the law of our God, ye people of Gomorrha.
“To what purpose do you offer Me the multitude of your victims, saith the Lord? I am full―I desire not holocausts of rams, and fat of fatlings, and blood of calves, and lambs, and buck goats. When you came to appear before Me, who required these things at your hands, that you should walk in My courts? Offer sacrifice no more in vain―incense is an abomination to Me. The new moons, and the Sabbaths, and other festivals I will not abide―your assemblies are wicked. My soul hates your new moons, and your solemnities―they are become troublesome to Me, I am weary of bearing them! And when you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away My eyes from you―and when you multiply prayer, I will not hear―for your hands are full of blood.
“Wash yourselves, be clean, take away the evil of your devices from My eyes, cease to do perversely! Learn to do well―seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge for the fatherless, defend the widow. And then come, and accuse Me, saith the Lord. If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool. If you be willing, and will listen to Me, you shall eat the good things of the land. But if you will not, and if you will provoke Me to wrath―then the sword shall devour you, because the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it!” (Isaias 1:3-20).
Same old problem, eh? “If you be willing to listen to Me…!” Too busy having fun, no time to listen. “They have ears and hear not!” (Psalm 113:14). “And thy ears shall hear the word of one admonishing thee behind thy back” (Isaias 30:21). “And the Lord hath sent to you all his servants the prophets, rising early, and sending, and you have not hearkened, nor inclined your ears to hear” (Jeremias 25:4). But to those who are willing to listen― “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear!” (Matthew 11:15)―Our Lord and Our Lady speak out:
Anemic Souls Destroy Church’s Lifeblood
“Many hearts consecrated to God in the priestly and religious state will fall into lukewarmness ... The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance … The priests, ministers of my Son, the priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety in the celebration of the Holy Mysteries, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity. Yes, the priests are asking for vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads. Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! The sins of those dedicated to God cry out towards Heaven and call for vengeance, and now vengeance is at their door, for there is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There are no more generous souls, there is no one left worthy of offering a spotless Sacrifice to the Eternal for the sake of the world. God will strike in an unprecedented way” (Our Lady of Good Success & La Salette).
We Will Pay With Our Blood!
“In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind ... The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God. There will be a formidable and frightful war, in which both native and foreign blood will flow, including that of secular and regular priests as well as that of other religious ... blood will flow on all sides. Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death ... France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war ... Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian ... Blood will flow in the streets ... Men will kill each other, massacre each other even in their homes ... A general war will follow which will be appalling ... This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph ... all order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family … With my Son I have intervened so many times to appease the wrath of the Father. I have prevented the coming of calamities by offering Him the sufferings of the Son on the Cross, His Precious Blood, and beloved souls who console Him forming a cohort of victim souls. Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger” (Our Lady of Good Success, La Salette & Akita).
Why will all these horrendous things happen? Because, as Our Lord said of Jerusalem while He still walked the Earth, “because thou hast not known the time of thy visitation!” (Luke 19:44). Or, as Sr. Lucia of Fatima reports in 1957: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.” Truly, we have not known the hour of Our Lady’s visitation—so we shall be visited in another way!
Woe! Woe! Woe! Thrice Woe!
To the same Mother Mariana, to whom Our Lady of Good Success was appearing, Our Lord also warned Mother Mariana that the chastisement would be severe for those religious who squandered so many graces with their pride and vainglory to secure positions of power and rank. He especially condemned the lukewarm: “Alas! If men, and above all, priests and religious souls, would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small inveterate imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me.... But I will not tolerate this. Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me. I desire all or nothing — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
“The times will come,” He told her, “when doctrine will be commonly known among the learned and the ignorant. ... Many religious books will be written. But the practice of the virtues and of these doctrines will be found in only a few souls; for this reason, saints will become rare. And precisely for this reason, My priests and My religious will fall into a fatal indifference. Their coldness will extinguish the fire of divine love, afflicting My Loving Heart with these small thorns that you see ... Alas! If you could only know My intense interior suffering ... caused by the lack of correspondence to this deluge of graces with which I inundate My priests and religious and, as a consequence, by the sins that they commit!
Jesus continued: “Know, moreover, that Divine Justice releases terrible chastisements on entire nations, not only for the sins of the people, but especially for those of priests and religious persons. For the latter are called, by the perfection of their state, to be the salt of the Earth, the masters of truth and the deflectors of divine wrath. Straying from their divine mission, they degrade themselves in such a way that, before the eyes of God, they quicken the rigor of the punishments.”
Add to all this the blood shed in abortions. In the USA, since Roe vs. Wade in 1973, an estimated 58 million babies have been killed (aborted), Worldwide, since 1980, the number is an estimated 1,340 million babies killed. Their blood is upon the head of the world and we live in that world.
Add to the aborted babies the escalating shedding of blood through Christian persecution, civil violence and political wars—and you have not just a pool of blood crying out to Heaven for vengeance, but a veritable sea of blood!
Way Out of This Bloody Mess!
What Our Lady of Good Success said to Mother Mariana, she says to us today—if we can only break ourselves away from having fun and find time to listen and act upon what she says: “Clamor insistently without tiring and weep with bitter tears in the privacy of your heart, imploring our Celestial Father that, for love of the Eucharistic Heart of my Most Holy Son and His Precious Blood shed with such generosity and the profound bitterness and sufferings of His cruel Passion and Death, He might take pity on His ministers and bring to an end those ominous times and restore the spirit of the priests” (Our Lady of Good Success).
The Rosary, especially, has been given a power that Heaven wants to see us use. Sr. Lucia of Fatima says: The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
So...! What are we going to do? Click with the mouse and timidly go to the next page? Or click our fingers and ask for another beer, wine or soda? Or click the remote and turn on the TV? Or let something click in our heads that makes us get down on our knees and ‘click’ through the mysteries of the Rosary and ‘click’ on the car keys to open the car doors and drive off for an extra Mass or two, or three?
DAILY THOUGHTS
FOR THE MONTH OF THE SACRED HEART 2024
FOR THE MONTH OF THE SACRED HEART 2024
Article 18
Friday & Saturday, June 28th & 29th
The Incredible Powerful Help of Mary!
Friday & Saturday, June 28th & 29th
The Incredible Powerful Help of Mary!
The Most Powerful Creature Outside of God
We shall be looking at many examples of Mary’s incredible power in this article―but, first of all, let us look at the theory behind Mary’s power, as stated by St. Louis de Montfort in his book True Devotion to Mary. St. Louis writes:
“Mary is the sanctuary and the repose of the Holy Trinity, where God dwells more magnificently and more divinely than in any other place in the universe. If we examine closely the rest of our Blessed Lord’s life, we shall see that it was His will to begin His miracles by Mary. He sanctified St. John in the womb of his mother, St. Elizabeth―but it was by Mary’s word. No sooner had she spoken, than John was sanctified―and this was His first miracle of grace. At the marriage of Cana He changed the water into wine, but it was at Mary’s humble prayer―and this was His first miracle of nature. He began and continued His miracles by Mary, and He will continue them to the end of ages by Mary. God the Holy Ghost has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary. The power which she exercises―even over God Himself―is incomprehensible! She is taken as the protectress of many kingdoms, provinces, dioceses and cities.
“If Moses, by the force of his prayer, held back the anger of God against the Israelites―in a manner so powerful that the most high and infinitely merciful Lord, being unable to resist him, told him to leave Him alone so that He might be angry with and punish that rebellious people― with much greater reason, what must we not think of the prayer of the humble Mary, that worthy Mother of God, which is more powerful with His Majesty than the prayers and intercessions of all the angels and saints both in Heaven and on Earth? The will of the Most High, Who exalts the humble (Luke 1:52), is that Heaven, Earth and Hell bend―with good will or bad will―to the commandments of the humble Mary, whom He has made sovereign of Heaven and Earth, the general of His armies, the treasurer of His treasures, the dispenser of His graces, the worker of His greatest marvels, the restorer of the human race, the Mediatrix of men, the exterminator of the enemies of God, and the faithful companion of His grandeurs and triumphs.
“Mary is the Queen of Heaven and Earth by grace, as Jesus is the King of them by nature and by conquest. Our Blessed Lady is a powerful aid for help. When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce. She will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints, who shall come at the end of the world, are reserved for her. Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times―in mercy, to bring back and lovingly receive the poor strayed sinners, who shall be converted and shall return to the Catholic Church; in might, against the enemies of God, idolaters, schismatics, Mahometans, Jews and souls hardened in impiety, who shall rise in terrible revolt against God to seduce all those who shall oppose them and to make them fall by promises and threats; and, finally, she must shine forth in grace, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ, who shall battle for His interests.
“God has formed enmity between Mary and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel, that the devil fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself. God has given Mary such great power against the devils that—as they have often been obliged to confess by the mouths of the possessed—they fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints, and one of her threats against them more than all other torments. Mary will always have the victory over that proud spirit, and so great a victory that she will go so far as to crush his head, where his pride dwells. She will always discover the malice of the serpent. She will always lay bare his infernal plots and dissipate his diabolical councils, and even to the end of time will guard her faithful servants from his cruel claw. But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times.” (St. Louis de Montfort in his book True Devotion to Mary). If we call Our Lady under the title “Queen of Angels”, then we can equally say that she is the “Terror of Demons!”
Virgin Most Powerful
It is not in vain that the Church calls Mary “Virgin Most Powerful” in the Litany of Loreto (Litany of Our Lady). Other titles of Our Lady echo this powerfulness of Our Lady: Our Lady of Victory, Our Lady of Great Power, Destroyer of All Heresies, etc. If you browse through the Litany of Our Lady, then you will see many more titles that are like bricks in the building that is Our Lady’s power; or like jigsaw pieces that contribute to the big picture of the entire jigsaw: Virgin Most Merciful, Refuge of Sinners, Mother of Divine Grace, Health of the Sick, Comforter of the Afflicted, Help of Christians, Queen of Angels, Queen of Patriarchs, Queen of Prophets, Queen of Apostles, Queen of Martyrs, Queen of Confessors, Queen of Virgins, Queen of all Saints, etc.
We underestimate some of these titles―for example, Virgin Most Merciful, Refuge of Sinners. We tend to forget that sin is the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127). Therefore, to save from sin is to save from the greatest evil in the world―and that is exactly what the “Virgin Most Merciful, Refuge of Sinners” does―and we take it for granted! Similarly with the title, “Mother of Divine Grace” ― St. Thomas Aquinas says that the good of the grace of one soul is greater than the good of the nature of the whole universe: “The gift of grace surpasses every capability of created nature, since it is nothing short of a partaking of the Divine Nature, which exceeds every other nature … The justification of the ungodly is greater than the creation of Heaven and Earth. The good of grace in one person is greater than the good of nature in the whole universe. Hence, St. Augustine says that for a just man to be made from a sinner is greater than to create Heaven and Earth.” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q. 112, art. 1; q.113, art. 9) ― we also take God’s grace for granted, as well as the fact that Mary is the Mediatrix of All Grace.
As for the title “Queen of Angels” ― the angels, both the good angels and the evil angels, are incredibly powerful. One single angel―your guardian angel for example―could destroy the whole created universe if he wanted to and if God were to allow it! The same applies to the demons. Yet the power of Mary―even though it is not infinite as the power of God―far surpasses the combined power of all the angels! Mary’s “prayers and petitions are so powerful with God that they always pass for commandments with His Majesty, Who never resists the prayer of His dear Mother, because she is always humble and conformed to His will.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). Elsewhere, St. Louis adds: “One single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary). All the prayers of all the saints are very powerful in obtaining for us graces and blessings from God. But there is such a world of difference between Mary’s power of intercession and that of all the saints put together, that the famous theologian Suarez once said: “Suppose ― by a stretch of the imagination ― that all the angels and saints in heaven got together to ask God for something while our Blessed Mother asked for the contrary ― God would hear her prayer in preference to that of all the saints.”
The Power of Mary Throughout the Centuries
Since God has decided to grant all His graces through the hands of the Blessed Virgin Mary, then you can safely say that Mary is instrumental in all the good that has ever happened since the time of Jesus Christ. That is power! Not that Mary is the source of that power―God is the source and God has decided that He will give all His graces through Mary. Some people might want to judge Mary’s power by counting the number of apparitions she has made and miracles that she has brought about―but that is not even the tip of the iceberg to what she is involved in and what she does!
Sure―we can speak of Mary’s powerful intervention at the Battle of Lepanto in 1571; or the miracle of the sun at Fatima in 1917; or her protection of the Jesuit priests from the Atom Bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945; or her intervention in removing Communist Russia from Austria in 1955; and the overthrowing of the Communist regime in Brazil in 1962, etc. But these are merely the major miracles or interventions that she has performed. There must be literally hundreds of thousands―of not millions―of minor, unknown, private, hidden miracles and interventions in both the physical and spiritual domains that she has also performed. “There are also many other things which Jesus did―which, if every one were to be written down, the world itself, I think, would not be able to contain the books that should be written!” (John 21:25).
Here are just a few incidents of Our Lady’s powerful intervention in history―but these are a merely a tiny fraction of the known and unknown interventions and miracles that the immense power of Our Lady has achieved.
Guadalupe (1531)
Spain had performed a prodigious military feat in subduing millions of Indians of Central America with only a few hundred soldiers, but failed to convert the Indians to the Catholic Faith. Numerous missionaries arrived in Mexico to open churches, schools and hospitals, but few Indians converted as paganism had struck deep roots in their soul. Moreover, the harsh treatment handed out by the earlier Spanish officials had turned them into a hostile group. A general uprising was imminent that would wipe out the Spanish presence in Central America. To avert the violent uprising, the Spanish Bishop Zumarraga, who had been sent to Mexico, prayed earnestly to Our Lady and asked her to send some Castilian roses as a sign that his prayers had been heard. Our Lady responded with her help. We all know the story of Our Lady of Guadalupe, how she appeared to a local peasant, Juan Diego, and miraculously imprinted her image on the tilma (cloak) of Juan Diego, as well as miraculously making Spanish Castillian roses bloom out of season growing in frozen, rocky soil on a Mexican hilltop. Our Lady demanded of Bishop Zumarraga that he build a chapel to house her miraculous image on the tilma, on a site that had been previously occupied by a pagan temple. The miraculous circumstances and the inexplicable, powerful attraction of Our Lady’s image drew thousands of Aztecs to the shrine. Already converted in their hearts when they left, the pilgrims sought out missionaries for baptism, which brought about an avalanche of conversions across Central America, estimated to be about nine million after a few years―a miraculous conversion rate especially in view of the fact that the Indians were almost totally opposed to any idea of converting to Catholicism.
Lepanto (1571)
When St. Pius V ascended to St. Peter’s throne in 1566, Christendom faced perils perhaps unequaled in its history of continual conflict with the world. For a long time, Christendom had been disintegrating and the Muslim Ottoman Empire was on the ascendancy, to the point that it by the time of Lepanto, it had total naval supremacy in the Mediterranean Sea. During the 16th and 17th centuries, the Ottoman Empire was especially at the height of its power under the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent (1520-1566). The Ottoman Empire was a powerful multinational, multilingual empire controlling much of Southeast Europe, Western Asia, the Caucasus, North Africa, and the Horn of Africa.
Europe, at the time of the Battle of Lepanto in October of 1571, was both divided and diseased. There was the agony of the Protestant Revolution and its resulting division of Christendom and its loss of souls within Christian Europe. The Muslim Ottoman Empire was rising in the east, while the Church and State were rapidly sinking in the west. Divided by religious quarrels and an explosion of sects who denied the authority of the established Christian Church; and also diseased with both excessive worldliness still flowing from the Renaissance and an excessive and superstitious austerity growing in opposition to it―the Catholic Church was losing its Christian balance. But the most immediate threat came from the outside―from the Muslim Turks.
In stark contrast to diseased and divided Europe, the Turkish Ottoman Empire was, to all outward appearances, remarkably strong and unified. In 1453, the Turks had taken Constantinople, effectively completing their conquest of the remains of the Christian Byzantine Empire. By the first part of the sixteenth century they began pressuring Europe on the Mediterranean coasts, as well as on Europe’s eastern frontiers. Having ransacked and subdued much of the Balkans, Hungary, and Romania, they were threatening Vienna in Austria by 1529. 250 years of 'trespassing' on European soil had not satisfied the Ottoman greed for annexing more and more of the European garden. In fact, their eye was fixed on Europe's religious and cultural center—Rome, which they called the “Red Apple” and by the mid-16th century, they were pretty close to picking that apple.
Pope Pius V understood the tremendous importance of resisting the aggressive expansion of the Turks better than any of his contemporaries appear to have. He tried to rally the nations of Europe to join in a Holy League ― a Christian Coalition to stop, break and push back the Muslim Ottoman Turk invaders and their control of the eastern Mediterranean Sea, who threatened the entire continent of Europe if they could secure the invasion of the chief and strategically placed islands of the Mediterranean Sea. The Pope was sure in his own mind that, unless the Holy League could be made effective by the spring of 1571, the present chance of repelling the ever-increasing Turkish aggression would be lost. He understood that the real battle being fought was spiritual; a clash of creeds was at hand, and the stakes were the very existence of the Christian West. No nation could stand up to the marauding infidels and the candidates for an alliance were few. Northern Europe had risen up in armed rebellion against the Church with France deeply involved in the conflict. Only Spain and Venice had the resources to resist, and they hated each other along with deep mistrust.
As the spring of 1571 approached, almost five years of pleading on the part of Pius V, for Europe to unite in opposition to the threat of the Turkish fleet, seemed to have been without any effect. After five years of pleading, and over a dozen unsuccessful attempts to form a Christian alliance against the Turks, as he begged the nations for help, Pope Pius V finally managed to form the Holy League. By fits and starts, with hesitation and quarreling on the part of a few of the principal players, the fleet of the Holy League was forming. The Holy League was then formally concluded on May 25th, 1571. Its members now were the Papal States, the Habsburg states of Spain, Naples and Sicily, the Republic of Venice, the Republic of Genoa, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, the Duchies of Savoy, Parma and Urbino and the Knights of Malta.
The Christian Fleet consisted of around 212 ships, 13,000 sailors and 28,000 soldiers. The Turkish fleet consisted of around 300 ships, 13,000 sailors and 34,000 soldiers. While the Christians were outnumbered in every other way, the Christian League had two significant advantages. Their infantry were definitely superior, and the Christians had 1,815 canons, compared to 750 among the Turkish vessels. The Christians also had more advanced muskets, while the Ottomans trusted in their greatly feared composite bowmen. The Archbishop of Mexico had an exact copy of the Holy Image of Guadalupe sent to King Philip II, who in turn gave it to Andrea Doria, one of the three principal admirals of the fleet, who placed it in his cabin. When the Armada went from file to line abreast and attacked on the morning of October 7th, 1571, the blue standard of Our Lady of Guadalupe was also flying from the masthead of Don Juan’s flagship. But Our Lady’s presence that day was more acutely felt through the Holy Rosary.
Don John, the commander of the Holy League fleet, reminded his fleet that the battle they would soon engage in was as much spiritual as physical. Pius V had granted a plenary indulgence to the soldiers and crews of the Holy League. Priests of the great orders, Franciscans, Capuchins, Dominicans, Theatines, and Jesuits, were stationed on the decks of the Holy League’s galleys, offering Mass and hearing confessions. Many of the men who rowed the Christian galleys were criminals. Don John ordered them all unchained, and he issued them each a weapon, promising them their freedom if they fought bravely. He then gave every man in his fleet a weapon more powerful than anything the Turks could muster: a Rosary.
Pope Pius V ordered all monasteries and convents in Rome to increase their prayers for the impending battle and organized Rosary processions in which he, as sick as he was, participated. As the Christian fleet sailed toward the great clash with the Ottomans, Mass was celebrated and the Rosary recited daily on each vessel. On the eve of battle, the men of the Holy League prepared their souls by falling to their knees on the decks of their galleys and praying the Rosary for hours on end. Back in Rome, and up and down the Italian Peninsula, at the behest of Pius V, the churches were filled with the faithful praying their Rosaries. In Heaven, the Blessed Mother, her Immaculate Heart aflame, was listening. This heartfelt request for divine assistance resulted in a crushing defeat of the Ottomans at Lepanto that ended their dominance in the Mediterranean. The Holy League fleet destroyed almost the entire Ottoman navy with its crew and military weaponry. Over 240 Turkish ships were lost. On the Christian side, 12 galleys were destroyed and 30 damaged so seriously that they had to be scuttled. The Turkish losses were estimated at 30,000 dead and wounded and 15,000 prisoners. On the Christian side, 7,500 soldiers, sailors and rowers were dead, but twice as many Christian prisoners, around 15,000, were freed from Turkish galleys. The Holy League credited the victory to the Virgin Mary, whose intercession with God they had implored for victory through the use of the Rosary.
Our Lady of Czestochowa (1655)
In the monastery-fortress of Jasna Gora, in Czestochowa, Poland is venerated an ancient icon of Holy Mary and the Infant God, with a fascinating history. Tradition has it that it was painted by St. Luke the Evangelist. The Empress Saint Helena, who found Our Lord’s cross, also discovered this icon in Jerusalem, and took it to Constantinople where her son, Constantine, built a church to enshrine it. The image remained in Constantinople for 500 years until, through dowries, it was taken to Russia to a region that later became Poland. This icon, now known as Our Lady of Czestochowa, has an embattled history. While still in Constantinople, placed on the wall of the city, the icon so frightened an army of besieging Muslims that they took flight.
In the 15th century, the polish king, Saint Ladislaus, installed the Holy Icon in his castle. Tartar invaders besieged the castle and an arrow pierced the image in the region of the throat, leaving a scar. Interestingly, repeated attempts to repair the damaged painting failed. The scar always reappears. Wishing to protect the Holy Icon from subsequent attacks, Saint Ladislaus took it to his town of birth, Opala. On the way, he stopped at city of Czestochowa to rest, placing it in the wooden church of the Assumption in the nearby place of Jasna Gora (Bright Hill). In the morning, the horses pulling the carriage containing the Holy Icon refused to move. Taking this as a sign from Heaven, St. Ladislaus re-installed the Holy Icon in the church of the Assumption and confided sanctuary and monastery to the Pauline Fathers.
The holy icon’s great epic was the Siege of Czestochowa in 1655 when an army of 12,000 Swedish Protestant invaders led by a General Miller, invaded and conquered most of Poland and attempted to take the monastery-fortress of Jasna Gora. Placing their full trust in Our Lady of Czestochowa, whose Holy Icon they guarded, the monastery of 40 monks resisted with only 300 men within its walls. Thus began the 40-day siege, and nothing was spared to bring down the walls of Jasna Gora.
The forty monks and the besieged prayed before the Holy Icon of Czestochowa. They prayed and fought, fought and prayed. The result was that a mysterious “Lady”, dressed in a white or blue mantle, whom the Swedes called a “witch” began to appear on the ramparts, herself supplying the cannons. The sight of her terrified the invaders.
A mysterious fog also enveloped the holy hill, which at times gave the illusion of the monastery-fortress being sometimes higher, and sometimes lower―the result being that the cannon-balls missed their target.
Finally, the mysterious lady appeared in the night to General Miller himself. After procuring a copy of the icon of Czestochowa, Miller said: “It is absolutely not comparable to that virgin who appeared to me; for it is not possible to see anything comparable on Earth. Something of the celestial and divine, which frightened me from the beginning, shone in her face.” In the end, spooked-out and discouraged by these supernatural occurrences, the Swedes abandoned the siege of Czestochowa.
There is even a modern legend from the time Russia invaded Poland in 1920. The Russian army was ready to attack, when an image of Mary was seen in the clouds. At this vision, the troops withdrew and Poland was again saved.
We shall be looking at many examples of Mary’s incredible power in this article―but, first of all, let us look at the theory behind Mary’s power, as stated by St. Louis de Montfort in his book True Devotion to Mary. St. Louis writes:
“Mary is the sanctuary and the repose of the Holy Trinity, where God dwells more magnificently and more divinely than in any other place in the universe. If we examine closely the rest of our Blessed Lord’s life, we shall see that it was His will to begin His miracles by Mary. He sanctified St. John in the womb of his mother, St. Elizabeth―but it was by Mary’s word. No sooner had she spoken, than John was sanctified―and this was His first miracle of grace. At the marriage of Cana He changed the water into wine, but it was at Mary’s humble prayer―and this was His first miracle of nature. He began and continued His miracles by Mary, and He will continue them to the end of ages by Mary. God the Holy Ghost has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary. The power which she exercises―even over God Himself―is incomprehensible! She is taken as the protectress of many kingdoms, provinces, dioceses and cities.
“If Moses, by the force of his prayer, held back the anger of God against the Israelites―in a manner so powerful that the most high and infinitely merciful Lord, being unable to resist him, told him to leave Him alone so that He might be angry with and punish that rebellious people― with much greater reason, what must we not think of the prayer of the humble Mary, that worthy Mother of God, which is more powerful with His Majesty than the prayers and intercessions of all the angels and saints both in Heaven and on Earth? The will of the Most High, Who exalts the humble (Luke 1:52), is that Heaven, Earth and Hell bend―with good will or bad will―to the commandments of the humble Mary, whom He has made sovereign of Heaven and Earth, the general of His armies, the treasurer of His treasures, the dispenser of His graces, the worker of His greatest marvels, the restorer of the human race, the Mediatrix of men, the exterminator of the enemies of God, and the faithful companion of His grandeurs and triumphs.
“Mary is the Queen of Heaven and Earth by grace, as Jesus is the King of them by nature and by conquest. Our Blessed Lady is a powerful aid for help. When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce. She will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints, who shall come at the end of the world, are reserved for her. Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times―in mercy, to bring back and lovingly receive the poor strayed sinners, who shall be converted and shall return to the Catholic Church; in might, against the enemies of God, idolaters, schismatics, Mahometans, Jews and souls hardened in impiety, who shall rise in terrible revolt against God to seduce all those who shall oppose them and to make them fall by promises and threats; and, finally, she must shine forth in grace, in order to animate and sustain the valiant soldiers and faithful servants of Jesus Christ, who shall battle for His interests.
“God has formed enmity between Mary and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. The most terrible of all the enemies, which God has set up against the devil, is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel, that the devil fears her, not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself. God has given Mary such great power against the devils that—as they have often been obliged to confess by the mouths of the possessed—they fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints, and one of her threats against them more than all other torments. Mary will always have the victory over that proud spirit, and so great a victory that she will go so far as to crush his head, where his pride dwells. She will always discover the malice of the serpent. She will always lay bare his infernal plots and dissipate his diabolical councils, and even to the end of time will guard her faithful servants from his cruel claw. But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times.” (St. Louis de Montfort in his book True Devotion to Mary). If we call Our Lady under the title “Queen of Angels”, then we can equally say that she is the “Terror of Demons!”
Virgin Most Powerful
It is not in vain that the Church calls Mary “Virgin Most Powerful” in the Litany of Loreto (Litany of Our Lady). Other titles of Our Lady echo this powerfulness of Our Lady: Our Lady of Victory, Our Lady of Great Power, Destroyer of All Heresies, etc. If you browse through the Litany of Our Lady, then you will see many more titles that are like bricks in the building that is Our Lady’s power; or like jigsaw pieces that contribute to the big picture of the entire jigsaw: Virgin Most Merciful, Refuge of Sinners, Mother of Divine Grace, Health of the Sick, Comforter of the Afflicted, Help of Christians, Queen of Angels, Queen of Patriarchs, Queen of Prophets, Queen of Apostles, Queen of Martyrs, Queen of Confessors, Queen of Virgins, Queen of all Saints, etc.
We underestimate some of these titles―for example, Virgin Most Merciful, Refuge of Sinners. We tend to forget that sin is the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127). Therefore, to save from sin is to save from the greatest evil in the world―and that is exactly what the “Virgin Most Merciful, Refuge of Sinners” does―and we take it for granted! Similarly with the title, “Mother of Divine Grace” ― St. Thomas Aquinas says that the good of the grace of one soul is greater than the good of the nature of the whole universe: “The gift of grace surpasses every capability of created nature, since it is nothing short of a partaking of the Divine Nature, which exceeds every other nature … The justification of the ungodly is greater than the creation of Heaven and Earth. The good of grace in one person is greater than the good of nature in the whole universe. Hence, St. Augustine says that for a just man to be made from a sinner is greater than to create Heaven and Earth.” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q. 112, art. 1; q.113, art. 9) ― we also take God’s grace for granted, as well as the fact that Mary is the Mediatrix of All Grace.
As for the title “Queen of Angels” ― the angels, both the good angels and the evil angels, are incredibly powerful. One single angel―your guardian angel for example―could destroy the whole created universe if he wanted to and if God were to allow it! The same applies to the demons. Yet the power of Mary―even though it is not infinite as the power of God―far surpasses the combined power of all the angels! Mary’s “prayers and petitions are so powerful with God that they always pass for commandments with His Majesty, Who never resists the prayer of His dear Mother, because she is always humble and conformed to His will.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). Elsewhere, St. Louis adds: “One single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary). All the prayers of all the saints are very powerful in obtaining for us graces and blessings from God. But there is such a world of difference between Mary’s power of intercession and that of all the saints put together, that the famous theologian Suarez once said: “Suppose ― by a stretch of the imagination ― that all the angels and saints in heaven got together to ask God for something while our Blessed Mother asked for the contrary ― God would hear her prayer in preference to that of all the saints.”
The Power of Mary Throughout the Centuries
Since God has decided to grant all His graces through the hands of the Blessed Virgin Mary, then you can safely say that Mary is instrumental in all the good that has ever happened since the time of Jesus Christ. That is power! Not that Mary is the source of that power―God is the source and God has decided that He will give all His graces through Mary. Some people might want to judge Mary’s power by counting the number of apparitions she has made and miracles that she has brought about―but that is not even the tip of the iceberg to what she is involved in and what she does!
Sure―we can speak of Mary’s powerful intervention at the Battle of Lepanto in 1571; or the miracle of the sun at Fatima in 1917; or her protection of the Jesuit priests from the Atom Bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945; or her intervention in removing Communist Russia from Austria in 1955; and the overthrowing of the Communist regime in Brazil in 1962, etc. But these are merely the major miracles or interventions that she has performed. There must be literally hundreds of thousands―of not millions―of minor, unknown, private, hidden miracles and interventions in both the physical and spiritual domains that she has also performed. “There are also many other things which Jesus did―which, if every one were to be written down, the world itself, I think, would not be able to contain the books that should be written!” (John 21:25).
Here are just a few incidents of Our Lady’s powerful intervention in history―but these are a merely a tiny fraction of the known and unknown interventions and miracles that the immense power of Our Lady has achieved.
Guadalupe (1531)
Spain had performed a prodigious military feat in subduing millions of Indians of Central America with only a few hundred soldiers, but failed to convert the Indians to the Catholic Faith. Numerous missionaries arrived in Mexico to open churches, schools and hospitals, but few Indians converted as paganism had struck deep roots in their soul. Moreover, the harsh treatment handed out by the earlier Spanish officials had turned them into a hostile group. A general uprising was imminent that would wipe out the Spanish presence in Central America. To avert the violent uprising, the Spanish Bishop Zumarraga, who had been sent to Mexico, prayed earnestly to Our Lady and asked her to send some Castilian roses as a sign that his prayers had been heard. Our Lady responded with her help. We all know the story of Our Lady of Guadalupe, how she appeared to a local peasant, Juan Diego, and miraculously imprinted her image on the tilma (cloak) of Juan Diego, as well as miraculously making Spanish Castillian roses bloom out of season growing in frozen, rocky soil on a Mexican hilltop. Our Lady demanded of Bishop Zumarraga that he build a chapel to house her miraculous image on the tilma, on a site that had been previously occupied by a pagan temple. The miraculous circumstances and the inexplicable, powerful attraction of Our Lady’s image drew thousands of Aztecs to the shrine. Already converted in their hearts when they left, the pilgrims sought out missionaries for baptism, which brought about an avalanche of conversions across Central America, estimated to be about nine million after a few years―a miraculous conversion rate especially in view of the fact that the Indians were almost totally opposed to any idea of converting to Catholicism.
Lepanto (1571)
When St. Pius V ascended to St. Peter’s throne in 1566, Christendom faced perils perhaps unequaled in its history of continual conflict with the world. For a long time, Christendom had been disintegrating and the Muslim Ottoman Empire was on the ascendancy, to the point that it by the time of Lepanto, it had total naval supremacy in the Mediterranean Sea. During the 16th and 17th centuries, the Ottoman Empire was especially at the height of its power under the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent (1520-1566). The Ottoman Empire was a powerful multinational, multilingual empire controlling much of Southeast Europe, Western Asia, the Caucasus, North Africa, and the Horn of Africa.
Europe, at the time of the Battle of Lepanto in October of 1571, was both divided and diseased. There was the agony of the Protestant Revolution and its resulting division of Christendom and its loss of souls within Christian Europe. The Muslim Ottoman Empire was rising in the east, while the Church and State were rapidly sinking in the west. Divided by religious quarrels and an explosion of sects who denied the authority of the established Christian Church; and also diseased with both excessive worldliness still flowing from the Renaissance and an excessive and superstitious austerity growing in opposition to it―the Catholic Church was losing its Christian balance. But the most immediate threat came from the outside―from the Muslim Turks.
In stark contrast to diseased and divided Europe, the Turkish Ottoman Empire was, to all outward appearances, remarkably strong and unified. In 1453, the Turks had taken Constantinople, effectively completing their conquest of the remains of the Christian Byzantine Empire. By the first part of the sixteenth century they began pressuring Europe on the Mediterranean coasts, as well as on Europe’s eastern frontiers. Having ransacked and subdued much of the Balkans, Hungary, and Romania, they were threatening Vienna in Austria by 1529. 250 years of 'trespassing' on European soil had not satisfied the Ottoman greed for annexing more and more of the European garden. In fact, their eye was fixed on Europe's religious and cultural center—Rome, which they called the “Red Apple” and by the mid-16th century, they were pretty close to picking that apple.
Pope Pius V understood the tremendous importance of resisting the aggressive expansion of the Turks better than any of his contemporaries appear to have. He tried to rally the nations of Europe to join in a Holy League ― a Christian Coalition to stop, break and push back the Muslim Ottoman Turk invaders and their control of the eastern Mediterranean Sea, who threatened the entire continent of Europe if they could secure the invasion of the chief and strategically placed islands of the Mediterranean Sea. The Pope was sure in his own mind that, unless the Holy League could be made effective by the spring of 1571, the present chance of repelling the ever-increasing Turkish aggression would be lost. He understood that the real battle being fought was spiritual; a clash of creeds was at hand, and the stakes were the very existence of the Christian West. No nation could stand up to the marauding infidels and the candidates for an alliance were few. Northern Europe had risen up in armed rebellion against the Church with France deeply involved in the conflict. Only Spain and Venice had the resources to resist, and they hated each other along with deep mistrust.
As the spring of 1571 approached, almost five years of pleading on the part of Pius V, for Europe to unite in opposition to the threat of the Turkish fleet, seemed to have been without any effect. After five years of pleading, and over a dozen unsuccessful attempts to form a Christian alliance against the Turks, as he begged the nations for help, Pope Pius V finally managed to form the Holy League. By fits and starts, with hesitation and quarreling on the part of a few of the principal players, the fleet of the Holy League was forming. The Holy League was then formally concluded on May 25th, 1571. Its members now were the Papal States, the Habsburg states of Spain, Naples and Sicily, the Republic of Venice, the Republic of Genoa, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, the Duchies of Savoy, Parma and Urbino and the Knights of Malta.
The Christian Fleet consisted of around 212 ships, 13,000 sailors and 28,000 soldiers. The Turkish fleet consisted of around 300 ships, 13,000 sailors and 34,000 soldiers. While the Christians were outnumbered in every other way, the Christian League had two significant advantages. Their infantry were definitely superior, and the Christians had 1,815 canons, compared to 750 among the Turkish vessels. The Christians also had more advanced muskets, while the Ottomans trusted in their greatly feared composite bowmen. The Archbishop of Mexico had an exact copy of the Holy Image of Guadalupe sent to King Philip II, who in turn gave it to Andrea Doria, one of the three principal admirals of the fleet, who placed it in his cabin. When the Armada went from file to line abreast and attacked on the morning of October 7th, 1571, the blue standard of Our Lady of Guadalupe was also flying from the masthead of Don Juan’s flagship. But Our Lady’s presence that day was more acutely felt through the Holy Rosary.
Don John, the commander of the Holy League fleet, reminded his fleet that the battle they would soon engage in was as much spiritual as physical. Pius V had granted a plenary indulgence to the soldiers and crews of the Holy League. Priests of the great orders, Franciscans, Capuchins, Dominicans, Theatines, and Jesuits, were stationed on the decks of the Holy League’s galleys, offering Mass and hearing confessions. Many of the men who rowed the Christian galleys were criminals. Don John ordered them all unchained, and he issued them each a weapon, promising them their freedom if they fought bravely. He then gave every man in his fleet a weapon more powerful than anything the Turks could muster: a Rosary.
Pope Pius V ordered all monasteries and convents in Rome to increase their prayers for the impending battle and organized Rosary processions in which he, as sick as he was, participated. As the Christian fleet sailed toward the great clash with the Ottomans, Mass was celebrated and the Rosary recited daily on each vessel. On the eve of battle, the men of the Holy League prepared their souls by falling to their knees on the decks of their galleys and praying the Rosary for hours on end. Back in Rome, and up and down the Italian Peninsula, at the behest of Pius V, the churches were filled with the faithful praying their Rosaries. In Heaven, the Blessed Mother, her Immaculate Heart aflame, was listening. This heartfelt request for divine assistance resulted in a crushing defeat of the Ottomans at Lepanto that ended their dominance in the Mediterranean. The Holy League fleet destroyed almost the entire Ottoman navy with its crew and military weaponry. Over 240 Turkish ships were lost. On the Christian side, 12 galleys were destroyed and 30 damaged so seriously that they had to be scuttled. The Turkish losses were estimated at 30,000 dead and wounded and 15,000 prisoners. On the Christian side, 7,500 soldiers, sailors and rowers were dead, but twice as many Christian prisoners, around 15,000, were freed from Turkish galleys. The Holy League credited the victory to the Virgin Mary, whose intercession with God they had implored for victory through the use of the Rosary.
Our Lady of Czestochowa (1655)
In the monastery-fortress of Jasna Gora, in Czestochowa, Poland is venerated an ancient icon of Holy Mary and the Infant God, with a fascinating history. Tradition has it that it was painted by St. Luke the Evangelist. The Empress Saint Helena, who found Our Lord’s cross, also discovered this icon in Jerusalem, and took it to Constantinople where her son, Constantine, built a church to enshrine it. The image remained in Constantinople for 500 years until, through dowries, it was taken to Russia to a region that later became Poland. This icon, now known as Our Lady of Czestochowa, has an embattled history. While still in Constantinople, placed on the wall of the city, the icon so frightened an army of besieging Muslims that they took flight.
In the 15th century, the polish king, Saint Ladislaus, installed the Holy Icon in his castle. Tartar invaders besieged the castle and an arrow pierced the image in the region of the throat, leaving a scar. Interestingly, repeated attempts to repair the damaged painting failed. The scar always reappears. Wishing to protect the Holy Icon from subsequent attacks, Saint Ladislaus took it to his town of birth, Opala. On the way, he stopped at city of Czestochowa to rest, placing it in the wooden church of the Assumption in the nearby place of Jasna Gora (Bright Hill). In the morning, the horses pulling the carriage containing the Holy Icon refused to move. Taking this as a sign from Heaven, St. Ladislaus re-installed the Holy Icon in the church of the Assumption and confided sanctuary and monastery to the Pauline Fathers.
The holy icon’s great epic was the Siege of Czestochowa in 1655 when an army of 12,000 Swedish Protestant invaders led by a General Miller, invaded and conquered most of Poland and attempted to take the monastery-fortress of Jasna Gora. Placing their full trust in Our Lady of Czestochowa, whose Holy Icon they guarded, the monastery of 40 monks resisted with only 300 men within its walls. Thus began the 40-day siege, and nothing was spared to bring down the walls of Jasna Gora.
The forty monks and the besieged prayed before the Holy Icon of Czestochowa. They prayed and fought, fought and prayed. The result was that a mysterious “Lady”, dressed in a white or blue mantle, whom the Swedes called a “witch” began to appear on the ramparts, herself supplying the cannons. The sight of her terrified the invaders.
A mysterious fog also enveloped the holy hill, which at times gave the illusion of the monastery-fortress being sometimes higher, and sometimes lower―the result being that the cannon-balls missed their target.
Finally, the mysterious lady appeared in the night to General Miller himself. After procuring a copy of the icon of Czestochowa, Miller said: “It is absolutely not comparable to that virgin who appeared to me; for it is not possible to see anything comparable on Earth. Something of the celestial and divine, which frightened me from the beginning, shone in her face.” In the end, spooked-out and discouraged by these supernatural occurrences, the Swedes abandoned the siege of Czestochowa.
There is even a modern legend from the time Russia invaded Poland in 1920. The Russian army was ready to attack, when an image of Mary was seen in the clouds. At this vision, the troops withdrew and Poland was again saved.
Article 17
Thursday, June 27th, Feast of Our Lady of Perpetual Help
Only She Can Help You Now!
Thursday, June 27th, Feast of Our Lady of Perpetual Help
Only She Can Help You Now!
We Need Help!
“Without Me―you can do nothing!” What is it about those words of Our Lord that we do not understand? Our Lord does not say: “Without Me―there a few things you cannot do!” Nor does He say: “Without Me―you can do most things!” Nor did He say: “There are some things you can without Me!” No―He tells us that THERE IS NOTHING that we are capable of doing without Him. How humbling! Yet how true!
Help is on the Way!
There are many―even countless―ways in which God can help us! He can help us directly or He can help us through others. One of those ways whereby He helps us through others is by means of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In fact, she even had two popular titles as regards the help that she gives to us. One is “Our Lady Help of Christians” and the other is “Our Lady of Perpetual Help.” The feast of Our Lady Help of Christians is celebrated on May 24th and the feast of Our Lady of Perpetual Help is celebrated 33 days later (now that’s a mystical number!) on June 27th. Most people are totally oblivious to the existence of these feasts and their dates. Unfortunately, that is to their own loss―for especially in these increasingly difficult and dangerous times that we are currently living in, one would think that we would like to get all the help that we can―but we fail to ask, we fail to notice these feasts, or if we know of them, we waste them by not profiting from the help that they offer to us.
We do well to remember the words of Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Akita concerning her help. At Fatima, speaking of herself in the third person singular, she said: “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” Whereas at Akita, she said: … “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
Our Lady and Sea Storms
In the earlier paragraphs we saw Our Lord come to aid the Apostles in stormy conditions, wherein they cried out for help: “Lord, save us! We perish!” (Matthew 8:25). Our Lady of Perpetual Help―through her icon―also did the same thing.
The original picture of Our Lady of Perpetual Help is a product of Byzantine art. According to many historians, the picture of Our Lady of Perpetual Help is a partial copy of The Madonna―a picture that was thought to have been painted by St. Luke the Evangelist. The history of this original icon (the partial copy of St. Luke’s painting), now enshrined in the Redemptorist Church of St. Alphonsus in Rome, can be traced back to the year 1495, when the image, already considered ancient in that time, was enshrined in a church on the island of Crete. For a long time, it was highly venerated on the island of Crete.
In the fifteenth century, the island was conquered by the Turks and numerous inhabitants fled away from the island. One of them, a merchant of Crete, took the holy picture―which had already worked many miracles on that island―and boarded a ship to Rome, Italy. When a great storm arose, the sailors began to despair for their safety. Though they knew nothing about the picture, they prayed fervently to God and to the Virgin. Their prayers were heard and they were saved from the storm.
The following passage, written by St. Bernard of Clairvaux, perfectly reflects the above incident: “When the storm of temptation arises, when you are midst the reefs and shoals of tribulation, fix your gaze upon the Star of the Sea―call upon Mary! If tossed by the rising tide of pride and ambition, if lost upon the troubled waters of scandal and contention―look then at the Star, invoke her name! Do the billows of anger, of avarice, of lust batter against your soul―cast thy eyes upon Mary! Does the greatness of your crime fill your soul with terror? Does your wretched conscience beat you down in shame and the fear of judgment paralyze your heart?―then, when about to sink to the depths of despondency, to plunge headlong into despair, then think of Mary! In perils and in sorrows and in fears―think of her, call upon her name! Let her name be ever on your lips and the thought of her be ever in your heart! Follow her―so that the power of her intercession may attend to your needs! Imitate her―for in her footsteps you cannot go astray! Call upon her―and you will not despair! Think of her―and you cannot fail. If she holds you by the hand―how can you fall? Under her protection you shall know no fear! Under her guidance you shall not falter! Under her patronage you shall surely reach the goal!” (St. Bernard of Clairvaux).
Don’t Need Mary’s Help? Think Again!
There may be some who think that they have no need of Our Lady’s help―then let them listen to the following quotes by some of the saints.
St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish!”
St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation!”
St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost!”
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection!”
St. Anselm (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost!”
St. Antonine is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified!”
St. John Damascene (a Doctor of the Church) says: “To be devout to you, O holy Virgin, is an arm of salvation which God gives to those whom He wishes to save!”
St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church), in his book, The Glories of Mary, says: “The intercession of Mary is even necessary to salvation. We say ‘necessary’, not absolutely, but morally. This necessity proceeds from the will itself of God, that all graces that He dispenses should pass by the hands of Mary, according to the opinion of St. Bernard.”
St. Louis de Montfort adds: “Devotion to our Blessed Lady is necessary to salvation, and that it is an infallible mark of reprobation to have no esteem and love for the holy Virgin; while on the other hand, it is an infallible mark of predestination to be entirely and truly devoted to her!”
St. Bernardine of Sienna addresses these words to the Blessed Virgin Mary: “O Lady, thou art the dispenser of all graces, and since the grace of salvation can only come through thy hands, our salvation depends on thee!”
Our Lady’s Words of Warning
Our Lady even warns us of the consequences in neglecting to seek her help―as is seen in this following words spoken to St. Bridget of Sweden―which St. Alphonsus Liguori quotes in his book, The Glories of Mary. The Blessed Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy―if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.”
What Our Lady is saying here is what Our Lord said in the Gospels: “Ask and it shall be given you! Seek and you shall find! Knock and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7; Luke 11:9)―of which St. Teresa of Avila says that if we do not ask then we shall not receive; if we do seek then we shall not find; and if we do not knock then the door shall not be opened to us. If we fail to seek out Our Lady; if we fail to knock on her door; and if we fail to ask for help―then we shall be left helpless. As Holy Scripture says: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! … He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (Galatians 6:8; 2 Corinthians 9:6).
Help Yourself if You Want Help!
You have most certainly heard the expression: “God helps those who help themselves.” You can say the same of Our Lady. What does that mean? It means that God (or Our Lady) will only help you if you are prepared to play your part. God (or Our Lady) will not do everything for you while you just sit back and watch as you guzzle and munch on your favorite beverages and snacks. If you are not prepared to help yourself in the things that you are able to do, then God is unlikely to help with the things you cannot do. St. Augustine (Sermon 169, 11, 13) tells us that God could save us without us lifting a finger―but God will not do so: “He who created us without our help will not save us without our consent.” Another translation reads: “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us.” As the theological principle says: “God will not do the extraordinary where the ordinary suffices.” In other words, God will not perform a miracle when things can be achieved without a miracle. God will rarely cure you of a disease if there is an easy remedy available―even though it might take some effort and some expense on your part.
Devotion to Our Lady gets Help from Our Lady
St. Louis de Montfort writes: “The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us … We are sure that grace will be given to all―though not in the same measure. I say “not in the same measure,” because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each … We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed … My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain grace from God … Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person … It was Mary who gave existence and life to the author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the Mother of Grace … God the Father, from Whom every perfect gift and every grace comes down to us, gave her every grace when He gave her His Son ... God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands. Such is the power that she has received from Him that, according to St. Bernardine, she gives the graces of the eternal Father, the virtues of Jesus Christ, and the gifts of the Holy Ghost to whom she wills, as and when she wills, and as much as she wills … The Saints tell us that when we have once found Mary—and through Mary, Jesus, and through Jesus, God the father—then we have discovered every good. When we say “every good,” we exclude nothing. “Every good” includes every grace, continuous friendship with God, every guarantee against the enemies of God, possession of truth to counter every falsehood, endless benefits and unfailing headway against the hazards we meet on the way to salvation, and finally every consolation and joy amid the bitter afflictions of life.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
St. Louis, in another book, True Devotion to Mary, further writes: “God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (mare). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Maria). God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich. God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues. He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly. To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Helping Sinners
St. Alphonsus Liguori’s book, The Glories of Mary, is filled with accounts where Our Lady has helped those who are unworthy―namely, sinners. Here are just a few extracts:
► ACCOUNT #1 ― We read, in the life of Sister Catherine of St. Augustine, that in the place where she resided, there was a woman, of the name of Mary, who in her youth was a sinner, and in her old age continued so obstinate in wickedness, that she was driven out of the city, and reduced to live in a secluded cave; there she died, half consumed by disease, without the sacraments, and was consequently interred in a field like a beast. Sister Catherine, who always recommended the souls of those who departed from this world, with great fervor to God, on hearing the unfortunate end of this poor, poor old woman, never thought of praying for her, and she looked upon her (as did everyone else) as irrevocably lost.
One day, four years afterwards, a suffering soul appeared to her, and exclaimed: “How unfortunate is my lot, Sister Catherine! You recommend the souls of all those that die to God―on my soul alone you do not have not compassion!”
“And who are you!” asked the servant of God.
“I am,” she replied, “that poor Mary who died in the cave.”
“And are you saved?” said Catherine.
“Yes,” she answered, “by the mercy of the Blessed Virgin Mary.”
“And how?”
“When I saw myself at the point of death, loaded with sins, and abandoned by all, I had recourse to the Mother of God, saying, ‘Lady, you are the refuge of abandoned creatures! Behold me, at this moment, abandoned by all! You are my only hope! You alone can help me! Have pity on me!’ The Blessed Virgin obtained, for me the grace to make a sufficient act of contrition. I died, and am saved! And besides this, she, my Queen, obtained for me another favor, which is that my Purgatory should be shortened, by enduring in intensity that which otherwise would have lasted for many years! I now want only a few Masses to be entirely delivered! I beg thee to have them said―and, on my part, I promise always to pray for thee to God and to Mary!”
Sister Catherine immediately arranged to have the Masses said; and, after a few days, that soul again appeared to her, shining like the sun, and said: “I thank thee, Catherine! Behold, I go to Paradise, to sing the mercies of my God, and to pray for thee!”
► ACCOUNT #2 ― A young nobleman named Eskil was sent by his father, the prince, to Hildesheim, a city of Saxony, to study; but he gave himself up to a disorderly life. He afterwards fell so dangerously ill that he received Extreme Unction. While in this state he had a vision, wherein he found himself shut up in a fiery furnace, and believed himself to already be in Hell; but then seemed to escape from and took refuge in a great palace, where he saw the most Blessed Virgin Mary, who said to him: “You are a very presumptuous man! How dare you appear before me? Depart and go to that fire which you have deserved!” The young man then begged the Blessed Virgin to have mercy on him; and then addressed himself to some persons who were there present, and begged them to recommend him to Mary. They did so, and the divine Mother replied: “But you do not know the wicked life which he leads, and he does not even salute me with a Hail Mary!” His advocates replied: “But he will change his life!” ― and the young man added: “Yes, I sincerely promise to amend, and I will become thy devout client!” The Blessed Virgin’s anger was then appeased, and she said to him: “Well, I accept thy promise! Be faithful to me! And meanwhile, with my blessing, be delivered from death and Hell!” With these words the vision disappeared. Eskil returned to himself, and, blessing Mary, related to others the grace which he had received from her. From that time onwards he led a holy life, always preserving a great devotion to our Blessed Lady. He eventually became the Archbishop of Lunden, in Sweden, where he converted many to the Faith. Towards the end of his life, on account of his age, he renounced his archbishopric and became a monk in Clairvaux, where he lived for four years, and died a holy death. Hence he is numbered by some authors amongst the Cistercian saints.
► ACCOUNT #3 ― The history of St. Mary of Egypt, in the first book of the lives of the Fathers, is well known. At the age of twelve years she fled from the house of her parents, went to Alexandria, where she led an infamous life as a prostitute and was a scandal to the whole city. After living for sixteen years in sin, she took it into her head to go to Jerusalem.
At the time the feast of the Holy Cross was being celebrated, and, moved rather by curiosity than by devotion, she determined on entering the church; but when at the door, she felt herself repelled by an invisible force. She made a second attempt, and was again unable to enter; and the same thing was repeated a third and a fourth time. Finding her efforts in vain, the unfortunate creature withdrew to a corner of the porch, and there, enlightened from above, understood that it was on account of her infamous life that God had repelled her even from the church.
In that moment she fortunately raised her eyes and beheld a picture of Mary. No sooner did she perceive it, than, sobbing, she exclaimed, “O Mother of God, pity a poor sinner! I know that on account of my sins I deserve not that you should even cast your eyes upon me. But you are the refuge of sinners! For the love of your Son Jesus, help me! Permit me to enter the church―and I promise to change my life, to go and do penance in whatever place you point out to me!”
She immediately heard an internal voice, as it were, that of the Blessed Virgin, replying: “Since you have recourse to me, and wish to change your life, go—enter the church, it is no longer closed against you!” The sinner entered, adored the Cross, and wept bitterly. She then returned to the picture, and said, “Lady, behold I am ready! Where do you want me to go so that I should go to do penance?” “Go,” the Blessed Virgin replied, “across the Jordan, and you wilt find the place of your repose!”
She went to Confession and Communion, and then crossed the river, and finding herself in the desert, she understood that it was in that place she should do penance for her sinful life. During the first seventeen years the assaults of the devil, by which he endeavored to make the saint again fall into sin, were terrible. And what were her means of defense? She constantly recommended herself to Mary, and this most Blessed Virgin obtained for her strength to resist during the whole of this time, after which her combats ceased.
After fifty-seven years spent in the desert, and having attained the age of eighty-seven years, by a disposition of Providence, she encountered the Abbot St. Zosimus. To him she related the history of her life, and entreated him to return the following year, and to bring her the Holy Communion. The saintly Abbot did so, and gave her the Bread of angels. She then requested that he would again return to see her. This also he did, but he found her dead. Her body was encompassed by a bright light, and at her head these words were written, “Bury my body here—it is that of a poor sinner, and intercede with God for me!” A lion came and made a grave with his claws. St. Zosimus buried her, returned to his monastery, and related the wonders of God’s mercy towards this happy sinner.
“Without Me―you can do nothing!” What is it about those words of Our Lord that we do not understand? Our Lord does not say: “Without Me―there a few things you cannot do!” Nor does He say: “Without Me―you can do most things!” Nor did He say: “There are some things you can without Me!” No―He tells us that THERE IS NOTHING that we are capable of doing without Him. How humbling! Yet how true!
Help is on the Way!
There are many―even countless―ways in which God can help us! He can help us directly or He can help us through others. One of those ways whereby He helps us through others is by means of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In fact, she even had two popular titles as regards the help that she gives to us. One is “Our Lady Help of Christians” and the other is “Our Lady of Perpetual Help.” The feast of Our Lady Help of Christians is celebrated on May 24th and the feast of Our Lady of Perpetual Help is celebrated 33 days later (now that’s a mystical number!) on June 27th. Most people are totally oblivious to the existence of these feasts and their dates. Unfortunately, that is to their own loss―for especially in these increasingly difficult and dangerous times that we are currently living in, one would think that we would like to get all the help that we can―but we fail to ask, we fail to notice these feasts, or if we know of them, we waste them by not profiting from the help that they offer to us.
We do well to remember the words of Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Akita concerning her help. At Fatima, speaking of herself in the third person singular, she said: “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” Whereas at Akita, she said: … “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
Our Lady and Sea Storms
In the earlier paragraphs we saw Our Lord come to aid the Apostles in stormy conditions, wherein they cried out for help: “Lord, save us! We perish!” (Matthew 8:25). Our Lady of Perpetual Help―through her icon―also did the same thing.
The original picture of Our Lady of Perpetual Help is a product of Byzantine art. According to many historians, the picture of Our Lady of Perpetual Help is a partial copy of The Madonna―a picture that was thought to have been painted by St. Luke the Evangelist. The history of this original icon (the partial copy of St. Luke’s painting), now enshrined in the Redemptorist Church of St. Alphonsus in Rome, can be traced back to the year 1495, when the image, already considered ancient in that time, was enshrined in a church on the island of Crete. For a long time, it was highly venerated on the island of Crete.
In the fifteenth century, the island was conquered by the Turks and numerous inhabitants fled away from the island. One of them, a merchant of Crete, took the holy picture―which had already worked many miracles on that island―and boarded a ship to Rome, Italy. When a great storm arose, the sailors began to despair for their safety. Though they knew nothing about the picture, they prayed fervently to God and to the Virgin. Their prayers were heard and they were saved from the storm.
The following passage, written by St. Bernard of Clairvaux, perfectly reflects the above incident: “When the storm of temptation arises, when you are midst the reefs and shoals of tribulation, fix your gaze upon the Star of the Sea―call upon Mary! If tossed by the rising tide of pride and ambition, if lost upon the troubled waters of scandal and contention―look then at the Star, invoke her name! Do the billows of anger, of avarice, of lust batter against your soul―cast thy eyes upon Mary! Does the greatness of your crime fill your soul with terror? Does your wretched conscience beat you down in shame and the fear of judgment paralyze your heart?―then, when about to sink to the depths of despondency, to plunge headlong into despair, then think of Mary! In perils and in sorrows and in fears―think of her, call upon her name! Let her name be ever on your lips and the thought of her be ever in your heart! Follow her―so that the power of her intercession may attend to your needs! Imitate her―for in her footsteps you cannot go astray! Call upon her―and you will not despair! Think of her―and you cannot fail. If she holds you by the hand―how can you fall? Under her protection you shall know no fear! Under her guidance you shall not falter! Under her patronage you shall surely reach the goal!” (St. Bernard of Clairvaux).
Don’t Need Mary’s Help? Think Again!
There may be some who think that they have no need of Our Lady’s help―then let them listen to the following quotes by some of the saints.
St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish!”
St. Bonaventure (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation!”
St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost!”
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection!”
St. Anselm (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost!”
St. Antonine is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified!”
St. John Damascene (a Doctor of the Church) says: “To be devout to you, O holy Virgin, is an arm of salvation which God gives to those whom He wishes to save!”
St. Alphonsus Liguori (a Doctor of the Church), in his book, The Glories of Mary, says: “The intercession of Mary is even necessary to salvation. We say ‘necessary’, not absolutely, but morally. This necessity proceeds from the will itself of God, that all graces that He dispenses should pass by the hands of Mary, according to the opinion of St. Bernard.”
St. Louis de Montfort adds: “Devotion to our Blessed Lady is necessary to salvation, and that it is an infallible mark of reprobation to have no esteem and love for the holy Virgin; while on the other hand, it is an infallible mark of predestination to be entirely and truly devoted to her!”
St. Bernardine of Sienna addresses these words to the Blessed Virgin Mary: “O Lady, thou art the dispenser of all graces, and since the grace of salvation can only come through thy hands, our salvation depends on thee!”
Our Lady’s Words of Warning
Our Lady even warns us of the consequences in neglecting to seek her help―as is seen in this following words spoken to St. Bridget of Sweden―which St. Alphonsus Liguori quotes in his book, The Glories of Mary. The Blessed Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy―if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.”
What Our Lady is saying here is what Our Lord said in the Gospels: “Ask and it shall be given you! Seek and you shall find! Knock and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7; Luke 11:9)―of which St. Teresa of Avila says that if we do not ask then we shall not receive; if we do seek then we shall not find; and if we do not knock then the door shall not be opened to us. If we fail to seek out Our Lady; if we fail to knock on her door; and if we fail to ask for help―then we shall be left helpless. As Holy Scripture says: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! … He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (Galatians 6:8; 2 Corinthians 9:6).
Help Yourself if You Want Help!
You have most certainly heard the expression: “God helps those who help themselves.” You can say the same of Our Lady. What does that mean? It means that God (or Our Lady) will only help you if you are prepared to play your part. God (or Our Lady) will not do everything for you while you just sit back and watch as you guzzle and munch on your favorite beverages and snacks. If you are not prepared to help yourself in the things that you are able to do, then God is unlikely to help with the things you cannot do. St. Augustine (Sermon 169, 11, 13) tells us that God could save us without us lifting a finger―but God will not do so: “He who created us without our help will not save us without our consent.” Another translation reads: “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us.” As the theological principle says: “God will not do the extraordinary where the ordinary suffices.” In other words, God will not perform a miracle when things can be achieved without a miracle. God will rarely cure you of a disease if there is an easy remedy available―even though it might take some effort and some expense on your part.
Devotion to Our Lady gets Help from Our Lady
St. Louis de Montfort writes: “The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us … We are sure that grace will be given to all―though not in the same measure. I say “not in the same measure,” because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each … We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed … My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain grace from God … Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person … It was Mary who gave existence and life to the author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the Mother of Grace … God the Father, from Whom every perfect gift and every grace comes down to us, gave her every grace when He gave her His Son ... God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands. Such is the power that she has received from Him that, according to St. Bernardine, she gives the graces of the eternal Father, the virtues of Jesus Christ, and the gifts of the Holy Ghost to whom she wills, as and when she wills, and as much as she wills … The Saints tell us that when we have once found Mary—and through Mary, Jesus, and through Jesus, God the father—then we have discovered every good. When we say “every good,” we exclude nothing. “Every good” includes every grace, continuous friendship with God, every guarantee against the enemies of God, possession of truth to counter every falsehood, endless benefits and unfailing headway against the hazards we meet on the way to salvation, and finally every consolation and joy amid the bitter afflictions of life.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
St. Louis, in another book, True Devotion to Mary, further writes: “God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (mare). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Maria). God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich. God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues. He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly. To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Helping Sinners
St. Alphonsus Liguori’s book, The Glories of Mary, is filled with accounts where Our Lady has helped those who are unworthy―namely, sinners. Here are just a few extracts:
► ACCOUNT #1 ― We read, in the life of Sister Catherine of St. Augustine, that in the place where she resided, there was a woman, of the name of Mary, who in her youth was a sinner, and in her old age continued so obstinate in wickedness, that she was driven out of the city, and reduced to live in a secluded cave; there she died, half consumed by disease, without the sacraments, and was consequently interred in a field like a beast. Sister Catherine, who always recommended the souls of those who departed from this world, with great fervor to God, on hearing the unfortunate end of this poor, poor old woman, never thought of praying for her, and she looked upon her (as did everyone else) as irrevocably lost.
One day, four years afterwards, a suffering soul appeared to her, and exclaimed: “How unfortunate is my lot, Sister Catherine! You recommend the souls of all those that die to God―on my soul alone you do not have not compassion!”
“And who are you!” asked the servant of God.
“I am,” she replied, “that poor Mary who died in the cave.”
“And are you saved?” said Catherine.
“Yes,” she answered, “by the mercy of the Blessed Virgin Mary.”
“And how?”
“When I saw myself at the point of death, loaded with sins, and abandoned by all, I had recourse to the Mother of God, saying, ‘Lady, you are the refuge of abandoned creatures! Behold me, at this moment, abandoned by all! You are my only hope! You alone can help me! Have pity on me!’ The Blessed Virgin obtained, for me the grace to make a sufficient act of contrition. I died, and am saved! And besides this, she, my Queen, obtained for me another favor, which is that my Purgatory should be shortened, by enduring in intensity that which otherwise would have lasted for many years! I now want only a few Masses to be entirely delivered! I beg thee to have them said―and, on my part, I promise always to pray for thee to God and to Mary!”
Sister Catherine immediately arranged to have the Masses said; and, after a few days, that soul again appeared to her, shining like the sun, and said: “I thank thee, Catherine! Behold, I go to Paradise, to sing the mercies of my God, and to pray for thee!”
► ACCOUNT #2 ― A young nobleman named Eskil was sent by his father, the prince, to Hildesheim, a city of Saxony, to study; but he gave himself up to a disorderly life. He afterwards fell so dangerously ill that he received Extreme Unction. While in this state he had a vision, wherein he found himself shut up in a fiery furnace, and believed himself to already be in Hell; but then seemed to escape from and took refuge in a great palace, where he saw the most Blessed Virgin Mary, who said to him: “You are a very presumptuous man! How dare you appear before me? Depart and go to that fire which you have deserved!” The young man then begged the Blessed Virgin to have mercy on him; and then addressed himself to some persons who were there present, and begged them to recommend him to Mary. They did so, and the divine Mother replied: “But you do not know the wicked life which he leads, and he does not even salute me with a Hail Mary!” His advocates replied: “But he will change his life!” ― and the young man added: “Yes, I sincerely promise to amend, and I will become thy devout client!” The Blessed Virgin’s anger was then appeased, and she said to him: “Well, I accept thy promise! Be faithful to me! And meanwhile, with my blessing, be delivered from death and Hell!” With these words the vision disappeared. Eskil returned to himself, and, blessing Mary, related to others the grace which he had received from her. From that time onwards he led a holy life, always preserving a great devotion to our Blessed Lady. He eventually became the Archbishop of Lunden, in Sweden, where he converted many to the Faith. Towards the end of his life, on account of his age, he renounced his archbishopric and became a monk in Clairvaux, where he lived for four years, and died a holy death. Hence he is numbered by some authors amongst the Cistercian saints.
► ACCOUNT #3 ― The history of St. Mary of Egypt, in the first book of the lives of the Fathers, is well known. At the age of twelve years she fled from the house of her parents, went to Alexandria, where she led an infamous life as a prostitute and was a scandal to the whole city. After living for sixteen years in sin, she took it into her head to go to Jerusalem.
At the time the feast of the Holy Cross was being celebrated, and, moved rather by curiosity than by devotion, she determined on entering the church; but when at the door, she felt herself repelled by an invisible force. She made a second attempt, and was again unable to enter; and the same thing was repeated a third and a fourth time. Finding her efforts in vain, the unfortunate creature withdrew to a corner of the porch, and there, enlightened from above, understood that it was on account of her infamous life that God had repelled her even from the church.
In that moment she fortunately raised her eyes and beheld a picture of Mary. No sooner did she perceive it, than, sobbing, she exclaimed, “O Mother of God, pity a poor sinner! I know that on account of my sins I deserve not that you should even cast your eyes upon me. But you are the refuge of sinners! For the love of your Son Jesus, help me! Permit me to enter the church―and I promise to change my life, to go and do penance in whatever place you point out to me!”
She immediately heard an internal voice, as it were, that of the Blessed Virgin, replying: “Since you have recourse to me, and wish to change your life, go—enter the church, it is no longer closed against you!” The sinner entered, adored the Cross, and wept bitterly. She then returned to the picture, and said, “Lady, behold I am ready! Where do you want me to go so that I should go to do penance?” “Go,” the Blessed Virgin replied, “across the Jordan, and you wilt find the place of your repose!”
She went to Confession and Communion, and then crossed the river, and finding herself in the desert, she understood that it was in that place she should do penance for her sinful life. During the first seventeen years the assaults of the devil, by which he endeavored to make the saint again fall into sin, were terrible. And what were her means of defense? She constantly recommended herself to Mary, and this most Blessed Virgin obtained for her strength to resist during the whole of this time, after which her combats ceased.
After fifty-seven years spent in the desert, and having attained the age of eighty-seven years, by a disposition of Providence, she encountered the Abbot St. Zosimus. To him she related the history of her life, and entreated him to return the following year, and to bring her the Holy Communion. The saintly Abbot did so, and gave her the Bread of angels. She then requested that he would again return to see her. This also he did, but he found her dead. Her body was encompassed by a bright light, and at her head these words were written, “Bury my body here—it is that of a poor sinner, and intercede with God for me!” A lion came and made a grave with his claws. St. Zosimus buried her, returned to his monastery, and related the wonders of God’s mercy towards this happy sinner.
Article 16
Tuesday & Wednesady, June 25th & 26th
The Only Thing That Can Get You To Heaven
Tuesday & Wednesady, June 25th & 26th
The Only Thing That Can Get You To Heaven
Have You Got What It Takes?
Hands up if you want to go to Heaven! Hopefully everyone raises their hand! But do you have what it takes to get to Heaven? The vast majority of souls are damned―so obviously they did not have what it takes to get to Heaven. Did the souls in Hell think they were going to be eternally damned? No―they thought that they had what it takes to get to Heaven―but they didn’t! There are very few people who want to go to Hell―everyone wants to go to Heaven. Yet everyone has a different idea of what it takes to get to Heaven―that is one reason why most souls are damned―they make up their own ideas about what will gain them entry into Heaven and most of those self-imagined ideas are wrong. What, then, is it that gets us to Heaven?
Confused Ideas
Many people―with a mere superficial idea of the Faith and theology―will come up with all kinds of confused, partially true, but insufficient ideas about what gets us to Heaven. For example, some will say that it is God that gets us to Heaven―which, of course, is partially true but it is too vague. Others will say devotion to Our Lady gets us to Heaven―again, partially true but imprecise. Others imagine that if they wear the Brown Scapular then they will get to Heaven―which again is only partially true but does not go deep enough. Then there are those who insist that if they pray the Rosary they will get to Heaven―again, too imprecise. Likewise with those who insist upon this or that prayer or devotion as being a guarantee of getting to Heaven, etc. All of the above mentioned things are partially true and are necessary and helpful means for getting to Heaven―but of themselves, they do not give a clear and precise answer.
The One Thing That Matters
Yes―it is ultimately God Who gets us to Heaven. Yes―Our Lady is a massive help in getting to Heaven. Yes―wearing the Scapular is also a major help. Yes―praying the Rosary is something Our Lady has continually insisted upon. Yes―other prayers and devotions are of assistance too. But all of these things revolve around one thing that God has created for our salvation―and that one thing is GRACE.
Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace. The Scapular is a Sacramental that draws down graces upon us. The Rosary is also a Sacramental that is a source of grace. Other prayers and devotions also attract graces. But ultimately, it is the GRACE of God in the soul that is passport to Heaven―not so much the Scapular around your neck or the Rosary in your pocket or purse! St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Everything is grace!” ― and you could add to that: “Grace is everything!” Let us explain that.
There is nobody in Heaven without sanctifying grace in their soul―and there is nobody in Hell with sanctifying grace in their soul. Grace is everything―it is all that really matters. If you are the richest person in world, but do not have sanctifying grace in your soul, then you cannot enter Heaven, you cannot buy your way into Heaven, nor can you bribe your way into Heaven. You might be the most famous person in the world―but without sanctifying grace your fame will get you nowhere when it comes to Heaven. You might be the most powerful person in the world―but without sanctifying grace in your soul, you will be powerless in getting to Heaven.
You might be the poorest person on Earth―but with sanctifying grace in your soul you are richer than the richest person on Earth. You may be hated by everyone and have no friends―but with sanctifying grace in your soul you are loved by God and all the angels and saints in Heaven. You may have been the biggest sinner the world has ever seen―but with sanctifying grace in your soul you will avoid Hell and eventually get to Heaven. Yes―grace is everything. Grace is everything we need to get to Heaven.
What is Grace?
The catechism, My Catholic Faith, tells us: “Grace is a supernatural gift of God bestowed on us through the merits of Jesus Christ for our salvation. Grace is a favor, a free gift, granted to us though we have no claim to it. God grants us graces because He is good, not because we deserve them. God grants us graces for the sake of His Son, Who died on the cross to earn for us these graces―we men can never merit these graces. Graces are supernatural and the supernatural is that which is beyond natural powers. Without the help of the graces that He dispenses, with merely natural powers, we cannot do the least work to merit salvation. Without God, we are nothing. We say with the Apostle: “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything, as from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God” (2 Corinthians 3:5).” Our Lord puts it succinctly when He says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 1:5).
What Does Grace Do?
What does grace do? Grace does everything―everything that is not sinful. That is why St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Everything is grace!” Our Lord Himself said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). We can expand upon that and have Our Lord say: “Without My grace―you can do nothing!” What is it about the word “NOTHING” that we fail to understand? “Nothing” means zero, nichts, nič, ništa, nada, niente, natin, nekas, rien ― or whatever other language you choose to use! We truly underestimate and misunderstand the extent to which grace works in our lives. If you read St. Thomas Aquinas speaking about grace (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114) then you will better understand our total and humiliating dependence upon grace. Here are a few key extracts from St. Thomas:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do they know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace―a gratuitous gift of God, Who moves the soul inwardly or inspires the good wish ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God when God turns it, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God.
“Grace is a gift of God … The gift of grace surpasses every capability of created nature … In the state of corrupt nature [after Original Sin] man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … In the state of corrupted nature man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … St. Augustine says that it is part of the Pelagian heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments …
“Sanctifying grace is called ‘gratuitous grace’ since it is bestowed on a man beyond the capability of human nature and beyond the merits of the person … Man’s free-will is moved by something which is above the human mind, that is to say, by God. The mind of man is not so great a master of its act that it does not need to be moved by God … God leads everything to love of Himself … … for this it is necessary that the will of man should be prepared with grace by God …
“In the state of corrupt nature, it cannot be that man remains for a long time without mortal sin … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Man needs grace to heal his nature, in order that he may entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace ... According to Jeremias 31:18: ‘Convert me and I shall be converted, for Thou art the Lord, my God!’ and Lamentations 5:21: ‘Convert us, O Lord, to Thee, and we shall be converted!’ … Correction is useful … Correction is necessary in order to abstain from sin; yet correction is not sufficient without God’s help. Hence after anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For to many persons grace is given to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114).
Clearing Up Misunderstandings and Ignorance About Grace
Sadly to say, most Catholics would have a hard time explaining what grace is and what kinds of graces there are and what are the roles of these different kinds of grace. Catholics can fall into the trap of thinking that God is like a “vending machine” of grace. We go to church, we put our money in the basket, we say our prayers, we do something nice for someone and then we expect God to give us our grace. And, when He doesn’t―or we don’t immediately sense or feel that the grace is given―we kick the “vending machine,” grumble and walk away feeling ripped-off. However, God is not a vending machine and “owes” us nothing.
You cannot love what you do not know; you cannot use to maximum potential something that you know little about. One would imagine that most people would want to know all there is to know about grace―especially since there can no salvation without grace: “The grace of God [brings] life everlasting” (Romans 6:23) … “By grace you are saved, and not of yourselves, for it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8) … “By Christ’s grace you are saved!” (Ephesians 2:5). “Being justified by His grace, we may be heirs to life everlasting” (Titus 3:7). “Let us go therefore with confidence to the throne of grace―so that we may obtain mercy!” (Hebrews 4:16). So let us try to dispel the darkness of our ignorance and profit from the potential that grace offers.
Grace is Given to Everyone
God does not wish to exclude anyone from His grace: “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:17). “Every man has received grace” (1 Peter 4:10). “To every one of us is given grace, according to the measure of the giving of Christ” (Ephesians 4:7). Even the pagans are offered God’s graces: “The grace of the Holy Ghost was poured out upon the Gentiles also! … God gave them the same grace, as to us also who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ!” who was I, that could withstand God?” (Acts 10:45; 11:17). “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men―instructing us, that by denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world” (Titus 2:11-12).
Unfortunately, with our God-given free will, we can stubbornly and tragically refuse to accept and cooperate with God’s graces: “The light shined in darkness and the darkness did not comprehend it! … That was the true light, which enlightens every man that comes into this world. He was in the world and the world was made by Him―and the world knew him not. He came unto His own―and His own received Him not! … The light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 1:5-11; 3:19).
The More Grace You Get―the More Fruit You Should Produce
Our Lord says: “I am the true vine and My Father is the gardener. Every branch in Me that bears not fruit, He will take away! And every branch that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit!” [John 15:1-2]. “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). We see this implied in Our Lord’s parable of the talents: “And to one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one, to everyone according to his proper ability: and immediately he took his journey. He that had received the five talents, went his way and traded and gained other five. And he that had received the two, gained another two. But he that had received the one, going his way dug into the earth and hid his lord’s money” (Matthew 25:15-18). We are expected to profit from the graces that God gives us―and not profitlessly bury them in the ground. “Receive not the grace of God in vain!” (2 Corinthians 6:1). “Stir up the grace of God which is in thee!” (2 Timothy 1:6). “Grow in grace” (2 Peter 3:18). “Neglect not the grace that is in thee!” (1 Timothy 4:14). “I cast not away the grace of God!” (Galatians 2:21). “His grace in me has not been void, but I have labored more abundantly than all they―yet not I, but the grace of God with me” (1 Corinthians 15:10).
Everything Revolves Around Grace
As already stated above―God saves you―but it through His grace that He does that saving. Our Lady can lead you to salvation―but not without the grace of God (and she is the Mediatrix of All Grace, the treasure chest of all God’s graces, through whom God gives all His graces). Baptism saves souls―but it is only by giving souls the grace of God. The Sacrament of Confession can save a soul from Hell merited by mortal sin―but it can only do this with the grace of God. Our Lady said that one day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, she would save the world―but this requires the grace of God. An act of perfect contrition can save a soul―but it only does this by restoring the grace of God to the soul in mortal sin.
All the countless events of everyday life revolve around and depend upon the grace of God―as shown in the above quotes of St. Thomas Aquinas. The actions of Divine Providence are the workings of the grace of God. Dom Chautard, in his book The Soul of the Apostolate, speaks of grace prodding, inspiring and moving us at every moment of the day, all throughout the day―he calls this “the grace of the present moment”. Dom Chautard writes: “At every instant Jesus presents Himself to you by the GRACE OF THE PRESENT MOMENT C every time there is a prayer to say, a Mass to celebrate or to hear, reacting to be done, or acts of patience, of zeal, of renunciation, of struggle, confidence, or love to be produced.” Sadly, most people are totally oblivious and ignorant of this―they fail to see the ceaseless actions of grace all throughout their day in all the little things of life.
Different Kinds of Grace
A man is different to a woman―yet both are called human beings. Both priests and laity are members of the Catholic Church―but they have different functions within the Church. A hammer has a different function than a screwdriver―yet both are called tools. Likewise, there are different forms of grace―which, even though they are all geared to get us to Heaven―they function differently. Let us then take a look at these different kinds of graces.
Sanctifying Grace and Actual Grace
There are two kinds of grace: Sanctifying Grace and Actual Grace.
(1) Sanctifying Grace gives us the very life of God. Sanctifying grace is not God Himself, but is a share in certain aspects of the life of God. It is an interior grace, which should habitually dwell in the soul and transform it, making it holy―hence it is sometimes called Sanctifying Grace because it makes us holy, and Habitual Grace because it should be a permanent grace that habitually reside in our souls. The ordinary way we receive Sanctifying Grace is through the Sacraments―beginning with its first reception at Baptism. It is Sanctifying Grace that is the basis for our salvation and is infused in us upon our Baptism. If we lose Sanctifying Grace, then we can regain in through the Sacrament of Confession.
(2) Actual Grace is supernatural help from God (like inspirations, suggestions, nudges to do the right thing according to the Will of God). Actual Grace is grace given to us when God acts in a particular moment in time; it is not continuous and does not stay with us. The unique feature of Actual Grace is that it comes and goes, not remaining permanently with the Christian. It serves a purpose such a moving the Christian to do good during a certain period of time. Actual Grace is not a permanent grace like Sanctifying Grace (unless lost by mortal sin), but Actual Grace is a temporary, passing, short-term grace that is meant to guide us through some particular thing or circumstance. It is external grace, working on us from the outside only; it does nothing to change the state of our soul. It does not remove mortal sin and it does not make us holy by itself―it is meant to inspire, lead and guide to do the things that will make us holy. Everyone receives actual grace, and it comes to us when we need it. We have the free will to cooperate with it or ignore it.
St. Thomas Aquinas says: “There is a twofold grace: (1) one whereby man himself is united to God, and this is called SANCTIFYING GRACE or HABITUAL GRACE, inasmuch as it heals and justifies the soul, and makes it pleasing to God; (2) the other is that whereby one man cooperates with another in leading him to God, and this gift is called GRATUITOUS GRACE [modern theology also calls it “ACTUAL GRACE”], since it is bestowed on a man beyond the capability of nature, and beyond the merit of the person.”
The most important type is sanctifying Grace, which is the grace that makes us holy, and which therefore obtains for us salvation. Actual Grace―of itself―does not directly make us holy, nor does it lead directly to salvation. Even pagans are given Actual Graces, but that does not guarantee their salvation―those graces are merely meant to lead them to the waters of Baptism, which imparts to Sanctifying Grace to the soul and begins the pilgrimage to Heaven.
Different Kinds of Actual Grace―Prevenient, Concomitant and Perservering
In Latin, theologians speak of (1) gratia praeveniens, (2) gratia concomitans, and (3) gratia perseverans. What are these three kinds of Actual Grace?
(1) Prevenient Grace is based on the Latin words “prae” or “pre” meaning “before” and “veniens” from the verb “venire” meaning “to come” ― hence “to come before” or to “precede.” Therefore, Grace is an Actual Grace (temporary passing grace) that comes before the other two―Concomitant Grace and Persevering Grace. Prevenient Grace is like a first impulse, an initial idea or suggestion that God sends―a kind of a “Hey! Why don’t you do this good thing?” The devil acts likewise in temptations to sin and evil. Prevenient Grace is like bait on the end of fishing line and hook―God uses it to attract us to some good thought, word or action.
(2) Concomitant Grace is based on the Latin words “con” meaning “with” and “mittens” from the verb “mittere” meaning “to send” ― hence “to send with.” Sometimes called Cooperating Grace, it is assistance given when we respond to a Prevenient Grace. It has been compared to a mother who, after coaxing a child to walk, actually takes it by the arms and assists it to take a few more steps. Or like a parent that suggests to the child that his or her bedroom should be cleaned and tidied―and then goes with the child to help the child get started. In Prevenient Graces God acts without man’s cooperation―God merely suggests or coaxes a person to do something; but in Concomitant Grace God acts together with the free cooperation of a person’s free-will by, so to speak, “jump-starting” the person into action.
(3) Persevering Grace comes from the Latin verb “perseverare” meaning “to continue, to persist, to persevere.” Starting something is usually far easier than seeing something through to the end―ask anyone who got married! Our Lord speaks of this perseverance when He says: “He that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:22). The word “persevere” could be divided into two ― “per” meaning “through” and the word “severe” meaning “very serious, something causing very great pain, difficulty, worry, damage, etc.” The way to Heaven is not a “cake-walk” but a fight―it is a fight against the devil, the world and our own wicked tendencies. God knows how hard this is―and He is willing to give the grace to persevere through all our trials and tribulations―but we must ask for that grace! St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Hence after anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil till the end of his life. For to many persons grace is given to whom perseverance in grace is not given.”
Different Kinds of Actual Grace―Sufficient Grace and Efficient (Efficacious) Grace
Some theologians speak of a Sufficient Grace and an Efficient Grace (also called an Efficacious Grace). What are these graces and what do they do? Sufficient and Efficient/Efficacious Graces are Actual Graces that describe how those Actual Graces work. If you like, they describe the power or efficacity that God puts into each and every Actual Grace that He sends to us. You could use an analogy with cars ― car engines can be supercharged or turbocharged, which may increase engine power up to 50%. This enables a small engine to perform like a naturally aspirated larger engine. Loosely speaking―and all analogies limp―Sufficient Grace could be compared to a normal car engine and Efficient/Efficacious Grace could be compared to a supercharged or turbocharged engine.
Human freedom, under grace, is a dogma. According to the Councils of Trent and the First Vatican Council, human freedom means that man has the power to resist grace, to answer it with dissent rather than consent. Freedom means a choice of two things―a power to do or not to do, to do this or that, to dissent or consent. It is possible to resist both Sufficient Grace and Efficient/Efficacious Grace and thus thwart God’s plans for us and risk our own damnation. Sufficient Grace has all it takes to “get the job done” yet it is also less ‘persuasive’ than Efficient/Efficacious Grace. Normally, if we do not resist Sufficient Grace, then it eventually progresses into an Ordinary Efficient/Efficacious Grace―like a seed becomes a plant. However, sometimes God will directly send an Extraordinary Efficient/Efficacious Grace which is far more powerful and far more persuasive that, so to speak, “makes us an offer that we cannot refuse”! Nevertheless, at all times our will remains free to either reject or accept the movement and guidance of God’s grace, regardless if which kind it is.
God Helps Those Who Help Themselves
St. Augustine says that the help of God’s grace should be more sought for things pertaining to our justification (returning and keeping ourselves in a state of sanctifying grace) so that we can achieve salvation―that is what he means when her refers to the word “justice” in the following paragraphs. He points out that God’s help does not exempt us from making our own efforts by cooperating with God’s grace:
“Remove yourself, I repeat, remove yourself from yourself―you just get in your own way! If it’s you that are building yourself, it is a ruin you are building. ‘Unless the Lord has built the house, they have labored in vain, who build it!’ (Psalm 127:1). God made you without you! You didn’t, after all, give any consent to God making you! How could you consent, if you didn’t yet exist? So while God made you without you, nevertheless, He does not justify you without you ... So stop wishing to have your own justice [justification/salvation]. Do not have your own justice [justification/salvation]―the Apostle Paul counts it as dung! But the whole thing is from God―not, however as though we were asleep, as though we did not have to make an effort, as though we did not have to be willing. Without your will, there will be no justice [justification/salvation] of God in you. The will, indeed, is only ours, the justice [justification/salvation] is only God’s. There can be such a thing as God’s justice [justification/salvation] without your will, but it [justification/salvation] cannot be in you apart from your will, without your will. You have been shown what you have to do. The law has laid down: ‘Do not do that, nor that; do this and that!’ It has been shown to you, laid down for you, your mind has been opened for you―you have understood what you should do. Beg for the power to do it!
“Do not think that just because you call yourself a Christian, you cannot for that reason stumble over the stone of stumbling. When you abuse God’s grace, you stumble over Him. Let there be justice [justification/salvation] in you―but let it be from grace, let it come to you from God―do not let it be your own! Sigh to obtain it, weep to obtain it, believe in order to obtain it. ‘Whoever calls upon the Name of the Lord,’ He says, ‘shall be saved’ (Romans 10:13; Joel 2:32). Or do you suppose that when it says: ‘Whoever calls upon the Name of the Lord shall be saved’ ― it means saved from malaria, or the pox, or the gout, or any other pain of the body? Not so! But ‘will be saved’ means ‘will be just.’ Because: ‘The doctor is not needed by the healthy, but by the sick.’ He explained that when he said: ‘I have not come to call the just, but sinners!’ (Mark 2:17).” (St. Augustine, Father and Doctor of the Church, Sermon 169).
Hands up if you want to go to Heaven! Hopefully everyone raises their hand! But do you have what it takes to get to Heaven? The vast majority of souls are damned―so obviously they did not have what it takes to get to Heaven. Did the souls in Hell think they were going to be eternally damned? No―they thought that they had what it takes to get to Heaven―but they didn’t! There are very few people who want to go to Hell―everyone wants to go to Heaven. Yet everyone has a different idea of what it takes to get to Heaven―that is one reason why most souls are damned―they make up their own ideas about what will gain them entry into Heaven and most of those self-imagined ideas are wrong. What, then, is it that gets us to Heaven?
Confused Ideas
Many people―with a mere superficial idea of the Faith and theology―will come up with all kinds of confused, partially true, but insufficient ideas about what gets us to Heaven. For example, some will say that it is God that gets us to Heaven―which, of course, is partially true but it is too vague. Others will say devotion to Our Lady gets us to Heaven―again, partially true but imprecise. Others imagine that if they wear the Brown Scapular then they will get to Heaven―which again is only partially true but does not go deep enough. Then there are those who insist that if they pray the Rosary they will get to Heaven―again, too imprecise. Likewise with those who insist upon this or that prayer or devotion as being a guarantee of getting to Heaven, etc. All of the above mentioned things are partially true and are necessary and helpful means for getting to Heaven―but of themselves, they do not give a clear and precise answer.
The One Thing That Matters
Yes―it is ultimately God Who gets us to Heaven. Yes―Our Lady is a massive help in getting to Heaven. Yes―wearing the Scapular is also a major help. Yes―praying the Rosary is something Our Lady has continually insisted upon. Yes―other prayers and devotions are of assistance too. But all of these things revolve around one thing that God has created for our salvation―and that one thing is GRACE.
Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace. The Scapular is a Sacramental that draws down graces upon us. The Rosary is also a Sacramental that is a source of grace. Other prayers and devotions also attract graces. But ultimately, it is the GRACE of God in the soul that is passport to Heaven―not so much the Scapular around your neck or the Rosary in your pocket or purse! St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Everything is grace!” ― and you could add to that: “Grace is everything!” Let us explain that.
There is nobody in Heaven without sanctifying grace in their soul―and there is nobody in Hell with sanctifying grace in their soul. Grace is everything―it is all that really matters. If you are the richest person in world, but do not have sanctifying grace in your soul, then you cannot enter Heaven, you cannot buy your way into Heaven, nor can you bribe your way into Heaven. You might be the most famous person in the world―but without sanctifying grace your fame will get you nowhere when it comes to Heaven. You might be the most powerful person in the world―but without sanctifying grace in your soul, you will be powerless in getting to Heaven.
You might be the poorest person on Earth―but with sanctifying grace in your soul you are richer than the richest person on Earth. You may be hated by everyone and have no friends―but with sanctifying grace in your soul you are loved by God and all the angels and saints in Heaven. You may have been the biggest sinner the world has ever seen―but with sanctifying grace in your soul you will avoid Hell and eventually get to Heaven. Yes―grace is everything. Grace is everything we need to get to Heaven.
What is Grace?
The catechism, My Catholic Faith, tells us: “Grace is a supernatural gift of God bestowed on us through the merits of Jesus Christ for our salvation. Grace is a favor, a free gift, granted to us though we have no claim to it. God grants us graces because He is good, not because we deserve them. God grants us graces for the sake of His Son, Who died on the cross to earn for us these graces―we men can never merit these graces. Graces are supernatural and the supernatural is that which is beyond natural powers. Without the help of the graces that He dispenses, with merely natural powers, we cannot do the least work to merit salvation. Without God, we are nothing. We say with the Apostle: “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything, as from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God” (2 Corinthians 3:5).” Our Lord puts it succinctly when He says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 1:5).
What Does Grace Do?
What does grace do? Grace does everything―everything that is not sinful. That is why St. Thérèse of Lisieux used to say: “Everything is grace!” Our Lord Himself said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). We can expand upon that and have Our Lord say: “Without My grace―you can do nothing!” What is it about the word “NOTHING” that we fail to understand? “Nothing” means zero, nichts, nič, ništa, nada, niente, natin, nekas, rien ― or whatever other language you choose to use! We truly underestimate and misunderstand the extent to which grace works in our lives. If you read St. Thomas Aquinas speaking about grace (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114) then you will better understand our total and humiliating dependence upon grace. Here are a few key extracts from St. Thomas:
“Human nature needs the help of God to do or wish any good whatsoever … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act! … Without grace men can do no good whatever! … Grace is a light of the soul … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help … Not only do they know by the light of grace what to do, but by its help they do lovingly what they know! … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life―for this a higher force is needed, namely, the force of grace. And thus without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Man cannot prepare himself for everlasting life without the help of grace―a gratuitous gift of God, Who moves the soul inwardly or inspires the good wish ... Man’s turning to God is by free-will―but free-will can only be turned to God when God turns it, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing!’ … Man can do nothing unless moved by God.
“Grace is a gift of God … The gift of grace surpasses every capability of created nature … In the state of corrupt nature [after Original Sin] man needs the help of grace to heal his nature … In the state of corrupted nature man cannot fulfill all the Divine commandments without healing grace … St. Augustine says that it is part of the Pelagian heresy to believe that without grace man can fulfill all the Divine commandments …
“Sanctifying grace is called ‘gratuitous grace’ since it is bestowed on a man beyond the capability of human nature and beyond the merits of the person … Man’s free-will is moved by something which is above the human mind, that is to say, by God. The mind of man is not so great a master of its act that it does not need to be moved by God … God leads everything to love of Himself … … for this it is necessary that the will of man should be prepared with grace by God …
“In the state of corrupt nature, it cannot be that man remains for a long time without mortal sin … Man cannot avoid every act of sin, except by grace … God’s grace is the outcome of His mercy … Man needs grace to heal his nature, in order that he may entirely abstain from sin … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace … In order for a man rise from sin there is required the help of grace ... According to Jeremias 31:18: ‘Convert me and I shall be converted, for Thou art the Lord, my God!’ and Lamentations 5:21: ‘Convert us, O Lord, to Thee, and we shall be converted!’ … Correction is useful … Correction is necessary in order to abstain from sin; yet correction is not sufficient without God’s help. Hence after anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil until the end of his life. For to many persons grace is given to whom perseverance in grace is not given!” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, questions 109 to 114).
Clearing Up Misunderstandings and Ignorance About Grace
Sadly to say, most Catholics would have a hard time explaining what grace is and what kinds of graces there are and what are the roles of these different kinds of grace. Catholics can fall into the trap of thinking that God is like a “vending machine” of grace. We go to church, we put our money in the basket, we say our prayers, we do something nice for someone and then we expect God to give us our grace. And, when He doesn’t―or we don’t immediately sense or feel that the grace is given―we kick the “vending machine,” grumble and walk away feeling ripped-off. However, God is not a vending machine and “owes” us nothing.
You cannot love what you do not know; you cannot use to maximum potential something that you know little about. One would imagine that most people would want to know all there is to know about grace―especially since there can no salvation without grace: “The grace of God [brings] life everlasting” (Romans 6:23) … “By grace you are saved, and not of yourselves, for it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8) … “By Christ’s grace you are saved!” (Ephesians 2:5). “Being justified by His grace, we may be heirs to life everlasting” (Titus 3:7). “Let us go therefore with confidence to the throne of grace―so that we may obtain mercy!” (Hebrews 4:16). So let us try to dispel the darkness of our ignorance and profit from the potential that grace offers.
Grace is Given to Everyone
God does not wish to exclude anyone from His grace: “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him!” (John 3:17). “Every man has received grace” (1 Peter 4:10). “To every one of us is given grace, according to the measure of the giving of Christ” (Ephesians 4:7). Even the pagans are offered God’s graces: “The grace of the Holy Ghost was poured out upon the Gentiles also! … God gave them the same grace, as to us also who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ!” who was I, that could withstand God?” (Acts 10:45; 11:17). “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men―instructing us, that by denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world” (Titus 2:11-12).
Unfortunately, with our God-given free will, we can stubbornly and tragically refuse to accept and cooperate with God’s graces: “The light shined in darkness and the darkness did not comprehend it! … That was the true light, which enlightens every man that comes into this world. He was in the world and the world was made by Him―and the world knew him not. He came unto His own―and His own received Him not! … The light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 1:5-11; 3:19).
The More Grace You Get―the More Fruit You Should Produce
Our Lord says: “I am the true vine and My Father is the gardener. Every branch in Me that bears not fruit, He will take away! And every branch that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit!” [John 15:1-2]. “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). We see this implied in Our Lord’s parable of the talents: “And to one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one, to everyone according to his proper ability: and immediately he took his journey. He that had received the five talents, went his way and traded and gained other five. And he that had received the two, gained another two. But he that had received the one, going his way dug into the earth and hid his lord’s money” (Matthew 25:15-18). We are expected to profit from the graces that God gives us―and not profitlessly bury them in the ground. “Receive not the grace of God in vain!” (2 Corinthians 6:1). “Stir up the grace of God which is in thee!” (2 Timothy 1:6). “Grow in grace” (2 Peter 3:18). “Neglect not the grace that is in thee!” (1 Timothy 4:14). “I cast not away the grace of God!” (Galatians 2:21). “His grace in me has not been void, but I have labored more abundantly than all they―yet not I, but the grace of God with me” (1 Corinthians 15:10).
Everything Revolves Around Grace
As already stated above―God saves you―but it through His grace that He does that saving. Our Lady can lead you to salvation―but not without the grace of God (and she is the Mediatrix of All Grace, the treasure chest of all God’s graces, through whom God gives all His graces). Baptism saves souls―but it is only by giving souls the grace of God. The Sacrament of Confession can save a soul from Hell merited by mortal sin―but it can only do this with the grace of God. Our Lady said that one day, through the Rosary and the Scapular, she would save the world―but this requires the grace of God. An act of perfect contrition can save a soul―but it only does this by restoring the grace of God to the soul in mortal sin.
All the countless events of everyday life revolve around and depend upon the grace of God―as shown in the above quotes of St. Thomas Aquinas. The actions of Divine Providence are the workings of the grace of God. Dom Chautard, in his book The Soul of the Apostolate, speaks of grace prodding, inspiring and moving us at every moment of the day, all throughout the day―he calls this “the grace of the present moment”. Dom Chautard writes: “At every instant Jesus presents Himself to you by the GRACE OF THE PRESENT MOMENT C every time there is a prayer to say, a Mass to celebrate or to hear, reacting to be done, or acts of patience, of zeal, of renunciation, of struggle, confidence, or love to be produced.” Sadly, most people are totally oblivious and ignorant of this―they fail to see the ceaseless actions of grace all throughout their day in all the little things of life.
Different Kinds of Grace
A man is different to a woman―yet both are called human beings. Both priests and laity are members of the Catholic Church―but they have different functions within the Church. A hammer has a different function than a screwdriver―yet both are called tools. Likewise, there are different forms of grace―which, even though they are all geared to get us to Heaven―they function differently. Let us then take a look at these different kinds of graces.
Sanctifying Grace and Actual Grace
There are two kinds of grace: Sanctifying Grace and Actual Grace.
(1) Sanctifying Grace gives us the very life of God. Sanctifying grace is not God Himself, but is a share in certain aspects of the life of God. It is an interior grace, which should habitually dwell in the soul and transform it, making it holy―hence it is sometimes called Sanctifying Grace because it makes us holy, and Habitual Grace because it should be a permanent grace that habitually reside in our souls. The ordinary way we receive Sanctifying Grace is through the Sacraments―beginning with its first reception at Baptism. It is Sanctifying Grace that is the basis for our salvation and is infused in us upon our Baptism. If we lose Sanctifying Grace, then we can regain in through the Sacrament of Confession.
(2) Actual Grace is supernatural help from God (like inspirations, suggestions, nudges to do the right thing according to the Will of God). Actual Grace is grace given to us when God acts in a particular moment in time; it is not continuous and does not stay with us. The unique feature of Actual Grace is that it comes and goes, not remaining permanently with the Christian. It serves a purpose such a moving the Christian to do good during a certain period of time. Actual Grace is not a permanent grace like Sanctifying Grace (unless lost by mortal sin), but Actual Grace is a temporary, passing, short-term grace that is meant to guide us through some particular thing or circumstance. It is external grace, working on us from the outside only; it does nothing to change the state of our soul. It does not remove mortal sin and it does not make us holy by itself―it is meant to inspire, lead and guide to do the things that will make us holy. Everyone receives actual grace, and it comes to us when we need it. We have the free will to cooperate with it or ignore it.
St. Thomas Aquinas says: “There is a twofold grace: (1) one whereby man himself is united to God, and this is called SANCTIFYING GRACE or HABITUAL GRACE, inasmuch as it heals and justifies the soul, and makes it pleasing to God; (2) the other is that whereby one man cooperates with another in leading him to God, and this gift is called GRATUITOUS GRACE [modern theology also calls it “ACTUAL GRACE”], since it is bestowed on a man beyond the capability of nature, and beyond the merit of the person.”
The most important type is sanctifying Grace, which is the grace that makes us holy, and which therefore obtains for us salvation. Actual Grace―of itself―does not directly make us holy, nor does it lead directly to salvation. Even pagans are given Actual Graces, but that does not guarantee their salvation―those graces are merely meant to lead them to the waters of Baptism, which imparts to Sanctifying Grace to the soul and begins the pilgrimage to Heaven.
Different Kinds of Actual Grace―Prevenient, Concomitant and Perservering
In Latin, theologians speak of (1) gratia praeveniens, (2) gratia concomitans, and (3) gratia perseverans. What are these three kinds of Actual Grace?
(1) Prevenient Grace is based on the Latin words “prae” or “pre” meaning “before” and “veniens” from the verb “venire” meaning “to come” ― hence “to come before” or to “precede.” Therefore, Grace is an Actual Grace (temporary passing grace) that comes before the other two―Concomitant Grace and Persevering Grace. Prevenient Grace is like a first impulse, an initial idea or suggestion that God sends―a kind of a “Hey! Why don’t you do this good thing?” The devil acts likewise in temptations to sin and evil. Prevenient Grace is like bait on the end of fishing line and hook―God uses it to attract us to some good thought, word or action.
(2) Concomitant Grace is based on the Latin words “con” meaning “with” and “mittens” from the verb “mittere” meaning “to send” ― hence “to send with.” Sometimes called Cooperating Grace, it is assistance given when we respond to a Prevenient Grace. It has been compared to a mother who, after coaxing a child to walk, actually takes it by the arms and assists it to take a few more steps. Or like a parent that suggests to the child that his or her bedroom should be cleaned and tidied―and then goes with the child to help the child get started. In Prevenient Graces God acts without man’s cooperation―God merely suggests or coaxes a person to do something; but in Concomitant Grace God acts together with the free cooperation of a person’s free-will by, so to speak, “jump-starting” the person into action.
(3) Persevering Grace comes from the Latin verb “perseverare” meaning “to continue, to persist, to persevere.” Starting something is usually far easier than seeing something through to the end―ask anyone who got married! Our Lord speaks of this perseverance when He says: “He that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:22). The word “persevere” could be divided into two ― “per” meaning “through” and the word “severe” meaning “very serious, something causing very great pain, difficulty, worry, damage, etc.” The way to Heaven is not a “cake-walk” but a fight―it is a fight against the devil, the world and our own wicked tendencies. God knows how hard this is―and He is willing to give the grace to persevere through all our trials and tribulations―but we must ask for that grace! St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Hence after anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for the gift of perseverance, so that he may be kept from evil till the end of his life. For to many persons grace is given to whom perseverance in grace is not given.”
Different Kinds of Actual Grace―Sufficient Grace and Efficient (Efficacious) Grace
Some theologians speak of a Sufficient Grace and an Efficient Grace (also called an Efficacious Grace). What are these graces and what do they do? Sufficient and Efficient/Efficacious Graces are Actual Graces that describe how those Actual Graces work. If you like, they describe the power or efficacity that God puts into each and every Actual Grace that He sends to us. You could use an analogy with cars ― car engines can be supercharged or turbocharged, which may increase engine power up to 50%. This enables a small engine to perform like a naturally aspirated larger engine. Loosely speaking―and all analogies limp―Sufficient Grace could be compared to a normal car engine and Efficient/Efficacious Grace could be compared to a supercharged or turbocharged engine.
Human freedom, under grace, is a dogma. According to the Councils of Trent and the First Vatican Council, human freedom means that man has the power to resist grace, to answer it with dissent rather than consent. Freedom means a choice of two things―a power to do or not to do, to do this or that, to dissent or consent. It is possible to resist both Sufficient Grace and Efficient/Efficacious Grace and thus thwart God’s plans for us and risk our own damnation. Sufficient Grace has all it takes to “get the job done” yet it is also less ‘persuasive’ than Efficient/Efficacious Grace. Normally, if we do not resist Sufficient Grace, then it eventually progresses into an Ordinary Efficient/Efficacious Grace―like a seed becomes a plant. However, sometimes God will directly send an Extraordinary Efficient/Efficacious Grace which is far more powerful and far more persuasive that, so to speak, “makes us an offer that we cannot refuse”! Nevertheless, at all times our will remains free to either reject or accept the movement and guidance of God’s grace, regardless if which kind it is.
God Helps Those Who Help Themselves
St. Augustine says that the help of God’s grace should be more sought for things pertaining to our justification (returning and keeping ourselves in a state of sanctifying grace) so that we can achieve salvation―that is what he means when her refers to the word “justice” in the following paragraphs. He points out that God’s help does not exempt us from making our own efforts by cooperating with God’s grace:
“Remove yourself, I repeat, remove yourself from yourself―you just get in your own way! If it’s you that are building yourself, it is a ruin you are building. ‘Unless the Lord has built the house, they have labored in vain, who build it!’ (Psalm 127:1). God made you without you! You didn’t, after all, give any consent to God making you! How could you consent, if you didn’t yet exist? So while God made you without you, nevertheless, He does not justify you without you ... So stop wishing to have your own justice [justification/salvation]. Do not have your own justice [justification/salvation]―the Apostle Paul counts it as dung! But the whole thing is from God―not, however as though we were asleep, as though we did not have to make an effort, as though we did not have to be willing. Without your will, there will be no justice [justification/salvation] of God in you. The will, indeed, is only ours, the justice [justification/salvation] is only God’s. There can be such a thing as God’s justice [justification/salvation] without your will, but it [justification/salvation] cannot be in you apart from your will, without your will. You have been shown what you have to do. The law has laid down: ‘Do not do that, nor that; do this and that!’ It has been shown to you, laid down for you, your mind has been opened for you―you have understood what you should do. Beg for the power to do it!
“Do not think that just because you call yourself a Christian, you cannot for that reason stumble over the stone of stumbling. When you abuse God’s grace, you stumble over Him. Let there be justice [justification/salvation] in you―but let it be from grace, let it come to you from God―do not let it be your own! Sigh to obtain it, weep to obtain it, believe in order to obtain it. ‘Whoever calls upon the Name of the Lord,’ He says, ‘shall be saved’ (Romans 10:13; Joel 2:32). Or do you suppose that when it says: ‘Whoever calls upon the Name of the Lord shall be saved’ ― it means saved from malaria, or the pox, or the gout, or any other pain of the body? Not so! But ‘will be saved’ means ‘will be just.’ Because: ‘The doctor is not needed by the healthy, but by the sick.’ He explained that when he said: ‘I have not come to call the just, but sinners!’ (Mark 2:17).” (St. Augustine, Father and Doctor of the Church, Sermon 169).
Article 15
Sunday & Monday, June 23rd & 24th
A Plan of Action that Works
Thoughts for Father's Day Week
Sunday & Monday, June 23rd & 24th
A Plan of Action that Works
Thoughts for Father's Day Week
Do This and You Shall Be Saved
Our Lord said to the young man who sought to be saved: “This do, and thou shalt live!” (Luke 10:28). On another occasion, “a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
The father and shepherd of the family must not be afraid to turn aside from the broad road to damnation and instead take the narrow path to salvation. The way to Heaven can only be God’s way, not the way of the world. Our Lord said that we cannot serve both God and the world: “You cannot serve God and mammon! No man can serve two masters!” (Matthew 6:24), adding: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … Be anxious for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on! … Be not anxious saying: ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-33). In other words, put God first and His Providence will take care of your needs (but not of your wants―for we always want far more than we need).
Love God Above All Else
Love God above all else and let that be seen by all family members. Put God ahead of your family and He will take care of your family “Seek first the kingdom of God and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-33). “Love God all thy life, and call upon Him for thy salvation!” (Ecclesiasticus 13:18). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). If loving God is the greatest commandment, then why risk your salvation and the salvation of your family by breaking this “greatest and first commandment”?
Do Not Love the World
If Our Lord said we cannot serve God and the world: “You cannot serve God and mammon! No man can serve two masters!” ― then why ignore His advice and why try to prove Him to be wrong? The vast majority of fathers (and people in general) are very much in love with the world and what it offers. They cannot wrench themselves away from the world―the thought of doing so is terrifying! What will others think? What will the family think? They will never go along with that! Such an attitude ignores the power of God’s grace! Our Lord said: “With men it is impossible; but not with God―for all things are possible with God!” (Mark 10:27).
When God sees that you prefer Him to the world, then His grace will inspire, move and convert your family―it is like St. Peter walking on water, he had to have Faith in Christ’s command and he had to take the first step without any guarantees or certitude: “And seeing Jesus walk upon the sea … Peter said: ‘Lord, if it be Thou, then bid me come to Thee upon the waters!’ And Jesus said: ‘Come!’ And Peter, going down out of the boat, walked upon the water to come to Jesus. But seeing the wind strong, he was afraid, and when he began to sink, he cried out, saying: ‘Lord, save me!’ And immediately Jesus stretching forth his hand took hold of him, and said to him: ‘O thou of little Faith! Why didst thou doubt?’” (Matthew 14:26-31).
Likewise, we tend to doubt God’s Providence, we tend to doubt that God will look after all our needs if we put Him first. Therefore, we essentially look after our own selves rather than allowing God to do so. The result is that we start to grumble, moan and complain about all the things that God sends our way―thus opposing God rather than following God. God has said: “My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9). Similarly, the world’s thoughts are not God’s thoughts, nor are the ways of the world the ways of God.
Our Lord Himself said: “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world … My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). “The prince of this world [the devil] cometh, and in Me he hath not anything!” (John 14:30). To the worldlings He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hate you, know that it hath hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hateth Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
Hence it is that Holy Scripture warns us: “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world! And this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Wonder not, brethren, if the world hate you!” (1 John 3:13). “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “For they that are according to the flesh, mind the things that are of the flesh―but they that are according to the spirit, mind the things that are of the spirit. The wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God―for it is not subject to the law of God, neither can it be. And they who are in the flesh, cannot please God.” (Romans 8:5-8). “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27). “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
“The Lord hath looked down from Heaven to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that doth good, no not one! They have not called upon God!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6). What does the Lord see when He looks down upon you and your family? Have you or your family gone aside from the path of God? Have you become unprofitable to God? Is there no fear of God in your family? Have you become corrupt? Do you still call upon God―rarely, less and less or even never? Coming back to the first and greatest commandment of all―do you and your family love God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength? If not, then you risk becoming one of vast majority who are damned―“for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14). Your prime concern should be the first and greatest commandment―the love of God. “For charity is of God. And everyone that loves, is born of God, and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity!” (1 John 4:8).
Charity is first and foremost a love of God, and only secondarily a love of neighbor―not because of any good qualities in your neighbor, but because God made your neighbor in His own image and likeness. Hence we cannot love God and hate our neighbor―not even our evil neighbor. We must hate the evil in our neighbor, without hating the neighbor. We hate the sin, but not the sinner. That is why Our Lady asks us pray for the conversion of sinners. That is why Our Lord says: “You have heard that it hath been said: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thy enemy!’ But I say to you: Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you! ― so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and the bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even sinners [publicans] do this? And if you only salute your brethren, what do you do that is more? Do not the heathens and pagans also do this? Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:43-48). Is that the kind of charity that exists in your home? Is that the charity that you teach your family members? Do you practice what you teach? Do you pray for and do good to your enemies? Love of God and love of neighbor (and your enemies are also your neighbors) are the two greatest commandments: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Without charity―which is like saying “without God”, “for God is charity” (1 John 4:8)―without charity we can do nothing and are nothing in the spiritual realm: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Yet love of neighbor does not mean love of the world! “What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord. Bear not the yoke with unbelievers!” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
You―and your family―are meant to be a living temple of God in which God is love above all things with your mind, heart, soul and strength. The pagan world, the worldly world, the non-godly world has no right of entrance into that temple―“What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols?”
No plan for the salvation of souls will work unless it works towards putting God in first place and loving God above all else. Love of the world has no place in a Catholic home, because it is, as Scripture says, a love of the enemy of God: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). The very first thing to aim for, the foundation of anything else that comes afterwards, is the love of God―and you cannot love what you do know; and you will not know unless you read and study; and you cannot pass on to the family what you do not have yourself.
Love of God Means Keeping His Commandments
We live in a hypocritical world in which we say one thing, but do the opposite. We tell the spouse we love them―but we look at other people and even have impure desires for them. The numbers we declare to the taxman are not always the real numbers concerning our income and expenditure. Women put on make-up and wear corsets to portray to the world something that is not true in reality. The same is true with God―we protest that we love Him, but we often offend through sin. Hence it is that Our Lord complained: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Love implies obedience―thus it is that Our Lord says: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words … If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24; 15:10).
What place have the commandments of God in your home? Are they displayed? It is amazing how many Catholics cannot name all the Ten Commandments! How can you love and keep what you do not know? In many places of the United States―for quite some time now―the Ten Commandments are not allowed to be displayed! Federal courts have routinely ruled that the Ten Commandments cannot be displayed in county courthouses and other public buildings. Recently, Louisiana has become the first state to require that the Ten Commandments be displayed in every public school classroom under a bill Republican Governor Jeff Landry signed House Bill 71 into law on June 19th, 2024. The legislation mandates that a poster-size display of the Ten Commandments in a “large, easily readable font” be in all public classrooms, from kindergarten to state-funded universities. Similar bills requiring that the Ten Commandments be displayed in classrooms have been proposed in Texas, Oklahoma, Utah and other states. However, with threats of legal battles over the constitutionality of such measures, no state besides Louisiana has made the bills law. Legal battles over displaying the Ten Commandments in classrooms are not new. In 1980, the Supreme Court ruled that a similar Kentucky law was unconstitutional and that it violated the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution, which says Congress can “make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” Four civil liberties groups will sue the state of Louisiana after Republican Gov. Jeff Landry signed a law that calls for the Ten Commandments to be displayed in school classrooms. The American Civil Liberties Union, its Louisiana chapter, Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the Freedom from Religion Foundation announced they intend to file a lawsuit to block enforcement of House Bill 71.
Fathers Can Learn from the Example of the Love of God by King Louis IX of France
Blessed Queen Blanche, the daughter of the king of Castile, Spain, was married for twenty-six years to Louis VIII, King of France. When he died he entrusted her with the guardianship of their twelve-year-old son Louis (Louis IX) and, until his maturity. Blanche proved that she was a true Christian mother, for she often said to her son: “I love you my dear son, as much as a mother can love her child; but I would rather see you dead at my feet than see you commit a mortal sin.” Queen Blanche was not satisfied with helping her son to avoid mortal sin, she was anxious also to preserve him from even venial sin. Therefore both Blanche and her son Louis had themselves enrolled in the Third Order of St. Francis. In living up to the rule she encouraged him to practice every virtue and to strive after Christian perfection.
Louis never forgot his moral upbringing. His friend and biographer, the Sieur de Joinville, who accompanied him on his first crusade to the Holy Land, relates that the King once asked him: “Tell me, would you rather be a leper or commit a mortal sin?”
Joinville answered in all honesty: “I would rather commit thirty mortal sins than be a leper.”
Louis strongly disagreed with him earnestly for making such a reply, and said: “When a man dies he is healed of leprosy in his body; but when a man who has committed a mortal sin dies, he cannot know of a certainty that he has in his lifetime repented in such a way that God has forgiven him; wherefore he must stand in great fear lest that leprosy of sin last as long as God is in Paradise.”
After taking the government of France, Louis openly and unabashedly lived out his Faith in a most striking manner. At his coronation as king of France, Louis IX bound himself by oath to behave as God’s anointed, as the father of his people. His biographers have told us of the long hours he spent in prayer, fasting, and penance. Louis loved sermons, heard two Masses daily, and was surrounded, even while traveling, with priests chanting the Divine Office. Louis forbade at his court any diversion dangerous to morals. He allowed no obscenity or profanity. Joinville, his friend and biographer, writes: “I was a good twenty-two years in the King’s company, and never once did I hear him swear―either by God, or His Mother, or His saints. I did not even hear him name the Devil, except if he met the word when reading aloud, or when discussing what had been read.” A Dominican who knew Louis well declared that he had never heard him speak ill of anyone. The King forbade all forms of usury, in accordance with the teachings of the Christian religion. He issued an edict that any man guilty of blasphemy should be branded and have their mouth and tongue mutilated. Even the clergy objected to the harshness of this penalty, and later, on the advice of Pope Clement IV, it was reduced to a fine, or flogging, or imprisonment, depending on circumstances.
In 1244, Louis announced his intention of undertaking a crusade to the East―although his advisers urged him to abandon the idea. In 1248, Louis left Paris for the holy crusade. The King issued orders that all acts of violence committed by his soldiers should be punished and restitution made to the persons injured. He forbade the killing of any infidel taken prisoner, and gave directions that all infidels who might desire to embrace the Christian Faith should be given instruction, and, if they wished it, be baptized. In April, 1250, Louis himself was taken prisoner and his army was routed. During his captivity, the King recited the Divine Office every day with two chaplains and had the prayers of the Mass read to him. Eventually the King and his fellow prisoners were released in return for a ransom of roughly $80 million in today’s money.
Thirteen years after his safe return to France, disturbed by new Muslim advances, the King was determined to go on another crusade, and in 1267 he announced his intention. The Pope supported the crusade but the crusade was a dismal failure. Louis set off on his crusade to North Africa in 1270. Within a month of their landing at Carthage, the army camp was decimated by disease and Louis’ second son died. That same day the King and his eldest son, Philip, became sick and it was soon apparent that Louis would not recover. He soon died.
Last Instructions of King Louis IX to his Eldest Son
At some point towards the end of his life, Louis instructed his son and heir, Philip, on how to rule the kingdom. Here are a few extracts pertaining to love and obedience to be shown to God:
“Dear son, since I desire with all my heart that you be well instructed in all things, it is in my thought to give you some advice this writing. For I have heard you say, several times, that you remember my words better than those of anyone else.
“My son, the first thing I would teach you is to set your heart to love God; for nobody can be saved unless he loves God. You should, with all your strength, shun everything which you believe to be displeasing to God. And you ought especially to be resolved not to commit mortal sin, no matter what may happen and should permit all your limbs to be hewn off, and suffer every manner of torment, rather than fall knowingly into mortal sin.
“If God sends you adversity, receive it in patience and give thanks to our Savior and think that you have deserved it, and that He will make it turn to your advantage. You should think that you have well merited it, because you have loved Him but little, and served Him but little, and have done many things contrary to His will. If He sends you prosperity, then thank Him humbly, so that you do not become worse from pride or any other cause, when you ought to be better. For we should not fight against God with His own gifts.
“I advise you that you accustom yourself to frequent confession and choose for your confessor a right worthy man who knows how to teach you what to do and what not to do; and bear yourself in such a manner that your confessor and your friends shall dare to reprove you for your misdoings. Listen to the services of Holy Church devoutly, and without chattering; and pray to God with your heart and with your lips, and especially at Mass when the consecration takes place.
“Love and honor all persons belonging to Holy Church, and see that no one take away or diminish the gifts and alms paid to them by your predecessors. Let your heart be tender and full of pity toward those who are poor, miserable, and afflicted, and comfort and help them to the utmost of your power.
“Finally, my very dear son, cause Masses to be sung for my soul, and prayers to be said throughout your realm; and give to me a special share and full part in all the good you do. Dear son, I give you all the blessings that a good father can give to his son. And may the blessed Trinity and all the saints keep and defend you from all evils; and God give you grace to do His will always, so that He be honored in you, and that you and I may both, after this mortal life is ended, be with Him together and praise Him everlastingly. Amen.”
So What Are You Doing? What Are You Saying? Where Are You Leading Others?
There you have just the tip of the iceberg of good spiritual advice given by a father to his son―but that is also the way in which to spoke to many others under his kingly care. You may well say: “Ah! But he was a saint!” The reply to that is: “Ah! But only saints go to Heaven! Where do you want to go?” Holy Scripture tells you: “All are called to be saints” (Romans 1:7). “Without holiness no man shall see God” (Hebrews 12:14). This is where probably 99% of fathers fail―they fail to realize and accept that there is no entry to Heaven if you are not a saint. What are those fathers preparing their families for? Where are they likely to end up? We all know the damned answer!
Yet God does not wish anyone to be damned―nobody should end up being damned if they cooperate with God’s grace. The problem is found in the halfhearted approach to salvation by 99% of persons―they ignore the warnings of Christ and Scripture: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Luke 13:24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14). Holy Scripture adds: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (2 Corinthians 9:6). “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12) “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Let the words of God from the Book of the Apocalypse serve as a reminder and a warning: “I know your works―that you art neither cold, nor hot. I would prefer that you were cold or hot! But because you are lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit you out of my mouth! Because you say: ‘I am rich and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and you know not that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I advise you to buy from Me gold―fire tried―that you may be made rich, and may be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of your nakedness may not appear; and anoint your eyes with eye-salve so that you may see! Those whom I love, I rebuke and chastise! Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
Yes―in this modern day materialistic and hedonistic (pleasure loving) world―we have become rich and wealthy and have need of nothing, not even God at times! The world gives us comforts, ease and joys―whereas religion imposes burdens and demands that make us sad. The material attracts more than the spiritual. St. Thomas Aquinas wrote: “No man can remain long without pleasure or in sadness, and so he withdraws from sorrowful things, or he turns to other things in which he delights. Those who cannot enjoy spiritual delights for the most part transfer themselves to corporal delights” (De Malo, q. 11, a. 4). If we fail to find joy in the Christian life―which invariably involves prayer, penance, mortification and sacrifices―then we will look elsewhere for joy or satisfaction, and seek more agreeable companionship than the friendship of God offers us. We will gravitate toward pleasures of the flesh of some kind, or to anything else here and now in this life that provides the satisfaction we feel we need. The devil knows which buttons to push and he will focus on the weakest members of the family in order to divide the family into spiritual and worldly camps.
Our Lord said to the young man who sought to be saved: “This do, and thou shalt live!” (Luke 10:28). On another occasion, “a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
The father and shepherd of the family must not be afraid to turn aside from the broad road to damnation and instead take the narrow path to salvation. The way to Heaven can only be God’s way, not the way of the world. Our Lord said that we cannot serve both God and the world: “You cannot serve God and mammon! No man can serve two masters!” (Matthew 6:24), adding: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … Be anxious for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on! … Be not anxious saying: ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-33). In other words, put God first and His Providence will take care of your needs (but not of your wants―for we always want far more than we need).
Love God Above All Else
Love God above all else and let that be seen by all family members. Put God ahead of your family and He will take care of your family “Seek first the kingdom of God and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-33). “Love God all thy life, and call upon Him for thy salvation!” (Ecclesiasticus 13:18). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). If loving God is the greatest commandment, then why risk your salvation and the salvation of your family by breaking this “greatest and first commandment”?
Do Not Love the World
If Our Lord said we cannot serve God and the world: “You cannot serve God and mammon! No man can serve two masters!” ― then why ignore His advice and why try to prove Him to be wrong? The vast majority of fathers (and people in general) are very much in love with the world and what it offers. They cannot wrench themselves away from the world―the thought of doing so is terrifying! What will others think? What will the family think? They will never go along with that! Such an attitude ignores the power of God’s grace! Our Lord said: “With men it is impossible; but not with God―for all things are possible with God!” (Mark 10:27).
When God sees that you prefer Him to the world, then His grace will inspire, move and convert your family―it is like St. Peter walking on water, he had to have Faith in Christ’s command and he had to take the first step without any guarantees or certitude: “And seeing Jesus walk upon the sea … Peter said: ‘Lord, if it be Thou, then bid me come to Thee upon the waters!’ And Jesus said: ‘Come!’ And Peter, going down out of the boat, walked upon the water to come to Jesus. But seeing the wind strong, he was afraid, and when he began to sink, he cried out, saying: ‘Lord, save me!’ And immediately Jesus stretching forth his hand took hold of him, and said to him: ‘O thou of little Faith! Why didst thou doubt?’” (Matthew 14:26-31).
Likewise, we tend to doubt God’s Providence, we tend to doubt that God will look after all our needs if we put Him first. Therefore, we essentially look after our own selves rather than allowing God to do so. The result is that we start to grumble, moan and complain about all the things that God sends our way―thus opposing God rather than following God. God has said: “My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9). Similarly, the world’s thoughts are not God’s thoughts, nor are the ways of the world the ways of God.
Our Lord Himself said: “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world … My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). “The prince of this world [the devil] cometh, and in Me he hath not anything!” (John 14:30). To the worldlings He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hate you, know that it hath hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hateth Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
Hence it is that Holy Scripture warns us: “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world! And this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “Wonder not, brethren, if the world hate you!” (1 John 3:13). “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “For they that are according to the flesh, mind the things that are of the flesh―but they that are according to the spirit, mind the things that are of the spirit. The wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God―for it is not subject to the law of God, neither can it be. And they who are in the flesh, cannot please God.” (Romans 8:5-8). “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27). “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
“The Lord hath looked down from Heaven to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that doth good, no not one! They have not called upon God!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6). What does the Lord see when He looks down upon you and your family? Have you or your family gone aside from the path of God? Have you become unprofitable to God? Is there no fear of God in your family? Have you become corrupt? Do you still call upon God―rarely, less and less or even never? Coming back to the first and greatest commandment of all―do you and your family love God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength? If not, then you risk becoming one of vast majority who are damned―“for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14). Your prime concern should be the first and greatest commandment―the love of God. “For charity is of God. And everyone that loves, is born of God, and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity!” (1 John 4:8).
Charity is first and foremost a love of God, and only secondarily a love of neighbor―not because of any good qualities in your neighbor, but because God made your neighbor in His own image and likeness. Hence we cannot love God and hate our neighbor―not even our evil neighbor. We must hate the evil in our neighbor, without hating the neighbor. We hate the sin, but not the sinner. That is why Our Lady asks us pray for the conversion of sinners. That is why Our Lord says: “You have heard that it hath been said: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thy enemy!’ But I say to you: Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you! ― so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and the bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even sinners [publicans] do this? And if you only salute your brethren, what do you do that is more? Do not the heathens and pagans also do this? Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:43-48). Is that the kind of charity that exists in your home? Is that the charity that you teach your family members? Do you practice what you teach? Do you pray for and do good to your enemies? Love of God and love of neighbor (and your enemies are also your neighbors) are the two greatest commandments: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Without charity―which is like saying “without God”, “for God is charity” (1 John 4:8)―without charity we can do nothing and are nothing in the spiritual realm: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Yet love of neighbor does not mean love of the world! “What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord. Bear not the yoke with unbelievers!” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
You―and your family―are meant to be a living temple of God in which God is love above all things with your mind, heart, soul and strength. The pagan world, the worldly world, the non-godly world has no right of entrance into that temple―“What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols?”
No plan for the salvation of souls will work unless it works towards putting God in first place and loving God above all else. Love of the world has no place in a Catholic home, because it is, as Scripture says, a love of the enemy of God: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). The very first thing to aim for, the foundation of anything else that comes afterwards, is the love of God―and you cannot love what you do know; and you will not know unless you read and study; and you cannot pass on to the family what you do not have yourself.
Love of God Means Keeping His Commandments
We live in a hypocritical world in which we say one thing, but do the opposite. We tell the spouse we love them―but we look at other people and even have impure desires for them. The numbers we declare to the taxman are not always the real numbers concerning our income and expenditure. Women put on make-up and wear corsets to portray to the world something that is not true in reality. The same is true with God―we protest that we love Him, but we often offend through sin. Hence it is that Our Lord complained: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Love implies obedience―thus it is that Our Lord says: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words … If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love!” (John 14:15, 14:21-24; 15:10).
What place have the commandments of God in your home? Are they displayed? It is amazing how many Catholics cannot name all the Ten Commandments! How can you love and keep what you do not know? In many places of the United States―for quite some time now―the Ten Commandments are not allowed to be displayed! Federal courts have routinely ruled that the Ten Commandments cannot be displayed in county courthouses and other public buildings. Recently, Louisiana has become the first state to require that the Ten Commandments be displayed in every public school classroom under a bill Republican Governor Jeff Landry signed House Bill 71 into law on June 19th, 2024. The legislation mandates that a poster-size display of the Ten Commandments in a “large, easily readable font” be in all public classrooms, from kindergarten to state-funded universities. Similar bills requiring that the Ten Commandments be displayed in classrooms have been proposed in Texas, Oklahoma, Utah and other states. However, with threats of legal battles over the constitutionality of such measures, no state besides Louisiana has made the bills law. Legal battles over displaying the Ten Commandments in classrooms are not new. In 1980, the Supreme Court ruled that a similar Kentucky law was unconstitutional and that it violated the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution, which says Congress can “make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” Four civil liberties groups will sue the state of Louisiana after Republican Gov. Jeff Landry signed a law that calls for the Ten Commandments to be displayed in school classrooms. The American Civil Liberties Union, its Louisiana chapter, Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the Freedom from Religion Foundation announced they intend to file a lawsuit to block enforcement of House Bill 71.
Fathers Can Learn from the Example of the Love of God by King Louis IX of France
Blessed Queen Blanche, the daughter of the king of Castile, Spain, was married for twenty-six years to Louis VIII, King of France. When he died he entrusted her with the guardianship of their twelve-year-old son Louis (Louis IX) and, until his maturity. Blanche proved that she was a true Christian mother, for she often said to her son: “I love you my dear son, as much as a mother can love her child; but I would rather see you dead at my feet than see you commit a mortal sin.” Queen Blanche was not satisfied with helping her son to avoid mortal sin, she was anxious also to preserve him from even venial sin. Therefore both Blanche and her son Louis had themselves enrolled in the Third Order of St. Francis. In living up to the rule she encouraged him to practice every virtue and to strive after Christian perfection.
Louis never forgot his moral upbringing. His friend and biographer, the Sieur de Joinville, who accompanied him on his first crusade to the Holy Land, relates that the King once asked him: “Tell me, would you rather be a leper or commit a mortal sin?”
Joinville answered in all honesty: “I would rather commit thirty mortal sins than be a leper.”
Louis strongly disagreed with him earnestly for making such a reply, and said: “When a man dies he is healed of leprosy in his body; but when a man who has committed a mortal sin dies, he cannot know of a certainty that he has in his lifetime repented in such a way that God has forgiven him; wherefore he must stand in great fear lest that leprosy of sin last as long as God is in Paradise.”
After taking the government of France, Louis openly and unabashedly lived out his Faith in a most striking manner. At his coronation as king of France, Louis IX bound himself by oath to behave as God’s anointed, as the father of his people. His biographers have told us of the long hours he spent in prayer, fasting, and penance. Louis loved sermons, heard two Masses daily, and was surrounded, even while traveling, with priests chanting the Divine Office. Louis forbade at his court any diversion dangerous to morals. He allowed no obscenity or profanity. Joinville, his friend and biographer, writes: “I was a good twenty-two years in the King’s company, and never once did I hear him swear―either by God, or His Mother, or His saints. I did not even hear him name the Devil, except if he met the word when reading aloud, or when discussing what had been read.” A Dominican who knew Louis well declared that he had never heard him speak ill of anyone. The King forbade all forms of usury, in accordance with the teachings of the Christian religion. He issued an edict that any man guilty of blasphemy should be branded and have their mouth and tongue mutilated. Even the clergy objected to the harshness of this penalty, and later, on the advice of Pope Clement IV, it was reduced to a fine, or flogging, or imprisonment, depending on circumstances.
In 1244, Louis announced his intention of undertaking a crusade to the East―although his advisers urged him to abandon the idea. In 1248, Louis left Paris for the holy crusade. The King issued orders that all acts of violence committed by his soldiers should be punished and restitution made to the persons injured. He forbade the killing of any infidel taken prisoner, and gave directions that all infidels who might desire to embrace the Christian Faith should be given instruction, and, if they wished it, be baptized. In April, 1250, Louis himself was taken prisoner and his army was routed. During his captivity, the King recited the Divine Office every day with two chaplains and had the prayers of the Mass read to him. Eventually the King and his fellow prisoners were released in return for a ransom of roughly $80 million in today’s money.
Thirteen years after his safe return to France, disturbed by new Muslim advances, the King was determined to go on another crusade, and in 1267 he announced his intention. The Pope supported the crusade but the crusade was a dismal failure. Louis set off on his crusade to North Africa in 1270. Within a month of their landing at Carthage, the army camp was decimated by disease and Louis’ second son died. That same day the King and his eldest son, Philip, became sick and it was soon apparent that Louis would not recover. He soon died.
Last Instructions of King Louis IX to his Eldest Son
At some point towards the end of his life, Louis instructed his son and heir, Philip, on how to rule the kingdom. Here are a few extracts pertaining to love and obedience to be shown to God:
“Dear son, since I desire with all my heart that you be well instructed in all things, it is in my thought to give you some advice this writing. For I have heard you say, several times, that you remember my words better than those of anyone else.
“My son, the first thing I would teach you is to set your heart to love God; for nobody can be saved unless he loves God. You should, with all your strength, shun everything which you believe to be displeasing to God. And you ought especially to be resolved not to commit mortal sin, no matter what may happen and should permit all your limbs to be hewn off, and suffer every manner of torment, rather than fall knowingly into mortal sin.
“If God sends you adversity, receive it in patience and give thanks to our Savior and think that you have deserved it, and that He will make it turn to your advantage. You should think that you have well merited it, because you have loved Him but little, and served Him but little, and have done many things contrary to His will. If He sends you prosperity, then thank Him humbly, so that you do not become worse from pride or any other cause, when you ought to be better. For we should not fight against God with His own gifts.
“I advise you that you accustom yourself to frequent confession and choose for your confessor a right worthy man who knows how to teach you what to do and what not to do; and bear yourself in such a manner that your confessor and your friends shall dare to reprove you for your misdoings. Listen to the services of Holy Church devoutly, and without chattering; and pray to God with your heart and with your lips, and especially at Mass when the consecration takes place.
“Love and honor all persons belonging to Holy Church, and see that no one take away or diminish the gifts and alms paid to them by your predecessors. Let your heart be tender and full of pity toward those who are poor, miserable, and afflicted, and comfort and help them to the utmost of your power.
“Finally, my very dear son, cause Masses to be sung for my soul, and prayers to be said throughout your realm; and give to me a special share and full part in all the good you do. Dear son, I give you all the blessings that a good father can give to his son. And may the blessed Trinity and all the saints keep and defend you from all evils; and God give you grace to do His will always, so that He be honored in you, and that you and I may both, after this mortal life is ended, be with Him together and praise Him everlastingly. Amen.”
So What Are You Doing? What Are You Saying? Where Are You Leading Others?
There you have just the tip of the iceberg of good spiritual advice given by a father to his son―but that is also the way in which to spoke to many others under his kingly care. You may well say: “Ah! But he was a saint!” The reply to that is: “Ah! But only saints go to Heaven! Where do you want to go?” Holy Scripture tells you: “All are called to be saints” (Romans 1:7). “Without holiness no man shall see God” (Hebrews 12:14). This is where probably 99% of fathers fail―they fail to realize and accept that there is no entry to Heaven if you are not a saint. What are those fathers preparing their families for? Where are they likely to end up? We all know the damned answer!
Yet God does not wish anyone to be damned―nobody should end up being damned if they cooperate with God’s grace. The problem is found in the halfhearted approach to salvation by 99% of persons―they ignore the warnings of Christ and Scripture: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Luke 13:24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14). Holy Scripture adds: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “He who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (2 Corinthians 9:6). “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12) “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Let the words of God from the Book of the Apocalypse serve as a reminder and a warning: “I know your works―that you art neither cold, nor hot. I would prefer that you were cold or hot! But because you are lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit you out of my mouth! Because you say: ‘I am rich and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and you know not that you are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I advise you to buy from Me gold―fire tried―that you may be made rich, and may be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of your nakedness may not appear; and anoint your eyes with eye-salve so that you may see! Those whom I love, I rebuke and chastise! Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
Yes―in this modern day materialistic and hedonistic (pleasure loving) world―we have become rich and wealthy and have need of nothing, not even God at times! The world gives us comforts, ease and joys―whereas religion imposes burdens and demands that make us sad. The material attracts more than the spiritual. St. Thomas Aquinas wrote: “No man can remain long without pleasure or in sadness, and so he withdraws from sorrowful things, or he turns to other things in which he delights. Those who cannot enjoy spiritual delights for the most part transfer themselves to corporal delights” (De Malo, q. 11, a. 4). If we fail to find joy in the Christian life―which invariably involves prayer, penance, mortification and sacrifices―then we will look elsewhere for joy or satisfaction, and seek more agreeable companionship than the friendship of God offers us. We will gravitate toward pleasures of the flesh of some kind, or to anything else here and now in this life that provides the satisfaction we feel we need. The devil knows which buttons to push and he will focus on the weakest members of the family in order to divide the family into spiritual and worldly camps.
Article 14
Friday & Saturday, June 21st & 22nd
Fathers Family Program for Success and Salvation
Thoughts for Father's Day Week
Friday & Saturday, June 21st & 22nd
Fathers Family Program for Success and Salvation
Thoughts for Father's Day Week
Success with God―Failure by Yourself
God wants you to succeed! Succeed in what? Business? Finance? Sports? Job? Hobbies? All of that is secondary fluff! Success is truly measured by whether or not you get to Heaven and take your family with you. As Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven!” (Matthew 6:19-21) ... “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). There are lots of successful businessmen in Hell; lots of rich people in Hell; lots of famous people in Hell; lots of sports stars and movie stars in Hell―is that success? Our Lord and Holy Scripture say “No!”
We have Our Lord’s parable about the ‘successful’ rich man: “And Jesus spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns and will build bigger ones; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and all my goods! And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thy rest―eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool! This very night do they require thy soul of thee! And whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’” (Luke 12:16-21). The lesson to be learned is that we should seek the riches of Heaven rather than the riches of this Earth―we should seek to possess Heaven rather than the things of this world.
We see a similar real-life encounter between Jesus and the well-intentioned rich young man who wanted to get to Heaven: “And behold, a certain rich young man, a ruler, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
► ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI, in The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, writes: “One thing is necessary! The salvation of our souls. It is not necessary to be great, noble, or rich in this world, or to enjoy uninterrupted health; but it is necessary to save our souls, For this has God placed us here: not to acquire honors, riches, or pleasures, but to acquire by our good works that eternal kingdom which is prepared for those who, during this present life, fight against and overcome the enemies of their eternal salvation” (The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, Part 1, Meditation 17).
► THE IMITATION OF CHRIST speaks along the same lines when it says: “Vanity of vanities and all is vanity, except to love God and serve Him alone. This is the greatest wisdom — to seek the kingdom of Heaven through contempt of the world. It is vanity, therefore, to seek and trust in riches that perish. It is vanity also to court honor and to be puffed up with pride. It is vanity to follow the lusts of the body and to desire things for which severe punishment later must come. It is vanity to wish for long life and to care little about a well-spent life. It is vanity to be concerned with the present only and not to make provision for things to come. It is vanity to love what passes quickly and not to look ahead where eternal joy abides.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 1).
► THE IMITATION OF CHRIST continues: “What good is much discussion of involved and obscure matters when our ignorance of them will not be held against us on Judgment Day? Neglect of things which are profitable and necessary―and undue concern with those which are irrelevant and harmful―are great folly. The more recollected a man is, and the more simple of heart he becomes, the easier he understands sublime things, for he receives the light of knowledge from above. Every perfection in this life has some imperfection mixed with it, and no learning of ours is without some darkness. Not that learning or knowledge is to be considered evil, which is good in itself, but a clean conscience and virtuous life ought always to be preferred. Many often err and accomplish little or nothing because they try to become learned, rather than trying to live well. If men used as much care in uprooting vices and implanting virtues as they do in discussing problems, there would not be so much evil and scandal in the world. On the Day of Judgment, surely, we shall not be asked what we have read, or what we know―but what we have done; not how well we have spoken, but how well we have lived. Tell me, where now are all the masters and teachers who were famous for their learning? During life they seemed to be something; now they are seldom remembered. How quickly the glory of the world passes away! If only their lives and virtues had kept pace with their learning, then their study and reading would have been worthwhile. How many there are who perish because of vain worldly knowledge and too little care for serving God. They became vain in their own conceits because they chose to be great rather than humble.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 3).
► FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE―one of the greatest theologians of the 20th century―similarly says: “The one thing necessary— which Jesus spoke of to Martha and Mary (Luke 10:38-42)—consists in hearing the word of God and living by it. The interior life, which presupposes the state of grace, consists, is a generous tendency of the soul toward God. The interior life is―in a soul that is in the state of grace―especially a life of humility, abnegation, Faith, Hope, and Charity, with the peace that comes from the progressive subordination of our feelings and wishes to the love of God. To have an interior life―an exceedingly active exterior apostolate does not suffice, nor does great theological knowledge, nor is it necessary. The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, more profound than artistic or literary life, more profound than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not. This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange also reminds us that entry to Heaven requires sanctity and nothing less―for only saints go to Heaven. So many fathers of families fail to instill that truth in family members, with lukewarmness being the norm: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
When Little Leads to a Lot
► ST. THOMAS AQUINAS, in his work Being and Essence, writes: “A small mistake in the beginning is a big one in the end.” Just being a little bit off-course at the start of a journey, becomes a long way off-course the further you go and the longer you travel―to the point that you will miss your destination. Have you heard the “one-in-sixty-rule”? Pilots are taught it. If you are one degree off-course at the start of your journey, then after sixty miles you will be one mile off-course. If you are off-course by just one degree, then after one foot, you’ll miss your target by 2/10ths of an inch – not a big deal. After 100 yards, you’ll be off by 5.2 feet. Not huge, but noticeable. After a mile, you’ll be off by 92.2 feet. One degree is starting to make a difference. After traveling the 380 miles from San Francisco to Los Angeles, you’ll be off by 6 miles. If you were traveling the 2,800 miles from San Francisco to Washington, D.C., you’d end up on the other side of Baltimore, 42.6 miles away. Going to the sun, you’d miss the sun by over 1.6 million miles. All of that is because of being off by a single degree.
This can have catastrophic consequences in our life of Faith and Morals. Over the course of a lifetime, if you exchange truth for beliefs that are “close” to the truth, you will eventually end up a very long way from the truth. If you deviate a little in your morals, then you will find that after a certain period of time your moral compass will have led you a long way off-course. God and Christ should be our compass in matters of Faith and Morals―not we ourselves, or some other worldly authority
Back in 1979, 257 people left New Zealand for a sightseeing flight to Antarctica. Unknown to the pilots, there was a 2-degree error in the flight coordinates. Most people hearing that would think that’s “close enough”― but that 2-degree error in fact it placed the aircraft 28 miles to the east of what was the planned route. As the pilots approached what they thought was their intended destination, clouds were obstructing the view. So, to give the sightseers a better look of the beautiful landscapes, they descended through the clouds to a lower altitude. Although the pilots had years of experience, they had never made this particular flight before. So they had no way of knowing that the incorrect coordinates had placed them directly in the path of Mount Erebus, an active volcano that rises from the frozen landscape to a height of more than 12,000 feet. Sadly, the plane crashed into the side of the volcano, killing everyone on board. It is hard to imagine how this tragedy of epic proportions was brought on by a minor error—a matter of only a few degrees.
Little by Little Satan Leads Us Astray
Satan’s tactics will vary according the level of religiosity and spirituality he finds in fathers and families. Those who are not very religious or spiritual are a pushover for Satan―he can take giant strides with them and plunge them deeper and deeper into worldliness and sin. Those who are religious and spiritual require a more patient approach by Satan. Too much temptation too soon will only produce a stubborn resistance to the temptation―therefore Satan will proceed little by little―as the saying goes: “Little by little one goes far!” You are more likely to make a minor concession than a major concession when it comes to sin. A venial sin is more readily agreed to than a mortal sin―or tolerance of sin in others is more readily accepted than actually committing sin yourself. Satan does not mind taking his time if it ensures capturing devout souls. In fact, devout, religious, spiritual souls are a much greater prize than pagan, fallen-away, indifferent or lukewarm souls―these are mere pushovers and “small-fry” fish compared to big fish of devout souls. Even if it takes him 60 years, Satan will willingly spend that time trying to capture and damn the devout.
The Little by Little Tools of Satan
Today, Satan is having a field-day! The tools of temptation are so many that Hell has more than it needs to tempt, ensnare and damn souls. Modern technology has to be the prime means of temptation today. You can certainly surmise that Satan, with his intelligence, has played a large part in the development of modern technology―for “by their fruits you shall know them. Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit” (Matthew 7:16-18). The fruits of modern technology, for the most part, are that they pull away people from prayer, spiritual reading, meditation, extra Mass attendance, visits to the Blessed Sacrament, religious conversations, etc. There is simply no time for these things due to the overwhelming material that distracts on the television, internet, social media, etc.
The television, internet and social media (and all similar forms or branches of modern technology) are the modern day equivalents of the famous “Wooden Horse of Troy.” For those who are unfamiliar with Ancient Greek mythology, here is a brief explanation about the “Wooden Horse of Troy” or “Trojan Horse.”
The Trojan Horse was a wooden horse said to have been used by the Greeks during the Trojan War to enter the city of Troy and win the war. After a fruitless 10-year siege of the city of Troy, the Greeks changed their tactics and constructed a huge hollow wooden horse, and hid a select force of soldiers inside. The Greeks pretended to sail away, and the Trojans pulled the horse into their city as a victory trophy. That night, the Greek force crept out of the horse and opened the gates for the rest of the Greek army, which had sailed back under the cover of darkness. The Greeks entered and destroyed the city, ending the war. A “Trojan Horse” has come to mean any trick or tactic that causes a target to invite a foe into a securely protected fortress or place. A malicious computer program that tricks users into willingly running it is also called a “Trojan Horse” or simply a “Trojan.”
The television and the internet are perfect examples of modern day “Trojan Horses” that have been manufactured by the enemy―the devil and world―in order to lure and seduce us into bringing those “Trojan Horses” into our homes. Once they have infiltrated the home, the gradually emerge and influence the family “little by little” and, after many years, you find that “little by little one goes far!” Just think back―if you are old enough―to the 1950s when the television began to infiltrate most homes. The content, compared to today, seems almost “angelic” compared to the sinful content of many television shows and movies today! An on-screen kiss was at first shocking way back then―and now look at the explicit sexual content of many shows and movies today! Little by little one goes far. When someone first commits sin―it can be a shocking experience. Then, little by little, we grow accustomed to sin and we commit it many times each day without any shock at all! Each sin we commit reduces our resistance to sin―that is how and why Satan will start his war upon us with seemingly trivial, tiny and undisturbing imperfections which are not even sins. Once we are comfortable with imperfections, Satan will entice us into trivial, tiny and undisturbing venial sins―from which he gradually leads us into slightly more serious venial sins, always increasing the degree until eventually he gets us to fall into what could be called the least-shocking mortal sins―for example, missing Mass on Sunday; revealing the serious sins of others (detraction) in gossip; having one drink too many; an impure glance or thought, etc.
Know Your Enemy
Sun Tzu was a Chinese military general, strategist, philosopher, and writer who lived during the Eastern Zhou period (771–256 BC). He is credited as the author of The Art of War, an influential work of military strategy that has affected both Western and East Asian philosophy and military thought. The Art of War outlines a clear strategy of winning decisively by whatever means were necessary. In order for warfare to be defined as anything other than a waste of life and resources, however, one needed to win. Sun Tzu mastered military science and created the military doctrine of asymmetrical warfare. According to it, an attack on the enemy should begin only after the enemy has no opportunity to either defend or counterattack. The Art of War is a systematic guide to strategy and tactics for rulers and commanders. It also emphasizes the unpredictability of battle and the use of flexible strategies and tactics. The book discusses various maneuvers and the effect of terrain on the outcome of battles. It stresses the importance of accurate information about the enemy’s forces, dispositions and deployments, and movements. This is summarized in the axiom “Know the enemy and know yourself, and you can fight a hundred battles with no danger of defeat.”
The book’s insistence on the close relationship between political considerations and military policy greatly influenced some modern strategists. Sun Tzu’s The Art of War has been admired by leaders as diverse as Mao Zedong (1893-1976) and the U.S Army General Norman Schwartzkopf (1924-2012). Mao Zedong and the Chinese communists took from The Art of War many of the tactics they utilized in fighting the Japanese and, later, the Chinese Nationalists. Many military establishments of the modern day incorporate Sun Tzu’s The Art of War as part of their military training.
America’s conflicts in East and Southeast Asia against Philippine, Imperial China, Japan, North Korea, and North Vietnam brought Sun Tzu’s The Art of War to the attention of American military leaders. The Department of the Army in the United States, through its Command and General Staff College, has directed all units to maintain libraries within their respective headquarters for the continuing education of personnel in the art of war. Sun Tzu’s The Art of War is mentioned as an example of works to be maintained at each facility, and staff duty officers are obliged to prepare short papers for presentation to other officers on their readings. Similarly, Sun Tzu’s The Art of War is listed on the Marine Corps Professional Reading Program. During the Gulf War in the 1990s, both Generals Norman Schwarzkopf Jr. and Colin Powell employed principles from Sun Tzu’s The Art of War related to deception, speed, and striking one’s enemy’s weak points.
The bottom line for us is the quote from the book: “Know the enemy and know yourself, and you can fight a hundred battles with no danger of defeat.” Holy Scripture tells us: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). We inescapably find ourselves in a spiritual warfare over our souls: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). We are obliged to fight: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). God wants to save, Satan wants to damn. To have any chance of success against the devil, we must know how he works and know what works against him. If we fail to do that, then we will fail to win. “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
God wants you to succeed! Succeed in what? Business? Finance? Sports? Job? Hobbies? All of that is secondary fluff! Success is truly measured by whether or not you get to Heaven and take your family with you. As Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven!” (Matthew 6:19-21) ... “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). There are lots of successful businessmen in Hell; lots of rich people in Hell; lots of famous people in Hell; lots of sports stars and movie stars in Hell―is that success? Our Lord and Holy Scripture say “No!”
We have Our Lord’s parable about the ‘successful’ rich man: “And Jesus spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns and will build bigger ones; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and all my goods! And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thy rest―eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool! This very night do they require thy soul of thee! And whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’” (Luke 12:16-21). The lesson to be learned is that we should seek the riches of Heaven rather than the riches of this Earth―we should seek to possess Heaven rather than the things of this world.
We see a similar real-life encounter between Jesus and the well-intentioned rich young man who wanted to get to Heaven: “And behold, a certain rich young man, a ruler, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
► ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI, in The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, writes: “One thing is necessary! The salvation of our souls. It is not necessary to be great, noble, or rich in this world, or to enjoy uninterrupted health; but it is necessary to save our souls, For this has God placed us here: not to acquire honors, riches, or pleasures, but to acquire by our good works that eternal kingdom which is prepared for those who, during this present life, fight against and overcome the enemies of their eternal salvation” (The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, Part 1, Meditation 17).
► THE IMITATION OF CHRIST speaks along the same lines when it says: “Vanity of vanities and all is vanity, except to love God and serve Him alone. This is the greatest wisdom — to seek the kingdom of Heaven through contempt of the world. It is vanity, therefore, to seek and trust in riches that perish. It is vanity also to court honor and to be puffed up with pride. It is vanity to follow the lusts of the body and to desire things for which severe punishment later must come. It is vanity to wish for long life and to care little about a well-spent life. It is vanity to be concerned with the present only and not to make provision for things to come. It is vanity to love what passes quickly and not to look ahead where eternal joy abides.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 1).
► THE IMITATION OF CHRIST continues: “What good is much discussion of involved and obscure matters when our ignorance of them will not be held against us on Judgment Day? Neglect of things which are profitable and necessary―and undue concern with those which are irrelevant and harmful―are great folly. The more recollected a man is, and the more simple of heart he becomes, the easier he understands sublime things, for he receives the light of knowledge from above. Every perfection in this life has some imperfection mixed with it, and no learning of ours is without some darkness. Not that learning or knowledge is to be considered evil, which is good in itself, but a clean conscience and virtuous life ought always to be preferred. Many often err and accomplish little or nothing because they try to become learned, rather than trying to live well. If men used as much care in uprooting vices and implanting virtues as they do in discussing problems, there would not be so much evil and scandal in the world. On the Day of Judgment, surely, we shall not be asked what we have read, or what we know―but what we have done; not how well we have spoken, but how well we have lived. Tell me, where now are all the masters and teachers who were famous for their learning? During life they seemed to be something; now they are seldom remembered. How quickly the glory of the world passes away! If only their lives and virtues had kept pace with their learning, then their study and reading would have been worthwhile. How many there are who perish because of vain worldly knowledge and too little care for serving God. They became vain in their own conceits because they chose to be great rather than humble.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 3).
► FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE―one of the greatest theologians of the 20th century―similarly says: “The one thing necessary— which Jesus spoke of to Martha and Mary (Luke 10:38-42)—consists in hearing the word of God and living by it. The interior life, which presupposes the state of grace, consists, is a generous tendency of the soul toward God. The interior life is―in a soul that is in the state of grace―especially a life of humility, abnegation, Faith, Hope, and Charity, with the peace that comes from the progressive subordination of our feelings and wishes to the love of God. To have an interior life―an exceedingly active exterior apostolate does not suffice, nor does great theological knowledge, nor is it necessary. The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, more profound than artistic or literary life, more profound than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity, which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not. This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange also reminds us that entry to Heaven requires sanctity and nothing less―for only saints go to Heaven. So many fathers of families fail to instill that truth in family members, with lukewarmness being the norm: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
When Little Leads to a Lot
► ST. THOMAS AQUINAS, in his work Being and Essence, writes: “A small mistake in the beginning is a big one in the end.” Just being a little bit off-course at the start of a journey, becomes a long way off-course the further you go and the longer you travel―to the point that you will miss your destination. Have you heard the “one-in-sixty-rule”? Pilots are taught it. If you are one degree off-course at the start of your journey, then after sixty miles you will be one mile off-course. If you are off-course by just one degree, then after one foot, you’ll miss your target by 2/10ths of an inch – not a big deal. After 100 yards, you’ll be off by 5.2 feet. Not huge, but noticeable. After a mile, you’ll be off by 92.2 feet. One degree is starting to make a difference. After traveling the 380 miles from San Francisco to Los Angeles, you’ll be off by 6 miles. If you were traveling the 2,800 miles from San Francisco to Washington, D.C., you’d end up on the other side of Baltimore, 42.6 miles away. Going to the sun, you’d miss the sun by over 1.6 million miles. All of that is because of being off by a single degree.
This can have catastrophic consequences in our life of Faith and Morals. Over the course of a lifetime, if you exchange truth for beliefs that are “close” to the truth, you will eventually end up a very long way from the truth. If you deviate a little in your morals, then you will find that after a certain period of time your moral compass will have led you a long way off-course. God and Christ should be our compass in matters of Faith and Morals―not we ourselves, or some other worldly authority
Back in 1979, 257 people left New Zealand for a sightseeing flight to Antarctica. Unknown to the pilots, there was a 2-degree error in the flight coordinates. Most people hearing that would think that’s “close enough”― but that 2-degree error in fact it placed the aircraft 28 miles to the east of what was the planned route. As the pilots approached what they thought was their intended destination, clouds were obstructing the view. So, to give the sightseers a better look of the beautiful landscapes, they descended through the clouds to a lower altitude. Although the pilots had years of experience, they had never made this particular flight before. So they had no way of knowing that the incorrect coordinates had placed them directly in the path of Mount Erebus, an active volcano that rises from the frozen landscape to a height of more than 12,000 feet. Sadly, the plane crashed into the side of the volcano, killing everyone on board. It is hard to imagine how this tragedy of epic proportions was brought on by a minor error—a matter of only a few degrees.
Little by Little Satan Leads Us Astray
Satan’s tactics will vary according the level of religiosity and spirituality he finds in fathers and families. Those who are not very religious or spiritual are a pushover for Satan―he can take giant strides with them and plunge them deeper and deeper into worldliness and sin. Those who are religious and spiritual require a more patient approach by Satan. Too much temptation too soon will only produce a stubborn resistance to the temptation―therefore Satan will proceed little by little―as the saying goes: “Little by little one goes far!” You are more likely to make a minor concession than a major concession when it comes to sin. A venial sin is more readily agreed to than a mortal sin―or tolerance of sin in others is more readily accepted than actually committing sin yourself. Satan does not mind taking his time if it ensures capturing devout souls. In fact, devout, religious, spiritual souls are a much greater prize than pagan, fallen-away, indifferent or lukewarm souls―these are mere pushovers and “small-fry” fish compared to big fish of devout souls. Even if it takes him 60 years, Satan will willingly spend that time trying to capture and damn the devout.
The Little by Little Tools of Satan
Today, Satan is having a field-day! The tools of temptation are so many that Hell has more than it needs to tempt, ensnare and damn souls. Modern technology has to be the prime means of temptation today. You can certainly surmise that Satan, with his intelligence, has played a large part in the development of modern technology―for “by their fruits you shall know them. Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit” (Matthew 7:16-18). The fruits of modern technology, for the most part, are that they pull away people from prayer, spiritual reading, meditation, extra Mass attendance, visits to the Blessed Sacrament, religious conversations, etc. There is simply no time for these things due to the overwhelming material that distracts on the television, internet, social media, etc.
The television, internet and social media (and all similar forms or branches of modern technology) are the modern day equivalents of the famous “Wooden Horse of Troy.” For those who are unfamiliar with Ancient Greek mythology, here is a brief explanation about the “Wooden Horse of Troy” or “Trojan Horse.”
The Trojan Horse was a wooden horse said to have been used by the Greeks during the Trojan War to enter the city of Troy and win the war. After a fruitless 10-year siege of the city of Troy, the Greeks changed their tactics and constructed a huge hollow wooden horse, and hid a select force of soldiers inside. The Greeks pretended to sail away, and the Trojans pulled the horse into their city as a victory trophy. That night, the Greek force crept out of the horse and opened the gates for the rest of the Greek army, which had sailed back under the cover of darkness. The Greeks entered and destroyed the city, ending the war. A “Trojan Horse” has come to mean any trick or tactic that causes a target to invite a foe into a securely protected fortress or place. A malicious computer program that tricks users into willingly running it is also called a “Trojan Horse” or simply a “Trojan.”
The television and the internet are perfect examples of modern day “Trojan Horses” that have been manufactured by the enemy―the devil and world―in order to lure and seduce us into bringing those “Trojan Horses” into our homes. Once they have infiltrated the home, the gradually emerge and influence the family “little by little” and, after many years, you find that “little by little one goes far!” Just think back―if you are old enough―to the 1950s when the television began to infiltrate most homes. The content, compared to today, seems almost “angelic” compared to the sinful content of many television shows and movies today! An on-screen kiss was at first shocking way back then―and now look at the explicit sexual content of many shows and movies today! Little by little one goes far. When someone first commits sin―it can be a shocking experience. Then, little by little, we grow accustomed to sin and we commit it many times each day without any shock at all! Each sin we commit reduces our resistance to sin―that is how and why Satan will start his war upon us with seemingly trivial, tiny and undisturbing imperfections which are not even sins. Once we are comfortable with imperfections, Satan will entice us into trivial, tiny and undisturbing venial sins―from which he gradually leads us into slightly more serious venial sins, always increasing the degree until eventually he gets us to fall into what could be called the least-shocking mortal sins―for example, missing Mass on Sunday; revealing the serious sins of others (detraction) in gossip; having one drink too many; an impure glance or thought, etc.
Know Your Enemy
Sun Tzu was a Chinese military general, strategist, philosopher, and writer who lived during the Eastern Zhou period (771–256 BC). He is credited as the author of The Art of War, an influential work of military strategy that has affected both Western and East Asian philosophy and military thought. The Art of War outlines a clear strategy of winning decisively by whatever means were necessary. In order for warfare to be defined as anything other than a waste of life and resources, however, one needed to win. Sun Tzu mastered military science and created the military doctrine of asymmetrical warfare. According to it, an attack on the enemy should begin only after the enemy has no opportunity to either defend or counterattack. The Art of War is a systematic guide to strategy and tactics for rulers and commanders. It also emphasizes the unpredictability of battle and the use of flexible strategies and tactics. The book discusses various maneuvers and the effect of terrain on the outcome of battles. It stresses the importance of accurate information about the enemy’s forces, dispositions and deployments, and movements. This is summarized in the axiom “Know the enemy and know yourself, and you can fight a hundred battles with no danger of defeat.”
The book’s insistence on the close relationship between political considerations and military policy greatly influenced some modern strategists. Sun Tzu’s The Art of War has been admired by leaders as diverse as Mao Zedong (1893-1976) and the U.S Army General Norman Schwartzkopf (1924-2012). Mao Zedong and the Chinese communists took from The Art of War many of the tactics they utilized in fighting the Japanese and, later, the Chinese Nationalists. Many military establishments of the modern day incorporate Sun Tzu’s The Art of War as part of their military training.
America’s conflicts in East and Southeast Asia against Philippine, Imperial China, Japan, North Korea, and North Vietnam brought Sun Tzu’s The Art of War to the attention of American military leaders. The Department of the Army in the United States, through its Command and General Staff College, has directed all units to maintain libraries within their respective headquarters for the continuing education of personnel in the art of war. Sun Tzu’s The Art of War is mentioned as an example of works to be maintained at each facility, and staff duty officers are obliged to prepare short papers for presentation to other officers on their readings. Similarly, Sun Tzu’s The Art of War is listed on the Marine Corps Professional Reading Program. During the Gulf War in the 1990s, both Generals Norman Schwarzkopf Jr. and Colin Powell employed principles from Sun Tzu’s The Art of War related to deception, speed, and striking one’s enemy’s weak points.
The bottom line for us is the quote from the book: “Know the enemy and know yourself, and you can fight a hundred battles with no danger of defeat.” Holy Scripture tells us: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). We inescapably find ourselves in a spiritual warfare over our souls: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). We are obliged to fight: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). God wants to save, Satan wants to damn. To have any chance of success against the devil, we must know how he works and know what works against him. If we fail to do that, then we will fail to win. “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Article 13
Wednesday & Thursday, June 19th & 20th
Fathers’ Fatal Flaw
Thoughts for Father's Day Week
Wednesday & Thursday, June 19th & 20th
Fathers’ Fatal Flaw
Thoughts for Father's Day Week
Family Failures are Fatherly Failures
Everywhere you look, families are failing. Some families disintegrate through divorce, other families stay together but in a dysfunctional atmosphere. It is interesting that Sister Lucia of Fatima said that Satan, in this current battle, would be focusing on the family. The current state of families indicates the truth of Sister Lucia’s statement and the massive success rate Satan is having in destroying families.
According to a 2023 Georgetown's Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) report, 28% of Catholic marriages end in divorce. According to a 2024 Pew Research Center report, about 34% of American Catholics who have ever been married have divorced. For divorced Catholics entering a second marriage, the likelihood of divorce is 76%. For third marriages, it jumps to 87%. Among mixed marriages, Catholics who marry Protestants or non-religious spouses, have a divorce rate of 49% and 48% respectively.
Over 50 years between 1969 and 2019, Catholic marriages declined 69% even as the Catholic population increased by nearly 20 million, according to Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate. Statistics show that for the USA there were over 420,000 Catholic marriages in 1970. That number dwindled to just over 154,000 by the year 2014. The numbers fell even more in with only 132,000 marriages celebrated in 2019. By 2021 the number fell to 102,000 Catholic marriages.
Just 23% of Americans called being married as either extremely or very important to living a fulfilling life, while just 26% said the same of having children. Most Catholics ranked having a job or career they enjoy (77%) and having close friends (59%) as extremely or very important to living a fulfilling life.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 18.4 million children aged under-18, which is nearly 1 in 4, live without a biological, step, or adoptive father in the home. That’s enough children to fill New York City twice or Los Angeles four times over. About 80% of single-parent homes are led by single mothers. The U.S. has the highest rate globally of children living in single-parent households. As of 2019, a staggering 23% of children lived with one parent and no other adults, which was over three times the global average of 7%, according to Pew Research. In China and India, this number stands at 3% and 4%, respectively. The statistics are even more staggering for black children, with nearly 50% living with a single mother.
While divorce causes some single-parent households, approximately 40% of children are born to unwed mothers. For women under the age of 30—who give birth to two-thirds of children in general—the out-of-wedlock birthrate increases to 53%. While many unmarried women cohabitate with a partner at the time of giving birth, these relationships fail at twice the rate of marriages.
Merely being physically present at home is not enough, either. Data suggests that even for children with a father present in the home, the average school-age boy only spends about 30 minutes per week in one-on-one conversations with his father. For comparison, the same boy, on average, will spend more than 40 hours (potentially more than 60 hours for teenagers) per week watching television, playing video games, and surfing the internet.
Even if the children were spending longer each week in one-to-one conversations with their fathers―the question arises, what kind of things are they talking about? It is a safe bet that God, religion, the Faith, the spiritual life, etc. are not at the top of the list. How much religious conversation takes place? It would be embarrassing to know!
The bottom line is that fathers are ignoring Our Lord’s command to seek first the Kingdom of God and all other necessary things (which does not mean all things that we want) will be supplied: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth .. but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … for where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [worldly interest]. Therefore I say to you, be not anxious for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on ... Behold the birds of the air―they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns and your heavenly Father feeds them! Are not you of much more value than they? And why are you anxious over clothing? Consider the lilies of the field and how they grow! They labor not, neither do they spin. Yet not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as one of these. And if God clothes the grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven―then how much more you, O ye of little Faith? Therefore be not anxious, saying: ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For the heathens seek after all these things. Your Father knows that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and his justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-33).
God in not an Option, but an Obligation
Fathers are made to be “heads of families”―not for their own sake and their own profit and benefit, but for the sake, profit and benefit of God. God has created all things for Himself. He says: “All the Earth is Mine!” (Exodus 19:5). “All things that are under Heaven are Mine!” (Job 41:2). “Behold all souls are Mine― as the soul of the father is Mine, so also the soul of the son is Mine!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “I have created him for My glory, I have formed him, and made him!” (Isaias 43:7). Our Lord Himself adds: “Suffer children to come to me, and forbid them not!” (Luke 18:16). All souls must be led to Him―as He Himself said: “Going therefore, teach ye all nations―baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost!” (Matthew 28:19). “Unto all nations the Gospel must be preached!” (Mark 13:10). “All the nations which Thou hast made shall come and adore before Thee, O Lord, and they shall glorify Thy Name!” (Psalm 85:9). “May all nations acknowledge that Thou art God” (Judith 9:19). “All kings of the Earth shall adore Him! All nations shall serve Him!” (Psalms 71:11). We therefore see that God is not an option, but an obligation―we are all obliged to know Him, love Him and serve Him. Nobody is exempt. The family of the father is in reality the family of God―for God made each and every soul within that family. The duty of the father of the family is to see that all the family knows, loves and serves God.
The duty of the father of the family is similar to that of a priest’s duties in his parish, or a bishop’s duties in his diocese. You could say that each family member is a church―“Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19). Therefore, the family are a number of individual churches that make up a diocese, of which the father of family is the “bishop”. St. John Chrysostom spoke of this when he addressed the men of Antioch and Constantinople with these words: “Convert your homes into churches, repeating in them what you have heard and seen in church.” St. Augustine goes even further, saying that the husband is more than a priest―he is a bishop, since he is the one who should teach holy doctrine.
The Father is the Family Watchman
The father of the family is a watchman, who must guard and watch over those entrusted to him by God. The following words of God are applicable to him: “I have made you a watchman to the house of Israel (the Church/the Family)! And you shall hear the word out of My mouth, and shall tell it to them from Me! If, when I say to the wicked: ‘You shall surely die!’ ― and you do not declare it to him, nor speak to him, so that he might be converted from his wicked ways and live, then the same wicked man shall certainly die in his iniquity, but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you give warning to the wicked, and he does not convert from his wickedness and from his evil ways―then he indeed shall die in his iniquity, but you will have saved your soul! Moreover, if the just man shall turn away from his justice, and shall commit iniquity―then I will lay a stumbling-block before him and he shall die―because you have not warned him! He shall die in his sin, and all his justices which he has done beforehand, shall not be remembered―but I will require his blood at your hands! But if you warn the just man, so that the just man may not sin, and he does not sin―then living he shall live, because you have warned him, and you will have saved your soul!” (Ezechiel 3:17-21).
Unfortunately, the fatherly watchmen are not vigilantly watching and guarding against the infiltration of their families by the devil and the world―the devil is “the prince of this world” (John 12:31). Temptation, sin and evil enters the family in so many different ways today―through the television, internet, social media, videos and video games, music, friends, conversations, fashions, literature, etc. Thus the world gets to influence the family for many hours each day, while any religious influence is only a few minutes―certainly not even an hour―which brings to mind Our Lord’s words to His Apostles―Peter, James and John―during His Agony in the Garden of Gethsemane: “What? Could you not watch one hour with Me? Watch and pray so that you do not enter into temptation!” (Matthew 26:40-41). Just as Peter, James and John slept while they should have been praying, the watchmen fathers of families do likewise: “His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant! Dumb dogs, not able to bark! Seeing vain things, sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10).
Our Lord warned Blessed Elena Aiello, in 1954, against the “Numerous scandals bringing souls to ruin particularly through the corruption of youth. Stirred-up and unrestrained in the enjoyment of the pleasures of the world, they have degraded their soul in corruption and sin. The bad example of parents trains the family in scandal and infidelity, instead of virtue and prayer, which is almost dead on the lips of many. Stained and withered is the fountain of Faith and sanctity the home!” (Our Lord to Blessed Elena Aiello).
Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “It is an act of justice, due to the eternal God, that every child, coming to the use of reason, direct its very first movement toward God. By knowing, it should begin to love Him, reverence Him and adore Him as its Creator and only true Lord. The parents are naturally bound to instruct their children, from their infancy, in this knowledge of God and to direct them with solicitous care, so that they may at once see their ultimate end, and seek it in their first acts of the intellect and will. They should with great watchfulness withdraw them from the childishness and puerile trickishness to which depraved nature will incline them, if left without direction. The demons instill into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and they incites the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition. If the fathers and mothers would be solicitous to prevent these vanities and perverted habits of their children, and would instruct them from their infancy in the knowledge of their God and Creator, then they would afterwards easily accustom them to know and adore Him. Parents must learn to love their children, help them, nourish them, exhort them, correct them and lead them on in the way of salvation without remissness or carelessness!”
Holy Scripture adds: “Fathers, provoke not your children to anger; but bring them up in the discipline and correction of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4). “Instruct thy son!” (Proverbs 29:17). “Persevere under discipline―for what son is there, whom the father does not correct?” (Hebrews 12:7). “Chastise thy son, despair not!” (Proverbs 19:18). “In the present moment all chastisement seems not to bring with it joy, but sorrow: but afterwards it will yield the peaceful fruit of justice to them that are exercised by it” (Hebrews 12:11). “The rod and reproof give wisdom” (Proverbs 29:15). “He that spares the rod hates his son―but he that loves his son corrects him in good time” (Proverbs 13:24). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:13-14) “A young man according to his way, even when he is old he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6). “And from his infancy he taught him to fear God, and to abstain from all sin” (Tobias 1:10). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength. And these words which I command thee this day, shall be in thy heart, and thou shalt tell them to thy children, and thou shalt meditate upon them sitting in thy house, and walking on thy journey, sleeping and rising” (Deuteronomy 6:5-7).
The problem today is that most fathers―following the worldly trends of our age―no longer seek to be authoritative leaders and disciplinarians of their children, but now seek to be a fun-loving buddy or friend of their children. This has led to many a catastrophe in this life―and an eternal catastrophe in the next life! There is nothing wrong in showing love to one’s children and being a friend to them―but not at the expense of authority, leadership and discipline: “For whomever the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives” (Hebrews 12:6). Yet “God is charity” (1 John 4:8).
Too Little Too Late
Too many fathers try to shut the stable door after the horse has bolted―mean that they have tried to prevent the spiritual demise and worldly rise in their families, but they have done so too late to prevent damage being done. Preventing a fire is always easier than trying to put out a fire―especially one that has been burning for a long time and has grown to immense proportions. By allowing a worldly fire to enter their homes and families, they are unwittingly risking and preparing the souls of their families for the eternal fires of Hell. Let us not beat about the bush or sugar-coat reality―most Catholic souls end up in Hell. That has been the teaching of many saints throughout each and every century―not just our degenerate and perverse 20th and 21st centuries. Any true and serious minded father would (should) be aware of that and would be taking all the possible steps to avoid that happening to his family. Our Lord said: “It is not the will of your Father, Who is in Heaven, that one of these little ones should perish!” (Matthew 18:14). “Whosoever shall scandalize one of these little ones that believe in Me; it were better for him that a millstone were hanged around his neck, and he were cast into the sea” (Mark 9:41) ― to “scandalize” literally means putting a stumbling-block in someone’s path so that they fall over it. Praying and going to Mass is no guarantee against damnation―many souls who are now damned did just that! As Our Lord clearly points that out:
“And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen! … Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name!’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ ... When the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!’ And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:22-23; 22:14).
Get Real and Be a Real Father!
Fatherhood is not the creation of some human person―it is the creation of God. God, the Father of all creation, made man in His own image and likeness: “And God said: ‘Let us make man to our image and likeness!’” (Genesis 1:26). Man, therefore, must reflect the image and likeness of God―and not some image and likeness of his own personal preference: “He will command his children and his household to keep the way of the Lord, and do judgment and justice” (Genesis 18:19). As Jesus said: “Be perfect as you heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48).
Everywhere you look, families are failing. Some families disintegrate through divorce, other families stay together but in a dysfunctional atmosphere. It is interesting that Sister Lucia of Fatima said that Satan, in this current battle, would be focusing on the family. The current state of families indicates the truth of Sister Lucia’s statement and the massive success rate Satan is having in destroying families.
According to a 2023 Georgetown's Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) report, 28% of Catholic marriages end in divorce. According to a 2024 Pew Research Center report, about 34% of American Catholics who have ever been married have divorced. For divorced Catholics entering a second marriage, the likelihood of divorce is 76%. For third marriages, it jumps to 87%. Among mixed marriages, Catholics who marry Protestants or non-religious spouses, have a divorce rate of 49% and 48% respectively.
Over 50 years between 1969 and 2019, Catholic marriages declined 69% even as the Catholic population increased by nearly 20 million, according to Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate. Statistics show that for the USA there were over 420,000 Catholic marriages in 1970. That number dwindled to just over 154,000 by the year 2014. The numbers fell even more in with only 132,000 marriages celebrated in 2019. By 2021 the number fell to 102,000 Catholic marriages.
Just 23% of Americans called being married as either extremely or very important to living a fulfilling life, while just 26% said the same of having children. Most Catholics ranked having a job or career they enjoy (77%) and having close friends (59%) as extremely or very important to living a fulfilling life.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 18.4 million children aged under-18, which is nearly 1 in 4, live without a biological, step, or adoptive father in the home. That’s enough children to fill New York City twice or Los Angeles four times over. About 80% of single-parent homes are led by single mothers. The U.S. has the highest rate globally of children living in single-parent households. As of 2019, a staggering 23% of children lived with one parent and no other adults, which was over three times the global average of 7%, according to Pew Research. In China and India, this number stands at 3% and 4%, respectively. The statistics are even more staggering for black children, with nearly 50% living with a single mother.
While divorce causes some single-parent households, approximately 40% of children are born to unwed mothers. For women under the age of 30—who give birth to two-thirds of children in general—the out-of-wedlock birthrate increases to 53%. While many unmarried women cohabitate with a partner at the time of giving birth, these relationships fail at twice the rate of marriages.
Merely being physically present at home is not enough, either. Data suggests that even for children with a father present in the home, the average school-age boy only spends about 30 minutes per week in one-on-one conversations with his father. For comparison, the same boy, on average, will spend more than 40 hours (potentially more than 60 hours for teenagers) per week watching television, playing video games, and surfing the internet.
Even if the children were spending longer each week in one-to-one conversations with their fathers―the question arises, what kind of things are they talking about? It is a safe bet that God, religion, the Faith, the spiritual life, etc. are not at the top of the list. How much religious conversation takes place? It would be embarrassing to know!
The bottom line is that fathers are ignoring Our Lord’s command to seek first the Kingdom of God and all other necessary things (which does not mean all things that we want) will be supplied: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth .. but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … for where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [worldly interest]. Therefore I say to you, be not anxious for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on ... Behold the birds of the air―they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns and your heavenly Father feeds them! Are not you of much more value than they? And why are you anxious over clothing? Consider the lilies of the field and how they grow! They labor not, neither do they spin. Yet not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as one of these. And if God clothes the grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven―then how much more you, O ye of little Faith? Therefore be not anxious, saying: ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For the heathens seek after all these things. Your Father knows that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and his justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-33).
God in not an Option, but an Obligation
Fathers are made to be “heads of families”―not for their own sake and their own profit and benefit, but for the sake, profit and benefit of God. God has created all things for Himself. He says: “All the Earth is Mine!” (Exodus 19:5). “All things that are under Heaven are Mine!” (Job 41:2). “Behold all souls are Mine― as the soul of the father is Mine, so also the soul of the son is Mine!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “I have created him for My glory, I have formed him, and made him!” (Isaias 43:7). Our Lord Himself adds: “Suffer children to come to me, and forbid them not!” (Luke 18:16). All souls must be led to Him―as He Himself said: “Going therefore, teach ye all nations―baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost!” (Matthew 28:19). “Unto all nations the Gospel must be preached!” (Mark 13:10). “All the nations which Thou hast made shall come and adore before Thee, O Lord, and they shall glorify Thy Name!” (Psalm 85:9). “May all nations acknowledge that Thou art God” (Judith 9:19). “All kings of the Earth shall adore Him! All nations shall serve Him!” (Psalms 71:11). We therefore see that God is not an option, but an obligation―we are all obliged to know Him, love Him and serve Him. Nobody is exempt. The family of the father is in reality the family of God―for God made each and every soul within that family. The duty of the father of the family is to see that all the family knows, loves and serves God.
The duty of the father of the family is similar to that of a priest’s duties in his parish, or a bishop’s duties in his diocese. You could say that each family member is a church―“Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19). Therefore, the family are a number of individual churches that make up a diocese, of which the father of family is the “bishop”. St. John Chrysostom spoke of this when he addressed the men of Antioch and Constantinople with these words: “Convert your homes into churches, repeating in them what you have heard and seen in church.” St. Augustine goes even further, saying that the husband is more than a priest―he is a bishop, since he is the one who should teach holy doctrine.
The Father is the Family Watchman
The father of the family is a watchman, who must guard and watch over those entrusted to him by God. The following words of God are applicable to him: “I have made you a watchman to the house of Israel (the Church/the Family)! And you shall hear the word out of My mouth, and shall tell it to them from Me! If, when I say to the wicked: ‘You shall surely die!’ ― and you do not declare it to him, nor speak to him, so that he might be converted from his wicked ways and live, then the same wicked man shall certainly die in his iniquity, but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you give warning to the wicked, and he does not convert from his wickedness and from his evil ways―then he indeed shall die in his iniquity, but you will have saved your soul! Moreover, if the just man shall turn away from his justice, and shall commit iniquity―then I will lay a stumbling-block before him and he shall die―because you have not warned him! He shall die in his sin, and all his justices which he has done beforehand, shall not be remembered―but I will require his blood at your hands! But if you warn the just man, so that the just man may not sin, and he does not sin―then living he shall live, because you have warned him, and you will have saved your soul!” (Ezechiel 3:17-21).
Unfortunately, the fatherly watchmen are not vigilantly watching and guarding against the infiltration of their families by the devil and the world―the devil is “the prince of this world” (John 12:31). Temptation, sin and evil enters the family in so many different ways today―through the television, internet, social media, videos and video games, music, friends, conversations, fashions, literature, etc. Thus the world gets to influence the family for many hours each day, while any religious influence is only a few minutes―certainly not even an hour―which brings to mind Our Lord’s words to His Apostles―Peter, James and John―during His Agony in the Garden of Gethsemane: “What? Could you not watch one hour with Me? Watch and pray so that you do not enter into temptation!” (Matthew 26:40-41). Just as Peter, James and John slept while they should have been praying, the watchmen fathers of families do likewise: “His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant! Dumb dogs, not able to bark! Seeing vain things, sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10).
Our Lord warned Blessed Elena Aiello, in 1954, against the “Numerous scandals bringing souls to ruin particularly through the corruption of youth. Stirred-up and unrestrained in the enjoyment of the pleasures of the world, they have degraded their soul in corruption and sin. The bad example of parents trains the family in scandal and infidelity, instead of virtue and prayer, which is almost dead on the lips of many. Stained and withered is the fountain of Faith and sanctity the home!” (Our Lord to Blessed Elena Aiello).
Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “It is an act of justice, due to the eternal God, that every child, coming to the use of reason, direct its very first movement toward God. By knowing, it should begin to love Him, reverence Him and adore Him as its Creator and only true Lord. The parents are naturally bound to instruct their children, from their infancy, in this knowledge of God and to direct them with solicitous care, so that they may at once see their ultimate end, and seek it in their first acts of the intellect and will. They should with great watchfulness withdraw them from the childishness and puerile trickishness to which depraved nature will incline them, if left without direction. The demons instill into the parents a base neglectfulness and carnal love for their offspring; and they incites the teachers to carelessness, so that the children find no support against evil in their education, but become depraved and spoiled by many bad habits, losing sight of virtue and of their good inclinations and going the way of perdition. If the fathers and mothers would be solicitous to prevent these vanities and perverted habits of their children, and would instruct them from their infancy in the knowledge of their God and Creator, then they would afterwards easily accustom them to know and adore Him. Parents must learn to love their children, help them, nourish them, exhort them, correct them and lead them on in the way of salvation without remissness or carelessness!”
Holy Scripture adds: “Fathers, provoke not your children to anger; but bring them up in the discipline and correction of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4). “Instruct thy son!” (Proverbs 29:17). “Persevere under discipline―for what son is there, whom the father does not correct?” (Hebrews 12:7). “Chastise thy son, despair not!” (Proverbs 19:18). “In the present moment all chastisement seems not to bring with it joy, but sorrow: but afterwards it will yield the peaceful fruit of justice to them that are exercised by it” (Hebrews 12:11). “The rod and reproof give wisdom” (Proverbs 29:15). “He that spares the rod hates his son―but he that loves his son corrects him in good time” (Proverbs 13:24). “Withhold not correction from a child―for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die! Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from Hell!” (Proverbs 23:13-14) “A young man according to his way, even when he is old he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6). “And from his infancy he taught him to fear God, and to abstain from all sin” (Tobias 1:10). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength. And these words which I command thee this day, shall be in thy heart, and thou shalt tell them to thy children, and thou shalt meditate upon them sitting in thy house, and walking on thy journey, sleeping and rising” (Deuteronomy 6:5-7).
The problem today is that most fathers―following the worldly trends of our age―no longer seek to be authoritative leaders and disciplinarians of their children, but now seek to be a fun-loving buddy or friend of their children. This has led to many a catastrophe in this life―and an eternal catastrophe in the next life! There is nothing wrong in showing love to one’s children and being a friend to them―but not at the expense of authority, leadership and discipline: “For whomever the Lord loves, He chastises; and He scourges every son whom He receives” (Hebrews 12:6). Yet “God is charity” (1 John 4:8).
Too Little Too Late
Too many fathers try to shut the stable door after the horse has bolted―mean that they have tried to prevent the spiritual demise and worldly rise in their families, but they have done so too late to prevent damage being done. Preventing a fire is always easier than trying to put out a fire―especially one that has been burning for a long time and has grown to immense proportions. By allowing a worldly fire to enter their homes and families, they are unwittingly risking and preparing the souls of their families for the eternal fires of Hell. Let us not beat about the bush or sugar-coat reality―most Catholic souls end up in Hell. That has been the teaching of many saints throughout each and every century―not just our degenerate and perverse 20th and 21st centuries. Any true and serious minded father would (should) be aware of that and would be taking all the possible steps to avoid that happening to his family. Our Lord said: “It is not the will of your Father, Who is in Heaven, that one of these little ones should perish!” (Matthew 18:14). “Whosoever shall scandalize one of these little ones that believe in Me; it were better for him that a millstone were hanged around his neck, and he were cast into the sea” (Mark 9:41) ― to “scandalize” literally means putting a stumbling-block in someone’s path so that they fall over it. Praying and going to Mass is no guarantee against damnation―many souls who are now damned did just that! As Our Lord clearly points that out:
“And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen! … Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name!’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ ... When the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!’ And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:22-23; 22:14).
Get Real and Be a Real Father!
Fatherhood is not the creation of some human person―it is the creation of God. God, the Father of all creation, made man in His own image and likeness: “And God said: ‘Let us make man to our image and likeness!’” (Genesis 1:26). Man, therefore, must reflect the image and likeness of God―and not some image and likeness of his own personal preference: “He will command his children and his household to keep the way of the Lord, and do judgment and justice” (Genesis 18:19). As Jesus said: “Be perfect as you heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48).
Article 12
Sunday & Monday & Tuesday, June 16th, 17th & 18th
Good Dad ― Bad Dad
Thoughts for Father's Day Week
Sunday & Monday & Tuesday, June 16th, 17th & 18th
Good Dad ― Bad Dad
Thoughts for Father's Day Week
Cannot Exist Without Fathers
Everyone has a father―nobody would be conceived and born without a father (and a mother too). Fatherhood comes from God Himself―for we speak of “God the Father”. The title “Father” signifies God’s role as the creator, the life-giver, the authority, ruler, and powerful protector. God also plays a “Fatherly” role in every conception of a human being ― by infusing or breathing a spirit, an intellectual soul, into the child at the instant of his/her physical conception.
Throughout the Bible we find God portrayed as a Father. Surprisingly, God is referred to as “Father” only 15 times in the Old Testament, but in the New Testament Jesus alone speaks on God as being a “Father” over 160 times. He not only refers to God as being His (Jesus’) Father, but also as being our Father: “Call none your father upon Earth; for one is your Father, Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 23:9). “Thus therefore shall you pray: “Our Father, Who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name!” (Matthew 6:9). “Be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:45). “Be perfect as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). He speaks of receiving “a reward of your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 6:1). He warns: “If you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences” (Matthew 6:15). He indicates that God the Father knows all things and governs all things: “Your Father knows what is needful for you, before you ask Him” (Matthew 6:8) … “not one sparrow shall fall on the ground without your Father” (Matthew 10:29). “Behold the birds of the air― they neither sow, nor reap, nor gather into barns―and your heavenly Father feeds them! Are not you of much more value than they?” (Matthew 6:26). At His Ascension into Heaven, Jesus says: “I ascend to My Father and to your Father, to My God and your God!” (John 20:17).
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Even among the Gentiles, in Athens and Rome, the authority of the father was absolute. In his own household, the father was a king. He had a truly sovereign dignity and power, and this power extended even to the right of life and death. In Catholic France, the father never had this right, but he was still the first judge of his children. Up until the 18th century, he conserved the right to deprive an unworthy son of his liberty, even if the latter were of age and married, and the king himself placed his power at the disposition of the father seeking justice. This was what happened when a father asked the sovereign for a lettre de cachet (sealed letter), soliciting the assistance of the royal power against a son when the latter was a cause of dishonor to the family. The king could then send him to a State prison. This custom was acknowledged everywhere, even by the receivers of the said lettres de cachet.
Paternal authority was considered essentially superior to all others, and, for this reason, profoundly respected. Jean Bodin (1530-1596), a French jurist and political philosopher, member of the Parlement of Paris and professor of law says: “The prince gives orders to his subjects; the master to his disciples; the captain to his soldiers; but to none of these did nature give such authority as to the father―who is the true image of the sovereign God, the universal Father of all things.”
In fact, children should think of their fathers as images of God upon Earth. In by-gone years, one would frequently find thoughts like the following, which are those of Stephen Pasquier: “We should consider our fathers like gods on Earth, who were given to us, not only to transmit life to us and conserve it, but also to sanctify us by a wise instruction.” Writing to one of his nieces, St. Francis de Sales explained: “Behold how you encounter in your father an image of the Eternal Father. For this reason we should honor and reverence the person through whom it so pleased God to give us life.” An authority with such a religious character should inspire respect and make obedience easy, stimulating devotion to the family and maintaining harmony among the children.
Throughout the 18th century, however, paternal authority was deteriorating because of egalitarian new customs, and the National Convention ended by destroying it almost completely. From the time that men who were imbued with the spirit of Rousseau ― that is, men who wanted to see the individual, not the family, as the basic element of society ― assumed the legislative power, they strove to enact laws to abolish a father’s authority over his children older than age 21 and weaken it over those younger. “The imperious voice of reason,” proclaimed Cambacérès, a famous revolutionary French legislator, “must be heard. Paternal power no longer exists. A man should not have direct power over another, even if it be his own child.”
Socialism, in its turn, sought to consecrate these propositions in the law. In his book Le socialisme intégral, Benoît Malon said: “What must happen is to completely abolish the authority of the father and his almost royal power in the family. In effect, equality only will be perfect if this is achieved. Aren’t the children of as great a value as the parents? By what right do the latter command the former? Enough of obedience! Enough of inequality!”
Today, the father finds himself before his children in a situation similar to that of a king deprived of any power or means of repressing the rebellion of his subjects. Literature and the media reinforce such laws, working against adults and elders with false principles and affirmations that our “dumbed-down” intelligence believes and accepts. Even the schools, through the knowledge transmitted in the order of material facts, persuade the children that they have a true superiority over the parents, who are often ignorant of such learning.
In this way, paternal authority is only a shadow of what it was before the French Revolution in 1789. The Liberal philosopher Tocqueville naively and stupidly applauded this change: “I think that as the laws and customs become more democratic, the relations of fathers with their sons will become more intimate and affectionate. As law and authority manifest themselves less, confidence and affection will increase. And while it is true that the social bond will weaken, the natural bond will grow stronger.” The facts contradict Tocqueville’s predictions. Today, we sees and deplore the rupture of family bonds, family unity and its consequences―the loss of respect and obedience of children toward their parents; the ever-increasing rights and freedom of children from their parents; the extreme corruption of good traditional moral customs, and finally, the general decadence of the people.
The American Colonial Father
Fatherhood has changed greatly for the worse in the last few centuries. Looking at the father in America, we see a massive difference between the colonial days and the modern day:
● In colonial days the father was head of family and he was mostly at home in the family.
● He was fully involved in family life, he would be a model for his children, since he often with them.
● He would oversee the education of the children and find jobs for them
● The women was also involved in these areas, but as cooperator.
● He was well versed in religion, and theology was a talking point amongst laymen
● He was also involved in politics
With the Declaration of Independence and the Industrial Revolution have come elements that would destroy the patriarchal family. Weldon Hardenbrook (born 1939), a priest of the American Orthodox Church, in his book Missing From Action, writes:
“With the Revolution and declaration of independence, Americans began to look upon all civil patriarchy as inherently evil and they became intent on not being ruled by anyone. Independence was all but enshrined as a national virtue. As it spilled over into economic, religious and domestic relationships, it began to profoundly alter our concept of manhood. The same bell that tolled for political liberty in the colonies, rang out a death knell for American fatherhood. Aided by the Industrial Revolution and the Second Great Awakening, thousands of years of responsible manhood crumbled into a pile of rubbleCall in less than a century.
“This new unquenchable thirst for independence created new heroic models for men of the late 18th and the 19th centuries. These models took the place of the colonial man, who was courageously devoted to the welfare of his family. These new men were the epitome of strength, determination and courageCto be sure. But, tragically, they were also the essence of independence and they were sorry examples of patriarchs.
“Davy Crocket was married three times. The adventurous Simon Kenton, of frontier fame, would disappear into the wilderness for months at a timeCwithout a word to his wife about when he was departing or when he planned to return. Daniel Boone, on one occasion after being gone from the home for too long, returned to find that his wife had just given birth to his brother’s son. These men―the captains of industry, the warriors, the frontiersmen, or even two fisted missionaries―were the forerunners of our current tough guys who can’t even keep a family together.” (Weldon Hardenbrook, Missing From Action, pp. 95-97).
Divine Blueprint
God made man―so man should reflect His maker! “And God said: ‘Let us make man to Our image and likeness!’ … And God created man to His own image―to the image of God He created him” (Genesis 1:26-27). “God created man ― to the image of His own likeness He made him” (Wisdom 2:23). “In the day that God created man, He made him to the likeness of God” (Genesis 5:1). “Men are made after the likeness of God” (James 3:9). “God created man of the earth, and made him after His own image” (Ecclesiasticus 17:1).
“You shall be holy men to Me!” (Exodus 22:31). “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2). “God has not called us to uncleanness, but to sanctification” (1 Thessalonians 4:7). “Strip yourselves of the old man with his deeds, and put on the new man, who is in the image of Him that created him!” (Colossians 3:10). “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? But if any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy! For the temple of God is holy―which you are!” (1 Corinthians 3:16-17). All of this is summed up by Our Lord when He says: “Be perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48).
Ultimately, holiness is the blueprint―for it is only saints who go to Heaven. The earthly father of his family is tasked with making his family holy. “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16-19). “And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’” (2 Corinthians 6:16). “But if any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy―which you are!” [or are supposed to be). (1 Corinthians 3:17).
If one single soul is a temple (church) of the Holy Ghost―then a whole family is even more so a temple of the Holy Ghost. Or you could say that each family member is a church and the family are a number of individual churches that make up a diocese, of which the father of family is the “bishop”. St. John Chrysostom spoke of this when he addressed the men of Antioch and Constantinople with these words: “Convert your homes into churches, repeating in them what you have heard and seen in church.” St. Augustine goes even further, saying that the husband is more than a priest―he is a bishop, since he is the one who should teach holy doctrine. We have lost this idea of married life. Contrary to the Church’s mind, we now usually see that religion is under the care of the wife, not of the man. She is the one who usually teaches catechism, prays with the children, who takes care that everybody goes to Mass. St. Paul and the Fathers say it is the man who is supposed to teach the children, lead family prayers, and who represents Our Lord in his home. And it is because men neglect this office that women feel the need to “take over” and do the job that otherwise no one will do. So we see that the natural function and role of the head, of the man, had been lost in our religion at home. It is the heart―it is the woman―who is doing the job of teaching, of leading, but it is not her function! The heart is not to do the job of the head!
If the Home is a Temple, it Should be a Place of Prayer
If our home is a temple, it must have not only a priest or bishop (the father of the family), but it should be a place of prayer, and not just of “individualistic” prayer―like that of the Protestants, trying to arrange business with God on their own. No, the home should be a place of both personal and of common prayer―father, mother and the children.
Thank God we have kept from the past somehow this ideal when we gather together at home to celebrate “in common” the great feasts of the Church, like Christmas and Easter. It is sad that we have made that celebration something of a mere social activity. We have lost the idea of, after celebrating the feast at our local parish church, bringing this celebration into our small temple, into the mini-church of our home.
We should, for example, pray the Rosary in common, say morning and night prayers together, under the leadership of the husband. Keep the custom of saying grace before meals, as an expression of the sanctification of daily things. For morning and night prayers we could use those of Mother Church herself. Obviously we cannot expect that they will be said in Latin or in their full length in all cases. But we can make a simplification and a good translation of Prime and Compline, for example. There is no better or more beautiful prayer than the prayer of the Church.
Likewise, the temple of the home should be a place of religious study and not hours and hours of television or some other secular pastime. Readings from the Bible and other spiritual books; a place of meditation where the children can to taught to meditate; a place of religious conversations; a place where Christian virtues are commonplace, etc.
Furthermore, the temple of the home should be a place where no worldly idols find entry and influence: “I am the Lord your God―you shall not make to yourselves any idol or graven thing to adore it: for I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 26:1). “Neither shalt thou bring any thing of the idol into thy house! Thou shalt detest it as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth!” (Deuteronomy 7:26). Today, the television and the internet have become our modern day idols―whereby we have no problem sitting and “worshiping” before them for hours on end!
Everyone has a father―nobody would be conceived and born without a father (and a mother too). Fatherhood comes from God Himself―for we speak of “God the Father”. The title “Father” signifies God’s role as the creator, the life-giver, the authority, ruler, and powerful protector. God also plays a “Fatherly” role in every conception of a human being ― by infusing or breathing a spirit, an intellectual soul, into the child at the instant of his/her physical conception.
Throughout the Bible we find God portrayed as a Father. Surprisingly, God is referred to as “Father” only 15 times in the Old Testament, but in the New Testament Jesus alone speaks on God as being a “Father” over 160 times. He not only refers to God as being His (Jesus’) Father, but also as being our Father: “Call none your father upon Earth; for one is your Father, Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 23:9). “Thus therefore shall you pray: “Our Father, Who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name!” (Matthew 6:9). “Be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:45). “Be perfect as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). He speaks of receiving “a reward of your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 6:1). He warns: “If you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences” (Matthew 6:15). He indicates that God the Father knows all things and governs all things: “Your Father knows what is needful for you, before you ask Him” (Matthew 6:8) … “not one sparrow shall fall on the ground without your Father” (Matthew 10:29). “Behold the birds of the air― they neither sow, nor reap, nor gather into barns―and your heavenly Father feeds them! Are not you of much more value than they?” (Matthew 6:26). At His Ascension into Heaven, Jesus says: “I ascend to My Father and to your Father, to My God and your God!” (John 20:17).
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Even among the Gentiles, in Athens and Rome, the authority of the father was absolute. In his own household, the father was a king. He had a truly sovereign dignity and power, and this power extended even to the right of life and death. In Catholic France, the father never had this right, but he was still the first judge of his children. Up until the 18th century, he conserved the right to deprive an unworthy son of his liberty, even if the latter were of age and married, and the king himself placed his power at the disposition of the father seeking justice. This was what happened when a father asked the sovereign for a lettre de cachet (sealed letter), soliciting the assistance of the royal power against a son when the latter was a cause of dishonor to the family. The king could then send him to a State prison. This custom was acknowledged everywhere, even by the receivers of the said lettres de cachet.
Paternal authority was considered essentially superior to all others, and, for this reason, profoundly respected. Jean Bodin (1530-1596), a French jurist and political philosopher, member of the Parlement of Paris and professor of law says: “The prince gives orders to his subjects; the master to his disciples; the captain to his soldiers; but to none of these did nature give such authority as to the father―who is the true image of the sovereign God, the universal Father of all things.”
In fact, children should think of their fathers as images of God upon Earth. In by-gone years, one would frequently find thoughts like the following, which are those of Stephen Pasquier: “We should consider our fathers like gods on Earth, who were given to us, not only to transmit life to us and conserve it, but also to sanctify us by a wise instruction.” Writing to one of his nieces, St. Francis de Sales explained: “Behold how you encounter in your father an image of the Eternal Father. For this reason we should honor and reverence the person through whom it so pleased God to give us life.” An authority with such a religious character should inspire respect and make obedience easy, stimulating devotion to the family and maintaining harmony among the children.
Throughout the 18th century, however, paternal authority was deteriorating because of egalitarian new customs, and the National Convention ended by destroying it almost completely. From the time that men who were imbued with the spirit of Rousseau ― that is, men who wanted to see the individual, not the family, as the basic element of society ― assumed the legislative power, they strove to enact laws to abolish a father’s authority over his children older than age 21 and weaken it over those younger. “The imperious voice of reason,” proclaimed Cambacérès, a famous revolutionary French legislator, “must be heard. Paternal power no longer exists. A man should not have direct power over another, even if it be his own child.”
Socialism, in its turn, sought to consecrate these propositions in the law. In his book Le socialisme intégral, Benoît Malon said: “What must happen is to completely abolish the authority of the father and his almost royal power in the family. In effect, equality only will be perfect if this is achieved. Aren’t the children of as great a value as the parents? By what right do the latter command the former? Enough of obedience! Enough of inequality!”
Today, the father finds himself before his children in a situation similar to that of a king deprived of any power or means of repressing the rebellion of his subjects. Literature and the media reinforce such laws, working against adults and elders with false principles and affirmations that our “dumbed-down” intelligence believes and accepts. Even the schools, through the knowledge transmitted in the order of material facts, persuade the children that they have a true superiority over the parents, who are often ignorant of such learning.
In this way, paternal authority is only a shadow of what it was before the French Revolution in 1789. The Liberal philosopher Tocqueville naively and stupidly applauded this change: “I think that as the laws and customs become more democratic, the relations of fathers with their sons will become more intimate and affectionate. As law and authority manifest themselves less, confidence and affection will increase. And while it is true that the social bond will weaken, the natural bond will grow stronger.” The facts contradict Tocqueville’s predictions. Today, we sees and deplore the rupture of family bonds, family unity and its consequences―the loss of respect and obedience of children toward their parents; the ever-increasing rights and freedom of children from their parents; the extreme corruption of good traditional moral customs, and finally, the general decadence of the people.
The American Colonial Father
Fatherhood has changed greatly for the worse in the last few centuries. Looking at the father in America, we see a massive difference between the colonial days and the modern day:
● In colonial days the father was head of family and he was mostly at home in the family.
● He was fully involved in family life, he would be a model for his children, since he often with them.
● He would oversee the education of the children and find jobs for them
● The women was also involved in these areas, but as cooperator.
● He was well versed in religion, and theology was a talking point amongst laymen
● He was also involved in politics
With the Declaration of Independence and the Industrial Revolution have come elements that would destroy the patriarchal family. Weldon Hardenbrook (born 1939), a priest of the American Orthodox Church, in his book Missing From Action, writes:
“With the Revolution and declaration of independence, Americans began to look upon all civil patriarchy as inherently evil and they became intent on not being ruled by anyone. Independence was all but enshrined as a national virtue. As it spilled over into economic, religious and domestic relationships, it began to profoundly alter our concept of manhood. The same bell that tolled for political liberty in the colonies, rang out a death knell for American fatherhood. Aided by the Industrial Revolution and the Second Great Awakening, thousands of years of responsible manhood crumbled into a pile of rubbleCall in less than a century.
“This new unquenchable thirst for independence created new heroic models for men of the late 18th and the 19th centuries. These models took the place of the colonial man, who was courageously devoted to the welfare of his family. These new men were the epitome of strength, determination and courageCto be sure. But, tragically, they were also the essence of independence and they were sorry examples of patriarchs.
“Davy Crocket was married three times. The adventurous Simon Kenton, of frontier fame, would disappear into the wilderness for months at a timeCwithout a word to his wife about when he was departing or when he planned to return. Daniel Boone, on one occasion after being gone from the home for too long, returned to find that his wife had just given birth to his brother’s son. These men―the captains of industry, the warriors, the frontiersmen, or even two fisted missionaries―were the forerunners of our current tough guys who can’t even keep a family together.” (Weldon Hardenbrook, Missing From Action, pp. 95-97).
Divine Blueprint
God made man―so man should reflect His maker! “And God said: ‘Let us make man to Our image and likeness!’ … And God created man to His own image―to the image of God He created him” (Genesis 1:26-27). “God created man ― to the image of His own likeness He made him” (Wisdom 2:23). “In the day that God created man, He made him to the likeness of God” (Genesis 5:1). “Men are made after the likeness of God” (James 3:9). “God created man of the earth, and made him after His own image” (Ecclesiasticus 17:1).
“You shall be holy men to Me!” (Exodus 22:31). “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2). “God has not called us to uncleanness, but to sanctification” (1 Thessalonians 4:7). “Strip yourselves of the old man with his deeds, and put on the new man, who is in the image of Him that created him!” (Colossians 3:10). “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? But if any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy! For the temple of God is holy―which you are!” (1 Corinthians 3:16-17). All of this is summed up by Our Lord when He says: “Be perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48).
Ultimately, holiness is the blueprint―for it is only saints who go to Heaven. The earthly father of his family is tasked with making his family holy. “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16-19). “And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’” (2 Corinthians 6:16). “But if any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy―which you are!” [or are supposed to be). (1 Corinthians 3:17).
If one single soul is a temple (church) of the Holy Ghost―then a whole family is even more so a temple of the Holy Ghost. Or you could say that each family member is a church and the family are a number of individual churches that make up a diocese, of which the father of family is the “bishop”. St. John Chrysostom spoke of this when he addressed the men of Antioch and Constantinople with these words: “Convert your homes into churches, repeating in them what you have heard and seen in church.” St. Augustine goes even further, saying that the husband is more than a priest―he is a bishop, since he is the one who should teach holy doctrine. We have lost this idea of married life. Contrary to the Church’s mind, we now usually see that religion is under the care of the wife, not of the man. She is the one who usually teaches catechism, prays with the children, who takes care that everybody goes to Mass. St. Paul and the Fathers say it is the man who is supposed to teach the children, lead family prayers, and who represents Our Lord in his home. And it is because men neglect this office that women feel the need to “take over” and do the job that otherwise no one will do. So we see that the natural function and role of the head, of the man, had been lost in our religion at home. It is the heart―it is the woman―who is doing the job of teaching, of leading, but it is not her function! The heart is not to do the job of the head!
If the Home is a Temple, it Should be a Place of Prayer
If our home is a temple, it must have not only a priest or bishop (the father of the family), but it should be a place of prayer, and not just of “individualistic” prayer―like that of the Protestants, trying to arrange business with God on their own. No, the home should be a place of both personal and of common prayer―father, mother and the children.
Thank God we have kept from the past somehow this ideal when we gather together at home to celebrate “in common” the great feasts of the Church, like Christmas and Easter. It is sad that we have made that celebration something of a mere social activity. We have lost the idea of, after celebrating the feast at our local parish church, bringing this celebration into our small temple, into the mini-church of our home.
We should, for example, pray the Rosary in common, say morning and night prayers together, under the leadership of the husband. Keep the custom of saying grace before meals, as an expression of the sanctification of daily things. For morning and night prayers we could use those of Mother Church herself. Obviously we cannot expect that they will be said in Latin or in their full length in all cases. But we can make a simplification and a good translation of Prime and Compline, for example. There is no better or more beautiful prayer than the prayer of the Church.
Likewise, the temple of the home should be a place of religious study and not hours and hours of television or some other secular pastime. Readings from the Bible and other spiritual books; a place of meditation where the children can to taught to meditate; a place of religious conversations; a place where Christian virtues are commonplace, etc.
Furthermore, the temple of the home should be a place where no worldly idols find entry and influence: “I am the Lord your God―you shall not make to yourselves any idol or graven thing to adore it: for I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 26:1). “Neither shalt thou bring any thing of the idol into thy house! Thou shalt detest it as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth!” (Deuteronomy 7:26). Today, the television and the internet have become our modern day idols―whereby we have no problem sitting and “worshiping” before them for hours on end!
|
The average American spends over 7 hours per day in front of an electronic screen―television, laptop computer, smartphone, tablet, desktop computer, etc. Television is still a major player―since it can also be accessed through the smartphone and computers via the internet. All these many hours of watching a screen bring to mind Our Lord’s complaint to His three Apostles in the Garden of Gethsemane: “Could you not watch one hour with Me?” (Matthew 26:40) ― and by “watch” He did not mean watch television!
Our Lord says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). Hence Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). |
Are today’s fathers vigilant if keeping out worldly idols from the temple of their home? Sadly, no! They themselves are among the prime adorers of the many kinds of idols that are available to today and which distract and take away the family from adoring the One True God. Religiosity is seen as fanaticism, whereas worldliness is seen as being normal! That attitude is clearly seen by the time allocated to a family’s religious activities and secular activities. The leisure life is rated far more than the spiritual life; playing is preferred to praying; self-gratification comes before mortification; browsing the internet is preferred to browsing the Bible, etc.
Statistics show that only 50% of American Catholics pray each day; 30% only pray a few times a month; while 20% never pray. As regards attendance at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―only 20% attend weekly; 65% attend a few times a year or less; and 15% never attend. As for going to Confession―7% go to Confession at least once a month; 30% confess anywhere from a few times a year to at least once a year; 28% confess less than annually, and 35% said they never go to Confession. Among the 37% who confess at least once a year, only 7% of all Catholics confess at least monthly. It is estimated that only 4% to 5% of Catholics pray the Rosary daily―whereas Our Lady insisted upon the daily recitation of the Rosary. Ultimately, these appalling statistics show the failure of Catholic fathers in fostering and maintaining a religious spirit in the temple of their home. It is not in vain that Christ―in speaking of the end times―said: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
A father who does not have God living in his soul by sanctifying grace, is to his family a “living, walking, talking corpse of a father” who can do little or nothing for the salvation of his family. We all know the saying: “You cannot give what you have not got!” A father who does not have God in his life, who is not ruled and guided by God and His principles, severely cripples his chances of leading his family to God and Heaven. That is what fatherhood is chiefly
about―attaining Heaven and salvation and avoiding Hell and damnation. All the rest is merely secondary―as Our Lord says: “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). A father might well put bread on the table, maintain the health of this children, give his children a successful education, see them in good jobs―but all of this (which might last for 60 or 70 years of the child’s life) is insignificant with eternity, where a billion, or trillion, or a zillion years is not even a drop of water in the ocean of eternity!
Fathers Are Not Independent
No doubt you have heard of the expressions: “A man’s home is his castle” and “A man is king of his castle.” To a certain extent this is true―but a man is still subject to the King of kings, Who is Almighty God. He says: “All the Earth is Mine!” (Exodus 19:5). “All things that are under Heaven are Mine!” (Job 41:2). “Behold all souls are Mine― as the soul of the father is Mine, so also the soul of the son is Mine!” (Ezechiel 18:4). Our Lord Jesus Christ is God and therefore Holy Scripture calls Him: “King of kings, and Lord of lords … Who was to rule all nations” (Apocalypse 19:16; 12:5).
Just as a baby, infant or young child cannot be independent of its father (and mother), likewise the father cannot be independent of God. “Every house is built by some man―but He that created all things is God” (Hebrews 3:4). All things belong God because He is maker of all things: “My hand made all these things and all these things were made, saith the Lord” (Isaias 66:2). “I made the Earth and I created man upon it! My hand stretched forth the Heavens!” (Isaias 45:12). “Thou hast created all things and for Thy will they were, and have been created” (Apocalypse 4:11).
An earthly father merely shares in the Fatherhood of God―and his share is a very tiny share indeed. Every father―like all other persons―is creature made by God. A father is not and cannot be independent of God. A father―in a certain sense―is a “co-father” to God. For God created the soul of each and every child that all the earthly fathers of the world have ever begotten, whereas the earthly father merely created the body of only a handful of children that would house the soul that God would create for them. In this sense, an earthly father is the father of a few children, whereas God is the Father of billions of children.
Being a “co-father” to God means being a subsidiary to God, an assistant to God, a subordinate of God, a tool of God. An earthly father is not his own property―he belongs to God; he should reflect God; he should operate according to the principles of God; he should fulfill the will of God in the domain of his own little “drop-of-water-in-the-ocean” family. He is merely a shepherd or teacher employed and appointed by God to shepherd and teach a little portion of God’s massive flock of souls. He is merely a pilot for God, who is meant to fly the plane and passengers that God’s airline has given him to the destination where God wants that plane with its passengers to be flown―which is from Earth to Heaven. The father is merely sergeant commanding a handful of soldiers in the immense army of God.
Father at War
Too many fathers live as though they were in a state of peace! There is no real peace in this world―only war―sometimes open warfare, at other times hidden warfare. “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with worldly things; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Today’s fathers are rarely―or barely―fighting the “the good fight of Faith.” They are too engrossed with the world and what the world offers―failing to realize that they are siding with the enemy: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). If the other family members do not see the father fighting for the Faith, then they are unlikely to fight for Faith―as they say: “Like father, like son!” The children take on the traits of their parents. If the Faith, religion, prayers, spiritual life all take a back seat to work, leisure, hobbies, fun and entertainment―then the children will happily follow that example.
The father can provide the family with good housing, lots of money, lots of possessions and toys, the best clothing, the healthiest food, cars for everyone, smartphones for everyone, a good education, even get the children into the best colleges, find them a magnificent job, etc. On paper, that looks like success―but if the father is not getting his family to Heaven, then he is abject failure. As Our Lord said: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26) ― and the loss of the souls of his family. Satan is only too willing to give each and every family whatever it takes to distract them from Heaven and salvation―it is what he tried to do to Our Lord in the temptation in the desert, after Our Lord had fasted and prayed for 40 days and 40 nights:
“Then Jesus, Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost, was led by the Spirit into the desert for the space of forty days to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterwards He was hungry. And the devil, the tempter, coming said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made into bread!’ Jesus answered and said: ‘It is written, “Not by bread alone does man live, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, and set him upon the pinnacle of the Temple and said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down, for it is written: “That He hath given His angels charge over Thee, and in their hands shall they bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash Thy foot against a stone.”’ Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!”’ Again the devil took him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee! To Thee will I give all this power and the glory of them―for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them. If Thou, therefore, will adore before me, all shall be thine!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and him only shalt thou serve!”’ And all the temptation being ended, the devil departed from Him for a time and angels came and ministered to Him” (Matthew 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-13).
Today, the temptations are far greater than at any other time in history―we are bombarded from all sides―electronic media has made that possible and is given access to any home many, many times a day. Yet the father does not fight alone, unaided. “Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof!” (Matthew 6:34) … “Where sin abounded, grace did more abound!” (Romans 5:20). It is on the grace of Christ that every father must confidently rely, for Christ said: “I will not leave you orphans! I will come to you!” (John 14:18) … “I am with you all days―even to the consummation of the world!” (Matthew 28:20). “For without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “If God be for us, who is against us?” (Romans 8:31).
Statistics show that only 50% of American Catholics pray each day; 30% only pray a few times a month; while 20% never pray. As regards attendance at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―only 20% attend weekly; 65% attend a few times a year or less; and 15% never attend. As for going to Confession―7% go to Confession at least once a month; 30% confess anywhere from a few times a year to at least once a year; 28% confess less than annually, and 35% said they never go to Confession. Among the 37% who confess at least once a year, only 7% of all Catholics confess at least monthly. It is estimated that only 4% to 5% of Catholics pray the Rosary daily―whereas Our Lady insisted upon the daily recitation of the Rosary. Ultimately, these appalling statistics show the failure of Catholic fathers in fostering and maintaining a religious spirit in the temple of their home. It is not in vain that Christ―in speaking of the end times―said: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
A father who does not have God living in his soul by sanctifying grace, is to his family a “living, walking, talking corpse of a father” who can do little or nothing for the salvation of his family. We all know the saying: “You cannot give what you have not got!” A father who does not have God in his life, who is not ruled and guided by God and His principles, severely cripples his chances of leading his family to God and Heaven. That is what fatherhood is chiefly
about―attaining Heaven and salvation and avoiding Hell and damnation. All the rest is merely secondary―as Our Lord says: “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). A father might well put bread on the table, maintain the health of this children, give his children a successful education, see them in good jobs―but all of this (which might last for 60 or 70 years of the child’s life) is insignificant with eternity, where a billion, or trillion, or a zillion years is not even a drop of water in the ocean of eternity!
Fathers Are Not Independent
No doubt you have heard of the expressions: “A man’s home is his castle” and “A man is king of his castle.” To a certain extent this is true―but a man is still subject to the King of kings, Who is Almighty God. He says: “All the Earth is Mine!” (Exodus 19:5). “All things that are under Heaven are Mine!” (Job 41:2). “Behold all souls are Mine― as the soul of the father is Mine, so also the soul of the son is Mine!” (Ezechiel 18:4). Our Lord Jesus Christ is God and therefore Holy Scripture calls Him: “King of kings, and Lord of lords … Who was to rule all nations” (Apocalypse 19:16; 12:5).
Just as a baby, infant or young child cannot be independent of its father (and mother), likewise the father cannot be independent of God. “Every house is built by some man―but He that created all things is God” (Hebrews 3:4). All things belong God because He is maker of all things: “My hand made all these things and all these things were made, saith the Lord” (Isaias 66:2). “I made the Earth and I created man upon it! My hand stretched forth the Heavens!” (Isaias 45:12). “Thou hast created all things and for Thy will they were, and have been created” (Apocalypse 4:11).
An earthly father merely shares in the Fatherhood of God―and his share is a very tiny share indeed. Every father―like all other persons―is creature made by God. A father is not and cannot be independent of God. A father―in a certain sense―is a “co-father” to God. For God created the soul of each and every child that all the earthly fathers of the world have ever begotten, whereas the earthly father merely created the body of only a handful of children that would house the soul that God would create for them. In this sense, an earthly father is the father of a few children, whereas God is the Father of billions of children.
Being a “co-father” to God means being a subsidiary to God, an assistant to God, a subordinate of God, a tool of God. An earthly father is not his own property―he belongs to God; he should reflect God; he should operate according to the principles of God; he should fulfill the will of God in the domain of his own little “drop-of-water-in-the-ocean” family. He is merely a shepherd or teacher employed and appointed by God to shepherd and teach a little portion of God’s massive flock of souls. He is merely a pilot for God, who is meant to fly the plane and passengers that God’s airline has given him to the destination where God wants that plane with its passengers to be flown―which is from Earth to Heaven. The father is merely sergeant commanding a handful of soldiers in the immense army of God.
Father at War
Too many fathers live as though they were in a state of peace! There is no real peace in this world―only war―sometimes open warfare, at other times hidden warfare. “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with worldly things; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Today’s fathers are rarely―or barely―fighting the “the good fight of Faith.” They are too engrossed with the world and what the world offers―failing to realize that they are siding with the enemy: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). If the other family members do not see the father fighting for the Faith, then they are unlikely to fight for Faith―as they say: “Like father, like son!” The children take on the traits of their parents. If the Faith, religion, prayers, spiritual life all take a back seat to work, leisure, hobbies, fun and entertainment―then the children will happily follow that example.
The father can provide the family with good housing, lots of money, lots of possessions and toys, the best clothing, the healthiest food, cars for everyone, smartphones for everyone, a good education, even get the children into the best colleges, find them a magnificent job, etc. On paper, that looks like success―but if the father is not getting his family to Heaven, then he is abject failure. As Our Lord said: “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26) ― and the loss of the souls of his family. Satan is only too willing to give each and every family whatever it takes to distract them from Heaven and salvation―it is what he tried to do to Our Lord in the temptation in the desert, after Our Lord had fasted and prayed for 40 days and 40 nights:
“Then Jesus, Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost, was led by the Spirit into the desert for the space of forty days to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterwards He was hungry. And the devil, the tempter, coming said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made into bread!’ Jesus answered and said: ‘It is written, “Not by bread alone does man live, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, and set him upon the pinnacle of the Temple and said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down, for it is written: “That He hath given His angels charge over Thee, and in their hands shall they bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash Thy foot against a stone.”’ Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!”’ Again the devil took him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee! To Thee will I give all this power and the glory of them―for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them. If Thou, therefore, will adore before me, all shall be thine!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and him only shalt thou serve!”’ And all the temptation being ended, the devil departed from Him for a time and angels came and ministered to Him” (Matthew 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-13).
Today, the temptations are far greater than at any other time in history―we are bombarded from all sides―electronic media has made that possible and is given access to any home many, many times a day. Yet the father does not fight alone, unaided. “Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof!” (Matthew 6:34) … “Where sin abounded, grace did more abound!” (Romans 5:20). It is on the grace of Christ that every father must confidently rely, for Christ said: “I will not leave you orphans! I will come to you!” (John 14:18) … “I am with you all days―even to the consummation of the world!” (Matthew 28:20). “For without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “If God be for us, who is against us?” (Romans 8:31).
Article 11
Friday & Saturday, June 14th & 15th
Catholics Need CPR!
Friday & Saturday, June 14th & 15th
Catholics Need CPR!
Catholic Cardiac Arrest
You could well say that the Church is dying on its feet! Yes―Christ promised that the gates of Hell would not prevail against His Church―but that means that Satan will not destroy the entire Church. It does not mean that Satan cannot destroy most of the Church and damn most souls. Our Lord Himself said: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) … “Enter ye in at the narrow gate! For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction―and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Few have a true heart for the Faith: “And the Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Isaias 29:13). “In the perverseness of their heart, they have gone after strange gods to serve them and to adore them!” (Jeremias 13:10). They “have gone away every man after the inclinations of his own wicked heart, to serve strange gods, and to do evil in the sight of the Lord God” (Baruch 1:22). “For from the heart come forth evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false testimonies, blasphemies” (Matthew 15:19). “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15). “A perverse heart is abominable to the Lord!” (Proverbs 11:20). “Turn away from sin and cleanse thy heart from all offence!” (Ecclesiasticus 38:10). “I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 11:19).
Speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. This dreadful carelessness arises from two causes: on the one hand men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. This insane love of avarice and covetousness of visible things perverts the greater part of humans. The wisdom of the flesh has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God. On the other hand, since the princes of darkness are invisible and unperceived by any of the senses and since carnal men neither touch, nor feel, nor see the demons―the result is that they forget the fear of them. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation! ... The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!”
Our Lady hits the nail on the head―“insane souls” and “fools” she calls them. With so many warnings being given by Heaven about Hell, and the frequent reminders that most souls fall into Hell―one has to agree that the indifference people show to these fearful truths, and their neglect in taking measures to avoid likewise falling into Hell, can only be described as foolishness and insanity. As Holy Scripture says: “The perverse are hard to be corrected, and the number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15).
Increasing numbers of Catholics are “dropping dead” each year―meaning that they are mortally wounded by mortal sin―and, without availing themselves of a spiritual remedy―they are Hell bound. One can estimate with relative certitude that most of the Catholic world is currently living in an habitual state of mortal sin―they are like the “walking dead”, alive to the world, but dead to God.
Cardiac Arrest and Heart Attacks
Cardiac Arrest and Heart Attack―people often use these terms interchangeably, but they are not the same. Cardiac Arrest occurs when the heart malfunctions and stops beating unexpectedly. Cardiac arrest is an “ELECTRICAL” problem. The heart stops beating and is no longer able to send blood to the rest of the body. Sudden cardiac arrests can happen to anyone, regardless of age, fitness level or heart issues. A Heart Attack occurs when blood flow to the heart is blocked. A heart attack is a “CIRCULATION” problem. Unlike with cardiac arrest, the heart usually does not stop beating during a heart attack. Most heart attacks do not lead to cardiac arrest. But when cardiac arrest occurs, heart attack is a common cause.
The functions of the heart are to pump blood and oxygen around the body and deliver waste products (carbon dioxide) back to the lungs to be removed. Arteries carry oxygenated blood away from the heart to other tissues in the body, while veins bring deoxygenated blood back into the heart. Minute dysfunctions or abnormalities in the heart may have drastic consequences on human health.
It is estimated that 350,000 Americans (adults and children) die from sudden cardiac arrest each year. Nearly 70% of cardiac arrests happen outside of the hospital, and about 90% of those people will die. Evidence suggests that over 6,000 children die outside of the hospital from a sudden cardiac arrest each year. Sudden cardiac arrests can be caused by an electrical abnormality of the heart. Or it can happen because the heart muscle is too large, too stiff, or unable to get enough oxygen supply. People can also suffer a sudden cardiac arrest by taking a forceful hit to the chest, such as during a tackle in a football game or from an incoming baseball.
Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) is an emergency lifesaving procedure performed when the heart stops beating. The majority of people who experience a heart attack will not need CPR. A person needs CPR only if they go into cardiac arrest. CPR can double or triple chances of survival after cardiac arrest. Delay in administering CPR leads to a 10% fall in chances of survival with each passing minute. CPR alone is unlikely to restart the heart. Administration of an electric shock to the subject's heart, termed defibrillation, is usually needed to restore a viable heart rhythm. Defibrillators produce a defibrillation (electric shocks) that can restore the normal heart function of the victim.
Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) consists of chest compressions often combined with artificial ventilation, or mouth to mouth in an effort to manually preserve intact brain function until further measures are taken to restore spontaneous blood circulation and breathing in a person who is in cardiac arrest. CPR is recommended for those who are unresponsive with no breathing, abnormal breathing, or breathing only in occasional gasps. CPR is used on people in cardiac arrest to oxygenate the blood and maintain a cardiac output to keep vital organs alive. Its main purpose is to restore the partial flow of oxygenated blood to the brain and heart. The heart is responsible for pumping blood, supplying oxygen and nutrients, and removing metabolic waste such as carbon dioxide from all the tissues in the body. Blood circulation and oxygenation are required to transport oxygen to the tissues. The objective is to delay tissue death and to extend the brief window of opportunity for a successful resuscitation without permanent brain damage.
Analogy of Physical and Spiritual Cardiac Arrests
We are made of body and soul. We are physical and spiritual. The physical can often teach us about the spiritual―and vice-versa. This leads us into comparing, by analogy (and all analogies limp!), physical cardiac arrest with spiritual “cardiac arrest.”
To get to the heart of the matter, we cannot live without a heart―and, since the physical heart represents our spiritual love of our soul―we cannot live without love. Deprive a person of all love from all sources, and that person will go into a kind of a “spiritual cardiac arrest.”
Back in the thirteenth century, the German king, Frederick II, conducted a diabolical experiment intended to discover what language children would naturally grow up to speak nobody spoke to the children. So King Frederick took babies from their mothers at birth and placed them in the care of nurses who were forbidden to speak in their hearing. But a second rule was imposed, as well―the nurses were not allowed to touch the infants. To his great dismay, Frederick’s experiment was cut short, but not before something tragically significant regarding human nature was revealed. As you may have guessed, the babies grew up to speak no language at all because they died.
In the United States, 1944, an experiment was conducted on 40 newborn infants to determine whether individuals could thrive alone on basic physiological needs without affection. Twenty newborn infants were housed in a special facility where they had caregivers who would go in to feed them, bathe them and change their diapers, but they would do nothing else. The caregivers had been instructed not to look at or touch the babies more than what was necessary, never communicating with them. All their physical needs were attended to scrupulously and the environment was kept sterile, none of the babies becoming ill. The experiment was halted after four months, by which time, at least half of the babies had died at that point. There was no physiological cause for the babies’ deaths; they were all physically very healthy. Before each baby died, there was a period where they would stop verbalizing and stop trying to engage with their caregivers, generally stop moving, nor cry or even change expression; death would follow shortly. The babies who had “given up” before being rescued, died in the same manner, even though they had been removed from the experimental conditions.
Modern medicine calls this phenomenon, “failure to thrive.” For some reason, we humans flourish under the influence of love and we gradually die without it. Dr. Dean Ornish. In his national best seller, Love and Survival, Ornish presents study after study demonstrating that love is a chief influence for mental, emotional, and even physical health. He writes: “Anything that promotes feelings of love and intimacy is healing; anything that promotes isolation, separation, loneliness, loss, hostility, anger, cynicism, depression, alienation, and related feelings often leads to suffering, disease, and premature death from all causes … “For some reason, we humans flourish under the influence of love and we gradually die without it. The scientific evidence leaves little doubt that love and intimacy are powerful determinants of our health and survival. Why they have such an impact remains somewhat a mystery.” (Dr. Dean Ornish, Love and Survival, pp. 22, 29, 171).
Spiritual Heart Attacks and Cardiac Arrest
The word “heart” is found over 800 times in the Douay Rheims Bible. The heart is an amazing organ. Your heart is responsible for pumping life-giving blood to 75 trillion cells in your body and can do so in under one minute! Today, your heart will beat approximately 100,000 times, shuttling 2,000 gallons of oxygen-filled blood through about 60,000 miles of blood vessels. Over your lifetime, your heart will pump around one million barrels of blood. The fact of the matter is that without your heart functioning properly, you cannot live to the fullest. A healthy heart is vital to your well-being and overall health. “With all watchfulness keep thy heart, because life issues out from it!” (Proverbs 4:23).
A very serious disease, if left untreated, will kill you. Spiritual heart failure is a serious matter as well, one which plagues us all. Just as important as the beating physical heart in our chest is the spiritual heart in our soul. Most people do not check their hearts enough. Many have hearts attacks and don’t know it — not physical heart attacks, but spiritual heart attacks. As natural heart attacks arise from blood flow cessation to the heart, spiritual heart attacks occur when God’s grace and influence is blocked by our soul. What we feed our spiritual heart and how we protect it will result in its overall spiritual health. A healthy spiritual heart is ruled by God’s Spirit, not by a human spirit or a worldly spirit. Your thoughts are a window into your spiritual heart. Thoughts can be helpful and they can be hurtful.
Satan is constantly seeking to cause a “spiritual heart attack” that aims to take us captive to do his will: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). If we allow these onslaughts to go unchecked, we might find ourselves with a spiritual heart that is barely functioning or dead.
You could well say that the Church is dying on its feet! Yes―Christ promised that the gates of Hell would not prevail against His Church―but that means that Satan will not destroy the entire Church. It does not mean that Satan cannot destroy most of the Church and damn most souls. Our Lord Himself said: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) … “Enter ye in at the narrow gate! For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction―and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Few have a true heart for the Faith: “And the Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Isaias 29:13). “In the perverseness of their heart, they have gone after strange gods to serve them and to adore them!” (Jeremias 13:10). They “have gone away every man after the inclinations of his own wicked heart, to serve strange gods, and to do evil in the sight of the Lord God” (Baruch 1:22). “For from the heart come forth evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false testimonies, blasphemies” (Matthew 15:19). “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15). “A perverse heart is abominable to the Lord!” (Proverbs 11:20). “Turn away from sin and cleanse thy heart from all offence!” (Ecclesiasticus 38:10). “I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 11:19).
Speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. This dreadful carelessness arises from two causes: on the one hand men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. This insane love of avarice and covetousness of visible things perverts the greater part of humans. The wisdom of the flesh has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God. On the other hand, since the princes of darkness are invisible and unperceived by any of the senses and since carnal men neither touch, nor feel, nor see the demons―the result is that they forget the fear of them. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation! ... The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!”
Our Lady hits the nail on the head―“insane souls” and “fools” she calls them. With so many warnings being given by Heaven about Hell, and the frequent reminders that most souls fall into Hell―one has to agree that the indifference people show to these fearful truths, and their neglect in taking measures to avoid likewise falling into Hell, can only be described as foolishness and insanity. As Holy Scripture says: “The perverse are hard to be corrected, and the number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15).
Increasing numbers of Catholics are “dropping dead” each year―meaning that they are mortally wounded by mortal sin―and, without availing themselves of a spiritual remedy―they are Hell bound. One can estimate with relative certitude that most of the Catholic world is currently living in an habitual state of mortal sin―they are like the “walking dead”, alive to the world, but dead to God.
Cardiac Arrest and Heart Attacks
Cardiac Arrest and Heart Attack―people often use these terms interchangeably, but they are not the same. Cardiac Arrest occurs when the heart malfunctions and stops beating unexpectedly. Cardiac arrest is an “ELECTRICAL” problem. The heart stops beating and is no longer able to send blood to the rest of the body. Sudden cardiac arrests can happen to anyone, regardless of age, fitness level or heart issues. A Heart Attack occurs when blood flow to the heart is blocked. A heart attack is a “CIRCULATION” problem. Unlike with cardiac arrest, the heart usually does not stop beating during a heart attack. Most heart attacks do not lead to cardiac arrest. But when cardiac arrest occurs, heart attack is a common cause.
The functions of the heart are to pump blood and oxygen around the body and deliver waste products (carbon dioxide) back to the lungs to be removed. Arteries carry oxygenated blood away from the heart to other tissues in the body, while veins bring deoxygenated blood back into the heart. Minute dysfunctions or abnormalities in the heart may have drastic consequences on human health.
It is estimated that 350,000 Americans (adults and children) die from sudden cardiac arrest each year. Nearly 70% of cardiac arrests happen outside of the hospital, and about 90% of those people will die. Evidence suggests that over 6,000 children die outside of the hospital from a sudden cardiac arrest each year. Sudden cardiac arrests can be caused by an electrical abnormality of the heart. Or it can happen because the heart muscle is too large, too stiff, or unable to get enough oxygen supply. People can also suffer a sudden cardiac arrest by taking a forceful hit to the chest, such as during a tackle in a football game or from an incoming baseball.
Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) is an emergency lifesaving procedure performed when the heart stops beating. The majority of people who experience a heart attack will not need CPR. A person needs CPR only if they go into cardiac arrest. CPR can double or triple chances of survival after cardiac arrest. Delay in administering CPR leads to a 10% fall in chances of survival with each passing minute. CPR alone is unlikely to restart the heart. Administration of an electric shock to the subject's heart, termed defibrillation, is usually needed to restore a viable heart rhythm. Defibrillators produce a defibrillation (electric shocks) that can restore the normal heart function of the victim.
Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) consists of chest compressions often combined with artificial ventilation, or mouth to mouth in an effort to manually preserve intact brain function until further measures are taken to restore spontaneous blood circulation and breathing in a person who is in cardiac arrest. CPR is recommended for those who are unresponsive with no breathing, abnormal breathing, or breathing only in occasional gasps. CPR is used on people in cardiac arrest to oxygenate the blood and maintain a cardiac output to keep vital organs alive. Its main purpose is to restore the partial flow of oxygenated blood to the brain and heart. The heart is responsible for pumping blood, supplying oxygen and nutrients, and removing metabolic waste such as carbon dioxide from all the tissues in the body. Blood circulation and oxygenation are required to transport oxygen to the tissues. The objective is to delay tissue death and to extend the brief window of opportunity for a successful resuscitation without permanent brain damage.
Analogy of Physical and Spiritual Cardiac Arrests
We are made of body and soul. We are physical and spiritual. The physical can often teach us about the spiritual―and vice-versa. This leads us into comparing, by analogy (and all analogies limp!), physical cardiac arrest with spiritual “cardiac arrest.”
To get to the heart of the matter, we cannot live without a heart―and, since the physical heart represents our spiritual love of our soul―we cannot live without love. Deprive a person of all love from all sources, and that person will go into a kind of a “spiritual cardiac arrest.”
Back in the thirteenth century, the German king, Frederick II, conducted a diabolical experiment intended to discover what language children would naturally grow up to speak nobody spoke to the children. So King Frederick took babies from their mothers at birth and placed them in the care of nurses who were forbidden to speak in their hearing. But a second rule was imposed, as well―the nurses were not allowed to touch the infants. To his great dismay, Frederick’s experiment was cut short, but not before something tragically significant regarding human nature was revealed. As you may have guessed, the babies grew up to speak no language at all because they died.
In the United States, 1944, an experiment was conducted on 40 newborn infants to determine whether individuals could thrive alone on basic physiological needs without affection. Twenty newborn infants were housed in a special facility where they had caregivers who would go in to feed them, bathe them and change their diapers, but they would do nothing else. The caregivers had been instructed not to look at or touch the babies more than what was necessary, never communicating with them. All their physical needs were attended to scrupulously and the environment was kept sterile, none of the babies becoming ill. The experiment was halted after four months, by which time, at least half of the babies had died at that point. There was no physiological cause for the babies’ deaths; they were all physically very healthy. Before each baby died, there was a period where they would stop verbalizing and stop trying to engage with their caregivers, generally stop moving, nor cry or even change expression; death would follow shortly. The babies who had “given up” before being rescued, died in the same manner, even though they had been removed from the experimental conditions.
Modern medicine calls this phenomenon, “failure to thrive.” For some reason, we humans flourish under the influence of love and we gradually die without it. Dr. Dean Ornish. In his national best seller, Love and Survival, Ornish presents study after study demonstrating that love is a chief influence for mental, emotional, and even physical health. He writes: “Anything that promotes feelings of love and intimacy is healing; anything that promotes isolation, separation, loneliness, loss, hostility, anger, cynicism, depression, alienation, and related feelings often leads to suffering, disease, and premature death from all causes … “For some reason, we humans flourish under the influence of love and we gradually die without it. The scientific evidence leaves little doubt that love and intimacy are powerful determinants of our health and survival. Why they have such an impact remains somewhat a mystery.” (Dr. Dean Ornish, Love and Survival, pp. 22, 29, 171).
Spiritual Heart Attacks and Cardiac Arrest
The word “heart” is found over 800 times in the Douay Rheims Bible. The heart is an amazing organ. Your heart is responsible for pumping life-giving blood to 75 trillion cells in your body and can do so in under one minute! Today, your heart will beat approximately 100,000 times, shuttling 2,000 gallons of oxygen-filled blood through about 60,000 miles of blood vessels. Over your lifetime, your heart will pump around one million barrels of blood. The fact of the matter is that without your heart functioning properly, you cannot live to the fullest. A healthy heart is vital to your well-being and overall health. “With all watchfulness keep thy heart, because life issues out from it!” (Proverbs 4:23).
A very serious disease, if left untreated, will kill you. Spiritual heart failure is a serious matter as well, one which plagues us all. Just as important as the beating physical heart in our chest is the spiritual heart in our soul. Most people do not check their hearts enough. Many have hearts attacks and don’t know it — not physical heart attacks, but spiritual heart attacks. As natural heart attacks arise from blood flow cessation to the heart, spiritual heart attacks occur when God’s grace and influence is blocked by our soul. What we feed our spiritual heart and how we protect it will result in its overall spiritual health. A healthy spiritual heart is ruled by God’s Spirit, not by a human spirit or a worldly spirit. Your thoughts are a window into your spiritual heart. Thoughts can be helpful and they can be hurtful.
Satan is constantly seeking to cause a “spiritual heart attack” that aims to take us captive to do his will: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). If we allow these onslaughts to go unchecked, we might find ourselves with a spiritual heart that is barely functioning or dead.
Article 10
Wednesday & Thursday, June 12th & 13th
A Four-Letter-Word Can Forgive All Sin and Get You to Heaven!
Wednesday & Thursday, June 12th & 13th
A Four-Letter-Word Can Forgive All Sin and Get You to Heaven!
You’ve Got To Be Joking!
How can a four-letter-word forgive sin and get you to Heaven? You’ve got be joking! Four-letter-words are sinful―how can sin remove sin? That’s just plain stupid! If anything―four-letter-words are more likely to get you closer to Hell than Heaven! The term “four-letter word” has been in use in both the United States and the United Kingdom since at least 1886 and serves as a euphemism for words that are often considered profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive. Everyone has heard (or unfortunately used) profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive four-letter-words many times in their lifetime. Therefore, there is no need to list those words here―and, even more so, no desire to condone them. The use of profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive four-letter-words is clearly sinful―either mortal or venial, depending upon the word used. Just as two wrongs do not make something right―likewise sin cannot remove sin.
Holy Scripture warns: “From the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing! My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:10). “Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth … or obscenity, or foolish talking!” (Ephesians 4:29; 5:4) … “Put you also all away blasphemy, filthy speech out of your mouth!” (Colossians 3:8). Our Lord Himself says: “How can you speak good things, whereas you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. A good man out of a good treasure bringeth forth good things―and an evil man out of an evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the Day of Judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned!” (Matthew 12:34-37). “What comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man … The things which proceed out of the mouth, come forth from the heart, and those things defile a man!” (Matthew 15:11, 18).
Not all four-letter-words are meant to be profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive―even though their meaning is not pleasant. Take, for example, the word “dung” (our modern day language replaces it with an even more crude sounding word). The word “dung” is found over 30 times in Holy Scripture. In the Old Testament, even God speaks of dung in relation to idols: “Thou shalt detest it [the idol] as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth!” (Deuteronomy 7:26). And again: “I will bring evils upon the house of Jeroboam! And will cut off from Jeroboam him that pisses against the wall. And I will sweep away the remnant of the house of Jeroboam, as dung is swept away till all be clean!” (3 Kings 14:10). And again: “The flesh of Jezabel shall be as dung upon the face of the Earth!” (4 Kings 9:37) … “Because they have sinned against the Lord, their blood shall be poured out as earth, and their bodies as dung” (Sophonias 1:17) … “O ye priests! If you will not give glory to My Name, says the Lord of hosts, I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities!” (Malachias 2:3). Our Lord speaks of dung indirectly, when He says: “Do you not understand, that whatsoever enters into the mouth, goes into the belly, and is cast out [excreted] into the privy [toilet]” (Matthew 15:17). St. Paul adds: “I count all things to be but loss and count them as dung, so that I may gain Christ!” (Philippians 3:8). Elsewhere, Scripture further adds: “that they may eat their own dung, and drink their urine” (4 Kings 18:27) … “Every woman that is a harlot, shall be trodden upon as dung in the way!” (Ecclesiasticus 9:10) … “The glory of a sinful man is dung!” (1 Machabees 2:62).
Negative and Positive Four-Letter-Words
Most four-letter words are negative in their connotation―but, just as in nature, everything has a positive and a negative―so too are there positive four-letter-words that are the opposite to their profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive counterparts―yet some of them can also be unpleasant! For example: Love, Pain, Woes, Bear, Weep, Pray, Deny, Help, Give, Holy, etc. Even though these are good and positive in themselves, we probably find it very hard to get enthusiastic about most of them―apart from Love!
Most four-letter words are negative in their connotation―but, just as in nature, everything has a positive and a negative―so too are there positive four-letter-words that are the opposite to their profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive counterparts―yet some of them can also be unpleasant! For example: Love, Pain, Woes, Bear, Weep, Pray, Deny, Help, Give, Holy, etc. Even though these are good and positive in themselves, we probably find it very hard to get enthusiastic about most of them―apart from Love!
► LOVE, of course, comes first! Our Lord commanded: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). We shall come back to the four-letter-word of love further below―since it will be our prime focal point since Our Lord said it was the greatest commandment of all. For now, let us briefly look at some other four-letter-words, the hearing of which might be unpleasant to our sensibilities!
► PAIN is exactly that ― “a pain in the neck”! Nobody likes pain and nobody wants pain―but, as they say: “No pain, no gain!” It is through pain that we gain eternal life. Our Lord and Holy Scripture tell us that it is only through pain that we can get to Heaven: “Every creature groans and labors in pain!” (Romans 8:22). All pain is ultimately traceable back to Original Sin―for punishment and death is the pain and penalty for sin: “We suffer thus for our sins” (2 Machabees 7:32). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) … “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56). When we break an arm or a leg, we suffer pain―likewise, when we break the Commandments of God we deserve the pain of punishment. “We suffer these things for having sinned against our God” (2 Machabees 7:18). Yet it is through that pain that we reach eternal life: “My brethren, having undergone a short pain, are now under the covenant of eternal life” (2 Machabees 7:36).
We have lost Heaven through sin―therefore we have to fight all life-long to regain what we have lost: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). War invariably means pain of some kind. “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Of St. Paul, the Lord said: “I will show him how many great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:16) ― and St. Paul later writes: “If we suffer with Him, we will also be glorified with Him! I reckon that the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come!” (Romans 8:17-18). “It is given to you, not only to believe in Christ, but also to suffer for Him!” (Philippians 1:29) … “that you may be counted worthy of the Kingdom of God, for which also you suffer” (2 Thessalonians 1:5).
► WOES are likewise not a favorite. Everyone wants joy and happiness, not woes and tribulations! Once again Hoy Scripture puts matters straight. We are all sinners―and thus we have to accept our fair share of woes for sin: “If I be wicked, woe unto me!” (Job 10:15). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “Woe to them that are of a double heart and to wicked lips, and to the hands that do evil, and to the sinner that goes on the earth two ways!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:14). “Woe to ungodly men, who have forsaken the law of the Lord!” (Ecclesiasticus 41:11). “Woe to the sinful nation! … Woe to the wicked! … Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil! … Woe to them that make wicked laws!” (Isaias 1:4; 3:11; 5:20; 10:1). “Woe to you that are wealthy!” (Amos 6:1). “Woe to the world because of scandals!” (Matthew 18:7).
But it is not only sinners who have to suffer woes (and we are all sinners), but good persons will also have to suffer woes from the world because they are Christians. Our Lord Himself said to His disciples: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “They will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … The brother shall also deliver up his brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:17-21). “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy!” (John 16:20). That is why St. Paul writes: “In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed! We suffer persecution, but are not forsaken!” (2 Corinthians 4:8-9). “All that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution” (2 Timothy 3:12).
► BEAR: To reach Heaven we must bear or carry the cross―Our Lord Himself said this: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23) … Sadly, the cross is not on the top of our Christmas present wish list―it is not even on the list! Yet Our Lord is clear on this point: “Whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). The crosses that we have to bear come in many forms―too many to list here. Some chief ones are poverty, sickness and failure―but perhaps the most difficult of all is that of persecution, which comes in many degrees, shapes, colors and sizes. It takes on the form of mockery; rejection; ostracization; loss of rights; job or reputation; wrongful accusations; wrongful imprisonment; violence and even death itself. “Blessed are they that suffer persecution” says Our Lord, “for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:10). “We are reviled, and we bless! We are persecuted, and we suffer it!” (1 Corinthians 4:12). “God is faithful, and will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able―but will make also with temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it!” (1 Corinthians 10:13).
► WEEP: Weeping is part and parcel of life―and even more so part and parcel of the spiritual life. Holy Scripture speaks of “A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance” (Ecclesiastes 3:4). The Church speaks of the “Gift of Tears.” as meaning a spiritual grace which is a gift from the Holy Ghost that is bestowed on someone through the healing flow of tears shed. It is a response of the heart, prompted by the Holy Ghost, whereby “the Holy Spirit Himself asks for us with unspeakable groanings” (Romans 8:26). The gift of tears is under-appreciated today. And yet, this grace has inspired reverence throughout the Church’s tradition―tears that fill our eyes, that are unbidden, and may express sorrow for sin. Natural tears are often mistaken for this supernatural gift, especially when they occur during or after an intense spiritual experience.
The fruit of the spiritual “Gift of Tears” leads both the recipient of this gift and others who witness it to joy and abiding peace. We do not only weep for sin, but we also “Weep for joy” (Tobias 11:11)―especially the joy at having our sins forgiven and being reconciled with God: “‘Be converted to Me with all your heart, in fasting, and in weeping, and in mourning!’ saith the Lord” (Joel 2:12) “Weeping they shall seek the Lord their God” (Jeremias 50:4). “They shall come with weeping and I will bring them back in mercy” (Jeremias 31:9). “They all craved mercy of the Lord with weeping and fasting, lying prostrate on the ground for three days continually” (2 Machabees 13:12). “After tears and weeping Thou pourest in joyfulness!” (Tobias 3:22).
Our Lord adds: “Woe to you that now laugh―for you shall mourn and weep! … Blessed are ye that weep now―for you shall laugh!” (Luke 6:21, 25). Better to weep for our sins in this world than weep for them in Hell! “The children of the kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth! … The unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth! … And He shall cast them into the furnace of fire―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” says Our Lord (Matthew 8:12; 25:30; 13:42). Therefore, it is better to weep for sin now, than weep for sin in Hell. Our Lord adds: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy!” (John 16:20). Hence Scripture says: “Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep! Let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy into sorrow!” (James 4:9).
Mary Magdalen wept for her sins as she washed Our Lord’s feet with her tears: “And standing behind at His feet, she began to wash His feet with tears” (Luke 7:38). Our Lord, while carrying His cross to Calvary, said to the weeping women of Jerusalem: “Weep not over Me―but weep for yourselves and for your children!” (Luke 23:28). “The Lord’s ministers shall weep and shall say: ‘Spare, O Lord, spare thy people!’” (Joel 2:17). “Weep and mourn all ye that take delight in drinking sweet wine and are drunk!” (Joel 1:5). “Go now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries which shall come upon you!” (James 5:1). Those “who have committed fornication, shall weep and bewail!” (Apocalypse 18:9).
► PRAY: Praying is the very staple of the spiritual life. Some of the saints compare it to breathing―which we have to do all the time. Hence Holy Scripture says: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17), with Our Lord adding: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1) … “Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times!” (Luke 21:36). St. Augustine says: “What more excellent than prayer? What more useful and profitable? What sweeter and more delicious? What higher and more exalted in the whole scheme of our Christian religion? As our body cannot live without nourishment, so our soul cannot spiritually be kept alive without prayer! Prayer is the key of Heaven that fits all the gates of Heaven and all the treasure chests of God!”
St. Thomas Aquinas says that whatever God decided from all eternity to grant us by His Divine Providence, He will give it to us by means of prayer―and on this depends the deliverance, salvation, conversion and cure of many souls and the progress and perfection of others. God has ruled that Matrimony begets children. Plowing and sowing brings an abundance of crops. Prayer brings abundant gifts and graces to the world. St. John Chrysostom says “It is simply impossible to lead, without the aid of prayer, a virtuous life.” We sin so much because we pray so little—if we would only pray much more, we would sin much less. “When prayer is poured forth, sins are covered” says St. Ambrose. Holy Scripture confirms this: “My son, hast thou sinned? Do so no more: but, for thy former sins, also pray that they may be forgiven thee” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). If we have sinned, we need to pray for forgiveness.
► DENY: In this materialistic world that we live in, we have been conditioned to possess more rather than possess less; extravagance outshines frugality; self-indulgence is preferred to self-denial; most people want a lot rather than a little. This is true whether it pertains to possessions, eating, drinking, entertainment, money, etc. A priest once asked the students in very traditional and conservative Catholic school to raise their hands if they wanted to be rich after they had graduated from school―over 90% of the students threw their arms into the air with wild enthusiasm and sparkling eyes! Yet Our Lord said to the rich young man, who wanted to be perfect and get to Heaven, to sell his possessions and then come and follow Him:
“And behold, a certain rich young man, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-29; Mark 10:17-31; Luke 18:18-25).
Elsewhere Our Lord said: “For what shall it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). In the early years of the Church, we read that property and possessions were held in common and not appropriated to oneself as private property: “The multitude of believers had but one heart and one soul―neither did anyone say that anything of the things which he possessed was his own; but all things were common unto them” (Acts 4:32). Self-denial for the sake of God is not the most popular thing these days! It seems as though denial of Church teachings and even denial of the Faith is becoming increasingly popular as the years go by.
► HELP:God commands that we help others: “I command you to open your hand to the needy and poor! … If one of your brethren falls into poverty, you shall not harden your heart, nor close your hand, but shall open it to the poor man, you shall lend to him that which you see he has need of! ” (Deuteronomy 15:7-11). Most people like and appreciate help from others―but far fewer people like to go out of their way to give help to others. “All for one and one for all” is best known as the motto of the title characters in the book The Three Musketeers, by the nineteenth-century French author Alexander Dumas. Unfortunately, “All for one and one for all” has degenerated into a selfish “All for one and that one is me! So all for me and none for all!”
Our Lord’s parable of the Good Samaritan is essentially a parable about helping―even our enemies: “A certain man [a Jew] went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, who also stripped him, and having wounded him went away, leaving him half dead. And it chanced, that a certain priest [also a fellow Jew] went down the same way―and seeing him, passed by. In like manner also a Levite [also a fellow Jew]―when he was near the place and saw him, passed by. But a certain Samaritan [an enemy of the Jews] being on his journey, came near him; and seeing him, was moved with compassion. And going up to him, bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine: and setting him upon his own beast, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And the next day he took out two pence, and gave to the host, and said: ‘Take care of him; and whatsoever thou shalt spend over and above, I, at my return, will repay thee!’ Which of these three, in thy opinion, was neighbor to him that fell among the robbers?’ But he said: ‘He that showed mercy to him.’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Go, and do thou in like manner!’” (Luke 10:30-37).
Another parable also speaks of giving help and neglecting to give help. Our Lord, using the imagery of sheep and goats (the good and the evil, the saved and the damned) says to good sheep: “I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me in; I was naked, and you covered Me; sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me!” Then shall the just answer Him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, and fed Thee; thirsty, and gave Thee drink; and when did we see Thee a stranger, and took Thee in; or naked, and covered Thee; or when did we see Thee sick or in prison, and came to Thee?’ And the king answering, shall say to them: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!’ Then he shall say to the goats that shall be on His left hand: ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels! For I was hungry, and you gave Me not to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me not in; naked, and you covered Me not; sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me!’ Then they also shall answer him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to Thee?’ Then He shall answer them, saying: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least of My brethren, neither did you do it to Me!’ And these shall go into everlasting punishment, but the just shall go into life everlasting” (Matthew 25:35-46).
► GIVE: Giving is similar to helping―we even speak of “giving help” to someone. Our Lord reminds us that God has freely given many things to us and we should do likewise to others: “Freely have you received, freely give!” (Matthew 10:8). “Give to everyone that asks thee!” (Luke 6:30). “Give, and it shall be given to you! For with the same measure that you shall give to others, it shall be measured to you again!” (Luke 6:38). Holy Scripture adds: “It is a more blessed thing to give, rather than to receive” (Acts 20:35) ― which is echoed in the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi who also speaks about the value of giving to others: “For it is in giving that we receive.” Scripture further says: “Do not forget to do good and to share―for by such sacrifices God's favor is obtained” (Hebrews 13:16). By giving to others, we receive the mercy of God: “Alms deliver from all sin and from death, and will not suffer the soul to go into darkness” (Tobias 4:11). “Everyone shall offer according to what he has” (Deuteronomy 16:17). “He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:17). “God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7) ― the problem is that we do not give cheerfully, and sometimes we do not give at all! That is one reason why we get so little from God!
► HOLY: We speak of the Holy Trinity, the Holy Family, the Holy Mass, the Holy Eucharist, the Holy Bible, the Holy Souls in Purgatory, etc. All of this should indicate to us that holiness is important and we ourselves should also be holy. God Himself says: “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2) … “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26) … “You shall be to Me a holy nation!” (Exodus 19:6) … “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy because I am the Lord your God” (Leviticus 20:7).
Unless we become holy―become saints―we shall not enter the Kingdom of Heaven: “Without holiness no man shall see God” (Hebrews 12:14). Today, very few people appreciate holiness and even fewer people seek to acquire true holiness. Healthiness is more sought after than holiness. Yet Scripture says: “Health of the soul in holiness is better than all gold and silver” (Ecclesiasticus 30:15). Therefore, we are commanded to “Put on the new man, who, according to God, is created in justice and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, on the subject of holiness and sanctity, writes: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God.” St. Thérèse of Lisieux tells us: “You cannot be half a saint. You must be a whole saint or no saint at all.”
The Power of Love in Wiping-Out Sin, Guilt and Punishment
Let us now return to the first of the above-listed four letter words: LOVE. If “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), then there has to be something special and powerful about love. If Christ says that the greatest commandment is that of love―“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31)―then there has to something special and powerful about love. If Holy Scripture says: “Charity covereth all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … and of the great sinner Mary Magdalen, Christ said: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). This gives us some clues as to the power and efficacity of love.
In fact, without love, everything is worthless in the spiritual realm: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
► THE COUNCIL OF TRENT says the following:
“That sorrow for sins committed should be so profound and supreme that no greater sorrow could be thought of, will easily appear from the considerations that follow. Perfect contrition is an act of charity, emanating from what is called filial fear; hence it is clear that the measure of contrition and charity should be the same. Since therefore the charity which we cherish towards God is the most perfect love, it follows that contrition should be the keenest sorrow of the soul ... Further, it should be noted that since, as St. Bernard says, there is no limit or measure to charity, there should no limit to the hatred of sin ... Besides, our contrition should not only be the greatest, but also the most intense, and so perfect that it excludes all apathy and indifference ... If, however, our contrition be not perfect, it may nevertheless be true and efficacious ... Our contrition may also be true and efficacious, although unaccompanied by tears. Penitential tears, however, are much to be desired and commended.” (Penance: Qualities of Sorrow for Sin).
Hence we see the Council of Trent distinguishing between varying degrees of intensity in the act of perfect contrition. It says our contrition should not only be the greatest (meaning true contrition―which is the greater amongst contrition and attrition), but also the most intense and most perfect of the greatest. It further gives evidence of these degrees of intensity when it says: “Our contrition may also be true and efficacious, although unaccompanied by tears. Penitential tears, however, are much to be desired and commended.”
► FR. DOMINIC M. PRUMMER, O.P., in his manual on Moral Theology says:
“The sacramental penance is the means whereby the sinner compensates for the temporal punishment due to sin ... The amount and nature of the penance must be determined by the kinds of sins confessed and by the condition of the penitent ... Therefore a grave penance should be imposed for a grave sin ... But there are just causes permitting the imposition of a smaller penance than usual” among those reasons he lists “deep and unusual contrition”.
This unusual contrition has to mean a high degree of contrition, i.e. above mere attrition and most probably an intense degree of perfect contrition. This means that at least some of the temporal punishment has already been taken away by the “unusual contrition” shown by the penitent. A lesser degree of contrition would then merit a greater penance since it would have taken away less of the temporal punishment due. In other words, both lesser and higher degrees of perfect contrition take away the eternal punishment and restore divine grace, but a lesser degree of perfect contrition will remit less temporal punishment, whereas a greater or more intense degree of perfect contrition will remit much, if not all, the temporal punishment due.
Thus, it is possible for the worst imaginable sinner, at the point of death, to go to directly to Heaven if he can elicit an act of perfect contrition of a proportionately intense degree ― but, for such a person it would an enormous, unmerited grace, that was undoubtedly gained by the prayers and sacrifices of others. This is exactly what the Venerable Louis of Granada, O.P., says: “True sorrow for sin is a special grace and a gift from God and a work which exceeds the power of human nature ... and no one can have such love and such sorrow if God does not give it. Hence for God to grant this to a sinner is the greatest gift and greatest grace He can bestow on him.” (Summa of the Christian Life, Vol. 3, pp. 236-237). Perfect contrition has varying degrees of intensity ― which logically, and in justice, must produce varying effects.
► FR. HERIBERT JONE O.FM. CAP., J.C.D., in his manual on Moral Theology states that:
“Sacramental satisfaction is some penitential work imposed by the confessor in confession, through which atonement for sin is made to God and the penitent is granted a remission of the temporal punishment due to sin ... Its efficacy is not only ‘ex opere operantis’, but also ‘ex opere operato’ ... Wherefore, in itself, a grave penance must be imposed for grievous sins ... [However] intense sorrow of the penitent [etc] are some of the reasons sufficient to excuse the priest from imposing a grave penance.” Why? Because the intense sorrow has wiped away much, if not all, of the temporal punishment due the sins the penitent has confessed.
► FR. EDWIN F. HEALY S.J., S.T.D., in his Manual on Moral Theology says the following:
“Through sacramental absolution, the guilt of all the sins for which the penitent has at least attrition and the eternal punishment for grave sins are canceled, but God does not always remit, by the same act, the temporal punishment which should be inflicted upon the penitent. Does it ever happen that temporal punishment is canceled in its entirety in the Sacrament of Penance? Very probably it is completely remitted when the penitent receives the sacrament with perfect contrition for all his sins, mortal and venial ... There are many circumstances which the confessor takes into consideration when imposing a penance. He may assign a slight penance for many grave sins if the penitent manifests extraordinary sorrow...”
► FR. H. NOLDIN S.J., in his Manual on Moral Theology says that little penance is to be given...
“If the penitent is seen to be intensely contrite; that the contrition is of such power, as to take away all temporal punishment, or a great part of it...” Thus meaning an intense degree of perfect contrition, so much so that it takes away totally, or at least a great part of, the temporal punishment due to sin. Hence, he too affirms that intense contrition (which must mean intense perfect contrition, not mere attrition) can remove the entire temporal punishment due to sin, but he speaks of intense or great contrition ― which seems to indicate a high degree of perfect contrition.
► CANON GEORGE D. SMITH, in his book The Teaching of the Catholic Church, also speaks of, and distinguishes, these degrees. He says that a basic act of perfect charity (contrition) is not difficult to make (though elsewhere he says we should think it is overly easy to make one). Then speaking of this act of perfect charity (contrition) he says:
“No habit could be more valuable for the man who is day by day struggling against mortal sin. For if he chance to fall, an act of perfect charity (with, of course, the implied intention of seeking later the sacramental absolution as commanded) will at once produce that disposition of soul which induces God to restore sanctifying grace, so that his sin is forgiven. So far we have described an act of charity of the lowest grade of intensity. A more intense act is within the capacity of the Christian enjoying ordinary grace. By this the will rejects etc ... Finally there is an advanced stage of charity which leads the soul to identify its will as completely as possible with that of God; which reaches out, in the yearning of love, to suffer for and with the Beloved; which welcomes such adverse circumstances as befall or contrives self-immolation, as satisfaction for sin or expression of love.”
► ST. THOMAS AQUINAS, in his article on “Whether the Entire Punishment Due to Sin Is Forgiven through the Sacrament of the Eucharist”, says: “Because this union is the effect of charity, from the fervor of which man obtains forgiveness, not only of guilt, but also of punishment.” Thus the effect of charity is not only to obtain forgiveness [i.e. escaping eternal damnation], but charity also takes away the temporal punishment due to sin. St. Thomas further stresses and underlines this by saying: “Hence it is that as a consequence [of charity] and by concomitance with the chief effect [of the Eucharist causing charity] man obtains forgiveness of the punishment, not indeed of the entire punishment, but according to the measure of his devotion and fervor.”
A few lines later, he reiterates the same, saying: “Therefore, although this offering suffices of its quantity to satisfy for all punishment, yet it becomes satisfactory ... according to the measure of their devotion, and not for the whole punishment …It may happen that the act of charity is so intense that the contrition resulting therefrom merits not only removal of guilt, but also the remission of all punishment.” Though it can remit the whole punishment, but he says: “If part of the punishment, and not the whole, be taken away by this Sacrament, it is due to a defect not on the part of Christ’s power, but on the part of man’s devotion.” St. Thomas further adds: “A man cannot be sure that his contrition suffices for the remission of both punishment and guilt―wherefore he is bound to confess and to make satisfaction, especially since his contrition would not be true contrition, unless he also had the purpose of confessing.”
How can a four-letter-word forgive sin and get you to Heaven? You’ve got be joking! Four-letter-words are sinful―how can sin remove sin? That’s just plain stupid! If anything―four-letter-words are more likely to get you closer to Hell than Heaven! The term “four-letter word” has been in use in both the United States and the United Kingdom since at least 1886 and serves as a euphemism for words that are often considered profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive. Everyone has heard (or unfortunately used) profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive four-letter-words many times in their lifetime. Therefore, there is no need to list those words here―and, even more so, no desire to condone them. The use of profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive four-letter-words is clearly sinful―either mortal or venial, depending upon the word used. Just as two wrongs do not make something right―likewise sin cannot remove sin.
Holy Scripture warns: “From the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing! My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:10). “Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth … or obscenity, or foolish talking!” (Ephesians 4:29; 5:4) … “Put you also all away blasphemy, filthy speech out of your mouth!” (Colossians 3:8). Our Lord Himself says: “How can you speak good things, whereas you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. A good man out of a good treasure bringeth forth good things―and an evil man out of an evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the Day of Judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned!” (Matthew 12:34-37). “What comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man … The things which proceed out of the mouth, come forth from the heart, and those things defile a man!” (Matthew 15:11, 18).
Not all four-letter-words are meant to be profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive―even though their meaning is not pleasant. Take, for example, the word “dung” (our modern day language replaces it with an even more crude sounding word). The word “dung” is found over 30 times in Holy Scripture. In the Old Testament, even God speaks of dung in relation to idols: “Thou shalt detest it [the idol] as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth!” (Deuteronomy 7:26). And again: “I will bring evils upon the house of Jeroboam! And will cut off from Jeroboam him that pisses against the wall. And I will sweep away the remnant of the house of Jeroboam, as dung is swept away till all be clean!” (3 Kings 14:10). And again: “The flesh of Jezabel shall be as dung upon the face of the Earth!” (4 Kings 9:37) … “Because they have sinned against the Lord, their blood shall be poured out as earth, and their bodies as dung” (Sophonias 1:17) … “O ye priests! If you will not give glory to My Name, says the Lord of hosts, I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities!” (Malachias 2:3). Our Lord speaks of dung indirectly, when He says: “Do you not understand, that whatsoever enters into the mouth, goes into the belly, and is cast out [excreted] into the privy [toilet]” (Matthew 15:17). St. Paul adds: “I count all things to be but loss and count them as dung, so that I may gain Christ!” (Philippians 3:8). Elsewhere, Scripture further adds: “that they may eat their own dung, and drink their urine” (4 Kings 18:27) … “Every woman that is a harlot, shall be trodden upon as dung in the way!” (Ecclesiasticus 9:10) … “The glory of a sinful man is dung!” (1 Machabees 2:62).
Negative and Positive Four-Letter-Words
Most four-letter words are negative in their connotation―but, just as in nature, everything has a positive and a negative―so too are there positive four-letter-words that are the opposite to their profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive counterparts―yet some of them can also be unpleasant! For example: Love, Pain, Woes, Bear, Weep, Pray, Deny, Help, Give, Holy, etc. Even though these are good and positive in themselves, we probably find it very hard to get enthusiastic about most of them―apart from Love!
Most four-letter words are negative in their connotation―but, just as in nature, everything has a positive and a negative―so too are there positive four-letter-words that are the opposite to their profane, vulgar, indecent or offensive counterparts―yet some of them can also be unpleasant! For example: Love, Pain, Woes, Bear, Weep, Pray, Deny, Help, Give, Holy, etc. Even though these are good and positive in themselves, we probably find it very hard to get enthusiastic about most of them―apart from Love!
► LOVE, of course, comes first! Our Lord commanded: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). We shall come back to the four-letter-word of love further below―since it will be our prime focal point since Our Lord said it was the greatest commandment of all. For now, let us briefly look at some other four-letter-words, the hearing of which might be unpleasant to our sensibilities!
► PAIN is exactly that ― “a pain in the neck”! Nobody likes pain and nobody wants pain―but, as they say: “No pain, no gain!” It is through pain that we gain eternal life. Our Lord and Holy Scripture tell us that it is only through pain that we can get to Heaven: “Every creature groans and labors in pain!” (Romans 8:22). All pain is ultimately traceable back to Original Sin―for punishment and death is the pain and penalty for sin: “We suffer thus for our sins” (2 Machabees 7:32). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) … “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56). When we break an arm or a leg, we suffer pain―likewise, when we break the Commandments of God we deserve the pain of punishment. “We suffer these things for having sinned against our God” (2 Machabees 7:18). Yet it is through that pain that we reach eternal life: “My brethren, having undergone a short pain, are now under the covenant of eternal life” (2 Machabees 7:36).
We have lost Heaven through sin―therefore we have to fight all life-long to regain what we have lost: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). War invariably means pain of some kind. “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Of St. Paul, the Lord said: “I will show him how many great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:16) ― and St. Paul later writes: “If we suffer with Him, we will also be glorified with Him! I reckon that the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come!” (Romans 8:17-18). “It is given to you, not only to believe in Christ, but also to suffer for Him!” (Philippians 1:29) … “that you may be counted worthy of the Kingdom of God, for which also you suffer” (2 Thessalonians 1:5).
► WOES are likewise not a favorite. Everyone wants joy and happiness, not woes and tribulations! Once again Hoy Scripture puts matters straight. We are all sinners―and thus we have to accept our fair share of woes for sin: “If I be wicked, woe unto me!” (Job 10:15). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “Woe to them that are of a double heart and to wicked lips, and to the hands that do evil, and to the sinner that goes on the earth two ways!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:14). “Woe to ungodly men, who have forsaken the law of the Lord!” (Ecclesiasticus 41:11). “Woe to the sinful nation! … Woe to the wicked! … Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil! … Woe to them that make wicked laws!” (Isaias 1:4; 3:11; 5:20; 10:1). “Woe to you that are wealthy!” (Amos 6:1). “Woe to the world because of scandals!” (Matthew 18:7).
But it is not only sinners who have to suffer woes (and we are all sinners), but good persons will also have to suffer woes from the world because they are Christians. Our Lord Himself said to His disciples: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “They will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … The brother shall also deliver up his brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:17-21). “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy!” (John 16:20). That is why St. Paul writes: “In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed! We suffer persecution, but are not forsaken!” (2 Corinthians 4:8-9). “All that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution” (2 Timothy 3:12).
► BEAR: To reach Heaven we must bear or carry the cross―Our Lord Himself said this: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23) … Sadly, the cross is not on the top of our Christmas present wish list―it is not even on the list! Yet Our Lord is clear on this point: “Whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross to follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). The crosses that we have to bear come in many forms―too many to list here. Some chief ones are poverty, sickness and failure―but perhaps the most difficult of all is that of persecution, which comes in many degrees, shapes, colors and sizes. It takes on the form of mockery; rejection; ostracization; loss of rights; job or reputation; wrongful accusations; wrongful imprisonment; violence and even death itself. “Blessed are they that suffer persecution” says Our Lord, “for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:10). “We are reviled, and we bless! We are persecuted, and we suffer it!” (1 Corinthians 4:12). “God is faithful, and will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able―but will make also with temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it!” (1 Corinthians 10:13).
► WEEP: Weeping is part and parcel of life―and even more so part and parcel of the spiritual life. Holy Scripture speaks of “A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance” (Ecclesiastes 3:4). The Church speaks of the “Gift of Tears.” as meaning a spiritual grace which is a gift from the Holy Ghost that is bestowed on someone through the healing flow of tears shed. It is a response of the heart, prompted by the Holy Ghost, whereby “the Holy Spirit Himself asks for us with unspeakable groanings” (Romans 8:26). The gift of tears is under-appreciated today. And yet, this grace has inspired reverence throughout the Church’s tradition―tears that fill our eyes, that are unbidden, and may express sorrow for sin. Natural tears are often mistaken for this supernatural gift, especially when they occur during or after an intense spiritual experience.
The fruit of the spiritual “Gift of Tears” leads both the recipient of this gift and others who witness it to joy and abiding peace. We do not only weep for sin, but we also “Weep for joy” (Tobias 11:11)―especially the joy at having our sins forgiven and being reconciled with God: “‘Be converted to Me with all your heart, in fasting, and in weeping, and in mourning!’ saith the Lord” (Joel 2:12) “Weeping they shall seek the Lord their God” (Jeremias 50:4). “They shall come with weeping and I will bring them back in mercy” (Jeremias 31:9). “They all craved mercy of the Lord with weeping and fasting, lying prostrate on the ground for three days continually” (2 Machabees 13:12). “After tears and weeping Thou pourest in joyfulness!” (Tobias 3:22).
Our Lord adds: “Woe to you that now laugh―for you shall mourn and weep! … Blessed are ye that weep now―for you shall laugh!” (Luke 6:21, 25). Better to weep for our sins in this world than weep for them in Hell! “The children of the kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth! … The unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth! … And He shall cast them into the furnace of fire―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” says Our Lord (Matthew 8:12; 25:30; 13:42). Therefore, it is better to weep for sin now, than weep for sin in Hell. Our Lord adds: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy!” (John 16:20). Hence Scripture says: “Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep! Let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy into sorrow!” (James 4:9).
Mary Magdalen wept for her sins as she washed Our Lord’s feet with her tears: “And standing behind at His feet, she began to wash His feet with tears” (Luke 7:38). Our Lord, while carrying His cross to Calvary, said to the weeping women of Jerusalem: “Weep not over Me―but weep for yourselves and for your children!” (Luke 23:28). “The Lord’s ministers shall weep and shall say: ‘Spare, O Lord, spare thy people!’” (Joel 2:17). “Weep and mourn all ye that take delight in drinking sweet wine and are drunk!” (Joel 1:5). “Go now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries which shall come upon you!” (James 5:1). Those “who have committed fornication, shall weep and bewail!” (Apocalypse 18:9).
► PRAY: Praying is the very staple of the spiritual life. Some of the saints compare it to breathing―which we have to do all the time. Hence Holy Scripture says: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17), with Our Lord adding: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1) … “Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times!” (Luke 21:36). St. Augustine says: “What more excellent than prayer? What more useful and profitable? What sweeter and more delicious? What higher and more exalted in the whole scheme of our Christian religion? As our body cannot live without nourishment, so our soul cannot spiritually be kept alive without prayer! Prayer is the key of Heaven that fits all the gates of Heaven and all the treasure chests of God!”
St. Thomas Aquinas says that whatever God decided from all eternity to grant us by His Divine Providence, He will give it to us by means of prayer―and on this depends the deliverance, salvation, conversion and cure of many souls and the progress and perfection of others. God has ruled that Matrimony begets children. Plowing and sowing brings an abundance of crops. Prayer brings abundant gifts and graces to the world. St. John Chrysostom says “It is simply impossible to lead, without the aid of prayer, a virtuous life.” We sin so much because we pray so little—if we would only pray much more, we would sin much less. “When prayer is poured forth, sins are covered” says St. Ambrose. Holy Scripture confirms this: “My son, hast thou sinned? Do so no more: but, for thy former sins, also pray that they may be forgiven thee” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). If we have sinned, we need to pray for forgiveness.
► DENY: In this materialistic world that we live in, we have been conditioned to possess more rather than possess less; extravagance outshines frugality; self-indulgence is preferred to self-denial; most people want a lot rather than a little. This is true whether it pertains to possessions, eating, drinking, entertainment, money, etc. A priest once asked the students in very traditional and conservative Catholic school to raise their hands if they wanted to be rich after they had graduated from school―over 90% of the students threw their arms into the air with wild enthusiasm and sparkling eyes! Yet Our Lord said to the rich young man, who wanted to be perfect and get to Heaven, to sell his possessions and then come and follow Him:
“And behold, a certain rich young man, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-29; Mark 10:17-31; Luke 18:18-25).
Elsewhere Our Lord said: “For what shall it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). In the early years of the Church, we read that property and possessions were held in common and not appropriated to oneself as private property: “The multitude of believers had but one heart and one soul―neither did anyone say that anything of the things which he possessed was his own; but all things were common unto them” (Acts 4:32). Self-denial for the sake of God is not the most popular thing these days! It seems as though denial of Church teachings and even denial of the Faith is becoming increasingly popular as the years go by.
► HELP:God commands that we help others: “I command you to open your hand to the needy and poor! … If one of your brethren falls into poverty, you shall not harden your heart, nor close your hand, but shall open it to the poor man, you shall lend to him that which you see he has need of! ” (Deuteronomy 15:7-11). Most people like and appreciate help from others―but far fewer people like to go out of their way to give help to others. “All for one and one for all” is best known as the motto of the title characters in the book The Three Musketeers, by the nineteenth-century French author Alexander Dumas. Unfortunately, “All for one and one for all” has degenerated into a selfish “All for one and that one is me! So all for me and none for all!”
Our Lord’s parable of the Good Samaritan is essentially a parable about helping―even our enemies: “A certain man [a Jew] went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, who also stripped him, and having wounded him went away, leaving him half dead. And it chanced, that a certain priest [also a fellow Jew] went down the same way―and seeing him, passed by. In like manner also a Levite [also a fellow Jew]―when he was near the place and saw him, passed by. But a certain Samaritan [an enemy of the Jews] being on his journey, came near him; and seeing him, was moved with compassion. And going up to him, bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine: and setting him upon his own beast, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And the next day he took out two pence, and gave to the host, and said: ‘Take care of him; and whatsoever thou shalt spend over and above, I, at my return, will repay thee!’ Which of these three, in thy opinion, was neighbor to him that fell among the robbers?’ But he said: ‘He that showed mercy to him.’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Go, and do thou in like manner!’” (Luke 10:30-37).
Another parable also speaks of giving help and neglecting to give help. Our Lord, using the imagery of sheep and goats (the good and the evil, the saved and the damned) says to good sheep: “I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me in; I was naked, and you covered Me; sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me!” Then shall the just answer Him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, and fed Thee; thirsty, and gave Thee drink; and when did we see Thee a stranger, and took Thee in; or naked, and covered Thee; or when did we see Thee sick or in prison, and came to Thee?’ And the king answering, shall say to them: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!’ Then he shall say to the goats that shall be on His left hand: ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels! For I was hungry, and you gave Me not to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me not in; naked, and you covered Me not; sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me!’ Then they also shall answer him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to Thee?’ Then He shall answer them, saying: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least of My brethren, neither did you do it to Me!’ And these shall go into everlasting punishment, but the just shall go into life everlasting” (Matthew 25:35-46).
► GIVE: Giving is similar to helping―we even speak of “giving help” to someone. Our Lord reminds us that God has freely given many things to us and we should do likewise to others: “Freely have you received, freely give!” (Matthew 10:8). “Give to everyone that asks thee!” (Luke 6:30). “Give, and it shall be given to you! For with the same measure that you shall give to others, it shall be measured to you again!” (Luke 6:38). Holy Scripture adds: “It is a more blessed thing to give, rather than to receive” (Acts 20:35) ― which is echoed in the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi who also speaks about the value of giving to others: “For it is in giving that we receive.” Scripture further says: “Do not forget to do good and to share―for by such sacrifices God's favor is obtained” (Hebrews 13:16). By giving to others, we receive the mercy of God: “Alms deliver from all sin and from death, and will not suffer the soul to go into darkness” (Tobias 4:11). “Everyone shall offer according to what he has” (Deuteronomy 16:17). “He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:17). “God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7) ― the problem is that we do not give cheerfully, and sometimes we do not give at all! That is one reason why we get so little from God!
► HOLY: We speak of the Holy Trinity, the Holy Family, the Holy Mass, the Holy Eucharist, the Holy Bible, the Holy Souls in Purgatory, etc. All of this should indicate to us that holiness is important and we ourselves should also be holy. God Himself says: “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2) … “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26) … “You shall be to Me a holy nation!” (Exodus 19:6) … “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy because I am the Lord your God” (Leviticus 20:7).
Unless we become holy―become saints―we shall not enter the Kingdom of Heaven: “Without holiness no man shall see God” (Hebrews 12:14). Today, very few people appreciate holiness and even fewer people seek to acquire true holiness. Healthiness is more sought after than holiness. Yet Scripture says: “Health of the soul in holiness is better than all gold and silver” (Ecclesiasticus 30:15). Therefore, we are commanded to “Put on the new man, who, according to God, is created in justice and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, on the subject of holiness and sanctity, writes: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God.” St. Thérèse of Lisieux tells us: “You cannot be half a saint. You must be a whole saint or no saint at all.”
The Power of Love in Wiping-Out Sin, Guilt and Punishment
Let us now return to the first of the above-listed four letter words: LOVE. If “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), then there has to be something special and powerful about love. If Christ says that the greatest commandment is that of love―“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31)―then there has to something special and powerful about love. If Holy Scripture says: “Charity covereth all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … and of the great sinner Mary Magdalen, Christ said: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). This gives us some clues as to the power and efficacity of love.
In fact, without love, everything is worthless in the spiritual realm: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
► THE COUNCIL OF TRENT says the following:
“That sorrow for sins committed should be so profound and supreme that no greater sorrow could be thought of, will easily appear from the considerations that follow. Perfect contrition is an act of charity, emanating from what is called filial fear; hence it is clear that the measure of contrition and charity should be the same. Since therefore the charity which we cherish towards God is the most perfect love, it follows that contrition should be the keenest sorrow of the soul ... Further, it should be noted that since, as St. Bernard says, there is no limit or measure to charity, there should no limit to the hatred of sin ... Besides, our contrition should not only be the greatest, but also the most intense, and so perfect that it excludes all apathy and indifference ... If, however, our contrition be not perfect, it may nevertheless be true and efficacious ... Our contrition may also be true and efficacious, although unaccompanied by tears. Penitential tears, however, are much to be desired and commended.” (Penance: Qualities of Sorrow for Sin).
Hence we see the Council of Trent distinguishing between varying degrees of intensity in the act of perfect contrition. It says our contrition should not only be the greatest (meaning true contrition―which is the greater amongst contrition and attrition), but also the most intense and most perfect of the greatest. It further gives evidence of these degrees of intensity when it says: “Our contrition may also be true and efficacious, although unaccompanied by tears. Penitential tears, however, are much to be desired and commended.”
► FR. DOMINIC M. PRUMMER, O.P., in his manual on Moral Theology says:
“The sacramental penance is the means whereby the sinner compensates for the temporal punishment due to sin ... The amount and nature of the penance must be determined by the kinds of sins confessed and by the condition of the penitent ... Therefore a grave penance should be imposed for a grave sin ... But there are just causes permitting the imposition of a smaller penance than usual” among those reasons he lists “deep and unusual contrition”.
This unusual contrition has to mean a high degree of contrition, i.e. above mere attrition and most probably an intense degree of perfect contrition. This means that at least some of the temporal punishment has already been taken away by the “unusual contrition” shown by the penitent. A lesser degree of contrition would then merit a greater penance since it would have taken away less of the temporal punishment due. In other words, both lesser and higher degrees of perfect contrition take away the eternal punishment and restore divine grace, but a lesser degree of perfect contrition will remit less temporal punishment, whereas a greater or more intense degree of perfect contrition will remit much, if not all, the temporal punishment due.
Thus, it is possible for the worst imaginable sinner, at the point of death, to go to directly to Heaven if he can elicit an act of perfect contrition of a proportionately intense degree ― but, for such a person it would an enormous, unmerited grace, that was undoubtedly gained by the prayers and sacrifices of others. This is exactly what the Venerable Louis of Granada, O.P., says: “True sorrow for sin is a special grace and a gift from God and a work which exceeds the power of human nature ... and no one can have such love and such sorrow if God does not give it. Hence for God to grant this to a sinner is the greatest gift and greatest grace He can bestow on him.” (Summa of the Christian Life, Vol. 3, pp. 236-237). Perfect contrition has varying degrees of intensity ― which logically, and in justice, must produce varying effects.
► FR. HERIBERT JONE O.FM. CAP., J.C.D., in his manual on Moral Theology states that:
“Sacramental satisfaction is some penitential work imposed by the confessor in confession, through which atonement for sin is made to God and the penitent is granted a remission of the temporal punishment due to sin ... Its efficacy is not only ‘ex opere operantis’, but also ‘ex opere operato’ ... Wherefore, in itself, a grave penance must be imposed for grievous sins ... [However] intense sorrow of the penitent [etc] are some of the reasons sufficient to excuse the priest from imposing a grave penance.” Why? Because the intense sorrow has wiped away much, if not all, of the temporal punishment due the sins the penitent has confessed.
► FR. EDWIN F. HEALY S.J., S.T.D., in his Manual on Moral Theology says the following:
“Through sacramental absolution, the guilt of all the sins for which the penitent has at least attrition and the eternal punishment for grave sins are canceled, but God does not always remit, by the same act, the temporal punishment which should be inflicted upon the penitent. Does it ever happen that temporal punishment is canceled in its entirety in the Sacrament of Penance? Very probably it is completely remitted when the penitent receives the sacrament with perfect contrition for all his sins, mortal and venial ... There are many circumstances which the confessor takes into consideration when imposing a penance. He may assign a slight penance for many grave sins if the penitent manifests extraordinary sorrow...”
► FR. H. NOLDIN S.J., in his Manual on Moral Theology says that little penance is to be given...
“If the penitent is seen to be intensely contrite; that the contrition is of such power, as to take away all temporal punishment, or a great part of it...” Thus meaning an intense degree of perfect contrition, so much so that it takes away totally, or at least a great part of, the temporal punishment due to sin. Hence, he too affirms that intense contrition (which must mean intense perfect contrition, not mere attrition) can remove the entire temporal punishment due to sin, but he speaks of intense or great contrition ― which seems to indicate a high degree of perfect contrition.
► CANON GEORGE D. SMITH, in his book The Teaching of the Catholic Church, also speaks of, and distinguishes, these degrees. He says that a basic act of perfect charity (contrition) is not difficult to make (though elsewhere he says we should think it is overly easy to make one). Then speaking of this act of perfect charity (contrition) he says:
“No habit could be more valuable for the man who is day by day struggling against mortal sin. For if he chance to fall, an act of perfect charity (with, of course, the implied intention of seeking later the sacramental absolution as commanded) will at once produce that disposition of soul which induces God to restore sanctifying grace, so that his sin is forgiven. So far we have described an act of charity of the lowest grade of intensity. A more intense act is within the capacity of the Christian enjoying ordinary grace. By this the will rejects etc ... Finally there is an advanced stage of charity which leads the soul to identify its will as completely as possible with that of God; which reaches out, in the yearning of love, to suffer for and with the Beloved; which welcomes such adverse circumstances as befall or contrives self-immolation, as satisfaction for sin or expression of love.”
► ST. THOMAS AQUINAS, in his article on “Whether the Entire Punishment Due to Sin Is Forgiven through the Sacrament of the Eucharist”, says: “Because this union is the effect of charity, from the fervor of which man obtains forgiveness, not only of guilt, but also of punishment.” Thus the effect of charity is not only to obtain forgiveness [i.e. escaping eternal damnation], but charity also takes away the temporal punishment due to sin. St. Thomas further stresses and underlines this by saying: “Hence it is that as a consequence [of charity] and by concomitance with the chief effect [of the Eucharist causing charity] man obtains forgiveness of the punishment, not indeed of the entire punishment, but according to the measure of his devotion and fervor.”
A few lines later, he reiterates the same, saying: “Therefore, although this offering suffices of its quantity to satisfy for all punishment, yet it becomes satisfactory ... according to the measure of their devotion, and not for the whole punishment …It may happen that the act of charity is so intense that the contrition resulting therefrom merits not only removal of guilt, but also the remission of all punishment.” Though it can remit the whole punishment, but he says: “If part of the punishment, and not the whole, be taken away by this Sacrament, it is due to a defect not on the part of Christ’s power, but on the part of man’s devotion.” St. Thomas further adds: “A man cannot be sure that his contrition suffices for the remission of both punishment and guilt―wherefore he is bound to confess and to make satisfaction, especially since his contrition would not be true contrition, unless he also had the purpose of confessing.”
Article 9
Monday & Tuesday, June 10th & 11th
Love is a Magnet for Mercy
Monday & Tuesday, June 10th & 11th
Love is a Magnet for Mercy
Want Mercy? Get Charity!
We all want mercy, but we often ignore the thing that attracts mercy like a magnet! What is it that you will want most of all on your deathbed, or as you are dying due to an accident, or a crime, or any other cause of death? Will you want one last drink? One last cigarette? One last joke? Your favorite snack or meal? Whether they admit it or not―everyone will desire mercy. Mercy comes to us by many different roads―but all those roads lead back to the source of mercy, which is God Himself. Who or what is God? “God is charity” (1 John 4:8)―and the greatest work of this God of charity, or charitable God is the work of mercy: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all; and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9).
The God of charity―Our Lord Jesus Christ―commands us: “Love one another, as I have loved you!” (John 13:34). “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you! Abide in My love!” (John 15:9) … “By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another!” (John 13:35).
Love attracts mercy―as Our Lord Himself said of St. Mary Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her because she has loved much!” (Luke 7:47). Those words are echoed elsewhere in Holy Scripture: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). “Above all things have charity, which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:14).
The Love of Magdalen Wins Mercy
Let us start with one whom we all know better than most—Mary Magdalen, who became St. Mary Magdalen. Who was she? What was she? What had she done? Mary Magdalen was the sister of Martha and Lazarus (whom Jesus raised from the dead). She is usually thought of as the second-most important woman in the New Testament, after Mary, the Mother of Jesus. Mary Magdalene traveled with Jesus as one of His followers. She was present at Jesus’ two most important moments: the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. Within the four Gospels, the oldest historical record mentioning her name, she is named at least 12 times, more than most of the Apostles. The Gospel references describe her as courageous, brave enough to stand by Jesus in His hours of suffering, death and beyond. That is the non-shocking side of Mary Magdalen.
Yet the Gospels tell us that she was a great sinner, as well as being possessed by seven devils! In the New Testament she is mentioned among the women who accompanied Christ and ministered to Him (Luke 8:2-3), where it is also said that seven devils had been cast out of her (Mark 16:9). “And it came to pass afterwards, that Jesus traveled through the cities and towns, preaching and evangelizing the Kingdom of God; and the Twelve with Him; and certain women, who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities; and Mary, who is called Magdalen, out of whom seven devils were gone forth; … and many others who ministered unto Him of their substance.” (Luke 8:1-2). St. Mark mentions her after the Resurrection of Jesus, saying: “Jesus, rising early the first day of the week, appeared first to Mary Magdalen, out of whom He had cast seven devils” (Mark 16:9). The seven devils, removed from her by Jesus, gradually came to symbolize the Seven Capital Sins (also known as the Seven Deadly Sins), and Mary Magdalene began to be condemned, not only for lust, but for pride, covetousness, and all the remaining Capital Sins as well. (read more here)
What was Jesus’ reaction to Mary? One would imagine—like Simon the Pharisee at the banquet—that Jesus “would not touch her with a barge-pole”! Simon the Pharisee was thinking within himself, as Mary was tearfully washing the feet of Jesus: “The Pharisee, who had invited him, seeing it, spoke within himself, saying: ‘This man, if He were a prophet, would know surely who and what manner of woman this is that touches Him, that she is a sinner!’” (Luke 7:39). Yet the Gospel of St. John says: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). Neither did the Blessed Virgin Mary exclude Magdalen from her entourage and company. Jesus was able to read the thoughts of the judgmental and condemning Simon the Pharisee. “And Jesus answering, said to him: ‘Simon, I have something to say to you!’ But Simon said: ‘Master, say it!’ Jesus said: ‘A certain creditor had two debtors―the one who owed five hundred pence, and the other owed fifty. And whereas they had not wherewith to pay, he forgave them both. Which, therefore, of the two loved him most?’ Simon, answering, said: ‘I suppose that he to whom he forgave most!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘You have judged rightly!’ And turning to the woman [Mary Magdalen], Jesus said to Simon: ‘Do you see this woman? I entered into your house, and you gave Me no water for My feet―but she with tears has washed My feet, and with her hairs has wiped them! You gave Me no kiss―but she, since she came in, has not ceased to kiss My feet! You did not anoint My head with oil; but she has anointed My feet with ointment! Wherefore I say to you: Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much! But to whom less is forgiven, he loves less!’ And Jesus said to her: ‘Thy sins are forgiven thee!’” (Luke 7:40-48).
Many sins were forgiven her, because she loved much. Those who love less, have less forgiveness: “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9). “He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity!” (1 John 4:8). What is it to love God? “If you love Me, keep My commandments! As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you. Abide in My love! If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love―as I also have kept My Father’s commandments, and do abide in His love!” (John 14:15; 15:9-10).
Vicious Circle or Victorious Circle?
Sin, which is a hatred of God, could be said to be a “vicious circle” ― whereas love of God is the opposite. A vicious circle is a chain of events in which the response to one difficulty creates a new problem that aggravates the original difficulty. Lower profits can lead to spending cuts which can cause lower production, which causes falling sales, which creates even lower profits―thus creating a vicious circle. Another example, your arm or leg or back is itching, so you start to scratch the part that itches. Scratching an itch causes minor pain which distracts you from the itch, but scratching also prompts the brain to release serotonin, which reacts with body receptors on neurons that carry itch signals to the brain, making itching worse―thus serotonin drives the vicious circle of itching and scratching. This is how one sin leads to another sin―or how venial sin progressively leads to mortal sin.
Jesus hates sin, but He does not hate sinners―He says of Himself: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). Mary Magdalen is an example of a great sinner, who was in clutches of the devil through sin and possession: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Jesus did not cast her aside―but He cast the devils out of her: “Mary Magdalen, out of whom He had cast seven devils” (Mark 16:9). Would we do what Jesus did? Would we love Mary as Jesus did? No, because we have nowhere near the amount of mercy that He had and still has!
Just as sin easily leads to further sin―likewise, charity can lead to increased charity. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange states: “St. Augustine commenting on chapter 5 of St. John’s Gospel, writes: ‘Charity merits increase, that being increased, it may also merit to be perfected.’ … By any act of charity, a man merits an increase of grace and eternal life … It will be forthcoming when he performs a more fervent act of charity … The charity of Christ dying on the cross was more pleasing to God than all the sins of men taken together were displeasing” (Commentary on the Summa Theologica of St. Thomas).
Mercy is a subsection of charity. “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) “and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalms 144:9). When we show mercy, we imitate God. When we show mercy, we show our charity. When we show charity, we show that we are the children of God. Our Lord says: “By this shall all men know that you are My disciples―if you have love one for another” (John 13:35). Holy Scripture adds: “If any man says, I love God, and hates his brother―then he is a liar! For he that loves not his brother, whom he can see, how can he love God Whom he sees not?” (1 John 4:20). “Be ye kind one to another; merciful, forgiving one another, even as God hath forgiven you in Christ!” (Ephesians 4:32). “Forgive thy neighbor if he has hurt thee―and then shall thy sins be forgiven to thee when thou prayest” (Ecclesiasticus 28:2). “Judge not, and you shall not be judged! Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned! Forgive, and you shall be forgiven!” (Luke 6:37). “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). “But judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy!” (James 2:13). “For if you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). “If you will not forgive, neither will your Father that is in Heaven, forgive you your sins” (Mark 11:26).
Obstacles to Receiving Mercy
It is blatantly obvious that most souls fail to receive the mercy of God―since most souls end up being damned, even Catholic souls. Why? There are several possible factors―though only God knows the state and circumstances of each and every individual soul. What is that damns? Only one thing―mortal sin. You would think that the knowledge of that would be enough to make every person avoid mortal sin like the plague! Yet most souls are damned!
Some of the chief causes of damnation―and consequently missing out on mercy―are as follows:
(1) Insufficient sorrow for mortal sins committed.
(2) False or invalid confession of mortal sins committed.
(3) Refusal or neglect in amending one’s life with regard to the mortal sins that have been confessed.
(4) Hatred of God or neighbor.
(5) Refusal to forgive the sins of others.
There are more―but these will suffice for the purpose of this article.
(1) Insufficient sorrow for mortal sins committed.
“The sorrow that is according to God works penance, steadfast unto salvation; but the sorrow of the world works death” (2 Corinthians 7:10). Since the end of the Second World War in 1945, one pope after another―even the Liberal and Modernist popes―have complained about the loss of the sense of sin in the world, even the Catholic world.
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Today, it is very rarely taught―in the home, in the school and from the pulpit in church―that “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
We have all encountered the child who is told by its parents to say “Sorry!” to someone they have hurt―the child reluctantly and begrudgingly says “Sorry!” but you can tell that it is just coming from the lips and not the heart. As Our Lord said: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8) ― the same is true in the confessional: people want to be forgiven, but they are not really sorry for their sins. When they say the Act of Contrition, one has to wonder how much is coming from the lips and how much from the heart!
How much sorrow is sorrow? Sorrow―like so many other things in life, such as intelligence or love―ranges from minimal sorrow to maximum sorrow. Not wishing that any soul be damned (though most souls still manage to damn themselves), God is willing to accept a minimal sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession. This minimal sorrow is called “attrition.” The maximum sorrow is called “contrition”. The earliest meaning of the English word “attrition” that relates to spiritual repentance, was borrowed from the figurative meaning of the medieval Latin “attrition”, meaning “hardship, tribulation.” Thus “attrition” for sin is the sorrow that is based upon fear of the “hardships and tribulations” that are a punishment for sin. Hence the Act of Contrition begins by saying: “O my God, I am sorry for having offended Thee because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell.” God is willing to accept this minimal sorrow that fears God and His punishments―but we were created not just to fear God, but more importantly to love God! “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). That is why the Act of Contrition evolves from being sorry “because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell” into saying: “But most of all because they [my sins] offend Thee, my God, Who art all good and deserving of all my love.”
Our relationship with God should grow from an initial fear of God to a love of God: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18). You can take this a stage further and say: “Perfect charity casts out mortal and venial sin―and all the punishments that are due to those sins.” Perfect contrition springs from the perfect love of God. When our love is imperfect, then we think principally of ourselves; whereas, if it is perfect, we think principally of God. Our contrition will be perfect when we repent of our sins through the perfect love of God. Much the same way as a child is imperfectly sorry for some fault when it fears a thrashing. Whereas a child repenting of a fault can be said to have perfect sorrow when it grieves at having offended its parents, who are so good and loving, and have done so much for it.
After St. Peter denied Jesus, he thought of his sin, and, “going out, wept bitterly.” Why did he weep? Perhaps for the shame he would feel in front of the other Apostles? If this was the reason, then his sorrow was purely natural and without merit for Heaven. Perhaps he feared being deprived of his dignity as an Apostle and Prince of the Apostles, or perhaps he feared losing Heaven. These certainly would be more worthy motives, but still his sorrow would be imperfect. No! Peter wept and repented because he had offended his beloved Master, Who was so good, so holy, so worthy of his love; he wept because he had repaid that love with the blackest ingratitude―and, as a consequence, his contrition was perfect, his sin was forgiven. With this golden key of perfect contrition he had again reopened the doors of Heaven, which he had closed a moment before by his triple denial.
The word “contrition” comes from the Latin “contritus”, meaning “to grind, to crush, to pound to pieces” ― in this sense, true sorrow, maximum sorrow, the best sorrow is one that is based upon love, not fear―a love that sees the heart “crushed” and “pounded into pieces” because of its sins against God and neighbor. We speak of “a perfect act of contrition” ― but we must not naively imagine that there is only one single degree of perfect contrition. To better understand this, you can compare perfect contrition to the saints―all the saints are perfect for they are in Heaven, and you only get to go to Heaven when you have been perfected―either while living on Earth, or in the fires of Purgatory. Yet none of the saints have the same degree of perfection―even though all are perfect! So you can always improve your perfect act of contrition because you can always grow in love and grow in sanctifying grace. There comes a point when your perfect act of contrition becomes so perfect that it takes away, not only all guilt for sin (which is what Confession does), but it will also take away all temporal punishment due to sin―so that if you die having made a perfect act of contrition, then you would go straight to Heaven, totally bypassing Purgatory!
Satan despises sorrow for sin―especially sorrow for sin out of love for God. The reason is that demons have no sorrow for their sin and they have no love for God―and they despise seeing us reconciled with God by sorrow for sin, especially a sorrow for sin based upon love. They will do all they can to prevent from having the right kind of sorrow for sin―and will try lead us down the path of counterfeit contrition and false sorrow―which ultimately is path to Hell. This is perhaps one of the most common failures that lead to invalid confessions. Sorrow for sin must be supernatural. It is insufficient to be sorry because we have be “found out”; or because we now “look bad” in the eyes of others; or have lost our reputation; lost our job; lost privileges; lost friendships; etc. All these are natural motives that fall short of the supernatural motives required for sorrow―the bare minimum being fear of God’s just punishments.
(2) False or invalid confession of mortal sins committed.
We should take heed and tremble at what happened to Ananias and Saphira when they lied to St. Peter about the price at which they sold their land and thereby give less money to the community and keep more money for themselves: “A certain man named Ananias, with Saphira his wife, sold a piece of land, and by fraud kept back part of the price of the land, his wife being privy thereunto: and bringing only a certain part of it, laid it at the feet of the Apostles. But Peter said: ‘Ananias, why has Satan tempted your heart, that you should lie to the Holy Ghost, and by fraud keep part of the price of the land? Whilst it remained, did it not remain in your possession? And after it was sold, was it not in your power? Why have you conceived this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God!’ And Ananias hearing these words, fell down, and gave up the ghost. And there came great fear upon all that heard it. And the young men rising up, removed him, and carrying him out, buried him. And it was about the space of three hours after, when his wife, not knowing what had happened, came in. And Peter said to her: ‘Tell me, woman, whether you sold the land for so much?’ And she said: ‘Yes, for so much!’ And Peter said unto her: ‘Why have you agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord? Behold the feet of them who have buried your husband are at the door, and they shall carry you out!’ Immediately she fell down before his feet, and gave up the ghost. And the young men coming in, found her dead―and carried her out, and buried her by her husband. And there came great fear upon the whole Church, and upon all that heard these things” (Acts 5:1-11).
The bottom line in this area is this ― if the demons cannot prevent you from going to Confession, then they will try and make you confess your sins in a way that makes the confession invalid. The most common pathways are (1) hiding a mortal sin in confession through shame, (2) fudging, obfuscating, twisting, cosmetically coating, misrepresenting, leaving out details, cloaking the mortal sin in such a way as make a mortal sin seem like a serious venial sin; (3) not stating the correct number of times that you committed the sin―for example, saying “a few times” instead of saying “ten times”. Ten is much more than “a few”; or simply saying: “I’ve stolen things” without saying what value of things and how many times you stole; (4) or not being specific as to the KIND of sin you committed―for example, merely saying: “I’ve been impure!” hides the kind of impurity―for there are increasing degrees of gravity in impurity: (a) impure with oneself; (b) impure with another person; (c) impure with animals. As regards impurity with other persons, you have to make distinctions: (a) are you married or single; (b) was the other person married or single; (c) was the other person of the same sex or the opposite sex; (d) was the other person a minor/child; (e) was the other person a religious―monk, nun, etc.
There are certain sins that can the added gravity of being a sacrilege―for example stealing from a store is different to stealing from the church; impurity with a religious adds a sacrilegious aspect to the sin. Another “tactic” is trying to hide your mortal among a whole bunch of venial sins that you quickly rattle off. These are just some of the ways that the actual confessing of sins can lead to invalid confessions. Always be honest in confession―you might fool the priest; you might fool yourself; but you cannot fool God. God knows all about your sin―He wants YOU to know YOUR sins as they really are so that you can get to work at uprooting them from your life.
(3) Refusal or neglect in amending one’s life with regard to the mortal sins that have been confessed.
“The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Our Lord Himself warned: “I came to call sinners to penance! … Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3). God Himself, in the Old Testament, says: “The soul that sins, the same shall die! … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment, and justice―then living he shall live, and shall not die! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done. Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? … Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities: and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:20-28).
Penance includes amendment of life. This is another “stumbling-block” or “pit-fall” in making good (valid) confessions. There are too many Catholics who use the confessional like a revolving door―always going and coming out, going back in and coming back out, in again and out again, confessing the same old mortal sins time and time again!
If a person does not take practical steps to avoid falling back into the mortal sins they have confessed, then the confession is invalid due to presumed lack of FIRM purpose of amendment. When a particular kind of mortal sin becomes increasingly repetitive and habitual, then one has to question whether or not there is a FIRM purpose of amendment. A FIRM purpose of amendment is far superior to a VAGUE purpose of amendment. A VAGUE purpose of amendment will merely say: “Oh, I’ve really got to stop doing this!” and will go no further. Whereas a FIRM purpose of amendment will go beyond saying: “I’ve got to stop doing this!” and will carefully analyze why these sins are being committed and will take concrete measures and practical plans to avoid the occasions of that particular sin―it goes beyond mere wishful thinking. The VAGUE purpose of amendment resides in the mind or intellect alone. The FIRM purpose of amendment is not only in the mind or intellect, but it then transfers itself to the heart or will, and puts the plans of the mind into practice.
(4) Hatred of God or Neighbor.
Moral Theology tells us that deep hatred is a mortal sin―whether it be hatred of God or neighbor. “Hatred, whether of dislike or of enmity, is from its nature a mortal sin, since it is directly opposed to the virtue of charity, which is the life of the soul. Dislike, if enmity is not joined to it, is rarely in fact a mortal sin. Aversions and antipathies for others usually are either indeliberate, or have to do with what are real or fancied defects in others. Dislike is a mortal sin only when one despises another so much that one deliberately loathes even that which is of divine provenance [God given qualities] in the other, or dislikes a real imperfection so immoderately as to inflict serious injury―for example, by refusing pardon, or the common signs of charity, by giving grave scandal, etc. Enmity in fact is often only a venial sin, either because one wishes only a small harm. Enmity is a mortal sin, however, when one deliberately wishes a grave evil to one’s neighbor.” (Fr. John McHugh, O.P. & Fr. Charles Callan, O.P., Moral Theology―A Complete Course Based on St. Thomas Aquinas, §1312 to §1319).
(5) Refusal to Forgive the Sins of Others.
Our Lord is clear on this point: “Forgive, and you shall be forgiven!” (Luke 6:37). “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). “For if you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). “If you will not forgive, neither will your Father that is in Heaven, forgive you your sins” (Mark 11:26). Sometimes we fall into a false sense of righteous indignation with regard to the sins of others―forgetting that we ourselves are also sinners! Our Lord put it this way: “Why do you see the splinter that is in your brother’s eye; but cannot see the plank that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother: ‘Let me remove the splinter out of your eye!’ ― and behold there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite! First cast out the plank from your own eye, and then you shall be able to see in order to cast out the splinter from your brother’s eye!” (Matthew 7:3-5).
Moral Theology has this to say on the matter: “Whether an offender asks pardon or not, one is obliged to forgive the offense―that is, to put aside all aversion, indignation and hatred: ‘Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us’ (Matthew 6:12). But, granting that one desires salvation for the offender as for others, shows the common signs of charity, and is not prompted by hatred, the following are not required: (a) that one so pardon the offense as to take the offender back to the same special friendship as may have existed before; (b) that one overlook an injury so as not to require satisfaction (and hence, without acting against charity, Gaia may insist on an apology from Claudia for the disrespectful language used by the latter); and (c) that one renounce restitution or reparation for damage done one. If there is no other way of securing one’s rights, one may have recourse to court. If the result of prosecution will be punishment of the offender rather than restitution (as in case of libel or slander), it is not uncharitable to prosecute the offender, if one’s motive is the fulfillment of justice, the prevention of the same wrong to others, or the honor of one’s family (Leviticus 19:17).
“There are cases, however, in which charity requires one to forgive a debt of satisfaction or restitution, namely, when this would impose too heavy a burden on the offender, compared with the benefit that would be derived therefrom. (a) Thus, restitution should not be insisted on, when the offender is repentant and can ill afford to pay the debt, and the party offended can easily get along without the payment. (b) Punishment should not be insisted on, if the harm done the offender or his family will be out of proportion to any good that may result. (c) Prosecution should not be used, if a wrong can be amicably adjusted out of court” (Fr. John McHugh, O.P. & Fr. Charles Callan, O.P., Moral Theology―A Complete Course Based on St. Thomas Aquinas, §1200 to §1201).
Merciless Modernity
Unfortunately, we are living in a time of increasing mercilessness. Mercy is a property of charity―and Our Lord warned that in the end times of the world (which Our Lady of Fatima indicated we have already entered) the charity of many would grow cold―and, consequently, mercy will grow cold too: “The disciples came to Jesus privately, saying: ‘Tell us when shall these things be? And what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the consummation of the world?’ And Jesus answering, said to them: ‘Many will come in My name saying, “I am Christ!” and they will seduce many. And you shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. These things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom! Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death―and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake. Then shall many be scandalized and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold!’” (Matthew 24:3-12).
Today, Christ is increasingly abandoned and even hated. Virtue is seen as being a vice―and vice is being touted as a virtue! Christian values are increasingly been seen as ‘sinful’―while truly sinful values replace them. To hate and speak out against sin is increasingly becoming a crime―but to hate and speak out against Christianity is permissible. Standing up for Christ and the Commandments is looked up as being unacceptable bigotry (narrow-mindedness, discrimination, bias)―while defending sinfulness is increasingly acceptable.
We all want mercy, but we often ignore the thing that attracts mercy like a magnet! What is it that you will want most of all on your deathbed, or as you are dying due to an accident, or a crime, or any other cause of death? Will you want one last drink? One last cigarette? One last joke? Your favorite snack or meal? Whether they admit it or not―everyone will desire mercy. Mercy comes to us by many different roads―but all those roads lead back to the source of mercy, which is God Himself. Who or what is God? “God is charity” (1 John 4:8)―and the greatest work of this God of charity, or charitable God is the work of mercy: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all; and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9).
The God of charity―Our Lord Jesus Christ―commands us: “Love one another, as I have loved you!” (John 13:34). “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you! Abide in My love!” (John 15:9) … “By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another!” (John 13:35).
Love attracts mercy―as Our Lord Himself said of St. Mary Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her because she has loved much!” (Luke 7:47). Those words are echoed elsewhere in Holy Scripture: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). “Above all things have charity, which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:14).
The Love of Magdalen Wins Mercy
Let us start with one whom we all know better than most—Mary Magdalen, who became St. Mary Magdalen. Who was she? What was she? What had she done? Mary Magdalen was the sister of Martha and Lazarus (whom Jesus raised from the dead). She is usually thought of as the second-most important woman in the New Testament, after Mary, the Mother of Jesus. Mary Magdalene traveled with Jesus as one of His followers. She was present at Jesus’ two most important moments: the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. Within the four Gospels, the oldest historical record mentioning her name, she is named at least 12 times, more than most of the Apostles. The Gospel references describe her as courageous, brave enough to stand by Jesus in His hours of suffering, death and beyond. That is the non-shocking side of Mary Magdalen.
Yet the Gospels tell us that she was a great sinner, as well as being possessed by seven devils! In the New Testament she is mentioned among the women who accompanied Christ and ministered to Him (Luke 8:2-3), where it is also said that seven devils had been cast out of her (Mark 16:9). “And it came to pass afterwards, that Jesus traveled through the cities and towns, preaching and evangelizing the Kingdom of God; and the Twelve with Him; and certain women, who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities; and Mary, who is called Magdalen, out of whom seven devils were gone forth; … and many others who ministered unto Him of their substance.” (Luke 8:1-2). St. Mark mentions her after the Resurrection of Jesus, saying: “Jesus, rising early the first day of the week, appeared first to Mary Magdalen, out of whom He had cast seven devils” (Mark 16:9). The seven devils, removed from her by Jesus, gradually came to symbolize the Seven Capital Sins (also known as the Seven Deadly Sins), and Mary Magdalene began to be condemned, not only for lust, but for pride, covetousness, and all the remaining Capital Sins as well. (read more here)
What was Jesus’ reaction to Mary? One would imagine—like Simon the Pharisee at the banquet—that Jesus “would not touch her with a barge-pole”! Simon the Pharisee was thinking within himself, as Mary was tearfully washing the feet of Jesus: “The Pharisee, who had invited him, seeing it, spoke within himself, saying: ‘This man, if He were a prophet, would know surely who and what manner of woman this is that touches Him, that she is a sinner!’” (Luke 7:39). Yet the Gospel of St. John says: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). Neither did the Blessed Virgin Mary exclude Magdalen from her entourage and company. Jesus was able to read the thoughts of the judgmental and condemning Simon the Pharisee. “And Jesus answering, said to him: ‘Simon, I have something to say to you!’ But Simon said: ‘Master, say it!’ Jesus said: ‘A certain creditor had two debtors―the one who owed five hundred pence, and the other owed fifty. And whereas they had not wherewith to pay, he forgave them both. Which, therefore, of the two loved him most?’ Simon, answering, said: ‘I suppose that he to whom he forgave most!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘You have judged rightly!’ And turning to the woman [Mary Magdalen], Jesus said to Simon: ‘Do you see this woman? I entered into your house, and you gave Me no water for My feet―but she with tears has washed My feet, and with her hairs has wiped them! You gave Me no kiss―but she, since she came in, has not ceased to kiss My feet! You did not anoint My head with oil; but she has anointed My feet with ointment! Wherefore I say to you: Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much! But to whom less is forgiven, he loves less!’ And Jesus said to her: ‘Thy sins are forgiven thee!’” (Luke 7:40-48).
Many sins were forgiven her, because she loved much. Those who love less, have less forgiveness: “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9). “He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity!” (1 John 4:8). What is it to love God? “If you love Me, keep My commandments! As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you. Abide in My love! If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love―as I also have kept My Father’s commandments, and do abide in His love!” (John 14:15; 15:9-10).
Vicious Circle or Victorious Circle?
Sin, which is a hatred of God, could be said to be a “vicious circle” ― whereas love of God is the opposite. A vicious circle is a chain of events in which the response to one difficulty creates a new problem that aggravates the original difficulty. Lower profits can lead to spending cuts which can cause lower production, which causes falling sales, which creates even lower profits―thus creating a vicious circle. Another example, your arm or leg or back is itching, so you start to scratch the part that itches. Scratching an itch causes minor pain which distracts you from the itch, but scratching also prompts the brain to release serotonin, which reacts with body receptors on neurons that carry itch signals to the brain, making itching worse―thus serotonin drives the vicious circle of itching and scratching. This is how one sin leads to another sin―or how venial sin progressively leads to mortal sin.
Jesus hates sin, but He does not hate sinners―He says of Himself: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). Mary Magdalen is an example of a great sinner, who was in clutches of the devil through sin and possession: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Jesus did not cast her aside―but He cast the devils out of her: “Mary Magdalen, out of whom He had cast seven devils” (Mark 16:9). Would we do what Jesus did? Would we love Mary as Jesus did? No, because we have nowhere near the amount of mercy that He had and still has!
Just as sin easily leads to further sin―likewise, charity can lead to increased charity. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange states: “St. Augustine commenting on chapter 5 of St. John’s Gospel, writes: ‘Charity merits increase, that being increased, it may also merit to be perfected.’ … By any act of charity, a man merits an increase of grace and eternal life … It will be forthcoming when he performs a more fervent act of charity … The charity of Christ dying on the cross was more pleasing to God than all the sins of men taken together were displeasing” (Commentary on the Summa Theologica of St. Thomas).
Mercy is a subsection of charity. “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) “and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalms 144:9). When we show mercy, we imitate God. When we show mercy, we show our charity. When we show charity, we show that we are the children of God. Our Lord says: “By this shall all men know that you are My disciples―if you have love one for another” (John 13:35). Holy Scripture adds: “If any man says, I love God, and hates his brother―then he is a liar! For he that loves not his brother, whom he can see, how can he love God Whom he sees not?” (1 John 4:20). “Be ye kind one to another; merciful, forgiving one another, even as God hath forgiven you in Christ!” (Ephesians 4:32). “Forgive thy neighbor if he has hurt thee―and then shall thy sins be forgiven to thee when thou prayest” (Ecclesiasticus 28:2). “Judge not, and you shall not be judged! Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned! Forgive, and you shall be forgiven!” (Luke 6:37). “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). “But judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy!” (James 2:13). “For if you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). “If you will not forgive, neither will your Father that is in Heaven, forgive you your sins” (Mark 11:26).
Obstacles to Receiving Mercy
It is blatantly obvious that most souls fail to receive the mercy of God―since most souls end up being damned, even Catholic souls. Why? There are several possible factors―though only God knows the state and circumstances of each and every individual soul. What is that damns? Only one thing―mortal sin. You would think that the knowledge of that would be enough to make every person avoid mortal sin like the plague! Yet most souls are damned!
Some of the chief causes of damnation―and consequently missing out on mercy―are as follows:
(1) Insufficient sorrow for mortal sins committed.
(2) False or invalid confession of mortal sins committed.
(3) Refusal or neglect in amending one’s life with regard to the mortal sins that have been confessed.
(4) Hatred of God or neighbor.
(5) Refusal to forgive the sins of others.
There are more―but these will suffice for the purpose of this article.
(1) Insufficient sorrow for mortal sins committed.
“The sorrow that is according to God works penance, steadfast unto salvation; but the sorrow of the world works death” (2 Corinthians 7:10). Since the end of the Second World War in 1945, one pope after another―even the Liberal and Modernist popes―have complained about the loss of the sense of sin in the world, even the Catholic world.
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Today, it is very rarely taught―in the home, in the school and from the pulpit in church―that “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
We have all encountered the child who is told by its parents to say “Sorry!” to someone they have hurt―the child reluctantly and begrudgingly says “Sorry!” but you can tell that it is just coming from the lips and not the heart. As Our Lord said: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8) ― the same is true in the confessional: people want to be forgiven, but they are not really sorry for their sins. When they say the Act of Contrition, one has to wonder how much is coming from the lips and how much from the heart!
How much sorrow is sorrow? Sorrow―like so many other things in life, such as intelligence or love―ranges from minimal sorrow to maximum sorrow. Not wishing that any soul be damned (though most souls still manage to damn themselves), God is willing to accept a minimal sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession. This minimal sorrow is called “attrition.” The maximum sorrow is called “contrition”. The earliest meaning of the English word “attrition” that relates to spiritual repentance, was borrowed from the figurative meaning of the medieval Latin “attrition”, meaning “hardship, tribulation.” Thus “attrition” for sin is the sorrow that is based upon fear of the “hardships and tribulations” that are a punishment for sin. Hence the Act of Contrition begins by saying: “O my God, I am sorry for having offended Thee because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell.” God is willing to accept this minimal sorrow that fears God and His punishments―but we were created not just to fear God, but more importantly to love God! “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). That is why the Act of Contrition evolves from being sorry “because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell” into saying: “But most of all because they [my sins] offend Thee, my God, Who art all good and deserving of all my love.”
Our relationship with God should grow from an initial fear of God to a love of God: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18). You can take this a stage further and say: “Perfect charity casts out mortal and venial sin―and all the punishments that are due to those sins.” Perfect contrition springs from the perfect love of God. When our love is imperfect, then we think principally of ourselves; whereas, if it is perfect, we think principally of God. Our contrition will be perfect when we repent of our sins through the perfect love of God. Much the same way as a child is imperfectly sorry for some fault when it fears a thrashing. Whereas a child repenting of a fault can be said to have perfect sorrow when it grieves at having offended its parents, who are so good and loving, and have done so much for it.
After St. Peter denied Jesus, he thought of his sin, and, “going out, wept bitterly.” Why did he weep? Perhaps for the shame he would feel in front of the other Apostles? If this was the reason, then his sorrow was purely natural and without merit for Heaven. Perhaps he feared being deprived of his dignity as an Apostle and Prince of the Apostles, or perhaps he feared losing Heaven. These certainly would be more worthy motives, but still his sorrow would be imperfect. No! Peter wept and repented because he had offended his beloved Master, Who was so good, so holy, so worthy of his love; he wept because he had repaid that love with the blackest ingratitude―and, as a consequence, his contrition was perfect, his sin was forgiven. With this golden key of perfect contrition he had again reopened the doors of Heaven, which he had closed a moment before by his triple denial.
The word “contrition” comes from the Latin “contritus”, meaning “to grind, to crush, to pound to pieces” ― in this sense, true sorrow, maximum sorrow, the best sorrow is one that is based upon love, not fear―a love that sees the heart “crushed” and “pounded into pieces” because of its sins against God and neighbor. We speak of “a perfect act of contrition” ― but we must not naively imagine that there is only one single degree of perfect contrition. To better understand this, you can compare perfect contrition to the saints―all the saints are perfect for they are in Heaven, and you only get to go to Heaven when you have been perfected―either while living on Earth, or in the fires of Purgatory. Yet none of the saints have the same degree of perfection―even though all are perfect! So you can always improve your perfect act of contrition because you can always grow in love and grow in sanctifying grace. There comes a point when your perfect act of contrition becomes so perfect that it takes away, not only all guilt for sin (which is what Confession does), but it will also take away all temporal punishment due to sin―so that if you die having made a perfect act of contrition, then you would go straight to Heaven, totally bypassing Purgatory!
Satan despises sorrow for sin―especially sorrow for sin out of love for God. The reason is that demons have no sorrow for their sin and they have no love for God―and they despise seeing us reconciled with God by sorrow for sin, especially a sorrow for sin based upon love. They will do all they can to prevent from having the right kind of sorrow for sin―and will try lead us down the path of counterfeit contrition and false sorrow―which ultimately is path to Hell. This is perhaps one of the most common failures that lead to invalid confessions. Sorrow for sin must be supernatural. It is insufficient to be sorry because we have be “found out”; or because we now “look bad” in the eyes of others; or have lost our reputation; lost our job; lost privileges; lost friendships; etc. All these are natural motives that fall short of the supernatural motives required for sorrow―the bare minimum being fear of God’s just punishments.
(2) False or invalid confession of mortal sins committed.
We should take heed and tremble at what happened to Ananias and Saphira when they lied to St. Peter about the price at which they sold their land and thereby give less money to the community and keep more money for themselves: “A certain man named Ananias, with Saphira his wife, sold a piece of land, and by fraud kept back part of the price of the land, his wife being privy thereunto: and bringing only a certain part of it, laid it at the feet of the Apostles. But Peter said: ‘Ananias, why has Satan tempted your heart, that you should lie to the Holy Ghost, and by fraud keep part of the price of the land? Whilst it remained, did it not remain in your possession? And after it was sold, was it not in your power? Why have you conceived this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God!’ And Ananias hearing these words, fell down, and gave up the ghost. And there came great fear upon all that heard it. And the young men rising up, removed him, and carrying him out, buried him. And it was about the space of three hours after, when his wife, not knowing what had happened, came in. And Peter said to her: ‘Tell me, woman, whether you sold the land for so much?’ And she said: ‘Yes, for so much!’ And Peter said unto her: ‘Why have you agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord? Behold the feet of them who have buried your husband are at the door, and they shall carry you out!’ Immediately she fell down before his feet, and gave up the ghost. And the young men coming in, found her dead―and carried her out, and buried her by her husband. And there came great fear upon the whole Church, and upon all that heard these things” (Acts 5:1-11).
The bottom line in this area is this ― if the demons cannot prevent you from going to Confession, then they will try and make you confess your sins in a way that makes the confession invalid. The most common pathways are (1) hiding a mortal sin in confession through shame, (2) fudging, obfuscating, twisting, cosmetically coating, misrepresenting, leaving out details, cloaking the mortal sin in such a way as make a mortal sin seem like a serious venial sin; (3) not stating the correct number of times that you committed the sin―for example, saying “a few times” instead of saying “ten times”. Ten is much more than “a few”; or simply saying: “I’ve stolen things” without saying what value of things and how many times you stole; (4) or not being specific as to the KIND of sin you committed―for example, merely saying: “I’ve been impure!” hides the kind of impurity―for there are increasing degrees of gravity in impurity: (a) impure with oneself; (b) impure with another person; (c) impure with animals. As regards impurity with other persons, you have to make distinctions: (a) are you married or single; (b) was the other person married or single; (c) was the other person of the same sex or the opposite sex; (d) was the other person a minor/child; (e) was the other person a religious―monk, nun, etc.
There are certain sins that can the added gravity of being a sacrilege―for example stealing from a store is different to stealing from the church; impurity with a religious adds a sacrilegious aspect to the sin. Another “tactic” is trying to hide your mortal among a whole bunch of venial sins that you quickly rattle off. These are just some of the ways that the actual confessing of sins can lead to invalid confessions. Always be honest in confession―you might fool the priest; you might fool yourself; but you cannot fool God. God knows all about your sin―He wants YOU to know YOUR sins as they really are so that you can get to work at uprooting them from your life.
(3) Refusal or neglect in amending one’s life with regard to the mortal sins that have been confessed.
“The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Our Lord Himself warned: “I came to call sinners to penance! … Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3). God Himself, in the Old Testament, says: “The soul that sins, the same shall die! … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment, and justice―then living he shall live, and shall not die! I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done. Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? … Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities: and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:20-28).
Penance includes amendment of life. This is another “stumbling-block” or “pit-fall” in making good (valid) confessions. There are too many Catholics who use the confessional like a revolving door―always going and coming out, going back in and coming back out, in again and out again, confessing the same old mortal sins time and time again!
If a person does not take practical steps to avoid falling back into the mortal sins they have confessed, then the confession is invalid due to presumed lack of FIRM purpose of amendment. When a particular kind of mortal sin becomes increasingly repetitive and habitual, then one has to question whether or not there is a FIRM purpose of amendment. A FIRM purpose of amendment is far superior to a VAGUE purpose of amendment. A VAGUE purpose of amendment will merely say: “Oh, I’ve really got to stop doing this!” and will go no further. Whereas a FIRM purpose of amendment will go beyond saying: “I’ve got to stop doing this!” and will carefully analyze why these sins are being committed and will take concrete measures and practical plans to avoid the occasions of that particular sin―it goes beyond mere wishful thinking. The VAGUE purpose of amendment resides in the mind or intellect alone. The FIRM purpose of amendment is not only in the mind or intellect, but it then transfers itself to the heart or will, and puts the plans of the mind into practice.
(4) Hatred of God or Neighbor.
Moral Theology tells us that deep hatred is a mortal sin―whether it be hatred of God or neighbor. “Hatred, whether of dislike or of enmity, is from its nature a mortal sin, since it is directly opposed to the virtue of charity, which is the life of the soul. Dislike, if enmity is not joined to it, is rarely in fact a mortal sin. Aversions and antipathies for others usually are either indeliberate, or have to do with what are real or fancied defects in others. Dislike is a mortal sin only when one despises another so much that one deliberately loathes even that which is of divine provenance [God given qualities] in the other, or dislikes a real imperfection so immoderately as to inflict serious injury―for example, by refusing pardon, or the common signs of charity, by giving grave scandal, etc. Enmity in fact is often only a venial sin, either because one wishes only a small harm. Enmity is a mortal sin, however, when one deliberately wishes a grave evil to one’s neighbor.” (Fr. John McHugh, O.P. & Fr. Charles Callan, O.P., Moral Theology―A Complete Course Based on St. Thomas Aquinas, §1312 to §1319).
(5) Refusal to Forgive the Sins of Others.
Our Lord is clear on this point: “Forgive, and you shall be forgiven!” (Luke 6:37). “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). “For if you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). “If you will not forgive, neither will your Father that is in Heaven, forgive you your sins” (Mark 11:26). Sometimes we fall into a false sense of righteous indignation with regard to the sins of others―forgetting that we ourselves are also sinners! Our Lord put it this way: “Why do you see the splinter that is in your brother’s eye; but cannot see the plank that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother: ‘Let me remove the splinter out of your eye!’ ― and behold there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite! First cast out the plank from your own eye, and then you shall be able to see in order to cast out the splinter from your brother’s eye!” (Matthew 7:3-5).
Moral Theology has this to say on the matter: “Whether an offender asks pardon or not, one is obliged to forgive the offense―that is, to put aside all aversion, indignation and hatred: ‘Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us’ (Matthew 6:12). But, granting that one desires salvation for the offender as for others, shows the common signs of charity, and is not prompted by hatred, the following are not required: (a) that one so pardon the offense as to take the offender back to the same special friendship as may have existed before; (b) that one overlook an injury so as not to require satisfaction (and hence, without acting against charity, Gaia may insist on an apology from Claudia for the disrespectful language used by the latter); and (c) that one renounce restitution or reparation for damage done one. If there is no other way of securing one’s rights, one may have recourse to court. If the result of prosecution will be punishment of the offender rather than restitution (as in case of libel or slander), it is not uncharitable to prosecute the offender, if one’s motive is the fulfillment of justice, the prevention of the same wrong to others, or the honor of one’s family (Leviticus 19:17).
“There are cases, however, in which charity requires one to forgive a debt of satisfaction or restitution, namely, when this would impose too heavy a burden on the offender, compared with the benefit that would be derived therefrom. (a) Thus, restitution should not be insisted on, when the offender is repentant and can ill afford to pay the debt, and the party offended can easily get along without the payment. (b) Punishment should not be insisted on, if the harm done the offender or his family will be out of proportion to any good that may result. (c) Prosecution should not be used, if a wrong can be amicably adjusted out of court” (Fr. John McHugh, O.P. & Fr. Charles Callan, O.P., Moral Theology―A Complete Course Based on St. Thomas Aquinas, §1200 to §1201).
Merciless Modernity
Unfortunately, we are living in a time of increasing mercilessness. Mercy is a property of charity―and Our Lord warned that in the end times of the world (which Our Lady of Fatima indicated we have already entered) the charity of many would grow cold―and, consequently, mercy will grow cold too: “The disciples came to Jesus privately, saying: ‘Tell us when shall these things be? And what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the consummation of the world?’ And Jesus answering, said to them: ‘Many will come in My name saying, “I am Christ!” and they will seduce many. And you shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. These things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom! Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death―and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake. Then shall many be scandalized and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold!’” (Matthew 24:3-12).
Today, Christ is increasingly abandoned and even hated. Virtue is seen as being a vice―and vice is being touted as a virtue! Christian values are increasingly been seen as ‘sinful’―while truly sinful values replace them. To hate and speak out against sin is increasingly becoming a crime―but to hate and speak out against Christianity is permissible. Standing up for Christ and the Commandments is looked up as being unacceptable bigotry (narrow-mindedness, discrimination, bias)―while defending sinfulness is increasingly acceptable.
Article 8
Saturday & Sunday, June 8th & 9th
Heart of Mercy
Saturday & Sunday, June 8th & 9th
Heart of Mercy
What Am I Adoring?
What exactly are we doing by venerating the Heart of Jesus? We should form an accurate and clear idea of the object and purpose of the devotion to the Sacred Heart, that is to say, of what exactly do we intend to worship in and by this devotion.
Is it just His Heart?
It is obvious that by the homage which we give to the Heart of Jesus, is not just for His Heart alone, but that we intend to honor, and we really do honor, Jesus Himself, the Person of Christ, with all that He is and all that He has. When we pay honor to a portion of the body of a person, we wish to render this homage to the person himself; for instance, when we kiss the hand or ring of a bishop, we intend to address this mark of respect to the bishop himself, and not just his hand or his ring.
We find this principle formulated in St. Thomas (Summa Theologica, III, q. 25, art. 1): “Honor is, properly speaking, rendered to the entire person. Even when we honor the foot or the hand of a person, we do not venerate these parts in themselves, but only by reason of the entire person to whom they belong.”
So it is also with regard to the Heart of Jesus. Pope Leo XIII, in his Encyclical Annum Sacrum (§10), recalls the fact: “All homage of love paid to the Divine Heart is really and properly addressed to Christ Himself.” Hence, the Person of Jesus is the ultimate object of devotion to the Sacred Heart.
Christ may also be said to be the general object of devotion to the Divine Heart. Indeed, all the devotions which honor one of the mysteries of the Life of our Lord, or some part of His Sacred Body, have for their common object His Divine Person. When, for instance, we venerate His sacred Wounds, or celebrate His Birth, His Resurrection, His Ascension, it is always the Divine Person of the Word Incarnate who receives the homage of our adoration and love.
We Honor the Person, Not Just the Part
But, although the Person of Jesus is but the ultimate and general object of the devotion, He is nevertheless also its principal object: for, by the homage which we pay to some part or to some quality of a person, it is his whole person whom we aim at, and whom we want to honor. The homage paid to the part or the quality is but the means; to give honor or homage to the person is its end or goal.
We Adore His Love and Mercy
But the question is: What distinguishes devotion to the Sacred Heart from all other devotions which have Jesus for their common object? What is its special and direct object? Our Lord Himself indicated this in His apparitions to St. Margaret Mary, especially in the fourth, called the “Great Apparition”. To what did He draw attention in the first place? To the Heart that beats in His breast: “Discovering to me His Heart, He said to me: ‘Behold this Heart ...’” And what did He declare concerning this Heart? That It ineffably loves us and is sensible to the manner in which men repay Its love: “Behold this Heart which has so loved men. ... And in return I receive from the greater part of them nothing but ingratitude.” And what did He demand for this Heart? “Therefore I ask of you that the first Friday after the octave of Corpus Christi be dedicated to a special feast in honor of My Heart.”
From this it appears that the special object of the devotion asked for by Our Lord is His Heart: His Heart which loves us and complains of the neglect of Its love. It is in this way that most people understand the devotion; what they wish to honor is the Heart of Jesus, and this because It loves us and because Its love is despised.
God is Love
St. John tells us that God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). The heart is also a symbol of love—we see it widely used as such in our present day images, where the heart replaces the word “love” in slogans and bumper stickers! That the two—the word and the image—be united is something that even stems from Holy Scripture: “From a sincere heart love one another” (1 Peter 1:22), “love Him with all your heart” (Deuteronomy 13:3).
Mercy Stands With Love
Love is the pinnacle of all virtues—“the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13) —and as such it deserves to be honored above all the others. Therefore, in Our Lord, we honor and adore His Sacred Heart which is the seat of His love for mankind. Mercy is a property or a child of love. St. Thomas Aquinas deals of Mercy under his section on Charity. As Psalm 144 says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all; and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). The Sacred Heart is all about those two pinnacles within God—His Love and His Mercy.
God’s Mercies Are Above All His Works
St. Thomas Aquinas says that Mercy is in itself the greatest of virtues, and it is said of God that “His Mercies are above all His works.” But, among creatures, Mercy (compassion shown to neighbor) is not so great a virtue as Charity (love shown to God), and, without Charity, Mercy would be wholly ineffective—“if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:3). However, St. Thomas says that Mercy ranks next to Charity itself, and, of the purely social virtues, Mercy is the greatest.
Our Lady is the Mother of Mercy
If “His Mercies are above all His works”, then what of Our Lady? Is she not the masterpiece of God? His greatest work? Yes she is! And that fits it in perfectly with the notion of mercy being the greatest of God’s works, for Mary is the Mother of Mercy! To whom shall we go for an assurance of salvation if not to her who, in order to save us, offered both her Only‑Begotten and herself to the cruel death of the Cross?
“It is not near the Cross,” says St. Bernard, “that Mary is found but on it, nailed to its beams as Jesus is.” She loves us with the same love she has for her Firstborn, and the double‑edged sword that pierced his Heart, opened wide her Heart, that it might be the refuge to sinners to the end of time, and the gate to Heaven for those who hope in her. Her love embraces every child of Adam and there is no power that will snatch a soul from her protecting love.
She was made to be the Mother of Mercy, and her mission, on Earth and in Heaven, is not to judge, but to show mercy and to open her pierced Heart wider and wider to the poor banished children of Eve, who cry to her for help. The Eternal Father made her “full of grace,” that her love might bestow it where justice would deny it. As St. Bernard says: “She is impetuous in mercy, she is resistless in mercy. The duration of her mercy is unto the end of the sinner’s life. The broadness of her mercy is unto the limits of the Earth. The height of her mercy is unto Heaven. The depth of her mercy is unto the lowest abyss of sin and sorrow—she is always merciful, she is only merciful. She is our Mother of Mercy.”
It Is All About Sin and Mercy
Ultimately, our relationship with God is all about mercy. Sin―both mortal and venial―is the greatest evil in the world and thus deserves the greatest punishment. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Both mortal and venial sin are punishable by death―and mortal sin is further punished by damnation in Hell. Adam and Eve were warned that disobedience to God would bring about their death: “Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!” (Genesis 2:16-17). Adam and Eve disobeyed God and death entered the world: “By one man sin entered into this world, and, by sin, death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned! … Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:12, 21). “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15). “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56).
We have all sinned―not one of us can pretend that we haven’t sinned. Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and do need the glory [mercy and grace) of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Why is sin the greatest evil in the world? It is the greatest evil because it strikes at and offends the greatest good―which is God. Sin is measured in two ways―(a) it is measured by the gravity of sinful thought, word, action or omission; and (b) it is measured by the dignity of the person who we sin against.
We all know that stealing is sinful―and that stealing $1,000 is more sinful than stealing $10. We all know impurity is mortally sinful―but being impure by yourself is not as serious as being impure with someone else; impurity with an unmarried person is not as serious as impurity with a married person; impurity with someone who is a Priest or a Religious is far worse than impurity with the secular persons, etc.
What we often fail to realize is that the gravity of sin is also increased the more dignified a person happens to be. For example, to punch a stranger in the face is serious, but it is more serious to punch your mother or father in the face. Worse still would be to punch a priest in the face; worse still if it is a bishop; worse still if it is a pope, etc. Yet all these persons are finite persons and their dignity is finite. God, however, is an infinite Being and every sin against God therefore becomes an infinite offence, which merits an infinite punishment. We are merely finite creatures, yet by each of our sins against God we have committed an infinite offense and contracted an infinite debt. Being finite creatures, we cannot pay an infinite debt―only an infinite Being can pay an infinite debt. The only infinite Being is God. However, the debt for sin is a human debt. Therefore it requires an infinite Being that is also a human being―which, of course, is Jesus Christ, Who is both God and man.
The Incarnation is God’s Act of Mercy
Mercy is not something to which we have an automatic right. Mercy, like grace, is an undeserved favor. There is nothing in us that forces or obliges God to show us mercy. Mercy is a totally optional and freely given gift of God that no human being merits of their own accord. “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy; and I will show mercy to whom I will show mercy!” (Romans 9:15). A holy and perfect God doesn’t have to be merciful. He could administer His justice daily according to His laws and be perfect and holy. Yet God’s mercy exceeds our expectations. His compassion and forgiveness are over the top. “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9).
“God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son” (John 3:16). “He that spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all” (Romans 8:32). “He is the propitiation for our sins―and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world” (1 John 2:2). “God shows His charity towards us; because when as yet we were sinners, Christ died for us … When we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son … being now justified by His Blood” (Romans 5:8-10) “By this has the charity of God appeared towards us, not as though we had loved God fist, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins … God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him” (1 John 4:9-10).
Let Us Not Place Limits on God’s Mercy!
We tend to morph or transform God into our own idea of what God should be like! Big mistake! God will not be reduced to a limited God of our own making! God Himself says: “My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9). There are many instances in Holy Scripture where God’s mercy is at loggerheads with man’s notion of mercy. Here are just a few of them.
Paid For Doing Little or No Work?
Yet, talking of getting paid for doing no work, we have the following parable:
”The Kingdom of Heaven is like a householder, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner.
“But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’ And when evening was come, the lord of the vineyard said to his steward: Call the laborers and pay them their hire, beginning from the last even to the first. When therefore they were come, that came about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny. But when the first also came, they thought that they should receive more: and they also received every man a penny.
“And receiving it they murmured against the master of the house, saying: ‘These last have worked but one hour, and you have made them equal to us, that have borne the burden of the day and the heats!’ But he answering said to one of them: ‘Friend, I do you no wrong! Did you not agree with me for a penny? Take what is yours, and go your way! I will also give to this last the same as to you! Or, is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Is your eye evil, because I am good?’ So shall the last be first, and the first last. For many are called, but few chosen.” (Matthew 20:1-16).
If we substitute the monetary reward of a penny, for the reward of mercy, then Our Lord seems to say that He will given Heaven just as readily to those who have done little work (penance) as to those who have worked (done penance) all day long (all life-long). Even though Our Lord Himself tells this parable, we feel for and sympathize with the men who worked all day long and were only paid the same as those who had merely worked an hour! We feel as though they have been cheated in some way! Yet the crunch line is: “Is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Is your eye evil, because I am good?”
You Owe Me How Much??!!!
Another parable of even more incredible mercy is the parable about the Unjust Steward who was forgiven and released from an incredible debt (Matthew 18:23-34).
“The Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who would take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents. And as he had not wherewith to pay it, his lord commanded that he should be sold, and his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, besought him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all!’ And the lord of that servant being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt. But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence―and laying hold of him, he throttled him, saying: ‘Pay what you owe me! And his fellow servant falling down, besought him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all!’ And he would not―but went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“Now his fellow servants seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him; and said to him: ‘You wicked servant, I forgave you all the debt, because you did beseech me! Should not you then have had compassion also on your fellow servant, even as I had compassion on you?’ And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers until he paid all the debt” (Matthew 18:24-34).
We read that parable and much of its significance passes over our heads, because we are too superficial and too lazy to inquire further and find out the value of a talent and a penny. A talent was seven hundred and fifty ounces of silver and so ten thousand talents came to 7,500,000 (7½ million ounces). The Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver—so a hundred pence would be a mere 12½ ounces of silver compared to the larger debt of 7½ million ounces! Or for curious, at present day prices (around $30 for an ounce of silver) the difference would be a debt of $225 million to a debt of $375 (yes, a mere three-hundred and seventy-five dollars). Does that put some of our judgments and condemnations into perspective?
Our Lord is painting a striking picture here. With the forgiveness of the large debt, it encourages us in seeing that even very grave sins can be cured and forgiven—showing the extreme kindness of the God of mercy. On the other hand, we see that the God of Justice can also be very true to His word—“Judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy” (James 2:13). “For mercy and wrath are with Him. He is mighty to forgive, and to pour out indignation” (Ecclesiasticus 16:12).
That is the whole point of mercy—it is a gift, it is not deserved, it is not merited, it is not earned. Sin is not measured merely by what is done, but also by the dignity of the one who is sinned against or offended. God is an infinite being, and so sin is in an infinite offense. We are mere finite creatures and even though we commit an infinite offense by sinning against God, as finite creatures we cannot repay an infinite debt. If we are forgiven, then we receive something way beyond our means and resources. Furthermore, if we do repent and are forgiven, then it is not something that we have done, but merely a co-operation with the merciful gift of God’s grace that inspires, moves and brings to back to Him.
Stealing Mercy
In confession, no matter how many and how serious the sins may be—if they are properly confessed with the right dispositions and intentions—then the guilt for them is instantly taken away. There is no lengthy cure, but an instantaneous cure takes place. The ultimate cure for sin and punishment due to it was seen upon Calvary, as Jesus was dying alongside a thief called Dismas—whose fate was dismal—and who has gone down in the annals of history as “The Good Thief”―we could say that the “Good Thief” stole mercy and Heaven! After a life of theft and robbery—which, in those days, more often meant killing into the bargain—the ‘Bad’ Thief is made into a ‘Good’ Thief in an instant. He begs of Our Lord: “‘Lord! Remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in paradise!’” (Luke 23:42-43). We can be sure that many were scandalized by that promise of Jesus! But then we come back to crunch line again: “Is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Is thy eye evil, because I am good?”
Remission of Sin is not Permission for Sin
In regard to sin, mercy is remissive not permissive (meaning: remission of sins not permission to sin). Mercy pardons evils in order to remove them, get them out of the way (Psalm 51:1 “wipe away” sins), so that the communion of love, broken by sin, may be restored and estranged parties might be reconciled. Mercy never overlooks evil, but rather mercy heals, overcomes evil by restoring one harmed by evil to their originally God-intended goodness. Or to use an image dear to St. Gregory Nazianzus, sin covers the divine image over with muck and filth and mercy washes it clean so that it might shine in us again with all its brilliance in the life of virtue. “The Lord shall wash away the filth” (Isaias 4:4). One cannot receive mercy if they intend to continue sinning.
Mercy does not exempt us from paying for sin. Mercy is first and foremost applied to our guilt―yet in every sin there is both guilt and debt. That is why, in the Sacrament of Confession, when you receive God’s mercy in the forgiveness of your sins, you still have to do penance and thereby pay for your sins (at least in part).
Mercy is always free, but, once accepted, is never cheap, since one who receives it accepts with mercy the obligation to radically eradicate evil, radically here meaning that which is related to the Latin word radix, meaning “root,” since mercy uproots evil. Mercy is always costly when it is permitted to be what it is and achieve its end―since the eradication of evil demands total conversion from evil, which is always costly to the sinner. St. John of the Cross describes the excruciating process of purgation that God puts us through as He gives us His mercy in order to eradicate sin and its distorting effects within us and make us capable of receiving and giving divine selfless love.
Lastly, there is another cost to mercy: one who receives it must also in turn give it (Matthew 18:21-35.) In the Kingdom, you can’t give what you don’t have, but you also can’t have what you don’t give. St. Gregory again says, mercy shows itself having restored God’s image in us when we cheerfully practice almsgiving to the ungrateful, undeserving poor or joyfully do good to our nasty neighbor. Then we look just like God who showers His gifts on the undeserving: “Your Father, Who is in Heaven, makes His sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45). When we give alms to those in need―we do not, or should not, only give alms to those who are good persons: “Do good to them that hate you!” (Matthew 5:44). “Almsgiving” comes from the Latin alemosyna, which comes from the Greek eleemosyne, which stems from the Greek root noun, eleos, which we translate in Scripture as mercy. Kyrie eleison. So almsgiving is mercy-giving, returning to God by way of the poor and undeserving and ungrateful the same mercy we received (Matthew 5:7; 10:8).
Then there’s forgiving mercy. The Our Father contains that stunning conditional clause that should make the “forgiven” tremble, tremble, tremble: “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father also will forgive you; but if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. Nothing cheap there. And there are many other examples of this in the New Testament. Free, yes; cheap, never.
What exactly are we doing by venerating the Heart of Jesus? We should form an accurate and clear idea of the object and purpose of the devotion to the Sacred Heart, that is to say, of what exactly do we intend to worship in and by this devotion.
Is it just His Heart?
It is obvious that by the homage which we give to the Heart of Jesus, is not just for His Heart alone, but that we intend to honor, and we really do honor, Jesus Himself, the Person of Christ, with all that He is and all that He has. When we pay honor to a portion of the body of a person, we wish to render this homage to the person himself; for instance, when we kiss the hand or ring of a bishop, we intend to address this mark of respect to the bishop himself, and not just his hand or his ring.
We find this principle formulated in St. Thomas (Summa Theologica, III, q. 25, art. 1): “Honor is, properly speaking, rendered to the entire person. Even when we honor the foot or the hand of a person, we do not venerate these parts in themselves, but only by reason of the entire person to whom they belong.”
So it is also with regard to the Heart of Jesus. Pope Leo XIII, in his Encyclical Annum Sacrum (§10), recalls the fact: “All homage of love paid to the Divine Heart is really and properly addressed to Christ Himself.” Hence, the Person of Jesus is the ultimate object of devotion to the Sacred Heart.
Christ may also be said to be the general object of devotion to the Divine Heart. Indeed, all the devotions which honor one of the mysteries of the Life of our Lord, or some part of His Sacred Body, have for their common object His Divine Person. When, for instance, we venerate His sacred Wounds, or celebrate His Birth, His Resurrection, His Ascension, it is always the Divine Person of the Word Incarnate who receives the homage of our adoration and love.
We Honor the Person, Not Just the Part
But, although the Person of Jesus is but the ultimate and general object of the devotion, He is nevertheless also its principal object: for, by the homage which we pay to some part or to some quality of a person, it is his whole person whom we aim at, and whom we want to honor. The homage paid to the part or the quality is but the means; to give honor or homage to the person is its end or goal.
We Adore His Love and Mercy
But the question is: What distinguishes devotion to the Sacred Heart from all other devotions which have Jesus for their common object? What is its special and direct object? Our Lord Himself indicated this in His apparitions to St. Margaret Mary, especially in the fourth, called the “Great Apparition”. To what did He draw attention in the first place? To the Heart that beats in His breast: “Discovering to me His Heart, He said to me: ‘Behold this Heart ...’” And what did He declare concerning this Heart? That It ineffably loves us and is sensible to the manner in which men repay Its love: “Behold this Heart which has so loved men. ... And in return I receive from the greater part of them nothing but ingratitude.” And what did He demand for this Heart? “Therefore I ask of you that the first Friday after the octave of Corpus Christi be dedicated to a special feast in honor of My Heart.”
From this it appears that the special object of the devotion asked for by Our Lord is His Heart: His Heart which loves us and complains of the neglect of Its love. It is in this way that most people understand the devotion; what they wish to honor is the Heart of Jesus, and this because It loves us and because Its love is despised.
God is Love
St. John tells us that God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). The heart is also a symbol of love—we see it widely used as such in our present day images, where the heart replaces the word “love” in slogans and bumper stickers! That the two—the word and the image—be united is something that even stems from Holy Scripture: “From a sincere heart love one another” (1 Peter 1:22), “love Him with all your heart” (Deuteronomy 13:3).
Mercy Stands With Love
Love is the pinnacle of all virtues—“the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13) —and as such it deserves to be honored above all the others. Therefore, in Our Lord, we honor and adore His Sacred Heart which is the seat of His love for mankind. Mercy is a property or a child of love. St. Thomas Aquinas deals of Mercy under his section on Charity. As Psalm 144 says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all; and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). The Sacred Heart is all about those two pinnacles within God—His Love and His Mercy.
God’s Mercies Are Above All His Works
St. Thomas Aquinas says that Mercy is in itself the greatest of virtues, and it is said of God that “His Mercies are above all His works.” But, among creatures, Mercy (compassion shown to neighbor) is not so great a virtue as Charity (love shown to God), and, without Charity, Mercy would be wholly ineffective—“if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:3). However, St. Thomas says that Mercy ranks next to Charity itself, and, of the purely social virtues, Mercy is the greatest.
Our Lady is the Mother of Mercy
If “His Mercies are above all His works”, then what of Our Lady? Is she not the masterpiece of God? His greatest work? Yes she is! And that fits it in perfectly with the notion of mercy being the greatest of God’s works, for Mary is the Mother of Mercy! To whom shall we go for an assurance of salvation if not to her who, in order to save us, offered both her Only‑Begotten and herself to the cruel death of the Cross?
“It is not near the Cross,” says St. Bernard, “that Mary is found but on it, nailed to its beams as Jesus is.” She loves us with the same love she has for her Firstborn, and the double‑edged sword that pierced his Heart, opened wide her Heart, that it might be the refuge to sinners to the end of time, and the gate to Heaven for those who hope in her. Her love embraces every child of Adam and there is no power that will snatch a soul from her protecting love.
She was made to be the Mother of Mercy, and her mission, on Earth and in Heaven, is not to judge, but to show mercy and to open her pierced Heart wider and wider to the poor banished children of Eve, who cry to her for help. The Eternal Father made her “full of grace,” that her love might bestow it where justice would deny it. As St. Bernard says: “She is impetuous in mercy, she is resistless in mercy. The duration of her mercy is unto the end of the sinner’s life. The broadness of her mercy is unto the limits of the Earth. The height of her mercy is unto Heaven. The depth of her mercy is unto the lowest abyss of sin and sorrow—she is always merciful, she is only merciful. She is our Mother of Mercy.”
It Is All About Sin and Mercy
Ultimately, our relationship with God is all about mercy. Sin―both mortal and venial―is the greatest evil in the world and thus deserves the greatest punishment. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Both mortal and venial sin are punishable by death―and mortal sin is further punished by damnation in Hell. Adam and Eve were warned that disobedience to God would bring about their death: “Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!” (Genesis 2:16-17). Adam and Eve disobeyed God and death entered the world: “By one man sin entered into this world, and, by sin, death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned! … Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:12, 21). “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15). “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56).
We have all sinned―not one of us can pretend that we haven’t sinned. Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). “For all have sinned, and do need the glory [mercy and grace) of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Why is sin the greatest evil in the world? It is the greatest evil because it strikes at and offends the greatest good―which is God. Sin is measured in two ways―(a) it is measured by the gravity of sinful thought, word, action or omission; and (b) it is measured by the dignity of the person who we sin against.
We all know that stealing is sinful―and that stealing $1,000 is more sinful than stealing $10. We all know impurity is mortally sinful―but being impure by yourself is not as serious as being impure with someone else; impurity with an unmarried person is not as serious as impurity with a married person; impurity with someone who is a Priest or a Religious is far worse than impurity with the secular persons, etc.
What we often fail to realize is that the gravity of sin is also increased the more dignified a person happens to be. For example, to punch a stranger in the face is serious, but it is more serious to punch your mother or father in the face. Worse still would be to punch a priest in the face; worse still if it is a bishop; worse still if it is a pope, etc. Yet all these persons are finite persons and their dignity is finite. God, however, is an infinite Being and every sin against God therefore becomes an infinite offence, which merits an infinite punishment. We are merely finite creatures, yet by each of our sins against God we have committed an infinite offense and contracted an infinite debt. Being finite creatures, we cannot pay an infinite debt―only an infinite Being can pay an infinite debt. The only infinite Being is God. However, the debt for sin is a human debt. Therefore it requires an infinite Being that is also a human being―which, of course, is Jesus Christ, Who is both God and man.
The Incarnation is God’s Act of Mercy
Mercy is not something to which we have an automatic right. Mercy, like grace, is an undeserved favor. There is nothing in us that forces or obliges God to show us mercy. Mercy is a totally optional and freely given gift of God that no human being merits of their own accord. “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy; and I will show mercy to whom I will show mercy!” (Romans 9:15). A holy and perfect God doesn’t have to be merciful. He could administer His justice daily according to His laws and be perfect and holy. Yet God’s mercy exceeds our expectations. His compassion and forgiveness are over the top. “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9).
“God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son” (John 3:16). “He that spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all” (Romans 8:32). “He is the propitiation for our sins―and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world” (1 John 2:2). “God shows His charity towards us; because when as yet we were sinners, Christ died for us … When we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son … being now justified by His Blood” (Romans 5:8-10) “By this has the charity of God appeared towards us, not as though we had loved God fist, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins … God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him” (1 John 4:9-10).
Let Us Not Place Limits on God’s Mercy!
We tend to morph or transform God into our own idea of what God should be like! Big mistake! God will not be reduced to a limited God of our own making! God Himself says: “My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9). There are many instances in Holy Scripture where God’s mercy is at loggerheads with man’s notion of mercy. Here are just a few of them.
Paid For Doing Little or No Work?
Yet, talking of getting paid for doing no work, we have the following parable:
”The Kingdom of Heaven is like a householder, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner.
“But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’ And when evening was come, the lord of the vineyard said to his steward: Call the laborers and pay them their hire, beginning from the last even to the first. When therefore they were come, that came about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny. But when the first also came, they thought that they should receive more: and they also received every man a penny.
“And receiving it they murmured against the master of the house, saying: ‘These last have worked but one hour, and you have made them equal to us, that have borne the burden of the day and the heats!’ But he answering said to one of them: ‘Friend, I do you no wrong! Did you not agree with me for a penny? Take what is yours, and go your way! I will also give to this last the same as to you! Or, is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Is your eye evil, because I am good?’ So shall the last be first, and the first last. For many are called, but few chosen.” (Matthew 20:1-16).
If we substitute the monetary reward of a penny, for the reward of mercy, then Our Lord seems to say that He will given Heaven just as readily to those who have done little work (penance) as to those who have worked (done penance) all day long (all life-long). Even though Our Lord Himself tells this parable, we feel for and sympathize with the men who worked all day long and were only paid the same as those who had merely worked an hour! We feel as though they have been cheated in some way! Yet the crunch line is: “Is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Is your eye evil, because I am good?”
You Owe Me How Much??!!!
Another parable of even more incredible mercy is the parable about the Unjust Steward who was forgiven and released from an incredible debt (Matthew 18:23-34).
“The Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who would take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents. And as he had not wherewith to pay it, his lord commanded that he should be sold, and his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, besought him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all!’ And the lord of that servant being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt. But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence―and laying hold of him, he throttled him, saying: ‘Pay what you owe me! And his fellow servant falling down, besought him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all!’ And he would not―but went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“Now his fellow servants seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him; and said to him: ‘You wicked servant, I forgave you all the debt, because you did beseech me! Should not you then have had compassion also on your fellow servant, even as I had compassion on you?’ And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers until he paid all the debt” (Matthew 18:24-34).
We read that parable and much of its significance passes over our heads, because we are too superficial and too lazy to inquire further and find out the value of a talent and a penny. A talent was seven hundred and fifty ounces of silver and so ten thousand talents came to 7,500,000 (7½ million ounces). The Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver—so a hundred pence would be a mere 12½ ounces of silver compared to the larger debt of 7½ million ounces! Or for curious, at present day prices (around $30 for an ounce of silver) the difference would be a debt of $225 million to a debt of $375 (yes, a mere three-hundred and seventy-five dollars). Does that put some of our judgments and condemnations into perspective?
Our Lord is painting a striking picture here. With the forgiveness of the large debt, it encourages us in seeing that even very grave sins can be cured and forgiven—showing the extreme kindness of the God of mercy. On the other hand, we see that the God of Justice can also be very true to His word—“Judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy” (James 2:13). “For mercy and wrath are with Him. He is mighty to forgive, and to pour out indignation” (Ecclesiasticus 16:12).
That is the whole point of mercy—it is a gift, it is not deserved, it is not merited, it is not earned. Sin is not measured merely by what is done, but also by the dignity of the one who is sinned against or offended. God is an infinite being, and so sin is in an infinite offense. We are mere finite creatures and even though we commit an infinite offense by sinning against God, as finite creatures we cannot repay an infinite debt. If we are forgiven, then we receive something way beyond our means and resources. Furthermore, if we do repent and are forgiven, then it is not something that we have done, but merely a co-operation with the merciful gift of God’s grace that inspires, moves and brings to back to Him.
Stealing Mercy
In confession, no matter how many and how serious the sins may be—if they are properly confessed with the right dispositions and intentions—then the guilt for them is instantly taken away. There is no lengthy cure, but an instantaneous cure takes place. The ultimate cure for sin and punishment due to it was seen upon Calvary, as Jesus was dying alongside a thief called Dismas—whose fate was dismal—and who has gone down in the annals of history as “The Good Thief”―we could say that the “Good Thief” stole mercy and Heaven! After a life of theft and robbery—which, in those days, more often meant killing into the bargain—the ‘Bad’ Thief is made into a ‘Good’ Thief in an instant. He begs of Our Lord: “‘Lord! Remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in paradise!’” (Luke 23:42-43). We can be sure that many were scandalized by that promise of Jesus! But then we come back to crunch line again: “Is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Is thy eye evil, because I am good?”
Remission of Sin is not Permission for Sin
In regard to sin, mercy is remissive not permissive (meaning: remission of sins not permission to sin). Mercy pardons evils in order to remove them, get them out of the way (Psalm 51:1 “wipe away” sins), so that the communion of love, broken by sin, may be restored and estranged parties might be reconciled. Mercy never overlooks evil, but rather mercy heals, overcomes evil by restoring one harmed by evil to their originally God-intended goodness. Or to use an image dear to St. Gregory Nazianzus, sin covers the divine image over with muck and filth and mercy washes it clean so that it might shine in us again with all its brilliance in the life of virtue. “The Lord shall wash away the filth” (Isaias 4:4). One cannot receive mercy if they intend to continue sinning.
Mercy does not exempt us from paying for sin. Mercy is first and foremost applied to our guilt―yet in every sin there is both guilt and debt. That is why, in the Sacrament of Confession, when you receive God’s mercy in the forgiveness of your sins, you still have to do penance and thereby pay for your sins (at least in part).
Mercy is always free, but, once accepted, is never cheap, since one who receives it accepts with mercy the obligation to radically eradicate evil, radically here meaning that which is related to the Latin word radix, meaning “root,” since mercy uproots evil. Mercy is always costly when it is permitted to be what it is and achieve its end―since the eradication of evil demands total conversion from evil, which is always costly to the sinner. St. John of the Cross describes the excruciating process of purgation that God puts us through as He gives us His mercy in order to eradicate sin and its distorting effects within us and make us capable of receiving and giving divine selfless love.
Lastly, there is another cost to mercy: one who receives it must also in turn give it (Matthew 18:21-35.) In the Kingdom, you can’t give what you don’t have, but you also can’t have what you don’t give. St. Gregory again says, mercy shows itself having restored God’s image in us when we cheerfully practice almsgiving to the ungrateful, undeserving poor or joyfully do good to our nasty neighbor. Then we look just like God who showers His gifts on the undeserving: “Your Father, Who is in Heaven, makes His sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45). When we give alms to those in need―we do not, or should not, only give alms to those who are good persons: “Do good to them that hate you!” (Matthew 5:44). “Almsgiving” comes from the Latin alemosyna, which comes from the Greek eleemosyne, which stems from the Greek root noun, eleos, which we translate in Scripture as mercy. Kyrie eleison. So almsgiving is mercy-giving, returning to God by way of the poor and undeserving and ungrateful the same mercy we received (Matthew 5:7; 10:8).
Then there’s forgiving mercy. The Our Father contains that stunning conditional clause that should make the “forgiven” tremble, tremble, tremble: “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father also will forgive you; but if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. Nothing cheap there. And there are many other examples of this in the New Testament. Free, yes; cheap, never.
Article 7
Friday, June 7th
The Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus
Friday, June 7th
The Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus
What Do You Know About Devotion to the Sacred Heart?
Since it is the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus today, let us try clear up what this feast is all about. Devotion to the Sacred Heart can easily become a misty, foggy, vague and very subjective nebulous thing. Do you really have a clear idea as to what it entails? As always, the best thing to do to clarify matters, is to go to the source. If we go and consult the writings of St. Margaret Mary, we can clearly see that Jesus wished by His apparitions and manifestations of His Heart to attain as many as seven different ends.
The Seven Parts of Devotion to the Sacred Heart
(1) He wished us to return love for His love,
(2) to make reparation to His Heart for the neglect of His love,
(3) to pay honor to His Heart,
(4) to place our trust in His Heart,
(5) to love His Heavenly Father more and more,
(6) to work to establish and extend the reign of His Heart, and
(7) to afford Him the occasion of pouring forth upon men the treasures of His Heart.
Growing Clearer?
Even these seven categories need further explanation, but at least we start to see something more clear emerging from the mist and fog of subjective imaginations about Devotion to the Sacred Heart. It is more than just the First Friday devotions—it is, in fact, a whole program for the glorification of God and the salvation of our souls. It is not a half-measure, or an optional ‘bell-and-whistle’ add-on, but something that goes to the very core—or should we say “very heart”—of the life of a Christian.
Primary & Secondary—Branches & Fruits
Yet all these desires of Jesus are not to be put on the same level; they are not all ends properly so called of the devotion which He wanted to establish. The first four points concern the affections which we should endeavor to arouse in our hearts by the contemplation of the Heart of Jesus and which we should manifest to His Heart if we want to practice this devotion in the manner that it is asked for by Our Lord.
These first four points are the heart and soul of the devotion—they are the trunk and main branches. The other three points are the results or fruits that these branches will produce, and which we shall almost necessarily and automatically attain, if we practice the devotion as Jesus asked for it. These seven points, then, are the real ends of the devotion. They drive away the fog or mist of vagueness that so often hides from us what this devotion is really about.
Let us, then, look at the four affections which we are to arouse within us and which we have to manifest to the Heart of Jesus—namely, love, reparation, veneration and confidence. Then we will examine the three secondary points, or fruits that come from these first four points.
He Wants us to Return Love for His Love
Jesus wants our love—it is not an optional thing for us! Love, they say, is reciprocal—meaning that it is all about “give and take”! That does not translate into “Jesus always gives and I always take”, but rather “I receive from Jesus and I give to Jesus.” In revealing His Heart, Jesus intended first of all that we should recognize the love of His Heart, that we should show Him our gratitude for it, and that we should reward it by our love.
St. Margaret Mary states it explicitly: “He gave me plainly to understand that His earnest desire of being loved by men had made Him form the design of revealing to them His Heart.” To her spiritual director she writes: “Jesus made known to me, in a manner that admits of no doubt, that it was His wish to establish everywhere this solid devotion and, through its means, to win countless faithful servants, perfect friends and supremely grateful children.” And to her former Superior, Mother de Saumaise, she wrote: “To win souls to His love, this is the chief end of this devotion.”
Because Jesus Said So!
St. Margaret Mary goes on to say: “Then He revealed to me the unspeakable marvels of His pure love, and the excess of love He had conceived for men, from whom He received nothing but ingratitude and contempt … ‘This is more grievous to Me, than all that I endured in My Passion. If they would only give Me some return of love, I should make no account of all that I have done for them, and I would do still more, if possible. But they have only coldness and contempt for all My endeavors to do them good. Do you, at least, give Me the happiness of making up for their ingratitude, as much as you can.’”
Jesus said to her: “Behold this Heart which has so loved men … And in return I receive from the greater part of men nothing but ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrileges, by the indifference and contempt with which they treat Me in this Sacrament of Love. Yet what is more painful to Me is that even souls consecrated to Me are acting in this way. Therefore I ask of you that the first Friday after the octave of Corpus Christi be dedicated to a special feast in honor of My Heart by making amends in an Act of Reparation.”
St. Margaret Mary states: “He assured me that the pleasure He takes in being loved, known and honored by His creatures is so great that He promised me that no one who has dedicated and consecrated himself to Him will ever perish … It is His eager desire of imparting graces of sanctification and salvation, to well-disposed hearts, that causes Him to wish to be known, adored and glorified by His creatures.”
In revealing His Heart, Jesus intended in the first place that we should repay His love with love. This, then, is the first and principal end of the devotion to the Sacred Heart.
Everyone Knew it was About Love
This was something that was perfectly understood by the first promoters. Fr. Croiset, the spiritual director of St. Margaret Mary, was the priest chosen by Jesus Himself to propagate the devotion to the Sacred Heart. Fr. Croiset writes: “The end aimed at in this devotion is, firstly, to recognize and to honor, to the best of our power, by our frequent acts of adoration, by a return of love, by our thanksgiving and every kind of homage, all the sentiments of love and tenderness which Jesus Christ bears us in the Holy Eucharist … It is, properly speaking, only an exercise of love―love is its object, love is its principal motive; love must also be its end.”
When Pope Pius IX, in 1856, extended the feast of the Sacred Heart to the universal Church, his purpose was, as we see here from his own words, “to urge on the faithful to make a return of love to the wounded Heart of Him Who has loved us and cleansed us from our sins in His Blood.”
And when he raised the Feast to a higher rite, it was again “that the devotion of love to the Heart of our Redeemer might spread more and more, and penetrate more deeply into the hearts of the faithful, and that thus charity, which has grown cold among many, might be rekindled by the fire of Divine love.”
Is Your Fire Burning?
But has this fire of love been enkindled? We have to be honest and say “No!” There are always exceptions to the rule; you will find souls, here and there, who really do have a sincere devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Even less in number will be those who practice their devotion to the Sacred Heart through the means of the Immaculate Heart of Mary—which is something that was advocated and taught by St. Margaret Mary herself.
The devil is very adept at quenching the fires of love that Heaven seeks to enkindle, as Jesus Himself said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49).
Pope Pius IX, in the Brief of beatification of Margaret Mary he states: “Jesus had nothing more in view than to enkindle in the hearts of men the fire of love with which His own Heart was inflamed … Therefore He wished that the veneration and cult of His Most Sacred Heart should be established and propagated in the Church.”
Why Are We So Cold?
Why is our love so lukewarm, so indifferent, or even so cold? Well, the simple, “no brainer’ answer is that we love something else more than the Sacred Heart (or God, or Our Lady, etc.). What is that something else? Quite simply, it is our own self and the world—with its persons, places and things. We seek first, not the kingdom of God and His justice, but we seek first and foremost ourselves and what the world—with all that it contains—can offer us. Those are the idols that have replaced the Sacred Heart (God, Our Lady, etc.).
Of course, we all have our excuses and protestations that this is not quite so! But like Adam and Eve, when confronted by God, after their sin, it is excuse upon excuse. As the French say: “Vos excuses vous accusent!” Which means: “Your excuses accuse you!”
Honesty is the Best Policy
It is better for us to be honest, and, in the vein of St. Peter, fall down at the feet of the Sacred Heart and cry out: “Depart from me, O Lord, for I am a sinful man!” Or, to borrow the famous cries about Faith: “I do believe, Lord! Help my unbelief” (Mark 9:23) “And the Apostles said to the Lord: ‘Increase our Faith!’” (Luke 17:5) to our own personal cry of “I do love, O Lord, help my lack of love! Increase my love!”
God says to us: “Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit!” (Ezechiel 18:31).
It is primarily our hearts and our love that Jesus seeks. He has everything else. What is stopping you from truly, really and sincerely loving Him? You need to ask yourself that question! You need to be honest in the reply that you give! Then you need to turn the Sacred Heart and cry out: “Create a clean heart in me, O God―and renew a right spirit within my bowels!” (Psalm 50:12).
And the Sacred Heart will reply: “And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you―and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26).
Since it is the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus today, let us try clear up what this feast is all about. Devotion to the Sacred Heart can easily become a misty, foggy, vague and very subjective nebulous thing. Do you really have a clear idea as to what it entails? As always, the best thing to do to clarify matters, is to go to the source. If we go and consult the writings of St. Margaret Mary, we can clearly see that Jesus wished by His apparitions and manifestations of His Heart to attain as many as seven different ends.
The Seven Parts of Devotion to the Sacred Heart
(1) He wished us to return love for His love,
(2) to make reparation to His Heart for the neglect of His love,
(3) to pay honor to His Heart,
(4) to place our trust in His Heart,
(5) to love His Heavenly Father more and more,
(6) to work to establish and extend the reign of His Heart, and
(7) to afford Him the occasion of pouring forth upon men the treasures of His Heart.
Growing Clearer?
Even these seven categories need further explanation, but at least we start to see something more clear emerging from the mist and fog of subjective imaginations about Devotion to the Sacred Heart. It is more than just the First Friday devotions—it is, in fact, a whole program for the glorification of God and the salvation of our souls. It is not a half-measure, or an optional ‘bell-and-whistle’ add-on, but something that goes to the very core—or should we say “very heart”—of the life of a Christian.
Primary & Secondary—Branches & Fruits
Yet all these desires of Jesus are not to be put on the same level; they are not all ends properly so called of the devotion which He wanted to establish. The first four points concern the affections which we should endeavor to arouse in our hearts by the contemplation of the Heart of Jesus and which we should manifest to His Heart if we want to practice this devotion in the manner that it is asked for by Our Lord.
These first four points are the heart and soul of the devotion—they are the trunk and main branches. The other three points are the results or fruits that these branches will produce, and which we shall almost necessarily and automatically attain, if we practice the devotion as Jesus asked for it. These seven points, then, are the real ends of the devotion. They drive away the fog or mist of vagueness that so often hides from us what this devotion is really about.
Let us, then, look at the four affections which we are to arouse within us and which we have to manifest to the Heart of Jesus—namely, love, reparation, veneration and confidence. Then we will examine the three secondary points, or fruits that come from these first four points.
He Wants us to Return Love for His Love
Jesus wants our love—it is not an optional thing for us! Love, they say, is reciprocal—meaning that it is all about “give and take”! That does not translate into “Jesus always gives and I always take”, but rather “I receive from Jesus and I give to Jesus.” In revealing His Heart, Jesus intended first of all that we should recognize the love of His Heart, that we should show Him our gratitude for it, and that we should reward it by our love.
St. Margaret Mary states it explicitly: “He gave me plainly to understand that His earnest desire of being loved by men had made Him form the design of revealing to them His Heart.” To her spiritual director she writes: “Jesus made known to me, in a manner that admits of no doubt, that it was His wish to establish everywhere this solid devotion and, through its means, to win countless faithful servants, perfect friends and supremely grateful children.” And to her former Superior, Mother de Saumaise, she wrote: “To win souls to His love, this is the chief end of this devotion.”
Because Jesus Said So!
St. Margaret Mary goes on to say: “Then He revealed to me the unspeakable marvels of His pure love, and the excess of love He had conceived for men, from whom He received nothing but ingratitude and contempt … ‘This is more grievous to Me, than all that I endured in My Passion. If they would only give Me some return of love, I should make no account of all that I have done for them, and I would do still more, if possible. But they have only coldness and contempt for all My endeavors to do them good. Do you, at least, give Me the happiness of making up for their ingratitude, as much as you can.’”
Jesus said to her: “Behold this Heart which has so loved men … And in return I receive from the greater part of men nothing but ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrileges, by the indifference and contempt with which they treat Me in this Sacrament of Love. Yet what is more painful to Me is that even souls consecrated to Me are acting in this way. Therefore I ask of you that the first Friday after the octave of Corpus Christi be dedicated to a special feast in honor of My Heart by making amends in an Act of Reparation.”
St. Margaret Mary states: “He assured me that the pleasure He takes in being loved, known and honored by His creatures is so great that He promised me that no one who has dedicated and consecrated himself to Him will ever perish … It is His eager desire of imparting graces of sanctification and salvation, to well-disposed hearts, that causes Him to wish to be known, adored and glorified by His creatures.”
In revealing His Heart, Jesus intended in the first place that we should repay His love with love. This, then, is the first and principal end of the devotion to the Sacred Heart.
Everyone Knew it was About Love
This was something that was perfectly understood by the first promoters. Fr. Croiset, the spiritual director of St. Margaret Mary, was the priest chosen by Jesus Himself to propagate the devotion to the Sacred Heart. Fr. Croiset writes: “The end aimed at in this devotion is, firstly, to recognize and to honor, to the best of our power, by our frequent acts of adoration, by a return of love, by our thanksgiving and every kind of homage, all the sentiments of love and tenderness which Jesus Christ bears us in the Holy Eucharist … It is, properly speaking, only an exercise of love―love is its object, love is its principal motive; love must also be its end.”
When Pope Pius IX, in 1856, extended the feast of the Sacred Heart to the universal Church, his purpose was, as we see here from his own words, “to urge on the faithful to make a return of love to the wounded Heart of Him Who has loved us and cleansed us from our sins in His Blood.”
And when he raised the Feast to a higher rite, it was again “that the devotion of love to the Heart of our Redeemer might spread more and more, and penetrate more deeply into the hearts of the faithful, and that thus charity, which has grown cold among many, might be rekindled by the fire of Divine love.”
Is Your Fire Burning?
But has this fire of love been enkindled? We have to be honest and say “No!” There are always exceptions to the rule; you will find souls, here and there, who really do have a sincere devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Even less in number will be those who practice their devotion to the Sacred Heart through the means of the Immaculate Heart of Mary—which is something that was advocated and taught by St. Margaret Mary herself.
The devil is very adept at quenching the fires of love that Heaven seeks to enkindle, as Jesus Himself said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49).
Pope Pius IX, in the Brief of beatification of Margaret Mary he states: “Jesus had nothing more in view than to enkindle in the hearts of men the fire of love with which His own Heart was inflamed … Therefore He wished that the veneration and cult of His Most Sacred Heart should be established and propagated in the Church.”
Why Are We So Cold?
Why is our love so lukewarm, so indifferent, or even so cold? Well, the simple, “no brainer’ answer is that we love something else more than the Sacred Heart (or God, or Our Lady, etc.). What is that something else? Quite simply, it is our own self and the world—with its persons, places and things. We seek first, not the kingdom of God and His justice, but we seek first and foremost ourselves and what the world—with all that it contains—can offer us. Those are the idols that have replaced the Sacred Heart (God, Our Lady, etc.).
Of course, we all have our excuses and protestations that this is not quite so! But like Adam and Eve, when confronted by God, after their sin, it is excuse upon excuse. As the French say: “Vos excuses vous accusent!” Which means: “Your excuses accuse you!”
Honesty is the Best Policy
It is better for us to be honest, and, in the vein of St. Peter, fall down at the feet of the Sacred Heart and cry out: “Depart from me, O Lord, for I am a sinful man!” Or, to borrow the famous cries about Faith: “I do believe, Lord! Help my unbelief” (Mark 9:23) “And the Apostles said to the Lord: ‘Increase our Faith!’” (Luke 17:5) to our own personal cry of “I do love, O Lord, help my lack of love! Increase my love!”
God says to us: “Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit!” (Ezechiel 18:31).
It is primarily our hearts and our love that Jesus seeks. He has everything else. What is stopping you from truly, really and sincerely loving Him? You need to ask yourself that question! You need to be honest in the reply that you give! Then you need to turn the Sacred Heart and cry out: “Create a clean heart in me, O God―and renew a right spirit within my bowels!” (Psalm 50:12).
And the Sacred Heart will reply: “And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you―and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26).
Article 6
Thursday, June 6th
Try This! It Really Works!
Thursday, June 6th
Try This! It Really Works!
Simplicity’s Simply Superior
Simple, but powerful! When we look at how God works, it can be generally said that God acts simply, but powerfully. The magnificent act of Creation could not have been simpler—God simply said a few words and it happened! Not much fuss, just simple and powerful. “And God said: ‘Be light made!’ And light was made.” (Genesis 1:3) and so on throughout the remaining days of Creation. God simply said, and it happened.
Throughout the Old Testament we see God’s simple, yet powerful, way of acting. He has Moses simply lift up his road and the Red Sea divides into two parts: “Lift thou up thy rod, and stretch forth thy hand over the sea, and divide it―so that the children of Israel may go through the midst of the sea on dry ground!” (Exodus 14:16). Later, God has Moses strike a rock in the desert with his rod, and, miraculously, water flows forth: “Behold I will stand there before thee, upon the rock Horeb―and thou shalt strike the rock, and water shall come out of it that the people may drink!” (Exodus 17:6).
God’s prophets also followed the same pattern. The Prophet Elias “stretched and measured himself upon the child three times, and cried to the Lord, and said: ‘O Lord my God, let the soul of this child, I beseech Thee, return into his body!’ And the Lord heard the voice of Elias: and the soul of the child returned into him, and he revived.” (3 Kings 21-22).
The Prophet Eliseus tells Naaman the leper, to simply wash seven times in the Jordan. Naaman thought this was ridiculously simplistic and was about to go home, until his servant persuaded him to try it—and lo and behold, he was cured (4 Kings 5:1-15).
David―a mere boy with a simple sling shot and one pebble―kills Goliath, whom the weapons and soldiers of the Israelites had failed to defeat (1 Kings 17:1-54).
Our Lord’s Miracles were Simple but Powerful
We see God the Son act in the same simple, but powerful way, in the miracles that he performed. Not much fuss, just simple actions or simple commands:
► The leper said: “‘Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean.’ And Jesus stretching forth His hand, touched him, saying: ‘I will―be thou made clean!’ And forthwith his leprosy was cleansed.” (Matthew 8:2-3). Simple, but powerful!
► “And when Jesus was come into Peter’s house, He saw his wife’s mother lying, and sick of a fever―and He touched her hand, and the fever left her, and she arose and ministered to them.” (Matthew 8:14-15). Simple, but powerful!
► “And behold they brought to Him one sick of the palsy, lying in a bed. And Jesus, seeing their Faith, said: ‘Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house!’ And he arose, and went into his house.” (Matthew 9:2-7). Simple, but powerful!
► “Jesus said: ‘Give place, for the girl is not dead, but sleeps!’ And they laughed Him to scorn. And when the multitude was put outside, He went in and took her by the hand. And the maid arose.” (Matthew 9:24-25). Simple, but powerful!
► “And when He was come to the house, the blind men came to Him. And Jesus said to them, ‘Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?’ They say to Him, ‘Yes, Lord!’ Then He touched their eyes, saying, ‘According to your Faith, be it done unto you!’ And their eyes were opened.” (Matthew 9:28-30). Simple, but powerful!
► “They besought Jesus that they might touch but the hem of His garment. And as many as touched it, they were made whole.” (Matthew 14:36). Simple, but powerful!
► “And taking the seven loaves and the fishes, and giving thanks, He broke and gave to His disciples, and the disciples gave to the people. And they did all eat and had their fill. And they took up seven baskets full of what remained of the fragments. And they that did eat were four thousand men, beside children and women.” (Matthew 15:26:38). Simple, but powerful!
► “Jesus rebuked him, and the devil went out of him, and the child was cured from that hour.” (Matthew 17:17). Simple, but powerful!
► “And behold two blind men, sitting by the way side, cried out, saying: ‘O Lord, Thou Son of David, have mercy on us!’ .... And Jesus stood and called them, and said: ‘What will ye that I do to you?’ They say to Him: ‘Lord, that our eyes be opened!’ And Jesus having compassion on them, touched their eyes. And immediately they saw, and followed Him.” (Matthew 20:20-34). Simple, but powerful!
► “And Jesus entered again into the synagogue, and there was a man there who had a withered hand ... He said to the man: ‘Stretch forth thy hand!’ And he stretched it forth and his hand was restored unto him.” (Mark 3:1-5). Simple, but powerful!
► “As Jesus was in the ship and there were other ships with Him. And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that the ship was filled. And He was sleeping; and they awakened Him, and said to Him: ‘Master, does it not concern Thee that we perish?’ And rising up, He rebuked the wind, and said to the sea: ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased and there was made a great calm.” (Mark 4:36-39). Simple, but powerful!
► “And wheresoever Jesus entered―into towns or into villages or cities―they laid the sick in the streets, and besought Him that they might touch but the hem of His garment: and as many as touched Him were made whole.” (Mark 6:56). Simple, but powerful!
► “And they brought to Jesus one who was deaf and dumb; and they besought Him that He would lay His hand upon him. And taking him from the multitude apart, He put His fingers into his ears, and spitting, He touched his tongue, and looking up to Heaven, He groaned, and said to him: ‘Ephpheta!’ which is, ‘Be thou opened!’ And immediately his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spoke right.” (Mark 7:32-35). Simple, but powerful!
► “Bartimeus the blind man, began to cry out: ‘Jesus son of David, have mercy on me!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘What wilt thou that I should do to thee?’ And the blind man said to Him: ‘Rabboni, that I may see!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way! Thy Faith hath made thee whole!’ And immediately he saw and followed Him in the way.” (Mark 10:47-52). Simple, but powerful!
► “When Jesus had said these things, He cried with a loud voice: ‘Lazarus, come forth!’ And he, that had been dead, came forth, bound feet and hands with winding bands; and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus said to them: ‘Loosen him and let him go!’” (John 11:43:44). Simple, but powerful!
With God, Simply Nothing is Impossible
With God nothing is impossible! As the Archangel Gabriel said to Mary, at the Annunciation: “No word shall be impossible with God!” (Luke 1:37). Which was later echoed by Jesus, when He said: “With God all things are possible!” Matthew 19:26). With God, the impossible is simply possible—because God is God, and whatever He wants, happens!
Our Lord would later repeat that truth when speaking of the difficulty of salvation: “Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus said to them: ‘With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:23-26).
The Power of the Simple Word of God
We forget or underestimate the power of the word of God. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God!” (John 1:1). “His word is full of power” (Ecclesiastes 8:4). “By the word of the Lord the Heavens were established; and all the power of them by the spirit of His mouth!” (Psalm 32:6). “O Lord God! Behold Thou hast made Heaven and Earth by Thy great power, and no word shall be hard to Thee!” (Jeremias 32:17). When Jesus cast out a devil by mere words, “there came fear upon all, and they talked among themselves, saying: ‘What word is this, for with authority and power He commands the unclean spirits, and they go out?’” (Luke 4:36)―which is still true today, for it is power of the word of God that drives the devil out of souls in exorcisms performed by mere priests. St. Paul speaks of God “upholding all things by the word of His power” (Hebrews 1:3).
St. Peter has Faith in the power of God’s word: “And Simon answering said to Jesus: ‘Master, we have labored all the night, and have taken nothing! But, at Thy word, I will let down the net!” (Luke 5:5) ― and a miraculous catch of fish was the result.
The Roman centurion, seeking a cure for his servant, does not ask that Jesus come down to his house, but has Faith in the mere word of Jesus: “The servant of a certain centurion, who was dear to him, being sick, was ready to die. And when he had heard of Jesus, he sent unto Him the ancients of the Jews, desiring Jesus to come and heal his servant. And when they came to Jesus, they besought Him earnestly, saying to Him: ‘He is worthy that Thou should do this for him! For he loves our nation; and he has built us a synagogue!’ And Jesus went with them. And when He was now not far from the house, the centurion sent his friends to Him, saying: ‘Lord, trouble not Thyself! For I am not worthy that Thou should enter under my roof. For which reason neither did I think myself worthy to come to Thee; but say the word, and my servant shall be healed. For I also am a man subject to authority, having under me soldiers: and I say to one, “Go!” and he goes; and to another, “Come!” and he comes; and to my servant, “Do this!” and he does it!’ Which Jesus hearing, marveled: and, turning about to the multitude that followed Him, He said: ‘Amen I say to you, I have not found so great Faith, not even in Israel!’” (Luke 7:2-9).
God’s Powerful Modern-Day Simplicity
This same simplicity, seen in a few simple words, yet powerful words, carries over into our day and age.
At Baptism, can we fully grasp the incredible things that happen at the simple, but powerful, words: “I baptize thee, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” while simple water is simply poured on the one being baptized? Miracles of grace suddenly take place! The baptized has Original Sin and all their personal sins removed; grace is poured into the soul; the Gifts of the Holy Ghost are planted within the soul; the theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity come into the soul; the person becomes an adopted child of God and an heir to the kingdom of Heaven! Simple words and actions, but an awesome and powerful result!
The same can be said of the Sacrament of Confession. Even though the priest may say additional prayers while giving absolution from sin, the key words are: “I absolve you from your sins, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen” while making a sign of the cross over the penitent. The worst crimes, the most shameful sins, no matter how many times committed, can be forgiven and forgotten by God using those simple words and actions.
When there is an impossibility to get to Confession, in such a case it is possible (though not guaranteed) that one short true act of perfect contrition can remove all guilt of sin and restore grace to the soul (provided one intends to confess those sins at the soonest possible time). Note, that we say TRUE and PERFECT act of contrition! This is sorrow that is based upon a true love of God, not a fear of His punishments. It is amazing what God will do when He sees that we TRULY mean those words: “I am sorry!” “I love you!”
The same applies to the Consecration at Mass, when God, using the ministry of His servants, the priests, changes mere bread and wine into the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of His Only-Begotten Son. What brings about such an awesome miracle? Again, like the Sacrament of Confession, even though more words are used, the essential words are the simple ones of “This is My Body” and “This is My Blood.” Simple words, beautiful result! Simply beautiful! Simply powerful!
The Modern-Day Power of God’s Word in Exorcisms
When we think of exorcisms, we tend to imagine a priest loaded with blessed crucifixes, holy water and relics of the saints. These things are, of course powerful and necessary tools as part of the exorcism process. However, this can distract us from the true and real and ultimate power behind the exorcism―which is the WORD OF GOD. At the heart of the formal Rite of Exorcism are the officially sanctioned prayers of the Church along with selected Scriptures, which are the words of God. These words remind the demons of the authority of God―the demon or demons eventually depart because GOD SAYS SO! The words of exorcism are SPOKEN IN THE NAME OF GOD―as can be seen from these few extracts from the Rite of Exorcism:
“Begone and stay far from this creature of God. For it is He Who commands you, He Who flung you headlong from the heights of Heaven into the depths of Hell. It is He Who commands you! … Graciously grant, O Lord, as we call on Thy Holy Name, that the evil spirit may retreat in terror and defeat … It is God + Himself Who commands you; the majestic Christ + Who commands you. God the Father + commands you; God the Son + commands you; God the Holy + Spirit commands you … The Word made flesh + commands you; the Virgin’s Son + commands you; Jesus + of Nazareth commands you … It is He Who casts you out … It is He Who repels you … It is He Who expels you, He Who has prepared everlasting hellfire for you and your angels, from Whose mouth shall come a sharp sword, Who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire.”
This imagery of the sword and the word (notice how the word “sword” contains the word “word”) is also seen in the battle of St. Michael the Archangel with Satan. St. Michael holds a sword, ready to deliver the death blow as he stands over the fallen demon. Of course, St. Michael doesn’t wield a real sword―for a physical, material sword cannot harm a spiritual being. Angels and demons are real, but, as spiritual beings, they are not affected by physical attacks―in the case of Holy Water, it is not the physical, material water that repels devils, but the invisible immaterial supernatural power attached to the water through a proper blessing given to water. The sword that St. Michael wields is the sword of the truth of God’s Word, of which Scripture says:
“Take unto you the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:17).
“For the word of God is living and effectual, and more piercing than any two edged sword; and reaching unto the division of the soul and the spirit, of the joints also and the marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12).
“And He [Jesus] was clothed with a garment sprinkled with blood; and His Name is called, THE WORD OF GOD … And out of His mouth proceeds a sharp two edged sword; that with it He may strike the nations ... and He has on His garment, and on His thigh written: ‘King of Kings, and Lord of Lords!’” (Apocalypse 19:13-16).
“And I saw the beast, and the kings of the Earth, and their armies make war with Him that sat upon the horse … And the beast was taken and … cast alive into the pool of fire, burning with brimstone, and the rest were slain by the sword of Him that sitts upon the horse, which proceeds out of His mouth!” (Apocalypse 19:19-21).
“To the angel of the church in Pergamum write: ‘These are the words of the One who holds the sharp, double-edged sword: ‘Some of you also hold to the teaching of the Nicolaitans. Therefore repent! Otherwise I will come to you shortly and wage war against them with the sword of My mouth!’” (Apocalypse 2:12, 15-16).
In the Rite of Exorcism, the words of God are to have prominence. Ideally, every exorcism has two priests, one of whom continuously reads the rite while the other uses Sacramentals and briefly engages the demons to gain necessary information (e.g., names, how they entered, when they will leave) and tries to find weak points. While the use of Sacramentals such as holy water, the touch of a stole, or relics torment the demons, almost every exorcist agrees that the greatest power of the Rite of Exorcism is to be found in the Church approved words of the prayers and words of God from Scripture. In fact, sometimes demons show exaggerated pain in response to lesser things so as to distract from the reading of the rite.
The words of the rite have the effect of shining the light of truth on demons and reminding them of their ultimate destiny. All of this is painful to the demons. Ultimately, the demons are commanded to depart, to flee and give way to God in the power of God’s Name, by power of the Holy Trinity and by the power of Christ. All these words and many more shine the light of truth on the demons and cause them pain. It is the Word, the prayer of the Church, that ultimately defeats Satan and all the other demons. This teaching on exorcism is an important lesson for all of us. The truest battleground for all of us is our mind; the battle is one of thoughts. We will either dwell in God’s truth and study His Word or be lost in Satan’s lies. We must learn to fight every temptation with the sword of God’s Word. We must test every thought we have to see if it conforms to God’s Word. We must decide either to believe God or Satan. The sword of God’s Word can drive out every temptation, fear, sorrow, and depression. The more we grow in God’s Word the less authority and influence Satan can have in our lives.
Where Is All This Leading To?
Now what has this long-winded, interminably dragging, endless introduction got to do with the title of this article―“Try This! It Really Works”? Well, simply this―if you are going to “buy-into” something, or purchase something, or try something, then you want to be sure that it works, that it will work for you and that is worth the time and investment. All of the above shows the power of the word of God, it shows that the word of God works, that it has worked for many people and that it can work for you too! The purpose of these endless examples of divine doings, has been to establish and explain the principle (which is not just a rare occurrence) of how God usually works with mankind. It is quite simple and quite powerful at the same time.
Underused, Refused and Abused
We are all woefully and pitifully guilty of underusing―and even refusing or abusing―the word of God. If, anything, the word of God and the Name of God sees more abuse than good use. Blasphemy and the use of God’s Name in vain is more common that using the words of God and the Name of God for good. The word of God is a source of grace―as we see in the wording of the Sacraments, which take their words from Holy Scripture: baptizing “in the Name of the Father, and of the Son and the Holy Ghost”; or, “This is My Body, This is My Blood”; etc.
Sacramentals are also a source of grace―though not in the same ways as Sacraments. There are many different Sacramentals―far more in number than the limited seven Sacraments. Prayer is just one of many different kinds of Sacramentals―and, what is prayer? As the catechism and many saints and theologians tell us: “Prayer is the raising of the mind and heart to God.” Prayer takes many formats―the Divine Office, the Divine Liturgy, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the prayers begging God’s blessings in the Roman Ritual, the Holy Rosary, countless novenas and other prayers, meditation is also a prayer, contemplation too, likewise spiritual reading.
Thus, Holy Scripture―which furnishes many of these types of prayer with their content―can be said to be a “prayer that surpasses most prayers” and that is why the reading of Holy Scripture is given a plenary indulgence if it read for more than 30 minutes―and, in case you didn’t know, indulgences are Sacramentals too! The Handbook of Indulgences states, “A partial indulgence is granted the Christian faithful who read Sacred Scripture with the veneration due God’s Word and as a form of spiritual reading. The indulgence will be a plenary one when such reading is for at least one-half hour.” Keep in mind that there are several requirements for acquiring a plenary indulgence. The Apostolic Constitution on Indulgences explains: “To acquire a plenary indulgence it is necessary to perform the work to which the indulgence is attached and to fulfill three conditions: (1) Sacramental Confession, (2) Eucharistic Communion and (3) prayer for the intentions of the Supreme Pontiff. It is further required that all attachment to sin, even to venial sin, be absent. If this disposition is in any way less than complete, or if the prescribed three conditions are not fulfilled, the indulgence will be only partial.”
So is the Bible a Sacramental?
Individual unblessed (not-blessed) copies of the Bible ARE NOT Sacramentals of themselves. Apart from prayer (which is not an object, but a spiritual invisible thing) all objects need to be blessed for them to become Sacramentals. A Rosary, or Scapular, or Medal, or Statue, or Crucifix, or water that has not been blessed is NOT a Sacramental. A copy of the Bible could be blessed and become a Sacramental, in the same way as other things. The Bible is not referred to as the “Holy” Bible just because a priest has blessed it and made it to be a blessed object, thus a Sacramental. The word “Bible” comes from the Greek word “Biblia”, which is the plural for book, therefore meaning “books”―for the Bible is a compilation of many books, or a mini-library of books. However, we call it the “Holy” Bible, not because it was blessed and sprinkled with Holy Water, but because it is filled with holiness, or rather filled with the Holy Words of God and counsels on how become holy. The Bible’s holiness derives from the message it contains, not from any blessing that has been pronounced on it. Thus, unless it has been blessed by a priest, the Bible is merely a book, yet also much, much more than a book.
An unblessed Bible, with its words and messages, is not a Sacramental, but, in one sense, it is much more than that. It is a foundational pillar of the Church―for all the other Sacramentals, such as the Roman Ritual with its blessings and ceremonies, the Roman Missal, many different prayers (for prayer is a Sacramental too) owe their origins and much of their content to the Bible. Scripture is, in this sense, profoundly Sacramental―for it has provided the ‘food’ and ‘clothing’ for the many different forms of Sacramentals that have come after Holy Scripture. Holy Scripture is the “Grand Patriarch” or “Grand Matriarch” of them all. While the Word of God is not a Sacrament or even a Sacramental in the strict sense, its proclamation in the liturgy and all other aspects of the Church has a special and unmatched authority and power.
Powerful Mottos From Holy Scripture For All Circumstances of Life
So very few people “tap-into” the power of Holy Scripture for the countless different circumstances and situations that they find themselves in daily. They are neglecting a great power that could transform their lives, transform their attitude, transform their approach to things, and transform the results that they are getting (or, most likely, failing to get). All it takes is a little “gold-mining” in the streams and seams of Holy Scripture―the nuggets that you will discover could totally change your life. So let us now get down to the “nitty-gritty” part of “panning” and “digging”!
Major Monumental Mottos
Mottos can be nuggets of gold. Yet not all mottos are made equal! You could say that some mottos have a major monumental meaning, whereas others can be meaningful but minor. What qualifies as being major and monumental? Obviously that which majorly impacts your salvation and helps avoid your damnation. One key phrase from Holy Scripture―which is short and sweet―is: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24)―or, if you want the longer version: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). The motto you could make from that could be: “It’s God or mammon! You can’t have both!” or “I will love God and hate mammon, or love mammon and hate God!”
If you are thick-skinned and need to be hit by a sledgehammer, or need an electric shock to stir you, then ponder these quotes and from them create a motto for yourself: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23). “Why call you Me ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Very closely linked to the above mottos are the words of Our Lord: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30). Your motto, based upon those words, could be: “Love God first―not partially, but totally!” or “To be holy I must love God wholly!” If you find that you are putting worldly things before God in your life, then say to yourself: “The first will be last and the last will be first!”―which comes from “Many that are first, shall be last; and the last shall be first!” (Matthew 19:30), or “God first, the world last!”
Similar to this, in bursting the bubble of worldliness and a preoccupation with earthly things, is: “What shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36)―which could be rephrased for a motto as being: “Lose the world or lose your soul!” or “Have fun at what cost? The world is won, but the soul is lost!” Another similar quote by Our Lord is: “Amen, I say to you: How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 19:16-26; Mark 10:17-27)―from which you could form a motto such as: “Material wealth leads to spiritual bankruptcy!” or “Better be poor on Earth and rich in Heaven; than rich on Earth and poor in Hell!”
Staying with this God versus the world idea, you also have the Scriptural quotes: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15) and “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Be dead with Christ from the elements of this world” (Colossians 2:20). “We have not received the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; so that we may know the things that are given us from God” (1 Corinthians 2:12). An easy motto, almost identical to an earlier one above, would be: “Love God and hate the world, or hate God and love the world!” or “Make a friend of the world and be an enemy of God!”
Avoiding the world has to be concrete and real: “What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). That is what we do not want to do―go out from them and “be ye separate”―we love mixing with them, but, thereby, we poison our cup of salvation with the poison of damnation. We forget or find it hard to believe that the devil is the “prince of this world” and that he uses this world as poisoned bait. “The prince of this world is coming, and in Me he has not anything … The prince of this world is already judged ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). “Jesus answered: ‘My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36). To the worldlings He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works thereof are evil!” (John 7:7).
It is of paramount importance that we drill into our thick skulls and hard hearts that we cannot have a dual-citizenship if we wish to reach Heaven. We cannot be citizens of this world (of which the devil is prince) and citizens of Heaven (where Christ is King). We must choose to follow one or the other. The fact that most people try to follow both, is a major contributory factor to their eventual damnation.
That Damned Motto!
It is a very damning statistic which says that most souls are damned when God wants to save everyone! Why on earth does that happen? What the hell is going on? One chief reason is down to the phrase: “Out of sight, out of mind!” meaning that something is easily forgotten or dismissed as unimportant if it is not in our direct view. This is exactly how the devil likes to work―out of sight, so he is out of our mind or thoughts, free to plot and plan our damnation without our ever giving a thought to it [read more here]. Holy Scripture, on the contrary, wants us to keep the salvation-damnation issue always before our eyes:
“With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12) … “For many are called, but few chosen!” (Matthew 20:16; 22:14). “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life, and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate! For many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28). Numerous other passages could be quoted, but you get the idea.
The saints got the idea and that is why they would say things such as the following quotes reveal. Bear in mind that the following saints are just “any-old-saints”, but all of them are DOCTORS OF THE CHURCH and they SPAN ALL THE CENTURIES from the 300s to the 1800s. The bottom line is: “Few are saved! To be saved with the few, live like the few!”--as the following quotes prove:
► St. Augustine (354-430), Doctor and Father of the Church: “Take care not to resemble the multitude whose knowledge of God’s will only condemns them to more severe punishment … It is certain that few are saved” (Sermon 111; also Against Cresconius) … “If you wish to imitate the multitude, then you shall not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow gate” (Sermon 224:1).
► St. Basil the Great (330-379), Doctor and Father of the Church: “Remember that it is not the multitude who are being saved! The great multitude of the people are carried hither and thither by winds like the waters of the sea!” (St. Basil the Great).
► St. John Climacus (579-606), Father of the Church: “Live with the few if you want to reign with the few!”
► St. Bede the Venerable (673-735), Doctor and Father of the Church: “We should not think that it is enough for salvation that we are no worse off than the mass of the careless and indifferent, or that, in our Faith, we are, like so many others, uninstructed … Christ’s flock is called ‘little’ in comparison with the greater number of the reprobates!”
► St. Hilary of Poitiers (300-368), Doctor and Father of the Church: “How few the Elect are, may be understood from the multitude being cast out!”
► St. Anselm (1033-1109), Doctor of the Church: “If thou wouldst be certain of being in the number of the elect, strive to be one of the few, not of the many! And if thou wouldst be quite sure of thy salvation, strive to be among the fewest of the few! … Do not follow the great majority of mankind, but follow those who enter upon the narrow way, who renounce the world, who give themselves to prayer, and who never relax their efforts by day or by night, that they may attain everlasting blessedness!”
► St. Thomas Aquinas (1235-1274), Doctor of the Church: “There are a select few who are saved!” (Summa Theologica, Ia, q.23, art.7, ad 3.) “Those who are saved are in the minority!” (Summa Theologica, Ia, q.23, art.8, ad.3).
► St. John of the Cross (1524-1591), Doctor of the Church: “Behold how many there are who are called, and how few who are chosen! And behold, if you have no care for yourself, your perdition is more certain than your amendment, especially since the way that leads to eternal life is so narrow!”
► St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), Doctor of the Church: “I had the greatest sorrow for the many souls that condemned themselves to Hell ... I saw souls falling into Hell like snowflakes!”
► St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori (1696-1787), Doctor of the Church: “The common opinion is that the greater part of adults is lost … In the Great Deluge in the days of Noe, nearly all mankind perished, eight persons alone being saved in the Ark. In our days a deluge, not of water but of sins, continually inundates the Earth, and out of this deluge very few escape. Scarcely anyone is saved! … Everyone desires to be saved but the greater part is lost! … All persons desire to be saved, but the greater part, because they will not adopt the means of being saved, fall into sin and are lost! In fact, the Elect are much fewer than the damned, for the reprobate are much more numerous than the Elect! … St. Teresa, as the Roman Rota attests, never fell into any mortal sin; but still Our Lord showed her the place prepared for her in Hell; not because she deserved Hell, but because, had she not risen from the state of lukewarmness in which she lived, she would in the end have lost the grace of God and been damned … The greater part of men choose to be damned rather than to love Almighty God! … The saved are few, but we must live with the few if we would be saved with the few! O God, too few indeed they are―yet amongst those few I wish to be!”
This whole issue of salvation and damnation is fundamental to the Catholic spiritual life and it is of paramount importance that we have a correct understanding of it―and not rose-colored, candy-coated, selfishly-tweaked and twisted, self-imagined unrealistic idea of the truths of salvation and damnation. That is what has led to the damnation of most souls, when God wishes the salvation of all souls―but that will never happen because of man’s stubbornness, willfulness, carelessness and indifference. Without a true notion of what it takes to be saved, we will be lost with the majority. Yes, salvation is hard―it has to be if you think about the rewards you expect: eternal life, no suffering in body or mind, no threats from others, no enemies, no illness, no injuries, no anxieties, no having to pay for anything, having everything supplied, eternal joy, ceaseless love, every good craving satisfied―all this is merely the tip of the iceberg! And you want all that for free? You want all that without making serious efforts to be worthy of all that? You want to sin freely and still get all that? Well that is the attitude of most people―and it “just won’t cut it”, and they “don’t make the cut”―they are cut-off from God for eternity. That is why we must “Live like the few, to be saved with the few!” The other alternative needs to be drummed-home relentlessly, for it seems to be the preferred path of most people: “To live like the many, leads to being damned with the many!” It is an inescapable truth of Scripture: “For many are called, but few chosen!” (Matthew 20:16; 22:14). “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Mottos of Means and Methods
Once we have clear idea that salvation is not “a piece of cake”, or no “push-over”, but something that requires our “work with fear and trembling” (Philippians 2:12), and that few are saved―not because of limited openings or limited places in Heaven, but because of limited interest and limited efforts here on Earth―then we have to start looking at how on earth we can become one of the few and what we must do as one of the few in order to be saved?
The means of salvation could take up a whole book―but you need something short and sweet to shake and shock you into starting your spiritual engine! St. Louis de Montfort, in his little booklet, The Secret of Mary, writes: “What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.” The means that St. Louis lists give us a framework around which we can work.
Mottos of Humility
Humility is the ESSENTIAL foundation of the spiritual life―there is nobody in Heaven who is not humble! Hell is for the proud ones and Hell is full of pride! Our Lord Himself says: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29). Our Lord could have listed many other virtues―charitable, courageous, devout, knowledgeable, honest, zealous, etc. ―but He didn’t. He mentioned only meekness and humility. Meekness and humility are intimately connected if you really think about it! What is meekness? Meekness is the opposite of anger. There is, of course, a just anger and an unjust anger―a good anger and a bad anger. Why do people get unjustly angry? Because things do not go according to how they want them to go―things are not according THEIR liking, THEIR ideas, THEIR expectations, etc. All of this kind of anger ultimately stems from pride, which is also the opposite of humility. Thus meekness (lack of anger) and humility (lack of pride) are related. So, as a basic reminder of this, you could have a mottos such as: “As humble as Heaven or as proud as Hell!” or “Humility Helps Holiness!” or “Proud Persons Perish!” etc., etc.
There are lots of one-liner Scriptural quotes to help you acquire humility and avoid pride: “Humble thy heart and endure!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:2). “Humility goeth before glory” (Proverbs 15:33). “Humiliation follows the proud: and glory shall uphold the humble!” (Proverbs 29:23). “Pride brings reproach! Humility brings wisdom!” (Proverbs 11:2). “The prayer of the humble and the meek hath always pleased Thee!” (Judith 9:16). “The Lord will save the humble!” (Psalm 33:19). “Whosoever shall humble himself as this little child―he is the greater in the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 18:4). “Whosoever shall exalt himself shall be humbled: and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted!” (Matthew 23:12). “He has put down the mighty from their seat and has exalted the humble!” (Luke 1:52). “God resists the proud, but to the humble he gives grace!” (1 Peter 5:5). Why not try form some mottos from these?
Simple, but powerful! When we look at how God works, it can be generally said that God acts simply, but powerfully. The magnificent act of Creation could not have been simpler—God simply said a few words and it happened! Not much fuss, just simple and powerful. “And God said: ‘Be light made!’ And light was made.” (Genesis 1:3) and so on throughout the remaining days of Creation. God simply said, and it happened.
Throughout the Old Testament we see God’s simple, yet powerful, way of acting. He has Moses simply lift up his road and the Red Sea divides into two parts: “Lift thou up thy rod, and stretch forth thy hand over the sea, and divide it―so that the children of Israel may go through the midst of the sea on dry ground!” (Exodus 14:16). Later, God has Moses strike a rock in the desert with his rod, and, miraculously, water flows forth: “Behold I will stand there before thee, upon the rock Horeb―and thou shalt strike the rock, and water shall come out of it that the people may drink!” (Exodus 17:6).
God’s prophets also followed the same pattern. The Prophet Elias “stretched and measured himself upon the child three times, and cried to the Lord, and said: ‘O Lord my God, let the soul of this child, I beseech Thee, return into his body!’ And the Lord heard the voice of Elias: and the soul of the child returned into him, and he revived.” (3 Kings 21-22).
The Prophet Eliseus tells Naaman the leper, to simply wash seven times in the Jordan. Naaman thought this was ridiculously simplistic and was about to go home, until his servant persuaded him to try it—and lo and behold, he was cured (4 Kings 5:1-15).
David―a mere boy with a simple sling shot and one pebble―kills Goliath, whom the weapons and soldiers of the Israelites had failed to defeat (1 Kings 17:1-54).
Our Lord’s Miracles were Simple but Powerful
We see God the Son act in the same simple, but powerful way, in the miracles that he performed. Not much fuss, just simple actions or simple commands:
► The leper said: “‘Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean.’ And Jesus stretching forth His hand, touched him, saying: ‘I will―be thou made clean!’ And forthwith his leprosy was cleansed.” (Matthew 8:2-3). Simple, but powerful!
► “And when Jesus was come into Peter’s house, He saw his wife’s mother lying, and sick of a fever―and He touched her hand, and the fever left her, and she arose and ministered to them.” (Matthew 8:14-15). Simple, but powerful!
► “And behold they brought to Him one sick of the palsy, lying in a bed. And Jesus, seeing their Faith, said: ‘Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house!’ And he arose, and went into his house.” (Matthew 9:2-7). Simple, but powerful!
► “Jesus said: ‘Give place, for the girl is not dead, but sleeps!’ And they laughed Him to scorn. And when the multitude was put outside, He went in and took her by the hand. And the maid arose.” (Matthew 9:24-25). Simple, but powerful!
► “And when He was come to the house, the blind men came to Him. And Jesus said to them, ‘Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?’ They say to Him, ‘Yes, Lord!’ Then He touched their eyes, saying, ‘According to your Faith, be it done unto you!’ And their eyes were opened.” (Matthew 9:28-30). Simple, but powerful!
► “They besought Jesus that they might touch but the hem of His garment. And as many as touched it, they were made whole.” (Matthew 14:36). Simple, but powerful!
► “And taking the seven loaves and the fishes, and giving thanks, He broke and gave to His disciples, and the disciples gave to the people. And they did all eat and had their fill. And they took up seven baskets full of what remained of the fragments. And they that did eat were four thousand men, beside children and women.” (Matthew 15:26:38). Simple, but powerful!
► “Jesus rebuked him, and the devil went out of him, and the child was cured from that hour.” (Matthew 17:17). Simple, but powerful!
► “And behold two blind men, sitting by the way side, cried out, saying: ‘O Lord, Thou Son of David, have mercy on us!’ .... And Jesus stood and called them, and said: ‘What will ye that I do to you?’ They say to Him: ‘Lord, that our eyes be opened!’ And Jesus having compassion on them, touched their eyes. And immediately they saw, and followed Him.” (Matthew 20:20-34). Simple, but powerful!
► “And Jesus entered again into the synagogue, and there was a man there who had a withered hand ... He said to the man: ‘Stretch forth thy hand!’ And he stretched it forth and his hand was restored unto him.” (Mark 3:1-5). Simple, but powerful!
► “As Jesus was in the ship and there were other ships with Him. And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that the ship was filled. And He was sleeping; and they awakened Him, and said to Him: ‘Master, does it not concern Thee that we perish?’ And rising up, He rebuked the wind, and said to the sea: ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased and there was made a great calm.” (Mark 4:36-39). Simple, but powerful!
► “And wheresoever Jesus entered―into towns or into villages or cities―they laid the sick in the streets, and besought Him that they might touch but the hem of His garment: and as many as touched Him were made whole.” (Mark 6:56). Simple, but powerful!
► “And they brought to Jesus one who was deaf and dumb; and they besought Him that He would lay His hand upon him. And taking him from the multitude apart, He put His fingers into his ears, and spitting, He touched his tongue, and looking up to Heaven, He groaned, and said to him: ‘Ephpheta!’ which is, ‘Be thou opened!’ And immediately his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spoke right.” (Mark 7:32-35). Simple, but powerful!
► “Bartimeus the blind man, began to cry out: ‘Jesus son of David, have mercy on me!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘What wilt thou that I should do to thee?’ And the blind man said to Him: ‘Rabboni, that I may see!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way! Thy Faith hath made thee whole!’ And immediately he saw and followed Him in the way.” (Mark 10:47-52). Simple, but powerful!
► “When Jesus had said these things, He cried with a loud voice: ‘Lazarus, come forth!’ And he, that had been dead, came forth, bound feet and hands with winding bands; and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus said to them: ‘Loosen him and let him go!’” (John 11:43:44). Simple, but powerful!
With God, Simply Nothing is Impossible
With God nothing is impossible! As the Archangel Gabriel said to Mary, at the Annunciation: “No word shall be impossible with God!” (Luke 1:37). Which was later echoed by Jesus, when He said: “With God all things are possible!” Matthew 19:26). With God, the impossible is simply possible—because God is God, and whatever He wants, happens!
Our Lord would later repeat that truth when speaking of the difficulty of salvation: “Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus said to them: ‘With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:23-26).
The Power of the Simple Word of God
We forget or underestimate the power of the word of God. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God!” (John 1:1). “His word is full of power” (Ecclesiastes 8:4). “By the word of the Lord the Heavens were established; and all the power of them by the spirit of His mouth!” (Psalm 32:6). “O Lord God! Behold Thou hast made Heaven and Earth by Thy great power, and no word shall be hard to Thee!” (Jeremias 32:17). When Jesus cast out a devil by mere words, “there came fear upon all, and they talked among themselves, saying: ‘What word is this, for with authority and power He commands the unclean spirits, and they go out?’” (Luke 4:36)―which is still true today, for it is power of the word of God that drives the devil out of souls in exorcisms performed by mere priests. St. Paul speaks of God “upholding all things by the word of His power” (Hebrews 1:3).
St. Peter has Faith in the power of God’s word: “And Simon answering said to Jesus: ‘Master, we have labored all the night, and have taken nothing! But, at Thy word, I will let down the net!” (Luke 5:5) ― and a miraculous catch of fish was the result.
The Roman centurion, seeking a cure for his servant, does not ask that Jesus come down to his house, but has Faith in the mere word of Jesus: “The servant of a certain centurion, who was dear to him, being sick, was ready to die. And when he had heard of Jesus, he sent unto Him the ancients of the Jews, desiring Jesus to come and heal his servant. And when they came to Jesus, they besought Him earnestly, saying to Him: ‘He is worthy that Thou should do this for him! For he loves our nation; and he has built us a synagogue!’ And Jesus went with them. And when He was now not far from the house, the centurion sent his friends to Him, saying: ‘Lord, trouble not Thyself! For I am not worthy that Thou should enter under my roof. For which reason neither did I think myself worthy to come to Thee; but say the word, and my servant shall be healed. For I also am a man subject to authority, having under me soldiers: and I say to one, “Go!” and he goes; and to another, “Come!” and he comes; and to my servant, “Do this!” and he does it!’ Which Jesus hearing, marveled: and, turning about to the multitude that followed Him, He said: ‘Amen I say to you, I have not found so great Faith, not even in Israel!’” (Luke 7:2-9).
God’s Powerful Modern-Day Simplicity
This same simplicity, seen in a few simple words, yet powerful words, carries over into our day and age.
At Baptism, can we fully grasp the incredible things that happen at the simple, but powerful, words: “I baptize thee, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” while simple water is simply poured on the one being baptized? Miracles of grace suddenly take place! The baptized has Original Sin and all their personal sins removed; grace is poured into the soul; the Gifts of the Holy Ghost are planted within the soul; the theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity come into the soul; the person becomes an adopted child of God and an heir to the kingdom of Heaven! Simple words and actions, but an awesome and powerful result!
The same can be said of the Sacrament of Confession. Even though the priest may say additional prayers while giving absolution from sin, the key words are: “I absolve you from your sins, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen” while making a sign of the cross over the penitent. The worst crimes, the most shameful sins, no matter how many times committed, can be forgiven and forgotten by God using those simple words and actions.
When there is an impossibility to get to Confession, in such a case it is possible (though not guaranteed) that one short true act of perfect contrition can remove all guilt of sin and restore grace to the soul (provided one intends to confess those sins at the soonest possible time). Note, that we say TRUE and PERFECT act of contrition! This is sorrow that is based upon a true love of God, not a fear of His punishments. It is amazing what God will do when He sees that we TRULY mean those words: “I am sorry!” “I love you!”
The same applies to the Consecration at Mass, when God, using the ministry of His servants, the priests, changes mere bread and wine into the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of His Only-Begotten Son. What brings about such an awesome miracle? Again, like the Sacrament of Confession, even though more words are used, the essential words are the simple ones of “This is My Body” and “This is My Blood.” Simple words, beautiful result! Simply beautiful! Simply powerful!
The Modern-Day Power of God’s Word in Exorcisms
When we think of exorcisms, we tend to imagine a priest loaded with blessed crucifixes, holy water and relics of the saints. These things are, of course powerful and necessary tools as part of the exorcism process. However, this can distract us from the true and real and ultimate power behind the exorcism―which is the WORD OF GOD. At the heart of the formal Rite of Exorcism are the officially sanctioned prayers of the Church along with selected Scriptures, which are the words of God. These words remind the demons of the authority of God―the demon or demons eventually depart because GOD SAYS SO! The words of exorcism are SPOKEN IN THE NAME OF GOD―as can be seen from these few extracts from the Rite of Exorcism:
“Begone and stay far from this creature of God. For it is He Who commands you, He Who flung you headlong from the heights of Heaven into the depths of Hell. It is He Who commands you! … Graciously grant, O Lord, as we call on Thy Holy Name, that the evil spirit may retreat in terror and defeat … It is God + Himself Who commands you; the majestic Christ + Who commands you. God the Father + commands you; God the Son + commands you; God the Holy + Spirit commands you … The Word made flesh + commands you; the Virgin’s Son + commands you; Jesus + of Nazareth commands you … It is He Who casts you out … It is He Who repels you … It is He Who expels you, He Who has prepared everlasting hellfire for you and your angels, from Whose mouth shall come a sharp sword, Who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire.”
This imagery of the sword and the word (notice how the word “sword” contains the word “word”) is also seen in the battle of St. Michael the Archangel with Satan. St. Michael holds a sword, ready to deliver the death blow as he stands over the fallen demon. Of course, St. Michael doesn’t wield a real sword―for a physical, material sword cannot harm a spiritual being. Angels and demons are real, but, as spiritual beings, they are not affected by physical attacks―in the case of Holy Water, it is not the physical, material water that repels devils, but the invisible immaterial supernatural power attached to the water through a proper blessing given to water. The sword that St. Michael wields is the sword of the truth of God’s Word, of which Scripture says:
“Take unto you the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:17).
“For the word of God is living and effectual, and more piercing than any two edged sword; and reaching unto the division of the soul and the spirit, of the joints also and the marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12).
“And He [Jesus] was clothed with a garment sprinkled with blood; and His Name is called, THE WORD OF GOD … And out of His mouth proceeds a sharp two edged sword; that with it He may strike the nations ... and He has on His garment, and on His thigh written: ‘King of Kings, and Lord of Lords!’” (Apocalypse 19:13-16).
“And I saw the beast, and the kings of the Earth, and their armies make war with Him that sat upon the horse … And the beast was taken and … cast alive into the pool of fire, burning with brimstone, and the rest were slain by the sword of Him that sitts upon the horse, which proceeds out of His mouth!” (Apocalypse 19:19-21).
“To the angel of the church in Pergamum write: ‘These are the words of the One who holds the sharp, double-edged sword: ‘Some of you also hold to the teaching of the Nicolaitans. Therefore repent! Otherwise I will come to you shortly and wage war against them with the sword of My mouth!’” (Apocalypse 2:12, 15-16).
In the Rite of Exorcism, the words of God are to have prominence. Ideally, every exorcism has two priests, one of whom continuously reads the rite while the other uses Sacramentals and briefly engages the demons to gain necessary information (e.g., names, how they entered, when they will leave) and tries to find weak points. While the use of Sacramentals such as holy water, the touch of a stole, or relics torment the demons, almost every exorcist agrees that the greatest power of the Rite of Exorcism is to be found in the Church approved words of the prayers and words of God from Scripture. In fact, sometimes demons show exaggerated pain in response to lesser things so as to distract from the reading of the rite.
The words of the rite have the effect of shining the light of truth on demons and reminding them of their ultimate destiny. All of this is painful to the demons. Ultimately, the demons are commanded to depart, to flee and give way to God in the power of God’s Name, by power of the Holy Trinity and by the power of Christ. All these words and many more shine the light of truth on the demons and cause them pain. It is the Word, the prayer of the Church, that ultimately defeats Satan and all the other demons. This teaching on exorcism is an important lesson for all of us. The truest battleground for all of us is our mind; the battle is one of thoughts. We will either dwell in God’s truth and study His Word or be lost in Satan’s lies. We must learn to fight every temptation with the sword of God’s Word. We must test every thought we have to see if it conforms to God’s Word. We must decide either to believe God or Satan. The sword of God’s Word can drive out every temptation, fear, sorrow, and depression. The more we grow in God’s Word the less authority and influence Satan can have in our lives.
Where Is All This Leading To?
Now what has this long-winded, interminably dragging, endless introduction got to do with the title of this article―“Try This! It Really Works”? Well, simply this―if you are going to “buy-into” something, or purchase something, or try something, then you want to be sure that it works, that it will work for you and that is worth the time and investment. All of the above shows the power of the word of God, it shows that the word of God works, that it has worked for many people and that it can work for you too! The purpose of these endless examples of divine doings, has been to establish and explain the principle (which is not just a rare occurrence) of how God usually works with mankind. It is quite simple and quite powerful at the same time.
Underused, Refused and Abused
We are all woefully and pitifully guilty of underusing―and even refusing or abusing―the word of God. If, anything, the word of God and the Name of God sees more abuse than good use. Blasphemy and the use of God’s Name in vain is more common that using the words of God and the Name of God for good. The word of God is a source of grace―as we see in the wording of the Sacraments, which take their words from Holy Scripture: baptizing “in the Name of the Father, and of the Son and the Holy Ghost”; or, “This is My Body, This is My Blood”; etc.
Sacramentals are also a source of grace―though not in the same ways as Sacraments. There are many different Sacramentals―far more in number than the limited seven Sacraments. Prayer is just one of many different kinds of Sacramentals―and, what is prayer? As the catechism and many saints and theologians tell us: “Prayer is the raising of the mind and heart to God.” Prayer takes many formats―the Divine Office, the Divine Liturgy, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the prayers begging God’s blessings in the Roman Ritual, the Holy Rosary, countless novenas and other prayers, meditation is also a prayer, contemplation too, likewise spiritual reading.
Thus, Holy Scripture―which furnishes many of these types of prayer with their content―can be said to be a “prayer that surpasses most prayers” and that is why the reading of Holy Scripture is given a plenary indulgence if it read for more than 30 minutes―and, in case you didn’t know, indulgences are Sacramentals too! The Handbook of Indulgences states, “A partial indulgence is granted the Christian faithful who read Sacred Scripture with the veneration due God’s Word and as a form of spiritual reading. The indulgence will be a plenary one when such reading is for at least one-half hour.” Keep in mind that there are several requirements for acquiring a plenary indulgence. The Apostolic Constitution on Indulgences explains: “To acquire a plenary indulgence it is necessary to perform the work to which the indulgence is attached and to fulfill three conditions: (1) Sacramental Confession, (2) Eucharistic Communion and (3) prayer for the intentions of the Supreme Pontiff. It is further required that all attachment to sin, even to venial sin, be absent. If this disposition is in any way less than complete, or if the prescribed three conditions are not fulfilled, the indulgence will be only partial.”
So is the Bible a Sacramental?
Individual unblessed (not-blessed) copies of the Bible ARE NOT Sacramentals of themselves. Apart from prayer (which is not an object, but a spiritual invisible thing) all objects need to be blessed for them to become Sacramentals. A Rosary, or Scapular, or Medal, or Statue, or Crucifix, or water that has not been blessed is NOT a Sacramental. A copy of the Bible could be blessed and become a Sacramental, in the same way as other things. The Bible is not referred to as the “Holy” Bible just because a priest has blessed it and made it to be a blessed object, thus a Sacramental. The word “Bible” comes from the Greek word “Biblia”, which is the plural for book, therefore meaning “books”―for the Bible is a compilation of many books, or a mini-library of books. However, we call it the “Holy” Bible, not because it was blessed and sprinkled with Holy Water, but because it is filled with holiness, or rather filled with the Holy Words of God and counsels on how become holy. The Bible’s holiness derives from the message it contains, not from any blessing that has been pronounced on it. Thus, unless it has been blessed by a priest, the Bible is merely a book, yet also much, much more than a book.
An unblessed Bible, with its words and messages, is not a Sacramental, but, in one sense, it is much more than that. It is a foundational pillar of the Church―for all the other Sacramentals, such as the Roman Ritual with its blessings and ceremonies, the Roman Missal, many different prayers (for prayer is a Sacramental too) owe their origins and much of their content to the Bible. Scripture is, in this sense, profoundly Sacramental―for it has provided the ‘food’ and ‘clothing’ for the many different forms of Sacramentals that have come after Holy Scripture. Holy Scripture is the “Grand Patriarch” or “Grand Matriarch” of them all. While the Word of God is not a Sacrament or even a Sacramental in the strict sense, its proclamation in the liturgy and all other aspects of the Church has a special and unmatched authority and power.
Powerful Mottos From Holy Scripture For All Circumstances of Life
So very few people “tap-into” the power of Holy Scripture for the countless different circumstances and situations that they find themselves in daily. They are neglecting a great power that could transform their lives, transform their attitude, transform their approach to things, and transform the results that they are getting (or, most likely, failing to get). All it takes is a little “gold-mining” in the streams and seams of Holy Scripture―the nuggets that you will discover could totally change your life. So let us now get down to the “nitty-gritty” part of “panning” and “digging”!
Major Monumental Mottos
Mottos can be nuggets of gold. Yet not all mottos are made equal! You could say that some mottos have a major monumental meaning, whereas others can be meaningful but minor. What qualifies as being major and monumental? Obviously that which majorly impacts your salvation and helps avoid your damnation. One key phrase from Holy Scripture―which is short and sweet―is: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24)―or, if you want the longer version: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). The motto you could make from that could be: “It’s God or mammon! You can’t have both!” or “I will love God and hate mammon, or love mammon and hate God!”
If you are thick-skinned and need to be hit by a sledgehammer, or need an electric shock to stir you, then ponder these quotes and from them create a motto for yourself: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23). “Why call you Me ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Very closely linked to the above mottos are the words of Our Lord: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30). Your motto, based upon those words, could be: “Love God first―not partially, but totally!” or “To be holy I must love God wholly!” If you find that you are putting worldly things before God in your life, then say to yourself: “The first will be last and the last will be first!”―which comes from “Many that are first, shall be last; and the last shall be first!” (Matthew 19:30), or “God first, the world last!”
Similar to this, in bursting the bubble of worldliness and a preoccupation with earthly things, is: “What shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36)―which could be rephrased for a motto as being: “Lose the world or lose your soul!” or “Have fun at what cost? The world is won, but the soul is lost!” Another similar quote by Our Lord is: “Amen, I say to you: How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 19:16-26; Mark 10:17-27)―from which you could form a motto such as: “Material wealth leads to spiritual bankruptcy!” or “Better be poor on Earth and rich in Heaven; than rich on Earth and poor in Hell!”
Staying with this God versus the world idea, you also have the Scriptural quotes: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15) and “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Be dead with Christ from the elements of this world” (Colossians 2:20). “We have not received the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; so that we may know the things that are given us from God” (1 Corinthians 2:12). An easy motto, almost identical to an earlier one above, would be: “Love God and hate the world, or hate God and love the world!” or “Make a friend of the world and be an enemy of God!”
Avoiding the world has to be concrete and real: “What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). That is what we do not want to do―go out from them and “be ye separate”―we love mixing with them, but, thereby, we poison our cup of salvation with the poison of damnation. We forget or find it hard to believe that the devil is the “prince of this world” and that he uses this world as poisoned bait. “The prince of this world is coming, and in Me he has not anything … The prince of this world is already judged ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). “Jesus answered: ‘My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36). To the worldlings He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works thereof are evil!” (John 7:7).
It is of paramount importance that we drill into our thick skulls and hard hearts that we cannot have a dual-citizenship if we wish to reach Heaven. We cannot be citizens of this world (of which the devil is prince) and citizens of Heaven (where Christ is King). We must choose to follow one or the other. The fact that most people try to follow both, is a major contributory factor to their eventual damnation.
That Damned Motto!
It is a very damning statistic which says that most souls are damned when God wants to save everyone! Why on earth does that happen? What the hell is going on? One chief reason is down to the phrase: “Out of sight, out of mind!” meaning that something is easily forgotten or dismissed as unimportant if it is not in our direct view. This is exactly how the devil likes to work―out of sight, so he is out of our mind or thoughts, free to plot and plan our damnation without our ever giving a thought to it [read more here]. Holy Scripture, on the contrary, wants us to keep the salvation-damnation issue always before our eyes:
“With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12) … “For many are called, but few chosen!” (Matthew 20:16; 22:14). “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life, and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate! For many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28). Numerous other passages could be quoted, but you get the idea.
The saints got the idea and that is why they would say things such as the following quotes reveal. Bear in mind that the following saints are just “any-old-saints”, but all of them are DOCTORS OF THE CHURCH and they SPAN ALL THE CENTURIES from the 300s to the 1800s. The bottom line is: “Few are saved! To be saved with the few, live like the few!”--as the following quotes prove:
► St. Augustine (354-430), Doctor and Father of the Church: “Take care not to resemble the multitude whose knowledge of God’s will only condemns them to more severe punishment … It is certain that few are saved” (Sermon 111; also Against Cresconius) … “If you wish to imitate the multitude, then you shall not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow gate” (Sermon 224:1).
► St. Basil the Great (330-379), Doctor and Father of the Church: “Remember that it is not the multitude who are being saved! The great multitude of the people are carried hither and thither by winds like the waters of the sea!” (St. Basil the Great).
► St. John Climacus (579-606), Father of the Church: “Live with the few if you want to reign with the few!”
► St. Bede the Venerable (673-735), Doctor and Father of the Church: “We should not think that it is enough for salvation that we are no worse off than the mass of the careless and indifferent, or that, in our Faith, we are, like so many others, uninstructed … Christ’s flock is called ‘little’ in comparison with the greater number of the reprobates!”
► St. Hilary of Poitiers (300-368), Doctor and Father of the Church: “How few the Elect are, may be understood from the multitude being cast out!”
► St. Anselm (1033-1109), Doctor of the Church: “If thou wouldst be certain of being in the number of the elect, strive to be one of the few, not of the many! And if thou wouldst be quite sure of thy salvation, strive to be among the fewest of the few! … Do not follow the great majority of mankind, but follow those who enter upon the narrow way, who renounce the world, who give themselves to prayer, and who never relax their efforts by day or by night, that they may attain everlasting blessedness!”
► St. Thomas Aquinas (1235-1274), Doctor of the Church: “There are a select few who are saved!” (Summa Theologica, Ia, q.23, art.7, ad 3.) “Those who are saved are in the minority!” (Summa Theologica, Ia, q.23, art.8, ad.3).
► St. John of the Cross (1524-1591), Doctor of the Church: “Behold how many there are who are called, and how few who are chosen! And behold, if you have no care for yourself, your perdition is more certain than your amendment, especially since the way that leads to eternal life is so narrow!”
► St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), Doctor of the Church: “I had the greatest sorrow for the many souls that condemned themselves to Hell ... I saw souls falling into Hell like snowflakes!”
► St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori (1696-1787), Doctor of the Church: “The common opinion is that the greater part of adults is lost … In the Great Deluge in the days of Noe, nearly all mankind perished, eight persons alone being saved in the Ark. In our days a deluge, not of water but of sins, continually inundates the Earth, and out of this deluge very few escape. Scarcely anyone is saved! … Everyone desires to be saved but the greater part is lost! … All persons desire to be saved, but the greater part, because they will not adopt the means of being saved, fall into sin and are lost! In fact, the Elect are much fewer than the damned, for the reprobate are much more numerous than the Elect! … St. Teresa, as the Roman Rota attests, never fell into any mortal sin; but still Our Lord showed her the place prepared for her in Hell; not because she deserved Hell, but because, had she not risen from the state of lukewarmness in which she lived, she would in the end have lost the grace of God and been damned … The greater part of men choose to be damned rather than to love Almighty God! … The saved are few, but we must live with the few if we would be saved with the few! O God, too few indeed they are―yet amongst those few I wish to be!”
This whole issue of salvation and damnation is fundamental to the Catholic spiritual life and it is of paramount importance that we have a correct understanding of it―and not rose-colored, candy-coated, selfishly-tweaked and twisted, self-imagined unrealistic idea of the truths of salvation and damnation. That is what has led to the damnation of most souls, when God wishes the salvation of all souls―but that will never happen because of man’s stubbornness, willfulness, carelessness and indifference. Without a true notion of what it takes to be saved, we will be lost with the majority. Yes, salvation is hard―it has to be if you think about the rewards you expect: eternal life, no suffering in body or mind, no threats from others, no enemies, no illness, no injuries, no anxieties, no having to pay for anything, having everything supplied, eternal joy, ceaseless love, every good craving satisfied―all this is merely the tip of the iceberg! And you want all that for free? You want all that without making serious efforts to be worthy of all that? You want to sin freely and still get all that? Well that is the attitude of most people―and it “just won’t cut it”, and they “don’t make the cut”―they are cut-off from God for eternity. That is why we must “Live like the few, to be saved with the few!” The other alternative needs to be drummed-home relentlessly, for it seems to be the preferred path of most people: “To live like the many, leads to being damned with the many!” It is an inescapable truth of Scripture: “For many are called, but few chosen!” (Matthew 20:16; 22:14). “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Mottos of Means and Methods
Once we have clear idea that salvation is not “a piece of cake”, or no “push-over”, but something that requires our “work with fear and trembling” (Philippians 2:12), and that few are saved―not because of limited openings or limited places in Heaven, but because of limited interest and limited efforts here on Earth―then we have to start looking at how on earth we can become one of the few and what we must do as one of the few in order to be saved?
The means of salvation could take up a whole book―but you need something short and sweet to shake and shock you into starting your spiritual engine! St. Louis de Montfort, in his little booklet, The Secret of Mary, writes: “What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.” The means that St. Louis lists give us a framework around which we can work.
Mottos of Humility
Humility is the ESSENTIAL foundation of the spiritual life―there is nobody in Heaven who is not humble! Hell is for the proud ones and Hell is full of pride! Our Lord Himself says: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29). Our Lord could have listed many other virtues―charitable, courageous, devout, knowledgeable, honest, zealous, etc. ―but He didn’t. He mentioned only meekness and humility. Meekness and humility are intimately connected if you really think about it! What is meekness? Meekness is the opposite of anger. There is, of course, a just anger and an unjust anger―a good anger and a bad anger. Why do people get unjustly angry? Because things do not go according to how they want them to go―things are not according THEIR liking, THEIR ideas, THEIR expectations, etc. All of this kind of anger ultimately stems from pride, which is also the opposite of humility. Thus meekness (lack of anger) and humility (lack of pride) are related. So, as a basic reminder of this, you could have a mottos such as: “As humble as Heaven or as proud as Hell!” or “Humility Helps Holiness!” or “Proud Persons Perish!” etc., etc.
There are lots of one-liner Scriptural quotes to help you acquire humility and avoid pride: “Humble thy heart and endure!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:2). “Humility goeth before glory” (Proverbs 15:33). “Humiliation follows the proud: and glory shall uphold the humble!” (Proverbs 29:23). “Pride brings reproach! Humility brings wisdom!” (Proverbs 11:2). “The prayer of the humble and the meek hath always pleased Thee!” (Judith 9:16). “The Lord will save the humble!” (Psalm 33:19). “Whosoever shall humble himself as this little child―he is the greater in the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 18:4). “Whosoever shall exalt himself shall be humbled: and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted!” (Matthew 23:12). “He has put down the mighty from their seat and has exalted the humble!” (Luke 1:52). “God resists the proud, but to the humble he gives grace!” (1 Peter 5:5). Why not try form some mottos from these?
Article 5
Wednesday, June 5th
Radical Remedies Require Really Radical Catholics!
Wholly Radical and Holy Radical Catholics!
Wednesday, June 5th
Radical Remedies Require Really Radical Catholics!
Wholly Radical and Holy Radical Catholics!
Just Not Good Enough!
God is known—but not known enough! We hope and trust in God—but we do not hope and trust enough! God is loved—but not loved enough! We pray to God—but we do not pray enough! We are sorry for our sins—but not sorry enough! We think about God—but we do think about Him enough! We read about God—but we do not read enough! We talk about God—but we do not talk about Him enough! We defend God—but we do not defend Him enough! We promote God—but we do not promote Him enough! We go to Holy Mass—but we do not go enough! We receive Holy Communion—but we do not receive it enough! We make visits to the Blessed Sacrament—but we do visit enough! Have you had enough yet? Enough’s enough! The point is that we FAR, FAR below and behind where we should be! That is why the Church and world are FAR, FAR below the standard and level that they should be at! That is why we have a worldwide crisis in Faith, morality, culture, politics, economics, education, etc. Sounds radical! Yet it is true!
We are all tempted to imagine that we are doing pretty well as regards our Faith and our relationship with God! We say to ourselves: “I go to Mass—sometimes I go several times a week! I say prayers every day—I even pray my Rosary daily, sometimes several Rosaries daily! I contribute to the support of the church! I try to avoid mortal sins! I do a bit of spiritual reading every day! I make a meditation and examination of conscience every day! I try to learn more and more about my Faith by frequent study! I am not like most other Catholics! Thank you Lord!”
This ‘smacks’ of the attitude of the Pharisee in Our Lord’s parable about the Pharisee and the Publican: “Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee, standing, prayed thus with himself [notice two things here: (1) that he is not openly bragging, but merely thinking to himself and talking to God within himself, and (2) he is not attributing his good works to himself, but thanking God and His grace for the good that he does]: ‘O God, I give Thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!’ And the publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other―because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!” (Luke 18:10-14).
Don’t Fool Yourself!
As Our Lord Himself says: “Which of you―having a servant ploughing or feeding cattle―will say to him, when he is come home from the field: ‘Immediately go, sit down to meat!’ Will you not rather say to him: ‘Make ready my supper, and gird thyself, and serve me, whilst I eat and drink, and afterwards thou shalt eat and drink!’? Does the master thank that servant for doing the things which he commanded him? I think not! So you also, when you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done that which we ought to do!’” (Luke 17:7-10).
This is echoed in the words spoken by Our Lord to one of His mystics, when He said to her that if she could see herself as He saw her, then she would die in terror! We are far from being mystics and far from having a true opinion of ourselves! What would Our Lord say to the world—the world that we are pretty much at peace with and happy and content to live in it and enjoy what it offers? The world would die in terror if it could see itself as Our Lord sees it! Our Lady of Akita pretty much said the same thing: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord. In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them. As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” (Our Lady of Akita). That is pretty radical! Huh?
If God is prepared to let fire fall from Heaven that will destroy the greater part of humanity—then somehow God must not too impressed nor very satisfied with the world! And that was said back in 1973! How much worse has the world become since 1973? For one, abortion had not yet “taken-off” and the majority of Catholics were still attending Sunday Mass on a regular weekly basis! The world has changed radically since 1973—for that year could be looked upon as a mere spark to the gigantic forest fire of evil that we see engulfing the world today! It is estimated that there have been 54 million abortions since Our Lady spoke those words in 1973! Furthermore, the number of those no longer regularly attending Sunday Mass (which binds under pain of mortal sin) has doubled since 1973—with the attendance figures being 75% attending in 1957; 48% attending in 1970; 42% in 1975; 20% in 2018; and now under 20% in 2024. This is a pretty radical change for the worse! Huh?
A World “On-Fire”
In a sense, you could say that the world in on fire with evil—yet Christ wants it burn with love: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). “The Lord thy God is a consuming fire, a jealous God!” (Deuteronomy 4:24), which is why that jealous God commands: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30). Furthermore, that jealous God warns us what will happen if that love of Him fails to reach the required standards: “Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16). That is a pretty radical statement! Huh?
Massive Forest Fires Have Small Beginnings
The Church and world need to change radically―and, for that to happen, we have to see at radical change at the grass roots level of Catholicism—that is to say, Catholicism as it is lived in each Catholic individuals, in Catholic families and from there in Catholic communities such as parishes and schools. All improvement, betterment, correction and reformation ultimately starts with “the few” and not “the many”—it starts with an minority, not a majority. The same is true for evil and revolution—it starts with “a few” and spreads to “many”—much like St. James’ example of the tongue:
“For in many things we all offend. If any man does not offend in word, the same is a perfect man. He is able also with a bridle to lead about the whole body. For if we put bits into the mouths of horses, that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole body. Behold also ships, whereas they are great, and are driven by strong winds, yet are they turned about with a small helm, whithersoever the force of the ship’s pilot desires. Even so the tongue is indeed a little part of the body, but boasts of great things. See how small a fire sets a great forest on fire. And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is placed among our members, which defiles the whole body, and inflames the wheel of our nativity, being set on fire by Hell! For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and hath been tamed, by the nature of man! But the tongue no man can tame! It is an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison! By it we bless God and the Father: and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceeds blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:2-10).
Radical—What is Radical?
When we hear the word “radical” today, we are often conditioned to imagine some kind of revolutionary Communist, or terrorist, or society ‘drop-out’, or some extremist opposed to society, etc. We would be surprised or even shocked if we were to be called a “radical”, and even more surprised and shocked if God was to be called a “radical”! What is “a radical”? Do we fully understand the meaning of the word? Too often we just throw around words without really knowing what they mean! For example, we often misuse the word “jealous”, mistaking it and interchanging it for the word “envy”—but they are two different things. “Jealousy” is wanting to keep what you have. “Envy” is wanting what others have. It is a misuse of the word “jealous” to say: “I am jealous of all the money he has!” or “I am jealous of his success!” We should be saying: “I am envious of all the money he has!” or “I am envious of his success!” We can be “jealous” of our own belongings, but not those of others. In Holy Scripture, God says: “I am the Lord thy God, a jealous God!” (Deuteronomy 5:9). This does not mean that God is “envious” of someone—He cannot be, for He has everything, every perfection and every power that you could have—it means that He is jealously wanting to preserve what belongs to Him and what is due to Him, for example His glory, and God will to extreme (radical) measures to make sure that He keeps what is His and gets His due.
Radical Defined
The dictionary defines “radical” as (1) “being of, relating to, or proceeding from a root: arising from or going to a root or source; basic”; (2) “of or relating to the origin of something; fundamental”; (3) “being very different from the usual: extreme”; (4) “favoring extreme changes in existing views, habits, conditions, or institutions”; (5) “associated with political views, practices, and policies of extreme change”; (6) “a person who advocates thorough or complete reform”; (7) “a description of an action or thing which is especially impressive.” Radical changes and differences are very important and great in degree. Radical people believe that there should be great changes in society and try to bring about these changes. Synonyms for the word “radical” are: “thoroughgoing, thorough, complete, total, comprehensive, exhaustive, sweeping, far-reaching, wide-ranging, extensive, across the board, profound, major, stringent, rigorous.”
The dictionary will give you the adjective “radical” as someone “believing or expressing the belief that there should be great or extreme religious, social, economic, or political change.” When situations are grave and serious, we speak of having to take “radical measures” and make “radical changes”. As a noun, the dictionary will tell you that a “radical” is “a person who supports great religious, social, economic, or political change.” In other words, “radical changes” and “radical measures” and “radical solutions” and “radical steps” are not partial changes, nor half-measures, nor little steps—but major ones, extreme ones, powerful ones, vigorous ones.
A Radical God
In this sense we can call God or Our Lord “radical”—for, as Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres: “If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
Likewise, the methods that God will use to “clean-up” and “correct” the world, will also be “radical measures”—as Our Lady foretells: “The Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad!” Yet, God is so “radical”—in the above definitions and their synonyms, with their meanings of “thoroughgoing, thorough, complete, total, comprehensive, exhaustive, sweeping, far-reaching, wide-ranging, extensive, across the board, profound, major, stringent, rigorous”―that once He has finished “cleaning house” the world will so holy and virtuous as never has been seen in the history of mankind! Our Lady of La Salette describes the “radical changes” that will take place during and after this “radical house cleaning”:
“And then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like. And then peace will be made, and man will be reconciled with God. Jesus Christ will be served, worshiped and glorified. Charity will flourish everywhere. The new kings will be the right arm of the Holy Church, which will be strong, humble, pious in Its poor but fervent imitation of the virtues of Jesus Christ. The Gospel will be preached everywhere and mankind will make great progress in its Faith, for there will be unity among the workers of Jesus Christ and man will live in fear of God.” (Our Lady of La Salette).
“Then, afterwards, a good time will come, and holy men will do wonders. Once people have their Faith again, a long period of peace will follow. Then there will be a shortened summer; winter and summer will not be distinguishable. Everywhere, the fear of God, virtue, and good morals will prevail. He will lead all erring sheep back to the fold, and there shall be one Faith, one law, one rule of life, and one Baptism on Earth. All men will love each other and do good, and all quarrels and wars will cease. The Church will become―by her Faith and by her love―more fervent and more flourishing than ever. The Church will witness many amazing things, even on the part of her former persecutors, for they will come forward and throw themselves at her feet, acknowledge her, and implore pardon from God and from here for all the crimes and outrages that they had perpetrated against her. She will no longer regard them as her enemies, but she will instead welcome them as her own children. Now all the true penitents will flow from all sides to the Church, which will receive them into her bosom. The entire community of the faithful will pour out their hearts in hymns of penance and thanksgiving to the glory of the Lord. A great power, led by the Holy Ghost, will restore order … A large assembly of pastors who will uphold the rights of the Church and of her Head. They will restore the former disciplines. All the false religions will be abolished; all the abuses of the Revolution will be destroyed and the altars of the true God restored. The former practices will be put into force again, and our religion – at least in some respects – will flourish more than ever.” (Catholic Prophecy). Again, pretty radical! Huh?
Getting Radical—Getting to the Root of the Matter!
The prefix, “rad-” in the word “radical”, comes from the Latin word “radix”, meaning “root”—hence, in the above dictionary definition, it speaks of “radical” as “being of, relating to, or proceeding from a root: arising from or going to a root or source; basic” … “of or relating to the origin of something; fundamental.” The “root” of the all the problems in the world today—whether they concern the spiritual life, the moral life, the life of Faith, the practice of Charity, or the intellectual, political, financial, cultural or social life—all find their “root cause” in God, or rather, the absence of God, the ignoring of God and His commandments. To an even greater degree, that ignoring of God is magnified and worsened by the ignoring of a God—not a God who is “miles away” in some distant Heaven—but the ignoring of a God who is here present on Earth, living in our midst in the tabernacles of the Catholic Church. In a certain sense, one would be less guilty (but guilty all the same) for ignoring a God somewhere way out there in a distant Heaven—on the premise of “Out of sight, out of mind!”—but God is not “out of sight and out of mind”, but perfectly visible, perpetually present and accessible in the Holy Eucharist inside the tabernacle her on Earth! The problem is that we are out of our minds by trying to keep Him out of sight!
The One Who can solve all our problems, is right here among us—but we can’t be bothered to go seek his advice and help! We are trying to “fix” things without Him! Idiocy! Stupidity! Pride! Our Lord Himself said: “Without Me, you can do NOTHING!” (John 15:5) and “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27) “With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible!” (Matthew 19:26). “With men it is impossible; but not with God―for all things are possible with God!” (Mark 10:27). “Because no word shall be impossible with God!” (Luke 1:37). Notice that ALL FOUR Evangelists report this truth—and there are very few things that are reported by ALL four of them.
The Radical Love of God
God does not need you skills, or your intelligence, or your books, or your blogs, or your forums, or your sermons, or your organizations, or your human plots, plans, ideas and schemes! As Our Lord said to some of His mystics:
“Do you think that anything happens without My permission? I dispose all things … Do not worry about what you can and what you cannot do. You know very well that you can do nothing … Do you understand that you are nothing? Apart from Me you are nothing but rebellion, refusal, negation … But I am He who can and will do all. Yes, I will do all, even what seems to you impossible.... I will supply for all that you lack or cannot do … I want what you do not want, but I can do what you cannot do. It is not for you to choose, but to surrender … The more you disappear, the more shall I be your life … There is but one thing to do: love and abandon oneself … You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! … Remember this: Everything is a means in My Hands; I make all work together to fulfill My will … Let Me act! You are not competent to do anything―it is not your province! … I can do everything I wish, and it is I who am doing everything! … Let Me do everything! You will see that I will do everything, and do it well! … You must henceforth think only of Me and of souls; of Me to love Me, and of souls to save them!” (Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love, Words of Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Mary of the Trinity and Sr. Consolata Betrone).
“There are several forms of humility: that which admits your nothingness, your unworthiness, speaks according to wisdom and truth. But it is also a form of humility not to speak of oneself, because one does not think of oneself; one thinks only of Me. I love that silence concerning oneself … Your value does not lie in your personal capabilities, however brilliant they may be, but in your capacity to receive your Creator and allow Him to live in you … Oh, if you would leave Me to act! I would splendidly transform each one of your lives. But you oppose Me by your desires, your tastes, your resistance! … Most religious give Me their work and their talents—I have sufficient talents at My disposal! … Instead of developing your talents, seek rather to welcome the gifts of God … What I desire is the soul―to make it My place of rest and of work, to live anew in it in humanity. Yes, My place of work, because a soul that would give herself to Me without reserve, how I would use her for the glory of God and of the Church, for the salvation of other souls, to a degree that you cannot imagine! … Weakness and worthlessness are of small account! What I want is their trust! These are the souls who draw down on the world mercy and peace … When a soul asks of Me what to human eyes is impossible, she honors Me … It is not sufficient to say: ‘My God, I have confidence in You.’ You must make the interior act of freeing yourself from all anxiety ... I await this confidence from every soul” (Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love, Words of Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Mary of the Trinity and Sr. Consolata Betrone).
“The best gift that you can make Me is to receive Me ... You must live by Faith; you must believe that I am there under the humble species, believe without proof … The best work that you can do is to obtain My cooperation—and, when you yourself have done all you could, to let Me act. I work with time … Place no limits on your confidence in Me, then I will place no limits on My graces for you! … You are astonished that often an effort that seemed impossible to make, instead of exhausting, strengthens you. It is not astonishing, it is true: I never allow Myself to be outdone by generosity ... Many souls deprive themselves of many graces because they refuse to make efforts which seem impossible to them, which are only offered to the generosity of their initiative … Love gives Itself as food to Its own and this food is the substance which gives them their life and sustains them. Love humbles Itself before Its own ... and in so doing raises them to the highest dignity. Love surrenders Itself in totality, It gives in profusion and without reserve. With enthusiasm, with vehemence It is sacrificed, It is immolated, It is given for those It loves.... The Holy Eucharist is love to the extreme of folly … I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift ... I thirst for love! … Oh, if people would only love Me, what happiness would reign in this unhappy world!” (Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love, Words of Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Mary of the Trinity and Sr. Consolata Betrone).
Love is the Radical Root of Reform
It is charity or love that will end the crisis in both the Church and world. Huh? Yes! Or should we say, “It is God who will end the crisis in both the Church and the world!” For “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8) and so Charity (God) will do what has to be done! For our part, we need a greater charity towards God (first of all) and then towards (neighbor). We cannot say that we love God enough when He is left abandoned in the tabernacles for most of the time! We cannot say we love God enough if cannot drag ourselves to extra Masses for love of Him, as He dragged Himself up to Calvary for love of us! We cannot say we love God enough if we rarely (once a week) receive Him in Holy Communion and our thanksgiving prayers are always the same, and like phrases out of a tourist’s “key phrases to use” language book—rarely finding anything of our own to say or anything new to say! We cannot say that we love Him enough when spend hours on worldly pursuits and will not pursue Him by visiting Him—“out of hours”—in the Blessed Sacrament! It is because our charity is so little, that the problems in the world and Church are so great!
Charity at the Root of All Success
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). The “charity” that St. Paul speaks about is first and foremost a love of God. Far too many of our works and efforts have a “love of self” mixed-in with a “love of God”! Sometimes there is far more “love of self” in what we do than there is a “love of God”—though we always protest that this is not true!
God Will Only Bless His Own Work!
What the Benedictine, Dom Hubert Van Zeller, says of holiness—that it has to be “God-Made” and not “Man-Made”—is also applicable to our religious efforts in our lives. God is the solution—not us! Dom Hubert Van Zeller writes:
“This means that however determined you are to be a saint, you will not become one if you rely on your own strength of mind. The only thing that can get you to sanctity is God’s grace. You will need all the strength of mind you have just to work together with God’s grace, but if you imagine that making good, strong resolutions will carry you the whole way, you are wrong. About the first thing to happen will be that God lets you break some of those good, strong resolutions before you get properly started. This will be to put you in your place, and show you that you can do nothing without Him. Once you are decently humbled, knowing that left to yourself you cannot even carry out the things that you very much want to carry out, you are getting ready to be used. You are being softened up like a steak. When all the toughness and pride and glamorized ideas of holiness have been beaten out of you by the down-to-earth action of truth, then God has got something there on which He can work. Without false notions and fancy plans, you can now begin to fall in with the true notions of holiness and with the plan God has in mind for you. It stands to reason. God is not going to reward anyone else’s work but His own. You cannot expect Him to recognize a holiness that He has done nothing to bring about. When you get right down to it, there is only one real goodness, one perfection, one sanctity, and that is God’s. When man invents a holiness of his own, God lets him look for it but does not help him find it, because a holiness of one’s own does not exist, and it is a waste of time searching for it. It is as if someone were to look for moonlight without the moon. Once you admit that all moonlight is bound to come from one particular place, and that it is a thing you cannot make yourself, you have learned something!” (Dom Hubert Van Zeller, Holiness—A Guide For Beginners).
What a Woeful Waste of Valuable Time and Resources!
If you are truly realistic and logical, then you have to admit that the vast majority of our day is either a total waste of time and effort or a partial waste of time and effort. Yes, of course, everyone has their “duty of state” to accomplish, and so a father or a mother with children, cannot be going door-to-door all day long, trying to win converts to the Catholic Faith, nor can they be on their knees all day long in a church before the Blessed Sacrament or praying the Rosary. Yet, that does not mean that one cannot be praying all day long! Otherwise, the words of Our Lord and Holy Scripture would be stupid and meaningless: “And Jesus spoke also a parable to them, that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). “ALL whatsoever you do in WORD or in WORK, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 3:17). You cannot be more clear than that! “Always pray … pray without ceasing … faint not … all you words and all your actions, do for God!”
“Oh no!” you say, “That is way too radical for me! I can’t be thinking about God all the time—that’s too radical! I have so many other things to attend to! I am sure God does not expect that from souls!” Ha! There you go again! Making-up your own version of God’s religion! Tell me—what do you not understand about these words: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy WHOLE heart, and with thy WHOLE soul, and with thy WHOLE mind, and with thy WHOLE strength. This is the first commandment … This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30; Matthew 22:38). Are you going to try to squirm your way out of that and interpret that like the Protestants try to misinterpret the words: “This is My Body! … This is My Blood!” Those who seek to misinterpret the clear and obvious meaning of the words of Christ, risk missing the straight and narrow path that leads to Heaven!
Isn’t that what love is all about? Tell me—what are the poor souls in the fires of Purgatory thinking about right now?
The ‘good times’ they had on Earth? Sports? Fashions? Socializing? Watching some Purgatory TV channel? Doing some Purgatorial social-media browsing looking for other poor souls on Facebook? No—they are ALL thinking about God ALL of the time! They are growing in their love of God ALL of the time! They have no time for anything else except God! Why are they there in the first place? They are burning in the fires of Purgatory because they did not burn enough with a love of God on Earth! They are “doing time” in Purgatory because they had little time for God on Earth. They are in Purgatory—just as souls are in Hell—because they wasted their time and wasted their efforts while on Earth, doing the wrong things, or doing the right things badly.
They would have been “saints in Heaven”, rather than “suffering in Purgatory” or “damned in Hell” if they had only been more radical during their lives—for all saints are radical, meaning, as the above dictionary definition indicated: “being very different from the usual―extreme; an action or thing which is especially impressive; believing or expressing the belief that there should be great or extreme religious, social, economic, or political change” and as the synonyms of “radical” indicated: “thorough, complete, total, far-reaching, wide-ranging, rigorous, profound.” If you can find a saint that didn’t exhibit most of these traits on Earth, then that saint did not die a saint and go straight to Heaven, but finished his or her “school of sanctity” by taking ‘remedial lessons’ for a greater or lesser length of time in the ‘remedial school’ of Purgatory! That is why, after the death of a ‘saint’, the Church requires miracles as proof that a ‘saint’ is in Heaven, before it will officially canonize a saint on Earth—until that moment we give them titles that indicate a progressive degree of sanctity: (1) Servant of God, (2) Venerable and then (3) Blessed.
Sanctity is Radical
We use the word “saint” far too glibly and loosely for people who are still living, and even for those who have just died (whom we like, for we rarely if ever call anyone a saint whom we do/did not like!)—“Oh I think that so-and-so is such a saint!” You may point out that St. Paul gives the title or name of “saint” to those living in Jerusalem and other cities--“I shall go to Jerusalem, to minister unto the saints … Make a contribution for the poor of the saints that are in Jerusalem … Help me in your prayers for me to God, that the offering of my service may be acceptable in Jerusalem to the saints!” (Romans 15:25-26, 30-31). He also speaks of “…all the saints that are in all Achaia …” (2 Corinthians 1:1), “…all the saints who are at Ephesus …” (Ephesians 1:1), “all the saints in Christ Jesus, who are at Philippi …” (Philippians 1:1), “…the saints who are at Colossa …” (Colossians 1:2) and then even refers to himself as a saint: “To me, the least of all the saints…” (Ephesians 3:8).
“To all that are at Rome, the beloved of God, called to be saints …” (Romans 1:7). “To the church of God that is at Corinth, called to be saints …” (1 Corinthians 1:2). Thus St. Paul speaks of the work of “the perfecting of the saints” (Ephesians 4:12), saying that, “We know that to them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as are called to be saints” (Romans 8:28).
The Radical Root of the Holy Eucharist
Staying with that Latin source for the word “root”—coming from the Latin “radix”, meaning “root” and in particular “an edible root”, we come to the “root” of our sanctity, the source of our sanctity, the edible root of our sanctity—which is the Holy Eucharist. Jesus is the vine and the root, and we are the branches growing out of that vine and root. At the Last Supper, when Jesus instituted the Holy Eucharist, He said: “I am the vine and you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
The Holy Eucharist fits perfectly fits this idea of root and vine. The root (which is below ground and invisible) of the Holy Eucharist is Jesus Christ—invisible to the eye, ‘hiding underground’ beneath the appearance of bread and wine. The vine (above ground and visible) of the Holy Eucharist is the outward appearance (bark of the vine) of bread and wine, which we can see. As the Latin noun “radix” indicates, this “root” is in particular “an edible root”—the “Root of Jesse” or in Latin “Radix Jesse” (Isaias 11:1, 10), Jesus Christ the “Edible Root of Jesse”, a ‘Radical’ Root of Jesse, who Himself says to us: “Amen, amen I say unto you! Unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day. For My Flesh is meat indeed: and My Blood is drink indeed. He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, abides in Me, and I in him!” (John 6:54-57).
The Holy Eucharist is the root of our sanctity as Christ’s sacrifice and death on Calvary is the root of our salvation. For without Him, we can do nothing (John 15:5). The Holy Eucharist is, as the Church teaches, both a SACRAMENT and a SACRIFICE—it is the Last Supper perpetuated in every Holy Communion and the Sacrifice of Christ on Calvary perpetuated in every Sacrifice of the Mass. The word “sacrament” finds it root in the Latin word “sacro” meaning “hallow, to make holy, to consecrate”, and from the Latin “sacer” meaning “sacred, holy.” The word “sacrifice” finds it root in the Latin word “sacrificium” a compound of two words: from “sacer” meaning “sacred, holy”, and “facio” meaning “to do, to make”―hence “to make holy.” Therefore, the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist is there to make us holy, and the Sacrifice of the Holy Eucharist (Holy Mass) is also there to make us holy. The Blessed Sacrament of Holy Eucharist is there to maintain and “top-up” our holiness each time we visit.
As Our Lady said of “The Most August Sacrament of the Eucharist―Comprehend the sublimity of this mystery and the reverence with which it should be treated and received by the faithful. It will be their antidote against sin, and an easy and powerful means for souls to unite themselves to their God and Redeemer, who, in the excess of His love, hides Himself under the appearance of the Host, and is exposed to the sacrilegious profanations of His ungrateful sons!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Earth-Shatteringly Radical?
Does being “radical” mean that we have to do “earth-shattering” things? No—but it does require that we the normal, everyday, things of life “earth shatteringly well”! As it was said of Jesus: “He hath done all things well!” (Mark 7:37) and Jesus tells us: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). That God of perfection also tells us the same: “I am the Almighty God! Walk before Me and be perfect!” (Genesis 17:1).
Radical Giving
What is it that perfects our actions? Well many things perfect our actions—First of all, for the perfection of our thoughts, words and actions, we must do all these things for God―“All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 3:17). “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31). Believe it or not, that is pretty “earth shattering” and radical. Try it for only one day! In everything you do! Don’t “cop-out” with a morning offering, “re-visit” that attitude time and time again. Otherwise you are taking the easy, cheap option—which betrays an cheap love! Try it on your spouse/child/parent/friend/etc., and tell them that you are going to offer them a “Thank you!” or an “I love you!” today, that is meant to last for the rest of the year! Cheap, huh? Frequently offer God the things you think, say or do! You won’t regret it! He won’t forget it!
Radical or Root Motives
Secondly, for the perfection of our thoughts, words and actions, we must do all these things with a pure intention and not for some selfish purpose or self-gain--“All the ways of a man are open to his eyes: the Lord is the weigher of spirits [motives]. Lay open thy works to the Lord!” (Proverbs 16:2-3). We see how God punished Ananias and Saphira, who, at a time when Christians shared everything they had, sold their property and lied about the price so that they could keep part of the money for themselves:
“But a certain man named Ananias, with Saphira his wife, sold a piece of land, and by fraud kept back part of the price of the land, his wife being privy thereunto: and bringing a certain part of it, laid it at the feet of the apostles. But Peter said: ‘Ananias, why hath Satan tempted thy heart, that thou shouldst lie to the Holy Ghost, and by fraud keep part of the price of the land? Whilst it remained, did it not remain to thee? And after it was sold, was it not in thy power? Why hast thou conceived this thing in thy heart? Thou hast not lied to men, but to God!’ And Ananias hearing these words, fell down, and gave up the ghost. And there came great fear upon all that heard it. And the young men rising up, removed him, and carrying him out, buried him. And it was about the space of three hours after, when his wife, not knowing what had happened, came in. And Peter said to her: ‘Tell me, woman, whether you sold the land for so much?’ And she said: ‘Yes, for so much!’ And Peter said unto her: ‘Why have you agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord? Behold the feet of them who have buried thy husband are at the door, and they shall carry thee out!’ Immediately she fell down before his feet, and gave up the ghost. And the young men, coming in, found her dead and carried her out, and buried her by her husband. And there came great fear upon the whole church, and upon all that heard these things” (Acts 5:1-11). Pretty radical, huh?
Radical Charity!
Thirdly, after doing ALL for God, doing all with a PURE INTENTION, do everything with a love of God—and an ever-increasing love of God. Love is like a muscle, the more you use it and exercise, the more it grows. Ultimately, it is the LOVE OF GOD (which is what “Charity” really means) that measures, weighs and assesses what we do. St. Paul could not have put it any better when he wrote: “Knowledge puffs up; but charity edifies! … Follow after charity! … Let all your things be done in charity! … If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 8:1; 14:1; 16:14; 13:1-3).
It is charity—the love of God—or the lack of it, that makes or breaks our thoughts, words and actions! It is the ‘glue’ of the spiritual life that makes everything ‘hang-together’ and prevents things from falling apart, coming unglued and collapsing: “Above all have charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14). “There remain faith, hope, and charity, these three―but the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13). “God is charity and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16). “Above all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves: for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). “Hatred stirs up strife and charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12).
Let Radical Charity Sink Its Roots into Your Life
The tree depends upon its roots, without good and healthy roots, there will be no good and healthy fruit. Hence Our Lord says: “Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:17-20). Since the tree depends upon its roots, just as it is said: “By the fruits you shall know them!”, you can also say: “By their roots you shall know them!” For the roots “either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil and its fruit evil” (Matthew 12:33). The problem today is a “root problem” (“root” comes from the Latin word “radix” meaning “root” in particular “an edible root”, just as “radical” comes from the Latin word “radix”).
This sinful world is close to being chopped-down and uprooted! “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees! Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire!” (Matthew 3:10). “If the root be holy, so are the branches” (Romans 11:16). “I, Jesus, I am the root” (Apocalypse 22:16). “And when the sun was risen, it was scorched; and because it had no root, it withered away … They have no root in themselves, but are only for a time: and then when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, they are presently scandalized” (Mark 4:6, 17).
Be Radical! Radically Change Your Life!
When you are radically changing anything, you must start at its roots or foundation. As the Church, back in the Early Middle-Ages used to say: “To convert the people, you must first convert the king!” Sometimes you will not improve a team unless you change the coach. It is amazing how, under a new coach, a team that was losing most of its games, can sometimes end up winning the championship—same players, but a different coach with different methods. You are who you are and you cannot change who you are—but you can “change the coach”! Changing the coach can mean getting yourself a ‘tougher’ and ‘more demanding’ spiritual director—since we are much like children, who tend to gravitate towards the parent who is the least demanding, most indulgent and most fun to be with.
You were not made to “coast” your way through life, but “with fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12). For “the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12)—and, as Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “How greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me! ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito Ecuador).
No More Radical Spiritual ‘Coaches’!
The spiritual ‘coaches’—the priests, the spiritual directors—are not that interested in ‘coaching’, as Our Lady forewarned: “The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! Many priests will lose their spirit, placing their souls in great danger” (Our Lady of Good Success).
“Woe to the Princes of the Church who think only of piling riches upon riches, to protect their authority and dominate with pride. The priests, ministers of my Son, the priests, by their wicked lives, are asking for vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads. For there is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There is no one left worthy of offering a spotless Sacrifice to the Eternal for the sake of the world. The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish!” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Fr. Tanquerey, in his book The Spiritual Life, writes: “Hardly ten in a thousand called by God to perfection heed the call; of a hundred called to contemplation, ninety-nine fail to respond. It must be acknowledged that one of the principal causes is the lack of spiritual directors. Under God, they are the pilots that conduct souls through this unknown ocean of the spiritual life. If no science, no art, how simple soever, can be learned well without a master, much less can anyone learn this high wisdom of evangelical perfection, wherein such great mysteries are found. This is the reason why I hold it morally impossible that a soul could without a miracle or without a master, go through what is highest and most arduous in the spiritual life, without running the risk of perishing” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life §539).
Radical Coaching
Fr. Tanquerey continues to explain what this ‘coaching’ or spiritual direction entails: “The object of spiritual direction consists in all that has a bearing upon the spiritual formation of souls. Confession limits itself to the accusation of faults; direction goes far beyond this. It reaches the causes of sin, deep-rooted inclinations, temperament, character, acquired habits, temptations, imprudences. This, in order to discover the right remedies, such as go to the very roots of the evil. In order to combat defects the better, direction in also concerned with virtues opposed to them, the virtues common to all Christians and those special to each particular class of persons. It includes the means most apt to foster the practice of these virtues: spiritual exercises such as mental prayer, the particular examination, devotion to the Most Blessed Sacrament, to the Sacred Heart, the Blessed virgin, which supply us with spiritual arms to force our way onward in the practice of virtue. It deals with vocation, and, once this question is settled, with the duties peculiar to each state of life. Hence, it is clear that the field of direction is very wide. In order to guide a person wisely, the spiritual director must be acquainted with the chief features of his past life, his habitual faults, his efforts to correct them, the results obtained, so that he sees clearly what is left to be done. He must, likewise, know his present dispositions, his likes and dislikes, the temptations , he undergoes and the method employed to overcome them, the virtues he feels the greatest need of, and the means used, to acquire them. The director must know all this in order to give proper advice” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life §541-§542).
As Fr. Tanquerey mentions, barely ten in a thousand will go for spiritual direction! Is there a connection between this “ten in a thousand” and the few number of souls that are saved? There has to be! The bottom line is that this kind of ‘coaching’ or spiritual direction is far too radical for us! It is too demanding! Like Fr. Faber writes in his book, Growth in Holiness, in the chapter on “Lukewarmness”, we are afraid of being made to more than we are prepared to do—which is little or nothing. Somehow we imagine we will be given a ‘complimentary ticket’ to Heaven, or that nobody will want to buy the highly-priced tickets, that God will offer them to us at ‘discount’ or ‘give-away’ prices!
Fr. Faber writes: “These instincts lead to avoid anything which will restore animation to the conscience. These instincts think it best to remain under ‘chloroform’ for life. Thus they make us shrink from anything like vigorous spiritual direction. We suspect we shall be awakened, and driven, and made too good. Discretion―that is, the discretion of the blind conscience―tells us this shrinking is wisdom and sagacity. We must, it says, be moderate in everything―but of all things amazingly moderate in the love of God! So in hearing sermons, reading books, cultivating acquaintances, patronizing works of mercy, it draws back from everything that is likely to come too near, or hit too hard. This blindness renders a cure still less likely. Indeed it is a characteristic of lukewarmness that, everything we do while we are in that state, has a tendency to confirm us as incurable!” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness).
Most spiritual writers are of the opinion that the greater part of Catholics are not even Beginners in the Spiritual Life (meaning that they frequently commit mortal sins in either thought, word or deed—with impurity, as Our Lady of Fatima indicated, being top of the list), or they are at best lukewarm—but can the words “at best” give us much comfort when God says in Holy Scripture: “Because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16)? It seems that we need a radical change in the way we see, think about and live out our Faith! The first and foundational or root element that has to undergo a radical change, is the foundation of the Holy Eucharist and how we see the Eucharist, how we approach the Eucharist, how we treat the Eucharist, how often we receive the Eucharist and how much we are focused upon and devoted to the Holy Eucharist. For the Holy Eucharist is God and “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), and charity is the engine-room or fire that drives us on.
Love the Eucharist and Grow in Love
St. Thomas Aquinas wrote: “The Eucharist is the Sacrament of Love―It signifies Love, It produces Love.” Every morning after celebrating Holy Mass, St. Thomas Aquinas served another Mass in thanksgiving. St. Thomas Aquinas, in an enlightening passage, wrote: “The celebration of the Holy Mass is as valuable as the death of Jesus on the Cross.”
Fr. Eugene Boylan, in his book This Tremendous Lover, basing himself upon St. Thomas Aquinas, states that “There is nothing in our selves or in our past that one Communion cannot more than repair ― if we have but enough Faith [and Love]! Listen to St. Thomas: ‘This sacrament contains in itself Christ crucified (Christum passum). Whence, whatever is the effect of the Passion of Our Lord, all that is likewise the effect of this sacrament.’” As Fr. Boylan so aptly puts it, “whatever our sins have done to us, the Holy Communion can repair; and whatever our sins have done to God, the Mass―which is part of the Eucharist―can restore.” This means we must have unlimited confidence in God’s love for us and His willingness to do whatever He can to bring us to Himself. The only thing He needs from us is our willingness, our submission of our free will to His will for us. There is nothing He will not do for us, for He is our Savior in every sense of the word. He places Himself at our disposal, and in return asks only our cooperation. And He even gives us what we need to do this, for it takes His grace to help us realize this extent of His love, this self-gift of His in the Eucharist.
The effects of the Eucharist are like the effects of food for our body. Food sustains life, and the Eucharist sustains the life of the soul. It gives us the grace we need to deny ourselves and to life for Christ, to live for our Life. The more love we have for Christ, the less self-love we have. The more we love God, the more we can resist temptation, and so the Eucharist strengthens us spiritually. Thus, the Eucharist has the effect of bringing to life the virtues in us so that we can live the life of Christ in us. But just as ordinary food can only produce a good effect if it is properly digested, so too the Eucharist can only produce Its good effects when we are properly disposed to receive It. The Eucharist is a Sacrament of Life, and so we must be spiritually living to have its effects. If we are spiritually dead, we must first receive the Sacrament of spiritual resurrection, the Sacrament of Confession, so that which is dead is brought back to life. Fr. Boylan tells us, again quoting St. Thomas Aquinas, that all the sacraments receive their power from the Passion of Christ, but “the Eucharist is ‘the perfect sacrament of the Passion’ for it contains Christ and the whole power of His Passion.” It is thus through the Eucharist that we can receive the effect of the transforming union with Christ.
“The desire of perfection―which is the first step forward―gives us the impulse needed to overcome obstacles. The first step toward perfection is the sincere, ardent and constant desire to attain it. The desire of perfection, then, may be defined as an act of the will, which, under the influence of grace, ever seeks after spiritual progress. This desire is born of the combined action of God’s grace and the human will. The desire for it is the first step toward perfection, the indispensable condition for attaining it. The road to perfection is arduous, and implies constant and energetic efforts―for no one can make progress in the path of God’s love without sacrifice, without struggling against the threefold concupiscence and against the law of least resistance. No one ever enters upon any steep, rugged path unless he is possessed of an ardent desire of arriving at the goal; and, were he to set out on such a path without such an ardent desire, he would soon abandon it. Likewise, no one starts on the way to perfection, or perseveres in it, unless sustained by a strong desire to reach the end” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
We can have all this if we would only surrender our will to the will of Christ in the Holy Eucharist. To do so is our greatest accomplishment. To do otherwise is our greatest tragedy. Many die of spiritual starvation as a consequence.
God is known—but not known enough! We hope and trust in God—but we do not hope and trust enough! God is loved—but not loved enough! We pray to God—but we do not pray enough! We are sorry for our sins—but not sorry enough! We think about God—but we do think about Him enough! We read about God—but we do not read enough! We talk about God—but we do not talk about Him enough! We defend God—but we do not defend Him enough! We promote God—but we do not promote Him enough! We go to Holy Mass—but we do not go enough! We receive Holy Communion—but we do not receive it enough! We make visits to the Blessed Sacrament—but we do visit enough! Have you had enough yet? Enough’s enough! The point is that we FAR, FAR below and behind where we should be! That is why the Church and world are FAR, FAR below the standard and level that they should be at! That is why we have a worldwide crisis in Faith, morality, culture, politics, economics, education, etc. Sounds radical! Yet it is true!
We are all tempted to imagine that we are doing pretty well as regards our Faith and our relationship with God! We say to ourselves: “I go to Mass—sometimes I go several times a week! I say prayers every day—I even pray my Rosary daily, sometimes several Rosaries daily! I contribute to the support of the church! I try to avoid mortal sins! I do a bit of spiritual reading every day! I make a meditation and examination of conscience every day! I try to learn more and more about my Faith by frequent study! I am not like most other Catholics! Thank you Lord!”
This ‘smacks’ of the attitude of the Pharisee in Our Lord’s parable about the Pharisee and the Publican: “Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee, standing, prayed thus with himself [notice two things here: (1) that he is not openly bragging, but merely thinking to himself and talking to God within himself, and (2) he is not attributing his good works to himself, but thanking God and His grace for the good that he does]: ‘O God, I give Thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!’ And the publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other―because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!” (Luke 18:10-14).
Don’t Fool Yourself!
As Our Lord Himself says: “Which of you―having a servant ploughing or feeding cattle―will say to him, when he is come home from the field: ‘Immediately go, sit down to meat!’ Will you not rather say to him: ‘Make ready my supper, and gird thyself, and serve me, whilst I eat and drink, and afterwards thou shalt eat and drink!’? Does the master thank that servant for doing the things which he commanded him? I think not! So you also, when you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done that which we ought to do!’” (Luke 17:7-10).
This is echoed in the words spoken by Our Lord to one of His mystics, when He said to her that if she could see herself as He saw her, then she would die in terror! We are far from being mystics and far from having a true opinion of ourselves! What would Our Lord say to the world—the world that we are pretty much at peace with and happy and content to live in it and enjoy what it offers? The world would die in terror if it could see itself as Our Lord sees it! Our Lady of Akita pretty much said the same thing: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord. In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them. As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” (Our Lady of Akita). That is pretty radical! Huh?
If God is prepared to let fire fall from Heaven that will destroy the greater part of humanity—then somehow God must not too impressed nor very satisfied with the world! And that was said back in 1973! How much worse has the world become since 1973? For one, abortion had not yet “taken-off” and the majority of Catholics were still attending Sunday Mass on a regular weekly basis! The world has changed radically since 1973—for that year could be looked upon as a mere spark to the gigantic forest fire of evil that we see engulfing the world today! It is estimated that there have been 54 million abortions since Our Lady spoke those words in 1973! Furthermore, the number of those no longer regularly attending Sunday Mass (which binds under pain of mortal sin) has doubled since 1973—with the attendance figures being 75% attending in 1957; 48% attending in 1970; 42% in 1975; 20% in 2018; and now under 20% in 2024. This is a pretty radical change for the worse! Huh?
A World “On-Fire”
In a sense, you could say that the world in on fire with evil—yet Christ wants it burn with love: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). “The Lord thy God is a consuming fire, a jealous God!” (Deuteronomy 4:24), which is why that jealous God commands: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30). Furthermore, that jealous God warns us what will happen if that love of Him fails to reach the required standards: “Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16). That is a pretty radical statement! Huh?
Massive Forest Fires Have Small Beginnings
The Church and world need to change radically―and, for that to happen, we have to see at radical change at the grass roots level of Catholicism—that is to say, Catholicism as it is lived in each Catholic individuals, in Catholic families and from there in Catholic communities such as parishes and schools. All improvement, betterment, correction and reformation ultimately starts with “the few” and not “the many”—it starts with an minority, not a majority. The same is true for evil and revolution—it starts with “a few” and spreads to “many”—much like St. James’ example of the tongue:
“For in many things we all offend. If any man does not offend in word, the same is a perfect man. He is able also with a bridle to lead about the whole body. For if we put bits into the mouths of horses, that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole body. Behold also ships, whereas they are great, and are driven by strong winds, yet are they turned about with a small helm, whithersoever the force of the ship’s pilot desires. Even so the tongue is indeed a little part of the body, but boasts of great things. See how small a fire sets a great forest on fire. And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is placed among our members, which defiles the whole body, and inflames the wheel of our nativity, being set on fire by Hell! For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and hath been tamed, by the nature of man! But the tongue no man can tame! It is an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison! By it we bless God and the Father: and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceeds blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:2-10).
Radical—What is Radical?
When we hear the word “radical” today, we are often conditioned to imagine some kind of revolutionary Communist, or terrorist, or society ‘drop-out’, or some extremist opposed to society, etc. We would be surprised or even shocked if we were to be called a “radical”, and even more surprised and shocked if God was to be called a “radical”! What is “a radical”? Do we fully understand the meaning of the word? Too often we just throw around words without really knowing what they mean! For example, we often misuse the word “jealous”, mistaking it and interchanging it for the word “envy”—but they are two different things. “Jealousy” is wanting to keep what you have. “Envy” is wanting what others have. It is a misuse of the word “jealous” to say: “I am jealous of all the money he has!” or “I am jealous of his success!” We should be saying: “I am envious of all the money he has!” or “I am envious of his success!” We can be “jealous” of our own belongings, but not those of others. In Holy Scripture, God says: “I am the Lord thy God, a jealous God!” (Deuteronomy 5:9). This does not mean that God is “envious” of someone—He cannot be, for He has everything, every perfection and every power that you could have—it means that He is jealously wanting to preserve what belongs to Him and what is due to Him, for example His glory, and God will to extreme (radical) measures to make sure that He keeps what is His and gets His due.
Radical Defined
The dictionary defines “radical” as (1) “being of, relating to, or proceeding from a root: arising from or going to a root or source; basic”; (2) “of or relating to the origin of something; fundamental”; (3) “being very different from the usual: extreme”; (4) “favoring extreme changes in existing views, habits, conditions, or institutions”; (5) “associated with political views, practices, and policies of extreme change”; (6) “a person who advocates thorough or complete reform”; (7) “a description of an action or thing which is especially impressive.” Radical changes and differences are very important and great in degree. Radical people believe that there should be great changes in society and try to bring about these changes. Synonyms for the word “radical” are: “thoroughgoing, thorough, complete, total, comprehensive, exhaustive, sweeping, far-reaching, wide-ranging, extensive, across the board, profound, major, stringent, rigorous.”
The dictionary will give you the adjective “radical” as someone “believing or expressing the belief that there should be great or extreme religious, social, economic, or political change.” When situations are grave and serious, we speak of having to take “radical measures” and make “radical changes”. As a noun, the dictionary will tell you that a “radical” is “a person who supports great religious, social, economic, or political change.” In other words, “radical changes” and “radical measures” and “radical solutions” and “radical steps” are not partial changes, nor half-measures, nor little steps—but major ones, extreme ones, powerful ones, vigorous ones.
A Radical God
In this sense we can call God or Our Lord “radical”—for, as Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres: “If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
Likewise, the methods that God will use to “clean-up” and “correct” the world, will also be “radical measures”—as Our Lady foretells: “The Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad!” Yet, God is so “radical”—in the above definitions and their synonyms, with their meanings of “thoroughgoing, thorough, complete, total, comprehensive, exhaustive, sweeping, far-reaching, wide-ranging, extensive, across the board, profound, major, stringent, rigorous”―that once He has finished “cleaning house” the world will so holy and virtuous as never has been seen in the history of mankind! Our Lady of La Salette describes the “radical changes” that will take place during and after this “radical house cleaning”:
“And then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like. And then peace will be made, and man will be reconciled with God. Jesus Christ will be served, worshiped and glorified. Charity will flourish everywhere. The new kings will be the right arm of the Holy Church, which will be strong, humble, pious in Its poor but fervent imitation of the virtues of Jesus Christ. The Gospel will be preached everywhere and mankind will make great progress in its Faith, for there will be unity among the workers of Jesus Christ and man will live in fear of God.” (Our Lady of La Salette).
“Then, afterwards, a good time will come, and holy men will do wonders. Once people have their Faith again, a long period of peace will follow. Then there will be a shortened summer; winter and summer will not be distinguishable. Everywhere, the fear of God, virtue, and good morals will prevail. He will lead all erring sheep back to the fold, and there shall be one Faith, one law, one rule of life, and one Baptism on Earth. All men will love each other and do good, and all quarrels and wars will cease. The Church will become―by her Faith and by her love―more fervent and more flourishing than ever. The Church will witness many amazing things, even on the part of her former persecutors, for they will come forward and throw themselves at her feet, acknowledge her, and implore pardon from God and from here for all the crimes and outrages that they had perpetrated against her. She will no longer regard them as her enemies, but she will instead welcome them as her own children. Now all the true penitents will flow from all sides to the Church, which will receive them into her bosom. The entire community of the faithful will pour out their hearts in hymns of penance and thanksgiving to the glory of the Lord. A great power, led by the Holy Ghost, will restore order … A large assembly of pastors who will uphold the rights of the Church and of her Head. They will restore the former disciplines. All the false religions will be abolished; all the abuses of the Revolution will be destroyed and the altars of the true God restored. The former practices will be put into force again, and our religion – at least in some respects – will flourish more than ever.” (Catholic Prophecy). Again, pretty radical! Huh?
Getting Radical—Getting to the Root of the Matter!
The prefix, “rad-” in the word “radical”, comes from the Latin word “radix”, meaning “root”—hence, in the above dictionary definition, it speaks of “radical” as “being of, relating to, or proceeding from a root: arising from or going to a root or source; basic” … “of or relating to the origin of something; fundamental.” The “root” of the all the problems in the world today—whether they concern the spiritual life, the moral life, the life of Faith, the practice of Charity, or the intellectual, political, financial, cultural or social life—all find their “root cause” in God, or rather, the absence of God, the ignoring of God and His commandments. To an even greater degree, that ignoring of God is magnified and worsened by the ignoring of a God—not a God who is “miles away” in some distant Heaven—but the ignoring of a God who is here present on Earth, living in our midst in the tabernacles of the Catholic Church. In a certain sense, one would be less guilty (but guilty all the same) for ignoring a God somewhere way out there in a distant Heaven—on the premise of “Out of sight, out of mind!”—but God is not “out of sight and out of mind”, but perfectly visible, perpetually present and accessible in the Holy Eucharist inside the tabernacle her on Earth! The problem is that we are out of our minds by trying to keep Him out of sight!
The One Who can solve all our problems, is right here among us—but we can’t be bothered to go seek his advice and help! We are trying to “fix” things without Him! Idiocy! Stupidity! Pride! Our Lord Himself said: “Without Me, you can do NOTHING!” (John 15:5) and “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27) “With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible!” (Matthew 19:26). “With men it is impossible; but not with God―for all things are possible with God!” (Mark 10:27). “Because no word shall be impossible with God!” (Luke 1:37). Notice that ALL FOUR Evangelists report this truth—and there are very few things that are reported by ALL four of them.
The Radical Love of God
God does not need you skills, or your intelligence, or your books, or your blogs, or your forums, or your sermons, or your organizations, or your human plots, plans, ideas and schemes! As Our Lord said to some of His mystics:
“Do you think that anything happens without My permission? I dispose all things … Do not worry about what you can and what you cannot do. You know very well that you can do nothing … Do you understand that you are nothing? Apart from Me you are nothing but rebellion, refusal, negation … But I am He who can and will do all. Yes, I will do all, even what seems to you impossible.... I will supply for all that you lack or cannot do … I want what you do not want, but I can do what you cannot do. It is not for you to choose, but to surrender … The more you disappear, the more shall I be your life … There is but one thing to do: love and abandon oneself … You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! … Remember this: Everything is a means in My Hands; I make all work together to fulfill My will … Let Me act! You are not competent to do anything―it is not your province! … I can do everything I wish, and it is I who am doing everything! … Let Me do everything! You will see that I will do everything, and do it well! … You must henceforth think only of Me and of souls; of Me to love Me, and of souls to save them!” (Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love, Words of Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Mary of the Trinity and Sr. Consolata Betrone).
“There are several forms of humility: that which admits your nothingness, your unworthiness, speaks according to wisdom and truth. But it is also a form of humility not to speak of oneself, because one does not think of oneself; one thinks only of Me. I love that silence concerning oneself … Your value does not lie in your personal capabilities, however brilliant they may be, but in your capacity to receive your Creator and allow Him to live in you … Oh, if you would leave Me to act! I would splendidly transform each one of your lives. But you oppose Me by your desires, your tastes, your resistance! … Most religious give Me their work and their talents—I have sufficient talents at My disposal! … Instead of developing your talents, seek rather to welcome the gifts of God … What I desire is the soul―to make it My place of rest and of work, to live anew in it in humanity. Yes, My place of work, because a soul that would give herself to Me without reserve, how I would use her for the glory of God and of the Church, for the salvation of other souls, to a degree that you cannot imagine! … Weakness and worthlessness are of small account! What I want is their trust! These are the souls who draw down on the world mercy and peace … When a soul asks of Me what to human eyes is impossible, she honors Me … It is not sufficient to say: ‘My God, I have confidence in You.’ You must make the interior act of freeing yourself from all anxiety ... I await this confidence from every soul” (Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love, Words of Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Mary of the Trinity and Sr. Consolata Betrone).
“The best gift that you can make Me is to receive Me ... You must live by Faith; you must believe that I am there under the humble species, believe without proof … The best work that you can do is to obtain My cooperation—and, when you yourself have done all you could, to let Me act. I work with time … Place no limits on your confidence in Me, then I will place no limits on My graces for you! … You are astonished that often an effort that seemed impossible to make, instead of exhausting, strengthens you. It is not astonishing, it is true: I never allow Myself to be outdone by generosity ... Many souls deprive themselves of many graces because they refuse to make efforts which seem impossible to them, which are only offered to the generosity of their initiative … Love gives Itself as food to Its own and this food is the substance which gives them their life and sustains them. Love humbles Itself before Its own ... and in so doing raises them to the highest dignity. Love surrenders Itself in totality, It gives in profusion and without reserve. With enthusiasm, with vehemence It is sacrificed, It is immolated, It is given for those It loves.... The Holy Eucharist is love to the extreme of folly … I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift ... I thirst for love! … Oh, if people would only love Me, what happiness would reign in this unhappy world!” (Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love, Words of Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Mary of the Trinity and Sr. Consolata Betrone).
Love is the Radical Root of Reform
It is charity or love that will end the crisis in both the Church and world. Huh? Yes! Or should we say, “It is God who will end the crisis in both the Church and the world!” For “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8) and so Charity (God) will do what has to be done! For our part, we need a greater charity towards God (first of all) and then towards (neighbor). We cannot say that we love God enough when He is left abandoned in the tabernacles for most of the time! We cannot say we love God enough if cannot drag ourselves to extra Masses for love of Him, as He dragged Himself up to Calvary for love of us! We cannot say we love God enough if we rarely (once a week) receive Him in Holy Communion and our thanksgiving prayers are always the same, and like phrases out of a tourist’s “key phrases to use” language book—rarely finding anything of our own to say or anything new to say! We cannot say that we love Him enough when spend hours on worldly pursuits and will not pursue Him by visiting Him—“out of hours”—in the Blessed Sacrament! It is because our charity is so little, that the problems in the world and Church are so great!
Charity at the Root of All Success
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). The “charity” that St. Paul speaks about is first and foremost a love of God. Far too many of our works and efforts have a “love of self” mixed-in with a “love of God”! Sometimes there is far more “love of self” in what we do than there is a “love of God”—though we always protest that this is not true!
God Will Only Bless His Own Work!
What the Benedictine, Dom Hubert Van Zeller, says of holiness—that it has to be “God-Made” and not “Man-Made”—is also applicable to our religious efforts in our lives. God is the solution—not us! Dom Hubert Van Zeller writes:
“This means that however determined you are to be a saint, you will not become one if you rely on your own strength of mind. The only thing that can get you to sanctity is God’s grace. You will need all the strength of mind you have just to work together with God’s grace, but if you imagine that making good, strong resolutions will carry you the whole way, you are wrong. About the first thing to happen will be that God lets you break some of those good, strong resolutions before you get properly started. This will be to put you in your place, and show you that you can do nothing without Him. Once you are decently humbled, knowing that left to yourself you cannot even carry out the things that you very much want to carry out, you are getting ready to be used. You are being softened up like a steak. When all the toughness and pride and glamorized ideas of holiness have been beaten out of you by the down-to-earth action of truth, then God has got something there on which He can work. Without false notions and fancy plans, you can now begin to fall in with the true notions of holiness and with the plan God has in mind for you. It stands to reason. God is not going to reward anyone else’s work but His own. You cannot expect Him to recognize a holiness that He has done nothing to bring about. When you get right down to it, there is only one real goodness, one perfection, one sanctity, and that is God’s. When man invents a holiness of his own, God lets him look for it but does not help him find it, because a holiness of one’s own does not exist, and it is a waste of time searching for it. It is as if someone were to look for moonlight without the moon. Once you admit that all moonlight is bound to come from one particular place, and that it is a thing you cannot make yourself, you have learned something!” (Dom Hubert Van Zeller, Holiness—A Guide For Beginners).
What a Woeful Waste of Valuable Time and Resources!
If you are truly realistic and logical, then you have to admit that the vast majority of our day is either a total waste of time and effort or a partial waste of time and effort. Yes, of course, everyone has their “duty of state” to accomplish, and so a father or a mother with children, cannot be going door-to-door all day long, trying to win converts to the Catholic Faith, nor can they be on their knees all day long in a church before the Blessed Sacrament or praying the Rosary. Yet, that does not mean that one cannot be praying all day long! Otherwise, the words of Our Lord and Holy Scripture would be stupid and meaningless: “And Jesus spoke also a parable to them, that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). “ALL whatsoever you do in WORD or in WORK, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 3:17). You cannot be more clear than that! “Always pray … pray without ceasing … faint not … all you words and all your actions, do for God!”
“Oh no!” you say, “That is way too radical for me! I can’t be thinking about God all the time—that’s too radical! I have so many other things to attend to! I am sure God does not expect that from souls!” Ha! There you go again! Making-up your own version of God’s religion! Tell me—what do you not understand about these words: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy WHOLE heart, and with thy WHOLE soul, and with thy WHOLE mind, and with thy WHOLE strength. This is the first commandment … This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30; Matthew 22:38). Are you going to try to squirm your way out of that and interpret that like the Protestants try to misinterpret the words: “This is My Body! … This is My Blood!” Those who seek to misinterpret the clear and obvious meaning of the words of Christ, risk missing the straight and narrow path that leads to Heaven!
Isn’t that what love is all about? Tell me—what are the poor souls in the fires of Purgatory thinking about right now?
The ‘good times’ they had on Earth? Sports? Fashions? Socializing? Watching some Purgatory TV channel? Doing some Purgatorial social-media browsing looking for other poor souls on Facebook? No—they are ALL thinking about God ALL of the time! They are growing in their love of God ALL of the time! They have no time for anything else except God! Why are they there in the first place? They are burning in the fires of Purgatory because they did not burn enough with a love of God on Earth! They are “doing time” in Purgatory because they had little time for God on Earth. They are in Purgatory—just as souls are in Hell—because they wasted their time and wasted their efforts while on Earth, doing the wrong things, or doing the right things badly.
They would have been “saints in Heaven”, rather than “suffering in Purgatory” or “damned in Hell” if they had only been more radical during their lives—for all saints are radical, meaning, as the above dictionary definition indicated: “being very different from the usual―extreme; an action or thing which is especially impressive; believing or expressing the belief that there should be great or extreme religious, social, economic, or political change” and as the synonyms of “radical” indicated: “thorough, complete, total, far-reaching, wide-ranging, rigorous, profound.” If you can find a saint that didn’t exhibit most of these traits on Earth, then that saint did not die a saint and go straight to Heaven, but finished his or her “school of sanctity” by taking ‘remedial lessons’ for a greater or lesser length of time in the ‘remedial school’ of Purgatory! That is why, after the death of a ‘saint’, the Church requires miracles as proof that a ‘saint’ is in Heaven, before it will officially canonize a saint on Earth—until that moment we give them titles that indicate a progressive degree of sanctity: (1) Servant of God, (2) Venerable and then (3) Blessed.
Sanctity is Radical
We use the word “saint” far too glibly and loosely for people who are still living, and even for those who have just died (whom we like, for we rarely if ever call anyone a saint whom we do/did not like!)—“Oh I think that so-and-so is such a saint!” You may point out that St. Paul gives the title or name of “saint” to those living in Jerusalem and other cities--“I shall go to Jerusalem, to minister unto the saints … Make a contribution for the poor of the saints that are in Jerusalem … Help me in your prayers for me to God, that the offering of my service may be acceptable in Jerusalem to the saints!” (Romans 15:25-26, 30-31). He also speaks of “…all the saints that are in all Achaia …” (2 Corinthians 1:1), “…all the saints who are at Ephesus …” (Ephesians 1:1), “all the saints in Christ Jesus, who are at Philippi …” (Philippians 1:1), “…the saints who are at Colossa …” (Colossians 1:2) and then even refers to himself as a saint: “To me, the least of all the saints…” (Ephesians 3:8).
“To all that are at Rome, the beloved of God, called to be saints …” (Romans 1:7). “To the church of God that is at Corinth, called to be saints …” (1 Corinthians 1:2). Thus St. Paul speaks of the work of “the perfecting of the saints” (Ephesians 4:12), saying that, “We know that to them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as are called to be saints” (Romans 8:28).
The Radical Root of the Holy Eucharist
Staying with that Latin source for the word “root”—coming from the Latin “radix”, meaning “root” and in particular “an edible root”, we come to the “root” of our sanctity, the source of our sanctity, the edible root of our sanctity—which is the Holy Eucharist. Jesus is the vine and the root, and we are the branches growing out of that vine and root. At the Last Supper, when Jesus instituted the Holy Eucharist, He said: “I am the vine and you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
The Holy Eucharist fits perfectly fits this idea of root and vine. The root (which is below ground and invisible) of the Holy Eucharist is Jesus Christ—invisible to the eye, ‘hiding underground’ beneath the appearance of bread and wine. The vine (above ground and visible) of the Holy Eucharist is the outward appearance (bark of the vine) of bread and wine, which we can see. As the Latin noun “radix” indicates, this “root” is in particular “an edible root”—the “Root of Jesse” or in Latin “Radix Jesse” (Isaias 11:1, 10), Jesus Christ the “Edible Root of Jesse”, a ‘Radical’ Root of Jesse, who Himself says to us: “Amen, amen I say unto you! Unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day. For My Flesh is meat indeed: and My Blood is drink indeed. He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, abides in Me, and I in him!” (John 6:54-57).
The Holy Eucharist is the root of our sanctity as Christ’s sacrifice and death on Calvary is the root of our salvation. For without Him, we can do nothing (John 15:5). The Holy Eucharist is, as the Church teaches, both a SACRAMENT and a SACRIFICE—it is the Last Supper perpetuated in every Holy Communion and the Sacrifice of Christ on Calvary perpetuated in every Sacrifice of the Mass. The word “sacrament” finds it root in the Latin word “sacro” meaning “hallow, to make holy, to consecrate”, and from the Latin “sacer” meaning “sacred, holy.” The word “sacrifice” finds it root in the Latin word “sacrificium” a compound of two words: from “sacer” meaning “sacred, holy”, and “facio” meaning “to do, to make”―hence “to make holy.” Therefore, the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist is there to make us holy, and the Sacrifice of the Holy Eucharist (Holy Mass) is also there to make us holy. The Blessed Sacrament of Holy Eucharist is there to maintain and “top-up” our holiness each time we visit.
As Our Lady said of “The Most August Sacrament of the Eucharist―Comprehend the sublimity of this mystery and the reverence with which it should be treated and received by the faithful. It will be their antidote against sin, and an easy and powerful means for souls to unite themselves to their God and Redeemer, who, in the excess of His love, hides Himself under the appearance of the Host, and is exposed to the sacrilegious profanations of His ungrateful sons!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Earth-Shatteringly Radical?
Does being “radical” mean that we have to do “earth-shattering” things? No—but it does require that we the normal, everyday, things of life “earth shatteringly well”! As it was said of Jesus: “He hath done all things well!” (Mark 7:37) and Jesus tells us: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). That God of perfection also tells us the same: “I am the Almighty God! Walk before Me and be perfect!” (Genesis 17:1).
Radical Giving
What is it that perfects our actions? Well many things perfect our actions—First of all, for the perfection of our thoughts, words and actions, we must do all these things for God―“All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 3:17). “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31). Believe it or not, that is pretty “earth shattering” and radical. Try it for only one day! In everything you do! Don’t “cop-out” with a morning offering, “re-visit” that attitude time and time again. Otherwise you are taking the easy, cheap option—which betrays an cheap love! Try it on your spouse/child/parent/friend/etc., and tell them that you are going to offer them a “Thank you!” or an “I love you!” today, that is meant to last for the rest of the year! Cheap, huh? Frequently offer God the things you think, say or do! You won’t regret it! He won’t forget it!
Radical or Root Motives
Secondly, for the perfection of our thoughts, words and actions, we must do all these things with a pure intention and not for some selfish purpose or self-gain--“All the ways of a man are open to his eyes: the Lord is the weigher of spirits [motives]. Lay open thy works to the Lord!” (Proverbs 16:2-3). We see how God punished Ananias and Saphira, who, at a time when Christians shared everything they had, sold their property and lied about the price so that they could keep part of the money for themselves:
“But a certain man named Ananias, with Saphira his wife, sold a piece of land, and by fraud kept back part of the price of the land, his wife being privy thereunto: and bringing a certain part of it, laid it at the feet of the apostles. But Peter said: ‘Ananias, why hath Satan tempted thy heart, that thou shouldst lie to the Holy Ghost, and by fraud keep part of the price of the land? Whilst it remained, did it not remain to thee? And after it was sold, was it not in thy power? Why hast thou conceived this thing in thy heart? Thou hast not lied to men, but to God!’ And Ananias hearing these words, fell down, and gave up the ghost. And there came great fear upon all that heard it. And the young men rising up, removed him, and carrying him out, buried him. And it was about the space of three hours after, when his wife, not knowing what had happened, came in. And Peter said to her: ‘Tell me, woman, whether you sold the land for so much?’ And she said: ‘Yes, for so much!’ And Peter said unto her: ‘Why have you agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord? Behold the feet of them who have buried thy husband are at the door, and they shall carry thee out!’ Immediately she fell down before his feet, and gave up the ghost. And the young men, coming in, found her dead and carried her out, and buried her by her husband. And there came great fear upon the whole church, and upon all that heard these things” (Acts 5:1-11). Pretty radical, huh?
Radical Charity!
Thirdly, after doing ALL for God, doing all with a PURE INTENTION, do everything with a love of God—and an ever-increasing love of God. Love is like a muscle, the more you use it and exercise, the more it grows. Ultimately, it is the LOVE OF GOD (which is what “Charity” really means) that measures, weighs and assesses what we do. St. Paul could not have put it any better when he wrote: “Knowledge puffs up; but charity edifies! … Follow after charity! … Let all your things be done in charity! … If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 8:1; 14:1; 16:14; 13:1-3).
It is charity—the love of God—or the lack of it, that makes or breaks our thoughts, words and actions! It is the ‘glue’ of the spiritual life that makes everything ‘hang-together’ and prevents things from falling apart, coming unglued and collapsing: “Above all have charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14). “There remain faith, hope, and charity, these three―but the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13). “God is charity and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16). “Above all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves: for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). “Hatred stirs up strife and charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12).
Let Radical Charity Sink Its Roots into Your Life
The tree depends upon its roots, without good and healthy roots, there will be no good and healthy fruit. Hence Our Lord says: “Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:17-20). Since the tree depends upon its roots, just as it is said: “By the fruits you shall know them!”, you can also say: “By their roots you shall know them!” For the roots “either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil and its fruit evil” (Matthew 12:33). The problem today is a “root problem” (“root” comes from the Latin word “radix” meaning “root” in particular “an edible root”, just as “radical” comes from the Latin word “radix”).
This sinful world is close to being chopped-down and uprooted! “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees! Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire!” (Matthew 3:10). “If the root be holy, so are the branches” (Romans 11:16). “I, Jesus, I am the root” (Apocalypse 22:16). “And when the sun was risen, it was scorched; and because it had no root, it withered away … They have no root in themselves, but are only for a time: and then when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, they are presently scandalized” (Mark 4:6, 17).
Be Radical! Radically Change Your Life!
When you are radically changing anything, you must start at its roots or foundation. As the Church, back in the Early Middle-Ages used to say: “To convert the people, you must first convert the king!” Sometimes you will not improve a team unless you change the coach. It is amazing how, under a new coach, a team that was losing most of its games, can sometimes end up winning the championship—same players, but a different coach with different methods. You are who you are and you cannot change who you are—but you can “change the coach”! Changing the coach can mean getting yourself a ‘tougher’ and ‘more demanding’ spiritual director—since we are much like children, who tend to gravitate towards the parent who is the least demanding, most indulgent and most fun to be with.
You were not made to “coast” your way through life, but “with fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12). For “the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12)—and, as Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “How greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me! ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito Ecuador).
No More Radical Spiritual ‘Coaches’!
The spiritual ‘coaches’—the priests, the spiritual directors—are not that interested in ‘coaching’, as Our Lady forewarned: “The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! Many priests will lose their spirit, placing their souls in great danger” (Our Lady of Good Success).
“Woe to the Princes of the Church who think only of piling riches upon riches, to protect their authority and dominate with pride. The priests, ministers of my Son, the priests, by their wicked lives, are asking for vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads. For there is no one left to beg mercy and forgiveness for the people. There is no one left worthy of offering a spotless Sacrifice to the Eternal for the sake of the world. The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish!” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Fr. Tanquerey, in his book The Spiritual Life, writes: “Hardly ten in a thousand called by God to perfection heed the call; of a hundred called to contemplation, ninety-nine fail to respond. It must be acknowledged that one of the principal causes is the lack of spiritual directors. Under God, they are the pilots that conduct souls through this unknown ocean of the spiritual life. If no science, no art, how simple soever, can be learned well without a master, much less can anyone learn this high wisdom of evangelical perfection, wherein such great mysteries are found. This is the reason why I hold it morally impossible that a soul could without a miracle or without a master, go through what is highest and most arduous in the spiritual life, without running the risk of perishing” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life §539).
Radical Coaching
Fr. Tanquerey continues to explain what this ‘coaching’ or spiritual direction entails: “The object of spiritual direction consists in all that has a bearing upon the spiritual formation of souls. Confession limits itself to the accusation of faults; direction goes far beyond this. It reaches the causes of sin, deep-rooted inclinations, temperament, character, acquired habits, temptations, imprudences. This, in order to discover the right remedies, such as go to the very roots of the evil. In order to combat defects the better, direction in also concerned with virtues opposed to them, the virtues common to all Christians and those special to each particular class of persons. It includes the means most apt to foster the practice of these virtues: spiritual exercises such as mental prayer, the particular examination, devotion to the Most Blessed Sacrament, to the Sacred Heart, the Blessed virgin, which supply us with spiritual arms to force our way onward in the practice of virtue. It deals with vocation, and, once this question is settled, with the duties peculiar to each state of life. Hence, it is clear that the field of direction is very wide. In order to guide a person wisely, the spiritual director must be acquainted with the chief features of his past life, his habitual faults, his efforts to correct them, the results obtained, so that he sees clearly what is left to be done. He must, likewise, know his present dispositions, his likes and dislikes, the temptations , he undergoes and the method employed to overcome them, the virtues he feels the greatest need of, and the means used, to acquire them. The director must know all this in order to give proper advice” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life §541-§542).
As Fr. Tanquerey mentions, barely ten in a thousand will go for spiritual direction! Is there a connection between this “ten in a thousand” and the few number of souls that are saved? There has to be! The bottom line is that this kind of ‘coaching’ or spiritual direction is far too radical for us! It is too demanding! Like Fr. Faber writes in his book, Growth in Holiness, in the chapter on “Lukewarmness”, we are afraid of being made to more than we are prepared to do—which is little or nothing. Somehow we imagine we will be given a ‘complimentary ticket’ to Heaven, or that nobody will want to buy the highly-priced tickets, that God will offer them to us at ‘discount’ or ‘give-away’ prices!
Fr. Faber writes: “These instincts lead to avoid anything which will restore animation to the conscience. These instincts think it best to remain under ‘chloroform’ for life. Thus they make us shrink from anything like vigorous spiritual direction. We suspect we shall be awakened, and driven, and made too good. Discretion―that is, the discretion of the blind conscience―tells us this shrinking is wisdom and sagacity. We must, it says, be moderate in everything―but of all things amazingly moderate in the love of God! So in hearing sermons, reading books, cultivating acquaintances, patronizing works of mercy, it draws back from everything that is likely to come too near, or hit too hard. This blindness renders a cure still less likely. Indeed it is a characteristic of lukewarmness that, everything we do while we are in that state, has a tendency to confirm us as incurable!” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness).
Most spiritual writers are of the opinion that the greater part of Catholics are not even Beginners in the Spiritual Life (meaning that they frequently commit mortal sins in either thought, word or deed—with impurity, as Our Lady of Fatima indicated, being top of the list), or they are at best lukewarm—but can the words “at best” give us much comfort when God says in Holy Scripture: “Because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16)? It seems that we need a radical change in the way we see, think about and live out our Faith! The first and foundational or root element that has to undergo a radical change, is the foundation of the Holy Eucharist and how we see the Eucharist, how we approach the Eucharist, how we treat the Eucharist, how often we receive the Eucharist and how much we are focused upon and devoted to the Holy Eucharist. For the Holy Eucharist is God and “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), and charity is the engine-room or fire that drives us on.
Love the Eucharist and Grow in Love
St. Thomas Aquinas wrote: “The Eucharist is the Sacrament of Love―It signifies Love, It produces Love.” Every morning after celebrating Holy Mass, St. Thomas Aquinas served another Mass in thanksgiving. St. Thomas Aquinas, in an enlightening passage, wrote: “The celebration of the Holy Mass is as valuable as the death of Jesus on the Cross.”
Fr. Eugene Boylan, in his book This Tremendous Lover, basing himself upon St. Thomas Aquinas, states that “There is nothing in our selves or in our past that one Communion cannot more than repair ― if we have but enough Faith [and Love]! Listen to St. Thomas: ‘This sacrament contains in itself Christ crucified (Christum passum). Whence, whatever is the effect of the Passion of Our Lord, all that is likewise the effect of this sacrament.’” As Fr. Boylan so aptly puts it, “whatever our sins have done to us, the Holy Communion can repair; and whatever our sins have done to God, the Mass―which is part of the Eucharist―can restore.” This means we must have unlimited confidence in God’s love for us and His willingness to do whatever He can to bring us to Himself. The only thing He needs from us is our willingness, our submission of our free will to His will for us. There is nothing He will not do for us, for He is our Savior in every sense of the word. He places Himself at our disposal, and in return asks only our cooperation. And He even gives us what we need to do this, for it takes His grace to help us realize this extent of His love, this self-gift of His in the Eucharist.
The effects of the Eucharist are like the effects of food for our body. Food sustains life, and the Eucharist sustains the life of the soul. It gives us the grace we need to deny ourselves and to life for Christ, to live for our Life. The more love we have for Christ, the less self-love we have. The more we love God, the more we can resist temptation, and so the Eucharist strengthens us spiritually. Thus, the Eucharist has the effect of bringing to life the virtues in us so that we can live the life of Christ in us. But just as ordinary food can only produce a good effect if it is properly digested, so too the Eucharist can only produce Its good effects when we are properly disposed to receive It. The Eucharist is a Sacrament of Life, and so we must be spiritually living to have its effects. If we are spiritually dead, we must first receive the Sacrament of spiritual resurrection, the Sacrament of Confession, so that which is dead is brought back to life. Fr. Boylan tells us, again quoting St. Thomas Aquinas, that all the sacraments receive their power from the Passion of Christ, but “the Eucharist is ‘the perfect sacrament of the Passion’ for it contains Christ and the whole power of His Passion.” It is thus through the Eucharist that we can receive the effect of the transforming union with Christ.
“The desire of perfection―which is the first step forward―gives us the impulse needed to overcome obstacles. The first step toward perfection is the sincere, ardent and constant desire to attain it. The desire of perfection, then, may be defined as an act of the will, which, under the influence of grace, ever seeks after spiritual progress. This desire is born of the combined action of God’s grace and the human will. The desire for it is the first step toward perfection, the indispensable condition for attaining it. The road to perfection is arduous, and implies constant and energetic efforts―for no one can make progress in the path of God’s love without sacrifice, without struggling against the threefold concupiscence and against the law of least resistance. No one ever enters upon any steep, rugged path unless he is possessed of an ardent desire of arriving at the goal; and, were he to set out on such a path without such an ardent desire, he would soon abandon it. Likewise, no one starts on the way to perfection, or perseveres in it, unless sustained by a strong desire to reach the end” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
We can have all this if we would only surrender our will to the will of Christ in the Holy Eucharist. To do so is our greatest accomplishment. To do otherwise is our greatest tragedy. Many die of spiritual starvation as a consequence.
Article 4
Tuesday, June 4th
Heart to Heart, or Lips to Heart?
Tuesday, June 4th
Heart to Heart, or Lips to Heart?
What’s It All About?
Fr. John (Jean) Croiset―one of the spiritual directors of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque―speaking of those few souls who have a sincere love of the Sacred Heart, writes: “When they consider how little the world is moved by this excess of love, how little men love Jesus Christ in return, and how little pains they take to be loved by Him, His faithful friends have not been able to endure seeing Him treated with such contempt day after day; they have endeavored to show their just sorrow at such treatment, and by their ardent love, their profound respect and by special acts of homage, to testify their great desire to make reparation to the utmost of their capacity for this ingratitude and contempt.” (The Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, chapter 1).
In explaining the devotion to the Sacred Heart, Fr. Croiset says: “The principal motive of this devotion is the immense love which Jesus Christ has for men, who, for the most part, have nothing but contempt, or at least indifference, for Him. The end which is proposed is:
(1) Firstly, to recognize and honor, as much as lies in our power, by our frequent adoration, by a return of love, by our acts of thanksgiving and by every kind of homage, all the sentiments of love which Jesus Christ has for us in the adorable Sacrament of the Blessed Eucharist; where, however, He is so little known by men, or at least so little loved even by these people who know Him.
(2) Secondly, to make reparation, by all possible means, for the indignities and outrages to which His love has exposed Him during the course of His mortal life, and to which this same love exposes Him every day in the Blessed Sacrament of the altar.
“This devotion consists, therefore, in ardently loving Jesus Christ … in the adorable Sacrament of the Eucharist.
“The particular character of this devotion … is nothing else than an exercise of love. Love is its object, love is its motive and principle, and it is love that ought to be its end” (The Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, chapter 1).
Do You Love Me?
“Jesus said to Simon Peter: ‘Simon son of John, lovest thou Me more than these?’ Peter said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord! Thou knowest that I love Thee!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Feed My lambs.’ Jesus said to him again: ‘Simon, son of John, lovest thou Me?’ Peter said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord! Thou knowest that I love Thee!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Feed My lambs.’ Jesus said to him the third time: ‘Simon, son of John, lovest thou Me?’ Peter was grieved, because Jesus had said to him the third time: ‘Lovest thou Me?’ And Peter said to Him: ‘Lord, Thou knowest all things! Thou knowest that I love Thee!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Feed My sheep’” (John 21:15-17).
If Our Lord were to ask us the same question: “Lovest thou Me?” What would be our answer? Remember—Our Lord can read hearts, and not just hear what comes from the lips!
With Lips Maybe! But With Heart and Soul?...
Speaking to the upholders of tradition, the Pharisees, Jesus said: “Hypocrites, well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me’” (Matthew 15:7-8). Our Lord refers to God speaking through Isaias: “And the Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me’” (Isaias 23:9). Which simply translates to “Swelling lips joined with a corrupt heart” (Proverbs 26:23). “With deceitful lips, and with a double heart have they spoken” (Psalms 11:3).
For Jesus knew what they were really after: “An enemy speaketh sweetly with his lips, but in his heart he lieth in wait, to throw thee into a pit” (Ecclesiasticus 12:15). The Pharisees were self-seekers who were seeking to put Jesus aside and do away with Him: “The Pharisees, going out, made a consultation against Him, how they might destroy Him” (Matthew 12:14).
Jesus ‘Cramps My Style’!
For many souls today, even those who seek to uphold the Faith—as did the Pharisees—Jesus “gets in the way” of things. He “cramps our style” and is looked upon as being a bit of a “party-pooper” who denies us the fun and games to which we feel entitled. Why on Earth should I go to an extra Mass or two each week? What’s the point of “putting a spanner in the spokes” of my already busy day to go and tediously sit bored in front of a tabernacle in an empty silent church? What’s wrong with rushing out of church, the moment Sunday Mass has finished, to go and speak with and enjoy the company of my friends? It’s all a matter of priorities! What matters most to us? Our Lord said: “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice [“justice” meaning what is due to Him], and all these things shall be added unto you” (Luke 12:31).
What or Whom Do You Seek?
“For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Luke 12:34). The rich young man was loved by Jesus and Our Lord invited him to sell all his possessions and to come and follow Him; but the young man went away sad, because he had great possessions, and he could not bear to part with them in order to go to Jesus: “Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me.’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:21-24). “For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Luke 12:34). Which is why St. John warns us: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
It was the things of the world that kept Martha busy, busy, busy—while her sister, Mary, was busy listening to the words of Jesus. Martha was preparing Jesus a meal, but Jesus was interested in feeding them with His words: “It is written, ‘Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God’” (Matthew 4:4). To the busy Martha, Jesus said: “Martha, Martha, thou art careful, and art troubled about many things: but only one thing is necessary. Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her” (Luke 10:41-42).
You Are Invited!
Likewise, we trouble ourselves about many things, and we neglect the one thing that is absolutely necessary to us—which is Jesus, or the Sacred Heart. We are invited, by Him through His inspirations, to come to His banquet—meaning, extra Masses, extra Holy Communions, visits to the Blessed Sacrament. Yet, just like the invited wedding guests in the Parable about the Wedding Feast, we make excuses—we are too busy with what we are doing:
Jesus spoke to His listeners this parable, which we can well apply to ourselves: “A certain man made a great supper, and invited many. And he sent his servant at the hour of supper to say to them that were invited, that they should come, for now all things are ready. And they began all at once to make excuse. The first said to him: ‘I have bought a farm, and I must needs go out and see it: I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to try them: I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come!’ And the servant returning, told these things to his Lord. Then the master of the house, being angry, said to his servant: ‘Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in hither the poor, and the feeble, and the blind, and the lame!’ And the servant said: ‘Lord, it is done as thou hast commanded, and yet there is room!’ And the Lord said to the servant: ‘Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled. But I say unto you, that none of those men that were invited, shall taste of my supper.’ And turning, Jesus said to them: ‘If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:16-26).
Now let us not blasphemously accuse Our Lord of telling us hate our family members! That is not what He means by this passage. He is simply telling us that no family member, neither mother, father, brother, sister, spouse or child, should be allowed to get in the way of our relationship with God. God comes first! “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31).
St. Matthew reports a similar parable, that of the King and the Wedding Feast: “The kingdom of Heaven is likened to a king, who made a marriage for his son. And he sent his servants, to call them that were invited to the marriage; and they would not come. Again he sent other servants, saying: ‘Tell them that were invited, “Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my calves and fatlings are killed, and all things are ready: come ye to the marriage.”‘ But they neglected, and went their own ways, one to his farm, and another to his merchandise. And the rest laid hands on his servants, and having treated them contumeliously, put them to death. But when the king had heard of it, he was angry, and sending his armies, he destroyed those murderers, and burnt their city. Then he said to his servants: ‘The marriage indeed is ready; but they that were invited were not worthy! Go ye therefore into the highways; and as many as you shall find, call to the marriage!’ And his servants going forth into the ways, gathered together all that they found, both bad and good: and the marriage was filled with guests” (Matthew 22:1-10).
Learning from Royalty
The King of Heaven had once asked King Louis XIV of France to consecrate France to the Sacred Heart. King Louis and the successive kings all delayed and refused to do so. At Rianjo, Spain in August 1931, Our Lord communicated to Sister Lucia of Fatima, His dissatisfaction with the Pope’s and the Catholic bishops’ failure to obey His command to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Our Lord said: “Make it known to My ministers, given that they follow the example of the King of France in delaying the execution of My requests, they will follow him into misfortune. It is never too late to have recourse to Jesus and Mary.” In another text Lucia wrote that Our Lord complained to her: “They did not wish to heed My request! Like the King of France they will repent of it, and they will do it, but it will be late. Russia will have already spread its errors in the world, provoking wars and persecutions against the Church. The Holy Father will have much to suffer.”
Disobedience to God Does Not Pay
The reference by Jesus to the King of France’s disobedience and punishment is as follows:
On June 17th, 1689 the Sacred Heart of Jesus manifested to Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque His command to the King of France [Louis XIV] that the King was to consecrate France to the Sacred Heart. For 100 years to the day the Kings of France delayed, and did not obey. So on June 17th, 1789 the King of France was stripped of his legislative authority by the upstart Third Estate, and four years later the soldiers of the French Revolution executed the King of France as if he were a criminal. In 1793 France sent its King, Louis XVI, to the guillotine. He and his predecessors had failed to obey Our Lord’s request that France be consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and thus misfortune had befallen both the King and his country, not to mention the disasters and catastrophes that Revolutionary France brought to Europe by spreading her errors, just like Our Lady said would happen with Russia, who would spread its errors throughout the world, unless we comply with Heaven’s wishes and commands.
But... But… But!
Why are we not complying with Heaven’s wishes? Because we, like the rich young man of many possessions and the Pharisees, are too caught up with ourselves and what we have and what we want—“Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Luke 12:34). Our Lord tells us to “lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven” (Matthew 6:20), but we want seek treasures here below—whether it be persons, places or things. And those who were invited to the Supper and the Wedding Feast, chose not to attend because of persons, places and things. Our problem is that we stupidly believe that we can somehow serve both God and mammon—that we can have our cake and eat it. Most souls, especially in this modern world with all its allurements, have lost sight of the fact that the Christian life is one of renunciation and mortification, whereby we are meant to die to the world in order to live for Christ. Just because hardly anybody does this, does not mean that it has become redundant—it is still the only way to Heaven.
Penance and Reparation to the Sacred Heart
Our Lord Himself warned us: “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” and Jesus repeats Himself two verses later: “I say to you; except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3-5). “Therefore, saith the Lord God, be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities: and iniquity shall not be your ruin” (Ezechiel 18:30). “Hear, I beseech you, My words, and do penance” (Job 21:2).
Our Lord complained, already in His own day, that too few were doing penance: “Woe to thee, Corozain, woe to thee, Bethsaida. For if in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the mighty works that have been wrought in you, they would have done penance long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes” (Luke 10:13). “God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23).
St. John the Baptist, even before Jesus’ Public Ministry began, was preaching penance in the desert: “The word of the Lord was made unto John, the son of Zachary, in the desert. And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of penance for the remission of sins” (Luke 3:2-3).
Our Lord sent out His disciples to preach penance: “Jesus called the Twelve; and began to send them two and two and gave them power over unclean spirits … and He said to them: ‘Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear you; going forth from thence, shake off the dust from your feet for a testimony to them!’ And, going forth, they preached that men should do penance” (Mark 6:7-12). When the Apostles, despite being given power over devils, had failed to cast out a devil from a boy, they asked Our Lord why they had failed. He replied: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” – in other words, prayer and penance. (Matthew 17:20). This is why Our Lady, at Fatima, asks for the Rosary and sacrifices – in other words, prayer and penance.
Let us take a cue the example quoted from Holy Scripture: “He prayed to the Lord his God: and did penance exceedingly” (2 Paralipomenon 33:12). “Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes” (Job 42:6).
Words of Love
To Sr. Consolata Bertone, the Sacred Heart said: “You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! Think no longer about yourself, about your perfection, on how to attain to sanctity, or about your defects, your present and future troubles. No. I will see to your sanctification, to your sanctity. You must henceforth think only of Me and of souls; of Me to love Me, and of souls to save them! What is it that keeps you from loving Me, Consolata? It is useless thoughts and being interested in others! Consolata, if, while you are contemplating the sky, you let your eyes rest on the windows of the neighboring houses, you will find death. Similarly, if, instead of loving Me alone, you rest your eyes on the actions of others, you will find death! Love is sanctity. The more you love Me, the more you will become holy! If a creature of good will desires to love Me and to make of her life one single act of love, from the moment of her rising until she falls asleep at night—from the heart, be it well understood—then I will perform incredible things for that soul. Write that down!” (Father Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love, chapters 1, 2, 6 & 11).
To Sr. Mary of the Trinity, the Sacred Heart said: “You came to the convent for Me; nevertheless, after a time, I am the last in your thoughts. My help is asked, yes, but it is seldom that My wishes are consulted, and that I am listened to. I am given what it pleases you to give Me; it appears as if it would be time wasted to find out whether it is what I ask and desire. Remember this: the value of your existence is not in what you have done, or said, or suffered: it is in the part of your being that you have given to your Savior; in what you have allowed Me to do with you. Give Me your heart—and your heart is your whole life! Most religious give Me their work and their talents—I have sufficient talents at My disposal; what I desire is the soul, to make it My place of rest and of work, to live anew in it in humanity. Yes, My place of work, because a soul that would give herself to Me without reserve, how I would use her for the glory of God and of the Church, for the salvation of other souls, to a degree that you cannot imagine!” (Father Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love, chapters 2 & 4). “You will be lacking in help only when My Divine Heart will be lacking in power” (The Sacred Heart to St. Margaret Mary).
To Sr. Josefa Menendez, the Sacred Heart said: “What would you do if you had not My Heart? … I require nothing of you beyond what is already yours. Give Me an empty heart and I will fill it ... give Me a heart destitute of all adornment and I will make it beautiful. Give it to Me with all its miseries, and I will consume them. What does all the rest matter? ... Your sins? Why, I can wipe them out ... Your miseries? I consume them ... Your weakness? I will be its support ... Let us remain united. My Heart is powerful enough to sustain you. It is yours; take from It all you need. If you are in Me and we are one, then you will bring forth much fruit and will become strong, for you will disappear like a drop of water in the ocean. Love will despoil you of self and allow you to think only of My glory and of souls” (Father Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love, chapter 13).
Would Jesus say the same to us? You bet He would! But He will not force us to go to Him; He will not force us to ask Him for help; He will not force us to listen; He will not force us to love Him (with our heart, not just our lips). These are things that we must do ourselves—these are prerequisites of love. Are you ready for His love? Are you ready for love in His terms? Or will you keep running? The time left to truly love Him is truly running out!
Fr. John (Jean) Croiset―one of the spiritual directors of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque―speaking of those few souls who have a sincere love of the Sacred Heart, writes: “When they consider how little the world is moved by this excess of love, how little men love Jesus Christ in return, and how little pains they take to be loved by Him, His faithful friends have not been able to endure seeing Him treated with such contempt day after day; they have endeavored to show their just sorrow at such treatment, and by their ardent love, their profound respect and by special acts of homage, to testify their great desire to make reparation to the utmost of their capacity for this ingratitude and contempt.” (The Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, chapter 1).
In explaining the devotion to the Sacred Heart, Fr. Croiset says: “The principal motive of this devotion is the immense love which Jesus Christ has for men, who, for the most part, have nothing but contempt, or at least indifference, for Him. The end which is proposed is:
(1) Firstly, to recognize and honor, as much as lies in our power, by our frequent adoration, by a return of love, by our acts of thanksgiving and by every kind of homage, all the sentiments of love which Jesus Christ has for us in the adorable Sacrament of the Blessed Eucharist; where, however, He is so little known by men, or at least so little loved even by these people who know Him.
(2) Secondly, to make reparation, by all possible means, for the indignities and outrages to which His love has exposed Him during the course of His mortal life, and to which this same love exposes Him every day in the Blessed Sacrament of the altar.
“This devotion consists, therefore, in ardently loving Jesus Christ … in the adorable Sacrament of the Eucharist.
“The particular character of this devotion … is nothing else than an exercise of love. Love is its object, love is its motive and principle, and it is love that ought to be its end” (The Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, chapter 1).
Do You Love Me?
“Jesus said to Simon Peter: ‘Simon son of John, lovest thou Me more than these?’ Peter said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord! Thou knowest that I love Thee!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Feed My lambs.’ Jesus said to him again: ‘Simon, son of John, lovest thou Me?’ Peter said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord! Thou knowest that I love Thee!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Feed My lambs.’ Jesus said to him the third time: ‘Simon, son of John, lovest thou Me?’ Peter was grieved, because Jesus had said to him the third time: ‘Lovest thou Me?’ And Peter said to Him: ‘Lord, Thou knowest all things! Thou knowest that I love Thee!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Feed My sheep’” (John 21:15-17).
If Our Lord were to ask us the same question: “Lovest thou Me?” What would be our answer? Remember—Our Lord can read hearts, and not just hear what comes from the lips!
With Lips Maybe! But With Heart and Soul?...
Speaking to the upholders of tradition, the Pharisees, Jesus said: “Hypocrites, well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me’” (Matthew 15:7-8). Our Lord refers to God speaking through Isaias: “And the Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me’” (Isaias 23:9). Which simply translates to “Swelling lips joined with a corrupt heart” (Proverbs 26:23). “With deceitful lips, and with a double heart have they spoken” (Psalms 11:3).
For Jesus knew what they were really after: “An enemy speaketh sweetly with his lips, but in his heart he lieth in wait, to throw thee into a pit” (Ecclesiasticus 12:15). The Pharisees were self-seekers who were seeking to put Jesus aside and do away with Him: “The Pharisees, going out, made a consultation against Him, how they might destroy Him” (Matthew 12:14).
Jesus ‘Cramps My Style’!
For many souls today, even those who seek to uphold the Faith—as did the Pharisees—Jesus “gets in the way” of things. He “cramps our style” and is looked upon as being a bit of a “party-pooper” who denies us the fun and games to which we feel entitled. Why on Earth should I go to an extra Mass or two each week? What’s the point of “putting a spanner in the spokes” of my already busy day to go and tediously sit bored in front of a tabernacle in an empty silent church? What’s wrong with rushing out of church, the moment Sunday Mass has finished, to go and speak with and enjoy the company of my friends? It’s all a matter of priorities! What matters most to us? Our Lord said: “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice [“justice” meaning what is due to Him], and all these things shall be added unto you” (Luke 12:31).
What or Whom Do You Seek?
“For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Luke 12:34). The rich young man was loved by Jesus and Our Lord invited him to sell all his possessions and to come and follow Him; but the young man went away sad, because he had great possessions, and he could not bear to part with them in order to go to Jesus: “Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me.’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:21-24). “For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Luke 12:34). Which is why St. John warns us: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
It was the things of the world that kept Martha busy, busy, busy—while her sister, Mary, was busy listening to the words of Jesus. Martha was preparing Jesus a meal, but Jesus was interested in feeding them with His words: “It is written, ‘Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God’” (Matthew 4:4). To the busy Martha, Jesus said: “Martha, Martha, thou art careful, and art troubled about many things: but only one thing is necessary. Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her” (Luke 10:41-42).
You Are Invited!
Likewise, we trouble ourselves about many things, and we neglect the one thing that is absolutely necessary to us—which is Jesus, or the Sacred Heart. We are invited, by Him through His inspirations, to come to His banquet—meaning, extra Masses, extra Holy Communions, visits to the Blessed Sacrament. Yet, just like the invited wedding guests in the Parable about the Wedding Feast, we make excuses—we are too busy with what we are doing:
Jesus spoke to His listeners this parable, which we can well apply to ourselves: “A certain man made a great supper, and invited many. And he sent his servant at the hour of supper to say to them that were invited, that they should come, for now all things are ready. And they began all at once to make excuse. The first said to him: ‘I have bought a farm, and I must needs go out and see it: I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to try them: I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come!’ And the servant returning, told these things to his Lord. Then the master of the house, being angry, said to his servant: ‘Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in hither the poor, and the feeble, and the blind, and the lame!’ And the servant said: ‘Lord, it is done as thou hast commanded, and yet there is room!’ And the Lord said to the servant: ‘Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled. But I say unto you, that none of those men that were invited, shall taste of my supper.’ And turning, Jesus said to them: ‘If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:16-26).
Now let us not blasphemously accuse Our Lord of telling us hate our family members! That is not what He means by this passage. He is simply telling us that no family member, neither mother, father, brother, sister, spouse or child, should be allowed to get in the way of our relationship with God. God comes first! “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31).
St. Matthew reports a similar parable, that of the King and the Wedding Feast: “The kingdom of Heaven is likened to a king, who made a marriage for his son. And he sent his servants, to call them that were invited to the marriage; and they would not come. Again he sent other servants, saying: ‘Tell them that were invited, “Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my calves and fatlings are killed, and all things are ready: come ye to the marriage.”‘ But they neglected, and went their own ways, one to his farm, and another to his merchandise. And the rest laid hands on his servants, and having treated them contumeliously, put them to death. But when the king had heard of it, he was angry, and sending his armies, he destroyed those murderers, and burnt their city. Then he said to his servants: ‘The marriage indeed is ready; but they that were invited were not worthy! Go ye therefore into the highways; and as many as you shall find, call to the marriage!’ And his servants going forth into the ways, gathered together all that they found, both bad and good: and the marriage was filled with guests” (Matthew 22:1-10).
Learning from Royalty
The King of Heaven had once asked King Louis XIV of France to consecrate France to the Sacred Heart. King Louis and the successive kings all delayed and refused to do so. At Rianjo, Spain in August 1931, Our Lord communicated to Sister Lucia of Fatima, His dissatisfaction with the Pope’s and the Catholic bishops’ failure to obey His command to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Our Lord said: “Make it known to My ministers, given that they follow the example of the King of France in delaying the execution of My requests, they will follow him into misfortune. It is never too late to have recourse to Jesus and Mary.” In another text Lucia wrote that Our Lord complained to her: “They did not wish to heed My request! Like the King of France they will repent of it, and they will do it, but it will be late. Russia will have already spread its errors in the world, provoking wars and persecutions against the Church. The Holy Father will have much to suffer.”
Disobedience to God Does Not Pay
The reference by Jesus to the King of France’s disobedience and punishment is as follows:
On June 17th, 1689 the Sacred Heart of Jesus manifested to Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque His command to the King of France [Louis XIV] that the King was to consecrate France to the Sacred Heart. For 100 years to the day the Kings of France delayed, and did not obey. So on June 17th, 1789 the King of France was stripped of his legislative authority by the upstart Third Estate, and four years later the soldiers of the French Revolution executed the King of France as if he were a criminal. In 1793 France sent its King, Louis XVI, to the guillotine. He and his predecessors had failed to obey Our Lord’s request that France be consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and thus misfortune had befallen both the King and his country, not to mention the disasters and catastrophes that Revolutionary France brought to Europe by spreading her errors, just like Our Lady said would happen with Russia, who would spread its errors throughout the world, unless we comply with Heaven’s wishes and commands.
But... But… But!
Why are we not complying with Heaven’s wishes? Because we, like the rich young man of many possessions and the Pharisees, are too caught up with ourselves and what we have and what we want—“Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Luke 12:34). Our Lord tells us to “lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven” (Matthew 6:20), but we want seek treasures here below—whether it be persons, places or things. And those who were invited to the Supper and the Wedding Feast, chose not to attend because of persons, places and things. Our problem is that we stupidly believe that we can somehow serve both God and mammon—that we can have our cake and eat it. Most souls, especially in this modern world with all its allurements, have lost sight of the fact that the Christian life is one of renunciation and mortification, whereby we are meant to die to the world in order to live for Christ. Just because hardly anybody does this, does not mean that it has become redundant—it is still the only way to Heaven.
Penance and Reparation to the Sacred Heart
Our Lord Himself warned us: “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” and Jesus repeats Himself two verses later: “I say to you; except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3-5). “Therefore, saith the Lord God, be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities: and iniquity shall not be your ruin” (Ezechiel 18:30). “Hear, I beseech you, My words, and do penance” (Job 21:2).
Our Lord complained, already in His own day, that too few were doing penance: “Woe to thee, Corozain, woe to thee, Bethsaida. For if in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the mighty works that have been wrought in you, they would have done penance long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes” (Luke 10:13). “God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23).
St. John the Baptist, even before Jesus’ Public Ministry began, was preaching penance in the desert: “The word of the Lord was made unto John, the son of Zachary, in the desert. And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of penance for the remission of sins” (Luke 3:2-3).
Our Lord sent out His disciples to preach penance: “Jesus called the Twelve; and began to send them two and two and gave them power over unclean spirits … and He said to them: ‘Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear you; going forth from thence, shake off the dust from your feet for a testimony to them!’ And, going forth, they preached that men should do penance” (Mark 6:7-12). When the Apostles, despite being given power over devils, had failed to cast out a devil from a boy, they asked Our Lord why they had failed. He replied: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” – in other words, prayer and penance. (Matthew 17:20). This is why Our Lady, at Fatima, asks for the Rosary and sacrifices – in other words, prayer and penance.
Let us take a cue the example quoted from Holy Scripture: “He prayed to the Lord his God: and did penance exceedingly” (2 Paralipomenon 33:12). “Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes” (Job 42:6).
Words of Love
To Sr. Consolata Bertone, the Sacred Heart said: “You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! Think no longer about yourself, about your perfection, on how to attain to sanctity, or about your defects, your present and future troubles. No. I will see to your sanctification, to your sanctity. You must henceforth think only of Me and of souls; of Me to love Me, and of souls to save them! What is it that keeps you from loving Me, Consolata? It is useless thoughts and being interested in others! Consolata, if, while you are contemplating the sky, you let your eyes rest on the windows of the neighboring houses, you will find death. Similarly, if, instead of loving Me alone, you rest your eyes on the actions of others, you will find death! Love is sanctity. The more you love Me, the more you will become holy! If a creature of good will desires to love Me and to make of her life one single act of love, from the moment of her rising until she falls asleep at night—from the heart, be it well understood—then I will perform incredible things for that soul. Write that down!” (Father Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love, chapters 1, 2, 6 & 11).
To Sr. Mary of the Trinity, the Sacred Heart said: “You came to the convent for Me; nevertheless, after a time, I am the last in your thoughts. My help is asked, yes, but it is seldom that My wishes are consulted, and that I am listened to. I am given what it pleases you to give Me; it appears as if it would be time wasted to find out whether it is what I ask and desire. Remember this: the value of your existence is not in what you have done, or said, or suffered: it is in the part of your being that you have given to your Savior; in what you have allowed Me to do with you. Give Me your heart—and your heart is your whole life! Most religious give Me their work and their talents—I have sufficient talents at My disposal; what I desire is the soul, to make it My place of rest and of work, to live anew in it in humanity. Yes, My place of work, because a soul that would give herself to Me without reserve, how I would use her for the glory of God and of the Church, for the salvation of other souls, to a degree that you cannot imagine!” (Father Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love, chapters 2 & 4). “You will be lacking in help only when My Divine Heart will be lacking in power” (The Sacred Heart to St. Margaret Mary).
To Sr. Josefa Menendez, the Sacred Heart said: “What would you do if you had not My Heart? … I require nothing of you beyond what is already yours. Give Me an empty heart and I will fill it ... give Me a heart destitute of all adornment and I will make it beautiful. Give it to Me with all its miseries, and I will consume them. What does all the rest matter? ... Your sins? Why, I can wipe them out ... Your miseries? I consume them ... Your weakness? I will be its support ... Let us remain united. My Heart is powerful enough to sustain you. It is yours; take from It all you need. If you are in Me and we are one, then you will bring forth much fruit and will become strong, for you will disappear like a drop of water in the ocean. Love will despoil you of self and allow you to think only of My glory and of souls” (Father Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love, chapter 13).
Would Jesus say the same to us? You bet He would! But He will not force us to go to Him; He will not force us to ask Him for help; He will not force us to listen; He will not force us to love Him (with our heart, not just our lips). These are things that we must do ourselves—these are prerequisites of love. Are you ready for His love? Are you ready for love in His terms? Or will you keep running? The time left to truly love Him is truly running out!
Article 3
Monday, June 3rd
Don’t Just Sit There―Do Something!
Monday, June 3rd
Don’t Just Sit There―Do Something!
So What’s the Problem?
Sometimes problems grow so slowly that we don’t even notice there is a problem. Why? Because each little growth in the problem seems insignificant when looked at by itself in isolation from the bigger picture. This is easily done in the case of those Catholics who pretty much live for today―ignoring the past and refusing to look to the future. You could say that this is perfectly reflected in the way most Americans live with regard to finances. Reports over the last three years consistently show that around 78% to 80% of workers are living from paycheck to paycheck. The reports add that even among those who earn over $100,000 a year, most would struggle to pay an unexpected $400 expense.
Problems accumulate like houses deteriorate―little by little, from one spot to another. The same is true for disease. Unless it is an accident―like a car crash, a fall, a cut, etc. ― all diseases are problems that progress and advance little by little, whereby the initial stages seem to be non-existent, minor or trivial―and each successive stage is the progress of the disease likewise seems like a trivial advance. Many people literally drop-dead from a heart attack, oblivious to the fact that for years they were ‘suffering’ (without feeling it) from heart disease.
The same is true of cancer. The Cancer Association says that the early warning signs of cancer may be difficult to detect because the symptoms may be similar to less serious conditions, such as the flu. Also, some cancers, such as lung or pancreatic cancer, may not show warning signs in early stages. Many cancers share common early warning signs, while some are specific to certain cancers. General early warning signs of cancer include:
● Fatigue
● Unexplained weight loss/gain
● Fever
● Pain that does not go away
● Loss of appetite
● Nausea, vomiting
● Skin changes, such as a rash, redness, tenderness or swelling
● Blood in the stool, urine, semen or sputum
● Persistent cough or hoarseness
● Difficulty emptying the bowel or bladder
As the Cancer Association says ― the early warning signs of cancer may be difficult to detect because the symptoms may be similar to less serious conditions. So when someone meets with these symptoms, OPTIMISM PREVAILS, and the symptoms are ignored―and the problem grows!
Likewise with obesity. Over 40% of America is obese. The prevalence of obesity was 40.0% among young adults aged 20 to 39 years, 44.8% among middle-aged adults aged 40 to 59 years, and 42.8% among older adults aged 60 and older. Overall, 1 child out of every 6 children is obese. In the range of students from 5th Grade to 9th Grade―40% are overweight or obese. The American Medical Association (AMA) designated obesity a disease in 2013 and as a result, the idea that obesity is caused by insufficient willpower, lack of discipline, and bad choices began to transform. According to the Merriam Webster Dictionary, a disease is “a condition . . . that impairs normal functioning and is typically manifested by distinguishing signs and symptoms.”
Obesity is a chronic disease. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, obesity affects 42.8% of middle-age adults. Obesity is closely related to several other chronic diseases, including heart disease, hypertension, type 2 diabetes, sleep apnea, certain cancers, joint diseases, and more. Yet after all that information on obesity, how do you become obese? The answer is, of course, slowly―little by little―and not really caring about it once you start to notice it, which, in turn, means you will not take any action to prevent it, or very little action―which turns out to be futile and pointless, and so even the little measures soon cease to be taken.
Symptoms in the World Today
Let us now transpose the above to the world of spirituality, politics, culture, philosophy, education, medicine, finance, etc. We will then see that nothing really changes―the “diseases” grow little by little, resulting in our indifference also growing little by little, and our acceptance of the “diseases” growing little by little. Some people protest and it “seems” to have an effect. But all that really happens is that hypocritical words are spoken condemning the “diseases”, cosmetic measures are taken to counteract the “diseases”―yet all this achieves is merely a slowing down of the progression of the “diseases” but not a regression of them. So they advance, taking three steps forward and two steps back―then again, three steps forward and now perhaps only one step back, etc.
Almost like Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale of the “Emperor’s New Clothes” ― also known as, “The King With No Clothes On” or “The Invisible Suit of Clothes” ― whereby everyone sees the obvious truth in that (1) there is no new set of clothes, and (2) the king is entirely naked when he thinks he is clothed by this invisible set of clothes. We see here the case of the ruler or king (government) buying into the lies told by the con-men (the ‘money men’ or ‘puppet-masters’), and the rest of the king’s courtiers (politicians) and finally the common people―watching the magnificent, pompous procession of the naked king (citizens)―also accepting a lie they knew to be a lie, purely out of human respect and fear of reprisals by the king (government).
In the Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale, it took a little innocent boy (not accustomed to lies and lying) to break the spell by shouting out loudly: “Look! The king is naked! He is not wearing any clothes!” This expression by the little young innocent boy reminds us the words of our innocent God in Heaven, who says in the Book of Apocalypse (which is fitting, since we are in apocalyptic times): “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot! But, because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth! Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind [to the truth], and NAKED! I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire-tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
But we won’t be zealous and we won’t do penance―because, just as in the fairy tale above, we are surrounded by a crowd who are not zealous, but lukewarm; who do no penance, but only seek self-gratification. So, we follow the crowd and merely try not to be as bad as the crowd. Our human respect and fear of reprisals makes us “put-up and shut-up” and makes us “sit-down for fear of rocking the boat”.
Deliberately Blind to Fatal Disease of the World
We see―but we don’t want to see! We hear―but we don’t want to hear! We put our hands in front of our eyes―but peek between our fingers. We cup our ears―but only enough so that we can still hear something. We live among the diseased―but don’t anything about their disease. Instead, like Cain who killed Abel, we say to God: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9)―yet God replies as He did to Cain: “What have you done? [Or in our case: “What have you NOT done about it?”] The voice of your brother’s blood cries to Me from the Earth! Now, therefore, cursed shall you be upon the Earth!” (Genesis 4:10).
St. John Chrysostom―a Father and Doctor of the Church―teaches that upon our death, at our Day of Judgment, we shall be judged for EVERYTHING that occurred in this world while we were alive! Why? Because we are part of the body of the human race―everyone is, so to speak, our brother or sister. It is natural for everyone to take care of their own human body―it should likewise be natural to take care of the more extended human body―that is to say, the “body of mankind” or “The Mystical Body of Christ”. This is echoed in the words of Christ in Holy Scripture:
“And when the Son of man shall come in His majesty, and all the angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the seat of His majesty. And all nations shall be gathered together before Him, and He shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on His left. Then shall the King say to them that shall be on His right hand: ‘Come, ye blessed of My Father! Possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me in; naked, and you covered Me; sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me!’
Then shall the just answer Him, saying: ‘Lord! When did we see Thee hungry, and fed Thee; thirsty, and gave Thee drink? And when did we see Thee a stranger, and took Thee in? Or naked, and covered Thee? Or when did we see Thee sick or in prison, and came to Thee?’ And the King, answering, shall say to them: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!’
“Then He shall say to them also that shall be on His left hand: ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry, and you gave Me not to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me not in; naked, and you covered Me not; sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me! Then they also shall answer Him, saying: ‘Lord! When did we see Thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to Thee?’ Then He shall answer them, saying: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least of My brethren, neither did you do it to Me!’ And these shall go into everlasting punishment: but the just, into life everlasting!” (Matthew 25:31-46).
If Christ came to seek and save that which was lost―then what on earth are we doing? “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). This is exactly what Our Lady echoed at Fatima, when she said to the three children in particular―and to all of us in general: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort! Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!”
What is the Blood that Cries to God for Vengeance?
Now, coming back to God’s words to Abel: The voice of your brother’s blood cries to Me from the Earth! Now, therefore, cursed shall you be upon the Earth!” (Genesis 4:10). Let us first take a natural look at blood and then supernaturalize what we find. In your body―which is a microcosm of the Mystical Body of Christ―plaque can build up in arteries ― which are the blood vessels that carry oxygen and nutrient-rich blood from your heart to your body’s tissues. Plaque in the arteries is a fatty, waxy substance that forms deposits in the artery wall. These deposits can narrow the artery and reduce blood flow. This is called atherosclerosis or “hardening of the arteries.” Plaques can also rupture and create a blood clot at the rupture site, as your body’s natural processes try to repair the “injury.” The blood clot can cut off blood flow through the artery and starve your body’s tissues of oxygen and nutrients. Therefore, a ruptured plaque can be serious. It is the most common cause of a heart attack or stroke.
The real key to preventing heart disease is to use a combined approach, one that treats all facets of your physical and emotional health. It is extremely important to eat real nourishing foods based on your metabolic type (to determine whether a low-fat, high-fat or other diet is best for you) and to get out and exercise―regularly and intensely enough. Further, you must address stress and your emotions, as too much stress and negative emotions will contribute significantly to this disease.
The same applies to the spiritual life―we must “eat” and “digest” nourishing things. As Our Lord said: “It is written: ‘Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God’” (Matthew 4:4)―whereby He quotes the Old Testament passage: “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Deuteronomy 8:3). The Word of God should be our food―is it? How much of it do we “eat”? Are we on a diet? Similarly, we should be getting lots of “spiritual exercise” ― prayers, sacrifices, penances, spiritual reading, daily meditation, daily examination of conscience, as many weekday Masses as our schedule allows―perhaps tweak the schedule to allow for more! We must also address our stress and emotions by a lively strong trust in Divine Providence―for nothing happens to us that we either do not deserve or cannot from.
When to Seek Medical Help?
Here is a PARTIAL list of things from a hospital website listing incidents that should make you seek medical help. We have taken the medical perspective and added to it a spiritual or moral perspective:
(1) You experience any sudden or severe pain
Are we not pained by the deluge of sin in the world today? Do you not feel the pain? Heaven does! On December 8th, 1956, Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello: “People are offending God too much! Were I to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief. These are grave times. The world is in total turmoil because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge. All is hanging on a slender thread. When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs. All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth.” At Akita, in Japan, in 1973, Our Lady added: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord. In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead.” Sudden, severe pain! Are we pained by the sin in the world, or have we been anesthetized to the pain by an overabundance of pleasure and entertainment?
(2) You have a persistent, high fever
Hopefully your spiritual fever is rising by your indignation boiling over! Unless, of course, just as “familiarity breeds contempt”, perhaps “sin has bred indifference” on your part. If we were truly Catholic―fervently Catholic―then we would feverishly praying that God put an end to all this evil in the world.
(3) Your symptoms continue to escalate and become unusually bad
Any Catholic worth his salt should be able to see the escalating symptoms of evil and that they are becoming unusually bad! “You are the salt of the Earth. But if the salt loses its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing any more, but to be cast out, and to be trodden on by men!” (Matthew 5:13). The words of Our Lady of Akita―concerning escalating ‘symptoms’ or ‘sin-toms’―should come to mind: “If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them.”
(4) You have lost weight suddenly and without explanation
The Mystical Body of Christ has drastically “lost weight” over the last 50 years! Only 20% of that Mystical Body of Christ regularly assist at Holy Mass every Sunday―meaning that 80% of the Mystical Body has fallen into a moral disease of sin―leaving the Mystical Body more than a little lightweight.
(5) You are short of breath, have difficulty breathing
St. John Eudes (1601-1680) said: “The air which we breathe, is not more necessary for man that he may live as a human being, than is prayer for the Christian that he may live as a Christian.” Holy Scripture tells us to “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). Prayer is a rhythmic, constant act ― just like breathing. As air gives us the oxygen our cells need for life―prayer fills souls with the grace needed for our spiritual life. Once the oxygen levels drop, the effects are progression from giddiness, mental confusion, loss of judgment, loss of coordination, weakness, nausea, to later fainting, loss of consciousness and death. Similarly for the spiritual life once we start to pray less, or if we give up prayer altogether. The soul finds it hard “to breathe” ― and the world is choking us more and more, so that our “breathing” or praying becomes less and less.
(6) You have difficulty speaking
Once you overdose or binge on the world―you invariably will find that you find it difficult to speak of spiritual things. All you can babble about is the world and worldly things. Today, even among Traditional and Conservative Catholics there is very little spiritual conversation or talk about matters of the Faith. “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5).
(7) You experience seizure
A seizure, for those who don’t know, is defined as “changes in behavior that occur after an episode of abnormal electrical activity in the brain.” Today we can see many “spiritual seizures” or changes in behavior brought about by abnormal electrical activity with the smartphone, tablet, laptop, or television screen. Just about every Catholic now has these “seizures” which can last for many hours each day!
(8) You experience severe chest, abdominal or pelvic pain
If your 4G smartphone was not giving you pains―then you now have 5G after its roll-out! Talking of pains―how many consciences are in pain? How many of those pained consciences have been anesthetized? Sadly, it is the case for most Catholics.
(9) You experience a sudden face drooping
Your jaw should be dropping at the sight of all that is going on in the world! Our faces should be drooping and downcast at the tsunami of sin that is ceaselessly flooding the world―just as Our Lady of Good Success said: “The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty.”
(10) You suspect you have a concussion
Do you feel the concussion yet? You should with your mind being constantly beaten with lie, after lie, after lie. Some Catholics are in a mental stupor―no longer able to think like Catholics―due to this constant brainwashing or “brain-beating” with lies and propaganda.
(11) Your bowel movement or urination has changed
Everyone’s bowel movements or urination should have increased drastically by now―with the perpetual worry of what comes next? Will I lose my job? Where will the money come from? What will we eat? When will they try to vaccinate me? What is coming next? etc.
(12) Your vision is interrupted by bright flashes
Every day our vision is interrupted by bright flashes―sometimes for hours on end―these being the television news flashes, reporting the latest crime, riot, scandal, sin, murder, demonstration, resignation, confiscation, Coronavirus escalation, the next virus that is about to come, etc. Everyone now experiences these bright flashes or news flashes!
(13) You experience confusion or changes in mood
Who wouldn’t experience a change in mood during these times. Everyone’s mood is changed―whether they like it or not. Even the “puppet-masters” are keen on mood-changing―for they send their stooges to stir up and change the mood of peaceful protestors into that of a raging rioting mob. The goal is to pit one mood against another.
(14) You experience uncontrolled bleeding
Sanctifying Grace in the soul has been compared to blood in the arteries or body. Once the body is wounded, blood flows―a mortal wound can lead to death. Similarly, a mortal sin wounds the soul and resulting “bleeding” of grace can lead to eternal ‘death’ ― and the loss of eternal life. Today, without doubt, the vast majority of Catholics are in mortal sin―not to mention the other 6 billion or more non-Catholics in the world. We have a mortal situation on our hands―a bloody mess.
(15) You experience severe or persistent vomiting or diarrhea
If this doesn’t make you want to throw-up, then there is something wrong with your Catholic sensibilities. The Catholic conscience has become numb and unresponsive―which is indicative of a very serious problem in itself!
You can take most of these things and transpose onto the persistent, recurring, chronic crises that the Church and mankind has been suffering decade after decade. We are in a mess! We are diseased! We are―or should be―in critical care, in some Intensive Care Unit (ICU)―but we are not! We are happily going along with our daily life as if none of this was happening, or as though it were merely a movie! Sad! Dangerously sad! Fatally sad!
When to Seek Spiritual Help and Heavenly Help?
With one crisis after another, year after year, decade after decade―what on earth is stopping us from seeking the help of the only ones who can help us? How dumb has the Catholic world become when it cannot realize that what we have been seeing, are seeing and will see―is not just a mere trivial human malfunction―but a fully fledged and carefully coordinated Satanic stranglehold and siege of the Church and the world!? When the body of mankind and the Mystical Body of the Church show symptoms of godlessness, lawlessness and sinfulness, while claiming blamelessness it its remorselessness―then we have an emergency! But―just as you can become accustomed to horror movies and violent movies―you can become accustomed to the horror and violence produced by a progressive but endless drift away from God into the charming, seductive façade of Satan’s princedom, a.k.a. the world. The world is strangling godliness out of people like the police officer seemingly strangled life out of the man that he held to the ground with a knee to the neck.
We have seen an unprecedented (organized) series of protests worldwide over the death of one man―yet there is no protest about the VAST MAJORITY of mankind of all races and colors that are damned daily. Every single day 160,032 people die. Every single week 1,123,303 (1.1 million) people die. Every single month (4.8 million) 4,867,646 people die. Every single year over 58 million people die ― and the VAST MAJORITY of mankind of all races and colors that are damned. Who says so? Our Lord says so! Our Lady says so! Many of the saints say so! [read the evidence here].
One extract from the sermon―that St. Leonard of Port Maurice preached to a crowd that included the pope and many cardinals and bishops―will illustrate that stark and sad truth. If you cannot see from that we are in a STATE OF EMERGENCY―and have been in almost every century―then you yourself need to see a medical doctor, and a psychiatrist and a good spiritual director.
Sermon of a Saint
Saint Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751) was an Italian Franciscan preacher and spiritual writer. He was one of the greatest missioners in the history of the Church. One of his contemporaries, who also lived in Italy, St. Alphonsus Liguori (1696 –1787), called St. Leonard “the great missionary of the 18th century.” He used to preach to thousands in the open square of every city and town where the churches could not hold his listeners. So brilliant and holy was his eloquence that once when he gave a two weeks’ mission in Rome, the Pope and College of Cardinals came to hear him. Here is what St. Leonard of Port Maurice told the Pope, the Cardinals, the Bishops, Priests and laity:
“Let us apply this truth to various states, and you will understand that you must either throw away reason, experience and the common sense of the faithful, or confess that the greater number of Catholics is damned. Is there any state in the world more favorable to innocence in which salvation seems easier and of which people have a higher idea than that of priests, the lieutenants of God?
“At first glance, who would not think that most of them are not only good but even perfect; yet I am horror-struck when I hear Saint Jerome declaring that although the world is full of priests, barely one in a hundred is living in a manner in conformity with state; when I hear a servant of God attesting that he has learned by revelation that the number of priests who fall into Hell each day is so great that it seemed impossible to him that there be any left on earth; when I hear Saint John Chrysostom exclaiming with tears in his eyes: “I do not believe that many priests are saved―I believe the contrary, that the number of those who are damned is greater!”
“Look higher still, and see the prelates of the Holy Church, pastors who have the charge of souls. Is the number of those who are saved among them greater than the number of those who are damned? Listen to Cantimpre; he will relate an event to you, and you may draw the conclusions. There was a synod being held in Paris, and a great number of prelates and pastors who had the charge of souls were in attendance; the king and princes also came to add luster to that assembly by their presence. A famous preacher was invited to preach. While he was preparing his sermon, a horrible demon appeared to him and said: “Lay your books aside! If you want to give a sermon that will be useful to these princes and prelates, content yourself with telling them on our part, ‘We the princes of darkness thank you, princes, prelates, and pastors of souls, that due to your negligence, the greater number of the faithful are damned; also, we are saving a reward for you for this favor, when you shall be with us in Hell.’”
“Woe to you who command others! If so many are damned by your fault, what will happen to you? If few out of those who are first in the Church of God are saved, what will happen to you? Take all states, both sexes, every condition: husbands, wives, widows, young women, young men, soldiers, merchants, craftsmen, rich and poor, noble and plebian. What are we to say about all these people who are living so badly? The following narrative from Saint Vincent Ferrer will show you what you may think about it. He relates that an archdeacon in Lyons gave up his charge and retreated into a desert place to do penance, and that he died the same day and hour as Saint Bernard. After his death, he appeared to his bishop and said to him: “Know, Monsignor, that at the very hour I passed away, thirty-three thousand people also died. Out of this number, Bernard and myself went up to Heaven without delay, three went to Purgatory, and all the others fell into Hell.”
“Our chronicles relate an even more dreadful happening. One of our brothers, well-known for his doctrine and holiness, was preaching in Germany. He represented the ugliness of the sin of impurity so forceful that a woman fell dead of sorrow in front of everyone. Then, coming back to life, she said: “When I was presented before the Tribunal of God, sixty thousand people arrived at the same time from all parts of the world; out of that number, three were saved by going to Purgatory, and all the rest were damned.” [Meaning that not one single soul of the 60,000 went immediately to Heaven. Have the morals of the world improved in our times?].
“O abyss of the judgments of God! Out of thirty thousand, only five were saved! And out of sixty thousand, only three went to Heaven! You sinners who are listening to me, in what category will you be numbered? ... What do you say? ... What do you think? I see almost all of you lowering your heads, filled with astonishment and horror. But let us lay our stupor aside, and instead of flattering ourselves, let us try to draw some profit from our fear. Is it not true that there are two roads which lead to Heaven―innocence and repentance?”
Repent! Repent! The End is Nigh!
The proverbial mantra, which has many times heard and many times mocked ― “Repent! Repent! The End is Nigh!” ― is no longer a laughing matter! As Sister Lucia revealed to Fr. Fuentes in 1957: “Father, the Blessed Virgin did not tell me [explicitly] that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this for three reasons:
“The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground.
“The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others.”
“And the third, because in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation, His Blessed Mother. If we despise and reject this last means, Heaven will no longer pardon us!” (Sr. Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
So―as you see―we have actually entered those dreaded “Last Times” and they will last a while―for we have to yet witness the Minor Apostasy (which actually will be very large), the world falling to totalitarianism and Communism to the point where Our Lady of Good Success says all will seem lost, then the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart, then a period of peace, then the coming of the Antichrist with the Major Apostasy and finally Christ’s triumph.
Meanwhile, back at the worldly ranch, life goes on with the One World Government edging closer and closer, while people edge closer and closer to their smartphones, computers and TVs―still trying to find as much fun as they can, while souls cascade into Hell by well over a hundred thousand every day. The tragedy of damnation beats the COVID-19 numbers “hands-down”―with the number of damned souls in three days (perhaps as many as 480,000 from a death rate of 160,032 daily) beating the current COVID-19 estimated at being 440,000 over a period of 6 months. Hmm! Why wouldn’t the MSM (mainstream media) report about things like that? If the MSM liked creating panic and fear all over the world with COVID-19, then think how much fear and panic they could cause reporting on the estimated number of damned souls!
It’s Time to Rise from the Armchair
As Sr. Lucia of Fatima said to Fr. Fuentes: “Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.”
“For this reason, Father, it is my mission not just to tell about the material punishments that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin.
“Father, we should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No, Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed. So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway.”
Sure “Black Lives Matter”―But What Life Matters Most?
Today we have a new slogan: “Black Lives Matter!” ― but all lives matter, whether black, brown, white or whatever color you can come up with! Nevertheless, what good is earthly life if it leads you to Hell? What good is it being rich if it leads you to Hell? What good is it breaking God’s Laws, or tinkering with and modifying God’s Laws if it leads you to Hell? What good is it living for pleasure if it eventually leads you to the torments and pains of Hell?
Wrong Solutions to the Crisis
We are frequently told to sign petitions, attend protest meetings, complain to our political representatives in local and national government―along the following lines, as one person wrote on his blog: “It’s time we sent that message loud and clear. So please, write your representatives. Spread the truth even if you are mocked. Remember these actions when the time comes to vote for our leaders. But most importantly, it’s time to start practicing civil disobedience. It’s time that we stand tall against the wave of tyranny that is upon us and declare that we will not go quietly. God created mankind to be free. Let no man take what God has given us. We will soon be banned from all deep state controlled networks such as Youtube, Twitter (already banned from Facebook in 2013) and all the rest. So in the meantime it is still possible to contact through email newsletters. Sign up so that when they finally lock down all the tech giants’ ‘social’ networks of control you can stay connected.”
Yet all this is a merely an attempt to solve what is essentially a supernatural problem with flimsy human means! Our Lord puts it in a nutshell: “Without Me, you can do NOTHING!” (John 15:5).
Sometimes problems grow so slowly that we don’t even notice there is a problem. Why? Because each little growth in the problem seems insignificant when looked at by itself in isolation from the bigger picture. This is easily done in the case of those Catholics who pretty much live for today―ignoring the past and refusing to look to the future. You could say that this is perfectly reflected in the way most Americans live with regard to finances. Reports over the last three years consistently show that around 78% to 80% of workers are living from paycheck to paycheck. The reports add that even among those who earn over $100,000 a year, most would struggle to pay an unexpected $400 expense.
Problems accumulate like houses deteriorate―little by little, from one spot to another. The same is true for disease. Unless it is an accident―like a car crash, a fall, a cut, etc. ― all diseases are problems that progress and advance little by little, whereby the initial stages seem to be non-existent, minor or trivial―and each successive stage is the progress of the disease likewise seems like a trivial advance. Many people literally drop-dead from a heart attack, oblivious to the fact that for years they were ‘suffering’ (without feeling it) from heart disease.
The same is true of cancer. The Cancer Association says that the early warning signs of cancer may be difficult to detect because the symptoms may be similar to less serious conditions, such as the flu. Also, some cancers, such as lung or pancreatic cancer, may not show warning signs in early stages. Many cancers share common early warning signs, while some are specific to certain cancers. General early warning signs of cancer include:
● Fatigue
● Unexplained weight loss/gain
● Fever
● Pain that does not go away
● Loss of appetite
● Nausea, vomiting
● Skin changes, such as a rash, redness, tenderness or swelling
● Blood in the stool, urine, semen or sputum
● Persistent cough or hoarseness
● Difficulty emptying the bowel or bladder
As the Cancer Association says ― the early warning signs of cancer may be difficult to detect because the symptoms may be similar to less serious conditions. So when someone meets with these symptoms, OPTIMISM PREVAILS, and the symptoms are ignored―and the problem grows!
Likewise with obesity. Over 40% of America is obese. The prevalence of obesity was 40.0% among young adults aged 20 to 39 years, 44.8% among middle-aged adults aged 40 to 59 years, and 42.8% among older adults aged 60 and older. Overall, 1 child out of every 6 children is obese. In the range of students from 5th Grade to 9th Grade―40% are overweight or obese. The American Medical Association (AMA) designated obesity a disease in 2013 and as a result, the idea that obesity is caused by insufficient willpower, lack of discipline, and bad choices began to transform. According to the Merriam Webster Dictionary, a disease is “a condition . . . that impairs normal functioning and is typically manifested by distinguishing signs and symptoms.”
Obesity is a chronic disease. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, obesity affects 42.8% of middle-age adults. Obesity is closely related to several other chronic diseases, including heart disease, hypertension, type 2 diabetes, sleep apnea, certain cancers, joint diseases, and more. Yet after all that information on obesity, how do you become obese? The answer is, of course, slowly―little by little―and not really caring about it once you start to notice it, which, in turn, means you will not take any action to prevent it, or very little action―which turns out to be futile and pointless, and so even the little measures soon cease to be taken.
Symptoms in the World Today
Let us now transpose the above to the world of spirituality, politics, culture, philosophy, education, medicine, finance, etc. We will then see that nothing really changes―the “diseases” grow little by little, resulting in our indifference also growing little by little, and our acceptance of the “diseases” growing little by little. Some people protest and it “seems” to have an effect. But all that really happens is that hypocritical words are spoken condemning the “diseases”, cosmetic measures are taken to counteract the “diseases”―yet all this achieves is merely a slowing down of the progression of the “diseases” but not a regression of them. So they advance, taking three steps forward and two steps back―then again, three steps forward and now perhaps only one step back, etc.
Almost like Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale of the “Emperor’s New Clothes” ― also known as, “The King With No Clothes On” or “The Invisible Suit of Clothes” ― whereby everyone sees the obvious truth in that (1) there is no new set of clothes, and (2) the king is entirely naked when he thinks he is clothed by this invisible set of clothes. We see here the case of the ruler or king (government) buying into the lies told by the con-men (the ‘money men’ or ‘puppet-masters’), and the rest of the king’s courtiers (politicians) and finally the common people―watching the magnificent, pompous procession of the naked king (citizens)―also accepting a lie they knew to be a lie, purely out of human respect and fear of reprisals by the king (government).
In the Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale, it took a little innocent boy (not accustomed to lies and lying) to break the spell by shouting out loudly: “Look! The king is naked! He is not wearing any clothes!” This expression by the little young innocent boy reminds us the words of our innocent God in Heaven, who says in the Book of Apocalypse (which is fitting, since we are in apocalyptic times): “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot! But, because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth! Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind [to the truth], and NAKED! I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire-tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see. Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
But we won’t be zealous and we won’t do penance―because, just as in the fairy tale above, we are surrounded by a crowd who are not zealous, but lukewarm; who do no penance, but only seek self-gratification. So, we follow the crowd and merely try not to be as bad as the crowd. Our human respect and fear of reprisals makes us “put-up and shut-up” and makes us “sit-down for fear of rocking the boat”.
Deliberately Blind to Fatal Disease of the World
We see―but we don’t want to see! We hear―but we don’t want to hear! We put our hands in front of our eyes―but peek between our fingers. We cup our ears―but only enough so that we can still hear something. We live among the diseased―but don’t anything about their disease. Instead, like Cain who killed Abel, we say to God: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9)―yet God replies as He did to Cain: “What have you done? [Or in our case: “What have you NOT done about it?”] The voice of your brother’s blood cries to Me from the Earth! Now, therefore, cursed shall you be upon the Earth!” (Genesis 4:10).
St. John Chrysostom―a Father and Doctor of the Church―teaches that upon our death, at our Day of Judgment, we shall be judged for EVERYTHING that occurred in this world while we were alive! Why? Because we are part of the body of the human race―everyone is, so to speak, our brother or sister. It is natural for everyone to take care of their own human body―it should likewise be natural to take care of the more extended human body―that is to say, the “body of mankind” or “The Mystical Body of Christ”. This is echoed in the words of Christ in Holy Scripture:
“And when the Son of man shall come in His majesty, and all the angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the seat of His majesty. And all nations shall be gathered together before Him, and He shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on His left. Then shall the King say to them that shall be on His right hand: ‘Come, ye blessed of My Father! Possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me in; naked, and you covered Me; sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me!’
Then shall the just answer Him, saying: ‘Lord! When did we see Thee hungry, and fed Thee; thirsty, and gave Thee drink? And when did we see Thee a stranger, and took Thee in? Or naked, and covered Thee? Or when did we see Thee sick or in prison, and came to Thee?’ And the King, answering, shall say to them: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!’
“Then He shall say to them also that shall be on His left hand: ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry, and you gave Me not to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me not in; naked, and you covered Me not; sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me! Then they also shall answer Him, saying: ‘Lord! When did we see Thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to Thee?’ Then He shall answer them, saying: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least of My brethren, neither did you do it to Me!’ And these shall go into everlasting punishment: but the just, into life everlasting!” (Matthew 25:31-46).
If Christ came to seek and save that which was lost―then what on earth are we doing? “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). This is exactly what Our Lady echoed at Fatima, when she said to the three children in particular―and to all of us in general: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort! Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!”
What is the Blood that Cries to God for Vengeance?
Now, coming back to God’s words to Abel: The voice of your brother’s blood cries to Me from the Earth! Now, therefore, cursed shall you be upon the Earth!” (Genesis 4:10). Let us first take a natural look at blood and then supernaturalize what we find. In your body―which is a microcosm of the Mystical Body of Christ―plaque can build up in arteries ― which are the blood vessels that carry oxygen and nutrient-rich blood from your heart to your body’s tissues. Plaque in the arteries is a fatty, waxy substance that forms deposits in the artery wall. These deposits can narrow the artery and reduce blood flow. This is called atherosclerosis or “hardening of the arteries.” Plaques can also rupture and create a blood clot at the rupture site, as your body’s natural processes try to repair the “injury.” The blood clot can cut off blood flow through the artery and starve your body’s tissues of oxygen and nutrients. Therefore, a ruptured plaque can be serious. It is the most common cause of a heart attack or stroke.
The real key to preventing heart disease is to use a combined approach, one that treats all facets of your physical and emotional health. It is extremely important to eat real nourishing foods based on your metabolic type (to determine whether a low-fat, high-fat or other diet is best for you) and to get out and exercise―regularly and intensely enough. Further, you must address stress and your emotions, as too much stress and negative emotions will contribute significantly to this disease.
The same applies to the spiritual life―we must “eat” and “digest” nourishing things. As Our Lord said: “It is written: ‘Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God’” (Matthew 4:4)―whereby He quotes the Old Testament passage: “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Deuteronomy 8:3). The Word of God should be our food―is it? How much of it do we “eat”? Are we on a diet? Similarly, we should be getting lots of “spiritual exercise” ― prayers, sacrifices, penances, spiritual reading, daily meditation, daily examination of conscience, as many weekday Masses as our schedule allows―perhaps tweak the schedule to allow for more! We must also address our stress and emotions by a lively strong trust in Divine Providence―for nothing happens to us that we either do not deserve or cannot from.
When to Seek Medical Help?
Here is a PARTIAL list of things from a hospital website listing incidents that should make you seek medical help. We have taken the medical perspective and added to it a spiritual or moral perspective:
(1) You experience any sudden or severe pain
Are we not pained by the deluge of sin in the world today? Do you not feel the pain? Heaven does! On December 8th, 1956, Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello: “People are offending God too much! Were I to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief. These are grave times. The world is in total turmoil because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge. All is hanging on a slender thread. When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs. All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth.” At Akita, in Japan, in 1973, Our Lady added: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord. In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead.” Sudden, severe pain! Are we pained by the sin in the world, or have we been anesthetized to the pain by an overabundance of pleasure and entertainment?
(2) You have a persistent, high fever
Hopefully your spiritual fever is rising by your indignation boiling over! Unless, of course, just as “familiarity breeds contempt”, perhaps “sin has bred indifference” on your part. If we were truly Catholic―fervently Catholic―then we would feverishly praying that God put an end to all this evil in the world.
(3) Your symptoms continue to escalate and become unusually bad
Any Catholic worth his salt should be able to see the escalating symptoms of evil and that they are becoming unusually bad! “You are the salt of the Earth. But if the salt loses its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing any more, but to be cast out, and to be trodden on by men!” (Matthew 5:13). The words of Our Lady of Akita―concerning escalating ‘symptoms’ or ‘sin-toms’―should come to mind: “If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them.”
(4) You have lost weight suddenly and without explanation
The Mystical Body of Christ has drastically “lost weight” over the last 50 years! Only 20% of that Mystical Body of Christ regularly assist at Holy Mass every Sunday―meaning that 80% of the Mystical Body has fallen into a moral disease of sin―leaving the Mystical Body more than a little lightweight.
(5) You are short of breath, have difficulty breathing
St. John Eudes (1601-1680) said: “The air which we breathe, is not more necessary for man that he may live as a human being, than is prayer for the Christian that he may live as a Christian.” Holy Scripture tells us to “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). Prayer is a rhythmic, constant act ― just like breathing. As air gives us the oxygen our cells need for life―prayer fills souls with the grace needed for our spiritual life. Once the oxygen levels drop, the effects are progression from giddiness, mental confusion, loss of judgment, loss of coordination, weakness, nausea, to later fainting, loss of consciousness and death. Similarly for the spiritual life once we start to pray less, or if we give up prayer altogether. The soul finds it hard “to breathe” ― and the world is choking us more and more, so that our “breathing” or praying becomes less and less.
(6) You have difficulty speaking
Once you overdose or binge on the world―you invariably will find that you find it difficult to speak of spiritual things. All you can babble about is the world and worldly things. Today, even among Traditional and Conservative Catholics there is very little spiritual conversation or talk about matters of the Faith. “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them!” (1 John 4:5).
(7) You experience seizure
A seizure, for those who don’t know, is defined as “changes in behavior that occur after an episode of abnormal electrical activity in the brain.” Today we can see many “spiritual seizures” or changes in behavior brought about by abnormal electrical activity with the smartphone, tablet, laptop, or television screen. Just about every Catholic now has these “seizures” which can last for many hours each day!
(8) You experience severe chest, abdominal or pelvic pain
If your 4G smartphone was not giving you pains―then you now have 5G after its roll-out! Talking of pains―how many consciences are in pain? How many of those pained consciences have been anesthetized? Sadly, it is the case for most Catholics.
(9) You experience a sudden face drooping
Your jaw should be dropping at the sight of all that is going on in the world! Our faces should be drooping and downcast at the tsunami of sin that is ceaselessly flooding the world―just as Our Lady of Good Success said: “The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty.”
(10) You suspect you have a concussion
Do you feel the concussion yet? You should with your mind being constantly beaten with lie, after lie, after lie. Some Catholics are in a mental stupor―no longer able to think like Catholics―due to this constant brainwashing or “brain-beating” with lies and propaganda.
(11) Your bowel movement or urination has changed
Everyone’s bowel movements or urination should have increased drastically by now―with the perpetual worry of what comes next? Will I lose my job? Where will the money come from? What will we eat? When will they try to vaccinate me? What is coming next? etc.
(12) Your vision is interrupted by bright flashes
Every day our vision is interrupted by bright flashes―sometimes for hours on end―these being the television news flashes, reporting the latest crime, riot, scandal, sin, murder, demonstration, resignation, confiscation, Coronavirus escalation, the next virus that is about to come, etc. Everyone now experiences these bright flashes or news flashes!
(13) You experience confusion or changes in mood
Who wouldn’t experience a change in mood during these times. Everyone’s mood is changed―whether they like it or not. Even the “puppet-masters” are keen on mood-changing―for they send their stooges to stir up and change the mood of peaceful protestors into that of a raging rioting mob. The goal is to pit one mood against another.
(14) You experience uncontrolled bleeding
Sanctifying Grace in the soul has been compared to blood in the arteries or body. Once the body is wounded, blood flows―a mortal wound can lead to death. Similarly, a mortal sin wounds the soul and resulting “bleeding” of grace can lead to eternal ‘death’ ― and the loss of eternal life. Today, without doubt, the vast majority of Catholics are in mortal sin―not to mention the other 6 billion or more non-Catholics in the world. We have a mortal situation on our hands―a bloody mess.
(15) You experience severe or persistent vomiting or diarrhea
If this doesn’t make you want to throw-up, then there is something wrong with your Catholic sensibilities. The Catholic conscience has become numb and unresponsive―which is indicative of a very serious problem in itself!
You can take most of these things and transpose onto the persistent, recurring, chronic crises that the Church and mankind has been suffering decade after decade. We are in a mess! We are diseased! We are―or should be―in critical care, in some Intensive Care Unit (ICU)―but we are not! We are happily going along with our daily life as if none of this was happening, or as though it were merely a movie! Sad! Dangerously sad! Fatally sad!
When to Seek Spiritual Help and Heavenly Help?
With one crisis after another, year after year, decade after decade―what on earth is stopping us from seeking the help of the only ones who can help us? How dumb has the Catholic world become when it cannot realize that what we have been seeing, are seeing and will see―is not just a mere trivial human malfunction―but a fully fledged and carefully coordinated Satanic stranglehold and siege of the Church and the world!? When the body of mankind and the Mystical Body of the Church show symptoms of godlessness, lawlessness and sinfulness, while claiming blamelessness it its remorselessness―then we have an emergency! But―just as you can become accustomed to horror movies and violent movies―you can become accustomed to the horror and violence produced by a progressive but endless drift away from God into the charming, seductive façade of Satan’s princedom, a.k.a. the world. The world is strangling godliness out of people like the police officer seemingly strangled life out of the man that he held to the ground with a knee to the neck.
We have seen an unprecedented (organized) series of protests worldwide over the death of one man―yet there is no protest about the VAST MAJORITY of mankind of all races and colors that are damned daily. Every single day 160,032 people die. Every single week 1,123,303 (1.1 million) people die. Every single month (4.8 million) 4,867,646 people die. Every single year over 58 million people die ― and the VAST MAJORITY of mankind of all races and colors that are damned. Who says so? Our Lord says so! Our Lady says so! Many of the saints say so! [read the evidence here].
One extract from the sermon―that St. Leonard of Port Maurice preached to a crowd that included the pope and many cardinals and bishops―will illustrate that stark and sad truth. If you cannot see from that we are in a STATE OF EMERGENCY―and have been in almost every century―then you yourself need to see a medical doctor, and a psychiatrist and a good spiritual director.
Sermon of a Saint
Saint Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751) was an Italian Franciscan preacher and spiritual writer. He was one of the greatest missioners in the history of the Church. One of his contemporaries, who also lived in Italy, St. Alphonsus Liguori (1696 –1787), called St. Leonard “the great missionary of the 18th century.” He used to preach to thousands in the open square of every city and town where the churches could not hold his listeners. So brilliant and holy was his eloquence that once when he gave a two weeks’ mission in Rome, the Pope and College of Cardinals came to hear him. Here is what St. Leonard of Port Maurice told the Pope, the Cardinals, the Bishops, Priests and laity:
“Let us apply this truth to various states, and you will understand that you must either throw away reason, experience and the common sense of the faithful, or confess that the greater number of Catholics is damned. Is there any state in the world more favorable to innocence in which salvation seems easier and of which people have a higher idea than that of priests, the lieutenants of God?
“At first glance, who would not think that most of them are not only good but even perfect; yet I am horror-struck when I hear Saint Jerome declaring that although the world is full of priests, barely one in a hundred is living in a manner in conformity with state; when I hear a servant of God attesting that he has learned by revelation that the number of priests who fall into Hell each day is so great that it seemed impossible to him that there be any left on earth; when I hear Saint John Chrysostom exclaiming with tears in his eyes: “I do not believe that many priests are saved―I believe the contrary, that the number of those who are damned is greater!”
“Look higher still, and see the prelates of the Holy Church, pastors who have the charge of souls. Is the number of those who are saved among them greater than the number of those who are damned? Listen to Cantimpre; he will relate an event to you, and you may draw the conclusions. There was a synod being held in Paris, and a great number of prelates and pastors who had the charge of souls were in attendance; the king and princes also came to add luster to that assembly by their presence. A famous preacher was invited to preach. While he was preparing his sermon, a horrible demon appeared to him and said: “Lay your books aside! If you want to give a sermon that will be useful to these princes and prelates, content yourself with telling them on our part, ‘We the princes of darkness thank you, princes, prelates, and pastors of souls, that due to your negligence, the greater number of the faithful are damned; also, we are saving a reward for you for this favor, when you shall be with us in Hell.’”
“Woe to you who command others! If so many are damned by your fault, what will happen to you? If few out of those who are first in the Church of God are saved, what will happen to you? Take all states, both sexes, every condition: husbands, wives, widows, young women, young men, soldiers, merchants, craftsmen, rich and poor, noble and plebian. What are we to say about all these people who are living so badly? The following narrative from Saint Vincent Ferrer will show you what you may think about it. He relates that an archdeacon in Lyons gave up his charge and retreated into a desert place to do penance, and that he died the same day and hour as Saint Bernard. After his death, he appeared to his bishop and said to him: “Know, Monsignor, that at the very hour I passed away, thirty-three thousand people also died. Out of this number, Bernard and myself went up to Heaven without delay, three went to Purgatory, and all the others fell into Hell.”
“Our chronicles relate an even more dreadful happening. One of our brothers, well-known for his doctrine and holiness, was preaching in Germany. He represented the ugliness of the sin of impurity so forceful that a woman fell dead of sorrow in front of everyone. Then, coming back to life, she said: “When I was presented before the Tribunal of God, sixty thousand people arrived at the same time from all parts of the world; out of that number, three were saved by going to Purgatory, and all the rest were damned.” [Meaning that not one single soul of the 60,000 went immediately to Heaven. Have the morals of the world improved in our times?].
“O abyss of the judgments of God! Out of thirty thousand, only five were saved! And out of sixty thousand, only three went to Heaven! You sinners who are listening to me, in what category will you be numbered? ... What do you say? ... What do you think? I see almost all of you lowering your heads, filled with astonishment and horror. But let us lay our stupor aside, and instead of flattering ourselves, let us try to draw some profit from our fear. Is it not true that there are two roads which lead to Heaven―innocence and repentance?”
Repent! Repent! The End is Nigh!
The proverbial mantra, which has many times heard and many times mocked ― “Repent! Repent! The End is Nigh!” ― is no longer a laughing matter! As Sister Lucia revealed to Fr. Fuentes in 1957: “Father, the Blessed Virgin did not tell me [explicitly] that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this for three reasons:
“The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground.
“The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others.”
“And the third, because in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation, His Blessed Mother. If we despise and reject this last means, Heaven will no longer pardon us!” (Sr. Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
So―as you see―we have actually entered those dreaded “Last Times” and they will last a while―for we have to yet witness the Minor Apostasy (which actually will be very large), the world falling to totalitarianism and Communism to the point where Our Lady of Good Success says all will seem lost, then the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart, then a period of peace, then the coming of the Antichrist with the Major Apostasy and finally Christ’s triumph.
Meanwhile, back at the worldly ranch, life goes on with the One World Government edging closer and closer, while people edge closer and closer to their smartphones, computers and TVs―still trying to find as much fun as they can, while souls cascade into Hell by well over a hundred thousand every day. The tragedy of damnation beats the COVID-19 numbers “hands-down”―with the number of damned souls in three days (perhaps as many as 480,000 from a death rate of 160,032 daily) beating the current COVID-19 estimated at being 440,000 over a period of 6 months. Hmm! Why wouldn’t the MSM (mainstream media) report about things like that? If the MSM liked creating panic and fear all over the world with COVID-19, then think how much fear and panic they could cause reporting on the estimated number of damned souls!
It’s Time to Rise from the Armchair
As Sr. Lucia of Fatima said to Fr. Fuentes: “Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.”
“For this reason, Father, it is my mission not just to tell about the material punishments that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin.
“Father, we should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No, Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed. So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway.”
Sure “Black Lives Matter”―But What Life Matters Most?
Today we have a new slogan: “Black Lives Matter!” ― but all lives matter, whether black, brown, white or whatever color you can come up with! Nevertheless, what good is earthly life if it leads you to Hell? What good is it being rich if it leads you to Hell? What good is it breaking God’s Laws, or tinkering with and modifying God’s Laws if it leads you to Hell? What good is it living for pleasure if it eventually leads you to the torments and pains of Hell?
Wrong Solutions to the Crisis
We are frequently told to sign petitions, attend protest meetings, complain to our political representatives in local and national government―along the following lines, as one person wrote on his blog: “It’s time we sent that message loud and clear. So please, write your representatives. Spread the truth even if you are mocked. Remember these actions when the time comes to vote for our leaders. But most importantly, it’s time to start practicing civil disobedience. It’s time that we stand tall against the wave of tyranny that is upon us and declare that we will not go quietly. God created mankind to be free. Let no man take what God has given us. We will soon be banned from all deep state controlled networks such as Youtube, Twitter (already banned from Facebook in 2013) and all the rest. So in the meantime it is still possible to contact through email newsletters. Sign up so that when they finally lock down all the tech giants’ ‘social’ networks of control you can stay connected.”
Yet all this is a merely an attempt to solve what is essentially a supernatural problem with flimsy human means! Our Lord puts it in a nutshell: “Without Me, you can do NOTHING!” (John 15:5).
Article 2
Sunday, June 2nd
Heart Functioning? Need a Transplant?
Sunday, June 2nd
Heart Functioning? Need a Transplant?
Heart and Health
The heart is at the heart of our well-being and existence. If the heart is weak, then that weakness will eventually extend itself to our entire being, directly or indirectly. Even our intellectual life will suffer indirectly, as the heart pumps blood to brain, and the brain needs much oxygen to function well, and that oxygen is carried by the blood the heart is supposed to pump.
The same is true of our spiritual life. If our ‘spiritual’ heart is healthy, then the healthier will be our entire spiritual life. “Soundness of heart is the life of the flesh” (Proverbs 14:30). That healthy heart refers to the love in our ‘heart’. This is also the key element in the apparitions and messages of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
Love is the Health of the Heart
The heart of our spiritual life is love. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments depends the whole Law and the Prophets!” (Matthew 22:37-40). “Above all things have charity, which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:14). Love is and has to be the soul of all that we do. “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Therefore, once again: “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14).
God is Love
God Himself is Charity, He is Charity Itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). This charity God has shown to a world that has not deserved or merited it—it is not as though we had something first, that necessitated God to repay. “Who has first given to Him, so that recompense shall be made to him?” (Romans 11:35). In fact, the world, by its sins, was more deserving of punishment and damnation than it was deserving of God’s charity! Yet that did not extinguish the charity of God.
Who Loved First?
“For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “God, Who is rich in mercy, for His exceeding charity wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, has quickened us together in Christ, by Whose grace you are saved!” (Ephesians 2:4-5). “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God―but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us” (1 John 3:16). “Let us therefore love God, because God first has loved us” (1 John 4:19). “This only take care of with all diligence―that you love the Lord your God” (Josue 23:11). “That Christ may dwell by Faith in your hearts; being rooted and founded in charity” (Ephesians 3:17). “The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost, Who is given to us” (Romans 5:5). “Follow after charity” (1 Corinthians 14:1). “For the charity of Christ presses us” (2 Corinthians 5:14).
Heart Failure
Yet despite this great and undeserved love of God, we have failed, on the whole, to fully appreciate and return that love. St. Thomas Aquinas teaches us that love is reciprocal—it is not just “give”; it is not just “take”; but it is a case of “give and take.” St. Augustine says (De Catech. Rud. iv): “Nothing will incite another more to love you, than that you love him first―for he must have a hard heart, indeed, who not only refuses to love, but declines to return love already given.” Yet this is precisely our guilt, as Our Lord would say to St. Margaret Mary:
“My Divine Heart is so inflamed with love for men―and for you in particular―that, being unable any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its burning Charity, It needs spread them abroad by your means, and manifest Itself to them (mankind) in order to enrich them with the precious graces of sanctification and salvation necessary to withdraw them from the abyss of perdition.
“Behold the Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing―even to exhausting and consuming Itself―in order to testify Its love; and, in return, I receive from the greater part only ingratitude―by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what I feel most keenly is that it is hearts which are consecrated to Me, that treat Me thus!”
Heart Full of Junk
If we eat certain wrong foods, they will eventually provoke heart failure and a heart attack. The following quote is from the American Heart Association (AHA) or should that be Aha!
“Added sugar was not a significant component of the human diet until the advent of modern food-processing methods. Since then, the intake of sugar has risen steadily. The average US sugar utilization per capita on the basis of food disappearance data was 120 lbs per year in 1970, and it reached 150 lbs per year in 1995 (almost half-a-pound per day)… Sugar has no nutritional value other than to provide calories. To improve the overall nutrient density of the diet and to help reduce the intake of excess calories, individuals should be sure foods high in added sugar are not displacing foods with essential nutrients or increasing calorie intake.” Their studies and research go on to irrefutably link a high sugar intake with cardio-vascular disease.
The World Serves Junk for the Soul
Similarly, if we replace the good ‘spiritual food’ that our ‘spiritual’ hearts were made for, with the highly sweetened junk ‘food’ offered by the world, we will eventually suffer a ‘spiritual-cardiac-arrest’! By highly sweetened junk food we mean the pleasures, amusements, distractions and fun that world offers, which is meant to displace the spirit of mortification and sacrifice that Heaven wants us to feed our souls upon.
Holy Scripture tells us this: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “The charity of God appeared towards us, because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him” (1 John 4:9). “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:11).
Good Daily Food
This charity we can find daily in Holy Communion, through which “God hath sent His only begotten Son into the world, so that we may live by Him.” But, sadly, He is not wanted nor received in Holy Communion—“He came unto His own, and His own received Him not.” Instead, souls seek out and stuff themselves upon the vanities of the world! The word “vanity” comes from the Latin word “vanus” which means “empty, fruitless, futile, idle, ineffectual, useless, vain.” Holy Scripture ask us the question: “Why do you love vanity” (Psalm 4:3). The Imitation of Christ, adds:
“For what would it profit us to know the whole Bible by heart and the principles of all the philosophers if we live without grace and the love of God? Vanity of vanities and all is vanity, except to love God and serve Him alone. This is the greatest wisdom—to seek the Kingdom of Heaven through contempt of the world. It is vanity, therefore, to seek and trust in riches that perish. It is vanity also to court honor and to be puffed up with pride. It is vanity to follow the lusts of the body and to desire things for which severe punishment later must come. It is vanity to wish for long life and to care little about a well-spent life. It is vanity to be concerned with the present only and not to make provision for things to come. It is vanity to love what passes quickly and not to look ahead where eternal joy abides.” (Book 1, chapter 1).
Change of Heart Needed
“O children, how long will you love childishness, and fools covet those things which are hurtful to themselves, and the unwise hate knowledge?” (Proverbs 1:22). “No servant can serve two masters―for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will hold to the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Luke 16:13). “Know the God of thy father, and serve Him with a perfect heart, and a willing mind―for the Lord searches all hearts, and understands all the thoughts of minds. If thou seek Him, thou shalt find Him―but if thou forsake Him, He will cast thee off forever” (1 Paralipomenon 28:9).
Unfortunately―as can easily be seen in the world today―most people “are faithless, companions of thieves―they all love bribes, the run after rewards!” (Isaias 1:23). “There is not a more wicked thing than to love money―for such a one sets even his own soul for sale!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:10). “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). In His parable about the Sower of the Seed, Our Lord explains: “He that received the seed (the word of God) among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke up the word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). “For the desire of money is the root of all evils; which some coveting have erred from the Faith, and have entangled themselves in many sorrows” (1 Timothy 6:10). “Better is a little to the just man, than the great riches of the wicked man” (Psalm 36:16). “Behold these are sinners―and yet, abounding in the world, they have obtained riches!” (Psalm 72:12). “If riches abound, set not your heart upon them!” (Psalm 61:11).
Other Pleasures Causing Spiritual Cardiac-Arrest
Following the allurements and seductions of the world inevitably leads to a spiritual cardiac-arrest and eternal death. Holy Scripture warns us against that: “Challenge not them that love wine―for wine has destroyed very many” (Ecclesiasticus 31:30). Babylon is a symbol of worldliness and sinfulness: “And when the sons of Babylon were come to her to the bed of love, they defiled her with their fornications, and she was polluted by them, and her soul was glutted with them” (Ezechiel 23:17). “As for them whose heart walks after their scandals and abominations, I will lay their way upon their head, says the Lord God” (Ezechiel 11:21). “Wherefore God gave them up to the desires of their heart, unto uncleanness, to dishonor their own bodies among themselves” (Romans 1:24). If you love sin, you cannot love God. “And because iniquity has abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12).
A New Heart
“But I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first charity” (Apocalypse 2:4). “Justify not thyself before God―for He knows the heart” (Ecclesiasticus 7:5). “The imagination and thought of man’s heart are prone to evil from his youth” (Genesis 8:21). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “Be mindful therefore from whence thou art fallen and do penance, and do the first works. Or else I shall come to thee, and will move thy candlestick out of its place―unless thou do penance!” (Apocalypse 2:4-5). “Return to the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul” (Deuteronomy 30:10). “Not serving to the eye―as it were pleasing men―but, as the servants of Christ doing the will of God from the heart” (Ephesians 6:6). “Covet ye therefore My words, and love them!” (Wisdom 6:12).
Holy Scripture speaks of acquiring a new heart: “Create a clean heart in me, O God: and renew a right spirit within my bowels” (Psalm 50:12) ― to which God replies: “I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26). It is time to allow God to soften our stony hearts: “God has softened my heart, and the Almighty has troubled me” (Job 23:16). “A contrite and humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise!” (Psalm 50:19). “God gave unto him another heart” (1 Kings 10:9).
The heart is at the heart of our well-being and existence. If the heart is weak, then that weakness will eventually extend itself to our entire being, directly or indirectly. Even our intellectual life will suffer indirectly, as the heart pumps blood to brain, and the brain needs much oxygen to function well, and that oxygen is carried by the blood the heart is supposed to pump.
The same is true of our spiritual life. If our ‘spiritual’ heart is healthy, then the healthier will be our entire spiritual life. “Soundness of heart is the life of the flesh” (Proverbs 14:30). That healthy heart refers to the love in our ‘heart’. This is also the key element in the apparitions and messages of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
Love is the Health of the Heart
The heart of our spiritual life is love. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments depends the whole Law and the Prophets!” (Matthew 22:37-40). “Above all things have charity, which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:14). Love is and has to be the soul of all that we do. “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Therefore, once again: “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14).
God is Love
God Himself is Charity, He is Charity Itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). This charity God has shown to a world that has not deserved or merited it—it is not as though we had something first, that necessitated God to repay. “Who has first given to Him, so that recompense shall be made to him?” (Romans 11:35). In fact, the world, by its sins, was more deserving of punishment and damnation than it was deserving of God’s charity! Yet that did not extinguish the charity of God.
Who Loved First?
“For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “God, Who is rich in mercy, for His exceeding charity wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, has quickened us together in Christ, by Whose grace you are saved!” (Ephesians 2:4-5). “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God―but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us” (1 John 3:16). “Let us therefore love God, because God first has loved us” (1 John 4:19). “This only take care of with all diligence―that you love the Lord your God” (Josue 23:11). “That Christ may dwell by Faith in your hearts; being rooted and founded in charity” (Ephesians 3:17). “The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost, Who is given to us” (Romans 5:5). “Follow after charity” (1 Corinthians 14:1). “For the charity of Christ presses us” (2 Corinthians 5:14).
Heart Failure
Yet despite this great and undeserved love of God, we have failed, on the whole, to fully appreciate and return that love. St. Thomas Aquinas teaches us that love is reciprocal—it is not just “give”; it is not just “take”; but it is a case of “give and take.” St. Augustine says (De Catech. Rud. iv): “Nothing will incite another more to love you, than that you love him first―for he must have a hard heart, indeed, who not only refuses to love, but declines to return love already given.” Yet this is precisely our guilt, as Our Lord would say to St. Margaret Mary:
“My Divine Heart is so inflamed with love for men―and for you in particular―that, being unable any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its burning Charity, It needs spread them abroad by your means, and manifest Itself to them (mankind) in order to enrich them with the precious graces of sanctification and salvation necessary to withdraw them from the abyss of perdition.
“Behold the Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing―even to exhausting and consuming Itself―in order to testify Its love; and, in return, I receive from the greater part only ingratitude―by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what I feel most keenly is that it is hearts which are consecrated to Me, that treat Me thus!”
Heart Full of Junk
If we eat certain wrong foods, they will eventually provoke heart failure and a heart attack. The following quote is from the American Heart Association (AHA) or should that be Aha!
“Added sugar was not a significant component of the human diet until the advent of modern food-processing methods. Since then, the intake of sugar has risen steadily. The average US sugar utilization per capita on the basis of food disappearance data was 120 lbs per year in 1970, and it reached 150 lbs per year in 1995 (almost half-a-pound per day)… Sugar has no nutritional value other than to provide calories. To improve the overall nutrient density of the diet and to help reduce the intake of excess calories, individuals should be sure foods high in added sugar are not displacing foods with essential nutrients or increasing calorie intake.” Their studies and research go on to irrefutably link a high sugar intake with cardio-vascular disease.
The World Serves Junk for the Soul
Similarly, if we replace the good ‘spiritual food’ that our ‘spiritual’ hearts were made for, with the highly sweetened junk ‘food’ offered by the world, we will eventually suffer a ‘spiritual-cardiac-arrest’! By highly sweetened junk food we mean the pleasures, amusements, distractions and fun that world offers, which is meant to displace the spirit of mortification and sacrifice that Heaven wants us to feed our souls upon.
Holy Scripture tells us this: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “The charity of God appeared towards us, because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him” (1 John 4:9). “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:11).
Good Daily Food
This charity we can find daily in Holy Communion, through which “God hath sent His only begotten Son into the world, so that we may live by Him.” But, sadly, He is not wanted nor received in Holy Communion—“He came unto His own, and His own received Him not.” Instead, souls seek out and stuff themselves upon the vanities of the world! The word “vanity” comes from the Latin word “vanus” which means “empty, fruitless, futile, idle, ineffectual, useless, vain.” Holy Scripture ask us the question: “Why do you love vanity” (Psalm 4:3). The Imitation of Christ, adds:
“For what would it profit us to know the whole Bible by heart and the principles of all the philosophers if we live without grace and the love of God? Vanity of vanities and all is vanity, except to love God and serve Him alone. This is the greatest wisdom—to seek the Kingdom of Heaven through contempt of the world. It is vanity, therefore, to seek and trust in riches that perish. It is vanity also to court honor and to be puffed up with pride. It is vanity to follow the lusts of the body and to desire things for which severe punishment later must come. It is vanity to wish for long life and to care little about a well-spent life. It is vanity to be concerned with the present only and not to make provision for things to come. It is vanity to love what passes quickly and not to look ahead where eternal joy abides.” (Book 1, chapter 1).
Change of Heart Needed
“O children, how long will you love childishness, and fools covet those things which are hurtful to themselves, and the unwise hate knowledge?” (Proverbs 1:22). “No servant can serve two masters―for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will hold to the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Luke 16:13). “Know the God of thy father, and serve Him with a perfect heart, and a willing mind―for the Lord searches all hearts, and understands all the thoughts of minds. If thou seek Him, thou shalt find Him―but if thou forsake Him, He will cast thee off forever” (1 Paralipomenon 28:9).
Unfortunately―as can easily be seen in the world today―most people “are faithless, companions of thieves―they all love bribes, the run after rewards!” (Isaias 1:23). “There is not a more wicked thing than to love money―for such a one sets even his own soul for sale!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:10). “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). In His parable about the Sower of the Seed, Our Lord explains: “He that received the seed (the word of God) among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke up the word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). “For the desire of money is the root of all evils; which some coveting have erred from the Faith, and have entangled themselves in many sorrows” (1 Timothy 6:10). “Better is a little to the just man, than the great riches of the wicked man” (Psalm 36:16). “Behold these are sinners―and yet, abounding in the world, they have obtained riches!” (Psalm 72:12). “If riches abound, set not your heart upon them!” (Psalm 61:11).
Other Pleasures Causing Spiritual Cardiac-Arrest
Following the allurements and seductions of the world inevitably leads to a spiritual cardiac-arrest and eternal death. Holy Scripture warns us against that: “Challenge not them that love wine―for wine has destroyed very many” (Ecclesiasticus 31:30). Babylon is a symbol of worldliness and sinfulness: “And when the sons of Babylon were come to her to the bed of love, they defiled her with their fornications, and she was polluted by them, and her soul was glutted with them” (Ezechiel 23:17). “As for them whose heart walks after their scandals and abominations, I will lay their way upon their head, says the Lord God” (Ezechiel 11:21). “Wherefore God gave them up to the desires of their heart, unto uncleanness, to dishonor their own bodies among themselves” (Romans 1:24). If you love sin, you cannot love God. “And because iniquity has abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12).
A New Heart
“But I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first charity” (Apocalypse 2:4). “Justify not thyself before God―for He knows the heart” (Ecclesiasticus 7:5). “The imagination and thought of man’s heart are prone to evil from his youth” (Genesis 8:21). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “Be mindful therefore from whence thou art fallen and do penance, and do the first works. Or else I shall come to thee, and will move thy candlestick out of its place―unless thou do penance!” (Apocalypse 2:4-5). “Return to the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul” (Deuteronomy 30:10). “Not serving to the eye―as it were pleasing men―but, as the servants of Christ doing the will of God from the heart” (Ephesians 6:6). “Covet ye therefore My words, and love them!” (Wisdom 6:12).
Holy Scripture speaks of acquiring a new heart: “Create a clean heart in me, O God: and renew a right spirit within my bowels” (Psalm 50:12) ― to which God replies: “I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26). It is time to allow God to soften our stony hearts: “God has softened my heart, and the Almighty has troubled me” (Job 23:16). “A contrite and humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise!” (Psalm 50:19). “God gave unto him another heart” (1 Kings 10:9).
Article 1
Saturday, June 1st
The Month for Heart Check-Ups!
Saturday, June 1st
The Month for Heart Check-Ups!
The Heart and Soul of the Matter
If Our Lord chose the image of the Sacred Heart as a symbol of His love for us, and if, as many spiritual authors suggest, devotion to the Sacred Heart is one last chief remedies that Christ offers the world in its spiritual sickness, then it is worth looking deeper into the heart to see what symbolism and teachings we can find to help us in our worldwide spiritual “congestive heart failure” that we are experiencing. The leading cause of physical death throughout the world is heart disease and strokes (which are related to the function of the heart which pumps the blood that clots and produces the stroke). You could say that the most common causes of death are heart attacks and brain attacks (which is what a stroke is essentially). Thus we have symbols of the Scriptural references to “heart” and “soul” and “mind”―as in the case of: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” Mark 12:30). Just as heart attacks and brain attacks are the most common cause of physical death―you could say that spiritual heart attacks and brain attacks are the most common cause of damnation, or loss of soul, loss of eternal life and eternal happiness.
From the Physical to the Spiritual
It is amazing how much there is to learn from heart attacks and strokes in relation to the spiritual life! Before applying it to the spiritual life, it is necessary to have a simple idea and understanding of heart attacks and strokes on the physical level. Both heart attacks and strokes concern arteries finding themselves blocked, or bursting and bleeding. A heart attack occurs when an artery supplying your heart with blood and oxygen becomes blocked by fatty deposits building up over time and forming plaques in your heart’s arteries. If a plaque ruptures, a blood clot can form and block your arteries, causing a heart attack. Likewise, a stroke is a disease that affects the arteries supplying blood to and within the brain. A stroke occurs when a blood vessel that carries oxygen and nutrients to the brain is either blocked by a clot or bursts (or ruptures). When that happens, part of the brain cannot get the blood it needs (and the oxygen it needs that is contained within the blood), so it and brain cells die. The effects of a stroke depend on which part of the brain is injured, and how severely it is injured. Strokes may cause sudden weakness, loss of sensation, or difficulty with speaking, seeing, or walking. Since different parts of the brain control different areas and functions, it is usually the area immediately surrounding the stroke that is affected. Sometimes people with stroke have a headache, but stroke can also be completely painless.
The effects of a stroke depend on several factors, including the location of the obstruction and how much brain tissue is affected. However, because one side of the brain controls the opposite side of the body, a stroke affecting one side will result in neurological complications on the side of the body it affects. The effects of a stroke depend primarily on the location of the obstruction and the extent of brain tissue affected. If the stroke occurs toward the back of the brain, for instance, it's likely that some disability involving vision will result.
Left Brain Strokes: If the stroke occurs in the left side of the brain, the right side of the body will be affected, producing some or all of the following: (1) Paralysis on the right side of the body; (2) Speech/language problems; (3) Slow, cautious behavioral style; (4) Memory loss.
Right Brain Strokes: If the stroke occurs in the right side of the brain, the left side of the body will be affected, producing some or all of the following: (1) Paralysis on the left side of the body; (2) Vision problems; (3) Quick, inquisitive behavioral style; (4) Memory loss.
Brain Stem Stroke: When stroke occurs in the brain stem, depending on the severity of the injury, it can affect both sides of the body and may leave someone in a “locked-in” state. When a locked-in state occurs, the patient is generally unable to speak or achieve any movement below the neck.
Heart, Brain and Blood
It is fairly obvious that there can be no life without a heart and no life without a brain and no life without blood. You can survive with a deformed, defective, partially developed, tiny heart or brain―but not entirely without one. The brain stem, which sits at the bottom of the brain and connects to the spine, controls vital functions such as breathing, swallowing, digestion, eye movement and heartbeat, there can be no life without it. But the rest of the brain is obviously capable of some remarkable feats, with one part able to compensate for deficiencies in another. Similarly with the heart, which is essentially a pump for the blood―no heart, no pumping, no blood flow, no life. Where would we be without blood? That red stuff that carries vital oxygen from our lungs to our muscles, and helps move our body’s chemical waste to where it can be recycled or disposed of? Blood is vital for life in humans. Our bodies need to move oxygen from our lungs to our cells to produce energy by burning the sugars, fats and proteins we eat in a controlled way. In humans, the oxygen is moved by a fluid called blood, and the plumbing for that fluid or blood consists of our veins, arteries and capillaries. The oxygen carrier in our blood is hemoglobin. Our blood carries lots of cells and molecules that perform functions, such as fighting infection, repairing blood vessels, and transporting chemical messages, such as hormones, around the body. All these cells and molecules travel around in a straw-colored liquid called plasma. Plasma makes up more than half your blood volume, helping the cells and molecules get around, a bit like how water gets you moving on a water slide.
Blood a Symbol of Love and Life
“The life of all flesh is in the blood” (Leviticus 17:14). “Because the life of the flesh is in the blood … I have given it to you” (Leviticus 17:11). “Live in thy blood!” (Ezechiel 16:6). Christ’s Blood is life-giving: “Jesus said to them: ‘Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you!’” (John 6:54).
God commanded that the blood of the lamb be smeared on the doors of the homes of the Hebrews in Egypt, in order to preserve their lives: “And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: ‘Llet every man take a lamb by their families and houses ... And they shall take of the blood thereof, and put it upon both the side posts, and on the upper door posts of the houses, wherein they shall eat it ... And I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and will kill every firstborn in the land of Egypt both man and beast: and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the Lord. And the blood shall be unto you for a sign in the houses where you shall be! And I shall see the blood, and shall pass over you: and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I shall strike the land of Egypt!’ … And Moses called all the ancients of the children of Israel, and said to them: ‘Go take a lamb by your families and sacrifice it and dip a bunch of hyssop in the blood that is at the door, and sprinkle the transom of the door therewith, and both the door cheeks … For the Lord will pass through striking the Egyptians: and when He shall see the blood on the transom, and on both the posts, He will pass over the door of the house, and not suffer the destroyer to come into your houses and to hurt you!’” (Exodus 12:1-23).
If the mere blood of a lamb saved the lives of the Hebrews in Egypt, how much more powerful is the Blood of Christ―as Holy Scripture points out: “If the blood of goats and of oxen, and the ashes of an heifer being sprinkled, sanctify such as are defiled, to the cleansing of the flesh, then how much more shall the Blood of Christ―Who, by the Holy Ghost, offered Himself unspotted unto God―cleanse our conscience from dead works, to serve the living God?” (Hebrews 9:13-14). Christ Himself, at the Last Supper, when changing the wine into His own Precious Blood, “after He had supped, said: ‘This is the chalice, the New Testament in My Blood, which shall be shed for you!” (Luke 22:20). “This is My Blood of the New Testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!” (Matthew 26:28), adding “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life [shed his blood] for his friends!” (John 15:13). Hence Scripture adds that our lives [souls] shall be saved by Christ’s Blood: “He was clothed with a garment sprinkled with blood; and His name is called, the Word of God” (Apocalypse 19:13). “Christ died for us! Therefore, being now justified by His Blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him!” (Romans 5:9). “Jesus Christ, Who hath loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own Blood!” (Apocalypse 1:5). “These that are clothed in white robes are they who are come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and have made them white in the Blood of the Lamb!” (Apocalypse 7:13-14).
Love to Live, Live to Love
We speak of “the spiritual life”―but what is the “spiritual life”? It is the life of God in the soul. But what is God? “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8). “For God so loved the world, as to give His only-begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He hath first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins!” (1 John 4:10). Love begets life―God, Who is charity, so loved us that He sent His Love, Christ, to give life to the world by His death.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him: and without Him was made nothing that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … [Christ is] the true Light, which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and his own received Him not” (John 1:1-11). “They loved the glory of men more than the glory of God” (John 12:43). “They loved Him with their mouth: and with their tongue they lied unto Him” (Psalm 77:36). “And we have known, and have believed the charity, which God hath to us. God is charity―and he that abideth in charity, abideth in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16) … “He that loveth not, knoweth not God―for God is charity!” (1 John 4:8). “Let us, therefore, love God, because God first hath loved us!” (1 John 4:19), “for His exceeding charity wherewith He loved us” (Ephesians 2:4).
Both the Old Testament and the New Testament equate love with life: “Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, that thou mayst live” (Deuteronomy 30:6). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind: and thy neighbor as thyself ... This do, and thou shalt live!” (Luke 10:27-28).
Both Testaments furnish other quotes that command us to love: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength” Deuteronomy 6:5). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). “Jesus said to him: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment!’” (Matthew 22:37-38). “From a sincere heart, love one another earnestly!” (1 Peter 1:22). “He that loveth not, knoweth not God: for God is charity” (1 John 4:8).
Sin Brings Death, Charity Brings Life
“By one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “Sin, when it is completed, begetteth death!” (James 1:15). “The soul that sinneth, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:20). “You shall die in your sin!” (John 8:24). “Everyone shall die for his own sin!” (Deuteronomy 24:16). This should engrave in our hearts and minds the gravity of sin! The Catechism tells us that mortal and venial sin are the TWO GREATEST EVILS IN THE WORLD―“Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, Spirago-Clarke; My Catholic Faith, Bishop Morrow, STD)―but we have long since stopped believing that, as we pile up sin upon sin (one greatest evil after another) in our daily lives! We are drugged and intoxicated on our own self-made (or at least self-tweaked) religion of subjective personal opinions―and in our opinion, regardless of the what the Catechism may say, sin is NO LONGER the greatest evil in the world. Which is proved by the fact that over 50% of Catholics accept same-sex relationships and marriages, over 90% of Catholics of reproductive age have practiced contraception, over 80% of Catholics no longer attend Sunday Mass regularly and believe you can be a good Catholic without going to Sunday Mass; over 50% of Catholics believe abortion should be legal in all cases; and so on and so forth through all the list of sins you can possibly imagine. It is clear that sin in no longer looked upon (if it ever was) as the greatest evil on Earth. No wonder most souls are lost―today and in every age of history.
“As I live, saith the Lord God, I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways: and why will you die?” (Ezechiel 33:11). “If you love Me, keep My Commandments” (John 14:15). “If the wicked do penance for all his sins which he hath committed, and keep all My commandments, and do judgment, and justice, living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he hath done―in his justice, which he hath wrought, he shall live! Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:21-23). “For I am the Lord thy God, a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon their children unto the third and fourth generation, to them that hate me, and showing mercy unto many thousands, to them that love Me, and keep My commandments!” (Deuteronomy 5:9-10). “A contrite and humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise!” (Psalm 50:19). However, a “contrite heart” and a “humbled heart”―which is such a rarity today―needs to be a healthy heart and a string heart: healed and strengthened by a love of God, rather than being weakened and diseased by an indifference to God or even a hatred of God (for sin is hatred of God and hatred of self, don’t fool yourself!). “He that loveth iniquity hateth his own soul” (Psalms 10:6)).
Strong Healthy Heart Needed For Heaven
Universally and perpetually, the heart has been associated with “love”―even Our Lord used the heart as symbol of love when He manifested His Sacred Heart to St. Margaret Mary. Our Lord revealed to her: “My Divine Heart is so inflamed with love for men, that, being unable any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its burning Charity, It must needs spread them abroad and manifest Itself to them (mankind) in order to enrich them with the precious graces of sanctification and salvation necessary to withdraw them from the abyss of perdition … . If only they would make Me some return for My Love, I should think but little of all I have done for them and would wish, were it possible, to suffer still more. But the sole return they make for all My eagerness to do them good is to reject Me and treat Me with coldness … Behold the Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming Itself, in order to testify Its love; and in return, I receive from the greater part only ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what I feel most keenly is that it is hearts which are consecrated to Me, that treat Me thus!”
Those words of Our Lord―lamenting the diseased hearts of men who love Him so little―were spoken WAY BACK IN THE 1670s!! Today, we far more indifferent, far more ungrateful, far more irreverent, far more lukewarm and commit far more sacrileges than 340 years ago! “Their heart was not right with Him, nor were they counted faithful” (Psalm 77:37). “Thy heart is not right in the sight of God” (Acts 8:21). “Direct thy heart into the right way!” (Jeremias 31:21). “How good is God to them that are of a right heart!” (Psalm 72:1). “Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, all ye right of heart!” (Psalm 31:11). If few souls were saved even back then―when the Sacred Heart made those lamentations―how much fewer is that number today? There is so much “plaque” in our spiritual life―our “mind” and “heart”―that we risk having a spiritual heart attack or a spiritual brain attack (stroke). What is all this “plaque” that is killing us spiritually?
The “Plaque” of the Soul
Arterial Plaque (plaque in the blood and arteries) is made up of fat, cholesterol, calcium, waste products from cells and a clotting agent called fibrin. Similarly, “Spiritual Plaque” is made up of the devil, the world and our own passions: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8) “Overcome the wicked one. Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world. “And the world passeth away, and the concupiscence thereof: but he that doth the will of God, lives for ever” (John 2:14-17).
The “plaque of the world” can be compared to the weeds and thorns in Our Lord’s parable of the Sower of the Seed: “Behold the sower went forth to sow. And whilst he soweth some fell by the way side, and the birds of the air came and ate them up. And other some fell upon stony ground, where they had not much earth: and they sprung up immediately, because they had no deepness of earth. And when the sun was up they were scorched: and because they had not root, they withered away. And others fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up and choked them. And others fell upon good ground: and they brought forth fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold … Hear you therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. When any one heareth the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, there cometh the wicked one, and catches away that which was sown in his heart: this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon stony ground, is he that heareth the word, and immediately receiveth it with joy. Yet hath he not root in himself, but is only for a time: and when there arises tribulation and persecution because of the word, he is presently scandalized. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that heareth the word, and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choketh up the word, and he becometh fruitless. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that heareth the word, and understands, and bears fruit, and yields the one a hundredfold, and another sixty, and another thirty” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23).
Seeds, Weeds, Thorns & Trees
The flimsy, fragile, tiny seed is meant to grow into a wooden tree that bears fruit! Talking of seeds, weeds, thorns and trees―let us look at the tree chopped-down and chopped-up (humbled) to make firewood or wood for the fire (which is a symbol of love). In a certain sense, the tree represents knowledge. We learn from trees. Once chopped-down, we can learn the age of the tree by reading the “writing” of the tree―the layered annual circles that indicate the age of the tree. This is a science called dendrochronology (or tree-ring dating) and is the scientific method of dating tree rings (also called growth rings) to the exact year they were formed. As well as dating the trees, this science can give data for dendroclimatology, the study of climate and atmospheric conditions during different periods in history from wood. Thus we gain knowledge and learn from trees.
Furthermore, trees provide us with paper―upon which knowledge is recorded and from which books are printed and distributed to teach others in homes, schools, universities and the world at large. Thus the tree indirectly contributes to every single ‘branch’ of knowledge (pardon the pun) that exists in this world.
We learn, also, that sin and death―Original Sin―came through a tree and its fruit; and that mercy and life also came from a wooden tree, the dead wooden tree on Calvary upon which hung the dying fruit of our Redemption, Jesus Christ, through Whose death, eternal life was once again offered to sinful and ‘dead’ mankind.
Talking of thorns and trees, Our Lord even mentions thorns and uses trees as a means of teaching, when He speaks of good trees and bad trees: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:16-19).
At the very beginning of time―on the “Third Day” God said: “Let the earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the earth. And it was so done. And the earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yieldeth seed according to its kind, and the tree that beareth fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:11-12). “And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of: the tree of life also in the midst of paradise: and the tree of knowledge of good and evil” (Genesis 2:9).
Our Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil
Knowledge and love are like wood and fire. There can be no fire without wood (okay, before the advent of gas and chemicals) and there can no love without knowledge. As philosophers rightly say: “You cannot love what you do not know!” Likewise, just as a good tree produces good fruit and bad tree produces bad fruit, so too does good knowledge produce a good and healthy love, but bad or evil knowledge produces love of evil or sin. “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth that which is evil. For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Luke 6:45).
Just as Our Lord says: “By their fruits you shall know them!” ―you could equally say: “By their words you shall know them!”―for words are the fruits produced by the parents of mind and heart. “God created in them the science of the spirit, He filled their heart with wisdom, and showed them both good and evil” (Ecclesiasticus 17:6). “The heart of a man changeth his countenance, either for good, or for evil” (Ecclesiasticus 13:31). “He that is of a perverse heart, shall not find good―and he that perverteth his tongue, shall fall into evil” (Proverbs 17:20).
Coming back to the idea of just little spark or kindling wood starting a great fire, we see Holy Scripture link this to the tongue. How many great raging fires of gossip, calumny, detraction and hatred have not been started by the tongue? “In many things we all offend. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man. He is able also with a bridle to lead about the whole body. For if we put bits into the mouths of horses, that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole body. Behold also ships, whereas they are great, and are driven by strong winds, yet are they turned about with a small helm, whithersoever the force of the governor willeth. Even so the tongue is indeed a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold how small a fire kindleth a great wood. And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is placed among our members, which defileth the whole body, and inflameth the wheel of our nativity, being set on fire by Hell. For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and hath been tamed, by the nature of man: [8] But the tongue no man can tame, an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison. By it we bless God and the Father: and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:2-10). Plenty of spiritual plaque is built-up and caused by the tongue.
What Wood Are You Using For Your Fire?
What’s your firewood? Twigs or logs? We need little twigs or slivers of kindling wood to start a fire (love), but we need something more substantial like logs (deeper knowledge) if we are to keep the fire (love) burning. We start a little child’s fire of love for God with light little twigs of catechism, mere kiddie-knowledge that is easily understood, when we start a child out at school―but why have so few progressed from that light, little kiddie-knowledge of the Faith to an adult-like knowledge of the Faith―as they most certainly have in many other areas of secular knowledge? Why are they still satisfied with little “twigs” of superficial trivial knowledge in their minds rather than “logs” of serious and deep knowledge?
How on earth can Catholics pretend to love God when they spend little or no time in reading and learning about God? A sports fan knows more about his worldly team that most Catholics know about God! How can they pretend to love Him when they pray so little to Him?―or, when they do, they speak to Him far, far faster than in any conversation they have with fellow human beings―often saying a Hail Mary in one breath (or two). The only time they speak that rapidly with human beings is when they are angry about something! How can Catholics pretend to love God when they devote so little time to God? They devote five, ten, fifteen times more time to earthly interests than they do to God! No wonder the “fires of love”―that we ask the Holy Ghost to kindle in us―are nothing but a smoldering heap of hot ash (or lukewarm ash)!
Going back to the analogy of the spiritual life to the physical life as regards heart and blood― most doctors will consider chronically low blood pressure as dangerous if it causes noticeable signs and symptoms, such as:
● Dizziness or light-headedness (at the mention of having to go to confession)
● Nausea (while standing in line for confession)
● Fainting (when the priest gives the penance after confession)
● Dehydration and unusual thirst (lack of incoming grace and a great thirst for the world)
● Lack of concentration (distraction during Mass, prayers, spiritual reading)
● Blurred vision (cannot see the Faith and spiritual things clearly)
● Cold, clammy, pale skin (when it comes to going to extra Masses or praying the Rosary)
● Rapid, shallow breathing (when the family announces that everyone is going to an extra Mass that weekend)
● Fatigue (after a few Hail Marys of the Rosary, or two minutes into the Sunday sermon)
● Depression (at the mere suggestion of spiritual exercises or during spiritual conversations).
If Our Lord chose the image of the Sacred Heart as a symbol of His love for us, and if, as many spiritual authors suggest, devotion to the Sacred Heart is one last chief remedies that Christ offers the world in its spiritual sickness, then it is worth looking deeper into the heart to see what symbolism and teachings we can find to help us in our worldwide spiritual “congestive heart failure” that we are experiencing. The leading cause of physical death throughout the world is heart disease and strokes (which are related to the function of the heart which pumps the blood that clots and produces the stroke). You could say that the most common causes of death are heart attacks and brain attacks (which is what a stroke is essentially). Thus we have symbols of the Scriptural references to “heart” and “soul” and “mind”―as in the case of: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” Mark 12:30). Just as heart attacks and brain attacks are the most common cause of physical death―you could say that spiritual heart attacks and brain attacks are the most common cause of damnation, or loss of soul, loss of eternal life and eternal happiness.
From the Physical to the Spiritual
It is amazing how much there is to learn from heart attacks and strokes in relation to the spiritual life! Before applying it to the spiritual life, it is necessary to have a simple idea and understanding of heart attacks and strokes on the physical level. Both heart attacks and strokes concern arteries finding themselves blocked, or bursting and bleeding. A heart attack occurs when an artery supplying your heart with blood and oxygen becomes blocked by fatty deposits building up over time and forming plaques in your heart’s arteries. If a plaque ruptures, a blood clot can form and block your arteries, causing a heart attack. Likewise, a stroke is a disease that affects the arteries supplying blood to and within the brain. A stroke occurs when a blood vessel that carries oxygen and nutrients to the brain is either blocked by a clot or bursts (or ruptures). When that happens, part of the brain cannot get the blood it needs (and the oxygen it needs that is contained within the blood), so it and brain cells die. The effects of a stroke depend on which part of the brain is injured, and how severely it is injured. Strokes may cause sudden weakness, loss of sensation, or difficulty with speaking, seeing, or walking. Since different parts of the brain control different areas and functions, it is usually the area immediately surrounding the stroke that is affected. Sometimes people with stroke have a headache, but stroke can also be completely painless.
The effects of a stroke depend on several factors, including the location of the obstruction and how much brain tissue is affected. However, because one side of the brain controls the opposite side of the body, a stroke affecting one side will result in neurological complications on the side of the body it affects. The effects of a stroke depend primarily on the location of the obstruction and the extent of brain tissue affected. If the stroke occurs toward the back of the brain, for instance, it's likely that some disability involving vision will result.
Left Brain Strokes: If the stroke occurs in the left side of the brain, the right side of the body will be affected, producing some or all of the following: (1) Paralysis on the right side of the body; (2) Speech/language problems; (3) Slow, cautious behavioral style; (4) Memory loss.
Right Brain Strokes: If the stroke occurs in the right side of the brain, the left side of the body will be affected, producing some or all of the following: (1) Paralysis on the left side of the body; (2) Vision problems; (3) Quick, inquisitive behavioral style; (4) Memory loss.
Brain Stem Stroke: When stroke occurs in the brain stem, depending on the severity of the injury, it can affect both sides of the body and may leave someone in a “locked-in” state. When a locked-in state occurs, the patient is generally unable to speak or achieve any movement below the neck.
Heart, Brain and Blood
It is fairly obvious that there can be no life without a heart and no life without a brain and no life without blood. You can survive with a deformed, defective, partially developed, tiny heart or brain―but not entirely without one. The brain stem, which sits at the bottom of the brain and connects to the spine, controls vital functions such as breathing, swallowing, digestion, eye movement and heartbeat, there can be no life without it. But the rest of the brain is obviously capable of some remarkable feats, with one part able to compensate for deficiencies in another. Similarly with the heart, which is essentially a pump for the blood―no heart, no pumping, no blood flow, no life. Where would we be without blood? That red stuff that carries vital oxygen from our lungs to our muscles, and helps move our body’s chemical waste to where it can be recycled or disposed of? Blood is vital for life in humans. Our bodies need to move oxygen from our lungs to our cells to produce energy by burning the sugars, fats and proteins we eat in a controlled way. In humans, the oxygen is moved by a fluid called blood, and the plumbing for that fluid or blood consists of our veins, arteries and capillaries. The oxygen carrier in our blood is hemoglobin. Our blood carries lots of cells and molecules that perform functions, such as fighting infection, repairing blood vessels, and transporting chemical messages, such as hormones, around the body. All these cells and molecules travel around in a straw-colored liquid called plasma. Plasma makes up more than half your blood volume, helping the cells and molecules get around, a bit like how water gets you moving on a water slide.
Blood a Symbol of Love and Life
“The life of all flesh is in the blood” (Leviticus 17:14). “Because the life of the flesh is in the blood … I have given it to you” (Leviticus 17:11). “Live in thy blood!” (Ezechiel 16:6). Christ’s Blood is life-giving: “Jesus said to them: ‘Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you!’” (John 6:54).
God commanded that the blood of the lamb be smeared on the doors of the homes of the Hebrews in Egypt, in order to preserve their lives: “And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: ‘Llet every man take a lamb by their families and houses ... And they shall take of the blood thereof, and put it upon both the side posts, and on the upper door posts of the houses, wherein they shall eat it ... And I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and will kill every firstborn in the land of Egypt both man and beast: and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the Lord. And the blood shall be unto you for a sign in the houses where you shall be! And I shall see the blood, and shall pass over you: and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I shall strike the land of Egypt!’ … And Moses called all the ancients of the children of Israel, and said to them: ‘Go take a lamb by your families and sacrifice it and dip a bunch of hyssop in the blood that is at the door, and sprinkle the transom of the door therewith, and both the door cheeks … For the Lord will pass through striking the Egyptians: and when He shall see the blood on the transom, and on both the posts, He will pass over the door of the house, and not suffer the destroyer to come into your houses and to hurt you!’” (Exodus 12:1-23).
If the mere blood of a lamb saved the lives of the Hebrews in Egypt, how much more powerful is the Blood of Christ―as Holy Scripture points out: “If the blood of goats and of oxen, and the ashes of an heifer being sprinkled, sanctify such as are defiled, to the cleansing of the flesh, then how much more shall the Blood of Christ―Who, by the Holy Ghost, offered Himself unspotted unto God―cleanse our conscience from dead works, to serve the living God?” (Hebrews 9:13-14). Christ Himself, at the Last Supper, when changing the wine into His own Precious Blood, “after He had supped, said: ‘This is the chalice, the New Testament in My Blood, which shall be shed for you!” (Luke 22:20). “This is My Blood of the New Testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!” (Matthew 26:28), adding “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life [shed his blood] for his friends!” (John 15:13). Hence Scripture adds that our lives [souls] shall be saved by Christ’s Blood: “He was clothed with a garment sprinkled with blood; and His name is called, the Word of God” (Apocalypse 19:13). “Christ died for us! Therefore, being now justified by His Blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him!” (Romans 5:9). “Jesus Christ, Who hath loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own Blood!” (Apocalypse 1:5). “These that are clothed in white robes are they who are come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and have made them white in the Blood of the Lamb!” (Apocalypse 7:13-14).
Love to Live, Live to Love
We speak of “the spiritual life”―but what is the “spiritual life”? It is the life of God in the soul. But what is God? “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8). “For God so loved the world, as to give His only-begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He hath first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins!” (1 John 4:10). Love begets life―God, Who is charity, so loved us that He sent His Love, Christ, to give life to the world by His death.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him: and without Him was made nothing that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … [Christ is] the true Light, which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and his own received Him not” (John 1:1-11). “They loved the glory of men more than the glory of God” (John 12:43). “They loved Him with their mouth: and with their tongue they lied unto Him” (Psalm 77:36). “And we have known, and have believed the charity, which God hath to us. God is charity―and he that abideth in charity, abideth in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16) … “He that loveth not, knoweth not God―for God is charity!” (1 John 4:8). “Let us, therefore, love God, because God first hath loved us!” (1 John 4:19), “for His exceeding charity wherewith He loved us” (Ephesians 2:4).
Both the Old Testament and the New Testament equate love with life: “Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, that thou mayst live” (Deuteronomy 30:6). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind: and thy neighbor as thyself ... This do, and thou shalt live!” (Luke 10:27-28).
Both Testaments furnish other quotes that command us to love: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength” Deuteronomy 6:5). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). “Jesus said to him: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment!’” (Matthew 22:37-38). “From a sincere heart, love one another earnestly!” (1 Peter 1:22). “He that loveth not, knoweth not God: for God is charity” (1 John 4:8).
Sin Brings Death, Charity Brings Life
“By one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “Sin, when it is completed, begetteth death!” (James 1:15). “The soul that sinneth, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:20). “You shall die in your sin!” (John 8:24). “Everyone shall die for his own sin!” (Deuteronomy 24:16). This should engrave in our hearts and minds the gravity of sin! The Catechism tells us that mortal and venial sin are the TWO GREATEST EVILS IN THE WORLD―“Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, Spirago-Clarke; My Catholic Faith, Bishop Morrow, STD)―but we have long since stopped believing that, as we pile up sin upon sin (one greatest evil after another) in our daily lives! We are drugged and intoxicated on our own self-made (or at least self-tweaked) religion of subjective personal opinions―and in our opinion, regardless of the what the Catechism may say, sin is NO LONGER the greatest evil in the world. Which is proved by the fact that over 50% of Catholics accept same-sex relationships and marriages, over 90% of Catholics of reproductive age have practiced contraception, over 80% of Catholics no longer attend Sunday Mass regularly and believe you can be a good Catholic without going to Sunday Mass; over 50% of Catholics believe abortion should be legal in all cases; and so on and so forth through all the list of sins you can possibly imagine. It is clear that sin in no longer looked upon (if it ever was) as the greatest evil on Earth. No wonder most souls are lost―today and in every age of history.
“As I live, saith the Lord God, I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways: and why will you die?” (Ezechiel 33:11). “If you love Me, keep My Commandments” (John 14:15). “If the wicked do penance for all his sins which he hath committed, and keep all My commandments, and do judgment, and justice, living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he hath done―in his justice, which he hath wrought, he shall live! Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:21-23). “For I am the Lord thy God, a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon their children unto the third and fourth generation, to them that hate me, and showing mercy unto many thousands, to them that love Me, and keep My commandments!” (Deuteronomy 5:9-10). “A contrite and humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise!” (Psalm 50:19). However, a “contrite heart” and a “humbled heart”―which is such a rarity today―needs to be a healthy heart and a string heart: healed and strengthened by a love of God, rather than being weakened and diseased by an indifference to God or even a hatred of God (for sin is hatred of God and hatred of self, don’t fool yourself!). “He that loveth iniquity hateth his own soul” (Psalms 10:6)).
Strong Healthy Heart Needed For Heaven
Universally and perpetually, the heart has been associated with “love”―even Our Lord used the heart as symbol of love when He manifested His Sacred Heart to St. Margaret Mary. Our Lord revealed to her: “My Divine Heart is so inflamed with love for men, that, being unable any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its burning Charity, It must needs spread them abroad and manifest Itself to them (mankind) in order to enrich them with the precious graces of sanctification and salvation necessary to withdraw them from the abyss of perdition … . If only they would make Me some return for My Love, I should think but little of all I have done for them and would wish, were it possible, to suffer still more. But the sole return they make for all My eagerness to do them good is to reject Me and treat Me with coldness … Behold the Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming Itself, in order to testify Its love; and in return, I receive from the greater part only ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what I feel most keenly is that it is hearts which are consecrated to Me, that treat Me thus!”
Those words of Our Lord―lamenting the diseased hearts of men who love Him so little―were spoken WAY BACK IN THE 1670s!! Today, we far more indifferent, far more ungrateful, far more irreverent, far more lukewarm and commit far more sacrileges than 340 years ago! “Their heart was not right with Him, nor were they counted faithful” (Psalm 77:37). “Thy heart is not right in the sight of God” (Acts 8:21). “Direct thy heart into the right way!” (Jeremias 31:21). “How good is God to them that are of a right heart!” (Psalm 72:1). “Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, all ye right of heart!” (Psalm 31:11). If few souls were saved even back then―when the Sacred Heart made those lamentations―how much fewer is that number today? There is so much “plaque” in our spiritual life―our “mind” and “heart”―that we risk having a spiritual heart attack or a spiritual brain attack (stroke). What is all this “plaque” that is killing us spiritually?
The “Plaque” of the Soul
Arterial Plaque (plaque in the blood and arteries) is made up of fat, cholesterol, calcium, waste products from cells and a clotting agent called fibrin. Similarly, “Spiritual Plaque” is made up of the devil, the world and our own passions: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8) “Overcome the wicked one. Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world. “And the world passeth away, and the concupiscence thereof: but he that doth the will of God, lives for ever” (John 2:14-17).
The “plaque of the world” can be compared to the weeds and thorns in Our Lord’s parable of the Sower of the Seed: “Behold the sower went forth to sow. And whilst he soweth some fell by the way side, and the birds of the air came and ate them up. And other some fell upon stony ground, where they had not much earth: and they sprung up immediately, because they had no deepness of earth. And when the sun was up they were scorched: and because they had not root, they withered away. And others fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up and choked them. And others fell upon good ground: and they brought forth fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold … Hear you therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. When any one heareth the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, there cometh the wicked one, and catches away that which was sown in his heart: this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon stony ground, is he that heareth the word, and immediately receiveth it with joy. Yet hath he not root in himself, but is only for a time: and when there arises tribulation and persecution because of the word, he is presently scandalized. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that heareth the word, and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choketh up the word, and he becometh fruitless. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that heareth the word, and understands, and bears fruit, and yields the one a hundredfold, and another sixty, and another thirty” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23).
Seeds, Weeds, Thorns & Trees
The flimsy, fragile, tiny seed is meant to grow into a wooden tree that bears fruit! Talking of seeds, weeds, thorns and trees―let us look at the tree chopped-down and chopped-up (humbled) to make firewood or wood for the fire (which is a symbol of love). In a certain sense, the tree represents knowledge. We learn from trees. Once chopped-down, we can learn the age of the tree by reading the “writing” of the tree―the layered annual circles that indicate the age of the tree. This is a science called dendrochronology (or tree-ring dating) and is the scientific method of dating tree rings (also called growth rings) to the exact year they were formed. As well as dating the trees, this science can give data for dendroclimatology, the study of climate and atmospheric conditions during different periods in history from wood. Thus we gain knowledge and learn from trees.
Furthermore, trees provide us with paper―upon which knowledge is recorded and from which books are printed and distributed to teach others in homes, schools, universities and the world at large. Thus the tree indirectly contributes to every single ‘branch’ of knowledge (pardon the pun) that exists in this world.
We learn, also, that sin and death―Original Sin―came through a tree and its fruit; and that mercy and life also came from a wooden tree, the dead wooden tree on Calvary upon which hung the dying fruit of our Redemption, Jesus Christ, through Whose death, eternal life was once again offered to sinful and ‘dead’ mankind.
Talking of thorns and trees, Our Lord even mentions thorns and uses trees as a means of teaching, when He speaks of good trees and bad trees: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:16-19).
At the very beginning of time―on the “Third Day” God said: “Let the earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the earth. And it was so done. And the earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yieldeth seed according to its kind, and the tree that beareth fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:11-12). “And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of: the tree of life also in the midst of paradise: and the tree of knowledge of good and evil” (Genesis 2:9).
Our Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil
Knowledge and love are like wood and fire. There can be no fire without wood (okay, before the advent of gas and chemicals) and there can no love without knowledge. As philosophers rightly say: “You cannot love what you do not know!” Likewise, just as a good tree produces good fruit and bad tree produces bad fruit, so too does good knowledge produce a good and healthy love, but bad or evil knowledge produces love of evil or sin. “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth that which is evil. For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Luke 6:45).
Just as Our Lord says: “By their fruits you shall know them!” ―you could equally say: “By their words you shall know them!”―for words are the fruits produced by the parents of mind and heart. “God created in them the science of the spirit, He filled their heart with wisdom, and showed them both good and evil” (Ecclesiasticus 17:6). “The heart of a man changeth his countenance, either for good, or for evil” (Ecclesiasticus 13:31). “He that is of a perverse heart, shall not find good―and he that perverteth his tongue, shall fall into evil” (Proverbs 17:20).
Coming back to the idea of just little spark or kindling wood starting a great fire, we see Holy Scripture link this to the tongue. How many great raging fires of gossip, calumny, detraction and hatred have not been started by the tongue? “In many things we all offend. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man. He is able also with a bridle to lead about the whole body. For if we put bits into the mouths of horses, that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole body. Behold also ships, whereas they are great, and are driven by strong winds, yet are they turned about with a small helm, whithersoever the force of the governor willeth. Even so the tongue is indeed a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold how small a fire kindleth a great wood. And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is placed among our members, which defileth the whole body, and inflameth the wheel of our nativity, being set on fire by Hell. For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and hath been tamed, by the nature of man: [8] But the tongue no man can tame, an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison. By it we bless God and the Father: and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:2-10). Plenty of spiritual plaque is built-up and caused by the tongue.
What Wood Are You Using For Your Fire?
What’s your firewood? Twigs or logs? We need little twigs or slivers of kindling wood to start a fire (love), but we need something more substantial like logs (deeper knowledge) if we are to keep the fire (love) burning. We start a little child’s fire of love for God with light little twigs of catechism, mere kiddie-knowledge that is easily understood, when we start a child out at school―but why have so few progressed from that light, little kiddie-knowledge of the Faith to an adult-like knowledge of the Faith―as they most certainly have in many other areas of secular knowledge? Why are they still satisfied with little “twigs” of superficial trivial knowledge in their minds rather than “logs” of serious and deep knowledge?
How on earth can Catholics pretend to love God when they spend little or no time in reading and learning about God? A sports fan knows more about his worldly team that most Catholics know about God! How can they pretend to love Him when they pray so little to Him?―or, when they do, they speak to Him far, far faster than in any conversation they have with fellow human beings―often saying a Hail Mary in one breath (or two). The only time they speak that rapidly with human beings is when they are angry about something! How can Catholics pretend to love God when they devote so little time to God? They devote five, ten, fifteen times more time to earthly interests than they do to God! No wonder the “fires of love”―that we ask the Holy Ghost to kindle in us―are nothing but a smoldering heap of hot ash (or lukewarm ash)!
Going back to the analogy of the spiritual life to the physical life as regards heart and blood― most doctors will consider chronically low blood pressure as dangerous if it causes noticeable signs and symptoms, such as:
● Dizziness or light-headedness (at the mention of having to go to confession)
● Nausea (while standing in line for confession)
● Fainting (when the priest gives the penance after confession)
● Dehydration and unusual thirst (lack of incoming grace and a great thirst for the world)
● Lack of concentration (distraction during Mass, prayers, spiritual reading)
● Blurred vision (cannot see the Faith and spiritual things clearly)
● Cold, clammy, pale skin (when it comes to going to extra Masses or praying the Rosary)
● Rapid, shallow breathing (when the family announces that everyone is going to an extra Mass that weekend)
● Fatigue (after a few Hail Marys of the Rosary, or two minutes into the Sunday sermon)
● Depression (at the mere suggestion of spiritual exercises or during spiritual conversations).
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR EASTER 2024
Article 42
Friday, May 31st, the Feast of Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Trumping Satan With The Queen of Hearts!
Friday, May 31st, the Feast of Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Trumping Satan With The Queen of Hearts!
Trumping
A “trump” is a playing card which is elevated above its normal rank in trick-taking games. Typically, an entire suit is nominated as a trump suit — these cards then outrank all cards of plain (non-trump) suits. In other contexts, the term trump card can refer to any sort of action, authority, or policy which automatically prevails over all others. The word “trump” derives from “trionfi” or “triumph”, which is documented as the name of a card game in 1529.
Our Lady is Heaven’s Trump Card
From this, we can easily draw parallels to the spiritual life. Of the four suits of cards, we can say that the Hearts are superior—for the heart is a symbol of love and St. John tells that God is love: “He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:8). Furthermore, the Church, in her liturgy, gives Our Lady the title of “Mother of Fair Love.” St. Louis de Montfort says of Our Lady that “we can call her, as the saints do, the Queen of All Hearts” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §38).
To the Heart of the Matter
We could also call her the “Queen of Hearts” of God’s personal suit of Hearts in the spiritual card deck—in which God holds the winning hand! Of all the four suits of cards—Hearts, Diamonds, Clubs and Spades—we could say that the suit of Hearts is superior. It is the heart that matters. We are to love God with all our whole heart:
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart” (Luke 10:27) … “But the people had not yet turned their heart to the Lord” (2 Paralipomenon 20:33) … “And if they be converted in their heart … and return to Thee with all their heart … Then hear Thou, from Heaven, their prayers, and forgive Thy people” (2 Paralipomenon 6:37-39) … “The Lord, Who is good, will show mercy, to all them, who with their whole heart, seek the Lord” (2 Paralipomenon 30:18-19). The absence of ‘heart’ is criticized by God: “The Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Isaias 29:13).
Queen of Hearts To Trump the Devil
It is this Queen, whose Immaculate Heart will “trump” or “triumph” over the plots and plans that Satan and his worldlings are concocting in the world today. As Our Lady says: “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!” Also at Fatima, referring to herself in the “third person”, Our Lady said: “Only she can help you now!” This also dovetails with the words of Our Lady of Good Success at Quito: “How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed … This will mark the arrival of my hour.”
And at La Salette, she adds: “I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son, those whom I carry in my arms, so to speak, those who have lived on my spirit. I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ! … It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you―provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ. Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
De Montfort’s Prophetic Words
St. Louis de Montfort wrote of the triumph of Mary in his book, True Devotion to Mary. At first, seeing that it was written in 1712, and that the manuscript remained practically unknown for more than a century, until it was ‘accidentally’ discovered in 1842, we could well be tempted to rashly judge St. Louis’ writings of Mary’s triumph in the ‘Latter Days’ as poetic wishful thinking. However, Our Lady has put such temptations to rest with her prophecies at La Salette and Fatima—not to mention earlier prophecies as Our Lady of Good Success (in the 17th century).
May 31st—the Queenship of Mary
Those beautiful, striking, encouraging, rousing and militant thoughts deserve to be read on at the end of this month of May—the month of Mary—and especially on what was traditionally kept as the feast of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary, as instigated by Pope Pius XII.
The Supreme Pontiff introduced the new feast of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary, on October 11th, 1954, in his encyclical Ad Caeli Reginam (“To the Queen of Heaven”). The feast itself was to be celebrated on May 31st. The initial ceremony for this feast involved the crowning of the Salus Populi Romani {“Salvation of the Roman People”) icon of the Virgin Mary in Rome by Pius XII as part of a Marian procession in Rome.
In 1969, Pope Paul VI moved the feast day to August 22nd (which furthermore displaced the traditional feast day of the Immaculate Heart of Mary!!!) You have wonder as to the wisdom and motivation of this moving around of traditional feast days―especially since we were warned about this kind of fiddling with the liturgical calendar by Our Lady in one of her apparitions!! With that duly said and noted, let us turn back to the fighting talk of St. Louis de Montfort:
Mary versus Satan
“Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times … Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil, knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls, will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §50).
“It is principally of these last and cruel persecutions of the devil, which shall go on increasing daily till the reign of Antichrist, that we ought to understand that first and celebrated prediction and curse of God pronounced in the terrestrial paradise against the serpent. It is to our purpose to explain this here for the glory of the most holy Virgin, for the salvation of her children and for the confusion of the devil: ‘I will put enmities between thee and the woman and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel’—Genesis 3:15” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §51).
Enmity to the Bitter End
“God has never made and formed but one enmity―but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end. It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. The most terrible of all the enemies which God has set up against the devil is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her, even since the days of the earthly paradise—though she existed then only in His idea—with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel, that he fears her not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §52).
“Not that the anger, the hatred and the power of God are not infinitely greater than those of the Blessed Virgin, for the perfections of Mary are limited; but first, because Satan, being proud, suffers infinitely more from being beaten and punished by a little and humble handmaid of God, and her humility humbles him more than the divine power; and secondly, because God has given Mary such great power against the devils that—as they have often been obliged to confess, in spite of themselves, by the mouths of the possessed—they fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints, and one of her threats against them more than all other torments” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §52).
“What Lucifer has lost by pride, Mary has gained by humility. What Eve has damned and lost by disobedience, Mary has saved by obedience. Eve, in obeying the serpent, has destroyed all her children together with herself, and has delivered them to him; Mary, in being perfectly faithful to God, has saved all her children and servants together with herself, and has consecrated them to His Majesty” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §53).
Satan versus Mary’s Children
“God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always up to this time persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will in the future persecute them more than ever” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §54).
“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But in return for this they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §54).
Who Are Mary’s Soldiers?
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be ‘like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful’ Mary to pierce her enemies. (Psalm 126:4). They shall be the sons of Levi, well purified by the fire of great tribulation, and closely adhering to God (1 Corinthians 6:17), who shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body. They shall be everywhere the good odor of Jesus Christ to the poor and to the little, while at the same time, they shall be an odor of death to the great, to the rich and to the proud worldlings” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §56).
“They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §57).
Soldiers of the Latter Times
“They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies. They shall sleep without gold or silver, and, what is more, without care, in the midst of the other priests, ecclesiastics, and clerics (Psalm 67:14); and yet they shall have the silvered wings of the dove to go, with the pure intention of the glory of God and the salvation of souls, wheresoever the Holy Ghost shall call them. Nor shall they leave behind them, in the places where they have preached, anything but the gold of charity, which is the fulfillment of the whole law” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §58).
“In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the Holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §59).
“These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious, the idolaters and the Mahometans. But when and how shall this be? God alone knows. As for us, we have but to hold our tongues, to pray, to sigh and to wait: ‘With expectation I have waited!’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §59).
Are We in the Latter Times?
It would seem so, as stated by Sr. Lucia of Fatima: “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that the devil is about to wage a decisive battle with the Virgin, and a decisive battle is a final battle, in which one side wins, the other side loses. Also, starting with the present time, we belong either to God or we belong to the demon; there is no middle ground.
“The devil is about to wage a decisive battle against the Blessed Virgin. The devil knows what it is that most offends God and which, in a short space of time, will gain for him the greatest number of souls. Thus the devil does everything to overcome souls consecrated to God, because in this way the devil will succeed in leaving the souls of the faithful abandoned by their leaders, thereby the more easily will he seize them” (Sister Lucia to Fr. Augustine Fuentes, a Mexican priest, December 26th, 1957).
The Opinions Within the Church
Cardinal Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII, said while still a cardinal: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul…. I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject her ornaments and make her feel remorse for her historical past.
“A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene, weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’” Cardinal Pacelli said this in 1931. He became Pope Pius XII in 1939.
Pope Paul VI said: “The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church” (Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13th, 1977. Pope Paul was dead 10 months later).
Pope Benedict XVI, while still Cardinal Ratzinger, said: “Yes, I have read [the Third Secret]. [It refers to] a radical call to conversion; the absolute seriousness of history; the dangers which threaten the Faith and the life of the Christian and therefore (the life) of the world” (Interview with Jesus magazine, November 11th, 1984).
Fr. J. Schweigl, Pope Pius XII’s interviewer of Sr. Lucia, said: “I cannot reveal anything of what I learned at Fatima concerning the Third Secret, but I can say that it has two parts: one concerns the Pope; the other logically (although I must say nothing) would have to be the continuation of the words: “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved” (The Whole Truth about Fatima, Vol. III, p. 74). Pope Pius XII personally sent Fr. Schweigl to interview Sr. Lucia about the Third Secret in 1952.
Fr. J. Alonso, the Church’s official archivist of Fatima 1965—1981, said: “In the period preceding the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, terrible things are to happen. These form the content of the third part of the Secret. What are they? If “in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved,”…it can be clearly deduced from this that in other parts of the Church these dogmas are going to become obscure or even lost altogether. Perhaps it even refers to the failures of the upper hierarchy of the Church.”
Cardinal Ottaviani said: “The message was not to be opened before 1960. I asked Sister Lucia, ‘Why this date?’ She answered, ‘Because then it will be clearer.’” Cardinal Ottaviani was the head of the Holy Office. He interviewed Sister Lucia in 1955.
Cardinal Oddi said: “According to the most probable interpretation, the Third Secret – which John XXIII did not consider opportune to reveal – is not about the conversion of Russia, which is still far from occurring, but the ‘revolution’ in the Catholic Church … What happened in 1960 that might have been seen in connection with the Secret of Fatima? The most important event is without a doubt the launching of the preparatory phase of the Second Vatican Council. Therefore I would not be surprised if the Secret had something to do with the convocation of Vatican II… I would not be surprised if the Third Secret alluded to dark times for the Church; grave confusions and troubling apostasies within Catholicism itself.”
Cardinal Ciappi, the Papal Theologian of Pope John Paul II, said in a personal communication to a Professor Baumgartner in Salzburg, Austria: “In the Third Secret, it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.”
The Devil’s Final Battle
Sister Lucia wrote to a priest nephew of hers, Fr. Jose Valinho in 1970: “I see by your letter that you are disturbed by the confusion of our time. It is sad indeed that so many persons let themselves be dominated by the diabolical wave, which is sweeping the world, and that they are blinded, to the point of being incapable of seeing error!”
At Akita, in 1973, Our Lady echoes the above words of Sr. Lucia, by warning that “the work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres...churches and altars sacked; the Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord.”
In her 1957 conversation with Fr. Fuentes, Sister Lucia said: “Father, we should not wait for an appeal to the world to come from Rome on the part of the Holy Father, to do penance. Nor should we wait for the call from our bishops in our dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No! Our Lord has already, very often, used these means and the world has not paid attention. That is why now it is necessary for each one of us to begin to reform ourselves spiritually. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also the souls that God has placed on our path.”
“Father, the Most Holy Virgin did not tell me [explicitly] that we are in the last times, but she made me understand this for three reasons.
►The first reason is as follows: The devil is about to wage a decisive battle against the Blessed Virgin, and a decisive battle is the final battle where one side will be victorious and the other side will suffer defeat.
►The second reason is as follows: She said to my cousins as well as to myself, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. These are the last two remedies, which signify that there will be no others.
►The third reason is as follows: God, before He is about to chastise, exhausts all other remedies.” (Sr. Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, 1957).
Sr. Lucia’s message is reinforced by Our Lady at Akita, barely 16 years later: “I have intervened so many times to appease the wrath of the Father. I have prevented the coming of calamities … I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach!”
Her Heart Will Triumph—Yet We Must Play Our Part
Our Lady will win, but she will win also through her instruments. As Our Lady says (at Quito, La Salette, Lourdes, Fatima and Akita): “I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father” (Akita) … “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners?” … “Sacrifice yourselves for sinners” (Fatima) … “Penance! Penance! Penance!” (Lourdes) … “Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger” (Akita) … “Say the Rosary every day” (Fatima) … “Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary” (Akita) … “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary” (Akita) … “Jesus wants to use you to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world” (Fatima).
On June 13th, 1929, Sr. Lucia saw another important apparition involving Mary as she was making a Holy Hour in the convent chapel at Tuy in Spain. She heard Mary speak to her: “The moment has come in which God asks the Holy Father, in union with all the Bishops in the world, to make the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, promising to save it by this means. There are so many souls whom the Justice of God condemns for sins committed against me, that I have come to ask reparation: sacrifice yourself for this intention and pray.”
Lucia told all this to her confessor who ordered her to write it down, and she also said that later on Jesus had spoken as follows to her: “They did not wish to heed My request. Like the king of France, they will repent and do it, but it will be late. Russia will have already spread her errors throughout the world, provoking wars and persecutions of the Church; the Holy Father will have much to suffer.”
All of the above shouts out loudly and clearly the desire on Heaven’s part for our cooperation—which is line with what the Catholic Catechism and St. Thomas Aquinas teach, namely, that God could save us without our cooperation, but He will not save us without our cooperation. The whole Old and New Testament is filled with examples of this mode of God’s action.
Not A ‘Solo’ Victory
If it was to be a totally ‘solo’ victory, then she would not have asked for us to be instrumental in that victory. She asked for the Pope to be instrumental in consecrating Russia to her Immaculate Heart. She has asked us to be instrumental by our prayers and sacrifices and penances—especially the Rosary and a devotion to her Immaculate Heart.
God has ruled that Our Lady is one of the few remedies left for the world, but we have to accept, take and use those remedies. “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved” (Akita).
Your Choice—Your Fate!
Our Lady does not beat about the bush—it is a case of “Do it, or else!” She says: “If these things are done…” but “If not, then…”—“If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it” … “If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace” … “The war is going to end; but if people do not cease offending God, a worse one will break out” … “As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” … “If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace; if not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, various nations will be annihilated!”
The Frog Sits Croaking in the Ever Hotter Water
Of course, God cannot lose! As Our Lady promised: “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph. The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me and she will be converted, and a period of peace will be granted to the world.” Yet how many frogs will be boiled before that happens? How many souls will be lost through lethargy, indifference, sloth and lukewarmness. If, as the Bible says, we will be judged for every idle word, then what kind of judgment awaits those who deliberately ignore Our Lady’s demands? Sr. Lucia said that Our Lady is very sad because nobody pays attention to her requests--“The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.”
This reminds us of the words of Our Lord from Holy Scripture: “And why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire… Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not do it to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!’” (Matthew 25:41-46). “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
A “trump” is a playing card which is elevated above its normal rank in trick-taking games. Typically, an entire suit is nominated as a trump suit — these cards then outrank all cards of plain (non-trump) suits. In other contexts, the term trump card can refer to any sort of action, authority, or policy which automatically prevails over all others. The word “trump” derives from “trionfi” or “triumph”, which is documented as the name of a card game in 1529.
Our Lady is Heaven’s Trump Card
From this, we can easily draw parallels to the spiritual life. Of the four suits of cards, we can say that the Hearts are superior—for the heart is a symbol of love and St. John tells that God is love: “He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:8). Furthermore, the Church, in her liturgy, gives Our Lady the title of “Mother of Fair Love.” St. Louis de Montfort says of Our Lady that “we can call her, as the saints do, the Queen of All Hearts” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §38).
To the Heart of the Matter
We could also call her the “Queen of Hearts” of God’s personal suit of Hearts in the spiritual card deck—in which God holds the winning hand! Of all the four suits of cards—Hearts, Diamonds, Clubs and Spades—we could say that the suit of Hearts is superior. It is the heart that matters. We are to love God with all our whole heart:
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart” (Luke 10:27) … “But the people had not yet turned their heart to the Lord” (2 Paralipomenon 20:33) … “And if they be converted in their heart … and return to Thee with all their heart … Then hear Thou, from Heaven, their prayers, and forgive Thy people” (2 Paralipomenon 6:37-39) … “The Lord, Who is good, will show mercy, to all them, who with their whole heart, seek the Lord” (2 Paralipomenon 30:18-19). The absence of ‘heart’ is criticized by God: “The Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Isaias 29:13).
Queen of Hearts To Trump the Devil
It is this Queen, whose Immaculate Heart will “trump” or “triumph” over the plots and plans that Satan and his worldlings are concocting in the world today. As Our Lady says: “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!” Also at Fatima, referring to herself in the “third person”, Our Lady said: “Only she can help you now!” This also dovetails with the words of Our Lady of Good Success at Quito: “How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed … This will mark the arrival of my hour.”
And at La Salette, she adds: “I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son, those whom I carry in my arms, so to speak, those who have lived on my spirit. I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ! … It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you―provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ. Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
De Montfort’s Prophetic Words
St. Louis de Montfort wrote of the triumph of Mary in his book, True Devotion to Mary. At first, seeing that it was written in 1712, and that the manuscript remained practically unknown for more than a century, until it was ‘accidentally’ discovered in 1842, we could well be tempted to rashly judge St. Louis’ writings of Mary’s triumph in the ‘Latter Days’ as poetic wishful thinking. However, Our Lady has put such temptations to rest with her prophecies at La Salette and Fatima—not to mention earlier prophecies as Our Lady of Good Success (in the 17th century).
May 31st—the Queenship of Mary
Those beautiful, striking, encouraging, rousing and militant thoughts deserve to be read on at the end of this month of May—the month of Mary—and especially on what was traditionally kept as the feast of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary, as instigated by Pope Pius XII.
The Supreme Pontiff introduced the new feast of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary, on October 11th, 1954, in his encyclical Ad Caeli Reginam (“To the Queen of Heaven”). The feast itself was to be celebrated on May 31st. The initial ceremony for this feast involved the crowning of the Salus Populi Romani {“Salvation of the Roman People”) icon of the Virgin Mary in Rome by Pius XII as part of a Marian procession in Rome.
In 1969, Pope Paul VI moved the feast day to August 22nd (which furthermore displaced the traditional feast day of the Immaculate Heart of Mary!!!) You have wonder as to the wisdom and motivation of this moving around of traditional feast days―especially since we were warned about this kind of fiddling with the liturgical calendar by Our Lady in one of her apparitions!! With that duly said and noted, let us turn back to the fighting talk of St. Louis de Montfort:
Mary versus Satan
“Mary must shine forth more than ever in mercy, in might and in grace, in these latter times … Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil, knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls, will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §50).
“It is principally of these last and cruel persecutions of the devil, which shall go on increasing daily till the reign of Antichrist, that we ought to understand that first and celebrated prediction and curse of God pronounced in the terrestrial paradise against the serpent. It is to our purpose to explain this here for the glory of the most holy Virgin, for the salvation of her children and for the confusion of the devil: ‘I will put enmities between thee and the woman and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel’—Genesis 3:15” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §51).
Enmity to the Bitter End
“God has never made and formed but one enmity―but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end. It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. The most terrible of all the enemies which God has set up against the devil is His holy Mother Mary. He has inspired her, even since the days of the earthly paradise—though she existed then only in His idea—with so much hatred against that cursed enemy of God, with so much ingenuity in unveiling the malice of that ancient serpent, with so much power to conquer, to overthrow and to crush that proud, impious rebel, that he fears her not only more than all angels and men, but in a sense more than God Himself” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §52).
“Not that the anger, the hatred and the power of God are not infinitely greater than those of the Blessed Virgin, for the perfections of Mary are limited; but first, because Satan, being proud, suffers infinitely more from being beaten and punished by a little and humble handmaid of God, and her humility humbles him more than the divine power; and secondly, because God has given Mary such great power against the devils that—as they have often been obliged to confess, in spite of themselves, by the mouths of the possessed—they fear one of her sighs for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints, and one of her threats against them more than all other torments” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §52).
“What Lucifer has lost by pride, Mary has gained by humility. What Eve has damned and lost by disobedience, Mary has saved by obedience. Eve, in obeying the serpent, has destroyed all her children together with herself, and has delivered them to him; Mary, in being perfectly faithful to God, has saved all her children and servants together with herself, and has consecrated them to His Majesty” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §53).
Satan versus Mary’s Children
“God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always up to this time persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will in the future persecute them more than ever” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §54).
“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But in return for this they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §54).
Who Are Mary’s Soldiers?
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be ‘like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful’ Mary to pierce her enemies. (Psalm 126:4). They shall be the sons of Levi, well purified by the fire of great tribulation, and closely adhering to God (1 Corinthians 6:17), who shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body. They shall be everywhere the good odor of Jesus Christ to the poor and to the little, while at the same time, they shall be an odor of death to the great, to the rich and to the proud worldlings” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §56).
“They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §57).
Soldiers of the Latter Times
“They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies. They shall sleep without gold or silver, and, what is more, without care, in the midst of the other priests, ecclesiastics, and clerics (Psalm 67:14); and yet they shall have the silvered wings of the dove to go, with the pure intention of the glory of God and the salvation of souls, wheresoever the Holy Ghost shall call them. Nor shall they leave behind them, in the places where they have preached, anything but the gold of charity, which is the fulfillment of the whole law” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §58).
“In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the Holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §59).
“These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious, the idolaters and the Mahometans. But when and how shall this be? God alone knows. As for us, we have but to hold our tongues, to pray, to sigh and to wait: ‘With expectation I have waited!’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §59).
Are We in the Latter Times?
It would seem so, as stated by Sr. Lucia of Fatima: “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that the devil is about to wage a decisive battle with the Virgin, and a decisive battle is a final battle, in which one side wins, the other side loses. Also, starting with the present time, we belong either to God or we belong to the demon; there is no middle ground.
“The devil is about to wage a decisive battle against the Blessed Virgin. The devil knows what it is that most offends God and which, in a short space of time, will gain for him the greatest number of souls. Thus the devil does everything to overcome souls consecrated to God, because in this way the devil will succeed in leaving the souls of the faithful abandoned by their leaders, thereby the more easily will he seize them” (Sister Lucia to Fr. Augustine Fuentes, a Mexican priest, December 26th, 1957).
The Opinions Within the Church
Cardinal Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII, said while still a cardinal: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul…. I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject her ornaments and make her feel remorse for her historical past.
“A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene, weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’” Cardinal Pacelli said this in 1931. He became Pope Pius XII in 1939.
Pope Paul VI said: “The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church” (Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13th, 1977. Pope Paul was dead 10 months later).
Pope Benedict XVI, while still Cardinal Ratzinger, said: “Yes, I have read [the Third Secret]. [It refers to] a radical call to conversion; the absolute seriousness of history; the dangers which threaten the Faith and the life of the Christian and therefore (the life) of the world” (Interview with Jesus magazine, November 11th, 1984).
Fr. J. Schweigl, Pope Pius XII’s interviewer of Sr. Lucia, said: “I cannot reveal anything of what I learned at Fatima concerning the Third Secret, but I can say that it has two parts: one concerns the Pope; the other logically (although I must say nothing) would have to be the continuation of the words: “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved” (The Whole Truth about Fatima, Vol. III, p. 74). Pope Pius XII personally sent Fr. Schweigl to interview Sr. Lucia about the Third Secret in 1952.
Fr. J. Alonso, the Church’s official archivist of Fatima 1965—1981, said: “In the period preceding the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, terrible things are to happen. These form the content of the third part of the Secret. What are they? If “in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved,”…it can be clearly deduced from this that in other parts of the Church these dogmas are going to become obscure or even lost altogether. Perhaps it even refers to the failures of the upper hierarchy of the Church.”
Cardinal Ottaviani said: “The message was not to be opened before 1960. I asked Sister Lucia, ‘Why this date?’ She answered, ‘Because then it will be clearer.’” Cardinal Ottaviani was the head of the Holy Office. He interviewed Sister Lucia in 1955.
Cardinal Oddi said: “According to the most probable interpretation, the Third Secret – which John XXIII did not consider opportune to reveal – is not about the conversion of Russia, which is still far from occurring, but the ‘revolution’ in the Catholic Church … What happened in 1960 that might have been seen in connection with the Secret of Fatima? The most important event is without a doubt the launching of the preparatory phase of the Second Vatican Council. Therefore I would not be surprised if the Secret had something to do with the convocation of Vatican II… I would not be surprised if the Third Secret alluded to dark times for the Church; grave confusions and troubling apostasies within Catholicism itself.”
Cardinal Ciappi, the Papal Theologian of Pope John Paul II, said in a personal communication to a Professor Baumgartner in Salzburg, Austria: “In the Third Secret, it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.”
The Devil’s Final Battle
Sister Lucia wrote to a priest nephew of hers, Fr. Jose Valinho in 1970: “I see by your letter that you are disturbed by the confusion of our time. It is sad indeed that so many persons let themselves be dominated by the diabolical wave, which is sweeping the world, and that they are blinded, to the point of being incapable of seeing error!”
At Akita, in 1973, Our Lady echoes the above words of Sr. Lucia, by warning that “the work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres...churches and altars sacked; the Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord.”
In her 1957 conversation with Fr. Fuentes, Sister Lucia said: “Father, we should not wait for an appeal to the world to come from Rome on the part of the Holy Father, to do penance. Nor should we wait for the call from our bishops in our dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No! Our Lord has already, very often, used these means and the world has not paid attention. That is why now it is necessary for each one of us to begin to reform ourselves spiritually. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also the souls that God has placed on our path.”
“Father, the Most Holy Virgin did not tell me [explicitly] that we are in the last times, but she made me understand this for three reasons.
►The first reason is as follows: The devil is about to wage a decisive battle against the Blessed Virgin, and a decisive battle is the final battle where one side will be victorious and the other side will suffer defeat.
►The second reason is as follows: She said to my cousins as well as to myself, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. These are the last two remedies, which signify that there will be no others.
►The third reason is as follows: God, before He is about to chastise, exhausts all other remedies.” (Sr. Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, 1957).
Sr. Lucia’s message is reinforced by Our Lady at Akita, barely 16 years later: “I have intervened so many times to appease the wrath of the Father. I have prevented the coming of calamities … I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach!”
Her Heart Will Triumph—Yet We Must Play Our Part
Our Lady will win, but she will win also through her instruments. As Our Lady says (at Quito, La Salette, Lourdes, Fatima and Akita): “I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father” (Akita) … “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners?” … “Sacrifice yourselves for sinners” (Fatima) … “Penance! Penance! Penance!” (Lourdes) … “Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger” (Akita) … “Say the Rosary every day” (Fatima) … “Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary” (Akita) … “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary” (Akita) … “Jesus wants to use you to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world” (Fatima).
On June 13th, 1929, Sr. Lucia saw another important apparition involving Mary as she was making a Holy Hour in the convent chapel at Tuy in Spain. She heard Mary speak to her: “The moment has come in which God asks the Holy Father, in union with all the Bishops in the world, to make the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, promising to save it by this means. There are so many souls whom the Justice of God condemns for sins committed against me, that I have come to ask reparation: sacrifice yourself for this intention and pray.”
Lucia told all this to her confessor who ordered her to write it down, and she also said that later on Jesus had spoken as follows to her: “They did not wish to heed My request. Like the king of France, they will repent and do it, but it will be late. Russia will have already spread her errors throughout the world, provoking wars and persecutions of the Church; the Holy Father will have much to suffer.”
All of the above shouts out loudly and clearly the desire on Heaven’s part for our cooperation—which is line with what the Catholic Catechism and St. Thomas Aquinas teach, namely, that God could save us without our cooperation, but He will not save us without our cooperation. The whole Old and New Testament is filled with examples of this mode of God’s action.
Not A ‘Solo’ Victory
If it was to be a totally ‘solo’ victory, then she would not have asked for us to be instrumental in that victory. She asked for the Pope to be instrumental in consecrating Russia to her Immaculate Heart. She has asked us to be instrumental by our prayers and sacrifices and penances—especially the Rosary and a devotion to her Immaculate Heart.
God has ruled that Our Lady is one of the few remedies left for the world, but we have to accept, take and use those remedies. “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved” (Akita).
Your Choice—Your Fate!
Our Lady does not beat about the bush—it is a case of “Do it, or else!” She says: “If these things are done…” but “If not, then…”—“If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it” … “If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace” … “The war is going to end; but if people do not cease offending God, a worse one will break out” … “As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” … “If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace; if not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, various nations will be annihilated!”
The Frog Sits Croaking in the Ever Hotter Water
Of course, God cannot lose! As Our Lady promised: “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph. The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me and she will be converted, and a period of peace will be granted to the world.” Yet how many frogs will be boiled before that happens? How many souls will be lost through lethargy, indifference, sloth and lukewarmness. If, as the Bible says, we will be judged for every idle word, then what kind of judgment awaits those who deliberately ignore Our Lady’s demands? Sr. Lucia said that Our Lady is very sad because nobody pays attention to her requests--“The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.”
This reminds us of the words of Our Lord from Holy Scripture: “And why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire… Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not do it to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!’” (Matthew 25:41-46). “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
Article 41
Thursday, May 30th, the Feast of Corpus Christi
Communicating Your Way to Heaven
Thursday, May 30th, the Feast of Corpus Christi
Communicating Your Way to Heaven
Hammer This Into Your Head!
St. Denis teaches that the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist has greater power and efficacy to sanctify souls than all other spiritual means. St. Vincent Ferrer says that a soul derives more profit from one Communion than from fasting a week on bread and water. The Holy Eucharist is, according to the holy Council of Trent, a medicine which delivers us from venial sins, and preserves us from mortal sins. According to St. John Chrysostom, Holy Communion inflames us with the fire of divine love, and makes us objects of terror to the devil.
Very Few Really Care About the Holy Eucharist
Our Lord, on several occasions, has complained of and criticized our neglect of the Blessed Sacrament. To St. Margaret Mary, Our Lord, as the Sacred Heart, said: “My Divine Heart is so inflamed with love for men, and for you in particular that, being unable any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its burning Charity, It must needs spread them abroad by your means, and manifest Itself to them (mankind) in order to enrich them with the precious graces of sanctification and salvation necessary to withdraw them from the abyss of perdition.
“Behold the Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming Itself, in order to testify Its love; and in return, I receive from the greater part only ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what I feel most keenly is that it is hearts which are consecrated to Me, that treat Me thus.”
No Change Today!
What was true at the time of St. Margaret Mary (17th century) was still true at the time of Fatima (20th century) which saw the Angel of Peace requiring the three children to make reparation for sins against the Holy Eucharist.
In the Fall of 1916, Angel of Peace appeared to the children with a chalice in his hand, over which was suspended a Host, from which drops of Blood were falling into the chalice. The Angel left the chalice and the Host suspended in the air, and prostrated himself before It. The children imitated him. The Angel then prayed repeatedly this act of reparation: “Most Holy Trinity―Father, Son, and Holy Spirit―I adore thee profoundly. I offer thee the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the tabernacles in the world, in reparation for all the outrages, sacrileges and indifferences by which He is offended.”
Then he rose, took the Host, and gave it to Lucia, while the contents of the chalice he gave to Jacinta and Francisco, and said: “Take the Body and the Blood of Jesus Christ horribly outraged by thankless men. Make reparation for their sins and crimes; and so comfort your God!”
Paying the Price of Neglect!
A lack of reverence, devotion and adoration of the Holy Eucharist leads to many punishments being inflicted upon the ungrateful and indifferent world. To Mother Mariana de Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame), Our Lord warned that this indifference and ingratitude would compel Him “…to let My Justice fall upon My beloved cloisters ― and even over cities ― when those so near to Me, who belong to Me, reject My spirit, abandoning Me alone in Tabernacles, rarely remembering that I live there especially for love of them, even more than for the rest of the faithful. Alas! If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small inveterate imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ...
“But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito, Ecuador).
We Cannot Love What We Do Not Know
It is true that we cannot love what we do not know—and “knowing” can come by personal experience or through others who tell us of their experiences. This is why St. Thérèse of Lisieux once lamented that Jesus is so little loved because He is so little known. Fr. Frederick Faber says something similar in the Preface of his personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary: “Mary is not half enough preached. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved. Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background.”
Cannot Fix What We Fail To Understand
Likewise, if we do not understand the problem, or we cannot recognize the symptoms of a disease, then we will not know how to fix it or we won’t know what medicine to take, or won’t even know that we have to take a medicine!
Lukewarmness, or call it what you want―tepidity, torpor, spiritual sloth, indifference, half-heartedness, etc.―is one of the chief contributors or causes to a neglect of the Blessed Sacrament, an indifference towards It, a lack of desire for It, and a lack of fervor in Its presence. This lukewarmness, unfortunately, as Fr. Faber says, is analogous to the physical ailment of blindness. Lukewarmness is a spiritual blindness, “It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness).
That is why it is so hard to fix, because most of its victims falsely and blindly think that there is nothing to fix! Everything is fine and dandy! They cannot see that the Blessed Sacrament has drifted more and more out their focus.
We are, probably, in the same boat―drifting further and further away from having the Holy Eucharist as the center-point and focal-point of our whole lives. The Eucharist is no longer―or perhaps never was―in the middle of the altar of our daily life and existence. It has been relegated to something that is attended to now and again―usually on Sundays―and, after that, loses Its importance and relevance in our daily, hourly, existence.
What We Have Lost!
In the increasingly Modernist Church of today, the Blessed Sacrament has found itself relegated, more and more, from center-stage to the background. Expositions, Benedictions, Holy Hours and Public Processions of the Blessed Sacrament have become a thing of the past. The Blessed Sacrament is now placed outside of the “social circle” during Mass, no longer being on the altar of sacrifice, but finds Itself behind the priest’s back as the priest faces the people, instead of facing the Lord during most Masses—or, even worse, is relegated and demoted to some side altar, out the way of all the proceedings. “We’ll call You when we need You—it’ll be at Communion time! So You’d better be ready, Lord!”
The way we worship reflects the way we think and believe. Gone are the genuflections that used to be made to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. Gone, for the most part, is the reverent and humble kneeling in adoration when receiving Him in Holy Communion. Gone is the reverential behavior in church in the presence of God in the Blessed Sacrament. If the Blessed Sacrament is “kept in the background” then the “fires of love” that we ask of the Holy Ghost and which Jesus came to enkindle in our hearts-—“I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49)—will never spark and will never burst into flames.
No Coals, No Kindling Wood, No Fire
The spiritual life of the majority of Catholics is so cold, or lukewarm at best, because they lack the heavenly ‘coals’ of Holy Communion in their souls, or, if they have the ‘coals’ they unfortunately lack the ‘spark’ and the ‘kindling wood’.
What the saints say is true. St. Denis teaches that the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist has greater power and efficacy to sanctify souls than all other spiritual means. St. Vincent Ferrer says that a soul derives more profit from one Holy Communion than from fasting a week on bread and water. While St. John Chrysostom says that Holy Communion inflames us with the fire of divine love.
The fault and failure in this regard is not a lack of something on the part of the Holy Eucharist, but the fault and failure is to be found with us and our dispositions, or, rather, our lack of the right dispositions. Let us try, during this Octave of Corpus Christi, to both identify and rectify those faults and failures.
Eucharistic Problem Solver!
When St. John Vianney, the Curé of Ars, first arrived at the obscure little village of Ars, someone said to him with bitterness: “Here there is nothing you can possibly do!” St. John Vianney replied: “That means there is everything to do!” And he began immediately to act. What did he do? He arose at 2:00 in the morning and went to pray near the altar in the dark church. He recited the Divine Office, he made his meditation and he prepared himself for Holy Mass. After the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, he made his thanksgiving; then he remained at prayer until noon. He would be always kneeling on the floor without any support, with a Rosary in his hand and his eyes fixed on the Tabernacle. Ten hours of prayer to start the day! Most of it in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament!
But then―he had to start changing his timetable when things reached a point requiring radical changes in his program. The Eucharistic Jesus and the Blessed Virgin Mary, little by little, drew souls to that poor parish, until the church did not seem big enough to contain the crowds, and the confessional of the holy priest became swamped with endless lines of penitents. The holy Curate was obliged to hear confessions for ten, fifteen and eighteen hours a day! How did such a transformation ever come about? Devotion to the Holy Eucharist (and Our Lady).
We can ask the same question regarding San Giovanni Rotondo, a town in Gargano, Italy. Until a few decades ago it was an obscure, unknown place. Suddenly, San Giovanni Rotondo became a center of spiritual life and its reputation spread internationally. Here, too, there had been an unpromising, sickly friar; an ancient, dilapidated little Friary; a small neglected church, with altar and Tabernacle left alone to this poor friar, St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina, who wore out his beads and his hands in the untiring recitation of anywhere from thirty to fifty Holy Rosaries (150 to 250 decades) each day and spent much time in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament and a very devoted offering of the Sacrifice of the Mass, the source of the Eucharist.
Questions and More Questions
How did the change come about? What caused the wonderful transformation that came to Ars and to San Giovanni Rotondo, so that hundreds of thousands, and perhaps millions, of persons have come there from every part of the Earth? Only God could work such. It is all due to Him, to the divine and infinite power of the Eucharist, to the almighty force of attraction which radiates from every Tabernacle, and which radiated from the Tabernacles of Ars and San Giovanni Rotondo, reaching souls through the ministry of those two priests, true “Ministers of the Tabernacles” and “dispensers of the mysteries of God” (1 Corinthians 4:1).
Let us ask another question: “What is the Eucharist?” It is God among us. It is the Lord Jesus present in the tabernacles of our churches with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. It is Jesus veiled under the appearance of bread, but really and physically present in the consecrated Host, so that He dwells in our midst, works within us and for us, and is at our disposal. The Eucharistic Jesus is the true “Emmanuel”, meaning the “God with us” (Matthew 1:23). However, the key question is: If “God is with us” ― are we with God, or are we somewhere else?
Who’s to Blame?
A man is to be blamed if he dies of starvation when bread is easily and readily accessible to him. The same is true for ourselves. If we die of spiritual starvation and end up in Hell, then we are to be fully blamed for our plight, because the spiritual and supernatural Bread was always accessible to us. Remember again that St. Denis teaches that the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist has greater power and efficacy to sanctify souls than all other spiritual means. St. Vincent Ferrer says that a soul derives more profit from one Holy Communion than from fasting a week on bread and water.
Turning Our Eucharistic Lives Around
Never before have there been so many churches dotting the surface of this Earth! Never before has the Tabernacle been so easily accessible in the history of the Church. Yet never before has the Holy Eucharist been so sadly neglected and undervalued as it is today. Let us not just blame the bishops and priests for this—let us also blame ourselves! The bishops and priests cannot stop you from visiting and adoring the Blessed Sacrament on the altar—and even if churches were to be locked-up and inaccessible, there is nothing to stop a Eucharistic adoration taking place in the Temple of your soul! “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” (1 Corinthians 3:16).
Exercise Your Heart
St. Peter Eymard declares: “The Eucharist is the supreme proof of the love of Jesus. After this, there is nothing more but Heaven itself.” Yet, how many of us do not know the vast extent of the love contained in the Holy Eucharist. How few have truly tasted and experienced that love? Very few! For as we sow, so shall we reap! “He who soweth sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
To explore the riches of the Eucharist, we use the heart. If every Christian must love Jesus Christ―“If any man love not our Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema” (1 Corinthians 16:22)―then love for the Eucharist must spring from the heart and be ever alive in us all. Now even love needs exercise. The heart needs to be exercised to love the true God and long for “The Author of Life” (Acts 3:15).
When St. Margaret Mary Alacoque left the world and consecrated herself to God in the cloister, she made a private vow and wrote it in her blood: “All for the Eucharist; nothing for me!” It is useless to attempt to describe the Saint’s burning love for the Holy Eucharist. In those days, daily Holy Communion was not yet commonly practiced in the Church―that would only arise in the reign of Pope St. Pius X (1903-1914)―prior to that time special permission was required to communicate daily. Suffice it to say that when St. Margaret Mary was not able to receive Holy Communion, she broke out in ardent expressions of love like these: “I have such a desire for Holy Communion that if I had to walk barefoot along a path of fire to obtain It, I would do so with unspeakable joy.”
St. Catherine of Siena said often to her confessor: “Father, I am hungry; for the love of God, give this soul her food, her Lord in the Eucharist.” She also confided: “When I am not able to receive my Lord, I go into the church, and there I look at Him ... I look at Him again ... and this satisfies me.”
When St. Thérèse of Lisieux was very ill, she dragged herself with great effort to church to receive Jesus. One morning, after Holy Communion, she was in her cell, exhausted. One of the Sisters remarked that she should not exert herself so much. The Saint replied: “Oh, what are these sufferings to me in comparison with one Holy Communion?” Her complaint was that she could not receive Holy Communion every day (as stated above, daily Communion was not yet permitted in her times—it was first allowed on a widespread basis by Pope St. Pius X in 1905). Therefore, she ardently pleaded with Jesus: “Remain within me, as You do in the Tabernacle! Do not ever withdraw Your presence from Your little Host!”
St. Gemma Galgani could exclaim in this regard: “I can no longer avoid the thought that in the wonderful scope of His Love, Jesus makes Himself perceptible and shows Himself to His lowliest creature in all the splendors of His Heart.” And what may we say about the “exercises” of the heart of St. Gemma, who desired to be a “tent of love” [the word “tabernaculum” is Latin for “tent”] in which she would keep Jesus always with her? She longed to have a “little place in the ciborium” to be able to stay always with Jesus. She asked that she could become “a flaming ball afire with love” for Jesus.
Holy Communion represents the loftiest point of this exercise of love, Whose consuming flames unite the heart of a creature and Jesus. This we call “exercising the heart.”
Do You Center Your Life on the Eucharist?
Of course not! To some degree, maybe! As much as you ought? No way! But why not? As with most things, the problem lays in our thoughts, our mind, our attitude. If you want to center your life on the Holy Eucharist—and you should want this—then the very first thing you are going to have to do is CHANGE THE WAY YOU THINK! Ideas have consequences. We act the way we think—and if we don’t think before acting, then we will begin to think the way we act. Our thoughts give birth to our actions—or that is how it should be. That is why there is a logical order to the catechetical command: “God made us to KNOW Him, love Him and serve Him…” We cannot love what we do not know, and we will serve poorly someone we do not love. If you want to have a life that is centered on the Holy Eucharist, then it all begins in the mind and not in the church or the Tabernacle.
A Change of Mind
Good food and healthy food does not always taste good. As the saying goes: “Bitter is better!” Virtue is rarely easy. Winning a championship or a trophy is rarely achieved without much labor and sweat. In short, what you plant or sow is what you get. If you sow sparingly you will reap sparingly. The Holy Eucharist, grace and virtue are not “freebies” or “bargain-basement deals.” St. Alphonsus Liguori says that “He who prays most receives most.” The same can be said of the Holy Eucharist—he who adores most, gets the most. Drill that into your mind and thoughts.
Another change of mind that must take place in our sense of values—not just in theory, but, more importantly, in practice. Our Lord, like any good teacher, puts it clearly, simply and bluntly: “Seek God first!” (Matthew 6:33) and “Love God with your whole mind, heart, soul and strength!” (Mark 12:30). We do seek God, but not always first. We do love God, but not always above everything else. We know what we should do in theory to save our souls, but, in practice, many of those things are not done. Like the Modernists, we create our own brand of ‘Catholicism’ to cater for our half-heartedness, lukewarmness, laziness and negligence. We find or create excuses that dispense us from seeking God first and loving Him above all else. We criticize the Modernists, yet we are doing the same thing—though on a much lesser scale. We prefer the “Do-It-Yourself-Kit” of the Faith, rather than the one Christ wishes us to have. We don’t want to be wholehearted Catholics, we prefer to be half-hearted or part-time Catholics.
What Spirit Drives You?
St. Leonard of Port Maurice, in his book The Hidden Treasure of the Holy Mass, writes: “Now, tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, you thoroughly well consider that you are going up as it were to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer. If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued [laughing, joking, etc.], with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers, what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball? But what shall be said if you profane those sacred functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time, and in any place―but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God.”
What is Your Mass Attendance Like?
Do you, and your family, approach the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass like you would Calvary? What is your preparation for Mass like? Read about St. Charbal Maklouf—a Maronite monk-priest—who had a great devotion to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist. That is all he lived for—he lived and said Mass in a cave, having been given permission to live a hermit-like existence. Already before sunrise, he would be at prayer—reciting his Divine Office (breviary) and other prayers in preparation for his 11:00 a.m. Mass. A monk would come up to his cave from the nearby monastery, to serve Mass and bring him a meager lunch. After Mass, he would spend at least one hour or even two in thanksgiving, before eating his lunch, and would then return to his thanksgiving—which he continued into the early evening. Then he would begin his prayers of preparation for the next day’s Mass. His whole life was centered on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist! His body lies incorrupt to this day.
On the Way to Mass
When you drive to Mass, what is the mood of the passengers in the car? Is it a prayerful mood, or a worldly mood—peppered with worldly or frivolous conversation, perhaps worldly music? If so, it weakens the notion of what the Sacrifice of the Mass is and the serious and awesome action you are about to take part in—there is no greater action taking place anywhere in the world, on any day, than that of the Mass. Perhaps passengers need to be told that henceforth, the approach to traveling to Sunday (daily/weekday) Masses will be different. Prayers could be said; hymns sung or played; suitable spiritual material read out aloud; or at least spiritual conversations held.
Arrival Time for Mass
Do you arrive in plenty of time to make a proper preparation for Mass in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament? Let’s face it—it is GOD HIMSELF that you are visiting when you go to Mass! It is not a commemoration of Calvary; it is not a mere human action; it is not a social function—you are there TO SEE GOD. Is there enough time made for God, or is it a last minute arrival? Or if you do make it on time, does everyone actually GO INSIDE TO SPEAK TO GOD, or do they spend time chatting with other parishioners prior to Mass starting? Worldly talk, frivolous talk, socializing, joking around and laughing? If the Mass is a sacrifice, then sacrifice something yourself and get right in there! The answers to these questions show the value we place on God and whether or not He is “Number One” in our lives.
Assistance at Mass
How do we assist at Mass? Some people clearly show that, even though their bodies are present at Mass, their minds most certainly are not—they gaze around, fidget with their ‘little-ones’, keeping them entertained so that they don’t cry, etc. Others may have a Missal, prayer book or Rosary in their hands—but their heart can be lukewarm and they listlessly, carelessly and mechanically go through the motions of praying, fitting the description of Our Lord: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). Lining up for Holy Communion is no different to lining up at the supermarket check-out—cold, indifferent, with no devotion or zeal.
Holy Communion
The manner of reception of Holy Communion makes you wonder if they really believe that God is present—but of course more or less than 70% of Catholics do not believe that He is present. Thanksgiving after Communion―if there is one―is frequently seen to be a mechanical repetition of the same old prayers, said without any real feeling and without any personal heart-to-heart conversation with the God that now rests within them! Once Mass is over, hardly anyone stays behind to continue their thanksgiving and to continue talking to their God—because friends beckon in the parking lot or the parish hall, and―instead of a tasteless Host―coffee and donuts with a variety of sweet fillings are available in the parish hall—and the early bird gets the best donuts! I guess the redeeming factor must be that the donut looks like a fat halo! Friends, coffee and donuts are “Number One”—“Number Two”—and “Number Three”—God came in fourth!
False Devotions to the Holy Eucharist
Is there anyone who dare boast that their Eucharistic devotion is as good as it should be? God forbid that there be found such an arrogant soul! How can an infinite God be sufficiently praised and adored by any finite creature. We are all capable and obliged to better and increase our devotion to this, the greatest of Treasures, that we find in our midst.
Any changes that we make, to our Eucharistic devotion, must not and cannot be mere superficial changes. We cannot just “glue-on” a Eucharistic spirit of adoration. It is not something EXTERNAL, but it has to be INTERNAL. Just as St. Louis de Montfort speaks of false devotions to Mary, we can also speak of false devotions to the Holy Eucharist—or, to give the benefit of the doubt, let us call them insufficient devotions to the Holy Eucharist. These would be the half-hearted devotion, the lukewarm devotion, the slothful devotion, the self-interested devotion, the “showing-off” devotion, the “fast-track” devotion.
St. Denis teaches that the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist has greater power and efficacy to sanctify souls than all other spiritual means. St. Vincent Ferrer says that a soul derives more profit from one Communion than from fasting a week on bread and water. The Holy Eucharist is, according to the holy Council of Trent, a medicine which delivers us from venial sins, and preserves us from mortal sins. According to St. John Chrysostom, Holy Communion inflames us with the fire of divine love, and makes us objects of terror to the devil.
Very Few Really Care About the Holy Eucharist
Our Lord, on several occasions, has complained of and criticized our neglect of the Blessed Sacrament. To St. Margaret Mary, Our Lord, as the Sacred Heart, said: “My Divine Heart is so inflamed with love for men, and for you in particular that, being unable any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its burning Charity, It must needs spread them abroad by your means, and manifest Itself to them (mankind) in order to enrich them with the precious graces of sanctification and salvation necessary to withdraw them from the abyss of perdition.
“Behold the Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming Itself, in order to testify Its love; and in return, I receive from the greater part only ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what I feel most keenly is that it is hearts which are consecrated to Me, that treat Me thus.”
No Change Today!
What was true at the time of St. Margaret Mary (17th century) was still true at the time of Fatima (20th century) which saw the Angel of Peace requiring the three children to make reparation for sins against the Holy Eucharist.
In the Fall of 1916, Angel of Peace appeared to the children with a chalice in his hand, over which was suspended a Host, from which drops of Blood were falling into the chalice. The Angel left the chalice and the Host suspended in the air, and prostrated himself before It. The children imitated him. The Angel then prayed repeatedly this act of reparation: “Most Holy Trinity―Father, Son, and Holy Spirit―I adore thee profoundly. I offer thee the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the tabernacles in the world, in reparation for all the outrages, sacrileges and indifferences by which He is offended.”
Then he rose, took the Host, and gave it to Lucia, while the contents of the chalice he gave to Jacinta and Francisco, and said: “Take the Body and the Blood of Jesus Christ horribly outraged by thankless men. Make reparation for their sins and crimes; and so comfort your God!”
Paying the Price of Neglect!
A lack of reverence, devotion and adoration of the Holy Eucharist leads to many punishments being inflicted upon the ungrateful and indifferent world. To Mother Mariana de Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame), Our Lord warned that this indifference and ingratitude would compel Him “…to let My Justice fall upon My beloved cloisters ― and even over cities ― when those so near to Me, who belong to Me, reject My spirit, abandoning Me alone in Tabernacles, rarely remembering that I live there especially for love of them, even more than for the rest of the faithful. Alas! If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small inveterate imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ...
“But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito, Ecuador).
We Cannot Love What We Do Not Know
It is true that we cannot love what we do not know—and “knowing” can come by personal experience or through others who tell us of their experiences. This is why St. Thérèse of Lisieux once lamented that Jesus is so little loved because He is so little known. Fr. Frederick Faber says something similar in the Preface of his personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary: “Mary is not half enough preached. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved. Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background.”
Cannot Fix What We Fail To Understand
Likewise, if we do not understand the problem, or we cannot recognize the symptoms of a disease, then we will not know how to fix it or we won’t know what medicine to take, or won’t even know that we have to take a medicine!
Lukewarmness, or call it what you want―tepidity, torpor, spiritual sloth, indifference, half-heartedness, etc.―is one of the chief contributors or causes to a neglect of the Blessed Sacrament, an indifference towards It, a lack of desire for It, and a lack of fervor in Its presence. This lukewarmness, unfortunately, as Fr. Faber says, is analogous to the physical ailment of blindness. Lukewarmness is a spiritual blindness, “It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness).
That is why it is so hard to fix, because most of its victims falsely and blindly think that there is nothing to fix! Everything is fine and dandy! They cannot see that the Blessed Sacrament has drifted more and more out their focus.
We are, probably, in the same boat―drifting further and further away from having the Holy Eucharist as the center-point and focal-point of our whole lives. The Eucharist is no longer―or perhaps never was―in the middle of the altar of our daily life and existence. It has been relegated to something that is attended to now and again―usually on Sundays―and, after that, loses Its importance and relevance in our daily, hourly, existence.
What We Have Lost!
In the increasingly Modernist Church of today, the Blessed Sacrament has found itself relegated, more and more, from center-stage to the background. Expositions, Benedictions, Holy Hours and Public Processions of the Blessed Sacrament have become a thing of the past. The Blessed Sacrament is now placed outside of the “social circle” during Mass, no longer being on the altar of sacrifice, but finds Itself behind the priest’s back as the priest faces the people, instead of facing the Lord during most Masses—or, even worse, is relegated and demoted to some side altar, out the way of all the proceedings. “We’ll call You when we need You—it’ll be at Communion time! So You’d better be ready, Lord!”
The way we worship reflects the way we think and believe. Gone are the genuflections that used to be made to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. Gone, for the most part, is the reverent and humble kneeling in adoration when receiving Him in Holy Communion. Gone is the reverential behavior in church in the presence of God in the Blessed Sacrament. If the Blessed Sacrament is “kept in the background” then the “fires of love” that we ask of the Holy Ghost and which Jesus came to enkindle in our hearts-—“I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49)—will never spark and will never burst into flames.
No Coals, No Kindling Wood, No Fire
The spiritual life of the majority of Catholics is so cold, or lukewarm at best, because they lack the heavenly ‘coals’ of Holy Communion in their souls, or, if they have the ‘coals’ they unfortunately lack the ‘spark’ and the ‘kindling wood’.
What the saints say is true. St. Denis teaches that the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist has greater power and efficacy to sanctify souls than all other spiritual means. St. Vincent Ferrer says that a soul derives more profit from one Holy Communion than from fasting a week on bread and water. While St. John Chrysostom says that Holy Communion inflames us with the fire of divine love.
The fault and failure in this regard is not a lack of something on the part of the Holy Eucharist, but the fault and failure is to be found with us and our dispositions, or, rather, our lack of the right dispositions. Let us try, during this Octave of Corpus Christi, to both identify and rectify those faults and failures.
Eucharistic Problem Solver!
When St. John Vianney, the Curé of Ars, first arrived at the obscure little village of Ars, someone said to him with bitterness: “Here there is nothing you can possibly do!” St. John Vianney replied: “That means there is everything to do!” And he began immediately to act. What did he do? He arose at 2:00 in the morning and went to pray near the altar in the dark church. He recited the Divine Office, he made his meditation and he prepared himself for Holy Mass. After the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, he made his thanksgiving; then he remained at prayer until noon. He would be always kneeling on the floor without any support, with a Rosary in his hand and his eyes fixed on the Tabernacle. Ten hours of prayer to start the day! Most of it in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament!
But then―he had to start changing his timetable when things reached a point requiring radical changes in his program. The Eucharistic Jesus and the Blessed Virgin Mary, little by little, drew souls to that poor parish, until the church did not seem big enough to contain the crowds, and the confessional of the holy priest became swamped with endless lines of penitents. The holy Curate was obliged to hear confessions for ten, fifteen and eighteen hours a day! How did such a transformation ever come about? Devotion to the Holy Eucharist (and Our Lady).
We can ask the same question regarding San Giovanni Rotondo, a town in Gargano, Italy. Until a few decades ago it was an obscure, unknown place. Suddenly, San Giovanni Rotondo became a center of spiritual life and its reputation spread internationally. Here, too, there had been an unpromising, sickly friar; an ancient, dilapidated little Friary; a small neglected church, with altar and Tabernacle left alone to this poor friar, St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina, who wore out his beads and his hands in the untiring recitation of anywhere from thirty to fifty Holy Rosaries (150 to 250 decades) each day and spent much time in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament and a very devoted offering of the Sacrifice of the Mass, the source of the Eucharist.
Questions and More Questions
How did the change come about? What caused the wonderful transformation that came to Ars and to San Giovanni Rotondo, so that hundreds of thousands, and perhaps millions, of persons have come there from every part of the Earth? Only God could work such. It is all due to Him, to the divine and infinite power of the Eucharist, to the almighty force of attraction which radiates from every Tabernacle, and which radiated from the Tabernacles of Ars and San Giovanni Rotondo, reaching souls through the ministry of those two priests, true “Ministers of the Tabernacles” and “dispensers of the mysteries of God” (1 Corinthians 4:1).
Let us ask another question: “What is the Eucharist?” It is God among us. It is the Lord Jesus present in the tabernacles of our churches with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. It is Jesus veiled under the appearance of bread, but really and physically present in the consecrated Host, so that He dwells in our midst, works within us and for us, and is at our disposal. The Eucharistic Jesus is the true “Emmanuel”, meaning the “God with us” (Matthew 1:23). However, the key question is: If “God is with us” ― are we with God, or are we somewhere else?
Who’s to Blame?
A man is to be blamed if he dies of starvation when bread is easily and readily accessible to him. The same is true for ourselves. If we die of spiritual starvation and end up in Hell, then we are to be fully blamed for our plight, because the spiritual and supernatural Bread was always accessible to us. Remember again that St. Denis teaches that the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist has greater power and efficacy to sanctify souls than all other spiritual means. St. Vincent Ferrer says that a soul derives more profit from one Holy Communion than from fasting a week on bread and water.
Turning Our Eucharistic Lives Around
Never before have there been so many churches dotting the surface of this Earth! Never before has the Tabernacle been so easily accessible in the history of the Church. Yet never before has the Holy Eucharist been so sadly neglected and undervalued as it is today. Let us not just blame the bishops and priests for this—let us also blame ourselves! The bishops and priests cannot stop you from visiting and adoring the Blessed Sacrament on the altar—and even if churches were to be locked-up and inaccessible, there is nothing to stop a Eucharistic adoration taking place in the Temple of your soul! “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” (1 Corinthians 3:16).
Exercise Your Heart
St. Peter Eymard declares: “The Eucharist is the supreme proof of the love of Jesus. After this, there is nothing more but Heaven itself.” Yet, how many of us do not know the vast extent of the love contained in the Holy Eucharist. How few have truly tasted and experienced that love? Very few! For as we sow, so shall we reap! “He who soweth sparingly, shall also reap sparingly” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
To explore the riches of the Eucharist, we use the heart. If every Christian must love Jesus Christ―“If any man love not our Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema” (1 Corinthians 16:22)―then love for the Eucharist must spring from the heart and be ever alive in us all. Now even love needs exercise. The heart needs to be exercised to love the true God and long for “The Author of Life” (Acts 3:15).
When St. Margaret Mary Alacoque left the world and consecrated herself to God in the cloister, she made a private vow and wrote it in her blood: “All for the Eucharist; nothing for me!” It is useless to attempt to describe the Saint’s burning love for the Holy Eucharist. In those days, daily Holy Communion was not yet commonly practiced in the Church―that would only arise in the reign of Pope St. Pius X (1903-1914)―prior to that time special permission was required to communicate daily. Suffice it to say that when St. Margaret Mary was not able to receive Holy Communion, she broke out in ardent expressions of love like these: “I have such a desire for Holy Communion that if I had to walk barefoot along a path of fire to obtain It, I would do so with unspeakable joy.”
St. Catherine of Siena said often to her confessor: “Father, I am hungry; for the love of God, give this soul her food, her Lord in the Eucharist.” She also confided: “When I am not able to receive my Lord, I go into the church, and there I look at Him ... I look at Him again ... and this satisfies me.”
When St. Thérèse of Lisieux was very ill, she dragged herself with great effort to church to receive Jesus. One morning, after Holy Communion, she was in her cell, exhausted. One of the Sisters remarked that she should not exert herself so much. The Saint replied: “Oh, what are these sufferings to me in comparison with one Holy Communion?” Her complaint was that she could not receive Holy Communion every day (as stated above, daily Communion was not yet permitted in her times—it was first allowed on a widespread basis by Pope St. Pius X in 1905). Therefore, she ardently pleaded with Jesus: “Remain within me, as You do in the Tabernacle! Do not ever withdraw Your presence from Your little Host!”
St. Gemma Galgani could exclaim in this regard: “I can no longer avoid the thought that in the wonderful scope of His Love, Jesus makes Himself perceptible and shows Himself to His lowliest creature in all the splendors of His Heart.” And what may we say about the “exercises” of the heart of St. Gemma, who desired to be a “tent of love” [the word “tabernaculum” is Latin for “tent”] in which she would keep Jesus always with her? She longed to have a “little place in the ciborium” to be able to stay always with Jesus. She asked that she could become “a flaming ball afire with love” for Jesus.
Holy Communion represents the loftiest point of this exercise of love, Whose consuming flames unite the heart of a creature and Jesus. This we call “exercising the heart.”
Do You Center Your Life on the Eucharist?
Of course not! To some degree, maybe! As much as you ought? No way! But why not? As with most things, the problem lays in our thoughts, our mind, our attitude. If you want to center your life on the Holy Eucharist—and you should want this—then the very first thing you are going to have to do is CHANGE THE WAY YOU THINK! Ideas have consequences. We act the way we think—and if we don’t think before acting, then we will begin to think the way we act. Our thoughts give birth to our actions—or that is how it should be. That is why there is a logical order to the catechetical command: “God made us to KNOW Him, love Him and serve Him…” We cannot love what we do not know, and we will serve poorly someone we do not love. If you want to have a life that is centered on the Holy Eucharist, then it all begins in the mind and not in the church or the Tabernacle.
A Change of Mind
Good food and healthy food does not always taste good. As the saying goes: “Bitter is better!” Virtue is rarely easy. Winning a championship or a trophy is rarely achieved without much labor and sweat. In short, what you plant or sow is what you get. If you sow sparingly you will reap sparingly. The Holy Eucharist, grace and virtue are not “freebies” or “bargain-basement deals.” St. Alphonsus Liguori says that “He who prays most receives most.” The same can be said of the Holy Eucharist—he who adores most, gets the most. Drill that into your mind and thoughts.
Another change of mind that must take place in our sense of values—not just in theory, but, more importantly, in practice. Our Lord, like any good teacher, puts it clearly, simply and bluntly: “Seek God first!” (Matthew 6:33) and “Love God with your whole mind, heart, soul and strength!” (Mark 12:30). We do seek God, but not always first. We do love God, but not always above everything else. We know what we should do in theory to save our souls, but, in practice, many of those things are not done. Like the Modernists, we create our own brand of ‘Catholicism’ to cater for our half-heartedness, lukewarmness, laziness and negligence. We find or create excuses that dispense us from seeking God first and loving Him above all else. We criticize the Modernists, yet we are doing the same thing—though on a much lesser scale. We prefer the “Do-It-Yourself-Kit” of the Faith, rather than the one Christ wishes us to have. We don’t want to be wholehearted Catholics, we prefer to be half-hearted or part-time Catholics.
What Spirit Drives You?
St. Leonard of Port Maurice, in his book The Hidden Treasure of the Holy Mass, writes: “Now, tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, you thoroughly well consider that you are going up as it were to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer. If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued [laughing, joking, etc.], with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers, what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball? But what shall be said if you profane those sacred functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time, and in any place―but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God.”
What is Your Mass Attendance Like?
Do you, and your family, approach the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass like you would Calvary? What is your preparation for Mass like? Read about St. Charbal Maklouf—a Maronite monk-priest—who had a great devotion to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist. That is all he lived for—he lived and said Mass in a cave, having been given permission to live a hermit-like existence. Already before sunrise, he would be at prayer—reciting his Divine Office (breviary) and other prayers in preparation for his 11:00 a.m. Mass. A monk would come up to his cave from the nearby monastery, to serve Mass and bring him a meager lunch. After Mass, he would spend at least one hour or even two in thanksgiving, before eating his lunch, and would then return to his thanksgiving—which he continued into the early evening. Then he would begin his prayers of preparation for the next day’s Mass. His whole life was centered on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist! His body lies incorrupt to this day.
On the Way to Mass
When you drive to Mass, what is the mood of the passengers in the car? Is it a prayerful mood, or a worldly mood—peppered with worldly or frivolous conversation, perhaps worldly music? If so, it weakens the notion of what the Sacrifice of the Mass is and the serious and awesome action you are about to take part in—there is no greater action taking place anywhere in the world, on any day, than that of the Mass. Perhaps passengers need to be told that henceforth, the approach to traveling to Sunday (daily/weekday) Masses will be different. Prayers could be said; hymns sung or played; suitable spiritual material read out aloud; or at least spiritual conversations held.
Arrival Time for Mass
Do you arrive in plenty of time to make a proper preparation for Mass in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament? Let’s face it—it is GOD HIMSELF that you are visiting when you go to Mass! It is not a commemoration of Calvary; it is not a mere human action; it is not a social function—you are there TO SEE GOD. Is there enough time made for God, or is it a last minute arrival? Or if you do make it on time, does everyone actually GO INSIDE TO SPEAK TO GOD, or do they spend time chatting with other parishioners prior to Mass starting? Worldly talk, frivolous talk, socializing, joking around and laughing? If the Mass is a sacrifice, then sacrifice something yourself and get right in there! The answers to these questions show the value we place on God and whether or not He is “Number One” in our lives.
Assistance at Mass
How do we assist at Mass? Some people clearly show that, even though their bodies are present at Mass, their minds most certainly are not—they gaze around, fidget with their ‘little-ones’, keeping them entertained so that they don’t cry, etc. Others may have a Missal, prayer book or Rosary in their hands—but their heart can be lukewarm and they listlessly, carelessly and mechanically go through the motions of praying, fitting the description of Our Lord: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). Lining up for Holy Communion is no different to lining up at the supermarket check-out—cold, indifferent, with no devotion or zeal.
Holy Communion
The manner of reception of Holy Communion makes you wonder if they really believe that God is present—but of course more or less than 70% of Catholics do not believe that He is present. Thanksgiving after Communion―if there is one―is frequently seen to be a mechanical repetition of the same old prayers, said without any real feeling and without any personal heart-to-heart conversation with the God that now rests within them! Once Mass is over, hardly anyone stays behind to continue their thanksgiving and to continue talking to their God—because friends beckon in the parking lot or the parish hall, and―instead of a tasteless Host―coffee and donuts with a variety of sweet fillings are available in the parish hall—and the early bird gets the best donuts! I guess the redeeming factor must be that the donut looks like a fat halo! Friends, coffee and donuts are “Number One”—“Number Two”—and “Number Three”—God came in fourth!
False Devotions to the Holy Eucharist
Is there anyone who dare boast that their Eucharistic devotion is as good as it should be? God forbid that there be found such an arrogant soul! How can an infinite God be sufficiently praised and adored by any finite creature. We are all capable and obliged to better and increase our devotion to this, the greatest of Treasures, that we find in our midst.
Any changes that we make, to our Eucharistic devotion, must not and cannot be mere superficial changes. We cannot just “glue-on” a Eucharistic spirit of adoration. It is not something EXTERNAL, but it has to be INTERNAL. Just as St. Louis de Montfort speaks of false devotions to Mary, we can also speak of false devotions to the Holy Eucharist—or, to give the benefit of the doubt, let us call them insufficient devotions to the Holy Eucharist. These would be the half-hearted devotion, the lukewarm devotion, the slothful devotion, the self-interested devotion, the “showing-off” devotion, the “fast-track” devotion.
Article 40
Wednesday, May 29th
Our Greatest Treasure! — Our Greatest Neglect!
Wednesday, May 29th
Our Greatest Treasure! — Our Greatest Neglect!
Our Greatest Treasure
As one diamond merchant writes: “A rough diamond is an unprocessed, unpolished diamond. Perhaps you have already held a rough diamond in your hand – and not even noticed it. It’s true―in its original form, the king of jewels looks utterly unimpressive. The untrained eye has difficulty recognizing a rough diamond and its authenticity. When unpolished, the precious stones resemble a piece of colorless, cloudy, milky glass, or even a yellowish-brown pebble. Only when cut and polished correctly is its beauty revealed.”
The Holy Eucharist or the Blessed Sacrament, is our greatest Treasure on Earth—because it is GOD HIMSELF, really and truly present under the species of bread, with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. Yet, just was said of the rough, uncut diamond above, the Holy Eucharist “the king of jewels looks utterly unimpressive. The untrained eye has difficulty recognizing a rough diamond and its authenticity. When unpolished, the precious stones resemble a piece of colorless, cloudy, milky glass, or even a yellowish-brown pebble.” Likewise, “Perhaps you have already held a rough diamond in your hand – and not even noticed it” or received the Eucharist on your tongue and not really thought much of It and have been left utterly unimpressed, perhaps even doubting its authenticity! That is the case with most people today—even those who are classified as being “Conservative” or “Traditional” Catholics, never mind the “Modernist” or “Liberal” Catholics! You watch their preparations, their body language, their faces, you note their thanksgiving style and length—and you are left wondering, “Do they realize that they have just received ‘the king of jewels’ or the King of kings?”
The name “diamond” is derived from the ancient Greek “adámas”, meaning “proper”, “unalterable”, “unbreakable”, “untamed”, from “a-” meaning “un-” + “damáō”, “I overpower”, “I tame”. Playing on the Greek word “adámas”—we call Christ the “New Adam”—so you could say Christ is the “New Diamond”! In similar fashion, in creating Adam, you could say God made a “diamond” or the “king of jewels” as in the “king of creation” or “king of all that God created” in the sense of being the “best” of creation. Christ the “Diamond” also fulfills the other meanings of the Greek word for diamond, “adámas”, in that He is “unalterable”, “unbreakable”, who could not be “tamed” by His enemies, but who “overpowered” His enemies and comes to “tame” the world and subject it to His reign.
Another diamond merchant writes: “Diamonds are the most valuable commodity on earth based on dollar value per weight. Some have sold for many times the value of an equivalent weight in gold ― such as the Hancock Red diamond that weighed only 0.95 carat & sold for nearly US$1 million. To put this in perspective, one carat weighs only 0.2 gram ― equivalent to 0.007 ounce (one seven thousandth of an ounce). Thus, this diamond was valued at more than 300,000 times an equal weight in gold!” The Holy Eucharist doesn’t weigh very much, but it outweighs everything else in the world—it even outweighs the weight of the world and all that is in it! Yet, even though we search for gold and diamonds, we rarely search for the Holy Eucharist with the same eagerness and enthusiasm!
Our Lord Belittled! Little Known, Little Thought Of, Little Visited, Little Loved!
The Holy Eucharist is there, among other things, to feed and strengthen our Faith; yet by neglecting to frequently visit, adore and eat this Bread of Heaven, we indirectly weaken our Faith and lose the necessary strength that is required in fighting the apostasy of our times. How much Faith is found today—when most do not attend Mass on regular basis? How much Faith is manifested today—when most Catholics do not even believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist? How much love of God is shown today—when the VAST majority of Catholics cannot even visit God at Mass each Sunday?
Even among those who do assist at Mass regularly—the vast majority are there only on “auto-pilot”—there is no real fervor and burning desire for the Holy Eucharist, it is just something they “have to do” on Sundays and nothing more. There is little or no preparation before Mass—either by praying in the car on the way to Mass, or by arriving early to spend time before Mass with Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, nor any lengthy and fervent thanksgiving after Mass for having received the greatest Treasure we have on Earth! All is automatic, auto-piloted, routine and mechanical—with nowhere near the interest, fervor or excitement that they will manifest on social media, or sitting in front of the earthly tabernacle of the TV or computer or tablet or smartphone screen! Maybe Our Lord needs to change His tactics and go on social media—maybe then more people will visit and “like” and “follow” Him!
We revisit again the words that Sister Lucia wrote in a letter to Fr. Umberto Pasquale: “The decadence which exists in the world is without any doubt the consequence of the lack of the spirit of prayer. Foreseeing this disorientation, the Blessed Virgin recommended recitation of the Rosary with such insistence. And since the Rosary is, after the Holy Eucharistic liturgy, the prayer most apt for preserving Faith in souls, the devil has unchained his struggles against it. Unfortunately, we see the disasters he has caused.”
What Answer Shall We Have?
When we finally die—sooner or later—we shall have to give some answers for the way we have neglected the spiritual in favor of the material! We shall have to give an account for the trivial, vain, and pointless things that we pursued instead of “seeking first the Kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33) and loving God with our whole heart, mind, soul and strength (Mark 12:30). Out of all that we could and should have loved—the Holy Eucharist will be in first place. If Our Lord could say: “Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me! ... Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40, 46). The attitude that we have towards the Holy Eucharist is the attitude we have to Our Lord. If we shall be judged for even a single idle word that we shall have uttered in our life--“I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the Day of Judgment!” (Matthew 12:36)—then how will our idleness towards seeking, visiting, loving, and receiving Jesus in the Holy Eucharist be judged? We shall, of course, put forth plenty of vain excuses, but as Our Lord said: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
We Have Better Things To Do!
Our Lord seeks to know us through the Holy Eucharist—His heavenly marriage and marriage feast with us on this Earth. Yet we neglect to come—we are too busy with other things! Our Lord forewarned of this:
“The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a king [God], who made a marriage for his son [Holy Communion—a union between us and Christ]. And he sent his servants, to call them that were invited to the marriage; and they would not come. Again he sent other servants, saying: ‘Tell them that were invited, “Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my calves and fatlings are killed, and all things are ready: come ye to the marriage!”’ [Come to Mass and Holy Communion]. But they neglected, and went their own ways, one to his farm, and another to his merchandise. And the rest laid hands on his servants, and having treated them contumeliously, put them to death” (Matthew 22:1-6). What is there in this world that we could claim is more important than the Holy Eucharist—in all its forms: the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, Holy Communion, and the abiding presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar? Though in theory we could not come up with anything that is more important, in practice, however, there are thousands of things that show themselves to be more important than Our Lord!
“When one of them that sat at table with Jesus, had heard these things, he said to Him: ‘Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the Kingdom of God!’ But Jesus said to him: ‘A certain man made a great supper, and invited many. And he sent his servant at the hour of supper to say to them that were invited, that they should come, for now all things are ready. And they began all at once to make excuse. The first said to him: “I have bought a farm, and I must needs go out and see it! I pray thee, hold me excused!” And another said: “I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to try them! I pray thee, hold me excused!” And another said: “I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come!” And the servant, returning, told these things to his lord. Then the master of the house, being angry, said to his servant: “Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in hither the poor, and the feeble, and the blind, and the lame!” And the servant said: “Lord, it is done as thou hast commanded, and yet there is room!” And the Lord said to the servant: Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled. But I say unto you, that none of those men that were invited, shall taste of my supper!”’ And there went great multitudes with Jesus. And turning, He said to them: ‘If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple!’” (Luke 14:15-26).
O how far we are from the level that we should be at! If we are told: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30) and if we know that God is present in the Holy Eucharist—in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, in Holy Communion and the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar (almost a ‘trinitarian’ or triple form of presence)—then it stands to reason that you should “love the Lord thy God [in the Holy Eucharist], with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” Yet we don’t! This is why Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “Alas! If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example ― for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito Ecuador).
Millions of Miles and Light Years From Heaven!
We have no problem driving miles and miles for matters that matter little and are little more than vanity! We will drive children to all their secular sports and musical activities; we will drive miles to a store for vain earthly product; we will drive miles to attend social gathering, or to “see the sights”, or visit a museum, an art gallery, a zoo or some such like attraction. Yet when it comes to driving a few miles to visit Our Lord—out of Sunday Mass hours—in the Blessed Sacrament and visit with Him for a while each week, or even a few times a week, then we find ourselves indifferent, unenthused, reluctant, sad, depressed and in frantic search for excuses for not going! It is almost like the above parable about those who were invited to the banquet—which parable, in this case, we could modify and apply to the Holy Eucharist:
Each day Our Lord holds a re-enactment of His “Great Supper”—the Last Supper—as well as a renewal of His Sacrifice on the Cross. He sends His inspirations to most Catholics, that they should come, for all things are ready. And they all begin to make excuses. One says to Him: “I have my daily job to attend to and have no time to go to Mass during the week, nor any time to visit You at some other hour of the day! I pray Thee, hold me excused!” Another says to Him: “I have my children to look after and a house to clean and meals to cook! I don’t have time to go to extra Masses, nor time to visit You in the Blessed Sacrament! I know You’ll understand! I pray Thee, hold me excused!” A third says to Him: “I have to go to school and lots of homework to do. Then I have chores around the house and lots of other things that I want to do! I am sure You understand! I pray Thee, hold me excused!”
And the angels, returning to Lord after trying to inspire these souls, told these things to the Lord. And the Lord, being angry, said to His angels: “If the just and the righteous will not come to Me, then go out into the world and find those who are not just and righteous—those poor in virtue, those of feeble Faith, the spiritually blind and morally lame—and bring them to Me! Go out into the highways and hedges—the haunts of the worldly and sinners—and compel them to come! For I say to you—those who were first invited to My banquet (the just and the righteous) are not worthy and shall not taste My supper, and instead I will make the unworthy worthy. For the first shall be last, and the last shall be first. Many have been called, but few will be chosen!”
A Warped Sense of Values and Righteousness
Perhaps we fail to think about it, or perhaps we have been spiritually blinded by the devil and our pride, but it must be stated that most people have a VERY warped sense of values and wrong estimation of righteousness. This is both proved and summed-up by the following Scriptural verses—the first being from God when speaking through the prophets Isaias and Ezechiel; the other verses coming directly through the words of Our Lord Himself.
Speaking through Isaias and Ezechiel, God bluntly and clearly tells us that He does not value our values very much, and that we do not value what He values: “My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9) … “And the children of Israel say: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Are not my ways right, O house of Israel, and are not rather your ways perverse?” (Ezechiel 18:29). Our ways are way too earthly and way too worldly—which Our Lord “shoots-down” when He says: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also. No man can serve two masters [which is what we try to do]. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Blending Worldliness and Spirituality is like Christ marrying the Devil
“Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
We cannot be spiritual and worldly at the same time—the two ideas are incompatible and mutually exclusive—they are of opposing sets of values. It is an ‘adultery’ of sorts, whereby we profess to love God and the world: “Adulterers! Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world! If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). To which Our Lord adds: “For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Yet, despite all these warnings and admonitions, most Catholics put the material and physical above the spiritual. They prefer the “Bread of the World” to the “Bread of Life”, they can easily sit for hours in front of the tabernacle of the television, computer, tablet or smartphone screen—but feel tortured at having to go to a church and sit before the Blessed Sacrament for a fraction of those many hours spent adoring in front of their electronic screens.
The Holy Eucharist could be compared to a treasure in a field: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in a field [a tabernacle]. Which, a man having found, hid it, and for joy thereof goeth, and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field” (Matthew 13:44). Our Lord could well address to us the very words He addressed to rich young man with many possessions: “And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! Go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow [visit] Me!’ Who being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful―for he had great possessions. And Jesus, looking round about, saith to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the kingdom of God!’” (Mark 10:21-23). We do not ‘follow’ Him—that is to say ‘follow His inspirations’ to visit Him—because, like the rich young man, we have many possessions and many activities, which, in comparison to the Holy Eucharist, are trivial, secondary and unimportant.
Perfect, Proud not Penitent—Applauded, Arrogant but Absent
St. Louis de Montfort, in his True Devotion to Mary, writes: “Our soul, united to our body, has become so carnal that it is called flesh: ‘All flesh having corrupted its way’ (Genesis 6:12). We have nothing for our portion but pride and blindness of spirit, hardness of heart, weakness and inconstancy of soul, concupiscence, revolted passions, and sicknesses in the body. We are naturally prouder than peacocks, more groveling than toads, more vile than unclean animals, more envious than serpents, more gluttonous than hogs, more furious than tigers, lazier than tortoises, weaker than reeds, and more capricious than weathercocks. We have within ourselves nothing but nothingness and sin, and we deserve nothing but the anger of God and everlasting Hell. After this, how can we be astonished if Our Lord has said that whoever wishes to follow Him must renounce himself and hate his own life, and that whosoever shall love his own life shall lose it, and whosoever shall hate it, shall save it? (John 12:25). He who is infinite Wisdom does not give commandments without reason, and He has commanded us to hate ourselves only because we so richly deserve to be hated. Nothing is worthier of love than God, and nothing is worthier of hatred than ourselves!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §79-§80).
Yet most of our love is given to ourselves and those around us, and the least amount of love is given to God—especially God living among us in the Holy Eucharist! We have an inflated and exaggerated sense of our own worthiness, which leaves little room for Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist. Instead of following the philosophy of St. John the Baptist―who said of Jesus: “He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30)―we decrease the time that we should be giving to Our Lord and increase the time dedicated to our own pursuits! We excuse ourselves by patting ourselves on the head and saying that we’re not that bad after all! We tell ourselves that we go to Mass on Sunday, we pray the Rosary, we support the Church, etc.―that we are not like rest of men: fallen-away, sinners, worldly, etc.
Our Lord has something to say about such a ‘righteous’ attitude: “To some who trusted in themselves as just, and despised others [as being unjust], Jesus spoke also this parable: ‘Two men went up into the temple to pray―the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican [extortionate tax collector and collaborator with the invading Romans]. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: “O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes [donate a tenth] of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards heaven; but struck his breast, saying: “O God, be merciful to me a sinner!” I say to you, this man [the Publican] went down into his house justified, rather than the other [the Pharisee]! Because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
Sure, there are people all around us who are worse than we are! Sure, we do many things that others do not do! Sure, we don’t commit the sins that others commit! All of this can tempt us to inflate our true value! As Holy Scripture says: “For who distinguishes thee? Or what hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). As Jesus Himself says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required: and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more” (Luke 12:48). “When you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants! We have done that which we ought to do!’” (Luke 17:10).
All the good that we have done; all the sins that we have avoided; all the virtues that we have acquired; all the good things that we have amassed; all the spiritual progress that we have made; all the perfections that we may have—all of this, to the very last drop and tiniest degree, has all been PRIMARILY the work of God! We have merely been ‘child-like’ cooperators following providential guidance and the graces and inspirations of God (sometimes without even realizing it). We are like the infant who is given a $100 bill to put into the collection basket at Mass―and the egotistical child will take pride in doing so, wrongly imagine that it is his own money, not his father’s, that he puts into the basket. We are like a student that answers a question correctly only with a multitude of prompts and clues and help of the teacher—and then we proudly think that WE DID IT! We are quick to exaggerate the good that we do and quick to exaggerate the evil other people do. We elevate our good works, while depreciating the good works of others. We are as blind as bats when it comes to our own sins, but we have the “eye of an eagle” when it comes to the sins of others. We excuse ourselves in everything, but excuse others in nothing!
Our Lord says of this attitude: “Why seest thou the splinter that is in thy brother’s eye; and seest not the plank that is in thy own eye? Or how sayest thou to thy brother: ‘Let me cast the splinter out of thy eye!’ ― and behold a plank is in thy own eye? Thou hypocrite! Cast out first the plank from thy own eye, and then shalt thou see to cast out the splinter from thy brother’s eye!” (Matthew 7:3-5). In effect, we easily slide into the attitude of the Pharisee, who said: “O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men!” Notice here that the Pharisee is not attributing his goodness to himself, but to God--“O God, I GIVE THEE THANKS that I am not as the rest of men!” Yet this was unacceptable to God! He lacked compassion and mercy for those “rest of men” who were ‘beneath’ him. In Our Lord’s parable, the Pharisee did not grasp the message and point of the Redemption! Our Lord says: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost! … I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … Go then and learn what this meaneth―‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice’!―For I am not come to call the just, but sinners!” (Luke 19:10; 5:32; Matthew 9:13).
Learning From the Eucharist
All of the above is taught and learnt in the school of the Holy Eucharist. Holy Scripture tells us that “The Lord is gracious and merciful―patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all―and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). This truth is epitomized in the Holy Eucharist, which is, first and foremost, an act of mercy—the merciful Sacrifice of Our Lord on Calvary, repeated each time the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is offered. “Christ died for our sins” (1 Corinthians 15:3). “Christ died once for our sins, the just for the unjust: that He might offer us to God” (1 Peter 3:18)—and that one sacrifice on Calvary is perpetuated by the Sacrifice of the Mass.
Within that Sacrifice of the Mass, the Holy Eucharist is ‘created’ as a sweet and merciful nourishment for us sinners―“O taste, and see that the Lord is sweet! … The Lord is sweet and righteous―therefore He will give a law to sinners in the way!” (Psalm 33:9; 24:8). “Whosoever is a little one, let him come to Me!” (Proverbs 9:4)—whether it be “little” in knowledge, “little” by way of love, or “little” in virtue--“Incline your ear and come to Me! Hear and your soul shall live!” (Isaias 55:3). Yet there are many who will not come to Him--“And you will not come to Me that you may have life! … Jesus stood and cried, saying: ‘If any man thirst, let him come to Me, and drink!’” (John 5:40; 7:37) “Come to Me, all you that labor, and are burdened, and I will refresh you!” (Matthew 11:28).
Eucharistic Prison
In the presence of Holy Eucharist we shall learn detachment from this world in the company of Our Lord and in the spirit of Our Lord. Through His manner of presence in the Holy Eucharist, Our Lord gives an example of silence and solitude—He is not “out and about”, but “locked-away”, “closed-in”, almost “jailed” under lock and key in a tiny little tabernacle akin to ‘solitary confinement’ and ‘seclusion’—a “prisoner of love” as some saints call Him. Waiting in His ‘prison of love’ for loving visitors to come and spend some ‘time’ with Him—away from the world! He calls us to His prison—like He called Peter and had him put prison, St. Paul was put in prison, St. John the Baptist was put in prison, most of the Apostles spent time in prison, the early Christians spent time in prison, the three children of Fatima spent time in prison, and hundreds of thousands of other Christians over the centuries have ‘shared prison’ with Our Lord and counted it a great grace to be separated from the world. The Desert Fathers created their own ‘prison’ in the desert—living in solitude like Our Lord in the tabernacle. All of this is a wonderful lesson in detachment from the world—which is an ESSENTIAL step that EVERYONE must go through if they want to get to Heaven. Any classic book on the spiritual life will tell you this—unless you prefer to read the sickly-sweet spiritual books of Crossless Cotton-Candy Catholics. If souls refuse to undergo this detachment from the world, then there only remains the solitary confinement of Purgatory as a life-saving (or soul-saving) grace to make up for what they refused to do on Earth.
Eucharistic Furnace
Additionally, the Holy Eucharist is a “furnace of love”—as manifested by the Sacred and Eucharistic Heart of Jesus to St. Margaret-Mary. Margaret, from her earliest years, lived a penitential life exhibiting an extraordinary devotion to the Blessed Sacrament. The First Apparition of the Sacred Heart was on December 27th, 1673, the Feast of St. John the Evangelist, while she was in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. Our Lord reveals the fire of His love, saying: “My Divine Heart is so inflamed with love for men, that, being unable any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its burning Charity, It needs to spread them abroad and manifest Itself to mankind, in order to enrich them with the precious graces of sanctification and salvation necessary to withdraw them from the abyss of perdition.”
On June 16th, 1675, during the octave of Corpus Christi, while St. Margaret was close to the choir grate, Our Lord appeared to her upon the Altar, saying: “Behold the Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming Itself, in order to testify Its love; and in return, I receive from the greater part only ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what I feel most keenly is that it is hearts which are consecrated to Me, that treat Me thus ... I come into the heart I have given you in order that through your fervor you may atone for the offenses which I have received from lukewarm and slothful hearts that dishonor me in the Blessed Sacrament … Therefore, I ask of you that the Friday after the Octave of Corpus Christi be set apart for a special Feast to honor My Heart, by communicating on that day, and making reparation to It by a solemn act, in order to make amends for the indignities which It has received during the time It has been exposed on the altars. I promise you that My Heart shall expand Itself to shed in abundance the influence of Its Divine Love upon those who shall thus honor It, and cause It to be honored.”
Our Lord had St. Margaret ask that a Feast in honor of His Heart be offered Him by the Church on the Friday after the Solemnity of His Body and Blood (Corpus Christi). Sister Margaret-Mary would console Jesus and by her love, and make reparation for the tepidness of other religious. Jesus asked her to come before the tabernacle an hour before midnight every first Thursday of the month and keep Him company while lying prostrate on the floor. The next day, He said, she was to receive Holy Communion in reparation for the lukewarmness of the whole Catholic world.
As one diamond merchant writes: “A rough diamond is an unprocessed, unpolished diamond. Perhaps you have already held a rough diamond in your hand – and not even noticed it. It’s true―in its original form, the king of jewels looks utterly unimpressive. The untrained eye has difficulty recognizing a rough diamond and its authenticity. When unpolished, the precious stones resemble a piece of colorless, cloudy, milky glass, or even a yellowish-brown pebble. Only when cut and polished correctly is its beauty revealed.”
The Holy Eucharist or the Blessed Sacrament, is our greatest Treasure on Earth—because it is GOD HIMSELF, really and truly present under the species of bread, with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. Yet, just was said of the rough, uncut diamond above, the Holy Eucharist “the king of jewels looks utterly unimpressive. The untrained eye has difficulty recognizing a rough diamond and its authenticity. When unpolished, the precious stones resemble a piece of colorless, cloudy, milky glass, or even a yellowish-brown pebble.” Likewise, “Perhaps you have already held a rough diamond in your hand – and not even noticed it” or received the Eucharist on your tongue and not really thought much of It and have been left utterly unimpressed, perhaps even doubting its authenticity! That is the case with most people today—even those who are classified as being “Conservative” or “Traditional” Catholics, never mind the “Modernist” or “Liberal” Catholics! You watch their preparations, their body language, their faces, you note their thanksgiving style and length—and you are left wondering, “Do they realize that they have just received ‘the king of jewels’ or the King of kings?”
The name “diamond” is derived from the ancient Greek “adámas”, meaning “proper”, “unalterable”, “unbreakable”, “untamed”, from “a-” meaning “un-” + “damáō”, “I overpower”, “I tame”. Playing on the Greek word “adámas”—we call Christ the “New Adam”—so you could say Christ is the “New Diamond”! In similar fashion, in creating Adam, you could say God made a “diamond” or the “king of jewels” as in the “king of creation” or “king of all that God created” in the sense of being the “best” of creation. Christ the “Diamond” also fulfills the other meanings of the Greek word for diamond, “adámas”, in that He is “unalterable”, “unbreakable”, who could not be “tamed” by His enemies, but who “overpowered” His enemies and comes to “tame” the world and subject it to His reign.
Another diamond merchant writes: “Diamonds are the most valuable commodity on earth based on dollar value per weight. Some have sold for many times the value of an equivalent weight in gold ― such as the Hancock Red diamond that weighed only 0.95 carat & sold for nearly US$1 million. To put this in perspective, one carat weighs only 0.2 gram ― equivalent to 0.007 ounce (one seven thousandth of an ounce). Thus, this diamond was valued at more than 300,000 times an equal weight in gold!” The Holy Eucharist doesn’t weigh very much, but it outweighs everything else in the world—it even outweighs the weight of the world and all that is in it! Yet, even though we search for gold and diamonds, we rarely search for the Holy Eucharist with the same eagerness and enthusiasm!
Our Lord Belittled! Little Known, Little Thought Of, Little Visited, Little Loved!
The Holy Eucharist is there, among other things, to feed and strengthen our Faith; yet by neglecting to frequently visit, adore and eat this Bread of Heaven, we indirectly weaken our Faith and lose the necessary strength that is required in fighting the apostasy of our times. How much Faith is found today—when most do not attend Mass on regular basis? How much Faith is manifested today—when most Catholics do not even believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist? How much love of God is shown today—when the VAST majority of Catholics cannot even visit God at Mass each Sunday?
Even among those who do assist at Mass regularly—the vast majority are there only on “auto-pilot”—there is no real fervor and burning desire for the Holy Eucharist, it is just something they “have to do” on Sundays and nothing more. There is little or no preparation before Mass—either by praying in the car on the way to Mass, or by arriving early to spend time before Mass with Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, nor any lengthy and fervent thanksgiving after Mass for having received the greatest Treasure we have on Earth! All is automatic, auto-piloted, routine and mechanical—with nowhere near the interest, fervor or excitement that they will manifest on social media, or sitting in front of the earthly tabernacle of the TV or computer or tablet or smartphone screen! Maybe Our Lord needs to change His tactics and go on social media—maybe then more people will visit and “like” and “follow” Him!
We revisit again the words that Sister Lucia wrote in a letter to Fr. Umberto Pasquale: “The decadence which exists in the world is without any doubt the consequence of the lack of the spirit of prayer. Foreseeing this disorientation, the Blessed Virgin recommended recitation of the Rosary with such insistence. And since the Rosary is, after the Holy Eucharistic liturgy, the prayer most apt for preserving Faith in souls, the devil has unchained his struggles against it. Unfortunately, we see the disasters he has caused.”
What Answer Shall We Have?
When we finally die—sooner or later—we shall have to give some answers for the way we have neglected the spiritual in favor of the material! We shall have to give an account for the trivial, vain, and pointless things that we pursued instead of “seeking first the Kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33) and loving God with our whole heart, mind, soul and strength (Mark 12:30). Out of all that we could and should have loved—the Holy Eucharist will be in first place. If Our Lord could say: “Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me! ... Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40, 46). The attitude that we have towards the Holy Eucharist is the attitude we have to Our Lord. If we shall be judged for even a single idle word that we shall have uttered in our life--“I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the Day of Judgment!” (Matthew 12:36)—then how will our idleness towards seeking, visiting, loving, and receiving Jesus in the Holy Eucharist be judged? We shall, of course, put forth plenty of vain excuses, but as Our Lord said: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
We Have Better Things To Do!
Our Lord seeks to know us through the Holy Eucharist—His heavenly marriage and marriage feast with us on this Earth. Yet we neglect to come—we are too busy with other things! Our Lord forewarned of this:
“The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a king [God], who made a marriage for his son [Holy Communion—a union between us and Christ]. And he sent his servants, to call them that were invited to the marriage; and they would not come. Again he sent other servants, saying: ‘Tell them that were invited, “Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my calves and fatlings are killed, and all things are ready: come ye to the marriage!”’ [Come to Mass and Holy Communion]. But they neglected, and went their own ways, one to his farm, and another to his merchandise. And the rest laid hands on his servants, and having treated them contumeliously, put them to death” (Matthew 22:1-6). What is there in this world that we could claim is more important than the Holy Eucharist—in all its forms: the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, Holy Communion, and the abiding presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar? Though in theory we could not come up with anything that is more important, in practice, however, there are thousands of things that show themselves to be more important than Our Lord!
“When one of them that sat at table with Jesus, had heard these things, he said to Him: ‘Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the Kingdom of God!’ But Jesus said to him: ‘A certain man made a great supper, and invited many. And he sent his servant at the hour of supper to say to them that were invited, that they should come, for now all things are ready. And they began all at once to make excuse. The first said to him: “I have bought a farm, and I must needs go out and see it! I pray thee, hold me excused!” And another said: “I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to try them! I pray thee, hold me excused!” And another said: “I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come!” And the servant, returning, told these things to his lord. Then the master of the house, being angry, said to his servant: “Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in hither the poor, and the feeble, and the blind, and the lame!” And the servant said: “Lord, it is done as thou hast commanded, and yet there is room!” And the Lord said to the servant: Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled. But I say unto you, that none of those men that were invited, shall taste of my supper!”’ And there went great multitudes with Jesus. And turning, He said to them: ‘If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple!’” (Luke 14:15-26).
O how far we are from the level that we should be at! If we are told: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30) and if we know that God is present in the Holy Eucharist—in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, in Holy Communion and the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar (almost a ‘trinitarian’ or triple form of presence)—then it stands to reason that you should “love the Lord thy God [in the Holy Eucharist], with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” Yet we don’t! This is why Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “Alas! If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example ― for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito Ecuador).
Millions of Miles and Light Years From Heaven!
We have no problem driving miles and miles for matters that matter little and are little more than vanity! We will drive children to all their secular sports and musical activities; we will drive miles to a store for vain earthly product; we will drive miles to attend social gathering, or to “see the sights”, or visit a museum, an art gallery, a zoo or some such like attraction. Yet when it comes to driving a few miles to visit Our Lord—out of Sunday Mass hours—in the Blessed Sacrament and visit with Him for a while each week, or even a few times a week, then we find ourselves indifferent, unenthused, reluctant, sad, depressed and in frantic search for excuses for not going! It is almost like the above parable about those who were invited to the banquet—which parable, in this case, we could modify and apply to the Holy Eucharist:
Each day Our Lord holds a re-enactment of His “Great Supper”—the Last Supper—as well as a renewal of His Sacrifice on the Cross. He sends His inspirations to most Catholics, that they should come, for all things are ready. And they all begin to make excuses. One says to Him: “I have my daily job to attend to and have no time to go to Mass during the week, nor any time to visit You at some other hour of the day! I pray Thee, hold me excused!” Another says to Him: “I have my children to look after and a house to clean and meals to cook! I don’t have time to go to extra Masses, nor time to visit You in the Blessed Sacrament! I know You’ll understand! I pray Thee, hold me excused!” A third says to Him: “I have to go to school and lots of homework to do. Then I have chores around the house and lots of other things that I want to do! I am sure You understand! I pray Thee, hold me excused!”
And the angels, returning to Lord after trying to inspire these souls, told these things to the Lord. And the Lord, being angry, said to His angels: “If the just and the righteous will not come to Me, then go out into the world and find those who are not just and righteous—those poor in virtue, those of feeble Faith, the spiritually blind and morally lame—and bring them to Me! Go out into the highways and hedges—the haunts of the worldly and sinners—and compel them to come! For I say to you—those who were first invited to My banquet (the just and the righteous) are not worthy and shall not taste My supper, and instead I will make the unworthy worthy. For the first shall be last, and the last shall be first. Many have been called, but few will be chosen!”
A Warped Sense of Values and Righteousness
Perhaps we fail to think about it, or perhaps we have been spiritually blinded by the devil and our pride, but it must be stated that most people have a VERY warped sense of values and wrong estimation of righteousness. This is both proved and summed-up by the following Scriptural verses—the first being from God when speaking through the prophets Isaias and Ezechiel; the other verses coming directly through the words of Our Lord Himself.
Speaking through Isaias and Ezechiel, God bluntly and clearly tells us that He does not value our values very much, and that we do not value what He values: “My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9) … “And the children of Israel say: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Are not my ways right, O house of Israel, and are not rather your ways perverse?” (Ezechiel 18:29). Our ways are way too earthly and way too worldly—which Our Lord “shoots-down” when He says: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also. No man can serve two masters [which is what we try to do]. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Blending Worldliness and Spirituality is like Christ marrying the Devil
“Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
We cannot be spiritual and worldly at the same time—the two ideas are incompatible and mutually exclusive—they are of opposing sets of values. It is an ‘adultery’ of sorts, whereby we profess to love God and the world: “Adulterers! Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world! If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). To which Our Lord adds: “For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Yet, despite all these warnings and admonitions, most Catholics put the material and physical above the spiritual. They prefer the “Bread of the World” to the “Bread of Life”, they can easily sit for hours in front of the tabernacle of the television, computer, tablet or smartphone screen—but feel tortured at having to go to a church and sit before the Blessed Sacrament for a fraction of those many hours spent adoring in front of their electronic screens.
The Holy Eucharist could be compared to a treasure in a field: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in a field [a tabernacle]. Which, a man having found, hid it, and for joy thereof goeth, and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field” (Matthew 13:44). Our Lord could well address to us the very words He addressed to rich young man with many possessions: “And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! Go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow [visit] Me!’ Who being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful―for he had great possessions. And Jesus, looking round about, saith to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the kingdom of God!’” (Mark 10:21-23). We do not ‘follow’ Him—that is to say ‘follow His inspirations’ to visit Him—because, like the rich young man, we have many possessions and many activities, which, in comparison to the Holy Eucharist, are trivial, secondary and unimportant.
Perfect, Proud not Penitent—Applauded, Arrogant but Absent
St. Louis de Montfort, in his True Devotion to Mary, writes: “Our soul, united to our body, has become so carnal that it is called flesh: ‘All flesh having corrupted its way’ (Genesis 6:12). We have nothing for our portion but pride and blindness of spirit, hardness of heart, weakness and inconstancy of soul, concupiscence, revolted passions, and sicknesses in the body. We are naturally prouder than peacocks, more groveling than toads, more vile than unclean animals, more envious than serpents, more gluttonous than hogs, more furious than tigers, lazier than tortoises, weaker than reeds, and more capricious than weathercocks. We have within ourselves nothing but nothingness and sin, and we deserve nothing but the anger of God and everlasting Hell. After this, how can we be astonished if Our Lord has said that whoever wishes to follow Him must renounce himself and hate his own life, and that whosoever shall love his own life shall lose it, and whosoever shall hate it, shall save it? (John 12:25). He who is infinite Wisdom does not give commandments without reason, and He has commanded us to hate ourselves only because we so richly deserve to be hated. Nothing is worthier of love than God, and nothing is worthier of hatred than ourselves!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §79-§80).
Yet most of our love is given to ourselves and those around us, and the least amount of love is given to God—especially God living among us in the Holy Eucharist! We have an inflated and exaggerated sense of our own worthiness, which leaves little room for Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist. Instead of following the philosophy of St. John the Baptist―who said of Jesus: “He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30)―we decrease the time that we should be giving to Our Lord and increase the time dedicated to our own pursuits! We excuse ourselves by patting ourselves on the head and saying that we’re not that bad after all! We tell ourselves that we go to Mass on Sunday, we pray the Rosary, we support the Church, etc.―that we are not like rest of men: fallen-away, sinners, worldly, etc.
Our Lord has something to say about such a ‘righteous’ attitude: “To some who trusted in themselves as just, and despised others [as being unjust], Jesus spoke also this parable: ‘Two men went up into the temple to pray―the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican [extortionate tax collector and collaborator with the invading Romans]. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: “O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes [donate a tenth] of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards heaven; but struck his breast, saying: “O God, be merciful to me a sinner!” I say to you, this man [the Publican] went down into his house justified, rather than the other [the Pharisee]! Because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
Sure, there are people all around us who are worse than we are! Sure, we do many things that others do not do! Sure, we don’t commit the sins that others commit! All of this can tempt us to inflate our true value! As Holy Scripture says: “For who distinguishes thee? Or what hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). As Jesus Himself says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required: and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more” (Luke 12:48). “When you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants! We have done that which we ought to do!’” (Luke 17:10).
All the good that we have done; all the sins that we have avoided; all the virtues that we have acquired; all the good things that we have amassed; all the spiritual progress that we have made; all the perfections that we may have—all of this, to the very last drop and tiniest degree, has all been PRIMARILY the work of God! We have merely been ‘child-like’ cooperators following providential guidance and the graces and inspirations of God (sometimes without even realizing it). We are like the infant who is given a $100 bill to put into the collection basket at Mass―and the egotistical child will take pride in doing so, wrongly imagine that it is his own money, not his father’s, that he puts into the basket. We are like a student that answers a question correctly only with a multitude of prompts and clues and help of the teacher—and then we proudly think that WE DID IT! We are quick to exaggerate the good that we do and quick to exaggerate the evil other people do. We elevate our good works, while depreciating the good works of others. We are as blind as bats when it comes to our own sins, but we have the “eye of an eagle” when it comes to the sins of others. We excuse ourselves in everything, but excuse others in nothing!
Our Lord says of this attitude: “Why seest thou the splinter that is in thy brother’s eye; and seest not the plank that is in thy own eye? Or how sayest thou to thy brother: ‘Let me cast the splinter out of thy eye!’ ― and behold a plank is in thy own eye? Thou hypocrite! Cast out first the plank from thy own eye, and then shalt thou see to cast out the splinter from thy brother’s eye!” (Matthew 7:3-5). In effect, we easily slide into the attitude of the Pharisee, who said: “O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men!” Notice here that the Pharisee is not attributing his goodness to himself, but to God--“O God, I GIVE THEE THANKS that I am not as the rest of men!” Yet this was unacceptable to God! He lacked compassion and mercy for those “rest of men” who were ‘beneath’ him. In Our Lord’s parable, the Pharisee did not grasp the message and point of the Redemption! Our Lord says: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost! … I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … Go then and learn what this meaneth―‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice’!―For I am not come to call the just, but sinners!” (Luke 19:10; 5:32; Matthew 9:13).
Learning From the Eucharist
All of the above is taught and learnt in the school of the Holy Eucharist. Holy Scripture tells us that “The Lord is gracious and merciful―patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all―and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). This truth is epitomized in the Holy Eucharist, which is, first and foremost, an act of mercy—the merciful Sacrifice of Our Lord on Calvary, repeated each time the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is offered. “Christ died for our sins” (1 Corinthians 15:3). “Christ died once for our sins, the just for the unjust: that He might offer us to God” (1 Peter 3:18)—and that one sacrifice on Calvary is perpetuated by the Sacrifice of the Mass.
Within that Sacrifice of the Mass, the Holy Eucharist is ‘created’ as a sweet and merciful nourishment for us sinners―“O taste, and see that the Lord is sweet! … The Lord is sweet and righteous―therefore He will give a law to sinners in the way!” (Psalm 33:9; 24:8). “Whosoever is a little one, let him come to Me!” (Proverbs 9:4)—whether it be “little” in knowledge, “little” by way of love, or “little” in virtue--“Incline your ear and come to Me! Hear and your soul shall live!” (Isaias 55:3). Yet there are many who will not come to Him--“And you will not come to Me that you may have life! … Jesus stood and cried, saying: ‘If any man thirst, let him come to Me, and drink!’” (John 5:40; 7:37) “Come to Me, all you that labor, and are burdened, and I will refresh you!” (Matthew 11:28).
Eucharistic Prison
In the presence of Holy Eucharist we shall learn detachment from this world in the company of Our Lord and in the spirit of Our Lord. Through His manner of presence in the Holy Eucharist, Our Lord gives an example of silence and solitude—He is not “out and about”, but “locked-away”, “closed-in”, almost “jailed” under lock and key in a tiny little tabernacle akin to ‘solitary confinement’ and ‘seclusion’—a “prisoner of love” as some saints call Him. Waiting in His ‘prison of love’ for loving visitors to come and spend some ‘time’ with Him—away from the world! He calls us to His prison—like He called Peter and had him put prison, St. Paul was put in prison, St. John the Baptist was put in prison, most of the Apostles spent time in prison, the early Christians spent time in prison, the three children of Fatima spent time in prison, and hundreds of thousands of other Christians over the centuries have ‘shared prison’ with Our Lord and counted it a great grace to be separated from the world. The Desert Fathers created their own ‘prison’ in the desert—living in solitude like Our Lord in the tabernacle. All of this is a wonderful lesson in detachment from the world—which is an ESSENTIAL step that EVERYONE must go through if they want to get to Heaven. Any classic book on the spiritual life will tell you this—unless you prefer to read the sickly-sweet spiritual books of Crossless Cotton-Candy Catholics. If souls refuse to undergo this detachment from the world, then there only remains the solitary confinement of Purgatory as a life-saving (or soul-saving) grace to make up for what they refused to do on Earth.
Eucharistic Furnace
Additionally, the Holy Eucharist is a “furnace of love”—as manifested by the Sacred and Eucharistic Heart of Jesus to St. Margaret-Mary. Margaret, from her earliest years, lived a penitential life exhibiting an extraordinary devotion to the Blessed Sacrament. The First Apparition of the Sacred Heart was on December 27th, 1673, the Feast of St. John the Evangelist, while she was in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. Our Lord reveals the fire of His love, saying: “My Divine Heart is so inflamed with love for men, that, being unable any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its burning Charity, It needs to spread them abroad and manifest Itself to mankind, in order to enrich them with the precious graces of sanctification and salvation necessary to withdraw them from the abyss of perdition.”
On June 16th, 1675, during the octave of Corpus Christi, while St. Margaret was close to the choir grate, Our Lord appeared to her upon the Altar, saying: “Behold the Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming Itself, in order to testify Its love; and in return, I receive from the greater part only ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what I feel most keenly is that it is hearts which are consecrated to Me, that treat Me thus ... I come into the heart I have given you in order that through your fervor you may atone for the offenses which I have received from lukewarm and slothful hearts that dishonor me in the Blessed Sacrament … Therefore, I ask of you that the Friday after the Octave of Corpus Christi be set apart for a special Feast to honor My Heart, by communicating on that day, and making reparation to It by a solemn act, in order to make amends for the indignities which It has received during the time It has been exposed on the altars. I promise you that My Heart shall expand Itself to shed in abundance the influence of Its Divine Love upon those who shall thus honor It, and cause It to be honored.”
Our Lord had St. Margaret ask that a Feast in honor of His Heart be offered Him by the Church on the Friday after the Solemnity of His Body and Blood (Corpus Christi). Sister Margaret-Mary would console Jesus and by her love, and make reparation for the tepidness of other religious. Jesus asked her to come before the tabernacle an hour before midnight every first Thursday of the month and keep Him company while lying prostrate on the floor. The next day, He said, she was to receive Holy Communion in reparation for the lukewarmness of the whole Catholic world.
Article 39
Tuesday, May 28th
Getting Ready for Corpus Christi
Tuesday, May 28th
Getting Ready for Corpus Christi
The Greatest Treasure
We hope that you are making some time to prepare for the Feast of Corpus Christi―which celebrates the Holy Eucharist. This year, the feast falls on Thursday May 30th. There are increasing numbers of Catholics who are refusing to believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. Many think of the Eucharist as a mere symbol of Christ, and look upon the Mass as a mere commemoration of the Last Supper, and not the Sacrifice that it really and truly is! What an offense this must be to Our Lord! If already, in the more believing day of St. Margaret Mary (in the 1600’s) Our Lord appeared to her and complained about the lack of love and devotion shown to Him—what would He have to say about our times?
Greatest Neglect
The Holy Eucharist is our “Greatest Treasure” and at the same time it is the modern era’s “Greatest Neglect.” It is impossible to identify the Holy Eucharist too closely with Jesus Christ. We should remember He is in the Holy Eucharist not merely with His substance. Some may say: “Transubstantiation means that the substance of bread and wine become the substance of Jesus Christ.”
No, it is not just an academic definition or philosophical explanation that is relegated to the memory banks of our mind—a cerebral thing. Transubstantiation means the substance of bread and wine are no longer there. The substance of bread and wine is replaced not only by the substance of Christ’s Body and Blood. What replaces the substance of bread and wine is Jesus Christ! Everything that makes Him Christ, replaces what had been the substance of bread and wine. The substance of bread and wine become the whole Christ—that is what we mean by “Body, Soul, Blood and Divinity”—the whole Christ.
Living Heart
Therefore, Christ in the Holy Eucharist is here with His human heart and His Sacred Heart. Is it a living heart? Yes! This is seen in the Miracles of Lanciano and Buenos Aires. This is also why the revelations Our Lord made to St. Margaret Mary about promoting devotion to the Sacred Heart were all made from the Holy Eucharist.
Why do we equate the Sacred Heart with the Holy Eucharist? Because the Holy Eucharist is the whole Christ with His human heart. According to St. Margaret Mary, the Sacred Heart is the Holy Eucharist. So it follows that devotion to the Sacred Heart is devotion to the Holy Eucharist. It is infinite Love Incarnate living in our midst in the Blessed Sacrament. When we receive the Holy Eucharist, we receive the living Christ—total, entire, living!
If Jesus causes the Host to become what science has identified as a human heart—and especially a muscle of the heart that is responsible for the contraction of a human heart, a heart that suffers like that of someone who has been beaten severely about the chest—if He does such things, it is in order to arouse and enliven our Faith in His Real Presence in the Holy Eucharist. He thus enables us to see that Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a re-presentation (i.e. a making present once again) of the entire drama of our salvation: namely, Christ’s Passion and Death on Calvary, but now in an unbloody manner in the Sacrifice of the Mass.
Signs-a-Plenty
Jesus says to His disciples: “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will not believe” (John 4:48). There is no need to actively seek out wondrous signs. But if Jesus chooses to give them to us, then we ought to accept them with meekness and humility in Faith, seeking to understand what He desires to tell us by them. Thanks to these signs, many people have discovered Faith in God—the One God in the Holy Trinity, Who reveals His Son to us: Jesus Christ, Who abides in the tabernacles of the world, Who worked through the Sacraments and Who teaches us through Holy Scripture, Tradition and the Magisterium of the Catholic Church—the triple cord of our Faith, of which Scripture says: “a threefold cord is not easily broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:12).
Miracles Seekers Are Often Blind
We have the “Greatest Treasure” staring us in the face, yet we run around trying to fill our minds and hearts with lesser spiritual treasures. We run after apparitions, we study prophecies, we delight over relics, we travel to holy sites where Our Lady or Our Lord might have appeared once, twice or a few times—but the place where Our Lord appears every day, which is the Altar upon which Mass is said, we often leave neglected and we place it way down in our rankings of holy places and things to see and visit. The Imitation of Christ puts it thus:
“Many people travel far to honor the relics of the saints, marveling at their wonderful deeds and at the building of magnificent shrines. They gaze upon and kiss the sacred relics encased in silk and gold; and behold, You are here present before me on the Altar, my God, Saint of saints, Creator of men, and Lord of angels! Often in looking at such things, men are moved by curiosity, by the novelty of the unseen, and they bear away little fruit for the amendment of their lives, especially when they go from place to place lightly and without true contrition. But here in the Sacrament of the Altar You are wholly present, my God, the man Christ Jesus, whence is obtained the full realization of eternal salvation, as often as You are worthily and devoutly received.”
A Mystery that Surpasses our Understanding
The Holy Eucharist—the actual presence of the risen person of Jesus under the appearances of bread and wine—is one of the most important and most difficult truths, revealed to us by Christ. Eucharistic miracles are merely visible confirmations of what He tells us about Himself; namely, that He really does give us His glorified Body and Blood as spiritual food and drink.
Jesus established the Eucharist on the eve of His Passion and Death. During the Last Supper, “Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke: and gave to His disciples, and said: ‘Take ye, and eat. This is My Body.’ And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave to them, saying: ‘Drink ye all of this. For this is My Blood of the new testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins’” (Matthew 26:26-28). When Jesus took and gave the Apostles the bread and wine, He said, “this is My Body….this is My Blood” by which He clearly meant that the bread and wine, which He gave them to eat and drink, really was His Body and Blood, and not some sort of symbol.
Jesus’ Eucharistic Sermon Shocks
Earlier, in the famous Eucharistic sermon recorded by St. John the Evangelist, Jesus said to the Jews: “Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, has everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day. For My Flesh is meat indeed: and My Blood is drink indeed. He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, abides in Me, and I in him’” (John 6:54-57).
Shocked by Jesus’ words, the Jews said, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?” (John 6:53). Many of Jesus’ disciples were also scandalized. “This saying is hard, and who can hear it?” they objected. Knowing that the truth of the Eucharist was a shock and a scandal to many of His listeners, Jesus responded, not by retracting His words, but by raising the stakes: “Does this scandalize you? The words that I have spoken to you, are spirit and life!” (John 6: 62-63). Many refused to believe Him: “After this many of His disciples went back; and walked no more with Him” (John 6:67).
Today, we see a repeat of both the incredulity and disbelief in the Real Presence—with anywhere from 65% to 80% of Catholics no longer believing that Jesus is present in the Holy Eucharist—as well as a repeat of “many walked no more with Him”—as only around 20% to 25% come to Mass regularly on Sundays, for the rest it ends up being a Sinday.
Jesus Throws Down the Gauntlet
Our Lord throws down the gauntlet of Faith before His Apostles, as He does before us: “Then Jesus said to the Twelve: Will you also go away?” (John 6:68). St. Peter replies for them, and for us, with words of Faith—not understanding but believing nevertheless—“Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we have believed and have known, that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God.” Here Jesus goes to the heart of the mystery, the “Eucharistic Heart” of the mystery and that “Eucharistic Heart” we still have with us in our tabernacles! But though Jesus is really in the tabernacle, is Faith really in our hearts?
Not all Jesus’ listeners accepted His teaching of the Eucharist. Thus He turned to them, saying, “ ‘But there are some of you that believe not!’ Jesus knew from the beginning the ones who would not believe and the one who would betray Him” (John 6:65). Judas’ betrayal began with his rejection of Jesus’ teaching about His real presence in the Eucharist. In confirmation of this fact, Jesus said, “‘Have not I chosen you Twelve? And one of you is a devil!’ Now He meant Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon―for this same was about to betray Him, whereas he was one of the Twelve.” (John 6:71-72).
Lack of Faith Today
How many today have not betrayed their Faith in Christ by refusing to believe in His Real Presence—Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity—in the Holy Eucharist? How many refuse to believe that the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is more than just a commemoration of the Last Supper, but is also, and more importantly, the unbloody re-offering of Jesus Christ’s Sacrifice on Calvary—in a way, a kind prolongation of that Sacrifice of Calvary through time.
The Eucharist is our Pillar of Faith. It is our strengthener and comfort in these increasingly evil days. The Eucharist is the Risen Jesus Himself in His glorified, and thus invisible, humanity. This is the essence of His teaching of the Eucharist (John 6:62-63). By its death and resurrection, the humanity of Jesus takes on a divine nature; it assumes a new order of existence: “For in Him dwells the whole fullness of the deity, bodily” (Colossians 2:9). In His glorified humanity, the Risen Jesus, becoming omnipresent, gives of Himself in the gift of the Eucharist. He shares with us, not only His life of suffering, but also His resurrected life and divine love, so that we may, even here on Earth, experience the reality of Heaven and partake of the life of the Holy Trinity.
Your Transubstantiation
He wishes to work a ‘transubstantiation’ of sorts in our minds and hearts—as He changes the Bread and Wine into Himself, so too does He wish to change us Body and Soul into Himself. He wants to change the worldly substance of our minds into a heavenly substance. Like He said to so many people while He walked upon this Earth: “Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?” (Matthew 9:28). We have to reply with the leper: “Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst!” (Luke 5:11). Confronting the mystery of the Eucharist, human reason feels its impotence and limitations. Yet St. Cyril of Jerusalem exhorts us: “Do not see in the bread and wine merely natural elements, because the Lord has expressly said that they are His Body and His Blood: Faith assures you of this, even though your senses suggest otherwise.”
Visiting His Temple, Delighting in the Lord
“One thing I have asked of the Lord, this will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life. That I may see the delight of the Lord, and may visit His temple” (Psalms 26:4). How many souls could truthfully say these words today? The houses of the Lord—the churches—are empty for most, if not all, the day. Few “see the delight of the Lord”—the Holy Eucharist—and “visit His temple”, the tabernacle.
Some souls might spend time in front of the Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, and pride themselves upon it―but why do they not encourage and work ‘tooth-and-nail’ to try get others to do likewise, instead of just priding themselves upon their practices of piety. This smacks of the Pharisee, condemned by Our Lord in His parable of the Pharisee and the Publican, who self-righteously boasts: “And when ye pray, you shall not be as the hypocrites, that love to stand and pray in the synagogues and corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men” (Matthew 6:5). “Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men―extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!’” (Luke 18:10-12).
Modern Day Pharisaical Boast
Today, the boast might be—“I go to Sunday Mass, whereas most Catholics no longer do! I say my Rosary every day, whereas 96% of Catholics do not!” Yet, to whom more is given, more is expected! We should not be comparing ourselves with the sinners below us, but with the saints above us. Then, our position will suddenly look weak and precarious! 96% of Catholics may not pray the Rosary every day, but St. Padre Pio was among those who did pray it every day—and he prayed anywhere from 30 to 50 Rosaries (150 to 250 decades) every day! “Ah, well!” you say, “That was Padre Pio! I am no priest and stigmatic! That’s an unfair example that you are trying to hoist upon us!” Okay! Well what about a little 9 year old boy, Francisco Marto, one of seers at Fatima, would say many Rosaries each day and, like St. Padre Pio, was rarely seen without the Rosary beads in his little hands. “They that fear the Lord, will seek after the things that are well pleasing to Him” (Ecclesiasticus 2:19).
Sacrifice of the Mass—the Greatest Thing in the World
St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751), in his book The Hidden Treasure of the Holy Mass, writes: “The principal excellence of the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass consists in being essentially, and in the very highest degree, identical with that which was offered on the Cross of Calvary: with this sole difference, that the Sacrifice on the Cross was bloody, and made once for all, and did on that one occasion satisfy fully for all the sins of the world; while the Sacrifice of the Altar is an unbloody sacrifice.” Sadly, today, this notion of the Mass has been, at best, blurred; or, at worst, is no longer believed.
In 1957, 75% of Catholics attended Sunday Mass regularly each week. By 1965 this had dropped to 65%. In 2004, there were only 25% of Catholics attending Sunday Mass regularly each week. Today that number has fallen to below 20% (some say 15%). Most of those who attend weekly Mass today are 50 years old or older. The disappearance of younger Catholics from Sunday Mass continues to show up in surveys. Only 19% (1 in 5) of Catholics ages 21-29 attend Mass once a week or “almost every week,” versus 44% who say they “seldom” attend Mass, and 11% percent who “never” attend Mass.
As for believe in the Real Presence (Jesus Christ being really and truly present with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity in the Holy Eucharist and Blessed Sacrament), over 66% of Catholics believe that the Holy Eucharist is only symbolic and not the Body and Blood of Christ.
St. Leonard of Port Maurice continues: “Now, tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, you thoroughly well consider that you are going up as it were to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer. If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued, with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers, what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball? But what shall be said if you profane those functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time, and in any place; but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God.”
What is Your Mass Attendance Like?
Do you, and your family, approach the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass like you would Calvary? What is your preparation for Mass like? Read about St. Charbal Maklouf—a Maronite monk-priest—who had a great devotion to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist. That is all he lived for—he lived and said Mass in a cave, having been given permission to live a hermit-like existence. Already before sunrise, he would be at prayer—reciting his Divine Office (breviary) and other prayers in preparation for his 11:00 a.m. Mass. A monk would come up to his cave from the nearby monastery, to serve Mass and bring him a meager lunch. After Mass, he would spend at least one hour or even two, before eating his lunch, and would then return to his thanksgiving—which he continued into the early evening. Then he would begin his prayers of preparation for the next day’s Mass. His body lies incorrupt to this day.
On the Way to Mass
When you drive to Mass, what is the mood of the passengers in the car? Is it a prayerful mood, or a worldly mood—peppered with worldly or frivolous conversation, perhaps worldly music? If so, it weakens the notion of what the Sacrifice of the Mass is and the serious and awesome action you are about to take part in—there is no greater action taking place anywhere in the world, on any day, than that of the Mass. Perhaps passengers need to be told that henceforth, the approach to traveling to Sunday (daily/weekday) Masses will be different. Prayers could be said; hymns sung or played; suitable spiritual material read out aloud; or at least spiritual conversations held.
Arrival Time for Mass
Do you arrive in plenty of time to make a proper preparation for Mass in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament? Let’s face it—it is GOD HIMSELF that you are visiting when you go to Mass! It is not a commemoration of Calvary; it is not a mere human action; it is not a social function—you are there TO SEE GOD. Is there enough time made for God, or is it a last minute arrival? Or if you do make it on time, does everyone actually GO INSIDE TO SPEAK TO GOD, or do they spend time chatting with other parishioners prior to Mass starting? Worldly talk, frivolous talk, socializing, joking around and laughing? If the Mass is a sacrifice, then sacrifice something yourself and get right in there! The answers to these questions show the value we place on God and whether or not He is “Number One” in our lives.
Assistance at Mass
How do we assist at Mass? Some people clearly show that, even though their bodies are present at Mass, their minds most certainly are not—they gaze around, fidget with their ‘little-ones’, keeping them entertained so that they don’t cry, etc. Others may have a Missal, prayer book or Rosary in their hands—but their heart can be lukewarm and they listlessly, carelessly and mechanically go through the motions of praying, fitting the description of Our Lord: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). Lining up for Holy Communion is no different to lining up at the supermarket check-out—cold, indifferent, with no devotion or zeal.
Holy Communion
The reception of Holy Communion makes you wonder if they really believe that God is present—but of course nearly 70% of Catholics do not believe that He is present. Thanksgiving after Communion, if there is one, is frequently seen to be a mechanical repetition of the same old prayers, said without any real feeling and without any personal heart-to-heart conversation with the God that now rests within them! Once Mass is over, hardly anyone stays behind to continue their thanksgiving and to continue talking to their God—for friends beckon in the parking lot or the parish hall, and, instead of a tasteless Host, coffee and donuts with a variety of sweet fillings are available in the parish hall—and the early bird gets the best donuts! I guess the redeeming factor must be that the donut looks like a fat halo! Friends, coffee and donuts are “Number One”—“Number Two”—and “Number Three”—God came in fourth!
On this feast of Corpus Christi--which is a holy day of obligation in the Universal Calendar of the Church, but not observed as such in most countries--let us strive to rekindle our esteem, appreciation, love and manner of assistance at the greatest Treasure we have this side of Heaven. Let us strive to attend the Sacrifice of the Mass more often; to assist at it with greater reverence and fervor; to make better thanksgivings after Mass, and to visit Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament much more frequently.
If, with the eyes of Faith, we REALLY saw GOD PRESENT in the Holy Eucharist and in the Sacrifice of the Mass, then this should not be too hard. But if our eyes of Faith have become myopic, or even blind, then we will go the way of the majority. It is not a path that we should be taking, for it ends in misery.
Let us ask our most Holy Mother for the grace to truly see, appreciate, reverence and love her Son in the Holy Mass and the Holy Eucharist. Let us ask her for the eyes of Faith that she must have had in looking at the humanity of her Son and seeing the divinity in Him.
We hope that you are making some time to prepare for the Feast of Corpus Christi―which celebrates the Holy Eucharist. This year, the feast falls on Thursday May 30th. There are increasing numbers of Catholics who are refusing to believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. Many think of the Eucharist as a mere symbol of Christ, and look upon the Mass as a mere commemoration of the Last Supper, and not the Sacrifice that it really and truly is! What an offense this must be to Our Lord! If already, in the more believing day of St. Margaret Mary (in the 1600’s) Our Lord appeared to her and complained about the lack of love and devotion shown to Him—what would He have to say about our times?
Greatest Neglect
The Holy Eucharist is our “Greatest Treasure” and at the same time it is the modern era’s “Greatest Neglect.” It is impossible to identify the Holy Eucharist too closely with Jesus Christ. We should remember He is in the Holy Eucharist not merely with His substance. Some may say: “Transubstantiation means that the substance of bread and wine become the substance of Jesus Christ.”
No, it is not just an academic definition or philosophical explanation that is relegated to the memory banks of our mind—a cerebral thing. Transubstantiation means the substance of bread and wine are no longer there. The substance of bread and wine is replaced not only by the substance of Christ’s Body and Blood. What replaces the substance of bread and wine is Jesus Christ! Everything that makes Him Christ, replaces what had been the substance of bread and wine. The substance of bread and wine become the whole Christ—that is what we mean by “Body, Soul, Blood and Divinity”—the whole Christ.
Living Heart
Therefore, Christ in the Holy Eucharist is here with His human heart and His Sacred Heart. Is it a living heart? Yes! This is seen in the Miracles of Lanciano and Buenos Aires. This is also why the revelations Our Lord made to St. Margaret Mary about promoting devotion to the Sacred Heart were all made from the Holy Eucharist.
Why do we equate the Sacred Heart with the Holy Eucharist? Because the Holy Eucharist is the whole Christ with His human heart. According to St. Margaret Mary, the Sacred Heart is the Holy Eucharist. So it follows that devotion to the Sacred Heart is devotion to the Holy Eucharist. It is infinite Love Incarnate living in our midst in the Blessed Sacrament. When we receive the Holy Eucharist, we receive the living Christ—total, entire, living!
If Jesus causes the Host to become what science has identified as a human heart—and especially a muscle of the heart that is responsible for the contraction of a human heart, a heart that suffers like that of someone who has been beaten severely about the chest—if He does such things, it is in order to arouse and enliven our Faith in His Real Presence in the Holy Eucharist. He thus enables us to see that Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a re-presentation (i.e. a making present once again) of the entire drama of our salvation: namely, Christ’s Passion and Death on Calvary, but now in an unbloody manner in the Sacrifice of the Mass.
Signs-a-Plenty
Jesus says to His disciples: “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will not believe” (John 4:48). There is no need to actively seek out wondrous signs. But if Jesus chooses to give them to us, then we ought to accept them with meekness and humility in Faith, seeking to understand what He desires to tell us by them. Thanks to these signs, many people have discovered Faith in God—the One God in the Holy Trinity, Who reveals His Son to us: Jesus Christ, Who abides in the tabernacles of the world, Who worked through the Sacraments and Who teaches us through Holy Scripture, Tradition and the Magisterium of the Catholic Church—the triple cord of our Faith, of which Scripture says: “a threefold cord is not easily broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:12).
Miracles Seekers Are Often Blind
We have the “Greatest Treasure” staring us in the face, yet we run around trying to fill our minds and hearts with lesser spiritual treasures. We run after apparitions, we study prophecies, we delight over relics, we travel to holy sites where Our Lady or Our Lord might have appeared once, twice or a few times—but the place where Our Lord appears every day, which is the Altar upon which Mass is said, we often leave neglected and we place it way down in our rankings of holy places and things to see and visit. The Imitation of Christ puts it thus:
“Many people travel far to honor the relics of the saints, marveling at their wonderful deeds and at the building of magnificent shrines. They gaze upon and kiss the sacred relics encased in silk and gold; and behold, You are here present before me on the Altar, my God, Saint of saints, Creator of men, and Lord of angels! Often in looking at such things, men are moved by curiosity, by the novelty of the unseen, and they bear away little fruit for the amendment of their lives, especially when they go from place to place lightly and without true contrition. But here in the Sacrament of the Altar You are wholly present, my God, the man Christ Jesus, whence is obtained the full realization of eternal salvation, as often as You are worthily and devoutly received.”
A Mystery that Surpasses our Understanding
The Holy Eucharist—the actual presence of the risen person of Jesus under the appearances of bread and wine—is one of the most important and most difficult truths, revealed to us by Christ. Eucharistic miracles are merely visible confirmations of what He tells us about Himself; namely, that He really does give us His glorified Body and Blood as spiritual food and drink.
Jesus established the Eucharist on the eve of His Passion and Death. During the Last Supper, “Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke: and gave to His disciples, and said: ‘Take ye, and eat. This is My Body.’ And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave to them, saying: ‘Drink ye all of this. For this is My Blood of the new testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins’” (Matthew 26:26-28). When Jesus took and gave the Apostles the bread and wine, He said, “this is My Body….this is My Blood” by which He clearly meant that the bread and wine, which He gave them to eat and drink, really was His Body and Blood, and not some sort of symbol.
Jesus’ Eucharistic Sermon Shocks
Earlier, in the famous Eucharistic sermon recorded by St. John the Evangelist, Jesus said to the Jews: “Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, has everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day. For My Flesh is meat indeed: and My Blood is drink indeed. He that eats My Flesh, and drinks My Blood, abides in Me, and I in him’” (John 6:54-57).
Shocked by Jesus’ words, the Jews said, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?” (John 6:53). Many of Jesus’ disciples were also scandalized. “This saying is hard, and who can hear it?” they objected. Knowing that the truth of the Eucharist was a shock and a scandal to many of His listeners, Jesus responded, not by retracting His words, but by raising the stakes: “Does this scandalize you? The words that I have spoken to you, are spirit and life!” (John 6: 62-63). Many refused to believe Him: “After this many of His disciples went back; and walked no more with Him” (John 6:67).
Today, we see a repeat of both the incredulity and disbelief in the Real Presence—with anywhere from 65% to 80% of Catholics no longer believing that Jesus is present in the Holy Eucharist—as well as a repeat of “many walked no more with Him”—as only around 20% to 25% come to Mass regularly on Sundays, for the rest it ends up being a Sinday.
Jesus Throws Down the Gauntlet
Our Lord throws down the gauntlet of Faith before His Apostles, as He does before us: “Then Jesus said to the Twelve: Will you also go away?” (John 6:68). St. Peter replies for them, and for us, with words of Faith—not understanding but believing nevertheless—“Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we have believed and have known, that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God.” Here Jesus goes to the heart of the mystery, the “Eucharistic Heart” of the mystery and that “Eucharistic Heart” we still have with us in our tabernacles! But though Jesus is really in the tabernacle, is Faith really in our hearts?
Not all Jesus’ listeners accepted His teaching of the Eucharist. Thus He turned to them, saying, “ ‘But there are some of you that believe not!’ Jesus knew from the beginning the ones who would not believe and the one who would betray Him” (John 6:65). Judas’ betrayal began with his rejection of Jesus’ teaching about His real presence in the Eucharist. In confirmation of this fact, Jesus said, “‘Have not I chosen you Twelve? And one of you is a devil!’ Now He meant Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon―for this same was about to betray Him, whereas he was one of the Twelve.” (John 6:71-72).
Lack of Faith Today
How many today have not betrayed their Faith in Christ by refusing to believe in His Real Presence—Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity—in the Holy Eucharist? How many refuse to believe that the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is more than just a commemoration of the Last Supper, but is also, and more importantly, the unbloody re-offering of Jesus Christ’s Sacrifice on Calvary—in a way, a kind prolongation of that Sacrifice of Calvary through time.
The Eucharist is our Pillar of Faith. It is our strengthener and comfort in these increasingly evil days. The Eucharist is the Risen Jesus Himself in His glorified, and thus invisible, humanity. This is the essence of His teaching of the Eucharist (John 6:62-63). By its death and resurrection, the humanity of Jesus takes on a divine nature; it assumes a new order of existence: “For in Him dwells the whole fullness of the deity, bodily” (Colossians 2:9). In His glorified humanity, the Risen Jesus, becoming omnipresent, gives of Himself in the gift of the Eucharist. He shares with us, not only His life of suffering, but also His resurrected life and divine love, so that we may, even here on Earth, experience the reality of Heaven and partake of the life of the Holy Trinity.
Your Transubstantiation
He wishes to work a ‘transubstantiation’ of sorts in our minds and hearts—as He changes the Bread and Wine into Himself, so too does He wish to change us Body and Soul into Himself. He wants to change the worldly substance of our minds into a heavenly substance. Like He said to so many people while He walked upon this Earth: “Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?” (Matthew 9:28). We have to reply with the leper: “Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst!” (Luke 5:11). Confronting the mystery of the Eucharist, human reason feels its impotence and limitations. Yet St. Cyril of Jerusalem exhorts us: “Do not see in the bread and wine merely natural elements, because the Lord has expressly said that they are His Body and His Blood: Faith assures you of this, even though your senses suggest otherwise.”
Visiting His Temple, Delighting in the Lord
“One thing I have asked of the Lord, this will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life. That I may see the delight of the Lord, and may visit His temple” (Psalms 26:4). How many souls could truthfully say these words today? The houses of the Lord—the churches—are empty for most, if not all, the day. Few “see the delight of the Lord”—the Holy Eucharist—and “visit His temple”, the tabernacle.
Some souls might spend time in front of the Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, and pride themselves upon it―but why do they not encourage and work ‘tooth-and-nail’ to try get others to do likewise, instead of just priding themselves upon their practices of piety. This smacks of the Pharisee, condemned by Our Lord in His parable of the Pharisee and the Publican, who self-righteously boasts: “And when ye pray, you shall not be as the hypocrites, that love to stand and pray in the synagogues and corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men” (Matthew 6:5). “Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men―extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!’” (Luke 18:10-12).
Modern Day Pharisaical Boast
Today, the boast might be—“I go to Sunday Mass, whereas most Catholics no longer do! I say my Rosary every day, whereas 96% of Catholics do not!” Yet, to whom more is given, more is expected! We should not be comparing ourselves with the sinners below us, but with the saints above us. Then, our position will suddenly look weak and precarious! 96% of Catholics may not pray the Rosary every day, but St. Padre Pio was among those who did pray it every day—and he prayed anywhere from 30 to 50 Rosaries (150 to 250 decades) every day! “Ah, well!” you say, “That was Padre Pio! I am no priest and stigmatic! That’s an unfair example that you are trying to hoist upon us!” Okay! Well what about a little 9 year old boy, Francisco Marto, one of seers at Fatima, would say many Rosaries each day and, like St. Padre Pio, was rarely seen without the Rosary beads in his little hands. “They that fear the Lord, will seek after the things that are well pleasing to Him” (Ecclesiasticus 2:19).
Sacrifice of the Mass—the Greatest Thing in the World
St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751), in his book The Hidden Treasure of the Holy Mass, writes: “The principal excellence of the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass consists in being essentially, and in the very highest degree, identical with that which was offered on the Cross of Calvary: with this sole difference, that the Sacrifice on the Cross was bloody, and made once for all, and did on that one occasion satisfy fully for all the sins of the world; while the Sacrifice of the Altar is an unbloody sacrifice.” Sadly, today, this notion of the Mass has been, at best, blurred; or, at worst, is no longer believed.
In 1957, 75% of Catholics attended Sunday Mass regularly each week. By 1965 this had dropped to 65%. In 2004, there were only 25% of Catholics attending Sunday Mass regularly each week. Today that number has fallen to below 20% (some say 15%). Most of those who attend weekly Mass today are 50 years old or older. The disappearance of younger Catholics from Sunday Mass continues to show up in surveys. Only 19% (1 in 5) of Catholics ages 21-29 attend Mass once a week or “almost every week,” versus 44% who say they “seldom” attend Mass, and 11% percent who “never” attend Mass.
As for believe in the Real Presence (Jesus Christ being really and truly present with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity in the Holy Eucharist and Blessed Sacrament), over 66% of Catholics believe that the Holy Eucharist is only symbolic and not the Body and Blood of Christ.
St. Leonard of Port Maurice continues: “Now, tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, you thoroughly well consider that you are going up as it were to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer. If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued, with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers, what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball? But what shall be said if you profane those functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time, and in any place; but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God.”
What is Your Mass Attendance Like?
Do you, and your family, approach the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass like you would Calvary? What is your preparation for Mass like? Read about St. Charbal Maklouf—a Maronite monk-priest—who had a great devotion to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Holy Eucharist. That is all he lived for—he lived and said Mass in a cave, having been given permission to live a hermit-like existence. Already before sunrise, he would be at prayer—reciting his Divine Office (breviary) and other prayers in preparation for his 11:00 a.m. Mass. A monk would come up to his cave from the nearby monastery, to serve Mass and bring him a meager lunch. After Mass, he would spend at least one hour or even two, before eating his lunch, and would then return to his thanksgiving—which he continued into the early evening. Then he would begin his prayers of preparation for the next day’s Mass. His body lies incorrupt to this day.
On the Way to Mass
When you drive to Mass, what is the mood of the passengers in the car? Is it a prayerful mood, or a worldly mood—peppered with worldly or frivolous conversation, perhaps worldly music? If so, it weakens the notion of what the Sacrifice of the Mass is and the serious and awesome action you are about to take part in—there is no greater action taking place anywhere in the world, on any day, than that of the Mass. Perhaps passengers need to be told that henceforth, the approach to traveling to Sunday (daily/weekday) Masses will be different. Prayers could be said; hymns sung or played; suitable spiritual material read out aloud; or at least spiritual conversations held.
Arrival Time for Mass
Do you arrive in plenty of time to make a proper preparation for Mass in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament? Let’s face it—it is GOD HIMSELF that you are visiting when you go to Mass! It is not a commemoration of Calvary; it is not a mere human action; it is not a social function—you are there TO SEE GOD. Is there enough time made for God, or is it a last minute arrival? Or if you do make it on time, does everyone actually GO INSIDE TO SPEAK TO GOD, or do they spend time chatting with other parishioners prior to Mass starting? Worldly talk, frivolous talk, socializing, joking around and laughing? If the Mass is a sacrifice, then sacrifice something yourself and get right in there! The answers to these questions show the value we place on God and whether or not He is “Number One” in our lives.
Assistance at Mass
How do we assist at Mass? Some people clearly show that, even though their bodies are present at Mass, their minds most certainly are not—they gaze around, fidget with their ‘little-ones’, keeping them entertained so that they don’t cry, etc. Others may have a Missal, prayer book or Rosary in their hands—but their heart can be lukewarm and they listlessly, carelessly and mechanically go through the motions of praying, fitting the description of Our Lord: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). Lining up for Holy Communion is no different to lining up at the supermarket check-out—cold, indifferent, with no devotion or zeal.
Holy Communion
The reception of Holy Communion makes you wonder if they really believe that God is present—but of course nearly 70% of Catholics do not believe that He is present. Thanksgiving after Communion, if there is one, is frequently seen to be a mechanical repetition of the same old prayers, said without any real feeling and without any personal heart-to-heart conversation with the God that now rests within them! Once Mass is over, hardly anyone stays behind to continue their thanksgiving and to continue talking to their God—for friends beckon in the parking lot or the parish hall, and, instead of a tasteless Host, coffee and donuts with a variety of sweet fillings are available in the parish hall—and the early bird gets the best donuts! I guess the redeeming factor must be that the donut looks like a fat halo! Friends, coffee and donuts are “Number One”—“Number Two”—and “Number Three”—God came in fourth!
On this feast of Corpus Christi--which is a holy day of obligation in the Universal Calendar of the Church, but not observed as such in most countries--let us strive to rekindle our esteem, appreciation, love and manner of assistance at the greatest Treasure we have this side of Heaven. Let us strive to attend the Sacrifice of the Mass more often; to assist at it with greater reverence and fervor; to make better thanksgivings after Mass, and to visit Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament much more frequently.
If, with the eyes of Faith, we REALLY saw GOD PRESENT in the Holy Eucharist and in the Sacrifice of the Mass, then this should not be too hard. But if our eyes of Faith have become myopic, or even blind, then we will go the way of the majority. It is not a path that we should be taking, for it ends in misery.
Let us ask our most Holy Mother for the grace to truly see, appreciate, reverence and love her Son in the Holy Mass and the Holy Eucharist. Let us ask her for the eyes of Faith that she must have had in looking at the humanity of her Son and seeing the divinity in Him.
Article 38
Monday, May 27th
Lost & Found, or Lost Forever?
Monday, May 27th
Lost & Found, or Lost Forever?
There is No Doubt We Are Losing It!
One would have to be totally insane or totally disconnected from the world not to see that we are losing it! The Faith is in a state of progressive and universal collapse. If that does not worry you or frighten you, then you are potentially next in line in the encroaching apostasy that is invading the Christian world. Our Lord had prophetically said that “The Son of man, when he cometh, shall he find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). However, He gave no clue as to precisely when it would happen. Numerous prophecies, over many centuries, only served to reinforce Our Lord’s words.
Then, in our modern times, Our Lady seems to have honed-in on the time period when all of this would happen and she points to our times. God and Our Lady of Good Success speaks explicitly of the 20th century, when all would start to unravel. Mother Mariana, to whom Our Lady of Good Success appeared several times in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, was, on one occasion, given a vision of Our Lord beginning His Agony, and she heard the voice of the Eternal Father saying, “This punishment will be for the 20th century.” She saw three swords hanging over the head of Christ. On each was written, “I shall punish heresy, blasphemy and impurity.”
Our Lady of Good Success then told Mother Mariana: “At the end of the 19th century and into the 20th century, various heresies will be propagated … I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty ... There will be almost no virgin souls in the world … Without virginity it would be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon in order to purify them.”
The Protection Has Gone
Prayer is protection. The Catholic world is ceasing to pray. The catastrophic losses in the numbers of priests, monks, brothers, nuns and sisters has taken away one of the chief sources of protection from the Church.
Our Lord revealed to Mother Mariana (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “Fortunate are those countries that possess monasteries and convents. They purify the air polluted by those in the world delivered over to the most shameful vices and passions ... Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils ... No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents.”
Yet in our modern era, since, what the Third Secret of Fatima purportedly calls the “Bad Council” (Vatican II), there has been an unprecedented and catastrophic collapse in those vocations!
PRIESTS: The Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) reported that in 1965 there were 59,426 priests in the United States. In 2022, there were only 34,344. More than half of these priests are over 70.
ORDINATIONS: In 1965, 1,575 new priests were ordained in the United States. In 2015, the number was 515. In 2022 it was just over 400. In 1965, only 1% of U.S. parishes were without a priest. In 2015, there were 3,500 priestless parishes, which is 20% of all U.S. parishes.
SEMINARIANS: Between 1965 and 2015, the number of seminarians dropped from 49,000 to 3,600, a decline of over 93%. Two-thirds of the 600 seminaries that were operating in 1965 have now closed.
RELIGIOUS SISTERS: In 1965, there were 180,000 Catholic nuns. By 2015, that had fallen to 48,000 and by 2022 it fell further to 42,000. The average age of a Catholic nun is today 74. In 1965, there were 104,000 teaching nuns. Today, there are around 6,000―a decline of 95% since the end of Vatican II.
RELIGIOUS ORDERS: For religious orders in America, the end is in sight. In 1965, 3,559 young men were studying to become Jesuit priests. In 2000, the figure was 389. With the Christian Brothers, the situation is even more dire. Their number has shrunk by two-thirds, with their number of seminarians falling 99%. In 1965, there were 912 seminarians in the Christian Brothers. In 2000, there were only seven. The number of young men studying to become Franciscan and Redemptorist priests fell from 3,379 in 1965, to 84 in 2000.
Our Lord further revealed to Mother Mariana: “Know, moreover, that Divine Justice releases terrible chastisements on entire nations, not only for the sins of the people, but especially for those of priests and religious persons. For the latter are called, by the perfection of their state, to be the salt of the Earth, the masters of truth and the deflectors of divine wrath. Straying from their divine mission, they degrade themselves in such a way that, before the eyes of God, they quicken the rigor of the punishments.”
Recovery? Restoration of the Faith?
Our Lady of Good Success, around 200 years earlier, had said: “In order to free men from bondage to these heresies of the 19th century and into the 20th century, those whom the merciful love of my Most Holy Son has designated to effect the restoration will need great strength of will, constancy, valor and confidence in God. To test this Faith and confidence of the just, there will be occasions when all will seem to be lost and paralyzed. The small number of souls who, hidden, will preserve the treasure of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom. Many of them will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings, and those who sacrifice themselves for the Church and their country will be counted as martyrs. This, then, will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration.”
Our Lady of La Salette also speaks of a restoration: “Then peace will be made, and man will be reconciled with God. Jesus Christ will be served, worshiped and glorified. Charity will flourish everywhere. The new kings will be the right arm of the Holy Church, which will be strong, humble, pious in It’s poor but fervent imitation of the virtues of Jesus Christ. The Gospel will be preached everywhere and mankind will make great progress in its Faith, for there will be unity among the workers of Jesus Christ and man will live in fear of God.”
But Before the Restoration, the Unpleasant Bits...
Today, we like the sweet without the sour, the pleasant without the unpleasant, the smooth without the rough. It will not be that way with the restoration. We will have to go through quite a bit of the sour, unpleasant and rough times before we sail into the calm and sweet waters.
At La Salette, Our Lady already puts forward elements of the Third Secret of Fatima that she would later reveal—especially regarding the loss of Faith: “The leaders of the people of God [let not parents and teachers exempt themselves from this category], have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish. God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell. Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement ... Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. They will have great power over Nature: there will be churches built to serve these spirits.”
“For a while the Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis. The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent and be superior to other people … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds.”
Our Lady of La Salette then goes on to describes the many atrocities that will come from civil wars and wars between nations. To which Our Lady of Fatima would add that “nations will be annihilated!”
Yet, as Our Lady of Akita warned, before any restoration comes about “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church, in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their colleagues ... Churches and altars will be sacked; the Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord. The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God.”
Are we not seeing this to an unprecedented degree today—if we drag ourselves away from our daily worldly preoccupations and seriously follow what is happening in the Church and the world, then we would have to say “Yes!” But what does that mean to you? What effect does it have on you? What are doing about all this? Our Lady doesn’t just give us these messages as a juicy piece of heavenly gossip—they are given to us in order to provoke a reaction on our part. What is our reaction?
Is There a Real Desire to Recover the Faith?
There can be no recovery without a fight! Sr. Lucia of Fatima, in 1957, categorically states: “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that the devil is about to wage a decisive battle with the Virgin, and a decisive battle is a final battle, in which one side wins, the other side loses. Also, starting with the present time, we belong either to God, or we belong to the demon—there is no middle ground.”
In all honesty, there will be very few who are prepared to wage war in this apocalyptic battle. Our Lady of Good Success this points out very clearly: “The SMALL NUMBER of souls who, hidden, will preserve the treasure of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom.”
The same “fewness” of those prepared to fight is mentioned by Our Lady of La Salette. She first makes a “call to arms” and then points out that very few will respond to the call, and will, we presume, be lost through their negligence and infidelity:
“The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay … I make an urgent appeal to the Earth. I call on the true disciples of the living God who reigns in Heaven; I call on the true followers of Christ made man, the only true Savior of men; I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son, those whom I carry in my arms, so to speak, those who have lived on my spirit. Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world. It is time they came out and filled the world with light. Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children. I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ. Fight, children of light, you, the FEW who can see. For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends.”
Our Lady calls us to battle, to wage war with the weapons Heaven offers! Yet most people are buried in “comfort-zone”—the only battling they do is over who gets the last cookie on the plate, or what TV program to watch, or who gets time on the computer and the internet, or battling to be the best in sports, or ahead of everyone else in fashion, beauty and social-standing. While we waste our time in these areas, the devil walks right into the Church, the parish, the home or the school through largely unguarded gates and doors.
Truly, many are called, but few respond to that call and few are chosen (Matthew 20:16; 22:14).
The Field of Battle
There are two aspects to this “Field of Battle”—where is that field and what kind of field is it?
(1) Unfortunately, the “Field of Battle” is the whole world—there is no hiding from the battle, there is no shelter from the onslaught. It is battle that HAS to be fought in one’s own soul and also in one’s own family and home. The battle MUST also be fought outside the home—in the parish, in the school, in the homes of relatives and friends, in the work place, in the world at large with all its amenities and gathering places. There is no hiding from the battle—as Holy Scripture says: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Remember Our Lord’s words: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters! … Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:32-33).
We fight to protect the things that we love. The less we value something, the less inclined we are to fight over it. That is the problem today with regard to the Faith. Very few souls value and treasure the Faith―that is why they are indifferent to losing the Faith and cowardly in standing up for the Faith.
Family members must begin to stand up for Christ—even at the risk of offending fellow family members, no matter who they are! Right after saying those words about confessing and denying Him, Our Lord continues: “Do not think that I came to send peace upon earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:34-37). Tough talk! Tough to do! Tough if we don’t!
(2) This battle will be fought and won or lost on the spiritual field. We know, of course, that Our Lady will triumph in the end-—“In the end my Immaculate will triumph” (Fatima) … “This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph. This, however, will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet and fettering him in the infernal abyss! Thus the Church will be finally free of his cruel tyranny!” (La Salette).
The weapons are spiritual weapons—at Akita Our Lady said: “The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and Sign left by My Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary … Continue to pray very much―very much! … Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.”
These words dovetail perfectly with what Our Lady revealed at Fatima and in private apparitions to Sr. Lucia in the years following the Fatima apparitions. Our Lady of Fatima said of herself, under the title of Our Lady of the Rosary, “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you.” The Rosary is merely the primal or foundational step in devotion to Our Lady, of which she said: “Jesus wants to use you to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world … God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart!”
Sr. Lucia tells us, with regard to the Rosary: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary—to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
With regard to the words of Our Lady of Akita—“The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and Sign left by My Son”―we can quite easily decipher what that “Sign left my Son” could be, for, at Fatima, the Angel of Peace brought the elements that are central to the Sacrifice of Mass—the Sacred Host that is the Body of Christ, and the chalice containing the Precious Blood, which was dripping from the Host into the chalice. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the sign and re-enactment of the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross on Mount Calvary all over again, but in an unbloody manner. We even speak of the “Sign of the Cross”! Furthermore, some years after the 1917 Fatima apparitions, Sr. Lucia had another apparition in June of 1929, Lucia, already a religious of St. Dorothy, describes the following apparition:
“Suddenly the entire convent Chapel was illuminated in a supernatural light, and a Cross of light appeared over the altar and reached the ceiling. On the superior part the face of man was seen and his body down to the waist. A dove of light was over his chest and nailed to the Cross was another man. Suspended in air over his waist, I was able to see a chalice with a large Host. Drops of Blood from the face of Jesus Crucified and His pierced side fell into the chalice, dripping from the Host. Beneath the right arm on the Cross was Our Lady. It was Our Lady of Fatima, with her Immaculate Heart in her left hand, without thorns or roses, but with a crown of thorns and flames. Underneath the left arm on the Cross, big letters, similar to crystal water came down to the altar forming these words: ‘Grace and Mercy.’”
What Field Am I In? What Weapons Am I Using?
Most people are “way out in left field”—which, for non-USA readers, means in this case “completely wrong and misguided.” They are not where they should be! They are, if you like AWOL (absent without leave) from the battlefield. They are having a fun time, or at least “doing their own thing” while, as Our Lady of Fatima says, “many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!”
As Sr. Lucia points out: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them!”
To this phenomenon we must add the words of Our Lord: “And that servant, who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes!” (Luke 12:47).
Questions and More Questions!
Why are so many souls lost forever? In case you doubt that truth, read about the overwhelming opinion of the saints on the few number of souls that are saved (click here). Even Sister Lucia of Fatima confirms that truth, when she corrects an over-optimistic priest, Fr. Lombardi.
Fr. Lombardi: “Do you really believe that many will go to Hell? I hope that God will save the greater part of humanity.”
Sr. Lucia: “Father, many will be lost.”
Fr. Lombardi: “It is true that the world is full of evil, but there is always a hope of salvation.”
Sr. Lucia: “No Father, many will be lost.”
Fr. Lombardi remembered that Lucia had seen Hell and added: “Her words disturbed me. I returned to Italy with that grave warning impressed on my heart.”
If only we could impress that grave warning on OUR hearts! Where, in all honesty, are the members of OUR family and OUR relatives and OUR friends headed? Are they really headed for Heaven, or are they already duped by the devil, the world and Modernists in the Church?
We have to seriously ask ourselves this question: “Am I playing a game of wishful thinking? Have a created a Catholic religion of my own, based on my wishful thinking? Am I disconnected from Catholic reality and realism, and living in a Catholic dream world of my own making?”
One would have to be totally insane or totally disconnected from the world not to see that we are losing it! The Faith is in a state of progressive and universal collapse. If that does not worry you or frighten you, then you are potentially next in line in the encroaching apostasy that is invading the Christian world. Our Lord had prophetically said that “The Son of man, when he cometh, shall he find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). However, He gave no clue as to precisely when it would happen. Numerous prophecies, over many centuries, only served to reinforce Our Lord’s words.
Then, in our modern times, Our Lady seems to have honed-in on the time period when all of this would happen and she points to our times. God and Our Lady of Good Success speaks explicitly of the 20th century, when all would start to unravel. Mother Mariana, to whom Our Lady of Good Success appeared several times in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, was, on one occasion, given a vision of Our Lord beginning His Agony, and she heard the voice of the Eternal Father saying, “This punishment will be for the 20th century.” She saw three swords hanging over the head of Christ. On each was written, “I shall punish heresy, blasphemy and impurity.”
Our Lady of Good Success then told Mother Mariana: “At the end of the 19th century and into the 20th century, various heresies will be propagated … I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty ... There will be almost no virgin souls in the world … Without virginity it would be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon in order to purify them.”
The Protection Has Gone
Prayer is protection. The Catholic world is ceasing to pray. The catastrophic losses in the numbers of priests, monks, brothers, nuns and sisters has taken away one of the chief sources of protection from the Church.
Our Lord revealed to Mother Mariana (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “Fortunate are those countries that possess monasteries and convents. They purify the air polluted by those in the world delivered over to the most shameful vices and passions ... Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils ... No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents.”
Yet in our modern era, since, what the Third Secret of Fatima purportedly calls the “Bad Council” (Vatican II), there has been an unprecedented and catastrophic collapse in those vocations!
PRIESTS: The Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) reported that in 1965 there were 59,426 priests in the United States. In 2022, there were only 34,344. More than half of these priests are over 70.
ORDINATIONS: In 1965, 1,575 new priests were ordained in the United States. In 2015, the number was 515. In 2022 it was just over 400. In 1965, only 1% of U.S. parishes were without a priest. In 2015, there were 3,500 priestless parishes, which is 20% of all U.S. parishes.
SEMINARIANS: Between 1965 and 2015, the number of seminarians dropped from 49,000 to 3,600, a decline of over 93%. Two-thirds of the 600 seminaries that were operating in 1965 have now closed.
RELIGIOUS SISTERS: In 1965, there were 180,000 Catholic nuns. By 2015, that had fallen to 48,000 and by 2022 it fell further to 42,000. The average age of a Catholic nun is today 74. In 1965, there were 104,000 teaching nuns. Today, there are around 6,000―a decline of 95% since the end of Vatican II.
RELIGIOUS ORDERS: For religious orders in America, the end is in sight. In 1965, 3,559 young men were studying to become Jesuit priests. In 2000, the figure was 389. With the Christian Brothers, the situation is even more dire. Their number has shrunk by two-thirds, with their number of seminarians falling 99%. In 1965, there were 912 seminarians in the Christian Brothers. In 2000, there were only seven. The number of young men studying to become Franciscan and Redemptorist priests fell from 3,379 in 1965, to 84 in 2000.
Our Lord further revealed to Mother Mariana: “Know, moreover, that Divine Justice releases terrible chastisements on entire nations, not only for the sins of the people, but especially for those of priests and religious persons. For the latter are called, by the perfection of their state, to be the salt of the Earth, the masters of truth and the deflectors of divine wrath. Straying from their divine mission, they degrade themselves in such a way that, before the eyes of God, they quicken the rigor of the punishments.”
Recovery? Restoration of the Faith?
Our Lady of Good Success, around 200 years earlier, had said: “In order to free men from bondage to these heresies of the 19th century and into the 20th century, those whom the merciful love of my Most Holy Son has designated to effect the restoration will need great strength of will, constancy, valor and confidence in God. To test this Faith and confidence of the just, there will be occasions when all will seem to be lost and paralyzed. The small number of souls who, hidden, will preserve the treasure of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom. Many of them will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings, and those who sacrifice themselves for the Church and their country will be counted as martyrs. This, then, will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration.”
Our Lady of La Salette also speaks of a restoration: “Then peace will be made, and man will be reconciled with God. Jesus Christ will be served, worshiped and glorified. Charity will flourish everywhere. The new kings will be the right arm of the Holy Church, which will be strong, humble, pious in It’s poor but fervent imitation of the virtues of Jesus Christ. The Gospel will be preached everywhere and mankind will make great progress in its Faith, for there will be unity among the workers of Jesus Christ and man will live in fear of God.”
But Before the Restoration, the Unpleasant Bits...
Today, we like the sweet without the sour, the pleasant without the unpleasant, the smooth without the rough. It will not be that way with the restoration. We will have to go through quite a bit of the sour, unpleasant and rough times before we sail into the calm and sweet waters.
At La Salette, Our Lady already puts forward elements of the Third Secret of Fatima that she would later reveal—especially regarding the loss of Faith: “The leaders of the people of God [let not parents and teachers exempt themselves from this category], have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish. God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell. Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement ... Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. They will have great power over Nature: there will be churches built to serve these spirits.”
“For a while the Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis. The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent and be superior to other people … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds.”
Our Lady of La Salette then goes on to describes the many atrocities that will come from civil wars and wars between nations. To which Our Lady of Fatima would add that “nations will be annihilated!”
Yet, as Our Lady of Akita warned, before any restoration comes about “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church, in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their colleagues ... Churches and altars will be sacked; the Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord. The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God.”
Are we not seeing this to an unprecedented degree today—if we drag ourselves away from our daily worldly preoccupations and seriously follow what is happening in the Church and the world, then we would have to say “Yes!” But what does that mean to you? What effect does it have on you? What are doing about all this? Our Lady doesn’t just give us these messages as a juicy piece of heavenly gossip—they are given to us in order to provoke a reaction on our part. What is our reaction?
Is There a Real Desire to Recover the Faith?
There can be no recovery without a fight! Sr. Lucia of Fatima, in 1957, categorically states: “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that the devil is about to wage a decisive battle with the Virgin, and a decisive battle is a final battle, in which one side wins, the other side loses. Also, starting with the present time, we belong either to God, or we belong to the demon—there is no middle ground.”
In all honesty, there will be very few who are prepared to wage war in this apocalyptic battle. Our Lady of Good Success this points out very clearly: “The SMALL NUMBER of souls who, hidden, will preserve the treasure of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom.”
The same “fewness” of those prepared to fight is mentioned by Our Lady of La Salette. She first makes a “call to arms” and then points out that very few will respond to the call, and will, we presume, be lost through their negligence and infidelity:
“The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay … I make an urgent appeal to the Earth. I call on the true disciples of the living God who reigns in Heaven; I call on the true followers of Christ made man, the only true Savior of men; I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son, those whom I carry in my arms, so to speak, those who have lived on my spirit. Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world. It is time they came out and filled the world with light. Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children. I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ. Fight, children of light, you, the FEW who can see. For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends.”
Our Lady calls us to battle, to wage war with the weapons Heaven offers! Yet most people are buried in “comfort-zone”—the only battling they do is over who gets the last cookie on the plate, or what TV program to watch, or who gets time on the computer and the internet, or battling to be the best in sports, or ahead of everyone else in fashion, beauty and social-standing. While we waste our time in these areas, the devil walks right into the Church, the parish, the home or the school through largely unguarded gates and doors.
Truly, many are called, but few respond to that call and few are chosen (Matthew 20:16; 22:14).
The Field of Battle
There are two aspects to this “Field of Battle”—where is that field and what kind of field is it?
(1) Unfortunately, the “Field of Battle” is the whole world—there is no hiding from the battle, there is no shelter from the onslaught. It is battle that HAS to be fought in one’s own soul and also in one’s own family and home. The battle MUST also be fought outside the home—in the parish, in the school, in the homes of relatives and friends, in the work place, in the world at large with all its amenities and gathering places. There is no hiding from the battle—as Holy Scripture says: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Remember Our Lord’s words: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters! … Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 12:30; 10:32-33).
We fight to protect the things that we love. The less we value something, the less inclined we are to fight over it. That is the problem today with regard to the Faith. Very few souls value and treasure the Faith―that is why they are indifferent to losing the Faith and cowardly in standing up for the Faith.
Family members must begin to stand up for Christ—even at the risk of offending fellow family members, no matter who they are! Right after saying those words about confessing and denying Him, Our Lord continues: “Do not think that I came to send peace upon earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:34-37). Tough talk! Tough to do! Tough if we don’t!
(2) This battle will be fought and won or lost on the spiritual field. We know, of course, that Our Lady will triumph in the end-—“In the end my Immaculate will triumph” (Fatima) … “This night will be most horrible, for, humanly speaking, evil will seem to triumph. This, however, will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet and fettering him in the infernal abyss! Thus the Church will be finally free of his cruel tyranny!” (La Salette).
The weapons are spiritual weapons—at Akita Our Lady said: “The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and Sign left by My Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary … Continue to pray very much―very much! … Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.”
These words dovetail perfectly with what Our Lady revealed at Fatima and in private apparitions to Sr. Lucia in the years following the Fatima apparitions. Our Lady of Fatima said of herself, under the title of Our Lady of the Rosary, “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you.” The Rosary is merely the primal or foundational step in devotion to Our Lady, of which she said: “Jesus wants to use you to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world … God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart!”
Sr. Lucia tells us, with regard to the Rosary: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary—to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
With regard to the words of Our Lady of Akita—“The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and Sign left by My Son”―we can quite easily decipher what that “Sign left my Son” could be, for, at Fatima, the Angel of Peace brought the elements that are central to the Sacrifice of Mass—the Sacred Host that is the Body of Christ, and the chalice containing the Precious Blood, which was dripping from the Host into the chalice. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the sign and re-enactment of the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross on Mount Calvary all over again, but in an unbloody manner. We even speak of the “Sign of the Cross”! Furthermore, some years after the 1917 Fatima apparitions, Sr. Lucia had another apparition in June of 1929, Lucia, already a religious of St. Dorothy, describes the following apparition:
“Suddenly the entire convent Chapel was illuminated in a supernatural light, and a Cross of light appeared over the altar and reached the ceiling. On the superior part the face of man was seen and his body down to the waist. A dove of light was over his chest and nailed to the Cross was another man. Suspended in air over his waist, I was able to see a chalice with a large Host. Drops of Blood from the face of Jesus Crucified and His pierced side fell into the chalice, dripping from the Host. Beneath the right arm on the Cross was Our Lady. It was Our Lady of Fatima, with her Immaculate Heart in her left hand, without thorns or roses, but with a crown of thorns and flames. Underneath the left arm on the Cross, big letters, similar to crystal water came down to the altar forming these words: ‘Grace and Mercy.’”
What Field Am I In? What Weapons Am I Using?
Most people are “way out in left field”—which, for non-USA readers, means in this case “completely wrong and misguided.” They are not where they should be! They are, if you like AWOL (absent without leave) from the battlefield. They are having a fun time, or at least “doing their own thing” while, as Our Lady of Fatima says, “many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!”
As Sr. Lucia points out: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them!”
To this phenomenon we must add the words of Our Lord: “And that servant, who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes!” (Luke 12:47).
Questions and More Questions!
Why are so many souls lost forever? In case you doubt that truth, read about the overwhelming opinion of the saints on the few number of souls that are saved (click here). Even Sister Lucia of Fatima confirms that truth, when she corrects an over-optimistic priest, Fr. Lombardi.
Fr. Lombardi: “Do you really believe that many will go to Hell? I hope that God will save the greater part of humanity.”
Sr. Lucia: “Father, many will be lost.”
Fr. Lombardi: “It is true that the world is full of evil, but there is always a hope of salvation.”
Sr. Lucia: “No Father, many will be lost.”
Fr. Lombardi remembered that Lucia had seen Hell and added: “Her words disturbed me. I returned to Italy with that grave warning impressed on my heart.”
If only we could impress that grave warning on OUR hearts! Where, in all honesty, are the members of OUR family and OUR relatives and OUR friends headed? Are they really headed for Heaven, or are they already duped by the devil, the world and Modernists in the Church?
We have to seriously ask ourselves this question: “Am I playing a game of wishful thinking? Have a created a Catholic religion of my own, based on my wishful thinking? Am I disconnected from Catholic reality and realism, and living in a Catholic dream world of my own making?”
Article 37
Trinity Saturday, May 26th
The Holy Trinity Within You
Trinity Saturday, May 26th
The Holy Trinity Within You
We Know in Part
“Now I know in part―but then I shall know even as I am known” (1 Corinthians 13:12). The Holy Trinity is a mystery that cannot be fully understood or explained. If anyone professes to you that they fully understand the Holy Trinity—call for a doctor and keep the patient calm and restrained! However, though we cannot fully grasp, understand and explain the Trinity in its inexhaustible depth, we can, nevertheless, grasp something about the Trinity that helps our frail and finite human reason have some idea of this impenetrable mystery.
A supernatural mystery is a truth which we cannot fully understand, but which we firmly believe because we have God’s word for it. A supernatural mystery is above reason, but not contrary to it. No man can explain a mystery; neither can anyone know it unless it is revealed by God. “Great art thou, O Lord, in counsel, and incomprehensible in thought” (Jeremias 32:19).
It is not unreasonable to believe in a supernatural mystery. There are many natural mysteries around us that no one has yet been able to explain, yet we believe them: electricity, magnetism, force, and many of the processes of life. The doctrine of the Blessed Trinity is a strict mystery; that is, we cannot learn it from reason, nor understand it completely, even after it has been revealed to us.
Some Things We Just Cannot Understand
The doctrine contains two truths our reason cannot fully understand: (1) that there is only one God; and (2) that each of the three Persons is God. We can understand each of these truths separately, but not when taken together. The mystery of the Blessed Trinity is not a contradiction. We do not say that there are three gods in one God, nor that the three divine Persons are one Person.
We only say that there are three Persons in one God, that is, three Persons, and one nature or essence. Somewhat similarly, the soul of man has will, understanding, and memory, but it is only one soul. Also, the sun has form, light, and heat, but it is only one sun. Three flames put together make only one flame.
This is why saints like Patrick would use a three-leaf-clover to give the Irish a basic grasp of this mystery, telling them that the Trinity was One God, but Three Persons—like the clover had one stem, but three leaves that came forth from the same stem. One could humanize this botanical example and present the hypothesis of, not Siamese-Twins, but imagine instead Siamese-Triplets! Three-in-one. One being, yet three separate persons! Yet, in the order of nature, this would not be a perfection, but an imperfection—with God there is no such imperfection with its consequent limitations and restraints. Analogies are always imperfect and impractical, even though they help somewhat in understanding a concept.
Eh? What is it?
What do we mean by the Blessed Trinity? The technical, theological, catechetical answer would be: “By the Blessed Trinity we mean one and the same God in three divine Persons.” The Athanasian Creed, which was composed in order to refute the Arian heresy, which held that the Jesus Christ was not fully God, says the following:
“So there is one Father, not three Fathers; one Son, not three Sons; one Holy Ghost, not three Holy Ghosts. And in this Trinity nothing is afore or after, nothing is greater or less; but the whole three Persons are co-eternal together, and co-equal. So that in all things, as in aforesaid, the unity in Trinity, and the Trinity in unity is to be worshiped” (Extract from the Athanasian Creed).
Job Description
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8). Since “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8), then all the Persons of the Holy Trinity are also Charity. The Holy Trinity is an interaction of charity. The Father is God and the First Person of the Blessed Trinity. We speak of Him as being the “Creator.” Omnipotence, and especially the work of creation, is attributed to God the Father. God the Father could have created millions of beings instead of you yourself; but He chose you out of a love wholly undeserved, saying, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love” (Jeremias 31:3). Let us then cry in thanksgiving, “Abba, Father!” (Romans 8:15). Let us show our gratitude by avoiding all that could displease God the Father, by trying to please Him with virtue, by trying to attain an ever greater perfection, in obedience to that command Our Lord’s: “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48).
The Son is God and the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. To God the Son we owe our redemption from sin and eternal death; by His death He gave us life. For us God the Son debased Himself, taking the form of a servant ... “becoming obedient to death, even to death on a cross” (Philippians 2:8). In Holy Communion we are united with Him, for He Himself said; “He who eats My flesh, and drinks My blood, abides in Me and I in him” (John 6:57). In return we should be “other Christs,” and, as the Apostle urged, “walk even as He walked.”
The Holy Ghost is God and the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity. He manifests Himself in us particularly in our sanctification. The word “Ghost” applied to the Third Person means “Spirit.” In Latin, the word used in “Spiritus.”
At our Baptism God the Holy Ghost purifies us from all sin and fills our souls with divine grace, so that we become truly children of God, sons and heirs, and co-heirs with Jesus Christ. By Baptism we become living temples of the Holy Ghost: “Or do you not know that your members are the temple of the Holy Spirit, Who is in you?” (1 Corinthians 6:19).
Trinitarian Spiritual Life
We are baptized in the Name of the Holy Trinity―“I baptize you in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost!” We make the Sign of the Cross innumerable times throughout our life―“In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.”―which should recall to us our baptism. We frequently give glory to the Holy Trinity whenever we say the prayer: “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen!”
The Three Persons of the Holy Trinity, can be found to symbolized or reflected in the Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life (cf. the book of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange under that title). The first way, or first conversion, which is called the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way, can be seen to symbolize God the Father, the Creator, Who creates our soul and sets it out on its path which is intended to lead to Heaven. The second way, or second conversion, which is called the Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way, can be seen to symbolize Jesus Christ, Who is the Light of the World. The third way, or the third conversion, which is called the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way, can be seen to symbolize the Holy Ghost, Who is the Spirit of Unity and Love, that passes to and fro between the Father and the Son, and is meant to lead us to perfection.
A Spiritual Life of Love
Holy Scripture tells us that “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “In this we have known the charity of God, because He hath laid down His life for us” (1 John 3:16). “Let us therefore love God, because God has first loved us!” (1 John 4:19). Our Lord would later say: “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you! Abide in My love!” (John 15:9).
As regards the hierarchy in charity, Our Lord would later command: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these! On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Yet this love of God is not merely “lip-service-love” but an “active-love”―Our Lord would complain: “These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). Our love must be a love that is proved by actions, for, as the proverb says: “Actions speak louder than words!” Hence Scripture adds: “Faith without works is dead” (James), for it must be a “Faith that works by charity” (Galatians 5:6).
This love or charity is not just meant to be shown to God alone, but to all of God’s creatures. Our Lord said: “A new commandment I give unto you―that you love one another! As I have loved you, so you also love one another! By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another” (John 13:34-35). “This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you!” (John 15:12). “You have heard that it has been said: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thy enemy!’ But I say to you―Love your enemies! So that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust! For if you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even the publicans do this? And if you salute your brethren only, what do you do that is more? Do not also the heathens do this? Be you therefore perfect as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:38-48).
“Let us love one another, for charity is of God. And every one that loves, is born of God and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity. By this has the charity of God appeared towards us, because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world to be a propitiation for our sins. If God has so loved us―then we also ought to love one another. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us. God is charity―and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him. If any man says: ‘I love God!’ and hates his brother―then he is a liar! For he that loves not his brother whom he sees, how can he love God Whom he sees not? And this commandment we have from God―that he who loves God, must also love his brother!” (1 John 4:7-21).
Without this charity of the Trinity, we are nothing and all that we do is worthless with regard to Heaven and a supernatural reward: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
The Holy Trinity on Fire!
Charity is often represented by fire―and all the three Persons of the Holy Trinity have chosen fire to represent Their Divinity and Charity. God the Father appears to Moses taking the form of fire in the burning bush: “And the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush” (Exodus 3:2). We see the Sacred Heart of Jesus issuing forth flames of fire, manifesting His Divine Love and in Scripture Our Lord says: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49), while to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, the Sacred Heart said: “My Divine Heart is so passionately inflamed with love for men, that it can no longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its ardent charity, and needs spread them abroad! … Behold this Heart which has so loved men that It spared nothing―even going so far as to exhaust and consume Itself, to prove to them Its love!” The Holy Ghost comes down upon Our Lady and the Apostles at Pentecost in the form of tongues of fire: “And there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them―and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost” (Acts 2:3-4).
Temples of the Holy Trinity
The Holy Trinity wants to create a temple for Itself within us; in order to sacrifice within that temple; and to sanctify that temple. If we are in the state of sanctifying grace (with no unforgiven mortal in our soul and on our conscience) then we have the Holy Trinity dwelling within us. “The Kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21). Jesus said to the Apostles: “If anyone loves Me, then he will keep My words, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make our abode with him” (John 14:23). “Know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you, whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 6:19). “Now therefore you are no more strangers and foreigners; but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and the domestics of God, built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone. In Whom all the building, being framed together, grows up into an holy temple in the Lord. In Whom you also are built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit” (Ephesians 2:19-22).
Nevertheless, there are strong warnings for those who misuse and abuse the temple of God: “But if any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy, which you are” (1 Corinthians 3:17). “And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves: And He said to them: ‘It is written, “My house shall be called the house of prayer!” but you have made it a den of thieves’” (Matthew 21:12-23). Is your soul a “house of prayer” or has it become a “den of thieves” whereby you have stolen the glory that should be given to God and have glorified the world instead? Where does most of your time, thoughts, energies focus on―God or the world?
Varied Love for the Holy Trinity
Our love for the Father is tender and confident like that of children; eager to glorify Him as His only-begotten Son taught us to do by word and example. Love for the Father is the intense desire to have His will fulfilled on Earth, as it is in Heaven. Our love for the Son, Who willed to become flesh for us, is characterized by the desire of union with Him and transformation into Him; by imitation of His example, participation in His life through grace, and the sharing of His sufferings and His Cross. The Holy Eucharist—mystery of love, of sorrow, and of union—reveals the characteristics of this love.
Love for the Holy Ghost also has its special character, which we should study in order completely to understand devotion to Him. We have seen how the Holy Ghost loves us, how He moves us, like a divine breath that draws us to the bosom of God, like a sacred fire that transforms us into fire, like a divine artist who forms Jesus in us. Surely, then, our love for the Holy Ghost should be stamped with a loving docility, by a full surrender to Him, and by a constant fidelity, that permits us to be moved, directed, and transformed by His sanctifying action.
Our love for the Father tends to glorify Him; our love for the Son, to transform ourselves into Him; our love for the Holy Ghost, to let ourselves be possessed and moved by Him.
Mary and the Holy Trinity
Christ promises a sort of Trinitarian in-dwelling for those who persevere in love and obedience: “If a man loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make our home with him” (John 14:23). The Immaculate Virgin Mary is the exemplar or prototype of this Trinitarian in-dwelling, as we see from the Annunciation. The Archangel Gabriel’s message to Mary consists of three distinct parts (each of which she responds to separately), and relating the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Mary and the Father (Luke 1:26-29)
In the sixth month the Archangel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee!” But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered in her mind what sort of greeting this might be. It’s interesting that Mary isn’t described as being troubled the appearance of an angel (which would be normal: Matthew 28:5; Luke 1:13). Rather, Luke says that she was troubled by the saying, and wondered what it might mean. Luke doesn’t tell us why she was greatly troubled, but some propose one possibility.
The Archangel calls Mary by the title “Full of Grace,” a reference to her Immaculate Conception (which is why, confusingly, this is the Gospel for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception). And then he tells her, “the Lord is with thee,” a reference to Nathan’s message to King David, after the king wanted to build the Temple (2 Kings 7:3). It was Nathan giving a green light to proceed with the Temple, but has to backtrack on this, after God puts a stop to the plans. Elsewhere, we’re told that this is because the blood on David’s hands made him unworthy to build the temple (1 Paralipomenon 28:3). So now, the Archangel Gabriel is giving the green light to Mary to build the Temple (John 2:21), after declaring her sinless. An astute Jew would recognize this for what it is: a Messianic promise.
Mary and the Son (Luke 1:30-34)
And the angel said to her: “Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God. Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a Son; and thou shalt call His Name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High; and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of David His father; and He shall reign in the house of Jacob for ever. And of His kingdom there shall be no end.” And Mary said to the angel: “How shall this be done, because I know not man?” So having found favor with the Father, Mary is promised that she will bear the Son of God, Jesus. This raises an obvious question: how can that occur, given that Mary is a perpetual Virgin?
Mary and the Holy Ghost (Luke 1:35-38)
And the angel said to her: “The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee. And therefore also the Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. And behold thy cousin Elizabeth, she also hath conceived a son in her old age; and this is the sixth month with her that is called barren: because no word shall be impossible with God.” And Mary said: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word.” And the angel departed from her. So Mary finds favor with the Father, bears the Son, and is overshadowed by the Trinity. This is what I mean by saying that she is the exemplar of Trinitarian in-dwelling: after all, she literally grew the Son of God in her body, offered to her by the Father, through the angel, and produced by the power of the Holy Ghost.
Mary is the Holy Trinity’s Holy Tool
St. Louis de Montfort further develops and explains Mary’s role as the chosen tool of the Holy Trinity for the redemption of mankind: “It was through the most holy Virgin Mary that Jesus came into the world, and it is also through her that He has to reign in the world ... God having willed to commence and to complete His greatest works by the most holy Virgin … gave His Only begotten to the world ... God the Father communicated to Mary His fruitfulness, inasmuch as a mere creature was capable of it, in order that He might give her the power to produce His Son and all the members of His Mystical Body” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“God the Son descended into her virginal womb, as the New Adam into His terrestrial paradise, to take His pleasure there, and to work in secret marvels of grace ... Jesus Christ gave more glory to God the Father by submission to His Mother, during those thirty years, than He would have given Him in converting the whole world by the working of the most stupendous miracles. O, how highly we glorify God when, to please Him, we submit ourselves to Mary, after the example of Jesus Christ … If we examine closely the rest of our Blessed Lord’s life, we shall see that it was His will to begin His miracles by Mary. He sanctified St. John in the womb of his mother, St. Elizabeth, but it was by Mary’s word. No sooner had she spoken than John was sanctified; and this was His first miracle of grace. At the marriage of Cana He changed the water into wine, but it was at Mary’s humble prayer; and this was His first miracle of nature. He began and continued His miracles by Mary, and He will continue them to the end of ages by Mary” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“God the Holy Ghost, being barren in God–that is to say, not producing another Divine Person–is become fruitful by Mary, whom He has espoused. It was with her, in her, and of her that He produced His Masterpiece, which is God made Man, and that He goes on producing daily, to the end of the world, the predestinate and the members of the Body of that adorable Head. This is the reason why He, the Holy Ghost, the more He finds Mary, His dear and inseparable spouse, in any soul, the more active and mighty He becomes in producing Jesus Christ in that soul, and that soul in Jesus Christ” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
All Entrusted to Mary
St. Louis continues and explains that the Holy Trinity made Mary to be treasury of all graces: “The conduct which the Three Persons of the Most Holy Trinity have deigned to pursue in the Incarnation and the first coming of Jesus Christ, They still pursue daily, throughout the whole Church; and They will still pursue it even to the consummation of ages. God the Father made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Maria in Latin means “sea”) … and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich. God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues; and He has made her the treasurer of all … It is by her that He applies His merits and communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly. To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such wise that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces ... Such are the sentiments of the Church and the holy Fathers” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Mary Produces Jesus in Us
St. Louis then explains Mary’s role of producing and forming Jesus―the Second Person of the Holy Trinity―within our souls: “Just as in the natural and corporal generation of children there are a father and a mother, so in the supernatural and spiritual generation there are a Father, who is God, and a Mother, who is Mary. All the true children of God, the predestinate, have God for their Father and Mary for their Mother. He who has not Mary for his Mother has not God for his Father ... God the Son wishes to form Himself, and, so to speak, to incarnate Himself in His members every day, by His dear Mother … the first man that is born in Mary is the Man-God, Jesus Christ; the second is a mere man, the child of God and Mary by adoption. If Jesus Christ, the Head of men, is born in her, then the predestinate, who are the members of that Head, ought also to be born in her, by a necessary consequence ... It is certain that Jesus Christ is, for each man in particular who possesses Him, the fruit and the work of Mary; so that if any one of the faithful has Jesus Christ formed in his heart, he can say boldly, ‘All thanks be to Mary! What I possess is her effect and her fruit, and without her I should never have had it’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“St. Augustine, surpassing himself, and going beyond all I have yet said, affirms that all the predestinate, in order to be conformed to the image of the Son of God, are in this world hidden in the womb of the most holy Virgin, where they are guarded, nourished, brought up and made to grow by that good Mother until she has brought them forth to glory after death, which is properly the day of their birth, as the Church calls the death of the just” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Mary Will Produce the Greatest Saints
Finally, St. Louis explains the “God the Holy Ghost wishes to form the elect for Himself in her and by her, and He says to her: … “Reproduce yourself in My elect!” Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be–a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints, that there will be, in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints, who shall come at the end of the world, are reserved for her ... We may evidently conclude, then, that Mary has received from God a great domination over the souls of the elect; as God the Father ordered her to do, and, as their mother, form, nourish and bring them forth to eternal life, and have them as her inheritance and portion, and form them in Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ in them” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Edel Quinn and the In-dwelling of the Trinity
The Venerable Edel Quinn (1907-1944), was a young Irish girl who was one of the jewels of the Legion of Mary. Edel Quinn felt a call to religious life at a young age. She wished to join the Poor Clares but was prevented by advanced tuberculosis. After spending eighteen months in a sanatorium, her condition unchanged, she decided to become active in the Legion of Mary, which she joined in Dublin at age 20. She gave herself completely to its work in the form of helping the poor in the slums of Dublin. In 1936, at age 29 and dying of tuberculosis, Quinn became a Legion of Mary Envoy, a very active missionary to East and Central Africa, departing in December 1936 for Mombasa. By the outbreak of World War II, she was working as far off as Dar es Salaam and Mauritius. Fighting her illness, in seven and a half years she established hundreds of Legion branches and councils in today’s Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Malawi, and Mauritius.
Edel Quinn had an extraordinary devotion to the Holy Eucharist. Fr. Anselm Moynihan O.P., who was the very dedicated vice-postulator for her Cause wrote: “To be deprived of Communion was one of the greatest sufferings she could conceive. At one period in Africa she was a patient in a non-Catholic sanatorium and was able to receive Holy Communion only once a week. She said later that the privation of daily Communion gave her an experience of what Hell must be like.” In her own words she says: “Without the Eucharist what a desolation life would be... Thank the Trinity over and over again for this Gift... We want to be united with Him, to give ourselves to Him utterly. Our Faith tells us He is in the Eucharist; let us seek Him there.” Devotion to the Holy Eucharist is one of the brightest jewels in the crown of Legion Spirituality.
From Eucharist to Trinity
The Eucharist led to another aspect of Edel’s interior life, namely, the in-dwelling of the Holy Trinity through grace in her soul. An Irish Carthusian nun, who was a very close friend of Edel, tells us how she and Edel read together again and again the little book: From Holy Communion to the Blessed Trinity by Fr. Bernadot O.P. The central theme of this book is that the Holy Eucharist is the supreme means of enabling us to live the mystery of the In-dwelling of the Trinity in our souls. Edel grasped this magnificent principle both in theory and daily practice. It was not surprising to learn that another of her favorite authors was St. Elizabeth of the Trinity (1880-1906). St. Elizabeth is one of the great teachers concerning this mystery of God’s extraordinary intimacy with us in the very depths of our being through grace. For St. Elizabeth, and for Edel too, there is no substantial difference between the In-dwelling Trinity and the reality of Heaven. The only difference between the two is that we live the mystery of In-dwelling by Faith and Heaven by direct and beatific vision. Once this is grasped it is easy to understand why Edel craved moments of time and indeed long hours if possible, of gentle silence and recollection. Several key witnesses at the tribunal for her beatification testified under oath that despite the extraordinary business of her apostolic life her most striking characteristic was her spirit of recollection.
In one of Edel’s private notebooks, we read: “We are sharers in the very life of the Blessed Trinity, with the Incarnate Word as our Brother, His Father as our Father, His Spirit as the Soul of our souls. Yet we can never forget the transcendent holiness of God. And as a consequence, underlying, though not weakening the sublime intimacy we enjoy with the Divine Persons, will be an attitude of profound reverence and adoration... She knew her soul to be the living sanctuary of the Triune God. She snatched at every opportunity of quiet and silence to recollect herself and be alone with God and offer Him the incense of her adoration.”
Edel wrote the following in her little spiritual notebook: “Let us ask the grace to live in realization of our life in Christ, through Mary, adoring the Trinity” … “In Christ Jesus we have all. Realize this. Often offer Him to the Trinity, present in our soul, giving all honor, reparation and glory throughout the day” … “Realize that I am the temple of God, the dwelling place of the Trinity. In Christ we adore the Trinity. Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus. Try and adore the Trinity in our soul, even in the midst of troubles and external duties” … “With Christ and helped by Mary, let us adore the Trinity. Cut out useless worrying thoughts... to adore with and in union with Jesus... the Trinity in my soul... per Mariam.”
“Now I know in part―but then I shall know even as I am known” (1 Corinthians 13:12). The Holy Trinity is a mystery that cannot be fully understood or explained. If anyone professes to you that they fully understand the Holy Trinity—call for a doctor and keep the patient calm and restrained! However, though we cannot fully grasp, understand and explain the Trinity in its inexhaustible depth, we can, nevertheless, grasp something about the Trinity that helps our frail and finite human reason have some idea of this impenetrable mystery.
A supernatural mystery is a truth which we cannot fully understand, but which we firmly believe because we have God’s word for it. A supernatural mystery is above reason, but not contrary to it. No man can explain a mystery; neither can anyone know it unless it is revealed by God. “Great art thou, O Lord, in counsel, and incomprehensible in thought” (Jeremias 32:19).
It is not unreasonable to believe in a supernatural mystery. There are many natural mysteries around us that no one has yet been able to explain, yet we believe them: electricity, magnetism, force, and many of the processes of life. The doctrine of the Blessed Trinity is a strict mystery; that is, we cannot learn it from reason, nor understand it completely, even after it has been revealed to us.
Some Things We Just Cannot Understand
The doctrine contains two truths our reason cannot fully understand: (1) that there is only one God; and (2) that each of the three Persons is God. We can understand each of these truths separately, but not when taken together. The mystery of the Blessed Trinity is not a contradiction. We do not say that there are three gods in one God, nor that the three divine Persons are one Person.
We only say that there are three Persons in one God, that is, three Persons, and one nature or essence. Somewhat similarly, the soul of man has will, understanding, and memory, but it is only one soul. Also, the sun has form, light, and heat, but it is only one sun. Three flames put together make only one flame.
This is why saints like Patrick would use a three-leaf-clover to give the Irish a basic grasp of this mystery, telling them that the Trinity was One God, but Three Persons—like the clover had one stem, but three leaves that came forth from the same stem. One could humanize this botanical example and present the hypothesis of, not Siamese-Twins, but imagine instead Siamese-Triplets! Three-in-one. One being, yet three separate persons! Yet, in the order of nature, this would not be a perfection, but an imperfection—with God there is no such imperfection with its consequent limitations and restraints. Analogies are always imperfect and impractical, even though they help somewhat in understanding a concept.
Eh? What is it?
What do we mean by the Blessed Trinity? The technical, theological, catechetical answer would be: “By the Blessed Trinity we mean one and the same God in three divine Persons.” The Athanasian Creed, which was composed in order to refute the Arian heresy, which held that the Jesus Christ was not fully God, says the following:
“So there is one Father, not three Fathers; one Son, not three Sons; one Holy Ghost, not three Holy Ghosts. And in this Trinity nothing is afore or after, nothing is greater or less; but the whole three Persons are co-eternal together, and co-equal. So that in all things, as in aforesaid, the unity in Trinity, and the Trinity in unity is to be worshiped” (Extract from the Athanasian Creed).
Job Description
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8). Since “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8), then all the Persons of the Holy Trinity are also Charity. The Holy Trinity is an interaction of charity. The Father is God and the First Person of the Blessed Trinity. We speak of Him as being the “Creator.” Omnipotence, and especially the work of creation, is attributed to God the Father. God the Father could have created millions of beings instead of you yourself; but He chose you out of a love wholly undeserved, saying, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love” (Jeremias 31:3). Let us then cry in thanksgiving, “Abba, Father!” (Romans 8:15). Let us show our gratitude by avoiding all that could displease God the Father, by trying to please Him with virtue, by trying to attain an ever greater perfection, in obedience to that command Our Lord’s: “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48).
The Son is God and the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. To God the Son we owe our redemption from sin and eternal death; by His death He gave us life. For us God the Son debased Himself, taking the form of a servant ... “becoming obedient to death, even to death on a cross” (Philippians 2:8). In Holy Communion we are united with Him, for He Himself said; “He who eats My flesh, and drinks My blood, abides in Me and I in him” (John 6:57). In return we should be “other Christs,” and, as the Apostle urged, “walk even as He walked.”
The Holy Ghost is God and the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity. He manifests Himself in us particularly in our sanctification. The word “Ghost” applied to the Third Person means “Spirit.” In Latin, the word used in “Spiritus.”
At our Baptism God the Holy Ghost purifies us from all sin and fills our souls with divine grace, so that we become truly children of God, sons and heirs, and co-heirs with Jesus Christ. By Baptism we become living temples of the Holy Ghost: “Or do you not know that your members are the temple of the Holy Spirit, Who is in you?” (1 Corinthians 6:19).
Trinitarian Spiritual Life
We are baptized in the Name of the Holy Trinity―“I baptize you in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost!” We make the Sign of the Cross innumerable times throughout our life―“In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.”―which should recall to us our baptism. We frequently give glory to the Holy Trinity whenever we say the prayer: “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen!”
The Three Persons of the Holy Trinity, can be found to symbolized or reflected in the Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life (cf. the book of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange under that title). The first way, or first conversion, which is called the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way, can be seen to symbolize God the Father, the Creator, Who creates our soul and sets it out on its path which is intended to lead to Heaven. The second way, or second conversion, which is called the Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way, can be seen to symbolize Jesus Christ, Who is the Light of the World. The third way, or the third conversion, which is called the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way, can be seen to symbolize the Holy Ghost, Who is the Spirit of Unity and Love, that passes to and fro between the Father and the Son, and is meant to lead us to perfection.
A Spiritual Life of Love
Holy Scripture tells us that “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; so that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “In this we have known the charity of God, because He hath laid down His life for us” (1 John 3:16). “Let us therefore love God, because God has first loved us!” (1 John 4:19). Our Lord would later say: “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you! Abide in My love!” (John 15:9).
As regards the hierarchy in charity, Our Lord would later command: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these! On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Yet this love of God is not merely “lip-service-love” but an “active-love”―Our Lord would complain: “These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). Our love must be a love that is proved by actions, for, as the proverb says: “Actions speak louder than words!” Hence Scripture adds: “Faith without works is dead” (James), for it must be a “Faith that works by charity” (Galatians 5:6).
This love or charity is not just meant to be shown to God alone, but to all of God’s creatures. Our Lord said: “A new commandment I give unto you―that you love one another! As I have loved you, so you also love one another! By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another” (John 13:34-35). “This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you!” (John 15:12). “You have heard that it has been said: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thy enemy!’ But I say to you―Love your enemies! So that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust! For if you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even the publicans do this? And if you salute your brethren only, what do you do that is more? Do not also the heathens do this? Be you therefore perfect as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:38-48).
“Let us love one another, for charity is of God. And every one that loves, is born of God and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity. By this has the charity of God appeared towards us, because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world to be a propitiation for our sins. If God has so loved us―then we also ought to love one another. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us. God is charity―and he that abides in charity, abides in God, and God in him. If any man says: ‘I love God!’ and hates his brother―then he is a liar! For he that loves not his brother whom he sees, how can he love God Whom he sees not? And this commandment we have from God―that he who loves God, must also love his brother!” (1 John 4:7-21).
Without this charity of the Trinity, we are nothing and all that we do is worthless with regard to Heaven and a supernatural reward: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
The Holy Trinity on Fire!
Charity is often represented by fire―and all the three Persons of the Holy Trinity have chosen fire to represent Their Divinity and Charity. God the Father appears to Moses taking the form of fire in the burning bush: “And the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush” (Exodus 3:2). We see the Sacred Heart of Jesus issuing forth flames of fire, manifesting His Divine Love and in Scripture Our Lord says: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49), while to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, the Sacred Heart said: “My Divine Heart is so passionately inflamed with love for men, that it can no longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its ardent charity, and needs spread them abroad! … Behold this Heart which has so loved men that It spared nothing―even going so far as to exhaust and consume Itself, to prove to them Its love!” The Holy Ghost comes down upon Our Lady and the Apostles at Pentecost in the form of tongues of fire: “And there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them―and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost” (Acts 2:3-4).
Temples of the Holy Trinity
The Holy Trinity wants to create a temple for Itself within us; in order to sacrifice within that temple; and to sanctify that temple. If we are in the state of sanctifying grace (with no unforgiven mortal in our soul and on our conscience) then we have the Holy Trinity dwelling within us. “The Kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21). Jesus said to the Apostles: “If anyone loves Me, then he will keep My words, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make our abode with him” (John 14:23). “Know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you, whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 6:19). “Now therefore you are no more strangers and foreigners; but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and the domestics of God, built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone. In Whom all the building, being framed together, grows up into an holy temple in the Lord. In Whom you also are built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit” (Ephesians 2:19-22).
Nevertheless, there are strong warnings for those who misuse and abuse the temple of God: “But if any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy, which you are” (1 Corinthians 3:17). “And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves: And He said to them: ‘It is written, “My house shall be called the house of prayer!” but you have made it a den of thieves’” (Matthew 21:12-23). Is your soul a “house of prayer” or has it become a “den of thieves” whereby you have stolen the glory that should be given to God and have glorified the world instead? Where does most of your time, thoughts, energies focus on―God or the world?
Varied Love for the Holy Trinity
Our love for the Father is tender and confident like that of children; eager to glorify Him as His only-begotten Son taught us to do by word and example. Love for the Father is the intense desire to have His will fulfilled on Earth, as it is in Heaven. Our love for the Son, Who willed to become flesh for us, is characterized by the desire of union with Him and transformation into Him; by imitation of His example, participation in His life through grace, and the sharing of His sufferings and His Cross. The Holy Eucharist—mystery of love, of sorrow, and of union—reveals the characteristics of this love.
Love for the Holy Ghost also has its special character, which we should study in order completely to understand devotion to Him. We have seen how the Holy Ghost loves us, how He moves us, like a divine breath that draws us to the bosom of God, like a sacred fire that transforms us into fire, like a divine artist who forms Jesus in us. Surely, then, our love for the Holy Ghost should be stamped with a loving docility, by a full surrender to Him, and by a constant fidelity, that permits us to be moved, directed, and transformed by His sanctifying action.
Our love for the Father tends to glorify Him; our love for the Son, to transform ourselves into Him; our love for the Holy Ghost, to let ourselves be possessed and moved by Him.
Mary and the Holy Trinity
Christ promises a sort of Trinitarian in-dwelling for those who persevere in love and obedience: “If a man loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make our home with him” (John 14:23). The Immaculate Virgin Mary is the exemplar or prototype of this Trinitarian in-dwelling, as we see from the Annunciation. The Archangel Gabriel’s message to Mary consists of three distinct parts (each of which she responds to separately), and relating the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Mary and the Father (Luke 1:26-29)
In the sixth month the Archangel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee!” But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered in her mind what sort of greeting this might be. It’s interesting that Mary isn’t described as being troubled the appearance of an angel (which would be normal: Matthew 28:5; Luke 1:13). Rather, Luke says that she was troubled by the saying, and wondered what it might mean. Luke doesn’t tell us why she was greatly troubled, but some propose one possibility.
The Archangel calls Mary by the title “Full of Grace,” a reference to her Immaculate Conception (which is why, confusingly, this is the Gospel for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception). And then he tells her, “the Lord is with thee,” a reference to Nathan’s message to King David, after the king wanted to build the Temple (2 Kings 7:3). It was Nathan giving a green light to proceed with the Temple, but has to backtrack on this, after God puts a stop to the plans. Elsewhere, we’re told that this is because the blood on David’s hands made him unworthy to build the temple (1 Paralipomenon 28:3). So now, the Archangel Gabriel is giving the green light to Mary to build the Temple (John 2:21), after declaring her sinless. An astute Jew would recognize this for what it is: a Messianic promise.
Mary and the Son (Luke 1:30-34)
And the angel said to her: “Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God. Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a Son; and thou shalt call His Name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High; and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of David His father; and He shall reign in the house of Jacob for ever. And of His kingdom there shall be no end.” And Mary said to the angel: “How shall this be done, because I know not man?” So having found favor with the Father, Mary is promised that she will bear the Son of God, Jesus. This raises an obvious question: how can that occur, given that Mary is a perpetual Virgin?
Mary and the Holy Ghost (Luke 1:35-38)
And the angel said to her: “The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee. And therefore also the Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. And behold thy cousin Elizabeth, she also hath conceived a son in her old age; and this is the sixth month with her that is called barren: because no word shall be impossible with God.” And Mary said: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word.” And the angel departed from her. So Mary finds favor with the Father, bears the Son, and is overshadowed by the Trinity. This is what I mean by saying that she is the exemplar of Trinitarian in-dwelling: after all, she literally grew the Son of God in her body, offered to her by the Father, through the angel, and produced by the power of the Holy Ghost.
Mary is the Holy Trinity’s Holy Tool
St. Louis de Montfort further develops and explains Mary’s role as the chosen tool of the Holy Trinity for the redemption of mankind: “It was through the most holy Virgin Mary that Jesus came into the world, and it is also through her that He has to reign in the world ... God having willed to commence and to complete His greatest works by the most holy Virgin … gave His Only begotten to the world ... God the Father communicated to Mary His fruitfulness, inasmuch as a mere creature was capable of it, in order that He might give her the power to produce His Son and all the members of His Mystical Body” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“God the Son descended into her virginal womb, as the New Adam into His terrestrial paradise, to take His pleasure there, and to work in secret marvels of grace ... Jesus Christ gave more glory to God the Father by submission to His Mother, during those thirty years, than He would have given Him in converting the whole world by the working of the most stupendous miracles. O, how highly we glorify God when, to please Him, we submit ourselves to Mary, after the example of Jesus Christ … If we examine closely the rest of our Blessed Lord’s life, we shall see that it was His will to begin His miracles by Mary. He sanctified St. John in the womb of his mother, St. Elizabeth, but it was by Mary’s word. No sooner had she spoken than John was sanctified; and this was His first miracle of grace. At the marriage of Cana He changed the water into wine, but it was at Mary’s humble prayer; and this was His first miracle of nature. He began and continued His miracles by Mary, and He will continue them to the end of ages by Mary” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“God the Holy Ghost, being barren in God–that is to say, not producing another Divine Person–is become fruitful by Mary, whom He has espoused. It was with her, in her, and of her that He produced His Masterpiece, which is God made Man, and that He goes on producing daily, to the end of the world, the predestinate and the members of the Body of that adorable Head. This is the reason why He, the Holy Ghost, the more He finds Mary, His dear and inseparable spouse, in any soul, the more active and mighty He becomes in producing Jesus Christ in that soul, and that soul in Jesus Christ” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
All Entrusted to Mary
St. Louis continues and explains that the Holy Trinity made Mary to be treasury of all graces: “The conduct which the Three Persons of the Most Holy Trinity have deigned to pursue in the Incarnation and the first coming of Jesus Christ, They still pursue daily, throughout the whole Church; and They will still pursue it even to the consummation of ages. God the Father made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Maria in Latin means “sea”) … and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich. God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues; and He has made her the treasurer of all … It is by her that He applies His merits and communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly. To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such wise that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces ... Such are the sentiments of the Church and the holy Fathers” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Mary Produces Jesus in Us
St. Louis then explains Mary’s role of producing and forming Jesus―the Second Person of the Holy Trinity―within our souls: “Just as in the natural and corporal generation of children there are a father and a mother, so in the supernatural and spiritual generation there are a Father, who is God, and a Mother, who is Mary. All the true children of God, the predestinate, have God for their Father and Mary for their Mother. He who has not Mary for his Mother has not God for his Father ... God the Son wishes to form Himself, and, so to speak, to incarnate Himself in His members every day, by His dear Mother … the first man that is born in Mary is the Man-God, Jesus Christ; the second is a mere man, the child of God and Mary by adoption. If Jesus Christ, the Head of men, is born in her, then the predestinate, who are the members of that Head, ought also to be born in her, by a necessary consequence ... It is certain that Jesus Christ is, for each man in particular who possesses Him, the fruit and the work of Mary; so that if any one of the faithful has Jesus Christ formed in his heart, he can say boldly, ‘All thanks be to Mary! What I possess is her effect and her fruit, and without her I should never have had it’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“St. Augustine, surpassing himself, and going beyond all I have yet said, affirms that all the predestinate, in order to be conformed to the image of the Son of God, are in this world hidden in the womb of the most holy Virgin, where they are guarded, nourished, brought up and made to grow by that good Mother until she has brought them forth to glory after death, which is properly the day of their birth, as the Church calls the death of the just” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Mary Will Produce the Greatest Saints
Finally, St. Louis explains the “God the Holy Ghost wishes to form the elect for Himself in her and by her, and He says to her: … “Reproduce yourself in My elect!” Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be–a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints, that there will be, in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints, who shall come at the end of the world, are reserved for her ... We may evidently conclude, then, that Mary has received from God a great domination over the souls of the elect; as God the Father ordered her to do, and, as their mother, form, nourish and bring them forth to eternal life, and have them as her inheritance and portion, and form them in Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ in them” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Edel Quinn and the In-dwelling of the Trinity
The Venerable Edel Quinn (1907-1944), was a young Irish girl who was one of the jewels of the Legion of Mary. Edel Quinn felt a call to religious life at a young age. She wished to join the Poor Clares but was prevented by advanced tuberculosis. After spending eighteen months in a sanatorium, her condition unchanged, she decided to become active in the Legion of Mary, which she joined in Dublin at age 20. She gave herself completely to its work in the form of helping the poor in the slums of Dublin. In 1936, at age 29 and dying of tuberculosis, Quinn became a Legion of Mary Envoy, a very active missionary to East and Central Africa, departing in December 1936 for Mombasa. By the outbreak of World War II, she was working as far off as Dar es Salaam and Mauritius. Fighting her illness, in seven and a half years she established hundreds of Legion branches and councils in today’s Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Malawi, and Mauritius.
Edel Quinn had an extraordinary devotion to the Holy Eucharist. Fr. Anselm Moynihan O.P., who was the very dedicated vice-postulator for her Cause wrote: “To be deprived of Communion was one of the greatest sufferings she could conceive. At one period in Africa she was a patient in a non-Catholic sanatorium and was able to receive Holy Communion only once a week. She said later that the privation of daily Communion gave her an experience of what Hell must be like.” In her own words she says: “Without the Eucharist what a desolation life would be... Thank the Trinity over and over again for this Gift... We want to be united with Him, to give ourselves to Him utterly. Our Faith tells us He is in the Eucharist; let us seek Him there.” Devotion to the Holy Eucharist is one of the brightest jewels in the crown of Legion Spirituality.
From Eucharist to Trinity
The Eucharist led to another aspect of Edel’s interior life, namely, the in-dwelling of the Holy Trinity through grace in her soul. An Irish Carthusian nun, who was a very close friend of Edel, tells us how she and Edel read together again and again the little book: From Holy Communion to the Blessed Trinity by Fr. Bernadot O.P. The central theme of this book is that the Holy Eucharist is the supreme means of enabling us to live the mystery of the In-dwelling of the Trinity in our souls. Edel grasped this magnificent principle both in theory and daily practice. It was not surprising to learn that another of her favorite authors was St. Elizabeth of the Trinity (1880-1906). St. Elizabeth is one of the great teachers concerning this mystery of God’s extraordinary intimacy with us in the very depths of our being through grace. For St. Elizabeth, and for Edel too, there is no substantial difference between the In-dwelling Trinity and the reality of Heaven. The only difference between the two is that we live the mystery of In-dwelling by Faith and Heaven by direct and beatific vision. Once this is grasped it is easy to understand why Edel craved moments of time and indeed long hours if possible, of gentle silence and recollection. Several key witnesses at the tribunal for her beatification testified under oath that despite the extraordinary business of her apostolic life her most striking characteristic was her spirit of recollection.
In one of Edel’s private notebooks, we read: “We are sharers in the very life of the Blessed Trinity, with the Incarnate Word as our Brother, His Father as our Father, His Spirit as the Soul of our souls. Yet we can never forget the transcendent holiness of God. And as a consequence, underlying, though not weakening the sublime intimacy we enjoy with the Divine Persons, will be an attitude of profound reverence and adoration... She knew her soul to be the living sanctuary of the Triune God. She snatched at every opportunity of quiet and silence to recollect herself and be alone with God and offer Him the incense of her adoration.”
Edel wrote the following in her little spiritual notebook: “Let us ask the grace to live in realization of our life in Christ, through Mary, adoring the Trinity” … “In Christ Jesus we have all. Realize this. Often offer Him to the Trinity, present in our soul, giving all honor, reparation and glory throughout the day” … “Realize that I am the temple of God, the dwelling place of the Trinity. In Christ we adore the Trinity. Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus. Try and adore the Trinity in our soul, even in the midst of troubles and external duties” … “With Christ and helped by Mary, let us adore the Trinity. Cut out useless worrying thoughts... to adore with and in union with Jesus... the Trinity in my soul... per Mariam.”
Article 36
Pentecost Saturday, May 25th
Superman―A Jew From Cleveland Ohio
Pentecost Saturday, May 25th
Superman―A Jew From Cleveland Ohio
|
Many youngsters (of old) must have been somewhat familiar with “Superman”—having read, or at least heard of the character. Superman is a fictional superhero appearing in American comic books. The Superman character was created in 1933 by two Jewish high school students at Glenville High School, in Cleveland, Ohio—writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster. The character was sold to Detective Comics, Inc. (later DC Comics) in 1938 and subsequently appeared in various radio serials, newspaper strips, television programs, films, and video games. The Superman character helped create the modern “superhero”. Superman’s appearance is distinctive and iconic. He usually wears a blue costume, red cape, with a stylized red-and-yellow “S” shield on his chest.
Jewish Origins Comics historians, Gerard Jones and Brad Meltzer, believe Siegel may have been inspired to create Superman because of the death of his father, Mitchell Siegel, a Jewish immigrant, who owned a clothing store on Cleveland’s near east side. He died during a robbery attempt in 1932, a year before Superman was created. Although Siegel never mentioned the death of his father in interviews, “It had to have an effect,” argues Jones. “There’s a connection there: the loss of a dad as a source for Superman.” Meltzer states: “Your father dies in a robbery, and you invent a bulletproof man who becomes the world’s greatest hero.” Superman has fascinated scholars, with cultural theorists, commentators, and critics alike exploring the character’s impact and role in the United States and worldwide. |
Who Was Superman Based Upon
Because Siegel and Shuster were both Jewish, some religious commentators and pop-culture scholars suggest that Superman’s creation was partly influenced by Moses. For example, Superman’s Kryptonian name, “Kal-El”, resembles the Hebrew words meaning “voice of God”. The suffix “el”, meaning “(of) God,” is also found in the name of angels, e.g., Gabri-el, Micha-el, Rapha-el, Ari-el), all of whom are represented in art as ‘flying’ creatures with superhuman powers, seeking the good of people. Some suggest that this “Voice of God” is an allusion to Moses’ role as a prophet. Moreover, Kal-El’s parents send him away in a vessel, delivering him to new adoptive parents, in an alien culture, in order to save him from impending doom, just as Moses’ parents do. The story line of the birth and death of the planet Krypton, is borrowed from the language of Genesis.
On the other hand, Superman has been seen by others as being an analogy for Jesus, being a savior of humanity. He is not of this world; he has superhuman powers that he uses for the good of people; he is ‘adopted’ by a human couple; he lives a ‘hidden’ life; he fights evil; evil men make many attempts upon his life; etc. However, this analogy is more like wishful thinking on the part of Christians, since Superman was a Jewish creation, and thus it is very unlikely that Superman was modeled on Him Whom the Jews reject. If Superman was a parody, or a comical character, then perhaps so. However, Superman is made to be a hero, and so this theory does not hold much water. Besides, who needs a fictional hero like Superman, when we have a true, real-life Superhero in Jesus Christ? On top of that, we have the countless number of saints, who are also true superheroes.
The Fictional Character
The origin story of Superman, real name Kal-El, relates that he was not from Earth, but was born on the planet Krypton, before being rocketed to Earth as an infant by his scientist father Jor-El, moments before Krypton’s destruction. Discovered and adopted by a Kansas farmer and his wife, the child is raised as Clark Kent and imbued with a strong moral compass. Very early on he started to display superhuman abilities, which, upon reaching maturity, he resolved to use for the benefit of humanity.
Kryptonite
This brings us to the Kryptonite. There is, of course, no such mineral in reality. Kryptonite is a fictional radioactive mineral, or rock-like substance, thought up for the Superman comic book series. The material, usually shown as having been created from the remains of Superman’s native planet of Krypton, generally has detrimental effects on Superman. Kryptonite was produced from the material of Krypton, when it was destroyed in an explosion. It is usually found in the form of a glowing green rock or metal. The comic book writers incorporated it into their stories, as both a convenient danger and weakness for Superman and to add an interesting element to his stories. The writers eventually came up with many different forms of Kryptonite—green, red, black, gold, blue, jewel, etc. The general effect was that Kryptonite—whatever form they chose to include in the story—had an adverse and weakening effect on Superman.
Green Kryptonite, the most common form of Kryptonite, caused immediate physical pain and weakening, reducing Superman’s powers, and with the ability to kill within hours. Red Kryptonite effects typically last for 24-48 hours (though sometimes as long as 72), after which Superman became immune to that specific chunk of Red Kryptonite. Superman suffered the following effects upon exposure to various pieces of Red Kryptonite: being turned into a dragon, a non-powered giant, a dwarf, an ant-headed humanoid, a lunatic, and an amnesiac; being made unable to see anything colored green; growing incredibly long hair, nails, and beard; being rendered totally powerless; growing fat; gaining the ability to read thoughts; losing his invulnerability along the left side of his body; being split into an evil Superman and a good Clark Kent; becoming clumsy when trying to help out; and multiple personality changes. The other forms of Kryptonite had other similar effects.
Spiritual Supermen and Superwomen
This leads us into an analogy with the spiritual life. We are all called to the supernatural life—which is, as the very name expresses, a life that is above that of mere human nature. We have been raised to a higher form of life—a ‘super life’ if you can call it that. The word “super” comes the Latin words “super” and “supra”, which mean “above, on top of, beyond, in addition to.”
In this spiritual sense, we are called to be “Supermen” and “Superwomen.” As Jesus said: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world” (John 15:19). We are to rise above this world, fly above the world. “He that comes from above, is above all. He that is of the Earth, of the Earth he is, and of the Earth he speaks. He that comes from heaven, is above all” (John 3:31). We come from Heaven. Our soul was made by the God of Heaven and it was made for Heaven. “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above; where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth” (Colossians 3:1-2).
Different Colors and Kinds of Spiritual Kryptonite
What is our spiritual Kryptonite? Superman was weakened by something that came from his native world of Krypton—it went by the name of Kryptonite. This fictional Kryptonite came in many different colors and kinds: green, red, black, gold, blue, jewel, etc., each having its own particular range of effects. The chief forms of Spiritual Kryptonite can be divided into three tribes—each having their own families and children. These three tribes are: (1) the Kryptonite of the Devil, (2) the Kryptonite of the World, and (3) the Kryptonite within ourselves (body and soul).
The Kryptonite of the Devil
St. Peter warns us: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). Our Number One Enemy is the devil. “By the envy of the devil, death came into the world” (Wisdom 2:24). We cannot avoid the devil and must learn to fight the devil. Our Lord shows us the way: “Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil” (Matthew 4:1). Each one of us has to follow in Our Lord’s footsteps and do battle.
“And the tempter coming said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread!’ Who answered and said: ‘It is written, “Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, and set Him upon the pinnacle of the Temple, and said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down, for it is written: “That He hath given His angels charge over Thee, and in their hands shall they bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash Thy foot against a stone.”’ Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!”’ Again the devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shall thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him” (Matthew 4:3-11).
The devil uses three kinds of satanic Kryptonite on Our Lord: he tries to weaken Him with the world, he tries to weaken Him by pride, and he tries to weaken Him through the flesh. He offers Him the kingdoms of world, he tries to make Him “show-off” and he tries to make Him put hunger for bread before a hunger for God. Spiritual writers call these three forms of spiritual Kryptonite the “Triple Concupiscence”—the Concupiscence of the Flesh, the Concupiscence of the Eyes and the Pride of Life. Each of these has a potentially debilitating or weakening effect upon our souls. Just as the heavy metal of lead could protect Superman against the radiation of Kryptonite, so can mortification protect us against this triple temptation of the devil. Our Lord withstood these satanic temptations because He had practiced mortification in the desert for forty days and nights, praying and fasting—this is what we must also do to ward off the same attacks. As Our Lord would later say: “But this kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20). In our modern day, both prayer and fasting have withered away, as the devil increases his grip upon the world. This is why these two elements—prayer and fasting, or prayer and sacrifice, or prayer and penance—are the focal point of so many of Our Lady’s modern day apparitions. It protects us from the ‘radiation’ of the multi-form Kryptonite of satanic temptation.
The Kryptonite of the World
Our Lord calls the devil “the prince of this world”―“Now shall the prince of this world be cast out … The prince of this world comes, and in Me he has not any thing … The prince of this world is already judged” (John 12:31; 14:30; 16:11). The prince of this world will therefore use the world as bait to tempt and weaken us—much as he tried to do with Our Lord. We are weakened by what comes from our world—it goes by the word Worldliness. Just as the fictional Kryptonite comes in all colors and sizes, so too does Worldliness come in all colors and sizes. Worldliness plays upon our natural tendency for spiritual sloth and saps us of our ‘superhuman’ strength, that is to say our spiritual strength. This sapping of spiritual strength causes the spiritual disease of Lukewarmness. Worldliness and Lukewarmness are related or partners in crime.
The world was the bait that the devil presented before Our Lord: “The devil took Jesus up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them. And said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus saith to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and him only shalt thou serve!”’” (Matthew 4:8-10). Our Lord warned that many would take the bait of what the world has to offer and lose their souls. “And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word [of God], and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word [of God], and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). “And the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things entering in choke the word, and it is made fruitless” (Mark 4:19).
Our Lord tells us to refuse the bait of the world: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world” (1 John 2:15) ... “and be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “that we be not condemned with this world” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Our Lord disassociates Himself from the world: “And He said to them: ‘You are from beneath, I am from above! You are of this world, I am not of this world!’” (John 8:23). Speaking to God the Father about His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16).
In fact, there is an enmity between Christ and the world: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). And we must, in return, hate the world—for the world is an enemy of God. Sure―we can and must pray for the world that it converts to Christ―but if we love the world or even befriend the world, we also become enemies of God: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them” (1 John 4:5). “Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God” (1 Corinthians 2:12). “The Spirit of Truth the world cannot receive, because it sees Him not, nor knows Him” (John 14:17). Yet despite all this, we still try to make a fusion of our Faith with the world. St. Paul says we cannot do this: “Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever?” (2 Corinthians 6:14-15). O what fools we are!
The Kryptonite of Ill-Ordered Passions
“Passions are a part of our human nature. God placed them there. Yet they are meant to be controlled by us, and not for us to be controlled by them. Passions are said to be ill-ordered when they focus on some sensible good which is forbidden, or even towards a good which is lawful, but which is pursued with too much eagerness and without any reference to God. Such ill-regulated passions have the following fatal effects:
“They produce blindness of soul, for by ignoring right reason, they move headlong toward their object, led on by attraction or by pleasure. This tends to unbalance our judgment and clouds right reason. The soul then, instead of being guided by duty, allows itself to be fascinated by the pleasure of the moment. Blinded by the passions, the soul no longer sees clearly the will of God, the duty to be fulfilled; it is no longer competent to form a sane judgment” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §790). This reminds us of Our Lady’s words at La Salette: “The love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement ... There will be unbridled luxury and impurity which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost.”
“Ill-ordered passions weary and torture the soul. The passions, says St. John of the Cross, ‘are as impatient little children that can never be pleased, that ask their mother now for this, now for that, and are never satisfied. A miser tires of digging in vain for a treasure; likewise, the soul wearies of seeking what its appetites demand. If one of these appetites is satisfied, others arise and wear us out, because they cannot all be satisfied ... Appetites afflict the soul, enervate it and trouble it, just as the wind agitates the sea.’ Hence, a suffering all the more intense, as the more ardent are the passions, for they torture the soul until they are satisfied, and just as the appetite for food is whetted by eating, so the passions ever crave for more. If conscience offers resistance, they lose patience, they fret, they importune the will to yield to their ever-recurring desires. This is an unspeakable torture” (Fr. Tanquerey,The Spiritual Life, §790).
“Ill-ordered passions also weaken the will. Drawn here and there by these rebellious passions, the will is forced to scatter its efforts in every direction and by so doing to lessen its strength. Every concession it makes to the passions increases their demands and diminishes its own energies. Like the useless, rapacious, parasitic shoots grow and sap the strength of the soul. A time comes when the weakened soul becomes the prey of laxness and lukewarmness and is ready to make any surrender” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §791).
“Ill-ordered passions, lastly, blemish the soul. When the soul, yielding, to the passions, joins itself to creatures it lowers: itself to their level. Instead of being the faithful image of God it takes on the likeness of the things to which it clings; specks of dust, blots of grime, sully its beauty and impede a perfect union with God. ‘I do not hesitate to affirm,’ says St. John of the Cross, ‘that one single disordered passion, even if it lead not to mortal sin, is enough to cause the soul such a state of darkness, ugliness and uncleanness, that it becomes, incapable of intimate union with God so long as it remains a slave of this passion. What then shall we say of the soul, that is marred by the ugliness of all its passions, that is a prey to all its appetites? At what infinite distance will it not be from divine purity? Neither words nor arguments can make us understand the diverse stains, which all these appetites create in the soul. Each one of them, in its own way, places its share of filth and ugliness in the soul’” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §792).
“If we wish, then, to attain to union with God, we must repress all inordinate movements of the passions, even the most trifling; for perfect union with. God presupposes that there be nothing. in us contrary to the, divine will, no willful attachment to creatures or to self. The moment we deliberately allow any passion to lead us astray, this perfect union no longer exists. This is especially true of habitual attachments. These paralyze the will even if they are in themselves trivial. St. John of the Cross says that ‘it makes little difference whether a bird be tied by a thin thread, or a heavy cord; it cannot fly until either be broken’” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §793). Once again, Our Lady’s words: “The love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement ... There will be unbridled luxury and impurity which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost.”
Kryptonite of Sloth
Sloth is related to the Ill-Ordered Passions—both focus on pleasure and comfort.”Sloth is connected with sensuality, for it proceeds from love of pleasure, inasmuch as it inclines us to avoid effort and hardship. There is in all of us a tendency to follow the line of least resistance, which paralyzes or lessens our activity. Sloth is an inclination to idleness, or at least to aimlessness, to apathy in action. The slothful want to escape all exertion, whatever might interfere with their comfort or involve fatigue. The indolent man takes up his task reluctantly, and indifferently; what he does, he does badly … He does not absolutely refuse to work, but he delays and postpones indefinitely the accepted task. The truly lazy man wants to do nothing that proves irksome and shows a distinct aversion to all real work, whether physical or mental. When sloth bears upon spiritual exercises, it is called spiritual sloth. This consists in a species of dislike for things spiritual, which tends to make us negligent in the performance of our spiritual exercises of piety, causes us to shorten them, or to omit them altogether for vain excuses. This is the foster-parent of lukewarmness” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §883-§884).
“Because of its baneful consequences, spiritual sloth constitutes one of the most serious obstacles to perfection … In the soul of the slothful, instead of virtues, vices thrive there, and the walls which mortification had raised to protect virtue, crumble little by little, and open a breach for the enemy, sin, to enter in ... It was idleness and pride that brought Sodom low: ‘Behold this was the iniquity of Sodom thy sister, pride, fullness of bread and abundance, and the idleness of her and of her daughters’ (Ezechiel 16:49). Man’s heart and man’s mind cannot for long remain inactive; unless they be engaged by study or other work, they are soon filled with a host of fancies, thoughts, desires and emotions. In the state of fallen nature, what has full sway within us when we do not react against it, is the threefold concupiscence. Sensual, ambitious, proud, egotistical, selfish thoughts then gain the upper hand and expose us to sin” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §886-§887).
So many souls have been fatally weakened by the Kryptonite of Sloth. The image that comes to mind is that of the frog in gradually heated pot of water—slothfully and comfortably sitting there until the temperature reaches a fatal point of no return, where the muscles no longer work to enable it to jump to safety. The spiritual muscle has atrophied in the vast majority of Catholics today.
The Kryptonite of Lukewarmness
Fr. Tanquerey calls sloth the “the foster-parent of lukewarmness.” One disease leads to another, and one spiritual malady leads to the next one. Lukewarmness is singled-out by God in Holy Scripture in a most terrible manner. Fr. Faber writes: “There is nothing in the spiritual life which arrests our attention so forcibly as lukewarmness because of the unusual language in which it has pleased God to express His ineffable disgust with it.” What language does God use concerning lukewarmness? He says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
What a horrible thought! To be spewed-out of the mouth of God! God goes on to say: “Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ Knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked? I counsel thee to buy of me gold fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see!’” (Apocalypse 3:17-18).
Fr. Faber takes us this idea of “that thou mayest see” by correlating the disease of lukewarmness to the physical disease of blindness: “The diseases and evils of the body are, as might be expected, seeing they are the immediate out-flowings of sin, in a great degree typical of the miseries and misfortunes of the soul. If we seek the correlative of lukewarmness, we shall find it in blindness. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, “Lukewarmness”).
Our Lady speaks of the evil of this lukewarmness, saying: “Some let themselves be dazzled by the false glamour of honors and human greatness, while others are blinded by self-love, not realizing that they are falling into lukewarmness, that immense evil which destroys their fervor, humility, self-renunciation and the ceaseless practice of religious virtues and fraternal charity and that child-like simplicity which makes souls so dear to my Divine Son and to me” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Fr. Faber, in x-raying lukewarmness, looks at its chief causes and points out that “It is usual to consider that this blindness [of lukewarmness] is owing principally to three causes, (i) the frequency of venial sins, (ii) habitual dissipation of mind and (iii) the ruling passion.” Sloth leads us to neglect our spiritual exercises—especially those of prayer and mortification. This, in turn, leaves us unprotected against temptation to sin. Though Mortal Sin may still shock and frighten our soul, Venial Sin seems to be the lesser of two evils and less threatening—besides, we argue that we can’t go to Hell for Venial Sin! Thus a gradual acceptance and increase of Venial Sin ensues.
Sloth also allows the mind to become undisciplined—it goes where it wants, looks at what it wants, thinks what it wants. However, it wants the material and sensible far more than it wants the spiritual and supernatural. Hence the fence of the mind is breached and in pour all the things of the world. Sloth also neglects keeping watch and guard over our predominant passion{s), with the result that, like a fast growing cancer, they take over our life.
Comfort, pleasure, indulgence and ease take over what little virtue we may have had. Sloth also prevents any violent and sustained reaction to this invasion, and we just sink into a forlorn sense of inevitability. As Fr. Faber writes: “It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor, the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, and then—lost forever” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, “Lukewarmness”).
Because Siegel and Shuster were both Jewish, some religious commentators and pop-culture scholars suggest that Superman’s creation was partly influenced by Moses. For example, Superman’s Kryptonian name, “Kal-El”, resembles the Hebrew words meaning “voice of God”. The suffix “el”, meaning “(of) God,” is also found in the name of angels, e.g., Gabri-el, Micha-el, Rapha-el, Ari-el), all of whom are represented in art as ‘flying’ creatures with superhuman powers, seeking the good of people. Some suggest that this “Voice of God” is an allusion to Moses’ role as a prophet. Moreover, Kal-El’s parents send him away in a vessel, delivering him to new adoptive parents, in an alien culture, in order to save him from impending doom, just as Moses’ parents do. The story line of the birth and death of the planet Krypton, is borrowed from the language of Genesis.
On the other hand, Superman has been seen by others as being an analogy for Jesus, being a savior of humanity. He is not of this world; he has superhuman powers that he uses for the good of people; he is ‘adopted’ by a human couple; he lives a ‘hidden’ life; he fights evil; evil men make many attempts upon his life; etc. However, this analogy is more like wishful thinking on the part of Christians, since Superman was a Jewish creation, and thus it is very unlikely that Superman was modeled on Him Whom the Jews reject. If Superman was a parody, or a comical character, then perhaps so. However, Superman is made to be a hero, and so this theory does not hold much water. Besides, who needs a fictional hero like Superman, when we have a true, real-life Superhero in Jesus Christ? On top of that, we have the countless number of saints, who are also true superheroes.
The Fictional Character
The origin story of Superman, real name Kal-El, relates that he was not from Earth, but was born on the planet Krypton, before being rocketed to Earth as an infant by his scientist father Jor-El, moments before Krypton’s destruction. Discovered and adopted by a Kansas farmer and his wife, the child is raised as Clark Kent and imbued with a strong moral compass. Very early on he started to display superhuman abilities, which, upon reaching maturity, he resolved to use for the benefit of humanity.
Kryptonite
This brings us to the Kryptonite. There is, of course, no such mineral in reality. Kryptonite is a fictional radioactive mineral, or rock-like substance, thought up for the Superman comic book series. The material, usually shown as having been created from the remains of Superman’s native planet of Krypton, generally has detrimental effects on Superman. Kryptonite was produced from the material of Krypton, when it was destroyed in an explosion. It is usually found in the form of a glowing green rock or metal. The comic book writers incorporated it into their stories, as both a convenient danger and weakness for Superman and to add an interesting element to his stories. The writers eventually came up with many different forms of Kryptonite—green, red, black, gold, blue, jewel, etc. The general effect was that Kryptonite—whatever form they chose to include in the story—had an adverse and weakening effect on Superman.
Green Kryptonite, the most common form of Kryptonite, caused immediate physical pain and weakening, reducing Superman’s powers, and with the ability to kill within hours. Red Kryptonite effects typically last for 24-48 hours (though sometimes as long as 72), after which Superman became immune to that specific chunk of Red Kryptonite. Superman suffered the following effects upon exposure to various pieces of Red Kryptonite: being turned into a dragon, a non-powered giant, a dwarf, an ant-headed humanoid, a lunatic, and an amnesiac; being made unable to see anything colored green; growing incredibly long hair, nails, and beard; being rendered totally powerless; growing fat; gaining the ability to read thoughts; losing his invulnerability along the left side of his body; being split into an evil Superman and a good Clark Kent; becoming clumsy when trying to help out; and multiple personality changes. The other forms of Kryptonite had other similar effects.
Spiritual Supermen and Superwomen
This leads us into an analogy with the spiritual life. We are all called to the supernatural life—which is, as the very name expresses, a life that is above that of mere human nature. We have been raised to a higher form of life—a ‘super life’ if you can call it that. The word “super” comes the Latin words “super” and “supra”, which mean “above, on top of, beyond, in addition to.”
In this spiritual sense, we are called to be “Supermen” and “Superwomen.” As Jesus said: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world” (John 15:19). We are to rise above this world, fly above the world. “He that comes from above, is above all. He that is of the Earth, of the Earth he is, and of the Earth he speaks. He that comes from heaven, is above all” (John 3:31). We come from Heaven. Our soul was made by the God of Heaven and it was made for Heaven. “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above; where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth” (Colossians 3:1-2).
Different Colors and Kinds of Spiritual Kryptonite
What is our spiritual Kryptonite? Superman was weakened by something that came from his native world of Krypton—it went by the name of Kryptonite. This fictional Kryptonite came in many different colors and kinds: green, red, black, gold, blue, jewel, etc., each having its own particular range of effects. The chief forms of Spiritual Kryptonite can be divided into three tribes—each having their own families and children. These three tribes are: (1) the Kryptonite of the Devil, (2) the Kryptonite of the World, and (3) the Kryptonite within ourselves (body and soul).
The Kryptonite of the Devil
St. Peter warns us: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). Our Number One Enemy is the devil. “By the envy of the devil, death came into the world” (Wisdom 2:24). We cannot avoid the devil and must learn to fight the devil. Our Lord shows us the way: “Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil” (Matthew 4:1). Each one of us has to follow in Our Lord’s footsteps and do battle.
“And the tempter coming said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread!’ Who answered and said: ‘It is written, “Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, and set Him upon the pinnacle of the Temple, and said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down, for it is written: “That He hath given His angels charge over Thee, and in their hands shall they bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash Thy foot against a stone.”’ Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!”’ Again the devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shall thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him” (Matthew 4:3-11).
The devil uses three kinds of satanic Kryptonite on Our Lord: he tries to weaken Him with the world, he tries to weaken Him by pride, and he tries to weaken Him through the flesh. He offers Him the kingdoms of world, he tries to make Him “show-off” and he tries to make Him put hunger for bread before a hunger for God. Spiritual writers call these three forms of spiritual Kryptonite the “Triple Concupiscence”—the Concupiscence of the Flesh, the Concupiscence of the Eyes and the Pride of Life. Each of these has a potentially debilitating or weakening effect upon our souls. Just as the heavy metal of lead could protect Superman against the radiation of Kryptonite, so can mortification protect us against this triple temptation of the devil. Our Lord withstood these satanic temptations because He had practiced mortification in the desert for forty days and nights, praying and fasting—this is what we must also do to ward off the same attacks. As Our Lord would later say: “But this kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20). In our modern day, both prayer and fasting have withered away, as the devil increases his grip upon the world. This is why these two elements—prayer and fasting, or prayer and sacrifice, or prayer and penance—are the focal point of so many of Our Lady’s modern day apparitions. It protects us from the ‘radiation’ of the multi-form Kryptonite of satanic temptation.
The Kryptonite of the World
Our Lord calls the devil “the prince of this world”―“Now shall the prince of this world be cast out … The prince of this world comes, and in Me he has not any thing … The prince of this world is already judged” (John 12:31; 14:30; 16:11). The prince of this world will therefore use the world as bait to tempt and weaken us—much as he tried to do with Our Lord. We are weakened by what comes from our world—it goes by the word Worldliness. Just as the fictional Kryptonite comes in all colors and sizes, so too does Worldliness come in all colors and sizes. Worldliness plays upon our natural tendency for spiritual sloth and saps us of our ‘superhuman’ strength, that is to say our spiritual strength. This sapping of spiritual strength causes the spiritual disease of Lukewarmness. Worldliness and Lukewarmness are related or partners in crime.
The world was the bait that the devil presented before Our Lord: “The devil took Jesus up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them. And said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus saith to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and him only shalt thou serve!”’” (Matthew 4:8-10). Our Lord warned that many would take the bait of what the world has to offer and lose their souls. “And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word [of God], and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word [of God], and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). “And the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things entering in choke the word, and it is made fruitless” (Mark 4:19).
Our Lord tells us to refuse the bait of the world: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world” (1 John 2:15) ... “and be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “that we be not condemned with this world” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Our Lord disassociates Himself from the world: “And He said to them: ‘You are from beneath, I am from above! You are of this world, I am not of this world!’” (John 8:23). Speaking to God the Father about His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16).
In fact, there is an enmity between Christ and the world: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). And we must, in return, hate the world—for the world is an enemy of God. Sure―we can and must pray for the world that it converts to Christ―but if we love the world or even befriend the world, we also become enemies of God: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them” (1 John 4:5). “Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God” (1 Corinthians 2:12). “The Spirit of Truth the world cannot receive, because it sees Him not, nor knows Him” (John 14:17). Yet despite all this, we still try to make a fusion of our Faith with the world. St. Paul says we cannot do this: “Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever?” (2 Corinthians 6:14-15). O what fools we are!
The Kryptonite of Ill-Ordered Passions
“Passions are a part of our human nature. God placed them there. Yet they are meant to be controlled by us, and not for us to be controlled by them. Passions are said to be ill-ordered when they focus on some sensible good which is forbidden, or even towards a good which is lawful, but which is pursued with too much eagerness and without any reference to God. Such ill-regulated passions have the following fatal effects:
“They produce blindness of soul, for by ignoring right reason, they move headlong toward their object, led on by attraction or by pleasure. This tends to unbalance our judgment and clouds right reason. The soul then, instead of being guided by duty, allows itself to be fascinated by the pleasure of the moment. Blinded by the passions, the soul no longer sees clearly the will of God, the duty to be fulfilled; it is no longer competent to form a sane judgment” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §790). This reminds us of Our Lady’s words at La Salette: “The love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement ... There will be unbridled luxury and impurity which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost.”
“Ill-ordered passions weary and torture the soul. The passions, says St. John of the Cross, ‘are as impatient little children that can never be pleased, that ask their mother now for this, now for that, and are never satisfied. A miser tires of digging in vain for a treasure; likewise, the soul wearies of seeking what its appetites demand. If one of these appetites is satisfied, others arise and wear us out, because they cannot all be satisfied ... Appetites afflict the soul, enervate it and trouble it, just as the wind agitates the sea.’ Hence, a suffering all the more intense, as the more ardent are the passions, for they torture the soul until they are satisfied, and just as the appetite for food is whetted by eating, so the passions ever crave for more. If conscience offers resistance, they lose patience, they fret, they importune the will to yield to their ever-recurring desires. This is an unspeakable torture” (Fr. Tanquerey,The Spiritual Life, §790).
“Ill-ordered passions also weaken the will. Drawn here and there by these rebellious passions, the will is forced to scatter its efforts in every direction and by so doing to lessen its strength. Every concession it makes to the passions increases their demands and diminishes its own energies. Like the useless, rapacious, parasitic shoots grow and sap the strength of the soul. A time comes when the weakened soul becomes the prey of laxness and lukewarmness and is ready to make any surrender” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §791).
“Ill-ordered passions, lastly, blemish the soul. When the soul, yielding, to the passions, joins itself to creatures it lowers: itself to their level. Instead of being the faithful image of God it takes on the likeness of the things to which it clings; specks of dust, blots of grime, sully its beauty and impede a perfect union with God. ‘I do not hesitate to affirm,’ says St. John of the Cross, ‘that one single disordered passion, even if it lead not to mortal sin, is enough to cause the soul such a state of darkness, ugliness and uncleanness, that it becomes, incapable of intimate union with God so long as it remains a slave of this passion. What then shall we say of the soul, that is marred by the ugliness of all its passions, that is a prey to all its appetites? At what infinite distance will it not be from divine purity? Neither words nor arguments can make us understand the diverse stains, which all these appetites create in the soul. Each one of them, in its own way, places its share of filth and ugliness in the soul’” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §792).
“If we wish, then, to attain to union with God, we must repress all inordinate movements of the passions, even the most trifling; for perfect union with. God presupposes that there be nothing. in us contrary to the, divine will, no willful attachment to creatures or to self. The moment we deliberately allow any passion to lead us astray, this perfect union no longer exists. This is especially true of habitual attachments. These paralyze the will even if they are in themselves trivial. St. John of the Cross says that ‘it makes little difference whether a bird be tied by a thin thread, or a heavy cord; it cannot fly until either be broken’” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §793). Once again, Our Lady’s words: “The love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement ... There will be unbridled luxury and impurity which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost.”
Kryptonite of Sloth
Sloth is related to the Ill-Ordered Passions—both focus on pleasure and comfort.”Sloth is connected with sensuality, for it proceeds from love of pleasure, inasmuch as it inclines us to avoid effort and hardship. There is in all of us a tendency to follow the line of least resistance, which paralyzes or lessens our activity. Sloth is an inclination to idleness, or at least to aimlessness, to apathy in action. The slothful want to escape all exertion, whatever might interfere with their comfort or involve fatigue. The indolent man takes up his task reluctantly, and indifferently; what he does, he does badly … He does not absolutely refuse to work, but he delays and postpones indefinitely the accepted task. The truly lazy man wants to do nothing that proves irksome and shows a distinct aversion to all real work, whether physical or mental. When sloth bears upon spiritual exercises, it is called spiritual sloth. This consists in a species of dislike for things spiritual, which tends to make us negligent in the performance of our spiritual exercises of piety, causes us to shorten them, or to omit them altogether for vain excuses. This is the foster-parent of lukewarmness” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §883-§884).
“Because of its baneful consequences, spiritual sloth constitutes one of the most serious obstacles to perfection … In the soul of the slothful, instead of virtues, vices thrive there, and the walls which mortification had raised to protect virtue, crumble little by little, and open a breach for the enemy, sin, to enter in ... It was idleness and pride that brought Sodom low: ‘Behold this was the iniquity of Sodom thy sister, pride, fullness of bread and abundance, and the idleness of her and of her daughters’ (Ezechiel 16:49). Man’s heart and man’s mind cannot for long remain inactive; unless they be engaged by study or other work, they are soon filled with a host of fancies, thoughts, desires and emotions. In the state of fallen nature, what has full sway within us when we do not react against it, is the threefold concupiscence. Sensual, ambitious, proud, egotistical, selfish thoughts then gain the upper hand and expose us to sin” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §886-§887).
So many souls have been fatally weakened by the Kryptonite of Sloth. The image that comes to mind is that of the frog in gradually heated pot of water—slothfully and comfortably sitting there until the temperature reaches a fatal point of no return, where the muscles no longer work to enable it to jump to safety. The spiritual muscle has atrophied in the vast majority of Catholics today.
The Kryptonite of Lukewarmness
Fr. Tanquerey calls sloth the “the foster-parent of lukewarmness.” One disease leads to another, and one spiritual malady leads to the next one. Lukewarmness is singled-out by God in Holy Scripture in a most terrible manner. Fr. Faber writes: “There is nothing in the spiritual life which arrests our attention so forcibly as lukewarmness because of the unusual language in which it has pleased God to express His ineffable disgust with it.” What language does God use concerning lukewarmness? He says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
What a horrible thought! To be spewed-out of the mouth of God! God goes on to say: “Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ Knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked? I counsel thee to buy of me gold fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see!’” (Apocalypse 3:17-18).
Fr. Faber takes us this idea of “that thou mayest see” by correlating the disease of lukewarmness to the physical disease of blindness: “The diseases and evils of the body are, as might be expected, seeing they are the immediate out-flowings of sin, in a great degree typical of the miseries and misfortunes of the soul. If we seek the correlative of lukewarmness, we shall find it in blindness. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, “Lukewarmness”).
Our Lady speaks of the evil of this lukewarmness, saying: “Some let themselves be dazzled by the false glamour of honors and human greatness, while others are blinded by self-love, not realizing that they are falling into lukewarmness, that immense evil which destroys their fervor, humility, self-renunciation and the ceaseless practice of religious virtues and fraternal charity and that child-like simplicity which makes souls so dear to my Divine Son and to me” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Fr. Faber, in x-raying lukewarmness, looks at its chief causes and points out that “It is usual to consider that this blindness [of lukewarmness] is owing principally to three causes, (i) the frequency of venial sins, (ii) habitual dissipation of mind and (iii) the ruling passion.” Sloth leads us to neglect our spiritual exercises—especially those of prayer and mortification. This, in turn, leaves us unprotected against temptation to sin. Though Mortal Sin may still shock and frighten our soul, Venial Sin seems to be the lesser of two evils and less threatening—besides, we argue that we can’t go to Hell for Venial Sin! Thus a gradual acceptance and increase of Venial Sin ensues.
Sloth also allows the mind to become undisciplined—it goes where it wants, looks at what it wants, thinks what it wants. However, it wants the material and sensible far more than it wants the spiritual and supernatural. Hence the fence of the mind is breached and in pour all the things of the world. Sloth also neglects keeping watch and guard over our predominant passion{s), with the result that, like a fast growing cancer, they take over our life.
Comfort, pleasure, indulgence and ease take over what little virtue we may have had. Sloth also prevents any violent and sustained reaction to this invasion, and we just sink into a forlorn sense of inevitability. As Fr. Faber writes: “It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor, the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, and then—lost forever” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, “Lukewarmness”).
Article 35
Pentecost Friday, May 24th
Do You Have a Ghost in the House? Do You Want a Ghost in the House?
Pentecost Friday, May 24th
Do You Have a Ghost in the House? Do You Want a Ghost in the House?
Spooky Spirit or Holy Ghost?
Do you have a ghost in your home? Do you want a ghost in your home? You have to have some kind of ghost or spirit in your home—for, as the saying goes, “Nature abhors a vacuum!” The supernatural also abhors a vacuum, as we see with King Saul: “But the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit troubled him” (1 Kings 16:14). Jesus also says: “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh, is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit, is spirit” (John 3:5-6). “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30).
So what is the ghost of your home? Or, rather, what spirit rules your home? Nature abhors a vacuum—you cannot have a godly spirit and worldly spirit, Our Lord Himself tells us this: “You cannot serve God and mammon! Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-24). “You are from beneath, I am from above! You are of this world, I am not of this world! … My Kingdom is not of this world … My Kingdom is not here! ... The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not anything! … The world hateth Me, because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil” (John 8:23; 18:36; 14:30; 7:7). Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:15-16).
“Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! I Know All This!”
“Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! I know all this! There’s no need to keep on repeating it again and again and again!” you say in exasperated boredom. The answer to that is: “Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! I know you know all this! But there’s a massive difference between knowing and doing!” Our Lord speaks thus of the “know-alls-and-do-nothings”—“Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). To which Holy Scripture adds: “Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if a man be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he shall be compared to a man beholding his own countenance in a glass. For he beheld himself, and went his way, and presently forgot what manner of man he was. But he that hath looked into the perfect law of liberty, and hath continued therein, not becoming a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work; this man shall be blessed in his deed. And if any man think himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man’s religion is vain. Religion clean and undefiled before God and the Father, is this: to keep one’s self unspotted from this world!” (James 1:22-27). Yet rather than be unspotted from this world, we love to be spotted by this world--the world has too much offer and enjoy for us to ignore it! The world just “hits the spot!”
Therefore, we need persistence in preaching to the family—in season and out of season—just as St. John, did in his old age, when he would never cease to say to his flock: “Children, love one another!”--which eventually provoked the complaint: “Do you have nothing else you can say?”―which, in turn, produced St. John’s answer: “There is nothing else that needs saying—everything is contained therein!” We need that same persistence and insistence within the family—in season and out of season, at all times and in all circumstances. As Holy Scripture say: “I charge thee, before God and Jesus Christ―Preach the word! Be insistent, in season and out of season! Reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine. For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears and will turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables!” (2 Timothy 4:1-4).
A Time of “Itching-Ears”, False Teachers and Fables
That is where we are today—having “itching ears” for what is going on in the world, believing “fables” or rumors or gossip, taking for our teachers worldly media outlets instead of God and His word; letting our beliefs follow our desires as we tinker, twist and change our God-given religion is a personally tailored religion that suits our preferences and pleasures. “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God: having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5).
Which Spirit Rules Your Home?
You cannot have it both ways—live for the world and live for God. There is one spirit that mostly and truly rules your home—and that spirit is either getting stronger or weaker. “That which is born of the flesh, is flesh [worldly]; and that which is born of the Spirit, is spirit [spiritual]” … “It is the spirit [spiritual] that quickeneth: the flesh [world] profiteth nothing. The words that I have spoken to you, are spirit and life!” (John 3:6, 6:64). “Walk not according to the flesh [world], but according to the Spirit [of God]. For they that are according to the flesh [world], mind the things that are of the flesh [world]; but they that are according to the Spirit [of God], mind the things that are of the Spirit. For the wisdom of the flesh is death; but the wisdom of the spirit is life and peace. Because the wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither can it be. And they who are in the flesh [worldly], cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh [world], but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of Christ’s. And if Christ be in you, the body indeed is dead [to the world], because of sin; but the spirit liveth, because of justification. And if the Spirit of Him, that raised up Jesus from the dead, dwell in you; He that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead, shall quicken also your mortal bodies, because of His Spirit that dwelleth in you” (Romans 8:4-11).
Therefore, your home and family is either “alive” to God or “alive” to the world, either “dead” to God or “dead” to the world. You cannot be, at the same time, “alive AND dead” to God, or “alive AND dead” to the world. “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). “What concord hath Christ with Belial? What fellowship hath light with darkness? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). “Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; that we may know the things that are given us from God!” (1 Corinthians 2:12). These are the kinds of words that you must use “in family”—not just once a year, or once a month, or once a week, nor even once a day—but if necessary many times a day―”in season and out of season”―just as the world preaches its messages many times a day on the TV, the internet, the social media, the radio, in music, in newspapers and magazines, in books, in advertising, etc. Just as in business, you have to compete or go out of business—likewise with the Faith, compete or lose the Faith or have your children gradually lose the Faith, or weaken in the Faith so much that, when the inevitable persecution comes, they will be so weak that they will be among the first to give up the Faith to save their skin.
The Spirit of God
Isaias, speaking of the future Christ, describes His spirit—the Spirit of God: “There shall come forth a Rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of His root. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him: the spirit of wisdom, and of understanding, the spirit of counsel, and of fortitude, the spirit of knowledge, and of godliness. And He shall be filled with the spirit of the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge according to the sight of the eyes, nor reprove according to the hearing of the ears. But He shall judge the poor with justice, and shall reprove with equity for the meek of the Earth: land he shall strike the Earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall slay the wicked. And justice shall be the girdle of his loins: and Faith the girdle of His reins” (Isaias 11:1-5).
We see here the listing of the Seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost—we list them in reverse order that is to say, in ascending order, from lowest to highest―Fear of the Lord, godliness (piety), knowledge, fortitude, counsel, understanding and wisdom. Though they all sound like virtues, they are not virtues. They are movements by Holy Ghost that perfect our virtues—which, logically, presupposes that we are practicing virtues! Remember—and this is VERY important. A virtue is not a “one time thing” or an “occasional thing” or a “now and again thing” or a “hit-and-miss” thing or a “three-weeks-on-and-two-weeks-off” thing. Virtue is an habitual thing—a “day-in-day-out” thing, or a “24/7/all-year-round” thing, it has to become and be a “normal-way-of-acting” thing. Anyone can be a “flash-in-the-pan” in some thing or another, but virtue requires that it be “the norm” and not a mere one-time “flash-in-the-pan”. Virtue separates the “amateur-armchair-quarterback” from the “professional-on-the-field-quarterback”—the first has “the mouth” and second has “the money”, and the first should “put his money where his mouth is”!
We Need the Spirit of God in Our Soul and Home
There is one ghost that you do need and one ghost you should not be afraid of—that is the Holy Ghost! If there is one spirit that you want to possess you—that spirit is the Holy Spirit! “God is a spirit; and they that adore Him, must adore Him in spirit” (John 4:24) “That which is born of the flesh, is flesh [worldly]; and that which is born of the Spirit, is spirit [spiritual]” (John 3:6). “Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; that we may know the things that are given us from God” (1 Corinthians 2:12). “If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of Christ’s … And if the Spirit of Him, that raised up Jesus from the dead, dwell in you; He that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead, shall quicken also your mortal bodies, because of His Spirit that dwelleth in you!” (Romans 8:9-11). There is your resurrection! “He that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead, shall quicken also your mortal bodies…”—but only if Christ’s spirit dwells within you: “…because of His Spirit that dwelleth in you!”
Let the Spirit Resurrect You!
There is nothing more that God wants than the resurrection of so many ‘dead’ Catholic families—it was the purpose of Christ’s coming: “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly!” (John 10:10)—but then He adds: “And you will not come to Me that you may have life!” (John 5:40). You will not come to Me, but you will go to your TV set, to your computer, to you tablet, to your smartphone, to your friends, to your hobbies, etc. So true are the words of the Gospel: “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not! He came unto His own, and His own received Him not!” (John 1:4-5-11).
We do not know Him because we don’t take time to know Him! O yes, of course, we know His Name—Jesus; we know His Mother—Mary; we know He is God; we know He came to die for our sins; we know He instituted the Eucharist; we know some stories from the Gospels (vaguely)—but the bottom line is that we FAR more about our neighbor, our favorite sport, our closest friends, our neighborhood, our hobbies, etc. than we know about Christ—yet we are supposed to love Him totally, not partially—“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30).
Dying, Dysfunctional, Divorced, Separated Families
Until the fulfilling of that “first commandment” starts to be the daily, official, formal, practical (not just theoretical), effective and fruit-bearing goal of our family, then our family is a spiritually dying (or dead) family, a spiritually dysfunctional family; a family experiencing and living in a spiritually ‘divorced’ or ‘separated’ environment, where God is honored with lips, but not heart, as we absent-mindedly, distractedly, hurriedly go through our spiritual duties. “But Jesus said to them: ‘Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: “These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!”‘“ (Mark 7:6). “My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:10).
Convicting the World
“I will ask the Father, and He shall give you another Paraclete, that He may abide with you for ever. The Spirit of Truth, Whom the world cannot receive, because it sees Him not, nor knows Him: but you shall know Him; because He shall abide with you, and shall be in you ... When the Paraclete cometh, Whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of Truth, Who proceeds from the Father, He shall give testimony of Me … It is expedient to you that I go! For if I go not, the Paraclete will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you. And when He is come, He will convict the world of sin, and of justice, and of judgment. Of sin―because they believed not in Me. And of justice―because I go to the Father; and you shall see Me no longer. And of judgment―because the prince of this world is already judged!” (John 14:16-17; 15:26; 16:7-11).
Do Not Doubt the Fair Justice of God
Right now, the world is casting stones at the Church, because members of the clergy and members of religious orders have been caught committing sexual sins. Those sins will be justly punished by God―make no mistake about it―either in this world or in the next, regardless of whether they are closer to God by vocation or not. God will reward everyone down to the tiniest good thought, word or action―and God will punish everyone for even the tiniest sinful thought, word, action, omission or neglect―regardless of who you are: Catholic or non-Catholic; Jew, Protestant, pagan or atheist. “God is not a respecter of persons!” (Acts 10:34).
This is further emphasized thus: “We know that, according to truth, the judgment of God is against them that do such [sinful] things ... Do thou despise the riches of God’s goodness, patience and longsuffering? Do you not know that the kindness of God leads thee to penance? But, according to thy hardness and impenitent heart, thou treasurest up to thyself wrath, in the day of wrath and revelation of the just judgment of God, Who will render to every man according to his works. To them indeed, who, according to patience in good works, seek glory and honor, incorruption and eternal life! But to them that are contentious and who obey not the truth, but give credit to iniquity, to them there will be wrath and indignation. Tribulation and anguish shall fall upon every soul of man that works evil―of the Jew first, and also of the Greek. But glory, and honor, and peace to everyone that works good―to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For there is no respect of persons with God. For whosoever have sinned without the law, shall perish without the law; and whosoever have sinned in the law, shall be judged by the law. For it is not the hearers [or talkers] of the law are just before God, but it is the doers of the law that shall be justified. (Romans 2:1-13).
Do you have a ghost in your home? Do you want a ghost in your home? You have to have some kind of ghost or spirit in your home—for, as the saying goes, “Nature abhors a vacuum!” The supernatural also abhors a vacuum, as we see with King Saul: “But the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit troubled him” (1 Kings 16:14). Jesus also says: “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh, is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit, is spirit” (John 3:5-6). “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30).
So what is the ghost of your home? Or, rather, what spirit rules your home? Nature abhors a vacuum—you cannot have a godly spirit and worldly spirit, Our Lord Himself tells us this: “You cannot serve God and mammon! Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-24). “You are from beneath, I am from above! You are of this world, I am not of this world! … My Kingdom is not of this world … My Kingdom is not here! ... The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not anything! … The world hateth Me, because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil” (John 8:23; 18:36; 14:30; 7:7). Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:15-16).
“Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! I Know All This!”
“Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! I know all this! There’s no need to keep on repeating it again and again and again!” you say in exasperated boredom. The answer to that is: “Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! I know you know all this! But there’s a massive difference between knowing and doing!” Our Lord speaks thus of the “know-alls-and-do-nothings”—“Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). To which Holy Scripture adds: “Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if a man be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he shall be compared to a man beholding his own countenance in a glass. For he beheld himself, and went his way, and presently forgot what manner of man he was. But he that hath looked into the perfect law of liberty, and hath continued therein, not becoming a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work; this man shall be blessed in his deed. And if any man think himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man’s religion is vain. Religion clean and undefiled before God and the Father, is this: to keep one’s self unspotted from this world!” (James 1:22-27). Yet rather than be unspotted from this world, we love to be spotted by this world--the world has too much offer and enjoy for us to ignore it! The world just “hits the spot!”
Therefore, we need persistence in preaching to the family—in season and out of season—just as St. John, did in his old age, when he would never cease to say to his flock: “Children, love one another!”--which eventually provoked the complaint: “Do you have nothing else you can say?”―which, in turn, produced St. John’s answer: “There is nothing else that needs saying—everything is contained therein!” We need that same persistence and insistence within the family—in season and out of season, at all times and in all circumstances. As Holy Scripture say: “I charge thee, before God and Jesus Christ―Preach the word! Be insistent, in season and out of season! Reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine. For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears and will turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables!” (2 Timothy 4:1-4).
A Time of “Itching-Ears”, False Teachers and Fables
That is where we are today—having “itching ears” for what is going on in the world, believing “fables” or rumors or gossip, taking for our teachers worldly media outlets instead of God and His word; letting our beliefs follow our desires as we tinker, twist and change our God-given religion is a personally tailored religion that suits our preferences and pleasures. “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God: having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5).
Which Spirit Rules Your Home?
You cannot have it both ways—live for the world and live for God. There is one spirit that mostly and truly rules your home—and that spirit is either getting stronger or weaker. “That which is born of the flesh, is flesh [worldly]; and that which is born of the Spirit, is spirit [spiritual]” … “It is the spirit [spiritual] that quickeneth: the flesh [world] profiteth nothing. The words that I have spoken to you, are spirit and life!” (John 3:6, 6:64). “Walk not according to the flesh [world], but according to the Spirit [of God]. For they that are according to the flesh [world], mind the things that are of the flesh [world]; but they that are according to the Spirit [of God], mind the things that are of the Spirit. For the wisdom of the flesh is death; but the wisdom of the spirit is life and peace. Because the wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither can it be. And they who are in the flesh [worldly], cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh [world], but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of Christ’s. And if Christ be in you, the body indeed is dead [to the world], because of sin; but the spirit liveth, because of justification. And if the Spirit of Him, that raised up Jesus from the dead, dwell in you; He that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead, shall quicken also your mortal bodies, because of His Spirit that dwelleth in you” (Romans 8:4-11).
Therefore, your home and family is either “alive” to God or “alive” to the world, either “dead” to God or “dead” to the world. You cannot be, at the same time, “alive AND dead” to God, or “alive AND dead” to the world. “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). “What concord hath Christ with Belial? What fellowship hath light with darkness? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). “Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; that we may know the things that are given us from God!” (1 Corinthians 2:12). These are the kinds of words that you must use “in family”—not just once a year, or once a month, or once a week, nor even once a day—but if necessary many times a day―”in season and out of season”―just as the world preaches its messages many times a day on the TV, the internet, the social media, the radio, in music, in newspapers and magazines, in books, in advertising, etc. Just as in business, you have to compete or go out of business—likewise with the Faith, compete or lose the Faith or have your children gradually lose the Faith, or weaken in the Faith so much that, when the inevitable persecution comes, they will be so weak that they will be among the first to give up the Faith to save their skin.
The Spirit of God
Isaias, speaking of the future Christ, describes His spirit—the Spirit of God: “There shall come forth a Rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of His root. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him: the spirit of wisdom, and of understanding, the spirit of counsel, and of fortitude, the spirit of knowledge, and of godliness. And He shall be filled with the spirit of the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge according to the sight of the eyes, nor reprove according to the hearing of the ears. But He shall judge the poor with justice, and shall reprove with equity for the meek of the Earth: land he shall strike the Earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall slay the wicked. And justice shall be the girdle of his loins: and Faith the girdle of His reins” (Isaias 11:1-5).
We see here the listing of the Seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost—we list them in reverse order that is to say, in ascending order, from lowest to highest―Fear of the Lord, godliness (piety), knowledge, fortitude, counsel, understanding and wisdom. Though they all sound like virtues, they are not virtues. They are movements by Holy Ghost that perfect our virtues—which, logically, presupposes that we are practicing virtues! Remember—and this is VERY important. A virtue is not a “one time thing” or an “occasional thing” or a “now and again thing” or a “hit-and-miss” thing or a “three-weeks-on-and-two-weeks-off” thing. Virtue is an habitual thing—a “day-in-day-out” thing, or a “24/7/all-year-round” thing, it has to become and be a “normal-way-of-acting” thing. Anyone can be a “flash-in-the-pan” in some thing or another, but virtue requires that it be “the norm” and not a mere one-time “flash-in-the-pan”. Virtue separates the “amateur-armchair-quarterback” from the “professional-on-the-field-quarterback”—the first has “the mouth” and second has “the money”, and the first should “put his money where his mouth is”!
We Need the Spirit of God in Our Soul and Home
There is one ghost that you do need and one ghost you should not be afraid of—that is the Holy Ghost! If there is one spirit that you want to possess you—that spirit is the Holy Spirit! “God is a spirit; and they that adore Him, must adore Him in spirit” (John 4:24) “That which is born of the flesh, is flesh [worldly]; and that which is born of the Spirit, is spirit [spiritual]” (John 3:6). “Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; that we may know the things that are given us from God” (1 Corinthians 2:12). “If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of Christ’s … And if the Spirit of Him, that raised up Jesus from the dead, dwell in you; He that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead, shall quicken also your mortal bodies, because of His Spirit that dwelleth in you!” (Romans 8:9-11). There is your resurrection! “He that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead, shall quicken also your mortal bodies…”—but only if Christ’s spirit dwells within you: “…because of His Spirit that dwelleth in you!”
Let the Spirit Resurrect You!
There is nothing more that God wants than the resurrection of so many ‘dead’ Catholic families—it was the purpose of Christ’s coming: “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly!” (John 10:10)—but then He adds: “And you will not come to Me that you may have life!” (John 5:40). You will not come to Me, but you will go to your TV set, to your computer, to you tablet, to your smartphone, to your friends, to your hobbies, etc. So true are the words of the Gospel: “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not! He came unto His own, and His own received Him not!” (John 1:4-5-11).
We do not know Him because we don’t take time to know Him! O yes, of course, we know His Name—Jesus; we know His Mother—Mary; we know He is God; we know He came to die for our sins; we know He instituted the Eucharist; we know some stories from the Gospels (vaguely)—but the bottom line is that we FAR more about our neighbor, our favorite sport, our closest friends, our neighborhood, our hobbies, etc. than we know about Christ—yet we are supposed to love Him totally, not partially—“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Mark 12:30).
Dying, Dysfunctional, Divorced, Separated Families
Until the fulfilling of that “first commandment” starts to be the daily, official, formal, practical (not just theoretical), effective and fruit-bearing goal of our family, then our family is a spiritually dying (or dead) family, a spiritually dysfunctional family; a family experiencing and living in a spiritually ‘divorced’ or ‘separated’ environment, where God is honored with lips, but not heart, as we absent-mindedly, distractedly, hurriedly go through our spiritual duties. “But Jesus said to them: ‘Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: “These people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!”‘“ (Mark 7:6). “My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:10).
Convicting the World
“I will ask the Father, and He shall give you another Paraclete, that He may abide with you for ever. The Spirit of Truth, Whom the world cannot receive, because it sees Him not, nor knows Him: but you shall know Him; because He shall abide with you, and shall be in you ... When the Paraclete cometh, Whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of Truth, Who proceeds from the Father, He shall give testimony of Me … It is expedient to you that I go! For if I go not, the Paraclete will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you. And when He is come, He will convict the world of sin, and of justice, and of judgment. Of sin―because they believed not in Me. And of justice―because I go to the Father; and you shall see Me no longer. And of judgment―because the prince of this world is already judged!” (John 14:16-17; 15:26; 16:7-11).
Do Not Doubt the Fair Justice of God
Right now, the world is casting stones at the Church, because members of the clergy and members of religious orders have been caught committing sexual sins. Those sins will be justly punished by God―make no mistake about it―either in this world or in the next, regardless of whether they are closer to God by vocation or not. God will reward everyone down to the tiniest good thought, word or action―and God will punish everyone for even the tiniest sinful thought, word, action, omission or neglect―regardless of who you are: Catholic or non-Catholic; Jew, Protestant, pagan or atheist. “God is not a respecter of persons!” (Acts 10:34).
This is further emphasized thus: “We know that, according to truth, the judgment of God is against them that do such [sinful] things ... Do thou despise the riches of God’s goodness, patience and longsuffering? Do you not know that the kindness of God leads thee to penance? But, according to thy hardness and impenitent heart, thou treasurest up to thyself wrath, in the day of wrath and revelation of the just judgment of God, Who will render to every man according to his works. To them indeed, who, according to patience in good works, seek glory and honor, incorruption and eternal life! But to them that are contentious and who obey not the truth, but give credit to iniquity, to them there will be wrath and indignation. Tribulation and anguish shall fall upon every soul of man that works evil―of the Jew first, and also of the Greek. But glory, and honor, and peace to everyone that works good―to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For there is no respect of persons with God. For whosoever have sinned without the law, shall perish without the law; and whosoever have sinned in the law, shall be judged by the law. For it is not the hearers [or talkers] of the law are just before God, but it is the doers of the law that shall be justified. (Romans 2:1-13).
Article 34
Pentecost Thursday, May 23rd
The Holy Ghost Comes for a Holy War! Are You Ready?
Pentecost Thursday, May 23rd
The Holy Ghost Comes for a Holy War! Are You Ready?
The Ascension Sends the Apostles to War
“Let not your heart be troubled … I shall go, and prepare a place for you! … I will ask the Father, and He shall give you another Paraclete, that He may abide with you for ever. The Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive―because it sees Him not, nor knows Him―but you shall know Him; because He shall abide with you, and shall be in you … The Paraclete, the Holy Ghost―whom the Father will send in My Name―He will teach you all things, and bring all things to your mind, whatsoever I shall have said to you … Let not your heart be troubled, nor let it be afraid! ... The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not any thing … You have not chosen Me: but I have chosen you; and have appointed you, that you should go and should bring forth fruit … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you ... If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you … All these things they will do to you for My Name’s sake―because they know not Him who sent Me … They will put you out of the synagogues [today ― churches]: yea, the hour cometh, that whosoever kills you, will think that he does a service to God ... But these things I have told you, that when the hour shall come, you may remember that I told you of them. Because I have spoken these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. But I tell you the truth―it is expedient to you that I go―for if I go not, the Paraclete will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you ... And when He is come, He will convict the world of sin, and of justice, and of judgment … because they believed not in Me … Behold, the hour comes, and it is now come, that you shall be scattered every man to his own … In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world ... Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” (extracts from the Last Supper discourse of Jesus, Gospel of St. John, chapters 14 to 18).
This Pentecost Sees the World at War
“At war? Don’t be ridiculous! There is no war!” you will say. What is war?
● Defined in its simplest form: “War is social conflict.” Taking things a little deeper, war is defined in simple terms as “a state of armed conflict between different nations or states [as in international wars or interstate wars], or different groups within a nation or state [as in civil wars, or religious wars].” Though it is not always necessary to be armed in the conventional manner with guns, tanks, planes, ships, etc. Modern warfare is much more subtle these days. Remember the words of Yuri Bezmenov, the Russian KGB defector of the 1980s, who said: “According to my opinion, and the opinions of many defectors of my caliber, only about 15% of time, money, and manpower is spent on espionage as such. The other 85% is a slow process which we call either ideological subversion, active measures, or psychological warfare. What it basically means is that it seeks to change the perception of reality of every American, so that, despite of the abundance of information, no one is able to come to sensible conclusions in the interest of defending themselves, their families, their community, and their country.”
● A further and even deeper definition of war is: “Three pure types of war are distinguished, namely: (1) absolute war which seeks annihilation of an enemy as much as possible, (2) instrumental war which seeks as many advantages as possible over the enemy, and (3) agonistic fighting which seeks self-glory and the shaming or humiliation of the enemy.”
● War is further defined thus: “War is a species in the genus of violence; more specifically it is collective, direct, manifest, personal, intentional, organized, institutionalized, instrumental, sanctioned, and sometimes ritualized and regulated, violence. Violence violates something. Violence can be done to your body, your health, your mind, your beliefs, your freedoms, your possessions, your rights.” Our Lord, in this sense, speaks of our having to take sides and having to fight to get to Heaven: “Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword!” (Matthew 10:34). “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three!” (Luke 12:51-52). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12), with Holy Scripture adding: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto you arecalled!” (1 Timothy 6:12).
● The 19th century Prussian general and military theorist, Carl von Clausewitz, defined war thus: “War is nothing but a duel on an extensive scale … an act of violence intended to compel our opponent to fulfill our will,” directed by political motives and morality. (Clausewitz 1940: Book I, Ch. I). War is neither a scientific game nor an international sport―it is an act of violence, characterized by destruction. (Clausewitz 1940: Book IV, Ch. XI). In terms of absolute war, Clausewitz discusses three characteristics that make it unique. First, the utmost use of force is necessary. Second, the aim is to disarm the enemy. Lastly, absolute war calls for the utmost exertion of powers.
In what Clausewitz refers to as the theoretical concept of war, he outlines three objectives for success. First, the armed forces of the opponent must be destroyed. Second, the country must be occupied. Third, the will of the enemy must be broken. Peace simply cannot be achieved until all three objectives are met “… the hostile feeling and action of hostile agencies, cannot be considered at an end, as long as the will of the enemy is not subdued.” To Clausewitz, “War is only a branch of political activity … the influence of politics on war is a matter of political choice, reflecting all the variety of political purposes that make wars into exterminations.” (Doyle 1997: 23). Clausewitz warns that politicians must not attempt to use war as an instrument through which to achieve purposes for which it is unsuited.
Finally, since man is multi-faceted and exists in a variety of circumstances, you can therefore have (1) physical warfare, (2) psychological warfare, (3) ideological warfare, (4) moral warfare, (5) economic or financial warfare, (6) territorial warfare, (7) racial warfare, (8) political warfare, (9) cultural warfare, (10) drug warfare, (11) gang warfare, (12) religious warfare, (13) family warfare, etc.
Thus, in a certain sense, the world has never ceased experience wars of one kind or another over the last few thousand years. Yet, without a doubt, as the population of the Earth increases, so do wars increase. Our Lord has even warned us that wars will herald in and be the precursors of the so-called “End Times” or “Last Days” that so many prophecies refer to―as well as Our Lady, who revealed to Sister Lucia of Fatima that we have already entered the “Last Days.”
In an interview with Fr. Fuentes in 1957, Sister Lucia said: “Father, the Blessed Virgin did not tell me [explicitly] that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this for three reasons. The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground. The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others. And the third, because in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation, His Blessed Mother.”
Those words ― “we are in the last times of the world” and “the devil is engaging in a final battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle” ― should not be taken lightly, yet, sadly, they are taken lightly. They roll-off us like water flows-off the duck’s back. We hear those words, but they have little or no impact upon us. As Our Lord says: “For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15).
Kill or Be Killed!
We need to get things straight in our minds! We are in a war—whether we want it or not, whether we like or not, whether we fight or not! It is a war of Faith! Even though the axiom insists: “It takes two to make a fight”—in this particular war, the enemy will fight us even if we refuse to fight—and then we are lost. We should rather focus on the axiom that says: “Kill, or be killed!” That is closer to the truth of the matter in the fight that we must fight.
Holy Scripture is loaded with quotes on the war that we must wage against the enemies of our Faith, we will just present a few of the hundreds to be found:
A Life-long Warfare
“The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1)—notice it says the “LIFE” meaning the entire life, and not just “part of man’s life”! “Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household” (Matthew 10:34-36)—meaning that you may even have to fight your own parents, spouse, children and relatives for the sake of the Faith—“He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37).
We Must Fight
“Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith―knowing that the same affliction befalls your brethren who are in the world!” (1 Peter 5:8). “Laying aside every weight and sin which surrounds us, let us run by patience to the fight proposed to us!” (Hebrews 12:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith … whereunto you are called” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Blessed be the Lord my God, Who teaches my hands to fight, and my fingers to war” (Psalm 143:1).
Confirmation made you a Soldier for Christ
This whole idea of warfare in the service of Christ is the foundation of the Sacrament of Confirmation. When we are confirmed, we become Soldiers for Christ. The Holy Ghost grants to our souls, among other graces and gifts, the Gift of Fortitude or courage for the fight. This is also indicated by the slap (now a gentle tap) that the bishop administers on the cheek of the confirmand—as a reminder that he or she will have receive blows from the enemy in the fight for the Faith unto which they are called.
Who are the enemy?
We all know the superficial off-the-cuff answer by heart: the devil, the world and the flesh! But let us look at the enemy in some more depth—especially since, at the present time, the enemy certainly has the upper-hand in the battles being waged throughout the world.
The Devil
Our Lord calls him the “prince of this world” and the “father of lies” and a “murderer”! Holy Scripture adds that “by the envy of the devil, death came into the world” (Wisdom 2:24). Who needs friends like that? St. Peter warns us that “the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). St. Paul says: “Give not place to the devil” (Ephesians 4:27), to which St. James adds: “but resist the devil, and he will fly from you” (James 4:7). Jesus calls the devil the “prince of this world” (John 14:30) and further states that “now shall the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31). So we have a lifelong fight against the devil, who hates us more than we can imagine and who never ceases nor sleeps in his fight against us.
The World
St. Augustine writes: “The carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be ... By ‘the world’, we must understand the lovers of the world, a love which cometh not of the Father. And therefore it is that this love of the world, which we strive to lessen and to destroy in ourselves, is contrary to the love of God, which is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost.”
St. James clearly tells us that the world and God are incompatible—that they are enmity with one another—and this is understandable if Jesus calls the devil the “prince of this world” (John 14:30) and that “now shall the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31). The world is the devil’s tool and his playground—that is why the world is one of the triple enemies of our soul. “The field is the world. The good seed are the children of the Kingdom. And the cockle are the children of the wicked one.” (Matthew 13:38). St. James could not say it any more clearly than when he states: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Surrounded by Cockle
Sadly, however, our family, relatives, friends and work colleagues can be the cockle! Even Our Lord had this problem, as many of His relatives were not enamored with His teaching—“For neither did His brethren believe in Him” (John 7:5). Which leads Jesus to complain: “Amen I say to you, that no prophet is accepted in his own country” (Luke 4:24). “And you shall be betrayed by your parents and brethren, and kinsmen and friends; and some of you they will put to death” (Luke 21:16). “The brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death” (Mark 13:12).
God Comes Before Family
“He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37) ... “If any man come to Me, and hates not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, then he cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:26). “Everyone that has left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands for My Name’s sake, shall receive a hundredfold, and shall possess life everlasting” (Matthew 19:29).
Our Lord could not put it more clearly than this: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law” (Luke 12:51-53).
This does not mean that we have to literally “hate” what is not evil. The law of Christ does not allow us to hate even our enemies, much less our parents: but the meaning of the text is, that we must be in that disposition of soul, as to be willing to renounce, and part with every thing, how near or dear soever it may be to us, that would keep us from following Christ. If those nearest and dearest to us risk leading us away from Christ and our salvation—then we are to hate that sinful behavior and separate ourselves from it—much as Christ said to St. Peter, “Go behind me, Satan! You are a scandal unto Me! Because you savor not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!” (Matthew 16:23). Shocking words indeed, but St. Peter was trying to turn Our Lord aside from the path He had chosen to take.
The Flesh
The third enemy is our flesh, this means more than just the body, but our whole selves, body and soul with all passions and concupiscences included. If the devil is called the “father of lies”, then we are not very far behind, for we are inclined to lie to ourselves and to others to cover our tendencies, guilt and true intentions. We are proud as peacocks, slow as tortoises, slimy as toads, slithery as snakes, with an eagle-eye for the faults of others, yet blind as a bat to our own faults, timid as mouse when it comes to spreading the Faith, roaring like a lion when offended, and bristling like a porcupine or hedgehog, smelly as a sinful skunk ... yet God still wants to save us! But to be saved we must fight and overcome ourselves! For “the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12) and that violence is primarily directed at ourselves with our passions and concupiscences. That is why Our Lord tells us: “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
So Fight We Must
Some of the above scenarios are not what we dream about and look forwards to—far from it—they are very painful to envisage and even more painful to have to live through. Abel suffered at the hands of Cain; Jacob at the hands of Esau; Joseph at the hands of his brothers and so on through history. We will not be the first, nor will we be the last. What we have to do is to clearly place, before our minds and hearts, the fact that God comes first—that we cannot serve God and mammon; that we cannot please our family and friends if it means not standing up for God; that we cannot reconcile two irreconcilables—God and the world, Christ and Belial, believers and unbelievers (Matthew 6:24; 2 Corinthians 6:15). We cannot, at the same time, pine for the fleshpots of Egypt and the milk and honey of the Promised Land. We must make a choice and fight for the choice we have made. If we choose not to fight, it does not mean the enemy will not fight. They will kill us, or at least kill the life of grace in our soul. Let us not be afraid—“Fear not, little flock!” (Luke 12:32) ... “I say to you, my friends: ‘Be not afraid of them who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will show you Whom you shall fear: fear ye Him, who, after He has killed, has power to cast into Hell! Yea, I say to you, fear Him!’” (Luke 12:4-5). So “Fight the good fight of Faith … whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12).
Armor and Weapons
“Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light” (Romans 13:12). “Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not [just] against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore, take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace: in all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:11-17).
Fight With the Word of God
“The word of God is more piercing than any two edged sword” (Hebrews 4:12) … “And from his mouth came out a sharp two-edged sword” (Apocalypse 1:16) … “I will fight against them with the sword of My mouth” (Apocalypse 2:16) ... “The high praise of God shall be in their mouth: and two-edged swords in their hands: to execute vengeance upon the nations, and chastisements among the people” (Psalm 149:6-7). “And they shall fight against thee, and shall not prevail: for I am with thee, says the Lord, to deliver thee” (Jeremias 1:19).
“Let not your heart be troubled … I shall go, and prepare a place for you! … I will ask the Father, and He shall give you another Paraclete, that He may abide with you for ever. The Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive―because it sees Him not, nor knows Him―but you shall know Him; because He shall abide with you, and shall be in you … The Paraclete, the Holy Ghost―whom the Father will send in My Name―He will teach you all things, and bring all things to your mind, whatsoever I shall have said to you … Let not your heart be troubled, nor let it be afraid! ... The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not any thing … You have not chosen Me: but I have chosen you; and have appointed you, that you should go and should bring forth fruit … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you ... If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you … All these things they will do to you for My Name’s sake―because they know not Him who sent Me … They will put you out of the synagogues [today ― churches]: yea, the hour cometh, that whosoever kills you, will think that he does a service to God ... But these things I have told you, that when the hour shall come, you may remember that I told you of them. Because I have spoken these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. But I tell you the truth―it is expedient to you that I go―for if I go not, the Paraclete will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you ... And when He is come, He will convict the world of sin, and of justice, and of judgment … because they believed not in Me … Behold, the hour comes, and it is now come, that you shall be scattered every man to his own … In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world ... Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” (extracts from the Last Supper discourse of Jesus, Gospel of St. John, chapters 14 to 18).
This Pentecost Sees the World at War
“At war? Don’t be ridiculous! There is no war!” you will say. What is war?
● Defined in its simplest form: “War is social conflict.” Taking things a little deeper, war is defined in simple terms as “a state of armed conflict between different nations or states [as in international wars or interstate wars], or different groups within a nation or state [as in civil wars, or religious wars].” Though it is not always necessary to be armed in the conventional manner with guns, tanks, planes, ships, etc. Modern warfare is much more subtle these days. Remember the words of Yuri Bezmenov, the Russian KGB defector of the 1980s, who said: “According to my opinion, and the opinions of many defectors of my caliber, only about 15% of time, money, and manpower is spent on espionage as such. The other 85% is a slow process which we call either ideological subversion, active measures, or psychological warfare. What it basically means is that it seeks to change the perception of reality of every American, so that, despite of the abundance of information, no one is able to come to sensible conclusions in the interest of defending themselves, their families, their community, and their country.”
● A further and even deeper definition of war is: “Three pure types of war are distinguished, namely: (1) absolute war which seeks annihilation of an enemy as much as possible, (2) instrumental war which seeks as many advantages as possible over the enemy, and (3) agonistic fighting which seeks self-glory and the shaming or humiliation of the enemy.”
● War is further defined thus: “War is a species in the genus of violence; more specifically it is collective, direct, manifest, personal, intentional, organized, institutionalized, instrumental, sanctioned, and sometimes ritualized and regulated, violence. Violence violates something. Violence can be done to your body, your health, your mind, your beliefs, your freedoms, your possessions, your rights.” Our Lord, in this sense, speaks of our having to take sides and having to fight to get to Heaven: “Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword!” (Matthew 10:34). “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three!” (Luke 12:51-52). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12), with Holy Scripture adding: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto you arecalled!” (1 Timothy 6:12).
● The 19th century Prussian general and military theorist, Carl von Clausewitz, defined war thus: “War is nothing but a duel on an extensive scale … an act of violence intended to compel our opponent to fulfill our will,” directed by political motives and morality. (Clausewitz 1940: Book I, Ch. I). War is neither a scientific game nor an international sport―it is an act of violence, characterized by destruction. (Clausewitz 1940: Book IV, Ch. XI). In terms of absolute war, Clausewitz discusses three characteristics that make it unique. First, the utmost use of force is necessary. Second, the aim is to disarm the enemy. Lastly, absolute war calls for the utmost exertion of powers.
In what Clausewitz refers to as the theoretical concept of war, he outlines three objectives for success. First, the armed forces of the opponent must be destroyed. Second, the country must be occupied. Third, the will of the enemy must be broken. Peace simply cannot be achieved until all three objectives are met “… the hostile feeling and action of hostile agencies, cannot be considered at an end, as long as the will of the enemy is not subdued.” To Clausewitz, “War is only a branch of political activity … the influence of politics on war is a matter of political choice, reflecting all the variety of political purposes that make wars into exterminations.” (Doyle 1997: 23). Clausewitz warns that politicians must not attempt to use war as an instrument through which to achieve purposes for which it is unsuited.
Finally, since man is multi-faceted and exists in a variety of circumstances, you can therefore have (1) physical warfare, (2) psychological warfare, (3) ideological warfare, (4) moral warfare, (5) economic or financial warfare, (6) territorial warfare, (7) racial warfare, (8) political warfare, (9) cultural warfare, (10) drug warfare, (11) gang warfare, (12) religious warfare, (13) family warfare, etc.
Thus, in a certain sense, the world has never ceased experience wars of one kind or another over the last few thousand years. Yet, without a doubt, as the population of the Earth increases, so do wars increase. Our Lord has even warned us that wars will herald in and be the precursors of the so-called “End Times” or “Last Days” that so many prophecies refer to―as well as Our Lady, who revealed to Sister Lucia of Fatima that we have already entered the “Last Days.”
In an interview with Fr. Fuentes in 1957, Sister Lucia said: “Father, the Blessed Virgin did not tell me [explicitly] that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this for three reasons. The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground. The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others. And the third, because in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation, His Blessed Mother.”
Those words ― “we are in the last times of the world” and “the devil is engaging in a final battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle” ― should not be taken lightly, yet, sadly, they are taken lightly. They roll-off us like water flows-off the duck’s back. We hear those words, but they have little or no impact upon us. As Our Lord says: “For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15).
Kill or Be Killed!
We need to get things straight in our minds! We are in a war—whether we want it or not, whether we like or not, whether we fight or not! It is a war of Faith! Even though the axiom insists: “It takes two to make a fight”—in this particular war, the enemy will fight us even if we refuse to fight—and then we are lost. We should rather focus on the axiom that says: “Kill, or be killed!” That is closer to the truth of the matter in the fight that we must fight.
Holy Scripture is loaded with quotes on the war that we must wage against the enemies of our Faith, we will just present a few of the hundreds to be found:
A Life-long Warfare
“The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1)—notice it says the “LIFE” meaning the entire life, and not just “part of man’s life”! “Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household” (Matthew 10:34-36)—meaning that you may even have to fight your own parents, spouse, children and relatives for the sake of the Faith—“He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37).
We Must Fight
“Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith―knowing that the same affliction befalls your brethren who are in the world!” (1 Peter 5:8). “Laying aside every weight and sin which surrounds us, let us run by patience to the fight proposed to us!” (Hebrews 12:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith … whereunto you are called” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Blessed be the Lord my God, Who teaches my hands to fight, and my fingers to war” (Psalm 143:1).
Confirmation made you a Soldier for Christ
This whole idea of warfare in the service of Christ is the foundation of the Sacrament of Confirmation. When we are confirmed, we become Soldiers for Christ. The Holy Ghost grants to our souls, among other graces and gifts, the Gift of Fortitude or courage for the fight. This is also indicated by the slap (now a gentle tap) that the bishop administers on the cheek of the confirmand—as a reminder that he or she will have receive blows from the enemy in the fight for the Faith unto which they are called.
Who are the enemy?
We all know the superficial off-the-cuff answer by heart: the devil, the world and the flesh! But let us look at the enemy in some more depth—especially since, at the present time, the enemy certainly has the upper-hand in the battles being waged throughout the world.
The Devil
Our Lord calls him the “prince of this world” and the “father of lies” and a “murderer”! Holy Scripture adds that “by the envy of the devil, death came into the world” (Wisdom 2:24). Who needs friends like that? St. Peter warns us that “the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). St. Paul says: “Give not place to the devil” (Ephesians 4:27), to which St. James adds: “but resist the devil, and he will fly from you” (James 4:7). Jesus calls the devil the “prince of this world” (John 14:30) and further states that “now shall the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31). So we have a lifelong fight against the devil, who hates us more than we can imagine and who never ceases nor sleeps in his fight against us.
The World
St. Augustine writes: “The carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be ... By ‘the world’, we must understand the lovers of the world, a love which cometh not of the Father. And therefore it is that this love of the world, which we strive to lessen and to destroy in ourselves, is contrary to the love of God, which is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost.”
St. James clearly tells us that the world and God are incompatible—that they are enmity with one another—and this is understandable if Jesus calls the devil the “prince of this world” (John 14:30) and that “now shall the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31). The world is the devil’s tool and his playground—that is why the world is one of the triple enemies of our soul. “The field is the world. The good seed are the children of the Kingdom. And the cockle are the children of the wicked one.” (Matthew 13:38). St. James could not say it any more clearly than when he states: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Surrounded by Cockle
Sadly, however, our family, relatives, friends and work colleagues can be the cockle! Even Our Lord had this problem, as many of His relatives were not enamored with His teaching—“For neither did His brethren believe in Him” (John 7:5). Which leads Jesus to complain: “Amen I say to you, that no prophet is accepted in his own country” (Luke 4:24). “And you shall be betrayed by your parents and brethren, and kinsmen and friends; and some of you they will put to death” (Luke 21:16). “The brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death” (Mark 13:12).
God Comes Before Family
“He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37) ... “If any man come to Me, and hates not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, then he cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:26). “Everyone that has left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands for My Name’s sake, shall receive a hundredfold, and shall possess life everlasting” (Matthew 19:29).
Our Lord could not put it more clearly than this: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law” (Luke 12:51-53).
This does not mean that we have to literally “hate” what is not evil. The law of Christ does not allow us to hate even our enemies, much less our parents: but the meaning of the text is, that we must be in that disposition of soul, as to be willing to renounce, and part with every thing, how near or dear soever it may be to us, that would keep us from following Christ. If those nearest and dearest to us risk leading us away from Christ and our salvation—then we are to hate that sinful behavior and separate ourselves from it—much as Christ said to St. Peter, “Go behind me, Satan! You are a scandal unto Me! Because you savor not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!” (Matthew 16:23). Shocking words indeed, but St. Peter was trying to turn Our Lord aside from the path He had chosen to take.
The Flesh
The third enemy is our flesh, this means more than just the body, but our whole selves, body and soul with all passions and concupiscences included. If the devil is called the “father of lies”, then we are not very far behind, for we are inclined to lie to ourselves and to others to cover our tendencies, guilt and true intentions. We are proud as peacocks, slow as tortoises, slimy as toads, slithery as snakes, with an eagle-eye for the faults of others, yet blind as a bat to our own faults, timid as mouse when it comes to spreading the Faith, roaring like a lion when offended, and bristling like a porcupine or hedgehog, smelly as a sinful skunk ... yet God still wants to save us! But to be saved we must fight and overcome ourselves! For “the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12) and that violence is primarily directed at ourselves with our passions and concupiscences. That is why Our Lord tells us: “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
So Fight We Must
Some of the above scenarios are not what we dream about and look forwards to—far from it—they are very painful to envisage and even more painful to have to live through. Abel suffered at the hands of Cain; Jacob at the hands of Esau; Joseph at the hands of his brothers and so on through history. We will not be the first, nor will we be the last. What we have to do is to clearly place, before our minds and hearts, the fact that God comes first—that we cannot serve God and mammon; that we cannot please our family and friends if it means not standing up for God; that we cannot reconcile two irreconcilables—God and the world, Christ and Belial, believers and unbelievers (Matthew 6:24; 2 Corinthians 6:15). We cannot, at the same time, pine for the fleshpots of Egypt and the milk and honey of the Promised Land. We must make a choice and fight for the choice we have made. If we choose not to fight, it does not mean the enemy will not fight. They will kill us, or at least kill the life of grace in our soul. Let us not be afraid—“Fear not, little flock!” (Luke 12:32) ... “I say to you, my friends: ‘Be not afraid of them who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will show you Whom you shall fear: fear ye Him, who, after He has killed, has power to cast into Hell! Yea, I say to you, fear Him!’” (Luke 12:4-5). So “Fight the good fight of Faith … whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12).
Armor and Weapons
“Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light” (Romans 13:12). “Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not [just] against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore, take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace: in all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:11-17).
Fight With the Word of God
“The word of God is more piercing than any two edged sword” (Hebrews 4:12) … “And from his mouth came out a sharp two-edged sword” (Apocalypse 1:16) … “I will fight against them with the sword of My mouth” (Apocalypse 2:16) ... “The high praise of God shall be in their mouth: and two-edged swords in their hands: to execute vengeance upon the nations, and chastisements among the people” (Psalm 149:6-7). “And they shall fight against thee, and shall not prevail: for I am with thee, says the Lord, to deliver thee” (Jeremias 1:19).
Article 33
Pentecost Wednesday, May 22nd
You Get the Version of the Holy Ghost that You Deserve!
Pentecost Wednesday, May 22nd
You Get the Version of the Holy Ghost that You Deserve!
Will the Real Holy Ghost Please Stand Up!
Is the Holy Ghost tough or mild? Is He loud or quiet? Reading Holy Scripture can be a little confusing―for it seems contradictory, or is it that God is a little bit of everything? God is God―whether it be God the Father, God the Son or God the Holy Ghost. The three members of the Holy Trinity think alike and act alike―there is no disagreement between them. They may have different roles―Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier―but the Spirit is the same. But what Spirit is it that rules and drives Them all? Trying to find out can be a little confusing as we read seemingly contradictory indications in Holy Scripture:
“Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the Lord! And behold the Lord passes, and a great and strong wind before the Lord over throwing the mountains, and breaking the rocks in pieces―the Lord is not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake―the Lord is not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire―the Lord is not in the fire―and after the fire a whistling of a gentle air” (3 Kings 19:11-12).
“And when the days of the Pentecost were accomplished, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from Heaven, as of a mighty wind coming, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they began to speak with divers tongues, according as the Holy Ghost gave them to speak” (Acts 2:1-4).
The Different Sides to God
Whether it be God the Father, or God the Son, or God the Holy Ghost―they all have the same Spirit, they are in concord or agreement―if you like, they all have the same character and characteristics. They all have “all the necessary tools in the toolbox” and will use whatever “tool” is needed for the many varying circumstances that arise. We are much the same―since we are all made in the image and likeness of God―we have many “tools” in our “toolbox” and some of them we prefer to use more than others, but, if required, we will use the ones we do not like to use.
So it is with God―whether it the Father, Son, or Holy Ghost. God prefers to love and be kind, because “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “I love them that love Me” (Proverbs 8:17). God says He will lavish His love upon us “If you walk in My precepts, and keep My commandments, and do them, then I will give you rain in due seasons. And the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit. The threshing of your harvest shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land without fear. I will give peace in your coasts: you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid. I will take away evil beasts: and the sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. Five of yours shall pursue a hundred others, and a hundred of you ten thousand: your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. I will look on you, and make you increase: you shall be multiplied, and I will establish My covenant with you. You shall eat the oldest of the old store, and, new coming on, you shall cast away the old. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people” (Leviticus 26:3-12).
Yet, with those who do not love Him, or even hate Him, God will reach into His “toolbox” and use other tools that He does not like to use, but will use when necessary: “I will render vengeance to My enemies, and repay them that hate Me!” (Deuteronomy 32:41). “But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws, and contemn My judgments, so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, and to make void My covenant, then I will quickly visit you with poverty, and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes, and consume your lives. You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies. I will set My face against you, and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you.
“I will break the pride of your stubbornness, and I will make to you the Heaven above as iron, and the Earth as brass! I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins! And I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge My covenant. And when you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies! I will destroy and break your idols. You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you. I will bring your cities to be a wilderness, and I will destroy your land. And I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed. You shall perish among the Gentiles, and an enemy’s land shall consume you.
“And if of them also some remain, they shall pine away in their iniquities, in the land of their enemies, and they shall be afflicted for the sins of their fathers, and their own―until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, whereby they have transgressed Me, and walked contrary unto Me. Therefore I also will walk them, and bring them into land of their enemies, until their uncircumcised mind becomes ashamed―then shall they pray for their sins!” (Leviticus 26:14-41).
The Life You Lead Dictates the God You Get
As Holy Scripture says elsewhere: “With the holy one Thou will be holy, and with the valiant, Thou will be perfect. With the elect Thou will be elect, and with the perverse Thou will be perverted. And the poor people Thou will save. And with Thy eyes Thou will humble the haughty!” (2 Kings 22:26-28). “With the holy, Thou will be holy; and with the innocent man Thou will be innocent. And with the elect Thou will be elect and with the perverse thou will be perverted. For Thou will save the humble people; but will bring down the eyes of the proud!” (Psalm 17:26-28).
In other words―God will be tough or kind, heavy-handed or gentle, depending on what we are “asking for” or what we deserve. As the New Testament says: “See then the goodness and the severity of God―towards them indeed that are fallen, the severity; but towards thee, if thou abide in goodness, the goodness of God―otherwise thou also shalt be cut off!” (Romans 11:22).
“And thou shall know that the Lord thy God, He is a strong and faithful God, keeping His covenant and mercy to them that love Him, and to them that keep His commandments, unto a thousand generations―and also repaying them that hate Him, so as to destroy them, without further delay, immediately rendering to them what they deserve” (Deuteronomy 7:9-10). So if you choose to keep the commandments of God and follow His will, then “the God of peace and of love shall be with you” (2 Corinthians 13:11). To those who reject the commandments and will God, they will soon see that “the wrath of God is revealed from Heaven against all ungodliness and injustice” (Romans 1:18). “I hated them for the wickedness of their devices―I will cast them forth out of My house, I will love them no more―all their princes are revolters!” (Osee 9:15).
What you sow is what you reap: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap” (Galatians 6:8) and the kind of life you lead dictates the kind of God you will meet. “If you will not hear, and if you will not lay it to heart, to give glory to My Name, says the Lord of hosts, then I will send poverty upon you, and will curse your blessings―yes I will curse them―because you have not laid it to heart! Behold, I will cast the shoulder to you, and I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities, and it shall take you away with it” (Malachias 2:2-3).
You Get the God You Deserve
No doubt you have heard it said: “We get the leaders we deserve!” Similarly, “We get the God we deserve!” Modern-day Christians are ceaselessly enthusing about God being “Love” and “Mercy” and all you have to do is believe in Him and you are “saved”. God is love, that is true, but God is not ONLY love. You would have thought that simple common sense would have told them that there is something wrong with their theory when scrutinized under the light of most souls ending up damned―but, of course, they refuse to look at and consider that part of reality!
The Kindness of God
The reality is that God wants to save everyone―but it has to be on His terms and not on their terms. God’s love excludes nobody―the excluding is done by a lack of love towards God. There are sufficient Scriptural quotes that confirm that God loves sinners, has compassion upon those sinners, and wishes to save those sinners―regardless of how sinful they are or may have been:
“The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “‘As I live,’ saith the Lord God, ‘I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways: and why will you die?’ (Ezechiel 33:11). “The soul that sinneth, the same shall die … But if the wicked do penance for all his sins which he hath committed, and keep all my commandments, and do judgment, and justice, living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he hath done! In his justice, which he hath wrought, he shall live!” (Ezechiel 18:20-22). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow―and if they be red as crimson, they shall be made white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). “Because I will be merciful to their iniquities, and their sins I will remember no more” (Hebrews 8:12). Beautiful, huh? Those quotes are only the tip of the iceberg!
As a further “dip the big toe in the water” reflection or meditation, Holy Scripture not only tells us that “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), but Scripture also unpacks or gives a brief description of that charity: “Charity is patient, is kind. Charity envies not, deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious, seeks not her own, is not provoked to anger, thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believeth all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never falls away―whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8).
The Toughness of God
Yet, on the other hand, God also says: “But if the just man turn himself away from his justice, and do iniquity―according to all the abominations which the wicked man useth to work―shall he live? All his justices, which he hath done, shall not be remembered in the prevarication, by which he hath prevaricated, and, in his sin, which he has committed, in them he shall die. And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore, O house of Israel: Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse? For when the just turns himself away from his justice and commits iniquity, then he shall die therein―in the injustice, that he hath wrought, he shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:24-26).
“Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great―He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’ For mercy and wrath quickly come from Him, and His wrath looks upon sinners. Delay not to be converted to the Lord, and defer it not from day to day. For His wrath shall come on a sudden, and in the time of vengeance He will destroy thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-9).
The Holy Ghost Will Convict the World of Sin
At the Last Supper, when speaking of the future coming of the Holy Ghost, Our Lord said: “I tell you the truth―it is expedient to you that I go―for if I go not, the Paraclete [the Holy Ghost] will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you. And when He is come, He will convict the world of sin, and of justice, and of judgment. Of sin―because they believed not in Me. And of justice―because I go to the Father and you shall see Me no longer. And of judgment―because the prince [Satan] of this world is already judged!” (John 16:7-11).
Our Lord, in His farewell discourses, explicitly declares that by the Holy Ghost’s coming we should learn what sin is, saying: “When He is come, He will convict the world of sin.” (John 16:8). Both in the old creation and in the new, both before the Incarnation of the Son of God, and after His Ascension into Heaven, it has been, it is, and it will be to the end of the world, the work and the office of the Holy Ghost, to convince the world of sin; that is to say, to convince the intellect, and to illuminate the reason of man to understand what sin is, and also to convince the consciences of men of their sinfulness and make them conscious that they are guilty before God.
As in the beginning, before the Fall of man, man, in the light of the Holy Ghost, knew God, His perfections and holiness, so after the Fall, God, in His mercy, has by His Spirit taught men to know, in some measure at least, His perfections and their own sinfulness; but it was only like the twilight preceding the noonday. We are in the noonday and if, in the noonday light, we are blind to the perfections of God and to our own sinfulness, then woe to us in the Day of Judgment.
Sadly―in the noonday light that came with the Incarnation, Birth, Ministry, Passion and Death of Christ, and that noonday light still shines today―the human race has been blinded to its sins. Since the time of Pope Pius XII, one pope after another has lamented that modern-man has “lost the sense of sin.” In an October 1946 Radio Message to the participants in the National Catechetical Congress of the United States―in Boston, Massachusetts, USA―Pope Pius XII said: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin.” Pope John Paul II, on March 14th, 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin. Christ’s invitation to conversion is all the more urgent!” In homily on March 13th, 2011, Pope Benedict XVI said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many … If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, we cannot speak of sin. Just as when the sun is hidden the shadows disappear and the shadows appear only if the sun is there, so, too, the eclipse of God necessarily brings the eclipse of sin.”
The Sin Against the Holy Ghost
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica (IIa-IIae, q. 14) speaks of three interpretations concerning the sin against the Holy Ghost that is mentioned specifically in Scripture (Matthew 12:31). The first interpretation is that it is the sin of final impenitence, by which a person rejects grace and pardon, up to and including the moment of death. Another interpretation is that sins against the Holy Ghost are sins of weakness against God the Father; or a sins of ignorance against God the Son; or sins of malice (deliberately entrenched in sin) against God the Holy Ghost.
St. Thomas, speaking of the latter mentioned sins of malice against the Holy Ghost, lists six chief sins of malice. These are: (1) despair, (2) presumption, (3) impenitence, (4) obstinacy, (5) resisting the known truth, and (5) envy of another person’s spiritual good. He adds that if the sin against the Holy Ghost is any sin of malice, then it is unforgivable in itself, although God may forgive it none the less. It may be incurable, as a disease is incurable; yet God can cure an incurable disease. He further adds that the sin against the Holy Ghost is regularly the outcome of many previous sins, and comes by a gradual turning of the mind and will to contempt for the means that God has given us for our salvation.
Is the Holy Ghost Gentle?
“O how good and sweet is Thy spirit, O Lord, in all things!” (Wisdom 12:1). “The Lord is sweet!” (1 Peter 2:3). Scripture speaks of “the goodness and kindness of God our Savior” (Titus 3:4). Just like any parent, the Holy Ghost is gentle if the “child” listens, obeys and is good. If we decide not to listen, not to obey and are bad, then, like any parent would do, the Holy Ghost has to take “corrective measures” and even “punitive measures.” Heck! We even treat pets the same way! Or even a pen that won’t write when it is needed to write, we tend to throw it aside and get one that will write! If you disobey God, ignore God, neglect God―even though He is patient and merciful―you will pay! Hey! Even those who are in Hell are experiencing the mercy of God―because they are not being punished as severely as they actually deserve to be punished.
Modern-man seems to ignore this truth. You have to get this straight―you do not mess with God just because He does not react immediately! “The Lord delays not His promise [to punish], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Yes, “the Lord is sweet and righteous” (Psalm 24:8). “O taste, and see that the Lord is sweet! Blessed is the man that hopes in Him!” (Psalm 33:9). “Thy mercy is sweet. Do thou deliver me!” (Psalm 108:21). When sweetness and kindness is merited, then God will give it―but He is also righteous, which means “acting in accord with divine or moral law”, and if man decides to break God’s law, then that righteous God will do what is right and His justice will be invoked. “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil―that put darkness for light, and light for darkness―that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
“The Lord is sweet to all―and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:9). “He has borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows” (Isaias 53:4). “Thou, O Lord, are sweet and mild and plenteous in mercy to all that call upon thee!” (Psalms 85:5). Yet merely “calling” on the Lord is not enough―we must “change” our ways if we seek and hope to obtain His “plenteous mercy”. There are too many who expect mercy without amending their sinful ways, who treat the Sacrament of Confession like a weekly “car-wash” or a revolving door, but drive back into the mud of sin immediately afterwards, just “as a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). Scripture adds: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Jesus warns us, saying: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.” (Matthew 7:21). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
The Holy Ghost is the Sanctifier
The Church Fathers, Doctors and theologians usually attribute different roles to each Member of the Holy Trinity―even though They all participate in everything. You could, so to speak, say that each Member of the Trinity gets to be the “Foreman” of the “three man crew” or “Three Person Crew” in which all work together. These “roles” are that of the Creator for God the Father, the Redeemer for God the Son, and the Sanctifier for God the Holy Ghost―we even call the third Person of the Trinity the “Holy” Ghost, the “Holy” Spirit, which literally means the “Spirit of Holiness.”
Holy Scripture is full of references of the holiness of God and our obligation to be holy like God is holy: “Let them therefore be holy, because I also am holy, the Lord, Who sanctifies them!” (Leviticus 21:8). “I am the Lord who sanctifies you!” (Leviticus 22:32). “The Lord will raise thee up to be a holy people to Himself, if thou keep the commandments of the Lord thy God, and walk in His ways!” (Deuteronomy 28:9). “And you shall be to Me a priestly kingdom, and a holy nation!” (Exodus 19:6). “And they shall call them, ‘The Holy People’, the redeemed of the Lord!” (Isaias 62:12). “Thou art a holy people to the Lord thy God: and He chose thee to be His peculiar people of all nations that are upon the Earth!” (Deuteronomy 14:2). “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2). “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy because I am the Lord your God” (Leviticus 20:7). “You shall be holy men to Me!” (Exodus 22:31). “Be a holy people of the Lord thy God!” (Deuteronomy 26:19). “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26). “They shall be holy to their God, and shall not profane His Name … therefore they shall be holy!” (Leviticus 21:6). God makes our obligation of being holy a non-negotiable thing. He does mention it just once, but repeatedly―so that there can be no plea of ignorance on our part!
You might think that this only applied in the Old Testament times, but St. Peter and St. Paul repeat the command in the New Testament: “But according to Him that hath called you, Who is holy, be you also in all manner of conversation holy―for it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy!’” (1 Peter 1:15-16). “As He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight!” (Ephesians 1:4).
Hence it is that role of the Holy Ghost is to sanctify us and thereby make us fit for the Kingdom of Heaven. This is why St. Louis de Montfort writes, in his booklet, The Secret of Mary, this following passage that states that holiness is our main vocation: “Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next (Matthew 5:48). It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this. Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
God is Charity―Charity Sanctifies
It is only logical that if “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8) and “God is holy” (Psalm 98:9), then Charity must have a major and crucial part to play in holiness. In fact, Holy Scripture tells us that without Charity, all that we might do will be useless, pointless and worthless without Charity: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). “Above all have charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:12-14).
“We are of God. Let us love one another, for charity is of God. And everyone that loves, is born of God, and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity. By this has the charity of God appeared towards us, because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him. In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins. My dearest, if God has so loved us; we also ought to love one another. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us” (1 John 4:6-12).
Is the Holy Ghost tough or mild? Is He loud or quiet? Reading Holy Scripture can be a little confusing―for it seems contradictory, or is it that God is a little bit of everything? God is God―whether it be God the Father, God the Son or God the Holy Ghost. The three members of the Holy Trinity think alike and act alike―there is no disagreement between them. They may have different roles―Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier―but the Spirit is the same. But what Spirit is it that rules and drives Them all? Trying to find out can be a little confusing as we read seemingly contradictory indications in Holy Scripture:
“Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the Lord! And behold the Lord passes, and a great and strong wind before the Lord over throwing the mountains, and breaking the rocks in pieces―the Lord is not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake―the Lord is not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire―the Lord is not in the fire―and after the fire a whistling of a gentle air” (3 Kings 19:11-12).
“And when the days of the Pentecost were accomplished, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from Heaven, as of a mighty wind coming, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they began to speak with divers tongues, according as the Holy Ghost gave them to speak” (Acts 2:1-4).
The Different Sides to God
Whether it be God the Father, or God the Son, or God the Holy Ghost―they all have the same Spirit, they are in concord or agreement―if you like, they all have the same character and characteristics. They all have “all the necessary tools in the toolbox” and will use whatever “tool” is needed for the many varying circumstances that arise. We are much the same―since we are all made in the image and likeness of God―we have many “tools” in our “toolbox” and some of them we prefer to use more than others, but, if required, we will use the ones we do not like to use.
So it is with God―whether it the Father, Son, or Holy Ghost. God prefers to love and be kind, because “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “I love them that love Me” (Proverbs 8:17). God says He will lavish His love upon us “If you walk in My precepts, and keep My commandments, and do them, then I will give you rain in due seasons. And the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit. The threshing of your harvest shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land without fear. I will give peace in your coasts: you shall sleep, and there shall be none to make you afraid. I will take away evil beasts: and the sword shall not pass through your quarters. You shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you. Five of yours shall pursue a hundred others, and a hundred of you ten thousand: your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. I will look on you, and make you increase: you shall be multiplied, and I will establish My covenant with you. You shall eat the oldest of the old store, and, new coming on, you shall cast away the old. I will set My tabernacle in the midst of you, and My soul shall not cast you off. I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be My people” (Leviticus 26:3-12).
Yet, with those who do not love Him, or even hate Him, God will reach into His “toolbox” and use other tools that He does not like to use, but will use when necessary: “I will render vengeance to My enemies, and repay them that hate Me!” (Deuteronomy 32:41). “But if you will not hear Me, nor do all My commandments, if you despise My laws, and contemn My judgments, so as not to do those things which are appointed by Me, and to make void My covenant, then I will quickly visit you with poverty, and burning heat, which shall waste your eyes, and consume your lives. You shall sow your seed in vain, which shall be devoured by your enemies. I will set My face against you, and you shall fall down before your enemies, and shall be made subject to them that hate you.
“I will break the pride of your stubbornness, and I will make to you the Heaven above as iron, and the Earth as brass! I will bring seven times more plagues upon you for your sins! And I will bring in upon you the sword that shall avenge My covenant. And when you shall flee into the cities, I will send the pestilence in the midst of you, and you shall be delivered into the hands of your enemies! I will destroy and break your idols. You shall fall among the ruins of your idols, and My soul shall abhor you. I will bring your cities to be a wilderness, and I will destroy your land. And I will scatter you among the Gentiles, and I will draw out the sword after you, and your land shall be desert, and your cities destroyed. You shall perish among the Gentiles, and an enemy’s land shall consume you.
“And if of them also some remain, they shall pine away in their iniquities, in the land of their enemies, and they shall be afflicted for the sins of their fathers, and their own―until they confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their ancestors, whereby they have transgressed Me, and walked contrary unto Me. Therefore I also will walk them, and bring them into land of their enemies, until their uncircumcised mind becomes ashamed―then shall they pray for their sins!” (Leviticus 26:14-41).
The Life You Lead Dictates the God You Get
As Holy Scripture says elsewhere: “With the holy one Thou will be holy, and with the valiant, Thou will be perfect. With the elect Thou will be elect, and with the perverse Thou will be perverted. And the poor people Thou will save. And with Thy eyes Thou will humble the haughty!” (2 Kings 22:26-28). “With the holy, Thou will be holy; and with the innocent man Thou will be innocent. And with the elect Thou will be elect and with the perverse thou will be perverted. For Thou will save the humble people; but will bring down the eyes of the proud!” (Psalm 17:26-28).
In other words―God will be tough or kind, heavy-handed or gentle, depending on what we are “asking for” or what we deserve. As the New Testament says: “See then the goodness and the severity of God―towards them indeed that are fallen, the severity; but towards thee, if thou abide in goodness, the goodness of God―otherwise thou also shalt be cut off!” (Romans 11:22).
“And thou shall know that the Lord thy God, He is a strong and faithful God, keeping His covenant and mercy to them that love Him, and to them that keep His commandments, unto a thousand generations―and also repaying them that hate Him, so as to destroy them, without further delay, immediately rendering to them what they deserve” (Deuteronomy 7:9-10). So if you choose to keep the commandments of God and follow His will, then “the God of peace and of love shall be with you” (2 Corinthians 13:11). To those who reject the commandments and will God, they will soon see that “the wrath of God is revealed from Heaven against all ungodliness and injustice” (Romans 1:18). “I hated them for the wickedness of their devices―I will cast them forth out of My house, I will love them no more―all their princes are revolters!” (Osee 9:15).
What you sow is what you reap: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap” (Galatians 6:8) and the kind of life you lead dictates the kind of God you will meet. “If you will not hear, and if you will not lay it to heart, to give glory to My Name, says the Lord of hosts, then I will send poverty upon you, and will curse your blessings―yes I will curse them―because you have not laid it to heart! Behold, I will cast the shoulder to you, and I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities, and it shall take you away with it” (Malachias 2:2-3).
You Get the God You Deserve
No doubt you have heard it said: “We get the leaders we deserve!” Similarly, “We get the God we deserve!” Modern-day Christians are ceaselessly enthusing about God being “Love” and “Mercy” and all you have to do is believe in Him and you are “saved”. God is love, that is true, but God is not ONLY love. You would have thought that simple common sense would have told them that there is something wrong with their theory when scrutinized under the light of most souls ending up damned―but, of course, they refuse to look at and consider that part of reality!
The Kindness of God
The reality is that God wants to save everyone―but it has to be on His terms and not on their terms. God’s love excludes nobody―the excluding is done by a lack of love towards God. There are sufficient Scriptural quotes that confirm that God loves sinners, has compassion upon those sinners, and wishes to save those sinners―regardless of how sinful they are or may have been:
“The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “‘As I live,’ saith the Lord God, ‘I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways: and why will you die?’ (Ezechiel 33:11). “The soul that sinneth, the same shall die … But if the wicked do penance for all his sins which he hath committed, and keep all my commandments, and do judgment, and justice, living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he hath done! In his justice, which he hath wrought, he shall live!” (Ezechiel 18:20-22). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow―and if they be red as crimson, they shall be made white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). “Because I will be merciful to their iniquities, and their sins I will remember no more” (Hebrews 8:12). Beautiful, huh? Those quotes are only the tip of the iceberg!
As a further “dip the big toe in the water” reflection or meditation, Holy Scripture not only tells us that “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), but Scripture also unpacks or gives a brief description of that charity: “Charity is patient, is kind. Charity envies not, deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious, seeks not her own, is not provoked to anger, thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believeth all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never falls away―whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8).
The Toughness of God
Yet, on the other hand, God also says: “But if the just man turn himself away from his justice, and do iniquity―according to all the abominations which the wicked man useth to work―shall he live? All his justices, which he hath done, shall not be remembered in the prevarication, by which he hath prevaricated, and, in his sin, which he has committed, in them he shall die. And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore, O house of Israel: Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse? For when the just turns himself away from his justice and commits iniquity, then he shall die therein―in the injustice, that he hath wrought, he shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:24-26).
“Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great―He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’ For mercy and wrath quickly come from Him, and His wrath looks upon sinners. Delay not to be converted to the Lord, and defer it not from day to day. For His wrath shall come on a sudden, and in the time of vengeance He will destroy thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-9).
The Holy Ghost Will Convict the World of Sin
At the Last Supper, when speaking of the future coming of the Holy Ghost, Our Lord said: “I tell you the truth―it is expedient to you that I go―for if I go not, the Paraclete [the Holy Ghost] will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you. And when He is come, He will convict the world of sin, and of justice, and of judgment. Of sin―because they believed not in Me. And of justice―because I go to the Father and you shall see Me no longer. And of judgment―because the prince [Satan] of this world is already judged!” (John 16:7-11).
Our Lord, in His farewell discourses, explicitly declares that by the Holy Ghost’s coming we should learn what sin is, saying: “When He is come, He will convict the world of sin.” (John 16:8). Both in the old creation and in the new, both before the Incarnation of the Son of God, and after His Ascension into Heaven, it has been, it is, and it will be to the end of the world, the work and the office of the Holy Ghost, to convince the world of sin; that is to say, to convince the intellect, and to illuminate the reason of man to understand what sin is, and also to convince the consciences of men of their sinfulness and make them conscious that they are guilty before God.
As in the beginning, before the Fall of man, man, in the light of the Holy Ghost, knew God, His perfections and holiness, so after the Fall, God, in His mercy, has by His Spirit taught men to know, in some measure at least, His perfections and their own sinfulness; but it was only like the twilight preceding the noonday. We are in the noonday and if, in the noonday light, we are blind to the perfections of God and to our own sinfulness, then woe to us in the Day of Judgment.
Sadly―in the noonday light that came with the Incarnation, Birth, Ministry, Passion and Death of Christ, and that noonday light still shines today―the human race has been blinded to its sins. Since the time of Pope Pius XII, one pope after another has lamented that modern-man has “lost the sense of sin.” In an October 1946 Radio Message to the participants in the National Catechetical Congress of the United States―in Boston, Massachusetts, USA―Pope Pius XII said: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin.” Pope John Paul II, on March 14th, 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin. Christ’s invitation to conversion is all the more urgent!” In homily on March 13th, 2011, Pope Benedict XVI said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many … If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, we cannot speak of sin. Just as when the sun is hidden the shadows disappear and the shadows appear only if the sun is there, so, too, the eclipse of God necessarily brings the eclipse of sin.”
The Sin Against the Holy Ghost
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica (IIa-IIae, q. 14) speaks of three interpretations concerning the sin against the Holy Ghost that is mentioned specifically in Scripture (Matthew 12:31). The first interpretation is that it is the sin of final impenitence, by which a person rejects grace and pardon, up to and including the moment of death. Another interpretation is that sins against the Holy Ghost are sins of weakness against God the Father; or a sins of ignorance against God the Son; or sins of malice (deliberately entrenched in sin) against God the Holy Ghost.
St. Thomas, speaking of the latter mentioned sins of malice against the Holy Ghost, lists six chief sins of malice. These are: (1) despair, (2) presumption, (3) impenitence, (4) obstinacy, (5) resisting the known truth, and (5) envy of another person’s spiritual good. He adds that if the sin against the Holy Ghost is any sin of malice, then it is unforgivable in itself, although God may forgive it none the less. It may be incurable, as a disease is incurable; yet God can cure an incurable disease. He further adds that the sin against the Holy Ghost is regularly the outcome of many previous sins, and comes by a gradual turning of the mind and will to contempt for the means that God has given us for our salvation.
Is the Holy Ghost Gentle?
“O how good and sweet is Thy spirit, O Lord, in all things!” (Wisdom 12:1). “The Lord is sweet!” (1 Peter 2:3). Scripture speaks of “the goodness and kindness of God our Savior” (Titus 3:4). Just like any parent, the Holy Ghost is gentle if the “child” listens, obeys and is good. If we decide not to listen, not to obey and are bad, then, like any parent would do, the Holy Ghost has to take “corrective measures” and even “punitive measures.” Heck! We even treat pets the same way! Or even a pen that won’t write when it is needed to write, we tend to throw it aside and get one that will write! If you disobey God, ignore God, neglect God―even though He is patient and merciful―you will pay! Hey! Even those who are in Hell are experiencing the mercy of God―because they are not being punished as severely as they actually deserve to be punished.
Modern-man seems to ignore this truth. You have to get this straight―you do not mess with God just because He does not react immediately! “The Lord delays not His promise [to punish], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Yes, “the Lord is sweet and righteous” (Psalm 24:8). “O taste, and see that the Lord is sweet! Blessed is the man that hopes in Him!” (Psalm 33:9). “Thy mercy is sweet. Do thou deliver me!” (Psalm 108:21). When sweetness and kindness is merited, then God will give it―but He is also righteous, which means “acting in accord with divine or moral law”, and if man decides to break God’s law, then that righteous God will do what is right and His justice will be invoked. “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil―that put darkness for light, and light for darkness―that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
“The Lord is sweet to all―and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:9). “He has borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows” (Isaias 53:4). “Thou, O Lord, are sweet and mild and plenteous in mercy to all that call upon thee!” (Psalms 85:5). Yet merely “calling” on the Lord is not enough―we must “change” our ways if we seek and hope to obtain His “plenteous mercy”. There are too many who expect mercy without amending their sinful ways, who treat the Sacrament of Confession like a weekly “car-wash” or a revolving door, but drive back into the mud of sin immediately afterwards, just “as a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). Scripture adds: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Jesus warns us, saying: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.” (Matthew 7:21). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
The Holy Ghost is the Sanctifier
The Church Fathers, Doctors and theologians usually attribute different roles to each Member of the Holy Trinity―even though They all participate in everything. You could, so to speak, say that each Member of the Trinity gets to be the “Foreman” of the “three man crew” or “Three Person Crew” in which all work together. These “roles” are that of the Creator for God the Father, the Redeemer for God the Son, and the Sanctifier for God the Holy Ghost―we even call the third Person of the Trinity the “Holy” Ghost, the “Holy” Spirit, which literally means the “Spirit of Holiness.”
Holy Scripture is full of references of the holiness of God and our obligation to be holy like God is holy: “Let them therefore be holy, because I also am holy, the Lord, Who sanctifies them!” (Leviticus 21:8). “I am the Lord who sanctifies you!” (Leviticus 22:32). “The Lord will raise thee up to be a holy people to Himself, if thou keep the commandments of the Lord thy God, and walk in His ways!” (Deuteronomy 28:9). “And you shall be to Me a priestly kingdom, and a holy nation!” (Exodus 19:6). “And they shall call them, ‘The Holy People’, the redeemed of the Lord!” (Isaias 62:12). “Thou art a holy people to the Lord thy God: and He chose thee to be His peculiar people of all nations that are upon the Earth!” (Deuteronomy 14:2). “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2). “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy because I am the Lord your God” (Leviticus 20:7). “You shall be holy men to Me!” (Exodus 22:31). “Be a holy people of the Lord thy God!” (Deuteronomy 26:19). “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26). “They shall be holy to their God, and shall not profane His Name … therefore they shall be holy!” (Leviticus 21:6). God makes our obligation of being holy a non-negotiable thing. He does mention it just once, but repeatedly―so that there can be no plea of ignorance on our part!
You might think that this only applied in the Old Testament times, but St. Peter and St. Paul repeat the command in the New Testament: “But according to Him that hath called you, Who is holy, be you also in all manner of conversation holy―for it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy!’” (1 Peter 1:15-16). “As He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight!” (Ephesians 1:4).
Hence it is that role of the Holy Ghost is to sanctify us and thereby make us fit for the Kingdom of Heaven. This is why St. Louis de Montfort writes, in his booklet, The Secret of Mary, this following passage that states that holiness is our main vocation: “Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next (Matthew 5:48). It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this. Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
God is Charity―Charity Sanctifies
It is only logical that if “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8) and “God is holy” (Psalm 98:9), then Charity must have a major and crucial part to play in holiness. In fact, Holy Scripture tells us that without Charity, all that we might do will be useless, pointless and worthless without Charity: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). “Above all have charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:12-14).
“We are of God. Let us love one another, for charity is of God. And everyone that loves, is born of God, and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity. By this has the charity of God appeared towards us, because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him. In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins. My dearest, if God has so loved us; we also ought to love one another. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us” (1 John 4:6-12).
Article 32
Pentecost Tuesday, May 21st
The Catholic Church is Fast Becoming an Un-Holy Ghost Town!
Pentecost Tuesday, May 21st
The Catholic Church is Fast Becoming an Un-Holy Ghost Town!
Week of the Holy Ghost & Ghost Towns
In this Octave of Pentecost, or “Week of the Holy Ghost”, it would be appropriate to speak of “Ghost Towns.” Just as you can call a glass that contains 50% water both “half-full” and “half-empty”―likewise you could call today’s Church (or local churches) as being “half-full” or “half-empty.” Yet the fact is that our churches are emptying. The Church should be a “Holy Ghost Town” where the Holy Ghost dwells, but the Church is fast becoming the other kind of “Ghost Town”―one which is becoming increasingly emptied of its inhabitants. Perhaps your own family has already become, or is fast becoming, a “Catholic Ghost Town”―whereby increasing numbers are leaning away from the Faith, not practicing the Faith, or have left the Faith. Recent research, studies and surveys show that over 90% of Catholic youth will no longer practice the Faith on a regular basis by the time they leave college (or high school, if they don’t pursue college education).
Nearly half of the “cradle Catholics” are gone by age eighteen. 80% (8 out of 10) are gone by age twenty-three. When a person walks away from the Church, that person usually leaves when it is young. Dynamic Catholic states that 85% of Catholic young adults (17 out of 20) stop practicing their Faith in college―most of them within their first year of leaving home. Curtis Martin, the founder of the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS) thinks that 85% is conservative, and that the Catholic Church is losing more than 90% of Catholic young people by the end of their college years. This data isn’t new―it has been the case year after year after year. At least three-quarters (75%) of people raised Catholic, say they attended Mass at least once a week as children, including those who later left the Catholic Church. But those who have become unaffiliated, exhibit a sharp decline in Mass attendance through their lifetime: 74% attended regularly as children, 44% did so as teens and only 2% do so as adults.
The Ghost Town Phenomenon
Dictionaries will define a “ghost town” as an abandoned village, town, or city, usually one that contains substantial visible remains. A town often becomes a “ghost town” because the economic activity that once supported it, has now failed, or it becomes a “ghost town” due to natural or human-caused disasters such as floods, prolonged droughts, government actions, uncontrolled lawlessness, war, pollution, or nuclear disasters. The term can sometimes refer to cities, towns, and neighborhoods that are still populated, but significantly less so than in past years; for example, those affected by high levels of unemployment and dereliction.
The above definition and description presents no difficulty when applied to the Church and the Faith. The Church can become a “Ghost Town” when for one reason or another―or through a combination of reasons―persons no longer show an interest, nor any concern, nor any devotion, nor any attachment to the Church and Her teachings, laws and practices. The causes could be internal, external or both. The result is a gradual ‘depopulation’ of the Church. Many will still call themselves “Catholic”―but will not believe all Catholic teachings, nor obey all Catholic laws, nor observe all Catholic practices and customs. All of this is a progressive disease that gradually leads down the slippery slope to apostasy, and from there further down the slippery slope to Hell. Such a diagnosis would be instantly rejected by those who are on that slippery slope―but Scripture is adamant:
“Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone, therefore, that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these my words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27). Since most houses are built on sand―when that storm comes, be it a storm of temptation, worldliness, persecution, etc., those houses fall and we are left with a ghost town.
Prophecy of a Catholic Ghost Town
If you are a prophecy aficionado (devotee), then you will be well aware of the many prophecies that paint a ghostly picture for the Faith in the “last days” or end times”―and, as Sr. Lucia of Fatima revealed: “The Blessed Virgin did not tell me (explicitly) that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this for three reasons. The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground. The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others. And the third, because in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation, His Blessed Mother” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
The “last times of the world” that Sr. Lucia speaks of, are closely entwined with the so-called “Third Secret of Fatima” as well as the many prophecies, made over many centuries, by many saints, blesseds, venerables and other holy persons within the Church. The so-called “Third Secret of Fatima” was the third and final part of the full prophetic Secret, in three parts, which Our Lady revealed to three children at Fatima on July 13th, 1917. The first and second parts of the Secret―namely, the vision of Hell and the warning about the rise of Communist Russia―were publicly revealed with the publication of Sr. Lucia’s memoirs in the 1940s (read here). The final part of the revelation remains in the possession of the Vatican and has not yet been correctly and fully disclosed to the world. In fact, it is widely believed that the Vatican has two versions of the Third Secret under lock and key―(1) the original one and (2) a doctored version, that has been sanitized, modified and sterilized. The doctored, modified, sanitized and sterilized version was revealed for public consumption in the year 2000―but very quickly this version was picked-to-pieces and discredited by most of the Fatima experts in the world.
Our Lady had commanded Sr. Lucia to write down on paper the Third Secret of Fatima and to entrust it to her bishop and, through him, to Pope Pius XII. At the same time, Our Lady also insisted that this part of the Secret was to be revealed to the faithful throughout the world no later than 1960. Lucia hesitated, and it was under the direct order of her bishop that Sr. Lucia finally wrote down the third part of the Secret on January 2nd, 1944. However, upon learning that her bishop was unwilling to open the envelope containing the Secret, Sr. Lucia made him promise that the Third Secret would be opened and read to the world upon her death, or in 1960, whichever would happen first. If her bishop died first, it was agreed that the Secret would be confided to the Cardinal Patriarch of Lisbon. Despite this agreement, the Secret was, in fact, delivered to the Vatican where it has remained undisclosed to the public―except for the disclosure of doctored, sanitized and modified version in 2000.
Haunting Words from Church Officials
The first pope to read the Third Secret of Fatima was not Pope Pius XII―during whose reign Lucia had written down the Secret―but it was his successor, Pope John XXIII.
► CARDINAL SILVIO ODDI
Cardinal Oddi (1910-2001), who had been had been the secretary of Archbishop Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli — later Pope John XXIII — When Roncalli served as the apostolic nuncio in Paris, insistently tried to get Pope John XXIII to publish the Third Secret of Fatima. As the British newspaper The Telegraph reported upon his death:
“In yet another unguarded interview, published in 1990, Cardinal Oddi spoke about his relationship with John XXIII. In the early 1960s, when acting as his secretary, he told the Pope: «Most Holy Father, there is one thing for which I cannot forgive you!» The Pope, surprised, asked what it was. Oddi replied that he had not revealed the Third Secret of Fatima, conveyed to three Portuguese children by the Virgin Mary in 1917, which had been scheduled for release in 1960.” Pope John XXIII replied: “Let’s not talk about it!” Cardinal Oddi revealed to the pope that he had already given over a hundred sermons and speeches on the subject. To which the Pope retorted: “I told you not to mention it!”
In another outspoken interview in 1990, Cardinal Oddi said: “I believe I knew John XXIII quite well, since I spent a number of years at his side when he was at the nunciature in Paris. If the Secret had concerned realities consoling for the Church like the conversion of Russia or the religious rebirth of Eastern Europe, I believe that he would have brought pressure to bear to make the Secret public. Due to his temperament, he did not hesitate to communicate joyful things. But when I asked him during an audience why in 1960, when the obligation to keep the Secret had come to an end, he had not made public the last part of the message of Fatima, he responded with a weary sigh. He then said: «Don’t bring that subject up with me, please!»“ Later, in that same interview, Cardinal Oddi explains his own theory concerning the content of the Third Secret of Fatima:
“What is it that happened in 1960, that might have been seen in connection with the Secret of Fatima? The most important event is without a doubt the launching of the preparatory phase of the Second Vatican Council. Therefore I would not be surprised if the Secret had something to do with the convocation of Vatican II … From the attitude Pope John showed during our conversation, I deduced ― but it is only an hypothesis ― that the Secret might contain a part that could have a rather unpleasant ring to it. John XXIII had convened the Council with the precise intention of directing the forces of the Church toward the solution of the problems that concern all of humanity, beginning from within. That is, he intended the work to begin with the evangelical perfection pursued by consecrated persons … But we all know that many sad things have taken place … I am thinking, for example, of the number of priests who have abandoned the priesthood―it is said that there have been 80,000. But one only has to recall the anguish with which the Holy Father, Paul VI, in 1968 cried out against the “auto-demolition” taking place in the Church (to include the “smoke of Satan has entered into the Church” quote). I would not be surprised if the Third Secret alluded to dark times for the Church: grave confusions and troubling apostasies within Catholicism itself … If we consider the grave crisis we have lived through since the Council, the signs that this prophecy has been fulfilled do not seem to be lacking!”
To the Italian journalist Lucio Brunelli, in an interview conducted for the Italian journal, Il Sabato, Cardinal Oddi said: “It (the Third Secret) has nothing to do with Gorbachev. The Blessed Virgin was alerting us against apostasy in the Church!”
Those words of Cardinal Oddi have been collaborated, substantiated and demonstrated to be true by many other high ranking members of the clergy.
► FATHER JOSE DOS SANTOS VALINHO
Sister Lucia’s nephew, Father Jose dos Santos Valinho. He related his opinion of the contents of the Third Secret in a book by Renzo and Roberto Allegri, entitled Reportage su Fatima (Milan 2000), which was published — providentially enough — very shortly before the disclosure of the vision purported to be the Third Secret and the publication of booklet entitled The Message of Fatima by Cardinal Ratzinger and Archbishop Bertone. Father Valinho stated:
“I believe that (third) part of the Secret concerns the Church from within, perhaps doctrinal difficulties, a crisis of unity, rebellion. The last sentence my aunt wrote, which precedes the part that is still unknown, says, ‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved.’ … Therefore, people elsewhere in the Church might waver on dogma. But this is just speculation.”
On February 14th, 2003 Father Valinho also spoke about the Third Secret on the program ENIGMA. It was transmitted prime time, nationwide on RAI, the national television network of Italy. Father Valinho stated on this occasion:
“I believe that there is a connection between that which is announced in the first part of the Secret, which concerns wars and sufferings which would be everywhere, and the second part which concerns the persecutions and a type of breakdown of the Faith. Because where the ellipsis (the three dots, “…”) was placed, it means “Here is the third part, which is not revealed” and then the conclusion: “In Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.” This suggests to me that there is a relationship between Faith and the third part of the Secret. Therefore, it is something that relates to the Church. It is some kind of universal crisis which affects the whole Church and all of humanity.”
► POPE PIUS XII (while still a Cardinal)
Cardinal Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII, said while still a cardinal: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul…. I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject her ornaments and make her feel remorse for her historical past. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene, weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’” Cardinal Pacelli said this in 1931. He became Pope Pius XII in 1939.
► POPE PAUL VI
Pope Paul VI said: “The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church” (Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13th, 1977. Pope Paul was dead 10 months later).
► POPE BENEDICT XVI (while still Cardinal Ratzinger)
Cardinal Ratzinger said: “Yes, I have read (the Third Secret). (It refers to) a radical call to conversion; the absolute seriousness of history; the dangers which threaten the Faith and the life of the Christian and therefore (the life) of the world” (Jesus magazine, November 11th, 1984).
► FR. J. SCHWEIGL (Pope Pius XII’s interviewer of Sr. Lucia)
Fr. J. Schweigl said: “I cannot reveal anything of what I learned at Fatima concerning the Third Secret, but I can say that it has two parts: one concerns the Pope; the other logically (although I must say nothing) would have to be the continuation of the words: ‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved’” (The Whole Truth about Fatima, Vol. III, p. 74). Pope Pius XII personally sent Fr. Schweigl to interview Sr. Lucia about the Third Secret in 1952.
► FR. J. ALONSO (the Church’s official archivist of Fatima 1965—1981)
Fr. J. Alonso said: “In the period preceding the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, terrible things are to happen. These form the content of the third part of the Secret. What are they? If ‘in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved,’ … then it can be clearly deduced, from this, that in other parts of the Church these dogmas are going to become obscure, or even lost altogether…. Perhaps it even refers to the failures of the upper hierarchy of the Church.”
► CARDINAL OTTAVIANI
Cardinal Ottaviani said: “The message was not to be opened before 1960. I asked Sister Lucia, ‘Why this date?’ She answered, ‘Because then it will be clearer.’” Cardinal Ottaviani was the head of the Holy Office. He interviewed Sister Lucia in 1955.
► CARDINAL MARIO LUIGI CIAPPI
Cardinal Ciappi, the Papal Theologian of Pope John Paul II, in a personal communication to a Professor Baumgartner in Salzburg, Austria, said: “In the Third Secret, it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.”
► SISTER LUCIA OF FATIMA
Sister Lucia, in an interview with Fr. Augustine Fuentes, said: “Father, the devil is in the mood for engaging in a decisive battle against the Blessed Virgin. And the devil knows what it is that most offends God and which in a short space of time will gain for him the greatest number of souls. Thus, the devil does everything to overcome souls consecrated to God, because in this way, the devil will succeed in leaving souls of the faithful abandoned by their leaders, thereby the more easily will he seize them! …. That which afflicts the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Heart of Jesus is the fall of religious and priestly souls. The devil knows that religious and priests who fall away from their beautiful vocation drag numerous souls to Hell… The devil wishes to take possession of consecrated souls. He tries to corrupt them in order to lull to sleep the souls of laypeople and thereby lead them to final impenitence …. Father, let us not wait for an appeal to come from Rome, on behalf of the Holy Father, calling on the whole world to do penance; nor let us wait for it to come from our bishops in their dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No. Our Lord has already made frequent use of these means and the world took no notice. That is why each of us must now begin his own spiritual reform. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also every soul that God has placed on his path.” (Fr. Augustine Fuentes interviewed Sr. Lucia on December 26th, 1957).
Sister Lucia, in a letter to Fr. Umberto Pasquale, who was very devoted to the cause of Fatima, wrote: “The decadence which exists in the world is without any doubt the consequence of the lack of the spirit of prayer. Foreseeing this disorientation, the Blessed Virgin recommended recitation of the Rosary with such insistence. And since the Rosary is, after the Holy Eucharistic liturgy, the prayer most apt for preserving Faith in souls, the devil has unchained his struggles against it. Unfortunately, we see the disasters he has caused.”
Second Vatican Council Ghost Town Haunted by Ghosts
We are all led by a spirit or spirits―no spirit, no life. Our soul is a spirit and, without the soul, the body is dead. Yet even though our soul is our main guiding spirit, we can be guided by other spirits too―the souls or spirits of our family, relatives, friends, teachers, acquaintances, employers, employees, strangers, the media, etc. Since we are made to be social creatures―as God said of Adam: “It is not good for man to be alone! Let Us make him a help like unto himself!” (Genesis 2:18)―and we are helped in life, for better or for worse, by the help, advice and guidance of others, other “kindred spirits” as the saying goes. Hence there are leaders and there are followers. Ultimately, at the end of the day, the two leaders are God and Satan―and humanity is caught in a tug-of-war between them.
The Catholic Church has always been in a tug-of-war with its enemies―the devil, the world and the flesh. The Second Vatican Council (1962-65) and its fruits (or rotten fruits) is a clear indication of this tug-of-war. With the advent of the Second Vatican Council, the Church has been losing ground in the tug-of-war with each passing year and decade―it has been dragged out of the safety of its Traditional Faith into the chaos and sinfulness of the world. The Second Vatican Council’s desire for the so-called “aggiornamento” (meaning “update”) which sought to open the doors and windows of the Church to the world―resulted not in the world coming into the Church, but in the faithful rushing out of those opened doors and leaping out of the opened windows into the arms of the sinful world. Today in most countries―varying from country to country―only around 5% to 20% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday Mass―which binds under the pain of mortal sin! The spirit of the Second Vatican Council was certainly not the Spirit of God, but an alien spirit―a mixture of a spirit of Modernism, Liberalism, lukewarmness, worldliness, and the infiltrators of the Church who had long since made their way into the Church for many decades, aided and abetted by the spirits of Hell, the devils themselves.
Even Our Lord was not exempt from this tug-of-war: “Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil” (Matthew 4:1). “The Spirit drove Him out into the desert. And He was in the desert forty days and forty nights, and was tempted by Satan; and He was with beasts, and the angels ministered to Him” (Mark 1:12-13).
What Our Lord went through, we have to go through. There is no exemption from temptation, there is no exemption from the test or exam of temptation, and there is no exemption from this warfare―“The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1)―in which “your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8) and in which “our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
These “spirits of wickedness in the high places” are no doubt the diabolically inspired and diabolically led infiltrators in both Church and State―as the recently deceased (2016) former chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, used to say: “Satan continually tries to dominate the world … He seeks to enslave men by making them obey himself and disobey God … We see it in laws that go totally against nature, such as divorce, abortion, ‘gay marriage’ … The influence of Satan is immense! … Today, Satan has free hands … Satanism is on the increase. Satanism is growing! Unfortunately it is being spread more and more! Satanism is spreading enormously! … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere! Everywhere! ... And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican. I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry. Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office! … Today Satan rules the world! … The whole world is in the power of the evil one!”
In that sense, the spirit of the world is increasingly becoming satanic―without even realizing it. People are being enslaved to the principles, maxims, fashions and attitudes of Satan. It is―as Fr. Amorth says―an increasing satanic world. “Today Satan rules the world! … The whole world is in the power of the evil one!”
Therefore, spirit of the modern-day Church is also becoming increasingly satanic. Some Catholics―clergy and laity alike―take on this spirit knowingly, others unknowingly. As Our Lord says, “by their fruits you shall know them” ― and the fruits of today’s modern Church are not good! A 2019 Pew Research study about the level of Catholic belief in the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist showed that a majority of Catholics do not believe that the bread and wine used at Mass become the body and blood of Christ. The Pew study showed that 69% of all self-identified Catholics said they believed the bread and wine consecrated at Mass are not the Real Presence of the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus, but instead are merely symbols of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ. That is just one example of the bad fruits of the Post-Conciliar (Post-Second Vatican Council) Church.
Other similar deviations from the Faith are seen by the fact that another Pew survey found most American Catholics, including those who go to church on a regular basis, have no moral problem with contraception. Just 8% percent said contraception is morally wrong, with 89 percent saying it was either morally acceptable or not a moral issue at all. Even among Catholics who attend Mass at least weekly, only about one in 8 (13%) in this group said contraception is morally wrong, with 87% of regular church goers saying it is either acceptable or not a moral issue.
On the issue of abortion, only about half of all U.S. Catholics say it is morally wrong, although that number shoots up to 83% among Catholics who attend Sunday Mass regularly.
About two-thirds of all U.S. Catholics (64%) say that homosexual behavior is either morally acceptable or not a moral issue at all, while 32 percent say it’s morally wrong. But Catholics who attend Mass weekly are more evenly split, with half labeling homosexual behavior as morally wrong.
Devil’s Final Battle
It is in this warfare against the devil that everyone must fight, or be conquered if they choose not to fight. Sr. Lucia of Fatima speaks of “the devil’s final battle” and says that it will be essentially be against “marriage and the family.”
In an interview with Fr. Fuentes, on December 26th, 1957, Sr. Lucia warned: “Father, the Blessed Virgin did not tell me that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this for three reasons:
“The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground.
“The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others.
“And the third, because in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation, His Blessed Mother” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
After Pope John Paul II asked Monsignor (later Cardinal) Carlo Caffarra (1938-2017) to begin a new Pontifical Institute for studies on marriage and the family, Caffarra wrote to Sister Lucia, simply requesting her prayers for this venture. He was surprised at receiving a very long letter with her signature, in which Lucia had written: “The final battle between the Lord and the reign of Satan will be about marriage and the family. Don’t be afraid, because anyone who works for the sanctity of marriage and the family will always be contended and opposed in every way, for this is the decisive issue.” And then Lucia concluded: “however, Our Lady has already crushed its head.”
Amongst the Liberals and Modernists cardinals, bishops and priests that infect the Church today, Cardinal Caffarra was one of the few lights in the present darkness, being less infected than the others. The Cardinal died in 2017, and a priest, who assisted the Cardinal in his last days, spoke the Cardinal’s distress over the disasters that he sees and endures in the Church every day, mentioning some incidents to him. The dying cardinal burst into tears, saying: “The Lord will not abandon His Church. There were Twelve Apostles, so the Lord will start again with a few! Imagine the suffering of Saint Athanasius, who was left alone to defend the truth for the love of Christ, of the Church and of men. We must have Faith, hope and fortitude!” The priest who assisted the Cardinal in his last days said: “The cardinal was very sorrowful, but he conveyed to me so much courage and love for the Church. He was comforted by the prophetic words which he had received years ago from Sister Lucia of Fatima, in that letter in which she said to him that ‘the final battle between God and Satan will be about marriage and the family.’”
Just in case you are tempted to bury your head in the sand, or switch into virtual reality mode, or retreat into a Disneyland version of the Faith―let the penny drop, let reality sink-in, and realize that “the final battle between God and Satan will be about marriage and the family” automatically includes your marriage and your family! Just as there is nobody who is exempt from temptation and just as we are all sinners―it stands to reason that we will all be part of this “final battle between God and Satan” upon “marriage and the family”―for, even if we are not married, we are all part of a family. The devil wants to possess marriage, he wants to possess the family―and he will being to achieve that possession by introducing, little by little, more and more, the spirit of the world (which is essentially and ultimately the spirit of the devil) into each and every marriage and family. Looking at the world today, it seems as though he has most marriages and most families in his grasp―and to the few that are resisting, he nevertheless has his foot in the door with some aspects of worldliness being accepted even by those who are resisting.
The Spirit of Our Times
St. Mark gives us several accounts of souls tormented or possessed by evil spirits―something which is on the increase today. Though relatively few souls might be possessed by the devil, many souls are oppressed and obsessed by the devil. For the spirit of the world is essentially the spirit of the devil―since the devil is the prince of the world, as Jesus Himself says: “The prince of this world comes, and in Me he has not any thing!” (John 14:30) “The prince of this world is already judged” (John 16:11). “Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31). It is now, in our days, that we need Our Lord to again cast out the prince of this world, whose spirit has possessed and created the spirit of the world, which has captivated so many souls today. These poor souls are not led by the spirit of God, but by the spirit of the devil, disguised and wrapped-up in the fancy coverings of the spirit of the world. “We have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God―that we may know the things that are given us from God” (1 Corinthians 2:12). “Woe to the foolish that follow their own spirit, and see nothing!” (Ezechiel 13:3). “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
This is exactly what Our Lady foretold: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell … and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops .... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls. The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God ... as true Faith fades and false light will brighten the people … The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten … disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth. People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin.” (Our Lady of La Salette).
When Our Lord speaks of there being no Faith on Earth when He returns― “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8)―He is thereby implying that there will be another spirit that will have replaced the spirit of Faith. That other spirit will be the spirit of the world―a child of the spirit of the devil. That spirit was unchained with the Second Vatican Council―which is what the Third Secret of Fatima is thought to mention―and the infiltration of the Church to the highest positions―which is what Our Lady also mentions: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord.” (Akita) … “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell.” (La Salette).
Taking On the Spirit of These Angels of Hell
We do well to re-read the accounts of demonic possession in the time of Our Lord, for demonic activity can only be on the increase in this “final battle between God and Satan” upon “marriage and the family.” Pope Paul VI, more than once, spoke of the smoke of Satan having entered the Church. Pope Paul VI complained that after the Second Vatican Council, that “from some fissure the smoke of Satan has entered the temple of God” (June 29th, 1972). A few years later he repeated the same concern: “The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church” (Pope Paul VI, Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13th, 1977).
The recently deceased (2016) famous exorcist of Rome, Father Gabriele Amorth, in an interview with the magazine 30 Days, in June 2000, also said: “The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Perhaps … a large number of exorcists might succeed in chasing out the legions of demons that have installed themselves in the Vatican.” When Fr. Amorth says “Satan has entered everywhere”, he means everywhere―your family included! Obviously you won’t see him wearing a red catsuit, with tail attached and pitchfork in hand―but you will see him in the worldliness that has crept into your family in one way or another, in one form or another, through one family member or another. This is his modern method of possession―or, more correctly speaking―obsession. He seeks to make each and every family more and more obsessed with the world, the spirit of the world, with worldliness. That is how he controls most people today.
Cardinal Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI, said: “We have now absorbed into Church teaching, and the Church has opened herself up to, principles which are not hers, but which come from modern society.” Elsewhere he said that with Vatican II, the principles of 1789 [the French Revolution] had entered the Church. Unfortunately, the opening of the windows of the Church to the world, has let worldliness into the Church, while many of the Catholics jumped out of the windows and joined the world!
“And there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit; and he cried out, saying: ‘What have we to do with Thee, Jesus of Nazareth? Art Thou come to destroy us? I know who Thou art―the Holy One of God!’ And Jesus threatened him, saying: ‘Speak no more, and go out of the man!’ And the unclean spirit, tearing him and crying out with a loud voice, went out of him” (Mark 1:23-26).
“There met Him [Jesus], out of the monuments, a man with an unclean spirit, who had his dwelling in the tombs, and no man now could bind him, not even with chains. For having been often bound with fetters and chains, he had burst the chains, and broken the fetters in pieces, and no one could tame him. And he was always day and night in the monuments and in the mountains, crying and cutting himself with stones. And seeing Jesus afar off, he ran and adored him. And crying with a loud voice, he said: ‘What have I to do with Thee, Jesus the Son of the most high God? I adjure Thee by God that Thou torment me not!’ For He said unto him: ‘Go out of the man, thou unclean spirit!’ And Jesus asked him: ‘What is thy name?’ And he said to Him: ‘My name is Legion, for we are many [devils in the man]!’ And he besought Jesus much, that He would not drive him away out of the country. And there was there near the mountain a great herd of swine, feeding. And the [evil] spirits besought Him, saying: ‘Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them!’ And Jesus immediately gave them permission. And the unclean spirits, going out of the man, entered into the swine―and the herd, with great violence, was carried headlong into the sea, being about two thousand, and were drowned in the sea. And they that fed them fled, and told it in the city and in the fields. And they went out to see what was done. And they came to Jesus, and they saw him that was troubled with the devil, sitting, clothed, and well in his wits, and they were afraid. And they, that had seen it, told them in what manner he had been dealt with who had the devil; and concerning the swine. And they began to pray Jesus that He would depart from their coasts. And when He went up into the ship, he that had been troubled with the devil, began to beseech Jesus that he might be with Him. And Jesus admitted him not onto the ship, but said to him: ‘Go into thy house to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord has done for thee, and has had mercy on thee!’ And he went his way, and began to publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him―and all men wondered” (Mark 5:2-20).
On another occasion, “He went into the coasts of Tyre and Sidon: and a woman, as soon as she heard of Him, whose daughter had an unclean spirit, came in and fell down at His feet. The woman was a Gentile, a Syrophenician born. And she besought Him that He would cast forth the devil out of her daughter. Who said to her: ‘Suffer first the children to be filled! For it is not good to take the bread of the children, and cast it to the dogs!’ But she answered and said to Him: ‘Yea, Lord! But even the whelps also eat under the table of the crumbs of the children!’ And He said to her: ‘For this saying―go thy way! The devil is gone out of thy daughter!’ And when she was come into her house, she found the girl lying upon the bed, and that the devil was gone out” (Mark 7:24-30).
And Jesus said: “When an unclean spirit is gone out of a man he walks through dry places seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says: ‘I will return into my house from whence I came out!’ And coming he finds it empty, swept, and garnished. Then he goes, and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is made worse than the first. So shall it be also to this wicked generation!” (Matthew 12:43-45).
Burning Down the Church Underground
The fate of an Ukranian Church in the little town of Centralia, now a ghost town, in Pennsylvannia, USA, in a way epitomizes what is happening to the Catholic Church as a whole today. The town of Centralia had more than a thousand people in 400 to 500 houses living there in 1962―coincidentally the year the Second Vatican Council began―today only six people live there! Once, there were homes and gardens. Now there are weeds. In 1962 it was a thriving coal-mining town. Today it is a ghost town―left to die―but its last remaining church is thriving. In Pennsylvania’s coal-mining mountains, there is an empty grid where a town once lived. The roads remain on Google Maps, they have names like Railway Avenue and Apple Alley ― but on the ground, they are ghost streets. Nameless. Silent. Stripped bare. Anonymous, in every sense. Yet on the horizon, there stand a white church amid black trees. Its congregation no longer lives in town, but the church still stands and is still frequented, but only by a few.
What happened to Centralia? More or less the same thing that has been happening to the Catholic Church. On May 27th, 1962 (the same year that the Second Vatican Council opened), a fire spread from a surface mine to underground seams, and kept burning. Nobody is quite sure how the fire started, but more than $7m was spent trying to stop the fire―without success. Though the town was able to extinguish the fire above ground, a much bigger inferno burned underneath, and it eventually spread its way under Centralia’s town center. “Through a monumental series of blunders and inadequate attention over the years, it got to the size underground where it basically destroyed the town of Centralia and everybody had to move,” said Davod Dekok, a Pennsylvania historian. In 1983, the US Congress approved a $42m package to relocate the residents. Some locals think the fire is either out, or no longer poses a danger today. The state says the fire could burn for more than 100 years.
By the 1980s, Centralia was fading from the map, like a photo developing in reverse. When the fire started, there were five churches in the town. One by one, they disappeared. In 1986, the Ukrainian church ― built in 1911 ― almost followed. “It was on its last breath,” says Father Michael Hutsko, the pastor. “The church would have been knocked down, and all that would have remained was the cemetery.” But, as the state oversaw the clearance of Centralia, Archbishop Stephen Sulyk ordered a survey under the hillside church. “So they drilled, and they found solid rock [rather than coal],” says Father Hutsko, “That’s so Scriptural! ‘You are Peter and upon this rock I will build My Church!’” The building was saved, and with the help of a small number of families, the church kept watching over Centralia. Its congregation has left town, but Centralia’s Ukrainian Catholic Church wasn’t going anywhere. The Blessed Virgin Mary Ukrainian Catholic Church continues to stand on its solid rock foundation as a symbol of resilience and steadfastness.
Similarly, in the Catholic Church, “the final battle between God and Satan will be about marriage and the family” and Satan, as is his preference to work out of sight and therefore out of mind, has been burning the foundations of the Catholic Church since 1962―the year the Second Vatican Council opened its deliberations. Just as in the case of Centralia, the numbers and the resolve of Catholics has been whittled down as attempts to put out the Satanic fires of Vatican II have failed. Yet, just as the Blessed Virgin Mary Ukrainian Catholic Church continues to stand in Centralia on its solid rock foundation as a symbol of resilience and steadfastness, so too will the Catholic Church survive this current underground fire―for as Our Lady promised, “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph.” In the meantime, however, as Our Lady also said at Quito (Our Lady of Good Success): “The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom. Many will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings and those who sacrifice themselves for the Church and their country will be counted as martyrs. There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration.”
What Our Lady foretold, Pope Benedict XVI reaffirmed and confirmed not too long ago, when he said: “The Church will become small and will have to start afresh, more or less, from the beginning. She will no longer be able to inhabit many of the edifices She built in prosperity. As the number of Her adherents diminishes ... She will lose many of Her social privileges ... As a small society, [the Church] will make much bigger demands on the initiative of Her individual members …. It will be hard-going for the Church … It will make Her poor and cause Her to become the Church of the meek ... The process will be long and wearisome ... But when the trial of this sifting is past, a great power will flow from a more spiritualized and simplified Church ... It seems certain to me that the Church is facing very hard times. The real crisis has scarcely begun. We will have to count on terrific upheavals. But I am equally certain about what will remain at the end: not the Church of the political cult, which is dead already, but the Church of Faith. She may well no longer be the dominant social power, to the extent that She was until recently; but She will enjoy a fresh blossoming and be seen as man’s home, where he will find life and hope beyond death” (Benedict XVI, from his book Faith and the Future).
In this Octave of Pentecost, or “Week of the Holy Ghost”, it would be appropriate to speak of “Ghost Towns.” Just as you can call a glass that contains 50% water both “half-full” and “half-empty”―likewise you could call today’s Church (or local churches) as being “half-full” or “half-empty.” Yet the fact is that our churches are emptying. The Church should be a “Holy Ghost Town” where the Holy Ghost dwells, but the Church is fast becoming the other kind of “Ghost Town”―one which is becoming increasingly emptied of its inhabitants. Perhaps your own family has already become, or is fast becoming, a “Catholic Ghost Town”―whereby increasing numbers are leaning away from the Faith, not practicing the Faith, or have left the Faith. Recent research, studies and surveys show that over 90% of Catholic youth will no longer practice the Faith on a regular basis by the time they leave college (or high school, if they don’t pursue college education).
Nearly half of the “cradle Catholics” are gone by age eighteen. 80% (8 out of 10) are gone by age twenty-three. When a person walks away from the Church, that person usually leaves when it is young. Dynamic Catholic states that 85% of Catholic young adults (17 out of 20) stop practicing their Faith in college―most of them within their first year of leaving home. Curtis Martin, the founder of the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS) thinks that 85% is conservative, and that the Catholic Church is losing more than 90% of Catholic young people by the end of their college years. This data isn’t new―it has been the case year after year after year. At least three-quarters (75%) of people raised Catholic, say they attended Mass at least once a week as children, including those who later left the Catholic Church. But those who have become unaffiliated, exhibit a sharp decline in Mass attendance through their lifetime: 74% attended regularly as children, 44% did so as teens and only 2% do so as adults.
The Ghost Town Phenomenon
Dictionaries will define a “ghost town” as an abandoned village, town, or city, usually one that contains substantial visible remains. A town often becomes a “ghost town” because the economic activity that once supported it, has now failed, or it becomes a “ghost town” due to natural or human-caused disasters such as floods, prolonged droughts, government actions, uncontrolled lawlessness, war, pollution, or nuclear disasters. The term can sometimes refer to cities, towns, and neighborhoods that are still populated, but significantly less so than in past years; for example, those affected by high levels of unemployment and dereliction.
The above definition and description presents no difficulty when applied to the Church and the Faith. The Church can become a “Ghost Town” when for one reason or another―or through a combination of reasons―persons no longer show an interest, nor any concern, nor any devotion, nor any attachment to the Church and Her teachings, laws and practices. The causes could be internal, external or both. The result is a gradual ‘depopulation’ of the Church. Many will still call themselves “Catholic”―but will not believe all Catholic teachings, nor obey all Catholic laws, nor observe all Catholic practices and customs. All of this is a progressive disease that gradually leads down the slippery slope to apostasy, and from there further down the slippery slope to Hell. Such a diagnosis would be instantly rejected by those who are on that slippery slope―but Scripture is adamant:
“Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone, therefore, that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these my words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27). Since most houses are built on sand―when that storm comes, be it a storm of temptation, worldliness, persecution, etc., those houses fall and we are left with a ghost town.
Prophecy of a Catholic Ghost Town
If you are a prophecy aficionado (devotee), then you will be well aware of the many prophecies that paint a ghostly picture for the Faith in the “last days” or end times”―and, as Sr. Lucia of Fatima revealed: “The Blessed Virgin did not tell me (explicitly) that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this for three reasons. The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground. The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others. And the third, because in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation, His Blessed Mother” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
The “last times of the world” that Sr. Lucia speaks of, are closely entwined with the so-called “Third Secret of Fatima” as well as the many prophecies, made over many centuries, by many saints, blesseds, venerables and other holy persons within the Church. The so-called “Third Secret of Fatima” was the third and final part of the full prophetic Secret, in three parts, which Our Lady revealed to three children at Fatima on July 13th, 1917. The first and second parts of the Secret―namely, the vision of Hell and the warning about the rise of Communist Russia―were publicly revealed with the publication of Sr. Lucia’s memoirs in the 1940s (read here). The final part of the revelation remains in the possession of the Vatican and has not yet been correctly and fully disclosed to the world. In fact, it is widely believed that the Vatican has two versions of the Third Secret under lock and key―(1) the original one and (2) a doctored version, that has been sanitized, modified and sterilized. The doctored, modified, sanitized and sterilized version was revealed for public consumption in the year 2000―but very quickly this version was picked-to-pieces and discredited by most of the Fatima experts in the world.
Our Lady had commanded Sr. Lucia to write down on paper the Third Secret of Fatima and to entrust it to her bishop and, through him, to Pope Pius XII. At the same time, Our Lady also insisted that this part of the Secret was to be revealed to the faithful throughout the world no later than 1960. Lucia hesitated, and it was under the direct order of her bishop that Sr. Lucia finally wrote down the third part of the Secret on January 2nd, 1944. However, upon learning that her bishop was unwilling to open the envelope containing the Secret, Sr. Lucia made him promise that the Third Secret would be opened and read to the world upon her death, or in 1960, whichever would happen first. If her bishop died first, it was agreed that the Secret would be confided to the Cardinal Patriarch of Lisbon. Despite this agreement, the Secret was, in fact, delivered to the Vatican where it has remained undisclosed to the public―except for the disclosure of doctored, sanitized and modified version in 2000.
Haunting Words from Church Officials
The first pope to read the Third Secret of Fatima was not Pope Pius XII―during whose reign Lucia had written down the Secret―but it was his successor, Pope John XXIII.
► CARDINAL SILVIO ODDI
Cardinal Oddi (1910-2001), who had been had been the secretary of Archbishop Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli — later Pope John XXIII — When Roncalli served as the apostolic nuncio in Paris, insistently tried to get Pope John XXIII to publish the Third Secret of Fatima. As the British newspaper The Telegraph reported upon his death:
“In yet another unguarded interview, published in 1990, Cardinal Oddi spoke about his relationship with John XXIII. In the early 1960s, when acting as his secretary, he told the Pope: «Most Holy Father, there is one thing for which I cannot forgive you!» The Pope, surprised, asked what it was. Oddi replied that he had not revealed the Third Secret of Fatima, conveyed to three Portuguese children by the Virgin Mary in 1917, which had been scheduled for release in 1960.” Pope John XXIII replied: “Let’s not talk about it!” Cardinal Oddi revealed to the pope that he had already given over a hundred sermons and speeches on the subject. To which the Pope retorted: “I told you not to mention it!”
In another outspoken interview in 1990, Cardinal Oddi said: “I believe I knew John XXIII quite well, since I spent a number of years at his side when he was at the nunciature in Paris. If the Secret had concerned realities consoling for the Church like the conversion of Russia or the religious rebirth of Eastern Europe, I believe that he would have brought pressure to bear to make the Secret public. Due to his temperament, he did not hesitate to communicate joyful things. But when I asked him during an audience why in 1960, when the obligation to keep the Secret had come to an end, he had not made public the last part of the message of Fatima, he responded with a weary sigh. He then said: «Don’t bring that subject up with me, please!»“ Later, in that same interview, Cardinal Oddi explains his own theory concerning the content of the Third Secret of Fatima:
“What is it that happened in 1960, that might have been seen in connection with the Secret of Fatima? The most important event is without a doubt the launching of the preparatory phase of the Second Vatican Council. Therefore I would not be surprised if the Secret had something to do with the convocation of Vatican II … From the attitude Pope John showed during our conversation, I deduced ― but it is only an hypothesis ― that the Secret might contain a part that could have a rather unpleasant ring to it. John XXIII had convened the Council with the precise intention of directing the forces of the Church toward the solution of the problems that concern all of humanity, beginning from within. That is, he intended the work to begin with the evangelical perfection pursued by consecrated persons … But we all know that many sad things have taken place … I am thinking, for example, of the number of priests who have abandoned the priesthood―it is said that there have been 80,000. But one only has to recall the anguish with which the Holy Father, Paul VI, in 1968 cried out against the “auto-demolition” taking place in the Church (to include the “smoke of Satan has entered into the Church” quote). I would not be surprised if the Third Secret alluded to dark times for the Church: grave confusions and troubling apostasies within Catholicism itself … If we consider the grave crisis we have lived through since the Council, the signs that this prophecy has been fulfilled do not seem to be lacking!”
To the Italian journalist Lucio Brunelli, in an interview conducted for the Italian journal, Il Sabato, Cardinal Oddi said: “It (the Third Secret) has nothing to do with Gorbachev. The Blessed Virgin was alerting us against apostasy in the Church!”
Those words of Cardinal Oddi have been collaborated, substantiated and demonstrated to be true by many other high ranking members of the clergy.
► FATHER JOSE DOS SANTOS VALINHO
Sister Lucia’s nephew, Father Jose dos Santos Valinho. He related his opinion of the contents of the Third Secret in a book by Renzo and Roberto Allegri, entitled Reportage su Fatima (Milan 2000), which was published — providentially enough — very shortly before the disclosure of the vision purported to be the Third Secret and the publication of booklet entitled The Message of Fatima by Cardinal Ratzinger and Archbishop Bertone. Father Valinho stated:
“I believe that (third) part of the Secret concerns the Church from within, perhaps doctrinal difficulties, a crisis of unity, rebellion. The last sentence my aunt wrote, which precedes the part that is still unknown, says, ‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved.’ … Therefore, people elsewhere in the Church might waver on dogma. But this is just speculation.”
On February 14th, 2003 Father Valinho also spoke about the Third Secret on the program ENIGMA. It was transmitted prime time, nationwide on RAI, the national television network of Italy. Father Valinho stated on this occasion:
“I believe that there is a connection between that which is announced in the first part of the Secret, which concerns wars and sufferings which would be everywhere, and the second part which concerns the persecutions and a type of breakdown of the Faith. Because where the ellipsis (the three dots, “…”) was placed, it means “Here is the third part, which is not revealed” and then the conclusion: “In Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.” This suggests to me that there is a relationship between Faith and the third part of the Secret. Therefore, it is something that relates to the Church. It is some kind of universal crisis which affects the whole Church and all of humanity.”
► POPE PIUS XII (while still a Cardinal)
Cardinal Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII, said while still a cardinal: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul…. I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject her ornaments and make her feel remorse for her historical past. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene, weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’” Cardinal Pacelli said this in 1931. He became Pope Pius XII in 1939.
► POPE PAUL VI
Pope Paul VI said: “The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church” (Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13th, 1977. Pope Paul was dead 10 months later).
► POPE BENEDICT XVI (while still Cardinal Ratzinger)
Cardinal Ratzinger said: “Yes, I have read (the Third Secret). (It refers to) a radical call to conversion; the absolute seriousness of history; the dangers which threaten the Faith and the life of the Christian and therefore (the life) of the world” (Jesus magazine, November 11th, 1984).
► FR. J. SCHWEIGL (Pope Pius XII’s interviewer of Sr. Lucia)
Fr. J. Schweigl said: “I cannot reveal anything of what I learned at Fatima concerning the Third Secret, but I can say that it has two parts: one concerns the Pope; the other logically (although I must say nothing) would have to be the continuation of the words: ‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved’” (The Whole Truth about Fatima, Vol. III, p. 74). Pope Pius XII personally sent Fr. Schweigl to interview Sr. Lucia about the Third Secret in 1952.
► FR. J. ALONSO (the Church’s official archivist of Fatima 1965—1981)
Fr. J. Alonso said: “In the period preceding the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, terrible things are to happen. These form the content of the third part of the Secret. What are they? If ‘in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved,’ … then it can be clearly deduced, from this, that in other parts of the Church these dogmas are going to become obscure, or even lost altogether…. Perhaps it even refers to the failures of the upper hierarchy of the Church.”
► CARDINAL OTTAVIANI
Cardinal Ottaviani said: “The message was not to be opened before 1960. I asked Sister Lucia, ‘Why this date?’ She answered, ‘Because then it will be clearer.’” Cardinal Ottaviani was the head of the Holy Office. He interviewed Sister Lucia in 1955.
► CARDINAL MARIO LUIGI CIAPPI
Cardinal Ciappi, the Papal Theologian of Pope John Paul II, in a personal communication to a Professor Baumgartner in Salzburg, Austria, said: “In the Third Secret, it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.”
► SISTER LUCIA OF FATIMA
Sister Lucia, in an interview with Fr. Augustine Fuentes, said: “Father, the devil is in the mood for engaging in a decisive battle against the Blessed Virgin. And the devil knows what it is that most offends God and which in a short space of time will gain for him the greatest number of souls. Thus, the devil does everything to overcome souls consecrated to God, because in this way, the devil will succeed in leaving souls of the faithful abandoned by their leaders, thereby the more easily will he seize them! …. That which afflicts the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Heart of Jesus is the fall of religious and priestly souls. The devil knows that religious and priests who fall away from their beautiful vocation drag numerous souls to Hell… The devil wishes to take possession of consecrated souls. He tries to corrupt them in order to lull to sleep the souls of laypeople and thereby lead them to final impenitence …. Father, let us not wait for an appeal to come from Rome, on behalf of the Holy Father, calling on the whole world to do penance; nor let us wait for it to come from our bishops in their dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No. Our Lord has already made frequent use of these means and the world took no notice. That is why each of us must now begin his own spiritual reform. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also every soul that God has placed on his path.” (Fr. Augustine Fuentes interviewed Sr. Lucia on December 26th, 1957).
Sister Lucia, in a letter to Fr. Umberto Pasquale, who was very devoted to the cause of Fatima, wrote: “The decadence which exists in the world is without any doubt the consequence of the lack of the spirit of prayer. Foreseeing this disorientation, the Blessed Virgin recommended recitation of the Rosary with such insistence. And since the Rosary is, after the Holy Eucharistic liturgy, the prayer most apt for preserving Faith in souls, the devil has unchained his struggles against it. Unfortunately, we see the disasters he has caused.”
Second Vatican Council Ghost Town Haunted by Ghosts
We are all led by a spirit or spirits―no spirit, no life. Our soul is a spirit and, without the soul, the body is dead. Yet even though our soul is our main guiding spirit, we can be guided by other spirits too―the souls or spirits of our family, relatives, friends, teachers, acquaintances, employers, employees, strangers, the media, etc. Since we are made to be social creatures―as God said of Adam: “It is not good for man to be alone! Let Us make him a help like unto himself!” (Genesis 2:18)―and we are helped in life, for better or for worse, by the help, advice and guidance of others, other “kindred spirits” as the saying goes. Hence there are leaders and there are followers. Ultimately, at the end of the day, the two leaders are God and Satan―and humanity is caught in a tug-of-war between them.
The Catholic Church has always been in a tug-of-war with its enemies―the devil, the world and the flesh. The Second Vatican Council (1962-65) and its fruits (or rotten fruits) is a clear indication of this tug-of-war. With the advent of the Second Vatican Council, the Church has been losing ground in the tug-of-war with each passing year and decade―it has been dragged out of the safety of its Traditional Faith into the chaos and sinfulness of the world. The Second Vatican Council’s desire for the so-called “aggiornamento” (meaning “update”) which sought to open the doors and windows of the Church to the world―resulted not in the world coming into the Church, but in the faithful rushing out of those opened doors and leaping out of the opened windows into the arms of the sinful world. Today in most countries―varying from country to country―only around 5% to 20% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday Mass―which binds under the pain of mortal sin! The spirit of the Second Vatican Council was certainly not the Spirit of God, but an alien spirit―a mixture of a spirit of Modernism, Liberalism, lukewarmness, worldliness, and the infiltrators of the Church who had long since made their way into the Church for many decades, aided and abetted by the spirits of Hell, the devils themselves.
Even Our Lord was not exempt from this tug-of-war: “Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil” (Matthew 4:1). “The Spirit drove Him out into the desert. And He was in the desert forty days and forty nights, and was tempted by Satan; and He was with beasts, and the angels ministered to Him” (Mark 1:12-13).
What Our Lord went through, we have to go through. There is no exemption from temptation, there is no exemption from the test or exam of temptation, and there is no exemption from this warfare―“The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1)―in which “your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8) and in which “our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
These “spirits of wickedness in the high places” are no doubt the diabolically inspired and diabolically led infiltrators in both Church and State―as the recently deceased (2016) former chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, used to say: “Satan continually tries to dominate the world … He seeks to enslave men by making them obey himself and disobey God … We see it in laws that go totally against nature, such as divorce, abortion, ‘gay marriage’ … The influence of Satan is immense! … Today, Satan has free hands … Satanism is on the increase. Satanism is growing! Unfortunately it is being spread more and more! Satanism is spreading enormously! … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere! Everywhere! ... And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican. I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry. Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office! … Today Satan rules the world! … The whole world is in the power of the evil one!”
In that sense, the spirit of the world is increasingly becoming satanic―without even realizing it. People are being enslaved to the principles, maxims, fashions and attitudes of Satan. It is―as Fr. Amorth says―an increasing satanic world. “Today Satan rules the world! … The whole world is in the power of the evil one!”
Therefore, spirit of the modern-day Church is also becoming increasingly satanic. Some Catholics―clergy and laity alike―take on this spirit knowingly, others unknowingly. As Our Lord says, “by their fruits you shall know them” ― and the fruits of today’s modern Church are not good! A 2019 Pew Research study about the level of Catholic belief in the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist showed that a majority of Catholics do not believe that the bread and wine used at Mass become the body and blood of Christ. The Pew study showed that 69% of all self-identified Catholics said they believed the bread and wine consecrated at Mass are not the Real Presence of the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus, but instead are merely symbols of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ. That is just one example of the bad fruits of the Post-Conciliar (Post-Second Vatican Council) Church.
Other similar deviations from the Faith are seen by the fact that another Pew survey found most American Catholics, including those who go to church on a regular basis, have no moral problem with contraception. Just 8% percent said contraception is morally wrong, with 89 percent saying it was either morally acceptable or not a moral issue at all. Even among Catholics who attend Mass at least weekly, only about one in 8 (13%) in this group said contraception is morally wrong, with 87% of regular church goers saying it is either acceptable or not a moral issue.
On the issue of abortion, only about half of all U.S. Catholics say it is morally wrong, although that number shoots up to 83% among Catholics who attend Sunday Mass regularly.
About two-thirds of all U.S. Catholics (64%) say that homosexual behavior is either morally acceptable or not a moral issue at all, while 32 percent say it’s morally wrong. But Catholics who attend Mass weekly are more evenly split, with half labeling homosexual behavior as morally wrong.
Devil’s Final Battle
It is in this warfare against the devil that everyone must fight, or be conquered if they choose not to fight. Sr. Lucia of Fatima speaks of “the devil’s final battle” and says that it will be essentially be against “marriage and the family.”
In an interview with Fr. Fuentes, on December 26th, 1957, Sr. Lucia warned: “Father, the Blessed Virgin did not tell me that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this for three reasons:
“The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground.
“The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others.
“And the third, because in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation, His Blessed Mother” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
After Pope John Paul II asked Monsignor (later Cardinal) Carlo Caffarra (1938-2017) to begin a new Pontifical Institute for studies on marriage and the family, Caffarra wrote to Sister Lucia, simply requesting her prayers for this venture. He was surprised at receiving a very long letter with her signature, in which Lucia had written: “The final battle between the Lord and the reign of Satan will be about marriage and the family. Don’t be afraid, because anyone who works for the sanctity of marriage and the family will always be contended and opposed in every way, for this is the decisive issue.” And then Lucia concluded: “however, Our Lady has already crushed its head.”
Amongst the Liberals and Modernists cardinals, bishops and priests that infect the Church today, Cardinal Caffarra was one of the few lights in the present darkness, being less infected than the others. The Cardinal died in 2017, and a priest, who assisted the Cardinal in his last days, spoke the Cardinal’s distress over the disasters that he sees and endures in the Church every day, mentioning some incidents to him. The dying cardinal burst into tears, saying: “The Lord will not abandon His Church. There were Twelve Apostles, so the Lord will start again with a few! Imagine the suffering of Saint Athanasius, who was left alone to defend the truth for the love of Christ, of the Church and of men. We must have Faith, hope and fortitude!” The priest who assisted the Cardinal in his last days said: “The cardinal was very sorrowful, but he conveyed to me so much courage and love for the Church. He was comforted by the prophetic words which he had received years ago from Sister Lucia of Fatima, in that letter in which she said to him that ‘the final battle between God and Satan will be about marriage and the family.’”
Just in case you are tempted to bury your head in the sand, or switch into virtual reality mode, or retreat into a Disneyland version of the Faith―let the penny drop, let reality sink-in, and realize that “the final battle between God and Satan will be about marriage and the family” automatically includes your marriage and your family! Just as there is nobody who is exempt from temptation and just as we are all sinners―it stands to reason that we will all be part of this “final battle between God and Satan” upon “marriage and the family”―for, even if we are not married, we are all part of a family. The devil wants to possess marriage, he wants to possess the family―and he will being to achieve that possession by introducing, little by little, more and more, the spirit of the world (which is essentially and ultimately the spirit of the devil) into each and every marriage and family. Looking at the world today, it seems as though he has most marriages and most families in his grasp―and to the few that are resisting, he nevertheless has his foot in the door with some aspects of worldliness being accepted even by those who are resisting.
The Spirit of Our Times
St. Mark gives us several accounts of souls tormented or possessed by evil spirits―something which is on the increase today. Though relatively few souls might be possessed by the devil, many souls are oppressed and obsessed by the devil. For the spirit of the world is essentially the spirit of the devil―since the devil is the prince of the world, as Jesus Himself says: “The prince of this world comes, and in Me he has not any thing!” (John 14:30) “The prince of this world is already judged” (John 16:11). “Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31). It is now, in our days, that we need Our Lord to again cast out the prince of this world, whose spirit has possessed and created the spirit of the world, which has captivated so many souls today. These poor souls are not led by the spirit of God, but by the spirit of the devil, disguised and wrapped-up in the fancy coverings of the spirit of the world. “We have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God―that we may know the things that are given us from God” (1 Corinthians 2:12). “Woe to the foolish that follow their own spirit, and see nothing!” (Ezechiel 13:3). “Leave them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
This is exactly what Our Lady foretold: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell … and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops .... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls. The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God ... as true Faith fades and false light will brighten the people … The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten … disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth. People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin.” (Our Lady of La Salette).
When Our Lord speaks of there being no Faith on Earth when He returns― “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8)―He is thereby implying that there will be another spirit that will have replaced the spirit of Faith. That other spirit will be the spirit of the world―a child of the spirit of the devil. That spirit was unchained with the Second Vatican Council―which is what the Third Secret of Fatima is thought to mention―and the infiltration of the Church to the highest positions―which is what Our Lady also mentions: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord.” (Akita) … “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell.” (La Salette).
Taking On the Spirit of These Angels of Hell
We do well to re-read the accounts of demonic possession in the time of Our Lord, for demonic activity can only be on the increase in this “final battle between God and Satan” upon “marriage and the family.” Pope Paul VI, more than once, spoke of the smoke of Satan having entered the Church. Pope Paul VI complained that after the Second Vatican Council, that “from some fissure the smoke of Satan has entered the temple of God” (June 29th, 1972). A few years later he repeated the same concern: “The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church” (Pope Paul VI, Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13th, 1977).
The recently deceased (2016) famous exorcist of Rome, Father Gabriele Amorth, in an interview with the magazine 30 Days, in June 2000, also said: “The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Perhaps … a large number of exorcists might succeed in chasing out the legions of demons that have installed themselves in the Vatican.” When Fr. Amorth says “Satan has entered everywhere”, he means everywhere―your family included! Obviously you won’t see him wearing a red catsuit, with tail attached and pitchfork in hand―but you will see him in the worldliness that has crept into your family in one way or another, in one form or another, through one family member or another. This is his modern method of possession―or, more correctly speaking―obsession. He seeks to make each and every family more and more obsessed with the world, the spirit of the world, with worldliness. That is how he controls most people today.
Cardinal Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI, said: “We have now absorbed into Church teaching, and the Church has opened herself up to, principles which are not hers, but which come from modern society.” Elsewhere he said that with Vatican II, the principles of 1789 [the French Revolution] had entered the Church. Unfortunately, the opening of the windows of the Church to the world, has let worldliness into the Church, while many of the Catholics jumped out of the windows and joined the world!
“And there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit; and he cried out, saying: ‘What have we to do with Thee, Jesus of Nazareth? Art Thou come to destroy us? I know who Thou art―the Holy One of God!’ And Jesus threatened him, saying: ‘Speak no more, and go out of the man!’ And the unclean spirit, tearing him and crying out with a loud voice, went out of him” (Mark 1:23-26).
“There met Him [Jesus], out of the monuments, a man with an unclean spirit, who had his dwelling in the tombs, and no man now could bind him, not even with chains. For having been often bound with fetters and chains, he had burst the chains, and broken the fetters in pieces, and no one could tame him. And he was always day and night in the monuments and in the mountains, crying and cutting himself with stones. And seeing Jesus afar off, he ran and adored him. And crying with a loud voice, he said: ‘What have I to do with Thee, Jesus the Son of the most high God? I adjure Thee by God that Thou torment me not!’ For He said unto him: ‘Go out of the man, thou unclean spirit!’ And Jesus asked him: ‘What is thy name?’ And he said to Him: ‘My name is Legion, for we are many [devils in the man]!’ And he besought Jesus much, that He would not drive him away out of the country. And there was there near the mountain a great herd of swine, feeding. And the [evil] spirits besought Him, saying: ‘Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them!’ And Jesus immediately gave them permission. And the unclean spirits, going out of the man, entered into the swine―and the herd, with great violence, was carried headlong into the sea, being about two thousand, and were drowned in the sea. And they that fed them fled, and told it in the city and in the fields. And they went out to see what was done. And they came to Jesus, and they saw him that was troubled with the devil, sitting, clothed, and well in his wits, and they were afraid. And they, that had seen it, told them in what manner he had been dealt with who had the devil; and concerning the swine. And they began to pray Jesus that He would depart from their coasts. And when He went up into the ship, he that had been troubled with the devil, began to beseech Jesus that he might be with Him. And Jesus admitted him not onto the ship, but said to him: ‘Go into thy house to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord has done for thee, and has had mercy on thee!’ And he went his way, and began to publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him―and all men wondered” (Mark 5:2-20).
On another occasion, “He went into the coasts of Tyre and Sidon: and a woman, as soon as she heard of Him, whose daughter had an unclean spirit, came in and fell down at His feet. The woman was a Gentile, a Syrophenician born. And she besought Him that He would cast forth the devil out of her daughter. Who said to her: ‘Suffer first the children to be filled! For it is not good to take the bread of the children, and cast it to the dogs!’ But she answered and said to Him: ‘Yea, Lord! But even the whelps also eat under the table of the crumbs of the children!’ And He said to her: ‘For this saying―go thy way! The devil is gone out of thy daughter!’ And when she was come into her house, she found the girl lying upon the bed, and that the devil was gone out” (Mark 7:24-30).
And Jesus said: “When an unclean spirit is gone out of a man he walks through dry places seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says: ‘I will return into my house from whence I came out!’ And coming he finds it empty, swept, and garnished. Then he goes, and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is made worse than the first. So shall it be also to this wicked generation!” (Matthew 12:43-45).
Burning Down the Church Underground
The fate of an Ukranian Church in the little town of Centralia, now a ghost town, in Pennsylvannia, USA, in a way epitomizes what is happening to the Catholic Church as a whole today. The town of Centralia had more than a thousand people in 400 to 500 houses living there in 1962―coincidentally the year the Second Vatican Council began―today only six people live there! Once, there were homes and gardens. Now there are weeds. In 1962 it was a thriving coal-mining town. Today it is a ghost town―left to die―but its last remaining church is thriving. In Pennsylvania’s coal-mining mountains, there is an empty grid where a town once lived. The roads remain on Google Maps, they have names like Railway Avenue and Apple Alley ― but on the ground, they are ghost streets. Nameless. Silent. Stripped bare. Anonymous, in every sense. Yet on the horizon, there stand a white church amid black trees. Its congregation no longer lives in town, but the church still stands and is still frequented, but only by a few.
What happened to Centralia? More or less the same thing that has been happening to the Catholic Church. On May 27th, 1962 (the same year that the Second Vatican Council opened), a fire spread from a surface mine to underground seams, and kept burning. Nobody is quite sure how the fire started, but more than $7m was spent trying to stop the fire―without success. Though the town was able to extinguish the fire above ground, a much bigger inferno burned underneath, and it eventually spread its way under Centralia’s town center. “Through a monumental series of blunders and inadequate attention over the years, it got to the size underground where it basically destroyed the town of Centralia and everybody had to move,” said Davod Dekok, a Pennsylvania historian. In 1983, the US Congress approved a $42m package to relocate the residents. Some locals think the fire is either out, or no longer poses a danger today. The state says the fire could burn for more than 100 years.
By the 1980s, Centralia was fading from the map, like a photo developing in reverse. When the fire started, there were five churches in the town. One by one, they disappeared. In 1986, the Ukrainian church ― built in 1911 ― almost followed. “It was on its last breath,” says Father Michael Hutsko, the pastor. “The church would have been knocked down, and all that would have remained was the cemetery.” But, as the state oversaw the clearance of Centralia, Archbishop Stephen Sulyk ordered a survey under the hillside church. “So they drilled, and they found solid rock [rather than coal],” says Father Hutsko, “That’s so Scriptural! ‘You are Peter and upon this rock I will build My Church!’” The building was saved, and with the help of a small number of families, the church kept watching over Centralia. Its congregation has left town, but Centralia’s Ukrainian Catholic Church wasn’t going anywhere. The Blessed Virgin Mary Ukrainian Catholic Church continues to stand on its solid rock foundation as a symbol of resilience and steadfastness.
Similarly, in the Catholic Church, “the final battle between God and Satan will be about marriage and the family” and Satan, as is his preference to work out of sight and therefore out of mind, has been burning the foundations of the Catholic Church since 1962―the year the Second Vatican Council opened its deliberations. Just as in the case of Centralia, the numbers and the resolve of Catholics has been whittled down as attempts to put out the Satanic fires of Vatican II have failed. Yet, just as the Blessed Virgin Mary Ukrainian Catholic Church continues to stand in Centralia on its solid rock foundation as a symbol of resilience and steadfastness, so too will the Catholic Church survive this current underground fire―for as Our Lady promised, “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph.” In the meantime, however, as Our Lady also said at Quito (Our Lady of Good Success): “The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom. Many will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings and those who sacrifice themselves for the Church and their country will be counted as martyrs. There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration.”
What Our Lady foretold, Pope Benedict XVI reaffirmed and confirmed not too long ago, when he said: “The Church will become small and will have to start afresh, more or less, from the beginning. She will no longer be able to inhabit many of the edifices She built in prosperity. As the number of Her adherents diminishes ... She will lose many of Her social privileges ... As a small society, [the Church] will make much bigger demands on the initiative of Her individual members …. It will be hard-going for the Church … It will make Her poor and cause Her to become the Church of the meek ... The process will be long and wearisome ... But when the trial of this sifting is past, a great power will flow from a more spiritualized and simplified Church ... It seems certain to me that the Church is facing very hard times. The real crisis has scarcely begun. We will have to count on terrific upheavals. But I am equally certain about what will remain at the end: not the Church of the political cult, which is dead already, but the Church of Faith. She may well no longer be the dominant social power, to the extent that She was until recently; but She will enjoy a fresh blossoming and be seen as man’s home, where he will find life and hope beyond death” (Benedict XVI, from his book Faith and the Future).
Article 31
Pentecost Monday, May 20th
The Holy Ghost Has Made You a Soldier of Christ! Are You Fighting?
Pentecost Monday, May 20th
The Holy Ghost Has Made You a Soldier of Christ! Are You Fighting?
Christ Is King―We Are His Soldiers
Christ is king “and of His Kingdom there shall be no end” said the Archangel Gabriel to Our Lady at the Annunciation (Luke 1:33). The Three Wise Men of Three Kings or Three Magi, came to seek this King, “saying: ‘Where is he that is born King of the Jews? For we have seen His star in the east, and are come to adore Him!’” (Matthew 2:2).
Later, during the time of His Passion, in speaking to the Roman governor of Judea―Pontius Pilate―Our Lord spoke of His Kingdom: “My Kingdom is not of this world. If my Kingdom were of this world, my servants would certainly strive that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now my Kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). “And Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked him, saying: ‘Art thou the King of the Jews?’ Jesus said to him: ‘Thou sayest it!’” (Matthew 27:11).
Christ was put to death for claiming to be the King of the Jews. “Pilate sought to release Him. But the Jews cried out, saying: ‘If thou release this man, thou art not Caesar’s friend! For whosoever makes himself a king, speaks against Caesar!’ Now when Pilate had heard these words, he brought Jesus forth, and he said to the Jews: ‘Behold your King!’ But they cried out: ‘Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him!’ Pilate said to them: ‘Shall I crucify your King?’ The chief priests answered: ‘We have no king but Caesar!’” (John 19:12-15). “And Pilate again answering, said to them: ‘What will you then that I do to the King of the Jews?’ But they again cried out: ‘Crucify him!’ So Pilate, being willing to satisfy the people, delivered up Jesus, when he had scourged Him, to be crucified’” (Mark 15:12-15).
“Then the soldiers of the governor taking Jesus into the hall, and stripping Him, they put a scarlet cloak about Him. And platting a crown of thorns, they put it upon His head, and a reed in His right hand. And bowing the knee before Him, they mocked Him, saying: ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ … And after they had mocked Him, they took off the cloak from Him, and put on him His own garments, and led Him away to crucify Him … And they came to the place that is called Golgotha, which is the place of Calvary ... And after they had crucified Him, they put over His head His cause written: This is Jesus the King of the Jews’” (Matthew 27:27-37).
Kings rule kingdoms and kings need soldiers to help them rule and protect those kingdoms. An essential aspect of a kingdom is that it has warriors, or soldiers, that defend and spread the kingdom (1 Kings 17; 2 Kings 8; 2 Kings 18). A kingdom is helpless without soldiers to protect the king, the queen mother, and the members of that kingdom from being attacked. The soldiers of a kingdom play a crucial role in the survival of the kingdom. Christ is King and Our Lady is the Mother of the King―the Queen Mother. Every member of the Kingdom of God is called to be a Soldier of Christ.
Soldiers of Christ and Light of the World or Suckers for the World?
“You are the salt of the Earth. But if the salt lose its savor, wherewith shall it be salted? It is good for nothing any more but to be cast out, and to be trodden on by men. You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house” (Matthew 5:13-16). Today, there are few “salty Catholics” to be found―most of them have become “soft Catholics” or “sweet Catholics” or “sugary Catholics” or “mammonized Catholics”―who love the world more than God (if not in theory, then most definitely in practice―which can be seen by the hours and hours they give to the world in relation to the few minutes they give to God).
The Soldiers of Christ have become Suckers for the World! They have laid down their arms and picked up their smartphones. Instead of meditating 5 decades of the Rosary―they meditate the internet with their latest 5G smartphones. “Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word of God” (Luke 4:4) becomes “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word he can read on the internet.” Instead of following Christ―they follow friends on social media. Instead of reading the texts of the Bible all day long, they send texts all day long. Instead of fighting those who have no time for God and His Church, they spend their time delighting in those who have no time for God and His Church. Nobody wants to be a saint―they just want to be quaint. Nobody wants to be hated for Christ’ sake―they want to be loved for their own sake. The words of Scripture are truer than ever before:
“The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no not one! The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside! They are become unprofitable together! There is none that does good―no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips. Their mouth [texts, e-mails, posts] is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways: and the way of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes!” (Psalm 13:1-3).
Our Lady’s Battle Cry
At La Salette, Our Lady sounds out her battle cry: “I make an urgent appeal to the Earth. I call on the true disciples of the living God who reigns in Heaven; I call on the true followers of Christ made man, the only true Savior of men; I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son, those whom I carry in my arms, so to speak, those who have lived on my spirit. Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world. It is time they came out and filled the world with light. Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children. I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ. Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see. For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends.” (Our Lady of La Salette). Holy Scripture echoes this: “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14) … “Fight the good fight of Faith … whereunto thou art called” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12).
The Sacrament of War
The Holy Ghost is directly associated with the Sacrament of Confirmation. The Sacrament of Confirmation is probably the least understood and most under-rated Sacrament of them all. You could call the Sacrament of Confirmation the Sacrament of War. Confirmation makes of us “Soldiers of Christ” ― and soldiers are meant to fight wars and not just prance around playing at being “make-believe soldiers.”
The several actions performed within the Sacrament of Confirmation symbolize the nature and purpose of the sacrament: the anointing signifies the strength given for the spiritual conflict; the balsam contained in the chrism, the fragrance of virtue and the good odor of Christ; the sign of the cross on the forehead, the courage to confess Christ, before all men; the imposition of hands and the blow on the cheek, enrollment in the service of Christ as soldiers who will have endure blows and wounds, but which bring true peace to the soul (Catholic Encyclopedia, Summa Theologica, IIIa, q. 72, art. 4).
Holy Scripture says: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). Our Lord clearly means this when He says: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Confirmation makes us “Soldiers of Christ” and strictly obliges us to spread and defend the Faith by both word and deed. “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
In 350 A.D., St. Cyril of Jerusalem gave a series of lectures during Easter week. When speaking on Confirmation, he stated: “Just as Christ, after His baptism and the coming upon Him of the Holy Spirit went forth and defeated the adversary―so also with you! After holy Baptism and the Mystical Chrism [Confirmation], having put on the full suit of armor of the Holy Spirit, you are to withstand the power of the adversary, and defeat him, saying, 'I am able to do all things in Christ, Who strengthens me!’”
In 1140, Hugh of St. Victor, in his work, On the Sacraments of the Christian Faith, writes: “For the Incarnate Word is our King, Who came into this world to war with the devil; and all the saints who were before His coming are soldiers, as it were, going before their King, and those who have come after and will come, even to the end of the world, are soldiers following their King. And the King Himself is in the midst of His army and proceeds protected and surrounded on all sides by His columns. And although in a multitude as vast as this, the kind of arms differ in the Sacraments and observance of the peoples preceding and following, yet all are really serving the one king and following the one banner; all are pursuing the one enemy and are being crowned by the one victory!”
St. Louis de Montfort’s End Time Warriors
This rallying cry of Our Lady fits perfectly with St. Louis de Montfort’s prophetic writings about the saints of end times:
“The formation and the education of the great saints who shall come at the end of the world are reserved for Mary ... I have said that this would come to pass, particularly at the end of the world and indeed soon … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady, illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection, so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God, that is to say, the most holy Virgin” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“The devil, knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls, will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others ... These last and cruel persecutions of the devil, shall go on increasing daily till the reign of Antichrist … But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High ... They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies”(St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the Holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Soldiers Are Made, Not Born
This is not empty rhetoric by St. Louis de Montfort—this is a prophetic picture of what we have to be in our day and age. No soldier is born a soldier, but has to be trained and made into a soldier. Looking at St. Louis imagery and comparing it with our own personal state and condition might well be despondent—but it is well worth reading the book by the ex-Communist turned Catholic, Douglas Hyde, entitled Dedication and Leadership, wherein he shows how Communists take the worst imaginable material and train and convert it into a very efficient Communist fighting machine. If the skill of Communists can do that—what can the grace of God do?
The Example of St. Paul
St. Paul gives us an example of a true Soldier for Christ. Referring to the Apostles, he says: “They are the ministers of Christ (I speak as one less wise). I am more; in many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness” (2 Corinthians 11:23-27).
Let us pray to Our Lady, St. Paul, St. Louis de Montfort and all the saints, especially the martyrs, that we might have a love of the Precious Blood of Jesus; that we believe and use the power of His Precious Blood; that we be ready to shed our own blood for love of Jesus—whether it be shed mystically or physically. As the saying goes: “The Blood of the Martyrs is the Seed of the Church!”
Light of the World?
Our Lord says: “You are the salt of the Earth! But if the salt loses its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing anymore, but to be cast out and to be trodden on by men. You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bucket―but upon a candlestick, so that it may shine to all that are in the house” (Matthew 5:13-16).
The Holy Ghost Needs Real Soldiers, Not Play Soldiers!
We are meant to carry the Light of the Faith into battle against the darkness of the world: “For whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world: and this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith! Who is he that overcomes the world, but he that believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” (1 John 5:4-5) … “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12) … “For your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9).
We cannot quote too often the fighting talk of Our Lord: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). We don’t like such fiery talk, but Our Lord says: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled? … Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided―three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me! He that finds his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Luke 12:49-53; Matthew 10:34-39).
We have to get out of our hypnotic state that imagines that life is meant to be enjoyed and we are here to have fun—each in his or her own way! “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called” (1 Timothy 6:12), for “the life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and this fight is not a virtual fight; it is not a fight in the imagination; nor a fight that existed in the past but no longer exists today; nor a fight that some but not all are involved in—it is a perennial fight, a universal fight, an apocalyptic fight! Your salvation rests upon whether or not you fight, whether or not you compromise, whether or not you surrender to the enemy. Just as Our Lord was asked: “And who is my neighbor?” — you may well ask: “And who is my enemy?” Let Holy Scripture answer you:
The Enemy―World, Flesh, Devil
The enemy is the world, the flesh and the devil. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “The whole world is seated in wickedness” (1 John 5:19). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world” (John 15:19). Satan is “the prince of this world” (John 14:30).
Too much worldly stuff provides the devil with excellent fuel for his “fires of Hell.” We need to burn that garbage before the rats of this world surround us and live-off us and our worldliness. Hence the Catholic spirit of abstinence, fasting, sacrifices, mortification, alms giving, temperance, etc. These are the good fires that burn up the trash and garbage that can inflame our souls with the fires of Hell.
The Fires of Heaven fight the Fires of Hell
There are basically two fires competing for this world―the fire of love for “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and the fires of hatred or the fires of Hell. In a sense, one fire is fighting the other fire. Can you fight fire with fire? Think about it for a second! A fire needs oxygen and fuel, such as leaves and vegetation, to continue raging. Rob the fire of either source of nourishment and you squelch the chemical reaction that produces it. When faced with an oil-well fire, firefighters have been known to remove the oxygen from the equation by detonating a little dynamite. The fiery blast from the dynamite eats up all the local oxygen, leaving nothing to keep the oil-well fire going. When an entire forest is ablaze, however, a different tactic is in order. Firefighters remove the fuel―and what better way to quickly remove combustible underbrush than to carefully set it on fire and destroy it before the forest fire gets a hold of it?
In pondering a fire’s hunger and growth, it’s easy to think of it as some form of organism―like a rat infestation. In addition to putting out poison, major metropolitan areas encourage residents to help combat rodent infestations through anti-litter campaigns. You don’t want rats in your home? Then don’t litter the streets with a buffet of fast-food garbage. Likewise, you can help prevent the spread of forest fires by keeping less fuel sitting around. Around the home, this strategy often means keeping your property free of vegetation that could act as fuel. If you’re managing a farm, forest or grassland, it often pays to conduct a controlled burn. In this scenario, wildlife managers set fire to an area under controlled conditions, burning fuel that could potentially feed a future wildfire. The burn creates a manmade firebreak, or gap, in combustible material to contain spreading wildfires.
Christ is king “and of His Kingdom there shall be no end” said the Archangel Gabriel to Our Lady at the Annunciation (Luke 1:33). The Three Wise Men of Three Kings or Three Magi, came to seek this King, “saying: ‘Where is he that is born King of the Jews? For we have seen His star in the east, and are come to adore Him!’” (Matthew 2:2).
Later, during the time of His Passion, in speaking to the Roman governor of Judea―Pontius Pilate―Our Lord spoke of His Kingdom: “My Kingdom is not of this world. If my Kingdom were of this world, my servants would certainly strive that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now my Kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). “And Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked him, saying: ‘Art thou the King of the Jews?’ Jesus said to him: ‘Thou sayest it!’” (Matthew 27:11).
Christ was put to death for claiming to be the King of the Jews. “Pilate sought to release Him. But the Jews cried out, saying: ‘If thou release this man, thou art not Caesar’s friend! For whosoever makes himself a king, speaks against Caesar!’ Now when Pilate had heard these words, he brought Jesus forth, and he said to the Jews: ‘Behold your King!’ But they cried out: ‘Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him!’ Pilate said to them: ‘Shall I crucify your King?’ The chief priests answered: ‘We have no king but Caesar!’” (John 19:12-15). “And Pilate again answering, said to them: ‘What will you then that I do to the King of the Jews?’ But they again cried out: ‘Crucify him!’ So Pilate, being willing to satisfy the people, delivered up Jesus, when he had scourged Him, to be crucified’” (Mark 15:12-15).
“Then the soldiers of the governor taking Jesus into the hall, and stripping Him, they put a scarlet cloak about Him. And platting a crown of thorns, they put it upon His head, and a reed in His right hand. And bowing the knee before Him, they mocked Him, saying: ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ … And after they had mocked Him, they took off the cloak from Him, and put on him His own garments, and led Him away to crucify Him … And they came to the place that is called Golgotha, which is the place of Calvary ... And after they had crucified Him, they put over His head His cause written: This is Jesus the King of the Jews’” (Matthew 27:27-37).
Kings rule kingdoms and kings need soldiers to help them rule and protect those kingdoms. An essential aspect of a kingdom is that it has warriors, or soldiers, that defend and spread the kingdom (1 Kings 17; 2 Kings 8; 2 Kings 18). A kingdom is helpless without soldiers to protect the king, the queen mother, and the members of that kingdom from being attacked. The soldiers of a kingdom play a crucial role in the survival of the kingdom. Christ is King and Our Lady is the Mother of the King―the Queen Mother. Every member of the Kingdom of God is called to be a Soldier of Christ.
Soldiers of Christ and Light of the World or Suckers for the World?
“You are the salt of the Earth. But if the salt lose its savor, wherewith shall it be salted? It is good for nothing any more but to be cast out, and to be trodden on by men. You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house” (Matthew 5:13-16). Today, there are few “salty Catholics” to be found―most of them have become “soft Catholics” or “sweet Catholics” or “sugary Catholics” or “mammonized Catholics”―who love the world more than God (if not in theory, then most definitely in practice―which can be seen by the hours and hours they give to the world in relation to the few minutes they give to God).
The Soldiers of Christ have become Suckers for the World! They have laid down their arms and picked up their smartphones. Instead of meditating 5 decades of the Rosary―they meditate the internet with their latest 5G smartphones. “Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word of God” (Luke 4:4) becomes “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word he can read on the internet.” Instead of following Christ―they follow friends on social media. Instead of reading the texts of the Bible all day long, they send texts all day long. Instead of fighting those who have no time for God and His Church, they spend their time delighting in those who have no time for God and His Church. Nobody wants to be a saint―they just want to be quaint. Nobody wants to be hated for Christ’ sake―they want to be loved for their own sake. The words of Scripture are truer than ever before:
“The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no not one! The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside! They are become unprofitable together! There is none that does good―no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips. Their mouth [texts, e-mails, posts] is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways: and the way of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes!” (Psalm 13:1-3).
Our Lady’s Battle Cry
At La Salette, Our Lady sounds out her battle cry: “I make an urgent appeal to the Earth. I call on the true disciples of the living God who reigns in Heaven; I call on the true followers of Christ made man, the only true Savior of men; I call on my children, the true faithful, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son, those whom I carry in my arms, so to speak, those who have lived on my spirit. Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world. It is time they came out and filled the world with light. Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children. I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ. Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see. For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends.” (Our Lady of La Salette). Holy Scripture echoes this: “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14) … “Fight the good fight of Faith … whereunto thou art called” (1 Timothy 6:12) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12).
The Sacrament of War
The Holy Ghost is directly associated with the Sacrament of Confirmation. The Sacrament of Confirmation is probably the least understood and most under-rated Sacrament of them all. You could call the Sacrament of Confirmation the Sacrament of War. Confirmation makes of us “Soldiers of Christ” ― and soldiers are meant to fight wars and not just prance around playing at being “make-believe soldiers.”
The several actions performed within the Sacrament of Confirmation symbolize the nature and purpose of the sacrament: the anointing signifies the strength given for the spiritual conflict; the balsam contained in the chrism, the fragrance of virtue and the good odor of Christ; the sign of the cross on the forehead, the courage to confess Christ, before all men; the imposition of hands and the blow on the cheek, enrollment in the service of Christ as soldiers who will have endure blows and wounds, but which bring true peace to the soul (Catholic Encyclopedia, Summa Theologica, IIIa, q. 72, art. 4).
Holy Scripture says: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). Our Lord clearly means this when He says: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). Confirmation makes us “Soldiers of Christ” and strictly obliges us to spread and defend the Faith by both word and deed. “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he has engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
In 350 A.D., St. Cyril of Jerusalem gave a series of lectures during Easter week. When speaking on Confirmation, he stated: “Just as Christ, after His baptism and the coming upon Him of the Holy Spirit went forth and defeated the adversary―so also with you! After holy Baptism and the Mystical Chrism [Confirmation], having put on the full suit of armor of the Holy Spirit, you are to withstand the power of the adversary, and defeat him, saying, 'I am able to do all things in Christ, Who strengthens me!’”
In 1140, Hugh of St. Victor, in his work, On the Sacraments of the Christian Faith, writes: “For the Incarnate Word is our King, Who came into this world to war with the devil; and all the saints who were before His coming are soldiers, as it were, going before their King, and those who have come after and will come, even to the end of the world, are soldiers following their King. And the King Himself is in the midst of His army and proceeds protected and surrounded on all sides by His columns. And although in a multitude as vast as this, the kind of arms differ in the Sacraments and observance of the peoples preceding and following, yet all are really serving the one king and following the one banner; all are pursuing the one enemy and are being crowned by the one victory!”
St. Louis de Montfort’s End Time Warriors
This rallying cry of Our Lady fits perfectly with St. Louis de Montfort’s prophetic writings about the saints of end times:
“The formation and the education of the great saints who shall come at the end of the world are reserved for Mary ... I have said that this would come to pass, particularly at the end of the world and indeed soon … These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady, illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection, so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God, that is to say, the most holy Virgin” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“The devil, knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls, will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others ... These last and cruel persecutions of the devil, shall go on increasing daily till the reign of Antichrist … But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High ... They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies”(St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the Holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Soldiers Are Made, Not Born
This is not empty rhetoric by St. Louis de Montfort—this is a prophetic picture of what we have to be in our day and age. No soldier is born a soldier, but has to be trained and made into a soldier. Looking at St. Louis imagery and comparing it with our own personal state and condition might well be despondent—but it is well worth reading the book by the ex-Communist turned Catholic, Douglas Hyde, entitled Dedication and Leadership, wherein he shows how Communists take the worst imaginable material and train and convert it into a very efficient Communist fighting machine. If the skill of Communists can do that—what can the grace of God do?
The Example of St. Paul
St. Paul gives us an example of a true Soldier for Christ. Referring to the Apostles, he says: “They are the ministers of Christ (I speak as one less wise). I am more; in many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness” (2 Corinthians 11:23-27).
Let us pray to Our Lady, St. Paul, St. Louis de Montfort and all the saints, especially the martyrs, that we might have a love of the Precious Blood of Jesus; that we believe and use the power of His Precious Blood; that we be ready to shed our own blood for love of Jesus—whether it be shed mystically or physically. As the saying goes: “The Blood of the Martyrs is the Seed of the Church!”
Light of the World?
Our Lord says: “You are the salt of the Earth! But if the salt loses its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing anymore, but to be cast out and to be trodden on by men. You are the light of the world! A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bucket―but upon a candlestick, so that it may shine to all that are in the house” (Matthew 5:13-16).
The Holy Ghost Needs Real Soldiers, Not Play Soldiers!
We are meant to carry the Light of the Faith into battle against the darkness of the world: “For whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world: and this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith! Who is he that overcomes the world, but he that believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” (1 John 5:4-5) … “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12) … “For your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9).
We cannot quote too often the fighting talk of Our Lord: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). We don’t like such fiery talk, but Our Lord says: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled? … Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided―three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me! He that finds his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Luke 12:49-53; Matthew 10:34-39).
We have to get out of our hypnotic state that imagines that life is meant to be enjoyed and we are here to have fun—each in his or her own way! “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called” (1 Timothy 6:12), for “the life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and this fight is not a virtual fight; it is not a fight in the imagination; nor a fight that existed in the past but no longer exists today; nor a fight that some but not all are involved in—it is a perennial fight, a universal fight, an apocalyptic fight! Your salvation rests upon whether or not you fight, whether or not you compromise, whether or not you surrender to the enemy. Just as Our Lord was asked: “And who is my neighbor?” — you may well ask: “And who is my enemy?” Let Holy Scripture answer you:
The Enemy―World, Flesh, Devil
The enemy is the world, the flesh and the devil. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “The whole world is seated in wickedness” (1 John 5:19). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world” (John 15:19). Satan is “the prince of this world” (John 14:30).
Too much worldly stuff provides the devil with excellent fuel for his “fires of Hell.” We need to burn that garbage before the rats of this world surround us and live-off us and our worldliness. Hence the Catholic spirit of abstinence, fasting, sacrifices, mortification, alms giving, temperance, etc. These are the good fires that burn up the trash and garbage that can inflame our souls with the fires of Hell.
The Fires of Heaven fight the Fires of Hell
There are basically two fires competing for this world―the fire of love for “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and the fires of hatred or the fires of Hell. In a sense, one fire is fighting the other fire. Can you fight fire with fire? Think about it for a second! A fire needs oxygen and fuel, such as leaves and vegetation, to continue raging. Rob the fire of either source of nourishment and you squelch the chemical reaction that produces it. When faced with an oil-well fire, firefighters have been known to remove the oxygen from the equation by detonating a little dynamite. The fiery blast from the dynamite eats up all the local oxygen, leaving nothing to keep the oil-well fire going. When an entire forest is ablaze, however, a different tactic is in order. Firefighters remove the fuel―and what better way to quickly remove combustible underbrush than to carefully set it on fire and destroy it before the forest fire gets a hold of it?
In pondering a fire’s hunger and growth, it’s easy to think of it as some form of organism―like a rat infestation. In addition to putting out poison, major metropolitan areas encourage residents to help combat rodent infestations through anti-litter campaigns. You don’t want rats in your home? Then don’t litter the streets with a buffet of fast-food garbage. Likewise, you can help prevent the spread of forest fires by keeping less fuel sitting around. Around the home, this strategy often means keeping your property free of vegetation that could act as fuel. If you’re managing a farm, forest or grassland, it often pays to conduct a controlled burn. In this scenario, wildlife managers set fire to an area under controlled conditions, burning fuel that could potentially feed a future wildfire. The burn creates a manmade firebreak, or gap, in combustible material to contain spreading wildfires.
Article 30
Pentecost Sunday, May 19th
Are You Fireproof?
Pentecost Sunday, May 19th
Are You Fireproof?
What’s This With God And Fire?
Pentecost is the time of fire par excellence! The Holy Ghost comes from Heaven, under the appearance of tongues of fire, and rests upon each of those present in the Upper Room. He “fires them up” and gives them a “fiery” courage to go out and confess and preach Christ.
We’ve hear of the expression: “Don’t play with fire!” Yet fire is all that God seems to think about! As Holy Scripture says: “Our God is a consuming fire!” (Hebrews 12:29). There is more fire around than we would imagine. Let us then draw closer to this fire and take a closer look at it, to see if, perhaps, it might warm our lukewarm souls!
God the Father and Fire
God the Father sparks things off by choosing fire to represent Himself on many an occasion—not least the time of Israelites’ wanderings in the desert, when He led them at night as “pillar of fire” (Exodus 13:21).
● God the Father appeared to Moses in the burning bush, on Mount Sinai: “Now Moses … came to the mountain of God, Horeb. And the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he saw that the bush was on fire and was not burnt. And Moses said: ‘I will go and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt!’ And when the Lord saw that he went forward to see, He called to him out of the midst of the bush, and said: ‘Moses! Moses!’ And he answered: Here I am. And He said: ‘Come not near here, put off the shoes from thy feet: for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground!’” (Exodus 3:1-5).
● “And when forty years were expired, there appeared to Moses, in the desert of Sinai, an angel in a flame of fire in a bush. And Moses seeing it, wondered at the sight. And as he drew near to view it, the voice of the Lord came unto him, saying: ‘I am the God of thy fathers; the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob!’” (Acts 7:30-32).
● “And the Lord went before them to show the way by day in a pillar of a cloud, and by night in a pillar of fire: that He might be the guide of their journey at both times. There never failed the pillar of the cloud by day, nor the pillar of fire by night, before the people” (Exodus 13:21-22).
● Another time, the whole of the Chosen People saw the glory of God in the fire that lit up the whole of the top of Mount Sinai: “And when Moses had brought them forth to meet God from the place of the camp, they stood at the bottom of the mount. And all Mount Sinai was on a smoke: because the Lord was come down upon it in fire, and the smoke arose from it as out of a furnace: and all the mount was terrible! … And the sight of the glory of the Lord was like a burning fire upon the top of the mount, in the eyes of the children of Israel” (Exodus 19:17-18; 24:17).
God the Son and Fire
● Besides showing St. Margaret Mary His Sacred Heart, on fire with love for men, just as His Father had shown Himself on fire atop Mount Sinai, Our Lord also said, while on Earth: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth! And what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). Not only that, but he often uses the image of fire as a part of His teaching:
● “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees! Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire!” (Matthew 3:10).
● “And if thy hand, or thy foot scandalize thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee. It is better for thee to go into life maimed or lame, than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into everlasting fire. And if thy eye scandalize thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee. It is better for thee having one eye to enter into life, than having two eyes to be cast into Hell fire” (Matthew 18:8-9).
● “If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:6).
● “But I say to you, that whosoever is angry with his brother, shall be in danger of the judgment. And whosoever shall say to his brother: ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. And whosoever shall say: ‘Thou Fool!’ shall be in danger of Hell fire” (Matthew 5:22).
● “The harvest is the end of the world. And the reapers are the angels. Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire: so shall it be at the end of the world. The Son of man shall send his angels, and they shall gather out of his Kingdom all scandals, and them that work iniquity. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. The angels shall go out, and shall separate the wicked from among the just. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth … Where their worm dies not, and the fire is not extinguished” (Matthew 13:40-50; Mark 9:43).
God the Holy Ghost and Fire
● “John the Baptist answered, saying unto all: ‘I indeed baptize you with water; but there shall come one mightier than I, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to loose: He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire!’” (Luke 3:16).
● On the first Pentecost Sunday, the Holy Ghost did indeed come as fire to ‘baptize’ them as “there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them” (Acts 2:3). Hence we have the phrase: “A baptism of fire!”
● The Church even incorporates fire in the devotion to the Holy Ghost—as is seen in the following extracts of various liturgical prayers: “Come, O Holy Ghost, … enkindle in us the fire of Thy love” … “Forth from the Father’s light it came, that beautiful and kindly flame: to fill with fervor of His word, the spirits faithful to their Lord” … “With quivering flame He lights on each, in fashion like a tongue, to teach!” … “Kindle with fire, brought from above, each sense and fill our hearts with love!” ... “The fire of God fell, not to burn them, but to enlighten them, and gave them gifts of grace.”
Heaven and Fire
● “And when His disciples James and John had seen this [rejection of Jesus], they said: ‘Lord, wilt Thou that we command fire to come down from Heaven, and consume them?’” (Luke 9:54). They were no doubt thinking of a repeat of Sodom and Gomorrha—which is another example of fire from Heaven.
● “And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from the Lord out of Heaven. And He destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the Earth” (Genesis 19:24-25).
● Jesus Himself mentions this punishing fire from Heaven, and states that the same thing will happen in the End Times: “And in the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from Heaven, and destroyed them all! Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man shall be revealed” (Luke 17:29-30).
The Antichrist and Fire
Among the ‘wonders’ that the Antichrist will work, we read: “And he did great signs, so that he made also fire to come down from Heaven unto the Earth in the sight of men” (Apocalypse 13:13).
Sin and Fire
● “The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity!” (James 3:6).
● “Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:3).
● “Sodom and Gomorrha, and the neighboring cities, in like manner, having given themselves to fornication, and going after other flesh, were made an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire” (Jude 1:7).
Day of Judgment and Fire
● “And the first angel sounded the trumpet, and there followed hail and fire, mingled with blood, and it was cast on the Earth, and the third part of the Earth was burnt up, and the third part of the trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up. And the second angel sounded the trumpet: and as it were a great mountain, burning with fire, was cast into the sea, and the third part of the sea became blood!” (Apocalypse 8:7-8).
● “Looking for the coming of the day of the Lord, by which the heavens, being on fire, shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with the burning heat” (2 Peter 3:12).
● “Every man’s work shall be manifest; for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work, of what sort it is. If any man’s work survive, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work burn, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire” (1 Corinthians 3:13-15).
● “When the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from Heaven, with the angels of his power, in a flame of fire, giving vengeance to them who know not God, and who obey not the Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Thessalonians 1:7-8).
● St. Paul speaks of “a certain dreadful expectation of judgment, and the rage of a fire which shall consume the adversaries” (Hebrews 10:27).
● Speaking of the iniquitous Babylon, the Book of Apocalypse says: “For her sins have reached unto Heaven, and the Lord hath remembered her iniquities … Therefore she shall be burnt with the fire; because God is strong, who shall judge her” (Apocalypse 18:5-8).
● The Book of Apocalypse has numerous other references to fire on the Day of Judgment.
Hell and Fire
● “He also shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is mingled with pure wine in the cup of his wrath, and shall be tormented with fire and brimstone” (Apocalypse 14:10).
● At Fatima, Our Lady showed the three children a vision of the fires of Hell. Sr. Lucia of Fatima relates the experience thus: “She opened her hands once more, as she had done the two previous months. The rays [of light] appeared to penetrate the Earth, and we saw, as it were, a vast sea of fire. Plunged in this fire, we saw the demons and the souls [of the damned]. The latter were like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, having human forms. They were floating about in that conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames which issued from within themselves, together with great clouds of smoke. Now they fell back on every side like sparks in huge fires, without weight or equilibrium, amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fright — it must have been this sight which caused me to cry out, as people say they heard me. The demons were distinguished [from the souls of the damned] by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning coals. That vision only lasted for a moment, thanks to our good heavenly Mother, who at the first apparition had promised to take us to Heaven. Without that, I think that we would have died of terror and fear.”
● She also told the children: “When you pray the Rosary, say after each mystery: ‘O my Jesus, forgive us, save us from the fire of Hell. Lead all souls to Heaven, especially those who are most in need of mercy.’”
Purgatory and Fire
● Pope St. Gregory the Great, in his Dialogues, informs us, that “the flames of Purgatory are, as it were, the instrument of divine justice, operating with such terrible power as to render the agony of the souls detained there intolerable. These pains far exceed all the tribulations, nay, and martyrdoms that can be witnessed, felt, or imagined in this life.”
● St. Catherine of Genoa, in the Treatise on Purgatory, writes: “From that furnace of divine love I see rays of fire dart like burning lamps towards the soul; and so violent and powerful are they that both soul and body would be utterly destroyed, if that were possible. These rays perform a double office; they purify and they annihilate. Consider gold: the oftener it is melted, the more pure does it become; continue to melt it and every imperfection is destroyed. This is the effect of fire on all materials. The soul, however, cannot be annihilated in God, but in herself she can, and the longer her purification lasts, the more perfectly does she die to herself, until at length she remains purified in God. When gold has been completely freed from dross, no fire, however great, has any further action on it, for nothing but its imperfections can be consumed. So it is with the divine fire in the soul. God retains her in these flames until every stain is burned away, and she is brought to the highest perfection of which she is capable, each soul in her own degree. And when this is accomplished, she rests wholly in God. Nothing of herself remains, and God is her entire being.”
● Fr. Schouppe, in his book Purgatory Explained, relating an experience of St. Frances of Rome, writes: “Purgatory, she said, is divided into three distinct parts … They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different states … The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but not sufficiently expiated during life. The servant of God then learned that, for all forgiven mortal sin, there remains to be undergone a suffering of seven years. This term cannot evidently be taken to mean a definite measure, since mortal sins differ in enormity, but as an average penalty. Although the souls are enveloped in the same flames, their sufferings are not the same; they differ according to the number and nature of their former sins.”
Our Lady and Fire
● Our Lady’s heart is on fire! In the Mass of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, the prayer during the Offertory Secret reads: “O Lord, we pray that our hearts may be set aflame by the fire that burned so wondrously in the Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary.” She would prefer that our hearts burn with love, like hers, but if not, she speaks of a different, more painful kind of fire!
● Already in the 1600’s, Our Lady of Good Success said: “If there are not any souls who, by their lives of immolation and sacrifice, appease the Divine Justice, fire will rain from Heaven! … Without virginity, it would be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon these lands in order to purify them!”
● Our Lady of La Salette also speaks of punishing fires: “The seasons will be altered, the Earth will produce nothing but bad fruit, the stars will lose their regular motion, the moon will only reflect a faint reddish glow. Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains and cities ... The fire of Heaven will fall and consume cities ... And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed. God will be served and glorified.”
● Our Lady of Akita also stresses the punishing fires from Heaven: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead.”
The Church’s Liturgy and Fire
● Fire is one of the most expressive and most ancient of liturgical symbols. All the creeds of antiquity give prominent place to fire, whose mysterious nature and irresistible power frequently caused it to be adored as a god. The sun, as the principle of heat and light for the Earth, had its share in this worship. Christianity adapted this belief, while refusing to give the title of divinity to heat and light, and instead made them mere symbols of the true divinity, which enlightens and warms humanity. The symbolism led quite naturally to the liturgical rite by which the Church on the Eve of Easter celebrates the mystery of the Death and Resurrection of Christ, of which the extinguished and rekindled fire furnishes the expressive image.
● The beginning of the Easter Divine Office also reflects ancient beliefs. The first ceremony consisted in the blessing of the New Fire, which was to furnish light for the whole Service. It was the daily custom, in the first ages of the Church, to strike a flame from a flint before Vespers; from this the lamps and candles were lit for the celebration of that Hour, and the light thus procured was kept up in the church till the Vespers of the following day. The Church at Rome observed this custom with great solemnity on Maundy Thursday morning, and the New Fire received a special blessing. We learn, from a letter written in the eight century by Pope St. Zachary to St. Boniface the Archbishop of Mainz, that three lamps were lit from this fire, which were then removed to some safe place, and care taken that their light be not extinguished. It was from these lamps that the light for Holy Saturday night was taken. The new fire is struck from a flint and is blessed with this prayer.
“Lord God, Almighty Father, inextinguishable light, Who hast created all light, bless this fire sanctified and blessed by Thee, Who hast enlightened the whole world; make us enlightened by that light and inflamed with the fire of Thy brightness; and as Thou didst enlighten Moses when he went out of Egypt, so illuminate our hearts and senses that we may attain life and light everlasting through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
● Fr. Goffine, writing on the use fire in the liturgy, says: “In ancient times it was customary to strike a new fire every day, bless it, and light the candles from it, and later this was done every Saturday; in the eleventh century this ceremony was restricted to Holy Saturday. The fire is struck from a stone to indicate, that Christ is the light of the world, and the Stone which the Jews rejected has now become the Corner stone of His Church (Psalm 117:22); that the divine Son, the light of the world, was apparently extinguished at His death, but at His resurrection shone anew; that all those who witness this ceremony today be spiritually enlightened hereafter. This fire is blessed, because the Church blesses everything that is used for divine service, and because the light and fire represent Christ, who brought the fire of love upon Earth with which to enkindle our hearts” (Fr. Goffine, The Church’s Year).
The large Paschal Candle representing Christ, which is lit in total darkness—symbolizing the darkness of a world that tries to do without Christ—and from that Paschal Candle we light our smaller candles. Again, the Paschal Candle is made of beeswax, but the smaller candles are not. The more candles that are lit from the Paschal Candle, the more light is shed around and everything brightens up.
● On Holy Thursday, at the consecration of the holy chrism (oil), there was collected in all the lamps of the Lateran basilica a quantity of oil sufficient to fill three large vases deposited in the corner of the church. Wicks burned in this oil until the night of Holy Saturday, when there were lighted from these lamps the candles and other lights, that were used during the Paschal Vigil (Eve of Easter) ceremonies—during which there is the blessing of the fire and the paschal candle at the beginning of Easter Eve.
● When the Paschal or Easter Vigil fire has been lit and blessed the three-branched candle (representing the Holy Trinity) is lighted with that blessed fire and the deacon then chants the “Exultet”, a chant still preserved in the Roman Liturgy. In the Eastern Church, the Easter ceremony of the new fire occupies a place of considerable importance in the paschal ritual of the Greek Church at Jerusalem. In the West we see the Irish, as early as the sixth century, lighting large fires at nightfall on the Eve of Easter.
● The feast of the Purification or Candlemas (February 2nd) has a celebrated rite with ancient prayers concerning the emission of liturgical fire and light. One of these prayers invokes Christ as “Thy servant Moses didst command the purest oil to be prepared for lamps to burn continuously before Thee: vouchsafe to pour forth the grace of Thy blessing ☩ upon these candles: that they may so afford us light outwardly that by Thy gift, the gift of Thy Spirit may never be wanting inwardly to our minds. … As these candles are enkindled with visible fire to dispel the darkness of night, so may our hearts illumined by invisible fire, that is, by the splendor of the Holy Spirit, in order to free from the blindness of all vice.” … “being worthily inflamed with the holy fire of Thy most sweet charity, we may deserve to be presented in the holy temple of Thy glory”
The flame of the candles represents God, His divinity and grace. God the Father appeared to Moses in the burning bush; God the Son showed Himself as a burning heart to St. Margaret Mary; God the Holy Ghost came down upon Our Lady and the Apostles in the form of tongues of fire at Pentecost. God chooses fire to show both His love, His mercy and His justice. Those in Heaven experience the fire of His love; those in Purgatory experience the fire of His mercy; those in Hell experience the fire of His justice. We even say, in the prayer to the Holy Ghost, “Come O Holy Ghost … enkindle in us the fire of Thy love.” Without God and His grace in our souls (candles), we are useless, just like an extinguished candle. A candle was made to burn, not to be extinguished. It should spend its life giving light to those around, as Our Lord said: “Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:15).
Mankind, You, and Fire
Surrounded by all this fire, you may well think there is no escape! You are right! In all truth, we were made to burn! The only variable thing is where we shall burn. We can choose to burn on Earth with a great love of God and have the fire of love purge us from all stain of sin: “And all that may pass through the fire, shall be purified by fire, but whatsoever cannot abide the fire, shall be sanctified with the water of expiation” (Numbers 31:23). We can neglect or escape from doing this, but we only jump out of the frying-pan into the fire—either the Fires of Purgatory, or the Fires of Hell. That is where our lukewarm, fireless soul will lead us to eventually. Our Lord said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth! And what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). He wants to kindle a fire in your soul, so that you can avoid the fires of Purgatory or Hell. You can come to that fire or flee from that fire.
Will the Real Holy Ghost Please Stand Up!
With all this talk of fire and the Holy Ghost choosing to come in the form of fire―the question naturally arises: “Is the Holy Ghost tough or mild?” ― for fires can be comforting and fires can be destructive! Is He loud or quiet? Is he comforting or destructive? Reading Holy Scripture can be a little confusing―for it seems contradictory, or is it that God is a little bit of everything? God is God―whether it be God the Father, God the Son or God the Holy Ghost. The three members of the Holy Trinity think alike and act alike―there is no disagreement between them. They may have different roles―Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier―but the Spirit is the same. But what Spirit is it that rules and drives Them all? Trying to find out can be a little confusing as we read seemingly contradictory indications in Holy Scripture:
“Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the Lord! And behold the Lord passeth, and a great and strong wind before the Lord over throwing the mountains, and breaking the rocks in pieces―the Lord is not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake―the Lord is not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire―the Lord is not in the fire―and after the fire a whistling of a gentle air” (3 Kings 19:11-12).
“And when the days of the Pentecost were accomplished, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from Heaven, as of a mighty wind coming, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they began to speak with divers tongues, according as the Holy Ghost gave them to speak” (Acts 2:1-4).
You Get the God You Deserve
No doubt you have heard it said: “We get the leaders we deserve!” Similarly, “We get the God we deserve!” Modern-day Christians are ceaselessly enthusing about God being “Love” and “Mercy” and all you have to do is believe in Him and you are “saved”. God is love, that is true, but God is not ONLY love. You would have thought that simple common sense would have told them that there is something wrong with their theory when scrutinized under the light of most souls ending up damned―but, of course, they refuse to look at and consider that part of reality!
The Life You Lead Dictates the God You Get
As Holy Scripture says elsewhere: “With the holy one Thou wilt be holy, and with the valiant, perfect. With the elect Thou wilt be elect, and with the perverse Thou wilt be perverted. And the poor people Thou wilt save. And with Thy eyes Thou wilt humble the haughty!” (2 Kings 22:26-28). “With the holy, Thou wilt be holy; and with the innocent man Thou wilt be innocent. And with the elect Thou wilt be elect and with the perverse thou wilt be perverted. For Thou wilt save the humble people; but wilt bring down the eyes of the proud!” (Psalm 17:26-28). In other words―God will be tough or kind, heavy-handed or gentle, depending on what we are “asking for” or what we deserve. As the New Testament says: “See then the goodness and the severity of God―towards them indeed that are fallen, the severity; but towards thee, if thou abide in goodness, the goodness of God―otherwise thou also shalt be cut off!” (Romans 11:22).
Is the Holy Ghost Gentle?
“O how good and sweet is Thy spirit, O Lord, in all things!” (Wisdom 12:1). “The Lord is sweet!” (1 Peter 2:3). Scripture speaks of “the goodness and kindness of God our Savior” (Titus 3:4). Just like any parent, the Holy Ghost is gentle if the “child” listens, obeys and is good. If we decide not to listen, not to obey and are bad, then, like any parent would do, the Holy Ghost has to take “corrective measures” and even “punitive measures.” Heck! We even treat pets the same way! Or even a pen that won’t write when it is needed to write, we tend to throw it aside and get one that will write! If you disobey God, ignore God, neglect God―even though He is patient and merciful―you will pay! Hey! Even those who are in Hell are experiencing the mercy of God―because they are not being punished as severely as they actually deserve to be punished.
Modern-man seems to ignore this truth. You have to get this straight―you do not mess with God just because He does not react immediately! “The Lord delays not His promise [to punish], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Yes, “the Lord is sweet and righteous” (Psalm 24:8). “O taste, and see that the Lord is sweet! Blessed is the man that hopes in Him!” (Psalm 33:9). “Thy mercy is sweet. Do thou deliver me!” (Psalm 108:21). When sweetness and kindness is merited, then God will give it―but He is also righteous, which means “acting in accord with divine or moral law”, and if man decides to break God’s law, then that righteous God will do what is right and His justice will be invoked. “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil―that put darkness for light, and light for darkness―that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
“The Lord is sweet to all―and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:9). “He has borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows” (Isaias 53:4). “Thou, O Lord, art sweet and mild and plenteous in mercy to all that call upon Thee!” (Psalms 85:5). Yet merely “calling” on the Lord is not enough―we must “change” our ways if we seek and hope to obtain His “plenteous mercy”. There are too many who expect mercy without amending their sinful ways, who treat the Sacrament of Confession like a weekly “car-wash” or a revolving door, but drive back into the mud of sin immediately afterwards, just “as a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). Scripture adds: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Jesus warns us, saying: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.” (Matthew 7:21). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
The Kindness of God
The reality is that God wants to save everyone―but it has to be on His terms and not on their terms. God’s love excludes nobody―the excluding is done by a lack of love towards God. There are sufficient Scriptural quotes that confirm that God loves sinners, has compassion upon those sinners, and wishes to save those sinners―regardless of how sinful they are or may have been: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “‘As I live,’ says the Lord God, ‘I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways: and why will you die?’ (Ezechiel 33:11). “The soul that sins, the same shall die … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all my commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live!” (Ezechiel 18:20-22). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). “Because I will be merciful to their iniquities, and their sins I will remember no more” (Hebrews 8:12). Beautiful, huh? Those quotes are only the tip of the iceberg!
As a further “dip the big toe in the water” reflection or meditation, Holy Scripture not only tells us that “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), but Scripture also unpacks or gives a brief description of that charity: “Charity is patient, is kind. Charity envies not, deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious, seeks not her own, is not provoked to anger, thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never falls away―whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8).
The Toughness of God
Yet, on the other hand, God also says: “But if the just man turn himself away from his justice, and do iniquity―according to all the abominations which the wicked man works―shall he live? All his justices, which he has done, shall not be remembered in the prevarication, by which he has prevaricated, and, in his sins, which he has committed, in them he shall die. And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore, O house of Israel: Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse? For when the just turns himself away from his justice and commits iniquity, then he shall die therein―in the injustice, that he has wrought, he shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:24-26).
“Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great―He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’ For mercy and wrath quickly come from Him, and His wrath looks upon sinners. Delay not to be converted to the Lord, and defer it not from day to day. For His wrath shall come on a sudden, and in the time of vengeance He will destroy thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-9).
God is Charity―Charity Sanctifies
It is only logical that if “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8) and “God is holy” (Psalm 98:9), then Charity must have a major and crucial part to play in holiness. In fact, Holy Scripture tells us that without Charity, all that we might do will be useless, pointless and worthless without Charity: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). “Above all have charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:12-14).
“We are of God. Let us love one another, for charity is of God. And every one that loves, is born of God, and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity. By this has the charity of God appeared towards us, because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him. In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins. My dearest, if God has so loved us; we also ought to love one another. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us” (1 John 4:6-12).
Pentecost is the time of fire par excellence! The Holy Ghost comes from Heaven, under the appearance of tongues of fire, and rests upon each of those present in the Upper Room. He “fires them up” and gives them a “fiery” courage to go out and confess and preach Christ.
We’ve hear of the expression: “Don’t play with fire!” Yet fire is all that God seems to think about! As Holy Scripture says: “Our God is a consuming fire!” (Hebrews 12:29). There is more fire around than we would imagine. Let us then draw closer to this fire and take a closer look at it, to see if, perhaps, it might warm our lukewarm souls!
God the Father and Fire
God the Father sparks things off by choosing fire to represent Himself on many an occasion—not least the time of Israelites’ wanderings in the desert, when He led them at night as “pillar of fire” (Exodus 13:21).
● God the Father appeared to Moses in the burning bush, on Mount Sinai: “Now Moses … came to the mountain of God, Horeb. And the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he saw that the bush was on fire and was not burnt. And Moses said: ‘I will go and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt!’ And when the Lord saw that he went forward to see, He called to him out of the midst of the bush, and said: ‘Moses! Moses!’ And he answered: Here I am. And He said: ‘Come not near here, put off the shoes from thy feet: for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground!’” (Exodus 3:1-5).
● “And when forty years were expired, there appeared to Moses, in the desert of Sinai, an angel in a flame of fire in a bush. And Moses seeing it, wondered at the sight. And as he drew near to view it, the voice of the Lord came unto him, saying: ‘I am the God of thy fathers; the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob!’” (Acts 7:30-32).
● “And the Lord went before them to show the way by day in a pillar of a cloud, and by night in a pillar of fire: that He might be the guide of their journey at both times. There never failed the pillar of the cloud by day, nor the pillar of fire by night, before the people” (Exodus 13:21-22).
● Another time, the whole of the Chosen People saw the glory of God in the fire that lit up the whole of the top of Mount Sinai: “And when Moses had brought them forth to meet God from the place of the camp, they stood at the bottom of the mount. And all Mount Sinai was on a smoke: because the Lord was come down upon it in fire, and the smoke arose from it as out of a furnace: and all the mount was terrible! … And the sight of the glory of the Lord was like a burning fire upon the top of the mount, in the eyes of the children of Israel” (Exodus 19:17-18; 24:17).
God the Son and Fire
● Besides showing St. Margaret Mary His Sacred Heart, on fire with love for men, just as His Father had shown Himself on fire atop Mount Sinai, Our Lord also said, while on Earth: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth! And what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). Not only that, but he often uses the image of fire as a part of His teaching:
● “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees! Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire!” (Matthew 3:10).
● “And if thy hand, or thy foot scandalize thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee. It is better for thee to go into life maimed or lame, than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into everlasting fire. And if thy eye scandalize thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee. It is better for thee having one eye to enter into life, than having two eyes to be cast into Hell fire” (Matthew 18:8-9).
● “If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:6).
● “But I say to you, that whosoever is angry with his brother, shall be in danger of the judgment. And whosoever shall say to his brother: ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. And whosoever shall say: ‘Thou Fool!’ shall be in danger of Hell fire” (Matthew 5:22).
● “The harvest is the end of the world. And the reapers are the angels. Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire: so shall it be at the end of the world. The Son of man shall send his angels, and they shall gather out of his Kingdom all scandals, and them that work iniquity. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. The angels shall go out, and shall separate the wicked from among the just. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth … Where their worm dies not, and the fire is not extinguished” (Matthew 13:40-50; Mark 9:43).
God the Holy Ghost and Fire
● “John the Baptist answered, saying unto all: ‘I indeed baptize you with water; but there shall come one mightier than I, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to loose: He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire!’” (Luke 3:16).
● On the first Pentecost Sunday, the Holy Ghost did indeed come as fire to ‘baptize’ them as “there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them” (Acts 2:3). Hence we have the phrase: “A baptism of fire!”
● The Church even incorporates fire in the devotion to the Holy Ghost—as is seen in the following extracts of various liturgical prayers: “Come, O Holy Ghost, … enkindle in us the fire of Thy love” … “Forth from the Father’s light it came, that beautiful and kindly flame: to fill with fervor of His word, the spirits faithful to their Lord” … “With quivering flame He lights on each, in fashion like a tongue, to teach!” … “Kindle with fire, brought from above, each sense and fill our hearts with love!” ... “The fire of God fell, not to burn them, but to enlighten them, and gave them gifts of grace.”
Heaven and Fire
● “And when His disciples James and John had seen this [rejection of Jesus], they said: ‘Lord, wilt Thou that we command fire to come down from Heaven, and consume them?’” (Luke 9:54). They were no doubt thinking of a repeat of Sodom and Gomorrha—which is another example of fire from Heaven.
● “And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from the Lord out of Heaven. And He destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the Earth” (Genesis 19:24-25).
● Jesus Himself mentions this punishing fire from Heaven, and states that the same thing will happen in the End Times: “And in the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from Heaven, and destroyed them all! Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man shall be revealed” (Luke 17:29-30).
The Antichrist and Fire
Among the ‘wonders’ that the Antichrist will work, we read: “And he did great signs, so that he made also fire to come down from Heaven unto the Earth in the sight of men” (Apocalypse 13:13).
Sin and Fire
● “The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity!” (James 3:6).
● “Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:3).
● “Sodom and Gomorrha, and the neighboring cities, in like manner, having given themselves to fornication, and going after other flesh, were made an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire” (Jude 1:7).
Day of Judgment and Fire
● “And the first angel sounded the trumpet, and there followed hail and fire, mingled with blood, and it was cast on the Earth, and the third part of the Earth was burnt up, and the third part of the trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up. And the second angel sounded the trumpet: and as it were a great mountain, burning with fire, was cast into the sea, and the third part of the sea became blood!” (Apocalypse 8:7-8).
● “Looking for the coming of the day of the Lord, by which the heavens, being on fire, shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with the burning heat” (2 Peter 3:12).
● “Every man’s work shall be manifest; for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work, of what sort it is. If any man’s work survive, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work burn, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire” (1 Corinthians 3:13-15).
● “When the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from Heaven, with the angels of his power, in a flame of fire, giving vengeance to them who know not God, and who obey not the Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Thessalonians 1:7-8).
● St. Paul speaks of “a certain dreadful expectation of judgment, and the rage of a fire which shall consume the adversaries” (Hebrews 10:27).
● Speaking of the iniquitous Babylon, the Book of Apocalypse says: “For her sins have reached unto Heaven, and the Lord hath remembered her iniquities … Therefore she shall be burnt with the fire; because God is strong, who shall judge her” (Apocalypse 18:5-8).
● The Book of Apocalypse has numerous other references to fire on the Day of Judgment.
Hell and Fire
● “He also shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is mingled with pure wine in the cup of his wrath, and shall be tormented with fire and brimstone” (Apocalypse 14:10).
● At Fatima, Our Lady showed the three children a vision of the fires of Hell. Sr. Lucia of Fatima relates the experience thus: “She opened her hands once more, as she had done the two previous months. The rays [of light] appeared to penetrate the Earth, and we saw, as it were, a vast sea of fire. Plunged in this fire, we saw the demons and the souls [of the damned]. The latter were like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, having human forms. They were floating about in that conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames which issued from within themselves, together with great clouds of smoke. Now they fell back on every side like sparks in huge fires, without weight or equilibrium, amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fright — it must have been this sight which caused me to cry out, as people say they heard me. The demons were distinguished [from the souls of the damned] by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning coals. That vision only lasted for a moment, thanks to our good heavenly Mother, who at the first apparition had promised to take us to Heaven. Without that, I think that we would have died of terror and fear.”
● She also told the children: “When you pray the Rosary, say after each mystery: ‘O my Jesus, forgive us, save us from the fire of Hell. Lead all souls to Heaven, especially those who are most in need of mercy.’”
Purgatory and Fire
● Pope St. Gregory the Great, in his Dialogues, informs us, that “the flames of Purgatory are, as it were, the instrument of divine justice, operating with such terrible power as to render the agony of the souls detained there intolerable. These pains far exceed all the tribulations, nay, and martyrdoms that can be witnessed, felt, or imagined in this life.”
● St. Catherine of Genoa, in the Treatise on Purgatory, writes: “From that furnace of divine love I see rays of fire dart like burning lamps towards the soul; and so violent and powerful are they that both soul and body would be utterly destroyed, if that were possible. These rays perform a double office; they purify and they annihilate. Consider gold: the oftener it is melted, the more pure does it become; continue to melt it and every imperfection is destroyed. This is the effect of fire on all materials. The soul, however, cannot be annihilated in God, but in herself she can, and the longer her purification lasts, the more perfectly does she die to herself, until at length she remains purified in God. When gold has been completely freed from dross, no fire, however great, has any further action on it, for nothing but its imperfections can be consumed. So it is with the divine fire in the soul. God retains her in these flames until every stain is burned away, and she is brought to the highest perfection of which she is capable, each soul in her own degree. And when this is accomplished, she rests wholly in God. Nothing of herself remains, and God is her entire being.”
● Fr. Schouppe, in his book Purgatory Explained, relating an experience of St. Frances of Rome, writes: “Purgatory, she said, is divided into three distinct parts … They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different states … The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but not sufficiently expiated during life. The servant of God then learned that, for all forgiven mortal sin, there remains to be undergone a suffering of seven years. This term cannot evidently be taken to mean a definite measure, since mortal sins differ in enormity, but as an average penalty. Although the souls are enveloped in the same flames, their sufferings are not the same; they differ according to the number and nature of their former sins.”
Our Lady and Fire
● Our Lady’s heart is on fire! In the Mass of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, the prayer during the Offertory Secret reads: “O Lord, we pray that our hearts may be set aflame by the fire that burned so wondrously in the Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary.” She would prefer that our hearts burn with love, like hers, but if not, she speaks of a different, more painful kind of fire!
● Already in the 1600’s, Our Lady of Good Success said: “If there are not any souls who, by their lives of immolation and sacrifice, appease the Divine Justice, fire will rain from Heaven! … Without virginity, it would be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon these lands in order to purify them!”
● Our Lady of La Salette also speaks of punishing fires: “The seasons will be altered, the Earth will produce nothing but bad fruit, the stars will lose their regular motion, the moon will only reflect a faint reddish glow. Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains and cities ... The fire of Heaven will fall and consume cities ... And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed. God will be served and glorified.”
● Our Lady of Akita also stresses the punishing fires from Heaven: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead.”
The Church’s Liturgy and Fire
● Fire is one of the most expressive and most ancient of liturgical symbols. All the creeds of antiquity give prominent place to fire, whose mysterious nature and irresistible power frequently caused it to be adored as a god. The sun, as the principle of heat and light for the Earth, had its share in this worship. Christianity adapted this belief, while refusing to give the title of divinity to heat and light, and instead made them mere symbols of the true divinity, which enlightens and warms humanity. The symbolism led quite naturally to the liturgical rite by which the Church on the Eve of Easter celebrates the mystery of the Death and Resurrection of Christ, of which the extinguished and rekindled fire furnishes the expressive image.
● The beginning of the Easter Divine Office also reflects ancient beliefs. The first ceremony consisted in the blessing of the New Fire, which was to furnish light for the whole Service. It was the daily custom, in the first ages of the Church, to strike a flame from a flint before Vespers; from this the lamps and candles were lit for the celebration of that Hour, and the light thus procured was kept up in the church till the Vespers of the following day. The Church at Rome observed this custom with great solemnity on Maundy Thursday morning, and the New Fire received a special blessing. We learn, from a letter written in the eight century by Pope St. Zachary to St. Boniface the Archbishop of Mainz, that three lamps were lit from this fire, which were then removed to some safe place, and care taken that their light be not extinguished. It was from these lamps that the light for Holy Saturday night was taken. The new fire is struck from a flint and is blessed with this prayer.
“Lord God, Almighty Father, inextinguishable light, Who hast created all light, bless this fire sanctified and blessed by Thee, Who hast enlightened the whole world; make us enlightened by that light and inflamed with the fire of Thy brightness; and as Thou didst enlighten Moses when he went out of Egypt, so illuminate our hearts and senses that we may attain life and light everlasting through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
● Fr. Goffine, writing on the use fire in the liturgy, says: “In ancient times it was customary to strike a new fire every day, bless it, and light the candles from it, and later this was done every Saturday; in the eleventh century this ceremony was restricted to Holy Saturday. The fire is struck from a stone to indicate, that Christ is the light of the world, and the Stone which the Jews rejected has now become the Corner stone of His Church (Psalm 117:22); that the divine Son, the light of the world, was apparently extinguished at His death, but at His resurrection shone anew; that all those who witness this ceremony today be spiritually enlightened hereafter. This fire is blessed, because the Church blesses everything that is used for divine service, and because the light and fire represent Christ, who brought the fire of love upon Earth with which to enkindle our hearts” (Fr. Goffine, The Church’s Year).
The large Paschal Candle representing Christ, which is lit in total darkness—symbolizing the darkness of a world that tries to do without Christ—and from that Paschal Candle we light our smaller candles. Again, the Paschal Candle is made of beeswax, but the smaller candles are not. The more candles that are lit from the Paschal Candle, the more light is shed around and everything brightens up.
● On Holy Thursday, at the consecration of the holy chrism (oil), there was collected in all the lamps of the Lateran basilica a quantity of oil sufficient to fill three large vases deposited in the corner of the church. Wicks burned in this oil until the night of Holy Saturday, when there were lighted from these lamps the candles and other lights, that were used during the Paschal Vigil (Eve of Easter) ceremonies—during which there is the blessing of the fire and the paschal candle at the beginning of Easter Eve.
● When the Paschal or Easter Vigil fire has been lit and blessed the three-branched candle (representing the Holy Trinity) is lighted with that blessed fire and the deacon then chants the “Exultet”, a chant still preserved in the Roman Liturgy. In the Eastern Church, the Easter ceremony of the new fire occupies a place of considerable importance in the paschal ritual of the Greek Church at Jerusalem. In the West we see the Irish, as early as the sixth century, lighting large fires at nightfall on the Eve of Easter.
● The feast of the Purification or Candlemas (February 2nd) has a celebrated rite with ancient prayers concerning the emission of liturgical fire and light. One of these prayers invokes Christ as “Thy servant Moses didst command the purest oil to be prepared for lamps to burn continuously before Thee: vouchsafe to pour forth the grace of Thy blessing ☩ upon these candles: that they may so afford us light outwardly that by Thy gift, the gift of Thy Spirit may never be wanting inwardly to our minds. … As these candles are enkindled with visible fire to dispel the darkness of night, so may our hearts illumined by invisible fire, that is, by the splendor of the Holy Spirit, in order to free from the blindness of all vice.” … “being worthily inflamed with the holy fire of Thy most sweet charity, we may deserve to be presented in the holy temple of Thy glory”
The flame of the candles represents God, His divinity and grace. God the Father appeared to Moses in the burning bush; God the Son showed Himself as a burning heart to St. Margaret Mary; God the Holy Ghost came down upon Our Lady and the Apostles in the form of tongues of fire at Pentecost. God chooses fire to show both His love, His mercy and His justice. Those in Heaven experience the fire of His love; those in Purgatory experience the fire of His mercy; those in Hell experience the fire of His justice. We even say, in the prayer to the Holy Ghost, “Come O Holy Ghost … enkindle in us the fire of Thy love.” Without God and His grace in our souls (candles), we are useless, just like an extinguished candle. A candle was made to burn, not to be extinguished. It should spend its life giving light to those around, as Our Lord said: “Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:15).
Mankind, You, and Fire
Surrounded by all this fire, you may well think there is no escape! You are right! In all truth, we were made to burn! The only variable thing is where we shall burn. We can choose to burn on Earth with a great love of God and have the fire of love purge us from all stain of sin: “And all that may pass through the fire, shall be purified by fire, but whatsoever cannot abide the fire, shall be sanctified with the water of expiation” (Numbers 31:23). We can neglect or escape from doing this, but we only jump out of the frying-pan into the fire—either the Fires of Purgatory, or the Fires of Hell. That is where our lukewarm, fireless soul will lead us to eventually. Our Lord said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth! And what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). He wants to kindle a fire in your soul, so that you can avoid the fires of Purgatory or Hell. You can come to that fire or flee from that fire.
Will the Real Holy Ghost Please Stand Up!
With all this talk of fire and the Holy Ghost choosing to come in the form of fire―the question naturally arises: “Is the Holy Ghost tough or mild?” ― for fires can be comforting and fires can be destructive! Is He loud or quiet? Is he comforting or destructive? Reading Holy Scripture can be a little confusing―for it seems contradictory, or is it that God is a little bit of everything? God is God―whether it be God the Father, God the Son or God the Holy Ghost. The three members of the Holy Trinity think alike and act alike―there is no disagreement between them. They may have different roles―Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier―but the Spirit is the same. But what Spirit is it that rules and drives Them all? Trying to find out can be a little confusing as we read seemingly contradictory indications in Holy Scripture:
“Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the Lord! And behold the Lord passeth, and a great and strong wind before the Lord over throwing the mountains, and breaking the rocks in pieces―the Lord is not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake―the Lord is not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire―the Lord is not in the fire―and after the fire a whistling of a gentle air” (3 Kings 19:11-12).
“And when the days of the Pentecost were accomplished, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from Heaven, as of a mighty wind coming, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they began to speak with divers tongues, according as the Holy Ghost gave them to speak” (Acts 2:1-4).
You Get the God You Deserve
No doubt you have heard it said: “We get the leaders we deserve!” Similarly, “We get the God we deserve!” Modern-day Christians are ceaselessly enthusing about God being “Love” and “Mercy” and all you have to do is believe in Him and you are “saved”. God is love, that is true, but God is not ONLY love. You would have thought that simple common sense would have told them that there is something wrong with their theory when scrutinized under the light of most souls ending up damned―but, of course, they refuse to look at and consider that part of reality!
The Life You Lead Dictates the God You Get
As Holy Scripture says elsewhere: “With the holy one Thou wilt be holy, and with the valiant, perfect. With the elect Thou wilt be elect, and with the perverse Thou wilt be perverted. And the poor people Thou wilt save. And with Thy eyes Thou wilt humble the haughty!” (2 Kings 22:26-28). “With the holy, Thou wilt be holy; and with the innocent man Thou wilt be innocent. And with the elect Thou wilt be elect and with the perverse thou wilt be perverted. For Thou wilt save the humble people; but wilt bring down the eyes of the proud!” (Psalm 17:26-28). In other words―God will be tough or kind, heavy-handed or gentle, depending on what we are “asking for” or what we deserve. As the New Testament says: “See then the goodness and the severity of God―towards them indeed that are fallen, the severity; but towards thee, if thou abide in goodness, the goodness of God―otherwise thou also shalt be cut off!” (Romans 11:22).
Is the Holy Ghost Gentle?
“O how good and sweet is Thy spirit, O Lord, in all things!” (Wisdom 12:1). “The Lord is sweet!” (1 Peter 2:3). Scripture speaks of “the goodness and kindness of God our Savior” (Titus 3:4). Just like any parent, the Holy Ghost is gentle if the “child” listens, obeys and is good. If we decide not to listen, not to obey and are bad, then, like any parent would do, the Holy Ghost has to take “corrective measures” and even “punitive measures.” Heck! We even treat pets the same way! Or even a pen that won’t write when it is needed to write, we tend to throw it aside and get one that will write! If you disobey God, ignore God, neglect God―even though He is patient and merciful―you will pay! Hey! Even those who are in Hell are experiencing the mercy of God―because they are not being punished as severely as they actually deserve to be punished.
Modern-man seems to ignore this truth. You have to get this straight―you do not mess with God just because He does not react immediately! “The Lord delays not His promise [to punish], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Yes, “the Lord is sweet and righteous” (Psalm 24:8). “O taste, and see that the Lord is sweet! Blessed is the man that hopes in Him!” (Psalm 33:9). “Thy mercy is sweet. Do thou deliver me!” (Psalm 108:21). When sweetness and kindness is merited, then God will give it―but He is also righteous, which means “acting in accord with divine or moral law”, and if man decides to break God’s law, then that righteous God will do what is right and His justice will be invoked. “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil―that put darkness for light, and light for darkness―that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
“The Lord is sweet to all―and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:9). “He has borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows” (Isaias 53:4). “Thou, O Lord, art sweet and mild and plenteous in mercy to all that call upon Thee!” (Psalms 85:5). Yet merely “calling” on the Lord is not enough―we must “change” our ways if we seek and hope to obtain His “plenteous mercy”. There are too many who expect mercy without amending their sinful ways, who treat the Sacrament of Confession like a weekly “car-wash” or a revolving door, but drive back into the mud of sin immediately afterwards, just “as a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). Scripture adds: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Jesus warns us, saying: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.” (Matthew 7:21). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
The Kindness of God
The reality is that God wants to save everyone―but it has to be on His terms and not on their terms. God’s love excludes nobody―the excluding is done by a lack of love towards God. There are sufficient Scriptural quotes that confirm that God loves sinners, has compassion upon those sinners, and wishes to save those sinners―regardless of how sinful they are or may have been: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). “Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “‘As I live,’ says the Lord God, ‘I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways: and why will you die?’ (Ezechiel 33:11). “The soul that sins, the same shall die … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all my commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done! In his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live!” (Ezechiel 18:20-22). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). “Because I will be merciful to their iniquities, and their sins I will remember no more” (Hebrews 8:12). Beautiful, huh? Those quotes are only the tip of the iceberg!
As a further “dip the big toe in the water” reflection or meditation, Holy Scripture not only tells us that “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), but Scripture also unpacks or gives a brief description of that charity: “Charity is patient, is kind. Charity envies not, deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious, seeks not her own, is not provoked to anger, thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never falls away―whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8).
The Toughness of God
Yet, on the other hand, God also says: “But if the just man turn himself away from his justice, and do iniquity―according to all the abominations which the wicked man works―shall he live? All his justices, which he has done, shall not be remembered in the prevarication, by which he has prevaricated, and, in his sins, which he has committed, in them he shall die. And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore, O house of Israel: Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse? For when the just turns himself away from his justice and commits iniquity, then he shall die therein―in the injustice, that he has wrought, he shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:24-26).
“Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great―He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’ For mercy and wrath quickly come from Him, and His wrath looks upon sinners. Delay not to be converted to the Lord, and defer it not from day to day. For His wrath shall come on a sudden, and in the time of vengeance He will destroy thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-9).
God is Charity―Charity Sanctifies
It is only logical that if “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8) and “God is holy” (Psalm 98:9), then Charity must have a major and crucial part to play in holiness. In fact, Holy Scripture tells us that without Charity, all that we might do will be useless, pointless and worthless without Charity: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). “Above all have charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:12-14).
“We are of God. Let us love one another, for charity is of God. And every one that loves, is born of God, and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity. By this has the charity of God appeared towards us, because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him. In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins. My dearest, if God has so loved us; we also ought to love one another. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us” (1 John 4:6-12).
Article 29
Friday & Saturday, May 17th & 18th
Are You Abusing Your Mother?
Friday & Saturday, May 17th & 18th
Are You Abusing Your Mother?
Would You Like Mercy?
We all love the idea of mercy! Holy Scripture says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-19). We all want a piece of that cake of mercy! If the mercies of God are above all His other works, then it is fitting that Mary—who is God’s greatest work—be also known as the “Mother of Mercy.” We all love Our Lady’s title—“Mother of Mercy”―because we want a piece of that mercy. On your deathbed, when you have lost your appetite for all the things of this world, you will still want a slice of that cake of mercy.
Don’t Be Presumptuous!
Sadly, there are some folk, who after reading books like The Glories of Mary, which extols the Mother of Mercy, then go and fearlessly immerse themselves in worldliness and sin, telling themselves that they need not worry, since the Mother of Mercy will save them as long they wear a Brown Scapular, say the Rosary, wear a medal of Our Lady, etc. Presumptuous fools who are thus fodder for the fires of Hell! This is a grave abuse of a merciful Mother that deserves the gravest of punishments.
Such a sinful and abusive attitude is a typical Modernist invention based, not on the theology of the Church, but on the theology of personal feelings and sentiments! Far from being even the slightest virtue, it is a grave sin of presumption—almost a sacrilege of sorts: to treat such a holy and merciful Mother in such a presumptuous and abusive manner.
A Blast From The Past!
For those who hold such a presumptuous state of mind, here is a blast from the past, by St. Alphonsus Liguori, who blasts such abusive behavior out of the water:
“When it is said that a devoted servant of Mary cannot be lost, those servants are not included who abuse their devotion by sinning with less fear. Such presumptuous persons, for their presumption, merit punishment and not mercy. It is understood, then only of those of her servants who, with the desire to amend, faithfully honor and commend themselves to the Mother of God. That these should be lost is, I say, morally impossible. Doctors and Saints unanimously agree on this point.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
Use Her Mercy—Don’t Abuse Her Mercy!
Those words of St. Alphonsus sting and wake us out of self-invented religious dreamland: “Presumptuous persons, for their presumption, merit punishment and not mercy!” St. Anselm says, that as he who is not devoted to Mary and protected by her, cannot be saved, so it is impossible that he should be condemned who recommends himself to the Virgin, and is regarded by her with affection. Do you think that an abuse of mercy manifests a devotion to Mary? Of course not! Therefore someone who abuses her mercy, is not devoted to her, and, according to St. Anselm, someone who is not devoted to Mary cannot be saved!
St. Alphonsus continues:
“St. Antoninus asserts the same thing in nearly the same words: ‘As it is impossible that those from whom Mary turns away her eyes of compassion should be saved, so it must be that all those towards whom she turns her eyes, and for whom she intercedes, shall be saved and glorified.’ This saint adds, then, that the servants of Mary must necessarily be saved.”
St. Alphonsus continues: “Let us note, however, the first part of the statement of these saints, and let those tremble, who little esteem or abandon through negligence, devotion to this divine mother. They say that it is impossible for those to be saved who are not protected by Mary. Do you think that abuse of her mercy shows little esteem for Our Lady? Of course it does! Does abuse of mercy manifest a neglect of love towards Our Lady? Of course it does. Therefore, according to the opinion of the saints, such a person cannot be saved.”
And this is also asserted by others, as St. Albert the Great: “All those who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.” St. Bonaventure, too: “He who neglects the service of Mary, shall die in sin.” Is an abuse of mercy a sign of neglect? Yes it is! And in another place St. Albert the Great writes: “He who has not recourse to thee, O Lady, will not reach paradise.” And commenting on Psalm 99, the saint goes so far as to say that “those from whom Mary turns away her face, not only will not be saved, but can have no hope of salvation.” Do we risk Mary turning away from us because of our repeated abuse of her mercy?
And before this St. Ignatius, the Martyr, said the same thing, asserting that a sinner cannot be saved except by means of the holy Virgin, who, on the other hand, saves, by her merciful intercession, many that would be condemned by the divine justice. Some persons doubt whether this passage is from St. Ignatius; at least Father Crasset says that St. John Chrysostom has adopted it as his own. It is also repeated by the Abbot of Celles. And, in the same sense, the holy Church applies to Mary these words of Proverbs: “All that hate me love death.” Is abuse more a sign of love or hate?
For, as Richard of St. Laurence says, commenting on the words: “She is like the merchant’s ship―all those who are outside of this ship, shall be submerged in the sea of this world.” Even the heretic, Oecolampadius, esteemed that the neglect of devotion to the Mother of God in anyone was a certain sign of reprobation; hence, he said : “Let it never be heard of me that I am averse to Mary, to be ill affected towards whom I should think a certain sign of a reprobate mind.”
Who Bothers Listening?
On the other hand, Mary says: “He that listens to me shall not be confounded. He who has recourse to me, and listens to what I say to him, shall not be lost.” From which St. Bonaventure said: “O Lady, those who are mindful to honor thee, shall be far from perdition.” (the above paragraphs were taken from St. Alphonsus Liguori’s The Glories of Mary).
Yet who is listening to her today? Who responds to her pleas for prayers? Our Lady demands that the Rosary be prayed: “Say the Rosary every day … I want you to tray the Rosary every day!” (Fatima, June 13, 1917). “Continue to pray the Rosary every day!” (Fatima, July 13, 1917). “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (Fatima, August 19, 1917). “Continue to pray the Rosary!” (Fatima, September 13, 1917). “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” (Fatima, October 13, 1917). “Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much ... very much!” (Akita, Japan, July 6, 1973). “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by My Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary … Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary” (Akita, Japan, October 13, 1973).
Modern Minimalists
Are you praying the Rosary “very much”? Do you “Pray, pray very much”? Or do you pray the minimum? Do we give the minimum to those whom we say we love? Are you happy with the bare minimum from those whom you love? What is it that shows and proves love? The maximum! This is why Our Lord says: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength!” (Mark 12:30).
Are You One of Those Who ‘Love’ But Ignore Mary?
How many times have we not experienced the case where the instructions or advice that we give is accepted only with the ears but not the heart and mind? They listen to us―but it is “in one ear and out the other”! This is exactly what most people do with Our Lady, as Sr. Lucia of Fatima points out: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.” (December, 1957).
The Church, in Her liturgy, applies to Our Lady these words: “Now therefore, ye children, hear me! Blessed are they that keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not! Blessed is the man that hears me, and that watches daily at my gates, and waits at the posts of my doors. He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord! But he that shall sin against me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate me love death!” (Proverbs 8:32-36).
Are you among those who “hear instruction and refuse it not”? Are you among those who “hear” her? Are you among those “that keep her ways”? Or are you among those of whom Our Lord says: “Hypocrites, well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘These people honor Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8).
Fake and Abusive Devotees of Our Lady
St. Louis de Montfort devotes a considerable portion of his book, True Devotion to Mary, to point-out the fake and abusive ways in which many people are devoted—or claim to be devoted—to Our Lady.
“Today, more than ever, we must take pains in choosing true devotion to our Blessed Lady, because, more than ever before, there are false devotions to our Blessed Lady which are easily mistaken for true ones. The devil, like a false coiner and a subtle and experienced sharper, has already deceived and destroyed so many souls by a false devotion to the Blessed Virgin that he makes a daily use of his diabolical experience to plunge many others by this same way into everlasting perdition; amusing them, lulling them to sleep in sin, under the pretext of some prayers badly said or of some outward practices which he inspires. As a false coiner does not ordinarily counterfeit anything but gold or silver, and very rarely other metals, because they are not worth the trouble, so the evil spirit does not for the most part counterfeit other devotions. It is then very important to recognize, first of all, false devotions to our Blessed Lady, in order to avoid them” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
This is why the devil strives so hard with sinners, in order that, having lost divine grace, they may also lose devotion to Mary. St. Louis then lists the fake devotions to Our Lady.
The Critical or “Modernist” Devotees
“The critical devotees are, for the most part, proud scholars, rash and self-sufficient souls, who have, at heart, some devotion to the holy Virgin, but who criticize nearly all the practices of devotion which simple people pay simply and holily to their good Mother, because these practices do not fall in with their own humor and fancy. They call in doubt all the miracles and pious stories recorded by authors worthy of Faith, or that have been drawn from the chronicles of religious orders: narratives which testify to us the mercies and the power of the most holy Virgin.
“They cannot see, without uneasiness, simple and humble people on their knees before an altar or an image of Our Lady, sometimes at the corner of a street, in order to pray to God there. They say that, for their part, they have no taste for these external devotions, and that they are not so naïve as to believe so many tales and stories that are told about Our Lady. These kinds of false devotees and of proud and worldly people are greatly to be feared. They do an infinite wrong to devotion to Our Lady; and they are but too successful in alienating people from it, under the pretext of destroying its abuses” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
This casting doubt on miracles and stories of Our Lady’s power and intervention, fall right in line with Modernist tactics, who use the false philosophy of Agnosticism (which holds that nothing can be truly known for certain) to make us doubt most of the history of the Faith.
The Scrupulous Devotees
“The scrupulous devotees are those who fear to dishonor the Son by honoring the Mother, to abase the one in elevating the other. They cannot bear that we should attribute to Our Lady the most just praise which the holy Fathers of the Church have given her. It is all they can do to endure that there should be more people before the altar of the Blessed Virgin than before the Blessed Sacrament—as if the one were contrary to the other, as if those who prayed to our Blessed Lady did not pray to Jesus Christ through her. They are unwilling that we should speak so often of Our Lady and address her so frequently.
“Here are some of their favorite sayings: “Why so many Rosaries, so many confraternities and so many external devotions to the Blessed Virgin? There is much ignorance in all this. Speak to us of those who are devout to Jesus Christ!” …”We must have recourse to Jesus Christ; He is our only Mediator. We must preach Jesus Christ; this is the solid devotion.”
“To hinder devotion to our Blessed Lady is very dangerous; and it is, under pretext of a greater good, a subtle snare of the evil one. For the more we honor the Blessed Virgin, the more we honor Jesus Christ, because we honor Mary only that we may the more perfectly honor Jesus, since we go to her only as the way by which we are to find the end we are seeking, which is Jesus” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The Superficial “On the Surface” Devotees
“External devotees are persons who make all devotion to our Blessed Lady consist in outward practices. They have no taste except for the exterior of this devotion, because they have no interior spirit of their own. They will say quantities of Rosaries with the greatest precipitation; they will hear many Masses distractedly; they will go, without devotion, to processions; they will enroll themselves in all her confraternities—without amending their lives, without doing any violence to their passions, or without imitating the virtues of that most holy Virgin.
“They have no love but for the outwards part of devotion, without having any relish for its interior. If they have not sensible sweetness in their practices, they think they are doing nothing; they get all out of joint, throw everything up, or do everything at random. The world is full of these exterior devotees, and there are no people who are more critical than they of men of prayer, who foster an interior spirit as the essential thing, without, however, disregarding that outward modesty which always accompanies true devotion” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
These devotees will put great importance upon having statues, pictures, carrying fancy Rosaries, wearing all kinds of Mary’s scapulars, singing hymns to her, etc. You name, they’ll do it! But as Our Lord says: “These people honor Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). We could rephrase that and have Our Lady saying: “These people honor me with their statues, pictures, Rosaries, scapulars, hymns and processions: but their heart is far from me.”
The Presumptuous Devotees
“Presumptuous devotees are sinners abandoned to their passions, or lovers of the world, who under the fair name of Christians and ‘servants’ of our Blessed Lady conceal pride, avarice, impurity, drunkenness, anger, swearing, detraction, injustice or some other sin.
“They sleep in peace in the midst of their bad habits, without doing any violence to themselves to correct their faults, under the pretext that they are devout to the Blessed Virgin. They promise themselves that God will pardon them; that they will not be allowed to die without confession; and that they will not be lost eternally because they say the Rosary, because they fast on Saturdays, because they belong to the Confraternity of the Holy Rosary, or wear the Scapular, or are enrolled in other congregations, or they wear the little habit or little chain of Our Lady.
“They will not believe us when we tell them that their devotion is only an illusion of the devil and a pernicious presumption likely to destroy their souls. They say that God is good and merciful; that He has not made us to condemn us everlastingly; that no man is without sin; that they shall not die without confession; that one good act of contrition at the hour of death is enough; that they are devout to Our Lady, wear the Scapular, say daily, without fail and without vanity, seven Our Fathers and seven Hail Mary’s in her honor; and that they sometimes say the Rosary and the Office of Our Lady, besides fasting and other things.
“To give authority to all this, and to blind themselves still further, they quote certain stories which they have heard or read—it does not matter to them whether they be true or false—relating how people have died in mortal sin without confession, and then, because in their lifetime they sometimes said some prayers or went through some practices of devotion to Our Lady, how they have been raised to life again in order to go to confession; or their soul has been miraculously retained in their bodies till confession; or through the clemency of the Blessed Virgin they have obtained from God, at the moment of death, contrition and pardon of their sins, and so have been saved; and that they themselves expect similar favors.
“Nothing in Christianity is more detestable than this diabolical presumption. For how can we truly say that we love and honor our Blessed Lady when by our sins we are pitilessly piercing, wounding, crucifying and outraging Jesus Christ, her Son? If Mary laid down a law to herself, to save by her mercy this sort of people, she would be authorizing crime and helping crucify and outrage her Son. Who would ever dare think of such a thing?
“I say that thus to abuse devotion to Our Lady, which, after devotion to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, is the holiest and solidest of all devotions, is to be guilty of a horrible sacrilege, which, after the sacrilege of an unworthy Communion, is the greatest and least pardonable of all sacrileges.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The “Hot and Cold” Devotees
“The inconstant devotees are those who are devout to our Blessed Lady by fits and starts. Sometimes they are fervent and sometimes lukewarm. Sometimes they seem ready to do anything for her, and then a little afterward, they are not like the same people. They begin by taking up all the devotions to her, and enrolling themselves in the confraternities; and then they do not practice the rules with fidelity.
“They change like the moon; and Mary puts them under her feet with the crescent, because they are changeable and unworthy to be reckoned among the servants of that faithful Virgin who have for their special graces fidelity and constancy. It were better for such persons not to burden themselves with so many prayers and practices but to choose a few and fulfill them with faithfulness and love, in spite of the world, the devil and the flesh.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The Hypocritical Devotees
“We have still to mention the false devotees to our Blessed Lady who are the hypocritical devotees, who cloak their sins and sinful habits with her mantle, in order to be taken by men for what they are not.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). They see devotion to Mary as a respectable in the eyes of others, that will give them an air of respectability by which to create a smoke-screen to their secret sinful lives and thus as a means of fooling others as what they are really like.
The “What’s In It For Me” Devotees
“There are also the self-interested devotees, who have recourse to Our Lady only to gain some lawsuit, or to avoid some danger, or to be cured of some illness, or for some other similar necessity, without which they would forget her altogether. All these are false devotees, pleasing neither to God nor to His holy Mother” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Our Lady on True Devotion
Our Lady, in speaking the Venerable Mary of Agreda, indicates some of the mindsets and attitudes that cause and create a lack of devotion; and what elements contribute to a true devotion: “Fear the danger of not paying attention to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God … In many of the faithful this ignorance goes still farther―for some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored! … From this dangerous attitude originates lukewarmness, want of fervor and diligence, absence of zeal and devotion! … The world does not know where true wisdom dwells … These worldlings abhor everything that is painful … Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom! … In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls, and they hold as being wisdom that which is nothing but diabolical and earthly ignorance! ... God knows that this insane love will pervert the greater part of the human nature!
“There is only one true Good, the highest Good is to be appreciated and recognized. All the other lesser goods are merely fictitious and apparent. Then only shall you give God true appreciation and love, when you shall enjoy and esteem Him above all created things. Carnal men never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or reckoning of It. How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! Under the outwardly good intention, are often hidden the earthly passions and inclinations, which dominate the heart. There are so few who are perfect and who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption. Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. I do not count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become so measureless, there are those who think that also the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be.”
“How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell you how many souls are lost, in order to not cause you to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told you that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation. So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing! It is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals failing to call upon me, resulting in so many souls being lost! Afflict yourself, lament and grieve without consolation over this ruin of so many souls!”
“Imitate me and follow my humble footsteps! Exert all your powers toward that which I shall teach you, and apply yourself with all your heart to my virtues and works. Withdraw your affections from all that is earthly, lift your aspirations on high―despising and fleeing all human honors, esteeming them as vanity of vanities and affliction of spirit! … Dispose yourself for the influx of the Holy Spirit and His gifts … Purify your soul by many acts of sorrow for having offended Him, magnify and praise Him with a most ardent love ... See that you advance in devotion and in hearty love toward Him, with special reverence, attention and devotion! … Seek Him, and rest not until you have found Him! … Man has no excuse for not devoting himself entirely to the fulfillment of the divine will ... The fulfillment of the precepts of the Lord must not be cold and lukewarm, but most fervent and devoted! … Whenever the Most High bids you or communicates to you anything for the welfare of souls, or especially for their eternal salvation, devote yourself to it entirely! … Multiply your acts of fervor, your devotions, your spiritual exercises and in all things increase your prayers and sacrifices to the eternal Father for the benefit of mortals! …
“But the soul cannot achieve this if it is not altogether devoted to the Lord! … Show yourself to be devoted! … Be fervent in your devotion! ... Increase your filial devotion toward me! ... You must advance in heartfelt love and devotion toward me, and be convinced that I shall be your help in all tribulations, your constant assistance in all your works; so that the gates of my mercy are opened up for you and for all whom you recommend to me, if only you shall make yourself such as I desire! ... Exhort others to continual love and devotion toward me, engrafting it in their hearts, and I will constitute myself their Mother, their help and defense! … Innumerable are those whom I have saved from the infernal dragon because of their devotion to me, even though they have recited only one Ave, or have said only one word in my honor and invocation. So great is my love for them, that if they would call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! ... All those who are devoted to me, who call upon me at the hour of death, shall be under my special protection in that hour, they shall have me as a defense against the demons, as a help and protection, and shall be presented by me before the tribunal of His mercy and there experience my intercession ... How much my intercession and the power I have in Heaven is worth has never been hidden in the Church, for I have demonstrated my ability to save all by so many thousands of miracles, prodigies and favors operated in behalf of those devoted to me ... Yet, though many are the souls whom I have helped, they are few in comparison with those, whom I could and am willing to help!”
Devotion is not Demotion
The whole idea of “devotion” consists of going over and above what is considered as being average. In a certain sense, devotion could be likened to fanaticism. The word fanatic is today regarded as a negative disapproving word implying unbalanced or obsessive behavior that is extreme or excessive. Yet God seems to demand a kind of fanaticism when He commands: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). If someone gives their whole time, whole focus, whole energy to something―then we call them a fanatic. God wants fanatics that are not focused on the right things and not the wrong things. God has programmed everyone to be a fanatic―otherwise we could not love God with our whole, entire, total mind, heart, soul and strength.
We find the origins of “devotion” in Latin, rooted in words like: “devotus, devotio, devovere”, etc. The verb, devovere”, giving the past participle “devotus”, is itself based on the verb “vovere”, pp. “votus”, meaning “to give up, to vow, dedicate or consecrate.” The Latin “devotus” means “faithful”, from which we obviously get our word “devoted”.
If we come to more modern times, and look up the word in the book of definitions, the Dictionary, we will encounter such definitions as: (1) earnestness and zeal in the performance of religious duties and observations; (2) religious fervor, reverence, piety; (3) an act of prayer or supplication—now usually used in plural; (4) oblation or offering, such as of oneself or an alms given from religious motives; (5) ardent love or affection; (6) strong attachment; (7) dedication or attachment to a cause, person, principle, etc. (8) zeal, enthusiasm.
This gives us a clear picture of “devotion” being a cut-above the average, being something especially noticeable due to the presence of a zeal, a fervor, an enthusiasm, a strong attachment and ardent love for some object or thing, or some person, or some place. It rules out notions like lukewarmness, tepidity, torpor, sloth, indifference, inconsistency, sporadic, half-hearted, selfish, etc.
Promotion not Demotion
This leads us to examine and question our own “devotion” to God and Our Lady. Is it above the average? Is it earnest, zealous, fervent, strong, enthusiastic? Or is it misfiring, sporadic, occasional, seasonal, etc.? Do the following words of Fr. Frederick Faber apply to us:
“Those who love God, lament that they do not love Him more. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but remember, nothing short of an immense one! Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that even Protestants may feel at ease about her! Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be! It has no faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized!
“Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines! Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother! Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!”
In essence, Fr. Faber is saying that it is our abuse of devotion to Mary that is at the heart of all our problems in the world, the Church, the family and personal lives. Yet―no doubt―we all have our excuses for explaining why our devotion to Mary is―as Fr. Faber says― “low and thin and poor; not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be!” At Fatima, Our Lady clearly stated: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. Jesus wants to use you to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” Speaking of herself in the third person, Our Lady adds: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” While at Akita, she adds: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach!”
Your Mother is Being Abused! Will You Just Stand By and Watch?
Our lukewarmness towards Our Lady, our indifference, our half-heartedness, and our minimalist devotion is most certainly an abuse of the kindness and mercy shown to each and every one of us by Our Lady. Yet there are some who abuse her even more! Yes―of course―every sin we commit, whether it be Venial or Mortal, is an abuse of Our Lady just as it is an abuse of God. Yet some go even further than that and directly attack Our Lady in many ways!
On December 10th, 1925, Our Lady and the Child Jesus appeared to Lucia in her convent. Our Lady showed Lucia a heart encircled by thorns which she was holding in her hand. At the same time, the Child Jesus said: “Have compassion on the Heart of your most holy Mother, covered with thorns, with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to make an act of reparation to remove them.” Then the most holy Virgin said: “Look at my Heart, surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce me at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You at least try to console me and say that I promise to assist, at the hour of death, with the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months, shall confess, receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary, and keep me company for fifteen minutes while meditating on the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me.”
Our Lady asked for Communions of reparation on five first Saturdays, instead of some other number. Our Blessed Lord answered that question when He appeared to Sr. Lucia May 29th, 1930. He explained that it was because of five kinds of offenses and blasphemies against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Our Lord said:
“My daughter, the motive is simple: there are five ways in which people offend and blaspheme against the Immaculate Heart of Mary:
(1) Blasphemies against the Immaculate Conception.
(2) Blasphemies against her Perpetual Virginity.
(3) Blasphemies against her Divine Maternity and at the same time the refusal to recognize her as the Mother of all mankind,
(4) Blasphemies of those who seek openly to foster in the hearts of children indifference or contempt and even hatred for this Immaculate Mother.
(5) The offenses of those who directly outrage Her in her holy images.
Here then, is the reason why the Immaculate Heart of Mary [My Mother] causes Me to ask for this little act of reparation and by means of it, moves My mercy to forgive those souls who had the misfortune of offending her. As for you, try without ceasing, with all your prayers and sacrifices, to move Me to mercy toward those poor souls.”
Our Lord and Our Lady asked for reparation from faithful Catholics for these blasphemies against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Very little reparation is done―for the most part, the few Catholics that are still regularly practicing the Faith, in essence are thinking: “I’m not committing these blasphemies―so why should I make reparation?” Our Mother is being attacked, assaulted, insulted―and we don’t want to do anything about it! Is that devotion? The words of Our Lord come to mind: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). We are like the Jewish Priest and Jewish Levite in Our Lord’s parable about the Good Samaritan, who saw a fellow Jew half-dead by the roadside after being attacked by robbers―but they did nothing to help and merely passed by him.
We all love the idea of mercy! Holy Scripture says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-19). We all want a piece of that cake of mercy! If the mercies of God are above all His other works, then it is fitting that Mary—who is God’s greatest work—be also known as the “Mother of Mercy.” We all love Our Lady’s title—“Mother of Mercy”―because we want a piece of that mercy. On your deathbed, when you have lost your appetite for all the things of this world, you will still want a slice of that cake of mercy.
Don’t Be Presumptuous!
Sadly, there are some folk, who after reading books like The Glories of Mary, which extols the Mother of Mercy, then go and fearlessly immerse themselves in worldliness and sin, telling themselves that they need not worry, since the Mother of Mercy will save them as long they wear a Brown Scapular, say the Rosary, wear a medal of Our Lady, etc. Presumptuous fools who are thus fodder for the fires of Hell! This is a grave abuse of a merciful Mother that deserves the gravest of punishments.
Such a sinful and abusive attitude is a typical Modernist invention based, not on the theology of the Church, but on the theology of personal feelings and sentiments! Far from being even the slightest virtue, it is a grave sin of presumption—almost a sacrilege of sorts: to treat such a holy and merciful Mother in such a presumptuous and abusive manner.
A Blast From The Past!
For those who hold such a presumptuous state of mind, here is a blast from the past, by St. Alphonsus Liguori, who blasts such abusive behavior out of the water:
“When it is said that a devoted servant of Mary cannot be lost, those servants are not included who abuse their devotion by sinning with less fear. Such presumptuous persons, for their presumption, merit punishment and not mercy. It is understood, then only of those of her servants who, with the desire to amend, faithfully honor and commend themselves to the Mother of God. That these should be lost is, I say, morally impossible. Doctors and Saints unanimously agree on this point.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
Use Her Mercy—Don’t Abuse Her Mercy!
Those words of St. Alphonsus sting and wake us out of self-invented religious dreamland: “Presumptuous persons, for their presumption, merit punishment and not mercy!” St. Anselm says, that as he who is not devoted to Mary and protected by her, cannot be saved, so it is impossible that he should be condemned who recommends himself to the Virgin, and is regarded by her with affection. Do you think that an abuse of mercy manifests a devotion to Mary? Of course not! Therefore someone who abuses her mercy, is not devoted to her, and, according to St. Anselm, someone who is not devoted to Mary cannot be saved!
St. Alphonsus continues:
“St. Antoninus asserts the same thing in nearly the same words: ‘As it is impossible that those from whom Mary turns away her eyes of compassion should be saved, so it must be that all those towards whom she turns her eyes, and for whom she intercedes, shall be saved and glorified.’ This saint adds, then, that the servants of Mary must necessarily be saved.”
St. Alphonsus continues: “Let us note, however, the first part of the statement of these saints, and let those tremble, who little esteem or abandon through negligence, devotion to this divine mother. They say that it is impossible for those to be saved who are not protected by Mary. Do you think that abuse of her mercy shows little esteem for Our Lady? Of course it does! Does abuse of mercy manifest a neglect of love towards Our Lady? Of course it does. Therefore, according to the opinion of the saints, such a person cannot be saved.”
And this is also asserted by others, as St. Albert the Great: “All those who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.” St. Bonaventure, too: “He who neglects the service of Mary, shall die in sin.” Is an abuse of mercy a sign of neglect? Yes it is! And in another place St. Albert the Great writes: “He who has not recourse to thee, O Lady, will not reach paradise.” And commenting on Psalm 99, the saint goes so far as to say that “those from whom Mary turns away her face, not only will not be saved, but can have no hope of salvation.” Do we risk Mary turning away from us because of our repeated abuse of her mercy?
And before this St. Ignatius, the Martyr, said the same thing, asserting that a sinner cannot be saved except by means of the holy Virgin, who, on the other hand, saves, by her merciful intercession, many that would be condemned by the divine justice. Some persons doubt whether this passage is from St. Ignatius; at least Father Crasset says that St. John Chrysostom has adopted it as his own. It is also repeated by the Abbot of Celles. And, in the same sense, the holy Church applies to Mary these words of Proverbs: “All that hate me love death.” Is abuse more a sign of love or hate?
For, as Richard of St. Laurence says, commenting on the words: “She is like the merchant’s ship―all those who are outside of this ship, shall be submerged in the sea of this world.” Even the heretic, Oecolampadius, esteemed that the neglect of devotion to the Mother of God in anyone was a certain sign of reprobation; hence, he said : “Let it never be heard of me that I am averse to Mary, to be ill affected towards whom I should think a certain sign of a reprobate mind.”
Who Bothers Listening?
On the other hand, Mary says: “He that listens to me shall not be confounded. He who has recourse to me, and listens to what I say to him, shall not be lost.” From which St. Bonaventure said: “O Lady, those who are mindful to honor thee, shall be far from perdition.” (the above paragraphs were taken from St. Alphonsus Liguori’s The Glories of Mary).
Yet who is listening to her today? Who responds to her pleas for prayers? Our Lady demands that the Rosary be prayed: “Say the Rosary every day … I want you to tray the Rosary every day!” (Fatima, June 13, 1917). “Continue to pray the Rosary every day!” (Fatima, July 13, 1917). “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (Fatima, August 19, 1917). “Continue to pray the Rosary!” (Fatima, September 13, 1917). “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” (Fatima, October 13, 1917). “Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much ... very much!” (Akita, Japan, July 6, 1973). “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by My Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary … Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary” (Akita, Japan, October 13, 1973).
Modern Minimalists
Are you praying the Rosary “very much”? Do you “Pray, pray very much”? Or do you pray the minimum? Do we give the minimum to those whom we say we love? Are you happy with the bare minimum from those whom you love? What is it that shows and proves love? The maximum! This is why Our Lord says: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength!” (Mark 12:30).
Are You One of Those Who ‘Love’ But Ignore Mary?
How many times have we not experienced the case where the instructions or advice that we give is accepted only with the ears but not the heart and mind? They listen to us―but it is “in one ear and out the other”! This is exactly what most people do with Our Lady, as Sr. Lucia of Fatima points out: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.” (December, 1957).
The Church, in Her liturgy, applies to Our Lady these words: “Now therefore, ye children, hear me! Blessed are they that keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not! Blessed is the man that hears me, and that watches daily at my gates, and waits at the posts of my doors. He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord! But he that shall sin against me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate me love death!” (Proverbs 8:32-36).
Are you among those who “hear instruction and refuse it not”? Are you among those who “hear” her? Are you among those “that keep her ways”? Or are you among those of whom Our Lord says: “Hypocrites, well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘These people honor Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8).
Fake and Abusive Devotees of Our Lady
St. Louis de Montfort devotes a considerable portion of his book, True Devotion to Mary, to point-out the fake and abusive ways in which many people are devoted—or claim to be devoted—to Our Lady.
“Today, more than ever, we must take pains in choosing true devotion to our Blessed Lady, because, more than ever before, there are false devotions to our Blessed Lady which are easily mistaken for true ones. The devil, like a false coiner and a subtle and experienced sharper, has already deceived and destroyed so many souls by a false devotion to the Blessed Virgin that he makes a daily use of his diabolical experience to plunge many others by this same way into everlasting perdition; amusing them, lulling them to sleep in sin, under the pretext of some prayers badly said or of some outward practices which he inspires. As a false coiner does not ordinarily counterfeit anything but gold or silver, and very rarely other metals, because they are not worth the trouble, so the evil spirit does not for the most part counterfeit other devotions. It is then very important to recognize, first of all, false devotions to our Blessed Lady, in order to avoid them” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
This is why the devil strives so hard with sinners, in order that, having lost divine grace, they may also lose devotion to Mary. St. Louis then lists the fake devotions to Our Lady.
The Critical or “Modernist” Devotees
“The critical devotees are, for the most part, proud scholars, rash and self-sufficient souls, who have, at heart, some devotion to the holy Virgin, but who criticize nearly all the practices of devotion which simple people pay simply and holily to their good Mother, because these practices do not fall in with their own humor and fancy. They call in doubt all the miracles and pious stories recorded by authors worthy of Faith, or that have been drawn from the chronicles of religious orders: narratives which testify to us the mercies and the power of the most holy Virgin.
“They cannot see, without uneasiness, simple and humble people on their knees before an altar or an image of Our Lady, sometimes at the corner of a street, in order to pray to God there. They say that, for their part, they have no taste for these external devotions, and that they are not so naïve as to believe so many tales and stories that are told about Our Lady. These kinds of false devotees and of proud and worldly people are greatly to be feared. They do an infinite wrong to devotion to Our Lady; and they are but too successful in alienating people from it, under the pretext of destroying its abuses” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
This casting doubt on miracles and stories of Our Lady’s power and intervention, fall right in line with Modernist tactics, who use the false philosophy of Agnosticism (which holds that nothing can be truly known for certain) to make us doubt most of the history of the Faith.
The Scrupulous Devotees
“The scrupulous devotees are those who fear to dishonor the Son by honoring the Mother, to abase the one in elevating the other. They cannot bear that we should attribute to Our Lady the most just praise which the holy Fathers of the Church have given her. It is all they can do to endure that there should be more people before the altar of the Blessed Virgin than before the Blessed Sacrament—as if the one were contrary to the other, as if those who prayed to our Blessed Lady did not pray to Jesus Christ through her. They are unwilling that we should speak so often of Our Lady and address her so frequently.
“Here are some of their favorite sayings: “Why so many Rosaries, so many confraternities and so many external devotions to the Blessed Virgin? There is much ignorance in all this. Speak to us of those who are devout to Jesus Christ!” …”We must have recourse to Jesus Christ; He is our only Mediator. We must preach Jesus Christ; this is the solid devotion.”
“To hinder devotion to our Blessed Lady is very dangerous; and it is, under pretext of a greater good, a subtle snare of the evil one. For the more we honor the Blessed Virgin, the more we honor Jesus Christ, because we honor Mary only that we may the more perfectly honor Jesus, since we go to her only as the way by which we are to find the end we are seeking, which is Jesus” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The Superficial “On the Surface” Devotees
“External devotees are persons who make all devotion to our Blessed Lady consist in outward practices. They have no taste except for the exterior of this devotion, because they have no interior spirit of their own. They will say quantities of Rosaries with the greatest precipitation; they will hear many Masses distractedly; they will go, without devotion, to processions; they will enroll themselves in all her confraternities—without amending their lives, without doing any violence to their passions, or without imitating the virtues of that most holy Virgin.
“They have no love but for the outwards part of devotion, without having any relish for its interior. If they have not sensible sweetness in their practices, they think they are doing nothing; they get all out of joint, throw everything up, or do everything at random. The world is full of these exterior devotees, and there are no people who are more critical than they of men of prayer, who foster an interior spirit as the essential thing, without, however, disregarding that outward modesty which always accompanies true devotion” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
These devotees will put great importance upon having statues, pictures, carrying fancy Rosaries, wearing all kinds of Mary’s scapulars, singing hymns to her, etc. You name, they’ll do it! But as Our Lord says: “These people honor Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). We could rephrase that and have Our Lady saying: “These people honor me with their statues, pictures, Rosaries, scapulars, hymns and processions: but their heart is far from me.”
The Presumptuous Devotees
“Presumptuous devotees are sinners abandoned to their passions, or lovers of the world, who under the fair name of Christians and ‘servants’ of our Blessed Lady conceal pride, avarice, impurity, drunkenness, anger, swearing, detraction, injustice or some other sin.
“They sleep in peace in the midst of their bad habits, without doing any violence to themselves to correct their faults, under the pretext that they are devout to the Blessed Virgin. They promise themselves that God will pardon them; that they will not be allowed to die without confession; and that they will not be lost eternally because they say the Rosary, because they fast on Saturdays, because they belong to the Confraternity of the Holy Rosary, or wear the Scapular, or are enrolled in other congregations, or they wear the little habit or little chain of Our Lady.
“They will not believe us when we tell them that their devotion is only an illusion of the devil and a pernicious presumption likely to destroy their souls. They say that God is good and merciful; that He has not made us to condemn us everlastingly; that no man is without sin; that they shall not die without confession; that one good act of contrition at the hour of death is enough; that they are devout to Our Lady, wear the Scapular, say daily, without fail and without vanity, seven Our Fathers and seven Hail Mary’s in her honor; and that they sometimes say the Rosary and the Office of Our Lady, besides fasting and other things.
“To give authority to all this, and to blind themselves still further, they quote certain stories which they have heard or read—it does not matter to them whether they be true or false—relating how people have died in mortal sin without confession, and then, because in their lifetime they sometimes said some prayers or went through some practices of devotion to Our Lady, how they have been raised to life again in order to go to confession; or their soul has been miraculously retained in their bodies till confession; or through the clemency of the Blessed Virgin they have obtained from God, at the moment of death, contrition and pardon of their sins, and so have been saved; and that they themselves expect similar favors.
“Nothing in Christianity is more detestable than this diabolical presumption. For how can we truly say that we love and honor our Blessed Lady when by our sins we are pitilessly piercing, wounding, crucifying and outraging Jesus Christ, her Son? If Mary laid down a law to herself, to save by her mercy this sort of people, she would be authorizing crime and helping crucify and outrage her Son. Who would ever dare think of such a thing?
“I say that thus to abuse devotion to Our Lady, which, after devotion to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, is the holiest and solidest of all devotions, is to be guilty of a horrible sacrilege, which, after the sacrilege of an unworthy Communion, is the greatest and least pardonable of all sacrileges.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The “Hot and Cold” Devotees
“The inconstant devotees are those who are devout to our Blessed Lady by fits and starts. Sometimes they are fervent and sometimes lukewarm. Sometimes they seem ready to do anything for her, and then a little afterward, they are not like the same people. They begin by taking up all the devotions to her, and enrolling themselves in the confraternities; and then they do not practice the rules with fidelity.
“They change like the moon; and Mary puts them under her feet with the crescent, because they are changeable and unworthy to be reckoned among the servants of that faithful Virgin who have for their special graces fidelity and constancy. It were better for such persons not to burden themselves with so many prayers and practices but to choose a few and fulfill them with faithfulness and love, in spite of the world, the devil and the flesh.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
The Hypocritical Devotees
“We have still to mention the false devotees to our Blessed Lady who are the hypocritical devotees, who cloak their sins and sinful habits with her mantle, in order to be taken by men for what they are not.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary). They see devotion to Mary as a respectable in the eyes of others, that will give them an air of respectability by which to create a smoke-screen to their secret sinful lives and thus as a means of fooling others as what they are really like.
The “What’s In It For Me” Devotees
“There are also the self-interested devotees, who have recourse to Our Lady only to gain some lawsuit, or to avoid some danger, or to be cured of some illness, or for some other similar necessity, without which they would forget her altogether. All these are false devotees, pleasing neither to God nor to His holy Mother” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Our Lady on True Devotion
Our Lady, in speaking the Venerable Mary of Agreda, indicates some of the mindsets and attitudes that cause and create a lack of devotion; and what elements contribute to a true devotion: “Fear the danger of not paying attention to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God … In many of the faithful this ignorance goes still farther―for some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored! … From this dangerous attitude originates lukewarmness, want of fervor and diligence, absence of zeal and devotion! … The world does not know where true wisdom dwells … These worldlings abhor everything that is painful … Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom! … In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls, and they hold as being wisdom that which is nothing but diabolical and earthly ignorance! ... God knows that this insane love will pervert the greater part of the human nature!
“There is only one true Good, the highest Good is to be appreciated and recognized. All the other lesser goods are merely fictitious and apparent. Then only shall you give God true appreciation and love, when you shall enjoy and esteem Him above all created things. Carnal men never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or reckoning of It. How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! Under the outwardly good intention, are often hidden the earthly passions and inclinations, which dominate the heart. There are so few who are perfect and who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption. Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. I do not count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become so measureless, there are those who think that also the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be.”
“How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell you how many souls are lost, in order to not cause you to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told you that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation. So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing! It is a great cause of sorrow to me to see mortals failing to call upon me, resulting in so many souls being lost! Afflict yourself, lament and grieve without consolation over this ruin of so many souls!”
“Imitate me and follow my humble footsteps! Exert all your powers toward that which I shall teach you, and apply yourself with all your heart to my virtues and works. Withdraw your affections from all that is earthly, lift your aspirations on high―despising and fleeing all human honors, esteeming them as vanity of vanities and affliction of spirit! … Dispose yourself for the influx of the Holy Spirit and His gifts … Purify your soul by many acts of sorrow for having offended Him, magnify and praise Him with a most ardent love ... See that you advance in devotion and in hearty love toward Him, with special reverence, attention and devotion! … Seek Him, and rest not until you have found Him! … Man has no excuse for not devoting himself entirely to the fulfillment of the divine will ... The fulfillment of the precepts of the Lord must not be cold and lukewarm, but most fervent and devoted! … Whenever the Most High bids you or communicates to you anything for the welfare of souls, or especially for their eternal salvation, devote yourself to it entirely! … Multiply your acts of fervor, your devotions, your spiritual exercises and in all things increase your prayers and sacrifices to the eternal Father for the benefit of mortals! …
“But the soul cannot achieve this if it is not altogether devoted to the Lord! … Show yourself to be devoted! … Be fervent in your devotion! ... Increase your filial devotion toward me! ... You must advance in heartfelt love and devotion toward me, and be convinced that I shall be your help in all tribulations, your constant assistance in all your works; so that the gates of my mercy are opened up for you and for all whom you recommend to me, if only you shall make yourself such as I desire! ... Exhort others to continual love and devotion toward me, engrafting it in their hearts, and I will constitute myself their Mother, their help and defense! … Innumerable are those whom I have saved from the infernal dragon because of their devotion to me, even though they have recited only one Ave, or have said only one word in my honor and invocation. So great is my love for them, that if they would call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! ... All those who are devoted to me, who call upon me at the hour of death, shall be under my special protection in that hour, they shall have me as a defense against the demons, as a help and protection, and shall be presented by me before the tribunal of His mercy and there experience my intercession ... How much my intercession and the power I have in Heaven is worth has never been hidden in the Church, for I have demonstrated my ability to save all by so many thousands of miracles, prodigies and favors operated in behalf of those devoted to me ... Yet, though many are the souls whom I have helped, they are few in comparison with those, whom I could and am willing to help!”
Devotion is not Demotion
The whole idea of “devotion” consists of going over and above what is considered as being average. In a certain sense, devotion could be likened to fanaticism. The word fanatic is today regarded as a negative disapproving word implying unbalanced or obsessive behavior that is extreme or excessive. Yet God seems to demand a kind of fanaticism when He commands: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). If someone gives their whole time, whole focus, whole energy to something―then we call them a fanatic. God wants fanatics that are not focused on the right things and not the wrong things. God has programmed everyone to be a fanatic―otherwise we could not love God with our whole, entire, total mind, heart, soul and strength.
We find the origins of “devotion” in Latin, rooted in words like: “devotus, devotio, devovere”, etc. The verb, devovere”, giving the past participle “devotus”, is itself based on the verb “vovere”, pp. “votus”, meaning “to give up, to vow, dedicate or consecrate.” The Latin “devotus” means “faithful”, from which we obviously get our word “devoted”.
If we come to more modern times, and look up the word in the book of definitions, the Dictionary, we will encounter such definitions as: (1) earnestness and zeal in the performance of religious duties and observations; (2) religious fervor, reverence, piety; (3) an act of prayer or supplication—now usually used in plural; (4) oblation or offering, such as of oneself or an alms given from religious motives; (5) ardent love or affection; (6) strong attachment; (7) dedication or attachment to a cause, person, principle, etc. (8) zeal, enthusiasm.
This gives us a clear picture of “devotion” being a cut-above the average, being something especially noticeable due to the presence of a zeal, a fervor, an enthusiasm, a strong attachment and ardent love for some object or thing, or some person, or some place. It rules out notions like lukewarmness, tepidity, torpor, sloth, indifference, inconsistency, sporadic, half-hearted, selfish, etc.
Promotion not Demotion
This leads us to examine and question our own “devotion” to God and Our Lady. Is it above the average? Is it earnest, zealous, fervent, strong, enthusiastic? Or is it misfiring, sporadic, occasional, seasonal, etc.? Do the following words of Fr. Frederick Faber apply to us:
“Those who love God, lament that they do not love Him more. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but remember, nothing short of an immense one! Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that even Protestants may feel at ease about her! Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be! It has no faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized!
“Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines! Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother! Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!”
In essence, Fr. Faber is saying that it is our abuse of devotion to Mary that is at the heart of all our problems in the world, the Church, the family and personal lives. Yet―no doubt―we all have our excuses for explaining why our devotion to Mary is―as Fr. Faber says― “low and thin and poor; not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be!” At Fatima, Our Lady clearly stated: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. Jesus wants to use you to make me known and loved. He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” Speaking of herself in the third person, Our Lady adds: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” While at Akita, she adds: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach!”
Your Mother is Being Abused! Will You Just Stand By and Watch?
Our lukewarmness towards Our Lady, our indifference, our half-heartedness, and our minimalist devotion is most certainly an abuse of the kindness and mercy shown to each and every one of us by Our Lady. Yet there are some who abuse her even more! Yes―of course―every sin we commit, whether it be Venial or Mortal, is an abuse of Our Lady just as it is an abuse of God. Yet some go even further than that and directly attack Our Lady in many ways!
On December 10th, 1925, Our Lady and the Child Jesus appeared to Lucia in her convent. Our Lady showed Lucia a heart encircled by thorns which she was holding in her hand. At the same time, the Child Jesus said: “Have compassion on the Heart of your most holy Mother, covered with thorns, with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to make an act of reparation to remove them.” Then the most holy Virgin said: “Look at my Heart, surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce me at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You at least try to console me and say that I promise to assist, at the hour of death, with the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months, shall confess, receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary, and keep me company for fifteen minutes while meditating on the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me.”
Our Lady asked for Communions of reparation on five first Saturdays, instead of some other number. Our Blessed Lord answered that question when He appeared to Sr. Lucia May 29th, 1930. He explained that it was because of five kinds of offenses and blasphemies against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Our Lord said:
“My daughter, the motive is simple: there are five ways in which people offend and blaspheme against the Immaculate Heart of Mary:
(1) Blasphemies against the Immaculate Conception.
(2) Blasphemies against her Perpetual Virginity.
(3) Blasphemies against her Divine Maternity and at the same time the refusal to recognize her as the Mother of all mankind,
(4) Blasphemies of those who seek openly to foster in the hearts of children indifference or contempt and even hatred for this Immaculate Mother.
(5) The offenses of those who directly outrage Her in her holy images.
Here then, is the reason why the Immaculate Heart of Mary [My Mother] causes Me to ask for this little act of reparation and by means of it, moves My mercy to forgive those souls who had the misfortune of offending her. As for you, try without ceasing, with all your prayers and sacrifices, to move Me to mercy toward those poor souls.”
Our Lord and Our Lady asked for reparation from faithful Catholics for these blasphemies against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Very little reparation is done―for the most part, the few Catholics that are still regularly practicing the Faith, in essence are thinking: “I’m not committing these blasphemies―so why should I make reparation?” Our Mother is being attacked, assaulted, insulted―and we don’t want to do anything about it! Is that devotion? The words of Our Lord come to mind: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30). We are like the Jewish Priest and Jewish Levite in Our Lord’s parable about the Good Samaritan, who saw a fellow Jew half-dead by the roadside after being attacked by robbers―but they did nothing to help and merely passed by him.
Article 28
Wednesday & Thursday, May 15th & 16th
Gow Will Inspect Your Fruit!
Wednesday & Thursday, May 15th & 16th
Gow Will Inspect Your Fruit!
God Creates Fruit!
God loves fruit! God created fruit trees when He created the world: “In the beginning God created Heaven, and Earth … And He said: ‘Let the earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the earth!’ And it was so done. And the earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that bears fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.” (Genesis 1:1-12).
And the Lord God formed man of the slime of the earth and breathed into his face the breath of life, and man became a living soul. And the Lord God had planted a paradise of pleasure from the beginning: wherein He placed man whom He had formed. And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of. The tree of life was also in the midst of paradise, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. And the Lord God took man, and put him into the paradise of pleasure, to dress it, and to keep it. And the Lord commanded him, saying: ‘“And God said: ‘Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed upon the Earth, and all trees that have in themselves seed of their own kind to be your meat … Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” (Genesis 1:29; 2:7-17).
God Wants Fruit
Thus we see God create fruit trees to be food for Adam and Eve, and commands them to work the land, to farm and produce what God had planted and to keep producing fruit. God expected Adam to work and produce fruit. The same applies to everyone―ourselves included: “‘I will visit upon you according to the fruit of your doings!’ saith the Lord” (Jeremias 21:14). God will “render unto everyone according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his devices” (Jeremias 32:19). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:8).
God demands the first-fruits of many things―including the fruit of trees―to be offered to Him: “Bring the first fruits of the land, and the first-fruits of all fruit of every tree, from year to year, in the house of our Lord” (2 Esdras 10:37). Furthermore, God’s “fruit is better than gold and the precious stone and choice silver!” (Proverbs 8:19). God again speaks of fruit to Moses: “When you shall be come into the land, and shall have planted in it fruit trees, you shall take away the first-fruits of them―the fruit that comes forth shall be unclean to you, neither shall you eat of them. But in the fourth year, all their fruit shall be sanctified, to the praise of the Lord. And in the fifth year you shall eat the fruits thereof, gathering the increase thereof. I am the Lord your God.” (Leviticus 19:23-24) … “I am the Lord. If you walk in my precepts, and keep my commandments, and do them, I will give you rain in due seasons and the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit” (Leviticus 26:2-4) … “The Lord will make thee abound with all goods―with the fruit of thy womb, and the fruit of thy cattle, with the fruit of thy land―which the Lord swore to thy fathers that He would give thee!” (Deuteronomy 28:11) … “But if thou wilt not hear the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep and to do all His commandments and ceremonies, then cursed shall be the fruit of thy womb, and the fruit of thy ground, the herds of thy oxen, and the flocks of thy sheep!” (Deuteronomy 28:15-18).
Our Lord Demands Fruit
Our Lord tells us: “I have chosen you that you should go and should bring forth fruit; and that your fruit should remain!” (John 15:16) ... “In this is My Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit!” (John 15:8). Our Lord Himself was the fruit of the womb of Mary―as stated by St. Elizabeth under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, said to Mary: “Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb!” (Luke 1:42). We also see Our Lord have a taste for fruit and also be demanding as to fruit being produced: “And seeing a certain fig tree by the wayside, Jesus came to it and found nothing on it but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward, forever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19).
“Jesus spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why does in encumber the ground? But the dresser, answering, said to him: “Lord, leave it alone this year also, until I dig around it and dung it! And perhaps, happily, it bears fruit―but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”’” (Luke 13:6-9).
“Hear ye another parable. There was a man who planted a vineyard and leased it out to farmers; and went abroad into a strange country for a long time. And when the time of the fruits drew near, he sent his servants to the farmers, so that they might receive the fruits thereof―that they should give him of the fruit of the vineyard. And the farmers, laying hands on his servants, beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again he sent other servants, more than the former―and the farmers did to them in like manner. And last of all he sent to them his son, saying: “They will reverence my son!” But the husbandmen seeing the son, said among themselves: “This is the heir! Come, let us kill him, and we shall have his inheritance!” And taking him, they cast him forth out of the vineyard, and killed him. When, therefore, the lord of the vineyard shall come, what will he do to those husbandmen? He will come and destroy these farmers. He will bring those evil men to an evil end; and will lease out his vineyard to other farmers, who shall give him the fruit in due season!’” (Matthew 21:33-41; Luke 20:9-16).
Yet another parable sends the same message: “Behold the sower went forth to sow seed! And, while he sowed, some seed fell by the way side, and the birds of the air came and ate them up. And other seed fell upon stony ground, where they had not much earth―and they sprung up immediately, because they had no deepness of earth. And when the sun was up, they were scorched and, because they had not root, they withered away. And other seed fell among thorns and the thorns grew up and choked them. And other seed fell upon good ground―and they brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold … Hear you therefore the [explanation] parable of the sower! When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, there cometh the wicked one, and catches away that which was sown in his heart: this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon stony ground, is he that hears the word, and immediately receives it with joy. Yet hath he not root in himself, but is only for a time: and when there arises tribulation and persecution because of the word, he is presently scandalized. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word, and he becomes fruitless! But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears the word, and understands, and bears fruit, and yields the one an hundredfold, and another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold” (Matthew 13:3-8; 13:18-23).
Thus Our Lord says: “By their fruits you shall know them! Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit! A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). “Either make the tree good and its fruit good; or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33).
This demand for fruit is repeated at the Last Supper, where Jesus said: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer [gardener]. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches: he that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit: for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:1-6).
The Holy Ghost is Fruitful
It was the Holy Ghost who produced the fruit of Mary’s womb―Jesus Christ: “The angel said to her: ‘Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God. Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a Son; and thou shalt call His Name Jesus … The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee. And, therefore, the Holy One which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God’” (Luke 1:30-35).
“The fruit of the Spirit is, charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity, mildness, faith, modesty, continency, chastity” (Galatians 5:22).
God Made Mary Fruitful
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of Our Lady’s fruitfulness at the hand of God: “God the Father communicated to Mary His fruitfulness, in order that He might give her the power to produce His Son and all the members of His Mystical Body … God the Holy Ghost, is become fruitful by Mary, whom He has espoused. It was with her, in her, and of her that He produced His Masterpiece―which is God made Man―and that He goes on producing daily, to the end of the world, the predestinate and the members of the Body of that adorable Head … Besides this, Jesus being at present as much as ever the fruit of Mary—as Heaven and Earth repeat thousands and thousands of times a day, ‘and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus’—it is certain that Jesus Christ is, for each man in particular who possesses Him, as truly the fruit and the work of Mary … Jesus is the fruit and the glory of Mary … Jesus is everywhere and always the Fruit and the Son of Mary; and Mary is everywhere the veritable tree who bears the Fruit of life, and the true Mother who produces it … He who wishes to have the fruit of life, Jesus Christ, must have the tree of life, which is Mary … If Mary, who is the tree of life, is well cultivated in our soul by fidelity to the practices of this devotion, she will bear her fruit in her own time, and her fruit is none other than Jesus Christ ... Jesus Christ wishes to receive some fruits from our wretched selves, namely our good works, because those works belong to Him alone: ‘Created in good works, in Christ Jesus’ (Ephesians 2:10) … When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce, because she alone is the fruitful Virgin who never has had, and never will have, her equal in purity and in fruitfulness” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
What Fruits Are You Producing?
Are your fruits heavenly or worldly? Spiritual or material. Our Lord warned against accumulating worldly fruits over spiritual fruits: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
A lesson is to be learned from the fruits offered by Cain and Abel ― both of whom made offerings to God. “Abel was a shepherd, and Cain a farmer. And it came to pass, after many days, that Cain offered gifts to the Lord of the fruits of the earth. Abel also offered of the firstlings of his flock, and of their fat―and the Lord had respect to [accepted] Abel and to his offerings. But to Cain and his offerings, the Lord had no respect [did not accept]―and Cain was exceedingly angry, and his countenance fell. And the Lord said to him: ‘Why are you angry? And why is your countenance fallen? If you have done well, shall you not receive acceptance? But if you have done ill, shall not sin forthwith be present at the door?” (Genesis 4:2-7). Are we giving God the best―like Abel? Or are we giving God second best―like Cain? Our Lord says: “Seek first the kingdom of God and all these [other necessary] things shall be added unto you!” (Luke 12:31).
“And Jesus spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns and will build bigger ones; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and all my goods! And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thy rest―eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool! This very night do they require thy soul of thee! And whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’” (Luke 12:16-21).
“Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, then itself it remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit. He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:24-25).
St. Louis de Montfort comments: “We must make use of the things of this world as if we made no use of them at all. (1 Corinthians 7:29-31). This is what St. Paul calls dying daily. (1 Corinthians 15:31). ‘Unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, itself remains alone,’ and brings forth no good fruit. (John 12:24-25). If we do not die to ourselves, and if our holiest devotions do not incline us to this necessary and useful death, we shall bring forth no fruit worth anything, and our devotions will become useless. All our good works will be stained by self-love and our own will; and this will cause God to hold in abomination the greatest sacrifices we can make and the best actions we can do; so that at our death we shall find our hands empty of virtues and of merits and we shall not have one spark of pure love.”
Our “treasure in Heaven” or our spiritual fruits should be those that pertain to holiness: “Health of the soul in holiness is better than all gold and silver … a never failing treasure of holiness” (Ecclesiasticus 30:15, 23). “Put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice, truth and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24). “Being made free from sin, you now have your fruit unto sanctification and the end of it is life everlasting” (Romans 6:22) … “You have heard in the word of the truth of the Gospel, which has come unto you and grows and brings forth fruit” (Colossians 1:5-6) … “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance! … Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire” (Matthew 3:8-10).
According to the testimonies of Our Lord, Our Lady and many Saints―there are a heck of a lot unfruitful ‘trees’ burning in Hell right now! Our Lord warned: “Many are called, but few are chosen … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 22:14; 7:13-14). At Fatima, Our Lady said: “Many souls go to Hell!” and to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady lamented: “The number of the reprobate is uncountable!” The Saints add: “Many arrive at the Faith, few are led into the heavenly kingdom!” (Pope St. Gregory the Great) … “The majority of men shall not see God!” (St. Justin) … “It is certain that few are saved!” (St. Augustine) … “Those who are saved are in the minority!” (St. Thomas Aquinas) … “Everyone desires to be saved but the greater part is lost!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori) ... “The number of the elect is so small―so small―that were we to know how small it is, we would faint away with grief!” (St. Louis de Montfort) ... “So vast a number of souls perish, and so comparatively few are saved!” (St. Philip Neri) ... “The world is dragging the majority of men into the pit of perdition!” (John Eudes) … “Taking into account the behavior of mankind, only a small part of the human race will be saved!” (Sister Lucia of Fatima).
Don’t Turn Up Empty Handed!
There are some souls―most souls―who are under the illusion that it simply suffices to have the Faith to get to Heaven. Nothing is further from the truth! The Faith is merely a seed that needs to grow and produce fruits: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! … You believe that there is one God. You do well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
God warns us in Holy Scripture: “Thou shalt not appear empty before Me!” (Exodus 23:15) … “Thou shalt not appear empty in the sight of the Lord” (Ecclesiasticus 35:6). “No one shall appear with his hands empty before the Lord!” (Deuteronomy 16:16). Nevertheless, “The majority of souls appear before the Judgment empty-handed. They did nothing good for eternity!” (Venerable Mary of Agreda). Consequently, these empty-handed and fruitless souls will face the wrath of God: “You shall be ashamed of your fruits, because of the fierce wrath of the Lord!” (Jeremias 12:13). “I will render to everyone according to his work [fruits]” (Proverbs 24:29) … “I am the Lord who searches the heart and who gives to everyone according to his way and according to the fruit of his devices!” (Jeremias 17:10).
This reminds us of Our Lord’s parable about the unprofitable servant or fruitless servant: “A man called his servants and to one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―to everyone according to his proper ability. He that had received the five talents, traded with them and gained another five. He that had received the two talents, gained another two. But he that received one talent, dug a hole into the earth and hid his lord’s money. After a long time, the lord came and reckoned with them. He that had received the five talents brought the other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you gave me five talents! Behold I have gained another five in addition!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant!’ He that had received two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you gave me two talents! Behold, I have gained another two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant!’ But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man! Being afraid, I went and hid your talent in the ground! Behold here it is―you can take back that which is yours!’ And his lord, answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You ought to have at least committed my money to the bankers, so that, at my coming, I should have received my own money back with usury [additional interest]!’ Take away the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
A lot of unprofitable servants or fruitless Catholics have found themselves cast into the exterior darkness and are now weeping and gnashing their teeth! As Our Lady said: “The number of the reprobate is uncountable!” How profitable are we? Have we used the “talents” that God gave us? The servant who was given five talents, produced five extra talents! “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). You have been given the Catholic Faith by the grace of God, without any merit on your part―for everything that is good is due to the grace of God. With there currently being around 1.4 billion (1,400 million) Catholics in a world population of around 8 billion (8,000 million), that puts you in a minority of around 1 in 5 persons. If you are a Traditional Catholic―of which there are only around 7 million worldwide―then you are 1 in 200,000,000 (200 million) persons among Catholics, or 1 in 1.1 billion (1,100 million) persons of the entire world’s population. To whom more has been forgiven, more is demanded. Are you living up to those demands? Are you producing fruit? “A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bucket, but upon a candlestick, so that it may shine to all that are in the house! So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” says Our Lord (Matthew 5:14-16).
Growing Fruit Under the Sun
Crop growth and yield are strongly affected by sunlight, temperature and growing season rainfall. From a farmer’s perspective, temperature and water availability are the two most important environmental factors that affect crop production. The same could be said for the production of spiritual fruits―the light from the sun can be compared to the light of the Faith; the heat of the sun can be compared to charity; and rainfall can be compared to grace.
As for the light of the Faith, Scripture says: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6). As regards the warmth and temperature of Charity, Scripture tells us: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). As for the rainfall of grace, Our Lord says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) and Scripture adds: “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17).
Fruitful With Mary
St. Louis de Montfort tells us give ourselves entirely to Mary if we desire to be truly fruitful in the eyes of God: “We give to Our Lord, by His Mother’s hands, all our good works, that good Mother purifies them, embellishes them and makes them acceptable to her Son. She purifies them of all the stain of self-love, and of that imperceptible attachment to created things which slips unnoticed into our best actions. As soon as they are in her most pure and fruitful hands, those same hands, which have never been sullied or idle and which purify whatever they touch, take away from the present which we give her all that was spoiled or imperfect about it.
“She embellishes our works, adorning them with her own merits and virtues. It is as if a peasant, wishing to gain the friendship and benevolence of the king, went to the queen and presented her with a fruit which was his whole revenue, in order that she might present it to the king. The queen, having accepted the poor little offering from the peasant, would place the fruit on a large and beautiful dish of gold, and so, on the peasant’s behalf, would present it to the king. Then the fruit, however unworthy in itself to be a king’s present, would become worthy of his majesty because of the dish of gold on which it rested and the person who presented it.
“She presents these good works to Jesus Christ; for she keeps nothing of what is given her for herself, as if she were our last end. She faithfully passes it all on to Jesus. If we give to her, we give necessarily to Jesus. If we praise her or glorify her, she immediately praises and glorifies Jesus. As of old when St. Elizabeth praised her, so now when we praise her and bless her, she sings: “My soul doth magnify the Lord.” (Luke 1:46).
“She persuades Jesus to accept these good works, however little and poor the present may be for that Saint of Saints and that King of Kings. When we present anything to Jesus by ourselves, and relying on our own efforts and dispositions, Jesus examines the offering, and often rejects it because of the stains it has contracted through self-love, just as of old He rejected the sacrifices of the Jews when they were full of their own will. But when we present Him anything by the pure and virginal hands of His well-beloved, we take Him by His weak side, if it is allowable to use such a term. He does not consider so much the thing that is given Him as the Mother who presents it. He does not consider so much whence the offering comes, as by whom it comes.
“Thus Mary, who is never repelled but always well received by her Son, makes everything she presents to Him, great or small, acceptable to His Majesty. Mary has but to present it for Jesus to accept it and be pleased with it. St. Bernard used to give to those whom he conducted to perfection this great counsel: ‘When you want to offer anything to God, take care to offer it by the most agreeable and worthy hands of Mary, unless you wish to have it rejected.’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Mary Will Not Do It Without You!
Having read the above, you might be tempted to fall into presumption―expecting Mary to “do it all”! St. Augustine says that God could save man without man’s cooperation, but God will not save man without man’s cooperation. The same applies to Mary. Her words at La Salette come to mind on this matter: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
God loves fruit! God created fruit trees when He created the world: “In the beginning God created Heaven, and Earth … And He said: ‘Let the earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the earth!’ And it was so done. And the earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that bears fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.” (Genesis 1:1-12).
And the Lord God formed man of the slime of the earth and breathed into his face the breath of life, and man became a living soul. And the Lord God had planted a paradise of pleasure from the beginning: wherein He placed man whom He had formed. And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of. The tree of life was also in the midst of paradise, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. And the Lord God took man, and put him into the paradise of pleasure, to dress it, and to keep it. And the Lord commanded him, saying: ‘“And God said: ‘Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed upon the Earth, and all trees that have in themselves seed of their own kind to be your meat … Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” (Genesis 1:29; 2:7-17).
God Wants Fruit
Thus we see God create fruit trees to be food for Adam and Eve, and commands them to work the land, to farm and produce what God had planted and to keep producing fruit. God expected Adam to work and produce fruit. The same applies to everyone―ourselves included: “‘I will visit upon you according to the fruit of your doings!’ saith the Lord” (Jeremias 21:14). God will “render unto everyone according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his devices” (Jeremias 32:19). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:8).
God demands the first-fruits of many things―including the fruit of trees―to be offered to Him: “Bring the first fruits of the land, and the first-fruits of all fruit of every tree, from year to year, in the house of our Lord” (2 Esdras 10:37). Furthermore, God’s “fruit is better than gold and the precious stone and choice silver!” (Proverbs 8:19). God again speaks of fruit to Moses: “When you shall be come into the land, and shall have planted in it fruit trees, you shall take away the first-fruits of them―the fruit that comes forth shall be unclean to you, neither shall you eat of them. But in the fourth year, all their fruit shall be sanctified, to the praise of the Lord. And in the fifth year you shall eat the fruits thereof, gathering the increase thereof. I am the Lord your God.” (Leviticus 19:23-24) … “I am the Lord. If you walk in my precepts, and keep my commandments, and do them, I will give you rain in due seasons and the ground shall bring forth its increase, and the trees shall be filled with fruit” (Leviticus 26:2-4) … “The Lord will make thee abound with all goods―with the fruit of thy womb, and the fruit of thy cattle, with the fruit of thy land―which the Lord swore to thy fathers that He would give thee!” (Deuteronomy 28:11) … “But if thou wilt not hear the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep and to do all His commandments and ceremonies, then cursed shall be the fruit of thy womb, and the fruit of thy ground, the herds of thy oxen, and the flocks of thy sheep!” (Deuteronomy 28:15-18).
Our Lord Demands Fruit
Our Lord tells us: “I have chosen you that you should go and should bring forth fruit; and that your fruit should remain!” (John 15:16) ... “In this is My Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit!” (John 15:8). Our Lord Himself was the fruit of the womb of Mary―as stated by St. Elizabeth under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, said to Mary: “Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb!” (Luke 1:42). We also see Our Lord have a taste for fruit and also be demanding as to fruit being produced: “And seeing a certain fig tree by the wayside, Jesus came to it and found nothing on it but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward, forever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19).
“Jesus spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why does in encumber the ground? But the dresser, answering, said to him: “Lord, leave it alone this year also, until I dig around it and dung it! And perhaps, happily, it bears fruit―but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”’” (Luke 13:6-9).
“Hear ye another parable. There was a man who planted a vineyard and leased it out to farmers; and went abroad into a strange country for a long time. And when the time of the fruits drew near, he sent his servants to the farmers, so that they might receive the fruits thereof―that they should give him of the fruit of the vineyard. And the farmers, laying hands on his servants, beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again he sent other servants, more than the former―and the farmers did to them in like manner. And last of all he sent to them his son, saying: “They will reverence my son!” But the husbandmen seeing the son, said among themselves: “This is the heir! Come, let us kill him, and we shall have his inheritance!” And taking him, they cast him forth out of the vineyard, and killed him. When, therefore, the lord of the vineyard shall come, what will he do to those husbandmen? He will come and destroy these farmers. He will bring those evil men to an evil end; and will lease out his vineyard to other farmers, who shall give him the fruit in due season!’” (Matthew 21:33-41; Luke 20:9-16).
Yet another parable sends the same message: “Behold the sower went forth to sow seed! And, while he sowed, some seed fell by the way side, and the birds of the air came and ate them up. And other seed fell upon stony ground, where they had not much earth―and they sprung up immediately, because they had no deepness of earth. And when the sun was up, they were scorched and, because they had not root, they withered away. And other seed fell among thorns and the thorns grew up and choked them. And other seed fell upon good ground―and they brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold … Hear you therefore the [explanation] parable of the sower! When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, there cometh the wicked one, and catches away that which was sown in his heart: this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon stony ground, is he that hears the word, and immediately receives it with joy. Yet hath he not root in himself, but is only for a time: and when there arises tribulation and persecution because of the word, he is presently scandalized. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word, and he becomes fruitless! But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears the word, and understands, and bears fruit, and yields the one an hundredfold, and another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold” (Matthew 13:3-8; 13:18-23).
Thus Our Lord says: “By their fruits you shall know them! Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit! A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). “Either make the tree good and its fruit good; or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33).
This demand for fruit is repeated at the Last Supper, where Jesus said: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer [gardener]. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches: he that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit: for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn!” (John 15:1-6).
The Holy Ghost is Fruitful
It was the Holy Ghost who produced the fruit of Mary’s womb―Jesus Christ: “The angel said to her: ‘Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God. Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a Son; and thou shalt call His Name Jesus … The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee. And, therefore, the Holy One which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God’” (Luke 1:30-35).
“The fruit of the Spirit is, charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity, mildness, faith, modesty, continency, chastity” (Galatians 5:22).
God Made Mary Fruitful
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of Our Lady’s fruitfulness at the hand of God: “God the Father communicated to Mary His fruitfulness, in order that He might give her the power to produce His Son and all the members of His Mystical Body … God the Holy Ghost, is become fruitful by Mary, whom He has espoused. It was with her, in her, and of her that He produced His Masterpiece―which is God made Man―and that He goes on producing daily, to the end of the world, the predestinate and the members of the Body of that adorable Head … Besides this, Jesus being at present as much as ever the fruit of Mary—as Heaven and Earth repeat thousands and thousands of times a day, ‘and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus’—it is certain that Jesus Christ is, for each man in particular who possesses Him, as truly the fruit and the work of Mary … Jesus is the fruit and the glory of Mary … Jesus is everywhere and always the Fruit and the Son of Mary; and Mary is everywhere the veritable tree who bears the Fruit of life, and the true Mother who produces it … He who wishes to have the fruit of life, Jesus Christ, must have the tree of life, which is Mary … If Mary, who is the tree of life, is well cultivated in our soul by fidelity to the practices of this devotion, she will bear her fruit in her own time, and her fruit is none other than Jesus Christ ... Jesus Christ wishes to receive some fruits from our wretched selves, namely our good works, because those works belong to Him alone: ‘Created in good works, in Christ Jesus’ (Ephesians 2:10) … When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce, because she alone is the fruitful Virgin who never has had, and never will have, her equal in purity and in fruitfulness” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
What Fruits Are You Producing?
Are your fruits heavenly or worldly? Spiritual or material. Our Lord warned against accumulating worldly fruits over spiritual fruits: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
A lesson is to be learned from the fruits offered by Cain and Abel ― both of whom made offerings to God. “Abel was a shepherd, and Cain a farmer. And it came to pass, after many days, that Cain offered gifts to the Lord of the fruits of the earth. Abel also offered of the firstlings of his flock, and of their fat―and the Lord had respect to [accepted] Abel and to his offerings. But to Cain and his offerings, the Lord had no respect [did not accept]―and Cain was exceedingly angry, and his countenance fell. And the Lord said to him: ‘Why are you angry? And why is your countenance fallen? If you have done well, shall you not receive acceptance? But if you have done ill, shall not sin forthwith be present at the door?” (Genesis 4:2-7). Are we giving God the best―like Abel? Or are we giving God second best―like Cain? Our Lord says: “Seek first the kingdom of God and all these [other necessary] things shall be added unto you!” (Luke 12:31).
“And Jesus spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns and will build bigger ones; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and all my goods! And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thy rest―eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool! This very night do they require thy soul of thee! And whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’” (Luke 12:16-21).
“Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, then itself it remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit. He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:24-25).
St. Louis de Montfort comments: “We must make use of the things of this world as if we made no use of them at all. (1 Corinthians 7:29-31). This is what St. Paul calls dying daily. (1 Corinthians 15:31). ‘Unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, itself remains alone,’ and brings forth no good fruit. (John 12:24-25). If we do not die to ourselves, and if our holiest devotions do not incline us to this necessary and useful death, we shall bring forth no fruit worth anything, and our devotions will become useless. All our good works will be stained by self-love and our own will; and this will cause God to hold in abomination the greatest sacrifices we can make and the best actions we can do; so that at our death we shall find our hands empty of virtues and of merits and we shall not have one spark of pure love.”
Our “treasure in Heaven” or our spiritual fruits should be those that pertain to holiness: “Health of the soul in holiness is better than all gold and silver … a never failing treasure of holiness” (Ecclesiasticus 30:15, 23). “Put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice, truth and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24). “Being made free from sin, you now have your fruit unto sanctification and the end of it is life everlasting” (Romans 6:22) … “You have heard in the word of the truth of the Gospel, which has come unto you and grows and brings forth fruit” (Colossians 1:5-6) … “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance! … Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire” (Matthew 3:8-10).
According to the testimonies of Our Lord, Our Lady and many Saints―there are a heck of a lot unfruitful ‘trees’ burning in Hell right now! Our Lord warned: “Many are called, but few are chosen … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 22:14; 7:13-14). At Fatima, Our Lady said: “Many souls go to Hell!” and to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady lamented: “The number of the reprobate is uncountable!” The Saints add: “Many arrive at the Faith, few are led into the heavenly kingdom!” (Pope St. Gregory the Great) … “The majority of men shall not see God!” (St. Justin) … “It is certain that few are saved!” (St. Augustine) … “Those who are saved are in the minority!” (St. Thomas Aquinas) … “Everyone desires to be saved but the greater part is lost!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori) ... “The number of the elect is so small―so small―that were we to know how small it is, we would faint away with grief!” (St. Louis de Montfort) ... “So vast a number of souls perish, and so comparatively few are saved!” (St. Philip Neri) ... “The world is dragging the majority of men into the pit of perdition!” (John Eudes) … “Taking into account the behavior of mankind, only a small part of the human race will be saved!” (Sister Lucia of Fatima).
Don’t Turn Up Empty Handed!
There are some souls―most souls―who are under the illusion that it simply suffices to have the Faith to get to Heaven. Nothing is further from the truth! The Faith is merely a seed that needs to grow and produce fruits: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! … You believe that there is one God. You do well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
God warns us in Holy Scripture: “Thou shalt not appear empty before Me!” (Exodus 23:15) … “Thou shalt not appear empty in the sight of the Lord” (Ecclesiasticus 35:6). “No one shall appear with his hands empty before the Lord!” (Deuteronomy 16:16). Nevertheless, “The majority of souls appear before the Judgment empty-handed. They did nothing good for eternity!” (Venerable Mary of Agreda). Consequently, these empty-handed and fruitless souls will face the wrath of God: “You shall be ashamed of your fruits, because of the fierce wrath of the Lord!” (Jeremias 12:13). “I will render to everyone according to his work [fruits]” (Proverbs 24:29) … “I am the Lord who searches the heart and who gives to everyone according to his way and according to the fruit of his devices!” (Jeremias 17:10).
This reminds us of Our Lord’s parable about the unprofitable servant or fruitless servant: “A man called his servants and to one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―to everyone according to his proper ability. He that had received the five talents, traded with them and gained another five. He that had received the two talents, gained another two. But he that received one talent, dug a hole into the earth and hid his lord’s money. After a long time, the lord came and reckoned with them. He that had received the five talents brought the other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you gave me five talents! Behold I have gained another five in addition!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant!’ He that had received two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you gave me two talents! Behold, I have gained another two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant!’ But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man! Being afraid, I went and hid your talent in the ground! Behold here it is―you can take back that which is yours!’ And his lord, answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You ought to have at least committed my money to the bankers, so that, at my coming, I should have received my own money back with usury [additional interest]!’ Take away the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
A lot of unprofitable servants or fruitless Catholics have found themselves cast into the exterior darkness and are now weeping and gnashing their teeth! As Our Lady said: “The number of the reprobate is uncountable!” How profitable are we? Have we used the “talents” that God gave us? The servant who was given five talents, produced five extra talents! “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required―and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). You have been given the Catholic Faith by the grace of God, without any merit on your part―for everything that is good is due to the grace of God. With there currently being around 1.4 billion (1,400 million) Catholics in a world population of around 8 billion (8,000 million), that puts you in a minority of around 1 in 5 persons. If you are a Traditional Catholic―of which there are only around 7 million worldwide―then you are 1 in 200,000,000 (200 million) persons among Catholics, or 1 in 1.1 billion (1,100 million) persons of the entire world’s population. To whom more has been forgiven, more is demanded. Are you living up to those demands? Are you producing fruit? “A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bucket, but upon a candlestick, so that it may shine to all that are in the house! So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” says Our Lord (Matthew 5:14-16).
Growing Fruit Under the Sun
Crop growth and yield are strongly affected by sunlight, temperature and growing season rainfall. From a farmer’s perspective, temperature and water availability are the two most important environmental factors that affect crop production. The same could be said for the production of spiritual fruits―the light from the sun can be compared to the light of the Faith; the heat of the sun can be compared to charity; and rainfall can be compared to grace.
As for the light of the Faith, Scripture says: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6). As regards the warmth and temperature of Charity, Scripture tells us: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). As for the rainfall of grace, Our Lord says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) and Scripture adds: “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17).
Fruitful With Mary
St. Louis de Montfort tells us give ourselves entirely to Mary if we desire to be truly fruitful in the eyes of God: “We give to Our Lord, by His Mother’s hands, all our good works, that good Mother purifies them, embellishes them and makes them acceptable to her Son. She purifies them of all the stain of self-love, and of that imperceptible attachment to created things which slips unnoticed into our best actions. As soon as they are in her most pure and fruitful hands, those same hands, which have never been sullied or idle and which purify whatever they touch, take away from the present which we give her all that was spoiled or imperfect about it.
“She embellishes our works, adorning them with her own merits and virtues. It is as if a peasant, wishing to gain the friendship and benevolence of the king, went to the queen and presented her with a fruit which was his whole revenue, in order that she might present it to the king. The queen, having accepted the poor little offering from the peasant, would place the fruit on a large and beautiful dish of gold, and so, on the peasant’s behalf, would present it to the king. Then the fruit, however unworthy in itself to be a king’s present, would become worthy of his majesty because of the dish of gold on which it rested and the person who presented it.
“She presents these good works to Jesus Christ; for she keeps nothing of what is given her for herself, as if she were our last end. She faithfully passes it all on to Jesus. If we give to her, we give necessarily to Jesus. If we praise her or glorify her, she immediately praises and glorifies Jesus. As of old when St. Elizabeth praised her, so now when we praise her and bless her, she sings: “My soul doth magnify the Lord.” (Luke 1:46).
“She persuades Jesus to accept these good works, however little and poor the present may be for that Saint of Saints and that King of Kings. When we present anything to Jesus by ourselves, and relying on our own efforts and dispositions, Jesus examines the offering, and often rejects it because of the stains it has contracted through self-love, just as of old He rejected the sacrifices of the Jews when they were full of their own will. But when we present Him anything by the pure and virginal hands of His well-beloved, we take Him by His weak side, if it is allowable to use such a term. He does not consider so much the thing that is given Him as the Mother who presents it. He does not consider so much whence the offering comes, as by whom it comes.
“Thus Mary, who is never repelled but always well received by her Son, makes everything she presents to Him, great or small, acceptable to His Majesty. Mary has but to present it for Jesus to accept it and be pleased with it. St. Bernard used to give to those whom he conducted to perfection this great counsel: ‘When you want to offer anything to God, take care to offer it by the most agreeable and worthy hands of Mary, unless you wish to have it rejected.’” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Mary Will Not Do It Without You!
Having read the above, you might be tempted to fall into presumption―expecting Mary to “do it all”! St. Augustine says that God could save man without man’s cooperation, but God will not save man without man’s cooperation. The same applies to Mary. Her words at La Salette come to mind on this matter: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! In vain you will pray! In vain you will act! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
Article 27
Monday & Tuesday, May 13th & 14th
Fatima Forgotten & Fruitless
Monday & Tuesday, May 13th & 14th
Fatima Forgotten & Fruitless
Today is the Day!
Today―May 13th, 2024―is the 107th anniversary of the first apparition of Our Lady of Fatima in 1917. After her initial apparition on May 13th, she would appear an additional five times over the next successive months until her final apparition on October 13th 1917. The date would be the same―the 13th of each month―apart from August, when the three children had been kidnapped and arrested by the local Masonic mayor.
You could legitimately ask if the Fatima apparitions and messages have been kidnapped and locked up by the modern day Church―even the Conservative and Traditional elements of the Church to a large degree. It is rarely mentioned, the messages are rarely stressed, the demands of Our Lady are rarely promoted and the general points of sacrifices, penances and prayers (especially the Rosary), and the First Saturday Devotions to the Immaculate Heart, as well a continual devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary are rarely encouraged, explained and provided.
In 1957―40 years after the first Fatima apparition―Sister Lucia of Fatima stated: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one heeds her message―neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
The powerful and exceptional words of Fr. Frederick Faber come to mind―which come from the Preface of his personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary―wherein Faber states:
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one! Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be! It has no faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized! Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines!
“Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother! I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable Grignion de Montfort! Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ! Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!”
Complacently Living in Ignorance
Just under 20 years ago, a Gallup Poll of American Catholics revealed that only around 1.5% (3 out of 200 persons) really knew what the Fatima message was about. You cannot imagine those numbers improving over the last 20 years―on the contrary, they are probably worse. Yes―of course―most Catholics have heard of Our Lady of Fatima, but their breadth and depth of knowledge of Our Lady’s Fatima related messages is pitifully low. That ignorance is not helped by the modern Church’s attempts at blurring certain Fatima related topics―such as (1) falsely claiming that the Third Secret of Fatima has already been fulfilled and is now a thing of the past; (2) falsely claiming that the Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart has already been performed in the manner requested by Our Lady; (3) allegedly installing a false “Lucia” whom numerous experts say is not the same person as the real Sister Lucia, etc.
One would logically think that if Our Lady took the trouble to come to Earth and appear six times at Fatima―not as a tourist, but as a worried and warning Mother―then Holy Mother Church (with all popes, bishops, priests and laity) would give Our Lady the utmost attention, cooperation and obedience! But no! The opposite has turned out to be true! Our Lady has largely been ignored and the masses live in ignorance of her messages and warnings. As regards the clergy―as Our Lady of Akita said: “Those who should speak out, will remain silent!” Yet the same can be said of parents and teachers―their indifference and neglect has also made them keep silent. There are better, more fun and entertaining things to talk and teach about. The Fatima message about Hell, wars, making many sacrifices, saying many prayers, accepting all the sufferings that God sends, praying the Rosary each every day, meditating on its mysteries, practicing devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, etc. is far from being fun!
Speaking of Speaking
Taking a lead from Our Lady’s comment at Akita: “Those who should speak out, will remain silent!” ― how much religious silence is there in your home? Is religious talk frequent or is it kept in the closet? Is everyone comfortable talking about religious matters, or is it something that is embarrassing and awkward? The Fathers of the Church speak of the home as being the “domestic church.” Our Lord and Holy Scripture indicate―either explicitly or implicitly―that religion should be our primary focus and concern, and therefore, consequently and naturally a chief subject of conversation. The following quotes bear this out: “Seek first the Kingdom of God!” (Matthew 6:33). “I will bless the Lord at all times, His praise shall be always in my mouth!” (Psalm 33:2). “All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 3:17). “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31). “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4; Luke 4:4). “Lay up these My words in your hearts and minds! Teach your children that they meditate on them when thou sit in your house, and when you walk on the way, and when you lay down and rise up!” (Deuteronomy 11:18-19). “Teach the children all which the Lord has spoken” (Leviticus 10:11). “Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:20). “He had always feared God from his infancy, and kept His commandments” (Tobias 2:13). “From thy infancy thou hast known the Holy Scriptures, which can instruct thee to salvation, by the Faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture, inspired of God, is profitable to teach, to reprove, to correct, to instruct in justice!” (2 Timothy 3:15-16). “As for me and my house we will serve the Lord!” (Josue 24:15).
You Cannot Give What You Have Not Got!
It is a philosophical axiom that states: “One cannot give what one does not have.” If you have no money, you cannot lend money to someone else. If you cannot speak French, then you cannot teach French. If you only know little or nothing about your Faith, then you will have little or nothing to say about the Faith. Most people know little or nothing about their Faith and that is why they are silent and avoid talking about the Faith, for they know that they will come across as being fools: “Even a fool, if he will hold his peace, shall be counted as being wise―and if he closes his lips, he will be thought of as a man of understanding!” (Proverbs 17:28).
A DIY Faith―A Dying Faith
Most Catholics know very little or next to nothing about their Faith―apart from the usual superficial elements and phrases which they do not really understand nor master in any kind of depth. Most Catholics could not even list all the Ten Commandments of God, and almost nobody will be able to name what are the Six Chief Commandments of the Church. Ask them what are the necessary conditions that constitute a mortal sin and how many conditions are there―and they will scratch their heads―yet mortal sin is one and only thing that sends baptized souls to Hell! Ask them for the number of conditions required for a good and valid confession and ask them to name those conditions―and you will have a similar result. Ask them to name all the Apostles of Jesus―and most Catholics will probably not get past Peter, James, John and Andrew―and some don’t even know the number of Apostles. There are many youngsters today who do not know the number and authors of the Gospels in the Bible. Most cannot name the three essential parts of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Ask them why the Catholic Faith is the only true Faith―and they are speechless. There are some youngsters who cannot name the Persons of the Holy Trinity―and some don’t even know that They are three in number! Yet those same people will reel-off all kinds of worldly facts and trivia in great depth! They are sold on the ‘gospel’ of the world, and have abandoned the Gospel of Christ. They know more about a sports star, a movie star, a television celebrity than they know about Christ and the Saints!
Ignorance about matters of Faith risks leading Catholics into a DIY (Do-It-Yourself) religion―which is something that has exploded and increased exponentially over the last few decades. Not knowing the Faith leads to not really caring about the Faith, which in turn leads to not adhering to and not practicing the Faith. That is why, today, less than 20% of Catholics attend Sunday Mass regularly; it is why anywhere from 60% to 80% of Catholics no longer believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist; it is why a minimum of 90% accept contraception; and a minimum of 50% accept abortion, divorce with remarriage, same-sex relationships and marriages, cohabitation, masturbation, pre-marital sex, etc.; it is why most Catholics feel that you can be good Catholic without regularly attending Sunday Mass; it is why most Catholics no longer go to Confession, etc. Even among the 15%, or so, who still attend Sunday Mass regularly, most of them rarely or never go to Confession. Is it because they are already saints and no longer commit sins? There is more mortal sin in the world than ever before!
St. Alphonsus Liguori―already back in 18th century―was of the opinion that most Catholics made bad confessions through shame or not confession correctly and therefore remained in a state of mortal sin after confession. This presumably and probably leads to most Catholics, who still attend Mass, going to Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin. One pope after another―since Pope Pius XII in 1948―has said that the world has lost the sense of sin. That includes Catholics too! They have created their own version of the Faith due to their laziness, indifference and neglect of studying their Catholic Faith. They are ignorant fools and “the number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15)―words echoed by Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error, who, desiring to appear wise, speak much and multiply words like the foolish. Many persons have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!”
Already over 100 years ago―and things have got worse since then―Pope St. Pius X wrote: “The chief cause of the present indifference and infirmity of soul, and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of things divine. God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘There is no knowledge of God in the land!’ It is a common complaint, unfortunately too well founded, that there are large numbers of Christians in our own time who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation. How many there are, alas, not only among the young, but among adults and those advanced in years, who know nothing of the chief mysteries of Faith! And when we mention Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life ― but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world, but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there. They rarely give thought to God, or to the teachings of the Faith of Christ. They know nothing of the Incarnation of the Word of God. Grace, the greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things, the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments by which we obtain grace, are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it. A great number of those who are condemned to eternal punishment, suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of Faith which must be known and believed in order to be numbered among the elect! Reflect on the great loss of souls due solely to ignorance of divine things! How many and how grave are the consequences of ignorance in matters of religion!” (Pope St. Pius X, Encyclical Acerbo Nimis).
Even a Liberal and Modernist pope like Benedict XVI, speaks of widespread religious ignorance: “One of the most serious problems of our time is ignorance of religious practice―in which many men and women live, including some Catholic faithful―ignorance of the content of the Faith, a lack of knowledge of Jesus Christ and ignorance of His teachings.” (Pope Benedict XVI, 2012).
Embarrassing Survey
The September 28th, 2010, publication of the U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life was surprising in that it showed how atheists and agnostics proved they had a greater comparative religious knowledge than Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and Mormons. The survey polled 3,412 Americans 18 and older and asked 32 questions about their own faith and also other religions. Atheists and agnostics scored the highest, correctly answering on average 20.9 questions; they were followed by Jews at 20.5, Mormons at 20.3, and Protestants at 16.0 and Catholics 14.7. These results should be embarrassing to U.S. Catholics and particularly to all those involved in Catholic education. Of the 32 questions on the survey, nine were those that every adult Catholic legitimately should have been able to answer:
● What is the first book of the Bible?
● What are the names of the first four books of the New Testament, that is, the four Gospels?
● Where, according to the Bible, was Jesus born? Bethlehem, Jerusalem, Nazareth or Jericho?
● Which of these is not in the Ten Commandments? Do unto others as you would have them do unto you; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; Keep holy the Sabbath day?
● Which figure is associated with remaining obedient to God despite suffering? Elijah, Moses, Job or Abraham?
● Which figure is associated with leading the exodus from Egypt? Elijah, Moses, Job or Abraham?
● Which figure is associated with willingness to sacrifice his son for God? Elijah, Moses, Job or Abraham?
● What is Catholic teaching about bread and wine in Communion? The bread and wine actually become the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ? Or the bread and wine are symbols of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ?
● Which group traditionally teaches that salvation is through Faith alone? Protestants, Catholics, both, or neither?
What were the results? With regard to the seven Biblical questions (the first seven questions above):
● Only 42% of Catholics could name Genesis as the first book of the Bible (compared to 71% of atheists and agnostics, 85% of Mormons, 76% of Protestants and 65% of Jews).
● Just 33% of Catholics could name the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John (compared to 39% of atheists and agnostics, 73% of Mormons, 57% of Protestants and 17% of Jews).
● Only 54% of Catholics could name Bethlehem as Jesus’ native place (bested again by 70% of atheists and agnostics, 78% of Protestants, 83% of Mormons and 61% of Jews).
● 57% of Catholics knew that the Golden Rule (Do unto others as you would have them do unto you) wasn’t one of the Ten Commandments (which compared to 62% of atheists and agnostics, 56% of Protestants, 81% of Muslims, 62% of Jews).
● Only 25% of Catholics could identify the sufferings of Job (in comparison with 42% of atheists, 70% of Mormons, 48% of Protestants and 47% of Jews).
● 65% of Catholics correctly identified Moses as the leader of the exodus (which was still far less than the 87% of atheists and agnostics, 92% of Mormons, 74% of Protestants and 90% of Jews).
● 55% of Catholics identified Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac (compared to 68% of atheists and agnostics, 87% of Mormons, 63% of Protestants and 83% of Jews).
In terms of the 7 questions on knowledge of the Old Testament and New Testament, Mormons overall correctly answered 5.7 of the 7 questions, white evangelical Protestants got 5.1, atheists and agnostics 4.4, black Protestants 4.4, Jews 4.3 (including 14% of Jews who got both New Testament questions correct), white mainline Protestants 3.9, white Catholics 3.8, and Latino Catholics (who could take the survey in either Spanish or English) 2.4. Overall Catholics answered 3.4 questions correctly.
The above survey was from 2010. Do you think things have improved in the last 14 years? Don’t bet on it! The tsunami of worldliness among Catholics has drowned many more in the waters of ignorance since 2010! If less than 15% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday Mass; if only 3% to 4% of Catholics pray the Rosary daily; if only 7% of regular Sunday Mass attending Catholics go to Confession at least once per month and 33% never go; if only 59% pray daily (13% for those aged under 30) ― then in view of those numbers, do you really think there is a massive interest in learning about the Faith? Of course not!
Today―May 13th, 2024―is the 107th anniversary of the first apparition of Our Lady of Fatima in 1917. After her initial apparition on May 13th, she would appear an additional five times over the next successive months until her final apparition on October 13th 1917. The date would be the same―the 13th of each month―apart from August, when the three children had been kidnapped and arrested by the local Masonic mayor.
You could legitimately ask if the Fatima apparitions and messages have been kidnapped and locked up by the modern day Church―even the Conservative and Traditional elements of the Church to a large degree. It is rarely mentioned, the messages are rarely stressed, the demands of Our Lady are rarely promoted and the general points of sacrifices, penances and prayers (especially the Rosary), and the First Saturday Devotions to the Immaculate Heart, as well a continual devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary are rarely encouraged, explained and provided.
In 1957―40 years after the first Fatima apparition―Sister Lucia of Fatima stated: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one heeds her message―neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
The powerful and exceptional words of Fr. Frederick Faber come to mind―which come from the Preface of his personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary―wherein Faber states:
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one! Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be! It has no faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized! Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines!
“Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother! I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable Grignion de Montfort! Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ! Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!”
Complacently Living in Ignorance
Just under 20 years ago, a Gallup Poll of American Catholics revealed that only around 1.5% (3 out of 200 persons) really knew what the Fatima message was about. You cannot imagine those numbers improving over the last 20 years―on the contrary, they are probably worse. Yes―of course―most Catholics have heard of Our Lady of Fatima, but their breadth and depth of knowledge of Our Lady’s Fatima related messages is pitifully low. That ignorance is not helped by the modern Church’s attempts at blurring certain Fatima related topics―such as (1) falsely claiming that the Third Secret of Fatima has already been fulfilled and is now a thing of the past; (2) falsely claiming that the Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart has already been performed in the manner requested by Our Lady; (3) allegedly installing a false “Lucia” whom numerous experts say is not the same person as the real Sister Lucia, etc.
One would logically think that if Our Lady took the trouble to come to Earth and appear six times at Fatima―not as a tourist, but as a worried and warning Mother―then Holy Mother Church (with all popes, bishops, priests and laity) would give Our Lady the utmost attention, cooperation and obedience! But no! The opposite has turned out to be true! Our Lady has largely been ignored and the masses live in ignorance of her messages and warnings. As regards the clergy―as Our Lady of Akita said: “Those who should speak out, will remain silent!” Yet the same can be said of parents and teachers―their indifference and neglect has also made them keep silent. There are better, more fun and entertaining things to talk and teach about. The Fatima message about Hell, wars, making many sacrifices, saying many prayers, accepting all the sufferings that God sends, praying the Rosary each every day, meditating on its mysteries, practicing devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, etc. is far from being fun!
Speaking of Speaking
Taking a lead from Our Lady’s comment at Akita: “Those who should speak out, will remain silent!” ― how much religious silence is there in your home? Is religious talk frequent or is it kept in the closet? Is everyone comfortable talking about religious matters, or is it something that is embarrassing and awkward? The Fathers of the Church speak of the home as being the “domestic church.” Our Lord and Holy Scripture indicate―either explicitly or implicitly―that religion should be our primary focus and concern, and therefore, consequently and naturally a chief subject of conversation. The following quotes bear this out: “Seek first the Kingdom of God!” (Matthew 6:33). “I will bless the Lord at all times, His praise shall be always in my mouth!” (Psalm 33:2). “All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 3:17). “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31). “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4; Luke 4:4). “Lay up these My words in your hearts and minds! Teach your children that they meditate on them when thou sit in your house, and when you walk on the way, and when you lay down and rise up!” (Deuteronomy 11:18-19). “Teach the children all which the Lord has spoken” (Leviticus 10:11). “Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:20). “He had always feared God from his infancy, and kept His commandments” (Tobias 2:13). “From thy infancy thou hast known the Holy Scriptures, which can instruct thee to salvation, by the Faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture, inspired of God, is profitable to teach, to reprove, to correct, to instruct in justice!” (2 Timothy 3:15-16). “As for me and my house we will serve the Lord!” (Josue 24:15).
You Cannot Give What You Have Not Got!
It is a philosophical axiom that states: “One cannot give what one does not have.” If you have no money, you cannot lend money to someone else. If you cannot speak French, then you cannot teach French. If you only know little or nothing about your Faith, then you will have little or nothing to say about the Faith. Most people know little or nothing about their Faith and that is why they are silent and avoid talking about the Faith, for they know that they will come across as being fools: “Even a fool, if he will hold his peace, shall be counted as being wise―and if he closes his lips, he will be thought of as a man of understanding!” (Proverbs 17:28).
A DIY Faith―A Dying Faith
Most Catholics know very little or next to nothing about their Faith―apart from the usual superficial elements and phrases which they do not really understand nor master in any kind of depth. Most Catholics could not even list all the Ten Commandments of God, and almost nobody will be able to name what are the Six Chief Commandments of the Church. Ask them what are the necessary conditions that constitute a mortal sin and how many conditions are there―and they will scratch their heads―yet mortal sin is one and only thing that sends baptized souls to Hell! Ask them for the number of conditions required for a good and valid confession and ask them to name those conditions―and you will have a similar result. Ask them to name all the Apostles of Jesus―and most Catholics will probably not get past Peter, James, John and Andrew―and some don’t even know the number of Apostles. There are many youngsters today who do not know the number and authors of the Gospels in the Bible. Most cannot name the three essential parts of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Ask them why the Catholic Faith is the only true Faith―and they are speechless. There are some youngsters who cannot name the Persons of the Holy Trinity―and some don’t even know that They are three in number! Yet those same people will reel-off all kinds of worldly facts and trivia in great depth! They are sold on the ‘gospel’ of the world, and have abandoned the Gospel of Christ. They know more about a sports star, a movie star, a television celebrity than they know about Christ and the Saints!
Ignorance about matters of Faith risks leading Catholics into a DIY (Do-It-Yourself) religion―which is something that has exploded and increased exponentially over the last few decades. Not knowing the Faith leads to not really caring about the Faith, which in turn leads to not adhering to and not practicing the Faith. That is why, today, less than 20% of Catholics attend Sunday Mass regularly; it is why anywhere from 60% to 80% of Catholics no longer believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist; it is why a minimum of 90% accept contraception; and a minimum of 50% accept abortion, divorce with remarriage, same-sex relationships and marriages, cohabitation, masturbation, pre-marital sex, etc.; it is why most Catholics feel that you can be good Catholic without regularly attending Sunday Mass; it is why most Catholics no longer go to Confession, etc. Even among the 15%, or so, who still attend Sunday Mass regularly, most of them rarely or never go to Confession. Is it because they are already saints and no longer commit sins? There is more mortal sin in the world than ever before!
St. Alphonsus Liguori―already back in 18th century―was of the opinion that most Catholics made bad confessions through shame or not confession correctly and therefore remained in a state of mortal sin after confession. This presumably and probably leads to most Catholics, who still attend Mass, going to Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin. One pope after another―since Pope Pius XII in 1948―has said that the world has lost the sense of sin. That includes Catholics too! They have created their own version of the Faith due to their laziness, indifference and neglect of studying their Catholic Faith. They are ignorant fools and “the number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15)―words echoed by Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error, who, desiring to appear wise, speak much and multiply words like the foolish. Many persons have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!”
Already over 100 years ago―and things have got worse since then―Pope St. Pius X wrote: “The chief cause of the present indifference and infirmity of soul, and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of things divine. God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘There is no knowledge of God in the land!’ It is a common complaint, unfortunately too well founded, that there are large numbers of Christians in our own time who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation. How many there are, alas, not only among the young, but among adults and those advanced in years, who know nothing of the chief mysteries of Faith! And when we mention Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life ― but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world, but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there. They rarely give thought to God, or to the teachings of the Faith of Christ. They know nothing of the Incarnation of the Word of God. Grace, the greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things, the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments by which we obtain grace, are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it. A great number of those who are condemned to eternal punishment, suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of Faith which must be known and believed in order to be numbered among the elect! Reflect on the great loss of souls due solely to ignorance of divine things! How many and how grave are the consequences of ignorance in matters of religion!” (Pope St. Pius X, Encyclical Acerbo Nimis).
Even a Liberal and Modernist pope like Benedict XVI, speaks of widespread religious ignorance: “One of the most serious problems of our time is ignorance of religious practice―in which many men and women live, including some Catholic faithful―ignorance of the content of the Faith, a lack of knowledge of Jesus Christ and ignorance of His teachings.” (Pope Benedict XVI, 2012).
Embarrassing Survey
The September 28th, 2010, publication of the U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life was surprising in that it showed how atheists and agnostics proved they had a greater comparative religious knowledge than Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and Mormons. The survey polled 3,412 Americans 18 and older and asked 32 questions about their own faith and also other religions. Atheists and agnostics scored the highest, correctly answering on average 20.9 questions; they were followed by Jews at 20.5, Mormons at 20.3, and Protestants at 16.0 and Catholics 14.7. These results should be embarrassing to U.S. Catholics and particularly to all those involved in Catholic education. Of the 32 questions on the survey, nine were those that every adult Catholic legitimately should have been able to answer:
● What is the first book of the Bible?
● What are the names of the first four books of the New Testament, that is, the four Gospels?
● Where, according to the Bible, was Jesus born? Bethlehem, Jerusalem, Nazareth or Jericho?
● Which of these is not in the Ten Commandments? Do unto others as you would have them do unto you; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; Keep holy the Sabbath day?
● Which figure is associated with remaining obedient to God despite suffering? Elijah, Moses, Job or Abraham?
● Which figure is associated with leading the exodus from Egypt? Elijah, Moses, Job or Abraham?
● Which figure is associated with willingness to sacrifice his son for God? Elijah, Moses, Job or Abraham?
● What is Catholic teaching about bread and wine in Communion? The bread and wine actually become the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ? Or the bread and wine are symbols of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ?
● Which group traditionally teaches that salvation is through Faith alone? Protestants, Catholics, both, or neither?
What were the results? With regard to the seven Biblical questions (the first seven questions above):
● Only 42% of Catholics could name Genesis as the first book of the Bible (compared to 71% of atheists and agnostics, 85% of Mormons, 76% of Protestants and 65% of Jews).
● Just 33% of Catholics could name the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John (compared to 39% of atheists and agnostics, 73% of Mormons, 57% of Protestants and 17% of Jews).
● Only 54% of Catholics could name Bethlehem as Jesus’ native place (bested again by 70% of atheists and agnostics, 78% of Protestants, 83% of Mormons and 61% of Jews).
● 57% of Catholics knew that the Golden Rule (Do unto others as you would have them do unto you) wasn’t one of the Ten Commandments (which compared to 62% of atheists and agnostics, 56% of Protestants, 81% of Muslims, 62% of Jews).
● Only 25% of Catholics could identify the sufferings of Job (in comparison with 42% of atheists, 70% of Mormons, 48% of Protestants and 47% of Jews).
● 65% of Catholics correctly identified Moses as the leader of the exodus (which was still far less than the 87% of atheists and agnostics, 92% of Mormons, 74% of Protestants and 90% of Jews).
● 55% of Catholics identified Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac (compared to 68% of atheists and agnostics, 87% of Mormons, 63% of Protestants and 83% of Jews).
In terms of the 7 questions on knowledge of the Old Testament and New Testament, Mormons overall correctly answered 5.7 of the 7 questions, white evangelical Protestants got 5.1, atheists and agnostics 4.4, black Protestants 4.4, Jews 4.3 (including 14% of Jews who got both New Testament questions correct), white mainline Protestants 3.9, white Catholics 3.8, and Latino Catholics (who could take the survey in either Spanish or English) 2.4. Overall Catholics answered 3.4 questions correctly.
The above survey was from 2010. Do you think things have improved in the last 14 years? Don’t bet on it! The tsunami of worldliness among Catholics has drowned many more in the waters of ignorance since 2010! If less than 15% of Catholics regularly attend Sunday Mass; if only 3% to 4% of Catholics pray the Rosary daily; if only 7% of regular Sunday Mass attending Catholics go to Confession at least once per month and 33% never go; if only 59% pray daily (13% for those aged under 30) ― then in view of those numbers, do you really think there is a massive interest in learning about the Faith? Of course not!
Article 26
Sunday, May 12th
Salvation and Mothers
Sunday, May 12th
Salvation and Mothers
Two Mothers―One Child
What is this? Some kind of same sex marriage statement? No, God forbid! It is a truth that applies to everyone! We all have two mothers―an earthly mother and a heavenly Mother. We all recognize, know and accept our earthly mother, but we often forget―at least in practice if not in theory―that we also have a heavenly Mother with whom we must also have a relationship. As Christ was dying on His cross on Calvary, He made Our Lady our spiritual Mother: “When Jesus therefore had seen His Mother and the disciple standing whom He loved, He said to His mother: ‘Woman, behold thy son!’ After that He said to the disciple: ‘Behold thy mother!’ And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own” (John 19:26-27). The Church unanimously agrees that not only did Christ make Our Lady the spiritual Mother of St. John, but through St. John He gave Our Lady as a spiritual Mother to all the world of all times―for Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Graces and there is nobody on Earth who receives graces from God in any other apart from receiving through the hands of Mary.
God’s Love Reflected in Mothers
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8). It is true that no earthly image can fully reveal the perfect love of God. God is transcendent and His love is beyond what this world can contain and fully understand. But, nonetheless, there are many things in this world that do reveal some aspects of the love of God. “For God created man [and woman] to the image of His own likeness” (Wisdom 2:23). One such “image” and “likeness” is that of a mother’s love―for, as they say, the husband is the head of the family and the wife is the heart of the family.
Though God has been revealed to us as the Father in Heaven and the Son of God came as a man, we can discover much about the love of God from a mother’s love. In fact, it is even appropriate to understand that God is like the tenderest mother to us. God’s love for us is very much like a mother’s love for her child. God Himself applies the following analogy of a mother to Himself: “Can a woman forget her infant, so as not to have pity on the son of her womb? And if she should forget―yet will not I forget thee!” (Isaias 49:15). Not only does God love us like a mother, but we experience God’s love in our mother’s love. For “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and all true love is ultimately born from God: “For without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
A mother is an image of God, an icon of God’s presence, a window into God’s mystery, a tangible embrace of God’s gentleness. God loves us into being and embraces us with His kindness. God’s love is unconditional and arose out of the act of God creating the Universe, just like the love of a mother originates from the fact of a child growing within her when she chooses to be pregnant. Motherhood is sacred because it is part of the natural design of God for humanity. He puts into a mother’s heart a powerful love for her child, offering unwavering commitment. Most of the time, mothers love their children throughout their lives, even though her children may disappoint her.
Though no mother is perfect, except our Blessed Mother, it is good to look at the beauty of a mother’s love when using it to understand God. The tenderness and unconditional acceptance of a mother, stand out as two aspects that reveal the love of God. All true love comes from God, for without Him we can do nothing (John 15:5). God does love you with a perfect motherly love. “My dearest―if God hath so loved us; we also ought to love one another!” (1 John 4:11). God plants in us the seeds of love when we receive sanctifying grace in the Sacrament of Baptism―it is our responsibility to grow those seeds of love into a tree of love, with powerful roots of love and branches of love reaching out in all directions.
Every living creature has a mother, and at some level, every mother loves her child. Such is true not only for human persons but for the animal kingdom as well. The National Geographic films show us that, out in the wild, ‘mothers’ of the animal kingdom give birth to ‘babies’, take care of them, and fiercely protect them from predators. Mothers have been known to give up their own lives for the sake of their children, both born and unborn. We hear in the news about pregnant women afflicted with cancer forgoing life-saving treatment, knowing they would die so that their child could be born and live. In the news stories about the 2017 mass shooting in Las Vegas, we heard of mothers using their bodies to take a bullet so that their children would survive.
Mothers are Owed Obedience
In Holy Scripture we read of Jesus―Who was, don’t forget, God Himself―showing obedience to Mary and Joseph! “And Jesus went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them” (Luke 2:51). The Apostle St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Colossians, says: “Children obey your parents!” This is one of the most obvious dictates of nature―even the irrational creatures are obedient by instinct, and follow the signs of the parent animal, or bird, or reptile. Perhaps there is no duty more generally acknowledged and accepted than this. Your obedience should begin early—the younger you are, the more you need a guide and a ruler.
The Qualities of Obedience
Obedience should be universal ― “Children obey your parents,” said the Apostle, “in all things.” Obedience reflects and proves our love. Our Lord Himself indicated this: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15). This loving obedience to parents is the school for acquiring a loving obedience towards God. Holy Scripture commands us obey our parents: “Children, obey your parents in the Lord! … Children, obey your parents in all things―for this is well pleasing to the Lord!” (Ephesians 6:1; Colossians 3:20). The only exception to this obligation of obeying our parents is when their commands are, in the letter or spirit of them, opposed to the commands of God. In this case, as well as in every other, we must “obey God, rather than men” (Acts 5:29). But even here your refusal to comply with the sinful command of a parent must be uttered in a meek and respectful manner, so that it shall be manifest you are actuated by pure, conscientious motives, and not by a mere rebellious resistance of parental authority. Your obedience should have no other exception than that which is made by conscience.
Your personal inclinations and tastes are out of the question—your inclinations and tastes must be crossed, opposed, and set aside, when opposed to parental authority. Obedience should be prompt. As soon as the command is uttered, it should be complied with. It is a disgrace to any child that it should be necessary for a father or a mother to repeat a command. You should even anticipate, if possible their injunctions, and not wait until their will is announced in words. A tardy obedience loses all its glory.
Obedience should be cheerful. A reluctant virtue is no virtue at all. Constrained and unwilling obedience, is rebellion in principle; it is vice clothed in the garment of goodness. God loves a cheerful giver, and so does man. A child retiring from a parent’s presence, muttering, sullen, and murmuring, is one of the ugliest spectacles in creation—of what value is anything he does, in such a temper as this?
Obedience should be self-denying. You must give up your own wills, and sacrifice your own desires, and perform the things that are difficult, as well as those that are easy. When a soldier receives a command, although he may be at home in comfort, and he is required at once to go into the field of danger, he hesitates not, he considers he has no option. A child has no more room for the gratification of self-will than the soldier has—he must obey.
Obedience should be uniform. Obedience is generally given and shown without much difficulty when the parents are present―but that is not always the case when they are absent. Children should despise this two-faced attitude of consulting the wishes and obeying the injunctions of your parents, only when they are there to witness your conduct. Such hypocrisy is detestable. Act upon nobler principles.
How sublimely simple and striking was the reply of the child, who upon being pressed in company to take something which his absent parents had forbidden him to touch; and who, upon being reminded that they were not there to witness him, replied: “That is true, but God and my conscience are here!” Be it your determination, to imitate this beautiful example of filial piety, and obey in all things even your absent parents.
It will be hard to find a child that has not been disobedient to its parents in general, and disobedient to the mother in particular. Just as St. Simeon prophesied that a sword of sorrow would pierce Our Lady’s Heart―so too have we pierced the hearts of our mothers. Some have done so more than others. The words that Our Lord addressed to St. Peter, could just as well be addressed to our parents: “He that hears you, hears Me; and he that despises you, despises Me; and he that despises Me, despises Him that sent Me!” (Luke 10:16).
God Given Authority
We should also remember the words that Our Lord spoke to Pontius Pilate, telling Pilate that his authority was God-given: “Thou shouldst not have any power against me, unless it were given thee from above!” (John 19:11). Our parents, likewise, have received their authority from God. When we reject their authority or neglect to fulfill their commands, then it is not only against our parents that we sin―but it is also against God that we sin. As Jesus said: “Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me! … Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these My least brethren, neither did you do it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40 & 45).
Perhaps an examination of conscience would not be a bad idea on the subject of our obedience to our parents in general, and our mother in particular, during the time of our childhood and teenage years while we still lived in our parental home! Expressing regret to our mother (and father) would also be a good idea! Remember that St. Peter wept for the rest of his life over the fact that he had denied Our Lord three times during the Passion!
Underestimated, Underestimated, Undervalued
Where would we be without our mothers? Obviously, a rhetorical question, as we wouldn’t even have life without the great gift of our mothers. But they play a much more important role in our lives than just giving birth: they form, they comfort, they teach us to pray, etc. Motherhood is such a beautiful and wonderful gift, and we should constantly thank God for the gifts that our mothers (and those who play a motherly role!) bring to our lives, both within and outside of the Church.
But even the Church is referred to as ‘Mother,’ for all the things that our mothers do for us in life, the Church does for her children in the spiritual life: she teaches, she comforts, she forms, she assists us in prayer, she protects and guards her children, etc. The Church spends her life so that her beloved sons and daughters might have life. And what a beautiful gift this is as well!
The Church even raises up motherly figures for us to identify and relate, the first among them the Blessed Mother: Mary, the Mother of Our Lord and Savior; for if we want to be close to Jesus, what better way is there than to be close to His Mother who will constantly bring our needs to Him and help us to understand His directions and guidance. (See John chapter 2, for example).
In line with the Blessed Mother are other great spiritual mothers who are foundresses of religious communities of women. Just in this country, there are several examples: St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, foundress of the Sisters of Charity; St. Marianne Cope who cared for lepers in Hawaii; Mother Theodore Guerin, who founded the Sisters of Providence of Saint Mary of the Woods near Terra Haute, Indiana; and St Frances Xavier Cabrini who did so much work caring for minority and native peoples in the late 1800s.
Beautifully, there are also mothers who are venerated at the Altars as well: St. Monica, the mother of St. Augustine, and the first married couple to be Canonized together: Saints Louis and Zelie Martin, the parents of St. Therese of Lisieux, who were declared saints in 2015.
We Owe an Unpayable Debt
Yes―we all owe a great debt to our mothers, a debt that in reality is unpayable, but a debt that we nevertheless must try to pay the best we can. Infants are ignorant of what their mothers are doing for them, while young children are too selfish to appreciate what their mothers do for them. It is only as we mature and enter adulthood that we―hopefully―start to realize the incredible amount of work, care and love that our mothers have invested in raising us.
In reality, mothers often end up being like slaves for their children―though they are usually loving slaves who love to slave for their children. The child is waited upon hand-and-foot from the moment of its birth. From infancy through to teenage years, the child gets to sleep far longer than the mother. The child pays no rent; does not buy food; does no cooking; has almost every meal cooked and served; does no cleaning; does no repairs; does not buy clothing; does not do the laundry; pays no bills; does not pay for schooling; buys nothing for the house; is driven around in a car; does not pay for the gas/fuel, etc., etc. The child is basically spoiled while the mother is toiled. If you had to pay for those services, you would end up penniless. Yet some children do not even “pay” with a sincere “Thank you, mom!” They expect all that service, they take it for granted, they demand it―and then still find time to complain!
Instead, our attitude ought to be like that of St. Paul, who writes: “I cease not to give thanks for you, making commemoration of you in my prayers!” (Ephesians 1:16). We are incapable of repaying the debt we owe to our mothers, but, as Jesus said: “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27).
How much do you pray for your mother―whether alive or deceased? We are talking here about Rosaries for your mother―and not just an occasional Our Father or Hail Mary!
How many Masses have you had offered for your mother? The Mass stipend is not earth shatteringly expensive―a mere few dollars usually suffices!
How many secret sacrifices do you make each day for your mother? Heck! She made tens of daily sacrifices for you during your childhood―and perhaps over a hundred daily sacrifices for you during your infancy―except that she did not call them “sacrifices” but “acts of love”!
Pointing Fingers is Easy!
Our Lord says to us: “Be ye perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). Who do you know that has achieved this perfection? Are you perfect? Is your mother perfect? Or was she perfect (if she is now deceased)? Of course not! True perfection is a rarity―even though God meant to be commonplace. Of the few souls that make it to Heaven, the vast majority have to achieve or “top-up” their perfection (or lack of it) in the fires of Purgatory.
No human being is born perfect (apart from the Blessed Virgin Mary). The attainment of perfection is meant to be a life-long work, with no shortage of setbacks and failures. Perfection is not a switch that you can just flick on. They say that every failure is a step closer to success―if we learn something from the failure. Similarly, you could say that each of our failings and falls is a step closer to perfection and holiness. When you were a baby, you did not suddenly stand up one day and started walking effortlessly and perfectly! You learned to walk by falling first, falling repeatedly, then falling less and less until you could string together a decent series of wobbly steps.
Something similar could be said of motherhood. Nobody is born a perfect mother. Mothers usually learn by trial and error―even if they have read many books on motherhood or have been given much advice by other mothers. Theory are practice are not identical twins! Just as your mother was patient and understanding with you during your infancy with your many failures in trying to walk, talk, dress yourself, feed yourself, etc. ― so too should you be understanding and forgiving of the many failures that your mother must have gone through in trying to raise you as a good Catholic. Are you a good Catholic today? Are you a perfect Catholic today? No! So, as Our Lord tells us: “Why seest thou the splinter that is in thy brother’s [mother’s] eye; and seest not the plank that is in thy own eye? Or how sayest thou to thy brother [mother’s]: ‘Let me cast the splinter out of thy eye!’ ― and behold there is a plank in thy own eye? Thou hypocrite! Cast out first the beam in thy own eye, and then shalt thou see to cast out the splinter out of thy brother’s [mother’s] eye!” (Matthew 7:3-5).
Merciful Mothers and Mercy for Mothers
Forgiveness of failures, offenses and sins is something very godly. Mercy is a beautiful thing―and the blueprint for mercy is found in God. Holy Scripture repeatedly puts the mercy of God before our eyes and encourages us to imitate that mercy of God. The closer we are God, then the more merciful we become. Here are just a handful of the hundreds of Scriptural quotes on mercy that can be found:
“The Lord is gracious and merciful, patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9).
“Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7).
“If thy brother sin against thee, reprove him: and if he do penance, forgive him. And if he sin against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day be converted unto thee, saying, ‘I repent!’― then forgive him” (Luke 17:3-4).
“Let all bitterness, and anger, and indignation, and clamor, and blasphemy, be put away from you, with all malice. And be ye kind one to another; merciful, forgiving one another, even as God hath forgiven you in Christ!” (Ephesians 4:31-32).
“If you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will also forgive you your offences. But if you will not forgive men, then neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15).
“And the Scribes and the Pharisees brought unto Him a woman taken in adultery: and they set her in the midst, and said to Him: ‘Master, this woman was even now taken in adultery! Now Moses in the law commanded us to stone such a one. But what sayest Thou?’ And this they said tempting Him, so that they might accuse Him. But Jesus, bowing Himself down, wrote with His finger on the ground. When therefore they continued asking Him, He lifted up Himself, and said to them: ‘He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!’ And again stooping down, He wrote on the ground. But they hearing this, went out, one by one, beginning at the eldest. And Jesus alone remained, and the woman standing in the midst. Then Jesus lifting up Himself, said to her: ‘Woman, where are they that accused thee? Hath no man condemned thee?’ She said: ‘No man, Lord!’ And Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:3-11).
Mercy has to be seen and sown in the family. We must learn mercy at an early age. We must learn to show mercy to those around us from the days of our childhood. If we hope for mercy, or expect mercy, then we must show and give mercy ― “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:8) … “For judgment without mercy will be shown to him that hath not done mercy. And mercy exalteth itself above judgment” (James 2:13). Today, we are far more concerned about judging others rather than showing mercy to others ― and that can even include judging our parents. Forgive your mother her sins and failings and you will find that God will also forgive you your sins and failings!
Even if your mother has physically or emotionally hurt you, harmed you, or neglected you―you must still love her. Why? Because you have done the same to God―and He still loves you, and is always willing to forgive you and accept you back in all sincerity. God holds no grudges―you should hold no grudges. We are all sinners and we all offend each other at some time or another, to one degree or another: Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9) … “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23) … “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “For in many things we all offend. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man. The tongue is a little member and boasts great things. The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue no man can tame, an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison. By it we bless God and the Father: and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:2-10).
Our Lord warns us: “For if you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will also forgive you your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15) … “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). To which Scripture adds: “Let all bitterness, and anger, and indignation, and shouting be put away from you! Be kind one to another, merciful, forgiving one another―even as God has forgiven you in Christ!” (Ephesians 4:31-32). “Bearing with one another and forgiving one another―if any have a complaint against another―even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also!” (Colossians 3:13).
The Mother’s Treadmill
As the proverb says: “A woman’s [mother’s] work is never done!” The proverb does not mean to say that the woman never does any work―but that despite all the work that she does, it never seems to end, there is always something else that comes along and requires attention. One of chief areas of attention is that of washing and cleaning. The list could really be endless―like a treadmill that you cannot get off, or a vicious circle that just goes on and on! Besides having to wash and give baths to her young children, there is a lot of material washing and cleaning that has to be done. Here is just the tip of the iceberg of cooking, washing and cleaning duties:
● do the shopping;
● prepare and cook the meals;
● wash the pots, pans, dishes and utensils;
● wash the family’s clothes;
● wash sheets, bedding, towels, tablecloths, etc.;
● clean kitchen counters and stove
● clean fridge and freezer
● wipe down bathroom counters and mirrors
● wipe down the outside of all kitchen/bathroom cabinets
● clean bathroom showers and toilets
● vacuum, sweep and mop all floors
● dust surfaces; de-cobweb and dust high surfaces (e.g. ceiling fans, tops of china cabinets, etc.)
● wash doors and door trims
● wash, dust blinds, windowsills and windows
● wash inside of trashcans (inside home and outdoor cans), etc. etc. etc.
Those things pertain to washing and cleaning material things. Yet human beings are more important than mere material objects―and in human beings, the spiritual is more important than the physical, the soul is more important than the body. Your mother will have tried to make sure that you were clean in both body and soul.
How many times has your mother spiritually cleaned you? In the very first days after your birth she showed you to the priests―so that you could be spiritually cleansed of Original Sin through the Sacrament of Baptism. She has physically cleansed you each and every day of your infancy and your early childhood. She has helped cleanse you from sin by often taking you to Confession. She has cleansed your mind from sinful, bad and erroneous thoughts by teaching you right from wrong; by warning you of dangers; by correcting and punishing you in wrongdoing.
Physical and material germs can come into the house by a multitude of avenues―the same is true of spiritual germs (temptations and sins). Just as the mother must be vigilant in preventing germs from entering and breeding in the home, so too must she be vigilant in preventing spiritual germs (temptations and sins) from gaining access to the souls of family members. Children are notoriously oblivious to the physical and moral dangers that surround them―and they hate being told: “Don’t do this! Don’t do that! This is bad for you! Leave that alone!” etc. That is one of the downsides of mothering―you don’t score very high on popularity and are seen to be a bit of a sourpuss, grouch, spoilsport, killjoy, etc. It is one of the unrewarding aspects of motherhood―policing everyone and everything.
Yet we should be thankful for such policing―especially moral policing―which, at the end of the day (or at the end of life), could save us from an eternity in Hell. “The foolish man despises his mother!” (Proverbs 15:20). “Thou shalt honor thy mother all the days of her life!” (Tobias 4:3) … “and forsake not the law of thy mother” (Proverbs 1:8) … “and despise not thy mother when she is old” (Proverbs 23:22). “He that honors his mother is like someone that lays up a treasure” (Ecclesiasticus 3:5).
Gratitude Deserved―Ingratitude Shown
St. Thomas Aquinas has the following to say on the virtue of gratitude and the sin of ingratitude:
By gratitude, we give thanks to benefactors. Gratitude is a special virtue, allied to justice and subordinate to it. We are to give thanks to every benefactor. We owe thanks to God, and, under God, to many of our fellowmen. Gratitude should be expressed in words and deeds according to circumstances and opportunities. Gratitude makes instant acknowledgment of favors by graciousness in receiving them, and by the thankful disposition of the heart. Favors themselves are to be repaid at a time convenient to the benefactor. In repaying a favor and in estimating our debt, we take into consideration the disposition of our benefactor even more than the gift he has bestowed. We are sometimes under greater obligation to one who confers a small favor with a large heart, than to one who gives something greater in a grudging spirit. The return of a favor, the repayment, should exceed in graciousness the favor received. Gratitude is due for what is freely given. An exact return of the favor received meets the moral obligation of the beneficiary, but does not include the gratitude he owes. Gratitude is something freely given over and above the amount of repayment. Hence, gratitude exceeds the favor received.
Ingratitude
Gratitude is a virtue. Its direct opposite is therefore a vice. Ingratitude is the vice which stands opposed to the virtue of gratitude. The vice of ingratitude finds expression in sins of ingratitude. Acts or sins of ingratitude are of three types: (a) failure to return a favor received; (b) failure to express thanks for a favor; (c) failure to notice that one has received a favor at all. These types of ungrateful acts are degrees, and are rated, in the order given, as bad, worse, and worst of all. Conscious ingratitude is always a sin, mortal or venial, according to the nature of the ungrateful act and the conditions of its doing. When ingratitude is complete, it is combined with contempt for the duty and obligation imposed by gratitude, and this can make it a mortal sin. Usually, however, human ingratitude is a matter of negligence or carelessness.
Gratitude is an important virtue and flows from humility. St. Teresa of Avila said: “If souls are humble, they will be moved to give thanks.” The proud person is reluctant to give thanks because he believes that he is entitled to whatever is given to him. Or he is so focused on himself that he fails to notice what others do for him. It is highly likely that most children have failed to notice most of the things that their mothers have done for them―since children are usually very selfish and focused on self.
You cannot fully repay all that your mother has done for you! Only God can fully repay her! So you need to turn to God and pray to God! Your mother has given you physical life―we all realize that truth. Yet what many or most of us forget is that your mother has been instrumental in giving you a spiritual life and a chance at obtaining eternal life. She had you baptized; she taught you how to pray; she talked about God with you; she warned you of the dangers of sin; she tried to lead you along the path of virtue, etc.
By all means ask for material benefits and physical health for your mother in your prayers―but all these things are nothing of substance or value without the icing on the cake―which is salvation. Sometimes God chooses to lead us to salvation without material benefits and without physical health―that is something we must always bear in mind and not become despondent if God does not grant those material and physical things. As Scripture says: “We know that to them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to His purpose, are called to be saints!” (Romans 8:28). It is better to be sick saint than a rich reprobate!
If your mother is deceased―don’t be a fool and automatically imagine that she is lounging around on a silk couch in Heaven, nibbling grapes and sipping wine! Better to err on the safe side of things and pray for her soul! “It is holy and wholesome to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins. (2 Machabees 12:46).
All of our thoughts, words and actions should be driven by the fuel of charity―which is primarily a love of God. Therefore, you love your mother because you love God―and your mother is a creature that God created in His own image and likeness. You also love your mother because she “created” you in her own image and likeness―you are her flesh and blood. You lived within her for nine months, relying upon her for nourishment and safety while you grew to the point when you could finally live and survive outside your mother’s womb―but still not without your mother’s love, care and assistance.
What is this? Some kind of same sex marriage statement? No, God forbid! It is a truth that applies to everyone! We all have two mothers―an earthly mother and a heavenly Mother. We all recognize, know and accept our earthly mother, but we often forget―at least in practice if not in theory―that we also have a heavenly Mother with whom we must also have a relationship. As Christ was dying on His cross on Calvary, He made Our Lady our spiritual Mother: “When Jesus therefore had seen His Mother and the disciple standing whom He loved, He said to His mother: ‘Woman, behold thy son!’ After that He said to the disciple: ‘Behold thy mother!’ And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own” (John 19:26-27). The Church unanimously agrees that not only did Christ make Our Lady the spiritual Mother of St. John, but through St. John He gave Our Lady as a spiritual Mother to all the world of all times―for Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Graces and there is nobody on Earth who receives graces from God in any other apart from receiving through the hands of Mary.
God’s Love Reflected in Mothers
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8). It is true that no earthly image can fully reveal the perfect love of God. God is transcendent and His love is beyond what this world can contain and fully understand. But, nonetheless, there are many things in this world that do reveal some aspects of the love of God. “For God created man [and woman] to the image of His own likeness” (Wisdom 2:23). One such “image” and “likeness” is that of a mother’s love―for, as they say, the husband is the head of the family and the wife is the heart of the family.
Though God has been revealed to us as the Father in Heaven and the Son of God came as a man, we can discover much about the love of God from a mother’s love. In fact, it is even appropriate to understand that God is like the tenderest mother to us. God’s love for us is very much like a mother’s love for her child. God Himself applies the following analogy of a mother to Himself: “Can a woman forget her infant, so as not to have pity on the son of her womb? And if she should forget―yet will not I forget thee!” (Isaias 49:15). Not only does God love us like a mother, but we experience God’s love in our mother’s love. For “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and all true love is ultimately born from God: “For without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
A mother is an image of God, an icon of God’s presence, a window into God’s mystery, a tangible embrace of God’s gentleness. God loves us into being and embraces us with His kindness. God’s love is unconditional and arose out of the act of God creating the Universe, just like the love of a mother originates from the fact of a child growing within her when she chooses to be pregnant. Motherhood is sacred because it is part of the natural design of God for humanity. He puts into a mother’s heart a powerful love for her child, offering unwavering commitment. Most of the time, mothers love their children throughout their lives, even though her children may disappoint her.
Though no mother is perfect, except our Blessed Mother, it is good to look at the beauty of a mother’s love when using it to understand God. The tenderness and unconditional acceptance of a mother, stand out as two aspects that reveal the love of God. All true love comes from God, for without Him we can do nothing (John 15:5). God does love you with a perfect motherly love. “My dearest―if God hath so loved us; we also ought to love one another!” (1 John 4:11). God plants in us the seeds of love when we receive sanctifying grace in the Sacrament of Baptism―it is our responsibility to grow those seeds of love into a tree of love, with powerful roots of love and branches of love reaching out in all directions.
Every living creature has a mother, and at some level, every mother loves her child. Such is true not only for human persons but for the animal kingdom as well. The National Geographic films show us that, out in the wild, ‘mothers’ of the animal kingdom give birth to ‘babies’, take care of them, and fiercely protect them from predators. Mothers have been known to give up their own lives for the sake of their children, both born and unborn. We hear in the news about pregnant women afflicted with cancer forgoing life-saving treatment, knowing they would die so that their child could be born and live. In the news stories about the 2017 mass shooting in Las Vegas, we heard of mothers using their bodies to take a bullet so that their children would survive.
Mothers are Owed Obedience
In Holy Scripture we read of Jesus―Who was, don’t forget, God Himself―showing obedience to Mary and Joseph! “And Jesus went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them” (Luke 2:51). The Apostle St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Colossians, says: “Children obey your parents!” This is one of the most obvious dictates of nature―even the irrational creatures are obedient by instinct, and follow the signs of the parent animal, or bird, or reptile. Perhaps there is no duty more generally acknowledged and accepted than this. Your obedience should begin early—the younger you are, the more you need a guide and a ruler.
The Qualities of Obedience
Obedience should be universal ― “Children obey your parents,” said the Apostle, “in all things.” Obedience reflects and proves our love. Our Lord Himself indicated this: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15). This loving obedience to parents is the school for acquiring a loving obedience towards God. Holy Scripture commands us obey our parents: “Children, obey your parents in the Lord! … Children, obey your parents in all things―for this is well pleasing to the Lord!” (Ephesians 6:1; Colossians 3:20). The only exception to this obligation of obeying our parents is when their commands are, in the letter or spirit of them, opposed to the commands of God. In this case, as well as in every other, we must “obey God, rather than men” (Acts 5:29). But even here your refusal to comply with the sinful command of a parent must be uttered in a meek and respectful manner, so that it shall be manifest you are actuated by pure, conscientious motives, and not by a mere rebellious resistance of parental authority. Your obedience should have no other exception than that which is made by conscience.
Your personal inclinations and tastes are out of the question—your inclinations and tastes must be crossed, opposed, and set aside, when opposed to parental authority. Obedience should be prompt. As soon as the command is uttered, it should be complied with. It is a disgrace to any child that it should be necessary for a father or a mother to repeat a command. You should even anticipate, if possible their injunctions, and not wait until their will is announced in words. A tardy obedience loses all its glory.
Obedience should be cheerful. A reluctant virtue is no virtue at all. Constrained and unwilling obedience, is rebellion in principle; it is vice clothed in the garment of goodness. God loves a cheerful giver, and so does man. A child retiring from a parent’s presence, muttering, sullen, and murmuring, is one of the ugliest spectacles in creation—of what value is anything he does, in such a temper as this?
Obedience should be self-denying. You must give up your own wills, and sacrifice your own desires, and perform the things that are difficult, as well as those that are easy. When a soldier receives a command, although he may be at home in comfort, and he is required at once to go into the field of danger, he hesitates not, he considers he has no option. A child has no more room for the gratification of self-will than the soldier has—he must obey.
Obedience should be uniform. Obedience is generally given and shown without much difficulty when the parents are present―but that is not always the case when they are absent. Children should despise this two-faced attitude of consulting the wishes and obeying the injunctions of your parents, only when they are there to witness your conduct. Such hypocrisy is detestable. Act upon nobler principles.
How sublimely simple and striking was the reply of the child, who upon being pressed in company to take something which his absent parents had forbidden him to touch; and who, upon being reminded that they were not there to witness him, replied: “That is true, but God and my conscience are here!” Be it your determination, to imitate this beautiful example of filial piety, and obey in all things even your absent parents.
It will be hard to find a child that has not been disobedient to its parents in general, and disobedient to the mother in particular. Just as St. Simeon prophesied that a sword of sorrow would pierce Our Lady’s Heart―so too have we pierced the hearts of our mothers. Some have done so more than others. The words that Our Lord addressed to St. Peter, could just as well be addressed to our parents: “He that hears you, hears Me; and he that despises you, despises Me; and he that despises Me, despises Him that sent Me!” (Luke 10:16).
God Given Authority
We should also remember the words that Our Lord spoke to Pontius Pilate, telling Pilate that his authority was God-given: “Thou shouldst not have any power against me, unless it were given thee from above!” (John 19:11). Our parents, likewise, have received their authority from God. When we reject their authority or neglect to fulfill their commands, then it is not only against our parents that we sin―but it is also against God that we sin. As Jesus said: “Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me! … Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these My least brethren, neither did you do it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40 & 45).
Perhaps an examination of conscience would not be a bad idea on the subject of our obedience to our parents in general, and our mother in particular, during the time of our childhood and teenage years while we still lived in our parental home! Expressing regret to our mother (and father) would also be a good idea! Remember that St. Peter wept for the rest of his life over the fact that he had denied Our Lord three times during the Passion!
Underestimated, Underestimated, Undervalued
Where would we be without our mothers? Obviously, a rhetorical question, as we wouldn’t even have life without the great gift of our mothers. But they play a much more important role in our lives than just giving birth: they form, they comfort, they teach us to pray, etc. Motherhood is such a beautiful and wonderful gift, and we should constantly thank God for the gifts that our mothers (and those who play a motherly role!) bring to our lives, both within and outside of the Church.
But even the Church is referred to as ‘Mother,’ for all the things that our mothers do for us in life, the Church does for her children in the spiritual life: she teaches, she comforts, she forms, she assists us in prayer, she protects and guards her children, etc. The Church spends her life so that her beloved sons and daughters might have life. And what a beautiful gift this is as well!
The Church even raises up motherly figures for us to identify and relate, the first among them the Blessed Mother: Mary, the Mother of Our Lord and Savior; for if we want to be close to Jesus, what better way is there than to be close to His Mother who will constantly bring our needs to Him and help us to understand His directions and guidance. (See John chapter 2, for example).
In line with the Blessed Mother are other great spiritual mothers who are foundresses of religious communities of women. Just in this country, there are several examples: St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, foundress of the Sisters of Charity; St. Marianne Cope who cared for lepers in Hawaii; Mother Theodore Guerin, who founded the Sisters of Providence of Saint Mary of the Woods near Terra Haute, Indiana; and St Frances Xavier Cabrini who did so much work caring for minority and native peoples in the late 1800s.
Beautifully, there are also mothers who are venerated at the Altars as well: St. Monica, the mother of St. Augustine, and the first married couple to be Canonized together: Saints Louis and Zelie Martin, the parents of St. Therese of Lisieux, who were declared saints in 2015.
We Owe an Unpayable Debt
Yes―we all owe a great debt to our mothers, a debt that in reality is unpayable, but a debt that we nevertheless must try to pay the best we can. Infants are ignorant of what their mothers are doing for them, while young children are too selfish to appreciate what their mothers do for them. It is only as we mature and enter adulthood that we―hopefully―start to realize the incredible amount of work, care and love that our mothers have invested in raising us.
In reality, mothers often end up being like slaves for their children―though they are usually loving slaves who love to slave for their children. The child is waited upon hand-and-foot from the moment of its birth. From infancy through to teenage years, the child gets to sleep far longer than the mother. The child pays no rent; does not buy food; does no cooking; has almost every meal cooked and served; does no cleaning; does no repairs; does not buy clothing; does not do the laundry; pays no bills; does not pay for schooling; buys nothing for the house; is driven around in a car; does not pay for the gas/fuel, etc., etc. The child is basically spoiled while the mother is toiled. If you had to pay for those services, you would end up penniless. Yet some children do not even “pay” with a sincere “Thank you, mom!” They expect all that service, they take it for granted, they demand it―and then still find time to complain!
Instead, our attitude ought to be like that of St. Paul, who writes: “I cease not to give thanks for you, making commemoration of you in my prayers!” (Ephesians 1:16). We are incapable of repaying the debt we owe to our mothers, but, as Jesus said: “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27).
How much do you pray for your mother―whether alive or deceased? We are talking here about Rosaries for your mother―and not just an occasional Our Father or Hail Mary!
How many Masses have you had offered for your mother? The Mass stipend is not earth shatteringly expensive―a mere few dollars usually suffices!
How many secret sacrifices do you make each day for your mother? Heck! She made tens of daily sacrifices for you during your childhood―and perhaps over a hundred daily sacrifices for you during your infancy―except that she did not call them “sacrifices” but “acts of love”!
Pointing Fingers is Easy!
Our Lord says to us: “Be ye perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). Who do you know that has achieved this perfection? Are you perfect? Is your mother perfect? Or was she perfect (if she is now deceased)? Of course not! True perfection is a rarity―even though God meant to be commonplace. Of the few souls that make it to Heaven, the vast majority have to achieve or “top-up” their perfection (or lack of it) in the fires of Purgatory.
No human being is born perfect (apart from the Blessed Virgin Mary). The attainment of perfection is meant to be a life-long work, with no shortage of setbacks and failures. Perfection is not a switch that you can just flick on. They say that every failure is a step closer to success―if we learn something from the failure. Similarly, you could say that each of our failings and falls is a step closer to perfection and holiness. When you were a baby, you did not suddenly stand up one day and started walking effortlessly and perfectly! You learned to walk by falling first, falling repeatedly, then falling less and less until you could string together a decent series of wobbly steps.
Something similar could be said of motherhood. Nobody is born a perfect mother. Mothers usually learn by trial and error―even if they have read many books on motherhood or have been given much advice by other mothers. Theory are practice are not identical twins! Just as your mother was patient and understanding with you during your infancy with your many failures in trying to walk, talk, dress yourself, feed yourself, etc. ― so too should you be understanding and forgiving of the many failures that your mother must have gone through in trying to raise you as a good Catholic. Are you a good Catholic today? Are you a perfect Catholic today? No! So, as Our Lord tells us: “Why seest thou the splinter that is in thy brother’s [mother’s] eye; and seest not the plank that is in thy own eye? Or how sayest thou to thy brother [mother’s]: ‘Let me cast the splinter out of thy eye!’ ― and behold there is a plank in thy own eye? Thou hypocrite! Cast out first the beam in thy own eye, and then shalt thou see to cast out the splinter out of thy brother’s [mother’s] eye!” (Matthew 7:3-5).
Merciful Mothers and Mercy for Mothers
Forgiveness of failures, offenses and sins is something very godly. Mercy is a beautiful thing―and the blueprint for mercy is found in God. Holy Scripture repeatedly puts the mercy of God before our eyes and encourages us to imitate that mercy of God. The closer we are God, then the more merciful we become. Here are just a handful of the hundreds of Scriptural quotes on mercy that can be found:
“The Lord is gracious and merciful, patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9).
“Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7).
“If thy brother sin against thee, reprove him: and if he do penance, forgive him. And if he sin against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day be converted unto thee, saying, ‘I repent!’― then forgive him” (Luke 17:3-4).
“Let all bitterness, and anger, and indignation, and clamor, and blasphemy, be put away from you, with all malice. And be ye kind one to another; merciful, forgiving one another, even as God hath forgiven you in Christ!” (Ephesians 4:31-32).
“If you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will also forgive you your offences. But if you will not forgive men, then neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15).
“And the Scribes and the Pharisees brought unto Him a woman taken in adultery: and they set her in the midst, and said to Him: ‘Master, this woman was even now taken in adultery! Now Moses in the law commanded us to stone such a one. But what sayest Thou?’ And this they said tempting Him, so that they might accuse Him. But Jesus, bowing Himself down, wrote with His finger on the ground. When therefore they continued asking Him, He lifted up Himself, and said to them: ‘He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!’ And again stooping down, He wrote on the ground. But they hearing this, went out, one by one, beginning at the eldest. And Jesus alone remained, and the woman standing in the midst. Then Jesus lifting up Himself, said to her: ‘Woman, where are they that accused thee? Hath no man condemned thee?’ She said: ‘No man, Lord!’ And Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:3-11).
Mercy has to be seen and sown in the family. We must learn mercy at an early age. We must learn to show mercy to those around us from the days of our childhood. If we hope for mercy, or expect mercy, then we must show and give mercy ― “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:8) … “For judgment without mercy will be shown to him that hath not done mercy. And mercy exalteth itself above judgment” (James 2:13). Today, we are far more concerned about judging others rather than showing mercy to others ― and that can even include judging our parents. Forgive your mother her sins and failings and you will find that God will also forgive you your sins and failings!
Even if your mother has physically or emotionally hurt you, harmed you, or neglected you―you must still love her. Why? Because you have done the same to God―and He still loves you, and is always willing to forgive you and accept you back in all sincerity. God holds no grudges―you should hold no grudges. We are all sinners and we all offend each other at some time or another, to one degree or another: Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9) … “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23) … “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “For in many things we all offend. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man. The tongue is a little member and boasts great things. The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue no man can tame, an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison. By it we bless God and the Father: and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be!” (James 3:2-10).
Our Lord warns us: “For if you will forgive men their offences, then your heavenly Father will also forgive you your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15) … “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). To which Scripture adds: “Let all bitterness, and anger, and indignation, and shouting be put away from you! Be kind one to another, merciful, forgiving one another―even as God has forgiven you in Christ!” (Ephesians 4:31-32). “Bearing with one another and forgiving one another―if any have a complaint against another―even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also!” (Colossians 3:13).
The Mother’s Treadmill
As the proverb says: “A woman’s [mother’s] work is never done!” The proverb does not mean to say that the woman never does any work―but that despite all the work that she does, it never seems to end, there is always something else that comes along and requires attention. One of chief areas of attention is that of washing and cleaning. The list could really be endless―like a treadmill that you cannot get off, or a vicious circle that just goes on and on! Besides having to wash and give baths to her young children, there is a lot of material washing and cleaning that has to be done. Here is just the tip of the iceberg of cooking, washing and cleaning duties:
● do the shopping;
● prepare and cook the meals;
● wash the pots, pans, dishes and utensils;
● wash the family’s clothes;
● wash sheets, bedding, towels, tablecloths, etc.;
● clean kitchen counters and stove
● clean fridge and freezer
● wipe down bathroom counters and mirrors
● wipe down the outside of all kitchen/bathroom cabinets
● clean bathroom showers and toilets
● vacuum, sweep and mop all floors
● dust surfaces; de-cobweb and dust high surfaces (e.g. ceiling fans, tops of china cabinets, etc.)
● wash doors and door trims
● wash, dust blinds, windowsills and windows
● wash inside of trashcans (inside home and outdoor cans), etc. etc. etc.
Those things pertain to washing and cleaning material things. Yet human beings are more important than mere material objects―and in human beings, the spiritual is more important than the physical, the soul is more important than the body. Your mother will have tried to make sure that you were clean in both body and soul.
How many times has your mother spiritually cleaned you? In the very first days after your birth she showed you to the priests―so that you could be spiritually cleansed of Original Sin through the Sacrament of Baptism. She has physically cleansed you each and every day of your infancy and your early childhood. She has helped cleanse you from sin by often taking you to Confession. She has cleansed your mind from sinful, bad and erroneous thoughts by teaching you right from wrong; by warning you of dangers; by correcting and punishing you in wrongdoing.
Physical and material germs can come into the house by a multitude of avenues―the same is true of spiritual germs (temptations and sins). Just as the mother must be vigilant in preventing germs from entering and breeding in the home, so too must she be vigilant in preventing spiritual germs (temptations and sins) from gaining access to the souls of family members. Children are notoriously oblivious to the physical and moral dangers that surround them―and they hate being told: “Don’t do this! Don’t do that! This is bad for you! Leave that alone!” etc. That is one of the downsides of mothering―you don’t score very high on popularity and are seen to be a bit of a sourpuss, grouch, spoilsport, killjoy, etc. It is one of the unrewarding aspects of motherhood―policing everyone and everything.
Yet we should be thankful for such policing―especially moral policing―which, at the end of the day (or at the end of life), could save us from an eternity in Hell. “The foolish man despises his mother!” (Proverbs 15:20). “Thou shalt honor thy mother all the days of her life!” (Tobias 4:3) … “and forsake not the law of thy mother” (Proverbs 1:8) … “and despise not thy mother when she is old” (Proverbs 23:22). “He that honors his mother is like someone that lays up a treasure” (Ecclesiasticus 3:5).
Gratitude Deserved―Ingratitude Shown
St. Thomas Aquinas has the following to say on the virtue of gratitude and the sin of ingratitude:
By gratitude, we give thanks to benefactors. Gratitude is a special virtue, allied to justice and subordinate to it. We are to give thanks to every benefactor. We owe thanks to God, and, under God, to many of our fellowmen. Gratitude should be expressed in words and deeds according to circumstances and opportunities. Gratitude makes instant acknowledgment of favors by graciousness in receiving them, and by the thankful disposition of the heart. Favors themselves are to be repaid at a time convenient to the benefactor. In repaying a favor and in estimating our debt, we take into consideration the disposition of our benefactor even more than the gift he has bestowed. We are sometimes under greater obligation to one who confers a small favor with a large heart, than to one who gives something greater in a grudging spirit. The return of a favor, the repayment, should exceed in graciousness the favor received. Gratitude is due for what is freely given. An exact return of the favor received meets the moral obligation of the beneficiary, but does not include the gratitude he owes. Gratitude is something freely given over and above the amount of repayment. Hence, gratitude exceeds the favor received.
Ingratitude
Gratitude is a virtue. Its direct opposite is therefore a vice. Ingratitude is the vice which stands opposed to the virtue of gratitude. The vice of ingratitude finds expression in sins of ingratitude. Acts or sins of ingratitude are of three types: (a) failure to return a favor received; (b) failure to express thanks for a favor; (c) failure to notice that one has received a favor at all. These types of ungrateful acts are degrees, and are rated, in the order given, as bad, worse, and worst of all. Conscious ingratitude is always a sin, mortal or venial, according to the nature of the ungrateful act and the conditions of its doing. When ingratitude is complete, it is combined with contempt for the duty and obligation imposed by gratitude, and this can make it a mortal sin. Usually, however, human ingratitude is a matter of negligence or carelessness.
Gratitude is an important virtue and flows from humility. St. Teresa of Avila said: “If souls are humble, they will be moved to give thanks.” The proud person is reluctant to give thanks because he believes that he is entitled to whatever is given to him. Or he is so focused on himself that he fails to notice what others do for him. It is highly likely that most children have failed to notice most of the things that their mothers have done for them―since children are usually very selfish and focused on self.
You cannot fully repay all that your mother has done for you! Only God can fully repay her! So you need to turn to God and pray to God! Your mother has given you physical life―we all realize that truth. Yet what many or most of us forget is that your mother has been instrumental in giving you a spiritual life and a chance at obtaining eternal life. She had you baptized; she taught you how to pray; she talked about God with you; she warned you of the dangers of sin; she tried to lead you along the path of virtue, etc.
By all means ask for material benefits and physical health for your mother in your prayers―but all these things are nothing of substance or value without the icing on the cake―which is salvation. Sometimes God chooses to lead us to salvation without material benefits and without physical health―that is something we must always bear in mind and not become despondent if God does not grant those material and physical things. As Scripture says: “We know that to them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to His purpose, are called to be saints!” (Romans 8:28). It is better to be sick saint than a rich reprobate!
If your mother is deceased―don’t be a fool and automatically imagine that she is lounging around on a silk couch in Heaven, nibbling grapes and sipping wine! Better to err on the safe side of things and pray for her soul! “It is holy and wholesome to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins. (2 Machabees 12:46).
All of our thoughts, words and actions should be driven by the fuel of charity―which is primarily a love of God. Therefore, you love your mother because you love God―and your mother is a creature that God created in His own image and likeness. You also love your mother because she “created” you in her own image and likeness―you are her flesh and blood. You lived within her for nine months, relying upon her for nourishment and safety while you grew to the point when you could finally live and survive outside your mother’s womb―but still not without your mother’s love, care and assistance.
Article 25
Saturday, May 11th
A Time of Fear!
Saturday, May 11th
A Time of Fear!
The Fear of the Apostles
After Our Lord’s Ascension into Heaven, the Apostles ran the whole gamut of emotions: wonder, awe, joy, disappointment, sadness, loneliness, and finally the fear with which they locked themselves in the Upper Room for fear of the Jews. So let us then, look at fear and the Holy Ghost’s Gift of Fear in some more detail―especially as we approach Pentecost Sunday.
Fear seems like a negative thing, a cowardly thing, an unmanly thing―something that we imagine that we should avoid and be ashamed of, rather than something positive that we can be proud of. People who are afraid are usually mocked and ridiculed, rather than praised.
The Gift of Fear of the Lord
All the gifts of the Holy Ghost are most perfect, yet there is undoubtedly a hierarchy between them that determines different degrees of excellence and perfection. This hierarchical scale begins with the gift of fear and reaches its apex with the gift of wisdom, the most sublime and excellent of all. Thus, we shall begin our study with the gift of fear.
Should God Be Feared?
St. Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 19, art. 1), begins the lengthy and magnificent question dedicated to the gift of the fear of God by asking if God is be feared. For St. Thomas, it seems clear that God cannot and should not be feared for two very clear and simple reasons:
(1) The object of fear is a future evil. But God is free of all evil since He is goodness itself. Therefore, He cannot and should not be feared.
(2) Fear is opposed to hope. Now, we hope in God. Therefore, we cannot fear Him at the same time.
Upright Fear of God
Despite these difficulties, it is evident that God can and ought to be feared in an upright way. God, as the supreme good and future beatitude of man, cannot be an object of fear; He is an object of love and desire. But God is also infinitely just—hating and punishing the sins of man. So, in so far as He is able to inflict evil upon us in punishment for our sins, He can and ought to be feared.
Difficulties
The first difficulty is resolved by realizing that the evil of fault is not from God, as its author, but from us, in so far as we forsake God; while the evil of punishment is from God as its author, in so far as it has the character of a good, since it is something just, through being inflicted on us justly; although originally this is due to the demerit of sin. Thus it is written in the book of Wisdom: “For God made not death; but the wicked, with works and words, have called it to them” (Wisdom 1:13 and 16).
The second difficulty is resolved by realizing that one must consider the justice of God, by which He punishes sinners, as well as His mercy, by which He spares us. Fear is aroused in us by the consideration of His justice, while hope enters by the consideration of His mercy. Thus, under different aspects, God is the object of hope and fear.
It is necessary to bear in mind, however, that there are many types of fear, and not all of them are perfect or even virtuous.
Different Types of Fear
Four types of fear can be distinguished, each very different from the other:
(1) Worldly Fear
This is the fear that would not hesitate to offend God in order to avoid a temporal evil. Thus one would apostatize from the Faith in order to avoid the torments and sufferings of persecution. Clearly, not only is this fear not virtuous, it is a great sin, since a created good (in this case one’s own life) is preferred to the non-created good, which is God Himself. For this reason Christ says in the Gospel: “He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it” (Matthew 10:39). The sins committed because of human respect stem, to a greater or lesser degree, from this kind of worldly fear. How far removed from this worldly fear was St. Teresa of Jesus, who said that she would rather be “completely lacking in gratitude to the whole world” than to offend God in a single point.
(2) Servile Fear
This is the fear of the servant who waits on his master out of fear of the punishment he might receive if he does not do so. Servile fear comes in two types:
(a) If fear of punishment is the only cause for avoiding sin, it is a sin, because it does not matter to him that sin is an offense against God; what keeps him from doing evil is simply the fear of punishment. (It is as if one were to say: “I would commit the sin if there were no Hell.”) This is evil and sinful because even though the person materially avoids sin, he commits it formally because of the affection he has admitted. In this sense it is called servilely servile fear, and is always evil and sinful.
(b) If fear of punishment is not the only or proximate cause but accompanies the first and principal cause (the fear of offending God), it is good and honest, since, in the final analysis, it rejects sin primarily because it offends God and, in addition, because it may result in punishment by God. Such is the sorrow called attrition, which the Church, against the doctrine of the Protestants and Jansenists, states to be “good and honest.” It is also called simply servile fear.
(3) Imperfect Filial Fear
This is the fear that avoids sin because it would separate us from God, Whom we love. It is the fear of a son who loves his father and does not want to be separated from him. This kind of fear is very good and honest. But it is not yet perfect, since it still takes into account the punishment that would result: the separation from the father and, thus, from Heaven. Nevertheless, it is far superior to simply servile fear, because it comes from the love for the father rather than from the fear of other kinds of pains. This is called initial fear and occupies an intermediate place between servile and true filial fear, as we shall see.
(4) Perfect Filial Fear
This is the fear of the loving son awaiting orders from his father, whom he will not disobey merely because he does not want to displease him, even if not threatened by any kind of pain or punishment. It is the perfect fear of those who can say in all honesty: “Even if there were no Heaven, I would love Thee, and even if there were no Hell, I would fear Thee.”
Will the Real Fear Please Stand Up!
We looked at four types of fear: (1) Worldly Fear, (2) Servile Fear, (3) Imperfect Filial Fear and (4) Perfect Filial Fear. The question now arises: “Which of these fears is the gift of the Holy Ghost?”
Evidently, it cannot be the worldly fear, nor the servile fear. It could not be the worldly fear, because it is sinful, for it fears more the loss of the world than the loss of God, Whom it would abandon for the world.
Nor could it be the servile fear, because, although not evil of itself, it could be found even in a sinner by means of an Actual Grace, that would move him to the sorrow of attrition because of the fear of punishment by God. This fear is a grace from God that moves one to repentance, but as yet it is not connected to charity nor, therefore, to the gifts of the Holy Ghost.
According to St. Thomas Aquinas, only perfect filial fear is the Gift of Fear, for it is based directly on charity or reverence of God as Father. But as imperfect filial fear (the seed of perfect filial fear) is not substantially different from perfect filial fear, the imperfect fear also is a part of the Gift of Fear, although only in its incipient and imperfect manifestations. In the measure that charity increases, initial fear is gradually purified so that it loses the servile aspect that still fears punishment and gradually considers sin solely as an offense against God (Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 19, articles 8-10). Perfect Filial Fear is the fear of the loving son for his father, whom he obeys―not out of fear of punishment, but out of a fear of offended someone whom he loves.
Nature of the Gift of Fear
Though the Gift of Fear is one of the most difficult to define, we could give the following definition regarding its nature: “The Gift of Fear is a an ever present supernatural attitude of the soul, which, under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, makes us docile to the Will of God, out of reverence for the excellence and majesty of God.”
God is the supreme cause as well the perfect example of all the supernatural gifts we have received from His divine generosity, yet it seems that one cannot find any example in Him for the Gift of Fear, since the existence of any kind of fear in God is absolutely impossible.
Fear in God?
The Divine model or example, which is very visible in all the other Gifts of the Holy Ghost, is difficult to see in the Gift of Fear. One can easily understand that the intellectual gifts have as their prototype the Intelligence, Knowledge, Wisdom and Counsel of God. The Gift of Piety is like an imitation of the glorification that God finds in Himself, in His Word. The Gift of Fortitude is like a reflection of the divine power of God. But, how could we discover in God a model of the Gift of Fear?
God’s Spirit of Fear
It exists, in fact, in His separateness from all evil, that is, in His infinite sanctity, which He communicates to men and angels, who “tremble” before Him; it exists in His divine purity, inaccessible to the least stain and endowed with a power sovereignly efficacious against all forms of evil. The Spirit of God is a Spirit of Fear, just as it is one of Love, Intelligence, Knowledge, Wisdom, Counsel, Fortitude and Piety. In His personal action in the most intimate part of the soul, the Spirit of the Father and the Son transmits something of the infinite hatred for sin that exists in God Himself, and something of His will to oppose the “evil of guilt,” and His ordaining of the “evil of pain” by His avenging justice for His greater glory and for the restoration of order in the universe.
A similar sentiment is shared, in the innermost parts of the soul, under the direct influence of the Spirit of Fear. Above all else, it is an energetic detestation for sin, dictated by Charity; in addition, it is a sentiment of reverence for the infinite grandeur of Him whose sovereign goodness deserves to be the supreme end of each of our acts, without the least selfish deviation toward sin. The godlike mode of the Spirit of Fear is measured by the holiness of God.
Related Virtues
The Gifts of the Holy Ghost are intimately related to each other and to the ensemble of Christian Virtues. This is because both the Gifts and the Virtues are cannot be separated from supernatural Charity, which is their form and their soul. However, each of the Gifts is especially related to one or several infused Virtues, which it perfects on account of their great affinity. The Gift of Fear is especially related to Hope, Temperance, Religion and Humility.
(1) Hope
Man feels a natural inclination to love himself excessively, to presume that he is something, that he is able to do much in the pursuit of eternal beatitude. Such is the sin of presumption, the contrary of the virtue of Hope, which can be uprooted only by the Gift of Fear. For Fear gives us that supernatural awareness of our absolute impotence before God and, as a consequence, inclines us to rely only on the omnipotent help of God, the formal motive of Hope. Without the Gift of Fear, the virtue of Hope would never be completely perfect in us.
Hope leads the human soul, conscious of its fragility and misery, to take refuge in God, whose merciful omnipotence is the only thing that can deliver it from all evil. Thus, the spirit of Fear and theological Hope, the sense of our weakness and of God’s omnipotence, help each other in us. The Gift of Fear thus becomes one of the most precious aids to Christian Hope. The weaker and more miserable one feels, the more capable of falling one feels, then all the more one takes refuge in God, just as a child takes refuge in his father’s arms.
(2) Temperance
The Gift of Fear looks principally at God, Whom we must avoid offending, and in this sense it pertains to the virtue of Hope, as we have already indicated. But secondarily fear can also look at any other thing which would be able to help man avoid offending God. In this sense the Gift of Fear helps to correct the disorderly tendency by which a man experiences a strong attraction to carnal delight, by repressing or controlling it through fear of the Lord and thus aiding and strengthening the virtue of Temperance. Without the reinforcement of the Gift of Fear, Temperance would be unable to always and everywhere triumph over the violence of the disorderly passions.
(3) Religion
Religion is the virtue that regulates the worship, owed to the majesty of God. When this virtue is perfected by the Gift of Fear, it reaches its greatest potential and full perfection. The worship due to the Divinity abounds, then, with that reverential Fear that even the angels experience before the majesty of God with that holy Fear which expresses itself in profound adoration before the infinite perfection of God: “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God of hosts” (Isaias 6:3).
The supreme model of this reverence, in the face of the grandeur and majesty of God, is Christ Himself. If we could contemplate the humanity or human nature of Jesus, we would see it overwhelmed by reverence before the Word of God, to Whom it was hypostatically united, that is, forming one Divine Person with Him. This is the reverence the Holy Ghost places in our souls by means of the Gift of Fear. He carefully fosters it in us, but moderates it and unites it with the gift of Piety, which places in our souls a sentiment of love and filial tenderness, fruit of our divine adoption, which allows us to call God our Father.
(4) Humility
The infinite contrast between the greatness and sanctity of God and our incredible littleness and misery is the basis and root of Christian Humility; but only the Gift of Fear acting intensely in the soul raises Humility to the sublime perfection that we admire in the saints. Let us see how a theologian explains this doctrine:
A man especially loves his own grandeur, and he loves to be considered greater than he really is. This is the result of Pride. Humility reduces this self-magnification, so that a man will not pretend to be more than he is. The Gift of Fear acts in this matter by submerging the soul in the abyss of its own nothingness before God in the depths of its own misery before the divine justice and majesty.
Thus, when the soul is permeated with this gift, when it sees that it is nothing when compared to God, and that it has nothing of itself but misery and sin, then it does not seek its own glory apart from God, nor does it judge itself to be worthy of anything but disdain and punishment. Only in this way does Humility reach its perfection. Such was the Humility that we see in the saints, who had a complete disdain for themselves.
Fear Aids Other Virtues Too
While it is most closely related to these four fundamental virtues, the Gift of Fear also exercises its influence over several other virtues, which are related in some manner to the first ones. There is no virtue, be it theological or cardinal, that does not receive the influence of one or more Gifts of the Holy Ghost. Thus, through Temperance, the Gift of Fear acts upon Chastity, elevating it to the most exquisite delicacy; on the virtue of Meekness, by totally repressing disordered anger; on the virtue of Modesty, by suppressing any disorderly internal or external bodily movements. Moreover, it combats the passions that, together with vainglory, are the daughters of pride: boastfulness, presumption, hypocrisy, pertinacity, discord, insolence and disobedience.
After Our Lord’s Ascension into Heaven, the Apostles ran the whole gamut of emotions: wonder, awe, joy, disappointment, sadness, loneliness, and finally the fear with which they locked themselves in the Upper Room for fear of the Jews. So let us then, look at fear and the Holy Ghost’s Gift of Fear in some more detail―especially as we approach Pentecost Sunday.
Fear seems like a negative thing, a cowardly thing, an unmanly thing―something that we imagine that we should avoid and be ashamed of, rather than something positive that we can be proud of. People who are afraid are usually mocked and ridiculed, rather than praised.
The Gift of Fear of the Lord
All the gifts of the Holy Ghost are most perfect, yet there is undoubtedly a hierarchy between them that determines different degrees of excellence and perfection. This hierarchical scale begins with the gift of fear and reaches its apex with the gift of wisdom, the most sublime and excellent of all. Thus, we shall begin our study with the gift of fear.
Should God Be Feared?
St. Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 19, art. 1), begins the lengthy and magnificent question dedicated to the gift of the fear of God by asking if God is be feared. For St. Thomas, it seems clear that God cannot and should not be feared for two very clear and simple reasons:
(1) The object of fear is a future evil. But God is free of all evil since He is goodness itself. Therefore, He cannot and should not be feared.
(2) Fear is opposed to hope. Now, we hope in God. Therefore, we cannot fear Him at the same time.
Upright Fear of God
Despite these difficulties, it is evident that God can and ought to be feared in an upright way. God, as the supreme good and future beatitude of man, cannot be an object of fear; He is an object of love and desire. But God is also infinitely just—hating and punishing the sins of man. So, in so far as He is able to inflict evil upon us in punishment for our sins, He can and ought to be feared.
Difficulties
The first difficulty is resolved by realizing that the evil of fault is not from God, as its author, but from us, in so far as we forsake God; while the evil of punishment is from God as its author, in so far as it has the character of a good, since it is something just, through being inflicted on us justly; although originally this is due to the demerit of sin. Thus it is written in the book of Wisdom: “For God made not death; but the wicked, with works and words, have called it to them” (Wisdom 1:13 and 16).
The second difficulty is resolved by realizing that one must consider the justice of God, by which He punishes sinners, as well as His mercy, by which He spares us. Fear is aroused in us by the consideration of His justice, while hope enters by the consideration of His mercy. Thus, under different aspects, God is the object of hope and fear.
It is necessary to bear in mind, however, that there are many types of fear, and not all of them are perfect or even virtuous.
Different Types of Fear
Four types of fear can be distinguished, each very different from the other:
(1) Worldly Fear
This is the fear that would not hesitate to offend God in order to avoid a temporal evil. Thus one would apostatize from the Faith in order to avoid the torments and sufferings of persecution. Clearly, not only is this fear not virtuous, it is a great sin, since a created good (in this case one’s own life) is preferred to the non-created good, which is God Himself. For this reason Christ says in the Gospel: “He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it” (Matthew 10:39). The sins committed because of human respect stem, to a greater or lesser degree, from this kind of worldly fear. How far removed from this worldly fear was St. Teresa of Jesus, who said that she would rather be “completely lacking in gratitude to the whole world” than to offend God in a single point.
(2) Servile Fear
This is the fear of the servant who waits on his master out of fear of the punishment he might receive if he does not do so. Servile fear comes in two types:
(a) If fear of punishment is the only cause for avoiding sin, it is a sin, because it does not matter to him that sin is an offense against God; what keeps him from doing evil is simply the fear of punishment. (It is as if one were to say: “I would commit the sin if there were no Hell.”) This is evil and sinful because even though the person materially avoids sin, he commits it formally because of the affection he has admitted. In this sense it is called servilely servile fear, and is always evil and sinful.
(b) If fear of punishment is not the only or proximate cause but accompanies the first and principal cause (the fear of offending God), it is good and honest, since, in the final analysis, it rejects sin primarily because it offends God and, in addition, because it may result in punishment by God. Such is the sorrow called attrition, which the Church, against the doctrine of the Protestants and Jansenists, states to be “good and honest.” It is also called simply servile fear.
(3) Imperfect Filial Fear
This is the fear that avoids sin because it would separate us from God, Whom we love. It is the fear of a son who loves his father and does not want to be separated from him. This kind of fear is very good and honest. But it is not yet perfect, since it still takes into account the punishment that would result: the separation from the father and, thus, from Heaven. Nevertheless, it is far superior to simply servile fear, because it comes from the love for the father rather than from the fear of other kinds of pains. This is called initial fear and occupies an intermediate place between servile and true filial fear, as we shall see.
(4) Perfect Filial Fear
This is the fear of the loving son awaiting orders from his father, whom he will not disobey merely because he does not want to displease him, even if not threatened by any kind of pain or punishment. It is the perfect fear of those who can say in all honesty: “Even if there were no Heaven, I would love Thee, and even if there were no Hell, I would fear Thee.”
Will the Real Fear Please Stand Up!
We looked at four types of fear: (1) Worldly Fear, (2) Servile Fear, (3) Imperfect Filial Fear and (4) Perfect Filial Fear. The question now arises: “Which of these fears is the gift of the Holy Ghost?”
Evidently, it cannot be the worldly fear, nor the servile fear. It could not be the worldly fear, because it is sinful, for it fears more the loss of the world than the loss of God, Whom it would abandon for the world.
Nor could it be the servile fear, because, although not evil of itself, it could be found even in a sinner by means of an Actual Grace, that would move him to the sorrow of attrition because of the fear of punishment by God. This fear is a grace from God that moves one to repentance, but as yet it is not connected to charity nor, therefore, to the gifts of the Holy Ghost.
According to St. Thomas Aquinas, only perfect filial fear is the Gift of Fear, for it is based directly on charity or reverence of God as Father. But as imperfect filial fear (the seed of perfect filial fear) is not substantially different from perfect filial fear, the imperfect fear also is a part of the Gift of Fear, although only in its incipient and imperfect manifestations. In the measure that charity increases, initial fear is gradually purified so that it loses the servile aspect that still fears punishment and gradually considers sin solely as an offense against God (Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 19, articles 8-10). Perfect Filial Fear is the fear of the loving son for his father, whom he obeys―not out of fear of punishment, but out of a fear of offended someone whom he loves.
Nature of the Gift of Fear
Though the Gift of Fear is one of the most difficult to define, we could give the following definition regarding its nature: “The Gift of Fear is a an ever present supernatural attitude of the soul, which, under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, makes us docile to the Will of God, out of reverence for the excellence and majesty of God.”
God is the supreme cause as well the perfect example of all the supernatural gifts we have received from His divine generosity, yet it seems that one cannot find any example in Him for the Gift of Fear, since the existence of any kind of fear in God is absolutely impossible.
Fear in God?
The Divine model or example, which is very visible in all the other Gifts of the Holy Ghost, is difficult to see in the Gift of Fear. One can easily understand that the intellectual gifts have as their prototype the Intelligence, Knowledge, Wisdom and Counsel of God. The Gift of Piety is like an imitation of the glorification that God finds in Himself, in His Word. The Gift of Fortitude is like a reflection of the divine power of God. But, how could we discover in God a model of the Gift of Fear?
God’s Spirit of Fear
It exists, in fact, in His separateness from all evil, that is, in His infinite sanctity, which He communicates to men and angels, who “tremble” before Him; it exists in His divine purity, inaccessible to the least stain and endowed with a power sovereignly efficacious against all forms of evil. The Spirit of God is a Spirit of Fear, just as it is one of Love, Intelligence, Knowledge, Wisdom, Counsel, Fortitude and Piety. In His personal action in the most intimate part of the soul, the Spirit of the Father and the Son transmits something of the infinite hatred for sin that exists in God Himself, and something of His will to oppose the “evil of guilt,” and His ordaining of the “evil of pain” by His avenging justice for His greater glory and for the restoration of order in the universe.
A similar sentiment is shared, in the innermost parts of the soul, under the direct influence of the Spirit of Fear. Above all else, it is an energetic detestation for sin, dictated by Charity; in addition, it is a sentiment of reverence for the infinite grandeur of Him whose sovereign goodness deserves to be the supreme end of each of our acts, without the least selfish deviation toward sin. The godlike mode of the Spirit of Fear is measured by the holiness of God.
Related Virtues
The Gifts of the Holy Ghost are intimately related to each other and to the ensemble of Christian Virtues. This is because both the Gifts and the Virtues are cannot be separated from supernatural Charity, which is their form and their soul. However, each of the Gifts is especially related to one or several infused Virtues, which it perfects on account of their great affinity. The Gift of Fear is especially related to Hope, Temperance, Religion and Humility.
(1) Hope
Man feels a natural inclination to love himself excessively, to presume that he is something, that he is able to do much in the pursuit of eternal beatitude. Such is the sin of presumption, the contrary of the virtue of Hope, which can be uprooted only by the Gift of Fear. For Fear gives us that supernatural awareness of our absolute impotence before God and, as a consequence, inclines us to rely only on the omnipotent help of God, the formal motive of Hope. Without the Gift of Fear, the virtue of Hope would never be completely perfect in us.
Hope leads the human soul, conscious of its fragility and misery, to take refuge in God, whose merciful omnipotence is the only thing that can deliver it from all evil. Thus, the spirit of Fear and theological Hope, the sense of our weakness and of God’s omnipotence, help each other in us. The Gift of Fear thus becomes one of the most precious aids to Christian Hope. The weaker and more miserable one feels, the more capable of falling one feels, then all the more one takes refuge in God, just as a child takes refuge in his father’s arms.
(2) Temperance
The Gift of Fear looks principally at God, Whom we must avoid offending, and in this sense it pertains to the virtue of Hope, as we have already indicated. But secondarily fear can also look at any other thing which would be able to help man avoid offending God. In this sense the Gift of Fear helps to correct the disorderly tendency by which a man experiences a strong attraction to carnal delight, by repressing or controlling it through fear of the Lord and thus aiding and strengthening the virtue of Temperance. Without the reinforcement of the Gift of Fear, Temperance would be unable to always and everywhere triumph over the violence of the disorderly passions.
(3) Religion
Religion is the virtue that regulates the worship, owed to the majesty of God. When this virtue is perfected by the Gift of Fear, it reaches its greatest potential and full perfection. The worship due to the Divinity abounds, then, with that reverential Fear that even the angels experience before the majesty of God with that holy Fear which expresses itself in profound adoration before the infinite perfection of God: “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God of hosts” (Isaias 6:3).
The supreme model of this reverence, in the face of the grandeur and majesty of God, is Christ Himself. If we could contemplate the humanity or human nature of Jesus, we would see it overwhelmed by reverence before the Word of God, to Whom it was hypostatically united, that is, forming one Divine Person with Him. This is the reverence the Holy Ghost places in our souls by means of the Gift of Fear. He carefully fosters it in us, but moderates it and unites it with the gift of Piety, which places in our souls a sentiment of love and filial tenderness, fruit of our divine adoption, which allows us to call God our Father.
(4) Humility
The infinite contrast between the greatness and sanctity of God and our incredible littleness and misery is the basis and root of Christian Humility; but only the Gift of Fear acting intensely in the soul raises Humility to the sublime perfection that we admire in the saints. Let us see how a theologian explains this doctrine:
A man especially loves his own grandeur, and he loves to be considered greater than he really is. This is the result of Pride. Humility reduces this self-magnification, so that a man will not pretend to be more than he is. The Gift of Fear acts in this matter by submerging the soul in the abyss of its own nothingness before God in the depths of its own misery before the divine justice and majesty.
Thus, when the soul is permeated with this gift, when it sees that it is nothing when compared to God, and that it has nothing of itself but misery and sin, then it does not seek its own glory apart from God, nor does it judge itself to be worthy of anything but disdain and punishment. Only in this way does Humility reach its perfection. Such was the Humility that we see in the saints, who had a complete disdain for themselves.
Fear Aids Other Virtues Too
While it is most closely related to these four fundamental virtues, the Gift of Fear also exercises its influence over several other virtues, which are related in some manner to the first ones. There is no virtue, be it theological or cardinal, that does not receive the influence of one or more Gifts of the Holy Ghost. Thus, through Temperance, the Gift of Fear acts upon Chastity, elevating it to the most exquisite delicacy; on the virtue of Meekness, by totally repressing disordered anger; on the virtue of Modesty, by suppressing any disorderly internal or external bodily movements. Moreover, it combats the passions that, together with vainglory, are the daughters of pride: boastfulness, presumption, hypocrisy, pertinacity, discord, insolence and disobedience.
Article 24
Friday, May 10th
Think of This Instead!
Friday, May 10th
Think of This Instead!
Where Are Your Thoughts? Where Is Your Heart?
“Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21). Ascension Thursday focused our minds on Heaven―but Heaven is not meant to be a focal point for just one day! It should be a daily focal point and a daily topic of conversation! Yet, as we all know, you cannot talk about what you know little about. Heaven is meant to be the goal of our life―yet we next to nothing about it!
Thoughts Lead to Actions
Ideas have consequences. We are what we think. What is in our heart, ends up in our actions. Our Lord said: “For from within out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and defile a man” (Mark 7:21-23). Which is the same as Holy Scripture says elsewhere: “The dressing of a tree shows the fruit thereof, so too a word out of the thought of the heart of man” (Ecclesiasticus 27:7). Our ideas become our ideals which become our actions. Feed the mind trash and …
Junk Does Not Bring Good Health
This is why good reading and good friends are of utmost importance. They are the chief suppliers of our ideas. If we eat junk food, so readily available on today’s market, then our health will become ‘junk’ as disease gradually sets in. As many doctors say, “We eat and drink ourselves into disease”! The same is true for the ‘food’ and ‘drink’ that we feed our minds and hearts. Our Lord said: “Man lives not by bread alone, but by every word of God” (Luke 4:4). He even gives us His own Flesh and Blood to eat and drink: “I am the living Bread which came down from Heaven. If any man eat of this Bread, he shall live forever; and the Bread that I will give, is My Flesh, for the life of the world … Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eats My flesh, and drinks My blood, has everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day” (John 6:51-56).
Think Little, Believe Even Less
This Bread of Life has even fed and kept several mystics and saints alive for varying numbers of years—over 10, 20 and even 30 years—without any other food being taken. The fare served by Heaven is certainly of the highest quality! It should be our greatest treasure—yet, alas, it is not! Varying numbers of Catholics—depending in which part of the world you live—no longer believe in the Real Presence of Jesus, with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, in the Holy Eucharist. This number of disbelievers, or ‘doubting Thomases’, ranges from 40% to 80% ― depending upon where they live and what age they are. Small wonder Our Lord lamented: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
We Think More of Earth Than Heaven
“The Lord hath looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God” (Psalms 13:2). Our Lady of La Salette replies: “People will think only of amusement!” To which Our Lady of Good Success adds: “Hearts are inflated with pride, pretending to know what they do not, or self-satisfied with empty knowledge … Moreover, in these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost.”
Ladder to Heaven
What Jacob saw in his sleep is an indication and an invitation for us also: “And he saw in his sleep a ladder standing upon the Earth, and the top thereof touching Heaven” (Genesis 28:12). We are to climb that ladder to Heaven! To do that, we must first climb there with our minds and hearts—which are the two vertical members of the ladder, while each thought or desire is a horizontal rung. If we think little of Heaven or desire it little, then there will be hardly any rungs on our ladder to Heaven.
Hours on the Ladder
Many saints spent many hours on the ladder! They thought about God and Heaven; they desired God and Heaven; they spoke about God and Heaven; they spent many hours in front of the Blessed Sacrament and thought they were in Heaven! Heavens above! Did they do this because they were saints? Not at all! It was the doing of this that made them saints! It is an infallible recipe for sanctity. It is a guaranteed cure! A certain success! Yet so few try it and even less persevere in it! It seems too arduous, or too boring, or too limiting, or too demanding. Yet, for those who think that, it plainly shows how little they think of Heaven—meaning that they cheapen Heaven, downgrade Heaven, expect Heaven to be a freebie.
The Perks of Heaven Would Perk Them Up
If they were only to think more about Heaven, then they would realize what an incredible ‘product’ it really is—it durability is eternal; it never runs-out or runs-down; it produces in a person a happiness and satisfaction that is unimaginable and unthinkable; the views are splendid; the mansions are many; the community is delightfully friendly; there is no crime in the neighborhood. The medical staff are out of this world—restoring all body parts so that they function perfectly; reversing aging and guaranteeing youthful looks for eternity; eliminating obesity without artificial means like liposuction, naturally or supernaturally; removing all fears, worries, anxieties and sufferings. The entertainment is divine! The music, by all accounts, is angelic—with melodies previously unheard and thought to be impossible.
More Than An Eyeful
No wonder St. Paul, who says he was caught up to the third Heaven, says: “That eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). We are reminded of St. Dominic Savio, who appeared in a vision to St. John Bosco, saying: “Father, tell the boys how wonderful it is here! How wonderful it is!” Which is why Our Lord tries to encourage us to focus more on Heaven than Earth: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
You Can Do It!
In speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady is also speaking to us, as she says: “With the help of the Almighty’s grace, thou canst rise above thyself and make thyself a daughter of Heaven, whence all grace comes. In order that thou mayest attain thereto, let thy habitation continue to be in the higher regions, keeping thy mind fixed in the knowledge of the immutable Being and perfections of God and never allowing thy attention to be drawn away to another even otherwise necessary object. With this continual presence and memory of God’s greatness thou wilt dispose thyself for the influx of the Holy Spirit and His gifts in closest friendship and communication with the Lord ... Let thy thoughts always be of the noblest and thy conversation in Heaven and with the angelic spirits … Of thee, my daughter, I require the practice of these rules, and through thee I wish to inculcate them on other mortals … Let their conversations be in Heaven with the Most High, and with me, who am their Mother, and let it be with the angels, imitating them in holy love.”
Happy Thoughts or Hopeless Thoughts
Putting our eggs in the basket of this world is like eating candy floss—the experience is over before you know it and your not left really satisfied. Why on earth would we place all our hopes for happiness in a miserably short stay on Earth—80 years long if we are lucky—when the basket of eternity is the other option? “Our days upon Earth are as a shadow, and there is no stay” (1 Paralipomenon 29:15). “His spirit shall go forth, and he shall return into his Earth: in that day all their thoughts shall perish” (Psalm 145:4). “Hardly do we guess aright at things that are upon Earth … But the things that are in Heaven, who shall search out?” (Wisdom 9:16). “I am a sojourner on the Earth” (Psalm 118:19).
Just because most other people seem to want to be ‘earthy’ and worldly, do I have to follow suit? “He that cometh from above, is above all. He that is of the Earth, of the Earth he is, and of the Earth he speaketh. He that cometh from Heaven, is above all” (John 3:31). “The first man was of the Earth, earthly: the second man, from Heaven, heavenly” (1 Corinthians 15:47). Our Lord came to Earth to lead us to Heaven: “And I, if I be lifted up from the Earth, will draw all things to Myself” (John 12:32). This Earth, and all that is in it, will perish—why place my eggs in that perishable basket?
On Ash Wednesday, as our foreheads are smeared with ashes, we are told: “Remember man that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return!” Adam was made from the dust or slime of the earth “And the dust return into its earth, from whence it was, and the spirit return to God, Who gave it” (Ecclesiastes 12:7). “All men are earth and ashes” (Ecclesiasticus 17:31). “And of the same clay by a vain labor he makes a god: he who a little before was made of earth himself, and a little after returns to the same out of which he was taken, when his life which was lent him shall be called for again. But his care is, not that he shall labor, nor that his life is short, but he strives with the goldsmiths and silversmiths: and he endeavors to do like the workers in brass, and counts it a glory to make vain things. For his heart is ashes, and his hope vain earth, and his life more base than clay. Forasmuch as he knew not his Maker and Him that breathed into him the soul that works, and that breathed into him a living spirit” (Wisdom 15:8-11).
The Spirit of St. Paul
Holy Scripture asks us a very searching question, that we must answer and act upon: “For what have I in Heaven? And besides Thee what do I desire upon Earth?” (Psalm 72:25). St. Paul gives us his answer: “I count all things to be but loss, for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord; for Whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ” (Philippians 3:8). Yet how many have the spirit of St. Paul? Most have the spirit of the world. They look upon religion as though it were dung, and would gladly suffer the loss of all religious obligations so that they may gain the world.
The Spirit of God Speaks
In response to these worldlings, the Holy Spirit, in Holy Scripture, says: “O Earth, Earth, Earth, hear the word of the Lord!” (Jeremias 22:29). “You have feasted upon Earth: and in riotousness you have nourished your hearts!” (James 5:5). “Where are the princes of the nations, and they that rule over the beasts that are upon the Earth? That take their diversion with the birds of the air. That hoard up silver and gold, wherein men trust, and there is no end of their getting? Who work in silver and are solicitous, and their works are unsearchable. They are cut off, and are gone down to Hell, and others are risen up in their place. Young men have seen the light, and dwelt upon the Earth: but the way of knowledge they have not known, nor have they understood the paths thereof, neither have their children received it, it is far from their face!” (Baruch 3:16-21). “Behold the Lord shall lay waste the Earth, and shall strip it, and shall afflict the face thereof … All mirth is forsaken: the joy of the Earth is gone away!” (Isaias 24:1, 11). “Destruction upon destruction is called for, and all the Earth is laid waste!” (Jeremias 4:20).
The World At His Feet
Our Lord had the world at His feet, but He chose to turn His back upon it: “Again the devil took Jesus up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’” (Matthew 4:8-9). “Jesus answered: My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36). “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing …” (John 14:30). “If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:18-19). “In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world!” (John 16:33).
Overcoming and Rising Above the World
If Our Lord has “overcome the world” then this means the world is an enemy. Therefore, we too must overcome the world, or be overcome by it. It is our Faith that overcomes the world: “For whatsoever is born of God, overcometh the world: and this is the victory which overcometh the world—our Faith” (1 John 5:4). “If then you be dead with Christ from the elements of this world, why do you yet decree as though living in the world?” (Colossians 2:20). “Religion clean and undefiled before God … is to keep one’s self unspotted from this world” (James 1:27). “Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; that we may know the things that are given us from God” (1 Corinthians 2:12).
What God Gives? What the World Gives?
God offers us eternity, the world can only promise 70, 80 or 90 years. In Heaven there are no enemies, in this world Our Lord says that “a man's enemies shall be they of his own household” (Matthew 10:36). Today, the enemies of Christianity are growing with each day, so too is the threat to Christianity—just as Our Lord forecast: “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death: and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name's sake” (Matthew 24:9). In Heaven, there shall be no such hatred—the hatred will be perpetual in Hell. The world offers can only offer us perishable riches—which are left behind the day we die. The riches of Heaven are forever—never to lost; never to taken away. God offers us a perfect body in the prime of life (they say around 33 years of age); perfect peace; perfect joy; perfect happiness; an abundance of true and pure love—the world cannot eliminate anxiety, stress, fear and threats. In Heaven we are loved by all, on Earth we are hated by many. In Heaven there is no gossip, no talk of past sins, failures and mistakes; whereas Earth is full of such talk. There are no diseases or wars in Heaven; while Earth is full of disease and impending war. The rulers of the Earth just want to take from you; in Heaven God and everyone seeks to give. SO WHY DO WE THINK AND TALK SO MUCH ABOUT LIFE IN THIS WORLD? THINK OF HEAVEN MORE, AND LESS OF THIS WORLD!
Heaven and Hell
Just as a coin has two sides that are inseparable, so too does our spiritual life have two inseparable thoughts—Heaven and Hell. In fact, the Church teaches us that the chief things that we should think about are the FOUR LAST THINGS, namely—Death, Judgment, Heaven and Hell. Sadly, none of those things make the “Top Ten” of our favorite thoughts for the day! Yet Holy Mother Church knows best! Most people would do well to follow their Mother’s advice. Yet little is known of what death is like! Who can tell us much about the final judgment after death? Who has been to Hell and come back to tell the tale? Who has come back to Earth from Heaven with pictures and a description?
Even so, there are snippets that we can glean from certain books—though few such books exist. Those that do exist, risk being a little dry for most readers. However, we do ourselves a disservice by neglecting to find and study material on these matters. Some books that spring to mind are Fr. Xavier Schouppe’s two books: Hell and How To Avoid It and its sister book, Purgatory Explained. That deals with the negative side of the coin. On the more positive side we have some books that gradually take us from the negativity of Hell, through the partial negativity of Purgatory, to the positivity of Heaven. These books are: The Last Things: Death, Judgment, Hell, and Heaven by Fr. Regis Martin; and The Four Last Things: Death, Judgment, Hell, Heaven by Fr. Martin von Cochem; Purgatory and Heaven by Fr. J. P. Arendzen; Guidance to Heaven by Cardinal Giovanni Bona; and, finally, The Happiness of Heaven: And How to Attain the Joys That Await You There by Fr. Boudreaux.
“Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21). Ascension Thursday focused our minds on Heaven―but Heaven is not meant to be a focal point for just one day! It should be a daily focal point and a daily topic of conversation! Yet, as we all know, you cannot talk about what you know little about. Heaven is meant to be the goal of our life―yet we next to nothing about it!
Thoughts Lead to Actions
Ideas have consequences. We are what we think. What is in our heart, ends up in our actions. Our Lord said: “For from within out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and defile a man” (Mark 7:21-23). Which is the same as Holy Scripture says elsewhere: “The dressing of a tree shows the fruit thereof, so too a word out of the thought of the heart of man” (Ecclesiasticus 27:7). Our ideas become our ideals which become our actions. Feed the mind trash and …
Junk Does Not Bring Good Health
This is why good reading and good friends are of utmost importance. They are the chief suppliers of our ideas. If we eat junk food, so readily available on today’s market, then our health will become ‘junk’ as disease gradually sets in. As many doctors say, “We eat and drink ourselves into disease”! The same is true for the ‘food’ and ‘drink’ that we feed our minds and hearts. Our Lord said: “Man lives not by bread alone, but by every word of God” (Luke 4:4). He even gives us His own Flesh and Blood to eat and drink: “I am the living Bread which came down from Heaven. If any man eat of this Bread, he shall live forever; and the Bread that I will give, is My Flesh, for the life of the world … Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eats My flesh, and drinks My blood, has everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day” (John 6:51-56).
Think Little, Believe Even Less
This Bread of Life has even fed and kept several mystics and saints alive for varying numbers of years—over 10, 20 and even 30 years—without any other food being taken. The fare served by Heaven is certainly of the highest quality! It should be our greatest treasure—yet, alas, it is not! Varying numbers of Catholics—depending in which part of the world you live—no longer believe in the Real Presence of Jesus, with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, in the Holy Eucharist. This number of disbelievers, or ‘doubting Thomases’, ranges from 40% to 80% ― depending upon where they live and what age they are. Small wonder Our Lord lamented: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
We Think More of Earth Than Heaven
“The Lord hath looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God” (Psalms 13:2). Our Lady of La Salette replies: “People will think only of amusement!” To which Our Lady of Good Success adds: “Hearts are inflated with pride, pretending to know what they do not, or self-satisfied with empty knowledge … Moreover, in these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost.”
Ladder to Heaven
What Jacob saw in his sleep is an indication and an invitation for us also: “And he saw in his sleep a ladder standing upon the Earth, and the top thereof touching Heaven” (Genesis 28:12). We are to climb that ladder to Heaven! To do that, we must first climb there with our minds and hearts—which are the two vertical members of the ladder, while each thought or desire is a horizontal rung. If we think little of Heaven or desire it little, then there will be hardly any rungs on our ladder to Heaven.
Hours on the Ladder
Many saints spent many hours on the ladder! They thought about God and Heaven; they desired God and Heaven; they spoke about God and Heaven; they spent many hours in front of the Blessed Sacrament and thought they were in Heaven! Heavens above! Did they do this because they were saints? Not at all! It was the doing of this that made them saints! It is an infallible recipe for sanctity. It is a guaranteed cure! A certain success! Yet so few try it and even less persevere in it! It seems too arduous, or too boring, or too limiting, or too demanding. Yet, for those who think that, it plainly shows how little they think of Heaven—meaning that they cheapen Heaven, downgrade Heaven, expect Heaven to be a freebie.
The Perks of Heaven Would Perk Them Up
If they were only to think more about Heaven, then they would realize what an incredible ‘product’ it really is—it durability is eternal; it never runs-out or runs-down; it produces in a person a happiness and satisfaction that is unimaginable and unthinkable; the views are splendid; the mansions are many; the community is delightfully friendly; there is no crime in the neighborhood. The medical staff are out of this world—restoring all body parts so that they function perfectly; reversing aging and guaranteeing youthful looks for eternity; eliminating obesity without artificial means like liposuction, naturally or supernaturally; removing all fears, worries, anxieties and sufferings. The entertainment is divine! The music, by all accounts, is angelic—with melodies previously unheard and thought to be impossible.
More Than An Eyeful
No wonder St. Paul, who says he was caught up to the third Heaven, says: “That eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). We are reminded of St. Dominic Savio, who appeared in a vision to St. John Bosco, saying: “Father, tell the boys how wonderful it is here! How wonderful it is!” Which is why Our Lord tries to encourage us to focus more on Heaven than Earth: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
You Can Do It!
In speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady is also speaking to us, as she says: “With the help of the Almighty’s grace, thou canst rise above thyself and make thyself a daughter of Heaven, whence all grace comes. In order that thou mayest attain thereto, let thy habitation continue to be in the higher regions, keeping thy mind fixed in the knowledge of the immutable Being and perfections of God and never allowing thy attention to be drawn away to another even otherwise necessary object. With this continual presence and memory of God’s greatness thou wilt dispose thyself for the influx of the Holy Spirit and His gifts in closest friendship and communication with the Lord ... Let thy thoughts always be of the noblest and thy conversation in Heaven and with the angelic spirits … Of thee, my daughter, I require the practice of these rules, and through thee I wish to inculcate them on other mortals … Let their conversations be in Heaven with the Most High, and with me, who am their Mother, and let it be with the angels, imitating them in holy love.”
Happy Thoughts or Hopeless Thoughts
Putting our eggs in the basket of this world is like eating candy floss—the experience is over before you know it and your not left really satisfied. Why on earth would we place all our hopes for happiness in a miserably short stay on Earth—80 years long if we are lucky—when the basket of eternity is the other option? “Our days upon Earth are as a shadow, and there is no stay” (1 Paralipomenon 29:15). “His spirit shall go forth, and he shall return into his Earth: in that day all their thoughts shall perish” (Psalm 145:4). “Hardly do we guess aright at things that are upon Earth … But the things that are in Heaven, who shall search out?” (Wisdom 9:16). “I am a sojourner on the Earth” (Psalm 118:19).
Just because most other people seem to want to be ‘earthy’ and worldly, do I have to follow suit? “He that cometh from above, is above all. He that is of the Earth, of the Earth he is, and of the Earth he speaketh. He that cometh from Heaven, is above all” (John 3:31). “The first man was of the Earth, earthly: the second man, from Heaven, heavenly” (1 Corinthians 15:47). Our Lord came to Earth to lead us to Heaven: “And I, if I be lifted up from the Earth, will draw all things to Myself” (John 12:32). This Earth, and all that is in it, will perish—why place my eggs in that perishable basket?
On Ash Wednesday, as our foreheads are smeared with ashes, we are told: “Remember man that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return!” Adam was made from the dust or slime of the earth “And the dust return into its earth, from whence it was, and the spirit return to God, Who gave it” (Ecclesiastes 12:7). “All men are earth and ashes” (Ecclesiasticus 17:31). “And of the same clay by a vain labor he makes a god: he who a little before was made of earth himself, and a little after returns to the same out of which he was taken, when his life which was lent him shall be called for again. But his care is, not that he shall labor, nor that his life is short, but he strives with the goldsmiths and silversmiths: and he endeavors to do like the workers in brass, and counts it a glory to make vain things. For his heart is ashes, and his hope vain earth, and his life more base than clay. Forasmuch as he knew not his Maker and Him that breathed into him the soul that works, and that breathed into him a living spirit” (Wisdom 15:8-11).
The Spirit of St. Paul
Holy Scripture asks us a very searching question, that we must answer and act upon: “For what have I in Heaven? And besides Thee what do I desire upon Earth?” (Psalm 72:25). St. Paul gives us his answer: “I count all things to be but loss, for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord; for Whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ” (Philippians 3:8). Yet how many have the spirit of St. Paul? Most have the spirit of the world. They look upon religion as though it were dung, and would gladly suffer the loss of all religious obligations so that they may gain the world.
The Spirit of God Speaks
In response to these worldlings, the Holy Spirit, in Holy Scripture, says: “O Earth, Earth, Earth, hear the word of the Lord!” (Jeremias 22:29). “You have feasted upon Earth: and in riotousness you have nourished your hearts!” (James 5:5). “Where are the princes of the nations, and they that rule over the beasts that are upon the Earth? That take their diversion with the birds of the air. That hoard up silver and gold, wherein men trust, and there is no end of their getting? Who work in silver and are solicitous, and their works are unsearchable. They are cut off, and are gone down to Hell, and others are risen up in their place. Young men have seen the light, and dwelt upon the Earth: but the way of knowledge they have not known, nor have they understood the paths thereof, neither have their children received it, it is far from their face!” (Baruch 3:16-21). “Behold the Lord shall lay waste the Earth, and shall strip it, and shall afflict the face thereof … All mirth is forsaken: the joy of the Earth is gone away!” (Isaias 24:1, 11). “Destruction upon destruction is called for, and all the Earth is laid waste!” (Jeremias 4:20).
The World At His Feet
Our Lord had the world at His feet, but He chose to turn His back upon it: “Again the devil took Jesus up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’” (Matthew 4:8-9). “Jesus answered: My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36). “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing …” (John 14:30). “If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:18-19). “In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world!” (John 16:33).
Overcoming and Rising Above the World
If Our Lord has “overcome the world” then this means the world is an enemy. Therefore, we too must overcome the world, or be overcome by it. It is our Faith that overcomes the world: “For whatsoever is born of God, overcometh the world: and this is the victory which overcometh the world—our Faith” (1 John 5:4). “If then you be dead with Christ from the elements of this world, why do you yet decree as though living in the world?” (Colossians 2:20). “Religion clean and undefiled before God … is to keep one’s self unspotted from this world” (James 1:27). “Now we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; that we may know the things that are given us from God” (1 Corinthians 2:12).
What God Gives? What the World Gives?
God offers us eternity, the world can only promise 70, 80 or 90 years. In Heaven there are no enemies, in this world Our Lord says that “a man's enemies shall be they of his own household” (Matthew 10:36). Today, the enemies of Christianity are growing with each day, so too is the threat to Christianity—just as Our Lord forecast: “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death: and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name's sake” (Matthew 24:9). In Heaven, there shall be no such hatred—the hatred will be perpetual in Hell. The world offers can only offer us perishable riches—which are left behind the day we die. The riches of Heaven are forever—never to lost; never to taken away. God offers us a perfect body in the prime of life (they say around 33 years of age); perfect peace; perfect joy; perfect happiness; an abundance of true and pure love—the world cannot eliminate anxiety, stress, fear and threats. In Heaven we are loved by all, on Earth we are hated by many. In Heaven there is no gossip, no talk of past sins, failures and mistakes; whereas Earth is full of such talk. There are no diseases or wars in Heaven; while Earth is full of disease and impending war. The rulers of the Earth just want to take from you; in Heaven God and everyone seeks to give. SO WHY DO WE THINK AND TALK SO MUCH ABOUT LIFE IN THIS WORLD? THINK OF HEAVEN MORE, AND LESS OF THIS WORLD!
Heaven and Hell
Just as a coin has two sides that are inseparable, so too does our spiritual life have two inseparable thoughts—Heaven and Hell. In fact, the Church teaches us that the chief things that we should think about are the FOUR LAST THINGS, namely—Death, Judgment, Heaven and Hell. Sadly, none of those things make the “Top Ten” of our favorite thoughts for the day! Yet Holy Mother Church knows best! Most people would do well to follow their Mother’s advice. Yet little is known of what death is like! Who can tell us much about the final judgment after death? Who has been to Hell and come back to tell the tale? Who has come back to Earth from Heaven with pictures and a description?
Even so, there are snippets that we can glean from certain books—though few such books exist. Those that do exist, risk being a little dry for most readers. However, we do ourselves a disservice by neglecting to find and study material on these matters. Some books that spring to mind are Fr. Xavier Schouppe’s two books: Hell and How To Avoid It and its sister book, Purgatory Explained. That deals with the negative side of the coin. On the more positive side we have some books that gradually take us from the negativity of Hell, through the partial negativity of Purgatory, to the positivity of Heaven. These books are: The Last Things: Death, Judgment, Hell, and Heaven by Fr. Regis Martin; and The Four Last Things: Death, Judgment, Hell, Heaven by Fr. Martin von Cochem; Purgatory and Heaven by Fr. J. P. Arendzen; Guidance to Heaven by Cardinal Giovanni Bona; and, finally, The Happiness of Heaven: And How to Attain the Joys That Await You There by Fr. Boudreaux.
Article 23
Ascension Thursday, May 9th
Are You Going Up, Nowhere or Down?
Ascension Thursday, May 9th
Are You Going Up, Nowhere or Down?
Gone For Good—Gone For the Good of Their Souls
“And He led them out as far as Bethania: and lifting up His hands, He blessed them. And it came to pass, whilst He blessed them, He departed from them, and was carried up to Heaven. And they adoring went back into Jerusalem with great joy” (Luke 24:50-52). Our Lord could have stayed on Earth for centuries, for millennia, teaching, healing, performing miracles—what a great advantage it would have been. But no! He leaves! He goes HOME! He goes to prepare a place for us to show us that HEAVEN is intended to be our true and only HOME. Home is where the heart is—where is your heart? In the things of Heaven, or the things of Earth? It is too easy to get attached to what you can see, over what you cannot see. Yet therein lies the test, the examination. Blessed are those who have not seen, yet believe.
Heaven Is Meant For All—Not All Get There
“The rulers and Pharisees sent ministers to apprehend Him. Jesus therefore said to them: ‘Yet a little while I am with you, and then I go to Him that sent Me. You shall seek Me, and shall not find Me: and where I am, there you cannot come!’ The Jews therefore said among themselves: ‘Where will He go, that we shall not find Him? Will He go unto the dispersed among the Gentiles, and teach the Gentiles? What is this saying that He has said: “You shall seek Me, and shall not find Me; and where I am, you cannot come?”’” (John 7:32-36).
“Again therefore Jesus said to them: ‘I go, and you shall seek Me, and you shall die in your sin! Where I go, you cannot come!’ The Jews therefore said: ‘Will He kill himself, because He said: “Where I go, you cannot come?”’ And He said to them: ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you, that you shall die in your sins!’” (John 8:21-24).
“Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You shall seek Me; and as I said to the Jews—‘Where I go you cannot come’— so I say to you now” (John 13:33).
Heavenly Realty is a Heavenly Reality
“Jesus said to them: ‘Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house there are many mansions. If not, I would have told you: because I go to prepare a place for you. And if I shall go, and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and will take you to Myself; that where I am, you also may be. And where I go you know, and the way you know.’
Do We Know The Way? Or Have We Lost Our Way?
“Thomas said to Him: ‘Lord, we know not where Thou goest; and how can we know the way?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life! No man comes to the Father, but by Me. If you had known Me, you would without doubt have known My Father also―and from henceforth you shall know Him, and you have seen Him.’
“Philip said to Him: ‘Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Have I been so long a time with you and have you not known Me? Philip, he that sees Me sees the Father also! How sayest thou, “Show us the Father?” Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me? The words that I speak to you, I speak not of Myself. But the Father Who abides in Me, He does the works. Believe you not that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? Otherwise believe for the very works’ sake. Amen, amen I say to you, he that believes in Me, the works that I do, he also shall do―and greater than these shall he do! Because I go to the Father and whatsoever you shall ask the Father in My Name, that will I do―so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you shall ask Me anything in My Name, that I will do’” (John 14:1-14).
Christ’s Sad Idea of Happiness
“But because I have spoken these things to you, sorrow hath filled your heart. But I tell you the truth: it is expedient to you that I go―for if I go not, the Paraclete will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you” (John 16:6-7).
“A little while, and now you shall not see Me; and again a little while, and you shall see Me: because I go to the Father. Then some of the disciples said one to another: ‘What is this that He says to us: “A little while, and you shall not see Me; and again a little while, and you shall see Me, and, because I go to the Father?”’ They said therefore: ‘What is this that He says, “A little while?” We know not what He speaks!’ And Jesus knew that they had a mind to ask Him; and He said to them: ‘Of this do you inquire among yourselves, because I said: “A little while, and you shall not see Me; and again a little while, and you shall see Me?” Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy ... So also you now indeed have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you .. . In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world ... I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again I leave the world, and I go to the Father.” (John 16:16-22, 28, 33).
“Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice’s sake―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are ye when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice! For your reward is very great in Heaven! For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you” (Matthew 5:10-12).
Where’s Your Bank Account?
“Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-21). One way to measure your treasure is to see how much time you give to all that is in your life. Compare how much time you spend on spiritual matters and how much time on secular matters. How much time in prayer and how much time on the phone/internet/social media/television. How much time meditating on the things of God and how much time day-dreaming about all kinds of other things. How much time in spiritual reading and how much time in secular reading. They say: “Time means money” ― and money is what many treasure, therefore the time we spend on things reflects how much we treasure those things.
Actions More Than Just Words
“Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21). “And why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “And calling the multitude together with His disciples, He said to them: ‘If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!’” (Mark 8:34). “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me … He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:35-37-38). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
Seed or Weed?
“Another parable He proposed to them, saying: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way ... The man said: “Suffer both to grow until the harvest, and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers: ‘Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn.’” ’” (Matthew 13:24-30) … “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8).
Do We “Cut The Mustard”? Do We Make The Grade?
“Another parable He proposed unto them, saying: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof’” (Matthew 13:31-32) ― thereby telling us that we must not be spiritually stagnant, but that we must grow spiritually and share our spiritual treasures with others; otherwise we become like the man, in the Parable of Talents, who buried his talent and did nothing with it. Too many souls are lost because they choose to be spiritually stunted or spiritually selfish. God expects our spiritually tree to bear fruit and He will purge it so that it bears even more fruit: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the gardener. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit! ... I am the vine, you the branches―he that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn” (John 15:1-6).
Are We Rising?
“Another parable He spoke to them: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is like to leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, until the whole was leavened’” (Matthew 13:33) — thereby teaching us that the spiritual must penetrate all material and physical aspects of our life and raise them to a higher supernatural level, whereby we do all things for God.
Treasure and Pearls
“The Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in a field. Which a man having found, hid it, and for joy thereof goes, and sells all that he hath, and buys that field. Again the Kingdom of Heaven is like to a merchant seeking good pearls. Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went his way, and sold all that he had, and bought it” (Matthew 13:44-46) — hereby teaching us that the spiritual is of far greater value than all material possessions. As St. Thomas Aquinas tells us, that one single soul in a state of grace is worth far more than all the material treasures of the universe. However, we have the example of the rich young man, who asked Our Lord what he had to do to get to Heaven. Our Lord told him to sell all he had and then come follow Him. “And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:22-24). How do we rate in this area? Are our possessions—whether things, hobbies or places—hindering our passage to Heaven? What comes first—God or mammon, morning prayers or morning coffee, to pray or to play?
Net Savings
“Again the Kingdom of Heaven is like to a net cast into the sea, and gathering together of all kind of fishes. Which, when it was filled, they drew out, and sitting by the shore, they chose out the good into vessels, but the bad they cast forth. So shall it be at the end of the world. The angels shall go out, and shall separate the wicked from among the just. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth’” (Matthew 13:47-50) ― this echoes the above quoted words: “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21). “And why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Got the Message?
“‘Have ye understood all these things?’ They say to him: ‘Yes!’” (Matthew 13:51). “And He said: ‘Amen I say to you, unless you be converted, and become as little children, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 18:3). “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!” (Mark 8:34). “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:38). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8).
Ideas of Happiness That Are Too Material
After the resurrection of Our Lord, the Apostles were still expecting Him to conquer all that lay before Him in a physical, material and worldly manner: “They therefore who were come together, asked Him, saying: ‘Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?’” Jesus would conquer, but He would conquer spiritually. He had told Pilate, before being crucified: “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would certainly strive that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now My kingdom is not from hence” (John 18:36).
Which kingdom do we seek to live in? Which kingdom do we love the most? Which kingdom takes up most of our time? The litmus test is really simple. Perhaps the answer is confusing and humiliating. Perhaps we are even afraid to take the test for fear of seeing the result!
Home is where your heart is! People long to be at home. Your home is whatever place you long to be. We’ve all heard or made similar expressions to the following: “I’ve had a lovely time visiting with you, but it’s time I was getting home!” or “It’s great to be home!” or again, “I’m homesick! I want to go home!” or something similar that you say which means that your true home is with the person or in the place that you love most.
We Envision Heaven in Different Ways
In meditating upon the happiness in store for the children of God, we are very apt to build up a Heaven of our own, which naturally takes the shape and color which our sorrows, needs, and sufferings lend to it. The poor man, for instance, who has suffered much from toil and want, looks upon Heaven as a place of rest, abounding with all that can satisfy the cravings of nature. Another, who has often endured the pangs of disease, looks upon it as a place where he shall enjoy perpetual health of body and mind. Another again, who, in the practice of virtue, has had all manner of temptations from the Devil, the world, and his own flesh, delights in viewing Heaven as a place totally free from temptation, where the danger, or even the possibility, of sin shall be no more.
All these, and other similar views of Heaven, are true inasmuch as they represent it as a place entirely free from evil and suffering, and, at the same time, as an abode of positive happiness. Nevertheless, they are all imperfect views, because not one of them takes in the whole of heavenly bliss, such as God has revealed it to us. They all ignore the Beatific Vision, which is the essential happiness of Heaven. Very few indeed understand what is implied in the vision of God. Many imagine that we shall simply gaze upon an object whose surpassing perfection will make us happy in a way that we do not understand. These do not fully comprehend what is meant by the Beatific Vision, although they view Heaven as a place where we shall see God.
Elusive Perfect Happiness
Perfect happiness cannot be found in this world. It certainly cannot be found in creatures—persons, places or things—for they were not clothed with the power to give it. God has promised a happiness so unspeakably great, that the Apostle St. Paul, who “was caught up into Paradise” (2 Corinthians 12:4) and was favored with a glimpse of Heaven, tells us that mortal “eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). This happiness—which is now so incomprehensible to us—is none other than the possession and enjoyment of God Himself in the Beatific Vision, as well as the perfect satisfaction of every rational craving of our nature in the glorious resurrection of the body.
Man-Made Heaven
In thinking about the happiness in store for the children of God, we are very likely to build up a Heaven of our own making, which naturally takes the shape and color that our sorrows, needs, and sufferings lend to it. The poor man, for example, who has suffered much from toil and want, looks upon Heaven as a place of rest, abounding with all that can satisfy the cravings of nature. Another, who has often endured the pangs of disease, looks upon it as a place where he shall enjoy perpetual health of body and mind. Someone who has endured hatred and persecution, envisages a place of love and peace. Another again, who, in the practice of virtue, has had all manner of temptations from the devil, the world, and his own flesh, delights in viewing Heaven as a place totally free from temptation, where the danger, or even the possibility, of sin shall be no more.
All these, and other similar views of Heaven, are true inasmuch as they represent it as a place entirely free from evil and suffering, and, at the same time, as a place of positive happiness. Nevertheless, they are all imperfect views, because not one of them takes in the whole of heavenly bliss, such as God has revealed it to us. They all ignore the Beatific Vision, which is the essential happiness of Heaven. Very few indeed understand what is implied in the vision of God. Many imagine that we shall simply eternally gaze upon an object whose surpassing perfection will make us happy in a way that we do not understand. These do not fully comprehend what is meant by the Beatific Vision, although they view Heaven as a place where we shall see God.
God Prepares You for Heaven
God is the great and mighty King who finds your soul in the wilderness of this world. To use the forcible words of Scripture, He found you “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked” (Apocalypse 3:17). Moved with compassion, He brought you into His holy Church. There, He washed you with His own Precious Blood, clothed you with the spotless robe of innocence, adorned you with the gifts of grace, and adopted you as His own child. Then He commanded His ministers and others to educate you for Heaven. By His grace, and your own cooperation, your soul is being gradually developed into a more perfect resemblance to Jesus Christ, who, in His human nature, is the standard of all created perfection.
Blind to Heaven
But you are blind yet, and must remain so until your heavenly Father calls you home. When that happy day dawns, you will leave this world, your eyes will be opened by the light of glory, and you will see God as He is, in all His glory and magnificence. You will see yourself as you are, adorned with the jewels of the many graces He has bestowed upon you. You will also see the beautiful angels and saints, clothed with the beauty of God Himself, standing around His throne to hear the sentence that will admit you into their society.
This sight of the living God, and of all the magnificence which surrounds Him, will fill your soul with a perfect knowledge of Him; and this knowledge will produce a most ardent and perfect love. And when He presses you to His bosom, proclaims you one of His children, and commands all to honor and love you as such, your joy will be full. This will be emphatically a Beatific Vision for you. You will then enter into the possession and enjoyment of God, who alone can fill the soul with pure and permanent happiness.
God Offers, But No Guarantees
That is what is offered, but not guaranteed! “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12). It requires work on you part—hard work: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). Yet we should be hopeful of obtaining it: “Fear not, little flock, for it hath pleased your Father to give you a kingdom” (Luke 12:32). Take note of the words “little flock” for elsewhere Our Lord says: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate ― for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life ― and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). If we find that we are just like the majority of people, then that must be danger sign!
Why don’t the majority find it? Does God hide it from them? No! They are too busy with the world—“And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22).
So on this Ascension Thursday, “lift up your hearts” to Heaven as we say in the Preface of the Mass. “Let us lift up our hearts with our hands to the Lord in the Heavens” (Lamentations 3:41). Heaven is your true and only home. Rise above the things of this world that prevent you from rising above it: “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above; where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth!” (Colossians 3:1). “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8). We cannot have both—mammon and God, earthly pleasures and heavenly pleasures—there is no loophole in God’s contract! What will it be? Will you sign on for Heaven? Or…
“And He led them out as far as Bethania: and lifting up His hands, He blessed them. And it came to pass, whilst He blessed them, He departed from them, and was carried up to Heaven. And they adoring went back into Jerusalem with great joy” (Luke 24:50-52). Our Lord could have stayed on Earth for centuries, for millennia, teaching, healing, performing miracles—what a great advantage it would have been. But no! He leaves! He goes HOME! He goes to prepare a place for us to show us that HEAVEN is intended to be our true and only HOME. Home is where the heart is—where is your heart? In the things of Heaven, or the things of Earth? It is too easy to get attached to what you can see, over what you cannot see. Yet therein lies the test, the examination. Blessed are those who have not seen, yet believe.
Heaven Is Meant For All—Not All Get There
“The rulers and Pharisees sent ministers to apprehend Him. Jesus therefore said to them: ‘Yet a little while I am with you, and then I go to Him that sent Me. You shall seek Me, and shall not find Me: and where I am, there you cannot come!’ The Jews therefore said among themselves: ‘Where will He go, that we shall not find Him? Will He go unto the dispersed among the Gentiles, and teach the Gentiles? What is this saying that He has said: “You shall seek Me, and shall not find Me; and where I am, you cannot come?”’” (John 7:32-36).
“Again therefore Jesus said to them: ‘I go, and you shall seek Me, and you shall die in your sin! Where I go, you cannot come!’ The Jews therefore said: ‘Will He kill himself, because He said: “Where I go, you cannot come?”’ And He said to them: ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you, that you shall die in your sins!’” (John 8:21-24).
“Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You shall seek Me; and as I said to the Jews—‘Where I go you cannot come’— so I say to you now” (John 13:33).
Heavenly Realty is a Heavenly Reality
“Jesus said to them: ‘Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house there are many mansions. If not, I would have told you: because I go to prepare a place for you. And if I shall go, and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and will take you to Myself; that where I am, you also may be. And where I go you know, and the way you know.’
Do We Know The Way? Or Have We Lost Our Way?
“Thomas said to Him: ‘Lord, we know not where Thou goest; and how can we know the way?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life! No man comes to the Father, but by Me. If you had known Me, you would without doubt have known My Father also―and from henceforth you shall know Him, and you have seen Him.’
“Philip said to Him: ‘Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Have I been so long a time with you and have you not known Me? Philip, he that sees Me sees the Father also! How sayest thou, “Show us the Father?” Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me? The words that I speak to you, I speak not of Myself. But the Father Who abides in Me, He does the works. Believe you not that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? Otherwise believe for the very works’ sake. Amen, amen I say to you, he that believes in Me, the works that I do, he also shall do―and greater than these shall he do! Because I go to the Father and whatsoever you shall ask the Father in My Name, that will I do―so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you shall ask Me anything in My Name, that I will do’” (John 14:1-14).
Christ’s Sad Idea of Happiness
“But because I have spoken these things to you, sorrow hath filled your heart. But I tell you the truth: it is expedient to you that I go―for if I go not, the Paraclete will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you” (John 16:6-7).
“A little while, and now you shall not see Me; and again a little while, and you shall see Me: because I go to the Father. Then some of the disciples said one to another: ‘What is this that He says to us: “A little while, and you shall not see Me; and again a little while, and you shall see Me, and, because I go to the Father?”’ They said therefore: ‘What is this that He says, “A little while?” We know not what He speaks!’ And Jesus knew that they had a mind to ask Him; and He said to them: ‘Of this do you inquire among yourselves, because I said: “A little while, and you shall not see Me; and again a little while, and you shall see Me?” Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy ... So also you now indeed have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you .. . In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world ... I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again I leave the world, and I go to the Father.” (John 16:16-22, 28, 33).
“Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice’s sake―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are ye when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice! For your reward is very great in Heaven! For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you” (Matthew 5:10-12).
Where’s Your Bank Account?
“Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-21). One way to measure your treasure is to see how much time you give to all that is in your life. Compare how much time you spend on spiritual matters and how much time on secular matters. How much time in prayer and how much time on the phone/internet/social media/television. How much time meditating on the things of God and how much time day-dreaming about all kinds of other things. How much time in spiritual reading and how much time in secular reading. They say: “Time means money” ― and money is what many treasure, therefore the time we spend on things reflects how much we treasure those things.
Actions More Than Just Words
“Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21). “And why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “And calling the multitude together with His disciples, He said to them: ‘If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!’” (Mark 8:34). “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me … He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:35-37-38). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12).
Seed or Weed?
“Another parable He proposed to them, saying: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way ... The man said: “Suffer both to grow until the harvest, and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers: ‘Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn.’” ’” (Matthew 13:24-30) … “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8).
Do We “Cut The Mustard”? Do We Make The Grade?
“Another parable He proposed unto them, saying: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof’” (Matthew 13:31-32) ― thereby telling us that we must not be spiritually stagnant, but that we must grow spiritually and share our spiritual treasures with others; otherwise we become like the man, in the Parable of Talents, who buried his talent and did nothing with it. Too many souls are lost because they choose to be spiritually stunted or spiritually selfish. God expects our spiritually tree to bear fruit and He will purge it so that it bears even more fruit: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the gardener. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit! ... I am the vine, you the branches―he that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn” (John 15:1-6).
Are We Rising?
“Another parable He spoke to them: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is like to leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, until the whole was leavened’” (Matthew 13:33) — thereby teaching us that the spiritual must penetrate all material and physical aspects of our life and raise them to a higher supernatural level, whereby we do all things for God.
Treasure and Pearls
“The Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in a field. Which a man having found, hid it, and for joy thereof goes, and sells all that he hath, and buys that field. Again the Kingdom of Heaven is like to a merchant seeking good pearls. Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went his way, and sold all that he had, and bought it” (Matthew 13:44-46) — hereby teaching us that the spiritual is of far greater value than all material possessions. As St. Thomas Aquinas tells us, that one single soul in a state of grace is worth far more than all the material treasures of the universe. However, we have the example of the rich young man, who asked Our Lord what he had to do to get to Heaven. Our Lord told him to sell all he had and then come follow Him. “And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:22-24). How do we rate in this area? Are our possessions—whether things, hobbies or places—hindering our passage to Heaven? What comes first—God or mammon, morning prayers or morning coffee, to pray or to play?
Net Savings
“Again the Kingdom of Heaven is like to a net cast into the sea, and gathering together of all kind of fishes. Which, when it was filled, they drew out, and sitting by the shore, they chose out the good into vessels, but the bad they cast forth. So shall it be at the end of the world. The angels shall go out, and shall separate the wicked from among the just. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth’” (Matthew 13:47-50) ― this echoes the above quoted words: “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21). “And why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Got the Message?
“‘Have ye understood all these things?’ They say to him: ‘Yes!’” (Matthew 13:51). “And He said: ‘Amen I say to you, unless you be converted, and become as little children, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 18:3). “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!” (Mark 8:34). “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:38). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8).
Ideas of Happiness That Are Too Material
After the resurrection of Our Lord, the Apostles were still expecting Him to conquer all that lay before Him in a physical, material and worldly manner: “They therefore who were come together, asked Him, saying: ‘Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?’” Jesus would conquer, but He would conquer spiritually. He had told Pilate, before being crucified: “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would certainly strive that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now My kingdom is not from hence” (John 18:36).
Which kingdom do we seek to live in? Which kingdom do we love the most? Which kingdom takes up most of our time? The litmus test is really simple. Perhaps the answer is confusing and humiliating. Perhaps we are even afraid to take the test for fear of seeing the result!
Home is where your heart is! People long to be at home. Your home is whatever place you long to be. We’ve all heard or made similar expressions to the following: “I’ve had a lovely time visiting with you, but it’s time I was getting home!” or “It’s great to be home!” or again, “I’m homesick! I want to go home!” or something similar that you say which means that your true home is with the person or in the place that you love most.
We Envision Heaven in Different Ways
In meditating upon the happiness in store for the children of God, we are very apt to build up a Heaven of our own, which naturally takes the shape and color which our sorrows, needs, and sufferings lend to it. The poor man, for instance, who has suffered much from toil and want, looks upon Heaven as a place of rest, abounding with all that can satisfy the cravings of nature. Another, who has often endured the pangs of disease, looks upon it as a place where he shall enjoy perpetual health of body and mind. Another again, who, in the practice of virtue, has had all manner of temptations from the Devil, the world, and his own flesh, delights in viewing Heaven as a place totally free from temptation, where the danger, or even the possibility, of sin shall be no more.
All these, and other similar views of Heaven, are true inasmuch as they represent it as a place entirely free from evil and suffering, and, at the same time, as an abode of positive happiness. Nevertheless, they are all imperfect views, because not one of them takes in the whole of heavenly bliss, such as God has revealed it to us. They all ignore the Beatific Vision, which is the essential happiness of Heaven. Very few indeed understand what is implied in the vision of God. Many imagine that we shall simply gaze upon an object whose surpassing perfection will make us happy in a way that we do not understand. These do not fully comprehend what is meant by the Beatific Vision, although they view Heaven as a place where we shall see God.
Elusive Perfect Happiness
Perfect happiness cannot be found in this world. It certainly cannot be found in creatures—persons, places or things—for they were not clothed with the power to give it. God has promised a happiness so unspeakably great, that the Apostle St. Paul, who “was caught up into Paradise” (2 Corinthians 12:4) and was favored with a glimpse of Heaven, tells us that mortal “eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). This happiness—which is now so incomprehensible to us—is none other than the possession and enjoyment of God Himself in the Beatific Vision, as well as the perfect satisfaction of every rational craving of our nature in the glorious resurrection of the body.
Man-Made Heaven
In thinking about the happiness in store for the children of God, we are very likely to build up a Heaven of our own making, which naturally takes the shape and color that our sorrows, needs, and sufferings lend to it. The poor man, for example, who has suffered much from toil and want, looks upon Heaven as a place of rest, abounding with all that can satisfy the cravings of nature. Another, who has often endured the pangs of disease, looks upon it as a place where he shall enjoy perpetual health of body and mind. Someone who has endured hatred and persecution, envisages a place of love and peace. Another again, who, in the practice of virtue, has had all manner of temptations from the devil, the world, and his own flesh, delights in viewing Heaven as a place totally free from temptation, where the danger, or even the possibility, of sin shall be no more.
All these, and other similar views of Heaven, are true inasmuch as they represent it as a place entirely free from evil and suffering, and, at the same time, as a place of positive happiness. Nevertheless, they are all imperfect views, because not one of them takes in the whole of heavenly bliss, such as God has revealed it to us. They all ignore the Beatific Vision, which is the essential happiness of Heaven. Very few indeed understand what is implied in the vision of God. Many imagine that we shall simply eternally gaze upon an object whose surpassing perfection will make us happy in a way that we do not understand. These do not fully comprehend what is meant by the Beatific Vision, although they view Heaven as a place where we shall see God.
God Prepares You for Heaven
God is the great and mighty King who finds your soul in the wilderness of this world. To use the forcible words of Scripture, He found you “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked” (Apocalypse 3:17). Moved with compassion, He brought you into His holy Church. There, He washed you with His own Precious Blood, clothed you with the spotless robe of innocence, adorned you with the gifts of grace, and adopted you as His own child. Then He commanded His ministers and others to educate you for Heaven. By His grace, and your own cooperation, your soul is being gradually developed into a more perfect resemblance to Jesus Christ, who, in His human nature, is the standard of all created perfection.
Blind to Heaven
But you are blind yet, and must remain so until your heavenly Father calls you home. When that happy day dawns, you will leave this world, your eyes will be opened by the light of glory, and you will see God as He is, in all His glory and magnificence. You will see yourself as you are, adorned with the jewels of the many graces He has bestowed upon you. You will also see the beautiful angels and saints, clothed with the beauty of God Himself, standing around His throne to hear the sentence that will admit you into their society.
This sight of the living God, and of all the magnificence which surrounds Him, will fill your soul with a perfect knowledge of Him; and this knowledge will produce a most ardent and perfect love. And when He presses you to His bosom, proclaims you one of His children, and commands all to honor and love you as such, your joy will be full. This will be emphatically a Beatific Vision for you. You will then enter into the possession and enjoyment of God, who alone can fill the soul with pure and permanent happiness.
God Offers, But No Guarantees
That is what is offered, but not guaranteed! “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12). It requires work on you part—hard work: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). Yet we should be hopeful of obtaining it: “Fear not, little flock, for it hath pleased your Father to give you a kingdom” (Luke 12:32). Take note of the words “little flock” for elsewhere Our Lord says: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate ― for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life ― and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). If we find that we are just like the majority of people, then that must be danger sign!
Why don’t the majority find it? Does God hide it from them? No! They are too busy with the world—“And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22).
So on this Ascension Thursday, “lift up your hearts” to Heaven as we say in the Preface of the Mass. “Let us lift up our hearts with our hands to the Lord in the Heavens” (Lamentations 3:41). Heaven is your true and only home. Rise above the things of this world that prevent you from rising above it: “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above; where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth!” (Colossians 3:1). “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8). We cannot have both—mammon and God, earthly pleasures and heavenly pleasures—there is no loophole in God’s contract! What will it be? Will you sign on for Heaven? Or…
Article 22
Tuesday & Wednesday, May 7th & 8th
Make Sure Your Devotion to Mary is Real and Not Fake!
Tuesday & Wednesday, May 7th & 8th
Make Sure Your Devotion to Mary is Real and Not Fake!
Love Makes the World Go Around
You have no doubt heard the saying: “Love makes the world go around!” Well―God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and He most certainly keeps the world going! Yet love is reciprocal thing―which means it a case of give and take. That is why Holy Scripture says: “Let us therefore love God, because God has loved us first!” (1 John 4:19). Our Lord―Who is God―commanded: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Then Our Lord commands us to love our neighbor: “And the second [greatest commandment] is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!” (Matthew 22:39).
Love Who?
Our Lord was asked who is our neighbor: “A certain lawyer stood up, tempting Him and saying: ‘Master, what must I do to possess eternal life?’ But Jesus said to him: ‘What is written in the law?’ How readest thou?’ The lawyer answering, said: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind―and thy neighbor as thyself!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou hast answered right! Do this, and thou shalt live!’ But the lawyer, wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus: ‘And who is my neighbor!’” (Luke 10:29). Jesus then told him the parable about the Good Samaritan.
Love or Hate Your Enemies?
In case you do not know, the Samaritans and the Jews were arch-enemies. The Samaritans in the Bible were considered unclean by the Jews because of their different religious beliefs and practices. Samaria was part of the Ten Tribes of Israel that made up the Northern Kingdom of Israel, with Judea (the Jews) being the Southern Kingdom. The kings of Israel (the Northern Kingdom) were mostly wicked. To keep their people from going to Jerusalem in Judea (the Southern Kingdom) to worship, they set up two altars with golden calves, one in Samaria, and one way up north in Dan. The Samaritan temple was considered pagan the Jews. In 732 B.C., the Assyrians invaded and conquered the Northern Kingdom, killing many and carrying away a large number as captives. In the place of the captives whom they took away to Assyria, the Assyrians planted pagan Gentiles from around their empire and these Gentiles intermarried with remaining Ten Tribes of Israel. Many of their descendants considered themselves Jews. The Jews in Judea did not agree. They considered the Samaritans (and the other intermarried Ten Tribes of Israel) to be a mongrel race and saw many problems with the way they practiced Judaism. This offended the Samaritans. The feud grew, and by the time of Christ, the Jews hated the Samaritans so much they crossed the River Jordan rather than travel through Samaria.
In His parable of the Good Samaritan―a very contentious and volatile subject for the Jews―Our Lord made the Samaritan a hero who helped the robbed, beaten and half-dead Jew by the roadside, whereas a Jewish priest and Jewish Levite walked by their fellow Jew by the roadside without helping him. Thus Our Lord was teaching them that even our enemies are to be regarded as our neighbors whom we are bound to love. Hence Our Lord says elsewhere: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thy enemy!’ But I say to you: ‘Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!’” (Matthew 5:43-44).
From the Bottom of the Ladder to the Top
Our enemies are our neighbors and we place them at the bottom of the “Neighbor Ladder”. Who, then, is at the top of that “Neighbor Ladder”? Obviously the neighbors who do the most good to us; who show us the greatest kindness; who manifest the greatest mercy towards us, etc. Who among all those “good” neighbors is at the very top of the ladder? It has to be, of course, Our Lady. There is nobody who does as much for us as Our Lady. Have no doubts about it―Our Lady is interceding, praying, working for your salvation (and everyone’s salvation) in such an intense, fervent and consistent manner that we could not possibly imagine. She deserves some kind of recompense or payment for her unremitting efforts, don’t you think? She is the Mediatrix of All Graces―there is not one single grace or favor from God that is not distributed through her hands. She even intercedes for the enemies of God and tries to bring about a reconciliation.
We, too, were enemies of God whenever we fell into mortal sin: “In past times, when you were dead in your offences and sins, you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air [Satan]” (Ephesians 2:1-2). We easily forget our sins and we forget that sin is the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD).
Sin is repulsive to God: “The way of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord!” (Proverbs 15:9). “Your iniquities have divided you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you” (Isaias 59:2). “Thou art not a God that willest iniquity. Neither shall the wicked dwell near Thee. Thou hatest all the workers of iniquity. Thou wilt destroy all that speak a lie. The bloody and the deceitful man the Lord will abhor” (Psalm 5:5-7).
Nevertheless, “The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9) and that is why “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10) … “God commends His charity towards us―because when we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8-9). “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9) ― and Our Lady is also the greatest of God’s works and she is our Mother of Mercy, as we say in the prayer Salve Regina: “Hail Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy … our hope! To thee do we cry … in this valley of tears! Turn, then, thy eyes of mercy towards us!”
As the above psalm said: “His tender mercies are over all His works” and what is more precious to us than mercy? On your deathbed―the most crucial moment of your life―what is that you will want above all else? Money? Food? Drink? Praise? Flattery? A list of your achievements? No! What you will undoubtedly crave above all things and will value above all things is mercy! Don’t fool yourself! Your whole eternity―whether you spend eternity in Heaven or Hell―will depend upon whether or not you obtain the mercy of God! Mary is that mercy of God. Mercy is the greatest grace we can hope for on our deathbed―and all graces come from God through Mary. “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:7). Your devotion (or lack of it) to the Mother of Mercy will dictate the degree of mercy that you will receive.
Love is More Than Just Words
The Catechism tells us that we were made to know God, love God and serve God. We cannot love what we do not know―and we will not serve very well someone whom we do not love. Knowledge and love lead to service. Service usually means obedience. The words of Our Lord at the Last Supper, could just as well come from the lips Our Lady also: “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you. Abide in My love! If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love; as I also have kept My Father’s commandments, and do abide in His love” (John 15:9-10) ― after all, Holy Mother Church places the following words on the lips of Our Lady in the liturgy: “I am the mother of fair love” (Mass of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Ecclesiasticus 24:24). By the same token, we can also apply to Our Lady―the Seat of Wisdom―the following words: “I love them that love me; and they that watch for me early in the morning, shall find me” (Proverbs 8:17). From these words we see that love is not just mere words of love, but love requires effort in continually seeking Jesus and Mary and keeping their commands and counsels.
Love Requires Obedience
Love is closely linked to obedience―as Our Lord said: “Why call you Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) adding “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15). Similarly, Holy Mother Church, in Her liturgy, applies the following words to Our Lady: “O children, listen to me! Happy are those who keep my ways! Hear instruction, and be wise, and refuse it not! Happy the man who obeys me―watching daily at my gates, waiting at my doorsteps―for he who finds me finds life, and wins favor from the Lord” (Mass of the Immaculate Conception, Proverbs 8:33-35). The above words are very striking!
● “O children, listen to me!” How many―or rather how few―are the souls that actually listen to Our Lady, read about her; assemble her comments, commands and counsels; daily reflect upon her words? We listen to the ones we love and are devoted to.
● “Happy are those who keep my ways!” The general unhappiness, dissatisfaction, dysfunction that we see all around us (and perhaps within ourselves and our families) is generally due to our refusal to keep the ways of sanctification and salvation that Our Lady has presented to us. At Fatima she asked for devotion to her Immaculate Heart; for many Rosaries to be prayed; for many sacrifices (for sinners) and penance (for our sinful selves); an acceptance of the sufferings God will send us, etc. Are we doing those things? With all our heart, or half-heartedly?
● “Watching daily at my gates, waiting at my doorsteps.” Broadly speaking, you could that one of things that “gates” could refer to are the “gates” through which Our Lady has entered this world by her apparitions―hence “watching daily at my gates” can refer to daily studying the apparitions of Our Lady, gleaning wisdom from them, meditating upon them and putting into practice her teachings, commands and counsels. The “doorstep” is even closer to her residence than the “gate”―hence we could interpret that as ever getting closer to Our Lady―at first being farther away at the gate, but then proceeding through the gate to doorstep.
● “He who finds me finds life.” Our Lady gave life to the Son of God, Who is life itself: “I am the life!” (John 14:6) … “I am the bread of life!” (John 6:48) … “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly!” (John 10:10). As we say: “To Jesus through Mary” ― Mary leads us Jesus and so she leads to life, life eternal in Jesus. He who finds Mary, finds Jesus and eternal life.
● “Wins favor from the Lord.” As St. Louis de Montfort writes: “God has made Mary the sole treasurer of His treasures and the sole dispenser of His graces―to ennoble, to exalt and to enrich whom she wishes; to give entry to whom she wills into the narrow way of Heaven; to bring whom she wills, and in spite of all obstacles, through the narrow gate of life; and to give the throne, the scepter and the crown of king to whom she wills. The greatest saints―the souls richest in graces and virtues―shall be the most assiduous in praying to our Blessed Lady.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Love and Devotion
The word “devotion” comes from the Latin verb “devovere”, meaning to avow oneself to, or to give oneself entirely to a deity or cause of some kind. Thus devotion to Mary implicitly requires this total consecration of ourselves to her, and through her to God. The word consecration comes from the Latin verb “consecrare”, meaning to dedicate, to set apart, hallow, sanctify, vow to a god.
If we come to more modern times, and look up the word in the Dictionary, we will encounter such definitions as: (1) earnestness and zeal in the performance of religious duties and observations; (2) religious fervor, reverence, piety; (3) an act of prayer or supplication; (4) oblation or offering, such as of oneself or an alms given from religious motives; (5) ardent love or affection; (6) strong attachment; (7) dedication or attachment to a cause, person, principle, etc. (8) zeal, enthusiasm.
This gives us a clear picture of “devotion” being a cut-above the average, being something especially noticeable due to the presence of a zeal, a fervor, an enthusiasm, a strong attachment and ardent love for some object or thing, or some person, or some place. It rules out notions like lukewarmness, tepidity, torpor, sloth, indifference, inconsistency, sporadic, half-hearted, selfish, etc.
Love with Your Whole Heart, Mind, Soul and Strength
Devotion is perfectly expressed in the commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength” (Mark 12:30). That is true devotion in a nutshell—whole soul, whole heart, whole mind, whole strength. We even admit that on a natural level. We will say of an outstanding worker or an outstanding athlete, that they put their whole soul, heart, mind and strength into the work/race/game. Let us not try water it down and give a second-rate love or devotion! In this way, devotion is not hard to understand—it means: everything, all, total, nothing held back. It is something “outstanding”, something “out of the ordinary”, something “above the ordinary”, something “extraordinary.”
Yet, an outstanding worker or athlete, an extraordinary musician or artist, did not start out being something outstanding or extraordinary—they worked their way up to that level. The same applies to us in our pursuit of true spiritual devotion. Nobody is made that way, they have to acquire it—and everyone CAN acquire it, if they really wish and try.
You Fanatic!
To those who love themselves, such an attitude will be denigrated as fanatical, ‘over-the-top’, extreme, or some other similar epithet. Yet this is exactly what God is! If God is perfection itself, then He is extreme—for perfection is something extremely good. We call people “fanatics” who blow themselves up, or burn themselves to death, for some earthly cause. “Christ also loved the Church, and delivered Himself up for it” (Ephesians 5:25). He could have saved us with one drop of His Precious Blood—the Circumcision would have been more than enough. Yet He was ‘fanatical’ about proving His love for us, and even called Peter “Satan” for trying to prevent Him from proving that love through His Passion and Crucifixion: “Who turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me: because thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:23).
Want to be a Fantastic Fanatic?
The word “fanatic” can be traced back, first to a mid-16th century French adjective, “fanatique”, which in turn owes its origins to the Latin, “fanaticus”, meaning “of a temple, inspired by a god,” which itself is based on the Latin word “fanum”, meaning “temple.” The adjective originally described behavior or speech that might result from possession by a god or demon—behavior or speech that we describe as “fantastic.” St. Paul says that we ought to be temples of the Holy Ghost—hence temples possessed by God, hence fantastic and fanatical in a good sense. “Know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you, whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 6:19). Sr. Lucia of Fatima echoes this: “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that … starting with the present time, we belong either to God, or we belong to the demon; there is no middle ground.” (Sr. Lucia, in 1957 to Fr. Augustine Fuentes).
Making Mountains of Holiness Out Of Our Molehills of Holiness
ST. FRANCIS DE SALES, the author of the spiritual classic, Introduction to the Devout Life, deals with the subject of devotion at quite some length. In fact, he opens the first chapter of the book with the question: “What is true Devotion?” Here are some extracts on what he says:
“Seeing that the small errors which people tend to commit in the beginning of any undertaking, tend to grow greater as they advance, and to become irreparable in the end, it is therefore most important that you should thoroughly understand wherein lies the grace of true devotion—because while there undoubtedly is such a true devotion, there are also many fake and look-alike imitations too; and unless you know which is real, you may mistake, and waste your energy in pursuing an empty, profitless shadow.
“We all color devotion according to our own likings and dispositions. One man sets great value on fasting, and believes himself to be leading a very devout life, so long as he fasts rigorously, although the while his heart is full of bitterness—and while he will not moisten his lips with wine, perhaps not even with water, in his great abstinence, he does not scruple to steep them in his neighbor’s blood, through slander and detraction. Another man reckons himself as devout because he repeats many prayers daily, although at the same time he does not refrain from all manner of angry, irritating, conceited or insulting speeches among his family and neighbors. This man freely opens his purse in almsgiving, but closes his heart to all gentle and forgiving feelings towards those who are opposed to him; while that one is ready enough to forgive his enemies, but will never pay his rightful debts except under pressure. Meanwhile all these people are conventionally called religious, but nevertheless they are in no true sense really devout.”
“But, in fact, all true and living devotion presupposes the love of God—and indeed it is neither more nor less than a very real love of God—but only when it attains its fullest perfection, in which it not only leads us to do well, but to act carefully, diligently, and promptly, then it is called devotion. Devotion consists in a high degree of real love―it not only makes us ready, active, and diligent in following all God’s Commands, but it also excites us to be ready and loving in performing as many good works as possible, even such as are not enjoined upon us, but are only matters of counsel or inspiration. The difference between love and devotion is just that which exists between fire and flame—love being a spiritual fire, which becomes devotion, when it is fanned into a flame—and what devotion adds to the fire of love, is that flame which makes it eager, energetic and diligent, not merely in obeying God’s Commandments, but in fulfilling His Divine Counsels and inspirations.” (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life).
As St. Francis de Sales says, there is only one true devotion, while there is a very large number of false and meaningless ones. So if you cannot recognize true devotion, you could be deceived and waste time in following some devotion that is irrelevant and irrational. It is in the devil’s interests to sell you a counterfeit devotion and thereby turn you aside from the true devotion. To achieve his satanic purpose, he seeks to blind you and keep you ignorance as to what devotion really is―so that you can be all the more easily fooled. In addition to that, the devil will make mountains out of the molehill of your false devotion―making you imagine that you are climbing in the heights of holiness! “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15).
Our Lady Speaks of Devotion
OUR LADY said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, : “I receive with maternal affection all those who, fervently and devoutly, desire to be my children and servants in the Lord. By the love which He has given me, I shall embrace them with open arms and shall be their Intercessor and Advocate … God, in His kindness, wishes to offer this opportune remedy to men, in order that all of them may seek help and eternal salvation through my intercession … . In the beatific vision, I pray without ceasing for the salvation of my clients … It should teach them to seek my most kind and powerful intercession and to fear the judgments of the Most High; for in this lies an efficacious means of salvation … One of the reasons why men should call me Mother of Mercy, is the knowledge of my loving desire, that all be filled with the flood of grace and taste the sweetness of the Lord. For, if they respond and follow me, I will offer them my protection and help, and I will intercede for them with my Son … If they obey me in this I offer them my protection, and I will constitute myself their Mother, to be their help and defense. And I will also promise them my continual and efficacious intercession with my most holy Son―if they do not displease me.
“For this purpose you should exhort them to a CONTINUAL LOVE AND DEVOTION TOWARD ME, engrafting it in their hearts! … Let therefore mortals beware, lest I, in the Day of Judgment, most justly refuse my intercession to those, who have foolishly despised and forgotten so many and so great favors and blessings! How can these ungrateful and pertinacious mortals expect mercy of the most just and righteous God, when He has given them sufficient and opportune time, invited them so often, called them, waited and worked for them, and conferred upon them immense blessings, while they abused and wasted all of them in the pursuit of vanity? Fear this, the greatest of all blindnesses.
“What then are my thoughts and the thoughts of the angels and saints, in seeing this world and all the faithful in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness? I obtain countless blessings for Christians ― and if not all experience them, it is not because I do not solicit them, but because there are VERY FEW of the faithful who call to me WITH ALL THEIR HEART and who dispose themselves toward meriting and reaping the fruit of my maternal love … All those DEVOTED to me, who call upon me at the hour of death, shall be under my special protection in that hour. They shall have me as a defense against the demons, as a help and protection, and shall be presented by me before the tribunal of His mercy and there experience my intercession … How much my intercession and the power I have in Heaven is worth has never been hidden in the Church, for I have demonstrated my ability to save all by so many thousands of miracles, prodigies and favors operated on behalf of those DEVOTED to me. With those who have called upon me in their needs I have always shown myself generous, and the Lord has shown Himself generous to them on my account. Yet, though many are the souls whom I have helped, they are few in comparison with those, whom I could help and am willing to help.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Devotion Must Grow
As the spiritual masters tell us, there is no such thing as standing still in the spiritual life―you are either going forwards or backwards. As FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE writes: “He who makes no progress loses ground.” By analogy, you could say that getting to Heaven is like having to swim upstream against the downward flowing water current. If you stop swimming, then in no time at all you are carried a long way backwards downstream. The stream or river that we are having to swim against is the devil, the world and the tendencies of our own flesh. Exercise builds muscles and strength―spiritual exercise builds spiritual muscle and spiritual strength.
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT speaks of varying levels of devotion―progressing from the minimal level to the highest level: “As the essential of this devotion consists in the interior which it ought to form, it will not be equally understood by everybody. Some will stop at what is exterior in it, and will go no further, and these will be the greatest number. Some, in small number, will enter into its inward spirit; but they will only mount one step. Who will mount to the second step? Who will get as far as the third step? Lastly, who will so advance as to make this devotion his habitual state [the fourth step]? He alone to whom the spirit of Jesus Christ shall have revealed this secret, the faultlessly faithful soul whom He shall conduct there Himself, to advance from virtue to virtue, from grace to grace, from light to light, until he arrives at the transformation of himself into Jesus Christ, and to the plenitude of His age on earth and of His glory in Heaven.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §119).
ST. FRANCIS DE SALES, in his Introduction to the Devout Life, states: “Devotion that is true and living presupposes the love of God―rather, it is nothing else than a true love of God. However, devotion is not love as such. People who are good, but have not yet progressed to devotion, love and fly towards God by their good deeds but only rarely, slowly and with difficulty. Persons who are devout fly to God frequently, promptly and freely. When love grows to such a degree of perfection that it makes us not only to do good, but rather moves us to do it carefully, frequently and promptly―then it is called devotion. In short, devotion is nothing else than a spiritual agility and liveliness. Just as it is the work of charity to make us keep all the commandments of God in general and without any exception, so it is the work of devotion to make us do so promptly and earnestly.
“Therefore, whoever does not keep all of God’s commandments cannot be considered either good or devout, because to be good one must have charity. To be devout one must, not only have charity, but a great liveliness and promptness in doing charitable actions. Since devotion is to be found at a certain level of charity that is extraordinary―it makes us prompt, active and earnest in keeping all of God’s commandments. Furthermore, it rouses us to do as many good works as we can, promptly and lovingly―even though they are in no way commanded, but rather only counseled or inspired. We move ahead and run in the paths of God’s counsels and inspirations. Charity and devotion are not more different from each other than the flame is from the fire. When charity burns with intense flames, it is called devotion. In fact, devotion adds to the fire of charity only the flame which makes charity prompt, active and diligent―not only to keep God’s commandments, but also to put into practice His counsels and inspirations.” (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life).
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE also speaks of the growth of charity within us―which, since it is the foundation of devotion, also can be applied not only to charity, but also devotion: “Thus speaks the inspired Apostle in his memorable Chapter on charity ― ‘When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away the things of a child’ (1 Corinthians 13:11). We learn from this comparison the need that we are under of developing in the spiritual life, just as we do in the natural life, from the weakness of childhood to the strength and ability of full-grown manhood. In the early years of spiritual life, charity is like a child, living indeed in the soul, but weak in its life, and consequently incapable of vigorous action. We possess, in early years, the gift of Divine charity, by virtue of the state of sanctifying grace. But we are like children and weak beginners. Application and the repetition of spiritual acts is needed. We must awaken interest in our mind and heart, and give ourselves to the great work―because if our thoughts and affections are not focused on these incomparable treasures of the interior life, they will infallibly turn to goods of a lower order, and be captivated by the perishable gratifications of creatures.
“That our charity is capable of increase is certain, with the certainty of Faith. It must emerge from the state of its first weakness, and advance towards the strength needful for its great enterprise. The Fathers and Doctors of the Church warn us that, in the way of God, there is no such thing as a standstill, but that if we advance not, we recede― not to gain is to lose, and not to advance is to fall back. St. Augustine teaches the same, when he says, that ‘love is always either rising or falling … Always advance, do not stop on the way, do not turn back, do not turn aside! If you say “enough”, then you are lost.’ St. Teresa of Avila also says: ‘In a spiritual life, he who does not advance, recedes. I consider it impossible for love to stand still.’ It is clear, then, that our charity must go on increasing. The highest Saint must still move onwards. Our work is not done till we reach perfection―and the increase of our charity is the progress of the soul to our perfection. As charity therefore increases, the soul advances. No limit to its increase in the soul may be placed here below. So that our proficiency lies not in much thinking [or talking], or much external doing, but in much loving, as St. Teresa of Avila tells us. If, however, we wish to provide to the full extent for charity’s increase within us, not only must our actions be done for God, by the principle of His love, but they must be throughout according to Him: which means that they must be done well.
“Souls are not to expect to find such perfection ready-made, and waiting for them. Vocal prayer, meditation, affective acts, aspirations, and contemplation, being communications, in various ways and degrees, with the source of Charity, and so bringing the soul under the direct influence of God’s light and love, are foremost among the means of nourishing the Divine life. Self-examination and confession, wisely used, are efficacious, instrumental means for ridding ourselves of the impediments to Charity; and, by purifying and reviving the soul, enable it the better to assimilate the nourishment it takes. The most Holy Eucharist is a participation of Divine charity itself; and is given by God for the direct purpose of nourishing the life of charity within the soul. Then all the modes of exercising charity to our neighbor―whether by spiritual or corporal works of mercy―become many direct means of increasing and developing the virtue of charity within us. St. Teresa of Avila says: ‘Be assured that the further you advance in the love of your neighbor, the more will you advance in the love of God.’”
You have no doubt heard the saying: “Love makes the world go around!” Well―God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and He most certainly keeps the world going! Yet love is reciprocal thing―which means it a case of give and take. That is why Holy Scripture says: “Let us therefore love God, because God has loved us first!” (1 John 4:19). Our Lord―Who is God―commanded: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Then Our Lord commands us to love our neighbor: “And the second [greatest commandment] is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!” (Matthew 22:39).
Love Who?
Our Lord was asked who is our neighbor: “A certain lawyer stood up, tempting Him and saying: ‘Master, what must I do to possess eternal life?’ But Jesus said to him: ‘What is written in the law?’ How readest thou?’ The lawyer answering, said: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind―and thy neighbor as thyself!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou hast answered right! Do this, and thou shalt live!’ But the lawyer, wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus: ‘And who is my neighbor!’” (Luke 10:29). Jesus then told him the parable about the Good Samaritan.
Love or Hate Your Enemies?
In case you do not know, the Samaritans and the Jews were arch-enemies. The Samaritans in the Bible were considered unclean by the Jews because of their different religious beliefs and practices. Samaria was part of the Ten Tribes of Israel that made up the Northern Kingdom of Israel, with Judea (the Jews) being the Southern Kingdom. The kings of Israel (the Northern Kingdom) were mostly wicked. To keep their people from going to Jerusalem in Judea (the Southern Kingdom) to worship, they set up two altars with golden calves, one in Samaria, and one way up north in Dan. The Samaritan temple was considered pagan the Jews. In 732 B.C., the Assyrians invaded and conquered the Northern Kingdom, killing many and carrying away a large number as captives. In the place of the captives whom they took away to Assyria, the Assyrians planted pagan Gentiles from around their empire and these Gentiles intermarried with remaining Ten Tribes of Israel. Many of their descendants considered themselves Jews. The Jews in Judea did not agree. They considered the Samaritans (and the other intermarried Ten Tribes of Israel) to be a mongrel race and saw many problems with the way they practiced Judaism. This offended the Samaritans. The feud grew, and by the time of Christ, the Jews hated the Samaritans so much they crossed the River Jordan rather than travel through Samaria.
In His parable of the Good Samaritan―a very contentious and volatile subject for the Jews―Our Lord made the Samaritan a hero who helped the robbed, beaten and half-dead Jew by the roadside, whereas a Jewish priest and Jewish Levite walked by their fellow Jew by the roadside without helping him. Thus Our Lord was teaching them that even our enemies are to be regarded as our neighbors whom we are bound to love. Hence Our Lord says elsewhere: “You have heard that it has been said: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thy enemy!’ But I say to you: ‘Love your enemies! Do good to them that hate you! And pray for them that persecute and calumniate you!’” (Matthew 5:43-44).
From the Bottom of the Ladder to the Top
Our enemies are our neighbors and we place them at the bottom of the “Neighbor Ladder”. Who, then, is at the top of that “Neighbor Ladder”? Obviously the neighbors who do the most good to us; who show us the greatest kindness; who manifest the greatest mercy towards us, etc. Who among all those “good” neighbors is at the very top of the ladder? It has to be, of course, Our Lady. There is nobody who does as much for us as Our Lady. Have no doubts about it―Our Lady is interceding, praying, working for your salvation (and everyone’s salvation) in such an intense, fervent and consistent manner that we could not possibly imagine. She deserves some kind of recompense or payment for her unremitting efforts, don’t you think? She is the Mediatrix of All Graces―there is not one single grace or favor from God that is not distributed through her hands. She even intercedes for the enemies of God and tries to bring about a reconciliation.
We, too, were enemies of God whenever we fell into mortal sin: “In past times, when you were dead in your offences and sins, you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air [Satan]” (Ephesians 2:1-2). We easily forget our sins and we forget that sin is the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD).
Sin is repulsive to God: “The way of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord!” (Proverbs 15:9). “Your iniquities have divided you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you” (Isaias 59:2). “Thou art not a God that willest iniquity. Neither shall the wicked dwell near Thee. Thou hatest all the workers of iniquity. Thou wilt destroy all that speak a lie. The bloody and the deceitful man the Lord will abhor” (Psalm 5:5-7).
Nevertheless, “The Lord deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9) and that is why “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10) … “God commends His charity towards us―because when we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8-9). “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9) ― and Our Lady is also the greatest of God’s works and she is our Mother of Mercy, as we say in the prayer Salve Regina: “Hail Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy … our hope! To thee do we cry … in this valley of tears! Turn, then, thy eyes of mercy towards us!”
As the above psalm said: “His tender mercies are over all His works” and what is more precious to us than mercy? On your deathbed―the most crucial moment of your life―what is that you will want above all else? Money? Food? Drink? Praise? Flattery? A list of your achievements? No! What you will undoubtedly crave above all things and will value above all things is mercy! Don’t fool yourself! Your whole eternity―whether you spend eternity in Heaven or Hell―will depend upon whether or not you obtain the mercy of God! Mary is that mercy of God. Mercy is the greatest grace we can hope for on our deathbed―and all graces come from God through Mary. “Blessed are the merciful―for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap!” (Galatians 6:7). Your devotion (or lack of it) to the Mother of Mercy will dictate the degree of mercy that you will receive.
Love is More Than Just Words
The Catechism tells us that we were made to know God, love God and serve God. We cannot love what we do not know―and we will not serve very well someone whom we do not love. Knowledge and love lead to service. Service usually means obedience. The words of Our Lord at the Last Supper, could just as well come from the lips Our Lady also: “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you. Abide in My love! If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love; as I also have kept My Father’s commandments, and do abide in His love” (John 15:9-10) ― after all, Holy Mother Church places the following words on the lips of Our Lady in the liturgy: “I am the mother of fair love” (Mass of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Ecclesiasticus 24:24). By the same token, we can also apply to Our Lady―the Seat of Wisdom―the following words: “I love them that love me; and they that watch for me early in the morning, shall find me” (Proverbs 8:17). From these words we see that love is not just mere words of love, but love requires effort in continually seeking Jesus and Mary and keeping their commands and counsels.
Love Requires Obedience
Love is closely linked to obedience―as Our Lord said: “Why call you Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) adding “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15). Similarly, Holy Mother Church, in Her liturgy, applies the following words to Our Lady: “O children, listen to me! Happy are those who keep my ways! Hear instruction, and be wise, and refuse it not! Happy the man who obeys me―watching daily at my gates, waiting at my doorsteps―for he who finds me finds life, and wins favor from the Lord” (Mass of the Immaculate Conception, Proverbs 8:33-35). The above words are very striking!
● “O children, listen to me!” How many―or rather how few―are the souls that actually listen to Our Lady, read about her; assemble her comments, commands and counsels; daily reflect upon her words? We listen to the ones we love and are devoted to.
● “Happy are those who keep my ways!” The general unhappiness, dissatisfaction, dysfunction that we see all around us (and perhaps within ourselves and our families) is generally due to our refusal to keep the ways of sanctification and salvation that Our Lady has presented to us. At Fatima she asked for devotion to her Immaculate Heart; for many Rosaries to be prayed; for many sacrifices (for sinners) and penance (for our sinful selves); an acceptance of the sufferings God will send us, etc. Are we doing those things? With all our heart, or half-heartedly?
● “Watching daily at my gates, waiting at my doorsteps.” Broadly speaking, you could that one of things that “gates” could refer to are the “gates” through which Our Lady has entered this world by her apparitions―hence “watching daily at my gates” can refer to daily studying the apparitions of Our Lady, gleaning wisdom from them, meditating upon them and putting into practice her teachings, commands and counsels. The “doorstep” is even closer to her residence than the “gate”―hence we could interpret that as ever getting closer to Our Lady―at first being farther away at the gate, but then proceeding through the gate to doorstep.
● “He who finds me finds life.” Our Lady gave life to the Son of God, Who is life itself: “I am the life!” (John 14:6) … “I am the bread of life!” (John 6:48) … “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly!” (John 10:10). As we say: “To Jesus through Mary” ― Mary leads us Jesus and so she leads to life, life eternal in Jesus. He who finds Mary, finds Jesus and eternal life.
● “Wins favor from the Lord.” As St. Louis de Montfort writes: “God has made Mary the sole treasurer of His treasures and the sole dispenser of His graces―to ennoble, to exalt and to enrich whom she wishes; to give entry to whom she wills into the narrow way of Heaven; to bring whom she wills, and in spite of all obstacles, through the narrow gate of life; and to give the throne, the scepter and the crown of king to whom she wills. The greatest saints―the souls richest in graces and virtues―shall be the most assiduous in praying to our Blessed Lady.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Love and Devotion
The word “devotion” comes from the Latin verb “devovere”, meaning to avow oneself to, or to give oneself entirely to a deity or cause of some kind. Thus devotion to Mary implicitly requires this total consecration of ourselves to her, and through her to God. The word consecration comes from the Latin verb “consecrare”, meaning to dedicate, to set apart, hallow, sanctify, vow to a god.
If we come to more modern times, and look up the word in the Dictionary, we will encounter such definitions as: (1) earnestness and zeal in the performance of religious duties and observations; (2) religious fervor, reverence, piety; (3) an act of prayer or supplication; (4) oblation or offering, such as of oneself or an alms given from religious motives; (5) ardent love or affection; (6) strong attachment; (7) dedication or attachment to a cause, person, principle, etc. (8) zeal, enthusiasm.
This gives us a clear picture of “devotion” being a cut-above the average, being something especially noticeable due to the presence of a zeal, a fervor, an enthusiasm, a strong attachment and ardent love for some object or thing, or some person, or some place. It rules out notions like lukewarmness, tepidity, torpor, sloth, indifference, inconsistency, sporadic, half-hearted, selfish, etc.
Love with Your Whole Heart, Mind, Soul and Strength
Devotion is perfectly expressed in the commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength” (Mark 12:30). That is true devotion in a nutshell—whole soul, whole heart, whole mind, whole strength. We even admit that on a natural level. We will say of an outstanding worker or an outstanding athlete, that they put their whole soul, heart, mind and strength into the work/race/game. Let us not try water it down and give a second-rate love or devotion! In this way, devotion is not hard to understand—it means: everything, all, total, nothing held back. It is something “outstanding”, something “out of the ordinary”, something “above the ordinary”, something “extraordinary.”
Yet, an outstanding worker or athlete, an extraordinary musician or artist, did not start out being something outstanding or extraordinary—they worked their way up to that level. The same applies to us in our pursuit of true spiritual devotion. Nobody is made that way, they have to acquire it—and everyone CAN acquire it, if they really wish and try.
You Fanatic!
To those who love themselves, such an attitude will be denigrated as fanatical, ‘over-the-top’, extreme, or some other similar epithet. Yet this is exactly what God is! If God is perfection itself, then He is extreme—for perfection is something extremely good. We call people “fanatics” who blow themselves up, or burn themselves to death, for some earthly cause. “Christ also loved the Church, and delivered Himself up for it” (Ephesians 5:25). He could have saved us with one drop of His Precious Blood—the Circumcision would have been more than enough. Yet He was ‘fanatical’ about proving His love for us, and even called Peter “Satan” for trying to prevent Him from proving that love through His Passion and Crucifixion: “Who turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me: because thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:23).
Want to be a Fantastic Fanatic?
The word “fanatic” can be traced back, first to a mid-16th century French adjective, “fanatique”, which in turn owes its origins to the Latin, “fanaticus”, meaning “of a temple, inspired by a god,” which itself is based on the Latin word “fanum”, meaning “temple.” The adjective originally described behavior or speech that might result from possession by a god or demon—behavior or speech that we describe as “fantastic.” St. Paul says that we ought to be temples of the Holy Ghost—hence temples possessed by God, hence fantastic and fanatical in a good sense. “Know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you, whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 6:19). Sr. Lucia of Fatima echoes this: “The Most Holy Virgin has made me understand that we are in the last times of the world. She has told me that … starting with the present time, we belong either to God, or we belong to the demon; there is no middle ground.” (Sr. Lucia, in 1957 to Fr. Augustine Fuentes).
Making Mountains of Holiness Out Of Our Molehills of Holiness
ST. FRANCIS DE SALES, the author of the spiritual classic, Introduction to the Devout Life, deals with the subject of devotion at quite some length. In fact, he opens the first chapter of the book with the question: “What is true Devotion?” Here are some extracts on what he says:
“Seeing that the small errors which people tend to commit in the beginning of any undertaking, tend to grow greater as they advance, and to become irreparable in the end, it is therefore most important that you should thoroughly understand wherein lies the grace of true devotion—because while there undoubtedly is such a true devotion, there are also many fake and look-alike imitations too; and unless you know which is real, you may mistake, and waste your energy in pursuing an empty, profitless shadow.
“We all color devotion according to our own likings and dispositions. One man sets great value on fasting, and believes himself to be leading a very devout life, so long as he fasts rigorously, although the while his heart is full of bitterness—and while he will not moisten his lips with wine, perhaps not even with water, in his great abstinence, he does not scruple to steep them in his neighbor’s blood, through slander and detraction. Another man reckons himself as devout because he repeats many prayers daily, although at the same time he does not refrain from all manner of angry, irritating, conceited or insulting speeches among his family and neighbors. This man freely opens his purse in almsgiving, but closes his heart to all gentle and forgiving feelings towards those who are opposed to him; while that one is ready enough to forgive his enemies, but will never pay his rightful debts except under pressure. Meanwhile all these people are conventionally called religious, but nevertheless they are in no true sense really devout.”
“But, in fact, all true and living devotion presupposes the love of God—and indeed it is neither more nor less than a very real love of God—but only when it attains its fullest perfection, in which it not only leads us to do well, but to act carefully, diligently, and promptly, then it is called devotion. Devotion consists in a high degree of real love―it not only makes us ready, active, and diligent in following all God’s Commands, but it also excites us to be ready and loving in performing as many good works as possible, even such as are not enjoined upon us, but are only matters of counsel or inspiration. The difference between love and devotion is just that which exists between fire and flame—love being a spiritual fire, which becomes devotion, when it is fanned into a flame—and what devotion adds to the fire of love, is that flame which makes it eager, energetic and diligent, not merely in obeying God’s Commandments, but in fulfilling His Divine Counsels and inspirations.” (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life).
As St. Francis de Sales says, there is only one true devotion, while there is a very large number of false and meaningless ones. So if you cannot recognize true devotion, you could be deceived and waste time in following some devotion that is irrelevant and irrational. It is in the devil’s interests to sell you a counterfeit devotion and thereby turn you aside from the true devotion. To achieve his satanic purpose, he seeks to blind you and keep you ignorance as to what devotion really is―so that you can be all the more easily fooled. In addition to that, the devil will make mountains out of the molehill of your false devotion―making you imagine that you are climbing in the heights of holiness! “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15).
Our Lady Speaks of Devotion
OUR LADY said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, : “I receive with maternal affection all those who, fervently and devoutly, desire to be my children and servants in the Lord. By the love which He has given me, I shall embrace them with open arms and shall be their Intercessor and Advocate … God, in His kindness, wishes to offer this opportune remedy to men, in order that all of them may seek help and eternal salvation through my intercession … . In the beatific vision, I pray without ceasing for the salvation of my clients … It should teach them to seek my most kind and powerful intercession and to fear the judgments of the Most High; for in this lies an efficacious means of salvation … One of the reasons why men should call me Mother of Mercy, is the knowledge of my loving desire, that all be filled with the flood of grace and taste the sweetness of the Lord. For, if they respond and follow me, I will offer them my protection and help, and I will intercede for them with my Son … If they obey me in this I offer them my protection, and I will constitute myself their Mother, to be their help and defense. And I will also promise them my continual and efficacious intercession with my most holy Son―if they do not displease me.
“For this purpose you should exhort them to a CONTINUAL LOVE AND DEVOTION TOWARD ME, engrafting it in their hearts! … Let therefore mortals beware, lest I, in the Day of Judgment, most justly refuse my intercession to those, who have foolishly despised and forgotten so many and so great favors and blessings! How can these ungrateful and pertinacious mortals expect mercy of the most just and righteous God, when He has given them sufficient and opportune time, invited them so often, called them, waited and worked for them, and conferred upon them immense blessings, while they abused and wasted all of them in the pursuit of vanity? Fear this, the greatest of all blindnesses.
“What then are my thoughts and the thoughts of the angels and saints, in seeing this world and all the faithful in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness? I obtain countless blessings for Christians ― and if not all experience them, it is not because I do not solicit them, but because there are VERY FEW of the faithful who call to me WITH ALL THEIR HEART and who dispose themselves toward meriting and reaping the fruit of my maternal love … All those DEVOTED to me, who call upon me at the hour of death, shall be under my special protection in that hour. They shall have me as a defense against the demons, as a help and protection, and shall be presented by me before the tribunal of His mercy and there experience my intercession … How much my intercession and the power I have in Heaven is worth has never been hidden in the Church, for I have demonstrated my ability to save all by so many thousands of miracles, prodigies and favors operated on behalf of those DEVOTED to me. With those who have called upon me in their needs I have always shown myself generous, and the Lord has shown Himself generous to them on my account. Yet, though many are the souls whom I have helped, they are few in comparison with those, whom I could help and am willing to help.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Devotion Must Grow
As the spiritual masters tell us, there is no such thing as standing still in the spiritual life―you are either going forwards or backwards. As FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE writes: “He who makes no progress loses ground.” By analogy, you could say that getting to Heaven is like having to swim upstream against the downward flowing water current. If you stop swimming, then in no time at all you are carried a long way backwards downstream. The stream or river that we are having to swim against is the devil, the world and the tendencies of our own flesh. Exercise builds muscles and strength―spiritual exercise builds spiritual muscle and spiritual strength.
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT speaks of varying levels of devotion―progressing from the minimal level to the highest level: “As the essential of this devotion consists in the interior which it ought to form, it will not be equally understood by everybody. Some will stop at what is exterior in it, and will go no further, and these will be the greatest number. Some, in small number, will enter into its inward spirit; but they will only mount one step. Who will mount to the second step? Who will get as far as the third step? Lastly, who will so advance as to make this devotion his habitual state [the fourth step]? He alone to whom the spirit of Jesus Christ shall have revealed this secret, the faultlessly faithful soul whom He shall conduct there Himself, to advance from virtue to virtue, from grace to grace, from light to light, until he arrives at the transformation of himself into Jesus Christ, and to the plenitude of His age on earth and of His glory in Heaven.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §119).
ST. FRANCIS DE SALES, in his Introduction to the Devout Life, states: “Devotion that is true and living presupposes the love of God―rather, it is nothing else than a true love of God. However, devotion is not love as such. People who are good, but have not yet progressed to devotion, love and fly towards God by their good deeds but only rarely, slowly and with difficulty. Persons who are devout fly to God frequently, promptly and freely. When love grows to such a degree of perfection that it makes us not only to do good, but rather moves us to do it carefully, frequently and promptly―then it is called devotion. In short, devotion is nothing else than a spiritual agility and liveliness. Just as it is the work of charity to make us keep all the commandments of God in general and without any exception, so it is the work of devotion to make us do so promptly and earnestly.
“Therefore, whoever does not keep all of God’s commandments cannot be considered either good or devout, because to be good one must have charity. To be devout one must, not only have charity, but a great liveliness and promptness in doing charitable actions. Since devotion is to be found at a certain level of charity that is extraordinary―it makes us prompt, active and earnest in keeping all of God’s commandments. Furthermore, it rouses us to do as many good works as we can, promptly and lovingly―even though they are in no way commanded, but rather only counseled or inspired. We move ahead and run in the paths of God’s counsels and inspirations. Charity and devotion are not more different from each other than the flame is from the fire. When charity burns with intense flames, it is called devotion. In fact, devotion adds to the fire of charity only the flame which makes charity prompt, active and diligent―not only to keep God’s commandments, but also to put into practice His counsels and inspirations.” (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life).
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE also speaks of the growth of charity within us―which, since it is the foundation of devotion, also can be applied not only to charity, but also devotion: “Thus speaks the inspired Apostle in his memorable Chapter on charity ― ‘When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away the things of a child’ (1 Corinthians 13:11). We learn from this comparison the need that we are under of developing in the spiritual life, just as we do in the natural life, from the weakness of childhood to the strength and ability of full-grown manhood. In the early years of spiritual life, charity is like a child, living indeed in the soul, but weak in its life, and consequently incapable of vigorous action. We possess, in early years, the gift of Divine charity, by virtue of the state of sanctifying grace. But we are like children and weak beginners. Application and the repetition of spiritual acts is needed. We must awaken interest in our mind and heart, and give ourselves to the great work―because if our thoughts and affections are not focused on these incomparable treasures of the interior life, they will infallibly turn to goods of a lower order, and be captivated by the perishable gratifications of creatures.
“That our charity is capable of increase is certain, with the certainty of Faith. It must emerge from the state of its first weakness, and advance towards the strength needful for its great enterprise. The Fathers and Doctors of the Church warn us that, in the way of God, there is no such thing as a standstill, but that if we advance not, we recede― not to gain is to lose, and not to advance is to fall back. St. Augustine teaches the same, when he says, that ‘love is always either rising or falling … Always advance, do not stop on the way, do not turn back, do not turn aside! If you say “enough”, then you are lost.’ St. Teresa of Avila also says: ‘In a spiritual life, he who does not advance, recedes. I consider it impossible for love to stand still.’ It is clear, then, that our charity must go on increasing. The highest Saint must still move onwards. Our work is not done till we reach perfection―and the increase of our charity is the progress of the soul to our perfection. As charity therefore increases, the soul advances. No limit to its increase in the soul may be placed here below. So that our proficiency lies not in much thinking [or talking], or much external doing, but in much loving, as St. Teresa of Avila tells us. If, however, we wish to provide to the full extent for charity’s increase within us, not only must our actions be done for God, by the principle of His love, but they must be throughout according to Him: which means that they must be done well.
“Souls are not to expect to find such perfection ready-made, and waiting for them. Vocal prayer, meditation, affective acts, aspirations, and contemplation, being communications, in various ways and degrees, with the source of Charity, and so bringing the soul under the direct influence of God’s light and love, are foremost among the means of nourishing the Divine life. Self-examination and confession, wisely used, are efficacious, instrumental means for ridding ourselves of the impediments to Charity; and, by purifying and reviving the soul, enable it the better to assimilate the nourishment it takes. The most Holy Eucharist is a participation of Divine charity itself; and is given by God for the direct purpose of nourishing the life of charity within the soul. Then all the modes of exercising charity to our neighbor―whether by spiritual or corporal works of mercy―become many direct means of increasing and developing the virtue of charity within us. St. Teresa of Avila says: ‘Be assured that the further you advance in the love of your neighbor, the more will you advance in the love of God.’”
Article 21
Sunday & Monday, May 5th & 6th
Neglect Mary At Your Own Peril!
Sunday & Monday, May 5th & 6th
Neglect Mary At Your Own Peril!
How Many Doors does Heaven Have?
“God sent His Son into the world … that the world may be saved by Him! … God gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting.” (John 3:16-17). “Be it known to you all that Our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth … the stone which was rejected by you the builders, which is become the head of the corner [the cornerstone of the building]. Neither is there salvation in any other. For there is no other name under Heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved!” (Acts Of Apostles 4:10-12).
Our Lord Himself confirms this, saying: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life! No man cometh to the Father, but by Me!” (John 14:6). “Amen, amen I say to you, I am the door of the sheep! … I am the door! By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved!” (John 10:7-9). “Enter in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). “If you believe not that I am He, then you shall die in your sin!” (John 8:24).
Nevertheless, the Church also calls Our Lady the “Gate of Heaven” ― which happens to be one of her many titles in the Litany of Loreto (the Litany of Our Lady). How can this be if Christ says: “I am the door of the sheep! … I am the door!”? The saints explain it thus―since Our Lady was the “gate” through which Christ came to save the world, then it stands to reason that Our Lady must also be the gate by which we go to our Savior―Jesus Christ. If you like, you could say that Mary is “the gate to the Gate” ― she is the pathway or channel or canal that safely and assuredly leads to Jesus Christ, our cornerstone, the door of the sheep, the door and gate to salvation whereby we must be saved. St. Louis de Montfort says that God has made her, chosen her and empowered her “to give entry to whom she wills into the narrow way of Heaven; to bring whom she wills, and in spite of all obstacles, through the narrow gate of life.”
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, nevertheless, affirms this need to head for Jesus our sole Savior―but he adds that we should head for Jesus with Mary, through Mary, by Mary and in Mary: “Jesus Christ our Savior, ought to be the last end of all our other devotions, else they are false and delusive. There has been no other name given under Heaven, except the Name of Jesus, by which we can be saved. God has laid no other foundation of our salvation than Jesus Christ. Every building which is not built on that firm rock is founded upon the moving sand, and sooner or later infallibly will fall. Everyone who is not united to Him as a branch to the vine, shall fall, shall wither, and shall be fit only to be cast into the fire. Outside of Him there exists nothing but error, falsehood, iniquity, futility, death and damnation. If, then, we establish solid devotion to our Blessed Lady, it is only to establish more perfectly devotion to Jesus Christ, and to provide an easy and secure means for finding Jesus Christ. If devotion to Our Lady removed us from Jesus Christ, we should have to reject it as an illusion of the devil―but, far from this being the case, devotion to Our Lady is, on the contrary, necessary for us as a means of finding Jesus Christ perfectly, loving Him and serving Him faithfully.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
No Salvation Without Grace―All Grace Comes Through Mary
There can be no salvation without grace―we need, above all, sanctifying grace in our souls and also the help of Actual Graces (temporary passing graces) to assist in keeping Sanctifying Grace in the soul and overcoming all the dangers to grace that surround us―as Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), which is the same as saying: “Without My grace you do can nothing!” Hence Scripture adds: “By grace you are saved, and not of yourselves, for it is the gift of God!” (Ephesians 2:8). To which St. Thérèse of Lisieux adds: “Everything Is Grace!” and we must also add that every grace comes to us through Mary―not that she herself decided so, but God decided that all graces should come to us through Mary, just like the Author of all Grace, Our Lord Jesus Christ, came to us through Mary. Mary does not and cannot create grace―Mary simply distributes all the graces that God has created.
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, further develops and explains this, saying: “God the Father made an assemblage of all His graces―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich. She has reached a point of grace immense and inconceivable—in such a way that the Most High has made her the sole treasurer of His treasures and the sole dispenser of His graces―to ennoble, to exalt and to enrich whom she wishes; to give entry to whom she wills into the narrow way of Heaven; to bring whom she wills, and in spite of all obstacles, through the narrow gate of life; and to give the throne, the scepter and the crown of king to whom she wills. The greatest saints―the souls richest in graces and virtues―shall be the most assiduous in praying to our Blessed Lady.
“God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him. It is by Mary that Jesus applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly.
“God the Holy Ghost is become fruitful by Mary. The Holy Ghost chose to make use of our Blessed Lady―though He had no absolute need of her―to bring His fruitfulness into action, by producing, in her and by her, Jesus Christ and His members. To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, Who has willed that we should have everything through Mary. When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce, because Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be—a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
HOLY MOTHER CHURCH therefore calls Our Lady “the Mediatrix of All Grace” ― meaning that all graces come to us through Mary, through the mediation of Mary, through the channel or canal that Mary is for us. The Church also calls her “Mother of Divine Grace” ― which is another one of the titles that the Church attributes to Mary in the Litany of Loreto (Litany of Our Lady). This is only fitting and appropriate, since, at the Annunciation, the Archangel Gabriel said to Mary that she was “full of grace” (Luke 1:28). What then can we say of the added graces that enriched her soul at the Incarnation ― since by it she became Mother of God, the Author and Source of all grace! Grace, then, is from Christ, whose Mother is Mary. She is, accordingly, the Mother of Divine Grace―which is something we implicitly when we pray the following words from the prayer, the Memorare: “Remember O most loving Virgin Mary, … never has it been known that anyone, who had recourse to thee, was left unaided.”
The Neglect of Mary
THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY herself revealed to St. Bridget: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them.” And then Our Lady concluded by saying: “Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners!” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
This need and necessity of Mary seems to even more important in our present calamitous and catastrophic times, when the whole world (and the Church) seems to falling down all around us.
OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS, in the 1600s, had already forebodingly warned of our terrible times, saying: “The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. They will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry … Corrupted priests will scandalize the Christian people! … The evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government, will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities! … Every type of vice will enter, calling down in turn every type of chastisement, such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy, the cause of the perdition of so many souls so dear to Jesus Christ and to me! ... In these unhappy times there will be unbridled luxury and impurity which will conquer innumerable frivolous souls, who will be lost! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay and the precious light of Faith will gradually be extinguished until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals! … The small number of souls, who will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom! … Offer sacrifices and prayers to shorten the duration of this terrible catastrophe! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed! This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration! … This will mark the arrival of my hour! … My hour will arrive when I, in an amazing manner, will overthrow proud Satan, crushing him under my feet!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE, in 1846, essentially echoed the same message: “Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! … God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell ... The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … The true Faith to the Lord will be forgotten … They will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis. Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls. Rome will lose the Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist … The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay ... The righteous will suffer greatly ... I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on my children, the true faithful, the true followers of Christ, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son! Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. I am at your side and within you―provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days!” (Our Lady of La Salette).
OUR LADY OF FATIMA, in 1917, also spoke along the same lines: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it! … If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! I am the Lady of the Rosary! … In the end my Immaculate Heart will triumph!” (Our Lady of Fatima).
OUR LADY, in the 1950s, said similar words to Blessed Elena Aiello: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! See how the souls are falling into Hell! These are grave times! Tremendous will be the upheaval of the whole world, because men — as at the time of the Deluge — have lost God’s way, and are ruled by the spirit of Satan! Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God! They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … In order to save souls, I wish that there be propagated in the world the consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Mediatrix of men! Advise men to return to God by prayers and penances, and to come with confidence to my Immaculate Heart. My intercession must be shown! Spread the devotion to my Immaculate Heart, in order that many souls maybe conquered by my love and that many sinners may return to my Maternal Heart. All those who accept my urgent warnings will be saved! … Through prayer and penance, my mercy will be able to hold back the hand of God’s justice! The hour of my triumph is close at hand. The victory will be accomplished through the love and mercy of the Heart of My Son, and of my Immaculate Heart, the Mediatrix!” (Words of Our Lady to Blessed Sister Elena Aiello).
OUR LADY OF AKITA, in 1973, likewise said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. With my Son I have intervened so many times to appease the wrath of the Father ... The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this … Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much—very much! … Pray with fervor! … Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary! With the Rosary, pray for the Pope, the bishops and priests … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful! … I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
No Salvation Without Mary
Hence it is that the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, the saints and theologians, insist that there can be no salvation without Mary―since there is no grace that does not come to us through Mary.
ST. ALBERT THE GREAT (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.”
ST. BONAVENTURE (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation.”
ST. IGNATIUS OF ANTIOCH (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.”
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (a Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.”
ST. ANSELM (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost.”
ST. ANTONINE is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified.”
ST. JOHN DAMASCENE (a Doctor of the Church) says: “To be devout to you, O holy Virgin, is an arm of salvation which God gives to those whom He wishes to save.”
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (a Doctor of the Church), in his book, The Glories of Mary, says: “The intercession of Mary is even necessary to salvation. We say ‘necessary’, not absolutely, but morally. This necessity proceeds from the will itself of God, that all graces that He dispenses should pass by the hands of Mary, according to the opinion of St. Bernard.”
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT adds: “Devotion to our Blessed Lady is necessary to salvation, and that it is an infallible mark of reprobation to have no esteem and love for the holy Virgin; while on the other hand, it is an infallible mark of predestination to be entirely and truly devoted to her.”
ST. BERNARDINE OF SIENNA addresses these words to the Blessed Virgin Mary: “O Lady, thou art the dispenser of all graces, and since the grace of salvation can only come through thy hands, our salvation depends on thee!”
How grieved must Our Lady be to see those souls so dear to her, for whom she has done so much in life―now condemned, through their own carelessness and misuse of the gifts and graces bestowed on them, to a period of exile more or less long in Purgatory (or worse still, in Hell), during which they will have to face a much rougher and tougher penance than would have sufficed to satisfy for their sins had they only had a more true and abiding sorrow for sin, and more desire and courage in mortifying themselves while still living on Earth!
How many times has Our Lady begged for more prayers, more penance, more sacrifices? What more is she supposed to do? Is she supposed to say our prayers for us? Do our penance for us? Make sacrifices for us? Very few people are listening to her―and the few who do listen, very few of those respond with sufficient prayers, penances and sacrifices. As Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello in the 1955: “I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not listening to my voice!” To which Sister Lucia of Fatima adds in 1957: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! It will be very sad for everyone, and far from a happy thing if the world does not pray and do penance before then!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
No Room for Armchair or Couch-Potato Devotees
Devotion to Our Lady is not a “one-way-street” where Our Lady shows devotion towards us and we simply sit on the sofa and lap it all up! Devotion is meant to “two-way-traffic” because love is reciprocal―which means it is all about “give-and-take” and not just “take and give nothing back”! At LA SALETTE, in 1846, Our Lady stated that she was “giving it her all” but she was getting little or nothing in return from us: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, then I will be forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
At FATIMA, in 1917, Our Lady basically says: “Get up and get devoted! Get off the sofa and do something! Pray and make sacrifices! Practice a devotion to my Immaculate Heart!” ― though she did not quite use those exact words. What she did say was: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you! If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners! for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
At AKITA, in 1973, once again Our Lady calls for us to get off our backsides and do something: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... The Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. With my Son I have intervened so many times to appease the wrath of the Father ... I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. I wish, with my Son, for souls … beloved souls who console Him by forming a cohort of victim souls ... who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this! Pray in reparation! … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much—very much! … Pray with fervor! … I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
OUR LADY warns us against lethargy, indifference and spiritual negligence that leads many souls to Hell: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. This dreadful carelessness arises from two causes: on the one hand men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. Anything that is interior seems harmless in their estimation. On the other hand, since the princes of darkness are invisible and unperceived by any of the senses and since carnal men neither touch, nor feel, nor see them―the result is that they forget the fear of them. Yet for this very reason they ought to be more attentive and careful, since invisible enemies are more cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day!” (Words of Our Lady to Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from Thy Mystical City of God).
“God sent His Son into the world … that the world may be saved by Him! … God gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting.” (John 3:16-17). “Be it known to you all that Our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth … the stone which was rejected by you the builders, which is become the head of the corner [the cornerstone of the building]. Neither is there salvation in any other. For there is no other name under Heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved!” (Acts Of Apostles 4:10-12).
Our Lord Himself confirms this, saying: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life! No man cometh to the Father, but by Me!” (John 14:6). “Amen, amen I say to you, I am the door of the sheep! … I am the door! By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved!” (John 10:7-9). “Enter in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). “If you believe not that I am He, then you shall die in your sin!” (John 8:24).
Nevertheless, the Church also calls Our Lady the “Gate of Heaven” ― which happens to be one of her many titles in the Litany of Loreto (the Litany of Our Lady). How can this be if Christ says: “I am the door of the sheep! … I am the door!”? The saints explain it thus―since Our Lady was the “gate” through which Christ came to save the world, then it stands to reason that Our Lady must also be the gate by which we go to our Savior―Jesus Christ. If you like, you could say that Mary is “the gate to the Gate” ― she is the pathway or channel or canal that safely and assuredly leads to Jesus Christ, our cornerstone, the door of the sheep, the door and gate to salvation whereby we must be saved. St. Louis de Montfort says that God has made her, chosen her and empowered her “to give entry to whom she wills into the narrow way of Heaven; to bring whom she wills, and in spite of all obstacles, through the narrow gate of life.”
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, nevertheless, affirms this need to head for Jesus our sole Savior―but he adds that we should head for Jesus with Mary, through Mary, by Mary and in Mary: “Jesus Christ our Savior, ought to be the last end of all our other devotions, else they are false and delusive. There has been no other name given under Heaven, except the Name of Jesus, by which we can be saved. God has laid no other foundation of our salvation than Jesus Christ. Every building which is not built on that firm rock is founded upon the moving sand, and sooner or later infallibly will fall. Everyone who is not united to Him as a branch to the vine, shall fall, shall wither, and shall be fit only to be cast into the fire. Outside of Him there exists nothing but error, falsehood, iniquity, futility, death and damnation. If, then, we establish solid devotion to our Blessed Lady, it is only to establish more perfectly devotion to Jesus Christ, and to provide an easy and secure means for finding Jesus Christ. If devotion to Our Lady removed us from Jesus Christ, we should have to reject it as an illusion of the devil―but, far from this being the case, devotion to Our Lady is, on the contrary, necessary for us as a means of finding Jesus Christ perfectly, loving Him and serving Him faithfully.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
No Salvation Without Grace―All Grace Comes Through Mary
There can be no salvation without grace―we need, above all, sanctifying grace in our souls and also the help of Actual Graces (temporary passing graces) to assist in keeping Sanctifying Grace in the soul and overcoming all the dangers to grace that surround us―as Our Lord said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), which is the same as saying: “Without My grace you do can nothing!” Hence Scripture adds: “By grace you are saved, and not of yourselves, for it is the gift of God!” (Ephesians 2:8). To which St. Thérèse of Lisieux adds: “Everything Is Grace!” and we must also add that every grace comes to us through Mary―not that she herself decided so, but God decided that all graces should come to us through Mary, just like the Author of all Grace, Our Lord Jesus Christ, came to us through Mary. Mary does not and cannot create grace―Mary simply distributes all the graces that God has created.
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, further develops and explains this, saying: “God the Father made an assemblage of all His graces―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich. She has reached a point of grace immense and inconceivable—in such a way that the Most High has made her the sole treasurer of His treasures and the sole dispenser of His graces―to ennoble, to exalt and to enrich whom she wishes; to give entry to whom she wills into the narrow way of Heaven; to bring whom she wills, and in spite of all obstacles, through the narrow gate of life; and to give the throne, the scepter and the crown of king to whom she wills. The greatest saints―the souls richest in graces and virtues―shall be the most assiduous in praying to our Blessed Lady.
“God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him. It is by Mary that Jesus applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly.
“God the Holy Ghost is become fruitful by Mary. The Holy Ghost chose to make use of our Blessed Lady―though He had no absolute need of her―to bring His fruitfulness into action, by producing, in her and by her, Jesus Christ and His members. To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, Who has willed that we should have everything through Mary. When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce, because Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be—a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
HOLY MOTHER CHURCH therefore calls Our Lady “the Mediatrix of All Grace” ― meaning that all graces come to us through Mary, through the mediation of Mary, through the channel or canal that Mary is for us. The Church also calls her “Mother of Divine Grace” ― which is another one of the titles that the Church attributes to Mary in the Litany of Loreto (Litany of Our Lady). This is only fitting and appropriate, since, at the Annunciation, the Archangel Gabriel said to Mary that she was “full of grace” (Luke 1:28). What then can we say of the added graces that enriched her soul at the Incarnation ― since by it she became Mother of God, the Author and Source of all grace! Grace, then, is from Christ, whose Mother is Mary. She is, accordingly, the Mother of Divine Grace―which is something we implicitly when we pray the following words from the prayer, the Memorare: “Remember O most loving Virgin Mary, … never has it been known that anyone, who had recourse to thee, was left unaided.”
The Neglect of Mary
THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY herself revealed to St. Bridget: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them.” And then Our Lady concluded by saying: “Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners!” (quoted by St. Alphonsus Liguori, Glories of Mary).
This need and necessity of Mary seems to even more important in our present calamitous and catastrophic times, when the whole world (and the Church) seems to falling down all around us.
OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS, in the 1600s, had already forebodingly warned of our terrible times, saying: “The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. They will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry … Corrupted priests will scandalize the Christian people! … The evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government, will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities! … Every type of vice will enter, calling down in turn every type of chastisement, such as plagues, famines, internal fighting and external disputes with other nations, and apostasy, the cause of the perdition of so many souls so dear to Jesus Christ and to me! ... In these unhappy times there will be unbridled luxury and impurity which will conquer innumerable frivolous souls, who will be lost! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay and the precious light of Faith will gradually be extinguished until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals! … The small number of souls, who will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom! … Offer sacrifices and prayers to shorten the duration of this terrible catastrophe! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed! This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration! … This will mark the arrival of my hour! … My hour will arrive when I, in an amazing manner, will overthrow proud Satan, crushing him under my feet!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE, in 1846, essentially echoed the same message: “Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events! Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God! … God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together! Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell ... The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … The true Faith to the Lord will be forgotten … They will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis. Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls. Rome will lose the Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist … The Church will be in eclipse, the world will be in dismay ... The righteous will suffer greatly ... I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on my children, the true faithful, the true followers of Christ, those who have given themselves to me, so that I may lead them to my divine Son! Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. I am at your side and within you―provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days!” (Our Lady of La Salette).
OUR LADY OF FATIMA, in 1917, also spoke along the same lines: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If people do not cease offending God, a worse war will break out! … You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it! … If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! I am the Lady of the Rosary! … In the end my Immaculate Heart will triumph!” (Our Lady of Fatima).
OUR LADY, in the 1950s, said similar words to Blessed Elena Aiello: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! See how the souls are falling into Hell! These are grave times! Tremendous will be the upheaval of the whole world, because men — as at the time of the Deluge — have lost God’s way, and are ruled by the spirit of Satan! Satan reigns and triumphs on Earth! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice, so I may act as Mediatrix for my Son in order to save souls! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not returning to God! They refuse grace, and are not listening to my voice! … In order to save souls, I wish that there be propagated in the world the consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Mediatrix of men! Advise men to return to God by prayers and penances, and to come with confidence to my Immaculate Heart. My intercession must be shown! Spread the devotion to my Immaculate Heart, in order that many souls maybe conquered by my love and that many sinners may return to my Maternal Heart. All those who accept my urgent warnings will be saved! … Through prayer and penance, my mercy will be able to hold back the hand of God’s justice! The hour of my triumph is close at hand. The victory will be accomplished through the love and mercy of the Heart of My Son, and of my Immaculate Heart, the Mediatrix!” (Words of Our Lady to Blessed Sister Elena Aiello).
OUR LADY OF AKITA, in 1973, likewise said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. With my Son I have intervened so many times to appease the wrath of the Father ... The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this … Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much—very much! … Pray with fervor! … Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary! With the Rosary, pray for the Pope, the bishops and priests … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful! … I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
No Salvation Without Mary
Hence it is that the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, the saints and theologians, insist that there can be no salvation without Mary―since there is no grace that does not come to us through Mary.
ST. ALBERT THE GREAT (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.”
ST. BONAVENTURE (a Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation.”
ST. IGNATIUS OF ANTIOCH (a Father of the Church), a martyr of the second century, writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.”
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (a Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.”
ST. ANSELM (a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost.”
ST. ANTONINE is of the same opinion. He says: “As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified.”
ST. JOHN DAMASCENE (a Doctor of the Church) says: “To be devout to you, O holy Virgin, is an arm of salvation which God gives to those whom He wishes to save.”
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (a Doctor of the Church), in his book, The Glories of Mary, says: “The intercession of Mary is even necessary to salvation. We say ‘necessary’, not absolutely, but morally. This necessity proceeds from the will itself of God, that all graces that He dispenses should pass by the hands of Mary, according to the opinion of St. Bernard.”
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT adds: “Devotion to our Blessed Lady is necessary to salvation, and that it is an infallible mark of reprobation to have no esteem and love for the holy Virgin; while on the other hand, it is an infallible mark of predestination to be entirely and truly devoted to her.”
ST. BERNARDINE OF SIENNA addresses these words to the Blessed Virgin Mary: “O Lady, thou art the dispenser of all graces, and since the grace of salvation can only come through thy hands, our salvation depends on thee!”
How grieved must Our Lady be to see those souls so dear to her, for whom she has done so much in life―now condemned, through their own carelessness and misuse of the gifts and graces bestowed on them, to a period of exile more or less long in Purgatory (or worse still, in Hell), during which they will have to face a much rougher and tougher penance than would have sufficed to satisfy for their sins had they only had a more true and abiding sorrow for sin, and more desire and courage in mortifying themselves while still living on Earth!
How many times has Our Lady begged for more prayers, more penance, more sacrifices? What more is she supposed to do? Is she supposed to say our prayers for us? Do our penance for us? Make sacrifices for us? Very few people are listening to her―and the few who do listen, very few of those respond with sufficient prayers, penances and sacrifices. As Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello in the 1955: “I ask for prayers, penance and sacrifice! … Men, in spite of repeated warnings, are not listening to my voice!” To which Sister Lucia of Fatima adds in 1957: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! It will be very sad for everyone, and far from a happy thing if the world does not pray and do penance before then!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
No Room for Armchair or Couch-Potato Devotees
Devotion to Our Lady is not a “one-way-street” where Our Lady shows devotion towards us and we simply sit on the sofa and lap it all up! Devotion is meant to “two-way-traffic” because love is reciprocal―which means it is all about “give-and-take” and not just “take and give nothing back”! At LA SALETTE, in 1846, Our Lady stated that she was “giving it her all” but she was getting little or nothing in return from us: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, then I will be forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
At FATIMA, in 1917, Our Lady basically says: “Get up and get devoted! Get off the sofa and do something! Pray and make sacrifices! Practice a devotion to my Immaculate Heart!” ― though she did not quite use those exact words. What she did say was: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you! If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners! for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
At AKITA, in 1973, once again Our Lady calls for us to get off our backsides and do something: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... The Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. With my Son I have intervened so many times to appease the wrath of the Father ... I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. I wish, with my Son, for souls … beloved souls who console Him by forming a cohort of victim souls ... who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this! Pray in reparation! … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much—very much! … Pray with fervor! … I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
OUR LADY warns us against lethargy, indifference and spiritual negligence that leads many souls to Hell: “Fear the danger of not attending to the divine calls, for that is the cause of the loss of innumerable souls ... Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. This dreadful carelessness arises from two causes: on the one hand men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. Anything that is interior seems harmless in their estimation. On the other hand, since the princes of darkness are invisible and unperceived by any of the senses and since carnal men neither touch, nor feel, nor see them―the result is that they forget the fear of them. Yet for this very reason they ought to be more attentive and careful, since invisible enemies are more cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day!” (Words of Our Lady to Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from Thy Mystical City of God).
Article 20
Friday & Saturday May 3rd & 4th
Let Mary Make You a Saint!
Friday & Saturday May 3rd & 4th
Let Mary Make You a Saint!
Why Are There So Few Saints?
The world needs saints! Yet there are fewer and fewer saints as time goes on! What on earth can we do? Well―for one―we could read the Preface of FR. FREDERICK FABER (1814-1863) to his own personal translation from the French into English of St. Louis de Montfort’s book, True Devotion to Mary, wherein he writes the following:
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary by St. Louis de Montfort], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns―and almost wonders while he mourns―that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry, which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses, which feel almost incompatible with his salvation―and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady―but, remember, nothing short of an immense one! Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It is frightened out of its wits by the sneers of heresy! It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary―that Protestants may feel at ease about her! Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be! It has no Faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls, which might be saints, wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized.
“Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow, which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin, that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines! Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother. I cannot think of a higher work, or a broader vocation, for anyone―than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable [St. Louis-Marie] Grignion de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ! Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!” (Fr. Frederick Faber).
ST. FRANCIS DE SALES, in his book Introduction to the Devout Life, speaks of various kinds of imaginary holiness (devotion) and then paints a true picture of holiness (devotion): “Each person represents devotion according to his own liking and imagination. He who is in the habit of fasting will think that because he fasts he is very devout―even though his heart is filled with hatred. He will not take a sip of wine, or even of water, anxious about sobriety―but he has no scruples to sip the blood of his neighbor by speaking ill or by making false statements. Another considers himself devout because of the very great number of prayers he recites every day―even though soon after this he speaks words that are annoying, full of pride and hurtful to those in his house and to his neighbors. Another very gladly opens his purse to give alms to the poor―but cannot take any gentleness from his heart to forgive his enemies. Yet another will forgive his enemies―but will not pay what he owes, unless he is legally forced to do so. All such persons are generally looked upon as devout whereas in fact they are not. In the Old Testament, when Saul’s soldiers came looking for David in his house, Michal placed a statue on a bed and covered it with David’s clothes and so made them believe that it was David himself asleep due to illness (1 Kings 19:11-16). In the same way, many people cover themselves with various external actions related to holy devotion. The world takes them for people who are truly devout and spiritual, whereas in reality they are nothing more than statues and illusions of devotion.
“Devotion that is true and living, presupposes the love of God―rather, it is nothing else than a true love of God. It is not, however, love as such. In so far as divine love enriches us―it is called grace, which makes us pleasing to God. In so far as it gives us the strength to do good―it is called charity. But when it grows to such a degree of perfection that it makes us not only to do good, but rather moves us to do it carefully, frequently and promptly―it is called devotion. Ostriches never fly; hens fly only awkwardly, quite low and rarely; but eagles, doves and swallows fly often, swiftly and very high. In the same way, sinners do not fly towards God―but rather all their movements are on the Earth and for the things of the Earth. People who are good―but have not yet progressed to devotion, fly towards God by their good deeds―but rarely, slowly and with difficulty. Persons who are devout fly to God frequently, promptly and freely. In short, devotion is nothing else than a spiritual agility and liveliness, by means of which charity realizes its actions in us, or we do so by charity, promptly and lovingly. Just as it is the work of charity to make us keep all the commandments of God in general and without any exception, so it is the work of devotion to make us do so promptly and earnestly. Therefore, whoever does not keep all of God’s commandments cannot be considered either good or devout, because to be good one must have charity. To be devout one must, not only have charity, but a great liveliness and promptness in doing charitable actions.” (St. Francis de Sales, in his book Introduction to the Devout Life, Chapter 1).
Called to Holiness and Sanctity
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, in The Three Ages of the Interior Life, speaks of the foolishness of some who think that they do not have to become saints in order to enter Heaven: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.”
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, in his booklet The Secret of Mary, tells us that our vocation is to be holy, to become saints: “Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next (Matthew 5:48). It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say “not in the same measure,” because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles. To find the grace of God, we must discover Mary.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, then develops this necessity of Mary for grace and sanctity in his book True Devotion to Mary, where he speaks of Our Lady as being the producer of saints and the mold of sanctity:
“Mary is the excellent masterpiece of the Most High! … She is the magnificence of the Most High where there are beauties and treasures unspeakable! … Her humility was so profound that she had no inclination on Earth, more powerful or more constant, than that of hiding herself, from herself, as well as from every other creature, so as to be known to God only … The whole Earth is full of her glory! … The very devils in Hell respect her while they fear her!
“God the Father made an assemblage of all His graces―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich. She has reached a point of grace immense and inconceivable—in such a way that the Most High has made her the sole treasurer of His treasures and the sole dispenser of His graces―to ennoble, to exalt and to enrich whom she wishes; to give entry to whom she wills into the narrow way of Heaven; to bring whom she wills, and in spite of all obstacles, through the narrow gate of life; and to give the throne, the scepter and the crown of king to whom she wills. The greatest saints, the souls richest in graces and virtues, shall be the most assiduous in praying to our Blessed Lady.
“God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly. God the Son wishes to form Himself, and, so to speak, to incarnate Himself in His members every day, by His dear Mother. If Jesus Christ, the Head of men, is born in her, then the predestinate, who are the members of that Head, ought also to be born in her by a necessary consequence. One and the same mother does not bring forth into the world the head without the members, or the members without the head―for this would be a monster of nature. So in like manner, in the order of grace, the Head and the members are born of one and the same Mother; and if a member of the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ—that is to say, one of the predestinate—were born of any other mother than Mary, who has produced the Head, he would not be one of the predestinate, nor a member of Jesus Christ, but simply a monster in the order of grace. St. Augustine―surpassing himself, and going beyond all I have yet said―affirms that all the predestinate, in order to be conformed to the image of the Son of God, are in this world hidden in the womb of the most holy Virgin, where they are guarded, nourished, brought up and made to grow by that good Mother, until she has brought them forth to glory after death, which is properly the day of their birth
“God the Holy Ghost is become fruitful by Mary, whom He has espoused. It was with her, in her, and of her that He produced His Masterpiece―which is God made Man―and that He goes on producing daily, to the end of the world, the predestinate and the members of the Body of that adorable Head. God the Holy Ghost wishes to form the elect for Himself in her and by her. This is the reason why He, the Holy Ghost, the more He finds Mary, His dear and inseparable spouse, in any soul, the more active and mighty He becomes in producing Jesus Christ in that soul, and that soul in Jesus Christ. The Holy Ghost chose to make use of our Blessed Lady―though He had no absolute need of her―to bring His fruitfulness into action, by producing, in her and by her, Jesus Christ and His members. To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, Who has willed that we should have everything through Mary.
“In the Heavens, Mary commands the angels and the blessed. As a recompense for her profound humility, God has empowered her and commissioned her to fill with saints the empty thrones, from which the apostate angels fell by pride. God has made Mary the general of His armies, treasurer of His treasures, dispenser of His graces, worker of His greatest marvels, restorer of the human race, Mediatrix of men, the exterminator of the enemies of God.
“When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce, because she alone is the fruitful Virgin who never has had, and never will have, her equal in purity and in fruitfulness. Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be—a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints who shall come at the end of the world are reserved for her. For it is only that singular and miraculous Virgin who can produce, in union with the Holy Ghost, singular and extraordinary things. When the Holy Ghost, her Spouse, has found Mary in a soul, He flies there. He enters there in His fullness; He communicates Himself to that soul abundantly. One of the greatest reasons why the Holy Ghost does not now do startling wonders in our souls, is because He does not find there a sufficiently great union with His faithful and inseparable spouse, Mary.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
True and False Holiness
DOM HUBERT VAN ZELLER, OSB (1905-1984), in his book Holiness―A Guide For Beginners (published 1963), gives us a down-to-earth notion of what holiness is not and what it should be. He writes: “If personal holiness is thought of as being a name at the top of a list, it is understood wrong. If it is thought of as something that merits a feast in the Church’s calendar, it is understood wrong. It is for God’s sake, more than for our own sake, that we should want to be saints. We work away at holiness, not because we are ambitious and want to be experts in a particular kind of lofty career, but because God wants us to be saints and is praised by our striving after sanctity. Anyone can be holy, or rather act holy, so long as others are saying: “There’s a saint for you!” but sooner or later this sort of holiness wears off. Either the person sees the trap, becomes humble, and goes ahead toward real holiness, or keeping up the act becomes too much of a strain and there’s a swing toward worldliness and perhaps to a lasting unholiness. The whole secret of sanctity is that it is a thing of grace, and so cannot be switched on as a part to be played.
“This means that however determined you are to be a saint, you will not become one if you rely on your own strength of mind. The only thing that can get you to sanctity is God’s grace. You will need all the strength of mind you have just to work together with God’s grace, but if you imagine that making good, strong resolutions will carry you the whole way, you are wrong. About the first thing to happen will be that God lets you break some of those good, strong resolutions before you get properly started. This will be to put you in your place, and show you that you can do nothing without Him. Once you are decently humbled, knowing that left to yourself you cannot even carry out the things that you very much want to carry out, you are getting ready to be used by God with the plan God has in mind for you.
“It stands to reason. God is not going to reward anyone else’s work but His own. You cannot expect Him to recognize a holiness that He has done nothing to bring about. When you get right down to it, there is only one real goodness, one perfection, one sanctity, and that is God’s. When man invents a holiness of his own, God lets him look for it but does not help him find it, because a holiness of one’s own does not exist, and it is a waste of time searching for it. What is it that the saints do that makes them into saints? The answer is that they do two things: on the one side they keep clear of anything that they think is going to get in the way of grace, and on the other they head directly for Our Lord.
“One great lesson you should learn from this is that sanctity is not a matter of reaching a particular milestone on the road to God. It is not a case of being an ordinary person until you come to the milestone, and a saint when you have gone beyond that milestone. It is a case of using your powers as perfectly as you can. There is no fixed milestone. The only thing that is fixed is the destination — God.” (Dom Humber van Zeller, OSB, Holiness―A Guide For Beginners, chapter 1).
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, also speaks of this need to head for Jesus―but he adds that we should head for Jesus with Mary: “Jesus Christ our Savior, ought to be the last end of all our other devotions, else they are false and delusive. There has been no other name given under Heaven, except the Name of Jesus, by which we can be saved. God has laid no other foundation of our salvation than Jesus Christ. Every building which is not built on that firm rock is founded upon the moving sand, and sooner or later infallibly will fall. Every one who is not united to Him as a branch to the vine, shall fall, shall wither, and shall be fit only to be cast into the fire. Outside of Him there exists nothing but error, falsehood, iniquity, futility, death and damnation. If, then, we establish solid devotion to our Blessed Lady, it is only to establish more perfectly devotion to Jesus Christ, and to provide an easy and secure means for finding Jesus Christ. If devotion to Our Lady removed us from Jesus Christ, we should have to reject it as an illusion of the devil―but, far from this being the case, devotion to Our Lady is, on the contrary, necessary for us as a means of finding Jesus Christ perfectly, loving Him and serving Him faithfully.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
St. Louis then goes on to warn us against a false holiness which is based upon a false devotion to Mary―listing seven chief false ways: “I find seven kinds of false devotees and false devotions to Our Lady, namely: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the self-interested devotees.”
(1) Critical Devotees: “The critical devotees are, for the most part, proud scholars, rash and self-sufficient spirits, who have at heart some devotion to the holy Virgin, but who criticize nearly all the practices of devotion which simple people pay simply and holily to their good Mother, because these practices do not fall in with their own humor and fancy. They call in doubt all the miracles and pious stories recorded by authors worthy of Faith, which testify to us the mercies and the power of the most holy Virgin. They cannot see, without uneasiness, simple and humble people on their knees before an altar or an image of Our Lady. They say that, for their part, they are not fond of these external devotions, and that they are not so gullible as to believe so many tales and stories that are told about Our Lady. These kinds of false devotees and of proud and worldly people are greatly to be feared. They do an infinite wrong to devotion to Our Lady; and they are but too successful in alienating people from it, under the pretext of destroying its abuses.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(2) Scrupulous Devotees: “The scrupulous devotees are those who fear to dishonor the Son by honoring the Mother, to abase the one in elevating the other. They cannot bear that we should attribute to Our Lady the most just praise which the holy Fathers have given her. It is all they can do to endure that there should be more people before the altar of the Blessed Virgin than before the Blessed Sacrament—as if the one were contrary to the other, as if those who prayed to our Blessed Lady did not pray to Jesus Christ through her. They are unwilling that we should speak so often of Our Lady and address her so frequently.
“Here are some of their favorite sayings: ‘Why so many Rosaries, so many confraternities and so many external devotions to the Blessed Virgin? There is much ignorance in all this. It makes a mummery of our religion. Speak to us of those who are devout to Jesus Christ. We must have recourse to Jesus Christ―He is our only Mediator. We must preach Jesus Christ―this is the solid devotion.’ What they say is in a certain sense true, but in the application they make of it, namely, to hinder devotion to our Blessed Lady, very dangerous; and it is, under pretext of a greater good, a subtle snare of the evil one. For the more we honor the Blessed Virgin, the more we honor Jesus Christ―because we honor Mary only that we may the more perfectly honor Jesus, since we go to her only as the way by which we are to find the end we are seeking, which is Jesus.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(3) External Devotees: “External devotees are persons who make all devotion to our Blessed Lady consist in outward practices. They only have a taste for the exterior elements of this devotion, because they have no interior spirit of their own. They will say quantities of Rosaries with the greatest speed; they will hear many Masses distractedly; they will go, without devotion, to processions; they will enroll themselves in all her confraternities—without amending their lives, without doing any violence to their passions, or without imitating the virtues of that most holy Virgin. If they get no sensible sweetness out of their external practices, they think they are doing nothing; they get all out of joint, throw everything up, or do everything at random. The world is full of these exterior devotees.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(4) Presumptuous Devotees: “Presumptuous devotees are sinners abandoned to their passions, or lovers of the world, who under the fair name of Christians and clients of our Blessed Lady conceal pride, avarice, impurity, drunkenness, anger, swearing, detraction, injustice or some other sin. They sleep in peace in the midst of their bad habits, without doing any violence to themselves to correct their faults, under the pretext that they are devout to the Blessed Virgin. They promise themselves that God will pardon them; that they will not be allowed to die without confession; and that they will not be lost eternally because they say the Rosary, because they fast on Saturdays, because they belong to the Confraternity of the Holy Rosary, or wear the Scapular, or are enrolled in other congregations, or they wear the little habit or little chain of Our Lady.
“They will not believe us when we tell them that their devotion is only an illusion of the devil and a pernicious presumption likely to destroy their souls. They say that God is good and merciful; that He has not made us to condemn us everlastingly; that no man is without sin; that they shall not die without confession; that one good act of contrition at the hour of death is enough; that they are devout to Our Lady, wear the Scapular, sometimes say the Rosary, or the Office of Our Lady, besides fasting and other things. To give authority to all this, they quote certain stories which they have heard or read—it does not matter to them whether they be true or false—relating how people have died in mortal sin without confession, and then, because in their lifetime they sometimes said some prayers, or went through some practices of devotion to Our Lady, how they have been raised to life again in order to go to confession; or their soul has been miraculously retained in their bodies till confession; or they have obtained from God, at the moment of death, contrition and pardon of their sins, and so have been saved; and that they themselves expect similar favors. Nothing in Christianity is more detestable than this diabolical presumption.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(5) Inconstant Devotees: “The inconstant devotees are those who are devout to our Blessed Lady by fits and starts. Sometimes they are fervent and sometimes lukewarm. Sometimes they seem ready to do anything for her, and then a little afterward, they are not like the same people. They begin by taking up all the devotions to her, and enrolling themselves in the confraternities; and then they do not practice the rules with fidelity. They change like the moon; and Mary puts them under her feet with the moon crescent, because they are changeable and unworthy to be reckoned among the servants of that faithful Virgin who have for their special graces fidelity and constancy. It were better for such persons not to burden themselves with so many prayers and practices, but to choose a few and fulfill them with faithfulness and love.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(6) Hypocritical Devotees: “We have still to mention the false devotees to our Blessed Lady who are the hypocritical devotees, who cloak their sins and sinful habits with her mantle, in order to be taken by men for what they are not.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(7) Self-Interested Devotees: “There are also the interested devotees, who have recourse to Our Lady only to gain some lawsuit, or to avoid some danger, or to be cured of some illness, or for some other similar necessity, without which they would forget her altogether. All these are false devotees, pleasing neither to God nor to His holy Mother.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
St. Louis then goes on to describe what a true devotion to Mary (and consequently a true holiness) should be. He states that it should be (1) interior and not just exterior; (2) confident at all times; (3) holy by doing things that lead to holiness; (4) constant and not forever changing; (5) disinterested and not self-interested.
Do You Want Sculpted Sanctity or Molded Sanctity
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, in another of his books, The Secret of Mary, speaks of two methods of attaining holiness and sanctity―one is what we call a “sculpted sanctity” and the other is a “molded sanctity.” He explains it thus: “Mary is called by St. Augustine, the “living mold of God” ― and indeed she is. In her alone the God-man was formed in His human nature without losing any feature of the Godhead. In her alone, by the grace of Jesus Christ, man is made godlike as far as human nature is capable of it. A sculptor can make a statue or a life-like model in two ways:
(1) By using his skill, strength, experience and good tools to produce a statue out of hard, shapeless matter;
(2) By making a cast of it in a mold. The first way is long and involved and open to all sorts of accidents. It only needs a faulty stroke of the chisel or hammer to ruin the whole work.
“The second method is quick, easy, straightforward, almost effortless and inexpensive, but the mold must be perfect and true to life and the material must be easy to handle and offer no resistance.
“Mary is the great mold of God, fashioned by the Holy Ghost to give human nature to a Man [Jesus] Who is God, and to fashion, through grace, men who are like to God. No godly feature is missing from this mold. Everyone who casts himself into it and allows himself to be molded, will acquire every feature of Jesus Christ, true God, with little pain or effort, as befits his weak human condition. He will take on a faithful likeness to Jesus with no possibility of distortion, for the devil has never had and never will have any access to Mary, the holy and immaculate Virgin, in whom there is not the least suspicion of a stain of sin.
“What a difference there is between a soul brought up in the ordinary way to resemble Jesus Christ by people who, like sculptors, rely on their own skill and industry, and a soul thoroughly easy to control, entirely detached, most ready to be molded in her by the working of the Holy Ghost. What blemishes and defects, what shadows and distortions, what natural and human imperfections are found in the first sculpted soul, and what a faithful and divine likeness to the first soul, and what a faithful and divine likeness to Jesus is found in the second molded soul!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
The world needs saints! Yet there are fewer and fewer saints as time goes on! What on earth can we do? Well―for one―we could read the Preface of FR. FREDERICK FABER (1814-1863) to his own personal translation from the French into English of St. Louis de Montfort’s book, True Devotion to Mary, wherein he writes the following:
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary by St. Louis de Montfort], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns―and almost wonders while he mourns―that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry, which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses, which feel almost incompatible with his salvation―and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady―but, remember, nothing short of an immense one! Mary is not half enough preached! Devotion to her is low and thin and poor! It is frightened out of its wits by the sneers of heresy! It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary―that Protestants may feel at ease about her! Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy! It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be! It has no Faith in itself! Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls, which might be saints, wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized.
“Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background! Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them! It is the miserable, unworthy shadow, which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin, that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines! Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother. I cannot think of a higher work, or a broader vocation, for anyone―than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable [St. Louis-Marie] Grignion de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ! Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!” (Fr. Frederick Faber).
ST. FRANCIS DE SALES, in his book Introduction to the Devout Life, speaks of various kinds of imaginary holiness (devotion) and then paints a true picture of holiness (devotion): “Each person represents devotion according to his own liking and imagination. He who is in the habit of fasting will think that because he fasts he is very devout―even though his heart is filled with hatred. He will not take a sip of wine, or even of water, anxious about sobriety―but he has no scruples to sip the blood of his neighbor by speaking ill or by making false statements. Another considers himself devout because of the very great number of prayers he recites every day―even though soon after this he speaks words that are annoying, full of pride and hurtful to those in his house and to his neighbors. Another very gladly opens his purse to give alms to the poor―but cannot take any gentleness from his heart to forgive his enemies. Yet another will forgive his enemies―but will not pay what he owes, unless he is legally forced to do so. All such persons are generally looked upon as devout whereas in fact they are not. In the Old Testament, when Saul’s soldiers came looking for David in his house, Michal placed a statue on a bed and covered it with David’s clothes and so made them believe that it was David himself asleep due to illness (1 Kings 19:11-16). In the same way, many people cover themselves with various external actions related to holy devotion. The world takes them for people who are truly devout and spiritual, whereas in reality they are nothing more than statues and illusions of devotion.
“Devotion that is true and living, presupposes the love of God―rather, it is nothing else than a true love of God. It is not, however, love as such. In so far as divine love enriches us―it is called grace, which makes us pleasing to God. In so far as it gives us the strength to do good―it is called charity. But when it grows to such a degree of perfection that it makes us not only to do good, but rather moves us to do it carefully, frequently and promptly―it is called devotion. Ostriches never fly; hens fly only awkwardly, quite low and rarely; but eagles, doves and swallows fly often, swiftly and very high. In the same way, sinners do not fly towards God―but rather all their movements are on the Earth and for the things of the Earth. People who are good―but have not yet progressed to devotion, fly towards God by their good deeds―but rarely, slowly and with difficulty. Persons who are devout fly to God frequently, promptly and freely. In short, devotion is nothing else than a spiritual agility and liveliness, by means of which charity realizes its actions in us, or we do so by charity, promptly and lovingly. Just as it is the work of charity to make us keep all the commandments of God in general and without any exception, so it is the work of devotion to make us do so promptly and earnestly. Therefore, whoever does not keep all of God’s commandments cannot be considered either good or devout, because to be good one must have charity. To be devout one must, not only have charity, but a great liveliness and promptness in doing charitable actions.” (St. Francis de Sales, in his book Introduction to the Devout Life, Chapter 1).
Called to Holiness and Sanctity
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, in The Three Ages of the Interior Life, speaks of the foolishness of some who think that they do not have to become saints in order to enter Heaven: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.”
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, in his booklet The Secret of Mary, tells us that our vocation is to be holy, to become saints: “Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next (Matthew 5:48). It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say “not in the same measure,” because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles. To find the grace of God, we must discover Mary.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, then develops this necessity of Mary for grace and sanctity in his book True Devotion to Mary, where he speaks of Our Lady as being the producer of saints and the mold of sanctity:
“Mary is the excellent masterpiece of the Most High! … She is the magnificence of the Most High where there are beauties and treasures unspeakable! … Her humility was so profound that she had no inclination on Earth, more powerful or more constant, than that of hiding herself, from herself, as well as from every other creature, so as to be known to God only … The whole Earth is full of her glory! … The very devils in Hell respect her while they fear her!
“God the Father made an assemblage of all His graces―and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich. She has reached a point of grace immense and inconceivable—in such a way that the Most High has made her the sole treasurer of His treasures and the sole dispenser of His graces―to ennoble, to exalt and to enrich whom she wishes; to give entry to whom she wills into the narrow way of Heaven; to bring whom she wills, and in spite of all obstacles, through the narrow gate of life; and to give the throne, the scepter and the crown of king to whom she wills. The greatest saints, the souls richest in graces and virtues, shall be the most assiduous in praying to our Blessed Lady.
“God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired―by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues―and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly. God the Son wishes to form Himself, and, so to speak, to incarnate Himself in His members every day, by His dear Mother. If Jesus Christ, the Head of men, is born in her, then the predestinate, who are the members of that Head, ought also to be born in her by a necessary consequence. One and the same mother does not bring forth into the world the head without the members, or the members without the head―for this would be a monster of nature. So in like manner, in the order of grace, the Head and the members are born of one and the same Mother; and if a member of the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ—that is to say, one of the predestinate—were born of any other mother than Mary, who has produced the Head, he would not be one of the predestinate, nor a member of Jesus Christ, but simply a monster in the order of grace. St. Augustine―surpassing himself, and going beyond all I have yet said―affirms that all the predestinate, in order to be conformed to the image of the Son of God, are in this world hidden in the womb of the most holy Virgin, where they are guarded, nourished, brought up and made to grow by that good Mother, until she has brought them forth to glory after death, which is properly the day of their birth
“God the Holy Ghost is become fruitful by Mary, whom He has espoused. It was with her, in her, and of her that He produced His Masterpiece―which is God made Man―and that He goes on producing daily, to the end of the world, the predestinate and the members of the Body of that adorable Head. God the Holy Ghost wishes to form the elect for Himself in her and by her. This is the reason why He, the Holy Ghost, the more He finds Mary, His dear and inseparable spouse, in any soul, the more active and mighty He becomes in producing Jesus Christ in that soul, and that soul in Jesus Christ. The Holy Ghost chose to make use of our Blessed Lady―though He had no absolute need of her―to bring His fruitfulness into action, by producing, in her and by her, Jesus Christ and His members. To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such a way that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men, which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, Who has willed that we should have everything through Mary.
“In the Heavens, Mary commands the angels and the blessed. As a recompense for her profound humility, God has empowered her and commissioned her to fill with saints the empty thrones, from which the apostate angels fell by pride. God has made Mary the general of His armies, treasurer of His treasures, dispenser of His graces, worker of His greatest marvels, restorer of the human race, Mediatrix of men, the exterminator of the enemies of God.
“When Mary has struck her roots in a soul, she produces there marvels of grace, which she alone can produce, because she alone is the fruitful Virgin who never has had, and never will have, her equal in purity and in fruitfulness. Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be—a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints who shall come at the end of the world are reserved for her. For it is only that singular and miraculous Virgin who can produce, in union with the Holy Ghost, singular and extraordinary things. When the Holy Ghost, her Spouse, has found Mary in a soul, He flies there. He enters there in His fullness; He communicates Himself to that soul abundantly. One of the greatest reasons why the Holy Ghost does not now do startling wonders in our souls, is because He does not find there a sufficiently great union with His faithful and inseparable spouse, Mary.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
True and False Holiness
DOM HUBERT VAN ZELLER, OSB (1905-1984), in his book Holiness―A Guide For Beginners (published 1963), gives us a down-to-earth notion of what holiness is not and what it should be. He writes: “If personal holiness is thought of as being a name at the top of a list, it is understood wrong. If it is thought of as something that merits a feast in the Church’s calendar, it is understood wrong. It is for God’s sake, more than for our own sake, that we should want to be saints. We work away at holiness, not because we are ambitious and want to be experts in a particular kind of lofty career, but because God wants us to be saints and is praised by our striving after sanctity. Anyone can be holy, or rather act holy, so long as others are saying: “There’s a saint for you!” but sooner or later this sort of holiness wears off. Either the person sees the trap, becomes humble, and goes ahead toward real holiness, or keeping up the act becomes too much of a strain and there’s a swing toward worldliness and perhaps to a lasting unholiness. The whole secret of sanctity is that it is a thing of grace, and so cannot be switched on as a part to be played.
“This means that however determined you are to be a saint, you will not become one if you rely on your own strength of mind. The only thing that can get you to sanctity is God’s grace. You will need all the strength of mind you have just to work together with God’s grace, but if you imagine that making good, strong resolutions will carry you the whole way, you are wrong. About the first thing to happen will be that God lets you break some of those good, strong resolutions before you get properly started. This will be to put you in your place, and show you that you can do nothing without Him. Once you are decently humbled, knowing that left to yourself you cannot even carry out the things that you very much want to carry out, you are getting ready to be used by God with the plan God has in mind for you.
“It stands to reason. God is not going to reward anyone else’s work but His own. You cannot expect Him to recognize a holiness that He has done nothing to bring about. When you get right down to it, there is only one real goodness, one perfection, one sanctity, and that is God’s. When man invents a holiness of his own, God lets him look for it but does not help him find it, because a holiness of one’s own does not exist, and it is a waste of time searching for it. What is it that the saints do that makes them into saints? The answer is that they do two things: on the one side they keep clear of anything that they think is going to get in the way of grace, and on the other they head directly for Our Lord.
“One great lesson you should learn from this is that sanctity is not a matter of reaching a particular milestone on the road to God. It is not a case of being an ordinary person until you come to the milestone, and a saint when you have gone beyond that milestone. It is a case of using your powers as perfectly as you can. There is no fixed milestone. The only thing that is fixed is the destination — God.” (Dom Humber van Zeller, OSB, Holiness―A Guide For Beginners, chapter 1).
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, also speaks of this need to head for Jesus―but he adds that we should head for Jesus with Mary: “Jesus Christ our Savior, ought to be the last end of all our other devotions, else they are false and delusive. There has been no other name given under Heaven, except the Name of Jesus, by which we can be saved. God has laid no other foundation of our salvation than Jesus Christ. Every building which is not built on that firm rock is founded upon the moving sand, and sooner or later infallibly will fall. Every one who is not united to Him as a branch to the vine, shall fall, shall wither, and shall be fit only to be cast into the fire. Outside of Him there exists nothing but error, falsehood, iniquity, futility, death and damnation. If, then, we establish solid devotion to our Blessed Lady, it is only to establish more perfectly devotion to Jesus Christ, and to provide an easy and secure means for finding Jesus Christ. If devotion to Our Lady removed us from Jesus Christ, we should have to reject it as an illusion of the devil―but, far from this being the case, devotion to Our Lady is, on the contrary, necessary for us as a means of finding Jesus Christ perfectly, loving Him and serving Him faithfully.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
St. Louis then goes on to warn us against a false holiness which is based upon a false devotion to Mary―listing seven chief false ways: “I find seven kinds of false devotees and false devotions to Our Lady, namely: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the self-interested devotees.”
(1) Critical Devotees: “The critical devotees are, for the most part, proud scholars, rash and self-sufficient spirits, who have at heart some devotion to the holy Virgin, but who criticize nearly all the practices of devotion which simple people pay simply and holily to their good Mother, because these practices do not fall in with their own humor and fancy. They call in doubt all the miracles and pious stories recorded by authors worthy of Faith, which testify to us the mercies and the power of the most holy Virgin. They cannot see, without uneasiness, simple and humble people on their knees before an altar or an image of Our Lady. They say that, for their part, they are not fond of these external devotions, and that they are not so gullible as to believe so many tales and stories that are told about Our Lady. These kinds of false devotees and of proud and worldly people are greatly to be feared. They do an infinite wrong to devotion to Our Lady; and they are but too successful in alienating people from it, under the pretext of destroying its abuses.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(2) Scrupulous Devotees: “The scrupulous devotees are those who fear to dishonor the Son by honoring the Mother, to abase the one in elevating the other. They cannot bear that we should attribute to Our Lady the most just praise which the holy Fathers have given her. It is all they can do to endure that there should be more people before the altar of the Blessed Virgin than before the Blessed Sacrament—as if the one were contrary to the other, as if those who prayed to our Blessed Lady did not pray to Jesus Christ through her. They are unwilling that we should speak so often of Our Lady and address her so frequently.
“Here are some of their favorite sayings: ‘Why so many Rosaries, so many confraternities and so many external devotions to the Blessed Virgin? There is much ignorance in all this. It makes a mummery of our religion. Speak to us of those who are devout to Jesus Christ. We must have recourse to Jesus Christ―He is our only Mediator. We must preach Jesus Christ―this is the solid devotion.’ What they say is in a certain sense true, but in the application they make of it, namely, to hinder devotion to our Blessed Lady, very dangerous; and it is, under pretext of a greater good, a subtle snare of the evil one. For the more we honor the Blessed Virgin, the more we honor Jesus Christ―because we honor Mary only that we may the more perfectly honor Jesus, since we go to her only as the way by which we are to find the end we are seeking, which is Jesus.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(3) External Devotees: “External devotees are persons who make all devotion to our Blessed Lady consist in outward practices. They only have a taste for the exterior elements of this devotion, because they have no interior spirit of their own. They will say quantities of Rosaries with the greatest speed; they will hear many Masses distractedly; they will go, without devotion, to processions; they will enroll themselves in all her confraternities—without amending their lives, without doing any violence to their passions, or without imitating the virtues of that most holy Virgin. If they get no sensible sweetness out of their external practices, they think they are doing nothing; they get all out of joint, throw everything up, or do everything at random. The world is full of these exterior devotees.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(4) Presumptuous Devotees: “Presumptuous devotees are sinners abandoned to their passions, or lovers of the world, who under the fair name of Christians and clients of our Blessed Lady conceal pride, avarice, impurity, drunkenness, anger, swearing, detraction, injustice or some other sin. They sleep in peace in the midst of their bad habits, without doing any violence to themselves to correct their faults, under the pretext that they are devout to the Blessed Virgin. They promise themselves that God will pardon them; that they will not be allowed to die without confession; and that they will not be lost eternally because they say the Rosary, because they fast on Saturdays, because they belong to the Confraternity of the Holy Rosary, or wear the Scapular, or are enrolled in other congregations, or they wear the little habit or little chain of Our Lady.
“They will not believe us when we tell them that their devotion is only an illusion of the devil and a pernicious presumption likely to destroy their souls. They say that God is good and merciful; that He has not made us to condemn us everlastingly; that no man is without sin; that they shall not die without confession; that one good act of contrition at the hour of death is enough; that they are devout to Our Lady, wear the Scapular, sometimes say the Rosary, or the Office of Our Lady, besides fasting and other things. To give authority to all this, they quote certain stories which they have heard or read—it does not matter to them whether they be true or false—relating how people have died in mortal sin without confession, and then, because in their lifetime they sometimes said some prayers, or went through some practices of devotion to Our Lady, how they have been raised to life again in order to go to confession; or their soul has been miraculously retained in their bodies till confession; or they have obtained from God, at the moment of death, contrition and pardon of their sins, and so have been saved; and that they themselves expect similar favors. Nothing in Christianity is more detestable than this diabolical presumption.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(5) Inconstant Devotees: “The inconstant devotees are those who are devout to our Blessed Lady by fits and starts. Sometimes they are fervent and sometimes lukewarm. Sometimes they seem ready to do anything for her, and then a little afterward, they are not like the same people. They begin by taking up all the devotions to her, and enrolling themselves in the confraternities; and then they do not practice the rules with fidelity. They change like the moon; and Mary puts them under her feet with the moon crescent, because they are changeable and unworthy to be reckoned among the servants of that faithful Virgin who have for their special graces fidelity and constancy. It were better for such persons not to burden themselves with so many prayers and practices, but to choose a few and fulfill them with faithfulness and love.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(6) Hypocritical Devotees: “We have still to mention the false devotees to our Blessed Lady who are the hypocritical devotees, who cloak their sins and sinful habits with her mantle, in order to be taken by men for what they are not.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
(7) Self-Interested Devotees: “There are also the interested devotees, who have recourse to Our Lady only to gain some lawsuit, or to avoid some danger, or to be cured of some illness, or for some other similar necessity, without which they would forget her altogether. All these are false devotees, pleasing neither to God nor to His holy Mother.” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
St. Louis then goes on to describe what a true devotion to Mary (and consequently a true holiness) should be. He states that it should be (1) interior and not just exterior; (2) confident at all times; (3) holy by doing things that lead to holiness; (4) constant and not forever changing; (5) disinterested and not self-interested.
Do You Want Sculpted Sanctity or Molded Sanctity
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT, in another of his books, The Secret of Mary, speaks of two methods of attaining holiness and sanctity―one is what we call a “sculpted sanctity” and the other is a “molded sanctity.” He explains it thus: “Mary is called by St. Augustine, the “living mold of God” ― and indeed she is. In her alone the God-man was formed in His human nature without losing any feature of the Godhead. In her alone, by the grace of Jesus Christ, man is made godlike as far as human nature is capable of it. A sculptor can make a statue or a life-like model in two ways:
(1) By using his skill, strength, experience and good tools to produce a statue out of hard, shapeless matter;
(2) By making a cast of it in a mold. The first way is long and involved and open to all sorts of accidents. It only needs a faulty stroke of the chisel or hammer to ruin the whole work.
“The second method is quick, easy, straightforward, almost effortless and inexpensive, but the mold must be perfect and true to life and the material must be easy to handle and offer no resistance.
“Mary is the great mold of God, fashioned by the Holy Ghost to give human nature to a Man [Jesus] Who is God, and to fashion, through grace, men who are like to God. No godly feature is missing from this mold. Everyone who casts himself into it and allows himself to be molded, will acquire every feature of Jesus Christ, true God, with little pain or effort, as befits his weak human condition. He will take on a faithful likeness to Jesus with no possibility of distortion, for the devil has never had and never will have any access to Mary, the holy and immaculate Virgin, in whom there is not the least suspicion of a stain of sin.
“What a difference there is between a soul brought up in the ordinary way to resemble Jesus Christ by people who, like sculptors, rely on their own skill and industry, and a soul thoroughly easy to control, entirely detached, most ready to be molded in her by the working of the Holy Ghost. What blemishes and defects, what shadows and distortions, what natural and human imperfections are found in the first sculpted soul, and what a faithful and divine likeness to the first soul, and what a faithful and divine likeness to Jesus is found in the second molded soul!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Article 19
Wednesday & Thursday May 1st & 2nd
Reaching the Pinnacle of Perfection and Unity
Article 5: The Third of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life: The Way of the Perfect, or the The Unitive Way
Wednesday & Thursday May 1st & 2nd
Reaching the Pinnacle of Perfection and Unity
Article 5: The Third of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life: The Way of the Perfect, or the The Unitive Way
Flying at High Altitude
Ever tried teaching algebra to a 5-year old? The mind and mentality of an adult is far more elevated than the mind of a 5-year old. He is preoccupied with questions which the 5-year old cannot grasp. The adult understands the child―having already passed through the childhood stage―but the child does not fully understand the adult; conversation between them on certain subjects, except of a very simple superficial kind, is impossible.
Why bother writing about the elevated, high-flying, pinnacle of the spiritual life―the mystical union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Perfection, or the Unitive Way), when almost everything will be over the heads and minds of the readers? As FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, in his Three Ages of the Interior Life, writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories―of beginners, proficients or perfect―but rather to that of stunted souls!” Of such a soul, in the spiritual domain, it is said: “He will be a child for the whole of his life.”
Another major obstacle to navigating the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is lukewarmness, of which of FR. FREDERICK FABER writes: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind.” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, Ch. 25). Most people will not attain the perfection of divine union (the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Unitive Way or the Way of the Perfect) until after death and after the purifying fires of Purgatory.
Nevertheless, the spiritual masters and theologians tell us that everyone is not only called to be baptized in the Catholic Faith, but everyone is also called leave sin (mortal and venial) behind, and to pass through the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life so as to embrace the mystical state―the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Perfection, the Unitive Way (which mystically united us to God here on Earth).
Most of us usually associate the “mystical state” with seeing visions and hearing voices. Visions and locutions, or voices, may or may not occur in the states of mystical union. They are not an essential part of the mystical state. Visions are imaginary. Likewise, locutions (communications) may be either mentally formed phrases representing thoughts, or impressions produced by divine grace in the soul while in a state of recollection, or they may be formed in the mind by direct supernatural intervention. But visions and locutions are not necessarily a part of mystical experience―and all mystical writers agree in asserting that they are the least important part. The possibility of self-delusion in such matters (in addition to the possibility of diabolical deception) is, of course, almost inexhaustible, and no mystical writer fails to warn his readers against this danger. Mysticism is an awareness of the divine activity of God on the soul. Mysticism is a passive and not an active experience―because only the Holy Spirit can produce this mystical experience in us by the activation of His gifts. Mystics are fully aware that what they are experiencing is not produced by themselves. They did not cause the experience and cannot retain it for a second longer than is desired by the One who produces it.
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS writes: “Why it is that there are so few that attain to this lofty state? It must be known that this is not because God is pleased that there should be only a few raised to this high spiritual state—on the contrary it would please God if all were so raised to this lofty state—but unfortunately He finds few souls in whom He can perform so high and lofty a work. For, when He proves and tests them in small things and finds them weak; and also sees that they quickly flee from labor, and desire not to submit to the least discomfort ... God finds that they are not strong enough to bear the favor which He was granting them when He began to purge them, and so He goes no farther with their purification.”
Most of us won’t progress to union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life (the Unitive Way) while living on this Earth, because we won’t give up our wills to God, but we are nevertheless all called to this level of holiness. Most will not even make it into the Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Illuminative Way, or Way of Proficients) because they are at peace with many or most venial sins and will not fight against them to eradicate them. The bottom line is―whether we understand these things or not; whether we like them or not; whether we choose to embark on the path or not―we will not get into Heaven until we have reached a perfect union with God. That has to take place in this life, or in the painful fires of Purgatory (which St. Thomas Aquinas says are as painful as the fires of Hell, the difference being is that at some time the fires of Purgatory end).
The Three Ways are not an option, but an obligation. They are not that complicated to understand―but there are more entertaining things to learn about for most people and the television, internet, social media, etc. supplies those needs. In most worthwhile professions there are certain aspects of that profession that are difficult to learn and master―but they must be learnt and mastered if you wish to qualify for that profession. The same is true for Heaven―even more so! You might not like it; you might not wish to conform to it; you might rebel against it and stamp your feet and scream out loud in protest against it―but you are not going to admitted into Heaven until you have reached that perfect union with God. If you refuse to do so on Earth―then you will be brought to that perfect union in the fires of Purgatory (at much greater pain and expense)―the only loser is you!
Entrance Requirements to the Third Way of the Spiritual Life
So what does it take to enter this elevated level, the pinnacle of the spiritual life? Just as the Way of Beginners required a conversion from mortal sin; and the Way of the Proficient required a conversion from venial sin―the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of the Perfect, requires a conversion away from any and all imperfections (which are not even venial sins, but cases where the soul knows it could do better). The characteristics of the soul in this Way of Perfection are as follows:
● No more deliberate mortal or venial sin
● Avoidance of all imperfections
● Perpetually living in presence of God
● Perpetual Prayer
● Conformity to God’s Will in Third Degree (the highest degree)
● Total abandonment to God
● Great spirit of Faith
● No self-love
● Thoughts totally centered on Our Lord
● Love of God becomes sole ruling virtue
● Heroic charity of Christ (love of Christ)
● Heroic service of neighbor
● Heroic love of enemies
● Humility practiced in Third Degree (the highest degree)
● Desire to suffer greatly for God
● Unalterable patience
● Detachment from all things, persons, places and events
Unfortunately, the advanced souls who have been making much progress in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of the Proficient or the Illuminative Way―do not have the above listed virtues or characteristics in any high degree. These advanced souls, these souls who are making progress, are still some way from being fit to enter into the Third Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way. Therefore God is obliged to purify them by what is called “The Dark Night of the Soul.”
Why the Soul or Spirit Still Needs to be Purified
Those souls who are making much progress in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way―are still far from being perfect. That is why they are unfit to enter the Third Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way. God, therefore, must purify the defective soul by a Dark Night of the Soul, before admitting it to the Third Way―just as He purified the senses by the Dark Night of the Senses before allowing the soul to pass from the First Way of Beginners into the Second Way of the Proficient. FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE explains this in his book, The Three Ages of the Interior Life:
“The necessity of the passive purification of the spirit is because of the defects which subsist in proficients or the advanced. There are still many defects in proficients, who have made considerable progress, whose souls, in large part, are already purified in the inferior or sensible part of the soul, and who have begun to live the life of the spirit through the initial infused contemplation of the mysteries of Faith. Nevertheless, the stains of the old man still remain in their spirit like rust that will disappear only under the action of a purifying fire.
“These advanced souls are still often subject to indirectly voluntary distractions in prayer; to dullness; to useless dissipation; to excessively human sympathy for certain persons; leading to a lack of esteem for others, which is more or less contrary to justice and charity. They have moments of natural rudeness―the result of the sin of impatience. Some fall into illusion by being too much attached to certain spiritual communications; they expose themselves to the devil, who takes pleasure in deceiving them by false prophecies. Others, under the same influence, fall into bitter zeal, which leads them to sermonize their neighbor and to deliver untimely corrections. Thereby―though unaware of it―these advanced souls are puffed up with spiritual pride and presumption, and thus deviate from the simplicity, humility, and purity required for close union with God.
“But these are only the defects related to the interior life, to relations with God. What would it be if one were to consider the defects that advanced souls still have in their relations with superiors, equals, and inferiors; if one were to consider―in this period of the spiritual life―all that still injures charity and justice; all that―in those who have to teach, govern or direct souls―stains their apostolate, teaching, government, and direction?
“Spiritual or intellectual pride, which still subsists, inspires excessive attachment to personal judgment, to one’s own way of seeing, feeling, sympathizing, willing. From it are born jealousy, secret ambition, or again great authoritarianism, unless one is by temperament inclined to the contrary defect, that is, to excessive indulgence and to weakness toward those who oppress others. Here, too, may often be remarked a lack of promptness and generosity in obedience, or, on the contrary, a servility inspired by self-love. Frequent also are faults against charity through jealousy, envy, slander, discord, contention.
“The root of the higher faculties of intellect and will is still deeply tainted with pride, personal judgment, and self-will. The divine light and the will of God do not yet reign there uncontested; far from it. These stains have, in some cases, been there for a long time; they may become encrusted as they grow old and may profoundly alter the character by turning it away from true intimacy with God. Thence are born many defamations and at times most grievous divisions among those who should work together for the good of souls.
“This is why St. Augustine used to say the prayer, often repeated by St. Louis Bertrand centuries later: “Lord, burn, cut, do not spare on this earth, that Thou mayest spare in eternity!” It is important to be purified on Earth with merit, rather than after death without merit. Nothing soiled enters Heaven―consequently, to enter there, the soul must undergo a profound purification sooner or later. It is evident that the beatific vision of God cannot be granted to a soul that is still impure.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Our Unconscious Pride and Egoism Must Go
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE explains that our secret pride and unconscious egoism is the obstacle to a true union with God. Therefore God has to step in and grind down the remaining obstacle and replace it with true humility and total submission to His Divine Will: “The depths of our will needs to be purified from the often unconscious egoism that has for long subsisted in it, leading us to disturbing and fruitless conversation with ourselves and not to tranquilizing and vivifying conversation with God. This unconscious egoism still inclines us to seek ourselves in everything and at times to judge our neighbor with severity while treating ourselves with great indulgence. This same egoism which makes us seek ourselves in many things is especially evident when trial strikes us; we are then completely upset and seek help, consolation, and counsel from without, where God is not to be found. We have not built our house sufficiently on Christ the rock, with the result that it lacks solidity. We have built on self, on self-will, which is equivalent to building on sand; thus at times there is great weakness underlying harshness of judgment. There is only one way to triumph over these obstacles―that is for God to take complete possession of the interior of the soul and occupy it―which is something that happens only to His true friends.”
“This passive purification will certainly not be without suffering, and, as St. John of the Cross teaches, it will even be a mystical death, the death to self, the disintegration of self-love, which until then has resisted grace, at times with great obstinacy. Here pride must receive the deathblow that it may give place to genuine humility, a virtue which has been compared to the deepest root of a tree, a root which buries itself so much the more deeply in the soil as the loftiest branch, the symbol of charity, rises higher toward the sky.”
“This center of the soul, the refuge of personal judgment and self-love that is often very subtle, must be illumined by the divine light and filled by God, rendered completely healthy, and vivified. From what we have just said it is evident that the passive purification of the spirit, made necessary by the defects of proficients, is the decisive struggle between two spirits: the spirit of pride, which may grow even to blasphemy, to hatred of God, and despair, and that of humility and charity, which is eternal life begun in us.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Removing the Rust and Stains of the Soul
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “The defects and the remains of spiritual or intellectual pride found in proficients or the advanced, require the absolute need of purification for the soul impregnated with self-love and subtle egoism. The Lord alone can effect this profound purification. Just as the passive purification of the sensible part of the soul (in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life) is manifested by the loss of the sensible consolations to which it was excessively attached, likewise the passive purification of the spirit at first consists in the deprivation of the lights previously received regarding the mysteries of Faith. Having become too familiar with them, the soul, forgetting their infinite elevation, considered them and thought of them in a manner somewhat too human. The soul dwelt, for example, a little too much on Christ’s humanity, without living sufficiently by Faith in His divinity; it only grasped the exterior aspects of the great mysteries of Providence, of the Incarnation, of the redemption, of the Mass, and of the life of the Church in the midst of continually recurring trials. The soul had still only a very superficial knowledge of these spiritual realities; its view of these mysteries was like that of a stained-glass window seen from outside the church.
“Then, what occurs? To lift the soul above this excessively inferior and superficial knowledge of divine things, the Lord detaches the soul from this way of thinking and praying, and seems to strip it of its lights, affections and feelings, leaving the understanding in darkness, leaving the will dry, leaving the memory empty, and leaving the affections of the soul in the deepest affliction, bitterness, and distress―withholding from it the former sweetness it had in spiritual things. The soul must now walk in the dark, in pure Faith―which is like walking in a dark night for our natural faculties and powers.
“Does the soul see nothing in this dark night? In the natural world, when the sun has set and completely disappeared, at least some stars are visible, which convey an idea of the depth of the firmament. Hence at night we can see much farther into to heavens than we can during the day! True―the hills or mountains, fifty or a hundred miles away, are no longer visible, but we can see stars and constellations which are thousands of miles from the Earth. When the soul enters the spiritual darkness we are speaking of, it no longer sees what is near it, but it has an increasingly better anticipatory grasp of the infinite majesty and purity of God, although the soul does not see it, this view is superior to all the ideas that we of ourselves can have of Him; and, by contrast, it sees much more clearly its own indigence and wretchedness.
“When the sun has set, we see the stars in the depths of the firmament. But before enjoying the contemplation of the starry sky, we must become used to walking fearlessly in the night and triumphing over powerful temptations against Faith and Hope―just as, during the Dark Night of the Senses, it was necessary to overcome many temptations against chastity and patience that have their seat in the sensible part of the soul.”
Dark Night of Some Saints
In the life of ST. ANGELA OF FOLIGNO we find a striking example of this fact, which she recounts as follows: “I see myself deprived of every good, of every virtue, filled with a multitude of vices; in my soul I see only defects―false humility, pride, hypocrisy. I would wish to cry out my iniquities to others. God is hidden for me. How can I hope in Him? Though all the wise men of the world and all the saints of paradise were to overwhelm me with their consolations, they would bring me no relief, if God does not change me in the depths of my soul. This interior torment is far worse than martyrdom.”
Another striking example of the spiritual night which we are speaking of is found in ST. PAUL OF THE CROSS, the founder of the Passionists. We read in his Letters: “Little corporal or spiritual tribulations are the first steps of this lofty and holy ladder which great and generous souls climb. They ascend step by step until they reach the last rung. There, at the summit, they find the purest suffering, without the slightest admixture of consolation coming from Heaven or Earth (the suffering which comes from offense offered to God). And if these souls are faithful in not seeking consolations, they will pass from this pure suffering to the pure love of God, without anything else being mingled with it. But rare are the souls which reach such a degree. It seems to them that they are abandoned by God, that He no longer loves them, that He is irritated against them. This is almost the pain of damnation, if I may express myself in this manner, a suffering, whose bitterness is comparable to no other. But if the soul is faithful, what treasures it amasses! The storms pass and go, the soul approaches true, very sweet, and very close union with Jesus crucified, who transforms it in Himself and reproduces His own features in it.”
These excerpts show that ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS is not the only one who spoke profoundly of the night of the spirit because he had experienced it. Before even him, HUGH OF ST. VICTOR had compared the passive purification of the soul by grace and the love of God to the transformation which green wood undergoes when attacked by fire: “The dampness is consumed, the smoke diminishes, the victorious flame shows itself; finally it communicates its own nature to the wood, which is set completely on fire. Likewise the love of God gradually grows in the soul, the passions of the heart at first resist, which causes many sufferings and troubles; this thick smoke must be dissipated. Then the love of God becomes more ardent, its flame more lively . . . and finally it penetrates the entire soul. The divine truth is found and assimilated by contemplation; the soul, detached from self, no longer seeks anything but God. He is for it all in all; it rests in His love and finds therein joy and peace.”
We read also in the life of ST. VINCENT DE PAUL that for four years he endured a trial of this type, which was marked by a persistent temptation against Faith. The temptation was so strong that he wrote the Credo on a sheet of paper, which he carried over his heart and pressed from time to time to assure himself that he did not consent to the temptation.
We Are Mere Theoreticians and Not Practitioners
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “If the passive purification of the spirit seems extraordinary to us, who are outside the normal way of sanctity, this is because we do not give enough thought to what a profound purification of the soul is necessary to receive immediately eternal life, the beatific vision of the divine essence, without having to pass through Purgatory, or after having done so. And when we read the exposition of this doctrine in the great masters, we read it perhaps through a certain curiosity about divine things, but without a sufficiently sincere desire for our own sanctification. If we had this desire, we would find in these pages what is suitable for us, and we would see there the one thing necessary. We must―in one way or another―pass through this crucible, without which there is no true sanctity. Sanctifying grace, as it grows, makes us more and more like to God; inasmuch as it assimilates us to Christ crucified, and should make us grow more like Him until our entrance into Heaven.
“The Book of Wisdom says of the just: ‘As gold in the furnace He hath proved them, and as a victim of a holocaust He hath received them.’ Gold in the crucible is purified by material fire; a still more intense fire is needed to transform coal into a diamond; likewise, in tribulation the soul of the just man is purified by a spiritual fire. We can never too strongly desire this purifying light which Scripture speaks of. Unfortunately we often flee from it, because we are afraid we may be told the truth about ourselves, when we so greatly love to tell others the truth about themselves. St. John of the Cross simply explains the nature of the purifying light spoken of in Scripture, when he writes: ‘The dark night is a certain inflowing of God into the soul which cleanses it of its ignorances and imperfections, habitual, natural, and spiritual. Contemplatives call it infused contemplation, or mystical theology, whereby God secretly teaches the soul and instructs it in the perfection of love, without any efforts on its own part, beyond a loving attention to God, listening to His voice and admitting the light He sends, but without understanding how this is infused contemplation.’ In the life of the holy Curé of Ars, St. John Vianney, we have a striking example of this state. Understanding better every day the loftiness of the priestly ideal and judging himself to be farther from it than ever before, he certainly did not think then that he was a contemplative, and yet it was God Himself who was enlightening him and instructing him in this way.
“This salutary crisis is a Purgatory before death, in which the soul is purified under the influence, not of a sensible fire, but of the spiritual fire of contemplation and love. ‘And thus,’ says St. John of the Cross, ‘the soul which passes through this state in the present life, and is perfectly purified, either enters not into Purgatory, or is detained there but a moment, for one hour here is of greater moment than many there.’ The reason is that on Earth man is purified while meriting and growing greatly at times in charity, whereas after death he is purified without meriting. And as Purgatory is a penalty and every penalty presupposes a sin that could have been avoided, the normal way of sanctity is to undergo the passive purifications of which we are speaking before death and not after death. In reality, however, rare are they who go immediately from Earth to Heaven, without passing through Purgatory. The true order of Christian life is fully realized only in the saints.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
When Light Seems Dark
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE says: “The divine wisdom is so high that it transcends the capacity of the soul, and therefore is, in that respect, darkness … just as the light of the sun seems dark to the eye of the owl, which can bear and attain only the dim light of twilight or dawn. The Blessed Trinity, which is Light itself, seems obscure to us―because it is too luminous for the weak eyes of our spirit. Furthermore, the divine light, given in the night of the spirit, causes suffering because of the impurity still existing in the soul. St. Augustine pointed this out, saying: ‘The light which so greatly pleases pure eyes is hateful to weak ones.’ This is so much truer when this divine light must overcome a special resistance of the soul, which is unwilling to be enlightened in regard to certain of its defects, wishing at times to see virtues in them: for example, in regard to a somewhat bitter zeal and a secret complacency, as a result of which it is deceived by its self-love and by the enemy of the good. ‘The light shineth in darkness,’ says St. John at the start of his Gospel, ‘and the [inferior] darkness did not comprehend it.’ This light seems painful when it must overcome resistance, especially a prolonged resistance. It even happens often that the soul suffers greatly because it cannot understand why God tries and tests it in this way, as if He were an implacable judge.
“This interior suffering increases still more through the fear of consenting to temptations arising at this time against Faith, Hope, and the love of God and of neighbor. In this painful state, the soul sees clearly that at times it resists these temptations, but at others it fears that it consented. This fear causes it anguish, for in this state the soul already greatly loves the Lord and would not for anything in the world offend His Majesty. At this stage there is in these tried and tested souls, just as in those of Purgatory, a flux and reflux―they are carried toward God by the impulse of their love, yet they feel themselves repulsed by all the wretchedness and pusillanimity which they see in themselves.
“Scripture states several times: ‘The Lord . . . bringeth down to Hell and bringeth back again. The Lord maketh poor and maketh rich, He humbleth and He exalteth.’ This statement is seen to be especially true in the Dark Night of the Soul, which is the mystical death; it prepares the soul for the intimacy of union with God. The soul empty of all self-love can reach absolute sincerity―every mask drops away. The soul no longer possesses anything of its own, but is ready to possess God, like the Apostles, of whom it was said: ‘As having nothing, and possessing all things.’ The emptiness that it experiences renders it still more eager for God.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Light After Darkness―Life After Death
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “The painful purification we are speaking of creates a great void in the soul by driving out self-love and pride, and gives it an increasingly eager desire for God. The more generously they accept this purification, the quicker it will end. If it is more intense, it will generally be shorter (like the purification of Purgatory) unless the soul is to suffer specially for sinners, over and above its personal purification. Nothing unclean can enter Heaven; therefore the purification of the spirit, which we are speaking of, must be undergone before or after death. However it is far better and more profitable to undergo it before death; for in the present life man merits while growing in charity, whereas in Purgatory he no longer merits. In this period of purification, one should ask our Lord for the love of the cross, for the desire to share in His holy humiliations in the measure willed by Providence. The soul should ask Him also to let it find in this desire the strength to bear whatever may come, the peace, and sometimes the joy, to restore its courage and that of souls that come to it.
“The painful passive purification just described is followed by a resurrection of the soul and a new life. At the end of this trial, charity toward God and one’s neighbor is purified of all alloy, as gold in the crucible is freed from its dross. And not only is the love of charity thus purified, but notably increased. The soul now makes intense and heroic acts of charity, which obtain immediately the increase of grace which they merit, and with sanctifying grace increase greatly at the same time all the infused virtues and the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost, which are connected with charity. Not only during Mass, the Divine Office, or prayer, but in the midst of external occupations, they remain in the presence of God and preserve actual union with Him. The love of God and of souls then becomes increasingly disinterested, ever more ardent and forgetful of self.
“The egoist thinks always of himself and, without realizing it, refers everything to himself. He talks continually with himself about his inordinate desires, sorrows, or superficial joys; his intimate conversation with himself is endless, but it is vain, sterile, and unproductive for all. The perfect man, on the contrary, instead of thinking always of himself, thinks continually of God, His glory, and the salvation of souls; he instinctively makes everything converge toward the object of his thoughts. His intimate conversation is no longer with himself, but with God, and the words of the Gospel frequently recur to his mind to enlighten from on high the smallest pleasurable or painful facts of daily life. Spiritual light and fervor are perpetually bestowed on him from above. The reason for this state is that the perfect man, unlike the beginner, no longer contemplates God only in the mirror of sensible things or of the Gospel parables, about which it is impossible to think continually. Neither does he, like the proficient, contemplate God only in the mirror of the mysteries of the life of Christ, a prayer that cannot last all day long; but, in the penumbra of Faith, he contemplates the divine goodness itself, a little as we see the diffused light that always surrounds us and illumines everything from above.
“As a consequence the perfect know themselves, no longer only in themselves but in God, their beginning and end. In Him they see their poverty, the infinite distance separating them from the Creator; they feel themselves preserved in being by His free love. They ceaselessly experience to what a degree they need His grace for the least salutary act; they do not become discouraged over their sins, but draw a truer humility from them. They sincerely consider themselves useless servants, who of themselves can do nothing, but whom the Lord deigns to use for the accomplishment of great things. If they see their neighbor’s sins, they think there is no sin committed by another which they themselves would not be capable of committing had they the same heredity and were they placed in the same circumstances, faced with the same temptations. If they see the great virtues of other souls, they rejoice in them for the sake of the Lord and of souls, remembering that in the mystical body of Christ the growth of one member redounds to the profit of all the others” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
The Signs of Union with God and the Indwelling of the Trinity in the Soul
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE then lists seven chief signs of our union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, which brings about a fullness of the indwelling of the Holy Trinity and grace in the soul:
“The signs of this indwelling are set forth at length by St. Thomas Aquinas in his Contra Gentes, and more briefly in the Summa Theologica, where he asks whether a man can know if he is in the state of grace. Without having absolute certitude that he has grace, he has signs which enable him, for example, to approach the Holy Table without fear of making a sacrilegious Communion.
“The principal signs of the state of grace, in ascending gradation, are the following.
“The first sign is the testimony of a good conscience, in the sense that he is not conscious of any mortal sin. This is the fundamental sign, presupposed by the following signs which confirm it.
“A second sign is joy in hearing the word of God preached, not only for the sake of hearing it, but to put it into practice. This may be observed in several countries where there is preserved, together with a simple life, a great Christian Faith which leads the faithful to listen willingly to their pastor when he explains the great truths of the Gospel.
“A third sign, confirming the preceding ones, is the relish of divine wisdom, which leads a man to read the Gospel privately, to seek in it the spirit under the letter, to nourish his soul with it, even when it deals with the mystery of the cross and with the cross he must bear every day.
“A fourth sign is the inclination leading the soul to converse intimately with God, and faithfully to resume this conversation when it has been interrupted. We cannot repeat too often that every man carries on an intimate conversation with himself, which, at times, is not good. True interior life begins, as we have often pointed out, when this intimate conversation is no longer only with self, but with God. This intimate conversation with God is like the revelation of the most secret thoughts, in the sense that nothing in us is hidden from the Lord and that He Himself recalls to us the portion of the Gospel that should illumine the duty of every moment.
“A fifth sign is to rejoice in God, fully consenting to His will even in adversity. Sometimes in the midst of dejection there is given us a pure and lofty joy which dissipates all sadness. This is a great sign of the Lord’s visit. Moreover, Jesus, in promising the Holy Ghost, called Him the Paraclete, or Comforter. And normally we rejoice so much the more in the Lord as we more perfectly fulfill His precepts, for by so doing we form increasingly one sole heart with Him.
“A sixth sign is found in the liberty of the children of God. On this subject, St. Thomas writes: “The children of God are led by the Holy Ghost, not like slaves, but like free creatures. . . . The Holy Ghost, in fact, makes us act by inclining our free will to will, for He gives us to love God and inclines us to act for love of Him and not through fear in a servile manner.
“Lastly, a seventh sign of the indwelling of the Blessed Trinity in the soul, according to St. Thomas, is that the person speaks of God out of the abundance of his heart. In this sense is realized what the holy doctor says elsewhere: “Preaching should spring from the plenitude of the contemplation of the mysteries of Faith.” Thus, from Pentecost on, St. Peter and the Apostles preached the mystery of the redemption; so too, St. Stephen, the first martyr, preached before being stoned; and likewise St. Dominic, who knew how to speak only with God or of God. Thus the Holy Ghost appears increasingly as a source of ever new graces, an unexhausted and inexhaustible source, the source of light and love” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Ever tried teaching algebra to a 5-year old? The mind and mentality of an adult is far more elevated than the mind of a 5-year old. He is preoccupied with questions which the 5-year old cannot grasp. The adult understands the child―having already passed through the childhood stage―but the child does not fully understand the adult; conversation between them on certain subjects, except of a very simple superficial kind, is impossible.
Why bother writing about the elevated, high-flying, pinnacle of the spiritual life―the mystical union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Perfection, or the Unitive Way), when almost everything will be over the heads and minds of the readers? As FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, in his Three Ages of the Interior Life, writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories―of beginners, proficients or perfect―but rather to that of stunted souls!” Of such a soul, in the spiritual domain, it is said: “He will be a child for the whole of his life.”
Another major obstacle to navigating the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is lukewarmness, of which of FR. FREDERICK FABER writes: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind.” (Fr. Faber, Growth in Holiness, Ch. 25). Most people will not attain the perfection of divine union (the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Unitive Way or the Way of the Perfect) until after death and after the purifying fires of Purgatory.
Nevertheless, the spiritual masters and theologians tell us that everyone is not only called to be baptized in the Catholic Faith, but everyone is also called leave sin (mortal and venial) behind, and to pass through the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life so as to embrace the mystical state―the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Perfection, the Unitive Way (which mystically united us to God here on Earth).
Most of us usually associate the “mystical state” with seeing visions and hearing voices. Visions and locutions, or voices, may or may not occur in the states of mystical union. They are not an essential part of the mystical state. Visions are imaginary. Likewise, locutions (communications) may be either mentally formed phrases representing thoughts, or impressions produced by divine grace in the soul while in a state of recollection, or they may be formed in the mind by direct supernatural intervention. But visions and locutions are not necessarily a part of mystical experience―and all mystical writers agree in asserting that they are the least important part. The possibility of self-delusion in such matters (in addition to the possibility of diabolical deception) is, of course, almost inexhaustible, and no mystical writer fails to warn his readers against this danger. Mysticism is an awareness of the divine activity of God on the soul. Mysticism is a passive and not an active experience―because only the Holy Spirit can produce this mystical experience in us by the activation of His gifts. Mystics are fully aware that what they are experiencing is not produced by themselves. They did not cause the experience and cannot retain it for a second longer than is desired by the One who produces it.
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS writes: “Why it is that there are so few that attain to this lofty state? It must be known that this is not because God is pleased that there should be only a few raised to this high spiritual state—on the contrary it would please God if all were so raised to this lofty state—but unfortunately He finds few souls in whom He can perform so high and lofty a work. For, when He proves and tests them in small things and finds them weak; and also sees that they quickly flee from labor, and desire not to submit to the least discomfort ... God finds that they are not strong enough to bear the favor which He was granting them when He began to purge them, and so He goes no farther with their purification.”
Most of us won’t progress to union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life (the Unitive Way) while living on this Earth, because we won’t give up our wills to God, but we are nevertheless all called to this level of holiness. Most will not even make it into the Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Illuminative Way, or Way of Proficients) because they are at peace with many or most venial sins and will not fight against them to eradicate them. The bottom line is―whether we understand these things or not; whether we like them or not; whether we choose to embark on the path or not―we will not get into Heaven until we have reached a perfect union with God. That has to take place in this life, or in the painful fires of Purgatory (which St. Thomas Aquinas says are as painful as the fires of Hell, the difference being is that at some time the fires of Purgatory end).
The Three Ways are not an option, but an obligation. They are not that complicated to understand―but there are more entertaining things to learn about for most people and the television, internet, social media, etc. supplies those needs. In most worthwhile professions there are certain aspects of that profession that are difficult to learn and master―but they must be learnt and mastered if you wish to qualify for that profession. The same is true for Heaven―even more so! You might not like it; you might not wish to conform to it; you might rebel against it and stamp your feet and scream out loud in protest against it―but you are not going to admitted into Heaven until you have reached that perfect union with God. If you refuse to do so on Earth―then you will be brought to that perfect union in the fires of Purgatory (at much greater pain and expense)―the only loser is you!
Entrance Requirements to the Third Way of the Spiritual Life
So what does it take to enter this elevated level, the pinnacle of the spiritual life? Just as the Way of Beginners required a conversion from mortal sin; and the Way of the Proficient required a conversion from venial sin―the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of the Perfect, requires a conversion away from any and all imperfections (which are not even venial sins, but cases where the soul knows it could do better). The characteristics of the soul in this Way of Perfection are as follows:
● No more deliberate mortal or venial sin
● Avoidance of all imperfections
● Perpetually living in presence of God
● Perpetual Prayer
● Conformity to God’s Will in Third Degree (the highest degree)
● Total abandonment to God
● Great spirit of Faith
● No self-love
● Thoughts totally centered on Our Lord
● Love of God becomes sole ruling virtue
● Heroic charity of Christ (love of Christ)
● Heroic service of neighbor
● Heroic love of enemies
● Humility practiced in Third Degree (the highest degree)
● Desire to suffer greatly for God
● Unalterable patience
● Detachment from all things, persons, places and events
Unfortunately, the advanced souls who have been making much progress in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of the Proficient or the Illuminative Way―do not have the above listed virtues or characteristics in any high degree. These advanced souls, these souls who are making progress, are still some way from being fit to enter into the Third Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way. Therefore God is obliged to purify them by what is called “The Dark Night of the Soul.”
Why the Soul or Spirit Still Needs to be Purified
Those souls who are making much progress in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way―are still far from being perfect. That is why they are unfit to enter the Third Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Perfection or the Unitive Way. God, therefore, must purify the defective soul by a Dark Night of the Soul, before admitting it to the Third Way―just as He purified the senses by the Dark Night of the Senses before allowing the soul to pass from the First Way of Beginners into the Second Way of the Proficient. FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE explains this in his book, The Three Ages of the Interior Life:
“The necessity of the passive purification of the spirit is because of the defects which subsist in proficients or the advanced. There are still many defects in proficients, who have made considerable progress, whose souls, in large part, are already purified in the inferior or sensible part of the soul, and who have begun to live the life of the spirit through the initial infused contemplation of the mysteries of Faith. Nevertheless, the stains of the old man still remain in their spirit like rust that will disappear only under the action of a purifying fire.
“These advanced souls are still often subject to indirectly voluntary distractions in prayer; to dullness; to useless dissipation; to excessively human sympathy for certain persons; leading to a lack of esteem for others, which is more or less contrary to justice and charity. They have moments of natural rudeness―the result of the sin of impatience. Some fall into illusion by being too much attached to certain spiritual communications; they expose themselves to the devil, who takes pleasure in deceiving them by false prophecies. Others, under the same influence, fall into bitter zeal, which leads them to sermonize their neighbor and to deliver untimely corrections. Thereby―though unaware of it―these advanced souls are puffed up with spiritual pride and presumption, and thus deviate from the simplicity, humility, and purity required for close union with God.
“But these are only the defects related to the interior life, to relations with God. What would it be if one were to consider the defects that advanced souls still have in their relations with superiors, equals, and inferiors; if one were to consider―in this period of the spiritual life―all that still injures charity and justice; all that―in those who have to teach, govern or direct souls―stains their apostolate, teaching, government, and direction?
“Spiritual or intellectual pride, which still subsists, inspires excessive attachment to personal judgment, to one’s own way of seeing, feeling, sympathizing, willing. From it are born jealousy, secret ambition, or again great authoritarianism, unless one is by temperament inclined to the contrary defect, that is, to excessive indulgence and to weakness toward those who oppress others. Here, too, may often be remarked a lack of promptness and generosity in obedience, or, on the contrary, a servility inspired by self-love. Frequent also are faults against charity through jealousy, envy, slander, discord, contention.
“The root of the higher faculties of intellect and will is still deeply tainted with pride, personal judgment, and self-will. The divine light and the will of God do not yet reign there uncontested; far from it. These stains have, in some cases, been there for a long time; they may become encrusted as they grow old and may profoundly alter the character by turning it away from true intimacy with God. Thence are born many defamations and at times most grievous divisions among those who should work together for the good of souls.
“This is why St. Augustine used to say the prayer, often repeated by St. Louis Bertrand centuries later: “Lord, burn, cut, do not spare on this earth, that Thou mayest spare in eternity!” It is important to be purified on Earth with merit, rather than after death without merit. Nothing soiled enters Heaven―consequently, to enter there, the soul must undergo a profound purification sooner or later. It is evident that the beatific vision of God cannot be granted to a soul that is still impure.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Our Unconscious Pride and Egoism Must Go
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE explains that our secret pride and unconscious egoism is the obstacle to a true union with God. Therefore God has to step in and grind down the remaining obstacle and replace it with true humility and total submission to His Divine Will: “The depths of our will needs to be purified from the often unconscious egoism that has for long subsisted in it, leading us to disturbing and fruitless conversation with ourselves and not to tranquilizing and vivifying conversation with God. This unconscious egoism still inclines us to seek ourselves in everything and at times to judge our neighbor with severity while treating ourselves with great indulgence. This same egoism which makes us seek ourselves in many things is especially evident when trial strikes us; we are then completely upset and seek help, consolation, and counsel from without, where God is not to be found. We have not built our house sufficiently on Christ the rock, with the result that it lacks solidity. We have built on self, on self-will, which is equivalent to building on sand; thus at times there is great weakness underlying harshness of judgment. There is only one way to triumph over these obstacles―that is for God to take complete possession of the interior of the soul and occupy it―which is something that happens only to His true friends.”
“This passive purification will certainly not be without suffering, and, as St. John of the Cross teaches, it will even be a mystical death, the death to self, the disintegration of self-love, which until then has resisted grace, at times with great obstinacy. Here pride must receive the deathblow that it may give place to genuine humility, a virtue which has been compared to the deepest root of a tree, a root which buries itself so much the more deeply in the soil as the loftiest branch, the symbol of charity, rises higher toward the sky.”
“This center of the soul, the refuge of personal judgment and self-love that is often very subtle, must be illumined by the divine light and filled by God, rendered completely healthy, and vivified. From what we have just said it is evident that the passive purification of the spirit, made necessary by the defects of proficients, is the decisive struggle between two spirits: the spirit of pride, which may grow even to blasphemy, to hatred of God, and despair, and that of humility and charity, which is eternal life begun in us.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Removing the Rust and Stains of the Soul
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “The defects and the remains of spiritual or intellectual pride found in proficients or the advanced, require the absolute need of purification for the soul impregnated with self-love and subtle egoism. The Lord alone can effect this profound purification. Just as the passive purification of the sensible part of the soul (in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life) is manifested by the loss of the sensible consolations to which it was excessively attached, likewise the passive purification of the spirit at first consists in the deprivation of the lights previously received regarding the mysteries of Faith. Having become too familiar with them, the soul, forgetting their infinite elevation, considered them and thought of them in a manner somewhat too human. The soul dwelt, for example, a little too much on Christ’s humanity, without living sufficiently by Faith in His divinity; it only grasped the exterior aspects of the great mysteries of Providence, of the Incarnation, of the redemption, of the Mass, and of the life of the Church in the midst of continually recurring trials. The soul had still only a very superficial knowledge of these spiritual realities; its view of these mysteries was like that of a stained-glass window seen from outside the church.
“Then, what occurs? To lift the soul above this excessively inferior and superficial knowledge of divine things, the Lord detaches the soul from this way of thinking and praying, and seems to strip it of its lights, affections and feelings, leaving the understanding in darkness, leaving the will dry, leaving the memory empty, and leaving the affections of the soul in the deepest affliction, bitterness, and distress―withholding from it the former sweetness it had in spiritual things. The soul must now walk in the dark, in pure Faith―which is like walking in a dark night for our natural faculties and powers.
“Does the soul see nothing in this dark night? In the natural world, when the sun has set and completely disappeared, at least some stars are visible, which convey an idea of the depth of the firmament. Hence at night we can see much farther into to heavens than we can during the day! True―the hills or mountains, fifty or a hundred miles away, are no longer visible, but we can see stars and constellations which are thousands of miles from the Earth. When the soul enters the spiritual darkness we are speaking of, it no longer sees what is near it, but it has an increasingly better anticipatory grasp of the infinite majesty and purity of God, although the soul does not see it, this view is superior to all the ideas that we of ourselves can have of Him; and, by contrast, it sees much more clearly its own indigence and wretchedness.
“When the sun has set, we see the stars in the depths of the firmament. But before enjoying the contemplation of the starry sky, we must become used to walking fearlessly in the night and triumphing over powerful temptations against Faith and Hope―just as, during the Dark Night of the Senses, it was necessary to overcome many temptations against chastity and patience that have their seat in the sensible part of the soul.”
Dark Night of Some Saints
In the life of ST. ANGELA OF FOLIGNO we find a striking example of this fact, which she recounts as follows: “I see myself deprived of every good, of every virtue, filled with a multitude of vices; in my soul I see only defects―false humility, pride, hypocrisy. I would wish to cry out my iniquities to others. God is hidden for me. How can I hope in Him? Though all the wise men of the world and all the saints of paradise were to overwhelm me with their consolations, they would bring me no relief, if God does not change me in the depths of my soul. This interior torment is far worse than martyrdom.”
Another striking example of the spiritual night which we are speaking of is found in ST. PAUL OF THE CROSS, the founder of the Passionists. We read in his Letters: “Little corporal or spiritual tribulations are the first steps of this lofty and holy ladder which great and generous souls climb. They ascend step by step until they reach the last rung. There, at the summit, they find the purest suffering, without the slightest admixture of consolation coming from Heaven or Earth (the suffering which comes from offense offered to God). And if these souls are faithful in not seeking consolations, they will pass from this pure suffering to the pure love of God, without anything else being mingled with it. But rare are the souls which reach such a degree. It seems to them that they are abandoned by God, that He no longer loves them, that He is irritated against them. This is almost the pain of damnation, if I may express myself in this manner, a suffering, whose bitterness is comparable to no other. But if the soul is faithful, what treasures it amasses! The storms pass and go, the soul approaches true, very sweet, and very close union with Jesus crucified, who transforms it in Himself and reproduces His own features in it.”
These excerpts show that ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS is not the only one who spoke profoundly of the night of the spirit because he had experienced it. Before even him, HUGH OF ST. VICTOR had compared the passive purification of the soul by grace and the love of God to the transformation which green wood undergoes when attacked by fire: “The dampness is consumed, the smoke diminishes, the victorious flame shows itself; finally it communicates its own nature to the wood, which is set completely on fire. Likewise the love of God gradually grows in the soul, the passions of the heart at first resist, which causes many sufferings and troubles; this thick smoke must be dissipated. Then the love of God becomes more ardent, its flame more lively . . . and finally it penetrates the entire soul. The divine truth is found and assimilated by contemplation; the soul, detached from self, no longer seeks anything but God. He is for it all in all; it rests in His love and finds therein joy and peace.”
We read also in the life of ST. VINCENT DE PAUL that for four years he endured a trial of this type, which was marked by a persistent temptation against Faith. The temptation was so strong that he wrote the Credo on a sheet of paper, which he carried over his heart and pressed from time to time to assure himself that he did not consent to the temptation.
We Are Mere Theoreticians and Not Practitioners
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “If the passive purification of the spirit seems extraordinary to us, who are outside the normal way of sanctity, this is because we do not give enough thought to what a profound purification of the soul is necessary to receive immediately eternal life, the beatific vision of the divine essence, without having to pass through Purgatory, or after having done so. And when we read the exposition of this doctrine in the great masters, we read it perhaps through a certain curiosity about divine things, but without a sufficiently sincere desire for our own sanctification. If we had this desire, we would find in these pages what is suitable for us, and we would see there the one thing necessary. We must―in one way or another―pass through this crucible, without which there is no true sanctity. Sanctifying grace, as it grows, makes us more and more like to God; inasmuch as it assimilates us to Christ crucified, and should make us grow more like Him until our entrance into Heaven.
“The Book of Wisdom says of the just: ‘As gold in the furnace He hath proved them, and as a victim of a holocaust He hath received them.’ Gold in the crucible is purified by material fire; a still more intense fire is needed to transform coal into a diamond; likewise, in tribulation the soul of the just man is purified by a spiritual fire. We can never too strongly desire this purifying light which Scripture speaks of. Unfortunately we often flee from it, because we are afraid we may be told the truth about ourselves, when we so greatly love to tell others the truth about themselves. St. John of the Cross simply explains the nature of the purifying light spoken of in Scripture, when he writes: ‘The dark night is a certain inflowing of God into the soul which cleanses it of its ignorances and imperfections, habitual, natural, and spiritual. Contemplatives call it infused contemplation, or mystical theology, whereby God secretly teaches the soul and instructs it in the perfection of love, without any efforts on its own part, beyond a loving attention to God, listening to His voice and admitting the light He sends, but without understanding how this is infused contemplation.’ In the life of the holy Curé of Ars, St. John Vianney, we have a striking example of this state. Understanding better every day the loftiness of the priestly ideal and judging himself to be farther from it than ever before, he certainly did not think then that he was a contemplative, and yet it was God Himself who was enlightening him and instructing him in this way.
“This salutary crisis is a Purgatory before death, in which the soul is purified under the influence, not of a sensible fire, but of the spiritual fire of contemplation and love. ‘And thus,’ says St. John of the Cross, ‘the soul which passes through this state in the present life, and is perfectly purified, either enters not into Purgatory, or is detained there but a moment, for one hour here is of greater moment than many there.’ The reason is that on Earth man is purified while meriting and growing greatly at times in charity, whereas after death he is purified without meriting. And as Purgatory is a penalty and every penalty presupposes a sin that could have been avoided, the normal way of sanctity is to undergo the passive purifications of which we are speaking before death and not after death. In reality, however, rare are they who go immediately from Earth to Heaven, without passing through Purgatory. The true order of Christian life is fully realized only in the saints.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
When Light Seems Dark
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE says: “The divine wisdom is so high that it transcends the capacity of the soul, and therefore is, in that respect, darkness … just as the light of the sun seems dark to the eye of the owl, which can bear and attain only the dim light of twilight or dawn. The Blessed Trinity, which is Light itself, seems obscure to us―because it is too luminous for the weak eyes of our spirit. Furthermore, the divine light, given in the night of the spirit, causes suffering because of the impurity still existing in the soul. St. Augustine pointed this out, saying: ‘The light which so greatly pleases pure eyes is hateful to weak ones.’ This is so much truer when this divine light must overcome a special resistance of the soul, which is unwilling to be enlightened in regard to certain of its defects, wishing at times to see virtues in them: for example, in regard to a somewhat bitter zeal and a secret complacency, as a result of which it is deceived by its self-love and by the enemy of the good. ‘The light shineth in darkness,’ says St. John at the start of his Gospel, ‘and the [inferior] darkness did not comprehend it.’ This light seems painful when it must overcome resistance, especially a prolonged resistance. It even happens often that the soul suffers greatly because it cannot understand why God tries and tests it in this way, as if He were an implacable judge.
“This interior suffering increases still more through the fear of consenting to temptations arising at this time against Faith, Hope, and the love of God and of neighbor. In this painful state, the soul sees clearly that at times it resists these temptations, but at others it fears that it consented. This fear causes it anguish, for in this state the soul already greatly loves the Lord and would not for anything in the world offend His Majesty. At this stage there is in these tried and tested souls, just as in those of Purgatory, a flux and reflux―they are carried toward God by the impulse of their love, yet they feel themselves repulsed by all the wretchedness and pusillanimity which they see in themselves.
“Scripture states several times: ‘The Lord . . . bringeth down to Hell and bringeth back again. The Lord maketh poor and maketh rich, He humbleth and He exalteth.’ This statement is seen to be especially true in the Dark Night of the Soul, which is the mystical death; it prepares the soul for the intimacy of union with God. The soul empty of all self-love can reach absolute sincerity―every mask drops away. The soul no longer possesses anything of its own, but is ready to possess God, like the Apostles, of whom it was said: ‘As having nothing, and possessing all things.’ The emptiness that it experiences renders it still more eager for God.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Light After Darkness―Life After Death
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “The painful purification we are speaking of creates a great void in the soul by driving out self-love and pride, and gives it an increasingly eager desire for God. The more generously they accept this purification, the quicker it will end. If it is more intense, it will generally be shorter (like the purification of Purgatory) unless the soul is to suffer specially for sinners, over and above its personal purification. Nothing unclean can enter Heaven; therefore the purification of the spirit, which we are speaking of, must be undergone before or after death. However it is far better and more profitable to undergo it before death; for in the present life man merits while growing in charity, whereas in Purgatory he no longer merits. In this period of purification, one should ask our Lord for the love of the cross, for the desire to share in His holy humiliations in the measure willed by Providence. The soul should ask Him also to let it find in this desire the strength to bear whatever may come, the peace, and sometimes the joy, to restore its courage and that of souls that come to it.
“The painful passive purification just described is followed by a resurrection of the soul and a new life. At the end of this trial, charity toward God and one’s neighbor is purified of all alloy, as gold in the crucible is freed from its dross. And not only is the love of charity thus purified, but notably increased. The soul now makes intense and heroic acts of charity, which obtain immediately the increase of grace which they merit, and with sanctifying grace increase greatly at the same time all the infused virtues and the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost, which are connected with charity. Not only during Mass, the Divine Office, or prayer, but in the midst of external occupations, they remain in the presence of God and preserve actual union with Him. The love of God and of souls then becomes increasingly disinterested, ever more ardent and forgetful of self.
“The egoist thinks always of himself and, without realizing it, refers everything to himself. He talks continually with himself about his inordinate desires, sorrows, or superficial joys; his intimate conversation with himself is endless, but it is vain, sterile, and unproductive for all. The perfect man, on the contrary, instead of thinking always of himself, thinks continually of God, His glory, and the salvation of souls; he instinctively makes everything converge toward the object of his thoughts. His intimate conversation is no longer with himself, but with God, and the words of the Gospel frequently recur to his mind to enlighten from on high the smallest pleasurable or painful facts of daily life. Spiritual light and fervor are perpetually bestowed on him from above. The reason for this state is that the perfect man, unlike the beginner, no longer contemplates God only in the mirror of sensible things or of the Gospel parables, about which it is impossible to think continually. Neither does he, like the proficient, contemplate God only in the mirror of the mysteries of the life of Christ, a prayer that cannot last all day long; but, in the penumbra of Faith, he contemplates the divine goodness itself, a little as we see the diffused light that always surrounds us and illumines everything from above.
“As a consequence the perfect know themselves, no longer only in themselves but in God, their beginning and end. In Him they see their poverty, the infinite distance separating them from the Creator; they feel themselves preserved in being by His free love. They ceaselessly experience to what a degree they need His grace for the least salutary act; they do not become discouraged over their sins, but draw a truer humility from them. They sincerely consider themselves useless servants, who of themselves can do nothing, but whom the Lord deigns to use for the accomplishment of great things. If they see their neighbor’s sins, they think there is no sin committed by another which they themselves would not be capable of committing had they the same heredity and were they placed in the same circumstances, faced with the same temptations. If they see the great virtues of other souls, they rejoice in them for the sake of the Lord and of souls, remembering that in the mystical body of Christ the growth of one member redounds to the profit of all the others” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
The Signs of Union with God and the Indwelling of the Trinity in the Soul
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE then lists seven chief signs of our union with God in the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, which brings about a fullness of the indwelling of the Holy Trinity and grace in the soul:
“The signs of this indwelling are set forth at length by St. Thomas Aquinas in his Contra Gentes, and more briefly in the Summa Theologica, where he asks whether a man can know if he is in the state of grace. Without having absolute certitude that he has grace, he has signs which enable him, for example, to approach the Holy Table without fear of making a sacrilegious Communion.
“The principal signs of the state of grace, in ascending gradation, are the following.
“The first sign is the testimony of a good conscience, in the sense that he is not conscious of any mortal sin. This is the fundamental sign, presupposed by the following signs which confirm it.
“A second sign is joy in hearing the word of God preached, not only for the sake of hearing it, but to put it into practice. This may be observed in several countries where there is preserved, together with a simple life, a great Christian Faith which leads the faithful to listen willingly to their pastor when he explains the great truths of the Gospel.
“A third sign, confirming the preceding ones, is the relish of divine wisdom, which leads a man to read the Gospel privately, to seek in it the spirit under the letter, to nourish his soul with it, even when it deals with the mystery of the cross and with the cross he must bear every day.
“A fourth sign is the inclination leading the soul to converse intimately with God, and faithfully to resume this conversation when it has been interrupted. We cannot repeat too often that every man carries on an intimate conversation with himself, which, at times, is not good. True interior life begins, as we have often pointed out, when this intimate conversation is no longer only with self, but with God. This intimate conversation with God is like the revelation of the most secret thoughts, in the sense that nothing in us is hidden from the Lord and that He Himself recalls to us the portion of the Gospel that should illumine the duty of every moment.
“A fifth sign is to rejoice in God, fully consenting to His will even in adversity. Sometimes in the midst of dejection there is given us a pure and lofty joy which dissipates all sadness. This is a great sign of the Lord’s visit. Moreover, Jesus, in promising the Holy Ghost, called Him the Paraclete, or Comforter. And normally we rejoice so much the more in the Lord as we more perfectly fulfill His precepts, for by so doing we form increasingly one sole heart with Him.
“A sixth sign is found in the liberty of the children of God. On this subject, St. Thomas writes: “The children of God are led by the Holy Ghost, not like slaves, but like free creatures. . . . The Holy Ghost, in fact, makes us act by inclining our free will to will, for He gives us to love God and inclines us to act for love of Him and not through fear in a servile manner.
“Lastly, a seventh sign of the indwelling of the Blessed Trinity in the soul, according to St. Thomas, is that the person speaks of God out of the abundance of his heart. In this sense is realized what the holy doctor says elsewhere: “Preaching should spring from the plenitude of the contemplation of the mysteries of Faith.” Thus, from Pentecost on, St. Peter and the Apostles preached the mystery of the redemption; so too, St. Stephen, the first martyr, preached before being stoned; and likewise St. Dominic, who knew how to speak only with God or of God. Thus the Holy Ghost appears increasingly as a source of ever new graces, an unexhausted and inexhaustible source, the source of light and love” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Article 18
Monday & Tuesday April 29th & 30th
The Conversion That Leads to the Second Way
Article 4: The Second of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life: The Way of the Proficient, or the The Illuminative Way
Monday & Tuesday April 29th & 30th
The Conversion That Leads to the Second Way
Article 4: The Second of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life: The Way of the Proficient, or the The Illuminative Way
The Only Way to Heaven
We are currently embarked upon a series of articles on the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. These are three obligatory stages or levels that every single soul on Earth must pass through if they wish to attain Heaven―except, of course, those baptized souls that die before reaching the age of reason. The duration of each stage depends upon the Providence of God and the willing cooperation of each individual soul.
The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life could be said be an essential “road map” to Heaven―giving directions and showing what we can expect to encounter on the road. We ignore them at our own peril―and many have perished through ignoring them. The fact that very few people know about these Three Ways of the Spiritual Life (or that very few care to know), can partially explain why the souls of most persons tragically end up being damned. As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” Most people will not attain the perfection of divine union (the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Unitive Way or the Way of the Perfect) until after death and after the purifying fires of Purgatory.
We cannot naively and foolishly make up our own path to Heaven―God has already mapped it out, and He expects us to follow His directions! It is a case of His way or the highway―or rather His way or the “broad way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat!” (Matthew 7:13). “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) ― and many could choose to study the Three Ways, but few choose to do so!
Even though this article will be dealing with Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Proficient Souls or the Illuminative Way), it is necessary to link this to the conversion crisis that Beginners in the First Way of the Spiritual Life must undergo, endure and cooperate with before they gain admittance to the Second Way. So let us briefly look at the faults of the Beginner that have to be purged by God through the means of a conversion crisis that is called the Dark Night of the Senses.
A Beginner is Beginner and No More!
The whole idea of a “beginning” is that it is just that―only a beginning and not an end; it is only a point of departure and not the point of destination. It is a state of imperfection that requires perfection―and that can only come by work and effort―just like being a Kindergartner is a long away from being a 12th Grade graduate; or a U.S. Marine recruit in Boot Camp is a long way from being a polished, battle-hardened, experienced Marine soldier. The Beginner in the Spiritual Life still has one foot in the world and the things of the world, while the other foot has stepped into the spiritual world. Beginners travel on the spiritual road to God in an inferior way and are wrapped-up in their own selfish desires. Beginners by definition are engaged in the balancing act of living by Faith and “doing one’s own thing” at one and the same time. They endeavor to sugarcoat their Faith. This makes for mixed feelings, divided loyalties or contradictory ideas. Their choices are partly for God, partly for themselves.
The Beginners in the spiritual life, those who have managed to pull themselves out of habitual mortal sin, are still susceptible to falling back into it. Like a beginner in any field, they are still inexperienced and weak as regards the depths and workings of the spiritual life. They think themselves safe, and some even rashly think themselves holy, but it is merely the bravado and false confidence akin to that of a child learning in school. It thinks itself to be wiser than its parents at times, but a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. Most of the world does not even register venial sin on their radar; or if they do, then it is to them a mere trifle, something that everyone does and something unimportant, since the Church says it cannot send you to Hell. But the Church also teaches that venial sin is, after mortal sin, the GREATEST EVIL IN THE WORLD. The Beginner has not “arrived” by leaving mortal sin behind, he has barely started. A man can be tied down not only by chains (mortal sin), but he can also be tied down by a multitude of strands of cotton thread; both can prevent any progress. A bird, likewise, can be prevented from flying upwards, to the heavens, by both wire and thread.
Faults of Beginners in the Spiritual Life
Beginners also tend to lack enthusiasm and energy when told to do something unpleasant. Because they always look for spiritual gratifications and delights, the result is that they are extremely weak in the fortitude and lax in labor that demands perfection. Like those who are rich and raised in luxury, they run from everything rough, and they are scandalized by the cross in which true spiritual delights are found. And the more spiritual exercises they have, the greater is their boredom. Since they expect to go about in spiritual matters according to the whims and satisfactions of their own will, they find that having to enter the narrow way of life is saddening, depressing and repugnant to them. The imperfect soul of the Beginner will often try to seek the Father without following the way of Jesus crucified, because they have a strong aversion to the suffering they know is required.
In the previous article, we listed some of the chief faults and failings of Beginners in the Spiritual Life, which have to be addressed and corrected―Spiritual inexperience and immaturity; Lack of generosity; Distractions leading away from spiritual things; Discouragement at imagined or perceived lack of progress or success; Seeking personal advantages; Living too much by feelings and emotions; Having a merely theoretical and abstract Faith; Being too material and sensual; Prayer can be mechanical, hurried and distracted.
The Immaturity of Beginners in the Spiritual Life
Being a beginner in the spiritual life―by having entered the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―can affect the soul in various ways. God often showers the new beginner with a variety of spiritual delights and graces. Some beginners risk loving those delights and graces more than they love God, Who is the origin of them. Many beginners want God to desire what they want, and they become sad if they have to desire God’s will. They feel an aversion toward adapting their will to God’s―because His will is usually more demanding than their own self-indulgent will. Hence they frequently believe that what is not their will, or brings them no satisfaction, is not God’s will, and, on the other hand, that if they are satisfied, then God is also satisfied. They measure God by themselves and not themselves by God.
Beginners have an initial knowledge of themselves; little by little they discern the defects they have, the remains of sins that have already been forgiven, and new failings that are more or less deliberate and voluntary. If these beginners are generous, they seek, not to excuse themselves, but to correct themselves, and the Lord shows them their wretchedness and poverty, making them understand, however, that they must consider it only in the light of divine mercy, which exhorts them to advance. They must daily examine their consciences and learn to overcome themselves that they may not follow the unconsidered impulse of their passions.
However, they know themselves as yet only in a superficial way. They have not discovered what a treasure baptism placed in their souls, and they are ignorant of all the self-love and the often unconscious egoism still continuing in them and revealing itself from time to time under a sharp vexation or reproach. Often they have a clearer perception of this self-love in others than in themselves; they ought to remember Christ’s words: “Why seest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye; and seest not the beam that is in thy own eye?” (Matthew 7:3).
Truly generous beginners love the Lord with a holy fear of sin which makes them flee mortal sin, and even deliberate venial sins, by the mortification of the senses and of the inordinate passions, or of the threefold concupiscence of the flesh, the eyes, and pride. This indicates that they have the beginnings of a deep, voluntary love―but as yet an imperfect love.
Nevertheless, a number of beginners practically neglect necessary mortification, and resemble a man who would like to begin climbing a mountain, not from the base of the mountain but halfway up the side. When they do this, they ascend in their imagination only, but not in reality; they travel rapidly, and their first enthusiasm will die out as quickly as burning straw. They will believe that they have a knowledge of spiritual things and will abandon them after having barely examined them superficially. This is, alas, frequently the case.
If, on the contrary, the beginner is generous and seriously wishes to advance, it is not unusual for him to receive, as a reward, some sensible consolations in prayer or in the study of divine things. The Lord thus conquers his sensibility by sensible consolations―since he still lives chiefly by his senses. Sensible grace, so called because it reacts on the sensibility, turns it from dangerous things and draws it toward our Lord and His holy Mother. At these times, the generous beginner already loves God with his whole heart, but not yet with his whole soul, nor with all his strength, nor with all his mind.
Then what generally happens? Almost all beginners, on receiving these sensible consolations, take too much complacency in them―as if they were an end in themselves, and not a means to the end. They then fall into a certain spiritual gluttony accompanied by rash haste and curiosity in the study of divine things, by unconscious pride that makes them wish to talk about these things as if they were already masters of the subject. What follows from this? According to the logic of the spiritual life, it follows that a second conversion is necessary, as described by St. John of the Cross under the name of the passive purification of the senses “common to the greater number of beginners” (The Dark Night of the Soul, Book 1, chapter 8) in order to introduce them into “the Illuminative Way of Proficients, where God nourishes the soul by infused contemplation.” (The Dark Night of the Soul, Book 1, chap. 14).
This passive purification of the senses is manifested by a prolonged sensible aridity in which the beginner is stripped of the sensible consolations wherein he delighted too greatly. If in this aridity there is a keen desire for God, for His reign in us, and the fear of offending Him, it is a sign that a divine purification is taking place.
The Crisis Conversion of the Dark Night of the Senses
The many imperfections of those who live in this beginner’s state prevent them from entering the Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way). Those imperfections require God to purge them so that are a fit and suitable to enter into the state of proficients. He does this by introducing them into the first of two dark night―the Dark Night of the Senses (the other being the Dark Night of the Soul which comes just before the entry into the Third Way of the Spiritual Life). The Dark Night of the Senses can last a long or a short time. It can also repeat itself with both greater and lesser intensity.
There are two parts the Dark Night of the Senses―(1) the Active Dark Night of the Senses (where we ourselves purge ourselves from earthly attachments), and (2) the Passive Dark Night of the Senses (where God steps in and perfects the purging).
Active Dark Night of the Senses—This process involves the intentional letting go of all worldly attachments to sin. The soul continues to refocus its desires in such a way that everything within its passions and appetites are turned toward God and His holy will. The goal of the “active night of the senses” is to free your soul from the lowest forms of pleasure, so that you can more fully seek God who also produces within you the highest form of spiritual delight, resulting from the perfection of divine union with Him. This first step is just that: the first step. Once a person walks through this initial purgation of their appetites and desires, God will take them through three more levels of purgation. But the first step is where we begin.
In this first purgation in the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the person must engage in intentional acts of self-denial and must also seek to know God in a new and deeper way through the prayer of meditation and not merely vocal prayer. Selfishness must be stripped away, and all the deceptive pleasures flowing from sinful attachments and unhealthy desires must be eliminated. The reason for this is that we are easily deceived about that which is good for us. In the beginning of our spiritual journey, we still cling to the pleasure that comes from sin and from the many other things of this world. We may still believe that the things that satisfy us are money, sensual delights, excessive food or the satisfaction of other disordered cravings. And while those things do produce a certain form of temporary delight, the end result is slavery and bondage. Therefore, God wants you free. So this first step involves you making specific choices to turn away from these deceptive attachments and desires while, at the same time, you grow in your knowledge of the glorious truths that God wants to reveal to you.
Passive Dark Night of the Senses—Is the person who completes the active purgation of the senses, as outlined above, free of all sensory attachments? Well, yes and no. Yes, the person who goes through this first purgation does eliminate all habitual attachments to disordered attachments and desires. But in the process, they became attached to new sensory experiences that they didn’t have before. These new sensory experiences must now be purged so that the soul can attach itself to God and God alone in a spiritual way. What are these “new” sensory attachments? They are all of the many consolations, good feelings and delights that the soul experiences during its Christian journey as a beginner.
The Passive Night of the Senses completes the purgation of the sensory appetites begun in the previous step. The soul no longer finds earthly joy and satisfaction in the things of this world and finds its inordinate appetites drying up. This purgation is painful, but the pain helps the soul to focus on God alone. The soul also becomes aware of the presence of the Seven Capital Sins in a new spiritual form― Spiritual Pride; Spiritual Greed; Spiritual Lust; Spiritual Anger; Spiritual Gluttony; Spiritual Envy; Spiritual Sloth. As a result, God even begins to dry up spiritual desires―so that the soul will no longer serve God because it “feels good,” but rather, because of love of God alone.
In this Dark Night of the Senses, God weans them from the breasts of the initial gratifications and delights, and, through pure dryness and interior darkness, God takes away all trivialities and childish ways, and makes them acquire real and solid virtues. No matter how earnestly beginners practice the mortification of self in all their actions and passions, they will never be able to do so entirely—far from it—until God accomplishes it in them passively by means of the purgation of this Dark Night of the Senses.
The Dark Night of Sense is a passive process we go through where God purges our soul of its need for worldly comforts and worldly attachments to persons, places or things― which can be an obstacle to our growth in a union with God―in order to draw us closer to Him. The Dark Night of the Senses is the also a spiritual crisis in which God deliberately and purposefully withdraws spiritual consolations from the senses―no more warm fuzziness in prayer; no more pleasant emotions; no more pictorial visions in the imagination, no more physical comfort, no more protection from external distractions, etc.
At the same time, the soul typically experiences no more consolation in the things of God, but likewise finds no consolation in created things―it seems to be in a kind of a “no-man’s-land” between God and the world. Secondly, thinks on God but with a painful anxiety. Thirdly, the soul is unable to meditate on the things of God. Fourthly, God allows the beginner to attacked by all kinds of temptations―even blasphemy, impurity, fornication and questioning the reality of the existence of God! All of this causes great anxiety and suffering and the individual will often experience a spirit of confusion―but God is testing the soul as to how willing the individual is prepared to suffer. As St. John of the Cross explains, even though some Christians may want to go deeper in spiritual life, but they do not want to go through the difficulties.
When God starts this purgation of the senses, this is very difficult for the soul, because it begins to worry that it is regressing, or has done something wrong to lose God’s favor. Instead, God is preparing the soul to enter more deeply into the love of God―and excessive natural attachments to things, or spiritual attachments to consolations and feelings, can be a great hindrance and diversion from focusing on God. The soul learns to seek the God of consolation, and not merely the consolations of God. Perhaps this Dark Night of the Senses is one of the most misunderstood elements of daily Christian living.
Advance or Retreat?
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS firmly holds to his conviction that the light of divine union cannot be established in the soul unless inordinate attachments are eradicated: “The road and ascent to God, then, necessarily demands a habitual effort to renounce and mortify the appetites; the sooner this mortification is achieved, the sooner the soul reaches the top.” Faced with this painful purgation or conversion crisis in the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the soul can choose to endure and advance, or flee the purgation and cease advancing towards God. Harsh as it may sound, St. John of the Cross holds that even the most trifling inordinate attachment―for example, to an article of clothing, to a book, to the way food tastes―will make it impossible in the long run to progress to perfection. Therefore, he explains: “It makes little difference whether a bird is tied by a thin thread or by a cord. Even if it is tied by a thread, the bird will be held bound just as surely as if it were tied by a cord; that is, it will be impeded from flying as long as it does not break the thread. Admittedly, the thread is easier to break, but no matter how easily this may be done, the bird will not fly away without first doing so. This is the lot of those who are attached to something: No matter how much virtue they have they will not reach the freedom of the divine union.”
Conversions of the Apostles and Our Conversions
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, who writes: “Beginners in the spiritual life must, after a certain period, undergo a second conversion, similar to the second conversion of the Apostles at the end of Our Lord’s Passion, and, still later, before entering upon the life of perfect union, there must be a third conversion or transformation of the soul, similar to that which took place in the souls of the Apostles on the day of Pentecost. Their first conversion had taken place when Jesus called them, with the words: ‘I will make you fishers of men.’ They followed Our Lord, listened with admiration to His teaching, saw His miracles and took part in His ministry. Three of them saw Him transfigured on Thabor. All were present at the institution of the Eucharist, were ordained priests and received Holy Communion. But when the hour of the Passion arrived, an hour which Jesus had so often foretold, the Apostles abandoned their Master.
“Before the end of the Passion of Christ there was clearly a second conversion in Peter and the other Apostles, a conversion which was consolidated during the days that followed. After His resurrection Our Lord appeared to them several times, enlightening them. He made Peter compensate for his threefold denial by a threefold act of love. The threefold act of love made reparation for the threefold denial. It was a consolidation of the second conversion, a measure of confirmation in grace before the transformation of Pentecost. We may say that if the Apostles stood in need of a second conversion, then still more do we with our faults which make this second conversion necessary―in particular self-love. In varying degrees this egoism survives in all imperfect souls in spite of the state of grace, and it is the source of a multitude of venial sins, of habitual faults which become characteristic features of the soul, making necessary a veritable purging.”
“This self-love of beginners is the mercenary love of the imperfect, of those who, without being conscious of it, serve God from self-interest, because they are attached to temporal or spiritual consolations, and who shed tears of self-pity when they are deprived of them. It is a strange but not uncommon mixture of sincere love of God with an inordinate love of self. The soul loves God more than itself, otherwise it would not be in the state of grace, it would not possess Charity; but it still loves itself with an inordinate love. It has not yet reached the stage of loving itself in God and for His sake. Such a state of soul is neither white nor black; it is a light grey, in which there is more white than black. The soul is on the upward path, but it still has a tendency to slip downwards. If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back. This is what the Fathers of the Church have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God, he who makes no progress, loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child but becomes an idiot, so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!”
ST. CATHERINE OF SIENA, in the 60th chapter of the Dialogue, writes (it is God who speaks): “Among those who have become My trusted servants there are some who serve Me with Faith, without servile fear―it is not the mere fear of punishment, but love which attaches them to My service (thus Peter before the Passion). But this love is still imperfect, because what they seek in My service (at any rate to a great extent) is their own profit, their own satisfaction, or the pleasure that they find in Me. The same imperfection is found in the love which they bear towards their neighbor. And do you know what shows the imperfection of their love? It is that, as soon as they are deprived of the consolations which they find in Me, their love fails and can no longer survive. It becomes weak and gradually cools towards Me when, in order to exercise them in virtue and to detach them from their imperfection, I withdraw spiritual consolations from them and send them difficulties and afflictions. I withdraw from the soul,” says the Lord, “so that it may see and know its defects, so that, feeling itself deprived of consolation and afflicted by pain, it may recognize its own weakness, and learn how incapable it is of stability or perseverance. I act in this way in order to bring them to perfection, to teach them to know themselves, to realize that they are nothing and that of themselves they have no grace. Adversity should have the effect of making them seek refuge in Me, recognize Me as their benefactor, and become attached to Me by a true humility. Then, having recognized the grievousness of its sin and repented of it, the soul begins to weep, for fear of punishment; then it rises to the consideration of My mercy, in which it finds satisfaction and comfort. But it is still imperfect, and, in order to draw it on to perfection, I withdraw from it―not in grace but in feeling. This I do in order to humiliate that soul, and cause it to seek Me in truth―without thought of self and with lively Faith and with hatred of its own sensuality. If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back.” (words of God to St. Catherine of Siena).
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE comments: “This is what the Fathers have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God, he who makes no progress, loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child, but becomes an idiot―so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” (Three Ages of the Interior Life).
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS gives us three signs which mark this second conversion: “The first sign is that the soul finds no pleasure or consolation in the things of God, but it also fails to find pleasure in anything created.... The second sign is that ordinarily the memory is centered upon God, with painful care and solicitude, thinking that it is not serving God, but backsliding, because it finds itself without sweetness in the things of God.... The third sign... is that the soul can no longer meditate or reflect in its sense of the imagination―for God now begins to communicate Himself to it―no longer through sense, as He did before, by means of reflections which joined and sundered its knowledge―but by an act of simple contemplation, which neither the exterior nor the interior senses of the lower part of the soul can attain.” Thus the Beginners advance to entry levels of the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Proficients, or the way of those making progress, according to St. John of the Cross, “upon the road and way of the spirit, which ... is called the way of illumination or of infused contemplation, wherewith God Himself feeds and refreshes the soul.”
The Fruits of Second Conversion
As we undergo this second conversion, as we enter into the Illuminative Way or the Way of Proficients, we reap further benefits of God’s love. One such benefit is an entry into contemplative prayer. We begin to contemplate the great mysteries of our Faith. Our life of contemplation grows without need for consolations from God, almost in replacement of consolation. We gain an even greater appreciation of the price of His Blood paid for our individual soul. Our relationship with God, our encounter with Him, now becomes more continuous as opposed to occasional. We are becoming His constant friend and companion, not just a servant who comes when beckoned. We become much more aware of God within us, of His constant presence within our soul. We become more aware of His continued presence and governance in our lives. The statement we have heard so often, that in a life with God there are no coincidences, now takes on real meaning. We experience the reality of becoming not just sanctified, but sanctified in Him.
During this time, we also understand how difficult it is to speak with those still on the first level of Beginners and communicate to them a true understanding of what we have become after this second conversion. The Proficients in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life observe the Beginners still enamored with the latest car, or fashion, or vacation spot, or technology, or any of the hundred other things that seem so very important. People collecting thousands of sports cards, as if they had real intrinsic value. People devoting enormous amounts of time and money to all sorts of things having no spiritual value whatever. It is like an adolescent trying to have a meaningful conversation about teenage kinds of things with a three year old. You can understand what they are experiencing but they cannot understand what you are experiencing, for they have no relational basis for absorbing what you say. It reminds us of what Jesus told His disciples in the account of the washing of the feet in the Gospel of John: “What I am doing you do not understand now, but you will understand later.”
As God begins to act in our lives, He may withdraw not only our consolations, but also those things to which we hold dear. He has to bring us to a state where we truly live the commandment to love God with our whole being. In some cases, He may remove either things, or people, or both from our lives. He may remove a loved one, or remove personal health, or social status, or the esteem in which we are held in the eyes of others. As these things happen, the suffering soul may cry out and try to hold on even tighter to the things to which they are attached, holding on so tight their knuckles turn white. Then He may remove the knuckles. He continues until finally the soul falls to its knees, and looking up at God cries out, “Why me? Why now? What more will You take from me? What else do You want from me?” He will look on the soul with love and reply: “I want whatever it is you prefer to hold onto instead of holding Me.” Then He will offer His hand, and if we are able to respond to this grace and place our hand in His, He will fill us with Himself and we will finally understand what He has been trying to offer us for so long.
The fruit of this second conversion is a beginning of contemplation by a progressive understanding of the great mystery of the Cross and the Redemption, a living appreciation of the infinite value of the Blood which Christ shed for us. The illuminative life―the Second Way of the Spiritual Life, or the Way of Proficients―brings with it the obscure infused contemplation of the mysteries of Faith, a contemplation which had already been initiated in the passive night of the senses. This early stage and minimal level of contemplation is accompanied by a union with God less dependent upon the fluctuations of sensibility, a purer, a stronger, a more continuous union. Sometimes this full illuminative life involves, not only the infused contemplation of mysteries, but also certain extraordinary graces (visions, revelations, interior speech), such as those described by St. Teresa in her own life.
Subsequently, if not joy, at all events peace, takes up its dwelling in the soul―even in the midst of adversity. The soul becomes filled, no longer with a merely abstract, theoretical and vague persuasion, but with a concrete and living conviction, that in God’s government all things are ordained towards the manifestation of His goodness: “To them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to his purpose, are called to be saints” (Romans 8:28). At the end of the Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena, God Himself declares this truth: “Nothing has ever happened and nothing happens except by the plan of My divine Providence. In all things that I permit, in all things that I give you, in tribulations and in consolations, temporal or spiritual, I do nothing save for your good, so that you may be sanctified in Me and that My Truth be fulfilled in you.”
The Traits and Characteristics of Proficients or Progressives
The Illuminative Way (the Second Way of the Spiritual Life or the Way of Proficients) consists of those who are in the state of progress and have their passions better under control, so that they easily keep themselves from mortal sin, but who do not so easily avoid venial sins, because they still take pleasure in earthly things and allow their minds to be distracted by various imaginations and their hearts with numberless desires―though not in matters that are strictly unlawful.
This second level or stage of the spiritual life is where the soul, now habitually free of mortal sin, starts to focus on THREE chief things: (1) the Proficient soul now starts to look for its venial sins in order to battle them, uproot them and destroy them, (2) It starts to pray much, much more than ever before, and (3) it starts to focus on the systematic (not random or sporadic) acquisition of virtues.
It is called the Illuminative Way, because in it the mind becomes more and more enlightened as to spiritual things and the practice of virtue. In this second stage, Charity is stronger and more perfect than in the state of Beginners; the soul is chiefly occupied with progress in the spiritual life and in all the virtues, both theological and moral. The practice of prayer suitable for this state is meditation on the mysteries of the Incarnation, the life of Our Savior, and the mysteries of His Sacred Passion.
The fundamental virtue of this state is recollection, that is, a constant attention of the mind and of the affections of the heart to thoughts and sentiments which elevate the soul to God ― exterior recollection which consists in the love of silence and retirement, interior recollection in simplicity of spirit and a right intention, as well as attention to God in all our actions. This does not mean that a person has to neglect the duties of his state or position in life, nor does it imply that honest and needful recreation should be avoided, because these lawful or necessary circumstances or occupations can well be reconciled with perfect recollection and the most holy union with God.
The soul in the Illuminative Way will have to experience periods of spiritual consolations and desolations. It does not at once enter upon the Unitive Way when it has passed through the aridities of the first purgation. It must spend some time, perhaps years, after quitting the state of beginners in exercising itself in the state of proficients.
St. John of the Cross tells us that in this state the soul, like one released from a rigorous imprisonment, occupies itself in Divine thoughts with a much greater freedom and satisfaction, and its joy is more abundant and interior than it ever experienced before it entered the night of the senses.
Its purgation is still somewhat incomplete, and the purification of the senses is not yet finished and perfect. It is not without aridities, darkness, and trials, sometimes more severe than in the past. During the period of desolation it will have to endure much suffering from temptations against the theological virtues and against the moral virtues. It will have to endure sometimes other diabolical attacks upon its imagination and senses. Also, God will permit natural causes to combine in afflicting the soul, such as the persecutions of men, and the ingratitude of friends. Patient suffering and resignation have to be borne during all these trials.
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE goes on to describe the chief traits and characteristics of souls that have graduated from the first level of Beginners into the second level of Proficients or Progressives (=those making progress):
“The mentality of Proficients, like that of the preceding level of Beginners, must be described in function of their knowledge and love of God. With their self-knowledge there is developed in them a quasi-experimental knowledge of God. They know Him, no longer merely in the mirror of the things of sense or of parables, but in the mirror of the mysteries of salvation, with which they become more and more familiar and which the Rosary, the school of contemplation, sets daily before their eyes.
“The greatness of God is contemplated now, no longer merely in the mirror of the starry heavens, in the sea or the mountains, no longer merely in the parables of the Good Shepherd or the Prodigal Son, but in the incomparably more perfect mirror of the mysteries of the Incarnation and the Redemption. The soul rises in a spiral movement, from the mystery of the Incarnation or the Infancy of Jesus, to those of His Passion, His Resurrection, His Ascension and His Glory; and in these mysteries it contemplates the radiance of the sovereign Goodness of God―thus admirably communicating itself to us. In this contemplation, which is more or less frequent, the Proficients receive an abundance of light—in proportion to their fidelity and generosity—through the gift of understanding, which enables them to penetrate more and more deeply into these mysteries, and to appreciate their beauty, at once so simple and so sublime.
“In the preceding period or stage of Beginners, God had won over their sensibility; now He thoroughly subjugates their intelligence to Himself, raising it above the excessive preoccupations and complications of merely human knowledge. He simplifies their knowledge by spiritualizing it. Accordingly, and as a normal consequence, these Proficients―being thus enlightened concerning the mysteries of the life of Christ―love God, not only by avoiding mortal sin and deliberate venial sin, but by imitating the virtues of Our Lord. His humility, gentleness, patience; and by observing not only those commandments that are laid upon all, but also the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience, or at any rate by keeping the spirit of these counsels, and by avoiding imperfections.
“As happened in the preceding period of Beginners, this generosity is rewarded, but no longer by merely sensible consolations, but by a greater abundance of light in contemplation and in the work of the apostolate; by intense desires for the glory of God and the salvation of souls, and by a greater facility in prayer. Not infrequently we find in the Proficients the prayer of Quiet, in which the will is momentarily held captive by the love of God. This period is marked also by a great facility in doing works for God, such as teaching, directing, organizing, and the rest. This is to love God, not only with the whole heart, but with the whole soul, with the whole of one’s activities; but not yet with the whole strength, nor with the whole mind―because God has not yet achieved complete dominion in that higher region of the soul which we call the spirit.
“And what happens generally at this stage? Something similar to what happened in the case of the Beginners who had been rewarded with sensible consolations. The Proficient begins to take complacency—by reason of an unconscious pride—in this great facility in prayer, working, teaching, or preaching. He tends to forget that these are God’s gifts, and he rejoices in them with a proprietary air which ill beseems one who adores in spirit and in truth. It is true that he is working for God, he is working for souls; but he has not yet sufficiently forgotten himself. An unconscious self-seeking and self-importance cause him to dissipate himself and to lose the sense of the presence of God. He thinks that his labors are being very fruitful; but it is not quite certain. He is becoming too sure of himself, he gives himself too much importance and is perhaps inclined to exaggerate his own talents, to forget his own imperfection and to be too greatly aware of the imperfections of others. Purity of intention, true recollection, perfect straightforwardness, are often lacking; there is something of a lie in his life. The depth of the soul does not belong entirely to God. God is offered an intention which really is only half given to Him.
“St. John of the Cross mentions these defects of Proficients as they are found in pure contemplatives, who, he says, ‘believe in vain visions and presume that God and the saints are speaking with them’―being deceived by the ruses of the devil. Not less notable are the defects, mentioned, for example, by St. Alphonsus, which are found in apostolic men entrusted with the care of souls. These defects in Proficients become manifest especially in the obstacles which they are called upon to meet, or in differences of opinion which, even at this advanced period of the spiritual life, may cause vocations to be lost. It then becomes evident that the presence of God is not sufficiently borne in mind, and that, in the search for God, it is the self which is really being sought. Hence the need of a third purgation; hence the need of that strong lye of the purgation of the spirit, in order to cleanse the very depth of the spiritual faculties.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
The Three Ways “See-Saw” or “Yo-Yo”
It is important to remember that the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in not a “one-way-street” ― even though that is what God would like it to be. What goes up, can come down. We can three steps forward, only to find ourselves taking one, or two, or three steps backwards. Everyone is different―and everyone has different levels of pride―which is the root of all sin: “Pride is the beginning of all sin―he that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Pride is a part of the baggage that comes along with Original Sin. It is one of the first things in our life―and it usually one of the last vices to disappear. As we progress through the Three Ways, our pride certainly diminishes in proportion to our growth in true humility. Nevertheless, even devout and holy persons can still have a good dose of pride―though it not brash and obvious, but disguised and hidden―much like a wolf in the clothing of sheep.
Pride often makes us imagine that we are much advanced in the spiritual life than actually is the case. It is ultimately pride that makes us fall back down the ladder of our spiritual climb to Heaven: “Pride goes before destruction: and the spirit is lifted up before a fall!” (Proverbs 16:18). It is for that reason Our Lord related for us the parable about the Pharisee and the Publican: “And Jesus spoke this parable to certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up into the Temple to pray―the one, a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself: “God! I thank you, that I am not as other men are―extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this Publican! I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes to Heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying: “God! Be merciful to me a sinner!” I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other―for every one that exalts himself shall be abased; and he that humbles himself shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
Our pride might be hiding from us the fact that we lukewarm, or even in mortal sin―thus meaning that we have not even entered the First Way of the Spiritual Life! Remember the sobering words of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” Also the sobering words of Fr. Frederick Faber: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind.” Likewise the sobering words of St. Alphonsus Liguori: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil that is not of rare occurrence, but frequent, especially in small country districts, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.” Could we be in mortal sin and not know it? Possibly―though it is more likely that we have forgotten our bad confession or bad confessions. Let us ask Our Lady―the Refuge of Sinners, the Mother of Mercy, the Seat of Wisdom―to help us clearly see the true state of our soul and then to take the appropriate steps to heal it!
We are currently embarked upon a series of articles on the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. These are three obligatory stages or levels that every single soul on Earth must pass through if they wish to attain Heaven―except, of course, those baptized souls that die before reaching the age of reason. The duration of each stage depends upon the Providence of God and the willing cooperation of each individual soul.
The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life could be said be an essential “road map” to Heaven―giving directions and showing what we can expect to encounter on the road. We ignore them at our own peril―and many have perished through ignoring them. The fact that very few people know about these Three Ways of the Spiritual Life (or that very few care to know), can partially explain why the souls of most persons tragically end up being damned. As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” Most people will not attain the perfection of divine union (the Third Way of the Spiritual Life, the Unitive Way or the Way of the Perfect) until after death and after the purifying fires of Purgatory.
We cannot naively and foolishly make up our own path to Heaven―God has already mapped it out, and He expects us to follow His directions! It is a case of His way or the highway―or rather His way or the “broad way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat!” (Matthew 7:13). “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) ― and many could choose to study the Three Ways, but few choose to do so!
Even though this article will be dealing with Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Proficient Souls or the Illuminative Way), it is necessary to link this to the conversion crisis that Beginners in the First Way of the Spiritual Life must undergo, endure and cooperate with before they gain admittance to the Second Way. So let us briefly look at the faults of the Beginner that have to be purged by God through the means of a conversion crisis that is called the Dark Night of the Senses.
A Beginner is Beginner and No More!
The whole idea of a “beginning” is that it is just that―only a beginning and not an end; it is only a point of departure and not the point of destination. It is a state of imperfection that requires perfection―and that can only come by work and effort―just like being a Kindergartner is a long away from being a 12th Grade graduate; or a U.S. Marine recruit in Boot Camp is a long way from being a polished, battle-hardened, experienced Marine soldier. The Beginner in the Spiritual Life still has one foot in the world and the things of the world, while the other foot has stepped into the spiritual world. Beginners travel on the spiritual road to God in an inferior way and are wrapped-up in their own selfish desires. Beginners by definition are engaged in the balancing act of living by Faith and “doing one’s own thing” at one and the same time. They endeavor to sugarcoat their Faith. This makes for mixed feelings, divided loyalties or contradictory ideas. Their choices are partly for God, partly for themselves.
The Beginners in the spiritual life, those who have managed to pull themselves out of habitual mortal sin, are still susceptible to falling back into it. Like a beginner in any field, they are still inexperienced and weak as regards the depths and workings of the spiritual life. They think themselves safe, and some even rashly think themselves holy, but it is merely the bravado and false confidence akin to that of a child learning in school. It thinks itself to be wiser than its parents at times, but a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. Most of the world does not even register venial sin on their radar; or if they do, then it is to them a mere trifle, something that everyone does and something unimportant, since the Church says it cannot send you to Hell. But the Church also teaches that venial sin is, after mortal sin, the GREATEST EVIL IN THE WORLD. The Beginner has not “arrived” by leaving mortal sin behind, he has barely started. A man can be tied down not only by chains (mortal sin), but he can also be tied down by a multitude of strands of cotton thread; both can prevent any progress. A bird, likewise, can be prevented from flying upwards, to the heavens, by both wire and thread.
Faults of Beginners in the Spiritual Life
Beginners also tend to lack enthusiasm and energy when told to do something unpleasant. Because they always look for spiritual gratifications and delights, the result is that they are extremely weak in the fortitude and lax in labor that demands perfection. Like those who are rich and raised in luxury, they run from everything rough, and they are scandalized by the cross in which true spiritual delights are found. And the more spiritual exercises they have, the greater is their boredom. Since they expect to go about in spiritual matters according to the whims and satisfactions of their own will, they find that having to enter the narrow way of life is saddening, depressing and repugnant to them. The imperfect soul of the Beginner will often try to seek the Father without following the way of Jesus crucified, because they have a strong aversion to the suffering they know is required.
In the previous article, we listed some of the chief faults and failings of Beginners in the Spiritual Life, which have to be addressed and corrected―Spiritual inexperience and immaturity; Lack of generosity; Distractions leading away from spiritual things; Discouragement at imagined or perceived lack of progress or success; Seeking personal advantages; Living too much by feelings and emotions; Having a merely theoretical and abstract Faith; Being too material and sensual; Prayer can be mechanical, hurried and distracted.
The Immaturity of Beginners in the Spiritual Life
Being a beginner in the spiritual life―by having entered the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―can affect the soul in various ways. God often showers the new beginner with a variety of spiritual delights and graces. Some beginners risk loving those delights and graces more than they love God, Who is the origin of them. Many beginners want God to desire what they want, and they become sad if they have to desire God’s will. They feel an aversion toward adapting their will to God’s―because His will is usually more demanding than their own self-indulgent will. Hence they frequently believe that what is not their will, or brings them no satisfaction, is not God’s will, and, on the other hand, that if they are satisfied, then God is also satisfied. They measure God by themselves and not themselves by God.
Beginners have an initial knowledge of themselves; little by little they discern the defects they have, the remains of sins that have already been forgiven, and new failings that are more or less deliberate and voluntary. If these beginners are generous, they seek, not to excuse themselves, but to correct themselves, and the Lord shows them their wretchedness and poverty, making them understand, however, that they must consider it only in the light of divine mercy, which exhorts them to advance. They must daily examine their consciences and learn to overcome themselves that they may not follow the unconsidered impulse of their passions.
However, they know themselves as yet only in a superficial way. They have not discovered what a treasure baptism placed in their souls, and they are ignorant of all the self-love and the often unconscious egoism still continuing in them and revealing itself from time to time under a sharp vexation or reproach. Often they have a clearer perception of this self-love in others than in themselves; they ought to remember Christ’s words: “Why seest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye; and seest not the beam that is in thy own eye?” (Matthew 7:3).
Truly generous beginners love the Lord with a holy fear of sin which makes them flee mortal sin, and even deliberate venial sins, by the mortification of the senses and of the inordinate passions, or of the threefold concupiscence of the flesh, the eyes, and pride. This indicates that they have the beginnings of a deep, voluntary love―but as yet an imperfect love.
Nevertheless, a number of beginners practically neglect necessary mortification, and resemble a man who would like to begin climbing a mountain, not from the base of the mountain but halfway up the side. When they do this, they ascend in their imagination only, but not in reality; they travel rapidly, and their first enthusiasm will die out as quickly as burning straw. They will believe that they have a knowledge of spiritual things and will abandon them after having barely examined them superficially. This is, alas, frequently the case.
If, on the contrary, the beginner is generous and seriously wishes to advance, it is not unusual for him to receive, as a reward, some sensible consolations in prayer or in the study of divine things. The Lord thus conquers his sensibility by sensible consolations―since he still lives chiefly by his senses. Sensible grace, so called because it reacts on the sensibility, turns it from dangerous things and draws it toward our Lord and His holy Mother. At these times, the generous beginner already loves God with his whole heart, but not yet with his whole soul, nor with all his strength, nor with all his mind.
Then what generally happens? Almost all beginners, on receiving these sensible consolations, take too much complacency in them―as if they were an end in themselves, and not a means to the end. They then fall into a certain spiritual gluttony accompanied by rash haste and curiosity in the study of divine things, by unconscious pride that makes them wish to talk about these things as if they were already masters of the subject. What follows from this? According to the logic of the spiritual life, it follows that a second conversion is necessary, as described by St. John of the Cross under the name of the passive purification of the senses “common to the greater number of beginners” (The Dark Night of the Soul, Book 1, chapter 8) in order to introduce them into “the Illuminative Way of Proficients, where God nourishes the soul by infused contemplation.” (The Dark Night of the Soul, Book 1, chap. 14).
This passive purification of the senses is manifested by a prolonged sensible aridity in which the beginner is stripped of the sensible consolations wherein he delighted too greatly. If in this aridity there is a keen desire for God, for His reign in us, and the fear of offending Him, it is a sign that a divine purification is taking place.
The Crisis Conversion of the Dark Night of the Senses
The many imperfections of those who live in this beginner’s state prevent them from entering the Second Way of the Spiritual Life (the Way of Proficients or the Illuminative Way). Those imperfections require God to purge them so that are a fit and suitable to enter into the state of proficients. He does this by introducing them into the first of two dark night―the Dark Night of the Senses (the other being the Dark Night of the Soul which comes just before the entry into the Third Way of the Spiritual Life). The Dark Night of the Senses can last a long or a short time. It can also repeat itself with both greater and lesser intensity.
There are two parts the Dark Night of the Senses―(1) the Active Dark Night of the Senses (where we ourselves purge ourselves from earthly attachments), and (2) the Passive Dark Night of the Senses (where God steps in and perfects the purging).
Active Dark Night of the Senses—This process involves the intentional letting go of all worldly attachments to sin. The soul continues to refocus its desires in such a way that everything within its passions and appetites are turned toward God and His holy will. The goal of the “active night of the senses” is to free your soul from the lowest forms of pleasure, so that you can more fully seek God who also produces within you the highest form of spiritual delight, resulting from the perfection of divine union with Him. This first step is just that: the first step. Once a person walks through this initial purgation of their appetites and desires, God will take them through three more levels of purgation. But the first step is where we begin.
In this first purgation in the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the person must engage in intentional acts of self-denial and must also seek to know God in a new and deeper way through the prayer of meditation and not merely vocal prayer. Selfishness must be stripped away, and all the deceptive pleasures flowing from sinful attachments and unhealthy desires must be eliminated. The reason for this is that we are easily deceived about that which is good for us. In the beginning of our spiritual journey, we still cling to the pleasure that comes from sin and from the many other things of this world. We may still believe that the things that satisfy us are money, sensual delights, excessive food or the satisfaction of other disordered cravings. And while those things do produce a certain form of temporary delight, the end result is slavery and bondage. Therefore, God wants you free. So this first step involves you making specific choices to turn away from these deceptive attachments and desires while, at the same time, you grow in your knowledge of the glorious truths that God wants to reveal to you.
Passive Dark Night of the Senses—Is the person who completes the active purgation of the senses, as outlined above, free of all sensory attachments? Well, yes and no. Yes, the person who goes through this first purgation does eliminate all habitual attachments to disordered attachments and desires. But in the process, they became attached to new sensory experiences that they didn’t have before. These new sensory experiences must now be purged so that the soul can attach itself to God and God alone in a spiritual way. What are these “new” sensory attachments? They are all of the many consolations, good feelings and delights that the soul experiences during its Christian journey as a beginner.
The Passive Night of the Senses completes the purgation of the sensory appetites begun in the previous step. The soul no longer finds earthly joy and satisfaction in the things of this world and finds its inordinate appetites drying up. This purgation is painful, but the pain helps the soul to focus on God alone. The soul also becomes aware of the presence of the Seven Capital Sins in a new spiritual form― Spiritual Pride; Spiritual Greed; Spiritual Lust; Spiritual Anger; Spiritual Gluttony; Spiritual Envy; Spiritual Sloth. As a result, God even begins to dry up spiritual desires―so that the soul will no longer serve God because it “feels good,” but rather, because of love of God alone.
In this Dark Night of the Senses, God weans them from the breasts of the initial gratifications and delights, and, through pure dryness and interior darkness, God takes away all trivialities and childish ways, and makes them acquire real and solid virtues. No matter how earnestly beginners practice the mortification of self in all their actions and passions, they will never be able to do so entirely—far from it—until God accomplishes it in them passively by means of the purgation of this Dark Night of the Senses.
The Dark Night of Sense is a passive process we go through where God purges our soul of its need for worldly comforts and worldly attachments to persons, places or things― which can be an obstacle to our growth in a union with God―in order to draw us closer to Him. The Dark Night of the Senses is the also a spiritual crisis in which God deliberately and purposefully withdraws spiritual consolations from the senses―no more warm fuzziness in prayer; no more pleasant emotions; no more pictorial visions in the imagination, no more physical comfort, no more protection from external distractions, etc.
At the same time, the soul typically experiences no more consolation in the things of God, but likewise finds no consolation in created things―it seems to be in a kind of a “no-man’s-land” between God and the world. Secondly, thinks on God but with a painful anxiety. Thirdly, the soul is unable to meditate on the things of God. Fourthly, God allows the beginner to attacked by all kinds of temptations―even blasphemy, impurity, fornication and questioning the reality of the existence of God! All of this causes great anxiety and suffering and the individual will often experience a spirit of confusion―but God is testing the soul as to how willing the individual is prepared to suffer. As St. John of the Cross explains, even though some Christians may want to go deeper in spiritual life, but they do not want to go through the difficulties.
When God starts this purgation of the senses, this is very difficult for the soul, because it begins to worry that it is regressing, or has done something wrong to lose God’s favor. Instead, God is preparing the soul to enter more deeply into the love of God―and excessive natural attachments to things, or spiritual attachments to consolations and feelings, can be a great hindrance and diversion from focusing on God. The soul learns to seek the God of consolation, and not merely the consolations of God. Perhaps this Dark Night of the Senses is one of the most misunderstood elements of daily Christian living.
Advance or Retreat?
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS firmly holds to his conviction that the light of divine union cannot be established in the soul unless inordinate attachments are eradicated: “The road and ascent to God, then, necessarily demands a habitual effort to renounce and mortify the appetites; the sooner this mortification is achieved, the sooner the soul reaches the top.” Faced with this painful purgation or conversion crisis in the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the soul can choose to endure and advance, or flee the purgation and cease advancing towards God. Harsh as it may sound, St. John of the Cross holds that even the most trifling inordinate attachment―for example, to an article of clothing, to a book, to the way food tastes―will make it impossible in the long run to progress to perfection. Therefore, he explains: “It makes little difference whether a bird is tied by a thin thread or by a cord. Even if it is tied by a thread, the bird will be held bound just as surely as if it were tied by a cord; that is, it will be impeded from flying as long as it does not break the thread. Admittedly, the thread is easier to break, but no matter how easily this may be done, the bird will not fly away without first doing so. This is the lot of those who are attached to something: No matter how much virtue they have they will not reach the freedom of the divine union.”
Conversions of the Apostles and Our Conversions
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, who writes: “Beginners in the spiritual life must, after a certain period, undergo a second conversion, similar to the second conversion of the Apostles at the end of Our Lord’s Passion, and, still later, before entering upon the life of perfect union, there must be a third conversion or transformation of the soul, similar to that which took place in the souls of the Apostles on the day of Pentecost. Their first conversion had taken place when Jesus called them, with the words: ‘I will make you fishers of men.’ They followed Our Lord, listened with admiration to His teaching, saw His miracles and took part in His ministry. Three of them saw Him transfigured on Thabor. All were present at the institution of the Eucharist, were ordained priests and received Holy Communion. But when the hour of the Passion arrived, an hour which Jesus had so often foretold, the Apostles abandoned their Master.
“Before the end of the Passion of Christ there was clearly a second conversion in Peter and the other Apostles, a conversion which was consolidated during the days that followed. After His resurrection Our Lord appeared to them several times, enlightening them. He made Peter compensate for his threefold denial by a threefold act of love. The threefold act of love made reparation for the threefold denial. It was a consolidation of the second conversion, a measure of confirmation in grace before the transformation of Pentecost. We may say that if the Apostles stood in need of a second conversion, then still more do we with our faults which make this second conversion necessary―in particular self-love. In varying degrees this egoism survives in all imperfect souls in spite of the state of grace, and it is the source of a multitude of venial sins, of habitual faults which become characteristic features of the soul, making necessary a veritable purging.”
“This self-love of beginners is the mercenary love of the imperfect, of those who, without being conscious of it, serve God from self-interest, because they are attached to temporal or spiritual consolations, and who shed tears of self-pity when they are deprived of them. It is a strange but not uncommon mixture of sincere love of God with an inordinate love of self. The soul loves God more than itself, otherwise it would not be in the state of grace, it would not possess Charity; but it still loves itself with an inordinate love. It has not yet reached the stage of loving itself in God and for His sake. Such a state of soul is neither white nor black; it is a light grey, in which there is more white than black. The soul is on the upward path, but it still has a tendency to slip downwards. If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back. This is what the Fathers of the Church have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God, he who makes no progress, loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child but becomes an idiot, so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!”
ST. CATHERINE OF SIENA, in the 60th chapter of the Dialogue, writes (it is God who speaks): “Among those who have become My trusted servants there are some who serve Me with Faith, without servile fear―it is not the mere fear of punishment, but love which attaches them to My service (thus Peter before the Passion). But this love is still imperfect, because what they seek in My service (at any rate to a great extent) is their own profit, their own satisfaction, or the pleasure that they find in Me. The same imperfection is found in the love which they bear towards their neighbor. And do you know what shows the imperfection of their love? It is that, as soon as they are deprived of the consolations which they find in Me, their love fails and can no longer survive. It becomes weak and gradually cools towards Me when, in order to exercise them in virtue and to detach them from their imperfection, I withdraw spiritual consolations from them and send them difficulties and afflictions. I withdraw from the soul,” says the Lord, “so that it may see and know its defects, so that, feeling itself deprived of consolation and afflicted by pain, it may recognize its own weakness, and learn how incapable it is of stability or perseverance. I act in this way in order to bring them to perfection, to teach them to know themselves, to realize that they are nothing and that of themselves they have no grace. Adversity should have the effect of making them seek refuge in Me, recognize Me as their benefactor, and become attached to Me by a true humility. Then, having recognized the grievousness of its sin and repented of it, the soul begins to weep, for fear of punishment; then it rises to the consideration of My mercy, in which it finds satisfaction and comfort. But it is still imperfect, and, in order to draw it on to perfection, I withdraw from it―not in grace but in feeling. This I do in order to humiliate that soul, and cause it to seek Me in truth―without thought of self and with lively Faith and with hatred of its own sensuality. If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back.” (words of God to St. Catherine of Siena).
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE comments: “This is what the Fathers have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God, he who makes no progress, loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child, but becomes an idiot―so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” (Three Ages of the Interior Life).
ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS gives us three signs which mark this second conversion: “The first sign is that the soul finds no pleasure or consolation in the things of God, but it also fails to find pleasure in anything created.... The second sign is that ordinarily the memory is centered upon God, with painful care and solicitude, thinking that it is not serving God, but backsliding, because it finds itself without sweetness in the things of God.... The third sign... is that the soul can no longer meditate or reflect in its sense of the imagination―for God now begins to communicate Himself to it―no longer through sense, as He did before, by means of reflections which joined and sundered its knowledge―but by an act of simple contemplation, which neither the exterior nor the interior senses of the lower part of the soul can attain.” Thus the Beginners advance to entry levels of the Second Way of the Spiritual Life―the Way of Proficients, or the way of those making progress, according to St. John of the Cross, “upon the road and way of the spirit, which ... is called the way of illumination or of infused contemplation, wherewith God Himself feeds and refreshes the soul.”
The Fruits of Second Conversion
As we undergo this second conversion, as we enter into the Illuminative Way or the Way of Proficients, we reap further benefits of God’s love. One such benefit is an entry into contemplative prayer. We begin to contemplate the great mysteries of our Faith. Our life of contemplation grows without need for consolations from God, almost in replacement of consolation. We gain an even greater appreciation of the price of His Blood paid for our individual soul. Our relationship with God, our encounter with Him, now becomes more continuous as opposed to occasional. We are becoming His constant friend and companion, not just a servant who comes when beckoned. We become much more aware of God within us, of His constant presence within our soul. We become more aware of His continued presence and governance in our lives. The statement we have heard so often, that in a life with God there are no coincidences, now takes on real meaning. We experience the reality of becoming not just sanctified, but sanctified in Him.
During this time, we also understand how difficult it is to speak with those still on the first level of Beginners and communicate to them a true understanding of what we have become after this second conversion. The Proficients in the Second Way of the Spiritual Life observe the Beginners still enamored with the latest car, or fashion, or vacation spot, or technology, or any of the hundred other things that seem so very important. People collecting thousands of sports cards, as if they had real intrinsic value. People devoting enormous amounts of time and money to all sorts of things having no spiritual value whatever. It is like an adolescent trying to have a meaningful conversation about teenage kinds of things with a three year old. You can understand what they are experiencing but they cannot understand what you are experiencing, for they have no relational basis for absorbing what you say. It reminds us of what Jesus told His disciples in the account of the washing of the feet in the Gospel of John: “What I am doing you do not understand now, but you will understand later.”
As God begins to act in our lives, He may withdraw not only our consolations, but also those things to which we hold dear. He has to bring us to a state where we truly live the commandment to love God with our whole being. In some cases, He may remove either things, or people, or both from our lives. He may remove a loved one, or remove personal health, or social status, or the esteem in which we are held in the eyes of others. As these things happen, the suffering soul may cry out and try to hold on even tighter to the things to which they are attached, holding on so tight their knuckles turn white. Then He may remove the knuckles. He continues until finally the soul falls to its knees, and looking up at God cries out, “Why me? Why now? What more will You take from me? What else do You want from me?” He will look on the soul with love and reply: “I want whatever it is you prefer to hold onto instead of holding Me.” Then He will offer His hand, and if we are able to respond to this grace and place our hand in His, He will fill us with Himself and we will finally understand what He has been trying to offer us for so long.
The fruit of this second conversion is a beginning of contemplation by a progressive understanding of the great mystery of the Cross and the Redemption, a living appreciation of the infinite value of the Blood which Christ shed for us. The illuminative life―the Second Way of the Spiritual Life, or the Way of Proficients―brings with it the obscure infused contemplation of the mysteries of Faith, a contemplation which had already been initiated in the passive night of the senses. This early stage and minimal level of contemplation is accompanied by a union with God less dependent upon the fluctuations of sensibility, a purer, a stronger, a more continuous union. Sometimes this full illuminative life involves, not only the infused contemplation of mysteries, but also certain extraordinary graces (visions, revelations, interior speech), such as those described by St. Teresa in her own life.
Subsequently, if not joy, at all events peace, takes up its dwelling in the soul―even in the midst of adversity. The soul becomes filled, no longer with a merely abstract, theoretical and vague persuasion, but with a concrete and living conviction, that in God’s government all things are ordained towards the manifestation of His goodness: “To them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to his purpose, are called to be saints” (Romans 8:28). At the end of the Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena, God Himself declares this truth: “Nothing has ever happened and nothing happens except by the plan of My divine Providence. In all things that I permit, in all things that I give you, in tribulations and in consolations, temporal or spiritual, I do nothing save for your good, so that you may be sanctified in Me and that My Truth be fulfilled in you.”
The Traits and Characteristics of Proficients or Progressives
The Illuminative Way (the Second Way of the Spiritual Life or the Way of Proficients) consists of those who are in the state of progress and have their passions better under control, so that they easily keep themselves from mortal sin, but who do not so easily avoid venial sins, because they still take pleasure in earthly things and allow their minds to be distracted by various imaginations and their hearts with numberless desires―though not in matters that are strictly unlawful.
This second level or stage of the spiritual life is where the soul, now habitually free of mortal sin, starts to focus on THREE chief things: (1) the Proficient soul now starts to look for its venial sins in order to battle them, uproot them and destroy them, (2) It starts to pray much, much more than ever before, and (3) it starts to focus on the systematic (not random or sporadic) acquisition of virtues.
It is called the Illuminative Way, because in it the mind becomes more and more enlightened as to spiritual things and the practice of virtue. In this second stage, Charity is stronger and more perfect than in the state of Beginners; the soul is chiefly occupied with progress in the spiritual life and in all the virtues, both theological and moral. The practice of prayer suitable for this state is meditation on the mysteries of the Incarnation, the life of Our Savior, and the mysteries of His Sacred Passion.
The fundamental virtue of this state is recollection, that is, a constant attention of the mind and of the affections of the heart to thoughts and sentiments which elevate the soul to God ― exterior recollection which consists in the love of silence and retirement, interior recollection in simplicity of spirit and a right intention, as well as attention to God in all our actions. This does not mean that a person has to neglect the duties of his state or position in life, nor does it imply that honest and needful recreation should be avoided, because these lawful or necessary circumstances or occupations can well be reconciled with perfect recollection and the most holy union with God.
The soul in the Illuminative Way will have to experience periods of spiritual consolations and desolations. It does not at once enter upon the Unitive Way when it has passed through the aridities of the first purgation. It must spend some time, perhaps years, after quitting the state of beginners in exercising itself in the state of proficients.
St. John of the Cross tells us that in this state the soul, like one released from a rigorous imprisonment, occupies itself in Divine thoughts with a much greater freedom and satisfaction, and its joy is more abundant and interior than it ever experienced before it entered the night of the senses.
Its purgation is still somewhat incomplete, and the purification of the senses is not yet finished and perfect. It is not without aridities, darkness, and trials, sometimes more severe than in the past. During the period of desolation it will have to endure much suffering from temptations against the theological virtues and against the moral virtues. It will have to endure sometimes other diabolical attacks upon its imagination and senses. Also, God will permit natural causes to combine in afflicting the soul, such as the persecutions of men, and the ingratitude of friends. Patient suffering and resignation have to be borne during all these trials.
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE goes on to describe the chief traits and characteristics of souls that have graduated from the first level of Beginners into the second level of Proficients or Progressives (=those making progress):
“The mentality of Proficients, like that of the preceding level of Beginners, must be described in function of their knowledge and love of God. With their self-knowledge there is developed in them a quasi-experimental knowledge of God. They know Him, no longer merely in the mirror of the things of sense or of parables, but in the mirror of the mysteries of salvation, with which they become more and more familiar and which the Rosary, the school of contemplation, sets daily before their eyes.
“The greatness of God is contemplated now, no longer merely in the mirror of the starry heavens, in the sea or the mountains, no longer merely in the parables of the Good Shepherd or the Prodigal Son, but in the incomparably more perfect mirror of the mysteries of the Incarnation and the Redemption. The soul rises in a spiral movement, from the mystery of the Incarnation or the Infancy of Jesus, to those of His Passion, His Resurrection, His Ascension and His Glory; and in these mysteries it contemplates the radiance of the sovereign Goodness of God―thus admirably communicating itself to us. In this contemplation, which is more or less frequent, the Proficients receive an abundance of light—in proportion to their fidelity and generosity—through the gift of understanding, which enables them to penetrate more and more deeply into these mysteries, and to appreciate their beauty, at once so simple and so sublime.
“In the preceding period or stage of Beginners, God had won over their sensibility; now He thoroughly subjugates their intelligence to Himself, raising it above the excessive preoccupations and complications of merely human knowledge. He simplifies their knowledge by spiritualizing it. Accordingly, and as a normal consequence, these Proficients―being thus enlightened concerning the mysteries of the life of Christ―love God, not only by avoiding mortal sin and deliberate venial sin, but by imitating the virtues of Our Lord. His humility, gentleness, patience; and by observing not only those commandments that are laid upon all, but also the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience, or at any rate by keeping the spirit of these counsels, and by avoiding imperfections.
“As happened in the preceding period of Beginners, this generosity is rewarded, but no longer by merely sensible consolations, but by a greater abundance of light in contemplation and in the work of the apostolate; by intense desires for the glory of God and the salvation of souls, and by a greater facility in prayer. Not infrequently we find in the Proficients the prayer of Quiet, in which the will is momentarily held captive by the love of God. This period is marked also by a great facility in doing works for God, such as teaching, directing, organizing, and the rest. This is to love God, not only with the whole heart, but with the whole soul, with the whole of one’s activities; but not yet with the whole strength, nor with the whole mind―because God has not yet achieved complete dominion in that higher region of the soul which we call the spirit.
“And what happens generally at this stage? Something similar to what happened in the case of the Beginners who had been rewarded with sensible consolations. The Proficient begins to take complacency—by reason of an unconscious pride—in this great facility in prayer, working, teaching, or preaching. He tends to forget that these are God’s gifts, and he rejoices in them with a proprietary air which ill beseems one who adores in spirit and in truth. It is true that he is working for God, he is working for souls; but he has not yet sufficiently forgotten himself. An unconscious self-seeking and self-importance cause him to dissipate himself and to lose the sense of the presence of God. He thinks that his labors are being very fruitful; but it is not quite certain. He is becoming too sure of himself, he gives himself too much importance and is perhaps inclined to exaggerate his own talents, to forget his own imperfection and to be too greatly aware of the imperfections of others. Purity of intention, true recollection, perfect straightforwardness, are often lacking; there is something of a lie in his life. The depth of the soul does not belong entirely to God. God is offered an intention which really is only half given to Him.
“St. John of the Cross mentions these defects of Proficients as they are found in pure contemplatives, who, he says, ‘believe in vain visions and presume that God and the saints are speaking with them’―being deceived by the ruses of the devil. Not less notable are the defects, mentioned, for example, by St. Alphonsus, which are found in apostolic men entrusted with the care of souls. These defects in Proficients become manifest especially in the obstacles which they are called upon to meet, or in differences of opinion which, even at this advanced period of the spiritual life, may cause vocations to be lost. It then becomes evident that the presence of God is not sufficiently borne in mind, and that, in the search for God, it is the self which is really being sought. Hence the need of a third purgation; hence the need of that strong lye of the purgation of the spirit, in order to cleanse the very depth of the spiritual faculties.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
The Three Ways “See-Saw” or “Yo-Yo”
It is important to remember that the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in not a “one-way-street” ― even though that is what God would like it to be. What goes up, can come down. We can three steps forward, only to find ourselves taking one, or two, or three steps backwards. Everyone is different―and everyone has different levels of pride―which is the root of all sin: “Pride is the beginning of all sin―he that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Pride is a part of the baggage that comes along with Original Sin. It is one of the first things in our life―and it usually one of the last vices to disappear. As we progress through the Three Ways, our pride certainly diminishes in proportion to our growth in true humility. Nevertheless, even devout and holy persons can still have a good dose of pride―though it not brash and obvious, but disguised and hidden―much like a wolf in the clothing of sheep.
Pride often makes us imagine that we are much advanced in the spiritual life than actually is the case. It is ultimately pride that makes us fall back down the ladder of our spiritual climb to Heaven: “Pride goes before destruction: and the spirit is lifted up before a fall!” (Proverbs 16:18). It is for that reason Our Lord related for us the parable about the Pharisee and the Publican: “And Jesus spoke this parable to certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up into the Temple to pray―the one, a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself: “God! I thank you, that I am not as other men are―extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this Publican! I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes to Heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying: “God! Be merciful to me a sinner!” I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other―for every one that exalts himself shall be abased; and he that humbles himself shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
Our pride might be hiding from us the fact that we lukewarm, or even in mortal sin―thus meaning that we have not even entered the First Way of the Spiritual Life! Remember the sobering words of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls!” Also the sobering words of Fr. Frederick Faber: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind.” Likewise the sobering words of St. Alphonsus Liguori: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil that is not of rare occurrence, but frequent, especially in small country districts, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.” Could we be in mortal sin and not know it? Possibly―though it is more likely that we have forgotten our bad confession or bad confessions. Let us ask Our Lady―the Refuge of Sinners, the Mother of Mercy, the Seat of Wisdom―to help us clearly see the true state of our soul and then to take the appropriate steps to heal it!
Article 17
Saturday & Sunday April 27th & 28th
The First Step is Always the Hardest
Article 3: The First of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life: The Way of Beginners, or the The Purgative Way
Saturday & Sunday April 27th & 28th
The First Step is Always the Hardest
Article 3: The First of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life: The Way of Beginners, or the The Purgative Way
The One Thing Necessary
The spiritual life or interior life is essentially a relationship with God―a life of love, whereby God loves us and we return love to God. “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because he has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins! … Let us therefore love God, because God first has loved us!” (1 John 4:10, 19).
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE writes: “The interior life is, for all persons, the one thing necessary. It ought to be constantly developing in our souls―more so than what we call our intellectual life, more so than our scientific, artistic or literary life. The interior life is lived in the depths of the soul; it is the life of the whole man, not merely of one or other of his faculties. And our intellectual life would gain immeasurably by appreciating this; it would receive an inestimable advantage if, instead of attempting to supplant the spiritual life, it recognized its necessity and importance, and welcomed its beneficial influence … The interior life virtually contains the solution of the social question and of the economic crisis which afflicts the world today. The Gospel puts it very simply: ‘Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you.’ If the world today is on its death-bed, it is because it has lost sight of a fundamental truth which for every Christian is elementary ... God is now showing men what a great mistake they make when they try to do without Him, when they regard earthly enjoyment as their highest good” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
The Three Ways Compared to Life
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “If such is the life of grace, it is not surprising to find that the development of the interior life has often been compared to the three periods or stages of physical life―childhood, youth, and manhood. The transition from childhood to adolescence and from youth to manhood. St. Thomas himself has indicated this analogy. Childhood lasts until the age of puberty, about fourteen―though early childhood, or infancy, ceases at the dawn of reason, about the age of seven. Upon reaching puberty, the second period of youth or adolescence, lasts from the age of fourteen to twenty. Then follows manhood, in which we may distinguish the period which precedes full maturity, about the age of thirty-five, and that which follows it, before the decline of old age sets in.
“A person’s mentality changes with the development of life―the activity of the child is not that of a man in miniature, or of a fatigued adult―childhood is different. The child has as yet no discernment, it is unable to organize in a rational manner; it follows the lead of the imagination and the impulses of sense. And even when its reason begins to awaken it still remains to a great extent dependent upon the senses. The period of puberty, which is the end of childhood, about the age of fourteen, is characterized by a transformation which is psychological, intellectual and moral. The youth is no longer content to follow his imagination as the child was; he now begins to reflect on the things of human life, on the need to prepare himself for some career or occupation in the future. He has no longer the child’s attitude towards family, social and religious matters; his moral personality begins to take shape, and he acquires the sense of honor and of good repute. Or else, on the contrary, if he passes unsuccessfully through this difficult period, he deteriorates and follows evil paths. The law of nature obliges that the transition from childhood to youth must follow a normal development―otherwise the person will assume a positive bias to evil, or else he will remain a half-wit, perhaps even a complete idiot, for the rest of his life. ‘He who makes no progress loses ground’ is a principle of the spiritual life.
“If the physical and moral crisis of puberty is a difficult transition, the same is to be said of the crisis of the first freedom, which occurs at the stage where the youth enters manhood, about the age of twenty. The young man, having now reached his complete physical development, has to begin to take his place in social life. It will soon be time for him to marry and to become an educator in his turn, unless he has received from God a higher vocation still. Many fail to surmount this crisis of the first freedom, and, like the prodigal son, depart from their father’s house and confuse liberty with license. Here again the natural law ordains that the transition must be made normally; otherwise the young man either takes the wrong road, or else his development is arrested and he becomes one of those of whom it is said: ‘He will be a child for the whole of his life.’ The true adult is not merely a young man grown a little older. He has a new mentality; he is preoccupied with wider questions, questions to which the youth does not yet grasp. He understands the younger generation, but the younger generation does not understand him; conversation between them on certain subjects, except of a very superficial kind, is impossible.
“It is at this point that the analogy becomes illuminating for the spiritual life. We shall see that the beginner who fails to become a proficient, either turns to sin or else presents an example of arrested spiritual development. Here, too, it is true that ‘he who makes no progress loses ground,’ as the Fathers of the Church have so often pointed out. There is a somewhat similar relation, in the spiritual life, between the proficient and the perfect. He who is perfect understands the earlier stages through which he has himself already passed; but he cannot expect to be understood by those who are still passing through them. The important thing to be noticed is that, just as there is the crisis of puberty between childhood and adolescence, so in the spiritual life there is a crisis during the transition from the purgative life of beginners to the illuminative life of proficients. Furthermore, just as the youth has to pass through a second crisis―that of the first freedom, in order to reach manhood, so too in the transition from the illuminative way of the proficients to the true life of union, there is a second spiritual crisis―under the name of the passive purgation of the spirit. This may be called a third conversion, or better, a transformation of the soul.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
Not an Option
The Three Ways of the Spiritual are not options but obligations―if we wish to get to Heaven. We have to pass through all three levels or stages of the spiritual life―the Way of Beginners, the Way of Proficients and the Way of the Perfect. Failure to do so results in either Hell or Purgatory. FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE (1877-1964)―who taught Ascetical and Mystical Theology for over 40 years at the Dominican Seminary (Angelicum) in Rome―writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls! At what stage are we ourselves? This is often a very difficult question to answer, and it would perhaps be vain curiosity to inquire at what point we have arrived in our upward path; but at least we must take care not to mistake the road, and not to take a path that leads downwards.” (The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life). Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange wrote those words in the 1930’s―when the world was in a far better state than it is today!
FR. FREDERICK FABER (1814-1863) was of a similar opinion around 80 years earlier―in the 1850s―when he wrote, in his book Growth in Holiness. In his estimation and experience, much of Catholic world was in varying degrees of lukewarmness: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind. The soul feels not altogether right with God. It does not exactly know what is wrong; but it is sure all is not right. It casts about to see. It quarrels with everything it does, and questions each of them, and yet the mischief eludes it. First there comes a false conscience. Then our bad instincts grow stronger in proportion as conscience becomes dark, cold, and finally numb. These bad instincts lead us to avoid anything which will restore life to the conscience. Thus they make us shrink from anything like vigorous spiritual direction. We suspect we shall be awakened, and driven, and made too good. The discretion of the blind conscience tells us this shrinking is wisdom. We must, it says, be moderate in everything, but of all things amazingly moderate in the love of God! So in hearing sermons, reading books, cultivating acquaintances, patronizing works of mercy, it draws back from everything that is likely to come too near or hit too hard.
“There is nothing in the spiritual life which arrests our attention so forcibly as lukewarmness because of the unusual language in which it has pleased God to express His ineffable disgust with it, and the startling doctrine which accompanies the declaration of His loathing and the extraordinary hatred which God has of this state, that coldness is less offensive to Him than tepidity: ‘I know thy works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I would rather you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth!’ (Apocalypse 3:14-16). This passage is without any parallel in Scripture. God not only prefers coldness, but He rejects tepidity. It turns Him sick who is eternal love. The charity of the Heart of Jesus, our only home, cannot retain us. His disgust is too strong for Him to resist it; and He rejects us with an unconquerable nausea. It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor, the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, and then―lost forever!” (Fr. Frederick Faber, Growth in Holiness, Chapter 25: “Lukewarmness”).
Sin and Lukewarmness Exclude a Soul from the First Way of Beginners
Some people are always in a hurry to get started and will thereby ignore important preparations. Lukewarmness either prevents us from starting out on our Three Ways pilgrimage to God and Heaven; or it drags us back down if we have already begun that pilgrimage. It is of the greatest importance to recognize, know and understand how this deadly virus of lukewarmness arises, disguises itself and operates. Sometimes a house can be repaired, sometimes it needs to be razed so a new one can be raised. To “raze a building” means to destroy or tear it down. Similarly, before planting things in the garden, it is usually necessary to weed out the weeds. Lukewarmness is weed that needs weeding out.
Know it or not―believe it or not―like it or not―accept it or not―the fact is that (1) habitual mortal sin, or (2) acceptance of venial as not being a major issue, or (3) the spirit of lukewarmness―all and any of these things put us outside the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. If we find such an attitude or lifestyle within us, then we have not even entered the mansion of the interior life with God. “It is certain that our God is so offended with sins” (Judith 11:8). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “Because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16).
Mortal sin and venial sin are the two greatest evils in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Lukewarmness is closely linked to worldliness, whereby it tries to make a compromise between serving God and enjoying the world―something that Our Lord said cannot be done: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). Holy Scripture further warns: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Lukewarmness and Worldliness
Lukewarmness is closely linked to worldliness, whereby it tries to make a compromise between serving God and enjoying the world―something that Our Lord said cannot be done: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). Holy Scripture further warns: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). To further confirm this point, we have the words of St. Pope Pius V (1504-1572): “All the evils of the world are due to lukewarm Catholics!”
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (1696-1787) writes: “There are two kinds of lukewarmness: one which can be avoided, and the other which cannot be avoided. Unavoidable lukewarmness is that which in the present life is endured even by fervent souls because, through natural weakness, they cannot avoid falling―from time to time―into some slight fault, but without full consent. A lukewarmness that hinders perfection when a person commits deliberate venial faults, is a lukewarmness which is avoidable―because all these faults, committed with open eyes, can effectually be avoided by the Divine grace, even in the present life. All the evil arises from the little love they have for Jesus Christ. They keep their heart open to external objects, and the mind always distracted, with an eagerness to listen to, and to know, so many things that have nothing to do with the service of God.”
ST. JOHN VIANNEY (1786-1859) gave a sermon on lukewarmness which is well worth reading: “A lukewarm soul is not yet quite dead in the eyes of God because the Faith, the Hope, and the Charity which are its spiritual life are not altogether extinct. But it is a Faith without zeal, a Hope without resolution, a Charity without ardor ... Nothing touches this soul―it hears the word of God, yes, that is true; but often it just bores it. Its possessor hears it with difficulty, more or less by habit, like someone who thinks that he knows enough about it and does enough of what he should. Any prayers which are a bit long are distasteful to him. This soul is so full of whatever it has just been doing or what it is going to do next, its boredom is so great, that this poor unfortunate thing is almost in agony. Fast days are reduced to practically nothing, either by advancing the time of the main meal or, under the pretext that Heaven was never taken by famine, by making the collation so abundant that it amounts to a full meal. It is still alive, but it is not capable of doing anything to gain Heaven .... For the last twenty years this soul has been filled with good intentions without doing anything at all to correct its habits.
“If God, in order to force such a soul to detach itself from temporal things, sends it any cross or suffering, it is fretful and grieving and abandons itself to grumbles and complaints. It seems as if it does not want to see that God has sent it these trials for its good, to detach it from this world and to draw it towards Himself. What has it done to deserve these trials? In this state a person thinks in his own mind that there are many others more blameworthy than himself who have not to submit to such trials.
“The lukewarm soul comes to the point of being completely indifferent to its own loss. It has nothing left but a love without tenderness, without action, and without energy which sustains it with difficulty in all that is essential for salvation. But for all other means of Grace, it looks upon them as nothing or almost nothing. Alas, my brethren, this poor soul in its tepidity is like someone between two bouts of sleep. It would like to act, but its will has become so softened that it lacks either the force or the courage to accomplish its wishes.
“It is true that a Christian who lives in tepidity still regularly ― in appearance at least ― fulfils his duties. He will go to the Sacraments―but in all of this there will be such a distaste, so much slackness and so much indifference, so little preparation, so little change in his way of life, that it is easy to see that he is only fulfilling his duties from habit and routine. His Confessions and his Communions are not sacrilegious, but they are Confessions and Communions which bear no fruit ― which, far from making him more perfect and more pleasing to God, only make him more unworthy. After having received Holy Communion, this person will hardly give another thought to God in all the days to follow.
“A lukewarm soul will go to Confession regularly, and even quite frequently. But what kind of Confessions are they? No preparation, no desire to correct faults, or, at the least, a desire so feeble and so small that the slightest difficulty will put a stop to it altogether. The Confessions of such a person are merely repetitions of old ones. Twenty years ago he was accusing himself of the same things he confesses today, and if he goes to Confession for the next twenty years, he will say the same things. A lukewarm soul will not, if you like, commit the big sins. But some slander or backbiting, a lie, a feeling of hatred, of dislike, of jealousy, a slight touch of deceit or double‑dealing ― these count for nothing with it. A lukewarm Christian thinks very little upon the state of his poor soul and almost never lets his mind run over the past. If the thought of making any effort to be better crosses his mind at all, he believes that once he has confessed his sins, he ought to be perfectly happy and at peace. With such people everything that is not a really serious sin is good enough.
“He assists at Holy Mass very much as he would at any ordinary activity. He does not think at all seriously of what he is doing and finds no trouble in chatting about all sorts of things while on the way to Mass. Possibly he will not give a single thought to the fact that he is about to participate in the greatest of all the gifts that God could give us. He might give some thought to the needs of his own soul, yes, but a very small and feeble amount of thought indeed. Frequently he will even present himself before the presence of God without having any idea of what he is going to ask of Him. He has few scruples in arriving late for Mass and cutting out, on the least pretext, the Asperges and the prayers before Mass. During the course of Mass, he does not want to go to sleep, of course, and he is even afraid that someone might see him, but he does not do himself any violence to himself to prevent it. He does not want, of course, to have distractions during prayer, or during the Holy Mass, yet when he should put up some little fight against them, he suffers them very patiently, considering the fact that he does not like them!
“As for his prayers, God alone knows what ― without, of course, any preparation ― he makes of these. In the morning it is not God who occupies his thoughts, nor the salvation of his poor soul―but he is taken up with thoughts of work; thinking about what he is going to be doing during the day; in what way he will expedite his own work. His mind is so wrapped up in the things of Earth, that the thought of God has no place in it. He will say his prayers―but he does not know what he wants to ask God, nor what he needs. Does he offer his day to God, to say his Grace? He does all that, but often without thinking of the One who is addressed. This lukewarm soul has no difficulty, on the slightest pretext, in talking during the course of his prayers. For no reason at all he will abandon them, partly at least, thinking that he will finish them at a later moment. He will not even stop working.
The lukewarm soul shuts God up in an obscure and ugly kind of prison. Its possessor does not crucify Him, but God can find little joy or consolation in his heart. All his dispositions proclaim that his poor soul is struggling for the breath of life. His manner of life tells us that he did not know the greatness of the happiness which had been his.
“The lukewarm like doing good, being faithful, but they wish that it would not cost them anything or, at least, that it cost very little. When he performs good or beneficial actions, his intentions are often very mixed ― sometimes it is to please someone, sometimes it is out of compassion, and sometimes it is just to please the world. They would like to visit the sick, indeed, but it would be more convenient if the sick would come to them. They have something to give away in alms, they know quite well that a certain person has need of help, but they wait until she comes to ask them, instead of anticipating her needs, which would make the kindness so very much more meritorious. We will even say that the person who leads a lukewarm life does not fail to do plenty of good works, to frequent the Sacraments, to assist regularly at all church services, but in all of this one sees only a weak, languishing Faith, Hope which the slightest trial will upset; and a love of God and of neighbor which is without warmth or pleasure. Everything that such a person does is not entirely lost, but it is very nearly so.
“See, before God, on what side you are! Are you on the side of the sinners, who have abandoned everything and plunge themselves into sin without remorse? Are you on the side of the just souls, who seek but God alone? Or are you one of the number of these slack, tepid, and indifferent souls such as we have just been depicting for you? Down which road are you traveling? Who can dare assure himself that he is neither a great sinner, nor a tepid soul, but that he is one of the elect? Alas, how many seem to be good Christians in the eyes of the world, but who are really tepid souls in the eyes of God, Who knows our inmost hearts! Let us ask God with all our hearts, if we are in this state, to give us the grace to get out of it, so that we may take the route that all the saints have taken and arrive at the happiness that they are enjoying.”
No Entry to the First Way with Lukewarmness
There is no admittance to the First Way of the Spiritual Life with deliberate lukewarmness―it has to be left outside the door. It is like a cancerous disease that will only grow and grow if left untreated and not uprooted. It is one of the most dangerous weeds to the spiritual life and union with God. As already stated above, God vomits the lukewarm out of His mouth: “Because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16). Why? Because lukewarmness, by its very nature, is at peace with venial sin and with time it can even lead one to be at peace with mortal sin. Lukewarmness seeks to give God the least it can possibly get away with. Yet Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Woe to souls like this! Woe!” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito Ecuador).
The same is true, for example, with the U.S. Marine Boot Camp! Half-hearted, worldly, “do the minimum” recruits will never make it. When they enter Boot Camp―which you call the Way of Beginners, or the Purgative Way―they are purged of all worldliness, selfishness, laziness, peevishness, grumpiness, goofiness and unfitness! You take up of cross and carry it―or you get out and go home! You show utmost respect to your superiors―or you risk being sent home! Your beloved hairstyle is sacrificed as you are shorn like a sheep! Contact with the outside world and family is severely restricted. Once the new recruits arrive, it was standard practice to keep them from sleeping the first 72 hours! Our Lord’s words to the sleeping Peter, James and John in Gethsemane come to mind: “What? Could you not watch one hour with Me?” (Matthew 26:40). The Boot Camp daily schedule could be compared to the schedule of a strict monastic order! You are allowed to bring very little with you to Boot Camp―which brings to mind Our Lord’s words to the rich young man who wanted to get to Heaven: “If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’” (Matthew 19:21). “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23).
The First Way ― the Way of Beginners ― the Purgative Way ― a Spiritual Boot Camp
You could say that getting to Heaven means having to go through a spiritual “Boot Camp”―which is more or less what Our Lord meant when “He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross and does not follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38) … “If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:26) … “Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:34-37). “They will lay their hands upon you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors, for My Name’s sake” (Luke 21:12). “They deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death, and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake!” (Matthew 24:9).
In the First Way of the Spiritual Life―also called the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―we must be open to purging ourselves, and also letting God purge us, of those things that will hinder our path to God. First and foremost is purging oneself of mortal sin―for you cannot gain entrance to the First Way if you habitually commit mortal sins. Since the First Way is called the Purgative Way, you must declare war on habitual mortal sin and purge and drive it out of your life. Yet, as the First Way indicates, being also called the Way of Beginners, this is only the beginning of the war―for you will have to perform, and undergo, many other purges before you are fit for Heaven. “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” (Hebrews 12:4).
As they say: “The first step is always the hardest!” Most U.S. Marines will tell you that their first step―which was entering a 3 month Boot Camp―was their hardest step. Most of them hated it―but of those who made it through Boot Camp, most of them were eventually glad of it, seeing its purpose and need, and proud at having completed it. If Our Lord says that “the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violent and the violent bear it away”, then that dovetails perfectly with the idea of a spiritual Boot Camp where those Soldiers of Christ are trained to “fight the good fight of the Faith.” Fighting is not easy―winning wars is not easy. Therefore, being a Catholic Soldier of Christ is not easy and getting to Heaven is not easy. Hence we have to purge ourselves―and allow God to also purge us―from anything and everything that might prevent us from attaining Heaven. Hence this First Way of the Spiritual Life, or the Way of Beginners, or the Purgative Way! The road to Heaven is not a sight-seeing tour on a luxury air-conditioned bus with comfortable reclining seats―the road is Heaven is straight and narrow: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and straight is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Some of the Fathers of Church make an additional comment upon those verses, saying that few there are that find that narrow path and even fewer are those who actually embark along it once they have found it!
A First Conversion is Necessary to Enter the First Way of the Spiritual Life
As stated above, habitual mortal sin disqualifies a soul from the First Way, the Way of Beginners. A first conversion is necessary before one can enter the First Way (more conversions will follow as we pass from one stage of the Spiritual Life to the next one). That conversion is essentially a purging and abandonment―with the help of God’s grace, without which we can do nothing (John 15:5)―of habitual mortal sin. Sin is an attack upon God. The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are essentially a progression from friendship with God, to a betrothal to God, and finally to a spiritual union or marriage to God. At each stage a conversion is necessary. It is the soul’s cooperation with grace that will determine whether it experiences all three levels of conversion, or even any conversion at all. How can we become friends of God in the First Way if we are deliberately attacking Him through our habitual mortal sins? Our Lord forgave the woman caught in adultery, but He said to her: “God and sin no more!” (John 8:11). To be a friend of God we must living in an habitual state of sanctifying grace, not habitual mortal sin! In fact, you can measure your friendship with God (or lack of it), by the number of mortal sins you are habitually committing.
After the first conversion, there ought to be a serious beginning of the purgative life, in which beginners love God by avoiding mortal sin and deliberate venial sin, through exterior and interior mortification and through prayer. But in actual fact this purgative life is found under two very different forms ― (1) in some, admittedly very few, this life is intense, generous; it is the narrow way of perfect self-denial described by the saints; (2) in many others the purgative life appears in an attenuated form, varying from good souls, who are a little weak, down to those lukewarm and retarded souls who from time to time fall into mortal sin.
As the soul progresses in this beginning stage, it enjoys certain consolations from God, given by Him to inspire and encourage the soul to continue its discovery of Him. We find that Rosaries turn gold, people see the spinning sun, they have all manner of spiritual experiences that are not explained by the laws of nature. They feel the interior call of God deep within them and they desire to respond. For what may be the first time in their lives, they understand God has a personal interest in them as an individual, not just as a member of the larger human race.
We learn some of how God works in our lives, and we learn the necessity of cooperation with His grace so that we might love Him more. We discover a growing desire for spiritual cleanliness, a desire for sanctifying grace. Our attendance at Mass, which might have been done, if at all, once a week through a sense of duty, is now done, as often as possible, out of a desire to grow in grace and wisdom as we partake of the gift of the Eucharist and the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
We now have a new goal, to “be ye perfect as the heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48), and suddenly we are profoundly aware of the absolute dependence we have on God to achieve this state. We can help by cooperating with grace, but God has to bring us to that state. No matter how gifted we may be, we cannot get there on our own. The closer we come to God, the more of Himself He communicates to us, the more insignificant we understand we are compared to Him, and the more we understand the power and extent of His infinite Love for each of us individually. The more this happens the more easily we discard the worldly baggage we brought with us.
We have undergone our first conversion. We have passed from mortal sin to a state of sanctifying grace. We have passed from indifference toward God, lukewarmness towards Him, to a growing fervor and desire to possess Him as fully as possible. We are tending to go beyond ourselves, and to make God the center of our lives instead of ourselves. We live for Him, and all the while we grow in love for Him and for each other. The more we love the more we understand it is God’s gift of love that we experience, for true love itself is always His supernatural gift.
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE tells us that sanctifying grace is the seed of eternal glory in Heaven. If we do not have that seed to grow, then we cannot get to Heaven. Sanctifying grace is essential for Heaven―and mortal sin destroys that grace in our souls. Charity―which is essentially a love of God―is an accompaniment of sanctifying grace. If we lose sanctifying grace, then we lose Charity, even though Faith and Hope remain within us. Therefore, we cannot be a peace with sin and at peace with God―for sin and God are mutually exclusive. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The blotting out and remission of sins thus described by the Scriptures can be effected only by the infusion of sanctifying grace and Charity—which is the supernatural love of God and of men for God’s sake ... Our interior life is the life of grace, it is the seed or germ of eternal life given to us in Baptism and nourished by the Eucharist. ‘Grace,’ says the whole of Tradition, ‘is the seed of glory.’ The raising of the dead to life, the miracle by which a corpse is reanimated with its natural life, is almost nothing in comparison with the resurrection of a soul, which has been lying spiritually dead in sin and has now been raised to the essentially supernatural life of grace. Grace, then, is eternal life already begun within us.
“St. Thomas expresses this doctrine in the brief statement: ‘Grace is nothing else but a certain beginning of glory within us.’ He also tells us that the lowest degree of grace in a soul, for example in that of a small child after its baptism, is of greater value than the natural goodness of the whole universe. St. Thomas adds that the justification of the sinner is proportionately more precious than the glorification of the just. Hence when a sinner is absolved in the confessional, an event occurs which is proportionately of greater importance than the entrance of a just soul into Heaven. Such is the supernatural life which we received in Baptism; and this is what constitutes our interior life. This beginning of eternal life, as we have called it, has to grow and develop until we enter Heaven. The root principle of this undying organism is sanctifying grace, received in the very essence of the soul; and this grace would last forever, were it not that sin, a radical disorder in the soul, sometimes destroys it.
“We are thus able to appreciate something of the importance of true conversion, by which a man passes from the state of mortal sin to the state of grace. In the state of mortal sin, his energies were dissipated and he was indifferent in regard to God; but now he loves God more than he loves himself, more than he loves anything else―or, at any rate, he esteems God beyond all earthly things, even though his love of God may not be free from all selfish motives. The state of mortal sin was a state of spiritual death; a state in which, more or less consciously, he made himself the center of all his activities and the end of all his desires; in which he was actually the slave of everything, the slave of his passions, of the spirit of the world, of the spirit of evil. The state of sanctifying grace, on the other hand, is a state of life in which man begins seriously to tend beyond himself and to make God the center of his activities, loving God more than himself. The state of sanctifying grace is entrance into the Kingdom of God, where the docile soul begins to reign with God over its own passions, over the spirit of the world and the spirit of evil.
“This is the fundamental truth of Christian spirituality. Consequently our interior life must be a life of humility, for we must remember always that sanctifying grace is a gift, and that we also need an actual grace for the slightest salutary act, for the shortest step forward in the way of salvation. It must be also a life of mortification; as St. Paul says, we must be ‘always bearing about in our body the mortification of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies’ ― that is to say: we must daily more and more die to sin and to the relics that sin leaves in us, so that God may reign more completely in us, even to the depth of the soul. But, above all, our interior life must be a life of Faith, Hope, Charity, and union with God by unceasing prayer; it is above all the life of the three Theological Virtues (Faith, Hope, Charity) and of the Gifts of the Holy Ghost which accompany them: the Gifts of Wisdom, Understanding, Knowledge, Piety, Counsel, Fortitude and Fear of the Lord. In this way we shall enter into the mysteries of Faith and relish them more and more. In other words, our whole interior life tends towards the supernatural contemplation of the mysteries of the inner life of God and of the Incarnation and Redemption; it tends, above all, towards a more intimate union with God; it is a preliminary to that union with Him which will be the consummation of eternal life.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
Humble Beginnings With Too Much Pride
The First Way of the Spiritual Life―which is the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―is just that: a beginning and not the final destination. It is like entering Kindergarten―with lots of learning still in store before graduation in 12th Grade; or it is like an apprentice who has been accepted but who has to be taught and can only work under supervision; or like a freshman at College or University, who has been accepted but whose Degree is not guaranteed. Coming back to the U.S. Marine Boot Camp analogy, of all the applications to join the Marines and enter Boot Camp, over 90% are rejected. “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) … “Many shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!” (Luke 13:24). As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories―of beginners, proficients or perfect―but rather to that of stunted souls!” In other words, those Catholic who actually embark upon the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way, are not many but a few. The few who actually “make it” can find that their ego is easily inflated and that they might look down upon others, just as the Pharisee did in one of Our Lord’s parables, pridefully saying: “I am not as the rest of men!” (Luke 18:11). In fact, as the spiritual writers tell us, pride will be the last vice to fall in our spiritual progression towards Heaven―it morphs from being a blatant, brash, obvious pride, into being a more subtle, hidden, disguised pride.
A Brief Overview of the Characteristics and Failings in the First Way of the Spiritual Life
► CHIEF CHARACTERISTICS:
● Being in a state of sanctifying grace most of the time
● Main focus being on purifying or purging oneself form past sins
● Avoiding mortal sins, perhaps falling occasionally
● Still committing frequent venial sins
● Conformity to God’s Will in the First Degree (the lowest degree)
● Obeying the Commandments
● Accepting trials reluctantly
● Humility practiced only in First Degree (the lowest degree)
● Still lots of self-love, self-centeredness and selfishness
● Thoughts mainly centered on self, not God
● Regular prayer life―mainly vocal prayer, discursive prayer, active
● Start of Meditation
● Sorrow for past sin
● Acts of Penance (to pay for past sins)
● Acts of Mortification (to avoid future sins)
● Fighting temptation to fall back into sin
● Struggling against sins and temptation
● Practicing virtue in haphazard way
● Bearing with the faults of our neighbor
● Forgiving injuries
► GENERAL FAULTS:
● Inexperience
● Lack of generosity
● Distractions leading away from spiritual things
● Discouragement at imagined or perceived lack of progress or success
● Seeking personal advantages
● Living too much by feelings and emotions
● Having a merely theoretical and abstract Faith
● Being too material and sensual
● Prayer can be mechanical, hurried and distracted
Crafty Conversion Con
Sanctifying grace is the essential element for the spiritual life and our relationship with God. We cannot please God if we are without sanctifying grace and in a state of mortal sin. Do not necessarily or automatically presume that you are living in a state of grace. Remember that lukewarmness warps and blinds the conscience. Bad confessions are not a rarity, but far more common than we imagine. Are we confessing mortal sins according to “number and kind”? St. Alphonsus Liguori was of the opinion―in arguably far better times than our times―that most people made bad confessions. Hence he would say: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil that is not of rare occurrence, but frequent, especially in small country districts, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.” Today, this is compounded and made much more frequent due to what recent popes have called “the loss of the sense of sin.”
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Not only do “we let the Kingdom of God crumble”, but we also let our state of sanctifying grace crumble due to our warped notions of what is sinful and what is not sinful! The demons are unbelievably intelligent, and so when the demons coax us into making bad (invalid) confessions they do so in a very subtle way―they do not advertize it, nor blow trumpets, nor wave the fact before our eyes. The perfect “con” is to “con” somebody and leave them oblivious to the fact that they have been conned. So when it comes to “conned” confessions, the demons want to have us thinking that we have confessed sufficiently well, whereas we have “botched” our confession and confessed badly (invalidly).
What Makes Bad Confessions?
What is it, then, that makes a confession invalid? A confession can be bad (invalid) in a variety of different ways, with each way having its own nuances or shades. Any and every Catholic should (but they don’t) know the conditions for a valid confession. The demons are only too happy to make forget or at least misinterpret those conditions. So what are those mysterious, half-forgotten, misinterpreted and twisted notions of the required conditions for a good (valid) confession? The good old Baltimore Catechism, for children making their First Holy Communion, taught us that the steps to a good confession are: (1) find out my sins; (2) be sorry for my sins; (3) make up my mind not to sin again; (4) tell my sins to the priest; (5) do the penance the priest gives me. Those are still the right conditions today, even for adults―even though the adult catechism explains it more thoroughly. Here is a more thorough explanation of each of those five conditions:
(1) EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE ― Most people “do things by halves” ― meaning that do things partially, halfheartedly, incompletely, doing as little as they can to get by. Such persons are Satan’s dream when it comes to the Sacrament of Confession! Examinations of conscience are on “fast-track” mode; knowledge of what is mortal and venial is “half-baked” at best; memory is selective as to what they want to remember and what they want to forget; they restrict the time for examining their conscience to the moment they join the confessional line―the shorter the line, the shorter the examination; or if there is no confessional line then they just dive in to the confessional without any time to examine their conscience and just “wing-it”. Some persons have lost the sense of sin as to what is mortal and what is venial, whereby they rely on their subjective feelings on the seriousness of sin, rather than the objective teaching of the Church as to what is mortal. Hence, today, you have Catholics who insist that they can still be good Catholics without any need to attend Sunday Mass; or those who feel masturbation is not a mortal sin; or that cohabitation is acceptable these days, etc. The chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, used to say that demons prefer not to be detected―well, the same applies to our sins―demons prefer that we fail to detect our sins!
(2) SUFFICIENT SORROW FOR YOUR SINS ― How much sorrow is sorrow? Sorrow―like so many other things in life, such as intelligence or love―ranges from minimal sorrow to maximum sorrow. Not wishing that any soul be damned (though most souls still manage to damn themselves), God is willing to accept a minimal sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession. This minimal sorrow is called “attrition.” The maximum sorrow is called “contrition”. God is willing to accept this minimal sorrow that fears God and His punishments―but we were created not just to fear God, but more importantly to love God! Our relationship with God should grow from an initial fear of God to a love of God: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18). Our contrition will be perfect when we repent of our sins through the perfect love of God.
(3) A FIRM PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT ― This is another “stumbling-block” or “pit-fall” in making good (valid) confessions. There are too many Catholics who use the confessional like a revolving door―always going and coming out, going back in and coming back out, in again and out again, confessing the same old mortal sins time and time again! If a person does not take practical steps to avoid falling back into the mortal sins they have confessed, then the confession is invalid due to presumed lack of FIRM purpose of amendment. When a particular kind of mortal sin becomes increasingly repetitive and habitual, then one has to question whether or not there is a FIRM purpose of amendment. A FIRM purpose of amendment is far superior to a VAGUE purpose of amendment. A VAGUE purpose of amendment will merely say: “Oh, I’ve really got to stop doing this!” and will go no further. Whereas a FIRM purpose of amendment will go beyond saying: “I’ve got to stop doing this!” and will carefully analyze why these sins are being committed and will take concrete measures and practical plans to avoid the occasions of that particular sin―it goes beyond mere wishful thinking. The VAGUE purpose of amendment resides in the mind or intellect alone. The FIRM purpose of amendment is not only in the mind or intellect, but it then transfers itself to the heart or will, and puts the plans of the mind into practice.
(4) CONFESSING YOUR SINS ― Here is another dangerous area which abounds with demonic interference. The bottom line in this area is this ― if the demons cannot prevent you from going to Confession, then they will try and make you confess your sins in a way that makes the confession invalid. The most common pathways are (1) hiding a mortal sin in confession through shame, (2) fudging, obfuscating, twisting, cosmetically coating, misrepresenting, leaving out details, cloaking the mortal sin in such a way as make a mortal sin seem like a serious venial sin; (3) not stating the correct number of times that you committed the sin―for example, saying “a few times” instead of saying “ten times”. Ten is much more than “a few”; or simply saying: “I’ve stolen things” without saying what value of things and how many times you stole; (4) or not being specific as to the KIND of sin you committed―for example, merely saying: “I’ve been impure!” hides the kind of impurity―for there are increasing degrees of gravity in impurity: (a) impure with oneself; (b) impure with another person; (c) impure with animals. As regards impurity with other persons, you have to make distinctions: (a) are you married or single; (b) was the other person married or single; (c) was the other person of the same sex or the opposite sex; (d) was the other person a minor/child; (e) was the other person a religious―monk, nun, etc. There are certain sins that can the added gravity of being a sacrilege―for example stealing from a store is different to stealing from the church; impurity with a religious adds a sacrilegious aspect to the sin. Always be honest in confession―you might fool the priest; you might fool yourself; but you cannot fool God. God knows all about your sin―He wants YOU to know YOUR sins as they really are so that you can get to work at uprooting them from your life.
(5) COMPLETING THE PENANCE THE PRIEST ASSIGNS TO YOU ― Listen carefully and take note of the penance that the priest assigns to you. Sometimes the instructions are general―such as: “Pray a Rosary!” This does not specify when to pray the Rosary; nor does it specify whether or not you have to pray all five decades at once, or whether you can divide it up into sections; nor does it specify which mysteries of the Rosary to pray; nor does it specify if you also have meditate the mysteries instead just saying the Our Fathers and Hail Marys. Therefore all these variations are left up to you. Other penances might be more precise―such as: “Make the Stations of the Cross in church on a Friday!” If this is impossible for you, then you must mention that to the priest and give the reason why. He might change some aspect, such as allowing you to make the Stations at home, or make them the next time you go to church, etc. Priests are obliged―under the pain of sin―to give serious penances for mortal sins: for example, five decades of the Rosary, or the Stations of the Cross, are regarded as the minimum in the class of serious penances. However, if you feel you can more―then tell the priest that you are willing to do more. The reason being is that a penance imposed in the Sacrament of Confession has more power and value than the same penance done by your personal choice―so a Rosary given as penance in Confession has more value than a Rosary prayed by your own free choice. Penance is essential―as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
The spiritual life or interior life is essentially a relationship with God―a life of love, whereby God loves us and we return love to God. “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because he has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins! … Let us therefore love God, because God first has loved us!” (1 John 4:10, 19).
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE writes: “The interior life is, for all persons, the one thing necessary. It ought to be constantly developing in our souls―more so than what we call our intellectual life, more so than our scientific, artistic or literary life. The interior life is lived in the depths of the soul; it is the life of the whole man, not merely of one or other of his faculties. And our intellectual life would gain immeasurably by appreciating this; it would receive an inestimable advantage if, instead of attempting to supplant the spiritual life, it recognized its necessity and importance, and welcomed its beneficial influence … The interior life virtually contains the solution of the social question and of the economic crisis which afflicts the world today. The Gospel puts it very simply: ‘Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you.’ If the world today is on its death-bed, it is because it has lost sight of a fundamental truth which for every Christian is elementary ... God is now showing men what a great mistake they make when they try to do without Him, when they regard earthly enjoyment as their highest good” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
The Three Ways Compared to Life
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE continues: “If such is the life of grace, it is not surprising to find that the development of the interior life has often been compared to the three periods or stages of physical life―childhood, youth, and manhood. The transition from childhood to adolescence and from youth to manhood. St. Thomas himself has indicated this analogy. Childhood lasts until the age of puberty, about fourteen―though early childhood, or infancy, ceases at the dawn of reason, about the age of seven. Upon reaching puberty, the second period of youth or adolescence, lasts from the age of fourteen to twenty. Then follows manhood, in which we may distinguish the period which precedes full maturity, about the age of thirty-five, and that which follows it, before the decline of old age sets in.
“A person’s mentality changes with the development of life―the activity of the child is not that of a man in miniature, or of a fatigued adult―childhood is different. The child has as yet no discernment, it is unable to organize in a rational manner; it follows the lead of the imagination and the impulses of sense. And even when its reason begins to awaken it still remains to a great extent dependent upon the senses. The period of puberty, which is the end of childhood, about the age of fourteen, is characterized by a transformation which is psychological, intellectual and moral. The youth is no longer content to follow his imagination as the child was; he now begins to reflect on the things of human life, on the need to prepare himself for some career or occupation in the future. He has no longer the child’s attitude towards family, social and religious matters; his moral personality begins to take shape, and he acquires the sense of honor and of good repute. Or else, on the contrary, if he passes unsuccessfully through this difficult period, he deteriorates and follows evil paths. The law of nature obliges that the transition from childhood to youth must follow a normal development―otherwise the person will assume a positive bias to evil, or else he will remain a half-wit, perhaps even a complete idiot, for the rest of his life. ‘He who makes no progress loses ground’ is a principle of the spiritual life.
“If the physical and moral crisis of puberty is a difficult transition, the same is to be said of the crisis of the first freedom, which occurs at the stage where the youth enters manhood, about the age of twenty. The young man, having now reached his complete physical development, has to begin to take his place in social life. It will soon be time for him to marry and to become an educator in his turn, unless he has received from God a higher vocation still. Many fail to surmount this crisis of the first freedom, and, like the prodigal son, depart from their father’s house and confuse liberty with license. Here again the natural law ordains that the transition must be made normally; otherwise the young man either takes the wrong road, or else his development is arrested and he becomes one of those of whom it is said: ‘He will be a child for the whole of his life.’ The true adult is not merely a young man grown a little older. He has a new mentality; he is preoccupied with wider questions, questions to which the youth does not yet grasp. He understands the younger generation, but the younger generation does not understand him; conversation between them on certain subjects, except of a very superficial kind, is impossible.
“It is at this point that the analogy becomes illuminating for the spiritual life. We shall see that the beginner who fails to become a proficient, either turns to sin or else presents an example of arrested spiritual development. Here, too, it is true that ‘he who makes no progress loses ground,’ as the Fathers of the Church have so often pointed out. There is a somewhat similar relation, in the spiritual life, between the proficient and the perfect. He who is perfect understands the earlier stages through which he has himself already passed; but he cannot expect to be understood by those who are still passing through them. The important thing to be noticed is that, just as there is the crisis of puberty between childhood and adolescence, so in the spiritual life there is a crisis during the transition from the purgative life of beginners to the illuminative life of proficients. Furthermore, just as the youth has to pass through a second crisis―that of the first freedom, in order to reach manhood, so too in the transition from the illuminative way of the proficients to the true life of union, there is a second spiritual crisis―under the name of the passive purgation of the spirit. This may be called a third conversion, or better, a transformation of the soul.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
Not an Option
The Three Ways of the Spiritual are not options but obligations―if we wish to get to Heaven. We have to pass through all three levels or stages of the spiritual life―the Way of Beginners, the Way of Proficients and the Way of the Perfect. Failure to do so results in either Hell or Purgatory. FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE (1877-1964)―who taught Ascetical and Mystical Theology for over 40 years at the Dominican Seminary (Angelicum) in Rome―writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls! At what stage are we ourselves? This is often a very difficult question to answer, and it would perhaps be vain curiosity to inquire at what point we have arrived in our upward path; but at least we must take care not to mistake the road, and not to take a path that leads downwards.” (The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life). Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange wrote those words in the 1930’s―when the world was in a far better state than it is today!
FR. FREDERICK FABER (1814-1863) was of a similar opinion around 80 years earlier―in the 1850s―when he wrote, in his book Growth in Holiness. In his estimation and experience, much of Catholic world was in varying degrees of lukewarmness: “I fear this evil of lukewarmness is very common, and that at this moment it is gnawing the life out of many souls who suspect not its presence there. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind. The soul feels not altogether right with God. It does not exactly know what is wrong; but it is sure all is not right. It casts about to see. It quarrels with everything it does, and questions each of them, and yet the mischief eludes it. First there comes a false conscience. Then our bad instincts grow stronger in proportion as conscience becomes dark, cold, and finally numb. These bad instincts lead us to avoid anything which will restore life to the conscience. Thus they make us shrink from anything like vigorous spiritual direction. We suspect we shall be awakened, and driven, and made too good. The discretion of the blind conscience tells us this shrinking is wisdom. We must, it says, be moderate in everything, but of all things amazingly moderate in the love of God! So in hearing sermons, reading books, cultivating acquaintances, patronizing works of mercy, it draws back from everything that is likely to come too near or hit too hard.
“There is nothing in the spiritual life which arrests our attention so forcibly as lukewarmness because of the unusual language in which it has pleased God to express His ineffable disgust with it, and the startling doctrine which accompanies the declaration of His loathing and the extraordinary hatred which God has of this state, that coldness is less offensive to Him than tepidity: ‘I know thy works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I would rather you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will begin to vomit you out of My mouth!’ (Apocalypse 3:14-16). This passage is without any parallel in Scripture. God not only prefers coldness, but He rejects tepidity. It turns Him sick who is eternal love. The charity of the Heart of Jesus, our only home, cannot retain us. His disgust is too strong for Him to resist it; and He rejects us with an unconquerable nausea. It is a great grace, a prophecy of a miraculous cure, to find out that we are lukewarm; but we are lost if we do not act with vigor, the moment we make this frightening discovery. It is like going to sleep in the snow, almost a pleasant tingling feeling at the first, and then―lost forever!” (Fr. Frederick Faber, Growth in Holiness, Chapter 25: “Lukewarmness”).
Sin and Lukewarmness Exclude a Soul from the First Way of Beginners
Some people are always in a hurry to get started and will thereby ignore important preparations. Lukewarmness either prevents us from starting out on our Three Ways pilgrimage to God and Heaven; or it drags us back down if we have already begun that pilgrimage. It is of the greatest importance to recognize, know and understand how this deadly virus of lukewarmness arises, disguises itself and operates. Sometimes a house can be repaired, sometimes it needs to be razed so a new one can be raised. To “raze a building” means to destroy or tear it down. Similarly, before planting things in the garden, it is usually necessary to weed out the weeds. Lukewarmness is weed that needs weeding out.
Know it or not―believe it or not―like it or not―accept it or not―the fact is that (1) habitual mortal sin, or (2) acceptance of venial as not being a major issue, or (3) the spirit of lukewarmness―all and any of these things put us outside the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. If we find such an attitude or lifestyle within us, then we have not even entered the mansion of the interior life with God. “It is certain that our God is so offended with sins” (Judith 11:8). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). “Because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16).
Mortal sin and venial sin are the two greatest evils in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Lukewarmness is closely linked to worldliness, whereby it tries to make a compromise between serving God and enjoying the world―something that Our Lord said cannot be done: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). Holy Scripture further warns: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Lukewarmness and Worldliness
Lukewarmness is closely linked to worldliness, whereby it tries to make a compromise between serving God and enjoying the world―something that Our Lord said cannot be done: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). Holy Scripture further warns: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). To further confirm this point, we have the words of St. Pope Pius V (1504-1572): “All the evils of the world are due to lukewarm Catholics!”
ST. ALPHONSUS LIGUORI (1696-1787) writes: “There are two kinds of lukewarmness: one which can be avoided, and the other which cannot be avoided. Unavoidable lukewarmness is that which in the present life is endured even by fervent souls because, through natural weakness, they cannot avoid falling―from time to time―into some slight fault, but without full consent. A lukewarmness that hinders perfection when a person commits deliberate venial faults, is a lukewarmness which is avoidable―because all these faults, committed with open eyes, can effectually be avoided by the Divine grace, even in the present life. All the evil arises from the little love they have for Jesus Christ. They keep their heart open to external objects, and the mind always distracted, with an eagerness to listen to, and to know, so many things that have nothing to do with the service of God.”
ST. JOHN VIANNEY (1786-1859) gave a sermon on lukewarmness which is well worth reading: “A lukewarm soul is not yet quite dead in the eyes of God because the Faith, the Hope, and the Charity which are its spiritual life are not altogether extinct. But it is a Faith without zeal, a Hope without resolution, a Charity without ardor ... Nothing touches this soul―it hears the word of God, yes, that is true; but often it just bores it. Its possessor hears it with difficulty, more or less by habit, like someone who thinks that he knows enough about it and does enough of what he should. Any prayers which are a bit long are distasteful to him. This soul is so full of whatever it has just been doing or what it is going to do next, its boredom is so great, that this poor unfortunate thing is almost in agony. Fast days are reduced to practically nothing, either by advancing the time of the main meal or, under the pretext that Heaven was never taken by famine, by making the collation so abundant that it amounts to a full meal. It is still alive, but it is not capable of doing anything to gain Heaven .... For the last twenty years this soul has been filled with good intentions without doing anything at all to correct its habits.
“If God, in order to force such a soul to detach itself from temporal things, sends it any cross or suffering, it is fretful and grieving and abandons itself to grumbles and complaints. It seems as if it does not want to see that God has sent it these trials for its good, to detach it from this world and to draw it towards Himself. What has it done to deserve these trials? In this state a person thinks in his own mind that there are many others more blameworthy than himself who have not to submit to such trials.
“The lukewarm soul comes to the point of being completely indifferent to its own loss. It has nothing left but a love without tenderness, without action, and without energy which sustains it with difficulty in all that is essential for salvation. But for all other means of Grace, it looks upon them as nothing or almost nothing. Alas, my brethren, this poor soul in its tepidity is like someone between two bouts of sleep. It would like to act, but its will has become so softened that it lacks either the force or the courage to accomplish its wishes.
“It is true that a Christian who lives in tepidity still regularly ― in appearance at least ― fulfils his duties. He will go to the Sacraments―but in all of this there will be such a distaste, so much slackness and so much indifference, so little preparation, so little change in his way of life, that it is easy to see that he is only fulfilling his duties from habit and routine. His Confessions and his Communions are not sacrilegious, but they are Confessions and Communions which bear no fruit ― which, far from making him more perfect and more pleasing to God, only make him more unworthy. After having received Holy Communion, this person will hardly give another thought to God in all the days to follow.
“A lukewarm soul will go to Confession regularly, and even quite frequently. But what kind of Confessions are they? No preparation, no desire to correct faults, or, at the least, a desire so feeble and so small that the slightest difficulty will put a stop to it altogether. The Confessions of such a person are merely repetitions of old ones. Twenty years ago he was accusing himself of the same things he confesses today, and if he goes to Confession for the next twenty years, he will say the same things. A lukewarm soul will not, if you like, commit the big sins. But some slander or backbiting, a lie, a feeling of hatred, of dislike, of jealousy, a slight touch of deceit or double‑dealing ― these count for nothing with it. A lukewarm Christian thinks very little upon the state of his poor soul and almost never lets his mind run over the past. If the thought of making any effort to be better crosses his mind at all, he believes that once he has confessed his sins, he ought to be perfectly happy and at peace. With such people everything that is not a really serious sin is good enough.
“He assists at Holy Mass very much as he would at any ordinary activity. He does not think at all seriously of what he is doing and finds no trouble in chatting about all sorts of things while on the way to Mass. Possibly he will not give a single thought to the fact that he is about to participate in the greatest of all the gifts that God could give us. He might give some thought to the needs of his own soul, yes, but a very small and feeble amount of thought indeed. Frequently he will even present himself before the presence of God without having any idea of what he is going to ask of Him. He has few scruples in arriving late for Mass and cutting out, on the least pretext, the Asperges and the prayers before Mass. During the course of Mass, he does not want to go to sleep, of course, and he is even afraid that someone might see him, but he does not do himself any violence to himself to prevent it. He does not want, of course, to have distractions during prayer, or during the Holy Mass, yet when he should put up some little fight against them, he suffers them very patiently, considering the fact that he does not like them!
“As for his prayers, God alone knows what ― without, of course, any preparation ― he makes of these. In the morning it is not God who occupies his thoughts, nor the salvation of his poor soul―but he is taken up with thoughts of work; thinking about what he is going to be doing during the day; in what way he will expedite his own work. His mind is so wrapped up in the things of Earth, that the thought of God has no place in it. He will say his prayers―but he does not know what he wants to ask God, nor what he needs. Does he offer his day to God, to say his Grace? He does all that, but often without thinking of the One who is addressed. This lukewarm soul has no difficulty, on the slightest pretext, in talking during the course of his prayers. For no reason at all he will abandon them, partly at least, thinking that he will finish them at a later moment. He will not even stop working.
The lukewarm soul shuts God up in an obscure and ugly kind of prison. Its possessor does not crucify Him, but God can find little joy or consolation in his heart. All his dispositions proclaim that his poor soul is struggling for the breath of life. His manner of life tells us that he did not know the greatness of the happiness which had been his.
“The lukewarm like doing good, being faithful, but they wish that it would not cost them anything or, at least, that it cost very little. When he performs good or beneficial actions, his intentions are often very mixed ― sometimes it is to please someone, sometimes it is out of compassion, and sometimes it is just to please the world. They would like to visit the sick, indeed, but it would be more convenient if the sick would come to them. They have something to give away in alms, they know quite well that a certain person has need of help, but they wait until she comes to ask them, instead of anticipating her needs, which would make the kindness so very much more meritorious. We will even say that the person who leads a lukewarm life does not fail to do plenty of good works, to frequent the Sacraments, to assist regularly at all church services, but in all of this one sees only a weak, languishing Faith, Hope which the slightest trial will upset; and a love of God and of neighbor which is without warmth or pleasure. Everything that such a person does is not entirely lost, but it is very nearly so.
“See, before God, on what side you are! Are you on the side of the sinners, who have abandoned everything and plunge themselves into sin without remorse? Are you on the side of the just souls, who seek but God alone? Or are you one of the number of these slack, tepid, and indifferent souls such as we have just been depicting for you? Down which road are you traveling? Who can dare assure himself that he is neither a great sinner, nor a tepid soul, but that he is one of the elect? Alas, how many seem to be good Christians in the eyes of the world, but who are really tepid souls in the eyes of God, Who knows our inmost hearts! Let us ask God with all our hearts, if we are in this state, to give us the grace to get out of it, so that we may take the route that all the saints have taken and arrive at the happiness that they are enjoying.”
No Entry to the First Way with Lukewarmness
There is no admittance to the First Way of the Spiritual Life with deliberate lukewarmness―it has to be left outside the door. It is like a cancerous disease that will only grow and grow if left untreated and not uprooted. It is one of the most dangerous weeds to the spiritual life and union with God. As already stated above, God vomits the lukewarm out of His mouth: “Because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16). Why? Because lukewarmness, by its very nature, is at peace with venial sin and with time it can even lead one to be at peace with mortal sin. Lukewarmness seeks to give God the least it can possibly get away with. Yet Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example, for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Woe to souls like this! Woe!” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito Ecuador).
The same is true, for example, with the U.S. Marine Boot Camp! Half-hearted, worldly, “do the minimum” recruits will never make it. When they enter Boot Camp―which you call the Way of Beginners, or the Purgative Way―they are purged of all worldliness, selfishness, laziness, peevishness, grumpiness, goofiness and unfitness! You take up of cross and carry it―or you get out and go home! You show utmost respect to your superiors―or you risk being sent home! Your beloved hairstyle is sacrificed as you are shorn like a sheep! Contact with the outside world and family is severely restricted. Once the new recruits arrive, it was standard practice to keep them from sleeping the first 72 hours! Our Lord’s words to the sleeping Peter, James and John in Gethsemane come to mind: “What? Could you not watch one hour with Me?” (Matthew 26:40). The Boot Camp daily schedule could be compared to the schedule of a strict monastic order! You are allowed to bring very little with you to Boot Camp―which brings to mind Our Lord’s words to the rich young man who wanted to get to Heaven: “If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’” (Matthew 19:21). “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23).
The First Way ― the Way of Beginners ― the Purgative Way ― a Spiritual Boot Camp
You could say that getting to Heaven means having to go through a spiritual “Boot Camp”―which is more or less what Our Lord meant when “He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross and does not follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38) … “If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:26) … “Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:34-37). “They will lay their hands upon you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors, for My Name’s sake” (Luke 21:12). “They deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death, and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake!” (Matthew 24:9).
In the First Way of the Spiritual Life―also called the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―we must be open to purging ourselves, and also letting God purge us, of those things that will hinder our path to God. First and foremost is purging oneself of mortal sin―for you cannot gain entrance to the First Way if you habitually commit mortal sins. Since the First Way is called the Purgative Way, you must declare war on habitual mortal sin and purge and drive it out of your life. Yet, as the First Way indicates, being also called the Way of Beginners, this is only the beginning of the war―for you will have to perform, and undergo, many other purges before you are fit for Heaven. “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” (Hebrews 12:4).
As they say: “The first step is always the hardest!” Most U.S. Marines will tell you that their first step―which was entering a 3 month Boot Camp―was their hardest step. Most of them hated it―but of those who made it through Boot Camp, most of them were eventually glad of it, seeing its purpose and need, and proud at having completed it. If Our Lord says that “the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violent and the violent bear it away”, then that dovetails perfectly with the idea of a spiritual Boot Camp where those Soldiers of Christ are trained to “fight the good fight of the Faith.” Fighting is not easy―winning wars is not easy. Therefore, being a Catholic Soldier of Christ is not easy and getting to Heaven is not easy. Hence we have to purge ourselves―and allow God to also purge us―from anything and everything that might prevent us from attaining Heaven. Hence this First Way of the Spiritual Life, or the Way of Beginners, or the Purgative Way! The road to Heaven is not a sight-seeing tour on a luxury air-conditioned bus with comfortable reclining seats―the road is Heaven is straight and narrow: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and straight is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Some of the Fathers of Church make an additional comment upon those verses, saying that few there are that find that narrow path and even fewer are those who actually embark along it once they have found it!
A First Conversion is Necessary to Enter the First Way of the Spiritual Life
As stated above, habitual mortal sin disqualifies a soul from the First Way, the Way of Beginners. A first conversion is necessary before one can enter the First Way (more conversions will follow as we pass from one stage of the Spiritual Life to the next one). That conversion is essentially a purging and abandonment―with the help of God’s grace, without which we can do nothing (John 15:5)―of habitual mortal sin. Sin is an attack upon God. The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are essentially a progression from friendship with God, to a betrothal to God, and finally to a spiritual union or marriage to God. At each stage a conversion is necessary. It is the soul’s cooperation with grace that will determine whether it experiences all three levels of conversion, or even any conversion at all. How can we become friends of God in the First Way if we are deliberately attacking Him through our habitual mortal sins? Our Lord forgave the woman caught in adultery, but He said to her: “God and sin no more!” (John 8:11). To be a friend of God we must living in an habitual state of sanctifying grace, not habitual mortal sin! In fact, you can measure your friendship with God (or lack of it), by the number of mortal sins you are habitually committing.
After the first conversion, there ought to be a serious beginning of the purgative life, in which beginners love God by avoiding mortal sin and deliberate venial sin, through exterior and interior mortification and through prayer. But in actual fact this purgative life is found under two very different forms ― (1) in some, admittedly very few, this life is intense, generous; it is the narrow way of perfect self-denial described by the saints; (2) in many others the purgative life appears in an attenuated form, varying from good souls, who are a little weak, down to those lukewarm and retarded souls who from time to time fall into mortal sin.
As the soul progresses in this beginning stage, it enjoys certain consolations from God, given by Him to inspire and encourage the soul to continue its discovery of Him. We find that Rosaries turn gold, people see the spinning sun, they have all manner of spiritual experiences that are not explained by the laws of nature. They feel the interior call of God deep within them and they desire to respond. For what may be the first time in their lives, they understand God has a personal interest in them as an individual, not just as a member of the larger human race.
We learn some of how God works in our lives, and we learn the necessity of cooperation with His grace so that we might love Him more. We discover a growing desire for spiritual cleanliness, a desire for sanctifying grace. Our attendance at Mass, which might have been done, if at all, once a week through a sense of duty, is now done, as often as possible, out of a desire to grow in grace and wisdom as we partake of the gift of the Eucharist and the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
We now have a new goal, to “be ye perfect as the heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48), and suddenly we are profoundly aware of the absolute dependence we have on God to achieve this state. We can help by cooperating with grace, but God has to bring us to that state. No matter how gifted we may be, we cannot get there on our own. The closer we come to God, the more of Himself He communicates to us, the more insignificant we understand we are compared to Him, and the more we understand the power and extent of His infinite Love for each of us individually. The more this happens the more easily we discard the worldly baggage we brought with us.
We have undergone our first conversion. We have passed from mortal sin to a state of sanctifying grace. We have passed from indifference toward God, lukewarmness towards Him, to a growing fervor and desire to possess Him as fully as possible. We are tending to go beyond ourselves, and to make God the center of our lives instead of ourselves. We live for Him, and all the while we grow in love for Him and for each other. The more we love the more we understand it is God’s gift of love that we experience, for true love itself is always His supernatural gift.
FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE tells us that sanctifying grace is the seed of eternal glory in Heaven. If we do not have that seed to grow, then we cannot get to Heaven. Sanctifying grace is essential for Heaven―and mortal sin destroys that grace in our souls. Charity―which is essentially a love of God―is an accompaniment of sanctifying grace. If we lose sanctifying grace, then we lose Charity, even though Faith and Hope remain within us. Therefore, we cannot be a peace with sin and at peace with God―for sin and God are mutually exclusive. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “The blotting out and remission of sins thus described by the Scriptures can be effected only by the infusion of sanctifying grace and Charity—which is the supernatural love of God and of men for God’s sake ... Our interior life is the life of grace, it is the seed or germ of eternal life given to us in Baptism and nourished by the Eucharist. ‘Grace,’ says the whole of Tradition, ‘is the seed of glory.’ The raising of the dead to life, the miracle by which a corpse is reanimated with its natural life, is almost nothing in comparison with the resurrection of a soul, which has been lying spiritually dead in sin and has now been raised to the essentially supernatural life of grace. Grace, then, is eternal life already begun within us.
“St. Thomas expresses this doctrine in the brief statement: ‘Grace is nothing else but a certain beginning of glory within us.’ He also tells us that the lowest degree of grace in a soul, for example in that of a small child after its baptism, is of greater value than the natural goodness of the whole universe. St. Thomas adds that the justification of the sinner is proportionately more precious than the glorification of the just. Hence when a sinner is absolved in the confessional, an event occurs which is proportionately of greater importance than the entrance of a just soul into Heaven. Such is the supernatural life which we received in Baptism; and this is what constitutes our interior life. This beginning of eternal life, as we have called it, has to grow and develop until we enter Heaven. The root principle of this undying organism is sanctifying grace, received in the very essence of the soul; and this grace would last forever, were it not that sin, a radical disorder in the soul, sometimes destroys it.
“We are thus able to appreciate something of the importance of true conversion, by which a man passes from the state of mortal sin to the state of grace. In the state of mortal sin, his energies were dissipated and he was indifferent in regard to God; but now he loves God more than he loves himself, more than he loves anything else―or, at any rate, he esteems God beyond all earthly things, even though his love of God may not be free from all selfish motives. The state of mortal sin was a state of spiritual death; a state in which, more or less consciously, he made himself the center of all his activities and the end of all his desires; in which he was actually the slave of everything, the slave of his passions, of the spirit of the world, of the spirit of evil. The state of sanctifying grace, on the other hand, is a state of life in which man begins seriously to tend beyond himself and to make God the center of his activities, loving God more than himself. The state of sanctifying grace is entrance into the Kingdom of God, where the docile soul begins to reign with God over its own passions, over the spirit of the world and the spirit of evil.
“This is the fundamental truth of Christian spirituality. Consequently our interior life must be a life of humility, for we must remember always that sanctifying grace is a gift, and that we also need an actual grace for the slightest salutary act, for the shortest step forward in the way of salvation. It must be also a life of mortification; as St. Paul says, we must be ‘always bearing about in our body the mortification of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies’ ― that is to say: we must daily more and more die to sin and to the relics that sin leaves in us, so that God may reign more completely in us, even to the depth of the soul. But, above all, our interior life must be a life of Faith, Hope, Charity, and union with God by unceasing prayer; it is above all the life of the three Theological Virtues (Faith, Hope, Charity) and of the Gifts of the Holy Ghost which accompany them: the Gifts of Wisdom, Understanding, Knowledge, Piety, Counsel, Fortitude and Fear of the Lord. In this way we shall enter into the mysteries of Faith and relish them more and more. In other words, our whole interior life tends towards the supernatural contemplation of the mysteries of the inner life of God and of the Incarnation and Redemption; it tends, above all, towards a more intimate union with God; it is a preliminary to that union with Him which will be the consummation of eternal life.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
Humble Beginnings With Too Much Pride
The First Way of the Spiritual Life―which is the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way―is just that: a beginning and not the final destination. It is like entering Kindergarten―with lots of learning still in store before graduation in 12th Grade; or it is like an apprentice who has been accepted but who has to be taught and can only work under supervision; or like a freshman at College or University, who has been accepted but whose Degree is not guaranteed. Coming back to the U.S. Marine Boot Camp analogy, of all the applications to join the Marines and enter Boot Camp, over 90% are rejected. “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) … “Many shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!” (Luke 13:24). As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories―of beginners, proficients or perfect―but rather to that of stunted souls!” In other words, those Catholic who actually embark upon the First Way of the Spiritual Life, the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way, are not many but a few. The few who actually “make it” can find that their ego is easily inflated and that they might look down upon others, just as the Pharisee did in one of Our Lord’s parables, pridefully saying: “I am not as the rest of men!” (Luke 18:11). In fact, as the spiritual writers tell us, pride will be the last vice to fall in our spiritual progression towards Heaven―it morphs from being a blatant, brash, obvious pride, into being a more subtle, hidden, disguised pride.
A Brief Overview of the Characteristics and Failings in the First Way of the Spiritual Life
► CHIEF CHARACTERISTICS:
● Being in a state of sanctifying grace most of the time
● Main focus being on purifying or purging oneself form past sins
● Avoiding mortal sins, perhaps falling occasionally
● Still committing frequent venial sins
● Conformity to God’s Will in the First Degree (the lowest degree)
● Obeying the Commandments
● Accepting trials reluctantly
● Humility practiced only in First Degree (the lowest degree)
● Still lots of self-love, self-centeredness and selfishness
● Thoughts mainly centered on self, not God
● Regular prayer life―mainly vocal prayer, discursive prayer, active
● Start of Meditation
● Sorrow for past sin
● Acts of Penance (to pay for past sins)
● Acts of Mortification (to avoid future sins)
● Fighting temptation to fall back into sin
● Struggling against sins and temptation
● Practicing virtue in haphazard way
● Bearing with the faults of our neighbor
● Forgiving injuries
► GENERAL FAULTS:
● Inexperience
● Lack of generosity
● Distractions leading away from spiritual things
● Discouragement at imagined or perceived lack of progress or success
● Seeking personal advantages
● Living too much by feelings and emotions
● Having a merely theoretical and abstract Faith
● Being too material and sensual
● Prayer can be mechanical, hurried and distracted
Crafty Conversion Con
Sanctifying grace is the essential element for the spiritual life and our relationship with God. We cannot please God if we are without sanctifying grace and in a state of mortal sin. Do not necessarily or automatically presume that you are living in a state of grace. Remember that lukewarmness warps and blinds the conscience. Bad confessions are not a rarity, but far more common than we imagine. Are we confessing mortal sins according to “number and kind”? St. Alphonsus Liguori was of the opinion―in arguably far better times than our times―that most people made bad confessions. Hence he would say: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil that is not of rare occurrence, but frequent, especially in small country districts, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.” Today, this is compounded and made much more frequent due to what recent popes have called “the loss of the sense of sin.”
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Not only do “we let the Kingdom of God crumble”, but we also let our state of sanctifying grace crumble due to our warped notions of what is sinful and what is not sinful! The demons are unbelievably intelligent, and so when the demons coax us into making bad (invalid) confessions they do so in a very subtle way―they do not advertize it, nor blow trumpets, nor wave the fact before our eyes. The perfect “con” is to “con” somebody and leave them oblivious to the fact that they have been conned. So when it comes to “conned” confessions, the demons want to have us thinking that we have confessed sufficiently well, whereas we have “botched” our confession and confessed badly (invalidly).
What Makes Bad Confessions?
What is it, then, that makes a confession invalid? A confession can be bad (invalid) in a variety of different ways, with each way having its own nuances or shades. Any and every Catholic should (but they don’t) know the conditions for a valid confession. The demons are only too happy to make forget or at least misinterpret those conditions. So what are those mysterious, half-forgotten, misinterpreted and twisted notions of the required conditions for a good (valid) confession? The good old Baltimore Catechism, for children making their First Holy Communion, taught us that the steps to a good confession are: (1) find out my sins; (2) be sorry for my sins; (3) make up my mind not to sin again; (4) tell my sins to the priest; (5) do the penance the priest gives me. Those are still the right conditions today, even for adults―even though the adult catechism explains it more thoroughly. Here is a more thorough explanation of each of those five conditions:
(1) EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE ― Most people “do things by halves” ― meaning that do things partially, halfheartedly, incompletely, doing as little as they can to get by. Such persons are Satan’s dream when it comes to the Sacrament of Confession! Examinations of conscience are on “fast-track” mode; knowledge of what is mortal and venial is “half-baked” at best; memory is selective as to what they want to remember and what they want to forget; they restrict the time for examining their conscience to the moment they join the confessional line―the shorter the line, the shorter the examination; or if there is no confessional line then they just dive in to the confessional without any time to examine their conscience and just “wing-it”. Some persons have lost the sense of sin as to what is mortal and what is venial, whereby they rely on their subjective feelings on the seriousness of sin, rather than the objective teaching of the Church as to what is mortal. Hence, today, you have Catholics who insist that they can still be good Catholics without any need to attend Sunday Mass; or those who feel masturbation is not a mortal sin; or that cohabitation is acceptable these days, etc. The chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, used to say that demons prefer not to be detected―well, the same applies to our sins―demons prefer that we fail to detect our sins!
(2) SUFFICIENT SORROW FOR YOUR SINS ― How much sorrow is sorrow? Sorrow―like so many other things in life, such as intelligence or love―ranges from minimal sorrow to maximum sorrow. Not wishing that any soul be damned (though most souls still manage to damn themselves), God is willing to accept a minimal sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession. This minimal sorrow is called “attrition.” The maximum sorrow is called “contrition”. God is willing to accept this minimal sorrow that fears God and His punishments―but we were created not just to fear God, but more importantly to love God! Our relationship with God should grow from an initial fear of God to a love of God: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18). Our contrition will be perfect when we repent of our sins through the perfect love of God.
(3) A FIRM PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT ― This is another “stumbling-block” or “pit-fall” in making good (valid) confessions. There are too many Catholics who use the confessional like a revolving door―always going and coming out, going back in and coming back out, in again and out again, confessing the same old mortal sins time and time again! If a person does not take practical steps to avoid falling back into the mortal sins they have confessed, then the confession is invalid due to presumed lack of FIRM purpose of amendment. When a particular kind of mortal sin becomes increasingly repetitive and habitual, then one has to question whether or not there is a FIRM purpose of amendment. A FIRM purpose of amendment is far superior to a VAGUE purpose of amendment. A VAGUE purpose of amendment will merely say: “Oh, I’ve really got to stop doing this!” and will go no further. Whereas a FIRM purpose of amendment will go beyond saying: “I’ve got to stop doing this!” and will carefully analyze why these sins are being committed and will take concrete measures and practical plans to avoid the occasions of that particular sin―it goes beyond mere wishful thinking. The VAGUE purpose of amendment resides in the mind or intellect alone. The FIRM purpose of amendment is not only in the mind or intellect, but it then transfers itself to the heart or will, and puts the plans of the mind into practice.
(4) CONFESSING YOUR SINS ― Here is another dangerous area which abounds with demonic interference. The bottom line in this area is this ― if the demons cannot prevent you from going to Confession, then they will try and make you confess your sins in a way that makes the confession invalid. The most common pathways are (1) hiding a mortal sin in confession through shame, (2) fudging, obfuscating, twisting, cosmetically coating, misrepresenting, leaving out details, cloaking the mortal sin in such a way as make a mortal sin seem like a serious venial sin; (3) not stating the correct number of times that you committed the sin―for example, saying “a few times” instead of saying “ten times”. Ten is much more than “a few”; or simply saying: “I’ve stolen things” without saying what value of things and how many times you stole; (4) or not being specific as to the KIND of sin you committed―for example, merely saying: “I’ve been impure!” hides the kind of impurity―for there are increasing degrees of gravity in impurity: (a) impure with oneself; (b) impure with another person; (c) impure with animals. As regards impurity with other persons, you have to make distinctions: (a) are you married or single; (b) was the other person married or single; (c) was the other person of the same sex or the opposite sex; (d) was the other person a minor/child; (e) was the other person a religious―monk, nun, etc. There are certain sins that can the added gravity of being a sacrilege―for example stealing from a store is different to stealing from the church; impurity with a religious adds a sacrilegious aspect to the sin. Always be honest in confession―you might fool the priest; you might fool yourself; but you cannot fool God. God knows all about your sin―He wants YOU to know YOUR sins as they really are so that you can get to work at uprooting them from your life.
(5) COMPLETING THE PENANCE THE PRIEST ASSIGNS TO YOU ― Listen carefully and take note of the penance that the priest assigns to you. Sometimes the instructions are general―such as: “Pray a Rosary!” This does not specify when to pray the Rosary; nor does it specify whether or not you have to pray all five decades at once, or whether you can divide it up into sections; nor does it specify which mysteries of the Rosary to pray; nor does it specify if you also have meditate the mysteries instead just saying the Our Fathers and Hail Marys. Therefore all these variations are left up to you. Other penances might be more precise―such as: “Make the Stations of the Cross in church on a Friday!” If this is impossible for you, then you must mention that to the priest and give the reason why. He might change some aspect, such as allowing you to make the Stations at home, or make them the next time you go to church, etc. Priests are obliged―under the pain of sin―to give serious penances for mortal sins: for example, five decades of the Rosary, or the Stations of the Cross, are regarded as the minimum in the class of serious penances. However, if you feel you can more―then tell the priest that you are willing to do more. The reason being is that a penance imposed in the Sacrament of Confession has more power and value than the same penance done by your personal choice―so a Rosary given as penance in Confession has more value than a Rosary prayed by your own free choice. Penance is essential―as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
Article 16
Thursday & Friday April 25th & 26th
Three Steps Big Picture
Article 2: An Overview of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life
Thursday & Friday April 25th & 26th
Three Steps Big Picture
Article 2: An Overview of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life
The Key to Heaven is a Four-Letter-Word
A four-letter word can get you into Heaven! “Huh? Is this a joke?” you say. No joke―but it should leave you laughing with joy! What four-letter-word can get you to Heaven? LOVE! God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and He wants to be loved: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Are you―or have you been―a great filthy sinner? Then LOVE God: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47).
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are essentially a progression of steps in the love of God―starting with no love of God and leading to a total love of God. We will cover all the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in greater detail in the forthcoming articles―but in this article we will give a brief overview of all three. It is important to see the big picture before descending into the details―otherwise we get caught up in the details and cannot see how everything fits together―as the saying goes: “One cannot see the forest because of the trees”, meaning that if you have your nose stuck in a tree looking at its details, then you will not be able to see past that tree and see the forest as a whole.
Similarly, when writing a essay―a basic essay consists of three main parts: introduction, body, and conclusion. The essay’s introduction gives you a glimpse of the of the forest as a whole―it gives the big picture. Then the body of the essay descends down into the details. Finally, the conclusion once again focuses on the forest as a whole, or the big picture, by rising above the details and giving a general conclusion.
If you are giving directions on how to get from San Francisco to New York, then you first of all give a general overall outline―for example: The fastest route is to take Interstate 80, which runs from San Francisco to Teaneck, New Jersey, which is just outside of New York City. This route will take you across Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and then on to New York. It is approximately 2,900 miles and takes around 43 hours of continuous driving. After the general overview, you can then descend into further details.
The Road to Heaven is a Highway of Love. We start out as sinners with little or no love of God and we are meant to progress along the Highway of Love by gradually and increasingly growing in our love for God (and also our neighbor for God’s sake―because God loves our neighbor too, and not only us).
Dom Jean-Baptiste Chautard, OCSO (1858-1935), was a French Trappist abbot and religious author. In his book, The Soul of the Apostolate, which was one of Pope St. Pius X’s favorite bedside books, Dom Chautard has drawn up a list of spiritual states that every person should study with painstaking care. He lists nine states that progress from mortal sin to sanctity. We have linked them to their appropriate levels to the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. The table below lists those states and the chief characteristics of each state.
NINE DEGREES ON THE ROAD FROM MORTAL SIN TO SANCTITY
1. HARDENED IN SIN (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Stubborn persistence in sin, either out of ignorance or because of a maliciously warped conscience.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Deliberate refusal to have any recourse to God.
2. SURFACE CHRISTIANITY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Considered as a trifling evil, easily forgiven. The soul easily gives way and commits mortal sin at almost every possible occasion or temptation. Confession almost without contrition.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Mechanical; either inattention, or always dictated by temporal interest―such souls enter into themselves rarely and superficially.
3. MEDIOCRE PIETY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Weak resistance. Hardly ever avoids occasions, but seriously regrets having sinned and makes good confessions.
►Venial Sin: Complete acceptance of this sin, which is considered as insignificant. Hence tepidity of the will (lukewarmness). Does nothing whatever to prevent venial sin, or to find it out and root it out, when it is concealed.
►Prayer: From time to time, prays well. Momentary fits of fervor.
4. INTERMITTENT PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Loyal resistance. Habitually avoids occasions. Deep regrets if there is a fall into mortal sin. Does penance to make reparation.
►Venial Sin: Sometimes deliberate. Puts up weak fight. Sorrow only superficial. Makes particular examination of conscience, but without any method or coherence.
►Prayer: Not firmly resolved to remain faithful to meditation. Gives it up as soon as dryness is felt or as soon as there is business to attend to.
5. SUSTAINED PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never. At most, very rare, when taken suddenly and violently by surprise. And then, often it is to be doubted if the sin is mortal. It is followed by ardent compunction and penance.
►Venial Sin: Vigilant in avoiding and fighting it. Rarely deliberate. Keen sorrow, but does little by way of reparation. Consistent particular examination of predominant faults, but aiming only at avoidance of deliberate venial sin.
►Imperfections: The soul avoids uncovering them so as not to have to fight them, or else easily excuses them. Approves the thought of renouncing them, and would like to do so, but makes little effort in that direction.
►Prayer: Always faithful to prayer, no matter what. Often affective. Alternating consolations and dryness that is hard to endure.
6. FERVOR (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never deliberate. By surprise, sometimes, or with imperfect advertence. Keenly regretted, and serious reparation made.
►Imperfections: Wants nothing to do with them. Watches over them, fights them with courage, in order to be more pleasing to God. Sometimes accepted, however, but regretted at once. Frequent acts of renunciation. Particular examination aims at perfection in a given virtue.
►Prayer: Mental prayer gladly prolonged. Prayer more affective, or even prayer of simplicity. Alternation between powerful consolations and fierce trials.
7. RELATIVE PERFECTION (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Guards against them energetically and with much love of God. They only happen with half advertence.
►Prayer: Habitual life of prayer even when occupied in external works. Thirst for self renunciation, annihilation, detachment, and divine love. Hunger for the Eucharist, and for heaven. Graces of infused prayer, of different degrees. Often, passive purification (where God's Providence sends sufferings and trials to the person).
8. HEROIC PERFECTION (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Nothing but the first impulse.
►Prayer: Supernatural graces of contemplation, sometimes accompanied by extraordinary phenomena. Pronounced passive purifications. Contempt of self to the point of complete self-forgetfulness. Prefers suffering to joys.
9. COMPLETE SANCTITY (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Hardly apparent.
►Prayer: Usually, transforming union. Spiritual marriage. Purifications by love. Ardent thirst for sufferings and humiliations. (Few and far between are the souls that belong to the last two, even to the last three categories).
From Hatred to Love
From the above table, we can see the pathway from sin and being an enemy to God, to eventually loving God and entering into a mystical spiritual marriage with God ― as Jesus said: “Sanctify them Father! … And for them do I sanctify Myself … that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee; that they also may be one in Us!” (John 17:17-21). “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make Our abode with him. He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:23-24). “The Father Himself loves you, because you have loved Me!” (John 16:27). “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you! Abide in My love! If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love; just as I have also kept My Father’s commandments, and do abide in His love” (John 15:9-10). “He that has my commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me! And he that loves Me, shall be loved by My Father, and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him!” (John 14:21).
The more we keep the commandments of God, the more we love Him: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15) ... The more we sin, the less we love. The less we sin, the more we love. “He that loves iniquity, hates his own soul! … He that shall sin against Me, shall hurt his own soul!” (Psalm 10:6; Proverbs 8:36). The less we love the world, the more we will love God: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). The less mechanically and distractedly we say our prayers, the more sincere our love becomes: “These people honor Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). The more we talk to God in prayer, the more it indicates a love for God. The more we are prepared to suffer for God, the more we manifest our love for God: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Christ died for our sins out of a love for us: “By this has the charity of God appeared towards us―because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him. In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins!” (1 John 4:9-10) … “Jesus Christ has loved us and washed us from our sins in His own Blood!” (Apocalypse 1:5) … “Christ has loved us and has delivered Himself for us as a sacrifice to God” (Ephesians 5:2) … “Christ loved the Church and delivered himself up for it!” (Ephesians 5:25).
The Power of Love
Love has to be the fuel that drives us through all the three stages of the spiritual life. It is like gasoline for the car―no matter how beautiful the car might be, it is going nowhere without gasoline. The same is true of charity―as was already quoted above: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Sadly and unfortunately, there is very little true love or true charity in the world today―even within the Catholic world. The sad thing is that they are all missing out on the unbelievable power of love.
The Imitation of Christ describes this power of love: “Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs calmly. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and separated from all worldly affections. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger or higher or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth―for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God.
“One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in God, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver. Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much where he who does not love fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle. Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful.
“Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5).
That is why we ask God the Holy Ghost―Who is Charity itself: “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8)―to come and enkindle in us the fire of His love: “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the FIRE OF THY LOVE!” The saints fully understood the place and power of charity in the big scheme of things. Here are just a few quotes:
Testimony of the Saints
“Charity may be a very short word, but with its tremendous meaning of pure love, it sums up man’s entire relation to God and to his neighbor. As Our Lord explained: ‘It is on charity that all the Law and the prophets depend.’” (St. Aelred of Rievaulx, 1110-1167).
“All is contained in these brief words: ‘Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with thy soul, and with all thy strength: and love thy neighbor as thyself.’” (St. Augustine, 354-430).
“Man is the perfection of the Universe. The spirit is the perfection of man. Love is the perfection of the spirit, and charity that of love. Therefore, the love of God is the end, the perfection of the Universe.” (St. Francis de Sales, 1567-1622).
“You ask me for a method of attaining perfection. I know of love—and only love. Love can do all things.” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“Perfection of life is the perfection of love. For love is the life of the soul.” (St. Francis de Sales, 1567-1622).
“To love God as He ought to be loved, we must be detached from all temporal love. We must love nothing but Him, or if we love anything else, we must love it only for His sake.” (St. Peter Claver, 1581-1654).
“He who wishes to love God does not truly love Him if he has not an ardent and constant desire to suffer for His sake.” (St. Aloysius Gonzaga, 1568-1591).
“What a weakness it is to love Jesus Christ only when He caresses us, and to be cold immediately He afflicts us. This is not true love. Those who love thus, love themselves too much to love God with all their heart.” (St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, 1647-1690).
“He who does not acquire the love of God will scarcely persevere in the grace of God, for it is very difficult to renounce sin merely through fear of chastisement.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, 1696-1787).
“If the greatest sinner on Earth should repent at the moment of death, and draw his last breath in an act of love; neither the many graces he had abused, nor the many sins he had committed would stand in his way. Our Lord would receive him into His mercy” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“Daily advance, then, in this love, both by praying and by well-doing, that through the help of Him who enjoined it on you, and whose gift it is, it may be nourished and increased, until, being perfected, it render you perfect.” (St. Augustine, 354-430).
“Love God, serve God―everything is in that.” (St. Clare of Assisi, 1193-1253).
Three Ways―One Thread
Thus we can compare the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life to the Holy Trinity―thee Persons in One God. The Three Ways have one thread that stretches throughout all of them―that thread is charity, which is most fitting since “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). If God is charity, then Heaven must be love. In our pilgrimage through the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life, we must progressively grow in love―first and foremost a love of God, without excluding a love of neighbor.
In the book, Word of Love, by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, we read various quotes of Our Lord to His mystics that stress this supremacy of charity. Here are just some of them (the original sources are listed):
“You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 109).
“You see, Consolata, sanctity means self-forgetfulness in everything, in thoughts, desires, words ... Allow Me to do it all! I will do everything; but you should, at every moment, give Me what I ask for with much love!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 153).
“I delight to work in a soul. You see, I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me.” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 154).
“That soul is dearest to Me who loves Me the most!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 100).
“I ask only for love. Ah, what are you doing about it?” (Jesus to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 44).
“I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift ... I thirst for love!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 75).
“Love Me, and you will be happy; and the more you love Me, the happier you will be! Even when you will find yourself in utter darkness, love will produce light, love will produce strength, and love will produce joy!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., pp. 106-107).
“Oh, if people would only love Me, what happiness would reign in this unhappy world!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 107).
“Love Me, Consolata, love Me alone! Love is everything, and so you will be giving Me everything. When you love Me, you give Jesus everything He desires from His creature: love, Love is everything! If you will now concentrate upon this one resolution, you will be giving everything to Jesus!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 97).
“Love Me more—oh, much more!—than human beings love one another.” (Jesus to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 134).
Love is More About Quality Than Quantity
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange says that the spiritual life is essentially a life of love and our mission and goal is grow in love all throughout our lives. Nevertheless, he points out that this growth is not primarily a growth in quantity, but a growth in quality and intensity. Quality is always superior to quantity. The growth of divine love or charity is through its intensity where we come to love God more perfectly and purely for Himself. The “multiplying” of love is not by the addition of acts upon acts. The science of divine loves works on another dimension where “love increases in us so far as it becomes stronger.”
“Charity does not grow by addition, like a heap of wheat. This addition would multiply charity without making it more intense. The increase would be in the order of quantity rather than quality, which is quite a different thing. In reality, charity or love increases in us in so far as it becomes stronger, takes deeper root in our will. As with the scholar, learning becomes more profound, more penetrating, more certain, without always reaching out to new conclusions. So charity grows in us by making us love God more perfectly and more purely for Himself, and our neighbor for God.” (Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life Volume One, pp 132-133).
In the same way that God is more glorified by a single act of pure love, so is the perfection of one soul of greater benefit to the whole Church, and more pleasing to God, than a number of souls who remain in a mediocre or a lukewarm state. “God is more glorified by a single act of charity of ten talents than by ten acts of charity of one talent each. Likewise, a single, very perfect, just soul pleases God more than many others who remain in mediocrity or tepidity. Quality is superior to quantity. This is why the plenitude of grace in Mary surpassed from the first day of her existence that of all the saints, as a single diamond is worth more than a quantity of precious stones.” (Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life Volume One, p. 136).
A four-letter word can get you into Heaven! “Huh? Is this a joke?” you say. No joke―but it should leave you laughing with joy! What four-letter-word can get you to Heaven? LOVE! God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and He wants to be loved: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Are you―or have you been―a great filthy sinner? Then LOVE God: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47).
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are essentially a progression of steps in the love of God―starting with no love of God and leading to a total love of God. We will cover all the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in greater detail in the forthcoming articles―but in this article we will give a brief overview of all three. It is important to see the big picture before descending into the details―otherwise we get caught up in the details and cannot see how everything fits together―as the saying goes: “One cannot see the forest because of the trees”, meaning that if you have your nose stuck in a tree looking at its details, then you will not be able to see past that tree and see the forest as a whole.
Similarly, when writing a essay―a basic essay consists of three main parts: introduction, body, and conclusion. The essay’s introduction gives you a glimpse of the of the forest as a whole―it gives the big picture. Then the body of the essay descends down into the details. Finally, the conclusion once again focuses on the forest as a whole, or the big picture, by rising above the details and giving a general conclusion.
If you are giving directions on how to get from San Francisco to New York, then you first of all give a general overall outline―for example: The fastest route is to take Interstate 80, which runs from San Francisco to Teaneck, New Jersey, which is just outside of New York City. This route will take you across Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and then on to New York. It is approximately 2,900 miles and takes around 43 hours of continuous driving. After the general overview, you can then descend into further details.
The Road to Heaven is a Highway of Love. We start out as sinners with little or no love of God and we are meant to progress along the Highway of Love by gradually and increasingly growing in our love for God (and also our neighbor for God’s sake―because God loves our neighbor too, and not only us).
Dom Jean-Baptiste Chautard, OCSO (1858-1935), was a French Trappist abbot and religious author. In his book, The Soul of the Apostolate, which was one of Pope St. Pius X’s favorite bedside books, Dom Chautard has drawn up a list of spiritual states that every person should study with painstaking care. He lists nine states that progress from mortal sin to sanctity. We have linked them to their appropriate levels to the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life. The table below lists those states and the chief characteristics of each state.
NINE DEGREES ON THE ROAD FROM MORTAL SIN TO SANCTITY
1. HARDENED IN SIN (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Stubborn persistence in sin, either out of ignorance or because of a maliciously warped conscience.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Deliberate refusal to have any recourse to God.
2. SURFACE CHRISTIANITY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Considered as a trifling evil, easily forgiven. The soul easily gives way and commits mortal sin at almost every possible occasion or temptation. Confession almost without contrition.
►Venial Sin: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as a sin.
►Prayer: Mechanical; either inattention, or always dictated by temporal interest―such souls enter into themselves rarely and superficially.
3. MEDIOCRE PIETY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE)
►Mortal Sin: Weak resistance. Hardly ever avoids occasions, but seriously regrets having sinned and makes good confessions.
►Venial Sin: Complete acceptance of this sin, which is considered as insignificant. Hence tepidity of the will (lukewarmness). Does nothing whatever to prevent venial sin, or to find it out and root it out, when it is concealed.
►Prayer: From time to time, prays well. Momentary fits of fervor.
4. INTERMITTENT PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Loyal resistance. Habitually avoids occasions. Deep regrets if there is a fall into mortal sin. Does penance to make reparation.
►Venial Sin: Sometimes deliberate. Puts up weak fight. Sorrow only superficial. Makes particular examination of conscience, but without any method or coherence.
►Prayer: Not firmly resolved to remain faithful to meditation. Gives it up as soon as dryness is felt or as soon as there is business to attend to.
5. SUSTAINED PIETY (THE FIRST WAY―THE WAY OF BEGINNERS―THE PURGATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never. At most, very rare, when taken suddenly and violently by surprise. And then, often it is to be doubted if the sin is mortal. It is followed by ardent compunction and penance.
►Venial Sin: Vigilant in avoiding and fighting it. Rarely deliberate. Keen sorrow, but does little by way of reparation. Consistent particular examination of predominant faults, but aiming only at avoidance of deliberate venial sin.
►Imperfections: The soul avoids uncovering them so as not to have to fight them, or else easily excuses them. Approves the thought of renouncing them, and would like to do so, but makes little effort in that direction.
►Prayer: Always faithful to prayer, no matter what. Often affective. Alternating consolations and dryness that is hard to endure.
6. FERVOR (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never deliberate. By surprise, sometimes, or with imperfect advertence. Keenly regretted, and serious reparation made.
►Imperfections: Wants nothing to do with them. Watches over them, fights them with courage, in order to be more pleasing to God. Sometimes accepted, however, but regretted at once. Frequent acts of renunciation. Particular examination aims at perfection in a given virtue.
►Prayer: Mental prayer gladly prolonged. Prayer more affective, or even prayer of simplicity. Alternation between powerful consolations and fierce trials.
7. RELATIVE PERFECTION (THE SECOND WAY―THE WAY OF PROFICIENTS―THE ILLUMINATIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Guards against them energetically and with much love of God. They only happen with half advertence.
►Prayer: Habitual life of prayer even when occupied in external works. Thirst for self renunciation, annihilation, detachment, and divine love. Hunger for the Eucharist, and for heaven. Graces of infused prayer, of different degrees. Often, passive purification (where God's Providence sends sufferings and trials to the person).
8. HEROIC PERFECTION (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Nothing but the first impulse.
►Prayer: Supernatural graces of contemplation, sometimes accompanied by extraordinary phenomena. Pronounced passive purifications. Contempt of self to the point of complete self-forgetfulness. Prefers suffering to joys.
9. COMPLETE SANCTITY (THE THIRD WAY―THE WAY OF THE PERFECT―THE UNITIVE WAY)
►Mortal Sin: Never.
►Venial Sin: Never.
►Imperfections: Hardly apparent.
►Prayer: Usually, transforming union. Spiritual marriage. Purifications by love. Ardent thirst for sufferings and humiliations. (Few and far between are the souls that belong to the last two, even to the last three categories).
From Hatred to Love
From the above table, we can see the pathway from sin and being an enemy to God, to eventually loving God and entering into a mystical spiritual marriage with God ― as Jesus said: “Sanctify them Father! … And for them do I sanctify Myself … that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee; that they also may be one in Us!” (John 17:17-21). “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make Our abode with him. He that loves Me not, keeps not My words!” (John 14:23-24). “The Father Himself loves you, because you have loved Me!” (John 16:27). “As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you! Abide in My love! If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love; just as I have also kept My Father’s commandments, and do abide in His love” (John 15:9-10). “He that has my commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me! And he that loves Me, shall be loved by My Father, and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him!” (John 14:21).
The more we keep the commandments of God, the more we love Him: “If you love Me, keep My commandments!” (John 14:15) ... The more we sin, the less we love. The less we sin, the more we love. “He that loves iniquity, hates his own soul! … He that shall sin against Me, shall hurt his own soul!” (Psalm 10:6; Proverbs 8:36). The less we love the world, the more we will love God: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). The less mechanically and distractedly we say our prayers, the more sincere our love becomes: “These people honor Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). The more we talk to God in prayer, the more it indicates a love for God. The more we are prepared to suffer for God, the more we manifest our love for God: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Christ died for our sins out of a love for us: “By this has the charity of God appeared towards us―because God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him. In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins!” (1 John 4:9-10) … “Jesus Christ has loved us and washed us from our sins in His own Blood!” (Apocalypse 1:5) … “Christ has loved us and has delivered Himself for us as a sacrifice to God” (Ephesians 5:2) … “Christ loved the Church and delivered himself up for it!” (Ephesians 5:25).
The Power of Love
Love has to be the fuel that drives us through all the three stages of the spiritual life. It is like gasoline for the car―no matter how beautiful the car might be, it is going nowhere without gasoline. The same is true of charity―as was already quoted above: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Sadly and unfortunately, there is very little true love or true charity in the world today―even within the Catholic world. The sad thing is that they are all missing out on the unbelievable power of love.
The Imitation of Christ describes this power of love: “Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs calmly. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and separated from all worldly affections. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger or higher or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth―for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God.
“One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in God, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver. Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much where he who does not love fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle. Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful.
“Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5).
That is why we ask God the Holy Ghost―Who is Charity itself: “God is Charity” (1 John 4:8)―to come and enkindle in us the fire of His love: “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the FIRE OF THY LOVE!” The saints fully understood the place and power of charity in the big scheme of things. Here are just a few quotes:
Testimony of the Saints
“Charity may be a very short word, but with its tremendous meaning of pure love, it sums up man’s entire relation to God and to his neighbor. As Our Lord explained: ‘It is on charity that all the Law and the prophets depend.’” (St. Aelred of Rievaulx, 1110-1167).
“All is contained in these brief words: ‘Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with thy soul, and with all thy strength: and love thy neighbor as thyself.’” (St. Augustine, 354-430).
“Man is the perfection of the Universe. The spirit is the perfection of man. Love is the perfection of the spirit, and charity that of love. Therefore, the love of God is the end, the perfection of the Universe.” (St. Francis de Sales, 1567-1622).
“You ask me for a method of attaining perfection. I know of love—and only love. Love can do all things.” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“Perfection of life is the perfection of love. For love is the life of the soul.” (St. Francis de Sales, 1567-1622).
“To love God as He ought to be loved, we must be detached from all temporal love. We must love nothing but Him, or if we love anything else, we must love it only for His sake.” (St. Peter Claver, 1581-1654).
“He who wishes to love God does not truly love Him if he has not an ardent and constant desire to suffer for His sake.” (St. Aloysius Gonzaga, 1568-1591).
“What a weakness it is to love Jesus Christ only when He caresses us, and to be cold immediately He afflicts us. This is not true love. Those who love thus, love themselves too much to love God with all their heart.” (St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, 1647-1690).
“He who does not acquire the love of God will scarcely persevere in the grace of God, for it is very difficult to renounce sin merely through fear of chastisement.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, 1696-1787).
“If the greatest sinner on Earth should repent at the moment of death, and draw his last breath in an act of love; neither the many graces he had abused, nor the many sins he had committed would stand in his way. Our Lord would receive him into His mercy” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux, 1873-1897).
“Daily advance, then, in this love, both by praying and by well-doing, that through the help of Him who enjoined it on you, and whose gift it is, it may be nourished and increased, until, being perfected, it render you perfect.” (St. Augustine, 354-430).
“Love God, serve God―everything is in that.” (St. Clare of Assisi, 1193-1253).
Three Ways―One Thread
Thus we can compare the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life to the Holy Trinity―thee Persons in One God. The Three Ways have one thread that stretches throughout all of them―that thread is charity, which is most fitting since “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). If God is charity, then Heaven must be love. In our pilgrimage through the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life, we must progressively grow in love―first and foremost a love of God, without excluding a love of neighbor.
In the book, Word of Love, by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, we read various quotes of Our Lord to His mystics that stress this supremacy of charity. Here are just some of them (the original sources are listed):
“You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 109).
“You see, Consolata, sanctity means self-forgetfulness in everything, in thoughts, desires, words ... Allow Me to do it all! I will do everything; but you should, at every moment, give Me what I ask for with much love!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 153).
“I delight to work in a soul. You see, I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me.” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 154).
“That soul is dearest to Me who loves Me the most!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 100).
“I ask only for love. Ah, what are you doing about it?” (Jesus to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 44).
“I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift ... I thirst for love!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 75).
“Love Me, and you will be happy; and the more you love Me, the happier you will be! Even when you will find yourself in utter darkness, love will produce light, love will produce strength, and love will produce joy!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., pp. 106-107).
“Oh, if people would only love Me, what happiness would reign in this unhappy world!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 107).
“Love Me, Consolata, love Me alone! Love is everything, and so you will be giving Me everything. When you love Me, you give Jesus everything He desires from His creature: love, Love is everything! If you will now concentrate upon this one resolution, you will be giving everything to Jesus!” (Jesus to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 97).
“Love Me more—oh, much more!—than human beings love one another.” (Jesus to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 134).
Love is More About Quality Than Quantity
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange says that the spiritual life is essentially a life of love and our mission and goal is grow in love all throughout our lives. Nevertheless, he points out that this growth is not primarily a growth in quantity, but a growth in quality and intensity. Quality is always superior to quantity. The growth of divine love or charity is through its intensity where we come to love God more perfectly and purely for Himself. The “multiplying” of love is not by the addition of acts upon acts. The science of divine loves works on another dimension where “love increases in us so far as it becomes stronger.”
“Charity does not grow by addition, like a heap of wheat. This addition would multiply charity without making it more intense. The increase would be in the order of quantity rather than quality, which is quite a different thing. In reality, charity or love increases in us in so far as it becomes stronger, takes deeper root in our will. As with the scholar, learning becomes more profound, more penetrating, more certain, without always reaching out to new conclusions. So charity grows in us by making us love God more perfectly and more purely for Himself, and our neighbor for God.” (Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life Volume One, pp 132-133).
In the same way that God is more glorified by a single act of pure love, so is the perfection of one soul of greater benefit to the whole Church, and more pleasing to God, than a number of souls who remain in a mediocre or a lukewarm state. “God is more glorified by a single act of charity of ten talents than by ten acts of charity of one talent each. Likewise, a single, very perfect, just soul pleases God more than many others who remain in mediocrity or tepidity. Quality is superior to quantity. This is why the plenitude of grace in Mary surpassed from the first day of her existence that of all the saints, as a single diamond is worth more than a quantity of precious stones.” (Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life Volume One, p. 136).
Article 15
Tuesday & Wednesday April 23rd & 24th
The Three Steps to Heaven
Article 1: An Introduction to the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life
Tuesday & Wednesday April 23rd & 24th
The Three Steps to Heaven
Article 1: An Introduction to the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life
One Step at a Time!
The Road to Hell is paved with good intentions, the Road to Heaven is paved with good deeds. Some people start out well―but finish badly. Others start out badly―but finish well. However, since we are not privy to the consciences of souls, nor are we aware and cognizant of the workings of God’s grace behind the scenes―therefore, we can never be really sure of who is damned and who is saved. Nevertheless, we can be sure that in general most souls are lost―for that is what we have been told by Our Lord, Our Lady and many of the saints and theologians.
What is more important than salvation? Our Lord asks the same question: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! Lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Our Lord then speaks of the paths or roads that read to Heaven and Hell: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate! For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction―and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 22:14). Everyone will live somewhere forever without end. Where you live forever is absolutely critical. There are only two options: Hell and eternal punishment, or Heaven and eternal joy. The question then is: “Which is the way to Heaven?”
Are we on the path to Heaven or Hell? “Every way of a man seems right to himself” (Proverbs 21:2). “There is a way which seems just to a man―but the ends of which lead to death!” Do not pride yourself on being Catholic―for “unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required; and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). If you have been given the Catholic Faith―by the grace of God―then much is expected of you! Having the Faith is not enough: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! … You believe that there is one God. You do well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
Road Maps to Heaven and Hell
Do you know where you are going? Sometimes you need a road map to help you reach your destination. Do you really know the way to Heaven? Yes, of course, you could say: “You need to be in state of sanctifying grace to get to Heaven!” ― but that is like saying: “To get to New York from San Francisco, all you have to do is go east!” The advice is true, but not very precise―and you could end up anywhere by merely going east of San Francisco! If that is true of an earthly journey, then how much true is that of our pilgrimage to Heaven! When Our Lord said to His Apostles: “Where I am going you know, and the way you know!” (John 14:4). Yet we have to say with the Apostle St. Thomas: “Lord, how can we know the way?” (John 14:5). Can we know the way to Heaven? Yes. Do we know the way to Heaven? Well, that is another question! Do we know the way―or do only imagine we know the way? God says: “I will lead the blind into the way which they know not; and in the paths which they were ignorant of I will make them walk; I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight!” (Isaias 42:16). “Jesus said: ‘I am the way! No man comes to the Father, but by Me!’” (John 14:6).
“The Chief Priests and the Scribes … asked Him, saying: ‘Master, we know that You teach the way of God in truth’” (Luke 20:19-21) ― they did not say this in order to learn the ways of God from Jesus, but they were seeking to entrap Him in His words, so that they could accuse Him. The Chief Priests and Scribes considered the ways of Jesus to be wrong and their own ways to correct. There are many Catholics who more or less do the same thing―they do not like some of the teachings and His Church, so they twist them, water them down, re-interpret them, or even reject them. Today, anywhere from 50% to 90% of Catholics accept same-sex relationships, same-sex marriages, divorce with remarriage, cohabitation, pre-marital sex, contraception, abortion, etc.
“Every way of a man seems right to himself” (Proverbs 21:2). “Everyone has turned aside into his own way” (Isaias 53:6). “Everyone has erred in his own way” (Isaias 47:15). “The way of knowledge they have not known, … neither did they find the way of knowledge” (Baruch 3:20, 27). “All have turned aside into their own way, everyone after his own gain, from the first even to the last! … They walk in a way that is not good after their own thoughts” (Isaias 56:11; 65:2). “They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst show them” (Exodus 32:8).
The Way to Heaven
From the earliest centuries, the spiritual masters have presented the way to Heaven as being a journey through three stages of the spiritual life. These three ways have various names, but all the names refer to the same stage:
(1) The Way of Beginners (also called the Purgative Way)
(2) The Way of Proficients (also called the Illuminative Way)
(3) The Way of Perfection (also called the Unitive Way)
► Some spiritual writers compare these three ways to the life of a human being and the necessary stages of life that each person must pass through: (1) Childhood, (2) Adolescence, (3) Adulthood. Someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin is not even classified as having entered the beginnings of the spiritual life―like an embryo within the womb of its mother has not yet entered natural life in the world.
► Other spiritual compare these three ways to human relationships between two people: (1) Friendship, which leads to (2) Betrothal, which finally leads to (3) Marriage. Someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin is not a friend of God, but a stranger or enemy to God.
► You could also compare the three ways to the different levels of education in schools: (1) Lower School, (2) Middle School, and (3) High School. Before entering Kindergarten or Pre-Kindergarten, the child is incapable of grasping the levels of understanding required in Lower School―just like someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin fails to grasp and understand the gravity of sin and beauty of the things of God. Or another aspect is: (1) Primary education at primary school or elementary school, and sometimes in the early years of middle school. (2) Secondary education at secondary school or high school, and sometimes in the latter years of middle school. (3) Higher education or vocational education.
► You also have three progressive stages of University degrees: (1) Bachelor's Degree: These degrees generally take three or four years to finish. (2) Master's Degree: After an individual completes a Bachelor's Degree, they may apply for admission to a master's degree program that typically requires one to three years of further education. This degree focuses more on mastering the field of study a candidate wishes to take. (3) Doctorate Degree: A doctorate degree is the highest level of education an individual may seek, and it involves specializing in a specific focus of study after securing a master's degree. This degree typically requires candidates to dedicate three to four years to education and research, and individuals gain the title of Doctor upon completing a doctoral program.
► Or again, you could compare the three ways to progressing through the medical field: (1) First comes Medical School, (2) then comes a period of Internship, where you can only practice medicine under guidance and supervision; (3) finally comes the choice of Residency (hospital doctors) or General Practitioner (outside of the hospital).
► Similarly, there are three major phases in military training: (1) Phase One/Red Phase―weeks one through three―which deal with: Fundamentals of soldiering; Core Army values; Army traditions and ethics; What it means to be a soldier; Taking the Army Combat Fitness Test. (2) Phase Two/White Phase―weeks four through five―where the focus is on: Self-discipline; Teamwork; Combat skills; Night training; Hand-to-hand combat and weapons training; Basic rifle marksmanship; Physical fitness. (3) Phase Three/Blue Phase―weeks six through nine―deals with: Additional weapons training and rifle marksmanship; Overview of convoy operations; Military operations in urban terrain; Field training exercises. If all these phases are successfully passed, then you officially graduate from basic combat training and are a fully-fledged soldier.
► We also see this triple stage of formation in some elements of nature. There are three phases of plant growth: (1) Meristematic, (2) Elongation and (3) Maturation. We can understand by looking at a seed. A seed―of itself―will not grow; it is like a soul in mortal sin which cannot grow in the love of God. Yet once that seed is “baptized” by receiving “the grace of water” and is planted in the “soil of the Faith”, then the seed comes to life and begins to grow: “Unless the grain of wheat, falling into the ground die, then it remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit” (John 12:25). When the seed gets planted into the “soil of Faith” with water (grace) and sun (love of God), then it will start to grow into a small sprout. Once “baptized” and “planted” the tips of roots and shoots exhibit continuous growth and hence are meristematic. The cells in this region are rich in protoplasm and have large nuclei. The cells next to this region represent the elongation growth phase, where there is the formation of new cell walls, vacuoles etc. The region next to the elongation phase represents the maturation phase in which the cells attain their maximal size. Seed, sprout, small plant, and adult plant.
► The same is true of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion Preparation for Consecration to Mary, wherein we have an introductory stage of Renouncing the Spirit of the World (which is akin to renouncing mortal sin before one can enter the Way of Beginners―the First Way or Purgative Way―in the spiritual life. (1) This is followed by a period devoted to the Knowledge of Self ― which is equivalent to the Way of Beginners or Purgative Way. (2) The second period of time is devoted to the Knowledge of Mary ― which is equivalent to the Way of the Proficient or the Illuminative Way. (3) The third period is devoted to the Knowledge of Jesus ― which is equivalent to the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way.
Do You See the Big Picture?
Hopefully you can see, from all the above examples, the need of a progressive growth in the spiritual life―which increasingly distances itself from the world and all that the world offers, and increasingly attaches itself to God and all that God offers. We cannot be going forwards and backwards at the same time―as Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth, but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters! For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Baptism is not an end in itself―it is only the beginning of a life that should grow and mature until it finally is at a level which grants the soul entry into Heaven. Baptism merely plants into our souls the seeds of the Theological, Cardinal and Moral virtues―but these need to be cultivated, watered, protected and nourished so that they can grow and thereby produce the fruits necessary for our entrance into Heaven. “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith also, if it have not works, is dead in itself. O vain man, know that Faith without works is dead! For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead” (James 2:14-26). We need to WORK OUT our salvation: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). As Our Lord said: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the husbandman [= gardener or farmer]. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit … In this is My Father glorified; that you bring forth very much fruit, and become My disciples … I have chosen you and have appointed you that you should go and should bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain!” (John 15:1-8, 16).
There can be no armchair Catholics in this life! Our Lord says: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a householder who went out, early in the morning, to hire laborers for his vineyard. And, having agreed a wage, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way into the vineyard. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. About the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why stand you here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:1-7).
One of greatest theologians of the 20th century, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange (1877-1964) was ordained to the priesthood in 1900 in the Dominican Order and has been widely acknowledged as a leading neo-Thomist of the 20th century. He helped write papal encyclicals for several popes. From 1909 to 1960 he taught Mystical and Ascetical Theology (Spiritual Theology) in Rome at the Dominican Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, commonly known as the “Angelicum”. He was thus one of the greatest masters of the spiritual life in the 20th century―some observers were of the opinion that he had reached the mystical state towards the end of his life. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange deals with the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in two different books: The multiple volume book The Three Ages of the Interior Life, and a much smaller book which is summary of the above, entitled The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life (later renamed The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life), in which he writes:
“To understand what our interior life is in itself and in its various phases, we must consider it not merely in its seed, but in its full and complete development. Now, if we ask the Gospel what our interior life is, it tells us that the life of grace, given to us in Baptism and nourished by the Eucharist, is the seed or germ of eternal life. A Christian on Earth could never become one of the blessed in Heaven unless he had already received the divine life in Baptism. We are thus able to appreciate something of the importance of true conversion, by which a man passes from the state of mortal sin to the state of grace. The state of sin was a state of spiritual death. The state of grace, on the other hand, is a state of life in which man begins seriously to tend beyond himself and to make God the center of his activities, loving God more than himself. The state of grace is entrance into the kingdom of God, where the docile soul begins to reign with God over its own passions, over the spirit of the world and the spirit of evil. Our spiritual progress cannot tend in the direction of the life of eternity unless it presupposes the seed of grace already existing in us. ‘Grace,’ says the whole of Tradition, ‘is the seed of glory.’ Grace, then, is eternal life already begun within us, and this is why Christ says: ’The Kingdom of God comes not with observation. Neither shall they say: “Behold here!” or “Behold there!” For behold, the Kingdom of God is within you.’ (Luke 17:20-21). St. Thomas expresses this doctrine in the brief statement: ‘Grace is nothing else but a certain beginning of glory within us.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
Your GPS Won’t Get You to Heaven
If you rely on a GPS to get you from point A to point B, you're not alone. A lot of drivers turn to mapping technology to keep them from getting lost or just simply to avoid the most congested route home. Surveys show that 93% of American drivers depend upon their GPS. 83% of drivers said they would get lost without their GPS. 60% of drivers use a GPS service at least once a week. 20% of respondents said they use it every day. 21% of GPS users surveyed said they have never used a paper map for directions, and 17% said they wouldn’t be able to find their way with one. All of that tells that people need help in navigating from one place to another―especially places that they have rarely or never driven to. Who has driven to Heaven? Nobody! So you would think that everybody would be interested in a “GPS” that could lead them to Heaven―but that is not the case.
Origins with Origen
The “Road Map” to Heaven exists, but it is rarely or never “handed-out” or explained―neither to the clergy, nor the faithful. Most priests will tell that learned little or nothing about the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life ― yet this doctrine seems clearly to be the traditional doctrine such as it is found in the works of the earliest mystical authors from Clement of Alexandria to St. Benedict to St. Thomas Aquinas to St. John of the Cross to St. Teresa of Avila to St. Francis de Sales. You could say the Three Ways find their concrete origins with Origen of Alexandria (185-253), who lived in Egypt long before the Desert Fathers arrived on the scene. Origen said that Christian spirituality can be understood as involving three stages, which he labeled (in Greek) ethike, physike, and enoptike. Origen’s ideas were shaped and adapted by future spiritual writers. Therefore, the doctrine of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is not something new, nor is it obscure, elitist, marginalized, etc.
What is Important is Seen As Unimportant
Therefore, the doctrine of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is not something new, nor is it obscure, elitist, marginalized, etc. It is meant for EVERYBODY because it guides and leads us to sanctity and it is only saints who can get into Heaven. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Father Garrigou-Lagrange insisted that the mystical life is meant to be the normal way of Christian perfection for EVERY CHRISTIAN. This thesis seems to be accepted as the more common opinion among theologians, since it is based on the teaching of the greatest doctors on this subject—for instance, St. Bonaventure, St. Bernard, St. Thomas, and above all St. John of the Cross. St. John of the Cross is so explicit on the point that there can be no room for doubt as to his opinion. He identifies perfect charity with the mystical marriage, as did St. Bernard and the Cistercian theologians of the twelfth century. He even asserts that it is only when one has reached transforming union that one is able to fulfill―completely and in total perfection―the will of God as it laid down for us in the first commandment of loving God with our whole heart and our whole mind and our whole strength ― because it is only when we have passed through the Dark Night of total mystical purification from every creature attachment and every imperfection, that we are able really to love God with our whole heart and our whole mind and our whole strength in all the literal truth of those words. Those who fail to achieve that on Earth, must achieve that in the loving fires and Dark Night of Purgatory. We rashly and stupidly underestimate the degree of holiness that is required for entry into Heaven. That is one reason why most souls are lost, and, as St. Padre Pio says, out of the few souls that are saved, most of them have to pass through Purgatory. Martyrs, of course, would go straight to Heaven.
Grave Neglect
The presentation and explanation of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is not rocket science! So why is it being gravely ignored? Why are not priests not preaching it? Why is not part of a Catholic School Curriculum? Why are there so few books and explanations upon the subject? It is not optional just as becoming a saint is not optional―and the Three Ways offer a clear guide to the stages that we must recognize and pass through on our path to an obligatory sanctity. If parents are not neglectful in providing their children with the means necessary to able to live and survive in this world―then why are they neglectful in providing their children with the means necessary to reach Heaven once this brief stay on Earth ends? The parents, after all, are the prime educators of their children!
Teaching the Catechism is fine and necessary―but the Catechism is only the first step. Above that comes the teaching of Catholic Morality―have you never heard the expression “Faith and Morals”? The Catholic Faith (Catechism) and Catholic Morals go in tandem. Yet above those two things is Catholic Spirituality (Catholic Ascetical and Mystical Theology) which builds upon Faith and Morals and deals with charity and our personal relationship of loving God. “Now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:13) and the greatest commandment is to love God: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Charity is a union of love between God and the soul and the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are the stages that everyone must pass through in order to obtain that union with God in Charity.
Our neglect to preach and teach these Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is criminal―especially when we know (or should know) that most souls are being lost! Why do we neglect to preach and teach the Three Ways? The reason is that we never learned much or anything about them in the first place! Sure we have hours and hours each week to watch television, browse the internet, post on blogs, use the smartphone, engage in idle chat, etc. But when comes to learning the ropes on how to increase the chances of saving our souls―then there is little or no time for that!
Sometimes, admittedly, the books that deal with the Three Ways can use language and words that leave us scratching our heads! Yet this should not be the case―for the subject matter can easily be broken down into more simple terms without losing anything of the essence of the teaching. Heck! We do that with the Catechism, don’t we? We start teaching the Catechism in Kindergarten―but in very simple terms―and in every successive school year we build upon those simple foundations with increasingly fuller and more-in-depth material. The same can be done with the Three Ways. That is what we shall try and do over the course of the next few articles.
This initial article has merely addressed the subject in a very loose and broad manner. The next articles will (1) give a general overview, (2) deal with First Way, the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way, (3) then cover the Second Way, the Way of the Proficient or the Illuminative Way, (4) and finally deal with the Third Way, the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way. We will try and simplify the vocabulary as much as possible―or at least give an explanation of the more difficult words, terms or phrases. For something so important it is a crime not to make it known and accessible to the multitudes―for God wants all of us to be saved, but we must play our part. And everyone wants to be saved―or at least one would hope so! Yet he who desires an end/goal/target, must also necessarily desire the means that lead to that end/goal/target. Heaven is our goal and the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are one of the essential means to reach that goal.
The Road to Hell is paved with good intentions, the Road to Heaven is paved with good deeds. Some people start out well―but finish badly. Others start out badly―but finish well. However, since we are not privy to the consciences of souls, nor are we aware and cognizant of the workings of God’s grace behind the scenes―therefore, we can never be really sure of who is damned and who is saved. Nevertheless, we can be sure that in general most souls are lost―for that is what we have been told by Our Lord, Our Lady and many of the saints and theologians.
What is more important than salvation? Our Lord asks the same question: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! Lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Our Lord then speaks of the paths or roads that read to Heaven and Hell: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate! For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction―and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 22:14). Everyone will live somewhere forever without end. Where you live forever is absolutely critical. There are only two options: Hell and eternal punishment, or Heaven and eternal joy. The question then is: “Which is the way to Heaven?”
Are we on the path to Heaven or Hell? “Every way of a man seems right to himself” (Proverbs 21:2). “There is a way which seems just to a man―but the ends of which lead to death!” Do not pride yourself on being Catholic―for “unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required; and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more!” (Luke 12:48). If you have been given the Catholic Faith―by the grace of God―then much is expected of you! Having the Faith is not enough: “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! … You believe that there is one God. You do well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
Road Maps to Heaven and Hell
Do you know where you are going? Sometimes you need a road map to help you reach your destination. Do you really know the way to Heaven? Yes, of course, you could say: “You need to be in state of sanctifying grace to get to Heaven!” ― but that is like saying: “To get to New York from San Francisco, all you have to do is go east!” The advice is true, but not very precise―and you could end up anywhere by merely going east of San Francisco! If that is true of an earthly journey, then how much true is that of our pilgrimage to Heaven! When Our Lord said to His Apostles: “Where I am going you know, and the way you know!” (John 14:4). Yet we have to say with the Apostle St. Thomas: “Lord, how can we know the way?” (John 14:5). Can we know the way to Heaven? Yes. Do we know the way to Heaven? Well, that is another question! Do we know the way―or do only imagine we know the way? God says: “I will lead the blind into the way which they know not; and in the paths which they were ignorant of I will make them walk; I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight!” (Isaias 42:16). “Jesus said: ‘I am the way! No man comes to the Father, but by Me!’” (John 14:6).
“The Chief Priests and the Scribes … asked Him, saying: ‘Master, we know that You teach the way of God in truth’” (Luke 20:19-21) ― they did not say this in order to learn the ways of God from Jesus, but they were seeking to entrap Him in His words, so that they could accuse Him. The Chief Priests and Scribes considered the ways of Jesus to be wrong and their own ways to correct. There are many Catholics who more or less do the same thing―they do not like some of the teachings and His Church, so they twist them, water them down, re-interpret them, or even reject them. Today, anywhere from 50% to 90% of Catholics accept same-sex relationships, same-sex marriages, divorce with remarriage, cohabitation, pre-marital sex, contraception, abortion, etc.
“Every way of a man seems right to himself” (Proverbs 21:2). “Everyone has turned aside into his own way” (Isaias 53:6). “Everyone has erred in his own way” (Isaias 47:15). “The way of knowledge they have not known, … neither did they find the way of knowledge” (Baruch 3:20, 27). “All have turned aside into their own way, everyone after his own gain, from the first even to the last! … They walk in a way that is not good after their own thoughts” (Isaias 56:11; 65:2). “They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst show them” (Exodus 32:8).
The Way to Heaven
From the earliest centuries, the spiritual masters have presented the way to Heaven as being a journey through three stages of the spiritual life. These three ways have various names, but all the names refer to the same stage:
(1) The Way of Beginners (also called the Purgative Way)
(2) The Way of Proficients (also called the Illuminative Way)
(3) The Way of Perfection (also called the Unitive Way)
► Some spiritual writers compare these three ways to the life of a human being and the necessary stages of life that each person must pass through: (1) Childhood, (2) Adolescence, (3) Adulthood. Someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin is not even classified as having entered the beginnings of the spiritual life―like an embryo within the womb of its mother has not yet entered natural life in the world.
► Other spiritual compare these three ways to human relationships between two people: (1) Friendship, which leads to (2) Betrothal, which finally leads to (3) Marriage. Someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin is not a friend of God, but a stranger or enemy to God.
► You could also compare the three ways to the different levels of education in schools: (1) Lower School, (2) Middle School, and (3) High School. Before entering Kindergarten or Pre-Kindergarten, the child is incapable of grasping the levels of understanding required in Lower School―just like someone who is in the habitual state of mortal sin fails to grasp and understand the gravity of sin and beauty of the things of God. Or another aspect is: (1) Primary education at primary school or elementary school, and sometimes in the early years of middle school. (2) Secondary education at secondary school or high school, and sometimes in the latter years of middle school. (3) Higher education or vocational education.
► You also have three progressive stages of University degrees: (1) Bachelor's Degree: These degrees generally take three or four years to finish. (2) Master's Degree: After an individual completes a Bachelor's Degree, they may apply for admission to a master's degree program that typically requires one to three years of further education. This degree focuses more on mastering the field of study a candidate wishes to take. (3) Doctorate Degree: A doctorate degree is the highest level of education an individual may seek, and it involves specializing in a specific focus of study after securing a master's degree. This degree typically requires candidates to dedicate three to four years to education and research, and individuals gain the title of Doctor upon completing a doctoral program.
► Or again, you could compare the three ways to progressing through the medical field: (1) First comes Medical School, (2) then comes a period of Internship, where you can only practice medicine under guidance and supervision; (3) finally comes the choice of Residency (hospital doctors) or General Practitioner (outside of the hospital).
► Similarly, there are three major phases in military training: (1) Phase One/Red Phase―weeks one through three―which deal with: Fundamentals of soldiering; Core Army values; Army traditions and ethics; What it means to be a soldier; Taking the Army Combat Fitness Test. (2) Phase Two/White Phase―weeks four through five―where the focus is on: Self-discipline; Teamwork; Combat skills; Night training; Hand-to-hand combat and weapons training; Basic rifle marksmanship; Physical fitness. (3) Phase Three/Blue Phase―weeks six through nine―deals with: Additional weapons training and rifle marksmanship; Overview of convoy operations; Military operations in urban terrain; Field training exercises. If all these phases are successfully passed, then you officially graduate from basic combat training and are a fully-fledged soldier.
► We also see this triple stage of formation in some elements of nature. There are three phases of plant growth: (1) Meristematic, (2) Elongation and (3) Maturation. We can understand by looking at a seed. A seed―of itself―will not grow; it is like a soul in mortal sin which cannot grow in the love of God. Yet once that seed is “baptized” by receiving “the grace of water” and is planted in the “soil of the Faith”, then the seed comes to life and begins to grow: “Unless the grain of wheat, falling into the ground die, then it remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit” (John 12:25). When the seed gets planted into the “soil of Faith” with water (grace) and sun (love of God), then it will start to grow into a small sprout. Once “baptized” and “planted” the tips of roots and shoots exhibit continuous growth and hence are meristematic. The cells in this region are rich in protoplasm and have large nuclei. The cells next to this region represent the elongation growth phase, where there is the formation of new cell walls, vacuoles etc. The region next to the elongation phase represents the maturation phase in which the cells attain their maximal size. Seed, sprout, small plant, and adult plant.
► The same is true of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion Preparation for Consecration to Mary, wherein we have an introductory stage of Renouncing the Spirit of the World (which is akin to renouncing mortal sin before one can enter the Way of Beginners―the First Way or Purgative Way―in the spiritual life. (1) This is followed by a period devoted to the Knowledge of Self ― which is equivalent to the Way of Beginners or Purgative Way. (2) The second period of time is devoted to the Knowledge of Mary ― which is equivalent to the Way of the Proficient or the Illuminative Way. (3) The third period is devoted to the Knowledge of Jesus ― which is equivalent to the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way.
Do You See the Big Picture?
Hopefully you can see, from all the above examples, the need of a progressive growth in the spiritual life―which increasingly distances itself from the world and all that the world offers, and increasingly attaches itself to God and all that God offers. We cannot be going forwards and backwards at the same time―as Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth, but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters! For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Baptism is not an end in itself―it is only the beginning of a life that should grow and mature until it finally is at a level which grants the soul entry into Heaven. Baptism merely plants into our souls the seeds of the Theological, Cardinal and Moral virtues―but these need to be cultivated, watered, protected and nourished so that they can grow and thereby produce the fruits necessary for our entrance into Heaven. “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith also, if it have not works, is dead in itself. O vain man, know that Faith without works is dead! For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead” (James 2:14-26). We need to WORK OUT our salvation: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). As Our Lord said: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the husbandman [= gardener or farmer]. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away: and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit … In this is My Father glorified; that you bring forth very much fruit, and become My disciples … I have chosen you and have appointed you that you should go and should bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain!” (John 15:1-8, 16).
There can be no armchair Catholics in this life! Our Lord says: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a householder who went out, early in the morning, to hire laborers for his vineyard. And, having agreed a wage, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way into the vineyard. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. About the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Why stand you here all the day idle?’ They said to him: ‘Because no man has hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:1-7).
One of greatest theologians of the 20th century, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange (1877-1964) was ordained to the priesthood in 1900 in the Dominican Order and has been widely acknowledged as a leading neo-Thomist of the 20th century. He helped write papal encyclicals for several popes. From 1909 to 1960 he taught Mystical and Ascetical Theology (Spiritual Theology) in Rome at the Dominican Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, commonly known as the “Angelicum”. He was thus one of the greatest masters of the spiritual life in the 20th century―some observers were of the opinion that he had reached the mystical state towards the end of his life. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange deals with the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life in two different books: The multiple volume book The Three Ages of the Interior Life, and a much smaller book which is summary of the above, entitled The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life (later renamed The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life), in which he writes:
“To understand what our interior life is in itself and in its various phases, we must consider it not merely in its seed, but in its full and complete development. Now, if we ask the Gospel what our interior life is, it tells us that the life of grace, given to us in Baptism and nourished by the Eucharist, is the seed or germ of eternal life. A Christian on Earth could never become one of the blessed in Heaven unless he had already received the divine life in Baptism. We are thus able to appreciate something of the importance of true conversion, by which a man passes from the state of mortal sin to the state of grace. The state of sin was a state of spiritual death. The state of grace, on the other hand, is a state of life in which man begins seriously to tend beyond himself and to make God the center of his activities, loving God more than himself. The state of grace is entrance into the kingdom of God, where the docile soul begins to reign with God over its own passions, over the spirit of the world and the spirit of evil. Our spiritual progress cannot tend in the direction of the life of eternity unless it presupposes the seed of grace already existing in us. ‘Grace,’ says the whole of Tradition, ‘is the seed of glory.’ Grace, then, is eternal life already begun within us, and this is why Christ says: ’The Kingdom of God comes not with observation. Neither shall they say: “Behold here!” or “Behold there!” For behold, the Kingdom of God is within you.’ (Luke 17:20-21). St. Thomas expresses this doctrine in the brief statement: ‘Grace is nothing else but a certain beginning of glory within us.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life).
Your GPS Won’t Get You to Heaven
If you rely on a GPS to get you from point A to point B, you're not alone. A lot of drivers turn to mapping technology to keep them from getting lost or just simply to avoid the most congested route home. Surveys show that 93% of American drivers depend upon their GPS. 83% of drivers said they would get lost without their GPS. 60% of drivers use a GPS service at least once a week. 20% of respondents said they use it every day. 21% of GPS users surveyed said they have never used a paper map for directions, and 17% said they wouldn’t be able to find their way with one. All of that tells that people need help in navigating from one place to another―especially places that they have rarely or never driven to. Who has driven to Heaven? Nobody! So you would think that everybody would be interested in a “GPS” that could lead them to Heaven―but that is not the case.
Origins with Origen
The “Road Map” to Heaven exists, but it is rarely or never “handed-out” or explained―neither to the clergy, nor the faithful. Most priests will tell that learned little or nothing about the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life ― yet this doctrine seems clearly to be the traditional doctrine such as it is found in the works of the earliest mystical authors from Clement of Alexandria to St. Benedict to St. Thomas Aquinas to St. John of the Cross to St. Teresa of Avila to St. Francis de Sales. You could say the Three Ways find their concrete origins with Origen of Alexandria (185-253), who lived in Egypt long before the Desert Fathers arrived on the scene. Origen said that Christian spirituality can be understood as involving three stages, which he labeled (in Greek) ethike, physike, and enoptike. Origen’s ideas were shaped and adapted by future spiritual writers. Therefore, the doctrine of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is not something new, nor is it obscure, elitist, marginalized, etc.
What is Important is Seen As Unimportant
Therefore, the doctrine of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is not something new, nor is it obscure, elitist, marginalized, etc. It is meant for EVERYBODY because it guides and leads us to sanctity and it is only saints who can get into Heaven. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Father Garrigou-Lagrange insisted that the mystical life is meant to be the normal way of Christian perfection for EVERY CHRISTIAN. This thesis seems to be accepted as the more common opinion among theologians, since it is based on the teaching of the greatest doctors on this subject—for instance, St. Bonaventure, St. Bernard, St. Thomas, and above all St. John of the Cross. St. John of the Cross is so explicit on the point that there can be no room for doubt as to his opinion. He identifies perfect charity with the mystical marriage, as did St. Bernard and the Cistercian theologians of the twelfth century. He even asserts that it is only when one has reached transforming union that one is able to fulfill―completely and in total perfection―the will of God as it laid down for us in the first commandment of loving God with our whole heart and our whole mind and our whole strength ― because it is only when we have passed through the Dark Night of total mystical purification from every creature attachment and every imperfection, that we are able really to love God with our whole heart and our whole mind and our whole strength in all the literal truth of those words. Those who fail to achieve that on Earth, must achieve that in the loving fires and Dark Night of Purgatory. We rashly and stupidly underestimate the degree of holiness that is required for entry into Heaven. That is one reason why most souls are lost, and, as St. Padre Pio says, out of the few souls that are saved, most of them have to pass through Purgatory. Martyrs, of course, would go straight to Heaven.
Grave Neglect
The presentation and explanation of the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is not rocket science! So why is it being gravely ignored? Why are not priests not preaching it? Why is not part of a Catholic School Curriculum? Why are there so few books and explanations upon the subject? It is not optional just as becoming a saint is not optional―and the Three Ways offer a clear guide to the stages that we must recognize and pass through on our path to an obligatory sanctity. If parents are not neglectful in providing their children with the means necessary to able to live and survive in this world―then why are they neglectful in providing their children with the means necessary to reach Heaven once this brief stay on Earth ends? The parents, after all, are the prime educators of their children!
Teaching the Catechism is fine and necessary―but the Catechism is only the first step. Above that comes the teaching of Catholic Morality―have you never heard the expression “Faith and Morals”? The Catholic Faith (Catechism) and Catholic Morals go in tandem. Yet above those two things is Catholic Spirituality (Catholic Ascetical and Mystical Theology) which builds upon Faith and Morals and deals with charity and our personal relationship of loving God. “Now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:13) and the greatest commandment is to love God: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Charity is a union of love between God and the soul and the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are the stages that everyone must pass through in order to obtain that union with God in Charity.
Our neglect to preach and teach these Three Ways of the Spiritual Life is criminal―especially when we know (or should know) that most souls are being lost! Why do we neglect to preach and teach the Three Ways? The reason is that we never learned much or anything about them in the first place! Sure we have hours and hours each week to watch television, browse the internet, post on blogs, use the smartphone, engage in idle chat, etc. But when comes to learning the ropes on how to increase the chances of saving our souls―then there is little or no time for that!
Sometimes, admittedly, the books that deal with the Three Ways can use language and words that leave us scratching our heads! Yet this should not be the case―for the subject matter can easily be broken down into more simple terms without losing anything of the essence of the teaching. Heck! We do that with the Catechism, don’t we? We start teaching the Catechism in Kindergarten―but in very simple terms―and in every successive school year we build upon those simple foundations with increasingly fuller and more-in-depth material. The same can be done with the Three Ways. That is what we shall try and do over the course of the next few articles.
This initial article has merely addressed the subject in a very loose and broad manner. The next articles will (1) give a general overview, (2) deal with First Way, the Way of Beginners or the Purgative Way, (3) then cover the Second Way, the Way of the Proficient or the Illuminative Way, (4) and finally deal with the Third Way, the Way of the Perfect or the Unitive Way. We will try and simplify the vocabulary as much as possible―or at least give an explanation of the more difficult words, terms or phrases. For something so important it is a crime not to make it known and accessible to the multitudes―for God wants all of us to be saved, but we must play our part. And everyone wants to be saved―or at least one would hope so! Yet he who desires an end/goal/target, must also necessarily desire the means that lead to that end/goal/target. Heaven is our goal and the Three Ways of the Spiritual Life are one of the essential means to reach that goal.
Article 14
Sunday & Monday April 21st & 22nd
Are You Being Called?
Sunday & Monday April 21st & 22nd
Are You Being Called?
Ring, Ring! Ring, Ring! Anyone There?
Are you taking calls? Can you hear your phone ringing? Is your phone on mute? Is your ringer turned-off? Is your voice mail box full? Are you checking your voice-mail? Are you checking your text messages? Are you checking your e-mail? Someone is trying to get in touch with you―but they can’t seem to get through to you! That “someone” happens to be God! Are you taking Heaven’s calls? God is constantly trying to get through to you! Have you―like most people―placed God’s “phone number” on your “blocked calls” list? Are you giving God the impression that your phone has been disconnected and is no longer in use?
“I called and you refused!” (Proverbs 1:24). “I have spoken to them, and they have not heard! I have called to them, and they have not answered Me!” (Jeremias 35:17). God wants to speak to you! Christ, the Son of God, is the Word of God and He wants to speak to us: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not!” (John 1:1-14). “Take notice of him, and hear his voice, and do not think him one to be contemned―for he will not forgive when thou hast sinned!” (Exodus 23:21). Our Lord would later complain: “Having ears, hear you not?” (Mark 8:18) … “Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word! … He that is of God, hears the words of God. Therefore you hear them not, because you are not of God!” (John 8:43, 47).
God had warned: “If you will not hear Me, … I will set My face against you, and you shall fall!” (Leviticus 26:14, 17). “If you will not hear the voice of the Lord your God, to keep and to do all His commandments, then curses shall come upon you and overtake you!” (Deuteronomy 28:15). But “they listened not to the voice of the Lord their God … they would not hear nor do!” (4 Kings 18:12) ― just as Jerusalem (and also Christians to this very day) did not listen to the voice of Christ and do not do what He commanded, but had Him crucified instead.
The resulting curse and fall was as Jesus had warned: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you that kill the prophets and stone them that are sent to you! How often would I have gathered your children as the bird gathers her brood under her wings―but you would not let Me! Behold your house shall be left to you desolate! … The days will come in which there shall not be left a stone upon a stone that shall not be thrown down! … For the days shall come upon you, and your enemies shall cast a trench around you, and surround you, and straiten you on every side, and beat you flat to the ground, and your children who are in you! And they shall not leave in you a stone upon a stone: because you have not known the time of your visitation!” (Luke 13:34-35; 21:6; 19:44).
God Calls You to Heaven
God wants everyone in Heaven. God excludes nobody. Yet we can exclude ourselves. “A certain man made a great supper and he sent his servant to say to them that were invited, that they should come, for now all things are ready. And they began all at once to make excuse. The first said to him: ‘I have bought a farm, and I must needs go out and see it! I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to try them! I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come!’” (Luke 14:16-20). Likewise, most Catholics are far too busy for Heaven because of their infatuation and preoccupation with the world.
Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Most have waded into the quagmire and quicksand of the world and are slowly sinking deeper and deeper into it. We were warned not to love the world: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
“The Father hath sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for those that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9).
God Calls You to Holiness
Even though God calls everyone to Heaven, that does not mean that Heaven is a “freebie” ― Heaven has a price. There is no entry into Heaven without holiness. Sanctifying grace does just that―it sanctifies us, it makes us holy. Yet we also have to cooperate with the grace of God if we want to be holy. Holiness is not just a word―just like Faith is more than just a word. “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! … You believe that there is one God. You do well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26). Similarly, you could say that a Christian life without holiness is dead, or at least dying.
God is very clear on the subject: “I am the Almighty God! Walk before Me and be perfect!” (Genesis 17:1). “For I am the Lord your God―be holy because I am holy!” (Leviticus 11:44). “You shall be holy unto Me, because I, the Lord, am holy!” (Leviticus 20:26). “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy because I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 20:7). “Without holiness no man shall see God” (Hebrews 12:14). “There shall not enter into it [Heaven] anything defiled!” (Apocalypse 21:27).
In his booklet, The Secret of Mary, St. Louis de Montfort speaks of holiness being our vocation: “It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say “not in the same measure,” because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles.
“To find the grace of God, we must discover Mary. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, in his The Three Ages of the Interior Life, underlines the necessity of sanctity as a requirement for entering Heaven: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.”
“The interior life of a just man — who tends toward God and who already lives by Him — is indeed the one thing necessary. To be a saint, neither intellectual culture, nor great exterior activity is a requisite; it suffices that we live profoundly by God. This truth is evident in the saints of the early Church; several of those saints were poor people, even slaves. It is evident also in St. Francis, St. Benedict Joseph Labre, in the Curé of Ars, and many others. They all had a deep understanding of these words of our Savior: ‘For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?’ (Matthew 16:26).
“If people sacrifice so many things to save the life of the body, which must ultimately die, what should we not sacrifice to save the life of our soul, which is to last forever? Ought not man to love his soul more than his body? ‘Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?’ (Mark 8:37). Our Lord adds. ‘One thing is necessary,’ He tells us. To save our soul, one thing alone is necessary ― to hear the word of God and to live by it. Therein lies the best part, which will not be taken away from a faithful soul, even though it should lose everything else.
“St. Alphonsus says: ‘Every one desires to die the death of the saints, but it is scarcely possible for the Christian to make a holy end, who has led a disorderly life until the time of his death; to die united with God, after having always lived at a distance from Him. The saints, in order to secure a happy death, renounced all the riches, the delights, and all the hopes which this world held out to them, and embraced poor and mortified lives. They buried themselves alive in this world, to avoid, when dead, being buried forever in Hell’ (The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, Part 1, Meditation 22).
“To wish to get along without God, leads to an abyss; not only to nothingness, but also to a physical and moral wretchedness that is worse than nothingness. Likewise, great problems grow exasperatingly serious, and man must finally perceive that all these problems ultimately lead to the fundamental religious problem; in other words, he will finally have to declare himself entirely for God or against Him. This is in its essence the problem of the interior life. Christ Himself says (Matthew 12:30): “He that is not with Me is against Me!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Are you taking calls? Can you hear your phone ringing? Is your phone on mute? Is your ringer turned-off? Is your voice mail box full? Are you checking your voice-mail? Are you checking your text messages? Are you checking your e-mail? Someone is trying to get in touch with you―but they can’t seem to get through to you! That “someone” happens to be God! Are you taking Heaven’s calls? God is constantly trying to get through to you! Have you―like most people―placed God’s “phone number” on your “blocked calls” list? Are you giving God the impression that your phone has been disconnected and is no longer in use?
“I called and you refused!” (Proverbs 1:24). “I have spoken to them, and they have not heard! I have called to them, and they have not answered Me!” (Jeremias 35:17). God wants to speak to you! Christ, the Son of God, is the Word of God and He wants to speak to us: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not!” (John 1:1-14). “Take notice of him, and hear his voice, and do not think him one to be contemned―for he will not forgive when thou hast sinned!” (Exodus 23:21). Our Lord would later complain: “Having ears, hear you not?” (Mark 8:18) … “Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word! … He that is of God, hears the words of God. Therefore you hear them not, because you are not of God!” (John 8:43, 47).
God had warned: “If you will not hear Me, … I will set My face against you, and you shall fall!” (Leviticus 26:14, 17). “If you will not hear the voice of the Lord your God, to keep and to do all His commandments, then curses shall come upon you and overtake you!” (Deuteronomy 28:15). But “they listened not to the voice of the Lord their God … they would not hear nor do!” (4 Kings 18:12) ― just as Jerusalem (and also Christians to this very day) did not listen to the voice of Christ and do not do what He commanded, but had Him crucified instead.
The resulting curse and fall was as Jesus had warned: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you that kill the prophets and stone them that are sent to you! How often would I have gathered your children as the bird gathers her brood under her wings―but you would not let Me! Behold your house shall be left to you desolate! … The days will come in which there shall not be left a stone upon a stone that shall not be thrown down! … For the days shall come upon you, and your enemies shall cast a trench around you, and surround you, and straiten you on every side, and beat you flat to the ground, and your children who are in you! And they shall not leave in you a stone upon a stone: because you have not known the time of your visitation!” (Luke 13:34-35; 21:6; 19:44).
God Calls You to Heaven
God wants everyone in Heaven. God excludes nobody. Yet we can exclude ourselves. “A certain man made a great supper and he sent his servant to say to them that were invited, that they should come, for now all things are ready. And they began all at once to make excuse. The first said to him: ‘I have bought a farm, and I must needs go out and see it! I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to try them! I pray thee, hold me excused!’ And another said: ‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come!’” (Luke 14:16-20). Likewise, most Catholics are far too busy for Heaven because of their infatuation and preoccupation with the world.
Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Most have waded into the quagmire and quicksand of the world and are slowly sinking deeper and deeper into it. We were warned not to love the world: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
“The Father hath sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for those that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9).
God Calls You to Holiness
Even though God calls everyone to Heaven, that does not mean that Heaven is a “freebie” ― Heaven has a price. There is no entry into Heaven without holiness. Sanctifying grace does just that―it sanctifies us, it makes us holy. Yet we also have to cooperate with the grace of God if we want to be holy. Holiness is not just a word―just like Faith is more than just a word. “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! … You believe that there is one God. You do well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26). Similarly, you could say that a Christian life without holiness is dead, or at least dying.
God is very clear on the subject: “I am the Almighty God! Walk before Me and be perfect!” (Genesis 17:1). “For I am the Lord your God―be holy because I am holy!” (Leviticus 11:44). “You shall be holy unto Me, because I, the Lord, am holy!” (Leviticus 20:26). “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy because I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 20:7). “Without holiness no man shall see God” (Hebrews 12:14). “There shall not enter into it [Heaven] anything defiled!” (Apocalypse 21:27).
In his booklet, The Secret of Mary, St. Louis de Montfort speaks of holiness being our vocation: “It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say “not in the same measure,” because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles.
“To find the grace of God, we must discover Mary. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, in his The Three Ages of the Interior Life, underlines the necessity of sanctity as a requirement for entering Heaven: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.”
“The interior life of a just man — who tends toward God and who already lives by Him — is indeed the one thing necessary. To be a saint, neither intellectual culture, nor great exterior activity is a requisite; it suffices that we live profoundly by God. This truth is evident in the saints of the early Church; several of those saints were poor people, even slaves. It is evident also in St. Francis, St. Benedict Joseph Labre, in the Curé of Ars, and many others. They all had a deep understanding of these words of our Savior: ‘For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?’ (Matthew 16:26).
“If people sacrifice so many things to save the life of the body, which must ultimately die, what should we not sacrifice to save the life of our soul, which is to last forever? Ought not man to love his soul more than his body? ‘Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?’ (Mark 8:37). Our Lord adds. ‘One thing is necessary,’ He tells us. To save our soul, one thing alone is necessary ― to hear the word of God and to live by it. Therein lies the best part, which will not be taken away from a faithful soul, even though it should lose everything else.
“St. Alphonsus says: ‘Every one desires to die the death of the saints, but it is scarcely possible for the Christian to make a holy end, who has led a disorderly life until the time of his death; to die united with God, after having always lived at a distance from Him. The saints, in order to secure a happy death, renounced all the riches, the delights, and all the hopes which this world held out to them, and embraced poor and mortified lives. They buried themselves alive in this world, to avoid, when dead, being buried forever in Hell’ (The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, Part 1, Meditation 22).
“To wish to get along without God, leads to an abyss; not only to nothingness, but also to a physical and moral wretchedness that is worse than nothingness. Likewise, great problems grow exasperatingly serious, and man must finally perceive that all these problems ultimately lead to the fundamental religious problem; in other words, he will finally have to declare himself entirely for God or against Him. This is in its essence the problem of the interior life. Christ Himself says (Matthew 12:30): “He that is not with Me is against Me!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Article 13
Friday & Saturday April 19th & 20th
Answer This If You Can!
Friday & Saturday April 19th & 20th
Answer This If You Can!
Awkward Intrusive Questions
Nobody likes awkward or intrusive questions. There are some awkward or intrusive questions that we would prefer not to answer ― and would prefer that they would not have been asked in the first place! Even without being forced to answer an awkward question, we have already been placed in an awkward position. Keeping silence can provoke the imagination of listeners to run rampant. They will think: “Why are they not answering the question? What have they got to hide?” Yet there are some questions to which nobody has a right to an answer.
For example ― let us take the sin that Our Lady of Fatima said sends most souls to Hell ― sexual impurity. If somebody were to ask you: “Have you ever practiced contraception? Have you ever committed adultery? Have you ever had homosexual relations? Have you ever masturbated? Have you ever had impure thoughts? Have you ever looked at impure material? Have you ever committed sexual abuse? Have you ever raped anyone or been raped?” Or other questions such as: “Have you ever had an abortion? Have you ever killed anyone? Have you ever taken recreational drugs? How many times have you been drunk? Have you ever driven a car in a state of drunkenness or while drugged? Have you ever stolen anything of value? Have you ever stolen from your employers? Have you ever cheated on your taxes? Have you ever received Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin? Have you ever lied in the Sacrament of Confession?” etc., etc.
Tell the Truth!
We are told to tell the truth and not to lie. It is even said that you cannot lie even in order to save your life! So what do you do? What can you do? What hope do you have? Normally, if a person is innocent, then you expect them answer any and all accusations with a strong denial: “I did not do it!” If a person remains silent under accusation, then the instinctive reaction of people is that the person is guilty as accused.
Jesus Says Nothing to His Accusers
Yet, Our Lord was mainly silent under accusation, refraining from denying the accusations made against Him: “And the Chief priests and the whole Council sought false witness against Jesus, that they might put Him to death―and they found not, whereas many false witnesses had come in. And last of all there came two false witnesses and they said: ‘This Man said, “I am able to destroy the temple of God, and after three days to rebuild it!”’ And the High Priest rising up, said to him: ‘Answerest thou nothing to the things which these witness against Thee?’ But Jesus held his peace” (Matthew 26:59-63). Yes, of course, Jesus was innocent of any and all wrongdoing ― but then why didn’t He react with a vehement denial to all the things of which He was falsely accused? That is what most people would have done! He had nothing to hide.
“And the Chief Priests and all the Council sought for evidence against Jesus, that they might put Him to death, and found none. For many bore false witness against Him, and their evidences were not agreeing. And some rising up, bore false witness against Him, saying: ‘We heard Him say, “I will destroy this temple made with hands, and within three days I will build another not made with hands.”’ And their witness did not agree. And the High Priest rising up in the midst, asked Jesus, saying: ‘Answerest Thou nothing to the things that are laid to Thy charge by these men?’ But He held His peace, and answered nothing” (Mark 14:55-61).
“The High Priest therefore asked Jesus of His disciples, and of His doctrine. Jesus answered him: ‘I have spoken openly to the world! I have always taught in the synagogue, and in the Temple, where all the Jews gather; and in secret I have spoken nothing! Why asketh thou Me? Ask them who have heard what I have spoken unto them! Behold they know what things I have said!’ And when He had said these things, one of the servants standing by, gave Jesus a blow, saying: ‘Answerest thou the High Priest so?’ Jesus answered him: ‘If I have spoken evil, give testimony of the evil; but if well, why strikest thou Me?’ And Annas sent Him bound to Caiphas the High Priest.” (John 18:19-24).
Jesus kept the same silence when interrogated by the governor, Pontius Pilate: “And when morning was come, all the Chief Priests and Ancients of the people took Jesus and they brought Him to Pontius Pilate, the governor. And Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked Him: ‘Art Thou the King of the Jews?’ Jesus said to him: ‘Thou sayest it!’ And when He was accused by the Chief Priests and Ancients, He answered nothing. Then Pilate said to Him: ‘Dost not Thou hear how great testimonies they allege against Thee?’ And Jesus answered him never a word; so that the governor wondered exceedingly” (Matthew 27:1-14).
“And straightway in the morning, the Chief Priests holding a consultation with the Ancients and the Scribes and the whole Council, binding Jesus, led Him away, and delivered Him to Pilate. And Pilate asked Him: ‘Art thou the King of the Jews?’ But He answering, said to him: ‘Thou sayest it!’ And the Chief Priests accused Him in many things. And Pilate again asked Him, saying: ‘Answerest Thou nothing? Behold in how many things they accuse Thee!’ But Jesus still answered nothing; so that Pilate wondered” (Mark 15:1-5).
“Pilate hearing Galilee, asked if Jesus was from Galilee. And when he understood that He was of Herod's jurisdiction, he sent him away to Herod, who was also himself at Jerusalem, in those days. And Herod, seeing Jesus, was very glad; for he was desirous of a long time to see Him, because he had heard many things of Him; and he hoped to see some sign wrought by Him. And the Chief Priests and the Scribes stood by, earnestly accusing Him. And Herod questioned Him in many words. But He answered him nothing” (Luke 32:6-10).
St. Dominic Savio
Did you know that Saint Dominic Savio is the patron saint of the falsely accused? St. Dominic Savio was silent under accusation. During his time at school, an incident occurred where two of his classmates wanted to cause trouble, so they filled a school stove with non-flammable items and claimed Dominic was the instigator. Instead of telling his teachers that the other boys were at fault, Dominic took the blame, and was reprimanded in front of his peers. When the truth was discovered the following day, his teacher asked him why he didn’t speak up, and Dominic simply stated that he was following Christ’s example by staying silent in the face of unjust accusations ― and then Dominic added that he was willing to take the blame because he feared that the two guilty boys might be expelled because of their very bad disciplinary record; but Dominic was confident that he would not be expelled because of good disciplinary record.
St. Gerard Majella
While serving as a Redemptorist lay brother, St. Gerard Majella was accused of being the father of a pregnant woman’s child. The woman, being unmarried and finding herself pregnant, accused Gerard of being her lover. Instead of defending himself and fighting back against her, St. Gerard retreated into silence in the face of his accuser. Can you imagine biting your tongue to everyone when you have been wrongly accused of something so monumental, that could destroy your life? The woman, seeing the holiness of Gerard and feeling remorse for the harm she caused him, eventually recanted her accusation and cleared his name. Because Gerard handled the situation so virtuously, his great sanctity was recognized by all close to the situation. St. Gerard Majella teaches us today to bite our tongue in the face of our wrongful accusers instead of viciously biting back at them. Gerard trusted God to defend his innocence.
St. Teresa of Avila
St. Teresa of Avila is of the opinion that the only time one should explain oneself when wrongly blamed is when failing to explain will cause either offence or scandal. Most people would consider that excusing oneself under blame, especially unjust blame, has little to do with prayer life. A naturalistic ethic would assume that a person may without any fault defend himself, as long as his defense is fair and honest and non-abusive toward the accuser. Not so St. Teresa. While there are occasions when it is right to explain oneself, they are in her view comparatively rare. Because the saint could say of herself that “I never seem unable to find a reason for thinking I am being virtuous when I make excuses for myself”, she considers that she does not have the humility to know when it is fitting to explain herself and her actions. It is better, then, usually to abstain from self-justification under accusation except when failing to explain will cause either offence or scandal.
St. Teresa offers 7 reasons to be silent in false blame. So important does Teresa consider this advice that she devotes several pages to offering her reasons.
(1) The first is the silence of Jesus in His Passion. He was supremely guiltless and yet did not open His mouth in self-defense. Even if we understood none of the other reasons, this one would be sufficient.
(2) Connected with this fact is another―imitating the Lord in His humiliations requires neither bodily strength, nor the aid of anyone but God. This penance will not harm one’s health as excessively corporal penances may do.
(3) A third reason is that silence under accusation can be practiced in small matters, and it accustoms one to “gain great victories” in other important affairs.
(4) Fourth, since we are all so full of faults for which others do not see and for which we are not blamed, then “we can never be blamed unjustly”. In other words, we have criticism coming to us, and when we receive it well, we also make reparation for our other sins.
(5) A fifth benefit stems from the good example silence gives to the accuser and to others, especially when they find out eventually that we were not guilty. “Such an experience”, observes the saint, “uplifts the soul more than ten sermons.”
(6) St. Teresa finds a sixth reason in the example of Jesus, Who twice defended a woman who was unjustly accused. Often people will do the same in our behalf. “His Majesty, then, will put it into somebody’s mind to defend you―if He does not, it will be because there is no need.”
(7) Last, and directly pertinent to growth in prayer, the person who usually remains silent under criticism gains a great freedom from concern and worry about other people’s opinions. No longer living as a slave to the opinions of others, such a person more easily soars into the Divine Mind through prayer linked to that sacrifice.
Does Telling the Truth Mean Revealing Your Sins?
Scary thought, huh? Just imagine being asked by any Tom, Dick or Harry―or Sue, Jane or Mary―if you have ever committed any of the sins listed at the start of this article! What are you going to answer? Hey! Moral Theology says: “A lie is intrinsically evil, so that no reason whatsoever can justify its use” (Fr. Dominic Prummer, Handbook of Moral Theology, §292). “Lying is never allowed. It is in itself, however, only a venial sin. Because a lie is intrinsically evil it may not be used as a means to avert even the gravest evil. Lying becomes mortally sinful if another virtue besides truthfulness (e.g., justice, charity) is thereby gravely violated” (Fr. Heribert Jone OFM, Moral Theology, §368).
When is a Lie not a Lie?
“A lie consists in speaking contrary to one’s mind, with the intention of deceiving one who has a right to the truth. If the person has no right to the truth, it ought not to be called a lie if the truth is concealed from him by saying the thing that is not in one’s mind. Such speaking against one’s mind might be called an untruth, but not a lie. Not every taking of human life is murder, and not every taking of another’s goods is stealing, and, therefore, not every speaking contrary to one’s mind ought to be called lying. As there is taking of human life that is justifiable, and, therefore, not sinful, and as there is taking of another’s property that is not stealing, and, therefore, not a sin, so there must be untruths that are not lies and, therefore, not sinful. There are many occasions when a person has no right to know the truth and to deny the truth to such a person is justifiable and, therefore, not sinful” (The Casuist― A Collection of Cases in Moral and Pastoral Theology, Volume 3, Chapter 7).
► MORAL THEOLOGY says: “No one is bound to damage his own good name” (Fr. Dominic Prummer, Handbook of Moral Theology, §288). “The defendant is not bound to admit his crime … Modem legal practice has changed in reference to the confession of crime. The principle formerly proposed by theologians ― “when the judge proposes lawful questions to the accused which accord with justice, the defendant is bound to admit the truth” ― is still true today, but the judge is no longer considered to be within his rights by forcing the accused to admit his crime (c. 1743 sq.).” (Fr. Dominic Prummer, Handbook of Moral Theology, §290).
“Is a Malefactor Bound to Accuse Himself? As a rule, he is not bound to confess guilt, either explicitly or implicitly, for this is too much opposed to natural inclination, and hence is not demanded by law. This seems to be true even though an accused person has unjustly declared himself innocent … In Canon Law those who would sustain damage from their own testimony are not bound to take the witness stand, and hence persons who reasonably fear that their evidence will subject themselves or their relatives to infamy, vexation or other disadvantage cannot be forced to testify ― Code of Canon Law, §1755, no. 2” (Fr. John A. McHugh OP & Fr. Charles J. Callan OP, Moral Theology―A Complete Course Based on St. Thomas Aquinas, §1968)
► CIVIL LAW says the same thing. The U.S. Fifth Amendment states: “No person … shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” This right is often referred to as the Fifth Amendment Privilege or, more colloquially, as the right to “take the Fifth.” The Supreme Court has many times affirmed the most natural understanding of these words: the defendant in a criminal case cannot be compelled to testify—that is, defendants cannot be called to the stand and thereafter cannot be held in contempt of court (usually leading to immediate imprisonment) if they refuse to answer questions relevant to the charges against them. Prosecutors cannot use a refusal to answer under the Fifth Amendment as evidence of guilt. In most cases, they cannot even call a person to the stand if they know the witness will invoke the Fifth Amendment. However, juries do sometimes interpret this silence as an admission of guilt. The reasoning is that if the jury could draw a negative conclusion from the defendant’s silence, this could induce a defendant, who preferred not to testify, to decide nonetheless to take the stand, at least where the defendant thought that his testimony would be less damaging than his complete silence.
The most important, and controversial, decision applying the Fifth Amendment Privilege outside the criminal trial is Miranda v. Arizona (1966). In order to protect criminal suspects from not only physical brutality, but also informal compulsion that is inherent in custodial interrogation, the Supreme Court in Miranda devised a set of warnings that the police must give before custodial questioning takes place. The individual must be told that she has a right to remain silent, that any statements she makes may be used against her, and that she has the right to have an attorney present during questioning, including the right to a court-appointed attorney if she cannot afford one. The Court recognized that an individual could “knowingly and intelligently waive these rights.” Critically, the Court fashioned an exclusionary rule to enforce the right to Miranda warnings: “unless and until such warnings and waiver are demonstrated by the prosecution at trial, no evidence obtained as a result of interrogation can be used against” the defendant at trial.
Innocent Until Proved Guilty or Guilty Until Proved Innocent?
The presumption of innocence was originally expressed by the French cardinal and canon lawyer jurist, Cardinal Jean Lemoine, in the phrase “item quilbet presumitur innocens nisi probetur nocens” (“a person is presumed innocent until proven guilty”), based on the legal inference that most people are not criminals. A presumption of innocence means that any defendant in a criminal trial is assumed to be innocent until they have been proven guilty. As such, a prosecutor is required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the person committed the crime if that person is to be convicted. The legal burden of proof is thus on the prosecution, which must present compelling evidence as to the guilt of the defendant to the judge or jury. Lack of evidence in favor of the defendant’s innocence isn’t enough to convict the defendant. This right to presumption of innocence is considered important enough in modern democracies, constitutional monarchies and republics, that many have explicitly included it in their legal codes and constitutions.
It is the responsibility of the state to prove that someone is guilty―not for the suspected person to prove their innocence. People should not be coerced into confessing to a crime or to give evidence against themselves. In general, if someone exercises their right to silence, it should not be used as evidence of guilt or as a reason to place them in pre-trial detention. Being convicted of a crime has serious, sometimes devastating, consequences. Therefore, States must prove guilt to a high standard. If there is ‘reasonable doubt’, an accused person must be given the benefit of the doubt and cleared because the state’s ‘burden of proof’ has not been met.
States should not treat people as if they are guilty before they have been convicted by a court of law―but they do! They should not make public statements of guilt during an investigation―but they do! They should not use measures of restraint that make someone appear dangerous, or walk arrested people through public places (e.g. from car to police station or courthouse or vice versa) so they can be photographed by the media ― also known as “perp walks” (“perp” standing for “perpetrator of a crime”) ― and thus portray the defendant in a way that makes it nearly impossible to believe they are innocent. Such reporting can even end up influencing or swaying the decision of judges and juries. No matter how guilty a person appears to be, it is important to follow due process and establish all facts about the allegations before making a decision.
Unfortunately, for a long time now, we have been shifting towards having “a presumption of guilt” instead of “a presumption of innocence.” Sometimes it’s easy to condemn another person without establishing the facts about the allegations. Our attitude has increasingly become one of: “He has been accused of doing this, that or the other―therefore he must be guilty!” That is especially true in the “Supreme Court of Our Own Mind”―where we usually play the role of judge, jury and prosecuting attorney―but rarely the role of defense attorney.
Kangaroo Courts
Today’s world is seeing a tsunami of kangaroo courts―especially on internet websites. Vast numbers of people are put on trial in the “kangaroo courts” of the media, the internet websites and gossip. Anyone can be a judge, jury member and prosecuting attorney. All you need is some gossip about person to appear and suddenly thousands of kangaroo courts also appear―ready to judge and condemn the victim. The victims come from all walks of life―popes, bishops, priests, presidents, governors, politicians, businessmen, famous people, sports personalities, actors, teachers, lawyers, police, etc. ― in short, anyone and everyone can quickly become a victim of a “kangaroo court.”
The expression “kangaroo courts” is thought to liken the jumping ability of kangaroos to a court that jumps to conclusions on an invalid or insufficient basis. A “kangaroo court” can exist on the internet, in the workplace, in colleges and schools, in sports ― basically anywhere. “Kangaroo court” proceedings are usually a sham carried out without legal authority in which the outcome has been predetermined without regard to the evidence or to the guilt or innocence of the accused. A “kangaroo court” is defined as a self-appointed irregularly operated court, or mob-operated unofficial court, held by a group of people in order to try someone looked upon as guilty of a crime or misdemeanor, but without good evidence. It ignores recognized standards and principles of law or justice; ignores due process and often comes to a predetermined biased conclusion so as to render a fair trial impossible. If you refer to a court or a meeting as a “kangaroo court”, you disapprove of it because it is unofficial or unfair, and is intended to find someone guilty at any cost. With the “kangaroo court” there is no presumption of innocence, only presumption of guilt. No real evidence is needed―appearances, accusations and opinion suffices. The “Thumbs-Up and Thumbs-Down Jury” will vote on the verdict! The internet and the media are the ones that do most of the damage.
Even Catholic internet forums have become “kangaroo courts” where innumerable persons and “tried” and “sentenced” by Catholics (often hiding behind the anonymity of a screen name), who pronounce “judgment” on frequently insufficient grounds that have not been checked and verified; or simply based upon hearsay and gossip. This internet forum ability to hide behind screen name anonymity has led many Catholic down uncharitable and merciless paths. It is not the Catholic spirit that chiefly guides them, but a spirit of the world that prefers vengeance to mercy. They forget that NOBODY will escape the justice of God. It is not as though evil people will get away with their evil deeds if we fail to judge them! “Revenge is mine, and I will repay them in due time! … I will repay them according to their deeds, and according to the works of their hands!” says the Lord (Deuteronomy 32:35; Jeremias 25:14).
These “kangaroo court” Catholics forget that Our Lord warned us that we will be judged in the same way that we have judged others. “Judge not, and you shall not be judged. Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned. Forgive, and you shall be forgiven!” (Luke 6:37). “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). “But judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy!” (James 2:13).
Our Lord’s parable about showing a lack of mercy should make us tremble:
“Then came Peter unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say you not just seven times; but seventy times seven times! Therefore is the Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of $29 an ounce, one talent would be worth $21,750―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $217 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“‘But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of $29 per ounce, one penny would be worth $3.63―therefore a hundred pence would be just over $363): and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: “Pay what you owe me!” And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“‘Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: “You wicked servant! I forgave thee all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?” And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!’” (Matthew 18:21-35).
Similarly, the “kangaroo court” consisting of “the Scribes and the Pharisees brought unto Jesus a woman taken in adultery: and they set her in the midst, and said to Him: ‘Master, this woman was even now taken in adultery! Now Moses in the law commanded us to stone such a one. But what sayest Thou?’ And this they said tempting Him, so that they might accuse Him. But Jesus, bowing Himself down, wrote with His finger on the ground. When therefore they continued asking Him, He lifted up Himself, and said to them: ‘He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!’ And again stooping down, He wrote on the ground. But they hearing this, went out, one by one, beginning with the eldest. And Jesus alone remained, and the woman standing in the midst. Then Jesus, lifting up Himself, said to her: ‘Woman, where are they that accused thee? Has no man condemned thee?’ She said: ‘No man, Lord!’ And Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:3-11).
“Judge not, and you shall not be judged. Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned. Forgive, and you shall be forgiven!” (Luke 6:37). “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). “But judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy!” (James 2:13).
Holy Scripture tells us: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). If God’s mercies are above all His other works, then what can be said of us? Is mercy above all our other works? Our Lord tells us to be like God inasmuch as we able: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48) … “If you will forgive men their offences, your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). Holy Scripture therefore adds: “Be ye kind one to another; merciful, forgiving one another―even as God has forgiven you in Christ!” (Ephesians 4:32). “Therefore, put ye on, as the elect of God, the bowels of mercy … bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another―even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also!” (Colossians 3:13).
Today, there is far too much screaming for justice, punishment, revenge, vengeance and blood. “The Pharisees said to the disciples of Jesus: ‘Why does your Master eat with publicans and sinners?’ But Jesus, hearing it, said: ‘They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill! Go then and learn what this means: “I will have mercy and not sacrifice!” For I am not come to call the just, but sinners!’” (Matthew 9:13).
At your death―at your final judgment―God will ask you how much mercy you have shown to others. What will your answer be? Will you be able to answer?
Nobody likes awkward or intrusive questions. There are some awkward or intrusive questions that we would prefer not to answer ― and would prefer that they would not have been asked in the first place! Even without being forced to answer an awkward question, we have already been placed in an awkward position. Keeping silence can provoke the imagination of listeners to run rampant. They will think: “Why are they not answering the question? What have they got to hide?” Yet there are some questions to which nobody has a right to an answer.
For example ― let us take the sin that Our Lady of Fatima said sends most souls to Hell ― sexual impurity. If somebody were to ask you: “Have you ever practiced contraception? Have you ever committed adultery? Have you ever had homosexual relations? Have you ever masturbated? Have you ever had impure thoughts? Have you ever looked at impure material? Have you ever committed sexual abuse? Have you ever raped anyone or been raped?” Or other questions such as: “Have you ever had an abortion? Have you ever killed anyone? Have you ever taken recreational drugs? How many times have you been drunk? Have you ever driven a car in a state of drunkenness or while drugged? Have you ever stolen anything of value? Have you ever stolen from your employers? Have you ever cheated on your taxes? Have you ever received Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin? Have you ever lied in the Sacrament of Confession?” etc., etc.
Tell the Truth!
We are told to tell the truth and not to lie. It is even said that you cannot lie even in order to save your life! So what do you do? What can you do? What hope do you have? Normally, if a person is innocent, then you expect them answer any and all accusations with a strong denial: “I did not do it!” If a person remains silent under accusation, then the instinctive reaction of people is that the person is guilty as accused.
Jesus Says Nothing to His Accusers
Yet, Our Lord was mainly silent under accusation, refraining from denying the accusations made against Him: “And the Chief priests and the whole Council sought false witness against Jesus, that they might put Him to death―and they found not, whereas many false witnesses had come in. And last of all there came two false witnesses and they said: ‘This Man said, “I am able to destroy the temple of God, and after three days to rebuild it!”’ And the High Priest rising up, said to him: ‘Answerest thou nothing to the things which these witness against Thee?’ But Jesus held his peace” (Matthew 26:59-63). Yes, of course, Jesus was innocent of any and all wrongdoing ― but then why didn’t He react with a vehement denial to all the things of which He was falsely accused? That is what most people would have done! He had nothing to hide.
“And the Chief Priests and all the Council sought for evidence against Jesus, that they might put Him to death, and found none. For many bore false witness against Him, and their evidences were not agreeing. And some rising up, bore false witness against Him, saying: ‘We heard Him say, “I will destroy this temple made with hands, and within three days I will build another not made with hands.”’ And their witness did not agree. And the High Priest rising up in the midst, asked Jesus, saying: ‘Answerest Thou nothing to the things that are laid to Thy charge by these men?’ But He held His peace, and answered nothing” (Mark 14:55-61).
“The High Priest therefore asked Jesus of His disciples, and of His doctrine. Jesus answered him: ‘I have spoken openly to the world! I have always taught in the synagogue, and in the Temple, where all the Jews gather; and in secret I have spoken nothing! Why asketh thou Me? Ask them who have heard what I have spoken unto them! Behold they know what things I have said!’ And when He had said these things, one of the servants standing by, gave Jesus a blow, saying: ‘Answerest thou the High Priest so?’ Jesus answered him: ‘If I have spoken evil, give testimony of the evil; but if well, why strikest thou Me?’ And Annas sent Him bound to Caiphas the High Priest.” (John 18:19-24).
Jesus kept the same silence when interrogated by the governor, Pontius Pilate: “And when morning was come, all the Chief Priests and Ancients of the people took Jesus and they brought Him to Pontius Pilate, the governor. And Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked Him: ‘Art Thou the King of the Jews?’ Jesus said to him: ‘Thou sayest it!’ And when He was accused by the Chief Priests and Ancients, He answered nothing. Then Pilate said to Him: ‘Dost not Thou hear how great testimonies they allege against Thee?’ And Jesus answered him never a word; so that the governor wondered exceedingly” (Matthew 27:1-14).
“And straightway in the morning, the Chief Priests holding a consultation with the Ancients and the Scribes and the whole Council, binding Jesus, led Him away, and delivered Him to Pilate. And Pilate asked Him: ‘Art thou the King of the Jews?’ But He answering, said to him: ‘Thou sayest it!’ And the Chief Priests accused Him in many things. And Pilate again asked Him, saying: ‘Answerest Thou nothing? Behold in how many things they accuse Thee!’ But Jesus still answered nothing; so that Pilate wondered” (Mark 15:1-5).
“Pilate hearing Galilee, asked if Jesus was from Galilee. And when he understood that He was of Herod's jurisdiction, he sent him away to Herod, who was also himself at Jerusalem, in those days. And Herod, seeing Jesus, was very glad; for he was desirous of a long time to see Him, because he had heard many things of Him; and he hoped to see some sign wrought by Him. And the Chief Priests and the Scribes stood by, earnestly accusing Him. And Herod questioned Him in many words. But He answered him nothing” (Luke 32:6-10).
St. Dominic Savio
Did you know that Saint Dominic Savio is the patron saint of the falsely accused? St. Dominic Savio was silent under accusation. During his time at school, an incident occurred where two of his classmates wanted to cause trouble, so they filled a school stove with non-flammable items and claimed Dominic was the instigator. Instead of telling his teachers that the other boys were at fault, Dominic took the blame, and was reprimanded in front of his peers. When the truth was discovered the following day, his teacher asked him why he didn’t speak up, and Dominic simply stated that he was following Christ’s example by staying silent in the face of unjust accusations ― and then Dominic added that he was willing to take the blame because he feared that the two guilty boys might be expelled because of their very bad disciplinary record; but Dominic was confident that he would not be expelled because of good disciplinary record.
St. Gerard Majella
While serving as a Redemptorist lay brother, St. Gerard Majella was accused of being the father of a pregnant woman’s child. The woman, being unmarried and finding herself pregnant, accused Gerard of being her lover. Instead of defending himself and fighting back against her, St. Gerard retreated into silence in the face of his accuser. Can you imagine biting your tongue to everyone when you have been wrongly accused of something so monumental, that could destroy your life? The woman, seeing the holiness of Gerard and feeling remorse for the harm she caused him, eventually recanted her accusation and cleared his name. Because Gerard handled the situation so virtuously, his great sanctity was recognized by all close to the situation. St. Gerard Majella teaches us today to bite our tongue in the face of our wrongful accusers instead of viciously biting back at them. Gerard trusted God to defend his innocence.
St. Teresa of Avila
St. Teresa of Avila is of the opinion that the only time one should explain oneself when wrongly blamed is when failing to explain will cause either offence or scandal. Most people would consider that excusing oneself under blame, especially unjust blame, has little to do with prayer life. A naturalistic ethic would assume that a person may without any fault defend himself, as long as his defense is fair and honest and non-abusive toward the accuser. Not so St. Teresa. While there are occasions when it is right to explain oneself, they are in her view comparatively rare. Because the saint could say of herself that “I never seem unable to find a reason for thinking I am being virtuous when I make excuses for myself”, she considers that she does not have the humility to know when it is fitting to explain herself and her actions. It is better, then, usually to abstain from self-justification under accusation except when failing to explain will cause either offence or scandal.
St. Teresa offers 7 reasons to be silent in false blame. So important does Teresa consider this advice that she devotes several pages to offering her reasons.
(1) The first is the silence of Jesus in His Passion. He was supremely guiltless and yet did not open His mouth in self-defense. Even if we understood none of the other reasons, this one would be sufficient.
(2) Connected with this fact is another―imitating the Lord in His humiliations requires neither bodily strength, nor the aid of anyone but God. This penance will not harm one’s health as excessively corporal penances may do.
(3) A third reason is that silence under accusation can be practiced in small matters, and it accustoms one to “gain great victories” in other important affairs.
(4) Fourth, since we are all so full of faults for which others do not see and for which we are not blamed, then “we can never be blamed unjustly”. In other words, we have criticism coming to us, and when we receive it well, we also make reparation for our other sins.
(5) A fifth benefit stems from the good example silence gives to the accuser and to others, especially when they find out eventually that we were not guilty. “Such an experience”, observes the saint, “uplifts the soul more than ten sermons.”
(6) St. Teresa finds a sixth reason in the example of Jesus, Who twice defended a woman who was unjustly accused. Often people will do the same in our behalf. “His Majesty, then, will put it into somebody’s mind to defend you―if He does not, it will be because there is no need.”
(7) Last, and directly pertinent to growth in prayer, the person who usually remains silent under criticism gains a great freedom from concern and worry about other people’s opinions. No longer living as a slave to the opinions of others, such a person more easily soars into the Divine Mind through prayer linked to that sacrifice.
Does Telling the Truth Mean Revealing Your Sins?
Scary thought, huh? Just imagine being asked by any Tom, Dick or Harry―or Sue, Jane or Mary―if you have ever committed any of the sins listed at the start of this article! What are you going to answer? Hey! Moral Theology says: “A lie is intrinsically evil, so that no reason whatsoever can justify its use” (Fr. Dominic Prummer, Handbook of Moral Theology, §292). “Lying is never allowed. It is in itself, however, only a venial sin. Because a lie is intrinsically evil it may not be used as a means to avert even the gravest evil. Lying becomes mortally sinful if another virtue besides truthfulness (e.g., justice, charity) is thereby gravely violated” (Fr. Heribert Jone OFM, Moral Theology, §368).
When is a Lie not a Lie?
“A lie consists in speaking contrary to one’s mind, with the intention of deceiving one who has a right to the truth. If the person has no right to the truth, it ought not to be called a lie if the truth is concealed from him by saying the thing that is not in one’s mind. Such speaking against one’s mind might be called an untruth, but not a lie. Not every taking of human life is murder, and not every taking of another’s goods is stealing, and, therefore, not every speaking contrary to one’s mind ought to be called lying. As there is taking of human life that is justifiable, and, therefore, not sinful, and as there is taking of another’s property that is not stealing, and, therefore, not a sin, so there must be untruths that are not lies and, therefore, not sinful. There are many occasions when a person has no right to know the truth and to deny the truth to such a person is justifiable and, therefore, not sinful” (The Casuist― A Collection of Cases in Moral and Pastoral Theology, Volume 3, Chapter 7).
► MORAL THEOLOGY says: “No one is bound to damage his own good name” (Fr. Dominic Prummer, Handbook of Moral Theology, §288). “The defendant is not bound to admit his crime … Modem legal practice has changed in reference to the confession of crime. The principle formerly proposed by theologians ― “when the judge proposes lawful questions to the accused which accord with justice, the defendant is bound to admit the truth” ― is still true today, but the judge is no longer considered to be within his rights by forcing the accused to admit his crime (c. 1743 sq.).” (Fr. Dominic Prummer, Handbook of Moral Theology, §290).
“Is a Malefactor Bound to Accuse Himself? As a rule, he is not bound to confess guilt, either explicitly or implicitly, for this is too much opposed to natural inclination, and hence is not demanded by law. This seems to be true even though an accused person has unjustly declared himself innocent … In Canon Law those who would sustain damage from their own testimony are not bound to take the witness stand, and hence persons who reasonably fear that their evidence will subject themselves or their relatives to infamy, vexation or other disadvantage cannot be forced to testify ― Code of Canon Law, §1755, no. 2” (Fr. John A. McHugh OP & Fr. Charles J. Callan OP, Moral Theology―A Complete Course Based on St. Thomas Aquinas, §1968)
► CIVIL LAW says the same thing. The U.S. Fifth Amendment states: “No person … shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” This right is often referred to as the Fifth Amendment Privilege or, more colloquially, as the right to “take the Fifth.” The Supreme Court has many times affirmed the most natural understanding of these words: the defendant in a criminal case cannot be compelled to testify—that is, defendants cannot be called to the stand and thereafter cannot be held in contempt of court (usually leading to immediate imprisonment) if they refuse to answer questions relevant to the charges against them. Prosecutors cannot use a refusal to answer under the Fifth Amendment as evidence of guilt. In most cases, they cannot even call a person to the stand if they know the witness will invoke the Fifth Amendment. However, juries do sometimes interpret this silence as an admission of guilt. The reasoning is that if the jury could draw a negative conclusion from the defendant’s silence, this could induce a defendant, who preferred not to testify, to decide nonetheless to take the stand, at least where the defendant thought that his testimony would be less damaging than his complete silence.
The most important, and controversial, decision applying the Fifth Amendment Privilege outside the criminal trial is Miranda v. Arizona (1966). In order to protect criminal suspects from not only physical brutality, but also informal compulsion that is inherent in custodial interrogation, the Supreme Court in Miranda devised a set of warnings that the police must give before custodial questioning takes place. The individual must be told that she has a right to remain silent, that any statements she makes may be used against her, and that she has the right to have an attorney present during questioning, including the right to a court-appointed attorney if she cannot afford one. The Court recognized that an individual could “knowingly and intelligently waive these rights.” Critically, the Court fashioned an exclusionary rule to enforce the right to Miranda warnings: “unless and until such warnings and waiver are demonstrated by the prosecution at trial, no evidence obtained as a result of interrogation can be used against” the defendant at trial.
Innocent Until Proved Guilty or Guilty Until Proved Innocent?
The presumption of innocence was originally expressed by the French cardinal and canon lawyer jurist, Cardinal Jean Lemoine, in the phrase “item quilbet presumitur innocens nisi probetur nocens” (“a person is presumed innocent until proven guilty”), based on the legal inference that most people are not criminals. A presumption of innocence means that any defendant in a criminal trial is assumed to be innocent until they have been proven guilty. As such, a prosecutor is required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the person committed the crime if that person is to be convicted. The legal burden of proof is thus on the prosecution, which must present compelling evidence as to the guilt of the defendant to the judge or jury. Lack of evidence in favor of the defendant’s innocence isn’t enough to convict the defendant. This right to presumption of innocence is considered important enough in modern democracies, constitutional monarchies and republics, that many have explicitly included it in their legal codes and constitutions.
It is the responsibility of the state to prove that someone is guilty―not for the suspected person to prove their innocence. People should not be coerced into confessing to a crime or to give evidence against themselves. In general, if someone exercises their right to silence, it should not be used as evidence of guilt or as a reason to place them in pre-trial detention. Being convicted of a crime has serious, sometimes devastating, consequences. Therefore, States must prove guilt to a high standard. If there is ‘reasonable doubt’, an accused person must be given the benefit of the doubt and cleared because the state’s ‘burden of proof’ has not been met.
States should not treat people as if they are guilty before they have been convicted by a court of law―but they do! They should not make public statements of guilt during an investigation―but they do! They should not use measures of restraint that make someone appear dangerous, or walk arrested people through public places (e.g. from car to police station or courthouse or vice versa) so they can be photographed by the media ― also known as “perp walks” (“perp” standing for “perpetrator of a crime”) ― and thus portray the defendant in a way that makes it nearly impossible to believe they are innocent. Such reporting can even end up influencing or swaying the decision of judges and juries. No matter how guilty a person appears to be, it is important to follow due process and establish all facts about the allegations before making a decision.
Unfortunately, for a long time now, we have been shifting towards having “a presumption of guilt” instead of “a presumption of innocence.” Sometimes it’s easy to condemn another person without establishing the facts about the allegations. Our attitude has increasingly become one of: “He has been accused of doing this, that or the other―therefore he must be guilty!” That is especially true in the “Supreme Court of Our Own Mind”―where we usually play the role of judge, jury and prosecuting attorney―but rarely the role of defense attorney.
Kangaroo Courts
Today’s world is seeing a tsunami of kangaroo courts―especially on internet websites. Vast numbers of people are put on trial in the “kangaroo courts” of the media, the internet websites and gossip. Anyone can be a judge, jury member and prosecuting attorney. All you need is some gossip about person to appear and suddenly thousands of kangaroo courts also appear―ready to judge and condemn the victim. The victims come from all walks of life―popes, bishops, priests, presidents, governors, politicians, businessmen, famous people, sports personalities, actors, teachers, lawyers, police, etc. ― in short, anyone and everyone can quickly become a victim of a “kangaroo court.”
The expression “kangaroo courts” is thought to liken the jumping ability of kangaroos to a court that jumps to conclusions on an invalid or insufficient basis. A “kangaroo court” can exist on the internet, in the workplace, in colleges and schools, in sports ― basically anywhere. “Kangaroo court” proceedings are usually a sham carried out without legal authority in which the outcome has been predetermined without regard to the evidence or to the guilt or innocence of the accused. A “kangaroo court” is defined as a self-appointed irregularly operated court, or mob-operated unofficial court, held by a group of people in order to try someone looked upon as guilty of a crime or misdemeanor, but without good evidence. It ignores recognized standards and principles of law or justice; ignores due process and often comes to a predetermined biased conclusion so as to render a fair trial impossible. If you refer to a court or a meeting as a “kangaroo court”, you disapprove of it because it is unofficial or unfair, and is intended to find someone guilty at any cost. With the “kangaroo court” there is no presumption of innocence, only presumption of guilt. No real evidence is needed―appearances, accusations and opinion suffices. The “Thumbs-Up and Thumbs-Down Jury” will vote on the verdict! The internet and the media are the ones that do most of the damage.
Even Catholic internet forums have become “kangaroo courts” where innumerable persons and “tried” and “sentenced” by Catholics (often hiding behind the anonymity of a screen name), who pronounce “judgment” on frequently insufficient grounds that have not been checked and verified; or simply based upon hearsay and gossip. This internet forum ability to hide behind screen name anonymity has led many Catholic down uncharitable and merciless paths. It is not the Catholic spirit that chiefly guides them, but a spirit of the world that prefers vengeance to mercy. They forget that NOBODY will escape the justice of God. It is not as though evil people will get away with their evil deeds if we fail to judge them! “Revenge is mine, and I will repay them in due time! … I will repay them according to their deeds, and according to the works of their hands!” says the Lord (Deuteronomy 32:35; Jeremias 25:14).
These “kangaroo court” Catholics forget that Our Lord warned us that we will be judged in the same way that we have judged others. “Judge not, and you shall not be judged. Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned. Forgive, and you shall be forgiven!” (Luke 6:37). “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). “But judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy!” (James 2:13).
Our Lord’s parable about showing a lack of mercy should make us tremble:
“Then came Peter unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say you not just seven times; but seventy times seven times! Therefore is the Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who wanted to take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices of $29 an ounce, one talent would be worth $21,750―that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $217 million). And as he could not pay his debt, his lord commanded that he, and his wife and children and all that he had, should be sold and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” And the lord of that servant, being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“‘But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce of silver. At today’s silver prices of $29 per ounce, one penny would be worth $3.63―therefore a hundred pence would be just over $363): and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: “Pay what you owe me!” And his fellow servant falling down, begged him, saying: “Have patience with me, and I will pay you all that I owe!” But he would not listen―and went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“‘Now his fellow servants, seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: “You wicked servant! I forgave thee all the debt, because you begged me! Should you not then have had the same compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had compassion on you?” And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive everyone from your hearts!’” (Matthew 18:21-35).
Similarly, the “kangaroo court” consisting of “the Scribes and the Pharisees brought unto Jesus a woman taken in adultery: and they set her in the midst, and said to Him: ‘Master, this woman was even now taken in adultery! Now Moses in the law commanded us to stone such a one. But what sayest Thou?’ And this they said tempting Him, so that they might accuse Him. But Jesus, bowing Himself down, wrote with His finger on the ground. When therefore they continued asking Him, He lifted up Himself, and said to them: ‘He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!’ And again stooping down, He wrote on the ground. But they hearing this, went out, one by one, beginning with the eldest. And Jesus alone remained, and the woman standing in the midst. Then Jesus, lifting up Himself, said to her: ‘Woman, where are they that accused thee? Has no man condemned thee?’ She said: ‘No man, Lord!’ And Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:3-11).
“Judge not, and you shall not be judged. Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned. Forgive, and you shall be forgiven!” (Luke 6:37). “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). “But judgment without mercy to him that has not done mercy!” (James 2:13).
Holy Scripture tells us: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). If God’s mercies are above all His other works, then what can be said of us? Is mercy above all our other works? Our Lord tells us to be like God inasmuch as we able: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48) … “If you will forgive men their offences, your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences!” (Matthew 6:14-15). Holy Scripture therefore adds: “Be ye kind one to another; merciful, forgiving one another―even as God has forgiven you in Christ!” (Ephesians 4:32). “Therefore, put ye on, as the elect of God, the bowels of mercy … bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another―even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also!” (Colossians 3:13).
Today, there is far too much screaming for justice, punishment, revenge, vengeance and blood. “The Pharisees said to the disciples of Jesus: ‘Why does your Master eat with publicans and sinners?’ But Jesus, hearing it, said: ‘They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill! Go then and learn what this means: “I will have mercy and not sacrifice!” For I am not come to call the just, but sinners!’” (Matthew 9:13).
At your death―at your final judgment―God will ask you how much mercy you have shown to others. What will your answer be? Will you be able to answer?
Article 12
Tuesday & Wednesday April 16th & 17th
The Most Foolish Thing!
Tuesday & Wednesday April 16th & 17th
The Most Foolish Thing!
Don’t Be Fooled! Don’t Be a Fool!
The “Feast of Fools” was an early 14th century satirical or mock festival celebrated in some churches on New Year’s Day in medieval times (looks like fools were always around, even back then!). “Fool’s Paradise” is a falsely imagined state of happiness based on ignorance or erroneous judgment. The phrase “Fool’s Gold” is used when talking about an item that its owner believes to be valuable, but that really is not so. “To be on a fool’s errand” means performing a task or activity that has no hope of success. Some of many other idioms on the subject of fools are:
● “A fool and his money are soon parted.”
● “There’s no fool like an old fool.”
● “A man who is his own lawyer has a fool for a client.”
Nobody likes to be called a fool. Our Lord even threatens punishment on the matter: “And whosoever shall say, ‘Thou Fool!’ shall be in danger of Hell fire” (Matthew 5:22). Nevertheless, Holy Scripture tells us that the number of fools in this world is uncountable: “The number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). That sentiment is echoed by Our Lady in her words to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable! The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God! The wisdom of the flesh―worldly wisdom―has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God! Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity and as the source of foolishness which intoxicates the heart!”
The Foolishness of Sin
To act foolishly is sin, and to sin is to act foolishly. “The thought of a fool is sin … A fool will laugh at sin … He that plans to do evils, shall be called a fool” (Proverbs 24:9; 14:9; 24:8). Sin is the greatest evil in the world―hence sin has the greatest penalty attached to it. Only a fool would sin―especially since the greatest penalty is the eternal fire and tortures of Hell. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
It is pure stupidity to commit sin―even venial sin―in view of the punishments attached to sin. Who in their right mind would deliberately and knowingly commit a venial when they know that the penalty will mean spending a long time in the fires of Purgatory. God offers us Heaven, not Hell. God offers us Heaven without having to pass through the fires of Purgatory. Yet most people ignore His offers: “Wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction―and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). St. Paul tells us: “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9). Yet we are told that most souls―whether Catholic or not, and from all ranks of Catholic clergy and laity―end up in Hell! How stupid is that? Analogically speaking, God offers you $50 billion―but not right now―and the Satan and the world offer you $5,000 immediately. Most people take the $5,000 and lose out on the $50 billion.
They say that fruits are beneficial to the body’s system. However, not all fruits will benefit the health―some fruits are poisonous. Black nightshade berries are reported to have a sweet taste, but are extremely toxic. Beach Apples are delicious, but highly toxic. Other substances can also be sweet but toxic. Some forms of mold are both toxic and sweet-smelling. Ethylene Glycol is a toxic substance found in antifreeze, and it has a sweet taste that can be appealing to animals and young children―sin is just the same: sweet but toxic. Sin does not pay―or not very much! It is, as they say, “Fool’s Gold.”
The Foolishness of Riches
Seeking Paradise on Earth is merely a “Fool’s Paradise” that seduces many! “Woe to you that are rich―for you have your consolation!” says Our Lord (Luke 6:24). “Gold is a stumbling-block to them that sacrifice to it! Woe to them that eagerly follow after it, and every fool shall perish by it!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:7). “The riches which he has swallowed, he shall vomit up, and God shall draw them out of his belly!” (Job 20:15). “The prosperity of fools shall destroy them!” (Proverbs 1:32) … “They shall leave their riches to strangers!” (Psalm 48:11). “Go now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you!” (James 5:1). Any joy on Earth is very short lived and quickly ends―the joys of Heaven last eternally. That is why Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23-24).
The parable of Our Lord about the rich man should be warning to us: “‘Take heed and beware of all covetousness―for a man’s life doth not consist in the abundance of things which he possesses!’ And He spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no more room where to store my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns, and will build bigger barns; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods! And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years―take thy rest! Eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “You fool! This very night will they require your soul! And whose shall those things be which you have provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’” (Luke 12:15-21).
Our Lord further adds: “For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it. For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:25-26). “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Luke 13:24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
Our Lord then relates the parable about the wise and foolish virgins: “Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be like to ten virgins, who taking their lamps went out to meet the bridegroom and the bride. And five of them were foolish, and five wise. But the five foolish, having taken their lamps, did not take oil with them. But the wise took oil in their vessels with the lamps. And the bridegroom tarrying, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made: ‘Behold the bridegroom cometh! Go ye forth to meet him!’ Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said to the wise: ‘Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out!’ The wise answered, saying: ‘Lest perhaps there be not enough for us and for you, go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves!’ Now whilst they went to buy, the bridegroom came: and they that were ready, went in with him to the marriage, and the door was shut. But at last come also the other virgins, saying: ‘Lord! Lord! Open to us! But He answering said: ‘Amen I say to you, I know you not!’” (Matthew 25:1-12).
Our Lord warned: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “Be not deceived! God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
No Time for God
The world foolishly has no time for God and the things of God. Recent surveys show that on an average day, nearly everyone (95%), aged 15 and over, engaged in some sort of leisure and sport activity, such as watching TV, socializing, or exercising. Men spent more time in these activities than did women (5.6 hours per day for men, compared with 4.8 hours for women). Watching TV was the leisure and sports activity that occupied the most time (2.8 hours per day). Playing games and computer use for leisure, and socializing and communicating were the next most common leisure and sports activities after watching TV. On an average day, individuals spent 34 minutes playing games and using a computer for leisure and an additional 34 minutes socializing and communicating. We all know of people who can spend hours every single day on their smartphone and watching their TV or computer screen―yet how much time do they give to God?
“God looked down from Heaven on the children of men―to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside! They are become unprofitable together! There is none that doth good―no not one! They are corrupted, and become abominable in iniquities! The fool said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’” (Psalm 52:1-4). “For My foolish people have not known Me! They are foolish and senseless children! They are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge!” (Jeremias 4:22).
Our Lady bewailed this lack of time for the things of God: “The temporal goods [material goods of this life] are created by God for the sole purpose of sustaining life―having attained this end, the need for them ceases. And―as this need is limited, soon and easily satisfied―there is no reason why the care for the immortal soul should be only occasional and temporary, while, on the other hand, the hunger after riches should be so perpetual and without end, as it has come to be among men. How many men are not fascinated by their unbounded greed? All of them usually place their hopes on gold and material riches. There are very few in the world in our days who use well the temporal riches and offer them to their God. Thus they spend all the time of their life―which was given them in order to gain eternal salvation and happiness―in these vanities. They lose themselves in these dark labyrinths and mazes! It is the height of perversion for man to devote all his time, all his care, all the exertion of his powers and all the alertness of his mind to the life of his body, of which he knows not the duration nor the end, and that, on the other hand, in many years of his existence he spares only one hour for his poor soul, and that hour is very often the last hour and the worst one of his whole life!”
“The faithful are in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness! Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. This dreadful carelessness arises from being so taken up with their earthly and material life. The princes of darkness are cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery. The demon always seeks to prepare the way for his deceits. He comes with his poison concealed in a golden cup [television, smartphone, computer, internet, social media, etc.], in order to divert or withdraw the soul from the love of the Lord. O insanity never sufficiently to be bewailed and so little considered by the children of Adam! All their life they labor and exert themselves to become more and more entangled in the snares of their passions, to be consumed in deceitful vanities and to deliver themselves over to an inextinguishable fire, death and everlasting perdition in Hell, as if all were a mere joke! They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as the joys of eternal life!”
“Souls also fail in the love due to God because they divert their love toward creatures. They esteem in creatures what they are seeking, namely power, riches, vain honor and ostentation. The faithful debase themselves to the level of worthless creatures. Those who have riches, trust in them―and those who have none, greedily chase after them! And so it happens that very few seek the Lord in such a way as to deserve His providential care. Very few trust in God and acknowledge Him as their Father, who is willing to provide for His children, who will nourish and sustain them without fail in all necessities. This deceitful error has filled the Earth with lovers of the world; it has filled the world with avarice and concupiscence against the law of the Creator; it has made men insane in their desires―for all of them commonly chase after riches and earthly possessions; claiming, thereby, merely to satisfy their needs―which is only a lame pretext for hiding their lack of interest in higher things, spiritual things. In reality they lie to themselves abominously, since they are seeking superfluous things that they do not really need and not what is really necessary.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
Spend Your Time Better―Spend Your Time Well
Our Lord could well address the words from one of His parables to each and every one of us: “Why do stand you here all the day idle?” (Matthew 20:6) ― in other words, why are you idly wasting your precious time on Earth on vanities and things of secondary importance? Why do you spend hours talking on the phone, and so little time talking to God in prayer? Why do you spend hours browsing the internet and social media, and so little time browsing through spiritual books and materials? Why do you spend hours sitting and watching the televisions tabernacle, and so little time sitting and watching in prayer before the tabernacle of Our Lord in the church? Why do you spend so much time on physical exercise for the body, and so little time on spiritual exercises for the soul? As Our Lord says: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) … “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). Every day―hopefully―we say in the Our Father: “Thy will be done on Earth as it is Heaven!” ― but do we really do the will of God, or do we do our own will most of the time? Our Lord will say: “This people honoureth Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8) …
The Imitation of Christ offers a few thoughts on the subject: “In all things consider the end; how you shall stand before the strict Judge from Whom nothing is hidden and Who will pronounce judgment in all justice, accepting neither bribes nor excuses. What answer will you give to the God Who knows all your sins? Why do you not provide for yourself against the Day of Judgment? In this life your work is profitable, your tears acceptable, your sighs audible, your sorrow satisfying and purifying. It is better to atone for sin now and to cut away vices than to keep them for purgation in the hereafter. In truth, we deceive ourselves by our ill-advised love of the flesh. What will that fire feed upon but our sins? The more we spare ourselves now and the more we satisfy the flesh, the harder will the reckoning be and the more we keep for the burning.
“For a man will be more grievously punished in the things in which he has sinned. There the lazy will be driven with burning prongs, and gluttons tormented with unspeakable hunger and thirst; the wanton and lust-loving will be bathed in burning pitch and foul brimstone; the envious will howl in their grief like mad dogs. Every vice will have its own proper punishment. The proud will be faced with every confusion and the avaricious pinched with the most abject want. One hour of suffering there will be more bitter than a hundred years of the most severe penance here. In this life men sometimes rest from work and enjoy the comfort of friends, but the damned have no rest or consolation.
“You must, therefore, take care and repent of your sins now so that on the Day of Judgment you may rest secure with the blessed. In that day every trial borne in patience will be pleasing and the voice of iniquity will be stilled; the devout will be glad; the irreligious will mourn; and the mortified body will rejoice far more than if it had been pampered with every pleasure. Then the cheap garment will shine with splendor and the rich garment will become faded and worn; the poor cottage will be more praised than the rich palace. Simple obedience will be exalted above all worldly cleverness; a good and clean conscience will gladden the heart of man far more than the philosophy of the learned; and contempt for riches will be of more weight than every treasure on Earth. Then you will find more consolation in having prayed devoutly than in having feasted daintily; you will be happy that you preferred silence to prolonged gossip. Then holy works will be of greater value than many fair words; strictness of life and hard penances will be more pleasing than all earthly delights. Learn, then, to suffer little things now that you may not have to suffer greater ones in eternity. If you can suffer only a little now, how will you be able to endure eternal torment? If a little suffering makes you impatient now, what will Hell fire do? In truth, you cannot have two joys―you cannot taste the pleasures of this world and afterward reign with Christ. All is vanity, therefore, except to love God and to serve Him alone” (The Imitation of Christ, Book One, Chapter 24: On the Judgment and the Punishment of Sin).
The Grave Responsibility of Priests, Parents and Teachers
The formation of children from the earliest age is of a paramount importance in the spiritual field. The example given by the guardians of children―parents, teachers and priests―is crucial, because children are like sticky-boards upon which everything sticks in what they see and hear. Holy Scripture says: “As the mother was, so also is her daughter” (Ezechiel 16:44) ― from which we get our modern proverb: “Like father, like son!”
To the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “It is an act of justice, due to the eternal God, that the creature coming to the use of reason, direct its very first movement toward God. By knowing, it should begin to love Him, reverence Him and adore Him as its Creator and only true Lord. The parents are naturally bound to instruct their children, from their infancy, in this knowledge of God and to direct them with solicitous care, so that they may at once see their ultimate end, and seek it in their first acts of the intellect and will. They should with great watchfulness withdraw them from the childishness and puerile trickishness to which depraved nature will incline them if left without direction. If the fathers and mothers would be solicitous to prevent these vanities and perverted habits of their children and would instruct them from their infancy in the knowledge of their God and Creator, then they would afterwards easily accustom them to know and adore Him.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
The Venerable Louis of Granada speaks of this responsibility that superiors have over those souls that have been entrusted to them by God. “According to the Apostle, those who govern must be vigilant in labor and in all things. “Be thou vigilant! … Fulfill thy ministry!” (2 Timothy 4:5). This watchfulness is generally proportioned to the value of the object and to the danger which surrounds it. Now, there is nothing of greater value, and at the same time nothing more exposed to danger, than a soul. Consequently nothing requires greater vigilance than the care which must be bestowed by one who is charged with so important a trust as that of a soul.
“Let married women faithfully acquit themselves of the duties of their household, discharging all their obligations to their husband and children. Let fathers of families reflect upon the terrible affliction which the high priest Heli drew upon himself by neglecting to chastise his children. Sudden death came upon himself and his sons, and the priesthood was withdrawn from his family forever. (Cf. 1 Kings 4). As the sins of children are, to a certain degree, attributable to parents, then the perdition of a child not infrequently involves the condemnation of the parents. How can he be called a true father who, having begotten his son for this world, fails to train him for the kingdom of Heaven? Therefore, advise and correct your children. Guard them from evil associates. Give them wise and virtuous masters. Teach them to love virtue, and let them, like Tobias, be inspired from their infancy with the fear of God: “He had always feared God from his infancy, and kept His commandments” (Tobias 2:13).
“Do not gratify their whims, but curb their wills that they may become truly submissive. Be no less solicitous in providing for their spiritual than their corporal wants; for it is unreasonable to suppose that the duty of parents extends no further than that of birds and beasts, whose only care is to feed and nourish their young. Fulfill the duties of a father in a manner becoming a Christian, a true servant of God, and thus you will bring up your children heirs to Heaven, and not slaves of Hell.” (Venerable Louis of Granada, The Sinner’s Guide, Chapter 43: The Obligations of our State in Life).
Parents, teachers and priests would do well to heed the following words of Holy Scripture on the subject of responsibility for the souls that God has entrusted to them: “Son of man, I have made you a watchman to the house of Israel! [your household, your classroom, your parish] And you shall hear the word out of My mouth, and shall tell it to them from Me! If, when I say to the wicked: ‘You shall surely die!’ ― and you do not declare it to him, nor speak to him, so that he might be converted from his wicked ways and live, then the same wicked man shall certainly die in his iniquity, but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you give warning to the wicked, and he does not convert from his wickedness and from his evil ways―then he indeed shall die in his iniquity, but you will have saved your soul! Moreover, if the just man shall turn away from his justice, and shall commit iniquity―then I will lay a stumbling-block before him and he shall die―because you have not warned him! He shall die in his sin, and all his justices which he has done beforehand, shall not be remembered―but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you warn the just man, so that the just may not sin, and he does not sin―then living he shall live, because you have warned him, and you will have saved your soul!” (Ezechiel 3:17-21).
The “Feast of Fools” was an early 14th century satirical or mock festival celebrated in some churches on New Year’s Day in medieval times (looks like fools were always around, even back then!). “Fool’s Paradise” is a falsely imagined state of happiness based on ignorance or erroneous judgment. The phrase “Fool’s Gold” is used when talking about an item that its owner believes to be valuable, but that really is not so. “To be on a fool’s errand” means performing a task or activity that has no hope of success. Some of many other idioms on the subject of fools are:
● “A fool and his money are soon parted.”
● “There’s no fool like an old fool.”
● “A man who is his own lawyer has a fool for a client.”
Nobody likes to be called a fool. Our Lord even threatens punishment on the matter: “And whosoever shall say, ‘Thou Fool!’ shall be in danger of Hell fire” (Matthew 5:22). Nevertheless, Holy Scripture tells us that the number of fools in this world is uncountable: “The number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15). That sentiment is echoed by Our Lady in her words to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable! The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God! The wisdom of the flesh―worldly wisdom―has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God! Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity and as the source of foolishness which intoxicates the heart!”
The Foolishness of Sin
To act foolishly is sin, and to sin is to act foolishly. “The thought of a fool is sin … A fool will laugh at sin … He that plans to do evils, shall be called a fool” (Proverbs 24:9; 14:9; 24:8). Sin is the greatest evil in the world―hence sin has the greatest penalty attached to it. Only a fool would sin―especially since the greatest penalty is the eternal fire and tortures of Hell. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
It is pure stupidity to commit sin―even venial sin―in view of the punishments attached to sin. Who in their right mind would deliberately and knowingly commit a venial when they know that the penalty will mean spending a long time in the fires of Purgatory. God offers us Heaven, not Hell. God offers us Heaven without having to pass through the fires of Purgatory. Yet most people ignore His offers: “Wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction―and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). St. Paul tells us: “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9). Yet we are told that most souls―whether Catholic or not, and from all ranks of Catholic clergy and laity―end up in Hell! How stupid is that? Analogically speaking, God offers you $50 billion―but not right now―and the Satan and the world offer you $5,000 immediately. Most people take the $5,000 and lose out on the $50 billion.
They say that fruits are beneficial to the body’s system. However, not all fruits will benefit the health―some fruits are poisonous. Black nightshade berries are reported to have a sweet taste, but are extremely toxic. Beach Apples are delicious, but highly toxic. Other substances can also be sweet but toxic. Some forms of mold are both toxic and sweet-smelling. Ethylene Glycol is a toxic substance found in antifreeze, and it has a sweet taste that can be appealing to animals and young children―sin is just the same: sweet but toxic. Sin does not pay―or not very much! It is, as they say, “Fool’s Gold.”
The Foolishness of Riches
Seeking Paradise on Earth is merely a “Fool’s Paradise” that seduces many! “Woe to you that are rich―for you have your consolation!” says Our Lord (Luke 6:24). “Gold is a stumbling-block to them that sacrifice to it! Woe to them that eagerly follow after it, and every fool shall perish by it!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:7). “The riches which he has swallowed, he shall vomit up, and God shall draw them out of his belly!” (Job 20:15). “The prosperity of fools shall destroy them!” (Proverbs 1:32) … “They shall leave their riches to strangers!” (Psalm 48:11). “Go now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you!” (James 5:1). Any joy on Earth is very short lived and quickly ends―the joys of Heaven last eternally. That is why Our Lord said: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23-24).
The parable of Our Lord about the rich man should be warning to us: “‘Take heed and beware of all covetousness―for a man’s life doth not consist in the abundance of things which he possesses!’ And He spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no more room where to store my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns, and will build bigger barns; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods! And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years―take thy rest! Eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “You fool! This very night will they require your soul! And whose shall those things be which you have provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’” (Luke 12:15-21).
Our Lord further adds: “For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it. For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:25-26). “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Luke 13:24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
Our Lord then relates the parable about the wise and foolish virgins: “Then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be like to ten virgins, who taking their lamps went out to meet the bridegroom and the bride. And five of them were foolish, and five wise. But the five foolish, having taken their lamps, did not take oil with them. But the wise took oil in their vessels with the lamps. And the bridegroom tarrying, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made: ‘Behold the bridegroom cometh! Go ye forth to meet him!’ Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said to the wise: ‘Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out!’ The wise answered, saying: ‘Lest perhaps there be not enough for us and for you, go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves!’ Now whilst they went to buy, the bridegroom came: and they that were ready, went in with him to the marriage, and the door was shut. But at last come also the other virgins, saying: ‘Lord! Lord! Open to us! But He answering said: ‘Amen I say to you, I know you not!’” (Matthew 25:1-12).
Our Lord warned: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “Be not deceived! God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
No Time for God
The world foolishly has no time for God and the things of God. Recent surveys show that on an average day, nearly everyone (95%), aged 15 and over, engaged in some sort of leisure and sport activity, such as watching TV, socializing, or exercising. Men spent more time in these activities than did women (5.6 hours per day for men, compared with 4.8 hours for women). Watching TV was the leisure and sports activity that occupied the most time (2.8 hours per day). Playing games and computer use for leisure, and socializing and communicating were the next most common leisure and sports activities after watching TV. On an average day, individuals spent 34 minutes playing games and using a computer for leisure and an additional 34 minutes socializing and communicating. We all know of people who can spend hours every single day on their smartphone and watching their TV or computer screen―yet how much time do they give to God?
“God looked down from Heaven on the children of men―to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside! They are become unprofitable together! There is none that doth good―no not one! They are corrupted, and become abominable in iniquities! The fool said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’” (Psalm 52:1-4). “For My foolish people have not known Me! They are foolish and senseless children! They are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge!” (Jeremias 4:22).
Our Lady bewailed this lack of time for the things of God: “The temporal goods [material goods of this life] are created by God for the sole purpose of sustaining life―having attained this end, the need for them ceases. And―as this need is limited, soon and easily satisfied―there is no reason why the care for the immortal soul should be only occasional and temporary, while, on the other hand, the hunger after riches should be so perpetual and without end, as it has come to be among men. How many men are not fascinated by their unbounded greed? All of them usually place their hopes on gold and material riches. There are very few in the world in our days who use well the temporal riches and offer them to their God. Thus they spend all the time of their life―which was given them in order to gain eternal salvation and happiness―in these vanities. They lose themselves in these dark labyrinths and mazes! It is the height of perversion for man to devote all his time, all his care, all the exertion of his powers and all the alertness of his mind to the life of his body, of which he knows not the duration nor the end, and that, on the other hand, in many years of his existence he spares only one hour for his poor soul, and that hour is very often the last hour and the worst one of his whole life!”
“The faithful are in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness! Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. This dreadful carelessness arises from being so taken up with their earthly and material life. The princes of darkness are cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery. The demon always seeks to prepare the way for his deceits. He comes with his poison concealed in a golden cup [television, smartphone, computer, internet, social media, etc.], in order to divert or withdraw the soul from the love of the Lord. O insanity never sufficiently to be bewailed and so little considered by the children of Adam! All their life they labor and exert themselves to become more and more entangled in the snares of their passions, to be consumed in deceitful vanities and to deliver themselves over to an inextinguishable fire, death and everlasting perdition in Hell, as if all were a mere joke! They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as the joys of eternal life!”
“Souls also fail in the love due to God because they divert their love toward creatures. They esteem in creatures what they are seeking, namely power, riches, vain honor and ostentation. The faithful debase themselves to the level of worthless creatures. Those who have riches, trust in them―and those who have none, greedily chase after them! And so it happens that very few seek the Lord in such a way as to deserve His providential care. Very few trust in God and acknowledge Him as their Father, who is willing to provide for His children, who will nourish and sustain them without fail in all necessities. This deceitful error has filled the Earth with lovers of the world; it has filled the world with avarice and concupiscence against the law of the Creator; it has made men insane in their desires―for all of them commonly chase after riches and earthly possessions; claiming, thereby, merely to satisfy their needs―which is only a lame pretext for hiding their lack of interest in higher things, spiritual things. In reality they lie to themselves abominously, since they are seeking superfluous things that they do not really need and not what is really necessary.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
Spend Your Time Better―Spend Your Time Well
Our Lord could well address the words from one of His parables to each and every one of us: “Why do stand you here all the day idle?” (Matthew 20:6) ― in other words, why are you idly wasting your precious time on Earth on vanities and things of secondary importance? Why do you spend hours talking on the phone, and so little time talking to God in prayer? Why do you spend hours browsing the internet and social media, and so little time browsing through spiritual books and materials? Why do you spend hours sitting and watching the televisions tabernacle, and so little time sitting and watching in prayer before the tabernacle of Our Lord in the church? Why do you spend so much time on physical exercise for the body, and so little time on spiritual exercises for the soul? As Our Lord says: “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) … “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21). Every day―hopefully―we say in the Our Father: “Thy will be done on Earth as it is Heaven!” ― but do we really do the will of God, or do we do our own will most of the time? Our Lord will say: “This people honoureth Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8) …
The Imitation of Christ offers a few thoughts on the subject: “In all things consider the end; how you shall stand before the strict Judge from Whom nothing is hidden and Who will pronounce judgment in all justice, accepting neither bribes nor excuses. What answer will you give to the God Who knows all your sins? Why do you not provide for yourself against the Day of Judgment? In this life your work is profitable, your tears acceptable, your sighs audible, your sorrow satisfying and purifying. It is better to atone for sin now and to cut away vices than to keep them for purgation in the hereafter. In truth, we deceive ourselves by our ill-advised love of the flesh. What will that fire feed upon but our sins? The more we spare ourselves now and the more we satisfy the flesh, the harder will the reckoning be and the more we keep for the burning.
“For a man will be more grievously punished in the things in which he has sinned. There the lazy will be driven with burning prongs, and gluttons tormented with unspeakable hunger and thirst; the wanton and lust-loving will be bathed in burning pitch and foul brimstone; the envious will howl in their grief like mad dogs. Every vice will have its own proper punishment. The proud will be faced with every confusion and the avaricious pinched with the most abject want. One hour of suffering there will be more bitter than a hundred years of the most severe penance here. In this life men sometimes rest from work and enjoy the comfort of friends, but the damned have no rest or consolation.
“You must, therefore, take care and repent of your sins now so that on the Day of Judgment you may rest secure with the blessed. In that day every trial borne in patience will be pleasing and the voice of iniquity will be stilled; the devout will be glad; the irreligious will mourn; and the mortified body will rejoice far more than if it had been pampered with every pleasure. Then the cheap garment will shine with splendor and the rich garment will become faded and worn; the poor cottage will be more praised than the rich palace. Simple obedience will be exalted above all worldly cleverness; a good and clean conscience will gladden the heart of man far more than the philosophy of the learned; and contempt for riches will be of more weight than every treasure on Earth. Then you will find more consolation in having prayed devoutly than in having feasted daintily; you will be happy that you preferred silence to prolonged gossip. Then holy works will be of greater value than many fair words; strictness of life and hard penances will be more pleasing than all earthly delights. Learn, then, to suffer little things now that you may not have to suffer greater ones in eternity. If you can suffer only a little now, how will you be able to endure eternal torment? If a little suffering makes you impatient now, what will Hell fire do? In truth, you cannot have two joys―you cannot taste the pleasures of this world and afterward reign with Christ. All is vanity, therefore, except to love God and to serve Him alone” (The Imitation of Christ, Book One, Chapter 24: On the Judgment and the Punishment of Sin).
The Grave Responsibility of Priests, Parents and Teachers
The formation of children from the earliest age is of a paramount importance in the spiritual field. The example given by the guardians of children―parents, teachers and priests―is crucial, because children are like sticky-boards upon which everything sticks in what they see and hear. Holy Scripture says: “As the mother was, so also is her daughter” (Ezechiel 16:44) ― from which we get our modern proverb: “Like father, like son!”
To the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Our Lady said: “It is an act of justice, due to the eternal God, that the creature coming to the use of reason, direct its very first movement toward God. By knowing, it should begin to love Him, reverence Him and adore Him as its Creator and only true Lord. The parents are naturally bound to instruct their children, from their infancy, in this knowledge of God and to direct them with solicitous care, so that they may at once see their ultimate end, and seek it in their first acts of the intellect and will. They should with great watchfulness withdraw them from the childishness and puerile trickishness to which depraved nature will incline them if left without direction. If the fathers and mothers would be solicitous to prevent these vanities and perverted habits of their children and would instruct them from their infancy in the knowledge of their God and Creator, then they would afterwards easily accustom them to know and adore Him.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
The Venerable Louis of Granada speaks of this responsibility that superiors have over those souls that have been entrusted to them by God. “According to the Apostle, those who govern must be vigilant in labor and in all things. “Be thou vigilant! … Fulfill thy ministry!” (2 Timothy 4:5). This watchfulness is generally proportioned to the value of the object and to the danger which surrounds it. Now, there is nothing of greater value, and at the same time nothing more exposed to danger, than a soul. Consequently nothing requires greater vigilance than the care which must be bestowed by one who is charged with so important a trust as that of a soul.
“Let married women faithfully acquit themselves of the duties of their household, discharging all their obligations to their husband and children. Let fathers of families reflect upon the terrible affliction which the high priest Heli drew upon himself by neglecting to chastise his children. Sudden death came upon himself and his sons, and the priesthood was withdrawn from his family forever. (Cf. 1 Kings 4). As the sins of children are, to a certain degree, attributable to parents, then the perdition of a child not infrequently involves the condemnation of the parents. How can he be called a true father who, having begotten his son for this world, fails to train him for the kingdom of Heaven? Therefore, advise and correct your children. Guard them from evil associates. Give them wise and virtuous masters. Teach them to love virtue, and let them, like Tobias, be inspired from their infancy with the fear of God: “He had always feared God from his infancy, and kept His commandments” (Tobias 2:13).
“Do not gratify their whims, but curb their wills that they may become truly submissive. Be no less solicitous in providing for their spiritual than their corporal wants; for it is unreasonable to suppose that the duty of parents extends no further than that of birds and beasts, whose only care is to feed and nourish their young. Fulfill the duties of a father in a manner becoming a Christian, a true servant of God, and thus you will bring up your children heirs to Heaven, and not slaves of Hell.” (Venerable Louis of Granada, The Sinner’s Guide, Chapter 43: The Obligations of our State in Life).
Parents, teachers and priests would do well to heed the following words of Holy Scripture on the subject of responsibility for the souls that God has entrusted to them: “Son of man, I have made you a watchman to the house of Israel! [your household, your classroom, your parish] And you shall hear the word out of My mouth, and shall tell it to them from Me! If, when I say to the wicked: ‘You shall surely die!’ ― and you do not declare it to him, nor speak to him, so that he might be converted from his wicked ways and live, then the same wicked man shall certainly die in his iniquity, but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you give warning to the wicked, and he does not convert from his wickedness and from his evil ways―then he indeed shall die in his iniquity, but you will have saved your soul! Moreover, if the just man shall turn away from his justice, and shall commit iniquity―then I will lay a stumbling-block before him and he shall die―because you have not warned him! He shall die in his sin, and all his justices which he has done beforehand, shall not be remembered―but I will require his blood at your hand! But if you warn the just man, so that the just may not sin, and he does not sin―then living he shall live, because you have warned him, and you will have saved your soul!” (Ezechiel 3:17-21).
Article 11
Sunday & Monday April 14th & 15th
The Crisis of Shepherds
Sunday & Monday April 14th & 15th
The Crisis of Shepherds
We are in the Time of Crisis
Today is traditionally known as “Good Shepherd Sunday” due to the Gospel reading at this Sunday’s Mass (Extraordinary Rite/Traditional Latin Mass), which sees Our Lord call Himself the “Good Shepherd.” This Sunday is sometimes called “Vocations Sunday” because of the link between Our Lord as Good Shepherd and the shepherds that He calls to shepherd His flock throughout the world and throughout the centuries. We have entered the period of Church History that we could well call “The Crisis of the Shepherd.” It is no secret that the so-called “Third Secret of Fatima” speaks of an apostasy or falling-away from the Faith, which is supposed to start at the “top”—meaning that it will start with the clergy or pastors within the Catholic Church and it will affect even those in the highest positions within the Church.
Repeated Warnings from Our Lady
It is not a though all this is a shock and a surprise—Our Lady has given the world ample time and wonderful remedies to avoid what is happening and will continue to worsen. Yet the world, apart from a very small number of souls, seems indifferent at best and scornful at worst with regard to her warnings. Our Lady of Fatima would complain that even the good are not listening to her message and are blindly carrying on with their own ‘good’ projects while ignoring what Heaven wants to be done.
Our Lady of Good Success at Quito, Ecuador
The warnings that have come from Our Lady are unmistakably clear and dire—the terrible times she foretells include a “Crisis of the Shepherd.” Already back in the 1600s, during her apparitions at Quito, in Ecuador, she warned us of these calamities. The Blessed Virgin under the glorious title of Our Lady of Good Success told Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres, that this battle would reach its most acute stage because of various unfaithful religious, who, Our Lady says, “under the appearance of virtue and bad-spirited zeal, would turn upon Religion.” She goes on to say: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs. The effects of secular education will increase, which will be one reason for the lack of priestly and religious vocations...”
Our Lady of Good Success continues: “The Sacred Sacrament of Holy Orders will be ridiculed, oppressed and despised. ...The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor with cruel and subtle astuteness to deviate them from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them. These corrupted priests, who will scandalize the Christian people, will incite the hatred of the bad Christians and the enemies of the Roman, Catholic and Apostolic Church to fall upon all priests. This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings to the good Pastors of the Church.” … “Moreover, in these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost.”
During this time, Our Lady foretold, “the secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! Lacking a Prelate and Father to guide them with paternal love, gentleness, strength, wisdom and prudence, many priests will lose their spirit, placing their souls in great danger. This will mark the arrival of my hour.”
Our Lady of La Salette
Though we have often quoted extracts from Our Lady’s La Salette message, we will do so again—following the words of wisdom from Holy Scripture: “Preach the word: be instant in season, out of season: reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine. For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears: and will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 4:2-4). Sadly, many today do “indeed turn away their hearing from the truth”—but as Our Lady never tires of repeating her message, we will not tire in repeating it in unison with her.
La Salette’s message takes up the same theme of Quito, Ecuador. Our Lady had the following tragic things to say: “Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! … The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence … The devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Rome will lose Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist.”
Our Lady of Fatima
In Sister Lucia’s fourth memoir, which was written from October-December 1941, Sister Lucia copied the first two parts of the Secret from the text of her third memoir, but added a sentence that is not found there. Sister Lucia gave us the first sentence of the Third Secret when she inserted into her fourth memoir the phrase “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.” This sentence had not appeared in her previous memoir. Sister Lucia purposely inserted it into her fourth memoir to indicate to us what the final part of the Third Secret is about.
In 1943, after having been asked by Bishop da Silva to write down the text of the Third Secret, Sister Lucia was finding the task difficult. She declared to the bishop that it was not absolutely necessary to write out the text, “since in a certain manner she had said it.” Sister Lucia was very likely referring to the additional phrase she had inserted into her fourth memoir, “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.”
The phrase, “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.” is a promise that the true Faith will be preserved in that country, although in its vagueness it does not state by whom. Yet, if in Portugal the true Faith will be preserved, what does that imply about the rest of the world? The Portuguese Father Messias de Coelho concluded that, “this allusion, so positive about what will happen among us, suggests to us that it will be different around us.”
Father Alonso, the official Fatima archivist had this to say on the Third Secret: “‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved’: The phrase most clearly implies a critical state of Faith, which other nations will suffer, that is to say, a crisis of Faith; whereas Portugal will preserve its Faith.”
Honest Members of the Church Admit the Crisis
Cardinal Manning: “The apostasy of the city of Rome from the vicar of Christ and its destruction by Antichrist may be thoughts very new to many Catholics, that I think it well to recite the text of theologians of greatest repute. First Malvenda, who writes expressly on the subject, states as the opinion of Ribera, Gaspar Melus, Biegas, Suarez, Bellarmine and Bosius that Rome shall apostatize from the Faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ and return to its ancient paganism. ...Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible; hidden in catacombs, in dens, in mountains, in lurking places; for a time it shall be swept, as it were from the face of the Earth. Such is the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church.” (Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, The Present Crisis of the Holy See, 1861, London: Burns and Lambert, pp. 88-90). For Cardinal Manning to speak about apostasy in his day, would seem to be scandalous — yet Manning was alive at the time of Our Lady’s warnings at La Salette. He heard; he understood and he believed.
Pope Pius XII: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul …. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God.” Cardinal Pacelli said this in 1931. He became Pope Pius XII in 1939. Here Pope Pius XII speaks of a future humanism that we are currently witnessing; and one that is increasing. “The Rights of Man” … “Human Dignity” … “the Human Person” are all phrases and ideas that have flooded the Church like never before. We are so focused on man, that we are forgetting God. Look at all the socials and activities organized by churches everywhere and compare those attendances to the attendances in visiting and adoring the Blessed Sacrament, where God Himself resides in our midst!
The Holy Eucharist is the most important Sacrament of the Church, but never has it been as important as in these days of impending apostasy. Notice the Eucharistic adoration that took place at Fatima, before Our Lady even appeared. Notice how Divine Providence reserved the prodigious scientific discoveries about the Holy Eucharist from the Miracle of Lanciano Italy, to be uncovered in 1969/1970 at a time when God knew that belief in the Eucharistic would dwindle in the world. The Holy Eucharist is there, among other things, to feed and strengthen our Faith; yet by neglecting to frequently visit, adore and eat this Bread of Heaven, we indirectly weaken our Faith and lose the necessary strength that is required in fighting the apostasy of our times.
Pope Paul VI: “The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church!” (Pope Paul VI, Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13th, 1977). Here too, Pope Paul VI speaks of the “Crisis of the Shepherds” by saying that the “darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church, even to its summit... Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading into the highest levels within the Church!” This explains, according to some authors on the “Third Secret of Fatima” the reluctance of the Church to speak on these matters, because of embarrassment that would arise from what would be tantamount to self-indictment.
Pope Benedict XVI: “Yes, I have read it [the Third Secret]. It refers to] the dangers which threaten the Faith and the life of the Christian and therefore (the life) of the world” (Pope Benedict XVI, while still Cardinal Ratzinger, Jesus magazine, November 11, 1984). What gives “life” to the Church? Grace and Truth, of course. But Grace and Truth have to be distributed by the Shepherds of the Church; that is why Jesus said to St. Peter: “Feed My lambs…Feed My sheep!” But Liberalism and Modernism feed poison to the lambs and sheep; and False Ecumenism introduces the lambs and sheep to wolves in sheep’s clothing. No wonder today’s statistics show that the “Cancer of Unbelief” has far advanced in the Catholic Church today!
Pope John Paul II’s Personal Theologian: “In the Third Secret, it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top” (Cardinal Ciappi, the Papal Theologian of Pope John Paul II).
Sister Lucia: In a letter to Fr. Umberto Pasquale, who was very devoted to the cause of Fatima, Sister Lucia wrote: “The decadence which exists in the world is without any doubt the consequence of the lack of the spirit of prayer. Foreseeing this disorientation, the Blessed Virgin recommended recitation of the Rosary with such insistence. And since the Rosary is, after the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the prayer most apt for preserving Faith in souls, the devil has unchained his struggles against it. Unfortunately, we see the disasters he has caused.”
The Devil’s Score-Card For he USA
► PRIESTS:
In 1965 there were 58,632 diocesan and religious-order priests in the United States.
In 2004 there were only 41,212 = a 30% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 37,302 = a 37% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2020 there were only 35,413 = a 40% fall from the 1965 numbers.
Since most are 65 years or older, the % drop could reach 85% in 7 to 10 years leaving less than 12,000 priests. And most of these are in aging categories. By 2025 it is estimated that religious sisters, brothers and religious order priests over 70 years of age will outnumber those under age 70 by nearly 4 to 1.
► SEMINARIANS:
In 1965 there were 48,992 seminarians.
In 2004 only 4,719 = a 90% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 the numbers are still very low at 4,856 = a 90% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2023 only 2,759 = a 94% fall from the 1965 numbers.
► RELIGIOUS BROTHERS:
In 1965 there were 12,271 brothers.
In 2004 only 5,505 remained = a 55% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2010 there were only 4,700 = a 62% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 3,953 = a 68% fall from the 1965 numbers.
► RELIGIOUS SISTERS:
In 1965 there were 179,954 sisters.
In 2004 only 71,468 = a 61% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there only remained 45,100 = a 75% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2022 there only remained 42,000 = a 77% fall from the 1965 numbers.
► CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOLS:
In 1965 there were 1,566 high schools.
In 2006 there were 1,210 high schools = a 23% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
In 2022 there were 1,173 high schools = a 26% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
► CATHOLIC GRADE SCHOOLS:
In 1965 there were 10,503 grade schools.
In 2004 only 6,623 = a 37% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 5,224 = a 37% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
► STUDENT ENROLLMENT IN CATHOLIC SCHOOLS:
In 1960 there were 5,253,000 (5.3 million) children in Catholic schools.
In 1972 there were only 3,789,723 (3.8 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
In 1982 there were only 3,026,000 (3 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
In 1992 there were only 2,567,630 (2.5 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
In 2002 there were only 2,489,376 (2.4 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
In 2012 there were only 2,001,740 (2 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
In 2022 there were only 1,693,493 (1.7 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
► TEACHING SISTERS:
In 1965 there were 104,314 religious sisters teaching in Catholic schools.
In 2004 there were only 8,233 religious sisters teaching in Catholic schools = a 92% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 2,470 religious sisters teaching in Catholic schools = a 98% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
► TEACHING PRIESTS:
In 1965 there were 12,346 priests teaching in Catholic schools.
In 2004 only 1,897 priests teaching in Catholic schools = a 85% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 784 priests teaching in Catholic schools = a 94% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
► WEEKLY MASS ATTENDANCE:
In 1965 approximately 67% of American Catholics would REGULARLY attend Sunday Mass each week.
In 2004 only 25% of Catholics would REGULARLY attend Sunday Mass each week = a 42% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 21% American Catholics attending Mass every week = a 46% fall from the 1965 numbers.
After COVID-19 made its devastating presence felt, the 21% of American Catholics attending Mass every week, dropped drastically to around 10% according to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) statistics = a 57% fall from the 1965 numbers. The projected regular Sunday attendance for the post-COVID era is estimated to be around 12%.
► WHAT CATHOLICS BELIEVE (OR DON’T BELIEVE)!
77% believe it is not necessary to attend Sunday Mass in order to be a good Catholic
65% believe Divorce and Remarriage is acceptable
53% believe abortion is acceptable
74% believe artificial birth control is acceptable
66% believe the Eucharist is only symbolic and not the Body and Blood of Christ.
These are all mortal sins that can lead to eternal suffering for those who practice these beliefs.
► OUR CATHOLIC SHEPHERDS IN SCHOOLS
Among Catholic Elementary School Teachers:
90% disagree with the Church’s condemnation of birth control
74% disagree with the Church’s condemnation of abortion
73% disagree with the Church’s teaching on Papal Infallibility
37% disagree with the Church teaching on the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist
There are many dogmas and teachings of the Catholic Church that these teachers disagree with, the above mentioned are only a sample of the whole. A prime example is you don’t have to believe in the official Catechism. It’s subjective. Let your conscience be your guide―but what about the dogmatic sections of the Catechism? These are some of the “Shepherds” who are teaching and guiding your children. Now you know why most Catholic elementary school students quit going to Mass after they leave our schools. The figures are far worse at Catholic High Schools and most Universities are a disgrace in what they do and do not teach about our Faith.
► DECLINE OF CATHOLIC RELIGIOUS COMMUNITIES between 1965 and 2000
Jesuit Priests declined 40%; Jesuit Seminarians declined 89%.
Franciscan Priests declined 41%; Franciscan Seminarians declined 97%
Benedictine Priests declined 40%; Benedictine Seminarians declined 93%
Dominican Priests declined 40%; Dominican Seminarians declined 89%
And so on for all communities. Most of the remaining priests will be gone in the near future, because of their advanced ages. And there increasingly fewer and fewer replacements, because there are so few seminarians; made worse by the fact that only a small percentage of these seminarians graduate.
In 1988, there were 19,705 Catholic parishes in the U.S.; by 2014 it had fallen to 17,483; by 2022 it had further fallen to 16,400. Parishes without resident pastors rose from 571 in 1970 to 3,215 by 2022. The number of parishes without priests could easily triple to 9,000 in a few short years because of the rapidly decreasing number of priests and so few replacements. In the mid-1980s, the Archdiocese of Chicago had nearly 450 parishes. In 2016 it was about 350, and by the summer of 2024 it will be 221. Over a period of 12 months (2022) the Archdiocese of New York whittled down 112 parishes (out of a total of 368) to a mere 55. And similar shrinkage is happening in smaller sees like Madison, Wisconsin, which expects to have consolidated its 102 parishes into about 30 by next year.
We have a Mess! We have a Crisis!
Folks! We have a “Crisis of Shepherds”! No surprise, for Our Lady already foretold it, but the world would not listen, nor take the remedies Our Lady offered. We may be tempted to bury our heads in the sand, with a spirit of hopelessness, muttering with Cain: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9) ... “I am only the sheep, I am not the shepherd!” ... “What can I do? I am only one among over a billion who inhabit this Earth!”
This is both a lack of Faith and desertion of obligation. The Apostles were only twelve; the disciples barely a hundred. Yet they were commanded to convert all nations and baptize all creatures. Our sense of desperation is only a natural human emotion and not supernatural response. Our Lord performed miracles and promised that we would do even greater ones, IF WE HAD THE FAITH! The devil said to St. John Vianney, the Curé of Ars, that if there were only four like him in France, then the devil would “be out of business”! St. Louis Marie de Montfort speaks of the greatest saints being formed and raised up by Our Lady at the end times.
If we look upon and rely upon our own powers, then we are lost; for we but sinful dust and ashes, to whom Our Lord says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Yet, if we tap into the vines, that Our Lord and Our Lady are, then nothing is impossible: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26) ... “For, amen I say to you, if you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, ‘Remove from hence hither!’ and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you” (Matthew 17:19).
Today is traditionally known as “Good Shepherd Sunday” due to the Gospel reading at this Sunday’s Mass (Extraordinary Rite/Traditional Latin Mass), which sees Our Lord call Himself the “Good Shepherd.” This Sunday is sometimes called “Vocations Sunday” because of the link between Our Lord as Good Shepherd and the shepherds that He calls to shepherd His flock throughout the world and throughout the centuries. We have entered the period of Church History that we could well call “The Crisis of the Shepherd.” It is no secret that the so-called “Third Secret of Fatima” speaks of an apostasy or falling-away from the Faith, which is supposed to start at the “top”—meaning that it will start with the clergy or pastors within the Catholic Church and it will affect even those in the highest positions within the Church.
Repeated Warnings from Our Lady
It is not a though all this is a shock and a surprise—Our Lady has given the world ample time and wonderful remedies to avoid what is happening and will continue to worsen. Yet the world, apart from a very small number of souls, seems indifferent at best and scornful at worst with regard to her warnings. Our Lady of Fatima would complain that even the good are not listening to her message and are blindly carrying on with their own ‘good’ projects while ignoring what Heaven wants to be done.
Our Lady of Good Success at Quito, Ecuador
The warnings that have come from Our Lady are unmistakably clear and dire—the terrible times she foretells include a “Crisis of the Shepherd.” Already back in the 1600s, during her apparitions at Quito, in Ecuador, she warned us of these calamities. The Blessed Virgin under the glorious title of Our Lady of Good Success told Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres, that this battle would reach its most acute stage because of various unfaithful religious, who, Our Lady says, “under the appearance of virtue and bad-spirited zeal, would turn upon Religion.” She goes on to say: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs. The effects of secular education will increase, which will be one reason for the lack of priestly and religious vocations...”
Our Lady of Good Success continues: “The Sacred Sacrament of Holy Orders will be ridiculed, oppressed and despised. ...The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor with cruel and subtle astuteness to deviate them from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them. These corrupted priests, who will scandalize the Christian people, will incite the hatred of the bad Christians and the enemies of the Roman, Catholic and Apostolic Church to fall upon all priests. This apparent triumph of Satan will bring enormous sufferings to the good Pastors of the Church.” … “Moreover, in these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost.”
During this time, Our Lady foretold, “the secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! Lacking a Prelate and Father to guide them with paternal love, gentleness, strength, wisdom and prudence, many priests will lose their spirit, placing their souls in great danger. This will mark the arrival of my hour.”
Our Lady of La Salette
Though we have often quoted extracts from Our Lady’s La Salette message, we will do so again—following the words of wisdom from Holy Scripture: “Preach the word: be instant in season, out of season: reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine. For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears: and will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 4:2-4). Sadly, many today do “indeed turn away their hearing from the truth”—but as Our Lady never tires of repeating her message, we will not tire in repeating it in unison with her.
La Salette’s message takes up the same theme of Quito, Ecuador. Our Lady had the following tragic things to say: “Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! … The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence … The devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Rome will lose Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist.”
Our Lady of Fatima
In Sister Lucia’s fourth memoir, which was written from October-December 1941, Sister Lucia copied the first two parts of the Secret from the text of her third memoir, but added a sentence that is not found there. Sister Lucia gave us the first sentence of the Third Secret when she inserted into her fourth memoir the phrase “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.” This sentence had not appeared in her previous memoir. Sister Lucia purposely inserted it into her fourth memoir to indicate to us what the final part of the Third Secret is about.
In 1943, after having been asked by Bishop da Silva to write down the text of the Third Secret, Sister Lucia was finding the task difficult. She declared to the bishop that it was not absolutely necessary to write out the text, “since in a certain manner she had said it.” Sister Lucia was very likely referring to the additional phrase she had inserted into her fourth memoir, “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.”
The phrase, “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.” is a promise that the true Faith will be preserved in that country, although in its vagueness it does not state by whom. Yet, if in Portugal the true Faith will be preserved, what does that imply about the rest of the world? The Portuguese Father Messias de Coelho concluded that, “this allusion, so positive about what will happen among us, suggests to us that it will be different around us.”
Father Alonso, the official Fatima archivist had this to say on the Third Secret: “‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved’: The phrase most clearly implies a critical state of Faith, which other nations will suffer, that is to say, a crisis of Faith; whereas Portugal will preserve its Faith.”
Honest Members of the Church Admit the Crisis
Cardinal Manning: “The apostasy of the city of Rome from the vicar of Christ and its destruction by Antichrist may be thoughts very new to many Catholics, that I think it well to recite the text of theologians of greatest repute. First Malvenda, who writes expressly on the subject, states as the opinion of Ribera, Gaspar Melus, Biegas, Suarez, Bellarmine and Bosius that Rome shall apostatize from the Faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ and return to its ancient paganism. ...Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible; hidden in catacombs, in dens, in mountains, in lurking places; for a time it shall be swept, as it were from the face of the Earth. Such is the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church.” (Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, The Present Crisis of the Holy See, 1861, London: Burns and Lambert, pp. 88-90). For Cardinal Manning to speak about apostasy in his day, would seem to be scandalous — yet Manning was alive at the time of Our Lady’s warnings at La Salette. He heard; he understood and he believed.
Pope Pius XII: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul …. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God.” Cardinal Pacelli said this in 1931. He became Pope Pius XII in 1939. Here Pope Pius XII speaks of a future humanism that we are currently witnessing; and one that is increasing. “The Rights of Man” … “Human Dignity” … “the Human Person” are all phrases and ideas that have flooded the Church like never before. We are so focused on man, that we are forgetting God. Look at all the socials and activities organized by churches everywhere and compare those attendances to the attendances in visiting and adoring the Blessed Sacrament, where God Himself resides in our midst!
The Holy Eucharist is the most important Sacrament of the Church, but never has it been as important as in these days of impending apostasy. Notice the Eucharistic adoration that took place at Fatima, before Our Lady even appeared. Notice how Divine Providence reserved the prodigious scientific discoveries about the Holy Eucharist from the Miracle of Lanciano Italy, to be uncovered in 1969/1970 at a time when God knew that belief in the Eucharistic would dwindle in the world. The Holy Eucharist is there, among other things, to feed and strengthen our Faith; yet by neglecting to frequently visit, adore and eat this Bread of Heaven, we indirectly weaken our Faith and lose the necessary strength that is required in fighting the apostasy of our times.
Pope Paul VI: “The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church!” (Pope Paul VI, Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13th, 1977). Here too, Pope Paul VI speaks of the “Crisis of the Shepherds” by saying that the “darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church, even to its summit... Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading into the highest levels within the Church!” This explains, according to some authors on the “Third Secret of Fatima” the reluctance of the Church to speak on these matters, because of embarrassment that would arise from what would be tantamount to self-indictment.
Pope Benedict XVI: “Yes, I have read it [the Third Secret]. It refers to] the dangers which threaten the Faith and the life of the Christian and therefore (the life) of the world” (Pope Benedict XVI, while still Cardinal Ratzinger, Jesus magazine, November 11, 1984). What gives “life” to the Church? Grace and Truth, of course. But Grace and Truth have to be distributed by the Shepherds of the Church; that is why Jesus said to St. Peter: “Feed My lambs…Feed My sheep!” But Liberalism and Modernism feed poison to the lambs and sheep; and False Ecumenism introduces the lambs and sheep to wolves in sheep’s clothing. No wonder today’s statistics show that the “Cancer of Unbelief” has far advanced in the Catholic Church today!
Pope John Paul II’s Personal Theologian: “In the Third Secret, it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top” (Cardinal Ciappi, the Papal Theologian of Pope John Paul II).
Sister Lucia: In a letter to Fr. Umberto Pasquale, who was very devoted to the cause of Fatima, Sister Lucia wrote: “The decadence which exists in the world is without any doubt the consequence of the lack of the spirit of prayer. Foreseeing this disorientation, the Blessed Virgin recommended recitation of the Rosary with such insistence. And since the Rosary is, after the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the prayer most apt for preserving Faith in souls, the devil has unchained his struggles against it. Unfortunately, we see the disasters he has caused.”
The Devil’s Score-Card For he USA
► PRIESTS:
In 1965 there were 58,632 diocesan and religious-order priests in the United States.
In 2004 there were only 41,212 = a 30% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 37,302 = a 37% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2020 there were only 35,413 = a 40% fall from the 1965 numbers.
Since most are 65 years or older, the % drop could reach 85% in 7 to 10 years leaving less than 12,000 priests. And most of these are in aging categories. By 2025 it is estimated that religious sisters, brothers and religious order priests over 70 years of age will outnumber those under age 70 by nearly 4 to 1.
► SEMINARIANS:
In 1965 there were 48,992 seminarians.
In 2004 only 4,719 = a 90% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 the numbers are still very low at 4,856 = a 90% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2023 only 2,759 = a 94% fall from the 1965 numbers.
► RELIGIOUS BROTHERS:
In 1965 there were 12,271 brothers.
In 2004 only 5,505 remained = a 55% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2010 there were only 4,700 = a 62% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 3,953 = a 68% fall from the 1965 numbers.
► RELIGIOUS SISTERS:
In 1965 there were 179,954 sisters.
In 2004 only 71,468 = a 61% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there only remained 45,100 = a 75% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2022 there only remained 42,000 = a 77% fall from the 1965 numbers.
► CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOLS:
In 1965 there were 1,566 high schools.
In 2006 there were 1,210 high schools = a 23% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
In 2022 there were 1,173 high schools = a 26% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
► CATHOLIC GRADE SCHOOLS:
In 1965 there were 10,503 grade schools.
In 2004 only 6,623 = a 37% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 5,224 = a 37% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
► STUDENT ENROLLMENT IN CATHOLIC SCHOOLS:
In 1960 there were 5,253,000 (5.3 million) children in Catholic schools.
In 1972 there were only 3,789,723 (3.8 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
In 1982 there were only 3,026,000 (3 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
In 1992 there were only 2,567,630 (2.5 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
In 2002 there were only 2,489,376 (2.4 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
In 2012 there were only 2,001,740 (2 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
In 2022 there were only 1,693,493 (1.7 million) children in Catholic schools = a 38% decrease on the 1960 numbers.
► TEACHING SISTERS:
In 1965 there were 104,314 religious sisters teaching in Catholic schools.
In 2004 there were only 8,233 religious sisters teaching in Catholic schools = a 92% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 2,470 religious sisters teaching in Catholic schools = a 98% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
► TEACHING PRIESTS:
In 1965 there were 12,346 priests teaching in Catholic schools.
In 2004 only 1,897 priests teaching in Catholic schools = a 85% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 784 priests teaching in Catholic schools = a 94% decrease on the 1965 numbers.
► WEEKLY MASS ATTENDANCE:
In 1965 approximately 67% of American Catholics would REGULARLY attend Sunday Mass each week.
In 2004 only 25% of Catholics would REGULARLY attend Sunday Mass each week = a 42% fall from the 1965 numbers.
In 2018 there were only 21% American Catholics attending Mass every week = a 46% fall from the 1965 numbers.
After COVID-19 made its devastating presence felt, the 21% of American Catholics attending Mass every week, dropped drastically to around 10% according to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) statistics = a 57% fall from the 1965 numbers. The projected regular Sunday attendance for the post-COVID era is estimated to be around 12%.
► WHAT CATHOLICS BELIEVE (OR DON’T BELIEVE)!
77% believe it is not necessary to attend Sunday Mass in order to be a good Catholic
65% believe Divorce and Remarriage is acceptable
53% believe abortion is acceptable
74% believe artificial birth control is acceptable
66% believe the Eucharist is only symbolic and not the Body and Blood of Christ.
These are all mortal sins that can lead to eternal suffering for those who practice these beliefs.
► OUR CATHOLIC SHEPHERDS IN SCHOOLS
Among Catholic Elementary School Teachers:
90% disagree with the Church’s condemnation of birth control
74% disagree with the Church’s condemnation of abortion
73% disagree with the Church’s teaching on Papal Infallibility
37% disagree with the Church teaching on the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist
There are many dogmas and teachings of the Catholic Church that these teachers disagree with, the above mentioned are only a sample of the whole. A prime example is you don’t have to believe in the official Catechism. It’s subjective. Let your conscience be your guide―but what about the dogmatic sections of the Catechism? These are some of the “Shepherds” who are teaching and guiding your children. Now you know why most Catholic elementary school students quit going to Mass after they leave our schools. The figures are far worse at Catholic High Schools and most Universities are a disgrace in what they do and do not teach about our Faith.
► DECLINE OF CATHOLIC RELIGIOUS COMMUNITIES between 1965 and 2000
Jesuit Priests declined 40%; Jesuit Seminarians declined 89%.
Franciscan Priests declined 41%; Franciscan Seminarians declined 97%
Benedictine Priests declined 40%; Benedictine Seminarians declined 93%
Dominican Priests declined 40%; Dominican Seminarians declined 89%
And so on for all communities. Most of the remaining priests will be gone in the near future, because of their advanced ages. And there increasingly fewer and fewer replacements, because there are so few seminarians; made worse by the fact that only a small percentage of these seminarians graduate.
In 1988, there were 19,705 Catholic parishes in the U.S.; by 2014 it had fallen to 17,483; by 2022 it had further fallen to 16,400. Parishes without resident pastors rose from 571 in 1970 to 3,215 by 2022. The number of parishes without priests could easily triple to 9,000 in a few short years because of the rapidly decreasing number of priests and so few replacements. In the mid-1980s, the Archdiocese of Chicago had nearly 450 parishes. In 2016 it was about 350, and by the summer of 2024 it will be 221. Over a period of 12 months (2022) the Archdiocese of New York whittled down 112 parishes (out of a total of 368) to a mere 55. And similar shrinkage is happening in smaller sees like Madison, Wisconsin, which expects to have consolidated its 102 parishes into about 30 by next year.
We have a Mess! We have a Crisis!
Folks! We have a “Crisis of Shepherds”! No surprise, for Our Lady already foretold it, but the world would not listen, nor take the remedies Our Lady offered. We may be tempted to bury our heads in the sand, with a spirit of hopelessness, muttering with Cain: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9) ... “I am only the sheep, I am not the shepherd!” ... “What can I do? I am only one among over a billion who inhabit this Earth!”
This is both a lack of Faith and desertion of obligation. The Apostles were only twelve; the disciples barely a hundred. Yet they were commanded to convert all nations and baptize all creatures. Our sense of desperation is only a natural human emotion and not supernatural response. Our Lord performed miracles and promised that we would do even greater ones, IF WE HAD THE FAITH! The devil said to St. John Vianney, the Curé of Ars, that if there were only four like him in France, then the devil would “be out of business”! St. Louis Marie de Montfort speaks of the greatest saints being formed and raised up by Our Lady at the end times.
If we look upon and rely upon our own powers, then we are lost; for we but sinful dust and ashes, to whom Our Lord says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Yet, if we tap into the vines, that Our Lord and Our Lady are, then nothing is impossible: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26) ... “For, amen I say to you, if you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, ‘Remove from hence hither!’ and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you” (Matthew 17:19).
Article 10
Saturday April 13th
The Faith versus The World
Saturday April 13th
The Faith versus The World
This is the Victory which Overcomes the World, our Faith
St. John speaks those wonderful and reassuring words from his Epistle: “This is the victory which overcomes the world, our Faith” (1 John 5:4). This evokes an idea of a battle and we see the same idea echoed in the Old Testament: “They called upon God in the battle and He heard them―because they had put their Faith in Him” (1 Paralipomenon 5:20).
“For He is found by them that tempt Him not: and He shows Himself to them that have Faith in Him” (Wisdom 1:2).
Jesus the Light, our Faith the Light
“For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting. For God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:16-17). “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not” (John 1:10). “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘I am the Light of the world―he that follows Me, walks not in darkness, but shall have the light of life” (John 8:12). “As long as I am in the world, I am the Light of the world” (John 9:5).
Opposition to the Faith and Light
But the world preferred darkness, as St. John tells us: “The Light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the Light―for their works were evil” (John 3:19). “And Jesus said to them: ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you, that you shall die in your sins. For if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sin’” (John 8:23-24). For judgment I am come into this world; that they who see not, may see; and they who see, may become blind” (John 9:39). By this He means that those who think they see, but see only with worldly eyes and ambitions, will be blinded to the truth. Whereas those, who have shut their eyes to the world and its ambitions, will see the truth of what Jesus says. We see this come true even in His own time—and even among his own Apostles—whereby their eyes were focused on a worldly, politically powerful Messias, who would physically conquer and subdue nations, and so they were blind to the humble, poverty-stricken, Messias that Jesus was.
Strength and Bond
Our Faith unites us to God: “I will espouse thee to Me in Faith: and thou shalt know that I am the Lord” (Osee 2:20).
“Has not God chosen the poor in this world, rich in Faith?” (James 2:5). We see the Faith of the Patriarchs and Prophets praised in chapter 11 of the Book of Hebrews:
“By Faith Abel offered to God a sacrifice exceeding that of Cain … By Faith Henoch was translated, that he should not see death … By Faith Noe, having received warning about those things which as yet were not seen, moved with fear, built the ark for the saving of his family … By Faith he that is called Abraham, obeyed to go out into a place which he was to receive for an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he went … By Faith also Sara herself, being barren, received strength to conceive seed, even past the time of age … By Faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up his only begotten son … By Faith Jacob dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph … By Faith Joseph, when he was dying, made mention of the going out of the children of Israel … By Faith Moses, denied himself to be the son of Pharao’ s daughter; rather choosing to be afflicted with the people of God, than to have the pleasure of sin for a time … By Faith he left Egypt, not fearing the fierceness of the king … By Faith they passed through the Red Sea … By Faith the walls of Jericho fell down” (Hebrews chapter 11).
“We walk by Faith, and not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7). “Watch ye, stand fast in the Faith, do manfully, and be strengthened!” (1 Corinthians 16:13).
Abraham Sanctified in the Faith
Our Faith is meant to be our sanctification:”He sanctified him in his Faith” (Ecclesiasticus 45:4). Abraham was sanctified by having his Faith tested—he was told to leave his homeland for some unknown Promised Land, and he complied and went into the unknown. He was asked to sacrifice his only begotten son through his wife Sarai, and he complied and took knife in hand. “As it is written: ‘Abraham believed God, and it was reputed to him unto justice!’ Know ye therefore, that they who are of Faith, the same are the children of Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing, that God justifies the Gentiles by Faith, told unto Abraham before: ‘In thee shall all nations be blessed!’ Therefore they that are of Faith, shall be blessed with faithful Abraham” (Galatians 3:6-9).
The Faith of Noe Overcomes the World
We see the Faith of Noe withstand mockery for decades as he embarked, through Faith, on a seemingly stupid project of building a gigantic ship miles from any water:”By Faith Noe, having received a warning concerning those things which as yet were not seen, moved with fear, built the ark for the saving of his family. By his Faith he condemned the world” (Hebrews 11:7). Yet in that ‘stupid’ ship they were saved!
In another boat, years later, the Apostles were saved by the person whom Noe had prefigured—Jesus. “And when Jesus entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him: and behold a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves, but He was asleep. And they came to Him, and awaked Him, saying: ‘Lord! Save us! We perish!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful, O ye of little Faith?’ Then rising up He commanded the winds, and the sea, and there came a great calm. But the men wondered, saying: ‘What manner of Man is this, for the winds and the sea obey Him?’” (Matthew 8:23-27)
Power of Faith
Faith saved the life of a pagan’s son—who, though a pagan, still had Faith in Jesus:”There came to Him a centurion, beseeching Him, and saying, ‘Lord, my servant lieth at home sick of the palsy, and is grievously tormented!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘I will come and heal him.’ And the centurion making answer, said: ‘Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof: but only say the word, and my servant shall be healed. For I also am a man subject to authority, having under me soldiers; and I say to this, “Go!” and he goeth, and to another, “Come!” and he cometh, and to my servant, “Do this!” and he doeth it.’ And Jesus hearing this, marveled; and said to them that followed Him: ‘Amen I say to you, I have not found so great Faith in Israel. And I say to you that many shall come from the east and the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the Kingdom of Heaven―but the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’ And Jesus said to the centurion: ‘Go, and as thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!’” (Matthew 8:5-13).
Temptations of the Prince of this World, the Devil
“The Pharisees therefore said among themselves: ‘Do you see that we prevail nothing? Behold, the whole world is gone after Him!’” (John 12:19). Jesus came to pull souls away from the world, for the devil is the prince of this world: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not anything” (John 14:30) … “now shall the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31). The devil himself admits that he is the prince of this world, as we saw above: “And the devil led Jesus into a high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time; and he said to Him: ‘To me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them!’” (Luke 4:5-7).
The world tempts us to turn our eyes and thoughts away from God, as we see in the Temptation of Christ in the desert: “And the devil led Jesus into a high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time; and he said to Him: ‘To Thee will I give all this power, and the glory of them; for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them. If Thou therefore wilt adore before me, all shall be Thine!’” (Luke 4:5-7). St. Matthew also relates the same incident: “The devil took Jesus up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve”’” (Matthew 4:8-10).
Likewise will the devil try to plant in our souls a greater and greater interest in the things of this world, whether it be persons, places or things. He knows we have only so many hours in each day to know, love and serve God; so, if he can fill those hours with as many earthly, worldly interests as possible, then the less time there is for God. He even hopes that he can move us to make gods out those earthly things and thereby replace the love of God with a love of the world.
Faith Overcomes Our Enemies
St. Peter warns us not to be complacent: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). As said above, in this battle, by Faith, we must turn to God: “They called upon God in the battle and He heard them―because they had put their Faith in Him” (1 Paralipomenon 5:20).
The devil, the world and the flesh are our enemies that we must fight and overcome by a strong Faith: “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world.” (1 John 2:16). To which St. James the Apostle says: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
Cannot Serve God and the World
“No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon (riches and worldly interest). Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat: and the body more than the clothing? Behold the birds of the air, for they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns: and your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you of much more value than they? And which of you by taking thought, can add to his stature by one cubit? And for clothing why are you solicitous? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow―they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as one of these. And if the grass of the field―which is today and tomorrow is cast into the oven―God does so clothe: how much more you, O ye of little Faith?” (Matthew 6:24-30).
The World Tries to Choke the Faith
But we will be tempted by the world, the attitudes and maxims of the world, the ways of the world, the fashions of the world, the pressure of the world, a desire of not being hated by world, but loved by the world. “He that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke up the word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). St. Mark relates the same: “And the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things, entering in, choke the word and it is made fruitless” (Mark 4:19).
However, Our Lord foresaw this and warned us against this: “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death: and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 24:9). “You shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake: but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved” (Matthew 10:22).
Or as St. Paul writes: “What concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever?” (2 Corinthians 6:15).
Confess and Profess
“You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid” (Matthew 5:14). Let us not be ashamed of our Faith, even though at times we may have to hide our Faith in persecution (see yesterday’s Daily Thoughts below).
“Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven. Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that takes not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me. He that finds his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:32-39).
“For what doth it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
“The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
St. John speaks those wonderful and reassuring words from his Epistle: “This is the victory which overcomes the world, our Faith” (1 John 5:4). This evokes an idea of a battle and we see the same idea echoed in the Old Testament: “They called upon God in the battle and He heard them―because they had put their Faith in Him” (1 Paralipomenon 5:20).
“For He is found by them that tempt Him not: and He shows Himself to them that have Faith in Him” (Wisdom 1:2).
Jesus the Light, our Faith the Light
“For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting. For God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:16-17). “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not” (John 1:10). “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘I am the Light of the world―he that follows Me, walks not in darkness, but shall have the light of life” (John 8:12). “As long as I am in the world, I am the Light of the world” (John 9:5).
Opposition to the Faith and Light
But the world preferred darkness, as St. John tells us: “The Light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the Light―for their works were evil” (John 3:19). “And Jesus said to them: ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you, that you shall die in your sins. For if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sin’” (John 8:23-24). For judgment I am come into this world; that they who see not, may see; and they who see, may become blind” (John 9:39). By this He means that those who think they see, but see only with worldly eyes and ambitions, will be blinded to the truth. Whereas those, who have shut their eyes to the world and its ambitions, will see the truth of what Jesus says. We see this come true even in His own time—and even among his own Apostles—whereby their eyes were focused on a worldly, politically powerful Messias, who would physically conquer and subdue nations, and so they were blind to the humble, poverty-stricken, Messias that Jesus was.
Strength and Bond
Our Faith unites us to God: “I will espouse thee to Me in Faith: and thou shalt know that I am the Lord” (Osee 2:20).
“Has not God chosen the poor in this world, rich in Faith?” (James 2:5). We see the Faith of the Patriarchs and Prophets praised in chapter 11 of the Book of Hebrews:
“By Faith Abel offered to God a sacrifice exceeding that of Cain … By Faith Henoch was translated, that he should not see death … By Faith Noe, having received warning about those things which as yet were not seen, moved with fear, built the ark for the saving of his family … By Faith he that is called Abraham, obeyed to go out into a place which he was to receive for an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he went … By Faith also Sara herself, being barren, received strength to conceive seed, even past the time of age … By Faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up his only begotten son … By Faith Jacob dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph … By Faith Joseph, when he was dying, made mention of the going out of the children of Israel … By Faith Moses, denied himself to be the son of Pharao’ s daughter; rather choosing to be afflicted with the people of God, than to have the pleasure of sin for a time … By Faith he left Egypt, not fearing the fierceness of the king … By Faith they passed through the Red Sea … By Faith the walls of Jericho fell down” (Hebrews chapter 11).
“We walk by Faith, and not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7). “Watch ye, stand fast in the Faith, do manfully, and be strengthened!” (1 Corinthians 16:13).
Abraham Sanctified in the Faith
Our Faith is meant to be our sanctification:”He sanctified him in his Faith” (Ecclesiasticus 45:4). Abraham was sanctified by having his Faith tested—he was told to leave his homeland for some unknown Promised Land, and he complied and went into the unknown. He was asked to sacrifice his only begotten son through his wife Sarai, and he complied and took knife in hand. “As it is written: ‘Abraham believed God, and it was reputed to him unto justice!’ Know ye therefore, that they who are of Faith, the same are the children of Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing, that God justifies the Gentiles by Faith, told unto Abraham before: ‘In thee shall all nations be blessed!’ Therefore they that are of Faith, shall be blessed with faithful Abraham” (Galatians 3:6-9).
The Faith of Noe Overcomes the World
We see the Faith of Noe withstand mockery for decades as he embarked, through Faith, on a seemingly stupid project of building a gigantic ship miles from any water:”By Faith Noe, having received a warning concerning those things which as yet were not seen, moved with fear, built the ark for the saving of his family. By his Faith he condemned the world” (Hebrews 11:7). Yet in that ‘stupid’ ship they were saved!
In another boat, years later, the Apostles were saved by the person whom Noe had prefigured—Jesus. “And when Jesus entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him: and behold a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves, but He was asleep. And they came to Him, and awaked Him, saying: ‘Lord! Save us! We perish!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful, O ye of little Faith?’ Then rising up He commanded the winds, and the sea, and there came a great calm. But the men wondered, saying: ‘What manner of Man is this, for the winds and the sea obey Him?’” (Matthew 8:23-27)
Power of Faith
Faith saved the life of a pagan’s son—who, though a pagan, still had Faith in Jesus:”There came to Him a centurion, beseeching Him, and saying, ‘Lord, my servant lieth at home sick of the palsy, and is grievously tormented!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘I will come and heal him.’ And the centurion making answer, said: ‘Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof: but only say the word, and my servant shall be healed. For I also am a man subject to authority, having under me soldiers; and I say to this, “Go!” and he goeth, and to another, “Come!” and he cometh, and to my servant, “Do this!” and he doeth it.’ And Jesus hearing this, marveled; and said to them that followed Him: ‘Amen I say to you, I have not found so great Faith in Israel. And I say to you that many shall come from the east and the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the Kingdom of Heaven―but the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’ And Jesus said to the centurion: ‘Go, and as thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!’” (Matthew 8:5-13).
Temptations of the Prince of this World, the Devil
“The Pharisees therefore said among themselves: ‘Do you see that we prevail nothing? Behold, the whole world is gone after Him!’” (John 12:19). Jesus came to pull souls away from the world, for the devil is the prince of this world: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not anything” (John 14:30) … “now shall the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31). The devil himself admits that he is the prince of this world, as we saw above: “And the devil led Jesus into a high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time; and he said to Him: ‘To me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them!’” (Luke 4:5-7).
The world tempts us to turn our eyes and thoughts away from God, as we see in the Temptation of Christ in the desert: “And the devil led Jesus into a high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time; and he said to Him: ‘To Thee will I give all this power, and the glory of them; for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them. If Thou therefore wilt adore before me, all shall be Thine!’” (Luke 4:5-7). St. Matthew also relates the same incident: “The devil took Jesus up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve”’” (Matthew 4:8-10).
Likewise will the devil try to plant in our souls a greater and greater interest in the things of this world, whether it be persons, places or things. He knows we have only so many hours in each day to know, love and serve God; so, if he can fill those hours with as many earthly, worldly interests as possible, then the less time there is for God. He even hopes that he can move us to make gods out those earthly things and thereby replace the love of God with a love of the world.
Faith Overcomes Our Enemies
St. Peter warns us not to be complacent: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). As said above, in this battle, by Faith, we must turn to God: “They called upon God in the battle and He heard them―because they had put their Faith in Him” (1 Paralipomenon 5:20).
The devil, the world and the flesh are our enemies that we must fight and overcome by a strong Faith: “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world.” (1 John 2:16). To which St. James the Apostle says: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
Cannot Serve God and the World
“No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon (riches and worldly interest). Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat: and the body more than the clothing? Behold the birds of the air, for they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns: and your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you of much more value than they? And which of you by taking thought, can add to his stature by one cubit? And for clothing why are you solicitous? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow―they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as one of these. And if the grass of the field―which is today and tomorrow is cast into the oven―God does so clothe: how much more you, O ye of little Faith?” (Matthew 6:24-30).
The World Tries to Choke the Faith
But we will be tempted by the world, the attitudes and maxims of the world, the ways of the world, the fashions of the world, the pressure of the world, a desire of not being hated by world, but loved by the world. “He that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke up the word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). St. Mark relates the same: “And the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things, entering in, choke the word and it is made fruitless” (Mark 4:19).
However, Our Lord foresaw this and warned us against this: “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death: and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 24:9). “You shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake: but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved” (Matthew 10:22).
Or as St. Paul writes: “What concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever?” (2 Corinthians 6:15).
Confess and Profess
“You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid” (Matthew 5:14). Let us not be ashamed of our Faith, even though at times we may have to hide our Faith in persecution (see yesterday’s Daily Thoughts below).
“Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven. Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that takes not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me. He that finds his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:32-39).
“For what doth it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
“The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
Article 9
Friday April 12th
Mary Reinforces Our Weak Faith
Friday April 12th
Mary Reinforces Our Weak Faith
Our Lady and the Faith
We read, in St. Luke’s Gospel, of Our Lady’s Faith being greatly praised. When Mary visits her cousin Elizabeth, “and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost: and she cried out with a loud voice, and said: ‘Blessed art thou among women, and ... blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord” (Luke 1:41-45).
The Believing Woman
Just as Mary is the Mother of Love and Hope, so she is also the Mother of Faith. St. Irenaeus says that this is so for a very good reason, for “the evil done by Eve’s unfaithfulness was remedied by Mary’s Faith.” Tertullian confirms this by saying that because Eve believed the serpent against the warning she had received from God, she brought death into the world; but because Mary believed the angel at the Annunciation, she brought salvation into the world. He puts it this way: “Eve believed the serpent; Mary believed Gabriel. What Eve demolished by her foolish credulity, Mary restored by her genuine Faith.” St. Augustine says: “It was Mary’s Faith that opened Heaven to men, when she agreed to cooperate in the Incarnation of the Eternal Word.”
Richard of Saint Lawrence commenting on these words of Saint Paul from Corinthians: “For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the believing wife” (1 Corinthians 7:14), says: “Mary is the believing woman by whose Faith the unbelieving Adam and all his posterity are saved.”
It was as a tribute to her Faith that Elizabeth called Our Lady “blessed”―“Blessed are you that has believed, because those things shall be accomplished in you that were spoken by the Lord” (Luke 1:45). And Saint Augustine adds: “Mary was blessed more by receiving the Faith of Christ than by conceiving the flesh of Christ.”
Mary Saw Through All Appearances
Father Suarez says that the most Holy Virgin had more Faith than all human beings and angels together. She saw her Son in the crib at Bethlehem and believed that He was the Creator of the world. She saw Him flee from Herod and believed that He was the King of kings. She saw Him born, yet believed Him to be eternal. She saw Him poor and in need of food, and believed that He was the Lord of the universe. She saw Him lying on straw, and believed that He was omnipotent. She observed that He did not speak, and yet believed that He was filled with infinite wisdom. She heard Him cry, and believed that He was the joy of paradise. Finally, she saw Him in death, despised and crucified, and even though Faith wavered in others, she remained firm in the conviction that He was God.
Commenting on those words of the Gospel: “There stood, by the cross of Jesus, His Mother” (John 19:25), Saint Antoninus says: “Mary stood there, supported by her Faith, which she firmly retained in the divinity of Christ.” And this is the reason why, the saint adds, in the midst of the Tenebrae service only one candle is left lighted.
The Light of Her Faith Shines On
With reference to this, St. Leo the Great applies to our Blessed Lady the words of Proverbs: “Her lamp shall not be put out in the night” (Proverbs 31:18). And with regard to the words of Isaias: “I have trodden the winepress alone, and...there is not a man with me” (Isaias 63:3), St. Thomas remarks that the prophet says “a man,” because of the Blessed Virgin, a woman, who never failed in Faith. St. Albert the Great assures us: “Mary displayed perfect Faith. Even when the disciples doubted, she did not doubt.”
Mary is Our Light
By her magnificent Faith, therefore, Mary merited to become “a light to all the faithful” as St. Methodius calls her; and the “Queen of the true Faith,” as she is called by St. Cyril of Alexandria. Holy Church herself attributes the destruction of all heresies to the merits of Mary: “Rejoice, O Virgin Mary, for you alone have destroyed all heresies throughout the world.” St. Thomas of Villanova, explaining the words of the Holy Spirit: “You have wounded my heart, my sister, my spouse...with one of your eyes” (Canticles 4:9), says: “These eyes denoted Mary’s Faith, by which she pleased the Son of God so much”—for it is with eyes that we see and Faith is about seeing the truths about God.
Imitate Mary’s Faith by Works of Faith
St. Ildephonsus makes a point of urging us to imitate Mary’s Faith. But how can we do this? Faith is both a gift and a virtue. It is a gift of God because it is a light infused by him into our souls; it is a virtue inasmuch as the soul must strive to practice it. Hence Faith must not only be the rule of our belief, but the rule of our actions as well. That is why St. Gregory the Great says: “That man really believes who puts what he believes into practice.” And St. Augustine: “You say ‘I believe.’ Do what you say and then it will be Faith.” To live according to our belief is what is meant by the expression “to have a living Faith.” “My just one lives by Faith” (Hebrews 10:38). The Blessed Virgin lived very differently from those who do not live according to what they believe. St. James declared: “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:26).
Actions Should Flow From Faith
Diogenes lighted a lantern and looked around for a man on earth. But God seems to be looking for a Christian. Among the baptized on earth, there are many who perform no good works at all. The majority are Christians only in name. The words once addressed by Alexander to a cowardly soldier should be applied to these people: “Either change your name or change your conduct.”
Father Ávila used to say: “It would be better to lock these poor creatures up as madmen. They believe that eternal happiness is in store for those who lead good lives and an eternity of misery for those who lead bad lives. And yet they act as if they believed nothing.” St. Augustine exhorts us to look at things with the eyes of Christians, that is, with eyes that see everything in the light of Faith. St. Teresa often used to say: “All sins come from the lack of Faith.” Let us therefore beg our Blessed Lady, by the merit of her Faith, to obtain a living Faith for us. “O Lady, increase our Faith!”
Faith Praised!
So often Our Lord would praise Faith in the Gospels: “Amen I say to you, I have not found so great Faith in Israel!” (Matthew 8:10) … “According to your Faith, be it done unto you” (Matthew 9:29) … “O woman, great is thy Faith: be it done to thee as thou wilt!” (Matthew 15:28) … “Be of good heart, daughter, thy Faith hath made thee whole” (Matthew 9:22) … “Thy Faith hath made thee safe” (Luke 7:50) … “Amen I say to you, if you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, Remove from hence hither, and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you” (Matthew 17:19) … “Amen, I say to you, if you shall have Faith, and stagger not, not only this of the fig tree shall you do, but also if you shall say to this mountain, Take up and cast thyself into the sea, it shall be done” (Matthew 21:21).
Faith Criticized!
He would also criticize and complain about a lack Faith: “O ye of little Faith?” (Matthew 6:30) … “Why are you fearful, O ye of little Faith?” (Matthew 8:26) … “O thou of little Faith, why didst thou doubt?” (Matthew 14:31) … “Why are you fearful? Have you not Faith yet?” (Mark 4:40) … “The Son of man, when he cometh, shall he find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
How’s Your Faith?
It would take a courageous person (or a fool) to stand up and say that they are satisfied with their level of Faith. More likely, we should imitate the Holy Apostles of Our Lord: “And the Apostles said to the Lord: ‘Increase our Faith!’” (Luke 17:5). Or we should cry out with the man, whose son Jesus cured: “I do believe, Lord! Help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:23).
This is especially true today, in this faithless age, as foretold by Our Lady on several occasions: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Rome will lose Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist.” (Our Lady of La Salette). “At the end of the 19th century and into the 20th century, various heresies will be propagated … As these heresies spread and dominate, the precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of customs. During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private.” (Our Lady of Good Success, Quito, Ecuador, 17th century).
However, there would be souls, promised Our Lady of Good Success, who would remain faithful and would preserve the treasure of the Faith and virtues. But these would suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom.
Our Lady to the Rescue
The fact is that Our Lord will help our unbelief, or doubtful believing—and today it is through Our Lady that He seeks to improve and strengthen our Faith. As St. Louis de Montfort says:
“We must examine and meditate on the great virtues which she practiced during her life, and particularly, first of all, her lively Faith, by which she believed without hesitation the angel’s word, and believed faithfully and constantly up to the foot of the cross” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“Our Blessed Lady will give you also a portion of her Faith, which was the greatest of all faiths that ever were on earth. Greater than the Faith of all the patriarchs, prophets, apostles and saints put together. Now that she is reigning in Heaven, she no longer exercises this Faith, because she sees all things clearly in God by the light of glory. Nevertheless, with the consent of the Most High, in entering into glory she did not lose her Faith. She kept it for her faithful servants in the Church Militant.
“The more, then, that you gain the favor of that august Princess and faithful Virgin, the more will you act by pure Faith; a pure Faith which will make you care hardly at all about sensible consolations and extraordinary favors; a lively Faith animated by charity, which will enable you to perform all your actions from the motive of pure love; a Faith firm and immovable as a rock, through which you will rest quiet and constant in the midst of storms and hurricanes; a Faith active and piercing, which like a mysterious passkey, will give you entrance into all the mysteries of Jesus, into the last ends of man, and into the Heart of God Himself; a courageous Faith, which will enable you to undertake and carry out without hesitation great things for God and for the salvation of souls; lastly, a Faith which will be your blazing torch, your divine life, your hidden treasure of divine wisdom and your omnipotent arm; which you will use to enlighten those who are in the darkness of the shadow of death, to inflame those who are lukewarm and who have need of the heated gold of charity, to give life to those who are dead in sin, to touch and overthrow, by your meek and powerful words, the hearts of marble and the cedars of Lebanon; and finally, to resist the devil and all the enemies of salvation” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Fr. Faber Speaks of the Necessity of Mary for the Faith
“One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one. Here in England, Mary is not half enough preached. Devotion to her is low and thin and poor. It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that Protestants may feel at ease about her. Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy. It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be. It has no Faith in itself. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized.
“Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background. Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them. It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines. Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother. I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable Grignion de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ. Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith.” (Fr. Frederick Faber, Preface to True Devotion to Mary).
Start Now! Bring Others Along!
Therefore, we announce once more, that starting on the feast of that great apostle of Our Lady and of True Devotion to her—St. Louis Marie de Montfort—which is April 28th, we will begin another 33-Day Preparation for St. Louis’ True Devotion Consecration to Mary which will be made at the end of Mary’s month of May, on May 31st (traditionally the feast of the Queenship of Our Lady).
Let others know of the 33-Day Preparation starting on April 28th—speak to them, call them, e-mail them, text them—do whatever it takes to spread this devotion to Our Lady. As one of the Epistles from a Mass of Our Lady says: “Now therefore, ye children, hear me: Blessed are they that keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not. Blessed is the man that heareth me, and that watcheth daily at my gates, and waiteth at the posts of my doors. He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord” (Proverbs 8:32-35).
We read, in St. Luke’s Gospel, of Our Lady’s Faith being greatly praised. When Mary visits her cousin Elizabeth, “and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost: and she cried out with a loud voice, and said: ‘Blessed art thou among women, and ... blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord” (Luke 1:41-45).
The Believing Woman
Just as Mary is the Mother of Love and Hope, so she is also the Mother of Faith. St. Irenaeus says that this is so for a very good reason, for “the evil done by Eve’s unfaithfulness was remedied by Mary’s Faith.” Tertullian confirms this by saying that because Eve believed the serpent against the warning she had received from God, she brought death into the world; but because Mary believed the angel at the Annunciation, she brought salvation into the world. He puts it this way: “Eve believed the serpent; Mary believed Gabriel. What Eve demolished by her foolish credulity, Mary restored by her genuine Faith.” St. Augustine says: “It was Mary’s Faith that opened Heaven to men, when she agreed to cooperate in the Incarnation of the Eternal Word.”
Richard of Saint Lawrence commenting on these words of Saint Paul from Corinthians: “For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the believing wife” (1 Corinthians 7:14), says: “Mary is the believing woman by whose Faith the unbelieving Adam and all his posterity are saved.”
It was as a tribute to her Faith that Elizabeth called Our Lady “blessed”―“Blessed are you that has believed, because those things shall be accomplished in you that were spoken by the Lord” (Luke 1:45). And Saint Augustine adds: “Mary was blessed more by receiving the Faith of Christ than by conceiving the flesh of Christ.”
Mary Saw Through All Appearances
Father Suarez says that the most Holy Virgin had more Faith than all human beings and angels together. She saw her Son in the crib at Bethlehem and believed that He was the Creator of the world. She saw Him flee from Herod and believed that He was the King of kings. She saw Him born, yet believed Him to be eternal. She saw Him poor and in need of food, and believed that He was the Lord of the universe. She saw Him lying on straw, and believed that He was omnipotent. She observed that He did not speak, and yet believed that He was filled with infinite wisdom. She heard Him cry, and believed that He was the joy of paradise. Finally, she saw Him in death, despised and crucified, and even though Faith wavered in others, she remained firm in the conviction that He was God.
Commenting on those words of the Gospel: “There stood, by the cross of Jesus, His Mother” (John 19:25), Saint Antoninus says: “Mary stood there, supported by her Faith, which she firmly retained in the divinity of Christ.” And this is the reason why, the saint adds, in the midst of the Tenebrae service only one candle is left lighted.
The Light of Her Faith Shines On
With reference to this, St. Leo the Great applies to our Blessed Lady the words of Proverbs: “Her lamp shall not be put out in the night” (Proverbs 31:18). And with regard to the words of Isaias: “I have trodden the winepress alone, and...there is not a man with me” (Isaias 63:3), St. Thomas remarks that the prophet says “a man,” because of the Blessed Virgin, a woman, who never failed in Faith. St. Albert the Great assures us: “Mary displayed perfect Faith. Even when the disciples doubted, she did not doubt.”
Mary is Our Light
By her magnificent Faith, therefore, Mary merited to become “a light to all the faithful” as St. Methodius calls her; and the “Queen of the true Faith,” as she is called by St. Cyril of Alexandria. Holy Church herself attributes the destruction of all heresies to the merits of Mary: “Rejoice, O Virgin Mary, for you alone have destroyed all heresies throughout the world.” St. Thomas of Villanova, explaining the words of the Holy Spirit: “You have wounded my heart, my sister, my spouse...with one of your eyes” (Canticles 4:9), says: “These eyes denoted Mary’s Faith, by which she pleased the Son of God so much”—for it is with eyes that we see and Faith is about seeing the truths about God.
Imitate Mary’s Faith by Works of Faith
St. Ildephonsus makes a point of urging us to imitate Mary’s Faith. But how can we do this? Faith is both a gift and a virtue. It is a gift of God because it is a light infused by him into our souls; it is a virtue inasmuch as the soul must strive to practice it. Hence Faith must not only be the rule of our belief, but the rule of our actions as well. That is why St. Gregory the Great says: “That man really believes who puts what he believes into practice.” And St. Augustine: “You say ‘I believe.’ Do what you say and then it will be Faith.” To live according to our belief is what is meant by the expression “to have a living Faith.” “My just one lives by Faith” (Hebrews 10:38). The Blessed Virgin lived very differently from those who do not live according to what they believe. St. James declared: “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:26).
Actions Should Flow From Faith
Diogenes lighted a lantern and looked around for a man on earth. But God seems to be looking for a Christian. Among the baptized on earth, there are many who perform no good works at all. The majority are Christians only in name. The words once addressed by Alexander to a cowardly soldier should be applied to these people: “Either change your name or change your conduct.”
Father Ávila used to say: “It would be better to lock these poor creatures up as madmen. They believe that eternal happiness is in store for those who lead good lives and an eternity of misery for those who lead bad lives. And yet they act as if they believed nothing.” St. Augustine exhorts us to look at things with the eyes of Christians, that is, with eyes that see everything in the light of Faith. St. Teresa often used to say: “All sins come from the lack of Faith.” Let us therefore beg our Blessed Lady, by the merit of her Faith, to obtain a living Faith for us. “O Lady, increase our Faith!”
Faith Praised!
So often Our Lord would praise Faith in the Gospels: “Amen I say to you, I have not found so great Faith in Israel!” (Matthew 8:10) … “According to your Faith, be it done unto you” (Matthew 9:29) … “O woman, great is thy Faith: be it done to thee as thou wilt!” (Matthew 15:28) … “Be of good heart, daughter, thy Faith hath made thee whole” (Matthew 9:22) … “Thy Faith hath made thee safe” (Luke 7:50) … “Amen I say to you, if you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, Remove from hence hither, and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you” (Matthew 17:19) … “Amen, I say to you, if you shall have Faith, and stagger not, not only this of the fig tree shall you do, but also if you shall say to this mountain, Take up and cast thyself into the sea, it shall be done” (Matthew 21:21).
Faith Criticized!
He would also criticize and complain about a lack Faith: “O ye of little Faith?” (Matthew 6:30) … “Why are you fearful, O ye of little Faith?” (Matthew 8:26) … “O thou of little Faith, why didst thou doubt?” (Matthew 14:31) … “Why are you fearful? Have you not Faith yet?” (Mark 4:40) … “The Son of man, when he cometh, shall he find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
How’s Your Faith?
It would take a courageous person (or a fool) to stand up and say that they are satisfied with their level of Faith. More likely, we should imitate the Holy Apostles of Our Lord: “And the Apostles said to the Lord: ‘Increase our Faith!’” (Luke 17:5). Or we should cry out with the man, whose son Jesus cured: “I do believe, Lord! Help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:23).
This is especially true today, in this faithless age, as foretold by Our Lady on several occasions: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Rome will lose Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist.” (Our Lady of La Salette). “At the end of the 19th century and into the 20th century, various heresies will be propagated … As these heresies spread and dominate, the precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of customs. During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private.” (Our Lady of Good Success, Quito, Ecuador, 17th century).
However, there would be souls, promised Our Lady of Good Success, who would remain faithful and would preserve the treasure of the Faith and virtues. But these would suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom.
Our Lady to the Rescue
The fact is that Our Lord will help our unbelief, or doubtful believing—and today it is through Our Lady that He seeks to improve and strengthen our Faith. As St. Louis de Montfort says:
“We must examine and meditate on the great virtues which she practiced during her life, and particularly, first of all, her lively Faith, by which she believed without hesitation the angel’s word, and believed faithfully and constantly up to the foot of the cross” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
“Our Blessed Lady will give you also a portion of her Faith, which was the greatest of all faiths that ever were on earth. Greater than the Faith of all the patriarchs, prophets, apostles and saints put together. Now that she is reigning in Heaven, she no longer exercises this Faith, because she sees all things clearly in God by the light of glory. Nevertheless, with the consent of the Most High, in entering into glory she did not lose her Faith. She kept it for her faithful servants in the Church Militant.
“The more, then, that you gain the favor of that august Princess and faithful Virgin, the more will you act by pure Faith; a pure Faith which will make you care hardly at all about sensible consolations and extraordinary favors; a lively Faith animated by charity, which will enable you to perform all your actions from the motive of pure love; a Faith firm and immovable as a rock, through which you will rest quiet and constant in the midst of storms and hurricanes; a Faith active and piercing, which like a mysterious passkey, will give you entrance into all the mysteries of Jesus, into the last ends of man, and into the Heart of God Himself; a courageous Faith, which will enable you to undertake and carry out without hesitation great things for God and for the salvation of souls; lastly, a Faith which will be your blazing torch, your divine life, your hidden treasure of divine wisdom and your omnipotent arm; which you will use to enlighten those who are in the darkness of the shadow of death, to inflame those who are lukewarm and who have need of the heated gold of charity, to give life to those who are dead in sin, to touch and overthrow, by your meek and powerful words, the hearts of marble and the cedars of Lebanon; and finally, to resist the devil and all the enemies of salvation” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Fr. Faber Speaks of the Necessity of Mary for the Faith
“One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one. Here in England, Mary is not half enough preached. Devotion to her is low and thin and poor. It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that Protestants may feel at ease about her. Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy. It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be. It has no Faith in itself. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized.
“Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background. Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them. It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines. Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother. I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable Grignion de Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ. Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith.” (Fr. Frederick Faber, Preface to True Devotion to Mary).
Start Now! Bring Others Along!
Therefore, we announce once more, that starting on the feast of that great apostle of Our Lady and of True Devotion to her—St. Louis Marie de Montfort—which is April 28th, we will begin another 33-Day Preparation for St. Louis’ True Devotion Consecration to Mary which will be made at the end of Mary’s month of May, on May 31st (traditionally the feast of the Queenship of Our Lady).
Let others know of the 33-Day Preparation starting on April 28th—speak to them, call them, e-mail them, text them—do whatever it takes to spread this devotion to Our Lady. As one of the Epistles from a Mass of Our Lady says: “Now therefore, ye children, hear me: Blessed are they that keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not. Blessed is the man that heareth me, and that watcheth daily at my gates, and waiteth at the posts of my doors. He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord” (Proverbs 8:32-35).
Article 8
Thursday April 11th
Are You Losing It?
Thursday April 11th
Are You Losing It?
Our Lady Warns of Dangers to the Faith
Faith is absolutely necessary for salvation. This means in the simplest terms that it is simply impossible for us to get to Heaven unless, during life, we have believed in God. It is impossible to please God without Faith. “For if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sin” (John 8:24).
That Faith is meant, not just for a few, but for the whole world, as shown by the following words of Our Lord: “Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:19-20). “He that hears you, hears Me; and he that despises you, despises Me; and he that despises Me, despises Him that sent Me” (Luke 10:16). “He that believes and is baptized, shall be saved: but he that believes not shall be condemned” (Mark 16:16).
We have to believe ALL things, that is to say all the dogmas, that the Church teaches us, and not just some of them.
Yet, Our Lady, over the last few hundred years, has given us ample warning about a time when the Faith will be lost—lost by most people, lost by priests and religious orders, lost by bishops, and lost even by Rome itself.
Warning About the Faith at La Salette
Our Lady had the following tragic things to say at La Salette: “Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! … The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence … The devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the earth … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God.”
“Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Rome will lose Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist.”
Our Lady warns of those who “will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus, denying the existence of Heaven.”
“Evil books will be abundant on earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principal, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds … There will be a kind of false peace in the world. People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin.”
“But the children of the holy Church, the children of My Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me. Blessed are the souls humbly guided by the Holy Ghost! I shall fight at their side, until they reach a fullness of years.”
“I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world. It is time they came out and filled the world with light. Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children. I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ. Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see. For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends.”
“God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will.”
As to the Pope, Our Lady speaks of Faith being one of the weapons he must use:”may he, however, be steadfast and noble, may he fight with the weapons of Faith and love.”
The Church Speaks After La Salette
“The apostasy of the city of Rome from the vicar of Christ and its destruction by Antichrist may be thoughts very new to many Catholics, that I think it well to recite the text of theologians of greatest repute. First Malvenda, who writes expressly on the subject, states as the opinion of Ribera, Gaspar Melus, Biegas, Suarez, Bellarmine and Bosius that Rome shall apostatize from the Faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ and return to its ancient paganism. ...Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible; hidden in catacombs, in dens, in mountains, in lurking places; for a time it shall be swept, as it were from the face of the earth. Such is the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church.” (Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, The Present Crisis of the Holy See, 1861, London: Burns and Lambert, pp. 88-90)
Warning About the Faith at Fatima
Our Lady also warned about a future loss of the Faith, nay, more than that—a future mass apostasy throughout the world, when she revealed the so-called Third Secret of Fatima as a warning for our day.
In her fourth memoir, which was written from October-December 1941, Sister Lucia copied the first two parts of the Secret from the text of her third memoir, but added a sentence that is not found there. Sister Lucia gave us the first sentence of the Third Secret when she inserted into her fourth memoir the phrase “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.” This sentence had not appeared in her previous memoir. Sister Lucia purposely inserted it into her fourth memoir to indicate to us what the final part of the Secret is about.
In 1943, after having been asked by Bishop da Silva to write down the text of the Third Secret, Sister Lucia was finding the task difficult. She declared to the bishop that it was not absolutely necessary to write out the text, “since in a certain manner she had said it.” Sister Lucia was very likely referring to the additional phrase she had inserted into her fourth memoir, “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.”
The phrase, “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.” is a promise that the true Faith will be preserved in that country, although in its vagueness it does not state by whom. Yet, if in Portugal the true Faith will be preserved, what does that imply about the rest of the world? The Portuguese Father Messias de Coelho concluded that, “this allusion, so positive about what will happen among us, suggests to us that it will be different around us.”
Father Alonso, the official Fatima archivist had this to say on the Third Secret: “‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved’: The phrase most clearly implies a critical state of Faith, which other nations will suffer, that is to say, a crisis of Faith; whereas Portugal will preserve its Faith.”
In the period preceding the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, terrible things are to happen. These form the content of the third part of the Secret. What are they? If “in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved,” ... it can be clearly deduced from this that in other parts of the Church these dogmas are going to become obscure or even lost altogether.
The Opinions Within the Church
► Cardinal Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII, said while still a cardinal: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul…. I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject her ornaments and make her feel remorse for her historical past.
“A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene, weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, “Where have they taken Him?” Cardinal Pacelli said this in 1931. He became Pope Pius XII in 1939.
► Pope Paul VI said: The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church” (Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13, 1977. Pope Paul was dead 10 months later).
► Pope Benedict XVI, while still Cardinal Ratzinger, said: “Yes, I have read [the Third Secret]. [It refers to] a radical call to conversion; the absolute seriousness of history; the dangers which threaten the Faith and the life of the Christian and therefore (the life) of the world” (Jesus, November 11, 1984).
► Fr. J. Schweigl, Pope Pius XII’s interviewer of Sr. Lucia, said: “I cannot reveal anything of what I learned at Fatima concerning the Third Secret, but I can say that it has two parts: one concerns the Pope; the other logically (although I must say nothing) would have to be the continuation of the words: “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved” (The Whole Truth about Fatima, Vol. III, p. 74). Pope Pius XII personally sent Fr. Schweigl to interrogate Sr. Lucia about the Third Secret in 1952.
► Fr. J. Alonso, the Church’s official archivist of Fatima 1965—1981, said: “In the period preceding the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, terrible things are to happen. These form the content of the third part of the Secret. What are they? If “in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved,”…it can be clearly deduced from this that in other parts of the Church these dogmas are going to become obscure or even lost altogether…. Perhaps it even refers to the failures of the upper hierarchy of the Church.
► Cardinal Ottaviani said: “The message was not to be opened before 1960. I asked Sister Lucia, ‘Why this date?’ She answered, ‘Because then it will be clearer.’” Cardinal Ottaviani was the head of the Holy Office. He interrogated Sister Lucia in 1955.
► Cardinal Oddi said: “What happened in 1960 that might have been seen in connection with the Secret of Fatima? The most important event is without a doubt the launching of the preparatory phase of the Second Vatican Council. Therefore I would not be surprised if the Secret had something to do with the convocation of Vatican II… I would not be surprised if the Third Secret alluded to dark times for the Church; grave confusions and troubling apostasies within Catholicism itself.”
► Cardinal Ciappi, the Papal Theologian of Pope John Paul II, in a personal communication to a Professor Baumgartner in Salzburg, Austria said: “In the Third Secret, it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.”
► Sister Lucia, in an interview with Fr. Augustine Fuentes, said: “Father, the devil is in the mood for engaging in a decisive battle against the Blessed Virgin. And the devil knows what it is that most offends God and which in a short space of time will gain for him the greatest number of souls. Thus, the devil does everything to overcome souls consecrated to God, because in this way, the devil will succeed in leaving souls of the faithful abandoned by their leaders, thereby the more easily will he seize them….
“That which afflicts the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Heart of Jesus is the fall of religious and priestly souls. The devil knows that religious and priests who fall away from their beautiful vocation drag numerous souls to hell… The devil wishes to take possession of consecrated souls. He tries to corrupt them in order to lull to sleep the souls of laypeople and thereby lead them to final impenitence….
“Father, let us not wait for an appeal to come from Rome, on behalf of the Holy Father, calling on the whole world to do penance; nor let us wait for it to come from our bishops in their dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No. Our Lord has already made frequent use of these means and the world took no notice. That is why each of us must now begin his own spiritual reform. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also every soul that God has placed on his path.” (Fr. Augustine Fuentes interviewed Sr. Lucia on December 26th, 1957).
In a letter to Fr. Umberto Pasquale, who was very devoted to the cause of Fatima, Sister Lucia wrote:
“The decadence which exists in the world is without any doubt the consequence of the lack of the spirit of prayer. Foreseeing this disorientation, the Blessed Virgin recommended recitation of the Rosary with such insistence. And since the Rosary is, after the holy Eucharistic liturgy, the prayer most apt for preserving Faith in souls, the devil has unchained his struggles against it. Unfortunately, we see the disasters he has caused.”
Time to Take Action
Devotion to Our Lady and the Holy Rosary is the key and the answer to what is about to dawn upon us. “God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart” said Our Lady at Fatima, and she also stated “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you.”
Starting on the feast of that great apostle of Our Lady and True Devotion to her—St. Louis Marie de Montfort—which is April 28th, we will begin another 33-Day Preparation for St. Louis’ True Devotion Consecration to Mary, which will be made at the end of Mary’s month of May, on May 31st (traditionally the feast of the Queenship of Our Lady). If God wishes the whole world to be devoted to Our Lady, then you have to play a part in seeing that this devotion is spread throughout the world. It is not something that we should keep to ourselves, much like the Faith is not meant to be kept to ourselves. Otherwise we bury the five, two or one talent that God has given us—and as a punishment for failing to use the talents to bring in more, it may even be taken from us. “Use it or lose it!” as they say!
So let others know of the 33-Day Preparation starting on April 28th—speak to them, call them, e-mail them, text them—do whatever it takes to spread this devotion to Our Lady. If you or others have already made the True Devotion Consecration to Mary―then remember that St. Louis de Montfort recommends that we renew it every year. As one of the Epistles from a Mass of Our Lady says: “Now therefore, ye children, hear me: Blessed are they that keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not. Blessed is the man that hears me, and that watches daily at my gates, and waits at the posts of my doors. He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord” (Proverbs 8:32-35).
Faith is absolutely necessary for salvation. This means in the simplest terms that it is simply impossible for us to get to Heaven unless, during life, we have believed in God. It is impossible to please God without Faith. “For if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sin” (John 8:24).
That Faith is meant, not just for a few, but for the whole world, as shown by the following words of Our Lord: “Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:19-20). “He that hears you, hears Me; and he that despises you, despises Me; and he that despises Me, despises Him that sent Me” (Luke 10:16). “He that believes and is baptized, shall be saved: but he that believes not shall be condemned” (Mark 16:16).
We have to believe ALL things, that is to say all the dogmas, that the Church teaches us, and not just some of them.
Yet, Our Lady, over the last few hundred years, has given us ample warning about a time when the Faith will be lost—lost by most people, lost by priests and religious orders, lost by bishops, and lost even by Rome itself.
Warning About the Faith at La Salette
Our Lady had the following tragic things to say at La Salette: “Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! … The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence … The devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the earth … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God.”
“Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Rome will lose Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist.”
Our Lady warns of those who “will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus, denying the existence of Heaven.”
“Evil books will be abundant on earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principal, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds … There will be a kind of false peace in the world. People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin.”
“But the children of the holy Church, the children of My Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me. Blessed are the souls humbly guided by the Holy Ghost! I shall fight at their side, until they reach a fullness of years.”
“I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world. It is time they came out and filled the world with light. Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children. I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ. Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see. For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends.”
“God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will.”
As to the Pope, Our Lady speaks of Faith being one of the weapons he must use:”may he, however, be steadfast and noble, may he fight with the weapons of Faith and love.”
The Church Speaks After La Salette
“The apostasy of the city of Rome from the vicar of Christ and its destruction by Antichrist may be thoughts very new to many Catholics, that I think it well to recite the text of theologians of greatest repute. First Malvenda, who writes expressly on the subject, states as the opinion of Ribera, Gaspar Melus, Biegas, Suarez, Bellarmine and Bosius that Rome shall apostatize from the Faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ and return to its ancient paganism. ...Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible; hidden in catacombs, in dens, in mountains, in lurking places; for a time it shall be swept, as it were from the face of the earth. Such is the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church.” (Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, The Present Crisis of the Holy See, 1861, London: Burns and Lambert, pp. 88-90)
Warning About the Faith at Fatima
Our Lady also warned about a future loss of the Faith, nay, more than that—a future mass apostasy throughout the world, when she revealed the so-called Third Secret of Fatima as a warning for our day.
In her fourth memoir, which was written from October-December 1941, Sister Lucia copied the first two parts of the Secret from the text of her third memoir, but added a sentence that is not found there. Sister Lucia gave us the first sentence of the Third Secret when she inserted into her fourth memoir the phrase “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.” This sentence had not appeared in her previous memoir. Sister Lucia purposely inserted it into her fourth memoir to indicate to us what the final part of the Secret is about.
In 1943, after having been asked by Bishop da Silva to write down the text of the Third Secret, Sister Lucia was finding the task difficult. She declared to the bishop that it was not absolutely necessary to write out the text, “since in a certain manner she had said it.” Sister Lucia was very likely referring to the additional phrase she had inserted into her fourth memoir, “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.”
The phrase, “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc.” is a promise that the true Faith will be preserved in that country, although in its vagueness it does not state by whom. Yet, if in Portugal the true Faith will be preserved, what does that imply about the rest of the world? The Portuguese Father Messias de Coelho concluded that, “this allusion, so positive about what will happen among us, suggests to us that it will be different around us.”
Father Alonso, the official Fatima archivist had this to say on the Third Secret: “‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved’: The phrase most clearly implies a critical state of Faith, which other nations will suffer, that is to say, a crisis of Faith; whereas Portugal will preserve its Faith.”
In the period preceding the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, terrible things are to happen. These form the content of the third part of the Secret. What are they? If “in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved,” ... it can be clearly deduced from this that in other parts of the Church these dogmas are going to become obscure or even lost altogether.
The Opinions Within the Church
► Cardinal Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII, said while still a cardinal: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul…. I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject her ornaments and make her feel remorse for her historical past.
“A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene, weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, “Where have they taken Him?” Cardinal Pacelli said this in 1931. He became Pope Pius XII in 1939.
► Pope Paul VI said: The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church” (Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13, 1977. Pope Paul was dead 10 months later).
► Pope Benedict XVI, while still Cardinal Ratzinger, said: “Yes, I have read [the Third Secret]. [It refers to] a radical call to conversion; the absolute seriousness of history; the dangers which threaten the Faith and the life of the Christian and therefore (the life) of the world” (Jesus, November 11, 1984).
► Fr. J. Schweigl, Pope Pius XII’s interviewer of Sr. Lucia, said: “I cannot reveal anything of what I learned at Fatima concerning the Third Secret, but I can say that it has two parts: one concerns the Pope; the other logically (although I must say nothing) would have to be the continuation of the words: “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved” (The Whole Truth about Fatima, Vol. III, p. 74). Pope Pius XII personally sent Fr. Schweigl to interrogate Sr. Lucia about the Third Secret in 1952.
► Fr. J. Alonso, the Church’s official archivist of Fatima 1965—1981, said: “In the period preceding the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, terrible things are to happen. These form the content of the third part of the Secret. What are they? If “in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved,”…it can be clearly deduced from this that in other parts of the Church these dogmas are going to become obscure or even lost altogether…. Perhaps it even refers to the failures of the upper hierarchy of the Church.
► Cardinal Ottaviani said: “The message was not to be opened before 1960. I asked Sister Lucia, ‘Why this date?’ She answered, ‘Because then it will be clearer.’” Cardinal Ottaviani was the head of the Holy Office. He interrogated Sister Lucia in 1955.
► Cardinal Oddi said: “What happened in 1960 that might have been seen in connection with the Secret of Fatima? The most important event is without a doubt the launching of the preparatory phase of the Second Vatican Council. Therefore I would not be surprised if the Secret had something to do with the convocation of Vatican II… I would not be surprised if the Third Secret alluded to dark times for the Church; grave confusions and troubling apostasies within Catholicism itself.”
► Cardinal Ciappi, the Papal Theologian of Pope John Paul II, in a personal communication to a Professor Baumgartner in Salzburg, Austria said: “In the Third Secret, it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.”
► Sister Lucia, in an interview with Fr. Augustine Fuentes, said: “Father, the devil is in the mood for engaging in a decisive battle against the Blessed Virgin. And the devil knows what it is that most offends God and which in a short space of time will gain for him the greatest number of souls. Thus, the devil does everything to overcome souls consecrated to God, because in this way, the devil will succeed in leaving souls of the faithful abandoned by their leaders, thereby the more easily will he seize them….
“That which afflicts the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Heart of Jesus is the fall of religious and priestly souls. The devil knows that religious and priests who fall away from their beautiful vocation drag numerous souls to hell… The devil wishes to take possession of consecrated souls. He tries to corrupt them in order to lull to sleep the souls of laypeople and thereby lead them to final impenitence….
“Father, let us not wait for an appeal to come from Rome, on behalf of the Holy Father, calling on the whole world to do penance; nor let us wait for it to come from our bishops in their dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No. Our Lord has already made frequent use of these means and the world took no notice. That is why each of us must now begin his own spiritual reform. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also every soul that God has placed on his path.” (Fr. Augustine Fuentes interviewed Sr. Lucia on December 26th, 1957).
In a letter to Fr. Umberto Pasquale, who was very devoted to the cause of Fatima, Sister Lucia wrote:
“The decadence which exists in the world is without any doubt the consequence of the lack of the spirit of prayer. Foreseeing this disorientation, the Blessed Virgin recommended recitation of the Rosary with such insistence. And since the Rosary is, after the holy Eucharistic liturgy, the prayer most apt for preserving Faith in souls, the devil has unchained his struggles against it. Unfortunately, we see the disasters he has caused.”
Time to Take Action
Devotion to Our Lady and the Holy Rosary is the key and the answer to what is about to dawn upon us. “God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart” said Our Lady at Fatima, and she also stated “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you.”
Starting on the feast of that great apostle of Our Lady and True Devotion to her—St. Louis Marie de Montfort—which is April 28th, we will begin another 33-Day Preparation for St. Louis’ True Devotion Consecration to Mary, which will be made at the end of Mary’s month of May, on May 31st (traditionally the feast of the Queenship of Our Lady). If God wishes the whole world to be devoted to Our Lady, then you have to play a part in seeing that this devotion is spread throughout the world. It is not something that we should keep to ourselves, much like the Faith is not meant to be kept to ourselves. Otherwise we bury the five, two or one talent that God has given us—and as a punishment for failing to use the talents to bring in more, it may even be taken from us. “Use it or lose it!” as they say!
So let others know of the 33-Day Preparation starting on April 28th—speak to them, call them, e-mail them, text them—do whatever it takes to spread this devotion to Our Lady. If you or others have already made the True Devotion Consecration to Mary―then remember that St. Louis de Montfort recommends that we renew it every year. As one of the Epistles from a Mass of Our Lady says: “Now therefore, ye children, hear me: Blessed are they that keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not. Blessed is the man that hears me, and that watches daily at my gates, and waits at the posts of my doors. He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord” (Proverbs 8:32-35).
Article 7
Tuesday & Wednesday, April 9th & 10th
The Easter Season—A Time of Faith, A Time For Faith!
Tuesday & Wednesday, April 9th & 10th
The Easter Season—A Time of Faith, A Time For Faith!
What is the Faith?
People take the Faith much too lightly! The Faith is something pretty ‘damned’ important! Without it you will be damned! “For all that is not of Faith is sin” (Romans 14:23). Lose it and you will be damned! Keep it, preserve it, treasure it, use it—and you will be saved! “According to your Faith, be it done unto you” (Matthew 9:29). “They redeemed themselves by strong Faith” (Ecclesiasticus 49:12), There is no salvation without the Faith! There is no protection or power without the Faith! With a weak Faith, you will be overcome by the devil, the world and your own flesh: “Having Faith and a good conscience, which some rejecting have made shipwreck concerning the Faith” (1 Timothy 1:19). “And the Apostles said to the Lord: ‘Increase our Faith!’” (Luke 17:5).
What value do we place on the Faith? Is our Faith strong? What do we know of the Faith? Does our Faith need increasing? The Faith of most people is quite abysmal! They know more about worldly affairs, current news, sports, maintenance, cooking, appliances, etc. than they know about the Faith—and we are not referring to difficult theological questions, but the most simple elements of a child’s catechism! Often, I will ask folk to list the Ten Commandments (First Communion level of catechism) and it is amazing to see how many folk are ‘stumped’ and ‘paralyzed’ by such a simple request! God forbid that you ask them some ‘adult’ level questions! It is not for nothing that Our Lord says: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Evidently not! Yet everyone expects to get to Heaven with the weak or “low-grade” Faith that they have! Again, we must ask--“Why are most souls lost?” Well, of course, the answer has various reasons—but one of those reasons is that these people, who ended up being lost, never took their Faith seriously.
Where Do We Place the Faith?
The theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity are the means by which we relate to God. St. Paul tells us that of these three, the greatest is Charity: “There remain Faith, Hope and Charity, these three: but the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13). Yes, it is more important to love God than to know Him, but we can’t love Him unless we first of all know Him. We must first reach God through knowledge, then by love. And Faith gives us our knowledge of the God of Revelation: the Triune God, Who created us, redeemed us, and sanctifies us; Who has communicated to us a share in His Divine Life through the death of His Beloved Son. As St. Thomas Aquinas writes (Summa Theologica, III, q. 62, a. 6): “The power of Christ’s Passion is linked up with us through Faith and through the sacraments. This, however, in different ways, for the linking up, which is by Faith, takes place by an act of the soul, while the linking up, which is by the Sacraments, takes place through the use of external things.” Faith is our first link with God.
Briefly, we will look what Faith is, and then our two obligations, to possess the Faith and to profess the Faith. Later we will examine the various the sins against Faith.
What is the Faith?
One of the best ways to understand the Faith is to take an official statement of the Church, break it down into its component elements, and analyze the elements one by one. The Church has given us a definition of the virtue of Faith, in the First Vatican Council, which was held at Rome in 1869-70:
“The Catholic Church holds that Faith, which is the beginning of human salvation, is a supernatural virtue by which, through the help and inspiration of God’s grace, we believe the things revealed by Him to be true, not on account of the intrinsic truth of these things, as perceived by the natural light of reason, but on account of the authority of God Himself revealing, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived!” (Denzinger #1789).
A Supernatural Virtue
First of all then, Faith is a Supernatural Virtue. This means that Faith is an “infused” virtue, given to us by God. We cannot acquire Faith through repeated acts, as we can acquire natural moral virtues—like courage for example. Faith is always a gift of God. Take, for example, a Mohammedan, or some other person, who does not possess the gift of Faith. He can make a thorough study of the Catechism, which contains all the truths of Faith; but he will get nothing out of his study except a lot of human knowledge, he will learn “what Catholics believe” about a great many things. But his knowledge will mean nothing to him, because he does not have the God-given supernatural habit of Faith.
When is ‘Faith’ not Faith?
Or consider a sincere inquirer, a person outside of the Church, who is looking for the truth. Suppose he becomes convinced, because of the overwhelming evidence that he sees in the things of creation, that God exists. Then he studies the Life of Our Lord in the Gospels, and again an inescapable conviction forces itself on his mind that Christ was really a “teacher sent from God”; that He taught truth, and proved the truth of His teachings through His miracles; and that He did indeed establish the One, Holy, Roman Catholic Church. Suppose our inquirer then takes instructions from a priest, learns the truths of Catholic Faith; and finally he decides (no two ways about it) he must become a Catholic, there is no other way in which he can be saved. Despite all this, he still he does not have the Faith.
All this inquiry, study, intellectual conviction, lead up to Faith, but they are not Faith. At some moment, the “help and inspiration of God’s grace” will bathe his soul in light, and he will begin to believe, with Divine Faith, not just human and natural Faith. Faith is always a gift from God, and a product of God’s Actual Grace. We do not know the exact moment when an adult convert’s conviction slips over into Faith; but one thing we do know: that the Faith with which he assents to God’s word is God’s own work in his soul, and not the product merely of his own study and conviction.
Faith Infused at Baptism
The virtue of Divine Faith is infused by God into the soul at Baptism, along with the Divine Life, the other theological virtues, and the supernatural moral virtues. Of course, a newly baptized infant cannot make acts of Faith, but he has the habit of Faith; and when he grows up and begins to make acts of Faith he is merely using the power that was in him since his Baptism. Thus Faith is the gateway to the Christian life. As the First Vatican Council says, it is “the beginning of human salvation.”
Can the Faithless be Blamed?
Well, then, if Faith is a gift from God, can we blame anybody for not having Faith? What of these people who say, “I just can’t believe!”? We simply cannot say, at any particular stage of their lives, whether it is their fault or not. But we do know that, at some time during life, God, by His grace, will reveal Himself to them, and they will have to cooperate with that grace. If they die without Faith, it will not be because they have never had the chance to know Him.
Faith is a Virtue of our Intellect
And secondly, Faith is a virtue by which we believe. We all know the difference between wishing and believing. We wish we could learn this course without studying, but we don’t really believe we can. Faith is not a wish, or an emotion, or a sentiment, or some vague feeling that everything is going to turn out all right. Faith is a virtue of the Intelligence, of the highest power of a man. It is an assent of the intellect to a body of truths which have been revealed by God. You remember that every virtue brings some human power (intellect, will, emotions) to a high level of efficient operation. Well, Faith lifts up our intellect to its highest peak of operation this side of Heaven, to the knowledge of the Mysteries of God. Faith is a very special kind of knowledge. It does not come from human reason. It is not contrary to human reason. It is simply above human reason. Faith is God’s own knowledge of Himself communicated to us.
Wrong Idea of Faith
Some people get Faith in God mixed up with confidence in God. We sometimes say that a person has “strong Faith” if he has utter confidence in the power of prayer to win from God every conceivable good thing, including Heaven itself. What we really mean is that he has “strong hope”—but that person would not have a “strong hope” if there was a lack of knowledge and believe that God can achieve and do what the person is hoping that God will achieve and do for that person’s life. We must know something before we can hope for something. Trusting God, striving towards Him with all the power of our will, is a virtue and a theological virtue. But it is not Faith, because Faith is believing God, which is an act of the intellect.
Treasured or Neglected?
Do we treasure our Faith as it should be treasured? Do we protect our Faith as it should be protected? Do we feed our Faith as it should be fed? Do we live our Faith as it should be lived? Yet, you cannot live and love what you do not know (and sometimes do not even want to know)! We cannot even know the Faith without learning about the Faith—unless, of course, you expect God to ‘download’ everything you need to know while you sleep at night! Therefore, we have to learn our Faith and that means studying our Faith--“Be not deceived! God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
What Do We Believe? Who Do We Believe?
The First Vatican Council teaches that by Faith we believe truths revealed by God. In catechetical parlance, the answer to the question, “What do we believe?” The answer is, “We believe truths revealed by God.” It is God who is the source of truth—not the Church, not the pope, not any bishop or priest. The latter are merely vehicles or means that God uses to communicate His truth—but those means are frail and fallible and can fail or mislead at times. They can change their opinions and minds—as is seen in the case of many heretics, who were once staunch Catholics, yet fell by wayside of false doctrine and fell into heresy. Better men and women than we ourselves are, have fallen. There, but by the grace of God, go we!
Go Direct!
It has often been said that if you want to know the mind and teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas, then do not go to the commentators of Aquinas, but go to St. Thomas himself first. If I want to know the mind of a person, the best way is to ask the person himself and not just somebody who happens to know the person. Revelation comes FROM God; it merely comes THROUGH the Church and its ministers. The Church and its ministers have no power or right to tamper with the truths that come from God. As our catechism teaches us: “God cannot be deceived and God cannot deceive”; but humans can be deceived and they can also deceive.
Closer to the Source
Another factor is that the closer you are to the source, the more likely it is that you will get a truer picture. Usually, a son has a better and deeper knowledge and understanding of his father than that of the grandchildren or great-grandchildren. The Apostles had a better knowledge of Christ’s teaching than the saints who came hundreds of years after them. The longer a truth has been taught, the more certain we can be about its infallibility. Hence the importance of Tradition. In fact, Tradition, together with the Bible, are the two sources of Divine Revelation. Every pope, bishop, priest, religious and lay-person has to submit to the authority of these two pillars of Divine Revelation.
The Natural Knowledge of God
We can know a number of things about God without His telling us about them. For example, that He exists. This is an easy deduction of natural human reason. The existence of the universe, with all of its variety and order, requires a sufficient cause to explain it. And we can know other things about God by reason alone, without any special help on His part. That God is a personal God, with intelligence and will; that He is One, and Eternal, and All-powerful, and All-Knowing. These “attributes,” or perfections of God, flow simply and reasonably out of the fact that He exists, and that He is God. We do not need a “revelation” to know them.
It is undoubtedly true that some uneducated persons believe (by Faith) many of these truths which can be known (by reason). But the point to be noted here is that the same truths (for example, that God exists) cannot be at the same time and in the same person, a matter of both reason and Faith. If we know a thing by reason, we cannot believe it by Faith.
For “Faith is the substance of things to be hoped for, the evidence of things that are not seen” (Hebrews 11:1). Faith is a submission of the intellect to something that the intellect cannot fully understand—Faith bears upon mysteries. Something that is not a mystery cannot therefore be accepted by Faith, because it there is no mystery in it. “Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed” (John 20:29). Faith is belief in a truth on the word of another, though that truth is not fully understood. In a trial, the judge believes the testimony of a witness known to be an honest man. When a fact is so obvious as “it is dark at midnight,” no belief is needed; that is known and fully understood.
It does not follow from this, however, that the well-educated Catholic has less Faith than the ignorant Catholic. In fact, he may have more Faith, directed towards the Mysteries, which are after all the proper subject matter of Faith.
The Revelation of Mysteries
But God wanted us to know truths about Himself that we could not know by our natural human reason alone, and these truths He has revealed to us. That is what “revelation” means: God telling us truths about Himself that we could not know by reason, God disclosing to us His “secrets.” The secrets of God are the Divine Mysteries, hidden in God from all eternity, revealed to us, and it is to these mysteries that we make the assent of Faith. It is of the highest importance for us to realize that Christianity is not a religion that we figure out for ourselves, but that it has been given us by God. Notice these solemn words of the great St. Paul, one of the agents of God’s Revelation, as he tells us about the central Mystery of our Faith (Ephesians 3: 1-10):
We shall paraphrase and simplify St. Paul’s words. In essence, St. Paul says this: “You will have been told how God planned to give me a special grace for preaching to you; how a revelation taught me the secret I have been setting out briefly here; briefly, yet so as to let you see how well I have mastered this secret of Christ’s. It was never made known to any human being in past ages, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to His holy Apostles and Prophets, and it is this: that through the Gospel preaching the Gentiles are to win the same body, to share the same divine promise, in Christ Jesus.
“With what grace God gives me (and He gives it in all the effectiveness of His power), I am a minister of that Gospel; on me, least as I am of all the saints, He has bestowed this privilege, of making known to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ, of publishing to the world the plan of this mystery, kept hidden from the beginning of time in the all-creating mind of God” (Ephesians 3:1-10).
Our Sources of Revelation
God’s public revelation to the world is contained in two sources, the Holy Bible and the divine and apostolic Tradition carried down the centuries by the Catholic Church. God’s public revelation to the world began many centuries before the birth of Christ, with Moses setting down in a divinely inspired book the account of God’s creation of the world. God’s public revelation ended many years after the Ascension of Our Lord into Heaven, upon the death of the last of the twelve Apostles, St. John, who lived out his long life at Ephesus, a city in Asia Minor, teaching the Christians there the truths-revealed by God. That is the span of God’s public revelation to the world, from the time of the Patriarch Moses until the death of the Apostle, St. John. There has been, and there will be, no public Revelation since that time, and consequently no new subject matter for our Faith. By Faith we believe what God has revealed to us, in Scripture and the Divine and Apostolic Tradition, that and nothing more.
What About Private Revelations?
There have been private revelations since the death of the last Apostle. For example, Our Lord revealed His Sacred Heart to St. Margaret Mary, and He has taught us many beneficial truths through the various apparitions of His Blessed Mother, at Lourdes and at Fatima, and other places. The approval which the Church gives to some of these private revelations means that the Church says there is nothing to be found in them contrary to the deposit of public revelation which the Church conserves and teaches. We should believe these private revelations, if they have been approved by the Church, and it would be rash and foolish on our part to question or reject them. But we cannot believe them with Divine Faith, because they are not contained in God’s public revelation to the world, which closed with the death of the last Apostle. St. Margaret Mary could believe with Divine Faith that Our Lord revealed Himself to her, and we believe St. Margaret Mary. Thus, our acceptance of private revelations is based on human testimony, not on God’s revelation.
The Motive of Faith
Finally, the Vatican Council teaches us why we believe the truths revealed by God. Because God has revealed them, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived. Why do we believe that Our Lord’s Body and Blood are really present in the Blessed Sacrament? Because we see them? But we can’t see them. We believe that Our Lord is present in the Holy Eucharist because God has revealed it, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived. We make our assent to this on the authority of God.
Sometimes a Catholic will say, “I believe this because the Church teaches it.” If what he is speaking about is a matter of Divine Revelation, he is making a mistake. The Church teaches us infallibly what God has revealed, but, when we believe, we do not believe because the Church teaches it, but because God has revealed it.
Different Levels of Belief
Sometimes the Church teaches us, and infallibly (i.e. with no chance of error), some truth which is not contained in Revelation. For example, the Church teaches us that St. Frances Cabrini or St. John Vianney is in Heaven. We must believe this, because the Church is our teacher of all religious truth, not just that part of religious truth which is contained in Scripture and Tradition. But we do not believe this with Divine Faith.
And when, for example, Pope Pius XI taught in an Encyclical that workers have a right to unite in unions for collective bargaining, we accept this teaching with all the veneration and respect that is due to the Vicar of Christ on Earth. But we do not believe it with Divine Faith, because it is not revealed by God. The only truths we believe with
Faith are those revealed by God; and the only reason why we believe them is that He has revealed them, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived.
Papal Infallibility and the Faith
Another misconception is that of papal infallibility. Many mistakenly think that papal infallibility means that the pope cannot err in anything at all! This is patently false. Papal infallibility is a limited guarantee that requires certain conditions to be met before it can be held to be in effect. Here is an explanation of papal infallibility from the venerated Catholic Encyclopedia:
“Infallibility is not attributed to every doctrinal act of the pope, but only to his ex cathedra teaching; and the conditions required for ex cathedra teaching are mentioned in the First Vatican Council decree:
1. The pontiff must teach in his public and official capacity as pastor and doctor of all Christians, not merely in his private capacity as a theologian preacher or speaker, nor in his capacity as a temporal prince, or as a mere ordinary of the Diocese of Rome. It must be clear that he speaks as spiritual head of the Church universal.
2. Then it is only when, in this capacity, he teaches some doctrine of Faith or morals that he is infallible.
3. Further it must be sufficiently evident that he intends to teach with all the fullness and finality of his supreme Apostolic authority, in other words that he wishes to determine some point of doctrine in an absolutely final and irrevocable way, or to define it in the technical sense. These are well-recognized formulas by means of which the defining intention may be manifested.
4. Finally for an ex cathedra decision it must be clear that the pope intends to bind the whole Church. To demand internal assent from all the faithful to his teaching under pain of incurring spiritual shipwreck (naufragium fidei—shipwreck of the Faith) according to the expression used by Pius IX in defining the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin.
“Theoretically, this intention might be made sufficiently clear in a papal decision which is addressed only to a particular Church; but in present day conditions, when it is so easy to communicate with the most distant parts of the Earth and to secure a literally universal promulgation of papal acts, the presumption is that unless the pope formally addresses the whole Church in the recognized official way, he does not intend his doctrinal teaching to be held by all the faithful as ex cathedra and infallible.” (Catholic Encyclopedia, “Papal Infallibility”).
But what if....?
Some ask how popes can be infallible if some of them lived scandalously. This objection of course, illustrates the common confusion between infallibility (not teaching error) and impeccability (not committing sin). There is no guarantee that popes won’t sin or give bad example.
Other people wonder how infallibility could exist if some popes disagreed with others. This, too, shows an inaccurate understanding of infallibility, which applies only to solemn, official teachings on Faith and morals, not to disciplinary decisions or even to unofficial comments on Faith and morals. A pope’s private theological opinions are not infallible, only what he solemnly defines is considered to be infallible teaching.
People take the Faith much too lightly! The Faith is something pretty ‘damned’ important! Without it you will be damned! “For all that is not of Faith is sin” (Romans 14:23). Lose it and you will be damned! Keep it, preserve it, treasure it, use it—and you will be saved! “According to your Faith, be it done unto you” (Matthew 9:29). “They redeemed themselves by strong Faith” (Ecclesiasticus 49:12), There is no salvation without the Faith! There is no protection or power without the Faith! With a weak Faith, you will be overcome by the devil, the world and your own flesh: “Having Faith and a good conscience, which some rejecting have made shipwreck concerning the Faith” (1 Timothy 1:19). “And the Apostles said to the Lord: ‘Increase our Faith!’” (Luke 17:5).
What value do we place on the Faith? Is our Faith strong? What do we know of the Faith? Does our Faith need increasing? The Faith of most people is quite abysmal! They know more about worldly affairs, current news, sports, maintenance, cooking, appliances, etc. than they know about the Faith—and we are not referring to difficult theological questions, but the most simple elements of a child’s catechism! Often, I will ask folk to list the Ten Commandments (First Communion level of catechism) and it is amazing to see how many folk are ‘stumped’ and ‘paralyzed’ by such a simple request! God forbid that you ask them some ‘adult’ level questions! It is not for nothing that Our Lord says: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Evidently not! Yet everyone expects to get to Heaven with the weak or “low-grade” Faith that they have! Again, we must ask--“Why are most souls lost?” Well, of course, the answer has various reasons—but one of those reasons is that these people, who ended up being lost, never took their Faith seriously.
Where Do We Place the Faith?
The theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity are the means by which we relate to God. St. Paul tells us that of these three, the greatest is Charity: “There remain Faith, Hope and Charity, these three: but the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13). Yes, it is more important to love God than to know Him, but we can’t love Him unless we first of all know Him. We must first reach God through knowledge, then by love. And Faith gives us our knowledge of the God of Revelation: the Triune God, Who created us, redeemed us, and sanctifies us; Who has communicated to us a share in His Divine Life through the death of His Beloved Son. As St. Thomas Aquinas writes (Summa Theologica, III, q. 62, a. 6): “The power of Christ’s Passion is linked up with us through Faith and through the sacraments. This, however, in different ways, for the linking up, which is by Faith, takes place by an act of the soul, while the linking up, which is by the Sacraments, takes place through the use of external things.” Faith is our first link with God.
Briefly, we will look what Faith is, and then our two obligations, to possess the Faith and to profess the Faith. Later we will examine the various the sins against Faith.
What is the Faith?
One of the best ways to understand the Faith is to take an official statement of the Church, break it down into its component elements, and analyze the elements one by one. The Church has given us a definition of the virtue of Faith, in the First Vatican Council, which was held at Rome in 1869-70:
“The Catholic Church holds that Faith, which is the beginning of human salvation, is a supernatural virtue by which, through the help and inspiration of God’s grace, we believe the things revealed by Him to be true, not on account of the intrinsic truth of these things, as perceived by the natural light of reason, but on account of the authority of God Himself revealing, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived!” (Denzinger #1789).
A Supernatural Virtue
First of all then, Faith is a Supernatural Virtue. This means that Faith is an “infused” virtue, given to us by God. We cannot acquire Faith through repeated acts, as we can acquire natural moral virtues—like courage for example. Faith is always a gift of God. Take, for example, a Mohammedan, or some other person, who does not possess the gift of Faith. He can make a thorough study of the Catechism, which contains all the truths of Faith; but he will get nothing out of his study except a lot of human knowledge, he will learn “what Catholics believe” about a great many things. But his knowledge will mean nothing to him, because he does not have the God-given supernatural habit of Faith.
When is ‘Faith’ not Faith?
Or consider a sincere inquirer, a person outside of the Church, who is looking for the truth. Suppose he becomes convinced, because of the overwhelming evidence that he sees in the things of creation, that God exists. Then he studies the Life of Our Lord in the Gospels, and again an inescapable conviction forces itself on his mind that Christ was really a “teacher sent from God”; that He taught truth, and proved the truth of His teachings through His miracles; and that He did indeed establish the One, Holy, Roman Catholic Church. Suppose our inquirer then takes instructions from a priest, learns the truths of Catholic Faith; and finally he decides (no two ways about it) he must become a Catholic, there is no other way in which he can be saved. Despite all this, he still he does not have the Faith.
All this inquiry, study, intellectual conviction, lead up to Faith, but they are not Faith. At some moment, the “help and inspiration of God’s grace” will bathe his soul in light, and he will begin to believe, with Divine Faith, not just human and natural Faith. Faith is always a gift from God, and a product of God’s Actual Grace. We do not know the exact moment when an adult convert’s conviction slips over into Faith; but one thing we do know: that the Faith with which he assents to God’s word is God’s own work in his soul, and not the product merely of his own study and conviction.
Faith Infused at Baptism
The virtue of Divine Faith is infused by God into the soul at Baptism, along with the Divine Life, the other theological virtues, and the supernatural moral virtues. Of course, a newly baptized infant cannot make acts of Faith, but he has the habit of Faith; and when he grows up and begins to make acts of Faith he is merely using the power that was in him since his Baptism. Thus Faith is the gateway to the Christian life. As the First Vatican Council says, it is “the beginning of human salvation.”
Can the Faithless be Blamed?
Well, then, if Faith is a gift from God, can we blame anybody for not having Faith? What of these people who say, “I just can’t believe!”? We simply cannot say, at any particular stage of their lives, whether it is their fault or not. But we do know that, at some time during life, God, by His grace, will reveal Himself to them, and they will have to cooperate with that grace. If they die without Faith, it will not be because they have never had the chance to know Him.
Faith is a Virtue of our Intellect
And secondly, Faith is a virtue by which we believe. We all know the difference between wishing and believing. We wish we could learn this course without studying, but we don’t really believe we can. Faith is not a wish, or an emotion, or a sentiment, or some vague feeling that everything is going to turn out all right. Faith is a virtue of the Intelligence, of the highest power of a man. It is an assent of the intellect to a body of truths which have been revealed by God. You remember that every virtue brings some human power (intellect, will, emotions) to a high level of efficient operation. Well, Faith lifts up our intellect to its highest peak of operation this side of Heaven, to the knowledge of the Mysteries of God. Faith is a very special kind of knowledge. It does not come from human reason. It is not contrary to human reason. It is simply above human reason. Faith is God’s own knowledge of Himself communicated to us.
Wrong Idea of Faith
Some people get Faith in God mixed up with confidence in God. We sometimes say that a person has “strong Faith” if he has utter confidence in the power of prayer to win from God every conceivable good thing, including Heaven itself. What we really mean is that he has “strong hope”—but that person would not have a “strong hope” if there was a lack of knowledge and believe that God can achieve and do what the person is hoping that God will achieve and do for that person’s life. We must know something before we can hope for something. Trusting God, striving towards Him with all the power of our will, is a virtue and a theological virtue. But it is not Faith, because Faith is believing God, which is an act of the intellect.
Treasured or Neglected?
Do we treasure our Faith as it should be treasured? Do we protect our Faith as it should be protected? Do we feed our Faith as it should be fed? Do we live our Faith as it should be lived? Yet, you cannot live and love what you do not know (and sometimes do not even want to know)! We cannot even know the Faith without learning about the Faith—unless, of course, you expect God to ‘download’ everything you need to know while you sleep at night! Therefore, we have to learn our Faith and that means studying our Faith--“Be not deceived! God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
What Do We Believe? Who Do We Believe?
The First Vatican Council teaches that by Faith we believe truths revealed by God. In catechetical parlance, the answer to the question, “What do we believe?” The answer is, “We believe truths revealed by God.” It is God who is the source of truth—not the Church, not the pope, not any bishop or priest. The latter are merely vehicles or means that God uses to communicate His truth—but those means are frail and fallible and can fail or mislead at times. They can change their opinions and minds—as is seen in the case of many heretics, who were once staunch Catholics, yet fell by wayside of false doctrine and fell into heresy. Better men and women than we ourselves are, have fallen. There, but by the grace of God, go we!
Go Direct!
It has often been said that if you want to know the mind and teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas, then do not go to the commentators of Aquinas, but go to St. Thomas himself first. If I want to know the mind of a person, the best way is to ask the person himself and not just somebody who happens to know the person. Revelation comes FROM God; it merely comes THROUGH the Church and its ministers. The Church and its ministers have no power or right to tamper with the truths that come from God. As our catechism teaches us: “God cannot be deceived and God cannot deceive”; but humans can be deceived and they can also deceive.
Closer to the Source
Another factor is that the closer you are to the source, the more likely it is that you will get a truer picture. Usually, a son has a better and deeper knowledge and understanding of his father than that of the grandchildren or great-grandchildren. The Apostles had a better knowledge of Christ’s teaching than the saints who came hundreds of years after them. The longer a truth has been taught, the more certain we can be about its infallibility. Hence the importance of Tradition. In fact, Tradition, together with the Bible, are the two sources of Divine Revelation. Every pope, bishop, priest, religious and lay-person has to submit to the authority of these two pillars of Divine Revelation.
The Natural Knowledge of God
We can know a number of things about God without His telling us about them. For example, that He exists. This is an easy deduction of natural human reason. The existence of the universe, with all of its variety and order, requires a sufficient cause to explain it. And we can know other things about God by reason alone, without any special help on His part. That God is a personal God, with intelligence and will; that He is One, and Eternal, and All-powerful, and All-Knowing. These “attributes,” or perfections of God, flow simply and reasonably out of the fact that He exists, and that He is God. We do not need a “revelation” to know them.
It is undoubtedly true that some uneducated persons believe (by Faith) many of these truths which can be known (by reason). But the point to be noted here is that the same truths (for example, that God exists) cannot be at the same time and in the same person, a matter of both reason and Faith. If we know a thing by reason, we cannot believe it by Faith.
For “Faith is the substance of things to be hoped for, the evidence of things that are not seen” (Hebrews 11:1). Faith is a submission of the intellect to something that the intellect cannot fully understand—Faith bears upon mysteries. Something that is not a mystery cannot therefore be accepted by Faith, because it there is no mystery in it. “Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed” (John 20:29). Faith is belief in a truth on the word of another, though that truth is not fully understood. In a trial, the judge believes the testimony of a witness known to be an honest man. When a fact is so obvious as “it is dark at midnight,” no belief is needed; that is known and fully understood.
It does not follow from this, however, that the well-educated Catholic has less Faith than the ignorant Catholic. In fact, he may have more Faith, directed towards the Mysteries, which are after all the proper subject matter of Faith.
The Revelation of Mysteries
But God wanted us to know truths about Himself that we could not know by our natural human reason alone, and these truths He has revealed to us. That is what “revelation” means: God telling us truths about Himself that we could not know by reason, God disclosing to us His “secrets.” The secrets of God are the Divine Mysteries, hidden in God from all eternity, revealed to us, and it is to these mysteries that we make the assent of Faith. It is of the highest importance for us to realize that Christianity is not a religion that we figure out for ourselves, but that it has been given us by God. Notice these solemn words of the great St. Paul, one of the agents of God’s Revelation, as he tells us about the central Mystery of our Faith (Ephesians 3: 1-10):
We shall paraphrase and simplify St. Paul’s words. In essence, St. Paul says this: “You will have been told how God planned to give me a special grace for preaching to you; how a revelation taught me the secret I have been setting out briefly here; briefly, yet so as to let you see how well I have mastered this secret of Christ’s. It was never made known to any human being in past ages, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to His holy Apostles and Prophets, and it is this: that through the Gospel preaching the Gentiles are to win the same body, to share the same divine promise, in Christ Jesus.
“With what grace God gives me (and He gives it in all the effectiveness of His power), I am a minister of that Gospel; on me, least as I am of all the saints, He has bestowed this privilege, of making known to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ, of publishing to the world the plan of this mystery, kept hidden from the beginning of time in the all-creating mind of God” (Ephesians 3:1-10).
Our Sources of Revelation
God’s public revelation to the world is contained in two sources, the Holy Bible and the divine and apostolic Tradition carried down the centuries by the Catholic Church. God’s public revelation to the world began many centuries before the birth of Christ, with Moses setting down in a divinely inspired book the account of God’s creation of the world. God’s public revelation ended many years after the Ascension of Our Lord into Heaven, upon the death of the last of the twelve Apostles, St. John, who lived out his long life at Ephesus, a city in Asia Minor, teaching the Christians there the truths-revealed by God. That is the span of God’s public revelation to the world, from the time of the Patriarch Moses until the death of the Apostle, St. John. There has been, and there will be, no public Revelation since that time, and consequently no new subject matter for our Faith. By Faith we believe what God has revealed to us, in Scripture and the Divine and Apostolic Tradition, that and nothing more.
What About Private Revelations?
There have been private revelations since the death of the last Apostle. For example, Our Lord revealed His Sacred Heart to St. Margaret Mary, and He has taught us many beneficial truths through the various apparitions of His Blessed Mother, at Lourdes and at Fatima, and other places. The approval which the Church gives to some of these private revelations means that the Church says there is nothing to be found in them contrary to the deposit of public revelation which the Church conserves and teaches. We should believe these private revelations, if they have been approved by the Church, and it would be rash and foolish on our part to question or reject them. But we cannot believe them with Divine Faith, because they are not contained in God’s public revelation to the world, which closed with the death of the last Apostle. St. Margaret Mary could believe with Divine Faith that Our Lord revealed Himself to her, and we believe St. Margaret Mary. Thus, our acceptance of private revelations is based on human testimony, not on God’s revelation.
The Motive of Faith
Finally, the Vatican Council teaches us why we believe the truths revealed by God. Because God has revealed them, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived. Why do we believe that Our Lord’s Body and Blood are really present in the Blessed Sacrament? Because we see them? But we can’t see them. We believe that Our Lord is present in the Holy Eucharist because God has revealed it, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived. We make our assent to this on the authority of God.
Sometimes a Catholic will say, “I believe this because the Church teaches it.” If what he is speaking about is a matter of Divine Revelation, he is making a mistake. The Church teaches us infallibly what God has revealed, but, when we believe, we do not believe because the Church teaches it, but because God has revealed it.
Different Levels of Belief
Sometimes the Church teaches us, and infallibly (i.e. with no chance of error), some truth which is not contained in Revelation. For example, the Church teaches us that St. Frances Cabrini or St. John Vianney is in Heaven. We must believe this, because the Church is our teacher of all religious truth, not just that part of religious truth which is contained in Scripture and Tradition. But we do not believe this with Divine Faith.
And when, for example, Pope Pius XI taught in an Encyclical that workers have a right to unite in unions for collective bargaining, we accept this teaching with all the veneration and respect that is due to the Vicar of Christ on Earth. But we do not believe it with Divine Faith, because it is not revealed by God. The only truths we believe with
Faith are those revealed by God; and the only reason why we believe them is that He has revealed them, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived.
Papal Infallibility and the Faith
Another misconception is that of papal infallibility. Many mistakenly think that papal infallibility means that the pope cannot err in anything at all! This is patently false. Papal infallibility is a limited guarantee that requires certain conditions to be met before it can be held to be in effect. Here is an explanation of papal infallibility from the venerated Catholic Encyclopedia:
“Infallibility is not attributed to every doctrinal act of the pope, but only to his ex cathedra teaching; and the conditions required for ex cathedra teaching are mentioned in the First Vatican Council decree:
1. The pontiff must teach in his public and official capacity as pastor and doctor of all Christians, not merely in his private capacity as a theologian preacher or speaker, nor in his capacity as a temporal prince, or as a mere ordinary of the Diocese of Rome. It must be clear that he speaks as spiritual head of the Church universal.
2. Then it is only when, in this capacity, he teaches some doctrine of Faith or morals that he is infallible.
3. Further it must be sufficiently evident that he intends to teach with all the fullness and finality of his supreme Apostolic authority, in other words that he wishes to determine some point of doctrine in an absolutely final and irrevocable way, or to define it in the technical sense. These are well-recognized formulas by means of which the defining intention may be manifested.
4. Finally for an ex cathedra decision it must be clear that the pope intends to bind the whole Church. To demand internal assent from all the faithful to his teaching under pain of incurring spiritual shipwreck (naufragium fidei—shipwreck of the Faith) according to the expression used by Pius IX in defining the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin.
“Theoretically, this intention might be made sufficiently clear in a papal decision which is addressed only to a particular Church; but in present day conditions, when it is so easy to communicate with the most distant parts of the Earth and to secure a literally universal promulgation of papal acts, the presumption is that unless the pope formally addresses the whole Church in the recognized official way, he does not intend his doctrinal teaching to be held by all the faithful as ex cathedra and infallible.” (Catholic Encyclopedia, “Papal Infallibility”).
But what if....?
Some ask how popes can be infallible if some of them lived scandalously. This objection of course, illustrates the common confusion between infallibility (not teaching error) and impeccability (not committing sin). There is no guarantee that popes won’t sin or give bad example.
Other people wonder how infallibility could exist if some popes disagreed with others. This, too, shows an inaccurate understanding of infallibility, which applies only to solemn, official teachings on Faith and morals, not to disciplinary decisions or even to unofficial comments on Faith and morals. A pope’s private theological opinions are not infallible, only what he solemnly defines is considered to be infallible teaching.
Article 6
Monday, April 8th
The transferred feast of the Annunciation from March 25th (due to its coinciding with Holy Week)
An Important Announcement
Monday, April 8th
The transferred feast of the Annunciation from March 25th (due to its coinciding with Holy Week)
An Important Announcement
The Great Announcement
Today we celebrate a great announcement! That is what the “Annunciation” is—a great and wonderful and stupendous announcement. God announces that He will save the world from its filth and sinfulness by sending His Only-Begotten Son to overcome our sinfulness, to redeem us from our slavery to the devil, the world and the flesh, and to bring about our salvation—if we want to, if we say “fiat” (be it done) with Mary. “For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). Today we celebrate the day that it all started—the day on which God became incarnate (taking on flesh) in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Yet it required Our Lady’s free and unforced cooperation with the invitation that the Archangel Gabriel offered on the part of God.
Announcing the Birthday of the Hail Mary
It also the birthday of the “Hail Mary”—for the Angel Gabriel began, at the Annunciation, what St. Elizabeth, filled by the Holy Ghost, would continue at the Visitation (July 2nd). The Angel Gabriel opens with the words: “HAIL FULL OF GRACE! THE LORD IS WITH THEE! BLESSED ART THOU AMONG WOMEN!” When Mary visits her cousin Elizabeth, “and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost: and she cried out with a loud voice, and said: ‘BLESSED ART THOU AMONG WOMEN, AND BLESSED IS THE FRUIT OF THY WOMB!’” (Luke 1:41-42). St. Elizabeth also calls her “MOTHER OF GOD” in saying: “And whence is this to me, that the MOTHER OF MY LORD should come to me?” (Luke 1:43).
Announcing the Annunciation with the Angelus
The Angelus is the announcement of the Annunciation and its commemoration! Perhaps today can be the day that we resolve to make the Angelus a regular part of our daily prayer life—if it is not already! This event—the Annunciation—is ever so dear to Our Lady’s heart, as she has made clear on several occasions.
Our Lady Announces
One day, when St. Mechtilde was praying and was trying to think of some way in which she could express her love of the Blessed Virgin better than before, she fell into ecstasy. Our Lady appeared to her with the Angelic Salutation written in letters of gold upon her breast and said to her:
“My daughter, I want you to know that no one can please me more than by saying the greeting which the most adorable Trinity presented to me and by which I was raised to the dignity of the Mother of God.
“By the word ‘Ave’, which is the name of Eve, Eva, I learned that God in His infinite power had preserved me from all sin and its attendant misery which the first woman had been subject to.
“The name ‘Mary’, which means ‘lady of light,’ shows that God has filled me with wisdom and light, like a shining star, to light up Heaven and Earth.
“The words ― ‘full of grace’ ― remind me that the Holy Spirit has showered so many graces upon me that I am able to give these graces in abundance to those who ask for them through my mediation.
“When people say ― ‘The Lord is with thee!’ ― they renew the indescribable joy that was mine when the eternal Word became incarnate in my womb.
“When you say to me ― ‘Blessed art thou among women!’ ― I praise the mercy of God Who has raised me to this exalted degree of happiness.
“And at the words ― ‘Blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus!’ ― the whole of Heaven rejoices with me to see my Son Jesus adored and glorified for having saved mankind.”
Mary and the Holy Trinity
Christ promises a sort of Trinitarian in-dwelling for those who persevere in love and obedience: “If a man loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make our home with him” (John 14:23). The Immaculate Virgin Mary is the exemplar of this Trinitarian in-dwelling, as we see from the Annunciation. The Archangel Gabriel’s message to Mary consists of three distinct parts (each of which she responds to separately), and relating the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Mary and the Father (Luke 1:26-29)
In the sixth month the Archangel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee!” But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered in her mind what sort of greeting this might be. It’s interesting that Mary isn’t described as being troubled the appearance of an angel (which would be normal: Matthew 28:5; Luke 1:13). Rather, Luke says that she was troubled by the saying, and wondered what it might mean. Luke doesn’t tell us why she was greatly troubled, but some propose one possibility.
The Archangel calls Mary by the title “Full of Grace,” a reference to her Immaculate Conception (which is why, confusingly, this is the Gospel for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception). And then he tells her, “the Lord is with thee,” a reference to Nathan’s message to King David, after the king wanted to build the Temple (2 Kings 7:3). It was Nathan giving a green light to proceed with the Temple, but has to backtrack on this, after God puts a stop to the plans. Elsewhere, we’re told that this is because the blood on David’s hands made him unworthy to build the temple (1 Paralipomenon 28:3). So now, the Archangel Gabriel is giving the green light to Mary to build the Temple (John 2:21), after declaring her sinless. An astute Jew would recognize this for what it is: a Messianic promise.
Mary and the Son (Luke 1:30-34)
And the angel said to her: “Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God.. Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a Son; and thou shalt call His name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High; and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of David his father; and He shall reign in the house of Jacob for ever. And of His kingdom there shall be no end.” And Mary said to the angel: “How shall this be done, because I know not man?” So having found favor with the Father, Mary is promised that she will bear the Son, Jesus. This raises an obvious question: How can that occur, given that Mary is a perpetual Virgin?
Mary and the Holy Ghost (Luke 1:35-38)
And the angel said to her: “The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee. And therefore also the Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. And behold thy cousin Elizabeth, she also hath conceived a son in her old age; and this is the sixth month with her that is called barren: because no word shall be impossible with God.” And Mary said: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word.” And the angel departed from her. So Mary finds favor with the Father, bears the Son, and is overshadowed by the Trinity. This is what I mean by saying that she is the exemplar of Trinitarian in-dwelling: after all, she literally grew the Son of God in her body, offered to her by the Father, through the angel, and produced by the power of the Holy Ghost.
What Will You Will?
Perfection is founded entirely on the love of God: “Charity is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14) and perfect love of God means the complete union of our will with God’s: “The principal effect of love is so to unite the wills of those who love each other as to make them will the same things” (St. Denis Areopagite), or as St. Thomas Aquinas says—one of the principal effects of love is a union of wills. It follows then, that the more one unites his will with the Divine Will, the greater will be his love of God. Mortification, meditation, receiving Holy Communion, acts of fraternal charity are all certainly pleasing to God—but only when they are in accordance with His Will. When they do not accord with God’s Will, He not only finds no pleasure in them, but He even rejects them utterly and punishes them.
Do What You Want—Or Do As You’re Told?
For example, a man has two servants. One works unremittingly all day long—but according to his own devices; the other, conceivably, works less, but he does do what he is told. This latter of course is going to find favor in the eyes of his master; the other will not. Now, in applying this example, we may ask: “Why should we perform actions for God’s glory, if they are not going to be acceptable to Him?” God does not want sacrifices―as the prophet Samuel told King Saul―but He does want obedience to His Will: “Does the Lord desire holocausts and victims, and not rather that the voice of the Lord should be obeyed? For obedience is better than sacrifices; and to listen, rather than to offer the fat of rams. Because it is like the sin of witchcraft to rebel; and like the crime of idolatry to refuse to obey” (1 Kings 15:22-23).
Self-Willed Adoration
The man who follows his own will independently of God’s, is guilty of a kind of idolatry. Instead of adoring God’s will, he, in a certain sense, adores his own. The greatest glory we can give to God is to do His will in everything. Our Redeemer came on Earth to glorify His heavenly Father and to teach us, by His example, how to do the same. St. Paul represents Him saying to His eternal Father: “Sacrifice and oblation Thou wouldst not: but a body Thou hast fitted to Me . . . Then said I: ‘Behold I come to do Thy Will, O God!’” (Habacuc 10:5-7). Thou hast refused the victims offered Thee by man; Thou dost will that I sacrifice My body to Thee. Behold Me ready to do Thy Will.
Example of Our Lord
Our Lord frequently declared that He had come on Earth not to do His own will, but solely that of His Father: “I came down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the Will of Him that sent Me!” (John 6:38). He spoke in the same manner in the Garden of Gethsemane: “And going a little further, He fell upon His face, praying, and saying: ‘My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from Me. Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt” (Matthew 26:39). And when He went forth to meet His enemies, who had come to seize Him and to lead Him to death, He said: “But that the world may know that I love the Father: and as the Father hath given Me commandment, so do I―arise and let us go hence!” (John 14:31.). Furthermore, he said He would recognize as His brother, him who would do His Will: “Whosoever shall do the Will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he is My brother” (Matthew 12:50).
Saints’ Sole Soul Focus
To do God’s will—this was the sole goal upon which the saints constantly fixed their gaze. They were fully persuaded that in this consists the entire perfection of the soul. Blessed Henry Suso used to say: “It is not God’s Will that we should abound in spiritual delights, but that in all things we should submit to His holy Will” (Blessed Henry Suso).
“Those who give themselves to prayer,” says St. Teresa of Avila, “should concentrate solely on this―the conformity of their wills with the Divine Will. They should be convinced that this constitutes their highest perfection. The more fully they practice this, the greater the gifts they will receive from God, and the greater the progress they will make in the interior life.”
A certain Dominican nun was granted a vision of Heaven one day. She recognized there some persons she had known during their mortal life on Earth. It was told her these souls were raised to the sublime heights of the seraphs on account of the uniformity of their wills with that of God’s Will during their lifetime here on Earth. Blessed Henry Suso, mentioned above, said of himself: “I would rather be the vilest worm on Earth by God’s will, than be a seraph by my own.”
Listen and Learn
During our pilgrimage through this world, we should learn from the saints, now in Heaven, how to love God. The pure and perfect love of God they enjoy there, consists in uniting themselves perfectly to His Will. It would be the greatest delight of the seraphs to pile up sand on the seashore, or to pull weeds in a garden for all eternity, if they found out such was God’s will. Our Lord Himself teaches us to ask to do the Will of God on Earth as the saints do it in Heaven: “Thy Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven” (Matthew 6:10). Because David fulfilled all His wishes, God called him a man after His own heart: “I have found David . . . a man according to My own heart, who shall do all My Wills.” David was always ready to embrace the Divine Will, as he frequently protested: “My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready!” (Psalm 56:8). He asked God for one thing alone—to teach him to do His Will: “Teach me to do Thy Will” (Psalm 142:10).
Will of Sanctity
A single act of uniformity with the Divine Will suffices to make a saint. Behold while Saul was persecuting the Church, God enlightened him and converted him. What does Saul do? What does he say? Nothing else but to offer himself to do God’s Will: “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?” (Acts 9:6). In return the Lord calls him a vessel of election and an Apostle of the Gentiles: “This man is to Me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles” (Acts 9:6).
Absolutely true—because he who gives his will to God, gives Him everything. He who gives his goods in alms, his blood in scourgings, his food in fasting, gives God what he has. But he who gives God his will, gives himself, gives everything he is. Such a one can say: “Though I am poor, Lord, I give Thee all I possess; but when I say I give Thee my will, I have nothing left to give Thee.”
Give God Your Will—You Will Not Be Disappointed!
This is just what God does require of us: “My son, give Me thy heart” (Proverbs 23:26). St. Augustine’s comment is: “There is nothing more pleasing we can offer God than to say to Him: ‘Possess Thyself of us’” (Commentary on Psalm 131:3). We cannot offer God anything more pleasing than to say: “Take us, Lord, we give Thee our entire will. Only let us know Thy Will and we will carry it out!” If we would completely rejoice the heart of God, let us strive in all things to conform ourselves to His Divine Will.
Let us not only strive to conform ourselves, but also to unite ourselves to whatever dispositions God makes of us. Conformity signifies that we join our wills to the Will of God. Uniformity means more—it means that we make one will of God’s Will and ours, so that we will only what God Wills; that God’s Will alone, is our will. This is the summit of perfection and to it we should always aspire; this should be the goal of all our works, desires, meditations and prayers. To this end we should always invoke the aid of our holy patrons, our guardian angels, and above all, of our mother Mary, the most perfect of all the saints, because she most perfectly embraced the Divine Will—“Be it done unto me according to Thy Will!”
At the Last Supper, as part of His Last Will and Testament, Our Lord tries to puncture their unrealistic human aspirations and prepare them for some reality, saying: “Every one that bears fruit, the Father will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit” (John 15:2). “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:18-19). “These things have I spoken to you, that you may not be scandalized. They will put you out of the synagogues: yea, the hour cometh, that whosoever kills you, will think that he does a service to God” (John 16:1-2). “Because I have spoken these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart” (John 16:6). “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy.” (John 16:20).
Our “Fiat” or “Thy Will Be Done”
Mary’s fiat, given to God through the Archangel Gabriel at the Annunciation, was not just a mental acceptance of God’s Will, based on logical reasoning—but it was an acceptance of God’s Will that came from the depth of her heart also. This reminds us of the words of God the Father to Isaias in the Old Testament, which were also quoted by Our Lord in the New Testament: “And the Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me!’” (isaias 29:13) … “Jesus said to them: ‘Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: “This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me”!’” (Mark 7:6).
Fighting the Good Fight of the Faith
It is simply impossible for us to get to Heaven and also impossible to please God without Faith. Our Lady’s warnings, over the last few hundred years, warned about a time when the Faith will be lost—lost by most people, lost by priests and religious orders, lost by bishops, and lost even by Rome itself. “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence … The love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Rome will lose Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Fight Fire with Fire
Our Lady recommends that we fight fire with fire—that we fight faithlessness with faithfulness: “But the children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me. I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ … Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children. I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. Fight, children of light [the light of the Faith], you, the few who can see. For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends … God will take care of His faithful servants.” As to the Pope, Our Lady speaks of Faith being one of the weapons he must use: “may he, however, be steadfast and noble, may he fight with the weapons of Faith and Charity” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Our Lady was born to fight, just we are all born to fight: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith: lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Our Lady was called to the fight and she gave her “fiat”—we have been called to the fight too, have we given our “fiat”? “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12).
The Annunciation is the first mystery of the Holy Rosary―and it is the Rosary that Our Lady requires today: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you!” (Fatima, July 13th, 1917). Sister Lucia of Fatima later said: “God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others … If we despise and reject this last means, Heaven will no longer pardon us!” Little Jacinta Marto of Fatima said, shortly before her death: “Tell everybody that God gives graces through the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Tell them to ask graces from her! Ask them to plead for peace from the Immaculate Heart of Mary, for the Lord has confided the peace of the world to her!”
While at Akita, Japan, in 1973, Our Lady stressed: “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by My Son … Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.”
No Mary! No chance!
Today we celebrate a great announcement! That is what the “Annunciation” is—a great and wonderful and stupendous announcement. God announces that He will save the world from its filth and sinfulness by sending His Only-Begotten Son to overcome our sinfulness, to redeem us from our slavery to the devil, the world and the flesh, and to bring about our salvation—if we want to, if we say “fiat” (be it done) with Mary. “For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). Today we celebrate the day that it all started—the day on which God became incarnate (taking on flesh) in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Yet it required Our Lady’s free and unforced cooperation with the invitation that the Archangel Gabriel offered on the part of God.
Announcing the Birthday of the Hail Mary
It also the birthday of the “Hail Mary”—for the Angel Gabriel began, at the Annunciation, what St. Elizabeth, filled by the Holy Ghost, would continue at the Visitation (July 2nd). The Angel Gabriel opens with the words: “HAIL FULL OF GRACE! THE LORD IS WITH THEE! BLESSED ART THOU AMONG WOMEN!” When Mary visits her cousin Elizabeth, “and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost: and she cried out with a loud voice, and said: ‘BLESSED ART THOU AMONG WOMEN, AND BLESSED IS THE FRUIT OF THY WOMB!’” (Luke 1:41-42). St. Elizabeth also calls her “MOTHER OF GOD” in saying: “And whence is this to me, that the MOTHER OF MY LORD should come to me?” (Luke 1:43).
Announcing the Annunciation with the Angelus
The Angelus is the announcement of the Annunciation and its commemoration! Perhaps today can be the day that we resolve to make the Angelus a regular part of our daily prayer life—if it is not already! This event—the Annunciation—is ever so dear to Our Lady’s heart, as she has made clear on several occasions.
Our Lady Announces
One day, when St. Mechtilde was praying and was trying to think of some way in which she could express her love of the Blessed Virgin better than before, she fell into ecstasy. Our Lady appeared to her with the Angelic Salutation written in letters of gold upon her breast and said to her:
“My daughter, I want you to know that no one can please me more than by saying the greeting which the most adorable Trinity presented to me and by which I was raised to the dignity of the Mother of God.
“By the word ‘Ave’, which is the name of Eve, Eva, I learned that God in His infinite power had preserved me from all sin and its attendant misery which the first woman had been subject to.
“The name ‘Mary’, which means ‘lady of light,’ shows that God has filled me with wisdom and light, like a shining star, to light up Heaven and Earth.
“The words ― ‘full of grace’ ― remind me that the Holy Spirit has showered so many graces upon me that I am able to give these graces in abundance to those who ask for them through my mediation.
“When people say ― ‘The Lord is with thee!’ ― they renew the indescribable joy that was mine when the eternal Word became incarnate in my womb.
“When you say to me ― ‘Blessed art thou among women!’ ― I praise the mercy of God Who has raised me to this exalted degree of happiness.
“And at the words ― ‘Blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus!’ ― the whole of Heaven rejoices with me to see my Son Jesus adored and glorified for having saved mankind.”
Mary and the Holy Trinity
Christ promises a sort of Trinitarian in-dwelling for those who persevere in love and obedience: “If a man loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make our home with him” (John 14:23). The Immaculate Virgin Mary is the exemplar of this Trinitarian in-dwelling, as we see from the Annunciation. The Archangel Gabriel’s message to Mary consists of three distinct parts (each of which she responds to separately), and relating the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Mary and the Father (Luke 1:26-29)
In the sixth month the Archangel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee!” But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered in her mind what sort of greeting this might be. It’s interesting that Mary isn’t described as being troubled the appearance of an angel (which would be normal: Matthew 28:5; Luke 1:13). Rather, Luke says that she was troubled by the saying, and wondered what it might mean. Luke doesn’t tell us why she was greatly troubled, but some propose one possibility.
The Archangel calls Mary by the title “Full of Grace,” a reference to her Immaculate Conception (which is why, confusingly, this is the Gospel for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception). And then he tells her, “the Lord is with thee,” a reference to Nathan’s message to King David, after the king wanted to build the Temple (2 Kings 7:3). It was Nathan giving a green light to proceed with the Temple, but has to backtrack on this, after God puts a stop to the plans. Elsewhere, we’re told that this is because the blood on David’s hands made him unworthy to build the temple (1 Paralipomenon 28:3). So now, the Archangel Gabriel is giving the green light to Mary to build the Temple (John 2:21), after declaring her sinless. An astute Jew would recognize this for what it is: a Messianic promise.
Mary and the Son (Luke 1:30-34)
And the angel said to her: “Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God.. Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a Son; and thou shalt call His name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High; and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of David his father; and He shall reign in the house of Jacob for ever. And of His kingdom there shall be no end.” And Mary said to the angel: “How shall this be done, because I know not man?” So having found favor with the Father, Mary is promised that she will bear the Son, Jesus. This raises an obvious question: How can that occur, given that Mary is a perpetual Virgin?
Mary and the Holy Ghost (Luke 1:35-38)
And the angel said to her: “The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the most High shall overshadow thee. And therefore also the Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. And behold thy cousin Elizabeth, she also hath conceived a son in her old age; and this is the sixth month with her that is called barren: because no word shall be impossible with God.” And Mary said: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word.” And the angel departed from her. So Mary finds favor with the Father, bears the Son, and is overshadowed by the Trinity. This is what I mean by saying that she is the exemplar of Trinitarian in-dwelling: after all, she literally grew the Son of God in her body, offered to her by the Father, through the angel, and produced by the power of the Holy Ghost.
What Will You Will?
Perfection is founded entirely on the love of God: “Charity is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14) and perfect love of God means the complete union of our will with God’s: “The principal effect of love is so to unite the wills of those who love each other as to make them will the same things” (St. Denis Areopagite), or as St. Thomas Aquinas says—one of the principal effects of love is a union of wills. It follows then, that the more one unites his will with the Divine Will, the greater will be his love of God. Mortification, meditation, receiving Holy Communion, acts of fraternal charity are all certainly pleasing to God—but only when they are in accordance with His Will. When they do not accord with God’s Will, He not only finds no pleasure in them, but He even rejects them utterly and punishes them.
Do What You Want—Or Do As You’re Told?
For example, a man has two servants. One works unremittingly all day long—but according to his own devices; the other, conceivably, works less, but he does do what he is told. This latter of course is going to find favor in the eyes of his master; the other will not. Now, in applying this example, we may ask: “Why should we perform actions for God’s glory, if they are not going to be acceptable to Him?” God does not want sacrifices―as the prophet Samuel told King Saul―but He does want obedience to His Will: “Does the Lord desire holocausts and victims, and not rather that the voice of the Lord should be obeyed? For obedience is better than sacrifices; and to listen, rather than to offer the fat of rams. Because it is like the sin of witchcraft to rebel; and like the crime of idolatry to refuse to obey” (1 Kings 15:22-23).
Self-Willed Adoration
The man who follows his own will independently of God’s, is guilty of a kind of idolatry. Instead of adoring God’s will, he, in a certain sense, adores his own. The greatest glory we can give to God is to do His will in everything. Our Redeemer came on Earth to glorify His heavenly Father and to teach us, by His example, how to do the same. St. Paul represents Him saying to His eternal Father: “Sacrifice and oblation Thou wouldst not: but a body Thou hast fitted to Me . . . Then said I: ‘Behold I come to do Thy Will, O God!’” (Habacuc 10:5-7). Thou hast refused the victims offered Thee by man; Thou dost will that I sacrifice My body to Thee. Behold Me ready to do Thy Will.
Example of Our Lord
Our Lord frequently declared that He had come on Earth not to do His own will, but solely that of His Father: “I came down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the Will of Him that sent Me!” (John 6:38). He spoke in the same manner in the Garden of Gethsemane: “And going a little further, He fell upon His face, praying, and saying: ‘My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from Me. Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt” (Matthew 26:39). And when He went forth to meet His enemies, who had come to seize Him and to lead Him to death, He said: “But that the world may know that I love the Father: and as the Father hath given Me commandment, so do I―arise and let us go hence!” (John 14:31.). Furthermore, he said He would recognize as His brother, him who would do His Will: “Whosoever shall do the Will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he is My brother” (Matthew 12:50).
Saints’ Sole Soul Focus
To do God’s will—this was the sole goal upon which the saints constantly fixed their gaze. They were fully persuaded that in this consists the entire perfection of the soul. Blessed Henry Suso used to say: “It is not God’s Will that we should abound in spiritual delights, but that in all things we should submit to His holy Will” (Blessed Henry Suso).
“Those who give themselves to prayer,” says St. Teresa of Avila, “should concentrate solely on this―the conformity of their wills with the Divine Will. They should be convinced that this constitutes their highest perfection. The more fully they practice this, the greater the gifts they will receive from God, and the greater the progress they will make in the interior life.”
A certain Dominican nun was granted a vision of Heaven one day. She recognized there some persons she had known during their mortal life on Earth. It was told her these souls were raised to the sublime heights of the seraphs on account of the uniformity of their wills with that of God’s Will during their lifetime here on Earth. Blessed Henry Suso, mentioned above, said of himself: “I would rather be the vilest worm on Earth by God’s will, than be a seraph by my own.”
Listen and Learn
During our pilgrimage through this world, we should learn from the saints, now in Heaven, how to love God. The pure and perfect love of God they enjoy there, consists in uniting themselves perfectly to His Will. It would be the greatest delight of the seraphs to pile up sand on the seashore, or to pull weeds in a garden for all eternity, if they found out such was God’s will. Our Lord Himself teaches us to ask to do the Will of God on Earth as the saints do it in Heaven: “Thy Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven” (Matthew 6:10). Because David fulfilled all His wishes, God called him a man after His own heart: “I have found David . . . a man according to My own heart, who shall do all My Wills.” David was always ready to embrace the Divine Will, as he frequently protested: “My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready!” (Psalm 56:8). He asked God for one thing alone—to teach him to do His Will: “Teach me to do Thy Will” (Psalm 142:10).
Will of Sanctity
A single act of uniformity with the Divine Will suffices to make a saint. Behold while Saul was persecuting the Church, God enlightened him and converted him. What does Saul do? What does he say? Nothing else but to offer himself to do God’s Will: “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?” (Acts 9:6). In return the Lord calls him a vessel of election and an Apostle of the Gentiles: “This man is to Me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles” (Acts 9:6).
Absolutely true—because he who gives his will to God, gives Him everything. He who gives his goods in alms, his blood in scourgings, his food in fasting, gives God what he has. But he who gives God his will, gives himself, gives everything he is. Such a one can say: “Though I am poor, Lord, I give Thee all I possess; but when I say I give Thee my will, I have nothing left to give Thee.”
Give God Your Will—You Will Not Be Disappointed!
This is just what God does require of us: “My son, give Me thy heart” (Proverbs 23:26). St. Augustine’s comment is: “There is nothing more pleasing we can offer God than to say to Him: ‘Possess Thyself of us’” (Commentary on Psalm 131:3). We cannot offer God anything more pleasing than to say: “Take us, Lord, we give Thee our entire will. Only let us know Thy Will and we will carry it out!” If we would completely rejoice the heart of God, let us strive in all things to conform ourselves to His Divine Will.
Let us not only strive to conform ourselves, but also to unite ourselves to whatever dispositions God makes of us. Conformity signifies that we join our wills to the Will of God. Uniformity means more—it means that we make one will of God’s Will and ours, so that we will only what God Wills; that God’s Will alone, is our will. This is the summit of perfection and to it we should always aspire; this should be the goal of all our works, desires, meditations and prayers. To this end we should always invoke the aid of our holy patrons, our guardian angels, and above all, of our mother Mary, the most perfect of all the saints, because she most perfectly embraced the Divine Will—“Be it done unto me according to Thy Will!”
At the Last Supper, as part of His Last Will and Testament, Our Lord tries to puncture their unrealistic human aspirations and prepare them for some reality, saying: “Every one that bears fruit, the Father will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit” (John 15:2). “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:18-19). “These things have I spoken to you, that you may not be scandalized. They will put you out of the synagogues: yea, the hour cometh, that whosoever kills you, will think that he does a service to God” (John 16:1-2). “Because I have spoken these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart” (John 16:6). “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy.” (John 16:20).
Our “Fiat” or “Thy Will Be Done”
Mary’s fiat, given to God through the Archangel Gabriel at the Annunciation, was not just a mental acceptance of God’s Will, based on logical reasoning—but it was an acceptance of God’s Will that came from the depth of her heart also. This reminds us of the words of God the Father to Isaias in the Old Testament, which were also quoted by Our Lord in the New Testament: “And the Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me!’” (isaias 29:13) … “Jesus said to them: ‘Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: “This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me”!’” (Mark 7:6).
Fighting the Good Fight of the Faith
It is simply impossible for us to get to Heaven and also impossible to please God without Faith. Our Lady’s warnings, over the last few hundred years, warned about a time when the Faith will be lost—lost by most people, lost by priests and religious orders, lost by bishops, and lost even by Rome itself. “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence … The love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Rome will lose Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Fight Fire with Fire
Our Lady recommends that we fight fire with fire—that we fight faithlessness with faithfulness: “But the children of the holy Church, the children of my Faith, my true followers, they will grow in their love for God and in all the virtues most precious to me. I call on the Apostles of the Last Days, the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ … Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children. I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days. Fight, children of light [the light of the Faith], you, the few who can see. For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends … God will take care of His faithful servants.” As to the Pope, Our Lady speaks of Faith being one of the weapons he must use: “may he, however, be steadfast and noble, may he fight with the weapons of Faith and Charity” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Our Lady was born to fight, just we are all born to fight: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith: lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). Our Lady was called to the fight and she gave her “fiat”—we have been called to the fight too, have we given our “fiat”? “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12).
The Annunciation is the first mystery of the Holy Rosary―and it is the Rosary that Our Lady requires today: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you!” (Fatima, July 13th, 1917). Sister Lucia of Fatima later said: “God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others … If we despise and reject this last means, Heaven will no longer pardon us!” Little Jacinta Marto of Fatima said, shortly before her death: “Tell everybody that God gives graces through the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Tell them to ask graces from her! Ask them to plead for peace from the Immaculate Heart of Mary, for the Lord has confided the peace of the world to her!”
While at Akita, Japan, in 1973, Our Lady stressed: “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by My Son … Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.”
No Mary! No chance!
Article 5
Saturday & Sunday, April 6th & 7th
God Wants to See a New You!
Saturday & Sunday, April 6th & 7th
God Wants to See a New You!
New! New! New!
People are obsessed with new things! Children want new toys, new experiences. They are always seeking to possess something new; the latest thing―the latest news; the latest gossip; the latest fashions; the latest model in shoes; the latest new phone; latest car; new television set; new computer; new house; new job; new friends―even a new spouse! The vast majority of people seek to buy new things―they seek to own the latest model. Who wants to buy old tomatoes when fresh tomatoes are available? When we buy a new car―we buy the latest model (if we can afford it) and not an older used car.
Commercial organizations depend and thrive on our natural curiosity. That’s right, companies know that people are driven by a strong obsession for obtaining new information, products and services. Just take a look at cellphone companies, and how they constantly find ways to upgrade you to new phones and contracts. Also take a look at your inbox. You will usually find countless emails arriving every week that are ads and promotions for new things―preying on your desire for what is new. Change becomes an obsession―lack of change is seen a lack of success, lack of excitement, lack of purpose.
Not all change is bad. Newness is not always bad in itself. A new-born-babe changes into an infant, then into a child, then into an adolescent and then into an adult. Our knowledge should be and is forever changing by acquiring new knowledge. Our personal talents change and grow by the acquisition of new skills. Once we acquire a new and better way of doing something, then we abandon the less perfect old way of doing something. Horses were a common form of transportation over a hundred years ago―yet since the invention of the first car (1885) and the availability of cars to the public in general (1920s), most people have abandoned the old form of transportation by horses in favor of the new mode of transportation by cars. The medical field is especially a good example of old medical procedures being replaced by new medical procedures.
Likewise our sanctity or holiness―which is our spiritual health―should be changing and growing by the acquisition of new virtues or by practicing already existing virtues to new and higher levels. We are all born in a state of Original Sin―lacking sanctifying grace. “I was conceived in iniquities and in sins did my mother conceive me” (Psalm 50:7). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean! I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “All have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us! … If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him [God] a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). Therefore, in order to reach Heaven, we must change from our old accustomed sinful state to a new holy state―which means we must become saints, for only saints go to Heaven.
Transformation into Holiness
In his booklet, The Secret of Mary, St. Louis de Montfort echoes those truths in the following passage: “Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next. It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, in book The Three Ages of the Interior Life, also speaks along the same lines: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God.”
There is no doubt that we are all sinners. Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9) … “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46) ... “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23) ... “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). We therefore―as St. Louis de Montfort says―work hard to change “dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness.” We must strive to eliminate the old sinful self and become a new holy self. Holy Scripture continually seeks to hammer that truth into us:
Christ says: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56) … “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5). What is penance? Penance is more than just saying a few Our Fathers and Hail Marys that the priest might give you in the Sacrament of Confession. It is more that fasting and abstaining from certain things. Penance, in its full extent, includes and requires a change of life―getting rid of the “old man” of sin and vice and putting on the “new man” of holiness and virtue. The Sacrament of Confession is not just about saying a few Our Fathers and Hail Marys as a penance―that is merely just one part or portion of the Sacrament of Confession. For a valid Confession, you must (1) examine your conscience; (2) be sorry for your sins through either attrition [a fear of punishment for sin] or contrition [sorrow for sin out of a love for God]; (3) you must truthfully and honestly confess all your mortal sins without fudging or misrepresenting them; (4) you must have a firm purpose of amending your sinful life; and (5) you must do penance for your sins, the minimum of which is doing the penance the priest imposes upon you―which is not the full price of sin, but merely, so to speak, the opening payment on a “mortgage” in repaying the debt for sin.
Thus the Sacrament of Confession is somewhat like the Emergency Room in a hospital―where the focus in on saving the life and restoring the health of the sick/injured patient. The patient has to cooperate with the medical staff and will often have to change their bad lifestyle that led to their serious sickness or serious accident in the first place. Sick persons are often advised to change their bad diet to a healthy diet, and to start exercising regularly―so too must spiritually sick persons change their bad sinful habits and undertake regular spiritual exercises―without which there will be no cure for their sins. Hence Our Lord warns: “Sin no more―lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14) ― and Holy Scripture adds: “Hast thou sinned? Do so no more!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). “Sin, when it is completed, begets death” (James 1:15).
When we purchase something, we expect the item to be without blemish, without fault, without malfunctioning. The same is true of our soul―God expects our soul to be without the blemish of sin, and if any blemish is found, then the soul is sent to the fires of Purgatory to have that blemish removed―or, in cases of unconfessed and unrepented mortal sin, the soul is sent to Hell, because “there shall not enter into Heaven anything defiled” (Apocalypse 21:27). Hence we should pray: “Create a clean heart in me, O God, and renew a right spirit within me!” (Psalm 50:12) ― to “renew a right spirit” means to correct what is wrong and make new what was corrupted and corroded by sin. “God has not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness” (1 Thessalonians 4:7) … “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy!” (Leviticus 20:26).
Since “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) and “the sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56)―we are, in a certain sense, entombed or buried in the tomb of sin. Just as the angel of the Lord rolled away the stone that covered the entrance to Christ’s tomb, so too do our guardian angels seek to roll away the stones or sins that keep us in the “tomb of sin” and help us resurrect from the death of sin to a new life in Christ. Just as Christ commanded the stone to be removed from the entrance to the tomb of Lazarus―who Jesus raised from the dead―so too does Jesus command us to remove the stones of sin that block our emergence from the tomb of sin and a new life in Christ.
One of those massive stones―that block our path to a new life in Christ―is the world: “Have the mind of Christ!” (1 Corinthians 2:16). “Be not conformed to this world; but be reformed in the newness of your mind!” (Romans 12:2). “They that are according to the flesh, mind the things that are of the flesh; but they that are according to the spirit, mind the things that are of the spirit!” (Romans 8:5). “Though our outward man is corrupted, yet the inward man is renewed day by day!” (2 Corinthians 4:16). “Put off the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error! Be renewed in the spirit of your mind and put on the new man, who is created in justice and holiness!” (Ephesians 4:22-24). “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth! For you are dead and your life is hidden with Christ in God. Therefore mortify your members from fornication, uncleanness, lust, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is the service of idols. Also put away anger, indignation, malice, blasphemy, filthy speech out of your mouth. Stripping yourselves of the old man with his deeds, and putting on the new man―him who is renewed unto knowledge, according to the image of God Who created him. Therefore put on the bowels of mercy, benignity, humility, modesty, patience; bearing with one another and forgiving one another if any have a complaint against another―even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also! But above all these things have charity―which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:1-14).
People are obsessed with new things! Children want new toys, new experiences. They are always seeking to possess something new; the latest thing―the latest news; the latest gossip; the latest fashions; the latest model in shoes; the latest new phone; latest car; new television set; new computer; new house; new job; new friends―even a new spouse! The vast majority of people seek to buy new things―they seek to own the latest model. Who wants to buy old tomatoes when fresh tomatoes are available? When we buy a new car―we buy the latest model (if we can afford it) and not an older used car.
Commercial organizations depend and thrive on our natural curiosity. That’s right, companies know that people are driven by a strong obsession for obtaining new information, products and services. Just take a look at cellphone companies, and how they constantly find ways to upgrade you to new phones and contracts. Also take a look at your inbox. You will usually find countless emails arriving every week that are ads and promotions for new things―preying on your desire for what is new. Change becomes an obsession―lack of change is seen a lack of success, lack of excitement, lack of purpose.
Not all change is bad. Newness is not always bad in itself. A new-born-babe changes into an infant, then into a child, then into an adolescent and then into an adult. Our knowledge should be and is forever changing by acquiring new knowledge. Our personal talents change and grow by the acquisition of new skills. Once we acquire a new and better way of doing something, then we abandon the less perfect old way of doing something. Horses were a common form of transportation over a hundred years ago―yet since the invention of the first car (1885) and the availability of cars to the public in general (1920s), most people have abandoned the old form of transportation by horses in favor of the new mode of transportation by cars. The medical field is especially a good example of old medical procedures being replaced by new medical procedures.
Likewise our sanctity or holiness―which is our spiritual health―should be changing and growing by the acquisition of new virtues or by practicing already existing virtues to new and higher levels. We are all born in a state of Original Sin―lacking sanctifying grace. “I was conceived in iniquities and in sins did my mother conceive me” (Psalm 50:7). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean! I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “All have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us! … If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him [God] a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). Therefore, in order to reach Heaven, we must change from our old accustomed sinful state to a new holy state―which means we must become saints, for only saints go to Heaven.
Transformation into Holiness
In his booklet, The Secret of Mary, St. Louis de Montfort echoes those truths in the following passage: “Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next. It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, in book The Three Ages of the Interior Life, also speaks along the same lines: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin—though it should be only venial—must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God.”
There is no doubt that we are all sinners. Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9) … “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46) ... “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23) ... “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). We therefore―as St. Louis de Montfort says―work hard to change “dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness.” We must strive to eliminate the old sinful self and become a new holy self. Holy Scripture continually seeks to hammer that truth into us:
Christ says: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56) … “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:32; 13:3-5). What is penance? Penance is more than just saying a few Our Fathers and Hail Marys that the priest might give you in the Sacrament of Confession. It is more that fasting and abstaining from certain things. Penance, in its full extent, includes and requires a change of life―getting rid of the “old man” of sin and vice and putting on the “new man” of holiness and virtue. The Sacrament of Confession is not just about saying a few Our Fathers and Hail Marys as a penance―that is merely just one part or portion of the Sacrament of Confession. For a valid Confession, you must (1) examine your conscience; (2) be sorry for your sins through either attrition [a fear of punishment for sin] or contrition [sorrow for sin out of a love for God]; (3) you must truthfully and honestly confess all your mortal sins without fudging or misrepresenting them; (4) you must have a firm purpose of amending your sinful life; and (5) you must do penance for your sins, the minimum of which is doing the penance the priest imposes upon you―which is not the full price of sin, but merely, so to speak, the opening payment on a “mortgage” in repaying the debt for sin.
Thus the Sacrament of Confession is somewhat like the Emergency Room in a hospital―where the focus in on saving the life and restoring the health of the sick/injured patient. The patient has to cooperate with the medical staff and will often have to change their bad lifestyle that led to their serious sickness or serious accident in the first place. Sick persons are often advised to change their bad diet to a healthy diet, and to start exercising regularly―so too must spiritually sick persons change their bad sinful habits and undertake regular spiritual exercises―without which there will be no cure for their sins. Hence Our Lord warns: “Sin no more―lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14) ― and Holy Scripture adds: “Hast thou sinned? Do so no more!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). “Sin, when it is completed, begets death” (James 1:15).
When we purchase something, we expect the item to be without blemish, without fault, without malfunctioning. The same is true of our soul―God expects our soul to be without the blemish of sin, and if any blemish is found, then the soul is sent to the fires of Purgatory to have that blemish removed―or, in cases of unconfessed and unrepented mortal sin, the soul is sent to Hell, because “there shall not enter into Heaven anything defiled” (Apocalypse 21:27). Hence we should pray: “Create a clean heart in me, O God, and renew a right spirit within me!” (Psalm 50:12) ― to “renew a right spirit” means to correct what is wrong and make new what was corrupted and corroded by sin. “God has not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness” (1 Thessalonians 4:7) … “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy!” (Leviticus 20:26).
Since “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) and “the sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56)―we are, in a certain sense, entombed or buried in the tomb of sin. Just as the angel of the Lord rolled away the stone that covered the entrance to Christ’s tomb, so too do our guardian angels seek to roll away the stones or sins that keep us in the “tomb of sin” and help us resurrect from the death of sin to a new life in Christ. Just as Christ commanded the stone to be removed from the entrance to the tomb of Lazarus―who Jesus raised from the dead―so too does Jesus command us to remove the stones of sin that block our emergence from the tomb of sin and a new life in Christ.
One of those massive stones―that block our path to a new life in Christ―is the world: “Have the mind of Christ!” (1 Corinthians 2:16). “Be not conformed to this world; but be reformed in the newness of your mind!” (Romans 12:2). “They that are according to the flesh, mind the things that are of the flesh; but they that are according to the spirit, mind the things that are of the spirit!” (Romans 8:5). “Though our outward man is corrupted, yet the inward man is renewed day by day!” (2 Corinthians 4:16). “Put off the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error! Be renewed in the spirit of your mind and put on the new man, who is created in justice and holiness!” (Ephesians 4:22-24). “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth! For you are dead and your life is hidden with Christ in God. Therefore mortify your members from fornication, uncleanness, lust, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is the service of idols. Also put away anger, indignation, malice, blasphemy, filthy speech out of your mouth. Stripping yourselves of the old man with his deeds, and putting on the new man―him who is renewed unto knowledge, according to the image of God Who created him. Therefore put on the bowels of mercy, benignity, humility, modesty, patience; bearing with one another and forgiving one another if any have a complaint against another―even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also! But above all these things have charity―which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:1-14).
Article 4
Easter Thursday & Friday, April 4th & 5th
You Must First Die in Order to Resurrect!
Easter Thursday & Friday, April 4th & 5th
You Must First Die in Order to Resurrect!
No Life Unless You Die!
Our Lord clearly―yet mysteriously―tells us: “Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat, falling into the ground, dies―then it remains itself alone! But if it dies, it brings forth much fruit. He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:24-25). “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it!” (Luke 17:33). “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “For how is a man advantaged if he gains the whole world and loses himself and casts away himself?” (Luke 9:25). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! No man can serve two masters. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” meaning the pleasures and treasures of this world (Matthew 6:19-24).
What Our Lord is trying to tell us is that we were not made for this world, but for Heaven―and that we should therefore seek the treasures and pleasures of Heaven rather than the treasures and pleasures of this world. In other words, we must “die” to this world in order to “live” for Heaven. Our Lord further explains: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 8:23; 18:36). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hate you, know that it hath hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hateth Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
That is why Holy Scripture further adds the following warnings: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
“Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Blind Leading the Blind
Most Catholics―even most bishops and priests―are blind to the above words. Yes―they have read those words many times and they believe in them in theory. Yet when it comes to putting into practice those words, that is when the divorce between theory and practice occurs! Sadly, most Catholics―whether clergy or laity―are Catholics in name only; wearing a Catholic mask that masks the worldliness that lurks beneath. It is no wonder that the saints tell us that most bishops, priests and laity end up being damned [read more here]!
Our Lady has lamented this on numerous occasions: “Consider the wicked disposition of mortals in the present age … there are so few who are perfect and who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption. Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become immeasurable, there are those who falsely think that the number of the perfect are also numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be! … Today the Church seeks deceitful powders [cosmetics] and paints [whitewashes] to cover the horrid ugliness of vice! ... The sacerdotal dignity and virtues are soiled by contagion with the worldly; the anointed of the Lord, consecrated solely to His worship and service, have lapsed from their noble and godlike station; they have lost their beauty in debasing themselves to vile actions, unworthy of their exalted position among men. They love vanity; they indulge greed and avarice; they serve their own interest; they love money, they place their hopes in treasures of silver and gold; they submit to the flatteries and to the slavery of the worldly and powerful! What is most deplorable is how they dishonor the High-priest Christ and in their lives depart just as far from the imitation of Christ and the Apostles, as the most profane men of the world!”
“If the preaching of the Divine Word, by these worldly ministers of Christ, is so dead and without power of vivifying the hearers, then it is not the fault of truth or the fault of the Holy Scriptures―but it is because of the abuse and of the distorted intentions of those that preach it. They seek to compromise the glory of Christ with their own selfish honor and vain esteem; they compromise the spiritual goods with base acquisition of stipends; and if those two selfish ends are reached, they do not care for other results of their preaching―which should be the sanctification and salvation of souls. Therefore they wander away from the pure and sincere doctrine, and sometimes even from the truth recorded in the Scriptures―instead, they slime it over with their own ingenious subtleties, seeking to cause the pleasure and admiration of their hearers than their advancement in holiness. When these adulterated Divine Truths reach the ears of the sinners, they produce an admiration of the preacher, rather than a love of Christ; and they no power or efficacy for penetrating the hearts, but are only a delight the ears.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
The clergy are increasing becoming the blind who lead the blind: “His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant! Dumb dogs not able to bark! Seeing vain things! Sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10). To which Our Lord adds: “Can the blind lead the blind? Do they not both fall into the ditch?” (Luke 6:39). “They are blind and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
Die to the World―Separate Yourself from the World!
The truth is brutal! The choice must be made! We cannot serve God and mammon! If we love the world, then we will perish with the world! “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Father Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., who taught Ascetical and Mystical Theology at the Dominican University in Rome from 1909 to 1960, in his book The Three Ways of the Interior Life, later re-titled as The Three Conversions in the Spiritual Life, writes: “We can exert no real or profound influence upon our fellow-men unless we live a truly interior life ourselves … The interior life is for all the “one thing necessary”. It ought to be constantly developing in our souls; more so than what we call our intellectual life, more so than our scientific, artistic or literary life … The pressing need of devoting ourselves to the consideration of the “one thing necessary” is especially manifest in these days of general chaos and unrest, when so many men and nations, neglecting their true destiny, give themselves up entirely to acquiring earthly possessions, failing to realize how inferior these are to the everlasting riches of the spirit … God is now showing men what a great mistake they make when they try to do without Him, when they regard earthly enjoyment as their highest good, and thus reverse the whole scale of values ... Men have sought their last end where it is not to be found, in earthly enjoyment—instead of God … The remedy is this―and this only―to consider the one thing necessary, and to ask God to give us saints who live only on this thought, saints who will give the world the spirit that it needs! God has always sent us saints in troubled times. We need them especially today!”
“To understand what our interior life is in itself and in its various phases, we must consider it not merely in its seed, but in its full and complete development. Now, if we ask the Gospel what our interior life is, it tells us that the life of grace, given to us in Baptism and nourished by the Eucharist, is the seed or germ of eternal life ... Sanctifying Grace is a real and formal participation of the divine nature … Sanctifying Grace, the principle of our interior life, makes us truly the children of God because it makes us partakers of His nature … Grace, then, is eternal life already begun within us. It is there, hidden within you―like the grain of mustard seed.”
“In the natural order, the germ which is contained in the acorn could never grow into an oak tree unless it were of the same nature as the oak, if it did not contain the life of the oak in a latent state. The little child, likewise, could never become a man if it had not a rational soul, if reason were not already latent within it. In the same way, a Christian on Earth could never become one of the blessed in Heaven unless he had already received the divine life in Baptism.”
Resurrecting from the Death of Sin to Life in God
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange continues: “We must daily more and more die to sin and to the remains that sin leaves in us, so that God may reign more completely in us, even to the depth of the soul … We are thus able to appreciate something of the importance of true conversion, by which a man passes from the state of mortal sin to the state of grace. In the former state [of mortal sin] his energies were dissipated and he was indifferent in regard to God; now [in a state of sanctifying grace] he loves God more than he loves himself, more than he loves anything else; at any rate he esteems God beyond all earthly things, even though his love of God may not be free from all selfish motives. The state of sin was a state of spiritual death―a state in which, more or less consciously, he made himself the center of all his activities and the end of all his desires; in which he was actually the slave of everything, the slave of his passions, of the spirit of the world, of the spirit of evil. The state of grace, on the other hand, is a state of life in which man begins seriously to tend beyond himself and to make God the center of his activities, loving God more than himself. The state of grace is entrance into the Kingdom of God, where the docile soul begins to reign with God over its own passions, over the spirit of the world and the spirit of evil … The root principle of this undying organism is Sanctifying Grace and this grace would last forever, were it not that mortal sin, a radical disorder in the soul, destroys it.”
“Those who follow the way of generosity, self-denial, and self-sacrifice which the saints have taught, will come at length to know and taste the joys of God’s complete dominion within us. Truly spiritual delights have their source in the cross, in the spirit of sacrifice, which causes disordered inclinations to die in us and gives the first place to the love of God and the love of souls in God.”
The World is Ruled by Satan―So Why Do We Love It So Much?
What most Catholics fail to realize―which consequently leads to failure in saving their souls―is the fact that we were not made to have a fun time on Earth, followed by a fun time in Heaven. The Earth belongs to Satan―Our Lord calls him “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― thus, we a living in enemy territory, from which we are meant to escape unscathed to Heaven. Earth is our temporary exile from Heaven. Earth is not our home, but a place that we merely passing through. Earth is the possession of Satan and he has set innumerable traps to ensnare our souls.
That is why Holy Scripture warns: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Our Lord says: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing!” (John 14:30) … “You are from beneath, I am from above! You are of this world, I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil! … Now is the judgment of the world! Now shall the prince of this world be cast out! … The prince of this world is already judged! ” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7; 12:31; 16:11).
Hence Holy Scripture further adds: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Our Lady echoes this when she speaks of where we are to find happiness―she says to St. Bernadette at Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next life!” Life on Earth is meant to be―as we say in the prayer, Hail Holy Queen―is a life where we, “poor banished children of Eve”, live and “send up our sighs mourning and weeping in this valley of tears”, hoping one day, “after this our exile”, to arrive safely in Heaven having survived the traps of this Earth. In God’s eyes, Earth is not meant to a place of fun and games, treasures and pleasures, entertainment and self-indulgence! Yet, sadly, that is how most Catholics view life on Earth!
Our Lord clearly―yet mysteriously―tells us: “Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat, falling into the ground, dies―then it remains itself alone! But if it dies, it brings forth much fruit. He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:24-25). “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it!” (Luke 17:33). “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “For how is a man advantaged if he gains the whole world and loses himself and casts away himself?” (Luke 9:25). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―but lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! No man can serve two masters. You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― “mammon” meaning the pleasures and treasures of this world (Matthew 6:19-24).
What Our Lord is trying to tell us is that we were not made for this world, but for Heaven―and that we should therefore seek the treasures and pleasures of Heaven rather than the treasures and pleasures of this world. In other words, we must “die” to this world in order to “live” for Heaven. Our Lord further explains: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 8:23; 18:36). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hate you, know that it hath hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hateth Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
That is why Holy Scripture further adds the following warnings: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
“Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Blind Leading the Blind
Most Catholics―even most bishops and priests―are blind to the above words. Yes―they have read those words many times and they believe in them in theory. Yet when it comes to putting into practice those words, that is when the divorce between theory and practice occurs! Sadly, most Catholics―whether clergy or laity―are Catholics in name only; wearing a Catholic mask that masks the worldliness that lurks beneath. It is no wonder that the saints tell us that most bishops, priests and laity end up being damned [read more here]!
Our Lady has lamented this on numerous occasions: “Consider the wicked disposition of mortals in the present age … there are so few who are perfect and who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption. Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become immeasurable, there are those who falsely think that the number of the perfect are also numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be! … Today the Church seeks deceitful powders [cosmetics] and paints [whitewashes] to cover the horrid ugliness of vice! ... The sacerdotal dignity and virtues are soiled by contagion with the worldly; the anointed of the Lord, consecrated solely to His worship and service, have lapsed from their noble and godlike station; they have lost their beauty in debasing themselves to vile actions, unworthy of their exalted position among men. They love vanity; they indulge greed and avarice; they serve their own interest; they love money, they place their hopes in treasures of silver and gold; they submit to the flatteries and to the slavery of the worldly and powerful! What is most deplorable is how they dishonor the High-priest Christ and in their lives depart just as far from the imitation of Christ and the Apostles, as the most profane men of the world!”
“If the preaching of the Divine Word, by these worldly ministers of Christ, is so dead and without power of vivifying the hearers, then it is not the fault of truth or the fault of the Holy Scriptures―but it is because of the abuse and of the distorted intentions of those that preach it. They seek to compromise the glory of Christ with their own selfish honor and vain esteem; they compromise the spiritual goods with base acquisition of stipends; and if those two selfish ends are reached, they do not care for other results of their preaching―which should be the sanctification and salvation of souls. Therefore they wander away from the pure and sincere doctrine, and sometimes even from the truth recorded in the Scriptures―instead, they slime it over with their own ingenious subtleties, seeking to cause the pleasure and admiration of their hearers than their advancement in holiness. When these adulterated Divine Truths reach the ears of the sinners, they produce an admiration of the preacher, rather than a love of Christ; and they no power or efficacy for penetrating the hearts, but are only a delight the ears.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
The clergy are increasing becoming the blind who lead the blind: “His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant! Dumb dogs not able to bark! Seeing vain things! Sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10). To which Our Lord adds: “Can the blind lead the blind? Do they not both fall into the ditch?” (Luke 6:39). “They are blind and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
Die to the World―Separate Yourself from the World!
The truth is brutal! The choice must be made! We cannot serve God and mammon! If we love the world, then we will perish with the world! “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Father Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., who taught Ascetical and Mystical Theology at the Dominican University in Rome from 1909 to 1960, in his book The Three Ways of the Interior Life, later re-titled as The Three Conversions in the Spiritual Life, writes: “We can exert no real or profound influence upon our fellow-men unless we live a truly interior life ourselves … The interior life is for all the “one thing necessary”. It ought to be constantly developing in our souls; more so than what we call our intellectual life, more so than our scientific, artistic or literary life … The pressing need of devoting ourselves to the consideration of the “one thing necessary” is especially manifest in these days of general chaos and unrest, when so many men and nations, neglecting their true destiny, give themselves up entirely to acquiring earthly possessions, failing to realize how inferior these are to the everlasting riches of the spirit … God is now showing men what a great mistake they make when they try to do without Him, when they regard earthly enjoyment as their highest good, and thus reverse the whole scale of values ... Men have sought their last end where it is not to be found, in earthly enjoyment—instead of God … The remedy is this―and this only―to consider the one thing necessary, and to ask God to give us saints who live only on this thought, saints who will give the world the spirit that it needs! God has always sent us saints in troubled times. We need them especially today!”
“To understand what our interior life is in itself and in its various phases, we must consider it not merely in its seed, but in its full and complete development. Now, if we ask the Gospel what our interior life is, it tells us that the life of grace, given to us in Baptism and nourished by the Eucharist, is the seed or germ of eternal life ... Sanctifying Grace is a real and formal participation of the divine nature … Sanctifying Grace, the principle of our interior life, makes us truly the children of God because it makes us partakers of His nature … Grace, then, is eternal life already begun within us. It is there, hidden within you―like the grain of mustard seed.”
“In the natural order, the germ which is contained in the acorn could never grow into an oak tree unless it were of the same nature as the oak, if it did not contain the life of the oak in a latent state. The little child, likewise, could never become a man if it had not a rational soul, if reason were not already latent within it. In the same way, a Christian on Earth could never become one of the blessed in Heaven unless he had already received the divine life in Baptism.”
Resurrecting from the Death of Sin to Life in God
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange continues: “We must daily more and more die to sin and to the remains that sin leaves in us, so that God may reign more completely in us, even to the depth of the soul … We are thus able to appreciate something of the importance of true conversion, by which a man passes from the state of mortal sin to the state of grace. In the former state [of mortal sin] his energies were dissipated and he was indifferent in regard to God; now [in a state of sanctifying grace] he loves God more than he loves himself, more than he loves anything else; at any rate he esteems God beyond all earthly things, even though his love of God may not be free from all selfish motives. The state of sin was a state of spiritual death―a state in which, more or less consciously, he made himself the center of all his activities and the end of all his desires; in which he was actually the slave of everything, the slave of his passions, of the spirit of the world, of the spirit of evil. The state of grace, on the other hand, is a state of life in which man begins seriously to tend beyond himself and to make God the center of his activities, loving God more than himself. The state of grace is entrance into the Kingdom of God, where the docile soul begins to reign with God over its own passions, over the spirit of the world and the spirit of evil … The root principle of this undying organism is Sanctifying Grace and this grace would last forever, were it not that mortal sin, a radical disorder in the soul, destroys it.”
“Those who follow the way of generosity, self-denial, and self-sacrifice which the saints have taught, will come at length to know and taste the joys of God’s complete dominion within us. Truly spiritual delights have their source in the cross, in the spirit of sacrifice, which causes disordered inclinations to die in us and gives the first place to the love of God and the love of souls in God.”
The World is Ruled by Satan―So Why Do We Love It So Much?
What most Catholics fail to realize―which consequently leads to failure in saving their souls―is the fact that we were not made to have a fun time on Earth, followed by a fun time in Heaven. The Earth belongs to Satan―Our Lord calls him “the prince of this world” (John 12:31) ― thus, we a living in enemy territory, from which we are meant to escape unscathed to Heaven. Earth is our temporary exile from Heaven. Earth is not our home, but a place that we merely passing through. Earth is the possession of Satan and he has set innumerable traps to ensnare our souls.
That is why Holy Scripture warns: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Our Lord says: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing!” (John 14:30) … “You are from beneath, I am from above! You are of this world, I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil! … Now is the judgment of the world! Now shall the prince of this world be cast out! … The prince of this world is already judged! ” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7; 12:31; 16:11).
Hence Holy Scripture further adds: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Our Lady echoes this when she speaks of where we are to find happiness―she says to St. Bernadette at Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next life!” Life on Earth is meant to be―as we say in the prayer, Hail Holy Queen―is a life where we, “poor banished children of Eve”, live and “send up our sighs mourning and weeping in this valley of tears”, hoping one day, “after this our exile”, to arrive safely in Heaven having survived the traps of this Earth. In God’s eyes, Earth is not meant to a place of fun and games, treasures and pleasures, entertainment and self-indulgence! Yet, sadly, that is how most Catholics view life on Earth!
Article 3
Easter Tuesday & Wednesday, April 2nd & 3rd
Have You Ever Risen From the Dead?
Easter Tuesday & Wednesday, April 2nd & 3rd
Have You Ever Risen From the Dead?
When Was Your Last Resurrection?
“What a stupid question!” you will say, “I have never died!” Well, there are different kinds of deaths. Since the soul cannot die, the soul cannot be said to return to life. The body does die―and we have accounts of Jesus raising three dead bodies to life―(1) the daughter of Jairus, who had only just died (Mark 5; Luke 8); (2) the son of the widow of Naim who had been dead for a while and was being carried to his tomb for burial (Luke 7); (3) the resurrection of Lazarus, the brother of Martha and Mary, who had been in the tomb for several days (John 11).
Even aside from Jesus, his disciples and saints have raised many persons from bodily death to life by the power of God. The excellent book “Saints Who Raised The Dead” (Tan Books, Father Alfred J. Hebert S.M., 2004) documents over 400 true stories of resurrection miracles in the lives of the Saints. Some of the many Saints listed in this book are: St. Francis of Paola, Venerable John Baptist Tholomei, St. Bernardine of Siena, St. John Capistrano, St. Francis of Paola, St. Joseph of Cupertino, St. Peter of Alcantara, St. Dominic, St. Ignatius Loyola, St. Philip Neri, St. Paul of the Cross, St. John Bosco, Blessed James Salomoni, St. Agnes of Montepulciano, Blessed Constantius of Fabrino, Blessed Sadoc and Companions, Blessed Mark of Modena, Blessed Ceslas, Blessed Augustine of Bugela, Colomb a of Rieti, St. Rose of Lima, St. Martin de Porres, St. Francis Solanus, Marianne de Jesus of Quito, Blessed Sebastian of Apparizio, St. Bernard of Abbeville, St. Stanislaus of Cracow, St. James of Tarentaise, St. Cyril of Constantinople, St. Peregrine, St. Philip Benizi, Bl. Peter Armengol, Blessed Eustachio, St. Gerard Majella, St. Charbel Makhlouf, St. Padre Pio, St. Margaret of Cortona, St. Felix of Cantalice, St. Rose of Viterbo, St. Pacific of San Severino, St. Hyacinth, St. Louis Bertrand, St. Francis Xavier, St. John Francis Regis, St. Andrew Bobola; St. Francis Jerome, Brother Antony Pereyra, and St. Patrick, the Apostle of Ireland―to name just a few.
Nevertheless, even thought the soul cannot die, the soul can experience the death of sin ― “You were dead in your offences and sins” (Ephesians 2:1) ― and therefore we speak of the rising of the soul from the death of sin to the life of grace: “Even when we were dead in sins, God has quickened us together in Christ, by whose grace you are saved” (Ephesians 2:5). Some sins are mortal ― they kill the supernatural life in our soul. Mortal sin casts out God and His grace from our souls. With Him goes eternal life. We die inside and fall. “All iniquity is sin and there is a sin unto death! … Whosoever is born of God, sins not” (1 John 5:17-18). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). The forgiveness of sins and restoration of sanctifying grace a greater miracle than the resurrection of Lazarus from physical death, because Lazarus was merely restored to a temporary life in the world (see John 11).
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Miraculous works can only be performed by Divine power … Miraculous works are beyond natural power. Now the justification of the ungodly is not beyond natural power [Nevertheless, as Christ said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5)] But no other cause except God can justify the ungodly … The justification of the ungodly is a movement whereby the soul is moved by God from a state of sin to a state of justice … The justification of the ungodly is a certain movement whereby the human mind is moved by God from the state of sin to the state of justice … The justification of the ungodly is caused by the justifying grace of the Holy Spirit ... and thus, generally speaking, both the justification of the ungodly and the creation of the world, and every work that can be done by God alone, is miraculous.” (Summa, Ia-IIae, q. 113, articles 6, 7 & 10).
When our souls are raised to life from spiritual death, they regain a share in eternal life. In his Summa Theologica, St. Thomas Aquinas wrote that the miracle of the restoration of sanctifying grace and salvation to a soul is, in God’s eyes, a greater miracle than the creation of the universe itself: “For a just man to be made from a sinner, is greater than to create Heaven and Earth … for Heaven and Earth shall pass away, but the justification of the ungodly shall endure … The good of [sanctifying] grace in one [person] is greater than the good of nature in the whole universe” (Summa, Ia-IIae, q. 113, art. 9). For the material universe is something that is brought into being for a time, but then one day will pass away. A soul that has sanctifying grace is saved for eternal life. The Sacrament of Confession is a Sacrament of spiritual resurrection. The spiritual death―brought about by mortal sin―is overcome and spiritual life is restored by sanctifying grace once again being infused in the soul! How many times have you been resurrected in the Sacrament of Confession? How great is your gratitude? How deep is your humility? How ardent is your love for all those repeated miracles of spiritual resurrection that have taken place throughout your whole life?
When Our Lord healed the ten lepers―leprosy in the body being a symbol of sin in the soul―only one leper was found who came back to Our Lord to give thanks! “There met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off; and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before the feet of Jesus, giving thanks―and this was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering, said: ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the other nine? There is no one found to return and give glory to God, but this stranger!’” (Luke 17:12-18). How many times have we been made clean in the Sacrament of Confession―and how many times have we prostrated ourselves before Our Lord in profuse gratitude? Nowhere near enough times―it is because we think sin is cheap, therefore we imagine forgiveness is cheap, and we decide that penance should be cheap!
How Long Did Your Resurrection Last?
Holy Scripture gives us three instances where Our Lord raised persons from the dead―(1) the daughter of Jairus; (2) the son of the widow of Naim; (3) the resurrection of Lazarus. Our Lord did not perform miraculous resurrections everywhere He went! This should indicate to us that Our Lord will not perform perpetual spiritual resurrections in the Sacrament of Confession. How many times will a doctor perform surgery on a sick patient before finally giving up hope of being to save his life?
As St. Alphonsus Liguori―the patron saint of moral theologians―writes: “God has fixed for each person the number of the days of his life, and the degrees of health and talent which He will give him, so He has also determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more. You say: ‘I am young: there are many who have committed more sins than I have!’ But is God, on that account, obliged to wait for your repentance if you offend him? Say not then, O sinner: ‘As God has forgiven me other sins, so He will pardon me this one if I commit it!’ Say not this―for, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned. ‘Be not without fear about sins forgiven, and add not sin to sin!’ (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). You must, then, tremble at the thought of committing a single mortal sin, particularly if you have already been guilty of mortal sins. God waits with patience until a certain number of sins are committed, but, when the measure of guilt is filled up, He waits no longer, but chastises the sinner.” (Sunday Sermons of St. Alphonsus).
St. Paul warns us of having a complacent attitude towards sin: “When you were the servants of sin … what fruit had you then in those things, of which you are now ashamed? For the end of them is death! For the wages of sin is death! But now, being made free from sin, and become servants to God, you have your fruit unto sanctification, and the end life everlasting in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:20-23)
“Shall we continue in sin? God forbid! For we that are dead to sin, how shall we live any longer in sin? Know you not that all we, who are baptized in Christ Jesus, are baptized in His death. For we are buried together with Him by Baptism into death; so that as Christ is risen from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also may walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection. Knowing this―that our old man is crucified with Him, so that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer!” (Romans 6:1-6).
The Newness of Life
God wants us to change―but we don’t want to change! God wants us to change our sinful ways into virtuous ways―but we are too entrenched and too attached to our sinful ways. Vice and virtue cannot co-exist. Sin and grace cannot co-exist. God and the world cannot co-exist. Believers and unbelievers cannot co-exist: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
As Our Lord Himself said: “They do not put new wine into old bottles. Otherwise the bottles break, and the wine runs out and the bottles perish. But they put new wine into new bottles―and both are preserved!” (Matthew 9:17) ... “No man puts new wine into old bottles―otherwise the wine will burst the bottles, and both the wine will be spilled, and the bottles will be lost. But new wine must be put into new bottles” (Mark 2:22). Christ has come to make all things new: “Behold, I make all things new!” (Apocalypse 21:5). “If then any be in Christ a new creature, the old things are passed away―behold all things are made new!” (2 Corinthians 5:17). “Remember not former things, and look not on things of old!” (Isaias 43:18). “No man putting his hand to the plough and then looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:62). “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste” (1 Corinthians 5:7). “Put off the old man, who is corrupted and put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness of truth!” (Ephesians 4:22-24). “Stripping yourselves of the old man with his deeds and putting on the new” (Colossians 3:9-10). “Be not conformed to this world, but be reformed in the newness of your mind” (Romans 12:2).
Locked Into Lent
Each year’s Lenten season should be looked upon as a lock on the canal. A lock is a device used for raising and lowering boats, ships and other watercraft between stretches of water of different levels on river and canal. You could loosely compare a series of locks to a staircase―which helps raise a boat from a lower level to a higher level (or vice-versa). Each Lent should see us rise to a higher spiritual level―which we should maintain until the next Lent comes along, and then we should rise to an even higher level. Unfortunately, that is not what happens. Once Lent is over―people go back to their old ways!
“As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly!” (Proverbs 26:11). “Flying from the pollutions of the world, through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome―and their latter state is become unto them worse than the former! For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of justice, than after they have known it, to turn back from that which was delivered to them! For, that of the true proverb has happened to them: ‘The dog is returned to his vomit!’ and, ‘The sow that was washed, returned to her wallowing in the mire!’” (2 Peter 2:20-22).
Loosing the Sense of Sin
Sadly, that is how most Catholics operate―they wash themselves in the confessional, but then return to mire of sin soon afterwards. Rather than using Lent as a lock that each year raises us higher and higher in the spiritual life―Lent is nothing other than a vicious circle, where the gains of Lent lead to the losses of Easter and the rest of the year. One, two, or three steps forward are followed by the same number of steps backward. Lenten fasting and abstinence leads to feasting and gluttony afterwards. Abstaining from alcohol leads to a non-Lenten over-indulgence in alcohol―and so on and so forth with most other virtues and their opposite vices. There is really no effort to quit sin altogether―and the words of Our Lord and Holy Scripture are ignored or even rejected: “Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14) … “Go! And now sin no more!” (John 8:11) ... “Be not without fear about sin forgiven―and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). As recent popes have said―even the Liberal and Modernist popes―people have lost the sense of sin:
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
The valid complaints of these popes are corroborated and verified by the unbelievable falling-away from the Sacrament of Confession. As one modern mainstream Catholic priest wrote in 2021: “In Catholic circles in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, patterns of regular confession that were once in abundance began to fade. While frequent confession became a thing of the past, Catholics continued to receive Communion.” Surveys show that to be true. Between 1965 and 1975, according to the National Opinion Research Council, the proportion of Catholics who confessed monthly fell from 38% to 17%. A University of Notre Dame study in the 1980s showed the decline continuing. In a 1997 poll by the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research at the University of Connecticut, only 10% of Catholics surveyed said that they confessed at least once a month; another 10% said they never went to confession at all. By 2015, a Pew Research Center survey showed that only 7% of Catholics went to Confession monthly; only 14% went several times a year; 21% only went once a year; 23% went less than once a year; and 35% no longer went to Confession. More recent statistics indicate that 45% of Catholics in the USA have never confessed since making the first Confession after coming of age. Almost 90% of those who line up to commune in the United States every Sunday [but take note that only around 15% of all Catholics go to Mass regularly each Sunday―so 90% of those 15%], and 95% of regular communicants in certain areas of Northern Europe and 60 to 80% in Italy are not even confessing once a year.
Some might appeal to the Code of Canon Law―where both the Old Code of Canon Law and the more recent New Code of Canon Law―which says: “After having reached the age of discretion, each member of the faithful is obliged to confess faithfully his or her grave sins at least once a year” (New Code of Canon Law, §989). “Grave sins” here means “mortal sins.” The Sacrament of Confession is required for those who commit mortal sins after their Baptism―the Council of Trent states: “For those who after baptism have fallen into sin, the Sacrament of Penance is as necessary unto salvation as is Baptism itself is necessary for those who have not yet been regenerated” (Council of Trent, Sess. XIV, c. 2). Even today’s modern Catechism states: “Christ instituted the Sacrament of Penance for all sinful members of His Church: above all for those who, since Baptism, have fallen into grave sin, and have thus lost their baptismal grace and wounded ecclesial communion. It is to them that the Sacrament of Penance offers a new possibility to convert and to recover the grace of justification [sanctifying grace]. The Fathers of the Church present this Sacrament as “the second plank [of salvation] after the shipwreck which is the loss of [sanctifying] grace.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, §1446).
For a sin to be mortal, three conditions must be met: grave matter, full knowledge, and complete consent. Yet absence of full knowledge does not always excuse from mortal―when it a culpable lack of knowledge, meaning that you lack knowledge that you SHOULD have, but do not have due to neglect, laziness, indifference, etc. Otherwise, a Catholic could refuse to learn about the Faith and thereby make the lame claim: “I didn’t know that such and such a thing was a mortal sin!” Easy way out, huh? Not with God! Such persons will get their just desserts!
Okay―the obligation to confess sins once a year only applies to mortal sins. Therefore, if you have not committed any mortal sins, then you are not obliged to confess once a year. Nevertheless, even the present day modern Catechism adds: “Without being strictly necessary, confession of everyday faults (venial sins) is nevertheless strongly recommended by the Church. Indeed the regular confession of our venial sins helps us form our conscience, fight against evil tendencies.” (CCC §1458).
So―since very few Catholics go to Confession, does that mean that most Catholics are no longer committing mortal sins? Have we really become so holy? Statistics show the opposite―there is far more mortal sin being committed today than ever before―it is just that Catholics have lost the sense of sin, they have created their own personal moral values where things like deliberately missing Sunday Mass; drunkenness; masturbation; impure thoughts; viewing immodest material (never mind pornography!) and even abortion are no longer sins for the modern-day Catholic.
Losing the Faith and Losing Grace
As regards Catholic teaching and belief in the Real Presence of Christ with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity in the Holy Eucharist―around 40% of Catholics no longer believe this teaching, instead they believe that the transubstantiated Bread and Wine at Holy Mass are ONLY symbols of the Body and Blood of Christ. Other surveys show numbers far greater than 40% ― some of them claiming that disbelieve in the Real Presence among Catholics is as high 70%.
Majorities of former Catholics who are now unaffiliated with any religion also cite having stopped believing in Catholicism’s teachings overall (65%) or dissatisfaction with Catholic teachings about abortion and homosexuality (56%), and almost half (48%) cite dissatisfaction with church teachings about birth control, as reasons for leaving Catholicism. These reasons are cited less commonly by former Catholics who have become Protestant; 50% say they stopped believing in Catholicism’s teachings, 23% say they differed with the Catholic Church on issues such as abortion and homosexuality, and only 16% say they were unhappy with Catholic teachings on birth control.
Increasing numbers of Catholics believe that you be saved in any religion! It doesn’t help matters when the Pope utters the same foolishness! An off-shoot of this is seen in the inter-denominational marriages, whereby Catholics have no problem marrying someone from another religion. Some Catholics no longer believe in the necessity of Baptism―and no longer baptize their children. Similarly with Confession―increasing numbers of Catholics belief that they can confess their sins directly to God and do not have to confess through a priest.
Similarly, increasing numbers of Catholics nowadays find acceptable and normal what is in reality a mortal sin―23% do not think that abortion is sinful; 40% do not think it is sinful to have homosexual relations; 33% do not think it is sinful to live together without marriage; 25% think it not sinful to use contraceptives; 75% of young American Catholics believe you can be a good Catholic without attending Sunday Mass; etc.
Is There Any Hope of These Souls Resurrecting From Their Erroneous Sinful Attitudes?
Most of the above rebellious attitudes are mortal sins of themselves. Consequently, it must be tragically surmised that most of the Catholic world is in a state of mortal sin. The same could possibly be said of the few Catholics who do go to the Sacrament of Confession―in view of what St. Alphonsus Liguori, a Doctor of the Church, writes: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil not of rare occurrence, but frequent, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.”
Our Lady of Fatima came to beg for many prayers and sacrifices for the salvation of so many souls who are falling into Hell because there is hardly anyone who seeks to resurrect them from this death of mortal sin. “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
“What a stupid question!” you will say, “I have never died!” Well, there are different kinds of deaths. Since the soul cannot die, the soul cannot be said to return to life. The body does die―and we have accounts of Jesus raising three dead bodies to life―(1) the daughter of Jairus, who had only just died (Mark 5; Luke 8); (2) the son of the widow of Naim who had been dead for a while and was being carried to his tomb for burial (Luke 7); (3) the resurrection of Lazarus, the brother of Martha and Mary, who had been in the tomb for several days (John 11).
Even aside from Jesus, his disciples and saints have raised many persons from bodily death to life by the power of God. The excellent book “Saints Who Raised The Dead” (Tan Books, Father Alfred J. Hebert S.M., 2004) documents over 400 true stories of resurrection miracles in the lives of the Saints. Some of the many Saints listed in this book are: St. Francis of Paola, Venerable John Baptist Tholomei, St. Bernardine of Siena, St. John Capistrano, St. Francis of Paola, St. Joseph of Cupertino, St. Peter of Alcantara, St. Dominic, St. Ignatius Loyola, St. Philip Neri, St. Paul of the Cross, St. John Bosco, Blessed James Salomoni, St. Agnes of Montepulciano, Blessed Constantius of Fabrino, Blessed Sadoc and Companions, Blessed Mark of Modena, Blessed Ceslas, Blessed Augustine of Bugela, Colomb a of Rieti, St. Rose of Lima, St. Martin de Porres, St. Francis Solanus, Marianne de Jesus of Quito, Blessed Sebastian of Apparizio, St. Bernard of Abbeville, St. Stanislaus of Cracow, St. James of Tarentaise, St. Cyril of Constantinople, St. Peregrine, St. Philip Benizi, Bl. Peter Armengol, Blessed Eustachio, St. Gerard Majella, St. Charbel Makhlouf, St. Padre Pio, St. Margaret of Cortona, St. Felix of Cantalice, St. Rose of Viterbo, St. Pacific of San Severino, St. Hyacinth, St. Louis Bertrand, St. Francis Xavier, St. John Francis Regis, St. Andrew Bobola; St. Francis Jerome, Brother Antony Pereyra, and St. Patrick, the Apostle of Ireland―to name just a few.
Nevertheless, even thought the soul cannot die, the soul can experience the death of sin ― “You were dead in your offences and sins” (Ephesians 2:1) ― and therefore we speak of the rising of the soul from the death of sin to the life of grace: “Even when we were dead in sins, God has quickened us together in Christ, by whose grace you are saved” (Ephesians 2:5). Some sins are mortal ― they kill the supernatural life in our soul. Mortal sin casts out God and His grace from our souls. With Him goes eternal life. We die inside and fall. “All iniquity is sin and there is a sin unto death! … Whosoever is born of God, sins not” (1 John 5:17-18). “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). The forgiveness of sins and restoration of sanctifying grace a greater miracle than the resurrection of Lazarus from physical death, because Lazarus was merely restored to a temporary life in the world (see John 11).
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Miraculous works can only be performed by Divine power … Miraculous works are beyond natural power. Now the justification of the ungodly is not beyond natural power [Nevertheless, as Christ said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5)] But no other cause except God can justify the ungodly … The justification of the ungodly is a movement whereby the soul is moved by God from a state of sin to a state of justice … The justification of the ungodly is a certain movement whereby the human mind is moved by God from the state of sin to the state of justice … The justification of the ungodly is caused by the justifying grace of the Holy Spirit ... and thus, generally speaking, both the justification of the ungodly and the creation of the world, and every work that can be done by God alone, is miraculous.” (Summa, Ia-IIae, q. 113, articles 6, 7 & 10).
When our souls are raised to life from spiritual death, they regain a share in eternal life. In his Summa Theologica, St. Thomas Aquinas wrote that the miracle of the restoration of sanctifying grace and salvation to a soul is, in God’s eyes, a greater miracle than the creation of the universe itself: “For a just man to be made from a sinner, is greater than to create Heaven and Earth … for Heaven and Earth shall pass away, but the justification of the ungodly shall endure … The good of [sanctifying] grace in one [person] is greater than the good of nature in the whole universe” (Summa, Ia-IIae, q. 113, art. 9). For the material universe is something that is brought into being for a time, but then one day will pass away. A soul that has sanctifying grace is saved for eternal life. The Sacrament of Confession is a Sacrament of spiritual resurrection. The spiritual death―brought about by mortal sin―is overcome and spiritual life is restored by sanctifying grace once again being infused in the soul! How many times have you been resurrected in the Sacrament of Confession? How great is your gratitude? How deep is your humility? How ardent is your love for all those repeated miracles of spiritual resurrection that have taken place throughout your whole life?
When Our Lord healed the ten lepers―leprosy in the body being a symbol of sin in the soul―only one leper was found who came back to Our Lord to give thanks! “There met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off; and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before the feet of Jesus, giving thanks―and this was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering, said: ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the other nine? There is no one found to return and give glory to God, but this stranger!’” (Luke 17:12-18). How many times have we been made clean in the Sacrament of Confession―and how many times have we prostrated ourselves before Our Lord in profuse gratitude? Nowhere near enough times―it is because we think sin is cheap, therefore we imagine forgiveness is cheap, and we decide that penance should be cheap!
How Long Did Your Resurrection Last?
Holy Scripture gives us three instances where Our Lord raised persons from the dead―(1) the daughter of Jairus; (2) the son of the widow of Naim; (3) the resurrection of Lazarus. Our Lord did not perform miraculous resurrections everywhere He went! This should indicate to us that Our Lord will not perform perpetual spiritual resurrections in the Sacrament of Confession. How many times will a doctor perform surgery on a sick patient before finally giving up hope of being to save his life?
As St. Alphonsus Liguori―the patron saint of moral theologians―writes: “God has fixed for each person the number of the days of his life, and the degrees of health and talent which He will give him, so He has also determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more. You say: ‘I am young: there are many who have committed more sins than I have!’ But is God, on that account, obliged to wait for your repentance if you offend him? Say not then, O sinner: ‘As God has forgiven me other sins, so He will pardon me this one if I commit it!’ Say not this―for, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned. ‘Be not without fear about sins forgiven, and add not sin to sin!’ (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). You must, then, tremble at the thought of committing a single mortal sin, particularly if you have already been guilty of mortal sins. God waits with patience until a certain number of sins are committed, but, when the measure of guilt is filled up, He waits no longer, but chastises the sinner.” (Sunday Sermons of St. Alphonsus).
St. Paul warns us of having a complacent attitude towards sin: “When you were the servants of sin … what fruit had you then in those things, of which you are now ashamed? For the end of them is death! For the wages of sin is death! But now, being made free from sin, and become servants to God, you have your fruit unto sanctification, and the end life everlasting in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:20-23)
“Shall we continue in sin? God forbid! For we that are dead to sin, how shall we live any longer in sin? Know you not that all we, who are baptized in Christ Jesus, are baptized in His death. For we are buried together with Him by Baptism into death; so that as Christ is risen from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also may walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection. Knowing this―that our old man is crucified with Him, so that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer!” (Romans 6:1-6).
The Newness of Life
God wants us to change―but we don’t want to change! God wants us to change our sinful ways into virtuous ways―but we are too entrenched and too attached to our sinful ways. Vice and virtue cannot co-exist. Sin and grace cannot co-exist. God and the world cannot co-exist. Believers and unbelievers cannot co-exist: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
As Our Lord Himself said: “They do not put new wine into old bottles. Otherwise the bottles break, and the wine runs out and the bottles perish. But they put new wine into new bottles―and both are preserved!” (Matthew 9:17) ... “No man puts new wine into old bottles―otherwise the wine will burst the bottles, and both the wine will be spilled, and the bottles will be lost. But new wine must be put into new bottles” (Mark 2:22). Christ has come to make all things new: “Behold, I make all things new!” (Apocalypse 21:5). “If then any be in Christ a new creature, the old things are passed away―behold all things are made new!” (2 Corinthians 5:17). “Remember not former things, and look not on things of old!” (Isaias 43:18). “No man putting his hand to the plough and then looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:62). “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste” (1 Corinthians 5:7). “Put off the old man, who is corrupted and put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness of truth!” (Ephesians 4:22-24). “Stripping yourselves of the old man with his deeds and putting on the new” (Colossians 3:9-10). “Be not conformed to this world, but be reformed in the newness of your mind” (Romans 12:2).
Locked Into Lent
Each year’s Lenten season should be looked upon as a lock on the canal. A lock is a device used for raising and lowering boats, ships and other watercraft between stretches of water of different levels on river and canal. You could loosely compare a series of locks to a staircase―which helps raise a boat from a lower level to a higher level (or vice-versa). Each Lent should see us rise to a higher spiritual level―which we should maintain until the next Lent comes along, and then we should rise to an even higher level. Unfortunately, that is not what happens. Once Lent is over―people go back to their old ways!
“As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly!” (Proverbs 26:11). “Flying from the pollutions of the world, through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome―and their latter state is become unto them worse than the former! For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of justice, than after they have known it, to turn back from that which was delivered to them! For, that of the true proverb has happened to them: ‘The dog is returned to his vomit!’ and, ‘The sow that was washed, returned to her wallowing in the mire!’” (2 Peter 2:20-22).
Loosing the Sense of Sin
Sadly, that is how most Catholics operate―they wash themselves in the confessional, but then return to mire of sin soon afterwards. Rather than using Lent as a lock that each year raises us higher and higher in the spiritual life―Lent is nothing other than a vicious circle, where the gains of Lent lead to the losses of Easter and the rest of the year. One, two, or three steps forward are followed by the same number of steps backward. Lenten fasting and abstinence leads to feasting and gluttony afterwards. Abstaining from alcohol leads to a non-Lenten over-indulgence in alcohol―and so on and so forth with most other virtues and their opposite vices. There is really no effort to quit sin altogether―and the words of Our Lord and Holy Scripture are ignored or even rejected: “Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14) … “Go! And now sin no more!” (John 8:11) ... “Be not without fear about sin forgiven―and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). As recent popes have said―even the Liberal and Modernist popes―people have lost the sense of sin:
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
The valid complaints of these popes are corroborated and verified by the unbelievable falling-away from the Sacrament of Confession. As one modern mainstream Catholic priest wrote in 2021: “In Catholic circles in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, patterns of regular confession that were once in abundance began to fade. While frequent confession became a thing of the past, Catholics continued to receive Communion.” Surveys show that to be true. Between 1965 and 1975, according to the National Opinion Research Council, the proportion of Catholics who confessed monthly fell from 38% to 17%. A University of Notre Dame study in the 1980s showed the decline continuing. In a 1997 poll by the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research at the University of Connecticut, only 10% of Catholics surveyed said that they confessed at least once a month; another 10% said they never went to confession at all. By 2015, a Pew Research Center survey showed that only 7% of Catholics went to Confession monthly; only 14% went several times a year; 21% only went once a year; 23% went less than once a year; and 35% no longer went to Confession. More recent statistics indicate that 45% of Catholics in the USA have never confessed since making the first Confession after coming of age. Almost 90% of those who line up to commune in the United States every Sunday [but take note that only around 15% of all Catholics go to Mass regularly each Sunday―so 90% of those 15%], and 95% of regular communicants in certain areas of Northern Europe and 60 to 80% in Italy are not even confessing once a year.
Some might appeal to the Code of Canon Law―where both the Old Code of Canon Law and the more recent New Code of Canon Law―which says: “After having reached the age of discretion, each member of the faithful is obliged to confess faithfully his or her grave sins at least once a year” (New Code of Canon Law, §989). “Grave sins” here means “mortal sins.” The Sacrament of Confession is required for those who commit mortal sins after their Baptism―the Council of Trent states: “For those who after baptism have fallen into sin, the Sacrament of Penance is as necessary unto salvation as is Baptism itself is necessary for those who have not yet been regenerated” (Council of Trent, Sess. XIV, c. 2). Even today’s modern Catechism states: “Christ instituted the Sacrament of Penance for all sinful members of His Church: above all for those who, since Baptism, have fallen into grave sin, and have thus lost their baptismal grace and wounded ecclesial communion. It is to them that the Sacrament of Penance offers a new possibility to convert and to recover the grace of justification [sanctifying grace]. The Fathers of the Church present this Sacrament as “the second plank [of salvation] after the shipwreck which is the loss of [sanctifying] grace.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, §1446).
For a sin to be mortal, three conditions must be met: grave matter, full knowledge, and complete consent. Yet absence of full knowledge does not always excuse from mortal―when it a culpable lack of knowledge, meaning that you lack knowledge that you SHOULD have, but do not have due to neglect, laziness, indifference, etc. Otherwise, a Catholic could refuse to learn about the Faith and thereby make the lame claim: “I didn’t know that such and such a thing was a mortal sin!” Easy way out, huh? Not with God! Such persons will get their just desserts!
Okay―the obligation to confess sins once a year only applies to mortal sins. Therefore, if you have not committed any mortal sins, then you are not obliged to confess once a year. Nevertheless, even the present day modern Catechism adds: “Without being strictly necessary, confession of everyday faults (venial sins) is nevertheless strongly recommended by the Church. Indeed the regular confession of our venial sins helps us form our conscience, fight against evil tendencies.” (CCC §1458).
So―since very few Catholics go to Confession, does that mean that most Catholics are no longer committing mortal sins? Have we really become so holy? Statistics show the opposite―there is far more mortal sin being committed today than ever before―it is just that Catholics have lost the sense of sin, they have created their own personal moral values where things like deliberately missing Sunday Mass; drunkenness; masturbation; impure thoughts; viewing immodest material (never mind pornography!) and even abortion are no longer sins for the modern-day Catholic.
Losing the Faith and Losing Grace
As regards Catholic teaching and belief in the Real Presence of Christ with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity in the Holy Eucharist―around 40% of Catholics no longer believe this teaching, instead they believe that the transubstantiated Bread and Wine at Holy Mass are ONLY symbols of the Body and Blood of Christ. Other surveys show numbers far greater than 40% ― some of them claiming that disbelieve in the Real Presence among Catholics is as high 70%.
Majorities of former Catholics who are now unaffiliated with any religion also cite having stopped believing in Catholicism’s teachings overall (65%) or dissatisfaction with Catholic teachings about abortion and homosexuality (56%), and almost half (48%) cite dissatisfaction with church teachings about birth control, as reasons for leaving Catholicism. These reasons are cited less commonly by former Catholics who have become Protestant; 50% say they stopped believing in Catholicism’s teachings, 23% say they differed with the Catholic Church on issues such as abortion and homosexuality, and only 16% say they were unhappy with Catholic teachings on birth control.
Increasing numbers of Catholics believe that you be saved in any religion! It doesn’t help matters when the Pope utters the same foolishness! An off-shoot of this is seen in the inter-denominational marriages, whereby Catholics have no problem marrying someone from another religion. Some Catholics no longer believe in the necessity of Baptism―and no longer baptize their children. Similarly with Confession―increasing numbers of Catholics belief that they can confess their sins directly to God and do not have to confess through a priest.
Similarly, increasing numbers of Catholics nowadays find acceptable and normal what is in reality a mortal sin―23% do not think that abortion is sinful; 40% do not think it is sinful to have homosexual relations; 33% do not think it is sinful to live together without marriage; 25% think it not sinful to use contraceptives; 75% of young American Catholics believe you can be a good Catholic without attending Sunday Mass; etc.
Is There Any Hope of These Souls Resurrecting From Their Erroneous Sinful Attitudes?
Most of the above rebellious attitudes are mortal sins of themselves. Consequently, it must be tragically surmised that most of the Catholic world is in a state of mortal sin. The same could possibly be said of the few Catholics who do go to the Sacrament of Confession―in view of what St. Alphonsus Liguori, a Doctor of the Church, writes: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil not of rare occurrence, but frequent, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.”
Our Lady of Fatima came to beg for many prayers and sacrifices for the salvation of so many souls who are falling into Hell because there is hardly anyone who seeks to resurrect them from this death of mortal sin. “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
Article 2
Easter Monday, April 1st
The Risen Jesus Was Unrecognizable!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Easter Monday, April 1st
The Risen Jesus Was Unrecognizable!
This article is currently being written. Sections will posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Who Is This Man?
From the moment Jesus rose from the dead He was unrecognizable! Even His nearest and dearest failed to recognize Him, or at least had a very hard time recognizing Him. Mary Magdalen fails to recognize Him; the Apostles fail to recognize Him; the two disciples on the road to Emmaus fail to recognize Him. Let us take a look at this puzzling factor by first looking at the Scriptural accounts of this problem.
Mary Magdalen Does Not Recognize Him
The first recorded encounter with the resurrected Jesus is that concerning Mary Magdalen: “But Mary stood at the outside the sepulcher, weeping. Now as she was weeping, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulcher, and she saw two angels in white, sitting, one at the head, and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus had been laid. They said to her: ‘Woman, why weepest thou?’ She said to them: ‘Because they have taken away my Lord; and I know not where they have laid Him!’ When she had thus spoken, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing; and she knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her: ‘Woman, why weepest thou?’ Whom seekest thou?’ She, thinking it was the gardener, said to Him: ‘Sir, if Thou hast taken him hence, tell me where Thou hast laid Him, and I will take Him away!’ Jesus said to her: ‘Mary!’ She turning, said to Him: ‘Rabboni!’ –which is to say, ‘Master’” (John 20:11-16).
The Emmaus Bound Disciples Do Not Recognize Him
The next recorded account is that of two disciples of Jesus on the road to Emmaus. They were disconsolate and saddened at the apparent failure of Jesus’ mission, which had been ended by His death.
“Behold, two of them went, the same day, to a town which was sixty furlongs from Jerusalem, named Emmaus. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass, that while they talked and reasoned with themselves, Jesus Himself also drawing near, went with them. But their eyes were held, that they should not know Him.
“And He said to them: ‘What are these discourses that you hold one with another as you walk, and are sad?’ And the one of them, whose name was Cleophas, answering, said to Him: ‘Art thou only a stranger to Jerusalem, and has not known the things that have been done there in these days?’ To whom He said: ‘What things?’
"And they said: ‘Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet, mighty in work and word before God and all the people; and how our chief priests and princes delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him. But we hoped that it was He that should have redeemed Israel! And now, besides all this, today is the third day since these things were done. Yea and certain women, also of our company, affrighted us, who, before it was light, were at the sepulcher, and not finding His body, came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, who say that He is alive. And some of our people went to the sepulcher, and found it so as the women had said, but Him they found not!’
“Then He said to them: ‘O foolish and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken! Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into His glory?’ And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures, the things that were written concerning Him.
"And they drew near to the town, where they were going: and He made as though He would go farther. But they constrained Him, saying: ‘Stay with us, because it is towards evening, and the day is now far spent!’ And He went in with them. And it came to pass, whilst He was at table with them, He took bread, and blessed, and broke, and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew Him: and He vanished out of their sight” (Luke 24:13-31).
Our Lord Appears to Peter
The two disciples, in their excitement, high-tailed back to Jerusalem, to tell all the other followers of Jesus that they had seen Jesus alive—only to have their balloon burst by being told that Jesus had already appeared to St. Peter—though in this case we do not know whether or not Peter recognized Him: “They went back to Jerusalem and they found the Eleven gathered together, and those that were staying with them, saying: ‘The Lord is risen indeed! And has appeared to Simon!’” (Luke 24:33-34).
Our Lord ‘Gate-Crashes’
While they were busy exchanging stories of how Our Lord had appeared to (Simon) Peter and then to the two disciples, Our Lord suddenly appears in their midst! “Now whilst they were speaking these things, Jesus stood in the midst of them, and said to them: ‘Peace be to you; it is I, fear not!’ But they being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit … And He said to them: ‘Why are you troubled, and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet, that it is I Myself! Handle, and see―for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have. And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet. But they yet believed not, and wondered for joy” (Luke 24:36-41).
Jesus and Doubting Thomas
While they were still in Jerusalem, Jesus appeared twice to His Apostles—once in the absence of Thomas (see above paragraph), and the second time in the presence of Thomas. “Now Thomas, one of the Twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Except I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe!’
“And after eight days again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst of them and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put in thy finger here and see My hands; and bring here thy hand, and put it into My side―and be not faithless, but believing!’ Thomas answered and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because thou hast seen Me, Thomas, thou hast believed―blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:24-29).
Jesus at the Sea of Tiberias
The third time that Jesus appeared to a group of His disciples was in Galilee. Again, they did not recognize Jesus, though some sensed that the person that they saw could possibly be Jesus. It is John, the beloved Apostle of Love, who first senses it might be Jesus. Love somehow knows these things!
“Jesus showed Himself again to the disciples at the sea of Tiberias. And He showed Himself after this manner. There were together Simon Peter, and Thomas, who is called Didymus, and Nathanael, who was of Cana of Galilee, and the sons of Zebedee, and two others of His disciples. Simon Peter said to them: ‘I am going fishing!’ They said to him: ‘We will also come with thee!’ And they went forth, and entered into the ship: and that night they caught nothing. But when the morning was come, Jesus stood on the shore: yet the disciples knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus therefore said to them: ‘Children, have you any meat?’ They answered Him: ‘No!’ He said to them: ‘Cast the net on the right side of the ship, and you shall find!’ They cast therefore; and now they were not able to draw it, for the multitude of fishes.
“That disciple whom Jesus loved, said to Peter: ‘It is the Lord!’ Simon Peter, when he heard that it was the Lord, girt his coat about him, (for he was naked,) and cast himself into the sea. But the other disciples came in the ship, (for they were not far from the land, but as it were two hundred cubits,) dragging the net with fishes. As soon then as they came to land, they saw hot coals lying, and a fish laid thereon, and bread. Jesus said to them: ‘Bring here the fishes which you have now caught!’ Simon Peter went up, and drew the net to land, full of great fishes, one hundred and fifty-three. And although there were so many, the net was not broken. Jesus said to them: ‘Come, and dine!’ And none of them, who were at meat, dared ask Him: ‘Who art thou?’ knowing that it was the Lord” (John 21:1-12).
A Mountain in Galilee
While they were in Galilee, Jesus also appeared to them upon a mountain. However, not all His disciples believed that what they were seeing was truly Jesus: “And the Eleven Disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them. And seeing Him they adored: but some doubted” (Matthew 28:16-17). Once again, in some way, Jesus is unrecognizable.
Why Does Jesus Do This?
Why does Jesus make Himself unrecognizable? Why doesn't He appear to His followers in a way that they can easily recognize Him? What is the point of all this?
From the moment Jesus rose from the dead He was unrecognizable! Even His nearest and dearest failed to recognize Him, or at least had a very hard time recognizing Him. Mary Magdalen fails to recognize Him; the Apostles fail to recognize Him; the two disciples on the road to Emmaus fail to recognize Him. Let us take a look at this puzzling factor by first looking at the Scriptural accounts of this problem.
Mary Magdalen Does Not Recognize Him
The first recorded encounter with the resurrected Jesus is that concerning Mary Magdalen: “But Mary stood at the outside the sepulcher, weeping. Now as she was weeping, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulcher, and she saw two angels in white, sitting, one at the head, and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus had been laid. They said to her: ‘Woman, why weepest thou?’ She said to them: ‘Because they have taken away my Lord; and I know not where they have laid Him!’ When she had thus spoken, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing; and she knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her: ‘Woman, why weepest thou?’ Whom seekest thou?’ She, thinking it was the gardener, said to Him: ‘Sir, if Thou hast taken him hence, tell me where Thou hast laid Him, and I will take Him away!’ Jesus said to her: ‘Mary!’ She turning, said to Him: ‘Rabboni!’ –which is to say, ‘Master’” (John 20:11-16).
The Emmaus Bound Disciples Do Not Recognize Him
The next recorded account is that of two disciples of Jesus on the road to Emmaus. They were disconsolate and saddened at the apparent failure of Jesus’ mission, which had been ended by His death.
“Behold, two of them went, the same day, to a town which was sixty furlongs from Jerusalem, named Emmaus. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass, that while they talked and reasoned with themselves, Jesus Himself also drawing near, went with them. But their eyes were held, that they should not know Him.
“And He said to them: ‘What are these discourses that you hold one with another as you walk, and are sad?’ And the one of them, whose name was Cleophas, answering, said to Him: ‘Art thou only a stranger to Jerusalem, and has not known the things that have been done there in these days?’ To whom He said: ‘What things?’
"And they said: ‘Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet, mighty in work and word before God and all the people; and how our chief priests and princes delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him. But we hoped that it was He that should have redeemed Israel! And now, besides all this, today is the third day since these things were done. Yea and certain women, also of our company, affrighted us, who, before it was light, were at the sepulcher, and not finding His body, came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, who say that He is alive. And some of our people went to the sepulcher, and found it so as the women had said, but Him they found not!’
“Then He said to them: ‘O foolish and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken! Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into His glory?’ And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures, the things that were written concerning Him.
"And they drew near to the town, where they were going: and He made as though He would go farther. But they constrained Him, saying: ‘Stay with us, because it is towards evening, and the day is now far spent!’ And He went in with them. And it came to pass, whilst He was at table with them, He took bread, and blessed, and broke, and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew Him: and He vanished out of their sight” (Luke 24:13-31).
Our Lord Appears to Peter
The two disciples, in their excitement, high-tailed back to Jerusalem, to tell all the other followers of Jesus that they had seen Jesus alive—only to have their balloon burst by being told that Jesus had already appeared to St. Peter—though in this case we do not know whether or not Peter recognized Him: “They went back to Jerusalem and they found the Eleven gathered together, and those that were staying with them, saying: ‘The Lord is risen indeed! And has appeared to Simon!’” (Luke 24:33-34).
Our Lord ‘Gate-Crashes’
While they were busy exchanging stories of how Our Lord had appeared to (Simon) Peter and then to the two disciples, Our Lord suddenly appears in their midst! “Now whilst they were speaking these things, Jesus stood in the midst of them, and said to them: ‘Peace be to you; it is I, fear not!’ But they being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit … And He said to them: ‘Why are you troubled, and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet, that it is I Myself! Handle, and see―for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have. And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet. But they yet believed not, and wondered for joy” (Luke 24:36-41).
Jesus and Doubting Thomas
While they were still in Jerusalem, Jesus appeared twice to His Apostles—once in the absence of Thomas (see above paragraph), and the second time in the presence of Thomas. “Now Thomas, one of the Twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Except I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe!’
“And after eight days again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst of them and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put in thy finger here and see My hands; and bring here thy hand, and put it into My side―and be not faithless, but believing!’ Thomas answered and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because thou hast seen Me, Thomas, thou hast believed―blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:24-29).
Jesus at the Sea of Tiberias
The third time that Jesus appeared to a group of His disciples was in Galilee. Again, they did not recognize Jesus, though some sensed that the person that they saw could possibly be Jesus. It is John, the beloved Apostle of Love, who first senses it might be Jesus. Love somehow knows these things!
“Jesus showed Himself again to the disciples at the sea of Tiberias. And He showed Himself after this manner. There were together Simon Peter, and Thomas, who is called Didymus, and Nathanael, who was of Cana of Galilee, and the sons of Zebedee, and two others of His disciples. Simon Peter said to them: ‘I am going fishing!’ They said to him: ‘We will also come with thee!’ And they went forth, and entered into the ship: and that night they caught nothing. But when the morning was come, Jesus stood on the shore: yet the disciples knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus therefore said to them: ‘Children, have you any meat?’ They answered Him: ‘No!’ He said to them: ‘Cast the net on the right side of the ship, and you shall find!’ They cast therefore; and now they were not able to draw it, for the multitude of fishes.
“That disciple whom Jesus loved, said to Peter: ‘It is the Lord!’ Simon Peter, when he heard that it was the Lord, girt his coat about him, (for he was naked,) and cast himself into the sea. But the other disciples came in the ship, (for they were not far from the land, but as it were two hundred cubits,) dragging the net with fishes. As soon then as they came to land, they saw hot coals lying, and a fish laid thereon, and bread. Jesus said to them: ‘Bring here the fishes which you have now caught!’ Simon Peter went up, and drew the net to land, full of great fishes, one hundred and fifty-three. And although there were so many, the net was not broken. Jesus said to them: ‘Come, and dine!’ And none of them, who were at meat, dared ask Him: ‘Who art thou?’ knowing that it was the Lord” (John 21:1-12).
A Mountain in Galilee
While they were in Galilee, Jesus also appeared to them upon a mountain. However, not all His disciples believed that what they were seeing was truly Jesus: “And the Eleven Disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them. And seeing Him they adored: but some doubted” (Matthew 28:16-17). Once again, in some way, Jesus is unrecognizable.
Why Does Jesus Do This?
Why does Jesus make Himself unrecognizable? Why doesn't He appear to His followers in a way that they can easily recognize Him? What is the point of all this?
Article 1
Easter Sunday, March 31st
Christ Won! Will You?
Easter Sunday, March 31st
Christ Won! Will You?
The Joy of Victory!
Victory brings joy! We even see that on a flimsy, superficial, worldly level—such as a sports team winning a trophy, or person winning a race or some other competition, or in winning the lottery! The exuberance, emotion, exhilaration and joy often “shoots through the roof!” How much more joy is there in victory over death?!! Imagine the joy of Martha and Mary in seeing their beloved dead brother being raised to back to life by Jesus! (John 11:1-45). Imagine the joy of widow of Naim, whose only son had died and was being carried to his tomb, when Jesus ‘chanced’ to pass by and brought him back to life (Luke 7:11-17). Imagine the joy of the ruler of the synagogue who had his daughter brought back to life (Matthew 9:23-26; Mark 5:38-43; Luke 8:49-56). Therefore, you can imagine the eventual joy (for at first many did not believe) of the Apostles and followers of Jesus when they realized that He had actually risen from the dead!
The Multiform Victory of Christ
Attacked from all sides—by the Sadducees (priests); the Scribes and Pharisees; by the mob or heartless cowardly crowd; by Pilate, Herod, Annas, Caiphas, the Roman soldiers; betrayed by Judas; abandoned by most of His Apostles; and last of all attacked by the devils themselves—the irrepressible Jesus, after His horrendous beating, emerges victorious!
Jesus Looked a Failure and a Loser as He Died on the Cross
Today the world looks upon those who are religious as losers. They mock us, like they mocked Christ. Our Lord said that if they have hated Me then they will also hate you. Let us not become cowards just because we are mocked and laughed at. He who laughs last, laughs longest. Those who laugh now at religion, will gnash and grind their teeth as they howl and wail for eternity.
Victory Over His Murderers
“Be not afraid of them who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do” (Luke 12:4) He was afraid, but He chose to walk into the jaws of death so as to come out alive. “For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel shall save it” (Mark 8:35). Don’t waste your life things that don’t matter, you may lose your eternal life over those things. Do not seek a long life, but rather a good one. Do not be afraid of martyrdom if it may come your way. “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Victory Over the Doubters and Unbelievers
“Let Christ the king of Israel come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe.” Yet, as Jesus had once said: “Which is easier, to say to the sick of the palsy: Thy sins are forgiven thee; or to say: Arise, take up thy bed, and walk?” (Mark 2:9); now, dying on Calvary, He could say: “Which is easier? To come down from this cross while I am still alive, or to rise from the dead once I have died?” As always, Our Lord chose the most difficult option.
He did much more than come down from the Cross whilst alive! He came out of the tomb when He was dead! Let us beg Him to conquer our unbelief...our unbelief or doubts, for example, about the Holy Eucharist, our unbelief or doubts about eternal life, our unbelief or doubts in the power of prayer, our unbelief or doubts about the devil, our unbelief or doubts about the existence of Hell, or whatever unbelief or doubts that we may be guilty of.
Victory Over Death
Say what you will, but most people fear death! Some will even renounce the Faith if threatened with death. Death is the penultimate punishment, which the punishment of Hell still manages to trump. The wage for sin is death. Yet Our Lord came to remove our fears over death.
Death where is thy sting? Through the old Adam death came into the world, because he ate a forbidden fruit from a tree. Now the new Adam, bore a new fruit on the tree of the Cross and through partaking of that fruit we have life eternal. Look at the lacerated, bruised, beaten, wounded body that hung on the cross and now is unrecognizable in His resurrection. Do not fear or flee your sufferings, for they will be your source of grace and glory. He had raised three persons from the dead while He was alive, now He raised Himself from the dead as He had predicted and when He had predicted. So too will He raise you and your loved ones from the dead on the last day. Do not fear so much as the death of mortal sin. Yet there too He raises from the dead of the tomb of confessional in which we bury ourselves. We enter dead to God and come out alive.
Victory Over the Devil
The devil was not sure who He was! His holiness enraged the devil so much that he plotted and waged war against Christ—as he will wage war against you the holier you try to become, stirring all manner of things against you. Yet by His humble acceptance and meekness in face of this onslaught, Christ bore the victory. He used the weight oh His enemies attack against his enemy. The greater the rage, the greater the defeat. Let us learn from Our Lord not to fear the devil, and above all not to love him and his allurements. The devil can do nothing without the permission and agreement of God.
Victory Over the World
Jesus did not rise from the dead to live in the world. After His resurrection, He could have lived in the world till the end of time; but He did not rise to live here forever. He rose from the dead to go to Heaven. He died for this world, but He also died to this world. He took nothing of this world with Him, nor shall we when we die. Let us not live as though it was only this world that matters. Especially the young ones, who have not yet tasted the poison that Satan offers under the glitter and charm of the world around us. Do not compromise your soul and your salvation for a cheap sin. What a way to repay your God who died for you in order to help you stay clean.
A Bunch of Disbelievers in His Victory!
The varying degrees of sadness, sorrow, discouragement, disillusionment and depression that hit the Apostles and disciples at the news and sight of Christ’s crucifixion and death was not wanted, intended or sent by God. Such negative reactions were purely the work of Satan and/or a too naturalistic and human spirit. Our Lord would point that out to two of His disciples whom He appeared to on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus after His resurrection from the dead.
“And behold, two of them [the disciples of Jesus] went, the same day, to a town which was sixty furlongs from Jerusalem, named Emmaus. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass, that while they talked and reasoned with themselves, Jesus Himself also drawing near, went with them. But their eyes were held, that they should not know Him. And He said to them: ‘What are these discourses that you hold one with another as you walk, and are sad?’ And the one of them, whose name was Cleophas, answering, said to Him: ‘Art Thou only a stranger to Jerusalem, and hast not known the things that have been done there in these days?’ To whom Jesus said: ‘What things?’ And they said: ‘Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, Who was a prophet, mighty in work and word before God and all the people; and how our chief priests and princes delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him. But we hoped that it was He that should have redeemed Israel! And now, besides all this, today is the third day since these things were done! And certain women, also of our company, frightened us―who, before it was light, were at the sepulcher, and, not finding His Body, came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, who say that He is alive! And some of our people went to the sepulcher and found it so as the women had said―but Him they found not!’ Then Jesus said to them: ‘O foolish and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken! Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into His glory?’ And, beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded to them all the things in the Scriptures that were concerning Him” (Luke 24:13-27).
We all know how St. Thomas was in disbelief about the Resurrection―but so too were all the Apostles and disciples! To them, Jesus was dead and buried―and all His plans with Him! The Gospels account of Our Lord apparitions after His resurrection designate Mary Magdalen as being the first person to whom Jesus appeared (though tradition tells us that Our Lady was the first person He appeared to). For Mary Magdalen, too, Jesus was “dead and buried” and this had made her disconsolate. “Mary Magdalen stood outside the sepulcher, weeping. Now, as she was weeping, she stooped down and looked into the sepulcher. And she saw two angels in white, sitting―one at the head and one at the feet―where the body of Jesus had been laid. They said to her: ‘Woman, why weepest thou?’ She said to them: ‘Because they have taken away my Lord―and I know not where they have laid Him!’ When she had said this, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing―and she knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her: ‘Woman, why weepest thou?’ Whom seekest thou?’ She, thinking it was the gardener, said to Him: ‘Sir! If thou hast taken Him from here, tell me where thou hast laid Him, and I will take Him away!’ Jesus said to her: ‘Mary!’ She turning, said to Him: ‘Rabboni!’ (which is to say, ‘Master!’). Jesus said to her: ‘Do not touch Me―for I am not yet ascended to My Father! But go to My brethren and tell them that I ascend to My Father and to your Father, to My God and your God!’” (John 20:11-17).
Yet when Mary ran back and told the Apostles and other disciples that Jesus has appeared to her, they did not believe her! That led to Our Lord appearing to them in person! “Jesus stood in the midst of them and said to them: ‘Peace be to you! It is I, fear not!’ But they, being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit. And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you troubled? And why do these thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet―and know that it is I Myself! Touch and see―for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have!’ And, when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet―yet they believed not” (Luke 24:36-41).
As regards the “Doubting Thomas”, Holy Scripture tells us that “Thomas, one of the Twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Unless I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side―I will not believe!’ And after eight days, again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus cometh, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put in thy finger here and see My hands! And bring here thy hand and put it into My side! And be not faithless―but believing!’ Thomas answered and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because thou hast seen Me, Thomas, thou hast believed! Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:29).
Which Turning Will You Take at the Easter Crossroads?
Now that Lent is over and Easter is here―what road will you take? Will you, like the two disciples on the road to Emmaus after the crucifixion, walk away from Jerusalem? Or will you stay where you are? In other words, there are those who walk away from the progress they may have made during Lent, and walk back into their old habits. Whereas there are some―admittedly few―who not only maintain the progress that they have made, but also build upon it.
All Change!
The resurrection of Our Lord sees Him come back much changed and much different to what He was before. So much so, that He is not even recognized by His nearest and dearest! Something similar is seen in the apparition of St. Dominic Savio after his death, when he came to St. John Bosco—his teacher and confessor while he was still on Earth. St. John Bosco did not recognize him and had to ask: “Is that you Dominic?”
New Life!
Our Lord had passed through the barrier of suffering and death and emerged on the other side in His new life, His glorious life, a life in His glorified body. This should teach us that, after the suffering and attempts to kill sin, during the season of Lent, we should be emerging from Lent as ‘new-beings’ with a new attitude and a new life-style.
Saul Resurrects as Paul
St. Paul, too, went through his ‘three-days-of death’ or, rather, ‘three-days-of-darkness’ when he was struck blind by Jesus on the road to Damascus. He then went through his own ‘Lent’ by praying and not eating or drinking for three days: “And he was there three days, without sight, and he did neither eat nor drink” (Acts 9:9).
In the meantime, God was preparing Saul for a new life. Saul would be given a new name—Paul (like Simon was renamed Peter). He would be given a new mission—instead of rounding up Christians to arrest them; he would now round up people and make them into Christians.
“And the Lord said to Ananias: ‘Arise, and go into the street that is called Strait, and seek in the house of Judas, one named Saul of Tarsus. For behold he prayeth!’ (And he saw a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hands upon him, that he might receive his sight.) But Ananias answered: ‘Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to Thy saints in Jerusalem. And here he hath authority from the chief priests to bind all that invoke Thy Name!’ And the Lord said to him: ‘Go thy way; for this man is to Me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!’” (Acts 9:1-16).
I was blind! Now I see!
This should also be the case for ourselves, who have been blind and, like Saul, by our sins, have persecuted Christ. Our Lord could well say to us the words He addressed to Saul (Paul): “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?” (Acts 9:4). Yet the mercy of Christ transformed the soul of Saul into the pillar of Paul, but not without pain and suffering.
Suffering After His Resurrection
The new Paul was destined to pay for his past sins by suffering throughout his new ‘risen’ or ‘resurrected’ life. Paul himself lists some of the many sufferings that he had endured in the short time since his ‘resurrection’:
“In many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Besides those things which are without: my daily instance, the solicitude for all the churches.
“Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is scandalized, and I am not on fire? If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity. My daily instance: The labors that come in, and press upon me every day. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is blessed for ever, knoweth that I lie not. At Damascus, the governor of the nation under Aretas the king, guarded the city of the Damascenes, to apprehend me. And through a window in a basket was I let down by the wall, and so escaped his hands …
“But for myself I will glory nothing, but in my infirmities. For though I should have a mind to glory, I shall not be foolish; for I will say the truth. But I forbear, lest any man should think of me above that which he seeth in me, or any thing he heareth from me. And lest the greatness of the revelations should exalt me, there was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me. For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me. And He said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee; for power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may dwell in me. For which cause I please myself in my infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ. For when I am weak, then am I powerful” (2 Corinthians 11:23-33; 12:1-10).
Don’t Go Back!
Our Easter should see, likewise, a resurrection in ourselves. We should not go back to our old ways, like the dog goes back to his vomit: “As a dog that returneth to his vomit, so is the fool that repeateth his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). There are too many Catholics, who, now that Lent is over, will go back to a life of self-indulgence and over-indulgence. They just don’t get it! They do not understand! “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding: who have eyes, and see not: and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21).
In very first readings of the first two Masses of Easter (the Midnight Mass and the Day Mass), the Church clearly tells us that we have to change! This is the very first message of Easter! That the old ways have to be cast far away from us, so that we live a new, resurrected, better and more holy life:
The Church’s Easter Message
“Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened: for Christ our Pasch is sacrificed. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (Epistle from Midnight Mass: 1 Corinthians 5:7-8).
“Brethren: If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God: mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth. For you are dead [to the world and sin], and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ shall appear, who is your life, then you also shall appear with Him in glory” (Epistle from the Day Mass: Colossians 3:1-4).
Christ Rises With His Wounds
The second point that is worth mentioning and imprinting upon our minds and hearts, is the fact that Our Lord rises from the dead WITH his wounds still visible. He could have healed Himself totally, but He chose to keep His wounds like a stigmata.
He also leaves His shroud to us as a relic and a reminder of His Passion. He doesn’t want to be remembered so much for His resurrection, as He wants to be remembered for His Passion and Death. It was the latter that redeemed us and brought about the defeat of the devil, sin and death.
We have arrived at the crossroads of Lent and Easter―yet that does not mean that we must now cast the cross off at the side of the road! Just because Lent is over, it does not mean an end to penance and sacrifice. Penance and sacrifice are the bread and butter of the Christian life. It should be the staple diet of any and every Christian. Our Lady calls for penance at Lourdes and sacrifice at Fatima. Our Lord clearly told us: “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross DAILY, and follow me” (Luke 9:23). “Daily” means every day of the year and not just Lent. Our Lord and Our Lady suffered every single day of their lives—not just during the Passion or Seven isolated Sorrows! And Our Lord told us: “I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Delighting the Devil
If we go back to our pre-Lenten attitudes and lifestyle, then we are insanely going backwards when we should going forwards—to the devil’s delight! Celebrating Easter does not mean over-indulging or, even less, going back to the venial or even mortal sins of the past! Otherwise, we end up caressing Our Lord with our extra prayers and sacrifices during Lent, and then go back to slapping Him around after Lent is over!
Maintain your Higher Spiritual Levels Gained During Lent
Though we may not be required to fast outside of Lent (though it is not forbidden to do so, for fasting is a wonderful weapon against the devil—who does not just work during Lent, but all-year-round!), we can and still should ‘fast’ from sin, occasions of sin, worldliness and frivolity. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4) … For the word of God cannot survive in a worldly atmosphere, “the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things entering in choke the word, and it is made fruitless” (Mark 4:19).
God Wants to Save; But Many Don’t Want His Terms
Even though “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17), “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not ... In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:4-11).
St. Paul was in darkness, which got worse and ended up with him being blinded as a means of driving home to him the extent of his spiritual blindness. Let the scales fall from our eyes as they fell from his eyes; so that we can see the new life that God has mapped out for us, beginning with this Easter season! How many Catholics and how many times have they rejected God’s invitation to come to the spiritual banquet of a new life at Easter? God may well say one day: “The marriage indeed is ready; but they that were invited were not worthy!’ And he said to his servants: ‘Go ye therefore into the highways; and as many as you shall find, call to the marriage!’” (Matthew 22:8-9).
Listen to Your Mother!
Let us not ignore God’s invitation, nor test His patience: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked” (Galatians 6:7). Let us take the advice of Holy Mother Church, as given at the very start of this Easter season: “Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth … If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God: mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth. For you are dead [to the world and sin], and your life is hid with Christ in God” (Epistles from the Midnight Mass and the Day Mass: 1 Corinthians 5:7-8; Colossians 3:1-4).
Celebrate we must, but our celebration is more spiritual (to satisfy the soul) than it is carnal (to satisfy the body). We do not see Our Lord ‘living-it-up’ after His resurrection by indulging in joys of the body, but we see Him giving much spiritual joy to His disciples. Let us imitate Our Lord! A happy, holy and joyous Easter to all!
Victory brings joy! We even see that on a flimsy, superficial, worldly level—such as a sports team winning a trophy, or person winning a race or some other competition, or in winning the lottery! The exuberance, emotion, exhilaration and joy often “shoots through the roof!” How much more joy is there in victory over death?!! Imagine the joy of Martha and Mary in seeing their beloved dead brother being raised to back to life by Jesus! (John 11:1-45). Imagine the joy of widow of Naim, whose only son had died and was being carried to his tomb, when Jesus ‘chanced’ to pass by and brought him back to life (Luke 7:11-17). Imagine the joy of the ruler of the synagogue who had his daughter brought back to life (Matthew 9:23-26; Mark 5:38-43; Luke 8:49-56). Therefore, you can imagine the eventual joy (for at first many did not believe) of the Apostles and followers of Jesus when they realized that He had actually risen from the dead!
The Multiform Victory of Christ
Attacked from all sides—by the Sadducees (priests); the Scribes and Pharisees; by the mob or heartless cowardly crowd; by Pilate, Herod, Annas, Caiphas, the Roman soldiers; betrayed by Judas; abandoned by most of His Apostles; and last of all attacked by the devils themselves—the irrepressible Jesus, after His horrendous beating, emerges victorious!
Jesus Looked a Failure and a Loser as He Died on the Cross
Today the world looks upon those who are religious as losers. They mock us, like they mocked Christ. Our Lord said that if they have hated Me then they will also hate you. Let us not become cowards just because we are mocked and laughed at. He who laughs last, laughs longest. Those who laugh now at religion, will gnash and grind their teeth as they howl and wail for eternity.
Victory Over His Murderers
“Be not afraid of them who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do” (Luke 12:4) He was afraid, but He chose to walk into the jaws of death so as to come out alive. “For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel shall save it” (Mark 8:35). Don’t waste your life things that don’t matter, you may lose your eternal life over those things. Do not seek a long life, but rather a good one. Do not be afraid of martyrdom if it may come your way. “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Victory Over the Doubters and Unbelievers
“Let Christ the king of Israel come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe.” Yet, as Jesus had once said: “Which is easier, to say to the sick of the palsy: Thy sins are forgiven thee; or to say: Arise, take up thy bed, and walk?” (Mark 2:9); now, dying on Calvary, He could say: “Which is easier? To come down from this cross while I am still alive, or to rise from the dead once I have died?” As always, Our Lord chose the most difficult option.
He did much more than come down from the Cross whilst alive! He came out of the tomb when He was dead! Let us beg Him to conquer our unbelief...our unbelief or doubts, for example, about the Holy Eucharist, our unbelief or doubts about eternal life, our unbelief or doubts in the power of prayer, our unbelief or doubts about the devil, our unbelief or doubts about the existence of Hell, or whatever unbelief or doubts that we may be guilty of.
Victory Over Death
Say what you will, but most people fear death! Some will even renounce the Faith if threatened with death. Death is the penultimate punishment, which the punishment of Hell still manages to trump. The wage for sin is death. Yet Our Lord came to remove our fears over death.
Death where is thy sting? Through the old Adam death came into the world, because he ate a forbidden fruit from a tree. Now the new Adam, bore a new fruit on the tree of the Cross and through partaking of that fruit we have life eternal. Look at the lacerated, bruised, beaten, wounded body that hung on the cross and now is unrecognizable in His resurrection. Do not fear or flee your sufferings, for they will be your source of grace and glory. He had raised three persons from the dead while He was alive, now He raised Himself from the dead as He had predicted and when He had predicted. So too will He raise you and your loved ones from the dead on the last day. Do not fear so much as the death of mortal sin. Yet there too He raises from the dead of the tomb of confessional in which we bury ourselves. We enter dead to God and come out alive.
Victory Over the Devil
The devil was not sure who He was! His holiness enraged the devil so much that he plotted and waged war against Christ—as he will wage war against you the holier you try to become, stirring all manner of things against you. Yet by His humble acceptance and meekness in face of this onslaught, Christ bore the victory. He used the weight oh His enemies attack against his enemy. The greater the rage, the greater the defeat. Let us learn from Our Lord not to fear the devil, and above all not to love him and his allurements. The devil can do nothing without the permission and agreement of God.
Victory Over the World
Jesus did not rise from the dead to live in the world. After His resurrection, He could have lived in the world till the end of time; but He did not rise to live here forever. He rose from the dead to go to Heaven. He died for this world, but He also died to this world. He took nothing of this world with Him, nor shall we when we die. Let us not live as though it was only this world that matters. Especially the young ones, who have not yet tasted the poison that Satan offers under the glitter and charm of the world around us. Do not compromise your soul and your salvation for a cheap sin. What a way to repay your God who died for you in order to help you stay clean.
A Bunch of Disbelievers in His Victory!
The varying degrees of sadness, sorrow, discouragement, disillusionment and depression that hit the Apostles and disciples at the news and sight of Christ’s crucifixion and death was not wanted, intended or sent by God. Such negative reactions were purely the work of Satan and/or a too naturalistic and human spirit. Our Lord would point that out to two of His disciples whom He appeared to on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus after His resurrection from the dead.
“And behold, two of them [the disciples of Jesus] went, the same day, to a town which was sixty furlongs from Jerusalem, named Emmaus. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass, that while they talked and reasoned with themselves, Jesus Himself also drawing near, went with them. But their eyes were held, that they should not know Him. And He said to them: ‘What are these discourses that you hold one with another as you walk, and are sad?’ And the one of them, whose name was Cleophas, answering, said to Him: ‘Art Thou only a stranger to Jerusalem, and hast not known the things that have been done there in these days?’ To whom Jesus said: ‘What things?’ And they said: ‘Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, Who was a prophet, mighty in work and word before God and all the people; and how our chief priests and princes delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him. But we hoped that it was He that should have redeemed Israel! And now, besides all this, today is the third day since these things were done! And certain women, also of our company, frightened us―who, before it was light, were at the sepulcher, and, not finding His Body, came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, who say that He is alive! And some of our people went to the sepulcher and found it so as the women had said―but Him they found not!’ Then Jesus said to them: ‘O foolish and slow of heart to believe in all things which the prophets have spoken! Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into His glory?’ And, beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded to them all the things in the Scriptures that were concerning Him” (Luke 24:13-27).
We all know how St. Thomas was in disbelief about the Resurrection―but so too were all the Apostles and disciples! To them, Jesus was dead and buried―and all His plans with Him! The Gospels account of Our Lord apparitions after His resurrection designate Mary Magdalen as being the first person to whom Jesus appeared (though tradition tells us that Our Lady was the first person He appeared to). For Mary Magdalen, too, Jesus was “dead and buried” and this had made her disconsolate. “Mary Magdalen stood outside the sepulcher, weeping. Now, as she was weeping, she stooped down and looked into the sepulcher. And she saw two angels in white, sitting―one at the head and one at the feet―where the body of Jesus had been laid. They said to her: ‘Woman, why weepest thou?’ She said to them: ‘Because they have taken away my Lord―and I know not where they have laid Him!’ When she had said this, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing―and she knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her: ‘Woman, why weepest thou?’ Whom seekest thou?’ She, thinking it was the gardener, said to Him: ‘Sir! If thou hast taken Him from here, tell me where thou hast laid Him, and I will take Him away!’ Jesus said to her: ‘Mary!’ She turning, said to Him: ‘Rabboni!’ (which is to say, ‘Master!’). Jesus said to her: ‘Do not touch Me―for I am not yet ascended to My Father! But go to My brethren and tell them that I ascend to My Father and to your Father, to My God and your God!’” (John 20:11-17).
Yet when Mary ran back and told the Apostles and other disciples that Jesus has appeared to her, they did not believe her! That led to Our Lord appearing to them in person! “Jesus stood in the midst of them and said to them: ‘Peace be to you! It is I, fear not!’ But they, being troubled and frightened, supposed that they saw a spirit. And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you troubled? And why do these thoughts arise in your hearts? See My hands and feet―and know that it is I Myself! Touch and see―for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have!’ And, when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet―yet they believed not” (Luke 24:36-41).
As regards the “Doubting Thomas”, Holy Scripture tells us that “Thomas, one of the Twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him: ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them: ‘Unless I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side―I will not believe!’ And after eight days, again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus cometh, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said: ‘Peace be to you!’ Then He said to Thomas: ‘Put in thy finger here and see My hands! And bring here thy hand and put it into My side! And be not faithless―but believing!’ Thomas answered and said to Him: ‘My Lord, and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Because thou hast seen Me, Thomas, thou hast believed! Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed!’” (John 20:29).
Which Turning Will You Take at the Easter Crossroads?
Now that Lent is over and Easter is here―what road will you take? Will you, like the two disciples on the road to Emmaus after the crucifixion, walk away from Jerusalem? Or will you stay where you are? In other words, there are those who walk away from the progress they may have made during Lent, and walk back into their old habits. Whereas there are some―admittedly few―who not only maintain the progress that they have made, but also build upon it.
All Change!
The resurrection of Our Lord sees Him come back much changed and much different to what He was before. So much so, that He is not even recognized by His nearest and dearest! Something similar is seen in the apparition of St. Dominic Savio after his death, when he came to St. John Bosco—his teacher and confessor while he was still on Earth. St. John Bosco did not recognize him and had to ask: “Is that you Dominic?”
New Life!
Our Lord had passed through the barrier of suffering and death and emerged on the other side in His new life, His glorious life, a life in His glorified body. This should teach us that, after the suffering and attempts to kill sin, during the season of Lent, we should be emerging from Lent as ‘new-beings’ with a new attitude and a new life-style.
Saul Resurrects as Paul
St. Paul, too, went through his ‘three-days-of death’ or, rather, ‘three-days-of-darkness’ when he was struck blind by Jesus on the road to Damascus. He then went through his own ‘Lent’ by praying and not eating or drinking for three days: “And he was there three days, without sight, and he did neither eat nor drink” (Acts 9:9).
In the meantime, God was preparing Saul for a new life. Saul would be given a new name—Paul (like Simon was renamed Peter). He would be given a new mission—instead of rounding up Christians to arrest them; he would now round up people and make them into Christians.
“And the Lord said to Ananias: ‘Arise, and go into the street that is called Strait, and seek in the house of Judas, one named Saul of Tarsus. For behold he prayeth!’ (And he saw a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hands upon him, that he might receive his sight.) But Ananias answered: ‘Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to Thy saints in Jerusalem. And here he hath authority from the chief priests to bind all that invoke Thy Name!’ And the Lord said to him: ‘Go thy way; for this man is to Me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!’” (Acts 9:1-16).
I was blind! Now I see!
This should also be the case for ourselves, who have been blind and, like Saul, by our sins, have persecuted Christ. Our Lord could well say to us the words He addressed to Saul (Paul): “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?” (Acts 9:4). Yet the mercy of Christ transformed the soul of Saul into the pillar of Paul, but not without pain and suffering.
Suffering After His Resurrection
The new Paul was destined to pay for his past sins by suffering throughout his new ‘risen’ or ‘resurrected’ life. Paul himself lists some of the many sufferings that he had endured in the short time since his ‘resurrection’:
“In many more labors, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Besides those things which are without: my daily instance, the solicitude for all the churches.
“Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is scandalized, and I am not on fire? If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity. My daily instance: The labors that come in, and press upon me every day. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is blessed for ever, knoweth that I lie not. At Damascus, the governor of the nation under Aretas the king, guarded the city of the Damascenes, to apprehend me. And through a window in a basket was I let down by the wall, and so escaped his hands …
“But for myself I will glory nothing, but in my infirmities. For though I should have a mind to glory, I shall not be foolish; for I will say the truth. But I forbear, lest any man should think of me above that which he seeth in me, or any thing he heareth from me. And lest the greatness of the revelations should exalt me, there was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me. For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me. And He said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee; for power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may dwell in me. For which cause I please myself in my infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ. For when I am weak, then am I powerful” (2 Corinthians 11:23-33; 12:1-10).
Don’t Go Back!
Our Easter should see, likewise, a resurrection in ourselves. We should not go back to our old ways, like the dog goes back to his vomit: “As a dog that returneth to his vomit, so is the fool that repeateth his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). There are too many Catholics, who, now that Lent is over, will go back to a life of self-indulgence and over-indulgence. They just don’t get it! They do not understand! “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding: who have eyes, and see not: and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21).
In very first readings of the first two Masses of Easter (the Midnight Mass and the Day Mass), the Church clearly tells us that we have to change! This is the very first message of Easter! That the old ways have to be cast far away from us, so that we live a new, resurrected, better and more holy life:
The Church’s Easter Message
“Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened: for Christ our Pasch is sacrificed. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (Epistle from Midnight Mass: 1 Corinthians 5:7-8).
“Brethren: If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God: mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth. For you are dead [to the world and sin], and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ shall appear, who is your life, then you also shall appear with Him in glory” (Epistle from the Day Mass: Colossians 3:1-4).
Christ Rises With His Wounds
The second point that is worth mentioning and imprinting upon our minds and hearts, is the fact that Our Lord rises from the dead WITH his wounds still visible. He could have healed Himself totally, but He chose to keep His wounds like a stigmata.
He also leaves His shroud to us as a relic and a reminder of His Passion. He doesn’t want to be remembered so much for His resurrection, as He wants to be remembered for His Passion and Death. It was the latter that redeemed us and brought about the defeat of the devil, sin and death.
We have arrived at the crossroads of Lent and Easter―yet that does not mean that we must now cast the cross off at the side of the road! Just because Lent is over, it does not mean an end to penance and sacrifice. Penance and sacrifice are the bread and butter of the Christian life. It should be the staple diet of any and every Christian. Our Lady calls for penance at Lourdes and sacrifice at Fatima. Our Lord clearly told us: “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross DAILY, and follow me” (Luke 9:23). “Daily” means every day of the year and not just Lent. Our Lord and Our Lady suffered every single day of their lives—not just during the Passion or Seven isolated Sorrows! And Our Lord told us: “I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Delighting the Devil
If we go back to our pre-Lenten attitudes and lifestyle, then we are insanely going backwards when we should going forwards—to the devil’s delight! Celebrating Easter does not mean over-indulging or, even less, going back to the venial or even mortal sins of the past! Otherwise, we end up caressing Our Lord with our extra prayers and sacrifices during Lent, and then go back to slapping Him around after Lent is over!
Maintain your Higher Spiritual Levels Gained During Lent
Though we may not be required to fast outside of Lent (though it is not forbidden to do so, for fasting is a wonderful weapon against the devil—who does not just work during Lent, but all-year-round!), we can and still should ‘fast’ from sin, occasions of sin, worldliness and frivolity. “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4) … For the word of God cannot survive in a worldly atmosphere, “the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things entering in choke the word, and it is made fruitless” (Mark 4:19).
God Wants to Save; But Many Don’t Want His Terms
Even though “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17), “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not ... In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:4-11).
St. Paul was in darkness, which got worse and ended up with him being blinded as a means of driving home to him the extent of his spiritual blindness. Let the scales fall from our eyes as they fell from his eyes; so that we can see the new life that God has mapped out for us, beginning with this Easter season! How many Catholics and how many times have they rejected God’s invitation to come to the spiritual banquet of a new life at Easter? God may well say one day: “The marriage indeed is ready; but they that were invited were not worthy!’ And he said to his servants: ‘Go ye therefore into the highways; and as many as you shall find, call to the marriage!’” (Matthew 22:8-9).
Listen to Your Mother!
Let us not ignore God’s invitation, nor test His patience: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked” (Galatians 6:7). Let us take the advice of Holy Mother Church, as given at the very start of this Easter season: “Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth … If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God: mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth. For you are dead [to the world and sin], and your life is hid with Christ in God” (Epistles from the Midnight Mass and the Day Mass: 1 Corinthians 5:7-8; Colossians 3:1-4).
Celebrate we must, but our celebration is more spiritual (to satisfy the soul) than it is carnal (to satisfy the body). We do not see Our Lord ‘living-it-up’ after His resurrection by indulging in joys of the body, but we see Him giving much spiritual joy to His disciples. Let us imitate Our Lord! A happy, holy and joyous Easter to all!
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR LENT 2024
Article 33
Holy Saturday in Holy Week, March 30th
From Good Friday to Lousy Saturday
Holy Saturday in Holy Week, March 30th
From Good Friday to Lousy Saturday
Where’s He Gone? They’ve Taken Him Away! No Mass, No Communion Today!
Yesterday, on Good Friday, there was no Sacrifice of the Mass offered anywhere. If you love your Mass, then that was not a good Good Friday feeling! However, every cloud has a silver lining―and the silver lining was that Holy Communion was still available in the Solemn Afternoon Liturgy! Today, however, could be termed “Lousy” Saturday―because, not only is there no Holy Sacrifice of the Mass available, but neither is Holy Communion available!
Jesus is Buried, But Cross Isn’t
On Holy Saturday—an incredibly ‘silent’ day in the Church’s Liturgy, apart from the Divine Office or Liturgy of the Hours—there is a sense of an absence of Christ. Walk into a church and what do you see? The tabernacle is open and empty. The altar is almost bare. All candles—especially the sanctuary light—are dead and extinguished. The statues buried beneath purple coverings. What can you see? There are some things that visible! What are they?
For one, there is the crucifix above the empty tabernacle—just as the cross of Christ remained on Calvary after Christ was taken away. Also, if you look around, you will still see the Stations of the Cross uncovered—as they have been throughout Lent, and also throughout Passiontide when the other statues and pictures were buried beneath purple ‘burial’ cloths, and they will remain uncovered throughout the whole year! The Cross of Christ and the Way or Stations of the Cross are not meant for Lent only, but it for the whole Liturgical Year and for every single day of our lives, in every circumstance of life. For without that Cross of Christ there is no salvation—hence the liturgy gives us phrases such as: “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”).
Don’t Bury Your Cross!
You may not have the Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion available to you because it has been “taken away”‘—but the cross is always available to you and always will be available to you until the day you die (whether you want that cross or not). If you ‘bury’ your cross—like the man who buried his talent in the ground (Matthew 25:14-30)—then your salvation is dead and buried! Like that man who buried the talent, we risk hearing the words: “And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant, thou knewest that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewn! Thou oughtest therefore to have committed my money to the bankers, and at my coming I should have received my own with usury [interest}. Take ye away therefore the talent from him, and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has shall be given, and he shall abound: but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have shall be taken away. And the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:26-30). Our crosses are far more precious than any talents (money) that we have. We cannot buy our way into Heaven with money (except giving alms), but we can buy Heaven with the cross.
This is why Our Lord says emphatically: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). There is absolutely no “wiggle-room” in those words—no loophole, no escape clause, no compromise—it is a “non-negotiable” fact. There is no salvation outside Christ and He is to be found on the cross—that is why we have the crucifix overlooking every altar and the Stations of the Cross peering down upon us from all sides—in season and out of season, during Lent and outside of Lent, before Good Friday, during Good Friday and after Good Friday! “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”).
Preach the Cross in Season and Out of Season
In this context we could also apply the words of St. Paul to St. Timothy: “Preach the word: be instant in season, out of season: reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine. For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears: 4 And will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 4:2-4). Today is that time when mankind prefers fables over the truth, cotton-candy (candy-floss) over solid food, playing more than praying, indulgence more than repentance. Of such, St. Paul says: “For many walk, of whom I have told you often―and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Philippians 3:19).
Easter’s Here! Bring Out the Beer!
For those Catholics “whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things”—Easter signals the start of the race to the “Beer-Fest” or “Pig-Fest.” For the few that have fasted throughout Lent, there is the temptation to “let one’s hair down” and “pig-out” for a while. In a sense, you could say that they unravel and destroy weeks of good work by this temporary spiritual insanity. It is like an alcoholic saying: “I’ve done without a beer for over six weeks now! I deserve to go on a binge!” Or some Catholic saying: “I’ve not committed a mortal sin for a few years! I think I deserve a couple of weeks of “Mortal Sin ‘Paradise’”! You can also apply that to venial sins too.
No Going Back to the Old-Self
Lent has—or should have been—a time of spiritual improvement. Are we going to go back to the sins and bad habits and over-indulgence that we left behind? Our Lord wants to progressively draw us away from the things of this world, so that we can draw closer to Him and focus more on Him—not the world: “As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). St. Peter takes up the same idea, saying: “For, that of the true proverb has happened to them: ‘The dog is returned to his vomit’ and, ‘The sow that was washed, to her wallowing in the mire!’” (2 Peter 2:22). We cannot live a perpetual revolving door of sin-confession-sin-confession-sin-confession, etc. If we are perpetually repeating the same sins over and over again, then it is sign that we lack one of the essential elements of a good and valid confession―a FIRM PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT. On several occasions Our Lord tied this firm purpose of amendment to His forgiveness of sin: “Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:11) … “Afterwards, Jesus found him in the Temple, and said to him: ‘Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!’” (John 5:14). Thus Holy Scripture adds: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5).
Leave Those Worldly Things Behind
Perfection means a gradual elimination of imperfection—exchanging what is less perfect for something that is more perfect. We see the rich young man of the Gospel unable to take the next step to perfection and leave the things of the world behind—even though he was essentially a God-fearing and commandment keeping person:
“And behold one came and said to Jesus: ‘Good master! What good shall I do that I may have life everlasting? Who said to him: ‘Why asketh thou Me concerning good? One is good, God. But if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ He said to Him: ‘Which?’ And Jesus said: ‘Thou shalt do no murder, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness. Honor thy father and thy mother: and, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’
“Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’
“And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible. Then Peter answering, said to him: ‘Behold we have left all things, and have followed Thee! What therefore shall we have?’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Amen, I say to you, that you, who have followed Me, and every one that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands for My Name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall possess life everlasting!” (Matthew 19:16-29).
No Perfect Imperfection or Imperfect Perfection!
We cannot have perfection while cleaving to imperfection! All the serious spiritual authors—not the cotton-candy ones—will tell you that progressive withdrawal from the world and its enticements (even the non-sinful ones) is part and parcel of the growth in spiritual perfection—as the very final verse of the penultimate chapter of Holy Scripture tells us: “There shall not enter into it anything defiled, or that worketh abomination, or maketh a lie, but they that are written in the book of life of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 21:27). This is nothing else but a summary of what God says in the Old Testament and Christ says in the New Testament: “I am the Lord your God: be holy because I am holy. Defile not your souls! … You shall be holy, because I am holy … You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine” [Leviticus 11:44-6; 20:26). “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48).
Notice those words—“I have separated you from other people”—God does not want us to be mixed-in and hand-in-hand with the world and the attitudes of the world. These words are echoed in the New Testament, where Our Lord and St. Paul speak of our separation from these things: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation” (Luke 12:51). His teaching demands this separation from the world and a false and artificial peace with it. St. Paul develops this, saying: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! … What agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Die to the World—Resurrect to Christ!
It is time to die to the world and live for Christ—anything other than that is spiritual suicide. Two-timing Christ will lead nowhere except Hell. We have often heard the Scripture verses―“Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15) … “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4)—but those words flow off us like the proverbial “water off a ducks back.”
Safety in Numbers? Waterproofed to God?
We are somewhat ‘waterproofed’ to the word of God—we see most Catholics ‘loving’ the world and we stupidly and naively think that “there is safety in numbers”! How can we be so stupid to believe that there is “safety in numbers” when Our Lord and numerous important saints and theologians tell that most souls are lost? (read more here) “And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But Jesus said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’” (Luke 13:23-24) … “Many are called, but few are chosen … Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 22:14; 7:13-14).
With Most God Is Displeased
St. Paul reminds us that God was displeased with most of the Chosen People at the time of the Exodus: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud, and in the sea: and did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the desert. Now these things were done in a figure of us, that we should not covet evil things as they also coveted. Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed fornication, and there fell in one day three and twenty thousand. Neither let us tempt Christ: as some of them tempted, and perished by the serpents. Neither do you murmur: as some of them murmured, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now all these things happened to them in figure: and they are written for our correction, upon whom the ends of the world are come. Wherefore he that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall” (1 Corinthians 10:1-11).
Let There Be a “New-You”
This is why the Easter Liturgy speaks to us of being dead to the world and alive to Christ: “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above; where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth. For you are dead; and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ shall appear, who is your life, then you also shall appear with Him in glory. Mortify therefore your members which are upon the Earth; fornication, uncleanness, lust, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is the service of idols” (Colossians 3:1-5). “So do you also reckon, that you are dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:11). “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened. For Christ our Pasch is sacrificed. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (1 Corinthians 5:7-8).
Yesterday, on Good Friday, there was no Sacrifice of the Mass offered anywhere. If you love your Mass, then that was not a good Good Friday feeling! However, every cloud has a silver lining―and the silver lining was that Holy Communion was still available in the Solemn Afternoon Liturgy! Today, however, could be termed “Lousy” Saturday―because, not only is there no Holy Sacrifice of the Mass available, but neither is Holy Communion available!
Jesus is Buried, But Cross Isn’t
On Holy Saturday—an incredibly ‘silent’ day in the Church’s Liturgy, apart from the Divine Office or Liturgy of the Hours—there is a sense of an absence of Christ. Walk into a church and what do you see? The tabernacle is open and empty. The altar is almost bare. All candles—especially the sanctuary light—are dead and extinguished. The statues buried beneath purple coverings. What can you see? There are some things that visible! What are they?
For one, there is the crucifix above the empty tabernacle—just as the cross of Christ remained on Calvary after Christ was taken away. Also, if you look around, you will still see the Stations of the Cross uncovered—as they have been throughout Lent, and also throughout Passiontide when the other statues and pictures were buried beneath purple ‘burial’ cloths, and they will remain uncovered throughout the whole year! The Cross of Christ and the Way or Stations of the Cross are not meant for Lent only, but it for the whole Liturgical Year and for every single day of our lives, in every circumstance of life. For without that Cross of Christ there is no salvation—hence the liturgy gives us phrases such as: “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”).
Don’t Bury Your Cross!
You may not have the Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion available to you because it has been “taken away”‘—but the cross is always available to you and always will be available to you until the day you die (whether you want that cross or not). If you ‘bury’ your cross—like the man who buried his talent in the ground (Matthew 25:14-30)—then your salvation is dead and buried! Like that man who buried the talent, we risk hearing the words: “And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant, thou knewest that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewn! Thou oughtest therefore to have committed my money to the bankers, and at my coming I should have received my own with usury [interest}. Take ye away therefore the talent from him, and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has shall be given, and he shall abound: but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have shall be taken away. And the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:26-30). Our crosses are far more precious than any talents (money) that we have. We cannot buy our way into Heaven with money (except giving alms), but we can buy Heaven with the cross.
This is why Our Lord says emphatically: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). There is absolutely no “wiggle-room” in those words—no loophole, no escape clause, no compromise—it is a “non-negotiable” fact. There is no salvation outside Christ and He is to be found on the cross—that is why we have the crucifix overlooking every altar and the Stations of the Cross peering down upon us from all sides—in season and out of season, during Lent and outside of Lent, before Good Friday, during Good Friday and after Good Friday! “Ave Crux, spes unica!” (“Hail Cross, our sole hope!”) and “In cruce salus” (“In the cross is salvation”).
Preach the Cross in Season and Out of Season
In this context we could also apply the words of St. Paul to St. Timothy: “Preach the word: be instant in season, out of season: reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine. For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears: 4 And will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 4:2-4). Today is that time when mankind prefers fables over the truth, cotton-candy (candy-floss) over solid food, playing more than praying, indulgence more than repentance. Of such, St. Paul says: “For many walk, of whom I have told you often―and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Philippians 3:19).
Easter’s Here! Bring Out the Beer!
For those Catholics “whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things”—Easter signals the start of the race to the “Beer-Fest” or “Pig-Fest.” For the few that have fasted throughout Lent, there is the temptation to “let one’s hair down” and “pig-out” for a while. In a sense, you could say that they unravel and destroy weeks of good work by this temporary spiritual insanity. It is like an alcoholic saying: “I’ve done without a beer for over six weeks now! I deserve to go on a binge!” Or some Catholic saying: “I’ve not committed a mortal sin for a few years! I think I deserve a couple of weeks of “Mortal Sin ‘Paradise’”! You can also apply that to venial sins too.
No Going Back to the Old-Self
Lent has—or should have been—a time of spiritual improvement. Are we going to go back to the sins and bad habits and over-indulgence that we left behind? Our Lord wants to progressively draw us away from the things of this world, so that we can draw closer to Him and focus more on Him—not the world: “As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly” (Proverbs 26:11). St. Peter takes up the same idea, saying: “For, that of the true proverb has happened to them: ‘The dog is returned to his vomit’ and, ‘The sow that was washed, to her wallowing in the mire!’” (2 Peter 2:22). We cannot live a perpetual revolving door of sin-confession-sin-confession-sin-confession, etc. If we are perpetually repeating the same sins over and over again, then it is sign that we lack one of the essential elements of a good and valid confession―a FIRM PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT. On several occasions Our Lord tied this firm purpose of amendment to His forgiveness of sin: “Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:11) … “Afterwards, Jesus found him in the Temple, and said to him: ‘Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!’” (John 5:14). Thus Holy Scripture adds: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5).
Leave Those Worldly Things Behind
Perfection means a gradual elimination of imperfection—exchanging what is less perfect for something that is more perfect. We see the rich young man of the Gospel unable to take the next step to perfection and leave the things of the world behind—even though he was essentially a God-fearing and commandment keeping person:
“And behold one came and said to Jesus: ‘Good master! What good shall I do that I may have life everlasting? Who said to him: ‘Why asketh thou Me concerning good? One is good, God. But if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ He said to Him: ‘Which?’ And Jesus said: ‘Thou shalt do no murder, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness. Honor thy father and thy mother: and, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’
“Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’
“And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible. Then Peter answering, said to him: ‘Behold we have left all things, and have followed Thee! What therefore shall we have?’ And Jesus said to them: ‘Amen, I say to you, that you, who have followed Me, and every one that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands for My Name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall possess life everlasting!” (Matthew 19:16-29).
No Perfect Imperfection or Imperfect Perfection!
We cannot have perfection while cleaving to imperfection! All the serious spiritual authors—not the cotton-candy ones—will tell you that progressive withdrawal from the world and its enticements (even the non-sinful ones) is part and parcel of the growth in spiritual perfection—as the very final verse of the penultimate chapter of Holy Scripture tells us: “There shall not enter into it anything defiled, or that worketh abomination, or maketh a lie, but they that are written in the book of life of the Lamb” (Apocalypse 21:27). This is nothing else but a summary of what God says in the Old Testament and Christ says in the New Testament: “I am the Lord your God: be holy because I am holy. Defile not your souls! … You shall be holy, because I am holy … You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine” [Leviticus 11:44-6; 20:26). “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48).
Notice those words—“I have separated you from other people”—God does not want us to be mixed-in and hand-in-hand with the world and the attitudes of the world. These words are echoed in the New Testament, where Our Lord and St. Paul speak of our separation from these things: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation” (Luke 12:51). His teaching demands this separation from the world and a false and artificial peace with it. St. Paul develops this, saying: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! … What agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part have the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Die to the World—Resurrect to Christ!
It is time to die to the world and live for Christ—anything other than that is spiritual suicide. Two-timing Christ will lead nowhere except Hell. We have often heard the Scripture verses―“Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15) … “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4)—but those words flow off us like the proverbial “water off a ducks back.”
Safety in Numbers? Waterproofed to God?
We are somewhat ‘waterproofed’ to the word of God—we see most Catholics ‘loving’ the world and we stupidly and naively think that “there is safety in numbers”! How can we be so stupid to believe that there is “safety in numbers” when Our Lord and numerous important saints and theologians tell that most souls are lost? (read more here) “And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But Jesus said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’” (Luke 13:23-24) … “Many are called, but few are chosen … Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 22:14; 7:13-14).
With Most God Is Displeased
St. Paul reminds us that God was displeased with most of the Chosen People at the time of the Exodus: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud, and in the sea: and did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the desert. Now these things were done in a figure of us, that we should not covet evil things as they also coveted. Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed fornication, and there fell in one day three and twenty thousand. Neither let us tempt Christ: as some of them tempted, and perished by the serpents. Neither do you murmur: as some of them murmured, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now all these things happened to them in figure: and they are written for our correction, upon whom the ends of the world are come. Wherefore he that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall” (1 Corinthians 10:1-11).
Let There Be a “New-You”
This is why the Easter Liturgy speaks to us of being dead to the world and alive to Christ: “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above; where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth. For you are dead; and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ shall appear, who is your life, then you also shall appear with Him in glory. Mortify therefore your members which are upon the Earth; fornication, uncleanness, lust, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is the service of idols” (Colossians 3:1-5). “So do you also reckon, that you are dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:11). “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened. For Christ our Pasch is sacrificed. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (1 Corinthians 5:7-8).
Article 32
Good Friday in Holy Week, March 29th
Why is an Evil Day Called Good Friday?
Good Friday in Holy Week, March 29th
Why is an Evil Day Called Good Friday?
How is Evil Good?
Why is the day when Jesus was brutally tortured and murdered called “Good Friday”? What’s “good” about it? As the Baltimore Catechism states: “Question: Why do you call that day “good” on which Christ died so sorrowful a death? Answer: We call that day good on which Christ died because by His death He showed His great love for man, and purchased for him every blessing.” While it may seem strange to call the day that Jesus died, “good,” it truly was good, and opened to us the gates of Heaven which had been closed to mankind due to sin.
We see the suffering and death Jesus endured for us on that day, which understandably brings us—or should bring us—great sorrow. Sorrow for what? Sorrow for sin! Sin is the greatest evil that exists in this world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” … “Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
We read in the Good Friday liturgy, when the priest processes with the crucifix down the center aisle of the church, stopping three times and saying these words: “Behold the wood of the Cross, on which hung the Savior of the world!” Good Friday is the day that Christ died on the cross for the redemption of the world. Redemption means the act of recovering something that was lost. When Adam and Eve sinned, humankind was plunged into sinfulness and lost the chance for eternity. Jesus’ death redeemed us from sin and eternal punishment for sin. Christ's greatest gift to us was that―even though He Himself was innocent of any sin―He was nevertheless willing to accept death so that we might be saved from the power of Satan and sin. Good Friday is good because it opens the possibility that we might live forever in Heaven, rather than suffer eternally in Hell.
Love and Live; Sin and Die
Love and death! At first, they conjure up two different emotions: desire and dread; pleasant and unpleasant; magnificent and morbid; delightful and depressing; exhilarating and excruciating! Two irreconcilables! Or are they?
An initial glance at Scripture seems to show their irreconcilability: God, Who is Love itself, is linked to life: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and God, Who is good, loves us and seeks to bring eternal life to our souls; the devil, who is evil, does not love us, but hates us and seeks to bring eternal death to our souls. Christ, with His grace, brings eternal life to us; the devil, with sin, brings eternal death to us. Jesus says of Himself: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life ... I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly” (John 14:6; 10:10); whereas, speaking of the devil, Jesus says: “He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him” (John 8:44).
“By one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). St. Paul tells us that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) and “the sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 14:56). God Himself tells us: “everyone shall die for his own sin” (Deuteronomy 24:16).
A God of Extremes
Yet our God is not just a God of extreme justice; He is also a God of extreme mercy:”For God loveth mercy and truth: the Lord will give grace and glory” (Psalm 83:12).”The Lord is merciful and just, and our God shows mercy” (Psalm 114:5). “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). But that mercy is not unconditional, nor is it free. To obtain that mercy, certain things have to be done.
“As I live, says the Lord God, I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways―and why will you die? Yea, if I shall say to the just that he shall surely live, and he, trusting in his justice, commits iniquity―then all his justices shall be forgotten, and in his iniquity, which he has committed, in the same shall he die. And if I shall say to the wicked: ‘Thou shalt surely die!’ and he do penance for his sin, and do judgment and justice, and if that wicked man restores what he had robbed, and walks in the commandments of life, and does no unjust thing―then he shall surely live, and shall not die! None of his sins, which he has committed, shall be imputed to him―for since he has done judgment and justice, he shall surely live...For when the just shall depart from his justice and commit iniquities, then he shall die in them. And when the wicked shall depart from his wickedness, and shall do judgment and justice, then he shall live in them” (Ezechiel 33:11-19).
Mercy Means Penance! What are the Means of Penance?
Sin must be paid for; our debt must be settled—otherwise we cannot enter Heaven. If we die in a state of unconfessed and unforgiven mortal sin, then the debt will be paid in Hell. If we neglect to pay for our confessed and forgiven sins in this life, then Purgatory awaits, and Jesus says: “thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last penny” (Matthew 5:26). The obvious solution is to pay now, rather than later. Now we can pay at a greatly ‘discounted’ price; after death, it will be payments with high interest added; “for the sin is great, and the fierce anger of the Lord hangs over Israel” (2 Paralipomenon 28:13). What payment plan will we choose? What payment plans are there to choose from?
The Penance of Pain & The Penance of Love
Upon Calvary, alongside the dying Christ, we see two sinners―one dying in pain, the other ‘dying’ out of grief-stricken love. One is a man, the other a woman. The man is the thief St. Dismas; the woman is the sinner St. Mary Magdalen. We may call them saints today, but at the time they were great sinners being transformed into saints. They were living proof that “the Lord is gracious and merciful, patient and plenteous in mercy ... and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9).
The Dismal Pain of Dismas
Dismas has led a dismal life; being a thief, robber, and consequently probably a murderer too, he was doing ‘penance’ for his sins and proving the truth of the statement that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). However, there is another thief suffering and dying with him; he has the same history, he has the same sufferings, but he does not have the same fate. His sufferings will be of no use to him, for he does not accept those sufferings as a just wage for his sins. He could have paid his debt there and then, like the Good Thief, Dismas, but he preferred (knowingly or unknowingly) to pay his debt in Hell.
Dismas would pay his debt alongside Jesus; or rather, he would co-pay with Jesus―for, of himself, he could not pay for any of his sins. Sin is an offense against God, even though we might sin against neighbor — “as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me” (Matthew 25:40). God is infinite, so any sin is consequently an infinite offense―since it offends an infinite God. Therefore, it contracts an infinite debt, which a finite man cannot hope to pay. It needs an infinite creature to be able to pay an infinite debt—Jesus is that infinite being―as an infinite God He can pay an infinite debt; as a human being He can pay the human debt for sin. Dismas merely co-pays, just as Our Lady co-redeems. We likewise have to co-pay—it is proof of our admission to guilt and proof of acceptance of responsibility and accountability.
Dismas pays primarily through his body―he is accepting of the pains and tortures of death as a just wage for his sins. It is not pain alone that saves him, it is pain processed and transformed by the soul into something above the natural, into something unnatural for him, into something supernatural. The pain breaks through into his soul and transforms him from a bad thief into a Good Thief who steals Heaven in the last lap of his life, with the last breath of his life. His was a payment plan of pain.
Yet, to say that Dismas died without love would be a grave misunderstanding and misrepresentation of what happened. He had to have some degree of love towards God in his heart for Christ to be able say to him: “This day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise” (Luke 23:43). A variety of things will have contributed to breaking down any hardness of heart that he may have had—but the pain of suffering undoubtedly opened and softened his heart, and prepared the soil of the soul to receive the seed of divine love. So, in the end, both death and love united in his life, to bring about his salvation.
The Mournful Love of Mary
The other sinner that we spoke of was Mary Magdalen, the sister of Martha, who according the traditional teaching of the Western (Roman) Church is the woman who was caught in adultery, the woman possessed by seven devils and the woman at the banquet of Simon the Leper who was weeping tears over Jesus’ feet, wiping them dry with her hair and anointing Jesus with precious alabaster. Like the thief, Dismas, she too was a great sinner.
However, her payment plan was of a different kind—she paid for her sins through love. Jesus Himself confirmed this, when at the banquet He said: “Why do you trouble this woman? Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much”(Matthew 26:10; Luke 7:47). Her payment plan was based upon the Old Testament quote of: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) and the same plan was carried over into the New Testament, as testified by St. Peter: “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). This is merely a reflection or an echo of the charity that led Jesus to lay down His life for our sins: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10).
Like Dismas, Mary experienced a blend of love and pain on Calvary. The more she loved Christ, the more she felt the pain of what was happening to Christ. We know this from personal experience: the more we treasure a person or an object, the more agitated, sorrowful and pained we become when suffering a separation or its loss.
Love and Death United
Love and Death, the two things that seemed contradictory and irreconcilable, now find themselves united on Calvary. The words of Christ perform a marriage, so to speak, between Love and Death: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Death proves Love; and Love leads to Death. Our Lord proves His love for us by dying for us; and that love of His had to go to the very extreme, to the point of death itself. He could not raise the stakes any higher than that.
Similarly, Mary Magdalen ‘dies’ on Calvary with Christ. In a vaguely analogous way, as Christ dies mystically in each Sacrifice of the Mass, Mary dies mystically in an unbloody manner at the Sacrifice on Calvary. Christ’s heart is pierced, she feels the wound—since it is for her benefit and salvation that He undergoes all this, and it is her sins (ours too) that pierce that Sacred Heart. She knows that He is the ‘scapegoat’ for her sins. She knows that she should be in His place, sentenced to death and dying on the cross.
Just as Christ had spared her a painful physical death from being stoned to death for adultery, He now prevents her spiritual death through sin by dying on the cross for those sins. Like a woman watching her child being slain (Massacre of the Innocents) and wishing that she could be slain in the place of her baby; Mary Magdalen must have wished that this Massacre of the Innocent One could have been prevented and that she could be slain in His place. She was grateful to Him when she escaped being stoned to death; she was grateful to Him again for His redeeming death—she died with Him out of love.
A Double Death
So on Calvary, the wage of sin was most certainly death for all involved—to the innocent and guilty alike. Some experienced the pains of death primarily in the body; others felt pain as though they were ‘dying’ in the soul. But regardless of which manner of death was being experienced, what mattered most was that which was taking place in the soul. Without the presence of a supernatural love, all and any death would be vain, useless and pointless. This is exactly what St. Paul was trying to tell us in the Epistle that the Church put before us on Quinquagesima Sunday: “If I should deliver my body to be burned (or crucified, or whatever form of death it may be), and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:3).
The Soul of Lent
This shows us the indispensable ingredient that should have been present in all our Lenten penances—charity, or a love God. If we perform our penances without that vital, life-giving ingredient, then our penances are mere lifeless corpses, to which we could apply the words of Our Lord and Isaias: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). In other words, we will be performing penances in a lifeless manner, without putting our heart into them—and the heart we need to put into them is a contrite heart, a broken heart, a sorrowing heart, a repentant heart, a new heart, but above all a loving heart. For charity is the form or the soul of all virtues; it is the inspiration, motivation and elevation of all that we do, ensuring that we do for God, and God alone! That is why Holy Scripture says: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Thus we can apply the axiom about prayer, to our penances, sacrifices and mortifications also: “One Hail Mary said well, is better than hundreds said badly!” Then, one act of penance done with a loving, broken, repentant heart, will be worth hundreds of penances done on ‘auto-pilot’ or mechanically.
Never Too Late
Perhaps, up to this point, our Lent has been “loveless”―the penances have been there, but the soul of charity was missing from them. This is what Our Lord meant when He said: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Perhaps, like the Good Thief on the cross, Dismas, we find ourselves in this dismal, loveless, painful state of having labored through Lent with our loveless penances. Well, like Dismas, we could still “steal” a profitable Lent like he “stole” Heaven―even at the “eleventh hour” or the very of end of “Lenten Life”. Or like the workers in the vineyard, who only began work at the eleventh hour, after being idle all day. There is still time left to bring good out evil, to make good what was not so good. In these last moments of Lent, let us crucify ourselves spiritually, rip our flesh away from the seductive world, nail ourselves to the cross of a truly spiritual life, and die to our enemies of the devil, the world and our own concupiscences.
Time for Appreciation―Time for Gratitude
As we await the resurrection of the Lord, we would do well to meditate upon His Passion and Death in order to increase our appreciation and gratitude for His sufferings that brought about our potential redemption. The Good Friday liturgy―during the adoration of the cross―has a particularly poignant passage which puts the following words in the mouth of Our Lord:
“What more ought I have done for thee, that I have not done?
I planted thee, indeed, My most beautiful vineyard: and thou hast become exceeding bitter to Me!
For in My thirst thou gavest Me vinegar to drink: and with a lance thou hast pierced the side of thy Savior.
For thy sake I scourged Egypt with its first-born: and thou hast scourged Me and delivered Me up.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I led thee out of Egypt having drowned Pharao in the Red Sea: and thou hast delivered Me to the chief priests.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I opened the sea before thee: and thou with a spear hast opened My side.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I went before thee in a pillar of cloud: and thou hast led Me to the judgment hall of Pilate.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I fed thee with manna in the desert; and thou hast beaten Me with whips and scourges.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I gave thee the water of salvation from the rock to drink: and thou hast given Me gall and vinegar.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
For thy sake I struck the kings of the Canaanites: and thou hast struck My head with a reed.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I gave thee a royal scepter: and thou hast given to My head a crown of thorns.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I exalted thee with great strength: and thou hast hanged Me on the gibbet of the Cross.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!”
Talking the Talk―Not Walking the Walk
During that same adoration of the cross on Good Friday, we sing: “We adore Thy Cross, O Lord … for behold by the wood of the Cross joy has come into the whole world!” Yet that sounds a little hypocritical―considering that we are always moaning and complaining about one thing or another, which betrays the fact that we are not appreciative of the crosses that God allows to come our way; nor are we grateful for them; and most certainly we do not adore them! We talk the talk in the liturgy, but we do not walk the walk in our daily lives! What is even more astounding is that we fail to make the connection with this sorry state of affairs and the even more tragic fact that most souls end up being damned! A large part of that is the fact that we do not embrace our soul-saving crosses! On Calvary, there were two thieves―one was saved because he embraced his cross; the other was damned because he hated his cross and looked to escape from it: “One of the robbers, who were hanging, blasphemed Jesus, saying: ‘If Thou be Christ, save Thyself and us!’ But the other robber answering, rebuked him, saying: ‘Neither dost thou fear God, seeing thou art condemned under the same condemnation! And we indeed justly―for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man [Jesus] has done no evil!’ And he said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in paradise!’” (Luke 23:39-43). St. Augustine, commenting upon this, says that the very same crosses lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell!
Salvation in the Cross and through the Cross
St. Paul writes: “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Galatians 6:14) ... “The word of the cross is foolishness to them that perish; but to them that are saved, it is the power of God!” (1 Corinthians 1:18). In the Sacrifice of the Mass, the Preface of the Holy Cross states: “Lord, holy Father, almighty and eternal God, You placed the salvation of the human race on the wood of the Cross!” The Passiontide Liturgy for Vespers clearly links the cross to salvation: “O Crux, ave, spes unica” ― “Hail, O Cross, our sole hope!” In the Introit of the Mass for Holy Thursday, we read: “We should glory in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, in whom is our salvation, life and resurrection, through whom we are saved and delivered!”
Our Lord had made this abundantly clear―“And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
Yet we plug our ears and ignore His words: “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15) … “Hear O foolish people without understanding―who have eyes and see not; and have ears and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21) … “You that see many things―will you not observe them? You that have ears open, will you not hear?” (Isaias 42:20) ... “Having eyes, do you not see? And having ears, can you not hear? Neither do you remember?” (Mark 8:18) … “They would not listen … They shut their ears, not to hear!” (Zacharias 7:11) … “Son of man, you dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see, and see not; and have ears to hear, and hear not―for they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2).
The Modern World is a Provoking House
Mankind today has truly become “a provoking house” to God―for they “have eyes to see, and see not; and have ears to hear, and hear not.” Our Lady has been sent by Heaven to warn us on many occasions ― yet most people choose to turn away and ignore her messages. Sister Lucia of Fatima said: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Regarding the increase of sin in the world and the terrible chastisements that await those sins as a consequence, Our Lady has said: “Nature is asking for vengeance because of man, and she trembles with dread at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime! … Many men in this world afflict the Lord! … Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [The Deluge was the Great Flood in Noe’s time] All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … God will strike in an unprecedented way. God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together!
“In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead! … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger … The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance! … Will you sacrifice yourself for the people of this time? … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send to you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … At the blood, the tears and prayers of the righteous, God will relent ... Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death ... Then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed. God will be served and glorified … Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like. And then peace will be made, and man will be reconciled with God.” (taken from Our Lady’s words to Blessed Elena Aiello, Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima & Our Lady of Akita).
The cross will triumph in the end―but if we fail to pick up and carry the “discounted” or “reduced-price” crosses that God sends everywhere throughout the world in the hope that we profit from them―then God will be obliged to send “full-price” crosses or even “inflation” crosses due to our refusal to accept and carry the “cheaper” crosses. We can triumph at a “reduced rate” or we will be forced to “pay the full price”―the choice is ours. But without the cross there is no hope―““We should glory in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ! … Hail, O Cross, our sole hope!” Our Lord had made this abundantly clear―“And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
“Say not: ‘I have sinned―and what harm has befallen me?’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:4). “The Lord delays not His promise [of punishment], as some imagine, but He deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9) ... “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). The cross is a penance―therefore, it is also the key to Heaven. Throw away your cross and you throw away your key to Heaven!
Why is the day when Jesus was brutally tortured and murdered called “Good Friday”? What’s “good” about it? As the Baltimore Catechism states: “Question: Why do you call that day “good” on which Christ died so sorrowful a death? Answer: We call that day good on which Christ died because by His death He showed His great love for man, and purchased for him every blessing.” While it may seem strange to call the day that Jesus died, “good,” it truly was good, and opened to us the gates of Heaven which had been closed to mankind due to sin.
We see the suffering and death Jesus endured for us on that day, which understandably brings us—or should bring us—great sorrow. Sorrow for what? Sorrow for sin! Sin is the greatest evil that exists in this world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” … “Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
We read in the Good Friday liturgy, when the priest processes with the crucifix down the center aisle of the church, stopping three times and saying these words: “Behold the wood of the Cross, on which hung the Savior of the world!” Good Friday is the day that Christ died on the cross for the redemption of the world. Redemption means the act of recovering something that was lost. When Adam and Eve sinned, humankind was plunged into sinfulness and lost the chance for eternity. Jesus’ death redeemed us from sin and eternal punishment for sin. Christ's greatest gift to us was that―even though He Himself was innocent of any sin―He was nevertheless willing to accept death so that we might be saved from the power of Satan and sin. Good Friday is good because it opens the possibility that we might live forever in Heaven, rather than suffer eternally in Hell.
Love and Live; Sin and Die
Love and death! At first, they conjure up two different emotions: desire and dread; pleasant and unpleasant; magnificent and morbid; delightful and depressing; exhilarating and excruciating! Two irreconcilables! Or are they?
An initial glance at Scripture seems to show their irreconcilability: God, Who is Love itself, is linked to life: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and God, Who is good, loves us and seeks to bring eternal life to our souls; the devil, who is evil, does not love us, but hates us and seeks to bring eternal death to our souls. Christ, with His grace, brings eternal life to us; the devil, with sin, brings eternal death to us. Jesus says of Himself: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life ... I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly” (John 14:6; 10:10); whereas, speaking of the devil, Jesus says: “He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him” (John 8:44).
“By one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). St. Paul tells us that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) and “the sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 14:56). God Himself tells us: “everyone shall die for his own sin” (Deuteronomy 24:16).
A God of Extremes
Yet our God is not just a God of extreme justice; He is also a God of extreme mercy:”For God loveth mercy and truth: the Lord will give grace and glory” (Psalm 83:12).”The Lord is merciful and just, and our God shows mercy” (Psalm 114:5). “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). But that mercy is not unconditional, nor is it free. To obtain that mercy, certain things have to be done.
“As I live, says the Lord God, I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways―and why will you die? Yea, if I shall say to the just that he shall surely live, and he, trusting in his justice, commits iniquity―then all his justices shall be forgotten, and in his iniquity, which he has committed, in the same shall he die. And if I shall say to the wicked: ‘Thou shalt surely die!’ and he do penance for his sin, and do judgment and justice, and if that wicked man restores what he had robbed, and walks in the commandments of life, and does no unjust thing―then he shall surely live, and shall not die! None of his sins, which he has committed, shall be imputed to him―for since he has done judgment and justice, he shall surely live...For when the just shall depart from his justice and commit iniquities, then he shall die in them. And when the wicked shall depart from his wickedness, and shall do judgment and justice, then he shall live in them” (Ezechiel 33:11-19).
Mercy Means Penance! What are the Means of Penance?
Sin must be paid for; our debt must be settled—otherwise we cannot enter Heaven. If we die in a state of unconfessed and unforgiven mortal sin, then the debt will be paid in Hell. If we neglect to pay for our confessed and forgiven sins in this life, then Purgatory awaits, and Jesus says: “thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last penny” (Matthew 5:26). The obvious solution is to pay now, rather than later. Now we can pay at a greatly ‘discounted’ price; after death, it will be payments with high interest added; “for the sin is great, and the fierce anger of the Lord hangs over Israel” (2 Paralipomenon 28:13). What payment plan will we choose? What payment plans are there to choose from?
The Penance of Pain & The Penance of Love
Upon Calvary, alongside the dying Christ, we see two sinners―one dying in pain, the other ‘dying’ out of grief-stricken love. One is a man, the other a woman. The man is the thief St. Dismas; the woman is the sinner St. Mary Magdalen. We may call them saints today, but at the time they were great sinners being transformed into saints. They were living proof that “the Lord is gracious and merciful, patient and plenteous in mercy ... and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9).
The Dismal Pain of Dismas
Dismas has led a dismal life; being a thief, robber, and consequently probably a murderer too, he was doing ‘penance’ for his sins and proving the truth of the statement that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). However, there is another thief suffering and dying with him; he has the same history, he has the same sufferings, but he does not have the same fate. His sufferings will be of no use to him, for he does not accept those sufferings as a just wage for his sins. He could have paid his debt there and then, like the Good Thief, Dismas, but he preferred (knowingly or unknowingly) to pay his debt in Hell.
Dismas would pay his debt alongside Jesus; or rather, he would co-pay with Jesus―for, of himself, he could not pay for any of his sins. Sin is an offense against God, even though we might sin against neighbor — “as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me” (Matthew 25:40). God is infinite, so any sin is consequently an infinite offense―since it offends an infinite God. Therefore, it contracts an infinite debt, which a finite man cannot hope to pay. It needs an infinite creature to be able to pay an infinite debt—Jesus is that infinite being―as an infinite God He can pay an infinite debt; as a human being He can pay the human debt for sin. Dismas merely co-pays, just as Our Lady co-redeems. We likewise have to co-pay—it is proof of our admission to guilt and proof of acceptance of responsibility and accountability.
Dismas pays primarily through his body―he is accepting of the pains and tortures of death as a just wage for his sins. It is not pain alone that saves him, it is pain processed and transformed by the soul into something above the natural, into something unnatural for him, into something supernatural. The pain breaks through into his soul and transforms him from a bad thief into a Good Thief who steals Heaven in the last lap of his life, with the last breath of his life. His was a payment plan of pain.
Yet, to say that Dismas died without love would be a grave misunderstanding and misrepresentation of what happened. He had to have some degree of love towards God in his heart for Christ to be able say to him: “This day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise” (Luke 23:43). A variety of things will have contributed to breaking down any hardness of heart that he may have had—but the pain of suffering undoubtedly opened and softened his heart, and prepared the soil of the soul to receive the seed of divine love. So, in the end, both death and love united in his life, to bring about his salvation.
The Mournful Love of Mary
The other sinner that we spoke of was Mary Magdalen, the sister of Martha, who according the traditional teaching of the Western (Roman) Church is the woman who was caught in adultery, the woman possessed by seven devils and the woman at the banquet of Simon the Leper who was weeping tears over Jesus’ feet, wiping them dry with her hair and anointing Jesus with precious alabaster. Like the thief, Dismas, she too was a great sinner.
However, her payment plan was of a different kind—she paid for her sins through love. Jesus Himself confirmed this, when at the banquet He said: “Why do you trouble this woman? Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much”(Matthew 26:10; Luke 7:47). Her payment plan was based upon the Old Testament quote of: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) and the same plan was carried over into the New Testament, as testified by St. Peter: “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). This is merely a reflection or an echo of the charity that led Jesus to lay down His life for our sins: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). “In this is charity―not as though we had loved God, but because He has first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10).
Like Dismas, Mary experienced a blend of love and pain on Calvary. The more she loved Christ, the more she felt the pain of what was happening to Christ. We know this from personal experience: the more we treasure a person or an object, the more agitated, sorrowful and pained we become when suffering a separation or its loss.
Love and Death United
Love and Death, the two things that seemed contradictory and irreconcilable, now find themselves united on Calvary. The words of Christ perform a marriage, so to speak, between Love and Death: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Death proves Love; and Love leads to Death. Our Lord proves His love for us by dying for us; and that love of His had to go to the very extreme, to the point of death itself. He could not raise the stakes any higher than that.
Similarly, Mary Magdalen ‘dies’ on Calvary with Christ. In a vaguely analogous way, as Christ dies mystically in each Sacrifice of the Mass, Mary dies mystically in an unbloody manner at the Sacrifice on Calvary. Christ’s heart is pierced, she feels the wound—since it is for her benefit and salvation that He undergoes all this, and it is her sins (ours too) that pierce that Sacred Heart. She knows that He is the ‘scapegoat’ for her sins. She knows that she should be in His place, sentenced to death and dying on the cross.
Just as Christ had spared her a painful physical death from being stoned to death for adultery, He now prevents her spiritual death through sin by dying on the cross for those sins. Like a woman watching her child being slain (Massacre of the Innocents) and wishing that she could be slain in the place of her baby; Mary Magdalen must have wished that this Massacre of the Innocent One could have been prevented and that she could be slain in His place. She was grateful to Him when she escaped being stoned to death; she was grateful to Him again for His redeeming death—she died with Him out of love.
A Double Death
So on Calvary, the wage of sin was most certainly death for all involved—to the innocent and guilty alike. Some experienced the pains of death primarily in the body; others felt pain as though they were ‘dying’ in the soul. But regardless of which manner of death was being experienced, what mattered most was that which was taking place in the soul. Without the presence of a supernatural love, all and any death would be vain, useless and pointless. This is exactly what St. Paul was trying to tell us in the Epistle that the Church put before us on Quinquagesima Sunday: “If I should deliver my body to be burned (or crucified, or whatever form of death it may be), and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:3).
The Soul of Lent
This shows us the indispensable ingredient that should have been present in all our Lenten penances—charity, or a love God. If we perform our penances without that vital, life-giving ingredient, then our penances are mere lifeless corpses, to which we could apply the words of Our Lord and Isaias: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8). In other words, we will be performing penances in a lifeless manner, without putting our heart into them—and the heart we need to put into them is a contrite heart, a broken heart, a sorrowing heart, a repentant heart, a new heart, but above all a loving heart. For charity is the form or the soul of all virtues; it is the inspiration, motivation and elevation of all that we do, ensuring that we do for God, and God alone! That is why Holy Scripture says: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Thus we can apply the axiom about prayer, to our penances, sacrifices and mortifications also: “One Hail Mary said well, is better than hundreds said badly!” Then, one act of penance done with a loving, broken, repentant heart, will be worth hundreds of penances done on ‘auto-pilot’ or mechanically.
Never Too Late
Perhaps, up to this point, our Lent has been “loveless”―the penances have been there, but the soul of charity was missing from them. This is what Our Lord meant when He said: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). Perhaps, like the Good Thief on the cross, Dismas, we find ourselves in this dismal, loveless, painful state of having labored through Lent with our loveless penances. Well, like Dismas, we could still “steal” a profitable Lent like he “stole” Heaven―even at the “eleventh hour” or the very of end of “Lenten Life”. Or like the workers in the vineyard, who only began work at the eleventh hour, after being idle all day. There is still time left to bring good out evil, to make good what was not so good. In these last moments of Lent, let us crucify ourselves spiritually, rip our flesh away from the seductive world, nail ourselves to the cross of a truly spiritual life, and die to our enemies of the devil, the world and our own concupiscences.
Time for Appreciation―Time for Gratitude
As we await the resurrection of the Lord, we would do well to meditate upon His Passion and Death in order to increase our appreciation and gratitude for His sufferings that brought about our potential redemption. The Good Friday liturgy―during the adoration of the cross―has a particularly poignant passage which puts the following words in the mouth of Our Lord:
“What more ought I have done for thee, that I have not done?
I planted thee, indeed, My most beautiful vineyard: and thou hast become exceeding bitter to Me!
For in My thirst thou gavest Me vinegar to drink: and with a lance thou hast pierced the side of thy Savior.
For thy sake I scourged Egypt with its first-born: and thou hast scourged Me and delivered Me up.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I led thee out of Egypt having drowned Pharao in the Red Sea: and thou hast delivered Me to the chief priests.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I opened the sea before thee: and thou with a spear hast opened My side.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I went before thee in a pillar of cloud: and thou hast led Me to the judgment hall of Pilate.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I fed thee with manna in the desert; and thou hast beaten Me with whips and scourges.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I gave thee the water of salvation from the rock to drink: and thou hast given Me gall and vinegar.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
For thy sake I struck the kings of the Canaanites: and thou hast struck My head with a reed.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I gave thee a royal scepter: and thou hast given to My head a crown of thorns.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!
I exalted thee with great strength: and thou hast hanged Me on the gibbet of the Cross.
O my people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer me!”
Talking the Talk―Not Walking the Walk
During that same adoration of the cross on Good Friday, we sing: “We adore Thy Cross, O Lord … for behold by the wood of the Cross joy has come into the whole world!” Yet that sounds a little hypocritical―considering that we are always moaning and complaining about one thing or another, which betrays the fact that we are not appreciative of the crosses that God allows to come our way; nor are we grateful for them; and most certainly we do not adore them! We talk the talk in the liturgy, but we do not walk the walk in our daily lives! What is even more astounding is that we fail to make the connection with this sorry state of affairs and the even more tragic fact that most souls end up being damned! A large part of that is the fact that we do not embrace our soul-saving crosses! On Calvary, there were two thieves―one was saved because he embraced his cross; the other was damned because he hated his cross and looked to escape from it: “One of the robbers, who were hanging, blasphemed Jesus, saying: ‘If Thou be Christ, save Thyself and us!’ But the other robber answering, rebuked him, saying: ‘Neither dost thou fear God, seeing thou art condemned under the same condemnation! And we indeed justly―for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man [Jesus] has done no evil!’ And he said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in paradise!’” (Luke 23:39-43). St. Augustine, commenting upon this, says that the very same crosses lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell!
Salvation in the Cross and through the Cross
St. Paul writes: “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Galatians 6:14) ... “The word of the cross is foolishness to them that perish; but to them that are saved, it is the power of God!” (1 Corinthians 1:18). In the Sacrifice of the Mass, the Preface of the Holy Cross states: “Lord, holy Father, almighty and eternal God, You placed the salvation of the human race on the wood of the Cross!” The Passiontide Liturgy for Vespers clearly links the cross to salvation: “O Crux, ave, spes unica” ― “Hail, O Cross, our sole hope!” In the Introit of the Mass for Holy Thursday, we read: “We should glory in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, in whom is our salvation, life and resurrection, through whom we are saved and delivered!”
Our Lord had made this abundantly clear―“And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
Yet we plug our ears and ignore His words: “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15) … “Hear O foolish people without understanding―who have eyes and see not; and have ears and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21) … “You that see many things―will you not observe them? You that have ears open, will you not hear?” (Isaias 42:20) ... “Having eyes, do you not see? And having ears, can you not hear? Neither do you remember?” (Mark 8:18) … “They would not listen … They shut their ears, not to hear!” (Zacharias 7:11) … “Son of man, you dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see, and see not; and have ears to hear, and hear not―for they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2).
The Modern World is a Provoking House
Mankind today has truly become “a provoking house” to God―for they “have eyes to see, and see not; and have ears to hear, and hear not.” Our Lady has been sent by Heaven to warn us on many occasions ― yet most people choose to turn away and ignore her messages. Sister Lucia of Fatima said: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness with their life of virtue and apostolate without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―do not see God’s chastisement about to fall upon them presently, and keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Regarding the increase of sin in the world and the terrible chastisements that await those sins as a consequence, Our Lady has said: “Nature is asking for vengeance because of man, and she trembles with dread at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime! … Many men in this world afflict the Lord! … Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended! … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [The Deluge was the Great Flood in Noe’s time] All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth! … If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before! … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! … God will strike in an unprecedented way. God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together!
“In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind! … Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead! … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger … The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance! … Will you sacrifice yourself for the people of this time? … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send to you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … At the blood, the tears and prayers of the righteous, God will relent ... Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death ... Then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed. God will be served and glorified … Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like. And then peace will be made, and man will be reconciled with God.” (taken from Our Lady’s words to Blessed Elena Aiello, Our Lady of Good Success, Our Lady of La Salette, Our Lady of Fatima & Our Lady of Akita).
The cross will triumph in the end―but if we fail to pick up and carry the “discounted” or “reduced-price” crosses that God sends everywhere throughout the world in the hope that we profit from them―then God will be obliged to send “full-price” crosses or even “inflation” crosses due to our refusal to accept and carry the “cheaper” crosses. We can triumph at a “reduced rate” or we will be forced to “pay the full price”―the choice is ours. But without the cross there is no hope―““We should glory in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ! … Hail, O Cross, our sole hope!” Our Lord had made this abundantly clear―“And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
“Say not: ‘I have sinned―and what harm has befallen me?’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:4). “The Lord delays not His promise [of punishment], as some imagine, but He deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9) ... “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). The cross is a penance―therefore, it is also the key to Heaven. Throw away your cross and you throw away your key to Heaven!
Article 31
Holy Thursday in Holy Week, March 28th
Holy Eucharist―Cause of Salvation and Damnation―a Medicine and a Poison
Holy Thursday in Holy Week, March 28th
Holy Eucharist―Cause of Salvation and Damnation―a Medicine and a Poison
Our Greatest Treasure―Our Greatest Danger
The Holy Eucharist stands at the heart and at the pinnacle of all the Sacraments. The difference is that the Sacraments give us the grace of God, but the Holy Eucharist gives us not only grace, but God Himself. The Holy Eucharist is the Real Presence of the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ under the appearance of bread. It is God Himself! What greater treasure can you imagine? Daily access to God! Having God enter your body and soul through Holy Communion! Yet, at the same time, there is a great danger attached to this! How so? Well, you know well the popular proverb: “Familiarity breeds contempt!” The more we get used to something, the less we start to esteem and respect it.
This is precisely what Holy Mother Church and St. Paul put before us in the Epistle from the Mass for Holy Thursday. The passage from St. Paul that Holy Mother Church has selected is the one where St. Paul rebukes those Christians at Corinth who are guilty of abusing the Holy Eucharist. He warns the Corinthians against the unworthy reception of Holy Communion (11:27–30), because the Eucharist is Jesus Himself: “Whoever eats the Bread or drinks the Cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the Body and Blood of the Lord … For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the Body eats and drinks condemnation upon himself” (11:27, 29). Paul says that we must examine ourselves before we receive (11:28). These three verses (11:27–29) — which concern a matter so important that salvation or damnation hinges on it — are read at least three times each year in the traditional Latin Mass. They were, however, systematically excluded and never read in the Novus Ordo Mass (the New Mass that came out at the end of the 1960s and continued to be changed at the start of the 1970s).
The Apostle also points out that unworthy reception of Communion can lead to physical sickness and death (11:30). St. Paul’s advice that Christians should first eat at home and then come later on to the Mass (11:34), emphasizing its proper dignity as a heavenly banquet, shows the remote origins of the discipline of the Eucharistic fast. Here is the entire passage:
“First of all, I hear that when you come together in the church, there are schisms among you―and in part I believe it. When you come therefore together into one place, it is not now to eat the Lord's Supper. [He speaks of them mixing together their secular meals with Lord’s Supper, that is Holy Mass]. For every one taketh before his own supper to eat. And one indeed is hungry and another is drunk! What, have you not houses to eat and to drink in? Or despise ye the church of God; and put them to shame that have not? What shall I say to you? Do I praise you? In this I praise you not! [He then reminds them that the Lord’s Supper is not a common meal, but a sacrifice―which we today call the Sacrifice of the Mass]. For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus, the same night in which He was betrayed, took bread. And giving thanks, broke, and said: ‘Take ye, and eat! This is My Body, which shall be delivered for you! Do this for the commemoration of Me!’ In like manner also the Chalice, after He had supped, saying: ‘This Chalice is the New Testament in My Blood! Do ye this, as often as you shall drink, for the commemoration of Me!’ For as often as you shall eat this Bread, and drink the Chalice, you shall show the death of the Lord, until He come! Therefore whosoever shall eat this Bread, or drink the Chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the Body and of the Blood of the Lord! But let a man prove himself―and so let him eat of that Bread, and drink of the Chalice. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the Body of the Lord. Therefore there are many infirm and weak among you, and many sleep. But if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But whilst we are judged, we are chastised by the Lord, that we be not condemned with this world. Wherefore, my brethren, when you come together to eat, wait for one another. If any man be hungry, let him eat at home [before coming to the Lord’s Supper or Holy Mass]; that you come not together unto judgment” (1 Corinthians 11:18-33).
The Holy Eucharist is inextricably tied to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―it is during the Holy Sacrifice that the Holy Eucharist is produced through transubstantiation, whereby the substances of bread and wine are changed into the substances of the Body and Blood of Christ, whilst miraculously retaining the appearance of bread and wine. You cannot get the Holy Eucharist without the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―much like you cannot beget a child without parents. That is why the Church teaches that the Holy Eucharist is NOT JUST a Sacrament, but a SACRAMENT and a SACRIFICE.
Fr. Stefano M. Manelli, in his book Jesus Our Eucharistic Love, writes: “Let us ask the question: What is the Eucharist? It is God with us. It is the Lord Jesus present in the tabernacles of our churches with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. It is Jesus veiled under the appearance of bread, but really and physically present in the consecrated Host, so that He dwells in our midst, works within us and for us, and is at our disposal. The Eucharistic Jesus is the true Emmanuel, which means ‘God with us’ (Matthew 1:23). The Faith of the Church, Pope Pius XII teaches us, is this: That one and identical is the Word of God and the Son of Mary, Who suffered on the Cross, Who is present in the Eucharist, and Who rules in Heaven. The Eucharistic Jesus is here with us as a brother, as a friend, as spouse of our souls. He wishes to enter within us to be our food for eternal life, our love, our support. He wants to make us part of His mystical Body in which He would redeem us and save us, and then take us into the kingdom of Heaven”
Christ came to “to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). He said of Himself: “I am the door. By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved” (John 10:9) … “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly” (John 10:10). He then explains how we achieve that eternal life: “He that believeth in Me, hath everlasting life. I am the Bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the desert, and are dead. This is the Bread which cometh down from Heaven; that if any man eat of it, he may not die. I am the living Bread which came down from Heaven. If any man eat of this Bread, he shall live for ever; and the Bread that I will give, is My flesh, for the life of the world … Amen, amen I say unto you: Unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eateth My Flesh, and drinketh My Blood, hath everlasting life―and I will raise him up in the last day. For My Flesh is meat indeed: and My Blood is drink indeed. He that eateth My Flesh, and drinketh My Blood, abideth in Me, and I in him. As the living Father hath sent Me, and I live by the Father; so he that eateth Me, the same also shall live by Me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead. He that eateth this Bread, shall live for ever!” (John 6:47-59).
The Only Way to Heaven
As Holy Scripture says: “Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other. For there is no other name under Heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:10-12). Our Lord said of Himself: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No man cometh to the Father, but by Me!” (John 14:6). “I am the door. By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved” (John 10:9). If that is the case, then you had better go find Him and find that door! Where is He? Where is that door? He is in the Holy Eucharist, behind the door of every tabernacle!
God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). To find God is to find love. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “The Eucharist is the Sacrament of Love: It signifies Love, It produces love.” Without that Love we shall never make Heaven―as Holy Scripture points out: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profiteth me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Lack of Eucharistic Love
The image of a heart is a symbol of charity and love. It is no coincidence that when Jesus came to St. Margaret Mary to sow the seeds of devotion to His Sacred Heart, it was during the octave of Corpus Christi (the Body of Christ), a Eucharistic feast. We even have a votive Mass dedicated to the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus. You could also call it the Eucharistic Love of Jesus―for the Heart of Jesus is all about love, and God is love itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). You can also correctly say that Holy Eucharist is the Sacred Heart of Jesus―especially since scientists discovered that 1,200 year old remains of a Host from the Eucharistic miracle at Lanciano, was actually a fragment of a human heart! [click here to read about it]. This “Heart” or “Loving Heart” of the Holy Eucharist is further amplified and proven by the words of the Sacred Heart, spoken to St. Margaret Mary: “My Divine Heart is so passionately inflamed with love for men … and is not able any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its ardent charity … Behold this Heart which has so loved men that It spared nothing, even going so far as to exhaust and consume Itself, to prove to them Its love. And in return I receive from the greater part of men nothing but ingratitude, by the contempt, irreverence, sacrileges and coldness with which they treat Me in this Sacrament of Love!”
In the parable of the wedding feast (isn’t marriage supposed to be all about love?), Our Lord mentions that the man without a wedding-garment (which biblical commentators say signifies a garment of love or charity) is cast out of the wedding banquet: “The marriage was filled with guests. And the king went in to see the guests: and he saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment. And he said to him: ‘Friend, how camest thou in hither not having a wedding garment?’ But he was silent. Then the king said to the waiters: ‘Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the exterior darkness! There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 22:10-13).
Our Lord is in the Eucharist―the Sacrament of Love―out of love for us. He expects us to come to Him with love―dressed in a wedding-garment, a garment of love. Yet too many come to Him stained with sins, even unconfessed mortal sins, for which they have no repentance, or they lack love and are lukewarm―of these He says: “Thou art neither cold, nor hot [that is to say, you neither hate Me nor love Me]. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth! Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ ― and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire tried [that is to say, charity which is symbolized by gold and fire], that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments [garments of grace and purity], and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see! Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise! Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
If every Christian must love Jesus Christ: “If any man love not Our Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema.” (1 Corinthians 16:22), love for the Eucharist must spring from the heart and be ever alive in us all. Now even love needs exercise. The heart needs to be exercised to love the true God. Yet exercises can be performed sluggishly, half-heartedly, lazily and lukewarmly―or the can be performed with energy, intensity, passion and zeal. We speak of spiritual EXERCISES―yet how poorly we perform them! Of all those who receive Holy Communion, what do you think their prayers of preparation and thanksgiving are like? The word “Eucharist” means “Thanksgiving”. Realistically, if you look around you at Mass, there are very few who manifest an energy, intensity, passion and zeal for the Holy Eucharist. Their prayers are more likely to be routine, automatic, mechanical, half-hearted, distracted, and insincere. The words of Our Lord spring to mind: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8).
As Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “Alas! If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example ― for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
Words of the Blessed Virgin Mary on the Holy Eucharist
Let us turn to the Mother of the Holy Eucharist, Mother of the Sacred and Eucharistic Heart of Jesus, who understood better than anyone the greatness of the Holy Eucharist, to learn from her what our dispositions ought to be. Here is what Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda:
“O if only the believers in the Catholic Faith would open their hardened and stony hearts in order to attain to a true understanding of the sacred and mysterious blessing of the Holy Eucharist! If they would only detach themselves, root out and reject their earthly inclinations, and, by restraining their passions, apply themselves with living Faith to study their great happiness in thus possessing their eternal God in the Holy Sacrament. If they would only appreciate being able, by its reception and constant communication, to participate in the effects of this heavenly Manna! If they would only worthily esteem this precious Gift, begin to taste its sweetness, and share in the hidden power of their omnipotent God! Then nothing would ever be lacking to them in their exile. Mortals have no reason to complain of their weakness and their passions―since in this Bread of Heaven they have at hand strength and health.
“It matters not that they are tempted and persecuted by the demons―for, by receiving this Sacrament frequently, they are enabled to overcome the demons gloriously. The faithful are themselves to blame for all their poverty and labors, because they pay no attention to this divine mystery, nor avail themselves of the divine powers, thus placed at their disposal by my most holy Son. I tell you truly, that Lucifer and his demons have such a fear of the most Holy Eucharist, that to approach it, causes them more torments than to remain in Hell itself. Although they do enter churches in order to tempt souls, they enter them with aversion, forcing themselves to endure cruel pains in the hope of destroying a soul and drawing it into sin, especially in the holy places and in the presence of the Holy Eucharist. Their wrath against the Lord and against the souls alone could induce them to expose themselves to the torment of His Real Sacramental Presence.
“Whenever He is carried through the streets, the demons usually fly and disperse in all haste; and they would not dare to approach those that accompany Him, if it were not by their long experience they know that they will succeed in inducing some persons to forget the reverence due to their Lord. Therefore they make special efforts to tempt the faithful in the churches―for they know what great offence they can do to the Lord Himself, Who in His sacramental love is there waiting to sanctify men and to receive the return of His sweetest and untiring love.
“Hence you can also understand the strength of those who prepare themselves to partake of this Bread of the angels and how the demons fear the souls, who receive the Lord worthily and devoutly, and who strive to preserve themselves in this purity until the next Holy Communion. But there are few who live with this intention, and the enemy is ceaselessly alert in striving to throw them back into their forgetfulness, distraction and indifference, so that he may not be obliged to encounter such powerful weapons in the hands of men.
“Write this admonition in your heart! And since the Almighty has ordained, without any merit on your part, that you can receive Holy Communion daily, seek by all possible means to preserve yourself in good dispositions from one Holy Communion to the other. It is the will of the Lord and my own, that with this sword of daily Communion you fight the battles of the Almighty, in the name of the Holy Church, against the invisible enemies.
“But while the omnipotent and just Judge, Who is so greatly incensed against sinful Catholics for having outraged His justice by their immeasurable and continual sins, none are found to consider and weigh the fearful damage of their sins, nor do any approach the easy remedy of receiving the Holy Eucharist with a contrite and humble heart; nor does anyone ask for my intercession. Though all the children of the Church are generally guilty of this fault, yet more to be blamed are the unworthy and wicked priests―because, by the irreverence with which they treat the Blessed Sacrament, other Catholics have been drawn, by this bad example, to undervalue the Blessed Sacrament. If the people see their priests approach the divine mysteries with holy fear and trembling, then they learn to treat and receive their God in the same manner. Those that so honor Him shall shine in Heaven like the sun among the stars―for my divine Son will reward, in a special manner, those who have behaved well toward Him in the Blessed Sacrament and have received Him with all reverence; whereas this will not happen to those who have not come this holy table with devotion.
“Moreover, those who were devout towards the Holy Eucharist, will bear on their breast, where they have so often harbored the Holy Eucharist, most beautiful and resplendent inscriptions, showing that they were most worthy tabernacles of the Holy Sacrament. This will be a great reward for them and a source of jubilation and admiration for the holy angels and the rest of the blessed. They will also enjoy the special favor of being able to penetrate deeper into the mystery of the presence of the Lord in this Sacrament, and to understand all the rest of the wonders hidden therein. This will be such a privilege, that it alone would suffice for their eternal happiness, even if there were no other enjoyment in Heaven. Moreover, the essential glory of those, who have worthily and devoutly received the Holy Eucharist, will in several respects exceed the glory of many martyrs who have not received the Blood of the Lord.
“I wish you to also hear, from my own mouth, what were my sentiments when in mortal life I was about to receive Holy Communion. I was preserved from Original Sin and, at the instant of my Conception, received the knowledge and vision of the Divinity. I knew more than all saints; I surpassed the highest seraphim in love; I never committed any fault; I constantly practiced all the virtues in a heroic degree and in the least of them I was greater than all the saints in their highest perfection; the intention and object of my actions were most exalted and my habits and gifts were noble without measure; I imitated my most holy Son most closely; I labored faithfully; I suffered with eagerness and co-operated with the doings of the Lord exactly as was becoming to me; I ceased not to exercise my love and gain new supereminent merits of grace. Yet I thought myself to have been fully repaid by being allowed to receive Him even once in the Holy Eucharist―though I did not consider myself worthy of this one favor.
“Reflect then what should be your sentiments, and those of the rest of the children of Adam, on being admitted to the reception of this admirable Sacrament. And if, for the greatest of saints, one Holy Communion is a superabundant reward, what must the priests and the faithful think, when they are allowed to receive it so frequently? Open your eyes in the deep darkness and blindness which overwhelm men around you, and raise them up to the divine brightness in order to understand these mysteries. Look upon all your works as insufficient, all your sufferings as most insignificant, all your thanksgiving as falling far short of what you owe to God for such an exquisite blessing as that of possessing in the Holy Church, Christ my divine Son, present in the Holy Sacrament, in order to enrich all the faithful. If you have nothing with which to show your thanks for this and the other blessings which you have received, then at least humiliate yourself to the dust and remain prostrate upon it; confess yourself as being unworthy with all the sincerity of your heart.”
Love One―Love the Other
You cannot have one without the other! You cannot love one without the other! They are inseparable―just like the Jesus and Mary, Son and Mother, are inseparable. If you want to love the Holy Eucharist, then you have to love the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. In fact, if you follow the Jewish standard of time-keeping or day-keeping, then the Last Supper and the Crucifixion were on the same day―because it was at sunset that the next day was calculated as having its beginning. The Catholic Church also adheres to this custom, because a first class feast begins on the eve of the feast―so, for example, the First Vespers of the feast of the Nativity of Our Lord (Christmas) are sung after sunset on December 24th, even though we consider Christmas Day to begin at midnight, at the end of December 24th. So, coming back to the point, in following this method of counting days, the Last Supper was technically at the start of the Pasch and Sabbath, you then have the Last Supper and the Crucifixion taking place on the same day―with Thursday night (as we call it) already being a part of Friday, because the sun had already set. Thus the inseparability of the Last Supper and Christ’s crucifixion, or, if you like, the Holy Eucharist and the Sacrifice of Christ on Calvary re-enacted in Holy Mass. We live-out this truth when we both, (1) attend the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and (2) receive Holy Communion at that same Mass―both events, attending Mass and receiving Communion, occurring on the same day.
Just stop and think for a moment! The greatest thing that you can do is to love God. The first thing that you MUST do is to love God―Our Lord Himself tells us this: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Where will you find God so as to be able to love Him with your whole heart, soul, mind and strength? The answer is so blatantly obvious―in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and in the Holy Eucharist, and, once Mass is over, you will find God in the Holy Eucharist as the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar in the tabernacle. God (Jesus) is found in the Holy Eucharist on the altar during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. God (Jesus) comes to us in the Holy Eucharist when it is usually distributed to the faithful at the end of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. God (Jesus) remains with us after the Sacrifice of the Mass as the Holy Eucharist in the tabernacle, which we call the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar. Nobody can claim that they did not know where to find God IN PERSON, and not just represented by a picture or a statue! It is God in the Holy Eucharist―whether in the Sacrifice of the Mass, or in Holy Communion, or in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar―that “Thou shalt love with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Our Greatest Treasure―Our Greatest Neglect
As the Imitation of Christ says: “What great devotion ought not I and all Christian people now show in the presence of this Sacrament; what reverence in receiving the most excellent Body of Christ! Many people travel far to honor the relics of the saints, marveling at their wonderful deeds and at the building of magnificent shrines. They gaze upon and kiss the sacred relics encased in silk and gold; and behold, You are here present before me on the altar, my God, Saint of saints, Creator of men, and Lord of angels! Often in looking at such things, men are moved by curiosity, by the novelty of the unseen, and they bear away little fruit for the amendment of their lives, especially when they go from place to place lightly and without true contrition. But here in the Sacrament of the altar You are wholly present, my God, the man Christ Jesus, whence is obtained the full realization of eternal salvation, as often as You are worthily and devoutly received. To this, indeed, we are not drawn by levity, or curiosity, or sensuality―but by firm faith, devout hope, and sincere love.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 4, Chapter 1).
The Imitation of Christ continues: “You, my Lord God, invite the poor and needy to receive Your most holy Body! Who am I, Lord, that I should presume to approach You? Behold, the Heaven of heavens cannot contain You, and yet You say: “Come, all of you, to Me.” What this most gracious honor and this friendly invitation mean? How shall I dare to come―I who am conscious of no good on which to presume? How shall I lead You into my house―I who have so often offended in Your most kindly sight? Angels and archangels revere You, the holy and the just fear You, and You say: “Come to Me: all of you!” If You, Lord, had not said it, who would have believed it to be true? And if You had not commanded, who would dare approach?
“Behold, Noe, a just man, worked a hundred years building the ark that he and a few others might be saved―how, then, can I prepare myself in one hour to receive with reverence the Maker of the world? Moses, Your great servant and special friend, made an ark of incorruptible wood, which he covered with purest gold wherein to place the tables of Your law―shall I, a creature of corruption, dare so easily to receive You, the Maker of law and the Giver of life? Solomon, the wisest of the kings of Israel, spent seven years building a magnificent temple in praise of Your Name, and celebrated its dedication with a feast of eight days. He offered a thousand victims in Your honor and solemnly bore the Ark of the Covenant with trumpeting and jubilation to the place prepared for it―and I, unhappy and poorest of men, how shall I lead You into my house, I who scarcely can spend a half-hour devoutly — would that I could spend even that as I ought!
“O my God, how hard these men tried to please You! Alas, how little is all that I do! How short the time I spend in preparing for Communion! I am seldom wholly recollected, and very seldom, indeed, entirely free from distraction. Yet surely, in the presence of Your life-giving Godhead, no unbecoming thought should arise and no creature possess my heart―for I am about to receive as my guest, not an angel, but the very Lord of angels. Why, then, do I not long more ardently for Your adorable Presence? Why do I not prepare myself with greater care to receive Your sacred Gifts, since those holy patriarchs and prophets of old, as well as kings and princes with all their people, have shown such affectionate devotion for the worship of God?
“Our neglect and coldness is much to be deplored and pitied, when we are not moved to receive with greater fervor Christ, in Whom is the hope and merit of all who will be saved. He is our sanctification and redemption. He is our consolation in this life and the eternal joy of the blessed in Heaven. This being true, it is lamentable that many pay so little heed to the salutary Mystery which fills the heavens with joy and maintains the whole universe in being.
“Oh, the blindness and the hardness of the heart of man that does not show more regard for so wonderful a gift, but rather falls into carelessness from its daily use! If this most holy Sacrament were celebrated in only one place and consecrated by only one priest in the whole world, with what great desire, do you think, would men be attracted to that place, to that priest of God, in order to witness the celebration of the divine Mysteries! But now there are many priests and Mass is offered in many places, that God’s grace and love for men may appear the more clearly as the Sacred Communion is spread more widely through the world.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 4, Chapter 1).
Receiving Christ Worthily and Humbly
“When I consider Your dignity, O Lord, and my own meanness, I become very much frightened and confused. For if I do not receive, I fly from Life―and if I intrude unworthily, I incur Your displeasure. What, then, shall I do, my God? Teach me the right way. Place before me some exercise suitable for Holy Communion, for it is good to know in what manner I ought to make my heart ready devoutly and fervently for You, to receive Your Sacrament for the good of my soul, or even to celebrate so great and divine a sacrifice.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 4, Chapter 6).
The Voice of Christ answers: “Carefully examine your conscience, then. Cleanse and purify it to the best of your power by true contrition and humble confession, that you may have no burden, know of no remorse, and thus be free to come near. Let the memory of all your sins grieve you, and especially lament and bewail your daily transgressions. Then, if time permits, confess to God in the secret depths of your heart all the miseries your passions have caused.
“Lament and grieve because you are still so worldly, so carnal, so passionate and unmortified, so full of roving lust, so careless in guarding the external senses, so often occupied in many vain fancies, so inclined to exterior things and so heedless of what lies within, so prone to laughter and dissipation and so indisposed to sorrow and tears, so inclined to ease and the pleasures of the flesh and so cool to austerity and zeal, so curious to hear what is new and to see the beautiful and so slow to embrace humiliation and dejection, so covetous of abundance, so niggardly in giving and so tenacious in keeping, so inconsiderate in speech, so reluctant in silence, so undisciplined in character, so disordered in action, so greedy at meals, so deaf to the Word of God, so prompt to rest and so slow to labor, so awake to empty conversation, so sleepy in keeping sacred vigils and so eager to end them, so wandering in your attention, so careless in saying the office, so lukewarm in celebrating, so heartless in receiving, so quickly distracted, so seldom fully recollected, so quickly moved to anger, so apt to take offense at others, so prone to judge, so severe in condemning, so happy in prosperity and so weak in adversity, so often making good resolutions and carrying so few of them into action.
“When you have confessed and deplored these and other faults with sorrow and great displeasure because of your weakness, be firmly determined to amend your life day by day and to advance in goodness. Then, with complete resignation and with your entire will offer yourself upon the altar of your heart as an everlasting sacrifice to the honor of My Name, by entrusting with Faith both body and soul to My care, that thus you may be considered worthy to draw near and offer sacrifice to God and profitably receive the Sacrament of My Body. For there is no more worthy offering, no greater satisfaction for washing away sin, than to offer yourself purely and entirely to God with the offering of the Body of Christ in Mass and Communion.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 4, Chapter 7).
Do You Love?
The Imitation of Christ has a beautiful chapter entitled “The Wonderful Effects of Divine Love”―which could be effects that we might feel in our souls if we would only receive Christ in Holy Communion with much greater desire, greater respect and greater fervor. Of course, as Our Lord says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5)―and without His inspiring, stirring, moving grace, we could not even desire to receive Him in such a manner. Yet we can be absolutely sure that such a grace will be given to everyone who asks: “Ask, and it shall be given you ― seek, and you shall find ― knock, and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7). If Christ has told us to love God with our whole soul, heart, mind and strength―then He must be prepared to give the graces required to fulfill that command. Here are some extracts from that beautiful chapter entitled “The Wonderful Effects of Divine Love.” Just think―you too could feel those effects in your soul from receiving Holy Communion in a more fervent manner!
“Ah, Lord God, when You come into my heart, all that is within me will rejoice. You are my glory and the exultation of my heart. But, because my love is as yet weak and my virtue imperfect, I must be strengthened and comforted by You. Visit me often, therefore, and teach me Your holy discipline. Free me from evil passions and cleanse my heart of all disorderly affection so that, healed and purified within, I may be fit to love, strong to suffer, and firm to persevere.
“Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs with equanimity. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and estranged from all worldly affections, lest its inward sight be obstructed, lest it be entangled in any temporal interest and overcome by adversity.
“Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger, or higher, or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in the one sovereign Good, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift, but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver.
“Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much, where he, who does not love, fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle.
“Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself, there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. It is mean and contemptible in its own eyes, devoted and thankful to God; always trusting and hoping in Him even when He is distasteful to it, for there is no living in love without sorrow. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved, is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter, for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5, “The Wonderful Effects of Divine Love”).
Love and Leave Things to Our Lord
Who needs God anymore, when we have science and technology? “The Lord hath looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together: there is none that doth good, no not one. They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that doth good, no, not one! The fool hath said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and unhappiness is in their ways and the way of peace they have not known! There is no fear of God before their eyes. They have not called upon the Lord: there have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear” (Psalm 13:1-5).
Another Psalm says much the same thing: “God looked down from heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. The fool said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that doth good, no, not one. They are corrupted, and become abominable in iniquities―there is none that doth good. They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. For God hath scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God hath despised them!” (Psalm 52:1-6).
Yes― “They have not called upon God!” Modern man has an especial difficulty with Our Lord’s words: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). In fact, modern man is pretty much trying to do everything without Christ! Even Catholics fall into this category. They will rely upon self first and foremost―and then, if things are not working out, they MIGHT POSSIBLY turn to God in prayer, though, for many or most people, that “prayer” might well be a blasphemy―as they use Our Lord’s Name in anger, in phrases such as: “Jesus Christ! Why the hell is everything going wrong?” or “O God! I’ve had enough of this!” or even adding some four-letter words to their “prayer”. It has almost come to a point where the idol of science can do everything and we need God for nothing! “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
We need to humble ourselves―before God forcefully humbles us in a manner far more humiliating than any willing self-humiliation―and recognize and return to the God Who can do all things: “Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:26) … “He said to them: ‘The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!’” (Luke 18:27) … “And Jesus looking on them, said: ‘With men it is impossible; but not with God: for all things are possible with God!’” (Mark 10:27) … “Because no word shall be impossible with God!” (Luke 1:37).
In the book, Words of Love, by Fr. Robert Gottemuller, which is a summary compiled from three other books by different authors, we read of the words of Jesus spoken to three different mystics―Sr. Consolata Betrone, Sr. Mary of the Trinity and Sr. Josefa Menendez. Though many different topics are covered, here are some extracts that pertain to our need to rely upon Jesus for all things:
“I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me … You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! … Know that I am thinking of everything, that I am providing for everything down to the smallest detail. Therefore, do not let one thought enter your mind, not one outside interest.... Have no fear! I am taking care of you! … Allow Me to do it all! I will do everything; but you should, at every moment, give Me what I ask for with much love! … Place no limits on your confidence in Me, then I will place no limits on My graces for you! … Let Me do everything! You will see that I will do everything, and do it well!” (Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., pages 153-154, 109, 59).
“The future is Mine, what do you fear? … Remember this: Everything is a means in My Hands; I make all work together to fulfill My will … To love Me is to have confidence in Me, not to doubt Me; it is to rely on Me … You oppose Me by your desires, your tastes, your resistance! … All souls could rapidly attain to the plenitude of their sanctity if they allowed Me to act, without resisting. Oh, the unacknowledged reserves of selfishness which paralyze the omnipotence of the Holy Spirit within you! … Most religious give Me their work and their talents—I have sufficient talents at My disposal … Let Me act! You are not competent to do anything―it is not your province! … Not one of those who have trusted in Me has ever been disappointed. My little daughter, you would be the first to whom that would happen: why do you doubt?” (Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., nos. 9, 132, 99, 608, 114, 432).
“Do you think that anything happens without My permission? I dispose all things for the good of each and every soul … Do not worry, Josefa, about what you can and what you cannot do. You know very well that you can do nothing. But I am He who can and will do all. Yes, I will do all, even what seems to you impossible.... I will supply for all that you lack or cannot do. I ask you only for your liberty. All I need is to possess your will [love resides in the will―so He is essentially saying: “I need your love”], for this I cannot find a substitute.” (Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, pages 331 & 401).
The Holy Eucharist stands at the heart and at the pinnacle of all the Sacraments. The difference is that the Sacraments give us the grace of God, but the Holy Eucharist gives us not only grace, but God Himself. The Holy Eucharist is the Real Presence of the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ under the appearance of bread. It is God Himself! What greater treasure can you imagine? Daily access to God! Having God enter your body and soul through Holy Communion! Yet, at the same time, there is a great danger attached to this! How so? Well, you know well the popular proverb: “Familiarity breeds contempt!” The more we get used to something, the less we start to esteem and respect it.
This is precisely what Holy Mother Church and St. Paul put before us in the Epistle from the Mass for Holy Thursday. The passage from St. Paul that Holy Mother Church has selected is the one where St. Paul rebukes those Christians at Corinth who are guilty of abusing the Holy Eucharist. He warns the Corinthians against the unworthy reception of Holy Communion (11:27–30), because the Eucharist is Jesus Himself: “Whoever eats the Bread or drinks the Cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the Body and Blood of the Lord … For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the Body eats and drinks condemnation upon himself” (11:27, 29). Paul says that we must examine ourselves before we receive (11:28). These three verses (11:27–29) — which concern a matter so important that salvation or damnation hinges on it — are read at least three times each year in the traditional Latin Mass. They were, however, systematically excluded and never read in the Novus Ordo Mass (the New Mass that came out at the end of the 1960s and continued to be changed at the start of the 1970s).
The Apostle also points out that unworthy reception of Communion can lead to physical sickness and death (11:30). St. Paul’s advice that Christians should first eat at home and then come later on to the Mass (11:34), emphasizing its proper dignity as a heavenly banquet, shows the remote origins of the discipline of the Eucharistic fast. Here is the entire passage:
“First of all, I hear that when you come together in the church, there are schisms among you―and in part I believe it. When you come therefore together into one place, it is not now to eat the Lord's Supper. [He speaks of them mixing together their secular meals with Lord’s Supper, that is Holy Mass]. For every one taketh before his own supper to eat. And one indeed is hungry and another is drunk! What, have you not houses to eat and to drink in? Or despise ye the church of God; and put them to shame that have not? What shall I say to you? Do I praise you? In this I praise you not! [He then reminds them that the Lord’s Supper is not a common meal, but a sacrifice―which we today call the Sacrifice of the Mass]. For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus, the same night in which He was betrayed, took bread. And giving thanks, broke, and said: ‘Take ye, and eat! This is My Body, which shall be delivered for you! Do this for the commemoration of Me!’ In like manner also the Chalice, after He had supped, saying: ‘This Chalice is the New Testament in My Blood! Do ye this, as often as you shall drink, for the commemoration of Me!’ For as often as you shall eat this Bread, and drink the Chalice, you shall show the death of the Lord, until He come! Therefore whosoever shall eat this Bread, or drink the Chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the Body and of the Blood of the Lord! But let a man prove himself―and so let him eat of that Bread, and drink of the Chalice. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the Body of the Lord. Therefore there are many infirm and weak among you, and many sleep. But if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But whilst we are judged, we are chastised by the Lord, that we be not condemned with this world. Wherefore, my brethren, when you come together to eat, wait for one another. If any man be hungry, let him eat at home [before coming to the Lord’s Supper or Holy Mass]; that you come not together unto judgment” (1 Corinthians 11:18-33).
The Holy Eucharist is inextricably tied to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―it is during the Holy Sacrifice that the Holy Eucharist is produced through transubstantiation, whereby the substances of bread and wine are changed into the substances of the Body and Blood of Christ, whilst miraculously retaining the appearance of bread and wine. You cannot get the Holy Eucharist without the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―much like you cannot beget a child without parents. That is why the Church teaches that the Holy Eucharist is NOT JUST a Sacrament, but a SACRAMENT and a SACRIFICE.
Fr. Stefano M. Manelli, in his book Jesus Our Eucharistic Love, writes: “Let us ask the question: What is the Eucharist? It is God with us. It is the Lord Jesus present in the tabernacles of our churches with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. It is Jesus veiled under the appearance of bread, but really and physically present in the consecrated Host, so that He dwells in our midst, works within us and for us, and is at our disposal. The Eucharistic Jesus is the true Emmanuel, which means ‘God with us’ (Matthew 1:23). The Faith of the Church, Pope Pius XII teaches us, is this: That one and identical is the Word of God and the Son of Mary, Who suffered on the Cross, Who is present in the Eucharist, and Who rules in Heaven. The Eucharistic Jesus is here with us as a brother, as a friend, as spouse of our souls. He wishes to enter within us to be our food for eternal life, our love, our support. He wants to make us part of His mystical Body in which He would redeem us and save us, and then take us into the kingdom of Heaven”
Christ came to “to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). He said of Himself: “I am the door. By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved” (John 10:9) … “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly” (John 10:10). He then explains how we achieve that eternal life: “He that believeth in Me, hath everlasting life. I am the Bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the desert, and are dead. This is the Bread which cometh down from Heaven; that if any man eat of it, he may not die. I am the living Bread which came down from Heaven. If any man eat of this Bread, he shall live for ever; and the Bread that I will give, is My flesh, for the life of the world … Amen, amen I say unto you: Unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eateth My Flesh, and drinketh My Blood, hath everlasting life―and I will raise him up in the last day. For My Flesh is meat indeed: and My Blood is drink indeed. He that eateth My Flesh, and drinketh My Blood, abideth in Me, and I in him. As the living Father hath sent Me, and I live by the Father; so he that eateth Me, the same also shall live by Me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead. He that eateth this Bread, shall live for ever!” (John 6:47-59).
The Only Way to Heaven
As Holy Scripture says: “Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other. For there is no other name under Heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:10-12). Our Lord said of Himself: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No man cometh to the Father, but by Me!” (John 14:6). “I am the door. By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved” (John 10:9). If that is the case, then you had better go find Him and find that door! Where is He? Where is that door? He is in the Holy Eucharist, behind the door of every tabernacle!
God is love: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). To find God is to find love. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “The Eucharist is the Sacrament of Love: It signifies Love, It produces love.” Without that Love we shall never make Heaven―as Holy Scripture points out: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profiteth me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Lack of Eucharistic Love
The image of a heart is a symbol of charity and love. It is no coincidence that when Jesus came to St. Margaret Mary to sow the seeds of devotion to His Sacred Heart, it was during the octave of Corpus Christi (the Body of Christ), a Eucharistic feast. We even have a votive Mass dedicated to the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus. You could also call it the Eucharistic Love of Jesus―for the Heart of Jesus is all about love, and God is love itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). You can also correctly say that Holy Eucharist is the Sacred Heart of Jesus―especially since scientists discovered that 1,200 year old remains of a Host from the Eucharistic miracle at Lanciano, was actually a fragment of a human heart! [click here to read about it]. This “Heart” or “Loving Heart” of the Holy Eucharist is further amplified and proven by the words of the Sacred Heart, spoken to St. Margaret Mary: “My Divine Heart is so passionately inflamed with love for men … and is not able any longer to contain within Itself the flames of Its ardent charity … Behold this Heart which has so loved men that It spared nothing, even going so far as to exhaust and consume Itself, to prove to them Its love. And in return I receive from the greater part of men nothing but ingratitude, by the contempt, irreverence, sacrileges and coldness with which they treat Me in this Sacrament of Love!”
In the parable of the wedding feast (isn’t marriage supposed to be all about love?), Our Lord mentions that the man without a wedding-garment (which biblical commentators say signifies a garment of love or charity) is cast out of the wedding banquet: “The marriage was filled with guests. And the king went in to see the guests: and he saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment. And he said to him: ‘Friend, how camest thou in hither not having a wedding garment?’ But he was silent. Then the king said to the waiters: ‘Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the exterior darkness! There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 22:10-13).
Our Lord is in the Eucharist―the Sacrament of Love―out of love for us. He expects us to come to Him with love―dressed in a wedding-garment, a garment of love. Yet too many come to Him stained with sins, even unconfessed mortal sins, for which they have no repentance, or they lack love and are lukewarm―of these He says: “Thou art neither cold, nor hot [that is to say, you neither hate Me nor love Me]. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth! Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ ― and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire tried [that is to say, charity which is symbolized by gold and fire], that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments [garments of grace and purity], and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see! Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise! Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
If every Christian must love Jesus Christ: “If any man love not Our Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema.” (1 Corinthians 16:22), love for the Eucharist must spring from the heart and be ever alive in us all. Now even love needs exercise. The heart needs to be exercised to love the true God. Yet exercises can be performed sluggishly, half-heartedly, lazily and lukewarmly―or the can be performed with energy, intensity, passion and zeal. We speak of spiritual EXERCISES―yet how poorly we perform them! Of all those who receive Holy Communion, what do you think their prayers of preparation and thanksgiving are like? The word “Eucharist” means “Thanksgiving”. Realistically, if you look around you at Mass, there are very few who manifest an energy, intensity, passion and zeal for the Holy Eucharist. Their prayers are more likely to be routine, automatic, mechanical, half-hearted, distracted, and insincere. The words of Our Lord spring to mind: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8).
As Our Lord said to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “Alas! If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example ― for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross. Moreover, I have continued to live in the Tabernacle under the same roof with these hidden souls, exposing Myself to so many hateful profanations and sacrileges! For I know well all that takes place in My sacramental life! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
Words of the Blessed Virgin Mary on the Holy Eucharist
Let us turn to the Mother of the Holy Eucharist, Mother of the Sacred and Eucharistic Heart of Jesus, who understood better than anyone the greatness of the Holy Eucharist, to learn from her what our dispositions ought to be. Here is what Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda:
“O if only the believers in the Catholic Faith would open their hardened and stony hearts in order to attain to a true understanding of the sacred and mysterious blessing of the Holy Eucharist! If they would only detach themselves, root out and reject their earthly inclinations, and, by restraining their passions, apply themselves with living Faith to study their great happiness in thus possessing their eternal God in the Holy Sacrament. If they would only appreciate being able, by its reception and constant communication, to participate in the effects of this heavenly Manna! If they would only worthily esteem this precious Gift, begin to taste its sweetness, and share in the hidden power of their omnipotent God! Then nothing would ever be lacking to them in their exile. Mortals have no reason to complain of their weakness and their passions―since in this Bread of Heaven they have at hand strength and health.
“It matters not that they are tempted and persecuted by the demons―for, by receiving this Sacrament frequently, they are enabled to overcome the demons gloriously. The faithful are themselves to blame for all their poverty and labors, because they pay no attention to this divine mystery, nor avail themselves of the divine powers, thus placed at their disposal by my most holy Son. I tell you truly, that Lucifer and his demons have such a fear of the most Holy Eucharist, that to approach it, causes them more torments than to remain in Hell itself. Although they do enter churches in order to tempt souls, they enter them with aversion, forcing themselves to endure cruel pains in the hope of destroying a soul and drawing it into sin, especially in the holy places and in the presence of the Holy Eucharist. Their wrath against the Lord and against the souls alone could induce them to expose themselves to the torment of His Real Sacramental Presence.
“Whenever He is carried through the streets, the demons usually fly and disperse in all haste; and they would not dare to approach those that accompany Him, if it were not by their long experience they know that they will succeed in inducing some persons to forget the reverence due to their Lord. Therefore they make special efforts to tempt the faithful in the churches―for they know what great offence they can do to the Lord Himself, Who in His sacramental love is there waiting to sanctify men and to receive the return of His sweetest and untiring love.
“Hence you can also understand the strength of those who prepare themselves to partake of this Bread of the angels and how the demons fear the souls, who receive the Lord worthily and devoutly, and who strive to preserve themselves in this purity until the next Holy Communion. But there are few who live with this intention, and the enemy is ceaselessly alert in striving to throw them back into their forgetfulness, distraction and indifference, so that he may not be obliged to encounter such powerful weapons in the hands of men.
“Write this admonition in your heart! And since the Almighty has ordained, without any merit on your part, that you can receive Holy Communion daily, seek by all possible means to preserve yourself in good dispositions from one Holy Communion to the other. It is the will of the Lord and my own, that with this sword of daily Communion you fight the battles of the Almighty, in the name of the Holy Church, against the invisible enemies.
“But while the omnipotent and just Judge, Who is so greatly incensed against sinful Catholics for having outraged His justice by their immeasurable and continual sins, none are found to consider and weigh the fearful damage of their sins, nor do any approach the easy remedy of receiving the Holy Eucharist with a contrite and humble heart; nor does anyone ask for my intercession. Though all the children of the Church are generally guilty of this fault, yet more to be blamed are the unworthy and wicked priests―because, by the irreverence with which they treat the Blessed Sacrament, other Catholics have been drawn, by this bad example, to undervalue the Blessed Sacrament. If the people see their priests approach the divine mysteries with holy fear and trembling, then they learn to treat and receive their God in the same manner. Those that so honor Him shall shine in Heaven like the sun among the stars―for my divine Son will reward, in a special manner, those who have behaved well toward Him in the Blessed Sacrament and have received Him with all reverence; whereas this will not happen to those who have not come this holy table with devotion.
“Moreover, those who were devout towards the Holy Eucharist, will bear on their breast, where they have so often harbored the Holy Eucharist, most beautiful and resplendent inscriptions, showing that they were most worthy tabernacles of the Holy Sacrament. This will be a great reward for them and a source of jubilation and admiration for the holy angels and the rest of the blessed. They will also enjoy the special favor of being able to penetrate deeper into the mystery of the presence of the Lord in this Sacrament, and to understand all the rest of the wonders hidden therein. This will be such a privilege, that it alone would suffice for their eternal happiness, even if there were no other enjoyment in Heaven. Moreover, the essential glory of those, who have worthily and devoutly received the Holy Eucharist, will in several respects exceed the glory of many martyrs who have not received the Blood of the Lord.
“I wish you to also hear, from my own mouth, what were my sentiments when in mortal life I was about to receive Holy Communion. I was preserved from Original Sin and, at the instant of my Conception, received the knowledge and vision of the Divinity. I knew more than all saints; I surpassed the highest seraphim in love; I never committed any fault; I constantly practiced all the virtues in a heroic degree and in the least of them I was greater than all the saints in their highest perfection; the intention and object of my actions were most exalted and my habits and gifts were noble without measure; I imitated my most holy Son most closely; I labored faithfully; I suffered with eagerness and co-operated with the doings of the Lord exactly as was becoming to me; I ceased not to exercise my love and gain new supereminent merits of grace. Yet I thought myself to have been fully repaid by being allowed to receive Him even once in the Holy Eucharist―though I did not consider myself worthy of this one favor.
“Reflect then what should be your sentiments, and those of the rest of the children of Adam, on being admitted to the reception of this admirable Sacrament. And if, for the greatest of saints, one Holy Communion is a superabundant reward, what must the priests and the faithful think, when they are allowed to receive it so frequently? Open your eyes in the deep darkness and blindness which overwhelm men around you, and raise them up to the divine brightness in order to understand these mysteries. Look upon all your works as insufficient, all your sufferings as most insignificant, all your thanksgiving as falling far short of what you owe to God for such an exquisite blessing as that of possessing in the Holy Church, Christ my divine Son, present in the Holy Sacrament, in order to enrich all the faithful. If you have nothing with which to show your thanks for this and the other blessings which you have received, then at least humiliate yourself to the dust and remain prostrate upon it; confess yourself as being unworthy with all the sincerity of your heart.”
Love One―Love the Other
You cannot have one without the other! You cannot love one without the other! They are inseparable―just like the Jesus and Mary, Son and Mother, are inseparable. If you want to love the Holy Eucharist, then you have to love the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. In fact, if you follow the Jewish standard of time-keeping or day-keeping, then the Last Supper and the Crucifixion were on the same day―because it was at sunset that the next day was calculated as having its beginning. The Catholic Church also adheres to this custom, because a first class feast begins on the eve of the feast―so, for example, the First Vespers of the feast of the Nativity of Our Lord (Christmas) are sung after sunset on December 24th, even though we consider Christmas Day to begin at midnight, at the end of December 24th. So, coming back to the point, in following this method of counting days, the Last Supper was technically at the start of the Pasch and Sabbath, you then have the Last Supper and the Crucifixion taking place on the same day―with Thursday night (as we call it) already being a part of Friday, because the sun had already set. Thus the inseparability of the Last Supper and Christ’s crucifixion, or, if you like, the Holy Eucharist and the Sacrifice of Christ on Calvary re-enacted in Holy Mass. We live-out this truth when we both, (1) attend the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and (2) receive Holy Communion at that same Mass―both events, attending Mass and receiving Communion, occurring on the same day.
Just stop and think for a moment! The greatest thing that you can do is to love God. The first thing that you MUST do is to love God―Our Lord Himself tells us this: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). Where will you find God so as to be able to love Him with your whole heart, soul, mind and strength? The answer is so blatantly obvious―in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and in the Holy Eucharist, and, once Mass is over, you will find God in the Holy Eucharist as the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar in the tabernacle. God (Jesus) is found in the Holy Eucharist on the altar during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. God (Jesus) comes to us in the Holy Eucharist when it is usually distributed to the faithful at the end of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. God (Jesus) remains with us after the Sacrifice of the Mass as the Holy Eucharist in the tabernacle, which we call the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar. Nobody can claim that they did not know where to find God IN PERSON, and not just represented by a picture or a statue! It is God in the Holy Eucharist―whether in the Sacrifice of the Mass, or in Holy Communion, or in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar―that “Thou shalt love with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Our Greatest Treasure―Our Greatest Neglect
As the Imitation of Christ says: “What great devotion ought not I and all Christian people now show in the presence of this Sacrament; what reverence in receiving the most excellent Body of Christ! Many people travel far to honor the relics of the saints, marveling at their wonderful deeds and at the building of magnificent shrines. They gaze upon and kiss the sacred relics encased in silk and gold; and behold, You are here present before me on the altar, my God, Saint of saints, Creator of men, and Lord of angels! Often in looking at such things, men are moved by curiosity, by the novelty of the unseen, and they bear away little fruit for the amendment of their lives, especially when they go from place to place lightly and without true contrition. But here in the Sacrament of the altar You are wholly present, my God, the man Christ Jesus, whence is obtained the full realization of eternal salvation, as often as You are worthily and devoutly received. To this, indeed, we are not drawn by levity, or curiosity, or sensuality―but by firm faith, devout hope, and sincere love.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 4, Chapter 1).
The Imitation of Christ continues: “You, my Lord God, invite the poor and needy to receive Your most holy Body! Who am I, Lord, that I should presume to approach You? Behold, the Heaven of heavens cannot contain You, and yet You say: “Come, all of you, to Me.” What this most gracious honor and this friendly invitation mean? How shall I dare to come―I who am conscious of no good on which to presume? How shall I lead You into my house―I who have so often offended in Your most kindly sight? Angels and archangels revere You, the holy and the just fear You, and You say: “Come to Me: all of you!” If You, Lord, had not said it, who would have believed it to be true? And if You had not commanded, who would dare approach?
“Behold, Noe, a just man, worked a hundred years building the ark that he and a few others might be saved―how, then, can I prepare myself in one hour to receive with reverence the Maker of the world? Moses, Your great servant and special friend, made an ark of incorruptible wood, which he covered with purest gold wherein to place the tables of Your law―shall I, a creature of corruption, dare so easily to receive You, the Maker of law and the Giver of life? Solomon, the wisest of the kings of Israel, spent seven years building a magnificent temple in praise of Your Name, and celebrated its dedication with a feast of eight days. He offered a thousand victims in Your honor and solemnly bore the Ark of the Covenant with trumpeting and jubilation to the place prepared for it―and I, unhappy and poorest of men, how shall I lead You into my house, I who scarcely can spend a half-hour devoutly — would that I could spend even that as I ought!
“O my God, how hard these men tried to please You! Alas, how little is all that I do! How short the time I spend in preparing for Communion! I am seldom wholly recollected, and very seldom, indeed, entirely free from distraction. Yet surely, in the presence of Your life-giving Godhead, no unbecoming thought should arise and no creature possess my heart―for I am about to receive as my guest, not an angel, but the very Lord of angels. Why, then, do I not long more ardently for Your adorable Presence? Why do I not prepare myself with greater care to receive Your sacred Gifts, since those holy patriarchs and prophets of old, as well as kings and princes with all their people, have shown such affectionate devotion for the worship of God?
“Our neglect and coldness is much to be deplored and pitied, when we are not moved to receive with greater fervor Christ, in Whom is the hope and merit of all who will be saved. He is our sanctification and redemption. He is our consolation in this life and the eternal joy of the blessed in Heaven. This being true, it is lamentable that many pay so little heed to the salutary Mystery which fills the heavens with joy and maintains the whole universe in being.
“Oh, the blindness and the hardness of the heart of man that does not show more regard for so wonderful a gift, but rather falls into carelessness from its daily use! If this most holy Sacrament were celebrated in only one place and consecrated by only one priest in the whole world, with what great desire, do you think, would men be attracted to that place, to that priest of God, in order to witness the celebration of the divine Mysteries! But now there are many priests and Mass is offered in many places, that God’s grace and love for men may appear the more clearly as the Sacred Communion is spread more widely through the world.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 4, Chapter 1).
Receiving Christ Worthily and Humbly
“When I consider Your dignity, O Lord, and my own meanness, I become very much frightened and confused. For if I do not receive, I fly from Life―and if I intrude unworthily, I incur Your displeasure. What, then, shall I do, my God? Teach me the right way. Place before me some exercise suitable for Holy Communion, for it is good to know in what manner I ought to make my heart ready devoutly and fervently for You, to receive Your Sacrament for the good of my soul, or even to celebrate so great and divine a sacrifice.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 4, Chapter 6).
The Voice of Christ answers: “Carefully examine your conscience, then. Cleanse and purify it to the best of your power by true contrition and humble confession, that you may have no burden, know of no remorse, and thus be free to come near. Let the memory of all your sins grieve you, and especially lament and bewail your daily transgressions. Then, if time permits, confess to God in the secret depths of your heart all the miseries your passions have caused.
“Lament and grieve because you are still so worldly, so carnal, so passionate and unmortified, so full of roving lust, so careless in guarding the external senses, so often occupied in many vain fancies, so inclined to exterior things and so heedless of what lies within, so prone to laughter and dissipation and so indisposed to sorrow and tears, so inclined to ease and the pleasures of the flesh and so cool to austerity and zeal, so curious to hear what is new and to see the beautiful and so slow to embrace humiliation and dejection, so covetous of abundance, so niggardly in giving and so tenacious in keeping, so inconsiderate in speech, so reluctant in silence, so undisciplined in character, so disordered in action, so greedy at meals, so deaf to the Word of God, so prompt to rest and so slow to labor, so awake to empty conversation, so sleepy in keeping sacred vigils and so eager to end them, so wandering in your attention, so careless in saying the office, so lukewarm in celebrating, so heartless in receiving, so quickly distracted, so seldom fully recollected, so quickly moved to anger, so apt to take offense at others, so prone to judge, so severe in condemning, so happy in prosperity and so weak in adversity, so often making good resolutions and carrying so few of them into action.
“When you have confessed and deplored these and other faults with sorrow and great displeasure because of your weakness, be firmly determined to amend your life day by day and to advance in goodness. Then, with complete resignation and with your entire will offer yourself upon the altar of your heart as an everlasting sacrifice to the honor of My Name, by entrusting with Faith both body and soul to My care, that thus you may be considered worthy to draw near and offer sacrifice to God and profitably receive the Sacrament of My Body. For there is no more worthy offering, no greater satisfaction for washing away sin, than to offer yourself purely and entirely to God with the offering of the Body of Christ in Mass and Communion.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 4, Chapter 7).
Do You Love?
The Imitation of Christ has a beautiful chapter entitled “The Wonderful Effects of Divine Love”―which could be effects that we might feel in our souls if we would only receive Christ in Holy Communion with much greater desire, greater respect and greater fervor. Of course, as Our Lord says: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5)―and without His inspiring, stirring, moving grace, we could not even desire to receive Him in such a manner. Yet we can be absolutely sure that such a grace will be given to everyone who asks: “Ask, and it shall be given you ― seek, and you shall find ― knock, and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7). If Christ has told us to love God with our whole soul, heart, mind and strength―then He must be prepared to give the graces required to fulfill that command. Here are some extracts from that beautiful chapter entitled “The Wonderful Effects of Divine Love.” Just think―you too could feel those effects in your soul from receiving Holy Communion in a more fervent manner!
“Ah, Lord God, when You come into my heart, all that is within me will rejoice. You are my glory and the exultation of my heart. But, because my love is as yet weak and my virtue imperfect, I must be strengthened and comforted by You. Visit me often, therefore, and teach me Your holy discipline. Free me from evil passions and cleanse my heart of all disorderly affection so that, healed and purified within, I may be fit to love, strong to suffer, and firm to persevere.
“Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs with equanimity. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and estranged from all worldly affections, lest its inward sight be obstructed, lest it be entangled in any temporal interest and overcome by adversity.
“Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger, or higher, or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in the one sovereign Good, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift, but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver.
“Love often knows no limits, but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much, where he, who does not love, fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle.
“Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself, there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. It is mean and contemptible in its own eyes, devoted and thankful to God; always trusting and hoping in Him even when He is distasteful to it, for there is no living in love without sorrow. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved, is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter, for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5, “The Wonderful Effects of Divine Love”).
Love and Leave Things to Our Lord
Who needs God anymore, when we have science and technology? “The Lord hath looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together: there is none that doth good, no not one. They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that doth good, no, not one! The fool hath said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and unhappiness is in their ways and the way of peace they have not known! There is no fear of God before their eyes. They have not called upon the Lord: there have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear” (Psalm 13:1-5).
Another Psalm says much the same thing: “God looked down from heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. The fool said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that doth good, no, not one. They are corrupted, and become abominable in iniquities―there is none that doth good. They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. For God hath scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God hath despised them!” (Psalm 52:1-6).
Yes― “They have not called upon God!” Modern man has an especial difficulty with Our Lord’s words: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). In fact, modern man is pretty much trying to do everything without Christ! Even Catholics fall into this category. They will rely upon self first and foremost―and then, if things are not working out, they MIGHT POSSIBLY turn to God in prayer, though, for many or most people, that “prayer” might well be a blasphemy―as they use Our Lord’s Name in anger, in phrases such as: “Jesus Christ! Why the hell is everything going wrong?” or “O God! I’ve had enough of this!” or even adding some four-letter words to their “prayer”. It has almost come to a point where the idol of science can do everything and we need God for nothing! “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
We need to humble ourselves―before God forcefully humbles us in a manner far more humiliating than any willing self-humiliation―and recognize and return to the God Who can do all things: “Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible―but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:26) … “He said to them: ‘The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!’” (Luke 18:27) … “And Jesus looking on them, said: ‘With men it is impossible; but not with God: for all things are possible with God!’” (Mark 10:27) … “Because no word shall be impossible with God!” (Luke 1:37).
In the book, Words of Love, by Fr. Robert Gottemuller, which is a summary compiled from three other books by different authors, we read of the words of Jesus spoken to three different mystics―Sr. Consolata Betrone, Sr. Mary of the Trinity and Sr. Josefa Menendez. Though many different topics are covered, here are some extracts that pertain to our need to rely upon Jesus for all things:
“I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me … You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! … Know that I am thinking of everything, that I am providing for everything down to the smallest detail. Therefore, do not let one thought enter your mind, not one outside interest.... Have no fear! I am taking care of you! … Allow Me to do it all! I will do everything; but you should, at every moment, give Me what I ask for with much love! … Place no limits on your confidence in Me, then I will place no limits on My graces for you! … Let Me do everything! You will see that I will do everything, and do it well!” (Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., pages 153-154, 109, 59).
“The future is Mine, what do you fear? … Remember this: Everything is a means in My Hands; I make all work together to fulfill My will … To love Me is to have confidence in Me, not to doubt Me; it is to rely on Me … You oppose Me by your desires, your tastes, your resistance! … All souls could rapidly attain to the plenitude of their sanctity if they allowed Me to act, without resisting. Oh, the unacknowledged reserves of selfishness which paralyze the omnipotence of the Holy Spirit within you! … Most religious give Me their work and their talents—I have sufficient talents at My disposal … Let Me act! You are not competent to do anything―it is not your province! … Not one of those who have trusted in Me has ever been disappointed. My little daughter, you would be the first to whom that would happen: why do you doubt?” (Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., nos. 9, 132, 99, 608, 114, 432).
“Do you think that anything happens without My permission? I dispose all things for the good of each and every soul … Do not worry, Josefa, about what you can and what you cannot do. You know very well that you can do nothing. But I am He who can and will do all. Yes, I will do all, even what seems to you impossible.... I will supply for all that you lack or cannot do. I ask you only for your liberty. All I need is to possess your will [love resides in the will―so He is essentially saying: “I need your love”], for this I cannot find a substitute.” (Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, pages 331 & 401).
Article 30
Wednesday in Holy Week, March 27th
Woeful Wednesday
Wednesday in Holy Week, March 27th
Woeful Wednesday
Why Woeful Wednesday?
We can call Wednesday in Holy Week “Woeful Wednesday” because it was on Wednesday that Judas made the final arrangements and plans for betraying Christ to His enemies―the priests (Sadducees), Scribes and Pharisees―all of whom carried great grievances against Jesus and who had for a long time sought to apprehend and kill Him, but were afraid of turning the people against themselves, for Jesus had gained widespread popularity and support.
On Monday and Tuesday―after His triumphal entrance into Jerusalem on what we today call “Palm Sunday”―Our Lord remained at Bethany (a few miles to the east of Jerusalem, on the other side of the Mount of Olives), without going to Jerusalem, and on this day the Scribes and Pharisees met at the house of the High-Priest, Caiphas, in order to plan the death of their Savior. They had already resolved to take away his life under the false pretext of the public good, as Caiphas had prophesied:
“The Chief Priests therefore, and the Pharisees, gathered a council, and said: ‘What do we do? For this Man does many miracles! If we leave Him alone―all will believe in Him; and the Romans will come, and take away our place and nation!’ But one of them, named Caiphas, being the high priest that year, said to them: ‘You know nothing! Neither do you consider that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not!’ And this he spoke not of himself: but being the high priest of that year, he prophesied that Jesus should die for the nation” (John 11:47-51).
Ruling Classes Reject God
Between them, the Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees “ruled” the Jewish nation even though the Romans had occupied Judea. Though they were opponents to each other in some areas of law and religion, they nevertheless were all members of the Sanhedrin―which could loosely be compared to the Senate―a body of 71 men who were a political and judicial council headed by the high priest (in his role as civil ruler). Politically, it could appoint the king and the high priest, declare war, and expand the territory of Jerusalem and the Temple. Judicially, it could try a high priest, a false prophet, a rebellious elder, or an errant tribe. Religiously, it supervised certain rituals.
To them we can apply the words of Holy Scripture concerning “kings” and “princes” ― “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3). The Sanhedrin, despite hearing of and witnessing many of the miracles Jesus had performed, refused to accept Him and decided, instead, to arrest Him and put Him on trial in front of the Sanhedrin. God judged by man! O what a nerve! What audacity! What hypocrisy! A power struggle between man and God―reminiscent of Lucifer’s desire to impose his will on the will of God, refusing to accept God’s will with the cry: “I will not serve!” Which, incidentally, is the attitude of the Liberal, who seeks to be a mini-god unto himself or herself―thinking what they want to think, believing what they want to believe, saying what they want to say, and doing what they want to do―even if it at odds with what God wants them to think, believe, say and do. The Sanhedrin’s treatment of Christ (God) is a perfect example of how Christ (God) is viewed by governments today―God is put in a position of subservience to man. Man is the judge of God and not the other way round. Man decides which laws of God to accept and which laws are to be rejected, changed or modified.
Bishops and Priests Crucifying Christ Again Today
You can add to that equation Judas―or the modern day Judases, who are members of the clergy, of whom Our Lady predicted: “Under the appearance of virtue and bad-spirited zeal, many will turn upon Religion, who nourished them at her breast ... Many people … will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil … The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God ... The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor with cruel and subtle astuteness to deviate them from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops … The Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord ... The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Many priests will lose their spirit, placing their souls in great danger … Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain ... By their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity. Yes, the priests are asking for vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads. Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God, who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again!” (Our Lady of Good Success, La Salette & Akita).
Those Damned Bishops and Priests!!!
If you think it is a scary thought that most souls are damned―then how much scarier is it to think that most bishops and priests are damned―and they are supposed to the leaders and guides of Christ’s flock! Yet that is the opinion of St. John Chrysostom, who says: “I do not speak rashly, but as I feel and think. I do not think that many bishops are saved, but that those who perish are far more numerous.” As regards priests, he says: “Do you not perceive how many qualities a priest must have that he may be strong in his teaching, patient, and hold fast to the faithful word which is according to doctrine? What care and pains does this require! Moreover, he is answerable for the sins of others. To pass over everything else―if only one soul dies without Baptism, does it not entirely endanger his own salvation? For the loss of one soul is so great an evil that it is impossible to express it in words! And if the salvation of that soul was of such value, that the Son of God became man and suffered so much, then just think of how great a punishment must await the one who loses that soul!” St. Teresa of Avila said most priests go to Hell. St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751), in his sermon on The Little Number of Those Who Are Saved, says: “I am horror-struck when I hear St. Jerome declaring that although the world is full of priests, barely one in a hundred is living in a manner in conformity with state; when I hear a servant of God attesting that he has learned by revelation that the number of priests who fall into Hell each day is so great; when I hear St. John Chrysostom exclaiming: ‘I do not believe that many priests are saved! I believe the contrary, that the number of those who are damned is greater!’”
“Yikes!” you say, “I certainly don’t want to become a priest! It seems like there is almost no chance of salvation! I think I will stay in the ranks of the laity!” The problem with that kind of false reasoning is that it ignores the fact that most laity are damned too! The problem is NOT that salvation is impossible―for Holy Scripture tells that us that “God wants all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4)―but the problem is that “the light came into the world, but men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 3:19). Christ “was the Light of men. And the Light shineth in darkness and the darkness did not comprehend it … He was the true Light, which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not!” (John 1:4-11).
That is exactly what Judas, the Sadducees, the Scribes and the Pharisees were guilty of―they were His own people, yet they chose to “know Him not”, they were of the Chosen People, yet they “received Him not”. They had their own ideas about how religion should be―they, in a sense, had already made their own version of God’s religion―which is what most of the world is guilty of today, even among the Conservatives and Traditionalists―but they will deny it vehemently, just as the Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees resented and refused Christ’s criticism of how they approached and lived their religion. Instead of removing the obstacles that Christ pointed-out to them, they saw Christ as the obstacle and chose to remove Him. What a bunch of woeful wrongheaded wretches! Woeful Wednesday is their day!
But never mind “Woeful Wednesday”―woe to us today! The clergy, for the most part, have gone down the same fatal path that was taken by the Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees! They no longer like the ancient teachings of the Church (Tradition), just like the Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees had departed from the ancient teachings of God (the Mosaic Law). Many priests no longer believe that the Holy Mass is a real sacrifice, preferring to call a meal, a commemoration, a community remembrance of the death of Jesus. Likewise, increasing numbers of priests no longer believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. Nor do they see the need for much prayer and penance. Nor do they see sin anymore in many sinful actions. Hence it is that their Catholic flock today holds views that are contrary to the Faith of old―today they accept contraception, divorce and remarriage, cohabitation before marriage, same sex relationships, masturbation, sodomy, transgenderism, abortion, immodesty, pornography, drunkenness, drug-use, false ecumenism, heretical views, etc.
As both Traditional and Liberal and Modernist popes have (strangely agreed and) said: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin” (Pope Pius XII) … “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin” (Pope John Paul II) … “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many” (Pope Benedict XVI) … “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost” (Pope Francis). As Our Lady of La Salette warned: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell [cf. “Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go forth, and seduce the nations, which are over the four quarters of the Earth” (Apocalypse 20:7)]. They will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell. The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. Everywhere, as true Faith has faded, a false light brightens the people … The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent” (Our Lady of La Salette).
“All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil rights, as well as ecclesiastical rights. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family. There will be desecration of holy places. In convents, the flowers of the Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts. May those in charge of religious communities be on their guard against the people they must receive, for the devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth” (Our Lady of La Salette).
From Sanhedrin to Senate! From Sadducee to Senator! Pharisee to Politician! Scribe to Legislator!
That is what is happening today! As Holy Scripture says: “What is it that hath been? The same thing that shall be! What is it that hath been done? The same that shall be done! Nothing under the sun is new, neither is any man able to say: ‘Behold this is new!’ ― for it hath already gone before, in the ages that were before us!” (Ecclesiastes 1:9-10).
“The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3). Is this not just as true today―or even more true today than ever before? It has to be―for Our Lady said back in 1956: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!” (Our Lady to Blessed Elena Aiello). Sin is a rejection of God, a rejection of the yoke of God, a desire to break the bonds that tie us to God. “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Which is why the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, said that, at this moment in time, the devil is in control of the world.
Satan loves to possess world leaders and business leaders. There is no doubt that Satan was behind all that Judas, the Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees plotted and did―“He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Judas himself was eventually possessed by the devil: “The devil put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, to betray Him … Jesus said: ‘Amen, amen I say to you, one of you shall betray Me!’ The disciples therefore looked one upon another, doubting of whom he spoke. Now [John] leaning on the breast of Jesus, said to Him: ‘Lord, who is it?’ Jesus answered: ‘He it is to whom I shall reach the dipped bread. And when He had dipped the bread, He gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon. And after the morsel, Satan entered into him” (John 13:2; 13:21-26).
Earlier, in speaking to the Scribes and Pharisees, Jesus said to them: “Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word. He that is of God, hears the words of God. Therefore you hear them not, because you are not of God. You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning!” (John 8:43-47). Our Lord accuses those religious leaders, the Scribes and Pharisees, of belonging to the devil.
Just as the religious leaders―Scribes and Pharisees―were in clutches of Satan back then, so too is the Vatican and the Church at large today. The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, says: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … If the people of the Church do not unite themselves with determination against Satan and fight tooth and nail ― then Satan is free to create havoc and destruction with impunity … Satanism is spreading enormously! The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world. The masses no longer believe in God. And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican. I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry. Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office! … It is not surprising that priests and bishops don’t believe, as they’ve never seen an exorcism, or heard speak about it, and in the seminaries the devil’s existence is ignored ... for some time the seminaries have no longer been teaching on angels and devils, nothing on exorcism … Unfortunately nowadays there are priests and Bishops who do not believe in the devil and that is why it is often very difficult to find exorcists … I would say that 99% of bishops do not believe in the extraordinary action of the devil ... We need many more exorcists, but the bishops won’t appoint them! … We, exorcists, are very badly treated. We are treated as though we are crazy fanatics. Generally speaking exorcists are scarcely even tolerated by the bishops who have appointed them!”
A Weak Church Cannot Resist Satan
As Fr. Amorth said above: “If the people of the Church do not unite themselves with determination against Satan and fight tooth and nail ― then Satan is free to create havoc and destruction with impunity … Satanism is spreading enormously! The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed.” That is why exorcisms―which would free a person from the devil in just a few sessions―today are taking many months, if not several years, to achieve the same liberation from the devil.
According to one exorcist working in Italy, the average time needed for a person to be freed from demonic influence in an exorcism is taking much longer than it did in even the recent past. Fr. Francois Dermine, O.P., an exorcist of nearly 30 years since 1994, says that whereas before it was common for a person to be liberated in one session, even if the exorcism or blessing lasted several hours, today, on average, sessions are growing longer and multiple meetings are required for a person to be completely freed from the devil’s grasp: “Some people can be liberated with very few blessings, though many require months.” Full-blown cases of possession, “can take a year.” He explains that these longer sessions were not really needed until recently, that is to say after the 1960s: “One blessing was enough – a blessing of one hour, two hours, three hours, six hours, but one blessing was enough to liberate one person of a possession. But now it’s different. It’s becoming very long. I think the reason for that is our society is becoming more and more atheistic, people are going away from prayer and the Sacraments … so there are fewer defenses against the devil.” He adds that another important, but “abnormal” factor, is a lack of Faith within the members of the Church itself, because during an exorcism, “the exorcist prays in the name of the Church. If, within the Church, you have the clergy and also a certain number of bishops who do not believe in the devil or his actions, then the exorcist is deprived of the power of the prayer of the Church.” Because of this, “the exorcist is liberating people more slowly. Before it was not the case. So it’s a sign that, within the Church, Faith in these things is not as strong as it was before.”
We can call Wednesday in Holy Week “Woeful Wednesday” because it was on Wednesday that Judas made the final arrangements and plans for betraying Christ to His enemies―the priests (Sadducees), Scribes and Pharisees―all of whom carried great grievances against Jesus and who had for a long time sought to apprehend and kill Him, but were afraid of turning the people against themselves, for Jesus had gained widespread popularity and support.
On Monday and Tuesday―after His triumphal entrance into Jerusalem on what we today call “Palm Sunday”―Our Lord remained at Bethany (a few miles to the east of Jerusalem, on the other side of the Mount of Olives), without going to Jerusalem, and on this day the Scribes and Pharisees met at the house of the High-Priest, Caiphas, in order to plan the death of their Savior. They had already resolved to take away his life under the false pretext of the public good, as Caiphas had prophesied:
“The Chief Priests therefore, and the Pharisees, gathered a council, and said: ‘What do we do? For this Man does many miracles! If we leave Him alone―all will believe in Him; and the Romans will come, and take away our place and nation!’ But one of them, named Caiphas, being the high priest that year, said to them: ‘You know nothing! Neither do you consider that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not!’ And this he spoke not of himself: but being the high priest of that year, he prophesied that Jesus should die for the nation” (John 11:47-51).
Ruling Classes Reject God
Between them, the Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees “ruled” the Jewish nation even though the Romans had occupied Judea. Though they were opponents to each other in some areas of law and religion, they nevertheless were all members of the Sanhedrin―which could loosely be compared to the Senate―a body of 71 men who were a political and judicial council headed by the high priest (in his role as civil ruler). Politically, it could appoint the king and the high priest, declare war, and expand the territory of Jerusalem and the Temple. Judicially, it could try a high priest, a false prophet, a rebellious elder, or an errant tribe. Religiously, it supervised certain rituals.
To them we can apply the words of Holy Scripture concerning “kings” and “princes” ― “The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3). The Sanhedrin, despite hearing of and witnessing many of the miracles Jesus had performed, refused to accept Him and decided, instead, to arrest Him and put Him on trial in front of the Sanhedrin. God judged by man! O what a nerve! What audacity! What hypocrisy! A power struggle between man and God―reminiscent of Lucifer’s desire to impose his will on the will of God, refusing to accept God’s will with the cry: “I will not serve!” Which, incidentally, is the attitude of the Liberal, who seeks to be a mini-god unto himself or herself―thinking what they want to think, believing what they want to believe, saying what they want to say, and doing what they want to do―even if it at odds with what God wants them to think, believe, say and do. The Sanhedrin’s treatment of Christ (God) is a perfect example of how Christ (God) is viewed by governments today―God is put in a position of subservience to man. Man is the judge of God and not the other way round. Man decides which laws of God to accept and which laws are to be rejected, changed or modified.
Bishops and Priests Crucifying Christ Again Today
You can add to that equation Judas―or the modern day Judases, who are members of the clergy, of whom Our Lady predicted: “Under the appearance of virtue and bad-spirited zeal, many will turn upon Religion, who nourished them at her breast ... Many people … will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil … The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God ... The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor with cruel and subtle astuteness to deviate them from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops … The Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord ... The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Many priests will lose their spirit, placing their souls in great danger … Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain ... By their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity. Yes, the priests are asking for vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads. Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God, who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again!” (Our Lady of Good Success, La Salette & Akita).
Those Damned Bishops and Priests!!!
If you think it is a scary thought that most souls are damned―then how much scarier is it to think that most bishops and priests are damned―and they are supposed to the leaders and guides of Christ’s flock! Yet that is the opinion of St. John Chrysostom, who says: “I do not speak rashly, but as I feel and think. I do not think that many bishops are saved, but that those who perish are far more numerous.” As regards priests, he says: “Do you not perceive how many qualities a priest must have that he may be strong in his teaching, patient, and hold fast to the faithful word which is according to doctrine? What care and pains does this require! Moreover, he is answerable for the sins of others. To pass over everything else―if only one soul dies without Baptism, does it not entirely endanger his own salvation? For the loss of one soul is so great an evil that it is impossible to express it in words! And if the salvation of that soul was of such value, that the Son of God became man and suffered so much, then just think of how great a punishment must await the one who loses that soul!” St. Teresa of Avila said most priests go to Hell. St. Leonard of Port Maurice (1676-1751), in his sermon on The Little Number of Those Who Are Saved, says: “I am horror-struck when I hear St. Jerome declaring that although the world is full of priests, barely one in a hundred is living in a manner in conformity with state; when I hear a servant of God attesting that he has learned by revelation that the number of priests who fall into Hell each day is so great; when I hear St. John Chrysostom exclaiming: ‘I do not believe that many priests are saved! I believe the contrary, that the number of those who are damned is greater!’”
“Yikes!” you say, “I certainly don’t want to become a priest! It seems like there is almost no chance of salvation! I think I will stay in the ranks of the laity!” The problem with that kind of false reasoning is that it ignores the fact that most laity are damned too! The problem is NOT that salvation is impossible―for Holy Scripture tells that us that “God wants all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4)―but the problem is that “the light came into the world, but men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 3:19). Christ “was the Light of men. And the Light shineth in darkness and the darkness did not comprehend it … He was the true Light, which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not!” (John 1:4-11).
That is exactly what Judas, the Sadducees, the Scribes and the Pharisees were guilty of―they were His own people, yet they chose to “know Him not”, they were of the Chosen People, yet they “received Him not”. They had their own ideas about how religion should be―they, in a sense, had already made their own version of God’s religion―which is what most of the world is guilty of today, even among the Conservatives and Traditionalists―but they will deny it vehemently, just as the Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees resented and refused Christ’s criticism of how they approached and lived their religion. Instead of removing the obstacles that Christ pointed-out to them, they saw Christ as the obstacle and chose to remove Him. What a bunch of woeful wrongheaded wretches! Woeful Wednesday is their day!
But never mind “Woeful Wednesday”―woe to us today! The clergy, for the most part, have gone down the same fatal path that was taken by the Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees! They no longer like the ancient teachings of the Church (Tradition), just like the Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees had departed from the ancient teachings of God (the Mosaic Law). Many priests no longer believe that the Holy Mass is a real sacrifice, preferring to call a meal, a commemoration, a community remembrance of the death of Jesus. Likewise, increasing numbers of priests no longer believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. Nor do they see the need for much prayer and penance. Nor do they see sin anymore in many sinful actions. Hence it is that their Catholic flock today holds views that are contrary to the Faith of old―today they accept contraception, divorce and remarriage, cohabitation before marriage, same sex relationships, masturbation, sodomy, transgenderism, abortion, immodesty, pornography, drunkenness, drug-use, false ecumenism, heretical views, etc.
As both Traditional and Liberal and Modernist popes have (strangely agreed and) said: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin” (Pope Pius XII) … “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin” (Pope John Paul II) … “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many” (Pope Benedict XVI) … “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost” (Pope Francis). As Our Lady of La Salette warned: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell [cf. “Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go forth, and seduce the nations, which are over the four quarters of the Earth” (Apocalypse 20:7)]. They will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell. The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. Everywhere, as true Faith has faded, a false light brightens the people … The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent” (Our Lady of La Salette).
“All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil rights, as well as ecclesiastical rights. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family. There will be desecration of holy places. In convents, the flowers of the Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts. May those in charge of religious communities be on their guard against the people they must receive, for the devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders, for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth” (Our Lady of La Salette).
From Sanhedrin to Senate! From Sadducee to Senator! Pharisee to Politician! Scribe to Legislator!
That is what is happening today! As Holy Scripture says: “What is it that hath been? The same thing that shall be! What is it that hath been done? The same that shall be done! Nothing under the sun is new, neither is any man able to say: ‘Behold this is new!’ ― for it hath already gone before, in the ages that were before us!” (Ecclesiastes 1:9-10).
“The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’” (Psalm 2:2-3). Is this not just as true today―or even more true today than ever before? It has to be―for Our Lady said back in 1956: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!” (Our Lady to Blessed Elena Aiello). Sin is a rejection of God, a rejection of the yoke of God, a desire to break the bonds that tie us to God. “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Which is why the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, said that, at this moment in time, the devil is in control of the world.
Satan loves to possess world leaders and business leaders. There is no doubt that Satan was behind all that Judas, the Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees plotted and did―“He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Judas himself was eventually possessed by the devil: “The devil put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, to betray Him … Jesus said: ‘Amen, amen I say to you, one of you shall betray Me!’ The disciples therefore looked one upon another, doubting of whom he spoke. Now [John] leaning on the breast of Jesus, said to Him: ‘Lord, who is it?’ Jesus answered: ‘He it is to whom I shall reach the dipped bread. And when He had dipped the bread, He gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon. And after the morsel, Satan entered into him” (John 13:2; 13:21-26).
Earlier, in speaking to the Scribes and Pharisees, Jesus said to them: “Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word. He that is of God, hears the words of God. Therefore you hear them not, because you are not of God. You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning!” (John 8:43-47). Our Lord accuses those religious leaders, the Scribes and Pharisees, of belonging to the devil.
Just as the religious leaders―Scribes and Pharisees―were in clutches of Satan back then, so too is the Vatican and the Church at large today. The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, says: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … If the people of the Church do not unite themselves with determination against Satan and fight tooth and nail ― then Satan is free to create havoc and destruction with impunity … Satanism is spreading enormously! The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world. The masses no longer believe in God. And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican. I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry. Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office! … It is not surprising that priests and bishops don’t believe, as they’ve never seen an exorcism, or heard speak about it, and in the seminaries the devil’s existence is ignored ... for some time the seminaries have no longer been teaching on angels and devils, nothing on exorcism … Unfortunately nowadays there are priests and Bishops who do not believe in the devil and that is why it is often very difficult to find exorcists … I would say that 99% of bishops do not believe in the extraordinary action of the devil ... We need many more exorcists, but the bishops won’t appoint them! … We, exorcists, are very badly treated. We are treated as though we are crazy fanatics. Generally speaking exorcists are scarcely even tolerated by the bishops who have appointed them!”
A Weak Church Cannot Resist Satan
As Fr. Amorth said above: “If the people of the Church do not unite themselves with determination against Satan and fight tooth and nail ― then Satan is free to create havoc and destruction with impunity … Satanism is spreading enormously! The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed.” That is why exorcisms―which would free a person from the devil in just a few sessions―today are taking many months, if not several years, to achieve the same liberation from the devil.
According to one exorcist working in Italy, the average time needed for a person to be freed from demonic influence in an exorcism is taking much longer than it did in even the recent past. Fr. Francois Dermine, O.P., an exorcist of nearly 30 years since 1994, says that whereas before it was common for a person to be liberated in one session, even if the exorcism or blessing lasted several hours, today, on average, sessions are growing longer and multiple meetings are required for a person to be completely freed from the devil’s grasp: “Some people can be liberated with very few blessings, though many require months.” Full-blown cases of possession, “can take a year.” He explains that these longer sessions were not really needed until recently, that is to say after the 1960s: “One blessing was enough – a blessing of one hour, two hours, three hours, six hours, but one blessing was enough to liberate one person of a possession. But now it’s different. It’s becoming very long. I think the reason for that is our society is becoming more and more atheistic, people are going away from prayer and the Sacraments … so there are fewer defenses against the devil.” He adds that another important, but “abnormal” factor, is a lack of Faith within the members of the Church itself, because during an exorcism, “the exorcist prays in the name of the Church. If, within the Church, you have the clergy and also a certain number of bishops who do not believe in the devil or his actions, then the exorcist is deprived of the power of the prayer of the Church.” Because of this, “the exorcist is liberating people more slowly. Before it was not the case. So it’s a sign that, within the Church, Faith in these things is not as strong as it was before.”
Article 29
Tuesday in Holy Week, March 26th
Your Lenten Litmus Test
Tuesday in Holy Week, March 26th
Your Lenten Litmus Test
Whose Side Are You On?
The words of Our Lord are blunt and penetrating: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). St. Luke also reports those same words: “He that is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Luke 11:23).
However, you may feel confused and tempted to ask: “What does He mean by not being with Him?” Elsewhere, on the occasion of the Last Supper, Our Lord expands upon this notion when He says: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that hats My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone love Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words … If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love … You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 14:15, 14:21-24; 15:10; 15:14). Obedience and love go hand-in-hand.
Therefore, essentially, the more we listen to and obey and fulfill the words, advice and commands of God, the more we actually love Him. “He that loves Me not, keeps not My words” (John 14:24). “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
“Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone therefore that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And everyone that hears these My words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27).
What’s Your Score?
We worry about school grades; credit scores or credit ratings. We worry about what other people think about us and how much they esteem us. We try to climb the social ladder, or clamber up higher upon the promotion ladder at work. Yet how much do we worry about what God thinks of us? How anxious are we over our ‘credit’ rating or score with God? How desperate are we in climbing the sanctity ladder? You can grade yourself on your standing with God by answering the following questions on the key elements of the Faith and the spiritual life―all of which directly or indirectly are concerned with keeping or ignoring the words of God. “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 14:15, 14:21-23; 15:14). “He that loves Me not, keeps not My words” (John 14:24).
So let us embark on a test of our spiritual ‘credit’ rating with God by honestly answering the following questions, which will cover all the chief categories virtues and vices that make up our ‘credit’ rating: “Turn away from evil and do good!” (Psalm 33:15) … “Decline from evil and do good, and dwell for ever and ever” (Psalm 36:27). For it is better to search ourselves and our works now, rather than leave them unsearched until our Day of Judgment, when “Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:22-23).
What is Your “Charity-Rating”?
Love of God comes before everything else―even before love of neighbor. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). “Jesus said to him: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment!’” (Matthew 22:37-38).“A certain lawyer stood up, tempting Him, and saying, ‘Master, what must I do to possess eternal life?’ But Jesus said to him: ‘What is written in the law? How readest thou?’ The lawyer answering, said: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind: and thy neighbor as thyself.’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou hast answered right! This do, and thou shalt live!’” (Luke 10:25-28).
As Our Lord said, charity “is the greatest and the first commandment!” Which is why St. Paul writes: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Nobody doubts that you love God―but how much do you love God? Can you really, truly and honestly say that you love God with “with your whole heart, and with your whole soul, and with your whole mind, and with your whole strength”? Notice that there is no mention of “loving God with your lips”―for Our Lord said: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘These people honor Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8). Check the box you honestly think applies to you:
► IS GOD THE MAIN FOCUS AND MOST TIME CONSUMING ACTIVITY OF THE DAY (OUTSIDE OF YOUR OBLIGATORY WORKING HOURS)?
YES (10 out of 10) QUITE A LOT (7 out of 10) NOT AS MUCH AS I SHOULD (4 out of 10) VERY LITTLE (1 out of 10)
Charity Towards Neighbor?
After telling us that love of God is the first and greatest commandment, Our Lord says that love of neighbor comes right after it: “And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these” (Mark 7:31), because “because “as long as you did it to one of these, My least brethren, you did it to Me … and … as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me” (Matthew 25:40-45). To which St. John adds: “We are of God. Let us love one another, for charity is of God. And everyone that loves, is born of God and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:6-8). While St. Paul gives us a basic initial description of some of the chief elements of love of neighbor: “Charity is patient; is kind; Charity envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeks not her own; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things. Charity never falls away!” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8). Read that list CAREFULLY and then grade yourself. Do you love your neighbor by practicing these recommendations all the time?
► DO YOU LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR BY PRACTICING THESE RECOMMENDATIONS ALL THE TIME AND TOWARDS ALL PEOPLE―BOTH FRIENDS AND FOES?
YES (10 out of 10) QUITE A LOT (7 out of 10) NOT AS MUCH AS I SHOULD (4 out of 10) VERY LITTLE (1 out of 10)
What's Your Score with Keeping the Commandments in General?
How well you keep to Commandments is an indication of how well you love God―it is the “Love Litmus Test” that has been given to us by Our Lord Himself, Who said at the Last Supper: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me. And he that loves Me, shall be loved of My Father” (John 14:15; 14:21).
Of course, everyone keeps some of the Commandments all of the time and all of the Commandments some of the time―but how well do you keep and are you getting better at it or worse at it. Are you becoming more sensitive to sin or are you becoming desensitized to sin? The lament of all the recent popes―traditional and modernist alike, from Pius XII to Francis―has been the fact that Catholics have lost or are losing the sense of sin. It is highly likely that your sensitivity to sin has declined over time, due to the social and cultural and permissive attitudes of the world that surrounds us―as they say: “You cannot leave clean clothes in a smoky room for long, without them taking on the smell of smoke!” We live in a world that has been set on fire by Hell―for the devil is the prince of this world (John 12:31), as Our Lord Himself says―and that smoke has penetrated all Catholic families―it is highly unlikely that yours is excluded. That smoke of Hell hides the gravity of sin behind its smokescreen of excuses, pleasure, fun and entertainment. Thus, like an acid that eats away at substance, does the world eat away at our Faith and Morals―with the result that Commandments are watered-down, tweaked for personal preferences, or even ignored or unknown, or at least known only superficially or partially. It is presumed that you know the Ten Commandments―even though you may be ignorant of all their subheadings and related sins. However, personal experience shows that even sincere and good Catholics have a sketchy memory of all of the Ten Commandments―knowing only some of them! How well do you know you Commandments? Just listing them or reeling them off does not necessarily mean that you KNOW and UNDERSTAND them! A parrot can be taught to reel off the Ten Commandments! Do you delve deeper into them and study their subheadings or “sub-sins”? Do you know their breadth and depth? Do you measure your daily life by them?
► HOW WELL DO YOU KNOW THE COMMANDMENTS OF GOD AND THE CHURCH―BEYOND MERELY "REELING THEM OFF" IN PARROT FASHION?
VERY WELL (10 out of 10) QUITE WELL (7 out of 10) NOT AS WELL AS I SHOULD (4 out of 10) VERY LITTLE (1 out of 10)
What’s You Rating in Relation to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass?
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and the Holy Eucharist that comes from the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, are the greatest treasures that we have on this Earth! St. Leonard of Pert Maurice, in his book, The Hidden Treasure of the Holy Mass, writes: “The principal excellence of the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass consists in being essentially, and in the very highest degree, identical with that which was offered on the Cross of Calvary: with this sole difference, that the Sacrifice on the Cross was bloody, and made once for all, and did on that one occasion satisfy fully for all the sins of the world; while the Sacrifice of the Altar is an unbloody sacrifice, which can be repeated an infinite number of times ... It may be said, with all truth, that in every Mass our Redeemer returns mystically to die for us, without really dying … Now, tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, you thoroughly well consider that you are going up as it were to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer. If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued, with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers, what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball or a dance? But what shall be said if you profane those functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time, and in any place; but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God!”
St. Padre Pio said of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass: “If we only knew how God regards this Sacrifice, we would risk our lives to be present at a single Mass!” St. John Vianney, the Curé of Ars, said: “All the good works in the world are not equal to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―because they are the works of men; but the Mass is the work of God. Martyrdom is nothing in comparison―for it is but the sacrifice of man to God; but the Mass is the sacrifice of God for man.”
If the Holy Mass is so important, you would think that Catholics could never be satisfied in learning more and more about it! In reading one book after another on the Holy Mass? You would imagine that they would be always thinking about the Mass, talking about the Mass, and going to Mass at every opportunity! Yet, no! Just as we have lost the sense of sin, we have also lost the sense of the sacred―the sacred has been desacralized and demoted to the ordinary. We know next to nothing about the Mass and we care next to nothing about the Mass. Any free time we have, we give to worldly pursuits and ignore the chances to attend extra Masses throughout the week! How to relate to the Mass? Do you attend Mass at every opportunity or do you give it pass when the opportunity arises? How much do you know about the Mass? Its origins, its development, the symbolism of the actions, the symbolism of the things used at Mass, etc.?
► DO YOU ATTEND THE SACRIFICE OF THE MASS AT EVERY OPPORTUNITY YOU GET?
YES (10 out of 10) QUITE A LOT (7 out of 10) NOT AS MUCH AS I SHOULD (4 out of 10) VERY LITTLE (1 out of 10)
► HOW MUCH DO YOU KNOW ABOUT THE HOLY SACRIFICE OF THE MASS?
A LOT (10 out of 10) QUITE A LOT (7 out of 10) NOT AS MUCH AS I SHOULD (4 out of 10) VERY LITTLE (1 out of 10)
What’s You Rating in Relation to the Holy Eucharist?
St. Maximilian Kolbe wrote: “The culmination of the Mass is not the Consecration, but Communion!” As Fr. Michael Muller, in his book, The Blessed Eucharist―Our Greatest Treasure, writes: “Who could believe that Jesus Christ is present in this Sacrament and fail in reverence towards it? What reverence did not the Jews pay to the Ark of the Covenant! No one dared to approach it―yet fifty thousand persons who, through curiosity, ventured to gaze thereat, were instantly struck dead as a punishment for their rash act! Yet, what did the Ark contain? Only the Ten Commandments of God. But in the Holy Eucharist, Faith tells us that God Himself is present, He Who made all things out of nothing and could destroy them in a moment. He Who at the last day will come on the clouds of Heaven to judge the living and the dead. Only let Catholics believe this with a lively Faith, and our churches will be filled with worshippers, whose behavior will correspond to their belief. The modest clothing, the guarded eyes, the bended knee, the humbly folded hands will bespeak the conviction of their hearts. Only let Catholics have a lively Faith in this mystery, and Jesus Christ will seldom be left alone. At all hours, His children will come to present themselves before Him, as subjects before their prince, as slaves before their master, as sick men before their physician, as children before their father, in a word, as friends before their beloved friend.”
St. Francis de Sales wrote: “When you have received Him, stir up your heart to do Him homage; speak to Him about your spiritual life; gazing upon Him in your soul where He is present for your happiness; welcome Him as warmly as possible; and behave outwardly in such a way that your actions may give proof to all of His Presence.” Father Lessius (1554-1623), the eminent Jesuit theologian, was afflicted with more than one painful disease. In spite of his sufferings, he would prolong his thanksgiving for a full hour after Mass. To those who pitied him he would reply: “Why should I complain? Mine is still the joy of receiving the Bread of angels!” St. Bernard tells us that the Lord will not lose His graces by giving them to the ungrateful. St. Alphonsus Liguori says: “Let us then remain, at least for half an hour, with Jesus Christ after Mass; or at least for a quarter. But, O good Lord! A quarter of an hour is too little!”
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU RECEIVE HOLY COMMUNION?
DAILY (10 out of 10) FEW TIMES A WEEK (7 out of 10) ONLY SUNDAYS (4 out of 10) LESS THAN WEEKLY (1 out of 10)
► HOW MUCH TIME TOTAL TIME (for both) DO YOU SPEND ON YOUR PREPARATION AND THANKSGIVING BEFORE AND AFTER RECEIVING HOLY COMMUNION?
OVER 30 MINS (10 out of 10) 20-30 MINS (7 out of 10) 10-20 MINS (4 out of 10) UNDER 10 MINS (1 out of 10)
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU MAKE A SPECIAL VISIT TO OUR LORD IN THE BLESSED SACRAMENT OUTSIDE OF SUNDAY?
ALMOST DAILY (10 out of 10) FEW TIMES A MONTH (7 out of 10) FEW TIMES A YEAR (4 out of 10) RARELY (1 out of 10)
How Good is You Credit Rating With Regard to Prayer?
St. Augustine tells us that “As our body cannot live without nourishment, so our soul cannot spiritually be kept alive without prayer,” while St. John Chrysostom says “It is simply impossible to lead, without the aid of prayer, a virtuous life.” St. Alphonsus Liguori says that “He who prays most receives most.” We sin so much because we pray so little—if we would only pray much more, we would sin much less. “When prayer is poured forth, sins are covered” says St. Ambrose. Holy Scripture confirms this: “My son, hast thou sinned? Do so no more: but, for thy former sins, also pray that they may be forgiven thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). St. John Climacus calls it “the bridge over temptations” and St. Ephrem points out that “Prayer preserves temperance. Prayer suppresses anger. Prayer prevents emotions of pride and envy.” Which is why Our Lord said: “Watch ye, and pray that you enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak!” (Mark 14:38).
God expects far more prayer than we actually give Him. Our Lord Himself said we ought pray always and not to grow faint: “And Jesus spoke also a parable to them, that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). “I desire therefore that men pray in every place” (1 Timothy 2:8). “I will praise Thy Name continually” (Ecclesiasticus 51:15). “We will give ourselves continually to prayer” (Acts 6:4). “Prayer was made without ceasing” (Acts 12:5). “By all prayer and supplication praying at all times” (Ephesians 6:18). God does not demand the impossible―therefore praying at all times must be possible. Obviously, we cannot be saying Our Fathers and Hail Marys non-stop throughout the day―but pray is defined as “the raising of the mind and heart to God” and that is possible all throughout the day, regardless of our occupations.
► HOW MUCH TIME TOTAL TIME DO YOU SPEND IN PRAYER (NOT INCLUDING MEDITATION OR SPIRITUAL READING)?
OVER 2 HOURS (10 out of 10) 1 TO 2 HOURS (7 out of 10) 30-60 MINS (4 out of 10) UNDER 30 MINS (1 out of 10)
Apart from the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Divine Office, the Rosary is the most powerful prayer that we have. It is also the prayer of our age―which has been repeatedly demanded by Our Lady at Lourdes, at Fatima and at Akita. “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you … Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war … The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the Rosary, pray for the Pope, the bishops and priests … Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary!” Concerning little 9-year old Francisco Marto at Fatima, Our Lady said that he would have to pray many Rosaries before he would be admitted into Heaven: “He must say many Rosaries!” (Our Lady of Fatima, May 13th, 1917).
► HOW MANY 5-DECADE ROSARIES DO YOU USUALLY PRAY EVERY DAY?
3+ ROSARIES (10 out of 10) 1 OR 2 ROSARIES (7 out of 10) 1 ROSARY (4 out of 10) LESS THAN ONE (1 out of 10)
St. Louis de Montfort, in his book, The Secret of the Rosary, writes: “It was because Our Lady wanted to help us in the great task of working out our salvation that she ordered Saint Dominic to teach the faithful to meditate upon the sacred mysteries … We must not only say the Rosary with our lips in honor of Jesus and Mary, but also meditate upon the sacred mysteries while we are saying it … A Christian who does not meditate on the mysteries of the Rosary is very ungrateful to Our Lord and shows how little he cares for all that our divine Savior has suffered to save the world. This attitude seems to show that he knows little or nothing of the life of Jesus Christ, and that he has never taken the trouble to find out what He has done and what He went through in order to save us … It is a great mistake to think that only priests and religious, and those who have withdrawn from the turmoil of the world, are supposed to meditate upon the truths of our Faith and the mysteries of the life of Christ. If priests and religious have an obligation to meditate on the great truths of our holy religion, in order to live up to their vocation worthily, the same obligation is just as much incumbent on the laity, because of the fact that every day they meet with spiritual dangers which might cause them to lose their souls. Therefore they should arm themselves with the frequent meditation on the life, virtues, and sufferings of our Blessed Lord, which are presented to us in the fifteen mysteries of the Holy Rosary …
“You, who are people of prayer, learn from this the power, the value and the importance of this devotion of the Holy Rosary when it is said with meditation on the mysteries. Our Lady said to Blessed Alan, «I want you to know that, although there are numerous indulgences already attached to the recitation of my Rosary, I shall add many more to every five decades for those who, free from serious sin, say them with devotion, on their knees. And whosoever shall persevere in the devotion of the Holy Rosary, with its prayers and meditations, shall be rewarded for it; I shall obtain for him full remission of the penalty and the guilt of all his sins at the end of his life.» She also said to Blessed Alan de la Roche in a vision, «When people say 150 Hail Marys, that prayer is very helpful to them and a most pleasing tribute to me. But they will do better still and will please me more if they say these salutations while meditating on the life, death, and passion of Jesus Christ, for this meditation is the soul of this prayer.»”
► HOW MANY 5-DECADE ROSARIES DO YOU USUALLY PRAY AND MEDITATE EVERY DAY?
3+ ROSARIES (10 out of 10) 1 OR 2 ROSARIES (7 out of 10) 1 ROSARY (4 out of 10) LESS THAN ONE (1 out of 10)
What’s You Rating in Relation to Studying Your Faith?
Our Lord says: “Learn of Me!” (Matthew 11:29). Elsewhere, He tells His Apostles and disciples: “Teach ye all nations … Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:19-20). “Faith then cometh by hearing; and hearing by the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17). “Continue in those things which thou hast learned, and which have been committed to thee!” (2 Timothy 3:14). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). However, Our Lord lamented: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8)―which is really a rhetorical question. A rhetorical question is a question someone asks without expecting an answer. The question might not have an answer, or it might have an obvious answer. In this case, Our Lord is hinting at the obvious answer―there will be little Faith remaining on Earth at His Second Coming. If we do not ‘feed’ our Faith, then our Faith will gradually weaken and die. The level of Faith―or the knowledge of the Faith―is pretty abysmal in our day and age, where Catholic adults do not even remember their First Communion Catechism (a 7-year-old’s level), nor their Confirmation Catechism (an 11 year-old’s level). They also lack even the most basic “parrot-fashion” memorization of certain important religious facts―and don’t even imagine or dare to hope that they can enter into a serious religious conversation or debate or argument about deeper matters concerning Faith or Morals. They just don’t have that kind of equipment! Yet some are highly intelligent and highly knowledgeable about material things!
As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange in his book, The Three Ages of the Spiritual Life, writes: “The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.”
► WHAT IS YOUR DAILY TOTAL NON-WORK, NON-FAITH RELATED TIME ON YOUR SMARTPHONE, LAPTOP, TABLET, TV, VIDEO PLAYER, OR SOCIAL MEDIA ?
UNDER 1 HOUR (10 out of 10) 1 - 2 HOURS (7 out of 10) 2 - 3 HOURS (4 out of 10) MORE THAN 3 HOURS (1 out of 10)
► WHAT IS THE TTAL TIME DEDICATED DAILY TO THE STUDY OF THE FAITH, WHETHER THROUGH BOOKS OR ELECTRONIC MEDIA?
OVER 60 MINS (10 out of 10) 30 - 6O MINS (7 out of 10) 15 - 30 MINS (4 out of 10) LESS THAN 15 MINS (1 out of 10)
What’s Your Meditation Credit-Score Like?
Normally, when we pray, we like to speak a lot―but we don't like or think to listen. Prayer, in itself, is as necessary for our spiritual life as breathing is necessary for our bodily life. Our spiritual life depends on God's grace, and he has, so to speak, given us the power to breathe it in prayer. Not to pray will have the same results, for the life of the soul, as not to breathe would have for the life of the body―that is sickness and death.
Prayer means to be with God and sometimes speak with him. The majority of people know only one kind of prayer called vocal prayer because we do it with our voices (i.e. standard prayers like Our Father, Hail Mary, or with words in the silences of our mind). These prayers are wonderful. We need to practice them. However they are not enough to nourish our soul. Sometimes, if we don't pay attention, we run the risk of merely saying prayers mechanically without really praying.
The majority of people like to speak to God, but very few speak with God. Everyone expects God to listen to what they saying―but do they make efforts to listen to what God is saying? To speak with God implies that we also listen, not only speak. How can we listen to God? God speaks to us, first of all, through His Word which is found in Holy Scripture and the Tradition of the Church (which is the teachings of Christ, Apostles, writings of the Popes, of the Church Councils, of the Saints, etc.). God also speaks to us through the events of our lives, through the people that we meet, through the circumstances, through the inspirations that He sends to us. We need to be aware of these in order to listen more. It is very hard for us to listen and far easier to talk and make God listen. But, besides vocal prayer we also need mental prayer. This is our way of listening to God. Mental prayer is also called meditation.
Meditation is simply reflecting on God's word with the help of the Holy Spirit. It is a very simple process that involves your mind, your heart (emotions and affections), and your will. Meditation does not mean that we are looking for visions or extraordinary insights. It is no different than paying attention to someone you care for. Anyone can do it. In fact, you are definitely meditating on many secular things all day long―you just need to channel that absorption away from the secular and onto the religious. In other words, you already have the tools of meditation and have been using them for years―but on the wrong things! As St. Teresa points out, meditation consists not so much in thinking a great deal, but in loving a great deal. However, you cannot love what you do not know―and you will only love a little if you only know a little. Thus, meditation goes hand-in-hand with studying the Faith, the spiritual life, the Bible, etc.
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU MAKE A MEDITATION?
ALMOST DAILY (10 out of 10) FEW TIMES A MONTH (7 out of 10) FEW TIMES A YEAR (4 out of 10) RARELY OR NEVER (1 out of 10)
How Would You Grade Your Daily-Examination of Conscience?
As already mentioned previously, all the popes since Pope Pius XII have complained about the loss of the sense of sin on the part of Catholics. Part of the problem, or one of the fundamental causes of the loss of a sense of sin, is a neglect in performing the daily examination of conscience at the end of each and every day, and then begging pardon from God for whatever sins we have committed throughout the course of that day. If you don’t use a tool, it gets rusty! If you don’t clean your conscience, it gets dirty and stays dirty.
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU MAKE A SERIOUS EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE?
ALMOST DAILY (10 out of 10) FEW TIMES A MONTH (7 out of 10) FEW TIMES A YEAR (4 out of 10) RARELY OR NEVER (1 out of 10)
What Scores is Your Mercy Getting?
Charity, of course, is the greatest of virtues―yet you can look at charity as being a mansion with many rooms. The best and most valuable room is the “Room of Mercy”―or could we say: “Room for Mercy.” Holy Scripture says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). Our Lord Himself points out: “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy … For if you will forgive men their offences, your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences” (Matthew 5:7; 6:14-15).
In the same Sermon on the Mount, Our Lord adds: “You have heard that it hath been said: ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth!’ But I say to you not to resist evil―but if one strike thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the other! And if a man will contend with thee in judgment, and take away thy coat, then also let go thy cloak unto him! And whosoever will force thee to go one mile, go with him another two! Give to him that asks of thee; and from him that would borrow of thee, turn not away! You have heard that it hath been said: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thy enemy!’ But I say to you: Love your enemies: do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you, so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even the publicans do this? And if you salute your brethren only, what do you do that is more? Do not also the heathens do this? Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:38-48).
“Then came Peter unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say not to thee, till seven times; but till seventy times seven times. Therefore is the Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who would take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices, that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $112 million). And as he had not wherewith to pay it, his lord commanded that he should be sold, and his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, besought him, saying: Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all. And the lord of that servant being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce. At today’s silver prices, a hundred pence would be just over $200): and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: ‘Pay what thou owest!’ And his fellow servant falling down, besought him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all!’ And he would not―but went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“Now his fellow servants seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: ‘Thou wicked servant! I forgave thee all the debt, because thou besoughtest me! Shouldst not thou then have had compassion also on thy fellow servant, even as I had compassion on thee?’ And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you forgive not everyone his brother from your hearts!” (Matthew 18:23-35).
Pope St. Gregory the Great, in chapter 60 of his Dialogues, says that we ought to pardon other men their sins, that we may obtain remission of our own:
“We have also further to know, that he does rightly and in good sort demand pardon for his own sin, who does forgive that which hath been done against himself. For our gift is not received, if, beforehand, we do not free our soul from all discord and lack of charity―for our Savior said: ‘If thou offer thy gift at the altar, and there thou remember that thy brother hath anything against thee, then leave there thy offering before the altar, and go first to be reconciled to thy brother, and then coming thou shalt offer thy gift!’ (Matthew 5:23-24). Wherein we have to consider, that whereas all sin is loosed by a gift, how grievous the sin of discord is, for which no gift is received. Therefore we ought, in soul and desire, to go unto our neighbor, though he be far off, and many miles distant from us, and there to humble ourselves before him, and to pacify him by humility and hearty good will, to the end that our Creator, seeing the desire of our mind, may forgive us our own sin, who receives a gift for sin. And our Savior Himself teaches us, how that servant, which did owe ten thousand talents, by penance obtained of his Lord the forgiveness of that debt: but yet because he would not forgive his fellow-servant an hundred pence, which were due to him, that was again exacted at his hands, which before was pardoned. (Matthew 18:27). Out of which sayings we learn, that if we do not from our heart forgive that which is committed against us, how that is again required at our hands, whereof before we were glad that by penance we had obtained pardon and remission. Wherefore, while time is given us, while our Judge doth bear with us, while He that examines our sins doth expect our conversion and amendment: let us soften with tears the hardness of our heart, and with sincere charity, love our neighbors: and then, dare I speak it boldly, we shall not have any need of the Holy Sacrifice after our death: if, before death, we offer up ourselves for a sacrifice unto almighty God.”
St Alphonsus Liguori told the story of a certain religious brother whose life was not what it should have been. When he came to the end of his life he was asked if he feared the judgment of God. His reply was, “No, because I have always forgiven my enemies!”
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU FORGIVE WRONGS COMMITTED BY FAMILY, RELATIVES AND FRIENDS?
ALWAYS (10 out of 10) MOST TIMES (7 out of 10) LESS THAN HALF THE TIME (4 out of 10) RARELY OR NEVER (1 out of 10)
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU FORGIVE WRONGS COMMITTED BY WORK COLLEAGUES, NEIGHBORS, ACQUAINTANCES, STRANGERS, ENEMIES?
ALWAYS (10 out of 10) MOST TIMES (7 out of 10) LESS THAN HALF THE TIME (4 out of 10) RARELY OR NEVER (1 out of 10)
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU PRAY FOR YOUR ENEMIES OR FOR THE SERIOUS SINNERS IN THE WORLD, FOR EXAMPLE THE ONE'S WHO MAKE THE NEWS?
ALWAYS (10 out of 10) MOST TIMES (7 out of 10) LESS THAN HALF THE TIME (4 out of 10) RARELY OR NEVER (1 out of 10)
Run With the Ball Yourself
These are just the very basic, foundational elements that everyone needs to examine in their own lives. Following the above system, you could further add the following points for examination―time and length of article do not allow this to be covered in one single article. However, now that you are familiar with the lay-out or approach, you can easily do this yourself. The additional points―which are only some key points and by no means the only points―are:
● Spiritual Reading
● The Corporal Works of Mercy
● The Spiritual Works of Mercy
● The Seven Deadly Sins: Pride, Covetousness, Gluttony, Anger, Lust, Envy and Sloth
● The Cardinal Virtues: Prudence, Justice, Fortitude and Temperance
● Each of the Ten Commandments taken individually
● The chief virtues, especially humility and charity
● Gossip through calumny (lies) and detraction (revealing true faults)
● Etc., etc., etc., etc.
In the meantime, you can add up your current score, which, based upon the above questions, potentially gives you a maximum of 180 points and an absolute minimum of 18 points. Although all of this is purely arbitrary and subjective, you could obviously say that anything below 90 is most certainly a sign of lukewarmness. Anything below 50 … well, hmm?! A score of around 120 would show seriousness about the spiritual life, whereas anywhere near 180 means you can start polishing your halo, but don’t drop it through pride!
The words of Our Lord are blunt and penetrating: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). St. Luke also reports those same words: “He that is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Luke 11:23).
However, you may feel confused and tempted to ask: “What does He mean by not being with Him?” Elsewhere, on the occasion of the Last Supper, Our Lord expands upon this notion when He says: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that hats My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone love Me, he will keep My word … He that loves Me not, keeps not My words … If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love … You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 14:15, 14:21-24; 15:10; 15:14). Obedience and love go hand-in-hand.
Therefore, essentially, the more we listen to and obey and fulfill the words, advice and commands of God, the more we actually love Him. “He that loves Me not, keeps not My words” (John 14:24). “Why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
“Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone therefore that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And everyone that hears these My words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand―and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27).
What’s Your Score?
We worry about school grades; credit scores or credit ratings. We worry about what other people think about us and how much they esteem us. We try to climb the social ladder, or clamber up higher upon the promotion ladder at work. Yet how much do we worry about what God thinks of us? How anxious are we over our ‘credit’ rating or score with God? How desperate are we in climbing the sanctity ladder? You can grade yourself on your standing with God by answering the following questions on the key elements of the Faith and the spiritual life―all of which directly or indirectly are concerned with keeping or ignoring the words of God. “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word … You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 14:15, 14:21-23; 15:14). “He that loves Me not, keeps not My words” (John 14:24).
So let us embark on a test of our spiritual ‘credit’ rating with God by honestly answering the following questions, which will cover all the chief categories virtues and vices that make up our ‘credit’ rating: “Turn away from evil and do good!” (Psalm 33:15) … “Decline from evil and do good, and dwell for ever and ever” (Psalm 36:27). For it is better to search ourselves and our works now, rather than leave them unsearched until our Day of Judgment, when “Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:22-23).
What is Your “Charity-Rating”?
Love of God comes before everything else―even before love of neighbor. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). “Jesus said to him: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment!’” (Matthew 22:37-38).“A certain lawyer stood up, tempting Him, and saying, ‘Master, what must I do to possess eternal life?’ But Jesus said to him: ‘What is written in the law? How readest thou?’ The lawyer answering, said: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind: and thy neighbor as thyself.’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou hast answered right! This do, and thou shalt live!’” (Luke 10:25-28).
As Our Lord said, charity “is the greatest and the first commandment!” Which is why St. Paul writes: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Nobody doubts that you love God―but how much do you love God? Can you really, truly and honestly say that you love God with “with your whole heart, and with your whole soul, and with your whole mind, and with your whole strength”? Notice that there is no mention of “loving God with your lips”―for Our Lord said: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘These people honor Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8). Check the box you honestly think applies to you:
► IS GOD THE MAIN FOCUS AND MOST TIME CONSUMING ACTIVITY OF THE DAY (OUTSIDE OF YOUR OBLIGATORY WORKING HOURS)?
YES (10 out of 10) QUITE A LOT (7 out of 10) NOT AS MUCH AS I SHOULD (4 out of 10) VERY LITTLE (1 out of 10)
Charity Towards Neighbor?
After telling us that love of God is the first and greatest commandment, Our Lord says that love of neighbor comes right after it: “And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these” (Mark 7:31), because “because “as long as you did it to one of these, My least brethren, you did it to Me … and … as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me” (Matthew 25:40-45). To which St. John adds: “We are of God. Let us love one another, for charity is of God. And everyone that loves, is born of God and knows God. He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:6-8). While St. Paul gives us a basic initial description of some of the chief elements of love of neighbor: “Charity is patient; is kind; Charity envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeks not her own; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things. Charity never falls away!” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8). Read that list CAREFULLY and then grade yourself. Do you love your neighbor by practicing these recommendations all the time?
► DO YOU LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR BY PRACTICING THESE RECOMMENDATIONS ALL THE TIME AND TOWARDS ALL PEOPLE―BOTH FRIENDS AND FOES?
YES (10 out of 10) QUITE A LOT (7 out of 10) NOT AS MUCH AS I SHOULD (4 out of 10) VERY LITTLE (1 out of 10)
What's Your Score with Keeping the Commandments in General?
How well you keep to Commandments is an indication of how well you love God―it is the “Love Litmus Test” that has been given to us by Our Lord Himself, Who said at the Last Supper: “If you love Me, keep My commandments … He that has My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me. And he that loves Me, shall be loved of My Father” (John 14:15; 14:21).
Of course, everyone keeps some of the Commandments all of the time and all of the Commandments some of the time―but how well do you keep and are you getting better at it or worse at it. Are you becoming more sensitive to sin or are you becoming desensitized to sin? The lament of all the recent popes―traditional and modernist alike, from Pius XII to Francis―has been the fact that Catholics have lost or are losing the sense of sin. It is highly likely that your sensitivity to sin has declined over time, due to the social and cultural and permissive attitudes of the world that surrounds us―as they say: “You cannot leave clean clothes in a smoky room for long, without them taking on the smell of smoke!” We live in a world that has been set on fire by Hell―for the devil is the prince of this world (John 12:31), as Our Lord Himself says―and that smoke has penetrated all Catholic families―it is highly unlikely that yours is excluded. That smoke of Hell hides the gravity of sin behind its smokescreen of excuses, pleasure, fun and entertainment. Thus, like an acid that eats away at substance, does the world eat away at our Faith and Morals―with the result that Commandments are watered-down, tweaked for personal preferences, or even ignored or unknown, or at least known only superficially or partially. It is presumed that you know the Ten Commandments―even though you may be ignorant of all their subheadings and related sins. However, personal experience shows that even sincere and good Catholics have a sketchy memory of all of the Ten Commandments―knowing only some of them! How well do you know you Commandments? Just listing them or reeling them off does not necessarily mean that you KNOW and UNDERSTAND them! A parrot can be taught to reel off the Ten Commandments! Do you delve deeper into them and study their subheadings or “sub-sins”? Do you know their breadth and depth? Do you measure your daily life by them?
► HOW WELL DO YOU KNOW THE COMMANDMENTS OF GOD AND THE CHURCH―BEYOND MERELY "REELING THEM OFF" IN PARROT FASHION?
VERY WELL (10 out of 10) QUITE WELL (7 out of 10) NOT AS WELL AS I SHOULD (4 out of 10) VERY LITTLE (1 out of 10)
What’s You Rating in Relation to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass?
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and the Holy Eucharist that comes from the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, are the greatest treasures that we have on this Earth! St. Leonard of Pert Maurice, in his book, The Hidden Treasure of the Holy Mass, writes: “The principal excellence of the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass consists in being essentially, and in the very highest degree, identical with that which was offered on the Cross of Calvary: with this sole difference, that the Sacrifice on the Cross was bloody, and made once for all, and did on that one occasion satisfy fully for all the sins of the world; while the Sacrifice of the Altar is an unbloody sacrifice, which can be repeated an infinite number of times ... It may be said, with all truth, that in every Mass our Redeemer returns mystically to die for us, without really dying … Now, tell me whether, when you enter church to hear Mass, you thoroughly well consider that you are going up as it were to Calvary, to be present at the death of the Redeemer. If so, would you go with behavior so unsubdued, with dress so flaunting? If the Magdalene had gone to Calvary, to the foot of the Cross, all dressed out, perfumed, and adorned, as when she associated with her lovers, what would have been said of her? What, then, shall be said of you who go to Holy Mass as if you were going to a ball or a dance? But what shall be said if you profane those functions of most dread sanctity with nods and becks, with tattle, with laughter, with the petty attentions of courtship, or with graver sacrileges of thought, word, or deed? Wickedness is hideous at any time, and in any place; but sins committed during the time of Mass, and before the altar, draw down after them the curse of God!”
St. Padre Pio said of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass: “If we only knew how God regards this Sacrifice, we would risk our lives to be present at a single Mass!” St. John Vianney, the Curé of Ars, said: “All the good works in the world are not equal to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass―because they are the works of men; but the Mass is the work of God. Martyrdom is nothing in comparison―for it is but the sacrifice of man to God; but the Mass is the sacrifice of God for man.”
If the Holy Mass is so important, you would think that Catholics could never be satisfied in learning more and more about it! In reading one book after another on the Holy Mass? You would imagine that they would be always thinking about the Mass, talking about the Mass, and going to Mass at every opportunity! Yet, no! Just as we have lost the sense of sin, we have also lost the sense of the sacred―the sacred has been desacralized and demoted to the ordinary. We know next to nothing about the Mass and we care next to nothing about the Mass. Any free time we have, we give to worldly pursuits and ignore the chances to attend extra Masses throughout the week! How to relate to the Mass? Do you attend Mass at every opportunity or do you give it pass when the opportunity arises? How much do you know about the Mass? Its origins, its development, the symbolism of the actions, the symbolism of the things used at Mass, etc.?
► DO YOU ATTEND THE SACRIFICE OF THE MASS AT EVERY OPPORTUNITY YOU GET?
YES (10 out of 10) QUITE A LOT (7 out of 10) NOT AS MUCH AS I SHOULD (4 out of 10) VERY LITTLE (1 out of 10)
► HOW MUCH DO YOU KNOW ABOUT THE HOLY SACRIFICE OF THE MASS?
A LOT (10 out of 10) QUITE A LOT (7 out of 10) NOT AS MUCH AS I SHOULD (4 out of 10) VERY LITTLE (1 out of 10)
What’s You Rating in Relation to the Holy Eucharist?
St. Maximilian Kolbe wrote: “The culmination of the Mass is not the Consecration, but Communion!” As Fr. Michael Muller, in his book, The Blessed Eucharist―Our Greatest Treasure, writes: “Who could believe that Jesus Christ is present in this Sacrament and fail in reverence towards it? What reverence did not the Jews pay to the Ark of the Covenant! No one dared to approach it―yet fifty thousand persons who, through curiosity, ventured to gaze thereat, were instantly struck dead as a punishment for their rash act! Yet, what did the Ark contain? Only the Ten Commandments of God. But in the Holy Eucharist, Faith tells us that God Himself is present, He Who made all things out of nothing and could destroy them in a moment. He Who at the last day will come on the clouds of Heaven to judge the living and the dead. Only let Catholics believe this with a lively Faith, and our churches will be filled with worshippers, whose behavior will correspond to their belief. The modest clothing, the guarded eyes, the bended knee, the humbly folded hands will bespeak the conviction of their hearts. Only let Catholics have a lively Faith in this mystery, and Jesus Christ will seldom be left alone. At all hours, His children will come to present themselves before Him, as subjects before their prince, as slaves before their master, as sick men before their physician, as children before their father, in a word, as friends before their beloved friend.”
St. Francis de Sales wrote: “When you have received Him, stir up your heart to do Him homage; speak to Him about your spiritual life; gazing upon Him in your soul where He is present for your happiness; welcome Him as warmly as possible; and behave outwardly in such a way that your actions may give proof to all of His Presence.” Father Lessius (1554-1623), the eminent Jesuit theologian, was afflicted with more than one painful disease. In spite of his sufferings, he would prolong his thanksgiving for a full hour after Mass. To those who pitied him he would reply: “Why should I complain? Mine is still the joy of receiving the Bread of angels!” St. Bernard tells us that the Lord will not lose His graces by giving them to the ungrateful. St. Alphonsus Liguori says: “Let us then remain, at least for half an hour, with Jesus Christ after Mass; or at least for a quarter. But, O good Lord! A quarter of an hour is too little!”
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU RECEIVE HOLY COMMUNION?
DAILY (10 out of 10) FEW TIMES A WEEK (7 out of 10) ONLY SUNDAYS (4 out of 10) LESS THAN WEEKLY (1 out of 10)
► HOW MUCH TIME TOTAL TIME (for both) DO YOU SPEND ON YOUR PREPARATION AND THANKSGIVING BEFORE AND AFTER RECEIVING HOLY COMMUNION?
OVER 30 MINS (10 out of 10) 20-30 MINS (7 out of 10) 10-20 MINS (4 out of 10) UNDER 10 MINS (1 out of 10)
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU MAKE A SPECIAL VISIT TO OUR LORD IN THE BLESSED SACRAMENT OUTSIDE OF SUNDAY?
ALMOST DAILY (10 out of 10) FEW TIMES A MONTH (7 out of 10) FEW TIMES A YEAR (4 out of 10) RARELY (1 out of 10)
How Good is You Credit Rating With Regard to Prayer?
St. Augustine tells us that “As our body cannot live without nourishment, so our soul cannot spiritually be kept alive without prayer,” while St. John Chrysostom says “It is simply impossible to lead, without the aid of prayer, a virtuous life.” St. Alphonsus Liguori says that “He who prays most receives most.” We sin so much because we pray so little—if we would only pray much more, we would sin much less. “When prayer is poured forth, sins are covered” says St. Ambrose. Holy Scripture confirms this: “My son, hast thou sinned? Do so no more: but, for thy former sins, also pray that they may be forgiven thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). St. John Climacus calls it “the bridge over temptations” and St. Ephrem points out that “Prayer preserves temperance. Prayer suppresses anger. Prayer prevents emotions of pride and envy.” Which is why Our Lord said: “Watch ye, and pray that you enter not into temptation! The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak!” (Mark 14:38).
God expects far more prayer than we actually give Him. Our Lord Himself said we ought pray always and not to grow faint: “And Jesus spoke also a parable to them, that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). “I desire therefore that men pray in every place” (1 Timothy 2:8). “I will praise Thy Name continually” (Ecclesiasticus 51:15). “We will give ourselves continually to prayer” (Acts 6:4). “Prayer was made without ceasing” (Acts 12:5). “By all prayer and supplication praying at all times” (Ephesians 6:18). God does not demand the impossible―therefore praying at all times must be possible. Obviously, we cannot be saying Our Fathers and Hail Marys non-stop throughout the day―but pray is defined as “the raising of the mind and heart to God” and that is possible all throughout the day, regardless of our occupations.
► HOW MUCH TIME TOTAL TIME DO YOU SPEND IN PRAYER (NOT INCLUDING MEDITATION OR SPIRITUAL READING)?
OVER 2 HOURS (10 out of 10) 1 TO 2 HOURS (7 out of 10) 30-60 MINS (4 out of 10) UNDER 30 MINS (1 out of 10)
Apart from the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Divine Office, the Rosary is the most powerful prayer that we have. It is also the prayer of our age―which has been repeatedly demanded by Our Lady at Lourdes, at Fatima and at Akita. “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you … Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war … The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the Rosary, pray for the Pope, the bishops and priests … Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary!” Concerning little 9-year old Francisco Marto at Fatima, Our Lady said that he would have to pray many Rosaries before he would be admitted into Heaven: “He must say many Rosaries!” (Our Lady of Fatima, May 13th, 1917).
► HOW MANY 5-DECADE ROSARIES DO YOU USUALLY PRAY EVERY DAY?
3+ ROSARIES (10 out of 10) 1 OR 2 ROSARIES (7 out of 10) 1 ROSARY (4 out of 10) LESS THAN ONE (1 out of 10)
St. Louis de Montfort, in his book, The Secret of the Rosary, writes: “It was because Our Lady wanted to help us in the great task of working out our salvation that she ordered Saint Dominic to teach the faithful to meditate upon the sacred mysteries … We must not only say the Rosary with our lips in honor of Jesus and Mary, but also meditate upon the sacred mysteries while we are saying it … A Christian who does not meditate on the mysteries of the Rosary is very ungrateful to Our Lord and shows how little he cares for all that our divine Savior has suffered to save the world. This attitude seems to show that he knows little or nothing of the life of Jesus Christ, and that he has never taken the trouble to find out what He has done and what He went through in order to save us … It is a great mistake to think that only priests and religious, and those who have withdrawn from the turmoil of the world, are supposed to meditate upon the truths of our Faith and the mysteries of the life of Christ. If priests and religious have an obligation to meditate on the great truths of our holy religion, in order to live up to their vocation worthily, the same obligation is just as much incumbent on the laity, because of the fact that every day they meet with spiritual dangers which might cause them to lose their souls. Therefore they should arm themselves with the frequent meditation on the life, virtues, and sufferings of our Blessed Lord, which are presented to us in the fifteen mysteries of the Holy Rosary …
“You, who are people of prayer, learn from this the power, the value and the importance of this devotion of the Holy Rosary when it is said with meditation on the mysteries. Our Lady said to Blessed Alan, «I want you to know that, although there are numerous indulgences already attached to the recitation of my Rosary, I shall add many more to every five decades for those who, free from serious sin, say them with devotion, on their knees. And whosoever shall persevere in the devotion of the Holy Rosary, with its prayers and meditations, shall be rewarded for it; I shall obtain for him full remission of the penalty and the guilt of all his sins at the end of his life.» She also said to Blessed Alan de la Roche in a vision, «When people say 150 Hail Marys, that prayer is very helpful to them and a most pleasing tribute to me. But they will do better still and will please me more if they say these salutations while meditating on the life, death, and passion of Jesus Christ, for this meditation is the soul of this prayer.»”
► HOW MANY 5-DECADE ROSARIES DO YOU USUALLY PRAY AND MEDITATE EVERY DAY?
3+ ROSARIES (10 out of 10) 1 OR 2 ROSARIES (7 out of 10) 1 ROSARY (4 out of 10) LESS THAN ONE (1 out of 10)
What’s You Rating in Relation to Studying Your Faith?
Our Lord says: “Learn of Me!” (Matthew 11:29). Elsewhere, He tells His Apostles and disciples: “Teach ye all nations … Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you!” (Matthew 28:19-20). “Faith then cometh by hearing; and hearing by the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17). “Continue in those things which thou hast learned, and which have been committed to thee!” (2 Timothy 3:14). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). However, Our Lord lamented: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8)―which is really a rhetorical question. A rhetorical question is a question someone asks without expecting an answer. The question might not have an answer, or it might have an obvious answer. In this case, Our Lord is hinting at the obvious answer―there will be little Faith remaining on Earth at His Second Coming. If we do not ‘feed’ our Faith, then our Faith will gradually weaken and die. The level of Faith―or the knowledge of the Faith―is pretty abysmal in our day and age, where Catholic adults do not even remember their First Communion Catechism (a 7-year-old’s level), nor their Confirmation Catechism (an 11 year-old’s level). They also lack even the most basic “parrot-fashion” memorization of certain important religious facts―and don’t even imagine or dare to hope that they can enter into a serious religious conversation or debate or argument about deeper matters concerning Faith or Morals. They just don’t have that kind of equipment! Yet some are highly intelligent and highly knowledgeable about material things!
As Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange in his book, The Three Ages of the Spiritual Life, writes: “The interior life is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life, or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good, in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.”
► WHAT IS YOUR DAILY TOTAL NON-WORK, NON-FAITH RELATED TIME ON YOUR SMARTPHONE, LAPTOP, TABLET, TV, VIDEO PLAYER, OR SOCIAL MEDIA ?
UNDER 1 HOUR (10 out of 10) 1 - 2 HOURS (7 out of 10) 2 - 3 HOURS (4 out of 10) MORE THAN 3 HOURS (1 out of 10)
► WHAT IS THE TTAL TIME DEDICATED DAILY TO THE STUDY OF THE FAITH, WHETHER THROUGH BOOKS OR ELECTRONIC MEDIA?
OVER 60 MINS (10 out of 10) 30 - 6O MINS (7 out of 10) 15 - 30 MINS (4 out of 10) LESS THAN 15 MINS (1 out of 10)
What’s Your Meditation Credit-Score Like?
Normally, when we pray, we like to speak a lot―but we don't like or think to listen. Prayer, in itself, is as necessary for our spiritual life as breathing is necessary for our bodily life. Our spiritual life depends on God's grace, and he has, so to speak, given us the power to breathe it in prayer. Not to pray will have the same results, for the life of the soul, as not to breathe would have for the life of the body―that is sickness and death.
Prayer means to be with God and sometimes speak with him. The majority of people know only one kind of prayer called vocal prayer because we do it with our voices (i.e. standard prayers like Our Father, Hail Mary, or with words in the silences of our mind). These prayers are wonderful. We need to practice them. However they are not enough to nourish our soul. Sometimes, if we don't pay attention, we run the risk of merely saying prayers mechanically without really praying.
The majority of people like to speak to God, but very few speak with God. Everyone expects God to listen to what they saying―but do they make efforts to listen to what God is saying? To speak with God implies that we also listen, not only speak. How can we listen to God? God speaks to us, first of all, through His Word which is found in Holy Scripture and the Tradition of the Church (which is the teachings of Christ, Apostles, writings of the Popes, of the Church Councils, of the Saints, etc.). God also speaks to us through the events of our lives, through the people that we meet, through the circumstances, through the inspirations that He sends to us. We need to be aware of these in order to listen more. It is very hard for us to listen and far easier to talk and make God listen. But, besides vocal prayer we also need mental prayer. This is our way of listening to God. Mental prayer is also called meditation.
Meditation is simply reflecting on God's word with the help of the Holy Spirit. It is a very simple process that involves your mind, your heart (emotions and affections), and your will. Meditation does not mean that we are looking for visions or extraordinary insights. It is no different than paying attention to someone you care for. Anyone can do it. In fact, you are definitely meditating on many secular things all day long―you just need to channel that absorption away from the secular and onto the religious. In other words, you already have the tools of meditation and have been using them for years―but on the wrong things! As St. Teresa points out, meditation consists not so much in thinking a great deal, but in loving a great deal. However, you cannot love what you do not know―and you will only love a little if you only know a little. Thus, meditation goes hand-in-hand with studying the Faith, the spiritual life, the Bible, etc.
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU MAKE A MEDITATION?
ALMOST DAILY (10 out of 10) FEW TIMES A MONTH (7 out of 10) FEW TIMES A YEAR (4 out of 10) RARELY OR NEVER (1 out of 10)
How Would You Grade Your Daily-Examination of Conscience?
As already mentioned previously, all the popes since Pope Pius XII have complained about the loss of the sense of sin on the part of Catholics. Part of the problem, or one of the fundamental causes of the loss of a sense of sin, is a neglect in performing the daily examination of conscience at the end of each and every day, and then begging pardon from God for whatever sins we have committed throughout the course of that day. If you don’t use a tool, it gets rusty! If you don’t clean your conscience, it gets dirty and stays dirty.
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU MAKE A SERIOUS EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE?
ALMOST DAILY (10 out of 10) FEW TIMES A MONTH (7 out of 10) FEW TIMES A YEAR (4 out of 10) RARELY OR NEVER (1 out of 10)
What Scores is Your Mercy Getting?
Charity, of course, is the greatest of virtues―yet you can look at charity as being a mansion with many rooms. The best and most valuable room is the “Room of Mercy”―or could we say: “Room for Mercy.” Holy Scripture says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). Our Lord Himself points out: “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy … For if you will forgive men their offences, your heavenly Father will forgive you also your offences. But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences” (Matthew 5:7; 6:14-15).
In the same Sermon on the Mount, Our Lord adds: “You have heard that it hath been said: ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth!’ But I say to you not to resist evil―but if one strike thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the other! And if a man will contend with thee in judgment, and take away thy coat, then also let go thy cloak unto him! And whosoever will force thee to go one mile, go with him another two! Give to him that asks of thee; and from him that would borrow of thee, turn not away! You have heard that it hath been said: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thy enemy!’ But I say to you: Love your enemies: do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you, so that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust. For if you only love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even the publicans do this? And if you salute your brethren only, what do you do that is more? Do not also the heathens do this? Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:38-48).
“Then came Peter unto Him and said: ‘Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?’ Jesus said to him: ‘I say not to thee, till seven times; but till seventy times seven times. Therefore is the Kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who would take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents (1 talent was 750 ounces of silver. At today’s silver prices, that would put the 10,000 talents at just over $112 million). And as he had not wherewith to pay it, his lord commanded that he should be sold, and his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, besought him, saying: Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all. And the lord of that servant being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt.
“But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence (the Roman penny was the eighth part of an ounce. At today’s silver prices, a hundred pence would be just over $200): and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: ‘Pay what thou owest!’ And his fellow servant falling down, besought him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all!’ And he would not―but went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt.
“Now his fellow servants seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him and said to him: ‘Thou wicked servant! I forgave thee all the debt, because thou besoughtest me! Shouldst not thou then have had compassion also on thy fellow servant, even as I had compassion on thee?’ And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers, until he paid all the debt. So also shall My heavenly Father do to you, if you forgive not everyone his brother from your hearts!” (Matthew 18:23-35).
Pope St. Gregory the Great, in chapter 60 of his Dialogues, says that we ought to pardon other men their sins, that we may obtain remission of our own:
“We have also further to know, that he does rightly and in good sort demand pardon for his own sin, who does forgive that which hath been done against himself. For our gift is not received, if, beforehand, we do not free our soul from all discord and lack of charity―for our Savior said: ‘If thou offer thy gift at the altar, and there thou remember that thy brother hath anything against thee, then leave there thy offering before the altar, and go first to be reconciled to thy brother, and then coming thou shalt offer thy gift!’ (Matthew 5:23-24). Wherein we have to consider, that whereas all sin is loosed by a gift, how grievous the sin of discord is, for which no gift is received. Therefore we ought, in soul and desire, to go unto our neighbor, though he be far off, and many miles distant from us, and there to humble ourselves before him, and to pacify him by humility and hearty good will, to the end that our Creator, seeing the desire of our mind, may forgive us our own sin, who receives a gift for sin. And our Savior Himself teaches us, how that servant, which did owe ten thousand talents, by penance obtained of his Lord the forgiveness of that debt: but yet because he would not forgive his fellow-servant an hundred pence, which were due to him, that was again exacted at his hands, which before was pardoned. (Matthew 18:27). Out of which sayings we learn, that if we do not from our heart forgive that which is committed against us, how that is again required at our hands, whereof before we were glad that by penance we had obtained pardon and remission. Wherefore, while time is given us, while our Judge doth bear with us, while He that examines our sins doth expect our conversion and amendment: let us soften with tears the hardness of our heart, and with sincere charity, love our neighbors: and then, dare I speak it boldly, we shall not have any need of the Holy Sacrifice after our death: if, before death, we offer up ourselves for a sacrifice unto almighty God.”
St Alphonsus Liguori told the story of a certain religious brother whose life was not what it should have been. When he came to the end of his life he was asked if he feared the judgment of God. His reply was, “No, because I have always forgiven my enemies!”
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU FORGIVE WRONGS COMMITTED BY FAMILY, RELATIVES AND FRIENDS?
ALWAYS (10 out of 10) MOST TIMES (7 out of 10) LESS THAN HALF THE TIME (4 out of 10) RARELY OR NEVER (1 out of 10)
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU FORGIVE WRONGS COMMITTED BY WORK COLLEAGUES, NEIGHBORS, ACQUAINTANCES, STRANGERS, ENEMIES?
ALWAYS (10 out of 10) MOST TIMES (7 out of 10) LESS THAN HALF THE TIME (4 out of 10) RARELY OR NEVER (1 out of 10)
► HOW OFTEN DO YOU PRAY FOR YOUR ENEMIES OR FOR THE SERIOUS SINNERS IN THE WORLD, FOR EXAMPLE THE ONE'S WHO MAKE THE NEWS?
ALWAYS (10 out of 10) MOST TIMES (7 out of 10) LESS THAN HALF THE TIME (4 out of 10) RARELY OR NEVER (1 out of 10)
Run With the Ball Yourself
These are just the very basic, foundational elements that everyone needs to examine in their own lives. Following the above system, you could further add the following points for examination―time and length of article do not allow this to be covered in one single article. However, now that you are familiar with the lay-out or approach, you can easily do this yourself. The additional points―which are only some key points and by no means the only points―are:
● Spiritual Reading
● The Corporal Works of Mercy
● The Spiritual Works of Mercy
● The Seven Deadly Sins: Pride, Covetousness, Gluttony, Anger, Lust, Envy and Sloth
● The Cardinal Virtues: Prudence, Justice, Fortitude and Temperance
● Each of the Ten Commandments taken individually
● The chief virtues, especially humility and charity
● Gossip through calumny (lies) and detraction (revealing true faults)
● Etc., etc., etc., etc.
In the meantime, you can add up your current score, which, based upon the above questions, potentially gives you a maximum of 180 points and an absolute minimum of 18 points. Although all of this is purely arbitrary and subjective, you could obviously say that anything below 90 is most certainly a sign of lukewarmness. Anything below 50 … well, hmm?! A score of around 120 would show seriousness about the spiritual life, whereas anywhere near 180 means you can start polishing your halo, but don’t drop it through pride!
Article 28
Monday in Holy Week, March 25th
The Feast of the Annunciation has been transferred to April 8th
Don't Waste Holy Week! Don't Insult Christ!
Monday in Holy Week, March 25th
The Feast of the Annunciation has been transferred to April 8th
Don't Waste Holy Week! Don't Insult Christ!
Will Your Holy Week Be Wholly Holy?
If there ever was a week to strengthen our weak love of God, then this is that week—Holy Week. We all know the greatest Commandment that we have the greatest difficulty in fulfilling--“And thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). We do love God—it is true—but not with our WHOLE heart, soul, mind and strength! We often fall into the category of those of whom Our Lord says: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). We are—at times, or even often—spiritual automatons, religious robots, going through our spiritual life on ‘auto-pilot’ uttering memorized prayers with more or less half-a-heart, half-focused, half-minded. The other half is focused on our daily life, our home and work life, our studies, our hobbies and our socializing.
This approach is—though we strenuously banish this truth from our half-focused minds—seriously condemned in Holy Scripture: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24). “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that doth the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21). “And why call you Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
What Does God Will? Holiness!
And what is His will? “For this is the will of God, your sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:3). “Think on the things of the Lord … Be holy both in body and in spirit!” (1 Corinthians 7:34). “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God” (Romans 12:1). “Because it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy!’” (1 Peter 1:16)—St. Peter here quotes the Old Testament: “For I am the Lord your God: be holy because I am holy. Defile not your souls … You shall be holy, because I am holy … You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 11:44-46; 20:26). St. Paul adds: “He chose us before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight” (Ephesians 1:4).
What Union Can There Be Between the Holy and Unholy?
This is why St. Paul commands that we separate ourselves from certain kinds of people: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people!’ Wherefore: ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
You Are A Holy Temple!―Or Should Be!
“Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? But if any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy, which you are! [or should be] Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16-17; 6:19).
Knock Down Your Worldly Temple, Build a Holy One!
Speaking of destroying temples, this is what Jesus predicted He would do—destroy and rebuild the Temple. This is what we should ask Him to do to our worldly, earthly or at best hybrid temple—knock it down and rebuild it as a truly spiritual and holy temple!
Get Outta Here!
“And the Pasch of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And He found in the Temple them that sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the changers of money sitting. And when He had made, as it were, a scourge of little cords, He drove them all out of the Temple, the sheep also and the oxen, and the money of the changers He poured out, and the tables He overthrew. And to them that sold doves He said: “Take these things out of here! And make not the house of my Father a house of traffic!” And His disciples remembered, that it was written: “The zeal of Thy house hath eaten me up!” The Jews, therefore, answered, and said to Him: “What sign dost Thou show unto us, seeing Thou dost these things?” Jesus answered, and said to them: “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up! The Jews then said: “Six and forty years was this Temple in building; and wilt Thou raise it up in three days?” But He spoke of the temple of His body” (John 2:13-21)—and we should ask Him to do the same to the temple of our soul!
The above incident happened earlier in Our Lord’s ministry—it was repeated on Palm Sunday, after His triumphal entry into Jerusalem—which is reported by St. Matthew and St. Mark. So it is twice that Our Lord drove people out of the Temple for misusing it, or for having a worldly attitude.
“And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves. And He said to them: ‘It is written, “My house shall be called the house of prayer!” but you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Matthew 21:12-13). St. Mark echoes the account: “And they came to Jerusalem. And when Jesus entered into the Temple, he began to cast out them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the chairs of them that sold doves. And he suffered not that any man should carry a vessel through the Temple; and he taught them, saying: ‘Is it not written, “My house shall be called the house of prayer to all nations”? But you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Mark 11:15-17).
Rebuilding the Temple of Our Soul
The false witnesses, at Jesus’ trial before the Chief Priests, testified of Jesus destroying and rebuilding the Temple: “And they said: ‘This man said, “I am able to destroy the Temple of God, and, after three days, rebuild it!”’ ” (Matthew 26:61). “We heard Him say, ‘I will destroy this temple made with hands, and within three days I will build another not made with hands!’” (Mark 14:58). We have remade the temple of our soul with ‘human hands’—we need to restore the temple of our soul to its pristine, holy state, which was given to it at Baptism by divine hands. We have ruined or soiled the temple of our soul with our human approach—we need Our Lord to cleanse and restore the temple of our soul to a holy state! Holy Week is the best time to have Him whip out the human and restore the divine!
In speaking to one of His mystics, Our Lord said: “With ruins, on ruins, I can build magnificently. It gives Me joy to use that which has humbled itself before Me, because My action is free … It is with coal that I make diamonds. What would I not do with a soul, however black she might be, who would give herself to Me!” (Our Lord to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, Words of Love, by Fr. Gottemoller). Holy Week is the time to give yourself to Him—to build on your ruins and make diamonds from the black coal of your sins!
A Lesson in the Palm in Your Hand
On Palm Sunday blessed palms were distributed. “Blessed” means “made holy”—a blessed medal becomes a “holy medal”; a blessed picture card becomes a “holy card”.
We would do well to reflect a little more deeply upon the words with which our palms were blessed today: “Bless, we beseech Thee, O Lord, these branches of palm and grant that what Thy people today bodily perform for Thy honor, they may perfect spiritually with the utmost devotion, by gaining the victory over the enemy, and ardently loving every work of mercy.”
You―like the palm that was blessed and made holy—are meant to be holy! You are meant to fight against the world and receive the palm of victory in Heaven for your brave and painful efforts! Just as Our Lady was told: “Blessed art thou among women!”—we should be blessed and holy in the unholy world in which we live.
Lessons from the Palm Tree
God made all things—down to their tiniest details—and God therefore made palm trees. As Holy Scripture says: “All men are vain, in whom there is not the knowledge of God: and who by these good things that are seen, could not understand Him that is, neither, by attending to the works of Him, have acknowledged Who was the Workman” (Wisdom 13:1). Let us, then, look at the visible palm tree, and see what invisible things of the heavenly Workman we can find therein!
To begin with, it must be noted that of the many thousands of trees that God did create—the palm tree found its way into Holy Scripture: “The just shall flourish like the palm tree” (Psalm 91:13). The palm tree goes even further, and makes up part of the ancient Tabernacle: “Go forth to the mount, and fetch branches of olive, and branches of beautiful wood, branches of myrtle, and branches of palm, and branches of thick trees, to make tabernacles, as it is written” (2 Esdras 8:15).
The date-palm tree is characteristic of Palestine. It is described as “flourishing” (Psalm 91:13), tall (Canticles 7:7), “upright” (Jeremias 10:5). Its branches are a symbol of victory (Apocalypse 7:9). Rising with slender stem 40 or 50, at times even 80, feet aloft, its only branches, the feathery, snow-like, pale-green fronds from 6 to 12 feet long, bending from its top, the palm attracts the eye wherever it is seen. The whole land of Palestine was called by the Greeks and Romans―“Phoenicia”, which means “the land of palms.”
The Upright Palm—The Upright Man
Most palms are a straight, unbranched stem, but sometimes they can have a branching stem (two faced Catholics), or even a creeping vine (hypocritical and evil Catholics). Some trees are irregular, they are twisted and tortuous in their growth; some hug the ground before they rise; but the palm rises straight toward Heaven, it stands upright among the trees. The good man is well symbolized in this―he is the man who does not stoop or cling to the earth, who does not bend and bow earthward, who stands erect, who moves in one heavenward direction, who is governed constantly by true and abiding principles. And these he gains from God and from his teachings. Through them, he is sustained in his principles, is reminded of them, gains fresh inspiration to illustrate and practice them.
Catholics should be ‘straight’ souls following the straight and narrow path upwards to Heaven. We see this 'straightness' reflected in the palm leaves, which are all straight: “The crooked shall become straight” (Isaias 40:4). “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight His paths!” (Mark 1:3). “How narrow is the gate, and straight is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:14). “Let thy eyes look straight on, and let thy eyelids go before thy steps. Make straight the path for thy feet. Decline not to the right hand, nor to the left [like the branched palm or creeping palm]: turn away thy foot from evil. For the Lord knoweth the ways that are on the right hand: but those are perverse which are on the left hand. But He will make thy courses straight, He will bring forward thy ways in peace … The wise man maketh straight his steps” (Proverbs 4:25-27; 15:21).
Tough Palm Trees—Tough Catholics
Palm trees are from a family of perennial lianas, shrubs, and trees and grow best in hot and humid climates. Most palm trees grow in the tropical and subtropical regions of the world. They occur from about 44° northern latitude to about 44° southern latitude. However—as with Catholics—there are also hardy palm trees that can withstand coldness and grow in much harsher and colder environments. Palm Trees, with proper care, planting, moisture and climate are grown all over the world even in locations with freezing cold winters. Canada serves a Northern reference point and many types of Palm Trees can grow there. The main factors affecting hardiness are the minimum winter temperature, the number of hours of cold every winter, the amount of heat every summer, and the relative wetness or dryness of the climate. In general, Palms are not particularly hardy. Many are actually injured by a single freezing night. Others Palms withstand 0° F (zero degrees Fahrenheit) for short periods without damage.
Community Life or Desert Father Hermits?
They have large evergreen leaves that are either “palmate” which is fan-leaved like a hand or “pinnate” which feather-leaved where the palms do not blend together at the base, but are separate leaves arranged in a spiral at the top of the trunk. If you liken that to religious life, you could say, broadly speaking, that the “palmate” palms are those that are joined together and live in community, whereas the “pinnate” palms are those who live like hermits or Desert Fathers.
Evergreen—Ever Humble
Being evergreens, reminds us of the virtue of humility (which is represented by the color green—as in green grass that walked upon and trodden on and squashed down). This humility should be present in us all year round—evergreen—and is required by Our Lord, Who said: "Learn of Me, for I am humble of heart!" (Matthew 11:29). “God hath made the roots of proud nations to wither, and hath planted the humble of these nations” (Ecclesiasticus 10:18). “And he shall be like a tree which is planted near the running waters, which shall bring forth its fruit, in due season. And his leaf shall not fall off: and all whatsoever he shall do shall prosper” (Psalm 1:3). There can be no fruit without humility—just as no tree can survive without humus (Latin for the word “soil”).
The Fruit of the Palm Tree
As Holy Scripture says: “I will go up into the palm tree, and will take hold of the fruit thereof” (Canticles 7:8). So what is the fruit of the palm tree? Surprisingly, from the various species of palm trees, we get a wide variety of fruit. Among the many species of palm tree there are many different fruits. The most common fruits that grow from palm trees are coconuts and dates. Other fruits from palm trees include the acai berry, jubaea, peach palm fruit and betel nut.
Similarly with Catholics—or saints (which each Catholic should be)—there is a wide variety of species of Catholic, each bearing different fruits (virtues). Some saints were mainly know for shedding their blood, others for their learning, others for the missionary zeal, others for suffering persecution, others for carrying a variety of burdens, and all of them had humility and charity in common.
The Coconut Palm Tree
The coconut you see in your store does not look anything like the coconut on the tree. The coconut has three layers and in the store you only the final inner layer—with the other two layers having been removed. In technical botanical jargon, a coconut is “a fibrous one-seeded drupe, also known as a dry drupe.” However, when using loose definitions, the coconut can be all three: a fruit, a nut, and a seed. Eh? Drupe? Okay! Classification of plants can be a complicated matter for the average person. A drupe is a fruit with a hard stony covering enclosing the seed and comes from the word drupa meaning “overripe olive”. A coconut, and all drupes, have three layers: the exocarp (outer layer), the mesocarp (fleshy middle layer), and the endocarp (hard, woody layer that surrounds the seed).
The coconut we buy in the store does not resemble the coconut you find growing on a coconut palm. An untouched coconut has three layers. The outermost layer, which is typically smooth with a greenish color, is called the exocarp. The next layer is the fibrous husk, or mesocarp, which ultimately surrounds the hard woody layer that we see and buy in the store which is called the endocarp. The endocarp surrounds the seed—the white fleshy part of the coconut. Generally speaking, when you buy a coconut at the supermarket, the exocarp (green exterior) and the mesocarp (middle layer of husk) are removed and what you see is the endocarp (the furry hard woody shell with the seed inside of it). If you look at one end of the coconut, you’ll see three pores (also called eyes). The coconut seed―inside of the furry or hairy hard woody shell―germinates and a shoot emerges from one of the pores. In addition to the “baby” plant in the seed, there is the food to kick off its life called the endosperm. The endosperm is what makes up most of the seed and, in the coconut’s case, is the yummy white stuff we eat.
The Coconut Palm of Milk, Cream and Water!
Also, inside that furry or hairy hard woody shell is coconut water—which is drinkable and not to be confused with coconut milk. Coconut water is the liquid that can be poured out from pierced coconuts. Coconut milk and coconut cream are both made from the white grated coconut meat that is macerated (soaked) in a measured quantity of water. When the resulting liquid is squeezed out, the first squeezing produces coconut cream, which is thick like dairy cream. Coconut milk has the liquid consistency of cow's milk and is made from simmering one part shredded coconut meat in one part water.
What do we learn from all of this? Well, first of all, to get to the good, edible and enjoyable part of the coconut—which you could call the ‘soul of the coconut’ or ‘coconut heaven’—you have to go through three states or stages: the smooth exterior of a greenish color, called the exocarp. Then the fibrous husk, or mesocarp. Finally the very hard woody layer that we see and buy in the store which is called the endocarp. So, in a sense, it gets harder the closer you get to the white yummy stuff in the center. The same is true for the spiritual life—we have three stages to pass through before God will allow us to get to Heaven—and nobody is exempt from any of those stages. The stages are those of the Beginner (the easiest), the Proficient (getting harder) and the Perfect (extremely hard). We either pass through these on Earth (which is preferable and easier) or in the fires of Purgatory (which is not preferable and incredibly more painful).
The water is the coconut is symbolic of grace in soul—for water has always been a symbol of grace for the Fathers of the Church. It is what keeps the coconut ‘alive’—just as grace keeps the soul ‘alive’ to God. The coconut milk and cream are produced by the white flesh being mixed with water and then either boiled (simmered) or squeezed to produce milk and cream respectively. This is symbolic of the pure soul (white flesh), working with grace (the water), under the pressure of the cross (simmered or squeezed) to produce virtues (milk or cream). This is symbolized by the way some Catholics like to fold the palm in order to make it into a Palm Cross—look it up online in you don’t know how to do that!
More Than Just a Palm!
Thus you can see that the simple palm that you were given on Palm Sunday has far more meaning than we superficially find it! And this is just “the tip of the iceberg” to what could be found if one looked deeper and researched more. It proves the point that you can find the DNA of God and the Faith in everything that God has made. Just as, proverbially, “all roads lead to Rome”—so too does all of creation point and lead to God, if we would only stop long enough to examine deeply enough all those things, or signposts, that God has placed before us!
Therefore, DO NOT WASTE YOUR HOLY WEEK! Just as with the palms of Palm Sunday, there is myriad or plethora of material present in Holy Week that shows the DNA of God and the Faith. But you need to free yourself from other things in order to have the time seek, dig, study, compare, connect and enjoy what God and His Church places before us in this holiest of weeks. Superficiality not only gets you nowhere, it is also as dissatisfying and unfulfilling for the spiritual appetite as cotton-candy (candy floss) is to a hungry man!
If there ever was a week to strengthen our weak love of God, then this is that week—Holy Week. We all know the greatest Commandment that we have the greatest difficulty in fulfilling--“And thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). We do love God—it is true—but not with our WHOLE heart, soul, mind and strength! We often fall into the category of those of whom Our Lord says: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8). We are—at times, or even often—spiritual automatons, religious robots, going through our spiritual life on ‘auto-pilot’ uttering memorized prayers with more or less half-a-heart, half-focused, half-minded. The other half is focused on our daily life, our home and work life, our studies, our hobbies and our socializing.
This approach is—though we strenuously banish this truth from our half-focused minds—seriously condemned in Holy Scripture: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24). “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that doth the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21). “And why call you Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
What Does God Will? Holiness!
And what is His will? “For this is the will of God, your sanctification!” (1 Thessalonians 4:3). “Think on the things of the Lord … Be holy both in body and in spirit!” (1 Corinthians 7:34). “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God” (Romans 12:1). “Because it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy!’” (1 Peter 1:16)—St. Peter here quotes the Old Testament: “For I am the Lord your God: be holy because I am holy. Defile not your souls … You shall be holy, because I am holy … You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 11:44-46; 20:26). St. Paul adds: “He chose us before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight” (Ephesians 1:4).
What Union Can There Be Between the Holy and Unholy?
This is why St. Paul commands that we separate ourselves from certain kinds of people: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people!’ Wherefore: ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
You Are A Holy Temple!―Or Should Be!
“Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? But if any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy, which you are! [or should be] Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16-17; 6:19).
Knock Down Your Worldly Temple, Build a Holy One!
Speaking of destroying temples, this is what Jesus predicted He would do—destroy and rebuild the Temple. This is what we should ask Him to do to our worldly, earthly or at best hybrid temple—knock it down and rebuild it as a truly spiritual and holy temple!
Get Outta Here!
“And the Pasch of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And He found in the Temple them that sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the changers of money sitting. And when He had made, as it were, a scourge of little cords, He drove them all out of the Temple, the sheep also and the oxen, and the money of the changers He poured out, and the tables He overthrew. And to them that sold doves He said: “Take these things out of here! And make not the house of my Father a house of traffic!” And His disciples remembered, that it was written: “The zeal of Thy house hath eaten me up!” The Jews, therefore, answered, and said to Him: “What sign dost Thou show unto us, seeing Thou dost these things?” Jesus answered, and said to them: “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up! The Jews then said: “Six and forty years was this Temple in building; and wilt Thou raise it up in three days?” But He spoke of the temple of His body” (John 2:13-21)—and we should ask Him to do the same to the temple of our soul!
The above incident happened earlier in Our Lord’s ministry—it was repeated on Palm Sunday, after His triumphal entry into Jerusalem—which is reported by St. Matthew and St. Mark. So it is twice that Our Lord drove people out of the Temple for misusing it, or for having a worldly attitude.
“And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves. And He said to them: ‘It is written, “My house shall be called the house of prayer!” but you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Matthew 21:12-13). St. Mark echoes the account: “And they came to Jerusalem. And when Jesus entered into the Temple, he began to cast out them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the chairs of them that sold doves. And he suffered not that any man should carry a vessel through the Temple; and he taught them, saying: ‘Is it not written, “My house shall be called the house of prayer to all nations”? But you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Mark 11:15-17).
Rebuilding the Temple of Our Soul
The false witnesses, at Jesus’ trial before the Chief Priests, testified of Jesus destroying and rebuilding the Temple: “And they said: ‘This man said, “I am able to destroy the Temple of God, and, after three days, rebuild it!”’ ” (Matthew 26:61). “We heard Him say, ‘I will destroy this temple made with hands, and within three days I will build another not made with hands!’” (Mark 14:58). We have remade the temple of our soul with ‘human hands’—we need to restore the temple of our soul to its pristine, holy state, which was given to it at Baptism by divine hands. We have ruined or soiled the temple of our soul with our human approach—we need Our Lord to cleanse and restore the temple of our soul to a holy state! Holy Week is the best time to have Him whip out the human and restore the divine!
In speaking to one of His mystics, Our Lord said: “With ruins, on ruins, I can build magnificently. It gives Me joy to use that which has humbled itself before Me, because My action is free … It is with coal that I make diamonds. What would I not do with a soul, however black she might be, who would give herself to Me!” (Our Lord to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, Words of Love, by Fr. Gottemoller). Holy Week is the time to give yourself to Him—to build on your ruins and make diamonds from the black coal of your sins!
A Lesson in the Palm in Your Hand
On Palm Sunday blessed palms were distributed. “Blessed” means “made holy”—a blessed medal becomes a “holy medal”; a blessed picture card becomes a “holy card”.
We would do well to reflect a little more deeply upon the words with which our palms were blessed today: “Bless, we beseech Thee, O Lord, these branches of palm and grant that what Thy people today bodily perform for Thy honor, they may perfect spiritually with the utmost devotion, by gaining the victory over the enemy, and ardently loving every work of mercy.”
You―like the palm that was blessed and made holy—are meant to be holy! You are meant to fight against the world and receive the palm of victory in Heaven for your brave and painful efforts! Just as Our Lady was told: “Blessed art thou among women!”—we should be blessed and holy in the unholy world in which we live.
Lessons from the Palm Tree
God made all things—down to their tiniest details—and God therefore made palm trees. As Holy Scripture says: “All men are vain, in whom there is not the knowledge of God: and who by these good things that are seen, could not understand Him that is, neither, by attending to the works of Him, have acknowledged Who was the Workman” (Wisdom 13:1). Let us, then, look at the visible palm tree, and see what invisible things of the heavenly Workman we can find therein!
To begin with, it must be noted that of the many thousands of trees that God did create—the palm tree found its way into Holy Scripture: “The just shall flourish like the palm tree” (Psalm 91:13). The palm tree goes even further, and makes up part of the ancient Tabernacle: “Go forth to the mount, and fetch branches of olive, and branches of beautiful wood, branches of myrtle, and branches of palm, and branches of thick trees, to make tabernacles, as it is written” (2 Esdras 8:15).
The date-palm tree is characteristic of Palestine. It is described as “flourishing” (Psalm 91:13), tall (Canticles 7:7), “upright” (Jeremias 10:5). Its branches are a symbol of victory (Apocalypse 7:9). Rising with slender stem 40 or 50, at times even 80, feet aloft, its only branches, the feathery, snow-like, pale-green fronds from 6 to 12 feet long, bending from its top, the palm attracts the eye wherever it is seen. The whole land of Palestine was called by the Greeks and Romans―“Phoenicia”, which means “the land of palms.”
The Upright Palm—The Upright Man
Most palms are a straight, unbranched stem, but sometimes they can have a branching stem (two faced Catholics), or even a creeping vine (hypocritical and evil Catholics). Some trees are irregular, they are twisted and tortuous in their growth; some hug the ground before they rise; but the palm rises straight toward Heaven, it stands upright among the trees. The good man is well symbolized in this―he is the man who does not stoop or cling to the earth, who does not bend and bow earthward, who stands erect, who moves in one heavenward direction, who is governed constantly by true and abiding principles. And these he gains from God and from his teachings. Through them, he is sustained in his principles, is reminded of them, gains fresh inspiration to illustrate and practice them.
Catholics should be ‘straight’ souls following the straight and narrow path upwards to Heaven. We see this 'straightness' reflected in the palm leaves, which are all straight: “The crooked shall become straight” (Isaias 40:4). “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight His paths!” (Mark 1:3). “How narrow is the gate, and straight is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:14). “Let thy eyes look straight on, and let thy eyelids go before thy steps. Make straight the path for thy feet. Decline not to the right hand, nor to the left [like the branched palm or creeping palm]: turn away thy foot from evil. For the Lord knoweth the ways that are on the right hand: but those are perverse which are on the left hand. But He will make thy courses straight, He will bring forward thy ways in peace … The wise man maketh straight his steps” (Proverbs 4:25-27; 15:21).
Tough Palm Trees—Tough Catholics
Palm trees are from a family of perennial lianas, shrubs, and trees and grow best in hot and humid climates. Most palm trees grow in the tropical and subtropical regions of the world. They occur from about 44° northern latitude to about 44° southern latitude. However—as with Catholics—there are also hardy palm trees that can withstand coldness and grow in much harsher and colder environments. Palm Trees, with proper care, planting, moisture and climate are grown all over the world even in locations with freezing cold winters. Canada serves a Northern reference point and many types of Palm Trees can grow there. The main factors affecting hardiness are the minimum winter temperature, the number of hours of cold every winter, the amount of heat every summer, and the relative wetness or dryness of the climate. In general, Palms are not particularly hardy. Many are actually injured by a single freezing night. Others Palms withstand 0° F (zero degrees Fahrenheit) for short periods without damage.
Community Life or Desert Father Hermits?
They have large evergreen leaves that are either “palmate” which is fan-leaved like a hand or “pinnate” which feather-leaved where the palms do not blend together at the base, but are separate leaves arranged in a spiral at the top of the trunk. If you liken that to religious life, you could say, broadly speaking, that the “palmate” palms are those that are joined together and live in community, whereas the “pinnate” palms are those who live like hermits or Desert Fathers.
Evergreen—Ever Humble
Being evergreens, reminds us of the virtue of humility (which is represented by the color green—as in green grass that walked upon and trodden on and squashed down). This humility should be present in us all year round—evergreen—and is required by Our Lord, Who said: "Learn of Me, for I am humble of heart!" (Matthew 11:29). “God hath made the roots of proud nations to wither, and hath planted the humble of these nations” (Ecclesiasticus 10:18). “And he shall be like a tree which is planted near the running waters, which shall bring forth its fruit, in due season. And his leaf shall not fall off: and all whatsoever he shall do shall prosper” (Psalm 1:3). There can be no fruit without humility—just as no tree can survive without humus (Latin for the word “soil”).
The Fruit of the Palm Tree
As Holy Scripture says: “I will go up into the palm tree, and will take hold of the fruit thereof” (Canticles 7:8). So what is the fruit of the palm tree? Surprisingly, from the various species of palm trees, we get a wide variety of fruit. Among the many species of palm tree there are many different fruits. The most common fruits that grow from palm trees are coconuts and dates. Other fruits from palm trees include the acai berry, jubaea, peach palm fruit and betel nut.
Similarly with Catholics—or saints (which each Catholic should be)—there is a wide variety of species of Catholic, each bearing different fruits (virtues). Some saints were mainly know for shedding their blood, others for their learning, others for the missionary zeal, others for suffering persecution, others for carrying a variety of burdens, and all of them had humility and charity in common.
The Coconut Palm Tree
The coconut you see in your store does not look anything like the coconut on the tree. The coconut has three layers and in the store you only the final inner layer—with the other two layers having been removed. In technical botanical jargon, a coconut is “a fibrous one-seeded drupe, also known as a dry drupe.” However, when using loose definitions, the coconut can be all three: a fruit, a nut, and a seed. Eh? Drupe? Okay! Classification of plants can be a complicated matter for the average person. A drupe is a fruit with a hard stony covering enclosing the seed and comes from the word drupa meaning “overripe olive”. A coconut, and all drupes, have three layers: the exocarp (outer layer), the mesocarp (fleshy middle layer), and the endocarp (hard, woody layer that surrounds the seed).
The coconut we buy in the store does not resemble the coconut you find growing on a coconut palm. An untouched coconut has three layers. The outermost layer, which is typically smooth with a greenish color, is called the exocarp. The next layer is the fibrous husk, or mesocarp, which ultimately surrounds the hard woody layer that we see and buy in the store which is called the endocarp. The endocarp surrounds the seed—the white fleshy part of the coconut. Generally speaking, when you buy a coconut at the supermarket, the exocarp (green exterior) and the mesocarp (middle layer of husk) are removed and what you see is the endocarp (the furry hard woody shell with the seed inside of it). If you look at one end of the coconut, you’ll see three pores (also called eyes). The coconut seed―inside of the furry or hairy hard woody shell―germinates and a shoot emerges from one of the pores. In addition to the “baby” plant in the seed, there is the food to kick off its life called the endosperm. The endosperm is what makes up most of the seed and, in the coconut’s case, is the yummy white stuff we eat.
The Coconut Palm of Milk, Cream and Water!
Also, inside that furry or hairy hard woody shell is coconut water—which is drinkable and not to be confused with coconut milk. Coconut water is the liquid that can be poured out from pierced coconuts. Coconut milk and coconut cream are both made from the white grated coconut meat that is macerated (soaked) in a measured quantity of water. When the resulting liquid is squeezed out, the first squeezing produces coconut cream, which is thick like dairy cream. Coconut milk has the liquid consistency of cow's milk and is made from simmering one part shredded coconut meat in one part water.
What do we learn from all of this? Well, first of all, to get to the good, edible and enjoyable part of the coconut—which you could call the ‘soul of the coconut’ or ‘coconut heaven’—you have to go through three states or stages: the smooth exterior of a greenish color, called the exocarp. Then the fibrous husk, or mesocarp. Finally the very hard woody layer that we see and buy in the store which is called the endocarp. So, in a sense, it gets harder the closer you get to the white yummy stuff in the center. The same is true for the spiritual life—we have three stages to pass through before God will allow us to get to Heaven—and nobody is exempt from any of those stages. The stages are those of the Beginner (the easiest), the Proficient (getting harder) and the Perfect (extremely hard). We either pass through these on Earth (which is preferable and easier) or in the fires of Purgatory (which is not preferable and incredibly more painful).
The water is the coconut is symbolic of grace in soul—for water has always been a symbol of grace for the Fathers of the Church. It is what keeps the coconut ‘alive’—just as grace keeps the soul ‘alive’ to God. The coconut milk and cream are produced by the white flesh being mixed with water and then either boiled (simmered) or squeezed to produce milk and cream respectively. This is symbolic of the pure soul (white flesh), working with grace (the water), under the pressure of the cross (simmered or squeezed) to produce virtues (milk or cream). This is symbolized by the way some Catholics like to fold the palm in order to make it into a Palm Cross—look it up online in you don’t know how to do that!
More Than Just a Palm!
Thus you can see that the simple palm that you were given on Palm Sunday has far more meaning than we superficially find it! And this is just “the tip of the iceberg” to what could be found if one looked deeper and researched more. It proves the point that you can find the DNA of God and the Faith in everything that God has made. Just as, proverbially, “all roads lead to Rome”—so too does all of creation point and lead to God, if we would only stop long enough to examine deeply enough all those things, or signposts, that God has placed before us!
Therefore, DO NOT WASTE YOUR HOLY WEEK! Just as with the palms of Palm Sunday, there is myriad or plethora of material present in Holy Week that shows the DNA of God and the Faith. But you need to free yourself from other things in order to have the time seek, dig, study, compare, connect and enjoy what God and His Church places before us in this holiest of weeks. Superficiality not only gets you nowhere, it is also as dissatisfying and unfulfilling for the spiritual appetite as cotton-candy (candy floss) is to a hungry man!
Article 27
Palm Sunday March 24th
In the Palm of God's Hand!
Palm Sunday March 24th
In the Palm of God's Hand!
Palms and Palms
Palm Sunday is all about palms. Yet we are so focused on the palm in our hand, that we tend to forget that we are in the palm of God’s Hand! That was what Our Lord would have thought and realized as He humbly rode in triumph into Jerusalem, with thousands of palms being laid before Him. God, His Father, was in total control of all events―as He had been from the beginning of creation and will be into eternity. In a sense, everything―past, present and future―lays before Him at all times in the Palm of His Hand, so to speak. Nothing escapes His grasp. “Who has measured the waters in the hollow of His Hand, and weighed the heavens with His Palm? Who has poised with three fingers the bulk of the Earth, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance?” (Isaias 40:12). “Can a woman forget her infant, so as not to have pity on the son of her womb? And if she should forget, yet will not I forget thee! Behold, I have graven thee in My Hands! Thy walls are always before my eyes!” (Isaias 49:15-16). “My sheep hear My voice and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them life everlasting; and they shall not perish for ever, and no man shall pluck them out of My Hand. That which My Father hath given Me, is greater than all―and no one can snatch them out of the Hand of My Father” (John 10:27-29). “Where shall I go from Thy Spirit? Or where shall I flee from Thy Face? If I ascend into Heaven, Thou art there! If I descend into Hell, Thou art present! If I take my wings early in the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there also shall Thy Hand lead me and Thy right Hand shall hold me!” (Psalm 138:7-10). The words that God spoke to Josue, the successor of Moses, God also speaks to us: “As I have been with Moses, so will I be with thee! I will not leave thee, nor forsake thee!” (Josue 1:5).
Therefore, consider yourself to be held in the palm of God’s Hand. He will never drop you or throw you away. Nor will He ever forsake you or reject you, merely because you have let Him down through sin. He knows perfectly well that you will let Him down and that you will inevitably sin. “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). He is totally realistic about you. So, the real question is not whether God will drop us, but whether we will choose to throw ourselves out of His hand. No person will ever be cut off or lose their salvation solely because they let God down or made mistakes or failed Him. If it was based on that, we would all have to be cut off and rejected every single day, because that is how often we fail God or let Him down, to some degree or another: “For all have sinned, and do need the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us … If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 8-10).
Triumph of Palm Sunday?
On Palm Sunday, Our Lord enters Jerusalem in apparent triumph among cheering crowds―but He has another kind of ‘triumph’ in mind. The triumph that He has in mind is not the triumph of trumpets and acclamations―but the triumph of the Cross with all its humiliations! “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ says the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). Even His own Apostles could not understand how He would triumph through the Cross, when He foretold His Passion and Death: “Then Jesus took unto Him the Twelve, and said to them: ‘Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things shall be accomplished which were written by the prophets concerning the Son of man. For the Son of man shall be betrayed to the Chief Priests and the Scribes, and they shall condemn Him to death. And shall deliver Him to the Gentiles to be mocked, spat upon and scourged. And after they have scourged and crucified Him, they will put Him to death, and on the third day He shall rise again!’ And they understood none of these things, and this word was hid from them, and they understood not the things that were said” (Matthew 20:18-19; Luke 18:31-34). From the ‘evil’ of His Passion He will bring about the ‘good’ of our salvation!
Prior to His Passion and Death, Our Lord―whilst looking down upon Jerusalem from the surrounding hills―lamented: “When Jesus drew near, seeing the city, He wept over it, saying: ‘If you also had known, in this thy day, the things that are for your peace―but now they are hidden from your eyes!” … (Luke 19:41-42) … “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you that kill the prophets, and stone them that are sent unto you! How often would I have gathered together your children, as the hen does gather her chickens under her wings―but you would not!” (Matthew 23:37). Jesus came to save―but they wanted to kill their Savior. In less than a week, after shouting joyously at Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is He that comes in the Name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” (Matthew 21:9), they would be bitterly crying for His crucifixion and death: “Crucify Him! Crucify Him! … Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him! … We have no king but Caesar!” (John 19:6; 15). Those whom He has come to save, seek instead to kill Him―but He would even bring good out of their evil!
God Seeks to Bring Good Out of Evil
God seeks to bring good out evil. “It is with coal that I make diamonds. What would I not do with a soul, however black she might be, who would give herself to Me.” (Word of Our Lord to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 559). Christ came to seek that which was lost. Both these points are stressed in Holy Scripture: “The soul that sins, the same shall die! … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done―in his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live. Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways and live? … Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit―and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dies, saith the Lord God. Return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:20-32). Which is why Christ said: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). Christ comes to rescue evil sinners. Christ comes to make evil people good. Only God can bring good out of evil―but only if we let Him into our lives and give Him freedom to do what He wants!
God Patiently Awaits Our Conversion and Amendment
As St. Peter says: “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that anyone should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). “Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more! … Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 8:11; 5:14).
There is a danger that we envisage God as being perpetually patient and perpetually forgiving. This is a mockery of mercy and is a sin of prideful presumption! Holy Scripture warns us: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). St. Alphonsus Liguori, in his sermon “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More”, shakes up our complacency and presumption and abuse of God’s mercy:
“In the Sacred Scriptures it is written: ‘Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!’ The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations, or without at least asking God’s help to conquer them, and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice, tempts God to work miracles, or rather to show to him an extraordinary mercy that is not extended to the generality of Christians. Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. But God does not forget them. He numbers the graces which He dispenses, as well as the sins which we commit. Hence, when the time which He has fixed arrives, God deprives us of His graces, and begins to inflict chastisement. I intend to show, in this discourse, that, when sins reach a certain number, God pardons no more. Be attentive. St. Basil, St. Jerome, St. John Chrysostom, St. Augustine, and other Fathers, teach, as according to the words of Scripture ― ‘Thou hast ordered all things in measure, and number, and weight’ (Wisdom 11:21) ― that God has fixed for each person the number of the days of his life, and the degrees of health and talent which He will give him, so He has also determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more. God is ready to heal those who sincerely wish to amend their lives, but cannot take pity on the obstinate sinner. The Lord pardons sins, but He cannot pardon those who are determined to offend Him. Nor can we demand from God a reason why He pardons one a hundred sins, and takes others out of life, and sends them to Hell, after three or four sins.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, sermon “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More”).
Since sin is a separation from God, a rejection of God, a departure from God―thus we can see that an obstinate sinner, who is not trying to amend, cannot remain indefinitely in the Palm of God’s Hand. It is not that God throws the sinner away―the sinner himself throws himself out of the Hand of God and into the hands of the devil through sin: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). You could say that, by sin, the sinner acts in the same way as the Roman soldiers did towards Christ during His Passion: “Then did they spit in His face, and buffeted Him: and others struck His face with the palms of their hands” (Matthew 26:67). “And some began to spit on Him, and to cover His face, and to buffet Him, and to say unto Him: ‘Prophesy!’ And the servants struck Him with the palms of their hands” (Mark 14:65).
The Fire of Sin
St. Alphonsus, in the aforementioned sermon, adds: “You say: ‘I am young! There are many who have committed more sins than I have!’ But is God, on that account, obliged to wait for your repentance if you offend Him? In the Gospel of St. Matthew (21:19) we read, that the Savior cursed a fig tree the first time He saw it without fruit: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward forever. And immediately the fig tree withered away.’ You must, then, tremble at the thought of committing a single mortal sin, particularly if you have already been guilty of mortal sins. ‘Be not without fear about sins forgiven, and add not sin to sin!’ (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Say not then, O sinner: ‘As God has forgiven me other sins, so He will pardon me this one if I commit it!’ Say not this―for, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned. God waits with patience until a certain number of sins is committed, but, when the measure of guilt is filled up, He waits no longer, but chastises the sinner. Sinners multiply their sins without keeping any account of them―but God numbers them that, when the harvest is ripe, that is, when the number of sins is completed, He may take vengeance on them.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, sermon “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More”).
You could say that, by continually sinning, the sinner is like a fire that is growing bigger and hotter in the palm of God’s hand―and like a fire, when it has burnt one place, it moves on to another―like the forest fires that we see so often these days. A fire needs fuel to burn―and God’s hand has no fuel for the fire of sin, neither has a virtuous life any fuel for sin―so the sinner jumps out of God’s Hand into the world, which has plenty of fuel for sin―like jumping out of the frying pan into the fire.
The Fire of Love
God wants to save souls―yet most souls do not want to be saved. Not that they would not like to be saved, but they refuse the terms and requirements of salvation that are offered by God. Our Lord, in a revelation to Sr. Josefa Menendez lamented: “My Heart takes comfort in forgiving. I have no greater desire, no greater joy, than when I can pardon a soul …. I am consumed with desire to pardon ... Yes, to pardon these dear souls for whom I shed My Blood …. I will make known that the measure of My love and mercy for fallen souls is limitless. I want to forgive them. It comforts Me to forgive. My Heart is not so much wounded by sin, as it is torn with grief that they will not take refuge with Me after it …. Poor sinners, how blind they are! I want only to forgive them, and they seek only to offend Me! That is My great sorrow―that SO MANY ARE LOST and that they do not all come to Me to be forgiven. ” (Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 94, p. 136, p. 174, p. 188, p. 237).
“However great is the number of your frailties―far greater are the mercies of My Heart.... My love never changes …. I pursue sinners as justice pursues criminals. But justice seeks them in order to punish ― I, in order to forgive …. Oh! If souls only realized how I wait for them in mercy. I am the love of all loves, and it is My joy to forgive.” (Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 374, pp. 237-238, p. 196).
To Sister Consolata Betrone, Our Lord revealed: “Consolata, you must never forget that I always am, and love to be, kind and merciful toward My creatures .… Look, Consolata, the enemy will make every effort to shake your blind Faith in Me, but you must never forget that I am, and love to be, exclusively kind and merciful. Understand My heart, Consolata; understand My love, and never permit the enemy to gain entrance into your soul, even for an instant, with a thought of diffidence―never! Believe Me, I am solely and always kind; I am solely and always like a parent to you! Imitate therefore the children who, at every little scratch of the finger, run at once to mother to have it bandaged. You should always do the same, and remember that I will always cancel out and repair your imperfections and infidelities, just as the mother will always bandage the child’s finger, whether it is really hurt or only seems so in imagination. And if the child were to really hurt his arm or his head, how tenderly and affectionately would he be cared for and bandaged by the mother! Well, I do the very same with regard to your soul when you fall, even though I may do it in silence. Do you understand, Consolata? Therefore, never, never, never have even a shadow of doubt! Lack of confidence wounds My Heart to the quick and makes Me suffer!” (Our Lord to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 42, pp. 53-54).
Walking the Tightrope of Confidence in God’s Mercy
Yet despite the infinite mercy of God, we tread a fine line and walk a tightrope―with confidence in the mercy of God being the rope, but we can easily fall-off the rope of confidence into presumption of mercy on the one side, and despair of mercy on the other side. The mercy of God is not to be abused―as already infallibly stated by the Scriptural quotes above: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). “Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more! … Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 8:11; 5:14).
The above private revelations of Our Lord are also infallibly echoed by God in Holy Scripture, which says: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow―and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool!” (Isaias 1:18). Nevertheless, “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
“The soul that sins, the same shall die! … But if the wicked do penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment, and justice, then living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done―in his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live. Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? But if the just man turns himself away from his justice, and does iniquity according to all the abominations which the wicked man uses to work, shall he live? All his justices which he has done, shall not be remembered! In the prevarication, by which he has prevaricated, and in his sin, which he hath committed, in them he shall die! And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse? For when the just man turns himself away from his justice, and commits iniquity, he shall die therein―in the injustice that he has wrought he shall die. And when the wicked turns himself away from his wickedness, which he has wrought, and does judgment and justice―he shall save his soul alive. Because he considers and turns away himself from all his iniquities which he has wrought, he shall surely live, and not die. And the children of Israel say: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Are not My ways right, and are not rather your ways perverse? Therefore will I judge every man according to his ways, says the Lord God. Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin. Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit―and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dies, saith the Lord God. Return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:20-32).
“‘As I live,’ saith the Lord God, ‘I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways: and why will you die, O house of Israel?’ Therefore, O son of man, say to the children of thy people: “The justice of the just shall not deliver him, in what day soever he shall sin: and the wickedness of the wicked shall not hurt him, in what day soever he shall turn from his wickedness: and the just shall not be able to live in his justice, in what day soever he shall sin!” Yea, if I shall say to the just that he shall surely live, and he, trusting in his justice, commit iniquity [through the sin of presumption in God’s mercy]― then all his justices shall be forgotten, and in his iniquity, which he has committed, in the same shall he die. And if I shall say to the wicked: “You shall surely die”― and he does penance for his sin, and do judgment and justice, and if that wicked man restore the pledge, and render what he had robbed, and walk in the commandments of life, and does no unjust thing―then he shall surely live, and shall not die. None of his sins, which he has committed, shall be imputed to him―because he has done judgment and justice, he shall surely live. For when the just shall depart from his justice, and commit iniquities [presuming on God’s mercy], he shall die in them. And when the wicked shall depart from his wickedness, and shall do judgments and justice: he shall live in them. And you say: “The way of the Lord is not right!” I will judge every one of you according to his ways, O house of Israel” (Ezechiel 33:11-20).
Falling-Off the Tightrope of Confidence into Presumption or Despair
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28).
Because of the presumption in God’s mercy in our modern world, the above words of Our Lord are rarely addressed and explained―yet that neglect does nothing to help those poor misguided presumptuous souls in the saving of their souls! By trying to be kind, they are in reality being cruel. [Read more here about the few who are saved]
And as Jesus says: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
“Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say? Everyone therefore that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these My words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27; Luke 6:46).
So, as you see, there has to be a balance between presumption of God’s mercy―which leads to wanton, reckless sinning thinking “God will forgive me no matter what I do or how much I sin!”―and, on the other hand, despairing of God’s mercy, which eventually can also lead to wanton, reckless sinning on the grounds of “What’s the point? I’ve already sinned too much to have any hope of mercy!” In case you have not be awake to the devil’s tactics―he usually begins by tempting us to presumption, by making us sin with over-confidence in God’s mercy and without much care for the offence we are causing Him. Then, when enough sins have committed to supply the ingredients for the devil’s stew of despair, then he strips us of the over-confidence by continually nagging us with the thought that we have sinned too much and too gravely to obtain forgiveness and that we will most certainly be damned.
In part, God allows that―as a punishment for our boldness, presumption, callousness and temerity to sin against God and offend Him so often―to make us realize that we cannot sin with impunity and every single sin will be addressed and will have to paid for in one way or another, and in one place or another (meaning here on Earth, in Purgatory, or in Hell). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Yet, at the same time, God loves us intensely. We have a hard time getting our heads around the fact that God is extremely loving and merciful, while, at the same time being extremely just and punishing―but that is all part and parcel of being God. God is “all perfect” in everything―and someone who is perfect at something, is EXTREMELY good at that thing. This makes for an EXTREME God―a God Who goes to EXTREMES in everything―all at the same time. He is extremely merciful while at the same time being extremely just. He is extremely loving while also being extremely punishing. He is extremely indulgent while also being extremely demanding―and so on throughout all His perfections. Our puny minds cannot understand that―yet, as God has already told us: “My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9).
Split Spiritual Personalities
Our problem is that we have a ‘split spiritual personality’―we are trying to live the two lives that Our Lord said cannot be lived: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24)―yet we do serve God and mammon, we are as worldly as the next person. Though we are Christians, we are afraid to stand up for Christ against the world, and we are afraid of world when it comes to living-out our Faith. We have become “Closet Catholics” or “Cafeteria Catholics” or “CINOs” (Catholics in name only). Our Lord says: “He that is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). Yet we are neither truly and fully with Our Lord, nor with the world―we are somehow caught in between the two. We then try and rationalize our position, as if were a act of wise prudence! We cannot bear to make a break with the world―and that is what loses so many souls. Holy Scripture is adamant and inflexible on this point of separation from the world―yet we refuse to take notice. The following quotes have been posted countless times before and will be posted countless times again―yet we stubbornly resist them:
The Medicine for Split Spiritual Personalities
“My kingdom is not of this world … My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). To the worldlings He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hateth Me because I give testimony of it, that the works thereof are evil!” (John 7:7). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). “He that loves his life [in this world] shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal!” (John 12:25).
Holy Scripture adds: “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “If then you be dead with Christ from the elements of this world, why do you still act as though living in the world?” (Colossians 2:20). “We have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; that we may know the things that are given us from God! … Use this world, as if [you] used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away!” (1 Corinthians 2:12; 7:31). “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27). “Adulterers! Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15).
“Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Palm Sunday is all about palms. Yet we are so focused on the palm in our hand, that we tend to forget that we are in the palm of God’s Hand! That was what Our Lord would have thought and realized as He humbly rode in triumph into Jerusalem, with thousands of palms being laid before Him. God, His Father, was in total control of all events―as He had been from the beginning of creation and will be into eternity. In a sense, everything―past, present and future―lays before Him at all times in the Palm of His Hand, so to speak. Nothing escapes His grasp. “Who has measured the waters in the hollow of His Hand, and weighed the heavens with His Palm? Who has poised with three fingers the bulk of the Earth, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance?” (Isaias 40:12). “Can a woman forget her infant, so as not to have pity on the son of her womb? And if she should forget, yet will not I forget thee! Behold, I have graven thee in My Hands! Thy walls are always before my eyes!” (Isaias 49:15-16). “My sheep hear My voice and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them life everlasting; and they shall not perish for ever, and no man shall pluck them out of My Hand. That which My Father hath given Me, is greater than all―and no one can snatch them out of the Hand of My Father” (John 10:27-29). “Where shall I go from Thy Spirit? Or where shall I flee from Thy Face? If I ascend into Heaven, Thou art there! If I descend into Hell, Thou art present! If I take my wings early in the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there also shall Thy Hand lead me and Thy right Hand shall hold me!” (Psalm 138:7-10). The words that God spoke to Josue, the successor of Moses, God also speaks to us: “As I have been with Moses, so will I be with thee! I will not leave thee, nor forsake thee!” (Josue 1:5).
Therefore, consider yourself to be held in the palm of God’s Hand. He will never drop you or throw you away. Nor will He ever forsake you or reject you, merely because you have let Him down through sin. He knows perfectly well that you will let Him down and that you will inevitably sin. “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). He is totally realistic about you. So, the real question is not whether God will drop us, but whether we will choose to throw ourselves out of His hand. No person will ever be cut off or lose their salvation solely because they let God down or made mistakes or failed Him. If it was based on that, we would all have to be cut off and rejected every single day, because that is how often we fail God or let Him down, to some degree or another: “For all have sinned, and do need the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us … If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 8-10).
Triumph of Palm Sunday?
On Palm Sunday, Our Lord enters Jerusalem in apparent triumph among cheering crowds―but He has another kind of ‘triumph’ in mind. The triumph that He has in mind is not the triumph of trumpets and acclamations―but the triumph of the Cross with all its humiliations! “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ says the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). Even His own Apostles could not understand how He would triumph through the Cross, when He foretold His Passion and Death: “Then Jesus took unto Him the Twelve, and said to them: ‘Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things shall be accomplished which were written by the prophets concerning the Son of man. For the Son of man shall be betrayed to the Chief Priests and the Scribes, and they shall condemn Him to death. And shall deliver Him to the Gentiles to be mocked, spat upon and scourged. And after they have scourged and crucified Him, they will put Him to death, and on the third day He shall rise again!’ And they understood none of these things, and this word was hid from them, and they understood not the things that were said” (Matthew 20:18-19; Luke 18:31-34). From the ‘evil’ of His Passion He will bring about the ‘good’ of our salvation!
Prior to His Passion and Death, Our Lord―whilst looking down upon Jerusalem from the surrounding hills―lamented: “When Jesus drew near, seeing the city, He wept over it, saying: ‘If you also had known, in this thy day, the things that are for your peace―but now they are hidden from your eyes!” … (Luke 19:41-42) … “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you that kill the prophets, and stone them that are sent unto you! How often would I have gathered together your children, as the hen does gather her chickens under her wings―but you would not!” (Matthew 23:37). Jesus came to save―but they wanted to kill their Savior. In less than a week, after shouting joyously at Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is He that comes in the Name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” (Matthew 21:9), they would be bitterly crying for His crucifixion and death: “Crucify Him! Crucify Him! … Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him! … We have no king but Caesar!” (John 19:6; 15). Those whom He has come to save, seek instead to kill Him―but He would even bring good out of their evil!
God Seeks to Bring Good Out of Evil
God seeks to bring good out evil. “It is with coal that I make diamonds. What would I not do with a soul, however black she might be, who would give herself to Me.” (Word of Our Lord to Sr. Mary of the Trinity, The Spiritual Legacy of Sister Mary of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Silvere Van Den Broek, O.F.M., no. 559). Christ came to seek that which was lost. Both these points are stressed in Holy Scripture: “The soul that sins, the same shall die! … But if the wicked does penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment and justice, then living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done―in his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live. Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways and live? … Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit―and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dies, saith the Lord God. Return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:20-32). Which is why Christ said: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). Christ comes to rescue evil sinners. Christ comes to make evil people good. Only God can bring good out of evil―but only if we let Him into our lives and give Him freedom to do what He wants!
God Patiently Awaits Our Conversion and Amendment
As St. Peter says: “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that anyone should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). “Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more! … Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 8:11; 5:14).
There is a danger that we envisage God as being perpetually patient and perpetually forgiving. This is a mockery of mercy and is a sin of prideful presumption! Holy Scripture warns us: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). St. Alphonsus Liguori, in his sermon “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More”, shakes up our complacency and presumption and abuse of God’s mercy:
“In the Sacred Scriptures it is written: ‘Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!’ The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations, or without at least asking God’s help to conquer them, and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice, tempts God to work miracles, or rather to show to him an extraordinary mercy that is not extended to the generality of Christians. Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. But God does not forget them. He numbers the graces which He dispenses, as well as the sins which we commit. Hence, when the time which He has fixed arrives, God deprives us of His graces, and begins to inflict chastisement. I intend to show, in this discourse, that, when sins reach a certain number, God pardons no more. Be attentive. St. Basil, St. Jerome, St. John Chrysostom, St. Augustine, and other Fathers, teach, as according to the words of Scripture ― ‘Thou hast ordered all things in measure, and number, and weight’ (Wisdom 11:21) ― that God has fixed for each person the number of the days of his life, and the degrees of health and talent which He will give him, so He has also determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more. God is ready to heal those who sincerely wish to amend their lives, but cannot take pity on the obstinate sinner. The Lord pardons sins, but He cannot pardon those who are determined to offend Him. Nor can we demand from God a reason why He pardons one a hundred sins, and takes others out of life, and sends them to Hell, after three or four sins.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, sermon “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More”).
Since sin is a separation from God, a rejection of God, a departure from God―thus we can see that an obstinate sinner, who is not trying to amend, cannot remain indefinitely in the Palm of God’s Hand. It is not that God throws the sinner away―the sinner himself throws himself out of the Hand of God and into the hands of the devil through sin: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). You could say that, by sin, the sinner acts in the same way as the Roman soldiers did towards Christ during His Passion: “Then did they spit in His face, and buffeted Him: and others struck His face with the palms of their hands” (Matthew 26:67). “And some began to spit on Him, and to cover His face, and to buffet Him, and to say unto Him: ‘Prophesy!’ And the servants struck Him with the palms of their hands” (Mark 14:65).
The Fire of Sin
St. Alphonsus, in the aforementioned sermon, adds: “You say: ‘I am young! There are many who have committed more sins than I have!’ But is God, on that account, obliged to wait for your repentance if you offend Him? In the Gospel of St. Matthew (21:19) we read, that the Savior cursed a fig tree the first time He saw it without fruit: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward forever. And immediately the fig tree withered away.’ You must, then, tremble at the thought of committing a single mortal sin, particularly if you have already been guilty of mortal sins. ‘Be not without fear about sins forgiven, and add not sin to sin!’ (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Say not then, O sinner: ‘As God has forgiven me other sins, so He will pardon me this one if I commit it!’ Say not this―for, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned. God waits with patience until a certain number of sins is committed, but, when the measure of guilt is filled up, He waits no longer, but chastises the sinner. Sinners multiply their sins without keeping any account of them―but God numbers them that, when the harvest is ripe, that is, when the number of sins is completed, He may take vengeance on them.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, sermon “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More”).
You could say that, by continually sinning, the sinner is like a fire that is growing bigger and hotter in the palm of God’s hand―and like a fire, when it has burnt one place, it moves on to another―like the forest fires that we see so often these days. A fire needs fuel to burn―and God’s hand has no fuel for the fire of sin, neither has a virtuous life any fuel for sin―so the sinner jumps out of God’s Hand into the world, which has plenty of fuel for sin―like jumping out of the frying pan into the fire.
The Fire of Love
God wants to save souls―yet most souls do not want to be saved. Not that they would not like to be saved, but they refuse the terms and requirements of salvation that are offered by God. Our Lord, in a revelation to Sr. Josefa Menendez lamented: “My Heart takes comfort in forgiving. I have no greater desire, no greater joy, than when I can pardon a soul …. I am consumed with desire to pardon ... Yes, to pardon these dear souls for whom I shed My Blood …. I will make known that the measure of My love and mercy for fallen souls is limitless. I want to forgive them. It comforts Me to forgive. My Heart is not so much wounded by sin, as it is torn with grief that they will not take refuge with Me after it …. Poor sinners, how blind they are! I want only to forgive them, and they seek only to offend Me! That is My great sorrow―that SO MANY ARE LOST and that they do not all come to Me to be forgiven. ” (Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 94, p. 136, p. 174, p. 188, p. 237).
“However great is the number of your frailties―far greater are the mercies of My Heart.... My love never changes …. I pursue sinners as justice pursues criminals. But justice seeks them in order to punish ― I, in order to forgive …. Oh! If souls only realized how I wait for them in mercy. I am the love of all loves, and it is My joy to forgive.” (Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez, The Way of Divine Love, p. 374, pp. 237-238, p. 196).
To Sister Consolata Betrone, Our Lord revealed: “Consolata, you must never forget that I always am, and love to be, kind and merciful toward My creatures .… Look, Consolata, the enemy will make every effort to shake your blind Faith in Me, but you must never forget that I am, and love to be, exclusively kind and merciful. Understand My heart, Consolata; understand My love, and never permit the enemy to gain entrance into your soul, even for an instant, with a thought of diffidence―never! Believe Me, I am solely and always kind; I am solely and always like a parent to you! Imitate therefore the children who, at every little scratch of the finger, run at once to mother to have it bandaged. You should always do the same, and remember that I will always cancel out and repair your imperfections and infidelities, just as the mother will always bandage the child’s finger, whether it is really hurt or only seems so in imagination. And if the child were to really hurt his arm or his head, how tenderly and affectionately would he be cared for and bandaged by the mother! Well, I do the very same with regard to your soul when you fall, even though I may do it in silence. Do you understand, Consolata? Therefore, never, never, never have even a shadow of doubt! Lack of confidence wounds My Heart to the quick and makes Me suffer!” (Our Lord to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Jesus Appeals to the World, by Lorenzo Sales, I.M.C., p. 42, pp. 53-54).
Walking the Tightrope of Confidence in God’s Mercy
Yet despite the infinite mercy of God, we tread a fine line and walk a tightrope―with confidence in the mercy of God being the rope, but we can easily fall-off the rope of confidence into presumption of mercy on the one side, and despair of mercy on the other side. The mercy of God is not to be abused―as already infallibly stated by the Scriptural quotes above: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). “Jesus said: ‘Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more! … Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 8:11; 5:14).
The above private revelations of Our Lord are also infallibly echoed by God in Holy Scripture, which says: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow―and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool!” (Isaias 1:18). Nevertheless, “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
“The soul that sins, the same shall die! … But if the wicked do penance for all his sins which he has committed, and keeps all My commandments, and does judgment, and justice, then living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he has done―in his justice, which he has wrought, he shall live. Is it My will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live? But if the just man turns himself away from his justice, and does iniquity according to all the abominations which the wicked man uses to work, shall he live? All his justices which he has done, shall not be remembered! In the prevarication, by which he has prevaricated, and in his sin, which he hath committed, in them he shall die! And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse? For when the just man turns himself away from his justice, and commits iniquity, he shall die therein―in the injustice that he has wrought he shall die. And when the wicked turns himself away from his wickedness, which he has wrought, and does judgment and justice―he shall save his soul alive. Because he considers and turns away himself from all his iniquities which he has wrought, he shall surely live, and not die. And the children of Israel say: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Are not My ways right, and are not rather your ways perverse? Therefore will I judge every man according to his ways, says the Lord God. Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin. Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit―and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dies, saith the Lord God. Return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:20-32).
“‘As I live,’ saith the Lord God, ‘I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways: and why will you die, O house of Israel?’ Therefore, O son of man, say to the children of thy people: “The justice of the just shall not deliver him, in what day soever he shall sin: and the wickedness of the wicked shall not hurt him, in what day soever he shall turn from his wickedness: and the just shall not be able to live in his justice, in what day soever he shall sin!” Yea, if I shall say to the just that he shall surely live, and he, trusting in his justice, commit iniquity [through the sin of presumption in God’s mercy]― then all his justices shall be forgotten, and in his iniquity, which he has committed, in the same shall he die. And if I shall say to the wicked: “You shall surely die”― and he does penance for his sin, and do judgment and justice, and if that wicked man restore the pledge, and render what he had robbed, and walk in the commandments of life, and does no unjust thing―then he shall surely live, and shall not die. None of his sins, which he has committed, shall be imputed to him―because he has done judgment and justice, he shall surely live. For when the just shall depart from his justice, and commit iniquities [presuming on God’s mercy], he shall die in them. And when the wicked shall depart from his wickedness, and shall do judgments and justice: he shall live in them. And you say: “The way of the Lord is not right!” I will judge every one of you according to his ways, O house of Israel” (Ezechiel 33:11-20).
Falling-Off the Tightrope of Confidence into Presumption or Despair
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28).
Because of the presumption in God’s mercy in our modern world, the above words of Our Lord are rarely addressed and explained―yet that neglect does nothing to help those poor misguided presumptuous souls in the saving of their souls! By trying to be kind, they are in reality being cruel. [Read more here about the few who are saved]
And as Jesus says: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
“Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say? Everyone therefore that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these My words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27; Luke 6:46).
So, as you see, there has to be a balance between presumption of God’s mercy―which leads to wanton, reckless sinning thinking “God will forgive me no matter what I do or how much I sin!”―and, on the other hand, despairing of God’s mercy, which eventually can also lead to wanton, reckless sinning on the grounds of “What’s the point? I’ve already sinned too much to have any hope of mercy!” In case you have not be awake to the devil’s tactics―he usually begins by tempting us to presumption, by making us sin with over-confidence in God’s mercy and without much care for the offence we are causing Him. Then, when enough sins have committed to supply the ingredients for the devil’s stew of despair, then he strips us of the over-confidence by continually nagging us with the thought that we have sinned too much and too gravely to obtain forgiveness and that we will most certainly be damned.
In part, God allows that―as a punishment for our boldness, presumption, callousness and temerity to sin against God and offend Him so often―to make us realize that we cannot sin with impunity and every single sin will be addressed and will have to paid for in one way or another, and in one place or another (meaning here on Earth, in Purgatory, or in Hell). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). Yet, at the same time, God loves us intensely. We have a hard time getting our heads around the fact that God is extremely loving and merciful, while, at the same time being extremely just and punishing―but that is all part and parcel of being God. God is “all perfect” in everything―and someone who is perfect at something, is EXTREMELY good at that thing. This makes for an EXTREME God―a God Who goes to EXTREMES in everything―all at the same time. He is extremely merciful while at the same time being extremely just. He is extremely loving while also being extremely punishing. He is extremely indulgent while also being extremely demanding―and so on throughout all His perfections. Our puny minds cannot understand that―yet, as God has already told us: “My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9).
Split Spiritual Personalities
Our problem is that we have a ‘split spiritual personality’―we are trying to live the two lives that Our Lord said cannot be lived: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24)―yet we do serve God and mammon, we are as worldly as the next person. Though we are Christians, we are afraid to stand up for Christ against the world, and we are afraid of world when it comes to living-out our Faith. We have become “Closet Catholics” or “Cafeteria Catholics” or “CINOs” (Catholics in name only). Our Lord says: “He that is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). Yet we are neither truly and fully with Our Lord, nor with the world―we are somehow caught in between the two. We then try and rationalize our position, as if were a act of wise prudence! We cannot bear to make a break with the world―and that is what loses so many souls. Holy Scripture is adamant and inflexible on this point of separation from the world―yet we refuse to take notice. The following quotes have been posted countless times before and will be posted countless times again―yet we stubbornly resist them:
The Medicine for Split Spiritual Personalities
“My kingdom is not of this world … My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). To the worldlings He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hateth Me because I give testimony of it, that the works thereof are evil!” (John 7:7). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth―where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven―where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). “He that loves his life [in this world] shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal!” (John 12:25).
Holy Scripture adds: “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12). “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world!” (1 John 2:16). “If then you be dead with Christ from the elements of this world, why do you still act as though living in the world?” (Colossians 2:20). “We have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; that we may know the things that are given us from God! … Use this world, as if [you] used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away!” (1 Corinthians 2:12; 7:31). “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27). “Adulterers! Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15).
“Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Article 26
Saturday after Passion Sunday March 23rd
Salvation in the Palm of Your Hand!
Saturday after Passion Sunday March 23rd
Salvation in the Palm of Your Hand!
Great, Painful and Holy!
The “Great Week” ... “The Painful Week” ... “Holy Week!” The only week that really matters! This is it! If, at the start of Lent, Holy Mother Church, in her liturgy, quoted St. Paul’s words: “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2), then all the more is Holy Week this “acceptable time” and this “day of salvation.” They say “pride comes before a fall” and here we could say “triumph comes before humiliation.” Our Lord was not proud during His triumphal entry into Jerusalem on what we call “Palm Sunday”―but His Apostles most certainly were! Our Lord chose to enter Jerusalem on an ass or donkey, not a horse. All four evangelists write of Jesus entering Jerusalem to a great welcome—not riding on a majestic horse that a king or warrior might ride, but riding on an ass or donkey. In our day it would be like a world leader, instead of coming on a private jet welcomed by military bands and ribboned officials, putt-putting in an old faithful station wagon. Or like the pope rejecting fine limousines and driving a humble compact instead.
Nevertheless, the crowds thronged all around Him, throwing palms, boughs of trees and their garments in front of the advancing ass or donkey carrying Jesus. The boughs and branches of trees that were chopped-off and thrown before Our Lord as He rode into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday: “And many spread their garments in the way: and others cut down boughs from the trees, and strewed them in the way” (Mark 11:8). Faced with this mass, universal adulation, the Apostles imagined that their time of triumph had arrived and that Jesus would be crowned king and would expel the invading, conquering, ruling Romans. How sadly mistaken they were and how greatly they fell when their expectations were not met and Christ was arrested: “Then His disciples, leaving Him, all fled away” (Mark 14:50). The palms of apparent victory of the triumphal Sunday procession were long forgotten on the night of Our Lord’s agony in the Garden of Gethsemane.
Let’s Do Some Palm Reading!
Have you ever taken time to do some palm-reading? No―not that kind of palm-reading that is related to fortune-telling! Such palm-reading―otherwise known as palmistry or fortune-telling―is against the First Commandment. In the Old Testament God commanded that any person who acts as a medium or fortuneteller shall be put to death by stoning: “A man, or woman, in whom there is a pythonical or divining spirit, dying let them die: they shall stone them: their blood be upon them” (Leviticus 20:27) … “Neither let there be found among you anyone that consults soothsayers, or observes dreams and omens, neither let there be any wizard, nor charmer, nor any one that consulteth pythonic spirits, or fortune tellers, or that seeks the truth from the dead. For the Lord abhors all these things, and for these abominations He will destroy them!” (Deuteronomy 18:10-12). While God can choose to reveal the future to His prophets or saints by means of private revelations, we, as individuals, must always have trust in His Divine Providence.
The palm-reading we are speaking about is reading into the meaning, symbolism, implications and consequences of what could be called “The Doctrine of Palms” or lessons to be learnt by digging deeper beyond the surface superficiality with which most people view the palms they have received from Holy Mother Church on this Palm Sunday, which is the gateway and triumphant entry into Holy Week and the Passion and Death of Christ. There is more to the palm than you think! It is sad that we superficially accept our palms on Palm Sunday without having any desire to learn more about them, their symbolism, their purpose in being given to us, and also their power (for they are blessed objects and therefore Sacramentals of the Church). According to the Code of Canon Law, blessed items are to be treated with reverence (Canon 1171). If there is a need to dispose of Sacramentals, they must be buried or burned―not discarded in the trash. So many Catholics are pitifully ignorant on palms and need to do some palm-reading to enlighten their darkness.
Fruit of the Palm Tree
Our Lord said: “Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:17-20). So what do you know of the “fruits” of the palm tree? Of course you know that coconuts comes from palm trees―but what others “fruits” or good uses can come from the palm tree? It is one of the most widely used trees on the planet. There are over 2,600 different kinds of palm trees growing in hot climates all over the world, from rainforests to deserts. Though most palm trees grow in tropical regions (symbol of charity), there are some species that can survive sub-zero temperatures. A “cold hardy” palm tree can tolerate cold weather―but not forever. Eventually, photosynthesis stops and the leaves start falling off. Slowly the plant freezes and becomes a plant statue. If we, as Catholics, are not planted in the “tropics” of charity, then we risk becoming lukewarm and even “freezing”, to the point where grace (photosynthesis) can no longer work and our “leaves” (virtues and spiritual exercises) start dropping off―and we become “plant statues”, that is to say “Catholics in name only.” Palm trees are among the most beneficial plants in tropical countries and have many uses. Here are just six of many uses:
(1) Palm Tree Fruit ― Palm trees are large fruit producers, the 2 main edible ones are, of course, coconuts and dates. All fruits borne by the palm tree are not edible. While dates and coconuts are edible, sago is poisonous to humans and animals. Coconut trees can produce fruit for upwards of 70 years, before the farmers replace them. The coconut we see and buy in the store, does not resemble the coconut you find growing on a coconut palm. An untouched coconut has three layers―just as the spiritual life has three different stages, all of which must be passed through. The outermost layer of the true coconut, which is typically smooth with a greenish color, is called the exocarp. The next layer is the fibrous husk, or mesocarp, which ultimately surrounds the hard woody layer called the endocarp. The endocarp surrounds the seed. In other words, to get to the fruit and milk of the coconut, you have to go through three layers―likewise, to get to the land of milk and honey (Heaven), you have to go through three stages―the Way of Beginners is like the smooth exocarp; the Way of Proficiency is like the slightly harder fibrous husk, the mesocarp; and the Way of the Perfect is like the very hard coconut shell, the endocarp. Let’s face it―to be holy (the Way of the Perfect), you have to be a tough nut to crack! Generally speaking, when you buy a coconut at the supermarket the exocarp and the mesocarp are removed and what you see is the endocarp.
Coconut Oil is extremely healthy, having many medicinal properties. Around half of the fatty acids in coconut oil are lauric acid. Lauric acid is particularly good at killing bacteria, viruses, and fungi. When you eat coconut oil, it reacts with enzymes to forms monolaurin, which is great for killing harmful pathogens. Both of these substances― lauric acid and monolaurin―have been shown to kill the bacteria and very dangerous pathogen, Staphylococcus Aureus and the yeast Candida Albicans, which is a common source of yeast infections. 2004 study published in the journal of Neurobiology of Aging demonstrated that the MCTs found in coconut oil improved the memory problems their older subjects were experiencing. According to an Evidence-based Complementary and Alternative Medicine study, coconut oil increases the healthy cholesterol (known as HDL) in your body. By increasing the HDL in the body and changing the ratio of HDL to LDL, the saturated fat in coconut oil helps promote heart health and lower the risk of heart disease. Ever heard of oil pulling? Well, before the invention of toothpaste, the act of swishing oil around the mouth was a method of cleansing the mouth of bacteria and for helping to heal the nasty ravages of periodontal disease. An abundance of MCTs is the reason why coconut oil is one of the many effective oils to pull with. The oil lifts the bacteria from the surfaces within the mouth and that's great because removing oral bacteria greatly reduces your risk of disease around your gums. These are just a small handful of the many benefits of the palm tree’s coconut oil.
(2) Palm Oil ― is a widely-used edible vegetable oil that comes from the fruit of oil palm trees and its versatile uses make it often referred to as a ‘miracle ingredient’ for so many products. Accounting for one-third of global plant oil production, you can find palm oil in just about anything, from pizza dough to washing detergent. It is also a major ingredient in beauty products including palm kernel oil for body lotions, or bleached palm oil for soap. One major beneficial use of the oil, however, is its frequent use as a base for mixing medicine such as cough syrups. It has also been associated with high vitamin A, lowering the body’s cholesterol and reducing the likelihood of major illnesses such as heart disease and cancer. Drawing spiritual analogies―you could say that this is akin to healing, beautifying and sanctifying the soul.
(3) Palm Beverages ― Now we come to palm tree trunks. There are cultures that make sugar out of the sap of the sugar palm tree. It is collected in very similar way to how we get sap for maple syrup from maple trees. Some use it as a sweetener―but it can also be fermented into the sugary drink called “palm wine” or “toddy.” This is a sweet and milky alcoholic beverage produced from the fermentation of sap of different palm tree species, including palmyra, date palms, and coconut palms. Using a knife or machete, an incision is made between the tree’s kernels, allowing for the sap to ooze out. Fermentation begins soon after the sap begins flowing, and within just 1-2 hours, the alcohol content can reach up to 4%. Not only is it a tasty and popular beverage choice in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean, it also poses major health benefits, from increased eye health with thanks to the Vitamin C content, and the prevention of cancer cells with the presence of riboflavin (B2).
(4) Construction and Crafts ― Palm trees are regularly used as constructive building material for house walls, rafters and roofing. The wood is extremely hard once cured, or dried. Harder than oak, by far. The fibrous wood can also be pulled apart and woven together to produce thatch for roof coverings, and logs for bridges. The fiber can also be woven to make carpet and wall coverings, as well as practical household items such as brooms, baskets and even furniture.
(5) Palm Wax ― Some of the best wax available for scented candles come from palms. This is because palm wax is an all-natural, renewable and environmentally-friendly resource that offers more choice for candle makers who are looking to market more sustainable products. Not only that, it makes for excellent results. Due to the palm tree’s growth in naturally hot climates, palm wax resists melting in hot weather, has a high contraction, and takes colors easily. Best of all, it holds and emits fragrances well for up to 50% longer, compared to candles made of paraffin wax.
(6) Palm Leaves ― Forget the oil, the wood and fruit―palm leaves (or palm fronds) have a diverse range of uses alone, from roof thatch, garden fencing and weaving to fuel and nutritional feed for livestock. The decaying leaves, wood from the stems and fiber can also be put to one side to be used as mulch. Yet palm tree leaves are also used to produce a different kinds of oil and wax than those made from the palm tree fruits.
Palms and Religion
In Assyria, the palm was one of the trees identified as a sacred tree connecting Heaven and Earth. Reliefs from the 9th Century BC, show winged creatures holding palm fronds in the presence of the sacred palm tree. In Egypt, the palm represented immortality, and was carried in funeral processions to represent eternal life. In Judaism the palm is part of the Feast of Tabernacles, hearkening back to the temporary dwellings in which farmers lived during harvesting, and to the fragile dwellings built of palms that the Israelites lived in during their 40 years in the desert. In their religious festivals, Israelites used palm branches for rejoicing. Palms were often depicted on coins and important buildings. King Solomon had palm branches carved into the walls and doors of the Temple: “And all the walls of the Temple round about, he carved with divers figures and carvings. And he made in them cherubims and palm trees, and divers representations, as it were standing out, and coming forth from the wall” (3 Kings 6:29). Holy Scripture links the palm tree with goodness and holiness: “The just shall flourish like the palm tree” (Psalm 91:13).
Palm of Victory
In ancient times, palm branches symbolized goodness, victory, triumph, peace and eternal life. Palms were symbols of life among the nomadic tribes, who, when crossing the desert, rejoiced at seeing the palm tree, because it indicated an oasis with life-giving water was near: “And the children of Israel came into Elim, where there were twelve fountains of water, and seventy palm trees: and they encamped by the waters” (Exodus 15:27). In pre-Christian times the palm was regarded as a symbol of victory. It was common practice in the ancient world to welcome home a king or war hero by laying out a path of palm branches for him to ride on or walk on – similar to rolling out the red carpet today. In ancient Greece a palm branch was awarded to victorious athletes, and in ancient Rome the Latin word “palma”, was a substitute word for victory ― a victory of any kind. A lawyer who won his case in the Roman Forum would decorate his front door with palm leaves. After the time of Christ, palms were adopted by the early Christians and became a symbol of the victory of the faithful over the enemies of the soul. Origen (Commentary on John 10:18) says the palm is the symbol of victory in that war waged by the spirit against the flesh. Ultimately, the palm is the symbol of eternal victory―in the sense of winning eternal life in Heaven.
“For us too, they [palms] must be symbols of triumph, indicative of the victory to be won in our battle against the evil in ourselves and against the evil which roams about us. As we receive the blessed palm, let us renew our pledge to conquer with Jesus, but let us not forget that it was on the cross that He conquered” (Father Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D., Divine Intimacy, pp. 392-393).
Palm of Martyrdom
In this sense it was especially applicable to martyrs, the victors par excellence over the spiritual foes of mankind; hence the frequent occurrence in the Acts of the martyrs of such expressions as “he received the palm of martyrdom.” A martyr goes straight to Heaven at his death, without passing through Purgatory. Pope Innocent III says: “We should be doing injustice to a martyr, if we were to pray for him.” A martyr possesses the love of God in the highest degree, since he despises life―the greatest of all earthly goods―for God’s sake. Every martyr is a conqueror, and is therefore depicted with a palm in his hand, since the palm is the mark of victory. Martyrdom is a victory of Faith over the world and sin―St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Martyrdom is conducive to the acquisition of the martyr’s palm” (Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 124, art. 1, ad 1). Martyrdom―in the eyes of the world―is a humiliation of the person being martyred. Yet, by confessing Christ in the face of death, they gain the martyr’s palm of eternal life. “He that findeth his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it” (Matthew 10:39).
From Palms to Ashes
The palms that the Church distributes on Palm Sunday, in one sense, represent the life of a Christian on Earth. If everything is done as suggested by liturgical rules, then the palms of today become the ashes of tomorrow. This means that palms that the Holy Mother Church hands to you today (Palm Sunday, March 28th, 2021), she wants you to return them to Holy Mother Church before next Ash Wednesday (March 2nd, 2022). By that time, your fairly fresh (though dried) palm will have withered and “grown old” and will be taken and burned to make the ashes for next Ash Wednesday. This brings to mind the words of God to Adam: “Dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!” (Genesis 3:19). Holy Scripture further adds: “In the morning, man shall grow up like grass; in the morning he shall flourish and pass away. In the evening he shall fall, grow dry, and wither” (Psalm 89:6). “My days have declined like a shadow, and I am withered like grass” (Psalm 101:1). “I am smitten as grass, and my heart is withered―because I forgot to eat my bread” (Psalm 101:5). “For all flesh is as grass; and all the glory thereof as the flower of grass. The grass is withered, and the flower thereof is fallen away” (1 Peter 1:24). “Mortal man shall wither away like grass” (Isaias 51:12). Therefore, while the palm that you were given is a sign of victory, it is at the same time a symbol of humility. Inevitably, like grass, you will wither and die―but, hopefully, your life and death will merit the palm of victory and eternal life.
From Palm to Cross
The palm, in a certain sense, leads to the cross. The procession of Jesus into Jerusalem, with palms being thrown in honor before Him, ultimately led to the Cross of Calvary. The very people who applaud Christ’s entrance into Jerusalem that morning, shouting out “Hosanna!” Hosanna in Hebrew literally means, “I beg you to save!” or “Please deliver us!” That “Hosanna!” will, within a week, be crying, “Crucify Him.” They will go from acclaiming Him as the new King of Israel to urging His life be traded in favor of a convicted criminal; they will first praise Him and then mock Him. Even friends entering Jerusalem at His side will desert Jesus. It is, in a certain sense, a blueprint for the life of a Christian. All this discord will take place during one week beginning on what we call Palm Sunday.
St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153) offered a homily about Christ’s entry into Jerusalem: “How different the cries, ‘Away with him, away with him, crucify him,’ and then, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, hosanna, in the highest!’ How different the cries are that now are calling him ‘King of Israel’ and then in a few days’ time will be saying, ‘We have no king but Caesar!’ What a contrast between the green branches and the cross, between the flowers and the thorns! Before they were offering their own clothes for him to walk upon, and so soon afterwards they are stripping him of his, and casting lots upon them.”
The palm comes from a tree―the hardwood palm tree―and it leads to the “Tree of the Cross”―another “hardwood” tree. On Palm Sunday, as we pick up our palms, we share our joy in the triumphant Christ. Yet, at the same time, we pick up the cross―for it was on the Cross of Calvary that Christ triumphed, far more than in triumphant procession into Jerusalem. In the Byzantine liturgy, as the people pick up the palms they sing: “Today we all take up Thy cross!” There is no other way to Heaven―as Our Lord Himself stated: “And He [Jesus] said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
Interestingly, many people like to fold their single palm leaf into a cross.
Palm Sunday Through the Ages
In the very early days of the new-born Church, Christians visited the sites of Christ’s Passion and Death―and even re-enacted certain events that had taken place―for example, Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Yet, due the on-and-off persecution of Christianity, such gatherings were rarely possible until the Roman Emperor Constantine ended all religious persecution in the early 4th century. Later in that century, a Spanish pilgrim named Eigera visited Jerusalem. In her diary, she recorded how Christians re-created the events of Holy Week. She wrote that they gathered outside the city on the Sunday before Easter and listened to one of the Gospels telling of Christ’s triumphant entrance into Jerusalem. Then they marched together through the city gates while carrying olive or palm branches. Our Palm Sunday processions are akin to what Eigera witnessed 17 centuries ago.
By the ninth century, the procession with blessed palms had expanded beyond Jerusalem and during the Middle Ages became widespread throughout Europe. In the 17th century Christians were not only processing into church with palms but, during Mass, holding the palms while the Passion was being read.
Through the centuries, Palm Sunday and the procession of people holding palms would be celebrated in a variety of ways. In some locations the Blessed Sacrament was part of the procession, in other places the congregation started in the parish cemetery and then went into the church. Palms were sometimes blessed in one church and the people, carrying the palms, marched to another church for Mass. Most typical was the blessing of the people and the palms at a place outside the church and then processing in. For some time, until the Vatican II changes in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the priest wore red vestments during the palm blessing and procession and then changed to a violet garment for Mass.
The Power of Palms
The procession at Mass with the palms was a public display of homage and loyalty to Christ our King and Redeemer. Christ is the King of our home, so we should incorporate the blessed palms and a family prayer service as part of this day.
From medieval times, people have believed that blessed palms formed into the shape of a cross would protect them from danger. Superstition? No! Blessed palms are Sacramentals of the Church and therefore a powerful source of graces―similar to blessed Rosaries, Scapulars, Medals, Statues, pictures and other blessed objects.
Palm trees aren’t readily available in some vicinities, there are other plants like olive branches, box, yew, spruce, willows and pussy-willows that are blessed and used the same way as palms for Palm Sunday.
The “Great Week” ... “The Painful Week” ... “Holy Week!” The only week that really matters! This is it! If, at the start of Lent, Holy Mother Church, in her liturgy, quoted St. Paul’s words: “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2), then all the more is Holy Week this “acceptable time” and this “day of salvation.” They say “pride comes before a fall” and here we could say “triumph comes before humiliation.” Our Lord was not proud during His triumphal entry into Jerusalem on what we call “Palm Sunday”―but His Apostles most certainly were! Our Lord chose to enter Jerusalem on an ass or donkey, not a horse. All four evangelists write of Jesus entering Jerusalem to a great welcome—not riding on a majestic horse that a king or warrior might ride, but riding on an ass or donkey. In our day it would be like a world leader, instead of coming on a private jet welcomed by military bands and ribboned officials, putt-putting in an old faithful station wagon. Or like the pope rejecting fine limousines and driving a humble compact instead.
Nevertheless, the crowds thronged all around Him, throwing palms, boughs of trees and their garments in front of the advancing ass or donkey carrying Jesus. The boughs and branches of trees that were chopped-off and thrown before Our Lord as He rode into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday: “And many spread their garments in the way: and others cut down boughs from the trees, and strewed them in the way” (Mark 11:8). Faced with this mass, universal adulation, the Apostles imagined that their time of triumph had arrived and that Jesus would be crowned king and would expel the invading, conquering, ruling Romans. How sadly mistaken they were and how greatly they fell when their expectations were not met and Christ was arrested: “Then His disciples, leaving Him, all fled away” (Mark 14:50). The palms of apparent victory of the triumphal Sunday procession were long forgotten on the night of Our Lord’s agony in the Garden of Gethsemane.
Let’s Do Some Palm Reading!
Have you ever taken time to do some palm-reading? No―not that kind of palm-reading that is related to fortune-telling! Such palm-reading―otherwise known as palmistry or fortune-telling―is against the First Commandment. In the Old Testament God commanded that any person who acts as a medium or fortuneteller shall be put to death by stoning: “A man, or woman, in whom there is a pythonical or divining spirit, dying let them die: they shall stone them: their blood be upon them” (Leviticus 20:27) … “Neither let there be found among you anyone that consults soothsayers, or observes dreams and omens, neither let there be any wizard, nor charmer, nor any one that consulteth pythonic spirits, or fortune tellers, or that seeks the truth from the dead. For the Lord abhors all these things, and for these abominations He will destroy them!” (Deuteronomy 18:10-12). While God can choose to reveal the future to His prophets or saints by means of private revelations, we, as individuals, must always have trust in His Divine Providence.
The palm-reading we are speaking about is reading into the meaning, symbolism, implications and consequences of what could be called “The Doctrine of Palms” or lessons to be learnt by digging deeper beyond the surface superficiality with which most people view the palms they have received from Holy Mother Church on this Palm Sunday, which is the gateway and triumphant entry into Holy Week and the Passion and Death of Christ. There is more to the palm than you think! It is sad that we superficially accept our palms on Palm Sunday without having any desire to learn more about them, their symbolism, their purpose in being given to us, and also their power (for they are blessed objects and therefore Sacramentals of the Church). According to the Code of Canon Law, blessed items are to be treated with reverence (Canon 1171). If there is a need to dispose of Sacramentals, they must be buried or burned―not discarded in the trash. So many Catholics are pitifully ignorant on palms and need to do some palm-reading to enlighten their darkness.
Fruit of the Palm Tree
Our Lord said: “Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:17-20). So what do you know of the “fruits” of the palm tree? Of course you know that coconuts comes from palm trees―but what others “fruits” or good uses can come from the palm tree? It is one of the most widely used trees on the planet. There are over 2,600 different kinds of palm trees growing in hot climates all over the world, from rainforests to deserts. Though most palm trees grow in tropical regions (symbol of charity), there are some species that can survive sub-zero temperatures. A “cold hardy” palm tree can tolerate cold weather―but not forever. Eventually, photosynthesis stops and the leaves start falling off. Slowly the plant freezes and becomes a plant statue. If we, as Catholics, are not planted in the “tropics” of charity, then we risk becoming lukewarm and even “freezing”, to the point where grace (photosynthesis) can no longer work and our “leaves” (virtues and spiritual exercises) start dropping off―and we become “plant statues”, that is to say “Catholics in name only.” Palm trees are among the most beneficial plants in tropical countries and have many uses. Here are just six of many uses:
(1) Palm Tree Fruit ― Palm trees are large fruit producers, the 2 main edible ones are, of course, coconuts and dates. All fruits borne by the palm tree are not edible. While dates and coconuts are edible, sago is poisonous to humans and animals. Coconut trees can produce fruit for upwards of 70 years, before the farmers replace them. The coconut we see and buy in the store, does not resemble the coconut you find growing on a coconut palm. An untouched coconut has three layers―just as the spiritual life has three different stages, all of which must be passed through. The outermost layer of the true coconut, which is typically smooth with a greenish color, is called the exocarp. The next layer is the fibrous husk, or mesocarp, which ultimately surrounds the hard woody layer called the endocarp. The endocarp surrounds the seed. In other words, to get to the fruit and milk of the coconut, you have to go through three layers―likewise, to get to the land of milk and honey (Heaven), you have to go through three stages―the Way of Beginners is like the smooth exocarp; the Way of Proficiency is like the slightly harder fibrous husk, the mesocarp; and the Way of the Perfect is like the very hard coconut shell, the endocarp. Let’s face it―to be holy (the Way of the Perfect), you have to be a tough nut to crack! Generally speaking, when you buy a coconut at the supermarket the exocarp and the mesocarp are removed and what you see is the endocarp.
Coconut Oil is extremely healthy, having many medicinal properties. Around half of the fatty acids in coconut oil are lauric acid. Lauric acid is particularly good at killing bacteria, viruses, and fungi. When you eat coconut oil, it reacts with enzymes to forms monolaurin, which is great for killing harmful pathogens. Both of these substances― lauric acid and monolaurin―have been shown to kill the bacteria and very dangerous pathogen, Staphylococcus Aureus and the yeast Candida Albicans, which is a common source of yeast infections. 2004 study published in the journal of Neurobiology of Aging demonstrated that the MCTs found in coconut oil improved the memory problems their older subjects were experiencing. According to an Evidence-based Complementary and Alternative Medicine study, coconut oil increases the healthy cholesterol (known as HDL) in your body. By increasing the HDL in the body and changing the ratio of HDL to LDL, the saturated fat in coconut oil helps promote heart health and lower the risk of heart disease. Ever heard of oil pulling? Well, before the invention of toothpaste, the act of swishing oil around the mouth was a method of cleansing the mouth of bacteria and for helping to heal the nasty ravages of periodontal disease. An abundance of MCTs is the reason why coconut oil is one of the many effective oils to pull with. The oil lifts the bacteria from the surfaces within the mouth and that's great because removing oral bacteria greatly reduces your risk of disease around your gums. These are just a small handful of the many benefits of the palm tree’s coconut oil.
(2) Palm Oil ― is a widely-used edible vegetable oil that comes from the fruit of oil palm trees and its versatile uses make it often referred to as a ‘miracle ingredient’ for so many products. Accounting for one-third of global plant oil production, you can find palm oil in just about anything, from pizza dough to washing detergent. It is also a major ingredient in beauty products including palm kernel oil for body lotions, or bleached palm oil for soap. One major beneficial use of the oil, however, is its frequent use as a base for mixing medicine such as cough syrups. It has also been associated with high vitamin A, lowering the body’s cholesterol and reducing the likelihood of major illnesses such as heart disease and cancer. Drawing spiritual analogies―you could say that this is akin to healing, beautifying and sanctifying the soul.
(3) Palm Beverages ― Now we come to palm tree trunks. There are cultures that make sugar out of the sap of the sugar palm tree. It is collected in very similar way to how we get sap for maple syrup from maple trees. Some use it as a sweetener―but it can also be fermented into the sugary drink called “palm wine” or “toddy.” This is a sweet and milky alcoholic beverage produced from the fermentation of sap of different palm tree species, including palmyra, date palms, and coconut palms. Using a knife or machete, an incision is made between the tree’s kernels, allowing for the sap to ooze out. Fermentation begins soon after the sap begins flowing, and within just 1-2 hours, the alcohol content can reach up to 4%. Not only is it a tasty and popular beverage choice in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean, it also poses major health benefits, from increased eye health with thanks to the Vitamin C content, and the prevention of cancer cells with the presence of riboflavin (B2).
(4) Construction and Crafts ― Palm trees are regularly used as constructive building material for house walls, rafters and roofing. The wood is extremely hard once cured, or dried. Harder than oak, by far. The fibrous wood can also be pulled apart and woven together to produce thatch for roof coverings, and logs for bridges. The fiber can also be woven to make carpet and wall coverings, as well as practical household items such as brooms, baskets and even furniture.
(5) Palm Wax ― Some of the best wax available for scented candles come from palms. This is because palm wax is an all-natural, renewable and environmentally-friendly resource that offers more choice for candle makers who are looking to market more sustainable products. Not only that, it makes for excellent results. Due to the palm tree’s growth in naturally hot climates, palm wax resists melting in hot weather, has a high contraction, and takes colors easily. Best of all, it holds and emits fragrances well for up to 50% longer, compared to candles made of paraffin wax.
(6) Palm Leaves ― Forget the oil, the wood and fruit―palm leaves (or palm fronds) have a diverse range of uses alone, from roof thatch, garden fencing and weaving to fuel and nutritional feed for livestock. The decaying leaves, wood from the stems and fiber can also be put to one side to be used as mulch. Yet palm tree leaves are also used to produce a different kinds of oil and wax than those made from the palm tree fruits.
Palms and Religion
In Assyria, the palm was one of the trees identified as a sacred tree connecting Heaven and Earth. Reliefs from the 9th Century BC, show winged creatures holding palm fronds in the presence of the sacred palm tree. In Egypt, the palm represented immortality, and was carried in funeral processions to represent eternal life. In Judaism the palm is part of the Feast of Tabernacles, hearkening back to the temporary dwellings in which farmers lived during harvesting, and to the fragile dwellings built of palms that the Israelites lived in during their 40 years in the desert. In their religious festivals, Israelites used palm branches for rejoicing. Palms were often depicted on coins and important buildings. King Solomon had palm branches carved into the walls and doors of the Temple: “And all the walls of the Temple round about, he carved with divers figures and carvings. And he made in them cherubims and palm trees, and divers representations, as it were standing out, and coming forth from the wall” (3 Kings 6:29). Holy Scripture links the palm tree with goodness and holiness: “The just shall flourish like the palm tree” (Psalm 91:13).
Palm of Victory
In ancient times, palm branches symbolized goodness, victory, triumph, peace and eternal life. Palms were symbols of life among the nomadic tribes, who, when crossing the desert, rejoiced at seeing the palm tree, because it indicated an oasis with life-giving water was near: “And the children of Israel came into Elim, where there were twelve fountains of water, and seventy palm trees: and they encamped by the waters” (Exodus 15:27). In pre-Christian times the palm was regarded as a symbol of victory. It was common practice in the ancient world to welcome home a king or war hero by laying out a path of palm branches for him to ride on or walk on – similar to rolling out the red carpet today. In ancient Greece a palm branch was awarded to victorious athletes, and in ancient Rome the Latin word “palma”, was a substitute word for victory ― a victory of any kind. A lawyer who won his case in the Roman Forum would decorate his front door with palm leaves. After the time of Christ, palms were adopted by the early Christians and became a symbol of the victory of the faithful over the enemies of the soul. Origen (Commentary on John 10:18) says the palm is the symbol of victory in that war waged by the spirit against the flesh. Ultimately, the palm is the symbol of eternal victory―in the sense of winning eternal life in Heaven.
“For us too, they [palms] must be symbols of triumph, indicative of the victory to be won in our battle against the evil in ourselves and against the evil which roams about us. As we receive the blessed palm, let us renew our pledge to conquer with Jesus, but let us not forget that it was on the cross that He conquered” (Father Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D., Divine Intimacy, pp. 392-393).
Palm of Martyrdom
In this sense it was especially applicable to martyrs, the victors par excellence over the spiritual foes of mankind; hence the frequent occurrence in the Acts of the martyrs of such expressions as “he received the palm of martyrdom.” A martyr goes straight to Heaven at his death, without passing through Purgatory. Pope Innocent III says: “We should be doing injustice to a martyr, if we were to pray for him.” A martyr possesses the love of God in the highest degree, since he despises life―the greatest of all earthly goods―for God’s sake. Every martyr is a conqueror, and is therefore depicted with a palm in his hand, since the palm is the mark of victory. Martyrdom is a victory of Faith over the world and sin―St. Thomas Aquinas says: “Martyrdom is conducive to the acquisition of the martyr’s palm” (Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 124, art. 1, ad 1). Martyrdom―in the eyes of the world―is a humiliation of the person being martyred. Yet, by confessing Christ in the face of death, they gain the martyr’s palm of eternal life. “He that findeth his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it” (Matthew 10:39).
From Palms to Ashes
The palms that the Church distributes on Palm Sunday, in one sense, represent the life of a Christian on Earth. If everything is done as suggested by liturgical rules, then the palms of today become the ashes of tomorrow. This means that palms that the Holy Mother Church hands to you today (Palm Sunday, March 28th, 2021), she wants you to return them to Holy Mother Church before next Ash Wednesday (March 2nd, 2022). By that time, your fairly fresh (though dried) palm will have withered and “grown old” and will be taken and burned to make the ashes for next Ash Wednesday. This brings to mind the words of God to Adam: “Dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!” (Genesis 3:19). Holy Scripture further adds: “In the morning, man shall grow up like grass; in the morning he shall flourish and pass away. In the evening he shall fall, grow dry, and wither” (Psalm 89:6). “My days have declined like a shadow, and I am withered like grass” (Psalm 101:1). “I am smitten as grass, and my heart is withered―because I forgot to eat my bread” (Psalm 101:5). “For all flesh is as grass; and all the glory thereof as the flower of grass. The grass is withered, and the flower thereof is fallen away” (1 Peter 1:24). “Mortal man shall wither away like grass” (Isaias 51:12). Therefore, while the palm that you were given is a sign of victory, it is at the same time a symbol of humility. Inevitably, like grass, you will wither and die―but, hopefully, your life and death will merit the palm of victory and eternal life.
From Palm to Cross
The palm, in a certain sense, leads to the cross. The procession of Jesus into Jerusalem, with palms being thrown in honor before Him, ultimately led to the Cross of Calvary. The very people who applaud Christ’s entrance into Jerusalem that morning, shouting out “Hosanna!” Hosanna in Hebrew literally means, “I beg you to save!” or “Please deliver us!” That “Hosanna!” will, within a week, be crying, “Crucify Him.” They will go from acclaiming Him as the new King of Israel to urging His life be traded in favor of a convicted criminal; they will first praise Him and then mock Him. Even friends entering Jerusalem at His side will desert Jesus. It is, in a certain sense, a blueprint for the life of a Christian. All this discord will take place during one week beginning on what we call Palm Sunday.
St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153) offered a homily about Christ’s entry into Jerusalem: “How different the cries, ‘Away with him, away with him, crucify him,’ and then, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, hosanna, in the highest!’ How different the cries are that now are calling him ‘King of Israel’ and then in a few days’ time will be saying, ‘We have no king but Caesar!’ What a contrast between the green branches and the cross, between the flowers and the thorns! Before they were offering their own clothes for him to walk upon, and so soon afterwards they are stripping him of his, and casting lots upon them.”
The palm comes from a tree―the hardwood palm tree―and it leads to the “Tree of the Cross”―another “hardwood” tree. On Palm Sunday, as we pick up our palms, we share our joy in the triumphant Christ. Yet, at the same time, we pick up the cross―for it was on the Cross of Calvary that Christ triumphed, far more than in triumphant procession into Jerusalem. In the Byzantine liturgy, as the people pick up the palms they sing: “Today we all take up Thy cross!” There is no other way to Heaven―as Our Lord Himself stated: “And He [Jesus] said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
Interestingly, many people like to fold their single palm leaf into a cross.
Palm Sunday Through the Ages
In the very early days of the new-born Church, Christians visited the sites of Christ’s Passion and Death―and even re-enacted certain events that had taken place―for example, Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Yet, due the on-and-off persecution of Christianity, such gatherings were rarely possible until the Roman Emperor Constantine ended all religious persecution in the early 4th century. Later in that century, a Spanish pilgrim named Eigera visited Jerusalem. In her diary, she recorded how Christians re-created the events of Holy Week. She wrote that they gathered outside the city on the Sunday before Easter and listened to one of the Gospels telling of Christ’s triumphant entrance into Jerusalem. Then they marched together through the city gates while carrying olive or palm branches. Our Palm Sunday processions are akin to what Eigera witnessed 17 centuries ago.
By the ninth century, the procession with blessed palms had expanded beyond Jerusalem and during the Middle Ages became widespread throughout Europe. In the 17th century Christians were not only processing into church with palms but, during Mass, holding the palms while the Passion was being read.
Through the centuries, Palm Sunday and the procession of people holding palms would be celebrated in a variety of ways. In some locations the Blessed Sacrament was part of the procession, in other places the congregation started in the parish cemetery and then went into the church. Palms were sometimes blessed in one church and the people, carrying the palms, marched to another church for Mass. Most typical was the blessing of the people and the palms at a place outside the church and then processing in. For some time, until the Vatican II changes in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the priest wore red vestments during the palm blessing and procession and then changed to a violet garment for Mass.
The Power of Palms
The procession at Mass with the palms was a public display of homage and loyalty to Christ our King and Redeemer. Christ is the King of our home, so we should incorporate the blessed palms and a family prayer service as part of this day.
From medieval times, people have believed that blessed palms formed into the shape of a cross would protect them from danger. Superstition? No! Blessed palms are Sacramentals of the Church and therefore a powerful source of graces―similar to blessed Rosaries, Scapulars, Medals, Statues, pictures and other blessed objects.
Palm trees aren’t readily available in some vicinities, there are other plants like olive branches, box, yew, spruce, willows and pussy-willows that are blessed and used the same way as palms for Palm Sunday.
Article 25
Friday after Passion Sunday March 22nd
The World Plays While Mary Mourns!
Friday after Passion Sunday March 22nd
The World Plays While Mary Mourns!
A Time of Sorrow
Friday after Passion Sunday is traditionally dedicated to the commemoration of the Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Holy Mother Church assigns to Our Lady of Sorrows the following Scriptural verse: “O all ye that pass by the way, attend, and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow!” (Lamentations 1:12). On that note, Our Lady of La Salette―who appeared weeping and sorrowful in 1846―is not a happy Mother, but a sad Mother—she weeps! Why does she weep? She weeps because she wants and tries to obtain mercy for us—but, by our continuing and ever increasing sins, we block the avenues of mercy that could be opened to us. Our Lady of La Salette laments: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
Yet despite all her warnings―from Quito in the late 1500s and early 1600’, through La Salette (1846), Lourdes (1858), Fatima (1917), Akita (1973)―we are deaf to her warnings as indicated by Sister Lucia of Fatima: “Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!” The time of the chastisement is ever approaching, but we have no time to think about it and act upon it! We are too busy doing other things!
Time for What? What Time is It?
The Book of Ecclesiastes is not a bad a book for “telling-the-time”―in its third chapter, it says: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal. A time to destroy, and a time to build. A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather. A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces. A time to get, and a time to lose. A time to keep, and a time to cast away. A time to rend, and a time to sew. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8). What time is it in your house?
If, as Ecclesiastes says, “all things have their season”, then what season is it now? We can look at the current season in relation to one single year, and we can also look at the current season in relation to all time. Of course, the season of the current year is one of winter passing into spring (northern hemisphere), and liturgically we are in the season of Lent (a spiritual winter) that will soon pass into the season of Easter (a spiritual springtime).
From another perspective, we can look at our present age (season) in relation to all the ages that have passed and to those which are yet to come. In this sense, we also find ourselves in a winter―which is from being finished―and before we can enter into a future springtime, some very heavy storms have to be weathered.
Weather Forecast
Talking of weather―putting aside the proverbial joke that when weather forecasters get their forecasts right, then it will be a sign that the end of world is fast approaching―there is a “forecast” that is a more reliable “weather forecast” than any earthly agency can provide. The “weather forecast” or “climate prediction” that is being referred to, is not focused on natural weather conditions, but on the spiritual and moral climate of the world and the resulting “supernatural weather” that these will provoke. This “spiritual and moral weather forecast” comes, of course, from Heaven―and Our Lady is God’s chosen “weathercaster” or weather forecaster.
Usually, people do not plan on organizing a parish picnic on a day when tornados and torrential rain has been forecast. When a hurricane hits the east coast of America, the advice is to stay indoors or even leave the area―rather than be a fatal victim of the hurricane. When the winter snow storms bring multiple feet of snow, nobody ventures outdoors wearing a t-shirt, shorts and sandals. When it is multiple degrees below freezing and the biting winter winds are howling, we don’t go swimming in the back-yard swimming pool. When flood waters invade our house, we do not put on knee-high rubber boots and continue watching TV, or browsing the internet and munching on our snacks and sipping beer or wine. All of this is patently obvious and pure common sense. Yet, we fail to apply this earthly or worldly wisdom to our spiritual life! We act like a person who is insane when we are faced with some blatant spiritual realities and “weather forecasts”.
Mary is No Cheery Weathercaster
The TV channel weathercasters are usually upbeat, cheery and smiling. Our Lady is far from falling into that stereotype. When the weather is going to be extraordinarily severe, then the weather updates are very frequent. This is equally true of Our Lady’s “weather forecasts” for our age. Unless you have your head buried in the sand (or the screen of some electronic device), then you cannot fail to see that Our Lady’s forecast is one of an impending catastrophe―so much so, that you might well want to bury your head in something, and switch over to a state of denial.
At Quito, there is NO RECORD OF OUR LADY BEING CHEERY AND SMILING―if some evidence turns up, it is likely to be minimal, for the whole tone of Our Lady’s message is somber, sad and depressing.
At La Salette (1846), Our Lady NEVER SMILES, BUT WEEPS! One of the seers, Melanie, reports: “I saw a most beautiful Lady sitting on top of our Paradise, with her head in her hands. This beautiful Lady stood up, she calmly crossed her arms while watching us. When I was up close to the beautiful Lady, she began to speak and, from her beautiful eyes, tears also started to flow.”
At Lourdes (1858), though Our Lady smiles at times, it is merely to calm the suspicious and frightened Bernadette. Otherwise, we read that Our Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears.
At Fatima (1917), Sr. Lucia of Fatima reveals: “The Blessed Virgin was very sad in all her apparitions. She never smiled at us. This anguish that we saw in her, caused by offenses to God and the chastisements that threaten sinners, penetrated our souls” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
At Akita in Japan (1973), the statue of Our Lady does not miraculously smile, but miraculously WEEPS, and it weeps tears of blood!
All of this sets the general tone of Our Lady’s appearance, emotions, and messages as being of a grave, tragic, sad and unhappy disposition―not a happy-go-lucky, cheerful, upbeat, smiling demeanor.
Mary's Frequent Weather Warnings
It may not seem that Our Lady’s forecasts are very frequent―if we are to take Quito in basically the first part of the 1600s (1594-1635), La Salette (1846), Lourdes (1858), Fatima (1917) and Akita (1973) as being the main “weather updates”. Yet, it must be remembered that, with God, “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Peter 3:8) and “a thousand years in Thy sight are as yesterday, which is past” (Psalm 89:4). Therefore, arguably and artificially, we could translate years into hours, and the dates of Our Lady’s apparitions at Quito (early 1660s), La Salette (1846), Lourdes (1858), Fatima (1917) and Akita (1973), as well as our present day―could all be looked at in the context of one single day. The year 1600 would become 16:00 hours; 1846 would become 18:46 hours; 18:58 would be 18:58 hours; 1917 would be 19:17 hours and 1973 (doesn’t quite work, for there are only 60 minutes in an hour) could be said to be almost 20:00 hours, while our present year, 2019, would translate into 20:19 hours. In this sense, following the principle that “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day”, we have Our Lady’s weather forecasts rapidly following one upon the other in one single “day”―as the darkness grows and night approaches―at 18:46 or 6:46 p.m., then at 18:58 or 6:58 p.m., again at 19:17 or 7:17 p.m. and again at 19:53(73) or 7:53 p.m. While now, in our present age and time, we have arrived at 20:19 or 8:19 p.m. Thus the weather warnings are flowing thick and fast between 4:00 p.m. and 8:19 p.m.
Our Lady is Sad and Sorrowful
What is our response? Ignore them and keep enjoying life! What is Our Lady’s response? The seer, Melanie, at La Salette reports: “I saw a most beautiful Lady sitting on top of our Paradise, with her head in her hands ... She began to speak and, from her beautiful eyes, tears also started to flow.” Bernadette at Lourdes reports that the Immaculate Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears. Sister Lucia of Fatima puts it in a nutshell when she says: “Our Lady never smiled. She was always very sad … The Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one has paid attention to her Message, neither the good nor the bad. The good, because they continue on the road of virtue, goodness and personal apostolates, but without paying attention and uniting their lives to this Message. The bad―the sinners―keep following the road of evil”―so much so that in the 1950’s (nowhere near a sinful time as 2019), Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello: “People are offending God too much! Were I to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief. These are grave times. The world is in total turmoil because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread. When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs. All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
Our Lady is so Sorrowful, She Sweats Blood and Weeps in Tears
Hence, in 1973, at Akita in Japan, at the time of Our Lady’s messages to Agnes Katsuko Sasagawa, her statue was seen to be ‘sweating’ tears of blood from her eyes on many occasions for over two months, as well as a having a stigmata miraculously appear on one of the statues hands. Sister Agnes also received the stigmata in one of her hands, that lasted for around one month―from June 28th to July 27th of 1973. Blood began to flow out of the statue's hand the very next day, from a stigmata wound that looked identical to Sister Agnes' wound. One of Sister Agnes’s fellow nuns, who observed the statue’s wound up close, stated: “It seemed to be truly cut into flesh. The edge of the cross had the aspect of human flesh and one even saw the grain of the skin like a fingerprint.” The statue sometimes bled simultaneously with Sister Agnes. A guardian angel told Sister Agnes: “The wounds of Mary are much deeper and more sorrowful than yours!” After that, the statue began to sweat beads of perspiration. More than a year later, on January 4th, 1975, the statue began to weep—crying three times on that first day. The weeping statue drew so much attention, that its crying was broadcast on national television throughout Japan, on December 8th, 1979―the feast of the Immaculate Conception. By the time the statue cried for the last time―which was on the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows (September 15th) in 1981—it was recorded that it had wept for a total of 101 times.
Blood, sweat and tears―all of which were combined in this miraculous occurrence―are invariably symbols of suffering, toil, agony and mourning. Samples of blood, sweat, and tears from the Akita statue were all scientifically tested by people who weren't told where the samples came from. The results: all of the fluids were identified as human. The blood was found to be Type B, the sweat Type AB, and the tears Type AB. Investigators came to the conclusion that a supernatural miracle had somehow caused a non-human object — the statue — to exude human bodily fluids because that would be impossible naturally.
To us, all these apparitions, all these words of Our Lady, all these solemn and grave warnings, are much like the proverbial “water flowing off the duck’s back”―we read them, we nod and then we file them away in our “been there, seen it, done it” folder―and then refocus once again on what really concerns us: our daily grind and the material preoccupations of our life. Somehow―we convince ourselves―these “weather advisories” or “storm warnings” do not apply to us, but to someone else, they are for some other part of the world, or for some future age.
Weather Psychologists Reveal Typical Human Reactions to Warnings
What is true on natural level, is often true on the spiritual level. Our reactions to severe weather alerts, storm warnings and even evacuation orders are similar to the way we react to Heaven's storm warnings and chastisement alerts. Dr. Laura Myers, the director and senior research scientist at the Center for Advanced Public Safety, has researched how people react to warnings. She reveals that most folk stubbornly do not want to change their plans or their behavior on account of weather warnings, unless they are convinced that storm will really affect them. Dr. Myers pointed out that people become desensitized to alerts and warnings (like “water flowing off the duck’s back”), and after a while, not having seen disasters in their neighborhood, tend to ignore the warnings and alerts. She added: “When people hear what the weather impacts are, such as damage and destruction to well-built homes, they start to pay attention. When they are told they need to take shelter now because their location is going to take a direct impact, they usually act.” Dr. Myers explained that the moment in time, when a warning is issued to the public, can also produce various reactions and responses. Given too much advance notice, people can fall into a complacency, become tired of waiting and go back to their usual daily occupations. Regardless of the warning, some people wait until they see their life is in danger.
AccuWeather Meteorologist, Dan Kottlowski, revealed that “a lot of social media research was done and people said they have to see [a tornado] before they do something.” Mike Smith, Senior Vice President of AccuWeather, revealed several reasons why people wait to react to severe weather alerts: “There is considerable inertia in people. They are busy or their attention is on some project. There is also sociological evidence that people feel silly for taking shelter; that it somehow reflects poorly on their courage.” Mike Smith further added that for many people it sometimes takes a push-and-a-shove from someone they really trust and whose opinions they really value, to get them to take shelter or evacuate. He added that repeated warnings from various different sources can also tip the balance from inertia to action.
Julie Demuth, a scientist who studies risk communication and weather, at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, looks for patterns in the behavior of people when faced with severe weather alerts. She says: “A lot of the research we look at is about the factors that influence people’s perceptions of the hurricane risks and the decisions they make. We’ve found that most people don’t outright ignore any kind of weather warning. People refer to their past experiences … Maybe it wasn’t as bad as they had anticipated and now they’re trying to apply that. Unfortunately every event is different.” Speaking of elements that prevent people from reacting as they should, Demuth said: “It could be limitations to transportation, so that they can’t evacuate even if they wanted to. They might not have the financial resources to evacuate. We sometimes encourage people to stock up on food, or have medications on hand, but for some people, if they had the money to buy a week’s worth of food, they would do that, but they don’t necessarily have that ability. There can also be medical limitations that influence whether or not people can evacuate ... After Hurricane Katrina, we started to understand the role of how important people’s pets are to them. People wouldn’t evacuate and leave their pets behind. Another factor is people’s relationships. People don’t necessarily make individual decisions. Often we make them at a household level. We consult with our spouse or our friends and we look to see what they’re doing, and that can influence what we do.”
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Weather Service analyzes forecasting performance and public response during the second deadliest tornado outbreak in U.S. history―the “Super Tuesday Tornado Outbreak” of February, 2008, when 82 tornadoes raked nine states throughout the South, killing 57 people, injuring 350 others and causing $400 million in property damage. NOAA’s key area of concern was: “Why do some people take cover while others ride out severe weather?” In reviewing the public response, the research team found that two-thirds of the victims were in mobile homes, and 60 percent did not have access to safe shelter (i.e., a basement or storm cellar). Some indicated they thought the threat was minimal because February is not within traditional tornado season. Several of those interviewed said they spent time seeking confirmation and went to a safe location only after they saw a tornado. Many people minimized the threat of personal risk through “optimism bias,” the belief that such bad things only happen to other people.
Lots of varying reasons are behind the phenomenon of why some people don’t pay attention to severe weather evacuation notices—some think they can ride out the winds and surging waters; while others basically have nowhere to go and or have means by which to evacuate. Others recall or perhaps have experienced previous unnecessary evacuations that resulted from forecasts “not coming true” and so they now react to such forecasts with a “boy who cried ‘wolf’” mentality. Rebecca Morss of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, says: “Some people just don't perceive the risk to be that high.”
Dr. Irwin Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness, says: “Following Hurricane Katrina, there is a level of awareness around the potential danger of large-scale coastal storms and hurricanes and it has been a wake-up call … Many, many people electively choose not to comply with official orders of mandatory evacuation and intend to stay in place no matter what the warnings are. Many of these people are putting themselves at an extreme level of risk … What we've found is that being hesitant about the communication messages, or using softer language doesn't work ... The message is being forcefully delivered in an attempt to absolutely minimize the number of people that stay behind … When a public official determines that the hardest possible language is going to be used, he or she is hoping that strongest message will get the most people to safety. On the other hand, there is the "crying wolf" phenomenon. They are taking a chance that if the conditions are not as dire as anticipated, that the next time there will be a great reluctance to heed those warnings …
“Theoretically, they could physically remove someone, especially if their remaining would endanger anyone else's safety and especially [the life of] first responders. But the strategy that officials may use, rather than arresting the recalcitrant citizen, is to make it very clear--absolutely clear—that rescue and response services may not be available. In essence, if you don't comply with evacuation orders, you are in effect waiving your right to get rescue and response if you need it … We just did a study on evacuations under scenarios of disasters without warnings. We are very concerned about disasters that occur without warning when we have to do evacuations in real-time—in essence, immediate—for example, an earthquake or a terrorist nuclear attack. We found about two thirds of people with children would not comply with official orders to evacuate, until and unless they were able to retrieve their children from school or day care. If we have two thirds of the population with children that would not comply, what we would have is evacuation chaos and an absolute breakdown of disaster response in circumstances that provided no warning.”
Research by the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) unearthed several factors that lead people to ignore warnings of severe or devastating weather alerts. The most common factor is OPTIMISM, because as human beings we prefer to think that, for us, things will go right rather than wrong, and that we will be among the lucky ones to escape. The next most common factor is UNCERTAINTY―people are told to prepare and evacuate and many just do not know how to go about doing it. So you sit back and keep thinking and saying: “What should I do? What should I do?” and this makes you increasingly uncertain, with the result that most people, when uncertain, keep doing the things they were doing before. The third factor is HERD THINKING―whereby we are very influenced by what our friends and neighbors do, so we look to see what they are doing―and if they are not “stocking-up” or not evacuating, then we assume they know what they are doing and we do likewise, not realizing (or denying) that they are as uncertain as we are.
Typical Reactions to Heaven’s Warnings
You have no doubt heard the saying “Like father, like son; like mother, like daughter”―which actually can be traced to Holy Scripture: “Behold every one that useth a common proverb, shall use this against thee, saying: ‘As the mother was, so also is her daughter’” (Ezechiel 16:44). Similarly, we could say―“As we are naturally, so we shall be spiritually!” Our natural, physical, bodily, material, earthly habits and attitudes seep into our supernatural and spiritual habits and attitudes. If a person is lazy in work, they are more likely to also be lazy about spiritual duties. If they are careless about material things, they will tend to be careless about spiritual things. Hence the above quoted research on people ignoring severe weather advisories, alerts and warnings, is just as applicable to the reaction of people to Heaven’s severe climate or chastisement advisories, alerts and warnings.
Therefore, most Catholics view Our Lady’s dire warnings as a case of “The boy crying: ‘Wolf!’” when there is no wolf to be found! Their mentality is one of: “It doesn’t apply to me, so why bother?” They have heard the warnings time and time again―but nothing happens. So they “switch-off” their minds to the warnings and just go about their daily life as though nothing was wrong. Just as the above quoted recipients of severe weather warnings, their “knee-jerk” response is one of false OPTIMISM―based upon one of many differing complacent rationalizations. “I’m not such a bad person! I'm not like most people! I go to church! I say my Rosary! etc.” Yet just as a natural storm makes no distinction between good people and bad people when it claims lives or inflicts serious injuries, likewise will Heaven do when it begins to chastise us for our sins and the sins of others―as Our Lady of Akita warned: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful.”
We are fools to ignore and do nothing about Our Lady's incessant and increasingly severe warnings: “Fools despise wisdom and instruction! … Fools covet those things which are hurtful to themselves! … The eyes of fools are on the ends of the Earth … The prosperity of fools shall destroy them! … And the number of fools is infinite!” (Proverbs 1:7; 1:22; 17:24; 1:32; Ecclesiastes 1:15). Holy Mother Church puts the following words of Scripture into the mouth of Mary, as part of the readings for the Masses on the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (December 8th) and also the Immaculate Heart of Mary (August 22nd): “Now therefore, ye children, hear me! Blessed are they that keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise―and refuse it not! Blessed is the man that heareth me, and that watcheth daily at my gates, and waiteth at the posts of my doors! He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord! But he that shall sin against me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate me love death … He who obeys me will not be put to shame, they who serve me will never fail. They who explain me shall have life everlasting!” (Proverbs 8:32-36; Ecclesiasticus 34:30-31). In other words, listen to her “weather warnings and advisories”, take them to heart, obey the instructions and pass them on to others.
From Year to Hour
Coming back to the concept of “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Peter 3:8), let us look at Our Lady’s “weather alerts” or spiritual storm advisories from the perspective of not being separated by hundreds of years―as in the case of Our Lady of Good Success giving her first warning in 1594, with the others following in the 379 years up to her messages at Akita in Japan in 1973―but look upon them as being given in one single day―by taking numbers of the year and making them into the numbers for the hours and minutes of the day. Thus the 1600s would become 16:00 hours or 4:00 p.m. and 1635 would become 16:35 p.m. or 4:35 p.m., etc. Thus Quito would translate to approximately 4:00 p.m. onwards; La Salette would translate to 6:46 p.m.; Lourdes would be 6:58 p.m.; Fatima would be 7:17 p.m. and Akita would be just before 8:00 p.m. So four major alerts, advisories and warnings in a ‘four hour’ period.
The Quito Weather Forecast (from 1594 to 1635)
Our Lady of Good Success appeared in Quito, Ecuador between 1594 and 1635. These centuries and years would translate to the period between 15:54(94) hours and 16:35 hours, on the 24-hour clock, or roughly between 3:54 p.m. and 4:35 p.m. In this “severe weather” 90-second warning, Our Lady says:
“At the end of the 19th century and throughout the 20th century, various heresies will be propagated ... As these heresies spread and dominate, the precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of morals. During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private. The small number of souls who, hidden, will preserve the treasure of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom. Many of them will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings … From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! … During these unfortunate times, evil will invade childhood innocence … Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world … Without virginity, it will be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon those lands in order to purify them … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith … In this way, vocations to the priesthood will be lost, resulting in a true calamity. Many authentic vocations will perish!”
The La Salette Weather Forecast (1846)
The year 1846 would translate to 18:46 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 6:46 p.m. Here is the two-minute weather warning (it is a brief warning and takes 2 minutes to read):
“If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it. I have suffered all of the time for the rest of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually. And the rest of you think little of this. In vain you will pray, in vain you will act, you will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for the rest of you … Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! … Woe to the inhabitants of the earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family. Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other ... The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God … Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls. Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God …
“All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. A general war will follow which will be appalling … The wicked will make use of all their evil ways. Men will kill each other, massacre each other even in their homes. Then, at the first blow of God’s thundering sword, the mountains and all Nature will tremble in terror, for the disorders and crimes of men have pierced the vault of the Heavens. Paris will burn and Marseilles will be engulfed. Several cities will be shaken down and swallowed up by earthquakes. People will believe that all is lost. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of arms and blasphemy. The righteous will suffer greatly.”
The Lourdes Weather Forecast (1858)
The year 1858 would translate to 18:58 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 6:58 p.m. The spiritual climate at Lourdes could be described as sunny, but changing to overcast skies and threatening storm clouds.
At her first apparition at Lourdes, on February 11th, 1858, Our Lady appeared as a beautiful young woman, dressed in white and holding a Rosary, and smiling most graciously toward the frightened little visionary―which indicates she was not smiling beforehand.
At her third apparition, on February 14th, Bernadette, thinking perhaps all this might be trick of the devil, sprinkles Our Lady with holy water, asking her to remain if she came from God, otherwise go away. The Lady smiles―which again indicates she was not smiling beforehand.
At her second apparition, on February 18th, Our Lady seems to be a “kill-joy” because she tells Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world but only in the other!” But we want to be happy in this world as well as the other, don’t we? We want to keep our cake and we want to eat it!
At her sixth apparition on Sunday, February 21st, the Immaculate Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears. Just as with Simeon’s prophecy, the Immaculate Heart of Mary seems to be pierced even now with the sword of sorrow caused by the sins of men, sins that crucify her Son, making Him a sign of contradiction.
The Fatima Weather Forecast (1917)
The year 1917 would translate to 19:17 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 7:17 p.m.
The Akita Weather Forecast (1973)
This is where the year/clock analogy fails somewhat―since there are only 60 minutes in an hour and you cannot have a time of 7:73 pm. Nevertheless we could say, by transforming the year into hours, that is almost 8:00 pm.
What’s the Forecast for 2024?
The year 2024 would translate to 20:24 or 8:24 pm on the 24-hour clock.
This article is still to be completed
Friday after Passion Sunday is traditionally dedicated to the commemoration of the Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Holy Mother Church assigns to Our Lady of Sorrows the following Scriptural verse: “O all ye that pass by the way, attend, and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow!” (Lamentations 1:12). On that note, Our Lady of La Salette―who appeared weeping and sorrowful in 1846―is not a happy Mother, but a sad Mother—she weeps! Why does she weep? She weeps because she wants and tries to obtain mercy for us—but, by our continuing and ever increasing sins, we block the avenues of mercy that could be opened to us. Our Lady of La Salette laments: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
Yet despite all her warnings―from Quito in the late 1500s and early 1600’, through La Salette (1846), Lourdes (1858), Fatima (1917), Akita (1973)―we are deaf to her warnings as indicated by Sister Lucia of Fatima: “Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her Message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this Message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil ignoring the Message and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!” The time of the chastisement is ever approaching, but we have no time to think about it and act upon it! We are too busy doing other things!
Time for What? What Time is It?
The Book of Ecclesiastes is not a bad a book for “telling-the-time”―in its third chapter, it says: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal. A time to destroy, and a time to build. A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather. A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces. A time to get, and a time to lose. A time to keep, and a time to cast away. A time to rend, and a time to sew. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8). What time is it in your house?
If, as Ecclesiastes says, “all things have their season”, then what season is it now? We can look at the current season in relation to one single year, and we can also look at the current season in relation to all time. Of course, the season of the current year is one of winter passing into spring (northern hemisphere), and liturgically we are in the season of Lent (a spiritual winter) that will soon pass into the season of Easter (a spiritual springtime).
From another perspective, we can look at our present age (season) in relation to all the ages that have passed and to those which are yet to come. In this sense, we also find ourselves in a winter―which is from being finished―and before we can enter into a future springtime, some very heavy storms have to be weathered.
Weather Forecast
Talking of weather―putting aside the proverbial joke that when weather forecasters get their forecasts right, then it will be a sign that the end of world is fast approaching―there is a “forecast” that is a more reliable “weather forecast” than any earthly agency can provide. The “weather forecast” or “climate prediction” that is being referred to, is not focused on natural weather conditions, but on the spiritual and moral climate of the world and the resulting “supernatural weather” that these will provoke. This “spiritual and moral weather forecast” comes, of course, from Heaven―and Our Lady is God’s chosen “weathercaster” or weather forecaster.
Usually, people do not plan on organizing a parish picnic on a day when tornados and torrential rain has been forecast. When a hurricane hits the east coast of America, the advice is to stay indoors or even leave the area―rather than be a fatal victim of the hurricane. When the winter snow storms bring multiple feet of snow, nobody ventures outdoors wearing a t-shirt, shorts and sandals. When it is multiple degrees below freezing and the biting winter winds are howling, we don’t go swimming in the back-yard swimming pool. When flood waters invade our house, we do not put on knee-high rubber boots and continue watching TV, or browsing the internet and munching on our snacks and sipping beer or wine. All of this is patently obvious and pure common sense. Yet, we fail to apply this earthly or worldly wisdom to our spiritual life! We act like a person who is insane when we are faced with some blatant spiritual realities and “weather forecasts”.
Mary is No Cheery Weathercaster
The TV channel weathercasters are usually upbeat, cheery and smiling. Our Lady is far from falling into that stereotype. When the weather is going to be extraordinarily severe, then the weather updates are very frequent. This is equally true of Our Lady’s “weather forecasts” for our age. Unless you have your head buried in the sand (or the screen of some electronic device), then you cannot fail to see that Our Lady’s forecast is one of an impending catastrophe―so much so, that you might well want to bury your head in something, and switch over to a state of denial.
At Quito, there is NO RECORD OF OUR LADY BEING CHEERY AND SMILING―if some evidence turns up, it is likely to be minimal, for the whole tone of Our Lady’s message is somber, sad and depressing.
At La Salette (1846), Our Lady NEVER SMILES, BUT WEEPS! One of the seers, Melanie, reports: “I saw a most beautiful Lady sitting on top of our Paradise, with her head in her hands. This beautiful Lady stood up, she calmly crossed her arms while watching us. When I was up close to the beautiful Lady, she began to speak and, from her beautiful eyes, tears also started to flow.”
At Lourdes (1858), though Our Lady smiles at times, it is merely to calm the suspicious and frightened Bernadette. Otherwise, we read that Our Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears.
At Fatima (1917), Sr. Lucia of Fatima reveals: “The Blessed Virgin was very sad in all her apparitions. She never smiled at us. This anguish that we saw in her, caused by offenses to God and the chastisements that threaten sinners, penetrated our souls” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
At Akita in Japan (1973), the statue of Our Lady does not miraculously smile, but miraculously WEEPS, and it weeps tears of blood!
All of this sets the general tone of Our Lady’s appearance, emotions, and messages as being of a grave, tragic, sad and unhappy disposition―not a happy-go-lucky, cheerful, upbeat, smiling demeanor.
Mary's Frequent Weather Warnings
It may not seem that Our Lady’s forecasts are very frequent―if we are to take Quito in basically the first part of the 1600s (1594-1635), La Salette (1846), Lourdes (1858), Fatima (1917) and Akita (1973) as being the main “weather updates”. Yet, it must be remembered that, with God, “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Peter 3:8) and “a thousand years in Thy sight are as yesterday, which is past” (Psalm 89:4). Therefore, arguably and artificially, we could translate years into hours, and the dates of Our Lady’s apparitions at Quito (early 1660s), La Salette (1846), Lourdes (1858), Fatima (1917) and Akita (1973), as well as our present day―could all be looked at in the context of one single day. The year 1600 would become 16:00 hours; 1846 would become 18:46 hours; 18:58 would be 18:58 hours; 1917 would be 19:17 hours and 1973 (doesn’t quite work, for there are only 60 minutes in an hour) could be said to be almost 20:00 hours, while our present year, 2019, would translate into 20:19 hours. In this sense, following the principle that “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day”, we have Our Lady’s weather forecasts rapidly following one upon the other in one single “day”―as the darkness grows and night approaches―at 18:46 or 6:46 p.m., then at 18:58 or 6:58 p.m., again at 19:17 or 7:17 p.m. and again at 19:53(73) or 7:53 p.m. While now, in our present age and time, we have arrived at 20:19 or 8:19 p.m. Thus the weather warnings are flowing thick and fast between 4:00 p.m. and 8:19 p.m.
Our Lady is Sad and Sorrowful
What is our response? Ignore them and keep enjoying life! What is Our Lady’s response? The seer, Melanie, at La Salette reports: “I saw a most beautiful Lady sitting on top of our Paradise, with her head in her hands ... She began to speak and, from her beautiful eyes, tears also started to flow.” Bernadette at Lourdes reports that the Immaculate Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears. Sister Lucia of Fatima puts it in a nutshell when she says: “Our Lady never smiled. She was always very sad … The Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one has paid attention to her Message, neither the good nor the bad. The good, because they continue on the road of virtue, goodness and personal apostolates, but without paying attention and uniting their lives to this Message. The bad―the sinners―keep following the road of evil”―so much so that in the 1950’s (nowhere near a sinful time as 2019), Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello: “People are offending God too much! Were I to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief. These are grave times. The world is in total turmoil because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread. When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs. All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
Our Lady is so Sorrowful, She Sweats Blood and Weeps in Tears
Hence, in 1973, at Akita in Japan, at the time of Our Lady’s messages to Agnes Katsuko Sasagawa, her statue was seen to be ‘sweating’ tears of blood from her eyes on many occasions for over two months, as well as a having a stigmata miraculously appear on one of the statues hands. Sister Agnes also received the stigmata in one of her hands, that lasted for around one month―from June 28th to July 27th of 1973. Blood began to flow out of the statue's hand the very next day, from a stigmata wound that looked identical to Sister Agnes' wound. One of Sister Agnes’s fellow nuns, who observed the statue’s wound up close, stated: “It seemed to be truly cut into flesh. The edge of the cross had the aspect of human flesh and one even saw the grain of the skin like a fingerprint.” The statue sometimes bled simultaneously with Sister Agnes. A guardian angel told Sister Agnes: “The wounds of Mary are much deeper and more sorrowful than yours!” After that, the statue began to sweat beads of perspiration. More than a year later, on January 4th, 1975, the statue began to weep—crying three times on that first day. The weeping statue drew so much attention, that its crying was broadcast on national television throughout Japan, on December 8th, 1979―the feast of the Immaculate Conception. By the time the statue cried for the last time―which was on the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows (September 15th) in 1981—it was recorded that it had wept for a total of 101 times.
Blood, sweat and tears―all of which were combined in this miraculous occurrence―are invariably symbols of suffering, toil, agony and mourning. Samples of blood, sweat, and tears from the Akita statue were all scientifically tested by people who weren't told where the samples came from. The results: all of the fluids were identified as human. The blood was found to be Type B, the sweat Type AB, and the tears Type AB. Investigators came to the conclusion that a supernatural miracle had somehow caused a non-human object — the statue — to exude human bodily fluids because that would be impossible naturally.
To us, all these apparitions, all these words of Our Lady, all these solemn and grave warnings, are much like the proverbial “water flowing off the duck’s back”―we read them, we nod and then we file them away in our “been there, seen it, done it” folder―and then refocus once again on what really concerns us: our daily grind and the material preoccupations of our life. Somehow―we convince ourselves―these “weather advisories” or “storm warnings” do not apply to us, but to someone else, they are for some other part of the world, or for some future age.
Weather Psychologists Reveal Typical Human Reactions to Warnings
What is true on natural level, is often true on the spiritual level. Our reactions to severe weather alerts, storm warnings and even evacuation orders are similar to the way we react to Heaven's storm warnings and chastisement alerts. Dr. Laura Myers, the director and senior research scientist at the Center for Advanced Public Safety, has researched how people react to warnings. She reveals that most folk stubbornly do not want to change their plans or their behavior on account of weather warnings, unless they are convinced that storm will really affect them. Dr. Myers pointed out that people become desensitized to alerts and warnings (like “water flowing off the duck’s back”), and after a while, not having seen disasters in their neighborhood, tend to ignore the warnings and alerts. She added: “When people hear what the weather impacts are, such as damage and destruction to well-built homes, they start to pay attention. When they are told they need to take shelter now because their location is going to take a direct impact, they usually act.” Dr. Myers explained that the moment in time, when a warning is issued to the public, can also produce various reactions and responses. Given too much advance notice, people can fall into a complacency, become tired of waiting and go back to their usual daily occupations. Regardless of the warning, some people wait until they see their life is in danger.
AccuWeather Meteorologist, Dan Kottlowski, revealed that “a lot of social media research was done and people said they have to see [a tornado] before they do something.” Mike Smith, Senior Vice President of AccuWeather, revealed several reasons why people wait to react to severe weather alerts: “There is considerable inertia in people. They are busy or their attention is on some project. There is also sociological evidence that people feel silly for taking shelter; that it somehow reflects poorly on their courage.” Mike Smith further added that for many people it sometimes takes a push-and-a-shove from someone they really trust and whose opinions they really value, to get them to take shelter or evacuate. He added that repeated warnings from various different sources can also tip the balance from inertia to action.
Julie Demuth, a scientist who studies risk communication and weather, at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, looks for patterns in the behavior of people when faced with severe weather alerts. She says: “A lot of the research we look at is about the factors that influence people’s perceptions of the hurricane risks and the decisions they make. We’ve found that most people don’t outright ignore any kind of weather warning. People refer to their past experiences … Maybe it wasn’t as bad as they had anticipated and now they’re trying to apply that. Unfortunately every event is different.” Speaking of elements that prevent people from reacting as they should, Demuth said: “It could be limitations to transportation, so that they can’t evacuate even if they wanted to. They might not have the financial resources to evacuate. We sometimes encourage people to stock up on food, or have medications on hand, but for some people, if they had the money to buy a week’s worth of food, they would do that, but they don’t necessarily have that ability. There can also be medical limitations that influence whether or not people can evacuate ... After Hurricane Katrina, we started to understand the role of how important people’s pets are to them. People wouldn’t evacuate and leave their pets behind. Another factor is people’s relationships. People don’t necessarily make individual decisions. Often we make them at a household level. We consult with our spouse or our friends and we look to see what they’re doing, and that can influence what we do.”
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Weather Service analyzes forecasting performance and public response during the second deadliest tornado outbreak in U.S. history―the “Super Tuesday Tornado Outbreak” of February, 2008, when 82 tornadoes raked nine states throughout the South, killing 57 people, injuring 350 others and causing $400 million in property damage. NOAA’s key area of concern was: “Why do some people take cover while others ride out severe weather?” In reviewing the public response, the research team found that two-thirds of the victims were in mobile homes, and 60 percent did not have access to safe shelter (i.e., a basement or storm cellar). Some indicated they thought the threat was minimal because February is not within traditional tornado season. Several of those interviewed said they spent time seeking confirmation and went to a safe location only after they saw a tornado. Many people minimized the threat of personal risk through “optimism bias,” the belief that such bad things only happen to other people.
Lots of varying reasons are behind the phenomenon of why some people don’t pay attention to severe weather evacuation notices—some think they can ride out the winds and surging waters; while others basically have nowhere to go and or have means by which to evacuate. Others recall or perhaps have experienced previous unnecessary evacuations that resulted from forecasts “not coming true” and so they now react to such forecasts with a “boy who cried ‘wolf’” mentality. Rebecca Morss of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, says: “Some people just don't perceive the risk to be that high.”
Dr. Irwin Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness, says: “Following Hurricane Katrina, there is a level of awareness around the potential danger of large-scale coastal storms and hurricanes and it has been a wake-up call … Many, many people electively choose not to comply with official orders of mandatory evacuation and intend to stay in place no matter what the warnings are. Many of these people are putting themselves at an extreme level of risk … What we've found is that being hesitant about the communication messages, or using softer language doesn't work ... The message is being forcefully delivered in an attempt to absolutely minimize the number of people that stay behind … When a public official determines that the hardest possible language is going to be used, he or she is hoping that strongest message will get the most people to safety. On the other hand, there is the "crying wolf" phenomenon. They are taking a chance that if the conditions are not as dire as anticipated, that the next time there will be a great reluctance to heed those warnings …
“Theoretically, they could physically remove someone, especially if their remaining would endanger anyone else's safety and especially [the life of] first responders. But the strategy that officials may use, rather than arresting the recalcitrant citizen, is to make it very clear--absolutely clear—that rescue and response services may not be available. In essence, if you don't comply with evacuation orders, you are in effect waiving your right to get rescue and response if you need it … We just did a study on evacuations under scenarios of disasters without warnings. We are very concerned about disasters that occur without warning when we have to do evacuations in real-time—in essence, immediate—for example, an earthquake or a terrorist nuclear attack. We found about two thirds of people with children would not comply with official orders to evacuate, until and unless they were able to retrieve their children from school or day care. If we have two thirds of the population with children that would not comply, what we would have is evacuation chaos and an absolute breakdown of disaster response in circumstances that provided no warning.”
Research by the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) unearthed several factors that lead people to ignore warnings of severe or devastating weather alerts. The most common factor is OPTIMISM, because as human beings we prefer to think that, for us, things will go right rather than wrong, and that we will be among the lucky ones to escape. The next most common factor is UNCERTAINTY―people are told to prepare and evacuate and many just do not know how to go about doing it. So you sit back and keep thinking and saying: “What should I do? What should I do?” and this makes you increasingly uncertain, with the result that most people, when uncertain, keep doing the things they were doing before. The third factor is HERD THINKING―whereby we are very influenced by what our friends and neighbors do, so we look to see what they are doing―and if they are not “stocking-up” or not evacuating, then we assume they know what they are doing and we do likewise, not realizing (or denying) that they are as uncertain as we are.
Typical Reactions to Heaven’s Warnings
You have no doubt heard the saying “Like father, like son; like mother, like daughter”―which actually can be traced to Holy Scripture: “Behold every one that useth a common proverb, shall use this against thee, saying: ‘As the mother was, so also is her daughter’” (Ezechiel 16:44). Similarly, we could say―“As we are naturally, so we shall be spiritually!” Our natural, physical, bodily, material, earthly habits and attitudes seep into our supernatural and spiritual habits and attitudes. If a person is lazy in work, they are more likely to also be lazy about spiritual duties. If they are careless about material things, they will tend to be careless about spiritual things. Hence the above quoted research on people ignoring severe weather advisories, alerts and warnings, is just as applicable to the reaction of people to Heaven’s severe climate or chastisement advisories, alerts and warnings.
Therefore, most Catholics view Our Lady’s dire warnings as a case of “The boy crying: ‘Wolf!’” when there is no wolf to be found! Their mentality is one of: “It doesn’t apply to me, so why bother?” They have heard the warnings time and time again―but nothing happens. So they “switch-off” their minds to the warnings and just go about their daily life as though nothing was wrong. Just as the above quoted recipients of severe weather warnings, their “knee-jerk” response is one of false OPTIMISM―based upon one of many differing complacent rationalizations. “I’m not such a bad person! I'm not like most people! I go to church! I say my Rosary! etc.” Yet just as a natural storm makes no distinction between good people and bad people when it claims lives or inflicts serious injuries, likewise will Heaven do when it begins to chastise us for our sins and the sins of others―as Our Lady of Akita warned: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful.”
We are fools to ignore and do nothing about Our Lady's incessant and increasingly severe warnings: “Fools despise wisdom and instruction! … Fools covet those things which are hurtful to themselves! … The eyes of fools are on the ends of the Earth … The prosperity of fools shall destroy them! … And the number of fools is infinite!” (Proverbs 1:7; 1:22; 17:24; 1:32; Ecclesiastes 1:15). Holy Mother Church puts the following words of Scripture into the mouth of Mary, as part of the readings for the Masses on the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (December 8th) and also the Immaculate Heart of Mary (August 22nd): “Now therefore, ye children, hear me! Blessed are they that keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise―and refuse it not! Blessed is the man that heareth me, and that watcheth daily at my gates, and waiteth at the posts of my doors! He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord! But he that shall sin against me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate me love death … He who obeys me will not be put to shame, they who serve me will never fail. They who explain me shall have life everlasting!” (Proverbs 8:32-36; Ecclesiasticus 34:30-31). In other words, listen to her “weather warnings and advisories”, take them to heart, obey the instructions and pass them on to others.
From Year to Hour
Coming back to the concept of “a day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Peter 3:8), let us look at Our Lady’s “weather alerts” or spiritual storm advisories from the perspective of not being separated by hundreds of years―as in the case of Our Lady of Good Success giving her first warning in 1594, with the others following in the 379 years up to her messages at Akita in Japan in 1973―but look upon them as being given in one single day―by taking numbers of the year and making them into the numbers for the hours and minutes of the day. Thus the 1600s would become 16:00 hours or 4:00 p.m. and 1635 would become 16:35 p.m. or 4:35 p.m., etc. Thus Quito would translate to approximately 4:00 p.m. onwards; La Salette would translate to 6:46 p.m.; Lourdes would be 6:58 p.m.; Fatima would be 7:17 p.m. and Akita would be just before 8:00 p.m. So four major alerts, advisories and warnings in a ‘four hour’ period.
The Quito Weather Forecast (from 1594 to 1635)
Our Lady of Good Success appeared in Quito, Ecuador between 1594 and 1635. These centuries and years would translate to the period between 15:54(94) hours and 16:35 hours, on the 24-hour clock, or roughly between 3:54 p.m. and 4:35 p.m. In this “severe weather” 90-second warning, Our Lady says:
“At the end of the 19th century and throughout the 20th century, various heresies will be propagated ... As these heresies spread and dominate, the precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of morals. During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private. The small number of souls who, hidden, will preserve the treasure of the Faith and practice virtue, will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom. Many of them will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings … From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! … During these unfortunate times, evil will invade childhood innocence … Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world … Without virginity, it will be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon those lands in order to purify them … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith … In this way, vocations to the priesthood will be lost, resulting in a true calamity. Many authentic vocations will perish!”
The La Salette Weather Forecast (1846)
The year 1846 would translate to 18:46 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 6:46 p.m. Here is the two-minute weather warning (it is a brief warning and takes 2 minutes to read):
“If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it. I have suffered all of the time for the rest of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for this continually. And the rest of you think little of this. In vain you will pray, in vain you will act, you will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for the rest of you … Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! … Woe to the inhabitants of the earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family. Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other ... The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God … Churches will be locked up or desecrated. Priests and religious orders will be hunted down, and made to die a cruel death. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls. Evil books will be abundant on Earth and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God …
“All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement … France, Italy, Spain, and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian will fight Italian. A general war will follow which will be appalling … The wicked will make use of all their evil ways. Men will kill each other, massacre each other even in their homes. Then, at the first blow of God’s thundering sword, the mountains and all Nature will tremble in terror, for the disorders and crimes of men have pierced the vault of the Heavens. Paris will burn and Marseilles will be engulfed. Several cities will be shaken down and swallowed up by earthquakes. People will believe that all is lost. Nothing will be seen but murder, nothing will be heard but the clash of arms and blasphemy. The righteous will suffer greatly.”
The Lourdes Weather Forecast (1858)
The year 1858 would translate to 18:58 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 6:58 p.m. The spiritual climate at Lourdes could be described as sunny, but changing to overcast skies and threatening storm clouds.
At her first apparition at Lourdes, on February 11th, 1858, Our Lady appeared as a beautiful young woman, dressed in white and holding a Rosary, and smiling most graciously toward the frightened little visionary―which indicates she was not smiling beforehand.
At her third apparition, on February 14th, Bernadette, thinking perhaps all this might be trick of the devil, sprinkles Our Lady with holy water, asking her to remain if she came from God, otherwise go away. The Lady smiles―which again indicates she was not smiling beforehand.
At her second apparition, on February 18th, Our Lady seems to be a “kill-joy” because she tells Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world but only in the other!” But we want to be happy in this world as well as the other, don’t we? We want to keep our cake and we want to eat it!
At her sixth apparition on Sunday, February 21st, the Immaculate Lady looks off into the distance and shows signs of deep sorrow, saying: “Pray to God for sinners!” At the sight of her sadness, Bernadette cannot help shedding tears. Just as with Simeon’s prophecy, the Immaculate Heart of Mary seems to be pierced even now with the sword of sorrow caused by the sins of men, sins that crucify her Son, making Him a sign of contradiction.
The Fatima Weather Forecast (1917)
The year 1917 would translate to 19:17 p.m. on the 24-hour clock, or 7:17 p.m.
The Akita Weather Forecast (1973)
This is where the year/clock analogy fails somewhat―since there are only 60 minutes in an hour and you cannot have a time of 7:73 pm. Nevertheless we could say, by transforming the year into hours, that is almost 8:00 pm.
What’s the Forecast for 2024?
The year 2024 would translate to 20:24 or 8:24 pm on the 24-hour clock.
This article is still to be completed
Article 24
Thursday after Passion Sunday March 21st
Sink or Swim in the Tide of the Passion!
Thursday after Passion Sunday March 21st
Sink or Swim in the Tide of the Passion!
Troubled Waters and No Plain-Sailing With Jesus
A true Christian will never find a smooth path, nor calm sailing, nor a flight without turbulence on their way to Heaven. Not even God’s favorites are granted such a pipe-dream. Holy Scripture tells us: “For whom the Lord loveth, He chastiseth; and He scourgeth every son whom He receiveth!” (Hebrews 12:6). That is an unpalatable and repulsive thought to those who have been raised on “Cotton-Candy Catholicism” (“Candy-Floss Catholicism) and who prefer the Hollywood or Fairy-Tale version of the Faith in place of the real Faith. Not even Christ’s personally chosen and favored Apostles were spared the chastising and scourging, but were frequently tested and tried by events that God’s Providence thrust upon them. The fact that they were chosen Apostles did not guarantee them plain-sailing―as the following passages amply indicate:
“And forthwith Jesus obliged His disciples to go up into the boat, and to go before Him over the water, while He dismissed the people. And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain, alone, to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone. But the boat, in the midst of the sea, was tossed with the waves―for the wind was against them. And in the fourth watch of the night, Jesus came to them walking upon the sea. And they, seeing Him walk upon the sea, were troubled, saying: ‘It is an apparition! [a ghost]’ And they cried out for fear. And immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘Be of good heart! It is I―fear ye not! And Peter, making answer, said: ‘Lord, if it be Thou, then bid me come to Thee upon the waters!’ And Jesus said: ‘Come!’ And Peter, going down out of the boat, walked upon the water to come to Jesus. But seeing that the wind strong, he was afraid. And when he began to sink, he cried out, saying: ‘Lord! Save me!’ And immediately Jesus stretching forth His hand took hold of him, and said to him: ‘O thou of little faith! Why didst thou doubt?’ And when they were come up into the boat, the wind ceased. And they that were in the boat came and adored him, saying: ‘Indeed Thou art the Son of God!’” (Matthew 14:22-33).
At another time, “when Jesus entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him. And when they were sailing, Jesus slept. And there came down a storm of wind upon the lake and behold a great tempest arose in the lake, so that the boat was covered with waves and they were in danger―but He was asleep. And they came and awakened Him, saying: ‘Master! Lord! Save us! We perish!’ Then, rising up, He rebuked and commanded the winds and the rage of the sea water― and it ceased and there came a great calm. And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful? Where is your Faith? O ye of little Faith!’ Who, being afraid, wondered, saying one to another: ‘Who is this? What manner of Man do you think this is? He commandeth both the winds and the sea―and they obey Him?’” (Matthew 8:23-27; Luke 8:23-25).
A Contrary Current or Tide
An incident in the life of St. Teresa of Avila illustrates the same hallmark of troubled waters for God’s saints. The Life of St. Teresa, a 1912 translation by Alice Lady Lovat, taken from the French version by ‘A Carmelite’ Nun, gives the following story on page 548. In January, of the last year of her life, 1582, Teresa left Ávila to establish convents in Burgos and Grenada, and Teresa describes the journey and what befell her along the way:
“We had to run many dangers. At no part of the road were the risks greater than within a few leagues of Burgos, at a place called Los Pontes. The rivers were so high that the water in places covered everything, neither road nor the smallest footpath could be seen, only water everywhere, and two abysses on each side. It seemed foolhardiness to advance, especially in a carriage, for if one strayed ever so little off the road (then invisible), one must have perished.”
The saint is silent on her share of the adventure, but her companions relate that, seeing their alarm, Teresa turned to them and encouraged them, saying that “as they were engaged in doing God’s work, how could they die in a better cause?” She then led the way on foot. The current was so strong that she lost her footing, and was on the point of being carried away by the current when Our Lord sustained her.
“Oh, my Lord!” she exclaimed, with her usual loving familiarity, “When will You stop scattering obstacles in our path?”
“Do not complain, daughter!” the Divine Master answered, “For I always I treat My friends in this way!”
“Ah, Lord! It is also the reason why You have so few of them!” was her reply. Ouch!
As St. Elizebeth Ann Seton said: “We must often draw the comparison between time and eternity. This is the remedy of all our troubles. How small will the present moment appear when we enter that great ocean!”
Yes, life is messy, life is hard, and everyone suffers. We don’t like that―that is only natural, but perhaps too natural and not supernatural enough. St. Francis de Sales points out that “Many would be willing to have afflictions provided that they not be inconvenienced by them!”
One day God will wipe every tear ever shed from our eyes: “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes: and death shall be no more, nor mourning, nor crying, nor sorrow shall be any more, for the former things are passed away!” (Apocalypse 21:4).
Walking On Water―Or Drowning In It?
The above miraculous incident, where St. Peter found himself being able to walk on water for a short period of time, before beginning to sink beneath the waves, is very instructive. We might not be able to “walk on water” like St. Peter, but we most certainly would like to “walk on air” ― meaning that we want to feel extremely excited or happy. Who doesn’t? Yet Our Lady said to St. Bernadette, whom she had favored with many apparitions at Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next life!” Ouch! Our Lord had said the same things to His Apostles at the Last Supper: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy!” … in Heaven (John 16:20).
All that Our Lord is saying―and Our Lady too, for that matter―is that for anyone hoping to get to Heaven, the cross is the daily staple diet―you can take it or leave it. Most people did not take it and they now have an even bigger cross in either in the fires of Hell, or, if they got lucky, in the fires of Purgatory. There is no other way! Cotton-Candy Catholicism is doomed to fail. You may well complain about the “negativity” of the message―but, as Holy Scripture says: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! [Neither is Our Lady!] For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). Painting a false picture of the small numbers that are saved does nobody any good. Sure, you can lie about it, create an over-optimistic picture of it (which is most people have always done)―but it is a lie that will lead many more to their damnation. Just because they believe a lie, does nothing to increase their chances of salvation. Tell them the truth, and there is at least a hope that some will change their lives to embrace that truth. If anyone could have painted a sweet picture of salvation and glossed-over the horrors of Hell―then that person would have been Our Lord, Who is Truth itself―but He didn’t, did He? He told the truth―He had to―He was the Truth.
Sure, nobody likes to hear negativity―but neither does God like the negativity of sin. Negativity deserves and begets negativity. If you disobey God, you lose Heaven. As you sow, so shall you reap. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit―as Our Lord Himself says: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them. Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that doth the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:16-21). So “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33).
The Tide of Passiontide
Each year the Church presents to us―not only 40 Day of Lent in order to do penance―but within those 40 days we have 2 whole weeks that we call “Passiontide” which are dedicated to the Cross, Suffering, Passion and Death of Our Lord. The word “Passiontide” means “Passion time”, yet we can also think of the word “tide” as being the alternate rising and falling of the sea, or something that fluctuates like the tides of the sea. EACH YEAR the tide of the Passion invades our souls and immerses them in its bitter waters. EACH YEAR the Church, so to speak, “rubs our sinful noses” in the horrific tortures, mental agony, brutal persecution and ignominious death of Our Lord. It is, of course, not pleasant to look and contemplate―if we do so correctly, without sweetening the pot, or superficially making light of what Our Lord underwent. It is all the more unpleasant when we realize that we are the cause of all those sufferings and that death through the callous and frequent commission of our personal sins. Is the Church cruel for rubbing our noses in these bitter waters of Passiontide? No―far from it! It is in these bitter waters that we learn about the bitterness of sin and its bitter consequences. As St. Paul writes: “For although I made you sorrowful by my epistle, I do not repent! And even if I did repent, seeing that the epistle did make you sorrowful― although but for a time―now I am glad! Not because you were made sorrowful―but because you were made sorrowful unto doing penance!” (2 Corinthians 7:8-9).
The words that the Church places on the lips of Our Lord in the Good Friday liturgy should haunt our shame: “O My people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer Me! Because I led thee out of the land of Egypt, thou hast prepared a cross for thy Savior! Because I led thee out through the desert forty years and fed thee with manna, and brought thee into a land exceeding good―thou hast prepared a Cross for thy Savior. What more ought I have done for thee, that I have not done? I planted thee, indeed, My most beautiful vineyard: and thou hast become exceeding bitter to Me: for in My thirst thou gavest Me vinegar to drink, and with a lance thou hast pierced the side of thy Savior.” How superficially are those words sung or read on Good Friday―paying more attention to superficially singing it well, or admiring how well the choir is singing, rather than letting the meaning of those words penetrate our souls like Our Lord’s side and heart was penetrated by the lance!
Back to the Lake!
Let us go back to the lake! Not to swim, paddle or sunbathe―but to immerse ourselves into the teachings that can be pulled out of the above waters of grace in the Gospel accounts of the Apostles on the lake. There are many things to be learnt that are floating on the top of the waters or that lie deep beneath the waters. God and Our Lord used water on many occasions as either part of their miracles or as a means of teaching. For example, already in the very second line of the Bible, we read that “the spirit of God moved over the waters” (Genesis 1:2). Then in sixth verse we read: “Let there be a firmament made amidst the waters: and let it divide the waters from the waters!” (Genesis 1:6). Again, “And God called the dry land, Earth; and the gathering together of the waters, he called Seas. And God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:10).
► SAVING AND DESTRUCTIVE WATERS #1: God later used that water to cleanse and purify the world which had grown sinful: “The wickedness of men was great on the Earth, and the thought of their heart was bent upon evil at all times. It repented God that he had made man on the earth. And being touched inwardly with sorrow of heart, He said: ‘I will destroy man, whom I have created, from the face of the Earth … for it repenteth Me that I have made them!’ And the Earth was corrupted before God, and was filled with iniquity ... But Noe found grace before the Lord … And when God had seen that the Earth was corrupted―for all flesh had corrupted its way upon the Earth―He said to Noe: ‘The end of all flesh is come before Me, the Earth is filled with iniquity through them, and I will destroy them with the Earth! Make thee an ark … Behold I will bring the waters of a great flood upon the Earth, to destroy all flesh … All things that are in the Earth shall be consumed … I will rain upon the Earth forty days and forty nights; and I will destroy every substance that I have made, from the face of the Earth … And the flood was forty days upon the Earth, and the waters increased, and lifted up the ark on high from the Earth. For they overflowed exceedingly and filled all on the face of the Earth: and the ark was carried upon the waters. And the waters prevailed beyond measure upon the Earth: and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered … And all flesh was destroyed that moved upon the Earth―fowl, cattle, beasts, all creeping things and all men. And all things wherein there is the breath of life on the Earth, died. And he destroyed all the substance that was upon the Earth … and Noe only remained, and they that were with him in the ark. And the waters prevailed upon the Earth a hundred and fifty days … And the waters returned from off the Earth, going and coming, and they began to be abated after a hundred and fifty days. And the ark rested upon the mountains of Armenia in the twenty-seventh day of the seventh month. And the waters were going and decreasing until the tenth month―for in the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains appeared” (Genesis 6:5-17; 7:4; 7:17-24; 8:3-5).
When the days of the flood are all totaled we find that Noe and his family, as well as the animals, were in the ark a total of 371 days―a massive cleansing operation had taken place. The scary part is found in the words of Our Lady in 1956 and 1973, where she mentions the Great Flood and compares the state of the world back then to the state of the modern-day world. To Blessed Sister Elena Aiello (1895-1961)―mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ―Our Lady, in an apparition on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th, 1956, said: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!” Whereas, at her apparition at Akita in Japan, in 1973, Our Lady adds: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead.”
► SAVING AND DESTRUCTIVE WATERS #2: God would later use the water of the river to save Moses from the mass slaughter of all male babies by the Egyptians, whom the Pharao ordered to be killed by thrown into and drowned in the waters of the river: “There arose a new king over Egypt, that knew not Joseph, and he said to his people: ‘Behold the people of the children of Israel are numerous and stronger than we! Come, let us wisely oppress them, lest they multiply: and if any war shall rise against us, join with our enemies!’ … And the Egyptians hated the children of Israel, and afflicted them and mocked them. And they made their life bitter with hard works in clay, and brick, and with all manner of service. But the more they oppressed them, the more they were multiplied, and increased … And the king of Egypt spoke to the midwives of the Hebrews, commanding them: ‘When you shall do the office of midwives to the Hebrew women, and the time of delivery is come―if it be a man child, then kill it; if a woman, then keep it alive!’ … Pharao also charged all his people, saying: ‘Whatsoever shall be born of the male sex, ye shall cast into the river; but whatsoever of the female, ye shall save alive!’ [A certain Hebrew woman] conceived and bore a son; and hid him for three months. When she could hide him no longer, she took a basket made of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and pitch: and put the little babe therein, and laid him in the sedges on the river’s bank [Sedges are a kind and tall grass growing in the shallow water at the edge of the river― hence the basket containing Moses was floating on water, at the river bank, amidst the tall grasses]. The daughter of Pharao and her maids walked by the river’s bank, for she came down to wash herself in the river. And when she saw the basket, she sent one of her maids for it. And when it was brought, she opened it and seeing within it an infant crying, having compassion on it she said: ‘This is one of the babes of the Hebrews!’ And the child’s sister said to her: ‘Shall I go and call to thee a Hebrew woman, to nurse the babe?’ She answered: ‘Go!’ The maid went and called her mother. And Pharao’s daughter said to her. ‘Take this child and nurse him for me! I will give thee thy wages!’ The woman took, and nursed the child: and when he was grown up, she delivered him to Pharao’s daughter. And she adopted him for a son, and called him Moses, saying: ‘Because I took him out of the water!’” (Exodus 1:8-10; 1:12-16; 2:2-10). “Moses” or, in the Egyptian tongue, “Moyses”, signifies one taken or saved out of the water.
► SAVING AND DESTRUCTIVE WATERS #3: God would later use water to save His Chosen People from the Egyptians, when God parted the water of the Red Sea for Moses to lead the Israelites to safety, whilst using the same waters to drown all of Pharao’s army who were in hot pursuit of them. This, as you can see for yourself, is a macrocosm of the microcosm―meaning that just as God’s Providence saved Moses in the basket floating on water, when male Hebrews were meant to be drowned in the river―here God’s Providence drowns the Egyptians in the water of the Red Sea, while saving the Israelites by miraculously parting those waters and allowing them to cross to safety.
“And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Go and speak to Pharao, the king of Egypt, that he let the children of Israel go out of his land!’” (Exodus 6:10-11). Of course, we all know that Pharao was duplicitous in his speech―speaking from both corners of his mouth―telling Moses that the Israelites could go, but then reneging on his word. Thus God inflicted the Ten Plagues on Pharao and Egypt―one of which was the waters of Egypt into blood: “The Lord said to Moses: ‘Say to Aaron: “Take thy rod and stretch forth thy hand upon the waters of Egypt, and upon their rivers, and streams and pools, and all the ponds of waters, that they may be turned into blood: and let blood be in all the land of Egypt, both in vessels of wood and of stone!”‘ And Moses and Aaron did as the Lord had commanded―and lifting up the rod he struck the water of the river before Pharao and his servants and it was turned into blood. And the fishes that were in the river died; and the river corrupted, and the Egyptians could not drink the water of the river, and there was blood in all the land of Egypt … And all the Egyptians dug round about the river for water to drink―for they could not drink of the water of the river” (Exodus 7:19-24).
Finally “when Pharao had sent out the people [released the Israelites], the Lord led them not by the way of the land of the Philistines―which is near, thinking lest perhaps they would repent, if they should see wars arise against them, and would return into Egypt―but He led them about by the way of the desert, which is by the Red Sea, and the children of Israel went up armed out of the land of Egypt … And it was told the king of the Egyptians that the people was fled. And the heart of Pharao and of his servants was changed with regard to the people, and they said: ‘What meant we to do, that we let Israel go from serving us?’ So he made ready his chariot, and took all his people with him. And he took six hundred chosen chariots, and all the chariots that were in Egypt, and the captains of the whole army. And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharao king of Egypt, and he pursued the children of Israel … The Egyptians followed the steps of them who were gone before, they found them encamped at the sea side … And when Moses had stretched forth his hand over the sea, the Lord took it away by a strong and burning wind blowing all the night, and turned it into dry ground: and the water was divided. And the children of Israel went in through the midst of the sea dried up: for the water was as a wall on their right hand and on their left. And the Egyptians pursuing went in after them, and all Pharao’s horses, his chariots and horsemen through the midst of the sea … And the Lord said to Moses: ‘Stretch forth thy hand over the sea, that the waters may come again upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots and horsemen!’ And when Moses had stretched forth his hand towards the sea, it returned to the former place and, as the Egyptians were fleeing away, the waters came upon them, and the Lord shut them up in the middle of the waves. And the waters returned, and covered the chariots and the horsemen of all the army of Pharao, who had come into the sea after them, neither did there so much as one of them remain. But the children of Israel marched through the midst of the sea upon dry land, and the waters were to them as a wall on the right hand and on the left. And the Lord delivered Israel on that day out of the hands of the Egyptians” (Exodus 13:17-18; 14:5-9; 14:21-30).
The Filthy Waters of Sin
You can see here, in the above details, God’s use of water―to either destroy or to save. Some are destroyed through water and some are saved through water. Yet in all the above cases, there is much tribulation and suffering experienced. The same is true for the waters of Baptism―not all baptized persons end up being saved, in fact, the majority are damned. It is not the waters of Baptism that damn them―for the waters of Baptism are meant to save―but it their own pig-headed stubbornness in sin that damns them―they do not ‘drown’ in the waters of Baptism, but they ‘drown’ in the filthy waters of sin. Our Lady of Good Success makes some reference to this “filthy ocean” of sin when she speaks of our modern-day era, saying: “From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! ... Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children born without the blessing of the Church … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay and the precious light of Faith will gradually be extinguished until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals … Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women … the spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world!”
The Waters of Retribution for Sin
In the conference of Pope John Paul II, in Fulda, Germany, as reported by the German Catholic journal and magazine, Stimme des Glaubens, in 1981, the Holy Father was asked: “What about the Third Secret of Fatima? Should it not have already been published by 1960?”
Pope John Paul II replied: “Given the seriousness of the contents, my predecessors in the Petrine office diplomatically preferred to postpone publication so as not to encourage the world power of Communism to make certain moves. On the other hand, it should be sufficient for all Christians to know this: if there is a message in which it is written that the oceans will flood whole areas of the Earth, and that from one moment to the next millions of people will perish, truly the publication of such a message is no longer something to be so much desired. Many wish to know simply from curiosity and a taste for the sensational, but they forget that knowledge also implies responsibility. They only seek the satisfaction of their curiosity, and that is dangerous if at the same time they are not disposed to do something, and if they are convinced that it is impossible to do anything against evil.” At this point the Pope grasped a Rosary and said: “Here is the remedy against this evil. Pray, pray, and ask for nothing more. Leave everything else to the Mother of God.”
The Holy Father was then asked: “What is going to happen to the Church?”
He answered: “We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ … With your and my prayer it is possible to mitigate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectively renewed. How many times has the renewal of the Church sprung from blood! This time, too, it will not be otherwise. We must be strong and prepared, and trust in Christ and His Mother, and be very, very assiduous in praying the Rosary.”
Water into Wine―Wine into Blood―Sinners into Saints
Water, wine and blood―what have they got in common? We drink all three! Water and wine―well that is pretty obvious―but blood? Yes, we drink the Blood of Christ in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Furthermore, Our Lord changed water into wine at the marriage feast of Cana; God changed water into blood in the time of Moses (see above), and Christ changed wine into blood at the Last Supper. On Calvary, when the soldier pierced the side of Jesus with a lance, blood and water flowed out His side: “One of the soldiers with a spear, opened His side, and immediately there came out blood and water” (John 19:34). As Holy Scripture says: “There are three that give testimony on earth―the spirit, and the water, and the blood―and these three are one” (1 John 5:8).
● WATER symbolizes grace in general, and, in particular, the sanctifying grace received through the waters of Baptism: “Here is water! What doth hinder me from being baptized?” (Acts 8:36).
● WINE symbolizes charity or love in general―and since “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), wine also symbolizes God in general, and the Holy Ghost (Holy Spirit) in particular, to whom we pray: “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in us the fire of Thy love!”
● BLOOD symbolizes suffering in general, and, in particular, the Blood of Christ shed in His Passion and Death for our redemption and salvation: “This is My Blood, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!” (Matthew 26:28).
Which brings us to the whole point of Christ’s incarnation and coming upon Earth―that is, the redemption and salvation of souls: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “The Lamb shall lead them to the fountains of the waters of life” (Apocalypse 7:17). “He that shall drink of the water that I will give him, shall not thirst for ever! The water that I will give him, shall become in him a fountain of water, springing up into life everlasting” (John 4:13-14). “I baptize you in the water unto penance” (Matthew 3:11). “I have baptized you with water; but He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost” (Mark 1:8).
As a side note on that―at Pentecost, when the Holy Ghost descended upon the Apostles and disciples in the form of tongues of fire, it resulted in them going out to preach in the streets, at which point the listeners thought that they were drunk on wine! “And when the days of the Pentecost were accomplished, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from Heaven, as of a mighty wind coming, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they began to speak with diverse tongues, according as the Holy Ghost gave them to speak. Now there were dwelling at Jerusalem, Jews, devout men, out of every nation under Heaven. And when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded in mind, because that every man heard them speak in his own tongue. And they were all amazed, and wondered, saying: Behold, are not all these, that speak, Galileans? And how have we heard, every man our own tongue wherein we were born? … And they were all astonished and wondered, saying one to another: ‘What meaneth this?’ But others, mocking, said: ‘These men are full of new wine!’ [14] But Peter standing up with the eleven, lifted up his voice, and spoke to them: ‘These are not drunk, as you suppose, seeing it is but the third hour of the day! But this is that which was spoken of by the prophet Joel: “I will pour out of My Spirit upon all flesh!” … Do penance, and be baptized every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of your sins―and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost!’ … They therefore that received his word, were baptized; and there were added in that day about three thousand souls” (Acts 2:1-41). Similarly, it was said of St. John the Baptist that “he shall be great before the Lord; and shall drink no wine nor strong drink―and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother’s womb” (Luke 1:15). Who needs wine when you have “wine” or “spirit” of the Holy Ghost (Holy Spirit)?!! Holy Scripture says: “Be not drunk with wine, wherein is luxury―but be ye filled with the Holy Spirit!” (Ephesians 5:18). Wine symbolizes the Holy Spirit, because being full of the Holy Spirit is being full of joy.
Water, Wine and Blood―The Three Levels of Love
As the spiritual masters and authors tell us, there are three stages of the spiritual life that we have to pass through before we will be admitted into Heaven―these are: (1) The Purgative Way or the Way of Beginners; (2) The Illuminative Way or the Way of Progress or Proficiency; and (3) The Unitive Way or the Way of Perfection. Water, wine and blood could be said to correspond to these three stages. Water being applied to the Purgative Way or the Way of Beginners. Wine being applicable to the Illuminative Way or the Way of Progress or Proficiency. Blood being applicable to the Unitive Way or the Way of Perfection.
● WATER: Even the economic side of things indicates the same order―water is cheap, wine is expensive, blood is priceless. With water we wash our dirty bodies―hence the Purgative Way. Water is also the staple drink of everyone―babies and children included. Water is cheap and it costs little or nothing to give someone else a cup of water: “Whosoever shall give to drink, to one of these little ones, a cup of cold water … he shall not lose his reward!” (Matthew 10:42).
● WINE: Wine is not given to babies and children, but only to those who have advanced in age and maturity―hence it is linked to the Way of Proficiency. Furthermore, from the point of view of friendship, a friend is someone with whom our relationship has progressed and passed from the beginnings of a mere stranger or an acquaintance, into a relationship of friendship. We will give water to strangers without much of a fuss―but wine we reserve for friends. This is also seen to be case with Our Lord, Who speaks of His ever growing relationship with His Apostles as having passed from mere acquaintance level, or “employer and employee”, or “master and servant” relationship, into a blossoming relationship called “friendship.” Our Lord says to them: “I will not now call you servants … But I have called you friends!” (John 15:15), going on to say that He there is a superior “wine” that He will drink with them in the Kingdom of Heaven: “And I say to you, I will not drink from henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I shall drink it with you new in the Kingdom of My Father” (Matthew 26:29).
● BLOOD: To give your water to someone is a basic act of kindness. To give your wine to another is an even greater act of kindness―for it is more expensive. Yet to give your blood for someone is the supreme act of charity―as Our Lord Himself says (and also does): “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). “Therefore doth the Father love Me―because I lay down My life” (John 10:17). “I lay down My life for My sheep” (John 10:15). “Jesus said to Peter: ‘Wilt thou lay down thy life for Me?’ Peter said to him: ‘I will lay down my life for Thee!’” (John 13:37-38) ― and we say, in the Stations of the Cross: “Jesus! You died for love of me! Let me die for love of Thee!” ― but do we really mean it? Have we really reached that level of love? Passiontide is all about that level of love―loving unto blood! Suffering unto blood! For most persons, that is terrifying―yet Holy Scripture speaks of this need, saying: “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” (Hebrews 12:4). Our Lord also implies this when He says: “Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, then itself remaineth alone. But if it die, then it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal” (John 12:24-25).
Swimming or Sailing Safely Through Suffering
The only way to Heaven is through the cross of suffering―there is no other way. “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). This is why the Church, in Her Liturgy, exults: “In cruce salus” ― “In the cross is salvation” ― and “Ave crux, spes unica!” ― “Hail O cross, sole hope!” The saints understood this so well that, if they ever noticed that they were without a cross at some point in their lives, then they would beg God to send one!
When Christopher Columbus sailed on his expedition to the Americas, his three ships―Pinta, Niña and Santa Maria―all had massive red crosses on their sails. The crosses on the sails were there for a double reason―firstly as a mark of Faith, which showed their Christian Faith; secondly, as a kind of a sacramental, which would invoke the protection of Heaven during the sea voyages. Just like the Christian life, those sea voyages were not fun and games―but a real cross! Small caravels, like the Niña and Pinta, were relatively small and very open with little shelter against the elements. They could only carry between 40 and 50 tons and usually had a crew of around 30 sailors each. Unlike the Santa Maria, which at least had tiny cabins where sailors could sleep between eight-hour shifts, the Niña and Pinta had a single small deck at the rear of the ship with only one cramped cabin reserved for the captain. The sailors on a caravels had to live and sleep on the deck―for there is almost no private space. Furthermore, work was relentless on any 15th-century ship. The 20 sailors on the Niña and the 26 sailors on the Pinta would have been constantly engaged with adjusting the rigging, trimming the sails, inspecting for leaks and plugging them with spongy scraps of old rope called oakum. The round-the-clock workload meant that even if you were off-duty, there was little or no chance of getting some good sleep on the deck while the other sailors stomped around. Hammocks weren’t yet in use on ships in the 15th century.
On top of that, there was much trouble and problems with the food on board the ships. Columbus stocked a full year’s worth of food for the journey, not knowing how long it would be before they could return to Spain. For food to last at sea, it needed to be dry. Staples included dried and salted anchovies and cod, pickled or salted beef and pork, dried grains like chickpeas, lentils and beans, and, of course, hardtack biscuits. Hardtack biscuits were so rock solid that they could only be eaten if softened with water or dipped in the communal slurry served every meal in a large wooden trough. Yet tooth-breaking, dry biscuits were still preferable to those that had been spoiled by exposure to water in their storage barrel. Ferdinand Columbus, the explorer’s 14-year-old son, reported on the conditions on Columbus’s fourth voyage to the Americas: “What with the heat and dampness, our ship biscuit had become so wormy that, God help me, I saw many who waited for darkness to eat porridge made of it, that they might not see the maggots,” wrote young Ferdinand, “and others were so used to eating them that they didn’t even trouble to pick them out because they might lose their supper had they been so fastidious.”
Swimming Across the Atlantic Ocean
Benoit Lecomte (born 1967) is a French-born long-distance swimmer (now a naturalized American citizen) who claimed to be the first man to swim across the Atlantic Ocean without a kick board in 1998. From July 16th (Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel) to September 25th 1998, Lecomte, then aged 31, undertook a swim in stages from Massachusetts to Brittany, France. During his 73-day, 3,716-mile swim, Lecomte was accompanied by a 40-foot (about half the length of Christopher Columbus’ Niña and Pinta) sailboat that had an electromagnetic field for 25 ft to ward off sharks. He was accompanied by a crew of three aboard the sailboat, where he could rest and eat between each swimming period. Lecomte typically spent eight hours swimming each day in sessions of two to four hours.
Where Lecomte succeeded, another Atlantic swimmer failed. Ben Hooper, a 38-year-old former English policeman, waded into the Atlantic Ocean from a beach in Dakar, Senegal hoping to swim across the Atlantic Ocean to Brazil, 1,879 miles away. He was hoping to swim around 12 miles a day for over 140 days straight. On the very first day, as the adrenaline wore off and the magnitude of the task began to sink in, he swam against currents that made it difficult to achieve his desired daily mileage of 12 miles. All he could manage was 4.5 miles. A fierce wind drove across the water and at times the swell rose so high Hooper lost sight of his support boat. On day two, Hooper’s crew lost contact with a second support boat, whose captain had returned to Dakar, refusing to continue with the expedition. A couple of days later, Hooper again faced unusually strong currents, limiting his mileage. Clouds stretched across the vast horizon, sometimes bringing rain, and the ocean became dark and choppy. Hooper began to spend more and more time on the boat, waiting for moments of calm. By day seven he was down on his targets. Fatigue mounted. Low moments became commonplace. His body was under attack. Small jellyfish stings were regular and sapped energy. While swimming through seaweed, lice nipped at his torso. When the ocean was choppy, waves battered his back, arms and legs, pushing him under, exacerbating exhaustion. In poor conditions, Hooper was in danger of injuring himself getting on and off the boat, and every now and then he would take a hit from a kayak that glided alongside him for support.
During day 17, he was sick, twice. On day 18, he began to complain of neuralgia. On day 21, Hooper swam blindly into the half-eaten remains of a Portuguese-man-of-war, a jellyfish whose venom paralyses its victims. Hooper began to writhe in pain, unaware of the cause. When he was retrieved from the water, the crew discovered stings up and down the right side of his body. A section of tentacle was still attached to his shoulder and had to be removed. Every now and then his eyes would roll into the back of his head and, as his speech began to slur and his blood pressure plummeted, he struggled to remain conscious. Hooper later told me that, at one point, he was “on my way out”, and that the ship’s medic, Pamela Mackie, “brought me back” to life. For hours, Hooper remained in significant danger. Pain coursed through his body like an electric current. For support, Mackie reached a British trauma surgeon by satellite, who told her that renal failure was an acute possibility. If his kidney packed up, Hooper would not survive. Hooper spent the next four days on the boat, recuperating. On day 26, he re-entered the water and swam two miles, still sore from the attack. Three days later, in stormy seas, a steering cable snapped and required repair. The storm built. Waves rose to 30ft, crashing around the crew. Now clouds covered the sky and everything appeared eerie. The rain poured. The wind grew in speed and force. The catamaran, perhaps betraying its age, creaked and groaned. Finally, on December 15th, Hooper put out a press release, announcing the expedition’s end.
All of this brings to mind the words of St. Paul, that Holy Mother Church placed before at the beginning of Lent: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain. And every one that striveth for the mastery, refraineth himself from all things: and they indeed that they may receive a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible one. I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection―lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
On the Stormy Sea of Persecution
St. John Bosco’s vision of the crisis in the Church is also well worth considering here, since we are talking about water, sailing, swimming and sinking! Don Bosco relates his vision:
“Imagine yourselves to be with me on the seashore, or better still, on an isolated rock and not to see any patch of land except what is under your feet. On the whole of that vast sheet of water, you see an innumerable fleet of ships in battle array. The prows of the ships are formed into sharp, spear-like points so that whatever they are thrust-into, they pierce and completely destroy. These ships are armed with cannons, with lots of rifles, with incendiary materials, with other arms of all kinds, and also with books, and they advance against a ship very much bigger and higher than themselves and try to ram it with the prows, or to burn it, or in some way to do it every possible harm. As escorts to that majestic fully equipped ship, there are many smaller ships, which receive commands by signal from it and carry out movements to defend themselves from the opposing fleet.
“In the midst of the immense expanse of sea, two mighty columns of great height arise, a little distance the one from the other. On the top of one, there is the statue of the Immaculate Virgin, from whose feet hangs a large placard with this inscription: “Auxilium Christianorum—Help of Christians.” On the other, which is much higher and bigger, stands a Host of great size proportionate to the column and beneath is another placard with the words: “Salus Credentium—Salvation of Believers.”
“The supreme commander on the big ship is the Sovereign Pontiff. He, on seeing the fury of the enemies and the evils among which his faithful find themselves, determines to summon around himself the captains of the smaller ships, to hold a council and decide on what is to be done. All the captains come aboard and gather around the Pope. They hold a meeting, but meanwhile the wind and the waves gather in storm, so they are sent back to control their own ships.
“There comes a short lull; for a second time the Pope gathers the captains together around him, while the flagship goes on its course. But the frightful storm returns. The Pope stands at the helm and all his energies are directed to steering the ship towards those two columns, from the top of which and from every side of which are hanging numerous anchors and big hooks, fastened to chains.
“All the enemy ships move to attack it, and they try in every way to stop it and to sink it: some with writings or books or inflammable materials, of which they are full; others with guns, with rifles and with rams. The battle rages ever more relentlessly. The enemy prows (battering rams on the front of the ships) thrust violently, but their efforts and impact prove useless. They make attempts in vain and waste all their labor and ammunition; the big ship goes safely and smoothly on its way. Sometimes it happens that, when struck by formidable blows, it gets large, deep gaps in its sides; but no sooner is the harm done than a gentle breeze blows from the two columns and the cracks close up and the gaps are stopped immediately.
“Meanwhile, the guns of the assailants are blown up, the rifles and other arms and prows are broken; many ships are shattered and sink into the sea. Then, the frenzied enemies strive to fight hand to hand, with fists, with blows, with blasphemy and with curses. All at once the Pope falls gravely wounded. Immediately, those who are with him run to help him and they lift him up. A second time the Pope is struck, he falls again and dies. A shout of victory and of joy rings out amongst the enemies; from their ships an unspeakable mockery arises. But hardly is the Pontiff dead than another Pope takes his place. The pilots of the ships, having met together, have elected the Pope so quickly that the news of the death of the Pope coincides with the news of the election of the successor. The adversaries begin to lose courage. The new Pope, putting the enemy to rout and overcoming every obstacle, guides the ship right up to the two columns and comes to rest between them; he makes it fast with a light chain that hangs from the bow to an anchor of the column on which stands the Host; and with another light chain which hangs from the stern, he fastens it at the opposite end to another anchor hanging from the column on which stands the Immaculate Virgin.
“Then a great convulsion takes place. All the ships that until then had fought against the Pope’s ship are scattered; they flee away, collide and break to pieces one against another. Some sink and try to sink others. Several small ships that had fought gallantly for the Pope race to be the first to bind themselves to those two columns. Many other ships, having retreated through fear of the battle, cautiously watch from far away; the wrecks of the broken ships having been scattered in the whirlpools of the sea, they in their turn sail in good earnest to those two columns, and, having reached them, they make themselves fast to the hooks hanging down from them and there they remain safe, together with the principal ship, on which is the Pope. Over the sea there reigns a great calm.”
At this point Don Bosco asked one of his fellow priests, Fr. Rua: “What do you think of the story?” Fr. Rua answered: “It seems to me that the Pope’s ship might mean the Church, of which he is the head: the ships, men; the sea, this world. Those who defend the big ship are the good, lovingly attached to the Holy See; the others are her enemies, who try with every kind of weapon to annihilate her. The two columns of salvation seem to be devotion to Mary Most Holy and to the Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist.”
Fr. Rua did not speak of the Pope who fell and died, and Don Bosco also was silent about him. He simply added: “You are right! Only I ought to correct one expression. The enemy ships are persecutions. The most serious trials for the Church are near at hand. That which has been so far is almost nothing in the face of that which must befall. Her enemies are represented by the ships that tried to sink the principal ship if they could. Only two means are left to save her amidst so much confusion: DEVOTION TO MARY MOST HOLY and FREQUENT COMMUNION, making use of every means and doing our best to practice them and having them practiced everywhere and by everybody.” Don Bosco did not give any other explanations about this dream.
Nevertheless, it is very clear that we are now living the days that St. John Bosco foresaw in his vision. The persecution of the Church is the ultimate and underlying agenda that hides behind the current Satanic “smoke and mirrors” that we are seeing all throughout the world today. As Sister of Lucia of Fatima clearly stated, Our Lady has said that we have now entered the period commonly called “The Last Days” or “The End Times”―not that the world is going to end any time soon, for the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary followed by a period of peace and holiness, before the Antichrist appears, must all come first before the end of the world. Nevertheless, before the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary there has to be a time of terrible persecution of the Church, a time of localized wars and also a Third World War, where―as Our Lady says―”all will seem lost.” If we are not building our “ark” as these storm clouds gather and if we imitate the complacent Chosen People, who “sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play” (Exodus 32:6; 1 Corinthians 10:7), then we risk sinking and drowning in ocean of sin that is invading what is left of “Christian Dry Land”.
As St. Paul warns in the text presented to us at the beginning of Lent: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all in Moses were baptized―in the cloud, and in the sea. And did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them―and the rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased―for they were overthrown in the desert. Now these things were done in a figure of us, that we should not covet evil things as they also coveted. Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play!’ Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed fornication, and there fell in one day three and twenty thousand! Neither let us tempt Christ―as some of them tempted, and perished by the serpents! Neither do you murmur―as some of them murmured, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now all these things happened to them in figure―and they are written for our correction, upon whom the ends of the world are come! Wherefore he that thinketh himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:1-12).
Just as the Israelites had to spend many years in the desert of suffering before being allowed into the Promised Land, so, too, do we have to spend many years on the sea of suffering here below, before we can have a chance of entering the Promised Land of Heaven. It is not what we suffer that matters the most―but how we suffer. That is why St. Augustine says that the same sufferings, the same crosses, lead some souls to Heaven and other souls to Hell. Suffering requires love. “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profiteth me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
A true Christian will never find a smooth path, nor calm sailing, nor a flight without turbulence on their way to Heaven. Not even God’s favorites are granted such a pipe-dream. Holy Scripture tells us: “For whom the Lord loveth, He chastiseth; and He scourgeth every son whom He receiveth!” (Hebrews 12:6). That is an unpalatable and repulsive thought to those who have been raised on “Cotton-Candy Catholicism” (“Candy-Floss Catholicism) and who prefer the Hollywood or Fairy-Tale version of the Faith in place of the real Faith. Not even Christ’s personally chosen and favored Apostles were spared the chastising and scourging, but were frequently tested and tried by events that God’s Providence thrust upon them. The fact that they were chosen Apostles did not guarantee them plain-sailing―as the following passages amply indicate:
“And forthwith Jesus obliged His disciples to go up into the boat, and to go before Him over the water, while He dismissed the people. And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain, alone, to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone. But the boat, in the midst of the sea, was tossed with the waves―for the wind was against them. And in the fourth watch of the night, Jesus came to them walking upon the sea. And they, seeing Him walk upon the sea, were troubled, saying: ‘It is an apparition! [a ghost]’ And they cried out for fear. And immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘Be of good heart! It is I―fear ye not! And Peter, making answer, said: ‘Lord, if it be Thou, then bid me come to Thee upon the waters!’ And Jesus said: ‘Come!’ And Peter, going down out of the boat, walked upon the water to come to Jesus. But seeing that the wind strong, he was afraid. And when he began to sink, he cried out, saying: ‘Lord! Save me!’ And immediately Jesus stretching forth His hand took hold of him, and said to him: ‘O thou of little faith! Why didst thou doubt?’ And when they were come up into the boat, the wind ceased. And they that were in the boat came and adored him, saying: ‘Indeed Thou art the Son of God!’” (Matthew 14:22-33).
At another time, “when Jesus entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him. And when they were sailing, Jesus slept. And there came down a storm of wind upon the lake and behold a great tempest arose in the lake, so that the boat was covered with waves and they were in danger―but He was asleep. And they came and awakened Him, saying: ‘Master! Lord! Save us! We perish!’ Then, rising up, He rebuked and commanded the winds and the rage of the sea water― and it ceased and there came a great calm. And Jesus said to them: ‘Why are you fearful? Where is your Faith? O ye of little Faith!’ Who, being afraid, wondered, saying one to another: ‘Who is this? What manner of Man do you think this is? He commandeth both the winds and the sea―and they obey Him?’” (Matthew 8:23-27; Luke 8:23-25).
A Contrary Current or Tide
An incident in the life of St. Teresa of Avila illustrates the same hallmark of troubled waters for God’s saints. The Life of St. Teresa, a 1912 translation by Alice Lady Lovat, taken from the French version by ‘A Carmelite’ Nun, gives the following story on page 548. In January, of the last year of her life, 1582, Teresa left Ávila to establish convents in Burgos and Grenada, and Teresa describes the journey and what befell her along the way:
“We had to run many dangers. At no part of the road were the risks greater than within a few leagues of Burgos, at a place called Los Pontes. The rivers were so high that the water in places covered everything, neither road nor the smallest footpath could be seen, only water everywhere, and two abysses on each side. It seemed foolhardiness to advance, especially in a carriage, for if one strayed ever so little off the road (then invisible), one must have perished.”
The saint is silent on her share of the adventure, but her companions relate that, seeing their alarm, Teresa turned to them and encouraged them, saying that “as they were engaged in doing God’s work, how could they die in a better cause?” She then led the way on foot. The current was so strong that she lost her footing, and was on the point of being carried away by the current when Our Lord sustained her.
“Oh, my Lord!” she exclaimed, with her usual loving familiarity, “When will You stop scattering obstacles in our path?”
“Do not complain, daughter!” the Divine Master answered, “For I always I treat My friends in this way!”
“Ah, Lord! It is also the reason why You have so few of them!” was her reply. Ouch!
As St. Elizebeth Ann Seton said: “We must often draw the comparison between time and eternity. This is the remedy of all our troubles. How small will the present moment appear when we enter that great ocean!”
Yes, life is messy, life is hard, and everyone suffers. We don’t like that―that is only natural, but perhaps too natural and not supernatural enough. St. Francis de Sales points out that “Many would be willing to have afflictions provided that they not be inconvenienced by them!”
One day God will wipe every tear ever shed from our eyes: “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes: and death shall be no more, nor mourning, nor crying, nor sorrow shall be any more, for the former things are passed away!” (Apocalypse 21:4).
Walking On Water―Or Drowning In It?
The above miraculous incident, where St. Peter found himself being able to walk on water for a short period of time, before beginning to sink beneath the waves, is very instructive. We might not be able to “walk on water” like St. Peter, but we most certainly would like to “walk on air” ― meaning that we want to feel extremely excited or happy. Who doesn’t? Yet Our Lady said to St. Bernadette, whom she had favored with many apparitions at Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next life!” Ouch! Our Lord had said the same things to His Apostles at the Last Supper: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy!” … in Heaven (John 16:20).
All that Our Lord is saying―and Our Lady too, for that matter―is that for anyone hoping to get to Heaven, the cross is the daily staple diet―you can take it or leave it. Most people did not take it and they now have an even bigger cross in either in the fires of Hell, or, if they got lucky, in the fires of Purgatory. There is no other way! Cotton-Candy Catholicism is doomed to fail. You may well complain about the “negativity” of the message―but, as Holy Scripture says: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! [Neither is Our Lady!] For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). Painting a false picture of the small numbers that are saved does nobody any good. Sure, you can lie about it, create an over-optimistic picture of it (which is most people have always done)―but it is a lie that will lead many more to their damnation. Just because they believe a lie, does nothing to increase their chances of salvation. Tell them the truth, and there is at least a hope that some will change their lives to embrace that truth. If anyone could have painted a sweet picture of salvation and glossed-over the horrors of Hell―then that person would have been Our Lord, Who is Truth itself―but He didn’t, did He? He told the truth―He had to―He was the Truth.
Sure, nobody likes to hear negativity―but neither does God like the negativity of sin. Negativity deserves and begets negativity. If you disobey God, you lose Heaven. As you sow, so shall you reap. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit―as Our Lord Himself says: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them. Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that doth the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:16-21). So “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33).
The Tide of Passiontide
Each year the Church presents to us―not only 40 Day of Lent in order to do penance―but within those 40 days we have 2 whole weeks that we call “Passiontide” which are dedicated to the Cross, Suffering, Passion and Death of Our Lord. The word “Passiontide” means “Passion time”, yet we can also think of the word “tide” as being the alternate rising and falling of the sea, or something that fluctuates like the tides of the sea. EACH YEAR the tide of the Passion invades our souls and immerses them in its bitter waters. EACH YEAR the Church, so to speak, “rubs our sinful noses” in the horrific tortures, mental agony, brutal persecution and ignominious death of Our Lord. It is, of course, not pleasant to look and contemplate―if we do so correctly, without sweetening the pot, or superficially making light of what Our Lord underwent. It is all the more unpleasant when we realize that we are the cause of all those sufferings and that death through the callous and frequent commission of our personal sins. Is the Church cruel for rubbing our noses in these bitter waters of Passiontide? No―far from it! It is in these bitter waters that we learn about the bitterness of sin and its bitter consequences. As St. Paul writes: “For although I made you sorrowful by my epistle, I do not repent! And even if I did repent, seeing that the epistle did make you sorrowful― although but for a time―now I am glad! Not because you were made sorrowful―but because you were made sorrowful unto doing penance!” (2 Corinthians 7:8-9).
The words that the Church places on the lips of Our Lord in the Good Friday liturgy should haunt our shame: “O My people, what have I done to thee? Or wherein have I afflicted thee? Answer Me! Because I led thee out of the land of Egypt, thou hast prepared a cross for thy Savior! Because I led thee out through the desert forty years and fed thee with manna, and brought thee into a land exceeding good―thou hast prepared a Cross for thy Savior. What more ought I have done for thee, that I have not done? I planted thee, indeed, My most beautiful vineyard: and thou hast become exceeding bitter to Me: for in My thirst thou gavest Me vinegar to drink, and with a lance thou hast pierced the side of thy Savior.” How superficially are those words sung or read on Good Friday―paying more attention to superficially singing it well, or admiring how well the choir is singing, rather than letting the meaning of those words penetrate our souls like Our Lord’s side and heart was penetrated by the lance!
Back to the Lake!
Let us go back to the lake! Not to swim, paddle or sunbathe―but to immerse ourselves into the teachings that can be pulled out of the above waters of grace in the Gospel accounts of the Apostles on the lake. There are many things to be learnt that are floating on the top of the waters or that lie deep beneath the waters. God and Our Lord used water on many occasions as either part of their miracles or as a means of teaching. For example, already in the very second line of the Bible, we read that “the spirit of God moved over the waters” (Genesis 1:2). Then in sixth verse we read: “Let there be a firmament made amidst the waters: and let it divide the waters from the waters!” (Genesis 1:6). Again, “And God called the dry land, Earth; and the gathering together of the waters, he called Seas. And God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:10).
► SAVING AND DESTRUCTIVE WATERS #1: God later used that water to cleanse and purify the world which had grown sinful: “The wickedness of men was great on the Earth, and the thought of their heart was bent upon evil at all times. It repented God that he had made man on the earth. And being touched inwardly with sorrow of heart, He said: ‘I will destroy man, whom I have created, from the face of the Earth … for it repenteth Me that I have made them!’ And the Earth was corrupted before God, and was filled with iniquity ... But Noe found grace before the Lord … And when God had seen that the Earth was corrupted―for all flesh had corrupted its way upon the Earth―He said to Noe: ‘The end of all flesh is come before Me, the Earth is filled with iniquity through them, and I will destroy them with the Earth! Make thee an ark … Behold I will bring the waters of a great flood upon the Earth, to destroy all flesh … All things that are in the Earth shall be consumed … I will rain upon the Earth forty days and forty nights; and I will destroy every substance that I have made, from the face of the Earth … And the flood was forty days upon the Earth, and the waters increased, and lifted up the ark on high from the Earth. For they overflowed exceedingly and filled all on the face of the Earth: and the ark was carried upon the waters. And the waters prevailed beyond measure upon the Earth: and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered … And all flesh was destroyed that moved upon the Earth―fowl, cattle, beasts, all creeping things and all men. And all things wherein there is the breath of life on the Earth, died. And he destroyed all the substance that was upon the Earth … and Noe only remained, and they that were with him in the ark. And the waters prevailed upon the Earth a hundred and fifty days … And the waters returned from off the Earth, going and coming, and they began to be abated after a hundred and fifty days. And the ark rested upon the mountains of Armenia in the twenty-seventh day of the seventh month. And the waters were going and decreasing until the tenth month―for in the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains appeared” (Genesis 6:5-17; 7:4; 7:17-24; 8:3-5).
When the days of the flood are all totaled we find that Noe and his family, as well as the animals, were in the ark a total of 371 days―a massive cleansing operation had taken place. The scary part is found in the words of Our Lady in 1956 and 1973, where she mentions the Great Flood and compares the state of the world back then to the state of the modern-day world. To Blessed Sister Elena Aiello (1895-1961)―mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ―Our Lady, in an apparition on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th, 1956, said: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!” Whereas, at her apparition at Akita in Japan, in 1973, Our Lady adds: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead.”
► SAVING AND DESTRUCTIVE WATERS #2: God would later use the water of the river to save Moses from the mass slaughter of all male babies by the Egyptians, whom the Pharao ordered to be killed by thrown into and drowned in the waters of the river: “There arose a new king over Egypt, that knew not Joseph, and he said to his people: ‘Behold the people of the children of Israel are numerous and stronger than we! Come, let us wisely oppress them, lest they multiply: and if any war shall rise against us, join with our enemies!’ … And the Egyptians hated the children of Israel, and afflicted them and mocked them. And they made their life bitter with hard works in clay, and brick, and with all manner of service. But the more they oppressed them, the more they were multiplied, and increased … And the king of Egypt spoke to the midwives of the Hebrews, commanding them: ‘When you shall do the office of midwives to the Hebrew women, and the time of delivery is come―if it be a man child, then kill it; if a woman, then keep it alive!’ … Pharao also charged all his people, saying: ‘Whatsoever shall be born of the male sex, ye shall cast into the river; but whatsoever of the female, ye shall save alive!’ [A certain Hebrew woman] conceived and bore a son; and hid him for three months. When she could hide him no longer, she took a basket made of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and pitch: and put the little babe therein, and laid him in the sedges on the river’s bank [Sedges are a kind and tall grass growing in the shallow water at the edge of the river― hence the basket containing Moses was floating on water, at the river bank, amidst the tall grasses]. The daughter of Pharao and her maids walked by the river’s bank, for she came down to wash herself in the river. And when she saw the basket, she sent one of her maids for it. And when it was brought, she opened it and seeing within it an infant crying, having compassion on it she said: ‘This is one of the babes of the Hebrews!’ And the child’s sister said to her: ‘Shall I go and call to thee a Hebrew woman, to nurse the babe?’ She answered: ‘Go!’ The maid went and called her mother. And Pharao’s daughter said to her. ‘Take this child and nurse him for me! I will give thee thy wages!’ The woman took, and nursed the child: and when he was grown up, she delivered him to Pharao’s daughter. And she adopted him for a son, and called him Moses, saying: ‘Because I took him out of the water!’” (Exodus 1:8-10; 1:12-16; 2:2-10). “Moses” or, in the Egyptian tongue, “Moyses”, signifies one taken or saved out of the water.
► SAVING AND DESTRUCTIVE WATERS #3: God would later use water to save His Chosen People from the Egyptians, when God parted the water of the Red Sea for Moses to lead the Israelites to safety, whilst using the same waters to drown all of Pharao’s army who were in hot pursuit of them. This, as you can see for yourself, is a macrocosm of the microcosm―meaning that just as God’s Providence saved Moses in the basket floating on water, when male Hebrews were meant to be drowned in the river―here God’s Providence drowns the Egyptians in the water of the Red Sea, while saving the Israelites by miraculously parting those waters and allowing them to cross to safety.
“And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Go and speak to Pharao, the king of Egypt, that he let the children of Israel go out of his land!’” (Exodus 6:10-11). Of course, we all know that Pharao was duplicitous in his speech―speaking from both corners of his mouth―telling Moses that the Israelites could go, but then reneging on his word. Thus God inflicted the Ten Plagues on Pharao and Egypt―one of which was the waters of Egypt into blood: “The Lord said to Moses: ‘Say to Aaron: “Take thy rod and stretch forth thy hand upon the waters of Egypt, and upon their rivers, and streams and pools, and all the ponds of waters, that they may be turned into blood: and let blood be in all the land of Egypt, both in vessels of wood and of stone!”‘ And Moses and Aaron did as the Lord had commanded―and lifting up the rod he struck the water of the river before Pharao and his servants and it was turned into blood. And the fishes that were in the river died; and the river corrupted, and the Egyptians could not drink the water of the river, and there was blood in all the land of Egypt … And all the Egyptians dug round about the river for water to drink―for they could not drink of the water of the river” (Exodus 7:19-24).
Finally “when Pharao had sent out the people [released the Israelites], the Lord led them not by the way of the land of the Philistines―which is near, thinking lest perhaps they would repent, if they should see wars arise against them, and would return into Egypt―but He led them about by the way of the desert, which is by the Red Sea, and the children of Israel went up armed out of the land of Egypt … And it was told the king of the Egyptians that the people was fled. And the heart of Pharao and of his servants was changed with regard to the people, and they said: ‘What meant we to do, that we let Israel go from serving us?’ So he made ready his chariot, and took all his people with him. And he took six hundred chosen chariots, and all the chariots that were in Egypt, and the captains of the whole army. And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharao king of Egypt, and he pursued the children of Israel … The Egyptians followed the steps of them who were gone before, they found them encamped at the sea side … And when Moses had stretched forth his hand over the sea, the Lord took it away by a strong and burning wind blowing all the night, and turned it into dry ground: and the water was divided. And the children of Israel went in through the midst of the sea dried up: for the water was as a wall on their right hand and on their left. And the Egyptians pursuing went in after them, and all Pharao’s horses, his chariots and horsemen through the midst of the sea … And the Lord said to Moses: ‘Stretch forth thy hand over the sea, that the waters may come again upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots and horsemen!’ And when Moses had stretched forth his hand towards the sea, it returned to the former place and, as the Egyptians were fleeing away, the waters came upon them, and the Lord shut them up in the middle of the waves. And the waters returned, and covered the chariots and the horsemen of all the army of Pharao, who had come into the sea after them, neither did there so much as one of them remain. But the children of Israel marched through the midst of the sea upon dry land, and the waters were to them as a wall on the right hand and on the left. And the Lord delivered Israel on that day out of the hands of the Egyptians” (Exodus 13:17-18; 14:5-9; 14:21-30).
The Filthy Waters of Sin
You can see here, in the above details, God’s use of water―to either destroy or to save. Some are destroyed through water and some are saved through water. Yet in all the above cases, there is much tribulation and suffering experienced. The same is true for the waters of Baptism―not all baptized persons end up being saved, in fact, the majority are damned. It is not the waters of Baptism that damn them―for the waters of Baptism are meant to save―but it their own pig-headed stubbornness in sin that damns them―they do not ‘drown’ in the waters of Baptism, but they ‘drown’ in the filthy waters of sin. Our Lady of Good Success makes some reference to this “filthy ocean” of sin when she speaks of our modern-day era, saying: “From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects. They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption. Woe to the children of these times! ... Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children born without the blessing of the Church … The Christian spirit will rapidly decay and the precious light of Faith will gradually be extinguished until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals … Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women … the spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world!”
The Waters of Retribution for Sin
In the conference of Pope John Paul II, in Fulda, Germany, as reported by the German Catholic journal and magazine, Stimme des Glaubens, in 1981, the Holy Father was asked: “What about the Third Secret of Fatima? Should it not have already been published by 1960?”
Pope John Paul II replied: “Given the seriousness of the contents, my predecessors in the Petrine office diplomatically preferred to postpone publication so as not to encourage the world power of Communism to make certain moves. On the other hand, it should be sufficient for all Christians to know this: if there is a message in which it is written that the oceans will flood whole areas of the Earth, and that from one moment to the next millions of people will perish, truly the publication of such a message is no longer something to be so much desired. Many wish to know simply from curiosity and a taste for the sensational, but they forget that knowledge also implies responsibility. They only seek the satisfaction of their curiosity, and that is dangerous if at the same time they are not disposed to do something, and if they are convinced that it is impossible to do anything against evil.” At this point the Pope grasped a Rosary and said: “Here is the remedy against this evil. Pray, pray, and ask for nothing more. Leave everything else to the Mother of God.”
The Holy Father was then asked: “What is going to happen to the Church?”
He answered: “We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ … With your and my prayer it is possible to mitigate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectively renewed. How many times has the renewal of the Church sprung from blood! This time, too, it will not be otherwise. We must be strong and prepared, and trust in Christ and His Mother, and be very, very assiduous in praying the Rosary.”
Water into Wine―Wine into Blood―Sinners into Saints
Water, wine and blood―what have they got in common? We drink all three! Water and wine―well that is pretty obvious―but blood? Yes, we drink the Blood of Christ in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Furthermore, Our Lord changed water into wine at the marriage feast of Cana; God changed water into blood in the time of Moses (see above), and Christ changed wine into blood at the Last Supper. On Calvary, when the soldier pierced the side of Jesus with a lance, blood and water flowed out His side: “One of the soldiers with a spear, opened His side, and immediately there came out blood and water” (John 19:34). As Holy Scripture says: “There are three that give testimony on earth―the spirit, and the water, and the blood―and these three are one” (1 John 5:8).
● WATER symbolizes grace in general, and, in particular, the sanctifying grace received through the waters of Baptism: “Here is water! What doth hinder me from being baptized?” (Acts 8:36).
● WINE symbolizes charity or love in general―and since “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), wine also symbolizes God in general, and the Holy Ghost (Holy Spirit) in particular, to whom we pray: “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in us the fire of Thy love!”
● BLOOD symbolizes suffering in general, and, in particular, the Blood of Christ shed in His Passion and Death for our redemption and salvation: “This is My Blood, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!” (Matthew 26:28).
Which brings us to the whole point of Christ’s incarnation and coming upon Earth―that is, the redemption and salvation of souls: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “The Lamb shall lead them to the fountains of the waters of life” (Apocalypse 7:17). “He that shall drink of the water that I will give him, shall not thirst for ever! The water that I will give him, shall become in him a fountain of water, springing up into life everlasting” (John 4:13-14). “I baptize you in the water unto penance” (Matthew 3:11). “I have baptized you with water; but He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost” (Mark 1:8).
As a side note on that―at Pentecost, when the Holy Ghost descended upon the Apostles and disciples in the form of tongues of fire, it resulted in them going out to preach in the streets, at which point the listeners thought that they were drunk on wine! “And when the days of the Pentecost were accomplished, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from Heaven, as of a mighty wind coming, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they began to speak with diverse tongues, according as the Holy Ghost gave them to speak. Now there were dwelling at Jerusalem, Jews, devout men, out of every nation under Heaven. And when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded in mind, because that every man heard them speak in his own tongue. And they were all amazed, and wondered, saying: Behold, are not all these, that speak, Galileans? And how have we heard, every man our own tongue wherein we were born? … And they were all astonished and wondered, saying one to another: ‘What meaneth this?’ But others, mocking, said: ‘These men are full of new wine!’ [14] But Peter standing up with the eleven, lifted up his voice, and spoke to them: ‘These are not drunk, as you suppose, seeing it is but the third hour of the day! But this is that which was spoken of by the prophet Joel: “I will pour out of My Spirit upon all flesh!” … Do penance, and be baptized every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of your sins―and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost!’ … They therefore that received his word, were baptized; and there were added in that day about three thousand souls” (Acts 2:1-41). Similarly, it was said of St. John the Baptist that “he shall be great before the Lord; and shall drink no wine nor strong drink―and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother’s womb” (Luke 1:15). Who needs wine when you have “wine” or “spirit” of the Holy Ghost (Holy Spirit)?!! Holy Scripture says: “Be not drunk with wine, wherein is luxury―but be ye filled with the Holy Spirit!” (Ephesians 5:18). Wine symbolizes the Holy Spirit, because being full of the Holy Spirit is being full of joy.
Water, Wine and Blood―The Three Levels of Love
As the spiritual masters and authors tell us, there are three stages of the spiritual life that we have to pass through before we will be admitted into Heaven―these are: (1) The Purgative Way or the Way of Beginners; (2) The Illuminative Way or the Way of Progress or Proficiency; and (3) The Unitive Way or the Way of Perfection. Water, wine and blood could be said to correspond to these three stages. Water being applied to the Purgative Way or the Way of Beginners. Wine being applicable to the Illuminative Way or the Way of Progress or Proficiency. Blood being applicable to the Unitive Way or the Way of Perfection.
● WATER: Even the economic side of things indicates the same order―water is cheap, wine is expensive, blood is priceless. With water we wash our dirty bodies―hence the Purgative Way. Water is also the staple drink of everyone―babies and children included. Water is cheap and it costs little or nothing to give someone else a cup of water: “Whosoever shall give to drink, to one of these little ones, a cup of cold water … he shall not lose his reward!” (Matthew 10:42).
● WINE: Wine is not given to babies and children, but only to those who have advanced in age and maturity―hence it is linked to the Way of Proficiency. Furthermore, from the point of view of friendship, a friend is someone with whom our relationship has progressed and passed from the beginnings of a mere stranger or an acquaintance, into a relationship of friendship. We will give water to strangers without much of a fuss―but wine we reserve for friends. This is also seen to be case with Our Lord, Who speaks of His ever growing relationship with His Apostles as having passed from mere acquaintance level, or “employer and employee”, or “master and servant” relationship, into a blossoming relationship called “friendship.” Our Lord says to them: “I will not now call you servants … But I have called you friends!” (John 15:15), going on to say that He there is a superior “wine” that He will drink with them in the Kingdom of Heaven: “And I say to you, I will not drink from henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I shall drink it with you new in the Kingdom of My Father” (Matthew 26:29).
● BLOOD: To give your water to someone is a basic act of kindness. To give your wine to another is an even greater act of kindness―for it is more expensive. Yet to give your blood for someone is the supreme act of charity―as Our Lord Himself says (and also does): “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). “Therefore doth the Father love Me―because I lay down My life” (John 10:17). “I lay down My life for My sheep” (John 10:15). “Jesus said to Peter: ‘Wilt thou lay down thy life for Me?’ Peter said to him: ‘I will lay down my life for Thee!’” (John 13:37-38) ― and we say, in the Stations of the Cross: “Jesus! You died for love of me! Let me die for love of Thee!” ― but do we really mean it? Have we really reached that level of love? Passiontide is all about that level of love―loving unto blood! Suffering unto blood! For most persons, that is terrifying―yet Holy Scripture speaks of this need, saying: “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” (Hebrews 12:4). Our Lord also implies this when He says: “Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, then itself remaineth alone. But if it die, then it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal” (John 12:24-25).
Swimming or Sailing Safely Through Suffering
The only way to Heaven is through the cross of suffering―there is no other way. “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). This is why the Church, in Her Liturgy, exults: “In cruce salus” ― “In the cross is salvation” ― and “Ave crux, spes unica!” ― “Hail O cross, sole hope!” The saints understood this so well that, if they ever noticed that they were without a cross at some point in their lives, then they would beg God to send one!
When Christopher Columbus sailed on his expedition to the Americas, his three ships―Pinta, Niña and Santa Maria―all had massive red crosses on their sails. The crosses on the sails were there for a double reason―firstly as a mark of Faith, which showed their Christian Faith; secondly, as a kind of a sacramental, which would invoke the protection of Heaven during the sea voyages. Just like the Christian life, those sea voyages were not fun and games―but a real cross! Small caravels, like the Niña and Pinta, were relatively small and very open with little shelter against the elements. They could only carry between 40 and 50 tons and usually had a crew of around 30 sailors each. Unlike the Santa Maria, which at least had tiny cabins where sailors could sleep between eight-hour shifts, the Niña and Pinta had a single small deck at the rear of the ship with only one cramped cabin reserved for the captain. The sailors on a caravels had to live and sleep on the deck―for there is almost no private space. Furthermore, work was relentless on any 15th-century ship. The 20 sailors on the Niña and the 26 sailors on the Pinta would have been constantly engaged with adjusting the rigging, trimming the sails, inspecting for leaks and plugging them with spongy scraps of old rope called oakum. The round-the-clock workload meant that even if you were off-duty, there was little or no chance of getting some good sleep on the deck while the other sailors stomped around. Hammocks weren’t yet in use on ships in the 15th century.
On top of that, there was much trouble and problems with the food on board the ships. Columbus stocked a full year’s worth of food for the journey, not knowing how long it would be before they could return to Spain. For food to last at sea, it needed to be dry. Staples included dried and salted anchovies and cod, pickled or salted beef and pork, dried grains like chickpeas, lentils and beans, and, of course, hardtack biscuits. Hardtack biscuits were so rock solid that they could only be eaten if softened with water or dipped in the communal slurry served every meal in a large wooden trough. Yet tooth-breaking, dry biscuits were still preferable to those that had been spoiled by exposure to water in their storage barrel. Ferdinand Columbus, the explorer’s 14-year-old son, reported on the conditions on Columbus’s fourth voyage to the Americas: “What with the heat and dampness, our ship biscuit had become so wormy that, God help me, I saw many who waited for darkness to eat porridge made of it, that they might not see the maggots,” wrote young Ferdinand, “and others were so used to eating them that they didn’t even trouble to pick them out because they might lose their supper had they been so fastidious.”
Swimming Across the Atlantic Ocean
Benoit Lecomte (born 1967) is a French-born long-distance swimmer (now a naturalized American citizen) who claimed to be the first man to swim across the Atlantic Ocean without a kick board in 1998. From July 16th (Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel) to September 25th 1998, Lecomte, then aged 31, undertook a swim in stages from Massachusetts to Brittany, France. During his 73-day, 3,716-mile swim, Lecomte was accompanied by a 40-foot (about half the length of Christopher Columbus’ Niña and Pinta) sailboat that had an electromagnetic field for 25 ft to ward off sharks. He was accompanied by a crew of three aboard the sailboat, where he could rest and eat between each swimming period. Lecomte typically spent eight hours swimming each day in sessions of two to four hours.
Where Lecomte succeeded, another Atlantic swimmer failed. Ben Hooper, a 38-year-old former English policeman, waded into the Atlantic Ocean from a beach in Dakar, Senegal hoping to swim across the Atlantic Ocean to Brazil, 1,879 miles away. He was hoping to swim around 12 miles a day for over 140 days straight. On the very first day, as the adrenaline wore off and the magnitude of the task began to sink in, he swam against currents that made it difficult to achieve his desired daily mileage of 12 miles. All he could manage was 4.5 miles. A fierce wind drove across the water and at times the swell rose so high Hooper lost sight of his support boat. On day two, Hooper’s crew lost contact with a second support boat, whose captain had returned to Dakar, refusing to continue with the expedition. A couple of days later, Hooper again faced unusually strong currents, limiting his mileage. Clouds stretched across the vast horizon, sometimes bringing rain, and the ocean became dark and choppy. Hooper began to spend more and more time on the boat, waiting for moments of calm. By day seven he was down on his targets. Fatigue mounted. Low moments became commonplace. His body was under attack. Small jellyfish stings were regular and sapped energy. While swimming through seaweed, lice nipped at his torso. When the ocean was choppy, waves battered his back, arms and legs, pushing him under, exacerbating exhaustion. In poor conditions, Hooper was in danger of injuring himself getting on and off the boat, and every now and then he would take a hit from a kayak that glided alongside him for support.
During day 17, he was sick, twice. On day 18, he began to complain of neuralgia. On day 21, Hooper swam blindly into the half-eaten remains of a Portuguese-man-of-war, a jellyfish whose venom paralyses its victims. Hooper began to writhe in pain, unaware of the cause. When he was retrieved from the water, the crew discovered stings up and down the right side of his body. A section of tentacle was still attached to his shoulder and had to be removed. Every now and then his eyes would roll into the back of his head and, as his speech began to slur and his blood pressure plummeted, he struggled to remain conscious. Hooper later told me that, at one point, he was “on my way out”, and that the ship’s medic, Pamela Mackie, “brought me back” to life. For hours, Hooper remained in significant danger. Pain coursed through his body like an electric current. For support, Mackie reached a British trauma surgeon by satellite, who told her that renal failure was an acute possibility. If his kidney packed up, Hooper would not survive. Hooper spent the next four days on the boat, recuperating. On day 26, he re-entered the water and swam two miles, still sore from the attack. Three days later, in stormy seas, a steering cable snapped and required repair. The storm built. Waves rose to 30ft, crashing around the crew. Now clouds covered the sky and everything appeared eerie. The rain poured. The wind grew in speed and force. The catamaran, perhaps betraying its age, creaked and groaned. Finally, on December 15th, Hooper put out a press release, announcing the expedition’s end.
All of this brings to mind the words of St. Paul, that Holy Mother Church placed before at the beginning of Lent: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain. And every one that striveth for the mastery, refraineth himself from all things: and they indeed that they may receive a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible one. I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection―lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
On the Stormy Sea of Persecution
St. John Bosco’s vision of the crisis in the Church is also well worth considering here, since we are talking about water, sailing, swimming and sinking! Don Bosco relates his vision:
“Imagine yourselves to be with me on the seashore, or better still, on an isolated rock and not to see any patch of land except what is under your feet. On the whole of that vast sheet of water, you see an innumerable fleet of ships in battle array. The prows of the ships are formed into sharp, spear-like points so that whatever they are thrust-into, they pierce and completely destroy. These ships are armed with cannons, with lots of rifles, with incendiary materials, with other arms of all kinds, and also with books, and they advance against a ship very much bigger and higher than themselves and try to ram it with the prows, or to burn it, or in some way to do it every possible harm. As escorts to that majestic fully equipped ship, there are many smaller ships, which receive commands by signal from it and carry out movements to defend themselves from the opposing fleet.
“In the midst of the immense expanse of sea, two mighty columns of great height arise, a little distance the one from the other. On the top of one, there is the statue of the Immaculate Virgin, from whose feet hangs a large placard with this inscription: “Auxilium Christianorum—Help of Christians.” On the other, which is much higher and bigger, stands a Host of great size proportionate to the column and beneath is another placard with the words: “Salus Credentium—Salvation of Believers.”
“The supreme commander on the big ship is the Sovereign Pontiff. He, on seeing the fury of the enemies and the evils among which his faithful find themselves, determines to summon around himself the captains of the smaller ships, to hold a council and decide on what is to be done. All the captains come aboard and gather around the Pope. They hold a meeting, but meanwhile the wind and the waves gather in storm, so they are sent back to control their own ships.
“There comes a short lull; for a second time the Pope gathers the captains together around him, while the flagship goes on its course. But the frightful storm returns. The Pope stands at the helm and all his energies are directed to steering the ship towards those two columns, from the top of which and from every side of which are hanging numerous anchors and big hooks, fastened to chains.
“All the enemy ships move to attack it, and they try in every way to stop it and to sink it: some with writings or books or inflammable materials, of which they are full; others with guns, with rifles and with rams. The battle rages ever more relentlessly. The enemy prows (battering rams on the front of the ships) thrust violently, but their efforts and impact prove useless. They make attempts in vain and waste all their labor and ammunition; the big ship goes safely and smoothly on its way. Sometimes it happens that, when struck by formidable blows, it gets large, deep gaps in its sides; but no sooner is the harm done than a gentle breeze blows from the two columns and the cracks close up and the gaps are stopped immediately.
“Meanwhile, the guns of the assailants are blown up, the rifles and other arms and prows are broken; many ships are shattered and sink into the sea. Then, the frenzied enemies strive to fight hand to hand, with fists, with blows, with blasphemy and with curses. All at once the Pope falls gravely wounded. Immediately, those who are with him run to help him and they lift him up. A second time the Pope is struck, he falls again and dies. A shout of victory and of joy rings out amongst the enemies; from their ships an unspeakable mockery arises. But hardly is the Pontiff dead than another Pope takes his place. The pilots of the ships, having met together, have elected the Pope so quickly that the news of the death of the Pope coincides with the news of the election of the successor. The adversaries begin to lose courage. The new Pope, putting the enemy to rout and overcoming every obstacle, guides the ship right up to the two columns and comes to rest between them; he makes it fast with a light chain that hangs from the bow to an anchor of the column on which stands the Host; and with another light chain which hangs from the stern, he fastens it at the opposite end to another anchor hanging from the column on which stands the Immaculate Virgin.
“Then a great convulsion takes place. All the ships that until then had fought against the Pope’s ship are scattered; they flee away, collide and break to pieces one against another. Some sink and try to sink others. Several small ships that had fought gallantly for the Pope race to be the first to bind themselves to those two columns. Many other ships, having retreated through fear of the battle, cautiously watch from far away; the wrecks of the broken ships having been scattered in the whirlpools of the sea, they in their turn sail in good earnest to those two columns, and, having reached them, they make themselves fast to the hooks hanging down from them and there they remain safe, together with the principal ship, on which is the Pope. Over the sea there reigns a great calm.”
At this point Don Bosco asked one of his fellow priests, Fr. Rua: “What do you think of the story?” Fr. Rua answered: “It seems to me that the Pope’s ship might mean the Church, of which he is the head: the ships, men; the sea, this world. Those who defend the big ship are the good, lovingly attached to the Holy See; the others are her enemies, who try with every kind of weapon to annihilate her. The two columns of salvation seem to be devotion to Mary Most Holy and to the Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist.”
Fr. Rua did not speak of the Pope who fell and died, and Don Bosco also was silent about him. He simply added: “You are right! Only I ought to correct one expression. The enemy ships are persecutions. The most serious trials for the Church are near at hand. That which has been so far is almost nothing in the face of that which must befall. Her enemies are represented by the ships that tried to sink the principal ship if they could. Only two means are left to save her amidst so much confusion: DEVOTION TO MARY MOST HOLY and FREQUENT COMMUNION, making use of every means and doing our best to practice them and having them practiced everywhere and by everybody.” Don Bosco did not give any other explanations about this dream.
Nevertheless, it is very clear that we are now living the days that St. John Bosco foresaw in his vision. The persecution of the Church is the ultimate and underlying agenda that hides behind the current Satanic “smoke and mirrors” that we are seeing all throughout the world today. As Sister of Lucia of Fatima clearly stated, Our Lady has said that we have now entered the period commonly called “The Last Days” or “The End Times”―not that the world is going to end any time soon, for the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary followed by a period of peace and holiness, before the Antichrist appears, must all come first before the end of the world. Nevertheless, before the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary there has to be a time of terrible persecution of the Church, a time of localized wars and also a Third World War, where―as Our Lady says―”all will seem lost.” If we are not building our “ark” as these storm clouds gather and if we imitate the complacent Chosen People, who “sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play” (Exodus 32:6; 1 Corinthians 10:7), then we risk sinking and drowning in ocean of sin that is invading what is left of “Christian Dry Land”.
As St. Paul warns in the text presented to us at the beginning of Lent: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all in Moses were baptized―in the cloud, and in the sea. And did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them―and the rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased―for they were overthrown in the desert. Now these things were done in a figure of us, that we should not covet evil things as they also coveted. Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play!’ Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed fornication, and there fell in one day three and twenty thousand! Neither let us tempt Christ―as some of them tempted, and perished by the serpents! Neither do you murmur―as some of them murmured, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now all these things happened to them in figure―and they are written for our correction, upon whom the ends of the world are come! Wherefore he that thinketh himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:1-12).
Just as the Israelites had to spend many years in the desert of suffering before being allowed into the Promised Land, so, too, do we have to spend many years on the sea of suffering here below, before we can have a chance of entering the Promised Land of Heaven. It is not what we suffer that matters the most―but how we suffer. That is why St. Augustine says that the same sufferings, the same crosses, lead some souls to Heaven and other souls to Hell. Suffering requires love. “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profiteth me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Article 23
Wednesday after Passion Sunday March 20th
A Passion for Passiontide!
Wednesday after Passion Sunday March 20th
A Passion for Passiontide!
What an Oxymoron!
A passion for Passiontide seems like an oxymoron―a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory terms are used together: “deafening silence,” “organized chaos,” etc. That is what we get when we analyze the word “passion” ― which you will find defined along the lines of “a strong or extravagant fondness, enthusiasm, or desire for anything; a strong liking or desire for, or devotion to some activity, object, or concept ― as in ‘a passion for chess’; ‘a passion for sport’; ‘a passion for food,’ etc.” All of that is not too bad and not too negative―but, when we dig deeper into the word “passion” we see that it comes from the Latin passio from the verb patior (pati, passus sum), meaning “to suffer, endure, undergo suffering, etc.” That is where we have a problem! Who has “a strong or extravagant fondness, enthusiasm, or desire for” suffering? A masochist, you may say. Yet that is meant to be the disposition of any and every true Christian!
Our Lord could not have made that any clearer: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross to come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross and does not follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). Our Lord said of the newly converted persecutor of Christians, Saul (St. Paul): “This man is to Me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how many great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:15-16).
That same persecutor of Christians, once converted, would write: “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 2:19). “We preach Christ crucified … For I judged not myself to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:23; 2:2). “And they that are Christ’s, have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences” (Galatians 5:24). “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer” (Romans 6:6). “I rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ, in my flesh, for His Body, which is the Church!” (Colossians 1:24). “Many walk―of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ! Whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). “The word of the cross, to them that perish, is foolishness―but to them that are saved, that is to us, it is the power of God!” (1 Corinthians 1:18).
The cross and suffering are not exactly the ultimate goal and love of most people―but without that cross and without suffering, there is no possible way of gaining entrance into Heaven. We must strive to overcome our repugnance for the cross and suffering―and seek to view it and embrace it as St. Paul did. A Christian is judged by his love or hatred of the cross and suffering.
Tell Me…
We all know the usual “Tell me…” phrases ― “Tell me who your friends are, and I will tell what kind of a person you are!” … “Tell me what you (love, like, eat, read, watch), and I will tell you what you are!” These phrases are somewhat akin to Our Lord’s statement: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20).
Elsewhere, Our Lord says to the worldlings: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7). If the works or fruits of the world are evil, then the world (the tree that bears those evil fruits) must also be evil: “The evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit.”
Along the same lines, Holy Scripture adds: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
The God and Lord of Unity―Or the God and Lord of Division?
The above words of Holy Scripture seem to be divisive: “‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” Yet, elsewhere, Scripture says: “I beseech you, brethren, by the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no schisms among you; but that you be perfect in the same mind, and in the same judgment” (1 Corinthians 1:10). T
The same sentiment is seen in various other books of the Bible: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor freeman, there is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus!” (Galatians 3:8). “Be of one mind, having the same charity, being of one accord, agreeing in sentiment. Let nothing be done through contention” (Philippians 2:2-3). “Careful to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. One body and one Spirit; as you are called in one hope of your calling―one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of all, Who is above all, and through all, and in us all” (Ephesians 4:3-6).
Our Lord, in speaking to His Father in Heaven at the Last Supper, adds: “I have manifested Thy Name to the men whom Thou hast given Me … I pray for them because they are Thine … And not for them only do I pray, but for them also who through their word shall believe in Me, so that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, are in Me, and I in thee; may they also be one in Us … that they may be one, as We also are one―I in them, and Thou in Me; so that they may be made perfect in oneness” (John 17:6-23).
All of this bespeaks and oozes unity! Yet it can all be taken out of context and other parts of Scripture that show the contrary can be deliberately ignored and set aside. This is much like only seeing God’s mercy without equally seeing God’s justice―it is being selective and taking what suits your personal preferences, ideology or outlook. Yes, God and Christ seek unity―but it is their version of unity and not the world’s false version of unity. God seeks that we be united in Him―following His teachings and commandments. The world will allow any kind of unity―do what the hell you want and we will unite in agreeing to disagree―everything is permissible, both sin and virtue, error and truth, paganism and Christianity.
If you have read a decent portion of the Bible, then you will have realized―consciously or unconsciously―that God the Father and God the Son are also Gods of division―in the sense of “It is My way, or the highway!” There can only be unity in God under God’s Law and Commandments―God will not tolerate or accept a false unity that rejects part or all of His Law or commandments. Our Lord also says at the Last Supper: “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15) … “He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them; he it is that loveth Me. And he that loveth Me, shall be loved of My Father: and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him” (John 14:21) … “If any one love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make Our abode with him” (John 14:23) … “He that loveth Me not, keepeth not My words” (John 14:24) ... “You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 15:14) … “If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love; as I also have kept My Father’s commandments, and do abide in His love” (John 15:10).
At the Last Supper, despite speaking about a desired unity, Our Lord also speaks of division―He places that division or draws that dividing-line between Himself and world: “I have manifested Thy Name, Father, to the men whom Thou hast given Me out of the world. Thine they were, and to Me Thou gavest them; and they have kept Thy word … I pray for them―I pray not for the world―but for them whom Thou hast given Me, because they are Thine! … They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:6-9, 16).
Born to Divide
This divisiveness of Christ was prophesied by St. Simeon at Our Lord’s Presentation in the Temple―which is both the 4th Joyful Mystery of the Rosary and 1st Mystery in the Rosary of Our Lady’s Seven Sorrows. “There was a man in Jerusalem named Simeon, and the Holy Ghost was in him. And he had received an answer from the Holy Ghost, that he should not see death, before he had seen the Christ of the Lord. And when His parents brought in the Child Jesus … Simeon took Him into his arms, and said: ‘O Lord … my eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of all peoples! A light to the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel! … Behold this Child is set for the fall, and for the resurrection of many in Israel, and for a sign which shall be contradicted” (Luke 2:25-34).
Almost immediately afterwards, the 2,000 year long acceptance and rejection of Christ began―for the Three Kings came from the East to adore, while King Herod sought to kill Him. When Our Lord began His public ministry at the age of 30, after 30 years of hidden life, the same phenomenon was to be seen―some accepted Him and loved Him, other rejected Him and hated Him.
Long before the Last Supper, Our Lord had clearly stated that He had come to cause division: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled! … Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! Everyone, therefore, that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! For they will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they shall persecute you in this city, flee into another!” (Luke 12:49-53; Matthew 10:17-22; 10:32-37).
The Real Cause of Division
God is not the cause of division―it is Satan, the devils and mankind that choose division by separating themselves from God and His Law: “Why have the Gentiles raged, and the people devised vain things? The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’ He that dwells in Heaven shall laugh at them: and the Lord shall deride them. Then shall He speak to them in His anger, and trouble them in his rage!” (Psalm 2:1-5). “These are they, who separate themselves, sensual men, having not the Spirit!” (Jude 1:19). “Whosoever revolts and continues not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that continues in the doctrine, the same hath both the Father and the Son. If any man come to you and bring not this doctrine―then receive him not into the house, nor say to him, ‘God speed you!’ For he that says unto him: ‘God speed you!’ communicates with his wicked works” (2 John 1:9-11).
This is why Christ and Holy Scripture recommends division, in the sense of separation, meaning that we separate ourselves from anyone and everyone who is opposed to Christ and His teachings in any way, shape or form. The world as a whole falls into this category―for Our Lord said concerning His followers: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). Are you of the world? Or are you not of this world? Are you comfortable with the world? Or are you uncomfortable with the world? Do you follow the fashions, maxims and opinions of the world? Or do you oppose them? “If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above―where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the earth. For you are dead and your life is hidden with Christ in God!” (Colossians 3:1-3). Alas, so many do the exact opposite―and that is one of the many reasons why most souls end up being lost. They refuse to play accord to the rule book―they create their own rule book, their own version of God’s religion!
Preferring One’s Own Religion to God’s Religion
This is what the Scribes and Pharisees were guilty of―even though they claimed to be the upholders of God Laws and Traditions, they had succumbed to tweaking God’s religion according their own opinions. Our Lord often condemned them for that with words such as: “Why do you also transgress the commandment of God for your tradition? … Hypocrites, well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me. And in vain do they worship Me, teaching doctrines and commandments of men!’” (Matthew 15:3, 7-9). Our Lord’s clashes with the Scribes and Pharisees came to a head in the Temple, on the Tuesday before His crucifixion (Tuesday of Holy Week as we call it today), when He “let them have it” with a tirade not seen elsewhere in the Gospels. Here are just some of the angry criticisms Our Lord made against them:
“They bind heavy and insupportable burdens, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but with a finger of their own they will not move them. All their works they do for to be seen of men ... They love the first places at feasts, and the first chairs in the synagogues, and salutations in the market place, and to be called by men, Rabbi [Master, Teacher] … Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you shut the Kingdom of Heaven against men, for you yourselves do not enter in; and those that are going in, you suffer not to enter! Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites: because you devour the houses of widows, praying long prayers. For this you shall receive the greater judgment. Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you go round about the sea and the land to make one convert; and when he is made, you make him the child of Hell twofold more than yourselves. Woe to you blind guides! … Ye foolish and blind! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites― because you [focus on less important things] and ignore the weightier things of the law; judgment, and mercy, and faith. These things you ought to have done and not to leave those undone! Blind guides, who strain out a gnat, but swallow a camel! Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness. Thou blind Pharisee! First make clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside may become clean! Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you are like to whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men’s bones, and of all filthiness! So you also outwardly indeed appear to men to be just; but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity! Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―that build the tombs of the prophets, and adorn the monuments of the just, whereas you are witnesses against yourselves, because you are the sons of them that killed the prophets! You serpents, generation of vipers! How will you flee from the judgment of Hell? Behold I send to you prophets, and wise men, and scribes―and some of them you will put to death and crucify, and some you will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city! Therefore upon you shall come all the just blood that hath been shed upon the Earth!” (Matthew 23:4-35).
Even the Apostles felt the wrath and indignation of Christ at times―especially when they too tried to “change” Christ’s religion, that is to say, to suggest another way of doing things to Christ’s way of doing things. One incident was where the brothers, St. James and St. John―known as the “Sons of Thunder”―asked Our Lord if they could pray for fire and brimstone to fall upon a Samaritan city that had just rejected Jesus: “And it came to pass, when the days of His assumption were accomplishing, that He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem. And He sent messengers before His face; and going, they entered into a city of the Samaritans, to prepare for Him. And they received Him not, because His face was of one going to Jerusalem. And when His disciples James and John had seen this, they said: ‘Lord, wilt Thou that we command fire to come down from Heaven and consume them?’ And turning, He rebuked them, saying: ‘You know not of what spirit you are! The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!’” (Luke 9:51-56). It’s Our Lord’s way or the highway!
St. Peter received an even greater rebuke, where Jesus called him “Satan” for trying to prevent Our Lord from fulfilling His mission to suffer and die at the hands of His enemies: “From that time Jesus began to show to His disciples, that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and the third day rise again. And Peter, taking Him, began to rebuke Him, saying: ‘Lord, be it far from Thee, this shall not be unto Thee!’ Jesus, turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind Me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me! Because thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:21-23). It’s Our Lord’s way or the highway!
Our Lord’s Passion for the Passion Misunderstood
Human thinking rarely aligns itself with Divine thinking―as God Himself says to us: “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). We tend to be minimalists by nature―seeking to get the maximum possible by making minimal efforts. Our Lord was the opposite―He sought to give the maximum when the minimal would have sufficed. He did not have to go through torture and death in order to earn for us the possibility of salvation―any minimal kind of suffering or even act of charity would have sufficed―because, while being human, He was also Divine, He was God and therefore infinite, and any action, however small, had infinite value. Yet He chose to “go all the way”, “to the very limit”, in order to show and prove His compassion and love for us. We do the minimal, while expecting maximum―Jesus did the maximum, while knowing His efforts would only have minimal results―because most souls are lost and damned as a result of not cooperating with and profiting from the graces of potential salvation earned by Christ.
Jesus, from the very beginning―since He was not only a man, but God―knew what was awaiting Him, even in His infancy. He knew His purpose on Earth: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I am come that they may have life” [meaning, eternal life] (John 10:10). St. Peter adds: “Christ died for our sins” (1 Peter 3:18) … “Who, His own self, bore our sins in His body upon the tree―so that we, being dead to sins, should live to justice―by Whose stripes you were healed!” (1 Peter 2:24). Old Testament prophecy spoke of the future Christ and Savior: “There is no beauty in Him, nor comeliness―and we have seen Him, and there was no sightliness that we should be desirous of Him. Despised and the most abject of men, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with infirmity. And His look was as it were hidden and despised, whereupon we esteemed Him not! He hath borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows―and we have thought of Him as it were a leper, and as one struck by God and afflicted. But He was wounded for our iniquities, He was bruised for our sins―the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and by His bruises we are healed!” (Isaias 53:2-5).
To Our Lady, at the marriage feast at Cana, Our Lord, knowing the future, said: “My hour is not yet come!” (John 2:4). When still in Galilee, “Jesus said: ‘My time is not yet come!’” (John 7:6). Later, when He had taken His public ministry from Galilee to Jerusalem, He came up against the envy and anger of the Scribes and Pharisees, who eventually decided that Jesus must be apprehended and killed, which led Jesus to ask them: “‘Why seek you to kill Me?’ … They then sought to apprehend Him, but no man laid hands on Him, because His hour was not yet come” (John 7:20 & 30). Again, in the next chapter of John, we read that “No man laid hands on Him, because His hour was not yet come” (John 8:20). As the time for His Passion drew closer, “it came to pass, when the days of His assumption were accomplishing, that He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem” (Luke 9:51). “From that time Jesus began to show to His disciples, that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and the third day rise again!” (Matthew 16:21). Jesus then spoke of the arrival of the hour for which He had come into this world: “Behold, the hour cometh, and it is now come, that you shall be scattered every man to his own, and shall leave Me alone!” (John 16:32). “All you shall be scandalized in Me this night. For it is written: ‘I will strike the Shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be dispersed!’” (Matthew 26:31). “Now is My soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save Me from this hour!’ But for this cause I came unto this hour!” (John 12:27).
Get a Passion for the Passion―Seek to Suffer for Christ!
St. Paul traces the path of suffering for us: “I judge myself to not know anything among you―except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified!” (1 Corinthians 2:2). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross” (Galatians 2:19). “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “Knowing this―that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer!” (Romans 6:6). “Christ died for our sins―the Just for the unjust―so that He might offer us to God, that we being put to death in the flesh, may enlivened in the Spirit” (1 Peter 3:18). “The fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable to His death” (Philippians 3:10). “For unto you it is given for Christ, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for Him” (Philippians 1:29). “We suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified with Him. For I reckon that the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come!” (Romans 8:17-18). “In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed; we are straitened, but are not destitute; we suffer persecution, but are not forsaken; we are cast down, but we perish not! Always bearing about in our body the mortification of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies!” (2 Corinthians 4:8-10).
“Christ, therefore, having suffered in the flesh, be you also armed with the same thought―for he that hath suffered in the flesh, hath ceased from sins, so that he may now live the rest of his time in his body, not according to the desires of men, but according to the will of God” (1 Peter 4:1-2). “The wisdom of the flesh is death; but the wisdom of the spirit is life and peace! … If you live according to the flesh, you shall die: but if you live by the Spirit―mortifying the deeds of the flesh―then you shall live!” (Romans 8:6 & 13).
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says much the same thing: “I understood, by divine light, that the incarnate Lord was to suffer a most cruel death and was to be bound most shamefully … In order merely to save them, it was not necessary to suffer so much … My Son and Lord could have redeemed the human race without suffering so much and that He wished to increase His sufferings only on account of the immensity of His love for souls … He began to suffer, and as soon as He was born into the world He and I were banished by Herod into a desert, and his sufferings continued until He died on the Cross … He it was who gave His own life and subjected Himself to sufferings for the good of His creatures without waiting for any merits on their part … for whom, as man, He had suffered and died … But the worldlings in their torpidity are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Father and Lord, nor by his declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in his sufferings and that his sinful children must reap the fruit of the Redemption by imitation of their sinless Chief … How persistently they forget, that their Teacher and Master has first accepted sufferings, and has honored and sanctified them in his own Person! It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should abhor suffering, even after my most holy Son did suffer for them … Ponder and meditate without intermission upon that, which my most holy Son suffered, so that thy soul be a participant in His sorrows. Let the pious memory of His sufferings engender in thee such a disgust and abhorrence of all earthly pleasures that thou despise and forget all that is visible, and instead, follow the Author of eternal life.
“Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him; for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross they cast it aside. Laborious exertions are very painful and averse to human nature according to the flesh; and the fruits of the spirit are more hidden and few guide themselves by the light … If passing labors and sufferings are accepted with joy and with serenity of heart, then they spiritualize the creature, they elevate it and furnish it with a divine insight―by which the soul begins to appreciate and esteem affliction at its proper value, and soon finds consolation in the blessings of mortification and finds freedom from disorderly passions … When the occasion of tasting the chalice and the cross of suffering is at hand, thou must not turn away in sorrow and affliction from the sufferings, by which the sincerity of a loving and affectionate heart is to be tried ... The divine influence will urge and draw thee on to desire of being despised by creatures, to joyful suffering, to love of the cross and an earnest and generous acceptation of it; it will move thee to seek the last place, to love those that persecute thee, to fear and abhor sin, even the slightest … seeking only to love and to suffer … Be willing to bear and suffer, forgive and love all who offend thee … When gold is untouched by the furnace-heat, the iron by the file, the grain by the grinding stone or flail, the grapes by the winepress, they are all useless and will not attain the end for which they are created … Thou canst not follow Christ, if thou refuse to embrace the cross and rejoice in it!
“Understand the ignorance and error of mortals, nearly all of them strive to avoid labor and suffering and are frightened by the royal and secure road of mortification and the Cross. Full of this deceitful ignorance, they not only abhor resemblance to Christ’s suffering, but they make their recovery impossible―since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering … Why then will mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? My most holy Son and myself are trying to find among those who have arrived at the way of the cross, some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If thou wish to be our disciple, then enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights … In this science of suffering are renewed all the blessed riches of the creatures―those that fly from them are insane, those that know nothing of this science, are foolish! … Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with this wisdom; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the blear-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors!”
“Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. He is not a true son of his father, who does not imitate him―nor is he a good disciple, who does not follow his Master―nor is he a good servant, who does not accompany his lord―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and so adverse to suffering, our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation. And yet even all this is insufficient, since their inclinations and their blind love of visible things detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart; these inclinations and blindness rob them of remembrance and affection toward these higher things, which could raise them above their wordliness … They do not seek the medicine of suffering … Hence it is that men do not find joy in their tribulations, nor rest in their labors, nor consolation in their sorrows, nor any peace in adversities. For, altogether different from the saints who glory in tribulation as the fulfillment of their most earnest desires, these wordlings desire none of it and abhor all that is painful. In many of the faithful this ignorance goes still farther―for some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion.
“Therefore, embrace the Cross and do not admit any consolation outside of it in this life … Life must be for thee a most rigid cross on which thou must remain crucified … in such a way that thou canst not stretch thyself in any way, being nailed immovably to the Cross with Christ … Keep in thy memory Christ crucified, who is my divine Son and thy Spouse, and never forget the sufferings of the Cross and the doctrine taught by Him upon it … Contemplate and consider in thy heart the image of my Son and Lord full of blood, torments, sorrows, and at last nailed to the Cross, no part of his sacred body being exempt from wounds and excruciating pains … By contemplating and feeling within thyself the sacred Passion, you will attain the summit of perfection and attain the love of a spouse. Bless and magnify my most holy Son for the love with which He delivered Himself up for the salvation of mankind. Little do mortals heed this mystery; but I, as an eyewitness, assure thee, that next to ascending to the right hand of his eternal Father, nothing was so highly estimated and so earnestly desired by Him, as to offer Himself for suffering and death and to deliver Himself up entirely to His enemies. Lament with great sorrow the fact that Judas, in his malice and treachery, has many more followers than Christ. Many are the infidels, many the bad Catholics, many the hypocrites, who under the name of a Christian, sell and deliver Him and wish to crucify Him again!
“The Lord and I suffered and endured such bitter sorrows, in order that mortals might be encouraged not to refuse less severe sufferings for their own eternal good. Therefore let mortals show themselves thankful, willingly entering upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, to bear it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness.”
A passion for Passiontide seems like an oxymoron―a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory terms are used together: “deafening silence,” “organized chaos,” etc. That is what we get when we analyze the word “passion” ― which you will find defined along the lines of “a strong or extravagant fondness, enthusiasm, or desire for anything; a strong liking or desire for, or devotion to some activity, object, or concept ― as in ‘a passion for chess’; ‘a passion for sport’; ‘a passion for food,’ etc.” All of that is not too bad and not too negative―but, when we dig deeper into the word “passion” we see that it comes from the Latin passio from the verb patior (pati, passus sum), meaning “to suffer, endure, undergo suffering, etc.” That is where we have a problem! Who has “a strong or extravagant fondness, enthusiasm, or desire for” suffering? A masochist, you may say. Yet that is meant to be the disposition of any and every true Christian!
Our Lord could not have made that any clearer: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross to come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that does not take up his cross and does not follow Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). Our Lord said of the newly converted persecutor of Christians, Saul (St. Paul): “This man is to Me a vessel of election, to carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how many great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake!” (Acts 9:15-16).
That same persecutor of Christians, once converted, would write: “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 2:19). “We preach Christ crucified … For I judged not myself to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:23; 2:2). “And they that are Christ’s, have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences” (Galatians 5:24). “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer” (Romans 6:6). “I rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ, in my flesh, for His Body, which is the Church!” (Colossians 1:24). “Many walk―of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping―that they are enemies of the cross of Christ! Whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:18-19). “The word of the cross, to them that perish, is foolishness―but to them that are saved, that is to us, it is the power of God!” (1 Corinthians 1:18).
The cross and suffering are not exactly the ultimate goal and love of most people―but without that cross and without suffering, there is no possible way of gaining entrance into Heaven. We must strive to overcome our repugnance for the cross and suffering―and seek to view it and embrace it as St. Paul did. A Christian is judged by his love or hatred of the cross and suffering.
Tell Me…
We all know the usual “Tell me…” phrases ― “Tell me who your friends are, and I will tell what kind of a person you are!” … “Tell me what you (love, like, eat, read, watch), and I will tell you what you are!” These phrases are somewhat akin to Our Lord’s statement: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire! Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20).
Elsewhere, Our Lord says to the worldlings: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7). If the works or fruits of the world are evil, then the world (the tree that bears those evil fruits) must also be evil: “The evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit.”
Along the same lines, Holy Scripture adds: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
The God and Lord of Unity―Or the God and Lord of Division?
The above words of Holy Scripture seem to be divisive: “‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” Yet, elsewhere, Scripture says: “I beseech you, brethren, by the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no schisms among you; but that you be perfect in the same mind, and in the same judgment” (1 Corinthians 1:10). T
The same sentiment is seen in various other books of the Bible: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor freeman, there is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus!” (Galatians 3:8). “Be of one mind, having the same charity, being of one accord, agreeing in sentiment. Let nothing be done through contention” (Philippians 2:2-3). “Careful to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. One body and one Spirit; as you are called in one hope of your calling―one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of all, Who is above all, and through all, and in us all” (Ephesians 4:3-6).
Our Lord, in speaking to His Father in Heaven at the Last Supper, adds: “I have manifested Thy Name to the men whom Thou hast given Me … I pray for them because they are Thine … And not for them only do I pray, but for them also who through their word shall believe in Me, so that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, are in Me, and I in thee; may they also be one in Us … that they may be one, as We also are one―I in them, and Thou in Me; so that they may be made perfect in oneness” (John 17:6-23).
All of this bespeaks and oozes unity! Yet it can all be taken out of context and other parts of Scripture that show the contrary can be deliberately ignored and set aside. This is much like only seeing God’s mercy without equally seeing God’s justice―it is being selective and taking what suits your personal preferences, ideology or outlook. Yes, God and Christ seek unity―but it is their version of unity and not the world’s false version of unity. God seeks that we be united in Him―following His teachings and commandments. The world will allow any kind of unity―do what the hell you want and we will unite in agreeing to disagree―everything is permissible, both sin and virtue, error and truth, paganism and Christianity.
If you have read a decent portion of the Bible, then you will have realized―consciously or unconsciously―that God the Father and God the Son are also Gods of division―in the sense of “It is My way, or the highway!” There can only be unity in God under God’s Law and Commandments―God will not tolerate or accept a false unity that rejects part or all of His Law or commandments. Our Lord also says at the Last Supper: “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15) … “He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them; he it is that loveth Me. And he that loveth Me, shall be loved of My Father: and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him” (John 14:21) … “If any one love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make Our abode with him” (John 14:23) … “He that loveth Me not, keepeth not My words” (John 14:24) ... “You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 15:14) … “If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love; as I also have kept My Father’s commandments, and do abide in His love” (John 15:10).
At the Last Supper, despite speaking about a desired unity, Our Lord also speaks of division―He places that division or draws that dividing-line between Himself and world: “I have manifested Thy Name, Father, to the men whom Thou hast given Me out of the world. Thine they were, and to Me Thou gavest them; and they have kept Thy word … I pray for them―I pray not for the world―but for them whom Thou hast given Me, because they are Thine! … They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:6-9, 16).
Born to Divide
This divisiveness of Christ was prophesied by St. Simeon at Our Lord’s Presentation in the Temple―which is both the 4th Joyful Mystery of the Rosary and 1st Mystery in the Rosary of Our Lady’s Seven Sorrows. “There was a man in Jerusalem named Simeon, and the Holy Ghost was in him. And he had received an answer from the Holy Ghost, that he should not see death, before he had seen the Christ of the Lord. And when His parents brought in the Child Jesus … Simeon took Him into his arms, and said: ‘O Lord … my eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of all peoples! A light to the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel! … Behold this Child is set for the fall, and for the resurrection of many in Israel, and for a sign which shall be contradicted” (Luke 2:25-34).
Almost immediately afterwards, the 2,000 year long acceptance and rejection of Christ began―for the Three Kings came from the East to adore, while King Herod sought to kill Him. When Our Lord began His public ministry at the age of 30, after 30 years of hidden life, the same phenomenon was to be seen―some accepted Him and loved Him, other rejected Him and hated Him.
Long before the Last Supper, Our Lord had clearly stated that He had come to cause division: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled! … Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no―but separation! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! Everyone, therefore, that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! For they will deliver you up in councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues. And you shall be brought before governors, and before kings for My sake … The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and shall put them to death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake―but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved. And when they shall persecute you in this city, flee into another!” (Luke 12:49-53; Matthew 10:17-22; 10:32-37).
The Real Cause of Division
God is not the cause of division―it is Satan, the devils and mankind that choose division by separating themselves from God and His Law: “Why have the Gentiles raged, and the people devised vain things? The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, [saying]: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’ He that dwells in Heaven shall laugh at them: and the Lord shall deride them. Then shall He speak to them in His anger, and trouble them in his rage!” (Psalm 2:1-5). “These are they, who separate themselves, sensual men, having not the Spirit!” (Jude 1:19). “Whosoever revolts and continues not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that continues in the doctrine, the same hath both the Father and the Son. If any man come to you and bring not this doctrine―then receive him not into the house, nor say to him, ‘God speed you!’ For he that says unto him: ‘God speed you!’ communicates with his wicked works” (2 John 1:9-11).
This is why Christ and Holy Scripture recommends division, in the sense of separation, meaning that we separate ourselves from anyone and everyone who is opposed to Christ and His teachings in any way, shape or form. The world as a whole falls into this category―for Our Lord said concerning His followers: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). Are you of the world? Or are you not of this world? Are you comfortable with the world? Or are you uncomfortable with the world? Do you follow the fashions, maxims and opinions of the world? Or do you oppose them? “If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above―where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the earth. For you are dead and your life is hidden with Christ in God!” (Colossians 3:1-3). Alas, so many do the exact opposite―and that is one of the many reasons why most souls end up being lost. They refuse to play accord to the rule book―they create their own rule book, their own version of God’s religion!
Preferring One’s Own Religion to God’s Religion
This is what the Scribes and Pharisees were guilty of―even though they claimed to be the upholders of God Laws and Traditions, they had succumbed to tweaking God’s religion according their own opinions. Our Lord often condemned them for that with words such as: “Why do you also transgress the commandment of God for your tradition? … Hypocrites, well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me. And in vain do they worship Me, teaching doctrines and commandments of men!’” (Matthew 15:3, 7-9). Our Lord’s clashes with the Scribes and Pharisees came to a head in the Temple, on the Tuesday before His crucifixion (Tuesday of Holy Week as we call it today), when He “let them have it” with a tirade not seen elsewhere in the Gospels. Here are just some of the angry criticisms Our Lord made against them:
“They bind heavy and insupportable burdens, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but with a finger of their own they will not move them. All their works they do for to be seen of men ... They love the first places at feasts, and the first chairs in the synagogues, and salutations in the market place, and to be called by men, Rabbi [Master, Teacher] … Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you shut the Kingdom of Heaven against men, for you yourselves do not enter in; and those that are going in, you suffer not to enter! Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites: because you devour the houses of widows, praying long prayers. For this you shall receive the greater judgment. Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you go round about the sea and the land to make one convert; and when he is made, you make him the child of Hell twofold more than yourselves. Woe to you blind guides! … Ye foolish and blind! … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites― because you [focus on less important things] and ignore the weightier things of the law; judgment, and mercy, and faith. These things you ought to have done and not to leave those undone! Blind guides, who strain out a gnat, but swallow a camel! Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness. Thou blind Pharisee! First make clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside may become clean! Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―because you are like to whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men’s bones, and of all filthiness! So you also outwardly indeed appear to men to be just; but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity! Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites―that build the tombs of the prophets, and adorn the monuments of the just, whereas you are witnesses against yourselves, because you are the sons of them that killed the prophets! You serpents, generation of vipers! How will you flee from the judgment of Hell? Behold I send to you prophets, and wise men, and scribes―and some of them you will put to death and crucify, and some you will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city! Therefore upon you shall come all the just blood that hath been shed upon the Earth!” (Matthew 23:4-35).
Even the Apostles felt the wrath and indignation of Christ at times―especially when they too tried to “change” Christ’s religion, that is to say, to suggest another way of doing things to Christ’s way of doing things. One incident was where the brothers, St. James and St. John―known as the “Sons of Thunder”―asked Our Lord if they could pray for fire and brimstone to fall upon a Samaritan city that had just rejected Jesus: “And it came to pass, when the days of His assumption were accomplishing, that He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem. And He sent messengers before His face; and going, they entered into a city of the Samaritans, to prepare for Him. And they received Him not, because His face was of one going to Jerusalem. And when His disciples James and John had seen this, they said: ‘Lord, wilt Thou that we command fire to come down from Heaven and consume them?’ And turning, He rebuked them, saying: ‘You know not of what spirit you are! The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!’” (Luke 9:51-56). It’s Our Lord’s way or the highway!
St. Peter received an even greater rebuke, where Jesus called him “Satan” for trying to prevent Our Lord from fulfilling His mission to suffer and die at the hands of His enemies: “From that time Jesus began to show to His disciples, that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and the third day rise again. And Peter, taking Him, began to rebuke Him, saying: ‘Lord, be it far from Thee, this shall not be unto Thee!’ Jesus, turning, said to Peter: ‘Go behind Me, Satan! Thou art a scandal unto Me! Because thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men!’” (Matthew 16:21-23). It’s Our Lord’s way or the highway!
Our Lord’s Passion for the Passion Misunderstood
Human thinking rarely aligns itself with Divine thinking―as God Himself says to us: “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). We tend to be minimalists by nature―seeking to get the maximum possible by making minimal efforts. Our Lord was the opposite―He sought to give the maximum when the minimal would have sufficed. He did not have to go through torture and death in order to earn for us the possibility of salvation―any minimal kind of suffering or even act of charity would have sufficed―because, while being human, He was also Divine, He was God and therefore infinite, and any action, however small, had infinite value. Yet He chose to “go all the way”, “to the very limit”, in order to show and prove His compassion and love for us. We do the minimal, while expecting maximum―Jesus did the maximum, while knowing His efforts would only have minimal results―because most souls are lost and damned as a result of not cooperating with and profiting from the graces of potential salvation earned by Christ.
Jesus, from the very beginning―since He was not only a man, but God―knew what was awaiting Him, even in His infancy. He knew His purpose on Earth: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I am come that they may have life” [meaning, eternal life] (John 10:10). St. Peter adds: “Christ died for our sins” (1 Peter 3:18) … “Who, His own self, bore our sins in His body upon the tree―so that we, being dead to sins, should live to justice―by Whose stripes you were healed!” (1 Peter 2:24). Old Testament prophecy spoke of the future Christ and Savior: “There is no beauty in Him, nor comeliness―and we have seen Him, and there was no sightliness that we should be desirous of Him. Despised and the most abject of men, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with infirmity. And His look was as it were hidden and despised, whereupon we esteemed Him not! He hath borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows―and we have thought of Him as it were a leper, and as one struck by God and afflicted. But He was wounded for our iniquities, He was bruised for our sins―the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and by His bruises we are healed!” (Isaias 53:2-5).
To Our Lady, at the marriage feast at Cana, Our Lord, knowing the future, said: “My hour is not yet come!” (John 2:4). When still in Galilee, “Jesus said: ‘My time is not yet come!’” (John 7:6). Later, when He had taken His public ministry from Galilee to Jerusalem, He came up against the envy and anger of the Scribes and Pharisees, who eventually decided that Jesus must be apprehended and killed, which led Jesus to ask them: “‘Why seek you to kill Me?’ … They then sought to apprehend Him, but no man laid hands on Him, because His hour was not yet come” (John 7:20 & 30). Again, in the next chapter of John, we read that “No man laid hands on Him, because His hour was not yet come” (John 8:20). As the time for His Passion drew closer, “it came to pass, when the days of His assumption were accomplishing, that He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem” (Luke 9:51). “From that time Jesus began to show to His disciples, that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the ancients and scribes and chief priests, and be put to death, and the third day rise again!” (Matthew 16:21). Jesus then spoke of the arrival of the hour for which He had come into this world: “Behold, the hour cometh, and it is now come, that you shall be scattered every man to his own, and shall leave Me alone!” (John 16:32). “All you shall be scandalized in Me this night. For it is written: ‘I will strike the Shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be dispersed!’” (Matthew 26:31). “Now is My soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save Me from this hour!’ But for this cause I came unto this hour!” (John 12:27).
Get a Passion for the Passion―Seek to Suffer for Christ!
St. Paul traces the path of suffering for us: “I judge myself to not know anything among you―except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified!” (1 Corinthians 2:2). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross” (Galatians 2:19). “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “Knowing this―that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin may be destroyed, to the end that we may serve sin no longer!” (Romans 6:6). “Christ died for our sins―the Just for the unjust―so that He might offer us to God, that we being put to death in the flesh, may enlivened in the Spirit” (1 Peter 3:18). “The fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable to His death” (Philippians 3:10). “For unto you it is given for Christ, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for Him” (Philippians 1:29). “We suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified with Him. For I reckon that the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come!” (Romans 8:17-18). “In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed; we are straitened, but are not destitute; we suffer persecution, but are not forsaken; we are cast down, but we perish not! Always bearing about in our body the mortification of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies!” (2 Corinthians 4:8-10).
“Christ, therefore, having suffered in the flesh, be you also armed with the same thought―for he that hath suffered in the flesh, hath ceased from sins, so that he may now live the rest of his time in his body, not according to the desires of men, but according to the will of God” (1 Peter 4:1-2). “The wisdom of the flesh is death; but the wisdom of the spirit is life and peace! … If you live according to the flesh, you shall die: but if you live by the Spirit―mortifying the deeds of the flesh―then you shall live!” (Romans 8:6 & 13).
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says much the same thing: “I understood, by divine light, that the incarnate Lord was to suffer a most cruel death and was to be bound most shamefully … In order merely to save them, it was not necessary to suffer so much … My Son and Lord could have redeemed the human race without suffering so much and that He wished to increase His sufferings only on account of the immensity of His love for souls … He began to suffer, and as soon as He was born into the world He and I were banished by Herod into a desert, and his sufferings continued until He died on the Cross … He it was who gave His own life and subjected Himself to sufferings for the good of His creatures without waiting for any merits on their part … for whom, as man, He had suffered and died … But the worldlings in their torpidity are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Father and Lord, nor by his declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in his sufferings and that his sinful children must reap the fruit of the Redemption by imitation of their sinless Chief … How persistently they forget, that their Teacher and Master has first accepted sufferings, and has honored and sanctified them in his own Person! It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should abhor suffering, even after my most holy Son did suffer for them … Ponder and meditate without intermission upon that, which my most holy Son suffered, so that thy soul be a participant in His sorrows. Let the pious memory of His sufferings engender in thee such a disgust and abhorrence of all earthly pleasures that thou despise and forget all that is visible, and instead, follow the Author of eternal life.
“Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him; for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross they cast it aside. Laborious exertions are very painful and averse to human nature according to the flesh; and the fruits of the spirit are more hidden and few guide themselves by the light … If passing labors and sufferings are accepted with joy and with serenity of heart, then they spiritualize the creature, they elevate it and furnish it with a divine insight―by which the soul begins to appreciate and esteem affliction at its proper value, and soon finds consolation in the blessings of mortification and finds freedom from disorderly passions … When the occasion of tasting the chalice and the cross of suffering is at hand, thou must not turn away in sorrow and affliction from the sufferings, by which the sincerity of a loving and affectionate heart is to be tried ... The divine influence will urge and draw thee on to desire of being despised by creatures, to joyful suffering, to love of the cross and an earnest and generous acceptation of it; it will move thee to seek the last place, to love those that persecute thee, to fear and abhor sin, even the slightest … seeking only to love and to suffer … Be willing to bear and suffer, forgive and love all who offend thee … When gold is untouched by the furnace-heat, the iron by the file, the grain by the grinding stone or flail, the grapes by the winepress, they are all useless and will not attain the end for which they are created … Thou canst not follow Christ, if thou refuse to embrace the cross and rejoice in it!
“Understand the ignorance and error of mortals, nearly all of them strive to avoid labor and suffering and are frightened by the royal and secure road of mortification and the Cross. Full of this deceitful ignorance, they not only abhor resemblance to Christ’s suffering, but they make their recovery impossible―since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering … Why then will mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? My most holy Son and myself are trying to find among those who have arrived at the way of the cross, some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If thou wish to be our disciple, then enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights … In this science of suffering are renewed all the blessed riches of the creatures―those that fly from them are insane, those that know nothing of this science, are foolish! … Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with this wisdom; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the blear-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors!”
“Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. He is not a true son of his father, who does not imitate him―nor is he a good disciple, who does not follow his Master―nor is he a good servant, who does not accompany his lord―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and so adverse to suffering, our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation. And yet even all this is insufficient, since their inclinations and their blind love of visible things detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart; these inclinations and blindness rob them of remembrance and affection toward these higher things, which could raise them above their wordliness … They do not seek the medicine of suffering … Hence it is that men do not find joy in their tribulations, nor rest in their labors, nor consolation in their sorrows, nor any peace in adversities. For, altogether different from the saints who glory in tribulation as the fulfillment of their most earnest desires, these wordlings desire none of it and abhor all that is painful. In many of the faithful this ignorance goes still farther―for some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion.
“Therefore, embrace the Cross and do not admit any consolation outside of it in this life … Life must be for thee a most rigid cross on which thou must remain crucified … in such a way that thou canst not stretch thyself in any way, being nailed immovably to the Cross with Christ … Keep in thy memory Christ crucified, who is my divine Son and thy Spouse, and never forget the sufferings of the Cross and the doctrine taught by Him upon it … Contemplate and consider in thy heart the image of my Son and Lord full of blood, torments, sorrows, and at last nailed to the Cross, no part of his sacred body being exempt from wounds and excruciating pains … By contemplating and feeling within thyself the sacred Passion, you will attain the summit of perfection and attain the love of a spouse. Bless and magnify my most holy Son for the love with which He delivered Himself up for the salvation of mankind. Little do mortals heed this mystery; but I, as an eyewitness, assure thee, that next to ascending to the right hand of his eternal Father, nothing was so highly estimated and so earnestly desired by Him, as to offer Himself for suffering and death and to deliver Himself up entirely to His enemies. Lament with great sorrow the fact that Judas, in his malice and treachery, has many more followers than Christ. Many are the infidels, many the bad Catholics, many the hypocrites, who under the name of a Christian, sell and deliver Him and wish to crucify Him again!
“The Lord and I suffered and endured such bitter sorrows, in order that mortals might be encouraged not to refuse less severe sufferings for their own eternal good. Therefore let mortals show themselves thankful, willingly entering upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, to bear it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness.”
Article 22
Tuesday after Passion Sunday March 19th
Passion Fruit for Passiontide!
Tuesday after Passion Sunday March 19th
Passion Fruit for Passiontide!
Passiontide―A Time of Trees and Fruit
As we enter this wonderful season of Passiontide―a two-week stretch where the Church focuses on the Passion and Death of Our Lord―we do well to put all else aside and tend to our tree―the “Passion Tree”, or the Cross on which Our Lord died and bore fruit―the fruit of His Passion, His “passion-fruit”, so to speak. The Cross is, of course, a tree of suffering. Yet it is also a tree of life―supernatural life and eternal life. The liturgy of Passion Sunday sings of the Tree of the Cross on which our Savior will die for our sins―let us then treat of trees, for there is much fruit to be found in reflecting upon the various trees that God has made and spoken about.
Learning from Trees
What can we learn from trees? Trees play a major role with God and have a place of importance in Holy Scripture! Even the Bible is printed on paper that comes from trees!! The Bible begins with the words: “In the beginning…” and very soon after that beginning, God made plants and trees! “And God said: ‘Let the Earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit, after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the Earth.’ And it was so done. And the Earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yieldeth seed according to its kind, and the tree that beareth fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:11-12).
Good Trees, Bad Trees
Speaking of that good and evil, Our Lord touches upon that in the New Testament—showing us that God had not lost interest in trees: “Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:17-20).
He adds elsewhere: “The axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire” (Matthew 3:10). Obviously, He is not talking about horticulture, but is likening the tree to the human being by analogy. This is clearly shown later, when, in speaking with the Pharisees, He says: “Either make the tree good and its fruit good: or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known. O generation of vipers, how can you speak good things, whereas you are evil?” (Matthew 12:33-34).
Tree of Knowledge
There is much to learn from trees—even though God forbade Adam and Eve to eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil! “And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of: the tree of life also in the midst of Paradise: and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil” (Genesis 2:9). “And God commanded Adam, saying: ‘Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat: but of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” (Genesis 2:16-17).
Teaching Trees
Our Lord would use the tree to communicate many things and truths to His followers—by both word and His actions. He will speak of the fig tree, the mulberry tree, the vine, the mustard seed that grows into a tree: “And He spoke to them in a similitude. ‘See the fig tree, and all the trees…’” (Luke 21:29). “And from the fig tree learn a parable…” (Matthew 24:32).
Danger for Fruitless Trees
“He spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it done therefore! Why is it encumbering the ground?” But he answering, said to him: “Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it! And if happily it bear fruit: but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”‘” (Luke 13:6-9).
“And the next day when they came out from Bethania, He was hungry. And when He had seen afar off a fig tree having leaves, He came if perhaps He might find anything on it. And when He was come to it, He found nothing but leaves. For it was not the time for figs. And answering He said to it: ‘May no man hereafter eat fruit of thee any more forever!’” (Mark 11:12-14). “And immediately the fig tree withered away. And the disciples seeing it wondered, saying: ‘How is it presently withered away?’ And Jesus answering, said to them: ‘Amen, I say to you, if you shall have Faith, and stagger not, not only this of the fig tree shall you do, but also if you shall say to this mountain, “Take up and cast thyself into the sea!” it shall be done. And in all things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive.” (Matthew 21:20-22).
Tree of Faith
“And the Lord said: ‘If you had Faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you might say to this mulberry tree, “Be thou rooted up, and be thou transplanted into the sea!” and it would obey you” (Luke 17:6).
“Another parable he proposed unto them, saying: The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof” (Matthew 13:31-32).
Encounters around Trees
“Jesus saw Nathanael coming to Him: and He said of him: ‘Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile!’ Nathanael said to Him: ‘How is it that Thou knowest me?’ Jesus answered, and said to him: ‘Even before Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw thee!’” (John 1:47-48).
“And entering in, he walked through Jericho. And behold, there was a man named Zacheus, who was the chief of the publicans, and he was rich. And he sought to see Jesus who He was, and he could not for the crowd, because he was low of stature. And running before, he climbed up into a sycamore tree, that he might see Him; for He was to pass that way. And when Jesus was come to the place, looking up, He saw him, and said to him: Zacheus, make haste and come down; for this day I must abide in thy house” (Luke 19:1-5).
Farewell Among Trees
On the eve of His Passion and Death, Our Lord made His way to the Garden of Gethsemane, on the Mount of Olives, and would pray among the olive trees: “And when they had said a hymn, they went forth to the Mount of Olives. And Jesus saith to them: ‘You will all be scandalized in My regard this night; for it is written, “I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep shall be dispersed”‘” (Mark 14:26-27). “And going out, He went, according to His custom, to the Mount of Olives. And His disciples also followed Him. And when He was come to the place, He said to them: ‘Pray, lest ye enter into temptation!’” (Luke 22:39-40).
Death on a Tree
St. Peter states that Jesus died upon a tree. When the Apostles were brought before the Sanhedrin and were forbidden to preach in Jesus’ Name, St. Peter retorted: “The God of our fathers has raised up Jesus, Whom you put to death, hanging Him upon a tree.” (Acts 5:30). Later in Caesarea, Peter, speaking before the converted centurion Cornelius, again says: “We are witnesses of all things that Jesus did in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem, Whom they killed, hanging Him upon a tree!” (Acts 10:39). St. Paul says the same thing in Antioch: “For they that inhabited Jerusalem, and the rulers thereof, … judging Him … and finding no cause of death in Him, they desired of Pilate, that they might kill Him. And when they had fulfilled all things that were written of Him, taking Him down from the tree, they laid Him in a sepulcher” (Acts 13:27-29).
So what is there to Learn?
“For the invisible things of Him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made” (Romans 1:20). As Our Lord said: “from the fig tree learn a parable…” (Matthew 24:32). So what can we learn? In fact, if we were to just take the time and delve into the things that were made by God—in this case, trees—then we would be amazed at what there is to find! One would suspect that, from merely looking at the preoccupation Holy Scripture has with trees.
Seek God First!
First things first! “Seek ye first … God!” (Luke 12:31). Well, in that case, let us look for God in the tree and see where He is to found! Now we know that God is a spirit, and spirit cannot be seen—so what is there about a tree that cannot be seen? Usually it is the roots. From the roots comes the trunk, which then divides into branches, and later twigs. It is the roots that furnish the tree with its life—much as God furnishes spiritual life through His grace. Hence, we could say that the sap is a symbol of the grace of God.
Tree of Calvary
If we look at the tree of the Cross, on which Jesus died, we can loosely compare it the three-leaf clover that St. Patrick would use to explain the Holy Trinity. The long base upright beam, that stems from the ground to the intersection with the horizontal beam, could be said to be the One God. The three sections of the cross that branch out north, east and west, after the intersection, could be said to be the Three Persons of the Holy Trinity—Father, Son and Holy Ghost.
The tree of the Cross on Calvary is our Tree of Life—for Christ died on the dead wood of a tree, in order to bring us eternal life. “Unless the grain of wheat (the tree) falling into the ground (being chopped-down) die, itself remaineth alone. But if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal” (John 12:24-25). The dead wood of the tree bore the fruit of eternal life—as we clearly see from the beautiful liturgy of Passiontide:
Liturgical Passion Tree With Passion Fruit
The mystery of the Cross shines out in glory,
The Cross on which Life suffered death,
And by that death gave life back to us.
The words of David’s prophetic song were fulfilled,
In which he announced to the nations:
“God has reigned from a tree.”
Tree of dazzling beauty,
Adorned with the purple of the King’s Blood,
And chosen from a stock worthy to bear Limbs so sacred!
How favored the tree, on whose branches hung the Ransom of the world;
It was made a balance on which His Body was weighed,
And bore away the prey that Hell had claimed.
The Redeemer had now completed thirty years
And had come to the end of His earthly life,
And then of His own free will, He gave Himself up to the Passion,
The Lamb was lifted up on to the tree of the Cross to be a sacrifice.
Faithful Cross, tree that is alone in its glory among all other trees;
No forest ever yielded its equal in leaf, flower and fruit.
Loving nails and loving wood bear a loving burden.
Soften your branches, noble tree;
Relax your taut fibers and let your natural hardness give way to yielding suppleness;
And so offer yourself as a gentle support for the Body of the King of Heaven.
You alone were worthy to bear the Victim of the world
And like the Ark, to give shelter to a shipwrecked world.
An Ark which the Sacred Blood, poured out from the Body of the Lamb, has annointed.
What a beautiful incorporation of the tree as an essential part of our salvation! These verses, extracted from the liturgy of Passiontide, are worth reading over and over again. They almost contain a fiery spark that is destined to enkindle our devotion.
Mary the Tree of Life
Taking this idea of Jesus on the tree a little further, we can say that Mary is the Tree of which Jesus is the Fruit: “Blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus!” St. Louis de Montfort does not hesitate in calling Mary the Tree of Life. “He who wishes to have the fruit well-ripened and well-formed, must have the tree that produces it; he who wishes to have the Fruit of Life, Jesus Christ, must have the Tree of Life, which is Mary” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §164).
“Jesus is everywhere and always the Fruit and the Son of Mary; and Mary is everywhere the veritable Tree who bears the Fruit of life, and the true Mother who produces it” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §44). “If Mary, who is the Tree of Life, is well-cultivated in our soul, by fidelity to the practices of this devotion, she will bear her fruit in her own time, and her Fruit is none other than Jesus Christ” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §218).
At Fatima, Our Lady essentially says the same thing: “Jesus wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it; these souls will be dear to God” (June 13, 1917).
Planting the Tree of Life in Ourselves
When we make the True Devotion Consecration to Mary, we plant a seed from this Tree of Life, that Mary is, in our own souls, so that Mary may reproduce her spirit in our soul. “O Holy Spirit, grant me all these graces. Plant in my soul the Tree of true Life, which is Mary; cultivate it and tend it so that it may grow and blossom and bring forth the fruit of life in abundance” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §67).
We are supposed to be the seed of Mary, for as God said to devil after he had made Adam and Eve fall: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.” (Genesis 3:15). “As Mother of the living, gives to all her children splinters of the Tree of Life, which is the Cross of Jesus” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §22). Through the Cross, Our Lord crushed and defeated the devil.
St. Louis continues: “Have you understood with the help of the Holy Ghost what I have tried to explain? If so, be thankful to God. It is a secret of which very few people are aware. If you have discovered this treasure in the field of Mary, this pearl of great price (Matthew 13:44-46), you should sell all you have to purchase it. You must offer yourself to Mary, happily lose yourself in her, only to find God in her” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §70).
Necessity of Cultivating the Tree of Life
“If the Holy Ghost has planted in your soul the true Tree of Life, which is the devotion that I have just explained (True Devotion to Mary), you should see carefully to its cultivation, so that it will yield its fruit in due season. This devotion is like the mustard seed of the Gospel (Mark 4:31), which is indeed the smallest of all seeds, but nevertheless it grows into a big plant, shooting up so high that the birds of the air, that is, the elect, come and make their nest in its branches. They repose there, shaded from the heat of the sun, and safely hidden from beasts of prey” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §70).
How to Cultivate the Tree of Life
“Here is the best way, chosen soul, to cultivate it:
(1) This Tree, once planted in a docile heart, requires fresh air and no human support. Being of heavenly origin, it must be uninfluenced by any creature, since a creature might hinder it from rising up towards God Who created it. Hence you must not rely on your own endeavors or your natural talents or your personal standing or the guidance of men. You must resort to Mary, relying solely on her help. (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §71).
(2) The person in whose soul this Tree has taken root must, like a good gardener, watch over it and protect it. For this Tree, having life and capable of producing the fruit of life, should be raised and tended with enduring care and attention of soul. A soul that desires to be holy, will make this its chief aim and occupation. (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §72).
“Whatever is likely to choke the Tree or in the course of time prevent its yielding fruit, such as thorns and thistles, must be cut away and rooted-out. This means that by self-denial and self-discipline you must sedulously cut short and even give up all empty pleasures and useless dealings with other creatures. In other words, you must crucify the flesh, keep a guard over the tongue, and mortify the bodily senses” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §73).
(3) You must guard against grubs doing harm to the Tree. These parasites are love of self and love of comfort, and they eat away the green foliage of the Tree and frustrate the fair hope it offered of yielding good fruit; for love of self is incompatible with love of Mary” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §74).
(4) You must not allow this Tree to be damaged by destructive animals, that is, by sins, for they may cause its death simply by their contact. They must not be allowed even to breathe upon the Tree, because their mere breath, that is, venial sins, which are most dangerous when we do not trouble ourselves about them” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §75).
(5) It is also necessary to water this Tree regularly with your Communions, Masses and other public and private prayers. Otherwise it will not continue bearing fruit” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §76).
(6) Yet you need not be alarmed when the winds blow and shake this Tree, for it must happen that the storm-winds of temptation will threaten to bring it down, and snow and frost tend to smother it. By this we mean that this devotion to our Blessed Lady will surely be called into question and attacked. But as long as we continue steadfastly in tending it, we have nothing to fear” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §77).
Its lasting fruit: Jesus Christ
“Chosen soul, provided you thus carefully cultivate the Tree of Life, which has been freshly planted in your soul by the Holy Ghost, I can assure you that in a short time it will grow so tall that the birds of the air will make their home in it. It will become such a good Tree, that it will yield in due season the sweet and adorable Fruit of honor and grace, which is Jesus, Who has always been, and will always be, the only fruit of Mary. Happy is that soul in which Mary, the Tree of Life, is planted. Happier still is the soul in which she has been able to grow and blossom. Happier again is the soul in which she brings forth her fruit. But happiest of all is the soul which savors the sweetness of Mary’s fruit and preserves it up till death, and then beyond, to all eternity” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §78).
Saintly Trees, Holy Trees
“It is Mary alone to whom God has given the keys of the cellars of divine love and the power to enter into the most sublime and secret ways of perfection, and the power likewise to make others enter in there also. It is Mary alone who has given to the miserable children of Eve, the faithless, entry into the terrestrial paradise; that they may walk there agreeably with God, hide there securely against their enemies, feed themselves there deliciously, without further fear of death, on the fruit of the Trees of Life and of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and drink, in long draughts, the heavenly waters of that fair fountain, which gushes forth there with abundance; or rather, since she is herself that terrestrial paradise, that virgin and blessed Earth, from which Adam and Eve, the sinners, have been driven, she gives no entry there except to those whom it is her pleasure to make saints” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §45).
“I have said that this would come to pass, particularly at the end of the world and indeed presently, because the Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity as much as the cedars of Lebanon outgrow the little shrubs. These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady, illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §47-48).
As we enter this wonderful season of Passiontide―a two-week stretch where the Church focuses on the Passion and Death of Our Lord―we do well to put all else aside and tend to our tree―the “Passion Tree”, or the Cross on which Our Lord died and bore fruit―the fruit of His Passion, His “passion-fruit”, so to speak. The Cross is, of course, a tree of suffering. Yet it is also a tree of life―supernatural life and eternal life. The liturgy of Passion Sunday sings of the Tree of the Cross on which our Savior will die for our sins―let us then treat of trees, for there is much fruit to be found in reflecting upon the various trees that God has made and spoken about.
Learning from Trees
What can we learn from trees? Trees play a major role with God and have a place of importance in Holy Scripture! Even the Bible is printed on paper that comes from trees!! The Bible begins with the words: “In the beginning…” and very soon after that beginning, God made plants and trees! “And God said: ‘Let the Earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit, after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the Earth.’ And it was so done. And the Earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yieldeth seed according to its kind, and the tree that beareth fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:11-12).
Good Trees, Bad Trees
Speaking of that good and evil, Our Lord touches upon that in the New Testament—showing us that God had not lost interest in trees: “Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:17-20).
He adds elsewhere: “The axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire” (Matthew 3:10). Obviously, He is not talking about horticulture, but is likening the tree to the human being by analogy. This is clearly shown later, when, in speaking with the Pharisees, He says: “Either make the tree good and its fruit good: or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known. O generation of vipers, how can you speak good things, whereas you are evil?” (Matthew 12:33-34).
Tree of Knowledge
There is much to learn from trees—even though God forbade Adam and Eve to eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil! “And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of: the tree of life also in the midst of Paradise: and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil” (Genesis 2:9). “And God commanded Adam, saying: ‘Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat: but of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” (Genesis 2:16-17).
Teaching Trees
Our Lord would use the tree to communicate many things and truths to His followers—by both word and His actions. He will speak of the fig tree, the mulberry tree, the vine, the mustard seed that grows into a tree: “And He spoke to them in a similitude. ‘See the fig tree, and all the trees…’” (Luke 21:29). “And from the fig tree learn a parable…” (Matthew 24:32).
Danger for Fruitless Trees
“He spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it done therefore! Why is it encumbering the ground?” But he answering, said to him: “Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it! And if happily it bear fruit: but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”‘” (Luke 13:6-9).
“And the next day when they came out from Bethania, He was hungry. And when He had seen afar off a fig tree having leaves, He came if perhaps He might find anything on it. And when He was come to it, He found nothing but leaves. For it was not the time for figs. And answering He said to it: ‘May no man hereafter eat fruit of thee any more forever!’” (Mark 11:12-14). “And immediately the fig tree withered away. And the disciples seeing it wondered, saying: ‘How is it presently withered away?’ And Jesus answering, said to them: ‘Amen, I say to you, if you shall have Faith, and stagger not, not only this of the fig tree shall you do, but also if you shall say to this mountain, “Take up and cast thyself into the sea!” it shall be done. And in all things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive.” (Matthew 21:20-22).
Tree of Faith
“And the Lord said: ‘If you had Faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you might say to this mulberry tree, “Be thou rooted up, and be thou transplanted into the sea!” and it would obey you” (Luke 17:6).
“Another parable he proposed unto them, saying: The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof” (Matthew 13:31-32).
Encounters around Trees
“Jesus saw Nathanael coming to Him: and He said of him: ‘Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile!’ Nathanael said to Him: ‘How is it that Thou knowest me?’ Jesus answered, and said to him: ‘Even before Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw thee!’” (John 1:47-48).
“And entering in, he walked through Jericho. And behold, there was a man named Zacheus, who was the chief of the publicans, and he was rich. And he sought to see Jesus who He was, and he could not for the crowd, because he was low of stature. And running before, he climbed up into a sycamore tree, that he might see Him; for He was to pass that way. And when Jesus was come to the place, looking up, He saw him, and said to him: Zacheus, make haste and come down; for this day I must abide in thy house” (Luke 19:1-5).
Farewell Among Trees
On the eve of His Passion and Death, Our Lord made His way to the Garden of Gethsemane, on the Mount of Olives, and would pray among the olive trees: “And when they had said a hymn, they went forth to the Mount of Olives. And Jesus saith to them: ‘You will all be scandalized in My regard this night; for it is written, “I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep shall be dispersed”‘” (Mark 14:26-27). “And going out, He went, according to His custom, to the Mount of Olives. And His disciples also followed Him. And when He was come to the place, He said to them: ‘Pray, lest ye enter into temptation!’” (Luke 22:39-40).
Death on a Tree
St. Peter states that Jesus died upon a tree. When the Apostles were brought before the Sanhedrin and were forbidden to preach in Jesus’ Name, St. Peter retorted: “The God of our fathers has raised up Jesus, Whom you put to death, hanging Him upon a tree.” (Acts 5:30). Later in Caesarea, Peter, speaking before the converted centurion Cornelius, again says: “We are witnesses of all things that Jesus did in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem, Whom they killed, hanging Him upon a tree!” (Acts 10:39). St. Paul says the same thing in Antioch: “For they that inhabited Jerusalem, and the rulers thereof, … judging Him … and finding no cause of death in Him, they desired of Pilate, that they might kill Him. And when they had fulfilled all things that were written of Him, taking Him down from the tree, they laid Him in a sepulcher” (Acts 13:27-29).
So what is there to Learn?
“For the invisible things of Him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made” (Romans 1:20). As Our Lord said: “from the fig tree learn a parable…” (Matthew 24:32). So what can we learn? In fact, if we were to just take the time and delve into the things that were made by God—in this case, trees—then we would be amazed at what there is to find! One would suspect that, from merely looking at the preoccupation Holy Scripture has with trees.
Seek God First!
First things first! “Seek ye first … God!” (Luke 12:31). Well, in that case, let us look for God in the tree and see where He is to found! Now we know that God is a spirit, and spirit cannot be seen—so what is there about a tree that cannot be seen? Usually it is the roots. From the roots comes the trunk, which then divides into branches, and later twigs. It is the roots that furnish the tree with its life—much as God furnishes spiritual life through His grace. Hence, we could say that the sap is a symbol of the grace of God.
Tree of Calvary
If we look at the tree of the Cross, on which Jesus died, we can loosely compare it the three-leaf clover that St. Patrick would use to explain the Holy Trinity. The long base upright beam, that stems from the ground to the intersection with the horizontal beam, could be said to be the One God. The three sections of the cross that branch out north, east and west, after the intersection, could be said to be the Three Persons of the Holy Trinity—Father, Son and Holy Ghost.
The tree of the Cross on Calvary is our Tree of Life—for Christ died on the dead wood of a tree, in order to bring us eternal life. “Unless the grain of wheat (the tree) falling into the ground (being chopped-down) die, itself remaineth alone. But if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal” (John 12:24-25). The dead wood of the tree bore the fruit of eternal life—as we clearly see from the beautiful liturgy of Passiontide:
Liturgical Passion Tree With Passion Fruit
The mystery of the Cross shines out in glory,
The Cross on which Life suffered death,
And by that death gave life back to us.
The words of David’s prophetic song were fulfilled,
In which he announced to the nations:
“God has reigned from a tree.”
Tree of dazzling beauty,
Adorned with the purple of the King’s Blood,
And chosen from a stock worthy to bear Limbs so sacred!
How favored the tree, on whose branches hung the Ransom of the world;
It was made a balance on which His Body was weighed,
And bore away the prey that Hell had claimed.
The Redeemer had now completed thirty years
And had come to the end of His earthly life,
And then of His own free will, He gave Himself up to the Passion,
The Lamb was lifted up on to the tree of the Cross to be a sacrifice.
Faithful Cross, tree that is alone in its glory among all other trees;
No forest ever yielded its equal in leaf, flower and fruit.
Loving nails and loving wood bear a loving burden.
Soften your branches, noble tree;
Relax your taut fibers and let your natural hardness give way to yielding suppleness;
And so offer yourself as a gentle support for the Body of the King of Heaven.
You alone were worthy to bear the Victim of the world
And like the Ark, to give shelter to a shipwrecked world.
An Ark which the Sacred Blood, poured out from the Body of the Lamb, has annointed.
What a beautiful incorporation of the tree as an essential part of our salvation! These verses, extracted from the liturgy of Passiontide, are worth reading over and over again. They almost contain a fiery spark that is destined to enkindle our devotion.
Mary the Tree of Life
Taking this idea of Jesus on the tree a little further, we can say that Mary is the Tree of which Jesus is the Fruit: “Blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus!” St. Louis de Montfort does not hesitate in calling Mary the Tree of Life. “He who wishes to have the fruit well-ripened and well-formed, must have the tree that produces it; he who wishes to have the Fruit of Life, Jesus Christ, must have the Tree of Life, which is Mary” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §164).
“Jesus is everywhere and always the Fruit and the Son of Mary; and Mary is everywhere the veritable Tree who bears the Fruit of life, and the true Mother who produces it” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §44). “If Mary, who is the Tree of Life, is well-cultivated in our soul, by fidelity to the practices of this devotion, she will bear her fruit in her own time, and her Fruit is none other than Jesus Christ” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §218).
At Fatima, Our Lady essentially says the same thing: “Jesus wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it; these souls will be dear to God” (June 13, 1917).
Planting the Tree of Life in Ourselves
When we make the True Devotion Consecration to Mary, we plant a seed from this Tree of Life, that Mary is, in our own souls, so that Mary may reproduce her spirit in our soul. “O Holy Spirit, grant me all these graces. Plant in my soul the Tree of true Life, which is Mary; cultivate it and tend it so that it may grow and blossom and bring forth the fruit of life in abundance” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §67).
We are supposed to be the seed of Mary, for as God said to devil after he had made Adam and Eve fall: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.” (Genesis 3:15). “As Mother of the living, gives to all her children splinters of the Tree of Life, which is the Cross of Jesus” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §22). Through the Cross, Our Lord crushed and defeated the devil.
St. Louis continues: “Have you understood with the help of the Holy Ghost what I have tried to explain? If so, be thankful to God. It is a secret of which very few people are aware. If you have discovered this treasure in the field of Mary, this pearl of great price (Matthew 13:44-46), you should sell all you have to purchase it. You must offer yourself to Mary, happily lose yourself in her, only to find God in her” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §70).
Necessity of Cultivating the Tree of Life
“If the Holy Ghost has planted in your soul the true Tree of Life, which is the devotion that I have just explained (True Devotion to Mary), you should see carefully to its cultivation, so that it will yield its fruit in due season. This devotion is like the mustard seed of the Gospel (Mark 4:31), which is indeed the smallest of all seeds, but nevertheless it grows into a big plant, shooting up so high that the birds of the air, that is, the elect, come and make their nest in its branches. They repose there, shaded from the heat of the sun, and safely hidden from beasts of prey” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §70).
How to Cultivate the Tree of Life
“Here is the best way, chosen soul, to cultivate it:
(1) This Tree, once planted in a docile heart, requires fresh air and no human support. Being of heavenly origin, it must be uninfluenced by any creature, since a creature might hinder it from rising up towards God Who created it. Hence you must not rely on your own endeavors or your natural talents or your personal standing or the guidance of men. You must resort to Mary, relying solely on her help. (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §71).
(2) The person in whose soul this Tree has taken root must, like a good gardener, watch over it and protect it. For this Tree, having life and capable of producing the fruit of life, should be raised and tended with enduring care and attention of soul. A soul that desires to be holy, will make this its chief aim and occupation. (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §72).
“Whatever is likely to choke the Tree or in the course of time prevent its yielding fruit, such as thorns and thistles, must be cut away and rooted-out. This means that by self-denial and self-discipline you must sedulously cut short and even give up all empty pleasures and useless dealings with other creatures. In other words, you must crucify the flesh, keep a guard over the tongue, and mortify the bodily senses” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §73).
(3) You must guard against grubs doing harm to the Tree. These parasites are love of self and love of comfort, and they eat away the green foliage of the Tree and frustrate the fair hope it offered of yielding good fruit; for love of self is incompatible with love of Mary” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §74).
(4) You must not allow this Tree to be damaged by destructive animals, that is, by sins, for they may cause its death simply by their contact. They must not be allowed even to breathe upon the Tree, because their mere breath, that is, venial sins, which are most dangerous when we do not trouble ourselves about them” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §75).
(5) It is also necessary to water this Tree regularly with your Communions, Masses and other public and private prayers. Otherwise it will not continue bearing fruit” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §76).
(6) Yet you need not be alarmed when the winds blow and shake this Tree, for it must happen that the storm-winds of temptation will threaten to bring it down, and snow and frost tend to smother it. By this we mean that this devotion to our Blessed Lady will surely be called into question and attacked. But as long as we continue steadfastly in tending it, we have nothing to fear” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §77).
Its lasting fruit: Jesus Christ
“Chosen soul, provided you thus carefully cultivate the Tree of Life, which has been freshly planted in your soul by the Holy Ghost, I can assure you that in a short time it will grow so tall that the birds of the air will make their home in it. It will become such a good Tree, that it will yield in due season the sweet and adorable Fruit of honor and grace, which is Jesus, Who has always been, and will always be, the only fruit of Mary. Happy is that soul in which Mary, the Tree of Life, is planted. Happier still is the soul in which she has been able to grow and blossom. Happier again is the soul in which she brings forth her fruit. But happiest of all is the soul which savors the sweetness of Mary’s fruit and preserves it up till death, and then beyond, to all eternity” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary, §78).
Saintly Trees, Holy Trees
“It is Mary alone to whom God has given the keys of the cellars of divine love and the power to enter into the most sublime and secret ways of perfection, and the power likewise to make others enter in there also. It is Mary alone who has given to the miserable children of Eve, the faithless, entry into the terrestrial paradise; that they may walk there agreeably with God, hide there securely against their enemies, feed themselves there deliciously, without further fear of death, on the fruit of the Trees of Life and of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and drink, in long draughts, the heavenly waters of that fair fountain, which gushes forth there with abundance; or rather, since she is herself that terrestrial paradise, that virgin and blessed Earth, from which Adam and Eve, the sinners, have been driven, she gives no entry there except to those whom it is her pleasure to make saints” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §45).
“I have said that this would come to pass, particularly at the end of the world and indeed presently, because the Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity as much as the cedars of Lebanon outgrow the little shrubs. These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady, illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §47-48).
Article 21
Passion Sunday and Monday, March 17th & 18th, the Fifth Week of Lent
Don’t Throw Away Your Key to Heaven―the Cross!
Passion Sunday and Monday, March 17th & 18th, the Fifth Week of Lent
Don’t Throw Away Your Key to Heaven―the Cross!
The Focal Point of History, Life, Lent, and the Liturgy
Passiontide! Or Passion-hide? There are times when we have to make a choice! Times when we can no longer pretend and insist on being neutral spectators. Times of an “either, or”! Our Lord puts it this way: “He that is not with Me, is against me!” (Matthew 12:30). “No servant can serve two masters―for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will hold to the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [the world, pleasures, treasures, etc.]” (Luke 16:13). “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23). “Whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). “He that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). Which is why St. Paul writes: “God forbid that I should glory in anything except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world! … With Christ I am nailed to the cross” (Galatians 6:14; 2:19).
Passiontide is the time of the cross. The cross is the key to Passiontide and the key to Heaven. Passiontide is the time where “the rubber meets the road” or the cross meets shoulder, or reality stares you in the face. The reality is that we have all sinned―and therefore, we have all incurred great debts for sin. The basic way to pay for sin is to carry the cross of the consequences of our rebellion against God. The penalty of the cross can be a direct consequence of our sin―for example, you get drunk, drive your car, have an accident and must suffer the crosses that come from that accident while driving under the influence of alcohol―you may lose your driver’s license, be sued by the person you knocked over, face a prison sentence, or perhaps you were left paralyzed by the accident. All of these are direct consequences, or direct crosses coming from your sinfulness in getting drunk and driving while drunk. Other crosses are indirect consequences for your sinfulness, which are usually events arranged by Divine Providence, to make you pay, or help you pay for your sins if you have not done sufficient penance for them, or are not sufficiently sorry for them.
Glorious Passiontide or Hideous Passiontide?
Some see Passiontide as being glorious as they embrace the glory of the cross. Others see Passiontide as being hideous as they seek to avoid and hide from the cross. A few see the benefits of the cross, but most see benefits in the absence of a cross. For most souls, the cross makes them cross and they reject it―yet for a few, the cross crosses out their debt for sin and they accept it. We either have a love for the cross, or a dislike (or even hatred) of the cross. Some accept the need for the cross in theory, but them complain, moan and groan when God’s Providence imposes some crosses upon them―even tiny ones! Of such Our Lord says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
In the same vein, The Imitation of Christ tells us: “Jesus has always many who love His heavenly kingdom, but few who bear His cross. He has many who desire consolation, but few who care for trial. He finds many to share His table, but few to take part in His fasting. All desire to be happy with Him; few wish to suffer anything for Him. Many follow Him to the breaking of bread, but few to the drinking of the chalice of His passion. Many revere His miracles; few approach the shame of the Cross. Many love Him as long as they encounter no hardship; many praise and bless Him as long as they receive some comfort from Him. But if Jesus hides Himself and leaves them for a while, they fall either into complaints or into deep dejection. Those, on the contrary, who love Him for His own sake and not for any comfort of their own, bless Him in all trial and anguish of heart as well as in the bliss of consolation. Even if He should never give them consolation, yet they would continue to praise Him and wish always to give Him thanks. What power there is in pure love for Jesus — love that is free from all self-interest and self-love!” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 2, Chapter 11: “Few Love The Cross Of Jesus”).
Our Lady Glorifies the Cross
Our Lady, in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: “Estimate then, and weigh within thy soul, how important is the eternal predestination or reprobation of the souls―since my most holy Son looked upon it with such great anxiety, that the difficulty or impossibility of saving all men added such immense bitterness to the death which He was about to suffer for all. What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation, when my divine Son and I have desired and sought to procure it for them with such sacrifices and untiring watchfulness? None of the mortals will have any excuse for their foolish negligence! Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16). Fear this sentence and renew in thy heart the care and zeal for thy salvation! Thou drawest upon thyself (and upon mortals) a severe judgment, if thou dost not overcome thy pusillanimity, ingratitude and baseness by meditating day and night on the Passion and Death of Jesus crucified. This is the great science of the saints, so little heeded by the worldly and the lack of which starves the lovers of this proud world. In this science I wish thee to be studious and wise. My Son and Lord taught us this science. Tell me then, if my Lord and Master has made Himself the life and the way for men through his Passion and Death, is it not evident that, in order to go that way and live up to this truth, they must follow Christ crucified, afflicted, scourged and affronted? To abhor earthly vanities, to desire being despised by creatures, to suffering joyfully, to love the cross and have an earnest and generous acceptation of it.
“Consider the ignorance of men who wish to come to the Father without following Christ, since they expect to reign with God without suffering or imitating his Passion, yea without even a thought of accepting any part of his suffering and Death, or of thanking Him for it. They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as of eternal life, while Christ their Creator has suffered the most bitter pains and torments in order to enter Heaven and to show them by his example how they are to find the way of light. All abhor poverty and thirst after riches, none of them being willing to recognize their emptiness. Infinite is the number of those who are carried away by their anger and vengeance, despising meekness. Few deplore their real miseries and struggle merely for terrestrial consolations; scarcely any love justice, or loyally pursue it in their dealings with the neighbors. Mercy is almost extinct, purity of heart is sullied and infringed upon, peace is constrained. None grant pardon, none wish to suffer for justice’s sake, yea not even the least of the many torments and pains, which they have so justly merited.
“Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. He is not a true son of his father, who does not imitate him, nor he a good disciple, who does not follow his Master, nor he a good servant, who does not accompany his lord; nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. But our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us, who see them forgetful of this truth and so adverse to suffering, to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation. And yet even all this is insufficient, since their inclinations and their blind love of visible things detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart; they rob them of remembrance and affection toward these higher things, which might raise them above themselves and above created things. Hence it comes, that men do not find joy in their tribulations, nor rest in their labors, nor consolation in their sorrows, nor any peace in adversities. For―altogether different from the saints who glory in tribulation as the fulfillment of their most earnest desires―they desire none of it and abhor all that is painful.
“My most holy Son and myself are trying to find among those, who have arrived at the way of the cross, some soul whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If thou wish to be our disciple, then enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights. The lesson containing the greatest wisdom for souls consists in the knowledge of the cross, in the love of sufferings, and in putting this knowledge into practice by bearing afflictions with patience. With this wisdom, the earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the blear-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors, and so full of ignorant admiration for costly worldly grandeur. The followers of this world and its vain pleasures deprive themselves of assistance and protection―since they hate the way of the Cross. Therefore embrace the Cross and do not admit any consolation outside of it in this mortal life. By contemplating and feeling within thyself the sacred Passion thou wilt attain the summit of perfection. Thou must acquire the precious gem of suffering and thus become pleasing to thy Lord. I exhort thee to select the sufferings of His Cross, in preference to His favors and gifts; and to rather embrace afflictions, than to desire to be visited with caresses! When the occasion of tasting the chalice and the cross of suffering is at hand, thou must not turn away in sorrow and affliction from the sufferings. For thou canst not follow Christ if thou refusest to embrace the cross and rejoice in it” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
The Season of the Cross
Even though we could rightly say Passiontide is the “season of the cross”, it would be wrong to label Passiontide (or even Lent for that matter) as the only season of the cross―for, in reality, the “season of the cross” spans all the four seasons of the year. There is never a day that goes by without many crosses coming our way. The cross is like the Barahmasia Mango Tree, which can be counted on to on to bear fruit throughout the year. The specialty of the tree is that its branches bear the fruits in different stages from flowering to ripening at the same time. While one branch has flowers, the others have matured mangoes. So, too, with the “tree of the cross” that God plants in our lives―the fruit of the “tree of the cross” is found on the tree all year round and we can harvest the fruit of the cross daily, every day, all throughout the year. Some crosses are in fully ripe, while others are merely beginning to bloom. This reminds of the biblical “tree of life” ― “In the midst … was the tree of life, bearing twelve fruits, yielding its fruits every month” (Apocalypse 22:2). Our Lord Himself speaks of this DAILY cross: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his CROSS DAILY, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23).
In some parts of the world, mango is called the “king of fruits.” It is a “drupe”, or stone fruit, which means that it has a large seed in the middle. However, the mango fruit can be difficult to cut―due to its tough skin and large pit (seed, kernel)―which speaks volumes symbolically, for Catholics should have a “tough skin” to face the “cuts” of persecution and a large heart (kernel, seed, pit). Mango is low in calories (worldliness) but full of nutrients (grace and virtues)―particularly vitamin C, which aids immunity, iron absorption and growth and repair. However, the health benefits are not just limited to the fruit―there numerous benefits from its seed, flower and the bark of the mango tree. Studies indicate that, overall, mangoes possesses the following properties―they are anti-inflammatory, anti-diabetic, anti-oxidant, anti-viral, anti-bacterial, anti-microbial, anti-fungal, anti-parasitic, anti-tumor, anti-spasmodic, anti-diarrheal, cardiotonic, immuno-modulating, and gastro-protective. Mango seeds help eliminate dandruff, reduces the risk of diarrhea, keeps cardiovascular disease at bay, ensures a healthy skin, is good for diabetics, etc. Mango stem bark, leaves and flowers have been used in traditional medicine to treat anemia, cutaneous infections, diabetes, diarrhea, scabies, syphilis, and malignant tumors and many, many other ailments. It is well worth researching―this article is not meant to be a full exposure of the benefits. The point of briefly mentioning the benefits is to create an analogy to the many benefits of the cross.
Tree-Talk
The liturgy for Passiontide is clearly, unashamedly and unapologetically focused on the “Tree of the Cross”, the life-giving tree, the “Tree of Life”. The Preface of the Holy Cross, that is said during Passiontide, says: “We give thanks unto Thee, O holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God; Who didst establish the salvation of mankind on the tree of the Cross; that whence death came, thence also life might arise again, and that he (the devil), who overcame (Adam and Eve) by the tree, by the tree (of the Cross) also might be overcome!” That is the theme throughout Passiontide―the redemption of mankind upon the “Tree of the Cross”. Here are just a few extracts from two of the liturgical hymns for Passiontide―the Pange Lingua and Vexilla Regis:
PANGE LINGUA
Sing, my tongue, the glorious battle
Sing the last, the dread affray;
O’er the cross, the victor’s trophy,
Sound the high triumphal lay:
Tell how Christ, the world’s Redeemer,
As a victim won the day.
Eating of the tree forbidden,
Man had sunk in Satan's snare,
When our pitying Creator did
This second tree prepare;
Destined, many ages later,
That first evil to repair.
Such the order God appointed
When for sin He would atone;
To the serpent thus opposing
Schemes yet deeper than his own;
Thence the remedy procuring,
Whence the fatal wound had come.
Thirty years among us dwelling,
His appointed time fulfilled,
Born for this, He meets His passion,
For that this He freely willed:
On the Cross the Lamb is lifted,
Where His life-blood shall be spilled.
He endured the nails, the spitting,
Vinegar, and spear, and reed;
From that holy body broken
Blood and water forth proceed:
Earth, and stars, and sky, and ocean,
By that flood from stain are free.
Faithful cross! Above all other,
One and only noble tree!
None in foliage, none in blossom,
None in fruit thy peers may be;
Sweetest wood and sweetest iron!
Sweetest weight is hung on thee.
Bend thy boughs, O tree of glory!
Thy relaxing sinews bend;
For awhile the ancient rigor,
That thy birth bestowed, suspend;
And the King of heavenly beauty
On thy bosom gently tend!
Thou alone wast counted worthy
This world’s Ransom to uphold;
For a shipwrecked race preparing
Harbor, like the ark of old;
With the sacred blood anointed
From the smitten Lamb that rolled.
Blessing, honor, everlasting,
To the immortal Deity;
To the Father, Son, and Spirit,
Equal praises ever be;
Glory through the earth and heaven
To Trinity in Unity.
Amen.
VEXILLA REGIS
Abroad the regal banners fly,
Now shines the cross’s mystery;
Upon it Life did death endure,
And yet by death did life procure.
Who, wounded with a direful spear,
Did, purposely to wash us clear
From stain of sin, pour out a flood
Of precious water mixed with blood.
That which the prophet-king of old
Hath in mysterious verse foretold,
Is now accomplished, whilst we see
God ruling nations from a tree.
O lovely and refulgent tree,
Adorned with purpled majesty;
Culled from a worthy stock, to bear
Those limbs which sanctifièd were.
Blest tree, whose happy branches bore
The Wealth that did the world restore;
The beam that did that Body weigh
Which raised up Hell’s expected prey.
O Cross, our one reliance, hail!
This holy Passiontide avail
To give fresh merit to the saint,
And pardon to the penitent.
Blest Trinity, salvation’s spring,
May every soul thy praises sing;
To those thou grantest conquest by
The holy cross, rewards apply.
Amen.
The Apostles engage in “tree-talk” as they speak of Our Lord dying on a tree―the tree of the Cross: “We are witnesses of all things that Jesus did in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem, Whom they killed, hanging Him upon a tree!” (Acts 10:39) … “Who, His own self, bore our sins in His Body upon the tree―so that we, being dead to sins, should live to justice―and by Whose stripes you were healed!” (1 Peter 2:24) … “And when they had fulfilled all things that were written of Him, taking him down from the tree, they laid him in a sepulcher” (Acts 13:29) … “The God of our fathers hath raised up Jesus, whom you put to death, hanging him upon a tree” (Acts of Apostles 5:30).
Our Lord Himself was full of “tree talk” while He walked this Earth. Here are just some of His teachings that we would do well do ponder and plant in the garden of our soul: “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33). “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). “For there is no good tree that bringeth forth evil fruit; nor an evil tree that bringeth forth good fruit. For every tree is known by its fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns; nor from a bramble bush do they gather the grape!” (Luke 6:43-44). “And seeing a certain fig tree by the way side, Jesus came to it, and found nothing on it but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19).
“He spoke also this parable: A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why encumbereth it the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And if happily it bear fruit, but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-9). To which Scripture adds: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire” (Matthew 3:10).
“To what is the kingdom of God like, and whereunto shall I resemble it? The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but, when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs and becometh a great tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof” (Matthew 13:31-32; Luke 13:18-19).
Our Lord even compares Himself to a tree of sorts when He says: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. And every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit! … Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he burneth!” (John 15:1-6).
We even engage in “tree-talk” ourselves with our idiomatic expressions. We say someone is “planted in good soil”, or that someone is “shaking like a leaf”, or is “branching-out”, or “holding out an olive branch to someone”, or referring to family traits when we say “the apple never falls far from the tree”, or someone being “at the top of the tree” or “barking up the wrong tree”, or that someone “cannot see the forest because of the tree”, or that “money doesn’t grow on trees”, or someone being “dressed-up like a Christmas Tree”, etc.
Sun and Rain for the Cross
The cross is synonymous with the tree―the Tree of Life―which is Our Lord’s Death on Calvary, and which is perpetuated in each and every Sacrifice of the Mass, whose fruit is the Holy Eucharist, which we receive in Holy Communion. To receive Holy Communion, we need to be in a state of grace (symbolized by water) and the Holy Eucharist―the fire of love, for “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), and God is in the Holy Eucharist, hence you could just as well say: “The Holy Eucharist is charity.” Without sanctifying grace―whatever we might do or suffer―is supernaturally useless. The same is true of charity―as Holy Scripture points out: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profiteth me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Charity and Sanctifying Grace are the “sun” and “rain” of our entire spiritual life―that includes the carrying of our crosses.
Understanding this, we can read the following passages with a clearer insight as to their meaning: “He shall be like a tree, which is planted near the running waters [symbol of grace], which shall bring forth its fruit [symbol of virtues], in due season. And his leaf shall not fall off; and all whatsoever he shall do, shall prosper” (Psalms 1:3). “The fruit of the just man is a tree of life” (Proverbs 11:30). “And he shall be as a tree that is planted by the waters, that spreadeth out its roots towards moisture―and it shall not fear when the heat cometh. And the leaf thereof shall be green, and in the time of drought it shall not be solicitous, neither shall it cease at any time to bring forth fruit” (Jeremias 17:8).
Just as each year a tree grows bigger, carries a heavier load of fruit and produces more fruit―likewise, the “tree of the cross”, that each of us has to be, must carry a “heavier load” with each successive year, and by carrying that load, “produce more and more fruit” with each successive year, by exercising all the various virtues needed to carry the cross with love for God. Anything that will increase the rainfall of grace and sunlight and heat of charity, must be actively sought by us―and we will essentially find that “rain” and “sunlight” in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and in the Holy Eucharist. We must frequently place ourselves in the grace-full downpour of sanctifying grace by planting ourselves daily (if possible) in the “garden” of the Holy Mass―for one hour’s “rain” only once a week, on Sundays, is barely enough “water” for our tree to survive. Additionally, we need to expose ourselves to the “Sun” of God, the Son of God, in the Holy Eucharist, in order to make our “tree” grow―as Our Lord said: “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me!” (John 15:4).
The Royal Road of the Cross
The Imitation of Christ has a most beautiful, yet hard-hitting passage, entitled: The Royal Road of the Cross, in which it lays down the need for carrying the cross if we wish to arrive at salvation and avoid damnation. Here is the entire passage―which is most suitable as we enter Passiontide, the “season of the cross”―or, more correctly, since the “season of the cross” is an all-year-round season, we could call Passiontide, the time when the cross matures, ripens and bears it fruit.
We will end with Book 2, Chapter 12 of The Imitation of Christ, “The Royal Road of the Holy Cross”, which states:
To many the saying, “Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow Me,” seems hard, but it will be much harder to hear that final word: “Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire.” Those who hear the word of the cross and follow it willingly now, need not fear that they will hear of eternal damnation on the Day of Judgment. This sign of the cross will be in the heavens when the Lord comes to judge. Then all the servants of the cross―who, during life, made themselves one with the Crucified―will draw near with great trust to Christ, the judge.
Why, then, do you fear to take up the cross when through it you can win a kingdom? In the cross is salvation, in the cross is life, in the cross is protection from enemies, in the cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness, in the cross is strength of mind, in the cross is joy of spirit, in the cross is highest virtue, in the cross is perfect holiness. There is no salvation of soul, nor hope of everlasting life, except in the cross.
Therefore, take up your cross and follow Jesus, and you shall enter eternal life. He Himself opened the way before you in carrying His cross, and upon it He died for you, so that you, too, might take up your cross and long to die upon it. If you die with Him, you shall also live with Him, and if you share His suffering, you shall also share His glory.
Behold, in the cross is everything, and upon your dying on the cross everything depends. There is no other way to life and to true inward peace than the way of the holy cross and daily mortification. Go where you will, seek what you will, you will not find a higher way, nor a less exalted but safer way, than the way of the holy cross. Arrange and order everything to suit your will and judgment, and still you will find that some suffering must always be borne, willingly or unwillingly, and thus you will always find the cross.
Either you will experience bodily pain or you will undergo tribulation of spirit in your soul. At times you will be forsaken by God, at times troubled by those about you and, what is worse, you will often grow weary of yourself. You cannot escape, you cannot be relieved by any remedy or comfort but must bear with it as long as God wills. For He wishes you to learn to bear trial without consolation, to submit yourself wholly to Him that you may become more humble through suffering. No one understands the passion of Christ so thoroughly or heartily, as the man whose lot it is to suffer the like himself.
The cross, therefore, is always ready; it awaits you everywhere. No matter where you may go, you cannot escape it, for wherever you go you take yourself with you and shall always find yourself. Turn where you will — above, below, without, or within — you will find a cross in everything, and everywhere you must have patience if you would have peace within and merit an eternal crown.
If you carry the cross willingly, it will carry and lead you to the desired goal where indeed there shall be no more suffering, but here there shall be. If you carry it unwillingly, you create a burden for yourself and increase the load, though still you have to bear it. If you cast away one cross, you will find another and perhaps a heavier one. Do you expect to escape what no mortal man can ever avoid? Which of the saints was without a cross or trial on this Earth? Not even Jesus Christ, our Lord, Whose every hour on Earth knew the pain of His passion. “Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into his glory?” (Luke 24:26). How is it that you look for another way than this, the royal way of the holy cross?
The whole life of Christ was a cross and a martyrdom, and do you seek rest and enjoyment for yourself? You deceive yourself, you are mistaken if you seek anything but to suffer, for this mortal life is full of miseries and marked with crosses on all sides. Indeed, the more spiritual progress a person makes, so much heavier will he frequently find the cross, because as his love increases, the pain of his exile also increases.
Yet such a man, though afflicted in many ways, is not without hope of consolation, because he knows that great reward is coming to him for bearing his cross. And when he carries it willingly, every pang of tribulation is changed into hope of solace from God. Besides, the more the flesh is distressed by affliction, so much the more is the spirit strengthened by inward grace. Not infrequently a man is so strengthened by his love of trials and hardship in his desire to conform to the cross of Christ, that he does not wish to be without sorrow or pain, since he believes he will be the more acceptable to God if he is able to endure more and more grievous things for His sake.
It is the grace of Christ, and not the virtue of man, which can and does bring it about that through fervor of spirit frail flesh learns to love and to gain what it naturally hates and shuns.
To carry the cross, to love the cross, to chastise the body and bring it to subjection, to flee honors, to endure contempt gladly, to despise self and wish to be despised, to suffer any adversity and loss, to desire no prosperous days on Earth — this is not man’s way. If you rely upon yourself, you can do none of these things, but if you trust in the Lord, strength will be given you from Heaven and the world and the flesh will be made subject to your word. You will not even fear your enemy, the devil, if you are armed with faith and signed with the cross of Christ.
Set yourself, then, like a good and faithful servant of Christ, to bear bravely the cross of your Lord, Who out of love was crucified for you. Be ready to suffer many adversities and many kinds of trouble in this miserable life, for troublesome and miserable life will always be, no matter where you are; and so you will find it wherever you may hide. Thus it must be; and there is no way to evade the trials and sorrows of life but to bear them.
Drink the chalice of the Lord with affection it you wish to be His friend and to have part with Him. Leave consolation to God; let Him do as most pleases Him. On your part, be ready to bear sufferings and consider them the greatest consolation, for even though you alone were to undergo them all, the sufferings of this life are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come.
When you shall have come to the point where suffering is sweet and acceptable for the sake of Christ, then consider yourself fortunate, for you have found paradise on Earth. But as long as suffering irks you and you seek to escape, so long will you be unfortunate, and the tribulation you seek to evade will follow you everywhere. If you put your mind to the things you ought to consider, that is, to suffering and death, you would soon be in a better state and would find peace.
Although you were taken to the third Heaven with Paul, you were not thereby insured against suffering. Jesus said: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake.” To suffer, then, remains your lot, if you mean to love Jesus and serve Him forever.
If you were but worthy to suffer something for the name of Jesus, what great glory would be in store for you, what great joy to all the saints of God, what great edification to those about you! For all men praise patience though there are few who wish to practice it. With good reason, then, ought you to be willing to suffer a little for Christ since many suffer much more for the world. Realize that you must lead a dying life; the more a man dies to himself, the more he begins to live unto God.
No man is fit to enjoy Heaven unless he has resigned himself to suffer hardship for Christ. Nothing is more acceptable to God, nothing more helpful for you on this Earth than to suffer willingly for Christ. If you had to make a choice, you ought to wish rather to suffer for Christ than to enjoy many consolations, for thus you would be more like Christ and more like all the saints. Our merit and progress consist not in many pleasures and comforts but rather in enduring great afflictions and sufferings.
If, indeed, there were anything better or more useful for man’s salvation than suffering, Christ would have shown it by word and example. But He clearly exhorts the disciples who follow Him and all who wish to follow Him to carry the cross, saying: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.” When, therefore, we have read and searched all that has been written, let this be the final conclusion — that through much suffering we must enter into the kingdom of God. (Here ends the passage from Book 2, Chapter 12 of The Imitation of Christ, “The Royal Road of the Holy Cross”).
Passiontide! Or Passion-hide? There are times when we have to make a choice! Times when we can no longer pretend and insist on being neutral spectators. Times of an “either, or”! Our Lord puts it this way: “He that is not with Me, is against me!” (Matthew 12:30). “No servant can serve two masters―for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will hold to the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [the world, pleasures, treasures, etc.]” (Luke 16:13). “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23). “Whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27). “He that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). Which is why St. Paul writes: “God forbid that I should glory in anything except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world! … With Christ I am nailed to the cross” (Galatians 6:14; 2:19).
Passiontide is the time of the cross. The cross is the key to Passiontide and the key to Heaven. Passiontide is the time where “the rubber meets the road” or the cross meets shoulder, or reality stares you in the face. The reality is that we have all sinned―and therefore, we have all incurred great debts for sin. The basic way to pay for sin is to carry the cross of the consequences of our rebellion against God. The penalty of the cross can be a direct consequence of our sin―for example, you get drunk, drive your car, have an accident and must suffer the crosses that come from that accident while driving under the influence of alcohol―you may lose your driver’s license, be sued by the person you knocked over, face a prison sentence, or perhaps you were left paralyzed by the accident. All of these are direct consequences, or direct crosses coming from your sinfulness in getting drunk and driving while drunk. Other crosses are indirect consequences for your sinfulness, which are usually events arranged by Divine Providence, to make you pay, or help you pay for your sins if you have not done sufficient penance for them, or are not sufficiently sorry for them.
Glorious Passiontide or Hideous Passiontide?
Some see Passiontide as being glorious as they embrace the glory of the cross. Others see Passiontide as being hideous as they seek to avoid and hide from the cross. A few see the benefits of the cross, but most see benefits in the absence of a cross. For most souls, the cross makes them cross and they reject it―yet for a few, the cross crosses out their debt for sin and they accept it. We either have a love for the cross, or a dislike (or even hatred) of the cross. Some accept the need for the cross in theory, but them complain, moan and groan when God’s Providence imposes some crosses upon them―even tiny ones! Of such Our Lord says: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
In the same vein, The Imitation of Christ tells us: “Jesus has always many who love His heavenly kingdom, but few who bear His cross. He has many who desire consolation, but few who care for trial. He finds many to share His table, but few to take part in His fasting. All desire to be happy with Him; few wish to suffer anything for Him. Many follow Him to the breaking of bread, but few to the drinking of the chalice of His passion. Many revere His miracles; few approach the shame of the Cross. Many love Him as long as they encounter no hardship; many praise and bless Him as long as they receive some comfort from Him. But if Jesus hides Himself and leaves them for a while, they fall either into complaints or into deep dejection. Those, on the contrary, who love Him for His own sake and not for any comfort of their own, bless Him in all trial and anguish of heart as well as in the bliss of consolation. Even if He should never give them consolation, yet they would continue to praise Him and wish always to give Him thanks. What power there is in pure love for Jesus — love that is free from all self-interest and self-love!” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 2, Chapter 11: “Few Love The Cross Of Jesus”).
Our Lady Glorifies the Cross
Our Lady, in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: “Estimate then, and weigh within thy soul, how important is the eternal predestination or reprobation of the souls―since my most holy Son looked upon it with such great anxiety, that the difficulty or impossibility of saving all men added such immense bitterness to the death which He was about to suffer for all. What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation, when my divine Son and I have desired and sought to procure it for them with such sacrifices and untiring watchfulness? None of the mortals will have any excuse for their foolish negligence! Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16). Fear this sentence and renew in thy heart the care and zeal for thy salvation! Thou drawest upon thyself (and upon mortals) a severe judgment, if thou dost not overcome thy pusillanimity, ingratitude and baseness by meditating day and night on the Passion and Death of Jesus crucified. This is the great science of the saints, so little heeded by the worldly and the lack of which starves the lovers of this proud world. In this science I wish thee to be studious and wise. My Son and Lord taught us this science. Tell me then, if my Lord and Master has made Himself the life and the way for men through his Passion and Death, is it not evident that, in order to go that way and live up to this truth, they must follow Christ crucified, afflicted, scourged and affronted? To abhor earthly vanities, to desire being despised by creatures, to suffering joyfully, to love the cross and have an earnest and generous acceptation of it.
“Consider the ignorance of men who wish to come to the Father without following Christ, since they expect to reign with God without suffering or imitating his Passion, yea without even a thought of accepting any part of his suffering and Death, or of thanking Him for it. They want it to procure for them the pleasures of this life as well as of eternal life, while Christ their Creator has suffered the most bitter pains and torments in order to enter Heaven and to show them by his example how they are to find the way of light. All abhor poverty and thirst after riches, none of them being willing to recognize their emptiness. Infinite is the number of those who are carried away by their anger and vengeance, despising meekness. Few deplore their real miseries and struggle merely for terrestrial consolations; scarcely any love justice, or loyally pursue it in their dealings with the neighbors. Mercy is almost extinct, purity of heart is sullied and infringed upon, peace is constrained. None grant pardon, none wish to suffer for justice’s sake, yea not even the least of the many torments and pains, which they have so justly merited.
“Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. He is not a true son of his father, who does not imitate him, nor he a good disciple, who does not follow his Master, nor he a good servant, who does not accompany his lord; nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. But our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us, who see them forgetful of this truth and so adverse to suffering, to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation. And yet even all this is insufficient, since their inclinations and their blind love of visible things detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart; they rob them of remembrance and affection toward these higher things, which might raise them above themselves and above created things. Hence it comes, that men do not find joy in their tribulations, nor rest in their labors, nor consolation in their sorrows, nor any peace in adversities. For―altogether different from the saints who glory in tribulation as the fulfillment of their most earnest desires―they desire none of it and abhor all that is painful.
“My most holy Son and myself are trying to find among those, who have arrived at the way of the cross, some soul whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom, in which the sons of Adam, with blind stubbornness, are rejecting the salutary discipline of sufferings. If thou wish to be our disciple, then enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the cross and the manner of reaching true peace and veritable delights. The lesson containing the greatest wisdom for souls consists in the knowledge of the cross, in the love of sufferings, and in putting this knowledge into practice by bearing afflictions with patience. With this wisdom, the earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible; nor the vain ostentation and pomp, which fascinates the blear-eyed worldlings, who are so covetous of passing honors, and so full of ignorant admiration for costly worldly grandeur. The followers of this world and its vain pleasures deprive themselves of assistance and protection―since they hate the way of the Cross. Therefore embrace the Cross and do not admit any consolation outside of it in this mortal life. By contemplating and feeling within thyself the sacred Passion thou wilt attain the summit of perfection. Thou must acquire the precious gem of suffering and thus become pleasing to thy Lord. I exhort thee to select the sufferings of His Cross, in preference to His favors and gifts; and to rather embrace afflictions, than to desire to be visited with caresses! When the occasion of tasting the chalice and the cross of suffering is at hand, thou must not turn away in sorrow and affliction from the sufferings. For thou canst not follow Christ if thou refusest to embrace the cross and rejoice in it” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
The Season of the Cross
Even though we could rightly say Passiontide is the “season of the cross”, it would be wrong to label Passiontide (or even Lent for that matter) as the only season of the cross―for, in reality, the “season of the cross” spans all the four seasons of the year. There is never a day that goes by without many crosses coming our way. The cross is like the Barahmasia Mango Tree, which can be counted on to on to bear fruit throughout the year. The specialty of the tree is that its branches bear the fruits in different stages from flowering to ripening at the same time. While one branch has flowers, the others have matured mangoes. So, too, with the “tree of the cross” that God plants in our lives―the fruit of the “tree of the cross” is found on the tree all year round and we can harvest the fruit of the cross daily, every day, all throughout the year. Some crosses are in fully ripe, while others are merely beginning to bloom. This reminds of the biblical “tree of life” ― “In the midst … was the tree of life, bearing twelve fruits, yielding its fruits every month” (Apocalypse 22:2). Our Lord Himself speaks of this DAILY cross: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his CROSS DAILY, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23).
In some parts of the world, mango is called the “king of fruits.” It is a “drupe”, or stone fruit, which means that it has a large seed in the middle. However, the mango fruit can be difficult to cut―due to its tough skin and large pit (seed, kernel)―which speaks volumes symbolically, for Catholics should have a “tough skin” to face the “cuts” of persecution and a large heart (kernel, seed, pit). Mango is low in calories (worldliness) but full of nutrients (grace and virtues)―particularly vitamin C, which aids immunity, iron absorption and growth and repair. However, the health benefits are not just limited to the fruit―there numerous benefits from its seed, flower and the bark of the mango tree. Studies indicate that, overall, mangoes possesses the following properties―they are anti-inflammatory, anti-diabetic, anti-oxidant, anti-viral, anti-bacterial, anti-microbial, anti-fungal, anti-parasitic, anti-tumor, anti-spasmodic, anti-diarrheal, cardiotonic, immuno-modulating, and gastro-protective. Mango seeds help eliminate dandruff, reduces the risk of diarrhea, keeps cardiovascular disease at bay, ensures a healthy skin, is good for diabetics, etc. Mango stem bark, leaves and flowers have been used in traditional medicine to treat anemia, cutaneous infections, diabetes, diarrhea, scabies, syphilis, and malignant tumors and many, many other ailments. It is well worth researching―this article is not meant to be a full exposure of the benefits. The point of briefly mentioning the benefits is to create an analogy to the many benefits of the cross.
Tree-Talk
The liturgy for Passiontide is clearly, unashamedly and unapologetically focused on the “Tree of the Cross”, the life-giving tree, the “Tree of Life”. The Preface of the Holy Cross, that is said during Passiontide, says: “We give thanks unto Thee, O holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God; Who didst establish the salvation of mankind on the tree of the Cross; that whence death came, thence also life might arise again, and that he (the devil), who overcame (Adam and Eve) by the tree, by the tree (of the Cross) also might be overcome!” That is the theme throughout Passiontide―the redemption of mankind upon the “Tree of the Cross”. Here are just a few extracts from two of the liturgical hymns for Passiontide―the Pange Lingua and Vexilla Regis:
PANGE LINGUA
Sing, my tongue, the glorious battle
Sing the last, the dread affray;
O’er the cross, the victor’s trophy,
Sound the high triumphal lay:
Tell how Christ, the world’s Redeemer,
As a victim won the day.
Eating of the tree forbidden,
Man had sunk in Satan's snare,
When our pitying Creator did
This second tree prepare;
Destined, many ages later,
That first evil to repair.
Such the order God appointed
When for sin He would atone;
To the serpent thus opposing
Schemes yet deeper than his own;
Thence the remedy procuring,
Whence the fatal wound had come.
Thirty years among us dwelling,
His appointed time fulfilled,
Born for this, He meets His passion,
For that this He freely willed:
On the Cross the Lamb is lifted,
Where His life-blood shall be spilled.
He endured the nails, the spitting,
Vinegar, and spear, and reed;
From that holy body broken
Blood and water forth proceed:
Earth, and stars, and sky, and ocean,
By that flood from stain are free.
Faithful cross! Above all other,
One and only noble tree!
None in foliage, none in blossom,
None in fruit thy peers may be;
Sweetest wood and sweetest iron!
Sweetest weight is hung on thee.
Bend thy boughs, O tree of glory!
Thy relaxing sinews bend;
For awhile the ancient rigor,
That thy birth bestowed, suspend;
And the King of heavenly beauty
On thy bosom gently tend!
Thou alone wast counted worthy
This world’s Ransom to uphold;
For a shipwrecked race preparing
Harbor, like the ark of old;
With the sacred blood anointed
From the smitten Lamb that rolled.
Blessing, honor, everlasting,
To the immortal Deity;
To the Father, Son, and Spirit,
Equal praises ever be;
Glory through the earth and heaven
To Trinity in Unity.
Amen.
VEXILLA REGIS
Abroad the regal banners fly,
Now shines the cross’s mystery;
Upon it Life did death endure,
And yet by death did life procure.
Who, wounded with a direful spear,
Did, purposely to wash us clear
From stain of sin, pour out a flood
Of precious water mixed with blood.
That which the prophet-king of old
Hath in mysterious verse foretold,
Is now accomplished, whilst we see
God ruling nations from a tree.
O lovely and refulgent tree,
Adorned with purpled majesty;
Culled from a worthy stock, to bear
Those limbs which sanctifièd were.
Blest tree, whose happy branches bore
The Wealth that did the world restore;
The beam that did that Body weigh
Which raised up Hell’s expected prey.
O Cross, our one reliance, hail!
This holy Passiontide avail
To give fresh merit to the saint,
And pardon to the penitent.
Blest Trinity, salvation’s spring,
May every soul thy praises sing;
To those thou grantest conquest by
The holy cross, rewards apply.
Amen.
The Apostles engage in “tree-talk” as they speak of Our Lord dying on a tree―the tree of the Cross: “We are witnesses of all things that Jesus did in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem, Whom they killed, hanging Him upon a tree!” (Acts 10:39) … “Who, His own self, bore our sins in His Body upon the tree―so that we, being dead to sins, should live to justice―and by Whose stripes you were healed!” (1 Peter 2:24) … “And when they had fulfilled all things that were written of Him, taking him down from the tree, they laid him in a sepulcher” (Acts 13:29) … “The God of our fathers hath raised up Jesus, whom you put to death, hanging him upon a tree” (Acts of Apostles 5:30).
Our Lord Himself was full of “tree talk” while He walked this Earth. Here are just some of His teachings that we would do well do ponder and plant in the garden of our soul: “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil, and its fruit evil. For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 12:33). “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). “For there is no good tree that bringeth forth evil fruit; nor an evil tree that bringeth forth good fruit. For every tree is known by its fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns; nor from a bramble bush do they gather the grape!” (Luke 6:43-44). “And seeing a certain fig tree by the way side, Jesus came to it, and found nothing on it but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19).
“He spoke also this parable: A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why encumbereth it the ground?’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And if happily it bear fruit, but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-9). To which Scripture adds: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire” (Matthew 3:10).
“To what is the kingdom of God like, and whereunto shall I resemble it? The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but, when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs and becometh a great tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof” (Matthew 13:31-32; Luke 13:18-19).
Our Lord even compares Himself to a tree of sorts when He says: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. And every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit! … Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he burneth!” (John 15:1-6).
We even engage in “tree-talk” ourselves with our idiomatic expressions. We say someone is “planted in good soil”, or that someone is “shaking like a leaf”, or is “branching-out”, or “holding out an olive branch to someone”, or referring to family traits when we say “the apple never falls far from the tree”, or someone being “at the top of the tree” or “barking up the wrong tree”, or that someone “cannot see the forest because of the tree”, or that “money doesn’t grow on trees”, or someone being “dressed-up like a Christmas Tree”, etc.
Sun and Rain for the Cross
The cross is synonymous with the tree―the Tree of Life―which is Our Lord’s Death on Calvary, and which is perpetuated in each and every Sacrifice of the Mass, whose fruit is the Holy Eucharist, which we receive in Holy Communion. To receive Holy Communion, we need to be in a state of grace (symbolized by water) and the Holy Eucharist―the fire of love, for “God is charity” (1 John 4:8), and God is in the Holy Eucharist, hence you could just as well say: “The Holy Eucharist is charity.” Without sanctifying grace―whatever we might do or suffer―is supernaturally useless. The same is true of charity―as Holy Scripture points out: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profiteth me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Charity and Sanctifying Grace are the “sun” and “rain” of our entire spiritual life―that includes the carrying of our crosses.
Understanding this, we can read the following passages with a clearer insight as to their meaning: “He shall be like a tree, which is planted near the running waters [symbol of grace], which shall bring forth its fruit [symbol of virtues], in due season. And his leaf shall not fall off; and all whatsoever he shall do, shall prosper” (Psalms 1:3). “The fruit of the just man is a tree of life” (Proverbs 11:30). “And he shall be as a tree that is planted by the waters, that spreadeth out its roots towards moisture―and it shall not fear when the heat cometh. And the leaf thereof shall be green, and in the time of drought it shall not be solicitous, neither shall it cease at any time to bring forth fruit” (Jeremias 17:8).
Just as each year a tree grows bigger, carries a heavier load of fruit and produces more fruit―likewise, the “tree of the cross”, that each of us has to be, must carry a “heavier load” with each successive year, and by carrying that load, “produce more and more fruit” with each successive year, by exercising all the various virtues needed to carry the cross with love for God. Anything that will increase the rainfall of grace and sunlight and heat of charity, must be actively sought by us―and we will essentially find that “rain” and “sunlight” in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and in the Holy Eucharist. We must frequently place ourselves in the grace-full downpour of sanctifying grace by planting ourselves daily (if possible) in the “garden” of the Holy Mass―for one hour’s “rain” only once a week, on Sundays, is barely enough “water” for our tree to survive. Additionally, we need to expose ourselves to the “Sun” of God, the Son of God, in the Holy Eucharist, in order to make our “tree” grow―as Our Lord said: “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me!” (John 15:4).
The Royal Road of the Cross
The Imitation of Christ has a most beautiful, yet hard-hitting passage, entitled: The Royal Road of the Cross, in which it lays down the need for carrying the cross if we wish to arrive at salvation and avoid damnation. Here is the entire passage―which is most suitable as we enter Passiontide, the “season of the cross”―or, more correctly, since the “season of the cross” is an all-year-round season, we could call Passiontide, the time when the cross matures, ripens and bears it fruit.
We will end with Book 2, Chapter 12 of The Imitation of Christ, “The Royal Road of the Holy Cross”, which states:
To many the saying, “Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow Me,” seems hard, but it will be much harder to hear that final word: “Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire.” Those who hear the word of the cross and follow it willingly now, need not fear that they will hear of eternal damnation on the Day of Judgment. This sign of the cross will be in the heavens when the Lord comes to judge. Then all the servants of the cross―who, during life, made themselves one with the Crucified―will draw near with great trust to Christ, the judge.
Why, then, do you fear to take up the cross when through it you can win a kingdom? In the cross is salvation, in the cross is life, in the cross is protection from enemies, in the cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness, in the cross is strength of mind, in the cross is joy of spirit, in the cross is highest virtue, in the cross is perfect holiness. There is no salvation of soul, nor hope of everlasting life, except in the cross.
Therefore, take up your cross and follow Jesus, and you shall enter eternal life. He Himself opened the way before you in carrying His cross, and upon it He died for you, so that you, too, might take up your cross and long to die upon it. If you die with Him, you shall also live with Him, and if you share His suffering, you shall also share His glory.
Behold, in the cross is everything, and upon your dying on the cross everything depends. There is no other way to life and to true inward peace than the way of the holy cross and daily mortification. Go where you will, seek what you will, you will not find a higher way, nor a less exalted but safer way, than the way of the holy cross. Arrange and order everything to suit your will and judgment, and still you will find that some suffering must always be borne, willingly or unwillingly, and thus you will always find the cross.
Either you will experience bodily pain or you will undergo tribulation of spirit in your soul. At times you will be forsaken by God, at times troubled by those about you and, what is worse, you will often grow weary of yourself. You cannot escape, you cannot be relieved by any remedy or comfort but must bear with it as long as God wills. For He wishes you to learn to bear trial without consolation, to submit yourself wholly to Him that you may become more humble through suffering. No one understands the passion of Christ so thoroughly or heartily, as the man whose lot it is to suffer the like himself.
The cross, therefore, is always ready; it awaits you everywhere. No matter where you may go, you cannot escape it, for wherever you go you take yourself with you and shall always find yourself. Turn where you will — above, below, without, or within — you will find a cross in everything, and everywhere you must have patience if you would have peace within and merit an eternal crown.
If you carry the cross willingly, it will carry and lead you to the desired goal where indeed there shall be no more suffering, but here there shall be. If you carry it unwillingly, you create a burden for yourself and increase the load, though still you have to bear it. If you cast away one cross, you will find another and perhaps a heavier one. Do you expect to escape what no mortal man can ever avoid? Which of the saints was without a cross or trial on this Earth? Not even Jesus Christ, our Lord, Whose every hour on Earth knew the pain of His passion. “Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into his glory?” (Luke 24:26). How is it that you look for another way than this, the royal way of the holy cross?
The whole life of Christ was a cross and a martyrdom, and do you seek rest and enjoyment for yourself? You deceive yourself, you are mistaken if you seek anything but to suffer, for this mortal life is full of miseries and marked with crosses on all sides. Indeed, the more spiritual progress a person makes, so much heavier will he frequently find the cross, because as his love increases, the pain of his exile also increases.
Yet such a man, though afflicted in many ways, is not without hope of consolation, because he knows that great reward is coming to him for bearing his cross. And when he carries it willingly, every pang of tribulation is changed into hope of solace from God. Besides, the more the flesh is distressed by affliction, so much the more is the spirit strengthened by inward grace. Not infrequently a man is so strengthened by his love of trials and hardship in his desire to conform to the cross of Christ, that he does not wish to be without sorrow or pain, since he believes he will be the more acceptable to God if he is able to endure more and more grievous things for His sake.
It is the grace of Christ, and not the virtue of man, which can and does bring it about that through fervor of spirit frail flesh learns to love and to gain what it naturally hates and shuns.
To carry the cross, to love the cross, to chastise the body and bring it to subjection, to flee honors, to endure contempt gladly, to despise self and wish to be despised, to suffer any adversity and loss, to desire no prosperous days on Earth — this is not man’s way. If you rely upon yourself, you can do none of these things, but if you trust in the Lord, strength will be given you from Heaven and the world and the flesh will be made subject to your word. You will not even fear your enemy, the devil, if you are armed with faith and signed with the cross of Christ.
Set yourself, then, like a good and faithful servant of Christ, to bear bravely the cross of your Lord, Who out of love was crucified for you. Be ready to suffer many adversities and many kinds of trouble in this miserable life, for troublesome and miserable life will always be, no matter where you are; and so you will find it wherever you may hide. Thus it must be; and there is no way to evade the trials and sorrows of life but to bear them.
Drink the chalice of the Lord with affection it you wish to be His friend and to have part with Him. Leave consolation to God; let Him do as most pleases Him. On your part, be ready to bear sufferings and consider them the greatest consolation, for even though you alone were to undergo them all, the sufferings of this life are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come.
When you shall have come to the point where suffering is sweet and acceptable for the sake of Christ, then consider yourself fortunate, for you have found paradise on Earth. But as long as suffering irks you and you seek to escape, so long will you be unfortunate, and the tribulation you seek to evade will follow you everywhere. If you put your mind to the things you ought to consider, that is, to suffering and death, you would soon be in a better state and would find peace.
Although you were taken to the third Heaven with Paul, you were not thereby insured against suffering. Jesus said: “I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake.” To suffer, then, remains your lot, if you mean to love Jesus and serve Him forever.
If you were but worthy to suffer something for the name of Jesus, what great glory would be in store for you, what great joy to all the saints of God, what great edification to those about you! For all men praise patience though there are few who wish to practice it. With good reason, then, ought you to be willing to suffer a little for Christ since many suffer much more for the world. Realize that you must lead a dying life; the more a man dies to himself, the more he begins to live unto God.
No man is fit to enjoy Heaven unless he has resigned himself to suffer hardship for Christ. Nothing is more acceptable to God, nothing more helpful for you on this Earth than to suffer willingly for Christ. If you had to make a choice, you ought to wish rather to suffer for Christ than to enjoy many consolations, for thus you would be more like Christ and more like all the saints. Our merit and progress consist not in many pleasures and comforts but rather in enduring great afflictions and sufferings.
If, indeed, there were anything better or more useful for man’s salvation than suffering, Christ would have shown it by word and example. But He clearly exhorts the disciples who follow Him and all who wish to follow Him to carry the cross, saying: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.” When, therefore, we have read and searched all that has been written, let this be the final conclusion — that through much suffering we must enter into the kingdom of God. (Here ends the passage from Book 2, Chapter 12 of The Imitation of Christ, “The Royal Road of the Holy Cross”).
Article 20
Friday & Saturday after the Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 15th & 16th
Lent is a Time to Rise from the Dead!
Friday & Saturday after the Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 15th & 16th
Lent is a Time to Rise from the Dead!
No Rising Before Dying
You cannot rise from the dead unless you are dead! Pretty obvious, huh? Are you dead? “Not yet!” you say. But you should be dead! Our Lord said: “Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat, falling into the ground, dies, then it remains alone. But if it dies, it brings forth much fruit. He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal” (John 12:24-25) ... “He that finds his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it” (Matthew 10:39) … “For he that will save his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25) ... “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it” (Mark 8:35) ... “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it―for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it” (Luke 9:24) … “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it” (Luke 17:33).
The ultimate example of what Our Lord is talking about is, of course, martyrdom―whereby we lay down our physical lives for Christ in obedience to the Faith and refusing to give up that Faith, even under threat of death. Yet there are lesser degrees and also metaphorical instances where we suffer a “lesser martyrdom” in the form of persecution for the sake of Christ―which requires a “dying” to the world and a “dying” to personal advantages for the sake of Christ and the Faith. “You are dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:11). “For we are buried together with Him by baptism into death; so that as Christ is risen from the dead, by the glory of the Father, so we also may walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:4). “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth. For you are dead [to the world] and your life is hidden with Christ in God!” (Colossians 3:1-3).
Lent has a Deathly Theme of Death
► ASH WEDNESDAY set a deathly tone when the ashes were smeared in the form of a cross on foreheads with the ominous words that remind of our future death: “Remember, man, that you are dust and into dust you shall return!” And in the Gospel of the Mass for Ash Wednesday, we are further reminded not to set our sights on a paradise in this world, but in the next world: “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on Earth, where rust and moth consume, and where thieves break in and steal―but lay up for yourselves treasures in Heaven, where neither rust nor moth consumes, nor thieves break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be!” This, of course, implies that we must die to this world in order to live for Heaven. This notion of dying is then reinforced by the words of Consecration at the Mass―and every Mass―which speak of Christ dying so that we might live: “This is the Chalice of My Blood of the New and Eternal Testament, the Mystery of Faith; which shall be shed for you and for many unto the remission of sins!”
► THURSDAY AFTER ASH WEDNESDAY continues the “deathly” theme. In the Epistle we read: “Ezechia was mortally ill, and the prophet Isaias, son of Amos, came and said to him: ‘Thus says the Lord: “Put your house in order, for you are about to die! You shall not recover!”’ Then Ezechia turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord: ‘O Lord, remember how faithfully and wholeheartedly I conducted myself in Your presence, doing what was pleasing to You!’ And Ezechia wept bitterly. Then the word of the Lord came to Isaias: ‘Go, tell Ezechia: “Thus says the Lord, the God of your father David―I have heard your prayer and seen your tears. I will add fifteen years to your life.”’”
The Gospel for the same day, also continues the “deathly” theme: “When Jesus had entered Capharnaum, there came to Him a centurion, who entreated Him, saying: ‘Lord, my servant is lying sick in the house, paralyzed, and is grievously afflicted!’ Jesus said to him: ‘I will come and cure him!’ But in answer the centurion said: ‘Lord, I am not worthy that You should come under my roof―but only say the word, and my servant will be healed!’ Then Jesus said to the centurion: ‘Go your way! As you have believed, so be it done to you!’ And the servant was healed in that hour.”
► EMBER FRIDAY IN THE FIRST WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. The Epistle warns that “the one who sins shall die ... Do I indeed derive any pleasure from the death of the wicked? says the Lord God ... Do I not rather rejoice when he turns from his evil way that he may live? … If a wicked man, turning from the wickedness he has committed, does what is right and just, he shall preserve his life; since he has turned away from all the sins which he committed, he shall surely live, he shall not die, says the Lord almighty.”
While the Gospel speaks of those who are sick and approaching the doors of death: “There is at Jerusalem, by the Sheepgate, a pool called in Hebrew ‘Bethsaida’ alongside which were lying a great multitude of the sick, blind, lame, and those with shriveled limbs, waiting for the moving of the water. For an angel of the Lord used to come down at certain times into the pool, and the water was troubled. And the first to go down into the pool after the troubling of the water was cured of whatever infirmity he had.”
► EMBER FRIDAY IN THE FIRST WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Epistle we read of the fiery furnace in which the three young Jewish men were thrown because they refused to adore the false god of King Nabuchodonosor: “In those days, the Angel of the Lord went down into the furnace with Azure and his companions, drove the fiery flames out of the furnace, and made the inside of the furnace as though a dew-laden breeze were blowing through it. And the flames rose forty-nine cubits above the furnace, and spread out, burning the Chaldeans nearby, the king’s men who were stoking the furnace. And the fire in no way touched them or caused them pain or harm. Then these three in the furnace with one voice sang, glorifying and blessing God.” They should have been burned to death―but God preserved them because of their fidelity to Him.
► WEDNESDAY IN THE SECOND WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. Jesus reveals to His Apostles what tortures and manner of death awaited Him in Jerusalem: “As Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, He took the twelve disciples aside by themselves, and said to them: ‘Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and the Scribes; and they will condemn Him to death, and will deliver Him to the Gentiles to be mocked and scourged and crucified; and on the third day He will rise again!’”
► THURSDAY IN THE SECOND WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Gospel, Our Lord relates a parable about how death catches up with both the rich and the poor: “A certain rich man who used to clothe himself in purple and fine linen, and who feasted every day in splendid fashion. And there was a certain poor man, named Lazarus, who lay at his gate, covered with sores, and longing to be filled with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. And it came to pass that the poor man died and was carried away by the angels into Abraham’s bosom; but the rich man also died and was buried in Hell.”
► FRIDAY IN THE SECOND WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Old Testament reading at Mass we encounter the desire of jealous brothers of Joseph to murder him: “Joseph went after his brothers looking for them and found them in Dothain. They saw him in the distance, and before he drew near them, they plotted to kill him. They said to one another: ‘Here comes that dreamer! Let us therefore kill him and throw him into a cistern! We can then say that a wild beast devoured him! Let us see then what becomes of his dreams!’”
In the Gospel, Jesus also relates a parable about death and murder: “At that time, Jesus spoke this parable to the multitude of the Jews and the chief priests: ‘There was a man, a householder, who planted a vineyard, and put a hedge about it, and dug a wine vat in it, and built a tower; then he let it out to vine-dressers. When the fruit season drew near, he sent his servants to the vine-dressers to receive his fruits. The vine-dressers seized his servants, and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again he sent another party of servants more numerous than the first; and they did the same to these. Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But the vine-dressers, on seeing the son, said among themselves, ‘This is the heir! Come, let us kill him, and we shall have his inheritance!’ So they seized him, cast him out of the vineyard, and killed him.”
► MONDAY IN THE THIRD WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Gospel we read how some of the Jews sought to kill Jesus by throwing Him off a cliff-edge: “And all in the synagogue, as they heard these things, were filled with wrath. And they rose up and put Him forth out of the town, and led Him to the brow of the hill, on which their town was built, that they might throw Him down headlong.”
► SATURDAY IN THE THIRD WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Old Testament reading we see how two judges lusted after Susanna, the wife of Joakim. Having failed to seduce her when alone with her in her garden, they alleged that she had committed adultery with a young man. The sentence for adultery was death. Fortunately, Daniel uncovered their lies and, instead of Susanna being put to death, the two judges were executed.
► MONDAY IN THE FOURTH WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Old Testament reading we encounter “two women who were harlots, who came to king Solomon. One of them said: “I and this woman dwelt in one house, and I gave birth to a child with her in the chamber. And the third day after I had delivered, she also gave birth. We were alone together and no other person was with us in the house, only we two. And this woman’s child died in the night; for in her sleep she overlaid him. And rising in the dead time of the night, she took my child from my side, while I was asleep, and laid it in her bosom; and laid her dead child in my bosom. When I rose in the morning, my child was dead; but considering him more diligently when it was clear day, I found it was not mine.’ And the other woman answered: ‘It is not so as you say, but your child is dead and mine is alive!’ Then said the king said: ‘Bring me a sword!’ And when they had brought a sword, the king said: ‘Divide the living child in two parts, and give half to the one woman, and half to the other!’ But the woman whose child was alive said to the king: ‘I beseech you, my lord, give her the child alive, and do not kill it!’ But the other woman said: ‘Let it neither be mine nor yours, but divide it!’ The king answered and said: ‘Give the living child to this woman, and let it not be killed; for she is the true mother thereof!’”
► TUESDAY IN THE FOURTH WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Gospel, Jesus addresses those who seek to kill Him: “Why do you seek to put Me to death?” The crowd answered and said: “You have a devil! Who seeks to put You to death?” Some other people of Jerusalem were saying: ‘Is not this the Man they seek to kill?’ … They wanted therefore to seize Him, but no one laid hands on Him because His hour had not yet come.”
► THURSDAY IN THE FOURTH WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Old Testament reading we encounter the dead child of the Sunamite woman, whom the prophet Elisesus would raise to life: “Eliseus therefore went into the house, and behold, the child lay dead on his bed: and, going in, he shut the door upon him and upon the child: and prayed to the Lord. And he went up and lay upon the child: and he put his mouth upon his mouth, and his eyes upon his eyes, and his hands upon his hands, and he bowed himself upon him: and the child’s flesh grew warm. Then he returned, and walked in the house―once to and fro: and then he went up and lay upon him again. And the child gaped seven times, and opened his eyes. And he called his servant Giezi, and said to him, ‘Call this Sunamitess woman!’ And she being called, went in to him. And he said: ‘Take up your son!’ And Eliseus returned to Galgal.”
In the Gospel reading, we see raise from the dead the only son of widow of Naim: “At that time, Jesus went into a city called Naim. And as He drew near the gate of the town, behold, a dead man was being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And the Lord, seeing her, had compassion on her, and said to her: ‘Do not weep!’ And He went up and touched the stretcher; and the bearers stood still. And He said: ‘Young man! I say to you, arise!’ And he who was dead, sat up, and began to speak. And He gave him to his mother.”
► FRIDAY IN THE FOURTH WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Old Testament reading we see Elias raise a child from the dead: “In those days, the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, fell sick, and the sickness was very grievous, so that there was no breath left in him. And she said to the prophet Elias: ‘O man of God! Have you come to me that my iniquities should be remembered, and that you should kill my son?’ And Elias said to her: ‘Give me your son!’ And he took him out of her bosom, and carried him into the upper chamber and laid him upon his own bed, and he cried to the Lord, and said: ‘O Lord my God, have You afflicted also the widow, so as to kill her son?’ And he stretched and measured himself upon the child three times, and cried to the Lord and said: ‘O Lord my God! I beseech You, let the soul of this child return into his body!’ And the Lord heard the voice of Elias; and the soul of the child returned into him, and he revived. And Elias took the child, and brought him down from the upper chamber to the house below, and delivered him to his mother, and said to her: ‘Behold, your son lives!’”
In the Gospel reading, we read how Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead: “At that time, the brother of Mary and Martha, Lazarus of Bethany, was sick. The sisters therefore sent news to Jesus, saying: ‘Lord, behold, he whom You love, is sick!’ When Jesus heard this, He said to the disciples: This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that through it the Son of God may be glorified!’ So when He heard that Lazarus was sick, He remained two more days in the same place. Then afterwards He said to His disciples: ‘Let us go again into Judea. Lazarus is dead; and I rejoice on your account that I was not there, that you may believe. But let us go to him!’ When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went to meet Him. Martha said to Jesus: ‘Lord, if You had been here―my brother would not have died! But even now I know that whatever You shall ask of God, God will give it to You!’ And when she had said this, she went away and quietly called Mary her sister, saying: ‘The Master is here and calls you!’ When Mary came where Jesus was, and saw Him, she fell at His feet, and said to Him: ‘Lord, if You had been her, my brother would not have died!’ Jesus came to the tomb. Now it was a cave and a stone was laid against it. Jesus said: ‘Take away the stone!’ They therefore removed the stone. And Jesus, raising His eyes, said: ‘Father, I give You thanks that You have heard Me. Yet I knew that You always hear Me; but because of the people who stand round, I spoke, that they may believe that You have sent Me!’ When He had said this, He cried out with a loud voice: ‘Lazarus! Come forth!’ And at once he, who had been dead, came forth, bound feet and hands with bandages, and his face was tied up with a cloth. Jesus said to them: ‘Unbind him, and let him go!’”
Do You Need Raising from the Dead?
“What a stupid question!” you say, “I am not dead! So how can I need raising from the dead?” God wants you dead! It is only through death that we can enter eternal life in Heaven. If we want to enter Heaven, then we must die to the world! If we have spiritually died to God and live only for this world―then we need to kill our worldliness so that we once again spiritually live for God! We cannot serve God and the world. Our Lord warned: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24) … “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7).
To which Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Dead or Alive?
We are either alive to God and dead to the world―or we are dead to God and alive to the world. What does it mean being “alive to God” and “dead to God”? Being alive to God means being in a state of sanctifying grace―being dead to God means being in a state of mortal sin. There is no other option, no other possibility, no third situation―we cannot be alive to God and dead to God at the same time. “He that is not with Me, is against Me” (Matthew 12:30). As already stated above: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). You cannot pretend to love God and love the world at the same time―it is like a man telling his wife that he loves her, but says the same thing to his mistress with whom he having an adulterous affair. The world is filled with these “adulterous” Catholics who pretend to love God while also loving the world―which is an enemy of God: “Adulterers, know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
What does Our Lord call such persons who pretend to love God while also loving the world? He calls them hypocrites: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8) ... “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) … “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
Our Lord came to rescue us from this world―but most people do not want to rescued from the world, they are happy with the world, they love living in this world, the love the world. What this boils down to is that they love the enemies of God. Our Lord was clear on this point: “My kingdom is not of this world! … My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). “The prince of this world [the devil] cometh, and in Me he has not anything!” (John 14:30). To the worldlings He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world!” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
The kingdom of Christ epitomizes sanctifying grace―the kingdom of the world epitomizes sin, which opposes and seeks to destroy grace. If we in a state of sanctifying grace, then we are in the kingdom of Christ―but if we are in a state of mortal sin, then we are in the kingdom of world and its prince, Satan (John 12:31). Venial sin merely leads to mortal sin in a gradual fashion. The more worldly we are, the more sinful we are―and “the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7) ― and “he that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8).
We take the notion of sin far too lightly―we almost like to think we are without sin! Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9) … “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9) … “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46) … “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23) … “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Bad Confessions or No Confessions―Hell’s Trump Card
Stop and think for a moment! What sends souls to Hell? Only one thing―an absence of sanctifying grace (the flip side of which is mortal sin which removes sanctifying grace from the soul). That is why Satan seeks to keep people away from Baptism and Confession. He further seeks to blind our minds to what is a mortal sin―often blurring the edges between some mortal sins and venial―making us wrongly believe that what we are about to do is only a venial sin and not a mortal sin. Lack of religious education helps him achieve this goal. If Satan cannot prevent you from going to Confession after you have committed mortal sin, then he will seek to prevent you regaining sanctifying grace by causing you to make a “bad” confession (an invalid and sacrilegious confession). St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church and patron saints of moral theologians, writes: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil not of rare occurrence, but frequent, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.” (Sunday Sermons of St. Alphonsus).
In his sermon for the Third Sunday of Lent, St. Alphonsus says: “The devil does not bring sinners to Hell with their eyes open: he first blinds them with the malice of their own sins. “For their own malice blinded them” (Wisdom 2:21). He thus leads them to eternal perdition. Before we fall into sin, the enemy labors to blind us, so that we may not see the evil we do and the ruin we bring upon ourselves by offending God. After we commit sin, he seeks to make us dumb, so that, through shame, we may conceal our guilt in confession. Thus, he leads us to Hell by a double chain―inducing us, after our sinful transgressions, to consent to a still greater sin―the sin of sacrilege. After we have offended God, the devil labors to keep our mouth closed, and to prevent us from confessing our guilt―to be silent in confessing our sins, is the ruin of the soul.”
Rising from the Death of Sin
St. Alphonsus continues: “God has made sin shameful, that we may abstain from it, and gives us confidence to confess it by promising pardon to all who accuse themselves of their sins. But the devil does the contrary―he gives confidence to sin by holding out hopes of pardon; but, when sin is committed, he inspires shame, to prevent the confession of it. To you, who have sinned, I say, that you ought to be ashamed to offend so great and so good a God. But you have no reason to be ashamed of confessing the sins which you have committed. Was it shameful in St. Mary Magdalene to acknowledge publicly at the feet of Jesus Christ that she was a sinner? By her confession she became a saint. Was it shameful in St. Augustine not only to confess his sins, but also to publish them in a book, that, for his confusion, they might be known to the whole world? Was it shameful in St. Mary of Egypt to confess, that for so many years she had led a scandalous life? By their confessions these have become saints. But, you say: ‘I feel greatly ashamed to confess such a sin!’ If you wish to be saved, you must conquer this shame. What hope of salvation can someone have who goes to confession and conceals his sins, and makes use of the tribunal of penance to offend God, and to make himself doubly the slave of Satan? What hope would you entertain of the recovery of the man who, instead of taking the medicine prescribed by his physician, drank a cup of poison? What can the Sacrament of Penance be to those who conceal their sins, but a deadly poison, which adds to their guilt the malice of sacrilege?”
“Some penitents ask: ‘What will my confessor say when he hears that I have committed such a sin?’ What will he say? He will say that you are, like all persons living on this Earth―miserable and prone to sin! He will say that, if you have done evil, then you have also performed a glorious action in overcoming shame, and in candidly confessing your fault. ‘But I am afraid to confess this sin!’ you say. To how many confessors, I ask, must you confess it? It is enough to mention it to one priest, who hears many sins of the same kind from other people. It is enough to confess it once―the confessor will give you penance and absolution, and your conscience shall be tranquillized. But, you say: “I feel a great repugnance to tell this sin to my spiritual father.” Tell it, then, to another confessor, and, if you wish, to one to whom you are unknown.”
“You have so many fears, and are not afraid of damning your own soul by the enormous crime of concealing mortal sins in confession! You are afraid of the rebuke of your confessor, and fear not the reproof which you shall receive from Jesus Christ, your Judge, at the hour of death. You are afraid that the sins you confess shall somehow become known (which is impossible), and you dread not the Day of Judgment, on which day, if you conceal them, they shall be revealed to all men. ‘Do you not know,’ says St. Bernard, ‘that if you refuse to confess your sins to one man, who, like yourself, is a sinner, they shall be made known not only to all your relatives and neighbors, but to the entire human race?’ … If you do not confess your sin, God himself shall, for your confusion, publish not only the mortal sin which you conceal, but also all your iniquities, in the presence of the angels and of the whole world. ‘I will discover thy shame to thy face, and will show thy wickedness to the nations’ (Nahum 3:5). If, then, there be a single soul among you who has ever concealed a sin through shame, in the tribunal of penance, let him take courage and make a full confession of all his faults. Courage, then! Expel this viper which you harbor in your soul, and which continually corrodes your heart and destroys your peace. O what a Hell does a Christian suffer, who keeps in his heart a mortal sin concealed through shame in confession!”
“And, so that you may not entertain groundless scruples, I think it is right to tell you, that if the sin, which you are ashamed to tell, be not mortal, you are not obliged to confess it; for we are bound only to confess mortal sins. Moreover, if you have doubts whether you ever confessed a certain sin of your former life, but know that, in preparing for confession, you always carefully examined your conscience, and that you never concealed a sin through shame; in this case, even though the sin, about the confession of which you are doubtful, had been a grievous fault, you are not obliged to confess it, because it is presumed to be morally certain that you have already confessed it. But, if you know that the sin was grievous, and that you never accused yourself of it in confession, then there is no remedy—you must confess it, or you must be damned for it.
“But, lost sheep, go instantly to confession. Jesus Christ is waiting for you; He stands with arms open to pardon and embrace you, if you acknowledge your guilt. I assure you that, after having confessed all your sins, you shall feel such consolation, at having unburdened your conscience and acquired the grace of God, that you shall forever bless the day on which you made this confession. Go as soon as possible in search of a confessor. Do not give the devil time to continue to tempt you and to make you put off your confession―go immediately―for Jesus Christ is waiting for you!”
You cannot rise from the dead unless you are dead! Pretty obvious, huh? Are you dead? “Not yet!” you say. But you should be dead! Our Lord said: “Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat, falling into the ground, dies, then it remains alone. But if it dies, it brings forth much fruit. He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal” (John 12:24-25) ... “He that finds his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it” (Matthew 10:39) … “For he that will save his life, shall lose it―and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it” (Matthew 16:25) ... “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it” (Mark 8:35) ... “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it―for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it” (Luke 9:24) … “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it” (Luke 17:33).
The ultimate example of what Our Lord is talking about is, of course, martyrdom―whereby we lay down our physical lives for Christ in obedience to the Faith and refusing to give up that Faith, even under threat of death. Yet there are lesser degrees and also metaphorical instances where we suffer a “lesser martyrdom” in the form of persecution for the sake of Christ―which requires a “dying” to the world and a “dying” to personal advantages for the sake of Christ and the Faith. “You are dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:11). “For we are buried together with Him by baptism into death; so that as Christ is risen from the dead, by the glory of the Father, so we also may walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:4). “Therefore, if you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth. For you are dead [to the world] and your life is hidden with Christ in God!” (Colossians 3:1-3).
Lent has a Deathly Theme of Death
► ASH WEDNESDAY set a deathly tone when the ashes were smeared in the form of a cross on foreheads with the ominous words that remind of our future death: “Remember, man, that you are dust and into dust you shall return!” And in the Gospel of the Mass for Ash Wednesday, we are further reminded not to set our sights on a paradise in this world, but in the next world: “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on Earth, where rust and moth consume, and where thieves break in and steal―but lay up for yourselves treasures in Heaven, where neither rust nor moth consumes, nor thieves break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be!” This, of course, implies that we must die to this world in order to live for Heaven. This notion of dying is then reinforced by the words of Consecration at the Mass―and every Mass―which speak of Christ dying so that we might live: “This is the Chalice of My Blood of the New and Eternal Testament, the Mystery of Faith; which shall be shed for you and for many unto the remission of sins!”
► THURSDAY AFTER ASH WEDNESDAY continues the “deathly” theme. In the Epistle we read: “Ezechia was mortally ill, and the prophet Isaias, son of Amos, came and said to him: ‘Thus says the Lord: “Put your house in order, for you are about to die! You shall not recover!”’ Then Ezechia turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord: ‘O Lord, remember how faithfully and wholeheartedly I conducted myself in Your presence, doing what was pleasing to You!’ And Ezechia wept bitterly. Then the word of the Lord came to Isaias: ‘Go, tell Ezechia: “Thus says the Lord, the God of your father David―I have heard your prayer and seen your tears. I will add fifteen years to your life.”’”
The Gospel for the same day, also continues the “deathly” theme: “When Jesus had entered Capharnaum, there came to Him a centurion, who entreated Him, saying: ‘Lord, my servant is lying sick in the house, paralyzed, and is grievously afflicted!’ Jesus said to him: ‘I will come and cure him!’ But in answer the centurion said: ‘Lord, I am not worthy that You should come under my roof―but only say the word, and my servant will be healed!’ Then Jesus said to the centurion: ‘Go your way! As you have believed, so be it done to you!’ And the servant was healed in that hour.”
► EMBER FRIDAY IN THE FIRST WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. The Epistle warns that “the one who sins shall die ... Do I indeed derive any pleasure from the death of the wicked? says the Lord God ... Do I not rather rejoice when he turns from his evil way that he may live? … If a wicked man, turning from the wickedness he has committed, does what is right and just, he shall preserve his life; since he has turned away from all the sins which he committed, he shall surely live, he shall not die, says the Lord almighty.”
While the Gospel speaks of those who are sick and approaching the doors of death: “There is at Jerusalem, by the Sheepgate, a pool called in Hebrew ‘Bethsaida’ alongside which were lying a great multitude of the sick, blind, lame, and those with shriveled limbs, waiting for the moving of the water. For an angel of the Lord used to come down at certain times into the pool, and the water was troubled. And the first to go down into the pool after the troubling of the water was cured of whatever infirmity he had.”
► EMBER FRIDAY IN THE FIRST WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Epistle we read of the fiery furnace in which the three young Jewish men were thrown because they refused to adore the false god of King Nabuchodonosor: “In those days, the Angel of the Lord went down into the furnace with Azure and his companions, drove the fiery flames out of the furnace, and made the inside of the furnace as though a dew-laden breeze were blowing through it. And the flames rose forty-nine cubits above the furnace, and spread out, burning the Chaldeans nearby, the king’s men who were stoking the furnace. And the fire in no way touched them or caused them pain or harm. Then these three in the furnace with one voice sang, glorifying and blessing God.” They should have been burned to death―but God preserved them because of their fidelity to Him.
► WEDNESDAY IN THE SECOND WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. Jesus reveals to His Apostles what tortures and manner of death awaited Him in Jerusalem: “As Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, He took the twelve disciples aside by themselves, and said to them: ‘Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and the Scribes; and they will condemn Him to death, and will deliver Him to the Gentiles to be mocked and scourged and crucified; and on the third day He will rise again!’”
► THURSDAY IN THE SECOND WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Gospel, Our Lord relates a parable about how death catches up with both the rich and the poor: “A certain rich man who used to clothe himself in purple and fine linen, and who feasted every day in splendid fashion. And there was a certain poor man, named Lazarus, who lay at his gate, covered with sores, and longing to be filled with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. And it came to pass that the poor man died and was carried away by the angels into Abraham’s bosom; but the rich man also died and was buried in Hell.”
► FRIDAY IN THE SECOND WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Old Testament reading at Mass we encounter the desire of jealous brothers of Joseph to murder him: “Joseph went after his brothers looking for them and found them in Dothain. They saw him in the distance, and before he drew near them, they plotted to kill him. They said to one another: ‘Here comes that dreamer! Let us therefore kill him and throw him into a cistern! We can then say that a wild beast devoured him! Let us see then what becomes of his dreams!’”
In the Gospel, Jesus also relates a parable about death and murder: “At that time, Jesus spoke this parable to the multitude of the Jews and the chief priests: ‘There was a man, a householder, who planted a vineyard, and put a hedge about it, and dug a wine vat in it, and built a tower; then he let it out to vine-dressers. When the fruit season drew near, he sent his servants to the vine-dressers to receive his fruits. The vine-dressers seized his servants, and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again he sent another party of servants more numerous than the first; and they did the same to these. Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But the vine-dressers, on seeing the son, said among themselves, ‘This is the heir! Come, let us kill him, and we shall have his inheritance!’ So they seized him, cast him out of the vineyard, and killed him.”
► MONDAY IN THE THIRD WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Gospel we read how some of the Jews sought to kill Jesus by throwing Him off a cliff-edge: “And all in the synagogue, as they heard these things, were filled with wrath. And they rose up and put Him forth out of the town, and led Him to the brow of the hill, on which their town was built, that they might throw Him down headlong.”
► SATURDAY IN THE THIRD WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Old Testament reading we see how two judges lusted after Susanna, the wife of Joakim. Having failed to seduce her when alone with her in her garden, they alleged that she had committed adultery with a young man. The sentence for adultery was death. Fortunately, Daniel uncovered their lies and, instead of Susanna being put to death, the two judges were executed.
► MONDAY IN THE FOURTH WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Old Testament reading we encounter “two women who were harlots, who came to king Solomon. One of them said: “I and this woman dwelt in one house, and I gave birth to a child with her in the chamber. And the third day after I had delivered, she also gave birth. We were alone together and no other person was with us in the house, only we two. And this woman’s child died in the night; for in her sleep she overlaid him. And rising in the dead time of the night, she took my child from my side, while I was asleep, and laid it in her bosom; and laid her dead child in my bosom. When I rose in the morning, my child was dead; but considering him more diligently when it was clear day, I found it was not mine.’ And the other woman answered: ‘It is not so as you say, but your child is dead and mine is alive!’ Then said the king said: ‘Bring me a sword!’ And when they had brought a sword, the king said: ‘Divide the living child in two parts, and give half to the one woman, and half to the other!’ But the woman whose child was alive said to the king: ‘I beseech you, my lord, give her the child alive, and do not kill it!’ But the other woman said: ‘Let it neither be mine nor yours, but divide it!’ The king answered and said: ‘Give the living child to this woman, and let it not be killed; for she is the true mother thereof!’”
► TUESDAY IN THE FOURTH WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Gospel, Jesus addresses those who seek to kill Him: “Why do you seek to put Me to death?” The crowd answered and said: “You have a devil! Who seeks to put You to death?” Some other people of Jerusalem were saying: ‘Is not this the Man they seek to kill?’ … They wanted therefore to seize Him, but no one laid hands on Him because His hour had not yet come.”
► THURSDAY IN THE FOURTH WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Old Testament reading we encounter the dead child of the Sunamite woman, whom the prophet Elisesus would raise to life: “Eliseus therefore went into the house, and behold, the child lay dead on his bed: and, going in, he shut the door upon him and upon the child: and prayed to the Lord. And he went up and lay upon the child: and he put his mouth upon his mouth, and his eyes upon his eyes, and his hands upon his hands, and he bowed himself upon him: and the child’s flesh grew warm. Then he returned, and walked in the house―once to and fro: and then he went up and lay upon him again. And the child gaped seven times, and opened his eyes. And he called his servant Giezi, and said to him, ‘Call this Sunamitess woman!’ And she being called, went in to him. And he said: ‘Take up your son!’ And Eliseus returned to Galgal.”
In the Gospel reading, we see raise from the dead the only son of widow of Naim: “At that time, Jesus went into a city called Naim. And as He drew near the gate of the town, behold, a dead man was being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And the Lord, seeing her, had compassion on her, and said to her: ‘Do not weep!’ And He went up and touched the stretcher; and the bearers stood still. And He said: ‘Young man! I say to you, arise!’ And he who was dead, sat up, and began to speak. And He gave him to his mother.”
► FRIDAY IN THE FOURTH WEEK OF LENT continues the “deathly” theme. In the Old Testament reading we see Elias raise a child from the dead: “In those days, the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, fell sick, and the sickness was very grievous, so that there was no breath left in him. And she said to the prophet Elias: ‘O man of God! Have you come to me that my iniquities should be remembered, and that you should kill my son?’ And Elias said to her: ‘Give me your son!’ And he took him out of her bosom, and carried him into the upper chamber and laid him upon his own bed, and he cried to the Lord, and said: ‘O Lord my God, have You afflicted also the widow, so as to kill her son?’ And he stretched and measured himself upon the child three times, and cried to the Lord and said: ‘O Lord my God! I beseech You, let the soul of this child return into his body!’ And the Lord heard the voice of Elias; and the soul of the child returned into him, and he revived. And Elias took the child, and brought him down from the upper chamber to the house below, and delivered him to his mother, and said to her: ‘Behold, your son lives!’”
In the Gospel reading, we read how Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead: “At that time, the brother of Mary and Martha, Lazarus of Bethany, was sick. The sisters therefore sent news to Jesus, saying: ‘Lord, behold, he whom You love, is sick!’ When Jesus heard this, He said to the disciples: This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that through it the Son of God may be glorified!’ So when He heard that Lazarus was sick, He remained two more days in the same place. Then afterwards He said to His disciples: ‘Let us go again into Judea. Lazarus is dead; and I rejoice on your account that I was not there, that you may believe. But let us go to him!’ When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went to meet Him. Martha said to Jesus: ‘Lord, if You had been here―my brother would not have died! But even now I know that whatever You shall ask of God, God will give it to You!’ And when she had said this, she went away and quietly called Mary her sister, saying: ‘The Master is here and calls you!’ When Mary came where Jesus was, and saw Him, she fell at His feet, and said to Him: ‘Lord, if You had been her, my brother would not have died!’ Jesus came to the tomb. Now it was a cave and a stone was laid against it. Jesus said: ‘Take away the stone!’ They therefore removed the stone. And Jesus, raising His eyes, said: ‘Father, I give You thanks that You have heard Me. Yet I knew that You always hear Me; but because of the people who stand round, I spoke, that they may believe that You have sent Me!’ When He had said this, He cried out with a loud voice: ‘Lazarus! Come forth!’ And at once he, who had been dead, came forth, bound feet and hands with bandages, and his face was tied up with a cloth. Jesus said to them: ‘Unbind him, and let him go!’”
Do You Need Raising from the Dead?
“What a stupid question!” you say, “I am not dead! So how can I need raising from the dead?” God wants you dead! It is only through death that we can enter eternal life in Heaven. If we want to enter Heaven, then we must die to the world! If we have spiritually died to God and live only for this world―then we need to kill our worldliness so that we once again spiritually live for God! We cannot serve God and the world. Our Lord warned: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24) … “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7).
To which Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Dead or Alive?
We are either alive to God and dead to the world―or we are dead to God and alive to the world. What does it mean being “alive to God” and “dead to God”? Being alive to God means being in a state of sanctifying grace―being dead to God means being in a state of mortal sin. There is no other option, no other possibility, no third situation―we cannot be alive to God and dead to God at the same time. “He that is not with Me, is against Me” (Matthew 12:30). As already stated above: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). You cannot pretend to love God and love the world at the same time―it is like a man telling his wife that he loves her, but says the same thing to his mistress with whom he having an adulterous affair. The world is filled with these “adulterous” Catholics who pretend to love God while also loving the world―which is an enemy of God: “Adulterers, know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
What does Our Lord call such persons who pretend to love God while also loving the world? He calls them hypocrites: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8) ... “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) … “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
Our Lord came to rescue us from this world―but most people do not want to rescued from the world, they are happy with the world, they love living in this world, the love the world. What this boils down to is that they love the enemies of God. Our Lord was clear on this point: “My kingdom is not of this world! … My kingdom is not from hence!” (John 18:36). “The prince of this world [the devil] cometh, and in Me he has not anything!” (John 14:30). To the worldlings He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world!” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
The kingdom of Christ epitomizes sanctifying grace―the kingdom of the world epitomizes sin, which opposes and seeks to destroy grace. If we in a state of sanctifying grace, then we are in the kingdom of Christ―but if we are in a state of mortal sin, then we are in the kingdom of world and its prince, Satan (John 12:31). Venial sin merely leads to mortal sin in a gradual fashion. The more worldly we are, the more sinful we are―and “the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7) ― and “he that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8).
We take the notion of sin far too lightly―we almost like to think we are without sin! Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9) … “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9) … “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46) … “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23) … “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10).
Bad Confessions or No Confessions―Hell’s Trump Card
Stop and think for a moment! What sends souls to Hell? Only one thing―an absence of sanctifying grace (the flip side of which is mortal sin which removes sanctifying grace from the soul). That is why Satan seeks to keep people away from Baptism and Confession. He further seeks to blind our minds to what is a mortal sin―often blurring the edges between some mortal sins and venial―making us wrongly believe that what we are about to do is only a venial sin and not a mortal sin. Lack of religious education helps him achieve this goal. If Satan cannot prevent you from going to Confession after you have committed mortal sin, then he will seek to prevent you regaining sanctifying grace by causing you to make a “bad” confession (an invalid and sacrilegious confession). St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church and patron saints of moral theologians, writes: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions, in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil not of rare occurrence, but frequent, which consigns innumerable souls to Hell.” (Sunday Sermons of St. Alphonsus).
In his sermon for the Third Sunday of Lent, St. Alphonsus says: “The devil does not bring sinners to Hell with their eyes open: he first blinds them with the malice of their own sins. “For their own malice blinded them” (Wisdom 2:21). He thus leads them to eternal perdition. Before we fall into sin, the enemy labors to blind us, so that we may not see the evil we do and the ruin we bring upon ourselves by offending God. After we commit sin, he seeks to make us dumb, so that, through shame, we may conceal our guilt in confession. Thus, he leads us to Hell by a double chain―inducing us, after our sinful transgressions, to consent to a still greater sin―the sin of sacrilege. After we have offended God, the devil labors to keep our mouth closed, and to prevent us from confessing our guilt―to be silent in confessing our sins, is the ruin of the soul.”
Rising from the Death of Sin
St. Alphonsus continues: “God has made sin shameful, that we may abstain from it, and gives us confidence to confess it by promising pardon to all who accuse themselves of their sins. But the devil does the contrary―he gives confidence to sin by holding out hopes of pardon; but, when sin is committed, he inspires shame, to prevent the confession of it. To you, who have sinned, I say, that you ought to be ashamed to offend so great and so good a God. But you have no reason to be ashamed of confessing the sins which you have committed. Was it shameful in St. Mary Magdalene to acknowledge publicly at the feet of Jesus Christ that she was a sinner? By her confession she became a saint. Was it shameful in St. Augustine not only to confess his sins, but also to publish them in a book, that, for his confusion, they might be known to the whole world? Was it shameful in St. Mary of Egypt to confess, that for so many years she had led a scandalous life? By their confessions these have become saints. But, you say: ‘I feel greatly ashamed to confess such a sin!’ If you wish to be saved, you must conquer this shame. What hope of salvation can someone have who goes to confession and conceals his sins, and makes use of the tribunal of penance to offend God, and to make himself doubly the slave of Satan? What hope would you entertain of the recovery of the man who, instead of taking the medicine prescribed by his physician, drank a cup of poison? What can the Sacrament of Penance be to those who conceal their sins, but a deadly poison, which adds to their guilt the malice of sacrilege?”
“Some penitents ask: ‘What will my confessor say when he hears that I have committed such a sin?’ What will he say? He will say that you are, like all persons living on this Earth―miserable and prone to sin! He will say that, if you have done evil, then you have also performed a glorious action in overcoming shame, and in candidly confessing your fault. ‘But I am afraid to confess this sin!’ you say. To how many confessors, I ask, must you confess it? It is enough to mention it to one priest, who hears many sins of the same kind from other people. It is enough to confess it once―the confessor will give you penance and absolution, and your conscience shall be tranquillized. But, you say: “I feel a great repugnance to tell this sin to my spiritual father.” Tell it, then, to another confessor, and, if you wish, to one to whom you are unknown.”
“You have so many fears, and are not afraid of damning your own soul by the enormous crime of concealing mortal sins in confession! You are afraid of the rebuke of your confessor, and fear not the reproof which you shall receive from Jesus Christ, your Judge, at the hour of death. You are afraid that the sins you confess shall somehow become known (which is impossible), and you dread not the Day of Judgment, on which day, if you conceal them, they shall be revealed to all men. ‘Do you not know,’ says St. Bernard, ‘that if you refuse to confess your sins to one man, who, like yourself, is a sinner, they shall be made known not only to all your relatives and neighbors, but to the entire human race?’ … If you do not confess your sin, God himself shall, for your confusion, publish not only the mortal sin which you conceal, but also all your iniquities, in the presence of the angels and of the whole world. ‘I will discover thy shame to thy face, and will show thy wickedness to the nations’ (Nahum 3:5). If, then, there be a single soul among you who has ever concealed a sin through shame, in the tribunal of penance, let him take courage and make a full confession of all his faults. Courage, then! Expel this viper which you harbor in your soul, and which continually corrodes your heart and destroys your peace. O what a Hell does a Christian suffer, who keeps in his heart a mortal sin concealed through shame in confession!”
“And, so that you may not entertain groundless scruples, I think it is right to tell you, that if the sin, which you are ashamed to tell, be not mortal, you are not obliged to confess it; for we are bound only to confess mortal sins. Moreover, if you have doubts whether you ever confessed a certain sin of your former life, but know that, in preparing for confession, you always carefully examined your conscience, and that you never concealed a sin through shame; in this case, even though the sin, about the confession of which you are doubtful, had been a grievous fault, you are not obliged to confess it, because it is presumed to be morally certain that you have already confessed it. But, if you know that the sin was grievous, and that you never accused yourself of it in confession, then there is no remedy—you must confess it, or you must be damned for it.
“But, lost sheep, go instantly to confession. Jesus Christ is waiting for you; He stands with arms open to pardon and embrace you, if you acknowledge your guilt. I assure you that, after having confessed all your sins, you shall feel such consolation, at having unburdened your conscience and acquired the grace of God, that you shall forever bless the day on which you made this confession. Go as soon as possible in search of a confessor. Do not give the devil time to continue to tempt you and to make you put off your confession―go immediately―for Jesus Christ is waiting for you!”
Article 19
Thursday after the Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 14th
Mixing Joy With Penance
Thursday after the Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 14th
Mixing Joy With Penance
What an Oxymoron!
An oxymoron is a combination of contradictory or incongruous words―such as cruel kindness. That is exactly what the idea of mixing joy with penance conjures up―it seems contradictory, mutually exclusive, diametrically opposed. Penance evokes thoughts of pain, suffering, hardship, etc. How can you reconcile that with Joy―which brings to mind thoughts of happiness, elation, fulfillment, etc.? Yet Our Lord says: “There shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … So I say to you, there shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 15:7-10).
You could argue that there is somewhat of a difference between angels rejoicing at seeing men do penance on the one hand, and on other hand, men themselves rejoicing at doing their own penance! Heck! Anyone could be happy at seeing others do penance―as long we don’t have to do penance! What motive could there be for us in rejoicing at having to do penance?
First of all, the overriding motive should be the words of Our Lord: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … No, I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). What joy is there is perishing and being damned? For those who insanely think that they have no need of penance―let them remind themselves that we are all sinners: “All have sinned!” (Romans 3:23) … “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us!” (1 John 1:8) … “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15) ... “Is it my will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways and live? … Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:23, 30).
If your boat sank quite some way off the coast―would you not exert yourself to try and swim to the shore and would that not bring you great joy at having succeeding in avoiding death and saving your life? If you succeeded in fighting-off a person who was trying to kidnap your child―would that not bring you joy, even if you suffered many punches, kicks, bruises and cuts?
Health of Soul and Health of Body
Just look at some of the professions that pay well but are tremendously arduous. Since we are talking about spiritual health, let us take the case of doctors―since they are all about physical health. How many doctors are there per 1,000 people in the USA? In 1960 there was only 1 doctor per 1,000 people. Today there are 3 doctors per 1,000 people―or around 1 doctor for 333 persons. Doctors―in general―are well-rewarded but they have also had a grueling training in medical school and are often overworked while completing their training in residency. The average medical doctor earns around $250,000 per year―some as low as $100,000 and some as high as $400,000. Specialist doctors can earn anywhere from $400,000 to almost $600,000 per year. Salaries that are most certainly envied by many people. But what are those salaries in comparison to the “eternal salary” that God offers to those who graduate into Heaven?
Becoming a doctor requires years of education, including college, medical school, residency and specialization. There is also a price that the “few who make it” have to pay―just as there is a hefty price to pay for “few who make it” to Heaven: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14). Our Lord then speaks of the hefty price we must pay for salvation: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5). To which Holy Scripture adds: “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4).
Those wanting to become doctors―just as those wanting to become saints―must pay a great price.
Firstly, there is the price of tuition― the cost of medical school is also hefty. The Association of American Medical Colleges found that the median four-year cost at U.S. medical schools exceeds $268,000, while resident students at private schools pay a median of $363,836.
Secondly, there is a hefty mental and emotional price to be paid in area of study, learning and training. The studies are notoriously intense, hard and unforgiving.
The Penance of Medical School
One doctor explains as follows―as you read along, make a comparison in your mind between getting to and graduating from medical school, to getting to and graduating into Heaven. Anyway, here is what the doctor writes:
“How hard is medical school and how hard is it to get into medical school? It is a long and arduous undertaking. Every step of the way is made to weed out students and cut the crowd in half―your SATs to get into undergrad, your MCAT (Medical College Admission Test) to get into medical school, and your USMLE (United States Medical Licensing Examination) to get into residency. Whether you are choosing between DO vs. MD (Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine vs. Doctor of Medicine) programs or have already made your choice―applying to medical school is not for the faint of heart.
“Each milestone is marked by an examination that will either get you to the next level―or leave you behind. This is one of many components that makes getting into medical school and after so challenging. Students often forget to ask themselves: “How hard is medical school once I'm there?” Medicine is a subject that encompasses science, methodology, practicality, patience, personality, and empathy. The sheer amount of knowledge required for medicine is difficult, but just getting into medical school can be even harder. Medical school acceptance rates are extremely low. You have to be the best. Medical schools want the most academically competitive students. That is what makes admissions so difficult. There are only so many seats at available at each school every year and an overabundance of applicants. 2015 saw 52,000 students apply to medical school with 20,000 students earning acceptance and 32,000 being rejected.
“Taking into account these factors, we can start to get a sense of the demanding task of medical school acceptance. It is a tall order and takes time. Getting into medical school is difficult, grueling, strenuous and every other synonym you can think of for difficult combined. Just because it is difficult does not make it impossible. Yes, medical school is hard, and every other synonym you can think of for hard. There’s no way to sugar coat it. The volume of information and detail you have to recall is intense. The subject matter is complex. The way you are tested will sometimes seem unfair and the standards you have to reach will feel unattainable. There is so much to know in such a compressed amount of time. Just when you think you’ve learned everything there is to know, you will realize that that subject can be broken down into even smaller parts. Realizing how much you still have yet to learn is a humbling and important lesson.
“Be prepared for the roughest years of your life (until you enter residency). You will have sleepless nights and you will be wishing you had more time to get everything done. It is incredibly tiresome and daunting. You will have bad days and be pushed to your limits. You will spend hours on a concept trying to understand it and apply it. Developing you into a pragmatic thinker (and not just a regurgitating parrot) is the goal of medical school. It is teaching you an insane amount of information so when you are presented with a problem you will be able to logically go through the steps to get to the right answer. You are not expected to just memorize and regurgitate information. You have to learn to apply it and reason through your explanation.
“The path to medicine is long but worth it. Getting into medical school was the hardest thing I ever had to do until I got to medical school. That was eclipsed in just a few short days of histology, when I longed for the simpler times of undergraduate days. Each step of your medical journey will feel like the hardest when you are experiencing it and that it is true. Just as the next step will be even harder than that. That makes the reward that much sweeter.”
Suffering Leads to Success
Hopefully you saw in that doctor’s account similarities with what it takes to get to Heaven! He speaks of from medical school as being “that much sweeter” due the great difficulties and hardships he had to endure. “As it is written: ‘That eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!’” (1 Corinthians 2:9). Just think of how sweet are the rewards of Heaven are after we graduate from the “medical school” of penance―for it is penance that gives us the necessary spiritual health that we need to possess if we are to enter Heaven―as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3).
Blind in Both Eyes!
Our problem here on Earth is that we blind in both eyes―in the eye that looks upon Heaven and the eye that looks upon Earth. In our blindness we fail to see what Heaven really is and we fail to see what this Earth really is. We imagine that entry to Heaven is so cheap that we can sin as much as want with impunity and then somehow still get to Heaven. As regards sin―we totally fail to see sin as being the greatest evil that there can possibly be on Earth, and therefore we have qualms committing it―for not only have we cheapened Heaven, we have also cheapened sin! “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
The result is that we instinctively do not want to pay the price for Heaven; nor do we want to pay the price for sin! We do not really want to roll-up our sleeves and work to get to Heaven; nor do we want to labor and pay-off our debts for sin―we are quick to take-out the mortgage of pleasure, but do not pay our monthly bill of penance! “With the mind I serve the law of God; but with the flesh, I serve the law of sin! Unhappy man that I am―who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Romans 7:24-25). We sin, but for sin we do not pay! Our prayers we only say but do not pray. We say we love God (in theory), but have little to show for it or prove it (in practice). Our love for the world has much more fruit than our love for God. We can easily spend hours browsing the internet (a form of worldly ‘meditation’) but cannot, will not, or rarely meditate one mystery of the Rosary―we just rattle-off the Hail Marys and leave it at that!
This spiritual blindness―which cheapens sin and cheapens Heaven―has led many to their damnation: “They are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14) ... “Can the blind lead the blind? Do they not both fall into the ditch?” (Luke 6:39). There are so many bishops, priests, religious monks and nuns, parents and teachers―who should be leading their flocks along the right road to salvation―but who are blinded by the world and its pleasures and treasures. As Our Lady warned: “Priest will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! Many priests will lose their spirit, placing their souls in great danger” (Our Lady of Good Success). “Priests, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, are asking for vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads.” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Yet the same can be said of many or most parents and teachers! Their prime God-given role is to help and lead those entrusted to them on the path to Heaven―but that is no longer (was it ever?) their main focus. God, Heaven, the spiritual life―all this has long been replaced by more mundane, worldly, entertaining, enjoyable, fun things! Yet those things do not purchase Heaven―prayer and penance purchases Heaven. Unfortunately, God and the spiritual find very little time and place in the daily conversations and doings of these parents and teachers―and thus their children are left spiritually starving! The grave dangers and grave consequences of sin are not correctly explained. Nor is there any serious and in-depth teaching and discussion about Heaven. The result is that children do not fear sin and they do not desire Heaven. “As I live, saith the Lord God, My flocks and My sheep are become a prey to all the beasts of the field, because My shepherds did not care after My flock, but the shepherds fed themselves, and fed not My flocks!” (Ezechiel 34:8). All these bishops, priests, religious monks and nuns, parents and teachers are the watchmen condemned in Holy Scripture: “His [God’s] watchmen are all blind! They are all ignorant! Dumb dogs not able to bark! Seeing vain things! Sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10). “Having eyes, see you not?” (Mark 8:18). We must―in our spiritual blindness―cry out to Jesus with the blind man in the Gospel: “Lord, that I may see!” (Luke 18:41).
Even the Traditional and Conservative sections of the Catholic Church have gradually become more and more blind over the years. The following true anecdote serves to illustrate the contamination of worldliness even in the Traditional and Conservative sphere. In a Traditional Conservative Catholic school, there was much emphasis and focus placed on the spiritual things in life―to the point where all the teachers were repeatedly encouraged (and shown how) to merge religion into the subjects being taught―for if “God is everywhere” then He also should be present in everything we teach. There was more than just a lip-service, token-gesture, minimal amount of prayer being said daily. The tone and tenor was good―the priest and teachers united the best they could to try and elevate the souls of the students above the universally pervasive worldliness that surrounded them outside the school. Nevertheless, one morning, during a sermon, the priest asked the students to raise their hands if they had the goal in life of being really rich―almost every single Catholic student enthusiastically and delightedly shot their arms into the air!
Where were those children getting this attitude from? It most certainly wasn’t from the school. Of course, it had to be the world―but why had not the parents spotted and detoxified this pernicious attitude before it was allowed to develop to such an enthusiastic degree? The parents were, to a degree, spiritually blind ― and they were leading their equally blind children happily and complacently along a path that Our Lord says leads to the pit. In their blindness they say: “Hey! All other Catholics are like that―so it must be okay if everyone does it!” Hey! Most Catholics end up in Hell―says Our Lord, Our Lady and many saints―therefore if everyone is going to Hell, it must be okay to imitate them! Really? “Then Jesus said to his disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23-24).
Riches Won’t Buy Heaven
Stocking up on riches, amassing wealth, increasing your possessions, having much money in the bank―will not buy a way into Heaven. The parable of Our Lord comes to mind: “And Jesus spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns, and will build greater; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods. And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thy rest; eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool! This night do they require thy soul of thee! And whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’” (Luke 12:16-21).
Little Love―Little Debt Reduction―Little Joy
How can we rich towards God? God has everything and needs nothing, or does He? God says: “My son, give Me thy heart and keep My ways!” (Proverbs 23:26) … “Beware lest perhaps your heart be deceived, and you depart from the Lord, and serve strange gods and adore them!” (Deuteronomy 11:16). “The Lord your God will test you, so that it may be seen whether you love Him with all your heart and with all your soul, or not” (Deuteronomy 13:3).
It is not how many penances we offer that matters first and foremost―but how “heavy” those penances are. That is to say, how much love they contain. Many penances are not done out of a love of God, but out of a fear of God. Which husband or father finds joy in the fact that his wife and children fear him? Does he not prefer that they love him more than they fear him? Sorrow for sin can be out of fear or out of love―we can be sorry that we offended someone because we are afraid of what they will now do to us; or we can be sorry because we have hurt the feelings of a friend. Love is worth far more than fear―it is like a $10,000 bill (the largest bill ever to be printed for public circulation in the U.S.) compared to 1 cent. Imagine what a debt of sin can be paid by one single act of loving penance (one single $10,000 bill) and how long it would take you pay the same debt with lots and lots of fearful penances (one single cent at a time). Is there not great joy at having finally paid all your debts and being debt-free? Well, a love of God can achieve that far faster than a fear of God. Penance pays debts for sin―do your penances willingly out of love, rather than begrudgingly out of fear or compulsion.
You Sinned with Joy―Now Pay with Joy!
When we sin, we usually do it with joy―for we imagine it will bring us joy. It does bring us joy―a false joy, a short-lived joy, and a painful joy. Every sin has its price―and each and every sin (mortal and venial) is classified as being the greatest evil in the world. If you commit the greatest crime, you naturally expect the greatest punishment―then why do think differently when it comes to our sins? The reason is―as all recent popes have said―is that we have “lost the sense of sin” or, more correctly, we have lost the sense of the gravity of sin and the expense of sin. That is why we no longer want to pay the full price of sin―sin has been devalued, and so we naturally but mistakenly feel that penance or payment for sin should also be devalued. “His heart was hardened, and it was made exceedingly hard” (Exodus 9:35). “All the thoughts of their heart were bent upon evil at all times” (Genesis 6:5) … “The imagination and thought of man's heart are prone to evil from youth” (Genesis 8:21).
Sin―even though it is perceived to be a joy―actually hurts the soul: “He that shall sin against Me, shall hurt his own soul!” (Proverbs 8:36). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Too few understand that properly―and that is why too many go to Hell. Sin is seen as “no big deal” ― you just do it and then confess it! Little thought is given to the price of sin ― the “Three Hail Marys” that the priest gives as penance is NOT the price of sin. Priests give such little penances because they fear that penitents would refuse to do a penance that was much greater ― and if the penitent refuses to do the penance, then the confessed sins are not forgiven. The “Three Hail Marys” (or whatever) are merely the first payment of many ‘mortgage’ payments that could last until the end of the person’s life. Most people are sitting on a mountain of debt for sin, which they will clearly see in payment portion of Purgatory! God is prepared to accept much easier payments for sin while we are still living on Earth ― but we are not prepared to pay.
Is not fasting or saying extra prayers much easier that burning in a fire for a long, long time? What we should accept with joy, we instead reject pridefully: “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). Whereas “there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance” (Luke 15:7) ― here on Earth, there are complaints and sadness on the part of every sinner who needs to do penance and does so reluctantly or negligently! Is it small wonder then that most souls end up being damned and few end up being saved: “No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5).
Imagine a criminal sentenced to execution, receiving a change of sentence from execution to life-imprisonment―most are only too happy about it (especially since many prisons are like hotels these days). Well, that is what God does for us―He gives us the opportunity to pay for sin at a far lesser price―almost like paying only 1 cent for every $10,000 owed. Penance is that “one-cent” ― yet we even grumble at this “discounted sentence”.
An oxymoron is a combination of contradictory or incongruous words―such as cruel kindness. That is exactly what the idea of mixing joy with penance conjures up―it seems contradictory, mutually exclusive, diametrically opposed. Penance evokes thoughts of pain, suffering, hardship, etc. How can you reconcile that with Joy―which brings to mind thoughts of happiness, elation, fulfillment, etc.? Yet Our Lord says: “There shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … So I say to you, there shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 15:7-10).
You could argue that there is somewhat of a difference between angels rejoicing at seeing men do penance on the one hand, and on other hand, men themselves rejoicing at doing their own penance! Heck! Anyone could be happy at seeing others do penance―as long we don’t have to do penance! What motive could there be for us in rejoicing at having to do penance?
First of all, the overriding motive should be the words of Our Lord: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … No, I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). What joy is there is perishing and being damned? For those who insanely think that they have no need of penance―let them remind themselves that we are all sinners: “All have sinned!” (Romans 3:23) … “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us!” (1 John 1:8) … “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15) ... “Is it my will that a sinner should die, says the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways and live? … Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:23, 30).
If your boat sank quite some way off the coast―would you not exert yourself to try and swim to the shore and would that not bring you great joy at having succeeding in avoiding death and saving your life? If you succeeded in fighting-off a person who was trying to kidnap your child―would that not bring you joy, even if you suffered many punches, kicks, bruises and cuts?
Health of Soul and Health of Body
Just look at some of the professions that pay well but are tremendously arduous. Since we are talking about spiritual health, let us take the case of doctors―since they are all about physical health. How many doctors are there per 1,000 people in the USA? In 1960 there was only 1 doctor per 1,000 people. Today there are 3 doctors per 1,000 people―or around 1 doctor for 333 persons. Doctors―in general―are well-rewarded but they have also had a grueling training in medical school and are often overworked while completing their training in residency. The average medical doctor earns around $250,000 per year―some as low as $100,000 and some as high as $400,000. Specialist doctors can earn anywhere from $400,000 to almost $600,000 per year. Salaries that are most certainly envied by many people. But what are those salaries in comparison to the “eternal salary” that God offers to those who graduate into Heaven?
Becoming a doctor requires years of education, including college, medical school, residency and specialization. There is also a price that the “few who make it” have to pay―just as there is a hefty price to pay for “few who make it” to Heaven: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14). Our Lord then speaks of the hefty price we must pay for salvation: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12) … “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5). To which Holy Scripture adds: “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4).
Those wanting to become doctors―just as those wanting to become saints―must pay a great price.
Firstly, there is the price of tuition― the cost of medical school is also hefty. The Association of American Medical Colleges found that the median four-year cost at U.S. medical schools exceeds $268,000, while resident students at private schools pay a median of $363,836.
Secondly, there is a hefty mental and emotional price to be paid in area of study, learning and training. The studies are notoriously intense, hard and unforgiving.
The Penance of Medical School
One doctor explains as follows―as you read along, make a comparison in your mind between getting to and graduating from medical school, to getting to and graduating into Heaven. Anyway, here is what the doctor writes:
“How hard is medical school and how hard is it to get into medical school? It is a long and arduous undertaking. Every step of the way is made to weed out students and cut the crowd in half―your SATs to get into undergrad, your MCAT (Medical College Admission Test) to get into medical school, and your USMLE (United States Medical Licensing Examination) to get into residency. Whether you are choosing between DO vs. MD (Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine vs. Doctor of Medicine) programs or have already made your choice―applying to medical school is not for the faint of heart.
“Each milestone is marked by an examination that will either get you to the next level―or leave you behind. This is one of many components that makes getting into medical school and after so challenging. Students often forget to ask themselves: “How hard is medical school once I'm there?” Medicine is a subject that encompasses science, methodology, practicality, patience, personality, and empathy. The sheer amount of knowledge required for medicine is difficult, but just getting into medical school can be even harder. Medical school acceptance rates are extremely low. You have to be the best. Medical schools want the most academically competitive students. That is what makes admissions so difficult. There are only so many seats at available at each school every year and an overabundance of applicants. 2015 saw 52,000 students apply to medical school with 20,000 students earning acceptance and 32,000 being rejected.
“Taking into account these factors, we can start to get a sense of the demanding task of medical school acceptance. It is a tall order and takes time. Getting into medical school is difficult, grueling, strenuous and every other synonym you can think of for difficult combined. Just because it is difficult does not make it impossible. Yes, medical school is hard, and every other synonym you can think of for hard. There’s no way to sugar coat it. The volume of information and detail you have to recall is intense. The subject matter is complex. The way you are tested will sometimes seem unfair and the standards you have to reach will feel unattainable. There is so much to know in such a compressed amount of time. Just when you think you’ve learned everything there is to know, you will realize that that subject can be broken down into even smaller parts. Realizing how much you still have yet to learn is a humbling and important lesson.
“Be prepared for the roughest years of your life (until you enter residency). You will have sleepless nights and you will be wishing you had more time to get everything done. It is incredibly tiresome and daunting. You will have bad days and be pushed to your limits. You will spend hours on a concept trying to understand it and apply it. Developing you into a pragmatic thinker (and not just a regurgitating parrot) is the goal of medical school. It is teaching you an insane amount of information so when you are presented with a problem you will be able to logically go through the steps to get to the right answer. You are not expected to just memorize and regurgitate information. You have to learn to apply it and reason through your explanation.
“The path to medicine is long but worth it. Getting into medical school was the hardest thing I ever had to do until I got to medical school. That was eclipsed in just a few short days of histology, when I longed for the simpler times of undergraduate days. Each step of your medical journey will feel like the hardest when you are experiencing it and that it is true. Just as the next step will be even harder than that. That makes the reward that much sweeter.”
Suffering Leads to Success
Hopefully you saw in that doctor’s account similarities with what it takes to get to Heaven! He speaks of from medical school as being “that much sweeter” due the great difficulties and hardships he had to endure. “As it is written: ‘That eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!’” (1 Corinthians 2:9). Just think of how sweet are the rewards of Heaven are after we graduate from the “medical school” of penance―for it is penance that gives us the necessary spiritual health that we need to possess if we are to enter Heaven―as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3).
Blind in Both Eyes!
Our problem here on Earth is that we blind in both eyes―in the eye that looks upon Heaven and the eye that looks upon Earth. In our blindness we fail to see what Heaven really is and we fail to see what this Earth really is. We imagine that entry to Heaven is so cheap that we can sin as much as want with impunity and then somehow still get to Heaven. As regards sin―we totally fail to see sin as being the greatest evil that there can possibly be on Earth, and therefore we have qualms committing it―for not only have we cheapened Heaven, we have also cheapened sin! “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
The result is that we instinctively do not want to pay the price for Heaven; nor do we want to pay the price for sin! We do not really want to roll-up our sleeves and work to get to Heaven; nor do we want to labor and pay-off our debts for sin―we are quick to take-out the mortgage of pleasure, but do not pay our monthly bill of penance! “With the mind I serve the law of God; but with the flesh, I serve the law of sin! Unhappy man that I am―who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Romans 7:24-25). We sin, but for sin we do not pay! Our prayers we only say but do not pray. We say we love God (in theory), but have little to show for it or prove it (in practice). Our love for the world has much more fruit than our love for God. We can easily spend hours browsing the internet (a form of worldly ‘meditation’) but cannot, will not, or rarely meditate one mystery of the Rosary―we just rattle-off the Hail Marys and leave it at that!
This spiritual blindness―which cheapens sin and cheapens Heaven―has led many to their damnation: “They are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14) ... “Can the blind lead the blind? Do they not both fall into the ditch?” (Luke 6:39). There are so many bishops, priests, religious monks and nuns, parents and teachers―who should be leading their flocks along the right road to salvation―but who are blinded by the world and its pleasures and treasures. As Our Lady warned: “Priest will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! Many priests will lose their spirit, placing their souls in great danger” (Our Lady of Good Success). “Priests, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, are asking for vengeance, and vengeance is hanging over their heads.” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Yet the same can be said of many or most parents and teachers! Their prime God-given role is to help and lead those entrusted to them on the path to Heaven―but that is no longer (was it ever?) their main focus. God, Heaven, the spiritual life―all this has long been replaced by more mundane, worldly, entertaining, enjoyable, fun things! Yet those things do not purchase Heaven―prayer and penance purchases Heaven. Unfortunately, God and the spiritual find very little time and place in the daily conversations and doings of these parents and teachers―and thus their children are left spiritually starving! The grave dangers and grave consequences of sin are not correctly explained. Nor is there any serious and in-depth teaching and discussion about Heaven. The result is that children do not fear sin and they do not desire Heaven. “As I live, saith the Lord God, My flocks and My sheep are become a prey to all the beasts of the field, because My shepherds did not care after My flock, but the shepherds fed themselves, and fed not My flocks!” (Ezechiel 34:8). All these bishops, priests, religious monks and nuns, parents and teachers are the watchmen condemned in Holy Scripture: “His [God’s] watchmen are all blind! They are all ignorant! Dumb dogs not able to bark! Seeing vain things! Sleeping and loving dreams!” (Isaias 56:10). “Having eyes, see you not?” (Mark 8:18). We must―in our spiritual blindness―cry out to Jesus with the blind man in the Gospel: “Lord, that I may see!” (Luke 18:41).
Even the Traditional and Conservative sections of the Catholic Church have gradually become more and more blind over the years. The following true anecdote serves to illustrate the contamination of worldliness even in the Traditional and Conservative sphere. In a Traditional Conservative Catholic school, there was much emphasis and focus placed on the spiritual things in life―to the point where all the teachers were repeatedly encouraged (and shown how) to merge religion into the subjects being taught―for if “God is everywhere” then He also should be present in everything we teach. There was more than just a lip-service, token-gesture, minimal amount of prayer being said daily. The tone and tenor was good―the priest and teachers united the best they could to try and elevate the souls of the students above the universally pervasive worldliness that surrounded them outside the school. Nevertheless, one morning, during a sermon, the priest asked the students to raise their hands if they had the goal in life of being really rich―almost every single Catholic student enthusiastically and delightedly shot their arms into the air!
Where were those children getting this attitude from? It most certainly wasn’t from the school. Of course, it had to be the world―but why had not the parents spotted and detoxified this pernicious attitude before it was allowed to develop to such an enthusiastic degree? The parents were, to a degree, spiritually blind ― and they were leading their equally blind children happily and complacently along a path that Our Lord says leads to the pit. In their blindness they say: “Hey! All other Catholics are like that―so it must be okay if everyone does it!” Hey! Most Catholics end up in Hell―says Our Lord, Our Lady and many saints―therefore if everyone is going to Hell, it must be okay to imitate them! Really? “Then Jesus said to his disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23-24).
Riches Won’t Buy Heaven
Stocking up on riches, amassing wealth, increasing your possessions, having much money in the bank―will not buy a way into Heaven. The parable of Our Lord comes to mind: “And Jesus spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns, and will build greater; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods. And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thy rest; eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool! This night do they require thy soul of thee! And whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’” (Luke 12:16-21).
Little Love―Little Debt Reduction―Little Joy
How can we rich towards God? God has everything and needs nothing, or does He? God says: “My son, give Me thy heart and keep My ways!” (Proverbs 23:26) … “Beware lest perhaps your heart be deceived, and you depart from the Lord, and serve strange gods and adore them!” (Deuteronomy 11:16). “The Lord your God will test you, so that it may be seen whether you love Him with all your heart and with all your soul, or not” (Deuteronomy 13:3).
It is not how many penances we offer that matters first and foremost―but how “heavy” those penances are. That is to say, how much love they contain. Many penances are not done out of a love of God, but out of a fear of God. Which husband or father finds joy in the fact that his wife and children fear him? Does he not prefer that they love him more than they fear him? Sorrow for sin can be out of fear or out of love―we can be sorry that we offended someone because we are afraid of what they will now do to us; or we can be sorry because we have hurt the feelings of a friend. Love is worth far more than fear―it is like a $10,000 bill (the largest bill ever to be printed for public circulation in the U.S.) compared to 1 cent. Imagine what a debt of sin can be paid by one single act of loving penance (one single $10,000 bill) and how long it would take you pay the same debt with lots and lots of fearful penances (one single cent at a time). Is there not great joy at having finally paid all your debts and being debt-free? Well, a love of God can achieve that far faster than a fear of God. Penance pays debts for sin―do your penances willingly out of love, rather than begrudgingly out of fear or compulsion.
You Sinned with Joy―Now Pay with Joy!
When we sin, we usually do it with joy―for we imagine it will bring us joy. It does bring us joy―a false joy, a short-lived joy, and a painful joy. Every sin has its price―and each and every sin (mortal and venial) is classified as being the greatest evil in the world. If you commit the greatest crime, you naturally expect the greatest punishment―then why do think differently when it comes to our sins? The reason is―as all recent popes have said―is that we have “lost the sense of sin” or, more correctly, we have lost the sense of the gravity of sin and the expense of sin. That is why we no longer want to pay the full price of sin―sin has been devalued, and so we naturally but mistakenly feel that penance or payment for sin should also be devalued. “His heart was hardened, and it was made exceedingly hard” (Exodus 9:35). “All the thoughts of their heart were bent upon evil at all times” (Genesis 6:5) … “The imagination and thought of man's heart are prone to evil from youth” (Genesis 8:21).
Sin―even though it is perceived to be a joy―actually hurts the soul: “He that shall sin against Me, shall hurt his own soul!” (Proverbs 8:36). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Too few understand that properly―and that is why too many go to Hell. Sin is seen as “no big deal” ― you just do it and then confess it! Little thought is given to the price of sin ― the “Three Hail Marys” that the priest gives as penance is NOT the price of sin. Priests give such little penances because they fear that penitents would refuse to do a penance that was much greater ― and if the penitent refuses to do the penance, then the confessed sins are not forgiven. The “Three Hail Marys” (or whatever) are merely the first payment of many ‘mortgage’ payments that could last until the end of the person’s life. Most people are sitting on a mountain of debt for sin, which they will clearly see in payment portion of Purgatory! God is prepared to accept much easier payments for sin while we are still living on Earth ― but we are not prepared to pay.
Is not fasting or saying extra prayers much easier that burning in a fire for a long, long time? What we should accept with joy, we instead reject pridefully: “God has given him time for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23). Whereas “there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance” (Luke 15:7) ― here on Earth, there are complaints and sadness on the part of every sinner who needs to do penance and does so reluctantly or negligently! Is it small wonder then that most souls end up being damned and few end up being saved: “No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5).
Imagine a criminal sentenced to execution, receiving a change of sentence from execution to life-imprisonment―most are only too happy about it (especially since many prisons are like hotels these days). Well, that is what God does for us―He gives us the opportunity to pay for sin at a far lesser price―almost like paying only 1 cent for every $10,000 owed. Penance is that “one-cent” ― yet we even grumble at this “discounted sentence”.
Article 18
Monday after the Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 11th
Get Some Painkilling Joy!
Monday after the Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 11th
Get Some Painkilling Joy!
Joy and Laughter are the Best Medicines
Holy Scripture tells us that a joyful heart is good medicine (Proverbs 17:2). Joy and laughter have the same effect. Laughter is one of the greatest mental tonics known to man. It is the second most powerful human emotion we as people can possibly express―the first being love. Joy and laughter can dispel anxiety, help manage stress, depression, fear, and worry. They can stimulate the healing process. Joy and laughter improve your immune system. Joy and laughter provide strong medical, psychological, social, and even spiritual benefits. Joy and laughter are medicines on a physical level also. They actually induce physical changes in your body. They enhance the respiratory system, help oxygenate the body, relax tense muscles, lower pulse and blood pressure, improve blood flow and lower levels of inflammation, increase immune cells and infection-fighting antibodies―and they are an all-around pain killer. Even in small amounts, joy and laughter affect our entire physiology, from the respiratory system, cardiovascular system, central nervous system, immune system, and more.
Joy and laughter ease pain by causing the body to produce its own natural painkillers. Negative thoughts become manifested by chemical reactions in your body, that can affect your body by bringing more stress into your system and decreasing your immunity. By contrast, positive thoughts can actually release neuropeptides that help fight stress and potentially more-serious illnesses. Laughter reduces the three stress hormones―cortisol, epinephrine, and dopamine. Joy and laughter release the body’s natural painkillers and ‘feel good” hormones, which are responsible for our feeling of well-being. Joy and laughter also release endorphins within the body, that can release stress and create a feeling of well-being. About 20 different types of endorphins exist. The name of these hormones comes from the term “endogenous morphine.” “Endogenous” because they are produced in our bodies. Morphine refers to the opioid painkiller whose actions they mimic. Endorphins are the body’s natural painkillers. Endorphins are released by the hypothalamus and pituitary gland in response to pain or stress, this group of peptide hormones both relieves pain and creates a general feeling of well-being.
One scientific report states: “Humor has been shown to increase lung capacity, strengthen abdominal muscles, and increase immunoglobulin A, which is one of the major antibodies produced by the immune system. Humor causes reductions in cortisol, growth hormones, and epinephrine. Following laughter or other humorous encounters, natural killer cell activity, immunoglobulin G and immunoglobulin M levels increase for as long as 12 hours, and these evaluations bring about beneficial health outcomes. The use of humor consistently results in improvements in pain thresholds. Humor also leads to the release of endorphins in the brain, which help to control pain. In a laboratory study of pain tolerance using cold pressor stimulation, participants in the humor group had a significant increase in pain tolerance as compared to the other groups. Pain management together with humor was found to be more effective than pain management alone. Qualitative findings have also supported the effectiveness of humor in patient care.”
The Attitude of the Saints Towards Laughing
Already before the time of Christ there was disagreement on the topic of laughter. Among the Greek Philosophers, Plato saw laughter as something to avoid, whereas Aristotle saw it as healthy because it is characteristics of human beings. Not all the saints are laughing! Not all saints find that laughing is funny? Funny―isn’t it―how saints can disagree and still be saints! The Early Church fathers, such as St. John Chrysostom (347-407 AD), pointed out that in Scripture we read of Jesus weeping, but we find no mention of Jesus laughing. Yet―it must also be said―that we find no mention in Scripture of Jesus doing many other things and that does not make those other things wrong or sinful. We read nothing about Jesus drinking beer (it existed in His time), though we do read of Jesus drinking wine. We read nothing of Jesus washing himself; nor do we read of Him eating daily; nothing is said of Him praying daily, etc. Yet just because it is not mentioned in Scripture, does not mean that He did not do those things or that those things were wrong and sinful.
► St. Clement of Alexandria (150-215 AD) warns against too much laughter: “Whatever things are natural to men we must not eradicate from them, but rather impose on them limits and suitable times. We are not to laugh perpetually, for that is going beyond bounds … Nor are we to laugh before all and sundry, nor in every place, nor to everyone, nor about everything. For to children, and women especially, laughter is the cause of slipping into scandal ... For man is not to laugh on all occasions because he is a laughing animal, any more than the horse neighs on all occasions because he is a neighing animal. But as rational beings, we are to regulate ourselves suitably, harmoniously relaxing the austerity and over-tension of our serious pursuits, not inharmoniously breaking them up altogether … The appropriate relaxation of the face in a harmonious manner is called a smile. So too is laughter on the face of well-regulated man. Smiling even requires to be made the subject of discipline. If it is at what is disgraceful, we ought to blush rather than smile. The unappropriate relaxation of face in the case of women is called a giggle, and can become prostitutional laughter; in the case of men, it is called a “guffaw”, and is savage and insulting laughter. “A fool raises his voice in laughter,” says the Scripture; but a clever man smiles almost imperceptibly. On the other hand, one needs not be gloomy, only grave. For I certainly prefer a man to smile who has a stern countenance than the reverse; for so his laughter will be less apt to become the object of ridicule.”
► St. Gregory of Nyssa (335-395 AD) described laughter as a grotesque form of madness, involving “an unseemly bodily loosening, agitated breathing, a shaking of the whole body, dilation of the cheeks, baring of teeth, gums and palate, stretching of the neck, and an abnormal breaking up of the voice as it is cut into by the fragmentation of the breath.”
► St. John Chrysostom (347-407 AD), a Father and Doctor of the Church, states that this world “is not the theatre of laughter; we have come together not to burst out into guffaws but to groan with grief.” He also comments about the cruel laughter that comes from jesting (making fun of someone else) or out of “witticisms,” again mostly at the expense of others. He is preaching is mainly against our tendency toward cruelty and cynicism, not against the laughter that is born of joy and peace with God. Though some say Chrysostom forbids laughter, this is not true―in one homily he says: “There is no harm in laughter; the harm is when it is beyond measure, and out of season. Laughter has been implanted in us, that when we see our friends after a long time, we may laugh; that when we see any persons downcast and fearful, we may relieve them by our smile; not that we should burst out violently and be always laughing. Laughter has been implanted in our soul, so that the soul may sometimes be refreshed. But carnal desire also is implanted in us, and yet it is not by any means necessary that just because it is implanted in us, therefore we should use it, or use it immoderately―but we should hold it in subjection, and not say: ‘Because it is implanted in us, let us use it!’”
► St. Augustine (354-430 AD), a Father and Doctor of the Church, stated that this wholly negative portrayal of laughter is a problematic simplification. However much the world may be fit for groaning and weeping rather than laughing, St. Augustine recognizes that not every moment of the Christian’s life is spent in mourning: “Sometimes a servant of God may be seen laughing: does this mean that desire [for God] is dead in such a person’s heart? No; and if desire is in him, groaning is in him too; it does not always reach human ears, but it never fails to reach the ears of God.” Augustine is clear that a Christian is perfectly capable of laughing while inwardly longing for God and groaning for the fulfillment of His Kingdom. Moreover, Augustine positively commends laughter in various ways. He says that those who boast in temporal goods are “to be laughed at,” and that Christians are set free by their love of God to “deride the whole world.” In more mundane situations, he recognizes that sometimes the best response to a bad argument is laughter: when showing the uselessness of appeals to authority, he says: “Suppose I were to say to you today, ‘You have to believe this, because Cicero said it, Plato said it, Pythagoras said it’― wouldn’t you all laugh at me?”
Medievals Make More Time for Laughter
The medieval Church wisely provided safety valves—Carnival, the Feast of Fools, the risus paschali or “Easter laughter.” By the high Middle Ages, stern patristic suspicions of laughter were softening. After the twelfth century, artists depicted human beings with smiles and laughs; prior to that time, only painted demons laughed. Following Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas was indulgent toward humor as a social lubricant.
► St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153), founder of the Cistercians, liked to laugh at his overly serious monks. One day, when opening a new abbey near Foigny, France, the monks found a swarm of pesky flies filling the church that was about to be dedicated. Bernard watched his monks swatting, shooing, coaxing—all with no success. Finally, he fixed his eyes on the swarming flies and loudly declared: “I hereby excommunicate all of you!” Bernard’s monks laughed with him but found hundreds of dead flies all over the floor the next morning. St. Bernard was focused on God (instead of the flies!), which made him free to ease the anxiety of his brothers by making a joke. Sometimes we get upset over things that would be easier to handle if we looked for the humor in them.
► St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1275 AD), a Doctor of the Church, in his commentary on the Book of Job, writes: “As laughter is a sign of joy, so sighing is a sign of bitterness of soul.” He also speaks of playfulness, jesting and joking in one the articles of his Summa Theologica. He writes: “Proverbs 14:13, says: ‘Laughter shall be mingled with sorrow and mourning taketh hold of the end of joy―a mourning that will last for ever!’ Now there is inordinate laughter and inordinate joy in excessive play. In all things that should be ruled according to reason, the excessive is that which goes beyond, and the deficient is that which falls short of the rule of reason. Playful or jesting words or deeds, are to be conducted according to reason. Wherefore excessive play [or jesting] is that which goes beyond the rule of reason: and this happens in two ways.
“First, when this kind of jesting is stated to be “discourteous, insolent, scandalous, and obscene,” when a man, for the purpose of jesting, employs indecent words or deeds, or such as are injurious to his neighbor, these being of themselves mortal sins.
“Secondly, there may be excess in play, through lack of due circumstances―for instance when people make use of fun at undue times or inappropriate places, or out of keeping with the matter in hand, or persons present. This may be sometimes a mortal sin on account of the strong attachment to play or jesting, when a man prefers the pleasure he derives from play or jesting more than the love of God, so much so as to be willing to disobey a commandment of God or of the Church rather than forego, such like amusements. Sometimes, however, it is a venial sin, for instance where a man is not so attached to amusement as to be willing, for its sake, to do anything in disobedience to God.
“Play is necessary for human life. Now whatever is useful to human life may be said to be a lawful employment. Wherefore the occupation of play-actors and comedians is to cheer the heart of man, and is not unlawful in itself; nor are they in a state of sin provided that their playing or jesting be moderated, namely that they use no unlawful words or deeds in order to amuse, and that they do not introduce play into inappropriate matters and inappropriate seasons. On the other hand, if a man spends too much on such things, or supports those comedians who practice unlawful mirth, he sins as encouraging them in their sin.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 168, art. 3).
Elsewhere, St. Thomas writes, not specifically of laughing, but of amusing oneself: “Amusement does have an aspect of good inasmuch as it is useful for human living. As man sometimes needs to give his body rest from labors, so also he sometimes needs to rest his soul from mental strain that ensues from his application to serious affairs. This is done by amusement.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Ethics of Aristotle, Book IV, Lecture 16, C. I).
Once again, in his Summa Theologica, St. Thomas asks the question whether a lack of mirth is a sin? He replies: “In human affairs whatever is against reason is a sin. Now it is against reason for a man to be burdensome to others, by offering no pleasure to others, and by hindering their enjoyment. … Now a man who is without mirth, not only is lacking in playful speech, but is also burdensome to others, since he is deaf to the moderate mirth of others. Consequently, they are vicious, and are said to be boorish or rude, as the Philosopher [Aristotle] states (Ethic. iv, 8) … [However], it follows that ‘lack of mirth is less sinful than excess of mirth.’ Hence the Philosopher says (Ethic. ix, 10): ‘We should make few friends merely for the sake of pleasure―since only a little sweetness suffices to season life, just as little salt suffices for our meat.’” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 168).
► St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), a Doctor of the Church, regretted having spent many years as a religious sister in lukewarmness and too much frivolity―yet, when she ‘converted’ and amended her ways, she did not lose her sense of humor. She would say things like: “From silly devotions, and from sour-faced saints, good Lord, deliver us!” She once looked around the chapel and saw all of the serious looking sisters and blurted-out: “Lord, save me from these sullen-faced saints!” Another time she stated: “A sad nun is a bad nun! I am more afraid of one unhappy sister than a crowd of evil spirits!” When touring Spain in her attempt to reform the Carmelite Order with a greater discipline, on one occasion she was thrown off her horse into a river. Frustrated and angry, she said to God: “Why are you doing this to me! I am trying to do your work and you let this happen to me!” God replied (rather humorously): “But Teresa! I treat all my friends like this!” St. Teresa, with her own humor, retorted: “Then I am not surprised that You have so few friends!”
► St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622), a Doctor of the Church, would say: “Do not become upset when difficulty comes your way. Laugh in its face and know that you are in the hands of God.” In his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, he writes: “As to words spoken in fun among ourselves with a modest gaiety and joyfulness, they belong to the virtue which is called ‘eutrapelia’ by the Greeks, which we may term ‘pleasant conversation’. By them, we take a decent and friendly recreation [find humor] from trifling situations which human imperfections cause. However, we must guard against passing from this simple joyfulness to mockery. Mockery provokes laughter through the contempt and scorn of our neighbor. But gaiety and humor cause laughter through simple freedom, trust, familiar simplicity joined to the charm of some words. St. Louis told the religious who wanted to speak to him of subtle matters after dinner that it was not the time for scholarly discussions but to recreate themselves with merriment and jokes; let each one say politely what he wants to. He was saying this for the sake of the nobles who accompanied him to receive his favors.”
There is a Place for Humor and Laughter
In other words, humor has its place in the life of man―but it is not a very important place. Mirth is a virtue that is to be had in moderation. A little salt goes a long way; too much salt will most likely raise blood pressure. Humor, mirth, playfulness―call it what you will―has a place in life like all other virtues; but it must remembered that virtues that focus on self or upon others, must always stand in the middle between excess and neglect. It is just like food and wine―we eat and drink in order to live, we DO NOT live in order to eat and drink. Food and wine are not evil―but we must not make idols or gods out of them by excessive and unnecessary indulgence―like those “whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things; whose end is destruction!” (Philippians 3:19). “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4).
Let us not forget that Jesus changed water into wine at the marriage feast at Cana (John 2:1-11). God has ruled “that wine may cheer the heart of man” (Psalm 103:15), but God has also commanded that we do not take an excess of wine and become drunk: “Sufficient is a little wine for a man well taught! … Wine taken with sobriety is equal life to men―if thou drink it moderately, thou shalt be sober! … Wine drunken with moderation is the joy of the soul and the heart! … Wine drunken with excess is bitterness of the soul” (Ecclesiasticus 31:22; 32, 36, 39). “Wine and drunkenness take away the understanding!” (Osee 4:11).
Laughter is, in a certain sense, wine for the soul―it makes the soul merry. Yet―just as in the case of wine―it must not be taken to an excess because, like wine, it can easily affect our reason and reasoning abilities; it can weaken our will-power and lead us into areas that we should be entering into.
Laughter―A Way of Life
Nevertheless, laughter is recognized as being part of life: “A time to weep, and a time to laugh” (Ecclesiastes 3:4). We need to take time to do both things―weep for our sins; rejoice in the goodness and mercy of God; laugh in our sufferings (because it incredibly cheaper to pay for sin by suffering in this world than in Purgatory or Hell). Yet both weeping and laughing need to be always done in moderation. Too much weeping and not enough laughing can lead to despair. Too little weeping and too much laughing can lead to presumption and indifference over sin.
Laughter is endearing―it is said to be the shortest distance between two people. Genuine laughter cannot be forced. It is something so true and so real. Think about the inner warmth you feel as you find yourself doubled over and tears flowing from your eyes in laughter. That passionate response of happiness that encompasses both body and soul can only be a mere foretaste of the happiness that awaits us in Heaven. Superficial or false laughter is repulsive. It is a basically a lie―and you cannot pass off a sin as being a virtue.
Many prominent and successful teachers of the Faith have been aware of the importance of laughter on the human heart. Archbishop Fulton Sheen believed that the very foundation of humor is the ability to “see through things.” He wrote: “Man laughs because he has a soul. Hence, the more spiritual a person is, the more enjoyment there is in [his] life. In this sense, humor is closely related to Faith―it bids us not to take anything too seriously.” G. K. Chesterton once said: “Angels fly because they take themselves lightly.”
The Benefits of Laughter
We have all heard that laughter is the best medicine―but are there really hidden health benefits that can be tied to laughter? It’s true―laughter is strong medicine! Studies have proven that there are many health related benefits associated with laughter. It draws people together in ways that trigger healthy physical and emotional changes in the body. Laughter strengthens your immune system, boosts mood, diminishes pain, and protects you from the damaging effects of stress. Nothing works faster or more dependably to bring your mind and body back into balance than a good laugh. Humor lightens your burdens, inspires hope, connects you to others, and keeps you grounded, focused, and alert. It also helps you release anger and forgive sooner.
Laughter is your birthright, a natural part of life that is innate and inborn. Infants begin smiling during the first weeks of life and laugh out loud within months of being born. As children, we used to laugh hundreds of times a day, but as adults, life tends to be more serious and laughter more infrequent. Even if you did not grow up in a household where laughter was a common sound, you can learn to laugh at any stage of life. By seeking out more opportunities for humor and laughter, you can improve your emotional health, strengthen your relationships, find greater happiness—and even add years to your life.
With so much power to heal and renew, the ability to laugh easily and frequently is a tremendous resource for surmounting problems, enhancing your relationships, and supporting both physical and emotional health. Laughter has no side effects, is readily accessible. Best of all, this priceless medicine is fun, free, and easy to use. With no downsides, side-effects, or risks, perhaps it is time to consider laughter seriously.
Laughter is Good for Your Health
For thousands of years, versions of the saying “laughter is the best medicine” have emerged in religious, scientific and popular literature—and for good reason. Laughter helps our neurological, physical, emotional, cognitive and social health and well-being in multiple ways.
Laughter is a normal and natural physiologic response to certain stimuli with widely acknowledged psychological benefits. However, current research is beginning to show that laughter may also have serious positive physiological effects for those who engage in it on a regular basis. Studied for many years, it was not generally thought to have any particular healing effect until 1979, when Norman Cousins published An Anatomy of an Illness. In this book, Cousins described laughter as creating an analgesic (relieving) effect for pain caused by his ankylosing spondylitis (an inflammatory disease that causes some of the bones in the spine, called vertebrae, to fuse. This fusing makes the spine less flexible and can result in a hunched posture. If ribs are affected, it can be difficult to breathe deeply). Norman Cousins fought his own debilitating pain with laughter, created “laugh therapy” which has since been adopted around the world.
Since that time, interest in laughter―as a potential therapeutic option―has grown, both in popular culture as well as in scientific research, where the field of psycho-neuro-immunology attempts to explore the impact of laughter on our physiology and psychology. Current research indicates that laughter has quantifiable positive physiologic benefits. It is commonly accepted that laughter produces psychological benefits, such as improving affect, depression, anxiety, and stress. Nevertheless, there is growing evidence that laughter can additionally produce positive physiological (physical health) benefits.
Some hospitals have created clown care units (CCUs). Clowns go on rounds to help bring humor and laughter to inpatients. Hospital clowns reduce stress and anxiety levels in hospitalized children and their parents. In 2020, a group of Brazilian and Canadian researchers conducted an analysis of 21 studies on the impact of hospital clowns on more than 1,600 children and adolescents suffering an array of symptoms, including anxiety, pain, stress, cancer-related fatigue, and crying. The research found that children exposed to the merry jesters were significantly less anxious during subsequent medical procedures, regardless of whether a parent was present, and experienced improved psychological well-being.
● Laughter relaxes the whole body. We change physiologically when we laugh. A good laugh has great short-term effects. When you start to laugh, it doesn't just lighten your load mentally, it actually induces physical changes in your body. Laughter enhances your intake of oxygen-rich air, stimulates your heart, lungs and muscles, and increases the endorphins that are released by your brain. Laughter shuts down the release of stress hormones and releases the “feel good” chemicals.
● Laughter boosts the immune system. Laughter can ease pain by causing the body to produce its own natural painkillers. Laughter increases serum immunoglobulins A and E. In most studies, it seems to increase natural killer cell activity as well. Laughter decreases stress hormones and increases immune cells and infection-fighting antibodies, thus improving your resistance to disease. Negative thoughts manifest into chemical reactions that can affect your body by bringing more stress into your system and decreasing your immunity. By contrast, positive thoughts can actually release neuropeptides that help fight stress and potentially more-serious illnesses.
● Laughter triggers the release of endorphins, the body’s natural feel-good chemicals. Laughter is complex neurologically and engages many different parts of the brain. Depending on the duration and intensity of the laughter, several neuro-chemicals may be released. Studies have shown that serotonin, dopamine, oxytocin, endorphins and even endogenous opioids can be released when we laugh. Endorphins promote an overall sense of well-being and can even temporarily relieve pain. Physically, laughter lowers levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, while raising the “feel good” neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin.
● Laughter protects the heart. There is an inverse association between coronary heart disease and propensity to laugh; laughing more means lower heart attack risk. The European Society of Cardiology in Amsterdam―the world’s largest heart conference―discovered that making coronary heart disease patients watch comedies on a regular basis over 12 weeks produced a 10% increase in the oxygen that the heart could pump, it also produced expansion in the arteries and reduced heart inflammation. Laughter improves the function of blood vessels and increases blood flow, which can help protect you against a heart attack and other cardiovascular problems. It increases stroke volume and cardiac output, and it dilates blood vessels. Laughing revs up the Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) without increasing blood pressure. Higher propensity to laugh correlates with fewer episodes of arrhythmias and recurrent MIs during cardiac rehabilitation.
● Laughter and the Lungs. Studies showed that watching a funny movie decreased bronchial responsiveness in people with lung problems. Laughing can provide a workout for your cardiovascular, pulmonary and respiratory systems. When you laugh, your diaphragm, chest and abdominal muscles tighten. This makes the lungs work harder by forcing stale air out and allowing fresh air deeper into the lungs. This is why, according to the Canadian Lung Association, laughter may make your exhalations more effective. When you laugh, your lungs get rid of stale air allowing more oxygen to enter. This is because laughter helps to expand alveoli, the tiny air sacs in your lungs. Expanding these means that the area for oxygen exchange is bigger and more oxygen enters your lungs. Laughter and clowning reduced hyperinflation of the lungs in people with severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). When we get all this oxygen to our organs, our heart rate decreases, brain fog can dissipate.
● Laughter and Diabetes. A 2018 study found that laughter therapy effectively delays cardiovascular complications of type 2 diabetes. Watching a comedy show decreased overall rise in glucose levels after eating. Laughter has been shown to lower blood glucose levels and to accelerate glucose utilization by the muscles while watching a comedy show. Humor can modify the expression of genes involved in insulin dysfunction and the elevation of blood glucose.
● Laughter burns calories. Okay, so it’s no replacement for going to the gym, but one study found that laughing for 10 to 15 minutes a day can burn approximately 40 calories—which could be enough to lose three or four pounds over the course of a year.
● Laughter lightens anger’s heavy load. A rollicking laugh fires up and then cools down your stress response, and it can increase and then decrease your heart rate and blood pressure. The result? A good, relaxed feeling. Nothing diffuses anger and conflict faster than a shared laugh. Laughter can also stimulate circulation and aid muscle relaxation, both of which can help reduce some of the physical symptoms of stress. Laughter can also make it easier to cope with difficult situations. Looking at the funny side can put problems into perspective and enable you to move on from confrontations without holding onto bitterness or resentment. It also helps you connect with other people.
● Laughter can improve your mood. Laughter can also make it easier to cope with difficult situations. Many people experience depression, sometimes due to chronic illnesses. Laughter lowers levels of the stress hormone, cortisol. Laughter can help lessen your stress, depression and anxiety and may make you feel happier. It can also improve your self-esteem. A good, hearty laugh relieves physical tension and stress, leaving your muscles relaxed for up to 45 minutes after.
● Laughter helps you stay mentally healthy. Laughter makes you feel good. And this positive feeling remains with you even after the laughter subsides. Humor helps you keep a positive, optimistic outlook through difficult situations, disappointments, and loss. More than just a respite from sadness and pain, laughter gives you the courage and strength to find new sources of meaning and hope. Even in the most difficult of times, a laugh–or even simply a smile–can go a long way toward making you feel better. And laughter really is contagious—just hearing laughter primes your brain and readies you to smile and join in the fun.
● Laughter may even help you to live longer. A study in Norway found that people with a strong sense of humor outlived those who don’t laugh as much. The difference was particularly notable for those battling cancer. “A joyful mind makes age flourishing: a sorrowful spirit dries up the bones” (Proverbs 17:22).
● Laughing impacts your social health. Laughing can be a social event. Laughter is found in all cultures―though what someone finds funny varies from one social group to another. When laughter is shared, it binds people together and increases happiness and intimacy. The chemical, oxytocin, which is released during laughter is an important neuro-chemical that is part of human social bonding. Social groups who laugh together develop strong bonds. Parents who laugh with their children tend to have better communication overall. If you laugh on a date, you’re more likely to have a second date. Laughing or laughter is one of the top traits people cite when talking about a prospective partner—they are looking for someone with a good sense of humor. And there’s a reason for that. Humans are social creatures, and sharing good times is one way we find and build a community with others. Humor and laughter naturally create bonds between people. When meeting someone new, if you can throw in a joke and make them laugh―then it sends a signal like: “Okay, we get each other!” and you start to feel like you can be more your authentic self with them.
● Improve your sense of humor. Are you afraid that you have an underdeveloped — or nonexistent — sense of humor? Unfortunately, however, many people don't get enough laughter in their lives. In fact, one study suggests that healthy children may laugh as much as 400 times per day, but adults tend to laugh only 15 times per day. Virtually all of us could use a little more laughter in our lives, considering how beneficial a good laugh can actually be for our stress levels and overall wellness. So are you short on humor and starved of laughter? No problem! Humor can be learned! In fact, developing or refining your sense of humor may be easier than you think. Find a few simple items, such as photos, greeting cards or comic strips, that make you chuckle. Then hang them up at home or in your office, or collect them in a file or notebook. Browse through your local bookstore or library's selection of joke books and add a few jokes to your list that you can share with friends. Keep funny movies, TV shows, books, magazines or comedy videos on hand―for the time when you need an added humor boost. Look online at joke websites or silly videos. Listen to humorous podcasts. Laugh and the world laughs with you. Make it a habit to spend time with friends who make you laugh―you are 30 times more likely to laugh around other people than when you are by yourself. And then return the favor by sharing funny stories or jokes with those around you. Find a way to laugh about your own situations and watch your stress begin to fade away. Even if it feels forced at first, practice laughing. Research shows even forced laughing does your body good.
● Know what isn't funny. Don't laugh at the expense of others. Some forms of humor aren't appropriate. Use your best judgment to discern a good joke from a bad or hurtful one. Be responsible with your laughter. It’s about laughing with them—not at them. Use your best judgment to know when a joke is harmful, hurtful or unfavorable.
Holy Scripture tells us that a joyful heart is good medicine (Proverbs 17:2). Joy and laughter have the same effect. Laughter is one of the greatest mental tonics known to man. It is the second most powerful human emotion we as people can possibly express―the first being love. Joy and laughter can dispel anxiety, help manage stress, depression, fear, and worry. They can stimulate the healing process. Joy and laughter improve your immune system. Joy and laughter provide strong medical, psychological, social, and even spiritual benefits. Joy and laughter are medicines on a physical level also. They actually induce physical changes in your body. They enhance the respiratory system, help oxygenate the body, relax tense muscles, lower pulse and blood pressure, improve blood flow and lower levels of inflammation, increase immune cells and infection-fighting antibodies―and they are an all-around pain killer. Even in small amounts, joy and laughter affect our entire physiology, from the respiratory system, cardiovascular system, central nervous system, immune system, and more.
Joy and laughter ease pain by causing the body to produce its own natural painkillers. Negative thoughts become manifested by chemical reactions in your body, that can affect your body by bringing more stress into your system and decreasing your immunity. By contrast, positive thoughts can actually release neuropeptides that help fight stress and potentially more-serious illnesses. Laughter reduces the three stress hormones―cortisol, epinephrine, and dopamine. Joy and laughter release the body’s natural painkillers and ‘feel good” hormones, which are responsible for our feeling of well-being. Joy and laughter also release endorphins within the body, that can release stress and create a feeling of well-being. About 20 different types of endorphins exist. The name of these hormones comes from the term “endogenous morphine.” “Endogenous” because they are produced in our bodies. Morphine refers to the opioid painkiller whose actions they mimic. Endorphins are the body’s natural painkillers. Endorphins are released by the hypothalamus and pituitary gland in response to pain or stress, this group of peptide hormones both relieves pain and creates a general feeling of well-being.
One scientific report states: “Humor has been shown to increase lung capacity, strengthen abdominal muscles, and increase immunoglobulin A, which is one of the major antibodies produced by the immune system. Humor causes reductions in cortisol, growth hormones, and epinephrine. Following laughter or other humorous encounters, natural killer cell activity, immunoglobulin G and immunoglobulin M levels increase for as long as 12 hours, and these evaluations bring about beneficial health outcomes. The use of humor consistently results in improvements in pain thresholds. Humor also leads to the release of endorphins in the brain, which help to control pain. In a laboratory study of pain tolerance using cold pressor stimulation, participants in the humor group had a significant increase in pain tolerance as compared to the other groups. Pain management together with humor was found to be more effective than pain management alone. Qualitative findings have also supported the effectiveness of humor in patient care.”
The Attitude of the Saints Towards Laughing
Already before the time of Christ there was disagreement on the topic of laughter. Among the Greek Philosophers, Plato saw laughter as something to avoid, whereas Aristotle saw it as healthy because it is characteristics of human beings. Not all the saints are laughing! Not all saints find that laughing is funny? Funny―isn’t it―how saints can disagree and still be saints! The Early Church fathers, such as St. John Chrysostom (347-407 AD), pointed out that in Scripture we read of Jesus weeping, but we find no mention of Jesus laughing. Yet―it must also be said―that we find no mention in Scripture of Jesus doing many other things and that does not make those other things wrong or sinful. We read nothing about Jesus drinking beer (it existed in His time), though we do read of Jesus drinking wine. We read nothing of Jesus washing himself; nor do we read of Him eating daily; nothing is said of Him praying daily, etc. Yet just because it is not mentioned in Scripture, does not mean that He did not do those things or that those things were wrong and sinful.
► St. Clement of Alexandria (150-215 AD) warns against too much laughter: “Whatever things are natural to men we must not eradicate from them, but rather impose on them limits and suitable times. We are not to laugh perpetually, for that is going beyond bounds … Nor are we to laugh before all and sundry, nor in every place, nor to everyone, nor about everything. For to children, and women especially, laughter is the cause of slipping into scandal ... For man is not to laugh on all occasions because he is a laughing animal, any more than the horse neighs on all occasions because he is a neighing animal. But as rational beings, we are to regulate ourselves suitably, harmoniously relaxing the austerity and over-tension of our serious pursuits, not inharmoniously breaking them up altogether … The appropriate relaxation of the face in a harmonious manner is called a smile. So too is laughter on the face of well-regulated man. Smiling even requires to be made the subject of discipline. If it is at what is disgraceful, we ought to blush rather than smile. The unappropriate relaxation of face in the case of women is called a giggle, and can become prostitutional laughter; in the case of men, it is called a “guffaw”, and is savage and insulting laughter. “A fool raises his voice in laughter,” says the Scripture; but a clever man smiles almost imperceptibly. On the other hand, one needs not be gloomy, only grave. For I certainly prefer a man to smile who has a stern countenance than the reverse; for so his laughter will be less apt to become the object of ridicule.”
► St. Gregory of Nyssa (335-395 AD) described laughter as a grotesque form of madness, involving “an unseemly bodily loosening, agitated breathing, a shaking of the whole body, dilation of the cheeks, baring of teeth, gums and palate, stretching of the neck, and an abnormal breaking up of the voice as it is cut into by the fragmentation of the breath.”
► St. John Chrysostom (347-407 AD), a Father and Doctor of the Church, states that this world “is not the theatre of laughter; we have come together not to burst out into guffaws but to groan with grief.” He also comments about the cruel laughter that comes from jesting (making fun of someone else) or out of “witticisms,” again mostly at the expense of others. He is preaching is mainly against our tendency toward cruelty and cynicism, not against the laughter that is born of joy and peace with God. Though some say Chrysostom forbids laughter, this is not true―in one homily he says: “There is no harm in laughter; the harm is when it is beyond measure, and out of season. Laughter has been implanted in us, that when we see our friends after a long time, we may laugh; that when we see any persons downcast and fearful, we may relieve them by our smile; not that we should burst out violently and be always laughing. Laughter has been implanted in our soul, so that the soul may sometimes be refreshed. But carnal desire also is implanted in us, and yet it is not by any means necessary that just because it is implanted in us, therefore we should use it, or use it immoderately―but we should hold it in subjection, and not say: ‘Because it is implanted in us, let us use it!’”
► St. Augustine (354-430 AD), a Father and Doctor of the Church, stated that this wholly negative portrayal of laughter is a problematic simplification. However much the world may be fit for groaning and weeping rather than laughing, St. Augustine recognizes that not every moment of the Christian’s life is spent in mourning: “Sometimes a servant of God may be seen laughing: does this mean that desire [for God] is dead in such a person’s heart? No; and if desire is in him, groaning is in him too; it does not always reach human ears, but it never fails to reach the ears of God.” Augustine is clear that a Christian is perfectly capable of laughing while inwardly longing for God and groaning for the fulfillment of His Kingdom. Moreover, Augustine positively commends laughter in various ways. He says that those who boast in temporal goods are “to be laughed at,” and that Christians are set free by their love of God to “deride the whole world.” In more mundane situations, he recognizes that sometimes the best response to a bad argument is laughter: when showing the uselessness of appeals to authority, he says: “Suppose I were to say to you today, ‘You have to believe this, because Cicero said it, Plato said it, Pythagoras said it’― wouldn’t you all laugh at me?”
Medievals Make More Time for Laughter
The medieval Church wisely provided safety valves—Carnival, the Feast of Fools, the risus paschali or “Easter laughter.” By the high Middle Ages, stern patristic suspicions of laughter were softening. After the twelfth century, artists depicted human beings with smiles and laughs; prior to that time, only painted demons laughed. Following Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas was indulgent toward humor as a social lubricant.
► St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153), founder of the Cistercians, liked to laugh at his overly serious monks. One day, when opening a new abbey near Foigny, France, the monks found a swarm of pesky flies filling the church that was about to be dedicated. Bernard watched his monks swatting, shooing, coaxing—all with no success. Finally, he fixed his eyes on the swarming flies and loudly declared: “I hereby excommunicate all of you!” Bernard’s monks laughed with him but found hundreds of dead flies all over the floor the next morning. St. Bernard was focused on God (instead of the flies!), which made him free to ease the anxiety of his brothers by making a joke. Sometimes we get upset over things that would be easier to handle if we looked for the humor in them.
► St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1275 AD), a Doctor of the Church, in his commentary on the Book of Job, writes: “As laughter is a sign of joy, so sighing is a sign of bitterness of soul.” He also speaks of playfulness, jesting and joking in one the articles of his Summa Theologica. He writes: “Proverbs 14:13, says: ‘Laughter shall be mingled with sorrow and mourning taketh hold of the end of joy―a mourning that will last for ever!’ Now there is inordinate laughter and inordinate joy in excessive play. In all things that should be ruled according to reason, the excessive is that which goes beyond, and the deficient is that which falls short of the rule of reason. Playful or jesting words or deeds, are to be conducted according to reason. Wherefore excessive play [or jesting] is that which goes beyond the rule of reason: and this happens in two ways.
“First, when this kind of jesting is stated to be “discourteous, insolent, scandalous, and obscene,” when a man, for the purpose of jesting, employs indecent words or deeds, or such as are injurious to his neighbor, these being of themselves mortal sins.
“Secondly, there may be excess in play, through lack of due circumstances―for instance when people make use of fun at undue times or inappropriate places, or out of keeping with the matter in hand, or persons present. This may be sometimes a mortal sin on account of the strong attachment to play or jesting, when a man prefers the pleasure he derives from play or jesting more than the love of God, so much so as to be willing to disobey a commandment of God or of the Church rather than forego, such like amusements. Sometimes, however, it is a venial sin, for instance where a man is not so attached to amusement as to be willing, for its sake, to do anything in disobedience to God.
“Play is necessary for human life. Now whatever is useful to human life may be said to be a lawful employment. Wherefore the occupation of play-actors and comedians is to cheer the heart of man, and is not unlawful in itself; nor are they in a state of sin provided that their playing or jesting be moderated, namely that they use no unlawful words or deeds in order to amuse, and that they do not introduce play into inappropriate matters and inappropriate seasons. On the other hand, if a man spends too much on such things, or supports those comedians who practice unlawful mirth, he sins as encouraging them in their sin.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 168, art. 3).
Elsewhere, St. Thomas writes, not specifically of laughing, but of amusing oneself: “Amusement does have an aspect of good inasmuch as it is useful for human living. As man sometimes needs to give his body rest from labors, so also he sometimes needs to rest his soul from mental strain that ensues from his application to serious affairs. This is done by amusement.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Ethics of Aristotle, Book IV, Lecture 16, C. I).
Once again, in his Summa Theologica, St. Thomas asks the question whether a lack of mirth is a sin? He replies: “In human affairs whatever is against reason is a sin. Now it is against reason for a man to be burdensome to others, by offering no pleasure to others, and by hindering their enjoyment. … Now a man who is without mirth, not only is lacking in playful speech, but is also burdensome to others, since he is deaf to the moderate mirth of others. Consequently, they are vicious, and are said to be boorish or rude, as the Philosopher [Aristotle] states (Ethic. iv, 8) … [However], it follows that ‘lack of mirth is less sinful than excess of mirth.’ Hence the Philosopher says (Ethic. ix, 10): ‘We should make few friends merely for the sake of pleasure―since only a little sweetness suffices to season life, just as little salt suffices for our meat.’” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 168).
► St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), a Doctor of the Church, regretted having spent many years as a religious sister in lukewarmness and too much frivolity―yet, when she ‘converted’ and amended her ways, she did not lose her sense of humor. She would say things like: “From silly devotions, and from sour-faced saints, good Lord, deliver us!” She once looked around the chapel and saw all of the serious looking sisters and blurted-out: “Lord, save me from these sullen-faced saints!” Another time she stated: “A sad nun is a bad nun! I am more afraid of one unhappy sister than a crowd of evil spirits!” When touring Spain in her attempt to reform the Carmelite Order with a greater discipline, on one occasion she was thrown off her horse into a river. Frustrated and angry, she said to God: “Why are you doing this to me! I am trying to do your work and you let this happen to me!” God replied (rather humorously): “But Teresa! I treat all my friends like this!” St. Teresa, with her own humor, retorted: “Then I am not surprised that You have so few friends!”
► St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622), a Doctor of the Church, would say: “Do not become upset when difficulty comes your way. Laugh in its face and know that you are in the hands of God.” In his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, he writes: “As to words spoken in fun among ourselves with a modest gaiety and joyfulness, they belong to the virtue which is called ‘eutrapelia’ by the Greeks, which we may term ‘pleasant conversation’. By them, we take a decent and friendly recreation [find humor] from trifling situations which human imperfections cause. However, we must guard against passing from this simple joyfulness to mockery. Mockery provokes laughter through the contempt and scorn of our neighbor. But gaiety and humor cause laughter through simple freedom, trust, familiar simplicity joined to the charm of some words. St. Louis told the religious who wanted to speak to him of subtle matters after dinner that it was not the time for scholarly discussions but to recreate themselves with merriment and jokes; let each one say politely what he wants to. He was saying this for the sake of the nobles who accompanied him to receive his favors.”
There is a Place for Humor and Laughter
In other words, humor has its place in the life of man―but it is not a very important place. Mirth is a virtue that is to be had in moderation. A little salt goes a long way; too much salt will most likely raise blood pressure. Humor, mirth, playfulness―call it what you will―has a place in life like all other virtues; but it must remembered that virtues that focus on self or upon others, must always stand in the middle between excess and neglect. It is just like food and wine―we eat and drink in order to live, we DO NOT live in order to eat and drink. Food and wine are not evil―but we must not make idols or gods out of them by excessive and unnecessary indulgence―like those “whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things; whose end is destruction!” (Philippians 3:19). “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4).
Let us not forget that Jesus changed water into wine at the marriage feast at Cana (John 2:1-11). God has ruled “that wine may cheer the heart of man” (Psalm 103:15), but God has also commanded that we do not take an excess of wine and become drunk: “Sufficient is a little wine for a man well taught! … Wine taken with sobriety is equal life to men―if thou drink it moderately, thou shalt be sober! … Wine drunken with moderation is the joy of the soul and the heart! … Wine drunken with excess is bitterness of the soul” (Ecclesiasticus 31:22; 32, 36, 39). “Wine and drunkenness take away the understanding!” (Osee 4:11).
Laughter is, in a certain sense, wine for the soul―it makes the soul merry. Yet―just as in the case of wine―it must not be taken to an excess because, like wine, it can easily affect our reason and reasoning abilities; it can weaken our will-power and lead us into areas that we should be entering into.
Laughter―A Way of Life
Nevertheless, laughter is recognized as being part of life: “A time to weep, and a time to laugh” (Ecclesiastes 3:4). We need to take time to do both things―weep for our sins; rejoice in the goodness and mercy of God; laugh in our sufferings (because it incredibly cheaper to pay for sin by suffering in this world than in Purgatory or Hell). Yet both weeping and laughing need to be always done in moderation. Too much weeping and not enough laughing can lead to despair. Too little weeping and too much laughing can lead to presumption and indifference over sin.
Laughter is endearing―it is said to be the shortest distance between two people. Genuine laughter cannot be forced. It is something so true and so real. Think about the inner warmth you feel as you find yourself doubled over and tears flowing from your eyes in laughter. That passionate response of happiness that encompasses both body and soul can only be a mere foretaste of the happiness that awaits us in Heaven. Superficial or false laughter is repulsive. It is a basically a lie―and you cannot pass off a sin as being a virtue.
Many prominent and successful teachers of the Faith have been aware of the importance of laughter on the human heart. Archbishop Fulton Sheen believed that the very foundation of humor is the ability to “see through things.” He wrote: “Man laughs because he has a soul. Hence, the more spiritual a person is, the more enjoyment there is in [his] life. In this sense, humor is closely related to Faith―it bids us not to take anything too seriously.” G. K. Chesterton once said: “Angels fly because they take themselves lightly.”
The Benefits of Laughter
We have all heard that laughter is the best medicine―but are there really hidden health benefits that can be tied to laughter? It’s true―laughter is strong medicine! Studies have proven that there are many health related benefits associated with laughter. It draws people together in ways that trigger healthy physical and emotional changes in the body. Laughter strengthens your immune system, boosts mood, diminishes pain, and protects you from the damaging effects of stress. Nothing works faster or more dependably to bring your mind and body back into balance than a good laugh. Humor lightens your burdens, inspires hope, connects you to others, and keeps you grounded, focused, and alert. It also helps you release anger and forgive sooner.
Laughter is your birthright, a natural part of life that is innate and inborn. Infants begin smiling during the first weeks of life and laugh out loud within months of being born. As children, we used to laugh hundreds of times a day, but as adults, life tends to be more serious and laughter more infrequent. Even if you did not grow up in a household where laughter was a common sound, you can learn to laugh at any stage of life. By seeking out more opportunities for humor and laughter, you can improve your emotional health, strengthen your relationships, find greater happiness—and even add years to your life.
With so much power to heal and renew, the ability to laugh easily and frequently is a tremendous resource for surmounting problems, enhancing your relationships, and supporting both physical and emotional health. Laughter has no side effects, is readily accessible. Best of all, this priceless medicine is fun, free, and easy to use. With no downsides, side-effects, or risks, perhaps it is time to consider laughter seriously.
Laughter is Good for Your Health
For thousands of years, versions of the saying “laughter is the best medicine” have emerged in religious, scientific and popular literature—and for good reason. Laughter helps our neurological, physical, emotional, cognitive and social health and well-being in multiple ways.
Laughter is a normal and natural physiologic response to certain stimuli with widely acknowledged psychological benefits. However, current research is beginning to show that laughter may also have serious positive physiological effects for those who engage in it on a regular basis. Studied for many years, it was not generally thought to have any particular healing effect until 1979, when Norman Cousins published An Anatomy of an Illness. In this book, Cousins described laughter as creating an analgesic (relieving) effect for pain caused by his ankylosing spondylitis (an inflammatory disease that causes some of the bones in the spine, called vertebrae, to fuse. This fusing makes the spine less flexible and can result in a hunched posture. If ribs are affected, it can be difficult to breathe deeply). Norman Cousins fought his own debilitating pain with laughter, created “laugh therapy” which has since been adopted around the world.
Since that time, interest in laughter―as a potential therapeutic option―has grown, both in popular culture as well as in scientific research, where the field of psycho-neuro-immunology attempts to explore the impact of laughter on our physiology and psychology. Current research indicates that laughter has quantifiable positive physiologic benefits. It is commonly accepted that laughter produces psychological benefits, such as improving affect, depression, anxiety, and stress. Nevertheless, there is growing evidence that laughter can additionally produce positive physiological (physical health) benefits.
Some hospitals have created clown care units (CCUs). Clowns go on rounds to help bring humor and laughter to inpatients. Hospital clowns reduce stress and anxiety levels in hospitalized children and their parents. In 2020, a group of Brazilian and Canadian researchers conducted an analysis of 21 studies on the impact of hospital clowns on more than 1,600 children and adolescents suffering an array of symptoms, including anxiety, pain, stress, cancer-related fatigue, and crying. The research found that children exposed to the merry jesters were significantly less anxious during subsequent medical procedures, regardless of whether a parent was present, and experienced improved psychological well-being.
● Laughter relaxes the whole body. We change physiologically when we laugh. A good laugh has great short-term effects. When you start to laugh, it doesn't just lighten your load mentally, it actually induces physical changes in your body. Laughter enhances your intake of oxygen-rich air, stimulates your heart, lungs and muscles, and increases the endorphins that are released by your brain. Laughter shuts down the release of stress hormones and releases the “feel good” chemicals.
● Laughter boosts the immune system. Laughter can ease pain by causing the body to produce its own natural painkillers. Laughter increases serum immunoglobulins A and E. In most studies, it seems to increase natural killer cell activity as well. Laughter decreases stress hormones and increases immune cells and infection-fighting antibodies, thus improving your resistance to disease. Negative thoughts manifest into chemical reactions that can affect your body by bringing more stress into your system and decreasing your immunity. By contrast, positive thoughts can actually release neuropeptides that help fight stress and potentially more-serious illnesses.
● Laughter triggers the release of endorphins, the body’s natural feel-good chemicals. Laughter is complex neurologically and engages many different parts of the brain. Depending on the duration and intensity of the laughter, several neuro-chemicals may be released. Studies have shown that serotonin, dopamine, oxytocin, endorphins and even endogenous opioids can be released when we laugh. Endorphins promote an overall sense of well-being and can even temporarily relieve pain. Physically, laughter lowers levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, while raising the “feel good” neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin.
● Laughter protects the heart. There is an inverse association between coronary heart disease and propensity to laugh; laughing more means lower heart attack risk. The European Society of Cardiology in Amsterdam―the world’s largest heart conference―discovered that making coronary heart disease patients watch comedies on a regular basis over 12 weeks produced a 10% increase in the oxygen that the heart could pump, it also produced expansion in the arteries and reduced heart inflammation. Laughter improves the function of blood vessels and increases blood flow, which can help protect you against a heart attack and other cardiovascular problems. It increases stroke volume and cardiac output, and it dilates blood vessels. Laughing revs up the Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) without increasing blood pressure. Higher propensity to laugh correlates with fewer episodes of arrhythmias and recurrent MIs during cardiac rehabilitation.
● Laughter and the Lungs. Studies showed that watching a funny movie decreased bronchial responsiveness in people with lung problems. Laughing can provide a workout for your cardiovascular, pulmonary and respiratory systems. When you laugh, your diaphragm, chest and abdominal muscles tighten. This makes the lungs work harder by forcing stale air out and allowing fresh air deeper into the lungs. This is why, according to the Canadian Lung Association, laughter may make your exhalations more effective. When you laugh, your lungs get rid of stale air allowing more oxygen to enter. This is because laughter helps to expand alveoli, the tiny air sacs in your lungs. Expanding these means that the area for oxygen exchange is bigger and more oxygen enters your lungs. Laughter and clowning reduced hyperinflation of the lungs in people with severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). When we get all this oxygen to our organs, our heart rate decreases, brain fog can dissipate.
● Laughter and Diabetes. A 2018 study found that laughter therapy effectively delays cardiovascular complications of type 2 diabetes. Watching a comedy show decreased overall rise in glucose levels after eating. Laughter has been shown to lower blood glucose levels and to accelerate glucose utilization by the muscles while watching a comedy show. Humor can modify the expression of genes involved in insulin dysfunction and the elevation of blood glucose.
● Laughter burns calories. Okay, so it’s no replacement for going to the gym, but one study found that laughing for 10 to 15 minutes a day can burn approximately 40 calories—which could be enough to lose three or four pounds over the course of a year.
● Laughter lightens anger’s heavy load. A rollicking laugh fires up and then cools down your stress response, and it can increase and then decrease your heart rate and blood pressure. The result? A good, relaxed feeling. Nothing diffuses anger and conflict faster than a shared laugh. Laughter can also stimulate circulation and aid muscle relaxation, both of which can help reduce some of the physical symptoms of stress. Laughter can also make it easier to cope with difficult situations. Looking at the funny side can put problems into perspective and enable you to move on from confrontations without holding onto bitterness or resentment. It also helps you connect with other people.
● Laughter can improve your mood. Laughter can also make it easier to cope with difficult situations. Many people experience depression, sometimes due to chronic illnesses. Laughter lowers levels of the stress hormone, cortisol. Laughter can help lessen your stress, depression and anxiety and may make you feel happier. It can also improve your self-esteem. A good, hearty laugh relieves physical tension and stress, leaving your muscles relaxed for up to 45 minutes after.
● Laughter helps you stay mentally healthy. Laughter makes you feel good. And this positive feeling remains with you even after the laughter subsides. Humor helps you keep a positive, optimistic outlook through difficult situations, disappointments, and loss. More than just a respite from sadness and pain, laughter gives you the courage and strength to find new sources of meaning and hope. Even in the most difficult of times, a laugh–or even simply a smile–can go a long way toward making you feel better. And laughter really is contagious—just hearing laughter primes your brain and readies you to smile and join in the fun.
● Laughter may even help you to live longer. A study in Norway found that people with a strong sense of humor outlived those who don’t laugh as much. The difference was particularly notable for those battling cancer. “A joyful mind makes age flourishing: a sorrowful spirit dries up the bones” (Proverbs 17:22).
● Laughing impacts your social health. Laughing can be a social event. Laughter is found in all cultures―though what someone finds funny varies from one social group to another. When laughter is shared, it binds people together and increases happiness and intimacy. The chemical, oxytocin, which is released during laughter is an important neuro-chemical that is part of human social bonding. Social groups who laugh together develop strong bonds. Parents who laugh with their children tend to have better communication overall. If you laugh on a date, you’re more likely to have a second date. Laughing or laughter is one of the top traits people cite when talking about a prospective partner—they are looking for someone with a good sense of humor. And there’s a reason for that. Humans are social creatures, and sharing good times is one way we find and build a community with others. Humor and laughter naturally create bonds between people. When meeting someone new, if you can throw in a joke and make them laugh―then it sends a signal like: “Okay, we get each other!” and you start to feel like you can be more your authentic self with them.
● Improve your sense of humor. Are you afraid that you have an underdeveloped — or nonexistent — sense of humor? Unfortunately, however, many people don't get enough laughter in their lives. In fact, one study suggests that healthy children may laugh as much as 400 times per day, but adults tend to laugh only 15 times per day. Virtually all of us could use a little more laughter in our lives, considering how beneficial a good laugh can actually be for our stress levels and overall wellness. So are you short on humor and starved of laughter? No problem! Humor can be learned! In fact, developing or refining your sense of humor may be easier than you think. Find a few simple items, such as photos, greeting cards or comic strips, that make you chuckle. Then hang them up at home or in your office, or collect them in a file or notebook. Browse through your local bookstore or library's selection of joke books and add a few jokes to your list that you can share with friends. Keep funny movies, TV shows, books, magazines or comedy videos on hand―for the time when you need an added humor boost. Look online at joke websites or silly videos. Listen to humorous podcasts. Laugh and the world laughs with you. Make it a habit to spend time with friends who make you laugh―you are 30 times more likely to laugh around other people than when you are by yourself. And then return the favor by sharing funny stories or jokes with those around you. Find a way to laugh about your own situations and watch your stress begin to fade away. Even if it feels forced at first, practice laughing. Research shows even forced laughing does your body good.
● Know what isn't funny. Don't laugh at the expense of others. Some forms of humor aren't appropriate. Use your best judgment to discern a good joke from a bad or hurtful one. Be responsible with your laughter. It’s about laughing with them—not at them. Use your best judgment to know when a joke is harmful, hurtful or unfavorable.
Article 17
Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 10th
Got Joy? Get Joy!
Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 10th
Got Joy? Get Joy!
“Laetare” Sunday
Today, the Fourth Sunday of Lent, is traditionally called “Laetare Sunday”—meaning “A Sunday to Rejoice”. This particular title owes its origins to the opening words of the Introit or Entrance Hymn for today’s Mass, which say: “Rejoice, O Jerusalem, and come together, all you who love her: rejoice with joy, you who have been in sorrow: that you may exult…”
Dom Guéranger, in his masterful multi-volume work, The Liturgical Year, states: “This Sunday, called, from the first word of the Introit, Laetare Sunday, is one of the most solemn of the year. The Church interrupts her Lenten mournfulness; the chants of the Mass speak of nothing but joy and consolation; the organ, which has been silent during the preceding three Sundays, now gives forth its melodious voice; the deacon resumes his dalmatic, and the subdeacon his tunic; and instead of purple, rose-colored vestments are allowed to be used.
"These same rites were practiced in Advent, on the third Sunday, called “Gaudete”. The Church’s motive for introducing this expression of joy into today’s liturgy is to encourage her children to persevere fervently to the end of this holy season. The real mid-Lent was last Thursday, but the Church, fearing lest the joy might lead to some infringement on the spirit of penance, has deferred her own notice of it to this Sunday, when she not only permits, but even bids, her children to rejoice!”
A Liturgical Oxymoron?
Eh? An “oxymoron” is a combination of contradictory or incongruous words as “cruel kindness”, or “laborious idleness”. It would, at first glance, seem oxymoronic to combine “penance” with “joy”, for it would be akin to combining “pain” with “laughter”, or “suffering” and “happiness”.
Yet, looked at from another perspective—and above all, a supernatural perspective—we can see how true and fitting is that combination. Our Lord Himself uses the combination of these two words—penance and joy—when He says: “I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance!” (Luke 15:7).
Joy Over A Sinner’s Return
We see a similar situation in the parable of the Prodigal Son—for the wayward, sinful son, after having wasted his father’s inheritance in debauchery, decides to return to his father, repentant and contrite, saying within himself: “I will arise, and will go to my father, and say to him: ‘Father! I have sinned against Heaven, and before thee! I am not worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants!’” (Luke 15:18-19).
This repentance and return brings joy to his father, who, rightfully, could be extremely indignant and would be within his rights in punishing him severely for the scandal and harm he had perpetrated.
Our Lord, in telling this parable, says: “And rising up he came to his father. And when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and was moved with compassion, and running to him fell upon his neck, and kissed him. And the son said to him: ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, I am not now worthy to be called thy son!’ And the father said to his servants: ‘Bring forth quickly the first robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet! And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it, and let us eat and make merry! Because this, my son, was dead, and is come to life again! Was lost, and is found!’ And they began to be merry” (Luke 15:20-24).
Wrong Kind of Joy
The world is the epitome of the wrong kind of joy. Whereas God loves the sinner and hates the sin, the world is merciless to the sinner and lenient to the sin. The world rejoices in what God condemns. Holy Scripture denounces this attitude: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter” (Isaias 5:20). Our penances may be bitter, but they will lead to sweet things—hence, we can call them bittersweet.
Rejoice with the World—Perish with the World
Let us not be sucked-into the damning whirlpool of the world—its fate is inevitable! Our Lord and the Apostles in particular, and Holy Scripture in general, repeatedly warn us against the false and fateful joys of the world: “You that rejoice in a thing of nought…” (Amos 6:14) … Rejoice not, O Israel, rejoice not as the nations do!” (Osee 9:1). “Rejoice not in ungodly children, neither be delighted in them, if the fear of God be not with them!” (Ecclesiasticus 16:1).
What Are We Rejoicing Over?
“Let the heart of them rejoice, that seek the Lord!” (1 Paralipomenon 16:10). “Serve ye the Lord with fear: and rejoice unto Him with trembling” (Psalm 2:11). Rejoice over the greatest gift of God! What is that greatest gift? Mercy! “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). “Let your soul rejoice in His mercy!” (Ecclesiasticus 51:37). “I have trusted in thy mercy. My heart shall rejoice in Thy salvation” (Psalm 12:6).
Rejoice Over Mercy!
What is it, above all things, that you will desire in your death throes and agony on your deathbed? It is mercy! Nothing else will matter. Nothing else will be worth anything if you fail to secure that mercy. All your future joy or misery will depend on one thing alone—whether or not you manage to secure the mercy of God. Our joy, on this day of rejoicing—Laetare Sunday—comes from the fact of God’s incredible mercy and pardon, which is to be used, but not abused.
Mercy—A Room in the Mansion of Charity
Lacking hope in that mercy and pardon, leads to despair. Being over-confident in that mercy and pardon, leads to presumption. Both despair and presumption are serious sins. We need to keep that balance between the two—for virtue stands in the middle between excess and neglect—and joyfully do penance for our sins, hoping and trusting in the mercy and pardon of God, Whose “tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:9). This is because “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and mercy is one of the rooms in the divine mansion of charity.
God Does Not Hate His Creation
God cannot hate what He has created—for all that He creates is good. Yet God does hate some things that man has created—and the chief focal point of hatred is sin. As St. Thomas Aquinas says: “…the hatred of something does not befit God. For as love is to the good, so hatred is to evil; for to those we love we will good, and to those we hate, evil. If, then, the will of God cannot be inclined to evil, as has been shown, it is impossible that He should hate anything” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Contra Gentiles, Book 1, chapter 96: “God Hates Nothing, and the Hatred of No Thing Befits Him”).
This is stated in slightly different terms by Holy Scripture: “All things were made by Him” (John 1:3). “The Lord has made all things for Himself” (Proverbs 16:4). Thus mankind was made for God and not for itself. Yet, God’s human creation—mankind—turned away from God through sin.
Nevertheless, God in His infinite mercy, sought a remedy to that rebelliousness, as explained by Our Lord Himself: “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting. For God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him. He that believeth in Him is not judged. But he that doth not believe, is already judged: because he believeth not in the Name of the Only-begotten Son of God” (John 3:16-18) … “Therefore I said to you, that you shall die in your sins. For if you believe not that I am he, you shall die in your sin” (John 8:24). “For everyone that doth evil, hateth the light, and cometh not to the light” (John 3:20).
Came to Save All—But All Will Not Be Saved
St. Thomas writes: “The power of the divine Incarnation is equal to the salvation ‘of all men, but the fact that some are not saved, thereby comes from their indisposition: they are unwilling to take unto themselves the fruit of the Incarnation; they do not cleave to the incarnate God by Faith and Love. For men were not intended to lose that freedom of choice, by which they are able to cleave or not to cleave to the incarnate God, lest the good of man be produced by coercion” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Contra Gentiles, Book 4, chapter 55: “Arguments Against the Suitability of the Incarnation”).
Thus we are free to choose—and, ultimately, we choose our own salvation or damnation. There will be no coercion from God in that matter.
Abuse of Mercy
Most souls fail to do so and are irrevocably lost—says Our Lord and most theologians of the Church. Yet every soul is capable of securing it. “Christ died for all” (2 Corinthians 5:15). Yet everyone WILL NOT DO what it takes to be saved. “And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But Jesus said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’” (Luke 13:23-24).
As St. Paul points out: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud, and in the sea; and did all eat the same spiritual food; and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:1-5). “For many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14). So rejoice—mercy is yours if you choose to abide by it, use it and not abuse it! But woe to you if you abuse it!
Joy Though Pain
The joys of Heaven are not “freebies” but must be painfully earned on Earth or in Purgatory. Mercy, of course, brings joy—but mercy requires payment. This is something that mankind—especially modern man—fails to grasp. Modern man thinks the joys of Heaven are there for sinners, or the lukewarm, or the mediocre man.
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange dispels this folly when he writes: “There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity.
"There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin, though it should be venial, must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Going Cheap…! Cheap Joys!
Most people put a cheap price on sin and cheap admission price to Heaven. How foolish and stupid we are! This stupidity is perhaps one of the chief reasons why so many souls are lost! It does not help matters to see almost everyone around us, living-out this insane sense of values.
These idiots—let us at least hope they are idiots, for idiocy might excuse them somewhat from sin—want joy on Earth and joy in Heaven! They want to neither suffer in this life, nor in the next! They, as the proverb goes, “want their cake and they want to eat it”! Our Lord says: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24)―“You can’t have your cake and eat it!”
Glass Half-Full or Half-Empty?
This brings us to the way in which we can view a glass that contains 50% liquid and 50% air. Some see this glass as being half-full; others see it as being half-empty. The “half-full” people are being positive about it; the “half-empty” people are being negative about it.
The same applies to our Faith and religion. Some see the Faith and religion as being a foretaste of the fullness of joy we shall experience in Heaven. Others sees our Faith and religion as “cramping their style” and robbing of them of many joys they would like to experience here on Earth.
One group sees the Faith, and the practice of it, as being “half-full” and look forward to being fulfilled in Heaven. The other group sees the Faith, and practice of it, as being “half-emptied” of potential Earthly joys, and dread having to give up even more of them. Yet our soul—in which joy resides—was made by God and only God can truly fill it with true joy—“Who satisfieth thy desire with good things” (Psalms 102:5).
Cotton Candy Joys
To seek the joys of this world above the joys of Heaven; to seek material joys above spiritual joys—is like eating cotton-candy (candy-floss) in comparison to a highly nutritious and delicious seven course meal. The cotton-candy melts away in your mouth before you know it! On top of that, the high sugar content is the favorite nesting place for disease!
Our Lord puts it this way: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Different Ideas of Joy
You are, no doubt, familiar with the Scriptural quote: “My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9). We could well paraphrase that into “My ideas of joy are not your ideas of joys: nor your joys My joys, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My joys exalted above your joys, and My ideas of joy above your ideas of joy!”
God is Joy Because God is Love
God is love and love is the cause of joy. For, we rejoice either because the object of our love is really present, or because we really find our own good existing, so to say, in the person, or in the object we love.
We rejoice because we find ourselves in the presence of one whom we cherish, or because we have good news from a friend or parent, separated from us by endless stretches of land, or by vast expanses of water; we find an unbounded joy when we know that son or brother called to serve his country's cause, in the gory battlefields of the world, is well, far removed from harm, or has been honored for his bravery.
Furthermore, our joy is enhanced by our love for the person from whom we receive the news, and is in proportion to it. We feel, for instance, little or no delight in our hearts when we read that a commander of a hostile force has escaped unscathed from battle. Our love is the cause of our joy.
To Find Joy, We Must Find and Love God
But, charity, in its highest object and point, is love of God, Whose good is infinite, unchanging and unchangeable, and, Who, by the very fact that He is loved, dwells in the person who loves Him. “God is charity: and he that abideth in charity, abideth in God and God in Him” (1 John 4:16). Hence joy is caused by love; hence, too, it follows charity.
What is this spiritual joy? It is not a virtue, separated from charity, spiritual joy is an action of the virtue charity, an effect, a result of charity. Joy of itself could not exist, it owes its very being to the virtue of charity, which is, for it, a fountainhead. Love is the first impulse of our will or heart, and from it proceed joy and desire. Thus joy is not a virtue distinct from charity, it is only an effect of charity, it is an action of charity.
Joy is that gratitude, that happy consciousness we have of the infinite goodness of God, the great object of our love, in Whom we live, move and have our being. Joy is the grand and consoling reward for the victories we have won in the battles with our passions.
A Religion of Joy
Since joy is a Fruit of the Holy Ghost, it follows that where the Holy Ghost is not, there is no joy. Now, the Divine Spirit is the vivifying principle of the Catholic Church and of her faithful. The Catholic Religion, is, then, essentially a religion of joy. Christ being the center of Christianity, there is no joy superior to that which He procures.
Down through the night of forgotten centuries and the fast highway of fleeting years, whatever holy joy was in the world was caused by Him. He was the unsurpassing joy of the patriarchs and prophets, of David, Isaias and Zachary, of Magdalene and John, of Peter and of Paul.
Faith itself is a joyous exposition of the truths that lead to Heaven; its precepts and commands are not merely a burden, but also a pleasure and a joy. Self-control in the service of the commandments makes us strong, and that is a source of joy. In sin we are downcast, and a load seems lifted from our hearts when grace, through the Sacrament of Penance, joy streams into our souls anew.
Once forgiven, we are children of God once again, perfect men and perfect Christians. Penance brings an entire Heaven of joy into our otherwise heavy hearts. “In thy salvation he shall rejoice exceedingly” (Psalm 20:2). “Thou hast turned for me my mourning into joy: Thou hast cut my sackcloth, and hast compassed me with gladness” (Psalm 29:12).
Purgatorial Joys
Penance brings joy to the souls in Purgatory, too! Even though they find themselves in the most unspeakably excruciating pains—which no tongue can describe nor imagination imagine—they are, nevertheless, also immersed in the most unspeakably great joys. They know that they are saved and that these horrendous pains are bringing Heaven and God closer with every excruciating moment. They are the perfect example of how the Catholic on Earth should find joy in suffering.
Those poor souls failed to learn how to suffer and do penance with joy on Earth, so now they have to learn that lesson in Purgatory. Yet their lesson is also a lesson for us—who, like the ill-fated Chosen People, are ever mumbling and grumbling, whining and whinging, moaning and groaning about the least suffering that we have to experience and suffer, by God’s Providence, here on Earth.
Worldly Joys Bring Sadness
At the Last Supper, Our Lord spoke of the two contrary lots that would befall His Apostles on the one hand, at the world on the other. He said: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” (John 16:20). If we take this to the next stage—if the sorrow of His followers shall be turned to joy, then the joy of the world shall be turned to sorrow. This is proven to be the case by other passages in Holy Scripture that depict the rich and the poor.
We have the case of Our Lord’s parable about the beggar, Lazarus, and Rich Man: “There was a beggar, named Lazarus, who lay at his gate, full of sores, desiring to be filled with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’s table, and no one did give him. Moreover, the dogs came, and licked his sores. And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom. And the rich man also died: and he was buried in Hell” (Luke 16:20-22).
In a real-life incident, we have the case of the rich young man—who you would have thought would be happy and joyful with all his riches, but he becomes sad and sorrowful because of them: “And behold a certain man running up and kneeling before Him: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou knowest the commandments—keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Jesus: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.
“Then Jesus, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you: How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus again answering, said to them: ‘Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus looking on them, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:16-26; Mark 10:17-27).
God Does Bestow Riches, But…
God has enriched many a man as well the Israelites as a nation—but it was always contingent upon their placing God before all riches and wealth. Once those riches and wealth became a hindrance to their love of God and led them down paths of infidelity, lukewarmness, infidelity and sin—God not only brutally removed or destroyed those riches and that wealth, but He also was not averse to slaying some or most of the wayward ones.
The Old Testament history of the Chosen People is a perpetual saga of God’s benefits leading them to forget God, which led God to acting in a way towards them that they would never forget! But forget they did—and foolishly repeated the same behavior.
God has to come first—Our Lord commands in the New Testament what had already been commanded in the Old Testament: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30), which merely repeats the Old Testament command: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength” (Deuteronomy 6:5).
This is what Job did in the Old Testament, and he was abundantly blessed by God. Yet, when God allowed all types of calamities to befall Job—losing his health, his children, his wealth and his properties and flocks—God never ceased to love and bless God, as much in calamity as in prosperity.
His famous quote—which we would well to take to heart—was: “Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither! The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away! As it hath pleased the Lord, so is it done! Blessed be the name of the Lord!” (Job 1:21). This eventual acceptance of the bitter with the sweet, led to God restoring all things to Job in an abundantly greater measure than he had possessed in the beginning: “And the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before” (Job 42:10).
The Joys of Heaven
This doubling of Job’s possessions and wealth, after his tribulations at the hands of the devil, is symbolic of our tests and trials in this life, after which we shall be rewarded with Heaven—if we have been faithful.
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “This vision will constitute eternal life. No one can express the joy and love that will be born in us of this vision. It will be so strong, so absolute a love of God, that, thenceforth, nothing will be able to destroy it, or even to diminish it. It will be a love by which we shall, above all, rejoice that God is God, infinitely holy, just, and merciful. We shall adore all the decrees of His providence in view of the manifestation of His goodness … We shall have entered into His beatitude, according to Christ's own words: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things! Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord!’” (The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Today, the Fourth Sunday of Lent, is traditionally called “Laetare Sunday”—meaning “A Sunday to Rejoice”. This particular title owes its origins to the opening words of the Introit or Entrance Hymn for today’s Mass, which say: “Rejoice, O Jerusalem, and come together, all you who love her: rejoice with joy, you who have been in sorrow: that you may exult…”
Dom Guéranger, in his masterful multi-volume work, The Liturgical Year, states: “This Sunday, called, from the first word of the Introit, Laetare Sunday, is one of the most solemn of the year. The Church interrupts her Lenten mournfulness; the chants of the Mass speak of nothing but joy and consolation; the organ, which has been silent during the preceding three Sundays, now gives forth its melodious voice; the deacon resumes his dalmatic, and the subdeacon his tunic; and instead of purple, rose-colored vestments are allowed to be used.
"These same rites were practiced in Advent, on the third Sunday, called “Gaudete”. The Church’s motive for introducing this expression of joy into today’s liturgy is to encourage her children to persevere fervently to the end of this holy season. The real mid-Lent was last Thursday, but the Church, fearing lest the joy might lead to some infringement on the spirit of penance, has deferred her own notice of it to this Sunday, when she not only permits, but even bids, her children to rejoice!”
A Liturgical Oxymoron?
Eh? An “oxymoron” is a combination of contradictory or incongruous words as “cruel kindness”, or “laborious idleness”. It would, at first glance, seem oxymoronic to combine “penance” with “joy”, for it would be akin to combining “pain” with “laughter”, or “suffering” and “happiness”.
Yet, looked at from another perspective—and above all, a supernatural perspective—we can see how true and fitting is that combination. Our Lord Himself uses the combination of these two words—penance and joy—when He says: “I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just who need not penance!” (Luke 15:7).
Joy Over A Sinner’s Return
We see a similar situation in the parable of the Prodigal Son—for the wayward, sinful son, after having wasted his father’s inheritance in debauchery, decides to return to his father, repentant and contrite, saying within himself: “I will arise, and will go to my father, and say to him: ‘Father! I have sinned against Heaven, and before thee! I am not worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants!’” (Luke 15:18-19).
This repentance and return brings joy to his father, who, rightfully, could be extremely indignant and would be within his rights in punishing him severely for the scandal and harm he had perpetrated.
Our Lord, in telling this parable, says: “And rising up he came to his father. And when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and was moved with compassion, and running to him fell upon his neck, and kissed him. And the son said to him: ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, I am not now worthy to be called thy son!’ And the father said to his servants: ‘Bring forth quickly the first robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet! And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it, and let us eat and make merry! Because this, my son, was dead, and is come to life again! Was lost, and is found!’ And they began to be merry” (Luke 15:20-24).
Wrong Kind of Joy
The world is the epitome of the wrong kind of joy. Whereas God loves the sinner and hates the sin, the world is merciless to the sinner and lenient to the sin. The world rejoices in what God condemns. Holy Scripture denounces this attitude: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter” (Isaias 5:20). Our penances may be bitter, but they will lead to sweet things—hence, we can call them bittersweet.
Rejoice with the World—Perish with the World
Let us not be sucked-into the damning whirlpool of the world—its fate is inevitable! Our Lord and the Apostles in particular, and Holy Scripture in general, repeatedly warn us against the false and fateful joys of the world: “You that rejoice in a thing of nought…” (Amos 6:14) … Rejoice not, O Israel, rejoice not as the nations do!” (Osee 9:1). “Rejoice not in ungodly children, neither be delighted in them, if the fear of God be not with them!” (Ecclesiasticus 16:1).
What Are We Rejoicing Over?
“Let the heart of them rejoice, that seek the Lord!” (1 Paralipomenon 16:10). “Serve ye the Lord with fear: and rejoice unto Him with trembling” (Psalm 2:11). Rejoice over the greatest gift of God! What is that greatest gift? Mercy! “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). “Let your soul rejoice in His mercy!” (Ecclesiasticus 51:37). “I have trusted in thy mercy. My heart shall rejoice in Thy salvation” (Psalm 12:6).
Rejoice Over Mercy!
What is it, above all things, that you will desire in your death throes and agony on your deathbed? It is mercy! Nothing else will matter. Nothing else will be worth anything if you fail to secure that mercy. All your future joy or misery will depend on one thing alone—whether or not you manage to secure the mercy of God. Our joy, on this day of rejoicing—Laetare Sunday—comes from the fact of God’s incredible mercy and pardon, which is to be used, but not abused.
Mercy—A Room in the Mansion of Charity
Lacking hope in that mercy and pardon, leads to despair. Being over-confident in that mercy and pardon, leads to presumption. Both despair and presumption are serious sins. We need to keep that balance between the two—for virtue stands in the middle between excess and neglect—and joyfully do penance for our sins, hoping and trusting in the mercy and pardon of God, Whose “tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:9). This is because “God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and mercy is one of the rooms in the divine mansion of charity.
God Does Not Hate His Creation
God cannot hate what He has created—for all that He creates is good. Yet God does hate some things that man has created—and the chief focal point of hatred is sin. As St. Thomas Aquinas says: “…the hatred of something does not befit God. For as love is to the good, so hatred is to evil; for to those we love we will good, and to those we hate, evil. If, then, the will of God cannot be inclined to evil, as has been shown, it is impossible that He should hate anything” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Contra Gentiles, Book 1, chapter 96: “God Hates Nothing, and the Hatred of No Thing Befits Him”).
This is stated in slightly different terms by Holy Scripture: “All things were made by Him” (John 1:3). “The Lord has made all things for Himself” (Proverbs 16:4). Thus mankind was made for God and not for itself. Yet, God’s human creation—mankind—turned away from God through sin.
Nevertheless, God in His infinite mercy, sought a remedy to that rebelliousness, as explained by Our Lord Himself: “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting. For God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him. He that believeth in Him is not judged. But he that doth not believe, is already judged: because he believeth not in the Name of the Only-begotten Son of God” (John 3:16-18) … “Therefore I said to you, that you shall die in your sins. For if you believe not that I am he, you shall die in your sin” (John 8:24). “For everyone that doth evil, hateth the light, and cometh not to the light” (John 3:20).
Came to Save All—But All Will Not Be Saved
St. Thomas writes: “The power of the divine Incarnation is equal to the salvation ‘of all men, but the fact that some are not saved, thereby comes from their indisposition: they are unwilling to take unto themselves the fruit of the Incarnation; they do not cleave to the incarnate God by Faith and Love. For men were not intended to lose that freedom of choice, by which they are able to cleave or not to cleave to the incarnate God, lest the good of man be produced by coercion” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Contra Gentiles, Book 4, chapter 55: “Arguments Against the Suitability of the Incarnation”).
Thus we are free to choose—and, ultimately, we choose our own salvation or damnation. There will be no coercion from God in that matter.
Abuse of Mercy
Most souls fail to do so and are irrevocably lost—says Our Lord and most theologians of the Church. Yet every soul is capable of securing it. “Christ died for all” (2 Corinthians 5:15). Yet everyone WILL NOT DO what it takes to be saved. “And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But Jesus said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’” (Luke 13:23-24).
As St. Paul points out: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud, and in the sea; and did all eat the same spiritual food; and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:1-5). “For many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14). So rejoice—mercy is yours if you choose to abide by it, use it and not abuse it! But woe to you if you abuse it!
Joy Though Pain
The joys of Heaven are not “freebies” but must be painfully earned on Earth or in Purgatory. Mercy, of course, brings joy—but mercy requires payment. This is something that mankind—especially modern man—fails to grasp. Modern man thinks the joys of Heaven are there for sinners, or the lukewarm, or the mediocre man.
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange dispels this folly when he writes: “There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity.
"There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin, though it should be venial, must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Going Cheap…! Cheap Joys!
Most people put a cheap price on sin and cheap admission price to Heaven. How foolish and stupid we are! This stupidity is perhaps one of the chief reasons why so many souls are lost! It does not help matters to see almost everyone around us, living-out this insane sense of values.
These idiots—let us at least hope they are idiots, for idiocy might excuse them somewhat from sin—want joy on Earth and joy in Heaven! They want to neither suffer in this life, nor in the next! They, as the proverb goes, “want their cake and they want to eat it”! Our Lord says: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24)―“You can’t have your cake and eat it!”
Glass Half-Full or Half-Empty?
This brings us to the way in which we can view a glass that contains 50% liquid and 50% air. Some see this glass as being half-full; others see it as being half-empty. The “half-full” people are being positive about it; the “half-empty” people are being negative about it.
The same applies to our Faith and religion. Some see the Faith and religion as being a foretaste of the fullness of joy we shall experience in Heaven. Others sees our Faith and religion as “cramping their style” and robbing of them of many joys they would like to experience here on Earth.
One group sees the Faith, and the practice of it, as being “half-full” and look forward to being fulfilled in Heaven. The other group sees the Faith, and practice of it, as being “half-emptied” of potential Earthly joys, and dread having to give up even more of them. Yet our soul—in which joy resides—was made by God and only God can truly fill it with true joy—“Who satisfieth thy desire with good things” (Psalms 102:5).
Cotton Candy Joys
To seek the joys of this world above the joys of Heaven; to seek material joys above spiritual joys—is like eating cotton-candy (candy-floss) in comparison to a highly nutritious and delicious seven course meal. The cotton-candy melts away in your mouth before you know it! On top of that, the high sugar content is the favorite nesting place for disease!
Our Lord puts it this way: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Different Ideas of Joy
You are, no doubt, familiar with the Scriptural quote: “My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9). We could well paraphrase that into “My ideas of joy are not your ideas of joys: nor your joys My joys, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My joys exalted above your joys, and My ideas of joy above your ideas of joy!”
God is Joy Because God is Love
God is love and love is the cause of joy. For, we rejoice either because the object of our love is really present, or because we really find our own good existing, so to say, in the person, or in the object we love.
We rejoice because we find ourselves in the presence of one whom we cherish, or because we have good news from a friend or parent, separated from us by endless stretches of land, or by vast expanses of water; we find an unbounded joy when we know that son or brother called to serve his country's cause, in the gory battlefields of the world, is well, far removed from harm, or has been honored for his bravery.
Furthermore, our joy is enhanced by our love for the person from whom we receive the news, and is in proportion to it. We feel, for instance, little or no delight in our hearts when we read that a commander of a hostile force has escaped unscathed from battle. Our love is the cause of our joy.
To Find Joy, We Must Find and Love God
But, charity, in its highest object and point, is love of God, Whose good is infinite, unchanging and unchangeable, and, Who, by the very fact that He is loved, dwells in the person who loves Him. “God is charity: and he that abideth in charity, abideth in God and God in Him” (1 John 4:16). Hence joy is caused by love; hence, too, it follows charity.
What is this spiritual joy? It is not a virtue, separated from charity, spiritual joy is an action of the virtue charity, an effect, a result of charity. Joy of itself could not exist, it owes its very being to the virtue of charity, which is, for it, a fountainhead. Love is the first impulse of our will or heart, and from it proceed joy and desire. Thus joy is not a virtue distinct from charity, it is only an effect of charity, it is an action of charity.
Joy is that gratitude, that happy consciousness we have of the infinite goodness of God, the great object of our love, in Whom we live, move and have our being. Joy is the grand and consoling reward for the victories we have won in the battles with our passions.
A Religion of Joy
Since joy is a Fruit of the Holy Ghost, it follows that where the Holy Ghost is not, there is no joy. Now, the Divine Spirit is the vivifying principle of the Catholic Church and of her faithful. The Catholic Religion, is, then, essentially a religion of joy. Christ being the center of Christianity, there is no joy superior to that which He procures.
Down through the night of forgotten centuries and the fast highway of fleeting years, whatever holy joy was in the world was caused by Him. He was the unsurpassing joy of the patriarchs and prophets, of David, Isaias and Zachary, of Magdalene and John, of Peter and of Paul.
Faith itself is a joyous exposition of the truths that lead to Heaven; its precepts and commands are not merely a burden, but also a pleasure and a joy. Self-control in the service of the commandments makes us strong, and that is a source of joy. In sin we are downcast, and a load seems lifted from our hearts when grace, through the Sacrament of Penance, joy streams into our souls anew.
Once forgiven, we are children of God once again, perfect men and perfect Christians. Penance brings an entire Heaven of joy into our otherwise heavy hearts. “In thy salvation he shall rejoice exceedingly” (Psalm 20:2). “Thou hast turned for me my mourning into joy: Thou hast cut my sackcloth, and hast compassed me with gladness” (Psalm 29:12).
Purgatorial Joys
Penance brings joy to the souls in Purgatory, too! Even though they find themselves in the most unspeakably excruciating pains—which no tongue can describe nor imagination imagine—they are, nevertheless, also immersed in the most unspeakably great joys. They know that they are saved and that these horrendous pains are bringing Heaven and God closer with every excruciating moment. They are the perfect example of how the Catholic on Earth should find joy in suffering.
Those poor souls failed to learn how to suffer and do penance with joy on Earth, so now they have to learn that lesson in Purgatory. Yet their lesson is also a lesson for us—who, like the ill-fated Chosen People, are ever mumbling and grumbling, whining and whinging, moaning and groaning about the least suffering that we have to experience and suffer, by God’s Providence, here on Earth.
Worldly Joys Bring Sadness
At the Last Supper, Our Lord spoke of the two contrary lots that would befall His Apostles on the one hand, at the world on the other. He said: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” (John 16:20). If we take this to the next stage—if the sorrow of His followers shall be turned to joy, then the joy of the world shall be turned to sorrow. This is proven to be the case by other passages in Holy Scripture that depict the rich and the poor.
We have the case of Our Lord’s parable about the beggar, Lazarus, and Rich Man: “There was a beggar, named Lazarus, who lay at his gate, full of sores, desiring to be filled with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’s table, and no one did give him. Moreover, the dogs came, and licked his sores. And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom. And the rich man also died: and he was buried in Hell” (Luke 16:20-22).
In a real-life incident, we have the case of the rich young man—who you would have thought would be happy and joyful with all his riches, but he becomes sad and sorrowful because of them: “And behold a certain man running up and kneeling before Him: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou knowest the commandments—keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Jesus: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.
“Then Jesus, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you: How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus again answering, said to them: ‘Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus looking on them, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:16-26; Mark 10:17-27).
God Does Bestow Riches, But…
God has enriched many a man as well the Israelites as a nation—but it was always contingent upon their placing God before all riches and wealth. Once those riches and wealth became a hindrance to their love of God and led them down paths of infidelity, lukewarmness, infidelity and sin—God not only brutally removed or destroyed those riches and that wealth, but He also was not averse to slaying some or most of the wayward ones.
The Old Testament history of the Chosen People is a perpetual saga of God’s benefits leading them to forget God, which led God to acting in a way towards them that they would never forget! But forget they did—and foolishly repeated the same behavior.
God has to come first—Our Lord commands in the New Testament what had already been commanded in the Old Testament: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30), which merely repeats the Old Testament command: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength” (Deuteronomy 6:5).
This is what Job did in the Old Testament, and he was abundantly blessed by God. Yet, when God allowed all types of calamities to befall Job—losing his health, his children, his wealth and his properties and flocks—God never ceased to love and bless God, as much in calamity as in prosperity.
His famous quote—which we would well to take to heart—was: “Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither! The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away! As it hath pleased the Lord, so is it done! Blessed be the name of the Lord!” (Job 1:21). This eventual acceptance of the bitter with the sweet, led to God restoring all things to Job in an abundantly greater measure than he had possessed in the beginning: “And the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before” (Job 42:10).
The Joys of Heaven
This doubling of Job’s possessions and wealth, after his tribulations at the hands of the devil, is symbolic of our tests and trials in this life, after which we shall be rewarded with Heaven—if we have been faithful.
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “This vision will constitute eternal life. No one can express the joy and love that will be born in us of this vision. It will be so strong, so absolute a love of God, that, thenceforth, nothing will be able to destroy it, or even to diminish it. It will be a love by which we shall, above all, rejoice that God is God, infinitely holy, just, and merciful. We shall adore all the decrees of His providence in view of the manifestation of His goodness … We shall have entered into His beatitude, according to Christ's own words: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things! Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord!’” (The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Article 16
Saturday after the Third Sunday of Lent, March 9th
Get Off the Sinking Ship
Saturday after the Third Sunday of Lent, March 9th
Get Off the Sinking Ship
What Ship Are You Sailing On?
The Church is often compared to ship―we see that in the vision granted to St. John Bosco [read more here], where he saw the Church of our day being attacked by pirates on all sides and even having its hull pierced. We also call the Church the “Ark of Salvation” ― outside of which there is no salvation. But, as Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich was shown by God in a vision, in our days there would be an attempt to build a false church from within the true Church―which you could say is a false ark of salvation, a false ship posing as the true Ark of Salvation.
Emmerich’s Vision of the False ‘Ship’ or Ark/Church
Here are the relevant extracts from BLESSED ANNE CATHERINE EMMERICH’S visions: “I saw a long processions of bishops [The four different sessions of the Second Vatican Council, held from 1962 to 1965, had between 2,000 and 2,500 bishops in daily attendance]. I saw what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world [the Second Vatican Council assembled all the bishops in the world], but only a small number were perfectly sound ... I saw some good bishops; but they were weak and wavering, their cowardice often got the upper hand … A concession was demanded from the clergy which could not be granted. I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church. I saw many older priests, especially one, who wept bitterly. A few younger ones were also weeping―but others, and the lukewarm among them, readily did what was demanded. It was as if people were splitting into two camps ... Priests were among them! … Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence … I now see that in this place [Rome], the [Catholic] Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived. They all work for its destruction ― even the clergy ... Most priests were lured by the glittering, but false knowledge of modern teachers, and they all contributed to the work of destruction. I saw the secret sect relentlessly undermining the great Church! … A great devastation is now near at hand! … They were building a large, strange, and extravagant church there in Rome … There was nothing holy in it, and only very few attended it [today’s regular Sunday Mass attendance in Catholic countries is abysmal: Brazil (8%), France (8%), Lithuania (16%), Austria (20%), Portugal (20%), Argentina (21%) ― and those numbers are on the generous or optimistic side. Yet in those same countries the vast majority of Catholics unbelievably consider themselves to be religious people: Brazil (82%), France (74%), Lithuania (92%), Austria (69%), Portugal (85%), Argentina (79%) ].
“There―in the strange big church―everything was being done according to human reason ... All in this church belonged to the Earth, returned to the Earth. All was dead, the work of human skill, a church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention like the new heterodox church in Rome … There was something proud, presumptuous, and violent about it, and they seemed very successful. I saw the fatal consequences of this counterfeit church … I saw it increase in size; I saw heretics of all kinds flocking to the city of Rome … Everyone was to be admitted in it in order to be united and have equal rights―Evangelicals, Catholics, sects of every description [all of which describes the current false spirit of Ecumenism that invaded the Church at the Council] ... The Protestant doctrine and that of the schismatic Greeks is to spread everywhere! … Then I saw that everything pertaining to Protestantism was gradually gaining the upper hand, and the Catholic religion fell into complete decadence ... I saw all sorts of people, things, doctrines, and opinions ... Then I saw darkness spreading around and people no longer seeking the true Church … The Church is in great danger! It was shown to me that there were almost no Christians left in the old acceptation of the word! … The Church is completely isolated and as if completely deserted. It seems that everyone is running away. I also saw the various regions of the Earth. In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars.”
ST. JOHN BOSCO was granted a vision of an Ecumenical Council in the 20th century (the Second Vatican Council was the only Ecumenical Council in the 19th century) which would bring chaos to the Church. John Bosco says: “There will be an Ecumenical Council in the next century, after which there will be chaos in the Church. Tranquility will not return until the Pope succeeds in anchoring the boat of Peter between the twin pillars of Eucharistic Devotion and Devotion to Our Lady.”
His vision has come true in our day! There is increasing chaos in the Church from year to year―to the point where even the Modernist and Liberal bishops and priests are seeing increased division among their ranks. As the Church proceeds deliriously along its chosen path to theological suicide, more and more clergy are beginning to question, doubt and even rebel against this foolish direction. Some clergy have even spoken of the likelihood of a schism if things continue the way they are. Add to equation the words of Our Lady of Akita: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres!” All this merely serves to underline and confirm the aforementioned visions of Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich and St. John Bosco.
The terrible falling-away from regular Sunday Mass attendance sees 80% of countries showing less than a 50% Sunday Mass attendance rate. This abysmal numbers of regular Sunday Mass attendees is largely and barely kept afloat by the “oldster” Catholics―for (depending upon country and region) as much as 90% of “youngsters” no longer attend Sunday Mass regularly. Dynamic Catholic states that 85% Catholic young adults stop practicing their Faith in college (most of them within their first year of leaving home). Curtis Martin, the founder of the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS) thinks that 85% number is conservative, and that the Catholic Church is losing more than 90% of Catholic young people by the end of their college years. The terrible future consequences are pretty obvious―as the philosophical axiom states: “You cannot give what you do not have.” Those non-practicing will marry and have children. How can those children be expected to love the Faith and practice the Faith if the parents do not love and practice the Faith?
Unprecedented Change in Church
St. John Bosco’s vision spoke of the chaos that would follow that 20th century Ecumenical Council (Vatican II). When you research the changes that this ill-fated Council opened the doors to, then the reality of St. John Bosco’s vision hits you between the eyes. Here is just a sampling from a list of around 200 such changes:
● Roman Curia Reorganized.
● Adoption of Collegiality — which weakens papal authority and that of individual bishops. Everyone has a say today!
● Religious Order Changes and the overthrow of many Rules in Religious Life.
● Changed Rites for the Ordination of Priests and Consecration of Bishops — the validity of which is questioned by some.
● Increased Democracy in the Church — especially seen in the recent tsunami of “Synods” by Pope Francis.
● Increased Local Authority at the expense of Papal Authority ― delegating papal decisions to local bishops.
● Introduction of the Concelebration of Mass by groups of priests ― meaning less Masses are celebrated when we need more.
● Major changes to the Prayers of the Mass―suppressing some prayers and introducing new prayers (especially 4 canons “Eucharistic Prayers #1 to #4).
● Elimination of explicitly sacrificial prayers in Mass.
● Introduction of the so-called “Clown Masses” or Masses with all kind of ridiculous props. “Clown Mass” is also used as a term to refer to any Mass that deviates wildly from the rubrics or is otherwise extraordinarily irreverent. A total loss of the sense of sacredness and awe due to Christ the Redeemer! Would we clown around on Calvary?
● Introduction of the Saturday Vigil Mass to satisfy the Sunday obligation of attending Mass.
● Holy Days of Obligation falling on weekdays transferred to nearest Sundays
● Introduction of Vernacular Language for Mass — “Use of the vernacular in liturgical prayers is false, rash, and productive of many evils.” (Pope Pius VI).
● Communion under both Species — Introduced illegally as a rebellion against.
● Communion in the Hand — Has led to many profanations and sacrileges. Blurs distinction between priest and laity―priest has his consecrated to touch the Holy Eucharist.
● Lay people distributing Holy Communion — See above: this also blurs the distinction between priest and laity.
● Reduced Eucharistic Fast ― originally from midnight, then down to a mere 3 hours, then down to 1 hour before Communion. If the sermon is very long, you have time for a hot-dog and a coke at the start of the sermon! Does that not show its ridiculousness?
● Reduced Eucharistic Adoration
● Changed Altars — Ornate marble and stone altars have been increasingly replaced by cheap plain wooden tables.
● Demotion of the Tabernacle — Often, the Tabernacle has been removed from the altar and has even been moved into a side chapel). However, Pope Pius XII warned: “The Tabernacle and Altar, by their very nature, must remain together.”
● Elimination of the Altar Rail.
● Replacement of Sacred Chant by Secular Music — often accompanied by guitars and drums.
● Frequent Inappropriate Handling of Holy Things
● Lay ‘Ministers’ who regularly take Holy Communion to the sick.
● Female Altar Servers
● Changed Baptisms—Fr. Amorth, chief exorcist in Rome: “The exorcism against Satan has virtually been eliminated.”
● Changed rites for other Sacraments — Many of these changes have been drastic and sometimes questionable as regards validity.
● Changed Blessing and Sacramentals
● Changed Rite of Exorcism ― exorcists found the new exorcism prayers useless and went back to old prayers.
● Changed Rosary ― addition of the Luminous Mysteries.
● Less Focus on the Blessed Virgin Mary
● Changed Breviary ― much abbreviated.
● New Canon Law.
● New Catechism.
● New Reforms Break with Tradition — Previously, all genuine Church reforms were based on old foundations; not laying new ones.
● Changed Liturgical Calendar ― many traditional feast days have been moved for no obvious reason.
● Many dropped Feast Days in the New Liturgical Calendar.
● Relaxation of Penance in Lent — 40 days of fast and abstinence reduced to 2 days (Ash Wednesday & Good Friday; a 95% discount).
● Changing of Friday Abstinence Regulations
● Reduced Fast Days ― by the elimination of all the Ember Days and many Vigils of Feasts.
● Changed Indulgences.
● Abolition of the Index of Forbidden Books (Index Librorum Prohibitorum).
● Use of ‘Medicine of Mercy’ without Correction and Amendment: Pope Francis recently said: “Always forgive!” The Church has NEVER taught that!
● Lost Missionary Impetus ― Why bother converting non-Catholics if Pope Francis says all religions can lead souls to Heaven?
● Forgetfulness that we are a Church Militant that should conquer and convert those outside of the Faith. It is now a “Dialoguing Church.”
● Lack of awareness that we have Enemies — Acting as though we have no enemies, either earthly or spiritual. Nice but not realistic.
● Emphasis from Truth to Liberty — No longer fighting error & heresy, but dialoging with them to reach a compromise.
● Forgetfulness of the Church’s true mission of saving sinners from Hell, in favor of making sinners feel good about themselves.
● Support for the condemned concept of “Separation of Church and State“ ― the State should take its lead from the Church!
● Avoiding ‘Negative’ Topics (Hell, Judgment, Sin, Purgatory, etc.) — One bishop said Hell was never mentioned in his seminary training years.
● Heresy tolerated (or not forcefully condemned).
● Failure to Refute Errors — Error refutation has been exchanged for “dialog”.
● Increased conformity to the World ― shift from “Repugnance” towards Modern World to “Embracing” the Modern World
● Increased concern over Public Opinion
● A shift in emphasis from Truths to Feelings ― truth matters less than what you feel is true. Failure to correct false feelings.
● Over-emphasis on Human Dignity and reduced emphasis on the Dignity of God ― needs of man come before needs of God.
● Increased Reliance on Lay ‘Experts’
● Use of terminology acceptable to Protestants (e.g. table vs. altar, bread vs. Host, preside vs. Priest, Lord’s Supper vs. Holy Sacrifice, Reconciliation vs. Confession, etc.)
That is nowhere near the 200 changes that have been recorded (and there are most certainly even more than that)―we have listed just over 50.
Can You See?
If all that does not indicate to you that what Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich saw is what we are seeing today, then your judgment has become warped ― she speaks of a “new church, a false church … Priests saying Mass with much irreverence … Where everything was being done according to human reason ... A church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention … a counterfeit church … with all sorts of people, things, doctrines, and opinions ... with Protestantism gradually gaining the upper hand, and the Catholic religion falling into complete decadence ... and people no longer seeking the true Church.”
Even Holy Scripture foretells these terrible times: “In the last days there shall come deceitful scoffers!” (2 Peter 3:3). “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times! Men shall be lovers of themselves! … Lovers of pleasures more than of God! Having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof! Now these avoid! … There shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine―but, according to their own desires, they will take unto themselves teachers, having itching ears, and will turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5; 4:3-4). To this Our Lord adds the icing to the catastrophic cake: “The Son of man, when He comes again, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8) ― that, of course, is a rhetorical question ― one which makes a point rather seeks to get an answer. In other words, He will find little Faith on Earth―something Our Lady of Good Success and Our Lady of La Salette echoed:
“Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God! Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects ... These years, during which the evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government, will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities … Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective, making it easy for everyone to live in sin. The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor with cruel and subtle astuteness to make them deviate from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them … Many hearts consecrated to God in the priestly and religious state will fall into lukewarmness. This, then, will be the cause of the cursed demon taking possession …
“The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals]. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... This, in turn, will cause of the perdition of so many souls so dear to Jesus Christ and to me … The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom … The Gospel of Jesus Christ having been forgotten … the devil will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus!”
They Said the Titanic Was Unsinkable
The Titanic was thought to be unsinkable. After the Titanic hit the iceberg, would you have wanted to say on board in your luxurious cabin, or would you have preferred a lifeboat without any comforts?
The current “Titanic” New Church is sinking and yet its passengers are in a delusionary sense of denial―much like many of the passengers on the Titanic on that fateful early morning of April 15th, 1912. Researchers have surmised that when it takes two-and-a-half hours for a ship to sink, then a sense of unreality can set in. Add that to the fact that everyone had been talking about the Titanic being the greatest ship ever built and was unsinkable―all this can create a false sense of optimism that has no basis in reality. Similarly, the fact that Christ said that the gates of Hell would never prevail against His Church, does not mean that the Church will never suffer horrendous losses. Our Lady indicates that to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Many persons―whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men!”
Stay Clear of the Disease
When there is a rampant disease going around, it is prudent to limit your contacts with other persons―or to take serious precautions when contact cannot be avoided. Modernism, Liberalism, Indifferentism, Atheism, Secularism and other “-isms” ― are all ultimately the fabrication of Satan. They are very virulent and contagious diseases that threaten the Catholic soul. As Holy Scripture warns: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! For what participation has justice with injustice? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God Himself says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore: ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
The Church is often compared to ship―we see that in the vision granted to St. John Bosco [read more here], where he saw the Church of our day being attacked by pirates on all sides and even having its hull pierced. We also call the Church the “Ark of Salvation” ― outside of which there is no salvation. But, as Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich was shown by God in a vision, in our days there would be an attempt to build a false church from within the true Church―which you could say is a false ark of salvation, a false ship posing as the true Ark of Salvation.
Emmerich’s Vision of the False ‘Ship’ or Ark/Church
Here are the relevant extracts from BLESSED ANNE CATHERINE EMMERICH’S visions: “I saw a long processions of bishops [The four different sessions of the Second Vatican Council, held from 1962 to 1965, had between 2,000 and 2,500 bishops in daily attendance]. I saw what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world [the Second Vatican Council assembled all the bishops in the world], but only a small number were perfectly sound ... I saw some good bishops; but they were weak and wavering, their cowardice often got the upper hand … A concession was demanded from the clergy which could not be granted. I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church. I saw many older priests, especially one, who wept bitterly. A few younger ones were also weeping―but others, and the lukewarm among them, readily did what was demanded. It was as if people were splitting into two camps ... Priests were among them! … Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence … I now see that in this place [Rome], the [Catholic] Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived. They all work for its destruction ― even the clergy ... Most priests were lured by the glittering, but false knowledge of modern teachers, and they all contributed to the work of destruction. I saw the secret sect relentlessly undermining the great Church! … A great devastation is now near at hand! … They were building a large, strange, and extravagant church there in Rome … There was nothing holy in it, and only very few attended it [today’s regular Sunday Mass attendance in Catholic countries is abysmal: Brazil (8%), France (8%), Lithuania (16%), Austria (20%), Portugal (20%), Argentina (21%) ― and those numbers are on the generous or optimistic side. Yet in those same countries the vast majority of Catholics unbelievably consider themselves to be religious people: Brazil (82%), France (74%), Lithuania (92%), Austria (69%), Portugal (85%), Argentina (79%) ].
“There―in the strange big church―everything was being done according to human reason ... All in this church belonged to the Earth, returned to the Earth. All was dead, the work of human skill, a church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention like the new heterodox church in Rome … There was something proud, presumptuous, and violent about it, and they seemed very successful. I saw the fatal consequences of this counterfeit church … I saw it increase in size; I saw heretics of all kinds flocking to the city of Rome … Everyone was to be admitted in it in order to be united and have equal rights―Evangelicals, Catholics, sects of every description [all of which describes the current false spirit of Ecumenism that invaded the Church at the Council] ... The Protestant doctrine and that of the schismatic Greeks is to spread everywhere! … Then I saw that everything pertaining to Protestantism was gradually gaining the upper hand, and the Catholic religion fell into complete decadence ... I saw all sorts of people, things, doctrines, and opinions ... Then I saw darkness spreading around and people no longer seeking the true Church … The Church is in great danger! It was shown to me that there were almost no Christians left in the old acceptation of the word! … The Church is completely isolated and as if completely deserted. It seems that everyone is running away. I also saw the various regions of the Earth. In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars.”
ST. JOHN BOSCO was granted a vision of an Ecumenical Council in the 20th century (the Second Vatican Council was the only Ecumenical Council in the 19th century) which would bring chaos to the Church. John Bosco says: “There will be an Ecumenical Council in the next century, after which there will be chaos in the Church. Tranquility will not return until the Pope succeeds in anchoring the boat of Peter between the twin pillars of Eucharistic Devotion and Devotion to Our Lady.”
His vision has come true in our day! There is increasing chaos in the Church from year to year―to the point where even the Modernist and Liberal bishops and priests are seeing increased division among their ranks. As the Church proceeds deliriously along its chosen path to theological suicide, more and more clergy are beginning to question, doubt and even rebel against this foolish direction. Some clergy have even spoken of the likelihood of a schism if things continue the way they are. Add to equation the words of Our Lady of Akita: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres!” All this merely serves to underline and confirm the aforementioned visions of Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich and St. John Bosco.
The terrible falling-away from regular Sunday Mass attendance sees 80% of countries showing less than a 50% Sunday Mass attendance rate. This abysmal numbers of regular Sunday Mass attendees is largely and barely kept afloat by the “oldster” Catholics―for (depending upon country and region) as much as 90% of “youngsters” no longer attend Sunday Mass regularly. Dynamic Catholic states that 85% Catholic young adults stop practicing their Faith in college (most of them within their first year of leaving home). Curtis Martin, the founder of the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS) thinks that 85% number is conservative, and that the Catholic Church is losing more than 90% of Catholic young people by the end of their college years. The terrible future consequences are pretty obvious―as the philosophical axiom states: “You cannot give what you do not have.” Those non-practicing will marry and have children. How can those children be expected to love the Faith and practice the Faith if the parents do not love and practice the Faith?
Unprecedented Change in Church
St. John Bosco’s vision spoke of the chaos that would follow that 20th century Ecumenical Council (Vatican II). When you research the changes that this ill-fated Council opened the doors to, then the reality of St. John Bosco’s vision hits you between the eyes. Here is just a sampling from a list of around 200 such changes:
● Roman Curia Reorganized.
● Adoption of Collegiality — which weakens papal authority and that of individual bishops. Everyone has a say today!
● Religious Order Changes and the overthrow of many Rules in Religious Life.
● Changed Rites for the Ordination of Priests and Consecration of Bishops — the validity of which is questioned by some.
● Increased Democracy in the Church — especially seen in the recent tsunami of “Synods” by Pope Francis.
● Increased Local Authority at the expense of Papal Authority ― delegating papal decisions to local bishops.
● Introduction of the Concelebration of Mass by groups of priests ― meaning less Masses are celebrated when we need more.
● Major changes to the Prayers of the Mass―suppressing some prayers and introducing new prayers (especially 4 canons “Eucharistic Prayers #1 to #4).
● Elimination of explicitly sacrificial prayers in Mass.
● Introduction of the so-called “Clown Masses” or Masses with all kind of ridiculous props. “Clown Mass” is also used as a term to refer to any Mass that deviates wildly from the rubrics or is otherwise extraordinarily irreverent. A total loss of the sense of sacredness and awe due to Christ the Redeemer! Would we clown around on Calvary?
● Introduction of the Saturday Vigil Mass to satisfy the Sunday obligation of attending Mass.
● Holy Days of Obligation falling on weekdays transferred to nearest Sundays
● Introduction of Vernacular Language for Mass — “Use of the vernacular in liturgical prayers is false, rash, and productive of many evils.” (Pope Pius VI).
● Communion under both Species — Introduced illegally as a rebellion against.
● Communion in the Hand — Has led to many profanations and sacrileges. Blurs distinction between priest and laity―priest has his consecrated to touch the Holy Eucharist.
● Lay people distributing Holy Communion — See above: this also blurs the distinction between priest and laity.
● Reduced Eucharistic Fast ― originally from midnight, then down to a mere 3 hours, then down to 1 hour before Communion. If the sermon is very long, you have time for a hot-dog and a coke at the start of the sermon! Does that not show its ridiculousness?
● Reduced Eucharistic Adoration
● Changed Altars — Ornate marble and stone altars have been increasingly replaced by cheap plain wooden tables.
● Demotion of the Tabernacle — Often, the Tabernacle has been removed from the altar and has even been moved into a side chapel). However, Pope Pius XII warned: “The Tabernacle and Altar, by their very nature, must remain together.”
● Elimination of the Altar Rail.
● Replacement of Sacred Chant by Secular Music — often accompanied by guitars and drums.
● Frequent Inappropriate Handling of Holy Things
● Lay ‘Ministers’ who regularly take Holy Communion to the sick.
● Female Altar Servers
● Changed Baptisms—Fr. Amorth, chief exorcist in Rome: “The exorcism against Satan has virtually been eliminated.”
● Changed rites for other Sacraments — Many of these changes have been drastic and sometimes questionable as regards validity.
● Changed Blessing and Sacramentals
● Changed Rite of Exorcism ― exorcists found the new exorcism prayers useless and went back to old prayers.
● Changed Rosary ― addition of the Luminous Mysteries.
● Less Focus on the Blessed Virgin Mary
● Changed Breviary ― much abbreviated.
● New Canon Law.
● New Catechism.
● New Reforms Break with Tradition — Previously, all genuine Church reforms were based on old foundations; not laying new ones.
● Changed Liturgical Calendar ― many traditional feast days have been moved for no obvious reason.
● Many dropped Feast Days in the New Liturgical Calendar.
● Relaxation of Penance in Lent — 40 days of fast and abstinence reduced to 2 days (Ash Wednesday & Good Friday; a 95% discount).
● Changing of Friday Abstinence Regulations
● Reduced Fast Days ― by the elimination of all the Ember Days and many Vigils of Feasts.
● Changed Indulgences.
● Abolition of the Index of Forbidden Books (Index Librorum Prohibitorum).
● Use of ‘Medicine of Mercy’ without Correction and Amendment: Pope Francis recently said: “Always forgive!” The Church has NEVER taught that!
● Lost Missionary Impetus ― Why bother converting non-Catholics if Pope Francis says all religions can lead souls to Heaven?
● Forgetfulness that we are a Church Militant that should conquer and convert those outside of the Faith. It is now a “Dialoguing Church.”
● Lack of awareness that we have Enemies — Acting as though we have no enemies, either earthly or spiritual. Nice but not realistic.
● Emphasis from Truth to Liberty — No longer fighting error & heresy, but dialoging with them to reach a compromise.
● Forgetfulness of the Church’s true mission of saving sinners from Hell, in favor of making sinners feel good about themselves.
● Support for the condemned concept of “Separation of Church and State“ ― the State should take its lead from the Church!
● Avoiding ‘Negative’ Topics (Hell, Judgment, Sin, Purgatory, etc.) — One bishop said Hell was never mentioned in his seminary training years.
● Heresy tolerated (or not forcefully condemned).
● Failure to Refute Errors — Error refutation has been exchanged for “dialog”.
● Increased conformity to the World ― shift from “Repugnance” towards Modern World to “Embracing” the Modern World
● Increased concern over Public Opinion
● A shift in emphasis from Truths to Feelings ― truth matters less than what you feel is true. Failure to correct false feelings.
● Over-emphasis on Human Dignity and reduced emphasis on the Dignity of God ― needs of man come before needs of God.
● Increased Reliance on Lay ‘Experts’
● Use of terminology acceptable to Protestants (e.g. table vs. altar, bread vs. Host, preside vs. Priest, Lord’s Supper vs. Holy Sacrifice, Reconciliation vs. Confession, etc.)
That is nowhere near the 200 changes that have been recorded (and there are most certainly even more than that)―we have listed just over 50.
Can You See?
If all that does not indicate to you that what Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich saw is what we are seeing today, then your judgment has become warped ― she speaks of a “new church, a false church … Priests saying Mass with much irreverence … Where everything was being done according to human reason ... A church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention … a counterfeit church … with all sorts of people, things, doctrines, and opinions ... with Protestantism gradually gaining the upper hand, and the Catholic religion falling into complete decadence ... and people no longer seeking the true Church.”
Even Holy Scripture foretells these terrible times: “In the last days there shall come deceitful scoffers!” (2 Peter 3:3). “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times! Men shall be lovers of themselves! … Lovers of pleasures more than of God! Having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof! Now these avoid! … There shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine―but, according to their own desires, they will take unto themselves teachers, having itching ears, and will turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5; 4:3-4). To this Our Lord adds the icing to the catastrophic cake: “The Son of man, when He comes again, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8) ― that, of course, is a rhetorical question ― one which makes a point rather seeks to get an answer. In other words, He will find little Faith on Earth―something Our Lady of Good Success and Our Lady of La Salette echoed:
“Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God! Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects ... These years, during which the evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government, will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities … Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws with the objective, making it easy for everyone to live in sin. The demon will try to persecute the Ministers of the Lord in every possible way and he will labor with cruel and subtle astuteness to make them deviate from the spirit of their vocation, corrupting many of them … Many hearts consecrated to God in the priestly and religious state will fall into lukewarmness. This, then, will be the cause of the cursed demon taking possession …
“The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs [morals]. In these unhappy times, people will only think of amusements and there will be unbridled impurity that will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost … Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops ... Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... This, in turn, will cause of the perdition of so many souls so dear to Jesus Christ and to me … The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom … The Gospel of Jesus Christ having been forgotten … the devil will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus!”
They Said the Titanic Was Unsinkable
The Titanic was thought to be unsinkable. After the Titanic hit the iceberg, would you have wanted to say on board in your luxurious cabin, or would you have preferred a lifeboat without any comforts?
The current “Titanic” New Church is sinking and yet its passengers are in a delusionary sense of denial―much like many of the passengers on the Titanic on that fateful early morning of April 15th, 1912. Researchers have surmised that when it takes two-and-a-half hours for a ship to sink, then a sense of unreality can set in. Add that to the fact that everyone had been talking about the Titanic being the greatest ship ever built and was unsinkable―all this can create a false sense of optimism that has no basis in reality. Similarly, the fact that Christ said that the gates of Hell would never prevail against His Church, does not mean that the Church will never suffer horrendous losses. Our Lady indicates that to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Many persons―whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! The demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men!”
Stay Clear of the Disease
When there is a rampant disease going around, it is prudent to limit your contacts with other persons―or to take serious precautions when contact cannot be avoided. Modernism, Liberalism, Indifferentism, Atheism, Secularism and other “-isms” ― are all ultimately the fabrication of Satan. They are very virulent and contagious diseases that threaten the Catholic soul. As Holy Scripture warns: “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! For what participation has justice with injustice? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God Himself says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore: ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Article 15
Wednesday & Thursday after the Third Sunday of Lent, March 6th & 7th
Why Most Catholics Fail
Wednesday & Thursday after the Third Sunday of Lent, March 6th & 7th
Why Most Catholics Fail
Winner or Loser?
Everyone loves a winner! Everyone loves being a winner! Especially in Heaven everyone loves a winner and everyone is a winner! Nobody loves a loser―apart from Satan and his demons―and nobody loves being a loser! How many win eternal life? How many lose eternal life? [read more on that here]. Your soul was made for Heaven―but Satan wants your soul in Hell. The result is the never-ending “tug-of-war” over your soul between Heaven and Hell. The general consensus of opinion amongst saints and theologians is that most souls end up being dragged into Hell. Why is this? If God is omnipotent, then why are most souls damned? The problem is not on the side of God, but on the side of the human race. Even though God is omnipotent (almighty), God will not violate the free-will that He has given every human being. The tragedy lies in the fact that mankind uses its free-will perversely―and not in the way God intended it to be used.
God wants all of mankind to be saved―there can be no doubt about that: “The Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that [we] may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32).
Satan, however, will not back-off in his attempts to damn those whom Christ wants to save: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). It seems like Satan has much success, as pointed out by Our Lady in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16)―fear this sentence and renew in your heart the care and zeal for your salvation! … How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day … that the demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men!”
► Our Lady then describes the infernal hatred that the demons have towards us:
“No intellect, nor any tongue of man or angels can describe the wrath and fury which Lucifer and his demons entertain against mortals―just because they are images of God and because they are capable of enjoying Him for all eternity. The Lord alone can comprehend the wicked malice of these proud and rebellious spirits. If these foes were not restrained by His almighty arm they would, in one moment, destroy the world; they would like famishing lions, like wild beasts and fierce dragons, destroy all mankind and tear them to pieces! ... Be very cautious and watchful in regard to the ignorance and darkness, by which the demon commonly ensnares mortals and makes them forget their eternal salvation and the continual danger of its loss through his persecutions ...
“The devil knows you and lurks around you, ever since the hour of your creation and entrance into this world. Night and day he restlessly prowls about seeking some chance of capturing you as a prize. He observes your natural inclinations and also the gifts of the Lord, in order to combat you with your own weapons. He charges other demons with your ruin and promises reward to those that are more diligent in securing it. They weigh your actions carefully, watch your footsteps, and work zealously to lay snares for you in all your undertakings.” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
► Our Lady then discloses some of the chief tactics of the demons:
“Ordinarily the demons have no power over souls, unless they gain entrance by some venial or mortal fault. Mortal sin gives them a sort of direct right over those who commit it; while venial sin weakens the strength of the soul and invites their attacks. Imperfections diminish the merit and the progress of virtue, and encourage the enemy. Whenever the astute serpent notices that the soul bears with its own levity and forgets about its danger, it blinds it and seeks to instill its deadly poison. The enemy then entices the soul like a little heedless bird, until it falls into one of the many snares from which there seems to be no escape.
“Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16)―fear this sentence and renew in your heart the care and zeal for your salvation! … The faithful are in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies! Since the princes of darkness are invisible and unperceived by any of the senses, and since carnal men can neither touch, nor feel, nor see them―the result is that they forget to live in fear of them. Yet for this very reason they ought to be more attentive and careful―since invisible enemies are more cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery. The demon always seeks to prepare the way for his deceits, especially in souls which he fears will resist his entrance.” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
► Our Lady reveals the especial hatred that demons have towards devout and religious souls and the especial efforts that demons make to try and conquer them:
“The demon uses more diligence in his attempts to overcome religious men and women, than he uses to conquer all the rest of worldly men. There are demons, whom Lucifer has expressly ordered to watch for the religious when they come forth from their retirement in their cells, in order to beset them and engage them in battle and cause their fall. And if one of these religious falls, all Hell exerts the greatest solicitude and care to prevent the soul from using the many means which religion affords for rising from a fall―such as obedience and holy exercises and the frequent use of the Sacraments. The demon then introduces other distractions and temptations, and, on account of their small appreciation of the rules and practices of religion, they begin to weaken in all of them, esteem them as light and unimportant matter, and, living on in their false security, come to lose the very perception of true virtue.
“The demons will then try to make all spiritual remedies miscarry and fail and be of no use to the fallen religious. The enemy applies so many cunning snares that it would fill with terror anyone who saw them. However, much of this is recognized in the actions and artifices by which a lax religious soul tries to defend its remissness, excusing it by false arguments, even if it does not break out in disobedience and yet greater disorders and faults.
“One of the greatest snares of the demon is to counteract the call of the Lord whenever He seeks to attract and incline the soul to a life of perfection in His service. The demon―by his fascinations and his deceitful and iniquitous suggestions―obscures the interior light of God and hides the deathly poison of Hell beneath some pleasant exterior. If man neglects to rise above his low desires and his forgetfulness for God―then he yields to the enemy of God and man. The more he alienates himself from the goodness of God, so much the more unworthy does he become of the secret callings and graces of the Most High, and so much the less does he appreciate His assistance, even though it be great. For the demon and the passions have obtained a greater dominion and power over his intellect and have made him more unfit and more incapable of the grace of the Almighty. Thereon rests the whole salvation or condemnation of souls, that is, in commencing to admit or resist the advances of the Lord.” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
► Our Lady warns of the dangers of mortal and venial sins in opening the door to demonic entry and control:
“Remember, that a voluntary remissness in regard to one imperfection, prepares and opens the way for others: these facilitate the commission of venial sins, and then these venial sins facilitate the commission of mortal sins. Thus the descent is from one abyss to another, until the bottom is found in the disregard of all evil. In order to prevent such a misfortune it is necessary to intercept from afar the current of sin―this practice seems but small, but it is an outwork which keeps the enemy at a distance, while the precepts and laws concerning more important matters are the fortress walls of conscience. The failure to correspond to the graces that God offers, brings on their greatest misfortune, because in this disloyalty consists the first great victory of the demon over man.
“If the demon can break through and gain the outer defenses, he is in better position to gain the inner ones. If then an opening is made in the walls of the soul by the commission of sin, although it may not be a very grievous one, the demon already has a better opportunity to make an assault on the interior reign of a soul. As the soul finds herself weakened by vicious acts and habits and without strength of grace, she does not resist the attack with fortitude, and the devil, acquiring more and more power over her, begins to subject and oppress her without opposition.
“How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! … Hell has opened its mouth and the more it is fed, the more insatiable becomes its hunger, seeking to damn all the rest of mankind. Since the number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate should also be uncountable, and that the demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
But Nobody is Listening to Our Lady!
For all that Our Lady has said over the years; for all the warnings she has given; for all the advice she has offered; for all the care she has shown―hardly anyone is paying much attention. That is why SISTER LUCIA OF FATIMA lamented: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil, also ignoring the message, and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them!”
In 1846, OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE similarly said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, then I will be forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep it back! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for you continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
In 1955, OUR LADY SAID TO BLESSED ELENA AIELLO: “Listen attentively! In spite of repeated warnings, people are not returning to God! They refuse grace and are not listening to my voice! My words are very clear, and you must transmit them to all!” In 1959 she added: “The immorality of the times has reached a peak! But men do not listen to my motherly warnings, so the world must soon be purified! … Therefore, the justice of God will pass over the sinful world to purify humanity for so many sins!” In 1960: “For a long time, I have advised men in many ways―but they do not listen to my maternal appeals, and they continue to walk the paths of perdition! But soon terrifying manifestations will be seen, which will make even the most hardened sinners tremble! Great calamities will come upon the world, which will bring confusion, tears, struggles and pain. Great earthquakes will swallow up entire cities and countries, and will bring epidemics, famine, and terrible destruction especially where the sons of darkness are!” In 1961 she again warned: “People pay no attention to my motherly warnings, and thus the world is falling headlong evermore into an abyss of iniquity. Nations shall be convulsed by terrible disasters, causing destruction and death!”
The words of God in Holy Scripture can readily be applied to mankind today: “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears have they heard heavily, and their eyes they have shut―lest perhaps they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them!” (Acts 28:27). “O foolish people―and without understanding―who have eyes and see not; and ears and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21). “You dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see and see not; and ears to hear and hear not―for they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2). “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Ghost!” (Acts 7:51).
Optional vs. Obligatory
A major problem among Catholics is that they look upon too many religious teachings as being optional, rather than obligatory. They pick and choose what they will believe, follow and practice. This is a major victory for Satan―much like his victory over Eve in the Garden of Eden―whereby he makes us feel like mini-gods who pick and choose what is right and wrong; good and evil; sinful and not sinful: “Your eyes shall be opened and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:5). God’s teaching on what is good and evil has been replaced by man’s opinions on what is good and evil: “Woe to you that call evil good and good evil; that put darkness for light and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
This fatal attitude of Catholics stems from a refusal of Our Lord’s statement: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― mammon meaning the world with its pleasures and treasures (Matthew 6:24) … “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7).
Most Catholics are only too happy seeking out and enjoying the pleasures and treasures of the world! In doing so, they gravely risk losing their souls―for Holy Scripture forcefully backs up those words of Our Lord and warns of the consequences of not obeying Him: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
The underlying direction of our Faith is one of detachment from the world and attachment to God. The whole spiritual life is meant to be a progressive detachment from worldliness and an ever-increasing growth and attachment to holiness. The world is not holy―but God is holy; and God says: “I am the Lord your God―be holy because I am holy! Defile not your souls by any thing upon the Earth! … You shall be holy, because I am holy! … Walk not after the laws of the nations! … You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 11:44-46; 20:23-26).
Holiness is NOT AN OPTION―HOLINESS IS AN OBLIGATION! The reason why so many Catholics fail to reach Heaven is that look upon holiness as an option―it is not an option, it is an absolute requirement for anyone desiring to enter Heaven. Half-hearted efforts are unacceptable to Our Lord―as He clearly made to know to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me! ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example ― for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
An objective look at the Catholic world today will clearly show that there are a lot of woeful souls who are CINOs―Catholic In Name Only. Many―or even of most―of them would protest that they are good Catholics; that they go to Sunday Mass regularly; that they pray the Rosary; etc. Yet that does not guarantee anything―as Our Lord and Holy Scripture clearly point out: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23) … “Why call you Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). We come back to earlier point―doing as we are commanded to do and not doing only what we want to do! Listening to the word of God and not shutting our ears to the word of God.
Moving Away from God
Today, the Catholic world is increasingly departing from God and working iniquity. For the most part, the modern Catholic world does not take God and God’s Laws seriously. You could say that the modern Catholic world has become Protestant―or ‘Cathestant’, or ‘Proteholic’―because most Catholics reject critical parts of Catholic teaching. Many (60% to 80%) no longer believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist; many no longer look upon the Mass as being a Holy Sacrifice, but merely a memorial or symbol of the Last Supper; many believe you can be good Catholic without regularly attending Sunday Mass; many accept same-sex relationships and same-sex marriages; many accept and practice contraception; increasing numbers have abortions―the list could go on and on.
It brings back to mind the visions God gave to Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, where she was shown the Catholic Church evolving into Protestantism: “I saw a long processions of bishops―what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world―but only a small number were perfectly sound! … I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church … The Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived. They all work for destruction―even the clergy! … They were building a large, strange, and extravagant church there in Rome … All in this church belonged to the Earth, returned to the Earth. All was the work of human skill, a church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention … a counterfeit church! … I saw heretics of all kinds flocking to the city of Rome … Everyone was to be admitted into this church in order to be united and have equal rights―Evangelicals, Catholics, sects of every description ... The Protestant doctrine is to spread everywhere! … Then I saw that everything pertaining to Protestantism was gradually gaining the upper hand, and the Catholic religion fell into complete decadence! … The Church is completely isolated and as if completely deserted. It seems that everyone is running away.”
What is Your Vocation?
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of our universal vocation to holiness or sanctity: “God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next! It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation! All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary, §3). Satan would probably counter St. Louis by offering us a vocation to worldliness: “Satan wants you to become rebellious like him in this life, and damned like him in the next! It is certain that growth in rebelliousness against God and His Church is your vocation! All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are not doing the work that Satan has lined up for you and for which he is even now working hard to make you accomplish!”
Different Pay Scale―Different Currency
God and Satan both pay―but their currency is different and their pay scale differs. God’s currency is bitter; Satan’s currency is sweet. God’s currency turns sweet only after this life ends―Satan’s currency turns bitter after this life ends. God bitter wages last only for few decades in this life―but once they turn sweet after death, that sweetness lasts for eternity. Satan’s sweet wages don’t even last a few decades―and after death, they turn bitter for eternity. Our Lady of Lourdes sums it up nicely when she says to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next life!” ― which is pretty much what Our Lord said to His Apostles: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy … and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you!” (John 16:20-22).
The problem is that most of mankind has a sweet-tooth and so they want their sweetness here and now! The only one promising a “here-and-now” brand of sweetness is Satan. Therefore, they either try serve God and the world, or they forsake God for the world―of which the devil is the prince (John 12:31). Let’s enjoy the world now! Heaven can wait! We’ll get round to that later! Right now, there’s just too much fun to miss! St. Louis de Montfort depicts that perfectly in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, where he writes: “The world’s group, is the devil’s in fact, which is far superior in number, and seemingly far more colorful and splendid in array! Fashionable folk are all in a hurry to enlist, the highways are overcrowded, although they are broad and ever broadening with the crowds that flow through in a torrent! These roads are strewn with flowers, bordered with all kinds of amusements and attractions and paved with gold and silver ... Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!’ they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat; let us drink; let us sing; let us dance; let us play! God is good! He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!’ And so they continue.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
Everyone loves a winner! Everyone loves being a winner! Especially in Heaven everyone loves a winner and everyone is a winner! Nobody loves a loser―apart from Satan and his demons―and nobody loves being a loser! How many win eternal life? How many lose eternal life? [read more on that here]. Your soul was made for Heaven―but Satan wants your soul in Hell. The result is the never-ending “tug-of-war” over your soul between Heaven and Hell. The general consensus of opinion amongst saints and theologians is that most souls end up being dragged into Hell. Why is this? If God is omnipotent, then why are most souls damned? The problem is not on the side of God, but on the side of the human race. Even though God is omnipotent (almighty), God will not violate the free-will that He has given every human being. The tragedy lies in the fact that mankind uses its free-will perversely―and not in the way God intended it to be used.
God wants all of mankind to be saved―there can be no doubt about that: “The Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17). “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son―so that [we] may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32).
Satan, however, will not back-off in his attempts to damn those whom Christ wants to save: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). It seems like Satan has much success, as pointed out by Our Lady in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16)―fear this sentence and renew in your heart the care and zeal for your salvation! … How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day … that the demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men!”
► Our Lady then describes the infernal hatred that the demons have towards us:
“No intellect, nor any tongue of man or angels can describe the wrath and fury which Lucifer and his demons entertain against mortals―just because they are images of God and because they are capable of enjoying Him for all eternity. The Lord alone can comprehend the wicked malice of these proud and rebellious spirits. If these foes were not restrained by His almighty arm they would, in one moment, destroy the world; they would like famishing lions, like wild beasts and fierce dragons, destroy all mankind and tear them to pieces! ... Be very cautious and watchful in regard to the ignorance and darkness, by which the demon commonly ensnares mortals and makes them forget their eternal salvation and the continual danger of its loss through his persecutions ...
“The devil knows you and lurks around you, ever since the hour of your creation and entrance into this world. Night and day he restlessly prowls about seeking some chance of capturing you as a prize. He observes your natural inclinations and also the gifts of the Lord, in order to combat you with your own weapons. He charges other demons with your ruin and promises reward to those that are more diligent in securing it. They weigh your actions carefully, watch your footsteps, and work zealously to lay snares for you in all your undertakings.” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
► Our Lady then discloses some of the chief tactics of the demons:
“Ordinarily the demons have no power over souls, unless they gain entrance by some venial or mortal fault. Mortal sin gives them a sort of direct right over those who commit it; while venial sin weakens the strength of the soul and invites their attacks. Imperfections diminish the merit and the progress of virtue, and encourage the enemy. Whenever the astute serpent notices that the soul bears with its own levity and forgets about its danger, it blinds it and seeks to instill its deadly poison. The enemy then entices the soul like a little heedless bird, until it falls into one of the many snares from which there seems to be no escape.
“Do not think that it is written in vain: ‘Many are called, but few are chosen!’ (Matthew 20:16)―fear this sentence and renew in your heart the care and zeal for your salvation! … The faithful are in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies! Since the princes of darkness are invisible and unperceived by any of the senses, and since carnal men can neither touch, nor feel, nor see them―the result is that they forget to live in fear of them. Yet for this very reason they ought to be more attentive and careful―since invisible enemies are more cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery. The demon always seeks to prepare the way for his deceits, especially in souls which he fears will resist his entrance.” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
► Our Lady reveals the especial hatred that demons have towards devout and religious souls and the especial efforts that demons make to try and conquer them:
“The demon uses more diligence in his attempts to overcome religious men and women, than he uses to conquer all the rest of worldly men. There are demons, whom Lucifer has expressly ordered to watch for the religious when they come forth from their retirement in their cells, in order to beset them and engage them in battle and cause their fall. And if one of these religious falls, all Hell exerts the greatest solicitude and care to prevent the soul from using the many means which religion affords for rising from a fall―such as obedience and holy exercises and the frequent use of the Sacraments. The demon then introduces other distractions and temptations, and, on account of their small appreciation of the rules and practices of religion, they begin to weaken in all of them, esteem them as light and unimportant matter, and, living on in their false security, come to lose the very perception of true virtue.
“The demons will then try to make all spiritual remedies miscarry and fail and be of no use to the fallen religious. The enemy applies so many cunning snares that it would fill with terror anyone who saw them. However, much of this is recognized in the actions and artifices by which a lax religious soul tries to defend its remissness, excusing it by false arguments, even if it does not break out in disobedience and yet greater disorders and faults.
“One of the greatest snares of the demon is to counteract the call of the Lord whenever He seeks to attract and incline the soul to a life of perfection in His service. The demon―by his fascinations and his deceitful and iniquitous suggestions―obscures the interior light of God and hides the deathly poison of Hell beneath some pleasant exterior. If man neglects to rise above his low desires and his forgetfulness for God―then he yields to the enemy of God and man. The more he alienates himself from the goodness of God, so much the more unworthy does he become of the secret callings and graces of the Most High, and so much the less does he appreciate His assistance, even though it be great. For the demon and the passions have obtained a greater dominion and power over his intellect and have made him more unfit and more incapable of the grace of the Almighty. Thereon rests the whole salvation or condemnation of souls, that is, in commencing to admit or resist the advances of the Lord.” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
► Our Lady warns of the dangers of mortal and venial sins in opening the door to demonic entry and control:
“Remember, that a voluntary remissness in regard to one imperfection, prepares and opens the way for others: these facilitate the commission of venial sins, and then these venial sins facilitate the commission of mortal sins. Thus the descent is from one abyss to another, until the bottom is found in the disregard of all evil. In order to prevent such a misfortune it is necessary to intercept from afar the current of sin―this practice seems but small, but it is an outwork which keeps the enemy at a distance, while the precepts and laws concerning more important matters are the fortress walls of conscience. The failure to correspond to the graces that God offers, brings on their greatest misfortune, because in this disloyalty consists the first great victory of the demon over man.
“If the demon can break through and gain the outer defenses, he is in better position to gain the inner ones. If then an opening is made in the walls of the soul by the commission of sin, although it may not be a very grievous one, the demon already has a better opportunity to make an assault on the interior reign of a soul. As the soul finds herself weakened by vicious acts and habits and without strength of grace, she does not resist the attack with fortitude, and the devil, acquiring more and more power over her, begins to subject and oppress her without opposition.
“How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day! … Hell has opened its mouth and the more it is fed, the more insatiable becomes its hunger, seeking to damn all the rest of mankind. Since the number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate should also be uncountable, and that the demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
But Nobody is Listening to Our Lady!
For all that Our Lady has said over the years; for all the warnings she has given; for all the advice she has offered; for all the care she has shown―hardly anyone is paying much attention. That is why SISTER LUCIA OF FATIMA lamented: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one has paid attention to her message―neither the good nor the bad. The good merely continue on with their life on the road of goodness, but without paying attention to this message. The bad―the sinners―because of their sins, keep following the road of evil, also ignoring the message, and do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them!”
In 1846, OUR LADY OF LA SALETTE similarly said: “If my people do not wish to submit themselves, then I will be forced to let go of the hand of my Son! It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep it back! I have suffered all of the time for all of you! If I do not wish my Son to abandon you, I must take it upon myself to pray for you continually! And all of you think little of this! You will never be able to make up for the trouble I have taken over for all of you!”
In 1955, OUR LADY SAID TO BLESSED ELENA AIELLO: “Listen attentively! In spite of repeated warnings, people are not returning to God! They refuse grace and are not listening to my voice! My words are very clear, and you must transmit them to all!” In 1959 she added: “The immorality of the times has reached a peak! But men do not listen to my motherly warnings, so the world must soon be purified! … Therefore, the justice of God will pass over the sinful world to purify humanity for so many sins!” In 1960: “For a long time, I have advised men in many ways―but they do not listen to my maternal appeals, and they continue to walk the paths of perdition! But soon terrifying manifestations will be seen, which will make even the most hardened sinners tremble! Great calamities will come upon the world, which will bring confusion, tears, struggles and pain. Great earthquakes will swallow up entire cities and countries, and will bring epidemics, famine, and terrible destruction especially where the sons of darkness are!” In 1961 she again warned: “People pay no attention to my motherly warnings, and thus the world is falling headlong evermore into an abyss of iniquity. Nations shall be convulsed by terrible disasters, causing destruction and death!”
The words of God in Holy Scripture can readily be applied to mankind today: “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears have they heard heavily, and their eyes they have shut―lest perhaps they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them!” (Acts 28:27). “O foolish people―and without understanding―who have eyes and see not; and ears and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21). “You dwell in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see and see not; and ears to hear and hear not―for they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2). “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Ghost!” (Acts 7:51).
Optional vs. Obligatory
A major problem among Catholics is that they look upon too many religious teachings as being optional, rather than obligatory. They pick and choose what they will believe, follow and practice. This is a major victory for Satan―much like his victory over Eve in the Garden of Eden―whereby he makes us feel like mini-gods who pick and choose what is right and wrong; good and evil; sinful and not sinful: “Your eyes shall be opened and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:5). God’s teaching on what is good and evil has been replaced by man’s opinions on what is good and evil: “Woe to you that call evil good and good evil; that put darkness for light and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
This fatal attitude of Catholics stems from a refusal of Our Lord’s statement: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” ― mammon meaning the world with its pleasures and treasures (Matthew 6:24) … “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7).
Most Catholics are only too happy seeking out and enjoying the pleasures and treasures of the world! In doing so, they gravely risk losing their souls―for Holy Scripture forcefully backs up those words of Our Lord and warns of the consequences of not obeying Him: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
The underlying direction of our Faith is one of detachment from the world and attachment to God. The whole spiritual life is meant to be a progressive detachment from worldliness and an ever-increasing growth and attachment to holiness. The world is not holy―but God is holy; and God says: “I am the Lord your God―be holy because I am holy! Defile not your souls by any thing upon the Earth! … You shall be holy, because I am holy! … Walk not after the laws of the nations! … You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 11:44-46; 20:23-26).
Holiness is NOT AN OPTION―HOLINESS IS AN OBLIGATION! The reason why so many Catholics fail to reach Heaven is that look upon holiness as an option―it is not an option, it is an absolute requirement for anyone desiring to enter Heaven. Half-hearted efforts are unacceptable to Our Lord―as He clearly made to know to Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres (of Our Lady of Good Success fame): “If men would only realize how greatly I am wounded and displeased with the coldness, indifference, lack of confidence and small spineless imperfections on the part of those who so closely belong to Me! ... But I will not tolerate this! Halfway measures are not pleasing to Me! I desire all or nothing! — according to My example ― for I gave of Myself to the last drop of Blood and Water from My shattered Body on the Cross! ... Woe to souls like this! Woe!”
An objective look at the Catholic world today will clearly show that there are a lot of woeful souls who are CINOs―Catholic In Name Only. Many―or even of most―of them would protest that they are good Catholics; that they go to Sunday Mass regularly; that they pray the Rosary; etc. Yet that does not guarantee anything―as Our Lord and Holy Scripture clearly point out: “Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23) … “Why call you Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). We come back to earlier point―doing as we are commanded to do and not doing only what we want to do! Listening to the word of God and not shutting our ears to the word of God.
Moving Away from God
Today, the Catholic world is increasingly departing from God and working iniquity. For the most part, the modern Catholic world does not take God and God’s Laws seriously. You could say that the modern Catholic world has become Protestant―or ‘Cathestant’, or ‘Proteholic’―because most Catholics reject critical parts of Catholic teaching. Many (60% to 80%) no longer believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist; many no longer look upon the Mass as being a Holy Sacrifice, but merely a memorial or symbol of the Last Supper; many believe you can be good Catholic without regularly attending Sunday Mass; many accept same-sex relationships and same-sex marriages; many accept and practice contraception; increasing numbers have abortions―the list could go on and on.
It brings back to mind the visions God gave to Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, where she was shown the Catholic Church evolving into Protestantism: “I saw a long processions of bishops―what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world―but only a small number were perfectly sound! … I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church … The Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived. They all work for destruction―even the clergy! … They were building a large, strange, and extravagant church there in Rome … All in this church belonged to the Earth, returned to the Earth. All was the work of human skill, a church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention … a counterfeit church! … I saw heretics of all kinds flocking to the city of Rome … Everyone was to be admitted into this church in order to be united and have equal rights―Evangelicals, Catholics, sects of every description ... The Protestant doctrine is to spread everywhere! … Then I saw that everything pertaining to Protestantism was gradually gaining the upper hand, and the Catholic religion fell into complete decadence! … The Church is completely isolated and as if completely deserted. It seems that everyone is running away.”
What is Your Vocation?
St. Louis de Montfort speaks of our universal vocation to holiness or sanctity: “God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next! It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation! All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary, §3). Satan would probably counter St. Louis by offering us a vocation to worldliness: “Satan wants you to become rebellious like him in this life, and damned like him in the next! It is certain that growth in rebelliousness against God and His Church is your vocation! All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are not doing the work that Satan has lined up for you and for which he is even now working hard to make you accomplish!”
Different Pay Scale―Different Currency
God and Satan both pay―but their currency is different and their pay scale differs. God’s currency is bitter; Satan’s currency is sweet. God’s currency turns sweet only after this life ends―Satan’s currency turns bitter after this life ends. God bitter wages last only for few decades in this life―but once they turn sweet after death, that sweetness lasts for eternity. Satan’s sweet wages don’t even last a few decades―and after death, they turn bitter for eternity. Our Lady of Lourdes sums it up nicely when she says to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next life!” ― which is pretty much what Our Lord said to His Apostles: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy … and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you!” (John 16:20-22).
The problem is that most of mankind has a sweet-tooth and so they want their sweetness here and now! The only one promising a “here-and-now” brand of sweetness is Satan. Therefore, they either try serve God and the world, or they forsake God for the world―of which the devil is the prince (John 12:31). Let’s enjoy the world now! Heaven can wait! We’ll get round to that later! Right now, there’s just too much fun to miss! St. Louis de Montfort depicts that perfectly in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, where he writes: “The world’s group, is the devil’s in fact, which is far superior in number, and seemingly far more colorful and splendid in array! Fashionable folk are all in a hurry to enlist, the highways are overcrowded, although they are broad and ever broadening with the crowds that flow through in a torrent! These roads are strewn with flowers, bordered with all kinds of amusements and attractions and paved with gold and silver ... Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!’ they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat; let us drink; let us sing; let us dance; let us play! God is good! He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!’ And so they continue.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
Article 14
Monday & Tuesday after the Third Sunday of Lent, March 4th & 5th
Sacramentals Miracles
Monday & Tuesday after the Third Sunday of Lent, March 4th & 5th
Sacramentals Miracles
What is a Sacramental?
Some years ago, two women were touring a desert region of southwest USA. They wandered off from their party and got lost. For two full days they tramped and tramped in search of a road or dwelling. They found none. One of them, in true womanly fashion, took out her compact, to repair the damage done by sun and dust. The sun flashed off the mirror. She got an idea. Someone might see the reflected light. They flashed the mirror in all directions. The search and rescue team saw the flashes, hurried to the source, and rescued the two ladies. Who would have thought that such a simple thing as a mirror could save human lives? This essential piece of female equipment did not directly save their lives, but it was the means, the instrument for reflecting light from the sun above and attracting attention and bringing help.
The Sacramentals are something like that. Of themselves they do not save souls, but they are the means for securing heavenly help for those who will make efforts to use them properly. A Sacramental is a sacred object, or religious action, which the Catholic Church―in imitation of the Sacraments―uses for the purpose of obtaining spiritual favors, especially through her prayer. A Sacramental is anything set apart or blessed by the Church, to excite good thoughts and to help devotion, and thus secure grace to help us avoid mortal sins, and also take away venial sin, or the temporal punishment due to sin.
The Sacraments produce grace directly in the soul, if there is no obstacle on the part of the recipient; the Sacramentals do not produce grace directly and of themselves―they produce grace indirectly by disposing and preparing the soul for this divine gift of grace. The Sacraments give or increase sanctifying grace―which is an habitual grace that can permanently reside in our souls and sanctify us, unless we expel it by mortal sin. Whereas the Sacramentals are the means to actual graces--which are temporary, passing, assisting graces that are sent for a particular task or need, at a particular moment in time, and do no reside with us permanently.
The Sacramentals can be categorized into prayers, blessed objects, sacred signs, and religious ceremonies. Some Sacramentals are a combination―they fall into two or more classes. Their value lies in the fact that they have been set aside and sanctified (blessed) by the Church for sacred purposes, by the power of the Church’s official prayer, and by the merits of Christ, preserved and distributed by His Church. Obviously Sacramentals are not as important as the Sacraments―yet they are nevertheless very important. Our Lady reputedly will, one day, save the world through her Rosary and her Brown Scapular. This claim is no idle claim―as you will be see in the following short extract or “tip-of-the-iceberg” of miracles that have been witnessed through the use of various Sacramentals of the Church―such as the Brown Scapular, the Rosary, the Miraculous Medal, etc.
Miracles of the Brown Scapular
► In November of 1955, a plane carrying 27 passengers crashed. All died except one young lady. When this girl saw that the plane was going down, she took hold of her Scapular, and called on Mary for help. She suffered burns, her clothing was reduced to ashes, but the flames did not touch or damage her Brown Scapular.
► In the same year of 1955, a similar miracle occurred in the Midwest, USA. A 3rd-grader schoolboy stopped in a gasoline station to put air in his bicycle tires, and at the very moment an explosion occurred. The boy’s clothing was burned off, but his Brown Scapular remained undamaged―a symbol of Mary’s protection. Today, although he still bears a few scars from the explosion, this young man has special reason to remember our Blessed Mother’s protection in time of danger.
► In May of 1957, a Carmelite priest in Germany published the unusual story of how the Scapular saved a home from fire. An entire row of homes had caught fire in Westboden, Germany. The devout inhabitants of a home in the middle of this row, seeing the fire, immediately fastened a Scapular to the main door of the house. Sparks flew over it and around it, but the house remained unharmed. Within 5 hours, 22 homes had been reduced to ashes. The one structure which stood undamaged amidst the destruction was that which had the Scapular attached to its door. The hundreds of people who came to see the place Our Lady had saved are eyewitnesses to the power of the Scapular and the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
► Another Scapular miracle took place in 1845. The English ship, King of the Ocean, on its way to Australia, found itself in the middle of a hurricane, not far from Cape Hope on the southern tip of South Africa. As wind and sea mercilessly lashed the ship, a Protestant minister, with his wife and children and other passengers, struggled to the deck to pray for mercy and forgiveness―because the end seemed near at hand. Among the crew was a young Catholic Irishman, John McAuliffe. On seeing the urgency of the situation, he opened his shirt, took off his Brown Scapular, and, making the Sign of the Cross with it over the raging waves, tossed the Scapular into the ocean. At that very moment, the wind calmed. Only one more wave washed the deck, bringing with it the Scapular which came to rest at the young man’s feet. All the while the Protestant minister―a Mr. Fisher―had been carefully observing McAuliffe’s actions and the miraculous effect of those actions. Upon questioning the young man, he was told about the Holy Virgin and her Scapular. Mr. Fisher and his family became determined to enter the Catholic Church as soon as possible, and thereby enjoy the same protection of Our Lady’s Scapular. This they did shortly after landing in Australia.
► When the French the town of Montpellier was in a state of siege in 1622, there occurred a miracle in the sight of the entire army and under the eyes of the King of France, Louis XIII. During the attack, one of his officers, Champrond De Beauregard, received a bullet wound in the chest. The wound should have been fatal, but the bullet, after piercing the clothing, flattened out against the Scapular, without doing the least bit of harm to the officer. Astonished by the miracle, the officer told all that were around him. Those who surrounded him―witnesses to this wonder―spread news of the incident through the army from rank to rank. Eventually news of the miracle reached the monarch’s ear. Louis XIII came forward to see this wonder that had been brought to his attention. He examined the facts very carefully, and after having convinced himself, with his own eyes, of the reality of the wonder, he wanted to dress himself in this heavenly armor, to receive the Scapular from the hands of the Carmelites and be enrolled as one of the members of the Confraternity.
You can read of more Scapular miracles by clicking here
Miraculous Medal Miracles
► A girl, around twenty years old, came to the hospital covered with the most repugnant scabs, which the doctors had said were incurable. The nun, who cared for her wounds, one day told her that the Most Holy Virgin had the power to cure her and that, if she wanted to wear the medal and ask for a cure, then she would obtain it. Knowing the doctors had given up on her, the girl answered roughly: “I do not believe in your Holy Virgin, nor do I want a medal!” The nun answered: “Very well then! In that case, keep your wounds!” Nevertheless, by the grace of God, some days later she asked for the medal and placed it around her neck, and prepared to be baptized. Shortly thereafter she left the hospital in perfect health, to the great astonishment of the doctors, who had been unanimous in considering her sickness incurable.
► An Austrian army officer in the garrison at Gratz, suffered from a serious wound in the right arm. He was brought to the general hospital, so that he might be more conveniently placed under the especial treatment of Dr. Rzehazeh, a very eminent surgeon. The doctor exhausted all his skill, but in vain―and after a few weeks he saw the necessity of amputation to save the officer’s life. Learning of the doctor’s decision, the patient was deeply grieved, and his oppressed heart sought refuge in piety. He―who had never spoken of God, and who had accepted the offered Medal only out of courtesy―now appeared to experience a genuine satisfaction when the Sisters told him they would implore the Blessed Virgin in his behalf. During the few days immediately preceding the operation, he felt inspired with a great confidence in the power of his Medal, and frequently repeated the invocation engraven upon it: “O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!”
The danger was now imminent, and the amputation, which must not be delayed, was to take place on the next day. One of the Sisters―seeing that the young officer’s confidence expressed itself in continual prayer―suggested that evening that he place the medal upon his afflicted arm, and let it remain there all night. The suggestion was humbly and joyfully received. Next morning she hastened to ascertain her patient’s condition, and get the Medal. He had spent a quiet night―his sufferings being less severe than usual. The Sister, while attributing his improvement to the medicine that had been prescribed, understood full well that the precious Medal had also been instrumental in procuring relief, and that Mary had looked compassionately upon him―but she did not yet realize the full extent of the blessing.
The surgeon came a few hours after, and whilst awaiting his assistants, he carefully examined the wounded arm, he touched it, he probed it, and to his great astonishment, perceived that amputation was not necessary. The other doctors, upon arriving, confirmed his opinion of this surprising change. The officer was struck dumb with happiness, and, not until he found himself alone with the chief surgeon, did he impart to the latter, as a secret, his opinion as to the cause of this wonderful change. On leaving him, the surgeon (despite the obligation of secrecy), could not refrain from saying to the Sister: “I believe the Sisters of Charity have engaged the good God in this case.” The officer’s arm was entirely healed. A few weeks later he left the hospital, taking with him the precious Medal as a memento of gratitude and love for Mary Immaculate.
► Despite the miracles associated with the Miraculous Medal, many people don’t believe it can make such a difference. Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J., an American priest, was one of those people. Not long after he had been ordained, a Vincentian priest encouraged him and others to promote the Miraculous Medal―because Blessed Mother really does work miracles through it. Although Fr. Hardon ordered a free pamphlet on how to bless the medals and enroll people in the Confraternity of the Miraculous Medal, he didn’t get one for himself. But later, in 1948, when the American priest encountered a ten-year-old boy, who was in a coma after a sledding accident, he decided to see if the Miraculous Medal would help. A sister who worked at the hospital found one and a ribbon the priest could use to hang it around the boy’s neck. Even though the boy had been diagnosed with inoperable permanent brain damage, the priest read the prayer that enrolled the boy in the Confraternity of the Miraculous Medal. As soon as he finished the prayer, the boy opened his eyes and asked his mother for ice cream. It was the first time he had spoken in nearly two weeks. New x-rays showed the brain damage had disappeared, and the boy was released from the hospital after about three days. Like the boy and his family, the Fr. Hardon’s life and his belief in the medal were forever changed.
You can read of more Miraculous Medal miracles by clicking here
Rosary Miracles
► LEPANTO ― The Battle of Lepanto, in 1571, was a crucial conflict between the defending Christians and the invading Ottoman Turks―one of the greatest naval battles of all time. The Christian lands around Greece and the Eastern Mediterranean were constantly getting attacked and sacked by Muslim pirates, and Ottoman warships were capturing Christian ships and enslaving vast numbers of sailors. Knowing the odds for victory were poor, Pope Saint Pius V called on the Catholic powers of Europe to unite in a crusade against the enemy threatening Christendom. After raising a crusade, he asked every non-combatant across the whole Christian world to pray the Rosary.
Even after this call to arms, the Christian fleet at Lepanto was greatly outnumbered by the Ottoman Turks. On the morning of the battle, the Christian forces all attended the Holy Sacrifice of Mass on their respective ships and received absolution. Before sailing into battle, the Christian soldiers and sailors spent several hours praying the Rosary. When they sailed to battle, the wind was against them―but then, miraculously, it changed and was now behind them―and now blowing against the Muslim fleet, hindering their progress and maneuvers. As the battle unfolded, the Muslims were yelling, screaming, and banging anything that would make noise. In contrast, the Christians kept an ominous silence, weapons in one hand, and Rosaries in the other. Soon after, the Christians and the Muslims were immersed in a bloody battle. The commander of the Christian fleet, Don Juan of Austria, valiantly led the Christians from the bridge of his flagship. The Muslims took aim at the large crucifix on the main deck of his vessel, but as the cannonball approached, the body of Our Lord and the crucifix miraculously turned to avoid the collision.
Muslim chroniclers of the battle also reported seeing, in the sky, a lady dressed in armor holding a child, and with a terrible gaze. As another point of interest, Admiral Andrea Doria carried a small image of Our Lady of Guadalupe into battle. This image is now venerated in the Church of San Stefano in Aveto, Italy. Terrified at the sight, the Turks began to lose control of the fleet, and the Christians pressed the attack. Thus it was that on October 7th, 1571, the Christian fleet was blessed with a miraculous victory. [read our multi-part series here]
Pope Pius V was blessed with a vision of the victory at Lepanto―even before he had received news from the returning fleet―and ordered public processions in thanksgiving. While in the Vatican, hundreds of miles away from battle, the good Pope is said to have suddenly stood up at the moment of victory, gone over to a window and exclaimed: “The Christian fleet is victorious!” When messengers arrived in Rome a week later to report the victory of the Christian fleet, they were quite surprised to find everyone already knew the outcome, the Holy Pontiff ordering all the bells in the city rung to announce the news. He immediately credited the victory to Our Lady, establishing October 7th as the feast of the Most Holy Rosary.
► SATANIST CONVERTED ― Bartolo Longo was born in 1841 to a devout Catholic family. During this period, there was a strong nationalistic movement in Italy and much anti-clericalism. When Bartolo grew up, he decided to study law. Naples at that time was undergoing a tremendous spiritual crisis. Many of his college professors were ex-priests who had a negative view of the Catholic Church. Paganism and Satanism of all sorts were abounding. Bartolo was not immune to these influences and started to dabble in the occult, eventually embracing Satanism. He was consecrated a Satanic priest and promised his soul to a demon. To his family’s dismay―who tried their hardest to get him to convert―he preached against the Catholic Faith and presided over blasphemous rituals.
However, Satanism began to torment his mind, and his family convinced him to make a good confession. His mental and physical health deteriorated and he sought help from a saintly Dominican priest, Fr. Alberto Radente, who helped lead him back to the Catholic Faith and encouraged his devotion to the Rosary. During this time, Bartolo had a miraculous conversion and, in 1870, he became a third order Dominican and chose to live a life in penance for all the terrible sins he had committed against the Church.
Nevertheless, Bartolo was still plagued with guilt about his past life, in particular making the promise of giving his soul to a demon. One day, he nearly succumbed to the sin of despair―feeling that God could never forgive the terrible sins he had committed against the Church. Doubting that God would forgive him, nearly drove him to suicide. But then he remembered a homily he had heard on the power of the Rosary. At that moment he received divine inspiration and remembered the Blessed Virgin’s promise that she would help in all their necessities those who would propagate her Rosary. As he later wrote: “Falling to my knees, I exclaimed: ‘If your words are true―that he who propagates your Rosary will be saved―then I shall attain salvation, because I shall not leave this Earth without propagating your Rosary!’”
He set out to restore the dilapidated chapel at Pompeii and to promote the Rosary to whoever would listen. Pamphlets about the Rosary were distributed to help the people learn to pray this powerful devotion. He tried to find an image of Our Lady of the Rosary worthy of hanging in the chapel, but was only offered a worm-eaten painting with an image that he felt was coarse and not worthy of veneration, however he accepted it from the convent in which it was stored. As Bartolo continued his work of propagating the Rosary, the chapel’s membership grew tremendously and many miracles began to be associated with Our Lady of Pompeii. Cures and spiritual conversions occurred due to the devotions through this new shrine. The people pledged their support to have a large church built that would properly honor Our Lady of the Rosary. Bartolo spent the rest of his life promoting this prayer and built the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary in Pompeii, which would become Italy’s premier Rosary shrine. In 1894, Bartolo and his wife gave the church over to the care of the Vatican.
Bartolo died on October 5th, 1926. The original image, which he had found in the convent, was restored for the last time in 1965 and the pope crowned the heads of Jesus and Mary with diadems donated by the people of Pompeii. On October 26th, 1980, Bartolo Longo was beatified by John Paul II, who called him “the man of the Madonna” and the “Apostle of the Rosary.”
► ROSARY PRIEST CURED ― Praying the Rosary led to a miraculous cure for Fr. Patrick Peyton, the famous “Rosary Priest”. Fr. Patrick Peyton was born on January 9th, 1909, in County Mayo, Ireland. He was the sixth child among a family of nine children. At age 19 he and his brother, Tom, emigrated to the United States. He wanted to become a priest, but his family in Ireland could not financially afford the required education.
He moved in with his sister Nellie and obtained a job working as a janitor at St. Stanislaus Cathedral in Pennsylvania. With help from Monsignor Paul Kelley, Patrick was able to pursue his schooling to become a priest. He entered the seminary at the Congregation of Holy Cross in Notre Dame, Indiana in 1932.
In October, 1938, at the age of 29, he started coughing blood and doctors discovered he had advanced stages of tuberculosis―which was incurable in those days. His sister Nellie encouraged him to ask our Holy Mother for help. Patrick consecrated himself completely to the Blessed Virgin Mary and devoted himself to praying the Rosary. To the astonishment of his doctors, he was soon completely and miraculously cured. The doctors discovered that the patches on his lungs had disappeared with no scientific explanation. With this miraculous cure, through the Rosary of our Holy Mother, Father Peyton vowed to Mary that he would promote the Rosary for the rest of his life.
Finally, on June 15th, 1941, Father Patrick Peyton was ordained a priest. He became one of the first evangelizers to use the electronic media to spread the word of God on radio and then television, the Holy Rosary and, in particular, encouraging families to regularly pray the Rosary together. Father Peyton coined the phrase: “The family that prays together, stays together.”
Father Patrick Peyton died peacefully on June 3rd, 1992 holding a Rosary in his hands. The cause for his sainthood began on June 1st, 2001. His cause for canonization is underway.
► CANADIAN SQUADRON PROTECTED IN WORLD WAR II ― Here is an account on how the Rosary saved an entire Air Force Squadron in the Second World War. The following story was recounted to the Dominican priest, Fr. Gabriel Harty, by a non-Catholic devotee of the Rosary from Canada.
It was May, 1940, and we joined the Air Force in late September. We were grouped into squadrons. About thirty to fifty men made up a squadron, along with the squadron leader―who gave all the orders and kept us functioning in unity. They told us that we were going overseas and would be in action right away. We eagerly awaited our new squadron leader. As an officer he would, we believed, go straight to the officers quarters. However, this squadron leader, Stan Fulton, in full uniform, headed for our bunk house, where he settled in with the rest of us. He threw his bag on an upper bunk. Wow! Our squadron leader, an officer, sleeping here with us! We liked him at once and our liking and our admiration grew each day.
That first night he knelt on the floor and prayed his Rosary in silence. Astounded, we were struck dumb. When he finished, he looked at us with his friendly smile and said, “I hope you guys don’t mind a fellow saying some prayers―because, where we’re going, we’re going to need them!” Next night, he repeated his prayer session. Although our group had been together for six months at least, I had never seen anyone kneel in prayer, and had no idea that any of our group was Catholic. The third night three of our companions joined Fulton in saying the Rosary. The rest of us did not understand, but we kept a respectful silence. We weren’t slow, however, on the pick-up. Soon we were all answering the Hail Marys and Our Fathers. In this way, we ended each day in prayer. Shortly enough, we were to begin a series of night raids from England over Germany. The evening before, Fulton gave each of us a Rosary. “We shall be in some tight situations, but if you agree to keep the Rosary with you and to say it, then I promise you that Our Lady will bring you all back safe!”
“Sure thing!” we replied―little thinking that we would be in action for four years, and often in dreadful danger. At such times, Fulton’s voice would ring through each plane, “Hail Mary…” and we would devoutly respond! We must have said hundreds of Rosaries in the skies. Ours was the ONLY squadron that had not lost a plane, nor a single life. We said nothing―but we treasured our secret weapon. We did survive, too! All the squadron returned to Canada in 1945, fully convinced that Our Lady had taken care of us. So I never forget to keep my Rosary with me and say it every day―although I am not a Catholic. When I change my trousers, the first thing I transfer―even before my wallet―is my Rosary.
► HIROSHIMA ― In the final stages of the Second World War, around 8:15 a.m., on August 6th, 1945, an American Boeing B-29 Super-Fortress bomber, christened “Enola Gay”, dropped the first atomic bomb in history over Hiroshima in Japan. The atomic blast generated an unimaginable ground heat of 10,832°F (6,000°C) and a tremendous wind at the sonic speed of 2.7 miles (4.4 kilometers) per second (over 9,700 miles per hour). Everything within a 1.2 mile radius of the hypocenter was annihilated, instantly killing 140,000 people. Concrete buildings collapsed into pieces and broken glass was thrown through the air as far as 10 miles away. The atomic radiation generated by the bomb was so unbelievably strong, that many persons outside of the range, who were exposed to it, lost all bodily functions, their cells underwent apoptosis ― a kind of cell suicide ― and they died within days. Between the blast itself, the resulting fires throughout the city and the radiation burns, some estimate that 200,000 citizens of Hiroshima lost their lives.
Yet, in the midst of burned bodies, charred skeletons, and structural damage, just eight blocks from ground zero (around half-a-mile), a two storey Catholic presbytery miraculously remained intact. When an investigation was made, it was discovered that there survived a community of eight German Jesuit priests who were all found unscathed, with only a few comparatively minor injuries. Among the survivors were Jesuit priests named Hugo Lassalle, Hubert Schiffer, Wilhelm Kleinsorge, Paul Ruge and Hubert Cieslik.
Father Hubert Schiffer, who headed the community, was 30 years old when the atomic bomb exploded at Hiroshima and he lived another 33 years in good health to tell of the miracle. The same can be said of the other seven priests of the community. Aside from some slight surface abrasions or scratches, they all lived out their days in full health with no radiation sickness, no loss of hearing, or any other visible long term defects, or cancer from radiation. Over the years, Father Schiffer was thoroughly examined and questioned by more than 200 scientists, who were unable to explain how he and his companions had survived the atomic blast. He attributed the miracle to the protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary. He declared: “I was in the middle of the atomic explosion and I am still here alive and well. I was not struck down by its destruction.” Furthermore, for several years, hundreds of experts and investigators continued to study and investigate the scientific reasons as to why the presbytery was not affected, and, when asked, Father Schiffer remarked each time: “We believe that we survived because we were living the Message of Fatima. We lived and prayed the Rosary daily in that home.”
To put into proper scientific perspective just how bewildering this survival tale is, consider the expert testimony of Dr. Stephen Rinehart, a nuclear physicist with the U.S. Department of Defense. He said: “Their residence should have been utterly destroyed (with a temperature of at least 2,000 Fahrenheit and air blast pressures of 100 pounds per square inch (psi). Unreinforced masonry, or brick walls (representative of commercial construction), are destroyed at pressures of 3 pounds per square inch (3 psi), which will also cause car damage and burst windows. At 10 psi, a human will experience severe lung and heart damage, burst eardrums and at 20 psi your limbs can be blown off. Your head will be blown off by 40 psi and no residential or unreinforced commercial construction would be left standing. At 80 psi even reinforced concrete is heavily damaged and no human would be alive because your skull would be crushed. All the cotton clothes would be on fire at 350 F (probably at 275 F) and your lungs would be inoperative within a minute breathing air (even for a few seconds) at these temperatures.”
The expected outcome described by this expert, in fact, perfectly describes what occurred in the area immediately surrounding the Jesuit rectory. One of the survivors priests said years later, in his recollection of the event, that after the nuclear blast occurred, he had opened his eyes and found himself laying on the ground. He looked around and there was NOTHING in any direction: the railroad station and buildings in all directions were leveled to the ground. The only physical harm to himself was that he could feel a few pieces of glass in the back of his neck. As far as he could tell, there was nothing else physically wrong. There are no physical laws to explain why the Jesuits were untouched in the Hiroshima air blast. All who were at this range from the epicenter should have received enough radiation to be dead within at most a matter of minutes if nothing else happened to them. There is no known way to design a uranium-235 atomic bomb, which could leave such a large discrete area intact while destroying everything around it immediately outside the fireball. From a scientific viewpoint, what happened to those Jesuits at Hiroshima still defies all human logic from the laws of physics as understood today (or at any time in the future). It must be concluded that some other external force was present whose power and/or capability to transform energy and matter as it relates to humans is beyond current comprehension. As Fr. Hubert Schiffer, one of Hiroshima priest survivors, said: “Prayer is more powerful than the atom bomb!”
► AUSTRIA FREED FROM COMMUNIST INVADERS ― The key player here is Father Petrus Pavlicek, who was born in Austria on January 6th, 1902. As a young boy, he felt called to the religious life, but grew indifferent in later years―eventually falling away from the Faith by the age of 19 and then leading a wild sinful life. In 1935, during a grave illness, he received the grace of conversion, resolving once again to embrace his vocation. On December 14th, 1941, he was ordained a priest of the Capuchin Order. In 1942, on May 13th, the Feast of Our Lady of Fatima, 1942, he was arrested by the German Gestapo for a supposed military-forces draft evasion and was brought to a court martial. The process ended with an acquittal ― but he was nevertheless forcefully conscripted into the German Army. On October 7th, the feast of the Holy Rosary, he was sent to the Western Front as a paramedic. On August 15th, 1944, the feast of the Assumption, he was captured by Americans and became a prisoner of war. It was during imprisonment that he first learned about Our Lady’s apparitions and messages at Fatima. Released on July 16th, 1945, the Feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, he went to Austria as a missionary. In 1946, on February 2nd― the feast of the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple and the Purification of Our Lady ― he went on pilgrimage to principal Marian shrine of Mariazell in Austria, to thank Mary for her protection in gratitude for the fortunate return home from the Second World War. It was at the shrine that he heard an interior voice, which said to him: “Do, as I say, and there will be peace!” These words reminded him of the message of Fatima―and so he founded, in February 1947, the Crusade of Reparation of the Holy Rosary for Peace in the World.
It was right after the Second World War (1939-1945) that much of Austria came under Communist control. After the war, Austria was divided up by the Allies―America, France, the United Kingdom, and Russia. The eastern half of Austria was handed over to be controlled by the Russian Communists. In 1947, with his country at the mercy of atheistic Soviet Marxism, Fr. Pavlicek began gathering people―in villages, towns and cities across Soviet controlled Austria―on the 13th of each month to pray the Rosary together in public, and he called it the Rosary Crusade. From 1947 until 1955, Fr. Pavlicek conducted public Rosary processions and rallies on the 13th of each month. Many people gathered at first, but often they could not sustain their spiritual practices, so the Rosary Crusade ebbed and flowed ― but Fr. Pavlicek persevered in his confidence in Our Lady. From September of 1948, every month in the Franciscan church of Vienna, there took place ceremonies for peace. From 1949, Fr. Pavlicek published a periodical, which is named “Betendes Gottesvolk” today. From 1950 to 1955, he organized, in the month of September, the yearly procession of the Holy Name of Mary (feast day September 12th) in the Vienna Ring Road. By 1955, eight years later, despite the initial resistance of Austria’s Catholic Church to Fr. Pavlicek’s “Rosary Atonement Crusade”, more than a half million Austrians (out of a 1955 Austrian population of around 7 million―therefore 1 out of 14 persons) had pledged to pray the Rosary every day, begging for the conversion of sinners, peace in the world, and freedom in Austria. Tens of thousands of Catholics, both clergy and laity, and even politicians, were seen marching in the streets, praying the Rosary and bearing votive candles for the intention of peace in the world.
Throughout this time the politicians conducted more than 260 peace conferences in the effort to remove the Soviets from power. But these efforts only ended with the Russians tightening their iron grip on Austria. Man alone does not have the power to change the course of history or bring peace. This is a job for the Queen of Peace. But she asks our cooperation in praying the daily Rosary. The Cold War intensified, and Communism refined its methods of religious persecution in Austria. It seemed that God wanted to test the Faith of those who had prayed so zealously for their country’s freedom. Their Faith having been sufficiently tested, the grace was finally given. On March 24th, 1955, the eve of the feast of the Annunciation, the Russian Communist governors invited the Austrians to a conference. Believing that his nation’s future would be sealed in Moscow, Prime Minister Raab entreated Father Pavlicek before his departure: “Please pray ― and ask your people to pray harder than ever!” To the world’s surprise, the Soviets signed the Austrian State Treaty guaranteeing the independence of Austria, by which they and the Allied Powers ended their post-war occupation of Austria, and stated they would withdraw their troops from Austria in just three months. On May 15th, during the Month of Mary, the Soviets signed a treaty. And on October 26th, 1955, very fittingly and appropriately during the month of the Holy Rosary, the last Russian soldier left the occupied eastern sector of Austria.
Basically, it was a large spiritual army of lay people, led by a priest, that had peacefully overcome the might of Communist Russia. That is the power of the Holy Rosary! What was achieved back then, can also be achieved today! However, it took almost 10% of the population to pray the Rosary and they had to pray and wait for over seven years before their prayers were answered and granted! Do we have the same tenacity and perseverance today?
► COMMUNISTS DRIVEN OUT IN BRAZIL ― In the late 1950s and start of the 1960s, the world was in a state of fear and confusion. Russia was trying to make headway in converting as many countries as possible to Communism under their rule. Impoverished nations, with corrupt governments in turmoil, were easy targets. Cuba had just fallen to the Soviets in 1960, and Brazil was another planned conquest. The president of Brazil, Joao Goulart, began to embrace Communism and began pushing for a Communist form of government. He started to install known Communists into high governmental positions, while at the same time dispatching representatives throughout the country to convince the citizens that Communism was good for the country.
With Catholicism still strong in the country, Cardinal de Barros Camara told people, through a weekly radio address, that by following the directives of Our Lady of Fatima regarding prayer and penance, Brazil could overthrow the Communist threat. In a speech, President Goulart mocked the Rosary, saying that governmental control―not reciting the prayers of the Rosary―would save the economy from collapse. During this time, he was lining his pockets with dollars given to Brazil in foreign aid from the U.S. and other countries.
A fifty-nine-year-old retired Brazilian woman schoolteacher, named Dona Amelia Bastos, was very concerned about this imminent danger. Her husband belonged to a group of men called the Anti-Reds, who were opposed to Communism in Brazil. One night Dona Amelia listened as the Anti-Reds discussed the threat facing their beloved country. She decided that she too could do something about it. Of her decision, she said: “I suddenly decided that politics had become too important to be left entirely to the men. Moreover, who has more at stake in what’s happening to our country than we women?”
She immediately formed a group called Campaign of Women for Democracy (CAMDE) and started to recruit as many people as possible to pray the Rosary in large groups, to thwart the plan for Communist takeover. In a town called Belo Horizonte, a group of 20,000 women, reciting the Rosary aloud, broke up a pro-Communist rally. The success of this peaceful protest fed the impetus for the Catholic women to do more.
With the help of Heaven and the strong influence of Archbishop Cardinal de Barros Camara, Dona Amelia recruited an amazing number of 600,000 women who marched in Sao Paulo to pray the Rosary for peace. They called their protest, “March of the Family with God Toward Freedom” under the declaration, “Mother of God, preserve us from the fate and suffering of the martyred women of Cuba, Poland, Hungary, and other enslaved nations.” Leone Brizola, a Communist high government official, left in a rage when his planned speech was thwarted by the rattling of 3,000 Rosaries and the murmuring of the prayers in the assembly hall. Not one life was lost in this most amazing peaceful anti-Communist protest, which is described by many witnesses as: “One of the most moving demonstrations in Brazilian History.” Many more Rosary rallies were held in major cities, in spite of threats of military action against the crusading women. Under this mounting pressure, on April 1st, 1964, President Goulart fled the country along with many members of the government.
► CORRUPT GOVERNMENT OVERTHROWN ― In the Philippines, the corrupt Marcos regime was defeated entirely through peaceful means in 1986. While their political leaders were living in luxury, many of the Philippine people were poor and some were starving. To this day people make jokes about Imelda Marcos’s shoes―because she had 3,000 pairs of shoes, along with 15 mink coats, 1,000 purses, and 508 fancy gowns. The people sought to elect a new leader―Benigno Aquino―but he was assassinated, right in front of his wife and family, as he stepped off a plane to run for office in Manila. After this brutal murder, Ninoy’s wife, Corazon “Cory” Aquino, became active in protests against the Marcos regime and one million people signed a petition for his widow, Corazon Aquino, to run for presidency in her assassinated husband’s place. She fulfilled the people’s wishes.
President Marcos called a snap election day on February 7th, 1986 which turned out to be a bloody, violent, and fraud-filled event. President Marcos―declared the winner by his corrupt government―took control of the media and sent out the military to quell any protests. Cardinal Sin, of the Archdiocese of Manila, urged a peaceful protest and the Catholic people came out in droves. They surrounded the military tanks and armed soldiers, prayed the Rosary, and sang religious hymns and protest songs. Holy Masses and prayer vigils took place in churches. This prayerful protest continued for almost a week when, unexpectedly, the soldiers stepped away from their tanks, put down their guns, and joined the peaceful crowd.
President Marcos fled the country on February 26th, 1986, and the whole nation took to the streets in celebration. Prayers of thanksgiving and holy Masses were held in gratitude to God. As the new President, Cory Aquino made sweeping changes and the Philippines became a free and democratic country. To this day people are in awe that the evil, corrupt regime of Marcos was completely overturned through peaceful means.
In one account of the events, Sister Ocariza and 16 other nuns, standing in pairs, led the Rosary as soldiers escorted rolling military tanks with their turrets trained on the sisters. The nun said staring down those tanks has been the scariest experience of her life. “I said, ‘Lord forgive me for all my sins and even the offenses of our Filipino people.’ If really the tanks would crush us, at least the two of us … kill us sisters, not the people, because we (did not) want bloodshed! I love my country!” But the tanks stopped, and the soldiers joined the protesters reciting the Rosary, that was really a miracle! Sister Ocariza said that God peacefully delivered them from the hands of a dictator and saved the country from what would have ultimately provoked a violent reaction. She said she looked back to that time as a source of courage and a reminder to stand for what is right always. The Chicago Tribune reported: “Instead of guns, there were prayers; instead of bloodshed, celebrations; instead of casualties, converts, guns fell to Rosaries in Philippine Revolution.”
► SAVED FROM MURDER ― Ted Bundy was one of the worst serial killers in history. On the night of January 15th, 1978, at 3:00 am, Ted Bundy entered the Chi Omega sorority house at Florida State University and murdered two girls before heading off to search for more victims. He entered a third room, but dropped his bat and fled when he saw a girl clutching a Rosary in her hands.
Later the girl told authorities that before she left for college she had promised her worried grandmother that she would pray the Rosary every night for protection, even if she fell asleep in the process. This is what she had done that night, and she was still holding the Rosary when the murderer entered her room.
Bundy later confessed to over thirty murders. When Bundy was awaiting his execution, he asked for a priest. The priest, Fr. Esper, asked him what happened that night. Bundy said he intended to murder the girl, but “some mysterious power prevented him.”
Father Joseph M. Esper says in his book, With Mary to Jesus: “Ironically, when Ted Bundy was on death row, awaiting execution for his crimes, he asked Monsignor Kerr to serve as a spiritual counselor, and the priest took the opportunity to ask about that terrible night. Bundy explained that when he entered the girl’s room, he had fully intended on murdering her; some mysterious power was preventing him.”
Father Esper adds: “And not only does it (the Rosary) aid our own spiritual growth ― it also undermines the kingdom of Satan.” The famous Vatican exorcist Father Gabriele Amorth testified: “One day a colleague of mine heard the devil say during an exorcism, ‘Every Hail Mary is like a blow on my head. If Christians knew how powerful the Rosary was, it would be my end!’”
► ROSARY IN AFRICA ― There are many online testimonials recounting miraculous escapes from danger and death by virtue of fidelity to the Rosary. During the 1994 Rwandan genocide, Immaculée Ilibagiza, and seven other women, spent ninety-one days hidden in the cramped bathroom of a local pastor’s house. Immaculée believed that praying the Rosary spared her from being slaughtered during the genocide, in which her family and more than a million other innocent people were brutally murdered. As well as physical protection, she also recounts the amazing spiritual benefits brought to her by the prayer during this time.
Another instance is that of Father Valentine Ezeagu, who was driving through Imo state in Nigeria, on December 15th, 2020, on the way to his father’s funeral, when he was ambushed by four armed men. The priest was unexpectedly freed thirty-six hours later. Reporting his release to his religious superior, Father Ezeagu said the abductors had let him go after seeing him pray the Rosary. Speaking to Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), Father George Okorie, Superior General of the Congregation of the Sons of Mary, Mother of Mercy, said: “When I spoke to Father Valentine, he told me that seeing him praying the Rosary made his abductors confused … They started having a guilty conscience. It made them realize that, since he was wearing a cassock, they had not got the right person, so they gave him some food and released him.”
► THE ROSARY CAN EVEN SAVE YOU! As you no doubt know―very few souls get to Heaven. Will you be one of the few? No matter how bad you are or have been, the Rosary can save you too! This is what St. Louis de Montfort says on the matter in his book The Secret of the Rosary―take it to heart:
“If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins ‘you shall receive a never‑fading crown of glory’ (1 Peter 5:4). Even if you are on the brink of damnation; even if you have one foot in Hell; even if you have sold your soul to the devil, as sorcerers do who practice black magic; and even if you are a heretic as obstinate as a devil―sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and save your soul, if—and mark well what I say--if you say the Rosary devoutly every day, until death, for the purpose of knowing the truth and obtaining contrition and pardon for your sins! In this book there are several stories of great sinners who were converted through the power of the Rosary. Please read and meditate upon them. Never will anyone be able to understand the marvelous riches of sanctification which are contained in the prayers and mysteries of the Holy Rosary. It gradually brings us a perfect knowledge of Jesus Christ; it purifies our souls from sin; it gives us victory over all our enemies; it makes the practice of virtue easy; it sets us on fire with the love of Our Lord; it enriches us with graces and merits; it supplies us with what is needed to pay all our debts to God and to our fellow‑men, and, finally, it obtains all kinds of graces from God.
“When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone, a man was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people. The devils, who were in possession of this wretched man, were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions in spite of themselves. They said: ‘This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots; breaks our snares; and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death―and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards―are saved by her intercession! Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned―because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins, by which they obtain pardon and mercy!’
“Are you in the miserable state of sin? Then call on Mary! … Are you groping in the darkness of ignorance and error? Go to Mary! … Are you in sorrow? Turn to Mary! … Have you lost the state of grace? The Blessed Virgin will give you some of her graces! … Are you alone, having lost God’s protection? Pray to Mary! … Have you become an outcast and been accursed by God? Our Lady will bless you! … Do you hunger for the bread of grace and the bread of life? Draw near to her!
“Catholics, who bear the mark of God’s reprobation, think but little of the Rosary. They either neglect to say it, or only say it quickly and in a lukewarm manner. It is a good thing to think over how we should pray if we want to please God and become more holy. To say the Holy Rosary with advantage one must be in a state of grace, or at least be fully determined to give up sin―for all our theology teaches us that good works and prayers are dead works if they are done in a state of mortal sin.
“Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all―so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention, they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin. The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary, is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said―especially when we have promised to say it regularly or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary! They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment―and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!
“In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary―but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer, would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us, if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? How can we expect Him to be pleased if, while in the presence of His tremendous majesty, we give in to distractions, like a child running after a butterfly? People who do that forfeit God’s blessing, which is changed into a curse for having treated the things of God disrespectfully: ‘Cursed be the one who does God’s work negligently’ (Jeremias 48:10). Of course, you cannot say your Rosary without having a few involuntary distractions; it is even difficult to say a Hail Mary without your imagination troubling you a little, for it is never still; but you can say it without voluntary [deliberate] distractions.”
Can You See? Have Your Realized?
Hopefully―if you are still awake―you can see the immense power of Sacramentals. The above listed “tip-of-the-iceberg” of miracles that Sacramentals have produced―and it really is merely the tip-of-the-iceberg of millions of miracles both great and small―has hopefully enkindled in you a similar hope for such miracles in the future to protect and benefit you and your nearest and dearest. God is good! As Our Lady of La Salette said―speaking of our current “End Times” which Our Lady of Fatima affirmed we have entered: “God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other! Yet God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will!” These “End Times” will also be “Sacramental Times” ― which will contribute to the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Our Lady has repeatedly and forcefully spoken of and placed before our eyes the purpose, usefulness and power of Sacramentals. The Rosary in particular and Prayer in general are Sacramentals―and Our Lady clearly stated: “The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much—very much! … Pray with fervor! … With the Rosary, pray for the pope, the bishops, and the pries!” (Akita). At Fatima, it was the same message: “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war!” (May 1917) … “Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war … (June 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted!” (July 1917) … “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (August 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war!” (September 1917) … “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” (October 1917).
The Brown Scapular―and all blessed Scapulars―are Sacramentals. It is to be noted and not forgotten that, at her final apparition at Fatima, on October 13th, 1917, Our Lady appeared as Our Lady of Mount Carmel and held out a Brown Scapular to the people. Sister Lucia said that the Blessed Mother wants everyone to wear it: “Our Lady never looked so beautiful as when she appeared in her Carmelite habit! Our Lady held the Scapular in her hands because she wants us all to wear it. Our Lady wants everyone to wear it―for it is the sign of consecration to her Immaculate Heart. The Scapular and the Rosary are inseparable!”
There will come a time―and it has already begun―when priests will be scarcer and scarcer. Therefore the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Holy Eucharist, Confession, Extreme Unction and the other Sacraments will become scarcer and scarcer. Blessings will be scarcer because there will no priests to bless things. In a family, when the husband dies, then the wife has to take over many, if not all of his duties, and perform them the best that she can. Likewise, when the Sacraments (the husband) become scarce and rare, then the Sacramentals (the wife) will have to do what they can to make up for the missing Sacraments.
Now is the Time! Now is the Hour! Where are Your Sacramentals?
In light of all this, and in light of what is currently happening in our world of darkness, it seems that now is the time and now is the hour to “prep” our Sacramentals and stock-up on Sacramentals. Yes―God can perform miracles without using anybody or anything―but, as the Church teaches: “God does not do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices!” Our Lady has repeatedly brought and placed Sacramentals before our blind eyes! Why? To instruct of their existence and power and to encourage us to use them.
In 1830, at the Rue du Bac in Paris, France, Our Lady appeared to St. Catherine Labouré and showed her the design for the “Miraculous Medal” (the Medal of the Immaculate Conception is its proper name)―which is, of course, a Sacramental―stating that she wanted this medal to be made and worn by everyone, adding: “Have a Medal struck after this model. All who wear it will receive great graces; they should wear it around the neck. Graces will abound for persons who wear it with confidence.”
In 1846, at La Salette in France, Our Lady insisted upon another Sacramental―which is prayer.
In 1858, at Lourdes, Our Lady placed the focus on water―not only the miraculous holy water of Lourdes, but also the holy water in general, which is a Sacramental of the Church.
In 1917, at Fatima in Portugal, the focus was primarily on the Sacramental of the Holy Rosary, and secondarily upon the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.
Penances―such as abstinence and fasting―are also Sacramentals, and Our Lady has insisted on penance and sacrifice at all of her apparitions.
Other commonly used Sacramentals are holy water, blessed oil, blessed candles, various approved scapulars, and many approved medals, such as the St. Benedict Medal, which is the oldest and most highly indulgenced of all Sacramental objects. But the term covers much more. Apart from the Sacraments and the public prayer of the Church (divine office and five litanies), blessings of ashes and palms, blessed foods, and even the Confiteors and Creeds and the giving of alms can all be considered as Sacramentals.
Heaven has given us weapons galore―it is for us to take them and use them. God will do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices―and the Sacramentals are for us the ordinary sources of actual graces and even miracles.
Some years ago, two women were touring a desert region of southwest USA. They wandered off from their party and got lost. For two full days they tramped and tramped in search of a road or dwelling. They found none. One of them, in true womanly fashion, took out her compact, to repair the damage done by sun and dust. The sun flashed off the mirror. She got an idea. Someone might see the reflected light. They flashed the mirror in all directions. The search and rescue team saw the flashes, hurried to the source, and rescued the two ladies. Who would have thought that such a simple thing as a mirror could save human lives? This essential piece of female equipment did not directly save their lives, but it was the means, the instrument for reflecting light from the sun above and attracting attention and bringing help.
The Sacramentals are something like that. Of themselves they do not save souls, but they are the means for securing heavenly help for those who will make efforts to use them properly. A Sacramental is a sacred object, or religious action, which the Catholic Church―in imitation of the Sacraments―uses for the purpose of obtaining spiritual favors, especially through her prayer. A Sacramental is anything set apart or blessed by the Church, to excite good thoughts and to help devotion, and thus secure grace to help us avoid mortal sins, and also take away venial sin, or the temporal punishment due to sin.
The Sacraments produce grace directly in the soul, if there is no obstacle on the part of the recipient; the Sacramentals do not produce grace directly and of themselves―they produce grace indirectly by disposing and preparing the soul for this divine gift of grace. The Sacraments give or increase sanctifying grace―which is an habitual grace that can permanently reside in our souls and sanctify us, unless we expel it by mortal sin. Whereas the Sacramentals are the means to actual graces--which are temporary, passing, assisting graces that are sent for a particular task or need, at a particular moment in time, and do no reside with us permanently.
The Sacramentals can be categorized into prayers, blessed objects, sacred signs, and religious ceremonies. Some Sacramentals are a combination―they fall into two or more classes. Their value lies in the fact that they have been set aside and sanctified (blessed) by the Church for sacred purposes, by the power of the Church’s official prayer, and by the merits of Christ, preserved and distributed by His Church. Obviously Sacramentals are not as important as the Sacraments―yet they are nevertheless very important. Our Lady reputedly will, one day, save the world through her Rosary and her Brown Scapular. This claim is no idle claim―as you will be see in the following short extract or “tip-of-the-iceberg” of miracles that have been witnessed through the use of various Sacramentals of the Church―such as the Brown Scapular, the Rosary, the Miraculous Medal, etc.
Miracles of the Brown Scapular
► In November of 1955, a plane carrying 27 passengers crashed. All died except one young lady. When this girl saw that the plane was going down, she took hold of her Scapular, and called on Mary for help. She suffered burns, her clothing was reduced to ashes, but the flames did not touch or damage her Brown Scapular.
► In the same year of 1955, a similar miracle occurred in the Midwest, USA. A 3rd-grader schoolboy stopped in a gasoline station to put air in his bicycle tires, and at the very moment an explosion occurred. The boy’s clothing was burned off, but his Brown Scapular remained undamaged―a symbol of Mary’s protection. Today, although he still bears a few scars from the explosion, this young man has special reason to remember our Blessed Mother’s protection in time of danger.
► In May of 1957, a Carmelite priest in Germany published the unusual story of how the Scapular saved a home from fire. An entire row of homes had caught fire in Westboden, Germany. The devout inhabitants of a home in the middle of this row, seeing the fire, immediately fastened a Scapular to the main door of the house. Sparks flew over it and around it, but the house remained unharmed. Within 5 hours, 22 homes had been reduced to ashes. The one structure which stood undamaged amidst the destruction was that which had the Scapular attached to its door. The hundreds of people who came to see the place Our Lady had saved are eyewitnesses to the power of the Scapular and the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
► Another Scapular miracle took place in 1845. The English ship, King of the Ocean, on its way to Australia, found itself in the middle of a hurricane, not far from Cape Hope on the southern tip of South Africa. As wind and sea mercilessly lashed the ship, a Protestant minister, with his wife and children and other passengers, struggled to the deck to pray for mercy and forgiveness―because the end seemed near at hand. Among the crew was a young Catholic Irishman, John McAuliffe. On seeing the urgency of the situation, he opened his shirt, took off his Brown Scapular, and, making the Sign of the Cross with it over the raging waves, tossed the Scapular into the ocean. At that very moment, the wind calmed. Only one more wave washed the deck, bringing with it the Scapular which came to rest at the young man’s feet. All the while the Protestant minister―a Mr. Fisher―had been carefully observing McAuliffe’s actions and the miraculous effect of those actions. Upon questioning the young man, he was told about the Holy Virgin and her Scapular. Mr. Fisher and his family became determined to enter the Catholic Church as soon as possible, and thereby enjoy the same protection of Our Lady’s Scapular. This they did shortly after landing in Australia.
► When the French the town of Montpellier was in a state of siege in 1622, there occurred a miracle in the sight of the entire army and under the eyes of the King of France, Louis XIII. During the attack, one of his officers, Champrond De Beauregard, received a bullet wound in the chest. The wound should have been fatal, but the bullet, after piercing the clothing, flattened out against the Scapular, without doing the least bit of harm to the officer. Astonished by the miracle, the officer told all that were around him. Those who surrounded him―witnesses to this wonder―spread news of the incident through the army from rank to rank. Eventually news of the miracle reached the monarch’s ear. Louis XIII came forward to see this wonder that had been brought to his attention. He examined the facts very carefully, and after having convinced himself, with his own eyes, of the reality of the wonder, he wanted to dress himself in this heavenly armor, to receive the Scapular from the hands of the Carmelites and be enrolled as one of the members of the Confraternity.
You can read of more Scapular miracles by clicking here
Miraculous Medal Miracles
► A girl, around twenty years old, came to the hospital covered with the most repugnant scabs, which the doctors had said were incurable. The nun, who cared for her wounds, one day told her that the Most Holy Virgin had the power to cure her and that, if she wanted to wear the medal and ask for a cure, then she would obtain it. Knowing the doctors had given up on her, the girl answered roughly: “I do not believe in your Holy Virgin, nor do I want a medal!” The nun answered: “Very well then! In that case, keep your wounds!” Nevertheless, by the grace of God, some days later she asked for the medal and placed it around her neck, and prepared to be baptized. Shortly thereafter she left the hospital in perfect health, to the great astonishment of the doctors, who had been unanimous in considering her sickness incurable.
► An Austrian army officer in the garrison at Gratz, suffered from a serious wound in the right arm. He was brought to the general hospital, so that he might be more conveniently placed under the especial treatment of Dr. Rzehazeh, a very eminent surgeon. The doctor exhausted all his skill, but in vain―and after a few weeks he saw the necessity of amputation to save the officer’s life. Learning of the doctor’s decision, the patient was deeply grieved, and his oppressed heart sought refuge in piety. He―who had never spoken of God, and who had accepted the offered Medal only out of courtesy―now appeared to experience a genuine satisfaction when the Sisters told him they would implore the Blessed Virgin in his behalf. During the few days immediately preceding the operation, he felt inspired with a great confidence in the power of his Medal, and frequently repeated the invocation engraven upon it: “O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!”
The danger was now imminent, and the amputation, which must not be delayed, was to take place on the next day. One of the Sisters―seeing that the young officer’s confidence expressed itself in continual prayer―suggested that evening that he place the medal upon his afflicted arm, and let it remain there all night. The suggestion was humbly and joyfully received. Next morning she hastened to ascertain her patient’s condition, and get the Medal. He had spent a quiet night―his sufferings being less severe than usual. The Sister, while attributing his improvement to the medicine that had been prescribed, understood full well that the precious Medal had also been instrumental in procuring relief, and that Mary had looked compassionately upon him―but she did not yet realize the full extent of the blessing.
The surgeon came a few hours after, and whilst awaiting his assistants, he carefully examined the wounded arm, he touched it, he probed it, and to his great astonishment, perceived that amputation was not necessary. The other doctors, upon arriving, confirmed his opinion of this surprising change. The officer was struck dumb with happiness, and, not until he found himself alone with the chief surgeon, did he impart to the latter, as a secret, his opinion as to the cause of this wonderful change. On leaving him, the surgeon (despite the obligation of secrecy), could not refrain from saying to the Sister: “I believe the Sisters of Charity have engaged the good God in this case.” The officer’s arm was entirely healed. A few weeks later he left the hospital, taking with him the precious Medal as a memento of gratitude and love for Mary Immaculate.
► Despite the miracles associated with the Miraculous Medal, many people don’t believe it can make such a difference. Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J., an American priest, was one of those people. Not long after he had been ordained, a Vincentian priest encouraged him and others to promote the Miraculous Medal―because Blessed Mother really does work miracles through it. Although Fr. Hardon ordered a free pamphlet on how to bless the medals and enroll people in the Confraternity of the Miraculous Medal, he didn’t get one for himself. But later, in 1948, when the American priest encountered a ten-year-old boy, who was in a coma after a sledding accident, he decided to see if the Miraculous Medal would help. A sister who worked at the hospital found one and a ribbon the priest could use to hang it around the boy’s neck. Even though the boy had been diagnosed with inoperable permanent brain damage, the priest read the prayer that enrolled the boy in the Confraternity of the Miraculous Medal. As soon as he finished the prayer, the boy opened his eyes and asked his mother for ice cream. It was the first time he had spoken in nearly two weeks. New x-rays showed the brain damage had disappeared, and the boy was released from the hospital after about three days. Like the boy and his family, the Fr. Hardon’s life and his belief in the medal were forever changed.
You can read of more Miraculous Medal miracles by clicking here
Rosary Miracles
► LEPANTO ― The Battle of Lepanto, in 1571, was a crucial conflict between the defending Christians and the invading Ottoman Turks―one of the greatest naval battles of all time. The Christian lands around Greece and the Eastern Mediterranean were constantly getting attacked and sacked by Muslim pirates, and Ottoman warships were capturing Christian ships and enslaving vast numbers of sailors. Knowing the odds for victory were poor, Pope Saint Pius V called on the Catholic powers of Europe to unite in a crusade against the enemy threatening Christendom. After raising a crusade, he asked every non-combatant across the whole Christian world to pray the Rosary.
Even after this call to arms, the Christian fleet at Lepanto was greatly outnumbered by the Ottoman Turks. On the morning of the battle, the Christian forces all attended the Holy Sacrifice of Mass on their respective ships and received absolution. Before sailing into battle, the Christian soldiers and sailors spent several hours praying the Rosary. When they sailed to battle, the wind was against them―but then, miraculously, it changed and was now behind them―and now blowing against the Muslim fleet, hindering their progress and maneuvers. As the battle unfolded, the Muslims were yelling, screaming, and banging anything that would make noise. In contrast, the Christians kept an ominous silence, weapons in one hand, and Rosaries in the other. Soon after, the Christians and the Muslims were immersed in a bloody battle. The commander of the Christian fleet, Don Juan of Austria, valiantly led the Christians from the bridge of his flagship. The Muslims took aim at the large crucifix on the main deck of his vessel, but as the cannonball approached, the body of Our Lord and the crucifix miraculously turned to avoid the collision.
Muslim chroniclers of the battle also reported seeing, in the sky, a lady dressed in armor holding a child, and with a terrible gaze. As another point of interest, Admiral Andrea Doria carried a small image of Our Lady of Guadalupe into battle. This image is now venerated in the Church of San Stefano in Aveto, Italy. Terrified at the sight, the Turks began to lose control of the fleet, and the Christians pressed the attack. Thus it was that on October 7th, 1571, the Christian fleet was blessed with a miraculous victory. [read our multi-part series here]
Pope Pius V was blessed with a vision of the victory at Lepanto―even before he had received news from the returning fleet―and ordered public processions in thanksgiving. While in the Vatican, hundreds of miles away from battle, the good Pope is said to have suddenly stood up at the moment of victory, gone over to a window and exclaimed: “The Christian fleet is victorious!” When messengers arrived in Rome a week later to report the victory of the Christian fleet, they were quite surprised to find everyone already knew the outcome, the Holy Pontiff ordering all the bells in the city rung to announce the news. He immediately credited the victory to Our Lady, establishing October 7th as the feast of the Most Holy Rosary.
► SATANIST CONVERTED ― Bartolo Longo was born in 1841 to a devout Catholic family. During this period, there was a strong nationalistic movement in Italy and much anti-clericalism. When Bartolo grew up, he decided to study law. Naples at that time was undergoing a tremendous spiritual crisis. Many of his college professors were ex-priests who had a negative view of the Catholic Church. Paganism and Satanism of all sorts were abounding. Bartolo was not immune to these influences and started to dabble in the occult, eventually embracing Satanism. He was consecrated a Satanic priest and promised his soul to a demon. To his family’s dismay―who tried their hardest to get him to convert―he preached against the Catholic Faith and presided over blasphemous rituals.
However, Satanism began to torment his mind, and his family convinced him to make a good confession. His mental and physical health deteriorated and he sought help from a saintly Dominican priest, Fr. Alberto Radente, who helped lead him back to the Catholic Faith and encouraged his devotion to the Rosary. During this time, Bartolo had a miraculous conversion and, in 1870, he became a third order Dominican and chose to live a life in penance for all the terrible sins he had committed against the Church.
Nevertheless, Bartolo was still plagued with guilt about his past life, in particular making the promise of giving his soul to a demon. One day, he nearly succumbed to the sin of despair―feeling that God could never forgive the terrible sins he had committed against the Church. Doubting that God would forgive him, nearly drove him to suicide. But then he remembered a homily he had heard on the power of the Rosary. At that moment he received divine inspiration and remembered the Blessed Virgin’s promise that she would help in all their necessities those who would propagate her Rosary. As he later wrote: “Falling to my knees, I exclaimed: ‘If your words are true―that he who propagates your Rosary will be saved―then I shall attain salvation, because I shall not leave this Earth without propagating your Rosary!’”
He set out to restore the dilapidated chapel at Pompeii and to promote the Rosary to whoever would listen. Pamphlets about the Rosary were distributed to help the people learn to pray this powerful devotion. He tried to find an image of Our Lady of the Rosary worthy of hanging in the chapel, but was only offered a worm-eaten painting with an image that he felt was coarse and not worthy of veneration, however he accepted it from the convent in which it was stored. As Bartolo continued his work of propagating the Rosary, the chapel’s membership grew tremendously and many miracles began to be associated with Our Lady of Pompeii. Cures and spiritual conversions occurred due to the devotions through this new shrine. The people pledged their support to have a large church built that would properly honor Our Lady of the Rosary. Bartolo spent the rest of his life promoting this prayer and built the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary in Pompeii, which would become Italy’s premier Rosary shrine. In 1894, Bartolo and his wife gave the church over to the care of the Vatican.
Bartolo died on October 5th, 1926. The original image, which he had found in the convent, was restored for the last time in 1965 and the pope crowned the heads of Jesus and Mary with diadems donated by the people of Pompeii. On October 26th, 1980, Bartolo Longo was beatified by John Paul II, who called him “the man of the Madonna” and the “Apostle of the Rosary.”
► ROSARY PRIEST CURED ― Praying the Rosary led to a miraculous cure for Fr. Patrick Peyton, the famous “Rosary Priest”. Fr. Patrick Peyton was born on January 9th, 1909, in County Mayo, Ireland. He was the sixth child among a family of nine children. At age 19 he and his brother, Tom, emigrated to the United States. He wanted to become a priest, but his family in Ireland could not financially afford the required education.
He moved in with his sister Nellie and obtained a job working as a janitor at St. Stanislaus Cathedral in Pennsylvania. With help from Monsignor Paul Kelley, Patrick was able to pursue his schooling to become a priest. He entered the seminary at the Congregation of Holy Cross in Notre Dame, Indiana in 1932.
In October, 1938, at the age of 29, he started coughing blood and doctors discovered he had advanced stages of tuberculosis―which was incurable in those days. His sister Nellie encouraged him to ask our Holy Mother for help. Patrick consecrated himself completely to the Blessed Virgin Mary and devoted himself to praying the Rosary. To the astonishment of his doctors, he was soon completely and miraculously cured. The doctors discovered that the patches on his lungs had disappeared with no scientific explanation. With this miraculous cure, through the Rosary of our Holy Mother, Father Peyton vowed to Mary that he would promote the Rosary for the rest of his life.
Finally, on June 15th, 1941, Father Patrick Peyton was ordained a priest. He became one of the first evangelizers to use the electronic media to spread the word of God on radio and then television, the Holy Rosary and, in particular, encouraging families to regularly pray the Rosary together. Father Peyton coined the phrase: “The family that prays together, stays together.”
Father Patrick Peyton died peacefully on June 3rd, 1992 holding a Rosary in his hands. The cause for his sainthood began on June 1st, 2001. His cause for canonization is underway.
► CANADIAN SQUADRON PROTECTED IN WORLD WAR II ― Here is an account on how the Rosary saved an entire Air Force Squadron in the Second World War. The following story was recounted to the Dominican priest, Fr. Gabriel Harty, by a non-Catholic devotee of the Rosary from Canada.
It was May, 1940, and we joined the Air Force in late September. We were grouped into squadrons. About thirty to fifty men made up a squadron, along with the squadron leader―who gave all the orders and kept us functioning in unity. They told us that we were going overseas and would be in action right away. We eagerly awaited our new squadron leader. As an officer he would, we believed, go straight to the officers quarters. However, this squadron leader, Stan Fulton, in full uniform, headed for our bunk house, where he settled in with the rest of us. He threw his bag on an upper bunk. Wow! Our squadron leader, an officer, sleeping here with us! We liked him at once and our liking and our admiration grew each day.
That first night he knelt on the floor and prayed his Rosary in silence. Astounded, we were struck dumb. When he finished, he looked at us with his friendly smile and said, “I hope you guys don’t mind a fellow saying some prayers―because, where we’re going, we’re going to need them!” Next night, he repeated his prayer session. Although our group had been together for six months at least, I had never seen anyone kneel in prayer, and had no idea that any of our group was Catholic. The third night three of our companions joined Fulton in saying the Rosary. The rest of us did not understand, but we kept a respectful silence. We weren’t slow, however, on the pick-up. Soon we were all answering the Hail Marys and Our Fathers. In this way, we ended each day in prayer. Shortly enough, we were to begin a series of night raids from England over Germany. The evening before, Fulton gave each of us a Rosary. “We shall be in some tight situations, but if you agree to keep the Rosary with you and to say it, then I promise you that Our Lady will bring you all back safe!”
“Sure thing!” we replied―little thinking that we would be in action for four years, and often in dreadful danger. At such times, Fulton’s voice would ring through each plane, “Hail Mary…” and we would devoutly respond! We must have said hundreds of Rosaries in the skies. Ours was the ONLY squadron that had not lost a plane, nor a single life. We said nothing―but we treasured our secret weapon. We did survive, too! All the squadron returned to Canada in 1945, fully convinced that Our Lady had taken care of us. So I never forget to keep my Rosary with me and say it every day―although I am not a Catholic. When I change my trousers, the first thing I transfer―even before my wallet―is my Rosary.
► HIROSHIMA ― In the final stages of the Second World War, around 8:15 a.m., on August 6th, 1945, an American Boeing B-29 Super-Fortress bomber, christened “Enola Gay”, dropped the first atomic bomb in history over Hiroshima in Japan. The atomic blast generated an unimaginable ground heat of 10,832°F (6,000°C) and a tremendous wind at the sonic speed of 2.7 miles (4.4 kilometers) per second (over 9,700 miles per hour). Everything within a 1.2 mile radius of the hypocenter was annihilated, instantly killing 140,000 people. Concrete buildings collapsed into pieces and broken glass was thrown through the air as far as 10 miles away. The atomic radiation generated by the bomb was so unbelievably strong, that many persons outside of the range, who were exposed to it, lost all bodily functions, their cells underwent apoptosis ― a kind of cell suicide ― and they died within days. Between the blast itself, the resulting fires throughout the city and the radiation burns, some estimate that 200,000 citizens of Hiroshima lost their lives.
Yet, in the midst of burned bodies, charred skeletons, and structural damage, just eight blocks from ground zero (around half-a-mile), a two storey Catholic presbytery miraculously remained intact. When an investigation was made, it was discovered that there survived a community of eight German Jesuit priests who were all found unscathed, with only a few comparatively minor injuries. Among the survivors were Jesuit priests named Hugo Lassalle, Hubert Schiffer, Wilhelm Kleinsorge, Paul Ruge and Hubert Cieslik.
Father Hubert Schiffer, who headed the community, was 30 years old when the atomic bomb exploded at Hiroshima and he lived another 33 years in good health to tell of the miracle. The same can be said of the other seven priests of the community. Aside from some slight surface abrasions or scratches, they all lived out their days in full health with no radiation sickness, no loss of hearing, or any other visible long term defects, or cancer from radiation. Over the years, Father Schiffer was thoroughly examined and questioned by more than 200 scientists, who were unable to explain how he and his companions had survived the atomic blast. He attributed the miracle to the protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary. He declared: “I was in the middle of the atomic explosion and I am still here alive and well. I was not struck down by its destruction.” Furthermore, for several years, hundreds of experts and investigators continued to study and investigate the scientific reasons as to why the presbytery was not affected, and, when asked, Father Schiffer remarked each time: “We believe that we survived because we were living the Message of Fatima. We lived and prayed the Rosary daily in that home.”
To put into proper scientific perspective just how bewildering this survival tale is, consider the expert testimony of Dr. Stephen Rinehart, a nuclear physicist with the U.S. Department of Defense. He said: “Their residence should have been utterly destroyed (with a temperature of at least 2,000 Fahrenheit and air blast pressures of 100 pounds per square inch (psi). Unreinforced masonry, or brick walls (representative of commercial construction), are destroyed at pressures of 3 pounds per square inch (3 psi), which will also cause car damage and burst windows. At 10 psi, a human will experience severe lung and heart damage, burst eardrums and at 20 psi your limbs can be blown off. Your head will be blown off by 40 psi and no residential or unreinforced commercial construction would be left standing. At 80 psi even reinforced concrete is heavily damaged and no human would be alive because your skull would be crushed. All the cotton clothes would be on fire at 350 F (probably at 275 F) and your lungs would be inoperative within a minute breathing air (even for a few seconds) at these temperatures.”
The expected outcome described by this expert, in fact, perfectly describes what occurred in the area immediately surrounding the Jesuit rectory. One of the survivors priests said years later, in his recollection of the event, that after the nuclear blast occurred, he had opened his eyes and found himself laying on the ground. He looked around and there was NOTHING in any direction: the railroad station and buildings in all directions were leveled to the ground. The only physical harm to himself was that he could feel a few pieces of glass in the back of his neck. As far as he could tell, there was nothing else physically wrong. There are no physical laws to explain why the Jesuits were untouched in the Hiroshima air blast. All who were at this range from the epicenter should have received enough radiation to be dead within at most a matter of minutes if nothing else happened to them. There is no known way to design a uranium-235 atomic bomb, which could leave such a large discrete area intact while destroying everything around it immediately outside the fireball. From a scientific viewpoint, what happened to those Jesuits at Hiroshima still defies all human logic from the laws of physics as understood today (or at any time in the future). It must be concluded that some other external force was present whose power and/or capability to transform energy and matter as it relates to humans is beyond current comprehension. As Fr. Hubert Schiffer, one of Hiroshima priest survivors, said: “Prayer is more powerful than the atom bomb!”
► AUSTRIA FREED FROM COMMUNIST INVADERS ― The key player here is Father Petrus Pavlicek, who was born in Austria on January 6th, 1902. As a young boy, he felt called to the religious life, but grew indifferent in later years―eventually falling away from the Faith by the age of 19 and then leading a wild sinful life. In 1935, during a grave illness, he received the grace of conversion, resolving once again to embrace his vocation. On December 14th, 1941, he was ordained a priest of the Capuchin Order. In 1942, on May 13th, the Feast of Our Lady of Fatima, 1942, he was arrested by the German Gestapo for a supposed military-forces draft evasion and was brought to a court martial. The process ended with an acquittal ― but he was nevertheless forcefully conscripted into the German Army. On October 7th, the feast of the Holy Rosary, he was sent to the Western Front as a paramedic. On August 15th, 1944, the feast of the Assumption, he was captured by Americans and became a prisoner of war. It was during imprisonment that he first learned about Our Lady’s apparitions and messages at Fatima. Released on July 16th, 1945, the Feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, he went to Austria as a missionary. In 1946, on February 2nd― the feast of the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple and the Purification of Our Lady ― he went on pilgrimage to principal Marian shrine of Mariazell in Austria, to thank Mary for her protection in gratitude for the fortunate return home from the Second World War. It was at the shrine that he heard an interior voice, which said to him: “Do, as I say, and there will be peace!” These words reminded him of the message of Fatima―and so he founded, in February 1947, the Crusade of Reparation of the Holy Rosary for Peace in the World.
It was right after the Second World War (1939-1945) that much of Austria came under Communist control. After the war, Austria was divided up by the Allies―America, France, the United Kingdom, and Russia. The eastern half of Austria was handed over to be controlled by the Russian Communists. In 1947, with his country at the mercy of atheistic Soviet Marxism, Fr. Pavlicek began gathering people―in villages, towns and cities across Soviet controlled Austria―on the 13th of each month to pray the Rosary together in public, and he called it the Rosary Crusade. From 1947 until 1955, Fr. Pavlicek conducted public Rosary processions and rallies on the 13th of each month. Many people gathered at first, but often they could not sustain their spiritual practices, so the Rosary Crusade ebbed and flowed ― but Fr. Pavlicek persevered in his confidence in Our Lady. From September of 1948, every month in the Franciscan church of Vienna, there took place ceremonies for peace. From 1949, Fr. Pavlicek published a periodical, which is named “Betendes Gottesvolk” today. From 1950 to 1955, he organized, in the month of September, the yearly procession of the Holy Name of Mary (feast day September 12th) in the Vienna Ring Road. By 1955, eight years later, despite the initial resistance of Austria’s Catholic Church to Fr. Pavlicek’s “Rosary Atonement Crusade”, more than a half million Austrians (out of a 1955 Austrian population of around 7 million―therefore 1 out of 14 persons) had pledged to pray the Rosary every day, begging for the conversion of sinners, peace in the world, and freedom in Austria. Tens of thousands of Catholics, both clergy and laity, and even politicians, were seen marching in the streets, praying the Rosary and bearing votive candles for the intention of peace in the world.
Throughout this time the politicians conducted more than 260 peace conferences in the effort to remove the Soviets from power. But these efforts only ended with the Russians tightening their iron grip on Austria. Man alone does not have the power to change the course of history or bring peace. This is a job for the Queen of Peace. But she asks our cooperation in praying the daily Rosary. The Cold War intensified, and Communism refined its methods of religious persecution in Austria. It seemed that God wanted to test the Faith of those who had prayed so zealously for their country’s freedom. Their Faith having been sufficiently tested, the grace was finally given. On March 24th, 1955, the eve of the feast of the Annunciation, the Russian Communist governors invited the Austrians to a conference. Believing that his nation’s future would be sealed in Moscow, Prime Minister Raab entreated Father Pavlicek before his departure: “Please pray ― and ask your people to pray harder than ever!” To the world’s surprise, the Soviets signed the Austrian State Treaty guaranteeing the independence of Austria, by which they and the Allied Powers ended their post-war occupation of Austria, and stated they would withdraw their troops from Austria in just three months. On May 15th, during the Month of Mary, the Soviets signed a treaty. And on October 26th, 1955, very fittingly and appropriately during the month of the Holy Rosary, the last Russian soldier left the occupied eastern sector of Austria.
Basically, it was a large spiritual army of lay people, led by a priest, that had peacefully overcome the might of Communist Russia. That is the power of the Holy Rosary! What was achieved back then, can also be achieved today! However, it took almost 10% of the population to pray the Rosary and they had to pray and wait for over seven years before their prayers were answered and granted! Do we have the same tenacity and perseverance today?
► COMMUNISTS DRIVEN OUT IN BRAZIL ― In the late 1950s and start of the 1960s, the world was in a state of fear and confusion. Russia was trying to make headway in converting as many countries as possible to Communism under their rule. Impoverished nations, with corrupt governments in turmoil, were easy targets. Cuba had just fallen to the Soviets in 1960, and Brazil was another planned conquest. The president of Brazil, Joao Goulart, began to embrace Communism and began pushing for a Communist form of government. He started to install known Communists into high governmental positions, while at the same time dispatching representatives throughout the country to convince the citizens that Communism was good for the country.
With Catholicism still strong in the country, Cardinal de Barros Camara told people, through a weekly radio address, that by following the directives of Our Lady of Fatima regarding prayer and penance, Brazil could overthrow the Communist threat. In a speech, President Goulart mocked the Rosary, saying that governmental control―not reciting the prayers of the Rosary―would save the economy from collapse. During this time, he was lining his pockets with dollars given to Brazil in foreign aid from the U.S. and other countries.
A fifty-nine-year-old retired Brazilian woman schoolteacher, named Dona Amelia Bastos, was very concerned about this imminent danger. Her husband belonged to a group of men called the Anti-Reds, who were opposed to Communism in Brazil. One night Dona Amelia listened as the Anti-Reds discussed the threat facing their beloved country. She decided that she too could do something about it. Of her decision, she said: “I suddenly decided that politics had become too important to be left entirely to the men. Moreover, who has more at stake in what’s happening to our country than we women?”
She immediately formed a group called Campaign of Women for Democracy (CAMDE) and started to recruit as many people as possible to pray the Rosary in large groups, to thwart the plan for Communist takeover. In a town called Belo Horizonte, a group of 20,000 women, reciting the Rosary aloud, broke up a pro-Communist rally. The success of this peaceful protest fed the impetus for the Catholic women to do more.
With the help of Heaven and the strong influence of Archbishop Cardinal de Barros Camara, Dona Amelia recruited an amazing number of 600,000 women who marched in Sao Paulo to pray the Rosary for peace. They called their protest, “March of the Family with God Toward Freedom” under the declaration, “Mother of God, preserve us from the fate and suffering of the martyred women of Cuba, Poland, Hungary, and other enslaved nations.” Leone Brizola, a Communist high government official, left in a rage when his planned speech was thwarted by the rattling of 3,000 Rosaries and the murmuring of the prayers in the assembly hall. Not one life was lost in this most amazing peaceful anti-Communist protest, which is described by many witnesses as: “One of the most moving demonstrations in Brazilian History.” Many more Rosary rallies were held in major cities, in spite of threats of military action against the crusading women. Under this mounting pressure, on April 1st, 1964, President Goulart fled the country along with many members of the government.
► CORRUPT GOVERNMENT OVERTHROWN ― In the Philippines, the corrupt Marcos regime was defeated entirely through peaceful means in 1986. While their political leaders were living in luxury, many of the Philippine people were poor and some were starving. To this day people make jokes about Imelda Marcos’s shoes―because she had 3,000 pairs of shoes, along with 15 mink coats, 1,000 purses, and 508 fancy gowns. The people sought to elect a new leader―Benigno Aquino―but he was assassinated, right in front of his wife and family, as he stepped off a plane to run for office in Manila. After this brutal murder, Ninoy’s wife, Corazon “Cory” Aquino, became active in protests against the Marcos regime and one million people signed a petition for his widow, Corazon Aquino, to run for presidency in her assassinated husband’s place. She fulfilled the people’s wishes.
President Marcos called a snap election day on February 7th, 1986 which turned out to be a bloody, violent, and fraud-filled event. President Marcos―declared the winner by his corrupt government―took control of the media and sent out the military to quell any protests. Cardinal Sin, of the Archdiocese of Manila, urged a peaceful protest and the Catholic people came out in droves. They surrounded the military tanks and armed soldiers, prayed the Rosary, and sang religious hymns and protest songs. Holy Masses and prayer vigils took place in churches. This prayerful protest continued for almost a week when, unexpectedly, the soldiers stepped away from their tanks, put down their guns, and joined the peaceful crowd.
President Marcos fled the country on February 26th, 1986, and the whole nation took to the streets in celebration. Prayers of thanksgiving and holy Masses were held in gratitude to God. As the new President, Cory Aquino made sweeping changes and the Philippines became a free and democratic country. To this day people are in awe that the evil, corrupt regime of Marcos was completely overturned through peaceful means.
In one account of the events, Sister Ocariza and 16 other nuns, standing in pairs, led the Rosary as soldiers escorted rolling military tanks with their turrets trained on the sisters. The nun said staring down those tanks has been the scariest experience of her life. “I said, ‘Lord forgive me for all my sins and even the offenses of our Filipino people.’ If really the tanks would crush us, at least the two of us … kill us sisters, not the people, because we (did not) want bloodshed! I love my country!” But the tanks stopped, and the soldiers joined the protesters reciting the Rosary, that was really a miracle! Sister Ocariza said that God peacefully delivered them from the hands of a dictator and saved the country from what would have ultimately provoked a violent reaction. She said she looked back to that time as a source of courage and a reminder to stand for what is right always. The Chicago Tribune reported: “Instead of guns, there were prayers; instead of bloodshed, celebrations; instead of casualties, converts, guns fell to Rosaries in Philippine Revolution.”
► SAVED FROM MURDER ― Ted Bundy was one of the worst serial killers in history. On the night of January 15th, 1978, at 3:00 am, Ted Bundy entered the Chi Omega sorority house at Florida State University and murdered two girls before heading off to search for more victims. He entered a third room, but dropped his bat and fled when he saw a girl clutching a Rosary in her hands.
Later the girl told authorities that before she left for college she had promised her worried grandmother that she would pray the Rosary every night for protection, even if she fell asleep in the process. This is what she had done that night, and she was still holding the Rosary when the murderer entered her room.
Bundy later confessed to over thirty murders. When Bundy was awaiting his execution, he asked for a priest. The priest, Fr. Esper, asked him what happened that night. Bundy said he intended to murder the girl, but “some mysterious power prevented him.”
Father Joseph M. Esper says in his book, With Mary to Jesus: “Ironically, when Ted Bundy was on death row, awaiting execution for his crimes, he asked Monsignor Kerr to serve as a spiritual counselor, and the priest took the opportunity to ask about that terrible night. Bundy explained that when he entered the girl’s room, he had fully intended on murdering her; some mysterious power was preventing him.”
Father Esper adds: “And not only does it (the Rosary) aid our own spiritual growth ― it also undermines the kingdom of Satan.” The famous Vatican exorcist Father Gabriele Amorth testified: “One day a colleague of mine heard the devil say during an exorcism, ‘Every Hail Mary is like a blow on my head. If Christians knew how powerful the Rosary was, it would be my end!’”
► ROSARY IN AFRICA ― There are many online testimonials recounting miraculous escapes from danger and death by virtue of fidelity to the Rosary. During the 1994 Rwandan genocide, Immaculée Ilibagiza, and seven other women, spent ninety-one days hidden in the cramped bathroom of a local pastor’s house. Immaculée believed that praying the Rosary spared her from being slaughtered during the genocide, in which her family and more than a million other innocent people were brutally murdered. As well as physical protection, she also recounts the amazing spiritual benefits brought to her by the prayer during this time.
Another instance is that of Father Valentine Ezeagu, who was driving through Imo state in Nigeria, on December 15th, 2020, on the way to his father’s funeral, when he was ambushed by four armed men. The priest was unexpectedly freed thirty-six hours later. Reporting his release to his religious superior, Father Ezeagu said the abductors had let him go after seeing him pray the Rosary. Speaking to Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), Father George Okorie, Superior General of the Congregation of the Sons of Mary, Mother of Mercy, said: “When I spoke to Father Valentine, he told me that seeing him praying the Rosary made his abductors confused … They started having a guilty conscience. It made them realize that, since he was wearing a cassock, they had not got the right person, so they gave him some food and released him.”
► THE ROSARY CAN EVEN SAVE YOU! As you no doubt know―very few souls get to Heaven. Will you be one of the few? No matter how bad you are or have been, the Rosary can save you too! This is what St. Louis de Montfort says on the matter in his book The Secret of the Rosary―take it to heart:
“If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins ‘you shall receive a never‑fading crown of glory’ (1 Peter 5:4). Even if you are on the brink of damnation; even if you have one foot in Hell; even if you have sold your soul to the devil, as sorcerers do who practice black magic; and even if you are a heretic as obstinate as a devil―sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and save your soul, if—and mark well what I say--if you say the Rosary devoutly every day, until death, for the purpose of knowing the truth and obtaining contrition and pardon for your sins! In this book there are several stories of great sinners who were converted through the power of the Rosary. Please read and meditate upon them. Never will anyone be able to understand the marvelous riches of sanctification which are contained in the prayers and mysteries of the Holy Rosary. It gradually brings us a perfect knowledge of Jesus Christ; it purifies our souls from sin; it gives us victory over all our enemies; it makes the practice of virtue easy; it sets us on fire with the love of Our Lord; it enriches us with graces and merits; it supplies us with what is needed to pay all our debts to God and to our fellow‑men, and, finally, it obtains all kinds of graces from God.
“When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone, a man was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people. The devils, who were in possession of this wretched man, were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions in spite of themselves. They said: ‘This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots; breaks our snares; and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death―and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards―are saved by her intercession! Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned―because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins, by which they obtain pardon and mercy!’
“Are you in the miserable state of sin? Then call on Mary! … Are you groping in the darkness of ignorance and error? Go to Mary! … Are you in sorrow? Turn to Mary! … Have you lost the state of grace? The Blessed Virgin will give you some of her graces! … Are you alone, having lost God’s protection? Pray to Mary! … Have you become an outcast and been accursed by God? Our Lady will bless you! … Do you hunger for the bread of grace and the bread of life? Draw near to her!
“Catholics, who bear the mark of God’s reprobation, think but little of the Rosary. They either neglect to say it, or only say it quickly and in a lukewarm manner. It is a good thing to think over how we should pray if we want to please God and become more holy. To say the Holy Rosary with advantage one must be in a state of grace, or at least be fully determined to give up sin―for all our theology teaches us that good works and prayers are dead works if they are done in a state of mortal sin.
“Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all―so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention, they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin. The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary, is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said―especially when we have promised to say it regularly or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary! They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment―and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!
“In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary―but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer, would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us, if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? How can we expect Him to be pleased if, while in the presence of His tremendous majesty, we give in to distractions, like a child running after a butterfly? People who do that forfeit God’s blessing, which is changed into a curse for having treated the things of God disrespectfully: ‘Cursed be the one who does God’s work negligently’ (Jeremias 48:10). Of course, you cannot say your Rosary without having a few involuntary distractions; it is even difficult to say a Hail Mary without your imagination troubling you a little, for it is never still; but you can say it without voluntary [deliberate] distractions.”
Can You See? Have Your Realized?
Hopefully―if you are still awake―you can see the immense power of Sacramentals. The above listed “tip-of-the-iceberg” of miracles that Sacramentals have produced―and it really is merely the tip-of-the-iceberg of millions of miracles both great and small―has hopefully enkindled in you a similar hope for such miracles in the future to protect and benefit you and your nearest and dearest. God is good! As Our Lady of La Salette said―speaking of our current “End Times” which Our Lady of Fatima affirmed we have entered: “God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other! Yet God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will!” These “End Times” will also be “Sacramental Times” ― which will contribute to the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Our Lady has repeatedly and forcefully spoken of and placed before our eyes the purpose, usefulness and power of Sacramentals. The Rosary in particular and Prayer in general are Sacramentals―and Our Lady clearly stated: “The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much—very much! … Pray with fervor! … With the Rosary, pray for the pope, the bishops, and the pries!” (Akita). At Fatima, it was the same message: “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war!” (May 1917) … “Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war … (June 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted!” (July 1917) … “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (August 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war!” (September 1917) … “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” (October 1917).
The Brown Scapular―and all blessed Scapulars―are Sacramentals. It is to be noted and not forgotten that, at her final apparition at Fatima, on October 13th, 1917, Our Lady appeared as Our Lady of Mount Carmel and held out a Brown Scapular to the people. Sister Lucia said that the Blessed Mother wants everyone to wear it: “Our Lady never looked so beautiful as when she appeared in her Carmelite habit! Our Lady held the Scapular in her hands because she wants us all to wear it. Our Lady wants everyone to wear it―for it is the sign of consecration to her Immaculate Heart. The Scapular and the Rosary are inseparable!”
There will come a time―and it has already begun―when priests will be scarcer and scarcer. Therefore the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Holy Eucharist, Confession, Extreme Unction and the other Sacraments will become scarcer and scarcer. Blessings will be scarcer because there will no priests to bless things. In a family, when the husband dies, then the wife has to take over many, if not all of his duties, and perform them the best that she can. Likewise, when the Sacraments (the husband) become scarce and rare, then the Sacramentals (the wife) will have to do what they can to make up for the missing Sacraments.
Now is the Time! Now is the Hour! Where are Your Sacramentals?
In light of all this, and in light of what is currently happening in our world of darkness, it seems that now is the time and now is the hour to “prep” our Sacramentals and stock-up on Sacramentals. Yes―God can perform miracles without using anybody or anything―but, as the Church teaches: “God does not do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices!” Our Lady has repeatedly brought and placed Sacramentals before our blind eyes! Why? To instruct of their existence and power and to encourage us to use them.
In 1830, at the Rue du Bac in Paris, France, Our Lady appeared to St. Catherine Labouré and showed her the design for the “Miraculous Medal” (the Medal of the Immaculate Conception is its proper name)―which is, of course, a Sacramental―stating that she wanted this medal to be made and worn by everyone, adding: “Have a Medal struck after this model. All who wear it will receive great graces; they should wear it around the neck. Graces will abound for persons who wear it with confidence.”
In 1846, at La Salette in France, Our Lady insisted upon another Sacramental―which is prayer.
In 1858, at Lourdes, Our Lady placed the focus on water―not only the miraculous holy water of Lourdes, but also the holy water in general, which is a Sacramental of the Church.
In 1917, at Fatima in Portugal, the focus was primarily on the Sacramental of the Holy Rosary, and secondarily upon the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.
Penances―such as abstinence and fasting―are also Sacramentals, and Our Lady has insisted on penance and sacrifice at all of her apparitions.
Other commonly used Sacramentals are holy water, blessed oil, blessed candles, various approved scapulars, and many approved medals, such as the St. Benedict Medal, which is the oldest and most highly indulgenced of all Sacramental objects. But the term covers much more. Apart from the Sacraments and the public prayer of the Church (divine office and five litanies), blessings of ashes and palms, blessed foods, and even the Confiteors and Creeds and the giving of alms can all be considered as Sacramentals.
Heaven has given us weapons galore―it is for us to take them and use them. God will do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices―and the Sacramentals are for us the ordinary sources of actual graces and even miracles.
Article 13
The Third Sunday of Lent, March 3rd
Sacramentals & Demons
The Third Sunday of Lent, March 3rd
Sacramentals & Demons
What are Sacramentals?
A Sacramental is a sacred object, or religious action, which the Catholic Church―in imitation of the Sacraments―uses for the purpose of obtaining spiritual favors, especially through her prayer. A Sacramental is anything set apart or blessed by the Church, to excite good thoughts and to help devotion, and thus secure grace to help us avoid mortal sins, and also take away venial sin, or the temporal punishment due to sin.
Let us compare and contrast the Sacraments and the Sacramentals:
(1) The Sacraments were instituted by Christ Himself; the Sacramentals were founded by Christ’s Church.
(2) The Sacraments are limited to the seven Sacraments instituted by Christ―namely, Baptism, Confirmation, Confession, Holy Eucharist, Extreme Unction, Holy Orders and Matrimony; whereas the Sacramentals are not a fixed number, but are numerous, varied and can increase in number, according to the directions of Holy Mother Church.
(3) The Sacraments produce grace directly in the soul, if there is no obstacle on the part of the recipient; the Sacramentals do not produce grace directly and of themselves―they produce grace indirectly by disposing and preparing the soul for this divine gift of grace.
(4) The words used in the Sacraments, except in Extreme Unction, positively declare that God is producing certain effects in the soul; the prayers used in the Sacramentals merely ask God to produce certain effects and to grant certain graces.
(5) The Sacraments give or increase sanctifying grace; and the Sacramentals are the means to actual graces.
We might divide the Sacramentals into prayers, pious objects, sacred signs, and religious ceremonies. Some Sacramentals are a combination―they fall into two or more classes. The Rosary, for example, is a blessed object and a prayer. The Sign of the Cross is a prayer and a sign. The Crucifix, pictures and statues are blessed objects. Certain ceremonies, performed in the various Sacraments, are also Sacramentals, like the extending of the hands in Confirmation; or the giving of blessed salt in Baptism; or anointing with Holy Oil in Baptism; giving the newly ordained priest a blessed candle during the ordination ceremony, etc.
How can mere material things help us on the way to Heaven? How can water, metal, wax, plaster, stone, or a piece of cloth help us fight demons and save our souls? You must ever remember that these objects in themselves have no power to save or help us. It would be superstitious to say they had any such power in themselves and by themselves. But things like blessed Crucifixes, holy pictures, statues, candles, etc.―besides being holy objects that demons detest―also can and do excite spiritual thoughts and feelings in those who use them correctly. They excite the fear and love of God; they arouse trust and hope in His mercy; they awaken sorrow and joy in the Lord. Their value lies in the fact that they have been set aside and sanctified (blessed) by the Church for sacred purposes, by the power of the Church’s official prayer, and by the merits of Christ, preserved and distributed by His Church.
Are Sacramentals Important?
Obviously Sacramentals are not as important as the Sacraments―yet they nevertheless very important, as you will see later in this article. Our Lady reputedly will, one day, save the world through her Rosary and her Brown Scapular. This prediction occurred in Rome, in the 13th century. Three famous men of God met on a street corner in Rome. They were the friar, St. Dominic, busy gathering recruits to a new Religious Order of Preachers; the brother, St. Francis of Assisi, the founder of another religious order, the Franciscans; and St. Angelus of Jerusalem, a Caremlite, who had been invited to Rome from Mount Carmel, in Palestine, because of his fame as a preacher. At their chance meeting, by the light of the Holy Spirit each of the three men recognized each other and, in the course of their conversation (as recorded by various followers who were present), they made prophecies to each other. Saint Angelus foretold the stigmata of Saint Francis, and Saint Dominic said: “One day, Brother Angelus, to your Order of Carmel the Most Blessed Virgin Mary will give a devotion to be known as the Brown Scapular, and to my Order of Preachers she will give a devotion to be known as the Rosary. AND ONE DAY, THROUGH THE ROSARY AND THE SCAPULAR, SHE WILL SAVE THE WORLD.”
The above claim is no idle claim―as you will be see in the following short extract or “tip-of-the-iceberg” of miracles that have been witnessed through the use of various Sacramentals of the Church―such as the Brown Scapular, the Rosary, the Miraculous Medal, etc.
Demons and the Armor of God
In the Gospel for the Third Sunday of Lent (Extraordinary Rite/Traditional Rite) we read of Jesus casting out a demon from a possessed man: “At that time, Jesus was casting out a devil, and the same was dumb; and when He had cast out the devil, the dumb man spoke. And the crowds marveled. But some of them said, By Beelzebub, the prince of devils, He casts out devils. And others, to test Him, demanded from Him a sign from Heaven. But He, seeing their thoughts, said to them: ‘Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and house will fall upon house! If, then, Satan also is divided against himself, how shall his kingdom stand? You say that I cast out devils by Beelzebub. Now, if I cast out devils by Beelzebub, by whom do your children cast them out? Therefore they shall be your judges! But if I cast out devils by the finger of God, then the Kingdom of God has come upon you! When the strong man, fully armed, guards his courtyard, his property is undisturbed. But if a stronger than he attacks and overcomes him, he will take away all his weapons that he relied upon, and will divide his spoils. He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me scatters! When the unclean spirit has gone out of a man, he roams through waterless places in search of rest; and finding none, he says, “I will return to my house which I left.” And when he has come to it, he finds the place swept and clean. Then he goes and takes seven other spirits―more evil than himself―and they enter in and dwell there; and the last state of that man becomes worse that the first!’” (Luke 11:14-28).
Holy Scripture tells us to be well-armed and protected against the attacks of the demons: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places! Therefore take the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day--having your loins girt about with truth; having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the Gospel. In all things taking the shield of Faith, so that you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God. By all prayer praying at all times in the spirit!” (Ephesians 6:12-18).
Gross Hearts! Deaf Ears! Eyes Shut!
Have we shut our eyes and ears to the truths and weapons that God has given us? Has our heart grown gross, our minds grown dull? Do we hear the word of God without really hearing it, or understanding it? Do we see religious things, objects, ceremonies and actions without really grasping what they are all about? Are we only seeing the tip-of-the-iceberg of our Faith, without realizing the immensity beneath the waters? Are we so choked-up with the cares, pleasures and riches of the world that we fail to truly and fully understand our Faith, what it offers, and to profit from it? Is our understanding and estimation of the Faith so shallow that the Faith never really sprouts and establishes deep roots within our souls?
Such a blindness, grossness, remissness, forgetfulness and carelessness about the Faith results in serious damage and dreadful consequences. The tools of the Faith are unused and left to rust and decay. Souls that could and should be saved are damned. Souls that could become saints, languish in lukewarmness. Truths that could be planted, sprouted, enrooted and grown in our minds―suffer neglect or even rejection. Things that could help our safety and salvation, are ignored or refused―thus leading many souls to ruin and damnation. “For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!”
Our Lady pretty much said the same thing to Sister Lucia of Fatima, who reveals to us: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Avoiding Chastisements Through Sacramentals
The above words of Sister Lucia of Fatima about chastisements remind us of the chastisements that God inflicted upon Egypt in the time of Moses and the Exodus. Prior to the Exodus from Egypt by the Israelites, God chastised the land with ten successive plagues: (1) all the water turning to blood, (2) a plague of frogs, (3) lice or gnats, (4) flies, (5) a livestock pestilence, (6) a plague of boils, (7) hail, (8) locusts, (9) darkness and (10) the killing of firstborn children.
Of particular interest is God’s killing of the firstborn children within Egypt: “And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron: ‘Speak ye to the whole assembly of the children of Israel, and say to them: “On the tenth day of this month let every man take a lamb by their families and houses ... It shall be a lamb without blemish, a male, of one year … And you shall sacrifice it in the evening of the fourteenth day of this month … And they shall take of the blood of the lamb, and put it upon both the side posts, and on the upper door posts of the houses … And I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and will kill every firstborn in the land of Egypt both man and beast … And the blood shall be unto you for a sign in the houses where you shall be: and I shall see the blood, and shall pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I shall strike the land of Egypt .. And the children of Israel going forth did as the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron. And it came to pass at midnight, the Lord slew every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharao, who sat on his throne, unto the firstborn of the captive woman that was in the prison, and all the firstborn of cattle. And Pharao arose in the night, and all his servants, and all Egypt―for there was not a house wherein there lay not one dead” (Exodus 12:3-30).
The Sacramental of Blessed Chalk
You could say that smearing of the blood of lamb on the doorposts and lintel of the doors of the Israelite houses was a figure or type of today’s Sacramentals of the Catholic Church. For example, today we used the Sacramental of chalk blessed on the feast of the Epiphany to inscribe the numbers of the current calendar year (2023) and the letters C M B (which represent the names of the three magi or kings at Bethlehem―Caspar, Melchior and Balthazar) on the lintels of the doors of our houses. [download the rite, ceremony, blessings here: Epiphany Blessings for Chalk & Home & Water]
In blessing the Epiphany chalk, the priest prays: “O Lord God, bless this chalk which Thou hast created, that it may be helpful to mankind; and grant that, through the invocation of Thy most holy Name, all those who use this chalk, or with it write over the doors of their houses the names of Thy Saints—Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar—may by their merits and intercession receive health of body and protection of soul. Through Christ Our Lord. Amen.”
Then, immediately after chalking the doors, the priest prays: “O Lord, almighty God, bless this house that it may become a shelter of health, chastity, self-conquest, humility, goodness, mildness, obedience to the Commandments, and thanksgiving to God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Upon this house and those who dwell herein may Thy blessing remain forever. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
Similarly, in the traditional blessing of a house, with the prayers from the Roman Ritual, the priest prays: “Hear us, holy Lord, almighty Father, eternal God! And deign to send Thy holy Angel from Heaven to guard, cherish, protect, visit, and defend all who dwell in this home. Though Christ our Lord. Amen.” During Easter time, the prayer reads as follows: “Hear us, holy Lord, Father almighty, eternal God! And as in their departure from Egypt Thou didst guard the homes of the Israelites from the avenging Angel, if they were smeared with blood―prefiguring our Pasch in which Christ is slain―so likewise send Thy holy Angel from Heaven to guard, cherish, protect, visit, and defend all who dwell in this house. Though the same Christ our Lord. Amen.”
Ask your priest for some blessed Epiphany Chalk―if he has none left (or never blessed any in the first place), then he can bless chalk at any time of the year. Get some! Use it! It is there to help you! Don’t abuse that help! Use it especially during this Christmas season―which lasts until February 2nd―and chalk the doors, not only of your main entrance, but go further and chalk all the lintels (the horizontal beam above head height that bridges the two vertical doorposts) with the traditional chalking (see your downloaded Epiphany Blessings: Chalk & Home & Water) of the year and the letters of the three Kings or Magi―interspersed with 4 signs of the cross: 20 + C + M + B + 23 Profit from these Sacramentals of the Church―God helps those who help themselves. God will do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices. The Sacramentals are the ordinary helps or tools that the Church offers us. Use them!
The Sacramental of Epiphany Water and Regular Holy Water
The rite of blessing Epiphany water, on the Vigil of the Epiphany, is much more solemn and elaborate than the simple rite of blessing Holy Water throughout the year. The entire rite can take anywhere from 30 to 40 minutes―whereas regular blessing of Holy Water only takes around 5 minutes or so. You can find the solemn rite of blessing Epiphany Water in the same download as that of blessed Epiphany Chalk [click here]. To read more about Holy Water [click here]
► THE EXORCISM AND BLESSING OF THE SALT: In exorcizing and blessing the salt, the priest prays: “God’s creature, salt, I cast out the demon from you by the living God, by the holy God, by God who ordered you to be thrown into the water-spring by Eliseus to heal it of its barrenness. May you be a purified salt―a means of health for those who believe; a medicine for body and soul for all who make use of you. May all evil fancies of the foul fiend, his malice and cunning, be driven afar from the place where you are sprinkled. And let every unclean spirit be repulsed by Him who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire. Amen.”
“Almighty everlasting God, we humbly appeal to Thy mercy and goodness to graciously bless this creature salt, which Thou hast given for mankind’s use. May all who use it find in it a remedy for body and mind. And may everything that it touches or sprinkles be freed from uncleanness and any influence of the evil spirit; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► THE EXORCISM AND BLESSING OF THE WATER: In exorcizing and blessing the water, the priest prays: “God’s creature, water, I cast out the demon from you in the Name of God the Father almighty, in the Name of Jesus Christ, His Son, our Lord, and in the power of the Holy Spirit. May you be a purified water, empowered to drive afar all power of the enemy, to root out and banish the enemy himself, along with his fallen angels. We ask this through the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire. Amen.”
“O God, Who, for man’s welfare, established the most wonderful mysteries in the substance of water, listen to our prayer, and pour forth Thy blessing on this element now being prepared with various purifying rites. May this creature of Thine―when used in your mysteries and endowed with Thy grace―serve to cast out demons and to banish disease. May everything that this water sprinkles―in the homes and gatherings of the faithful―be delivered from all that is unclean and hurtful; let no breath of contagion hover there, no stain of corruption; let all the wiles of the lurking enemy come to nothing. By the sprinkling of this water, may everything opposed to the safety and peace of the occupants of these homes be banished, so that in calling on Thy holy Name they may gain the well-being they desire, and be protected from every peril; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► MIXING THE BLESSED SALT WITH THE BLESSED WATER: While mixing the salt with the water, the priest prays: “God, source of irresistible might and king of an invincible realm, the ever-glorious conqueror; Who restrains the force of the adversary, silencing the uproar of his rage, and valiantly subduing his wickedness; in awe and humility we beg Thee, Lord, to regard with favor this creature thing of salt and water, to let the light of Thy kindness shine upon it, and to hallow it with the dew of Thy mercy; so that wherever it is sprinkled and Thy holy Name is invoked, may every assault of the unclean spirit be baffled, and all dread of the serpent’s venom be cast out. To us who entreat Thy mercy, grant that the Holy Spirit may be with us wherever we may be; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: There are many things and circumstances for which you can use Epiphany Water or even regular Holy Water. You can drink Holy Water―we eat blessed food, don’t we?―but make sure you are getting your Holy Water through the faucet or spigot of the Holy Water cistern in church, which is usually sealed, and not from the open Holy Water font in church into which everyone dips their fingers! Also drink as fresh a Holy Water as you can get―not water that is years old. St. Teresa of Avila used to drink Holy Water. Similarly, you can also cook with Holy Water (again, fresh Holy Water and not old water) and also add blessed salt to your food or recipes. Furthermore, you can keep it in bottles throughout the rooms in your home―to sprinkle often or even daily. The devil hates Holy Water―that is why this Sacramental is one of several Sacramentals that are used during exorcisms. St. Teresa would often sprinkle herself or her surroundings with Holy Water―especially during temptations. Likewise, if you have blessed salt, you can also sprinkle that around―for the blessing of salt mentions precisely that: “…wherever it is sprinkled…”
Why not take Epiphany Water or Holy Water and either sprinkle or pour a thin stream all around the perimeter of your house, while reciting certain prayers or extracts from the prayers above. Don’t just do this once and no more! Do it as often as you like―once a month, or once a week. Do it especially in times of impending danger―whether natural or man-made―such as storms, floods, earthquakes, fires, or civic unrest. If there are squabbles and arguments, or even violence or sin occurring within the family, sprinkle holy water around the rooms of the house in combination with some prayers. If things and appliances start to “act-up” or malfunction, it does no harm to sprinkle them with Holy Water―for sometimes it is the devil that is behind these things. If threatened by someone, why not sprinkle them with Holy Water―you have nothing to lose and potentially much to gain. Some people, who are under the control or influence of Satan, have been known to feel a burning sensation when sprinkled with Holy Water!
On a side issue, if you find Holy Water hard to obtain, then you can regular water to your Holy Water―as long as the regular water is a lesser quantity than the amount of Holy Water you have left. The regular water added to the holy water must be less than the original volume―for example, 49% regular water to 51% Holy Water, or 9 cups of regular water to 10 cups of Holy Water, etc. But the 49%/51% method leaves no room for error! It would be safer and less risky to use 40% regular water to 60% holy water―for example, 4 cups of regular water to 6 cups holy water. If the regular water exceeds the amount of Holy Water, then the Holy Water loses its Sacramental qualities and becomes regular water. That is the procedure followed by the Church with the Holy Oils that a bishop consecrates on Holy Thursday―after the ceremony, the urns are taken away and then the Holy Oils are “multiplied” by adding regular olive oil to it, but always in a lesser quantity than the amount of Holy Oil.
There will come a time when all Hell breaks loose and we will no longer have access to churches, priests and the Holy Water they bless and you obviously find Holy Water hard to obtain, then simply add regular water to your Holy Water―as long as the regular water is a lesser quantity than the amount of Holy Water you have left―and keep doing that for the duration of the crisis or societal breakdown.
The Sacramental of the Blessing of a Home
Do not underestimate or dismiss the power of having your home blessed! You will be opening your home to a potential stream of graces, blessings and protection―which is precisely what the prayers of house blessings invoke:
► BLESSING: In blessing the home, the priest prays: “Hear us, holy Lord and Father, almighty everlasting God, and in Thy goodness visit, we beseech thee, O Lord, this dwelling, to protect all who live in this home and drive far from it the snares of the enemy; let Thy holy angels watch over and dwell therein, to be with them, give them comfort and encouragement, and to preserve them in peace, and let Thy blessing be always upon them, through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► ALTERNATIVE BLESSING: “God the Father almighty, we fervently implore Thee, for the sake of this home and its occupants and possessions, that Thou may bless and sanctify them, enriching them by Thy kindness in every way possible. Pour out on them, Lord, heavenly dew in good measure, as well as an abundance of earthly needs. Mercifully listen to their prayers, and grant that their desires be fulfilled. At our lowly coming, be pleased to bless and sanctify this home, as Thou once were pleased to bless the home of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Within these walls, let Thy angels of light preside and stand watch over those who live here; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: It is sheer foolishness, imprudence and complacency to neglect having one’s house blessed by the priest! From the spiritual perspective it fortifies your home against all kinds of potential dangers―coming from both devils and men. In this present era, when it seems as though Our Lady of La Salette’s prophecy is being fulfilled ― “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell ... The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts … The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. Everywhere, as true Faith fades, a false light will brighten the people … The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family. Blood will flow in the streets! Men will kill each other, massacre each other, even in their homes!” In such an environment, only a fool would wish to live a house which, through neglect and indifference, has not been blessed!
The Sacramental of the Crucifix
The blessed Crucifix is always part and parcel of the things that an exorcist priest will take with him to the exorcism. It was on the Cross that the crucified Christ won His definitive victory over Satan and the powers of Hell. The Crucifix always reminds Satan of his defeat at the hands of Christ―that is why it is so important and so powerful a Sacramental. It is not for nothing that in Ancient Roman times, the future emperor Constantine, was facing battle while being heavily outnumbered. Constantine realized that he needed help from a power greater than himself―but who or what? He had his doubts about the traditional Roman gods. He prayed earnestly that the true God―whoever that may be―would “reveal to him who he is, and stretch forth his right hand to help him.” God gave him a vision of a cross together with the words: “In hoc signo vinces” which is a Latin phrase that means: “In this sign thou shalt conquer!” This sign brought Constantine the assurance he needed. He accepted this as the answer to his prayer and ordered his soldiers to inscribe crosses on their shields. Encouraged by his vision in the heavens, he hurled his troops against his rival Maxentius, at Rome’s Milvian Bridge. Surprisingly, Constantine was victorious. Maxentius was among those who drowned in the Tiber. Afterward Constantine does not forget to whom he owes his victory. Constantine issued orders that the Christian Church was to be tolerated―just as other religions were. Although he did not make Christianity the official religion of the Empire, Constantine bestowed favor upon it, built places of worship for Christians, and presided over the first general Church council. He became the first emperor to embrace Christianity and was be baptized on his death bed.
► BLESSING: In blessing the Crucifix the priest prays: “O Holy Lord, almighty Father, eternal God, bless this cross that it be a saving help to mankind. Let it be a bulwark of Faith, an encouragement to good works, the redemption of souls; and may it be consolation, protection and a shield against the cruel darts of the enemy. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
“Bless, O Lord Jesus Christ this cross by which Thou hast snatched the world from Satan’s grasp and upon which Thou hast overcome, by thy suffering, him who is the prompter of sin, who rejoiced in Adam’s deception at the accursed tree of Paradise. May this symbol of salvation be sanctified in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and may all who kneel and pray before this cross for our Lord’s honor receive health of body and soul. Through the selfsame Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: Seek to place a blessed Crucifix in all the rooms of your house. You can also place a Crucifix in your outdoor buildings―garage, barn, shed, etc. You could add to the Crucifix a small plaque, or a simply frame a small sheet of paper upon which you could type the following Scriptural quotes:
“If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And whoever does not take up his cross and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
Parents have every right to bless their own children. They can do so by making the Sign of the Cross on their child’s forehead while saying: “May God bless you and keep you, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.” They could even make the same Sign of the Cross using a blessed Crucifix.
When you are tempted, make the Sign of the Cross over yourself―slowly and deliberately―many times if necessary. Additionally, you could take your blessed Crucifix and sign yourself with the Sign of the Cross using the blessed Crucifix.
The Sacramental of the St. Benedict Medal
The Medal of St. Benedict is powerful to ward off all dangers of body and soul coming from the evil spirit. [read more here] We are exposed to the wicked assaults of the devil day and night. St. Peter says: “Your adversary the devil, as roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). In the life of St. Benedict we see how the devil tried to do harm to his soul and body, and also to his spiritual children. Father Paul of Moll, saintly Flemish Benedictine wonder-worker (1824-1896), frustrated the evil doings of the spirits of darkness chiefly through the use of the Medal of St. Benedict, which has proved a most powerful protection against the snares and delusions of Satan. Missionaries in pagan lands used this Medal with such a great effect that it was been given the remarkable name, “The devil-chasing Medal.”
The Medal is a powerful means:
● To destroy witchcraft and all other diabolical influences.
● To keep away the spells of magicians, of wicked and evil-minded persons.
● To impart protection to persons tempted, deluded or tormented by evil spirits.
● To obtain the conversion of sinners, especially when they are in danger of death.
● To secure a timely and healthy birth for children.
● To help and strengthen a person at the time of death.
● To serve as an armor in temptations against holy purity.
● To destroy the effects of poison.
● To give protection against storms and lightning.
● To serve as an efficacious remedy for bodily afflictions and a means of protection against contagious diseases.
● For animals infected with plague or other maladies, and for fields when invaded by harmful insects.
The front of the medal depicts St. Benedict holding in his right hand a cross, and in his left, the book of his Rule. On his right is a poisoned cup, and on his left a raven with a poisoned loaf. A jealous enemy had given him this cup and loaf; when St. Benedict made the Sign of the Cross over them, the cup shattered and a raven flew in and carried away the loaf. Above these items are the Latin words “CRUX SANCTI PATRIS BENEDICTI” (The Cross of our holy father Benedict). Surrounding the figure of St. Benedict are the words “EIUS IN OBITU NOSTRO PRAESENTIA MUNIAMUR!” (May we be strengthened by his presence in the hour of our death), as he was always regarded by the Benedictines as the patron of a happy death.
The back of the medal depicts a Cross. On the Cross are the letters C S S M L ― N D S M D, initials of the Latin words “CRUX SACRA SIT MIHI LUX! NUNQUAM DRACO SIT MIHI DUX!” (May the Holy Cross be my light! May the dragon never be my guide!). Above the cross is the word PAX (peace.) Encircling the cross are the letters V R S N S M V - S M Q L I V B, the initials of “VADE RETRO SATANA! NUNQUAM SUADE MIHI VANA! SUNT MALA QUAE LIBAS. IPSE VENENA BIBAS!” (Begone Satan! Never tempt me with your vanities! What you offer me is evil. Drink the poison yourself!)
The purpose of the medal is to call down God’s blessing and protection upon us, wherever we are, and upon our homes and possessions, especially through the intercession of St. Benedict. By the conscious and devout use of the medal, it becomes a constant silent prayer and a reminder of our dignity as followers of Christ.
► BLESSING: In blessing the St. Benedict Medal, the priest prays: “I purge you medals of evil by God the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth and of the sea and of all that they contain. O every power of the adversary, every cohort of the devil, every attack and appearance of Satan―get thee out of these medals and fly afar! And may they become for all who will use them a help for body and soul, in the Name of the Father Almighty, in the Name of Jesus Christ, His Son, our Lord, in the Name of the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, and in the love of the selfsame Lord Jesus Christ, Who shall come to judge the living and the dead and the world by fire.”
“Almighty God, lavish Dispenser of every good, we Thy suppliants pray that, by the intercession of St. Benedict, Thou wouldst pour out Thy blessing on these sacred medals. Let all who will wear them, with minds intent on good works, deserve to obtain health of body and soul; the grace of making progress in holiness; as well as the indulgences which have been granted (to us). And may they seek to avoid, by Thy merciful help, every onslaught and fraud of the devil, and finally stand before thee sinless and holy. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: There is no special way prescribed for carrying or wearing the Medal of St. Benedict. It can be worn on a chain around the neck, attached to one’s Rosary, kept in one’s pocket or purse, or placed in one’s car or home. The medal is often put into the foundations of houses and building, on the walls of barns and sheds, or in one’s place of business. You can even purchase what is called a “St. Benedict Home Blessing Door Hang” for around $15, which hangs on door knobs or hooks. It includes St. Benedict crucifix and two St. Benedict medals, being around 11” long overall. However, you can create your own “door hangs” by combining the St. Benedict Medal with, not only a Crucifix or St. Benedict Crucifix, but also the Miraculous Medal, the Green Scapular, and any other Sacramental you wish. Place one such combination―not only on your exterior entrance doors, but on every door and above or below every window in the house. You could also plant the blessed St. Benedict Medals in the soil all around the perimeter of your house, spacing them out as you wish. Attach or plant a medal in your exterior buildings―barn, shed, garage, etc. Plant some further away from the house―especially at the main entrance and other entrances to your property. Don’t just have one or two medals at home, buy lots of them and have them blessed. It is a very powerful Sacramental with centuries of a proven track record.
The Sacramental of the Holy Rosary
Make no mistake about it―the Holy Rosary is THE weapon for our present day. It was St. Padre Pio who called the THE weapon―and he himself would pray anywhere from 30 to 50 Rosaries each day! The Rosary praying Jesuit priests of Hiroshima, who survived, in good health, the dropping of the 1945 Atom Bomb by the Americans on Hiroshima, repeatedly said: “The Rosary is more powerful than the Atom Bomb!”
In 1957, Sister Lucia of Fatima told us what Our Lady revealed to her about the Holy Rosary: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
That is why Our Lady repeatedly insisted, at every single Fatima apparition, upon the Rosary being prayed a lot: “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war!” (May 1917) … “Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war … (June 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted!” (July 1917) … “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (August 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war!” (September 1917) … “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” (October 1917). At Akita, in 1973, Our Lady adds: “The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the Rosary, pray for the pope, the bishops, and the priests! … Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men! … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much—very much! … Pray with fervor!”
► BLESSING: In blessing the Rosary beads, the priest prays: “Almighty and merciful God, in Thy great charity and out of love for us, Thine only-begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ didst descend to earth, was announced by the Angel, received flesh in the holy womb of our Lady, the Most Blessed Virgin Mary; was crucified and became subject to death; and on the third day gloriously willed to rise from the dead, in order that we might be delivered from the power of the devil. We beg Thy great mercy, that this Rosary, used by the assembly of Thy faithful for the honor and praise of the same Mother of Thy Son, may be blessed and sanctified; so that through the overflowing power of Thy Holy Ghost, at whatever hour or in whatever place it is carried, or retained in their homes, through it, according to the institutes of Thy holy Society, they may be led to Thee by the contemplation of Thy divine mysteries in devout prayer, being nourished and preserved in abundant devotion. Partaking of all the graces, privileges, and indulgences which the Holy See has granted; may they always and everywhere be protected from every visible or invisible power of this world; and upon leaving it, may the same Blessed Virgin Mother of God present them to Thee, robed in an abundance of good works. This we ask of Thee through the same Jesus Christ . . . world without end. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: Copy, paste, save, read and re-read the miracles of Rosary that you will find in the preceding article. It will foster in you an abiding confidence in the power of the Rosary. St. Louis de Montfort’s book, The Secret of the Rosary, is a testimony to the power of the Rosary and the esteem with which Our Lady and Heaven show towards the Rosary. It is an excellent book to kindle our fires of love towards the Holy Rosary. Get a copy! Read it! Remember―it is not how MANY Rosaries we SAY, but HOW WELL WE PRAY them. As St. Louis writes in his book: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly!”
That is why devil―if he sees that he cannot make you abandon the Rosary―he will then tempt you to do the lesser good. That lesser good is to make you SAY the Rosary, rather than have you PRAY the Rosary. SAYING the Rosary means only saying the words of the prayers without meditating on the mysteries; whereas PRAYING the Rosary means not only saying the words, but also MEDITATING upon the mysteries. Furthermore, TRUE meditation always involves MAKING AND TAKING RESOLUTIONS based upon what you have meditated―otherwise it is like making a meal or baking a cake, and then not eating it. Probably 99.9% of Catholics merely SAY the Rosary, but NEVER PRAY the Rosary. Small wonder that souls never become better, or that so many souls are lost.
St. Louis further adds: “God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? People who do that forfeit God’s blessing, which is changed into a curse for having treated the things of God disrespectfully: ‘Cursed be the one who does God’s work negligently!’ (Jeremias 48:10). Our Lady said to Blessed Alan de la Roche in a vision ‘When people say 150 Hail Marys, that prayer is very helpful to them and a most pleasing tribute to me. But they will do better still and will please me more if they say these salutations while meditating on the life, death, and passion of Jesus Christ, for this meditation is the soul of this prayer.’ For the Rosary said without the meditation on the sacred mysteries of our salvation would almost be a body without a soul, excellent matter, but without the form, which is the meditation.
“Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin. The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
Another point to be made is that of having lots of blessed Rosaries available in your home―they can be of various kinds, simple string Rosaries that are knotted to create the “beads”, or a good number of plastic Rosaries for distribution to others who may be in need, plus the kind of Rosaries that you personally prefer. As a suggestion, the so-called “ladder Rosaries” seem to be more hardy and durable than the thin-wire like Rosaries―obviously you pay more, but they are worth the money. If you can get someone to make you Rosary from scratch, then it is suggested that you include other Sacramentals as part of your “tailor-made” Rosary. For example, for the center piece medallion use the Miraculous Medal; for the Our Father beads uses the St. Benedict Medal; for the Crucifix use a St. Benedict Crucifix which has the St. Benedict Medal embedded at the point where the horizontal and vertical beams cross, right behind the head of Christ. Thus, when you have your Rosary blessed, ask the priest to give the Rosary beads a multiple blessing: (1) the special blessing for the Rosary; (2) the special blessing for the Crucifix; (3) the special blessing for the Miraculous Medal, and (4) the special blessing for the St. Benedict Medal. These four blessings, one after another, will take around 8 to 10 minutes. Not all priests will be willing to do that―too much time and trouble―but it is worth asking around until you find one that will. That will give you a very powerful multi-Sacramental Rosary!
Finally, make sure to ALWAYS carry your Rosary with you. St. Padre Pio would NEVER be without his Rosary beads. Even when he could no longer wash himself and tend to his stigmata, and had to have others do these things, he would always hold his Rosary beads in one hand while they washed the other hand. He would take his Rosary beads to bed with him. DO THE SAME! Soldiers sleep alongside their weapons! Sleep with you Rosary! Some people will even wear their Rosary beads around their neck. The devils despise blessed Rosary beads. St. Louis de Montfort, in The Secret of the Rosary, writes: “Blessed Alan relates that a man he knew had tried desperately all kinds of devotions to rid himself of the evil spirit which possessed him, but without success. Finally, he thought of wearing his Rosary round his neck, which eased him considerably. He discovered that whenever he took it off the devil tormented him cruelly, so he resolved to wear it night and day. This drove the evil spirit away forever because he could not bear such a terrible chain. Blessed Alan also testifies that he delivered a great number of those who were possessed by putting a Rosary round their necks.”
The Sacramental of the Brown Scapular
Just as the Holy Rosary is the weapon for our times, so too is the Brown Scapular a weapon for our days. You could loosely look upon the Rosary as a sword and the Scapular as a shield or a suit of armor. In fact, a full size monk’s scapular pretty much covers him like a suit of armor―being shoulder width and hanging down almost to the ground front and back. Sister Lucia of Fatima said that Our Lady was dressed as Our Lady of Mount Carmel at her sixth and last apparition at Fatima―holding out the Scapular towards all the people, which signified that Our Lady wanted everyone to accept and wear the Brown Scapular. The essence of the Scapular is defense―as stated in the blessing of the Scapular:
► BLESSING: In blessing the Brown Scapular, the priest prays: “O Lord Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, sanctify by Thy right hand these scapulars, which for love of Thee and for love of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, Thy servants will wear devoutly, so that through the intercession of the same Virgin Mary, Mother of God, and protected against the evil spirit, they persevere until death in Thy grace. Thou who live and reign world without end. Amen.”
“Receive this blessed Scapular and beseech the Blessed Virgin that through her merits, you may wear it without stain. May it defend you against all adversity and accompany you to eternal life. Amen.”
“I, by the power vested in me, admit you to participate in all the spiritual benefits obtained through the mercy of Jesus Christ by the Religious Order of Mount Carmel. In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.”
“May God Almighty, the Creator of Heaven and Earth, bless you, He who has deigned to join you to the Confraternity of the Blessed Virgin of Mount Carmel; we beseech her to crush the head of the ancient serpent at the hour of your death, so that you my enter into possession of your eternal heritage, through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: It is important that you know the rules and regulations of wearing the Brown Scapular and being enrolled in the Confraternity of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. To help you with this task, check our webpage on FAQs about the Brown Scapular [click here]. As with the Rosaries and Medals, keep a large stock of Brown Scapulars at home. You could also, together with other mentioned Sacramentals, hang them above your doors and windows―keeping in mind the protective nature of the Brown Scapular.
Have confidence in your Brown Scapular―read about some of the many miracles that the Brown Scapular has produced over the years [to read click here]. Many of those miracles were not granted to saints, but to everyday people. In some cases, the miracles were in response to a positive request, Faith and confidence on the part of the recipient. In other cases the miracles happened without being requested and in some cases totally unknown to the recipient until afterwards. You can see an example of each in the previous article, under the Brown Scapular section―here is one miracle that was not asked for, nor was known to have happened until later:
A French priest on pilgrimage was walking to the local church to celebrate Mass. As he drew near to the church, the priest realized he forgot something. He had forgotten to put on his Brown Scapular after washing and dressing that morning. Disturbed by the thought of being without his Scapular and offering Mass without it, the priest ran back to get his Scapular, preferring to celebrate Mass clothed with his Scapular. Later, as he was offering the Holy Sacrifice, a young man approached the altar, pulled out a gun, and shot the priest in the back. To the amazement of all, the priest continued to say the prayers of the Mass as though nothing had occurred. It was at first presumed that the bullet had miraculously missed its target. However, upon examination, the bullet was found STUCK TO THE BROWN SCAPULAR which the priest had so obstinately refused to be without.
Similarly, in May of 1957, a Carmelite priest in Germany published the unusual story of how the Scapular saved a home from fire. An entire row of homes had caught fire in Westboden, Germany. The devout Catholic inhabitants of a home in the middle of this row, seeing the fire, immediately fastened a Scapular to the main door of the house. Sparks flew over it and around it, but the house remained unharmed. Within 5 hours, 22 homes had been reduced to ashes. The one structure which stood undamaged, amidst all the destruction, was that which had the Scapular attached to its door. The hundreds of people who came to see the place Our Lady had saved are eyewitnesses to the power of the Scapular and the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
It is not for nothing that Our Lady held out the Brown Scapular to the world at her final October 13th, 1917, apparition at Fatima. Take it and wear it and use it! Let it be a magnet that attracts graces and protection from Heaven. You can read more about the history and meaning of the Brown Scapular [by clicking here].
The Sacramental of the Miraculous Medal
The very name “Miraculous Medal” smacks of miracles! In fact, the real name of the “Miraculous Medal” is actually “The Medal of the Immaculate Conception”―but it received its popular name of “Miraculous Medal” on account of the multitude of miracles that it brought about [read about the miracles here]. Here is just a sample:
A girl, some twenty years old, came to the hospital covered with the most repugnant scabs which the doctors had said were incurable. The nun, who cared for her wounds, one day told her that the Most Holy Virgin had the power to cure her and that, if she wanted to wear the medal and ask for a cure, she would obtain it. Knowing the doctors had given up, she answered roughly: “I do not believe in your Holy Virgin, nor do I want a medal.” The nun answered: “Very well then, in that case, keep your wounds!” Some days later, the girl asked for the medal and placed it around her neck, and soon after found herself preparing to be baptized. Shortly thereafter, she left the hospital in perfect health―to the great astonishment of the doctors, who had been unanimous in considering her sickness incurable.
In another miracle, the person was also converted but not cured. Nevertheless she died a happy and holy death. A religious sister relates the story: “A poor young Protestant girl, who was brought to our hospital to be treated for a grave malady, had so great a horror of our holy religion, that, at the very sight of a Catholic near her, she acted like someone possessed. The presence of a Sister was especially irritating, and one day she even went so far as to spit in the Sister’s face, but the latter, not dismayed and ever hoping that the God of all mercy would change this wolf into a lamb, continued her kind attentions―the more disrespectful her patient, the more gentle and considerate the Sister. The Sister was at last inspired with the thought of slipping a Miraculous Medal between the two mattresses―she acted upon the inspiration, and, the following night, the Immaculate Mary’s image became an instrument of salvation and happiness to that guilty soul. Pitching and tossing upon her bed―by reason of a high fever―the patient, in some unaccountable manner, found the Medal, and the Sister’s astonishment next morning―at seeing her clasping it in her hands, and covering it with kisses―was second only to that she experienced on perceiving the wonderful transformation grace had wrought in this poor creature’s soul. A supernatural light had revealed to her the sad state of her conscience; her criminal life filled her with horror, and, penetrated with regret for the past, she sighed only for holy Baptism. After the necessary instruction, she was baptized; and, during the remainder of her sickness―which was long and tedious―her patience and fervor never faltered. She persevered in these edifying sentiments, until a happy death placed the seal upon the graces she had received through the intercession of Mary Immaculate.”
Finally, we see another miraculous cure. An officer, in Austrian army, suffered from a serious wound in the right arm. At the general hospital, he was placed under the especial treatment of Dr. Rzehazeh, a very eminent surgeon. The doctor exhausted all his skills, but in vain―and after a few weeks he saw the necessity of amputation to save the officer’s life. The religious sisters in the hospital offered him a Miraculous Medal, which he accepted only out of courtesy. In the few days prior to the operation, he felt inspired with a great confidence in his Medal, and frequently repeated the invocation engraven upon it: “O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!”
The danger was now imminent, and the amputation, which must not be delayed, was to take place on the next day. One of the Sisters―seeing that the young officer’s confidence expressed itself in continual prayer―suggested on the eve of the amputation that he lay the medal upon his afflicted arm, and let it remain all night. He gladly and joyfully complied. Next morning she hastened to ascertain her patient’s condition, and get the Medal. He had spent a quiet night―his sufferings being less severe than usual. The Sister, while attributing his improvement to the medicine that had been prescribed, understood full well that the precious Medal had also been instrumental in procuring relief, and that Mary had looked compassionately upon him―but she did not yet realize the full extent of the blessing.
The surgeon came a few hours after, and whilst awaiting his assistants, he carefully examined the wounded arm, he touched it, he probed it, and to his great astonishment, realized that amputation was no longer necessary. The other doctors, on arriving, confirmed his opinion of this surprising change. The officer was struck dumb with happiness, and, not until he found himself alone with the chief surgeon, did the patient reveal his secret about the Medal, which, in his opinion, caused this wonderful change. On leaving him, the surgeon could not refrain from saying to the Sister: “I believe the Sisters of Charity have engaged the good God in this case!” The officer’s arm was entirely healed. A few weeks later he left the hospital, taking with him the precious Medal as a memento of gratitude and love for Mary Immaculate.
The design of the Miraculous Medal came straight from the hands of Our Lady―for she showed the design that she wanted to St. Catherine Labouré in a 1830 vision at the Rue du Bac, in Paris, France. Concerning the rays of light that came forth from the rings on the fingers of her outstretched hands (see front of Medal), she was told: “These rays symbolize the graces I shed upon those who ask for them. The gems, from which rays do not fall, are the graces for which souls neglect to ask.” The voice added: “Have a Medal struck after this model. All who wear it will receive great graces; they should wear it around the neck. Graces will abound for persons who wear it with confidence.”
► BLESSING: In blessing the Miraculous Medal, the priest prays: “Almighty and merciful God, Who, by the many appearances on Earth of the Immaculate Virgin Mary, were pleased to work miracles again and again for the salvation of souls; kindly pour out Thy blessing on this Medal, so that all who devoutly wear it and reverence it may experience the patronage of Mary Immaculate and obtain mercy from Thee; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
“Take this holy medal; wear it with Faith, and handle it with due devotion, so that the holy and Immaculate Queen of Heaven may protect and defend you. And as she is ever ready to renew her wondrous acts of kindness, may she obtain for you in her mercy whatever you humbly ask of God, so that both in life and in death you may rest happily in her motherly embrace. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: First and foremost, always wear your blessed Miraculous Medal around your neck. If you also wear the Brown Scapular, you may―if you so wish―attach the Miraculous Medal to the cords of your Scapular; or you wear the Medal on a chain or cord of its own. However, do not limit the use of the Miraculous Medal to being worn around your neck. As with the other Sacramentals mentioned above, you could attach the blessed Medal above every door and window in the house; or plant a large number of blessed Medals in the soil around the perimeter of your house―thus creating, as it were, a spiritual moat or spiritual wall of grace around the house. Likewise, attach or plant a medal in your exterior buildings―barn, shed, garage, etc. Plant some further away from the house―especially at the main entrance and other entrances to your property. Plant the blessed Medal in the homes of those whom you seek to convert to the Faith or bring back to the Faith from sin. Always keep a blessed Medal in your car as extra insurance against accidents, theft and other dangers.
The Sacramental of the Blessed Candles
Finally―though there are many more Sacramentals that could be examined in addition to the above handful―we come to blessed candles. Candles are an integral part of the Catholic Faith―Our Lord refers to them and the Church constantly uses them. Our Lord said: “You are the light of the world. Men do not light a candle and put it under a bucket, but upon a candlestick, so that it may shine to all that are in the house! So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:14-16). Every single Sacrifice of the Mass is offered with candles burning―and the priest is forbidden to say Mass without candles. In a High Mass or Sung Mass, the altar servers (acolytes) enter the church carrying lit candles. When we have Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament―candles likewise must be lit. When the priest makes a sick call to a home, he traditionally had to be greeted by a family member carrying a lit candle. A newly baptized person receives a lit candle during the baptismal ceremony. Candles surround the coffin at a funeral. Deacons carry a lit candle during their ordination to the priesthood. A bishop, when performing solemn ceremonies, has an extra candle that is carried for him by one of the altar servers. We have the Paschal Candle at Easter and the Advent Candles during Advent. The Easter Vigil procession with the Paschal Candle into the dark church has the faithful carrying lit candles during the procession. These are just some of the many instances where candles are used in the Liturgy of the Church.
The candle represents or is symbolic of both Christ and ourselves. Our Lord says: “I am the light of the world” (John 8:12) and then He adds: “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14). The wax is symbolic of our body, the wick is symbolic of our soul (hidden within the body), and the flame is symbolic of the divinity of God, charity of God and grace of God in the soul. A candle is useless unless it is lit―and our soul is useless if it does not possess the charity and grace of God: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profiteth me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
There is no better day than February 2nd to have your candles blessed―even though candles can be blessed on any day of the year. Why then February 2nd? Well, February 2nd―besides being the feast of the Presentation of the Infant Jesus in the Temple and the Purification of His Most Holy Mother, February 2nd is also commonly and popularly known as “Candlemas Day” [read more here] ― the title originates from the fact that candles receive a special solemn blessing at Mass on that day (Candles blessed at Mass on that day = Candlemas Day). As you will see below, the regular blessing for candles on any day of the year pales away into the shadows when compared to the solemn blessing of candles on Candlemas Day. Additionally, some saints and mystics insist that the beeswax candles to be used for the so-called “Three Days of Darkness” are meant to be blessed on Candlemas Day.
► REGULAR BLESSING OF CANDLES: In blessing the candles, the priest prays: “O Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, bless these candles at our supplication. By the power of the Holy Cross, pour out upon them a heavenly blessing, O Lord, Who gave them to human kind in order to repel the darkness. From this signing with the Holy Cross may they receive such blessing that, wherever they are set up or lighted, the princes of darkness may begin to tremble and depart, may flee in fear with all their ministers from such dwelling places, and may not dare again to disquiet or molest those who serve Thee, almighty God, who live and reign forever and ever. Amen.”
► BLESSING OF CANDLES WITH EXORCISM: An “upgrade” on the regular blessing of candles is the blessing of candles coupled with an exorcism of those candles. When exorcising and blessing the candles, the priest prays: “O candles, I exorcise you in the Name of God the Father Almighty, in the Name of Jesus Christ his Son, our Lord, and in the Name of the Holy Spirit. May God uproot and cast out from these objects, all power of the devil, all attacks of the unclean spirit, and all deceptions of Satan, so that they may bring health of mind and body to all who use them. We ask this through the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire. Amen.”
“O Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, light of everlasting life, Thou hast given us candles to dispel the darkness. We humbly implore Thee now, to bless these candles at our lowly request, and hallow them by the light of Thy grace. By the power of the Holy Cross, endow them with a heavenly blessing. May the blessing they receive be so powerful that, wherever they are placed or lighted, the princes of darkness shall flee in fear, along with all their legions, and never more dare to disturb those who serve Thee, the almighty God. Let the entire building in which these candles are kept, be free from the power of the adversary, and be defended from the snares of the enemy. Grant we pray, that those who will use these candles may be protected from every assault of the evil spirit, and be safeguarded from all danger. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► CANDLESMAS DAY BLESSING: However, the most solemn blessing of candles is that which is done at the start of Mass on Candlemas Day (February 2nd). Before the start of Mass, in blessing the candles at the altar, the priest prays: “O Holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God, who hast created all things out of nothing, and by Thy command hast caused this liquid to become perfect wax by the labor of bees: and who, on this day didst fulfill the petition of the righteous man Simeon: we humbly entreat Thee, that by the invocation of Thy most holy Name and through the intercession of Blessed Mary ever Virgin whose feast is today devoutly observed, and by the prayers of all Thy Saints, Thou wouldst vouchsafe to bless and sanctify these candles for the service of men and for the health of their bodies and souls, whether on land or on sea: and that Thou wouldst hear from Thy holy heaven, and from the throne of Thy Majesty the voices of this Thy people, who desire to carry them in their hands with honor, and to praise Thee with hymns; and wouldst be propitious to all that call upon Thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen.”
“O almighty and everlasting God, who on this day didst present Thine only-begotten Son in Thy holy Temple to be received in the arms of holy Simeon: we humbly entreat Thy clemency, that Thou wouldst vouchsafe to bless and sanctify and to kindle with the light of Thy heavenly benediction these candles, which we, Thy servants, desire to receive and to bear lighted in the honor of Thy Name: that, by offering them to Thee our Lord God, being worthily inflamed with the holy fire of Thy most sweet charity, we may deserve to be presented in the holy Temple of Thy glory. Through the same Jesus Christ, thy Son, Our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen.”
“O Lord Jesus Christ, the true Light who enlightenest every man that cometh into this world: pour forth Thy blessing upon these candles, and sanctify them with the light of Thy grace, and mercifully grant, that as these lights enkindled with visible fire dispel the darkness of night, so our hearts illumined by invisible fire, that is, by the splendor of the Holy Spirit, may be free from the blindness of all vice, that the eye of our mind being cleansed, we may be able to discern what is pleasing to Thee and profitable to our salvation; so that after the perilous darkness of this life we may deserve to attain to never failing light: through Thee, O Christ Jesus, Savior of the world, who in the perfect Trinity, livest and reignest, God, world without end. Amen.”
“O almighty and everlasting God, who by Thy servant Moses didst command the purest oil to be prepared for lamps to burn continuously before Thee: vouchsafe to pour forth the grace of Thy blessing upon these candles: that they may so afford us light outwardly that by Thy gift, the gift of Thy Spirit may never be wanting inwardly to our minds.
Through Jesus Christ, thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen.”
“O Lord Jesus Christ, who appearing on this day among men in the substance of our flesh, wast presented by Thy parents in the temple: whom the venerable and aged Simeon, illuminated by the light of Thy Spirit, recognized, received into his arms, and blessed: mercifully grant that, enlightened and taught by the grace of the same Holy Ghost, we may truly acknowledge Thee and faithfully love Thee; Who with God the Father in the unity of the same Holy Ghost livest and reignest, God, world without end. Amen.”
Ideally, it would be wonderful if Holy Mother Church combined all of the above three versions into one version!
► BLESSING OF CANDLES ON THE FEAST OF ST. BLAISE, FEBRUARY 3rd: Incidentally, on the feast of St. Blaise on February 3rd―the day following Candlemas Day―it has been traditional since the 8th century to bless two candles in honor of St. Blaise and then use those two candles to bless the throats of the faithful. In blessing the candles, the priest prays:
“O God, almighty and all-mild, by Thy Word alone did create the manifold things in the world, and willed that that same Word, by Whom all things were made, take flesh in order to redeem mankind; Thou art great and immeasurable, awesome and praiseworthy, a worker of marvels. Hence in professing his Faith in Thee, the glorious martyr and bishop, Blaise, did not fear any manner of torment, but gladly accepted the palm of martyrdom. In virtue of which Thou hast bestowed on him, among other gifts, the power to heal all ailments of the throat. And now we implore Thy majesty that, overlooking our guilt, and considering only his merits and intercession, it may please Thee to bless, and sanctify, and impart Thy grace to these candles. Let all men of Faith, whose necks are touched with them, be healed of every malady of the throat, and, being restored in health and good spirits, let them return thanks to Thee in Thy holy Church, and praise Thy glorious name which is blessed forever; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
Then, in placing the two candles (crossed-over in the form of an “X” or a cross) like “scissors” on the neck of the person receiving the blessing, the priest prays: “By the intercession of St. Blaise, bishop and martyr, may God deliver you from every malady of the throat, and from every possible mishap; in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.”
► ST. BERNADETTE OF LOURDES & CANDLES:
There was another Apparition on April 7th, remarkable for the now well-known phenomenon of the lighted candle.
Dr. Dozous gives us an account of what then took place. He at first saw Bernadette kneeling her Rosary in her hands. Then he saw her begin her customary ascent on her knees to the spot beneath the wild rosebush. For some reason or another she stopped short in this ascent and brought the lighted taper in her right hand beneath the open fingers of her left one. The flame sped upward through the open fingers of her left hand, and with all the greater rapidity owing to a brisk wind blowing at the time. A good number of people saw what was going on and would certainly have gone to Bernadette’s aid if Dr. Dozous had not interfered. The medical doctor would not allow her to be touched or spoken to. He took out his watch and noticed that she remained in the same attitude for a quarter of an hour, with the flame passing through her fingers for the entire time and seeming to leave them uninjured. At the end of about a quarter of an hour she continued her ascent up the rock.
When all was over and she had come back to her place, and the inward light had faded from her face, the doctor asked to look at her left hand. He took the hand she held out to him and examined it carefully. There was upon it no sign of the action of fire. He asked for the taper she had held, lighted it, and put the flame for a moment close to her fingers. He did the same thing more than once. Each time Bernadette quickly drew her hand away, saying, “You are burning me!”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: The feast of Candlemas is just over 1 week away. Call your local priest to see if he will be blessing candles at the start of Mass on February 2nd―if not, then call around until you find one. Tip: priests who still say the Traditional Latin Mass (also known as: “Mass in the Extraordinary Rite”) will no doubt be blessing candles on that day. Then ask if he would also kindly bless a box or several boxes of candles for you. Then call around, or look online, for suppliers of 100% beeswax candles and buy as many as you can afford (and as many as you think the priest will accept to bless―he probably won’t be happy if you turn with 50 boxes of candles!). Additionally, as an insurance for the so-called “Three Days of Darkness”, it is advised to get some 100% beeswax candles in glass jars that will be burn for at least three days―you can expect to pay anything from $22 to $46 per jar (they vary in burning time from 100 hours or 4 days, to as much as 7 days). Yes―they are like sanctuary lights that burn alongside the tabernacle, but these will be 100% beeswax. Have those jar-candles also blessed on February 2nd if possible.
As for when to use blessed candles―there are a number of occasions for which the Church recommends that blessed candles be lit. One such occasion is during times of threatening storms or earthquakes. Blessed candles are also a powerful Sacramental to use against evil spirits roaming about. We all know that the devil lives in darkness, and so the light of the blessed candle invokes the power of God to keep the devil’s influence at bay. Another occasion is at times of danger of any kind―whether of human or natural source. You can also light a blessed candle at times of family disruption by arguments, division, bad temper or even violence. Blessed candles would also be lit and placed at the bedside of both sick persons and dying persons.
Conclusion
You probably thought there would be no conclusion to this interminable article which is more like a book than an article. Apologies for the length, but no apologies for the need. We are rapidly approaching grave times for which no human solution will work. How well protected are you? Are you ready for emergencies? What is the likelihood of your survival? As Our Lord said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Why do we stupidly try to solve our problems by firstly having recourse to human means, human intelligence and human skills? Our Lord said: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God!” (Luke 12:31) ― why then do we often turn to God as a last resort?
The Sacramentals of the Church are God’s gifts to men―aimed at helping us in all our troubles and adversities. Use them and don’t abuse them by neglecting them! As you sow, so shall you reap: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:8).
A Sacramental is a sacred object, or religious action, which the Catholic Church―in imitation of the Sacraments―uses for the purpose of obtaining spiritual favors, especially through her prayer. A Sacramental is anything set apart or blessed by the Church, to excite good thoughts and to help devotion, and thus secure grace to help us avoid mortal sins, and also take away venial sin, or the temporal punishment due to sin.
Let us compare and contrast the Sacraments and the Sacramentals:
(1) The Sacraments were instituted by Christ Himself; the Sacramentals were founded by Christ’s Church.
(2) The Sacraments are limited to the seven Sacraments instituted by Christ―namely, Baptism, Confirmation, Confession, Holy Eucharist, Extreme Unction, Holy Orders and Matrimony; whereas the Sacramentals are not a fixed number, but are numerous, varied and can increase in number, according to the directions of Holy Mother Church.
(3) The Sacraments produce grace directly in the soul, if there is no obstacle on the part of the recipient; the Sacramentals do not produce grace directly and of themselves―they produce grace indirectly by disposing and preparing the soul for this divine gift of grace.
(4) The words used in the Sacraments, except in Extreme Unction, positively declare that God is producing certain effects in the soul; the prayers used in the Sacramentals merely ask God to produce certain effects and to grant certain graces.
(5) The Sacraments give or increase sanctifying grace; and the Sacramentals are the means to actual graces.
We might divide the Sacramentals into prayers, pious objects, sacred signs, and religious ceremonies. Some Sacramentals are a combination―they fall into two or more classes. The Rosary, for example, is a blessed object and a prayer. The Sign of the Cross is a prayer and a sign. The Crucifix, pictures and statues are blessed objects. Certain ceremonies, performed in the various Sacraments, are also Sacramentals, like the extending of the hands in Confirmation; or the giving of blessed salt in Baptism; or anointing with Holy Oil in Baptism; giving the newly ordained priest a blessed candle during the ordination ceremony, etc.
How can mere material things help us on the way to Heaven? How can water, metal, wax, plaster, stone, or a piece of cloth help us fight demons and save our souls? You must ever remember that these objects in themselves have no power to save or help us. It would be superstitious to say they had any such power in themselves and by themselves. But things like blessed Crucifixes, holy pictures, statues, candles, etc.―besides being holy objects that demons detest―also can and do excite spiritual thoughts and feelings in those who use them correctly. They excite the fear and love of God; they arouse trust and hope in His mercy; they awaken sorrow and joy in the Lord. Their value lies in the fact that they have been set aside and sanctified (blessed) by the Church for sacred purposes, by the power of the Church’s official prayer, and by the merits of Christ, preserved and distributed by His Church.
Are Sacramentals Important?
Obviously Sacramentals are not as important as the Sacraments―yet they nevertheless very important, as you will see later in this article. Our Lady reputedly will, one day, save the world through her Rosary and her Brown Scapular. This prediction occurred in Rome, in the 13th century. Three famous men of God met on a street corner in Rome. They were the friar, St. Dominic, busy gathering recruits to a new Religious Order of Preachers; the brother, St. Francis of Assisi, the founder of another religious order, the Franciscans; and St. Angelus of Jerusalem, a Caremlite, who had been invited to Rome from Mount Carmel, in Palestine, because of his fame as a preacher. At their chance meeting, by the light of the Holy Spirit each of the three men recognized each other and, in the course of their conversation (as recorded by various followers who were present), they made prophecies to each other. Saint Angelus foretold the stigmata of Saint Francis, and Saint Dominic said: “One day, Brother Angelus, to your Order of Carmel the Most Blessed Virgin Mary will give a devotion to be known as the Brown Scapular, and to my Order of Preachers she will give a devotion to be known as the Rosary. AND ONE DAY, THROUGH THE ROSARY AND THE SCAPULAR, SHE WILL SAVE THE WORLD.”
The above claim is no idle claim―as you will be see in the following short extract or “tip-of-the-iceberg” of miracles that have been witnessed through the use of various Sacramentals of the Church―such as the Brown Scapular, the Rosary, the Miraculous Medal, etc.
Demons and the Armor of God
In the Gospel for the Third Sunday of Lent (Extraordinary Rite/Traditional Rite) we read of Jesus casting out a demon from a possessed man: “At that time, Jesus was casting out a devil, and the same was dumb; and when He had cast out the devil, the dumb man spoke. And the crowds marveled. But some of them said, By Beelzebub, the prince of devils, He casts out devils. And others, to test Him, demanded from Him a sign from Heaven. But He, seeing their thoughts, said to them: ‘Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and house will fall upon house! If, then, Satan also is divided against himself, how shall his kingdom stand? You say that I cast out devils by Beelzebub. Now, if I cast out devils by Beelzebub, by whom do your children cast them out? Therefore they shall be your judges! But if I cast out devils by the finger of God, then the Kingdom of God has come upon you! When the strong man, fully armed, guards his courtyard, his property is undisturbed. But if a stronger than he attacks and overcomes him, he will take away all his weapons that he relied upon, and will divide his spoils. He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me scatters! When the unclean spirit has gone out of a man, he roams through waterless places in search of rest; and finding none, he says, “I will return to my house which I left.” And when he has come to it, he finds the place swept and clean. Then he goes and takes seven other spirits―more evil than himself―and they enter in and dwell there; and the last state of that man becomes worse that the first!’” (Luke 11:14-28).
Holy Scripture tells us to be well-armed and protected against the attacks of the demons: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places! Therefore take the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day--having your loins girt about with truth; having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the Gospel. In all things taking the shield of Faith, so that you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God. By all prayer praying at all times in the spirit!” (Ephesians 6:12-18).
Gross Hearts! Deaf Ears! Eyes Shut!
Have we shut our eyes and ears to the truths and weapons that God has given us? Has our heart grown gross, our minds grown dull? Do we hear the word of God without really hearing it, or understanding it? Do we see religious things, objects, ceremonies and actions without really grasping what they are all about? Are we only seeing the tip-of-the-iceberg of our Faith, without realizing the immensity beneath the waters? Are we so choked-up with the cares, pleasures and riches of the world that we fail to truly and fully understand our Faith, what it offers, and to profit from it? Is our understanding and estimation of the Faith so shallow that the Faith never really sprouts and establishes deep roots within our souls?
Such a blindness, grossness, remissness, forgetfulness and carelessness about the Faith results in serious damage and dreadful consequences. The tools of the Faith are unused and left to rust and decay. Souls that could and should be saved are damned. Souls that could become saints, languish in lukewarmness. Truths that could be planted, sprouted, enrooted and grown in our minds―suffer neglect or even rejection. Things that could help our safety and salvation, are ignored or refused―thus leading many souls to ruin and damnation. “For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!”
Our Lady pretty much said the same thing to Sister Lucia of Fatima, who reveals to us: “The Blessed Virgin is very sad, because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on the road of goodness without paying attention to this Message―they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners, the bad―because of their sins―keep following the road of evil through sin, ignoring the Message, because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way! The chastisement from Heaven is imminent!” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Avoiding Chastisements Through Sacramentals
The above words of Sister Lucia of Fatima about chastisements remind us of the chastisements that God inflicted upon Egypt in the time of Moses and the Exodus. Prior to the Exodus from Egypt by the Israelites, God chastised the land with ten successive plagues: (1) all the water turning to blood, (2) a plague of frogs, (3) lice or gnats, (4) flies, (5) a livestock pestilence, (6) a plague of boils, (7) hail, (8) locusts, (9) darkness and (10) the killing of firstborn children.
Of particular interest is God’s killing of the firstborn children within Egypt: “And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron: ‘Speak ye to the whole assembly of the children of Israel, and say to them: “On the tenth day of this month let every man take a lamb by their families and houses ... It shall be a lamb without blemish, a male, of one year … And you shall sacrifice it in the evening of the fourteenth day of this month … And they shall take of the blood of the lamb, and put it upon both the side posts, and on the upper door posts of the houses … And I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and will kill every firstborn in the land of Egypt both man and beast … And the blood shall be unto you for a sign in the houses where you shall be: and I shall see the blood, and shall pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I shall strike the land of Egypt .. And the children of Israel going forth did as the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron. And it came to pass at midnight, the Lord slew every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharao, who sat on his throne, unto the firstborn of the captive woman that was in the prison, and all the firstborn of cattle. And Pharao arose in the night, and all his servants, and all Egypt―for there was not a house wherein there lay not one dead” (Exodus 12:3-30).
The Sacramental of Blessed Chalk
You could say that smearing of the blood of lamb on the doorposts and lintel of the doors of the Israelite houses was a figure or type of today’s Sacramentals of the Catholic Church. For example, today we used the Sacramental of chalk blessed on the feast of the Epiphany to inscribe the numbers of the current calendar year (2023) and the letters C M B (which represent the names of the three magi or kings at Bethlehem―Caspar, Melchior and Balthazar) on the lintels of the doors of our houses. [download the rite, ceremony, blessings here: Epiphany Blessings for Chalk & Home & Water]
In blessing the Epiphany chalk, the priest prays: “O Lord God, bless this chalk which Thou hast created, that it may be helpful to mankind; and grant that, through the invocation of Thy most holy Name, all those who use this chalk, or with it write over the doors of their houses the names of Thy Saints—Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar—may by their merits and intercession receive health of body and protection of soul. Through Christ Our Lord. Amen.”
Then, immediately after chalking the doors, the priest prays: “O Lord, almighty God, bless this house that it may become a shelter of health, chastity, self-conquest, humility, goodness, mildness, obedience to the Commandments, and thanksgiving to God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Upon this house and those who dwell herein may Thy blessing remain forever. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
Similarly, in the traditional blessing of a house, with the prayers from the Roman Ritual, the priest prays: “Hear us, holy Lord, almighty Father, eternal God! And deign to send Thy holy Angel from Heaven to guard, cherish, protect, visit, and defend all who dwell in this home. Though Christ our Lord. Amen.” During Easter time, the prayer reads as follows: “Hear us, holy Lord, Father almighty, eternal God! And as in their departure from Egypt Thou didst guard the homes of the Israelites from the avenging Angel, if they were smeared with blood―prefiguring our Pasch in which Christ is slain―so likewise send Thy holy Angel from Heaven to guard, cherish, protect, visit, and defend all who dwell in this house. Though the same Christ our Lord. Amen.”
Ask your priest for some blessed Epiphany Chalk―if he has none left (or never blessed any in the first place), then he can bless chalk at any time of the year. Get some! Use it! It is there to help you! Don’t abuse that help! Use it especially during this Christmas season―which lasts until February 2nd―and chalk the doors, not only of your main entrance, but go further and chalk all the lintels (the horizontal beam above head height that bridges the two vertical doorposts) with the traditional chalking (see your downloaded Epiphany Blessings: Chalk & Home & Water) of the year and the letters of the three Kings or Magi―interspersed with 4 signs of the cross: 20 + C + M + B + 23 Profit from these Sacramentals of the Church―God helps those who help themselves. God will do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices. The Sacramentals are the ordinary helps or tools that the Church offers us. Use them!
The Sacramental of Epiphany Water and Regular Holy Water
The rite of blessing Epiphany water, on the Vigil of the Epiphany, is much more solemn and elaborate than the simple rite of blessing Holy Water throughout the year. The entire rite can take anywhere from 30 to 40 minutes―whereas regular blessing of Holy Water only takes around 5 minutes or so. You can find the solemn rite of blessing Epiphany Water in the same download as that of blessed Epiphany Chalk [click here]. To read more about Holy Water [click here]
► THE EXORCISM AND BLESSING OF THE SALT: In exorcizing and blessing the salt, the priest prays: “God’s creature, salt, I cast out the demon from you by the living God, by the holy God, by God who ordered you to be thrown into the water-spring by Eliseus to heal it of its barrenness. May you be a purified salt―a means of health for those who believe; a medicine for body and soul for all who make use of you. May all evil fancies of the foul fiend, his malice and cunning, be driven afar from the place where you are sprinkled. And let every unclean spirit be repulsed by Him who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire. Amen.”
“Almighty everlasting God, we humbly appeal to Thy mercy and goodness to graciously bless this creature salt, which Thou hast given for mankind’s use. May all who use it find in it a remedy for body and mind. And may everything that it touches or sprinkles be freed from uncleanness and any influence of the evil spirit; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► THE EXORCISM AND BLESSING OF THE WATER: In exorcizing and blessing the water, the priest prays: “God’s creature, water, I cast out the demon from you in the Name of God the Father almighty, in the Name of Jesus Christ, His Son, our Lord, and in the power of the Holy Spirit. May you be a purified water, empowered to drive afar all power of the enemy, to root out and banish the enemy himself, along with his fallen angels. We ask this through the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire. Amen.”
“O God, Who, for man’s welfare, established the most wonderful mysteries in the substance of water, listen to our prayer, and pour forth Thy blessing on this element now being prepared with various purifying rites. May this creature of Thine―when used in your mysteries and endowed with Thy grace―serve to cast out demons and to banish disease. May everything that this water sprinkles―in the homes and gatherings of the faithful―be delivered from all that is unclean and hurtful; let no breath of contagion hover there, no stain of corruption; let all the wiles of the lurking enemy come to nothing. By the sprinkling of this water, may everything opposed to the safety and peace of the occupants of these homes be banished, so that in calling on Thy holy Name they may gain the well-being they desire, and be protected from every peril; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► MIXING THE BLESSED SALT WITH THE BLESSED WATER: While mixing the salt with the water, the priest prays: “God, source of irresistible might and king of an invincible realm, the ever-glorious conqueror; Who restrains the force of the adversary, silencing the uproar of his rage, and valiantly subduing his wickedness; in awe and humility we beg Thee, Lord, to regard with favor this creature thing of salt and water, to let the light of Thy kindness shine upon it, and to hallow it with the dew of Thy mercy; so that wherever it is sprinkled and Thy holy Name is invoked, may every assault of the unclean spirit be baffled, and all dread of the serpent’s venom be cast out. To us who entreat Thy mercy, grant that the Holy Spirit may be with us wherever we may be; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: There are many things and circumstances for which you can use Epiphany Water or even regular Holy Water. You can drink Holy Water―we eat blessed food, don’t we?―but make sure you are getting your Holy Water through the faucet or spigot of the Holy Water cistern in church, which is usually sealed, and not from the open Holy Water font in church into which everyone dips their fingers! Also drink as fresh a Holy Water as you can get―not water that is years old. St. Teresa of Avila used to drink Holy Water. Similarly, you can also cook with Holy Water (again, fresh Holy Water and not old water) and also add blessed salt to your food or recipes. Furthermore, you can keep it in bottles throughout the rooms in your home―to sprinkle often or even daily. The devil hates Holy Water―that is why this Sacramental is one of several Sacramentals that are used during exorcisms. St. Teresa would often sprinkle herself or her surroundings with Holy Water―especially during temptations. Likewise, if you have blessed salt, you can also sprinkle that around―for the blessing of salt mentions precisely that: “…wherever it is sprinkled…”
Why not take Epiphany Water or Holy Water and either sprinkle or pour a thin stream all around the perimeter of your house, while reciting certain prayers or extracts from the prayers above. Don’t just do this once and no more! Do it as often as you like―once a month, or once a week. Do it especially in times of impending danger―whether natural or man-made―such as storms, floods, earthquakes, fires, or civic unrest. If there are squabbles and arguments, or even violence or sin occurring within the family, sprinkle holy water around the rooms of the house in combination with some prayers. If things and appliances start to “act-up” or malfunction, it does no harm to sprinkle them with Holy Water―for sometimes it is the devil that is behind these things. If threatened by someone, why not sprinkle them with Holy Water―you have nothing to lose and potentially much to gain. Some people, who are under the control or influence of Satan, have been known to feel a burning sensation when sprinkled with Holy Water!
On a side issue, if you find Holy Water hard to obtain, then you can regular water to your Holy Water―as long as the regular water is a lesser quantity than the amount of Holy Water you have left. The regular water added to the holy water must be less than the original volume―for example, 49% regular water to 51% Holy Water, or 9 cups of regular water to 10 cups of Holy Water, etc. But the 49%/51% method leaves no room for error! It would be safer and less risky to use 40% regular water to 60% holy water―for example, 4 cups of regular water to 6 cups holy water. If the regular water exceeds the amount of Holy Water, then the Holy Water loses its Sacramental qualities and becomes regular water. That is the procedure followed by the Church with the Holy Oils that a bishop consecrates on Holy Thursday―after the ceremony, the urns are taken away and then the Holy Oils are “multiplied” by adding regular olive oil to it, but always in a lesser quantity than the amount of Holy Oil.
There will come a time when all Hell breaks loose and we will no longer have access to churches, priests and the Holy Water they bless and you obviously find Holy Water hard to obtain, then simply add regular water to your Holy Water―as long as the regular water is a lesser quantity than the amount of Holy Water you have left―and keep doing that for the duration of the crisis or societal breakdown.
The Sacramental of the Blessing of a Home
Do not underestimate or dismiss the power of having your home blessed! You will be opening your home to a potential stream of graces, blessings and protection―which is precisely what the prayers of house blessings invoke:
► BLESSING: In blessing the home, the priest prays: “Hear us, holy Lord and Father, almighty everlasting God, and in Thy goodness visit, we beseech thee, O Lord, this dwelling, to protect all who live in this home and drive far from it the snares of the enemy; let Thy holy angels watch over and dwell therein, to be with them, give them comfort and encouragement, and to preserve them in peace, and let Thy blessing be always upon them, through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► ALTERNATIVE BLESSING: “God the Father almighty, we fervently implore Thee, for the sake of this home and its occupants and possessions, that Thou may bless and sanctify them, enriching them by Thy kindness in every way possible. Pour out on them, Lord, heavenly dew in good measure, as well as an abundance of earthly needs. Mercifully listen to their prayers, and grant that their desires be fulfilled. At our lowly coming, be pleased to bless and sanctify this home, as Thou once were pleased to bless the home of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Within these walls, let Thy angels of light preside and stand watch over those who live here; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: It is sheer foolishness, imprudence and complacency to neglect having one’s house blessed by the priest! From the spiritual perspective it fortifies your home against all kinds of potential dangers―coming from both devils and men. In this present era, when it seems as though Our Lady of La Salette’s prophecy is being fulfilled ― “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell ... The Church will decompose and the devil will make himself like the king of all hearts … The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. Everywhere, as true Faith fades, a false light will brighten the people … The Church will yield to large persecution, a time of darkness and the Church will witness a frightful crisis ... All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot and only homicides, hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family. Blood will flow in the streets! Men will kill each other, massacre each other, even in their homes!” In such an environment, only a fool would wish to live a house which, through neglect and indifference, has not been blessed!
The Sacramental of the Crucifix
The blessed Crucifix is always part and parcel of the things that an exorcist priest will take with him to the exorcism. It was on the Cross that the crucified Christ won His definitive victory over Satan and the powers of Hell. The Crucifix always reminds Satan of his defeat at the hands of Christ―that is why it is so important and so powerful a Sacramental. It is not for nothing that in Ancient Roman times, the future emperor Constantine, was facing battle while being heavily outnumbered. Constantine realized that he needed help from a power greater than himself―but who or what? He had his doubts about the traditional Roman gods. He prayed earnestly that the true God―whoever that may be―would “reveal to him who he is, and stretch forth his right hand to help him.” God gave him a vision of a cross together with the words: “In hoc signo vinces” which is a Latin phrase that means: “In this sign thou shalt conquer!” This sign brought Constantine the assurance he needed. He accepted this as the answer to his prayer and ordered his soldiers to inscribe crosses on their shields. Encouraged by his vision in the heavens, he hurled his troops against his rival Maxentius, at Rome’s Milvian Bridge. Surprisingly, Constantine was victorious. Maxentius was among those who drowned in the Tiber. Afterward Constantine does not forget to whom he owes his victory. Constantine issued orders that the Christian Church was to be tolerated―just as other religions were. Although he did not make Christianity the official religion of the Empire, Constantine bestowed favor upon it, built places of worship for Christians, and presided over the first general Church council. He became the first emperor to embrace Christianity and was be baptized on his death bed.
► BLESSING: In blessing the Crucifix the priest prays: “O Holy Lord, almighty Father, eternal God, bless this cross that it be a saving help to mankind. Let it be a bulwark of Faith, an encouragement to good works, the redemption of souls; and may it be consolation, protection and a shield against the cruel darts of the enemy. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
“Bless, O Lord Jesus Christ this cross by which Thou hast snatched the world from Satan’s grasp and upon which Thou hast overcome, by thy suffering, him who is the prompter of sin, who rejoiced in Adam’s deception at the accursed tree of Paradise. May this symbol of salvation be sanctified in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and may all who kneel and pray before this cross for our Lord’s honor receive health of body and soul. Through the selfsame Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: Seek to place a blessed Crucifix in all the rooms of your house. You can also place a Crucifix in your outdoor buildings―garage, barn, shed, etc. You could add to the Crucifix a small plaque, or a simply frame a small sheet of paper upon which you could type the following Scriptural quotes:
“If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And whoever does not take up his cross and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
Parents have every right to bless their own children. They can do so by making the Sign of the Cross on their child’s forehead while saying: “May God bless you and keep you, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.” They could even make the same Sign of the Cross using a blessed Crucifix.
When you are tempted, make the Sign of the Cross over yourself―slowly and deliberately―many times if necessary. Additionally, you could take your blessed Crucifix and sign yourself with the Sign of the Cross using the blessed Crucifix.
The Sacramental of the St. Benedict Medal
The Medal of St. Benedict is powerful to ward off all dangers of body and soul coming from the evil spirit. [read more here] We are exposed to the wicked assaults of the devil day and night. St. Peter says: “Your adversary the devil, as roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). In the life of St. Benedict we see how the devil tried to do harm to his soul and body, and also to his spiritual children. Father Paul of Moll, saintly Flemish Benedictine wonder-worker (1824-1896), frustrated the evil doings of the spirits of darkness chiefly through the use of the Medal of St. Benedict, which has proved a most powerful protection against the snares and delusions of Satan. Missionaries in pagan lands used this Medal with such a great effect that it was been given the remarkable name, “The devil-chasing Medal.”
The Medal is a powerful means:
● To destroy witchcraft and all other diabolical influences.
● To keep away the spells of magicians, of wicked and evil-minded persons.
● To impart protection to persons tempted, deluded or tormented by evil spirits.
● To obtain the conversion of sinners, especially when they are in danger of death.
● To secure a timely and healthy birth for children.
● To help and strengthen a person at the time of death.
● To serve as an armor in temptations against holy purity.
● To destroy the effects of poison.
● To give protection against storms and lightning.
● To serve as an efficacious remedy for bodily afflictions and a means of protection against contagious diseases.
● For animals infected with plague or other maladies, and for fields when invaded by harmful insects.
The front of the medal depicts St. Benedict holding in his right hand a cross, and in his left, the book of his Rule. On his right is a poisoned cup, and on his left a raven with a poisoned loaf. A jealous enemy had given him this cup and loaf; when St. Benedict made the Sign of the Cross over them, the cup shattered and a raven flew in and carried away the loaf. Above these items are the Latin words “CRUX SANCTI PATRIS BENEDICTI” (The Cross of our holy father Benedict). Surrounding the figure of St. Benedict are the words “EIUS IN OBITU NOSTRO PRAESENTIA MUNIAMUR!” (May we be strengthened by his presence in the hour of our death), as he was always regarded by the Benedictines as the patron of a happy death.
The back of the medal depicts a Cross. On the Cross are the letters C S S M L ― N D S M D, initials of the Latin words “CRUX SACRA SIT MIHI LUX! NUNQUAM DRACO SIT MIHI DUX!” (May the Holy Cross be my light! May the dragon never be my guide!). Above the cross is the word PAX (peace.) Encircling the cross are the letters V R S N S M V - S M Q L I V B, the initials of “VADE RETRO SATANA! NUNQUAM SUADE MIHI VANA! SUNT MALA QUAE LIBAS. IPSE VENENA BIBAS!” (Begone Satan! Never tempt me with your vanities! What you offer me is evil. Drink the poison yourself!)
The purpose of the medal is to call down God’s blessing and protection upon us, wherever we are, and upon our homes and possessions, especially through the intercession of St. Benedict. By the conscious and devout use of the medal, it becomes a constant silent prayer and a reminder of our dignity as followers of Christ.
► BLESSING: In blessing the St. Benedict Medal, the priest prays: “I purge you medals of evil by God the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth and of the sea and of all that they contain. O every power of the adversary, every cohort of the devil, every attack and appearance of Satan―get thee out of these medals and fly afar! And may they become for all who will use them a help for body and soul, in the Name of the Father Almighty, in the Name of Jesus Christ, His Son, our Lord, in the Name of the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, and in the love of the selfsame Lord Jesus Christ, Who shall come to judge the living and the dead and the world by fire.”
“Almighty God, lavish Dispenser of every good, we Thy suppliants pray that, by the intercession of St. Benedict, Thou wouldst pour out Thy blessing on these sacred medals. Let all who will wear them, with minds intent on good works, deserve to obtain health of body and soul; the grace of making progress in holiness; as well as the indulgences which have been granted (to us). And may they seek to avoid, by Thy merciful help, every onslaught and fraud of the devil, and finally stand before thee sinless and holy. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: There is no special way prescribed for carrying or wearing the Medal of St. Benedict. It can be worn on a chain around the neck, attached to one’s Rosary, kept in one’s pocket or purse, or placed in one’s car or home. The medal is often put into the foundations of houses and building, on the walls of barns and sheds, or in one’s place of business. You can even purchase what is called a “St. Benedict Home Blessing Door Hang” for around $15, which hangs on door knobs or hooks. It includes St. Benedict crucifix and two St. Benedict medals, being around 11” long overall. However, you can create your own “door hangs” by combining the St. Benedict Medal with, not only a Crucifix or St. Benedict Crucifix, but also the Miraculous Medal, the Green Scapular, and any other Sacramental you wish. Place one such combination―not only on your exterior entrance doors, but on every door and above or below every window in the house. You could also plant the blessed St. Benedict Medals in the soil all around the perimeter of your house, spacing them out as you wish. Attach or plant a medal in your exterior buildings―barn, shed, garage, etc. Plant some further away from the house―especially at the main entrance and other entrances to your property. Don’t just have one or two medals at home, buy lots of them and have them blessed. It is a very powerful Sacramental with centuries of a proven track record.
The Sacramental of the Holy Rosary
Make no mistake about it―the Holy Rosary is THE weapon for our present day. It was St. Padre Pio who called the THE weapon―and he himself would pray anywhere from 30 to 50 Rosaries each day! The Rosary praying Jesuit priests of Hiroshima, who survived, in good health, the dropping of the 1945 Atom Bomb by the Americans on Hiroshima, repeatedly said: “The Rosary is more powerful than the Atom Bomb!”
In 1957, Sister Lucia of Fatima told us what Our Lady revealed to her about the Holy Rosary: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
That is why Our Lady repeatedly insisted, at every single Fatima apparition, upon the Rosary being prayed a lot: “Pray the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war!” (May 1917) … “Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war … (June 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you! … If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted!” (July 1917) … “Continue to say the Rosary every day! … Pray, pray very much!” (August 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war!” (September 1917) … “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day!” (October 1917). At Akita, in 1973, Our Lady adds: “The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the Rosary, pray for the pope, the bishops, and the priests! … Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men! … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much—very much! … Pray with fervor!”
► BLESSING: In blessing the Rosary beads, the priest prays: “Almighty and merciful God, in Thy great charity and out of love for us, Thine only-begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ didst descend to earth, was announced by the Angel, received flesh in the holy womb of our Lady, the Most Blessed Virgin Mary; was crucified and became subject to death; and on the third day gloriously willed to rise from the dead, in order that we might be delivered from the power of the devil. We beg Thy great mercy, that this Rosary, used by the assembly of Thy faithful for the honor and praise of the same Mother of Thy Son, may be blessed and sanctified; so that through the overflowing power of Thy Holy Ghost, at whatever hour or in whatever place it is carried, or retained in their homes, through it, according to the institutes of Thy holy Society, they may be led to Thee by the contemplation of Thy divine mysteries in devout prayer, being nourished and preserved in abundant devotion. Partaking of all the graces, privileges, and indulgences which the Holy See has granted; may they always and everywhere be protected from every visible or invisible power of this world; and upon leaving it, may the same Blessed Virgin Mother of God present them to Thee, robed in an abundance of good works. This we ask of Thee through the same Jesus Christ . . . world without end. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: Copy, paste, save, read and re-read the miracles of Rosary that you will find in the preceding article. It will foster in you an abiding confidence in the power of the Rosary. St. Louis de Montfort’s book, The Secret of the Rosary, is a testimony to the power of the Rosary and the esteem with which Our Lady and Heaven show towards the Rosary. It is an excellent book to kindle our fires of love towards the Holy Rosary. Get a copy! Read it! Remember―it is not how MANY Rosaries we SAY, but HOW WELL WE PRAY them. As St. Louis writes in his book: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly!”
That is why devil―if he sees that he cannot make you abandon the Rosary―he will then tempt you to do the lesser good. That lesser good is to make you SAY the Rosary, rather than have you PRAY the Rosary. SAYING the Rosary means only saying the words of the prayers without meditating on the mysteries; whereas PRAYING the Rosary means not only saying the words, but also MEDITATING upon the mysteries. Furthermore, TRUE meditation always involves MAKING AND TAKING RESOLUTIONS based upon what you have meditated―otherwise it is like making a meal or baking a cake, and then not eating it. Probably 99.9% of Catholics merely SAY the Rosary, but NEVER PRAY the Rosary. Small wonder that souls never become better, or that so many souls are lost.
St. Louis further adds: “God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? People who do that forfeit God’s blessing, which is changed into a curse for having treated the things of God disrespectfully: ‘Cursed be the one who does God’s work negligently!’ (Jeremias 48:10). Our Lady said to Blessed Alan de la Roche in a vision ‘When people say 150 Hail Marys, that prayer is very helpful to them and a most pleasing tribute to me. But they will do better still and will please me more if they say these salutations while meditating on the life, death, and passion of Jesus Christ, for this meditation is the soul of this prayer.’ For the Rosary said without the meditation on the sacred mysteries of our salvation would almost be a body without a soul, excellent matter, but without the form, which is the meditation.
“Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin. The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
Another point to be made is that of having lots of blessed Rosaries available in your home―they can be of various kinds, simple string Rosaries that are knotted to create the “beads”, or a good number of plastic Rosaries for distribution to others who may be in need, plus the kind of Rosaries that you personally prefer. As a suggestion, the so-called “ladder Rosaries” seem to be more hardy and durable than the thin-wire like Rosaries―obviously you pay more, but they are worth the money. If you can get someone to make you Rosary from scratch, then it is suggested that you include other Sacramentals as part of your “tailor-made” Rosary. For example, for the center piece medallion use the Miraculous Medal; for the Our Father beads uses the St. Benedict Medal; for the Crucifix use a St. Benedict Crucifix which has the St. Benedict Medal embedded at the point where the horizontal and vertical beams cross, right behind the head of Christ. Thus, when you have your Rosary blessed, ask the priest to give the Rosary beads a multiple blessing: (1) the special blessing for the Rosary; (2) the special blessing for the Crucifix; (3) the special blessing for the Miraculous Medal, and (4) the special blessing for the St. Benedict Medal. These four blessings, one after another, will take around 8 to 10 minutes. Not all priests will be willing to do that―too much time and trouble―but it is worth asking around until you find one that will. That will give you a very powerful multi-Sacramental Rosary!
Finally, make sure to ALWAYS carry your Rosary with you. St. Padre Pio would NEVER be without his Rosary beads. Even when he could no longer wash himself and tend to his stigmata, and had to have others do these things, he would always hold his Rosary beads in one hand while they washed the other hand. He would take his Rosary beads to bed with him. DO THE SAME! Soldiers sleep alongside their weapons! Sleep with you Rosary! Some people will even wear their Rosary beads around their neck. The devils despise blessed Rosary beads. St. Louis de Montfort, in The Secret of the Rosary, writes: “Blessed Alan relates that a man he knew had tried desperately all kinds of devotions to rid himself of the evil spirit which possessed him, but without success. Finally, he thought of wearing his Rosary round his neck, which eased him considerably. He discovered that whenever he took it off the devil tormented him cruelly, so he resolved to wear it night and day. This drove the evil spirit away forever because he could not bear such a terrible chain. Blessed Alan also testifies that he delivered a great number of those who were possessed by putting a Rosary round their necks.”
The Sacramental of the Brown Scapular
Just as the Holy Rosary is the weapon for our times, so too is the Brown Scapular a weapon for our days. You could loosely look upon the Rosary as a sword and the Scapular as a shield or a suit of armor. In fact, a full size monk’s scapular pretty much covers him like a suit of armor―being shoulder width and hanging down almost to the ground front and back. Sister Lucia of Fatima said that Our Lady was dressed as Our Lady of Mount Carmel at her sixth and last apparition at Fatima―holding out the Scapular towards all the people, which signified that Our Lady wanted everyone to accept and wear the Brown Scapular. The essence of the Scapular is defense―as stated in the blessing of the Scapular:
► BLESSING: In blessing the Brown Scapular, the priest prays: “O Lord Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, sanctify by Thy right hand these scapulars, which for love of Thee and for love of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, Thy servants will wear devoutly, so that through the intercession of the same Virgin Mary, Mother of God, and protected against the evil spirit, they persevere until death in Thy grace. Thou who live and reign world without end. Amen.”
“Receive this blessed Scapular and beseech the Blessed Virgin that through her merits, you may wear it without stain. May it defend you against all adversity and accompany you to eternal life. Amen.”
“I, by the power vested in me, admit you to participate in all the spiritual benefits obtained through the mercy of Jesus Christ by the Religious Order of Mount Carmel. In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.”
“May God Almighty, the Creator of Heaven and Earth, bless you, He who has deigned to join you to the Confraternity of the Blessed Virgin of Mount Carmel; we beseech her to crush the head of the ancient serpent at the hour of your death, so that you my enter into possession of your eternal heritage, through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: It is important that you know the rules and regulations of wearing the Brown Scapular and being enrolled in the Confraternity of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. To help you with this task, check our webpage on FAQs about the Brown Scapular [click here]. As with the Rosaries and Medals, keep a large stock of Brown Scapulars at home. You could also, together with other mentioned Sacramentals, hang them above your doors and windows―keeping in mind the protective nature of the Brown Scapular.
Have confidence in your Brown Scapular―read about some of the many miracles that the Brown Scapular has produced over the years [to read click here]. Many of those miracles were not granted to saints, but to everyday people. In some cases, the miracles were in response to a positive request, Faith and confidence on the part of the recipient. In other cases the miracles happened without being requested and in some cases totally unknown to the recipient until afterwards. You can see an example of each in the previous article, under the Brown Scapular section―here is one miracle that was not asked for, nor was known to have happened until later:
A French priest on pilgrimage was walking to the local church to celebrate Mass. As he drew near to the church, the priest realized he forgot something. He had forgotten to put on his Brown Scapular after washing and dressing that morning. Disturbed by the thought of being without his Scapular and offering Mass without it, the priest ran back to get his Scapular, preferring to celebrate Mass clothed with his Scapular. Later, as he was offering the Holy Sacrifice, a young man approached the altar, pulled out a gun, and shot the priest in the back. To the amazement of all, the priest continued to say the prayers of the Mass as though nothing had occurred. It was at first presumed that the bullet had miraculously missed its target. However, upon examination, the bullet was found STUCK TO THE BROWN SCAPULAR which the priest had so obstinately refused to be without.
Similarly, in May of 1957, a Carmelite priest in Germany published the unusual story of how the Scapular saved a home from fire. An entire row of homes had caught fire in Westboden, Germany. The devout Catholic inhabitants of a home in the middle of this row, seeing the fire, immediately fastened a Scapular to the main door of the house. Sparks flew over it and around it, but the house remained unharmed. Within 5 hours, 22 homes had been reduced to ashes. The one structure which stood undamaged, amidst all the destruction, was that which had the Scapular attached to its door. The hundreds of people who came to see the place Our Lady had saved are eyewitnesses to the power of the Scapular and the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
It is not for nothing that Our Lady held out the Brown Scapular to the world at her final October 13th, 1917, apparition at Fatima. Take it and wear it and use it! Let it be a magnet that attracts graces and protection from Heaven. You can read more about the history and meaning of the Brown Scapular [by clicking here].
The Sacramental of the Miraculous Medal
The very name “Miraculous Medal” smacks of miracles! In fact, the real name of the “Miraculous Medal” is actually “The Medal of the Immaculate Conception”―but it received its popular name of “Miraculous Medal” on account of the multitude of miracles that it brought about [read about the miracles here]. Here is just a sample:
A girl, some twenty years old, came to the hospital covered with the most repugnant scabs which the doctors had said were incurable. The nun, who cared for her wounds, one day told her that the Most Holy Virgin had the power to cure her and that, if she wanted to wear the medal and ask for a cure, she would obtain it. Knowing the doctors had given up, she answered roughly: “I do not believe in your Holy Virgin, nor do I want a medal.” The nun answered: “Very well then, in that case, keep your wounds!” Some days later, the girl asked for the medal and placed it around her neck, and soon after found herself preparing to be baptized. Shortly thereafter, she left the hospital in perfect health―to the great astonishment of the doctors, who had been unanimous in considering her sickness incurable.
In another miracle, the person was also converted but not cured. Nevertheless she died a happy and holy death. A religious sister relates the story: “A poor young Protestant girl, who was brought to our hospital to be treated for a grave malady, had so great a horror of our holy religion, that, at the very sight of a Catholic near her, she acted like someone possessed. The presence of a Sister was especially irritating, and one day she even went so far as to spit in the Sister’s face, but the latter, not dismayed and ever hoping that the God of all mercy would change this wolf into a lamb, continued her kind attentions―the more disrespectful her patient, the more gentle and considerate the Sister. The Sister was at last inspired with the thought of slipping a Miraculous Medal between the two mattresses―she acted upon the inspiration, and, the following night, the Immaculate Mary’s image became an instrument of salvation and happiness to that guilty soul. Pitching and tossing upon her bed―by reason of a high fever―the patient, in some unaccountable manner, found the Medal, and the Sister’s astonishment next morning―at seeing her clasping it in her hands, and covering it with kisses―was second only to that she experienced on perceiving the wonderful transformation grace had wrought in this poor creature’s soul. A supernatural light had revealed to her the sad state of her conscience; her criminal life filled her with horror, and, penetrated with regret for the past, she sighed only for holy Baptism. After the necessary instruction, she was baptized; and, during the remainder of her sickness―which was long and tedious―her patience and fervor never faltered. She persevered in these edifying sentiments, until a happy death placed the seal upon the graces she had received through the intercession of Mary Immaculate.”
Finally, we see another miraculous cure. An officer, in Austrian army, suffered from a serious wound in the right arm. At the general hospital, he was placed under the especial treatment of Dr. Rzehazeh, a very eminent surgeon. The doctor exhausted all his skills, but in vain―and after a few weeks he saw the necessity of amputation to save the officer’s life. The religious sisters in the hospital offered him a Miraculous Medal, which he accepted only out of courtesy. In the few days prior to the operation, he felt inspired with a great confidence in his Medal, and frequently repeated the invocation engraven upon it: “O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!”
The danger was now imminent, and the amputation, which must not be delayed, was to take place on the next day. One of the Sisters―seeing that the young officer’s confidence expressed itself in continual prayer―suggested on the eve of the amputation that he lay the medal upon his afflicted arm, and let it remain all night. He gladly and joyfully complied. Next morning she hastened to ascertain her patient’s condition, and get the Medal. He had spent a quiet night―his sufferings being less severe than usual. The Sister, while attributing his improvement to the medicine that had been prescribed, understood full well that the precious Medal had also been instrumental in procuring relief, and that Mary had looked compassionately upon him―but she did not yet realize the full extent of the blessing.
The surgeon came a few hours after, and whilst awaiting his assistants, he carefully examined the wounded arm, he touched it, he probed it, and to his great astonishment, realized that amputation was no longer necessary. The other doctors, on arriving, confirmed his opinion of this surprising change. The officer was struck dumb with happiness, and, not until he found himself alone with the chief surgeon, did the patient reveal his secret about the Medal, which, in his opinion, caused this wonderful change. On leaving him, the surgeon could not refrain from saying to the Sister: “I believe the Sisters of Charity have engaged the good God in this case!” The officer’s arm was entirely healed. A few weeks later he left the hospital, taking with him the precious Medal as a memento of gratitude and love for Mary Immaculate.
The design of the Miraculous Medal came straight from the hands of Our Lady―for she showed the design that she wanted to St. Catherine Labouré in a 1830 vision at the Rue du Bac, in Paris, France. Concerning the rays of light that came forth from the rings on the fingers of her outstretched hands (see front of Medal), she was told: “These rays symbolize the graces I shed upon those who ask for them. The gems, from which rays do not fall, are the graces for which souls neglect to ask.” The voice added: “Have a Medal struck after this model. All who wear it will receive great graces; they should wear it around the neck. Graces will abound for persons who wear it with confidence.”
► BLESSING: In blessing the Miraculous Medal, the priest prays: “Almighty and merciful God, Who, by the many appearances on Earth of the Immaculate Virgin Mary, were pleased to work miracles again and again for the salvation of souls; kindly pour out Thy blessing on this Medal, so that all who devoutly wear it and reverence it may experience the patronage of Mary Immaculate and obtain mercy from Thee; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
“Take this holy medal; wear it with Faith, and handle it with due devotion, so that the holy and Immaculate Queen of Heaven may protect and defend you. And as she is ever ready to renew her wondrous acts of kindness, may she obtain for you in her mercy whatever you humbly ask of God, so that both in life and in death you may rest happily in her motherly embrace. Amen.”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: First and foremost, always wear your blessed Miraculous Medal around your neck. If you also wear the Brown Scapular, you may―if you so wish―attach the Miraculous Medal to the cords of your Scapular; or you wear the Medal on a chain or cord of its own. However, do not limit the use of the Miraculous Medal to being worn around your neck. As with the other Sacramentals mentioned above, you could attach the blessed Medal above every door and window in the house; or plant a large number of blessed Medals in the soil around the perimeter of your house―thus creating, as it were, a spiritual moat or spiritual wall of grace around the house. Likewise, attach or plant a medal in your exterior buildings―barn, shed, garage, etc. Plant some further away from the house―especially at the main entrance and other entrances to your property. Plant the blessed Medal in the homes of those whom you seek to convert to the Faith or bring back to the Faith from sin. Always keep a blessed Medal in your car as extra insurance against accidents, theft and other dangers.
The Sacramental of the Blessed Candles
Finally―though there are many more Sacramentals that could be examined in addition to the above handful―we come to blessed candles. Candles are an integral part of the Catholic Faith―Our Lord refers to them and the Church constantly uses them. Our Lord said: “You are the light of the world. Men do not light a candle and put it under a bucket, but upon a candlestick, so that it may shine to all that are in the house! So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:14-16). Every single Sacrifice of the Mass is offered with candles burning―and the priest is forbidden to say Mass without candles. In a High Mass or Sung Mass, the altar servers (acolytes) enter the church carrying lit candles. When we have Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament―candles likewise must be lit. When the priest makes a sick call to a home, he traditionally had to be greeted by a family member carrying a lit candle. A newly baptized person receives a lit candle during the baptismal ceremony. Candles surround the coffin at a funeral. Deacons carry a lit candle during their ordination to the priesthood. A bishop, when performing solemn ceremonies, has an extra candle that is carried for him by one of the altar servers. We have the Paschal Candle at Easter and the Advent Candles during Advent. The Easter Vigil procession with the Paschal Candle into the dark church has the faithful carrying lit candles during the procession. These are just some of the many instances where candles are used in the Liturgy of the Church.
The candle represents or is symbolic of both Christ and ourselves. Our Lord says: “I am the light of the world” (John 8:12) and then He adds: “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14). The wax is symbolic of our body, the wick is symbolic of our soul (hidden within the body), and the flame is symbolic of the divinity of God, charity of God and grace of God in the soul. A candle is useless unless it is lit―and our soul is useless if it does not possess the charity and grace of God: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profiteth me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
There is no better day than February 2nd to have your candles blessed―even though candles can be blessed on any day of the year. Why then February 2nd? Well, February 2nd―besides being the feast of the Presentation of the Infant Jesus in the Temple and the Purification of His Most Holy Mother, February 2nd is also commonly and popularly known as “Candlemas Day” [read more here] ― the title originates from the fact that candles receive a special solemn blessing at Mass on that day (Candles blessed at Mass on that day = Candlemas Day). As you will see below, the regular blessing for candles on any day of the year pales away into the shadows when compared to the solemn blessing of candles on Candlemas Day. Additionally, some saints and mystics insist that the beeswax candles to be used for the so-called “Three Days of Darkness” are meant to be blessed on Candlemas Day.
► REGULAR BLESSING OF CANDLES: In blessing the candles, the priest prays: “O Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, bless these candles at our supplication. By the power of the Holy Cross, pour out upon them a heavenly blessing, O Lord, Who gave them to human kind in order to repel the darkness. From this signing with the Holy Cross may they receive such blessing that, wherever they are set up or lighted, the princes of darkness may begin to tremble and depart, may flee in fear with all their ministers from such dwelling places, and may not dare again to disquiet or molest those who serve Thee, almighty God, who live and reign forever and ever. Amen.”
► BLESSING OF CANDLES WITH EXORCISM: An “upgrade” on the regular blessing of candles is the blessing of candles coupled with an exorcism of those candles. When exorcising and blessing the candles, the priest prays: “O candles, I exorcise you in the Name of God the Father Almighty, in the Name of Jesus Christ his Son, our Lord, and in the Name of the Holy Spirit. May God uproot and cast out from these objects, all power of the devil, all attacks of the unclean spirit, and all deceptions of Satan, so that they may bring health of mind and body to all who use them. We ask this through the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is coming to judge both the living and the dead and the world by fire. Amen.”
“O Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, light of everlasting life, Thou hast given us candles to dispel the darkness. We humbly implore Thee now, to bless these candles at our lowly request, and hallow them by the light of Thy grace. By the power of the Holy Cross, endow them with a heavenly blessing. May the blessing they receive be so powerful that, wherever they are placed or lighted, the princes of darkness shall flee in fear, along with all their legions, and never more dare to disturb those who serve Thee, the almighty God. Let the entire building in which these candles are kept, be free from the power of the adversary, and be defended from the snares of the enemy. Grant we pray, that those who will use these candles may be protected from every assault of the evil spirit, and be safeguarded from all danger. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
► CANDLESMAS DAY BLESSING: However, the most solemn blessing of candles is that which is done at the start of Mass on Candlemas Day (February 2nd). Before the start of Mass, in blessing the candles at the altar, the priest prays: “O Holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God, who hast created all things out of nothing, and by Thy command hast caused this liquid to become perfect wax by the labor of bees: and who, on this day didst fulfill the petition of the righteous man Simeon: we humbly entreat Thee, that by the invocation of Thy most holy Name and through the intercession of Blessed Mary ever Virgin whose feast is today devoutly observed, and by the prayers of all Thy Saints, Thou wouldst vouchsafe to bless and sanctify these candles for the service of men and for the health of their bodies and souls, whether on land or on sea: and that Thou wouldst hear from Thy holy heaven, and from the throne of Thy Majesty the voices of this Thy people, who desire to carry them in their hands with honor, and to praise Thee with hymns; and wouldst be propitious to all that call upon Thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen.”
“O almighty and everlasting God, who on this day didst present Thine only-begotten Son in Thy holy Temple to be received in the arms of holy Simeon: we humbly entreat Thy clemency, that Thou wouldst vouchsafe to bless and sanctify and to kindle with the light of Thy heavenly benediction these candles, which we, Thy servants, desire to receive and to bear lighted in the honor of Thy Name: that, by offering them to Thee our Lord God, being worthily inflamed with the holy fire of Thy most sweet charity, we may deserve to be presented in the holy Temple of Thy glory. Through the same Jesus Christ, thy Son, Our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen.”
“O Lord Jesus Christ, the true Light who enlightenest every man that cometh into this world: pour forth Thy blessing upon these candles, and sanctify them with the light of Thy grace, and mercifully grant, that as these lights enkindled with visible fire dispel the darkness of night, so our hearts illumined by invisible fire, that is, by the splendor of the Holy Spirit, may be free from the blindness of all vice, that the eye of our mind being cleansed, we may be able to discern what is pleasing to Thee and profitable to our salvation; so that after the perilous darkness of this life we may deserve to attain to never failing light: through Thee, O Christ Jesus, Savior of the world, who in the perfect Trinity, livest and reignest, God, world without end. Amen.”
“O almighty and everlasting God, who by Thy servant Moses didst command the purest oil to be prepared for lamps to burn continuously before Thee: vouchsafe to pour forth the grace of Thy blessing upon these candles: that they may so afford us light outwardly that by Thy gift, the gift of Thy Spirit may never be wanting inwardly to our minds.
Through Jesus Christ, thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen.”
“O Lord Jesus Christ, who appearing on this day among men in the substance of our flesh, wast presented by Thy parents in the temple: whom the venerable and aged Simeon, illuminated by the light of Thy Spirit, recognized, received into his arms, and blessed: mercifully grant that, enlightened and taught by the grace of the same Holy Ghost, we may truly acknowledge Thee and faithfully love Thee; Who with God the Father in the unity of the same Holy Ghost livest and reignest, God, world without end. Amen.”
Ideally, it would be wonderful if Holy Mother Church combined all of the above three versions into one version!
► BLESSING OF CANDLES ON THE FEAST OF ST. BLAISE, FEBRUARY 3rd: Incidentally, on the feast of St. Blaise on February 3rd―the day following Candlemas Day―it has been traditional since the 8th century to bless two candles in honor of St. Blaise and then use those two candles to bless the throats of the faithful. In blessing the candles, the priest prays:
“O God, almighty and all-mild, by Thy Word alone did create the manifold things in the world, and willed that that same Word, by Whom all things were made, take flesh in order to redeem mankind; Thou art great and immeasurable, awesome and praiseworthy, a worker of marvels. Hence in professing his Faith in Thee, the glorious martyr and bishop, Blaise, did not fear any manner of torment, but gladly accepted the palm of martyrdom. In virtue of which Thou hast bestowed on him, among other gifts, the power to heal all ailments of the throat. And now we implore Thy majesty that, overlooking our guilt, and considering only his merits and intercession, it may please Thee to bless, and sanctify, and impart Thy grace to these candles. Let all men of Faith, whose necks are touched with them, be healed of every malady of the throat, and, being restored in health and good spirits, let them return thanks to Thee in Thy holy Church, and praise Thy glorious name which is blessed forever; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
Then, in placing the two candles (crossed-over in the form of an “X” or a cross) like “scissors” on the neck of the person receiving the blessing, the priest prays: “By the intercession of St. Blaise, bishop and martyr, may God deliver you from every malady of the throat, and from every possible mishap; in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.”
► ST. BERNADETTE OF LOURDES & CANDLES:
There was another Apparition on April 7th, remarkable for the now well-known phenomenon of the lighted candle.
Dr. Dozous gives us an account of what then took place. He at first saw Bernadette kneeling her Rosary in her hands. Then he saw her begin her customary ascent on her knees to the spot beneath the wild rosebush. For some reason or another she stopped short in this ascent and brought the lighted taper in her right hand beneath the open fingers of her left one. The flame sped upward through the open fingers of her left hand, and with all the greater rapidity owing to a brisk wind blowing at the time. A good number of people saw what was going on and would certainly have gone to Bernadette’s aid if Dr. Dozous had not interfered. The medical doctor would not allow her to be touched or spoken to. He took out his watch and noticed that she remained in the same attitude for a quarter of an hour, with the flame passing through her fingers for the entire time and seeming to leave them uninjured. At the end of about a quarter of an hour she continued her ascent up the rock.
When all was over and she had come back to her place, and the inward light had faded from her face, the doctor asked to look at her left hand. He took the hand she held out to him and examined it carefully. There was upon it no sign of the action of fire. He asked for the taper she had held, lighted it, and put the flame for a moment close to her fingers. He did the same thing more than once. Each time Bernadette quickly drew her hand away, saying, “You are burning me!”
► PRACTICAL ADVICE: The feast of Candlemas is just over 1 week away. Call your local priest to see if he will be blessing candles at the start of Mass on February 2nd―if not, then call around until you find one. Tip: priests who still say the Traditional Latin Mass (also known as: “Mass in the Extraordinary Rite”) will no doubt be blessing candles on that day. Then ask if he would also kindly bless a box or several boxes of candles for you. Then call around, or look online, for suppliers of 100% beeswax candles and buy as many as you can afford (and as many as you think the priest will accept to bless―he probably won’t be happy if you turn with 50 boxes of candles!). Additionally, as an insurance for the so-called “Three Days of Darkness”, it is advised to get some 100% beeswax candles in glass jars that will be burn for at least three days―you can expect to pay anything from $22 to $46 per jar (they vary in burning time from 100 hours or 4 days, to as much as 7 days). Yes―they are like sanctuary lights that burn alongside the tabernacle, but these will be 100% beeswax. Have those jar-candles also blessed on February 2nd if possible.
As for when to use blessed candles―there are a number of occasions for which the Church recommends that blessed candles be lit. One such occasion is during times of threatening storms or earthquakes. Blessed candles are also a powerful Sacramental to use against evil spirits roaming about. We all know that the devil lives in darkness, and so the light of the blessed candle invokes the power of God to keep the devil’s influence at bay. Another occasion is at times of danger of any kind―whether of human or natural source. You can also light a blessed candle at times of family disruption by arguments, division, bad temper or even violence. Blessed candles would also be lit and placed at the bedside of both sick persons and dying persons.
Conclusion
You probably thought there would be no conclusion to this interminable article which is more like a book than an article. Apologies for the length, but no apologies for the need. We are rapidly approaching grave times for which no human solution will work. How well protected are you? Are you ready for emergencies? What is the likelihood of your survival? As Our Lord said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Why do we stupidly try to solve our problems by firstly having recourse to human means, human intelligence and human skills? Our Lord said: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God!” (Luke 12:31) ― why then do we often turn to God as a last resort?
The Sacramentals of the Church are God’s gifts to men―aimed at helping us in all our troubles and adversities. Use them and don’t abuse them by neglecting them! As you sow, so shall you reap: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:8).
Article 12
Friday & Saturday after the Second Sunday of Lent, March 1st & March 2nd
Let the Holy Eucharist Free You From Your Demons
Friday & Saturday after the Second Sunday of Lent, March 1st & March 2nd
Let the Holy Eucharist Free You From Your Demons
Sacraments vs. Sacramentals
The Sacraments are the first line of defense against the attacks of the demons. The two most frequently used Sacraments―the Holy Eucharist and its source, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, together with the Sacrament of Confession―can be said to be the two legs with which we run to escape Satan in our race for Heaven.
The Sacraments were created and instituted by Christ. Sacramentals are created and instituted by Christ’s Church. An exorcism is not a Sacrament―it is only a Sacramental. Sacraments are more powerful than Sacramentals. That is why exorcists will say: “A good confession is better than ten or a hundred exorcisms!” If a person desires to stay in a state of mortal sin and refuses to confess their mortal sins―then you can perform all the exorcisms you want, but they will be in vain.
Power Over Demons
Christ cast out many demons from possessed souls while He walked upon this Earth. In the Gospel of St. Mark we read: “Jesus entered into Capharnaum, and going into the synagogue on the Sabbath days, He taught them. And there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit; and he cried out, saying: ‘What have we to do with Thee, Jesus of Nazareth? Art Thou come to destroy us? I know who Thou art―the Holy One of God!’ And Jesus threatened him, saying: ‘Speak no more, and go out of the man!’ And the unclean spirit, tearing him and crying out with a loud voice, went out of him. And they were all amazed” (Mark 1:21-27).
The Holy One of God in the Holy Eucharist
The demon called Jesus “the Holy One of God!” That is exactly what the Holy Eucharist is―the Holy One of God, Jesus Christ, really and truly present in the Holy Eucharist with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. It is the same Christ as walked into that synagogue and cast out the demon from the possessed man. It is the same God-man Who walked this Earth around 2,000 years ago. Christ is the Holy Eucharist is the same Christ who cast out the demon from that possessed man and many others: “And they presented to Him all sick people and such as were possessed by devils, and He cured them” (Matthew 4:24) … “They brought to him many that were possessed with devils―and he cast out the spirits with His word” (Matthew 8:16).
The above passage from the Gospel of St. Mark recalls an incident that occurred when a Catholic priest was offering Holy Mass. In a 2014, Msgr. Charles Pope recalled an experience he had 15 years earlier while celebrating the Traditional Latin Mass at St. Mary, Mother of God, in Washington DC. Msgr. Pope writes:
“As you may know, the ancient Latin Mass is celebrated ‘ad orientem’ (toward the Liturgical East). Priest and people all face in one direction. What this means practically for the celebrant is that the people are behind him. It was time for the consecration. At this time, the priest is directed to bow low, with his forearms on the altar table, and the host between his fingers. As directed, the venerable words of Consecration were said in a low but distinct voice, ‘Hoc est enim Corpus Meum’ (‘For this is My Body’). The bells rang as I genuflected.
“But behind me there was a disturbance of some sort―a shaking or rustling sound came from the front pews behind me to my right. And then a moaning or grumbling. ‘What was that?’ I wondered. It did not really sound human, more like the grumbling of a large animal such as a boar or a bear, along with a plaintive moan that also did not seem human. I elevated the host and again wondered, ‘What was that?’ Then silence. As the celebrant in the ancient Latin Mass I could not easily turn to look. But still I thought, ‘What was that?’ Then it was time for the consecration of the wine in the chalice. Again I bowed low, pronouncing clearly and distinctly but in a low voice, ‘Hic est enim calix sanguinis Mei, novi et æterni testamenti; mysterium Fidei; qui pro vobis et pro multis effundetur in remissionem pecatorum. Haec quotiescumque feceritis in Mei memoriam facietis’ (‘For this is the chalice of My Blood, of the new and eternal covenant; the mystery of Faith; which will be shed for you and for many for the remission of sins. Whensoever you do these things, you shall do them in remembrance of Me’).
“Then, I heard another sound―this time an undeniable moan and then a shriek as someone cried out: ‘Leave me alone, Jesus! Why do You torture me?’ Suddenly there was a scuffling noise and someone ran out, with the groaning sound of having been injured. The back doors swung open and then closed. Then silence. I could not turn to look for I was raising the Chalice high over my head. But I knew in an instant that some poor demon-tormented soul had encountered Christ in the Eucharist and could not endure His real presence displayed for all to see. And the words of Scripture occurred to me: ‘Even Demons believe and tremble!’ (James 2:19). But just as James used those words to rebuke the weak Faith of his flock, I too had to repent. Why was a demon-troubled man more aware of the True Presence and more astonished by it than I was? He was moved in a negative sense and ran away. Why was I not more moved in a positive but comparable way? What of the other believers in the pews?
“I don’t doubt that all of us believed intellectually in the True Presence. But there is something very different and far more wonderful in being moved to the depth of your soul! It is so easy for us to be sleepy in the presence of the Divine, to be forgetful of the miraculous and awesome Presence available to us. This is startling at first glance, but upon further reflection, makes perfect sense. The fallen angels absolutely know the true nature of the Eucharist. They have a metaphysical understanding that surpasses merely human knowledge. If we would act like the Eucharist is what we profess it to be — through reverent liturgy, exposition and benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, adoration, Corpus Christi processions, and the like — then it would make a huge difference in our own belief and understanding of this sacred mystery.”
Another Case of Eucharistic Power
There is the sensational expulsion of the devil from a woman by the exorcist, Father Theophilus Riesinger, which occurred in Iowa in 1928. She was possessed the first time in 1908 through her aunt, Mina, known among the people as a witch. The latter had placed a spell on some herbs which she placed among the woman's food. Father Theophilus freed her from this possession June 18, 1912. She became possessed again due to the curses hurled against her by her wicked father. During the exorcisms that followed, we read of the reaction of the demons in the presence of the Holy Eucharist:
“They twisted about and howled mournfully in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, acting like whipped curs who growl and snarl under the pain of the biting lash. Others showed themselves bold and fearless, as if they wanted every moment to assail the consecrated Species―only to discover that they were powerless. Frothing and spitting and vomiting forth unmentionable excrements from the mouth of the poor woman, they would try to ward off the influence of the exorcist. Apparently they were trying to befoul the consecrated Host in the pyx―but failed in their purpose …
“One of the demons was Mina―the mistress of Jacob, the father of the possessed woman. Mina admitted that the cause of her damnation was her prolonged immoral life with Jacob while his wife was still living. Her demeanor towards the Blessed Sacrament is beyond description. She would spit and vomit in a most hideous manner. Because of her unworthy communions, it was clear that the Blessed Sacrament, the Bread of Eternal Life, which should have been the source of her eternal salvation, turned out to be unto her eternal damnation. For this she tried to get at the Blessed Sacrament with a burning vengeance and hatred … As the exorcism progressed, one could see that the benediction of the Blessed Sacrament pained the devil most acutely. That was always something unbearable for him. How he spat and vomited! …
“Eventually, on December 22nd, 1928, a piercing sound filled the room causing all to tremble vehemently. Voices saying, ‘Beelzebub, Judas, Jacob, Mina,’ could be heard. And this was repeated over and over until they faded far away into the distance. ‘Beelzebub Judas — Jacob — Mina.’ To these words were added: ‘Hell — Hell — Hell!’ Everyone present was terrified by this gruesome scene. It was the long awaited sign indicating that Satan was forced to leave his victim at last and to return to hell with his associates. From that time on the woman, always sincerely good, pious and religious, frequently visited the Blessed Sacrament and assisted at Holy Mass. She received Communion in a most edifying manner. That which was so terrible for her while she was under the torturing powers of Satan is now the peaceful joy, of her heart and soul” (Fr. Celestine Kapsner, Begone Satan!).
Eucharistic Drives Demons Away
St. John Chrysostom spoke in one his homilies of the Eucharist’s power to drive away demons: “Let us then return from receiving the Eucharist like lions breathing fire, having become terrible to the devil; thinking about our Head [Jesus], and on the love which [Jesus] has shown for us!” Chrysostom explains why we become “terrible to the devil” after receiving Holy Communion: “This Blood, if rightly taken, drives away devils, and keeps them afar off from us, while it calls unto us the Angels and the Lord of Angels. For wherever they see the Lord’s Blood, devils flee and Angels come together. This Blood, poured forth, washed clean all the world … This Blood is the salvation of our souls, by this Blood the soul is washed, by this Blood it is made beautiful, by this Blood it is inflamed. This causes our understanding to be more bright than fire, and our soul more beaming than gold! This Blood was poured forth, and through It Heaven was made accessible!” Now, of course, when you receive Holy Communion under the appearance of bread, Christ is present not only with His Body, but also with His Blood, soul and Divinity.
Therefore, it should come as no surprise that the devil will often lead people away from Holy Mass and away from receiving Holy Communion. Or, other hand, the devil will try make sinners receive Holy Communion unworthily, in a state of mortal sin―which, if done often enough, can even lead to possession. This is why exorcists advise people, who are feeling oppressed by demons, to receive the Holy Eucharist worthily and frequently. Simply put―Jesus is truly present in the Holy Eucharist! A demon cannot stand to be in a place where God is present. By receiving Holy Communion―if we are not in the state of mortal sin―we are forgiven of every venial sin; we are strengthened by this spiritual Food in our battles with demons; we increase the sanctifying grace within us and thus fortify our souls against the attacks of demons.
The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, stresses that the best defense against all demonic attacks―ordinary, extraordinary, curses, etc.―is faithfully living the Catholic life, especially frequent participation in the Sacraments of Confession and the Holy Eucharist: “In most cases, those who are distant from the Faith are more susceptible to this risk of possession, but this is only an indication of the maxim that says the devil is more tranquil if he does not have to live with prayer, fasting, the Eucharist, and the other Sacramental practices.”
The American exorcist, Fr. Chadd Ripperger, says: “How does one eliminate these generational demons? Firstly, by not committing any more mortal sins, which invite the demons into your family tree. Secondly, if they entered through a satanic curse―then true repentance, the Holy Eucharist, and Holy Mass are the best ways to eliminate them.”
Saints Used the Eucharist Against Demons
St. John Cassian had recommended the practice of giving Holy Communion to people oppressed by Satan as early as 432 AD.
In 441, the Church’s Synod of Orange spoke out in favor of allowing so-called “energumenes” (i.e. the demonically oppressed) to worthily partake of the Holy Eucharist in order to be set free.
St. Bernard of Clairvaux often cast out evil spirits by exposing the victim to the consecrated Host.
St. John of the Cross is said to have done the same in the case of a certain Maria Vichès, whom diabolic oppression prevented from entering a church. After receiving the Holy Eucharist from the saintly Carmelite, the woman was instantly made whole. Church history abounds in such testimonies to the power of the Eucharist.
St. Francis de Sales, on being appointed bishop of Geneva early in the seventeenth century, found himself in a Calvinist-dominated area that no longer believed in the Christ’s real presence in the Holy Eucharist. And yet, in the course of his daily pastoral activity, more and more demonically oppressed people were being brought to him. The unavailability of the Holy Eucharist in a Christian country was not without consequence. With his own hands the bishop gave out Holy Communion to those needing it (ensuring they were in a state of grace through Confession). Spectacular expulsions and healings took place. Over four hundred people were delivered in this way. St. Francis de Sale’s practice was not without controversy, but he justified the practice with the following simple words: “Yes, many such innocent souls turn to me. I give them the Blessed Sacrament, bless them and say, ‘Go in joy, for your suffering has left you!’”
St. Peter of Verona—a tireless defender of the Church against the Manichaeans―had an extraordinary incident happen. Whenever traveling to Milan, St. Peter of Verona made it a practice to stop at the house of a good friend, who was an ardent Catholic. On one occasion the friend received him with uncharacteristic coldness. On being asked for the reason for this unexpected change, the host replied that he had recently met a Manichaean who reproached him for extending his hospitality to Peter of Verona―a Catholic and “enemy of the truth.” This Manichaean had proposed that they go to a certain shrine and hear from the mouth of Mary herself who was right in the matter of Faith. And, indeed, Peter’s friend had witnessed the appearance of a wondrous lady on the altar, who said to him: “My son, you are in error. Look, the real Faith is here, not with the Catholics. I, the Mother of Jesus, am telling you this!” On hearing this, Peter of Verona answered: “Go tell your friend that I too will become a Manichaean, if I see the Mother of God.” A meeting was arranged for the following day. A woman serving as a medium went into a trance and soon the figure of a beautiful woman stood before them on the altar. At this moment Peter withdrew a host, which he had consecrated that morning at Holy Mass, and, holding it up, said, “If you really are the Mother of God, then pay homage to your Son!” The vision vanished instantly in a puff of smoke.
St. Clare of Assisi was the beneficiary of the famous miracle that occurred in 1240, in which the Saracen soldiers stormed the convent cloister of San Damiano in Assisi, where St. Clare and her sisters lived. The miracle story is taken from the writings of Tommaso da Celano; a Francisican Friar who lived during the time of St. Clare. He writes that the nuns were terrified and cried to St. Clare for help. St. Clare with a fearless heart though she was weak and sick, prostrated herself before the Lord and said, “Behold, my Lord, is it possible You want to deliver into the hands of pagans Your defenseless handmaids, whom I have taught out of love for You? I pray You, Lord protect these Your handmaids whom I cannot now save by myself.” She suddenly heard a voice from the tabernacle, “I will always protect you.” She then proceeded to bring the silver case containing the Holy Eucharist, and carrying the Blessed Sacrament out before the Saracens while, in complete Faith and trust, she called upon the Lord for that protection. The Saracens were struck with fear from seeing the Blessed Sacrament and the courage of St. Clare and her sisters standing before them without fear. They retreated and left Assisi.
Father John Edward Lamy (1855-1931) ― a mystic and founder of the Religious Congregation of the Servants of Jesus and Mary ― was a Catholic priest, whom Satan tormented whenever he said Holy Mass. He experienced personally the extent to which the Evil One despised both the Eucharist and the priesthood. “When a soul stops praying — the Devil admitted to him — I begin to regard him as my own possession. Stop praying, and I will stop tormenting you!” One morning the devil appeared before the priest across the altar just as he was about to start Holy Mass. “No doubt he’s here to sneer right into my face” thought the exasperated priest; and he said to Satan, “Right then, I’ll say no Mass this morning!” “Say it!” the Lord’s voice suddenly boomed forth. “We both learned a lesson this time!” said the pious priest after his unwelcome guest’s sudden disappearance.
Do You Believe?
The Holy Eucharist is the Child of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass that a priest, by the power of God and Jesus Christ, changes the bread and wine into the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ. That is why we say the Holy Eucharist is not only a Sacrament, but also a Sacrifice.
Many times we read in the Gospels of Jesus’ requirement for Faith and belief in cases where people were seeking miracles from Him: “Do you believe that I can do this unto you?” (Matthew 9:28) … “If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth” (Mark 9:22) … “Whosoever shall believe, it shall be done unto him!” (Mark 11:23) … “All things, whatsoever you ask when ye pray, believe that you shall receive them; and they shall come unto you!” (Mark 11:24) … “According to your faith, be it done unto you!” (Matthew 9:29) … “Fear not; believe only, and she shall be safe!” (Luke 8:50) … “Go thy way; thy son liveth! The man believed the word which Jesus said to him, and went his way” (John 4:50) … “Whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive!” (Matthew 21:22) … “If you had Faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree: ‘Be thou rooted up, and be thou transplanted into the sea!’ and it would obey you!” (Luke 17:6) … “As thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!” (Matthew 8:13) … “Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way, thy Faith hath made thee whole. And immediately he saw” (Mark 10:52) … “O woman, great is thy Faith! Be it done to thee as thou wilt! And her daughter was cured from that hour” (Matthew 15:28) … “Arise, go thy way! For thy Faith hath made thee whole!” (Luke 17:19) … “Daughter, thy Faith hath made thee whole! Go in peace and be thou healed of thy disease!” (Mark 5:34) … “Blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord!” (Luke 1:45) … “Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed” … (John 20:29) … “Why are you fearful, O ye of little Faith?” (Matthew 8:26) … “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
A Pew Research Center survey found that most self-described Catholics don’t believe that the Holy Eucharist constitutes the Real Presence of Christ with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. In fact, nearly seven-in-ten Catholics (69%) say they personally believe that during the Catholic Mass, the bread and wine used in Communion “are symbols of the body and blood of Jesus Christ.” Just one-third of U.S. Catholics (31%) say they believe that “during Catholic Mass, the bread and wine actually become the Body and Blood of Jesus.” Even amongst the few Catholics (15%) who regularly attend Sunday Mass, only around 6 out 10 believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist!
No Belief―No Help
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, in speaking of belief in the Holy Eucharist, says: “Back in the 1990s, or maybe the late 1980s, they did a statistical review of the clergy in the United States and 40% of them didn’t even believe in the Real Presence―so they didn’t believe that there was transubstantiation, that it was the Body Blood Soul and Divinity of Christ! As far as the lay-people go―it's even higher. I think they did a statistical review of lay-people and they said 67% don't believe. So this is a serious problem!”
If most Catholics―a large number of priests―no longer belief in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist, then they have little or fear in receiving Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin (that is if they even belief in mortal sin!). We must receive Holy Communion in a state grace―if we receive it in a state of mortal sin, then we commit a sacrilege of an enormous degree, and the only sin that is worse than that is, as Holy Mother Church teaches, the sin of final impenitence.
Fr. Chad Ripperger comments on this: “It is a revealed truth you cannot get to Heaven unless you are in the state of sanctifying grace. Therefore you should not be receiving Holy Communion unless you are in the state of sanctifying grace. If you do that―if you receive Holy Communion when not in the state of sanctifying grace, then what happens is that you actually end up offending God because you are unworthy. It the very nature of a sacrament to confirm grace―so if you go to Holy Communion in the state of mortal sin, knowing that when you receive Holy Communion the proper effect of receiving Holy Communion is an increase in sanctifying grace―but you are not in a state of sanctifying grace, the there is not going to be an increase in grace.
“So there is an actual warning where the Church says that the gravest sacrilege that you can commit―apart from final in penitence― is receiving Holy Communion in the state of mortal sin. The reception of Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin increases the darkness of the intellect of the individual receiving it. The intellect starts judging things in a wrong way and becomes more habituated to these erroneous judgments. The second thing is that receiving Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin opens you up to diabolic influence―because it's a grave sin that the demons want. The demons want us commit a sacrilege against the Holy Eucharist by people receiving Holy Communion in the state of mortal sin―and, when you do that, you place yourself under the demons.”
“The principal way you keep yourself protected is staying in the State of Sanctifying Grace; leading an authentic Catholic life by getting to Mass on Sundays and Holy Days; getting to Confession on a regular basis; saying your prayers; making use of the Sacraments. If you are leading a normal Catholic life, then your odds are becoming diabolically obsessed, or oppressed, or possessed are going to be very low. But it is also the case that even if they don’t lead a good Catholic life, the people that are diabolically obsessed just need to go to Confession and get everything confessed properly―this takes care of 80% of the people that actually need your help. Just making a good General Confession gets all that stuff taken care of.
“Another thing to take note of is the fact that the amount of sanctifying grace that you receive depends upon your dispositions. So the person who receives it more devoutly, more reflectively, and with attention―they are likely to benefit from the Holy Eucharist. This is one of the reasons why people who receive Holy Communion day after day after day after day but never notice much of an increase in their spiritual life―it is because of the fact that there is something wrong on the side of devotional side things.”
The Sacraments are the first line of defense against the attacks of the demons. The two most frequently used Sacraments―the Holy Eucharist and its source, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, together with the Sacrament of Confession―can be said to be the two legs with which we run to escape Satan in our race for Heaven.
The Sacraments were created and instituted by Christ. Sacramentals are created and instituted by Christ’s Church. An exorcism is not a Sacrament―it is only a Sacramental. Sacraments are more powerful than Sacramentals. That is why exorcists will say: “A good confession is better than ten or a hundred exorcisms!” If a person desires to stay in a state of mortal sin and refuses to confess their mortal sins―then you can perform all the exorcisms you want, but they will be in vain.
Power Over Demons
Christ cast out many demons from possessed souls while He walked upon this Earth. In the Gospel of St. Mark we read: “Jesus entered into Capharnaum, and going into the synagogue on the Sabbath days, He taught them. And there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit; and he cried out, saying: ‘What have we to do with Thee, Jesus of Nazareth? Art Thou come to destroy us? I know who Thou art―the Holy One of God!’ And Jesus threatened him, saying: ‘Speak no more, and go out of the man!’ And the unclean spirit, tearing him and crying out with a loud voice, went out of him. And they were all amazed” (Mark 1:21-27).
The Holy One of God in the Holy Eucharist
The demon called Jesus “the Holy One of God!” That is exactly what the Holy Eucharist is―the Holy One of God, Jesus Christ, really and truly present in the Holy Eucharist with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. It is the same Christ as walked into that synagogue and cast out the demon from the possessed man. It is the same God-man Who walked this Earth around 2,000 years ago. Christ is the Holy Eucharist is the same Christ who cast out the demon from that possessed man and many others: “And they presented to Him all sick people and such as were possessed by devils, and He cured them” (Matthew 4:24) … “They brought to him many that were possessed with devils―and he cast out the spirits with His word” (Matthew 8:16).
The above passage from the Gospel of St. Mark recalls an incident that occurred when a Catholic priest was offering Holy Mass. In a 2014, Msgr. Charles Pope recalled an experience he had 15 years earlier while celebrating the Traditional Latin Mass at St. Mary, Mother of God, in Washington DC. Msgr. Pope writes:
“As you may know, the ancient Latin Mass is celebrated ‘ad orientem’ (toward the Liturgical East). Priest and people all face in one direction. What this means practically for the celebrant is that the people are behind him. It was time for the consecration. At this time, the priest is directed to bow low, with his forearms on the altar table, and the host between his fingers. As directed, the venerable words of Consecration were said in a low but distinct voice, ‘Hoc est enim Corpus Meum’ (‘For this is My Body’). The bells rang as I genuflected.
“But behind me there was a disturbance of some sort―a shaking or rustling sound came from the front pews behind me to my right. And then a moaning or grumbling. ‘What was that?’ I wondered. It did not really sound human, more like the grumbling of a large animal such as a boar or a bear, along with a plaintive moan that also did not seem human. I elevated the host and again wondered, ‘What was that?’ Then silence. As the celebrant in the ancient Latin Mass I could not easily turn to look. But still I thought, ‘What was that?’ Then it was time for the consecration of the wine in the chalice. Again I bowed low, pronouncing clearly and distinctly but in a low voice, ‘Hic est enim calix sanguinis Mei, novi et æterni testamenti; mysterium Fidei; qui pro vobis et pro multis effundetur in remissionem pecatorum. Haec quotiescumque feceritis in Mei memoriam facietis’ (‘For this is the chalice of My Blood, of the new and eternal covenant; the mystery of Faith; which will be shed for you and for many for the remission of sins. Whensoever you do these things, you shall do them in remembrance of Me’).
“Then, I heard another sound―this time an undeniable moan and then a shriek as someone cried out: ‘Leave me alone, Jesus! Why do You torture me?’ Suddenly there was a scuffling noise and someone ran out, with the groaning sound of having been injured. The back doors swung open and then closed. Then silence. I could not turn to look for I was raising the Chalice high over my head. But I knew in an instant that some poor demon-tormented soul had encountered Christ in the Eucharist and could not endure His real presence displayed for all to see. And the words of Scripture occurred to me: ‘Even Demons believe and tremble!’ (James 2:19). But just as James used those words to rebuke the weak Faith of his flock, I too had to repent. Why was a demon-troubled man more aware of the True Presence and more astonished by it than I was? He was moved in a negative sense and ran away. Why was I not more moved in a positive but comparable way? What of the other believers in the pews?
“I don’t doubt that all of us believed intellectually in the True Presence. But there is something very different and far more wonderful in being moved to the depth of your soul! It is so easy for us to be sleepy in the presence of the Divine, to be forgetful of the miraculous and awesome Presence available to us. This is startling at first glance, but upon further reflection, makes perfect sense. The fallen angels absolutely know the true nature of the Eucharist. They have a metaphysical understanding that surpasses merely human knowledge. If we would act like the Eucharist is what we profess it to be — through reverent liturgy, exposition and benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, adoration, Corpus Christi processions, and the like — then it would make a huge difference in our own belief and understanding of this sacred mystery.”
Another Case of Eucharistic Power
There is the sensational expulsion of the devil from a woman by the exorcist, Father Theophilus Riesinger, which occurred in Iowa in 1928. She was possessed the first time in 1908 through her aunt, Mina, known among the people as a witch. The latter had placed a spell on some herbs which she placed among the woman's food. Father Theophilus freed her from this possession June 18, 1912. She became possessed again due to the curses hurled against her by her wicked father. During the exorcisms that followed, we read of the reaction of the demons in the presence of the Holy Eucharist:
“They twisted about and howled mournfully in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, acting like whipped curs who growl and snarl under the pain of the biting lash. Others showed themselves bold and fearless, as if they wanted every moment to assail the consecrated Species―only to discover that they were powerless. Frothing and spitting and vomiting forth unmentionable excrements from the mouth of the poor woman, they would try to ward off the influence of the exorcist. Apparently they were trying to befoul the consecrated Host in the pyx―but failed in their purpose …
“One of the demons was Mina―the mistress of Jacob, the father of the possessed woman. Mina admitted that the cause of her damnation was her prolonged immoral life with Jacob while his wife was still living. Her demeanor towards the Blessed Sacrament is beyond description. She would spit and vomit in a most hideous manner. Because of her unworthy communions, it was clear that the Blessed Sacrament, the Bread of Eternal Life, which should have been the source of her eternal salvation, turned out to be unto her eternal damnation. For this she tried to get at the Blessed Sacrament with a burning vengeance and hatred … As the exorcism progressed, one could see that the benediction of the Blessed Sacrament pained the devil most acutely. That was always something unbearable for him. How he spat and vomited! …
“Eventually, on December 22nd, 1928, a piercing sound filled the room causing all to tremble vehemently. Voices saying, ‘Beelzebub, Judas, Jacob, Mina,’ could be heard. And this was repeated over and over until they faded far away into the distance. ‘Beelzebub Judas — Jacob — Mina.’ To these words were added: ‘Hell — Hell — Hell!’ Everyone present was terrified by this gruesome scene. It was the long awaited sign indicating that Satan was forced to leave his victim at last and to return to hell with his associates. From that time on the woman, always sincerely good, pious and religious, frequently visited the Blessed Sacrament and assisted at Holy Mass. She received Communion in a most edifying manner. That which was so terrible for her while she was under the torturing powers of Satan is now the peaceful joy, of her heart and soul” (Fr. Celestine Kapsner, Begone Satan!).
Eucharistic Drives Demons Away
St. John Chrysostom spoke in one his homilies of the Eucharist’s power to drive away demons: “Let us then return from receiving the Eucharist like lions breathing fire, having become terrible to the devil; thinking about our Head [Jesus], and on the love which [Jesus] has shown for us!” Chrysostom explains why we become “terrible to the devil” after receiving Holy Communion: “This Blood, if rightly taken, drives away devils, and keeps them afar off from us, while it calls unto us the Angels and the Lord of Angels. For wherever they see the Lord’s Blood, devils flee and Angels come together. This Blood, poured forth, washed clean all the world … This Blood is the salvation of our souls, by this Blood the soul is washed, by this Blood it is made beautiful, by this Blood it is inflamed. This causes our understanding to be more bright than fire, and our soul more beaming than gold! This Blood was poured forth, and through It Heaven was made accessible!” Now, of course, when you receive Holy Communion under the appearance of bread, Christ is present not only with His Body, but also with His Blood, soul and Divinity.
Therefore, it should come as no surprise that the devil will often lead people away from Holy Mass and away from receiving Holy Communion. Or, other hand, the devil will try make sinners receive Holy Communion unworthily, in a state of mortal sin―which, if done often enough, can even lead to possession. This is why exorcists advise people, who are feeling oppressed by demons, to receive the Holy Eucharist worthily and frequently. Simply put―Jesus is truly present in the Holy Eucharist! A demon cannot stand to be in a place where God is present. By receiving Holy Communion―if we are not in the state of mortal sin―we are forgiven of every venial sin; we are strengthened by this spiritual Food in our battles with demons; we increase the sanctifying grace within us and thus fortify our souls against the attacks of demons.
The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, stresses that the best defense against all demonic attacks―ordinary, extraordinary, curses, etc.―is faithfully living the Catholic life, especially frequent participation in the Sacraments of Confession and the Holy Eucharist: “In most cases, those who are distant from the Faith are more susceptible to this risk of possession, but this is only an indication of the maxim that says the devil is more tranquil if he does not have to live with prayer, fasting, the Eucharist, and the other Sacramental practices.”
The American exorcist, Fr. Chadd Ripperger, says: “How does one eliminate these generational demons? Firstly, by not committing any more mortal sins, which invite the demons into your family tree. Secondly, if they entered through a satanic curse―then true repentance, the Holy Eucharist, and Holy Mass are the best ways to eliminate them.”
Saints Used the Eucharist Against Demons
St. John Cassian had recommended the practice of giving Holy Communion to people oppressed by Satan as early as 432 AD.
In 441, the Church’s Synod of Orange spoke out in favor of allowing so-called “energumenes” (i.e. the demonically oppressed) to worthily partake of the Holy Eucharist in order to be set free.
St. Bernard of Clairvaux often cast out evil spirits by exposing the victim to the consecrated Host.
St. John of the Cross is said to have done the same in the case of a certain Maria Vichès, whom diabolic oppression prevented from entering a church. After receiving the Holy Eucharist from the saintly Carmelite, the woman was instantly made whole. Church history abounds in such testimonies to the power of the Eucharist.
St. Francis de Sales, on being appointed bishop of Geneva early in the seventeenth century, found himself in a Calvinist-dominated area that no longer believed in the Christ’s real presence in the Holy Eucharist. And yet, in the course of his daily pastoral activity, more and more demonically oppressed people were being brought to him. The unavailability of the Holy Eucharist in a Christian country was not without consequence. With his own hands the bishop gave out Holy Communion to those needing it (ensuring they were in a state of grace through Confession). Spectacular expulsions and healings took place. Over four hundred people were delivered in this way. St. Francis de Sale’s practice was not without controversy, but he justified the practice with the following simple words: “Yes, many such innocent souls turn to me. I give them the Blessed Sacrament, bless them and say, ‘Go in joy, for your suffering has left you!’”
St. Peter of Verona—a tireless defender of the Church against the Manichaeans―had an extraordinary incident happen. Whenever traveling to Milan, St. Peter of Verona made it a practice to stop at the house of a good friend, who was an ardent Catholic. On one occasion the friend received him with uncharacteristic coldness. On being asked for the reason for this unexpected change, the host replied that he had recently met a Manichaean who reproached him for extending his hospitality to Peter of Verona―a Catholic and “enemy of the truth.” This Manichaean had proposed that they go to a certain shrine and hear from the mouth of Mary herself who was right in the matter of Faith. And, indeed, Peter’s friend had witnessed the appearance of a wondrous lady on the altar, who said to him: “My son, you are in error. Look, the real Faith is here, not with the Catholics. I, the Mother of Jesus, am telling you this!” On hearing this, Peter of Verona answered: “Go tell your friend that I too will become a Manichaean, if I see the Mother of God.” A meeting was arranged for the following day. A woman serving as a medium went into a trance and soon the figure of a beautiful woman stood before them on the altar. At this moment Peter withdrew a host, which he had consecrated that morning at Holy Mass, and, holding it up, said, “If you really are the Mother of God, then pay homage to your Son!” The vision vanished instantly in a puff of smoke.
St. Clare of Assisi was the beneficiary of the famous miracle that occurred in 1240, in which the Saracen soldiers stormed the convent cloister of San Damiano in Assisi, where St. Clare and her sisters lived. The miracle story is taken from the writings of Tommaso da Celano; a Francisican Friar who lived during the time of St. Clare. He writes that the nuns were terrified and cried to St. Clare for help. St. Clare with a fearless heart though she was weak and sick, prostrated herself before the Lord and said, “Behold, my Lord, is it possible You want to deliver into the hands of pagans Your defenseless handmaids, whom I have taught out of love for You? I pray You, Lord protect these Your handmaids whom I cannot now save by myself.” She suddenly heard a voice from the tabernacle, “I will always protect you.” She then proceeded to bring the silver case containing the Holy Eucharist, and carrying the Blessed Sacrament out before the Saracens while, in complete Faith and trust, she called upon the Lord for that protection. The Saracens were struck with fear from seeing the Blessed Sacrament and the courage of St. Clare and her sisters standing before them without fear. They retreated and left Assisi.
Father John Edward Lamy (1855-1931) ― a mystic and founder of the Religious Congregation of the Servants of Jesus and Mary ― was a Catholic priest, whom Satan tormented whenever he said Holy Mass. He experienced personally the extent to which the Evil One despised both the Eucharist and the priesthood. “When a soul stops praying — the Devil admitted to him — I begin to regard him as my own possession. Stop praying, and I will stop tormenting you!” One morning the devil appeared before the priest across the altar just as he was about to start Holy Mass. “No doubt he’s here to sneer right into my face” thought the exasperated priest; and he said to Satan, “Right then, I’ll say no Mass this morning!” “Say it!” the Lord’s voice suddenly boomed forth. “We both learned a lesson this time!” said the pious priest after his unwelcome guest’s sudden disappearance.
Do You Believe?
The Holy Eucharist is the Child of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass that a priest, by the power of God and Jesus Christ, changes the bread and wine into the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ. That is why we say the Holy Eucharist is not only a Sacrament, but also a Sacrifice.
Many times we read in the Gospels of Jesus’ requirement for Faith and belief in cases where people were seeking miracles from Him: “Do you believe that I can do this unto you?” (Matthew 9:28) … “If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth” (Mark 9:22) … “Whosoever shall believe, it shall be done unto him!” (Mark 11:23) … “All things, whatsoever you ask when ye pray, believe that you shall receive them; and they shall come unto you!” (Mark 11:24) … “According to your faith, be it done unto you!” (Matthew 9:29) … “Fear not; believe only, and she shall be safe!” (Luke 8:50) … “Go thy way; thy son liveth! The man believed the word which Jesus said to him, and went his way” (John 4:50) … “Whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive!” (Matthew 21:22) … “If you had Faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree: ‘Be thou rooted up, and be thou transplanted into the sea!’ and it would obey you!” (Luke 17:6) … “As thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!” (Matthew 8:13) … “Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way, thy Faith hath made thee whole. And immediately he saw” (Mark 10:52) … “O woman, great is thy Faith! Be it done to thee as thou wilt! And her daughter was cured from that hour” (Matthew 15:28) … “Arise, go thy way! For thy Faith hath made thee whole!” (Luke 17:19) … “Daughter, thy Faith hath made thee whole! Go in peace and be thou healed of thy disease!” (Mark 5:34) … “Blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord!” (Luke 1:45) … “Blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed” … (John 20:29) … “Why are you fearful, O ye of little Faith?” (Matthew 8:26) … “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
A Pew Research Center survey found that most self-described Catholics don’t believe that the Holy Eucharist constitutes the Real Presence of Christ with His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. In fact, nearly seven-in-ten Catholics (69%) say they personally believe that during the Catholic Mass, the bread and wine used in Communion “are symbols of the body and blood of Jesus Christ.” Just one-third of U.S. Catholics (31%) say they believe that “during Catholic Mass, the bread and wine actually become the Body and Blood of Jesus.” Even amongst the few Catholics (15%) who regularly attend Sunday Mass, only around 6 out 10 believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist!
No Belief―No Help
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, in speaking of belief in the Holy Eucharist, says: “Back in the 1990s, or maybe the late 1980s, they did a statistical review of the clergy in the United States and 40% of them didn’t even believe in the Real Presence―so they didn’t believe that there was transubstantiation, that it was the Body Blood Soul and Divinity of Christ! As far as the lay-people go―it's even higher. I think they did a statistical review of lay-people and they said 67% don't believe. So this is a serious problem!”
If most Catholics―a large number of priests―no longer belief in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist, then they have little or fear in receiving Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin (that is if they even belief in mortal sin!). We must receive Holy Communion in a state grace―if we receive it in a state of mortal sin, then we commit a sacrilege of an enormous degree, and the only sin that is worse than that is, as Holy Mother Church teaches, the sin of final impenitence.
Fr. Chad Ripperger comments on this: “It is a revealed truth you cannot get to Heaven unless you are in the state of sanctifying grace. Therefore you should not be receiving Holy Communion unless you are in the state of sanctifying grace. If you do that―if you receive Holy Communion when not in the state of sanctifying grace, then what happens is that you actually end up offending God because you are unworthy. It the very nature of a sacrament to confirm grace―so if you go to Holy Communion in the state of mortal sin, knowing that when you receive Holy Communion the proper effect of receiving Holy Communion is an increase in sanctifying grace―but you are not in a state of sanctifying grace, the there is not going to be an increase in grace.
“So there is an actual warning where the Church says that the gravest sacrilege that you can commit―apart from final in penitence― is receiving Holy Communion in the state of mortal sin. The reception of Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin increases the darkness of the intellect of the individual receiving it. The intellect starts judging things in a wrong way and becomes more habituated to these erroneous judgments. The second thing is that receiving Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin opens you up to diabolic influence―because it's a grave sin that the demons want. The demons want us commit a sacrilege against the Holy Eucharist by people receiving Holy Communion in the state of mortal sin―and, when you do that, you place yourself under the demons.”
“The principal way you keep yourself protected is staying in the State of Sanctifying Grace; leading an authentic Catholic life by getting to Mass on Sundays and Holy Days; getting to Confession on a regular basis; saying your prayers; making use of the Sacraments. If you are leading a normal Catholic life, then your odds are becoming diabolically obsessed, or oppressed, or possessed are going to be very low. But it is also the case that even if they don’t lead a good Catholic life, the people that are diabolically obsessed just need to go to Confession and get everything confessed properly―this takes care of 80% of the people that actually need your help. Just making a good General Confession gets all that stuff taken care of.
“Another thing to take note of is the fact that the amount of sanctifying grace that you receive depends upon your dispositions. So the person who receives it more devoutly, more reflectively, and with attention―they are likely to benefit from the Holy Eucharist. This is one of the reasons why people who receive Holy Communion day after day after day after day but never notice much of an increase in their spiritual life―it is because of the fact that there is something wrong on the side of devotional side things.”
Article 11
Wednesday & Thursday after the Second Sunday of Lent, February 28th & 29th
Keeping Your Soul Free from Demonic Damage
Wednesday & Thursday after the Second Sunday of Lent, February 28th & 29th
Keeping Your Soul Free from Demonic Damage
Wishful Thinking!
As much as we would like the opposite, there is no avoiding the demons while we live in this world―we all know that because we have all sinned―and if we sin, then place ourselves under the devil: “Whosoever commits sin, is the servant of sin … He that commits sin is of the devil” (John 8:34; 1 John 3:8). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “For all have sinned, and do need the glory [mercy and grace) of God!” (Romans 3:23).
Don’t Make Matters Worse!
Just because we have sinned―both or either mortally and venially―does not mean that we should continue sinning. Sin makes us an enemy of God―mortal sin enslaves us to Satan―venial sin ultimately leads to mortal sin―and continuing in sin lessens the chances of our extricating ourselves from sin. The more you sprain you ankle, the weaker and weaker it becomes. The more you sin, the weaker and weaker you become spiritually. If you have sinned―as we all have―then Our Lord says to us what He said to sinners in the Gospels―to the woman caught in adultery, He says: “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:11); and to man He cured by the Pool of Bethsaida, He said: “Thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14). Hence Holy Scripture adds: “My son, hast thou sinned? Do so no more! But for thy former sins also pray that they may be forgiven thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “Why do you call Me ‘Lord! Lord’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Stop Sinning―Stop Satan
Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Ordinarily, the demons have no power over souls, unless they gain entrance by some mortal or venial fault. Mortal sin gives them a direct right over those who commit it; while venial sin weakens the strength of the soul and invites their attacks.” So the first thing to do is to seriously and intensely fight sin so that we eventually stop sinning: “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4)―and thereby to stop placing ourselves in the hands of Satan by our mortal sins―so that Satan, “when he is come, he finds it [our soul] swept and garnished” (Luke 11:25). “Be not ashamed to confess thy sins!” (Ecclesiasticus 4:31) … “Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities! … Do penance … and keep all My commandments! … Cast away from you all your transgressions!” (Ezechiel 18:21, 30-31). “If My people, being converted, shall make supplication to Me, and seek out My face, and do penance for their most wicked ways―then will I hear from Heaven, and will forgive their sins and will heal their land!” (2 Paralipomenon 7:14).
You Need to Fight!
Holy Scripture is very clear about this life on Earth being an endless battle: “The life of man on Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness … Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day and to stand in all things perfect!” (Ephesians 6:12-3). “Resist the devil and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7).
We will not fight against what we love―and it is easier to fight things that we hate. The problem is that too many Catholics do not hate sin―some even love sin (not necessarily loving mortal sins, but most certainly loving certain venial sins). Such an attitude rejects Church teaching on sin: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” … “Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
Satan Never Gives Up!
Satan will never give up in his fight to damn you. Even when you confess your mortal sins and break your ties to Satan, he will still come back at you: “When an unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walks through dry places without water seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says: ‘I will return into my house from whence I came out!’ And when he is come, he finds it empty [of evil], swept [clean of sin], and garnished [with grace]. Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there! And the last state of that man is made worse than the first!” (Matthew 12:44-45; Luke 11:24-26).
Just because you confessed your sins does not mean that Satan will never more approach you with temptations! You will never avoid Satan―he will always come knocking on the door of your soul―but you can make your soul more and more of a fortress against temptation and sin. By increasing sanctifying grace in your soul and growing in true holiness, you can reduce the number of attacks and repel their ferocity. Even the saints were incessantly attacked by demons―take for example, St. John Vianney and St. Padre Pio―attacks that at times even terrified them. How was it that they withstood these demonic attacks? Obviously by God’s help―but also because of the great amounts of sanctifying grace that they had accrued in their souls, and also by their holiness in life.
The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, says: “Satan fears the sons of God―those who are seeking to conform their lives to Jesus. The devil is aware that he is stronger and more intelligent than we are, but he also knows that we are not alone in the struggle against him. One example suffices―toward the sunset of his life, Don Bosco, one of the greatest saints of the nineteenth century, liberated a girl from possession simply by entering the chapel dressed in sacred vestments to celebrate Mass. The devil is in fear of the saints and their sanctity!”
Grow in Grace―Grow in Holiness―Grow in Immunity to Satan
Ultimately, everything good is the work of God’s grace―Our Lord says that another way: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). St. Thérèse of Lisieux said: “Everything is grace!” The quote comes from the book “Her Last Conversations” and in full it reads: “Everything is a grace! Everything is the direct effect of our Father’s love―difficulties, contradictions, humiliations, all the soul’s miseries, her burdens, her needs―everything! Through them the soul learns humility and realizes her weakness. Everything is a grace, because everything is God’s gift. Whatever be the character of life or its unexpected events―to the heart that loves, all is well!”
When St. Paul was being tormented by a demon, he asked the Lord to deliver him from the demon―but the Lord said: “My grace is sufficient for thee―for power is made perfect in infirmity!” (2 Corinthians 12:9). The same applies to our struggles with demons. The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, says: “What many people fail to see, grasp and understand is the fact that struggling against the demons is actually good for us! We tend to think of demons as the things that are detracting against our sanctification; that is only true when we give in to them, but when we fight them and work against them, they actually become the instruments of our purification and sanctification. You have to understand that God regulates every single thing demons do. We have this idea which is false―that demons get to maraud around and go do whatever they want! That is not true. When they tempt you; and the degree of the temptation, the content of the temptation, the length of the temptation―all this is entirely determined by God! Even in cases of possession―who can possess; the degrees of possession; what kinds of manifestations occur; how long the possession is going to last; what is going to get them; out what parts of the body they can possess; when they can manifest and when they cannot manifest; the degree of the individual manifestations―all these are entirely determined by God. They demons are on an extraordinarily short leash!”
Sanctifying Grace is Crucial
Satan hates holiness and sanctifying grace. It is sanctifying grace that gives us the basic level of holiness―the word “sanctifying” is a compound of two Latin words: “Sanctus” meaning “holy”; and “facere” meaning “to make” ― therefore, “to make holy”. Satan is all about damnation―that is his chief focus. Yet you cannot be damned if you are in state of sanctifying grace. Therefore he hates it―for it prevents damnation, unless, of course, Satan makes us lose sanctifying grace through committing mortal sin. We grossly undervalue sanctifying grace―and that is why we lose it so easily. It is not the precious thing that it ought to be in our lives. People would weep more over losing a $1,000 than losing the state of sanctifying grace! Yet the smallest degree of grace is worth more than all the wealth in the entire universe!
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange explains the splendor, beauty and power of sanctifying grace: “If it were given to us to contemplate the amazing splendor of sanctifying grace, then we would be ravished! We cannot know the value of sanctifying grace unless we have considered what the full development of this grace will be in the life of eternity. Sanctifying grace is a participation in the divine nature and in the inner life of God. Only this grace can make the soul capable of seeing God. The interior life is the life of grace in the soul. To have a true interior life it is doubtless not sufficient to be in the state of grace. The interior life requires further a struggle against everything that inclines us to fall back into sin. If we had a profound knowledge of the state of grace, we would see that it is not only the principle of a true and very holy interior life, but that it is the seed of eternal life. The slightest degree of sanctifying grace contained in the soul is more precious than the natural good of the entire universe and all angelic natures taken together ― for the least degree of sanctifying grace belongs to an enormously superior order, to the order of the inner life of God, which is superior to all miracles and to all the outward signs of divine revelation. With sanctifying grace we received infused charity. Sanctifying grace is inseparable from charity. Sanctifying grace and charity unite us to God in His intimate life, and are very superior to all other graces and extraordinary graces, such as prophecy and the gift of tongues. From sanctifying grace the infused virtues, both theological and moral, and also the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost spring forth in our faculties. Charity is the highest of the theological virtues, and together with sanctifying grace, it ought to endure forever. As soon as man sins mortally, he loses sanctifying grace and charity, since he turns away from God. By sacramental absolution in Confession, sanctifying grace and charity are restored to the penitent.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, elaborates: “Your primary means of protection against any diabolic influence is your state of grace―which means you must never allow yourself to fall into mortal sin! Ever! Because if you are in the state of grace, the demons are far less likely to want to get involved with you. Why? Because when Christ puts an investment in something He will protect the investment. If Christ brought you into the state of grace, He is going to try to protect that. When people come to me and they are possessed, I tell them the first thing you have got to do is you have to start leading a Catholic life. That means you are never going to fall into mortal sin again! Also, your state of grace is the means by which you merit protection. Most people have this idea that: ‘If I perform a good action, somehow or another God is going to reward me!’ That is absolute garbage! It is not that the action is good―it is that you don’t deserve anything, you don’t deserve any merit in Heaven at all for any good action, except, in so far as you―being in the state of grace―merit something in the eyes of God because of the fact that you are participating in His nature through sanctifying grace. It is because you are participating in divine nature that God will look at that and say: ‘You deserve a reward for that good action!’ The reward is not because you have done a good deed. If you are in the state of mortal sin and you do a good action, you get nothing for it―except perhaps some natural benefit. It is the same thing in the spiritual warfare. If you are not in the state of grace, you cannot pray to Our Lord and ask for protection. I mean―you can and He might protect you under certain circumstances, and normally He will―but the fact is that He doesn’t have to grant the effect of your prayer. Whereas if you are in the state of grace, He will readily grant that protection to you. That means you have got to keep staying in the state of grace!”
The Use and Misuse of Confession
As has been stated many times before―sin is the greatest evil in the world―yet somehow the “penny fails to drop” in the minds of most Catholics. If sanctifying graces is more valuable than all the treasures in the universe―then, mortal sin, which makes us lose sanctifying grace, has to be the greatest evil in the universe. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, says: “Most people don’t know that the proper effect of every single mortal sin is demonic possession. It’s just that God blocks it in 99.9% of the cases.” If you were to be mortally wounded by a gunshot, then you would race to the Emergency Room of the nearest hospital. Yet when our soul is mortally wounded by mortal sin, we feel little urgency to rush to the Emergency Room of the nearest confessional.
Once the demons have enticed you to sin mortally, then the next step is to try and keep you in that state of mortal sin. If they see that you intend to go to Confession and confess your mortal sins, then they will try and make that confession an invalid confession by making you confess badly.
St. Alphonsus Liguori warns of bad confessions: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions―in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil not of rare occurrence, but is frequent―especially in small country districts―which consigns innumerable souls to Hell. Hence it is very useful to mention, from time to time, some example of souls that were damned by willfully concealing sins in confession.” Today, this is compounded and made much more frequent due to what recent popes have called “the loss of the sense of sin.”
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Not only do “we let the Kingdom of God crumble”, but we also let our state of sanctifying grace crumble due to our warped notions of what is sinful and what is not sinful! The demons are unbelievably intelligent, and so when the demons coax us into making bad (invalid) confessions they do so in a very subtle way―they do not advertize it, nor blow trumpets, nor wave the fact before our eyes. The perfect “con” is to “con” somebody and leave them oblivious to the fact that they have been conned. So when it comes to “conned” confessions, the demons want to have us thinking that we have confessed sufficiently well, whereas we have “botched” our confession and confessed badly (invalidly).
What is it, then, that makes a confession invalid? A confession can be bad (invalid) in a variety of different ways, with each way having its own nuances or shades. Any and every Catholic should (but they don’t) know the conditions for a valid confession. The demons are only too happy to make forget or at least misinterpret those conditions. So what are those mysterious, half-forgotten, misinterpreted and twisted notions of the required conditions for a good (valid) confession? Do we even know how many conditions there are? The act of simply going to Confession and mentioning sins without having sorrow, or without having the intention to avoid those sins in the future, makes the confession invalid!
The good old Baltimore Catechism, for children making their First Holy Communion, taught us that the steps to a good confession are: (1) find out my sins; (2) be sorry for my sins; (3) make up my mind not to sin again; (4) tell my sins to the priest; (5) do the penance the priest gives me. Those are still the right conditions today, even for adults―even though the adult catechism explains it more thoroughly. Here is a more thorough explanation of each of those five conditions:
(1) EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE ― Most people “do things by halves” ― meaning that do things partially, halfheartedly, incompletely, doing as little as they can to get by. Such persons are Satan’s dream when it comes to the Sacrament of Confession! Examinations of conscience are on “fast-track” mode; knowledge of what is mortal and venial is “half-baked” at best; memory is selective as to what they want to remember and what they want to forget; they restrict the time for examining their conscience to the moment they join the confessional line―the shorter the line, the shorter the examination; or if there is no confessional line then they just dive in to the confessional without any time to examine their conscience and just “wing-it”. Some persons are so caught up with petty details about their venial sins that risk forgetting all their mortal sins―and this is more easily done if they have lost the sense of sin as to what is mortal and what is venial, whereby they rely on their subjective feelings on the seriousness of sin, rather than the objective teaching of the Church as to what is mortal. Hence, today, you have Catholics who insist that they can still be good Catholics without any need to attend Sunday Mass; or those who feel masturbation is not a mortal sin; or that cohabitation is acceptable these days, etc.
Normally speaking, a person should be aware if they are frequent mortal sinner; an occasional mortal sinner; or a rare mortal sinner. It stands to reason that a person who frequently commits mortal sins would have to spend more time examining the conscience to recall all the many mortal sins they have committed―it takes less time to count a teaspoon of peas rather than a bagful of peas! In confessing any and all mortal sins―you have to name the number of sins, and so that, too, takes more time to cover and remember. If the frequent mortal sinner only dedicates the time that he is standing in line at the confessional to his examination of conscience―then he risks missing some mortal sins. Furthermore, it also takes away valuable time from trying to deepen our sorrow for our sins―the greater the sorrow, the less temporal punishment there will be.
Ideally, your examination of conscience should be made at home before you even go to church―just like a shopping list is made at home before we go to the store. Begin with a prayer asking for God’s help―because you will need all the help you can get to overcome the usual satanic interference that comes along every time we want to confess our sins. Satan will try to do all he can to produce a bad (invalid) confession one way or another―and if he cannot achieve that, then he will at least try to reduce the efficacity and fruits of any good (valid) confession. The chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, used to say that demons prefer not to be detected―well, the same applies to our sins―demons prefer that we fail to detect our sins!
There are many examinations of conscience books/leaflets/flyers floating around―and these are very useful in several ways: (1) to remind and show us the breadth of sin that exists, which serves to prevent a loss of the sense of sin, (2) it jogs our memory and conscience about sins we may have forgotten―especially if our confessions are not weekly; (3) it educates us on the different kinds of sins that we should watch out for and avoid. Do not skimp on time dedicated to the examination of your conscience! Spiritual writes recommend that a nightly examination of conscience is a powerful tool in our battle against sin and Satan―even if you have already quit mortal sin and only commit venial sins―for all sin, whether mortal or venial, is the greatest evil in the world. A person cannot be content with merely not committing mortal sins―they must also strive to eliminate all venial sins. Just reflect on the truth of Purgatory, where many souls are burning and being purified from their venial sins which they did not root out while still living on Earth!
(2) SUFFICIENT SORROW FOR YOUR SINS ― We have all encountered the child who is told by its parents to say “Sorry!” to someone they have hurt―the child reluctantly and begrudgingly says “Sorry!” but you can tell that it is just coming from the lips and not the heart. As Our Lord said: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8) ― the same is true in the confessional: people want to be forgiven, but they are not really sorry for their sins. When they say the Act of Contrition, one has to wonder how much is coming from the lips and how much from the heart!
How much sorrow is sorrow? Sorrow―like so many other things in life, such as intelligence or love―ranges from minimal sorrow to maximum sorrow. Not wishing that any soul be damned (though most souls still manage to damn themselves), God is willing to accept a minimal sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession. This minimal sorrow is called “attrition.” The maximum sorrow is called “contrition”. The earliest meaning of the English word “attrition” that relates to spiritual repentance, was borrowed from the figurative meaning of the medieval Latin “attrition”, meaning “hardship, tribulation.” Thus “attrition” for sin is the sorrow that is based upon fear of the “hardships and tribulations” that are a punishment for sin. Hence the Act of Contrition begins by saying: “O my God, I am sorry for having offended Thee because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell.” God is willing to accept this minimal sorrow that fears God and His punishments―but we were created not just to fear God, but more importantly to love God! “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). That is why the Act of Contrition evolves from being sorry “because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell” into saying: “But most of all because they [my sins] offend Thee, my God, Who art all good and deserving of all my love.”
Our relationship with God should grow from an initial fear of God to a love of God: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18). You can take this a stage further and say: “Perfect charity casts out mortal and venial sin―and all the punishments that are due to those sins.” Perfect contrition springs from the perfect love of God. When our love is imperfect, then we think principally of ourselves; whereas, if it is perfect, we think principally of God. Our contrition will be perfect when we repent of our sins through the perfect love of God. Much the same way as a child is imperfectly sorry for some fault when it fears a thrashing. Whereas a child repenting of a fault can be said to have perfect sorrow when it grieves at having offended its parents, who are so good and loving, and have done so much for it.
After St. Peter denied Jesus, he thought of his sin, and, “going out, wept bitterly.” Why did he weep? Perhaps for the shame he would feel in front of the other Apostles? If this was the reason, then his sorrow was purely natural and without merit for Heaven. Perhaps he feared being deprived of his dignity as an Apostle and Prince of the Apostles, or perhaps he feared losing Heaven. These certainly would be more worthy motives, but still his sorrow would be imperfect. No! Peter wept and repented because he had offended his beloved Master, Who was so good, so holy, so worthy of his love; he wept because he had repaid that love with the blackest ingratitude―and, as a consequence, his contrition was perfect, his sin was forgiven. With this golden key of perfect contrition he had again reopened the doors of Heaven, which he had closed a moment before by his triple denial.
The word “contrition” comes from the Latin “contritus”, meaning “to grind, to crush, to pound to pieces” ― in this sense, true sorrow, maximum sorrow, the best sorrow is one that is based upon love, not fear―a love that sees the heart “crushed” and “pounded into pieces” because of its sins against God and neighbor. We speak of “a perfect act of contrition” ― but we must not naively imagine that there is only one single degree of perfect contrition. To better understand this, you can compare perfect contrition to the saints―all the saints are perfect for they are in Heaven, and you only get to go to Heaven when you have been perfected―either while living on Earth, or in the fires of Purgatory. Yet none of the saints have the same degree of perfection―even though all are perfect! So you can always improve your perfect act of contrition because you can always grow in love and grow in sanctifying grace. There comes a point when your perfect act of contrition becomes so perfect that it takes away, not only all guilt for sin (which is what Confession does), but it will also take away all temporal punishment due to sin―so that if you die having made a perfect act of contrition, then you would go straight to Heaven, totally bypassing Purgatory!
Satan despises sorrow for sin―especially sorrow for sin out of love for God. The reason is that demons have no sorrow for their sin and they have no love for God―and they despise seeing us reconciled with God by sorrow for sin, especially a sorrow for sin based upon love. They will do all they can to prevent from having the right kind of sorrow for sin―and will try lead us down the path of counterfeit contrition and false sorrow―which ultimately is path to Hell. This is perhaps one of the most common failures that lead to invalid confessions. Sorrow for sin must be supernatural. It is insufficient to be sorry because we have be “found out”; or because we now “look bad” in the eyes of others; or have lost our reputation; lost our job; lost privileges; lost friendships; etc. All these are natural motives that fall short of the supernatural motives required for sorrow―the bare minimum being fear of God’s just punishments.
(3) A FIRM PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT ― This is another “stumbling-block” or “pit-fall” in making good (valid) confessions. There are too many Catholics who use the confessional like a revolving door―always going and coming out, going back in and coming back out, in again and out again, confessing the same old mortal sins time and time again! If a person does not take practical steps to avoid falling back into the mortal sins they have confessed, then the confession is invalid due to presumed lack of FIRM purpose of amendment. When a particular kind of mortal sin becomes increasingly repetitive and habitual, then one has to question whether or not there is a FIRM purpose of amendment. A FIRM purpose of amendment is far superior to a VAGUE purpose of amendment. A VAGUE purpose of amendment will merely say: “Oh, I’ve really got to stop doing this!” and will go no further. Whereas a FIRM purpose of amendment will go beyond saying: “I’ve got to stop doing this!” and will carefully analyze why these sins are being committed and will take concrete measures and practical plans to avoid the occasions of that particular sin―it goes beyond mere wishful thinking. The VAGUE purpose of amendment resides in the mind or intellect alone. The FIRM purpose of amendment is not only in the mind or intellect, but it then transfers itself to the heart or will, and puts the plans of the mind into practice.
(4) CONFESSING YOUR SINS ― Here is another dangerous area which abounds with demonic interference. The bottom line in this area is this ― if the demons cannot prevent you from going to Confession, then they will try and make you confess your sins in a way that makes the confession invalid. The most common pathways are (1) hiding a mortal sin in confession through shame, (2) fudging, obfuscating, twisting, cosmetically coating, misrepresenting, leaving out details, cloaking the mortal sin in such a way as make a mortal sin seem like a serious venial sin; (3) not stating the correct number of times that you committed the sin―for example, saying “a few times” instead of saying “ten times”. Ten is much more than “a few”; or simply saying: “I’ve stolen things” without saying what value of things and how many times you stole; (4) or not being specific as to the KIND of sin you committed―for example, merely saying: “I’ve been impure!” hides the kind of impurity―for there are increasing degrees of gravity in impurity: (a) impure with oneself; (b) impure with another person; (c) impure with animals. As regards impurity with other persons, you have to make distinctions: (a) are you married or single; (b) was the other person married or single; (c) was the other person of the same sex or the opposite sex; (d) was the other person a minor/child; (e) was the other person a religious―monk, nun, etc.
There are certain sins that can the added gravity of being a sacrilege―for example stealing from a store is different to stealing from the church; impurity with a religious adds a sacrilegious aspect to the sin. Another “tactic” is trying to hide your mortal among a whole bunch of venial sins that you quickly rattle off. These are just some of the ways that the actual confessing of sins can lead to invalid confessions. Always be honest in confession―you might fool the priest; you might fool yourself; but you cannot fool God. God knows all about your sin―He wants YOU to know YOUR sins as they really are so that you can get to work at uprooting them from your life.
(5) COMPLETING THE PENANCE THE PRIEST ASSIGNS TO YOU ― Listen carefully and take note of the penance that the priest assigns to you. Sometimes the instructions are general―such as: “Pray a Rosary!” This does not specify when to pray the Rosary; nor does it specify whether or not you have to pray all five decades at once, or whether you can divide it up into sections; nor does it specify which mysteries of the Rosary to pray; nor does it specify if you also have meditate the mysteries instead just saying the Our Fathers and Hail Marys. Therefore all these variations are left up to you.
Other penances might be more precise―such as: “Make the Stations of the Cross in church on a Friday!” If this is impossible for you, then you must mention that to the priest and give the reason why. He might change some aspect, such as allowing you to make the Stations at home, or make them the next time you go to church, etc.
Priests are obliged―under the pain of sin―to give serious penances for mortal sins: for example, five decades of the Rosary, or the Stations of the Cross, are regarded as the minimum in the class of serious penances. However, if you feel you can more―then tell the priest that you are willing to do more. The reason being is that a penance imposed in the Sacrament of Confession has more power and value than the same penance done by your personal choice―so a Rosary given as penance in Confession has more value than a Rosary prayed by your own free choice.
The best way to ensure that the penance is done and not forgotten, is to fulfill the penance as soon as it practical. For example, if the penance is in the form of a prayer―then try say that prayer after Confession, or say it after Mass has finished, or after your thanksgiving, etc. Forgetting to do the penance does not make your confession invalid―but if you refuse to do the penance, then that does make your confession invalid. If you forgot what the penance was, then you could approach the priest and ask him, or do a penance that the priest usually gives you for the same kind of sins you confessed in the past.
Penance is essential―as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
Confession the Antidote to Hell
We are all sinners: “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). The harsh brutal truth is that mortal sin is what leads souls into damnation―there is nothing else that damns souls. Another harsh brutal truth is that most souls end up being damned―not because God wants that (Satan most certainly does) but because people did not avail themselves of the antidote to mortal sin―which is the Sacrament of Confession. It is impossible to go to Hell if the Sacrament of Confession is being used correctly. Unfortunately―as has already been stated―most souls abuse the Sacrament of Confession (with the help of the demons). Read more about the Sacrament of Confession. Meditate on what you read. Examine yourself to see if you using the Sacrament of Confession correctly or if you are abusing it. Put right whatever is wrong. Your salvation depends on it. Nobody can go to Hell if they use the Sacrament of Confession correctly.
Remember what the exorcists say: “One good confession is better and more powerful than ten or a hundred exorcisms!”
We read in the book, Begone Satan!, the following passage concerning the Sacrament of Confession: “Apparently Satan knows only the sins that have not been confessed or repented. What has been submitted to the confessional seems to be out of his reach. It would seem that the Sacrament of Penance blots out or obliterates sins from the soul so as not to leave the slightest possibility for Satan to discover them. Through the Sacrament of Penance everything is, so to say, drowned in the abyss of God's mercy. The rubrics in the Roman Ritual for exorcism, demand that not only the exorcist, but also all witnesses and all those called upon to aid in subduing the possessed person, should make a thorough general confession, or at least a sincere act of perfect contrition, before the process of exorcism begins. Once they are cleansed from sin, they are more at ease in facing Satan and will not be subject to annoying remarks on the part of Satan for the sins committed in the past.” (Fr. Celestine Kapsner, Begone Satan!).
More Help on the Way!
We will continue focusing on the battle with the demonic in the next articles―since Lent is the time par excellence of this kind of spiritual warfare. The next articles will deal with the Holy Eucharist and how it can be used to weaken and overcome the demonic influences that surround us. Then we will also take a close look at the chief Sacramentals of the Church and see how they can be used to overcome the demonic attacks and seductions.
As much as we would like the opposite, there is no avoiding the demons while we live in this world―we all know that because we have all sinned―and if we sin, then place ourselves under the devil: “Whosoever commits sin, is the servant of sin … He that commits sin is of the devil” (John 8:34; 1 John 3:8). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “For all have sinned, and do need the glory [mercy and grace) of God!” (Romans 3:23).
Don’t Make Matters Worse!
Just because we have sinned―both or either mortally and venially―does not mean that we should continue sinning. Sin makes us an enemy of God―mortal sin enslaves us to Satan―venial sin ultimately leads to mortal sin―and continuing in sin lessens the chances of our extricating ourselves from sin. The more you sprain you ankle, the weaker and weaker it becomes. The more you sin, the weaker and weaker you become spiritually. If you have sinned―as we all have―then Our Lord says to us what He said to sinners in the Gospels―to the woman caught in adultery, He says: “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:11); and to man He cured by the Pool of Bethsaida, He said: “Thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14). Hence Holy Scripture adds: “My son, hast thou sinned? Do so no more! But for thy former sins also pray that they may be forgiven thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 21:1). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin! And say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, He will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5-6). “Why do you call Me ‘Lord! Lord’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Stop Sinning―Stop Satan
Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Ordinarily, the demons have no power over souls, unless they gain entrance by some mortal or venial fault. Mortal sin gives them a direct right over those who commit it; while venial sin weakens the strength of the soul and invites their attacks.” So the first thing to do is to seriously and intensely fight sin so that we eventually stop sinning: “You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin!” (Hebrews 12:4)―and thereby to stop placing ourselves in the hands of Satan by our mortal sins―so that Satan, “when he is come, he finds it [our soul] swept and garnished” (Luke 11:25). “Be not ashamed to confess thy sins!” (Ecclesiasticus 4:31) … “Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities! … Do penance … and keep all My commandments! … Cast away from you all your transgressions!” (Ezechiel 18:21, 30-31). “If My people, being converted, shall make supplication to Me, and seek out My face, and do penance for their most wicked ways―then will I hear from Heaven, and will forgive their sins and will heal their land!” (2 Paralipomenon 7:14).
You Need to Fight!
Holy Scripture is very clear about this life on Earth being an endless battle: “The life of man on Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour―whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness … Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day and to stand in all things perfect!” (Ephesians 6:12-3). “Resist the devil and he will flee from you!” (James 4:7).
We will not fight against what we love―and it is easier to fight things that we hate. The problem is that too many Catholics do not hate sin―some even love sin (not necessarily loving mortal sins, but most certainly loving certain venial sins). Such an attitude rejects Church teaching on sin: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” … “Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
Satan Never Gives Up!
Satan will never give up in his fight to damn you. Even when you confess your mortal sins and break your ties to Satan, he will still come back at you: “When an unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walks through dry places without water seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says: ‘I will return into my house from whence I came out!’ And when he is come, he finds it empty [of evil], swept [clean of sin], and garnished [with grace]. Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there! And the last state of that man is made worse than the first!” (Matthew 12:44-45; Luke 11:24-26).
Just because you confessed your sins does not mean that Satan will never more approach you with temptations! You will never avoid Satan―he will always come knocking on the door of your soul―but you can make your soul more and more of a fortress against temptation and sin. By increasing sanctifying grace in your soul and growing in true holiness, you can reduce the number of attacks and repel their ferocity. Even the saints were incessantly attacked by demons―take for example, St. John Vianney and St. Padre Pio―attacks that at times even terrified them. How was it that they withstood these demonic attacks? Obviously by God’s help―but also because of the great amounts of sanctifying grace that they had accrued in their souls, and also by their holiness in life.
The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, says: “Satan fears the sons of God―those who are seeking to conform their lives to Jesus. The devil is aware that he is stronger and more intelligent than we are, but he also knows that we are not alone in the struggle against him. One example suffices―toward the sunset of his life, Don Bosco, one of the greatest saints of the nineteenth century, liberated a girl from possession simply by entering the chapel dressed in sacred vestments to celebrate Mass. The devil is in fear of the saints and their sanctity!”
Grow in Grace―Grow in Holiness―Grow in Immunity to Satan
Ultimately, everything good is the work of God’s grace―Our Lord says that another way: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). St. Thérèse of Lisieux said: “Everything is grace!” The quote comes from the book “Her Last Conversations” and in full it reads: “Everything is a grace! Everything is the direct effect of our Father’s love―difficulties, contradictions, humiliations, all the soul’s miseries, her burdens, her needs―everything! Through them the soul learns humility and realizes her weakness. Everything is a grace, because everything is God’s gift. Whatever be the character of life or its unexpected events―to the heart that loves, all is well!”
When St. Paul was being tormented by a demon, he asked the Lord to deliver him from the demon―but the Lord said: “My grace is sufficient for thee―for power is made perfect in infirmity!” (2 Corinthians 12:9). The same applies to our struggles with demons. The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, says: “What many people fail to see, grasp and understand is the fact that struggling against the demons is actually good for us! We tend to think of demons as the things that are detracting against our sanctification; that is only true when we give in to them, but when we fight them and work against them, they actually become the instruments of our purification and sanctification. You have to understand that God regulates every single thing demons do. We have this idea which is false―that demons get to maraud around and go do whatever they want! That is not true. When they tempt you; and the degree of the temptation, the content of the temptation, the length of the temptation―all this is entirely determined by God! Even in cases of possession―who can possess; the degrees of possession; what kinds of manifestations occur; how long the possession is going to last; what is going to get them; out what parts of the body they can possess; when they can manifest and when they cannot manifest; the degree of the individual manifestations―all these are entirely determined by God. They demons are on an extraordinarily short leash!”
Sanctifying Grace is Crucial
Satan hates holiness and sanctifying grace. It is sanctifying grace that gives us the basic level of holiness―the word “sanctifying” is a compound of two Latin words: “Sanctus” meaning “holy”; and “facere” meaning “to make” ― therefore, “to make holy”. Satan is all about damnation―that is his chief focus. Yet you cannot be damned if you are in state of sanctifying grace. Therefore he hates it―for it prevents damnation, unless, of course, Satan makes us lose sanctifying grace through committing mortal sin. We grossly undervalue sanctifying grace―and that is why we lose it so easily. It is not the precious thing that it ought to be in our lives. People would weep more over losing a $1,000 than losing the state of sanctifying grace! Yet the smallest degree of grace is worth more than all the wealth in the entire universe!
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange explains the splendor, beauty and power of sanctifying grace: “If it were given to us to contemplate the amazing splendor of sanctifying grace, then we would be ravished! We cannot know the value of sanctifying grace unless we have considered what the full development of this grace will be in the life of eternity. Sanctifying grace is a participation in the divine nature and in the inner life of God. Only this grace can make the soul capable of seeing God. The interior life is the life of grace in the soul. To have a true interior life it is doubtless not sufficient to be in the state of grace. The interior life requires further a struggle against everything that inclines us to fall back into sin. If we had a profound knowledge of the state of grace, we would see that it is not only the principle of a true and very holy interior life, but that it is the seed of eternal life. The slightest degree of sanctifying grace contained in the soul is more precious than the natural good of the entire universe and all angelic natures taken together ― for the least degree of sanctifying grace belongs to an enormously superior order, to the order of the inner life of God, which is superior to all miracles and to all the outward signs of divine revelation. With sanctifying grace we received infused charity. Sanctifying grace is inseparable from charity. Sanctifying grace and charity unite us to God in His intimate life, and are very superior to all other graces and extraordinary graces, such as prophecy and the gift of tongues. From sanctifying grace the infused virtues, both theological and moral, and also the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost spring forth in our faculties. Charity is the highest of the theological virtues, and together with sanctifying grace, it ought to endure forever. As soon as man sins mortally, he loses sanctifying grace and charity, since he turns away from God. By sacramental absolution in Confession, sanctifying grace and charity are restored to the penitent.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, elaborates: “Your primary means of protection against any diabolic influence is your state of grace―which means you must never allow yourself to fall into mortal sin! Ever! Because if you are in the state of grace, the demons are far less likely to want to get involved with you. Why? Because when Christ puts an investment in something He will protect the investment. If Christ brought you into the state of grace, He is going to try to protect that. When people come to me and they are possessed, I tell them the first thing you have got to do is you have to start leading a Catholic life. That means you are never going to fall into mortal sin again! Also, your state of grace is the means by which you merit protection. Most people have this idea that: ‘If I perform a good action, somehow or another God is going to reward me!’ That is absolute garbage! It is not that the action is good―it is that you don’t deserve anything, you don’t deserve any merit in Heaven at all for any good action, except, in so far as you―being in the state of grace―merit something in the eyes of God because of the fact that you are participating in His nature through sanctifying grace. It is because you are participating in divine nature that God will look at that and say: ‘You deserve a reward for that good action!’ The reward is not because you have done a good deed. If you are in the state of mortal sin and you do a good action, you get nothing for it―except perhaps some natural benefit. It is the same thing in the spiritual warfare. If you are not in the state of grace, you cannot pray to Our Lord and ask for protection. I mean―you can and He might protect you under certain circumstances, and normally He will―but the fact is that He doesn’t have to grant the effect of your prayer. Whereas if you are in the state of grace, He will readily grant that protection to you. That means you have got to keep staying in the state of grace!”
The Use and Misuse of Confession
As has been stated many times before―sin is the greatest evil in the world―yet somehow the “penny fails to drop” in the minds of most Catholics. If sanctifying graces is more valuable than all the treasures in the universe―then, mortal sin, which makes us lose sanctifying grace, has to be the greatest evil in the universe. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, says: “Most people don’t know that the proper effect of every single mortal sin is demonic possession. It’s just that God blocks it in 99.9% of the cases.” If you were to be mortally wounded by a gunshot, then you would race to the Emergency Room of the nearest hospital. Yet when our soul is mortally wounded by mortal sin, we feel little urgency to rush to the Emergency Room of the nearest confessional.
Once the demons have enticed you to sin mortally, then the next step is to try and keep you in that state of mortal sin. If they see that you intend to go to Confession and confess your mortal sins, then they will try and make that confession an invalid confession by making you confess badly.
St. Alphonsus Liguori warns of bad confessions: “The preacher should often speak against bad confessions―in which sins are concealed through shame. This is an evil not of rare occurrence, but is frequent―especially in small country districts―which consigns innumerable souls to Hell. Hence it is very useful to mention, from time to time, some example of souls that were damned by willfully concealing sins in confession.” Today, this is compounded and made much more frequent due to what recent popes have called “the loss of the sense of sin.”
● Pope Pius XII said in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many.”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “The sense of sin is lost … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Not only do “we let the Kingdom of God crumble”, but we also let our state of sanctifying grace crumble due to our warped notions of what is sinful and what is not sinful! The demons are unbelievably intelligent, and so when the demons coax us into making bad (invalid) confessions they do so in a very subtle way―they do not advertize it, nor blow trumpets, nor wave the fact before our eyes. The perfect “con” is to “con” somebody and leave them oblivious to the fact that they have been conned. So when it comes to “conned” confessions, the demons want to have us thinking that we have confessed sufficiently well, whereas we have “botched” our confession and confessed badly (invalidly).
What is it, then, that makes a confession invalid? A confession can be bad (invalid) in a variety of different ways, with each way having its own nuances or shades. Any and every Catholic should (but they don’t) know the conditions for a valid confession. The demons are only too happy to make forget or at least misinterpret those conditions. So what are those mysterious, half-forgotten, misinterpreted and twisted notions of the required conditions for a good (valid) confession? Do we even know how many conditions there are? The act of simply going to Confession and mentioning sins without having sorrow, or without having the intention to avoid those sins in the future, makes the confession invalid!
The good old Baltimore Catechism, for children making their First Holy Communion, taught us that the steps to a good confession are: (1) find out my sins; (2) be sorry for my sins; (3) make up my mind not to sin again; (4) tell my sins to the priest; (5) do the penance the priest gives me. Those are still the right conditions today, even for adults―even though the adult catechism explains it more thoroughly. Here is a more thorough explanation of each of those five conditions:
(1) EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE ― Most people “do things by halves” ― meaning that do things partially, halfheartedly, incompletely, doing as little as they can to get by. Such persons are Satan’s dream when it comes to the Sacrament of Confession! Examinations of conscience are on “fast-track” mode; knowledge of what is mortal and venial is “half-baked” at best; memory is selective as to what they want to remember and what they want to forget; they restrict the time for examining their conscience to the moment they join the confessional line―the shorter the line, the shorter the examination; or if there is no confessional line then they just dive in to the confessional without any time to examine their conscience and just “wing-it”. Some persons are so caught up with petty details about their venial sins that risk forgetting all their mortal sins―and this is more easily done if they have lost the sense of sin as to what is mortal and what is venial, whereby they rely on their subjective feelings on the seriousness of sin, rather than the objective teaching of the Church as to what is mortal. Hence, today, you have Catholics who insist that they can still be good Catholics without any need to attend Sunday Mass; or those who feel masturbation is not a mortal sin; or that cohabitation is acceptable these days, etc.
Normally speaking, a person should be aware if they are frequent mortal sinner; an occasional mortal sinner; or a rare mortal sinner. It stands to reason that a person who frequently commits mortal sins would have to spend more time examining the conscience to recall all the many mortal sins they have committed―it takes less time to count a teaspoon of peas rather than a bagful of peas! In confessing any and all mortal sins―you have to name the number of sins, and so that, too, takes more time to cover and remember. If the frequent mortal sinner only dedicates the time that he is standing in line at the confessional to his examination of conscience―then he risks missing some mortal sins. Furthermore, it also takes away valuable time from trying to deepen our sorrow for our sins―the greater the sorrow, the less temporal punishment there will be.
Ideally, your examination of conscience should be made at home before you even go to church―just like a shopping list is made at home before we go to the store. Begin with a prayer asking for God’s help―because you will need all the help you can get to overcome the usual satanic interference that comes along every time we want to confess our sins. Satan will try to do all he can to produce a bad (invalid) confession one way or another―and if he cannot achieve that, then he will at least try to reduce the efficacity and fruits of any good (valid) confession. The chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, used to say that demons prefer not to be detected―well, the same applies to our sins―demons prefer that we fail to detect our sins!
There are many examinations of conscience books/leaflets/flyers floating around―and these are very useful in several ways: (1) to remind and show us the breadth of sin that exists, which serves to prevent a loss of the sense of sin, (2) it jogs our memory and conscience about sins we may have forgotten―especially if our confessions are not weekly; (3) it educates us on the different kinds of sins that we should watch out for and avoid. Do not skimp on time dedicated to the examination of your conscience! Spiritual writes recommend that a nightly examination of conscience is a powerful tool in our battle against sin and Satan―even if you have already quit mortal sin and only commit venial sins―for all sin, whether mortal or venial, is the greatest evil in the world. A person cannot be content with merely not committing mortal sins―they must also strive to eliminate all venial sins. Just reflect on the truth of Purgatory, where many souls are burning and being purified from their venial sins which they did not root out while still living on Earth!
(2) SUFFICIENT SORROW FOR YOUR SINS ― We have all encountered the child who is told by its parents to say “Sorry!” to someone they have hurt―the child reluctantly and begrudgingly says “Sorry!” but you can tell that it is just coming from the lips and not the heart. As Our Lord said: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8) ― the same is true in the confessional: people want to be forgiven, but they are not really sorry for their sins. When they say the Act of Contrition, one has to wonder how much is coming from the lips and how much from the heart!
How much sorrow is sorrow? Sorrow―like so many other things in life, such as intelligence or love―ranges from minimal sorrow to maximum sorrow. Not wishing that any soul be damned (though most souls still manage to damn themselves), God is willing to accept a minimal sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession. This minimal sorrow is called “attrition.” The maximum sorrow is called “contrition”. The earliest meaning of the English word “attrition” that relates to spiritual repentance, was borrowed from the figurative meaning of the medieval Latin “attrition”, meaning “hardship, tribulation.” Thus “attrition” for sin is the sorrow that is based upon fear of the “hardships and tribulations” that are a punishment for sin. Hence the Act of Contrition begins by saying: “O my God, I am sorry for having offended Thee because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell.” God is willing to accept this minimal sorrow that fears God and His punishments―but we were created not just to fear God, but more importantly to love God! “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). That is why the Act of Contrition evolves from being sorry “because I dread the loss of Heaven and pains of Hell” into saying: “But most of all because they [my sins] offend Thee, my God, Who art all good and deserving of all my love.”
Our relationship with God should grow from an initial fear of God to a love of God: “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear has pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18). You can take this a stage further and say: “Perfect charity casts out mortal and venial sin―and all the punishments that are due to those sins.” Perfect contrition springs from the perfect love of God. When our love is imperfect, then we think principally of ourselves; whereas, if it is perfect, we think principally of God. Our contrition will be perfect when we repent of our sins through the perfect love of God. Much the same way as a child is imperfectly sorry for some fault when it fears a thrashing. Whereas a child repenting of a fault can be said to have perfect sorrow when it grieves at having offended its parents, who are so good and loving, and have done so much for it.
After St. Peter denied Jesus, he thought of his sin, and, “going out, wept bitterly.” Why did he weep? Perhaps for the shame he would feel in front of the other Apostles? If this was the reason, then his sorrow was purely natural and without merit for Heaven. Perhaps he feared being deprived of his dignity as an Apostle and Prince of the Apostles, or perhaps he feared losing Heaven. These certainly would be more worthy motives, but still his sorrow would be imperfect. No! Peter wept and repented because he had offended his beloved Master, Who was so good, so holy, so worthy of his love; he wept because he had repaid that love with the blackest ingratitude―and, as a consequence, his contrition was perfect, his sin was forgiven. With this golden key of perfect contrition he had again reopened the doors of Heaven, which he had closed a moment before by his triple denial.
The word “contrition” comes from the Latin “contritus”, meaning “to grind, to crush, to pound to pieces” ― in this sense, true sorrow, maximum sorrow, the best sorrow is one that is based upon love, not fear―a love that sees the heart “crushed” and “pounded into pieces” because of its sins against God and neighbor. We speak of “a perfect act of contrition” ― but we must not naively imagine that there is only one single degree of perfect contrition. To better understand this, you can compare perfect contrition to the saints―all the saints are perfect for they are in Heaven, and you only get to go to Heaven when you have been perfected―either while living on Earth, or in the fires of Purgatory. Yet none of the saints have the same degree of perfection―even though all are perfect! So you can always improve your perfect act of contrition because you can always grow in love and grow in sanctifying grace. There comes a point when your perfect act of contrition becomes so perfect that it takes away, not only all guilt for sin (which is what Confession does), but it will also take away all temporal punishment due to sin―so that if you die having made a perfect act of contrition, then you would go straight to Heaven, totally bypassing Purgatory!
Satan despises sorrow for sin―especially sorrow for sin out of love for God. The reason is that demons have no sorrow for their sin and they have no love for God―and they despise seeing us reconciled with God by sorrow for sin, especially a sorrow for sin based upon love. They will do all they can to prevent from having the right kind of sorrow for sin―and will try lead us down the path of counterfeit contrition and false sorrow―which ultimately is path to Hell. This is perhaps one of the most common failures that lead to invalid confessions. Sorrow for sin must be supernatural. It is insufficient to be sorry because we have be “found out”; or because we now “look bad” in the eyes of others; or have lost our reputation; lost our job; lost privileges; lost friendships; etc. All these are natural motives that fall short of the supernatural motives required for sorrow―the bare minimum being fear of God’s just punishments.
(3) A FIRM PURPOSE OF AMENDMENT ― This is another “stumbling-block” or “pit-fall” in making good (valid) confessions. There are too many Catholics who use the confessional like a revolving door―always going and coming out, going back in and coming back out, in again and out again, confessing the same old mortal sins time and time again! If a person does not take practical steps to avoid falling back into the mortal sins they have confessed, then the confession is invalid due to presumed lack of FIRM purpose of amendment. When a particular kind of mortal sin becomes increasingly repetitive and habitual, then one has to question whether or not there is a FIRM purpose of amendment. A FIRM purpose of amendment is far superior to a VAGUE purpose of amendment. A VAGUE purpose of amendment will merely say: “Oh, I’ve really got to stop doing this!” and will go no further. Whereas a FIRM purpose of amendment will go beyond saying: “I’ve got to stop doing this!” and will carefully analyze why these sins are being committed and will take concrete measures and practical plans to avoid the occasions of that particular sin―it goes beyond mere wishful thinking. The VAGUE purpose of amendment resides in the mind or intellect alone. The FIRM purpose of amendment is not only in the mind or intellect, but it then transfers itself to the heart or will, and puts the plans of the mind into practice.
(4) CONFESSING YOUR SINS ― Here is another dangerous area which abounds with demonic interference. The bottom line in this area is this ― if the demons cannot prevent you from going to Confession, then they will try and make you confess your sins in a way that makes the confession invalid. The most common pathways are (1) hiding a mortal sin in confession through shame, (2) fudging, obfuscating, twisting, cosmetically coating, misrepresenting, leaving out details, cloaking the mortal sin in such a way as make a mortal sin seem like a serious venial sin; (3) not stating the correct number of times that you committed the sin―for example, saying “a few times” instead of saying “ten times”. Ten is much more than “a few”; or simply saying: “I’ve stolen things” without saying what value of things and how many times you stole; (4) or not being specific as to the KIND of sin you committed―for example, merely saying: “I’ve been impure!” hides the kind of impurity―for there are increasing degrees of gravity in impurity: (a) impure with oneself; (b) impure with another person; (c) impure with animals. As regards impurity with other persons, you have to make distinctions: (a) are you married or single; (b) was the other person married or single; (c) was the other person of the same sex or the opposite sex; (d) was the other person a minor/child; (e) was the other person a religious―monk, nun, etc.
There are certain sins that can the added gravity of being a sacrilege―for example stealing from a store is different to stealing from the church; impurity with a religious adds a sacrilegious aspect to the sin. Another “tactic” is trying to hide your mortal among a whole bunch of venial sins that you quickly rattle off. These are just some of the ways that the actual confessing of sins can lead to invalid confessions. Always be honest in confession―you might fool the priest; you might fool yourself; but you cannot fool God. God knows all about your sin―He wants YOU to know YOUR sins as they really are so that you can get to work at uprooting them from your life.
(5) COMPLETING THE PENANCE THE PRIEST ASSIGNS TO YOU ― Listen carefully and take note of the penance that the priest assigns to you. Sometimes the instructions are general―such as: “Pray a Rosary!” This does not specify when to pray the Rosary; nor does it specify whether or not you have to pray all five decades at once, or whether you can divide it up into sections; nor does it specify which mysteries of the Rosary to pray; nor does it specify if you also have meditate the mysteries instead just saying the Our Fathers and Hail Marys. Therefore all these variations are left up to you.
Other penances might be more precise―such as: “Make the Stations of the Cross in church on a Friday!” If this is impossible for you, then you must mention that to the priest and give the reason why. He might change some aspect, such as allowing you to make the Stations at home, or make them the next time you go to church, etc.
Priests are obliged―under the pain of sin―to give serious penances for mortal sins: for example, five decades of the Rosary, or the Stations of the Cross, are regarded as the minimum in the class of serious penances. However, if you feel you can more―then tell the priest that you are willing to do more. The reason being is that a penance imposed in the Sacrament of Confession has more power and value than the same penance done by your personal choice―so a Rosary given as penance in Confession has more value than a Rosary prayed by your own free choice.
The best way to ensure that the penance is done and not forgotten, is to fulfill the penance as soon as it practical. For example, if the penance is in the form of a prayer―then try say that prayer after Confession, or say it after Mass has finished, or after your thanksgiving, etc. Forgetting to do the penance does not make your confession invalid―but if you refuse to do the penance, then that does make your confession invalid. If you forgot what the penance was, then you could approach the priest and ask him, or do a penance that the priest usually gives you for the same kind of sins you confessed in the past.
Penance is essential―as Our Lord said: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
Confession the Antidote to Hell
We are all sinners: “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “There is no man who sins not” (3 Kings 8:46). The harsh brutal truth is that mortal sin is what leads souls into damnation―there is nothing else that damns souls. Another harsh brutal truth is that most souls end up being damned―not because God wants that (Satan most certainly does) but because people did not avail themselves of the antidote to mortal sin―which is the Sacrament of Confession. It is impossible to go to Hell if the Sacrament of Confession is being used correctly. Unfortunately―as has already been stated―most souls abuse the Sacrament of Confession (with the help of the demons). Read more about the Sacrament of Confession. Meditate on what you read. Examine yourself to see if you using the Sacrament of Confession correctly or if you are abusing it. Put right whatever is wrong. Your salvation depends on it. Nobody can go to Hell if they use the Sacrament of Confession correctly.
Remember what the exorcists say: “One good confession is better and more powerful than ten or a hundred exorcisms!”
We read in the book, Begone Satan!, the following passage concerning the Sacrament of Confession: “Apparently Satan knows only the sins that have not been confessed or repented. What has been submitted to the confessional seems to be out of his reach. It would seem that the Sacrament of Penance blots out or obliterates sins from the soul so as not to leave the slightest possibility for Satan to discover them. Through the Sacrament of Penance everything is, so to say, drowned in the abyss of God's mercy. The rubrics in the Roman Ritual for exorcism, demand that not only the exorcist, but also all witnesses and all those called upon to aid in subduing the possessed person, should make a thorough general confession, or at least a sincere act of perfect contrition, before the process of exorcism begins. Once they are cleansed from sin, they are more at ease in facing Satan and will not be subject to annoying remarks on the part of Satan for the sins committed in the past.” (Fr. Celestine Kapsner, Begone Satan!).
More Help on the Way!
We will continue focusing on the battle with the demonic in the next articles―since Lent is the time par excellence of this kind of spiritual warfare. The next articles will deal with the Holy Eucharist and how it can be used to weaken and overcome the demonic influences that surround us. Then we will also take a close look at the chief Sacramentals of the Church and see how they can be used to overcome the demonic attacks and seductions.
Article 10
Tuesday after the Second Sunday of Lent, February 27th
Getting Rid of Your Demons
Tuesday after the Second Sunday of Lent, February 27th
Getting Rid of Your Demons
Don’t Fool Yourself!
Some people simply don’t believe that demons exist―which is a state of affairs that Satan loves. As the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, says: “The Devil does not like to be seen ― that is when he is happiest! The devil prefers this way! Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways!”
Other folk imagine demons as a distant reality―who sometimes come along to tempt them. Fr. Amorth states: Our contemporary religious culture―while not entirely negating the existence of Satan and the other devils―is inclined to diminish their involvement and influence over people. Discrediting this satanic influence has become almost compulsory and is considered a sign of ‘wisdom’.
The reality is that demons exist and they are not a distant reality―they prowl around us continually seeking to bring about our damnation: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8).
The Slavery of Sin
Sin places us under Satan: “Whosoever commits sin, is the servant of sin … He that commits sin is of the devil” (John 8:34; 1 John 3:8). Fr. Gabriele Amorth said: “The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin.” The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger adds: “Every mortal, by its nature, takes, the person out from underneath the authority structure of God and places the person underneath the authority structure of Satan.” That is something we rarely think about! Yet most people have sinned mortally. Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). The more we sin mortally, the more we fall under the increasing control of the devil.
Mortal sin is ultimately the only way in which Satan can bring about our damnation. Getting souls to commit mortal sin is Satan’s sole objective―even though he has millions of different ways he goes about it. Nobody is so holy as to be exempt from Satan’s temptations to mortal sin―not even Our Lord and Our Lady―so do not imagine for one second that there is no demon in your life! Some are tempted more, some are tempted less―all according to God’s wisdom and Divine Providence―yet God does not allow the demons to tempt anyone to a degree where it is impossible to resist: “God is faithful, and will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able endure, but will make also with temptation issue that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).
Dull, Dumb, Disconnected Catholics
“They have not known, nor understood―for their eyes are covered that they may not see, and that they may not understand with their heart!” (Isaias 44:18) ... “Hearing you shall hear and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see and shall not perceive!” (Matthew 13:14) … “Do you not yet know nor understand? Have you still your heart blinded? … How do you not yet understand?” (Mark 8:17, 21) … “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand!” (Matthew 13:13).
It seems as today’s Catholics just cannot connect the dots! They have been taught things about the Faith but they do not understand! They have heard that most souls are lost―but it merely washes over them like water over a duck’s back! They have read Our Lord’s words: “Many are called but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) ― but few choose to take those words to heart! They know that Our Lady of Fatima said that many souls go to Hell, but they live their lives as if there was no Hell! They have read the words of Our Lady of Good Success, who said: “From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects!” ― but they are largely indifferent to that warning.
Another dumb thing is that the world has lost the sense of sin. Sin is no longer viewed as the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Fr. Gabriele Amorth points out: “The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed and, by inducing man to sin!” One pope after another―even the Liberal and Modernist popes―have spoken about this loss of the sense of sin.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin ... The meaning of sin ― which is a different thing from ‘guilt feelings’ as understood in psychology ― is only grasped in discovering the meaning of God!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Not only do we let the Kingdom of God crumble when we lose the sense of sin―but we also let our defenses against Satan crumble as well! We open the door to Satan and he only too willingly comes into our lives. As the American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger says: “Having absolutely no demons in your life is unlikely. Usually everybody’s got one. I've never really met a family that didn't have one, or at least one! Most families have one ― in fact I would say 99% of families have one. It is even possible for one individual in a family to be under more than one set of generational spirits―because of the mortal sins that the parents or somebody in the family committed, and then the spirit, with its particular mortal sin, gets passed on from generation to generation as a form of temporal punishment due to the sin.”
We stupidly underestimate (1) the degree of demonic activity in our lives; (2) the capabilities and powers of the demons; (3) the grave risks and consequences that we incur by committing mortal sins―and even venial sins, for venial sins are merely steps towards mortal sin.
(1) THE DEGREE OF DEMONIC ACTIVITY IN OUR LIVES ― The demons are perpetually at work in our lives. We might need to take breaks in our lives and spend nights sleeping―but the demons never sleep. They are ALWAYS watching you and plotting how to eventually damn you―which can only be done through mortal sin. Someone who is possessed cannot be damned unless they knowingly and willingly commit mortal sins and then remain unrepentant for them.
(2) THE CAPABILITIES AND POWERS OF THE DEMONS ― Entire books could be written on this topic, so one or a few paragraphs cannot do justice to this topic. Nevertheless, you should be made to realize something about the incredible powers that demons (and good angels) possess. Their intelligence is beyond our wildest imagination. Fr. Ripperger explains: “The knowledge of all particular things as they have happened―from the beginning of history until now―have been infused in their intellects. They literally know every single material thing that is happening in the entire universe all the time. All they have to do is think of what a human being is and they know all there is to know about human beings. They know every single faculty and exactly how it works. They know how our appetites and emotions work. They know how the interrelations of the various faculties work. They also know the various kinds of causes and things perfectly. They know perfectly the nature of causes and so they know where the things these things are headed. They can look at super complex states of things and know the nature of causes and know where they are generally headed.
“They know how DNA works. They know how our dispositions work, and how DNA is connected to our dispositions. They already know by our DNA what our proclivities are likely to be whether dispositions what are inclinations to specific vices are going to be in things of that sort just by looking at our DNA but then they also watch our patterns of behavior so that they know likely they have a pretty good idea of what virtues and vices you have what your spiritual weaknesses are what your spiritual strengths are the other thing they are watching for are the external manifestations of grace that God has given you internally, so that they can map that, engage that, and take that into consideration of the spiritual warfare. They also have infused knowledge of warfare―which means they have a perfect knowledge of human nature and, because they have a perfect knowledge of spiritual warfare; and, because they’ve been watching you for decades, they know the precise strategy that they can use to take you out―God permitting.”
“You have to understand that God regulates every single thing demons do. We have this idea which is false―that demons get to maraud around and go do whatever they want! That is not true. When they tempt you; and the degree of the temptation, the content of the temptation, the length of the temptation―all this is entirely determined by God! Even in cases of possession―who can possess; the degrees of possession; what kinds of manifestations occur; how long the possession is going to last; what is going to get them; out what parts of the body they can possess; when they can manifest and when they cannot manifest; the degree of the individual manifestations―all these are entirely determined by God. They demons are on an extraordinarily short leash!”
(3) THE GRAVE RISKS AND CONSEQUENCES THAT WE INCUR BY COMMITTING MORTAL SINS ― What most people don’t realize is that the proper effect of every mortal sin is possession. The only reason that anyone and everyone who commits mortal sin does not become possessed by demons, is simply and solely the mercy of God. God controls the demons, not us. So, even when we open up the door, it’s up to God to determine whether He is going to allow the demon to step through the door; whether it’s going to be good for them or not. Ultimately, God does allow it sometimes, but very rarely―very rarely does He allow the demon into the person’s life as a punishment. When God does allow it, then part of the reason is to make the sinner realize: “Look, this is what you’ve chosen! This is what you wanted, and this is the effect of your sin!”
Once the generational demonic spirit gains access, then it can be one hell of a job getting him out! That is what we will now look at―how the hell to get Satan out of our lives.
Getting Rid of Our Demons
Some people might be surprised, shocked, offended, insulted or discouraged at the thought that are generational demons in their family and lives―but such is the consequence of repeated mortal sins! As Fr. Ripperger says, the presence of generational demons in families, from generation to generation, is a form of temporal punishment that God allows for those repeated mortal sins. And, as the popes and exorcists say, if the world has lost the sense of sin, then mortal sins must be abounding more and more―therefore, the generational spirits must be abounding more and more within families. As the saying goes: “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure!” It is much easier to prevent the entry of the demonic generational spirits than it is to get them out once they gain entry.
Fr. Chad Ripperger points out: “You can pray ‘until the cows come home’ but you are not going to get the generational demon out of your family lineage until you know exactly what his angle is―that is to say, what his nature is [e.g. the demon of lust, or greed, or anger, or sloth, or envy, etc.). Then once you know that, then there are ways of getting the demon or demons out.” So what are the most common mortal sins that you or the other family members have been committing? Some mortal sins are external―and so they are easier to spot. Internal mortal sins are harder to spot―unless some clues indicate what they might be. The internal mortal sins of others and their frequency―if unknown―make it harder to pinpoint what kind of demon is present, and thus make its expulsion more difficult.
As the famous axiom says: “Know thy enemy!” The ancient Chinese military strategist, Sun Tzu, writes in the 5th century B.C.: “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle!” (Sun Tzu, The Art of War).
Holy Scripture says: “Resist the devil, and he will fly from you!” (James 4:7). Yet, on the other hand, many exorcists admit to being afraid of the demons―especially in the early years of their ministry. Even St. John Vianney and St. Padre Pio admitted to being initially afraid the devil―but they were being physically assaulted by demons! Should we fear the devil or not? Well―that depends. If we are truly striving after holiness; if we are in state of sanctifying grace; if we are continually growing in sanctifying grace; if we living deep spiritual lives; if we have a fervent prayer life; if we regularly not only say the Rosary but also meditate the Rosary; if we attend Mass and receive Holy Communion frequently; if we regularly go to Confession and confess our venial sins in an attempt to ward off mortal sin before it strikes; if we truly have the virtue of humility; if have a high degree of charity―then there is little or nothing to fear.
The Attacks of the Devil are Good for You!
Fr. Chad Ripperger states: “What many people fail to see, grasp and understand is the fact that struggling against the demons is actually good for us! We tend to think of demons as the things that are detracting against our sanctification; that is only true when we give in to them, but when we fight them and work against them, they actually become the instruments of our purification, because we have to deny ourselves–we have to work against them―we have to build virtue contrary to the temptations they are throwing at us. God allows demons in to enter into our lives primarily as instruments of our sanctification―even in cases possession. It weakens demons when the exorcist forces them to admit that the person they are possessing is becoming holier as a result of the demon’s involvement in their lives. The possessed persons have to fight against him, they have to constantly make acts of confidence in God. They have to constantly be working towards God. They have to work on their own healing. They have to work on their own perfections, or virtues, or vices, etc, constantly―because when you’re possessed, there’s no swimming freely; you either have to fight your way out, or you’re going to go down.
“Probably the highest level of spiritual warfare is found in the case of the person who is possessed and who has decided to cooperate with the will of God and fight their way through it. In fact, I’ve even told some of the people that have been possessed, I say: “Okay, now, look! When you get to Heaven, you have to be nice to me, because you are going to be and you are holier than me, which means you are going to be above me and you can boss me around, so you have to be nice to me when you get to Heaven, okay?” Because they are some of the holiest people I’ve met. And it’s through that spiritual warfare that they gained that level of holiness.
“There’s no middle road. But that’s actually also true of the whole spiritual life. Either you are swimming upstream in the spiritual life, or you are lazily floating downstream. There can be no treading water. One of the biggest or most unfortunate things among a lot of Catholics is they like to reach a certain plateau where they are staying out of mortal sin; they might have a few venial sins they are struggling with; they feel comfortable in their spiritual life; they might be going to Mass regularly; they are receiving the Sacraments; and life just seems kind of comfortable―and they know that in order to eradicate those last imperfections in their life, means that there is going to have to be a lot of suffering and a lot of self-denial. And so they shy away from it. The presence of demons won’t let you do that. God allows them into your life precisely to drag you one way or the other. God allows demons in our lives so that we can grow in virtue and thereby we become the instruments of humiliation for the demons. We become the instruments of God’s justice against them. There comes time when the demon the suffering and the punishment of the demons is so extreme that the demons will literally turn to God and beg Him to allow them to go back to Hell, and He returns silence to them, because He doesn’t hear their prayers. But why is that? It’s because of the fact that He wants them to have to go through this punishment.
“Let’s face it, most of us, would end up lukewarm or mediocre, at best, if there was no diabolic activity in our lives. If there was no temptation, most of us wouldn’t develop any level of virtue whatsoever. But when we have to fight against the demons, it means that the application of our wills, and the struggle that we undergo, is harder and we have to exert more energy, and we have to do it more powerfully. As a result of that, we gain a level of virtue and grow in virtue. Our virtue is higher than it would be if we were just meandering through life on our own, trying to practice virtue through a normal process of just developing virtue without adversity.”
Remove Demons by Spiritual Warfare
Fr. Chad Ripperger continues: “We think to ourselves: ‘Oh, I’m struggling in my spiritual life!’ ― we don’t have a clue! The spiritual warfare of these possessed people is on a level that none of us ever experience―and yet, God gives them everything necessary. That should give us confidence and hope. It doesn’t matter what the level of spiritual warfare happens to be; or what the attack is; what the onslaught is; whether it’s in me; or whether it’s in my family; or whether it’s in the Church; or in society; or in the culture; in politics; etc. ― it doesn’t matter! In the end, God is the Lord of History. God has control over it, and God will be the one to determine what we can do with it and how we can overcome it―and that just means that we have to cooperate with Him if He wants a demon in your life. And usually everybody has got one―usually most families in my experience―most families have demonic generational spirits.
“So how does one eliminate these generational demons?
Stop Committing Mortal Sins
“Firstly, by not committing any more mortal sins, which invite the demons into your family tree. Most people fail to realize that the very area in which they habitually commit sins―what that actually tells you is that God wants you to attain a level of perfection in the virtue that is opposed to that particular sin, because it’s through the struggle that you develop the virtue and achieve that perfection. So, instead of looking at it and saying: “You know, I’m never going to get this!” ― it should be the other way around; we should be working on it harder in the particular areas that we fall, in order to attain that perfection.
Sacrament of Confession
“Secondly, if the generational spirits entered through a satanic curse―then true repentance, the Sacrament of Confession, the Holy Eucharist and Holy Mass are the best ways to eliminate them, combined with forgiving the person who cursed you. Naming the persons in your family tree who you know have committed specific sins, and praying for forgiveness for those sins during Holy Mass, that you have arranged to have offered for them, cleanses the family tree. Confession is actually more efficacious in most cases than solemn exorcism. That means the legal hold the demon has on them is broken, that means every time you commit a sin or every time you make a choice, you either bind yourself to God to the choice of the good or you bind yourself to the demons in evil. The term ‘absolution’―‘absolvere’ in Latin―literally means to dissolve or untie, or to remove the bond of justice, because, in justice, you’ve taken yourself out from underneath God and placed yourself underneath Satan through your sin. And, as a result of that, you are connected to this demon now. And so when you go to Confession and confess your mortal sins, it breaks that tie. With that absolution, you are no longer tied to your sin or the effects of your sin. Confession also gives you a special Sacramental grace to help you avoid each and every that you have confessed.
The Holy Mass and Holy Eucharist
“The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the same Sacrifice as that of Christ on Calvary. It was Christ’s Sacrifice on the cross on Calvary―and the rest of His tortuous Passion―that definitively defeated Satan. The demons hate the Mass since it always reminds them of their defeat on Calvary.
Devotion to Mary
“Our Lady possesses perfect coercive power over the demons. Exorcists say that at some point, in basically every exorcism, Our Lady becomes involved. In about 70% of the cases that I've had, it is Our Lady that shows up and it Mary that ultimately liberates. When she appears, you immediately know that it is all over for the demons. You can tell something’s going on [inside the possessed person]. Our Lady will appear, they will literally see the abyss open up, they will feel the demon getting ripped out, they will see it going down into the abyss, it closes, and she leaves. She literally doesn’t have to say a thing. That’s how powerful she is! Mary’s love is unique and different from anyone else’s because she continually sacrificed herself to God without ever considering herself in the equation. The devil fears Mary because she is the perfect example of humility and obedience to God. The demon is crushed by humility― thus revealing the power of humility in overcoming evil.
Devotion to Your Guardian Angel
“Call upon your Guardian Angel and remember your Guardian Angel is more powerful than the devil himself. Scripture teaches us the importance of our angels. In Psalm 90 we read, ‘He hath given His angels charge over thee―to keep thee in all thy ways. In their hands they shall bear thee up―lest thou dash thy foot against a stone!’ (Psalm 90:11-12).
Pray and Fast
“When the disciples asked Jesus why they were not able to cast out a particular demon, He replied: ‘This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer and fasting’ (Mark 9:28). St. Matthew’s Gospel, which deals with same incident, Jesus tells them that they were not able to cast out the demon because of their lack of faith: “Then came the disciples to Jesus secretly and said: ‘Why could not we cast him out?’ Jesus said to them: ‘Because of your unbelief! For, amen I say to you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, “Remove from here to there!” and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you! But this kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:18-20). When we pray, we connect ourselves more tightly to God and are protected from demonic influence. When we fast, we show that our soul is stronger than the hunger pangs of the body and come to realize that only God can satisfy the deepest longings of the human heart.
Show a Willingness to Suffer
“Another key thing is a willingness to suffer. And that’s the thing that demons don’t want you to master. They will use every form of fear possible to keep you from being willing to suffer because, if you’re willing to suffer, there is nothing in your spiritual life that you cannot obtain. But if you are unwilling to overcome that fear of suffering―that horror of suffering, as they used to call it in the Catechisms―if you’re unwilling to overcome that, you will never reach the heights of perfection.”
Using the Sacramentals of the Church
One of the most remarkable effects of Sacramentals is the virtue to drive away evil spirits whose mysterious and baleful operations affect sometimes the physical activity of man. To combat this occult power the Church has recourse to Sacramentals―of which exorcism is one. The Sacramentals are the means to actual graces (not sanctifying grace)―which are our daily helps in avoiding evil and doing good. The first thing to remember is that the power of the Sacramentals of the Church depends upon the degree of Faith in the Church in general and the dispositions of the user and degree of Faith in the person using the Sacramental. Exorcists will tell you that the efficacy or power of the Church’s Rite of Exorcism (Exorcism is a Sacramental) has been reduced over the last 60 or so years due to the ever increasing lack of Faith that is plaguing the Church. The same has to be said for all the other Sacramentals of the Church―some of which are: (1) blessed Rosaries; (2) blessed Medals; (3) blessed Scapulars; (4) blessed Crucifixes; (5) blessed pictures and statues; (6) blessed Salt; (7) Holy Water; (8) blessed Epiphany Chalk ― to name but a few. Nevertheless, if your Faith in them is strong, then you can still hope for and expect great graces of various kinds in you ceaseless spiritual warfare against the powers of evil.
Know Your Faith
“Another one of the principle ways to combat in spiritual warfare is that you have to know your Faith. It’s not good enough just to say a few prayers here and there―you have to continually learn about your Faith so that you don’t get sucked into this Modernism, which is now the prevalent heresy in the Church, and is so toxic. Modernism so much in the air that, unless you have a special grace, or unless you really know your Faith extraordinarily well, you are simply going to end up in error. It’s that simple!
Do not trust your emotions!
“St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross to the Church, who completely departed from that and said the emotions cannot be trusted. Why? Because the demons have access to them; they can cause the emotions―and I’ve seen it. They can cause positive emotions in relationship to certain pious practices but they can also block them as well. So you can’t follow your emotions, they can’t be trusted, you have to follow reason enlightened by Faith. That’s what we should be following.
Willingness to Suffer
“Another key thing is a willingness to suffer. And that’s the thing that demons don’t want you to master. They will use every form of fear possible to keep you from being willing to suffer because, if you’re willing to suffer, there is nothing in your spiritual life that you cannot obtain. But if you are unwilling to overcome that fear of suffering―that horror of suffering, as they used to call it in the Catechisms―if you’re unwilling to overcome that, you will never reach the heights of perfection.”
Prayers to Heal Your Family Tree from Demonic Generational Spirits
Heavenly Father, I come before Thee as Thy child, in great need of Thy help! I have physical health needs, emotional needs, spiritual needs, and interpersonal needs. Many of my problems have been caused by my own faults, failure, neglect, and sinfulness―for which I humbly beg Thy Forgiveness. But Father, I also ask Thee to forgive the sins of my ancestors―whose failures have left their effects on me in the form of unwanted tendencies, behavior patterns and defects in body, mind and spirit! Heal me, O Lord, of all these disorders! Amen.
Heavenly Father, with the help of Thy grace, I sincerely forgive everyone, especially living or dead members of my family tree, who have directly offended me or my loved ones in any way; or those whose sins have resulted in our present sufferings and disorders! In the Name of Thy Son, Jesus, and by the Power of His Holy Spirit, I ask Thee, Eternal Father, to deliver me and my entire family tree from the influence of the Devil. Free all living and dead members of my family tree, including those in adoptive relationships, and those in extended family relationships, from every contaminating form of bondage. By Thy loving concern for us, Eternal Father, and by the Most Precious Blood of Thy Son, Jesus, I beg Thee to extend Thy Blessing to me and to all my living and deceased relatives. Heal every negative effect transmitted through all past generations, and prevent such negative effects in future generations of my family tree. Amen.
Heavenly Father, I symbolically place the Cross of Our Lord Jesus over the head of each person in my family tree, and between each generation. I ask Thee to let the cleansing Blood of Jesus purify the bloodlines in my family lineage. Send Thy protective angels to encamp around us, and permit the Archangel Raphael, the patron of healing, to administer Thy Divine Healing Power to all of us, even in areas of genetic disability. Give special power to the guardian angels of our family members, to heal, protect, guide and encourage each of us in all our needs. Let Thy Healing Power be released at this very moment, and let it continue as long as Thy Sovereignty permits. Amen.
Heavenly Father, in our family tree, replace, O Lord, all bondage with a Holy bonding in family love. And let there be an ever-deeper bonding with Thee, Eternal Father, by the Holy Spirit, to Thy Son, Jesus. Let the Family of the Holy Trinity pervade our family with Its tender, warm, Loving Presence, so that our family may recognize and manifest that Love in all our relationships. We include all of our unknown needs with this petition which we pray in the Precious Holy Name of Jesus. Amen.
Holy Mary, who crushes Satan’s head, pray for us!
St. Joseph, Patron of family life, pray for us!
St. Michael the Archangel, vanquisher of Satan, defend us!
St. Raphael the Archangel, heal us and lead us to safety!
St. Gabriel the Archangel, instruct us!
All ye Nine Choirs of Angels, protect us!
Prayer Against Demonic Oppression
O Most Blessed Trinity, by the authority given to me by the Natural Law, and by virtue of Thy giving these things and rights to me, I claim authority, rights and power over my (mention whatever applies: spiritual health, mental health, emotional health, physical health, relationships, family, security, freedom, reputation, income, finances, possessions, job, etc.) and anything else that pertains to the demonic oppression.
O Lord Jesus Christ, by the merits of Thy Sacred Wounds, I reclaim the rights, powers and authority over anything which I may have lost or conceded to any demon; and I ask Thee to remove any demon’s ability to influence or affect anything in my life.
O God Almighty Father, humiliate the demons that have sought to steal Thy glory from Thee, by oppressing Thy creatures. I beseech Thee to show Thy great glory and power over them; and to show Thy generosity, kindness and mercy to me, Thine unworthy servant and sinful creature, by answering and granting all that I have asked of Thee.
O God Almighty Father, bind all demons of oppression―in the Name of Jesus Christ, by the power of the Most Precious Blood; by the power of the humility with which Christ suffered His wounds; and by the intercession of the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Virgin Most Powerful; and through the intercession of St. Michael the Archangel, St. Gabriel the Archangel, St. Raphael the Archangel, the Nine Choirs of Angels, my Guardian Angel, the blessed Apostles St. Peter and St. Paul, St. Joseph, my patron Saints and of all the Saints―command, O Lord, the demons to go to the foot of the Holy Cross to receive their sentence, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
Consecration of One’s Exterior Goods to Our Lady
O Most Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, Holy Mother of God, I (say your name), a faithless sinner, renew and ratify today, in thy hands, the vows of my Baptism. I renounce forever Satan, his pomps and works; and I give myself entirely to Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Wisdom, to carry my cross after Him all the days of my life, and to be more faithful to Him than I have ever been before.
In the presence of all the heavenly court, I choose thee this day, O Mary, for my Mother and Mistress. Knowing that I have received rights over all my exterior goods, by the promulgation of the Natural Law by the Divine Author, I deliver and consecrate to thee, as thy slave, all of my exterior goods ― past, present and future.
I relinquish, into thy hands, my Heavenly Mother, all rights over my exterior goods ― including my physical and mental health, my emotions and emotional health, my relationships, my family, all persons under my authority, my security, freedom, reputation, my possessions, income, finances, property, job, and all my earthly endeavors and success ― and I retain for myself no right of disposing of the goods that come to me, but leave to thee the entire and full right of disposing of all that belongs to me, without exception, according to thy good pleasure, for the greater glory of God in time and in eternity.
As I now interiorly relinquish what belongs to me exteriorly, into thy hands, I also entrust to thee the protection of those exterior goods against the evil one ― so that, knowing that they now belong to thee, he cannot touch them.
Receive, O good and pious Virgin, this little offering, in honor of, and in union with, that subjection which the Eternal Wisdom deigned to have to thy maternity; in homage to the power which both of you have over this poor sinner, and in thanksgiving for the privileges with which the Holy Trinity has favored thee.
Trusting in the providential care of God the Father and thy maternal care, I have full confidence that thou will take care of me as to the necessities of this life and will not leave me forsaken. O God the Father, increase my trust in Thy Son’s Mother! Our Lady of Fair Love, give me perfect confidence in the providence of thy Son! Amen.
Some people simply don’t believe that demons exist―which is a state of affairs that Satan loves. As the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, says: “The Devil does not like to be seen ― that is when he is happiest! The devil prefers this way! Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways!”
Other folk imagine demons as a distant reality―who sometimes come along to tempt them. Fr. Amorth states: Our contemporary religious culture―while not entirely negating the existence of Satan and the other devils―is inclined to diminish their involvement and influence over people. Discrediting this satanic influence has become almost compulsory and is considered a sign of ‘wisdom’.
The reality is that demons exist and they are not a distant reality―they prowl around us continually seeking to bring about our damnation: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8).
The Slavery of Sin
Sin places us under Satan: “Whosoever commits sin, is the servant of sin … He that commits sin is of the devil” (John 8:34; 1 John 3:8). Fr. Gabriele Amorth said: “The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin.” The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger adds: “Every mortal, by its nature, takes, the person out from underneath the authority structure of God and places the person underneath the authority structure of Satan.” That is something we rarely think about! Yet most people have sinned mortally. Who dare say: “I am clean, and without sin! I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me!” (Job 33:9). “For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God!” (Romans 3:23). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). The more we sin mortally, the more we fall under the increasing control of the devil.
Mortal sin is ultimately the only way in which Satan can bring about our damnation. Getting souls to commit mortal sin is Satan’s sole objective―even though he has millions of different ways he goes about it. Nobody is so holy as to be exempt from Satan’s temptations to mortal sin―not even Our Lord and Our Lady―so do not imagine for one second that there is no demon in your life! Some are tempted more, some are tempted less―all according to God’s wisdom and Divine Providence―yet God does not allow the demons to tempt anyone to a degree where it is impossible to resist: “God is faithful, and will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able endure, but will make also with temptation issue that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).
Dull, Dumb, Disconnected Catholics
“They have not known, nor understood―for their eyes are covered that they may not see, and that they may not understand with their heart!” (Isaias 44:18) ... “Hearing you shall hear and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see and shall not perceive!” (Matthew 13:14) … “Do you not yet know nor understand? Have you still your heart blinded? … How do you not yet understand?” (Mark 8:17, 21) … “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand!” (Matthew 13:13).
It seems as today’s Catholics just cannot connect the dots! They have been taught things about the Faith but they do not understand! They have heard that most souls are lost―but it merely washes over them like water over a duck’s back! They have read Our Lord’s words: “Many are called but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14) ― but few choose to take those words to heart! They know that Our Lady of Fatima said that many souls go to Hell, but they live their lives as if there was no Hell! They have read the words of Our Lady of Good Success, who said: “From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects!” ― but they are largely indifferent to that warning.
Another dumb thing is that the world has lost the sense of sin. Sin is no longer viewed as the greatest evil in the world: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin … Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Fr. Gabriele Amorth points out: “The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed and, by inducing man to sin!” One pope after another―even the Liberal and Modernist popes―have spoken about this loss of the sense of sin.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin ... The meaning of sin ― which is a different thing from ‘guilt feelings’ as understood in psychology ― is only grasped in discovering the meaning of God!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
Not only do we let the Kingdom of God crumble when we lose the sense of sin―but we also let our defenses against Satan crumble as well! We open the door to Satan and he only too willingly comes into our lives. As the American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger says: “Having absolutely no demons in your life is unlikely. Usually everybody’s got one. I've never really met a family that didn't have one, or at least one! Most families have one ― in fact I would say 99% of families have one. It is even possible for one individual in a family to be under more than one set of generational spirits―because of the mortal sins that the parents or somebody in the family committed, and then the spirit, with its particular mortal sin, gets passed on from generation to generation as a form of temporal punishment due to the sin.”
We stupidly underestimate (1) the degree of demonic activity in our lives; (2) the capabilities and powers of the demons; (3) the grave risks and consequences that we incur by committing mortal sins―and even venial sins, for venial sins are merely steps towards mortal sin.
(1) THE DEGREE OF DEMONIC ACTIVITY IN OUR LIVES ― The demons are perpetually at work in our lives. We might need to take breaks in our lives and spend nights sleeping―but the demons never sleep. They are ALWAYS watching you and plotting how to eventually damn you―which can only be done through mortal sin. Someone who is possessed cannot be damned unless they knowingly and willingly commit mortal sins and then remain unrepentant for them.
(2) THE CAPABILITIES AND POWERS OF THE DEMONS ― Entire books could be written on this topic, so one or a few paragraphs cannot do justice to this topic. Nevertheless, you should be made to realize something about the incredible powers that demons (and good angels) possess. Their intelligence is beyond our wildest imagination. Fr. Ripperger explains: “The knowledge of all particular things as they have happened―from the beginning of history until now―have been infused in their intellects. They literally know every single material thing that is happening in the entire universe all the time. All they have to do is think of what a human being is and they know all there is to know about human beings. They know every single faculty and exactly how it works. They know how our appetites and emotions work. They know how the interrelations of the various faculties work. They also know the various kinds of causes and things perfectly. They know perfectly the nature of causes and so they know where the things these things are headed. They can look at super complex states of things and know the nature of causes and know where they are generally headed.
“They know how DNA works. They know how our dispositions work, and how DNA is connected to our dispositions. They already know by our DNA what our proclivities are likely to be whether dispositions what are inclinations to specific vices are going to be in things of that sort just by looking at our DNA but then they also watch our patterns of behavior so that they know likely they have a pretty good idea of what virtues and vices you have what your spiritual weaknesses are what your spiritual strengths are the other thing they are watching for are the external manifestations of grace that God has given you internally, so that they can map that, engage that, and take that into consideration of the spiritual warfare. They also have infused knowledge of warfare―which means they have a perfect knowledge of human nature and, because they have a perfect knowledge of spiritual warfare; and, because they’ve been watching you for decades, they know the precise strategy that they can use to take you out―God permitting.”
“You have to understand that God regulates every single thing demons do. We have this idea which is false―that demons get to maraud around and go do whatever they want! That is not true. When they tempt you; and the degree of the temptation, the content of the temptation, the length of the temptation―all this is entirely determined by God! Even in cases of possession―who can possess; the degrees of possession; what kinds of manifestations occur; how long the possession is going to last; what is going to get them; out what parts of the body they can possess; when they can manifest and when they cannot manifest; the degree of the individual manifestations―all these are entirely determined by God. They demons are on an extraordinarily short leash!”
(3) THE GRAVE RISKS AND CONSEQUENCES THAT WE INCUR BY COMMITTING MORTAL SINS ― What most people don’t realize is that the proper effect of every mortal sin is possession. The only reason that anyone and everyone who commits mortal sin does not become possessed by demons, is simply and solely the mercy of God. God controls the demons, not us. So, even when we open up the door, it’s up to God to determine whether He is going to allow the demon to step through the door; whether it’s going to be good for them or not. Ultimately, God does allow it sometimes, but very rarely―very rarely does He allow the demon into the person’s life as a punishment. When God does allow it, then part of the reason is to make the sinner realize: “Look, this is what you’ve chosen! This is what you wanted, and this is the effect of your sin!”
Once the generational demonic spirit gains access, then it can be one hell of a job getting him out! That is what we will now look at―how the hell to get Satan out of our lives.
Getting Rid of Our Demons
Some people might be surprised, shocked, offended, insulted or discouraged at the thought that are generational demons in their family and lives―but such is the consequence of repeated mortal sins! As Fr. Ripperger says, the presence of generational demons in families, from generation to generation, is a form of temporal punishment that God allows for those repeated mortal sins. And, as the popes and exorcists say, if the world has lost the sense of sin, then mortal sins must be abounding more and more―therefore, the generational spirits must be abounding more and more within families. As the saying goes: “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure!” It is much easier to prevent the entry of the demonic generational spirits than it is to get them out once they gain entry.
Fr. Chad Ripperger points out: “You can pray ‘until the cows come home’ but you are not going to get the generational demon out of your family lineage until you know exactly what his angle is―that is to say, what his nature is [e.g. the demon of lust, or greed, or anger, or sloth, or envy, etc.). Then once you know that, then there are ways of getting the demon or demons out.” So what are the most common mortal sins that you or the other family members have been committing? Some mortal sins are external―and so they are easier to spot. Internal mortal sins are harder to spot―unless some clues indicate what they might be. The internal mortal sins of others and their frequency―if unknown―make it harder to pinpoint what kind of demon is present, and thus make its expulsion more difficult.
As the famous axiom says: “Know thy enemy!” The ancient Chinese military strategist, Sun Tzu, writes in the 5th century B.C.: “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle!” (Sun Tzu, The Art of War).
Holy Scripture says: “Resist the devil, and he will fly from you!” (James 4:7). Yet, on the other hand, many exorcists admit to being afraid of the demons―especially in the early years of their ministry. Even St. John Vianney and St. Padre Pio admitted to being initially afraid the devil―but they were being physically assaulted by demons! Should we fear the devil or not? Well―that depends. If we are truly striving after holiness; if we are in state of sanctifying grace; if we are continually growing in sanctifying grace; if we living deep spiritual lives; if we have a fervent prayer life; if we regularly not only say the Rosary but also meditate the Rosary; if we attend Mass and receive Holy Communion frequently; if we regularly go to Confession and confess our venial sins in an attempt to ward off mortal sin before it strikes; if we truly have the virtue of humility; if have a high degree of charity―then there is little or nothing to fear.
The Attacks of the Devil are Good for You!
Fr. Chad Ripperger states: “What many people fail to see, grasp and understand is the fact that struggling against the demons is actually good for us! We tend to think of demons as the things that are detracting against our sanctification; that is only true when we give in to them, but when we fight them and work against them, they actually become the instruments of our purification, because we have to deny ourselves–we have to work against them―we have to build virtue contrary to the temptations they are throwing at us. God allows demons in to enter into our lives primarily as instruments of our sanctification―even in cases possession. It weakens demons when the exorcist forces them to admit that the person they are possessing is becoming holier as a result of the demon’s involvement in their lives. The possessed persons have to fight against him, they have to constantly make acts of confidence in God. They have to constantly be working towards God. They have to work on their own healing. They have to work on their own perfections, or virtues, or vices, etc, constantly―because when you’re possessed, there’s no swimming freely; you either have to fight your way out, or you’re going to go down.
“Probably the highest level of spiritual warfare is found in the case of the person who is possessed and who has decided to cooperate with the will of God and fight their way through it. In fact, I’ve even told some of the people that have been possessed, I say: “Okay, now, look! When you get to Heaven, you have to be nice to me, because you are going to be and you are holier than me, which means you are going to be above me and you can boss me around, so you have to be nice to me when you get to Heaven, okay?” Because they are some of the holiest people I’ve met. And it’s through that spiritual warfare that they gained that level of holiness.
“There’s no middle road. But that’s actually also true of the whole spiritual life. Either you are swimming upstream in the spiritual life, or you are lazily floating downstream. There can be no treading water. One of the biggest or most unfortunate things among a lot of Catholics is they like to reach a certain plateau where they are staying out of mortal sin; they might have a few venial sins they are struggling with; they feel comfortable in their spiritual life; they might be going to Mass regularly; they are receiving the Sacraments; and life just seems kind of comfortable―and they know that in order to eradicate those last imperfections in their life, means that there is going to have to be a lot of suffering and a lot of self-denial. And so they shy away from it. The presence of demons won’t let you do that. God allows them into your life precisely to drag you one way or the other. God allows demons in our lives so that we can grow in virtue and thereby we become the instruments of humiliation for the demons. We become the instruments of God’s justice against them. There comes time when the demon the suffering and the punishment of the demons is so extreme that the demons will literally turn to God and beg Him to allow them to go back to Hell, and He returns silence to them, because He doesn’t hear their prayers. But why is that? It’s because of the fact that He wants them to have to go through this punishment.
“Let’s face it, most of us, would end up lukewarm or mediocre, at best, if there was no diabolic activity in our lives. If there was no temptation, most of us wouldn’t develop any level of virtue whatsoever. But when we have to fight against the demons, it means that the application of our wills, and the struggle that we undergo, is harder and we have to exert more energy, and we have to do it more powerfully. As a result of that, we gain a level of virtue and grow in virtue. Our virtue is higher than it would be if we were just meandering through life on our own, trying to practice virtue through a normal process of just developing virtue without adversity.”
Remove Demons by Spiritual Warfare
Fr. Chad Ripperger continues: “We think to ourselves: ‘Oh, I’m struggling in my spiritual life!’ ― we don’t have a clue! The spiritual warfare of these possessed people is on a level that none of us ever experience―and yet, God gives them everything necessary. That should give us confidence and hope. It doesn’t matter what the level of spiritual warfare happens to be; or what the attack is; what the onslaught is; whether it’s in me; or whether it’s in my family; or whether it’s in the Church; or in society; or in the culture; in politics; etc. ― it doesn’t matter! In the end, God is the Lord of History. God has control over it, and God will be the one to determine what we can do with it and how we can overcome it―and that just means that we have to cooperate with Him if He wants a demon in your life. And usually everybody has got one―usually most families in my experience―most families have demonic generational spirits.
“So how does one eliminate these generational demons?
Stop Committing Mortal Sins
“Firstly, by not committing any more mortal sins, which invite the demons into your family tree. Most people fail to realize that the very area in which they habitually commit sins―what that actually tells you is that God wants you to attain a level of perfection in the virtue that is opposed to that particular sin, because it’s through the struggle that you develop the virtue and achieve that perfection. So, instead of looking at it and saying: “You know, I’m never going to get this!” ― it should be the other way around; we should be working on it harder in the particular areas that we fall, in order to attain that perfection.
Sacrament of Confession
“Secondly, if the generational spirits entered through a satanic curse―then true repentance, the Sacrament of Confession, the Holy Eucharist and Holy Mass are the best ways to eliminate them, combined with forgiving the person who cursed you. Naming the persons in your family tree who you know have committed specific sins, and praying for forgiveness for those sins during Holy Mass, that you have arranged to have offered for them, cleanses the family tree. Confession is actually more efficacious in most cases than solemn exorcism. That means the legal hold the demon has on them is broken, that means every time you commit a sin or every time you make a choice, you either bind yourself to God to the choice of the good or you bind yourself to the demons in evil. The term ‘absolution’―‘absolvere’ in Latin―literally means to dissolve or untie, or to remove the bond of justice, because, in justice, you’ve taken yourself out from underneath God and placed yourself underneath Satan through your sin. And, as a result of that, you are connected to this demon now. And so when you go to Confession and confess your mortal sins, it breaks that tie. With that absolution, you are no longer tied to your sin or the effects of your sin. Confession also gives you a special Sacramental grace to help you avoid each and every that you have confessed.
The Holy Mass and Holy Eucharist
“The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the same Sacrifice as that of Christ on Calvary. It was Christ’s Sacrifice on the cross on Calvary―and the rest of His tortuous Passion―that definitively defeated Satan. The demons hate the Mass since it always reminds them of their defeat on Calvary.
Devotion to Mary
“Our Lady possesses perfect coercive power over the demons. Exorcists say that at some point, in basically every exorcism, Our Lady becomes involved. In about 70% of the cases that I've had, it is Our Lady that shows up and it Mary that ultimately liberates. When she appears, you immediately know that it is all over for the demons. You can tell something’s going on [inside the possessed person]. Our Lady will appear, they will literally see the abyss open up, they will feel the demon getting ripped out, they will see it going down into the abyss, it closes, and she leaves. She literally doesn’t have to say a thing. That’s how powerful she is! Mary’s love is unique and different from anyone else’s because she continually sacrificed herself to God without ever considering herself in the equation. The devil fears Mary because she is the perfect example of humility and obedience to God. The demon is crushed by humility― thus revealing the power of humility in overcoming evil.
Devotion to Your Guardian Angel
“Call upon your Guardian Angel and remember your Guardian Angel is more powerful than the devil himself. Scripture teaches us the importance of our angels. In Psalm 90 we read, ‘He hath given His angels charge over thee―to keep thee in all thy ways. In their hands they shall bear thee up―lest thou dash thy foot against a stone!’ (Psalm 90:11-12).
Pray and Fast
“When the disciples asked Jesus why they were not able to cast out a particular demon, He replied: ‘This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer and fasting’ (Mark 9:28). St. Matthew’s Gospel, which deals with same incident, Jesus tells them that they were not able to cast out the demon because of their lack of faith: “Then came the disciples to Jesus secretly and said: ‘Why could not we cast him out?’ Jesus said to them: ‘Because of your unbelief! For, amen I say to you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, “Remove from here to there!” and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you! But this kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:18-20). When we pray, we connect ourselves more tightly to God and are protected from demonic influence. When we fast, we show that our soul is stronger than the hunger pangs of the body and come to realize that only God can satisfy the deepest longings of the human heart.
Show a Willingness to Suffer
“Another key thing is a willingness to suffer. And that’s the thing that demons don’t want you to master. They will use every form of fear possible to keep you from being willing to suffer because, if you’re willing to suffer, there is nothing in your spiritual life that you cannot obtain. But if you are unwilling to overcome that fear of suffering―that horror of suffering, as they used to call it in the Catechisms―if you’re unwilling to overcome that, you will never reach the heights of perfection.”
Using the Sacramentals of the Church
One of the most remarkable effects of Sacramentals is the virtue to drive away evil spirits whose mysterious and baleful operations affect sometimes the physical activity of man. To combat this occult power the Church has recourse to Sacramentals―of which exorcism is one. The Sacramentals are the means to actual graces (not sanctifying grace)―which are our daily helps in avoiding evil and doing good. The first thing to remember is that the power of the Sacramentals of the Church depends upon the degree of Faith in the Church in general and the dispositions of the user and degree of Faith in the person using the Sacramental. Exorcists will tell you that the efficacy or power of the Church’s Rite of Exorcism (Exorcism is a Sacramental) has been reduced over the last 60 or so years due to the ever increasing lack of Faith that is plaguing the Church. The same has to be said for all the other Sacramentals of the Church―some of which are: (1) blessed Rosaries; (2) blessed Medals; (3) blessed Scapulars; (4) blessed Crucifixes; (5) blessed pictures and statues; (6) blessed Salt; (7) Holy Water; (8) blessed Epiphany Chalk ― to name but a few. Nevertheless, if your Faith in them is strong, then you can still hope for and expect great graces of various kinds in you ceaseless spiritual warfare against the powers of evil.
Know Your Faith
“Another one of the principle ways to combat in spiritual warfare is that you have to know your Faith. It’s not good enough just to say a few prayers here and there―you have to continually learn about your Faith so that you don’t get sucked into this Modernism, which is now the prevalent heresy in the Church, and is so toxic. Modernism so much in the air that, unless you have a special grace, or unless you really know your Faith extraordinarily well, you are simply going to end up in error. It’s that simple!
Do not trust your emotions!
“St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross to the Church, who completely departed from that and said the emotions cannot be trusted. Why? Because the demons have access to them; they can cause the emotions―and I’ve seen it. They can cause positive emotions in relationship to certain pious practices but they can also block them as well. So you can’t follow your emotions, they can’t be trusted, you have to follow reason enlightened by Faith. That’s what we should be following.
Willingness to Suffer
“Another key thing is a willingness to suffer. And that’s the thing that demons don’t want you to master. They will use every form of fear possible to keep you from being willing to suffer because, if you’re willing to suffer, there is nothing in your spiritual life that you cannot obtain. But if you are unwilling to overcome that fear of suffering―that horror of suffering, as they used to call it in the Catechisms―if you’re unwilling to overcome that, you will never reach the heights of perfection.”
Prayers to Heal Your Family Tree from Demonic Generational Spirits
Heavenly Father, I come before Thee as Thy child, in great need of Thy help! I have physical health needs, emotional needs, spiritual needs, and interpersonal needs. Many of my problems have been caused by my own faults, failure, neglect, and sinfulness―for which I humbly beg Thy Forgiveness. But Father, I also ask Thee to forgive the sins of my ancestors―whose failures have left their effects on me in the form of unwanted tendencies, behavior patterns and defects in body, mind and spirit! Heal me, O Lord, of all these disorders! Amen.
Heavenly Father, with the help of Thy grace, I sincerely forgive everyone, especially living or dead members of my family tree, who have directly offended me or my loved ones in any way; or those whose sins have resulted in our present sufferings and disorders! In the Name of Thy Son, Jesus, and by the Power of His Holy Spirit, I ask Thee, Eternal Father, to deliver me and my entire family tree from the influence of the Devil. Free all living and dead members of my family tree, including those in adoptive relationships, and those in extended family relationships, from every contaminating form of bondage. By Thy loving concern for us, Eternal Father, and by the Most Precious Blood of Thy Son, Jesus, I beg Thee to extend Thy Blessing to me and to all my living and deceased relatives. Heal every negative effect transmitted through all past generations, and prevent such negative effects in future generations of my family tree. Amen.
Heavenly Father, I symbolically place the Cross of Our Lord Jesus over the head of each person in my family tree, and between each generation. I ask Thee to let the cleansing Blood of Jesus purify the bloodlines in my family lineage. Send Thy protective angels to encamp around us, and permit the Archangel Raphael, the patron of healing, to administer Thy Divine Healing Power to all of us, even in areas of genetic disability. Give special power to the guardian angels of our family members, to heal, protect, guide and encourage each of us in all our needs. Let Thy Healing Power be released at this very moment, and let it continue as long as Thy Sovereignty permits. Amen.
Heavenly Father, in our family tree, replace, O Lord, all bondage with a Holy bonding in family love. And let there be an ever-deeper bonding with Thee, Eternal Father, by the Holy Spirit, to Thy Son, Jesus. Let the Family of the Holy Trinity pervade our family with Its tender, warm, Loving Presence, so that our family may recognize and manifest that Love in all our relationships. We include all of our unknown needs with this petition which we pray in the Precious Holy Name of Jesus. Amen.
Holy Mary, who crushes Satan’s head, pray for us!
St. Joseph, Patron of family life, pray for us!
St. Michael the Archangel, vanquisher of Satan, defend us!
St. Raphael the Archangel, heal us and lead us to safety!
St. Gabriel the Archangel, instruct us!
All ye Nine Choirs of Angels, protect us!
Prayer Against Demonic Oppression
O Most Blessed Trinity, by the authority given to me by the Natural Law, and by virtue of Thy giving these things and rights to me, I claim authority, rights and power over my (mention whatever applies: spiritual health, mental health, emotional health, physical health, relationships, family, security, freedom, reputation, income, finances, possessions, job, etc.) and anything else that pertains to the demonic oppression.
O Lord Jesus Christ, by the merits of Thy Sacred Wounds, I reclaim the rights, powers and authority over anything which I may have lost or conceded to any demon; and I ask Thee to remove any demon’s ability to influence or affect anything in my life.
O God Almighty Father, humiliate the demons that have sought to steal Thy glory from Thee, by oppressing Thy creatures. I beseech Thee to show Thy great glory and power over them; and to show Thy generosity, kindness and mercy to me, Thine unworthy servant and sinful creature, by answering and granting all that I have asked of Thee.
O God Almighty Father, bind all demons of oppression―in the Name of Jesus Christ, by the power of the Most Precious Blood; by the power of the humility with which Christ suffered His wounds; and by the intercession of the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Virgin Most Powerful; and through the intercession of St. Michael the Archangel, St. Gabriel the Archangel, St. Raphael the Archangel, the Nine Choirs of Angels, my Guardian Angel, the blessed Apostles St. Peter and St. Paul, St. Joseph, my patron Saints and of all the Saints―command, O Lord, the demons to go to the foot of the Holy Cross to receive their sentence, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
Consecration of One’s Exterior Goods to Our Lady
O Most Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, Holy Mother of God, I (say your name), a faithless sinner, renew and ratify today, in thy hands, the vows of my Baptism. I renounce forever Satan, his pomps and works; and I give myself entirely to Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Wisdom, to carry my cross after Him all the days of my life, and to be more faithful to Him than I have ever been before.
In the presence of all the heavenly court, I choose thee this day, O Mary, for my Mother and Mistress. Knowing that I have received rights over all my exterior goods, by the promulgation of the Natural Law by the Divine Author, I deliver and consecrate to thee, as thy slave, all of my exterior goods ― past, present and future.
I relinquish, into thy hands, my Heavenly Mother, all rights over my exterior goods ― including my physical and mental health, my emotions and emotional health, my relationships, my family, all persons under my authority, my security, freedom, reputation, my possessions, income, finances, property, job, and all my earthly endeavors and success ― and I retain for myself no right of disposing of the goods that come to me, but leave to thee the entire and full right of disposing of all that belongs to me, without exception, according to thy good pleasure, for the greater glory of God in time and in eternity.
As I now interiorly relinquish what belongs to me exteriorly, into thy hands, I also entrust to thee the protection of those exterior goods against the evil one ― so that, knowing that they now belong to thee, he cannot touch them.
Receive, O good and pious Virgin, this little offering, in honor of, and in union with, that subjection which the Eternal Wisdom deigned to have to thy maternity; in homage to the power which both of you have over this poor sinner, and in thanksgiving for the privileges with which the Holy Trinity has favored thee.
Trusting in the providential care of God the Father and thy maternal care, I have full confidence that thou will take care of me as to the necessities of this life and will not leave me forsaken. O God the Father, increase my trust in Thy Son’s Mother! Our Lady of Fair Love, give me perfect confidence in the providence of thy Son! Amen.
Article 9
The Second Sunday of Lent, February 25th
Generational Evil Spirits
The Second Sunday of Lent, February 25th
Generational Evil Spirits
Effects of Sin Passed On in the Family
Holy Scripture mentions 56 times―either directly or indirectly―that the sins of the parents are visited upon their children unto the third or fourth generation: “I am the Lord thy God, mighty, jealous, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation” (Exodus 20:5) … “Who renders the iniquity of the fathers to the children, and to the grandchildren, unto the third and fourth generation” (Exodus 34:7) … “The Lord visits the sins of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation” (Numbers 14:18) … “I am the Lord thy God, a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon their children unto the third and fourth generation” (Deuteronomy 5:9).
Thus we see that there is a transmission of the effects of the sin of parents to the third and fourth generation―not a transmission of the guilt of parents, but only a transmission of the effects that their sins have brought about. This can be seen in dysfunctional families, in divorces, in physical and sexual abuse, immodesty, impurity, adultery, homosexuality, alcoholism, drug addiction, child neglect, abortion, mental disorders, emotional disorders, physical disorders, health disorders, fertility disorders, financial disorders, inter-relationship disorders, etc, etc. Literally thousands of different kinds of sinful disorders can be transmitted from one generation to the next. It results a trans-generational bondage. This shines a new light upon the proverb: “As the mother was, so also is her daughter!” (Ezechiel 16:44) or our modern version: “Like father, like son!”
Do You Have a Demon in the Family?
Are there demons in your home? Of course there are! Who do you think tempts you? The demons are everywhere ― even in church on Sundays (though they hate being there and it pains them). Everyone has demons that tempt them―and they are there all the time, just like your guardian angel. As the American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger says: “Generational spirits, in the general sense, are the same as the guardian spirits that God assigns. The categories are essentially the same. A family can also have a “generational spirit― in fact 99% of families have one. I've never really met a family that didn't have one, or at least one! Having absolutely no demons in your life is unlikely. So you could have a family to which God has assigned a guardian angel, but very often Satan will assign a demon, a generational spirit, to that same family in order to tempt it and the role of that demon is to get its foot in the door, so that it becomes permanently attached to the family line. It is even possible for one individual in a family to be under more than one set of generational spirits! Usually everybody’s got one, usually most families have one. In my experience most families have generational spirits because of the mortal sins that the parents or somebody in the family committed, and then the spirit, with its particular mortal sin, gets passed on from generation to generation as a form of temporal punishment due to the sin. Sometimes you can have a whole family that is off the rails and only one person is normal. Sometimes it is the opposite, where the whole family is normal, but one family member is off the rails. Look at Adam and Eve―we all got stuck with the generational spirit, Satan, from Adam and Eve’s one sin―Original Sin!”
Fr. Ripperger also explains that just as God assigns angels to races, countries, regions, cities, corporations, businesses, religious orders, dioceses, parishes, schools, families and many other kinds of entities to which persons belong, so too are there evil generational spirits for all these same entities―each specializing in certain temptations and sins: “A generational spirit can be over families, over generations, over nations, over races, over corporations. A generational spirit can be assigned by Satan to a whole generation worldwide, such as, to take just one example, the so-called “Hippie Generation. Another kind of generational spirit can be assigned over particular countries. This is what we actually saw. Exorcists surmise that there was a particular generational spirit in Nazi Germany which basically affected people intellectually and put them under the sway of what was happening around them. Over the whole of America you have generational spirit of greed. You can have generational spirits in regions―for example, the two that are the most obvious and that have been there for a little while, are in Fresno California, which has the demon of illness; and in Los Angeles is the demon of unreality making people disconnected from reality. There are also generational spirits over races―every single race throughout the world and in history has one. You can actually end up in a situation where it can even be in corporations where a demon gets his foot in the door and the corporation becomes dysfunctional and it maintains that dysfunction all the way up until it collapses. The generational spirits can also be found in dioceses and religious orders.”
There is an invisible, perpetual tug-of-war for your soul that goes on all the time. Let’s face it, most of us, would end up mediocre, at best, if there was no diabolic activity in our lives. If there was no temptation, most of us wouldn’t develop any level of virtue whatsoever. When we have to fight against the demons, it means that the application of our wills, and the struggle that we undergo is harder and we have to exert more energy, and we have to do it more strongly.
As a result of that, we gain and increase a level of virtue. Our virtue is higher than it would be without being tested by temptation―“no pain, no gain” as they say. Temptations are like lifting weights―the more we lift and the heavier weight we lift, the stronger we become. “As silver is tried by fire, and gold tried in the furnace: so the Lord tries [tests] the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3) … “For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men are tried [tested] in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5) ― and temptations are a humiliation. “When thou comest to the service of God, prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1) … “Because thou wast acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove thee!” (Tobias 12:13) ― and demons are the ultimate source of temptation even though they might use persons, places and things to tempt us.
Generational Spirits
Several priests have written books on the phenomenon known as “Generational Spirits” and the “Healing of the Family Tree,” which is a process to eliminate the effects of ancestral sins on the present generation.
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, explains: “The term generational spirit actually has two different meanings. First of all, there is the general sense in which it is taken, and that means any spirit that is passed from one person to another. Demons aren’t contagious. It’s not like you sneeze and then the other person has one now. No―there are precise mechanisms that cause this demonic passing from one person to another―and people have to understand how it works. But this is just a general term to cover any way in which a demon is passed from one person to another. So your brother can pass it to you, and things of this sort. Second, the next meaning of the term “generational spirit” refers to a spirit passed along a family tree through a specific lineage. When you hear people talking about generational spirits, they’re usually talking about family spirits; that is to say, those demons passed down the line from one generation to another in the same family.
“In the past people used to talk about what they call a familial spirit. A familial spirit is something that seems to be around an individual ― just hanging around them all the time. Now this familial spirit can either be generational in the sense that it is unknowingly passed to a child by their family when they are very young ― even from the time of conception ― or it can be familial in the sense in which somebody does something and, as a result, a spirit is able to attach itself to the individual on account of their sinful actions. That spirit can then become familial in the sense that if the person in question has a particular headship in their family, they can end up inadvertently passing that spirit on, which is how it enters into a familial line. Once the spirit gets into the family, his goal is to cause the people to commit that particular sin and thereby increase his hold over the family. The demon picks on one family member―usually the weakest―and gets them to commit a mortal sin. That attaches the demon to person and through that person the demon comes into the family home and starts to get to work on the other family members. That’s one way. So the primary generational spirits that we talk about are familial ― that’s the one in the family.
“But there are other kinds of generational spirits too. How do we break them down? It’s very simple. Generational spirits, when you’re talking about them in the general sense, are analogous to the guardian spirits that God assigns. The categories are essentially the same. So you can also have the following type of generational spirits in the family. When properly constituted within a valid marriage, God assigns a guardian angel to safeguard each particular family, but very often Satan will send a demon in order to tempt it. Moreover, the goal of that demon is to get his foot in the door so as to become permanently attached to the family line. But he also may try something else. Demons are all in a hierarchy, so the one above him may say: “Get me into this family!” So then he sends the little minion out and the minion tempts them in a manner that he knows will open the door to this stronger kind of spirit.”
How Does It Get In And How Does It Get Passed On?
Fr. Ripperger continues: “Well, first we’ll talk about how he gets in, and then we’ll talk about how he gets passed. And this is always through some kind of sin. We’re not talking about venial sin here, no! We are talking about something grave, we’re talking about mortal sin. When somebody in a family line commits a mortal sin, that mortal sins then get into the family. So the primary way through which spirits get in is the committing of a mortal sin and then through that sin attaching themselves to somebody in the family lineage. A person in the family commits a mortal sin and that allows a demon to get into the family, and then it picks on the other people in the family to make them commit more sins, and then from there it gets passed from generation to generation. It’s important to know this―because how they got in and how they get passed can actually be crucial for getting them out.
“So the mechanism through which they get in is mortal sin, and then once the demon is in, then it can either get passed by further mortal sin or by authority. How do we know this method of passing through authority? Exorcists have observed ― and some priests themselves will notice the phenomenon, but they don’t know quite what to make of it ― and it’s when you’re sitting in the confessional and the father of the family comes in and confesses a very distinctive kind of sin against the sixth commandment. So, you give him the penance. Then his young child comes in (let’s say, six to nine years of age) and starts confessing that they are having thoughts identical to what the father has been engaging in and nobody even knows about it apart from the father of the family and the priest.
“So, you can see that the demon has already got his foot in the family and this demon is starting to pick on the children. This is one of the ways that you notice that it’s getting passed. There have been times where I’ve had to tell people: “Look, you knock it off! Your children are going to end up with this problem!” Usually the people don’t care―because they don’t want to do the battle that is necessary in order to get them out.
“Once the generational spirit gets into the family, his goal is to cause the people to commit that particular mortal sin and thereby increase his hold over the family. The people will also start picking at each other [the tactic of divide and conquer] and the demon is able to use this for his own specific purposes.
“For example, one family I know had a very distinctive demon of fear. Not specific fear, it was just generalized fear. If you saw the family you would think that their problem was quarreling, because they just fought all the time, even the children! Although the children still loved one another, they also loved beating up on each other, making each other’s day miserable, you know, fighting! So why was the quarreling the result of the demon of fear? Because they didn’t want to suffer. They were afraid of suffering, and so when one of the people in the family would say something about another family member, they would start fighting and bickering about it, because they didn’t want to have to suffer the insult/correction/fault revealing/etc.
“And so you’ll see this when the tempters start working other angles. The goal is to get more than one generational spirit in the lineage. Demons are like flies; once you’ve got one, give it time, and you’ll have many others congregating around unless you get rid of the thing that’s attracting the fly, which is usually the real issue in the family.”
Holy Scripture mentions 56 times―either directly or indirectly―that the sins of the parents are visited upon their children unto the third or fourth generation: “I am the Lord thy God, mighty, jealous, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation” (Exodus 20:5) … “Who renders the iniquity of the fathers to the children, and to the grandchildren, unto the third and fourth generation” (Exodus 34:7) … “The Lord visits the sins of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation” (Numbers 14:18) … “I am the Lord thy God, a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon their children unto the third and fourth generation” (Deuteronomy 5:9).
Thus we see that there is a transmission of the effects of the sin of parents to the third and fourth generation―not a transmission of the guilt of parents, but only a transmission of the effects that their sins have brought about. This can be seen in dysfunctional families, in divorces, in physical and sexual abuse, immodesty, impurity, adultery, homosexuality, alcoholism, drug addiction, child neglect, abortion, mental disorders, emotional disorders, physical disorders, health disorders, fertility disorders, financial disorders, inter-relationship disorders, etc, etc. Literally thousands of different kinds of sinful disorders can be transmitted from one generation to the next. It results a trans-generational bondage. This shines a new light upon the proverb: “As the mother was, so also is her daughter!” (Ezechiel 16:44) or our modern version: “Like father, like son!”
Do You Have a Demon in the Family?
Are there demons in your home? Of course there are! Who do you think tempts you? The demons are everywhere ― even in church on Sundays (though they hate being there and it pains them). Everyone has demons that tempt them―and they are there all the time, just like your guardian angel. As the American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger says: “Generational spirits, in the general sense, are the same as the guardian spirits that God assigns. The categories are essentially the same. A family can also have a “generational spirit― in fact 99% of families have one. I've never really met a family that didn't have one, or at least one! Having absolutely no demons in your life is unlikely. So you could have a family to which God has assigned a guardian angel, but very often Satan will assign a demon, a generational spirit, to that same family in order to tempt it and the role of that demon is to get its foot in the door, so that it becomes permanently attached to the family line. It is even possible for one individual in a family to be under more than one set of generational spirits! Usually everybody’s got one, usually most families have one. In my experience most families have generational spirits because of the mortal sins that the parents or somebody in the family committed, and then the spirit, with its particular mortal sin, gets passed on from generation to generation as a form of temporal punishment due to the sin. Sometimes you can have a whole family that is off the rails and only one person is normal. Sometimes it is the opposite, where the whole family is normal, but one family member is off the rails. Look at Adam and Eve―we all got stuck with the generational spirit, Satan, from Adam and Eve’s one sin―Original Sin!”
Fr. Ripperger also explains that just as God assigns angels to races, countries, regions, cities, corporations, businesses, religious orders, dioceses, parishes, schools, families and many other kinds of entities to which persons belong, so too are there evil generational spirits for all these same entities―each specializing in certain temptations and sins: “A generational spirit can be over families, over generations, over nations, over races, over corporations. A generational spirit can be assigned by Satan to a whole generation worldwide, such as, to take just one example, the so-called “Hippie Generation. Another kind of generational spirit can be assigned over particular countries. This is what we actually saw. Exorcists surmise that there was a particular generational spirit in Nazi Germany which basically affected people intellectually and put them under the sway of what was happening around them. Over the whole of America you have generational spirit of greed. You can have generational spirits in regions―for example, the two that are the most obvious and that have been there for a little while, are in Fresno California, which has the demon of illness; and in Los Angeles is the demon of unreality making people disconnected from reality. There are also generational spirits over races―every single race throughout the world and in history has one. You can actually end up in a situation where it can even be in corporations where a demon gets his foot in the door and the corporation becomes dysfunctional and it maintains that dysfunction all the way up until it collapses. The generational spirits can also be found in dioceses and religious orders.”
There is an invisible, perpetual tug-of-war for your soul that goes on all the time. Let’s face it, most of us, would end up mediocre, at best, if there was no diabolic activity in our lives. If there was no temptation, most of us wouldn’t develop any level of virtue whatsoever. When we have to fight against the demons, it means that the application of our wills, and the struggle that we undergo is harder and we have to exert more energy, and we have to do it more strongly.
As a result of that, we gain and increase a level of virtue. Our virtue is higher than it would be without being tested by temptation―“no pain, no gain” as they say. Temptations are like lifting weights―the more we lift and the heavier weight we lift, the stronger we become. “As silver is tried by fire, and gold tried in the furnace: so the Lord tries [tests] the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3) … “For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men are tried [tested] in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5) ― and temptations are a humiliation. “When thou comest to the service of God, prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1) … “Because thou wast acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove thee!” (Tobias 12:13) ― and demons are the ultimate source of temptation even though they might use persons, places and things to tempt us.
Generational Spirits
Several priests have written books on the phenomenon known as “Generational Spirits” and the “Healing of the Family Tree,” which is a process to eliminate the effects of ancestral sins on the present generation.
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, explains: “The term generational spirit actually has two different meanings. First of all, there is the general sense in which it is taken, and that means any spirit that is passed from one person to another. Demons aren’t contagious. It’s not like you sneeze and then the other person has one now. No―there are precise mechanisms that cause this demonic passing from one person to another―and people have to understand how it works. But this is just a general term to cover any way in which a demon is passed from one person to another. So your brother can pass it to you, and things of this sort. Second, the next meaning of the term “generational spirit” refers to a spirit passed along a family tree through a specific lineage. When you hear people talking about generational spirits, they’re usually talking about family spirits; that is to say, those demons passed down the line from one generation to another in the same family.
“In the past people used to talk about what they call a familial spirit. A familial spirit is something that seems to be around an individual ― just hanging around them all the time. Now this familial spirit can either be generational in the sense that it is unknowingly passed to a child by their family when they are very young ― even from the time of conception ― or it can be familial in the sense in which somebody does something and, as a result, a spirit is able to attach itself to the individual on account of their sinful actions. That spirit can then become familial in the sense that if the person in question has a particular headship in their family, they can end up inadvertently passing that spirit on, which is how it enters into a familial line. Once the spirit gets into the family, his goal is to cause the people to commit that particular sin and thereby increase his hold over the family. The demon picks on one family member―usually the weakest―and gets them to commit a mortal sin. That attaches the demon to person and through that person the demon comes into the family home and starts to get to work on the other family members. That’s one way. So the primary generational spirits that we talk about are familial ― that’s the one in the family.
“But there are other kinds of generational spirits too. How do we break them down? It’s very simple. Generational spirits, when you’re talking about them in the general sense, are analogous to the guardian spirits that God assigns. The categories are essentially the same. So you can also have the following type of generational spirits in the family. When properly constituted within a valid marriage, God assigns a guardian angel to safeguard each particular family, but very often Satan will send a demon in order to tempt it. Moreover, the goal of that demon is to get his foot in the door so as to become permanently attached to the family line. But he also may try something else. Demons are all in a hierarchy, so the one above him may say: “Get me into this family!” So then he sends the little minion out and the minion tempts them in a manner that he knows will open the door to this stronger kind of spirit.”
How Does It Get In And How Does It Get Passed On?
Fr. Ripperger continues: “Well, first we’ll talk about how he gets in, and then we’ll talk about how he gets passed. And this is always through some kind of sin. We’re not talking about venial sin here, no! We are talking about something grave, we’re talking about mortal sin. When somebody in a family line commits a mortal sin, that mortal sins then get into the family. So the primary way through which spirits get in is the committing of a mortal sin and then through that sin attaching themselves to somebody in the family lineage. A person in the family commits a mortal sin and that allows a demon to get into the family, and then it picks on the other people in the family to make them commit more sins, and then from there it gets passed from generation to generation. It’s important to know this―because how they got in and how they get passed can actually be crucial for getting them out.
“So the mechanism through which they get in is mortal sin, and then once the demon is in, then it can either get passed by further mortal sin or by authority. How do we know this method of passing through authority? Exorcists have observed ― and some priests themselves will notice the phenomenon, but they don’t know quite what to make of it ― and it’s when you’re sitting in the confessional and the father of the family comes in and confesses a very distinctive kind of sin against the sixth commandment. So, you give him the penance. Then his young child comes in (let’s say, six to nine years of age) and starts confessing that they are having thoughts identical to what the father has been engaging in and nobody even knows about it apart from the father of the family and the priest.
“So, you can see that the demon has already got his foot in the family and this demon is starting to pick on the children. This is one of the ways that you notice that it’s getting passed. There have been times where I’ve had to tell people: “Look, you knock it off! Your children are going to end up with this problem!” Usually the people don’t care―because they don’t want to do the battle that is necessary in order to get them out.
“Once the generational spirit gets into the family, his goal is to cause the people to commit that particular mortal sin and thereby increase his hold over the family. The people will also start picking at each other [the tactic of divide and conquer] and the demon is able to use this for his own specific purposes.
“For example, one family I know had a very distinctive demon of fear. Not specific fear, it was just generalized fear. If you saw the family you would think that their problem was quarreling, because they just fought all the time, even the children! Although the children still loved one another, they also loved beating up on each other, making each other’s day miserable, you know, fighting! So why was the quarreling the result of the demon of fear? Because they didn’t want to suffer. They were afraid of suffering, and so when one of the people in the family would say something about another family member, they would start fighting and bickering about it, because they didn’t want to have to suffer the insult/correction/fault revealing/etc.
“And so you’ll see this when the tempters start working other angles. The goal is to get more than one generational spirit in the lineage. Demons are like flies; once you’ve got one, give it time, and you’ll have many others congregating around unless you get rid of the thing that’s attracting the fly, which is usually the real issue in the family.”
Article 8
DOUBLE DAY ARTICLE
Thursday & Friday after the First Sunday of Lent, February 22nd & 23rd
The Tactics of the Devil
DOUBLE DAY ARTICLE
Thursday & Friday after the First Sunday of Lent, February 22nd & 23rd
The Tactics of the Devil
Exorcist Says 1 in 200 are Possessed
In a January 24th, 2024, sermon at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York, the exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger mentions having kept statistics on his exorcism work for the last 15 to 17 years (as of 2024). He says that only about 0.5% of those who come to him seeking help are actually possessed by the devil―0.5% translates to 1 in 200. Fr. Ripperger assumes that this percentage, on average, must be true throughout the world. But Fr. Ripperger’s percentage (0.5% or 1 in 200) is only with regard to those coming to seek his help―many if not most persons are not even aware of the satanic influence in their lives―because that is how the devil likes it. As Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome says: “The devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways! … The devil prefers this way and we are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour!”
Aside from normal, everyday temptations, the ways in which the devils torment us are two: from without and from within. When demons torment us from without, from outside the body, it is called “obsession” or “oppression,” depending on the phenomena involved; when they torment us from within the body, it is called “possession.”
The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, in his book, An Exorcist Tells His Story, explains three kinds of diabolical activity in our lives―oppression, obsession and possession.
Oppression (Vexation)
Fr. Amorth writes: “Diabolical oppressions (a.k.a. vexations) are the second type of the demon’s extraordinary spiritual aggression and are far and away the most numerous. They are caused by a person’s cultivation of imprudent habits; by frequenting wizards or séances; through repeated and persistent serious sins; or by submitting to spells. Here the devil acts without any dominant and prevailing influence over the body and the mind of the victim, as happens in the case of possession. Oppressions (vexations) are true and actual aggression, physical or psychological attacks that the demon works against a person. At times they result in scratches, burns, bruises, or, in the most serious cases, broken bones. At times the victim is the target of stones or other objects.
“Symptoms vary from a very serious to a mild illness. There is no possession, loss of consciousness, or involuntary action and word. The Bible gives us many examples of oppression; one of them is Job. He was not possessed, but he lost his children, his goods, and his health. In the Gospels, the bent woman and the deaf and dumb man―who were cured by Jesus―were not subject to total possession, but there was a demonic presence that caused physical discomfort. St. Paul was most certainly not possessed by a demon, but he had a demonic oppression that caused an evil affliction: “And to keep me from being too elated by the abundance of revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to harass [oppress] me” (2 Corinthians 12:7).
We can give some examples from the lives of the saints: St. Padre Pio, for example, was whipped by a demon. The Curé of Ars, St. John Vianney, was often thrown out of his bed by Satan. I would say that these cases concerned diabolical oppressions (vexations), not possessions. Typical cases of oppression (vexation) are illnesses without any apparent cause that affect the internal organs, or the limbs, or pathologies, that provoke pain in a part of the body without visible signs. Oppressions (vexations) can involve health, affections, or work. Oppressions (vexations) are not always manifested on a physical level. Sometimes they can strike affections or emotions: it can happen, for example, that a couple who are married or are engaged to be married can separate, or, to the contrary, two persons can become engaged, even though they are incompatible. Other oppressions (vexations) are manifested in work: the person in search of work does not find it; or the person who finds work loses it; or a person may have gross difficulties with colleagues and bosses at work. Other times, vexations can break up friendships and isolate a person. It is impossible to enumerate all the cases.”
“The demons tend to attack man in five chief areas. These attacks are more or less severe, according to their origin. The five chief areas are the following: health, business, affections, enjoyment of life, and desire for death.
(1) HEALTH―“The evil one has the power to cause physical and mental illness. I have already mentioned that the two most commonly affected areas are the head and the stomach. Usually, the sickness is persistent. At times, though, it is transitory, lasting only the length of the exorcism. The latter include plague-like growths, stab wounds, and bruises. The Ritual suggests blessing the affected areas with the Sign of the Cross and sprinkling them with holy water. Many times I have witnessed the efficacy of simply covering the area with the stole and pressing on it with one hand. Many times women have come to me before undergoing surgery for ovarian cysts, which were diagnosed following a sonogram and the description of the pain. After the benediction, the pain stopped; a new sonogram showed the absence of any cyst, and surgery was canceled. Father Candido can document numerous cases of grave illnesses that disappeared simply with his “blessing”, including medically verified brain tumors. I must caution that these incidents can happen only to people who are subject to “negativities”, and by this I mean cases whose origin is of suspected evil origin.
(2) AFFECTIONS―“The evil one can cause unrestrained animosities, especially toward those who love us the most. He destroys marriages, breaks up engagements; he fosters screaming fights in families where everyone truly loves one another―and always for futile reasons. Satan also ruins friendships; through his intervention, the victim feels unwelcome everywhere, avoided by everyone, ending in a desire for isolation. Then there follows a conviction of total lack of love and understanding, a complete affective void that makes marriage an impossibility. And so, every time that a friendly relationship grows and blossoms into love, it suddenly ends without reason.
(3) BUSINESS―“Impossibility to find work—even when it seems that a job offer is certain—for improbable, even absurd motives. The victim may finally have found a job but leaves it for no apparent reason and then searches for another job, but either does not go to the interview or leaves the new job as well, citing the same futile motive. The relatives of these unfortunate individuals suspect abnormal or irresponsible personality. I have witnessed extremely wealthy families fall into abject poverty for humanly unexplainable reasons. Successful industrialists are suddenly inexplicably faced with everything going to rack and ruin, or astute businessmen begin to make one bad decision after another and, as a result, fall seriously in debt. Yet again, owners of very popular stores experience a disastrous decrease in customers. When the evil one influences money matters, finding a job becomes impossible, the wealthy are suddenly forced into poverty, and the employed become jobless, and always without any apparent reason.
(4) ENJOYMENT OF LIFE―“Logically, physical illnesses, affective and emotional isolation, and economic bankruptcy bring about such pessimism that life is seen only in a negative way. Those so affected become incapable of optimism, of hope; life appears completely bleak, without any way out, unbearable.
(5) DESIRE FOR DEATH―“This is the final goal of the evil enemy―to bring us to despair and suicide. Here I immediately add that when we place ourselves under the protection of the Church, even if it is only with one exorcism, the fifth stage is eliminated. We seem to relive what Job was allowed to suffer: “God said to Satan: ‘Behold, he is in your power; only spare his life!’” (Job 2:6). I could tell many instances where, with almost miraculous intervention, the Lord saved some people from suicide.
“While possessions are still relatively rare today, we exorcists run into a great number of people who have been struck by the devil in their health, jobs, or relationships. We must make it clear that to diagnose and heal an oppression-related illness is not any easier than to diagnose and cure a person afflicted by full possession. The degree of gravity may be different, but the difficulty of the diagnosis and the amount of time involved in healing are the same.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, An Exorcist Tells His Story).
Obsession
This type of disturbance strikes a person in his inner serenity, his psycho-emotive balance. Satan causes perturbation, anxiety, inner torment. Fr. Amorth says: “Sacred Scripture assures us that the forms of Satan’s power over the world include physical and mental obsession. This type of disturbance strikes a person in his inner serenity, his psycho-emotive balance. It consists of uncontrollable evil thoughts that torment an individual, especially at night, or in some cases always. Satan causes perturbation, anxiety, inner torment. Symptoms include sudden attacks, at times ongoing, of obsessive thoughts, sometimes even rationally absurd, but of such nature that the victim is unable to free himself. Therefore the obsessed person lives in a perpetual state of prostration, desperation, and attempts at suicide. Almost always obsession influences dreams. Some people will say that this is evidence of mental illness, requiring the services of a psychiatrist or a psychologist. The same could be said of all other forms of demonic phenomena. Some symptoms, however, are so inconsistent with known illnesses that they point with certainty to their evil origins. Only an expert and well-trained eye can identify the crucial differences. (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, in his book, An Exorcist Tells His Story).
Possession
This occurs when Satan takes full possession of the body (not the soul); he speaks and acts without the knowledge or consent of the victim, who therefore is morally blameless. It is the gravest and most spectacular form of demonic afflictions, and it attracts the attention of producers of movies such as The Exorcist. According to the Ritual for exorcisms, some of the signs of possession include: speaking in tongues, extraordinary strength, and revealing the unknown. Diabolical possession is relatively rare, although exorcists have been reporting an increase in cases. A brief overview will suffice for a general idea of this most severe diabolical condition. Possession markers include the following:
● superhuman strength and unnatural physical contortions; whites of eyes showing
● knowledge of languages the person has never studied
● knowledge of secrets the person could not have obtained by normal human means (for example, in one case, a demon revealed, “If you are not directly under my power, it is because your mother has been praying for you, and she has put up a wall of prayer!”)
● strong aversion to the sacred, such as churches, Holy Communion, Prayer, Holy Water, Rosaries, Relics of Saints, or the Bible (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, in his book, An Exorcist Tells His Story).
Diabolical Influence is on the Rise
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, speaks of diabolical obsession (which is different to diabolical possession) and says that “statistically, the amount of rates of diabolical possession are drastically on the rise … I polled several of the top exorcists in this country and I asked them what percentage of the adult population in this country do you think is diabolically obsessed. Every single one of us came up with the same statistic―25% (1 in 4 persons). Diabolical oppression (which is different to diabolical possession and diabolical obsession) is also on the rise, but e but for different causes. Diabolical oppression is also on the rise. We figure that the average number of people that are being diabolically oppressed is somewhere between 10% and 15% of the population. It is an indicator that the diabolic influence is drastically increasing and it's increasing for a variety of different reasons.
“It is increasing because people are doing a lot of evil things. Every mortal sin is an open door to possession. In fact mortal sin, by its nature, takes, the person out from underneath the authority structure of God and places the person underneath the authority structure of Satan. The proper effect of mortal sin is possession. Now that doesn’t mean that everybody who commits a mortal sin becomes possessed―because even though the person opens the door to Satan, God is the one who determines whether the demon gets to step across the threshold. And so that means that, by the mercy of God, most people who commit mortal sin do not become possessed―but the number of evil things that people are doing is opening up the door to demons getting more influence in this life. Then, of course, there is the increase in the occult. We are seeing this all over the place! The amount of occult material, the occult activity, that is going on, is drastically on the increase and as exorcists we are seeing it across the board.
“Before 1963 [note that the Second Vatican Council took place from 1962 to 1965], the average time to liberate someone from full possession was one to two days average time―maybe a week on the outside. A case that originally started out here on the East Coast, but ended up in St Louis, took 59 days! This was practically unheard of! That is what was so shocking―that it took so long. After 1963, what used to take one to two days went to 8 months to two years to liberate the average possessed person. Today it takes, on average, four years to liberate somebody! There are two reasons for that―one is because the world is much more evil and the demons are a lot more powerful; the second component is that exorcisms work on what they call ‘ex opere operantis ecclesiae’. What does that mean? It means―the level of holiness of the people that are in the Catholic Church determines how effective my prayers are when I walk into an exorcism session. That tells us that there is a fundamental problem with the members of the Church―they are not as holy as their counterparts were in the past.”
Fr. Gabriel Amorth speaks along the same lines: “Satan’s power is felt more keenly in periods of history when the sinfulness of the community is more evident … The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin … The problem is getting worse. The Devil is gaining ground. We are living in an age when Faith is diminishing! ... Today we live in a period of little Faith! ... Young people receive everything from their parents―except the Faith! ... It is purely mathematical ― when Faith declines, superstition grows ... When Faith in God declines, idolatry and irrationality increase … Whoever lives in indifference, in absent-mindedness, far from God―that person is open to an easy satanic conquest! ... If you abandon God, the Devil will take His place … When we abandon God, we give ourselves to practices that open the door to Satan!”
Satanic Strategies and Tactics
The terms “strategy” and “tactics” originated as military terminology. The terms “strategy” and “tactics” originated as military terminology derived from ancient Chinese general, Sun Tzu’s book, The Art of War. In The Art of War, Sun Tzu wrote: “All men can see the tactics whereby I conquer―but what nobody can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved! … Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” Sun Tzu illustrates that while tactics are more concrete and easier to see, an overarching strategy is equally important. The question should not be strategy vs. tactics, but strategy and tactics.
These two techniques are like two different sides of the same coin—both are necessary to achieve your goals. While strategy is the action plan that takes you where you want to go, the tactics are the individual steps and actions that will get you there. If someone is trying to reach their goals with strategy alone, they won’t get anywhere―since tactics are the concrete action items that take you where you need to go. In a broad sense, you could say that “strategy” is the theoretical plan, whereas “tactics” are the individual concrete steps that seek to put the theory into practice. Or, in other loose terms, “strategy” could be said to focus on the end or goal―whereas tactics are the individual means to achieving that goal. Or again, “strategy” being the long-term vision; and “tactics” being the short-term actions. Or again, strategy is focused on the destination and how to get there―whereas tactics will be all the individual steps you will take to get to that destination. The strategy will be one―the tactics will be many. Overall, the rule of thumb for understanding the difference between strategy and tactics is: “Think strategically, act tactically.”
Overall, Satan’s strategy is to damn us and the only way he can do that is through mortal sin―therefore, the flip-side of the coin of damnation is mortal sin. There is no other way a soul can be damned. Demonic possession cannot, by itself, damn a soul―for there have been saints whom God allowed to be possessed by demons through no fault or sin of their own. Nevertheless, mortal sin is the common gateway to possession―especially habitual, hardened, unrepented mortal sin that piles on sin upon another.
Hence Fr. Gabriel Amorth writes: “The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin … I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. I have dealt many times with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. It is almost redundant to say that, in all these stages, the way to healing can begin only with a sincere conversion!”
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, adds: “You can become possessed in three different ways―one is through mortal sin, which is about half our case load. The other half―roughly half, because there’s a very small percentage of the third kind where God allows possession through no fault of the victim―but the second kind is when some grave thing has happened to the individual. And so about 50%―sometimes a little higher―but 50% of the people that come to us are women who have been raped; molested psychologically; or physically gravely abused. That is how the demon got his foot in the door … Now that doesn’t mean that everybody who commits a mortal sin becomes possessed―because even though the person opens the door to Satan, God is the one who determines whether the demon gets to step across the threshold. And so that means that, by the mercy of God, most people who commit mortal sin do not become possessed.”
So basically, there you have it―the strategy of damnation through mortal sin. There is no other way that a baptized soul can be damned. For unbaptized persons, the outlook is much more bleak! They are lacking sanctifying grace that comes through Baptism. Furthermore, they lack the weapons that the Catholic Church gives them. They are unprotected against the assaults of the demons and mortal sin is much easily committed―and they lack the Sacrament of Confession that can remove the wound of mortal sin and restore sanctifying grace to the soul. Thus they are “easy-pickings” for the demons. We fail to see and appreciate the incredible gift that the Sacrament of Confession is! It is a Sacrament that saves from damnation! That is why Fr. Gabriel Amorth says: “One good Confession is worth ten (some say a thousand) exorcisms!”
More Mortal Sin Means More Satanic Control
The spiritual math speaks for itself. If habitual mortal sin is the most common way of opening the door to Satan―“He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8)―then it only stands to reason that the more habitual mortal sin there is in the world, then all the more will there be cases of possession and the other aforementioned demonic influences in the world.
Already back in 1956, Our Lady lamented the amount of sin in the world: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [The Deluge was the Great Flood in Noe’s time] All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!” (Words of Our Lady to Blessed Elena Aiello).
Seventeen years later, at Akita in Japan, Our Lady added: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … The Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before!”
All of this merely echoes the words of Our Lady of Good Success, who spoke of our present day times already back in the 17th century, saying: From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects … There will be unbridled impurity which will ensnare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost. Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world!”
Satanic Entry Points
The American exorcist, Fr. Vincent Lampert, lists EIGHT CHIEF WAYS (there are more) by which we can let the devil into our lives:
(1) Ties to the Occult
(2) Entertainment Industry
(3) Being Cursed
(4) Being Dedicated to a Demon
(5) Sexual Abuse
(6) Habitual Mortal Sin
(7) Inviting the Demon into Your Life
(8) Broken Relationships
Fr. Gabriel Amorth also comments: “How can we fall prey to extraordinary satanic activity? By this I mean other than the ordinary activity—temptation—which applies to everyone. We can do so through our own fault or by being completely unaware. We can group the reasons into four categories: (1) with God’s permission, (2) as innocent victims of an evil spell, (3) due to a grave and hardened sinful condition, (4) through association with evil people or places …
“Sorcery using evil spells is one of the most frequent causes that we encounter in those who are struck by possession or other evil influences. This intervention of sorcery can take many different forms: the spell, the curse, the evil eye, and binding. The most common cause for Satanic attacks is the curse or spell. Around 90% of the cases that I deal with are precisely spells. If a person is habitually in the state of grace and prays a lot, then it is difficult for the curse or spell to take effect. Those who stick to God through prayer and a life based on justice and truth, through the guidance of the Virgin Mary, the saints and their guardian angels, put themselves in a protected position. But if the person is less protected from the spiritual point of view, it is easier for the curse or spell to affect him.
“The Roman Curia showed its incompetence when it issued the new Ritual that is a disaster for us exorcists ― which prohibits exorcisms against curses and spells!!! But more than 90% of diabolic infestation originates in a curse or spell!!! So, according to the new Ritual, we should never do exorcisms!! These liturgical reforms are incredible [as in unbelievably stupid] ― because they are contrary to what the Church has believed for centuries!! The new Ritual says we cannot perform an exorcism unless we know for certain that the Evil One is present. That is ridiculous! It is only through exorcism that the demons reveal themselves! We only can acquire this certainty by carrying out an exorcism! The declarations contained in the New Ritual are very serious and very damaging. They are the fruit of ignorance and inexperience. We are lucky that the old Ritual [pre-Vatican II] continues to be valid. I use it―otherwise I would have to quit my job”
“The most frequent weak points in man are, from time to time, always the same: pride, money, and lust … I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. Many times I have dealt with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. With time, the person is “hardened” in sin and evil takes root.” (Fr. Gabriel Amorth).
In a January 24th, 2024, sermon at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York, the exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger mentions having kept statistics on his exorcism work for the last 15 to 17 years (as of 2024). He says that only about 0.5% of those who come to him seeking help are actually possessed by the devil―0.5% translates to 1 in 200. Fr. Ripperger assumes that this percentage, on average, must be true throughout the world. But Fr. Ripperger’s percentage (0.5% or 1 in 200) is only with regard to those coming to seek his help―many if not most persons are not even aware of the satanic influence in their lives―because that is how the devil likes it. As Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome says: “The devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways! … The devil prefers this way and we are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour!”
Aside from normal, everyday temptations, the ways in which the devils torment us are two: from without and from within. When demons torment us from without, from outside the body, it is called “obsession” or “oppression,” depending on the phenomena involved; when they torment us from within the body, it is called “possession.”
The recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, in his book, An Exorcist Tells His Story, explains three kinds of diabolical activity in our lives―oppression, obsession and possession.
Oppression (Vexation)
Fr. Amorth writes: “Diabolical oppressions (a.k.a. vexations) are the second type of the demon’s extraordinary spiritual aggression and are far and away the most numerous. They are caused by a person’s cultivation of imprudent habits; by frequenting wizards or séances; through repeated and persistent serious sins; or by submitting to spells. Here the devil acts without any dominant and prevailing influence over the body and the mind of the victim, as happens in the case of possession. Oppressions (vexations) are true and actual aggression, physical or psychological attacks that the demon works against a person. At times they result in scratches, burns, bruises, or, in the most serious cases, broken bones. At times the victim is the target of stones or other objects.
“Symptoms vary from a very serious to a mild illness. There is no possession, loss of consciousness, or involuntary action and word. The Bible gives us many examples of oppression; one of them is Job. He was not possessed, but he lost his children, his goods, and his health. In the Gospels, the bent woman and the deaf and dumb man―who were cured by Jesus―were not subject to total possession, but there was a demonic presence that caused physical discomfort. St. Paul was most certainly not possessed by a demon, but he had a demonic oppression that caused an evil affliction: “And to keep me from being too elated by the abundance of revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to harass [oppress] me” (2 Corinthians 12:7).
We can give some examples from the lives of the saints: St. Padre Pio, for example, was whipped by a demon. The Curé of Ars, St. John Vianney, was often thrown out of his bed by Satan. I would say that these cases concerned diabolical oppressions (vexations), not possessions. Typical cases of oppression (vexation) are illnesses without any apparent cause that affect the internal organs, or the limbs, or pathologies, that provoke pain in a part of the body without visible signs. Oppressions (vexations) can involve health, affections, or work. Oppressions (vexations) are not always manifested on a physical level. Sometimes they can strike affections or emotions: it can happen, for example, that a couple who are married or are engaged to be married can separate, or, to the contrary, two persons can become engaged, even though they are incompatible. Other oppressions (vexations) are manifested in work: the person in search of work does not find it; or the person who finds work loses it; or a person may have gross difficulties with colleagues and bosses at work. Other times, vexations can break up friendships and isolate a person. It is impossible to enumerate all the cases.”
“The demons tend to attack man in five chief areas. These attacks are more or less severe, according to their origin. The five chief areas are the following: health, business, affections, enjoyment of life, and desire for death.
(1) HEALTH―“The evil one has the power to cause physical and mental illness. I have already mentioned that the two most commonly affected areas are the head and the stomach. Usually, the sickness is persistent. At times, though, it is transitory, lasting only the length of the exorcism. The latter include plague-like growths, stab wounds, and bruises. The Ritual suggests blessing the affected areas with the Sign of the Cross and sprinkling them with holy water. Many times I have witnessed the efficacy of simply covering the area with the stole and pressing on it with one hand. Many times women have come to me before undergoing surgery for ovarian cysts, which were diagnosed following a sonogram and the description of the pain. After the benediction, the pain stopped; a new sonogram showed the absence of any cyst, and surgery was canceled. Father Candido can document numerous cases of grave illnesses that disappeared simply with his “blessing”, including medically verified brain tumors. I must caution that these incidents can happen only to people who are subject to “negativities”, and by this I mean cases whose origin is of suspected evil origin.
(2) AFFECTIONS―“The evil one can cause unrestrained animosities, especially toward those who love us the most. He destroys marriages, breaks up engagements; he fosters screaming fights in families where everyone truly loves one another―and always for futile reasons. Satan also ruins friendships; through his intervention, the victim feels unwelcome everywhere, avoided by everyone, ending in a desire for isolation. Then there follows a conviction of total lack of love and understanding, a complete affective void that makes marriage an impossibility. And so, every time that a friendly relationship grows and blossoms into love, it suddenly ends without reason.
(3) BUSINESS―“Impossibility to find work—even when it seems that a job offer is certain—for improbable, even absurd motives. The victim may finally have found a job but leaves it for no apparent reason and then searches for another job, but either does not go to the interview or leaves the new job as well, citing the same futile motive. The relatives of these unfortunate individuals suspect abnormal or irresponsible personality. I have witnessed extremely wealthy families fall into abject poverty for humanly unexplainable reasons. Successful industrialists are suddenly inexplicably faced with everything going to rack and ruin, or astute businessmen begin to make one bad decision after another and, as a result, fall seriously in debt. Yet again, owners of very popular stores experience a disastrous decrease in customers. When the evil one influences money matters, finding a job becomes impossible, the wealthy are suddenly forced into poverty, and the employed become jobless, and always without any apparent reason.
(4) ENJOYMENT OF LIFE―“Logically, physical illnesses, affective and emotional isolation, and economic bankruptcy bring about such pessimism that life is seen only in a negative way. Those so affected become incapable of optimism, of hope; life appears completely bleak, without any way out, unbearable.
(5) DESIRE FOR DEATH―“This is the final goal of the evil enemy―to bring us to despair and suicide. Here I immediately add that when we place ourselves under the protection of the Church, even if it is only with one exorcism, the fifth stage is eliminated. We seem to relive what Job was allowed to suffer: “God said to Satan: ‘Behold, he is in your power; only spare his life!’” (Job 2:6). I could tell many instances where, with almost miraculous intervention, the Lord saved some people from suicide.
“While possessions are still relatively rare today, we exorcists run into a great number of people who have been struck by the devil in their health, jobs, or relationships. We must make it clear that to diagnose and heal an oppression-related illness is not any easier than to diagnose and cure a person afflicted by full possession. The degree of gravity may be different, but the difficulty of the diagnosis and the amount of time involved in healing are the same.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, An Exorcist Tells His Story).
Obsession
This type of disturbance strikes a person in his inner serenity, his psycho-emotive balance. Satan causes perturbation, anxiety, inner torment. Fr. Amorth says: “Sacred Scripture assures us that the forms of Satan’s power over the world include physical and mental obsession. This type of disturbance strikes a person in his inner serenity, his psycho-emotive balance. It consists of uncontrollable evil thoughts that torment an individual, especially at night, or in some cases always. Satan causes perturbation, anxiety, inner torment. Symptoms include sudden attacks, at times ongoing, of obsessive thoughts, sometimes even rationally absurd, but of such nature that the victim is unable to free himself. Therefore the obsessed person lives in a perpetual state of prostration, desperation, and attempts at suicide. Almost always obsession influences dreams. Some people will say that this is evidence of mental illness, requiring the services of a psychiatrist or a psychologist. The same could be said of all other forms of demonic phenomena. Some symptoms, however, are so inconsistent with known illnesses that they point with certainty to their evil origins. Only an expert and well-trained eye can identify the crucial differences. (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, in his book, An Exorcist Tells His Story).
Possession
This occurs when Satan takes full possession of the body (not the soul); he speaks and acts without the knowledge or consent of the victim, who therefore is morally blameless. It is the gravest and most spectacular form of demonic afflictions, and it attracts the attention of producers of movies such as The Exorcist. According to the Ritual for exorcisms, some of the signs of possession include: speaking in tongues, extraordinary strength, and revealing the unknown. Diabolical possession is relatively rare, although exorcists have been reporting an increase in cases. A brief overview will suffice for a general idea of this most severe diabolical condition. Possession markers include the following:
● superhuman strength and unnatural physical contortions; whites of eyes showing
● knowledge of languages the person has never studied
● knowledge of secrets the person could not have obtained by normal human means (for example, in one case, a demon revealed, “If you are not directly under my power, it is because your mother has been praying for you, and she has put up a wall of prayer!”)
● strong aversion to the sacred, such as churches, Holy Communion, Prayer, Holy Water, Rosaries, Relics of Saints, or the Bible (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, in his book, An Exorcist Tells His Story).
Diabolical Influence is on the Rise
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, speaks of diabolical obsession (which is different to diabolical possession) and says that “statistically, the amount of rates of diabolical possession are drastically on the rise … I polled several of the top exorcists in this country and I asked them what percentage of the adult population in this country do you think is diabolically obsessed. Every single one of us came up with the same statistic―25% (1 in 4 persons). Diabolical oppression (which is different to diabolical possession and diabolical obsession) is also on the rise, but e but for different causes. Diabolical oppression is also on the rise. We figure that the average number of people that are being diabolically oppressed is somewhere between 10% and 15% of the population. It is an indicator that the diabolic influence is drastically increasing and it's increasing for a variety of different reasons.
“It is increasing because people are doing a lot of evil things. Every mortal sin is an open door to possession. In fact mortal sin, by its nature, takes, the person out from underneath the authority structure of God and places the person underneath the authority structure of Satan. The proper effect of mortal sin is possession. Now that doesn’t mean that everybody who commits a mortal sin becomes possessed―because even though the person opens the door to Satan, God is the one who determines whether the demon gets to step across the threshold. And so that means that, by the mercy of God, most people who commit mortal sin do not become possessed―but the number of evil things that people are doing is opening up the door to demons getting more influence in this life. Then, of course, there is the increase in the occult. We are seeing this all over the place! The amount of occult material, the occult activity, that is going on, is drastically on the increase and as exorcists we are seeing it across the board.
“Before 1963 [note that the Second Vatican Council took place from 1962 to 1965], the average time to liberate someone from full possession was one to two days average time―maybe a week on the outside. A case that originally started out here on the East Coast, but ended up in St Louis, took 59 days! This was practically unheard of! That is what was so shocking―that it took so long. After 1963, what used to take one to two days went to 8 months to two years to liberate the average possessed person. Today it takes, on average, four years to liberate somebody! There are two reasons for that―one is because the world is much more evil and the demons are a lot more powerful; the second component is that exorcisms work on what they call ‘ex opere operantis ecclesiae’. What does that mean? It means―the level of holiness of the people that are in the Catholic Church determines how effective my prayers are when I walk into an exorcism session. That tells us that there is a fundamental problem with the members of the Church―they are not as holy as their counterparts were in the past.”
Fr. Gabriel Amorth speaks along the same lines: “Satan’s power is felt more keenly in periods of history when the sinfulness of the community is more evident … The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin … The problem is getting worse. The Devil is gaining ground. We are living in an age when Faith is diminishing! ... Today we live in a period of little Faith! ... Young people receive everything from their parents―except the Faith! ... It is purely mathematical ― when Faith declines, superstition grows ... When Faith in God declines, idolatry and irrationality increase … Whoever lives in indifference, in absent-mindedness, far from God―that person is open to an easy satanic conquest! ... If you abandon God, the Devil will take His place … When we abandon God, we give ourselves to practices that open the door to Satan!”
Satanic Strategies and Tactics
The terms “strategy” and “tactics” originated as military terminology. The terms “strategy” and “tactics” originated as military terminology derived from ancient Chinese general, Sun Tzu’s book, The Art of War. In The Art of War, Sun Tzu wrote: “All men can see the tactics whereby I conquer―but what nobody can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved! … Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” Sun Tzu illustrates that while tactics are more concrete and easier to see, an overarching strategy is equally important. The question should not be strategy vs. tactics, but strategy and tactics.
These two techniques are like two different sides of the same coin—both are necessary to achieve your goals. While strategy is the action plan that takes you where you want to go, the tactics are the individual steps and actions that will get you there. If someone is trying to reach their goals with strategy alone, they won’t get anywhere―since tactics are the concrete action items that take you where you need to go. In a broad sense, you could say that “strategy” is the theoretical plan, whereas “tactics” are the individual concrete steps that seek to put the theory into practice. Or, in other loose terms, “strategy” could be said to focus on the end or goal―whereas tactics are the individual means to achieving that goal. Or again, “strategy” being the long-term vision; and “tactics” being the short-term actions. Or again, strategy is focused on the destination and how to get there―whereas tactics will be all the individual steps you will take to get to that destination. The strategy will be one―the tactics will be many. Overall, the rule of thumb for understanding the difference between strategy and tactics is: “Think strategically, act tactically.”
Overall, Satan’s strategy is to damn us and the only way he can do that is through mortal sin―therefore, the flip-side of the coin of damnation is mortal sin. There is no other way a soul can be damned. Demonic possession cannot, by itself, damn a soul―for there have been saints whom God allowed to be possessed by demons through no fault or sin of their own. Nevertheless, mortal sin is the common gateway to possession―especially habitual, hardened, unrepented mortal sin that piles on sin upon another.
Hence Fr. Gabriel Amorth writes: “The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin … I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. I have dealt many times with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. It is almost redundant to say that, in all these stages, the way to healing can begin only with a sincere conversion!”
The American exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, adds: “You can become possessed in three different ways―one is through mortal sin, which is about half our case load. The other half―roughly half, because there’s a very small percentage of the third kind where God allows possession through no fault of the victim―but the second kind is when some grave thing has happened to the individual. And so about 50%―sometimes a little higher―but 50% of the people that come to us are women who have been raped; molested psychologically; or physically gravely abused. That is how the demon got his foot in the door … Now that doesn’t mean that everybody who commits a mortal sin becomes possessed―because even though the person opens the door to Satan, God is the one who determines whether the demon gets to step across the threshold. And so that means that, by the mercy of God, most people who commit mortal sin do not become possessed.”
So basically, there you have it―the strategy of damnation through mortal sin. There is no other way that a baptized soul can be damned. For unbaptized persons, the outlook is much more bleak! They are lacking sanctifying grace that comes through Baptism. Furthermore, they lack the weapons that the Catholic Church gives them. They are unprotected against the assaults of the demons and mortal sin is much easily committed―and they lack the Sacrament of Confession that can remove the wound of mortal sin and restore sanctifying grace to the soul. Thus they are “easy-pickings” for the demons. We fail to see and appreciate the incredible gift that the Sacrament of Confession is! It is a Sacrament that saves from damnation! That is why Fr. Gabriel Amorth says: “One good Confession is worth ten (some say a thousand) exorcisms!”
More Mortal Sin Means More Satanic Control
The spiritual math speaks for itself. If habitual mortal sin is the most common way of opening the door to Satan―“He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8)―then it only stands to reason that the more habitual mortal sin there is in the world, then all the more will there be cases of possession and the other aforementioned demonic influences in the world.
Already back in 1956, Our Lady lamented the amount of sin in the world: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [The Deluge was the Great Flood in Noe’s time] All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!” (Words of Our Lady to Blessed Elena Aiello).
Seventeen years later, at Akita in Japan, Our Lady added: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … The Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before!”
All of this merely echoes the words of Our Lady of Good Success, who spoke of our present day times already back in the 17th century, saying: From the end of the 19th century and especially in the 20th century, the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects … There will be unbridled impurity which will ensnare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost. Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world!”
Satanic Entry Points
The American exorcist, Fr. Vincent Lampert, lists EIGHT CHIEF WAYS (there are more) by which we can let the devil into our lives:
(1) Ties to the Occult
(2) Entertainment Industry
(3) Being Cursed
(4) Being Dedicated to a Demon
(5) Sexual Abuse
(6) Habitual Mortal Sin
(7) Inviting the Demon into Your Life
(8) Broken Relationships
Fr. Gabriel Amorth also comments: “How can we fall prey to extraordinary satanic activity? By this I mean other than the ordinary activity—temptation—which applies to everyone. We can do so through our own fault or by being completely unaware. We can group the reasons into four categories: (1) with God’s permission, (2) as innocent victims of an evil spell, (3) due to a grave and hardened sinful condition, (4) through association with evil people or places …
“Sorcery using evil spells is one of the most frequent causes that we encounter in those who are struck by possession or other evil influences. This intervention of sorcery can take many different forms: the spell, the curse, the evil eye, and binding. The most common cause for Satanic attacks is the curse or spell. Around 90% of the cases that I deal with are precisely spells. If a person is habitually in the state of grace and prays a lot, then it is difficult for the curse or spell to take effect. Those who stick to God through prayer and a life based on justice and truth, through the guidance of the Virgin Mary, the saints and their guardian angels, put themselves in a protected position. But if the person is less protected from the spiritual point of view, it is easier for the curse or spell to affect him.
“The Roman Curia showed its incompetence when it issued the new Ritual that is a disaster for us exorcists ― which prohibits exorcisms against curses and spells!!! But more than 90% of diabolic infestation originates in a curse or spell!!! So, according to the new Ritual, we should never do exorcisms!! These liturgical reforms are incredible [as in unbelievably stupid] ― because they are contrary to what the Church has believed for centuries!! The new Ritual says we cannot perform an exorcism unless we know for certain that the Evil One is present. That is ridiculous! It is only through exorcism that the demons reveal themselves! We only can acquire this certainty by carrying out an exorcism! The declarations contained in the New Ritual are very serious and very damaging. They are the fruit of ignorance and inexperience. We are lucky that the old Ritual [pre-Vatican II] continues to be valid. I use it―otherwise I would have to quit my job”
“The most frequent weak points in man are, from time to time, always the same: pride, money, and lust … I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. Many times I have dealt with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. With time, the person is “hardened” in sin and evil takes root.” (Fr. Gabriel Amorth).
Article 7
Wednesday after the First Sunday of Lent, February 21st
Fighting the Devil Interiorly!
Wednesday after the First Sunday of Lent, February 21st
Fighting the Devil Interiorly!
In the previous article, we chiefly looked at the external weapons that Heaven has granted us in our battle against Satan. In this article we shall look at the interior weapons that are to be used in the same battle. Without any more ado, let us launch straight into those interior weapons or dispositions.
(1) Not Trusting in One’s Self, but Turning Totally to God
“We should not trust in ourselves, but in God” (2 Corinthians 1:9). Why? Because, as Christ said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Unfortunately, we live in a time when everyone trusts in themselves! Most people have fallen for Satan’s modern-day version of his “Eve Temptation” ― which is essentially putting yourself in the place of God in deciding what is good and what is sinful. This fatal subjectivism has led many souls to reject the commandments and counsels of God and replace them with one’s own ‘commandments’ and counsels. That is why you see increasing numbers of Catholics accepting or tolerating or practicing contraception, masturbation, adultery, divorce with remarriage, cohabitation, same-sex relationships, immodesty, pornography, drunkenness, drug-use, blasphemy, foul language, lying, stealing, cheating, etc. People will find a way to rationalize away their sinfulness and find some way of condoning the practice of such things.
This kind of “self-trust” ultimately stems from pride―which is the beginning of all sin: “For pride is the beginning of all sin! He that holds pride, shall be filled with maledictions, and it shall ruin him in the end!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Scripture condemns this: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil! That put darkness for light, and light for darkness! That put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20). Those words pretty much sum up our modern day attitudes, whereby we try to twist truth in order to hide the evil and make evil acceptable―abortion is just one of many such tactics. Instead of calling abortion by its real name―murder, today it is called “Pro-Choice” or “Women’s Health Care.”
“We should not trust in ourselves, but in God” (2 Corinthians 1:9). “Trust not in the uncertainty of riches―but in the living God!” (1 Timothy 6:17). “Blessed is the man that has not gone after gold, nor put his trust in money nor in treasures!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:8). “Trust not thyself!” (Ecclesiasticus 7:28). “Trust not in your bow! Neither shall your sword save you!” (Psalm 43:7). “Trust not in your spears, nor arrows!” (Judith 7:8). “Trust not in iniquity!” (Psalm 61:11). “Trust not in lying words!” (Jeremias 7:4). “Trust not in a prince” (Micheas 7:5). “Trust not in any brother” (Jeremias 9:4). “Trust in God!” (Ecclesiasticus 11:22).
“We have sinned before the Lord our God, and have put our trust in Him!” (Baruch 1:17). “Commit thy way to the Lord, and trust in Him!” (Psalm 36:5). “Let them trust in Thee who know Thy Name―for Thou hast not forsaken them that seek Thee, O Lord!” (Psalm 9:11). “God is the shield of all that trust in Him!” (2 Kings 22:31). “He is the protector of all that trust in Him!” (Psalm 17:31). “The Lord gives strength to those who trust in Him!” (2 Paralipomenon 16:9). “God saves them that trust in Him!” (Daniel 13:60). “Blessed is the man whose trust is in the Name of the Lord!” (Psalm 39:5). “They trust in their weapons and in their boldness―but we trust in the Almighty Lord, who at a beck can utterly destroy both them that come against us, and the whole world!” (2 Machabees 8:18). “I have put my trust in the Lord!” (Psalm 25:1). “In God I have put my trust! I will not fear what flesh can do against me!” (Psalm 55:5).
Sadly, most of world trusts others more than God! The modern day god is Science! “Follow the Science!” they say, “Trust Science! … Believe the Science!” etc. Modern technology is trusted more than God―especially with the advent of the internet, and now, Artificial Intelligence―which is an artificial god.
(2) Do Not Toy With Temptations—Reject Them Immediately
The Scriptures warn us: “When thou comest to the service of God, stand in fear, and prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “He that shall persevere to the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 24:13). “He that shall endure unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Mark 13:13). Most souls are damned because they gave in to temptation. They gave in to temptation because they did not overcome temptation with the tools that God has given us. They neglected to use these God-given weapons when they were tempted and so they fell into sin ― again, and again, and again ― until they finally died in a state of mortal sin, having repeatedly given in to the many temptations to mortal sin. The starting point for the journey to Hell is temptation. Yet, strangely enough, the starting point for the journey to Heaven is also temptation. Temptation is a cross, a trial, a test―and, as St. Augustine says: “The same crosses lead some souls to Heaven and other souls to Hell” ― meaning that those who do not refuse the cross and carry it well, end up in Heaven; but those who refuse the cross and carry it badly, end up in Hell. The same can be said of temptations―the same temptation will lead one soul to Heaven, and another soul to Hell. If we toy with temptations, if we play with them, amuse ourselves with them―then it is to be feared that we shall be conquered by them.
The Imitation of Christ has some very sound advice and encouragement on temptations: “So long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and temptation. Whence it is written in Job: ‘The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!’’ (Job 7:1). Everyone, therefore, must guard against temptation and must watch in prayer lest the devil, who never sleeps but goes about seeking whom he may devour, may find occasion to deceive him. No one is so perfect or so holy but he is sometimes tempted; man cannot be altogether free from temptation. Yet temptations, though troublesome and severe, are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many temptations and trials to profit by them, while those who could not resist became reprobate and fell away.”
(3) Do Not Enter Into Any Kind of Discussion with the Devil
Too many people play with temptation, rather than resist and repress it. When temptation comes, too many persons talk with the temptation and the tempter—like Eve spoke with the serpent—rather than talk to God in prayer. This gives “place to the devil”, whereas St. Paul tells us: “Give not place to the devil!” (Ephesians 4:27). Our attitude and words should be those of Christ: “The prince of this world (Satan) cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing!” (John 14:30).
In his book, Rules for Discerning the Spirits, Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle writes: “Many people do not realize the influences that a spirit can have on us … One has to wake up! A Spanish proverb says: ‘When someone knocks at the door, one does not only hear the knocking, but also, one must realize WHO is knocking!’ … One does not play with the devil. Playing with the devil is the fact of tarrying with a thought that one knows to be not good. Woe to him who consents to dialogue with the devil―who is much stronger that we are. Eve succumbed because she played with the devil―she entered into a dialogue with Satan. Instead of cutting him short, she started to discuss with him! … Nobody becomes suddenly bad. We sometimes hear of priests falling, or of great exemplary Christians falling, etc. Know that it has not happened all of a sudden. For a long time, they have played and dialogued with the devil.”
(4) Confession
Fr. Tanquerey, in his Spiritual Life, writes concerning Confession weakening the power of the devil over us: “One of the most efficacious of all is the purification of the soul by a worthy confession, particularly a general confession, which, by humiliating and sanctifying the penitent, puts to flight the proud and impure spirit. The Ritual counsels the addition of fasting, prayer and the reception of Holy Communion. The more pure and the more mortified one becomes, the weaker becomes the influence of the devil, and, in Holy Communion, one receives Him Who conquered Satan.”
Needless to say, confessions should be “good confessions” where nothing is hidden or ‘twisted’ or ‘fudged’—which all stems from pride, and pride is what makes us like the devil. Fr. Jordan Aumann, OP, in his Spiritual Theology, writes that the confession should be “a humble and sincere confession, It will have a special efficacy if it is a general confession of. one’s whole life, because of the humiliation and renewal of soul it presupposes.”
The chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, and many other priests have stressed that the number one protection from evil is the Sacrament of Confession and the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. Fr. Amorth used to say: “One Confession is worth ten exorcisms!” He was convinced that a good Confession is much more effective than an exorcism―which, when you think about it, is only logical―for Confession is a Sacrament of the Church, whereas an exorcism is only a Sacramental of the Church. Confession is able to give us sanctifying grace when we are in a state of mortal sin―which is something an exorcism cannot achieve. In fact, the exorcists will tell that it is by living habitually in a state of mortal sin that can open the door to possession by the devil. Fr. Amorth says: “The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin.”
(5) Obedience to Your Confessor
Satan epitomizes disobedience―which ultimately comes from pride. Satan’s famous cry of disobedience was: “I will not serve!” Satan’s ultimate goal is to make us follow that same path of prideful disobedience that he followed. Satan is disobedience personified―Christ is obedience personified: “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross!” (Philippians 2:8).
Obedience is the greatest of sacrifices that we make: “For obedience is better than sacrifices!” (1 Kings 15:22). Fr. Carlo Giuseppe Quadrupani, Barnabite (1740-1807) was a nineteenth century spiritual author from Milan. He is best remembered for his writings on spiritual guidance. His most memorable book is Light and Peace. In that book he writes: “In matters of conscience obedience to a spiritual director is obedience to God, for Christ has said to His ministers on Earth: ‘He that hears you, hears Me’ (Luke 10:16). A soul possessed of this spirit of obedience cannot be lost―a soul devoid of this spirit cannot be saved (cf. St. Philip Neri). St. Bernard says there is no need for the devil to tempt those who ignore obedience and permit themselves to be guided by their own light and deterred by their fears, for they act the devil’s part towards themselves.
“Do not fear that your director may be mistaken in what he prescribes for your guidance, or that he does not fully understand the state of your conscience because you did not explain it clearly enough to him. Such doubts cause obedience to be eluded or postponed and thus frustrate the designs of God in placing you under the direction of a prudent guide. It was the priest’s duty to have questioned you further had he not fully understood you, and that he did not do so is a positive proof that he knew enough to enable him to pronounce a safe judgment. God has promised his special help to those who represent Him in the direction of souls. Is not this assurance enough to induce you to obey with promptness and simplicity as the Holy Scripture commands?
“God does not show the state of our souls as clearly to us as he does to him who is to guide us in his place. You should be quite satisfied, then, if your director tells you the course you follow is the right one and that the mercy and grace of your Heavenly Father are guiding you in it. You should believe and obey him in this as in all else, for as St. John of the Cross tells us, ‘it betrays pride and lack of Faith not to put entire confidence in what our confessor says.’” (Fr. Carlo Giuseppe Quadrupani, Light and Peace).
(6) Praying and Meditating the Holy Rosary
Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the chief exorcist in Rome for several decades, reports that the devil admitted: “Every Hail Mary is like a blow on my head! If Christians knew how powerful the Rosary was, it would be my end!” Sr. Lucia of Fatima tells us more or less the same thing: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary—to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls!”
In the above mentioned exorcism by St. Dominic, the devils also admitted: “Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy.”
(7) Invocation of the Holy Name of Jesus
When arrested for healing a man, Peter and John are asked by the authorities, “By what name did you do this?” They understood that names had power, and they wanted to know what name had the power to heal. Peter boldly tells them that it is the Name of Jesus that healed the man. But then Peter goes further―he tells them that salvation itself comes from this Name (Acts 4:5-12). In fact, under no other name may one be saved. Salvation is intimately bound up with the Name of Jesus.
We give honor to the Name of Jesus, not because we believe that there is any intrinsic power hidden in the letters composing it, but because the Name of Jesus reminds us of all the blessings we receive through our Holy Redeemer―Who is our Lord and God. Thus, the power of the Holy Name of Jesus is the power of God. At the Holy Name of Jesus we uncover our heads, and we bend our knees. The Name of Jesus invoked with confidence brings help in bodily needs, according to the promise of Christ: “In My Name they shall take up serpents; and if they shall drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them: they shall lay their hands upon the sick, and they shall recover.” (Mark 16:17-18).
In the Name of Jesus the Apostles gave strength to the lame to walk again (Acts 3:6; 9:34) and life to the dead (Acts 9:40). It gives consolation in spiritual trials. It protects us against Satan and his plots and snares―for the Devil fears the Name of Jesus, who has conquered him on the Cross. In the Name of Jesus we obtain every blessing and grace for time and eternity, for Christ has said: “If you ask the Father anything in My Name, then He will give it you” (John 16:23). Therefore the Church concludes all her prayers by the words: “Through Our Lord Jesus Christ”, etc. Holy Scripture commands “That in the Name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those that are in Heaven, on Earth, and under the Earth” (Philippians 2:10).
(1) Not Trusting in One’s Self, but Turning Totally to God
“We should not trust in ourselves, but in God” (2 Corinthians 1:9). Why? Because, as Christ said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Unfortunately, we live in a time when everyone trusts in themselves! Most people have fallen for Satan’s modern-day version of his “Eve Temptation” ― which is essentially putting yourself in the place of God in deciding what is good and what is sinful. This fatal subjectivism has led many souls to reject the commandments and counsels of God and replace them with one’s own ‘commandments’ and counsels. That is why you see increasing numbers of Catholics accepting or tolerating or practicing contraception, masturbation, adultery, divorce with remarriage, cohabitation, same-sex relationships, immodesty, pornography, drunkenness, drug-use, blasphemy, foul language, lying, stealing, cheating, etc. People will find a way to rationalize away their sinfulness and find some way of condoning the practice of such things.
This kind of “self-trust” ultimately stems from pride―which is the beginning of all sin: “For pride is the beginning of all sin! He that holds pride, shall be filled with maledictions, and it shall ruin him in the end!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15). Scripture condemns this: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil! That put darkness for light, and light for darkness! That put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20). Those words pretty much sum up our modern day attitudes, whereby we try to twist truth in order to hide the evil and make evil acceptable―abortion is just one of many such tactics. Instead of calling abortion by its real name―murder, today it is called “Pro-Choice” or “Women’s Health Care.”
“We should not trust in ourselves, but in God” (2 Corinthians 1:9). “Trust not in the uncertainty of riches―but in the living God!” (1 Timothy 6:17). “Blessed is the man that has not gone after gold, nor put his trust in money nor in treasures!” (Ecclesiasticus 31:8). “Trust not thyself!” (Ecclesiasticus 7:28). “Trust not in your bow! Neither shall your sword save you!” (Psalm 43:7). “Trust not in your spears, nor arrows!” (Judith 7:8). “Trust not in iniquity!” (Psalm 61:11). “Trust not in lying words!” (Jeremias 7:4). “Trust not in a prince” (Micheas 7:5). “Trust not in any brother” (Jeremias 9:4). “Trust in God!” (Ecclesiasticus 11:22).
“We have sinned before the Lord our God, and have put our trust in Him!” (Baruch 1:17). “Commit thy way to the Lord, and trust in Him!” (Psalm 36:5). “Let them trust in Thee who know Thy Name―for Thou hast not forsaken them that seek Thee, O Lord!” (Psalm 9:11). “God is the shield of all that trust in Him!” (2 Kings 22:31). “He is the protector of all that trust in Him!” (Psalm 17:31). “The Lord gives strength to those who trust in Him!” (2 Paralipomenon 16:9). “God saves them that trust in Him!” (Daniel 13:60). “Blessed is the man whose trust is in the Name of the Lord!” (Psalm 39:5). “They trust in their weapons and in their boldness―but we trust in the Almighty Lord, who at a beck can utterly destroy both them that come against us, and the whole world!” (2 Machabees 8:18). “I have put my trust in the Lord!” (Psalm 25:1). “In God I have put my trust! I will not fear what flesh can do against me!” (Psalm 55:5).
Sadly, most of world trusts others more than God! The modern day god is Science! “Follow the Science!” they say, “Trust Science! … Believe the Science!” etc. Modern technology is trusted more than God―especially with the advent of the internet, and now, Artificial Intelligence―which is an artificial god.
(2) Do Not Toy With Temptations—Reject Them Immediately
The Scriptures warn us: “When thou comest to the service of God, stand in fear, and prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1). “He that shall persevere to the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 24:13). “He that shall endure unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Mark 13:13). Most souls are damned because they gave in to temptation. They gave in to temptation because they did not overcome temptation with the tools that God has given us. They neglected to use these God-given weapons when they were tempted and so they fell into sin ― again, and again, and again ― until they finally died in a state of mortal sin, having repeatedly given in to the many temptations to mortal sin. The starting point for the journey to Hell is temptation. Yet, strangely enough, the starting point for the journey to Heaven is also temptation. Temptation is a cross, a trial, a test―and, as St. Augustine says: “The same crosses lead some souls to Heaven and other souls to Hell” ― meaning that those who do not refuse the cross and carry it well, end up in Heaven; but those who refuse the cross and carry it badly, end up in Hell. The same can be said of temptations―the same temptation will lead one soul to Heaven, and another soul to Hell. If we toy with temptations, if we play with them, amuse ourselves with them―then it is to be feared that we shall be conquered by them.
The Imitation of Christ has some very sound advice and encouragement on temptations: “So long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and temptation. Whence it is written in Job: ‘The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!’’ (Job 7:1). Everyone, therefore, must guard against temptation and must watch in prayer lest the devil, who never sleeps but goes about seeking whom he may devour, may find occasion to deceive him. No one is so perfect or so holy but he is sometimes tempted; man cannot be altogether free from temptation. Yet temptations, though troublesome and severe, are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many temptations and trials to profit by them, while those who could not resist became reprobate and fell away.”
(3) Do Not Enter Into Any Kind of Discussion with the Devil
Too many people play with temptation, rather than resist and repress it. When temptation comes, too many persons talk with the temptation and the tempter—like Eve spoke with the serpent—rather than talk to God in prayer. This gives “place to the devil”, whereas St. Paul tells us: “Give not place to the devil!” (Ephesians 4:27). Our attitude and words should be those of Christ: “The prince of this world (Satan) cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing!” (John 14:30).
In his book, Rules for Discerning the Spirits, Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle writes: “Many people do not realize the influences that a spirit can have on us … One has to wake up! A Spanish proverb says: ‘When someone knocks at the door, one does not only hear the knocking, but also, one must realize WHO is knocking!’ … One does not play with the devil. Playing with the devil is the fact of tarrying with a thought that one knows to be not good. Woe to him who consents to dialogue with the devil―who is much stronger that we are. Eve succumbed because she played with the devil―she entered into a dialogue with Satan. Instead of cutting him short, she started to discuss with him! … Nobody becomes suddenly bad. We sometimes hear of priests falling, or of great exemplary Christians falling, etc. Know that it has not happened all of a sudden. For a long time, they have played and dialogued with the devil.”
(4) Confession
Fr. Tanquerey, in his Spiritual Life, writes concerning Confession weakening the power of the devil over us: “One of the most efficacious of all is the purification of the soul by a worthy confession, particularly a general confession, which, by humiliating and sanctifying the penitent, puts to flight the proud and impure spirit. The Ritual counsels the addition of fasting, prayer and the reception of Holy Communion. The more pure and the more mortified one becomes, the weaker becomes the influence of the devil, and, in Holy Communion, one receives Him Who conquered Satan.”
Needless to say, confessions should be “good confessions” where nothing is hidden or ‘twisted’ or ‘fudged’—which all stems from pride, and pride is what makes us like the devil. Fr. Jordan Aumann, OP, in his Spiritual Theology, writes that the confession should be “a humble and sincere confession, It will have a special efficacy if it is a general confession of. one’s whole life, because of the humiliation and renewal of soul it presupposes.”
The chief exorcist of Rome, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, and many other priests have stressed that the number one protection from evil is the Sacrament of Confession and the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. Fr. Amorth used to say: “One Confession is worth ten exorcisms!” He was convinced that a good Confession is much more effective than an exorcism―which, when you think about it, is only logical―for Confession is a Sacrament of the Church, whereas an exorcism is only a Sacramental of the Church. Confession is able to give us sanctifying grace when we are in a state of mortal sin―which is something an exorcism cannot achieve. In fact, the exorcists will tell that it is by living habitually in a state of mortal sin that can open the door to possession by the devil. Fr. Amorth says: “The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin.”
(5) Obedience to Your Confessor
Satan epitomizes disobedience―which ultimately comes from pride. Satan’s famous cry of disobedience was: “I will not serve!” Satan’s ultimate goal is to make us follow that same path of prideful disobedience that he followed. Satan is disobedience personified―Christ is obedience personified: “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross!” (Philippians 2:8).
Obedience is the greatest of sacrifices that we make: “For obedience is better than sacrifices!” (1 Kings 15:22). Fr. Carlo Giuseppe Quadrupani, Barnabite (1740-1807) was a nineteenth century spiritual author from Milan. He is best remembered for his writings on spiritual guidance. His most memorable book is Light and Peace. In that book he writes: “In matters of conscience obedience to a spiritual director is obedience to God, for Christ has said to His ministers on Earth: ‘He that hears you, hears Me’ (Luke 10:16). A soul possessed of this spirit of obedience cannot be lost―a soul devoid of this spirit cannot be saved (cf. St. Philip Neri). St. Bernard says there is no need for the devil to tempt those who ignore obedience and permit themselves to be guided by their own light and deterred by their fears, for they act the devil’s part towards themselves.
“Do not fear that your director may be mistaken in what he prescribes for your guidance, or that he does not fully understand the state of your conscience because you did not explain it clearly enough to him. Such doubts cause obedience to be eluded or postponed and thus frustrate the designs of God in placing you under the direction of a prudent guide. It was the priest’s duty to have questioned you further had he not fully understood you, and that he did not do so is a positive proof that he knew enough to enable him to pronounce a safe judgment. God has promised his special help to those who represent Him in the direction of souls. Is not this assurance enough to induce you to obey with promptness and simplicity as the Holy Scripture commands?
“God does not show the state of our souls as clearly to us as he does to him who is to guide us in his place. You should be quite satisfied, then, if your director tells you the course you follow is the right one and that the mercy and grace of your Heavenly Father are guiding you in it. You should believe and obey him in this as in all else, for as St. John of the Cross tells us, ‘it betrays pride and lack of Faith not to put entire confidence in what our confessor says.’” (Fr. Carlo Giuseppe Quadrupani, Light and Peace).
(6) Praying and Meditating the Holy Rosary
Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the chief exorcist in Rome for several decades, reports that the devil admitted: “Every Hail Mary is like a blow on my head! If Christians knew how powerful the Rosary was, it would be my end!” Sr. Lucia of Fatima tells us more or less the same thing: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary—to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls!”
In the above mentioned exorcism by St. Dominic, the devils also admitted: “Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy.”
(7) Invocation of the Holy Name of Jesus
When arrested for healing a man, Peter and John are asked by the authorities, “By what name did you do this?” They understood that names had power, and they wanted to know what name had the power to heal. Peter boldly tells them that it is the Name of Jesus that healed the man. But then Peter goes further―he tells them that salvation itself comes from this Name (Acts 4:5-12). In fact, under no other name may one be saved. Salvation is intimately bound up with the Name of Jesus.
We give honor to the Name of Jesus, not because we believe that there is any intrinsic power hidden in the letters composing it, but because the Name of Jesus reminds us of all the blessings we receive through our Holy Redeemer―Who is our Lord and God. Thus, the power of the Holy Name of Jesus is the power of God. At the Holy Name of Jesus we uncover our heads, and we bend our knees. The Name of Jesus invoked with confidence brings help in bodily needs, according to the promise of Christ: “In My Name they shall take up serpents; and if they shall drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them: they shall lay their hands upon the sick, and they shall recover.” (Mark 16:17-18).
In the Name of Jesus the Apostles gave strength to the lame to walk again (Acts 3:6; 9:34) and life to the dead (Acts 9:40). It gives consolation in spiritual trials. It protects us against Satan and his plots and snares―for the Devil fears the Name of Jesus, who has conquered him on the Cross. In the Name of Jesus we obtain every blessing and grace for time and eternity, for Christ has said: “If you ask the Father anything in My Name, then He will give it you” (John 16:23). Therefore the Church concludes all her prayers by the words: “Through Our Lord Jesus Christ”, etc. Holy Scripture commands “That in the Name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those that are in Heaven, on Earth, and under the Earth” (Philippians 2:10).
|
A special lover of the Holy Name was St. Bernard, who speaks of it in most glowing terms in many of his sermons. But the greatest promoters of this devotion were St. Bernardine of Siena and St. John Capistran. They carried with them on their missions in the turbulent cities of Italy a copy of the monogram of the Holy Name, surrounded by rays, painted on a wooden tablet. The emblem or monogram representing the Holy Name of Jesus consists of the three letters: IHS. Wherever they blessed the sick with this monogram, it produced great miracles. At the close of their sermons they exhibited this emblem to the faithful and asked them to prostrate themselves, to adore the Redeemer of mankind. They recommended their hearers to have the monogram of Jesus placed over the gates of their cities and above the doors of their dwelling (cf. Seeberger, “Key to the Spiritual Treasures”, 1897, 102). Because the manner in which St. Bernardine preached this devotion was new, he was accused by his enemies, and brought before the tribunal of Pope Martin V. But St. John Capistran defended his master so successfully that the pope not only permitted the worship of the Holy Name, but also assisted at a procession in which the holy monogram was carried. The tablet used by St. Bernardine is venerated at Santa Maria in Ara Coeli at Rome.
|
The exorcist, Fr. Gabriel Amorth, states: “It is only in His Name that we can win and free ourselves from the enemy of our salvation―Satan. At the end of the most difficult exorcisms, when I am confronted with total demonic possession, I pray the Christological hymn of the Letter of Paul to the Philippians (2:5-11): ‘Christ Jesus, Who being in the form of God, emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men. He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross. For which reason God also has exalted Him, and has given Him a Name which is above all names! That in the Name of Jesus every knee should bow―of those that are in Heaven, on Earth, and under the Earth! And that every tongue should confess that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father!’ (Philippians 2:5-11). When I speak the words ― ‘so that all beings in the heavens, on earth, and in the underworld should bend the knee at the name of Jesus’ ― I kneel, everyone present kneels, and always the one possessed by the demons is also compelled to kneel. It is a moving and powerful moment. I always feel that all the legions of the angels are surrounding us, kneeling at the name of Jesus.” (Fr. Gabriel Amorth, An Exorcist Tells His Story).
(8) Invocation of the Name of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Richard of St. Laurence states “there is not such powerful help in any name, nor is there any other name given to men, after that of Jesus, from which so much salvation is poured forth upon men as from the name of Mary.” He continues, “that the devout invocation of this sweet and holy name, leads to the acquisition of superabundant graces in this life, and a very high degree of glory in the next.”
After the most sacred Name of Jesus, the name of Mary is so rich in every good thing, that on earth and in Heaven there is no other from which devout souls receive so much grace, hope, and sweetness.
Hence Richard of St. Laurence encourages sinners to have recourse to this great name, “because it alone will suffice to cure them of all their evils;” and “there is no disorder, however malignant, that does not immediately yield to the power of the name of Mary.” The Blessed Raymond Jordano says, “that however hardened and diffident a heart may be, the name of this most Blessed Virgin has such efficacy, that if it is only pronounced that heart will be wonderfully softened.” Moreover, it is well known, and is daily experienced by the clients of Mary, that her powerful name gives the particular strength necessary to overcome temptations against purity.
In fine, “thy name, O Mother of God, is filled with divine graces and blessings,” as St. Methodius says. So much so, that St. Bonaventure declares, “that thy name, O Mary, cannot be pronounced without bringing some grace to him who does so devoutly.” Grant, O Lady, that we may often remember to name thee with love and confidence; for this practice either shows the possession of divine grace, or else is a pledge that we shall soon recover it.
On the other hand, Thomas a Kempis affirms “that the devils fear the Queen of Heaven to such a degree, that only on hearing her great name pronounced, they fly from him who does so, as from a burning fire.” The Blessed Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget “that there is not on earth a sinner, however devoid he may be of the love of God, from whom the devil is not obliged immediately to fly, if he invokes her holy name with a determination to repent.” On another occasion she repeated the same thing to the saint, saying, “that all the devils venerate and fear her name to such a degree, that, on hearing it, they immediately loosen the claws with which they hold the soul captive.” Our Blessed Lady also told St. Bridget, “that in the same way as the rebel angels fly from sinners, who invoke the name of Mary, so also do the good angels approach nearer to just souls, who pronounce her name with devotion.”
(9) Fasting
The current Rite of Exorcism (2004)―which most exorcists regard as inferior to the old Rite of Exorcism―says: “The Exorcist, mindful that the tribe of demons cannot be cast out except through prayer and fasting, should take care that these two most effective remedies for obtaining divine help be used, after the example of the Holy Fathers, both by himself and by others, insofar as is possible” (De Exorcismis, #31).
The Older Rite of Exocism (1614)―which most of today’s exorcists have gone back to using―also advises: “Therefore, he [the exorcist] will be mindful of the words of our Lord (Matthew 17:20), to the effect that there is a certain type of evil spirit who cannot be driven out except by prayer and fasting. Therefore, let him avail himself of these two means above all for imploring the divine assistance in expelling demons, after the example of the holy fathers; and not only himself, but let him induce others, as far as possible, to do the same” (De Exorcizandis, #10).
Our Lord Himself told us of the power of fasting in the battle against Satan and the demons. When the disciples asked Jesus why they were not able to cast out a particular demon, He responded: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:14-20). St. John Vianney said, “The devil is not greatly afraid of the discipline [self-scourging] and other instruments of penance. That which beats him is the curtailment of one’s food, drink and sleep. There is nothing the devil fears more, consequently, nothing is more pleasing to God.”
The exorcist, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, says: “The devil is more tranquil if he does not have to live with prayer, fasting, the Eucharist, and the other Sacramental practices! … According to Our Lady’s words in Fatima, if we had prayed and fasted, there would not have been World War II. We have not listened to her and therefore there was a war. Our Lady speaks often about prayer and fasting … Our Lady insists so much on fasting, then why does the Church not speak? … Who ought to pray and fast? Everyone — the person struck by the spiritual evil and those close to him! … I recommend three tips that Jesus gives to heal the ills of evil, even without the need for exorcisms: (1) much Faith (2) much prayer and (3) fasting.”
Another exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, says: “If you want protection [against demons] you have to start developing a consistent prayer life but you also need to be engaging in forms of mortification, where it is consistent and requires daily self-denial. Our own community―which does exorcisms―in our community we pray three to four hours a day! Yes! Three to four hours! And that is what keeps us largely immune. The other thing is that when we are engaged in doing solemn exorcism sessions, we are fasting six days a week on one meal a day. We do it consistently and that is what keeps us protected! We know it is not us―not our own power―we know it is God Who is honoring our sacrifices. But it is that consistent discipline that keeps people immune to the demonic.” (Conference at Our Lady of the Lake Catholic Church, Chapin, South Carolina, March 9th, 2023).
Even if certain demons are best driven out by prayer and fasting, we must never forget that it is God who drives out demons, and He doesn’t need our fasting to do so. Any prideful notions about the effects of our fasting should be strictly avoided. Indeed, we ought to have a kind of humility regarding fasting. Fasting is certainly necessary, and the Lord Himself says that there is a time for fasting (Mark 2:20, Luke 5:35). But fasting can also be a source of pride (Luke 18:12; 5:33). Fasting done out of pride or superiority isn’t going to drive out any demons; in fact it will likely attract them. So fast we should and must―but let not pride contaminate and infect our fasting!
(10) Shortened Sleep (within limits)
You may have heard the expression: “Satan never sleeps!” Similarly, “Don’t let the devil lull you to sleep!” As humans, we all need to sleep―even Our Lord slept: “There arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that the ship was filled with water. Jesus was in the rear part of the ship, sleeping upon a pillow; and they awakened Him, and said to Him: ‘Master, does it not concern Thee that we perish?’” (Mark 4:38).
Yet Our Lord also chastised His three favorite Apostles―Peter, James and John―for sleeping in the Garden of Gethsemane when He had asked them to pray: “And Jesus came and found them sleeping. And He said to Peter: ‘Simon! Sleepest thou? Couldst thou not watch one hour? Watch ye and pray so that you enter not into temptation!’” (Mark 14:37-38). St. John Vianney said: “The devil is not greatly afraid of the discipline [self-scourging] and other instruments of penance. That which beats him is the curtailment of one’s food, drink and sleep. There is nothing the devil fears more!”
St. Francis de Sales (1567 - 1622) only slept five hours per night. He once remarked: “We shall have all eternity in which to rest!” St. Philip Neri (1515 - 1595) was known to only take about four or five hours of sleep per night. He often decided to sleep on the floor rather than the bed. Nevertheless, he was not reluctant to go to sleep and said: “When a man really loves God, he comes to such a state in the end that he is obliged to say: ‘Lord, let me get some sleep!’” St. John Vianney (1786 - 1859) worked around the clock―celebrating Mass, hearing confessions, administering the other sacraments, praying and doing penance for sinners. During the last 10 years of his life, he would spend as many as 16 to 18 hours a day in the confessional. What did this cost him? Well, quite a bit, including sleep! He typically only slept three hours a night―and many times that three hours sleep was disturbed because he experienced demonic attacks at night.
Today, some religious orders―such as the Carthusians―also deprive themselves of sleep in the middle of the night in order to pray. They will go to bed at 8:00 pm and then rise again at 11:30 p.m. to meet in the chapel for prayer (Matins and other prayers). At 2:30 a.m. they return to their sleep until 6:30 a.m.
Obviously―just as with fasting―deliberate sleep deprivation must find a prudent middle road by being neither going too far, nor doing too little. Once you start to do something good and beneficial for your spiritual warfare, then the demons will try to make you exaggerate what you are doing, and will try make you go to extremes out of pride. In this way―with sleep deprivation―they can easily wear you out. Remember that sleep deprivation to an extreme degree is a method that torturers use to break the will of their prisoners!
(11) Other Penances & Sacrifices
You can find a very comprehensive list of penances and sacrifices on our webpage IDEAS FOR LENT (click here). Ultimately, all true and effective penances―just like prayer―must come from the heart. Otherwise the condemning words of Our Lord apply: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘These people honor Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8). Sacrifice and penance must come from the heart and must be inspired by a love of God (charity). Hence Scripture warns: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
(12) Practice Humility
The devil can be defeated, what it is it that defeats him? HUMILITY and CHARITY. Satan is neither humble nor charitable. In the devil there is no humility, but only pride. Pride is opposed to humility just as the devil is opposed to Christ. The sin of the devil was pride—“I will not serve!”--whereas the foundational virtue of Christ was humility. In the devil there is no love, only love of self and hatred of God and others. There was a Desert Father who was able to banish the demons and he asked them: “What power sends you away?” They replied: “Nothing can overcome us, but only humility.” The Desert Mother, Amma Theodora, concluded by saying: “Do you see how humility is victorious over the demons?” Whereas St. John Climacus said that humility is a “virtue no devil can imitate. If pride made demons out of angels, there is no doubt that humility could make angels out of demons.”
In his book Holiness, A Guide For Beginners, the Benedictine, Dom Hubert Van Zeller, writes: “The qualities to look for in a saint’s life are the not-very-obvious ones, or at any rate not-very-popular ones―humility and charity.” Little or no humility means little or no chance of Heaven! Our Lord commanded: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29).
There is no holiness without humility as its foundation. Remember Our Lady’s prayer, the Magnificat, wherein she says that God has “regarded the humility of His handmaid…He has put down the mighty from their seat and has exalted the humble.” The Old Testament says: “...nor from the beginning have the proud been acceptable to Thee! But the prayer of the humble and the meek has always pleased Thee” (Judith 9:16). “May the Lord destroy all deceitful lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things” (Psalm 11:4). “Thou hast rebuked the proud” (Psalm118:21). “Every proud man is an abomination to the Lord” (Proverbs 16:5).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, writes: “Humility is considered in all Christian tradition as the foundation of the spiritual life, since it removes Pride, which is, says Holy Scripture, the beginning of every sin, because it separates us from God. Thus Humility has often been compared to the excavation, which must be dug for the erection of a building, an excavation which should be so much the deeper in proportion as the building is to be higher. From this point of view, as we have seen, the two principal pillars of the temple to be built are Faith and Hope, and its dome is Charity. Humility ought certainly to repress pride under all its forms, including intellectual and spiritual pride” (The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
We all have probably heard the famous phrase: “The moment you think that you have actually acquired humility, you have, in reality, actually lost it!” St. Francis de Sales has this to say: “We often SAY that we are nothing. But we would be very sad if anyone should really take us at our word. We pretend to retire and hide ourselves, so that the world may run after us and seek us out. True humility does not make a show of herself, or use many humble words; for she desires not only to conceal all other virtues, but most of all to conceal herself.”
There is an axiom which says: “I would rather follow God as a humble sinner than a proud saint!” Our faults do not change the love of God for us, as the Parable of the Prodigal Son shows so well. But He asks us to be sorry for them and to repair them by our acts of humility and repentant love. Sometimes our sins seem like stones―they weigh us down. Don’t throw away you stones, nor throw them at other sinners—as Jesus said of Mary Magdalen: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her” (John 8:7)—“Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). ““Why do you see the splinter that is in your brother’s eye; but cannot see the plank that is in your own eye?” (Matthew 7:3). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8), “for all have sinned” (Romans 3:23)―but, instead, let us cast our stones of sin into the pit of our own foundation of humility. They will be of far more use there than being hurled through the air! We all have more than enough stones for our own foundation of humility—“If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us” (1 John 1:10). “Although Jesus was without sin, He humbled Himself like a sinner. He had nothing to be ashamed of―as the Good Thief put it: ‘This Man hath done nothing wrong.’ But we have done much to be ashamed of!” (St. Peter Julian Eymard).
After explaining the various degrees of humility, St Benedict adds that they lead to the love of God, that perfect love that excludes fear: “Therefore, after having ascended all these degrees of humility, the monk soon reaches, the love of God, that perfect love that ‘casts out fear’.” This, then, is the goal to which humility leads. Our heart must contain humility for charity to grow, for Pride is an excessive love of self, which kills charity.
Thus a focus on our sins, rather than our achievements, is of far more profit and is far more likely to lead to an acquisition and preservation of humility. “For I will think for my sin ... For I know my iniquity, and my sin is always before me” (Psalms 37:19; 50:5). Then we shall have the humility of the Prodigal Son, who said: “Father, I have sinned against Heaven, and before thee, I am not now worthy to be called thy son” (Luke 15:21) and will live out our lives in a humble spirit of compunction—which is defined as “an ever abiding sorrow for sin.”
(13) Practice Charity
“Above all these things have Charity” (Colossians 3:14). “For God is Charity!” (1 John 4:8). God is Charity. He does not say of Himself that He is penance, or perseverance, or even that He is obedience, or humility; He says of Himself that He is Charity — and that those who live in Charity are living in Him (1 John 4:16). Just as Jesus (Who is Charity itself) says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), so too it can be said that without Charity we can do nothing―or that anything we do is worthless supernaturally. Holy Scripture affirms this: If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
God urges us on towards ever increasing growth in Charity―whereas Satan seeks to make us grow in hatred. God seeks to make us hate sin and love virtue: “Hate evil and love good!” (Amos 5:15)―whereas Satan seeks to make us hate virtue and love sin: “Hate good and love evil!” (Micheas 3:2). God says: “He that shall sin against Me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate Me love death!” (Proverbs 8:36). Our Lord says: “Love your enemies, do good to them that hate you!” (Luke 6:27)―whereas Satan seeks to make us hate our enemies and to plot and work against them. St. Alphonsus Liguori tells us that “True charity consists in doing good to those who do us evil, and in thus winning them over.”
Charity rescues us from sin and clutches of Satan. As Holy Scripture says: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) ... “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … and Our Lord said of the sinner Mary Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). That is why St. Thérèse of Lisieux of wrote: “If the greatest sinner on Earth should repent at the moment of death, and draw his last breath in an act of love; neither the many graces he had abused, nor the many sins he had committed would stand in his way. Our Lord would receive him into His mercy.” St. Robert Bellarmine wrote: “Charity is that with which no man is lost, and without which no man is saved.”
(14) Nourish and Have a Deep Faith
The First Vatican Council (1869-1870) states: “The Catholic Church holds that Faith, which is the beginning of human salvation, is a supernatural virtue by which, through the help and inspiration of God’s grace, we believe the things revealed by Him to be true!” Holy Scripture tells us: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6) and Our Lord warns of a failure and lack of Faith in the End Times (which Our Lady of Fatima says we have already entered): “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Our Lady of Good Success seems to echo Our Lord’s words, when she speaks of “the small number of souls, who will preserve the treasures of the Faith.”
Our Lady of La Salette seems to explain the reason for this falling away in Faith: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Rome will lose Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist.” She adds that they “will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus, denying the existence of Heaven.”
(15) Have a firm Hope, Come What May
“Hope in the Lord!” (Psalm 30:25). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow―and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool!” (Isaias 1:18) … “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy! The Lord is sweet to all―and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalms 144:8-9). Hope is the theological virtue by which we aspire with confidence to God’s grace and eternal life in Heaven. Hope looks directly to our eternal happiness. Hope means trusting God, and being resolved to use His help. We pin our hope on God, not man.
Satan has no hope―apart from a hope of bring about our damnation so that we can eternally share in his hopelessness and despair in Hell. Despair―the ultimate goal of Satan― is the loss or abandonment of Hope. It is grave sin, and it leads souls into many other sins. St. Paul says (Ephesians 4:19): “Who, despairing, have given themselves up to lasciviousness, unto the working of all uncleanness, and unto covetousness.”
Despair is a most grievous sin. It turns a person completely away from God. In itself, despair is not so grievous as unbelief or hatred of God. Yet for man it is more dangerous than these sins. For despair leads a person to fling himself headlong into all manner of sins. Not everyone who despairs has lost or rejected the Faith. A person may know by Faith that all sin is pardonable, and yet, by a corrupted judgment on his own particular case, may abandon all hope of pardon for himself. Despair arises from disorders in the soul, such as lust. But in a special way, it comes from the sin of sloth, from spiritual laziness which will not let the soul grapple with difficulties, and overcome them in the strength and grace of supernatural Hope.
(8) Invocation of the Name of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Richard of St. Laurence states “there is not such powerful help in any name, nor is there any other name given to men, after that of Jesus, from which so much salvation is poured forth upon men as from the name of Mary.” He continues, “that the devout invocation of this sweet and holy name, leads to the acquisition of superabundant graces in this life, and a very high degree of glory in the next.”
After the most sacred Name of Jesus, the name of Mary is so rich in every good thing, that on earth and in Heaven there is no other from which devout souls receive so much grace, hope, and sweetness.
Hence Richard of St. Laurence encourages sinners to have recourse to this great name, “because it alone will suffice to cure them of all their evils;” and “there is no disorder, however malignant, that does not immediately yield to the power of the name of Mary.” The Blessed Raymond Jordano says, “that however hardened and diffident a heart may be, the name of this most Blessed Virgin has such efficacy, that if it is only pronounced that heart will be wonderfully softened.” Moreover, it is well known, and is daily experienced by the clients of Mary, that her powerful name gives the particular strength necessary to overcome temptations against purity.
In fine, “thy name, O Mother of God, is filled with divine graces and blessings,” as St. Methodius says. So much so, that St. Bonaventure declares, “that thy name, O Mary, cannot be pronounced without bringing some grace to him who does so devoutly.” Grant, O Lady, that we may often remember to name thee with love and confidence; for this practice either shows the possession of divine grace, or else is a pledge that we shall soon recover it.
On the other hand, Thomas a Kempis affirms “that the devils fear the Queen of Heaven to such a degree, that only on hearing her great name pronounced, they fly from him who does so, as from a burning fire.” The Blessed Virgin herself revealed to St. Bridget “that there is not on earth a sinner, however devoid he may be of the love of God, from whom the devil is not obliged immediately to fly, if he invokes her holy name with a determination to repent.” On another occasion she repeated the same thing to the saint, saying, “that all the devils venerate and fear her name to such a degree, that, on hearing it, they immediately loosen the claws with which they hold the soul captive.” Our Blessed Lady also told St. Bridget, “that in the same way as the rebel angels fly from sinners, who invoke the name of Mary, so also do the good angels approach nearer to just souls, who pronounce her name with devotion.”
(9) Fasting
The current Rite of Exorcism (2004)―which most exorcists regard as inferior to the old Rite of Exorcism―says: “The Exorcist, mindful that the tribe of demons cannot be cast out except through prayer and fasting, should take care that these two most effective remedies for obtaining divine help be used, after the example of the Holy Fathers, both by himself and by others, insofar as is possible” (De Exorcismis, #31).
The Older Rite of Exocism (1614)―which most of today’s exorcists have gone back to using―also advises: “Therefore, he [the exorcist] will be mindful of the words of our Lord (Matthew 17:20), to the effect that there is a certain type of evil spirit who cannot be driven out except by prayer and fasting. Therefore, let him avail himself of these two means above all for imploring the divine assistance in expelling demons, after the example of the holy fathers; and not only himself, but let him induce others, as far as possible, to do the same” (De Exorcizandis, #10).
Our Lord Himself told us of the power of fasting in the battle against Satan and the demons. When the disciples asked Jesus why they were not able to cast out a particular demon, He responded: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:14-20). St. John Vianney said, “The devil is not greatly afraid of the discipline [self-scourging] and other instruments of penance. That which beats him is the curtailment of one’s food, drink and sleep. There is nothing the devil fears more, consequently, nothing is more pleasing to God.”
The exorcist, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, says: “The devil is more tranquil if he does not have to live with prayer, fasting, the Eucharist, and the other Sacramental practices! … According to Our Lady’s words in Fatima, if we had prayed and fasted, there would not have been World War II. We have not listened to her and therefore there was a war. Our Lady speaks often about prayer and fasting … Our Lady insists so much on fasting, then why does the Church not speak? … Who ought to pray and fast? Everyone — the person struck by the spiritual evil and those close to him! … I recommend three tips that Jesus gives to heal the ills of evil, even without the need for exorcisms: (1) much Faith (2) much prayer and (3) fasting.”
Another exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger, says: “If you want protection [against demons] you have to start developing a consistent prayer life but you also need to be engaging in forms of mortification, where it is consistent and requires daily self-denial. Our own community―which does exorcisms―in our community we pray three to four hours a day! Yes! Three to four hours! And that is what keeps us largely immune. The other thing is that when we are engaged in doing solemn exorcism sessions, we are fasting six days a week on one meal a day. We do it consistently and that is what keeps us protected! We know it is not us―not our own power―we know it is God Who is honoring our sacrifices. But it is that consistent discipline that keeps people immune to the demonic.” (Conference at Our Lady of the Lake Catholic Church, Chapin, South Carolina, March 9th, 2023).
Even if certain demons are best driven out by prayer and fasting, we must never forget that it is God who drives out demons, and He doesn’t need our fasting to do so. Any prideful notions about the effects of our fasting should be strictly avoided. Indeed, we ought to have a kind of humility regarding fasting. Fasting is certainly necessary, and the Lord Himself says that there is a time for fasting (Mark 2:20, Luke 5:35). But fasting can also be a source of pride (Luke 18:12; 5:33). Fasting done out of pride or superiority isn’t going to drive out any demons; in fact it will likely attract them. So fast we should and must―but let not pride contaminate and infect our fasting!
(10) Shortened Sleep (within limits)
You may have heard the expression: “Satan never sleeps!” Similarly, “Don’t let the devil lull you to sleep!” As humans, we all need to sleep―even Our Lord slept: “There arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that the ship was filled with water. Jesus was in the rear part of the ship, sleeping upon a pillow; and they awakened Him, and said to Him: ‘Master, does it not concern Thee that we perish?’” (Mark 4:38).
Yet Our Lord also chastised His three favorite Apostles―Peter, James and John―for sleeping in the Garden of Gethsemane when He had asked them to pray: “And Jesus came and found them sleeping. And He said to Peter: ‘Simon! Sleepest thou? Couldst thou not watch one hour? Watch ye and pray so that you enter not into temptation!’” (Mark 14:37-38). St. John Vianney said: “The devil is not greatly afraid of the discipline [self-scourging] and other instruments of penance. That which beats him is the curtailment of one’s food, drink and sleep. There is nothing the devil fears more!”
St. Francis de Sales (1567 - 1622) only slept five hours per night. He once remarked: “We shall have all eternity in which to rest!” St. Philip Neri (1515 - 1595) was known to only take about four or five hours of sleep per night. He often decided to sleep on the floor rather than the bed. Nevertheless, he was not reluctant to go to sleep and said: “When a man really loves God, he comes to such a state in the end that he is obliged to say: ‘Lord, let me get some sleep!’” St. John Vianney (1786 - 1859) worked around the clock―celebrating Mass, hearing confessions, administering the other sacraments, praying and doing penance for sinners. During the last 10 years of his life, he would spend as many as 16 to 18 hours a day in the confessional. What did this cost him? Well, quite a bit, including sleep! He typically only slept three hours a night―and many times that three hours sleep was disturbed because he experienced demonic attacks at night.
Today, some religious orders―such as the Carthusians―also deprive themselves of sleep in the middle of the night in order to pray. They will go to bed at 8:00 pm and then rise again at 11:30 p.m. to meet in the chapel for prayer (Matins and other prayers). At 2:30 a.m. they return to their sleep until 6:30 a.m.
Obviously―just as with fasting―deliberate sleep deprivation must find a prudent middle road by being neither going too far, nor doing too little. Once you start to do something good and beneficial for your spiritual warfare, then the demons will try to make you exaggerate what you are doing, and will try make you go to extremes out of pride. In this way―with sleep deprivation―they can easily wear you out. Remember that sleep deprivation to an extreme degree is a method that torturers use to break the will of their prisoners!
(11) Other Penances & Sacrifices
You can find a very comprehensive list of penances and sacrifices on our webpage IDEAS FOR LENT (click here). Ultimately, all true and effective penances―just like prayer―must come from the heart. Otherwise the condemning words of Our Lord apply: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘These people honor Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8). Sacrifice and penance must come from the heart and must be inspired by a love of God (charity). Hence Scripture warns: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
(12) Practice Humility
The devil can be defeated, what it is it that defeats him? HUMILITY and CHARITY. Satan is neither humble nor charitable. In the devil there is no humility, but only pride. Pride is opposed to humility just as the devil is opposed to Christ. The sin of the devil was pride—“I will not serve!”--whereas the foundational virtue of Christ was humility. In the devil there is no love, only love of self and hatred of God and others. There was a Desert Father who was able to banish the demons and he asked them: “What power sends you away?” They replied: “Nothing can overcome us, but only humility.” The Desert Mother, Amma Theodora, concluded by saying: “Do you see how humility is victorious over the demons?” Whereas St. John Climacus said that humility is a “virtue no devil can imitate. If pride made demons out of angels, there is no doubt that humility could make angels out of demons.”
In his book Holiness, A Guide For Beginners, the Benedictine, Dom Hubert Van Zeller, writes: “The qualities to look for in a saint’s life are the not-very-obvious ones, or at any rate not-very-popular ones―humility and charity.” Little or no humility means little or no chance of Heaven! Our Lord commanded: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29).
There is no holiness without humility as its foundation. Remember Our Lady’s prayer, the Magnificat, wherein she says that God has “regarded the humility of His handmaid…He has put down the mighty from their seat and has exalted the humble.” The Old Testament says: “...nor from the beginning have the proud been acceptable to Thee! But the prayer of the humble and the meek has always pleased Thee” (Judith 9:16). “May the Lord destroy all deceitful lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things” (Psalm 11:4). “Thou hast rebuked the proud” (Psalm118:21). “Every proud man is an abomination to the Lord” (Proverbs 16:5).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, writes: “Humility is considered in all Christian tradition as the foundation of the spiritual life, since it removes Pride, which is, says Holy Scripture, the beginning of every sin, because it separates us from God. Thus Humility has often been compared to the excavation, which must be dug for the erection of a building, an excavation which should be so much the deeper in proportion as the building is to be higher. From this point of view, as we have seen, the two principal pillars of the temple to be built are Faith and Hope, and its dome is Charity. Humility ought certainly to repress pride under all its forms, including intellectual and spiritual pride” (The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
We all have probably heard the famous phrase: “The moment you think that you have actually acquired humility, you have, in reality, actually lost it!” St. Francis de Sales has this to say: “We often SAY that we are nothing. But we would be very sad if anyone should really take us at our word. We pretend to retire and hide ourselves, so that the world may run after us and seek us out. True humility does not make a show of herself, or use many humble words; for she desires not only to conceal all other virtues, but most of all to conceal herself.”
There is an axiom which says: “I would rather follow God as a humble sinner than a proud saint!” Our faults do not change the love of God for us, as the Parable of the Prodigal Son shows so well. But He asks us to be sorry for them and to repair them by our acts of humility and repentant love. Sometimes our sins seem like stones―they weigh us down. Don’t throw away you stones, nor throw them at other sinners—as Jesus said of Mary Magdalen: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her” (John 8:7)—“Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). ““Why do you see the splinter that is in your brother’s eye; but cannot see the plank that is in your own eye?” (Matthew 7:3). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8), “for all have sinned” (Romans 3:23)―but, instead, let us cast our stones of sin into the pit of our own foundation of humility. They will be of far more use there than being hurled through the air! We all have more than enough stones for our own foundation of humility—“If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us” (1 John 1:10). “Although Jesus was without sin, He humbled Himself like a sinner. He had nothing to be ashamed of―as the Good Thief put it: ‘This Man hath done nothing wrong.’ But we have done much to be ashamed of!” (St. Peter Julian Eymard).
After explaining the various degrees of humility, St Benedict adds that they lead to the love of God, that perfect love that excludes fear: “Therefore, after having ascended all these degrees of humility, the monk soon reaches, the love of God, that perfect love that ‘casts out fear’.” This, then, is the goal to which humility leads. Our heart must contain humility for charity to grow, for Pride is an excessive love of self, which kills charity.
Thus a focus on our sins, rather than our achievements, is of far more profit and is far more likely to lead to an acquisition and preservation of humility. “For I will think for my sin ... For I know my iniquity, and my sin is always before me” (Psalms 37:19; 50:5). Then we shall have the humility of the Prodigal Son, who said: “Father, I have sinned against Heaven, and before thee, I am not now worthy to be called thy son” (Luke 15:21) and will live out our lives in a humble spirit of compunction—which is defined as “an ever abiding sorrow for sin.”
(13) Practice Charity
“Above all these things have Charity” (Colossians 3:14). “For God is Charity!” (1 John 4:8). God is Charity. He does not say of Himself that He is penance, or perseverance, or even that He is obedience, or humility; He says of Himself that He is Charity — and that those who live in Charity are living in Him (1 John 4:16). Just as Jesus (Who is Charity itself) says: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), so too it can be said that without Charity we can do nothing―or that anything we do is worthless supernaturally. Holy Scripture affirms this: If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
God urges us on towards ever increasing growth in Charity―whereas Satan seeks to make us grow in hatred. God seeks to make us hate sin and love virtue: “Hate evil and love good!” (Amos 5:15)―whereas Satan seeks to make us hate virtue and love sin: “Hate good and love evil!” (Micheas 3:2). God says: “He that shall sin against Me, shall hurt his own soul. All that hate Me love death!” (Proverbs 8:36). Our Lord says: “Love your enemies, do good to them that hate you!” (Luke 6:27)―whereas Satan seeks to make us hate our enemies and to plot and work against them. St. Alphonsus Liguori tells us that “True charity consists in doing good to those who do us evil, and in thus winning them over.”
Charity rescues us from sin and clutches of Satan. As Holy Scripture says: “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) ... “Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … and Our Lord said of the sinner Mary Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). That is why St. Thérèse of Lisieux of wrote: “If the greatest sinner on Earth should repent at the moment of death, and draw his last breath in an act of love; neither the many graces he had abused, nor the many sins he had committed would stand in his way. Our Lord would receive him into His mercy.” St. Robert Bellarmine wrote: “Charity is that with which no man is lost, and without which no man is saved.”
(14) Nourish and Have a Deep Faith
The First Vatican Council (1869-1870) states: “The Catholic Church holds that Faith, which is the beginning of human salvation, is a supernatural virtue by which, through the help and inspiration of God’s grace, we believe the things revealed by Him to be true!” Holy Scripture tells us: “Without Faith it is impossible to please God!” (Hebrews 11:6) and Our Lord warns of a failure and lack of Faith in the End Times (which Our Lady of Fatima says we have already entered): “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Our Lady of Good Success seems to echo Our Lord’s words, when she speaks of “the small number of souls, who will preserve the treasures of the Faith.”
Our Lady of La Salette seems to explain the reason for this falling away in Faith: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God. Several will abandon the Faith, and a great number of priests and members of religious orders will break away from the true religion; among these people there will even be bishops … Rome will lose Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist.” She adds that they “will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus, denying the existence of Heaven.”
(15) Have a firm Hope, Come What May
“Hope in the Lord!” (Psalm 30:25). “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow―and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool!” (Isaias 1:18) … “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy! The Lord is sweet to all―and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalms 144:8-9). Hope is the theological virtue by which we aspire with confidence to God’s grace and eternal life in Heaven. Hope looks directly to our eternal happiness. Hope means trusting God, and being resolved to use His help. We pin our hope on God, not man.
Satan has no hope―apart from a hope of bring about our damnation so that we can eternally share in his hopelessness and despair in Hell. Despair―the ultimate goal of Satan― is the loss or abandonment of Hope. It is grave sin, and it leads souls into many other sins. St. Paul says (Ephesians 4:19): “Who, despairing, have given themselves up to lasciviousness, unto the working of all uncleanness, and unto covetousness.”
Despair is a most grievous sin. It turns a person completely away from God. In itself, despair is not so grievous as unbelief or hatred of God. Yet for man it is more dangerous than these sins. For despair leads a person to fling himself headlong into all manner of sins. Not everyone who despairs has lost or rejected the Faith. A person may know by Faith that all sin is pardonable, and yet, by a corrupted judgment on his own particular case, may abandon all hope of pardon for himself. Despair arises from disorders in the soul, such as lust. But in a special way, it comes from the sin of sloth, from spiritual laziness which will not let the soul grapple with difficulties, and overcome them in the strength and grace of supernatural Hope.
Article 6
Tuesday after the First Sunday of Lent, February 20th
Fighting the Devil!
Tuesday after the First Sunday of Lent, February 20th
Fighting the Devil!
No Choice But To Fight!
Staying with the theme that Holy Mother Church presented to us on the First Sunday of Lent―Our Lord’s fight with Satan and his temptations in the desert―we today approach the aspect of our obligatory and unavoidable fight with Satan in our own personal lives.
Satan is a reality that we cannot avoid! We can either fight against him, or be overcome by him. There is no other option! It is a case of “Kill, or be killed!” Holy Scripture warns: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour! Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9) … “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) … “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3) … “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Put you on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil! For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places! Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day!” (Ephesians 6:11-13).
Fr. Gabriel Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome for over 30 years, speaks of this constant and obligatory fight against Satan: “The influence of Satan is immense! … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … Every person is on battle alert―because life on Earth is a trial of faithfulness to God! … If the people of the Church do not unite themselves with determination against Satan and fight tooth and nail ― then Satan is free to create havoc and destruction with impunity! … Those who live in a state of grace and those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin! … In the current environment, where we are witnessing the collapse of the family, I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. I have dealt many times with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with possessed homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins! …
“Satan’s power is felt more keenly in periods of history when the sinfulness of the community is more evident … The problem is getting worse. The Devil is gaining ground. We are living in an age when Faith is diminishing ... Today we live in a period of little Faith ... Young people receive everything from their parents―except the Faith ... It is purely mathematical ― when Faith in God declines, idolatry and irrationality increase … Whoever lives in indifference, in absent-mindedness, and far from God―that person is open to an easy satanic conquest! … If you abandon God, the Devil will take His place … When we abandon God, we give ourselves to practices that open the door to Satan! … The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed and, by inducing man to sin, he takes man progressively away from the love of God, weakens the consciences of men and women and leads them toward egoism, closing their hearts, lack of forgiveness, and doing everything for money, power, and sex …
“Our Lady’s messages speak about Satan. She often spoke about this. She underlined that Satan is powerful and that he wants to destroy her plans. She invited us to pray, to pray, to pray! Through prayer, we can even stop wars! Maybe we do not pray with the heart―this is possible!! We must pray in Faith, not mechanically! Pray with Faith―and prayer increases Faith and Charity. According to Our Lady’s words in Fatima, if we had prayed and fasted, there would not have been World War II. We have not listened to her and therefore there was a war. Our Lady speaks often about prayer and fasting. I think that this is very important, because contemporary men are following the spirit of consumerism. Humanity searches how to avoid any kind of sacrifice and so it exposes itself to sin. There is no practice of making sacrifice. Only if we are used to sacrifice ourselves, we will be able to live Christian life. For Christian life, besides prayer, we need a certain austerity of life. If there is no austerity of life, there is no perseverance in Christian life.” (Fr. Gabriel Amorth).
Our Lady’s Fight Against Satan
Speaking of Our Lady, here are some powerful passages from St. Louis de Montfort’s book, True Devotion to Mary, on the fight between Our Lady and her followers against Satan and his followers:
“Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be—a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints who shall come at the end of the world are reserved for her. The Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints, who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity.
“These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady―illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection―so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God, that is to say, the most holy Virgin, called by the Fathers the ‘Temple of Solomon’ and the ‘City of God.’ By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone.
“Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others. God has never made and formed but one enmity; but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end.
“It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always, up to this time, persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will, in the future, persecute them more than ever.
“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But, in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful Mary to pierce her enemies. (Psalm 126:4). They shall be the sons of Levi, well purified by the fire of great tribulation, and closely adhering to God (1 Corinthians 6:17), who shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body. They shall be everywhere the good odor of Jesus Christ to the poor and to the little, while at the same time, they shall be an odor of death to the great, to the rich and to the proud worldlings.
“They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High.
“They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies. They shall sleep without gold or silver, and, what is more, without care, in the midst of the other priests, ecclesiastics, and clerics (Psalm 67:14); and yet they shall have the silvered wings of the dove to go, with the pure intention of the glory of God and the salvation of souls, wheresoever the Holy Ghost shall call them. Nor shall they leave behind them, in the places where they have preached, anything but the gold of charity, which is the fulfillment of the whole law. (Romans 13:10).
“In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior.
“These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious, the idolaters and the Mahometans. But when and how shall this be? God alone knows. As for us, we have but to hold our tongues, to pray, to sigh and to wait: ‘With expectation I have waited!’―Psalm 39:2” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
So Where Do You Stand?
So where have you set up camp? Where do you stand? As already stated above―this is universal war that involves every human being: man, woman and child. There can be no neutrality, no spectators, no pacifists―only winners and losers, the saved and the damned. Sister Lucia of Fatima alluded to this when she reveals what Our Lady had told her: “Our Lady told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Our Lady of La Salette had already spoken of this fight, calling her true followers to the battle: “I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful! Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days [notice how this reference of the “Apostles of the Last Days” dovetails with St. Louis de Montfort’s prophetic writings above), the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ! It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days! May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends! … I shall fight at their side! God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will. At the blood, the tears and prayers of the righteous, God will relent. Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like. And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed. God will be served and glorified. And then peace will be made, and man will be reconciled with God. Jesus Christ will be served, worshiped and glorified. Charity will flourish everywhere.” (Our Lady of La Salette).
How Shall We Fight? With What Shall We Fight?
Satan and all the devils are far superior to us mere mortals. One single angel―whether it be a good angel or a bad angel―is capable of destroying the whole universe (if God would allow it or want it). We have trouble swatting a fly or a mosquito! Any exorcist will tell that he is no match for the devil―it is only by the power of God that the exorcist is able to cast out demons. Our Lord’s words must always be heeded: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). You are not going to successfully fight against demons with mere human power and ingenuity! It is like trying to shoot down an enemy airplane with a water pistol! It is doomed to failure. Heaven has given us weapons that can and should be used in everyone’s unavoidable and obligatory battles against Hell and its demons. We can loosely or generally classify those weapons as (1) weapons that are external, or outside of ourselves, and (2) weapons that are within us.
WEAPONS OUTSIDE OF ONESELF
(1) Trust in God
God Himself is the most powerful weapon—we often forget that while our thoughts immediately rush to think of weapons like holy water, Rosaries, relics, blessed medals, etc. All these subsidiary weapons need to draw their power from God in the first place. Calling on the Name and help of God is the first thing we must do. Trust in God above all and first of all, rather than trusting in oneself or subsidiary weapons. The first rule to remember is that God is always in absolute control, and the devil can do nothing without God’s permission.
“Some trust in chariots, and some in horses: but we will call upon the Name of the Lord our God” (Psalm 19:8). “Blessed is the man whose trust is in the Name of the Lord!” (Psalm 39:5). “The Name of the Lord is a strong tower: the just runneth to it” (Proverbs 18:10). “Our help is in the Name of the Lord” (Psalm 123:8). “Surrounding me they compassed me about: and in the Name of the Lord I have been revenged on them! They surrounded me like bees, and they burned like fire among thorns: and in the Name of the Lord I was revenged on them” (Psalm 117:11-12). “And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call upon the Name of the Lord, shall be saved” (Acts 2:21).
(2) The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass = God
St. Leonard of Port Maurice, in his book The Hidden Treasure of the Holy Mass, writes: “The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass ... is the sun of Christianity, the soul of Faith, the center of the Catholic religion, wherein are beheld all her rites, all her ceremonies, and all her Sacraments; in fine, it is the compendium of all the good and beautiful to be found in the Church of God … It contains the Just One Himself, and the Saint of Saints … The principal excellence of the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass consists in being essentially, and in the very highest degree, identical with that which was offered on the Cross of Calvary … What tongue, human or angelic, may ever describe a power so immeasurable … It is a greater power than that which would be required to change the place of mountains, to dry up seas, and to turn round the heavens.”
St. Thomas Aquinas states: “The celebration of Holy Mass is as valuable as the death of Jesus on the cross.” While St. Padre Pio adds: “It would be easier for the world to survive without the sun than to do without Holy Mass!” It was by His Holy Sacrifice on Calvary that Our Lord definitively defeated Satan, and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the bloodless re-enactment of that same sacrifice, thus it a re-enactment of the defeat of Satan.
(3) The Holy Eucharist = God
“There is nothing so great as the Eucharist. If God had something more precious, He would have given it to us” (St. John Vianney). The Holy Eucharist is God present with us—it the “Real Presence” of Christ under the appearance of bread—it is his Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity hidden in the Sacred Species. If you want to speak directly to God in His presence, then put yourself in the presence of the “Real Presence” of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar. You could put it this way—when we pray to Christ, it is like calling Him on the phone; but when we visit Him in the Holy Eucharist, in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar, then we are there with Him, face to face.
Take note that some exorcists take the Blessed Sacrament in a pyx (the small receptacle they use to carry the Eucharist when on sick calls), along with them when go to perform an exorcism—thus they have Jesus really and truly present, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, to help them in the exorcism. Who could you take along that is any better? Likewise, to combat the devil, it is good to receive Holy Communion as many times as you can—preferably daily.
(4) The Blessed Virgin Mary = Mother of God
We read in St. Louis de Montfort’s The Secret of the Rosary that: “When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone, an Albigensian was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people. The devils who were in possession of this wretched man were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions in spite of themselves. They said that by the Rosary which he preached, he put fear and horror into the depths of Hell, and that he was the man they hated most throughout the world because of the souls he snatched from them by the devotion of the Rosary. They revealed several other things.
“St. Dominic put his Rosary round the neck of the possessed man and asked them who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most, who should therefore be the most loved and revered by men. At this they let out such unearthly screams that most of the people fell to the ground, seized with fear. St. Dominic saw the Blessed Virgin near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod that she held and said, ‘Answer my servant Dominic at once!’
“Then the devils started screaming: ‘Oh, you who are enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven, must we, in spite of ourselves, tell the whole truth and confess before everyone who it is who is the cause of our shame and our ruin? Oh, woe to us, princes of darkness. Then listen, you Christians. This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell. She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety. It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective. We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us; one single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints. We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants. Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards are saved by her intercession!’” (St. Louis de Montfort’s The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
(5) St. Michael the Archangel
Following Holy Scripture passages, Christian tradition gives to St. Michael four offices:
(1) To fight against Satan.
(2) To rescue the souls of the faithful from the power of the enemy, especially at the hour of death.
(3) To be the champion of God’s people, the Jews in the Old Law, the Christians in the New Testament; therefore he was the patron of the Church, and of the orders of knights during the Middle Ages.
(4) To call away from earth and bring men’s souls to judgment.
Theologians are of the opinion that St. Michael surpasses in glory and power all the other Angels in Heaven. This position of honor was merited by St. Michael in the battle which he waged against Lucifer and the rebellious Angels before the creation of the world. Learned and saintly theologians hold that God revealed to the Angels the future Incarnation of His Divine Son, whom they were to adore in His sacred humanity. At the same time He revealed to them the surpassing dignity and glory of Mary, whom, as the Mother of God, they were to venerate as their Queen.
Lucifer, one of the most glorious and exalted princes of the Heavenly court, dazzled by the splendor of his own gifts, rebelled at the thought that human nature should be preferred to his own Angelic nature. Desiring for himself the prerogatives of the God-man, he raised his great battle-cry of rebellion: “I will be like unto the Most High!” (Isaias 14:14). Some have held that in their pride, a third of the Angels took up Lucifer’s rebellious cry. At the same instant another great Archangel, equal in beauty and grace to the proud Lucifer, opposed the cry of the rebellious Angels with his own battle-cry of love and loyalty: “Michael”—Who is like unto God?
The fearlessness and fidelity of this mighty champion roused the faithful Angels, who rallied to his standard. Then followed that tremendous battle between the good and the bad Angels which St. John describes in the Book of the Apocalypse: “And there was a battle in Heaven: Michael and his Angels battled with the dragon, and the dragon fought and his Angels. And they did not prevail, neither was their place found any more in Heaven. And that great dragon was cast down, the ancient serpent, he who is called the devil and Satan, who led astray the whole world” (Apocalypse 12: 7-9). Thus, St. Michael and his faithful followers won a glorious victory. With the swiftness of lightning, Lucifer and his companions were transformed into hideous demons and cast into the abyss of eternal torment and darkness which God created for them. In reward for his zeal and fidelity, the holy Archangel Michael was made Prince and commander-in-chief of all the Heavenly legions.
(6) Your Guardian Angel
Guardian angels are not just a comforting bedtime story for children! What follows is from the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas, Abbot Anscar Vonier, and others. It is commonly thought that angels were created for us. This idea is correct, but it would be better to say that “man was created for the angels”. This means that the guidance and protection that the guardian angels give us during our lives has one ultimate goal: to ensure that one day we will be worthy of being their companions in Heaven. In order to accomplish this goal each human has a guardian angel assigned to him by God. According to Tradition, guardian angels are not assigned to more than one person. Since the job of a guardian angel ends once the soul under his care has passed into eternal life, this one-angel-to-one-person ratio only applies to those of us who are on earth. According to St. Thomas, even the Anti-Christ, the Man of Sin, will have a guardian angel.
However, just because God assigns a guardian angel to us, does not necessarily mean that the angel does not perform other tasks. Distance does not exist for angels because they are spirits. Our earthly bodies anchor us to this place because of their physical nature, but angels do not have this problem. When a guardian angel is acting on the human soul, he is present. When he has stopped acting, he has departed. St. Thomas Aquinas points out that the angel has complete knowledge of the soul in his charge, even when he is not present.
In order to perform their duty to the best of their ability, guardian angels are granted entire and intimate knowledge of the soul under his care. No other angel has access to this knowledge. Not even demons, who try to lead souls to Hell, have knowledge as intimate as our guardian angels. With this intimate knowledge, guardians angels have the ability to guide us. They can lead us to new trains of thought and new ideas when we are deep in thought. Angels introduce new thoughts to us so subtly, that they appear to be our own—yet the devil, being an angel also, also tries to do the same thing. St. Paul tells us that he will try to appear as “an angel of light”—and we see this in the lives of so many saints, where the devil has appeared imitating the appearance of Our Lord, Our Lady, the saints, the angels and even other human being still living on this Earth. Prudence, caution and knowledge of the rules of discernment are necessary to distinguish and recognize this trap.
While guardian angels can influence and guide us towards Heaven, the amount of help we receive depends on us. St. Thomas states that the power of a guardian angel to work on the interior life of man is dependent on how that man is spiritually disposed. An angel cannot change a person’s will or affect his intellect. These are things only God can do because He created both the will and the intellect. Guardian angels are limited in their influence by the moral state of the man in their care. Like everything that God gives us, guardian angels are only beneficial if we would make use of them. Vonier states “Like all Divine gifts, it may be hidden forever in a napkin, and it may be made to produce a hundredfold.” A muscle that is neglected will atrophy, but exercise will strengthen it and make it strong. So too can calling upon the untapped guidance and wisdom of our guardian angels leads us to eternal life with them. Just as they say today: “Use it, or lose it!”—it could be said of the guardian angels: “Use them, or lose them!”, or more like “Use them, or lose your soul!” The devil is an angel, a human being is no match for an angel, so use your good angel to fight the bad angels—they know all about that kind of warfare. To read more, click here.
(7) Relic of the True Cross
St. Paul talked powerfully about the Holy Cross: “With Christ I am nailed to the cross” (Galatians 2: 19) … “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me and I to the world” (Galatians 6: 14). The Holy Cross is only wood from a tree. But God works powerfully through the wood of the Cross, because Jesus was nailed and died on this wood. For this reason it has become an object of respect and worship for Catholics. God continues to bring about healing and conversions through such a horrible instrument of death. “We adore you O Christ and we bless Thee, because by Thy Holy Cross You have redeemed the world”—we say at each station of the Stations of the Cross.
Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the chief exorcist in Rome for several decades, would use the relic of the True Cross during his exorcisms, and, in his book, An Exorcist Tells His Story, he writes: “The relic of the Holy Cross is most effective, because it is by this Cross that Jesus defeated Satan’s kingdom.” Fr. Amorth, was asked how one can tell if someone is possessed, he replied: “By their aversion to the Blessed Sacrament and all things sacred.” One of the clearest signs of demonic possession is a hatred for the Eucharist or the crucifix.
In his treatise on ascetical and mystical theology Fr. Adolphe Tanquerey explains that: “The Sacramentals and blessed objects are also efficacious remedies [for possession and diabolical temptation], because of the prayers said by the Church when blessing them ... The Crucifix, the Sign of the Cross, and especially genuine relics of the True Cross are terrifying to the devil, who was vanquished by the Cross: ‘That the one who conquered by a tree should himself be likewise conquered by the Tree.’ For the same reason the Evil Spirit dreads the invocation of the Holy Name of Jesus, which, on the Master's Own promise, possesses a wondrous power for putting the devil to flight” (The Spiritual Life, p. 724).
(8) Relics of Saints
St. Augustine, in his Confessions, writes of the relics of the martyrs Protasius and Gervasius: “The bodies of the martyrs Protasius and Gervasius were hidden … After the bodies had been discovered and dug up, they were carried to Ambrose's basilica with the honor that was due to them. On the way several persons who were tormented by evil spirits were cured, for even the devils acknowledged the holy relics.”
The Roman Ritual prescribes a Rite of Exorcism containing a series of prayers, blessings and invocations in the exorcizing of the devil. The holy arsenal of weapons used in an exorcism include blessings with the relics of saints. Fr. Jordan Aumann, OP, in his Spiritual Theology, writes: “The Roman Ritual also recommends the use of relics in the rite of exorcism. The most precious and venerated of all relics, and those that inspire the greatest horror in the demons, are the particles of the true Cross because they remind the demons of the definitive victory that Christ won over them on Calvary.”
(9) Holy Water
St. Teresa of Avila in The Book of Her Life stated: “I often experience that there is nothing the devils flee from more -without returning than holy water” (Chapter 31). We cannot fail to be impressed by the urgent supplication of the Church, during the blessing of holy water, for protection from the infernal enemy, from his cunning and wickedness. This petition recurs in each of the five prayers. Here are some extracts from the Roman Ritual for the blessing and exorcising of the salt and water used in the making of Holy Water:
As the priest exorcises the salt, he says: “I exorcise thee, creature of salt, by the living + God, by the true + God, by the holy + God … that thou mayest become exorcised salt for the salvation of those that believe; and that thou mayest be for the healing of soul and body to all those receiving thee, and that there may be banished from the place in which thou hast been sprinkled every kind of hallucination and wickedness, or wile of devilish deceit, and every unclean spirit … O Almighty and eternal God, we humbly implore Thine infinite mercy, that this creature of salt … may make for health of mind and body to all who partake of it; and that what ever is touched or sprinkled with it may be freed from all uncleanness, and from the assaults of the evil spirit ...”
As the priest exorcises the water, he says: “I exorcise thee, creature of water, in the Name of God + the Father Almighty, and in the name of Jesus + Christ His Son our Lord, and in the power of the Holy + Spirit, that thou mayest be made exorcised water for the banishment of every power of the enemy, and that thou mayest be able to uproot and cast out that enemy himself, together with his rebel angels … Fill this element … with Thy power and blessing + so that this creature of Thine may be endowed with divine grace to drive away devils and to cast out diseases; that whatever in the houses or possessions of the faithful may be sprinkled by this water may be freed from everything unclean and delivered from what is hurtful. Let no spirit of pestilence or baleful breath abide therein; let all the snares of the enemy who lieth in wait be driven forth; and let everything that threatens the safety or peace of the dwellers therein be banished by the sprinkling of this water …”
As the Priest puts blessed salt into the water, making three signs of the cross, he says: “O God, the giver of invincible strength, and King of irresistible power, ever wonderful in triumph, who holdest in check the power of the enemy, who overcomest the fury of raging enemies, who by Thy might gainest the victory over all their guile; we humbly pray and beseech Thee, O Lord, to look upon this Thy creation of salt and water … that wherever it be sprinkled … every assault of the unclean spirit may be baffled, all fear of the venomous serpent cast out …”
(10) Blessed Crucifix
Fr. Jordan Aumann, OP, in his Spiritual Theology writes: “The Roman Ritual prescribes that the exorcist should have a crucifix in his hand or before his eyes. It has been verified many times that the devil will flee merely at the sight of a crucifix. The sign of the cross has always been used by Christians as a safeguard against the devil, and the Church makes special use of it in the rite of exorcism.”
(11) Blessed Rosary Beads
We read the following account in The Secret of the Rosary, by St. Louis de Montfort: “Blessed Alan [de la Roche]relates that a man he knew had tried desperately all kinds of devotions to rid himself of the evil spirit which possessed him, but without success. Finally, he thought of wearing his Rosary round his neck, which eased him considerably. He discovered that whenever he took it off the devil tormented him cruelly, so he resolved to wear it night and day. This drove the evil spirit away forever because he could not bear such a terrible chain. Blessed Alan also testifies that he delivered a great number of those who were possessed by putting a Rosary round their necks.
“Father Jean Amât, of the Order of St. Dominic, was giving a series of Lenten sermons in the Kingdom of Aragon one year, when a young girl was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. After he had exorcised her several times without success, he put his Rosary round her neck. Hardly had he done so when the girl began to scream and cry out in a fearful way, shrieking, ‘Take it off! Take it off! These beads are tormenting me!’ At last, the priest, filled with pity for the girl, took his Rosary off her” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Twenty-Seventh Rose”).
(12) Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel
During the blessing of the Brown Scapular and the investiture that follows, the Holy Mother Church says the following through her priest: “May God Almighty, the Creator of Heaven and earth, bless you, He who has deigned to join you to the confraternity of the Blessed Virgin of Mount Carmel; we beseech her to crush the head of the ancient serpent so that you may enter into possession of your eternal heritage…”
The Venerable Francis Ypes had his Scapular fall off one day. As he replaced it, God allowed him hear the devil howl: “Take off that habit, which snatches so many souls from us!” Then and there Francis made the devil admit that there are three things which the demons are most afraid of: the Holy Name of Jesus, the Holy Name of Mary, and the Holy Scapular of Carmel. To that list we could add the Holy Rosary.
(13) St. Benedict Medal
The origin of the Medal probably dates back to the time of St. Benedict himself, of whom we know that, in his frequent combats with the evil spirit, he generally made use of the Sign of the Cross and wrought many miracles thereby. He also taught his disciples to use the Sign of our redemption against the assaults of Satan and in other dangers. St. Maurus and St. Placidus, his first and most renowned disciples, wrought their numerous miracles through the power of the holy Cross and in the name and by the merits of their holy Founder.
For the early Christians, the cross was a favorite symbol and badge of their faith in Christ. From the writings of St. Gregory the Great (540-604), we know that St. Benedict had a deep Faith in the Cross and worked miracles with the Sign of the Cross. This Faith in, and special devotion to, the Cross was passed on to succeeding generations of Benedictines. Devotion to the Cross of Christ also gave rise to the striking of medals that bore the image of St. Benedict, holding a cross aloft in his right hand and his Rule for Monasteries in the other hand. Thus, the Cross has always been closely associated with the Medal of St. Benedict, which is often referred to as the Medal-Cross of St. Benedict.
On the back of the medal, the Cross is dominant. On the arms of the Cross are the initial letters of a rhythmic Latin prayer: Crux sacra sit mihi lux! Nunquam draco sit mihi dux! (May the Holy Cross be my light! May the dragon never be my guide!). Around the margin of the back of the medal, the letters V R S N S M V - S M Q L I V B are the initial letters of a Latin prayer of exorcism against Satan: Vade retro Satana! Nunquam suade mihi vana! Sunt mala quae libas. Ipse venena bibas! (Begone Satan! Never tempt me with your vanities! What you offer me is evil. Drink the poison yourself!). For a full explanation of the symbolism on the medal and a downloadable poster click here.
(14) Other Blessed Medals and articles
Fr. Adolphe Tanquerey explains that: “The Sacramentals and blessed objects are also efficacious remedies [for possession and diabolical temptation], because of the prayers said by the Church when blessing them” ... Fr. Amorth, was asked how one can tell if someone is possessed, he replied: “By their aversion to the Blessed Sacrament and all things sacred.”
(15) The words of Holy Scripture
To St. Catherine of Bologna God showed Seven Spiritual Weapons for combatting the devil, which she later wrote down in a book of the same name—Seven Spiritual Weapons. The seventh weapon concerns knowledge and use of the Word of God, meaning Holy Scripture. St. Catherine writes:
“The seventh weapon with which we can conquer our enemies is the memory of Holy Scripture which we must carry in our hearts and from which, as from a most devoted mother, we must take counsel in the things we have to do. Thus we read of the most prudent and consecrated virgin St. Cecilia where it says: ”She always bore the gospel of Christ hidden in her heart.””And with this weapon, our savior Christ Jesus conquered and confounded the devil in the desert saying: ”It is written, etc …” (Luke 4:1-13). Therefore, let not the daily readings go without effect; and let the thoughts which you hear each day in the Gospels and Epistles at Mass, be new letters sent to you by your heavenly spouse. And with great and fervent love put them in your heart, and when you have more time, think about them. By doing this you will find yourselves continuously consoled, because you will often receive news from the one whom you love above all else.
“Is not the word of Christ evangelical doctrine? Certainly it is, and so how attentively you should listen to it. Learn to use these weapons wisely and never be found without them so that you can better obtain the triumph of victory against your adversaries. And be on guard that you are not deceived by the mere appearance of good, for the devil sometimes appears in the appearance of Christ, or of the virgin Mary, or in the shape of an angel or of a saint. Therefore, in every apparition that occurs, take up the weapon of Scripture which shows how the mother of Christ carried herself when the Angel Gabriel appeared to her. She said to him: ”What manner of greeting is this? (Luke 1:29). Follow her example in every appearance and feeling, and you will want to test much better, whether it is a good or a wicked spirit, before you listen to him. Blessed is whoever does this.” (St. Catherine of Bolgona, Seven Spiritual Weapons).
(16) Zeal in Doing Good
St. Catherine of Bologna, to whom God showed Seven Spiritual Weapons for combatting the devil, also speaks of the weapon of zeal for doing good. She writes:
“The first weapon I call zeal, that is solicitude in doing good, since the Holy Scriptures condemn those who are negligent and lukewarm in the way of God (Apocalypse 3.15-16).The office of the Holy Spirit is to inspire in us good inspirations, while our duty is to accept them and put them into operation by waging continual violence against our sensuality which always invites us to what is contrary to what the spirit wills. Therefore, it is necessary to resist it with true diligence and not to let the time, granted to us, pass by without acquiring the fruit of good works, as it is written: “Whoever wishes to go up, let him rest not from thoughts, from speaking words and doing deeds.”
“And always exerting himself in God but with discretion, so that when our adversary, like a wicked traitor, assails us from ambush, we can defend ourselves. By the words ”from ambush” I mean, when, under the appearance of good he wishes to kill you, for there is as much danger in too much as in too little. And so I tell you “with discretion,” aware that this virtue establishes and perfects all the other virtues according to what was said by the glorious teacher of the ancient holy fathers, that is, St. Antonio of Vienna.
“So it is proper for us to exercise with true discretion all the spiritual and temporal virtues. However, when the enemy sees that he cannot impede the servant of Christ from doing good, he will seek to entice her with doing too much. So exercise all the virtues in proper measure that the weapon of true and diligent discretion may be exercised by us for our salvation and for the praise of Christ” (St. Catherine of Bolgona, Seven Spiritual Weapons).
(17) Remembrance of Death, Judgement, Heaven & Hell
Another weapon revealed to St. Catherine of Bologna is that of ever having before our eyes and in our mind the fact that our death approaches closer with each day—and after death comes Judgment and a final eternal abode: Heaven or Hell, with Purgatory being an extremely painful temporary residence. St. Catherine writes:
“The fifth weapon is to remind oneself that we must die. This time is called the ‘time of mercy’ in which God looks down day after day so that we can amend our lives from good to better. If we do not do this, we will have to render account, not only of the evils we have done, but also of the goods left undone by our negligence. And so Paul the glorious Apostle spoke well: ‘Let us do good while we have time’ (Galatians 6.10). So often think about death and always stand ready for it, for we know neither the day nor the hour when the most strict judge will command us to render account of the talent of good will granted to us so we could exercise it in praise of Him and for the salvation of our soul and of our neighbors.
“Souls should be especially on guard, lest, out of excessive confidence in themselves, they trespass the rule imposed on them by their superiors. They should devote all their effort to walking along that way which is marked for them. I say this because, sometimes, the enemy, with shrewd cunning, leads those who are only slightly instructed in the spiritual battle to think that they must soon die and that they will have little to show for themselves if they do not do further penance.
“For this reason, the malignant one strives and studies to make them exceed the rule of true obedience, which is without any doubt more meritorious than any penance they could do. So it is necessary to use with good judgment this weapon of recollection of our death, so that it can be utilized for the salvation of the soul and for the praise of Christ” (St. Catherine of Bolgona, Seven Spiritual Weapons).
(18) Remembrance of Eternal Rewards & Punishment
Another weapon revealed to St. Catherine of Bologna is that of remembering the paradise prepared for those who fight the good fight of Faith, which should help us overcome the temptations by the goods of this world, with which the devil tempts us. Our Lord told to place our treasure in Heaven, not Earth: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
St. Catherine writes:
“The sixth weapon is the memory of the goods of paradise, which are prepared for those who lawfully struggle, by abandoning all the vain pleasures of the present life, in accord with the saying of the most holy doctor Saint Augustine: that it is impossible to enjoy present goods and future ones too. So be content not to have, in this world, any pleasure or any beloved, and do not grow tired of denying your own will, remembering what St. Francis said, that is, that the most excellent and greatest gift, that God’s servant can receive from God in this world, is to conquer himself by denying his own will. I beg you, that you not follow your current evil desire and temptation, but stand strong and persevere until the end, so that you can finally reach that noble feast and company which I saw, and rest eternally with these glorious saints who await you.”
Think on the parable of Sheep and the Goats: “And all nations shall be gathered together before Him, and He shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separateth the sheep from the goats. And He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on His left. Then shall the King say to them that shall be on His right hand: ‘Come, ye blessed of My Father, possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me in; naked, and you covered Me: sick, and you visited Me: I was in prison, and you came to Me.’
“Then shall the just answer Him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, and fed Thee; thirsty, and gave Thee drink? And when did we see Thee a stranger, and took Thee in? Or naked, and covered Thee? Or when did we see Thee sick or in prison, and came to Thee?’
“And the king answering, shall say to them: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to Me!’
“Then He shall say to them also that shall be on His left hand: ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels! For I was hungry, and you gave Me not to eat: I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me not in; naked, and you covered Me not; sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me!’
“Then they also shall answer Him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to Thee?’ Then He shall answer them, saying: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!’ And these shall go into everlasting punishment: but the just, into life everlasting” (Matthew 25:32-46).
Staying with the theme that Holy Mother Church presented to us on the First Sunday of Lent―Our Lord’s fight with Satan and his temptations in the desert―we today approach the aspect of our obligatory and unavoidable fight with Satan in our own personal lives.
Satan is a reality that we cannot avoid! We can either fight against him, or be overcome by him. There is no other option! It is a case of “Kill, or be killed!” Holy Scripture warns: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour! Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9) … “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) … “Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6) … “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus!” (2 Timothy 2:3) … “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12) … The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Put you on the armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil! For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places! Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day!” (Ephesians 6:11-13).
Fr. Gabriel Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome for over 30 years, speaks of this constant and obligatory fight against Satan: “The influence of Satan is immense! … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … Every person is on battle alert―because life on Earth is a trial of faithfulness to God! … If the people of the Church do not unite themselves with determination against Satan and fight tooth and nail ― then Satan is free to create havoc and destruction with impunity! … Those who live in a state of grace and those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin! … In the current environment, where we are witnessing the collapse of the family, I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. I have dealt many times with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with possessed homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins! …
“Satan’s power is felt more keenly in periods of history when the sinfulness of the community is more evident … The problem is getting worse. The Devil is gaining ground. We are living in an age when Faith is diminishing ... Today we live in a period of little Faith ... Young people receive everything from their parents―except the Faith ... It is purely mathematical ― when Faith in God declines, idolatry and irrationality increase … Whoever lives in indifference, in absent-mindedness, and far from God―that person is open to an easy satanic conquest! … If you abandon God, the Devil will take His place … When we abandon God, we give ourselves to practices that open the door to Satan! … The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed and, by inducing man to sin, he takes man progressively away from the love of God, weakens the consciences of men and women and leads them toward egoism, closing their hearts, lack of forgiveness, and doing everything for money, power, and sex …
“Our Lady’s messages speak about Satan. She often spoke about this. She underlined that Satan is powerful and that he wants to destroy her plans. She invited us to pray, to pray, to pray! Through prayer, we can even stop wars! Maybe we do not pray with the heart―this is possible!! We must pray in Faith, not mechanically! Pray with Faith―and prayer increases Faith and Charity. According to Our Lady’s words in Fatima, if we had prayed and fasted, there would not have been World War II. We have not listened to her and therefore there was a war. Our Lady speaks often about prayer and fasting. I think that this is very important, because contemporary men are following the spirit of consumerism. Humanity searches how to avoid any kind of sacrifice and so it exposes itself to sin. There is no practice of making sacrifice. Only if we are used to sacrifice ourselves, we will be able to live Christian life. For Christian life, besides prayer, we need a certain austerity of life. If there is no austerity of life, there is no perseverance in Christian life.” (Fr. Gabriel Amorth).
Our Lady’s Fight Against Satan
Speaking of Our Lady, here are some powerful passages from St. Louis de Montfort’s book, True Devotion to Mary, on the fight between Our Lady and her followers against Satan and his followers:
“Mary has produced, together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be—a God Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest saints that there will be in the end of time. The formation and the education of the great saints who shall come at the end of the world are reserved for her. The Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints, who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity.
“These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady―illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection―so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God, that is to say, the most holy Virgin, called by the Fathers the ‘Temple of Solomon’ and the ‘City of God.’ By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone.
“Mary must be terrible to the devil and his crew, as an army ranged in battle, principally in these latter times, because the devil―knowing that he has but little time, and now less than ever, to destroy souls―will every day redouble his efforts and his combats. He will presently raise up cruel persecutions and will put terrible snares before the faithful servants and true children of Mary, whom it gives him more trouble to conquer than it does to conquer others. God has never made and formed but one enmity; but it is an irreconcilable one, which shall endure and grow even to the end.
“It is between Mary, His worthy Mother, and the devil—between the children and the servants of the Blessed Virgin, and the children and tools of Lucifer. God has not only set an enmity, but enmities, not simply between Mary and the devil, but between the race of the holy Virgin and the race of the devil; that is to say, God has set enmities, antipathies and secret hatreds between the true children and servants of Mary and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no love for each other. They have no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial, the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world (for it is the same thing) have always, up to this time, persecuted those who belong to our Blessed Lady, and will, in the future, persecute them more than ever.
“But the power of Mary over all the devils will especially shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lay his snares against her heel: that is to say, her humble slaves and her poor children, whom she will raise up to make war against him. They shall be little and poor in the world’s esteem, and abased before all like the heel, trodden underfoot and persecuted as the heel is by the other members of the body. But, in return for this, they shall be rich in the grace of God, which Mary shall distribute to them abundantly. They shall be great and exalted before God in sanctity, superior to all other creatures by their lively zeal, and so well sustained with God’s assistance that, with the humility of their heel, in union with Mary, they shall crush the head of the devil and cause Jesus Christ to triumph.
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful Mary to pierce her enemies. (Psalm 126:4). They shall be the sons of Levi, well purified by the fire of great tribulation, and closely adhering to God (1 Corinthians 6:17), who shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body. They shall be everywhere the good odor of Jesus Christ to the poor and to the little, while at the same time, they shall be an odor of death to the great, to the rich and to the proud worldlings.
“They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High.
“They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies. They shall sleep without gold or silver, and, what is more, without care, in the midst of the other priests, ecclesiastics, and clerics (Psalm 67:14); and yet they shall have the silvered wings of the dove to go, with the pure intention of the glory of God and the salvation of souls, wheresoever the Holy Ghost shall call them. Nor shall they leave behind them, in the places where they have preached, anything but the gold of charity, which is the fulfillment of the whole law. (Romans 13:10).
“In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior.
“These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious, the idolaters and the Mahometans. But when and how shall this be? God alone knows. As for us, we have but to hold our tongues, to pray, to sigh and to wait: ‘With expectation I have waited!’―Psalm 39:2” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
So Where Do You Stand?
So where have you set up camp? Where do you stand? As already stated above―this is universal war that involves every human being: man, woman and child. There can be no neutrality, no spectators, no pacifists―only winners and losers, the saved and the damned. Sister Lucia of Fatima alluded to this when she reveals what Our Lady had told her: “Our Lady told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground” (Sr. Lucia of Fatima to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Our Lady of La Salette had already spoken of this fight, calling her true followers to the battle: “I make an urgent appeal to the Earth! I call on the true disciples of the living God! I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful! Finally, I call on the Apostles of the Last Days [notice how this reference of the “Apostles of the Last Days” dovetails with St. Louis de Montfort’s prophetic writings above), the faithful disciples of Jesus Christ! It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you in these unhappy days! May your zeal make you famished for the glory and the honor of Jesus Christ! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends! … I shall fight at their side! God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will. At the blood, the tears and prayers of the righteous, God will relent. Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like. And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed. God will be served and glorified. And then peace will be made, and man will be reconciled with God. Jesus Christ will be served, worshiped and glorified. Charity will flourish everywhere.” (Our Lady of La Salette).
How Shall We Fight? With What Shall We Fight?
Satan and all the devils are far superior to us mere mortals. One single angel―whether it be a good angel or a bad angel―is capable of destroying the whole universe (if God would allow it or want it). We have trouble swatting a fly or a mosquito! Any exorcist will tell that he is no match for the devil―it is only by the power of God that the exorcist is able to cast out demons. Our Lord’s words must always be heeded: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). You are not going to successfully fight against demons with mere human power and ingenuity! It is like trying to shoot down an enemy airplane with a water pistol! It is doomed to failure. Heaven has given us weapons that can and should be used in everyone’s unavoidable and obligatory battles against Hell and its demons. We can loosely or generally classify those weapons as (1) weapons that are external, or outside of ourselves, and (2) weapons that are within us.
WEAPONS OUTSIDE OF ONESELF
(1) Trust in God
God Himself is the most powerful weapon—we often forget that while our thoughts immediately rush to think of weapons like holy water, Rosaries, relics, blessed medals, etc. All these subsidiary weapons need to draw their power from God in the first place. Calling on the Name and help of God is the first thing we must do. Trust in God above all and first of all, rather than trusting in oneself or subsidiary weapons. The first rule to remember is that God is always in absolute control, and the devil can do nothing without God’s permission.
“Some trust in chariots, and some in horses: but we will call upon the Name of the Lord our God” (Psalm 19:8). “Blessed is the man whose trust is in the Name of the Lord!” (Psalm 39:5). “The Name of the Lord is a strong tower: the just runneth to it” (Proverbs 18:10). “Our help is in the Name of the Lord” (Psalm 123:8). “Surrounding me they compassed me about: and in the Name of the Lord I have been revenged on them! They surrounded me like bees, and they burned like fire among thorns: and in the Name of the Lord I was revenged on them” (Psalm 117:11-12). “And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call upon the Name of the Lord, shall be saved” (Acts 2:21).
(2) The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass = God
St. Leonard of Port Maurice, in his book The Hidden Treasure of the Holy Mass, writes: “The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass ... is the sun of Christianity, the soul of Faith, the center of the Catholic religion, wherein are beheld all her rites, all her ceremonies, and all her Sacraments; in fine, it is the compendium of all the good and beautiful to be found in the Church of God … It contains the Just One Himself, and the Saint of Saints … The principal excellence of the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass consists in being essentially, and in the very highest degree, identical with that which was offered on the Cross of Calvary … What tongue, human or angelic, may ever describe a power so immeasurable … It is a greater power than that which would be required to change the place of mountains, to dry up seas, and to turn round the heavens.”
St. Thomas Aquinas states: “The celebration of Holy Mass is as valuable as the death of Jesus on the cross.” While St. Padre Pio adds: “It would be easier for the world to survive without the sun than to do without Holy Mass!” It was by His Holy Sacrifice on Calvary that Our Lord definitively defeated Satan, and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the bloodless re-enactment of that same sacrifice, thus it a re-enactment of the defeat of Satan.
(3) The Holy Eucharist = God
“There is nothing so great as the Eucharist. If God had something more precious, He would have given it to us” (St. John Vianney). The Holy Eucharist is God present with us—it the “Real Presence” of Christ under the appearance of bread—it is his Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity hidden in the Sacred Species. If you want to speak directly to God in His presence, then put yourself in the presence of the “Real Presence” of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar. You could put it this way—when we pray to Christ, it is like calling Him on the phone; but when we visit Him in the Holy Eucharist, in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar, then we are there with Him, face to face.
Take note that some exorcists take the Blessed Sacrament in a pyx (the small receptacle they use to carry the Eucharist when on sick calls), along with them when go to perform an exorcism—thus they have Jesus really and truly present, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, to help them in the exorcism. Who could you take along that is any better? Likewise, to combat the devil, it is good to receive Holy Communion as many times as you can—preferably daily.
(4) The Blessed Virgin Mary = Mother of God
We read in St. Louis de Montfort’s The Secret of the Rosary that: “When St. Dominic was preaching the Rosary near Carcassone, an Albigensian was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. The Saint exorcised him in the presence of a great crowd of people. The devils who were in possession of this wretched man were forced to answer St. Dominic’s questions in spite of themselves. They said that by the Rosary which he preached, he put fear and horror into the depths of Hell, and that he was the man they hated most throughout the world because of the souls he snatched from them by the devotion of the Rosary. They revealed several other things.
“St. Dominic put his Rosary round the neck of the possessed man and asked them who, of all the saints in Heaven, was the one they feared most, who should therefore be the most loved and revered by men. At this they let out such unearthly screams that most of the people fell to the ground, seized with fear. St. Dominic saw the Blessed Virgin near at hand surrounded by a multitude of angels. She struck the possessed man with a golden rod that she held and said, ‘Answer my servant Dominic at once!’
“Then the devils started screaming: ‘Oh, you who are enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? O advocate of sinners, you who snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven, must we, in spite of ourselves, tell the whole truth and confess before everyone who it is who is the cause of our shame and our ruin? Oh, woe to us, princes of darkness. Then listen, you Christians. This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell. She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety. It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective. We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us; one single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints. We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants. Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards are saved by her intercession!’” (St. Louis de Montfort’s The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
(5) St. Michael the Archangel
Following Holy Scripture passages, Christian tradition gives to St. Michael four offices:
(1) To fight against Satan.
(2) To rescue the souls of the faithful from the power of the enemy, especially at the hour of death.
(3) To be the champion of God’s people, the Jews in the Old Law, the Christians in the New Testament; therefore he was the patron of the Church, and of the orders of knights during the Middle Ages.
(4) To call away from earth and bring men’s souls to judgment.
Theologians are of the opinion that St. Michael surpasses in glory and power all the other Angels in Heaven. This position of honor was merited by St. Michael in the battle which he waged against Lucifer and the rebellious Angels before the creation of the world. Learned and saintly theologians hold that God revealed to the Angels the future Incarnation of His Divine Son, whom they were to adore in His sacred humanity. At the same time He revealed to them the surpassing dignity and glory of Mary, whom, as the Mother of God, they were to venerate as their Queen.
Lucifer, one of the most glorious and exalted princes of the Heavenly court, dazzled by the splendor of his own gifts, rebelled at the thought that human nature should be preferred to his own Angelic nature. Desiring for himself the prerogatives of the God-man, he raised his great battle-cry of rebellion: “I will be like unto the Most High!” (Isaias 14:14). Some have held that in their pride, a third of the Angels took up Lucifer’s rebellious cry. At the same instant another great Archangel, equal in beauty and grace to the proud Lucifer, opposed the cry of the rebellious Angels with his own battle-cry of love and loyalty: “Michael”—Who is like unto God?
The fearlessness and fidelity of this mighty champion roused the faithful Angels, who rallied to his standard. Then followed that tremendous battle between the good and the bad Angels which St. John describes in the Book of the Apocalypse: “And there was a battle in Heaven: Michael and his Angels battled with the dragon, and the dragon fought and his Angels. And they did not prevail, neither was their place found any more in Heaven. And that great dragon was cast down, the ancient serpent, he who is called the devil and Satan, who led astray the whole world” (Apocalypse 12: 7-9). Thus, St. Michael and his faithful followers won a glorious victory. With the swiftness of lightning, Lucifer and his companions were transformed into hideous demons and cast into the abyss of eternal torment and darkness which God created for them. In reward for his zeal and fidelity, the holy Archangel Michael was made Prince and commander-in-chief of all the Heavenly legions.
(6) Your Guardian Angel
Guardian angels are not just a comforting bedtime story for children! What follows is from the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas, Abbot Anscar Vonier, and others. It is commonly thought that angels were created for us. This idea is correct, but it would be better to say that “man was created for the angels”. This means that the guidance and protection that the guardian angels give us during our lives has one ultimate goal: to ensure that one day we will be worthy of being their companions in Heaven. In order to accomplish this goal each human has a guardian angel assigned to him by God. According to Tradition, guardian angels are not assigned to more than one person. Since the job of a guardian angel ends once the soul under his care has passed into eternal life, this one-angel-to-one-person ratio only applies to those of us who are on earth. According to St. Thomas, even the Anti-Christ, the Man of Sin, will have a guardian angel.
However, just because God assigns a guardian angel to us, does not necessarily mean that the angel does not perform other tasks. Distance does not exist for angels because they are spirits. Our earthly bodies anchor us to this place because of their physical nature, but angels do not have this problem. When a guardian angel is acting on the human soul, he is present. When he has stopped acting, he has departed. St. Thomas Aquinas points out that the angel has complete knowledge of the soul in his charge, even when he is not present.
In order to perform their duty to the best of their ability, guardian angels are granted entire and intimate knowledge of the soul under his care. No other angel has access to this knowledge. Not even demons, who try to lead souls to Hell, have knowledge as intimate as our guardian angels. With this intimate knowledge, guardians angels have the ability to guide us. They can lead us to new trains of thought and new ideas when we are deep in thought. Angels introduce new thoughts to us so subtly, that they appear to be our own—yet the devil, being an angel also, also tries to do the same thing. St. Paul tells us that he will try to appear as “an angel of light”—and we see this in the lives of so many saints, where the devil has appeared imitating the appearance of Our Lord, Our Lady, the saints, the angels and even other human being still living on this Earth. Prudence, caution and knowledge of the rules of discernment are necessary to distinguish and recognize this trap.
While guardian angels can influence and guide us towards Heaven, the amount of help we receive depends on us. St. Thomas states that the power of a guardian angel to work on the interior life of man is dependent on how that man is spiritually disposed. An angel cannot change a person’s will or affect his intellect. These are things only God can do because He created both the will and the intellect. Guardian angels are limited in their influence by the moral state of the man in their care. Like everything that God gives us, guardian angels are only beneficial if we would make use of them. Vonier states “Like all Divine gifts, it may be hidden forever in a napkin, and it may be made to produce a hundredfold.” A muscle that is neglected will atrophy, but exercise will strengthen it and make it strong. So too can calling upon the untapped guidance and wisdom of our guardian angels leads us to eternal life with them. Just as they say today: “Use it, or lose it!”—it could be said of the guardian angels: “Use them, or lose them!”, or more like “Use them, or lose your soul!” The devil is an angel, a human being is no match for an angel, so use your good angel to fight the bad angels—they know all about that kind of warfare. To read more, click here.
(7) Relic of the True Cross
St. Paul talked powerfully about the Holy Cross: “With Christ I am nailed to the cross” (Galatians 2: 19) … “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me and I to the world” (Galatians 6: 14). The Holy Cross is only wood from a tree. But God works powerfully through the wood of the Cross, because Jesus was nailed and died on this wood. For this reason it has become an object of respect and worship for Catholics. God continues to bring about healing and conversions through such a horrible instrument of death. “We adore you O Christ and we bless Thee, because by Thy Holy Cross You have redeemed the world”—we say at each station of the Stations of the Cross.
Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the chief exorcist in Rome for several decades, would use the relic of the True Cross during his exorcisms, and, in his book, An Exorcist Tells His Story, he writes: “The relic of the Holy Cross is most effective, because it is by this Cross that Jesus defeated Satan’s kingdom.” Fr. Amorth, was asked how one can tell if someone is possessed, he replied: “By their aversion to the Blessed Sacrament and all things sacred.” One of the clearest signs of demonic possession is a hatred for the Eucharist or the crucifix.
In his treatise on ascetical and mystical theology Fr. Adolphe Tanquerey explains that: “The Sacramentals and blessed objects are also efficacious remedies [for possession and diabolical temptation], because of the prayers said by the Church when blessing them ... The Crucifix, the Sign of the Cross, and especially genuine relics of the True Cross are terrifying to the devil, who was vanquished by the Cross: ‘That the one who conquered by a tree should himself be likewise conquered by the Tree.’ For the same reason the Evil Spirit dreads the invocation of the Holy Name of Jesus, which, on the Master's Own promise, possesses a wondrous power for putting the devil to flight” (The Spiritual Life, p. 724).
(8) Relics of Saints
St. Augustine, in his Confessions, writes of the relics of the martyrs Protasius and Gervasius: “The bodies of the martyrs Protasius and Gervasius were hidden … After the bodies had been discovered and dug up, they were carried to Ambrose's basilica with the honor that was due to them. On the way several persons who were tormented by evil spirits were cured, for even the devils acknowledged the holy relics.”
The Roman Ritual prescribes a Rite of Exorcism containing a series of prayers, blessings and invocations in the exorcizing of the devil. The holy arsenal of weapons used in an exorcism include blessings with the relics of saints. Fr. Jordan Aumann, OP, in his Spiritual Theology, writes: “The Roman Ritual also recommends the use of relics in the rite of exorcism. The most precious and venerated of all relics, and those that inspire the greatest horror in the demons, are the particles of the true Cross because they remind the demons of the definitive victory that Christ won over them on Calvary.”
(9) Holy Water
St. Teresa of Avila in The Book of Her Life stated: “I often experience that there is nothing the devils flee from more -without returning than holy water” (Chapter 31). We cannot fail to be impressed by the urgent supplication of the Church, during the blessing of holy water, for protection from the infernal enemy, from his cunning and wickedness. This petition recurs in each of the five prayers. Here are some extracts from the Roman Ritual for the blessing and exorcising of the salt and water used in the making of Holy Water:
As the priest exorcises the salt, he says: “I exorcise thee, creature of salt, by the living + God, by the true + God, by the holy + God … that thou mayest become exorcised salt for the salvation of those that believe; and that thou mayest be for the healing of soul and body to all those receiving thee, and that there may be banished from the place in which thou hast been sprinkled every kind of hallucination and wickedness, or wile of devilish deceit, and every unclean spirit … O Almighty and eternal God, we humbly implore Thine infinite mercy, that this creature of salt … may make for health of mind and body to all who partake of it; and that what ever is touched or sprinkled with it may be freed from all uncleanness, and from the assaults of the evil spirit ...”
As the priest exorcises the water, he says: “I exorcise thee, creature of water, in the Name of God + the Father Almighty, and in the name of Jesus + Christ His Son our Lord, and in the power of the Holy + Spirit, that thou mayest be made exorcised water for the banishment of every power of the enemy, and that thou mayest be able to uproot and cast out that enemy himself, together with his rebel angels … Fill this element … with Thy power and blessing + so that this creature of Thine may be endowed with divine grace to drive away devils and to cast out diseases; that whatever in the houses or possessions of the faithful may be sprinkled by this water may be freed from everything unclean and delivered from what is hurtful. Let no spirit of pestilence or baleful breath abide therein; let all the snares of the enemy who lieth in wait be driven forth; and let everything that threatens the safety or peace of the dwellers therein be banished by the sprinkling of this water …”
As the Priest puts blessed salt into the water, making three signs of the cross, he says: “O God, the giver of invincible strength, and King of irresistible power, ever wonderful in triumph, who holdest in check the power of the enemy, who overcomest the fury of raging enemies, who by Thy might gainest the victory over all their guile; we humbly pray and beseech Thee, O Lord, to look upon this Thy creation of salt and water … that wherever it be sprinkled … every assault of the unclean spirit may be baffled, all fear of the venomous serpent cast out …”
(10) Blessed Crucifix
Fr. Jordan Aumann, OP, in his Spiritual Theology writes: “The Roman Ritual prescribes that the exorcist should have a crucifix in his hand or before his eyes. It has been verified many times that the devil will flee merely at the sight of a crucifix. The sign of the cross has always been used by Christians as a safeguard against the devil, and the Church makes special use of it in the rite of exorcism.”
(11) Blessed Rosary Beads
We read the following account in The Secret of the Rosary, by St. Louis de Montfort: “Blessed Alan [de la Roche]relates that a man he knew had tried desperately all kinds of devotions to rid himself of the evil spirit which possessed him, but without success. Finally, he thought of wearing his Rosary round his neck, which eased him considerably. He discovered that whenever he took it off the devil tormented him cruelly, so he resolved to wear it night and day. This drove the evil spirit away forever because he could not bear such a terrible chain. Blessed Alan also testifies that he delivered a great number of those who were possessed by putting a Rosary round their necks.
“Father Jean Amât, of the Order of St. Dominic, was giving a series of Lenten sermons in the Kingdom of Aragon one year, when a young girl was brought to him who was possessed by the devil. After he had exorcised her several times without success, he put his Rosary round her neck. Hardly had he done so when the girl began to scream and cry out in a fearful way, shrieking, ‘Take it off! Take it off! These beads are tormenting me!’ At last, the priest, filled with pity for the girl, took his Rosary off her” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Twenty-Seventh Rose”).
(12) Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel
During the blessing of the Brown Scapular and the investiture that follows, the Holy Mother Church says the following through her priest: “May God Almighty, the Creator of Heaven and earth, bless you, He who has deigned to join you to the confraternity of the Blessed Virgin of Mount Carmel; we beseech her to crush the head of the ancient serpent so that you may enter into possession of your eternal heritage…”
The Venerable Francis Ypes had his Scapular fall off one day. As he replaced it, God allowed him hear the devil howl: “Take off that habit, which snatches so many souls from us!” Then and there Francis made the devil admit that there are three things which the demons are most afraid of: the Holy Name of Jesus, the Holy Name of Mary, and the Holy Scapular of Carmel. To that list we could add the Holy Rosary.
(13) St. Benedict Medal
The origin of the Medal probably dates back to the time of St. Benedict himself, of whom we know that, in his frequent combats with the evil spirit, he generally made use of the Sign of the Cross and wrought many miracles thereby. He also taught his disciples to use the Sign of our redemption against the assaults of Satan and in other dangers. St. Maurus and St. Placidus, his first and most renowned disciples, wrought their numerous miracles through the power of the holy Cross and in the name and by the merits of their holy Founder.
For the early Christians, the cross was a favorite symbol and badge of their faith in Christ. From the writings of St. Gregory the Great (540-604), we know that St. Benedict had a deep Faith in the Cross and worked miracles with the Sign of the Cross. This Faith in, and special devotion to, the Cross was passed on to succeeding generations of Benedictines. Devotion to the Cross of Christ also gave rise to the striking of medals that bore the image of St. Benedict, holding a cross aloft in his right hand and his Rule for Monasteries in the other hand. Thus, the Cross has always been closely associated with the Medal of St. Benedict, which is often referred to as the Medal-Cross of St. Benedict.
On the back of the medal, the Cross is dominant. On the arms of the Cross are the initial letters of a rhythmic Latin prayer: Crux sacra sit mihi lux! Nunquam draco sit mihi dux! (May the Holy Cross be my light! May the dragon never be my guide!). Around the margin of the back of the medal, the letters V R S N S M V - S M Q L I V B are the initial letters of a Latin prayer of exorcism against Satan: Vade retro Satana! Nunquam suade mihi vana! Sunt mala quae libas. Ipse venena bibas! (Begone Satan! Never tempt me with your vanities! What you offer me is evil. Drink the poison yourself!). For a full explanation of the symbolism on the medal and a downloadable poster click here.
(14) Other Blessed Medals and articles
Fr. Adolphe Tanquerey explains that: “The Sacramentals and blessed objects are also efficacious remedies [for possession and diabolical temptation], because of the prayers said by the Church when blessing them” ... Fr. Amorth, was asked how one can tell if someone is possessed, he replied: “By their aversion to the Blessed Sacrament and all things sacred.”
(15) The words of Holy Scripture
To St. Catherine of Bologna God showed Seven Spiritual Weapons for combatting the devil, which she later wrote down in a book of the same name—Seven Spiritual Weapons. The seventh weapon concerns knowledge and use of the Word of God, meaning Holy Scripture. St. Catherine writes:
“The seventh weapon with which we can conquer our enemies is the memory of Holy Scripture which we must carry in our hearts and from which, as from a most devoted mother, we must take counsel in the things we have to do. Thus we read of the most prudent and consecrated virgin St. Cecilia where it says: ”She always bore the gospel of Christ hidden in her heart.””And with this weapon, our savior Christ Jesus conquered and confounded the devil in the desert saying: ”It is written, etc …” (Luke 4:1-13). Therefore, let not the daily readings go without effect; and let the thoughts which you hear each day in the Gospels and Epistles at Mass, be new letters sent to you by your heavenly spouse. And with great and fervent love put them in your heart, and when you have more time, think about them. By doing this you will find yourselves continuously consoled, because you will often receive news from the one whom you love above all else.
“Is not the word of Christ evangelical doctrine? Certainly it is, and so how attentively you should listen to it. Learn to use these weapons wisely and never be found without them so that you can better obtain the triumph of victory against your adversaries. And be on guard that you are not deceived by the mere appearance of good, for the devil sometimes appears in the appearance of Christ, or of the virgin Mary, or in the shape of an angel or of a saint. Therefore, in every apparition that occurs, take up the weapon of Scripture which shows how the mother of Christ carried herself when the Angel Gabriel appeared to her. She said to him: ”What manner of greeting is this? (Luke 1:29). Follow her example in every appearance and feeling, and you will want to test much better, whether it is a good or a wicked spirit, before you listen to him. Blessed is whoever does this.” (St. Catherine of Bolgona, Seven Spiritual Weapons).
(16) Zeal in Doing Good
St. Catherine of Bologna, to whom God showed Seven Spiritual Weapons for combatting the devil, also speaks of the weapon of zeal for doing good. She writes:
“The first weapon I call zeal, that is solicitude in doing good, since the Holy Scriptures condemn those who are negligent and lukewarm in the way of God (Apocalypse 3.15-16).The office of the Holy Spirit is to inspire in us good inspirations, while our duty is to accept them and put them into operation by waging continual violence against our sensuality which always invites us to what is contrary to what the spirit wills. Therefore, it is necessary to resist it with true diligence and not to let the time, granted to us, pass by without acquiring the fruit of good works, as it is written: “Whoever wishes to go up, let him rest not from thoughts, from speaking words and doing deeds.”
“And always exerting himself in God but with discretion, so that when our adversary, like a wicked traitor, assails us from ambush, we can defend ourselves. By the words ”from ambush” I mean, when, under the appearance of good he wishes to kill you, for there is as much danger in too much as in too little. And so I tell you “with discretion,” aware that this virtue establishes and perfects all the other virtues according to what was said by the glorious teacher of the ancient holy fathers, that is, St. Antonio of Vienna.
“So it is proper for us to exercise with true discretion all the spiritual and temporal virtues. However, when the enemy sees that he cannot impede the servant of Christ from doing good, he will seek to entice her with doing too much. So exercise all the virtues in proper measure that the weapon of true and diligent discretion may be exercised by us for our salvation and for the praise of Christ” (St. Catherine of Bolgona, Seven Spiritual Weapons).
(17) Remembrance of Death, Judgement, Heaven & Hell
Another weapon revealed to St. Catherine of Bologna is that of ever having before our eyes and in our mind the fact that our death approaches closer with each day—and after death comes Judgment and a final eternal abode: Heaven or Hell, with Purgatory being an extremely painful temporary residence. St. Catherine writes:
“The fifth weapon is to remind oneself that we must die. This time is called the ‘time of mercy’ in which God looks down day after day so that we can amend our lives from good to better. If we do not do this, we will have to render account, not only of the evils we have done, but also of the goods left undone by our negligence. And so Paul the glorious Apostle spoke well: ‘Let us do good while we have time’ (Galatians 6.10). So often think about death and always stand ready for it, for we know neither the day nor the hour when the most strict judge will command us to render account of the talent of good will granted to us so we could exercise it in praise of Him and for the salvation of our soul and of our neighbors.
“Souls should be especially on guard, lest, out of excessive confidence in themselves, they trespass the rule imposed on them by their superiors. They should devote all their effort to walking along that way which is marked for them. I say this because, sometimes, the enemy, with shrewd cunning, leads those who are only slightly instructed in the spiritual battle to think that they must soon die and that they will have little to show for themselves if they do not do further penance.
“For this reason, the malignant one strives and studies to make them exceed the rule of true obedience, which is without any doubt more meritorious than any penance they could do. So it is necessary to use with good judgment this weapon of recollection of our death, so that it can be utilized for the salvation of the soul and for the praise of Christ” (St. Catherine of Bolgona, Seven Spiritual Weapons).
(18) Remembrance of Eternal Rewards & Punishment
Another weapon revealed to St. Catherine of Bologna is that of remembering the paradise prepared for those who fight the good fight of Faith, which should help us overcome the temptations by the goods of this world, with which the devil tempts us. Our Lord told to place our treasure in Heaven, not Earth: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
St. Catherine writes:
“The sixth weapon is the memory of the goods of paradise, which are prepared for those who lawfully struggle, by abandoning all the vain pleasures of the present life, in accord with the saying of the most holy doctor Saint Augustine: that it is impossible to enjoy present goods and future ones too. So be content not to have, in this world, any pleasure or any beloved, and do not grow tired of denying your own will, remembering what St. Francis said, that is, that the most excellent and greatest gift, that God’s servant can receive from God in this world, is to conquer himself by denying his own will. I beg you, that you not follow your current evil desire and temptation, but stand strong and persevere until the end, so that you can finally reach that noble feast and company which I saw, and rest eternally with these glorious saints who await you.”
Think on the parable of Sheep and the Goats: “And all nations shall be gathered together before Him, and He shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separateth the sheep from the goats. And He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on His left. Then shall the King say to them that shall be on His right hand: ‘Come, ye blessed of My Father, possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me in; naked, and you covered Me: sick, and you visited Me: I was in prison, and you came to Me.’
“Then shall the just answer Him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, and fed Thee; thirsty, and gave Thee drink? And when did we see Thee a stranger, and took Thee in? Or naked, and covered Thee? Or when did we see Thee sick or in prison, and came to Thee?’
“And the king answering, shall say to them: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to Me!’
“Then He shall say to them also that shall be on His left hand: ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels! For I was hungry, and you gave Me not to eat: I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink; I was a stranger, and you took Me not in; naked, and you covered Me not; sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me!’
“Then they also shall answer Him, saying: ‘Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to Thee?’ Then He shall answer them, saying: ‘Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!’ And these shall go into everlasting punishment: but the just, into life everlasting” (Matthew 25:32-46).
Article 5
Monday after the First Sunday of Lent, February 19th
Delving into the Devil!
Monday after the First Sunday of Lent, February 19th
Delving into the Devil!
The Prince of this World
We are born, we live, and we die on the battlefield of life: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). For this Earth is the fiefdom or princedom of the devil, whom Our Lord calls the “prince of this world” who rules the world. “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not any thing” (John 14:30). Our Lord therefore separates Himself from this world: “And He said to them (Pharisees): ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world’” (John 8:23). He tells Pilate: “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36) and He says to us: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, for I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:19).
No Peace with the Prince of this World
“No man can serve two masters! For either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will sustain the one, and despise the other! You cannot serve God and mammon (the world)!” (Matthew 6:24). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15), for “know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). There can be no true and lasting peace on Earth until “the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
“Be Gone!” Christ Tells Satan
In the Gospel for the First Sunday of Lent, we saw how Christ was tempted by Satan. Christ primarily uses the words of Holy Scripture against Satan: “… Jesus answered and said: ‘It is written, “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” … Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!” … Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him” (Matthew 4:1-11).
Who Do We Serve?
Whose side are we on? Who do we serve? Who do we work for? Ultimately, we are either for Christ, or for Satan: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30)―there is no third option, no neutrality, no fence-sitting! In theory, of course, we will vehemently insist that we are for Christ―much like St. Peter protested to Our Lord that he would never leave Him: “And Jesus said to Peter: ‘Amen I say to thee! Today, even in this night, before the cock crows twice, thou shall deny Me thrice!’ But Peter spoke the more vehemently, saying: ‘Although I should die together with Thee, I will not deny Thee!’” (Mark 14:30-31). Peter vehemently insisted on his allegiance to Christ―but he denied Him three times during Christ’s Passion. The same applies to us―in theory, we vehemently insist that we are on Christ’s side; but then we go ahead and sin: “He that commits sin is of the devil!” (1 John 3:8). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us!” (1 John 1:8).
Just as Christ rules by grace, so too does Satan rule by sin. Whether we believe it or not, or like to admit it or not, we have frequently change sides from Christ to Satan, back to Christ, then back to Satan, then again back to Christ―all lifelong. As Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the former chief exorcist of Rome, says: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world―the whole world is in the power of the evil one! … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere! Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world! … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican! … Legions of demons have lodged there! … One day Padre Pio said to me very sorrowfully: ‘You know what, Gabriele? It is Satan who has been introduced into the bosom of the Church and within a very short time he will come to rule a false Church!’ … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan! The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin … In most cases, those who are distant from the Faith are more susceptible to this risk, but this is only an indication of the maxim that says the devil is more tranquil if he does not have to live with prayer, fasting, the Eucharist, and the other sacramental practices.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
Another exorcist, Fr. Aga Tarog, warns: “Mortal sin is the primary entry point for demonic possession!” Another exorcist adds: “Sin is a far greater danger than the devil. The devil is outside of us. Even in a possession, he cannot possess our soul.” Nevertheless―as even the Liberal and Modernist Pope Paul VI said― “Satan is enemy number one, he is the tempter par excellence … the enemy of mankind!”
Know Your Enemy
Sun Tzu was a Chinese military general, strategist, philosopher and writer, who was born in 544 BC. Sun Tzu is traditionally credited as the author of The Art of War―an influential work of military strategy that has affected both Western and East Asian philosophy and military thinking. In The Art of War, he writes: “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”
It is imperative that we know our enemies and know their tactics. Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, tells us that our enemy, Satan, prefers to be unknown and unseen―so that he might better wreak his havoc and do his damage: “The devil does not like to be seen … Satan’s biggest triumph is mankind’s conviction that he doesn’t exist ... He makes people believe that Hell does not exist, that sin does not exist, and that he is nothing but one more experience to try out ... When we jeer at the devil and tell ourselves that he does not exist, that is when he is happiest!”
How the Devil Gets Into Your Life
Fr. Gabriele Amorth explains: “How can we fall prey to extraordinary satanic activity? By this I mean other than the ordinary activity—temptation—which applies to everyone. We can do so through our own fault or by being completely unaware. We can group the reasons into four categories: (1) with God’s permission, (2) as innocent victims of an evil spell, (3) due to a grave and hardened sinful condition, (4) through association with evil people or places." (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
1. With God’s Permission
Fr. Gabriele Amorth continues: “I want to make absolutely clear that nothing happens without God’s permission. It is also absolutely clear that God does not wish evil for anyone, but he allows it when it is our will (since he created us with completely free will), and he can use everything, even evil, for our own good. The characteristic of the first category of extraordinary demonic activity is complete absence of human guilt; it is entirely due to a diabolical intervention. God always allows normal satanic activity—temptation—and gives us all the graces necessary to resist, with the resulting good of strengthening our spiritual life.
“In the same manner, God at times also allows extraordinary satanic activity—possession, evil influences—to increase our humility, patience, and mortification. We have already given a couple of examples of this category: an external action of the devil that causes physical pain (such as the beatings and floggings suffered by the Curé of Ars and St. Padre Pio) or when a so-called oppression is allowed, as we have mentioned concerning Job and Saint Paul.
“The lives of many saints include examples of this affliction. Among modern saints, I can cite two: Father Giovanni Calabria and Sister Mary of Jesus Crucified (who was the first Arab to be beatified). In both cases, and without any human fault, they were subjected to periods of true satanic possession. During those periods, the two saints did and said things totally incompatible with their holiness, without the least fault―because it was the devil who acted through their bodies.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
2. When We Are Subjected to an Evil Spell.
Fr. Gabriele Amorth states: “This is another case in which the victim is completely blameless. Here, however, there is some human activity, but it is performed by those who cast the spell or those who hire a witch to cast it. I will devote an entire chapter to this topic. Here I will simply say that an evil spell is causing the suffering of others through the intervention of the devil. This intervention can take many different forms: binding, the evil eye, a curse. I will say right away that the most common method is sorcery. Sorcery is also the most frequent cause that we encounter in those who are struck by possession or other evil influences. I do not understand the reasons behind the refusal of some churchmen who claim not to believe in sorcery, and cannot protect from sorcery those among their flock who are victims of this evil.
“Some may be surprised that God allows this sort of evil to happen. God created us free, and He never rejects His creatures, not even the most perverted. At the end, he rewards everyone according to his just deserts, because everyone will be judged according to his actions. In the meantime, if we use well the freedom that He gave us, we will gain merit; or we can use it for evil purposes, and we will earn blame. We can either help others, or hurt them through many forms of abuse. To give an example: I can pay a killer to murder someone; God is not obligated to stop him. Just as easily, I can pay a warlock or a witch doctor to cast an evil spell on someone. God, just as in the first case, is not obligated to intervene, although in many cases He does. For instance, those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining Divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin.
“Here I must give a warning that I will expand in a later chapter: the field of sorcery and other evil actions is the domain of swindlers. Instances of true sorcery are a minute percentage among the wholesale deceit that prevails in this arena. Besides offering a variety of opportunities to swindlers, sorcery is also particularly suited to suggestions and whims of feeble minds. Therefore, it is important that the exorcist be on guard against deception, but it is also important that everyone with common sense be vigilant too." (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
3. A Grave and Hardened State of Sin
Fr. Gabriele Amorth warns against being hardened in habitual mortal sin: “Here we are addressing the cause that today, unfortunately, is on the increase, with a resulting increase in the numbers of people who are victims of the devil. At the root, the true cause is always a lack of Faith. As lack of Faith increases, so does superstition; it is almost a mathematical reality. I believe that the Gospel gives us a clear example of this in the character of Judas. He was a thief. Who knows how many times Jesus tried to correct him and call him to repentance? And the only result was rejection and a hardening in sin. Judas reaches the climax when he asks the chief priests: “What are you prepared to give me, if I hand Him over to you?” (Matthew 26:15). In the narrative of the Last Supper, the Gospel tells us that terrible sentence about Judas: “Then after the morsel, Satan entered into him” (John 13:27). I have no doubt that here it means true diabolic possession.
“In the current environment, where we are witnessing the collapse of the family, I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. I have dealt many times with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. It is almost redundant to say that, in all these stages, the way to healing can begin only with a sincere conversion.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
4. Association with Evil People and Places
Fr. Gabriele Amorth concludes: “This category includes the practice or assisting in the practice of séances, witchcraft, satanic cults, or sects—which culminate in black masses—the occult… associating with warlocks, witch doctors, or certain types of card readers. These are all activities that make us vulnerable to evil spells. If we go so far as to desire a relationship with Satan, there is such a thing as consecration to Satan, the blood pact with Satan, attendance at satanic schools, and the election to the priesthood of Satan. Unfortunately, in the past fifteen years, we have witnessed an increase, almost an explosion, of these types of associations.
“A very common example of associating with warlocks or witch doctors is this: Someone who is the victim of a stubborn illness cannot find any remedy. Someone else experiences all sorts of misfortune and believes that it is due to an evil influence. They appeal to a card reader or a warlock, who tells them, “You are subject to an evil spell.” Up to now, there is very little damage done. However, unfortunately what follows is something like this: “For one thousand dollars—or more—I will cure you.” These fees can be as high as $35,000. If the individual agrees, the card reader or warlock asks for some personal item: a photograph, a piece of underwear, a lock of hair, a few hairs, or a nail clipping. At this point, the evil act is accomplished. What does the warlock do with these items? He obviously uses them to practice black magic.
“Unfortunately, many fall victim to these individuals because these sorcerers are often women who are always seen in church, or because the room of the warlock is blanketed with crucifixes, portraits of saints, the Blessed Virgin, and portraits of Padre Pio. The victims are also often told, “I practice only white magic; if you asked me for black magic I would refuse.” In current terminology, white magic means to take away a spell; black magic means to cast a spell. In reality, as Father Candido never ceased to repeat, there are no such things as “white” and “black” magic; there is only black magic. Every form of magic is practiced with recourse to Satan. Therefore, the poor victim who went to the warlock with a minor evil influence (or probably without any such influence) goes home with a true, full-blown one. When this occurs, often we exorcists have to work much harder after the ill-fated action of the warlocks, than we would have if the person had come to us with the original complaint.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
Devil On Your Shoulder
As Fr. Amorth and the other exorcists say―we all have a devil on our shoulder―24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, all lifelong: “We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … When I hear confessions, I often say to my penitents, somewhat jokingly, that their temptations will end only five minutes after they have exhaled their last breath! ... Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour! … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere! Everywhere! … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan!” (Fr. Amorth). Yet most people―even most Catholics―are oblivious and indifferent to the ever present devils in their lives. That is how the devil likes it―for he can best do his work when he is unnoticed: “The devil does not like to be seen … This helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed … When we jeer at the devil and tell ourselves that he does not exist, that is when he is happiest!” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
We are born, we live, and we die on the battlefield of life: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). For this Earth is the fiefdom or princedom of the devil, whom Our Lord calls the “prince of this world” who rules the world. “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not any thing” (John 14:30). Our Lord therefore separates Himself from this world: “And He said to them (Pharisees): ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world’” (John 8:23). He tells Pilate: “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36) and He says to us: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, for I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:19).
No Peace with the Prince of this World
“No man can serve two masters! For either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will sustain the one, and despise the other! You cannot serve God and mammon (the world)!” (Matthew 6:24). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15), for “know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). There can be no true and lasting peace on Earth until “the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
“Be Gone!” Christ Tells Satan
In the Gospel for the First Sunday of Lent, we saw how Christ was tempted by Satan. Christ primarily uses the words of Holy Scripture against Satan: “… Jesus answered and said: ‘It is written, “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” … Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!” … Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him” (Matthew 4:1-11).
Who Do We Serve?
Whose side are we on? Who do we serve? Who do we work for? Ultimately, we are either for Christ, or for Satan: “He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 12:30)―there is no third option, no neutrality, no fence-sitting! In theory, of course, we will vehemently insist that we are for Christ―much like St. Peter protested to Our Lord that he would never leave Him: “And Jesus said to Peter: ‘Amen I say to thee! Today, even in this night, before the cock crows twice, thou shall deny Me thrice!’ But Peter spoke the more vehemently, saying: ‘Although I should die together with Thee, I will not deny Thee!’” (Mark 14:30-31). Peter vehemently insisted on his allegiance to Christ―but he denied Him three times during Christ’s Passion. The same applies to us―in theory, we vehemently insist that we are on Christ’s side; but then we go ahead and sin: “He that commits sin is of the devil!” (1 John 3:8). “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us!” (1 John 1:8).
Just as Christ rules by grace, so too does Satan rule by sin. Whether we believe it or not, or like to admit it or not, we have frequently change sides from Christ to Satan, back to Christ, then back to Satan, then again back to Christ―all lifelong. As Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the former chief exorcist of Rome, says: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands! … Satan continually tries to dominate the world―the whole world is in the power of the evil one! … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere! Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world! … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican! … Legions of demons have lodged there! … One day Padre Pio said to me very sorrowfully: ‘You know what, Gabriele? It is Satan who has been introduced into the bosom of the Church and within a very short time he will come to rule a false Church!’ … I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family]. Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan! The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin … In most cases, those who are distant from the Faith are more susceptible to this risk, but this is only an indication of the maxim that says the devil is more tranquil if he does not have to live with prayer, fasting, the Eucharist, and the other sacramental practices.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
Another exorcist, Fr. Aga Tarog, warns: “Mortal sin is the primary entry point for demonic possession!” Another exorcist adds: “Sin is a far greater danger than the devil. The devil is outside of us. Even in a possession, he cannot possess our soul.” Nevertheless―as even the Liberal and Modernist Pope Paul VI said― “Satan is enemy number one, he is the tempter par excellence … the enemy of mankind!”
Know Your Enemy
Sun Tzu was a Chinese military general, strategist, philosopher and writer, who was born in 544 BC. Sun Tzu is traditionally credited as the author of The Art of War―an influential work of military strategy that has affected both Western and East Asian philosophy and military thinking. In The Art of War, he writes: “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”
It is imperative that we know our enemies and know their tactics. Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome, tells us that our enemy, Satan, prefers to be unknown and unseen―so that he might better wreak his havoc and do his damage: “The devil does not like to be seen … Satan’s biggest triumph is mankind’s conviction that he doesn’t exist ... He makes people believe that Hell does not exist, that sin does not exist, and that he is nothing but one more experience to try out ... When we jeer at the devil and tell ourselves that he does not exist, that is when he is happiest!”
How the Devil Gets Into Your Life
Fr. Gabriele Amorth explains: “How can we fall prey to extraordinary satanic activity? By this I mean other than the ordinary activity—temptation—which applies to everyone. We can do so through our own fault or by being completely unaware. We can group the reasons into four categories: (1) with God’s permission, (2) as innocent victims of an evil spell, (3) due to a grave and hardened sinful condition, (4) through association with evil people or places." (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
1. With God’s Permission
Fr. Gabriele Amorth continues: “I want to make absolutely clear that nothing happens without God’s permission. It is also absolutely clear that God does not wish evil for anyone, but he allows it when it is our will (since he created us with completely free will), and he can use everything, even evil, for our own good. The characteristic of the first category of extraordinary demonic activity is complete absence of human guilt; it is entirely due to a diabolical intervention. God always allows normal satanic activity—temptation—and gives us all the graces necessary to resist, with the resulting good of strengthening our spiritual life.
“In the same manner, God at times also allows extraordinary satanic activity—possession, evil influences—to increase our humility, patience, and mortification. We have already given a couple of examples of this category: an external action of the devil that causes physical pain (such as the beatings and floggings suffered by the Curé of Ars and St. Padre Pio) or when a so-called oppression is allowed, as we have mentioned concerning Job and Saint Paul.
“The lives of many saints include examples of this affliction. Among modern saints, I can cite two: Father Giovanni Calabria and Sister Mary of Jesus Crucified (who was the first Arab to be beatified). In both cases, and without any human fault, they were subjected to periods of true satanic possession. During those periods, the two saints did and said things totally incompatible with their holiness, without the least fault―because it was the devil who acted through their bodies.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
2. When We Are Subjected to an Evil Spell.
Fr. Gabriele Amorth states: “This is another case in which the victim is completely blameless. Here, however, there is some human activity, but it is performed by those who cast the spell or those who hire a witch to cast it. I will devote an entire chapter to this topic. Here I will simply say that an evil spell is causing the suffering of others through the intervention of the devil. This intervention can take many different forms: binding, the evil eye, a curse. I will say right away that the most common method is sorcery. Sorcery is also the most frequent cause that we encounter in those who are struck by possession or other evil influences. I do not understand the reasons behind the refusal of some churchmen who claim not to believe in sorcery, and cannot protect from sorcery those among their flock who are victims of this evil.
“Some may be surprised that God allows this sort of evil to happen. God created us free, and He never rejects His creatures, not even the most perverted. At the end, he rewards everyone according to his just deserts, because everyone will be judged according to his actions. In the meantime, if we use well the freedom that He gave us, we will gain merit; or we can use it for evil purposes, and we will earn blame. We can either help others, or hurt them through many forms of abuse. To give an example: I can pay a killer to murder someone; God is not obligated to stop him. Just as easily, I can pay a warlock or a witch doctor to cast an evil spell on someone. God, just as in the first case, is not obligated to intervene, although in many cases He does. For instance, those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining Divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin.
“Here I must give a warning that I will expand in a later chapter: the field of sorcery and other evil actions is the domain of swindlers. Instances of true sorcery are a minute percentage among the wholesale deceit that prevails in this arena. Besides offering a variety of opportunities to swindlers, sorcery is also particularly suited to suggestions and whims of feeble minds. Therefore, it is important that the exorcist be on guard against deception, but it is also important that everyone with common sense be vigilant too." (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
3. A Grave and Hardened State of Sin
Fr. Gabriele Amorth warns against being hardened in habitual mortal sin: “Here we are addressing the cause that today, unfortunately, is on the increase, with a resulting increase in the numbers of people who are victims of the devil. At the root, the true cause is always a lack of Faith. As lack of Faith increases, so does superstition; it is almost a mathematical reality. I believe that the Gospel gives us a clear example of this in the character of Judas. He was a thief. Who knows how many times Jesus tried to correct him and call him to repentance? And the only result was rejection and a hardening in sin. Judas reaches the climax when he asks the chief priests: “What are you prepared to give me, if I hand Him over to you?” (Matthew 26:15). In the narrative of the Last Supper, the Gospel tells us that terrible sentence about Judas: “Then after the morsel, Satan entered into him” (John 13:27). I have no doubt that here it means true diabolic possession.
“In the current environment, where we are witnessing the collapse of the family, I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. I have dealt many times with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. It is almost redundant to say that, in all these stages, the way to healing can begin only with a sincere conversion.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
4. Association with Evil People and Places
Fr. Gabriele Amorth concludes: “This category includes the practice or assisting in the practice of séances, witchcraft, satanic cults, or sects—which culminate in black masses—the occult… associating with warlocks, witch doctors, or certain types of card readers. These are all activities that make us vulnerable to evil spells. If we go so far as to desire a relationship with Satan, there is such a thing as consecration to Satan, the blood pact with Satan, attendance at satanic schools, and the election to the priesthood of Satan. Unfortunately, in the past fifteen years, we have witnessed an increase, almost an explosion, of these types of associations.
“A very common example of associating with warlocks or witch doctors is this: Someone who is the victim of a stubborn illness cannot find any remedy. Someone else experiences all sorts of misfortune and believes that it is due to an evil influence. They appeal to a card reader or a warlock, who tells them, “You are subject to an evil spell.” Up to now, there is very little damage done. However, unfortunately what follows is something like this: “For one thousand dollars—or more—I will cure you.” These fees can be as high as $35,000. If the individual agrees, the card reader or warlock asks for some personal item: a photograph, a piece of underwear, a lock of hair, a few hairs, or a nail clipping. At this point, the evil act is accomplished. What does the warlock do with these items? He obviously uses them to practice black magic.
“Unfortunately, many fall victim to these individuals because these sorcerers are often women who are always seen in church, or because the room of the warlock is blanketed with crucifixes, portraits of saints, the Blessed Virgin, and portraits of Padre Pio. The victims are also often told, “I practice only white magic; if you asked me for black magic I would refuse.” In current terminology, white magic means to take away a spell; black magic means to cast a spell. In reality, as Father Candido never ceased to repeat, there are no such things as “white” and “black” magic; there is only black magic. Every form of magic is practiced with recourse to Satan. Therefore, the poor victim who went to the warlock with a minor evil influence (or probably without any such influence) goes home with a true, full-blown one. When this occurs, often we exorcists have to work much harder after the ill-fated action of the warlocks, than we would have if the person had come to us with the original complaint.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
Devil On Your Shoulder
As Fr. Amorth and the other exorcists say―we all have a devil on our shoulder―24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, all lifelong: “We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … When I hear confessions, I often say to my penitents, somewhat jokingly, that their temptations will end only five minutes after they have exhaled their last breath! ... Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour! … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere! Everywhere! … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan!” (Fr. Amorth). Yet most people―even most Catholics―are oblivious and indifferent to the ever present devils in their lives. That is how the devil likes it―for he can best do his work when he is unnoticed: “The devil does not like to be seen … This helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed … When we jeer at the devil and tell ourselves that he does not exist, that is when he is happiest!” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth).
Article 4
The First Sunday of Lent, February 18th
Getting to Grips with Temptation!
The First Sunday of Lent, February 18th
Getting to Grips with Temptation!
(A) FORMING THE BATTLE LINES
The Battle Arena of Temptation
We are born, we live, and we die on the battlefield of life: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). For this Earth is the fiefdom or princedom of the devil, whom Our Lord calls the “prince of this world” who rules the world. “The prince of this world cometh, and in me he hath not any thing” (John 14:30). There can be no true and lasting peace on Earth until “the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31), “because the prince of this world is already judged” (John 16:11).
Whose Side Are We On?
In our lives there can be no neutrality. We have to make a choice in this world—do we live for Heaven and renounce the things of the world? Or do we live for this world and―despite our wishful thinking to the contrary―renounce the things of Heaven: “No man can serve two masters! For either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will sustain the one, and despise the other! You cannot serve God and mammon (the world)!” (Matthew 6:24). To the rich young man, Our Lord said: “‘If you want to be perfect, go sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad― for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:21-23).
Our Lord therefore separates Himself from this world: “And he said to them (Pharisees): ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world’” (John 8:23). He tells Pilate: “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36) and He says to us: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, for I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:19).
Battles and Bullets
That is why we are not to love the world, for the world belongs to the devil, an enemy of God: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15), for “know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). Thus we have two opposing camps in this world—the one of God and the one of the devil. There can be no spectators in this battle, for, as Our Lord says: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). Therefore, once again, we are born into a battle and the first enemy we meet on the battlefield is temptation, or, to put it another way, the first things we will encounter will be the bullets of temptation. That is why Holy Scripture warns us: “Son, when you come to the service of God, stand in justice and in fear, and prepare your soul for temptation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1), “and because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should test you!” (Tobias 12:13).
The Prince and His Kingdom
The devil―the prince and ruler of the world (John 12:31)―will use the world to tempt us and he will unite the temptations of the world to his own direct temptations in order to break-down our resistance. He will use persons, places and things to draw us away from God and into an addiction to the things and pleasures the world can offer.
Soldiers of the Devil
Once drawn away from God and being true soldiers of Christ―we become soldiers of the devil―“the children of the Kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness” (Matthew 8:12), where they become “the children of unbelief … children of this world … being fettered with the bonds of darkness” (Ephesians 5:6; Luke 16:8; Wisdom 17:2). These, newly-won recruits to the ranks of the world, the devil will use to entice others away from God. “They adored the dragon, which gave power to the beast: and they adored the beast, saying: ‘Who is like to the beast? and who shall be able to fight with him?’” (Apocalypse 13:4). “For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
No Peace With the Enemy
“Wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit that now works on the children of unbelief. In which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest of men” (Ephesians 2:2-3). “Let us cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light” (Romans 13:12). “You are the children of light, and children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness” (1 Thessalonians 5:5). “Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them” (Ephesians 5:11). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what agreement hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols?” (2 Corinthians 6:14-16). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12) and “war in them a good warfare!” (1 Timothy 1:18). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12).
The Weapons of Warfare
“The weapons of our warfare are not carnal” (2 Corinthians 10:4). “Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. In all things taking the shield of faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. By all prayer and supplication praying at all times in the spirit; and in the same watching with all instance and supplication for all the saints” (Ephesians 6:11-18).
(B) THE START OF THE BATTLE
The devil and the world will attack you at your weakest points. Everyone has a weakest point and then a descending order of lesser weak points that are on the devil’s ‘hit-list’. In his Spiritual Exercises, St. Ignatius of Loyola writes that the devil “behaves as a chief bent on conquering and robbing what he desires: for, as a captain and chief of the army, pitching his camp, and looking at the forces or defenses of a stronghold, attacks it on the weakest side, in like manner the enemy of human nature, roaming about, looks in turn at all our virtues―theological, cardinal and moral; and where he finds us weakest and most in need for our eternal salvation, there he attacks us and aims at taking us” (The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola).
The Great Success Rate of Attacking the Weak Point
Fr. Jordan Aumann, O.P., in an essay on the Discernment of Spirits, writes: “the devil utilizes human weakness and the effects of Original Sin to further his evil aims.”
Fr. Ludovic Barrielle, in his book comments upon the above rule of St. Ignatius, saying: “A commander in chief who wants to attack a town sends in his spies first, to find the weakest and least fortified point before he decides where to attack. Likewise, the devil “roams about us,” as St. Peter says, looking for our weak points in order to attack them. Thus, we can know ahead of time where he will strike. You like to eat ... to drink ... to be lazy ... or you are imprudent, you read anything indiscriminately ... you do not select your friends carefully, etc. How many catastrophes have started by slight imprudence! I have known people filled with great qualities and virtues. They only had a very small fault. They were a little too sensitive to criticism. One day their parish priest reproached them, with or without reason. They left all, even the practice of religion! This was surely the work of the devil. When you observe so many priests, religious and Christians, well advanced in the interior life, who later stagnate or even slide backwards, you wonder why. Whence did it come about? Out of a major difficulty? No! There was a slight inordinate attachment, gluttony or, more frequently, human respect, this accursed human respect which is the source of laxity and even of the damnation of so many people, even amongst the clergy!” (Fr. Ludovic Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits)
But I Am Not Like the Rest of Men!
The first temptation is to ignore the fact that we have a weakest point―and to help us do that, the devil makes us focus on the weakest point of others—much like the Pharisee in the Parable of the Pharisee and the Publican: “The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican. I fast twice in a week: I give tithes of all that I possess!’” (Luke 18:11-12).
The temptation is to hide our weakest point behind the more obvious weak points of others. Yet if I do not address my weakest points, then I am susceptible to repeated attacks in those areas, with the result that the walls of my soul will be breached sooner or later.
Prowling, Roaring, Devouring Devil
St. Peter warns us: “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith―knowing that the same affliction befalls your brethren who are in the world!” (1 Peter 5:8-9).
We have to face up to the fact that we will be targeted, not matter what we may think or feel about the matter—“the same affliction befalls your brethren who are in the world.” We may not like it and have an attitude of “I don’t think it’s fair! I don’t want to play! I’m taking my ball and going home!” Yet, like it or not, we are born into a battle—like a baby born to parents during a war—it is just the way it is.
The Shield of Faith
What we have to do is resist as St. Peter said: “Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” It is our Faith that has the answers, it is the Faith that is our primary defense: “In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts [bullets of temptation] of the most wicked one” (Ephesians 6:16). “For this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith” (1 John 5:4).
Holes in the Shield
Yet a weak Faith will mean there is only a weak resistance and, today, the Faith of most Catholics is weak. It is no idle statement on the part of Our Lord, when He says: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
This is reinforced by Our Lady in her apparitions at Quito and La Salette: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs and morals.” She speaks of “The small number of souls who, hidden, will preserve the treasure of the Faith” because “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls.”
How to React to the Onslaught
As St. Ignatius points out in his Spiritual Exercises: “The enemy acts like a woman, in being weak against vigor and strength of will. Because, as it is the way of the woman, when she is quarreling with some man she begins to lose heart, taking flight when the man shows her much courage: and, on the contrary, if the man, losing heart, begins to flee, then the wrath, revenge, and ferocity of the woman is very great, and so without limits. In the same manner, it is the way of the enemy to weaken and lose heart, with his temptations taking flight, when the person who is exercising himself in spiritual things shows a bold front against the temptations of the enemy, doing diametrically the opposite. And on the contrary, if the person who is exercising himself commences to have fear and lose heart in suffering the temptations, then there is no beast so wild on the face of the Earth, as the enemy of human nature, in following out his damnable intention with so great malice.”
St. Ignatius tells us, “I do not trouble myself over evil thoughts that the devil sends me and which I do not accept, nor do I pride myself concerning the good thoughts that my good Angel sends me and are not mine.” He further adds: “Both St. Peter and St. Paul also had bad thoughts, but they did not sin.”
One of two, St. Paul, tells us: “there was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me. For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me.” And God knows how much the Sacred Heart loved St. Paul! What did Our Lord reply to him? “And He said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee! For power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.” (2 Corinthians 12:7-9).
If St. Peter and St. Paul had evil thoughts, rest assured that we also will have them. The main thing is to know how to behave while under temptation.
GENERAL RULES
Playing with the Devil
There are some general rules which are of capital importance. The first one is: “One does not play with the devil.” By “playing with the devil” we mean the fact of tarrying or playing with a thought that one knows to be not good―and thus, from the devil―while at the same time reassuring oneself that one will not to consent to it. Woe to him who consents to dialogue with the devil―who is much stronger that we are.
Eve succumbed because she “played” with the devil. After having told her that God had forbidden it, the devil followed up with new reasons. Instead of cutting him short, she started to discuss with him: “If we eat of it, we will die.” The devil insisted: “No, you will not die, you will become like gods, knowing good and evil!” She discussed, and the devil finished by making her fall.
How do I know that an inspiration that I feel comes from God or from the devil? There are rules. These rules differ for those who are living in the state of sin and for those who are making progress in virtue.
THE FIRST RULE
St. Ignatius tells us that “Those who go from mortal sin to mortal sin are usually influenced in this way. The enemy proposes certain illusory delights, causing them to imagine sensual pleasures and enjoyments, the more effectively to keep them under the sway of their vicious and sinful course. The good spirit deals with these same people in the opposite way, working on their consciences in order to induce compunction and remorse.”
The Devil Reassures the Sinner
So it is, with those who live in mortal sin―the evil spirit reassures the sinner and pushes him further and further into sin. He presents to the sinner more vivid pleasures, and sensible delectation. He represents to him the objects of sin as the greatest happiness, so that he will plunge deeper and deeper into it with all the more security and joy, just as if it were something normal and indispensable: “The whole world is doing it.”
The Good Angels Reproaches the Sinner
The good angel, on the contrary, sends a sting. He stirs one’s conscience, this prevents the sinner from being complacent: he uses rational reproaches. He shows him the consequences of sin. The sinner is in the state of damnation. If his car should hit a lamp post or a milestone, he risks passing from his steering wheel to the judgment of God, and Hell.
The Devil Says “Don’t Worry!”
The devil makes him reject such thoughts, by which the good angels have converted so many souls! He says to them: “Do not worry yourself, God is good! Everybody does it! Just take a look around! It is not worth talking to your priest about it! It doesn’t concern him! You will confess whatever you have to confess on your death bed. You will always have enough time! You are still young, etc.”
Those who reassure the sinner in his sins also play the game of the devil.
The Good Angel Threatens the Sinner
On the contrary, there are persons who have been saved because they one day encountered a confessor who said to them: “Since you are not decided to do away with sin, I cannot grant you absolution, for we would both be committing a sacrilege! ... You must convert!”
It is the devil that reassures the sinner in his sins. BEWARE! The good angel gives “rational and reasonable reproaches.” He says clearly who he is, he does not beat around the bush. The famous Fr. Roothan said that this first rule of St. Ignatius can also be applied to those who, without being in the state of mortal sin, are well entrenched in tepidity or lukewarmness. For example, those Christians and religious who have decided not to correct their venial sins. The devil reassures them and makes them feel comfortable in their tepidity and lukewarmness―and this is very dangerous for their salvation. The good angel sends them grave warnings. Woe to those who pay no attention! It is in this way that laxity is introduced into many convents and even into Christian families.
THE SECOND RULE
This rule will answer the questions: How does the devil proceed? How does the good angel behave with those who work courageously at correcting their sins?
The devils, as well as the good angels, are pure spirits. We do not see them. God did not want the devils, our enemies, to come and attack us without us having something like a “rule” by which to detect them. This is why the examination of conscience is so important. “Vigilate et orate” said Jesus in the Gospels: “Watch and pray.” Watch over yourself and your conscience and pray that God enlightens your conscience with truth and prevents you from forming a false conscience, by which you will fool yourself. You should regularly patrol the ramparts of your soul and check on who is coming through the gates into the city of your soul. Woe to the Christian that is not on his guard! The devil will do with his soul as he pleases if he is not on the alert. But to watch is not sufficient ― we must also recognize the signs which discern the good angel from the bad one.
St. Ignatius gives us six signs by which to recognize the evil spirit who seeks to tempt those who progress in virtue. He tells us, in the SECOND RULE, that “The contrary prevails with those who are making earnest progress in self‑purification, rising from good to better in the service of God, Our Lord. In these cases it is typical of the evil spirit to cause regret and sadness, using fallacious arguments to disturb them and to impede their progress.”
We have arranged and slightly modified them by way of a mnemonic device to help you remember them: SD-FORD or Satan Drives FORD. Whereby “S” stands for sadness; “D” stands for disturbance; “F” stands for false reasoning; “O” stands for obstacles; “R” stands for regret; and “D” stands for discouragement. This last one—discouragement—is the trump card in the hand of the devil.
1. Sadness
“A saint who is sad is a sad saint,” said St. Francis de Sales—meaning that a person who allows sadness to rule in their soul is a very poor ‘saint’ indeed. The devil is eternally sad―he cannot get rid of his sadness. As soon as he comes near you he communicates his sadness, without even so much as wanting to do so.
This is so much the case, that in the rules for discerning the spirits of the second week, it is shown that when the devil attempts to tempt a fervent soul, under the appearance of good, one of the signs for recognizing that it is the devil, is this sadness that we feel overcoming us.
Such is one who, leaving the confessional feeling content and at peace, is suddenly struck by sadness. Recognize that it is the devil who comes near with his sadness! Behold a sad young man! I do not say that he has sinned, but I know that the devil is hovering about him. Beware of these melancholic moods and dreams! One may not realize, but the devil is not far off! Sadness drains our fervor! Fervor is what the devil hates—it is lukewarmness that he prefers to see in us.
2. Disturbance
“All trouble comes from the devil,” said St. John Berchmans, including moody temperaments and vivid emotions. These disturbances can be interior disturbances of emotion, anxiety, fear, etc., or they can be external disturbances from other persons, things or places.
Sometimes in the family, there is tension in the air. The wife loses her temper, the children are particularly noisy and unbearable, the father is boxing everyone’s ears. It may be that the neighbors are rowdy, or animals are howling, or whatever else it may be. Know that the devil is present! In such an environment he wins every time—for foolish things are said and done, sin is committed more or less gravely, and more or less numerously.
Watch and Pray! Later, we will explain, in a future article, the means by which you can counterattack the devil’s impact. One must warn the children against certain dissipations or feelings of anger or pride―which the devil makes use of by using that spark to start a forest fire of disturbance. The spiritual life is greatly handicapped by constant disturbance—which is what the devil wants. The less you pray and read, the weaker you become and thus you are more likely to be overcome by temptations.
3. False Reasoning
False or fallacious reasoning is an unmistakable sign of the devil. One must be very skeptical of certain false theories, of certain slogans which engender many sins, and often grave sins against the faith, against justice or charity. For example: “The children can choose their own religion when they grow up!” … “They need to have fun! Our home is not a convent!” “Who am I to correct my neighbor? It is wrong to judge others!” … “God is good, He understands, He has not made us to damn us!” … “Everyone does it, God is not going to send them all to Hell!” etc. FALSE REASONINGS!
The devil, as Our Lord says, is a liar and a murderer. He will lie to kill the grace in your soul. He is full of half-truths that are twisted around to make sin seem to be acceptable, even necessary at times. The devil deceives us with many false and empty promises. Most of these relate to the lie that we will be happier and more fulfilled if we sin, or deny aspects of the truths of the Faith. Whatever passing pleasures come with sin, they are in fact passing―they do not last! Great and accumulated suffering eventually comes with almost all sinful activity. Yet, despite this experience, we human beings remain very gullible, we seem to love empty promises and put all sorts of false hopes of them.
The devil also deceives us by suggesting all sorts of complexities, especially in our thinking. And thus he seeks to confuse and conceal the fundamental truth about our sinful action. Our minds are very wily and love to indulge complexity, as a way of avoiding the truth, finding loopholes and making excuses. So we, by conniving with the devil, entertain endless complications by asking “But what if this….and What about that….??!” Along with the devil, we project all sorts of possible difficulties, exceptions, or potential sob stories, to avoid insisting that we or others behave well and live according to the truth.
The devil also seeks to deceive us with “word-smithing” or euphemisms. And thus the dismemberment and murder of a child through abortion becomes “reproductive freedom” or “Choice.” Sodomy is called “gay” (a word which is normally used to mean “happy”). Our Faith and ancient wisdom is called “darkness,” “superstition” or “ignorance.” Fornication is called “cohabitation.” Euthanasia (murder) is call “mercy-killing.” And the redefinition of the nature of marriage as it is been known for some 5,000 years, is labeled “marriage freedom.” And thus, through exaggerations and outright false labeling, the devil deceives us, and we too easily connive by calling good, or “no big deal,” what God calls sinful.
The devil also deceives us through the sheer volume of information. Information is not the same as truth, and data can be assembled very craftily to make deceitful points―the business world and politics do it all the time. Furthermore, certain facts and figures can be emphasized, in exclusion to other, balancing truths. And, thus, even information or data, which is true in itself, becomes a form of deception. The news media, and other sources of information, sometimes exercise their greatest power in what they do not report. And this too is a way that the devil brings deceptions upon us.
We do well to carefully assess the many ways Satan seeks to deceive us. Do not believe everything you think or hear. While we ought not to be cynical, we ought to be sober, and seek to verify what we see and hear and square it with God’s revealed truth.
4. Obstacles, Difficulties, Impediments
The devil excels in making the practice of virtue seem too difficult; he blows out of proportion all the difficulties. How many people think that a really Christian life is impossible, that there are insurmountable difficulties in saving oneself, in practicing chastity according to one’s state of life, in living as a Christian in marriage!
Think of the horror at the thought of not appearing like the rest of the world, which has persuaded so many great Christians to dishonor themselves by impure fashions. How many times has a “panic pregnancy” persuaded an allegedly Catholic woman to commit an infanticide ― a crime which cries to Heaven for vengeance before God! ― to be deprived of that eternal treasure, that unequalled joy for the whole family, which a newly‑born baby brings, and which, as we know, provides also the health and happiness of the woman.
The devil inflates all the difficulties and at the same time hides that which renders the Christian life easy―flight from occasions of sin; the power of prayer, penance, sacrifice and mortification; the use of the Sacraments and Sacramentals; the profound joys of living a Christian family life, the eternal bliss and rewards of Heaven, etc.
5. Regret
Fr. Louis Lallamant, the famous Jesuit said: “All conditional propositions that disturb one’s soul, come from the devil.” All these thoughts that begin with or contain “If only…” ― “What if…” ― “Who knows if…” ― “Perhaps if…” ― “Maybe…” ― “It might...” etc.
It’s the second rule! It is the devil that is confusing you, and the devil is a liar! We live in a real world, not a conditional, “maybe” world. If you had made a sacrilegious confession, the devil would have reassured you that it was good, while the good angel would tell you why and in what way you would have made a sacrilegious confession. Behold a seminarian who ponders within himself whether or not he has a vocation. These thoughts, in themselves, come from the devil. The good angel would tell him clearly why he does not have a vocation.
Banish such thoughts as: “I wonder what it would be like if I had married so and so instead” ... “What if wasn’t married and was in the religious life?” ... “What if I wasn’t in this religious order and was married instead?” … “What if I was born 500 years ago?” ... “What if I was living in another country?” ... etc. Forget the “what if” world and get on with the real world, with who you are, what you are, where you are and under what circumstances you find yourself actually and really in. Leave the “what if” world to writers of fiction and makers of movies.
6. Discouragement
Discouragement is the work of the devil. This is the trump-card of the devil. Courage is required in order to fight—and, as we said at the start of the article, we must fight our way to Heaven. Discouragement whittles-down and erodes courage and eventually destroys it. It is a tactic also used in human warfare, by the use of propaganda—whereby the enemy tries to convince you that it hopeless to keep up the fighting. That it is in your best interests to surrender.
The same propaganda occurs in spiritual warfare. You have begun well―all of a sudden your courage dries up: the devil has passed by. What about the good angel? He provides courage, peace, joy and makes all things easy!
Remember the temptations of St. Augustine! He was in the garden. He was 32 years old, and not even baptized. He had led a dissolute life and became a Manichean. He had a very holy mother who prayed for him during these 32 years. She followed him to Milan, where the emperor appointed Augustine as director of the imperial school. There, he came into contact with the bishop St. Ambrose, who had no difficulties in showing the young director (who was very intelligent and loved to hear St. Ambrose speak), that if he wanted to save his soul he would, at all costs, have to become a Christian, to quit his evil ways, to get baptized, etc. He was enrolled as a catechumen and was supposed to be baptized at Easter.
Do you honestly believe, from this, that it all went so smoothly? St. Augustine, in his book, Confessions (Book 8), tells us how it actually happened. He was in his garden, when all of a sudden he became sad: “You are not stupid! Have you reflected enough?” He cried crocodile tears and was even obliged to walk around so that he could breathe. “This is impossible!” he said. All his old friendships flooded his memory: “How could you live without us? Augustine! Oh, dear Augustine! It is impossible!” The temptation was so great that he was on the point of refusing Baptism and of sending word to the archbishop: “Excellency, I am not ready, I underestimated my strength.”
But the good angel does not abandon his own, and while he was walking in the garden, he received an idea: “After all, what all these Christians can do―why could I not do it too? Well, just like them, I will flee from the occasions of sin, I will pray; and if I fall, I will go to Confession; I will go to Communion! How fortunate I am!” This thought gave him peace and joy: “For Easter I will be like my mother!”
St. Paul tells us something that should keep us from all discouragement: “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able, but will make also with temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).
Back to the Fight
So we come back to the fight! We are born, we live, and we die on the battlefield of life: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). Like St. Paul, we must “so fight, not as one beating the air” (1 Corinthians 9:26), remembering that “the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). We must perpetually fight the temptations that endless temptations that come to us from the devil, the world, and the tendencies of our own flesh. May we, on our deathbed, be able to say with St. Paul: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the Faith” (2 Timothy 4:7).
The Battle Arena of Temptation
We are born, we live, and we die on the battlefield of life: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). For this Earth is the fiefdom or princedom of the devil, whom Our Lord calls the “prince of this world” who rules the world. “The prince of this world cometh, and in me he hath not any thing” (John 14:30). There can be no true and lasting peace on Earth until “the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:31), “because the prince of this world is already judged” (John 16:11).
Whose Side Are We On?
In our lives there can be no neutrality. We have to make a choice in this world—do we live for Heaven and renounce the things of the world? Or do we live for this world and―despite our wishful thinking to the contrary―renounce the things of Heaven: “No man can serve two masters! For either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will sustain the one, and despise the other! You cannot serve God and mammon (the world)!” (Matthew 6:24). To the rich young man, Our Lord said: “‘If you want to be perfect, go sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad― for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:21-23).
Our Lord therefore separates Himself from this world: “And he said to them (Pharisees): ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world’” (John 8:23). He tells Pilate: “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36) and He says to us: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, for I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:19).
Battles and Bullets
That is why we are not to love the world, for the world belongs to the devil, an enemy of God: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15), for “know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). Thus we have two opposing camps in this world—the one of God and the one of the devil. There can be no spectators in this battle, for, as Our Lord says: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). Therefore, once again, we are born into a battle and the first enemy we meet on the battlefield is temptation, or, to put it another way, the first things we will encounter will be the bullets of temptation. That is why Holy Scripture warns us: “Son, when you come to the service of God, stand in justice and in fear, and prepare your soul for temptation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1), “and because you were acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should test you!” (Tobias 12:13).
The Prince and His Kingdom
The devil―the prince and ruler of the world (John 12:31)―will use the world to tempt us and he will unite the temptations of the world to his own direct temptations in order to break-down our resistance. He will use persons, places and things to draw us away from God and into an addiction to the things and pleasures the world can offer.
Soldiers of the Devil
Once drawn away from God and being true soldiers of Christ―we become soldiers of the devil―“the children of the Kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness” (Matthew 8:12), where they become “the children of unbelief … children of this world … being fettered with the bonds of darkness” (Ephesians 5:6; Luke 16:8; Wisdom 17:2). These, newly-won recruits to the ranks of the world, the devil will use to entice others away from God. “They adored the dragon, which gave power to the beast: and they adored the beast, saying: ‘Who is like to the beast? and who shall be able to fight with him?’” (Apocalypse 13:4). “For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
No Peace With the Enemy
“Wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit that now works on the children of unbelief. In which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest of men” (Ephesians 2:2-3). “Let us cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light” (Romans 13:12). “You are the children of light, and children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness” (1 Thessalonians 5:5). “Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them” (Ephesians 5:11). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what agreement hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols?” (2 Corinthians 6:14-16). “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12) and “war in them a good warfare!” (1 Timothy 1:18). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12).
The Weapons of Warfare
“The weapons of our warfare are not carnal” (2 Corinthians 10:4). “Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. In all things taking the shield of faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. By all prayer and supplication praying at all times in the spirit; and in the same watching with all instance and supplication for all the saints” (Ephesians 6:11-18).
(B) THE START OF THE BATTLE
The devil and the world will attack you at your weakest points. Everyone has a weakest point and then a descending order of lesser weak points that are on the devil’s ‘hit-list’. In his Spiritual Exercises, St. Ignatius of Loyola writes that the devil “behaves as a chief bent on conquering and robbing what he desires: for, as a captain and chief of the army, pitching his camp, and looking at the forces or defenses of a stronghold, attacks it on the weakest side, in like manner the enemy of human nature, roaming about, looks in turn at all our virtues―theological, cardinal and moral; and where he finds us weakest and most in need for our eternal salvation, there he attacks us and aims at taking us” (The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola).
The Great Success Rate of Attacking the Weak Point
Fr. Jordan Aumann, O.P., in an essay on the Discernment of Spirits, writes: “the devil utilizes human weakness and the effects of Original Sin to further his evil aims.”
Fr. Ludovic Barrielle, in his book comments upon the above rule of St. Ignatius, saying: “A commander in chief who wants to attack a town sends in his spies first, to find the weakest and least fortified point before he decides where to attack. Likewise, the devil “roams about us,” as St. Peter says, looking for our weak points in order to attack them. Thus, we can know ahead of time where he will strike. You like to eat ... to drink ... to be lazy ... or you are imprudent, you read anything indiscriminately ... you do not select your friends carefully, etc. How many catastrophes have started by slight imprudence! I have known people filled with great qualities and virtues. They only had a very small fault. They were a little too sensitive to criticism. One day their parish priest reproached them, with or without reason. They left all, even the practice of religion! This was surely the work of the devil. When you observe so many priests, religious and Christians, well advanced in the interior life, who later stagnate or even slide backwards, you wonder why. Whence did it come about? Out of a major difficulty? No! There was a slight inordinate attachment, gluttony or, more frequently, human respect, this accursed human respect which is the source of laxity and even of the damnation of so many people, even amongst the clergy!” (Fr. Ludovic Barrielle, Rules for Discerning the Spirits)
But I Am Not Like the Rest of Men!
The first temptation is to ignore the fact that we have a weakest point―and to help us do that, the devil makes us focus on the weakest point of others—much like the Pharisee in the Parable of the Pharisee and the Publican: “The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican. I fast twice in a week: I give tithes of all that I possess!’” (Luke 18:11-12).
The temptation is to hide our weakest point behind the more obvious weak points of others. Yet if I do not address my weakest points, then I am susceptible to repeated attacks in those areas, with the result that the walls of my soul will be breached sooner or later.
Prowling, Roaring, Devouring Devil
St. Peter warns us: “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist ye, strong in Faith―knowing that the same affliction befalls your brethren who are in the world!” (1 Peter 5:8-9).
We have to face up to the fact that we will be targeted, not matter what we may think or feel about the matter—“the same affliction befalls your brethren who are in the world.” We may not like it and have an attitude of “I don’t think it’s fair! I don’t want to play! I’m taking my ball and going home!” Yet, like it or not, we are born into a battle—like a baby born to parents during a war—it is just the way it is.
The Shield of Faith
What we have to do is resist as St. Peter said: “Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” It is our Faith that has the answers, it is the Faith that is our primary defense: “In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts [bullets of temptation] of the most wicked one” (Ephesians 6:16). “For this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith” (1 John 5:4).
Holes in the Shield
Yet a weak Faith will mean there is only a weak resistance and, today, the Faith of most Catholics is weak. It is no idle statement on the part of Our Lord, when He says: “The Son of man, when He comes, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8).
This is reinforced by Our Lady in her apparitions at Quito and La Salette: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith, until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs and morals.” She speaks of “The small number of souls who, hidden, will preserve the treasure of the Faith” because “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls.”
How to React to the Onslaught
As St. Ignatius points out in his Spiritual Exercises: “The enemy acts like a woman, in being weak against vigor and strength of will. Because, as it is the way of the woman, when she is quarreling with some man she begins to lose heart, taking flight when the man shows her much courage: and, on the contrary, if the man, losing heart, begins to flee, then the wrath, revenge, and ferocity of the woman is very great, and so without limits. In the same manner, it is the way of the enemy to weaken and lose heart, with his temptations taking flight, when the person who is exercising himself in spiritual things shows a bold front against the temptations of the enemy, doing diametrically the opposite. And on the contrary, if the person who is exercising himself commences to have fear and lose heart in suffering the temptations, then there is no beast so wild on the face of the Earth, as the enemy of human nature, in following out his damnable intention with so great malice.”
St. Ignatius tells us, “I do not trouble myself over evil thoughts that the devil sends me and which I do not accept, nor do I pride myself concerning the good thoughts that my good Angel sends me and are not mine.” He further adds: “Both St. Peter and St. Paul also had bad thoughts, but they did not sin.”
One of two, St. Paul, tells us: “there was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me. For which thing thrice I besought the Lord, that it might depart from me.” And God knows how much the Sacred Heart loved St. Paul! What did Our Lord reply to him? “And He said to me: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee! For power is made perfect in infirmity!’ Gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.” (2 Corinthians 12:7-9).
If St. Peter and St. Paul had evil thoughts, rest assured that we also will have them. The main thing is to know how to behave while under temptation.
GENERAL RULES
Playing with the Devil
There are some general rules which are of capital importance. The first one is: “One does not play with the devil.” By “playing with the devil” we mean the fact of tarrying or playing with a thought that one knows to be not good―and thus, from the devil―while at the same time reassuring oneself that one will not to consent to it. Woe to him who consents to dialogue with the devil―who is much stronger that we are.
Eve succumbed because she “played” with the devil. After having told her that God had forbidden it, the devil followed up with new reasons. Instead of cutting him short, she started to discuss with him: “If we eat of it, we will die.” The devil insisted: “No, you will not die, you will become like gods, knowing good and evil!” She discussed, and the devil finished by making her fall.
How do I know that an inspiration that I feel comes from God or from the devil? There are rules. These rules differ for those who are living in the state of sin and for those who are making progress in virtue.
THE FIRST RULE
St. Ignatius tells us that “Those who go from mortal sin to mortal sin are usually influenced in this way. The enemy proposes certain illusory delights, causing them to imagine sensual pleasures and enjoyments, the more effectively to keep them under the sway of their vicious and sinful course. The good spirit deals with these same people in the opposite way, working on their consciences in order to induce compunction and remorse.”
The Devil Reassures the Sinner
So it is, with those who live in mortal sin―the evil spirit reassures the sinner and pushes him further and further into sin. He presents to the sinner more vivid pleasures, and sensible delectation. He represents to him the objects of sin as the greatest happiness, so that he will plunge deeper and deeper into it with all the more security and joy, just as if it were something normal and indispensable: “The whole world is doing it.”
The Good Angels Reproaches the Sinner
The good angel, on the contrary, sends a sting. He stirs one’s conscience, this prevents the sinner from being complacent: he uses rational reproaches. He shows him the consequences of sin. The sinner is in the state of damnation. If his car should hit a lamp post or a milestone, he risks passing from his steering wheel to the judgment of God, and Hell.
The Devil Says “Don’t Worry!”
The devil makes him reject such thoughts, by which the good angels have converted so many souls! He says to them: “Do not worry yourself, God is good! Everybody does it! Just take a look around! It is not worth talking to your priest about it! It doesn’t concern him! You will confess whatever you have to confess on your death bed. You will always have enough time! You are still young, etc.”
Those who reassure the sinner in his sins also play the game of the devil.
The Good Angel Threatens the Sinner
On the contrary, there are persons who have been saved because they one day encountered a confessor who said to them: “Since you are not decided to do away with sin, I cannot grant you absolution, for we would both be committing a sacrilege! ... You must convert!”
It is the devil that reassures the sinner in his sins. BEWARE! The good angel gives “rational and reasonable reproaches.” He says clearly who he is, he does not beat around the bush. The famous Fr. Roothan said that this first rule of St. Ignatius can also be applied to those who, without being in the state of mortal sin, are well entrenched in tepidity or lukewarmness. For example, those Christians and religious who have decided not to correct their venial sins. The devil reassures them and makes them feel comfortable in their tepidity and lukewarmness―and this is very dangerous for their salvation. The good angel sends them grave warnings. Woe to those who pay no attention! It is in this way that laxity is introduced into many convents and even into Christian families.
THE SECOND RULE
This rule will answer the questions: How does the devil proceed? How does the good angel behave with those who work courageously at correcting their sins?
The devils, as well as the good angels, are pure spirits. We do not see them. God did not want the devils, our enemies, to come and attack us without us having something like a “rule” by which to detect them. This is why the examination of conscience is so important. “Vigilate et orate” said Jesus in the Gospels: “Watch and pray.” Watch over yourself and your conscience and pray that God enlightens your conscience with truth and prevents you from forming a false conscience, by which you will fool yourself. You should regularly patrol the ramparts of your soul and check on who is coming through the gates into the city of your soul. Woe to the Christian that is not on his guard! The devil will do with his soul as he pleases if he is not on the alert. But to watch is not sufficient ― we must also recognize the signs which discern the good angel from the bad one.
St. Ignatius gives us six signs by which to recognize the evil spirit who seeks to tempt those who progress in virtue. He tells us, in the SECOND RULE, that “The contrary prevails with those who are making earnest progress in self‑purification, rising from good to better in the service of God, Our Lord. In these cases it is typical of the evil spirit to cause regret and sadness, using fallacious arguments to disturb them and to impede their progress.”
We have arranged and slightly modified them by way of a mnemonic device to help you remember them: SD-FORD or Satan Drives FORD. Whereby “S” stands for sadness; “D” stands for disturbance; “F” stands for false reasoning; “O” stands for obstacles; “R” stands for regret; and “D” stands for discouragement. This last one—discouragement—is the trump card in the hand of the devil.
1. Sadness
“A saint who is sad is a sad saint,” said St. Francis de Sales—meaning that a person who allows sadness to rule in their soul is a very poor ‘saint’ indeed. The devil is eternally sad―he cannot get rid of his sadness. As soon as he comes near you he communicates his sadness, without even so much as wanting to do so.
This is so much the case, that in the rules for discerning the spirits of the second week, it is shown that when the devil attempts to tempt a fervent soul, under the appearance of good, one of the signs for recognizing that it is the devil, is this sadness that we feel overcoming us.
Such is one who, leaving the confessional feeling content and at peace, is suddenly struck by sadness. Recognize that it is the devil who comes near with his sadness! Behold a sad young man! I do not say that he has sinned, but I know that the devil is hovering about him. Beware of these melancholic moods and dreams! One may not realize, but the devil is not far off! Sadness drains our fervor! Fervor is what the devil hates—it is lukewarmness that he prefers to see in us.
2. Disturbance
“All trouble comes from the devil,” said St. John Berchmans, including moody temperaments and vivid emotions. These disturbances can be interior disturbances of emotion, anxiety, fear, etc., or they can be external disturbances from other persons, things or places.
Sometimes in the family, there is tension in the air. The wife loses her temper, the children are particularly noisy and unbearable, the father is boxing everyone’s ears. It may be that the neighbors are rowdy, or animals are howling, or whatever else it may be. Know that the devil is present! In such an environment he wins every time—for foolish things are said and done, sin is committed more or less gravely, and more or less numerously.
Watch and Pray! Later, we will explain, in a future article, the means by which you can counterattack the devil’s impact. One must warn the children against certain dissipations or feelings of anger or pride―which the devil makes use of by using that spark to start a forest fire of disturbance. The spiritual life is greatly handicapped by constant disturbance—which is what the devil wants. The less you pray and read, the weaker you become and thus you are more likely to be overcome by temptations.
3. False Reasoning
False or fallacious reasoning is an unmistakable sign of the devil. One must be very skeptical of certain false theories, of certain slogans which engender many sins, and often grave sins against the faith, against justice or charity. For example: “The children can choose their own religion when they grow up!” … “They need to have fun! Our home is not a convent!” “Who am I to correct my neighbor? It is wrong to judge others!” … “God is good, He understands, He has not made us to damn us!” … “Everyone does it, God is not going to send them all to Hell!” etc. FALSE REASONINGS!
The devil, as Our Lord says, is a liar and a murderer. He will lie to kill the grace in your soul. He is full of half-truths that are twisted around to make sin seem to be acceptable, even necessary at times. The devil deceives us with many false and empty promises. Most of these relate to the lie that we will be happier and more fulfilled if we sin, or deny aspects of the truths of the Faith. Whatever passing pleasures come with sin, they are in fact passing―they do not last! Great and accumulated suffering eventually comes with almost all sinful activity. Yet, despite this experience, we human beings remain very gullible, we seem to love empty promises and put all sorts of false hopes of them.
The devil also deceives us by suggesting all sorts of complexities, especially in our thinking. And thus he seeks to confuse and conceal the fundamental truth about our sinful action. Our minds are very wily and love to indulge complexity, as a way of avoiding the truth, finding loopholes and making excuses. So we, by conniving with the devil, entertain endless complications by asking “But what if this….and What about that….??!” Along with the devil, we project all sorts of possible difficulties, exceptions, or potential sob stories, to avoid insisting that we or others behave well and live according to the truth.
The devil also seeks to deceive us with “word-smithing” or euphemisms. And thus the dismemberment and murder of a child through abortion becomes “reproductive freedom” or “Choice.” Sodomy is called “gay” (a word which is normally used to mean “happy”). Our Faith and ancient wisdom is called “darkness,” “superstition” or “ignorance.” Fornication is called “cohabitation.” Euthanasia (murder) is call “mercy-killing.” And the redefinition of the nature of marriage as it is been known for some 5,000 years, is labeled “marriage freedom.” And thus, through exaggerations and outright false labeling, the devil deceives us, and we too easily connive by calling good, or “no big deal,” what God calls sinful.
The devil also deceives us through the sheer volume of information. Information is not the same as truth, and data can be assembled very craftily to make deceitful points―the business world and politics do it all the time. Furthermore, certain facts and figures can be emphasized, in exclusion to other, balancing truths. And, thus, even information or data, which is true in itself, becomes a form of deception. The news media, and other sources of information, sometimes exercise their greatest power in what they do not report. And this too is a way that the devil brings deceptions upon us.
We do well to carefully assess the many ways Satan seeks to deceive us. Do not believe everything you think or hear. While we ought not to be cynical, we ought to be sober, and seek to verify what we see and hear and square it with God’s revealed truth.
4. Obstacles, Difficulties, Impediments
The devil excels in making the practice of virtue seem too difficult; he blows out of proportion all the difficulties. How many people think that a really Christian life is impossible, that there are insurmountable difficulties in saving oneself, in practicing chastity according to one’s state of life, in living as a Christian in marriage!
Think of the horror at the thought of not appearing like the rest of the world, which has persuaded so many great Christians to dishonor themselves by impure fashions. How many times has a “panic pregnancy” persuaded an allegedly Catholic woman to commit an infanticide ― a crime which cries to Heaven for vengeance before God! ― to be deprived of that eternal treasure, that unequalled joy for the whole family, which a newly‑born baby brings, and which, as we know, provides also the health and happiness of the woman.
The devil inflates all the difficulties and at the same time hides that which renders the Christian life easy―flight from occasions of sin; the power of prayer, penance, sacrifice and mortification; the use of the Sacraments and Sacramentals; the profound joys of living a Christian family life, the eternal bliss and rewards of Heaven, etc.
5. Regret
Fr. Louis Lallamant, the famous Jesuit said: “All conditional propositions that disturb one’s soul, come from the devil.” All these thoughts that begin with or contain “If only…” ― “What if…” ― “Who knows if…” ― “Perhaps if…” ― “Maybe…” ― “It might...” etc.
It’s the second rule! It is the devil that is confusing you, and the devil is a liar! We live in a real world, not a conditional, “maybe” world. If you had made a sacrilegious confession, the devil would have reassured you that it was good, while the good angel would tell you why and in what way you would have made a sacrilegious confession. Behold a seminarian who ponders within himself whether or not he has a vocation. These thoughts, in themselves, come from the devil. The good angel would tell him clearly why he does not have a vocation.
Banish such thoughts as: “I wonder what it would be like if I had married so and so instead” ... “What if wasn’t married and was in the religious life?” ... “What if I wasn’t in this religious order and was married instead?” … “What if I was born 500 years ago?” ... “What if I was living in another country?” ... etc. Forget the “what if” world and get on with the real world, with who you are, what you are, where you are and under what circumstances you find yourself actually and really in. Leave the “what if” world to writers of fiction and makers of movies.
6. Discouragement
Discouragement is the work of the devil. This is the trump-card of the devil. Courage is required in order to fight—and, as we said at the start of the article, we must fight our way to Heaven. Discouragement whittles-down and erodes courage and eventually destroys it. It is a tactic also used in human warfare, by the use of propaganda—whereby the enemy tries to convince you that it hopeless to keep up the fighting. That it is in your best interests to surrender.
The same propaganda occurs in spiritual warfare. You have begun well―all of a sudden your courage dries up: the devil has passed by. What about the good angel? He provides courage, peace, joy and makes all things easy!
Remember the temptations of St. Augustine! He was in the garden. He was 32 years old, and not even baptized. He had led a dissolute life and became a Manichean. He had a very holy mother who prayed for him during these 32 years. She followed him to Milan, where the emperor appointed Augustine as director of the imperial school. There, he came into contact with the bishop St. Ambrose, who had no difficulties in showing the young director (who was very intelligent and loved to hear St. Ambrose speak), that if he wanted to save his soul he would, at all costs, have to become a Christian, to quit his evil ways, to get baptized, etc. He was enrolled as a catechumen and was supposed to be baptized at Easter.
Do you honestly believe, from this, that it all went so smoothly? St. Augustine, in his book, Confessions (Book 8), tells us how it actually happened. He was in his garden, when all of a sudden he became sad: “You are not stupid! Have you reflected enough?” He cried crocodile tears and was even obliged to walk around so that he could breathe. “This is impossible!” he said. All his old friendships flooded his memory: “How could you live without us? Augustine! Oh, dear Augustine! It is impossible!” The temptation was so great that he was on the point of refusing Baptism and of sending word to the archbishop: “Excellency, I am not ready, I underestimated my strength.”
But the good angel does not abandon his own, and while he was walking in the garden, he received an idea: “After all, what all these Christians can do―why could I not do it too? Well, just like them, I will flee from the occasions of sin, I will pray; and if I fall, I will go to Confession; I will go to Communion! How fortunate I am!” This thought gave him peace and joy: “For Easter I will be like my mother!”
St. Paul tells us something that should keep us from all discouragement: “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able, but will make also with temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).
Back to the Fight
So we come back to the fight! We are born, we live, and we die on the battlefield of life: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). Like St. Paul, we must “so fight, not as one beating the air” (1 Corinthians 9:26), remembering that “the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). We must perpetually fight the temptations that endless temptations that come to us from the devil, the world, and the tendencies of our own flesh. May we, on our deathbed, be able to say with St. Paul: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the Faith” (2 Timothy 4:7).
Article 3
Saturday after Ash Wednesday, February 17th
Welcome to Temptation Weekend!
Saturday after Ash Wednesday, February 17th
Welcome to Temptation Weekend!
The Desert of Temptation
In the Gospel for the First Sunday of Lent, we read of Jesus being led into the desert by the Holy Spirit, where he would spend 40 days in SOLITUDE, in PRAYER and in FASTING―after which He would do battle with Satan and his temptations: “Then Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterwards He was hungry. And the tempter coming said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread!’ Jesus answered and said: ‘It is written: “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, and set Him upon the pinnacle of the Temple, and said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down, for it is written: “That He has given His angels charge over Thee, and in their hands shall they bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash Thy foot against a stone!’” Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!”’ Again the devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written: “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him” (Matthew 4:1-11).
We also read elsewhere in the Gospel that once the devil has been cast out, he wanders through DESERT PLACES, and not liking them, wants to return to the person from who he was cast out, so that he can sow new seeds or weeds of pride and hatred in the soul of that person: “When an unclean spirit is gone out of a man he walks through dry places seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says: ‘I will return into my house from whence I came out!’ And coming he finds it empty, swept, and garnished. Then he goes, and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there―and the last state of that man is made worse than the first!” (Matthew 12:44-45; Luke 11:24-26).
The Desert is a Spiritual Boot-Camp
In the above Gospel readings, we read of the devil wandering through desert places and not finding any rest there―and Our Lord choosing the desert for His combat with the devil and temptation—it is where He goes to strengthen Himself beforehand, by SOLITUDE, PRAYER and FASTING. The desert could be said to be the “Spiritual-Boot-Camp” for soldiers of Christ. The desert is a humble place; it has little or nothing to offer. This is why those great saints and hermits of old, the Desert Fathers, fled to the desert to secure their salvation. In a sense, the devil has less weapons with which to fight us in the desert—no TV’s, computers, radios, stores and malls, etc. The devil did not tempt Our Lord with an absence of things, but with an abundance of things: he tempts Our Lord’s hunger with food and not further fasting; he tempts Our Lord’s lack of possessions in the desert with the abundance of kingdoms of the world; Our Lord’s humility is attacked with a temptation to show off and perform miracles just for the sake of it. The devil is the prince of this world, and in the desert he is a prince without his army. Though most of us cannot flee to a real desert, we can create our own desert with: SOLITUDE, SILENCE, and PRAYER.
Jesus was led by the Holy Ghost into the desert for precisely that! He would be alone, but not alone—He would be alone with God and only God. Being in the desert, He would find silence—with no noise or activities to distract Him. So, being alone and being in silence, He can do the obvious—PRAY! Prayer is the meat of this sandwich; SOLITUDE and SILENCE are merely the slices of bread that hold the meat of PRAYER in the center. “When ye pray, you shall not be as the hypocrites, that love to stand and pray in the synagogues and corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men … When thou shalt pray, enter into thy chamber, and having shut the door, pray to thy Father in secret” (Matthew 6:6).
Learning to Fight Satan and Temptation
Prayer should be the center of our lives, and, since we are weak and infirm, solitude and silence are NECESSARY CRUTCHES will help us hobble along in prayer. In order to strengthen our prayer in the battle against the devil, we also need to FAST. “Prayer is good with fasting” (Tobias 12:8). Sometimes it takes the sacrifice of fasting to give backbone or bite to our prayer. We see this in a particular instance when the disciples failed in their battle with a devil. When the disciples failed to cast out a particular devil “The disciples came to Jesus secretly, and said: ‘Why could not we cast him out?’... Jesus said to them: ‘This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting’!” (Mt. 17:18-20). We see echoes of this in the following verse: “But as for me, when they were troublesome to me, I was clothed with haircloth. I humbled my soul with fasting; and my prayer shall be turned into my bosom” (Psalm 34:13).
Do We Have to be Tempted?
Have you ever wondered about the necessity for temptation. It seems that this goes all the way back to the creation of the world and the temptation of Adam and Eve in the garden. Why did God allow the serpent to tempt them? Temptations are necessary in that they reveal who or what our true love is; temptations reveal what it is to which we are truly dedicated. If Adam and Eve did not have the temptation of the fruit on the tree which God had said not to eat from, they would not have had a means of demonstrating their love and dedication to God. There would not have been any alternative.
The devil―the prince and ruler of the world (John 12:31)―will use the world to tempt us and he will unite the temptations of the world to his own direct temptations in order to break-down our resistance. He will use persons, places and things to draw us away from God and into an addiction to the things the world can offer. “For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
The Ancient Roman philosopher, Seneca the Younger, wrote: “Fire proves gold, adversity proves men.” Holy Scripture puts it this way: “When thou comest to the service of God, prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1) … “and because thou wast acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove thee!” (Tobias 12:13). We must always remember that “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able―but will make also with temptation issue, so that you may be able to bear it!” (1 Corinthians 10:13).
Not fair!
We may feel that it is unfair for God to expose us to temptation and allow it to attack us. We know that Our Lord was tempted in the desert after praying and fasting there for forty days and nights—but He, after all, was God. We are mere mortals! We are like babies or infants compared to an adult! But as children we had to learn to avoid many unpleasant and dangerous things: poisonous liquids, poisonous berries, fire, electricity, lakes and rivers if we couldn’t swim, reptiles, snakes, vicious animals, and so many other things that are too numerous to name. Dealing with and avoiding what is harmful, is all part and parcel of growing up. The same is true for growing up spiritually.
The example of Our Lord shows us that even one who is sinless may be the subject of temptation. He suffered temptation for our sakes, just as He suffered death for our sakes. He suffered temptation, in order, as St. Paul says, “that we may have such a High Priest―not one who cannot have compassion, or be touched with a feeling of our infirmities―but One Who was tempted in all things like we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15); and again, that “He suffered―being tempted―that He might know how to aid or give help to those that are tempted” (Hebrews 2:18). It was that, out of His own personal experience, the Son of God, incarnate in our humanity, might taste of sin in all its bitterness, in all its penalties, except only that which to Him is impossible―the guilt of sin―that so He might be a Savior full of sympathy with sinners.
Is God a Tempter?
In Holy Scripture, in the book of Genesis, we read these words, that “God did tempt Abraham” (Genesis 22:1); but in the Epistle of St. James we read, “Let no man, when he is tempted, say that he is tempted by God” (James 1:13). This seems to be a contradiction — but it is not, because the word “tempt” is a word of perfectly neutral signification. It does not necessarily mean “tempt with evil”; it simply means to “try” — “God did try Abraham”; for God puts us on our trial, and that in two ways. He either by His providence sends us a variety of afflictions, or crosses, or losses, or contradictions, by which He tries what our spirit is; or, secondly, He permits that Satan should try us, as He permitted Satan to try and afflict Job. Therefore, when it is said that God “tempts,” it means that God tries us; but the other signification is an evil one; for all the temptations that come from Satan are evil in themselves. He never tempts any man to good, unless some accidental good may be the occasion of evil. Now, it is in this latter sense that I am going to speak — that is, of our being tried by evil, tried by Satan. God overrules even the temptations of Satan for our benefit.
Same Temptation—Different Destination
St. Augustine tells us that the same crosses lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. By this he means that some souls accept their crosses and sufferings—like the ‘Good Thief’ on the cross; whereas others refuse their crosses and sufferings and seek to escape them—like the ‘Bad Thief’ on the cross. The ‘Good Thief’ ended up in Paradise, the ‘Bad Thief’ did not! Likewise, the same temptations will lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. It depends upon whether the temptation is powerfully rejected or gladly accepted.
Material of Glory
Fr. Faber tells us that “Temptations are the raw material of glory.” That is why St. James says: “My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations!” (James 1:2), to which St. Peter will add: “You shall greatly rejoice, if now you must be for a little time made sorrowful in divers temptations: so that the trial of your Faith (much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire) may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:6-7).
Beware If You Have No Temptations
“If you have no temptations,” St. Gregory tells us, “it is because the devils are your friends, your leaders, and your shepherds. And by allowing you to pass your poor life tranquilly, to the end of your days, they will drag you down into the depths.” St. Augustine tells us that the greatest temptation is not to have temptations because this means that one is a person who has been rejected, abandoned by God, and left entirely in the grip of one’s own passions.
We Must Expect Temptation
St. John Vianney explains: “If Our Lord was tempted, it was in order to show us that we must be also. It follows, therefore, that we must expect temptation. If you ask me what is the cause of our temptations, I shall tell you that it is the beauty and the great worth and importance of our souls which the Devil values and which he loves so much that he would consent to suffer two Hells, if necessary, if by so doing he could drag our souls into Hell” (St. John Vianney).
“Whom does the devil pursue must? Perhaps you are thinking that it must be those who are tempted most; these would undoubtedly be the habitual drunkards, the scandalmongers, the immodest and shameless people who wallow in moral filth, and the miser, who hoards in all sorts of ways. No, my dear brethren no, it is not these people. On the contrary, the Devil despises them, or else he holds onto them, lest they not have a long enough time in which to do evil, because the longer they live, the more their bad example will drag souls into Hell” (St. John Vianney).
“If the Devil had pursued a lewd and shameless old fellow too closely, he might have shortened the latter’s life by fifteen or twenty years, and he would not then have destroyed the virginity of that young girl by plunging her into the unspeakable mire of his indecencies; he would not, again, have seduced that wife, nor would he have taught his evil lessons to that young man, who will perhaps continue to practice them until his death. If the Devil had prompted this thief to rob on every occasion, he would long since have ended on the scaffold and so he would not have induced his neighbor to follow his example. If the Devil had urged this drunkard to fill himself unceasingly with wine, he would long ago have perished in his debaucheries, instead of which, by living longer, he has made many others like himself. If the Devil had taken away the life of this musician, of that dancehall owner, of this cabaret keeper, in some raid or scuffle, or on any other occasion, how many souls would there be who, without these people, would not be damned and who now will be? St. Augustine teaches us that the Devil does not bother these people very much; on the contrary, he despises them and spits upon them” (St. John Vianney).
Temptations Are Necessary
That classic book, The Imitation of Christ, tells us that “It is good for us to have trials and troubles at times, for they often remind us that we are on probation and ought not to hope in any worldly thing. It is good for us sometimes to suffer contradiction, to be misjudged by men even though we do well and mean well. These things help us to be humble and shield us from vainglory. When to all outward appearances men give us no credit, when they do not think well of us, then we are more inclined to seek God Who sees our hearts. Therefore, a man ought to root himself so firmly in God that he will not need the consolations of men. When a man of good will is afflicted, tempted, and tormented by evil thoughts, he realizes clearly that his greatest need is God, without Whom he can do no good. Saddened by his miseries and sufferings, he laments and prays. He wearies of living longer and wishes for death that he might be dissolved and be with Christ. Then he understands fully that perfect security and complete peace cannot be found on earth” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 12).
Nobody is Exempt from Temptations
The author of The Imitation of Christ continues: “So long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and temptation. Whence it is written in Job: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare.” Everyone, therefore, must guard against temptation and must watch in prayer lest the devil, who never sleeps but goes about seeking whom he may devour, find occasion to deceive him. No one is so perfect or so holy but he is sometimes tempted; man cannot be altogether free from temptation. Yet temptations―though troublesome and severe―are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many temptations and trials to profit by them, while those who could not resist became reprobate and fell away” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 13).
“There is no state so holy, no place so secret, that temptations and trials will not come. Man is never safe from them as long as he lives, for they come from within us ― in sin we were born. When one temptation or trial passes, another comes; we shall always have something to suffer because we have lost the state of original blessedness. Many people try to escape temptations, only to fall more deeply. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but by patience and true humility we become stronger than all our enemies. The man who only shuns temptations outwardly and does not uproot them will make little progress; indeed they will quickly return, more violent than before. Little by little, in patience and long-suffering you will overcome them, by the help of God rather than by severity and your own rash ways. Often take counsel when tempted; and do not be harsh with others who are tempted, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 13).
A Testing and Trying Time
Before all else, it is essential that we get as clear a notion as possible of the meaning of the word temptation.
“Temptation” is derived from the Latin “tentare”, which means “to try” or “to test”. Accordingly, a temptation may be said to be a trying or a testing of the soul for the purpose of ascertaining its attitude toward God and its fidelity in the service it owes to Him.
To a great extent, temptations are to the spiritual life, what various tests on machines and materials are to mechanical and building operations. Before a steam boiler is put into operation, its ability to withstand a determined pressure of steam is ascertained by subjecting it to a rigorous test. Before a beam is placed in a building, its carrying strength is determined. And so in hundreds of other cases. The machines and materials are put through stresses designed to show whether they will prove adequate to the demand that will be made on them. By a transfer of meaning, we can say that they are tempted.
This, then, is the meaning of temptation — a trial or a test. In the service of God, souls are tested or tried in order that the quality of their love for God and their devotion to Him may become known, and that they may at the same time be given opportunities of winning for themselves large treasures of grace and merit. Temptations, therefore, are meant to reveal whether the love that a soul claims to have for God is genuine and true, and not mere hollow sham and vain pretense. They are the acid test of the spiritual life.
Sifting the True form the Fake
It is well known that there are certain substances that look so much like gold that they are often mistaken for that precious metal by ignorant and inexperienced persons. Many a man has been deceived by the worthless substance commonly known as “fool’s gold.” To discover whether minerals that look like gold are the genuine metal, an assayer employs special tests. One of these consists in subjecting the substance to the action of strong nitric acid. If the substance is gold, the acid will have no effect on it; if it is not, it will break up and dissolve — an easy way of proving that what was thought to be gold was nothing more than worthless dross.
This has its parallel in the spiritual world. There are many souls parading before men what appears to be solid and genuine virtue. An acid test is needed to reveal the true character of these souls. This is supplied by temptations. The soul that truly loves God will not allow itself to be overcome by them, but will remain firm and immovable in the keeping of His holy law; whereas that which is only a pretender, will offer but little resistance, or perhaps none at all.
God Causes Some Temptations and Permits Others
When the man on the street speaks of temptations, it is commonly understood as an incitement or allurement to some sin, brought about by either suggestion, the fear of suffering, or the offer of some good or pleasure. It may be an external temptation, such as the sight of objects, e.g., books, improper pictures, immodestly dressed persons; or by hearing, e.g., of suggestive or obscene stories, attacks on religion or the Church, detraction, or calumny. It may be a temptation to consume things, e.g. by eating and drinking immoderately. Or it may be an internal temptation, as when evil thoughts, imaginings, or desires spring up in the mind, or when feelings or sensations of a sensual character arise in the body without our having voluntarily caused them. These and similar causes make an assault on the will to induce it to give its consent to the evil proposed.
In the Sacred Scriptures we find two sets of passages, relating to temptations, that, at first sight, seem to contradict each other. One set appears to make God the author of temptations, while the other plainly denies this. Thus we read that “God tempted Abraham” (Genesis 22:1) while we are assured by St. James that “God tempts no man” (James 1:13). To reconcile these two seemingly contradictory statements, we must keep in mind that there are two distinct varieties of temptations: those which are known as temptations of probation and those which go by the name of temptations of solicitation.
Temptations of Probation
The word “probation” finds it root in the Latin verb “probare” which means “to examine, to test, to try or to prove.” By temptations of probation we understand all those special trials to which God at times subjects persons, to prove their virtue, to prepare them for some particular work, or to elevate them to a very high degree of holiness, as was the case with Abraham, the Egyptian Joseph, Job, and Tobias in the Old Law; and with St. John the Baptist, St. Joseph, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and countless other saints in the New. Such temptations are not incitements to sin, but simply what the first meaning of the word implies: a proving or testing of a person’s virtue, as of Faith, Hope, Patience, etc. In this sense, it is quite correct to say that God tempts man.
Hence all such evils as sickness, loss of fortune, poverty, enmities, false accusations, persecutions, wars, and other calamities with which people, both the good and the bad, are often visited, can be designated as temptations sent by God, or temptations of probation.
Temptations of Solicitation
But the case is entirely different when there is question of temptations of solicitation. The word “solicitation” finds it root in the Latin verb “sollicitare” which means “to stir up, to arouse, to agitate, or to incite.” These are really incitements or allurements to violations of the law of God that come, directly or indirectly, from the Devil. They come from him directly by reason of the superior spiritual powers he possesses and by which he can, to a great extent, work on our imagination and senses and suggest evil to our mind. They come from him indirectly by what Sacred Scripture designates as “the flesh” and “the world,” or by what St. John more particularly calls “the concupiscence of the flesh, the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life” (1 John 2:16). Of these means the enemy of our souls makes constant use for the purpose of enticing us to commit sin.
The Providential Design Behind Temptations
Fr. Tanquerey, in his book The Spiritual Life, explains the providential reason and use that God makes of temptations: God Himself does not tempt us directly: “Let no man, when he is tempted, say that he is tempted by God. For God is not a tempter of evils : and He tempts no man” (James 1:13). But He allows us to be tempted by our spiritual enemies, at the same time giving us the graces necessary to resist: “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able: but will make also with temptation issue, so that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13). And this for excellent reasons of His own.
1. He wants to make us merit Heaven.
Undoubtedly He could have bestowed upon us eternal life as a pure gift, but in His wisdom He has willed that we merit it as a reward. He even wills that the recompense be in proportion to the merit and hence in proportion to the obstacle overcome. Temptation, which imperils our frail virtue, is certainly one of the most trying hardships; to struggle courageously against it is one of the most meritorious acts we can perform; and once we have triumphed with God’s grace, we can repeat with St. Paul, that we have fought the good fight, and that it only remains for us to receive the crown of justice which God has prepared for us. The more we have done in order to merit that crown, the greater shall be our honor and our joy.
2. Temptation is likewise a means of purification.
(a) It reminds us that through lack of vigilance and of effort in the past we have fallen, and it becomes thus an occasion for new acts of contrition, shame, and humiliation, which make for the purification of the soul.
(b) It obliges us at the same time to put forth earnest and sustained efforts lest we fall; it makes us atone for our negligences and for our surrenders by the performance of contrary acts which further purify the soul. This is why when God wants to purify a soul more perfectly in order to raise it to contemplation, He allows it to undergo horrible temptations, as we shall see when treating of the unitive way.
3. Lastly, temptation is an instrument of spiritual progress.
(a) It is like a stripe of the lash that awakens us at the moment we would lull ourselves to sleep and relax. It makes us realize the necessity of forging ahead, of not halting midway, but of ever aiming higher, the more surely to remove the danger.
(b) It is a school of humility, of distrust of self. When tempted we realize more fully our weakness, our powerlessness; we feel more keenly the need of grace, and we pray with greater earnestness. We see all the better the necessity of mortifying in us the love of pleasure, the source of our temptations, and we embrace more eagerly the little crosses of every day in order to weaken the power of concupiscence.
(c) It is a school of love of God; for to insure our power of resistance, we throw ourselves into God’s arms there to seek for strength and shelter; we are more grateful to Him for His unfailing grace; we act towards Him as children of a most loving Father to Whom we have recourse in all our trials.
Hence, temptation possesses manifold advantages and it is on this account that God allows His friends to be tempted: “Because thou wast acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove you” (Tobias 12:13). Which is why Fr. Faber says “Temptations are the raw material of glory” and St. James commands: “My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations!” (James 1:2).
Increase of Temptations During Lent
Hence, to jeopardize and scuttle our best intentions for Lent, he brings out his best temptations for Lent—which we will see symbolized by the Gospel of the Triple Temptation of Christ in the desert (on the First Sunday of Lent). Have you ever noticed that temptations are heightened and intensified during Lent—we somehow seem hungrier than ever when we know we have to fast―which leads to the temptation of perhaps increasing the quantity of food we usually take at our main meal and making the two little collations to be not quite so little!
Our resolve to prayer more during Lent, suddenly finds obstacles from all kinds of sources—especially worldly events, commitments, appointments, requests for help, intensified curiosity with TV and internet, etc. Before we know it, the intention to pray more has sometimes resulted in praying even less than normal! We have to be really single-minded and strong-minded in these things, even to the point of violently resisting the temptations to be side-tracked: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). Remember that “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1), so “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called” (1 Timothy 6:12).
Temptations are to be combated by the avoidance, where possible, of the occasions that give rise to them, by recourse to prayer, and by fostering within oneself a spirit of humble distrust of one’s own powers and of unbounded confidence in God. The resistance we are bound to offer need not always be direct. Sometimes, particularly when there is question of reiterated evil interior suggestions, it may be useful to employ an indirect method, that is, to simply ignore them and quietly divert the attention into another channel. Temptations as such can never be intended by God. They are permitted by Him to give us an opportunity of practicing virtue and self-mastery and acquiring merit. The fact of temptation, no matter how large it looms in a person’s life, is not an indication that such a one is under the ban. Indeed those whom God calls to special heights of sanctity are just those who may expect to have to wrestle bravely with temptations more numerous and fearsome than fall to the lot of the average mortal.
In the Gospel for the First Sunday of Lent, we read of Jesus being led into the desert by the Holy Spirit, where he would spend 40 days in SOLITUDE, in PRAYER and in FASTING―after which He would do battle with Satan and his temptations: “Then Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterwards He was hungry. And the tempter coming said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread!’ Jesus answered and said: ‘It is written: “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, and set Him upon the pinnacle of the Temple, and said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down, for it is written: “That He has given His angels charge over Thee, and in their hands shall they bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash Thy foot against a stone!’” Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!”’ Again the devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus said to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written: “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him” (Matthew 4:1-11).
We also read elsewhere in the Gospel that once the devil has been cast out, he wanders through DESERT PLACES, and not liking them, wants to return to the person from who he was cast out, so that he can sow new seeds or weeds of pride and hatred in the soul of that person: “When an unclean spirit is gone out of a man he walks through dry places seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says: ‘I will return into my house from whence I came out!’ And coming he finds it empty, swept, and garnished. Then he goes, and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there―and the last state of that man is made worse than the first!” (Matthew 12:44-45; Luke 11:24-26).
The Desert is a Spiritual Boot-Camp
In the above Gospel readings, we read of the devil wandering through desert places and not finding any rest there―and Our Lord choosing the desert for His combat with the devil and temptation—it is where He goes to strengthen Himself beforehand, by SOLITUDE, PRAYER and FASTING. The desert could be said to be the “Spiritual-Boot-Camp” for soldiers of Christ. The desert is a humble place; it has little or nothing to offer. This is why those great saints and hermits of old, the Desert Fathers, fled to the desert to secure their salvation. In a sense, the devil has less weapons with which to fight us in the desert—no TV’s, computers, radios, stores and malls, etc. The devil did not tempt Our Lord with an absence of things, but with an abundance of things: he tempts Our Lord’s hunger with food and not further fasting; he tempts Our Lord’s lack of possessions in the desert with the abundance of kingdoms of the world; Our Lord’s humility is attacked with a temptation to show off and perform miracles just for the sake of it. The devil is the prince of this world, and in the desert he is a prince without his army. Though most of us cannot flee to a real desert, we can create our own desert with: SOLITUDE, SILENCE, and PRAYER.
Jesus was led by the Holy Ghost into the desert for precisely that! He would be alone, but not alone—He would be alone with God and only God. Being in the desert, He would find silence—with no noise or activities to distract Him. So, being alone and being in silence, He can do the obvious—PRAY! Prayer is the meat of this sandwich; SOLITUDE and SILENCE are merely the slices of bread that hold the meat of PRAYER in the center. “When ye pray, you shall not be as the hypocrites, that love to stand and pray in the synagogues and corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men … When thou shalt pray, enter into thy chamber, and having shut the door, pray to thy Father in secret” (Matthew 6:6).
Learning to Fight Satan and Temptation
Prayer should be the center of our lives, and, since we are weak and infirm, solitude and silence are NECESSARY CRUTCHES will help us hobble along in prayer. In order to strengthen our prayer in the battle against the devil, we also need to FAST. “Prayer is good with fasting” (Tobias 12:8). Sometimes it takes the sacrifice of fasting to give backbone or bite to our prayer. We see this in a particular instance when the disciples failed in their battle with a devil. When the disciples failed to cast out a particular devil “The disciples came to Jesus secretly, and said: ‘Why could not we cast him out?’... Jesus said to them: ‘This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting’!” (Mt. 17:18-20). We see echoes of this in the following verse: “But as for me, when they were troublesome to me, I was clothed with haircloth. I humbled my soul with fasting; and my prayer shall be turned into my bosom” (Psalm 34:13).
Do We Have to be Tempted?
Have you ever wondered about the necessity for temptation. It seems that this goes all the way back to the creation of the world and the temptation of Adam and Eve in the garden. Why did God allow the serpent to tempt them? Temptations are necessary in that they reveal who or what our true love is; temptations reveal what it is to which we are truly dedicated. If Adam and Eve did not have the temptation of the fruit on the tree which God had said not to eat from, they would not have had a means of demonstrating their love and dedication to God. There would not have been any alternative.
The devil―the prince and ruler of the world (John 12:31)―will use the world to tempt us and he will unite the temptations of the world to his own direct temptations in order to break-down our resistance. He will use persons, places and things to draw us away from God and into an addiction to the things the world can offer. “For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
The Ancient Roman philosopher, Seneca the Younger, wrote: “Fire proves gold, adversity proves men.” Holy Scripture puts it this way: “When thou comest to the service of God, prepare thy soul for temptation!” (Ecclesiasticus 2:1) … “and because thou wast acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove thee!” (Tobias 12:13). We must always remember that “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able―but will make also with temptation issue, so that you may be able to bear it!” (1 Corinthians 10:13).
Not fair!
We may feel that it is unfair for God to expose us to temptation and allow it to attack us. We know that Our Lord was tempted in the desert after praying and fasting there for forty days and nights—but He, after all, was God. We are mere mortals! We are like babies or infants compared to an adult! But as children we had to learn to avoid many unpleasant and dangerous things: poisonous liquids, poisonous berries, fire, electricity, lakes and rivers if we couldn’t swim, reptiles, snakes, vicious animals, and so many other things that are too numerous to name. Dealing with and avoiding what is harmful, is all part and parcel of growing up. The same is true for growing up spiritually.
The example of Our Lord shows us that even one who is sinless may be the subject of temptation. He suffered temptation for our sakes, just as He suffered death for our sakes. He suffered temptation, in order, as St. Paul says, “that we may have such a High Priest―not one who cannot have compassion, or be touched with a feeling of our infirmities―but One Who was tempted in all things like we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15); and again, that “He suffered―being tempted―that He might know how to aid or give help to those that are tempted” (Hebrews 2:18). It was that, out of His own personal experience, the Son of God, incarnate in our humanity, might taste of sin in all its bitterness, in all its penalties, except only that which to Him is impossible―the guilt of sin―that so He might be a Savior full of sympathy with sinners.
Is God a Tempter?
In Holy Scripture, in the book of Genesis, we read these words, that “God did tempt Abraham” (Genesis 22:1); but in the Epistle of St. James we read, “Let no man, when he is tempted, say that he is tempted by God” (James 1:13). This seems to be a contradiction — but it is not, because the word “tempt” is a word of perfectly neutral signification. It does not necessarily mean “tempt with evil”; it simply means to “try” — “God did try Abraham”; for God puts us on our trial, and that in two ways. He either by His providence sends us a variety of afflictions, or crosses, or losses, or contradictions, by which He tries what our spirit is; or, secondly, He permits that Satan should try us, as He permitted Satan to try and afflict Job. Therefore, when it is said that God “tempts,” it means that God tries us; but the other signification is an evil one; for all the temptations that come from Satan are evil in themselves. He never tempts any man to good, unless some accidental good may be the occasion of evil. Now, it is in this latter sense that I am going to speak — that is, of our being tried by evil, tried by Satan. God overrules even the temptations of Satan for our benefit.
Same Temptation—Different Destination
St. Augustine tells us that the same crosses lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. By this he means that some souls accept their crosses and sufferings—like the ‘Good Thief’ on the cross; whereas others refuse their crosses and sufferings and seek to escape them—like the ‘Bad Thief’ on the cross. The ‘Good Thief’ ended up in Paradise, the ‘Bad Thief’ did not! Likewise, the same temptations will lead some souls to Heaven, but other souls to Hell. It depends upon whether the temptation is powerfully rejected or gladly accepted.
Material of Glory
Fr. Faber tells us that “Temptations are the raw material of glory.” That is why St. James says: “My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations!” (James 1:2), to which St. Peter will add: “You shall greatly rejoice, if now you must be for a little time made sorrowful in divers temptations: so that the trial of your Faith (much more precious than gold which is tried by the fire) may be found unto praise and glory and honor at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:6-7).
Beware If You Have No Temptations
“If you have no temptations,” St. Gregory tells us, “it is because the devils are your friends, your leaders, and your shepherds. And by allowing you to pass your poor life tranquilly, to the end of your days, they will drag you down into the depths.” St. Augustine tells us that the greatest temptation is not to have temptations because this means that one is a person who has been rejected, abandoned by God, and left entirely in the grip of one’s own passions.
We Must Expect Temptation
St. John Vianney explains: “If Our Lord was tempted, it was in order to show us that we must be also. It follows, therefore, that we must expect temptation. If you ask me what is the cause of our temptations, I shall tell you that it is the beauty and the great worth and importance of our souls which the Devil values and which he loves so much that he would consent to suffer two Hells, if necessary, if by so doing he could drag our souls into Hell” (St. John Vianney).
“Whom does the devil pursue must? Perhaps you are thinking that it must be those who are tempted most; these would undoubtedly be the habitual drunkards, the scandalmongers, the immodest and shameless people who wallow in moral filth, and the miser, who hoards in all sorts of ways. No, my dear brethren no, it is not these people. On the contrary, the Devil despises them, or else he holds onto them, lest they not have a long enough time in which to do evil, because the longer they live, the more their bad example will drag souls into Hell” (St. John Vianney).
“If the Devil had pursued a lewd and shameless old fellow too closely, he might have shortened the latter’s life by fifteen or twenty years, and he would not then have destroyed the virginity of that young girl by plunging her into the unspeakable mire of his indecencies; he would not, again, have seduced that wife, nor would he have taught his evil lessons to that young man, who will perhaps continue to practice them until his death. If the Devil had prompted this thief to rob on every occasion, he would long since have ended on the scaffold and so he would not have induced his neighbor to follow his example. If the Devil had urged this drunkard to fill himself unceasingly with wine, he would long ago have perished in his debaucheries, instead of which, by living longer, he has made many others like himself. If the Devil had taken away the life of this musician, of that dancehall owner, of this cabaret keeper, in some raid or scuffle, or on any other occasion, how many souls would there be who, without these people, would not be damned and who now will be? St. Augustine teaches us that the Devil does not bother these people very much; on the contrary, he despises them and spits upon them” (St. John Vianney).
Temptations Are Necessary
That classic book, The Imitation of Christ, tells us that “It is good for us to have trials and troubles at times, for they often remind us that we are on probation and ought not to hope in any worldly thing. It is good for us sometimes to suffer contradiction, to be misjudged by men even though we do well and mean well. These things help us to be humble and shield us from vainglory. When to all outward appearances men give us no credit, when they do not think well of us, then we are more inclined to seek God Who sees our hearts. Therefore, a man ought to root himself so firmly in God that he will not need the consolations of men. When a man of good will is afflicted, tempted, and tormented by evil thoughts, he realizes clearly that his greatest need is God, without Whom he can do no good. Saddened by his miseries and sufferings, he laments and prays. He wearies of living longer and wishes for death that he might be dissolved and be with Christ. Then he understands fully that perfect security and complete peace cannot be found on earth” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 12).
Nobody is Exempt from Temptations
The author of The Imitation of Christ continues: “So long as we live in this world we cannot escape suffering and temptation. Whence it is written in Job: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare.” Everyone, therefore, must guard against temptation and must watch in prayer lest the devil, who never sleeps but goes about seeking whom he may devour, find occasion to deceive him. No one is so perfect or so holy but he is sometimes tempted; man cannot be altogether free from temptation. Yet temptations―though troublesome and severe―are often useful to a man, for in them he is humbled, purified, and instructed. The saints all passed through many temptations and trials to profit by them, while those who could not resist became reprobate and fell away” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 13).
“There is no state so holy, no place so secret, that temptations and trials will not come. Man is never safe from them as long as he lives, for they come from within us ― in sin we were born. When one temptation or trial passes, another comes; we shall always have something to suffer because we have lost the state of original blessedness. Many people try to escape temptations, only to fall more deeply. We cannot conquer simply by fleeing, but by patience and true humility we become stronger than all our enemies. The man who only shuns temptations outwardly and does not uproot them will make little progress; indeed they will quickly return, more violent than before. Little by little, in patience and long-suffering you will overcome them, by the help of God rather than by severity and your own rash ways. Often take counsel when tempted; and do not be harsh with others who are tempted, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 13).
A Testing and Trying Time
Before all else, it is essential that we get as clear a notion as possible of the meaning of the word temptation.
“Temptation” is derived from the Latin “tentare”, which means “to try” or “to test”. Accordingly, a temptation may be said to be a trying or a testing of the soul for the purpose of ascertaining its attitude toward God and its fidelity in the service it owes to Him.
To a great extent, temptations are to the spiritual life, what various tests on machines and materials are to mechanical and building operations. Before a steam boiler is put into operation, its ability to withstand a determined pressure of steam is ascertained by subjecting it to a rigorous test. Before a beam is placed in a building, its carrying strength is determined. And so in hundreds of other cases. The machines and materials are put through stresses designed to show whether they will prove adequate to the demand that will be made on them. By a transfer of meaning, we can say that they are tempted.
This, then, is the meaning of temptation — a trial or a test. In the service of God, souls are tested or tried in order that the quality of their love for God and their devotion to Him may become known, and that they may at the same time be given opportunities of winning for themselves large treasures of grace and merit. Temptations, therefore, are meant to reveal whether the love that a soul claims to have for God is genuine and true, and not mere hollow sham and vain pretense. They are the acid test of the spiritual life.
Sifting the True form the Fake
It is well known that there are certain substances that look so much like gold that they are often mistaken for that precious metal by ignorant and inexperienced persons. Many a man has been deceived by the worthless substance commonly known as “fool’s gold.” To discover whether minerals that look like gold are the genuine metal, an assayer employs special tests. One of these consists in subjecting the substance to the action of strong nitric acid. If the substance is gold, the acid will have no effect on it; if it is not, it will break up and dissolve — an easy way of proving that what was thought to be gold was nothing more than worthless dross.
This has its parallel in the spiritual world. There are many souls parading before men what appears to be solid and genuine virtue. An acid test is needed to reveal the true character of these souls. This is supplied by temptations. The soul that truly loves God will not allow itself to be overcome by them, but will remain firm and immovable in the keeping of His holy law; whereas that which is only a pretender, will offer but little resistance, or perhaps none at all.
God Causes Some Temptations and Permits Others
When the man on the street speaks of temptations, it is commonly understood as an incitement or allurement to some sin, brought about by either suggestion, the fear of suffering, or the offer of some good or pleasure. It may be an external temptation, such as the sight of objects, e.g., books, improper pictures, immodestly dressed persons; or by hearing, e.g., of suggestive or obscene stories, attacks on religion or the Church, detraction, or calumny. It may be a temptation to consume things, e.g. by eating and drinking immoderately. Or it may be an internal temptation, as when evil thoughts, imaginings, or desires spring up in the mind, or when feelings or sensations of a sensual character arise in the body without our having voluntarily caused them. These and similar causes make an assault on the will to induce it to give its consent to the evil proposed.
In the Sacred Scriptures we find two sets of passages, relating to temptations, that, at first sight, seem to contradict each other. One set appears to make God the author of temptations, while the other plainly denies this. Thus we read that “God tempted Abraham” (Genesis 22:1) while we are assured by St. James that “God tempts no man” (James 1:13). To reconcile these two seemingly contradictory statements, we must keep in mind that there are two distinct varieties of temptations: those which are known as temptations of probation and those which go by the name of temptations of solicitation.
Temptations of Probation
The word “probation” finds it root in the Latin verb “probare” which means “to examine, to test, to try or to prove.” By temptations of probation we understand all those special trials to which God at times subjects persons, to prove their virtue, to prepare them for some particular work, or to elevate them to a very high degree of holiness, as was the case with Abraham, the Egyptian Joseph, Job, and Tobias in the Old Law; and with St. John the Baptist, St. Joseph, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and countless other saints in the New. Such temptations are not incitements to sin, but simply what the first meaning of the word implies: a proving or testing of a person’s virtue, as of Faith, Hope, Patience, etc. In this sense, it is quite correct to say that God tempts man.
Hence all such evils as sickness, loss of fortune, poverty, enmities, false accusations, persecutions, wars, and other calamities with which people, both the good and the bad, are often visited, can be designated as temptations sent by God, or temptations of probation.
Temptations of Solicitation
But the case is entirely different when there is question of temptations of solicitation. The word “solicitation” finds it root in the Latin verb “sollicitare” which means “to stir up, to arouse, to agitate, or to incite.” These are really incitements or allurements to violations of the law of God that come, directly or indirectly, from the Devil. They come from him directly by reason of the superior spiritual powers he possesses and by which he can, to a great extent, work on our imagination and senses and suggest evil to our mind. They come from him indirectly by what Sacred Scripture designates as “the flesh” and “the world,” or by what St. John more particularly calls “the concupiscence of the flesh, the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life” (1 John 2:16). Of these means the enemy of our souls makes constant use for the purpose of enticing us to commit sin.
The Providential Design Behind Temptations
Fr. Tanquerey, in his book The Spiritual Life, explains the providential reason and use that God makes of temptations: God Himself does not tempt us directly: “Let no man, when he is tempted, say that he is tempted by God. For God is not a tempter of evils : and He tempts no man” (James 1:13). But He allows us to be tempted by our spiritual enemies, at the same time giving us the graces necessary to resist: “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able: but will make also with temptation issue, so that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13). And this for excellent reasons of His own.
1. He wants to make us merit Heaven.
Undoubtedly He could have bestowed upon us eternal life as a pure gift, but in His wisdom He has willed that we merit it as a reward. He even wills that the recompense be in proportion to the merit and hence in proportion to the obstacle overcome. Temptation, which imperils our frail virtue, is certainly one of the most trying hardships; to struggle courageously against it is one of the most meritorious acts we can perform; and once we have triumphed with God’s grace, we can repeat with St. Paul, that we have fought the good fight, and that it only remains for us to receive the crown of justice which God has prepared for us. The more we have done in order to merit that crown, the greater shall be our honor and our joy.
2. Temptation is likewise a means of purification.
(a) It reminds us that through lack of vigilance and of effort in the past we have fallen, and it becomes thus an occasion for new acts of contrition, shame, and humiliation, which make for the purification of the soul.
(b) It obliges us at the same time to put forth earnest and sustained efforts lest we fall; it makes us atone for our negligences and for our surrenders by the performance of contrary acts which further purify the soul. This is why when God wants to purify a soul more perfectly in order to raise it to contemplation, He allows it to undergo horrible temptations, as we shall see when treating of the unitive way.
3. Lastly, temptation is an instrument of spiritual progress.
(a) It is like a stripe of the lash that awakens us at the moment we would lull ourselves to sleep and relax. It makes us realize the necessity of forging ahead, of not halting midway, but of ever aiming higher, the more surely to remove the danger.
(b) It is a school of humility, of distrust of self. When tempted we realize more fully our weakness, our powerlessness; we feel more keenly the need of grace, and we pray with greater earnestness. We see all the better the necessity of mortifying in us the love of pleasure, the source of our temptations, and we embrace more eagerly the little crosses of every day in order to weaken the power of concupiscence.
(c) It is a school of love of God; for to insure our power of resistance, we throw ourselves into God’s arms there to seek for strength and shelter; we are more grateful to Him for His unfailing grace; we act towards Him as children of a most loving Father to Whom we have recourse in all our trials.
Hence, temptation possesses manifold advantages and it is on this account that God allows His friends to be tempted: “Because thou wast acceptable to God, it was necessary that temptation should prove you” (Tobias 12:13). Which is why Fr. Faber says “Temptations are the raw material of glory” and St. James commands: “My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations!” (James 1:2).
Increase of Temptations During Lent
Hence, to jeopardize and scuttle our best intentions for Lent, he brings out his best temptations for Lent—which we will see symbolized by the Gospel of the Triple Temptation of Christ in the desert (on the First Sunday of Lent). Have you ever noticed that temptations are heightened and intensified during Lent—we somehow seem hungrier than ever when we know we have to fast―which leads to the temptation of perhaps increasing the quantity of food we usually take at our main meal and making the two little collations to be not quite so little!
Our resolve to prayer more during Lent, suddenly finds obstacles from all kinds of sources—especially worldly events, commitments, appointments, requests for help, intensified curiosity with TV and internet, etc. Before we know it, the intention to pray more has sometimes resulted in praying even less than normal! We have to be really single-minded and strong-minded in these things, even to the point of violently resisting the temptations to be side-tracked: “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). Remember that “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1), so “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called” (1 Timothy 6:12).
Temptations are to be combated by the avoidance, where possible, of the occasions that give rise to them, by recourse to prayer, and by fostering within oneself a spirit of humble distrust of one’s own powers and of unbounded confidence in God. The resistance we are bound to offer need not always be direct. Sometimes, particularly when there is question of reiterated evil interior suggestions, it may be useful to employ an indirect method, that is, to simply ignore them and quietly divert the attention into another channel. Temptations as such can never be intended by God. They are permitted by Him to give us an opportunity of practicing virtue and self-mastery and acquiring merit. The fact of temptation, no matter how large it looms in a person’s life, is not an indication that such a one is under the ban. Indeed those whom God calls to special heights of sanctity are just those who may expect to have to wrestle bravely with temptations more numerous and fearsome than fall to the lot of the average mortal.
Article 2
DOUBLE DAY ARTICLE
Thursday & Friday after Ash Wednesday, February 15th & 16th
Lent Isn't Over! Lent is More than Just Ash Wednesday!
DOUBLE DAY ARTICLE
Thursday & Friday after Ash Wednesday, February 15th & 16th
Lent Isn't Over! Lent is More than Just Ash Wednesday!
One Day Wonders!
The modern world has created a breed of human being that could be called a “One Day Wonder!” It is a by-product of the modern “fast-track” world, which changes with the blink of an eye! “Here today―gone tomorrow!” seems a fitting adage to the phenomenon. You increasingly see that approach at Christmastime―for many people Christmas is over and done with on December 26th. Some hardy, resolute, never-say-die folk might stubbornly prolong their Christmas until the New Year’s Eve celebrations―and, after that, down come the Christmas decorations and out goes the Christmas tree!
Something similar can be seen during the season of Lent―thanks to Pope Paul VI’s 1966 Apostolic Constitution Paenitemini, which dramatically reduced Catholic obligatory fasting requirements. He recommended that fasting be appropriate to the local economic situation, and that all Catholics merely voluntarily fast and abstain. The Lenten Fast was reduced from an obligatory 40 Days to a mere 2 Days (Ash Wednesday and Good Friday) ― which is a 95% discount! With such a discount, one can imagine that, for many Catholics, Lent is now merely a “two-day-pain” with over 5 weeks recovery time from having fasted on Ash Wednesday until the next obligatory fast on Good Friday! Isn’t God good? Or rather, is not the Church foolish?
All this is symptomatic of modern manufacturing and consumerism―nothing is made to last, there is no money to made in making durable life-long goods. Take the light-bulb, for instance. They know how to make an “eternal” light bulb―but there is little profit to made in such an instance―so the manufacturers entered a pact whereby they would exclusively make short-life light bulbs. The world's longest-lasting light bulb is the Centennial Light located at 4550 East Avenue, Livermore, California. It is maintained by the Livermore-Pleasanton Fire Department. The fire department claims that the bulb is at least 121 years old (installed 1901) and has only been turned off a handful of times.
Some products simply stop working, or are deactivated after a certain date, forcing consumers to replace them even if they are still in a usable condition. One example out countless examples is found in computer software and hardware―whether on desktops, laptops, tablets, or smartphones. How often do people get a new mobile phone? Or how about a computer? Or a TV? The chances are people have been ‘upgrading’ more frequently in recent years due, to a great extent, to the phenomenon of “planned obsolescence”. This phenomenon means that not only do technological gadgets stop working after a certain time but they are also considered obsolete when a better version is produced, or they simply become unfashionable. Products stop working because they are designed to stop working and, in many cases, the manufacturer has carefully scheduled the end of their useful lives to force us to buy new products. The strategy is attributed to the motor industry in the United States when, in 1924, a General Motors executive, Alfred P. Sloan Jr., suggested launching new models every year to keep sales moving. The planned obsolescence strategy has been applied to a wide range of consumer products for decades. As we said, cars are a clear example, but so are electronics, with everything from computers, televisions and mobile phones to household appliances such as washing machines, dishwashers, microwaves, etc. and software.
The “Planned Obsolesecne” of the Church
The Church―especially since the Second Vatican Council―has also entered this “planned obsolescence” game. We can clearly see its boldness and relentless pushiness, not only with the gradual diminishing of obligatory fasting, but also the advent of issues such as the potential permission for priests to marry; for women to become priests; the acceptance of same-sex relations and same-sex marriages; contraception; abortion; transgenderism; etc., etc. The Liberals and Modernists are forever chanting that this or that traditional teaching is now obsolete and that the Church must change with the times! What was once a sin yesterday or yesteryear―is no longer a sin today! Traditional Catholic views―that go back many centuries―are increasingly being replaced by modern or Modernist Catholic views.
The Church of Constant Change
The list of changes brought about in the Catholic Church, since the Second Vatican Council, literally goes into the hundreds! Here are some (around 46) of the major changes from a list of almost 200 (and even that list is incomplete):
● Abandonment of the Ancient Traditional Mass
● Introduction of the Concelebration of Mass by many priests
● Introduction of Vernacular Language for Mass
● Introduction of the Saturday Vigil Mass to satisfy the Sunday obligation of attending Mass.
● The New Mass is praised by Protestants, whereas the Traditional Mass was criticized by Protestants
● Introduction of Female Altar Servers
● Demotion of the Altar to a mere wooden table
● Demotion of the Tabernacle ― sometimes hidden in some side-altar, or not present on the Altar of Mass
● Elimination of explicitly Sacrificial Prayers in Mass
● Reduced Eucharistic Fast from midnight, to three hours, and then to one hour.
● Introduction of Communion in the hand while standing; instead on the tongue while kneeling
● Communion under both species of Bread and Wine
● Reduced Eucharistic Adoration
● Changed Baptisms — the rite of baptism for children has seen the exorcism against Satan virtually eliminated.
● Changed Rite for Ordination of Priests and Consecration of Bishops
● Introduction of Lay ‘Ministers’ to Increasingly Replace Priests in Certain Duties
● Overthrow of many Rules in Religious Life
● Changed Breviary (Divine Office/Liturgy of the Hours)
● Changed Rosary (additional five decades―Luminous Mysteries)
● Changed Rites for other Sacraments
● Changes to Rituals which cause widespread loss of reverence and solemnity, and lead to frequent liturgical abuses, sacrileges, and profanation
● Changed Sacramentals
● Changed Blessings
● New Canon Law
● New Catechism
● Changed Indulgences
● Reduced Fast Days ― only two obligatory fast days in the whole year. Used to be over 60 fast days in USA before Vatican II.
● Appearance of a “watered down” Doctrine
● Attempt to Cover Over (or Rework) the Doctrine of “No Salvation Outside the Church”
● Less Focus on the Blessed Virgin Mary
● New Bible Translations
● Changed Liturgical Calendar
● Dropped Liturgical Seasons (e.g. Septuagesima Season)
● Elimination of the penitential Ember Days
● Reduction / Elimination of Octaves and Vigils
● Many dropped Feast Days
● Holy Days of Obligation falling on weekdays transferred to nearest Sundays
● Drastic changes in prayers for remaining Feast Days
● Widespread adoption of a False Ecumenism
● Toleration of Cremation, which was previously a condemned practice.
● Reversal of Acceptance: Liberalism and Modernism now praised; Conservatism and Traditionalism now criticized
● Reduction in Demands Made of Catholics
● Increased Conformity to the World
● Increased focus on Earth rather than Heaven
● Shift from the Service of God to the Service of Man
● Over-emphasis on Human Dignity at the expense of the Dignity of God
If you think that the above list is long―then realize that it is only the tip of the iceberg of changes that have been relentlessly and gradually introduced since the Second Vatican Council. Since most Catholics have an abysmal knowledge of their Faith and its history, very few of realize the magnitude and quantity of these changes. In fact, most Catholics welcome such changes because it makes Catholic life easier! Who wants to buy gasoline at $5 per gallon when you can get a cheap brand of gasoline for $3 per gallon?
Already Foreseen and Foretold
All of this should bring to mind the prophecy of St. John Bosco (1815-1888) and the visions granted to the Marian visionary, ecstatic and stigmatist, Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824)―both of which concerned the Church of our current times. St. John Bosco said: “There will be an Ecumenical Council in the next century, after which there will be chaos in the Church.” Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich’s visions went into much more detail―here are some key extracts:
“I a long processions of bishops [The four different sessions of the Second Vatican Council, held from 1962 to 1965, had between 2,000 and 2,500 bishops in daily attendance] ... I saw what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world [the Second Vatican Council assembled all the bishops in the world], but only a small number were perfectly sound … A concession was demanded from the clergy which could not be granted. I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church. I saw many older priests, especially one, who wept bitterly. A few younger ones were also weeping. But others, and the lukewarm among them, readily did what was demanded. It was as if people were splitting into two camps ... Priests were among them! … Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence. I saw that few of them were still godly priests ... I saw some good pious bishops; but they were weak and wavering, their cowardice often got the upper hand … I now see that in this place [Rome], the [Catholic] Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived. They all work for destruction ― even the clergy ... Most priests were lured by the glittering, but false knowledge of modern teachers, and they all contributed to the work of destruction.
“I saw the secret sect relentlessly undermining the great Church! … They were building a large, strange, and extravagant church there in Rome … I did not see a single angel, nor a single saint helping in the work ... There was nothing holy in it. They had preaching and singing, but nothing else [which possibly implies the absence of the true Sacrifice of the Mass in this new church], and only very few attended it. People were kneading bread in the crypt below ... but it would not rise, nor did they receive the Body of our Lord, but only bread. Those who were in error, through no fault of their own―and who piously and ardently longed for the Body of Jesus―were spiritually consoled, but not by their communion ...
“There―in the strange big church―all the work was being done mechanically according to set rules and formulae. Everything was being done according to human reason ... All in this church belonged to the Earth, returned to the Earth. All was dead, the work of human skill, a church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention like the new heterodox church in Rome … There was something proud, presumptuous, and violent about it, and they seemed very successful. I saw the fatal consequences of this counterfeit church … All sorts of abominations were perpetrated there … I saw how harmful would be the consequences of this false church. I saw it increase in size; I saw heretics of all kinds flocking to the city of Rome … Everyone was to be admitted in it in order to be united and have equal rights―Evangelicals, Catholics, sects of every description [all of which describes the current false spirit of Ecumenism that invaded the Church at the Secon Vatican Council] ... The Protestant doctrine and that of the schismatic Greeks is to spread everywhere! … Then I saw that everything pertaining to Protestantism was gradually gaining the upper hand, and the Catholic religion fell into complete decadence ... I saw all sorts of people, things, doctrines, and opinions ... Then I saw darkness spreading around and people no longer seeking the true Church … The Church is in great danger! It was shown to me that there were almost no Christians left in the old acceptation of the word! … The Church is completely isolated and as if completely deserted. It seems that everyone is running away.”
Are You Running Away?
Catholics are certainly running away from the Faith today! Just look at these worldwide national statistics for those Catholics who attend Mass at least once a week―usually on Sunday, or the Saturday Vigil Mass.
The modern world has created a breed of human being that could be called a “One Day Wonder!” It is a by-product of the modern “fast-track” world, which changes with the blink of an eye! “Here today―gone tomorrow!” seems a fitting adage to the phenomenon. You increasingly see that approach at Christmastime―for many people Christmas is over and done with on December 26th. Some hardy, resolute, never-say-die folk might stubbornly prolong their Christmas until the New Year’s Eve celebrations―and, after that, down come the Christmas decorations and out goes the Christmas tree!
Something similar can be seen during the season of Lent―thanks to Pope Paul VI’s 1966 Apostolic Constitution Paenitemini, which dramatically reduced Catholic obligatory fasting requirements. He recommended that fasting be appropriate to the local economic situation, and that all Catholics merely voluntarily fast and abstain. The Lenten Fast was reduced from an obligatory 40 Days to a mere 2 Days (Ash Wednesday and Good Friday) ― which is a 95% discount! With such a discount, one can imagine that, for many Catholics, Lent is now merely a “two-day-pain” with over 5 weeks recovery time from having fasted on Ash Wednesday until the next obligatory fast on Good Friday! Isn’t God good? Or rather, is not the Church foolish?
All this is symptomatic of modern manufacturing and consumerism―nothing is made to last, there is no money to made in making durable life-long goods. Take the light-bulb, for instance. They know how to make an “eternal” light bulb―but there is little profit to made in such an instance―so the manufacturers entered a pact whereby they would exclusively make short-life light bulbs. The world's longest-lasting light bulb is the Centennial Light located at 4550 East Avenue, Livermore, California. It is maintained by the Livermore-Pleasanton Fire Department. The fire department claims that the bulb is at least 121 years old (installed 1901) and has only been turned off a handful of times.
Some products simply stop working, or are deactivated after a certain date, forcing consumers to replace them even if they are still in a usable condition. One example out countless examples is found in computer software and hardware―whether on desktops, laptops, tablets, or smartphones. How often do people get a new mobile phone? Or how about a computer? Or a TV? The chances are people have been ‘upgrading’ more frequently in recent years due, to a great extent, to the phenomenon of “planned obsolescence”. This phenomenon means that not only do technological gadgets stop working after a certain time but they are also considered obsolete when a better version is produced, or they simply become unfashionable. Products stop working because they are designed to stop working and, in many cases, the manufacturer has carefully scheduled the end of their useful lives to force us to buy new products. The strategy is attributed to the motor industry in the United States when, in 1924, a General Motors executive, Alfred P. Sloan Jr., suggested launching new models every year to keep sales moving. The planned obsolescence strategy has been applied to a wide range of consumer products for decades. As we said, cars are a clear example, but so are electronics, with everything from computers, televisions and mobile phones to household appliances such as washing machines, dishwashers, microwaves, etc. and software.
The “Planned Obsolesecne” of the Church
The Church―especially since the Second Vatican Council―has also entered this “planned obsolescence” game. We can clearly see its boldness and relentless pushiness, not only with the gradual diminishing of obligatory fasting, but also the advent of issues such as the potential permission for priests to marry; for women to become priests; the acceptance of same-sex relations and same-sex marriages; contraception; abortion; transgenderism; etc., etc. The Liberals and Modernists are forever chanting that this or that traditional teaching is now obsolete and that the Church must change with the times! What was once a sin yesterday or yesteryear―is no longer a sin today! Traditional Catholic views―that go back many centuries―are increasingly being replaced by modern or Modernist Catholic views.
The Church of Constant Change
The list of changes brought about in the Catholic Church, since the Second Vatican Council, literally goes into the hundreds! Here are some (around 46) of the major changes from a list of almost 200 (and even that list is incomplete):
● Abandonment of the Ancient Traditional Mass
● Introduction of the Concelebration of Mass by many priests
● Introduction of Vernacular Language for Mass
● Introduction of the Saturday Vigil Mass to satisfy the Sunday obligation of attending Mass.
● The New Mass is praised by Protestants, whereas the Traditional Mass was criticized by Protestants
● Introduction of Female Altar Servers
● Demotion of the Altar to a mere wooden table
● Demotion of the Tabernacle ― sometimes hidden in some side-altar, or not present on the Altar of Mass
● Elimination of explicitly Sacrificial Prayers in Mass
● Reduced Eucharistic Fast from midnight, to three hours, and then to one hour.
● Introduction of Communion in the hand while standing; instead on the tongue while kneeling
● Communion under both species of Bread and Wine
● Reduced Eucharistic Adoration
● Changed Baptisms — the rite of baptism for children has seen the exorcism against Satan virtually eliminated.
● Changed Rite for Ordination of Priests and Consecration of Bishops
● Introduction of Lay ‘Ministers’ to Increasingly Replace Priests in Certain Duties
● Overthrow of many Rules in Religious Life
● Changed Breviary (Divine Office/Liturgy of the Hours)
● Changed Rosary (additional five decades―Luminous Mysteries)
● Changed Rites for other Sacraments
● Changes to Rituals which cause widespread loss of reverence and solemnity, and lead to frequent liturgical abuses, sacrileges, and profanation
● Changed Sacramentals
● Changed Blessings
● New Canon Law
● New Catechism
● Changed Indulgences
● Reduced Fast Days ― only two obligatory fast days in the whole year. Used to be over 60 fast days in USA before Vatican II.
● Appearance of a “watered down” Doctrine
● Attempt to Cover Over (or Rework) the Doctrine of “No Salvation Outside the Church”
● Less Focus on the Blessed Virgin Mary
● New Bible Translations
● Changed Liturgical Calendar
● Dropped Liturgical Seasons (e.g. Septuagesima Season)
● Elimination of the penitential Ember Days
● Reduction / Elimination of Octaves and Vigils
● Many dropped Feast Days
● Holy Days of Obligation falling on weekdays transferred to nearest Sundays
● Drastic changes in prayers for remaining Feast Days
● Widespread adoption of a False Ecumenism
● Toleration of Cremation, which was previously a condemned practice.
● Reversal of Acceptance: Liberalism and Modernism now praised; Conservatism and Traditionalism now criticized
● Reduction in Demands Made of Catholics
● Increased Conformity to the World
● Increased focus on Earth rather than Heaven
● Shift from the Service of God to the Service of Man
● Over-emphasis on Human Dignity at the expense of the Dignity of God
If you think that the above list is long―then realize that it is only the tip of the iceberg of changes that have been relentlessly and gradually introduced since the Second Vatican Council. Since most Catholics have an abysmal knowledge of their Faith and its history, very few of realize the magnitude and quantity of these changes. In fact, most Catholics welcome such changes because it makes Catholic life easier! Who wants to buy gasoline at $5 per gallon when you can get a cheap brand of gasoline for $3 per gallon?
Already Foreseen and Foretold
All of this should bring to mind the prophecy of St. John Bosco (1815-1888) and the visions granted to the Marian visionary, ecstatic and stigmatist, Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824)―both of which concerned the Church of our current times. St. John Bosco said: “There will be an Ecumenical Council in the next century, after which there will be chaos in the Church.” Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich’s visions went into much more detail―here are some key extracts:
“I a long processions of bishops [The four different sessions of the Second Vatican Council, held from 1962 to 1965, had between 2,000 and 2,500 bishops in daily attendance] ... I saw what I believe to be nearly all the bishops of the world [the Second Vatican Council assembled all the bishops in the world], but only a small number were perfectly sound … A concession was demanded from the clergy which could not be granted. I saw that many pastors allowed themselves to be taken up with ideas that were dangerous to the Church. I saw many older priests, especially one, who wept bitterly. A few younger ones were also weeping. But others, and the lukewarm among them, readily did what was demanded. It was as if people were splitting into two camps ... Priests were among them! … Priests allowed everything and said Mass with much irreverence. I saw that few of them were still godly priests ... I saw some good pious bishops; but they were weak and wavering, their cowardice often got the upper hand … I now see that in this place [Rome], the [Catholic] Church is being so cleverly undermined, that there hardly remain a hundred or so priests who have not been deceived. They all work for destruction ― even the clergy ... Most priests were lured by the glittering, but false knowledge of modern teachers, and they all contributed to the work of destruction.
“I saw the secret sect relentlessly undermining the great Church! … They were building a large, strange, and extravagant church there in Rome … I did not see a single angel, nor a single saint helping in the work ... There was nothing holy in it. They had preaching and singing, but nothing else [which possibly implies the absence of the true Sacrifice of the Mass in this new church], and only very few attended it. People were kneading bread in the crypt below ... but it would not rise, nor did they receive the Body of our Lord, but only bread. Those who were in error, through no fault of their own―and who piously and ardently longed for the Body of Jesus―were spiritually consoled, but not by their communion ...
“There―in the strange big church―all the work was being done mechanically according to set rules and formulae. Everything was being done according to human reason ... All in this church belonged to the Earth, returned to the Earth. All was dead, the work of human skill, a church of the latest style, a church of man’s invention like the new heterodox church in Rome … There was something proud, presumptuous, and violent about it, and they seemed very successful. I saw the fatal consequences of this counterfeit church … All sorts of abominations were perpetrated there … I saw how harmful would be the consequences of this false church. I saw it increase in size; I saw heretics of all kinds flocking to the city of Rome … Everyone was to be admitted in it in order to be united and have equal rights―Evangelicals, Catholics, sects of every description [all of which describes the current false spirit of Ecumenism that invaded the Church at the Secon Vatican Council] ... The Protestant doctrine and that of the schismatic Greeks is to spread everywhere! … Then I saw that everything pertaining to Protestantism was gradually gaining the upper hand, and the Catholic religion fell into complete decadence ... I saw all sorts of people, things, doctrines, and opinions ... Then I saw darkness spreading around and people no longer seeking the true Church … The Church is in great danger! It was shown to me that there were almost no Christians left in the old acceptation of the word! … The Church is completely isolated and as if completely deserted. It seems that everyone is running away.”
Are You Running Away?
Catholics are certainly running away from the Faith today! Just look at these worldwide national statistics for those Catholics who attend Mass at least once a week―usually on Sunday, or the Saturday Vigil Mass.
|
Nigeria (94%)
Kenya (73%) Lebanon (69%) Philippines (56%) Colombia (54%) Poland (52%) Ecuador (50%) Bosnia and Herzegovina (48%) |
Mexico (47%)
Nicaragua (45%) Bolivia (42%), Slovakia (40%) Italy (34%) Peru (33%) Venezuela (30%) Albania (29%) |
Spain (27%)
Croatia (27%) New Zealand (25%) United Kingdom (25%) Hungary (24%) Slovenia (24%) Uruguay (23%) Australia (21%) |
Argentina (21%)
Portugal (20%) Czech Republic (20%) United States (20%) Austria (17%) Lithuania (16%) Germany (14%) Canada (14%) |
Ireland (14%)
Latvia (11%) Switzerland (11%) Brazil (8%) France (8%) Netherlands (7%) |
You can look a glass half-filled with water from two different viewpoints. You can say that the glass is half-empty or you can say the glass in half-full. Similarly, you can look at Catholic churches and say they are half-empty or say they are half-full. However, in this case―if we to be totally realistic and objective―we have to say that they are emptying and not filling-up. The current trend is an ever decreasing number of Catholics who regularly attend Mass at least once a week. Therefore, things are not getting better―they are getting worse.
Some of the countries with the largest percentage of Catholics among their population do not show very good numbers in regular Mass attendance:
● Croatia is 86% Catholic, but only 27% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Poland is 86% Catholic, but only 52% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Portugal is 85% Catholic, but only 20% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Italy is 83% Catholic, but only 34% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Philippines is 81% Catholic, but only 56% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Mexico is 80% Catholic, but only 47% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Ireland is 78% Catholic, but only 14% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Lithuania is 77% Catholic, but only 16% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
A Tree Known by Its Fruits
The infallible words of Our Lord have to be applied to the above things: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them! … Either make the tree good and its fruit good―or make the tree evil and its fruit evil! For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 7:15-20; 12:33). Anyone who pretends that the tree of the Second Vatican Council has, overall, produced good fruits―needs to be locked up in a lunatic asylum! Overall and in general the fruits of the tree of the Second Vatican Council―which has been now growing for around 60 years―are on the whole disastrous. The Liberal and Modernist Church has increasingly played with the fire of Hell by its gradual weakening on many moral issues such as contraception, abortion, homosexuality, same-sex relationships, etc. Some priests even tell penitents in Confession that masturbation is not a sin; that impure thoughts are not sinful as long as you do not act out upon them; that remarried divorcees should not worry because the Church will soon accept that; etc.
The Counterfeit Comfortable Carefree Cafeteria Church
Now you may well ask: “What has all this to do with the title of this article: ‘Lent Isn't Over! Lent is More than Just Ash Wednesday!’?” Well―the whole point is that 60 years of gradual but relentless erosion and weakening of the Church’s dogmatic and moral teachings has led most Catholics into a religious and spiritual superficiality that waters-down the Faith into cheap, easy, fast-track, microwave, no hassle, no pain, effortless product and service. The current 95% discount on Lenten penance―40 days of fasting reduced to two days―epitomizes the whole Liberal/Modernist re-jigging, remaking, recycling and repackaging of the Faith into a sugary-sweet, off-the-shelf, easy-to-use, watered-down version of what Christ gave us. We have been lulled into a false sense of security concerning sin and salvation. We have been made to forget that sin is the greatest evil in the world into thinking that sin is no big deal―it is something we do, confess, say the few Hail Marys the priest gives us as a penance and then forget all about it.
Likewise with the doctrine on salvation―ever since the time of Christ the Church has taught that there is no salvation outside of the Church and that most souls are lost and few are saved. Today, we have the ever-increasing teaching that most souls are saved and all religions have the power of saving souls. We no longer have funeral Masses using the color black―but we have funeral Masses using the color white, which insinuates that the deceased soul is already in Heaven. The liturgical instructions for the Novus Ordo Missae (New Order of Mass) state: “Besides the color violet, the colors white or black may be used at funeral services and at other Offices and Masses for the Dead in the Dioceses of the United States of America.” Today, almost all funeral Masses are said in white. Before the Second Vatican Council, the only time a funeral Mass was said in white was for baptized children who had died before reaching the age of reason (around 6 to 7 years of age)―which indicated that the child was already in Heaven, because they had been incapable of committing sin―since all sin requires that we are able to use our reason to realize that something is sinful.
Thus, this modern trend of offering all funeral Masses in white, implies that the souls of the recently deceased persons are already in Heaven. Really? One finds that hard to believe in our current era and age, of which Our Lady spoke of way back in 1956, saying: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [The Deluge was the Great Flood in Noe’s time] All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
In 1973, at Akita in Japan, Our Lady further added: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … The Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before!”
Some of the countries with the largest percentage of Catholics among their population do not show very good numbers in regular Mass attendance:
● Croatia is 86% Catholic, but only 27% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Poland is 86% Catholic, but only 52% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Portugal is 85% Catholic, but only 20% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Italy is 83% Catholic, but only 34% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Philippines is 81% Catholic, but only 56% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Mexico is 80% Catholic, but only 47% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Ireland is 78% Catholic, but only 14% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
● Lithuania is 77% Catholic, but only 16% of Catholics attend Mass regularly at least once a week.
A Tree Known by Its Fruits
The infallible words of Our Lord have to be applied to the above things: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them! … Either make the tree good and its fruit good―or make the tree evil and its fruit evil! For by the fruit the tree is known!” (Matthew 7:15-20; 12:33). Anyone who pretends that the tree of the Second Vatican Council has, overall, produced good fruits―needs to be locked up in a lunatic asylum! Overall and in general the fruits of the tree of the Second Vatican Council―which has been now growing for around 60 years―are on the whole disastrous. The Liberal and Modernist Church has increasingly played with the fire of Hell by its gradual weakening on many moral issues such as contraception, abortion, homosexuality, same-sex relationships, etc. Some priests even tell penitents in Confession that masturbation is not a sin; that impure thoughts are not sinful as long as you do not act out upon them; that remarried divorcees should not worry because the Church will soon accept that; etc.
The Counterfeit Comfortable Carefree Cafeteria Church
Now you may well ask: “What has all this to do with the title of this article: ‘Lent Isn't Over! Lent is More than Just Ash Wednesday!’?” Well―the whole point is that 60 years of gradual but relentless erosion and weakening of the Church’s dogmatic and moral teachings has led most Catholics into a religious and spiritual superficiality that waters-down the Faith into cheap, easy, fast-track, microwave, no hassle, no pain, effortless product and service. The current 95% discount on Lenten penance―40 days of fasting reduced to two days―epitomizes the whole Liberal/Modernist re-jigging, remaking, recycling and repackaging of the Faith into a sugary-sweet, off-the-shelf, easy-to-use, watered-down version of what Christ gave us. We have been lulled into a false sense of security concerning sin and salvation. We have been made to forget that sin is the greatest evil in the world into thinking that sin is no big deal―it is something we do, confess, say the few Hail Marys the priest gives us as a penance and then forget all about it.
Likewise with the doctrine on salvation―ever since the time of Christ the Church has taught that there is no salvation outside of the Church and that most souls are lost and few are saved. Today, we have the ever-increasing teaching that most souls are saved and all religions have the power of saving souls. We no longer have funeral Masses using the color black―but we have funeral Masses using the color white, which insinuates that the deceased soul is already in Heaven. The liturgical instructions for the Novus Ordo Missae (New Order of Mass) state: “Besides the color violet, the colors white or black may be used at funeral services and at other Offices and Masses for the Dead in the Dioceses of the United States of America.” Today, almost all funeral Masses are said in white. Before the Second Vatican Council, the only time a funeral Mass was said in white was for baptized children who had died before reaching the age of reason (around 6 to 7 years of age)―which indicated that the child was already in Heaven, because they had been incapable of committing sin―since all sin requires that we are able to use our reason to realize that something is sinful.
Thus, this modern trend of offering all funeral Masses in white, implies that the souls of the recently deceased persons are already in Heaven. Really? One finds that hard to believe in our current era and age, of which Our Lady spoke of way back in 1956, saying: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [The Deluge was the Great Flood in Noe’s time] All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
In 1973, at Akita in Japan, Our Lady further added: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them! … The Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before!”
Article 1
Ash Wednesday, February 14th
Do You Have a Black Mark Against Your Name or on Your Forehead?
Ash Wednesday, February 14th
Do You Have a Black Mark Against Your Name or on Your Forehead?
Back to Black!
We often think of black as being a color―but black isn’t a primary, secondary, or tertiary color. In fact, black isn’t on the color wheel because it isn’t considered a color. It’s all colors. Or rather, the absorption of all colors. Black absorbs all light in the color spectrum.
In electrics, the red wire is positive; the black wire is negative. Black conjures up all kinds of contradictory, opposing, mutually incompatible, contradictory and confusing notions and thoughts! Black is good and black is bad! Black can meaning having credit or it can mean losing all credit! Black is seen as both beautiful and ugly!
Black is associated with a number of positive qualities and characteristics. For example, some common associations with the color black is associated include: Authority; Elegance; Formality; Intelligence; Power; Prestige; Sophistication. Black is often described as strong and elegant. Black oozes sophistication. That’s why many people wear black clothing when attending a fancy or formal event. The color black has long been associated with power and prestige―as seen from priests to civil judges.
However, many use the color black to symbolize all things negative. Throughout history, this somber color has been tied to death and all things evil and bad. It evokes strong feelings of anger, aggression, fear, and sadness. The connection between black and negativity is probably most clearly seen in our language. Just consider these commonly used expressions: Black Monday. Black Plague. Black Death. Blacklist. Black sheep. Black magic. Blackball. Blackhole. Black-hearted. Black mood. Black sheep. Blackmail. Black market. Blackout. The list could go on. Nothing says “bad guy” quite like the color black. Black has a sinister note to it. Though black is worn (and often preferred) by people from all walks of society, it is often seen as the stereotypical color for criminals and villains―with shady movie and TV show characters almost always wearing black?
Holy Scripture gives us both positive and negative notions of black: “I am black, but beautiful” (Canticles 1:4) is positive, whereas “My skin is become black upon me, and my bones are dried up with heat!” (Job 30:30) is negative. In the Bible, the color black is often associated with darkness, suffering, and blindness―especially spiritual blindness. Black often symbolizes shadow or darkness―an absence of light. God clearly uses light and darkness in His creation. Originally, the entire world was created in darkness, but then God created light―and Christ says that He is the light of the world (John 9:5).
The Church uses both ideas of black―the positive and the negative. Traditionally, priests and clerics will wear black clothes―cassock, shirt, jacket, trousers, etc. Many religious orders also incorporate black attire―either entirely (Benedictines, Jesuits) or partially (Dominicans, Cistercians). Many religious books―breviaries, missals for the laity, bibles―have black covers. The majority of the text in these (and even most secular books) is black. We even have what is called the “Black Fast” ― which entails going without any kind of food and water all day long until after sunset―and then having a limited meal (not gorging oneself).
Holy Mother Church blesses ashes on Ash Wednesday and thus elevates them to the rank of being a Sacramental. Most of the ashes used on Ash Wednesday are very black―as opposed to the more commonly found grey ashes. The ashes are typically supposed to be made from the previous year’s Palm Sunday palm leaves. To get the good black ash, you cannot just burn them. You have to let them smolder with no oxygen, and that is how it gets the real charcoal black appearance.
Let Those Ashes Sink Into Your Head!
While you are still walking around with ashes on your forehead, there are a few thoughts about ashes that you might like to put into your head! There is more to ash than meets the eye—hopefully no ash fell into your eye this Ash Wednesday! Let’s “hash-out” some ash details that might make us better appreciate the wisdom of God’s Providence in arranging for ashes to be smeared on our foreheads! You will see that your ash can turn to cash—or at least 'spiritual cash'!
Ash is the residue, or solid remains, of burned plant parts like bark, wood, sawdust, leaves, woody debris, pulp, husk, hulls, fronds, and other plant debris. This brings to mind the idea of sacrifice—especially burnt offerings—where the things of this world were destroyed by fire as an act of adoration, submission or reparation to God. All that would remain of someone’s treasures belongings would be ash!
Ash also reminds us that, one day, we too will be burnt-out and have to die—this is poignant message given to us by Holy Mother Church, when She smears ash on our forehead, saying: “Remember man, that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return!”
Ashes, from this perspective, also teach us humility—for ashes, at least in their appearance, are very humble and far from being desired. Whoever heard of anyone collecting ashes? Or hoarding ashes? Gold and silver—yes, but ashes, most certainly no!
Medicinal Ashes
However, for all their humble appearance, ashes are far from being useless! Ash is good for physical health, just as humility is good for spiritual health. Ash has been used for soil liming and for traditional pest control to some crawling pests. This reminds of the many sinful pests that crawl about our soul—the imposition of blessed ashes symbolizes the penance that can get rid of those sinful pests! Also, like soap, ash is also a disinfecting agent (alkaline). Even the World Health Organization recommends ash as alternative to soap, when soap is not available. Doesn’t our soul need DiSINfecting too? The ashes, having been blessed, are a sacramental—therefore an avenue to and a source of actual graces that can help diSINfect the soul!
You can make lye water out of ash. Lye water is a great cleaning agent and sanitizer for clothes, floors, windows, silverware, plates, and even rust in marble. Tossing a bit of wood ash into your dirty skillet will produce enough lye (and friction) to get your camp skillets good and clean. Some people even use it raw as soap. Our ancestors learned to make lye, a caustic cleaning agent, at least 5000 years ago by running water through wood ashes, eventually learning to combine it with animal fats and water to make soap. Some hardy folks still do. Holy Mother Church has added ash to us, at the start of Lent, in the hope that we use it to clean and sanitize our souls!
Stain Removing Ashes
Sodium Carbonate, can be made out of ash. It is known to be an excellent product, used as household cleaner. A paste made out of ash and water, can remove stains from furniture. Or if we want to remove a stain from clothes the moment they happen, we add a bit of ash and after about five minutes, we rub it with the crumb of a bread—not the crust, but the soft white bit. This teaches us to do penance (ash is a symbol of penance) immediately after committing a sin—in this way we can reduce the stain of sin upon the soul and lessen its damage!
Stench Remover
Ash is a great odor repellent, just add a bit over the area that smells, for example the cat kitty litter. You can also remove odors from a fridge, by adding a plate of charcoal ash inside. Keep changing the charcoal periodically until the smell is gone. With regard to odors of the mouth, you can use it to brush your teeth. Not all woods are suitable. Conifer trees produce ash that is softer on the enamel. Some woods contain harsh minerals that may damage your teeth. Likewise, the stench of sin can be removed by penance—that is what Lent is for, and that is why the Church has placed ashes upon us!
Helps Growth
Ash was used for many years in farming. It recycles the natural nutrients back into the earth. It can be used as compost but does not include nitrogen. It aids in the increase of the earth’s PH level, which, in return, aids in the growth of the plants. But not all vegetables and fruit thrive from it, for example potatoes. Similarly, not all people profit from penance. They may do it for the wrong motives, or without any sorrow, contrition or compunction for their sins.
Ash strengthens plants that love calcium, such as tomatoes, vineyards, beans, spinach, peas, avocados, garlic, etc. Even rose bushes. This reminds of the spiritual advice that says: “Pray is good, but prayer is more powerful when penance is added to it!” Or, as Holy Scripture says: “Prayer is good with fasting and alms” (Tobias 12:8).
Animals and Pests Hate Ash
Animals hate ash. You can rid your garden of insects and various parasites, such as slugs and snails. You can rid yourself of ants. If you throw some ash in their colony, they will be forced to relocate, as they can’t move the ash. Spread some ash in the corners of the house, or dark spots of your cellar, etc. For as long as there is ash, no mice, rats, cockroaches or insects approach. It repels lice, ticks and fleas off animals. You make a thick paste of ash and vinegar and spread over the fur. It’s messy, but it works. It repels clothes moths. You can add some ash on your stored clothes, and simply shake it off when you need to use them. You can leave them for years this way, and nothing will happen to them. Likewise, the devil hates penance! As Our Lord said: “But this kind [of devil] is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20).
Nature’s Filter
The charcoal collected within the ash, can be used as a filter. You can use charcoal to filter blurry wine. You can use charcoal to filter water before drinking. Our spiritual life is in grave need of a filter these days—there is so much out there that can either weaken or even destroy the grace in souls. Penance helps filter out the “bad-stuff”!
Ash Food Preservative
No fridge? No worries! You can preserve your fruits and vegetables for many days, months, even years, by digging a hole in the ground and filling it with ash. Add your veg and fruit, ensuring enough space between them, so that they do not touch each other, or the muddy ground. Seal the hole with a piece of wood, and then let them be. In the older days, they used to preserve seeds in large clay containers, by adding a thick layer of ash over them. This prevented insects from destroying their produce. Ash is used for “immortal eggs”. In a recipe used in the Middle East, they preserve eggs in a mix of clay, ash, salt, lime and rice rind for many months. Penance likewise preserves our souls and virtues from corruption. Cover yourself with penances and seal the soul with the wood of the Cross and you shall be preserved!
Fire Extinguisher
You can put a fire out quickly by throwing ash over it. Similarly, you can put out the fires of your many and varied passions by throwing penance over them! Whereas indulging your passions is like throwing gasoline onto a fire! You can look upon the ashes of penance as being your fire-extinguisher for the fires of Purgatory or Hell—for if we do penance for our sins in this world, we shall not have to suffer for them in the next!
Extinguishing the Fire of Passion and Sin
The Lenten ashes imposed upon our foreheads on Ash Wednesday in part symbolize the need to extinguish the fires of our passions that ultimately ignite the fires of sin. “The tongue is a little member [of the body] and boasts great things. Behold how small a fire kindles a great wood! The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue defiles the whole body!” (James 3:5-6). How can we tame our passions? By prayer and fasting! Our Lord, speaking of how the Apostles failed to cast out a demon from a boy, said: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20). St. John Vianney said: “The devil is not greatly afraid of the discipline and other instruments of penance. That which beats him is the curtailment of one’s food and drink!”
Old Testament Practice
Fasting was, in the Old Testament, one of the great means of making atonement for sin; it was called “to afflict the soul.” However, for fasting to be acceptable to God, it had to be accompanied by sentiments of sorrow for sin and mercy towards others. Otherwise it would be hypocritical to seek mercy for oneself while not extending mercy to others―for you want God to show you the mercy that you refuse to show to others!
True and Fake Fasting
“Why have we fasted, and Thou hast not regarded: have we humbled our souls, and Thou hast not taken notice? The Lord replies: ‘Behold in the day of your fast your own will is found, and you exact of all your debtors! Behold you fast for debates and strife, and strike with the fist wickedly! Do not fast as you have done until this day, to make your cry to be heard on high. Is this such a fast as I have chosen―for a man to afflict his soul [just] for a day? Is this it―to wind his head about like a circle, and to spread sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast, and a day acceptable to the Lord? Is not this rather the fast that I have chosen? That you loosen the bands of wickedness; undo the bundles that oppress; let them that are broken go free; and break asunder every burden. Give your bread to the hungry, and bring the needy and the homeless into your house; when you shalt see someone naked, cover him; and despise not thy own flesh!’” (Isaias 58:3-7).
We see true sorrow in Ninive, where the prophet Jonas delivered God’s threats of destruction to the inhabitants: “Jonas began to enter into the city one day’s journey: and he cried, and said: ‘Yet forty days, and Ninive shall be destroyed!’ And the men of Ninive believed in God: and they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth from the greatest to the least. And the word came to the king of Ninive; and he rose up out of his throne, and cast away his robe from him, and was clothed with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published in Ninive from the mouth of the king and of his princes, saying: ‘Let neither men nor beasts, oxen nor sheep, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water! And let men and beasts be covered with sackcloth, and cry to the Lord with all their strength, and let them turn everyone from his evil way, and from the iniquity that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn, and forgive: and will turn away from His fierce anger, and we shall not perish?’ And God saw their works, that they were turned from their evil way: and God had mercy with regard to the evil which He had said that He would do to them, and He did it not.” (Jonas 3:4-10).
Fasting in the New Testament
In the New Testament, fasting is seen as an earnest act of grief and of penance. The Apostles do not fast as long as the Bridegroom is with them, but they will fast when He is gone (Matthew 9:14-15), Our Lord, wishing to expiate our sins, fasted forty days and forty nights, and taught His Apostles that certain evil spirits cannot be cast out except by prayer and fasting (Matthew 17:20). St. Paul was so alive to the necessity of mortifying the flesh that he punished it severely in order to escape sin and final reprobation: “I chastise my body and bring it into subjection” (1 Corinthians 9:27).
The Church and Fasting
True to His teachings, the Church has established the Lenten Fast, that of the Vigils and of the Ember Days (now sadly discarded) to offer her children the opportunity of making expiation for their faults. Some religious orders would fast almost all year round, except for major feast days and Sundays.
Already mentioned in passing, further above, we have the “Black Fast.” Traditionally, the Black Fast is undertaken during Lent. This form of fasting, the most rigorous in the history of Church legislation, was marked by austerity regarding both the quantity and quality of food permitted on fasting days as well as the time of day wherein such food might be legitimately taken.
● More than one meal was strictly prohibited.
● At this meal flesh meat, eggs, butter, cheese, and milk were forbidden.
● To these restrictions abstinence from wine was added during Lent.
● During Holy Week the meal was much more frugal and consisted of solely of bread, salt, herbs, and water.
● Finally, this meal was not allowed until sunset.
The days of Lent as well as those preceding priestly and clerical ordination were marked by the black fast. This regime continued until the tenth century when the more easy-going custom of taking the only meal of the day at three o’clock was introduced. In the fourteenth century the hour of taking this meal was changed to noon. Shortly afterwards the practice of taking an additional small meal in the evening began to gain ground. Finally, the custom of taking a crust of bread and some coffee in the morning was introduced in the early part of the nineteenth century. Since then, owing to ever changing circumstances of time and place, the Church has gradually relaxed the severity of penitential requirements, so that now little more than a symbolic trace of the former rigorous fast remains.
In 1966, after the Second Vatican Council, Pope Paul VI, in his Apostolic Constitution Paenitemini, further changed the Catholic fasting requirements. He recommended that fasting be appropriate to the local economic situation, and that all Catholics voluntarily fast and abstain. The Lenten Fast was reduced from an obligatory 40 Days to a mere 2 Days (Ash Wednesday and Good Friday) ― which is a 95% discount! You would think that in these ever increasingly sinful modern times we would need more penance rather than less penance! Pope Paul VI’s recommendation that all Catholics voluntarily (rather than obligatorily) fast and abstain, has been a total disaster―hardly anybody fasts the 40 days voluntarily, as everyone takes the easy way out! It is no longer a sin to refuse to fast, so I will not fast!” is the attitude of most Catholics.
Many a sin takes its rise directly or indirectly in the craving for pleasure, in excess in eating and drinking, and nothing is so effective in making atonement as mortification in eating, reaching as it does the very root of the evil by mortifying the craving for sensual pleasure. This is why the Saints have made a practice, of fasting even outside the seasons appointed by the Church. Generous Christian souls imitate them and, if they cannot keep the strict fast, forego some food at each meal in order thus to curb their sensuality. If we fail in this, we will, before very long, experience the rebellion of the flesh.
The Catechism of the Council of Trent says: “All kinds of satisfaction are reducible to three heads: prayer, fasting and alms-deeds, which correspond to three kinds of goods which we have received from God; those of the soul, those of the body and what are called external goods. Nothing can be more effectual in uprooting all sin from the soul than these three kinds of satisfaction. For since whatever is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh, the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, everyone can see that to these three causes of disease are opposed also three remedies.
“To the first is opposed fasting; to the second, alms-deeds; to the third, prayer. Moreover, if we consider those whom our sins injure, we shall easily perceive why all kinds of satisfaction are reduced especially to these three. For those (we offend by our sins) are: God, our neighbor and ourselves. God we appease by prayer, our neighbor we satisfy by alms, and ourselves we chastise by fasting. [...]
“This triple remedy was, therefore, appointed by God to aid man in the attainment of salvation. For by sin we offend God, wrong our neighbor, or injure ourselves. The wrath of God we appease by pious prayer; our offenses against man we redeem by alms-deeds; the stains of our own lives we wash away by fasting. [...] Fasting is most intimately connected with prayer. For the mind of one who is filled with food and drink is so borne down as not to be able to raise itself to the contemplation of God, or even to understand what prayer means.” (The Catechism of the Council of Trent).
The Baltimore Catechism adds: “The chief means by which we satisfy God for the temporal punishment due to sin are: Prayer, Fasting, Almsgiving, all spiritual and corporal works of mercy, and the patient suffering of the ills of life.”
In more recent times, even the Liberal Pope Benedict XVI, in a general address for Lent in 2009, again emphasized the need to restore fasting back to its proper place, “so that the authentic and perennial significance of this long held practice may be rediscovered.”
The Saints and Fasting
Regarding mortification, St. John Vianney once said, “The devil is not greatly afraid of the discipline and other instruments of penance. That which beats him is the curtailment of one’s food, drink and sleep. There is nothing the devil fears more, consequently, nothing is more pleasing to God. Oh! How often have I experienced it! Whilst I was alone—and I was alone during eight or nine years, and therefore quite free to yield to my attraction—it happened at times that I refrained from food for entire days. On those occasions I obtained, both for myself and for others, whatsoever I asked of Almighty God.”
St. John Chrysostom says: “Do you fast? Give me proof of it by your works…Let the hands fast, by being free of avarice. Let the feet fast, by ceasing to run after sin. Let the eye fast, by disciplining them not to glare at that which is sinful. Let the ear fast, by not listening to evil talk and gossip. Let the mouth fast from foul words and criticism. For what good is it if we abstain from fowl and fishes, but bite and devour one another?”
St. Peter Chrysologus tells us: “Fasting is the soul of prayer, mercy is the lifeblood of fasting. Let no one try to separate them; they cannot be separated. If you have only one of them or not all together, you have nothing. So if you pray, fast; if you fast, show mercy; if you want your petition to be heard, hear the petition of others. When you fast, see the fasting of others.”
The chief reasons for fasting are listed by St. Thomas Aquinas: “For we fast for three purposes: (1) to restrain the desires of the flesh; (2) to raise the mind to contemplate sublime things; (3) to make satisfaction for our sins. These are good and noble things, and so fasting is virtuous.”
Whereas St. Francis de Sales says: “God has given us the goods of the Earth, not only that we may enjoy them, but also that we may have the means of … showing him our love by the voluntary renunciation of His gifts, and by the oblation of them to His glory. To abandon, for God’s sake, all worldly enjoyments, has always been the practice of holy souls.”
Yet the motive behind fasting can be both good and evil—it can be done out of pride, to show off; or it can be done in a way that it should be done—with contrition and compunction for our sins, and out of love and in a spirit of humility.
In The Spiritual Life, Fr. Tanquerey writes: “Even among devout souls there are those who err as to the true nature of perfection, and who describe it, each according to the caprice of his own bias and fancy. Many, mistaking devotions for devotion, imagine perfection to consist in reciting a great number of prayers, in joining sundry religious societies, even if such practices entail the occasional neglect of their duties of state or of the charity due to the other members of the household. This is a substitution of non-essentials for the necessary, a sacrifice of the end to the means.
“Others give themselves to fasting and austerities, which lead to the exhaustion of the body, and thus become unfit for the discharge of their duties of state and consider themselves dispensed therefore from the law of charity toward their neighbor. They dare not permit themselves any little dainties, yet they do not hesitate ‘to drench their lips with the life-blood of their fellow-men through calumny and slander’ (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part 1, ch. 1). Here again one forgets the essentials of perfection and neglects the fundamental duty of charity, in favor of practices, good indeed, but far less important. The like mistake is made by those who give generously to charity, but refuse to forgive their enemies, or those who, whilst forgiving them, think not of paying their debts.
“Some, taking spiritual consolations for fervor, think they have arrived at perfection if they are filled with joy and can pray with ease, and they consider themselves lukewarm when they are seized by aridity and distractions. Such persons forget that what counts before God is the generous, oft-renewed effort despite apparent failures.
“Others, taken up by a life of action and external activities, neglect the interior life to give themselves more entirely to works of zeal. They forget that the life and soul of all zeal is habitual prayer which draws down the grace of God and gives fruitfulness to action.
“Others, having read mystical works or the lives of the Saints in which ecstasies and visions are described, fancy perfection to consist in these extraordinary phenomena and strain their minds and imaginations to obtain them. They have never understood that such phenomena are, as the mystics themselves testify, but incidental; that they do not constitute the essence of sanctity and that it is foolhardy to covet them.
“Summing up the doctrine of the essence of perfection according to Holy Scripture and of the Fathers of the Church, St. Thomas answers that perfection essentially consists in the love of God and of one’s neighbor for God’s sake. ‘Essentially the perfection of the Christian life consists in charity first and foremost in the love of God, then in the love of one’s neighbor’ (Summa Theologica, 1a 2ae, q. 3, art 1).” (Fr. Tanquerey. The Spiritual Life).
We often think of black as being a color―but black isn’t a primary, secondary, or tertiary color. In fact, black isn’t on the color wheel because it isn’t considered a color. It’s all colors. Or rather, the absorption of all colors. Black absorbs all light in the color spectrum.
In electrics, the red wire is positive; the black wire is negative. Black conjures up all kinds of contradictory, opposing, mutually incompatible, contradictory and confusing notions and thoughts! Black is good and black is bad! Black can meaning having credit or it can mean losing all credit! Black is seen as both beautiful and ugly!
Black is associated with a number of positive qualities and characteristics. For example, some common associations with the color black is associated include: Authority; Elegance; Formality; Intelligence; Power; Prestige; Sophistication. Black is often described as strong and elegant. Black oozes sophistication. That’s why many people wear black clothing when attending a fancy or formal event. The color black has long been associated with power and prestige―as seen from priests to civil judges.
However, many use the color black to symbolize all things negative. Throughout history, this somber color has been tied to death and all things evil and bad. It evokes strong feelings of anger, aggression, fear, and sadness. The connection between black and negativity is probably most clearly seen in our language. Just consider these commonly used expressions: Black Monday. Black Plague. Black Death. Blacklist. Black sheep. Black magic. Blackball. Blackhole. Black-hearted. Black mood. Black sheep. Blackmail. Black market. Blackout. The list could go on. Nothing says “bad guy” quite like the color black. Black has a sinister note to it. Though black is worn (and often preferred) by people from all walks of society, it is often seen as the stereotypical color for criminals and villains―with shady movie and TV show characters almost always wearing black?
Holy Scripture gives us both positive and negative notions of black: “I am black, but beautiful” (Canticles 1:4) is positive, whereas “My skin is become black upon me, and my bones are dried up with heat!” (Job 30:30) is negative. In the Bible, the color black is often associated with darkness, suffering, and blindness―especially spiritual blindness. Black often symbolizes shadow or darkness―an absence of light. God clearly uses light and darkness in His creation. Originally, the entire world was created in darkness, but then God created light―and Christ says that He is the light of the world (John 9:5).
The Church uses both ideas of black―the positive and the negative. Traditionally, priests and clerics will wear black clothes―cassock, shirt, jacket, trousers, etc. Many religious orders also incorporate black attire―either entirely (Benedictines, Jesuits) or partially (Dominicans, Cistercians). Many religious books―breviaries, missals for the laity, bibles―have black covers. The majority of the text in these (and even most secular books) is black. We even have what is called the “Black Fast” ― which entails going without any kind of food and water all day long until after sunset―and then having a limited meal (not gorging oneself).
Holy Mother Church blesses ashes on Ash Wednesday and thus elevates them to the rank of being a Sacramental. Most of the ashes used on Ash Wednesday are very black―as opposed to the more commonly found grey ashes. The ashes are typically supposed to be made from the previous year’s Palm Sunday palm leaves. To get the good black ash, you cannot just burn them. You have to let them smolder with no oxygen, and that is how it gets the real charcoal black appearance.
Let Those Ashes Sink Into Your Head!
While you are still walking around with ashes on your forehead, there are a few thoughts about ashes that you might like to put into your head! There is more to ash than meets the eye—hopefully no ash fell into your eye this Ash Wednesday! Let’s “hash-out” some ash details that might make us better appreciate the wisdom of God’s Providence in arranging for ashes to be smeared on our foreheads! You will see that your ash can turn to cash—or at least 'spiritual cash'!
Ash is the residue, or solid remains, of burned plant parts like bark, wood, sawdust, leaves, woody debris, pulp, husk, hulls, fronds, and other plant debris. This brings to mind the idea of sacrifice—especially burnt offerings—where the things of this world were destroyed by fire as an act of adoration, submission or reparation to God. All that would remain of someone’s treasures belongings would be ash!
Ash also reminds us that, one day, we too will be burnt-out and have to die—this is poignant message given to us by Holy Mother Church, when She smears ash on our forehead, saying: “Remember man, that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return!”
Ashes, from this perspective, also teach us humility—for ashes, at least in their appearance, are very humble and far from being desired. Whoever heard of anyone collecting ashes? Or hoarding ashes? Gold and silver—yes, but ashes, most certainly no!
Medicinal Ashes
However, for all their humble appearance, ashes are far from being useless! Ash is good for physical health, just as humility is good for spiritual health. Ash has been used for soil liming and for traditional pest control to some crawling pests. This reminds of the many sinful pests that crawl about our soul—the imposition of blessed ashes symbolizes the penance that can get rid of those sinful pests! Also, like soap, ash is also a disinfecting agent (alkaline). Even the World Health Organization recommends ash as alternative to soap, when soap is not available. Doesn’t our soul need DiSINfecting too? The ashes, having been blessed, are a sacramental—therefore an avenue to and a source of actual graces that can help diSINfect the soul!
You can make lye water out of ash. Lye water is a great cleaning agent and sanitizer for clothes, floors, windows, silverware, plates, and even rust in marble. Tossing a bit of wood ash into your dirty skillet will produce enough lye (and friction) to get your camp skillets good and clean. Some people even use it raw as soap. Our ancestors learned to make lye, a caustic cleaning agent, at least 5000 years ago by running water through wood ashes, eventually learning to combine it with animal fats and water to make soap. Some hardy folks still do. Holy Mother Church has added ash to us, at the start of Lent, in the hope that we use it to clean and sanitize our souls!
Stain Removing Ashes
Sodium Carbonate, can be made out of ash. It is known to be an excellent product, used as household cleaner. A paste made out of ash and water, can remove stains from furniture. Or if we want to remove a stain from clothes the moment they happen, we add a bit of ash and after about five minutes, we rub it with the crumb of a bread—not the crust, but the soft white bit. This teaches us to do penance (ash is a symbol of penance) immediately after committing a sin—in this way we can reduce the stain of sin upon the soul and lessen its damage!
Stench Remover
Ash is a great odor repellent, just add a bit over the area that smells, for example the cat kitty litter. You can also remove odors from a fridge, by adding a plate of charcoal ash inside. Keep changing the charcoal periodically until the smell is gone. With regard to odors of the mouth, you can use it to brush your teeth. Not all woods are suitable. Conifer trees produce ash that is softer on the enamel. Some woods contain harsh minerals that may damage your teeth. Likewise, the stench of sin can be removed by penance—that is what Lent is for, and that is why the Church has placed ashes upon us!
Helps Growth
Ash was used for many years in farming. It recycles the natural nutrients back into the earth. It can be used as compost but does not include nitrogen. It aids in the increase of the earth’s PH level, which, in return, aids in the growth of the plants. But not all vegetables and fruit thrive from it, for example potatoes. Similarly, not all people profit from penance. They may do it for the wrong motives, or without any sorrow, contrition or compunction for their sins.
Ash strengthens plants that love calcium, such as tomatoes, vineyards, beans, spinach, peas, avocados, garlic, etc. Even rose bushes. This reminds of the spiritual advice that says: “Pray is good, but prayer is more powerful when penance is added to it!” Or, as Holy Scripture says: “Prayer is good with fasting and alms” (Tobias 12:8).
Animals and Pests Hate Ash
Animals hate ash. You can rid your garden of insects and various parasites, such as slugs and snails. You can rid yourself of ants. If you throw some ash in their colony, they will be forced to relocate, as they can’t move the ash. Spread some ash in the corners of the house, or dark spots of your cellar, etc. For as long as there is ash, no mice, rats, cockroaches or insects approach. It repels lice, ticks and fleas off animals. You make a thick paste of ash and vinegar and spread over the fur. It’s messy, but it works. It repels clothes moths. You can add some ash on your stored clothes, and simply shake it off when you need to use them. You can leave them for years this way, and nothing will happen to them. Likewise, the devil hates penance! As Our Lord said: “But this kind [of devil] is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20).
Nature’s Filter
The charcoal collected within the ash, can be used as a filter. You can use charcoal to filter blurry wine. You can use charcoal to filter water before drinking. Our spiritual life is in grave need of a filter these days—there is so much out there that can either weaken or even destroy the grace in souls. Penance helps filter out the “bad-stuff”!
Ash Food Preservative
No fridge? No worries! You can preserve your fruits and vegetables for many days, months, even years, by digging a hole in the ground and filling it with ash. Add your veg and fruit, ensuring enough space between them, so that they do not touch each other, or the muddy ground. Seal the hole with a piece of wood, and then let them be. In the older days, they used to preserve seeds in large clay containers, by adding a thick layer of ash over them. This prevented insects from destroying their produce. Ash is used for “immortal eggs”. In a recipe used in the Middle East, they preserve eggs in a mix of clay, ash, salt, lime and rice rind for many months. Penance likewise preserves our souls and virtues from corruption. Cover yourself with penances and seal the soul with the wood of the Cross and you shall be preserved!
Fire Extinguisher
You can put a fire out quickly by throwing ash over it. Similarly, you can put out the fires of your many and varied passions by throwing penance over them! Whereas indulging your passions is like throwing gasoline onto a fire! You can look upon the ashes of penance as being your fire-extinguisher for the fires of Purgatory or Hell—for if we do penance for our sins in this world, we shall not have to suffer for them in the next!
Extinguishing the Fire of Passion and Sin
The Lenten ashes imposed upon our foreheads on Ash Wednesday in part symbolize the need to extinguish the fires of our passions that ultimately ignite the fires of sin. “The tongue is a little member [of the body] and boasts great things. Behold how small a fire kindles a great wood! The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue defiles the whole body!” (James 3:5-6). How can we tame our passions? By prayer and fasting! Our Lord, speaking of how the Apostles failed to cast out a demon from a boy, said: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20). St. John Vianney said: “The devil is not greatly afraid of the discipline and other instruments of penance. That which beats him is the curtailment of one’s food and drink!”
Old Testament Practice
Fasting was, in the Old Testament, one of the great means of making atonement for sin; it was called “to afflict the soul.” However, for fasting to be acceptable to God, it had to be accompanied by sentiments of sorrow for sin and mercy towards others. Otherwise it would be hypocritical to seek mercy for oneself while not extending mercy to others―for you want God to show you the mercy that you refuse to show to others!
True and Fake Fasting
“Why have we fasted, and Thou hast not regarded: have we humbled our souls, and Thou hast not taken notice? The Lord replies: ‘Behold in the day of your fast your own will is found, and you exact of all your debtors! Behold you fast for debates and strife, and strike with the fist wickedly! Do not fast as you have done until this day, to make your cry to be heard on high. Is this such a fast as I have chosen―for a man to afflict his soul [just] for a day? Is this it―to wind his head about like a circle, and to spread sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast, and a day acceptable to the Lord? Is not this rather the fast that I have chosen? That you loosen the bands of wickedness; undo the bundles that oppress; let them that are broken go free; and break asunder every burden. Give your bread to the hungry, and bring the needy and the homeless into your house; when you shalt see someone naked, cover him; and despise not thy own flesh!’” (Isaias 58:3-7).
We see true sorrow in Ninive, where the prophet Jonas delivered God’s threats of destruction to the inhabitants: “Jonas began to enter into the city one day’s journey: and he cried, and said: ‘Yet forty days, and Ninive shall be destroyed!’ And the men of Ninive believed in God: and they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth from the greatest to the least. And the word came to the king of Ninive; and he rose up out of his throne, and cast away his robe from him, and was clothed with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published in Ninive from the mouth of the king and of his princes, saying: ‘Let neither men nor beasts, oxen nor sheep, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water! And let men and beasts be covered with sackcloth, and cry to the Lord with all their strength, and let them turn everyone from his evil way, and from the iniquity that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn, and forgive: and will turn away from His fierce anger, and we shall not perish?’ And God saw their works, that they were turned from their evil way: and God had mercy with regard to the evil which He had said that He would do to them, and He did it not.” (Jonas 3:4-10).
Fasting in the New Testament
In the New Testament, fasting is seen as an earnest act of grief and of penance. The Apostles do not fast as long as the Bridegroom is with them, but they will fast when He is gone (Matthew 9:14-15), Our Lord, wishing to expiate our sins, fasted forty days and forty nights, and taught His Apostles that certain evil spirits cannot be cast out except by prayer and fasting (Matthew 17:20). St. Paul was so alive to the necessity of mortifying the flesh that he punished it severely in order to escape sin and final reprobation: “I chastise my body and bring it into subjection” (1 Corinthians 9:27).
The Church and Fasting
True to His teachings, the Church has established the Lenten Fast, that of the Vigils and of the Ember Days (now sadly discarded) to offer her children the opportunity of making expiation for their faults. Some religious orders would fast almost all year round, except for major feast days and Sundays.
Already mentioned in passing, further above, we have the “Black Fast.” Traditionally, the Black Fast is undertaken during Lent. This form of fasting, the most rigorous in the history of Church legislation, was marked by austerity regarding both the quantity and quality of food permitted on fasting days as well as the time of day wherein such food might be legitimately taken.
● More than one meal was strictly prohibited.
● At this meal flesh meat, eggs, butter, cheese, and milk were forbidden.
● To these restrictions abstinence from wine was added during Lent.
● During Holy Week the meal was much more frugal and consisted of solely of bread, salt, herbs, and water.
● Finally, this meal was not allowed until sunset.
The days of Lent as well as those preceding priestly and clerical ordination were marked by the black fast. This regime continued until the tenth century when the more easy-going custom of taking the only meal of the day at three o’clock was introduced. In the fourteenth century the hour of taking this meal was changed to noon. Shortly afterwards the practice of taking an additional small meal in the evening began to gain ground. Finally, the custom of taking a crust of bread and some coffee in the morning was introduced in the early part of the nineteenth century. Since then, owing to ever changing circumstances of time and place, the Church has gradually relaxed the severity of penitential requirements, so that now little more than a symbolic trace of the former rigorous fast remains.
In 1966, after the Second Vatican Council, Pope Paul VI, in his Apostolic Constitution Paenitemini, further changed the Catholic fasting requirements. He recommended that fasting be appropriate to the local economic situation, and that all Catholics voluntarily fast and abstain. The Lenten Fast was reduced from an obligatory 40 Days to a mere 2 Days (Ash Wednesday and Good Friday) ― which is a 95% discount! You would think that in these ever increasingly sinful modern times we would need more penance rather than less penance! Pope Paul VI’s recommendation that all Catholics voluntarily (rather than obligatorily) fast and abstain, has been a total disaster―hardly anybody fasts the 40 days voluntarily, as everyone takes the easy way out! It is no longer a sin to refuse to fast, so I will not fast!” is the attitude of most Catholics.
Many a sin takes its rise directly or indirectly in the craving for pleasure, in excess in eating and drinking, and nothing is so effective in making atonement as mortification in eating, reaching as it does the very root of the evil by mortifying the craving for sensual pleasure. This is why the Saints have made a practice, of fasting even outside the seasons appointed by the Church. Generous Christian souls imitate them and, if they cannot keep the strict fast, forego some food at each meal in order thus to curb their sensuality. If we fail in this, we will, before very long, experience the rebellion of the flesh.
The Catechism of the Council of Trent says: “All kinds of satisfaction are reducible to three heads: prayer, fasting and alms-deeds, which correspond to three kinds of goods which we have received from God; those of the soul, those of the body and what are called external goods. Nothing can be more effectual in uprooting all sin from the soul than these three kinds of satisfaction. For since whatever is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh, the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, everyone can see that to these three causes of disease are opposed also three remedies.
“To the first is opposed fasting; to the second, alms-deeds; to the third, prayer. Moreover, if we consider those whom our sins injure, we shall easily perceive why all kinds of satisfaction are reduced especially to these three. For those (we offend by our sins) are: God, our neighbor and ourselves. God we appease by prayer, our neighbor we satisfy by alms, and ourselves we chastise by fasting. [...]
“This triple remedy was, therefore, appointed by God to aid man in the attainment of salvation. For by sin we offend God, wrong our neighbor, or injure ourselves. The wrath of God we appease by pious prayer; our offenses against man we redeem by alms-deeds; the stains of our own lives we wash away by fasting. [...] Fasting is most intimately connected with prayer. For the mind of one who is filled with food and drink is so borne down as not to be able to raise itself to the contemplation of God, or even to understand what prayer means.” (The Catechism of the Council of Trent).
The Baltimore Catechism adds: “The chief means by which we satisfy God for the temporal punishment due to sin are: Prayer, Fasting, Almsgiving, all spiritual and corporal works of mercy, and the patient suffering of the ills of life.”
In more recent times, even the Liberal Pope Benedict XVI, in a general address for Lent in 2009, again emphasized the need to restore fasting back to its proper place, “so that the authentic and perennial significance of this long held practice may be rediscovered.”
The Saints and Fasting
Regarding mortification, St. John Vianney once said, “The devil is not greatly afraid of the discipline and other instruments of penance. That which beats him is the curtailment of one’s food, drink and sleep. There is nothing the devil fears more, consequently, nothing is more pleasing to God. Oh! How often have I experienced it! Whilst I was alone—and I was alone during eight or nine years, and therefore quite free to yield to my attraction—it happened at times that I refrained from food for entire days. On those occasions I obtained, both for myself and for others, whatsoever I asked of Almighty God.”
St. John Chrysostom says: “Do you fast? Give me proof of it by your works…Let the hands fast, by being free of avarice. Let the feet fast, by ceasing to run after sin. Let the eye fast, by disciplining them not to glare at that which is sinful. Let the ear fast, by not listening to evil talk and gossip. Let the mouth fast from foul words and criticism. For what good is it if we abstain from fowl and fishes, but bite and devour one another?”
St. Peter Chrysologus tells us: “Fasting is the soul of prayer, mercy is the lifeblood of fasting. Let no one try to separate them; they cannot be separated. If you have only one of them or not all together, you have nothing. So if you pray, fast; if you fast, show mercy; if you want your petition to be heard, hear the petition of others. When you fast, see the fasting of others.”
The chief reasons for fasting are listed by St. Thomas Aquinas: “For we fast for three purposes: (1) to restrain the desires of the flesh; (2) to raise the mind to contemplate sublime things; (3) to make satisfaction for our sins. These are good and noble things, and so fasting is virtuous.”
Whereas St. Francis de Sales says: “God has given us the goods of the Earth, not only that we may enjoy them, but also that we may have the means of … showing him our love by the voluntary renunciation of His gifts, and by the oblation of them to His glory. To abandon, for God’s sake, all worldly enjoyments, has always been the practice of holy souls.”
Yet the motive behind fasting can be both good and evil—it can be done out of pride, to show off; or it can be done in a way that it should be done—with contrition and compunction for our sins, and out of love and in a spirit of humility.
In The Spiritual Life, Fr. Tanquerey writes: “Even among devout souls there are those who err as to the true nature of perfection, and who describe it, each according to the caprice of his own bias and fancy. Many, mistaking devotions for devotion, imagine perfection to consist in reciting a great number of prayers, in joining sundry religious societies, even if such practices entail the occasional neglect of their duties of state or of the charity due to the other members of the household. This is a substitution of non-essentials for the necessary, a sacrifice of the end to the means.
“Others give themselves to fasting and austerities, which lead to the exhaustion of the body, and thus become unfit for the discharge of their duties of state and consider themselves dispensed therefore from the law of charity toward their neighbor. They dare not permit themselves any little dainties, yet they do not hesitate ‘to drench their lips with the life-blood of their fellow-men through calumny and slander’ (St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part 1, ch. 1). Here again one forgets the essentials of perfection and neglects the fundamental duty of charity, in favor of practices, good indeed, but far less important. The like mistake is made by those who give generously to charity, but refuse to forgive their enemies, or those who, whilst forgiving them, think not of paying their debts.
“Some, taking spiritual consolations for fervor, think they have arrived at perfection if they are filled with joy and can pray with ease, and they consider themselves lukewarm when they are seized by aridity and distractions. Such persons forget that what counts before God is the generous, oft-renewed effort despite apparent failures.
“Others, taken up by a life of action and external activities, neglect the interior life to give themselves more entirely to works of zeal. They forget that the life and soul of all zeal is habitual prayer which draws down the grace of God and gives fruitfulness to action.
“Others, having read mystical works or the lives of the Saints in which ecstasies and visions are described, fancy perfection to consist in these extraordinary phenomena and strain their minds and imaginations to obtain them. They have never understood that such phenomena are, as the mystics themselves testify, but incidental; that they do not constitute the essence of sanctity and that it is foolhardy to covet them.
“Summing up the doctrine of the essence of perfection according to Holy Scripture and of the Fathers of the Church, St. Thomas answers that perfection essentially consists in the love of God and of one’s neighbor for God’s sake. ‘Essentially the perfection of the Christian life consists in charity first and foremost in the love of God, then in the love of one’s neighbor’ (Summa Theologica, 1a 2ae, q. 3, art 1).” (Fr. Tanquerey. The Spiritual Life).
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR SEPTUAGESIMA 2024
Article 17
Tuesday after Quinquagesima Sunday, February 13th
Final Call! Are You Getting Ashen-Faced?
Tuesday after Quinquagesima Sunday, February 13th
Final Call! Are You Getting Ashen-Faced?
Final Call!
“Final call! The Lenten train is about to depart! All aboard please!” If you don’t get on board, you may not make it to the destination—for it is the only train that goes there! “I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9) “
Let the Countdown not be a Letdown
Hopefully these last two days―Monday and Tuesday―a countdown to Ash Wednesday following on from Quinquagesima Sunday, are not a “countdown letdown”. It is the final call for our entry into the arena, where we will be called to do battle with the devil, the world and our own weak and sinful flesh, body and soul.
Dumbed Down and ‘Muscle-less’
The battle—like schooling—is obligatory. Yet, just like schooling or education—which has been “dumbed-down” to produce non-thinking ‘sheeple’ (sheep+people)—Lent , likewise, has been “toned-down” to produce ‘muscle-less’ Catholics, who will then be too weak to fight their way through the jungle and jingles of this seductive world, in order to reach Heaven. “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed―but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24).
Time for Violent Efforts
As St. Paul says: “I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection!” (1 Corinthians 9:26-27). The violence, the effort, the struggle―necessary to obtain Heaven―is accomplished and realized through PENANCE. “Let him do penance for his sin” (Leviticus 5:5). But of the enemy that we face, Our Lord said: “This kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20)—which, in other words, means PENANCE. “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it unto pride” (Job 24:23). “Hear, I beseech you, my words, and do penance!” (Job 21:2). To which Our Lord ominously adds this warning: “I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
A Battle You Cannot Avoid!
You don’t have to even look for a fight—the fight comes looking for you! “Because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). This coming Sunday’s Gospel, for the First Sunday of Lent, sees Jesus undergo His ‘desert battle’ with nature and the devil. Your weak human nature—weakened due to the inherited ‘scars’ of Original Sin—and the devil who will always be at your shoulder until the day you die, will both fight against your soul relentlessly—which prompts Holy Scripture to say: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) and “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12).
There is no avoiding this fight—we either fight and win, or we lay down our arms and lose. As St. Paul tells us: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24), and he himself gives us the example of how he approaches that ‘race’ for Heaven: “I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body and bring it into subjection! Lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:26-27).
You Are in the Race—Like It or Not!
God has entered every Catholic in the upcoming Lenten ‘race’—yet not many will finish it, and of those that do, only a handful will receive a gold, silver or bronze medal! The rest will be mere “also rans”—who won’t “make the cut” or “make the grade” or “pass the test”! Some will start and not finish--“Many are called, few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
It is amazing how much effort we can put into earthly endeavors and how little effort we find available for heavenly endeavors—St. Paul points out this anomaly between the physical athlete and the spiritual athlete, saying that the physical athletes run “that they may receive a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible one” (1 Corinthians 9:25). Yet so very few souls care much about their incorruptible crown—which is why so many souls perish! Halfhearted athletes rarely win races. Ill-prepared students rarely or never get the top grades in exams--“For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” Galatians 6:8), therefore, he says elsewhere, “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Complacency Courts Catastrophe
A brief look at the various sports will invariably show you many results where the lower ranked athlete or team beat the higher ranked athlete or team. Sometimes the bottom team in the league ends up being the top placed team in the league! In American Football, the favorites sometimes lose to a lowly team. In Basketball, the favorites lose some games to a bunch of mediocre teams. In Baseball, you will often find the same phenomenon, where the final win percentage for champions is even lower than in other sports, where the best teams barely win 60% of all their games. In other professional sports—such as tennis, cycling, golf, etc.—you will find a similar scenario. You will often hear comments about the “underdogs” who gained an unforeseen victory, coming from the deflated and defeated favorites, such as: “They were hungrier than we were!” or “They wanted it more than we did!” or “They were better prepared than we were!” or “They gave it everything they had and we didn’t!” or “We thought we could just turn up and win!”
All in all, as they say, “You are only as good as your last game!” and your successes of yesterday give you no automatic entitlement to win today. There is no room for complacency or over-confidence. Complacency leads to catastrophe! Pride comes before a fall! “Pride goes before destruction and the spirit is lifted up before a fall!” (Proverbs 16:18).
The Same is True in Business
An article by Forbes on overconfidence states:
“Executives all make big decisions―about hiring, company valuations, product launches, investments, strategic direction, building new facilities, mergers, acquisitions, changing technology, new approaches to doing business, and more. Psychologists tell us that the following weaknesses commonly harm our decision making:
(1) Overestimating our accuracy and depth of knowledge about a situation.
Dozens of studies of lawyers, doctors, nurses, managers, entrepreneurs, investment bankers, and others have found that they tend to put great trust in their opinions and overestimate their expertise … In making critical decisions, you should always question your assumptions, biases, and knowledge. Everyone perceives a situation differently, and your interpretation can be wrong. Seek out a diversity of perspectives, find opinions different from your own, collect additional information, and use that information systematically. As Mark Twain noted, “It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so.”
(2) Ignoring or not seeking disconfirming information.
A study of physicians found that a second common bias was the failure to pay attention to or actively seek information to the challenge the initial diagnosis. People tend to overuse information and data that support their current beliefs. Additionally, people often fail to critically question what is really happening. People who make important decisions must develop the practice of actively seeking out information that might contradict their conclusions and acting on it.
(3) Over assurance from past success.
In 2012 Kodak filed for bankruptcy. John Kotter, professor emeritus at Harvard Business School, noted that Kodak’s failure resulted from complacency bred by its own success. The company had stopped innovating and stopped creating urgency around changes in its marketplace, and, perhaps as damaging, its executives had stopped listening to employees who saw the problems coming. Overconfidence created by success leads to poor decisions. Companies need to celebrate successes but also avoid letting those successes breed complacency and blind them to important change.
The Same is True in the Business of Saving Our Souls
Just as we have seen, above, in the sports domain and the business domain, we are liable to lose our souls by a spirit of complacency or over-confidence. We believe what we like to believe or what we are most comfortable in believing. Hence we prefer to believe that most souls are saved (especially our souls and those of our nearest and dearest), even though there is overwhelming evidence coming from the mouths of Our Lord, Our Lady and many saints that the contrary is true and that most souls are lost! As quoted above: “People tend to overuse information and data that support their current beliefs. People often fail to critically question what is really happening” and “they tend to put great trust in their opinions and overestimate their expertise … You should always question your assumptions, biases, and knowledge. Your interpretation can be wrong. Find opinions different from your own, collect additional information.”
Complacent Over-Confident Catholics
The modern Church and modern clergy and modern Catholics have “bought into” Pope Paul VI’s newly introduced (1966) 95% discount on Lenten Fasting that has seen the 40-day fast reduced to a 2-day fast (only Ash Wednesday and Good Friday), and their opinion is that this is good and great! Most funeral Masses are in white, and not black anymore—for the popular belief is that everyone goes to Heaven, hence no mention is made of praying for the soul of the deceased who, if they are lucky enough to be saved, will probably be spending a long time in Purgatory. Nor are there any more sermons on Hell—for everyone goes to Heaven, or so they think! Holy Scripture begs to differ on that point, saying: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). While Our Lord, being asked by a man: “‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But Jesus said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’” (Luke 13:23-24).
Our Lady, also—at La Salette, Lourdes, Fatima and Akita—has another contrary opinion to that of the complacent Catholic, which says: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish” (La Salette), while at Lourdes she demands: “Penance! Penance! Penance! … Kiss the ground as a penance for sinners!”
At Fatima she points out the consequences of this lack of penance (sacrifices made for past sins): “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? Then you will have much to suffer! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: ‘O Jesus, it is for love of Thee, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed!’” Even before Our Lady had appeared at Fatima, the Angel of Portugal had told the little children: “Make of everything you can a sacrifice and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which He is offended, and in supplication for the conversion of sinners!”
At Akita, Our Lady said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead … I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
Do Not Underestimate Lent, Nor Overrate Yourself!
For most people, Lent is no big deal—at inconvenience at the most—but one that they will put right come Easter time, when they will stuff themselves to high heaven with the things that they have been deprived of during Lent! These people are merely taking two steps forward during Lent, only to take two steps backwards after Lent is over. They are going nowhere fast—or they are going somewhere where they wish they had never gone, come the end of the world! These people think little of sin—which to them is merely a speck of dust on the surface of their soul that they imagine is easily wiped-way with the cloth of confession! They sin—they confess—they sin—they confess—they sin again—they confess again—they sin yet again—they confess yet again, etc. They have never read and do not care to read the words of Holy Scripture that say: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5), or Our Lady’s words: “If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them!” (Akita).
We think ourselves to be far, far better than we actually are! St. Louis de Montfort, in his book True Devotion to Mary, turns over the stone of our soul, and in the dirt that is stuck to the stone, he see all kinds of vile “creepy-crawlies”, to the extent that he writes:
“The sin of our first father has spoilt us all, soured us, puffed us up and corrupted us, as the leaven sours, puffs up and corrupts the dough into which it is put. The actual sins which we have committed, whether mortal or venial, pardoned though they may be, have nevertheless increased our concupiscence, our weakness, our inconstancy and our corruption, and have left evil remains in our souls. Our bodies are so corrupted that they are called by the Holy Ghost bodies of sin (Romans 6:6), conceived in sin (Psalm 50:7), nourished in sin, and capable of all sin—bodies subject to thousands of maladies, which go on corrupting from day to day, and which engender nothing but disease, vermin and corruption.
“Our soul, united to our body, has become so carnal that it is called flesh: ‘All flesh having corrupted its way ’ (Genesis 6:12). We have nothing for our portion but pride and blindness of spirit, hardness of heart, weakness and inconstancy of soul, concupiscence, revolted passions, and sicknesses in the body. We are naturally prouder than peacocks, more groveling than toads, more vile than unclean animals, more envious than serpents, more gluttonous than hogs, more furious than tigers, lazier than tortoises, weaker than reeds, and more capricious than weathercocks. We have within ourselves nothing but nothingness and sin, and we deserve nothing but the anger of God and everlasting Hell. After this, ought we to be astonished if Our Lord has said that whoever wishes to follow Him must renounce himself and hate his own life, and that whosoever shall love his own life shall lose it, and whosoever shall hate it, shall save it? (John 12:25). He who is infinite Wisdom does not give commandments without reason, and He has commanded us to hate ourselves only because we so richly deserve to be hated. Nothing is worthier of love than God, and nothing is worthier of hatred than ourselves.
“In order to rid ourselves of self, we must die to ourselves daily. That is to say, we must renounce the operations of the powers of our soul and of the senses of our body. We must see as if we saw not, understand as if we understood not, and make use of the things of this world as if we made no use of them at all. (1 Corinthians 7:29-31). This is what St. Paul calls dying daily. (1 Corinthians 15:31). ‘Unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, itself remains alone,’ and brings forth no good fruit. (John 12:24-25). If we do not die to ourselves, and if our holiest devotions do not incline us to this necessary and useful death, we shall bring forth no fruit worth anything, and our devotions will become useless. All our good works will be stained by self-love and our own will; and this will cause God to hold in abomination the greatest sacrifices we can make and the best actions we can do; so that at our death we shall find our hands empty of virtues and of merits and we shall not have one spark of pure love, which is only communicated to souls dead to themselves, souls whose life is hidden with Jesus Christ in God. (Colossians 3:3).” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §79 to §81).
The above passage reminds one of the words that Our Lord spoke to one of His mystics, whereby He said that if she could see herself as He saw her, then she would die in terror! We are far inferior to any mystic! What would Our Lord say to us? Our pride inflates our true value—we live in an unreal bubble of our self-created spiritual inflation, where the little that we do and have done is grossly overpriced. While, at the same time, we devalue the currency of Heaven and have devalued the price of sin to a point where it is almost worthless—and so we sin freely, because we falsely think sin is so inexpensive! O fools that we are!
Separate from the World
As Dom Guéranger writes: “The fundamental rule of Christian life is, as almost every page of the Gospel tells us, that we should live out of the world, separate ourselves from the world, hate the world. The world is that ungodly land which Abraham, our sublime model, is commanded by God to quit. It is that Babylon of our exile and captivity, where we are beset with dangers.” …
“The beloved disciple, St. John, cries out to us: ‘Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him’ (John 2:15). Our most merciful Jesus, at the very time when He was about to offer Himself as a sacrifice for all men, spoke these awful words: ‘I pray not for the world’ (John 17:9). When we were baptized, and were signed with the glorious and indelible character of Christians, the condition required of us, and accepted, was that we should renounce the works and pomps of the world (which we expressed under the name of Satan); and this solemn baptismal promise we have often renewed.” …
“But what is the meaning of our promise to renounce the world? Is it that we cannot be Christians, unless we flee into the desert and separate ourselves from our fellow-creatures? Such cannot be God's will for all, since, in that same Scripture, wherein He commands us to flee from the world, He also tells us what are our duties to each other, and sanctions and blesses those ties which He Himself has willed should exist among us. His apostle, also, tells us to use this world as though we did not use it (1 Corinthians 7:31).” (Dom Guéranger, The Liturgical Year, Tuesday of Quinquagesima Week).
Choked by the World
So deeply are Catholics entrenched and rooted in the world today, that talk such as this falls on deaf ears—as Jesus points out: “He that received the seed (the Word of God) among thorns, is he that hears the Word, and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the Word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand” (Matthew 13:13). The Word of God goes in one ear and passes out the other, bearing little or not fruit—whereas the word of the world is the word that is retained and bears [bad] fruit a hundredfold.
In the World, but Not of the World
Yet, we find ourselves among this worldly world and our daily lives must necessarily unfold therein. If it is not, therefore, forbidden for us to live in, and to use, the world, then what does all this talk about renouncing the world mean? Can there be contradiction in God's commandments? Is it possible that we are condemned to wander blindly on the brink of a precipice, into which we must at last inevitably fall?
There is neither contradiction nor snare. If by the world, we mean these visible things around us, which God created in His power and goodness; if we mean this outward world, which He made for His own glory and our benefit; it is worthy of its divine Author, and it us to us—if we would only use it correctly—a ladder by which our souls can ascend to their God. With such an attitude, let us gratefully use this world; go through it, without making it the object of our hope; not waste upon it that love, which God alone deserves; and ever be mindful, that we are not made for this, but for another and a happier, world.
Lastly, let those who must go, on these days, and mingle in the company of worldlings, be guided by St. Francis of Sales, who advises them to think, from time to time, on such considerations as these: “that while all these frivolous, and often dangerous, amusements are going on, there are countless souls being tormented in the fire of Hell, on account of the sins they committed on similar occasions; that, at that very hour of the night, there are many holy Religious depriving themselves of sleep in order to sing the divine praises and implore God’s mercy upon the world, and upon them that are wasting their time in its vanities; that there are thousands in the agonies of death, whilst all that gaiety is going on; that God and his Angels are attentively looking upon this thoughtless group; and finally, that life is passing away, and death so much nearer each moment” (Introduction to a Devout Life, Part III, Chapter 33).
What’s YOUR Name?
But the majority of men, century after century, were not and are not prudent, nor correct in their use of the world. Their hearts are fixed upon it, and not upon God and Heaven. Thus the Creator decided to come into this world, in order that He might save it and to show us how to use the things of the world correctly―but “the world knew Him not” (John 1:10). Men are called after the name of the object of their love―for example, “sports fans”, “hunters”, “party-goers”, “movie-goers”, “smokers”, “drinkers”, “gamblers”, etc., etc.
Light or Darkness?
Now the men, whom God came to save, shut their eyes to the light; they became darkness; so God calls them “the world”―“You are of this world, I am not of this world” (John 8:23)―or the children of darkness―“The people that sat in darkness, have seen great light: and to them that sat in the region of the shadow of death, light is sprung up” … “And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” … “For all you are the children of light, and children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness” … “For you were heretofore darkness, but now light in the Lord. Walk then as children of the light” (Matthew 4:16; John 1:5; Ephesians 5:8; 1 Thessalonians 5:5).
Named Forever
Whatever you nationality may be, you retain that nationality wherever you may happen to go in the world. Whatever your first name or Christian name may be, you retain that name throughout your life, no matter where you may go or who you may marry. By your Baptism, you have been marked for eternity with the seal or mark of Christ—you are a Christian, no matter where you may go or what you may do—even if you end up in Hell, that mark of Christ will still be upon your soul. In Confirmation, you were given another mark or seal—that of a Soldier for Christ—and that, too, will always be upon your soul for eternity. We are Christ’s—Christians by family name, belonging to Christ—but are we merely Christians by name, or also Christians by nature? Do we simply carry the name, or do we also carry the spirit? Are we, perhaps, Christ’s by name and the world’s by spirit? Are we vainly trying to serve Christ and world simultaneously—God and mammon?
Lenten Shakedown
Lent has a habit of sorting the men from the boys―the wheat from the chaff—the good fruit from the bad fruit. There is an axiom that says that you see the true mettle of man when he is placed under great stress—it then that you see what he is really made of. The same could be said about Lent—you see the true colors of souls during Lent, for they will either go through it with humility and love, or they will murmur and grumble and cheat like the Israelites in the desert with Moses. Then we will see whether the prayers come from merely the lips or from the heart; whether fasts and other penances are performed from a spirit of pride and boastfulness or from a spirit of humility and contrition for past sins.
See the Profit!
Let us look upon Lent with joy! For the monetary-minded, look upon the season as the “LENTEN SALES” with 95% reductions on every sin you have ever committed—buy mercy now and you won’t have to pay for it later at the full price with added interest! If you are sports-minded, take St. Paul’s analogy of having to “RUN A RACE” and get ahead of spiritually flabby worldly couch-potatoes, who “talk a good race” but gasp for breath after just a few days of Lent—when they find out that “talking the talk” is nothing like “walking the walk”. If you “LOVE TO TALK”, then now is your chance to “bend God’s ear”—for He certainly would like to hear from you and will be “all ears” to what you have to humbly say about your past sins—“saying: ‘If we do not penance, we shall fall into the hands of the Lord, and not into the hands of men!’” (Ecclesiasticus 2:22).
“I’m Listening!”
We should take note of Solomon’s prayer to God: “If they sin against Thee (for there is no man that sins not) and Thou be angry with them, and deliver them up to their enemies, and they lead them away captive to a land either afar off, or near at hand, and if they be converted in their heart in the land to which they were led captive, and do penance, and pray to Thee in the land of their captivity, saying: ‘We have sinned! We have done wickedly! We have dealt unjustly!’ and return to Thee with all their heart, and with all their soul, in the land of their captivity, to which they were led away, and adore Thee: then hear Thou from Heaven, their prayers, and do judgment, and forgive Thy people, although they have sinned” (2 Paralipomenon 6:36-39).
And God will reply to us: “And My people, upon whom My Name is called, being converted, shall make supplication to Me, and seek out My Face, and do penance for their most wicked ways: then will I hear from Heaven, and will forgive their sins and will heal their land” (2 Paralipomenon 7:14).
The Reason for the Season
The “Reason for the Season” is sin! Know that for Heaven “The entrance is the penance” and that “Where there’s prayer, there’s no despair” while “Those who fast, won’t be aghast, when judgment is passed”!
“Final call! The Lenten train is about to depart! All aboard please!” If you don’t get on board, you may not make it to the destination—for it is the only train that goes there! “I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9) “
Let the Countdown not be a Letdown
Hopefully these last two days―Monday and Tuesday―a countdown to Ash Wednesday following on from Quinquagesima Sunday, are not a “countdown letdown”. It is the final call for our entry into the arena, where we will be called to do battle with the devil, the world and our own weak and sinful flesh, body and soul.
Dumbed Down and ‘Muscle-less’
The battle—like schooling—is obligatory. Yet, just like schooling or education—which has been “dumbed-down” to produce non-thinking ‘sheeple’ (sheep+people)—Lent , likewise, has been “toned-down” to produce ‘muscle-less’ Catholics, who will then be too weak to fight their way through the jungle and jingles of this seductive world, in order to reach Heaven. “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed―but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24).
Time for Violent Efforts
As St. Paul says: “I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection!” (1 Corinthians 9:26-27). The violence, the effort, the struggle―necessary to obtain Heaven―is accomplished and realized through PENANCE. “Let him do penance for his sin” (Leviticus 5:5). But of the enemy that we face, Our Lord said: “This kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20)—which, in other words, means PENANCE. “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it unto pride” (Job 24:23). “Hear, I beseech you, my words, and do penance!” (Job 21:2). To which Our Lord ominously adds this warning: “I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
A Battle You Cannot Avoid!
You don’t have to even look for a fight—the fight comes looking for you! “Because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). This coming Sunday’s Gospel, for the First Sunday of Lent, sees Jesus undergo His ‘desert battle’ with nature and the devil. Your weak human nature—weakened due to the inherited ‘scars’ of Original Sin—and the devil who will always be at your shoulder until the day you die, will both fight against your soul relentlessly—which prompts Holy Scripture to say: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) and “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12).
There is no avoiding this fight—we either fight and win, or we lay down our arms and lose. As St. Paul tells us: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24), and he himself gives us the example of how he approaches that ‘race’ for Heaven: “I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body and bring it into subjection! Lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:26-27).
You Are in the Race—Like It or Not!
God has entered every Catholic in the upcoming Lenten ‘race’—yet not many will finish it, and of those that do, only a handful will receive a gold, silver or bronze medal! The rest will be mere “also rans”—who won’t “make the cut” or “make the grade” or “pass the test”! Some will start and not finish--“Many are called, few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
It is amazing how much effort we can put into earthly endeavors and how little effort we find available for heavenly endeavors—St. Paul points out this anomaly between the physical athlete and the spiritual athlete, saying that the physical athletes run “that they may receive a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible one” (1 Corinthians 9:25). Yet so very few souls care much about their incorruptible crown—which is why so many souls perish! Halfhearted athletes rarely win races. Ill-prepared students rarely or never get the top grades in exams--“For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” Galatians 6:8), therefore, he says elsewhere, “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Complacency Courts Catastrophe
A brief look at the various sports will invariably show you many results where the lower ranked athlete or team beat the higher ranked athlete or team. Sometimes the bottom team in the league ends up being the top placed team in the league! In American Football, the favorites sometimes lose to a lowly team. In Basketball, the favorites lose some games to a bunch of mediocre teams. In Baseball, you will often find the same phenomenon, where the final win percentage for champions is even lower than in other sports, where the best teams barely win 60% of all their games. In other professional sports—such as tennis, cycling, golf, etc.—you will find a similar scenario. You will often hear comments about the “underdogs” who gained an unforeseen victory, coming from the deflated and defeated favorites, such as: “They were hungrier than we were!” or “They wanted it more than we did!” or “They were better prepared than we were!” or “They gave it everything they had and we didn’t!” or “We thought we could just turn up and win!”
All in all, as they say, “You are only as good as your last game!” and your successes of yesterday give you no automatic entitlement to win today. There is no room for complacency or over-confidence. Complacency leads to catastrophe! Pride comes before a fall! “Pride goes before destruction and the spirit is lifted up before a fall!” (Proverbs 16:18).
The Same is True in Business
An article by Forbes on overconfidence states:
“Executives all make big decisions―about hiring, company valuations, product launches, investments, strategic direction, building new facilities, mergers, acquisitions, changing technology, new approaches to doing business, and more. Psychologists tell us that the following weaknesses commonly harm our decision making:
(1) Overestimating our accuracy and depth of knowledge about a situation.
Dozens of studies of lawyers, doctors, nurses, managers, entrepreneurs, investment bankers, and others have found that they tend to put great trust in their opinions and overestimate their expertise … In making critical decisions, you should always question your assumptions, biases, and knowledge. Everyone perceives a situation differently, and your interpretation can be wrong. Seek out a diversity of perspectives, find opinions different from your own, collect additional information, and use that information systematically. As Mark Twain noted, “It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so.”
(2) Ignoring or not seeking disconfirming information.
A study of physicians found that a second common bias was the failure to pay attention to or actively seek information to the challenge the initial diagnosis. People tend to overuse information and data that support their current beliefs. Additionally, people often fail to critically question what is really happening. People who make important decisions must develop the practice of actively seeking out information that might contradict their conclusions and acting on it.
(3) Over assurance from past success.
In 2012 Kodak filed for bankruptcy. John Kotter, professor emeritus at Harvard Business School, noted that Kodak’s failure resulted from complacency bred by its own success. The company had stopped innovating and stopped creating urgency around changes in its marketplace, and, perhaps as damaging, its executives had stopped listening to employees who saw the problems coming. Overconfidence created by success leads to poor decisions. Companies need to celebrate successes but also avoid letting those successes breed complacency and blind them to important change.
The Same is True in the Business of Saving Our Souls
Just as we have seen, above, in the sports domain and the business domain, we are liable to lose our souls by a spirit of complacency or over-confidence. We believe what we like to believe or what we are most comfortable in believing. Hence we prefer to believe that most souls are saved (especially our souls and those of our nearest and dearest), even though there is overwhelming evidence coming from the mouths of Our Lord, Our Lady and many saints that the contrary is true and that most souls are lost! As quoted above: “People tend to overuse information and data that support their current beliefs. People often fail to critically question what is really happening” and “they tend to put great trust in their opinions and overestimate their expertise … You should always question your assumptions, biases, and knowledge. Your interpretation can be wrong. Find opinions different from your own, collect additional information.”
Complacent Over-Confident Catholics
The modern Church and modern clergy and modern Catholics have “bought into” Pope Paul VI’s newly introduced (1966) 95% discount on Lenten Fasting that has seen the 40-day fast reduced to a 2-day fast (only Ash Wednesday and Good Friday), and their opinion is that this is good and great! Most funeral Masses are in white, and not black anymore—for the popular belief is that everyone goes to Heaven, hence no mention is made of praying for the soul of the deceased who, if they are lucky enough to be saved, will probably be spending a long time in Purgatory. Nor are there any more sermons on Hell—for everyone goes to Heaven, or so they think! Holy Scripture begs to differ on that point, saying: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). While Our Lord, being asked by a man: “‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But Jesus said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’” (Luke 13:23-24).
Our Lady, also—at La Salette, Lourdes, Fatima and Akita—has another contrary opinion to that of the complacent Catholic, which says: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish” (La Salette), while at Lourdes she demands: “Penance! Penance! Penance! … Kiss the ground as a penance for sinners!”
At Fatima she points out the consequences of this lack of penance (sacrifices made for past sins): “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? Then you will have much to suffer! … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: ‘O Jesus, it is for love of Thee, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed!’” Even before Our Lady had appeared at Fatima, the Angel of Portugal had told the little children: “Make of everything you can a sacrifice and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which He is offended, and in supplication for the conversion of sinners!”
At Akita, Our Lady said: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord … If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead … I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
Do Not Underestimate Lent, Nor Overrate Yourself!
For most people, Lent is no big deal—at inconvenience at the most—but one that they will put right come Easter time, when they will stuff themselves to high heaven with the things that they have been deprived of during Lent! These people are merely taking two steps forward during Lent, only to take two steps backwards after Lent is over. They are going nowhere fast—or they are going somewhere where they wish they had never gone, come the end of the world! These people think little of sin—which to them is merely a speck of dust on the surface of their soul that they imagine is easily wiped-way with the cloth of confession! They sin—they confess—they sin—they confess—they sin again—they confess again—they sin yet again—they confess yet again, etc. They have never read and do not care to read the words of Holy Scripture that say: “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5), or Our Lady’s words: “If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them!” (Akita).
We think ourselves to be far, far better than we actually are! St. Louis de Montfort, in his book True Devotion to Mary, turns over the stone of our soul, and in the dirt that is stuck to the stone, he see all kinds of vile “creepy-crawlies”, to the extent that he writes:
“The sin of our first father has spoilt us all, soured us, puffed us up and corrupted us, as the leaven sours, puffs up and corrupts the dough into which it is put. The actual sins which we have committed, whether mortal or venial, pardoned though they may be, have nevertheless increased our concupiscence, our weakness, our inconstancy and our corruption, and have left evil remains in our souls. Our bodies are so corrupted that they are called by the Holy Ghost bodies of sin (Romans 6:6), conceived in sin (Psalm 50:7), nourished in sin, and capable of all sin—bodies subject to thousands of maladies, which go on corrupting from day to day, and which engender nothing but disease, vermin and corruption.
“Our soul, united to our body, has become so carnal that it is called flesh: ‘All flesh having corrupted its way ’ (Genesis 6:12). We have nothing for our portion but pride and blindness of spirit, hardness of heart, weakness and inconstancy of soul, concupiscence, revolted passions, and sicknesses in the body. We are naturally prouder than peacocks, more groveling than toads, more vile than unclean animals, more envious than serpents, more gluttonous than hogs, more furious than tigers, lazier than tortoises, weaker than reeds, and more capricious than weathercocks. We have within ourselves nothing but nothingness and sin, and we deserve nothing but the anger of God and everlasting Hell. After this, ought we to be astonished if Our Lord has said that whoever wishes to follow Him must renounce himself and hate his own life, and that whosoever shall love his own life shall lose it, and whosoever shall hate it, shall save it? (John 12:25). He who is infinite Wisdom does not give commandments without reason, and He has commanded us to hate ourselves only because we so richly deserve to be hated. Nothing is worthier of love than God, and nothing is worthier of hatred than ourselves.
“In order to rid ourselves of self, we must die to ourselves daily. That is to say, we must renounce the operations of the powers of our soul and of the senses of our body. We must see as if we saw not, understand as if we understood not, and make use of the things of this world as if we made no use of them at all. (1 Corinthians 7:29-31). This is what St. Paul calls dying daily. (1 Corinthians 15:31). ‘Unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, itself remains alone,’ and brings forth no good fruit. (John 12:24-25). If we do not die to ourselves, and if our holiest devotions do not incline us to this necessary and useful death, we shall bring forth no fruit worth anything, and our devotions will become useless. All our good works will be stained by self-love and our own will; and this will cause God to hold in abomination the greatest sacrifices we can make and the best actions we can do; so that at our death we shall find our hands empty of virtues and of merits and we shall not have one spark of pure love, which is only communicated to souls dead to themselves, souls whose life is hidden with Jesus Christ in God. (Colossians 3:3).” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §79 to §81).
The above passage reminds one of the words that Our Lord spoke to one of His mystics, whereby He said that if she could see herself as He saw her, then she would die in terror! We are far inferior to any mystic! What would Our Lord say to us? Our pride inflates our true value—we live in an unreal bubble of our self-created spiritual inflation, where the little that we do and have done is grossly overpriced. While, at the same time, we devalue the currency of Heaven and have devalued the price of sin to a point where it is almost worthless—and so we sin freely, because we falsely think sin is so inexpensive! O fools that we are!
Separate from the World
As Dom Guéranger writes: “The fundamental rule of Christian life is, as almost every page of the Gospel tells us, that we should live out of the world, separate ourselves from the world, hate the world. The world is that ungodly land which Abraham, our sublime model, is commanded by God to quit. It is that Babylon of our exile and captivity, where we are beset with dangers.” …
“The beloved disciple, St. John, cries out to us: ‘Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him’ (John 2:15). Our most merciful Jesus, at the very time when He was about to offer Himself as a sacrifice for all men, spoke these awful words: ‘I pray not for the world’ (John 17:9). When we were baptized, and were signed with the glorious and indelible character of Christians, the condition required of us, and accepted, was that we should renounce the works and pomps of the world (which we expressed under the name of Satan); and this solemn baptismal promise we have often renewed.” …
“But what is the meaning of our promise to renounce the world? Is it that we cannot be Christians, unless we flee into the desert and separate ourselves from our fellow-creatures? Such cannot be God's will for all, since, in that same Scripture, wherein He commands us to flee from the world, He also tells us what are our duties to each other, and sanctions and blesses those ties which He Himself has willed should exist among us. His apostle, also, tells us to use this world as though we did not use it (1 Corinthians 7:31).” (Dom Guéranger, The Liturgical Year, Tuesday of Quinquagesima Week).
Choked by the World
So deeply are Catholics entrenched and rooted in the world today, that talk such as this falls on deaf ears—as Jesus points out: “He that received the seed (the Word of God) among thorns, is he that hears the Word, and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the Word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13:22). “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand” (Matthew 13:13). The Word of God goes in one ear and passes out the other, bearing little or not fruit—whereas the word of the world is the word that is retained and bears [bad] fruit a hundredfold.
In the World, but Not of the World
Yet, we find ourselves among this worldly world and our daily lives must necessarily unfold therein. If it is not, therefore, forbidden for us to live in, and to use, the world, then what does all this talk about renouncing the world mean? Can there be contradiction in God's commandments? Is it possible that we are condemned to wander blindly on the brink of a precipice, into which we must at last inevitably fall?
There is neither contradiction nor snare. If by the world, we mean these visible things around us, which God created in His power and goodness; if we mean this outward world, which He made for His own glory and our benefit; it is worthy of its divine Author, and it us to us—if we would only use it correctly—a ladder by which our souls can ascend to their God. With such an attitude, let us gratefully use this world; go through it, without making it the object of our hope; not waste upon it that love, which God alone deserves; and ever be mindful, that we are not made for this, but for another and a happier, world.
Lastly, let those who must go, on these days, and mingle in the company of worldlings, be guided by St. Francis of Sales, who advises them to think, from time to time, on such considerations as these: “that while all these frivolous, and often dangerous, amusements are going on, there are countless souls being tormented in the fire of Hell, on account of the sins they committed on similar occasions; that, at that very hour of the night, there are many holy Religious depriving themselves of sleep in order to sing the divine praises and implore God’s mercy upon the world, and upon them that are wasting their time in its vanities; that there are thousands in the agonies of death, whilst all that gaiety is going on; that God and his Angels are attentively looking upon this thoughtless group; and finally, that life is passing away, and death so much nearer each moment” (Introduction to a Devout Life, Part III, Chapter 33).
What’s YOUR Name?
But the majority of men, century after century, were not and are not prudent, nor correct in their use of the world. Their hearts are fixed upon it, and not upon God and Heaven. Thus the Creator decided to come into this world, in order that He might save it and to show us how to use the things of the world correctly―but “the world knew Him not” (John 1:10). Men are called after the name of the object of their love―for example, “sports fans”, “hunters”, “party-goers”, “movie-goers”, “smokers”, “drinkers”, “gamblers”, etc., etc.
Light or Darkness?
Now the men, whom God came to save, shut their eyes to the light; they became darkness; so God calls them “the world”―“You are of this world, I am not of this world” (John 8:23)―or the children of darkness―“The people that sat in darkness, have seen great light: and to them that sat in the region of the shadow of death, light is sprung up” … “And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” … “For all you are the children of light, and children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness” … “For you were heretofore darkness, but now light in the Lord. Walk then as children of the light” (Matthew 4:16; John 1:5; Ephesians 5:8; 1 Thessalonians 5:5).
Named Forever
Whatever you nationality may be, you retain that nationality wherever you may happen to go in the world. Whatever your first name or Christian name may be, you retain that name throughout your life, no matter where you may go or who you may marry. By your Baptism, you have been marked for eternity with the seal or mark of Christ—you are a Christian, no matter where you may go or what you may do—even if you end up in Hell, that mark of Christ will still be upon your soul. In Confirmation, you were given another mark or seal—that of a Soldier for Christ—and that, too, will always be upon your soul for eternity. We are Christ’s—Christians by family name, belonging to Christ—but are we merely Christians by name, or also Christians by nature? Do we simply carry the name, or do we also carry the spirit? Are we, perhaps, Christ’s by name and the world’s by spirit? Are we vainly trying to serve Christ and world simultaneously—God and mammon?
Lenten Shakedown
Lent has a habit of sorting the men from the boys―the wheat from the chaff—the good fruit from the bad fruit. There is an axiom that says that you see the true mettle of man when he is placed under great stress—it then that you see what he is really made of. The same could be said about Lent—you see the true colors of souls during Lent, for they will either go through it with humility and love, or they will murmur and grumble and cheat like the Israelites in the desert with Moses. Then we will see whether the prayers come from merely the lips or from the heart; whether fasts and other penances are performed from a spirit of pride and boastfulness or from a spirit of humility and contrition for past sins.
See the Profit!
Let us look upon Lent with joy! For the monetary-minded, look upon the season as the “LENTEN SALES” with 95% reductions on every sin you have ever committed—buy mercy now and you won’t have to pay for it later at the full price with added interest! If you are sports-minded, take St. Paul’s analogy of having to “RUN A RACE” and get ahead of spiritually flabby worldly couch-potatoes, who “talk a good race” but gasp for breath after just a few days of Lent—when they find out that “talking the talk” is nothing like “walking the walk”. If you “LOVE TO TALK”, then now is your chance to “bend God’s ear”—for He certainly would like to hear from you and will be “all ears” to what you have to humbly say about your past sins—“saying: ‘If we do not penance, we shall fall into the hands of the Lord, and not into the hands of men!’” (Ecclesiasticus 2:22).
“I’m Listening!”
We should take note of Solomon’s prayer to God: “If they sin against Thee (for there is no man that sins not) and Thou be angry with them, and deliver them up to their enemies, and they lead them away captive to a land either afar off, or near at hand, and if they be converted in their heart in the land to which they were led captive, and do penance, and pray to Thee in the land of their captivity, saying: ‘We have sinned! We have done wickedly! We have dealt unjustly!’ and return to Thee with all their heart, and with all their soul, in the land of their captivity, to which they were led away, and adore Thee: then hear Thou from Heaven, their prayers, and do judgment, and forgive Thy people, although they have sinned” (2 Paralipomenon 6:36-39).
And God will reply to us: “And My people, upon whom My Name is called, being converted, shall make supplication to Me, and seek out My Face, and do penance for their most wicked ways: then will I hear from Heaven, and will forgive their sins and will heal their land” (2 Paralipomenon 7:14).
The Reason for the Season
The “Reason for the Season” is sin! Know that for Heaven “The entrance is the penance” and that “Where there’s prayer, there’s no despair” while “Those who fast, won’t be aghast, when judgment is passed”!
Article 16
Monday after Quinquagesima Sunday, February 12th
The Only Fuel For Lent!
Monday after Quinquagesima Sunday, February 12th
The Only Fuel For Lent!
The Lifeblood or Engine of Holiness
Do you want to go Heaven? Do you want to be a holy and become a saint? Remember that it is only saints that get to enter Heaven! And the lifeblood of sanctity is, of course, the Charity of Christ. He is the vine, and we are the branches (John 15:5); the branches are alive and fruitful for just as long as they receive the life that belongs to the vine. In the same way, personal sanctity is true and fruitful for just as long as it comes from the person of Christ. Try breaking off a twig from a vine and hanging it over your bed. No matter how long you keep it there, you will never see it produce a bunch of grapes. It will gradually shrivel up and die. That is why Christ said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
The Soul of Holiness
This is why St. Paul warns us that, without Charity driving us and all our actions, we and they are worth nothing! “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). It is Charity (which is defined as “a love of God”) which holds all things together, just as God (who is Charity itself) holds the whole universe together. “But above all these things have Charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14).
Vine and Branches
At the Last Supper―which can be called a “Discourse of Love”―Our Lord speaks often of Charity. He also puts forth the image of the Vine (like a father) feeding the branches (his children). Our Lord is the Vine and we are His branches, and He, being Charity itself--”God is Charity” (1 John 4:8)—feeds or pours out that Charity into our souls: “the Charity of God is poured forth in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost” (Romans 5:5), Who is the Spirit of Love.
So the most important thing is to remain one with the vine, letting yourself grow out of it with the strength it gives you. You must take whatever direction the vine wants you to take, and you must not try to show-off, to the other branches, by growing more quickly than the vine means you to grow. Leave the question of producing fruit to the way things work out―you will not be fruitless if you “abide in the vine.” These are the conditions laid down by Our Lord: “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me” (John 15:4).
Branches Must Be Pruned
But do not be dismayed when you find that what looks like something becoming a splendid growth, promising a cluster of grapes in the future, is clipped off. The pruning knife is not stunting your growth, but making sure that you grow better, stronger, and healthier. Do not cry out against the knife; it is doing what you cannot do. Grass grows faster after it has been cut short. You cannot become a saint without the Cross. “Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away―and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit” (John 15:2).
The Power of Charity
Now, if the Charity of Christ is our source of sanctity, it is the fuel for holiness, the more we draw from it, the greater will be the gift we can offer to God—and the greater will be the graces that we receive from God. The ultimate evil in the world is sin, and so the ultimate grace is the grace of mercy: “The Lord is gracious and merciful―patient and plenteous in mercy. And His tender mercies are over all his works” (Psalm 144:8-9). That is why Holy Scripture says: “Before all things have a constant mutual Charity among yourselves―for Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … which is why Our Lord said of Mary Magdalen” “Wherefore I say to thee―Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47).
Natural Charity Must Be Supernaturalized
Whatever we possess in the way of natural kindness and friendliness, must be made to mingle with Christ’s divine Charity—and so become supernatural. To be nice to people, merely because we happen to like them, is not enough―we must set our affection higher up the scale and be nice to them for the love of God. This ought not to be too difficult because affection comes from God and can easily be directed back again to Him. As one part of an act of charity says: “My God, I love Thee with all my heart—and I love my neighbor, as myself, for love of Thee!” For Charity without God in the equation, is not Charity at all, but a secular, natural, heathen kind of charity, that does deserve the name “Charity” but is merely natural love and no more.
The Bible Tells Us So!
Holy Scripture repeatedly makes this point: “Love one another with the Charity of brotherhood, with honor preventing [anticipating the needs of] one another” (Romans 12:10) … “Dearly beloved, let us love one another, for Charity is of God” (1 John 4:7) and “the Charity of Christ urges and presses us” (2 Corinthians 5:14). For Jesus Himself, at the Last Supper, told us: “A new commandment I give unto you―That you love one another. As I have loved you, that you also love one another” (John 13:34) ... “This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you” (John 15:12) ... “I command you, that you love one another” (John 15:17).
Which is why St. Paul, St. Peter and St. John tell us: “Owe no man anything, but to love one another. For he that loveshis neighbor, has fulfilled the law” (Romans 13:8). “You yourselves have learned of God to love one another” (1 Thessalonians 4:9). “Purifying your souls in the obedience of Charity, with a brotherly love, from a sincere heart love one another earnestly” (1 Peter 1:22). “For this is the declaration, which you have heard from the beginning, that you should love one another” (1 John 3:11).
Satan’s Short-Circuiting of Charity
The trouble is that the flow of Charity through us to other people, and through them to God, can often be cut clean off. One of Satan’s first objectives is to make us put obstacles in the way of what might be called “the holy circulation of love.” Just as in history, one country has tried to keep another country away, by building a wall, so we are apt to put up walls between ourselves and other people. Without open warfare, members of the same human race can glare at one another from their own sides of the wall. Once built, these walls are very hard to pull down. Nations that are afraid of other nations build walls. Nations that have a secret they do not want to share―build walls. Then everyone becomes deceitful and suspicious―and this is no way to be. But the world is stiff with walls, and there is very little trust, and that is why wars break out.
We Make Matters Worse
Although it is not entirely your fault, nor mine, that there is no true peace in the world, and that freedom is a chancy thing that some countries enjoy, while others do not, it is your fault and mine that we allow intolerance in our lives. If all of us tried to be helpful, instead of wondering how we were going to be double-crossed, we would all get on far better. But, because we expect to be double-crossed, we lay ourselves open to be double-crossed, and this makes us retreat more and more into ‘uncharity’ and intolerance.
Now, sanctity cannot take root where there are suspicions and the deliberate refusal to see another person’s point of view. A readiness to understand—which supposes a readiness to make allowances for what genuinely cannot be understood—is an absolute condition of Charity. You cannot raise-up a sanctity where there is no foundation of understanding. It goes by other names (such as sympathy, long-suffering, harmony, consideration, patience, compassion), but the many sides of understanding and tolerance amount to only one thing: Charity.
Charity Towards the Saints and Sinners
You will find to your surprise that Charity is just as difficult to practice toward good people, as toward bad ones. The saintly can be very irritating. Making allowances for the sinner is so much preached about, that, when you hear of his failures, you may feel ready to excuse him. His temptations, his upbringing, his background: these things perhaps lessen his guilt and let him off. But do you make enough allowances for the maddening ways, or for the downright failures, of the soul who is trying to be a saint? All are objects of our Charity, not just the obvious ones.
Neither Charity nor Sanctity is a “One-Size-Fits-All”
The best way to spread your Charity, so that it covers the people who are working toward God, as well as those who are apparently working away from Him, is to realize that each single person has to find his own way of serving God, and that just because it is not your way, you must not find fault with it. On the contrary, you must try to find the good in it. If you were really humble, you would admit that God was probably better served by this other person’s slogging along, in his way, than by your hopping along in your way.
Notice how St. Paul again and again comes back to the idea that there are many vocations, but one Spirit working through all of them (1 Corinthians 12:4-11). And Our Lord Himself says that, in His Father’s house, there are many mansions (John 14:2). The Good Shepherd has an endless number of sheep to look after―each one is different, and they bump into one another, and their bleating must infuriate right and left, but all are going in the same direction. The Good Shepherd is drawing them in His way, and the millions of separate sheep are trotting after Him in their way.
Step-Back! Take it Easy! Calm Down!
To be tolerant, and to have sympathy for other people’s approach to God―which may be very unlike ours―is a mark of true perfection. This is what St. Catherine of Siena says about it: “Such a one does not make himself a judge of God’s servants, nor of any other; he congratulates every example and every state of life. He rejoices more in the different kinds of men that he sees, than he would in seeing them all walk by the same way, for so he sees the greatness of God made manifest.” However, it must be pointed out that when we speak of toleration―it does not include the toleration and acceptance of sin!
Holiness in All Shapes and Sizes
It is this variety that makes holiness practical to us as well as beautiful in itself. If all who wanted to be holy had to become monks and nuns, it would narrow our chances a good deal. Instead of this, there are endless patterns of sanctity to choose from. Since sanctity is the life God has given us, lived divinely, we can be saints if we are actors or archbishops, stewardesses or mother foundresses. The whole thing depends on the love of God, and if we really love God, it does not seem to matter much what our profession is. As St. Augustine once famously said: “Love God and do what you want!” Which, when you think about it, means that if you really love God, you will not do anything that offends Him, but do what pleases Him.
Focus on Acquiring Charity Above All Things
“But above all these things have Charity” (Colossians 3:14). “Charity is patient, is kind. Charity envies not, deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeks not her own [advantage]; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believeth all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7). So if Charity is the material of holiness, it follows that the nearer we get to becoming saints, then the less critical we shall be of others and the more welcoming we shall be. Of course, sin remains the greatest evil in the world and there can no tolerance of sin―but there should be a compassionate tolerance of the sinner―as they say: “Hate the sin, but love the sinner!” This means showing compassion for the sinner―for as they also say: “There but for the grace of God go I.”
It is this compassion and love for the sinner that Our Lady highlights at her apparitions at Fatima, when she begs prayers for sinners: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: ‘O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.’ … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
This requires that we lay down the foundation of HUMILITY—which is why Our Lord commands: “Learn of Me, for I am humble of Heart!” (Matthew 11:29). Our heart must contain Humility for Charity to grown, for Pride is an excessive love of self, which kills Charity. With Humility and Charity working together, we shall want to forgive, we shall want to share, and we shall want to bring others into the circle of God’s love. And all this we shall do because we want to please Our Lord. In showing Charity, we cannot miss. In almost everything else, we can make fools of ourselves by greed and selfishness, but in the matter of Charity, we are giving out God Himself. God is Charity. He does not say of Himself that He is penance, or perseverance, or even that He is obedience, or humility; He says of Himself that He is Charity — and that those who live in Charity are living in Him (1 John 4:16).
What Don’t You Understand?
“This is My commandment,” says Our Lord, “that you should love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:12). What could be clearer than that? It means that if God loves us with all the love that is in Him, then we must love with all the love that is in us. The only difference is that God’s love for us is infinite whereas our love for one another is finite. But you would be surprised how wide that finite love of ours can be stretched: the love of the saints, for their fellow human beings, was stretched to include all mankind. Charity, if it is really of God, has to be all-embracing.
So when you think of Charity, do not think at once of charity bazaars and rummage sales, of collections and subscriptions and fund-raising letters. Instead think first of God’s love for every single person in the world, and try to model yourself on that. If you can reach the stage of loving every single person in the world (which does not mean loving their sins), you will be only too glad to help in the various works of charity—whether for the hospitals, the missions, the poor, the old, or simply in being kind to people who need to be treated kindly, or to sacrifice yourself as Our Lady asked, in praying and sacrificing for the conversion of poor sinners.
Most of us do not have to go far out of our way to find souls to be nice to. We do not even have to go out in search of sinners―we simply pray and sacrifice for them. Most of us, however, do have to make an effort to be nice to others for the love of God. And that is where sanctity comes in. Sanctity is not choosing which side of Charity we want to follow—love of God or love of neighbor—but choosing both and making them into one.
Do you want to go Heaven? Do you want to be a holy and become a saint? Remember that it is only saints that get to enter Heaven! And the lifeblood of sanctity is, of course, the Charity of Christ. He is the vine, and we are the branches (John 15:5); the branches are alive and fruitful for just as long as they receive the life that belongs to the vine. In the same way, personal sanctity is true and fruitful for just as long as it comes from the person of Christ. Try breaking off a twig from a vine and hanging it over your bed. No matter how long you keep it there, you will never see it produce a bunch of grapes. It will gradually shrivel up and die. That is why Christ said: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
The Soul of Holiness
This is why St. Paul warns us that, without Charity driving us and all our actions, we and they are worth nothing! “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). It is Charity (which is defined as “a love of God”) which holds all things together, just as God (who is Charity itself) holds the whole universe together. “But above all these things have Charity, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14).
Vine and Branches
At the Last Supper―which can be called a “Discourse of Love”―Our Lord speaks often of Charity. He also puts forth the image of the Vine (like a father) feeding the branches (his children). Our Lord is the Vine and we are His branches, and He, being Charity itself--”God is Charity” (1 John 4:8)—feeds or pours out that Charity into our souls: “the Charity of God is poured forth in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost” (Romans 5:5), Who is the Spirit of Love.
So the most important thing is to remain one with the vine, letting yourself grow out of it with the strength it gives you. You must take whatever direction the vine wants you to take, and you must not try to show-off, to the other branches, by growing more quickly than the vine means you to grow. Leave the question of producing fruit to the way things work out―you will not be fruitless if you “abide in the vine.” These are the conditions laid down by Our Lord: “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me” (John 15:4).
Branches Must Be Pruned
But do not be dismayed when you find that what looks like something becoming a splendid growth, promising a cluster of grapes in the future, is clipped off. The pruning knife is not stunting your growth, but making sure that you grow better, stronger, and healthier. Do not cry out against the knife; it is doing what you cannot do. Grass grows faster after it has been cut short. You cannot become a saint without the Cross. “Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away―and every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit” (John 15:2).
The Power of Charity
Now, if the Charity of Christ is our source of sanctity, it is the fuel for holiness, the more we draw from it, the greater will be the gift we can offer to God—and the greater will be the graces that we receive from God. The ultimate evil in the world is sin, and so the ultimate grace is the grace of mercy: “The Lord is gracious and merciful―patient and plenteous in mercy. And His tender mercies are over all his works” (Psalm 144:8-9). That is why Holy Scripture says: “Before all things have a constant mutual Charity among yourselves―for Charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) … which is why Our Lord said of Mary Magdalen” “Wherefore I say to thee―Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much” (Luke 7:47).
Natural Charity Must Be Supernaturalized
Whatever we possess in the way of natural kindness and friendliness, must be made to mingle with Christ’s divine Charity—and so become supernatural. To be nice to people, merely because we happen to like them, is not enough―we must set our affection higher up the scale and be nice to them for the love of God. This ought not to be too difficult because affection comes from God and can easily be directed back again to Him. As one part of an act of charity says: “My God, I love Thee with all my heart—and I love my neighbor, as myself, for love of Thee!” For Charity without God in the equation, is not Charity at all, but a secular, natural, heathen kind of charity, that does deserve the name “Charity” but is merely natural love and no more.
The Bible Tells Us So!
Holy Scripture repeatedly makes this point: “Love one another with the Charity of brotherhood, with honor preventing [anticipating the needs of] one another” (Romans 12:10) … “Dearly beloved, let us love one another, for Charity is of God” (1 John 4:7) and “the Charity of Christ urges and presses us” (2 Corinthians 5:14). For Jesus Himself, at the Last Supper, told us: “A new commandment I give unto you―That you love one another. As I have loved you, that you also love one another” (John 13:34) ... “This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you” (John 15:12) ... “I command you, that you love one another” (John 15:17).
Which is why St. Paul, St. Peter and St. John tell us: “Owe no man anything, but to love one another. For he that loveshis neighbor, has fulfilled the law” (Romans 13:8). “You yourselves have learned of God to love one another” (1 Thessalonians 4:9). “Purifying your souls in the obedience of Charity, with a brotherly love, from a sincere heart love one another earnestly” (1 Peter 1:22). “For this is the declaration, which you have heard from the beginning, that you should love one another” (1 John 3:11).
Satan’s Short-Circuiting of Charity
The trouble is that the flow of Charity through us to other people, and through them to God, can often be cut clean off. One of Satan’s first objectives is to make us put obstacles in the way of what might be called “the holy circulation of love.” Just as in history, one country has tried to keep another country away, by building a wall, so we are apt to put up walls between ourselves and other people. Without open warfare, members of the same human race can glare at one another from their own sides of the wall. Once built, these walls are very hard to pull down. Nations that are afraid of other nations build walls. Nations that have a secret they do not want to share―build walls. Then everyone becomes deceitful and suspicious―and this is no way to be. But the world is stiff with walls, and there is very little trust, and that is why wars break out.
We Make Matters Worse
Although it is not entirely your fault, nor mine, that there is no true peace in the world, and that freedom is a chancy thing that some countries enjoy, while others do not, it is your fault and mine that we allow intolerance in our lives. If all of us tried to be helpful, instead of wondering how we were going to be double-crossed, we would all get on far better. But, because we expect to be double-crossed, we lay ourselves open to be double-crossed, and this makes us retreat more and more into ‘uncharity’ and intolerance.
Now, sanctity cannot take root where there are suspicions and the deliberate refusal to see another person’s point of view. A readiness to understand—which supposes a readiness to make allowances for what genuinely cannot be understood—is an absolute condition of Charity. You cannot raise-up a sanctity where there is no foundation of understanding. It goes by other names (such as sympathy, long-suffering, harmony, consideration, patience, compassion), but the many sides of understanding and tolerance amount to only one thing: Charity.
Charity Towards the Saints and Sinners
You will find to your surprise that Charity is just as difficult to practice toward good people, as toward bad ones. The saintly can be very irritating. Making allowances for the sinner is so much preached about, that, when you hear of his failures, you may feel ready to excuse him. His temptations, his upbringing, his background: these things perhaps lessen his guilt and let him off. But do you make enough allowances for the maddening ways, or for the downright failures, of the soul who is trying to be a saint? All are objects of our Charity, not just the obvious ones.
Neither Charity nor Sanctity is a “One-Size-Fits-All”
The best way to spread your Charity, so that it covers the people who are working toward God, as well as those who are apparently working away from Him, is to realize that each single person has to find his own way of serving God, and that just because it is not your way, you must not find fault with it. On the contrary, you must try to find the good in it. If you were really humble, you would admit that God was probably better served by this other person’s slogging along, in his way, than by your hopping along in your way.
Notice how St. Paul again and again comes back to the idea that there are many vocations, but one Spirit working through all of them (1 Corinthians 12:4-11). And Our Lord Himself says that, in His Father’s house, there are many mansions (John 14:2). The Good Shepherd has an endless number of sheep to look after―each one is different, and they bump into one another, and their bleating must infuriate right and left, but all are going in the same direction. The Good Shepherd is drawing them in His way, and the millions of separate sheep are trotting after Him in their way.
Step-Back! Take it Easy! Calm Down!
To be tolerant, and to have sympathy for other people’s approach to God―which may be very unlike ours―is a mark of true perfection. This is what St. Catherine of Siena says about it: “Such a one does not make himself a judge of God’s servants, nor of any other; he congratulates every example and every state of life. He rejoices more in the different kinds of men that he sees, than he would in seeing them all walk by the same way, for so he sees the greatness of God made manifest.” However, it must be pointed out that when we speak of toleration―it does not include the toleration and acceptance of sin!
Holiness in All Shapes and Sizes
It is this variety that makes holiness practical to us as well as beautiful in itself. If all who wanted to be holy had to become monks and nuns, it would narrow our chances a good deal. Instead of this, there are endless patterns of sanctity to choose from. Since sanctity is the life God has given us, lived divinely, we can be saints if we are actors or archbishops, stewardesses or mother foundresses. The whole thing depends on the love of God, and if we really love God, it does not seem to matter much what our profession is. As St. Augustine once famously said: “Love God and do what you want!” Which, when you think about it, means that if you really love God, you will not do anything that offends Him, but do what pleases Him.
Focus on Acquiring Charity Above All Things
“But above all these things have Charity” (Colossians 3:14). “Charity is patient, is kind. Charity envies not, deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeks not her own [advantage]; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believeth all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7). So if Charity is the material of holiness, it follows that the nearer we get to becoming saints, then the less critical we shall be of others and the more welcoming we shall be. Of course, sin remains the greatest evil in the world and there can no tolerance of sin―but there should be a compassionate tolerance of the sinner―as they say: “Hate the sin, but love the sinner!” This means showing compassion for the sinner―for as they also say: “There but for the grace of God go I.”
It is this compassion and love for the sinner that Our Lady highlights at her apparitions at Fatima, when she begs prayers for sinners: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make some sacrifice: ‘O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.’ … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, June, July & August of 1917).
This requires that we lay down the foundation of HUMILITY—which is why Our Lord commands: “Learn of Me, for I am humble of Heart!” (Matthew 11:29). Our heart must contain Humility for Charity to grown, for Pride is an excessive love of self, which kills Charity. With Humility and Charity working together, we shall want to forgive, we shall want to share, and we shall want to bring others into the circle of God’s love. And all this we shall do because we want to please Our Lord. In showing Charity, we cannot miss. In almost everything else, we can make fools of ourselves by greed and selfishness, but in the matter of Charity, we are giving out God Himself. God is Charity. He does not say of Himself that He is penance, or perseverance, or even that He is obedience, or humility; He says of Himself that He is Charity — and that those who live in Charity are living in Him (1 John 4:16).
What Don’t You Understand?
“This is My commandment,” says Our Lord, “that you should love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:12). What could be clearer than that? It means that if God loves us with all the love that is in Him, then we must love with all the love that is in us. The only difference is that God’s love for us is infinite whereas our love for one another is finite. But you would be surprised how wide that finite love of ours can be stretched: the love of the saints, for their fellow human beings, was stretched to include all mankind. Charity, if it is really of God, has to be all-embracing.
So when you think of Charity, do not think at once of charity bazaars and rummage sales, of collections and subscriptions and fund-raising letters. Instead think first of God’s love for every single person in the world, and try to model yourself on that. If you can reach the stage of loving every single person in the world (which does not mean loving their sins), you will be only too glad to help in the various works of charity—whether for the hospitals, the missions, the poor, the old, or simply in being kind to people who need to be treated kindly, or to sacrifice yourself as Our Lady asked, in praying and sacrificing for the conversion of poor sinners.
Most of us do not have to go far out of our way to find souls to be nice to. We do not even have to go out in search of sinners―we simply pray and sacrifice for them. Most of us, however, do have to make an effort to be nice to others for the love of God. And that is where sanctity comes in. Sanctity is not choosing which side of Charity we want to follow—love of God or love of neighbor—but choosing both and making them into one.
Article 15
Quinquagesima Sunday, February 11th, also the Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes
Lourdes and Lent—To Penance We Are Sent!
Quinquagesima Sunday, February 11th, also the Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes
Lourdes and Lent—To Penance We Are Sent!
Lourdes Goes Around and Comes Around
We come around, once again, to commemorating the beginning of Our Lady’s apparitions at Lourdes to St. Bernadette in 1858. Our Lady appeared a total of 18 times from February 11th to July 16th (the feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel). The timing of her first apparition is very important for us—since it happened during the Septuagesima season, just before the beginning of Lent. In fact, in 1858, Ash Wednesday fell on February 17th—for us, in 2024, Ash Wednesday falls on February 14th. As we shall see, the main subject matter, that Our Lady spoke of at her apparitions, had a very Lenten and penitential tone to it. We should recall her authoritative insistence as she spoke the words: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” ― words which bring to mind Our Lord’s words: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5).
The Silent Queen versus The Loquacious World
In the first two apparitions, Our Lady was silent—she merely prayed the Rosary. It was not until the third apparition that she spoke—not a bad resolution for most of us: pray before you speak! How much less would we sin with our tongues if we would only do that! As St. James laments: “If any man offends not in word, the same is a perfect man. He is able also with a bridle to lead about the whole body. For if we put bits into the mouths of horses, so that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole body. Behold also ships, whereas they are great, and are driven by strong winds, yet are they turned about with a small helm, wheresoever the pilot desires. Even so the tongue is indeed a little member, and boasts great things. Behold how small a fire kindles a great wood. And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is placed among our members, which defiles the whole body, being set on fire by Hell.” (James 3:2-6).
Today, the world has become overwhelmingly loquacious and verbose—with a constant barrage of words through constant TV, incessant internet, endless songs, media mountains with dense forests of verbiage—the likes of which the world has never know before! Man drowns fellow man in a sea of words about man—while, in regards to God, we are mainly silent. Our Lady is known as “a woman of few words”. Yet her words are filled with significance and rich meaning.
Our Lady’s Words at Lourdes
When Our Lady does speak, she speaks mainly of penance and suffering. As far as fun is concerned—Our Lady is quite simply no fun at all! At the Third Apparition, on Thursday, February 18th 1858, which was the day after Ash Wednesday in 1858, she ominously told Bernadette: "I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next."
By the time the Sixth apparition came round on the First Sunday of Lent, February 21st 1858, Our Lady commanded: “Pray for sinners." Two apparitions later, at her Eighth appearance on Wednesday, February 24th 1858, she continues the same theme, saying: “Penance! Penance! Penance! … Pray to God for sinners .... Kiss the ground as an act of penance for sinners!” The next day, Thursday, February 25th 1858, Our Lady commands Bernadette to “Go, drink of the spring and wash yourself there. You will eat the grass that is there.”
Bernadette relates: “(The Lady) told me that I should go and drink at the fountain and wash myself. Seeing no fountain I went to drink at the River Gave. She said it was not there; she pointed with her finger that I was to go in under the rock. I went, and I found a puddle of water which was more like mud, and the quantity was so small that I could hardly gather a little in the hollow of my hand. Nevertheless I obeyed, and started scratching the ground; after doing that I was able to take some. The water was so dirty that three times I threw it away. The fourth time I was able to drink it. She made me eat grass growing in the same place where I had drunk.” In front of the crowd that was asking “Do you think that she is crazy doing things like that?” she calmly replied; “It is for sinners!”
Providentially Primed
When Our Lady told Bernadette that she would not be granted happiness in this world, but in the next—this did not mean that Bernadette had led a carefree and happy life until that point, which would now suddenly be taken away. Bernadette was well acquainted with the cross from her earliest years—she had been providentially primed to suffer.
Problematic Father
Born in Lourdes, France, on January 7th, 1844, Bernadette was the first child of François and Louise Soubirous. At the time of her birth, François was a miller, operating a mill which had belonged to his wife's people. He was a good-natured, easy-going man, with little ability for carrying on a business, and before many years had passed the mill had to be forfeited due to debt. During most of Bernadette's childhood, he was merely an odd job man, picking up a day's work whenever the opportunity offered itself—thus Bernadette experienced a childhood of poverty. From time to time, François tried to escape from his problems and responsibilities by turning to the delusive comfort of alcohol.
Poor Family
His wife and children, naturally, were the chief sufferers from his ineffectualness. Louise, whose family was of somewhat better economic status than her husband's, was a hard worker, a warm-hearted neighbor, and exemplary in her observance of Catholic Faith. Within a short space of years, many children were born to her, only five of whom survived infancy. After Bernadette, there was another girl, Antoinette (‘Toinette) Marie, and three boys.
Nevertheless, Bernadette's family had to endure extreme poverty. To help feed and clothe them it was often necessary for their harassed mother to go out to work by the day, doing laundry and other rough tasks for the more prosperous citizens, and, on one occasion, at least, helping to harvest a crop of grain. A peasant woman of the region has told of seeing little Bernadette, then about twelve, carrying the youngest baby to Louise in the field, to be nursed during the noon-day rest period. As a child, Bernadette not only did more than might be expected in caring for the smaller children, but helped in their moral and religious training as well.
Poor Health
Bernadette was never strong. She contracted cholera as a toddler and, from the age of six, she showed symptoms of a respiratory ailment that later became a chronic affliction. It is not clear at this early stage whether she suffered from asthma or tuberculosis, but we know that her mother was anxious about her health and made an effort to provide special food for her. Her respiratory illness plagued her for the rest of her life and tuberculosis would strike later in life.
Separated From Family
When Bernadette was thirteen, she was sent to the neighboring mountain village of Bartres, to the home of one Marie Arevant, her foster-mother. It was here that Bernadette had been taken for a few months, when she was still an infant, to be nursed by Madame Arevant, who had just lost a baby. The woman now had a large family and little Bernadette made herself useful in the house and in the fields. One of her duties was to tend a small flock of sheep that grazed on a hillside nearby; it is this brief phase of her girlhood that has inspired artists to picture her as a shepherdess. Her life was a lonely one, and we get the impression that she was overworked and homesick while she remained in this peasant home. At all events, she sent word to her parents that she wished to leave Bartres.
Deprived of Holy Communion
One thing seemed especially to disturb her at this time; although she was now fourteen, she had not made her First Communion. Her foster mother had tried half-heartedly to prepare her, but after one or two sessions had impatiently given it up, saying that Bernadette was too dull to learn.
Poorly Educated
When Bernadette went back to Lourdes, it made her very happy to be admitted to the day school conducted by the Sisters of Charity and Christian Instruction. This was a teaching and nursing order whose mother-house is at Nevers, in central France. A hospice, a day school, and a boarding school were maintained at Lourdes by these devout nuns, who were, as a group, unusually well-trained.
Thus Bernadette at last began her secular education, and, under Fr. Pomian, continued to prepare for First Communion. She was also learning a little French, for up to this time she spoke only the local dialect. The nuns discovered that beneath a quiet, modest exterior, Bernadette had a winning personality and a lively sense of humor. This might have been a happy and constructive time for the little girl, had it not been for the ever-increasing shadows of poverty at home.
Finding Home in Old Prison Cell
After moving from one poor location to another, the Soubirous family was now living in a single room of a dilapidated structure in the rue des Petits Fosses; this damp, unwholesome place had once served as a jail and was known as Le Cachot, the Dungeon. Above loomed an ancient fortress, and the narrow cobbled street had once been a part of the moat.
Stressful Times During Apparitions
Although some believed they were witnessing a miraculous occurrence when Bernadette claimed she was seeing apparitions, others in the town were both critical and suspicious. Town elders and the police brought Bernadette several times in for questioning; she even had to undergo medical testing to prove she wasn’t fit for a mental asylum. Great pressure was placed on Bernadette to avoid going back to the grotto. However, under cross examination, she retained a childlike innocence and also an implacable faith in the veracity of the experiences she had witnessed. Despite frequent and intense examinations, they were unable to find flaws in her story. She didn’t seek to exaggerate or materially profit from her experiences.
Seeking Refuge in the Religious Life
Bernadette never sought publicity, or a name and fame, in many ways she wished to live a quiet life; after the apparitions she became increasingly attracted towards living a religious cloistered life. Disliking the attention she was attracting, Bernadette went to the hospice school run by the Sisters of Charity of Nevers where she finally learned to read and write. At the age of twenty she decided to take the veil. Since the state of her health precluded the more ascetic orders, it was considered best for her to join the Sisters who had taught and sheltered her.
Although she considered joining the Carmelites, her health precluded her entering any of the strict contemplative orders. On July 29th, 1866, with 42 other candidates, she took the religious habit of a postulant and joined the Sisters of Charity at their mother-house at Nevers. The Mother Superior at the time gave her the name Marie-Bernarde in honor of her godmother who was named "Bernarde".
No Escape
Even in the convent, intrusions upon her privacy were allowed; these she bore as patiently as she could. Many senior clergy and other dignitaries came to the convent, with the hope of speaking to the young visionary. On most occasions, the Convent gave permission for the senior priests to have an interview with Bernadette. While her fame not only continued, but steadily grew, Bernadette herself withdrew more and more. Bernadette, with failing health, found these repeated interviews quite exhausting and on occasions tried to escape. However, although she felt drained from giving so many interviews, Bernadette would always answer the questions with good grace and humility.
Severe Treatment in Convent
Her novitiate was full of trials and sorrows. Acting under the quite unfounded notion that Bernadette's visions and all the attendant publicity might have made the young woman vain or self-important, Sister Marie Therese Vauzous, now novice-mistress at Nevers, was very severe with her former pupil. Although she made life difficult for Bernadette, the little novice met all tests with perfect humility. She cheerfully performed the menial tasks assigned to her, at first in the convent kitchen, although this work must have taxed her strength.
Sickly Bernadette Cares for the Sick
Later, when it was noted that her sympathetic manner made her a favorite with sick people, she was appointed assistant infirmarian. Her step and touch were light, and her very presence brought comfort. But during these years, Bernadette was suffering from the chronic disease which was slowly draining her life away. She was finally given work in the sacristy, where cleverness with the needle made her work admired and cherished. She displayed a real gift for design and color in embroidering, creating beautiful embroidery for altar cloths and vestments. To all tasks she brought a pure grace of spirit and an utter willingness to serve.
Plagued by Ill-Health
She later contracted tuberculosis of the bone in her right knee. For several months prior to her death, seemed to suffer from various ailments and afflictions. She was unable to take an active part in convent life. For long periods she was confined to her bed. When asked why she didn’t go to Lourdes for healing, she replied “It is not for me.”
Sister Nathalie Portat was present during the final day of Bernadette’s life. She remarked how in the afternoon the patient seemed to be tortured by an inexpressible interior agony and asked for those nearby to pray for her soul. Sister Portat recalls: “At the words of the Angelic Salutation—‘Holy Mary, Mother of God’—the dying Bernadette revived, and, in a voice full of conviction, a voice that in her final moments expressed her profound humility and her daughterly confidence in the Immaculate Virgin, she twice repeated: ‘Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for me, a poor sinner.’”
A few moments later Bernadette made a large sign of the cross, drank a few drops of water and left her mortal body. She eventually died of her long-term illness at the age of 35 on April 16th, 1879.
Lessons of Lourdes for Ourselves
The story of Lourdes is rich in lessons for us. Despite the miraculous waters that emerged from Lourdes, perhaps, paradoxically, the chief lesson of Lourdes is about suffering. Lourdes shows us two faces of Divine Providence that can appear to be contradictory: suffering and cure.
Cures of the Body and Cures of the Soul
On one hand, the thing that attracts the most attention at Lourdes is that Our Lady has pity on men, hears their requests, and works miracles to free them from the pain and illnesses they suffer. However, there are also even greater miraculous cures that take place that are not visible to the human eye, or the medical investigation. Our Lady has also brought about many spiritual miracles of conversions—either conversions to the Catholic Faith from some other religion, or conversions within the Catholic Faith, by souls leaving behind the disease of mortal sin. By making both physical and spiritual miracles, she shows that she is our Mother who loves us and wants to relieve us from suffering both here and in eternity.
To Cure, or Not to Cure—That is the Question
Yet for every cure that takes place at Lourdes, there are thousands—perhaps hundreds of thousands—of sick people who go to Lourdes and return without being cured. They utter the same words that Bernadette uttered in her illnesses: “It is not for me!” Why does Our Lady give cures to some, and not to others? In fact, there is an important lesson for us in the cures she doesn’t give, and perhaps the greatest miracle of Lourdes is found precisely in this.
For the great majority of persons, suffering is absolutely necessary for their own sanctification and salvation. Her Son had already said: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). Therefore, the illnesses and troubles they suffer are necessary. It is through sicknesses and spiritual tribulations that they will sanctify themselves. One who does not understand the role of suffering and sorrow—in bringing about detachment, conversion, and love of God—does not understand what the spiritual life really is.
The Eighth Sacrament
St. Francis of Sales used to affirm that suffering is the “Eighth Sacrament”. It is so indispensable that he considered that no one could be saved without it. Pope Pius XI once boasted to Cardinal Pedro Segura, Archbishop of Seville, that he had never been sick. The Cardinal told him: “So, Your Holiness does not have the sign of the elect soul.” The Pope was taken aback, but Cardinal Segura firmly insisted: “There is no predestined soul who does not suffer profoundly from sickness at least once in his lifetime. If Your Holiness has never had any health problem, you do not have the sign of the elect.” Some days later, Pope Pius XI suffered a severe heart attack. From his bed he wrote to Cardinal Segura, saying: “Your Eminence, now I also have the sign of the elect!” Suffering—be it physical or moral—is the sign of the elect soul.
If Our Lady would cure every illness, then would work against the salvation of many if not most souls. Sometimes she does obtain a cure, because it is for the ultimate good of that person to be relieved of the suffering. But normally it is not the best thing for people. This is why Our Lady, who is the Mother of Mercy, permits suffering for some souls, because it is indispensable.
The Miracle of Resignation
But in such a case, Our Lady also does something else that is very beautiful. For the sick persons that she declines to cure, she obtains for them a conformity to the will of God and the acceptance of their sufferings. It is rare to find a person who has been to Lourdes and was not cured, who then became angry and revolted against God. On the contrary, persons who go there return with an enormous resignation, happy to have been at Lourdes and seen other people being cured.
Greater Love No Man Hath, Than…
“Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). There are numerous cases of persons who have traveled long distances to Lourdes, and witness other persons who are suffering far more than they are, and thus see that these have greater need of being cured. Seeing this, they ask Our Lady to cure those persons instead of themselves. That is, a person voluntarily accepts his suffering for the advantage of another. This too is a miracle—a miracle of grace. It is the renunciation of one’s own self love for the love of God and neighbor.
The Lesson of Suffering
The greatest lesson of Lourdes, then, is the acceptance of suffering, be it a physical illness or a moral sorrow, if it is necessary for our salvation. It is very difficult to carry the cross of suffering with resignation. Yes, it really is. But in such cases, we are reminded of Our Lord in the Garden of Gethsemane who prayed: “Father, if Thou wilt, remove this chalice from Me! Nevertheless, not My will, but Thine, be done” (Luke 22:42). This is the position we should have in face of our particular sufferings. If it is not possible to remove the chalice, then “not my will, but Thine, be done.” A grace will come to console us, like the Angel who came to console and give strength to Our Lord. We should have an understanding of suffering, the courage, resolution, and energy it takes to face it, and even the joy to receive it. We should remember that to suffer is a sign of the elect. Our Lady will help us to face our sufferings, just as she helps those who request her assistance at Lourdes.
Lent & Suffering
Lent is our own personal Lourdes—except rather than ask for a cure of the body, we should be seeking a cure of the soul. Rather than seeking and praying for some physical disease to be removed from us, we should be seeking and praying for spiritual disease to be removed from our soul. Does not our Faith and the Catechism teach us that the soul is far more important than the body? We should enter Lent with this hope, just as many a sick person enters Lourdes with hope. Yet the cure (of soul) will not be granted to the half-hearted, or the lukewarm, or those who merely pray with their lips while their hearts are elsewhere.
Love & Suffering
The Epistle from today’s Mass on Quinquagesima Sunday, indicates to us the primacy of love or charity as the chief ingredient that must be present in all our sufferings: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
The Epistle then gives us a description of some the acts or effects of charity: “Charity is patient, is kind; Charity envies not; it deals not perversely; it is not puffed up; it is not ambitious; Charity seeks not her own [advantage]; it is not provoked to anger; it thinks no evil; it does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; Charity bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things. Charity never falls away: whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed ... And now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three: but the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:4-13).
Faith in Suffering
Just as a strong Faith brings about cures at Lourdes, so will a strong Faith bring about cures during Lent. Many times Our Lord required a strong Faith (belief and confidence) on the part of those who came seeking a cure from Him: “The blind men came to Him and Jesus said to them: ‘Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?’” (Matthew 9:28). We may have to imitate the father of the possessed boy: “And immediately the father of the boy crying out, with tears said: ‘I do believe, Lord! help my unbelief!’” (Mark 9:23) if we wish to hear Our Lord say: “Go thy way, thy faith hath made thee whole!” (Mark 10:52) … “Thy faith hath made thee whole! Go in peace, and be thou healed of thy disease!” (Mark 5:34) … “Great is thy faith―be it done to thee as thou wilt!” (Matthew 15:28).
Let us therefore be prepared to suffer throughout Lent with our prayers and fasting, begging of God and Our Lady the grace of a cure for all our spiritual maladies. Seek and you find! Knock and it shall be opened to you! Ask and you shall receive!
We come around, once again, to commemorating the beginning of Our Lady’s apparitions at Lourdes to St. Bernadette in 1858. Our Lady appeared a total of 18 times from February 11th to July 16th (the feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel). The timing of her first apparition is very important for us—since it happened during the Septuagesima season, just before the beginning of Lent. In fact, in 1858, Ash Wednesday fell on February 17th—for us, in 2024, Ash Wednesday falls on February 14th. As we shall see, the main subject matter, that Our Lady spoke of at her apparitions, had a very Lenten and penitential tone to it. We should recall her authoritative insistence as she spoke the words: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” ― words which bring to mind Our Lord’s words: “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … Again I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5).
The Silent Queen versus The Loquacious World
In the first two apparitions, Our Lady was silent—she merely prayed the Rosary. It was not until the third apparition that she spoke—not a bad resolution for most of us: pray before you speak! How much less would we sin with our tongues if we would only do that! As St. James laments: “If any man offends not in word, the same is a perfect man. He is able also with a bridle to lead about the whole body. For if we put bits into the mouths of horses, so that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole body. Behold also ships, whereas they are great, and are driven by strong winds, yet are they turned about with a small helm, wheresoever the pilot desires. Even so the tongue is indeed a little member, and boasts great things. Behold how small a fire kindles a great wood. And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is placed among our members, which defiles the whole body, being set on fire by Hell.” (James 3:2-6).
Today, the world has become overwhelmingly loquacious and verbose—with a constant barrage of words through constant TV, incessant internet, endless songs, media mountains with dense forests of verbiage—the likes of which the world has never know before! Man drowns fellow man in a sea of words about man—while, in regards to God, we are mainly silent. Our Lady is known as “a woman of few words”. Yet her words are filled with significance and rich meaning.
Our Lady’s Words at Lourdes
When Our Lady does speak, she speaks mainly of penance and suffering. As far as fun is concerned—Our Lady is quite simply no fun at all! At the Third Apparition, on Thursday, February 18th 1858, which was the day after Ash Wednesday in 1858, she ominously told Bernadette: "I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next."
By the time the Sixth apparition came round on the First Sunday of Lent, February 21st 1858, Our Lady commanded: “Pray for sinners." Two apparitions later, at her Eighth appearance on Wednesday, February 24th 1858, she continues the same theme, saying: “Penance! Penance! Penance! … Pray to God for sinners .... Kiss the ground as an act of penance for sinners!” The next day, Thursday, February 25th 1858, Our Lady commands Bernadette to “Go, drink of the spring and wash yourself there. You will eat the grass that is there.”
Bernadette relates: “(The Lady) told me that I should go and drink at the fountain and wash myself. Seeing no fountain I went to drink at the River Gave. She said it was not there; she pointed with her finger that I was to go in under the rock. I went, and I found a puddle of water which was more like mud, and the quantity was so small that I could hardly gather a little in the hollow of my hand. Nevertheless I obeyed, and started scratching the ground; after doing that I was able to take some. The water was so dirty that three times I threw it away. The fourth time I was able to drink it. She made me eat grass growing in the same place where I had drunk.” In front of the crowd that was asking “Do you think that she is crazy doing things like that?” she calmly replied; “It is for sinners!”
Providentially Primed
When Our Lady told Bernadette that she would not be granted happiness in this world, but in the next—this did not mean that Bernadette had led a carefree and happy life until that point, which would now suddenly be taken away. Bernadette was well acquainted with the cross from her earliest years—she had been providentially primed to suffer.
Problematic Father
Born in Lourdes, France, on January 7th, 1844, Bernadette was the first child of François and Louise Soubirous. At the time of her birth, François was a miller, operating a mill which had belonged to his wife's people. He was a good-natured, easy-going man, with little ability for carrying on a business, and before many years had passed the mill had to be forfeited due to debt. During most of Bernadette's childhood, he was merely an odd job man, picking up a day's work whenever the opportunity offered itself—thus Bernadette experienced a childhood of poverty. From time to time, François tried to escape from his problems and responsibilities by turning to the delusive comfort of alcohol.
Poor Family
His wife and children, naturally, were the chief sufferers from his ineffectualness. Louise, whose family was of somewhat better economic status than her husband's, was a hard worker, a warm-hearted neighbor, and exemplary in her observance of Catholic Faith. Within a short space of years, many children were born to her, only five of whom survived infancy. After Bernadette, there was another girl, Antoinette (‘Toinette) Marie, and three boys.
Nevertheless, Bernadette's family had to endure extreme poverty. To help feed and clothe them it was often necessary for their harassed mother to go out to work by the day, doing laundry and other rough tasks for the more prosperous citizens, and, on one occasion, at least, helping to harvest a crop of grain. A peasant woman of the region has told of seeing little Bernadette, then about twelve, carrying the youngest baby to Louise in the field, to be nursed during the noon-day rest period. As a child, Bernadette not only did more than might be expected in caring for the smaller children, but helped in their moral and religious training as well.
Poor Health
Bernadette was never strong. She contracted cholera as a toddler and, from the age of six, she showed symptoms of a respiratory ailment that later became a chronic affliction. It is not clear at this early stage whether she suffered from asthma or tuberculosis, but we know that her mother was anxious about her health and made an effort to provide special food for her. Her respiratory illness plagued her for the rest of her life and tuberculosis would strike later in life.
Separated From Family
When Bernadette was thirteen, she was sent to the neighboring mountain village of Bartres, to the home of one Marie Arevant, her foster-mother. It was here that Bernadette had been taken for a few months, when she was still an infant, to be nursed by Madame Arevant, who had just lost a baby. The woman now had a large family and little Bernadette made herself useful in the house and in the fields. One of her duties was to tend a small flock of sheep that grazed on a hillside nearby; it is this brief phase of her girlhood that has inspired artists to picture her as a shepherdess. Her life was a lonely one, and we get the impression that she was overworked and homesick while she remained in this peasant home. At all events, she sent word to her parents that she wished to leave Bartres.
Deprived of Holy Communion
One thing seemed especially to disturb her at this time; although she was now fourteen, she had not made her First Communion. Her foster mother had tried half-heartedly to prepare her, but after one or two sessions had impatiently given it up, saying that Bernadette was too dull to learn.
Poorly Educated
When Bernadette went back to Lourdes, it made her very happy to be admitted to the day school conducted by the Sisters of Charity and Christian Instruction. This was a teaching and nursing order whose mother-house is at Nevers, in central France. A hospice, a day school, and a boarding school were maintained at Lourdes by these devout nuns, who were, as a group, unusually well-trained.
Thus Bernadette at last began her secular education, and, under Fr. Pomian, continued to prepare for First Communion. She was also learning a little French, for up to this time she spoke only the local dialect. The nuns discovered that beneath a quiet, modest exterior, Bernadette had a winning personality and a lively sense of humor. This might have been a happy and constructive time for the little girl, had it not been for the ever-increasing shadows of poverty at home.
Finding Home in Old Prison Cell
After moving from one poor location to another, the Soubirous family was now living in a single room of a dilapidated structure in the rue des Petits Fosses; this damp, unwholesome place had once served as a jail and was known as Le Cachot, the Dungeon. Above loomed an ancient fortress, and the narrow cobbled street had once been a part of the moat.
Stressful Times During Apparitions
Although some believed they were witnessing a miraculous occurrence when Bernadette claimed she was seeing apparitions, others in the town were both critical and suspicious. Town elders and the police brought Bernadette several times in for questioning; she even had to undergo medical testing to prove she wasn’t fit for a mental asylum. Great pressure was placed on Bernadette to avoid going back to the grotto. However, under cross examination, she retained a childlike innocence and also an implacable faith in the veracity of the experiences she had witnessed. Despite frequent and intense examinations, they were unable to find flaws in her story. She didn’t seek to exaggerate or materially profit from her experiences.
Seeking Refuge in the Religious Life
Bernadette never sought publicity, or a name and fame, in many ways she wished to live a quiet life; after the apparitions she became increasingly attracted towards living a religious cloistered life. Disliking the attention she was attracting, Bernadette went to the hospice school run by the Sisters of Charity of Nevers where she finally learned to read and write. At the age of twenty she decided to take the veil. Since the state of her health precluded the more ascetic orders, it was considered best for her to join the Sisters who had taught and sheltered her.
Although she considered joining the Carmelites, her health precluded her entering any of the strict contemplative orders. On July 29th, 1866, with 42 other candidates, she took the religious habit of a postulant and joined the Sisters of Charity at their mother-house at Nevers. The Mother Superior at the time gave her the name Marie-Bernarde in honor of her godmother who was named "Bernarde".
No Escape
Even in the convent, intrusions upon her privacy were allowed; these she bore as patiently as she could. Many senior clergy and other dignitaries came to the convent, with the hope of speaking to the young visionary. On most occasions, the Convent gave permission for the senior priests to have an interview with Bernadette. While her fame not only continued, but steadily grew, Bernadette herself withdrew more and more. Bernadette, with failing health, found these repeated interviews quite exhausting and on occasions tried to escape. However, although she felt drained from giving so many interviews, Bernadette would always answer the questions with good grace and humility.
Severe Treatment in Convent
Her novitiate was full of trials and sorrows. Acting under the quite unfounded notion that Bernadette's visions and all the attendant publicity might have made the young woman vain or self-important, Sister Marie Therese Vauzous, now novice-mistress at Nevers, was very severe with her former pupil. Although she made life difficult for Bernadette, the little novice met all tests with perfect humility. She cheerfully performed the menial tasks assigned to her, at first in the convent kitchen, although this work must have taxed her strength.
Sickly Bernadette Cares for the Sick
Later, when it was noted that her sympathetic manner made her a favorite with sick people, she was appointed assistant infirmarian. Her step and touch were light, and her very presence brought comfort. But during these years, Bernadette was suffering from the chronic disease which was slowly draining her life away. She was finally given work in the sacristy, where cleverness with the needle made her work admired and cherished. She displayed a real gift for design and color in embroidering, creating beautiful embroidery for altar cloths and vestments. To all tasks she brought a pure grace of spirit and an utter willingness to serve.
Plagued by Ill-Health
She later contracted tuberculosis of the bone in her right knee. For several months prior to her death, seemed to suffer from various ailments and afflictions. She was unable to take an active part in convent life. For long periods she was confined to her bed. When asked why she didn’t go to Lourdes for healing, she replied “It is not for me.”
Sister Nathalie Portat was present during the final day of Bernadette’s life. She remarked how in the afternoon the patient seemed to be tortured by an inexpressible interior agony and asked for those nearby to pray for her soul. Sister Portat recalls: “At the words of the Angelic Salutation—‘Holy Mary, Mother of God’—the dying Bernadette revived, and, in a voice full of conviction, a voice that in her final moments expressed her profound humility and her daughterly confidence in the Immaculate Virgin, she twice repeated: ‘Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for me, a poor sinner.’”
A few moments later Bernadette made a large sign of the cross, drank a few drops of water and left her mortal body. She eventually died of her long-term illness at the age of 35 on April 16th, 1879.
Lessons of Lourdes for Ourselves
The story of Lourdes is rich in lessons for us. Despite the miraculous waters that emerged from Lourdes, perhaps, paradoxically, the chief lesson of Lourdes is about suffering. Lourdes shows us two faces of Divine Providence that can appear to be contradictory: suffering and cure.
Cures of the Body and Cures of the Soul
On one hand, the thing that attracts the most attention at Lourdes is that Our Lady has pity on men, hears their requests, and works miracles to free them from the pain and illnesses they suffer. However, there are also even greater miraculous cures that take place that are not visible to the human eye, or the medical investigation. Our Lady has also brought about many spiritual miracles of conversions—either conversions to the Catholic Faith from some other religion, or conversions within the Catholic Faith, by souls leaving behind the disease of mortal sin. By making both physical and spiritual miracles, she shows that she is our Mother who loves us and wants to relieve us from suffering both here and in eternity.
To Cure, or Not to Cure—That is the Question
Yet for every cure that takes place at Lourdes, there are thousands—perhaps hundreds of thousands—of sick people who go to Lourdes and return without being cured. They utter the same words that Bernadette uttered in her illnesses: “It is not for me!” Why does Our Lady give cures to some, and not to others? In fact, there is an important lesson for us in the cures she doesn’t give, and perhaps the greatest miracle of Lourdes is found precisely in this.
For the great majority of persons, suffering is absolutely necessary for their own sanctification and salvation. Her Son had already said: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). Therefore, the illnesses and troubles they suffer are necessary. It is through sicknesses and spiritual tribulations that they will sanctify themselves. One who does not understand the role of suffering and sorrow—in bringing about detachment, conversion, and love of God—does not understand what the spiritual life really is.
The Eighth Sacrament
St. Francis of Sales used to affirm that suffering is the “Eighth Sacrament”. It is so indispensable that he considered that no one could be saved without it. Pope Pius XI once boasted to Cardinal Pedro Segura, Archbishop of Seville, that he had never been sick. The Cardinal told him: “So, Your Holiness does not have the sign of the elect soul.” The Pope was taken aback, but Cardinal Segura firmly insisted: “There is no predestined soul who does not suffer profoundly from sickness at least once in his lifetime. If Your Holiness has never had any health problem, you do not have the sign of the elect.” Some days later, Pope Pius XI suffered a severe heart attack. From his bed he wrote to Cardinal Segura, saying: “Your Eminence, now I also have the sign of the elect!” Suffering—be it physical or moral—is the sign of the elect soul.
If Our Lady would cure every illness, then would work against the salvation of many if not most souls. Sometimes she does obtain a cure, because it is for the ultimate good of that person to be relieved of the suffering. But normally it is not the best thing for people. This is why Our Lady, who is the Mother of Mercy, permits suffering for some souls, because it is indispensable.
The Miracle of Resignation
But in such a case, Our Lady also does something else that is very beautiful. For the sick persons that she declines to cure, she obtains for them a conformity to the will of God and the acceptance of their sufferings. It is rare to find a person who has been to Lourdes and was not cured, who then became angry and revolted against God. On the contrary, persons who go there return with an enormous resignation, happy to have been at Lourdes and seen other people being cured.
Greater Love No Man Hath, Than…
“Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). There are numerous cases of persons who have traveled long distances to Lourdes, and witness other persons who are suffering far more than they are, and thus see that these have greater need of being cured. Seeing this, they ask Our Lady to cure those persons instead of themselves. That is, a person voluntarily accepts his suffering for the advantage of another. This too is a miracle—a miracle of grace. It is the renunciation of one’s own self love for the love of God and neighbor.
The Lesson of Suffering
The greatest lesson of Lourdes, then, is the acceptance of suffering, be it a physical illness or a moral sorrow, if it is necessary for our salvation. It is very difficult to carry the cross of suffering with resignation. Yes, it really is. But in such cases, we are reminded of Our Lord in the Garden of Gethsemane who prayed: “Father, if Thou wilt, remove this chalice from Me! Nevertheless, not My will, but Thine, be done” (Luke 22:42). This is the position we should have in face of our particular sufferings. If it is not possible to remove the chalice, then “not my will, but Thine, be done.” A grace will come to console us, like the Angel who came to console and give strength to Our Lord. We should have an understanding of suffering, the courage, resolution, and energy it takes to face it, and even the joy to receive it. We should remember that to suffer is a sign of the elect. Our Lady will help us to face our sufferings, just as she helps those who request her assistance at Lourdes.
Lent & Suffering
Lent is our own personal Lourdes—except rather than ask for a cure of the body, we should be seeking a cure of the soul. Rather than seeking and praying for some physical disease to be removed from us, we should be seeking and praying for spiritual disease to be removed from our soul. Does not our Faith and the Catechism teach us that the soul is far more important than the body? We should enter Lent with this hope, just as many a sick person enters Lourdes with hope. Yet the cure (of soul) will not be granted to the half-hearted, or the lukewarm, or those who merely pray with their lips while their hearts are elsewhere.
Love & Suffering
The Epistle from today’s Mass on Quinquagesima Sunday, indicates to us the primacy of love or charity as the chief ingredient that must be present in all our sufferings: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
The Epistle then gives us a description of some the acts or effects of charity: “Charity is patient, is kind; Charity envies not; it deals not perversely; it is not puffed up; it is not ambitious; Charity seeks not her own [advantage]; it is not provoked to anger; it thinks no evil; it does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; Charity bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things. Charity never falls away: whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed ... And now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three: but the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:4-13).
Faith in Suffering
Just as a strong Faith brings about cures at Lourdes, so will a strong Faith bring about cures during Lent. Many times Our Lord required a strong Faith (belief and confidence) on the part of those who came seeking a cure from Him: “The blind men came to Him and Jesus said to them: ‘Do you believe, that I can do this unto you?’” (Matthew 9:28). We may have to imitate the father of the possessed boy: “And immediately the father of the boy crying out, with tears said: ‘I do believe, Lord! help my unbelief!’” (Mark 9:23) if we wish to hear Our Lord say: “Go thy way, thy faith hath made thee whole!” (Mark 10:52) … “Thy faith hath made thee whole! Go in peace, and be thou healed of thy disease!” (Mark 5:34) … “Great is thy faith―be it done to thee as thou wilt!” (Matthew 15:28).
Let us therefore be prepared to suffer throughout Lent with our prayers and fasting, begging of God and Our Lady the grace of a cure for all our spiritual maladies. Seek and you find! Knock and it shall be opened to you! Ask and you shall receive!
Article 14
Saturday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 10th
Fighting With Yourself! Fighting Over Love!
Saturday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 10th
Fighting With Yourself! Fighting Over Love!
The Interior Battlefield
As the start of Lent draws ever nearer, so too does the start of the fight draw ever nearer! Looking for a fight? You don’t have to go anywhere! There is battlefield right in the middle of your soul! Holy Scripture tells us: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and St. Paul tells us we must fight: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12), adding that this fight is not only against the devil―”Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12)—but that our fight is also against ourselves, as he himself experiences and testifies:
“For that which I do, I understand not. For I do not that good which I want to do; but the evil which I hate, that I do! … For a desire to want to do good, is present with me; but to accomplish that which is good, I find not. For the good which I want to do, I do not; but the evil which I do not want to do, that I do. Now, if I do that which I do not want to do not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find, then, a law, that when I have a desire to do good, evil is present with me. For I am delighted with the law of God, according to the inward [spiritual] man, but I see another law in my body, fighting against the law of my mind [soul], and captivating me in the law of sin, that is in my body [passions]. Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Romans 7:15-24).
The Traitors Within
Our Lord said: “The Kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21)—God lives in our soul by His sanctifying grace. The attacks of the devil and the world—directly and indirectly—seek to weaken and destroy this wall of sanctifying grace, battering against it with one temptation after another, all life long. Yet, in every war, there are traitors on each side. We have those traitors or betrayers within our own camp—it was Original Sin that made them traitors and now they rebel against our soul. Who are those rebels and traitors? They are our passions—or, as the Church calls them, our concupiscences, that is to say our passions and their instinctive pursuit of their own particular goals: comfort, ease, wealth, possessions, pleasure, power, fame, honor, advantage, etc., etc.
A Passionate Fight
Each passion has its in-built goal that it pursues blindly and recklessly. Our soul—with its powers of reasoning and will-power—is supposed to control and keep in check the blind and frenzied activities of the passions, but since Original Sin has wounded and weakened our soul, we now find that our minds tend towards ignorance and our wills are weak. The only thing that can come to the aid of the ignorant mind and the weak will is the grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the grace of God—and it is this that St. Paul says, after painting the woeful state of his interior battles within and between his body and his soul: “Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God, by Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:24-25).
Only Love Can Bring Victory
In the Epistle from the upcoming Mass of Quinquagesima Sunday—an Epistle that we can call “A Letter of Love”—God points out to us that the only thing that can bring victory and success is Charity (a.k.a. Love of God). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing! … Charity never falls away―whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed … And now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3, 13).
The War Against Your Charity
Holy Scripture tells us that God is love: “God is charity: and he that abides in Charity, abides in God, and God in him … He that loveth not, knows not God―for God is Charity!” (1 John 4:8; 4:16). Our Lord—Who is the Incarnate Charity of God, or the Love of God in human form—tells us: “A new commandment I give unto you: ‘That you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another!’ By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another … This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you. Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 13:34-35; 15:12).
Holy Scripture develops or describes this Charity, by which we love our neighbor because of our love for God (which is the only true way to love our neighbor—for the sake of God and not for any personal profit, advantage or benefit): “Charity is patient; is kind; charity envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious, seeks not her own [advantage]; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things!” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7).
Satan and all devils—being opposed to the one true God—are opposed to true Charity. The devils are hatred personified and Hell is a place of universal hatred, just as Heaven is a place of universal love—in Hell each devil and each damned soul hates everyone else in Hell, even those whom they once loved on Earth, whereas, in Heaven, each saved soul loves everyone else in Heaven, even those whom they have at one time hated here on Earth, or those who have them great harm.
A Hatred of Love and a Love of Hatred
The devil hates Charity and he despises to see Charity in a soul and Charity growing in a soul. Thus, he will pull all the strings he can to destroy Charity in such a soul, or at least to slow down or stop any further growth of that heavenly virtue in a soul. Thus he will have you do anything that is good and holy―if that thing will not directly make you grow in Charity. If the devil sees you contemplating to do something that will make you grow in Charity, then he will suggest that you do some other good action that is “less-loaded” with Charity—for him it is a case of “the lesser of two ‘evils.’” He knows that it is not what we do that matters, but the love of God that we do it with—thus he seeks to destroy, debilitate, deform, demean or damage any and all trace of true supernatural Charity in the soul, and he will gladly con you, make you “buy into” and sell you a fake naturalistic, philanthropic, humanized, inferior version of Charity to replace that precious soul-saving version.
The devil hates to see God loved and he hates to see us grow in the love of God, for there are two virtues that hit him and weaken him more than any others—those two virtues are Humility and Charity. Hence Our Lord insists: “Learn of Me, because I am meek, and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29) and “thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Mark 12:30-31) and then, after God, “Love one another as I have loved you!” (John 13:34).
Pride Chokes Love
If we are not humble, then we are proud—and pride is an excessive love of self. If we love ourselves excessively, then we cannot love God totally, or with our “whole soul, whole mind, whole heart and whole strength!” Thus the importance of Humility—it is the foundation for Charity. Hence, St. John the Baptist says of Christ: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30). St. John the Baptist also stated: “A man cannot receive any thing, unless it be given him from Heaven!” (John 3:27), and Jesus confirms this, saying: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), while to Pontius Pilate, Jesus says: “Thou should not have any power against Me, unless it were given thee from above!” (John 19:11), while St. James reminds us that: “Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17), to which St. Paul adds: “For who distinguishes thee? Or what hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received it, why dost thou glory, as if thou had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7), which is why St. Paul goes on to say: “If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity!” (2 Corinthians 11:30)—for our weaknesses, sins and failings are entirely our own work and sufficient proof and reason enough for us to be greatly humbled.
Of course, we know all this in THEORY, but IN PRACTICE we ignore it! We pride ourselves on what we know, on what we can do, on what we have achieved, on what we have, on our intelligence, our experience, our strength, our beauty, our possessions, etc. All of this betrays a lack of a true love of God, because of the presence of the weeds of self-love that choke and prevent the tree of a love of God from growing within us. We have to weed-out that self-love, that pride (for that is what pride essentially is: self-love) so that we can grow in a love of God: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30), or He will only increase if I make myself decrease.
No Love or Charity Without Humility
In his excellent book on the spiritual life, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange speaks of Humility as being the foundation for Charity and all other virtues. This passage shows the tremendous battle that we must fight within our naturally proud nature in order to acquire Humility and thus prepare the way for Charity:
“Humility is considered in all Christian tradition as the foundation of the spiritual life, since it removes pride, which is, says Holy Scripture, the beginning of every sin because it separates us from God. Thus humility has often been compared to the excavation which must be dug for the erection of a building, an excavation which should be so much the deeper in proportion as the building is to be higher. From this point of view, as we have seen, the two principal pillars of the temple to be built are Faith and Hope, and its dome is Charity.
“The act proper to humility consists in bowing toward the earth, called ‘humus’ in Latin, from which the name of this virtue is derived. To speak without metaphor, its essential act consists in abasing ourselves before God and adore what is of God in every creature. To abase ourselves before the Most High is to recognize our inferiority, littleness, and indigence, even though we are innocent, and, once we have sinned, it consists in recognizing our wretchedness. Humility is based on truth, especially on the truth that there is an infinite distance between the Creator and the creature … and it is expressed in these words of the Savior: ‘Without Me―you can do nothing’ (John 15:5).
“From this principle spring four consequences:
“First of all, in relation to God the Creator, we should recognize that of ourselves we are nothing … We were created out of nothing by God, Who preserves us in existence, without Whom we would be immediately annihilated. We should recognize practically that without God, the Creator and Preserver of all things, we are nothing.
“Secondly, in regard to Providence, without God the supreme Ordainer, without His providence which directs all things, our life completely lacks direction. We should, therefore, humbly receive from Him the general direction and the particular direction that the Most High has chosen from all eternity for each one of us. Consequently we should humbly accept the place which God has willed from all eternity for each one of us. Christ in His sorrowful life humbly wished the last place, that in which Barabbas was preferred to Him, the opprobrium of the cross.
“Thirdly, in this special direction chosen by God for us, we cannot take the slightest step forward, or perform the least salutary and meritorious act, without the help of an actual grace. We need this grace particularly to persevere to the end and should, consequently, humbly ask for it.
Finally, while humility, which recognizes our indigence [poverty], should be found in all the just and should be in the innocent man―it is after we commit sin that we should recognize practically not only our indigence, but our wretchedness: the baseness of our selfish, narrow hearts, of our inconstant wills, of our vacillating, whimsical, ungovernable characters; the wretched weaknesses of our minds, guilty of unpardonable forgetfulness and contradictions that they could and should avoid; the wretchedness of pride, of concupiscence, which leads to indifference to the glory of God and the salvation of souls. This wretchedness is beneath nothingness itself, since it is a disorder, and it occasionally plunges our souls into a contemptible state of abjection.
“Practically, what must we do to reach the perfection of humility, without which we cannot have that of charity? Our attitude toward praise and reproach is of great importance. In regard to praise, we must not praise ourselves; by so doing we would soil ourselves, as the Italian proverb says: ‘Chi si loda, s’imbroda’ (‘He who praises himself befouls himself’). Men praise themselves when they think they are not sufficiently praised by others. Furthermore, we must not seek praise―should we do this, we would render ourselves ridiculous and lose the merit of our good acts. Lastly, we should not take pleasure in praise when it comes―to do so would be to lose, if not the merit of our good actions, at least the flower of merit.
“We must, however, mount still higher by acting as we should in regard to reproaches. We must patiently accept deserved reproaches, especially when they come from superiors who have the right and the duty to make them. If we pout, we lose the benefit of these just observations. It is also fitting that we accept patiently, at times, a reproach that is only slightly deserved or undeserved. Thus, while still a novice, St. Thomas was unjustly reproved for a so-called mistake in Latin while reading in the refectory. He corrected himself as he had been told to do. Later, at recreation, his brethren were astonished and said to him: ‘You were right! Why did you correct yourself?’ ‘It is better in the eyes of God,’ answered the saint, ‘to make a mistake in grammar than to fail in obedience and humility.’ Lastly, we would do well to ask for a love of contempt, keeping in mind the examples of the saints.
“When Our Lord asked St: John of the Cross: ‘What do you wish for a reward?’ the saint replied: ‘To be scorned and to suffer for love of Thee!’ His prayer was granted a few days later in the most painful manner; he was treated like an unworthy religious in a scarcely credible fashion. Likewise St. Francis of Assisi said to Brother Leo: ‘If, when we arrive this evening at the door of the convent, the brother porter [doorkeeper] does not wish to open the door for us, if he takes us for thieves and receives us with blows and leaves us outside all night in the rain and cold, then we must say: “Santa Letizia!”, that is, ‘What holy joy, O Lord, to suffer for Thee and to become a little like Thee!’ The saints reached even this height.
“St. Anselm admirably described the degrees of humility: ‘(1) to acknowledge ourselves contemptible; (2) to grieve on account of this; (3) to admit that we are so; (4) to wish our neighbor to believe it; (5) patiently to endure people’s saying it; (6) willingly to be treated as a person worthy of contempt; (7) to love to be treated in this fashion.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, On Humility).
Our Lord Wants Humility and Love
In that wonderful book, Words of Love by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Our Lord is quoted as saying to SR. JOSEFA MENENDEZ: “Yes, I love all souls, but with very special affection those who are the most weak and little! … Always remember that if I love you it is because you are little, not because you are good … Do not forget that it is your nothingness and littleness that act as magnets to attract Me to you … You must not be troubled, Josefa. I want you to be nothing, that I may be all … I want you to be very little and very humble, and always joyful … The more you disappear, the more shall I be your life … Do not worry, Josefa, about what you can and what you cannot do. You know very well that you can do nothing. But I am He who can and will do all ... Little still implies some being, but, Josefa, you are less than that, you are nothingness personified! … Let the sight of your nothingness never lessen your trust, but only confirm you in humility …
“Do you not know, Josefa, that the more wretched souls are, the more I love them? … Even your falls comfort Me! Do not be discouraged, for this act of humility, which your fault drew from you, has consoled Me more than if you had not fallen … A soul will profit even after the greatest sins, if she humbles herself … When you commit a fault, repair it at once. I wish your soul to be as pure as crystal. Do not let your falls, however many, trouble you. It is trouble and worry that keep a soul from God … That soul may and will fall often again, but if she humbles herself, if she recognizes her nothingness, if she tries to repair her faults by little acts of generosity and love, if she confides and surrenders herself once more to My Heart, she gives Me more glory and can do more good to other souls than if she had never fallen … He who never needs forgiveness is not the most happy, but rather he who has humbled himself many times … Miseries and weaknesses are of no consequence; what I do ask of them is love … I will raise up the humble, and make little of their frailties, and even of their falls, provided they have humility and love … It does not matter that it [your heart] is small! I will expand it, but let it be all Mine!” On one occasion the devil appeared to Sr. Josefa Menendez and screamed in admission: “There is no doubt about it―all those, who reach highest sanctity, have sunk deepest in humility!” (Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love).
To SR. CONSOLATE BETRONE, Our Lord says: “Poor Consolata, you have no virtue, you have no merits, you have nothing! You would have your sins, but they exist no more, for I have forgotten them for all eternity! ... You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! … I delight to work in a soul. You see, I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me … If a creature of good will desires to love Me and, to make of her life, one single act of love, from the moment of her rising until she falls asleep at night―from the heart, be it well understood—then I will perform incredible things for that soul. Write that down! Write ‘The Gentle Heart of Jesus’; for everyone knows that I am holy, but not all know that I am gentle! … Do not make Me out a God of rigor, whereas I am nothing but a God of love! … Love Me, and you will be happy; and the more you love Me, the happier you will be! Oh, if people would only love Me―what happiness would reign in this unhappy world! Love Me alone! I will attend to maintaining you in humility!” (Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love).
Then, what Our Lord says to SR. MARY OF THE TRINITY, reminds us the above words of St. John the Baptist concerning Christ: “He must increase and I must decrease!”―for to Sr. Mary of the Trinity He says: “Do you understand that you are nothing? Apart from Me you are nothing but rebellion, refusal, negation! … Yes, pride leads to a crashing fall, and humility leads to light and glory! … It is not sins that injure your purity, it is your pride, which, so often, does not wish to acknowledge those sins … With ruins, on ruins, I can build magnificently! It gives Me joy to use that which has humbled itself before Me! … It is with coal that I make diamonds! What would I not do with a soul―however black she might be―who would give herself to Me! … Leave all. Let there no longer be anything else in the world for you, but the love between you and Me! … I ask only for love. Ah! What are you doing about it?” (Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love).
What Are You Doing About It?
Holy Scripture tells us that we are a temple of God: “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Know you not, that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19).
Unfortunately, most Catholics are PAC Catholics―pick-and-choose Catholics. They pick-and-choose what they want to believe and do with regard to the Catholic Faith, and ignore or neglect the rest. Whether or not they know it, or admit it, or deny it―they have built of Catholic religion of their own choosing according to their personal preferences, likes and dislikes. Sadly, we have all constructed OUR OWN RELIGION to a certain extent and to such an extent, that it is hard for us to admit that we have built badly and that we must knock-down our badly built personal version of the Faith in order to rebuild the temple of our soul according to Christ’s specifications and style!
It is by our love of comfort and hatred for mortification, it is by our taste for the earthly and distaste for the heavenly, it is by our desire to play and not to pray, it is by our zeal to know about the things of the world and our sloth in learning much more about our Faith—through all these deviations, discrepancies and dysfunctions, we have modified the design of the Faith and the specifications given by Christ as to how the temple of our soul should be designed and built and used. We are living in a weak, wobbly and rickety self-made temple, built on the foundations of shifting sands, that only partially resembles God’s design and it is one that could fall down with the advent of any serious storm, tribulation or persecution. We are like the man who built his house on sand and not on rock:
“Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone, therefore, that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these My words, and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27).
We have altered the design of the temple of God that we are supposed to be—and God will not take kindly to those alterations in design! “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells within you? … Know you not, that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19) … “The temple of God is holy, which you are [or are you?] … If any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy!” (1 Corinthians 3:17). Already in Our Lord’s own day did He rebuke the misuse of the Temple of God, when He cast out the money-changers and merchants from the Temple in Jerusalem: “And Jesus went into the Temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves: and He said to them: ‘It is written, “My House shall be called the House of prayer” but you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Matthew 21:12-13).
We Destroy Our Charity By Our Pride
If we do not set a guard and seal our soul with Humility, then the traitorous weed of pride―that we have inherited through Original Sin―will secretly open the doors and windows of our soul to the pride of the devil and the pride of the world: “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16) and the originator of that worldly pride is the proud “prince of this world” (John 12:31), who cried out to God: “Non serviam!” “I will not serve!” ― “And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; and he was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him!” (Apocalypse 12:9).
The Destructive Tactics of Satan
There are the five chief areas of your life where Satan wants to enter and seduce you away from God and godliness:
(1) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Heart – So It Is Not God’s Alone
Holy Scripture warns us: “With all watchfulness keep thy heart!” (Proverbs 4:23) … “Be sober and watch! Because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). Satan knows he has an entry point into our life if God is not first in our hearts―“Seek ye first the Kingdom of God!” (Matthew 6:33), meaning the Kingdom of Heaven and no other kingdom, great or small. “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). God’s first commandment, set forth under the Old Covenant, was: “Thou shalt not have strange gods before Me!” (Exodus 20:3). And Jesus restated that in the New Testament when He was asked what is the greatest commandment and He responded by saying: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Luke 10:27).
Satan’s greatest desire is to prevent you from giving God all of your heart so he will constantly dangle people, things, and desires in front of you ― anything to distract you, so he can erect a false god or idol in front of you, that you don’t even realize you have―“for Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14) and will cloak evil with apparent good. He will try to lure you with a false god―like your career; a spouse or love interest; a dream or goal; a hobby or lifestyle; wealth or possessions, etc. For many modern men and women, their first love is their body, so they spend more time in the gym working-out; dieting (not fasting to beautify their souls for God, but fasting for themselves in order to lose weight and get a more beautiful body); buying clothing, cosmetics and other externals for the body, rather than letting God work within their soul. This love of self is a subtle way of starting to love other things more than God. Some of us love food, money, recreation, entertainment, sports, hobbies, our children, alcohol, a drug or substance, or a “feeling” (like being in love, or feeling energetic) more than God, Himself.
Guard your heart by keeping Christ on the throne of your heart and soul, so that Satan doesn’t try to sneak anything else in there. Satan cannot enter the soul—even in cases of possession—the body is the limit that God has set him. Yet someone outside your home, who cannot get into your house, can still communicate with you by shouting through the door, or making phone calls, or sending messages, e-mails or letters—and can thus influence you and your thoughts, emotions, and moods. Satan, likewise will use all the items of this world—which is his princedom—and will influence your family and friends, neighbors and work colleagues, to infiltrate and affect the way you think, speak and act. All these sources of communication Satan will use to distract you from God and attach you to lesser things.
(2) Satan Seeks to Cause Worries―To Make You Doubt God’s Love and Providence
Satan wants you worrying and stressing, because then you are failing to truest in God’s ability to care for you. Women tend to stress over temporal things ― bills that must be paid; the house that must be maintained; the well-being of the children; whether or not their husband still loves them, or prefers somebody else,; or, if single, whether a man will come into their lives; if they will be able to have a child,; or what someone is saying about them; how their body, face, hair looks; and so on. Men tend to stress about their jobs and money; about providing for their families; and whether or not they are “making the cut” in several areas of life; they worry superficially about their ‘image’ and how they come across; they are vain like women, but more subtly so—worrying about their appearance, their body, their attractiveness. Then there are combined worries for both men and women about their health; their wealth; their reputation; fears about our aging parents; family problems; social issues and other situations that can crowd out God’s peace in our lives and even cause us to begin to blame God for our circumstances.
Satan is a master at this game! St. Ignatius of Loyola, in his Spiritual Exercises, tells us that there are six chief ways in which Satan causes worries and stress. These are (1) False reasoning—whereby he makes us reason illogically and have unfounded fears; (2) Disturbance—interior of mind and emotions, or exterior by disturbing events; (3) Creating Obstacles—which he makes out to be insurmountable; (4) Sadness—whereby he drains us all joy in following a Christian life by making us feel as though we are missing out on a lot of fun; (5) Regret—whereby he makes us start to regret the fact that we are Christians and that it would be better not being a Christian; (6) Discouragement—which is his crowning trick or trump card, which takes away the courage that we need to persevere on the straight and narrow path to God.
Don’t let Satan in this door through his tantalizing “What if?” questions and the doubts he weaves through your mind. God instructs us to “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6-7). Keep praying about your concerns and keep thanking God ahead of time for what He’s about to do for you, so Satan doesn’t get a stranglehold and a stronghold in your mind through your worries and fears.
(3) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Everyday Thinking―So You Think Just Like the World
It’s amazing how many people profess to know God and follow Him, yet their thinking patterns are just like those of anyone else in the world. Satan loves that. He wants you to be so absorbed with the ways of the world that you are clueless about what God’s Word says. He will do this through the media—TV, internet, radio, movies; by subtle messages in the lyrics of songs; by commercials and advertisements; by statements and actions from your favorite celebrities or sports stars; by the opinions and words of advice from friends, neighbors and work colleagues. Scripture commands us: “Be not conformed to this world; but be reformed in the newness of your mind, that you may prove what is the good, and the acceptable, and the perfect will of God” (Romans 12:2). Furthermore, God’s Word warns that “the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke up the Word of God, and the person become fruitless” (Matthew 13:22).
That is why we are told: “The cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the Word of God, and the Word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit” (Mark 4:19; Luke 8:14). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). “Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?” (1 Corinthians 1:20). “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them! We are of God. He that knows God, hears us. He that is not of God, hears us not. By this we know the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error!” (1 John 4:5-6). But Satan would rather have us in mental anguish by listening to the world, rather than the word of God. Guard your everyday thinking by soaking it in Holy Scripture―which is the Word of God. It’s the only way to keep Satan and his worldly philosophies from entering in.
(4) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Speech – So You Tear Others Apart
God wants us to be holy mouthpieces for Him ― He wants us to be people who heal and help with our words: “Let the word of Christ dwell in you abundantly, in all wisdom: teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual canticles, singing in grace in your hearts to God” (Colossians 3:16). “Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth; but that which is good, to the edification of faith, that it may administer grace to the hearers” (Ephesians 4:29).”He that hears you, hears Me; and he that despises you, despises Me; and he that despises Me, despises Him that sent Me!” (Luke 10:16).
But Satan would rather have us “blowing it big time” with our mouths. A few critical words here, a few complaints there, some profanity mixed in with a little gossip on the side―and we enlisted in his army of those who have given him permission to train them into devilish people, who tear others apart, and sound no different (and sometimes worse) than unbelievers. Satan knows we can cause much damage with our mouths if we do not bring them under God’s control.
St. James warns us of this: “We all offend in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say, is perfect and able to keep their whole body in check. When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by Hell. All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be!” (James 3:2-10).
Whether it is gossip, lies, revealing the sins of others, criticism or unkind remarks―our mouths can be instruments of God or the devil. Close that door to Satan, altogether, by applying God’s instructions: “Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth―but only that which is good, to the edification of Faith” (Ephesians 4:29). And Scripture also tells us: “See that none render evil for evil to any man―but ever follow that which is good towards each other, and towards all men” (1 Thessalonians 5:15). “Put ye on therefore, as the elect of God, holy, and beloved, the bowels of mercy, benignity, humility, modesty, patience, bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another. Even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also. But above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:12-14). Be a verbally positive person, who speaks only to lift others up, not tear them down. That will diminish and destroy a critical and complaining spirit that gives Satan a stronghold in our lives.
(5) Satan Seeks to Enter Our Bodies―So They No Longer Glorify God
Why is it that when people get depressed they overeat or drink excessively or turn to alcohol or substances? Why is it that young boys and girls will cut their bodies, or starve themselves when they are dealing with emotional pain, or, worse still, commit suicide? Or look at the increasing numbers of people who have tattoos all over their bodies, or have pierced their bodies with all kinds of needles, rings, chains, etc. To a large degree this mutilation is down to the influence of Satan, who wants to turn us against our bodies, because they are meant to be—together with our souls—temples of God, and thus, if he can, Satan sees it as a way of “getting back at God.” Our bodies are precious to God. Scripture commands: “Therefore, I beseech you, brethren, by the mercy of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God” (Romans 12:1).
Satan knows that God considers our bodies as His temple and therefore God wants us to keep our bodies holy, healthy and honoring Him: “Know you not, that the members of your body are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own? For you are bought with a great price! Glorify and bear God in your body!” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). Scripture says that keeping our bodies holy is our spiritual act of worship (Romans 12:1). So, since our bodies are holy to God, Satan would love to have us harm them, mutilate them, deface them, starve them, and destroy them with substances, or destroy them altogether. Don’t let him in. Not in how you dress. Not in the jewelry, ornaments, trinkets or even more grotesque items you put on or pierce yourself with. Not in how you see yourself or carry yourself. Not in sensual body movements. Not in how you treat yourself. Ask God for the grace to treat your body holily and a desire to protect your body from all physical and moral evil, so you can serve Him on this Earth in the temple He has placed you in, for as long as possible.
So...What Will You Do? Will You Fight? Or Lay Down Your Arms?
So what is your strategy going to be, now that you know the chief areas where Satan wants to enter your life? God gives us a great defense through St. Paul’s instructions to the saints: “Be strengthened in the Lord, and in the might of His power. Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect! Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace! In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit (which is the word of God). By all prayer and supplication praying at all times in the spirit; and in the same watching with all instance and supplication for all the saints!” (Ephesians 6:10-18). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12).
As the start of Lent draws ever nearer, so too does the start of the fight draw ever nearer! Looking for a fight? You don’t have to go anywhere! There is battlefield right in the middle of your soul! Holy Scripture tells us: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and St. Paul tells us we must fight: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12), adding that this fight is not only against the devil―”Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12)—but that our fight is also against ourselves, as he himself experiences and testifies:
“For that which I do, I understand not. For I do not that good which I want to do; but the evil which I hate, that I do! … For a desire to want to do good, is present with me; but to accomplish that which is good, I find not. For the good which I want to do, I do not; but the evil which I do not want to do, that I do. Now, if I do that which I do not want to do not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find, then, a law, that when I have a desire to do good, evil is present with me. For I am delighted with the law of God, according to the inward [spiritual] man, but I see another law in my body, fighting against the law of my mind [soul], and captivating me in the law of sin, that is in my body [passions]. Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Romans 7:15-24).
The Traitors Within
Our Lord said: “The Kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21)—God lives in our soul by His sanctifying grace. The attacks of the devil and the world—directly and indirectly—seek to weaken and destroy this wall of sanctifying grace, battering against it with one temptation after another, all life long. Yet, in every war, there are traitors on each side. We have those traitors or betrayers within our own camp—it was Original Sin that made them traitors and now they rebel against our soul. Who are those rebels and traitors? They are our passions—or, as the Church calls them, our concupiscences, that is to say our passions and their instinctive pursuit of their own particular goals: comfort, ease, wealth, possessions, pleasure, power, fame, honor, advantage, etc., etc.
A Passionate Fight
Each passion has its in-built goal that it pursues blindly and recklessly. Our soul—with its powers of reasoning and will-power—is supposed to control and keep in check the blind and frenzied activities of the passions, but since Original Sin has wounded and weakened our soul, we now find that our minds tend towards ignorance and our wills are weak. The only thing that can come to the aid of the ignorant mind and the weak will is the grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the grace of God—and it is this that St. Paul says, after painting the woeful state of his interior battles within and between his body and his soul: “Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God, by Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:24-25).
Only Love Can Bring Victory
In the Epistle from the upcoming Mass of Quinquagesima Sunday—an Epistle that we can call “A Letter of Love”—God points out to us that the only thing that can bring victory and success is Charity (a.k.a. Love of God). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing! … Charity never falls away―whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed … And now there remain Faith, Hope, and Charity, these three―but the greatest of these is Charity!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3, 13).
The War Against Your Charity
Holy Scripture tells us that God is love: “God is charity: and he that abides in Charity, abides in God, and God in him … He that loveth not, knows not God―for God is Charity!” (1 John 4:8; 4:16). Our Lord—Who is the Incarnate Charity of God, or the Love of God in human form—tells us: “A new commandment I give unto you: ‘That you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another!’ By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another … This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you. Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends!” (John 13:34-35; 15:12).
Holy Scripture develops or describes this Charity, by which we love our neighbor because of our love for God (which is the only true way to love our neighbor—for the sake of God and not for any personal profit, advantage or benefit): “Charity is patient; is kind; charity envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious, seeks not her own [advantage]; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things!” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7).
Satan and all devils—being opposed to the one true God—are opposed to true Charity. The devils are hatred personified and Hell is a place of universal hatred, just as Heaven is a place of universal love—in Hell each devil and each damned soul hates everyone else in Hell, even those whom they once loved on Earth, whereas, in Heaven, each saved soul loves everyone else in Heaven, even those whom they have at one time hated here on Earth, or those who have them great harm.
A Hatred of Love and a Love of Hatred
The devil hates Charity and he despises to see Charity in a soul and Charity growing in a soul. Thus, he will pull all the strings he can to destroy Charity in such a soul, or at least to slow down or stop any further growth of that heavenly virtue in a soul. Thus he will have you do anything that is good and holy―if that thing will not directly make you grow in Charity. If the devil sees you contemplating to do something that will make you grow in Charity, then he will suggest that you do some other good action that is “less-loaded” with Charity—for him it is a case of “the lesser of two ‘evils.’” He knows that it is not what we do that matters, but the love of God that we do it with—thus he seeks to destroy, debilitate, deform, demean or damage any and all trace of true supernatural Charity in the soul, and he will gladly con you, make you “buy into” and sell you a fake naturalistic, philanthropic, humanized, inferior version of Charity to replace that precious soul-saving version.
The devil hates to see God loved and he hates to see us grow in the love of God, for there are two virtues that hit him and weaken him more than any others—those two virtues are Humility and Charity. Hence Our Lord insists: “Learn of Me, because I am meek, and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29) and “thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these!” (Mark 12:30-31) and then, after God, “Love one another as I have loved you!” (John 13:34).
Pride Chokes Love
If we are not humble, then we are proud—and pride is an excessive love of self. If we love ourselves excessively, then we cannot love God totally, or with our “whole soul, whole mind, whole heart and whole strength!” Thus the importance of Humility—it is the foundation for Charity. Hence, St. John the Baptist says of Christ: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30). St. John the Baptist also stated: “A man cannot receive any thing, unless it be given him from Heaven!” (John 3:27), and Jesus confirms this, saying: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), while to Pontius Pilate, Jesus says: “Thou should not have any power against Me, unless it were given thee from above!” (John 19:11), while St. James reminds us that: “Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17), to which St. Paul adds: “For who distinguishes thee? Or what hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received it, why dost thou glory, as if thou had not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7), which is why St. Paul goes on to say: “If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity!” (2 Corinthians 11:30)—for our weaknesses, sins and failings are entirely our own work and sufficient proof and reason enough for us to be greatly humbled.
Of course, we know all this in THEORY, but IN PRACTICE we ignore it! We pride ourselves on what we know, on what we can do, on what we have achieved, on what we have, on our intelligence, our experience, our strength, our beauty, our possessions, etc. All of this betrays a lack of a true love of God, because of the presence of the weeds of self-love that choke and prevent the tree of a love of God from growing within us. We have to weed-out that self-love, that pride (for that is what pride essentially is: self-love) so that we can grow in a love of God: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30), or He will only increase if I make myself decrease.
No Love or Charity Without Humility
In his excellent book on the spiritual life, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange speaks of Humility as being the foundation for Charity and all other virtues. This passage shows the tremendous battle that we must fight within our naturally proud nature in order to acquire Humility and thus prepare the way for Charity:
“Humility is considered in all Christian tradition as the foundation of the spiritual life, since it removes pride, which is, says Holy Scripture, the beginning of every sin because it separates us from God. Thus humility has often been compared to the excavation which must be dug for the erection of a building, an excavation which should be so much the deeper in proportion as the building is to be higher. From this point of view, as we have seen, the two principal pillars of the temple to be built are Faith and Hope, and its dome is Charity.
“The act proper to humility consists in bowing toward the earth, called ‘humus’ in Latin, from which the name of this virtue is derived. To speak without metaphor, its essential act consists in abasing ourselves before God and adore what is of God in every creature. To abase ourselves before the Most High is to recognize our inferiority, littleness, and indigence, even though we are innocent, and, once we have sinned, it consists in recognizing our wretchedness. Humility is based on truth, especially on the truth that there is an infinite distance between the Creator and the creature … and it is expressed in these words of the Savior: ‘Without Me―you can do nothing’ (John 15:5).
“From this principle spring four consequences:
“First of all, in relation to God the Creator, we should recognize that of ourselves we are nothing … We were created out of nothing by God, Who preserves us in existence, without Whom we would be immediately annihilated. We should recognize practically that without God, the Creator and Preserver of all things, we are nothing.
“Secondly, in regard to Providence, without God the supreme Ordainer, without His providence which directs all things, our life completely lacks direction. We should, therefore, humbly receive from Him the general direction and the particular direction that the Most High has chosen from all eternity for each one of us. Consequently we should humbly accept the place which God has willed from all eternity for each one of us. Christ in His sorrowful life humbly wished the last place, that in which Barabbas was preferred to Him, the opprobrium of the cross.
“Thirdly, in this special direction chosen by God for us, we cannot take the slightest step forward, or perform the least salutary and meritorious act, without the help of an actual grace. We need this grace particularly to persevere to the end and should, consequently, humbly ask for it.
Finally, while humility, which recognizes our indigence [poverty], should be found in all the just and should be in the innocent man―it is after we commit sin that we should recognize practically not only our indigence, but our wretchedness: the baseness of our selfish, narrow hearts, of our inconstant wills, of our vacillating, whimsical, ungovernable characters; the wretched weaknesses of our minds, guilty of unpardonable forgetfulness and contradictions that they could and should avoid; the wretchedness of pride, of concupiscence, which leads to indifference to the glory of God and the salvation of souls. This wretchedness is beneath nothingness itself, since it is a disorder, and it occasionally plunges our souls into a contemptible state of abjection.
“Practically, what must we do to reach the perfection of humility, without which we cannot have that of charity? Our attitude toward praise and reproach is of great importance. In regard to praise, we must not praise ourselves; by so doing we would soil ourselves, as the Italian proverb says: ‘Chi si loda, s’imbroda’ (‘He who praises himself befouls himself’). Men praise themselves when they think they are not sufficiently praised by others. Furthermore, we must not seek praise―should we do this, we would render ourselves ridiculous and lose the merit of our good acts. Lastly, we should not take pleasure in praise when it comes―to do so would be to lose, if not the merit of our good actions, at least the flower of merit.
“We must, however, mount still higher by acting as we should in regard to reproaches. We must patiently accept deserved reproaches, especially when they come from superiors who have the right and the duty to make them. If we pout, we lose the benefit of these just observations. It is also fitting that we accept patiently, at times, a reproach that is only slightly deserved or undeserved. Thus, while still a novice, St. Thomas was unjustly reproved for a so-called mistake in Latin while reading in the refectory. He corrected himself as he had been told to do. Later, at recreation, his brethren were astonished and said to him: ‘You were right! Why did you correct yourself?’ ‘It is better in the eyes of God,’ answered the saint, ‘to make a mistake in grammar than to fail in obedience and humility.’ Lastly, we would do well to ask for a love of contempt, keeping in mind the examples of the saints.
“When Our Lord asked St: John of the Cross: ‘What do you wish for a reward?’ the saint replied: ‘To be scorned and to suffer for love of Thee!’ His prayer was granted a few days later in the most painful manner; he was treated like an unworthy religious in a scarcely credible fashion. Likewise St. Francis of Assisi said to Brother Leo: ‘If, when we arrive this evening at the door of the convent, the brother porter [doorkeeper] does not wish to open the door for us, if he takes us for thieves and receives us with blows and leaves us outside all night in the rain and cold, then we must say: “Santa Letizia!”, that is, ‘What holy joy, O Lord, to suffer for Thee and to become a little like Thee!’ The saints reached even this height.
“St. Anselm admirably described the degrees of humility: ‘(1) to acknowledge ourselves contemptible; (2) to grieve on account of this; (3) to admit that we are so; (4) to wish our neighbor to believe it; (5) patiently to endure people’s saying it; (6) willingly to be treated as a person worthy of contempt; (7) to love to be treated in this fashion.’” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, On Humility).
Our Lord Wants Humility and Love
In that wonderful book, Words of Love by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Our Lord is quoted as saying to SR. JOSEFA MENENDEZ: “Yes, I love all souls, but with very special affection those who are the most weak and little! … Always remember that if I love you it is because you are little, not because you are good … Do not forget that it is your nothingness and littleness that act as magnets to attract Me to you … You must not be troubled, Josefa. I want you to be nothing, that I may be all … I want you to be very little and very humble, and always joyful … The more you disappear, the more shall I be your life … Do not worry, Josefa, about what you can and what you cannot do. You know very well that you can do nothing. But I am He who can and will do all ... Little still implies some being, but, Josefa, you are less than that, you are nothingness personified! … Let the sight of your nothingness never lessen your trust, but only confirm you in humility …
“Do you not know, Josefa, that the more wretched souls are, the more I love them? … Even your falls comfort Me! Do not be discouraged, for this act of humility, which your fault drew from you, has consoled Me more than if you had not fallen … A soul will profit even after the greatest sins, if she humbles herself … When you commit a fault, repair it at once. I wish your soul to be as pure as crystal. Do not let your falls, however many, trouble you. It is trouble and worry that keep a soul from God … That soul may and will fall often again, but if she humbles herself, if she recognizes her nothingness, if she tries to repair her faults by little acts of generosity and love, if she confides and surrenders herself once more to My Heart, she gives Me more glory and can do more good to other souls than if she had never fallen … He who never needs forgiveness is not the most happy, but rather he who has humbled himself many times … Miseries and weaknesses are of no consequence; what I do ask of them is love … I will raise up the humble, and make little of their frailties, and even of their falls, provided they have humility and love … It does not matter that it [your heart] is small! I will expand it, but let it be all Mine!” On one occasion the devil appeared to Sr. Josefa Menendez and screamed in admission: “There is no doubt about it―all those, who reach highest sanctity, have sunk deepest in humility!” (Fr. Robert Gottemoller, Words of Love).
To SR. CONSOLATE BETRONE, Our Lord says: “Poor Consolata, you have no virtue, you have no merits, you have nothing! You would have your sins, but they exist no more, for I have forgotten them for all eternity! ... You must think only of loving Me! I will think of everything else, even to the smallest details! … I delight to work in a soul. You see, I love to do everything Myself; and from this soul I ask only that she love Me … If a creature of good will desires to love Me and, to make of her life, one single act of love, from the moment of her rising until she falls asleep at night―from the heart, be it well understood—then I will perform incredible things for that soul. Write that down! Write ‘The Gentle Heart of Jesus’; for everyone knows that I am holy, but not all know that I am gentle! … Do not make Me out a God of rigor, whereas I am nothing but a God of love! … Love Me, and you will be happy; and the more you love Me, the happier you will be! Oh, if people would only love Me―what happiness would reign in this unhappy world! Love Me alone! I will attend to maintaining you in humility!” (Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love).
Then, what Our Lord says to SR. MARY OF THE TRINITY, reminds us the above words of St. John the Baptist concerning Christ: “He must increase and I must decrease!”―for to Sr. Mary of the Trinity He says: “Do you understand that you are nothing? Apart from Me you are nothing but rebellion, refusal, negation! … Yes, pride leads to a crashing fall, and humility leads to light and glory! … It is not sins that injure your purity, it is your pride, which, so often, does not wish to acknowledge those sins … With ruins, on ruins, I can build magnificently! It gives Me joy to use that which has humbled itself before Me! … It is with coal that I make diamonds! What would I not do with a soul―however black she might be―who would give herself to Me! … Leave all. Let there no longer be anything else in the world for you, but the love between you and Me! … I ask only for love. Ah! What are you doing about it?” (Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, Words of Love).
What Are You Doing About It?
Holy Scripture tells us that we are a temple of God: “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Know you not, that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19).
Unfortunately, most Catholics are PAC Catholics―pick-and-choose Catholics. They pick-and-choose what they want to believe and do with regard to the Catholic Faith, and ignore or neglect the rest. Whether or not they know it, or admit it, or deny it―they have built of Catholic religion of their own choosing according to their personal preferences, likes and dislikes. Sadly, we have all constructed OUR OWN RELIGION to a certain extent and to such an extent, that it is hard for us to admit that we have built badly and that we must knock-down our badly built personal version of the Faith in order to rebuild the temple of our soul according to Christ’s specifications and style!
It is by our love of comfort and hatred for mortification, it is by our taste for the earthly and distaste for the heavenly, it is by our desire to play and not to pray, it is by our zeal to know about the things of the world and our sloth in learning much more about our Faith—through all these deviations, discrepancies and dysfunctions, we have modified the design of the Faith and the specifications given by Christ as to how the temple of our soul should be designed and built and used. We are living in a weak, wobbly and rickety self-made temple, built on the foundations of shifting sands, that only partially resembles God’s design and it is one that could fall down with the advent of any serious storm, tribulation or persecution. We are like the man who built his house on sand and not on rock:
“Not everyone that says to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone, therefore, that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these My words, and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house―and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:21-27).
We have altered the design of the temple of God that we are supposed to be—and God will not take kindly to those alterations in design! “Know you not, that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells within you? … Know you not, that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own?” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19) … “The temple of God is holy, which you are [or are you?] … If any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy!” (1 Corinthians 3:17). Already in Our Lord’s own day did He rebuke the misuse of the Temple of God, when He cast out the money-changers and merchants from the Temple in Jerusalem: “And Jesus went into the Temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves: and He said to them: ‘It is written, “My House shall be called the House of prayer” but you have made it a den of thieves!’” (Matthew 21:12-13).
We Destroy Our Charity By Our Pride
If we do not set a guard and seal our soul with Humility, then the traitorous weed of pride―that we have inherited through Original Sin―will secretly open the doors and windows of our soul to the pride of the devil and the pride of the world: “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16) and the originator of that worldly pride is the proud “prince of this world” (John 12:31), who cried out to God: “Non serviam!” “I will not serve!” ― “And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; and he was cast unto the Earth, and his angels were thrown down with him!” (Apocalypse 12:9).
The Destructive Tactics of Satan
There are the five chief areas of your life where Satan wants to enter and seduce you away from God and godliness:
(1) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Heart – So It Is Not God’s Alone
Holy Scripture warns us: “With all watchfulness keep thy heart!” (Proverbs 4:23) … “Be sober and watch! Because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). Satan knows he has an entry point into our life if God is not first in our hearts―“Seek ye first the Kingdom of God!” (Matthew 6:33), meaning the Kingdom of Heaven and no other kingdom, great or small. “For what shall it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). God’s first commandment, set forth under the Old Covenant, was: “Thou shalt not have strange gods before Me!” (Exodus 20:3). And Jesus restated that in the New Testament when He was asked what is the greatest commandment and He responded by saying: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment!” (Luke 10:27).
Satan’s greatest desire is to prevent you from giving God all of your heart so he will constantly dangle people, things, and desires in front of you ― anything to distract you, so he can erect a false god or idol in front of you, that you don’t even realize you have―“for Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14) and will cloak evil with apparent good. He will try to lure you with a false god―like your career; a spouse or love interest; a dream or goal; a hobby or lifestyle; wealth or possessions, etc. For many modern men and women, their first love is their body, so they spend more time in the gym working-out; dieting (not fasting to beautify their souls for God, but fasting for themselves in order to lose weight and get a more beautiful body); buying clothing, cosmetics and other externals for the body, rather than letting God work within their soul. This love of self is a subtle way of starting to love other things more than God. Some of us love food, money, recreation, entertainment, sports, hobbies, our children, alcohol, a drug or substance, or a “feeling” (like being in love, or feeling energetic) more than God, Himself.
Guard your heart by keeping Christ on the throne of your heart and soul, so that Satan doesn’t try to sneak anything else in there. Satan cannot enter the soul—even in cases of possession—the body is the limit that God has set him. Yet someone outside your home, who cannot get into your house, can still communicate with you by shouting through the door, or making phone calls, or sending messages, e-mails or letters—and can thus influence you and your thoughts, emotions, and moods. Satan, likewise will use all the items of this world—which is his princedom—and will influence your family and friends, neighbors and work colleagues, to infiltrate and affect the way you think, speak and act. All these sources of communication Satan will use to distract you from God and attach you to lesser things.
(2) Satan Seeks to Cause Worries―To Make You Doubt God’s Love and Providence
Satan wants you worrying and stressing, because then you are failing to truest in God’s ability to care for you. Women tend to stress over temporal things ― bills that must be paid; the house that must be maintained; the well-being of the children; whether or not their husband still loves them, or prefers somebody else,; or, if single, whether a man will come into their lives; if they will be able to have a child,; or what someone is saying about them; how their body, face, hair looks; and so on. Men tend to stress about their jobs and money; about providing for their families; and whether or not they are “making the cut” in several areas of life; they worry superficially about their ‘image’ and how they come across; they are vain like women, but more subtly so—worrying about their appearance, their body, their attractiveness. Then there are combined worries for both men and women about their health; their wealth; their reputation; fears about our aging parents; family problems; social issues and other situations that can crowd out God’s peace in our lives and even cause us to begin to blame God for our circumstances.
Satan is a master at this game! St. Ignatius of Loyola, in his Spiritual Exercises, tells us that there are six chief ways in which Satan causes worries and stress. These are (1) False reasoning—whereby he makes us reason illogically and have unfounded fears; (2) Disturbance—interior of mind and emotions, or exterior by disturbing events; (3) Creating Obstacles—which he makes out to be insurmountable; (4) Sadness—whereby he drains us all joy in following a Christian life by making us feel as though we are missing out on a lot of fun; (5) Regret—whereby he makes us start to regret the fact that we are Christians and that it would be better not being a Christian; (6) Discouragement—which is his crowning trick or trump card, which takes away the courage that we need to persevere on the straight and narrow path to God.
Don’t let Satan in this door through his tantalizing “What if?” questions and the doubts he weaves through your mind. God instructs us to “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6-7). Keep praying about your concerns and keep thanking God ahead of time for what He’s about to do for you, so Satan doesn’t get a stranglehold and a stronghold in your mind through your worries and fears.
(3) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Everyday Thinking―So You Think Just Like the World
It’s amazing how many people profess to know God and follow Him, yet their thinking patterns are just like those of anyone else in the world. Satan loves that. He wants you to be so absorbed with the ways of the world that you are clueless about what God’s Word says. He will do this through the media—TV, internet, radio, movies; by subtle messages in the lyrics of songs; by commercials and advertisements; by statements and actions from your favorite celebrities or sports stars; by the opinions and words of advice from friends, neighbors and work colleagues. Scripture commands us: “Be not conformed to this world; but be reformed in the newness of your mind, that you may prove what is the good, and the acceptable, and the perfect will of God” (Romans 12:2). Furthermore, God’s Word warns that “the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke up the Word of God, and the person become fruitless” (Matthew 13:22).
That is why we are told: “The cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the Word of God, and the Word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit” (Mark 4:19; Luke 8:14). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). “Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?” (1 Corinthians 1:20). “They are of the world―therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them! We are of God. He that knows God, hears us. He that is not of God, hears us not. By this we know the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error!” (1 John 4:5-6). But Satan would rather have us in mental anguish by listening to the world, rather than the word of God. Guard your everyday thinking by soaking it in Holy Scripture―which is the Word of God. It’s the only way to keep Satan and his worldly philosophies from entering in.
(4) Satan Seeks to Enter Your Speech – So You Tear Others Apart
God wants us to be holy mouthpieces for Him ― He wants us to be people who heal and help with our words: “Let the word of Christ dwell in you abundantly, in all wisdom: teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual canticles, singing in grace in your hearts to God” (Colossians 3:16). “Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth; but that which is good, to the edification of faith, that it may administer grace to the hearers” (Ephesians 4:29).”He that hears you, hears Me; and he that despises you, despises Me; and he that despises Me, despises Him that sent Me!” (Luke 10:16).
But Satan would rather have us “blowing it big time” with our mouths. A few critical words here, a few complaints there, some profanity mixed in with a little gossip on the side―and we enlisted in his army of those who have given him permission to train them into devilish people, who tear others apart, and sound no different (and sometimes worse) than unbelievers. Satan knows we can cause much damage with our mouths if we do not bring them under God’s control.
St. James warns us of this: “We all offend in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say, is perfect and able to keep their whole body in check. When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by Hell. All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be!” (James 3:2-10).
Whether it is gossip, lies, revealing the sins of others, criticism or unkind remarks―our mouths can be instruments of God or the devil. Close that door to Satan, altogether, by applying God’s instructions: “Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth―but only that which is good, to the edification of Faith” (Ephesians 4:29). And Scripture also tells us: “See that none render evil for evil to any man―but ever follow that which is good towards each other, and towards all men” (1 Thessalonians 5:15). “Put ye on therefore, as the elect of God, holy, and beloved, the bowels of mercy, benignity, humility, modesty, patience, bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another. Even as the Lord has forgiven you, so do you also. But above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection!” (Colossians 3:12-14). Be a verbally positive person, who speaks only to lift others up, not tear them down. That will diminish and destroy a critical and complaining spirit that gives Satan a stronghold in our lives.
(5) Satan Seeks to Enter Our Bodies―So They No Longer Glorify God
Why is it that when people get depressed they overeat or drink excessively or turn to alcohol or substances? Why is it that young boys and girls will cut their bodies, or starve themselves when they are dealing with emotional pain, or, worse still, commit suicide? Or look at the increasing numbers of people who have tattoos all over their bodies, or have pierced their bodies with all kinds of needles, rings, chains, etc. To a large degree this mutilation is down to the influence of Satan, who wants to turn us against our bodies, because they are meant to be—together with our souls—temples of God, and thus, if he can, Satan sees it as a way of “getting back at God.” Our bodies are precious to God. Scripture commands: “Therefore, I beseech you, brethren, by the mercy of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God” (Romans 12:1).
Satan knows that God considers our bodies as His temple and therefore God wants us to keep our bodies holy, healthy and honoring Him: “Know you not, that the members of your body are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and you are not your own? For you are bought with a great price! Glorify and bear God in your body!” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). Scripture says that keeping our bodies holy is our spiritual act of worship (Romans 12:1). So, since our bodies are holy to God, Satan would love to have us harm them, mutilate them, deface them, starve them, and destroy them with substances, or destroy them altogether. Don’t let him in. Not in how you dress. Not in the jewelry, ornaments, trinkets or even more grotesque items you put on or pierce yourself with. Not in how you see yourself or carry yourself. Not in sensual body movements. Not in how you treat yourself. Ask God for the grace to treat your body holily and a desire to protect your body from all physical and moral evil, so you can serve Him on this Earth in the temple He has placed you in, for as long as possible.
So...What Will You Do? Will You Fight? Or Lay Down Your Arms?
So what is your strategy going to be, now that you know the chief areas where Satan wants to enter your life? God gives us a great defense through St. Paul’s instructions to the saints: “Be strengthened in the Lord, and in the might of His power. Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood―but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect! Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace! In all things taking the shield of Faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit (which is the word of God). By all prayer and supplication praying at all times in the spirit; and in the same watching with all instance and supplication for all the saints!” (Ephesians 6:10-18). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12).
Article 13
Friday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 9th
Lost For Words!
Friday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 9th
Lost For Words!
Loss of Words
The Gospel of Sexagesima Sunday spoke of “sowing the seed” whereby the “seed” symbolizes or represents the “word of God”. The “seed” is withering just as intelligence is withering. In 1990, Harper's Index noted the rather astounding fact that, over the previous fifty years, the vocabulary of the average American student had declined from 25,000 words to 10,000.
In December, 2012, the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) found that the diction of American students is not nearly as good as it should be. A report from DOE’s National Center for Education Statistics found that vocabulary skills are tied closely to reading level, and that both must start being developed from a young age in order to progress properly.
In a later report, in October of 2013, it was shown that the United States ranks lower than other developed countries in many key skills in Math, Vocabulary, and Technology.
In Washington, in September of 2016, an alarming report was published by the National Center for Education Research, the majority of American students do not possess the language skills and vocabulary necessary to belittle their classmates in an effective manner. The report―based on observations of more than 500,000 students around the country from kindergarten through 12th grade―concludes that while most can easily perceive weakness and vulnerability in their fellow schoolchildren, their rudimentary linguistic capabilities routinely prevent them from mocking the appearance, personality, or athletic ability of others in such a way that those individuals are reduced to tears and suffer chronically low self-esteem.
“Unfortunately, most of our students are finishing high school with only a fifth-grade ability to shame and deride their peers,” said report co-author and educational psychologist Joyce Marrone, observing that most graduates cannot string together two sentences about a classmate’s lisp or general weirdness with enough proficiency to completely devastate them. “While they know how to identify a loser, they lack the semantic tools to articulate exactly why that person is so lame, ugly, or stupid.” Now doing such a thing is obviously and blatantly uncharitable―but it goes to show that even in uncharitableness (which is the predominant attitude of the world today) vocabulary is greatly lacking (and that is putting it charitably!).
The Words of the Rich and the Poor
The results are also vexing because early vocabulary skills have long been a divider between rich and poor kids before they even step foot in the classroom: a seminal study in 1995 found that children whose families were on welfare heard on average 616 words per hour, while children from wealthier families heard 2,153 words per hour.
Dummies of the Faith
You could say the same thing about the Faith—knowledge of the Faith is closely linked to a reading level. If we never challenge ourselves by delving deeper into the Faith by reading books that give a deeper and broader exposition of the Faith, then we shall end up being “Faith-challenged” or, to put it more bluntly, “Dummies in the Faith”! We shall end up being “at a loss for words” when it comes to discussing, promoting or defending our Faith—which is the case for most Catholics, for they have even forgotten much of their First Holy Communion Catechism or their Confirmation Catechism, which they learnt only to pass a test and then filed it away in the trash cans of their memories. Most Catholics today could correctly recall all of the Ten Commandments, nor the Six Chief Commandments of the Church, nor the five conditions required for a good confession, nor name how many conditions must be present for a mortal sin, and a host of similar questions asked to the 7 or 8 year old children preparing for their First Communion. All that is just “Kiddie-Catechism”—yet most adults do not even have a “Kiddie-Knowledge” of the Faith—and we are not kidding!
Already 20 years ago, a Catholic college professor lamented: “Perhaps the religious illiteracy of so many otherwise well-educated young Catholics is too familiar to bear mentioning again. One has come to expect that even at elite Catholic colleges and universities, entering students will not know what is meant by the “Immaculate Conception”―hardly anyone knows that anymore. No surprise, either, when students do not know the proper number of natures and persons in Christ, Mary, and the Trinity―what’s an extra nature or two here or there? Besides, who’s counting? It’s not a chemical formula and it doesn’t take rocket science to believe God loves me anyway. As for ignorance of more technical terms, for example, confusing the Greek word for the relationship between Jesus and God the Father―“homoousios” meaning “of the same substance”―with a Near Eastern dish made of chickpeas (a good guess, I suppose), or conflating the temperature at which paper burns (451 degrees Fahrenheit) with the date of the Church Council of Chalcedon in 451 AD―who can worry? Still, when more than a third of the students have to guess how many Gospels are in the Bible, or think that the phrase “original sin” refers to sex; when more than half have no idea what is meant by “Incarnation” unless it has the prefix re-; when only ten out of a class of fifty know what “Exodus” refers to, or what is meant by the phrase “Real Presence,” and only a slightly higher percentage can give a credible definition of “Sacrament”; when one student can convince a large group of classmates that “Catholic Social Teaching” refers to restrictions on same-sex marriage―we can perhaps bear to mention the problem of religious ignorance yet again.”
The Words of the “Faith Rich” and “Faith Poor”
Furthermore, there is also a “rich” and “poor” divide or chasm in matters of not only vocabulary, but also Faith. There are families “rich” in the Faith, who speak about and discuss the Faith often, and there are families that are “poor” in the Faith, who speak about or discuss the Faith only rarely, or never at all. In families who are “rich in the Faith” a child will hear “thousands” of words on the Faith spoken daily, while in families who are “poor in the Faith” a child will hear only a few Faith related words spoken daily.
Pope’s Guide On Dummies
Pope St. Pius X is of the same opinion: “We are forced to agree with those who hold that the chief cause of the present indifference and, as it were, infirmity of soul, and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of things divine. This is fully in accord with what God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘And there is no knowledge of God in the land. Cursing and lying and killing and theft and adultery have overflowed: and blood hath touched blood. Thereafter shall the land mourn, and everyone that dwells in it shall languish.’ It is a common complaint, unfortunately too well founded, that there are large numbers of Christians in our own time who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation.
“And when we mention Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life ― for these find some excuse for their ignorance in the fact that the demands of their harsh employers hardly leave them time to take care of themselves or of their dear ones — but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there. They rarely give thought to God, or to the teachings of the Faith of Christ. They know nothing of … Grace, the greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things, the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments, are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it.
“And so they arrive at life’s end in such a condition … And so Our Predecessor, Benedict XIV, had just cause to write: ‘We declare that a great number of those, who are condemned to eternal punishment, suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of Faith which must be known and believed, in order to be numbered among the elect.’”
Does a Loss of Words Lead to a Loss of Souls?
To have a decent chance of survival in this life and in this world, you need you know how to speak and how to write. You need to know your local language where you wish and hope to live and survive. You need to be able to “read the word”, “understand the word” and “speak the word”. Words are important! Our very life depends upon them! Misunderstandings can lead to death. Refusal to communicate the word can lead to death. Lack of understanding what is said to you can lead to death!
If you cannot read the words of warning on a bottle of liquid that tells you it is poisonous—then you could die. If you cannot understand or do not bother to read the words: “Shark infested beach” before going to swim in the sea, then you are risking your life. If you cannot understand the words—“Toxic chemicals”—when handling a substance, then you are risking your health or even your life. The examples are endless. The truth is obvious. Words are important and sometimes life-saving. The same is true of the Word of God. “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4).
The “Word” of All Words—Jesus Christ the Word of God!
The “Word of all words”—so to speak—is Jesus Christ. That is what Holy Scripture tells us: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him: and without Him was made nothing that was made … And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us … full of grace and truth … In Him was life, and the life was the light of men ... The true light, which enlightens every man that cometh into this world … And the light shone in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. But as many as received Him, He gave them power to be made the sons of God, to them that believe in His Name” (John 1:1-14).
A parallel passage to the above, that is closely linked to it, is found in the Book of Apocalypse, which also speaks of Christ being the “Word of God”. The above passage (John 1:1-14) refers to Christ as the “Word of God” in His “First Coming” which was in His birth at Bethlehem and His successive short life on Earth. The Book of the Apocalypse refers to Christ as the “Word of God” in His “Second Coming” at towards the end of time:
“And I saw Heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and He that sat upon it was called ‘faithful’ and ‘true’, and with justice does He judge and fight. And His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on His head were many diadems, and He had a Name written, which no man knows but Himself. And He was clothed with a garment sprinkled with blood; and His name is called, “THE WORD OF GOD”. And the armies that are in Heaven followed Him on white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean. And out of His mouth proceeds a sharp two-edged sword; that with it He may strike the nations. And He shall rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the winepress of the fierceness of the wrath of God the Almighty. And He has on His garment, and on His thigh written: ‘KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS’” (Apocalypse 19:11-6).
Why is Christ Called “The Word of God”?
We get to know things—we learn—through words. Parents and teachers use words to explain things to their children and students. In the Old Testament we read of God saying: “My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9).
We could say that Our Lord is personification and verbalization of the thoughts of God. He has come to teach us what His Father, God the Father, wants to be taught―as Jesus Himself says: “The Word which you have heard, is not Mine; but the Father’s, Who sent Me!” (John 14:15-24). “I came down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me … And this is the will of My Father that sent Me―that everyone who sees the Son, and believes in Him, may have life everlasting, and I will raise him up in the last day” (John 6:38-40).
Jesus is the personification of wisdom, He is the wisdom incarnate, He is the wisdom of the thought of God made incarnate as a man, to speak the thoughts of God His Father to us―as is described in the Book of Proverbs, in chapters 5 to 8. That section begins by saying: “My son, attend to My wisdom, and incline thy ear to My prudence! That thou mayest keep My thoughts, and thy lips may preserve My instruction!” (Proverbs 5:1-2).
This “Word”, this “Wisdom”, is God’s communication to humanity. Christ is the communication of God to humanity. He revealed to the world the Word of God. Jesus was the personification of the written and spoken Word. In the Old Testament God revealed His word through the mere mortals, the prophets, while in the New Testament the word of God the Father was revealed in a Person, a Divine Person―God the Son. “God sent the Word to the children of Israel, by Jesus Christ” (Acts 10:36).
The Power of “The Word of God”
In the Old Testament, the Word carries the idea of active power. God ‘spoke’ the universe into being. In the first chapter of the Book of Genesis—the very first chapter of the whole Bible—we read of God ‘speaking’ all things into existence:
“And God said: ‘Be light made!’ And light was made … And God said: ‘Let there be a firmament made amidst the waters: and let it divide the waters from the waters!’ … and it was so! … God also said: ‘Let the waters that are under the heaven, be gathered together into one place: and let the dry land appear!’ And it was so done ... And He said: ‘Let the earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the earth!’ And it was so done ... And God said: ‘Let there be lights made in the firmament of heaven, to divide the day and the night, and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years, to shine in the firmament of heaven, and to give light upon the Earth!’ And it was so done … God also said: ‘Let the waters bring forth the creeping creature having life, and the fowl that may fly over the earth under the firmament of heaven!’ And God created the great whales, and every living and moving creature, which the waters brought forth, according to their kinds, and every winged fowl according to its kind … And God said: ‘Let the Earth bring forth the living creature in its kind, cattle and creeping things, and beasts of the Earth, according to their kinds!’ And it was so done ... And He said: ‘Let us make man to Our image and likeness … and God created man to His own image” (Genesis 1:1-27).
This “power” of the “Word of God” is later echoed by Holy Scripture, where Psalm (33:6) states: “By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established!” Creation was brought about through the Word of God, just as John observed of the Word, " All things were made by Him; and without Him was made nothing that was made” (John 1:3). Other Psalms testify the same thing: “And they cried to the Lord in their affliction and He delivered them out of their distresses. He sent his Word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions” (Psalm 106:19-20). “He sends forth His command to the Earth; His word runs very swiftly. He gives snow like wool; He scatters the frost like ashes. He casts forth His ice as fragments! Who can stand before His cold? He sends forth His Word and melts them; He causes His wind to blow and the waters to flow!” (Psalm 147:15-18).
This “power” of the “Word of God” is later, once again, echoed by God’s own words to His prophet Isaias: “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there without watering the earth and making it bear and sprout, and furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater; so will My Word be, which goes forth from My mouth! It will not return to Me empty, without accomplishing what I desire, and without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it” (Isaias 55:10-11).
The pagan Centurion, seeking the cure of his servant, trusted in the great power of the ‘mere’ “Word of God” to cure the servant, without even asking for Christ to personally go to cure him:
“The servant of a certain centurion, who was dear to him, being sick, was ready to die. And when he had heard of Jesus, he sent unto Him the ancients of the Jews, desiring him to come and heal his servant. And when they came to Jesus, they besought him earnestly, saying to him: ‘He is worthy that Thou should do this for him. For he loves our nation; and he has built us a synagogue!’ And Jesus went with them. And when He was now not far from the house, the centurion sent his friends to Him, saying: ‘Lord! Trouble not Thyself! For I am not worthy that Thou should enter under my roof! For which cause neither did I think myself worthy to come to thee; but say the Word, and my servant shall be healed! For I also am a man subject to authority, having under me soldiers: and I say to one, “Go!” and he goes; and to another, “Come!” and he comes; and to my servant, “Do this!” and he does it.’ Which Jesus hearing, marveled: and turning about to the multitude that followed Him, He said: ‘Amen I say to you, I have not found so great Faith, not even in Israel. And they who were sent, being returned to the house, found the servant whole [cured] who had been sick” (Luke 7:2-10).
Jesus performed many other miracles by His “Word” alone.
The Canaanite women has her possessed daughter cured by the mere Word of Jesus: “Then Jesus answering, said to her: ‘O woman, great is thy faith! Be it done to thee as thou wilt!’ And her daughter was cured from that hour” (Matthew 15:21-28).
“Jesus came again into Cana of Galilee, where he made the water change into wine. And there was a certain ruler, whose son was sick at Capharnaum. He having heard that Jesus was come from Judea into Galilee, went to Him, and prayed Him to come down, and heal his son; for he was at the point of death. Jesus therefore said to him: ‘Unless you see signs and wonders, you believe not!’ The ruler said to Him: ‘Lord! Come down before that my son die!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way! Thy son lives!’ The man believed the word which Jesus said to him, and went his way. And as he was going down, his servants met him; and they brought word, saying, that his son lived. He asked, therefore, of them the hour wherein he grew better. And they said to him: ‘Yesterday, at the seventh hour, the fever left him!’ The father therefore knew, that it was at the same hour that Jesus said to him: ‘Thy son lives!’ and he himself believed, and his whole household” (John 4:46-53).
At other times, Jesus merely says the word and devils leave the bodies of those whom they had possessed: “Jesus rebuked him, and the devil went out of him, and the child was cured from that hour” (Matthew 17:17).
Similarly, “there met him a man with an unclean spirit, … and seeing Jesus afar off, he ran and adored Him. And crying with a loud voice, he said: ‘What have I to do with thee, Jesus the Son of the most high God? I adjure thee by God that thou torment me not!’ For Jesus said unto him: ‘Go out of the man, thou unclean spirit!’ … And there was, near the mountain, a great herd of swine, feeding. And the spirits besought Him, saying: ‘Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them!’ And Jesus immediately gave them leave. And the unclean spirits going out, entered into the swine: and the herd with great violence was carried headlong into the sea, being about two thousand, and were drowned in the sea” (Mark 5:2-13).
On another occasion, “Jesus said to the sick of the palsy: ‘I say to thee: Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house!’ And immediately he arose; and taking up his bed, went his way in the sight of all; so that all wondered and glorified God, saying: ‘We never saw the like!’” (Mark 2:10-12).
The Word of God is Powerful For Us
Holy Scripture says: “Take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:17). “For the word of God is living and effectual, and more piercing than any two edged sword” (Hebrews 4:12). “He has made my mouth like a sharp sword” (Isaias 49:2). “They shall speak with their mouth, and a sword is in their lips!” (Psalm 58:8). “You are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the wicked one” (1 John 2:14). “Let the word of Christ dwell in you abundantly, in all wisdom―teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual canticles, singing in grace in your hearts to God!” (Colossians 3:16).
“Elias the prophet stood up as a fire, and his word burnt like a torch. He brought a famine upon them, and they that provoked him in their envy, were reduced to a small number, for they could not endure the commandments of the Lord. By the word of the Lord he shut up the heaven, and he brought down fire from heaven thrice. Thus was Elias magnified in his wondrous works, who raised up a dead man from below, from the lot of death, by the word of the Lord God” (Ecclesiasticus 48:1-5).
That “Sword of the Word” will be seen to strike down the sinners and enemies of God in the last days. Speaking of the ‘sword’ that is Christ’s tongue, the Book of Apocalypse says: “And from His mouth came out a sharp two edged sword: and His face was as the sun shining in His power … And out of His mouth proceeds a sharp two-edged sword; that with it He may strike the nations. And He shall rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the winepress of the fierceness of the wrath of God the Almighty! … And the rest were slain by the sword of Him, that sits upon the horse, which proceeds out of His mouth!” (Apocalypse 1:16; 19:15, 19:21).
Listen to the “Word” of All Words, or Lose Your Soul
At the transfiguration of Jesus, on Mount Tabor, Our Lord had taken Peter, James and John with Him onto the mountain, and He was transfigured before them: “And there was a cloud overshadowing them: and a voice came out of the cloud, saying: ‘This is My most beloved Son! Hear ye Him!’” (Mark 9:6). “And as He was yet speaking, behold a bright cloud overshadowed them. And lo, a voice out of the cloud, saying: ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased: hear ye Him!’” (Matthew 17:5). “And there came a cloud, and overshadowed them; and they were afraid, when they entered into the cloud. And a voice came out of the cloud, saying: ‘This is My beloved Son; hear Him!’” (Luke 9:35).
St. Peter testifies to this event much later, after Christ’s ascension into Heaven, when, speaking of Jesus, Peter says: “For He received from God the Father, honor and glory! This voice coming down to Him from the excellent glory: ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him!’” (2 Peter 1:17).
Jesus Himself says: “This is the will of My Father that sent Me: that everyone who sees the Son, and believes in Him, may have life everlasting, and I will raise him up in the last day” (John 6:40). This echoes the Old Testament: “My son, keep My words, and lay up My precepts with thee. Son, keep My commandments, and thou shalt live!” (Proverbs 7:1-2).
Our Lord tells us take His Words seriously: “If you love me, keep my commandments … He that hath My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If any one love Me, he will keep My Word … He that loves me not, keeps not My Words. And the Word which you have heard, is not mine; but the Father’s, Who sent Me!” (John 14:15-24).
Our Lord, speaking of Himself, said: “For he that shall be ashamed of Me, and of My words, in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of man also will be ashamed of him, when He shall come in the glory of his Father with the holy angels!” (Mark 8:38). “Heaven and Earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass away!” (Matthew 24:35). “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that doth the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!” (Matthew 7:21-23).
“Everyone therefore that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these My words, and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:24-27).
“Hear the Word of the Lord, for the Lord shall enter into judgment with the inhabitants of the land―for there is no truth, and there is no mercy, and there is no knowledge of God in the land!” (Osee 4:1).
Let us learn from Our Lady: “Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart” (Luke 2:19).
The Hypocrisy of Our Words
The danger is—and always has been—is that we do not ponder the words of God deep in our hearts, but we merely let them float on the surface of our memory, and sometimes the heat of the world even makes those words evaporate! Our Lord complained bitterly of this kind of superficiality: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
Our Lord also spoke of the hypocritical Pharisees, saying: “The Scribes and the Pharisees have sat on the chair of Moses. All things therefore whatsoever they shall say to you, observe and do―but according to their works do ye not; for they say, and do not!” (Matthew 23:2-3).
“I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the Day of Judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned!” (Matthew 12:13-14). “Every man’s word shall be his burden―for you have perverted the words of the living God” (Jeremias 23:36). Woe to them who have started changing our Faith—the Liberals and the Modernists—and those lay people who ‘invent’ their own form of Catholicism, saying that they refuse to accept this or that! Woe to those who have perverted the Word of God by saying same-sex unions are acceptable, that divorce is acceptable, that contraception is permissible, that abortion is allowable, that such and such a thing is no longer a sin, that you can be a ‘good Catholic’ while not going to Mass on Sundays and not confessing your mortal sins, etc.
“Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! Woe to you that are wise in your own eyes, and prudent in your own conceits! … For they have cast away the Law of the Lord!” (Isaias 5:20-24). “And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore! Is it my way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse?” (Ezechiel 18:25). “Thus saith the Lord the God of hosts: ‘Because you have spoken this word, behold I will make My Words in thy mouth as fire, and this people as wood, and it shall devour them!’” (Jeremias 5:14).
The Gospel of Sexagesima Sunday spoke of “sowing the seed” whereby the “seed” symbolizes or represents the “word of God”. The “seed” is withering just as intelligence is withering. In 1990, Harper's Index noted the rather astounding fact that, over the previous fifty years, the vocabulary of the average American student had declined from 25,000 words to 10,000.
In December, 2012, the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) found that the diction of American students is not nearly as good as it should be. A report from DOE’s National Center for Education Statistics found that vocabulary skills are tied closely to reading level, and that both must start being developed from a young age in order to progress properly.
In a later report, in October of 2013, it was shown that the United States ranks lower than other developed countries in many key skills in Math, Vocabulary, and Technology.
In Washington, in September of 2016, an alarming report was published by the National Center for Education Research, the majority of American students do not possess the language skills and vocabulary necessary to belittle their classmates in an effective manner. The report―based on observations of more than 500,000 students around the country from kindergarten through 12th grade―concludes that while most can easily perceive weakness and vulnerability in their fellow schoolchildren, their rudimentary linguistic capabilities routinely prevent them from mocking the appearance, personality, or athletic ability of others in such a way that those individuals are reduced to tears and suffer chronically low self-esteem.
“Unfortunately, most of our students are finishing high school with only a fifth-grade ability to shame and deride their peers,” said report co-author and educational psychologist Joyce Marrone, observing that most graduates cannot string together two sentences about a classmate’s lisp or general weirdness with enough proficiency to completely devastate them. “While they know how to identify a loser, they lack the semantic tools to articulate exactly why that person is so lame, ugly, or stupid.” Now doing such a thing is obviously and blatantly uncharitable―but it goes to show that even in uncharitableness (which is the predominant attitude of the world today) vocabulary is greatly lacking (and that is putting it charitably!).
The Words of the Rich and the Poor
The results are also vexing because early vocabulary skills have long been a divider between rich and poor kids before they even step foot in the classroom: a seminal study in 1995 found that children whose families were on welfare heard on average 616 words per hour, while children from wealthier families heard 2,153 words per hour.
Dummies of the Faith
You could say the same thing about the Faith—knowledge of the Faith is closely linked to a reading level. If we never challenge ourselves by delving deeper into the Faith by reading books that give a deeper and broader exposition of the Faith, then we shall end up being “Faith-challenged” or, to put it more bluntly, “Dummies in the Faith”! We shall end up being “at a loss for words” when it comes to discussing, promoting or defending our Faith—which is the case for most Catholics, for they have even forgotten much of their First Holy Communion Catechism or their Confirmation Catechism, which they learnt only to pass a test and then filed it away in the trash cans of their memories. Most Catholics today could correctly recall all of the Ten Commandments, nor the Six Chief Commandments of the Church, nor the five conditions required for a good confession, nor name how many conditions must be present for a mortal sin, and a host of similar questions asked to the 7 or 8 year old children preparing for their First Communion. All that is just “Kiddie-Catechism”—yet most adults do not even have a “Kiddie-Knowledge” of the Faith—and we are not kidding!
Already 20 years ago, a Catholic college professor lamented: “Perhaps the religious illiteracy of so many otherwise well-educated young Catholics is too familiar to bear mentioning again. One has come to expect that even at elite Catholic colleges and universities, entering students will not know what is meant by the “Immaculate Conception”―hardly anyone knows that anymore. No surprise, either, when students do not know the proper number of natures and persons in Christ, Mary, and the Trinity―what’s an extra nature or two here or there? Besides, who’s counting? It’s not a chemical formula and it doesn’t take rocket science to believe God loves me anyway. As for ignorance of more technical terms, for example, confusing the Greek word for the relationship between Jesus and God the Father―“homoousios” meaning “of the same substance”―with a Near Eastern dish made of chickpeas (a good guess, I suppose), or conflating the temperature at which paper burns (451 degrees Fahrenheit) with the date of the Church Council of Chalcedon in 451 AD―who can worry? Still, when more than a third of the students have to guess how many Gospels are in the Bible, or think that the phrase “original sin” refers to sex; when more than half have no idea what is meant by “Incarnation” unless it has the prefix re-; when only ten out of a class of fifty know what “Exodus” refers to, or what is meant by the phrase “Real Presence,” and only a slightly higher percentage can give a credible definition of “Sacrament”; when one student can convince a large group of classmates that “Catholic Social Teaching” refers to restrictions on same-sex marriage―we can perhaps bear to mention the problem of religious ignorance yet again.”
The Words of the “Faith Rich” and “Faith Poor”
Furthermore, there is also a “rich” and “poor” divide or chasm in matters of not only vocabulary, but also Faith. There are families “rich” in the Faith, who speak about and discuss the Faith often, and there are families that are “poor” in the Faith, who speak about or discuss the Faith only rarely, or never at all. In families who are “rich in the Faith” a child will hear “thousands” of words on the Faith spoken daily, while in families who are “poor in the Faith” a child will hear only a few Faith related words spoken daily.
Pope’s Guide On Dummies
Pope St. Pius X is of the same opinion: “We are forced to agree with those who hold that the chief cause of the present indifference and, as it were, infirmity of soul, and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of things divine. This is fully in accord with what God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘And there is no knowledge of God in the land. Cursing and lying and killing and theft and adultery have overflowed: and blood hath touched blood. Thereafter shall the land mourn, and everyone that dwells in it shall languish.’ It is a common complaint, unfortunately too well founded, that there are large numbers of Christians in our own time who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation.
“And when we mention Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life ― for these find some excuse for their ignorance in the fact that the demands of their harsh employers hardly leave them time to take care of themselves or of their dear ones — but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there. They rarely give thought to God, or to the teachings of the Faith of Christ. They know nothing of … Grace, the greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things, the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments, are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it.
“And so they arrive at life’s end in such a condition … And so Our Predecessor, Benedict XIV, had just cause to write: ‘We declare that a great number of those, who are condemned to eternal punishment, suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of Faith which must be known and believed, in order to be numbered among the elect.’”
Does a Loss of Words Lead to a Loss of Souls?
To have a decent chance of survival in this life and in this world, you need you know how to speak and how to write. You need to know your local language where you wish and hope to live and survive. You need to be able to “read the word”, “understand the word” and “speak the word”. Words are important! Our very life depends upon them! Misunderstandings can lead to death. Refusal to communicate the word can lead to death. Lack of understanding what is said to you can lead to death!
If you cannot read the words of warning on a bottle of liquid that tells you it is poisonous—then you could die. If you cannot understand or do not bother to read the words: “Shark infested beach” before going to swim in the sea, then you are risking your life. If you cannot understand the words—“Toxic chemicals”—when handling a substance, then you are risking your health or even your life. The examples are endless. The truth is obvious. Words are important and sometimes life-saving. The same is true of the Word of God. “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4).
The “Word” of All Words—Jesus Christ the Word of God!
The “Word of all words”—so to speak—is Jesus Christ. That is what Holy Scripture tells us: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him: and without Him was made nothing that was made … And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us … full of grace and truth … In Him was life, and the life was the light of men ... The true light, which enlightens every man that cometh into this world … And the light shone in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. But as many as received Him, He gave them power to be made the sons of God, to them that believe in His Name” (John 1:1-14).
A parallel passage to the above, that is closely linked to it, is found in the Book of Apocalypse, which also speaks of Christ being the “Word of God”. The above passage (John 1:1-14) refers to Christ as the “Word of God” in His “First Coming” which was in His birth at Bethlehem and His successive short life on Earth. The Book of the Apocalypse refers to Christ as the “Word of God” in His “Second Coming” at towards the end of time:
“And I saw Heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and He that sat upon it was called ‘faithful’ and ‘true’, and with justice does He judge and fight. And His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on His head were many diadems, and He had a Name written, which no man knows but Himself. And He was clothed with a garment sprinkled with blood; and His name is called, “THE WORD OF GOD”. And the armies that are in Heaven followed Him on white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean. And out of His mouth proceeds a sharp two-edged sword; that with it He may strike the nations. And He shall rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the winepress of the fierceness of the wrath of God the Almighty. And He has on His garment, and on His thigh written: ‘KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS’” (Apocalypse 19:11-6).
Why is Christ Called “The Word of God”?
We get to know things—we learn—through words. Parents and teachers use words to explain things to their children and students. In the Old Testament we read of God saying: “My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!” (Isaias 55:8-9).
We could say that Our Lord is personification and verbalization of the thoughts of God. He has come to teach us what His Father, God the Father, wants to be taught―as Jesus Himself says: “The Word which you have heard, is not Mine; but the Father’s, Who sent Me!” (John 14:15-24). “I came down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me … And this is the will of My Father that sent Me―that everyone who sees the Son, and believes in Him, may have life everlasting, and I will raise him up in the last day” (John 6:38-40).
Jesus is the personification of wisdom, He is the wisdom incarnate, He is the wisdom of the thought of God made incarnate as a man, to speak the thoughts of God His Father to us―as is described in the Book of Proverbs, in chapters 5 to 8. That section begins by saying: “My son, attend to My wisdom, and incline thy ear to My prudence! That thou mayest keep My thoughts, and thy lips may preserve My instruction!” (Proverbs 5:1-2).
This “Word”, this “Wisdom”, is God’s communication to humanity. Christ is the communication of God to humanity. He revealed to the world the Word of God. Jesus was the personification of the written and spoken Word. In the Old Testament God revealed His word through the mere mortals, the prophets, while in the New Testament the word of God the Father was revealed in a Person, a Divine Person―God the Son. “God sent the Word to the children of Israel, by Jesus Christ” (Acts 10:36).
The Power of “The Word of God”
In the Old Testament, the Word carries the idea of active power. God ‘spoke’ the universe into being. In the first chapter of the Book of Genesis—the very first chapter of the whole Bible—we read of God ‘speaking’ all things into existence:
“And God said: ‘Be light made!’ And light was made … And God said: ‘Let there be a firmament made amidst the waters: and let it divide the waters from the waters!’ … and it was so! … God also said: ‘Let the waters that are under the heaven, be gathered together into one place: and let the dry land appear!’ And it was so done ... And He said: ‘Let the earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the earth!’ And it was so done ... And God said: ‘Let there be lights made in the firmament of heaven, to divide the day and the night, and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years, to shine in the firmament of heaven, and to give light upon the Earth!’ And it was so done … God also said: ‘Let the waters bring forth the creeping creature having life, and the fowl that may fly over the earth under the firmament of heaven!’ And God created the great whales, and every living and moving creature, which the waters brought forth, according to their kinds, and every winged fowl according to its kind … And God said: ‘Let the Earth bring forth the living creature in its kind, cattle and creeping things, and beasts of the Earth, according to their kinds!’ And it was so done ... And He said: ‘Let us make man to Our image and likeness … and God created man to His own image” (Genesis 1:1-27).
This “power” of the “Word of God” is later echoed by Holy Scripture, where Psalm (33:6) states: “By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established!” Creation was brought about through the Word of God, just as John observed of the Word, " All things were made by Him; and without Him was made nothing that was made” (John 1:3). Other Psalms testify the same thing: “And they cried to the Lord in their affliction and He delivered them out of their distresses. He sent his Word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions” (Psalm 106:19-20). “He sends forth His command to the Earth; His word runs very swiftly. He gives snow like wool; He scatters the frost like ashes. He casts forth His ice as fragments! Who can stand before His cold? He sends forth His Word and melts them; He causes His wind to blow and the waters to flow!” (Psalm 147:15-18).
This “power” of the “Word of God” is later, once again, echoed by God’s own words to His prophet Isaias: “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there without watering the earth and making it bear and sprout, and furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater; so will My Word be, which goes forth from My mouth! It will not return to Me empty, without accomplishing what I desire, and without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it” (Isaias 55:10-11).
The pagan Centurion, seeking the cure of his servant, trusted in the great power of the ‘mere’ “Word of God” to cure the servant, without even asking for Christ to personally go to cure him:
“The servant of a certain centurion, who was dear to him, being sick, was ready to die. And when he had heard of Jesus, he sent unto Him the ancients of the Jews, desiring him to come and heal his servant. And when they came to Jesus, they besought him earnestly, saying to him: ‘He is worthy that Thou should do this for him. For he loves our nation; and he has built us a synagogue!’ And Jesus went with them. And when He was now not far from the house, the centurion sent his friends to Him, saying: ‘Lord! Trouble not Thyself! For I am not worthy that Thou should enter under my roof! For which cause neither did I think myself worthy to come to thee; but say the Word, and my servant shall be healed! For I also am a man subject to authority, having under me soldiers: and I say to one, “Go!” and he goes; and to another, “Come!” and he comes; and to my servant, “Do this!” and he does it.’ Which Jesus hearing, marveled: and turning about to the multitude that followed Him, He said: ‘Amen I say to you, I have not found so great Faith, not even in Israel. And they who were sent, being returned to the house, found the servant whole [cured] who had been sick” (Luke 7:2-10).
Jesus performed many other miracles by His “Word” alone.
The Canaanite women has her possessed daughter cured by the mere Word of Jesus: “Then Jesus answering, said to her: ‘O woman, great is thy faith! Be it done to thee as thou wilt!’ And her daughter was cured from that hour” (Matthew 15:21-28).
“Jesus came again into Cana of Galilee, where he made the water change into wine. And there was a certain ruler, whose son was sick at Capharnaum. He having heard that Jesus was come from Judea into Galilee, went to Him, and prayed Him to come down, and heal his son; for he was at the point of death. Jesus therefore said to him: ‘Unless you see signs and wonders, you believe not!’ The ruler said to Him: ‘Lord! Come down before that my son die!’ Jesus said to him: ‘Go thy way! Thy son lives!’ The man believed the word which Jesus said to him, and went his way. And as he was going down, his servants met him; and they brought word, saying, that his son lived. He asked, therefore, of them the hour wherein he grew better. And they said to him: ‘Yesterday, at the seventh hour, the fever left him!’ The father therefore knew, that it was at the same hour that Jesus said to him: ‘Thy son lives!’ and he himself believed, and his whole household” (John 4:46-53).
At other times, Jesus merely says the word and devils leave the bodies of those whom they had possessed: “Jesus rebuked him, and the devil went out of him, and the child was cured from that hour” (Matthew 17:17).
Similarly, “there met him a man with an unclean spirit, … and seeing Jesus afar off, he ran and adored Him. And crying with a loud voice, he said: ‘What have I to do with thee, Jesus the Son of the most high God? I adjure thee by God that thou torment me not!’ For Jesus said unto him: ‘Go out of the man, thou unclean spirit!’ … And there was, near the mountain, a great herd of swine, feeding. And the spirits besought Him, saying: ‘Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them!’ And Jesus immediately gave them leave. And the unclean spirits going out, entered into the swine: and the herd with great violence was carried headlong into the sea, being about two thousand, and were drowned in the sea” (Mark 5:2-13).
On another occasion, “Jesus said to the sick of the palsy: ‘I say to thee: Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house!’ And immediately he arose; and taking up his bed, went his way in the sight of all; so that all wondered and glorified God, saying: ‘We never saw the like!’” (Mark 2:10-12).
The Word of God is Powerful For Us
Holy Scripture says: “Take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:17). “For the word of God is living and effectual, and more piercing than any two edged sword” (Hebrews 4:12). “He has made my mouth like a sharp sword” (Isaias 49:2). “They shall speak with their mouth, and a sword is in their lips!” (Psalm 58:8). “You are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the wicked one” (1 John 2:14). “Let the word of Christ dwell in you abundantly, in all wisdom―teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual canticles, singing in grace in your hearts to God!” (Colossians 3:16).
“Elias the prophet stood up as a fire, and his word burnt like a torch. He brought a famine upon them, and they that provoked him in their envy, were reduced to a small number, for they could not endure the commandments of the Lord. By the word of the Lord he shut up the heaven, and he brought down fire from heaven thrice. Thus was Elias magnified in his wondrous works, who raised up a dead man from below, from the lot of death, by the word of the Lord God” (Ecclesiasticus 48:1-5).
That “Sword of the Word” will be seen to strike down the sinners and enemies of God in the last days. Speaking of the ‘sword’ that is Christ’s tongue, the Book of Apocalypse says: “And from His mouth came out a sharp two edged sword: and His face was as the sun shining in His power … And out of His mouth proceeds a sharp two-edged sword; that with it He may strike the nations. And He shall rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the winepress of the fierceness of the wrath of God the Almighty! … And the rest were slain by the sword of Him, that sits upon the horse, which proceeds out of His mouth!” (Apocalypse 1:16; 19:15, 19:21).
Listen to the “Word” of All Words, or Lose Your Soul
At the transfiguration of Jesus, on Mount Tabor, Our Lord had taken Peter, James and John with Him onto the mountain, and He was transfigured before them: “And there was a cloud overshadowing them: and a voice came out of the cloud, saying: ‘This is My most beloved Son! Hear ye Him!’” (Mark 9:6). “And as He was yet speaking, behold a bright cloud overshadowed them. And lo, a voice out of the cloud, saying: ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased: hear ye Him!’” (Matthew 17:5). “And there came a cloud, and overshadowed them; and they were afraid, when they entered into the cloud. And a voice came out of the cloud, saying: ‘This is My beloved Son; hear Him!’” (Luke 9:35).
St. Peter testifies to this event much later, after Christ’s ascension into Heaven, when, speaking of Jesus, Peter says: “For He received from God the Father, honor and glory! This voice coming down to Him from the excellent glory: ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him!’” (2 Peter 1:17).
Jesus Himself says: “This is the will of My Father that sent Me: that everyone who sees the Son, and believes in Him, may have life everlasting, and I will raise him up in the last day” (John 6:40). This echoes the Old Testament: “My son, keep My words, and lay up My precepts with thee. Son, keep My commandments, and thou shalt live!” (Proverbs 7:1-2).
Our Lord tells us take His Words seriously: “If you love me, keep my commandments … He that hath My commandments, and keeps them; he it is that loves Me … If any one love Me, he will keep My Word … He that loves me not, keeps not My Words. And the Word which you have heard, is not mine; but the Father’s, Who sent Me!” (John 14:15-24).
Our Lord, speaking of Himself, said: “For he that shall be ashamed of Me, and of My words, in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of man also will be ashamed of him, when He shall come in the glory of his Father with the holy angels!” (Mark 8:38). “Heaven and Earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass away!” (Matthew 24:35). “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that doth the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!” (Matthew 7:21-23).
“Everyone therefore that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these My words, and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:24-27).
“Hear the Word of the Lord, for the Lord shall enter into judgment with the inhabitants of the land―for there is no truth, and there is no mercy, and there is no knowledge of God in the land!” (Osee 4:1).
Let us learn from Our Lady: “Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart” (Luke 2:19).
The Hypocrisy of Our Words
The danger is—and always has been—is that we do not ponder the words of God deep in our hearts, but we merely let them float on the surface of our memory, and sometimes the heat of the world even makes those words evaporate! Our Lord complained bitterly of this kind of superficiality: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
Our Lord also spoke of the hypocritical Pharisees, saying: “The Scribes and the Pharisees have sat on the chair of Moses. All things therefore whatsoever they shall say to you, observe and do―but according to their works do ye not; for they say, and do not!” (Matthew 23:2-3).
“I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the Day of Judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned!” (Matthew 12:13-14). “Every man’s word shall be his burden―for you have perverted the words of the living God” (Jeremias 23:36). Woe to them who have started changing our Faith—the Liberals and the Modernists—and those lay people who ‘invent’ their own form of Catholicism, saying that they refuse to accept this or that! Woe to those who have perverted the Word of God by saying same-sex unions are acceptable, that divorce is acceptable, that contraception is permissible, that abortion is allowable, that such and such a thing is no longer a sin, that you can be a ‘good Catholic’ while not going to Mass on Sundays and not confessing your mortal sins, etc.
“Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! Woe to you that are wise in your own eyes, and prudent in your own conceits! … For they have cast away the Law of the Lord!” (Isaias 5:20-24). “And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore! Is it my way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse?” (Ezechiel 18:25). “Thus saith the Lord the God of hosts: ‘Because you have spoken this word, behold I will make My Words in thy mouth as fire, and this people as wood, and it shall devour them!’” (Jeremias 5:14).
Article 12
Thursday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 8th
Coming From All Sides!
Thursday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 8th
Coming From All Sides!
The Holy Trinity and the Triple Enemy
They say that “things come in threes”—it is true in some cases and it is true of both good and of evil. We have the three persons of the Holy Trinity, we have the three members of the Holy Family; we have the three hierarchies of angels, with each hierarchy having three choirs of angles; we have the three theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity; we have the three stages of the spiritual life that we must all pass through: the way of beginners, the proficient and the perfect; we have the three prayers of each decade of the Rosary beads: the Our Father, Hail Mary and Glory Be; we have the three traditional sets of mysteries of the Rosary: the Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious mysteries; we have the three essential parts of the Sacrifice of the Mass: the Offertory, the Consecration (Canon) and the Communion; the Catechism tells us that we were made by God for a triple purpose: to know Him, to love Him and to serve Him, etc., etc.
The platform, or root, or foundation of evil is sin—which consists of three letters: “S-I-N”―and the threesome within sin consists of (1) the very first sin of all, which was of the devils, (2) the very first sin of humans, which we call the Original Sin of Adam and Eve, and (3) our own personal sins, which the Church calls “Actual Sin”, meaning sins that we actually commit ourselves—as opposed to the sins of the devils and the “Original Sin” of our first or original parents, which we did not commit, but we inherit its consequences.
Another threesome on the side of evil, is what the Church calls “the triple enemy of the soul”—the devil, the world and the flesh—which can be found in Jesus’ parable of the Sower, where the three scenes of unproductive soil represent “Satan” (the birds eating the seed), shallow and unreceptive believers (corresponding to weak “flesh”), and “the cares of the world and the lure of wealth” (Mark 4:15–17). These three are also present as a triad in St. Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians: “And you, when you were dead in your offences, and sins, wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit … in which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our senses ...” (Ephesians 2:1-3).
Another evil threesome comes out of one of those triple enemies of the soul—and that is “the flesh” and which is “fed” by another of the triple enemies, and that is “the world”, as Holy Scripture shows: “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16). It is this triple concupiscence that the devil tried to use against Our Lord when tempting Him in the desert—the devil tempts his hungry flesh by asking Him to change stones into bread; the devil tempts Him to pride by telling Him to cast Himself off the pinnacle of the Temple so that the angels can catch Him; and he tempts His eyes by showing Him all the kingdoms of world which the devil offers Him.
“Then Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterwards He was hungry. And the tempter coming said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread!’ Jesus answered and said: ‘It is written: “Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, and set Him upon the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down, for it is written: “That He hath given His angels charge over Thee, and in their hands shall they bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash Thy foot against a stone!’” Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!’” Again the devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus saith to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written: “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him” (Matthew 4:1-11).
The Triple Enemy of Lent (and All Your Life!)
Holy Scripture speaks of our triple enemy―the devil, the world and the flesh: (1) DEVIL: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). (2) WORLD: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). (3) FLESH: “For all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16) … “The flesh lusts against the spirit; and the spirit against the flesh―for these are contrary one to another” (Galatians 5:17).
There is a link between the devil and the world (and the flesh too). Our Lord calls the devil “the prince of this world” and tells us that He has nothing to do with this “prince”, nor has He anything to do with the world—except to try and save it. Other than that, He is not of this world, and He tells us that we should not be of this world, even though we live in this world. In other words, we are part of the world, but should live apart from the world. We cannot be separated from this world in physical way—for we walk on this planet and we have to live here. Yet we should be separated from this world in our mind and our heart. Here are the quotes from Our Lord and Scripture that testify to this principle:
“Jesus answered: ‘My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36). “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not anything … The prince of this world is already judged ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). Christ came into the world to save the world from the world. He has compassion on the world: “For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting. For God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:16-17). “I came not to judge the world, but to save the world” (John 12:47), so that “all the world may be made subject to God” (Romans 3:19). “Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present wicked world” (Galatians 1:4).
Yet, even though Christ had compassion for the world, He did not have compassion for the spirit of worldliness. He came to extract us from the world, not to cement us in the world. “This is the judgment―because the light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light: for their works were evil” (John 3:19). “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘I am the light of the world! He that follows Me, walks not in darkness!’” (John 8:12). “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not … He came unto His own, and His own received him not … the light shone in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:5-11).
God loved the world, but the world hated God and preferred evil pleasures: “The world cannot hate you; but Me it hates―because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil” (John 7:7). “If the world hate you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, since I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:19).
“Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! ... No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
The next triple evil comes out of desire to serve and enjoy both God and the world—it is the evil of sin that is essentially committed three ways: (1) by our thoughts, (2) by our words, and (3) by our actions—which is why, in the old Latin Mass (now called the “Extraordinary Rite of Mass”), you would strike your breast three times during the Confiteor (the “I confess to Almighty God…” etc.), saying: “I have sinned in thought, word and deed. Through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault!”
You will say: “But what about sins of omission? Doesn’t that make four and not three categories?” No, because “omission” is simply the opposite of “commission”—we either do or don’t do something, and the things that we do or don’t do are only three: thoughts, words and actions. “Committing” or “omitting” are not things in themselves, they merely describe “how” the sin applies to us—either by positively doing thinking, saying or doing something that we should not have thought, said or done, or negatively neglecting to think, say or do something that we should have thought, said or done. Our battle against sin focuses on our thoughts, words and actions. “Commission” or “omission” merely modifies or further explains our sinful thought, word or action.
But We Love the World!
Anyway, coming back to the above quotes of Our Lord, we find those statements of Our Lord hard to take and swallow! Yes, of course, in theory we can do nothing but accept those words—even though we don’t like them—but, in practice, we seek a loophole, we seek a way out, we seek a system where we can reconcile or marry God to mammon (the pleasures and riches of the world), Christ to the world, and ourselves to both God and to mammon. Yet God says that it cannot be done: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24) and “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord [agreement] has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! Wherefore: ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
We have a problem with that! “It is too harsh!” we think to ourselves. “It is impossible to do!” we say. “I don’t want to be like that!” we protest. That is where Catholics end up creating their own hybrid religion, just like the Scribes and the Pharisees had done—they took what God had said and added their own “bells and whistles” or their own laws and their own interpretations of God’s Law.
Most Catholics have done that—they have ‘adulterated’ the teaching of Christ by ‘marrying’ Christianity with world—which, incidentally, is also what the Second Vatican Council did by opening the ‘doors’ and ‘windows’ of the Church to the world and to please the world, it has ‘adulterated’ certain aspects of the Faith and continues to ‘adulterate’ more and more teachings to this very day, which is why St. James writes: “Adulterers! Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4), while St. James commands: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, then the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). All those statements—whether they come from Saints James, John or Paul—are the words of God the Holy Ghost, Who is ultimately the true and only author behind Holy Scripture.
We Are Surrounded and Besieged by the World
As Holy Scripture says, the world—though it has been made by God—is not of God: “My kingdom is not of this world! … You are from beneath, I am from above! You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 18:36; 8:23). The world, through sin, belongs to its sinful prince—the devil: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Our Lord has nothing to do with sin or devil: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not anything! … The prince of this world is already judged! ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). We too must cast out the prince of this world and the worldly influence that prince uses to seduce us into worldliness―which is what the devil tried to do to Jesus: “The devil took Jesus up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them” (Matthew 4:8). Jesus refused the temptation, and, as He would later say: “The cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things entering in choke the word of God, and it is made fruitless” (Mark 4:19). “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Harden Your Heart to the World
“Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12). “Wherein, in times past, you walked according to the course of this world … fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts … But now in Christ Jesus, you, who some time were afar off, are … reconciled both to God by the cross” (Ephesians 2:2; 2:13-16). “Be dead with Christ from the elements of this world” (Colossians 2:20). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16).
“Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
“I say then, walk in the spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the spirit; and the spirit against the flesh―for these are contrary one to another―so that you do not the things that you would. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are fornication, uncleanness, immodesty, luxury, idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects, envies, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and such like. Of the which I foretell you, as I have foretold to you, that they who do such things shall not obtain the Kingdom of God” (Galatians 5:16-21).
Surrounded But Not Confounded
We are undoubtedly surrounded and hounded by the spirit of the world! Beneath the increasingly strained pleasantries and constrained legislation towards Christians, there lies a restrained persecution that is simmering and waiting to bubble over into and unrestrained violent persecution—which Our Lord, Our Lady and many saints have prophesied for our times. Though we are surrounded we should not be confounded! As Our Lord said: “In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world!” (John 16:33). “Then He said to them: ‘Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom ... They will lay their hands upon you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors, for My Name’s sake ... And you shall be betrayed by your parents and brethren, and kinsmen and friends; and some of you they will put to death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake. But a hair of your head shall not perish! In your patience you shall possess your souls! And when you shall see Jerusalem surrounded by an army; then know that the desolation thereof is at hand. Then let those who are in Judea, flee to the mountains; and those who are in the midst thereof, depart out; and those who are in the countries, not enter into it. For these are the days of vengeance, that all things may be fulfilled, that are written!’” (Luke 21:10-22).
Not only will we be surrounded by physical enemies, we shall also be surrounded by moral and doctrinal enemies: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God―having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid! … For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears: and will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables! …
"Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5; 4:3-4; 1 Timothy 6:12).
Fighting the Fight for the Faith
It of these times that St. Louis de Montfort writes in his True Devotion to Mary, telling us that “… at the end of the world and indeed presently, the Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity as much as the cedars of Lebanon outgrow the little shrubs. These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady, illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection, so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God, that is to say, the most holy Virgin, called by the Fathers the “Temple of Solomon” and the “City of God.” By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §47-§48).
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be ‘like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful’ Mary to pierce her enemies. (Psalm 126:4). They shall be the sons of Levi, well purified by the fire of great tribulation, and closely adhering to God (1 Corinthians 6:17), who shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body. They shall be everywhere the good odor of Jesus Christ to the poor and to the little, while at the same time, they shall be an odor of death to the great, to the rich and to the proud worldlings. They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High. They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies.
“They shall sleep without gold or silver, and, what is more, without care, in the midst of the other priests, ecclesiastics, and clerics (Psalm 67:14); and yet they shall have the silvered wings of the dove to go, with the pure intention of the glory of God and the salvation of souls, wheresoever the Holy Ghost shall call them. Nor shall they leave behind them, in the places where they have preached, anything but the gold of charity―which is the fulfillment of the whole law. (Romans 13:10). In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior. These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious, the idolaters and the Mahometans. But when and how shall this be? God alone knows. As for us, we have but to hold our tongues, to pray, to sigh and to wait: ‘With expectation I have waited!’ (Psalm 39:2).” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §56-§59).
They say that “things come in threes”—it is true in some cases and it is true of both good and of evil. We have the three persons of the Holy Trinity, we have the three members of the Holy Family; we have the three hierarchies of angels, with each hierarchy having three choirs of angles; we have the three theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity; we have the three stages of the spiritual life that we must all pass through: the way of beginners, the proficient and the perfect; we have the three prayers of each decade of the Rosary beads: the Our Father, Hail Mary and Glory Be; we have the three traditional sets of mysteries of the Rosary: the Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious mysteries; we have the three essential parts of the Sacrifice of the Mass: the Offertory, the Consecration (Canon) and the Communion; the Catechism tells us that we were made by God for a triple purpose: to know Him, to love Him and to serve Him, etc., etc.
The platform, or root, or foundation of evil is sin—which consists of three letters: “S-I-N”―and the threesome within sin consists of (1) the very first sin of all, which was of the devils, (2) the very first sin of humans, which we call the Original Sin of Adam and Eve, and (3) our own personal sins, which the Church calls “Actual Sin”, meaning sins that we actually commit ourselves—as opposed to the sins of the devils and the “Original Sin” of our first or original parents, which we did not commit, but we inherit its consequences.
Another threesome on the side of evil, is what the Church calls “the triple enemy of the soul”—the devil, the world and the flesh—which can be found in Jesus’ parable of the Sower, where the three scenes of unproductive soil represent “Satan” (the birds eating the seed), shallow and unreceptive believers (corresponding to weak “flesh”), and “the cares of the world and the lure of wealth” (Mark 4:15–17). These three are also present as a triad in St. Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians: “And you, when you were dead in your offences, and sins, wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit … in which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our senses ...” (Ephesians 2:1-3).
Another evil threesome comes out of one of those triple enemies of the soul—and that is “the flesh” and which is “fed” by another of the triple enemies, and that is “the world”, as Holy Scripture shows: “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16). It is this triple concupiscence that the devil tried to use against Our Lord when tempting Him in the desert—the devil tempts his hungry flesh by asking Him to change stones into bread; the devil tempts Him to pride by telling Him to cast Himself off the pinnacle of the Temple so that the angels can catch Him; and he tempts His eyes by showing Him all the kingdoms of world which the devil offers Him.
“Then Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterwards He was hungry. And the tempter coming said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread!’ Jesus answered and said: ‘It is written: “Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God!”’ Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, and set Him upon the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him: ‘If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down, for it is written: “That He hath given His angels charge over Thee, and in their hands shall they bear Thee up, lest perhaps Thou dash Thy foot against a stone!’” Jesus said to him: ‘It is written again: “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God!’” Again the devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus saith to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written: “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve!”’ Then the devil left Him” (Matthew 4:1-11).
The Triple Enemy of Lent (and All Your Life!)
Holy Scripture speaks of our triple enemy―the devil, the world and the flesh: (1) DEVIL: “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). (2) WORLD: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). (3) FLESH: “For all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16) … “The flesh lusts against the spirit; and the spirit against the flesh―for these are contrary one to another” (Galatians 5:17).
There is a link between the devil and the world (and the flesh too). Our Lord calls the devil “the prince of this world” and tells us that He has nothing to do with this “prince”, nor has He anything to do with the world—except to try and save it. Other than that, He is not of this world, and He tells us that we should not be of this world, even though we live in this world. In other words, we are part of the world, but should live apart from the world. We cannot be separated from this world in physical way—for we walk on this planet and we have to live here. Yet we should be separated from this world in our mind and our heart. Here are the quotes from Our Lord and Scripture that testify to this principle:
“Jesus answered: ‘My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36). “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not anything … The prince of this world is already judged ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). Christ came into the world to save the world from the world. He has compassion on the world: “For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting. For God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:16-17). “I came not to judge the world, but to save the world” (John 12:47), so that “all the world may be made subject to God” (Romans 3:19). “Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present wicked world” (Galatians 1:4).
Yet, even though Christ had compassion for the world, He did not have compassion for the spirit of worldliness. He came to extract us from the world, not to cement us in the world. “This is the judgment―because the light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light: for their works were evil” (John 3:19). “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘I am the light of the world! He that follows Me, walks not in darkness!’” (John 8:12). “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not … He came unto His own, and His own received him not … the light shone in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:5-11).
God loved the world, but the world hated God and preferred evil pleasures: “The world cannot hate you; but Me it hates―because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil” (John 7:7). “If the world hate you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you … If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, since I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:19).
“Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! ... No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
The next triple evil comes out of desire to serve and enjoy both God and the world—it is the evil of sin that is essentially committed three ways: (1) by our thoughts, (2) by our words, and (3) by our actions—which is why, in the old Latin Mass (now called the “Extraordinary Rite of Mass”), you would strike your breast three times during the Confiteor (the “I confess to Almighty God…” etc.), saying: “I have sinned in thought, word and deed. Through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault!”
You will say: “But what about sins of omission? Doesn’t that make four and not three categories?” No, because “omission” is simply the opposite of “commission”—we either do or don’t do something, and the things that we do or don’t do are only three: thoughts, words and actions. “Committing” or “omitting” are not things in themselves, they merely describe “how” the sin applies to us—either by positively doing thinking, saying or doing something that we should not have thought, said or done, or negatively neglecting to think, say or do something that we should have thought, said or done. Our battle against sin focuses on our thoughts, words and actions. “Commission” or “omission” merely modifies or further explains our sinful thought, word or action.
But We Love the World!
Anyway, coming back to the above quotes of Our Lord, we find those statements of Our Lord hard to take and swallow! Yes, of course, in theory we can do nothing but accept those words—even though we don’t like them—but, in practice, we seek a loophole, we seek a way out, we seek a system where we can reconcile or marry God to mammon (the pleasures and riches of the world), Christ to the world, and ourselves to both God and to mammon. Yet God says that it cannot be done: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24) and “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord [agreement] has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! Wherefore: ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
We have a problem with that! “It is too harsh!” we think to ourselves. “It is impossible to do!” we say. “I don’t want to be like that!” we protest. That is where Catholics end up creating their own hybrid religion, just like the Scribes and the Pharisees had done—they took what God had said and added their own “bells and whistles” or their own laws and their own interpretations of God’s Law.
Most Catholics have done that—they have ‘adulterated’ the teaching of Christ by ‘marrying’ Christianity with world—which, incidentally, is also what the Second Vatican Council did by opening the ‘doors’ and ‘windows’ of the Church to the world and to please the world, it has ‘adulterated’ certain aspects of the Faith and continues to ‘adulterate’ more and more teachings to this very day, which is why St. James writes: “Adulterers! Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4), while St. James commands: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, then the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16). All those statements—whether they come from Saints James, John or Paul—are the words of God the Holy Ghost, Who is ultimately the true and only author behind Holy Scripture.
We Are Surrounded and Besieged by the World
As Holy Scripture says, the world—though it has been made by God—is not of God: “My kingdom is not of this world! … You are from beneath, I am from above! You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 18:36; 8:23). The world, through sin, belongs to its sinful prince—the devil: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Our Lord has nothing to do with sin or devil: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he has not anything! … The prince of this world is already judged! ... Now shall the prince of this world be cast out!” (John 12:31; 16:11; 14:30). We too must cast out the prince of this world and the worldly influence that prince uses to seduce us into worldliness―which is what the devil tried to do to Jesus: “The devil took Jesus up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them” (Matthew 4:8). Jesus refused the temptation, and, as He would later say: “The cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things entering in choke the word of God, and it is made fruitless” (Mark 4:19). “What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Harden Your Heart to the World
“Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12). “Wherein, in times past, you walked according to the course of this world … fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts … But now in Christ Jesus, you, who some time were afar off, are … reconciled both to God by the cross” (Ephesians 2:2; 2:13-16). “Be dead with Christ from the elements of this world” (Colossians 2:20). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16).
“Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
“I say then, walk in the spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the spirit; and the spirit against the flesh―for these are contrary one to another―so that you do not the things that you would. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are fornication, uncleanness, immodesty, luxury, idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects, envies, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and such like. Of the which I foretell you, as I have foretold to you, that they who do such things shall not obtain the Kingdom of God” (Galatians 5:16-21).
Surrounded But Not Confounded
We are undoubtedly surrounded and hounded by the spirit of the world! Beneath the increasingly strained pleasantries and constrained legislation towards Christians, there lies a restrained persecution that is simmering and waiting to bubble over into and unrestrained violent persecution—which Our Lord, Our Lady and many saints have prophesied for our times. Though we are surrounded we should not be confounded! As Our Lord said: “In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world!” (John 16:33). “Then He said to them: ‘Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom ... They will lay their hands upon you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors, for My Name’s sake ... And you shall be betrayed by your parents and brethren, and kinsmen and friends; and some of you they will put to death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake. But a hair of your head shall not perish! In your patience you shall possess your souls! And when you shall see Jerusalem surrounded by an army; then know that the desolation thereof is at hand. Then let those who are in Judea, flee to the mountains; and those who are in the midst thereof, depart out; and those who are in the countries, not enter into it. For these are the days of vengeance, that all things may be fulfilled, that are written!’” (Luke 21:10-22).
Not only will we be surrounded by physical enemies, we shall also be surrounded by moral and doctrinal enemies: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God―having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid! … For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears: and will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables! …
"Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5; 4:3-4; 1 Timothy 6:12).
Fighting the Fight for the Faith
It of these times that St. Louis de Montfort writes in his True Devotion to Mary, telling us that “… at the end of the world and indeed presently, the Most High with His holy Mother has to form for Himself great saints who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity as much as the cedars of Lebanon outgrow the little shrubs. These great souls, full of grace and zeal, shall be chosen to match themselves against the enemies of God, who shall rage on all sides; and they shall be singularly devout to our Blessed Lady, illuminated by her light, strengthened with her nourishment, led by her spirit, supported by her arm and sheltered under her protection, so that they shall fight with one hand and build with the other. With the one hand they shall fight, overthrow and crush the heretics with their heresies, the schismatics with their schisms, the idolaters with their idolatries and the sinners with their impieties. With the other hand they shall build the temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God, that is to say, the most holy Virgin, called by the Fathers the “Temple of Solomon” and the “City of God.” By their words and their examples they shall draw the whole world to true devotion to Mary. This shall bring upon them many enemies, but shall also bring many victories and much glory for God alone!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §47-§48).
“But who shall those servants, slaves and children of Mary be? They shall be the ministers of the Lord who, like a burning fire, shall kindle the fire of divine love everywhere. They shall be ‘like sharp arrows in the hand of the powerful’ Mary to pierce her enemies. (Psalm 126:4). They shall be the sons of Levi, well purified by the fire of great tribulation, and closely adhering to God (1 Corinthians 6:17), who shall carry the gold of love in their heart, the incense of prayer in their spirit, and the myrrh of mortification in their body. They shall be everywhere the good odor of Jesus Christ to the poor and to the little, while at the same time, they shall be an odor of death to the great, to the rich and to the proud worldlings. They shall be clouds thundering and flying through the air at the least breath of the Holy Ghost; who, detaching themselves from everything and troubling themselves about nothing, shall shower forth the rain of the Word of God and of life eternal. They shall thunder against sin; they shall storm against the world; they shall strike the devil and his crew; and they shall pierce through and through, for life or for death, with their two-edged sword of the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17), all those to whom they shall be sent on the part of the Most High. They shall be the true apostles of the latter times, to whom the Lord of Hosts shall give the word and the might to work marvels and to carry off with glory the spoils of His enemies.
“They shall sleep without gold or silver, and, what is more, without care, in the midst of the other priests, ecclesiastics, and clerics (Psalm 67:14); and yet they shall have the silvered wings of the dove to go, with the pure intention of the glory of God and the salvation of souls, wheresoever the Holy Ghost shall call them. Nor shall they leave behind them, in the places where they have preached, anything but the gold of charity―which is the fulfillment of the whole law. (Romans 13:10). In a word, we know that they shall be true disciples of Jesus Christ, walking in the footsteps of His poverty, humility, contempt of the world, charity; teaching the narrow way of God in pure truth, according to the holy Gospel, and not according to the maxims of the world; troubling themselves about nothing; not accepting persons; sparing, fearing and listening to no mortal, however influential he may be. They shall have in their mouths the two-edged sword of the Word of God. They shall carry on their shoulders the bloody standard of the Cross, the Crucifix in their right hand and the Rosary in their left, the sacred Names of Jesus and Mary in their hearts, and the modesty and mortification of Jesus Christ in their own behavior. These are the great men who are to come; but Mary is the one who, by order of the Most High, shall fashion them for the purpose of extending His empire over that of the impious, the idolaters and the Mahometans. But when and how shall this be? God alone knows. As for us, we have but to hold our tongues, to pray, to sigh and to wait: ‘With expectation I have waited!’ (Psalm 39:2).” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §56-§59).
Article 11
Wednesday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 7th
This Could Be Your Best Lent Ever, IF ...
Wednesday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 7th
This Could Be Your Best Lent Ever, IF ...
Are We All Crazy, Mad and Insane?
There is more truth to that question than we would at first care to admit! What would you think of a person who would throw themselves willingly into a fire? What would you think of a person who accumulates enormous debts without any real desire to pay back that debt? What would you think of someone who is prepared to commit theft, adultery, enjoy impure thoughts, who uses bad language, who practices calumny (lies and exaggerations) and detraction (revealing sins of others), who is scathing and uncharitable in thoughts, words and actions—and is willing to do all or some of this for an eternity of torture and burning in the fires of Hell? You would say that such a person is crazy, mad and insane! Yet, sadly, we are—in part or in total—that person!
Our Lady revealed to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “None of the mortals have altogether avoided sinning against God; and the punishment and retribution must inevitably correspond to the guilt―either in this life or the next. Therefore, as the soul commits sin in union with the body, it follows that both of them must be punished. The interior sorrow is not sufficient for atonement, if the body seeks to escape the punishment that corresponds to the guilt. Moreover, the debt is so great and the satisfaction that can be given by the creature so limited and scanty, that there remains continual uncertainty whether the Judge is satisfied―even after the exertions of a whole lifetime! Hence, the soul should find no rest to the end of life! … Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored! Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment! … What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation?” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
We sin, we confess (hopefully!), we do little or no penance, and we forget all about our sins! Such is our ‘mental’ attitude towards sin! We are, perhaps, even oblivious to the terrible consequences of even forgiven sins! “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5)—but WE ARE without fear about our past forgiven sins, and WE DO add sin upon sin! Insane! Crazy! Nuts! We refuse to accept the truth that the greatest evil that exists in the world is SIN! Our catechisms tell us that: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, Spirago-Clarke; My Catholic Faith, Bishop Morrow, STD).
We read that, but the “penny doesn’t drop”—we live as though sin was harmless, or relatively harmless—we (with the devil’s whispering helping us along) believe something different: “O God is good! O God is kind! O God is merciful! O God understands! O God has forgiven me! O God wouldn’t send me to Hell! Jesus died for me!” etc., etc. All of this is wonderfully true—as Holy Scripture says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). “Many, O Lord, are Thy mercies!” (Psalm 118:156). There are numerous quotes in Holy Scripture that testify to and confirm the mercies of God.
Yet everything in creation has a “positive-negative” aspect—even God. We cannot have the day without the night; the summer without the winter; heat without cold; health without sickness—we breathe (inhale) in and we breathe out (exhale); we cannot stay awake continually and work without having to sleep; we cannot just have great happiness in this life without times of great sorrow, etc. Likewise, God is not just “merciful”, but He is also “just”-- “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “All things that are done, God will bring into judgment, whether it be good or evil” (Ecclesiastes 12:14). “Evil pursues sinners: and to the just good shall be repaid” (Proverbs 13:21). For God is also just and God is not a doormat for the dirty boots of sin! “God is a just judge” (Psalm 7:12). “The Lord, Who is just, will cut the necks of sinners” (Psalm 128:4). Ouch! Reality check! Sanity reset button!
Blind and Crazy
We all know—at least instinctively—the price of sin―“The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23)―yet we “turn a blind-eye” to its consequences for ourselves. Of course, when it comes to the sins of others, we are no longer blind, but suddenly have “the eye of an eagle”—yet that is not what Our Lord wants: “Why seest thou the splinter that is in thy brother’s eye; and seest not the plank that is in thy own eye? Or how sayest thou to thy brother: ‘Let me cast the splinter out of thy eye; and behold a plank is in thy own eye? Thou hypocrite! Cast out first the plank from thy own eye, and then shalt thou see to cast out the splinter out of thy brother’s eye!” (Matthew 7:3-5). Such a “blinded” attitude—and it is very common—provoked Our Lord to say of such people: “Leave them alone! They are blind and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
Crazy Blind Scribes and Pharisees
Those words above were addressed to the ‘crazy’ and ‘blind’ Scribes and Pharisees, who were the “blind leaders” of the “blind people” to whom Our Lord referred. They were exposed to Our Lord’s truth, but, crazily and insanely, they did not accept Our Lord’s truth: “If I shall tell you, you will not believe Me! … If I say the truth to you, why do you not believe Me? Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word! You do not believe, because you are not of My sheep! You are of your father the devil! He stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of lies. If you believe not, then you shall die in your sin! He that is of God, hears the words of God. Therefore you hear them not, because you are not of God. Every one that is of the truth, hears My voice!” (Luke 22:67; John 8:43-48; 10:26; 8:24; 18:37).
Crazy Confused Complacent Carefree Conned Catholics!
What would you think of someone, whose house was burning down, or whose ship was sinking (think of the Titanic read more here), who wasn’t concerned about what was happening and just wanted to continue watching TV, surfing the internet, listening to music, chatting or texting on the phone, playing games, eating, drinking and partying? You would say that they are crazy and insane! Yet that is exactly what most Catholics are doing as the Ark of the Church, the Barque of St. Peter, or the Ship of Faith, is being attacked, torpedoed, boarded and dismantled!
Even the otherwise Liberal Pope Paul VI publicly admitted on several occasions that Satan had entered the Church—thus confirming the prophecy of Our Lady of Akita, who said: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops.” We have been seeing that phenomenon, on an ever increasing scale, since the ‘great divide’ that occurred during the Second Vatican Council between the Conservatives on one side, and the Liberals and Modernists on the other side. The actual words of Pope Paul VI were: “From some fissure the smoke of Satan has entered the temple of God” (June 29th, 1972). He repeated the same warning five years later—meaning, therefore, that the problem was not ‘cured’ or ‘resolved’: “The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church” (Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13th, 1977. Pope Paul was dead 10 months later).
The famous modern-day exorcist, Fr. Gabriele Amorth (1925-2016), added “fuel to the fire” when he said in the year 2000: “The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Perhaps we [the exorcists] were excluded from the audience with the Pope because they were afraid that such a large number of exorcists might succeed in chasing out the legions of demons that have installed themselves in the Vatican. It may seem like a joke, but I do not believe it is. I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially, just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, 30 Days magazine, June 2000 issue).
The Fruits of Infiltration
What are fruits—projected, prophesied and actual—of this infiltration of Satan and his devils into the Church? Our Lady of La Salette foretold what we today can see for ourselves: “Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! … The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish. God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … they will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus … As true Faith fades, a false light brightens the people ... The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten … disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement!” (Our Lady of La Salette).
We’ve read all this before, we’ve seen all this before in our own lives, and we’ve perhaps been guilty of such things in our own lives—in other words, “We’ve been there, seen it, done it!”—and we don’t care! Or we care very little. All we really care about—or what we care MOST about—is our own little feathered nest and our own personal comforts in this “Valley of Tears”—except we have no tears to shed—for our sinful selves or for the sinful world. “But Jesus, turning to them, said: ‘Daughters of Jerusalem! Weep not over Me! But weep for yourselves, and for your children!” (Luke 23:28). Yet the only time we weep, is when we lose out on the comforts, advantages, pleasures, entertainments, profits or fun of the world! We are nuts! We are crazy! We are insane!
Our Lady said more or less the same thing to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Weep in deepest sorrow over the ruin of so many souls absorbed in such dangerous tepidity. They live in the obscurity of their passions and depraved inclinations, forgetful of the danger, unmoved by their losses, and heedless of their dealings. Instead of fearing and avoiding the occasions of evil, they encounter and seek for them in blind ignorance. In senseless fury they follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and care not where they walk, even if to the most dangerous precipices. They are surrounded by innumerable enemies, who pursue them with diabolical treachery, unceasing vigilance, unquenchable wrath and restless diligence. What wonder then, that from such extremes, or rather from such unequal combat, irreparable defeats should arise among the mortals? Since the number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate should also be uncountable, is there any wonder that the demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men? May the eternal God preserve thee from such a misfortune; and do thou weep and deplore that of thy brethren, continually asking for their salvation as far as is possible!” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Lenten Weeping
This brings us to the subject of Lent—which has been one of the prime targets for destruction by the devilish infiltrators of the Church. Why a prime target? Because of the weapons that Lent promotes and uses (or once promoted and once used)—namely, prayer and fasting. These weapons the devil fears: “Then came the disciples to Jesus secretly, and said: ‘Why could not we cast him [the devil] out?’ Jesus said to them: ‘Because this kind [of devil] is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!’” (Matthew 17:18-20). Hence, the less we pray and the less we fast, the more powerful the devil becomes—in the world in general and in our lives in particular. Hence the weakness of Catholics today—because they pray little and they do little penance. A large part of the blame and influence has to be laid at the feet of the Second Vatican Council and its successive fruits—one of which was the reduction of Lenten fasting by 95% by Pope Paul VI’s 1966 decree, Poenitemini, which reduced Lenten fasting from 40 day to merely two days—Ash Wednesday and Good Friday—which is a 95% reduction. Great deal, huh? Fantastic discount, huh? Ask those in ‘beneficiary’ lukewarm Catholics in Hell if they think so! “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou were cold, or hot! But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
Time For Lenten Change? A Lenten Upgrade?
Immediately after that shocking phrase of vomiting us out of His Mouth, God continues by blasting our inflated notion of self-sufficiency and complacency: “Thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I counsel thee to buy of Me gold [charity], fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see! Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance! Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock. If any man shall hear My voice, and open to Me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me. To him that shall overcome, I will give to sit with Me in My throne―as I also have overcome and am set down with My Father in His throne. He that hath an ear, let him hear!” (Apocalypse 3:17-22).
We Hear, But Don’t Hear
We hear, but it goes in one ear and out the other! “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand!” (Matthew 13:13). “Wherefore casting away all uncleanness, and abundance of sinfulness, with humility receive the ingrafted word, which is able to save your souls. But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if a man be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he shall be compared to a man beholding his own countenance in a glass. For he beheld himself, and went his way, and presently forgot what manner of man he was!” (James 1:21-24). In one ear and out the other! “God hath given him place for penance and he abuses it unto pride!”(Job 24:23). As Our Lord said: “No, I say to you! Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3) and Our Lady adds: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish!”
Catastrophically Cheap Catholic Cures
The 95% discounted Lent is not favorable for our salvation! It is “cheap” and it is “too easy” to be true (it is a con and a fake). In times of severe sickness (or the severe sick sinfulness that we see today), it is not less medicine that is required, but more medicine and more powerful medicine (penance)! You can shop for your medicine at whatever store you want—the old-fashioned traditional medicine that works, or the new medicine that does not work. “This kind [of devil] is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:18-20). We might add that the Vatican’s chief exorcist and the founder and president of the International Association of Exorcists, Fr. Gabriele Amorth (1925-2016), stopped using the new post-Vatican II rite of exorcism because it did not work, and he, as well as most other exorcists, went back to using the pre-Vatican II rite of exorcism once again! Do you get the point?
Speaking about the New Ritual of Exorcism, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, said in 2000 (a year after the new ritual was introduced), during an interview with 30 Days magazine (June 2000 issue):
“At the Vatican II Ecumenical Council, each commission was aided by a group of experts who assisted the bishops in their work. And this custom was kept up after the Council, every time that parts of the Ritual were redrafted. But not this time. And yet, if there were ever a subject that demanded the participation of specialists, it was truly this ... The declarations contained in the New Ritual are very serious and very damaging. They are the fruit of ignorance and inexperience ... I can affirm with certainty that none of the members of these commissions had ever performed an exorcism, had ever been present at an exorcism and ever possessed the slightest idea of what an exorcism is. Here lies the error, the original sin of this Ritual. Not one of those who collaborated on it was an exorcism specialist ... And yet we exorcists were never consulted. And what is more, any suggestions that we were able to make were unfavorably received by the commissions … What is more, the authors of the Ritual failed to notice that on two points they were contradicting the Catechism of the Catholic Church ... We are very badly treated. Our brother priests who are charged with this delicate task are treated as though they are crazy, as fanatics.
“We exorcists, the ones who would have to use it, we took the opportunity to point out that, on a number of points, we were in disagreement with the New Ritual. But the underlying Latin text has remained the same in this revised translation. This long-awaited Ritual has turned into a farce. An incredible obstacle that is likely to prevent us acting against the demon. They were looking to give us a blunt weapon. Efficacious prayers, prayers that had been in existence for twelve centuries, were suppressed and replaced by new ineffective prayers. But, as luck would have it, they threw us a lifeline at the last moment. The new Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship, Cardinal Jorge Medina, attached to the Ritual a Notification in which he specified that exorcists were not obliged to use this [new] Ritual and that, if they wished, they could ask their bishop for authorization to use the old one.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, 30 Days magazine, June 2000 issue).
Ten years later, in March of 2010, Fr. Amorth told La Repubblica, an Italian newspaper: “The devil resides in the Vatican and you can see the consequences … When one speaks of ‘the smoke of Satan’ [the phrase coined by Pope Paul VI in 1972] in the holy rooms, it is all true!”
In a book entitled The Kingdom of Darkness, the ex-Jesuit priest, Father Malachi Martin, who was the secretary to Cardinal Bea (the Vatican’s Head of the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity), describes what is meant by “the smoke of Satan”. Fr. Martin tells of an interview that Pope Paul VI gave to his close friend, Jean (John) Guitton, not long before he died. When Guitton asked Pope Paul VI about his often-quoted remark regarding “the smoke of Satan”, Paul VI replied: “Yes, the smoke of Satan is in the sanctuary. Due to the presence of Satan, Catholics are destined to become an infinitesimally small part of humanity.”
Father Martin continued: “We must remember this. A new assault has been launched. The assault is very simple. The temptation is: ‘Just be like the rest of men. Adore a general god. Be good. Be compassionate. Be humanitarian. Join the rest of humanity in building man’s earthly world.’ In Rome, there is a force which at the present moment is immovable. It cannot be dislodged by ordinary human means. This is where, again, one’s Faith in Our Lady of Fatima comes in, because she said that only she can save the Church, because that is what her Son has willed. It is not so because it was her own choice, but because it what Christ has chosen. Christ chose that His Mother should be the one to come and finally save the Church. If you read carefully what Our Lady told Sister Lucia, you get a strong message that things are going bad. Many of the elect will lose their Faith.”
A Fight for the Faith
Many have ALREADY lost their Faith—and the numbers are increasing. Will you be next? Remember that nobody loses the Faith overnight! The Faith is lost by the Faith being gradually weakened—Our Lady of La Salette says: “little by little!” Is your Faith—and the Faith of those in your family and those who surround you—is your and their Faith growing stronger year by year? If it is not growing stronger, then it is becoming weaker—for just as the masters of the spiritual life say that there is no standing still in the spiritual life: meaning that we are either progressing or regressing—likewise there is no standing still for the Faith.
If your Faith is not the most important thing in your life and if you are not feeding your Faith regularly, then you are running a great risk of losing your Faith sooner or later. God will not perform a miracle to keep you Faith alive if you are not keeping it alive on your own. As the theologians say: “God will not do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices.” To put it another way, “God helps those who help themselves!” If you will not lift the spoon to your mouth to feed yourself, God is not going to “spoon-feed” you! There were many priests and laity, who were raised and trained in pre-Vatican II times, who have now lost their Faith! “There but for the grace of God go we!” St. Paul puts it this way: “Wherefore he that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:12), adding: “with fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). If you cannot see and admit that we are in a perpetual warfare with our triple enemy—the devil, the world and our own flesh—then you risk falling in battle: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called! (1 Timothy 6:12). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12).
Most Christian ‘Soldiers’ Will Die in the Fight
Be not complacent, cocky nor presumptuous! Remember that Pope Paul VI said that “Catholics are destined to become an infinitesimally small part of humanity” and Fr. Malachi Martin added: “Many of the elect will lose their Faith.” Is that all fanciful talk and scaremongery? Well, didn’t Our Lord say: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). In speaking of our days, didn’t Our Lady of Good Success refer to “the small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith”? Didn’t Our Lady of La Salette speak of devils being released from Hell who “will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell. Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... Rome will lose the Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist”? Didn’t Our Lady of Fatima imply that most of the world would lose the Faith—or that is how most Fatima experts see it—when she said: “But in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved!”?
No “IFS” and “BUTS”
There are no “ifs” and “buts” about it―as Lent approaches, so too does the devil approach—remember that the Gospel for the First Sunday of Lent will see Our Lord tempted by the devil in the desert. The devil does not want “Good Lents” and, though he is there to tempt us all throughout the year, Lent is a time when he will pull out the “big guns” and seek to “blow us out of the water” before we even get started. This Lent will not be a good Lent—never mind dreaming of your best Lent ever—if you are not preparing to fight the devil and fight him with the powerful weapons Holy Mother Church gives you. Yet, if you imagine that there is no enemy, then you will not prepare for a fight―and you will come out of the battleground of Lent being the loser!
The devil’s preferred manner of working is in concealment—as Fr. Amorth says: “Satan's greatest success is to succeed in making people believe that he doesn’t exist. And in this he has almost succeeded. Even within the Church. We have a clergy and an episcopate who no longer believe in the devil, in exorcisms, in the extraordinary evil that the devil can cause, nor in the power that Jesus has given us to drive out demons” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, 30 Days magazine, June 2000).
Your Lenten Fight—the Devil’s Final Battle?
Is the devil satisfied—perhaps even gleefully rejoicing—over your previous Lents? Does he view you as being a half-baked Catholic, a half-hearted weakling, a lukewarm loser with a ‘pea-shooter’ or a ‘feather’ as a weapon? Are you a Lenten pushover, or a Lenten warrior? Will you go with Our Lord into the desert of Lent to defeat the devil, or will you lay conquered at the devil’s feet? Will you use the traditional weapons that have always worked, or will you buy into the 95% discounted Lent that does not work? The evidence is there if you want to see it! As Jesus said: “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. And the prophecy of Isaias is fulfilled in them, who says: ‘By hearing you shall hear and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see and shall not perceive.’ For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:13-15).
There is more truth to that question than we would at first care to admit! What would you think of a person who would throw themselves willingly into a fire? What would you think of a person who accumulates enormous debts without any real desire to pay back that debt? What would you think of someone who is prepared to commit theft, adultery, enjoy impure thoughts, who uses bad language, who practices calumny (lies and exaggerations) and detraction (revealing sins of others), who is scathing and uncharitable in thoughts, words and actions—and is willing to do all or some of this for an eternity of torture and burning in the fires of Hell? You would say that such a person is crazy, mad and insane! Yet, sadly, we are—in part or in total—that person!
Our Lady revealed to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “None of the mortals have altogether avoided sinning against God; and the punishment and retribution must inevitably correspond to the guilt―either in this life or the next. Therefore, as the soul commits sin in union with the body, it follows that both of them must be punished. The interior sorrow is not sufficient for atonement, if the body seeks to escape the punishment that corresponds to the guilt. Moreover, the debt is so great and the satisfaction that can be given by the creature so limited and scanty, that there remains continual uncertainty whether the Judge is satisfied―even after the exertions of a whole lifetime! Hence, the soul should find no rest to the end of life! … Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored! Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment! … What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation?” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
We sin, we confess (hopefully!), we do little or no penance, and we forget all about our sins! Such is our ‘mental’ attitude towards sin! We are, perhaps, even oblivious to the terrible consequences of even forgiven sins! “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5)—but WE ARE without fear about our past forgiven sins, and WE DO add sin upon sin! Insane! Crazy! Nuts! We refuse to accept the truth that the greatest evil that exists in the world is SIN! Our catechisms tell us that: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, Spirago-Clarke; My Catholic Faith, Bishop Morrow, STD).
We read that, but the “penny doesn’t drop”—we live as though sin was harmless, or relatively harmless—we (with the devil’s whispering helping us along) believe something different: “O God is good! O God is kind! O God is merciful! O God understands! O God has forgiven me! O God wouldn’t send me to Hell! Jesus died for me!” etc., etc. All of this is wonderfully true—as Holy Scripture says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). “Many, O Lord, are Thy mercies!” (Psalm 118:156). There are numerous quotes in Holy Scripture that testify to and confirm the mercies of God.
Yet everything in creation has a “positive-negative” aspect—even God. We cannot have the day without the night; the summer without the winter; heat without cold; health without sickness—we breathe (inhale) in and we breathe out (exhale); we cannot stay awake continually and work without having to sleep; we cannot just have great happiness in this life without times of great sorrow, etc. Likewise, God is not just “merciful”, but He is also “just”-- “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “All things that are done, God will bring into judgment, whether it be good or evil” (Ecclesiastes 12:14). “Evil pursues sinners: and to the just good shall be repaid” (Proverbs 13:21). For God is also just and God is not a doormat for the dirty boots of sin! “God is a just judge” (Psalm 7:12). “The Lord, Who is just, will cut the necks of sinners” (Psalm 128:4). Ouch! Reality check! Sanity reset button!
Blind and Crazy
We all know—at least instinctively—the price of sin―“The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23)―yet we “turn a blind-eye” to its consequences for ourselves. Of course, when it comes to the sins of others, we are no longer blind, but suddenly have “the eye of an eagle”—yet that is not what Our Lord wants: “Why seest thou the splinter that is in thy brother’s eye; and seest not the plank that is in thy own eye? Or how sayest thou to thy brother: ‘Let me cast the splinter out of thy eye; and behold a plank is in thy own eye? Thou hypocrite! Cast out first the plank from thy own eye, and then shalt thou see to cast out the splinter out of thy brother’s eye!” (Matthew 7:3-5). Such a “blinded” attitude—and it is very common—provoked Our Lord to say of such people: “Leave them alone! They are blind and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
Crazy Blind Scribes and Pharisees
Those words above were addressed to the ‘crazy’ and ‘blind’ Scribes and Pharisees, who were the “blind leaders” of the “blind people” to whom Our Lord referred. They were exposed to Our Lord’s truth, but, crazily and insanely, they did not accept Our Lord’s truth: “If I shall tell you, you will not believe Me! … If I say the truth to you, why do you not believe Me? Why do you not know My speech? Because you cannot hear My word! You do not believe, because you are not of My sheep! You are of your father the devil! He stood not in the truth; because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of lies. If you believe not, then you shall die in your sin! He that is of God, hears the words of God. Therefore you hear them not, because you are not of God. Every one that is of the truth, hears My voice!” (Luke 22:67; John 8:43-48; 10:26; 8:24; 18:37).
Crazy Confused Complacent Carefree Conned Catholics!
What would you think of someone, whose house was burning down, or whose ship was sinking (think of the Titanic read more here), who wasn’t concerned about what was happening and just wanted to continue watching TV, surfing the internet, listening to music, chatting or texting on the phone, playing games, eating, drinking and partying? You would say that they are crazy and insane! Yet that is exactly what most Catholics are doing as the Ark of the Church, the Barque of St. Peter, or the Ship of Faith, is being attacked, torpedoed, boarded and dismantled!
Even the otherwise Liberal Pope Paul VI publicly admitted on several occasions that Satan had entered the Church—thus confirming the prophecy of Our Lady of Akita, who said: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops.” We have been seeing that phenomenon, on an ever increasing scale, since the ‘great divide’ that occurred during the Second Vatican Council between the Conservatives on one side, and the Liberals and Modernists on the other side. The actual words of Pope Paul VI were: “From some fissure the smoke of Satan has entered the temple of God” (June 29th, 1972). He repeated the same warning five years later—meaning, therefore, that the problem was not ‘cured’ or ‘resolved’: “The tail of the devil is functioning in the disintegration of the Catholic world. The darkness of Satan has entered and spread throughout the Catholic Church even to its summit. Apostasy, the loss of the Faith, is spreading throughout the world and into the highest levels within the Church” (Address on the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Fatima Apparitions, October 13th, 1977. Pope Paul was dead 10 months later).
The famous modern-day exorcist, Fr. Gabriele Amorth (1925-2016), added “fuel to the fire” when he said in the year 2000: “The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Perhaps we [the exorcists] were excluded from the audience with the Pope because they were afraid that such a large number of exorcists might succeed in chasing out the legions of demons that have installed themselves in the Vatican. It may seem like a joke, but I do not believe it is. I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially, just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, 30 Days magazine, June 2000 issue).
The Fruits of Infiltration
What are fruits—projected, prophesied and actual—of this infiltration of Satan and his devils into the Church? Our Lady of La Salette foretold what we today can see for ourselves: “Woe to the priests and to those dedicated to God who, by their unfaithfulness and their wicked lives, are crucifying my Son again! … The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish. God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family ... Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God … they will preach another Gospel contrary to that of the true Christ Jesus … As true Faith fades, a false light brightens the people ... The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten … disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement!” (Our Lady of La Salette).
We’ve read all this before, we’ve seen all this before in our own lives, and we’ve perhaps been guilty of such things in our own lives—in other words, “We’ve been there, seen it, done it!”—and we don’t care! Or we care very little. All we really care about—or what we care MOST about—is our own little feathered nest and our own personal comforts in this “Valley of Tears”—except we have no tears to shed—for our sinful selves or for the sinful world. “But Jesus, turning to them, said: ‘Daughters of Jerusalem! Weep not over Me! But weep for yourselves, and for your children!” (Luke 23:28). Yet the only time we weep, is when we lose out on the comforts, advantages, pleasures, entertainments, profits or fun of the world! We are nuts! We are crazy! We are insane!
Our Lady said more or less the same thing to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Weep in deepest sorrow over the ruin of so many souls absorbed in such dangerous tepidity. They live in the obscurity of their passions and depraved inclinations, forgetful of the danger, unmoved by their losses, and heedless of their dealings. Instead of fearing and avoiding the occasions of evil, they encounter and seek for them in blind ignorance. In senseless fury they follow their pleasures, place no restraint on their passionate desires, and care not where they walk, even if to the most dangerous precipices. They are surrounded by innumerable enemies, who pursue them with diabolical treachery, unceasing vigilance, unquenchable wrath and restless diligence. What wonder then, that from such extremes, or rather from such unequal combat, irreparable defeats should arise among the mortals? Since the number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate should also be uncountable, is there any wonder that the demon should be inflated by his triumphs in the perdition of so many men? May the eternal God preserve thee from such a misfortune; and do thou weep and deplore that of thy brethren, continually asking for their salvation as far as is possible!” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda).
Lenten Weeping
This brings us to the subject of Lent—which has been one of the prime targets for destruction by the devilish infiltrators of the Church. Why a prime target? Because of the weapons that Lent promotes and uses (or once promoted and once used)—namely, prayer and fasting. These weapons the devil fears: “Then came the disciples to Jesus secretly, and said: ‘Why could not we cast him [the devil] out?’ Jesus said to them: ‘Because this kind [of devil] is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!’” (Matthew 17:18-20). Hence, the less we pray and the less we fast, the more powerful the devil becomes—in the world in general and in our lives in particular. Hence the weakness of Catholics today—because they pray little and they do little penance. A large part of the blame and influence has to be laid at the feet of the Second Vatican Council and its successive fruits—one of which was the reduction of Lenten fasting by 95% by Pope Paul VI’s 1966 decree, Poenitemini, which reduced Lenten fasting from 40 day to merely two days—Ash Wednesday and Good Friday—which is a 95% reduction. Great deal, huh? Fantastic discount, huh? Ask those in ‘beneficiary’ lukewarm Catholics in Hell if they think so! “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou were cold, or hot! But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
Time For Lenten Change? A Lenten Upgrade?
Immediately after that shocking phrase of vomiting us out of His Mouth, God continues by blasting our inflated notion of self-sufficiency and complacency: “Thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I counsel thee to buy of Me gold [charity], fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see! Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance! Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock. If any man shall hear My voice, and open to Me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me. To him that shall overcome, I will give to sit with Me in My throne―as I also have overcome and am set down with My Father in His throne. He that hath an ear, let him hear!” (Apocalypse 3:17-22).
We Hear, But Don’t Hear
We hear, but it goes in one ear and out the other! “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand!” (Matthew 13:13). “Wherefore casting away all uncleanness, and abundance of sinfulness, with humility receive the ingrafted word, which is able to save your souls. But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if a man be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he shall be compared to a man beholding his own countenance in a glass. For he beheld himself, and went his way, and presently forgot what manner of man he was!” (James 1:21-24). In one ear and out the other! “God hath given him place for penance and he abuses it unto pride!”(Job 24:23). As Our Lord said: “No, I say to you! Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3) and Our Lady adds: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish!”
Catastrophically Cheap Catholic Cures
The 95% discounted Lent is not favorable for our salvation! It is “cheap” and it is “too easy” to be true (it is a con and a fake). In times of severe sickness (or the severe sick sinfulness that we see today), it is not less medicine that is required, but more medicine and more powerful medicine (penance)! You can shop for your medicine at whatever store you want—the old-fashioned traditional medicine that works, or the new medicine that does not work. “This kind [of devil] is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:18-20). We might add that the Vatican’s chief exorcist and the founder and president of the International Association of Exorcists, Fr. Gabriele Amorth (1925-2016), stopped using the new post-Vatican II rite of exorcism because it did not work, and he, as well as most other exorcists, went back to using the pre-Vatican II rite of exorcism once again! Do you get the point?
Speaking about the New Ritual of Exorcism, Fr. Gabriele Amorth, said in 2000 (a year after the new ritual was introduced), during an interview with 30 Days magazine (June 2000 issue):
“At the Vatican II Ecumenical Council, each commission was aided by a group of experts who assisted the bishops in their work. And this custom was kept up after the Council, every time that parts of the Ritual were redrafted. But not this time. And yet, if there were ever a subject that demanded the participation of specialists, it was truly this ... The declarations contained in the New Ritual are very serious and very damaging. They are the fruit of ignorance and inexperience ... I can affirm with certainty that none of the members of these commissions had ever performed an exorcism, had ever been present at an exorcism and ever possessed the slightest idea of what an exorcism is. Here lies the error, the original sin of this Ritual. Not one of those who collaborated on it was an exorcism specialist ... And yet we exorcists were never consulted. And what is more, any suggestions that we were able to make were unfavorably received by the commissions … What is more, the authors of the Ritual failed to notice that on two points they were contradicting the Catechism of the Catholic Church ... We are very badly treated. Our brother priests who are charged with this delicate task are treated as though they are crazy, as fanatics.
“We exorcists, the ones who would have to use it, we took the opportunity to point out that, on a number of points, we were in disagreement with the New Ritual. But the underlying Latin text has remained the same in this revised translation. This long-awaited Ritual has turned into a farce. An incredible obstacle that is likely to prevent us acting against the demon. They were looking to give us a blunt weapon. Efficacious prayers, prayers that had been in existence for twelve centuries, were suppressed and replaced by new ineffective prayers. But, as luck would have it, they threw us a lifeline at the last moment. The new Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship, Cardinal Jorge Medina, attached to the Ritual a Notification in which he specified that exorcists were not obliged to use this [new] Ritual and that, if they wished, they could ask their bishop for authorization to use the old one.” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, 30 Days magazine, June 2000 issue).
Ten years later, in March of 2010, Fr. Amorth told La Repubblica, an Italian newspaper: “The devil resides in the Vatican and you can see the consequences … When one speaks of ‘the smoke of Satan’ [the phrase coined by Pope Paul VI in 1972] in the holy rooms, it is all true!”
In a book entitled The Kingdom of Darkness, the ex-Jesuit priest, Father Malachi Martin, who was the secretary to Cardinal Bea (the Vatican’s Head of the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity), describes what is meant by “the smoke of Satan”. Fr. Martin tells of an interview that Pope Paul VI gave to his close friend, Jean (John) Guitton, not long before he died. When Guitton asked Pope Paul VI about his often-quoted remark regarding “the smoke of Satan”, Paul VI replied: “Yes, the smoke of Satan is in the sanctuary. Due to the presence of Satan, Catholics are destined to become an infinitesimally small part of humanity.”
Father Martin continued: “We must remember this. A new assault has been launched. The assault is very simple. The temptation is: ‘Just be like the rest of men. Adore a general god. Be good. Be compassionate. Be humanitarian. Join the rest of humanity in building man’s earthly world.’ In Rome, there is a force which at the present moment is immovable. It cannot be dislodged by ordinary human means. This is where, again, one’s Faith in Our Lady of Fatima comes in, because she said that only she can save the Church, because that is what her Son has willed. It is not so because it was her own choice, but because it what Christ has chosen. Christ chose that His Mother should be the one to come and finally save the Church. If you read carefully what Our Lady told Sister Lucia, you get a strong message that things are going bad. Many of the elect will lose their Faith.”
A Fight for the Faith
Many have ALREADY lost their Faith—and the numbers are increasing. Will you be next? Remember that nobody loses the Faith overnight! The Faith is lost by the Faith being gradually weakened—Our Lady of La Salette says: “little by little!” Is your Faith—and the Faith of those in your family and those who surround you—is your and their Faith growing stronger year by year? If it is not growing stronger, then it is becoming weaker—for just as the masters of the spiritual life say that there is no standing still in the spiritual life: meaning that we are either progressing or regressing—likewise there is no standing still for the Faith.
If your Faith is not the most important thing in your life and if you are not feeding your Faith regularly, then you are running a great risk of losing your Faith sooner or later. God will not perform a miracle to keep you Faith alive if you are not keeping it alive on your own. As the theologians say: “God will not do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices.” To put it another way, “God helps those who help themselves!” If you will not lift the spoon to your mouth to feed yourself, God is not going to “spoon-feed” you! There were many priests and laity, who were raised and trained in pre-Vatican II times, who have now lost their Faith! “There but for the grace of God go we!” St. Paul puts it this way: “Wherefore he that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:12), adding: “with fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). If you cannot see and admit that we are in a perpetual warfare with our triple enemy—the devil, the world and our own flesh—then you risk falling in battle: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called! (1 Timothy 6:12). “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places!” (Ephesians 6:12).
Most Christian ‘Soldiers’ Will Die in the Fight
Be not complacent, cocky nor presumptuous! Remember that Pope Paul VI said that “Catholics are destined to become an infinitesimally small part of humanity” and Fr. Malachi Martin added: “Many of the elect will lose their Faith.” Is that all fanciful talk and scaremongery? Well, didn’t Our Lord say: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). In speaking of our days, didn’t Our Lady of Good Success refer to “the small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith”? Didn’t Our Lady of La Salette speak of devils being released from Hell who “will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell. Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls ... Rome will lose the Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist”? Didn’t Our Lady of Fatima imply that most of the world would lose the Faith—or that is how most Fatima experts see it—when she said: “But in Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved!”?
No “IFS” and “BUTS”
There are no “ifs” and “buts” about it―as Lent approaches, so too does the devil approach—remember that the Gospel for the First Sunday of Lent will see Our Lord tempted by the devil in the desert. The devil does not want “Good Lents” and, though he is there to tempt us all throughout the year, Lent is a time when he will pull out the “big guns” and seek to “blow us out of the water” before we even get started. This Lent will not be a good Lent—never mind dreaming of your best Lent ever—if you are not preparing to fight the devil and fight him with the powerful weapons Holy Mother Church gives you. Yet, if you imagine that there is no enemy, then you will not prepare for a fight―and you will come out of the battleground of Lent being the loser!
The devil’s preferred manner of working is in concealment—as Fr. Amorth says: “Satan's greatest success is to succeed in making people believe that he doesn’t exist. And in this he has almost succeeded. Even within the Church. We have a clergy and an episcopate who no longer believe in the devil, in exorcisms, in the extraordinary evil that the devil can cause, nor in the power that Jesus has given us to drive out demons” (Fr. Gabriele Amorth, 30 Days magazine, June 2000).
Your Lenten Fight—the Devil’s Final Battle?
Is the devil satisfied—perhaps even gleefully rejoicing—over your previous Lents? Does he view you as being a half-baked Catholic, a half-hearted weakling, a lukewarm loser with a ‘pea-shooter’ or a ‘feather’ as a weapon? Are you a Lenten pushover, or a Lenten warrior? Will you go with Our Lord into the desert of Lent to defeat the devil, or will you lay conquered at the devil’s feet? Will you use the traditional weapons that have always worked, or will you buy into the 95% discounted Lent that does not work? The evidence is there if you want to see it! As Jesus said: “Seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. And the prophecy of Isaias is fulfilled in them, who says: ‘By hearing you shall hear and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see and shall not perceive.’ For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:13-15).
Article 10
Tuesday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 6th
Let Our Lady Lend a Lenten Hand This Lent
Tuesday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 6th
Let Our Lady Lend a Lenten Hand This Lent
Do You Want Christ To Live In You?
During this Sexagesima week of the Septuagesima season, Holy Mother Church has given us the theme of sowing seeds, which was “sown” by the Gospel of the Mass on Sexagesima Sunday—“The Sower of the Seed.” Therefore, let us continue studying the various angles or perspectives that this theme gives us. In the previous article we spoke of planting the Tree of Life in our soul. This “Tree of Life” consists of both Jesus and Mary—for you cannot have one without the other. As St. Louis de Montfort writes, in his True Devotion to Mary, Jesus and Mary are inseparable—like a tree trunk and its roots, or like a body and its soul. Separation means death. “O sweet Jesus, to complain lovingly to Thy Divine Majesty that the greater part of Christians, even the most learned, do not know the necessary union there is between Thee and Thy holy Mother. Thou, Lord, art always with Mary, and Mary is always with Thee, and she cannot be without Thee, else she would cease to be what she is. She is so transformed into Thee by grace that she lives no more, she is as though she were not” (St. Louis de Montfort writes, in his True Devotion to Mary, §63).
St. Louis further writes: “Be persuaded, then, that the more you look at Mary in your prayers, contemplations, actions and sufferings, if not with a distinct and definite view, at least with a general and imperceptible one, the more perfectly will you find Jesus Christ, who is always, with Mary.” [That is why we must] “do all our actions by Mary, with Mary, in Mary and for Mary; so that we may do them all the more perfectly by Jesus, with Jesus, in Jesus and for Jesus” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §165 & §257).
Similarly, you cannot have Jesus living in you without His grace. In the Foreword of St. Louis de Montfort’s book Love of eternal Wisdom, we read: “Christ lives in all Christians who are in the state of grace. In the great majority, however, the Christian life is only, as it were, in its embryo. Montfort’s aim is to develop that embryo until Christ has come to the fullness of His age in us. That is, until we have become perfect Christians. According to Montfort this perfect Christian life is acquired by an ardent desire, continual prayer, universal mortification and a tender and true devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary.”
“Without Me, You Can Do Nothing!”
What Our Lord says of Himself--“Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5)—is equally true of Our Lady. The saints are clear on this point. St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.” St. Bonaventure (also Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation.” St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church) writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.” St. Alphonsus Liguori (another Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.” St. Anselm (also a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost.”
So how is it that most souls are lost? They are lost because they have little or no devotion to Mary, or because their devotion to Mary is false or fake. St. Louis de Montfort lists seven chief false devotions: “More than ever before, there are false devotions to our Blessed Lady which are easily mistaken for true ones ... I find seven kinds of false devotees and false devotions to Our Lady, namely: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the interested devotees … The devil, like a false coiner and a subtle and experienced sharper, has already deceived and destroyed so many souls by a false devotion to the Blessed Virgin that he makes a daily use of his diabolical experience to plunge many others by this same way into everlasting perdition; amusing them, lulling them to sleep in sin, under the pretext of some prayers badly said or of some outward practices which he inspires … It is then very important to recognize, first of all, false devotions to our Blessed Lady, in order to avoid them, and true devotion, in order to embrace it; secondly, which of the many practices of true devotion to our Blessed Lady is the most perfect, the most agreeable to her, the most glorious to God, and the most sanctifying for ourselves, so that we may adopt that one” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §90 - §92).
Bank on Mary—Bank with Mary
Holy Mother Church tells us that Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace—meaning that she is medium through which Our Lord (the Author of All Grace) distributes His graces to the whole world. From the greatest possible grace down to tiniest grace—all of those graces pass through the hands of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
You could—in a very imperfect way—liken it to family situation, where the father goes out to work and earns the money, and then brings the money home and gives it all to his wife, telling her to use it on the children as she sees fit and to take care of paying the bills and purchasing all that needs purchasing. In a sense, the husband makes the wife to be the treasurer of his earnings. Our Lord has done the same thing with Our Lady—she is the treasurer of all His graces.
St. Louis de Montfort writes: “God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (mare). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Maria [“maria” in Latin means “sea”]). This great God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has of beauty and splendor, of rarity and preciousness, including even His own Son: and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich .
“God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues; and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly.
“To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such wise that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary; so that she who, impoverished, humbled, and who hid herself even unto the abyss of nothingness by her profound humility her whole life long, should now be enriched and exalted and honored by the Most High. Such are the sentiments of the Church and the holy Fathers” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §23 - §25).
Of Mary There Is Never Enough!
St. Louis de Montfort urges us on to a greater reliance upon and a more fervent devotion to Mary—for only a true devotion can guarantee to save our souls—and few and far between are those who can say their devotion is a true devotion, ranked above the many imaginary, futile and false ‘devotions’ that exist in most souls:
“The saints have said admirable things of this holy city of God; and they were never more eloquent and more content than when they spoke of her. Yet, after all they have said, they cry out that the height of her merits cannot be fully seen; that the breadth of her charity is in truth immeasurable; that the length of her power is incomprehensible; and finally, that the depth of her humility, and of all her virtues and graces, is an abyss which never can be sounded. O height incomprehensible! O breadth unspeakable! O length immeasurable! O abyss impenetrable! … St. Bonaventure tells us that all the angels in Heaven cry out incessantly to her: ‘Holy, holy, holy Mary, Mother of God and Virgin’ and that they offer to her, millions and millions of times a day, the Angelical Salutation, the Ave Maria, prostrating themselves before her, and begging of her in her graciousness to honor them with some of her commands …
“The whole Earth is full of her glory, especially among Christians, by whom she is taken as the protectress of many kingdoms, provinces, dioceses and cities. Many cathedrals are consecrated to God under her name. There is not a church without an altar in her honor, not a country nor a canton where there are not some miraculous images where all sorts of evils are cured and all sorts of good gifts obtained. Who can count the confraternities and congregations in her honor? How many religious orders have been founded in her name and under her protection? How many members in these confraternities, and how many religious men and women in all these orders, who publish her praises and confess her mercies! …
“Yet after all that, we must cry out with the saints: ‘De Maria numquam satis’—‘Of Mary there is never enough.’ We have not yet praised, exalted, honored, loved and served Mary as we ought. She deserves still more praise, still more respect, still more love, and still more service … We must cry out with the Apostle, “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor man’s heart comprehended” (1 Corinthians 2:9) the beauties, the grandeurs, the excellences of Mary!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §7 - §10, §12).
Fr. Faber’s Preface
In his personal translation of St. Louis’ True Devotion to Mary, Fr. Faber—no doubt urged on by the above quoted words of St. Louis—writes in the Preface of his translation equally inspiring and true words:
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one. Here in England, Mary is not half enough preached. Devotion to her is low and thin and poor. It is frightened out of its wits by the sneers of heresy. It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that Protestants may feel at ease about her. Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy. It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be. It has no faith in itself. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized.
“Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background. Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them. It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines. Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother. I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable [St. Louis] Grignon De Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ. Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!” (Fr. Faber, Preface, True Devotion to Mary).
A Spiritually Synthetic “Slap-In-The-Face”
Much of the above quoted words should be like a “spiritual slap in the face” with regard to our attitude towards Our Lady. Hardly anyone has a “true” devotion to her! Most people have, what we could in modern terms call, a “synthetic” devotion to her—meaning that is full of man-made “additives” that spoil, corrupt and weaken what could and should be a “true”, “real” and “organic” devotion to Mary.
We ‘poison’ our devotion to Mary like modern man poisons his food by unnatural additives. Dr. Royal Lee (1895-1967), who died shortly after the Second Vatican Council ended (1965), was a true genius, inventor, scientist and nutritionist. He was a mechanical genius, with countless patents and inventions to his name, that can be found in everything from standing food mixers to electric dental drills. He was also a farmer, a researcher, an activist, and a philanthropist who was decorated by humanitarian and scientific societies alike. Dr. Royal Lee was called the “Einstein of nutrition,” and hailed as the greatest nutritionist of the twentieth century. Yet today his name and work go largely unknown―much like St. Louis de Montfort’s “True Devotion to Mary”. This is no coincidence. Dr. Lee’s basic message—that the ultimate cause of most modern disease is malnutrition brought on by industrially produced foods—threatened some of America’s mightiest institutions.
Dr. Lee wrote: “One of the biggest tragedies of human civilization is the precedence of chemical therapy over nutrition. It is the substitution of artificial therapy over natural, of poisons over food, in which we are feeding people poisons trying to correct the reactions of starvation.”
A similar thing could be said with reference to the spiritual realm, which we could, in a parallel fashion, phrase as follows: “One of the biggest tragedies of human civilization is the precedence of worldliness, or devotion to the world, over devotion to Mary. It is the substitution of artificial solutions for the only real solution, it is the substitution of the material for the spiritual, the substitution of worldly poisons over spirituality―by which we are feeding unnatural and poisonous nourishment to the souls of people who are starving for God―without even realizing it―but, instead, are being fed godless material things to satisfy that spiritual hunger. This leads to a spiritual deprivation, a spiritual malnutrition, a spiritual starvation, and, ultimately, to a spiritual damnation.”
Synthetic and Sin-thetic
Food is the fuel that energizes our body for work, play and healing. It is the source of our vitality and contains all sub-stances necessary for the regulation of all our bodily processes. Human life has existed and survived for thousands of years using nothing more than natural foods from plants and animals, along with fresh water and clear air. Today, our environment (not to mention our soul) has become very polluted. Most people live far removed from farms and have no gardens (just as they live far from God, the Church and have no 'spiritual gardens' in their souls). Food is processed to allow for long distance transportation and a long shelf-life, not nutritional content. Synthetic compounds are used to increase crop yields, to add flavor, and to preserve food. Then we use synthetic vitamins and medications to treat deficiency diseases caused by depletion of life-giving nutrients. What a vicious synthetic cycle! Synthetics in food make us sick and then we take synthetic medicines in the hope that we will become healthy again! In the spiritual realm, you could change the word “synthetic” into “sin-thetic”!
Synthetic or Sin-thetic Spirituality
Everything that glitters is not gold. Just as there are synthetic materials like polyester, there are authentic fabrics like cotton or wool. You can have real wood or synthetic plastic ‘wood’. There are real diamonds and mere glass ‘diamonds’ that are fakes. The synthetic and authentic can look a lot alike. The same is true in spirituality. There are synthetic, man-made spiritualities and there are authentic, God-made spiritualities—just as there are ‘synthetic’ man-made Christian churches and there is the authentic God-made Church—the Catholic Church .
Yet within that authentic Catholic Church there are many synthetic man-made spiritualities. In fact, most souls have created their own ‘synthetic’ spirituality, which caters to their personal wishes, hopes, dreams and preferences! Do not take that statement lightly, nor dismiss it too quickly! For you are quite likely to be one of those who has created their own preferred ‘synthetic’ spirituality, whereby you refuse to read, think, write and talk about the unpleasant things, but love to read, think, talk and write about the pleasant aspects of religion. Priests fall into that category and lay people fall into that category—and their numbers have grown immensely since the Second Vatican Council—which has “sown the seed” of a “sweet” Catholicism that makes Catholicism “lose its teeth” and hence we are plagued by “toothless Catholics” today. Or could you call those “toothless Catholics” another name, such as “Cotton-Candy Catholics” (“Candy-Floss Catholics” in other parts of the English-speaking world)? Whereas, in Christ’s opinion, they should be “Cross-Carrying Catholics” and not “Cotton-Candy Catholics”! “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23). Our Lord even cursed the fig tree that He found to be “all leaves and no fruit”—which can be translated as “all words and no actions”, or “Faith without works.”
“Synthetic” Catholics prefer a “Synthetic” spirituality that needs little care and attention—much like plastic flowers! You can buy some truly exquisite bouquets of plastic flowers that you can take home, plonk on the table, and that is all you have to do! A one time thing! You do not have you water them, they will not wilt, they won’t smell ‘funny’ with time, you don’t have to keep changing the water or prune or throw out the wilted ones. From a distance, they look like the real thing. But when you get up close, you can see that each one is exactly alike. They all came out of the same press. They were ‘flawless’ and don’t have those little brown veins or ragged edges you see on real flowers. But they also could not emit a beautiful aroma, or offer tenderness to the touch. They are not living flowers, but dead plastic or dead synthetic fabric flowers.
Synthetic Scribes and Plastic Pharisees!
This “synthetic spirituality”—a mixture of God made elements and man-made preferences—was even prevalent in the time of Our Lord. The Scribes and the Pharisees were prime example of this “synthetic spirituality” and Our Lord made that clear on many occasions. The Scribes and Pharisees had taken the religion and law of God, to which they then added their own religious practices and self-made laws. They held themselves to be almost flawless and looked upon those who were not of their group, as something inferior and to be shunned—as Our Lord has the Pharisee say in His parable of the Pharisee and the Publican: “O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!” (Luke 18:11-12).
Our Lord’s attitude to these “Synthetic Scribes and Plastic Pharisees” is seen and proved by the following words: “The Scribes and the Pharisees have sat on the chair of Moses. All things therefore whatsoever they shall say to you, observe and do: but according to their works do ye not; for they say, and do not! … They love the first places at feasts, and the first chairs in the synagogues, and salutations in the market place, and to be called by men, ‘Rabbi!’ … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness! Thou blind Pharisee! First make clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, that the outside may become clean! Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you are like to whited sepulchers, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men's bones, and of all filthiness! So you also outwardly indeed appear to men just; but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity!” (Matthew, chapter 23). Just like fake wood, fake marble, fake crystal, fake flowers, fake fruit—all those things appear real on the outside, but are a mere pretense of reality.
The same applies to Catholics who are synthetic. They look good from a distance, but when you look more closely, you find they rarely, if ever, admit any flaws. Authentic Catholics are open about their flaws, yet they are being shaped by the Holy Spirit, and not being pressed and shaped by a human mold.
Authentic or Synthetic?
Authenticity means a person must live following the perspective, principles and power of God’s kingdom. The synthetic person operates in the perspective, principles and power of this world. God says: “My thoughts [perspectives and principles] are not your thoughts [perspectives and principles]: nor your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so are my ways exalted above your ways, and my thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9).
This leads us back to Mary—have we, over the years, created our own “synthetic devotion” to Mary? Have we filtered-out the God’s unpleasant ingredients and demands and mixed-in our own man-made “synthetic sweetener” to make it less demanding, less abrasive, less painful, less troublesome, less time-consuming, less noticeable, etc.? The odds are stacked in favor of an affirmative answer to that question! Yes, we have made our own “synthetic devotion” to Mary—and we are very comfortable with it! We like a less demanding, less abrasive, less painful, less troublesome, less time-consuming, less noticeable devotion—it gives us more time to do the things we really want to do!
It is this kind of a “synthetic” attitude that leads to little fruit in the spiritual life and leads to little hope of salvation, which is why Our Lord and many saints say the little is the number of those who are saved: “A certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved? But Jesus said: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14). As we say in the Litany of Our Lady (Litany of Loreto): “Gate of Heaven”—Our Lady is our gate to Heaven, our narrow gate to Heaven, and few there are that truly find that gate! St. Louis de Montfort, speaking of his “True Devotion to Mary”, writes: “The practice which I am about to disclose is one of these secrets of grace, unknown to the greater number of Christians, known even to few of the devout, and practiced and relished by a lesser number still!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §83).
Get Yourself an Authentic, NOT Synthetic, Devotion to Mary!
That is why we shall be launching another True Devotion to Mary consecration—beginning on the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes on February 11th and ending on the feast of the Annunciation (Palm Sunday) on March 25th. If you want something less demanding, less abrasive, less painful, less troublesome, less time-consuming and less fatiguing, then there are plenty of other “Cotton-Candy Catholic” websites and books where you will find a “cotton-candy meditation” that is over in 2 minutes and asks no more than one a day! If that is your idea of devotion to Mary, then good luck—especially on Judgment Day! For our part, we prefer to follow St. Louis de Montfort’s authentic advice—and not some synthetic imitator’s advice—of giving it our ALL! “We must choose, therefore, among all the devotions to the Blessed Virgin, the one which draws us most toward this death to ourselves, inasmuch as it will be the best and the most sanctifying. For we must not think that all that shines is gold, that all that tastes sweet is honey, or that all that is easy to do and is done by the greatest number is the most sanctifying” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §83).
You can rest assured that the devil—as St. Louis de Montfort foretells—will do all in his power to sidetrack you and prevent you from successfully making (for you can also make it, but unsuccessfully or fruitlessly, by just mechanically going through the prayers, readings and exercises). “The devil, like a false coiner and a subtle and experienced sharper, has already deceived and destroyed so many souls by a false devotion to the Blessed Virgin that he makes a daily use of his diabolical experience to plunge many others by this same way into everlasting perdition; amusing them, lulling them to sleep in sin, under the pretext of some prayers badly said or of some outward practices which he inspires … It is then very important to recognize, first of all, false devotions to our Blessed Lady, in order to avoid them, and true devotion, in order to embrace it!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §90).
The devil knows the power of Mary and the power of devotion to her—as he testified to St. Dominic during an exorcism: “We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! … And we have no success with her faithful servants!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”, §104). That means to say that the devils DO HAVE SUCCESS with those who are NOT “really persevered in her service” and who are NOT “her faithful servants”.
A Scary Authentic, NOT Synthetic, Truth!
Think on this! Most Catholics have prayed the Rosary, yet most Catholics are damned! Most Catholics have had some kind of devotion to Our Lady, yet most Catholics are damned! It is not what you do—it is how well you do it that matters. Our Lord gives a similar warning: “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, but he that doth the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!’” (Matthew 7:21-23). What is this ‘mysterious’ will of His Father? Our Lady tells us at Fatima: “He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it!” (June 1917) … “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” (July 1917).
To the already above quoted passage about “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven”―Our Lord then immediately goes on to say: “Everyone therefore that heareth these My words, and doth them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that heareth these My words, and doth them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof” (Matthew 7:24-27). The rock is a “True Devotion to Mary”—it is a “rock” that will withstand all the assaults of man and devil. The “sand” consists of the multiple flimsy, tiny, partial, condensed, synthetic devotions to Mary—which are not worthy of the name “devotion” nor worthy of Mary. Which one will you choose? Which one will you offer Mary? Which one will lead you where? “And great was the fall thereof!”
During this Sexagesima week of the Septuagesima season, Holy Mother Church has given us the theme of sowing seeds, which was “sown” by the Gospel of the Mass on Sexagesima Sunday—“The Sower of the Seed.” Therefore, let us continue studying the various angles or perspectives that this theme gives us. In the previous article we spoke of planting the Tree of Life in our soul. This “Tree of Life” consists of both Jesus and Mary—for you cannot have one without the other. As St. Louis de Montfort writes, in his True Devotion to Mary, Jesus and Mary are inseparable—like a tree trunk and its roots, or like a body and its soul. Separation means death. “O sweet Jesus, to complain lovingly to Thy Divine Majesty that the greater part of Christians, even the most learned, do not know the necessary union there is between Thee and Thy holy Mother. Thou, Lord, art always with Mary, and Mary is always with Thee, and she cannot be without Thee, else she would cease to be what she is. She is so transformed into Thee by grace that she lives no more, she is as though she were not” (St. Louis de Montfort writes, in his True Devotion to Mary, §63).
St. Louis further writes: “Be persuaded, then, that the more you look at Mary in your prayers, contemplations, actions and sufferings, if not with a distinct and definite view, at least with a general and imperceptible one, the more perfectly will you find Jesus Christ, who is always, with Mary.” [That is why we must] “do all our actions by Mary, with Mary, in Mary and for Mary; so that we may do them all the more perfectly by Jesus, with Jesus, in Jesus and for Jesus” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §165 & §257).
Similarly, you cannot have Jesus living in you without His grace. In the Foreword of St. Louis de Montfort’s book Love of eternal Wisdom, we read: “Christ lives in all Christians who are in the state of grace. In the great majority, however, the Christian life is only, as it were, in its embryo. Montfort’s aim is to develop that embryo until Christ has come to the fullness of His age in us. That is, until we have become perfect Christians. According to Montfort this perfect Christian life is acquired by an ardent desire, continual prayer, universal mortification and a tender and true devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary.”
“Without Me, You Can Do Nothing!”
What Our Lord says of Himself--“Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5)—is equally true of Our Lady. The saints are clear on this point. St. Albert the Great (a Doctor of the Church), says: “They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish.” St. Bonaventure (also Doctor of the Church) repeats the same thought when he says: “They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation.” St. Ignatius of Antioch (a Father of the Church) writes: “A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost.” St. Alphonsus Liguori (another Doctor of the Church) says: “It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection.” St. Anselm (also a Doctor of the Church) writes: “He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost.”
So how is it that most souls are lost? They are lost because they have little or no devotion to Mary, or because their devotion to Mary is false or fake. St. Louis de Montfort lists seven chief false devotions: “More than ever before, there are false devotions to our Blessed Lady which are easily mistaken for true ones ... I find seven kinds of false devotees and false devotions to Our Lady, namely: (1) the critical devotees; (2) the scrupulous devotees; (3) the external devotees; (4) the presumptuous devotees; (5) the inconstant devotees; (6) the hypocritical devotees; (7) the interested devotees … The devil, like a false coiner and a subtle and experienced sharper, has already deceived and destroyed so many souls by a false devotion to the Blessed Virgin that he makes a daily use of his diabolical experience to plunge many others by this same way into everlasting perdition; amusing them, lulling them to sleep in sin, under the pretext of some prayers badly said or of some outward practices which he inspires … It is then very important to recognize, first of all, false devotions to our Blessed Lady, in order to avoid them, and true devotion, in order to embrace it; secondly, which of the many practices of true devotion to our Blessed Lady is the most perfect, the most agreeable to her, the most glorious to God, and the most sanctifying for ourselves, so that we may adopt that one” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §90 - §92).
Bank on Mary—Bank with Mary
Holy Mother Church tells us that Our Lady is the Mediatrix of All Grace—meaning that she is medium through which Our Lord (the Author of All Grace) distributes His graces to the whole world. From the greatest possible grace down to tiniest grace—all of those graces pass through the hands of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
You could—in a very imperfect way—liken it to family situation, where the father goes out to work and earns the money, and then brings the money home and gives it all to his wife, telling her to use it on the children as she sees fit and to take care of paying the bills and purchasing all that needs purchasing. In a sense, the husband makes the wife to be the treasurer of his earnings. Our Lord has done the same thing with Our Lady—she is the treasurer of all His graces.
St. Louis de Montfort writes: “God the Father made an assemblage of all the waters and He named it the sea (mare). He made an assemblage of all His graces and he called it Mary (Maria [“maria” in Latin means “sea”]). This great God has a most rich treasury in which He has laid up all that He has of beauty and splendor, of rarity and preciousness, including even His own Son: and this immense treasury is none other than Mary, whom the saints have named the Treasure of the Lord, out of whose plenitude all men are made rich .
“God the Son has communicated to His Mother all that He acquired by His life and His death, His infinite merits and His admirable virtues; and He has made her the treasurer of all that His Father gave Him for His inheritance. It is by her that He applies His merits to His members, and that He communicates His virtues, and distributes His graces. She is His mysterious canal; she is His aqueduct, through which He makes His mercies flow gently and abundantly.
“To Mary, His faithful spouse, God the Holy Ghost has communicated His unspeakable gifts; and He has chosen her to be the dispenser of all He possesses, in such wise that she distributes to whom she wills, as much as she wills, as she wills and when she wills, all His gifts and graces. The Holy Ghost gives no heavenly gift to men which He does not have pass through her virginal hands. Such has been the will of God, who has willed that we should have everything through Mary; so that she who, impoverished, humbled, and who hid herself even unto the abyss of nothingness by her profound humility her whole life long, should now be enriched and exalted and honored by the Most High. Such are the sentiments of the Church and the holy Fathers” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §23 - §25).
Of Mary There Is Never Enough!
St. Louis de Montfort urges us on to a greater reliance upon and a more fervent devotion to Mary—for only a true devotion can guarantee to save our souls—and few and far between are those who can say their devotion is a true devotion, ranked above the many imaginary, futile and false ‘devotions’ that exist in most souls:
“The saints have said admirable things of this holy city of God; and they were never more eloquent and more content than when they spoke of her. Yet, after all they have said, they cry out that the height of her merits cannot be fully seen; that the breadth of her charity is in truth immeasurable; that the length of her power is incomprehensible; and finally, that the depth of her humility, and of all her virtues and graces, is an abyss which never can be sounded. O height incomprehensible! O breadth unspeakable! O length immeasurable! O abyss impenetrable! … St. Bonaventure tells us that all the angels in Heaven cry out incessantly to her: ‘Holy, holy, holy Mary, Mother of God and Virgin’ and that they offer to her, millions and millions of times a day, the Angelical Salutation, the Ave Maria, prostrating themselves before her, and begging of her in her graciousness to honor them with some of her commands …
“The whole Earth is full of her glory, especially among Christians, by whom she is taken as the protectress of many kingdoms, provinces, dioceses and cities. Many cathedrals are consecrated to God under her name. There is not a church without an altar in her honor, not a country nor a canton where there are not some miraculous images where all sorts of evils are cured and all sorts of good gifts obtained. Who can count the confraternities and congregations in her honor? How many religious orders have been founded in her name and under her protection? How many members in these confraternities, and how many religious men and women in all these orders, who publish her praises and confess her mercies! …
“Yet after all that, we must cry out with the saints: ‘De Maria numquam satis’—‘Of Mary there is never enough.’ We have not yet praised, exalted, honored, loved and served Mary as we ought. She deserves still more praise, still more respect, still more love, and still more service … We must cry out with the Apostle, “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor man’s heart comprehended” (1 Corinthians 2:9) the beauties, the grandeurs, the excellences of Mary!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §7 - §10, §12).
Fr. Faber’s Preface
In his personal translation of St. Louis’ True Devotion to Mary, Fr. Faber—no doubt urged on by the above quoted words of St. Louis—writes in the Preface of his translation equally inspiring and true words:
“All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.
“But what is the remedy that is wanted? What is the remedy indicated by God Himself? If we may rely on the disclosures of the saints, it is an immense increase of devotion to our Blessed Lady; but, remember, nothing short of an immense one. Here in England, Mary is not half enough preached. Devotion to her is low and thin and poor. It is frightened out of its wits by the sneers of heresy. It is always invoking human respect and carnal prudence, wishing to make Mary so little of a Mary that Protestants may feel at ease about her. Its ignorance of theology makes it unsubstantial and unworthy. It is not the prominent characteristic of our religion which it ought to be. It has no faith in itself. Hence it is that Jesus is not loved, that heretics are not converted, that the Church is not exalted; that souls which might be saints wither and dwindle; that the Sacraments are not rightly frequented, or souls enthusiastically evangelized.
“Jesus is obscured because Mary is kept in the background. Thousands of souls perish because Mary is withheld from them. It is the miserable, unworthy shadow which we call our devotion to the Blessed Virgin that is the cause of all these wants and blights, these evils and omissions and declines. Yet, if we are to believe the revelations of the saints, God is pressing for a greater, a wider, a stronger, quite another devotion to His Blessed Mother. I cannot think of a higher work or a broader vocation for anyone than the simple spreading of this peculiar devotion of the Venerable [St. Louis] Grignon De Montfort. Let a man but try it for himself, and his surprise at the graces it brings with it, and the transformations it causes in his soul, will soon convince him of its otherwise almost incredible efficacy as a means for the salvation of men, and for the coming of the kingdom of Christ. Oh, if Mary were but known, there would be no coldness to Jesus then! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much more wonderful would be our Faith, and how different would our Communions be! Oh, if Mary were but known, how much happier, how much holier, how much less worldly should we be, and how much more should we be living images of our sole Lord and Savior, her dearest and most blessed Son!” (Fr. Faber, Preface, True Devotion to Mary).
A Spiritually Synthetic “Slap-In-The-Face”
Much of the above quoted words should be like a “spiritual slap in the face” with regard to our attitude towards Our Lady. Hardly anyone has a “true” devotion to her! Most people have, what we could in modern terms call, a “synthetic” devotion to her—meaning that is full of man-made “additives” that spoil, corrupt and weaken what could and should be a “true”, “real” and “organic” devotion to Mary.
We ‘poison’ our devotion to Mary like modern man poisons his food by unnatural additives. Dr. Royal Lee (1895-1967), who died shortly after the Second Vatican Council ended (1965), was a true genius, inventor, scientist and nutritionist. He was a mechanical genius, with countless patents and inventions to his name, that can be found in everything from standing food mixers to electric dental drills. He was also a farmer, a researcher, an activist, and a philanthropist who was decorated by humanitarian and scientific societies alike. Dr. Royal Lee was called the “Einstein of nutrition,” and hailed as the greatest nutritionist of the twentieth century. Yet today his name and work go largely unknown―much like St. Louis de Montfort’s “True Devotion to Mary”. This is no coincidence. Dr. Lee’s basic message—that the ultimate cause of most modern disease is malnutrition brought on by industrially produced foods—threatened some of America’s mightiest institutions.
Dr. Lee wrote: “One of the biggest tragedies of human civilization is the precedence of chemical therapy over nutrition. It is the substitution of artificial therapy over natural, of poisons over food, in which we are feeding people poisons trying to correct the reactions of starvation.”
A similar thing could be said with reference to the spiritual realm, which we could, in a parallel fashion, phrase as follows: “One of the biggest tragedies of human civilization is the precedence of worldliness, or devotion to the world, over devotion to Mary. It is the substitution of artificial solutions for the only real solution, it is the substitution of the material for the spiritual, the substitution of worldly poisons over spirituality―by which we are feeding unnatural and poisonous nourishment to the souls of people who are starving for God―without even realizing it―but, instead, are being fed godless material things to satisfy that spiritual hunger. This leads to a spiritual deprivation, a spiritual malnutrition, a spiritual starvation, and, ultimately, to a spiritual damnation.”
Synthetic and Sin-thetic
Food is the fuel that energizes our body for work, play and healing. It is the source of our vitality and contains all sub-stances necessary for the regulation of all our bodily processes. Human life has existed and survived for thousands of years using nothing more than natural foods from plants and animals, along with fresh water and clear air. Today, our environment (not to mention our soul) has become very polluted. Most people live far removed from farms and have no gardens (just as they live far from God, the Church and have no 'spiritual gardens' in their souls). Food is processed to allow for long distance transportation and a long shelf-life, not nutritional content. Synthetic compounds are used to increase crop yields, to add flavor, and to preserve food. Then we use synthetic vitamins and medications to treat deficiency diseases caused by depletion of life-giving nutrients. What a vicious synthetic cycle! Synthetics in food make us sick and then we take synthetic medicines in the hope that we will become healthy again! In the spiritual realm, you could change the word “synthetic” into “sin-thetic”!
Synthetic or Sin-thetic Spirituality
Everything that glitters is not gold. Just as there are synthetic materials like polyester, there are authentic fabrics like cotton or wool. You can have real wood or synthetic plastic ‘wood’. There are real diamonds and mere glass ‘diamonds’ that are fakes. The synthetic and authentic can look a lot alike. The same is true in spirituality. There are synthetic, man-made spiritualities and there are authentic, God-made spiritualities—just as there are ‘synthetic’ man-made Christian churches and there is the authentic God-made Church—the Catholic Church .
Yet within that authentic Catholic Church there are many synthetic man-made spiritualities. In fact, most souls have created their own ‘synthetic’ spirituality, which caters to their personal wishes, hopes, dreams and preferences! Do not take that statement lightly, nor dismiss it too quickly! For you are quite likely to be one of those who has created their own preferred ‘synthetic’ spirituality, whereby you refuse to read, think, write and talk about the unpleasant things, but love to read, think, talk and write about the pleasant aspects of religion. Priests fall into that category and lay people fall into that category—and their numbers have grown immensely since the Second Vatican Council—which has “sown the seed” of a “sweet” Catholicism that makes Catholicism “lose its teeth” and hence we are plagued by “toothless Catholics” today. Or could you call those “toothless Catholics” another name, such as “Cotton-Candy Catholics” (“Candy-Floss Catholics” in other parts of the English-speaking world)? Whereas, in Christ’s opinion, they should be “Cross-Carrying Catholics” and not “Cotton-Candy Catholics”! “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!” (Luke 9:23). Our Lord even cursed the fig tree that He found to be “all leaves and no fruit”—which can be translated as “all words and no actions”, or “Faith without works.”
“Synthetic” Catholics prefer a “Synthetic” spirituality that needs little care and attention—much like plastic flowers! You can buy some truly exquisite bouquets of plastic flowers that you can take home, plonk on the table, and that is all you have to do! A one time thing! You do not have you water them, they will not wilt, they won’t smell ‘funny’ with time, you don’t have to keep changing the water or prune or throw out the wilted ones. From a distance, they look like the real thing. But when you get up close, you can see that each one is exactly alike. They all came out of the same press. They were ‘flawless’ and don’t have those little brown veins or ragged edges you see on real flowers. But they also could not emit a beautiful aroma, or offer tenderness to the touch. They are not living flowers, but dead plastic or dead synthetic fabric flowers.
Synthetic Scribes and Plastic Pharisees!
This “synthetic spirituality”—a mixture of God made elements and man-made preferences—was even prevalent in the time of Our Lord. The Scribes and the Pharisees were prime example of this “synthetic spirituality” and Our Lord made that clear on many occasions. The Scribes and Pharisees had taken the religion and law of God, to which they then added their own religious practices and self-made laws. They held themselves to be almost flawless and looked upon those who were not of their group, as something inferior and to be shunned—as Our Lord has the Pharisee say in His parable of the Pharisee and the Publican: “O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!” (Luke 18:11-12).
Our Lord’s attitude to these “Synthetic Scribes and Plastic Pharisees” is seen and proved by the following words: “The Scribes and the Pharisees have sat on the chair of Moses. All things therefore whatsoever they shall say to you, observe and do: but according to their works do ye not; for they say, and do not! … They love the first places at feasts, and the first chairs in the synagogues, and salutations in the market place, and to be called by men, ‘Rabbi!’ … Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness! Thou blind Pharisee! First make clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, that the outside may become clean! Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you are like to whited sepulchers, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men's bones, and of all filthiness! So you also outwardly indeed appear to men just; but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity!” (Matthew, chapter 23). Just like fake wood, fake marble, fake crystal, fake flowers, fake fruit—all those things appear real on the outside, but are a mere pretense of reality.
The same applies to Catholics who are synthetic. They look good from a distance, but when you look more closely, you find they rarely, if ever, admit any flaws. Authentic Catholics are open about their flaws, yet they are being shaped by the Holy Spirit, and not being pressed and shaped by a human mold.
Authentic or Synthetic?
Authenticity means a person must live following the perspective, principles and power of God’s kingdom. The synthetic person operates in the perspective, principles and power of this world. God says: “My thoughts [perspectives and principles] are not your thoughts [perspectives and principles]: nor your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so are my ways exalted above your ways, and my thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9).
This leads us back to Mary—have we, over the years, created our own “synthetic devotion” to Mary? Have we filtered-out the God’s unpleasant ingredients and demands and mixed-in our own man-made “synthetic sweetener” to make it less demanding, less abrasive, less painful, less troublesome, less time-consuming, less noticeable, etc.? The odds are stacked in favor of an affirmative answer to that question! Yes, we have made our own “synthetic devotion” to Mary—and we are very comfortable with it! We like a less demanding, less abrasive, less painful, less troublesome, less time-consuming, less noticeable devotion—it gives us more time to do the things we really want to do!
It is this kind of a “synthetic” attitude that leads to little fruit in the spiritual life and leads to little hope of salvation, which is why Our Lord and many saints say the little is the number of those who are saved: “A certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved? But Jesus said: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14). As we say in the Litany of Our Lady (Litany of Loreto): “Gate of Heaven”—Our Lady is our gate to Heaven, our narrow gate to Heaven, and few there are that truly find that gate! St. Louis de Montfort, speaking of his “True Devotion to Mary”, writes: “The practice which I am about to disclose is one of these secrets of grace, unknown to the greater number of Christians, known even to few of the devout, and practiced and relished by a lesser number still!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §83).
Get Yourself an Authentic, NOT Synthetic, Devotion to Mary!
That is why we shall be launching another True Devotion to Mary consecration—beginning on the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes on February 11th and ending on the feast of the Annunciation (Palm Sunday) on March 25th. If you want something less demanding, less abrasive, less painful, less troublesome, less time-consuming and less fatiguing, then there are plenty of other “Cotton-Candy Catholic” websites and books where you will find a “cotton-candy meditation” that is over in 2 minutes and asks no more than one a day! If that is your idea of devotion to Mary, then good luck—especially on Judgment Day! For our part, we prefer to follow St. Louis de Montfort’s authentic advice—and not some synthetic imitator’s advice—of giving it our ALL! “We must choose, therefore, among all the devotions to the Blessed Virgin, the one which draws us most toward this death to ourselves, inasmuch as it will be the best and the most sanctifying. For we must not think that all that shines is gold, that all that tastes sweet is honey, or that all that is easy to do and is done by the greatest number is the most sanctifying” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §83).
You can rest assured that the devil—as St. Louis de Montfort foretells—will do all in his power to sidetrack you and prevent you from successfully making (for you can also make it, but unsuccessfully or fruitlessly, by just mechanically going through the prayers, readings and exercises). “The devil, like a false coiner and a subtle and experienced sharper, has already deceived and destroyed so many souls by a false devotion to the Blessed Virgin that he makes a daily use of his diabolical experience to plunge many others by this same way into everlasting perdition; amusing them, lulling them to sleep in sin, under the pretext of some prayers badly said or of some outward practices which he inspires … It is then very important to recognize, first of all, false devotions to our Blessed Lady, in order to avoid them, and true devotion, in order to embrace it!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, §90).
The devil knows the power of Mary and the power of devotion to her—as he testified to St. Dominic during an exorcism: “We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! … And we have no success with her faithful servants!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”, §104). That means to say that the devils DO HAVE SUCCESS with those who are NOT “really persevered in her service” and who are NOT “her faithful servants”.
A Scary Authentic, NOT Synthetic, Truth!
Think on this! Most Catholics have prayed the Rosary, yet most Catholics are damned! Most Catholics have had some kind of devotion to Our Lady, yet most Catholics are damned! It is not what you do—it is how well you do it that matters. Our Lord gives a similar warning: “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, but he that doth the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!’” (Matthew 7:21-23). What is this ‘mysterious’ will of His Father? Our Lady tells us at Fatima: “He wishes to establish the devotion to my Immaculate Heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it!” (June 1917) … “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved!” (July 1917).
To the already above quoted passage about “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven”―Our Lord then immediately goes on to say: “Everyone therefore that heareth these My words, and doth them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that heareth these My words, and doth them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof” (Matthew 7:24-27). The rock is a “True Devotion to Mary”—it is a “rock” that will withstand all the assaults of man and devil. The “sand” consists of the multiple flimsy, tiny, partial, condensed, synthetic devotions to Mary—which are not worthy of the name “devotion” nor worthy of Mary. Which one will you choose? Which one will you offer Mary? Which one will lead you where? “And great was the fall thereof!”
Article 9
Monday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 5th
Seedy Souls!
Monday after Sexagesima Sunday, February 5th
Seedy Souls!
What Are You Planning on Planting This Lent?
Since we in Septuagesima season, and, furthermore, since we are in the week that follows Sexagesima Sunday, with its Gospel of “The Sower of the Seed”, then let us not abandon this rich and fruitful topic, but let us stay with the ‘seedy’ subject of sowing seeds for Lent. Seeds cannot be ‘microwaved’ to grow in a minute! They take time to germinate, sprout and grow. Likewise for our ideas and plans—they take time to ‘germinate’, ‘sprout’ and ‘grow’!
Germinate, Sprout and Grow
When seeds germinate, they begin to grow sprouts. The term “sprouting” is also used by people who grow edible sprouts from seeds and beans. An understanding of how seeds germinate will help you understand what we could analogically call ‘spiritual germination’ and ‘spiritual sprouting’! A little bit of “Seed Anatomy” will help us grasp some “Spiritual Anatomy”. The interior of seeds contain an embryo that has all of the parts of an adult plant, including tiny roots and leaves, which are the first part of the sprout to emerge from the seed. The seed contains “endosperm”, which is the food that will nourish the embryo in the early stages of germination―likewise, in the soul, we need sanctifying grace to give the soul its basic spiritual life and nourishment, but which has to grow and cannot remain static. The exterior of the seed blocks parasites and protects the embryo from injury, and in some cases, against hot or freezing weather―likewise, we need to have a ‘shell’ or ‘coating’ for the soul, that surrounds it and protects it from the parasites of the devil and the world.
Giving the Seed (Soul) Some Water (Grace)
When seeds absorb water (when souls absorb grace), the water activates gibberellic acid, which is a plant hormone similar to steroids, that causes the embryo cells to divide―God’s grace, likewise, will activate within the soul varieties of spiritual activities (division of cells, or division of interests, division into various spiritual exercises). If the seeds do not get moisture (if souls have no grace), they typically cannot germinate and grow.
Tiny Roots (Humility) Sprout from the Seed (Soul)
The tip of a tiny root emerges first from the germinating seed. The root provides water and nutrients to the developing seed embryo. We can liken this tiny root to the tiny bit of humility that must emerge from our soul—and this humility, like the root, must grow if it is to receive more grace to feed the soul: “Do you all insinuate humility one to another, for God resists the proud, but to the humble He gives grace” (1 Peter 5:5). “God resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6). “The greater thou art, the more you should humble thyself in all things, and thou shalt find grace before God” (Ecclesiasticus 3:20). The very word “humility” implicitly speaks of soil (from the Latin noun: “humus” which means soil) and planting. The saints say that the higher we want to build a building (of sanctity and holiness), the deeper we have to dig into the ground to lay deeper foundations―thus we speak of the roots of sanctity, which is what humility is: the root of sanctity.
The Seed Needs Many Helps
The embryo of the seed sends cotyledons (the beginnings of roots, branches and leaves) through the seed coat, and the sprouts continue to grow. Germination needs vary with the seed. Some cannot germinate without light (knowledge of the Faith); others need darkness (the Dark Night of the Senses, and the Dark Night of the Soul). Some need to be warm (practice charity); others need cooler temperatures (mortification and penance).
Some Seeds Need the “Cold Treatment”
Since moisture (grace) is important to germination, many seed packages tell you to soak seeds in water (grace) before sowing them. The newly emerged root (humility of the soul) needs water (grace), so you should plant the seeds a little deeper in hot weather to protect it from the heat (the heat of sin and worldliness). Depending on the plant species, you may have to store your seeds in a refrigerator for weeks or even months before you plant them. This is called “stratification”, and it mimics the conditions of winter dormancy that some seeds require before they will germinate. Sometimes the “cold-treatment” is needed to make a soul spiritual—and God will give that soul the “cold-treatment” to wake up a lukewarm soul: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
Seeds Need to be Scarified
Another necessary process is called “scarification”—think of the words “scary” or “scarred” by wounds—whereby rivers, streams or the ocean surf sometimes tumble seeds, scraping their thick coats (our thick-skinned and thick-headed and hard-hearted souls) enough to let in water (grace) necessary for germination. Some animals (devils and the worldliness of the world) scrape the thick coats of some seeds in an unsuccessful effort to eat them. Still other animals prepare the exterior of the seeds for germination by passing them through their digestive tracts when they eat fruit. You may have to scarify the hard coats of some seeds yourself by scraping them with a knife or rubbing them with sandpaper. In preparing for Lent, we need so “scarify” our souls by some friction being applied to our easy-going, comfort-loving, hardship-avoiding souls!
As You Sow, So Shall You Reap!
“Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. Going they went and wept, casting their seeds. But coming they shall come with joyfulness, carrying their sheaves!” (Psalm 125:5-7). So let us take time to plant well ahead of Lent—which has been this websites constant theme for the last 10 days. What are you planting for Lent—or, more precisely, what have you ALREADY planted for Lent?
Plant Early! Plant Now!
Planting in February? Are you nuts? Well, it all depends on where you live—Northern or Southern Hemispheres—and in what part of those hemispheres—the cold region, the temperate region or the sub-tropical region! So, please, no arguments! You are where you are and you can plant whatever you can plant! This is not a gardening class, but a spiritual lesson that seeks to derive some symbolic assistance from gardening! As they say, “all analogies limp in some way” and this ‘branch’ of the analogy is a ‘limp branch’ like all other analogies! Nevertheless, let us dig-down a little into this spiritual soil and see what we can find for this cold season of the year (Northern Hemisphere!!).
Seasons are unpredictable and Lent is, in a sense, ‘predictably unpredictable’—meaning that, each year Lent starts on a different date. Ash Wednesday can be as early as February 4th or as late March 10th. Yet the ‘spiritual gardening’ should already start ‘indoors’—that is to say in our soul: which is our mind and heart—before it is transplanted ‘outdoors’—that is to say by our actions such as fasting, performing acts of charity, practicing various spiritual exercises, etc. In other words, we plant the ‘seeds of Lent’, before Lent even arrives, ‘indoors’ or in our souls. We nurture them—think about them, let the ideas grow and take root—before we transplant them outdoors.
“Back to the Land” for the Moment!
Likewise, you can start the gardening season with a selection of plant seeds you start indoors in February. Seed packets provide information about planting times, sowing depth and the days to harvest. As a general rule, you start the seeds 4 to 6 weeks before the outdoor planting season begins. You start the seeds earlier in order to produce a more mature plant for transplanting. Likewise, you can start your Lenten seeds early by practicing some of the penances―less frequently and with less intensity than you would during Lent. This “matures” you and “strengthens” you for Lent, so that your Lenten resolutions do not fade, fail and die. Some plants do not transplant well, such as carrots or radishes. Warm weather vegetables, such as tomatoes and peppers, need a long growing period. Start the seeds indoors in February and grow them for 6 to 8 weeks. Once the seedlings reach about 8 inches high, harden them off for a week or two before transplanting into the garden (see below on “hardening-off” plants).
Other vegetables to start in February include lettuce varieties, chard and eggplant. February is a good time to start cauliflower, brussels sprouts, broccoli and cabbage. Start summer squash when you start the pepper and tomato plants. You can plant cucumber seeds during the last week in February. You can start watermelon, cantaloupe and honeydew by planting seeds indoors in February, due to the long growing season required by melons. Pumpkins require a long growing season as well and should be started in February. Strawberry seeds need about 6 weeks of cold before planting in February. Once the seedlings have three leaves, the plants need hardening off and moved into their permanent growing site in the garden. As for herbs, you can start basil, oregano, parsley and dill indoors in February. Other herbs that do well when started indoors include mints, thyme and sage. Basil and parsley suffer in cold weather and do not survive temperatures below freezing. Many other herbs grow as perennials in cold and warm weather climates.
“Hardening-Off” Plants
Young, pampered seedlings (just like modern-day humans) that were grown either indoors, or in a greenhouse, will need a period to adjust and acclimate to outdoor conditions, prior to planting in the garden. This transition period is called “hardening-off.” Hardening-off gradually exposes the tender plants to the wind, the sun, and rain and toughens them up by thickening the cuticle on the leaves so that the leaves lose less water when exposed to the elements. This helps prevent transplant shock; seedlings that languish, become stunted or die from sudden changes in temperature. The length of time a seedling requires to “harden-off” depends on the type of plants you are growing and the temperature and temperature fluctuations. So be flexible when “hardening-off” your seedlings and be prepared to whisk them indoors or cover them if there is a late freeze or snow. There are three approaches to “hardening-off” plants. The first method is to gradually exposing them to longer periods of time outdoors each day. The second method involves placing the plants in a cold frame. The third method involves withholding water for a period of time.
Lenten “Indoor Planting” and “Hardening-Off”
Similarly, in the case of the spiritual and liturgical season of Lent, we need to first of all plant our “Lenten Seedlings” well before Lent begins and then, as Lent draws nearer, we need to “harden-off” those seedlings! Huh? Confused? Sounds crazy? Okay! Here is the explanation.
A seed has a hard exterior but a “soft-center”—the Christian soul must also have a hard exterior and soft-center. The hard exterior is our hardness in face of the temptations and attacks of the devil, the world, even fellow Catholics and our own passions and sinful tendencies—we must seek to be “hard” in face of them, be “hard” to against their attempted penetration, to show a “hard” face towards their insults and mockeries, in a nutshell (if you pardon the pun, for a nutshell is hard), we must show them that we are “hard” to overcome, and “hard” to beat. This “hard” resistance towards them is what Holy Scripture so often talks about:
“Therefore thus saith the Lord: ‘If thou wilt be converted, I will convert thee, and thou shalt stand before my face; and if thou wilt separate the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as My mouth: they shall be turned to thee, and thou shalt not be turned to them. And I will make thee, to this people, as a strong wall of brass: and they shall fight against thee, and shall not prevail: for I am with thee to save thee, and to deliver thee’, saith the Lord. ‘And I will deliver thee out of the hand of the wicked, and I will redeem thee out of the hand of the mighty!’” (Jeremias 15:19-21).
“What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord [agreement] has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
“Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). As Jesus said: “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you … In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world” (John 15:18-19; 16:33)—to which St. John adds: “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world: and this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). This predicament―of being hated by world because we are Catholics―is like the process of “hardening-off” or “toughening-up” that any and every true Catholic must inevitably go through at some point in life. “If one strike thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the other!” (Matthew 5:39) … “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven! Blessed are ye when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you!” (Matthew 5:10-12).
The Blood of Martyrs is the Seed of the Faith
Tertullian, one of the 2nd century Church Fathers, wrote that “the blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church”, implying that the martyrs’ willing sacrifice of their lives leads to the conversion of others. The Church and the Faith are inseparably connected. You cannot have the Church without Faith—it would be faithless church, or a false church, or no church at all. Nor can you have the Faith without belonging to the Church—as the famous axiom states: “No salvation outside of the Church!”
Planting the Seed of Faith at Baptism
At our Baptism, the priest asked: “What do you ask of the Church of God?” The reply was: “Faith!” Then the priest said: “What does Faith offer you?” (“Fides quid tibi praestat?”). The reply to that was: “Life everlasting!” Notice that the Church (through the priest) says: “What does Faith OFFER you?” and NOT “What does Faith GIVE you!” The Latin word that the Church uses is “praestat” which is a compound of two words: “prae-” meaning “in front of” and the verb “stare” (pronounced “star-ray” and not “stair”) which means “to stand” or “to place”. The actual verb “praestare” means to “make available”, “to offer”, “to present”.
Thus, when we ask for the seed of Faith in Baptism, the Church OFFERS to us, the Church MAKES AVAILABLE to us, the POSSIBILITY of life everlasting through that Faith, but the Church DOES NOT GUARANTEE life everlasting—it is something that we must work for all through our life, making that “mustard seed” of Faith grow into a mighty tree of Faith, that gives shelter to others too! Your Faith “is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof” (Matthew 13:31-32).
Is Our Seed of Faith a Blessing or a Curse?
Lent, like life, is a training ground—being anywhere from a kindergarten to a boot-camp―depending upon how well we use Lent, or how well we live our life. God made your soul and planted in your soul the Seed of Faith, so that you could grow that Seed of Faith throughout your life—a Seed of Faith that must germinate and grow into a powerful Tree of Faith—not just for yourself, but for the benefit of others too. Marriage is meant to be fruitful--“Increase and multiply” as God said to both Adam (Genesis 1:22; 1:28) and Noe (Genesis 8:17; 9:1), “Thy wife as a fruitful vine, on the sides of thy house. Thy children as olive plants, round about thy table” (Psalms 127:3). “Blessed shalt thou be among all people. No one shall be barren among you of either sex, neither of men nor cattle” (Deuteronomy 7:14). A married couple without children was looked upon as an evil―as a punishment or curse by God for sin (Genesis 20:18; 30:2; Leviticus 20:21-22). Yet many holy women and holy couples were barren for long periods of time: Abraham’s wife Sara, Jacob’s wife Rachel, Our Lady’s mother St. Anne, etc.
Our ‘marriage’ to Holy Mother Church, through Baptism, is meant to produce many ‘children’ (converts) and many ‘fruits’ (virtues). In a sense, we are ‘impregnated’ at Baptism by the Seed of Faith, which is planted by God in our souls. This Seed of Faith is meant to grow in our souls and produce those ‘children’ and ‘fruits’—yet there is no guarantee of this, for we can perform an abortion (apostasy), or provoke a miscarriage (fall away from regularly practicing the Faith), or ‘give birth’ to deformed or handicapped ‘children’ or bitter or rotten ‘fruit’ (by sinful worldly living and neglect of the Faith).
Planting the Tree of Life in Our Soul
What the heck? Is this a gardening class or what? I don’t need gardening lessons! I am here for the spiritual! Get to the point will you! All of this ‘plant stuff’ is a waste of time!
Okay, okay, but Holy Scripture does say: “That which is known of God, is manifest in the invisible things made by Him in the creation of the world and are clearly seen and understood by the things that are made by Him” (Romans 1:19-20). “The heavens show forth the glory of God, and the Earth declares the work of His hands” (Psalm 18:2). “By Faith we understand that the world was made by the Word of God; that from invisible things visible things were made” (Hebrews 11:3)—and the same idea is true in reverse—for by those visible things that were made by God, we come to know the invisible God Who made them. Did not Our Lord Himself say: “And from the fig tree learn a parable” (Matthew 24:32) and did He not teach by means of agricultural terms and symbols? ―“To what is the Kingdom of God like, and to what shall I compare it? It is like to a grain of mustard seed … I am the vine, you are the branches … There was a man who planted a vineyard … A man sowed good wheat seeds in his field. But his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat … A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit … etc” (Luke 13:18-19; John 15:5; Matthew 21:33; 13:24-35; 7:18). Our Lord even calls God the Father a “garderner”― “my Father is the husbandman” (John 15:1)―“husbandman” is an ancient term for gardener or farmer. So please, have the patience of a gardener or farmer, and bear with us a little longer, so we shall soon bear fruit! Rome wasn’t built in a day! Trees don’t grow in a day! Saints aren’t made in a day! So, anyway—back to planting the Tree of Life in our soul!
Two Kinds of Seeds and Trees and Fruit
Our Lord speaks of two kinds of trees—“good trees” and “bad trees” which, in their turn, give “good fruit” and “bad fruit”, adding that “a good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them.” (Matthew 7:18-20).
Trees come from seeds and so a good seed cannot produce a bad tree, nor can a bad seed produce a good tree―without external intervention changing something in the process, for God can bring good out evil, as He has done in the cases of many great sinners whom He has made into great saints (thus we can have hope!). Therefore and however, we must take care as what seeds we plant in our soul! The good seed will normally grow into a good tree and produce good fruit. The bad seed will normally grow into a bad tree and produce bad fruit. As Holy Scripture says: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8). “The wages of sin is death. But the grace of God” (Romans 6:23). Grace (the good seed) brings life; sin (the bad seed) brings death.
Use Only the Best Seeds
The better the seed, the better the chance of quality produce. You get what you pay for—you reap what you sow! We have all heard of the terms “organic” and “heirloom” in relation to plants, fruits and vegetables. Organic refers to a specific way plants and seeds are grown, while heirloom describes a plant’s heritage. Plants and seeds labeled as organic must be grown and processed in accordance with the USDA’s National Organic Program (NOP), which prohibits the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, genetically engineered seeds and materials, sewage sludge, and fresh manure.
The definition of heirlooms is less cut-and-dried. With seed-grown plants, only open-pollinated varieties are considered heirlooms. Unlike hybrid seeds, open-pollinated seeds will reproduce “true to type”, meaning the offspring will display the same characteristics as the parent plant, and seeds can be saved from season to season. Agriculturalist, Peggy Cornett, director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for Historic Plants, says: “Many people preserve special plants and pass them down from one generation to the next along with the stories and histories surrounding these heirlooms. When we lose that essential connection, it is often lost forever.”
Our Faith, likewise, must be and ‘organic’ Faith and a ‘heirloom’ Faith. It must be free from any admixture of false faiths, worldliness and sinfulness. It must be directly linked to Our Lord Jesus Christ through the Catholic Faith and even more so, the true Catholic Faith and not the Liberal or Modernist ‘hybrid’ and ‘cross-pollinated’ Catholic Faith that is being increasingly planted in more and more souls with each passing year.
The Seed of the Tree of Life
It is amazing how the “truth of nature” (which owes itself to God) is a wonderful reflection of the “truth of the Faith” (which also comes from God)—as enunciated by the ‘Gardener-in-Chief’ Himself, Our Lord Jesus Christ: “Learn of Me … I am the way, and the truth, and the life” (Matthew 11:29; John 14:6). “In Me is all grace of the way and of the truth, in Me is all hope of life and of virtue” (Ecclesiasticus 24:25). If we want “life” and not “death”—or, more correctly, if we want “eternal life” and not “eternal ‘death’ or damnation”—then we need to plant the seed of the Tree of Life in our souls. In this sense, just as one tree comes from the seed or fruit of another tree, we therefore need to plant the “Tree of Life” that Mary is, in order for her to produce “the fruit of her womb, Jesus”, who is the true “Tree of Life” that Mary will produce in our souls. Mary is the best seed obtainable! She is ‘organic’—in that there is not external contamination to her seed. She is an ‘heirloom’—in that she is the “true type” or reflection of Our Lord Jesus Christ, without any admixture.
The process that a seed must go through, before its internal embryo produces the first roots, can be likened to the process that a soul has to go through in preparing for a “True Devotion to Mary”—as recommended by that master Marian ‘gardener’, St. Louis de Montfort, who calls Mary “the Tree of Life” on several occasions: “O Holy Spirit! Plant in my soul the Tree of true Life, which is Mary! Cultivate it and tend it so that it may grow and blossom and bring forth the fruit of life in abundance!” Then he goes on to say: “Mary, as Mother of the living, gives to all her children splinters (i.e. seeds) of the Tree of Life, which is the Cross of Jesus” (The Secret of Mary, §67, §22).
St. Louis then ends his booklet, The Secret of Mary, with these splendid and inspired words:
“The person in whose soul this tree has taken root must, like a good gardener, watch over it and protect it. For this tree, having life and capable of producing the fruit of life, should be raised and tended with enduring care and attention of soul. A soul that desires to be holy will make this its chief aim and occupation.
“Whatever is likely to choke the tree or in the course of time prevent its yielding fruit, such as thorns and thistles, must be cut away and rooted out. This means that by self-denial and self-discipline you must sedulously cut short and even give up all empty pleasures and useless dealings with other creatures. In other words, you must crucify the flesh, keep a guard over the tongue, and mortify the bodily senses.
“You must guard against grubs doing harm to the tree. These parasites are love of self and love of comfort, and they eat away the green foliage of the Tree and frustrate the fair hope it offered of yielding good fruit; for love of self is incompatible with love of Mary.
“You must not allow this Tree to be damaged by destructive animals, that is, by sins, for they may cause its death simply by their contact. They must not be allowed even to breathe upon the Tree, because their mere breath, that is, venial sins, which are most dangerous when we do not trouble ourselves about them.
“It is also necessary to water this Tree regularly with your Communions, Masses and other public and private prayers. Otherwise it will not continue bearing fruit.
“Yet you need not be alarmed when the winds blow and shake this tree, for it must happen that the storm-winds of temptation will threaten to bring it down, and snow and frost tend to smother it. By this we mean that this devotion to our Blessed Lady will surely be called into question and attacked. But as long as we continue steadfastly in tending it, we have nothing to fear.
“Chosen soul, provided you thus carefully cultivate the Tree of Life, which has been freshly planted in your soul by the Holy Ghost, I can assure you that in a short time it will grow so tall that the birds of the air will make their home in it. It will become such a good tree that it will yield in due season the sweet and adorable Fruit of honor and grace, which is Jesus, Who has always been and will always be the only fruit of Mary.
“Happy is that soul in which Mary, the tree of life, is planted. Happier still is the soul in which she has been able to grow and blossom. Happier again is the soul in which she brings forth her fruit. But happiest of all is the soul which savors the sweetness of Mary’s fruit and preserves it up till death and then beyond to all eternity. Amen!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary, §72 to §78).
Planting the Tree of Life on March 25th
With this in mind, we shall start another 33-day preparation for St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion Consecration to Jesus through Mary, later this month, so that the day of consecration falls on Monday, March 25th, usually the feast of the Annunciation, or the Incarnation (“planting” of “seed”) of Jesus in the womb of Mary. This year, this March 25th falls in Holy Week―and so the Feast of the Annunciation is transferred to the first available slot after Easter Sunday—which this year will be Monday April 8th. Nevertheless, even if cannot liturgically celebrate the Annunciation on March 25th this year, nothing prevents us from making our True Devotion Consecration to Jesus through Mary on the actual real date of the Annunciation. A further importance of this date is the fact that March 25th was thought, by many Fathers of the Church, to be the date of Adam being created (or “planted” on Earth), and the Fathers also thought that March 25th was the day that Christ died, after being nailed to the Cross, which was “planted” on Calvary. In view of all this, March 25th of this year (2024), is a perfect day to make for the first time (or to renew) our consecration to Jesus through Mary.
St. Louis himself writes: “Choose a special feast day to consecrate ourselves through Mary to Jesus … We should choose a special feast day on which to give ourselves and consecrate and sacrifice to her, unreservedly, our body and soul” (The Secret of Mary, §29 & §61). “Once a year at least, and on the same day, they should renew the same consecration” (True Devotion to Mary, §233) and he adds that we should: “celebrate every year with special fervor the feast of the Annunciation of Our Lord” (The Secret of Mary, §63). St. Louis also states that his suggested 33-day preparation period can be increased or decreased in time.
Hence, since the Preparation for the True Devotion Consecration to Mary coincides with Lent, and since the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes—with Our Lady cry of “Penance! Penance! Penance!”—occurs on February 11th, which this year falls on Quinquagesima Sunday―just 3 days before Ash Wednesday. What better way to do penance than spending 33 days in the middle of Lent going through the spiritual exercises of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion Consecration to Jesus Through Mary? So mark your calendars for the start date―this coming Wednesday, February 21st, the Ember Wednesday of Lent―a week after Ash Wednesday! May Our Lady cure us of our spiritual ills! May the true Tree of Life be firmly planted within us! May the ‘spiritual’ waters of our prayers water the Seed of Faith and the Seed of the true Tree of Life within our souls!
Since we in Septuagesima season, and, furthermore, since we are in the week that follows Sexagesima Sunday, with its Gospel of “The Sower of the Seed”, then let us not abandon this rich and fruitful topic, but let us stay with the ‘seedy’ subject of sowing seeds for Lent. Seeds cannot be ‘microwaved’ to grow in a minute! They take time to germinate, sprout and grow. Likewise for our ideas and plans—they take time to ‘germinate’, ‘sprout’ and ‘grow’!
Germinate, Sprout and Grow
When seeds germinate, they begin to grow sprouts. The term “sprouting” is also used by people who grow edible sprouts from seeds and beans. An understanding of how seeds germinate will help you understand what we could analogically call ‘spiritual germination’ and ‘spiritual sprouting’! A little bit of “Seed Anatomy” will help us grasp some “Spiritual Anatomy”. The interior of seeds contain an embryo that has all of the parts of an adult plant, including tiny roots and leaves, which are the first part of the sprout to emerge from the seed. The seed contains “endosperm”, which is the food that will nourish the embryo in the early stages of germination―likewise, in the soul, we need sanctifying grace to give the soul its basic spiritual life and nourishment, but which has to grow and cannot remain static. The exterior of the seed blocks parasites and protects the embryo from injury, and in some cases, against hot or freezing weather―likewise, we need to have a ‘shell’ or ‘coating’ for the soul, that surrounds it and protects it from the parasites of the devil and the world.
Giving the Seed (Soul) Some Water (Grace)
When seeds absorb water (when souls absorb grace), the water activates gibberellic acid, which is a plant hormone similar to steroids, that causes the embryo cells to divide―God’s grace, likewise, will activate within the soul varieties of spiritual activities (division of cells, or division of interests, division into various spiritual exercises). If the seeds do not get moisture (if souls have no grace), they typically cannot germinate and grow.
Tiny Roots (Humility) Sprout from the Seed (Soul)
The tip of a tiny root emerges first from the germinating seed. The root provides water and nutrients to the developing seed embryo. We can liken this tiny root to the tiny bit of humility that must emerge from our soul—and this humility, like the root, must grow if it is to receive more grace to feed the soul: “Do you all insinuate humility one to another, for God resists the proud, but to the humble He gives grace” (1 Peter 5:5). “God resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6). “The greater thou art, the more you should humble thyself in all things, and thou shalt find grace before God” (Ecclesiasticus 3:20). The very word “humility” implicitly speaks of soil (from the Latin noun: “humus” which means soil) and planting. The saints say that the higher we want to build a building (of sanctity and holiness), the deeper we have to dig into the ground to lay deeper foundations―thus we speak of the roots of sanctity, which is what humility is: the root of sanctity.
The Seed Needs Many Helps
The embryo of the seed sends cotyledons (the beginnings of roots, branches and leaves) through the seed coat, and the sprouts continue to grow. Germination needs vary with the seed. Some cannot germinate without light (knowledge of the Faith); others need darkness (the Dark Night of the Senses, and the Dark Night of the Soul). Some need to be warm (practice charity); others need cooler temperatures (mortification and penance).
Some Seeds Need the “Cold Treatment”
Since moisture (grace) is important to germination, many seed packages tell you to soak seeds in water (grace) before sowing them. The newly emerged root (humility of the soul) needs water (grace), so you should plant the seeds a little deeper in hot weather to protect it from the heat (the heat of sin and worldliness). Depending on the plant species, you may have to store your seeds in a refrigerator for weeks or even months before you plant them. This is called “stratification”, and it mimics the conditions of winter dormancy that some seeds require before they will germinate. Sometimes the “cold-treatment” is needed to make a soul spiritual—and God will give that soul the “cold-treatment” to wake up a lukewarm soul: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16).
Seeds Need to be Scarified
Another necessary process is called “scarification”—think of the words “scary” or “scarred” by wounds—whereby rivers, streams or the ocean surf sometimes tumble seeds, scraping their thick coats (our thick-skinned and thick-headed and hard-hearted souls) enough to let in water (grace) necessary for germination. Some animals (devils and the worldliness of the world) scrape the thick coats of some seeds in an unsuccessful effort to eat them. Still other animals prepare the exterior of the seeds for germination by passing them through their digestive tracts when they eat fruit. You may have to scarify the hard coats of some seeds yourself by scraping them with a knife or rubbing them with sandpaper. In preparing for Lent, we need so “scarify” our souls by some friction being applied to our easy-going, comfort-loving, hardship-avoiding souls!
As You Sow, So Shall You Reap!
“Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8). “They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. Going they went and wept, casting their seeds. But coming they shall come with joyfulness, carrying their sheaves!” (Psalm 125:5-7). So let us take time to plant well ahead of Lent—which has been this websites constant theme for the last 10 days. What are you planting for Lent—or, more precisely, what have you ALREADY planted for Lent?
Plant Early! Plant Now!
Planting in February? Are you nuts? Well, it all depends on where you live—Northern or Southern Hemispheres—and in what part of those hemispheres—the cold region, the temperate region or the sub-tropical region! So, please, no arguments! You are where you are and you can plant whatever you can plant! This is not a gardening class, but a spiritual lesson that seeks to derive some symbolic assistance from gardening! As they say, “all analogies limp in some way” and this ‘branch’ of the analogy is a ‘limp branch’ like all other analogies! Nevertheless, let us dig-down a little into this spiritual soil and see what we can find for this cold season of the year (Northern Hemisphere!!).
Seasons are unpredictable and Lent is, in a sense, ‘predictably unpredictable’—meaning that, each year Lent starts on a different date. Ash Wednesday can be as early as February 4th or as late March 10th. Yet the ‘spiritual gardening’ should already start ‘indoors’—that is to say in our soul: which is our mind and heart—before it is transplanted ‘outdoors’—that is to say by our actions such as fasting, performing acts of charity, practicing various spiritual exercises, etc. In other words, we plant the ‘seeds of Lent’, before Lent even arrives, ‘indoors’ or in our souls. We nurture them—think about them, let the ideas grow and take root—before we transplant them outdoors.
“Back to the Land” for the Moment!
Likewise, you can start the gardening season with a selection of plant seeds you start indoors in February. Seed packets provide information about planting times, sowing depth and the days to harvest. As a general rule, you start the seeds 4 to 6 weeks before the outdoor planting season begins. You start the seeds earlier in order to produce a more mature plant for transplanting. Likewise, you can start your Lenten seeds early by practicing some of the penances―less frequently and with less intensity than you would during Lent. This “matures” you and “strengthens” you for Lent, so that your Lenten resolutions do not fade, fail and die. Some plants do not transplant well, such as carrots or radishes. Warm weather vegetables, such as tomatoes and peppers, need a long growing period. Start the seeds indoors in February and grow them for 6 to 8 weeks. Once the seedlings reach about 8 inches high, harden them off for a week or two before transplanting into the garden (see below on “hardening-off” plants).
Other vegetables to start in February include lettuce varieties, chard and eggplant. February is a good time to start cauliflower, brussels sprouts, broccoli and cabbage. Start summer squash when you start the pepper and tomato plants. You can plant cucumber seeds during the last week in February. You can start watermelon, cantaloupe and honeydew by planting seeds indoors in February, due to the long growing season required by melons. Pumpkins require a long growing season as well and should be started in February. Strawberry seeds need about 6 weeks of cold before planting in February. Once the seedlings have three leaves, the plants need hardening off and moved into their permanent growing site in the garden. As for herbs, you can start basil, oregano, parsley and dill indoors in February. Other herbs that do well when started indoors include mints, thyme and sage. Basil and parsley suffer in cold weather and do not survive temperatures below freezing. Many other herbs grow as perennials in cold and warm weather climates.
“Hardening-Off” Plants
Young, pampered seedlings (just like modern-day humans) that were grown either indoors, or in a greenhouse, will need a period to adjust and acclimate to outdoor conditions, prior to planting in the garden. This transition period is called “hardening-off.” Hardening-off gradually exposes the tender plants to the wind, the sun, and rain and toughens them up by thickening the cuticle on the leaves so that the leaves lose less water when exposed to the elements. This helps prevent transplant shock; seedlings that languish, become stunted or die from sudden changes in temperature. The length of time a seedling requires to “harden-off” depends on the type of plants you are growing and the temperature and temperature fluctuations. So be flexible when “hardening-off” your seedlings and be prepared to whisk them indoors or cover them if there is a late freeze or snow. There are three approaches to “hardening-off” plants. The first method is to gradually exposing them to longer periods of time outdoors each day. The second method involves placing the plants in a cold frame. The third method involves withholding water for a period of time.
Lenten “Indoor Planting” and “Hardening-Off”
Similarly, in the case of the spiritual and liturgical season of Lent, we need to first of all plant our “Lenten Seedlings” well before Lent begins and then, as Lent draws nearer, we need to “harden-off” those seedlings! Huh? Confused? Sounds crazy? Okay! Here is the explanation.
A seed has a hard exterior but a “soft-center”—the Christian soul must also have a hard exterior and soft-center. The hard exterior is our hardness in face of the temptations and attacks of the devil, the world, even fellow Catholics and our own passions and sinful tendencies—we must seek to be “hard” in face of them, be “hard” to against their attempted penetration, to show a “hard” face towards their insults and mockeries, in a nutshell (if you pardon the pun, for a nutshell is hard), we must show them that we are “hard” to overcome, and “hard” to beat. This “hard” resistance towards them is what Holy Scripture so often talks about:
“Therefore thus saith the Lord: ‘If thou wilt be converted, I will convert thee, and thou shalt stand before my face; and if thou wilt separate the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as My mouth: they shall be turned to thee, and thou shalt not be turned to them. And I will make thee, to this people, as a strong wall of brass: and they shall fight against thee, and shall not prevail: for I am with thee to save thee, and to deliver thee’, saith the Lord. ‘And I will deliver thee out of the hand of the wicked, and I will redeem thee out of the hand of the mighty!’” (Jeremias 15:19-21).
“What fellowship has light with darkness? And what concord [agreement] has Christ with Belial? Or what part has the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
“Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). As Jesus said: “If the world hates you, know ye, that it has hated Me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you … In the world you shall have distress―but have confidence, I have overcome the world” (John 15:18-19; 16:33)—to which St. John adds: “Whatsoever is born of God, overcomes the world: and this is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). This predicament―of being hated by world because we are Catholics―is like the process of “hardening-off” or “toughening-up” that any and every true Catholic must inevitably go through at some point in life. “If one strike thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the other!” (Matthew 5:39) … “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for the sake of justice―for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven! Blessed are ye when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets that were before you!” (Matthew 5:10-12).
The Blood of Martyrs is the Seed of the Faith
Tertullian, one of the 2nd century Church Fathers, wrote that “the blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church”, implying that the martyrs’ willing sacrifice of their lives leads to the conversion of others. The Church and the Faith are inseparably connected. You cannot have the Church without Faith—it would be faithless church, or a false church, or no church at all. Nor can you have the Faith without belonging to the Church—as the famous axiom states: “No salvation outside of the Church!”
Planting the Seed of Faith at Baptism
At our Baptism, the priest asked: “What do you ask of the Church of God?” The reply was: “Faith!” Then the priest said: “What does Faith offer you?” (“Fides quid tibi praestat?”). The reply to that was: “Life everlasting!” Notice that the Church (through the priest) says: “What does Faith OFFER you?” and NOT “What does Faith GIVE you!” The Latin word that the Church uses is “praestat” which is a compound of two words: “prae-” meaning “in front of” and the verb “stare” (pronounced “star-ray” and not “stair”) which means “to stand” or “to place”. The actual verb “praestare” means to “make available”, “to offer”, “to present”.
Thus, when we ask for the seed of Faith in Baptism, the Church OFFERS to us, the Church MAKES AVAILABLE to us, the POSSIBILITY of life everlasting through that Faith, but the Church DOES NOT GUARANTEE life everlasting—it is something that we must work for all through our life, making that “mustard seed” of Faith grow into a mighty tree of Faith, that gives shelter to others too! Your Faith “is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof” (Matthew 13:31-32).
Is Our Seed of Faith a Blessing or a Curse?
Lent, like life, is a training ground—being anywhere from a kindergarten to a boot-camp―depending upon how well we use Lent, or how well we live our life. God made your soul and planted in your soul the Seed of Faith, so that you could grow that Seed of Faith throughout your life—a Seed of Faith that must germinate and grow into a powerful Tree of Faith—not just for yourself, but for the benefit of others too. Marriage is meant to be fruitful--“Increase and multiply” as God said to both Adam (Genesis 1:22; 1:28) and Noe (Genesis 8:17; 9:1), “Thy wife as a fruitful vine, on the sides of thy house. Thy children as olive plants, round about thy table” (Psalms 127:3). “Blessed shalt thou be among all people. No one shall be barren among you of either sex, neither of men nor cattle” (Deuteronomy 7:14). A married couple without children was looked upon as an evil―as a punishment or curse by God for sin (Genesis 20:18; 30:2; Leviticus 20:21-22). Yet many holy women and holy couples were barren for long periods of time: Abraham’s wife Sara, Jacob’s wife Rachel, Our Lady’s mother St. Anne, etc.
Our ‘marriage’ to Holy Mother Church, through Baptism, is meant to produce many ‘children’ (converts) and many ‘fruits’ (virtues). In a sense, we are ‘impregnated’ at Baptism by the Seed of Faith, which is planted by God in our souls. This Seed of Faith is meant to grow in our souls and produce those ‘children’ and ‘fruits’—yet there is no guarantee of this, for we can perform an abortion (apostasy), or provoke a miscarriage (fall away from regularly practicing the Faith), or ‘give birth’ to deformed or handicapped ‘children’ or bitter or rotten ‘fruit’ (by sinful worldly living and neglect of the Faith).
Planting the Tree of Life in Our Soul
What the heck? Is this a gardening class or what? I don’t need gardening lessons! I am here for the spiritual! Get to the point will you! All of this ‘plant stuff’ is a waste of time!
Okay, okay, but Holy Scripture does say: “That which is known of God, is manifest in the invisible things made by Him in the creation of the world and are clearly seen and understood by the things that are made by Him” (Romans 1:19-20). “The heavens show forth the glory of God, and the Earth declares the work of His hands” (Psalm 18:2). “By Faith we understand that the world was made by the Word of God; that from invisible things visible things were made” (Hebrews 11:3)—and the same idea is true in reverse—for by those visible things that were made by God, we come to know the invisible God Who made them. Did not Our Lord Himself say: “And from the fig tree learn a parable” (Matthew 24:32) and did He not teach by means of agricultural terms and symbols? ―“To what is the Kingdom of God like, and to what shall I compare it? It is like to a grain of mustard seed … I am the vine, you are the branches … There was a man who planted a vineyard … A man sowed good wheat seeds in his field. But his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat … A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit … etc” (Luke 13:18-19; John 15:5; Matthew 21:33; 13:24-35; 7:18). Our Lord even calls God the Father a “garderner”― “my Father is the husbandman” (John 15:1)―“husbandman” is an ancient term for gardener or farmer. So please, have the patience of a gardener or farmer, and bear with us a little longer, so we shall soon bear fruit! Rome wasn’t built in a day! Trees don’t grow in a day! Saints aren’t made in a day! So, anyway—back to planting the Tree of Life in our soul!
Two Kinds of Seeds and Trees and Fruit
Our Lord speaks of two kinds of trees—“good trees” and “bad trees” which, in their turn, give “good fruit” and “bad fruit”, adding that “a good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them.” (Matthew 7:18-20).
Trees come from seeds and so a good seed cannot produce a bad tree, nor can a bad seed produce a good tree―without external intervention changing something in the process, for God can bring good out evil, as He has done in the cases of many great sinners whom He has made into great saints (thus we can have hope!). Therefore and however, we must take care as what seeds we plant in our soul! The good seed will normally grow into a good tree and produce good fruit. The bad seed will normally grow into a bad tree and produce bad fruit. As Holy Scripture says: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8). “The wages of sin is death. But the grace of God” (Romans 6:23). Grace (the good seed) brings life; sin (the bad seed) brings death.
Use Only the Best Seeds
The better the seed, the better the chance of quality produce. You get what you pay for—you reap what you sow! We have all heard of the terms “organic” and “heirloom” in relation to plants, fruits and vegetables. Organic refers to a specific way plants and seeds are grown, while heirloom describes a plant’s heritage. Plants and seeds labeled as organic must be grown and processed in accordance with the USDA’s National Organic Program (NOP), which prohibits the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, genetically engineered seeds and materials, sewage sludge, and fresh manure.
The definition of heirlooms is less cut-and-dried. With seed-grown plants, only open-pollinated varieties are considered heirlooms. Unlike hybrid seeds, open-pollinated seeds will reproduce “true to type”, meaning the offspring will display the same characteristics as the parent plant, and seeds can be saved from season to season. Agriculturalist, Peggy Cornett, director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for Historic Plants, says: “Many people preserve special plants and pass them down from one generation to the next along with the stories and histories surrounding these heirlooms. When we lose that essential connection, it is often lost forever.”
Our Faith, likewise, must be and ‘organic’ Faith and a ‘heirloom’ Faith. It must be free from any admixture of false faiths, worldliness and sinfulness. It must be directly linked to Our Lord Jesus Christ through the Catholic Faith and even more so, the true Catholic Faith and not the Liberal or Modernist ‘hybrid’ and ‘cross-pollinated’ Catholic Faith that is being increasingly planted in more and more souls with each passing year.
The Seed of the Tree of Life
It is amazing how the “truth of nature” (which owes itself to God) is a wonderful reflection of the “truth of the Faith” (which also comes from God)—as enunciated by the ‘Gardener-in-Chief’ Himself, Our Lord Jesus Christ: “Learn of Me … I am the way, and the truth, and the life” (Matthew 11:29; John 14:6). “In Me is all grace of the way and of the truth, in Me is all hope of life and of virtue” (Ecclesiasticus 24:25). If we want “life” and not “death”—or, more correctly, if we want “eternal life” and not “eternal ‘death’ or damnation”—then we need to plant the seed of the Tree of Life in our souls. In this sense, just as one tree comes from the seed or fruit of another tree, we therefore need to plant the “Tree of Life” that Mary is, in order for her to produce “the fruit of her womb, Jesus”, who is the true “Tree of Life” that Mary will produce in our souls. Mary is the best seed obtainable! She is ‘organic’—in that there is not external contamination to her seed. She is an ‘heirloom’—in that she is the “true type” or reflection of Our Lord Jesus Christ, without any admixture.
The process that a seed must go through, before its internal embryo produces the first roots, can be likened to the process that a soul has to go through in preparing for a “True Devotion to Mary”—as recommended by that master Marian ‘gardener’, St. Louis de Montfort, who calls Mary “the Tree of Life” on several occasions: “O Holy Spirit! Plant in my soul the Tree of true Life, which is Mary! Cultivate it and tend it so that it may grow and blossom and bring forth the fruit of life in abundance!” Then he goes on to say: “Mary, as Mother of the living, gives to all her children splinters (i.e. seeds) of the Tree of Life, which is the Cross of Jesus” (The Secret of Mary, §67, §22).
St. Louis then ends his booklet, The Secret of Mary, with these splendid and inspired words:
“The person in whose soul this tree has taken root must, like a good gardener, watch over it and protect it. For this tree, having life and capable of producing the fruit of life, should be raised and tended with enduring care and attention of soul. A soul that desires to be holy will make this its chief aim and occupation.
“Whatever is likely to choke the tree or in the course of time prevent its yielding fruit, such as thorns and thistles, must be cut away and rooted out. This means that by self-denial and self-discipline you must sedulously cut short and even give up all empty pleasures and useless dealings with other creatures. In other words, you must crucify the flesh, keep a guard over the tongue, and mortify the bodily senses.
“You must guard against grubs doing harm to the tree. These parasites are love of self and love of comfort, and they eat away the green foliage of the Tree and frustrate the fair hope it offered of yielding good fruit; for love of self is incompatible with love of Mary.
“You must not allow this Tree to be damaged by destructive animals, that is, by sins, for they may cause its death simply by their contact. They must not be allowed even to breathe upon the Tree, because their mere breath, that is, venial sins, which are most dangerous when we do not trouble ourselves about them.
“It is also necessary to water this Tree regularly with your Communions, Masses and other public and private prayers. Otherwise it will not continue bearing fruit.
“Yet you need not be alarmed when the winds blow and shake this tree, for it must happen that the storm-winds of temptation will threaten to bring it down, and snow and frost tend to smother it. By this we mean that this devotion to our Blessed Lady will surely be called into question and attacked. But as long as we continue steadfastly in tending it, we have nothing to fear.
“Chosen soul, provided you thus carefully cultivate the Tree of Life, which has been freshly planted in your soul by the Holy Ghost, I can assure you that in a short time it will grow so tall that the birds of the air will make their home in it. It will become such a good tree that it will yield in due season the sweet and adorable Fruit of honor and grace, which is Jesus, Who has always been and will always be the only fruit of Mary.
“Happy is that soul in which Mary, the tree of life, is planted. Happier still is the soul in which she has been able to grow and blossom. Happier again is the soul in which she brings forth her fruit. But happiest of all is the soul which savors the sweetness of Mary’s fruit and preserves it up till death and then beyond to all eternity. Amen!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary, §72 to §78).
Planting the Tree of Life on March 25th
With this in mind, we shall start another 33-day preparation for St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion Consecration to Jesus through Mary, later this month, so that the day of consecration falls on Monday, March 25th, usually the feast of the Annunciation, or the Incarnation (“planting” of “seed”) of Jesus in the womb of Mary. This year, this March 25th falls in Holy Week―and so the Feast of the Annunciation is transferred to the first available slot after Easter Sunday—which this year will be Monday April 8th. Nevertheless, even if cannot liturgically celebrate the Annunciation on March 25th this year, nothing prevents us from making our True Devotion Consecration to Jesus through Mary on the actual real date of the Annunciation. A further importance of this date is the fact that March 25th was thought, by many Fathers of the Church, to be the date of Adam being created (or “planted” on Earth), and the Fathers also thought that March 25th was the day that Christ died, after being nailed to the Cross, which was “planted” on Calvary. In view of all this, March 25th of this year (2024), is a perfect day to make for the first time (or to renew) our consecration to Jesus through Mary.
St. Louis himself writes: “Choose a special feast day to consecrate ourselves through Mary to Jesus … We should choose a special feast day on which to give ourselves and consecrate and sacrifice to her, unreservedly, our body and soul” (The Secret of Mary, §29 & §61). “Once a year at least, and on the same day, they should renew the same consecration” (True Devotion to Mary, §233) and he adds that we should: “celebrate every year with special fervor the feast of the Annunciation of Our Lord” (The Secret of Mary, §63). St. Louis also states that his suggested 33-day preparation period can be increased or decreased in time.
Hence, since the Preparation for the True Devotion Consecration to Mary coincides with Lent, and since the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes—with Our Lady cry of “Penance! Penance! Penance!”—occurs on February 11th, which this year falls on Quinquagesima Sunday―just 3 days before Ash Wednesday. What better way to do penance than spending 33 days in the middle of Lent going through the spiritual exercises of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion Consecration to Jesus Through Mary? So mark your calendars for the start date―this coming Wednesday, February 21st, the Ember Wednesday of Lent―a week after Ash Wednesday! May Our Lady cure us of our spiritual ills! May the true Tree of Life be firmly planted within us! May the ‘spiritual’ waters of our prayers water the Seed of Faith and the Seed of the true Tree of Life within our souls!
Article 8
Sexagesima Sunday, February 4th
Seedy Sexagesima Sunday!
Sexagesima Sunday, February 4th
Seedy Sexagesima Sunday!
A Seedy Story! Fruitful or Fruitless?
Today―on Sexagesima Sunday―Our Lord relates a “seedy” parable—which is that of the parable of “The Sower of the Seed”—related by three of the Evangelists: St. Matthew, St. Mark and St. Luke—the Church choosing to use the account given by St. Luke. Here is a combined version from the texts of all three Evangelists:
“The sower went out to sow his seed. And whilst he sowed, some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down by men, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And some seed fell upon stony ground, where it had not much depth of earth, and the seed sprouted and shot up immediately, because there was no deepness of earth. But when the sun was risen, the sprouted seed was scorched, because it had no root and no moisture. And other seed fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up with it and choked it and it yielded no fruit. And others fell upon good ground: and this seed brought forth fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold.
“And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom Jesus said: ‘The parable is this! Hear therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
Worldly Weeds, Satanic Seeds, Hellish Herbs and Paradisical Plants
Our Lord often brings agriculture and plants into His teachings―this parable of the sower of the seed; His reference to Himself being the vine and we being the branches (John 15); the parable of the fruitless fig tree (Luke 13); the parable about the wheat and the cockle (Matthew 13); the plentiful harvest (Luke 10); the mustard seed (Mark 4; Luke 13; Matthew 17); good and bad trees and good and bad fruit (Matthew 7); He cursed the unfruitful fig tree (Matthew 21); learning signs from the trees and branches (Matthew 24); comparing Faith to seeds (Luke 17); etc.
Besides the above examples, there are many more references to trees, plants, seeds and fruits in the Old Testament. With all these examples, you would imagine that God is a Green-Fingered Gardener! The Holy Ghost—the inspirer and author behind Holy Scripture—has made sure that the Bible is full of ‘agricultural’ and ‘gardening’ elements from beginning to end! Incidentally, beginning with Septuagesima Sunday—which was last Sunday—the Church, in her Divine Office (Breviary), starts with first chapter of the Bible for the readings at the Divine Office of Matins. Therefore, this dovetails with what is about to be said. The opening books of the Bible could be said to be—tongue-in-cheek—a “Gardening Book” of sorts.
We read, in the very first book of the Bible, in its very first chapter: “And God said: ‘Let the Earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the Earth!’ And it was so done. And the Earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that bears fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:11-12).
A little further on, in the same fist chapter, we read: “And God created man to His own image―to the image of God He created him―male and female He created them. And God blessed them, saying: ‘Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it! … Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed upon the Earth, and all trees that have in themselves seed of their own kind, to be your meat [food]!” (Genesis 1:27-29).
Then, in the second chapter of Genesis, we again read: “And the Lord God had planted a paradise of pleasure from the beginning: wherein He placed man whom He had formed. And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of―the tree of life also, in the midst of paradise, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil ... And the Lord God took man and put him into the paradise of pleasure, to dress it and to keep it. And Lord God commanded Adam, saying: ‘Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” (Genesis 2:8-17).
Satanic Seeds and Hellish Herbs
They say “it comes in threes” and so with these ‘gardening’ references in the opening books of the Bible! In the third book of Genesis, we come to dramatic scene of the story, the grand finale! “Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why hath God commanded you that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat! But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God hath commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No! You shall not die the death! For God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened: and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’ And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold: and she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband who did eat. And the eyes of them both were opened: and when they perceived themselves to be naked, they sewed together fig leaves, and made themselves aprons. And when they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in paradise at the afternoon air, Adam and his wife hid themselves from the face of the Lord God, amidst the trees of paradise” (Genesis 3:1-8).
From Fruit to Thistles! From Life to Death!
In agriculture and gardening, there are certain rules that you must obey, or else ‘Mother Nature’ will punish you with failure. The same was true for Adam and, as we shall see, the same is true for ourselves in the spiritual garden of our soul. Adam and Eve failed to follow the rules and Adam and Eve were punished severely—in fact, they were sentenced to death!
“And the Lord God called Adam, and said to him: Where art thou?’ And Adam said: ‘I heard Thy voice in paradise and I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid myself!’ And the Lord God said to Adam: ‘And who hath told thee that thou wast naked, unless thou hast eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat?’ And Adam said: ‘The woman, whom thou gavest me to be my companion, gave me of the tree, and I did eat!’ And the Lord God said to the woman: ‘Why hast thou done this?’ And she answered: ‘The serpent deceived me, and I did eat!’” (Genesis 3:9-11).
Adam and Eve are Cast-Out from the Garden of Eden
Excuses! Excuses! We are always full of excuses—a tendency we have all inherited from the Original Sin of Adam and Eve! It is never our fault—we will always “point the finger” at someone or something else! One would imagine that we are the only faultless, blameless people walking on the face of this Earth! The sinners will always blame everyone else, the saints will always blame themselves! St. Peter says to Our Lord: “Peter fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying: ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!’” (Luke 5:8), while the Pharisee says: “The Pharisee standing, prayed thus within himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican!’” (Luke 18:11). We should take note of what the Holy Ghost says through the Psalmist in Holy Scripture: “Incline not my heart to make excuses in sins!” (Psalm 140:4).
God refuses the excuses of Adam and Eve and “To the woman God said: ‘I will multiply thy sorrows and thy conceptions: in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children, and thou shalt be under thy husband’s power, and he shall have dominion over thee!’ And to Adam He said: ‘Because thou hast listened to the voice of thy wife and hast eaten of the tree―of which I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat―cursed is the earth in thy work; with labor and toil shalt thou eat thereof all the days of thy life! Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth! In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth, out of which thou wast taken! For dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!’” (Genesis 3:16-19).
Here we see, very clearly, the truth of what the Holy Ghost would later say in Holy Scripture, through the mouth and pen of St. Paul in the New Testament: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Not All Gardeners Are Made Equal
Some gardeners succeed, some gardeners fail! Likewise, in the garden of the soul, some gardeners succeed while others fail. At the end of His parable about the “Workers in the Vineyard” ― another agricultural or gardening reference―Our Lord closes with the words: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 20:16). In a similar vein, speaking of the end times, Our Lord says: “But of that day and hour no one knoweth, not the angels of Heaven, but the Father alone … Then two shall be in the field: one shall be taken, and one shall be left” (Matthew 24:36-40). So work in the garden of our soul we must, but not all will work in a way that will lead to salvation. “Because of the cold, the sluggard would not plough: he shall beg therefore in the summer, and it shall not be given him!” (Proverbs 20:4) … “The thoughts of the industrious always bring forth abundance: but every sluggard is always in want” (Proverbs 21:5).
We see that Adam and Eve’s first born—Cain—was a farmer or gardener, while his brother Abel looked after the animals, yet things turned out badly for Cain and well for Abel—and it was in the fields that Cain murdered Abel: “And Cain said to Abel his brother: ‘Let us go forth outside!’ And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him” (Genesis 4:8). On the contrary, we see that Jacob was the farmer or gardener, and his brother Esau hunted animals—yet things turned out badly for Esau, but well for Jacob. However, in the case of the first two kings of Israel—Saul and then David—Saul was the farmer that God chose to be the first king, but things went sour for Saul when he disobeyed God’s commands through the prophet Samuel, and God chose David, a shepherd of animals, to replace Saul. There are other examples that can be given, but let us stop there. Suffice it to say that not all gardeners are made equal—some succeed, some don’t, which is why St. Paul says: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Agriculturalists, Farmers, Gardeners Galore!
Today’s Gospel reading, at the Mass of Sexagesima Sunday, sees Our Lord speak of the “Sower of the Seed”, yet before we dig into that Gospel, you will be amazed by the numerous Scriptural references that, in a precise or general way, speak of agriculture, farming and gardening—in both the Old and New Testaments. So much so, that it is not a mere coincidence, but a deliberate ‘game-plan’ by God in mentioning these connected themes so many times.
After the Great Flood that destroyed most of the world, God addresses Noe in words similar to those spoken to Adam—for, in essence, God is going to “start the world” all over again through Noe. “God blessed Noe and his sons. And He said to them: ‘Increase and multiply, and fill the Earth! All that moves upon the Earth is delivered into your hand. And everything that moves and lives, shall be meat for you―even as the green herbs―have I delivered them all to you! …
And Noe, a husbandman, began to till the ground and planted a vineyard” (Genesis 9:1-2, 20).
Abraham was a successful farmer and shepherd. Abraham’s son, Isaac, was a successful farmer and shepherd: “And Isaac sowed in that land, and he found that same year a hundredfold: and the Lord blessed him. And the man was enriched, and he went on prospering and increasing, till he became exceeding great” (Genesis 26:12-13). Isaac’s son, Jacob, was a farmer and a shepherd. Jacob’s favorite son, Joseph, tells of a dream he had: “Hear my dream which I dreamed. I thought we were binding sheaves in the field: and my sheaf arose as it were, and stood, and your sheaves standing about, bowed down before my sheaf!” (Genesis 37:6-7).
Likewise in the time of Moses: “And the Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying: ‘Speak to the children of Israel, and thou shalt say to them: “When you shall have entered into the land which I will give you, observe the rest of the Sabbath to the Lord. Six years thou shalt sow thy field and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and shalt gather the fruits thereo. But in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath to the land, of the resting of the Lord: thou shalt not sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard … for it is a year of rest to the land!”‘” (Leviticus 25:1-4).
Firmly Planted in the New Testament!
Okay, let us “give it rest” as regards Old Testament quotes—though you will find many, many more explicit and implicit references to agriculture, farming and gardening that can be liked analogically and symbolically to the spiritual gardening that has to take place in the soul.
The New Testament is even more striking in this respect. Our Lord Himself frequently uses agricultural references as part of His teaching—for it is a common way of life and Our Lord teaches by referring to things that the people understand well and can easily relate to—there were no media entertainment outlets in those days: no TV, computers, videos, sports, cars, movies, malls, supermarkets, etc. Our Lord speaks ‘agriculturally’ on many occasions:
“Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as one of these. And if the grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, God doth so clothe: how much more you, O ye of little faith?” (Matthew 6:28-30).
“By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:16-20).
“I am the true vine; and my Father is the farmer [gardener]. Every branch in Me, that beareth not fruit, He will take away: and every one that beareth fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches: he that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit: for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he burneth!” (John 15:1-6).
“Another parable he proposed to them, saying: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, and had brought forth fruit, then appeared also the cockle. And the servants of the good man of the house coming said to him: ‘Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? Whence then hath it cockle?’ And he said to them: ‘An enemy hath done this!’ And the servants said to him: ‘Wilt thou that we go and gather it up?’ And he said: ‘No, lest perhaps gathering up the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it! Suffer both to grow until the harvest, and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers: “Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn!”‘ [Jesus then explained the parable to His disciples] … ‘He that soweth the good seed, is the Son of man. And the field is the world. And the good seed are the children of the kingdom. And the cockle are the children of the wicked one. And the enemy that sowed them, is the devil. But the harvest is the end of the world. And the reapers are the angels. Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire: so shall it be at the end of the world!’” (Matthew 13:24-30, 13:37-40).
Sexagesima Sunday’s Gospel of the Sower of the Seed
This leads us back into the Gospel for Sexagesima Sunday—the parable of “The Sower of the Seed”—and the need to receive the seed of the Word of God in a good fertile soil that will allow the seed to grow and bear fruit. Our Lord refers to our obligation to bear fruit when He says: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. And every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit! … In this is My Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit!” (John 15:1-8). But even before becoming a fruitful branch, we need to fruitfully receive the seed of the Word of God:
“The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
Worldly Weeds
Of course, to receive the Word fruitfully, means not allowing oneself to be sucked into the whirlpool of worldly cares. The Imitation of Christ warns us against this:
“Do you think that men of the world have no suffering, or perhaps but little? Ask even those who enjoy the most delights and you will learn otherwise. ‘But,’ you will say, ‘they enjoy many pleasures and follow their own wishes; therefore they do not feel their troubles very much.’ Granted that they do have whatever they wish, how long do you think it will last? Behold, they, who prosper in the world, shall perish as smoke, and there shall be no memory of their past joys. Even in this life they do not find rest in these pleasures without bitterness, weariness, and fear. For they often receive the penalty of sorrow from the very thing from which they believe their happiness comes. And it is just. Since they seek and follow after pleasures without reason, they should not enjoy them without shame and bitterness. How brief, how false, how unreasonable and shameful all these pleasures are! Yet, in their drunken blindness, men do not understand this, but, like brute beasts, incur death of soul for the miserly enjoyment of a corruptible life. Therefore, my child, do not pursue your lusts, but turn away from your own will. Seek thy pleasure in the Lord and He will give thee thy heart’s desires” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 12).
The Dangers of Fruitlessness
Elsewhere in Holy Scripture, we are clearly shown the danger of not being fruitful.
“Jesus went out of the city of Jerusalem into Bethania, and remained there. And in the morning, returning into Jerusalem, He was hungry. And seeing a certain fig tree, afar off, by the way side, He came to it, if perhaps He might find anything on it. And He found nothing on it, but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward and may no man hereafter eat fruit of thee anymore, forever!’ And His disciples heard it. And immediately the fig tree withered away. And they went on to Jerusalem … when evening was come, Jesus went forth out of the city. And when they passed by the fig tree they saw it dried up from the roots. And Peter remembering, said to him: Master! Behold the fig tree, which Thou didst curse, is withered away!’ And the disciples, seeing it, wondered, saying: ‘How is it presently withered away?” (Matthew 21:17-19; Mark 11:11-21).
We see a similar “fruitless” incident, this time in a parable of Our Lord: “He spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why cumbereth it the ground?” But he answering, said to him: “Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And, perhaps happily it bear fruit, but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”‘” (Luke 13:6-9).
St. John the Baptist says: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down and cast into the fire!” (Luke 3:9). Likewise, Our Lord says: “Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:19).
We can link this to what Our Lord said a few days later, at the Last Supper: “I am the true vine; and my Father is the farmer [gardener]. Every branch in Me, that beareth not fruit, He will take away. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches: he that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit: for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he burneth!” (John 15:1-6).
God Wants More Gardeners for His Garden!
Our Lord tells us that God seeks more laborers for His harvest of souls, more gardeners laboring in the garden of the soul. “Then Jesus said to His disciples: “The harvest indeed is great, but the laborers are few! Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he send forth laborers into his harvest!” (Matthew 9:37-38).
“The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a householder, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And, having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing there, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They say to him: ‘Because no man hath hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:1-7).
Our Lord points out: “Do you not say: ‘There are yet four months and then the harvest cometh’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes, and see the countries; for they are white already to harvest. And he that reaps receiveth wages, and gathers fruit unto life everlasting: that both he that soweth, and he that reaps, may rejoice together. For in this is the saying true: ‘That it is one man that soweth, and it is another that reaps!’ I have sent you to reap that in which you did not labor: others have labored, and you have entered into their labors” (John 4:35-38). Which is why St. Paul writes: “I have planted, Apollo watered, but God gave the increase!” (1 Corinthians 3:6).
God Wants Fruitful Gardens and Diligent Gardeners
It is clear from what Our Lord says that God wants us to be fruitful in our spiritual gardening—whether gardening in the garden of our own souls, or helping other souls to grow spiritually. “Hear ye another parable. There was a man an householder, who planted a vineyard, and made a hedge round about it, and dug in it a press, and built a tower, and let it out to farmers; and went into a strange country. And when the time of the fruits drew nigh, he sent his servants to the farmers that they might receive the fruits thereof” (Matthew 21:33-34).
Nor is God satisfied with just some fruit, God wants you to produce more and more fruit―“Everyone that beareth fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit!” (John 15:2). As Dom Hubert Van Zeller writes in his book, Holiness, A Guide For Beginners, there is no point in our life when we can say: “Okay! I’ve done it! I’ve no more to do!” The only “finishing-line” that ends our race is death! “One great lesson you are meant to learn is that sanctity is not a matter of reaching a particular milestone on the road to God. It is not a case of being an ordinary person until you come to the milestone, and a saint when you have got beyond it. It is a case of using your powers as perfectly as you can. There is no fixed milestone. The only thing that is fixed is the destination — God” (Dom Hubert Van Zeller, Holiness—A Guide For Beginners).
Why is it that we have much energy for amassing earthly fruits, but little energy for amassing heavenly fruits? Another parable of Our Lord’s should make us seriously reflect on this anomaly: “And He spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and will build greater; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods. And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thy rest; eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee: and whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God! … But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!’” (Luke 12:16-21, 31). “Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting, which the Son of man will give you!” (John 6:27). “What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26). "Let Thy children, O Lord, whom Thou lovest, know that it is not the growing of fruits that nourishes men, but Thy word preserves them that believe in thee!” (Wisdom 16:26).
The Fruit of Life is Death—The Fruit of Death is Life!
The fruit of life is death and the fruit of death is life? Sounds like an oxymoron (a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory or paradoxical terms appear in conjunction with each other). At first glance, yes! Yet that is exactly what Our Lord says in the Gospels:
► “He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:39).
► Still in Matthew’s Gospel, but six chapters later, Our Lord is again seen to repeat the same idea: “For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:25).
All the other three Evangelists also report Our Lord as saying this—and St. Luke also reports it twice:
► “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35).
► “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it!” (Luke 9:24).
► “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it!” (Luke 17:33).
► “Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, then itself it remaineth alone. But if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal!” (John 12:24-25).
Out of all those last six references, quoted above just now, in four of them Our Lord links the “saving” and “losing” of life to the obligation to carry the cross. Of the other two, one refers to the tribulations that will come in the end times and the last one, from St. John’s Gospel, refers to the need for the seed to die unto itself before it can bear fruit.
Out of all those last six references, quoted above just now, in four of them Our Lord links the “saving” and “losing” of life to the obligation to carry the cross. Of the other two, one refers to the tribulations that will come in the end times and the last one, from St. John’s Gospel, refers to the need for the seed to die unto itself before it can bear fruit.
► “He that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me! He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:38-39).
► “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me! For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:24-25).
► “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:34-35).
► “And he said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it! For what is a man advantaged, if he gain the whole world, and lose himself, and cast away himself?’” (Luke 9:23-25).
► “As it came to pass in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat and drink, they married wives, and were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark―and the flood came and destroyed them all! Likewise as it came to pass, in the days of Lot―they did eat and drink, they bought and sold, they planted and built. And in the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from Heaven, and destroyed them all! Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man shall be revealed. In that hour, he that shall be on the housetop, and his goods in the house, let him not go down to take them away: and he that shall be in the field, in like manner, let him not return back! Remember Lot’s wife! Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it. I say to you: in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left! Two women shall be grinding together: the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left: two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left!” (Luke 17:26-35).
We look upon the cross wrongly and mistakenly. We see the cross as “cramping our style” and “dampening our fun”. We see the Cross as a “killjoy” and as something “negative” in our lives. Yet the Cross is the seed of life that can grow into a tree of life. If we just stop to think and reflect upon it—then it all makes sense.
The Ultimate Seed of Life is the Seed of the Cross
Nowhere is the Church as eloquent in her liturgy as she is during Passiontide—the last two weeks before Easter Sunday, within which we have “Holy Week”, and within that “Holy Week” we have “Good Friday”. The focus of Passiontide is the Cross—the torturous Cross, the Cross that kills, the Cross that brings death, but through that death the Cross brings eternal life. The “fruit” of Mary’s womb—Jesus—is also the “fruit” of the Cross! The following verses are a mere excerpts or a mere “tip of the iceberg” of the beauty that can found in the liturgy of those last two weeks of Lent. We could, by analogy, say that the Septuagesima Season is the “planting season” (the Sower of the Seed), then Lent can be seen as the “growing season”, with Passiontide being the “season of harvest”! Here are some verses from the “harvest season” of Passiontide, when Christ “matures” and “ripens” as our “fruit of eternal life” on the “Tree of the Cross”:
The Hymn: Pange Lingua
Sing, my tongue,
The Savior’s glory;
Tell His triumph far and wide;
Tell aloud the famous story
Of His body crucified;
How upon the cross a victim,
Vanquishing in death, He died.
Eating of the tree forbidden,
Man had sunk in Satan’s snare,
When our pitying Creator did
This second tree prepare;
Destined, many ages later,
That first evil to repair.
Lofty tree, bend down thy branches,
To embrace thy sacred load;
Oh, relax the native tension
Of that all too rigid wood;
Gently, gently bear the members
Of thy dying King and God.
Tree, which solely wast found worthy
The world’s Victim to sustain.
Harbor from the raging tempest!
Ark, that saved the world again!
Tree, with sacred blood anointed
Of the Lamb for sinners slain.
The Hymn: Vexilla Regis
The Royal Banner forward goes,
The mystic Cross refulgent glows:
Where He, in Flesh, flesh who made,
Upon the Tree of pain is laid.
That which the Prophet-King of old
Hath in mysterious verse foretold,
Is now accomplished, whilst we see
God ruling nations from a Tree.
O lovely and refulgent Tree,
Adorned with purpled majesty;
Culled from a worthy stock, to bear
Those limbs which sanctified were.
Blest Tree, whose happy branches bore
The wealth that did the world restore;
The beam that did that Body weigh
Which raised up Hell’s expected prey.
Then in thy hymn from the Divine Office of Lauds for the morning of Passion Sunday, we have the following beautiful references to the Cross of Christ being a Tree of Life:
Faithful cross! Above all other,
One and only noble tree!
None in foliage, none in blossom,
None in fruit thy peers may be;
Sweetest wood and sweetest iron!
Sweetest weight is hung on thee.
Bend thy boughs, O tree of glory!
Thy relaxing sinews bend;
For awhile the ancient rigor,
That thy birth bestowed, suspend;
And the King of heavenly beauty
On thy bosom gently tend!
Thou alone wast counted worthy
This world’s ransom to uphold;
For a shipwrecked race preparing
Harbor, like the ark of old;
With the sacred blood anointed
From the smitten Lamb that rolled.
Friend or Foe?
We ought to love the Cross—but we rarely do! St. Paul speaks of the enemies of the Cross—are we among them? “For many walk, of whom I have told you often (and now tell you weeping), that they are enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Philippians 3:18-19).
In his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, St. Louis de Montfort writes: “A Friend of the Cross is one chosen by God from among ten thousand who have reason and sense for their only guide. He is truly divine, raised above reason and thoroughly opposed to the things of sense, for he lives in the light of true faith and burns with love for the Cross … A Friend of the Cross is a holy man, separated from visible things. His heart is lifted high above all that is frail and perishable; he journeys here below like a stranger and pilgrim. He keeps his heart free from the world, looks upon it with an unconcerned glance of his left eye and disdainfully tramples it under foot.
“Is the way you follow the one that leads to this goal? Is it the true way of life, the narrow way, the thorn-strewn way to Calvary? Or are you unconsciously traveling the world’s broad road, the road to perdition? Do you realize that there is a highroad which to all appearances is straight and safe for man to travel, but which in reality leads to death? … Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!’ they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat, let us drink, let us sing, let us dance, let us play! God is good, He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!’ And so they continue.
“The elect who are willing to be made conformable to the crucified Christ by carrying their cross are few in number. It would cause us to faint away from grief to learn how surprisingly small is their number! It is so small that among ten thousand people there is scarcely one to be found, as was revealed to several Saints … In fact, only a privileged number of men receive this practical knowledge of the mystery of the Cross. For that man who climbs up to Calvary and lets himself be nailed on the Cross with Jesus, must be a brave man, a hero, a resolute man, one who is lifted up in God, who treats as muck both the world and Hell, as well as his very body and his own will. He must be resolved to relinquish all things, to undertake anything and to suffer everything for Jesus. Understand this, dear Friends of the Cross, should there be anyone among you who has not this firm resolve, he is just limping along on one foot, flying with one wing, and undeserving of your company, since he is not worthy to be called a Friend of the Cross!” (St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
Essential Tree!
St. Louis de Montfort, in his poem/hymn The Triumph of the Cross, found in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, penned the following beautiful stanza:
“Essential is the Tree,
And we who know its cost
Must mount to Calvary
Or languish and be lost.
As Saint Augustine states
With outcry ominous,
We all are reprobates
Unless God chastens us.”
That “essential tree” must be planted in our souls. St. Louis continues: “The Holy Ghost compares us to (1) trees planted along the waters of grace, in the field of the Church, who ought to bring forth their fruit in their seasons; (2) to the branches of a vine of which Jesus Christ is the stock, and which must yield good grapes; (3) to a flock of which Jesus Christ is the Shepherd, and which is to multiply and give milk; (4) to a good land of which God is the Farmer, in which the seed multiplies itself and brings forth thirtyfold, sixtyfold and a hundredfold. Jesus Christ cursed the unfruitful fig tree, and pronounced sentence against the useless servant who had not made any profit on his talent” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Plant the Seed of the Tree of Life in Your Soul
St. Louis de Montfort refers to Mary being the Tree of Life: “Mary is everywhere the veritable tree who bears the Fruit of life, and the true Mother who produces it … One reason why so few souls come to the fullness of the age of Jesus Christ is that Mary, who is as much as ever the fruitful spouse of the Holy Ghost, is not sufficiently formed in their hearts. He who wishes to have the fruit well-ripened and well-formed must have the tree that produces it; he who wishes to have the fruit of life, Jesus Christ, must have the tree of life, which is Mary, who makes Him fertile and fruit-bearing … If Mary, who is the tree of life, is well cultivated in our soul by fidelity to the practices of this devotion, she will bear her fruit in her own time, and her fruit is none other than Jesus Christ …
“Know that Our Blessed Lady is the true terrestrial paradise of the New Adam, Jesus Christ … It is in this earthly paradise that there is the true tree of life, which has borne Jesus Christ, the Fruit of Life … There are in this divine place trees planted by the hand of God, and watered by His divine unction, which have borne and daily bear fruits of a divine taste. There are flowerbeds adorned with beautiful and varied blossoms of virtues diffusing odors which delight the very angels. There are meadows green with hope, impregnable towers of strength!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
In a similar vein, in his booklet The Secret of Mary, St. Louis adds: “This does not mean that one who has discovered Mary, through a genuine devotion, is exempt from crosses and sufferings. Far from it! One is tried even more than others, because Mary, as Mother of the living, gives to all her children splinters of the tree of life, which is the Cross of Jesus. But while giving out crosses to them, she gives the grace to bear them with patience, and even with joy. In this way, the crosses she sends to those who trust themselves to her are rather like sweetmeats, i.e., “sweetened” crosses rather than “bitter” ones. If, from time to time, they do taste the bitterness of the chalice from which, we must drink to become proven friends of God, the consolation and joy which their Mother sends in the wake of their sorrows creates, in them, a strong desire to carry even heavier and still more bitter crosses” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Today―on Sexagesima Sunday―Our Lord relates a “seedy” parable—which is that of the parable of “The Sower of the Seed”—related by three of the Evangelists: St. Matthew, St. Mark and St. Luke—the Church choosing to use the account given by St. Luke. Here is a combined version from the texts of all three Evangelists:
“The sower went out to sow his seed. And whilst he sowed, some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down by men, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And some seed fell upon stony ground, where it had not much depth of earth, and the seed sprouted and shot up immediately, because there was no deepness of earth. But when the sun was risen, the sprouted seed was scorched, because it had no root and no moisture. And other seed fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up with it and choked it and it yielded no fruit. And others fell upon good ground: and this seed brought forth fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold.
“And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom Jesus said: ‘The parable is this! Hear therefore the [explanation of the] parable of the sower. The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
Worldly Weeds, Satanic Seeds, Hellish Herbs and Paradisical Plants
Our Lord often brings agriculture and plants into His teachings―this parable of the sower of the seed; His reference to Himself being the vine and we being the branches (John 15); the parable of the fruitless fig tree (Luke 13); the parable about the wheat and the cockle (Matthew 13); the plentiful harvest (Luke 10); the mustard seed (Mark 4; Luke 13; Matthew 17); good and bad trees and good and bad fruit (Matthew 7); He cursed the unfruitful fig tree (Matthew 21); learning signs from the trees and branches (Matthew 24); comparing Faith to seeds (Luke 17); etc.
Besides the above examples, there are many more references to trees, plants, seeds and fruits in the Old Testament. With all these examples, you would imagine that God is a Green-Fingered Gardener! The Holy Ghost—the inspirer and author behind Holy Scripture—has made sure that the Bible is full of ‘agricultural’ and ‘gardening’ elements from beginning to end! Incidentally, beginning with Septuagesima Sunday—which was last Sunday—the Church, in her Divine Office (Breviary), starts with first chapter of the Bible for the readings at the Divine Office of Matins. Therefore, this dovetails with what is about to be said. The opening books of the Bible could be said to be—tongue-in-cheek—a “Gardening Book” of sorts.
We read, in the very first book of the Bible, in its very first chapter: “And God said: ‘Let the Earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind, which may have seed in itself upon the Earth!’ And it was so done. And the Earth brought forth the green herb, and such as yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that bears fruit, having seed each one according to its kind. And God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:11-12).
A little further on, in the same fist chapter, we read: “And God created man to His own image―to the image of God He created him―male and female He created them. And God blessed them, saying: ‘Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it! … Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed upon the Earth, and all trees that have in themselves seed of their own kind, to be your meat [food]!” (Genesis 1:27-29).
Then, in the second chapter of Genesis, we again read: “And the Lord God had planted a paradise of pleasure from the beginning: wherein He placed man whom He had formed. And the Lord God brought forth of the ground all manner of trees, fair to behold, and pleasant to eat of―the tree of life also, in the midst of paradise, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil ... And the Lord God took man and put him into the paradise of pleasure, to dress it and to keep it. And Lord God commanded Adam, saying: ‘Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat! But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat! For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!’” (Genesis 2:8-17).
Satanic Seeds and Hellish Herbs
They say “it comes in threes” and so with these ‘gardening’ references in the opening books of the Bible! In the third book of Genesis, we come to dramatic scene of the story, the grand finale! “Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why hath God commanded you that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat! But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God hath commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No! You shall not die the death! For God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened: and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’ And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold: and she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband who did eat. And the eyes of them both were opened: and when they perceived themselves to be naked, they sewed together fig leaves, and made themselves aprons. And when they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in paradise at the afternoon air, Adam and his wife hid themselves from the face of the Lord God, amidst the trees of paradise” (Genesis 3:1-8).
From Fruit to Thistles! From Life to Death!
In agriculture and gardening, there are certain rules that you must obey, or else ‘Mother Nature’ will punish you with failure. The same was true for Adam and, as we shall see, the same is true for ourselves in the spiritual garden of our soul. Adam and Eve failed to follow the rules and Adam and Eve were punished severely—in fact, they were sentenced to death!
“And the Lord God called Adam, and said to him: Where art thou?’ And Adam said: ‘I heard Thy voice in paradise and I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid myself!’ And the Lord God said to Adam: ‘And who hath told thee that thou wast naked, unless thou hast eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat?’ And Adam said: ‘The woman, whom thou gavest me to be my companion, gave me of the tree, and I did eat!’ And the Lord God said to the woman: ‘Why hast thou done this?’ And she answered: ‘The serpent deceived me, and I did eat!’” (Genesis 3:9-11).
Adam and Eve are Cast-Out from the Garden of Eden
Excuses! Excuses! We are always full of excuses—a tendency we have all inherited from the Original Sin of Adam and Eve! It is never our fault—we will always “point the finger” at someone or something else! One would imagine that we are the only faultless, blameless people walking on the face of this Earth! The sinners will always blame everyone else, the saints will always blame themselves! St. Peter says to Our Lord: “Peter fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying: ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!’” (Luke 5:8), while the Pharisee says: “The Pharisee standing, prayed thus within himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican!’” (Luke 18:11). We should take note of what the Holy Ghost says through the Psalmist in Holy Scripture: “Incline not my heart to make excuses in sins!” (Psalm 140:4).
God refuses the excuses of Adam and Eve and “To the woman God said: ‘I will multiply thy sorrows and thy conceptions: in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children, and thou shalt be under thy husband’s power, and he shall have dominion over thee!’ And to Adam He said: ‘Because thou hast listened to the voice of thy wife and hast eaten of the tree―of which I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat―cursed is the earth in thy work; with labor and toil shalt thou eat thereof all the days of thy life! Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth! In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth, out of which thou wast taken! For dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!’” (Genesis 3:16-19).
Here we see, very clearly, the truth of what the Holy Ghost would later say in Holy Scripture, through the mouth and pen of St. Paul in the New Testament: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Not All Gardeners Are Made Equal
Some gardeners succeed, some gardeners fail! Likewise, in the garden of the soul, some gardeners succeed while others fail. At the end of His parable about the “Workers in the Vineyard” ― another agricultural or gardening reference―Our Lord closes with the words: “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 20:16). In a similar vein, speaking of the end times, Our Lord says: “But of that day and hour no one knoweth, not the angels of Heaven, but the Father alone … Then two shall be in the field: one shall be taken, and one shall be left” (Matthew 24:36-40). So work in the garden of our soul we must, but not all will work in a way that will lead to salvation. “Because of the cold, the sluggard would not plough: he shall beg therefore in the summer, and it shall not be given him!” (Proverbs 20:4) … “The thoughts of the industrious always bring forth abundance: but every sluggard is always in want” (Proverbs 21:5).
We see that Adam and Eve’s first born—Cain—was a farmer or gardener, while his brother Abel looked after the animals, yet things turned out badly for Cain and well for Abel—and it was in the fields that Cain murdered Abel: “And Cain said to Abel his brother: ‘Let us go forth outside!’ And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him” (Genesis 4:8). On the contrary, we see that Jacob was the farmer or gardener, and his brother Esau hunted animals—yet things turned out badly for Esau, but well for Jacob. However, in the case of the first two kings of Israel—Saul and then David—Saul was the farmer that God chose to be the first king, but things went sour for Saul when he disobeyed God’s commands through the prophet Samuel, and God chose David, a shepherd of animals, to replace Saul. There are other examples that can be given, but let us stop there. Suffice it to say that not all gardeners are made equal—some succeed, some don’t, which is why St. Paul says: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Agriculturalists, Farmers, Gardeners Galore!
Today’s Gospel reading, at the Mass of Sexagesima Sunday, sees Our Lord speak of the “Sower of the Seed”, yet before we dig into that Gospel, you will be amazed by the numerous Scriptural references that, in a precise or general way, speak of agriculture, farming and gardening—in both the Old and New Testaments. So much so, that it is not a mere coincidence, but a deliberate ‘game-plan’ by God in mentioning these connected themes so many times.
After the Great Flood that destroyed most of the world, God addresses Noe in words similar to those spoken to Adam—for, in essence, God is going to “start the world” all over again through Noe. “God blessed Noe and his sons. And He said to them: ‘Increase and multiply, and fill the Earth! All that moves upon the Earth is delivered into your hand. And everything that moves and lives, shall be meat for you―even as the green herbs―have I delivered them all to you! …
And Noe, a husbandman, began to till the ground and planted a vineyard” (Genesis 9:1-2, 20).
Abraham was a successful farmer and shepherd. Abraham’s son, Isaac, was a successful farmer and shepherd: “And Isaac sowed in that land, and he found that same year a hundredfold: and the Lord blessed him. And the man was enriched, and he went on prospering and increasing, till he became exceeding great” (Genesis 26:12-13). Isaac’s son, Jacob, was a farmer and a shepherd. Jacob’s favorite son, Joseph, tells of a dream he had: “Hear my dream which I dreamed. I thought we were binding sheaves in the field: and my sheaf arose as it were, and stood, and your sheaves standing about, bowed down before my sheaf!” (Genesis 37:6-7).
Likewise in the time of Moses: “And the Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying: ‘Speak to the children of Israel, and thou shalt say to them: “When you shall have entered into the land which I will give you, observe the rest of the Sabbath to the Lord. Six years thou shalt sow thy field and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and shalt gather the fruits thereo. But in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath to the land, of the resting of the Lord: thou shalt not sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard … for it is a year of rest to the land!”‘” (Leviticus 25:1-4).
Firmly Planted in the New Testament!
Okay, let us “give it rest” as regards Old Testament quotes—though you will find many, many more explicit and implicit references to agriculture, farming and gardening that can be liked analogically and symbolically to the spiritual gardening that has to take place in the soul.
The New Testament is even more striking in this respect. Our Lord Himself frequently uses agricultural references as part of His teaching—for it is a common way of life and Our Lord teaches by referring to things that the people understand well and can easily relate to—there were no media entertainment outlets in those days: no TV, computers, videos, sports, cars, movies, malls, supermarkets, etc. Our Lord speaks ‘agriculturally’ on many occasions:
“Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they labor not, neither do they spin. But I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as one of these. And if the grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, God doth so clothe: how much more you, O ye of little faith?” (Matthew 6:28-30).
“By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:16-20).
“I am the true vine; and my Father is the farmer [gardener]. Every branch in Me, that beareth not fruit, He will take away: and every one that beareth fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches: he that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit: for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he burneth!” (John 15:1-6).
“Another parable he proposed to them, saying: ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seeds in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and over-sowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, and had brought forth fruit, then appeared also the cockle. And the servants of the good man of the house coming said to him: ‘Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? Whence then hath it cockle?’ And he said to them: ‘An enemy hath done this!’ And the servants said to him: ‘Wilt thou that we go and gather it up?’ And he said: ‘No, lest perhaps gathering up the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it! Suffer both to grow until the harvest, and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers: “Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn!”‘ [Jesus then explained the parable to His disciples] … ‘He that soweth the good seed, is the Son of man. And the field is the world. And the good seed are the children of the kingdom. And the cockle are the children of the wicked one. And the enemy that sowed them, is the devil. But the harvest is the end of the world. And the reapers are the angels. Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire: so shall it be at the end of the world!’” (Matthew 13:24-30, 13:37-40).
Sexagesima Sunday’s Gospel of the Sower of the Seed
This leads us back into the Gospel for Sexagesima Sunday—the parable of “The Sower of the Seed”—and the need to receive the seed of the Word of God in a good fertile soil that will allow the seed to grow and bear fruit. Our Lord refers to our obligation to bear fruit when He says: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away. And every one that bears fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit! … In this is My Father glorified―that you bring forth very much fruit!” (John 15:1-8). But even before becoming a fruitful branch, we need to fruitfully receive the seed of the Word of God:
“The seed is the word of God. And they by the way side are they that hear. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and understands it not, the devil comes [the birds of the air] and takes the word [of God], which was sown in his heart, out of his heart―lest believing he should be saved. And he that received the seed upon the rock or stony ground, is he that hears the word of God, immediately receives it with joy and believes for a while. Yet he has no root in himself, but keeps the word of God only for a time. For, in time of temptation, when tribulation and persecution arises because of the word of God, he is suddenly scandalized [weakened] and he falls away. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that hears the word, but the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life, choke up the word of God, and the word becomes fruitless and yields no fruit. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that hears and understands the word of God in a good and perfect heart, and bring forth fruit in patience; and the yield for one is a hundredfold, for another sixtyfold, and another thirtyfold!’” (Matthew 13:3-8, 13:18-23; Mark 4:3-8; Luke 8:5-15).
Worldly Weeds
Of course, to receive the Word fruitfully, means not allowing oneself to be sucked into the whirlpool of worldly cares. The Imitation of Christ warns us against this:
“Do you think that men of the world have no suffering, or perhaps but little? Ask even those who enjoy the most delights and you will learn otherwise. ‘But,’ you will say, ‘they enjoy many pleasures and follow their own wishes; therefore they do not feel their troubles very much.’ Granted that they do have whatever they wish, how long do you think it will last? Behold, they, who prosper in the world, shall perish as smoke, and there shall be no memory of their past joys. Even in this life they do not find rest in these pleasures without bitterness, weariness, and fear. For they often receive the penalty of sorrow from the very thing from which they believe their happiness comes. And it is just. Since they seek and follow after pleasures without reason, they should not enjoy them without shame and bitterness. How brief, how false, how unreasonable and shameful all these pleasures are! Yet, in their drunken blindness, men do not understand this, but, like brute beasts, incur death of soul for the miserly enjoyment of a corruptible life. Therefore, my child, do not pursue your lusts, but turn away from your own will. Seek thy pleasure in the Lord and He will give thee thy heart’s desires” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 12).
The Dangers of Fruitlessness
Elsewhere in Holy Scripture, we are clearly shown the danger of not being fruitful.
“Jesus went out of the city of Jerusalem into Bethania, and remained there. And in the morning, returning into Jerusalem, He was hungry. And seeing a certain fig tree, afar off, by the way side, He came to it, if perhaps He might find anything on it. And He found nothing on it, but leaves only, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward and may no man hereafter eat fruit of thee anymore, forever!’ And His disciples heard it. And immediately the fig tree withered away. And they went on to Jerusalem … when evening was come, Jesus went forth out of the city. And when they passed by the fig tree they saw it dried up from the roots. And Peter remembering, said to him: Master! Behold the fig tree, which Thou didst curse, is withered away!’ And the disciples, seeing it, wondered, saying: ‘How is it presently withered away?” (Matthew 21:17-19; Mark 11:11-21).
We see a similar “fruitless” incident, this time in a parable of Our Lord: “He spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: “Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why cumbereth it the ground?” But he answering, said to him: “Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And, perhaps happily it bear fruit, but if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down!”‘” (Luke 13:6-9).
St. John the Baptist says: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down and cast into the fire!” (Luke 3:9). Likewise, Our Lord says: “Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:19).
We can link this to what Our Lord said a few days later, at the Last Supper: “I am the true vine; and my Father is the farmer [gardener]. Every branch in Me, that beareth not fruit, He will take away. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches: he that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit: for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in Me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he burneth!” (John 15:1-6).
God Wants More Gardeners for His Garden!
Our Lord tells us that God seeks more laborers for His harvest of souls, more gardeners laboring in the garden of the soul. “Then Jesus said to His disciples: “The harvest indeed is great, but the laborers are few! Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he send forth laborers into his harvest!” (Matthew 9:37-38).
“The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a householder, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard. And, having agreed with the laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing there, and he said to them: ‘Why do you stand here all the day idle?’ They say to him: ‘Because no man hath hired us!’ He said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’” (Matthew 20:1-7).
Our Lord points out: “Do you not say: ‘There are yet four months and then the harvest cometh’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes, and see the countries; for they are white already to harvest. And he that reaps receiveth wages, and gathers fruit unto life everlasting: that both he that soweth, and he that reaps, may rejoice together. For in this is the saying true: ‘That it is one man that soweth, and it is another that reaps!’ I have sent you to reap that in which you did not labor: others have labored, and you have entered into their labors” (John 4:35-38). Which is why St. Paul writes: “I have planted, Apollo watered, but God gave the increase!” (1 Corinthians 3:6).
God Wants Fruitful Gardens and Diligent Gardeners
It is clear from what Our Lord says that God wants us to be fruitful in our spiritual gardening—whether gardening in the garden of our own souls, or helping other souls to grow spiritually. “Hear ye another parable. There was a man an householder, who planted a vineyard, and made a hedge round about it, and dug in it a press, and built a tower, and let it out to farmers; and went into a strange country. And when the time of the fruits drew nigh, he sent his servants to the farmers that they might receive the fruits thereof” (Matthew 21:33-34).
Nor is God satisfied with just some fruit, God wants you to produce more and more fruit―“Everyone that beareth fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit!” (John 15:2). As Dom Hubert Van Zeller writes in his book, Holiness, A Guide For Beginners, there is no point in our life when we can say: “Okay! I’ve done it! I’ve no more to do!” The only “finishing-line” that ends our race is death! “One great lesson you are meant to learn is that sanctity is not a matter of reaching a particular milestone on the road to God. It is not a case of being an ordinary person until you come to the milestone, and a saint when you have got beyond it. It is a case of using your powers as perfectly as you can. There is no fixed milestone. The only thing that is fixed is the destination — God” (Dom Hubert Van Zeller, Holiness—A Guide For Beginners).
Why is it that we have much energy for amassing earthly fruits, but little energy for amassing heavenly fruits? Another parable of Our Lord’s should make us seriously reflect on this anomaly: “And He spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and will build greater; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods. And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years take thy rest; eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee: and whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God! … But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!’” (Luke 12:16-21, 31). “Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting, which the Son of man will give you!” (John 6:27). “What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26). "Let Thy children, O Lord, whom Thou lovest, know that it is not the growing of fruits that nourishes men, but Thy word preserves them that believe in thee!” (Wisdom 16:26).
The Fruit of Life is Death—The Fruit of Death is Life!
The fruit of life is death and the fruit of death is life? Sounds like an oxymoron (a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory or paradoxical terms appear in conjunction with each other). At first glance, yes! Yet that is exactly what Our Lord says in the Gospels:
► “He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:39).
► Still in Matthew’s Gospel, but six chapters later, Our Lord is again seen to repeat the same idea: “For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:25).
All the other three Evangelists also report Our Lord as saying this—and St. Luke also reports it twice:
► “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35).
► “For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it!” (Luke 9:24).
► “Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it!” (Luke 17:33).
► “Amen, amen I say to you, unless the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, then itself it remaineth alone. But if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal!” (John 12:24-25).
Out of all those last six references, quoted above just now, in four of them Our Lord links the “saving” and “losing” of life to the obligation to carry the cross. Of the other two, one refers to the tribulations that will come in the end times and the last one, from St. John’s Gospel, refers to the need for the seed to die unto itself before it can bear fruit.
Out of all those last six references, quoted above just now, in four of them Our Lord links the “saving” and “losing” of life to the obligation to carry the cross. Of the other two, one refers to the tribulations that will come in the end times and the last one, from St. John’s Gospel, refers to the need for the seed to die unto itself before it can bear fruit.
► “He that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me! He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:38-39).
► “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me! For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall find it!” (Matthew 16:24-25).
► “If any man will follow Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:34-35).
► “And he said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; for he that shall lose his life for My sake, shall save it! For what is a man advantaged, if he gain the whole world, and lose himself, and cast away himself?’” (Luke 9:23-25).
► “As it came to pass in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat and drink, they married wives, and were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark―and the flood came and destroyed them all! Likewise as it came to pass, in the days of Lot―they did eat and drink, they bought and sold, they planted and built. And in the day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from Heaven, and destroyed them all! Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man shall be revealed. In that hour, he that shall be on the housetop, and his goods in the house, let him not go down to take them away: and he that shall be in the field, in like manner, let him not return back! Remember Lot’s wife! Whosoever shall seek to save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever shall lose it, shall preserve it. I say to you: in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left! Two women shall be grinding together: the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left: two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left!” (Luke 17:26-35).
We look upon the cross wrongly and mistakenly. We see the cross as “cramping our style” and “dampening our fun”. We see the Cross as a “killjoy” and as something “negative” in our lives. Yet the Cross is the seed of life that can grow into a tree of life. If we just stop to think and reflect upon it—then it all makes sense.
The Ultimate Seed of Life is the Seed of the Cross
Nowhere is the Church as eloquent in her liturgy as she is during Passiontide—the last two weeks before Easter Sunday, within which we have “Holy Week”, and within that “Holy Week” we have “Good Friday”. The focus of Passiontide is the Cross—the torturous Cross, the Cross that kills, the Cross that brings death, but through that death the Cross brings eternal life. The “fruit” of Mary’s womb—Jesus—is also the “fruit” of the Cross! The following verses are a mere excerpts or a mere “tip of the iceberg” of the beauty that can found in the liturgy of those last two weeks of Lent. We could, by analogy, say that the Septuagesima Season is the “planting season” (the Sower of the Seed), then Lent can be seen as the “growing season”, with Passiontide being the “season of harvest”! Here are some verses from the “harvest season” of Passiontide, when Christ “matures” and “ripens” as our “fruit of eternal life” on the “Tree of the Cross”:
The Hymn: Pange Lingua
Sing, my tongue,
The Savior’s glory;
Tell His triumph far and wide;
Tell aloud the famous story
Of His body crucified;
How upon the cross a victim,
Vanquishing in death, He died.
Eating of the tree forbidden,
Man had sunk in Satan’s snare,
When our pitying Creator did
This second tree prepare;
Destined, many ages later,
That first evil to repair.
Lofty tree, bend down thy branches,
To embrace thy sacred load;
Oh, relax the native tension
Of that all too rigid wood;
Gently, gently bear the members
Of thy dying King and God.
Tree, which solely wast found worthy
The world’s Victim to sustain.
Harbor from the raging tempest!
Ark, that saved the world again!
Tree, with sacred blood anointed
Of the Lamb for sinners slain.
The Hymn: Vexilla Regis
The Royal Banner forward goes,
The mystic Cross refulgent glows:
Where He, in Flesh, flesh who made,
Upon the Tree of pain is laid.
That which the Prophet-King of old
Hath in mysterious verse foretold,
Is now accomplished, whilst we see
God ruling nations from a Tree.
O lovely and refulgent Tree,
Adorned with purpled majesty;
Culled from a worthy stock, to bear
Those limbs which sanctified were.
Blest Tree, whose happy branches bore
The wealth that did the world restore;
The beam that did that Body weigh
Which raised up Hell’s expected prey.
Then in thy hymn from the Divine Office of Lauds for the morning of Passion Sunday, we have the following beautiful references to the Cross of Christ being a Tree of Life:
Faithful cross! Above all other,
One and only noble tree!
None in foliage, none in blossom,
None in fruit thy peers may be;
Sweetest wood and sweetest iron!
Sweetest weight is hung on thee.
Bend thy boughs, O tree of glory!
Thy relaxing sinews bend;
For awhile the ancient rigor,
That thy birth bestowed, suspend;
And the King of heavenly beauty
On thy bosom gently tend!
Thou alone wast counted worthy
This world’s ransom to uphold;
For a shipwrecked race preparing
Harbor, like the ark of old;
With the sacred blood anointed
From the smitten Lamb that rolled.
Friend or Foe?
We ought to love the Cross—but we rarely do! St. Paul speaks of the enemies of the Cross—are we among them? “For many walk, of whom I have told you often (and now tell you weeping), that they are enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Philippians 3:18-19).
In his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, St. Louis de Montfort writes: “A Friend of the Cross is one chosen by God from among ten thousand who have reason and sense for their only guide. He is truly divine, raised above reason and thoroughly opposed to the things of sense, for he lives in the light of true faith and burns with love for the Cross … A Friend of the Cross is a holy man, separated from visible things. His heart is lifted high above all that is frail and perishable; he journeys here below like a stranger and pilgrim. He keeps his heart free from the world, looks upon it with an unconcerned glance of his left eye and disdainfully tramples it under foot.
“Is the way you follow the one that leads to this goal? Is it the true way of life, the narrow way, the thorn-strewn way to Calvary? Or are you unconsciously traveling the world’s broad road, the road to perdition? Do you realize that there is a highroad which to all appearances is straight and safe for man to travel, but which in reality leads to death? … Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!’ they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat, let us drink, let us sing, let us dance, let us play! God is good, He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!’ And so they continue.
“The elect who are willing to be made conformable to the crucified Christ by carrying their cross are few in number. It would cause us to faint away from grief to learn how surprisingly small is their number! It is so small that among ten thousand people there is scarcely one to be found, as was revealed to several Saints … In fact, only a privileged number of men receive this practical knowledge of the mystery of the Cross. For that man who climbs up to Calvary and lets himself be nailed on the Cross with Jesus, must be a brave man, a hero, a resolute man, one who is lifted up in God, who treats as muck both the world and Hell, as well as his very body and his own will. He must be resolved to relinquish all things, to undertake anything and to suffer everything for Jesus. Understand this, dear Friends of the Cross, should there be anyone among you who has not this firm resolve, he is just limping along on one foot, flying with one wing, and undeserving of your company, since he is not worthy to be called a Friend of the Cross!” (St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
Essential Tree!
St. Louis de Montfort, in his poem/hymn The Triumph of the Cross, found in his Letter to the Friends of the Cross, penned the following beautiful stanza:
“Essential is the Tree,
And we who know its cost
Must mount to Calvary
Or languish and be lost.
As Saint Augustine states
With outcry ominous,
We all are reprobates
Unless God chastens us.”
That “essential tree” must be planted in our souls. St. Louis continues: “The Holy Ghost compares us to (1) trees planted along the waters of grace, in the field of the Church, who ought to bring forth their fruit in their seasons; (2) to the branches of a vine of which Jesus Christ is the stock, and which must yield good grapes; (3) to a flock of which Jesus Christ is the Shepherd, and which is to multiply and give milk; (4) to a good land of which God is the Farmer, in which the seed multiplies itself and brings forth thirtyfold, sixtyfold and a hundredfold. Jesus Christ cursed the unfruitful fig tree, and pronounced sentence against the useless servant who had not made any profit on his talent” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Plant the Seed of the Tree of Life in Your Soul
St. Louis de Montfort refers to Mary being the Tree of Life: “Mary is everywhere the veritable tree who bears the Fruit of life, and the true Mother who produces it … One reason why so few souls come to the fullness of the age of Jesus Christ is that Mary, who is as much as ever the fruitful spouse of the Holy Ghost, is not sufficiently formed in their hearts. He who wishes to have the fruit well-ripened and well-formed must have the tree that produces it; he who wishes to have the fruit of life, Jesus Christ, must have the tree of life, which is Mary, who makes Him fertile and fruit-bearing … If Mary, who is the tree of life, is well cultivated in our soul by fidelity to the practices of this devotion, she will bear her fruit in her own time, and her fruit is none other than Jesus Christ …
“Know that Our Blessed Lady is the true terrestrial paradise of the New Adam, Jesus Christ … It is in this earthly paradise that there is the true tree of life, which has borne Jesus Christ, the Fruit of Life … There are in this divine place trees planted by the hand of God, and watered by His divine unction, which have borne and daily bear fruits of a divine taste. There are flowerbeds adorned with beautiful and varied blossoms of virtues diffusing odors which delight the very angels. There are meadows green with hope, impregnable towers of strength!” (St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
In a similar vein, in his booklet The Secret of Mary, St. Louis adds: “This does not mean that one who has discovered Mary, through a genuine devotion, is exempt from crosses and sufferings. Far from it! One is tried even more than others, because Mary, as Mother of the living, gives to all her children splinters of the tree of life, which is the Cross of Jesus. But while giving out crosses to them, she gives the grace to bear them with patience, and even with joy. In this way, the crosses she sends to those who trust themselves to her are rather like sweetmeats, i.e., “sweetened” crosses rather than “bitter” ones. If, from time to time, they do taste the bitterness of the chalice from which, we must drink to become proven friends of God, the consolation and joy which their Mother sends in the wake of their sorrows creates, in them, a strong desire to carry even heavier and still more bitter crosses” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
Article 7
Saturday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 3rd
God Wants to See You Burn!
Saturday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 3rd
God Wants to See You Burn!
Combustible Catholics
In the previous article we stated that God has made us inflammable, so to speak. We were made to burn: (1) to burn with a love of God and neighbor here on Earth, or (2) to have a lukewarm love of God and neighbor heated-up to the required level in the fires of Purgatory, or (3) to burn eternally in fires of Hell for having refused to burn with a love of God and neighbor on Earth, and so burn with hatred forever. Even those in Heaven, burn eternally, not out of hatred for God, but they burn with a love of God. So, at the end of the day, burn we must.
Don’t Be Afraid of Fire
Let us not be afraid of fire, especially supernatural fire, for fire represents God. We should draw near to that fire, as Moses drew near to God in the burning bush; or as St. Margaret Mary drew close to the fires of the Sacred Heart. Our Lord said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). The Holy Ghost also came down to cast fire upon Earth, as He did upon Our Lady and the Apostles, at Pentecost, in the form of tongues of fire. Do we not say, in the prayer to the Holy Ghost, “enkindle in us the fire of Thy love”? Let us love that fire of love and let the Holy Ghost enkindle it your soul, and let the Holy Eucharist, received often (if not daily) be the daily Holy ‘Coal’ for that fire in your soul! Without the spark (the Holy Ghost) and without the coals (the Holy Eucharist) and without a supply of air/oxygen (which is prayer) that fire will go out!
Words of Love on the Power of Love
Here are a few quotes from Our Lord, taken from the book Words of Love, by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, which is compilation of extracts of revelations made by Our Lord to three mystics of the last century: Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Consolata Betrone and Sr. Mary of the Trinity. Our Lord speaks of the great necessity of love:
“Love is sanctity. The more you love Me, the more you will become holy!” … “He who never needs forgiveness is not the most happy, but rather he who has humbled himself many times.”
“I want to tell you this, that My best-loved and specially favored souls—My priests and My consecrated nuns—may learn it through you. My Heart is never wounded unless it be by My chosen souls. If their infidelities wound Me deeply, their love consoles and delights My Heart to such a degree that I, so to speak, forget the sins of many others on their account. I do not say that by the fact of My choice, a [chosen] soul is freed from her faults and wretchedness. That soul may and will fall often again, but if she humbles herself, if she recognizes her nothingness, if she tries to repair her faults by little acts of generosity and love, if she confides and surrenders herself once more to My Heart ... she gives Me more glory and can do more good to other souls than if she had never fallen. Miseries and weaknesses are of no consequence; what I do ask of them is love.”
“The obstinacy of a guilty soul wounds My Heart deeply, but the tender affection of one who loves Me, not only heals the wound, but turns away the effects of My Father’s Justice” … “As soon as a soul throws itself at My feet and implores My forgiveness, I forget all her sins” … “Love is reparation and reparation is love” … “It is love that makes reparation, because that which offends God in sin is the absence of love.”
“A soul will profit even after the greatest sins, if she humbles herself. I will raise up the humble, and make little of their frailties, and even of their falls, provided they have humility and love.” … “Yes, I love all souls, but with very special affection those who are the most weak and little.”
“Think no longer about yourself, about your perfection, on how to attain to sanctity, or about your defects, your present and future troubles. No. I will see to your sanctification, to your sanctity. You must henceforth think only of Me and of souls; of Me to love Me, and of souls to save them!”
“A true mother will not consider her child ugly, no matter how much it may be so; to her it is always lovely, and so it will always remain in her innermost heart. That is precisely the way My Heart feels toward souls: though they be ugly, soiled, filthy, My love considers them always beautiful. I suffer when their ugliness is confirmed to Me; on the other hand, I rejoice when, in conformity with My parental sentiments, someone dissuades Me about their ugliness and tells Me that it is not true and that they are still beautiful. The souls are Mine; for them I have given all My Blood!”
“I ask only for love. Ah, what are you doing about it ? … I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift ... I thirst for love.” … “That soul is dearest to Me who loves Me the most.”
Reality, not Poetry
Beautiful words! Not just poetry, but reality! The reality of love! These quotes are a fitting finale to the Scriptural examples selected above. Advent is a time of preparation; a time of preparing to receive the seed of God, Who is Love itself, into our poor human souls with our meager love; a time of preparing this fire of love in the coldness of a dark wintry world. Love will light up any soul—the souls of sinners, the souls of the just and the souls of saints. It is a universal solution to the ills of the soul and the ills of the world. Truly, “love makes the world go around”, but only when it is a love with a divine flame! The absence of love, like the absence of God Who is Love itself, is pure Hell. “He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:8).
A Sign of the Presence of God
In Judaism, a perpetual light was kept burning in the Temple and the synagogues not only to ensure the ability to light other candles or oil lamps in the evening but also to show the presence of God (cf. Exodus 27:20-21 and Leviticus 24:24). Later, the Talmud prescribed a lit lamp at the Ark, where the Torah and other writings of Sacred Scripture were kept, to show reverence to the Word of God. (This practice probably influenced our own one of having a lit candle near the tabernacle to indicate the presence of and to show reverence for the Blessed Sacrament.)
Roman pagan culture also used candles in religious practice. Lit candles were used in religious and military processions, showing the divine presence, aid or favor of the gods. With the development of emperor worship, candles were also lit near his image as a sign of respect and reverence. Remember that by the time of Jesus, the emperor was considered divine and even given the titles Pontifex Maximus (high priest) and Dominus et Deus (Lord and God).
Votive Candles
With this background, we can appreciate the usage of votive candles. Here, as in early Christian times, we light a candle before a statue or sacred image of our Lord or of a saint. Of course, we do not honor the statue or the image itself, but the one whom that statue or image represents. The light signifies our prayer offered in faith coming into the light of God. With the light of faith, we petition our Lord in prayer, or petition the saint to pray with us and for us to the Lord. The light also shows a special reverence and our desire to remain present to the Lord in prayer even though we may depart and go about our daily business.
Interestingly, in the Middle-Ages, the symbolism of the votive candles was elaborated. St. Radigund (died 587) described a practice whereby a person would light a candle, or several candles, which equaled his own height, this was called “measuring to” such a saint. Although it may seem peculiar to us, this “measuring” actually reflects the idea of the candle representing the person in Faith, who has come into the light to offer his prayer.
Also, some medieval spiritual writers expanded the imagery of the candle itself―bees wax symbolized the purity of Christ, the wick, the human soul of Christ, and the light His divinity. Also, the burning candle symbolized a sacrifice, which is made in both the offering of the prayer and the acceptance of the Lord’s Will.
In all, the usage of votive candles is a pious practice which continues today in many churches. The symbolism does remind us that prayer is a “coming into” the light of Christ, allowing our souls to be filled with His light, and letting that light bum on in our souls, even though we may return to our other activities.
In the Class of Candles
Providentially, the lights used by the Church in general, and candles in particular, have much to teach us about our spiritual life. Let us therefore enter the ‘class’ of candles for a lesson on how we could improve or better understand our spiritual life and its obligations, for God is always using outward signs to teach us about inward graces. We just need to show more interest in what He is trying to do, and take more time in penetrating the mysteries that He explains through them, much like Jesus did with His parables.
Candles are Sacramentals if Blessed
Besides the Sign of the Cross, Holy Water, the Crucifix, Rosary and Scapular, there are many other Sacramentals of the Church for our use and benefit—not only spiritual benefits, but natural benefits too! The list of chief Sacramentals include such objects as blessed crucifixes (also used in exorcisms), blessed Rosaries and Chaplets, Scapulars and Medals, Candles, Ashes, Palms, images of Our Lord, Our Lady and the Saints, etc. In other words, blessed candles are holy candles―and that is what the “Catholic Candle” (the Catholic person) must be: a “holy candle”, that is to say, a holy Catholic.
God is adamant on that point: “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26). “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy because I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 20:7). “He chose us before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight in charity” (Ephesians 1:4).
Candles of Faith
Faith comes first, even though it may not be of first importance (Charity is the most important virtue). Faith is about knowing and then believing what we know. There can be no hope without knowledge—I cannot hope to be saved from an illness if I have no knowledge of the existence of the cure, nor any knowledge on how to use that cure. Nor can love something or somebody if I do not know of their existence, whereabouts, qualities, etc. I will not be allowed to serve the community as a priest, doctor, attorney, teacher, etc., if I do not have the pre-requisite knowledge for whatever capacity I wish to be of service. “You shall know that I am the Lord God” (Ezechiel 13:9). “Thou shalt know that the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 7:9).
In knowing Him, we shall be enLIGHTened, for He is the Light. “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘I am the light of the world! He that follows Me, walks not in darkness, but shall have the light of life!’” (John 8:12). “I am come a light into the world; that whosoever believeth in Me, may not remain in darkness” (John 12:46). “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5). His teachings shine a light on our vocation and the purpose of life. We are called to the Light and we are called to be a Light unto others: “You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men” (Matthew 5:14-16).
Like St. John the Baptist, we are not THE Light, but a reflection or a part of THE Light, and we have to give witness to that Light to those sat in darkness of the world. “There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. This man came for a witness, to give testimony of the light, that all men might believe through him. He was not the light, but was to give testimony of the light” (John 1:6-8). St. John the Baptist’s father, St. Zachary, had prophesied this at John’s birth: “And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the Highest: for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare His ways: to give knowledge of salvation to His people ...to enlighten them that sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death” (Luke 1:76-79).
Most of do hide our candle under the bushel; not entirely of course, but we tailor it to suit our preferences and our love for ease and comfort, and our abhorrence of difficulty and confrontation. We know the quote, but we brush it off. But there is no escaping the words of Our Lord: “So let your light shine before men” (Matthew 5:16) ... “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 10:32-33).
Candles of Hope
Fire is one of the basic elements of life. Arguably, we could say it forms part of a trinity of essentials: air, water and fire. Without these we suffocate, we dehydrate and we freeze. When we have fire, we have warmth, we can cook, we can even melt and mold materials into tools that otherwise we could not use. In essence, the flame ignites the engines of our cars and planes. The ‘fire’ of the sun, besides giving light, also warms our Earth and makes things grow. Without all this we would have no hope.
The candle is a platform for that flame, just like the soul is a platform for God and His grace. We say “Where there is life, there is hope!” Likewise, where there is supernatural life, there is hope. If we have the fire of God within us, the grace of God within us, then we have what is essential—ultimately, when push comes to shove, nothing else matters. What is it that we all need on our deathbed? The grace of God! If that grace has not been extinguished in the candle of our soul, then we can be full of hope of being saved.
Similarly, “Where there is light, there is hope!” If we are stuck in dark subterranean caverns, we need light to escape the darkness. Without that light, things look to be hopeless. With the presence of a light, there is hope that we can make our way safely out of the dark caverns back to surface.
Candles of Charity
Charity is the highest of the three theological virtues. It is the virtue that we will be ultimately judged upon, for we have been told: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.’ On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets” (Matthew 22:37-40). So everything rests upon our love of God and neighbor. That is why charity has to infuse and penetrate every virtue, every good thought, word and action that we do, otherwise it is, as St. Paul says, useless:
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and have all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing. Charity is patient; is kind; charity envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeks not her own [advantage]; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never falls away―whether prophecies shall be made void; or tongues shall cease; or knowledge shall be destroyed. And now there remain faith, hope, and charity, these three―but the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:1-13).
The candle of charity should never be extinguished: “Many waters cannot quench charity, neither can the floods drown it” (Canticle 8:7). Yet, it is we ourselves who can extinguish the flame of charity, if we do not replenish it. This is where the original ‘candles’ or lamps serve our analogy better, for the wax candle cannot be ‘topped-up’ as it burns, unlike the original ‘candles’ which were the olive-oil lamps (the parable of wise and foolish virgins). As the wick draws up the olive-oil to burn it, new oil is added to the reservoir. Olive-oil is a symbol of humility, as it is obtained through the crushing of the olive, much like wine is obtained by the crushing of the grape. Though wine is readily a symbol of charity, olive-oil can be said to be humility that turns to charity (for humility means little love of self, as opposed to pride which is a great love of self). The humble olive-oil is a suitable substance for the fiery flame of charity to feed upon and keep burning.
Flickering Candles in Tribulation
Life is not always easy for the candle! There are many drafts of air wishing to extinguish the brave candle! The result is a candle that flickers nervously and desperately as it battles the air current; often exuding wavering smoke as it wavers back and forth, like a candle tempted to bend in the direction that the wind blows!
This, of course, is symbolic of our battle against the powerful gusting winds of the devil, the world and our own flesh with its concupiscences. Any one of these can quickly extinguish our candle. Usually, in the case of a candle, the thicker or larger is the wick, the less likely it is to be extinguished by a gust of wind. Likewise, the ticker or bigger the soul (in the sense of being filled more with the things of God), the less likely it is to be blown out. Sometimes brass followers (which are those brass-caps that are placed on top of the candle) aid the candle to burn correctly and give some minor protection against air-drafts. They are like a cross on the shoulder of the candle, that it has to carry, but a cross that preserves its burning flame of charity.
However, sometimes the wind is powerful and sustained (imagine an outdoor procession with candles) and unless there is extra protection for the candle, it stands no chance of keeping its flame alive in these situations. The remedy for that situation is drastic, and the candle has to isolate itself from everything else around it. The altar server candles will often have a brass follower that allows a 2-3 inch tall glass funnel to sit atop, thus cutting-off the candle from the world and protecting it from the onslaught of the wind. Another, less aesthetic solution, would be to simply put the candle is a glass jar. In all of these cases, the beneficial light can get out, but the damaging wind of the world finds it hard to get in.
That is what we have to sometimes do in relation to the world: whether it be in the circle of family and relatives, or in the work and social environment. The flame and fire of God is too precious to lose.
Burning the Candle at Both Ends
The Benedictine Order has for its motto, the words Ora et Labora, meaning Pray and Work. Notice that PRAY comes before WORK, just as God comes before man, and the soul is more important than the body.
The problem today is that there is more focus, care and attention being given to work, man and the body, than there is to prayer, God and the soul. People are prepared to “burn the candle at both ends” when it comes to work, fun or their own bodies, but are not willing to “burn the candle at both ends” when it comes to their spiritual life.
Yet we see the example of Our Lord “burning the candle at both ends”, where, after working hard all day, He does not dispense Himself from His duties to His Father, and spends the successive night in prayer: “And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and he passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12). We too easily dispense ourselves from our spiritual duties so that we can take care of worldly duties. It is a case of the sisters Martha and Mary all over again. “And the Lord said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! Thou art careful, and art troubled about many things: but one thing is necessary. Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her.’” (Luke 10:41-42).
Burnt Out Candles
The candle burns itself out in order to give us light. The light is not its own, it came from elsewhere, but the candle is a vehicle for that light. It was made for that light. It fails to live up to its vocation as a candle if it remains unlit and gives off no light. The burn-out candle, paradoxically, is a good candle, or shall we say was a good candle, for it exists no longer in this world, except in memory.
Likewise, we too will no longer exist, except in memory. Will we have burn ourselves out giving the light of faith and the flame of hope and the fire of charity to others? Will we have passed on the flame that we received? “For I have delivered unto you that which I received of the Lord” (1 Corinthians 11:23). Or will we hide our light under a bushel or bury our talent in the ground?
As Our Lord said: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Greater love no man hath than he who burns himself out for love of God and for the love of the friends of God. This is what the martyrs did. Finally, is it not providential that some martyrs died like human candles? We speak of those Christians whom the evil Roman Emperor Nero had coated with tar, tied to pillars and then set alight to burn to death! Now they burn brightly in Heaven—for eternity.
The Light of Lent
Lent will be a time to open ourselves to the light—but can we take the light? Can we endure the light? Are we afraid that the light will light up certain parts of our soul that we would prefer to leave untouched and in the dark? Right before Lent starts, on the preceding Sunday, called Quinquagesima Sunday, the Church puts before us the Gospel reading of the blind man of Jericho: “Now it came to pass, when Jesus drew near to Jericho, that a certain blind man sat by the way side, begging. And when he heard the multitude passing by, he asked what this meant. And they told him, that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. And he cried out, saying: ‘Jesus! Son of David! Have mercy on me!’ And they that went before, rebuked him, that he should hold his peace: but he cried out much more: ‘Son of David! Have mercy on me!’ And Jesus standing, commanded him to be brought unto him. And when he was come near, Jesus asked him, saying: ‘What wilt thou that I do to thee?’ But he said: ‘Lord! That I may see!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Receive thy sight! Thy Faith hath made thee whole!’ And immediately he saw, and followed Jesus, glorifying God” (Luke 18:35-42).
There we have, in a nutshell, what we need to do. We need so see correctly! We need our blindness, coming from being blinded by the world, to be removed! We need to beg and beg until Christ, in His mercy and kindness, opens our eyes and draws us to follow Him properly and sincerely, glorifying God. That is Lent in a nutshell. We might all be running in a race—as St. Paul says in the Epistle for Septuagesima Sunday—but how can a blind man run? Where on earth will he end up running? And if you follow such blind people, then they will lead you into Hell: “Let them alone! They are blind and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
So, yes, we are in a race—but we first see where we are going and plan well how to negotiate the route. Professional athletes and cyclists will often walk or drive the route that has been chosen for a particular race, to see where the danger spots are and to assess what tactics can best be used during what stages of the race. St. Paul speaks of our race for Heaven in a similar vein. We need to see and study the course beforehand. That means we need to plan our Lent carefully before it starts—and these days from Septuagesima Sunday, through Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays, is just that—it is a time of study and preparation and perhaps a time to warm up and cut back on things so that we do not go into Lent “cold”.
In the previous article we stated that God has made us inflammable, so to speak. We were made to burn: (1) to burn with a love of God and neighbor here on Earth, or (2) to have a lukewarm love of God and neighbor heated-up to the required level in the fires of Purgatory, or (3) to burn eternally in fires of Hell for having refused to burn with a love of God and neighbor on Earth, and so burn with hatred forever. Even those in Heaven, burn eternally, not out of hatred for God, but they burn with a love of God. So, at the end of the day, burn we must.
Don’t Be Afraid of Fire
Let us not be afraid of fire, especially supernatural fire, for fire represents God. We should draw near to that fire, as Moses drew near to God in the burning bush; or as St. Margaret Mary drew close to the fires of the Sacred Heart. Our Lord said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). The Holy Ghost also came down to cast fire upon Earth, as He did upon Our Lady and the Apostles, at Pentecost, in the form of tongues of fire. Do we not say, in the prayer to the Holy Ghost, “enkindle in us the fire of Thy love”? Let us love that fire of love and let the Holy Ghost enkindle it your soul, and let the Holy Eucharist, received often (if not daily) be the daily Holy ‘Coal’ for that fire in your soul! Without the spark (the Holy Ghost) and without the coals (the Holy Eucharist) and without a supply of air/oxygen (which is prayer) that fire will go out!
Words of Love on the Power of Love
Here are a few quotes from Our Lord, taken from the book Words of Love, by Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, which is compilation of extracts of revelations made by Our Lord to three mystics of the last century: Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Consolata Betrone and Sr. Mary of the Trinity. Our Lord speaks of the great necessity of love:
“Love is sanctity. The more you love Me, the more you will become holy!” … “He who never needs forgiveness is not the most happy, but rather he who has humbled himself many times.”
“I want to tell you this, that My best-loved and specially favored souls—My priests and My consecrated nuns—may learn it through you. My Heart is never wounded unless it be by My chosen souls. If their infidelities wound Me deeply, their love consoles and delights My Heart to such a degree that I, so to speak, forget the sins of many others on their account. I do not say that by the fact of My choice, a [chosen] soul is freed from her faults and wretchedness. That soul may and will fall often again, but if she humbles herself, if she recognizes her nothingness, if she tries to repair her faults by little acts of generosity and love, if she confides and surrenders herself once more to My Heart ... she gives Me more glory and can do more good to other souls than if she had never fallen. Miseries and weaknesses are of no consequence; what I do ask of them is love.”
“The obstinacy of a guilty soul wounds My Heart deeply, but the tender affection of one who loves Me, not only heals the wound, but turns away the effects of My Father’s Justice” … “As soon as a soul throws itself at My feet and implores My forgiveness, I forget all her sins” … “Love is reparation and reparation is love” … “It is love that makes reparation, because that which offends God in sin is the absence of love.”
“A soul will profit even after the greatest sins, if she humbles herself. I will raise up the humble, and make little of their frailties, and even of their falls, provided they have humility and love.” … “Yes, I love all souls, but with very special affection those who are the most weak and little.”
“Think no longer about yourself, about your perfection, on how to attain to sanctity, or about your defects, your present and future troubles. No. I will see to your sanctification, to your sanctity. You must henceforth think only of Me and of souls; of Me to love Me, and of souls to save them!”
“A true mother will not consider her child ugly, no matter how much it may be so; to her it is always lovely, and so it will always remain in her innermost heart. That is precisely the way My Heart feels toward souls: though they be ugly, soiled, filthy, My love considers them always beautiful. I suffer when their ugliness is confirmed to Me; on the other hand, I rejoice when, in conformity with My parental sentiments, someone dissuades Me about their ugliness and tells Me that it is not true and that they are still beautiful. The souls are Mine; for them I have given all My Blood!”
“I ask only for love. Ah, what are you doing about it ? … I prefer an act of love and a Communion of love to any other gift ... I thirst for love.” … “That soul is dearest to Me who loves Me the most.”
Reality, not Poetry
Beautiful words! Not just poetry, but reality! The reality of love! These quotes are a fitting finale to the Scriptural examples selected above. Advent is a time of preparation; a time of preparing to receive the seed of God, Who is Love itself, into our poor human souls with our meager love; a time of preparing this fire of love in the coldness of a dark wintry world. Love will light up any soul—the souls of sinners, the souls of the just and the souls of saints. It is a universal solution to the ills of the soul and the ills of the world. Truly, “love makes the world go around”, but only when it is a love with a divine flame! The absence of love, like the absence of God Who is Love itself, is pure Hell. “He that loves not, knows not God―for God is charity” (1 John 4:8).
A Sign of the Presence of God
In Judaism, a perpetual light was kept burning in the Temple and the synagogues not only to ensure the ability to light other candles or oil lamps in the evening but also to show the presence of God (cf. Exodus 27:20-21 and Leviticus 24:24). Later, the Talmud prescribed a lit lamp at the Ark, where the Torah and other writings of Sacred Scripture were kept, to show reverence to the Word of God. (This practice probably influenced our own one of having a lit candle near the tabernacle to indicate the presence of and to show reverence for the Blessed Sacrament.)
Roman pagan culture also used candles in religious practice. Lit candles were used in religious and military processions, showing the divine presence, aid or favor of the gods. With the development of emperor worship, candles were also lit near his image as a sign of respect and reverence. Remember that by the time of Jesus, the emperor was considered divine and even given the titles Pontifex Maximus (high priest) and Dominus et Deus (Lord and God).
Votive Candles
With this background, we can appreciate the usage of votive candles. Here, as in early Christian times, we light a candle before a statue or sacred image of our Lord or of a saint. Of course, we do not honor the statue or the image itself, but the one whom that statue or image represents. The light signifies our prayer offered in faith coming into the light of God. With the light of faith, we petition our Lord in prayer, or petition the saint to pray with us and for us to the Lord. The light also shows a special reverence and our desire to remain present to the Lord in prayer even though we may depart and go about our daily business.
Interestingly, in the Middle-Ages, the symbolism of the votive candles was elaborated. St. Radigund (died 587) described a practice whereby a person would light a candle, or several candles, which equaled his own height, this was called “measuring to” such a saint. Although it may seem peculiar to us, this “measuring” actually reflects the idea of the candle representing the person in Faith, who has come into the light to offer his prayer.
Also, some medieval spiritual writers expanded the imagery of the candle itself―bees wax symbolized the purity of Christ, the wick, the human soul of Christ, and the light His divinity. Also, the burning candle symbolized a sacrifice, which is made in both the offering of the prayer and the acceptance of the Lord’s Will.
In all, the usage of votive candles is a pious practice which continues today in many churches. The symbolism does remind us that prayer is a “coming into” the light of Christ, allowing our souls to be filled with His light, and letting that light bum on in our souls, even though we may return to our other activities.
In the Class of Candles
Providentially, the lights used by the Church in general, and candles in particular, have much to teach us about our spiritual life. Let us therefore enter the ‘class’ of candles for a lesson on how we could improve or better understand our spiritual life and its obligations, for God is always using outward signs to teach us about inward graces. We just need to show more interest in what He is trying to do, and take more time in penetrating the mysteries that He explains through them, much like Jesus did with His parables.
Candles are Sacramentals if Blessed
Besides the Sign of the Cross, Holy Water, the Crucifix, Rosary and Scapular, there are many other Sacramentals of the Church for our use and benefit—not only spiritual benefits, but natural benefits too! The list of chief Sacramentals include such objects as blessed crucifixes (also used in exorcisms), blessed Rosaries and Chaplets, Scapulars and Medals, Candles, Ashes, Palms, images of Our Lord, Our Lady and the Saints, etc. In other words, blessed candles are holy candles―and that is what the “Catholic Candle” (the Catholic person) must be: a “holy candle”, that is to say, a holy Catholic.
God is adamant on that point: “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26). “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy because I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 20:7). “He chose us before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight in charity” (Ephesians 1:4).
Candles of Faith
Faith comes first, even though it may not be of first importance (Charity is the most important virtue). Faith is about knowing and then believing what we know. There can be no hope without knowledge—I cannot hope to be saved from an illness if I have no knowledge of the existence of the cure, nor any knowledge on how to use that cure. Nor can love something or somebody if I do not know of their existence, whereabouts, qualities, etc. I will not be allowed to serve the community as a priest, doctor, attorney, teacher, etc., if I do not have the pre-requisite knowledge for whatever capacity I wish to be of service. “You shall know that I am the Lord God” (Ezechiel 13:9). “Thou shalt know that the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 7:9).
In knowing Him, we shall be enLIGHTened, for He is the Light. “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘I am the light of the world! He that follows Me, walks not in darkness, but shall have the light of life!’” (John 8:12). “I am come a light into the world; that whosoever believeth in Me, may not remain in darkness” (John 12:46). “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5). His teachings shine a light on our vocation and the purpose of life. We are called to the Light and we are called to be a Light unto others: “You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men” (Matthew 5:14-16).
Like St. John the Baptist, we are not THE Light, but a reflection or a part of THE Light, and we have to give witness to that Light to those sat in darkness of the world. “There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. This man came for a witness, to give testimony of the light, that all men might believe through him. He was not the light, but was to give testimony of the light” (John 1:6-8). St. John the Baptist’s father, St. Zachary, had prophesied this at John’s birth: “And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the Highest: for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare His ways: to give knowledge of salvation to His people ...to enlighten them that sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death” (Luke 1:76-79).
Most of do hide our candle under the bushel; not entirely of course, but we tailor it to suit our preferences and our love for ease and comfort, and our abhorrence of difficulty and confrontation. We know the quote, but we brush it off. But there is no escaping the words of Our Lord: “So let your light shine before men” (Matthew 5:16) ... “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 10:32-33).
Candles of Hope
Fire is one of the basic elements of life. Arguably, we could say it forms part of a trinity of essentials: air, water and fire. Without these we suffocate, we dehydrate and we freeze. When we have fire, we have warmth, we can cook, we can even melt and mold materials into tools that otherwise we could not use. In essence, the flame ignites the engines of our cars and planes. The ‘fire’ of the sun, besides giving light, also warms our Earth and makes things grow. Without all this we would have no hope.
The candle is a platform for that flame, just like the soul is a platform for God and His grace. We say “Where there is life, there is hope!” Likewise, where there is supernatural life, there is hope. If we have the fire of God within us, the grace of God within us, then we have what is essential—ultimately, when push comes to shove, nothing else matters. What is it that we all need on our deathbed? The grace of God! If that grace has not been extinguished in the candle of our soul, then we can be full of hope of being saved.
Similarly, “Where there is light, there is hope!” If we are stuck in dark subterranean caverns, we need light to escape the darkness. Without that light, things look to be hopeless. With the presence of a light, there is hope that we can make our way safely out of the dark caverns back to surface.
Candles of Charity
Charity is the highest of the three theological virtues. It is the virtue that we will be ultimately judged upon, for we have been told: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.’ On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets” (Matthew 22:37-40). So everything rests upon our love of God and neighbor. That is why charity has to infuse and penetrate every virtue, every good thought, word and action that we do, otherwise it is, as St. Paul says, useless:
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and have all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing. Charity is patient; is kind; charity envies not; deals not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeks not her own [advantage]; is not provoked to anger; thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never falls away―whether prophecies shall be made void; or tongues shall cease; or knowledge shall be destroyed. And now there remain faith, hope, and charity, these three―but the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:1-13).
The candle of charity should never be extinguished: “Many waters cannot quench charity, neither can the floods drown it” (Canticle 8:7). Yet, it is we ourselves who can extinguish the flame of charity, if we do not replenish it. This is where the original ‘candles’ or lamps serve our analogy better, for the wax candle cannot be ‘topped-up’ as it burns, unlike the original ‘candles’ which were the olive-oil lamps (the parable of wise and foolish virgins). As the wick draws up the olive-oil to burn it, new oil is added to the reservoir. Olive-oil is a symbol of humility, as it is obtained through the crushing of the olive, much like wine is obtained by the crushing of the grape. Though wine is readily a symbol of charity, olive-oil can be said to be humility that turns to charity (for humility means little love of self, as opposed to pride which is a great love of self). The humble olive-oil is a suitable substance for the fiery flame of charity to feed upon and keep burning.
Flickering Candles in Tribulation
Life is not always easy for the candle! There are many drafts of air wishing to extinguish the brave candle! The result is a candle that flickers nervously and desperately as it battles the air current; often exuding wavering smoke as it wavers back and forth, like a candle tempted to bend in the direction that the wind blows!
This, of course, is symbolic of our battle against the powerful gusting winds of the devil, the world and our own flesh with its concupiscences. Any one of these can quickly extinguish our candle. Usually, in the case of a candle, the thicker or larger is the wick, the less likely it is to be extinguished by a gust of wind. Likewise, the ticker or bigger the soul (in the sense of being filled more with the things of God), the less likely it is to be blown out. Sometimes brass followers (which are those brass-caps that are placed on top of the candle) aid the candle to burn correctly and give some minor protection against air-drafts. They are like a cross on the shoulder of the candle, that it has to carry, but a cross that preserves its burning flame of charity.
However, sometimes the wind is powerful and sustained (imagine an outdoor procession with candles) and unless there is extra protection for the candle, it stands no chance of keeping its flame alive in these situations. The remedy for that situation is drastic, and the candle has to isolate itself from everything else around it. The altar server candles will often have a brass follower that allows a 2-3 inch tall glass funnel to sit atop, thus cutting-off the candle from the world and protecting it from the onslaught of the wind. Another, less aesthetic solution, would be to simply put the candle is a glass jar. In all of these cases, the beneficial light can get out, but the damaging wind of the world finds it hard to get in.
That is what we have to sometimes do in relation to the world: whether it be in the circle of family and relatives, or in the work and social environment. The flame and fire of God is too precious to lose.
Burning the Candle at Both Ends
The Benedictine Order has for its motto, the words Ora et Labora, meaning Pray and Work. Notice that PRAY comes before WORK, just as God comes before man, and the soul is more important than the body.
The problem today is that there is more focus, care and attention being given to work, man and the body, than there is to prayer, God and the soul. People are prepared to “burn the candle at both ends” when it comes to work, fun or their own bodies, but are not willing to “burn the candle at both ends” when it comes to their spiritual life.
Yet we see the example of Our Lord “burning the candle at both ends”, where, after working hard all day, He does not dispense Himself from His duties to His Father, and spends the successive night in prayer: “And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and he passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12). We too easily dispense ourselves from our spiritual duties so that we can take care of worldly duties. It is a case of the sisters Martha and Mary all over again. “And the Lord said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! Thou art careful, and art troubled about many things: but one thing is necessary. Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her.’” (Luke 10:41-42).
Burnt Out Candles
The candle burns itself out in order to give us light. The light is not its own, it came from elsewhere, but the candle is a vehicle for that light. It was made for that light. It fails to live up to its vocation as a candle if it remains unlit and gives off no light. The burn-out candle, paradoxically, is a good candle, or shall we say was a good candle, for it exists no longer in this world, except in memory.
Likewise, we too will no longer exist, except in memory. Will we have burn ourselves out giving the light of faith and the flame of hope and the fire of charity to others? Will we have passed on the flame that we received? “For I have delivered unto you that which I received of the Lord” (1 Corinthians 11:23). Or will we hide our light under a bushel or bury our talent in the ground?
As Our Lord said: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Greater love no man hath than he who burns himself out for love of God and for the love of the friends of God. This is what the martyrs did. Finally, is it not providential that some martyrs died like human candles? We speak of those Christians whom the evil Roman Emperor Nero had coated with tar, tied to pillars and then set alight to burn to death! Now they burn brightly in Heaven—for eternity.
The Light of Lent
Lent will be a time to open ourselves to the light—but can we take the light? Can we endure the light? Are we afraid that the light will light up certain parts of our soul that we would prefer to leave untouched and in the dark? Right before Lent starts, on the preceding Sunday, called Quinquagesima Sunday, the Church puts before us the Gospel reading of the blind man of Jericho: “Now it came to pass, when Jesus drew near to Jericho, that a certain blind man sat by the way side, begging. And when he heard the multitude passing by, he asked what this meant. And they told him, that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. And he cried out, saying: ‘Jesus! Son of David! Have mercy on me!’ And they that went before, rebuked him, that he should hold his peace: but he cried out much more: ‘Son of David! Have mercy on me!’ And Jesus standing, commanded him to be brought unto him. And when he was come near, Jesus asked him, saying: ‘What wilt thou that I do to thee?’ But he said: ‘Lord! That I may see!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Receive thy sight! Thy Faith hath made thee whole!’ And immediately he saw, and followed Jesus, glorifying God” (Luke 18:35-42).
There we have, in a nutshell, what we need to do. We need so see correctly! We need our blindness, coming from being blinded by the world, to be removed! We need to beg and beg until Christ, in His mercy and kindness, opens our eyes and draws us to follow Him properly and sincerely, glorifying God. That is Lent in a nutshell. We might all be running in a race—as St. Paul says in the Epistle for Septuagesima Sunday—but how can a blind man run? Where on earth will he end up running? And if you follow such blind people, then they will lead you into Hell: “Let them alone! They are blind and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14).
So, yes, we are in a race—but we first see where we are going and plan well how to negotiate the route. Professional athletes and cyclists will often walk or drive the route that has been chosen for a particular race, to see where the danger spots are and to assess what tactics can best be used during what stages of the race. St. Paul speaks of our race for Heaven in a similar vein. We need to see and study the course beforehand. That means we need to plan our Lent carefully before it starts—and these days from Septuagesima Sunday, through Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays, is just that—it is a time of study and preparation and perhaps a time to warm up and cut back on things so that we do not go into Lent “cold”.
Article 6
Friday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 2nd
Candlemas Day, the Feast of the Purification of Our Lady and the Presentation of the Our Lord in the Temple
Candles, Candlemas & You
Friday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 2nd
Candlemas Day, the Feast of the Purification of Our Lady and the Presentation of the Our Lord in the Temple
Candles, Candlemas & You
A Time of Candles
Today, February 2nd, we celebrate Candlemas Day―which is the feast of the Purification of Our Lady and the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple of Jerusalem, shortly after His birth. Candles―in the Catholic Church’s Liturgy―symbolize persons. For example, the Paschal Candle symbolizes Christ; the smaller candles symbolize the rest of the Church.
Before looking at the symbolism of candles in particular, let us briefly look at the history of the candle. The candle is relative a latecomer on scene of light! The new kids on the block were the later born gaslights and electric lights, but funnily enough the candle did not come to light much before the year 500 BC—as far we know, but then, what do we know!?! Man’s knowledge, though he thinks it is great, is quite paltry in reality! Anyhow, that’s what they say—around 500 BC. Though some claim―with no evidence―that the Ancient Egyptians used candles 5,000 years ago!
Candles were made by the Romans beginning about 500 BC (though some claim it was 1000 BC). These were true dipped candles and made from tallow (molten animal fat).
The ancient Egyptians used candles as early as 300 BC. However their candles didn't have a wick, it had plant reeds instead. These reeds were soaked in tallow.
It is also thought that candles were made from whale-fat by the Chinese, during the Qin Dynasty (221–206 BC).
In India, wax from boiling cinnamon was used for temple candles.
Extracts from tree nuts were used to make candle wax in early Japan.
In parts of Europe, the Middle-East and Africa, where lamp-oil made from olives was readily available, candle making remained unknown until the early Middle-Ages. Even today, some Catholic churches and chapels still prefer to burn olive-oil for their sanctuary (tabernacle) lights. Candles were primarily made from tallow and beeswax until about 1850, but since then have been increasingly made from spermaceti, purified animal fats (stearin) and paraffin wax.
Candles in Divine Worship
Candles have always played a central part in divine worship—even in Old Testament times, though olive oil was the main source of illumination in the Mediterranean regions. Candles were made by the Romans beginning about 500 BC. These were true dipped candles and made from tallow. After the collapse of the Roman Empire, trading disruptions made olive oil, the most common fuel for oil lamps, unavailable throughout much of Europe. As a consequence, candles became more widely used. Tallow (fat from cows or sheep), became the standard material used in candles in Europe. The unpleasant smell of tallow candles is due to the glycerine they contain. The smell of the manufacturing process was so unpleasant that it was banned by ordinance in several European cities. Beeswax was discovered to be an excellent substance for candle production without the unpleasant odor, but remained restricted in usage for the rich and for churches and royal events, due to their great expense.
The Catholic Encyclopedia entry for “Candles” is worth excerpting: “The Church, from a very early period, took candles into her service, just as she adopted many other things, indifferent in themselves, which seemed proper to enhance the splendor of religious ceremonial. The use of a multitude of candles and lamps was undoubtedly a prominent feature of the celebration of the Easter vigil, dating, we may believe, almost from Apostolic times. The ancient historian, Bishop Eusebius, speaks of the ‘pillars of wax’ with which Constantine transformed night into day, and Prudentius and other authors have left eloquent descriptions of the brilliance within the churches. The practice of setting candles upon the altar itself seems to be somewhat older than the twelfth century.
“The close association of lighted candles with the baptismal ceremony, which took place on Easter Eve, shows that the Christian symbolism of blessed candles was already making itself felt at that early date. This conclusion is further confirmed by the language of the Exultet, still used in our day on Holy Saturday for the blessing of the paschal candle. It is highly probable that St. Jerome himself composed such a ‘praeconium paschale’, and in this the idea of the supposed virginity of bees is insisted on, and the wax is therefore regarded as typifying in a most appropriate way the flesh of Jesus Christ born of a virgin mother. From this has sprung the further conception that the wick symbolizes more particularly the soul of Jesus Christ and the flame the Divinity which absorbs and dominates both. Thus the great paschal candle represents Christ, ‘the true light’, and the smaller candles are typical of each individual Christian who strives to reproduce Christ in his life.
“Candles were constantly used in the Roman Ceremonial from the seventh century and probably still earlier. These candles were placed upon the pavement of the sanctuary and not until much later upon the altars. It is not lawful to say Mass without lighted candles, and if the candles are in danger of being blown out by the wind they must be protected by lanterns. As regards material, the candles used for liturgical purposes should be of beeswax. This is adhered to on account probably of its symbolic reference to the flesh of Christ, as already explained. In the case of the paschal candle and the two candles which are of obligation at Mass, a decree of the Congregation of Rites (in 1904) decided that they must be of beeswax in “maxima parte”, which commentators have interpreted as meaning not less than 75%.” [Today, that has been reduced to the bare minimum of 51%, which is more of modern introduction and less expensive option―which says a lot for how much attention and expense we are prepared to give or not to give God]. (The Catholic Encyclopedia).
The Blessing of Candles on Candlemas Day (February 2nd)
The prayers used by Holy Mother Church in blessing candles on Candlemas Day are very enlightening, descriptive and instructive. There are five short prayers that the priest says over the candles. Here are the relevant excerpts of those five prayers―which we will comment upon afterwards:
(1) “O Holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God, Who … by Thy command hast caused this liquid to become perfect wax by the labor of bees … We humbly beg Thee … to bless ✠ and sanctify ✠ these candles for the service of men and for the health of their bodies and souls and that Thou wouldst hear … the voices of Thy people, who desire to carry them in their hands with honor … and wouldst be favorably disposed to all that call upon Thee!”
(2) “O almighty and everlasting God … we humbly beg that Thou wouldst bless ✠ and sanctify ✠ and to kindle with the light of Thy heavenly blessing these candles, which we desire to receive and to carry lighted in the honor of Thy Name: that, by offering them to Thee, being inflamed with the holy fire of Thy most sweet charity, we may deserve to be presented in the holy temple of Thy glory.”
(3) “O Lord Jesus Christ―the true Light Who enlightenest every man that cometh into this world―pour forth Thy blessing ✠ upon these candles, and sanctify ✠ them with the light of Thy grace, and mercifully grant, that as these lights―enkindled with visible fire― dispel the darkness of night, so our hearts illumined by invisible fire, that is, by the splendor of the Holy Spirit, may be free from the blindness of all vice, that the eye of our mind being cleansed, we may be able to discern what is pleasing to Thee and profitable to our salvation; so that, after the perilous darkness of this life, we may deserve to attain to never failing light!”
(4) “O almighty and everlasting God, who by Thy servant Moses didst command the purest oil to be prepared for lamps to burn continuously before Thee―pour forth the grace of Thy blessing ✠ upon these candles, so that they may give us light outwardly, so that by Thy gift, the gift of Thy Spirit may never be lacking inwardly to our minds.”
(5) “O Lord Jesus Christ, presented by Thy parents in the temple, whom Simeon, illuminated by the light of Thy Spirit, recognized, received into his arms, and blessed―grant that, enlightened and taught by the grace of the same Holy Ghost, we may truly acknowledge Thee and faithfully love Thee!”
Immediately following these prayers comes the Distribution of Candles to the faithful, during which the choir sings of Christ being “a light for the revelation of the Gentiles.” Then, once the faithful have received their candles, there follows a procession during which all the candles that the faithful are carrying, are lit. During the procession the choir again sings of Christ being the new light that has come into the world: “Welcome Christ the King! With loving embrace greet Mary, who is the very gate of Heaven―for she brings to thee the glorious King of the new light!” (Processional hymn after the blessing of the candles).
Immediately following the procession with candles, comes the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, whose readings refer to Christ being a fire and a light to all nations. The Epistle reading says: “Thus says the Lord God: ‘Behold … suddenly there will come to the Temple the Lord Whom you seek! Yes! He is coming! Who will endure the day of His coming? Who can stand when He appears? For He is like the refiner’s fire! He will sit refining and purifying silver, and He will purify the sons of Levi, refining them like gold or like silver that they may offer due sacrifice to the Lord!’” (Epistle of the Mass for the Purification of Mary and the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple; Malachias 3:1-4).
Whereas the Gospel reading says: “At that time, when the days of Mary’s purification were fulfilled according to the Law of Moses, they took Jesus up to Jerusalem to present Him to the Lord ... There was in Jerusalem a man named Simeon, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he should not see death before he had seen the Christ of the Lord. And he came by inspiration of the Spirit into the temple. And when His parents brought in the Child Jesus Simeon received Him into his arms and blessed God, saying: ‘Now You can dismiss Your servant, O Lord, according to Your word, in peace―because my eyes have seen Your salvation, which You have prepared before the face of all peoples: a light of revelation to the Gentiles, and a glory for Your people Israel.” (Gospel of the Mass for the Purification of Mary and the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple; Luke 2:22-32).
Even the Creed―which we recite every Sunday and on major feast days―speaks of Christ being the light: “I believe … in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God. Born of the Father, before all ages. God of God―Light of Light―true God of true God.”
The Light of the World
St. John, in the very first chapter of his Gospel, speaks of Christ being the light that has come into this world of darkness: “In the beginning was the Word … All things were made by Him and without Him was made nothing that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men― the true light, which enlightens every man that comes into this world. And the light shone in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:1-9). Our Lord says of Himself: “I am come a light into the world; that whosoever believeth in Me, may not remain in darkness” (John 12:46). “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5).
In relation to this, Our Lord, being Himself the “Light of the world” (John 9:5), goes on to say in His Sermon on the Mount: “You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid” (Matthew 5:14). “No man, lighting a candle, covers it with a vessel, or puts it under a bed; but sets it upon a candlestick, so that they who come in may see the light” (Luke 8:16). St. Matthew reports the same: “Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house” (Matthew 5:15). While we are in the world, we should be the light of the world—as Our Lord commands: “So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father, Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:16).
Not Many Like The Light!
Yet, though you are the “light of the world”, don’t expect the world to rejoice over your light! What St. John writes of Our Lord, will also be our lot in life: “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:4-5). Sometimes people just don’t want the light! They prefer the darkness! “The people that sat in darkness … did not comprehend … He was in the world, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (Matthew 4:16; John 1:5-11). Which is why “the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 8:12), “and the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30). “If thy eye be evil, then thy whole body shall be darksome. If then the light that is in thee, be darkness: the darkness itself how great shall it be!” (Matthew 6:23). “Take heed therefore, that the light which is in thee, be not darkness!” (Luke 11:35).
Maybe there are some members of your family, parish, neighborhood or workplace who prefer the darkness of the world to the light of Christ. Our Lord lamented that “the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light” (Luke 16:8). In other words, the children of darkness put much more effort into keeping things in the dark, than the meager efforts we make in bringing people to the light! We bury our talent, or hide our candle! By doing so, or rather failing to do what we ought, we risk becoming unprofitable to God: “and the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30).
Unlit Candles are Useless Candles
A candle without a flame is dead or dormant candle―it is not living up to its purpose, which is burn and give off light. Similarly, we ‘Catholic Candles’ are dead or dormant candles if we lack the flame or fire of God. The flame of the candles represents God, His divinity, charity and grace. God the Father appeared to Moses in the burning bush; God the Son showed Himself as a burning heart to St. Margaret Mary; God the Holy Ghost came down upon Our Lady and the Apostles in the form of tongues of fire at Pentecost. God chooses fire to show both His love, His mercy and His justice. Those in Heaven experience the fire of His love; those in Purgatory experience the fire of His mercy; those in Hell experience the fire of His justice. We even say, in the prayer to the Holy Ghost, “Come O Holy Ghost … enkindle in us the fire of Thy love.” Without God and His grace in our souls (candles), we are useless, just like an extinguished candle. A candle was made to burn, not to be extinguished. It should spend its life giving light to those around, as Our Lord said: “Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:15).
Candles & Virtue
The candle very fittingly represents the three theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity. A candle gives off light, so that we see the things around us clearly, just as Faith helps us see God more clearly and helps us see the world for what it really is.
A candle is also necessary to light our path and to lead us out of pit or cavern of this world, in which we have blundered into; without that light, there is a danger of injury in the darkness by stumbling into things, and there is no hope of seeing where to go in order to emerge from the darkness; this symbolizes the virtue of Hope.
The candle also gives off, not just light, but also warmth. This is a symbol of Charity, that we should show to all those around us, just as God does, so “that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45).
The combination of these three virtues should lead us to imitate the larger Candle of Christ, in burning ourselves out in this life for the love of God and neighbor … “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind: and thy neighbor as thyself” (Luke 10:27) ... “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) ... and our first and foremost Friend is God (Father, Son and Holy Ghost), then Our Lady, then the rest of the Mystical Body in hierarchical order.
Candles, Mercy & Grace
As the candle cannot light itself, neither can we obtain the grace of God by ourselves—nobody has an automatic meritorious right to the initial grace of God. Grace, as the catechism tells us, is “a gift of God, freely given.” God’s grace inspires us; God’s grace ‘jump-starts’ us; God’s grace keeps us running until we reach our destination―“Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Each time we relight the Advent candles, we should think of the times when grace was absent from our souls, and God, by His mercy, re-lit divine life in our sinful repentant souls.
Weeping Burning Candles
The wax that the candles ‘weep’ and drip, is symbolic of tears of sorrow for sin. The diminishing size of the candles as they burn with the flame of love and sorrow, is a symbol of humility, as St. John the Baptist, the prophet of penance who burned in the scorching desert heat, said: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30). These two aspects, humility and charity, are the foundation of our sanctity and salvation. Let us develop that theme a little a more.
Purple candles are lit and burned at different stages throughout Advent, yet all will have spent considerable time burning before they enjoy seeing the white candle of Christ finally lit and burning in the midst of them at the end of the Vigil of Christmas, at midnight, signifying the birth and long-awaited arrival of the Son of God at Bethlehem. The fact that the purple candles have been lit at different stages throughout Advent (1st week, 2nd week, 3rd week and 4th week) can interpreted in various ways.
Useless Candles Need Fire
Unless it is lit, a candles is literally useless—for it cannot be used for its intended purpose—the candle-maker’s purpose—which is to give light. Our Lord called us the “Light of the world” and alluded to candle, which He said cannot be hidden under some object so as to prevent it from giving light. Our Lord has come to cast light into the darkness of the world―“I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49)—and God also chooses fire to represent or symbolize Himself and the love that He is: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). God appears to Moses as a burning bush with flames of fire; He appears as fire on top of the mountain in the sight of the Israelites during the Exodus, whom He also leads by night as a pillar of fire. Our Lord shows flames of fire shooting forth from His Sacred Heart. The Holy Ghost came down upon Our Lady and the Apostles at Pentecost in the form of tongues of fire. Fire represents God. We need God, therefore we need His fire—which is why we say, in the prayer to the Holy Ghost, “…enkindle in us the fire of Thy love.”
New Gods of ‘Fire’
Fire used to the chief form of light and heat in bygone years—nowadays, with the discovery of electricity, modern man has less and less need of real fire, when a fake fire will do. He now has electric lights, electric ovens, electric cooking appliances like grills, pans, crockpots, etc. It is a little like that with God—nowadays who needs God and His fiery Divine Providence? Modern man has found a new god to provide for him—the god of science and all that it can ‘create’ and produce. Modern man is very happy tithing and contributing to the gods of science by purchasing these gods’ goods!
God Will Fight Fire With Fire
These modern day ‘bright-sparks’, or new gods on the block, will meet the fiery wrath of the one and only God pretty soon! As Our Lady says: “If there are not any souls who, by their lives of immolation and sacrifice, appease the Divine Justice, fire will rain from Heaven” (Quito) … “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful” (Akita) … “Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains and cities … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume three cities … And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed. God will be served and glorified” (La Salette).
We Were Made To Burn!
Either we burn the debt of sins with the fires of love in our hearts here below; or we burn for the debt of our sins in either Purgatory or Hell. God wants us to do it the least painful way—what do we want to do? It’s a simple logical case of burn now, or burn later! Our Lord said that He came to cast fire on Earth: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). Each time we say the prayer to the Holy Ghost, we ask Him to “enkindle in us the fire” of His love. That fire within us must be kindled and it must burn brightly—either in this world, or in Purgatory. We can only enter Heaven with a raging fire of love in our hearts! That burning must begin here on Earth: “My heart grew hot within me: and, in my meditation, a fire shall flame out” (Psalm 38:4). “And they said one to the other: ‘Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in this way, and opened to us the Scriptures?’” (Luke 24:32)
Burning in Purgatory
By neglecting or refusing to do penance for our sins, then—if we don’t perish in Hell—we will at least burn many a long year in Purgatory. This is a brutal fact that there is no getting away from. This is a terrifying thought and one that makes the bravest man shudder. Which of us does not tremble when he thinks of those persons, in this world, who have been burnt to death in a slow fire? Some may have been deliberately burnt to death, as in the case of many martyrs; others accidentally burnt to death, as in the case of a house burning down. What fear would not be ours if we had to face a similar death? Yet their suffering was of relatively short duration. The incomparably fiercer fire of Purgatory, which we may have to face, may last 20, 50, 100 years or even many centuries!
The Candles of Purgatory
As Fr. Schouppe writes in his book, Purgatory: “Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next … Purgatory is divided into three distinct parts, which are as the three large provinces of that kingdom of suffering. They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different orders. These souls are buried more deeply in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance. The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers, is that of Hell … The same fire, says St. Gregory, torments the damned and purifies the elect. ‘Almost all theologians,’ says the cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, ‘teach that the reprobate and the souls in Purgatory suffer the action of the same fire’ … Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but not sufficiently expiated during life.” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory).
Speaking of this interchange of love, between the God and the soul in Purgatory, St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book, The Dialogue, says:
“When the soul beholds within herself the amorous flame by which she is drawn toward her sweet Master and her God, the burning heat of love overpowers her and she melts. Then, in that divine light she sees how God, by His great care and constant providence, never ceases to attract her to her last perfection, and that He does so through pure love alone. She sees, too, that she herself, clogged by sin, cannot follow that attraction toward God, that is, that reconciling glance which He casts upon her that He may draw her to Himself. Moreover, a comprehension of that great misery, which it is to be hindered from gazing upon the light of God, is added to the instinctive desire of the soul to be wholly free to yield herself to that unifying flame. I repeat, it is the view of all these things which causes the pain of the suffering souls in Purgatory, not that they esteem their pains as great (cruel thought they be), but they count as far worse that opposition which they find in themselves to the will of that God whom they behold burning for them with so ardent and so pure a love. This love, with its unifying regard, is ever drawing these souls, as if it had no other thing to do; and when the soul beholds this, if she could find a yet more painful Purgatory in which she could be more quickly cleansed, she would plunge at once therein, impelled by the burning, mutual love between herself and God.”
The Candles of Hell
The children at Fatima were commanded to add a prayer after each decade of the Rosary that they would pray--”O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fire of Hell” (Fatima prayer taught by Our Lady). The reason for this was, as Our Lady said: “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them.”
Our Lady showed these three young children a vision of Hell, concerning which Sr. Lucia would later say: “She opened her hands once more, as she had done the two previous months. The rays [of light] appeared to penetrate the Earth, and we saw, as it were, a vast sea of fire. Plunged in this fire, we saw the demons and the souls [of the damned]. The latter were like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, having human forms. They were floating about in that conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames which issued from within themselves, together with great clouds of smoke. Now they fell back on every side like sparks in huge fires, without weight or equilibrium, amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fright—it must have been this sight which caused me to cry out, as people say they heard me. The demons were distinguished [from the souls of the damned] by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning coals. That vision only lasted for a moment, thanks to our good Heavenly Mother, who at the first apparition had promised to take us to Heaven. Without that, I think that we would have died of terror and fear.”
In the life of Mother Marian de Jesus Torres, we read of the sufferings she had to undergo to pay for the conversion of a hateful and rebellious religious sister—La Capitana. Shortly after La Capitana’s heart had been touched by God’s merciful grace, Mother Mariana began to fulfil the sentence that she had undertaken for the conversion of this rebellious sister. For five years, she suffered the stench of Hell that tortured her sense of smell. At the end of the five years, Mother Mariana called together the remaining founding mothers, who in spirit had accompanied her in her sufferings with their prayers, sacrifices and penances. She told them: “Alas, my sisters! How terrible Hell is! No words can describe it!”
Candles on Earth
Our Lord said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). St. Jacinta Marto of Fatima, not long before dying, said: “Oh! If only I could put into all hearts the fire I feel in my own, which makes me love the Hearts of Jesus and Mary so much!”
The candle can be a beautiful and profound subject for meditation—and this is why we are looking at candles around this feast of Candlemas Day (February 2nd). Yet the candle is relative a latecomer on scene of light! The “new kids on the block” were the later born gaslights and electric lights.
We Were Made to Burn on Earth
The candle is merely a form of light. It is a platform for light. It is the platform for fire, which is what gives life and purpose to the candle. After all, what good is candle if it is unlit. It only achieves its purpose once it is ‘on fire.’ A candle that is not ‘on fire’, or one that you cannot light, is like a soul without grace—absolutely useless. The soul without grace is fit for nothing, except to burn in Hell. Every soul was made to burn! It will either burn with a love of God here on Earth; or it will have a lukewarm love heated-up as it burns in Purgatory; or it will have its rejection of Divine Love tormented as it burns in the fires of Hell.
Big, Small, Fat and Tall
What is important about the candle is not its size or shape, but its receptivity to the fire that wants to give it life. You can have big or small candles, thick or slender candles, short or tall candles—what matters is that they burn. God appeared to Moses under the form of fire—God was the flame, the bush was the ‘candle’ that He used as a platform. The Holy Ghost came down upon Our Lady and the Apostles, at Pentecost, in the form of tongues of fire and used them as a platform—they must have looked like ‘human candles’ at that moment.
Jesus the Candle
That is what we are meant to be—human candles, just like Our Lord: “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘I am the light of the world: he that followeth Me, walketh not in darkness, but shall have the light of life!’” (John 8:12). “I am come a light into the world; that whosoever believeth in Me, may not remain in darkness!” (John 12:46). “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world!” (John 9:5). We speak of Jesus the Light coming at Christmas; and we light the Paschal Candle (which represents Jesus) at Easter.
You Are a Candle for Christ
But it is not just Jesus who is the light of the world; we are also meant to be the light of the world. At Easter, we light our candles from the Paschal Candle; we get our light from the Paschal Candle, just as we get the light of Faith from Jesus, the divine light or divine Candle that came amongst us. And that light, that we get from Him, we cannot hide, for we, too, are the light of the world. He Himself told us this: “You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men” (Matthew 5:14-16).
Today, February 2nd, we celebrate Candlemas Day―which is the feast of the Purification of Our Lady and the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple of Jerusalem, shortly after His birth. Candles―in the Catholic Church’s Liturgy―symbolize persons. For example, the Paschal Candle symbolizes Christ; the smaller candles symbolize the rest of the Church.
Before looking at the symbolism of candles in particular, let us briefly look at the history of the candle. The candle is relative a latecomer on scene of light! The new kids on the block were the later born gaslights and electric lights, but funnily enough the candle did not come to light much before the year 500 BC—as far we know, but then, what do we know!?! Man’s knowledge, though he thinks it is great, is quite paltry in reality! Anyhow, that’s what they say—around 500 BC. Though some claim―with no evidence―that the Ancient Egyptians used candles 5,000 years ago!
Candles were made by the Romans beginning about 500 BC (though some claim it was 1000 BC). These were true dipped candles and made from tallow (molten animal fat).
The ancient Egyptians used candles as early as 300 BC. However their candles didn't have a wick, it had plant reeds instead. These reeds were soaked in tallow.
It is also thought that candles were made from whale-fat by the Chinese, during the Qin Dynasty (221–206 BC).
In India, wax from boiling cinnamon was used for temple candles.
Extracts from tree nuts were used to make candle wax in early Japan.
In parts of Europe, the Middle-East and Africa, where lamp-oil made from olives was readily available, candle making remained unknown until the early Middle-Ages. Even today, some Catholic churches and chapels still prefer to burn olive-oil for their sanctuary (tabernacle) lights. Candles were primarily made from tallow and beeswax until about 1850, but since then have been increasingly made from spermaceti, purified animal fats (stearin) and paraffin wax.
Candles in Divine Worship
Candles have always played a central part in divine worship—even in Old Testament times, though olive oil was the main source of illumination in the Mediterranean regions. Candles were made by the Romans beginning about 500 BC. These were true dipped candles and made from tallow. After the collapse of the Roman Empire, trading disruptions made olive oil, the most common fuel for oil lamps, unavailable throughout much of Europe. As a consequence, candles became more widely used. Tallow (fat from cows or sheep), became the standard material used in candles in Europe. The unpleasant smell of tallow candles is due to the glycerine they contain. The smell of the manufacturing process was so unpleasant that it was banned by ordinance in several European cities. Beeswax was discovered to be an excellent substance for candle production without the unpleasant odor, but remained restricted in usage for the rich and for churches and royal events, due to their great expense.
The Catholic Encyclopedia entry for “Candles” is worth excerpting: “The Church, from a very early period, took candles into her service, just as she adopted many other things, indifferent in themselves, which seemed proper to enhance the splendor of religious ceremonial. The use of a multitude of candles and lamps was undoubtedly a prominent feature of the celebration of the Easter vigil, dating, we may believe, almost from Apostolic times. The ancient historian, Bishop Eusebius, speaks of the ‘pillars of wax’ with which Constantine transformed night into day, and Prudentius and other authors have left eloquent descriptions of the brilliance within the churches. The practice of setting candles upon the altar itself seems to be somewhat older than the twelfth century.
“The close association of lighted candles with the baptismal ceremony, which took place on Easter Eve, shows that the Christian symbolism of blessed candles was already making itself felt at that early date. This conclusion is further confirmed by the language of the Exultet, still used in our day on Holy Saturday for the blessing of the paschal candle. It is highly probable that St. Jerome himself composed such a ‘praeconium paschale’, and in this the idea of the supposed virginity of bees is insisted on, and the wax is therefore regarded as typifying in a most appropriate way the flesh of Jesus Christ born of a virgin mother. From this has sprung the further conception that the wick symbolizes more particularly the soul of Jesus Christ and the flame the Divinity which absorbs and dominates both. Thus the great paschal candle represents Christ, ‘the true light’, and the smaller candles are typical of each individual Christian who strives to reproduce Christ in his life.
“Candles were constantly used in the Roman Ceremonial from the seventh century and probably still earlier. These candles were placed upon the pavement of the sanctuary and not until much later upon the altars. It is not lawful to say Mass without lighted candles, and if the candles are in danger of being blown out by the wind they must be protected by lanterns. As regards material, the candles used for liturgical purposes should be of beeswax. This is adhered to on account probably of its symbolic reference to the flesh of Christ, as already explained. In the case of the paschal candle and the two candles which are of obligation at Mass, a decree of the Congregation of Rites (in 1904) decided that they must be of beeswax in “maxima parte”, which commentators have interpreted as meaning not less than 75%.” [Today, that has been reduced to the bare minimum of 51%, which is more of modern introduction and less expensive option―which says a lot for how much attention and expense we are prepared to give or not to give God]. (The Catholic Encyclopedia).
The Blessing of Candles on Candlemas Day (February 2nd)
The prayers used by Holy Mother Church in blessing candles on Candlemas Day are very enlightening, descriptive and instructive. There are five short prayers that the priest says over the candles. Here are the relevant excerpts of those five prayers―which we will comment upon afterwards:
(1) “O Holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God, Who … by Thy command hast caused this liquid to become perfect wax by the labor of bees … We humbly beg Thee … to bless ✠ and sanctify ✠ these candles for the service of men and for the health of their bodies and souls and that Thou wouldst hear … the voices of Thy people, who desire to carry them in their hands with honor … and wouldst be favorably disposed to all that call upon Thee!”
(2) “O almighty and everlasting God … we humbly beg that Thou wouldst bless ✠ and sanctify ✠ and to kindle with the light of Thy heavenly blessing these candles, which we desire to receive and to carry lighted in the honor of Thy Name: that, by offering them to Thee, being inflamed with the holy fire of Thy most sweet charity, we may deserve to be presented in the holy temple of Thy glory.”
(3) “O Lord Jesus Christ―the true Light Who enlightenest every man that cometh into this world―pour forth Thy blessing ✠ upon these candles, and sanctify ✠ them with the light of Thy grace, and mercifully grant, that as these lights―enkindled with visible fire― dispel the darkness of night, so our hearts illumined by invisible fire, that is, by the splendor of the Holy Spirit, may be free from the blindness of all vice, that the eye of our mind being cleansed, we may be able to discern what is pleasing to Thee and profitable to our salvation; so that, after the perilous darkness of this life, we may deserve to attain to never failing light!”
(4) “O almighty and everlasting God, who by Thy servant Moses didst command the purest oil to be prepared for lamps to burn continuously before Thee―pour forth the grace of Thy blessing ✠ upon these candles, so that they may give us light outwardly, so that by Thy gift, the gift of Thy Spirit may never be lacking inwardly to our minds.”
(5) “O Lord Jesus Christ, presented by Thy parents in the temple, whom Simeon, illuminated by the light of Thy Spirit, recognized, received into his arms, and blessed―grant that, enlightened and taught by the grace of the same Holy Ghost, we may truly acknowledge Thee and faithfully love Thee!”
Immediately following these prayers comes the Distribution of Candles to the faithful, during which the choir sings of Christ being “a light for the revelation of the Gentiles.” Then, once the faithful have received their candles, there follows a procession during which all the candles that the faithful are carrying, are lit. During the procession the choir again sings of Christ being the new light that has come into the world: “Welcome Christ the King! With loving embrace greet Mary, who is the very gate of Heaven―for she brings to thee the glorious King of the new light!” (Processional hymn after the blessing of the candles).
Immediately following the procession with candles, comes the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, whose readings refer to Christ being a fire and a light to all nations. The Epistle reading says: “Thus says the Lord God: ‘Behold … suddenly there will come to the Temple the Lord Whom you seek! Yes! He is coming! Who will endure the day of His coming? Who can stand when He appears? For He is like the refiner’s fire! He will sit refining and purifying silver, and He will purify the sons of Levi, refining them like gold or like silver that they may offer due sacrifice to the Lord!’” (Epistle of the Mass for the Purification of Mary and the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple; Malachias 3:1-4).
Whereas the Gospel reading says: “At that time, when the days of Mary’s purification were fulfilled according to the Law of Moses, they took Jesus up to Jerusalem to present Him to the Lord ... There was in Jerusalem a man named Simeon, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he should not see death before he had seen the Christ of the Lord. And he came by inspiration of the Spirit into the temple. And when His parents brought in the Child Jesus Simeon received Him into his arms and blessed God, saying: ‘Now You can dismiss Your servant, O Lord, according to Your word, in peace―because my eyes have seen Your salvation, which You have prepared before the face of all peoples: a light of revelation to the Gentiles, and a glory for Your people Israel.” (Gospel of the Mass for the Purification of Mary and the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple; Luke 2:22-32).
Even the Creed―which we recite every Sunday and on major feast days―speaks of Christ being the light: “I believe … in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God. Born of the Father, before all ages. God of God―Light of Light―true God of true God.”
The Light of the World
St. John, in the very first chapter of his Gospel, speaks of Christ being the light that has come into this world of darkness: “In the beginning was the Word … All things were made by Him and without Him was made nothing that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men― the true light, which enlightens every man that comes into this world. And the light shone in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:1-9). Our Lord says of Himself: “I am come a light into the world; that whosoever believeth in Me, may not remain in darkness” (John 12:46). “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5).
In relation to this, Our Lord, being Himself the “Light of the world” (John 9:5), goes on to say in His Sermon on the Mount: “You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid” (Matthew 5:14). “No man, lighting a candle, covers it with a vessel, or puts it under a bed; but sets it upon a candlestick, so that they who come in may see the light” (Luke 8:16). St. Matthew reports the same: “Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house” (Matthew 5:15). While we are in the world, we should be the light of the world—as Our Lord commands: “So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father, Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:16).
Not Many Like The Light!
Yet, though you are the “light of the world”, don’t expect the world to rejoice over your light! What St. John writes of Our Lord, will also be our lot in life: “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:4-5). Sometimes people just don’t want the light! They prefer the darkness! “The people that sat in darkness … did not comprehend … He was in the world, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (Matthew 4:16; John 1:5-11). Which is why “the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 8:12), “and the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30). “If thy eye be evil, then thy whole body shall be darksome. If then the light that is in thee, be darkness: the darkness itself how great shall it be!” (Matthew 6:23). “Take heed therefore, that the light which is in thee, be not darkness!” (Luke 11:35).
Maybe there are some members of your family, parish, neighborhood or workplace who prefer the darkness of the world to the light of Christ. Our Lord lamented that “the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light” (Luke 16:8). In other words, the children of darkness put much more effort into keeping things in the dark, than the meager efforts we make in bringing people to the light! We bury our talent, or hide our candle! By doing so, or rather failing to do what we ought, we risk becoming unprofitable to God: “and the unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:30).
Unlit Candles are Useless Candles
A candle without a flame is dead or dormant candle―it is not living up to its purpose, which is burn and give off light. Similarly, we ‘Catholic Candles’ are dead or dormant candles if we lack the flame or fire of God. The flame of the candles represents God, His divinity, charity and grace. God the Father appeared to Moses in the burning bush; God the Son showed Himself as a burning heart to St. Margaret Mary; God the Holy Ghost came down upon Our Lady and the Apostles in the form of tongues of fire at Pentecost. God chooses fire to show both His love, His mercy and His justice. Those in Heaven experience the fire of His love; those in Purgatory experience the fire of His mercy; those in Hell experience the fire of His justice. We even say, in the prayer to the Holy Ghost, “Come O Holy Ghost … enkindle in us the fire of Thy love.” Without God and His grace in our souls (candles), we are useless, just like an extinguished candle. A candle was made to burn, not to be extinguished. It should spend its life giving light to those around, as Our Lord said: “Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:15).
Candles & Virtue
The candle very fittingly represents the three theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity. A candle gives off light, so that we see the things around us clearly, just as Faith helps us see God more clearly and helps us see the world for what it really is.
A candle is also necessary to light our path and to lead us out of pit or cavern of this world, in which we have blundered into; without that light, there is a danger of injury in the darkness by stumbling into things, and there is no hope of seeing where to go in order to emerge from the darkness; this symbolizes the virtue of Hope.
The candle also gives off, not just light, but also warmth. This is a symbol of Charity, that we should show to all those around us, just as God does, so “that you may be the children of your Father Who is in Heaven, Who makes His sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45).
The combination of these three virtues should lead us to imitate the larger Candle of Christ, in burning ourselves out in this life for the love of God and neighbor … “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind: and thy neighbor as thyself” (Luke 10:27) ... “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13) ... and our first and foremost Friend is God (Father, Son and Holy Ghost), then Our Lady, then the rest of the Mystical Body in hierarchical order.
Candles, Mercy & Grace
As the candle cannot light itself, neither can we obtain the grace of God by ourselves—nobody has an automatic meritorious right to the initial grace of God. Grace, as the catechism tells us, is “a gift of God, freely given.” God’s grace inspires us; God’s grace ‘jump-starts’ us; God’s grace keeps us running until we reach our destination―“Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Each time we relight the Advent candles, we should think of the times when grace was absent from our souls, and God, by His mercy, re-lit divine life in our sinful repentant souls.
Weeping Burning Candles
The wax that the candles ‘weep’ and drip, is symbolic of tears of sorrow for sin. The diminishing size of the candles as they burn with the flame of love and sorrow, is a symbol of humility, as St. John the Baptist, the prophet of penance who burned in the scorching desert heat, said: “He must increase, but I must decrease!” (John 3:30). These two aspects, humility and charity, are the foundation of our sanctity and salvation. Let us develop that theme a little a more.
Purple candles are lit and burned at different stages throughout Advent, yet all will have spent considerable time burning before they enjoy seeing the white candle of Christ finally lit and burning in the midst of them at the end of the Vigil of Christmas, at midnight, signifying the birth and long-awaited arrival of the Son of God at Bethlehem. The fact that the purple candles have been lit at different stages throughout Advent (1st week, 2nd week, 3rd week and 4th week) can interpreted in various ways.
Useless Candles Need Fire
Unless it is lit, a candles is literally useless—for it cannot be used for its intended purpose—the candle-maker’s purpose—which is to give light. Our Lord called us the “Light of the world” and alluded to candle, which He said cannot be hidden under some object so as to prevent it from giving light. Our Lord has come to cast light into the darkness of the world―“I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49)—and God also chooses fire to represent or symbolize Himself and the love that He is: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). God appears to Moses as a burning bush with flames of fire; He appears as fire on top of the mountain in the sight of the Israelites during the Exodus, whom He also leads by night as a pillar of fire. Our Lord shows flames of fire shooting forth from His Sacred Heart. The Holy Ghost came down upon Our Lady and the Apostles at Pentecost in the form of tongues of fire. Fire represents God. We need God, therefore we need His fire—which is why we say, in the prayer to the Holy Ghost, “…enkindle in us the fire of Thy love.”
New Gods of ‘Fire’
Fire used to the chief form of light and heat in bygone years—nowadays, with the discovery of electricity, modern man has less and less need of real fire, when a fake fire will do. He now has electric lights, electric ovens, electric cooking appliances like grills, pans, crockpots, etc. It is a little like that with God—nowadays who needs God and His fiery Divine Providence? Modern man has found a new god to provide for him—the god of science and all that it can ‘create’ and produce. Modern man is very happy tithing and contributing to the gods of science by purchasing these gods’ goods!
God Will Fight Fire With Fire
These modern day ‘bright-sparks’, or new gods on the block, will meet the fiery wrath of the one and only God pretty soon! As Our Lady says: “If there are not any souls who, by their lives of immolation and sacrifice, appease the Divine Justice, fire will rain from Heaven” (Quito) … “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful” (Akita) … “Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions and terrible earthquakes which will swallow up mountains and cities … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume three cities … And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed. God will be served and glorified” (La Salette).
We Were Made To Burn!
Either we burn the debt of sins with the fires of love in our hearts here below; or we burn for the debt of our sins in either Purgatory or Hell. God wants us to do it the least painful way—what do we want to do? It’s a simple logical case of burn now, or burn later! Our Lord said that He came to cast fire on Earth: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). Each time we say the prayer to the Holy Ghost, we ask Him to “enkindle in us the fire” of His love. That fire within us must be kindled and it must burn brightly—either in this world, or in Purgatory. We can only enter Heaven with a raging fire of love in our hearts! That burning must begin here on Earth: “My heart grew hot within me: and, in my meditation, a fire shall flame out” (Psalm 38:4). “And they said one to the other: ‘Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in this way, and opened to us the Scriptures?’” (Luke 24:32)
Burning in Purgatory
By neglecting or refusing to do penance for our sins, then—if we don’t perish in Hell—we will at least burn many a long year in Purgatory. This is a brutal fact that there is no getting away from. This is a terrifying thought and one that makes the bravest man shudder. Which of us does not tremble when he thinks of those persons, in this world, who have been burnt to death in a slow fire? Some may have been deliberately burnt to death, as in the case of many martyrs; others accidentally burnt to death, as in the case of a house burning down. What fear would not be ours if we had to face a similar death? Yet their suffering was of relatively short duration. The incomparably fiercer fire of Purgatory, which we may have to face, may last 20, 50, 100 years or even many centuries!
The Candles of Purgatory
As Fr. Schouppe writes in his book, Purgatory: “Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next … Purgatory is divided into three distinct parts, which are as the three large provinces of that kingdom of suffering. They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different orders. These souls are buried more deeply in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance. The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers, is that of Hell … The same fire, says St. Gregory, torments the damned and purifies the elect. ‘Almost all theologians,’ says the cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, ‘teach that the reprobate and the souls in Purgatory suffer the action of the same fire’ … Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but not sufficiently expiated during life.” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory).
Speaking of this interchange of love, between the God and the soul in Purgatory, St. Catherine of Genoa, in her book, The Dialogue, says:
“When the soul beholds within herself the amorous flame by which she is drawn toward her sweet Master and her God, the burning heat of love overpowers her and she melts. Then, in that divine light she sees how God, by His great care and constant providence, never ceases to attract her to her last perfection, and that He does so through pure love alone. She sees, too, that she herself, clogged by sin, cannot follow that attraction toward God, that is, that reconciling glance which He casts upon her that He may draw her to Himself. Moreover, a comprehension of that great misery, which it is to be hindered from gazing upon the light of God, is added to the instinctive desire of the soul to be wholly free to yield herself to that unifying flame. I repeat, it is the view of all these things which causes the pain of the suffering souls in Purgatory, not that they esteem their pains as great (cruel thought they be), but they count as far worse that opposition which they find in themselves to the will of that God whom they behold burning for them with so ardent and so pure a love. This love, with its unifying regard, is ever drawing these souls, as if it had no other thing to do; and when the soul beholds this, if she could find a yet more painful Purgatory in which she could be more quickly cleansed, she would plunge at once therein, impelled by the burning, mutual love between herself and God.”
The Candles of Hell
The children at Fatima were commanded to add a prayer after each decade of the Rosary that they would pray--”O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fire of Hell” (Fatima prayer taught by Our Lady). The reason for this was, as Our Lady said: “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them.”
Our Lady showed these three young children a vision of Hell, concerning which Sr. Lucia would later say: “She opened her hands once more, as she had done the two previous months. The rays [of light] appeared to penetrate the Earth, and we saw, as it were, a vast sea of fire. Plunged in this fire, we saw the demons and the souls [of the damned]. The latter were like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, having human forms. They were floating about in that conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames which issued from within themselves, together with great clouds of smoke. Now they fell back on every side like sparks in huge fires, without weight or equilibrium, amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fright—it must have been this sight which caused me to cry out, as people say they heard me. The demons were distinguished [from the souls of the damned] by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning coals. That vision only lasted for a moment, thanks to our good Heavenly Mother, who at the first apparition had promised to take us to Heaven. Without that, I think that we would have died of terror and fear.”
In the life of Mother Marian de Jesus Torres, we read of the sufferings she had to undergo to pay for the conversion of a hateful and rebellious religious sister—La Capitana. Shortly after La Capitana’s heart had been touched by God’s merciful grace, Mother Mariana began to fulfil the sentence that she had undertaken for the conversion of this rebellious sister. For five years, she suffered the stench of Hell that tortured her sense of smell. At the end of the five years, Mother Mariana called together the remaining founding mothers, who in spirit had accompanied her in her sufferings with their prayers, sacrifices and penances. She told them: “Alas, my sisters! How terrible Hell is! No words can describe it!”
Candles on Earth
Our Lord said: “I am come to cast fire on the Earth; and what will I, but that it be kindled?” (Luke 12:49). St. Jacinta Marto of Fatima, not long before dying, said: “Oh! If only I could put into all hearts the fire I feel in my own, which makes me love the Hearts of Jesus and Mary so much!”
The candle can be a beautiful and profound subject for meditation—and this is why we are looking at candles around this feast of Candlemas Day (February 2nd). Yet the candle is relative a latecomer on scene of light! The “new kids on the block” were the later born gaslights and electric lights.
We Were Made to Burn on Earth
The candle is merely a form of light. It is a platform for light. It is the platform for fire, which is what gives life and purpose to the candle. After all, what good is candle if it is unlit. It only achieves its purpose once it is ‘on fire.’ A candle that is not ‘on fire’, or one that you cannot light, is like a soul without grace—absolutely useless. The soul without grace is fit for nothing, except to burn in Hell. Every soul was made to burn! It will either burn with a love of God here on Earth; or it will have a lukewarm love heated-up as it burns in Purgatory; or it will have its rejection of Divine Love tormented as it burns in the fires of Hell.
Big, Small, Fat and Tall
What is important about the candle is not its size or shape, but its receptivity to the fire that wants to give it life. You can have big or small candles, thick or slender candles, short or tall candles—what matters is that they burn. God appeared to Moses under the form of fire—God was the flame, the bush was the ‘candle’ that He used as a platform. The Holy Ghost came down upon Our Lady and the Apostles, at Pentecost, in the form of tongues of fire and used them as a platform—they must have looked like ‘human candles’ at that moment.
Jesus the Candle
That is what we are meant to be—human candles, just like Our Lord: “Jesus spoke to them, saying: ‘I am the light of the world: he that followeth Me, walketh not in darkness, but shall have the light of life!’” (John 8:12). “I am come a light into the world; that whosoever believeth in Me, may not remain in darkness!” (John 12:46). “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world!” (John 9:5). We speak of Jesus the Light coming at Christmas; and we light the Paschal Candle (which represents Jesus) at Easter.
You Are a Candle for Christ
But it is not just Jesus who is the light of the world; we are also meant to be the light of the world. At Easter, we light our candles from the Paschal Candle; we get our light from the Paschal Candle, just as we get the light of Faith from Jesus, the divine light or divine Candle that came amongst us. And that light, that we get from Him, we cannot hide, for we, too, are the light of the world. He Himself told us this: “You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men” (Matthew 5:14-16).
Article 5
Thursday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 1st
Septuagesima Seasoning
Thursday after Septuagesima Sunday, February 1st
Septuagesima Seasoning
Beauty, But Only Skin Deep!
For those lucky enough to be following the Septuagesima Season, there is therein a rich vein of spiritual teaching and thought, presented to us by a wise Mother—Holy Mother Church—to nourish our souls with what is most profitable to our salvation. Yet even those who are fortunate to have attended a Mass that celebrated Septuagesima Sunday, are unlikely to benefit from the fruits that Holy Mother Church offered them—because we have become a very superficial race of people living in a very superficial world, where superficial news is given in little, easy to understand, 30-second or 1-minute servings, that has very little depth to it. The attention span of man has grown shorter and shorter over the last few decades—with the blame to be largely placed at the feet of modern electronic communications such as radio, TV, internet, and even newspapers—all of whom give it to you as short and as succinct as possible. Thinking has been replaced by mere watching. Images have increasingly replaced words. Feelings count for more than truth.
Vocabulary Dried-Up
Vocabulary has also had the juice of its words squeezed out if it and we look at the carcass or bones of vocabulary in phrases and abbreviations such as: “Wassup?” replaces “What is the matter?” “Bro” … replaces “brother”. “?4U” replaces “I have a question for you”. “2EZ” replaces “Too easy”. “2M2H” replaces “Too much to handle”. “2MORO” replaces “Tomorrow”. “2NITE” replaces “Tonight”. “GRATZ” replaces “Congratulations”. etc., etc.
All of this is synonymous with “the fast life”—“fast food” restaurants, “fast-track” or “express-lanes” in stores and airports, “speed-dialing” and “faster computers”, etc. Researchers note that this push for speed is changing the way people think. The need to be efficient and instant leads to a dumbing down of information intake so that people become scanners and “decoders” of information, cruising horizontally across the screen to pick up bytes, rather than delving towards a deeper understanding.
Intellectual Decline Brings Spiritual Decline
It is this turning away from a deeper understanding and being satisfied with superficial knowledge, that causes havoc within the spiritual life and makes salvation less and less likely, as people can no longer (and no longer want to) get to grips with the nuts and bolts of the spiritual life. For the spiritual life and spiritual knowledge is much more difficult and much more demanding than the physical life or the intellectual life. In fact, St. Thomas Aquinas states that in comparing the three levels of possible work—physical work, intellectual work and spiritual work—it is physical work which is less demanding for the soul; intellectual work is much harder for the soul; while spiritual work is the hardest of all for the soul.
Our mind (intellect) has already been weakened by Original Sin, and we are born in a state of ignorance which finds learning hard. Add to this natural state the modern “dumbing-down” that the world has brought about upon the intellectual levels of people worldwide, then you have a mind that shrinks and shirks anything that is spiritual demanding to understand.
Baby Language—Baby Spirituality
A baby or an infant can only understand so much before its mind is “frazzled” by its inability to understand more complex or difficult words or concepts. To communicate with a child at that infantile level, you have use infantile language or “baby talk”—gradually raising the levels of vocabulary and concepts as the child grows older. The problem is that, today, most Catholics cannot get past or cannot grasp anything beyond “infantile Catholicism” because the world, in many respects, is becoming more and more infantile, banal, superficial and pretentious as it goes along on the broad wide to the gates of you know where. If the child will not learn, ultimately the teacher or parent will use severe punishment—physical or psychological—to remedy the situation. Even the State does that with fines, imprisonment and capital punishment for criminals who “will not learn” and remedy their criminal behavior.
God will do the same, at some point in the future, with His “Great Chastisement” which the world will think is “not so great”—when He will unleash a physical and psychological punishment of the kind that has never been seen before in the history of mankind. Then, suddenly—as is often the case with a punished child or student—seriousness, behavioral rectitude, effort and results will improve—and prophecies foretell that the level of spirituality and holiness in the world, after the chastisement, will be of a level never before seen in the history of the world! Amazing what punishment can do for incorrigible folk!
Anyway, back to “baby Catholicism” or “infantile Catholicism”! So many Catholics never really “grow-up” spiritually. The little bit catechism (a survival ration), that they were once taught at school, has not been built upon in the years since leaving school, but has been largely forgotten. Put any Catholic on the spot with an impromptu catechism test, and they will fail miserably—and I am talking about a First Communion Catechism, or at best, a Confirmation Catechism—thus for ages around 7 to 11 years old. Let us not forget that this level of catechism is mostly “parrot-fashion” repetition of answers with only a minimal of thinking and understanding taking place. For example, a 6 or 7 year old will tell you: “God is a spirit!”—but after that, there is nothing much more that they can tell you, except that “a spirit has no body”!
Most Catholics could not tell you how many books there are in the Bible, let alone even name them, and definitely not name them in their correct order—but even if they could, that is nothing more than a work of mere memorization that is devoid of understanding and deeper knowledge. It is handily forgotten that back in colonial America, many fathers of families were comfortable with debating the finer points of theology! And that entrance exams to the top universities, in the early 1900s, required the high-school graduate to debate with his future professors in either Greek or Latin! O how far have we fallen intellectually since those days. We may possess a greater and broader intelligence in technology, but we have become too specialized and lack breadth of knowledge. Search online for the “copy of the eighth-grade exam used in schools in Bullitt County, Kentucky, in 1912” and present it to an eighth-grader today, and you will see the difference in results.
The Spiritual Babies of 1905
Yet even back at that time—in 1905—Pope St. Pius X wrote a papal encyclical on the dangers of religious ignorance! Yes, over 100 years ago! What would he say today? A few lines from the encyclical will give you the idea (the encyclical can be read here).
“We are forced to agree with those who hold that the chief cause of the present indifference and, as it were, infirmity of soul, and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of things divine. This is fully in accord with what God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘And there is no knowledge of God in the land. Cursing and lying and killing and theft and adultery have overflowed: and blood hath touched blood. Thereafter shall the land mourn, and everyone that dwelleth in it shall languish.’
“It is a common complaint, unfortunately too well founded, that there are large numbers of Christians in our own time who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation. And when we mention Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life -- for these find some excuse for their ignorance in the fact that the demands of their harsh employers hardly leave them time to take care of themselves or of their dear ones — but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there.
“They rarely give thought to God, the Supreme Author and Ruler of all things, or to the teachings of the faith of Christ. They know nothing of the Incarnation of the Word of God, nothing of the perfect restoration of the human race which He accomplished. Grace, the greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things, the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments by which we obtain grace, are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it. And so they arrive at life's end in such a condition … Our Predecessor, Benedict XIV, had just cause to write: ‘We declare that a great number of those, who are condemned to eternal punishment, suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of Faith which must be known and believed in order to be numbered among the elect.’” (Pope St. Pius X, encyclical Acerbo Nimis. April 1905).
What Has This to Do With Septuagesima?
Good question! Well, it is like this. You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink. You can a Catholic to the Catechism or Bible, but you cannot make them think! And if they just look at the surface of the content, they will not really understand the Faith, and thus won’t really live the Faith. To understand, you need to see what stand under the thing—you need to dig below the surface. You can live on an oil-field yet die of poverty and starvation if you are not prepared to dig. As St. Thomas Aquinas says, in effect, physical digging is easier than intellectual digging, but spiritual digging is harder than either physical or intellectual digging. Most people do not want to dig spiritually—so they will die of spiritual poverty and starved of grace!
Septuagesima Sunday—and the ensuing Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays—are a rich oil-field or rich storehouse of theological and spiritual wealth. Yet they remain untapped sources for most Catholics. They have no time, no inclination and no desire to venture therein. For the few that do follow the liturgical rite that still celebrates the Septuagesima season, many of those ‘fortunate’ Catholics unfortunately let the texts of the liturgy go in one ear and out the other. Their spiritual stomachs are hungry as they enter church and they come away with equally empty stomachs after Mass—the sad (and most dangerous) thing is that they DO NOT FEEL HUNGRY! Perhaps it because they are “Compromised Catholics”, who live for both the world and for God—a marriage that Christ said cannot happen: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). Being eagerly fed by the junk food of mammon, they have no real appetite for the word of God, yet, as Christ also said: “Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4).
The child who is raised on junk food and fast food, loaded with sugar—will have revulsion for the very healthy bitter foods, such as garlic, onions, lemons, limes, and a host of other herbs and spices—which, though they do not form the main part of the meal, they are often the most healthiest part of the meal—as research and studies have shown. There is a general axiom that says: “Bitter is better!”
Septuagesima Seasoning
The texts for the Mass of Septuagesima Sunday could be said to be like seasoning—they are somewhat bitter! Here is an extract for those who did not have the benefit or privilege of attending a Septuagesima Sunday Mass. You can well imagine many people wincing and whining at the spiciness of the Septuagesima Sunday seasoning! The Entrance Hymn (Introit) and the Prayer (collect) are pretty sharp and spicy: “The terrors of death surged round me, the cords of the nether world enmeshed me. In my distress I called upon the Lord … Hear the prayers of Thy people, that we, who are justly punished for our sins, may be mercifully delivered!” St. Paul adds some more spice to the food in the Epistle: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers … did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink … But with most of them God was not well pleased!” Immediately after the Epistle, the Gradual chimes in with another “not-too-sweet” verse: “Out of the depths I cry to Thee, O Lord! Lord, hear my voice! If Thou, O Lord, mark iniquities, Lord, who can stand it?” Then the Gospel asks: “Why do stand here all day idle?” and ends with the haunting and harrowing words of Our Lord: “Many are called, but few chosen!” While the Communion prayer pleads: “O Lord, let me not be put to shame, for I call upon Thee!”
Just like spice with a meal—there is not a predominance of it, but enough to make the eyes water and the nose to run as the sinuses are cleared out. Likewise, the Septuagesima Season seasoning or spice, should sting our consciences and make our eyes water with tears for our sins, clearing-out the sinuses of our consciences by making us run to confession and performing penance.
A “Baby Lent” or a “Serious Lent”?
Usually, words and actions come forth from thoughts. We think of something first and then we say it or do it. Serious things require serious thought and reflection—everybody will agree on that. The more expensive the thing that we intend to buy, the more we think about it. Tell, me—what is more expensive than sin? We treat sin lightly—not so with God! Sin, in God’s eyes, is so evil that He created Hell for its punishment, and sent the rebellious angels there without a second thought. He placed the penalty of death over Adam, Eve and mankind because of sin, warning Adam and Eve: “Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat: but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death” (Genesis 2:16-17). In the Old Testament, God said: “He that hath sinned against me, him will I strike out of my book” (Exodus 32:33) and nothing has changed since, for God never changes. That is why St. Paul, in the New Testament, tells us: “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Our catechisms tell us that: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, Spirago-Clarke; My Catholic Faith, Bishop Morrow, STD).
I Disagree!
Just because we do not think this way, does not make it false. Sin is the greatest evil in the world. At a pinch, we might persuade ourselves of that in the case of SOME mortal sins…but ALL MORTAL SINS?? We say, no way!! But God says: “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways,’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). In God’s eyes, “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Adam and Eve found that out after committing JUST ONE SIN! Did God over-react? It would be blasphemy to think so!
Let It Sink In
Now let those phrases sink-in: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin.” Let us think of and list some evils that we can imagine (that is to say, evils that have nothing to do with sin). An earthquake destroys buildings in a city—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! An earthquake kills thousands of people in a city—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that. Think back to the tsunamis of recent times and the devastation that they caused and the lives they took—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! A forest fire destroys thousands of acres of cultivated orchards and hundreds of homes—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! It’s not the way WE think, or this may not be acceptable to OUR sense of values—but it is God’s way of thinking and God’s way of evaluating things.
It is with that mentality and sentiment that we should be preparing for Lent. For we have all sinned, as Holy Scripture tells us: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:8-10).
Measuring and Weighing by Sin
If we had a true notion of the gravity, seriousness, heinousness and evil of sin, then any suffering, or any penance, or any sacrifice would fade away in relation to the suffering due to sin. If we look at the fires of Purgatory and the fires of Hell (which the saints, like St. Thomas Aquinas, tell us are one and the same fire), then we start to get an idea or a feel for sin’s gravity. If God can have a soul burn in Purgatory for centuries on end, then that must tell us something about God’s value system. If God can send a soul to Hell for eternity, just for one single unrepented mortal sin, then that value system becomes even clearer. Read some of the extracts from Fr. Schouppe’s renowned book Purgatory Explained, and you will start to get the picture.
Extreme Justice, Yet Extreme Mercy
The fires of Purgatory and Hell are one side of the coin—the negative side, the side of Justice. Yet there is another side of the coin—the positive side, the side of Mercy. God is extremely perfect; therefore all of His virtues go to the extreme. Our puny minds cannot possibly grasp the notion of extreme Justice blending with extreme Mercy. To us it seems like a contradiction, total opposites. God is extreme in everything, for He is perfect in everything, He is all perfect, therefore He is all-extreme. The souls in Purgatory and Hell can perhaps grasp that better than we grasp it here below. They know that they deserve what they are getting and they see the price of sin quite clearly. Yet they also know that what they are suffering is nowhere near to what they deserve to get—for God’s mercy has softened the punishment enormously. In this way, even the souls in Hell know that God is being merciful to them, and since they have rejected God, they hate His Mercy, for, in a way, it rubs salt into their wounds. I guess St. Paul’s words are most applicable here: “But if thy enemy be hungry, give him to eat; if he thirst, give him to drink. For, doing this, thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head” (Romans 12:20).
What About Me?
Now let us get to the Mercy bit for ourselves! If such is the punishment of sin in Purgatory and Hell, and if that punishment can last for even centuries, then what an incredible act of Mercy is it by God, to offer sinners (whether mortal or venial or both) the chance to forego all that burning and go straight from death in this world to the joys of Heaven, without as much as one second being spent in those burning, purging, cleansing fires! It almost seems like cheating to be able to avoid all that burning! Yet it is possible and it made possible by the grace of martyrdom. Ouch! That is a nasty gruesome word! Okay then! Well what about love? Is that a nasty gruesome word? We can pay by pain (martyrdom) or we can pay by love (which ends up being a kind of martyrdom anyway). The Good Thief paid for his ticket to Paradise by willingly accepting the pain that the crucifixion justly inflicted on him, whereas St. Mary Magdalen paid my much love: Our Lord, referring to the previously sinful woman, that was weeping over His feet at the banquet of Simon the Leper, and wiping His feet with her hair, thought by many to St. Mary Magdalen, said to Simon: “Wherefore, I say to thee: Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47).
“He that loves God and wishes to save his soul, must despise the world and all human respect; and to do this, everyone must offer violence to himself. St. Mary Magdalene had to do great violence to herself; in order to overcome human respect and the murmurings and scoffs of the world, when in the presence of so many persons, she cast herself at the feet of Jesus Christ to wash them with her tears, and dry them with her hair. But she thus became a saint, and merited from Jesus Christ pardon of her sins and praise for her great love–her great love of Him, not her great love of the world.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori).
Our Lord ate with sinners, preached to sinners, forgave sinners, but accepted no practicing sinner into His inner-circle of friends—Mary Magdalen converted and paid heed to Our Lord’s command of “Go and sin no more” before she was accepted.
St. Peter learned a powerful lesson at that banquet where St. Mary Magdalen washed Our Lord’s feet with her tears for her sins, and St. Peter later wrote: “But before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves: for charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). Yet this is nothing new, for the Old Testament Scriptures had already stated “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12).
St. James shows us an example of a great act of charity: “He must know that he who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20).
“In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. He that has the substance of this world and shall see his brother in need and shall shut up his bowels from him: how does the charity of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word nor in tongue, but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:15-18).
Time to Warm-Up
Nobody likes to eat food that has gone cold! Not even God! Just as we find lukewarm food repulsive, so too does God find lukewarm souls repulsive, hence He says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou wert cold, or hot! But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16). Perhaps we need to heat up and spice up a little before Lent starts! Now is the time to do it. Septuagesima is like a planning and rehearsing period given to us—just like an athlete does not go into the race “cold”, but warms-up and stretches his muscles before the race begins, we too should be planning, stretching, rehearsing and getting our Lenten “race” tactics worked out before the race begins. The same is true for sports teams―especially those that play more or less once a week. They do not start talking tactics and developing a game-plan five minutes before the game—but they spend many days planning and training for the game.
For those lucky enough to be following the Septuagesima Season, there is therein a rich vein of spiritual teaching and thought, presented to us by a wise Mother—Holy Mother Church—to nourish our souls with what is most profitable to our salvation. Yet even those who are fortunate to have attended a Mass that celebrated Septuagesima Sunday, are unlikely to benefit from the fruits that Holy Mother Church offered them—because we have become a very superficial race of people living in a very superficial world, where superficial news is given in little, easy to understand, 30-second or 1-minute servings, that has very little depth to it. The attention span of man has grown shorter and shorter over the last few decades—with the blame to be largely placed at the feet of modern electronic communications such as radio, TV, internet, and even newspapers—all of whom give it to you as short and as succinct as possible. Thinking has been replaced by mere watching. Images have increasingly replaced words. Feelings count for more than truth.
Vocabulary Dried-Up
Vocabulary has also had the juice of its words squeezed out if it and we look at the carcass or bones of vocabulary in phrases and abbreviations such as: “Wassup?” replaces “What is the matter?” “Bro” … replaces “brother”. “?4U” replaces “I have a question for you”. “2EZ” replaces “Too easy”. “2M2H” replaces “Too much to handle”. “2MORO” replaces “Tomorrow”. “2NITE” replaces “Tonight”. “GRATZ” replaces “Congratulations”. etc., etc.
All of this is synonymous with “the fast life”—“fast food” restaurants, “fast-track” or “express-lanes” in stores and airports, “speed-dialing” and “faster computers”, etc. Researchers note that this push for speed is changing the way people think. The need to be efficient and instant leads to a dumbing down of information intake so that people become scanners and “decoders” of information, cruising horizontally across the screen to pick up bytes, rather than delving towards a deeper understanding.
Intellectual Decline Brings Spiritual Decline
It is this turning away from a deeper understanding and being satisfied with superficial knowledge, that causes havoc within the spiritual life and makes salvation less and less likely, as people can no longer (and no longer want to) get to grips with the nuts and bolts of the spiritual life. For the spiritual life and spiritual knowledge is much more difficult and much more demanding than the physical life or the intellectual life. In fact, St. Thomas Aquinas states that in comparing the three levels of possible work—physical work, intellectual work and spiritual work—it is physical work which is less demanding for the soul; intellectual work is much harder for the soul; while spiritual work is the hardest of all for the soul.
Our mind (intellect) has already been weakened by Original Sin, and we are born in a state of ignorance which finds learning hard. Add to this natural state the modern “dumbing-down” that the world has brought about upon the intellectual levels of people worldwide, then you have a mind that shrinks and shirks anything that is spiritual demanding to understand.
Baby Language—Baby Spirituality
A baby or an infant can only understand so much before its mind is “frazzled” by its inability to understand more complex or difficult words or concepts. To communicate with a child at that infantile level, you have use infantile language or “baby talk”—gradually raising the levels of vocabulary and concepts as the child grows older. The problem is that, today, most Catholics cannot get past or cannot grasp anything beyond “infantile Catholicism” because the world, in many respects, is becoming more and more infantile, banal, superficial and pretentious as it goes along on the broad wide to the gates of you know where. If the child will not learn, ultimately the teacher or parent will use severe punishment—physical or psychological—to remedy the situation. Even the State does that with fines, imprisonment and capital punishment for criminals who “will not learn” and remedy their criminal behavior.
God will do the same, at some point in the future, with His “Great Chastisement” which the world will think is “not so great”—when He will unleash a physical and psychological punishment of the kind that has never been seen before in the history of mankind. Then, suddenly—as is often the case with a punished child or student—seriousness, behavioral rectitude, effort and results will improve—and prophecies foretell that the level of spirituality and holiness in the world, after the chastisement, will be of a level never before seen in the history of the world! Amazing what punishment can do for incorrigible folk!
Anyway, back to “baby Catholicism” or “infantile Catholicism”! So many Catholics never really “grow-up” spiritually. The little bit catechism (a survival ration), that they were once taught at school, has not been built upon in the years since leaving school, but has been largely forgotten. Put any Catholic on the spot with an impromptu catechism test, and they will fail miserably—and I am talking about a First Communion Catechism, or at best, a Confirmation Catechism—thus for ages around 7 to 11 years old. Let us not forget that this level of catechism is mostly “parrot-fashion” repetition of answers with only a minimal of thinking and understanding taking place. For example, a 6 or 7 year old will tell you: “God is a spirit!”—but after that, there is nothing much more that they can tell you, except that “a spirit has no body”!
Most Catholics could not tell you how many books there are in the Bible, let alone even name them, and definitely not name them in their correct order—but even if they could, that is nothing more than a work of mere memorization that is devoid of understanding and deeper knowledge. It is handily forgotten that back in colonial America, many fathers of families were comfortable with debating the finer points of theology! And that entrance exams to the top universities, in the early 1900s, required the high-school graduate to debate with his future professors in either Greek or Latin! O how far have we fallen intellectually since those days. We may possess a greater and broader intelligence in technology, but we have become too specialized and lack breadth of knowledge. Search online for the “copy of the eighth-grade exam used in schools in Bullitt County, Kentucky, in 1912” and present it to an eighth-grader today, and you will see the difference in results.
The Spiritual Babies of 1905
Yet even back at that time—in 1905—Pope St. Pius X wrote a papal encyclical on the dangers of religious ignorance! Yes, over 100 years ago! What would he say today? A few lines from the encyclical will give you the idea (the encyclical can be read here).
“We are forced to agree with those who hold that the chief cause of the present indifference and, as it were, infirmity of soul, and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of things divine. This is fully in accord with what God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘And there is no knowledge of God in the land. Cursing and lying and killing and theft and adultery have overflowed: and blood hath touched blood. Thereafter shall the land mourn, and everyone that dwelleth in it shall languish.’
“It is a common complaint, unfortunately too well founded, that there are large numbers of Christians in our own time who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation. And when we mention Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life -- for these find some excuse for their ignorance in the fact that the demands of their harsh employers hardly leave them time to take care of themselves or of their dear ones — but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there.
“They rarely give thought to God, the Supreme Author and Ruler of all things, or to the teachings of the faith of Christ. They know nothing of the Incarnation of the Word of God, nothing of the perfect restoration of the human race which He accomplished. Grace, the greatest of the helps for attaining eternal things, the Holy Sacrifice and the Sacraments by which we obtain grace, are entirely unknown to them. They have no conception of the malice and baseness of sin; hence they show no anxiety to avoid sin or to renounce it. And so they arrive at life's end in such a condition … Our Predecessor, Benedict XIV, had just cause to write: ‘We declare that a great number of those, who are condemned to eternal punishment, suffer that everlasting calamity because of ignorance of those mysteries of Faith which must be known and believed in order to be numbered among the elect.’” (Pope St. Pius X, encyclical Acerbo Nimis. April 1905).
What Has This to Do With Septuagesima?
Good question! Well, it is like this. You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink. You can a Catholic to the Catechism or Bible, but you cannot make them think! And if they just look at the surface of the content, they will not really understand the Faith, and thus won’t really live the Faith. To understand, you need to see what stand under the thing—you need to dig below the surface. You can live on an oil-field yet die of poverty and starvation if you are not prepared to dig. As St. Thomas Aquinas says, in effect, physical digging is easier than intellectual digging, but spiritual digging is harder than either physical or intellectual digging. Most people do not want to dig spiritually—so they will die of spiritual poverty and starved of grace!
Septuagesima Sunday—and the ensuing Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays—are a rich oil-field or rich storehouse of theological and spiritual wealth. Yet they remain untapped sources for most Catholics. They have no time, no inclination and no desire to venture therein. For the few that do follow the liturgical rite that still celebrates the Septuagesima season, many of those ‘fortunate’ Catholics unfortunately let the texts of the liturgy go in one ear and out the other. Their spiritual stomachs are hungry as they enter church and they come away with equally empty stomachs after Mass—the sad (and most dangerous) thing is that they DO NOT FEEL HUNGRY! Perhaps it because they are “Compromised Catholics”, who live for both the world and for God—a marriage that Christ said cannot happen: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). Being eagerly fed by the junk food of mammon, they have no real appetite for the word of God, yet, as Christ also said: “Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4).
The child who is raised on junk food and fast food, loaded with sugar—will have revulsion for the very healthy bitter foods, such as garlic, onions, lemons, limes, and a host of other herbs and spices—which, though they do not form the main part of the meal, they are often the most healthiest part of the meal—as research and studies have shown. There is a general axiom that says: “Bitter is better!”
Septuagesima Seasoning
The texts for the Mass of Septuagesima Sunday could be said to be like seasoning—they are somewhat bitter! Here is an extract for those who did not have the benefit or privilege of attending a Septuagesima Sunday Mass. You can well imagine many people wincing and whining at the spiciness of the Septuagesima Sunday seasoning! The Entrance Hymn (Introit) and the Prayer (collect) are pretty sharp and spicy: “The terrors of death surged round me, the cords of the nether world enmeshed me. In my distress I called upon the Lord … Hear the prayers of Thy people, that we, who are justly punished for our sins, may be mercifully delivered!” St. Paul adds some more spice to the food in the Epistle: “For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers … did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink … But with most of them God was not well pleased!” Immediately after the Epistle, the Gradual chimes in with another “not-too-sweet” verse: “Out of the depths I cry to Thee, O Lord! Lord, hear my voice! If Thou, O Lord, mark iniquities, Lord, who can stand it?” Then the Gospel asks: “Why do stand here all day idle?” and ends with the haunting and harrowing words of Our Lord: “Many are called, but few chosen!” While the Communion prayer pleads: “O Lord, let me not be put to shame, for I call upon Thee!”
Just like spice with a meal—there is not a predominance of it, but enough to make the eyes water and the nose to run as the sinuses are cleared out. Likewise, the Septuagesima Season seasoning or spice, should sting our consciences and make our eyes water with tears for our sins, clearing-out the sinuses of our consciences by making us run to confession and performing penance.
A “Baby Lent” or a “Serious Lent”?
Usually, words and actions come forth from thoughts. We think of something first and then we say it or do it. Serious things require serious thought and reflection—everybody will agree on that. The more expensive the thing that we intend to buy, the more we think about it. Tell, me—what is more expensive than sin? We treat sin lightly—not so with God! Sin, in God’s eyes, is so evil that He created Hell for its punishment, and sent the rebellious angels there without a second thought. He placed the penalty of death over Adam, Eve and mankind because of sin, warning Adam and Eve: “Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat: but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death” (Genesis 2:16-17). In the Old Testament, God said: “He that hath sinned against me, him will I strike out of my book” (Exodus 32:33) and nothing has changed since, for God never changes. That is why St. Paul, in the New Testament, tells us: “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Our catechisms tell us that: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, Spirago-Clarke; My Catholic Faith, Bishop Morrow, STD).
I Disagree!
Just because we do not think this way, does not make it false. Sin is the greatest evil in the world. At a pinch, we might persuade ourselves of that in the case of SOME mortal sins…but ALL MORTAL SINS?? We say, no way!! But God says: “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways,’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). In God’s eyes, “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Adam and Eve found that out after committing JUST ONE SIN! Did God over-react? It would be blasphemy to think so!
Let It Sink In
Now let those phrases sink-in: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … [venial sin] is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin.” Let us think of and list some evils that we can imagine (that is to say, evils that have nothing to do with sin). An earthquake destroys buildings in a city—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! An earthquake kills thousands of people in a city—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that. Think back to the tsunamis of recent times and the devastation that they caused and the lives they took—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! A forest fire destroys thousands of acres of cultivated orchards and hundreds of homes—one single venial sin is a greater evil than that! It’s not the way WE think, or this may not be acceptable to OUR sense of values—but it is God’s way of thinking and God’s way of evaluating things.
It is with that mentality and sentiment that we should be preparing for Lent. For we have all sinned, as Holy Scripture tells us: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:8-10).
Measuring and Weighing by Sin
If we had a true notion of the gravity, seriousness, heinousness and evil of sin, then any suffering, or any penance, or any sacrifice would fade away in relation to the suffering due to sin. If we look at the fires of Purgatory and the fires of Hell (which the saints, like St. Thomas Aquinas, tell us are one and the same fire), then we start to get an idea or a feel for sin’s gravity. If God can have a soul burn in Purgatory for centuries on end, then that must tell us something about God’s value system. If God can send a soul to Hell for eternity, just for one single unrepented mortal sin, then that value system becomes even clearer. Read some of the extracts from Fr. Schouppe’s renowned book Purgatory Explained, and you will start to get the picture.
Extreme Justice, Yet Extreme Mercy
The fires of Purgatory and Hell are one side of the coin—the negative side, the side of Justice. Yet there is another side of the coin—the positive side, the side of Mercy. God is extremely perfect; therefore all of His virtues go to the extreme. Our puny minds cannot possibly grasp the notion of extreme Justice blending with extreme Mercy. To us it seems like a contradiction, total opposites. God is extreme in everything, for He is perfect in everything, He is all perfect, therefore He is all-extreme. The souls in Purgatory and Hell can perhaps grasp that better than we grasp it here below. They know that they deserve what they are getting and they see the price of sin quite clearly. Yet they also know that what they are suffering is nowhere near to what they deserve to get—for God’s mercy has softened the punishment enormously. In this way, even the souls in Hell know that God is being merciful to them, and since they have rejected God, they hate His Mercy, for, in a way, it rubs salt into their wounds. I guess St. Paul’s words are most applicable here: “But if thy enemy be hungry, give him to eat; if he thirst, give him to drink. For, doing this, thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head” (Romans 12:20).
What About Me?
Now let us get to the Mercy bit for ourselves! If such is the punishment of sin in Purgatory and Hell, and if that punishment can last for even centuries, then what an incredible act of Mercy is it by God, to offer sinners (whether mortal or venial or both) the chance to forego all that burning and go straight from death in this world to the joys of Heaven, without as much as one second being spent in those burning, purging, cleansing fires! It almost seems like cheating to be able to avoid all that burning! Yet it is possible and it made possible by the grace of martyrdom. Ouch! That is a nasty gruesome word! Okay then! Well what about love? Is that a nasty gruesome word? We can pay by pain (martyrdom) or we can pay by love (which ends up being a kind of martyrdom anyway). The Good Thief paid for his ticket to Paradise by willingly accepting the pain that the crucifixion justly inflicted on him, whereas St. Mary Magdalen paid my much love: Our Lord, referring to the previously sinful woman, that was weeping over His feet at the banquet of Simon the Leper, and wiping His feet with her hair, thought by many to St. Mary Magdalen, said to Simon: “Wherefore, I say to thee: Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47).
“He that loves God and wishes to save his soul, must despise the world and all human respect; and to do this, everyone must offer violence to himself. St. Mary Magdalene had to do great violence to herself; in order to overcome human respect and the murmurings and scoffs of the world, when in the presence of so many persons, she cast herself at the feet of Jesus Christ to wash them with her tears, and dry them with her hair. But she thus became a saint, and merited from Jesus Christ pardon of her sins and praise for her great love–her great love of Him, not her great love of the world.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori).
Our Lord ate with sinners, preached to sinners, forgave sinners, but accepted no practicing sinner into His inner-circle of friends—Mary Magdalen converted and paid heed to Our Lord’s command of “Go and sin no more” before she was accepted.
St. Peter learned a powerful lesson at that banquet where St. Mary Magdalen washed Our Lord’s feet with her tears for her sins, and St. Peter later wrote: “But before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves: for charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). Yet this is nothing new, for the Old Testament Scriptures had already stated “Charity covers all sins” (Proverbs 10:12).
St. James shows us an example of a great act of charity: “He must know that he who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20).
“In this we have known the charity of God, because He has laid down His life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. He that has the substance of this world and shall see his brother in need and shall shut up his bowels from him: how does the charity of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word nor in tongue, but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:15-18).
Time to Warm-Up
Nobody likes to eat food that has gone cold! Not even God! Just as we find lukewarm food repulsive, so too does God find lukewarm souls repulsive, hence He says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot! I would thou wert cold, or hot! But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:15-16). Perhaps we need to heat up and spice up a little before Lent starts! Now is the time to do it. Septuagesima is like a planning and rehearsing period given to us—just like an athlete does not go into the race “cold”, but warms-up and stretches his muscles before the race begins, we too should be planning, stretching, rehearsing and getting our Lenten “race” tactics worked out before the race begins. The same is true for sports teams―especially those that play more or less once a week. They do not start talking tactics and developing a game-plan five minutes before the game—but they spend many days planning and training for the game.
Article 4
Wednesday after Septuagesima Sunday, January 31st
What is Crippling Your Family?
This article is currently being written. Sections will be posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
Wednesday after Septuagesima Sunday, January 31st
What is Crippling Your Family?
This article is currently being written. Sections will be posted as they are completed. Please check back later.
The Cripple of Jerusalem
“Now there is at Jerusalem a pond, called Probatica, which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of sick, of blind, of lame, of withered; waiting for the moving of the water. And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under. And there was a certain man there, that had been eight and thirty years under his infirmity.
“When Jesus had seen him lying there, and knew that he had been now a long time, He said to him: ‘Wilt thou be made whole?’
“The infirm man answered Him: ‘Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pond! For whilst I am coming, another goeth down before me!’
“Jesus said to him: ‘Arise! Take up thy bed, and walk!’
“And immediately the man was made whole: and he took up his bed, and walked.
“Afterwards, Jesus found him in the Temple, and said to him: ‘Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!’” (John 5:2-14).
Another Cripple of Jerusalem
“Now Peter and John went up into the Temple at the ninth hour of prayer. And a certain man who was lame from his mother’s womb, was carried: whom they laid every day at the gate of the temple, which is called Beautiful, that he might ask alms of them that went into the Temple. He, when he had seen Peter and John about to go into the Temple, asked to receive an alms.
“But Peter with John fastening his eyes upon him, said: ‘Look upon us!’
“But he looked earnestly upon them, hoping that he should receive something of them.
“But Peter said: ‘Silver and gold I have none; but what I have, I give thee! In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, arise, and walk!’ And taking him by the right hand, he lifted him up, and forthwith his feet and soles received strength.
“And he leaping up, stood, and walked, and went in with them into the temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God. And all the people saw him walking and praising God. And they knew him, that it was he who sat begging alms at the ‘Beautiful Gate’ of the Temple: and they were filled with wonder and amazement at that which had happened to him” (Acts 3:1-10).
The Lame Walk—The Blind See
Just as Jesus comes to seek and save that which was lost, so too does He come to heal the sick and the lame: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “And there came to Him the blind and the lame in the Temple; and He healed them” (Matthew 21:14). “And there came to Him great multitudes, having with them the dumb, the blind, the lame, the maimed, and many others: and they cast them down at His feet, and He healed them, so that the multitudes marveled seeing the dumb speak, the lame walk, and the blind see―and they glorified the God of Israel” (Matthew 15:30-31).
Lame, Blind, Maimed and Dumb Families
God often speaks to us spiritually through the natural, physical and material things of this life. Our Lord even uses such a method in His many parables: the Cockle and the Wheat; the Sower of the Seed; the Laborers in the Vineyard; the Talents and Servants; the Good Samaritan; the Rich Fool; the Unjust Steward; the Prodigal Son; and whole host of other parables. He does this because we can more easily access and understand the invisible (spiritual) through the visible (physical and material).
Sicknesses of Body and Soul
The sicknesses of the body can be correlative to sicknesses of the soul. We can be spiritually blind, spiritually dumb, spiritually, deaf, spiritually lame, etc. Fr. Faber, writing on Lukewarmness, in his book Growth in Holiness, says: “The diseases and evils of the body are in a great degree typical of the miseries and misfortunes of the soul. If we seek the correlative of lukewarmness, we shall find it in blindness. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself. It is a judicial blindness, because it once saw better itself, and now does not remember either what it saw, or that it ever saw at all.” In this passage Fr. Faber correlates physical blindness with a spiritual blindness in the form of lukewarmness.
Our Lord, speaking of the Scribes and Pharisees, also uses the idea of physical blindness and correlates it to a spiritual blindness on the part of the Scribes and Pharisees: “Let them alone: they are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). Our Lord does not mean that they are physically blind, but that they are spiritually blind. This same correlation could just as well be used with the notion of being deaf, dumb, lame and even dead! There are, in fact, very many families (or, at the very least, many members of families) who are spiritually blind, spiritually deaf, spiritually dumb, spiritually lame and even spiritually dead. If Our Lord came “to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10); and if “there came to Him the blind and the lame in the Temple; and He healed them” (Matthew 21:14), then He must want to seek and save, heal and cure those members of our families too!
Deaf, Blind, Dumb, Lame and Dead
You could say that there is a progressive downward spiral in spiritual sickness—we are first of all spiritually deaf, which leads to us becoming spiritually blind, which, in turn, makes us spiritually dumb, then lame and finally spiritually dead. Let us briefly examine those states—though entire articles or even books could be written on each particular stage.
As a springboard for this—to show that it is not just an arbitrary or novel idea—we have the following words of Our Lord Himself, which pave the way for this examination: “‘He that hath ears to hear, let him hear!’ And His disciples came and said to Him: ‘Why speakest Thou to them in parables?’ Who answered and said to them: ‘Because to you it is given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven: but to them it is not given. For he that hath, to him shall be given, and he shall abound: but he that hath not, from him shall be taken away that also which he hath. Therefore do I speak to them in parables: because seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. And the prophecy of Isaias is fulfilled in them, who saith: “By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand: and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive. For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear. For, amen, I say to you, many prophets and just men have desired to see the things that you see, and have not seen them, and to hear the things that you hear and have not heard them!’” (Matthew 13:9-17).
Spiritually Deaf
The above words of Our Lord were spoken in the context of the Parable of the Sower of the Seed (Matthew 13:3-8; 18-23; Mark 4:2-20; Luke 8:5-15)—where, as Our Lord explains, “The seed is the word of God … He that soweth, soweth the word” but the word of God is received in various ways that do not bear any fruit—which is depicted as being “by the wayside” or “upon stony ground” or “among thorns”. These are symbolic, as Our Lord says, of “those that hear the word of God and understand it not” and “those that hear the word with joy, but do not let it take root” and “those that hear but are choked up by the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches.”
Since three of the four Evangelist record this parable, it is evident that it is of the utmost importance—especially since the parable and its explanation almost takes an entire chapter with each Evangelist. Therefore, here is a composite (blending together of all three: Matthew 13:3-23; Mark 4:2-20; Luke 8:5-15) for you instruction—for this explains much of the spiritual deafness that exists among Catholics.
“Hear you therefore the parable of the sower. The sower went out to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And other some fell upon stony ground, where it had not much earth; and it shot up immediately, because it had no depth of earth. And when the sun was risen, it was scorched; and because it had no root, it withered away. And some fell among thorns; and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no fruit. And some fell upon good ground; and brought forth fruit that grew up, and increased and yielded, one thirty, another sixty, and another a hundred. Saying these things, he cried out: ‘He that hath ears to hear, let him hear!’”
“And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom He said: ‘To you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God; but to the rest in parables, that seeing they may not see, and hearing may not understand!’”
Our Lord then proceeds to explain the symbolism: “The seed is the word of God. He that sows, sows the word. When any one hears the word of the kingdom and understands it not, Satan comes and takes away that which was sown in his heart, lest believing they should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side.
“Now they upon the rock, are they who when they hear, receive the word with joy: and these have no roots; for they believe for a while, and, in time of temptation, when there arises tribulation and persecution because of the word, they fall away.
“And that which fell among thorns, are they who have heard the word, but going their way, are choked with the cares of the world and pleasures of this life and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things, and it is made fruitless and yields no fruit.
“And the seed that is sown upon the good ground, are they who hear the word, and receive and understand it, and yield fruit, the one thirty, another sixty, and another a hundred.”
How true is this of our present day! There are so many who hear the word of God, but do not hear it—that is to say, they do not hear what is really being said; they hear selectively; they hear only what they want to hear; they hear and like and remember the “nice bits”, but they “tune-out” the “tough bits” and “rough bits”—they refuse to “take the rough with the smooth”.
For them there is only a “God of Love” and there is no such thing as a “God of Justice”! They hear only want they want to hear—and they are the ones Holy Scripture speaks about when it says: “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!”(Matthew 13:15). They are spiritually deaf to the true word of God as St. Paul says: “For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears! And will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 4:3-4).
Curing the Spiritually Deaf
The usual cures are—as St. Ignatius Loyola writes in his Spiritual Exercises—are to “agere contra”, meaning: to do the contrary, to do the opposite. Thus St. Paul writes: “What son is there whom the father doth not correct?” (Hebrews 12:7). “And he that will not hear his words, which he shall speak in My Name, I will be the revenger!” (Deuteronomy 18:19).
“Even so it is not the will of your Father, Who is in Heaven, that one of these little ones should perish. But if thy brother shall offend against thee, go, and rebuke him between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain thy brother. And if he will not hear thee, take with thee one or two more: that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may stand. And if he will not hear them: tell the church. And if he will not hear the church, let him be to thee as the heathen and publican!” (Matthew 18:14-17).
“Preach the word: be instant in season, out of season: reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine. For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine…” (2 Timothy 4:2-2) … “By what doth a young man correct his way? By observing Thy words” (Psalm 118:9). “All Scripture, inspired of God, is profitable to teach, to reprove, to correct, to instruct in justice” (2 Timothy 3:16).
The Dethroned Word of God Needs Re-crowning
Let us not pretend that the word of God rules supreme in families today—it is the word of the world that rules in most families. The word of God might not be totally ignored, but the word of the world is given equal footing, if not more. The finger of blame for this can be pointed in many directions: parents, parish priests, school teachers, peers, media, etc. Yet whatever the secondary cause may be, we are the ultimate responsibility for what enters the family—there is no escaping that. We can play the “Adam and Eve” games of passing the buck of blame, but it finally comes back to us. We have a free will and we have the opportunity to seek, research and learn—but we prefer not to, for we are infected, some more and some less, with the spirit of today’s world, and religious study comes pretty low on totem pole of our preferred activities—and then we complain in disbelief that most souls are lost! Figure that one out!
Until the word of God is replaced (or, in some cases, placed for the first time) in its rightful place at the head of the family, then families will continue to be spiritually deaf, dumb, blind, lame and even dead. You do not speak much about things you don’t love. You cannot love what you do not know, but you cannot know unless you listen and read. The word of God must be read and spoken and preached in the family; the word of God must reign in the family. God, and attention to God, must come first. If your family has lost that—then you have to do something to bring it back! Will it painful? You can bet your last dollar that it will be painful—for the devil is not going to give up years of investment and profit just because you suddenly decide to stop playing his game! There are two Scriptural quotes that bear this out:
The Word
Firstly, on the word of God: “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, shall be saved. How then shall they call on Him, in whom they have not believed? Or how shall they believe Him, of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear, without a preacher? … Faith then cometh by hearing; and hearing by the word of Christ. But I say: Have they not heard? Yes, verily, their sound hath gone forth into all the Earth, and their words unto the ends of the whole world ... But all do not obey the Gospel ... But I say: Hath not Israel known? … All the day long have I spread my hands to a people that believe not and contradict Me!” (Romans 10:13-21).
If you family is spiritually weak, lukewarm and worldly, it is because it is not being sufficiently fed the word of God: “Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). You are allowing the world to feed your family far more than you are allowing God to feed your family—as you sow, so shall you reap, what you feed is what you get. If the majority of the diet is worldly, you will get a worldly family; if the majority is of God, you should get a godly family.
The Battle
Secondly, the devil is not going you relinquish any crafty control that he has over your family. Jesus said: “When a strong man armed keepeth his court, those things are in peace which he possesses. But if a stronger than he come upon him, and overcome him; he will take away all his armor wherein he trusted, and will distribute his spoils. He that is not with me, is against me; and he that gathers not with me, scatters. When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walks through places without water, seeking rest; and not finding, he saith: ‘I will return into my house whence I came out!’ And when he is come, he findeth it swept and garnished. Then he goeth and taketh with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and entering in they dwell there. And the last state of that man becomes worse than the first!” (Luke 11:21-26).
Most families are so weak in their knowledge and awareness of the spiritual, that they fail to realize the omnipresence of devils all throughout the day—with the result that little or no measures are taken to combat them. These families live ‘at peace’ amongst this infernal subtle onslaught, totally forgetting that “The life of man upon earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and that “our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
It is not for nothing that the Church, on the First Sunday of Lent, gives us the Gospel reading of Christ doing battle with the devil in the desert, after having fasted and prayed for forty days and forty nights in the desert. Spiritual warfare is our daily fare—from birth to death: “The life of man upon earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). Woe to those who do not train for the battle and who refuse to do battle—but most persons and families DO NEGLECT this critical aspect of life! Small wonder, then, that most souls are lost! As you sow, so shall you reap.
Spiritual reading—which is nothing other than sowing the seed of the word of God—may not be the most popular family activity, but it is the most crucial and the most neglected. Plan to put that right this Lent! Get a wise supply of books ready and just as the Church lays down the law concerning Lent, so too must you lay down the law concerning the Lent that your family will follow. The bottom line has to be: “Are we truly Catholic, or are we pagans? Whose word comes first? God’s or the world’s?” You may well be in for a fight--”For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three” (Luke 12:52)—but it is probably partially your fault anyway that things have slid downhill as far as they have! If you caused it, you must try to put it right!
Spiritually Blind
We do not want to see those things that we do not like. We do not like to see ourselves as we really are. We do not want to admit to the truth about ourselves and our families. It is all very natural, but it is not very supernatural. Such a blindness is closely connected to pride. “Seeing they see not” (Matthew 13:13) … “They do not see, nor understand, that they may be ashamed!” (Isaias 44:9) … “Seeing they see, and do not perceive; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them” (Mark 4:12). “His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant: seeing vain things, sleeping and loving dreams” (Isaias 56:10).
Worldliness leads to spiritual blindness. The glitz and dazzle of the world blinds the eyes of the worldly so that they cannot see the truths of the Gospel: “Our Gospel is hid to them that are lost, in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of unbelievers, that the light of the Gospel should not shine unto them” (2 Corinthians 4:3-4). “The sensual man perceives not these things that are of the Spirit of God; for it is foolishness to him, and he cannot understand” (1 Corinthians 2:14). “Go to this people, and say to them: ‘With the ear you shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive!’ For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears have they heard heavily, and their eyes they have shut; lest perhaps they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them” (Acts 28:26-27). “Let them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16).
Denial of Spiritual Blindness
Why can some people just not get it? Why can they not see things that are as clear as the nose on their face? The saddest part about spiritual blindness is that a person who is spiritually blind, usually cannot recognize the fact that he cannot see! People who are physically blind are very aware of the fact that they are blind and that everything around them is dark. But the spiritually blind actually think they can see and, in fact, often think they can see better than anyone else! Is this not what Jesus meant when He spoke about the man with the plank in his eye, wanting to remove the small splinter from another person’s eye? (Matthew 7:3-5). God also told the church in Laodicea: “Thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’―and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind!” (Apocalypse 3:17).
Religious leaders are often amongst those who are spiritually blind. Many times Jesus accused the Pharisees of being “blind leaders of the blind” (Matthew 15:14; 23:24; 23:26, etc.). Jesus said to the Pharisees that the very fact that they say they can see is proof that they are blind! “And Jesus said: ‘ I am come into this world; that they who see not, may see; and they who see, may become blind!’ And some of the Pharisees, who were with Jesus, heard: and they said unto Him: ‘Are we also blind?’ Jesus said to them: ‘If you were blind, you should not have sin! But now because you say: “We see!” your sin remains!” (John 9:39-41).
Causes of Spiritual Blindness
There are a few things that cause spiritual blindness. The first is pride. Remember that “All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes” (Proverbs 16:2). After Saul had disobeyed the command of the Lord, he actually erected a statue to himself, and with the bleating of the cursed sheep in the background, greeted Samuel with the words: “I have performed the commandment of the Lord” (1 Kings 15:13). His arrogance had made him so blind, that he really thought that wrong was right. Even after Samuel had clearly explained to Saul how he had disobeyed, he still did not get it. The story of the first king of Israel is a sad saga of a man who was so blinded by his arrogance, that he never understood a single thing the prophet Samuel said to him. Even once David had been anointed in Saul’s place and clearly carried God’s blessing, Saul still thought he could hold onto the anointing by killing David. In a similar way, we can be so proud that we ignore the word of God that comes to us through Holy Scripture, the Liturgy, and the writings of the Church Fathers, Popes and Saints. We are deaf to their entreaties and warnings, and so our spiritual deafness leads us into spiritual blindness. If we don’t listen, then we won’t see!
In the same way we develop the sad ability to see the specks in the eyes of others without seeing the log in our own eye. We see so clearly how unruly other people’s children are, but are blind to the faults of our own. We see the addiction of others to drugs, but cannot see our own addiction to criticism, gossip, revealing of faults, uncharitable thoughts, impure thoughts, eating, drinking, television or other forms of entertainment. But it goes further. Whenever we hear or read Holy Scripture, we see how all the positive things (promises, blessings etc.) apply to us, and how all the negative things (rebuke, correction, admonition, punishment) apply to everyone else.
This kind of selective vision is very dangerous, because it soon becomes permanent, so that we are no longer able to see the realities even if we want to―we see everything through tinted glasses. They say that if a person is given a pair of glasses to wear, that turn everything upside down, it only takes a few days for the mind to invert the image and to make everything look the right way up. The mind is powerful and it causes us to see wrong as right and black as white.
The antidote to blindness that comes through pride is obviously humility. Take every rebuke personally and receive every message you hear for yourself. Read every word in Holy Scripture as a personal message to you, especially those that contain admonition, warning and rebuke. Ask others to be honest with you and to tell you how they see you and be humble enough to listen to their advice. Above all, ask the Lord daily to open your eyes so you may really see. When you see others stumbling about in darkness, you should never look down on them, but rather allow it to be a warning and immediately flee to the Lord and ask Him to help you see and to keep you from developing blind spots.
“I counsel you to ... anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see!” (Apocalypse 3:18). That eye salve is the word of God.
The Spiritually Dumb
We have all heard the saying: “Hear no evil! See no evil! Speak no evil!” Well, something similar could be said of the spiritual life and the Faith. “Hear nothing spiritual! See nothing spiritual! Say nothing spiritual!” If we do not hear anything spiritual, then we will not be accustomed to seeing or understanding spiritual things, and consequently our minds will be empty of spiritual knowledge to the extent that we will be incapable of speaking spiritually about spiritual things. Thus we end up being spiritually dumb.
The dumb person is ‘tongue-tied’ and cannot speak. This is also the effect of lacking knowledge about the Faith—we become ‘tongue-tied’ in the sense that we are afraid to open our mouths and risk showing how dumb or stupid we really are. Do not try fool yourself, the average Catholic is pretty dumb doctrinally—some do not even have the level of knowledge to pass an old-fashioned First Holy Communion test, or the Sacrament of Confirmation test. This is why they cannot argue logically and persuasively on points of doctrine—when faced with opposition, the discussion is either abandoned, or transforms itself into anger, insults, recriminations, or emotional illogical statements.
As Pope St. Pius X wrote, speaking of the ignorance of Catholics: “We are forced to agree with those who hold that the chief cause of the present indifference and sickness of soul, and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of divine things. This fully agrees with what God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘And there is no knowledge of God in the land. Cursing and lying and killing and theft and adultery have overflowed’ (Osee 4:1-2). It is a common complaint, unfortunately too well founded, that there are large numbers of Christians who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation.
“And when we speak of Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life—for these find some excuse for their ignorance—but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world, but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there. They rarely give thought to God, the Supreme Author and Ruler of all things, or to the teachings of the Faith of Christ … How many and how grave are the consequences of ignorance in matters of religion! And on the other hand, how necessary and how beneficial is religious instruction! It is indeed vain to expect a fulfillment of the duties of a Christian by one who does not even know them … How many there are, alas, not only among the young, but among adults and those advanced in years, who know nothing of the chief mysteries of Faith …
“It follows, too, that if Faith languishes in our days, if among large numbers it has almost vanished, the reason is that the duty of catechetical teaching is either fulfilled very superficially or altogether neglected. It will not do to say, in excuse, that Faith is a free gift of God bestowed upon each one at Baptism. True enough, when we are baptized in Christ, the habit of Faith is given, but this most divine seed, if left entirely to itself, by its own power, so to speak, is not like the mustard seed which “grows up. . . and puts out great branches.” Man has the faculty of understanding at his birth, but he also has need of his mother’s word to awaken it, as it were, and to make it active. So too, the Christian, born again of water and the Holy Spirit, has Faith within him, but he requires the word of the teaching Church to nourish and develop it and to make it bear fruit. Thus wrote the Apostle: ‘Faith then depends on hearing, and hearing on the word of Christ’; and to show the necessity of instruction, he added, ‘How are they to hear, if no one preaches?’ … We pray and entreat you to reflect on the great loss of souls due solely to ignorance of divine things!” (Pope St. Pius X, encyclical Acerbo Nimis).
The Spiritually Lame
At the start of the Septuagesima season—on Septuagesima Sunday itself—the Church presents us with the Epistle of St. Paul saying: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain!” (1 Corinthians 9:24). Yet the lame man cannot run! If we have not listened to the word of God, if we do not if we cannot clearly see the spiritual mechanisms in our life, if we cannot understand the workings and paths of the spiritual life, if we are spiritually deaf, blind and dumb, then we will invariably also become spiritually lame. Every step along the spiritual path to Heaven will see us dragging our feet, barely moving along. The race cannot and will not be won in that state. Small wonder, then, that most souls are lost! As St. Paul says: “With most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:5).
The spiritually lame have to drag themselves to pray—and they even pray lamely! The spiritually lame cannot make it to an extra Mass, or very rarely. The spiritually lame limp through Mass lukewarmly with little or no devotion or fervor. Any spiritual exercise seems like having to move the Earth! Spiritual reading or meditation is a torture that keeps them away from the fun things in life! They trudge and limp though life like spiritual cripples. It is the combination and final consequence of being spiritually deaf, spiritually blind, and spiritually dumb. Only a miracle of grace can help them now—for as we live, so shall we die!
Lent could be a remedy, but who will have the courage, strength, and endurance to take a remedy that one instinctively finds “gut-wrenching”? Now is the time to pray to Our Lady that she mercifully obtain for us this grace! There are only 14 days to go! Prepare and be prepared! No preparation leads to inevitable deterioration―and even potential damnation!
“Now there is at Jerusalem a pond, called Probatica, which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of sick, of blind, of lame, of withered; waiting for the moving of the water. And an angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water, was made whole, of whatsoever infirmity he lay under. And there was a certain man there, that had been eight and thirty years under his infirmity.
“When Jesus had seen him lying there, and knew that he had been now a long time, He said to him: ‘Wilt thou be made whole?’
“The infirm man answered Him: ‘Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pond! For whilst I am coming, another goeth down before me!’
“Jesus said to him: ‘Arise! Take up thy bed, and walk!’
“And immediately the man was made whole: and he took up his bed, and walked.
“Afterwards, Jesus found him in the Temple, and said to him: ‘Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!’” (John 5:2-14).
Another Cripple of Jerusalem
“Now Peter and John went up into the Temple at the ninth hour of prayer. And a certain man who was lame from his mother’s womb, was carried: whom they laid every day at the gate of the temple, which is called Beautiful, that he might ask alms of them that went into the Temple. He, when he had seen Peter and John about to go into the Temple, asked to receive an alms.
“But Peter with John fastening his eyes upon him, said: ‘Look upon us!’
“But he looked earnestly upon them, hoping that he should receive something of them.
“But Peter said: ‘Silver and gold I have none; but what I have, I give thee! In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, arise, and walk!’ And taking him by the right hand, he lifted him up, and forthwith his feet and soles received strength.
“And he leaping up, stood, and walked, and went in with them into the temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God. And all the people saw him walking and praising God. And they knew him, that it was he who sat begging alms at the ‘Beautiful Gate’ of the Temple: and they were filled with wonder and amazement at that which had happened to him” (Acts 3:1-10).
The Lame Walk—The Blind See
Just as Jesus comes to seek and save that which was lost, so too does He come to heal the sick and the lame: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “And there came to Him the blind and the lame in the Temple; and He healed them” (Matthew 21:14). “And there came to Him great multitudes, having with them the dumb, the blind, the lame, the maimed, and many others: and they cast them down at His feet, and He healed them, so that the multitudes marveled seeing the dumb speak, the lame walk, and the blind see―and they glorified the God of Israel” (Matthew 15:30-31).
Lame, Blind, Maimed and Dumb Families
God often speaks to us spiritually through the natural, physical and material things of this life. Our Lord even uses such a method in His many parables: the Cockle and the Wheat; the Sower of the Seed; the Laborers in the Vineyard; the Talents and Servants; the Good Samaritan; the Rich Fool; the Unjust Steward; the Prodigal Son; and whole host of other parables. He does this because we can more easily access and understand the invisible (spiritual) through the visible (physical and material).
Sicknesses of Body and Soul
The sicknesses of the body can be correlative to sicknesses of the soul. We can be spiritually blind, spiritually dumb, spiritually, deaf, spiritually lame, etc. Fr. Faber, writing on Lukewarmness, in his book Growth in Holiness, says: “The diseases and evils of the body are in a great degree typical of the miseries and misfortunes of the soul. If we seek the correlative of lukewarmness, we shall find it in blindness. It is a blindness which does not know even its own self, and does not suspect that it is blind, or that other men see better than itself. It is a judicial blindness, because it once saw better itself, and now does not remember either what it saw, or that it ever saw at all.” In this passage Fr. Faber correlates physical blindness with a spiritual blindness in the form of lukewarmness.
Our Lord, speaking of the Scribes and Pharisees, also uses the idea of physical blindness and correlates it to a spiritual blindness on the part of the Scribes and Pharisees: “Let them alone: they are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). Our Lord does not mean that they are physically blind, but that they are spiritually blind. This same correlation could just as well be used with the notion of being deaf, dumb, lame and even dead! There are, in fact, very many families (or, at the very least, many members of families) who are spiritually blind, spiritually deaf, spiritually dumb, spiritually lame and even spiritually dead. If Our Lord came “to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10); and if “there came to Him the blind and the lame in the Temple; and He healed them” (Matthew 21:14), then He must want to seek and save, heal and cure those members of our families too!
Deaf, Blind, Dumb, Lame and Dead
You could say that there is a progressive downward spiral in spiritual sickness—we are first of all spiritually deaf, which leads to us becoming spiritually blind, which, in turn, makes us spiritually dumb, then lame and finally spiritually dead. Let us briefly examine those states—though entire articles or even books could be written on each particular stage.
As a springboard for this—to show that it is not just an arbitrary or novel idea—we have the following words of Our Lord Himself, which pave the way for this examination: “‘He that hath ears to hear, let him hear!’ And His disciples came and said to Him: ‘Why speakest Thou to them in parables?’ Who answered and said to them: ‘Because to you it is given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven: but to them it is not given. For he that hath, to him shall be given, and he shall abound: but he that hath not, from him shall be taken away that also which he hath. Therefore do I speak to them in parables: because seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. And the prophecy of Isaias is fulfilled in them, who saith: “By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand: and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive. For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear. For, amen, I say to you, many prophets and just men have desired to see the things that you see, and have not seen them, and to hear the things that you hear and have not heard them!’” (Matthew 13:9-17).
Spiritually Deaf
The above words of Our Lord were spoken in the context of the Parable of the Sower of the Seed (Matthew 13:3-8; 18-23; Mark 4:2-20; Luke 8:5-15)—where, as Our Lord explains, “The seed is the word of God … He that soweth, soweth the word” but the word of God is received in various ways that do not bear any fruit—which is depicted as being “by the wayside” or “upon stony ground” or “among thorns”. These are symbolic, as Our Lord says, of “those that hear the word of God and understand it not” and “those that hear the word with joy, but do not let it take root” and “those that hear but are choked up by the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches.”
Since three of the four Evangelist record this parable, it is evident that it is of the utmost importance—especially since the parable and its explanation almost takes an entire chapter with each Evangelist. Therefore, here is a composite (blending together of all three: Matthew 13:3-23; Mark 4:2-20; Luke 8:5-15) for you instruction—for this explains much of the spiritual deafness that exists among Catholics.
“Hear you therefore the parable of the sower. The sower went out to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some fell by the way side, and it was trodden down, and the birds of the air came and ate it up. And other some fell upon stony ground, where it had not much earth; and it shot up immediately, because it had no depth of earth. And when the sun was risen, it was scorched; and because it had no root, it withered away. And some fell among thorns; and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no fruit. And some fell upon good ground; and brought forth fruit that grew up, and increased and yielded, one thirty, another sixty, and another a hundred. Saying these things, he cried out: ‘He that hath ears to hear, let him hear!’”
“And His disciples asked Him what this parable might be. To whom He said: ‘To you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God; but to the rest in parables, that seeing they may not see, and hearing may not understand!’”
Our Lord then proceeds to explain the symbolism: “The seed is the word of God. He that sows, sows the word. When any one hears the word of the kingdom and understands it not, Satan comes and takes away that which was sown in his heart, lest believing they should be saved―this is he that received the seed by the way side.
“Now they upon the rock, are they who when they hear, receive the word with joy: and these have no roots; for they believe for a while, and, in time of temptation, when there arises tribulation and persecution because of the word, they fall away.
“And that which fell among thorns, are they who have heard the word, but going their way, are choked with the cares of the world and pleasures of this life and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things, and it is made fruitless and yields no fruit.
“And the seed that is sown upon the good ground, are they who hear the word, and receive and understand it, and yield fruit, the one thirty, another sixty, and another a hundred.”
How true is this of our present day! There are so many who hear the word of God, but do not hear it—that is to say, they do not hear what is really being said; they hear selectively; they hear only what they want to hear; they hear and like and remember the “nice bits”, but they “tune-out” the “tough bits” and “rough bits”—they refuse to “take the rough with the smooth”.
For them there is only a “God of Love” and there is no such thing as a “God of Justice”! They hear only want they want to hear—and they are the ones Holy Scripture speaks about when it says: “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!”(Matthew 13:15). They are spiritually deaf to the true word of God as St. Paul says: “For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears! And will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 4:3-4).
Curing the Spiritually Deaf
The usual cures are—as St. Ignatius Loyola writes in his Spiritual Exercises—are to “agere contra”, meaning: to do the contrary, to do the opposite. Thus St. Paul writes: “What son is there whom the father doth not correct?” (Hebrews 12:7). “And he that will not hear his words, which he shall speak in My Name, I will be the revenger!” (Deuteronomy 18:19).
“Even so it is not the will of your Father, Who is in Heaven, that one of these little ones should perish. But if thy brother shall offend against thee, go, and rebuke him between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain thy brother. And if he will not hear thee, take with thee one or two more: that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may stand. And if he will not hear them: tell the church. And if he will not hear the church, let him be to thee as the heathen and publican!” (Matthew 18:14-17).
“Preach the word: be instant in season, out of season: reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine. For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine…” (2 Timothy 4:2-2) … “By what doth a young man correct his way? By observing Thy words” (Psalm 118:9). “All Scripture, inspired of God, is profitable to teach, to reprove, to correct, to instruct in justice” (2 Timothy 3:16).
The Dethroned Word of God Needs Re-crowning
Let us not pretend that the word of God rules supreme in families today—it is the word of the world that rules in most families. The word of God might not be totally ignored, but the word of the world is given equal footing, if not more. The finger of blame for this can be pointed in many directions: parents, parish priests, school teachers, peers, media, etc. Yet whatever the secondary cause may be, we are the ultimate responsibility for what enters the family—there is no escaping that. We can play the “Adam and Eve” games of passing the buck of blame, but it finally comes back to us. We have a free will and we have the opportunity to seek, research and learn—but we prefer not to, for we are infected, some more and some less, with the spirit of today’s world, and religious study comes pretty low on totem pole of our preferred activities—and then we complain in disbelief that most souls are lost! Figure that one out!
Until the word of God is replaced (or, in some cases, placed for the first time) in its rightful place at the head of the family, then families will continue to be spiritually deaf, dumb, blind, lame and even dead. You do not speak much about things you don’t love. You cannot love what you do not know, but you cannot know unless you listen and read. The word of God must be read and spoken and preached in the family; the word of God must reign in the family. God, and attention to God, must come first. If your family has lost that—then you have to do something to bring it back! Will it painful? You can bet your last dollar that it will be painful—for the devil is not going to give up years of investment and profit just because you suddenly decide to stop playing his game! There are two Scriptural quotes that bear this out:
The Word
Firstly, on the word of God: “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, shall be saved. How then shall they call on Him, in whom they have not believed? Or how shall they believe Him, of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear, without a preacher? … Faith then cometh by hearing; and hearing by the word of Christ. But I say: Have they not heard? Yes, verily, their sound hath gone forth into all the Earth, and their words unto the ends of the whole world ... But all do not obey the Gospel ... But I say: Hath not Israel known? … All the day long have I spread my hands to a people that believe not and contradict Me!” (Romans 10:13-21).
If you family is spiritually weak, lukewarm and worldly, it is because it is not being sufficiently fed the word of God: “Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). You are allowing the world to feed your family far more than you are allowing God to feed your family—as you sow, so shall you reap, what you feed is what you get. If the majority of the diet is worldly, you will get a worldly family; if the majority is of God, you should get a godly family.
The Battle
Secondly, the devil is not going you relinquish any crafty control that he has over your family. Jesus said: “When a strong man armed keepeth his court, those things are in peace which he possesses. But if a stronger than he come upon him, and overcome him; he will take away all his armor wherein he trusted, and will distribute his spoils. He that is not with me, is against me; and he that gathers not with me, scatters. When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walks through places without water, seeking rest; and not finding, he saith: ‘I will return into my house whence I came out!’ And when he is come, he findeth it swept and garnished. Then he goeth and taketh with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and entering in they dwell there. And the last state of that man becomes worse than the first!” (Luke 11:21-26).
Most families are so weak in their knowledge and awareness of the spiritual, that they fail to realize the omnipresence of devils all throughout the day—with the result that little or no measures are taken to combat them. These families live ‘at peace’ amongst this infernal subtle onslaught, totally forgetting that “The life of man upon earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1) and that “our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
It is not for nothing that the Church, on the First Sunday of Lent, gives us the Gospel reading of Christ doing battle with the devil in the desert, after having fasted and prayed for forty days and forty nights in the desert. Spiritual warfare is our daily fare—from birth to death: “The life of man upon earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). Woe to those who do not train for the battle and who refuse to do battle—but most persons and families DO NEGLECT this critical aspect of life! Small wonder, then, that most souls are lost! As you sow, so shall you reap.
Spiritual reading—which is nothing other than sowing the seed of the word of God—may not be the most popular family activity, but it is the most crucial and the most neglected. Plan to put that right this Lent! Get a wise supply of books ready and just as the Church lays down the law concerning Lent, so too must you lay down the law concerning the Lent that your family will follow. The bottom line has to be: “Are we truly Catholic, or are we pagans? Whose word comes first? God’s or the world’s?” You may well be in for a fight--”For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three” (Luke 12:52)—but it is probably partially your fault anyway that things have slid downhill as far as they have! If you caused it, you must try to put it right!
Spiritually Blind
We do not want to see those things that we do not like. We do not like to see ourselves as we really are. We do not want to admit to the truth about ourselves and our families. It is all very natural, but it is not very supernatural. Such a blindness is closely connected to pride. “Seeing they see not” (Matthew 13:13) … “They do not see, nor understand, that they may be ashamed!” (Isaias 44:9) … “Seeing they see, and do not perceive; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them” (Mark 4:12). “His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant: seeing vain things, sleeping and loving dreams” (Isaias 56:10).
Worldliness leads to spiritual blindness. The glitz and dazzle of the world blinds the eyes of the worldly so that they cannot see the truths of the Gospel: “Our Gospel is hid to them that are lost, in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of unbelievers, that the light of the Gospel should not shine unto them” (2 Corinthians 4:3-4). “The sensual man perceives not these things that are of the Spirit of God; for it is foolishness to him, and he cannot understand” (1 Corinthians 2:14). “Go to this people, and say to them: ‘With the ear you shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive!’ For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears have they heard heavily, and their eyes they have shut; lest perhaps they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them” (Acts 28:26-27). “Let them alone! They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16).
Denial of Spiritual Blindness
Why can some people just not get it? Why can they not see things that are as clear as the nose on their face? The saddest part about spiritual blindness is that a person who is spiritually blind, usually cannot recognize the fact that he cannot see! People who are physically blind are very aware of the fact that they are blind and that everything around them is dark. But the spiritually blind actually think they can see and, in fact, often think they can see better than anyone else! Is this not what Jesus meant when He spoke about the man with the plank in his eye, wanting to remove the small splinter from another person’s eye? (Matthew 7:3-5). God also told the church in Laodicea: “Thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’―and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind!” (Apocalypse 3:17).
Religious leaders are often amongst those who are spiritually blind. Many times Jesus accused the Pharisees of being “blind leaders of the blind” (Matthew 15:14; 23:24; 23:26, etc.). Jesus said to the Pharisees that the very fact that they say they can see is proof that they are blind! “And Jesus said: ‘ I am come into this world; that they who see not, may see; and they who see, may become blind!’ And some of the Pharisees, who were with Jesus, heard: and they said unto Him: ‘Are we also blind?’ Jesus said to them: ‘If you were blind, you should not have sin! But now because you say: “We see!” your sin remains!” (John 9:39-41).
Causes of Spiritual Blindness
There are a few things that cause spiritual blindness. The first is pride. Remember that “All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes” (Proverbs 16:2). After Saul had disobeyed the command of the Lord, he actually erected a statue to himself, and with the bleating of the cursed sheep in the background, greeted Samuel with the words: “I have performed the commandment of the Lord” (1 Kings 15:13). His arrogance had made him so blind, that he really thought that wrong was right. Even after Samuel had clearly explained to Saul how he had disobeyed, he still did not get it. The story of the first king of Israel is a sad saga of a man who was so blinded by his arrogance, that he never understood a single thing the prophet Samuel said to him. Even once David had been anointed in Saul’s place and clearly carried God’s blessing, Saul still thought he could hold onto the anointing by killing David. In a similar way, we can be so proud that we ignore the word of God that comes to us through Holy Scripture, the Liturgy, and the writings of the Church Fathers, Popes and Saints. We are deaf to their entreaties and warnings, and so our spiritual deafness leads us into spiritual blindness. If we don’t listen, then we won’t see!
In the same way we develop the sad ability to see the specks in the eyes of others without seeing the log in our own eye. We see so clearly how unruly other people’s children are, but are blind to the faults of our own. We see the addiction of others to drugs, but cannot see our own addiction to criticism, gossip, revealing of faults, uncharitable thoughts, impure thoughts, eating, drinking, television or other forms of entertainment. But it goes further. Whenever we hear or read Holy Scripture, we see how all the positive things (promises, blessings etc.) apply to us, and how all the negative things (rebuke, correction, admonition, punishment) apply to everyone else.
This kind of selective vision is very dangerous, because it soon becomes permanent, so that we are no longer able to see the realities even if we want to―we see everything through tinted glasses. They say that if a person is given a pair of glasses to wear, that turn everything upside down, it only takes a few days for the mind to invert the image and to make everything look the right way up. The mind is powerful and it causes us to see wrong as right and black as white.
The antidote to blindness that comes through pride is obviously humility. Take every rebuke personally and receive every message you hear for yourself. Read every word in Holy Scripture as a personal message to you, especially those that contain admonition, warning and rebuke. Ask others to be honest with you and to tell you how they see you and be humble enough to listen to their advice. Above all, ask the Lord daily to open your eyes so you may really see. When you see others stumbling about in darkness, you should never look down on them, but rather allow it to be a warning and immediately flee to the Lord and ask Him to help you see and to keep you from developing blind spots.
“I counsel you to ... anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see!” (Apocalypse 3:18). That eye salve is the word of God.
The Spiritually Dumb
We have all heard the saying: “Hear no evil! See no evil! Speak no evil!” Well, something similar could be said of the spiritual life and the Faith. “Hear nothing spiritual! See nothing spiritual! Say nothing spiritual!” If we do not hear anything spiritual, then we will not be accustomed to seeing or understanding spiritual things, and consequently our minds will be empty of spiritual knowledge to the extent that we will be incapable of speaking spiritually about spiritual things. Thus we end up being spiritually dumb.
The dumb person is ‘tongue-tied’ and cannot speak. This is also the effect of lacking knowledge about the Faith—we become ‘tongue-tied’ in the sense that we are afraid to open our mouths and risk showing how dumb or stupid we really are. Do not try fool yourself, the average Catholic is pretty dumb doctrinally—some do not even have the level of knowledge to pass an old-fashioned First Holy Communion test, or the Sacrament of Confirmation test. This is why they cannot argue logically and persuasively on points of doctrine—when faced with opposition, the discussion is either abandoned, or transforms itself into anger, insults, recriminations, or emotional illogical statements.
As Pope St. Pius X wrote, speaking of the ignorance of Catholics: “We are forced to agree with those who hold that the chief cause of the present indifference and sickness of soul, and the serious evils that result from it, is to be found above all in ignorance of divine things. This fully agrees with what God Himself declared through the Prophet Osee: ‘And there is no knowledge of God in the land. Cursing and lying and killing and theft and adultery have overflowed’ (Osee 4:1-2). It is a common complaint, unfortunately too well founded, that there are large numbers of Christians who are entirely ignorant of those truths necessary for salvation.
“And when we speak of Christians, We refer not only to the masses or to those in the lower walks of life—for these find some excuse for their ignorance—but We refer to those especially who do not lack culture or talents and, indeed, are possessed of abundant knowledge regarding things of the world, but live rashly and imprudently with regard to religion. It is hard to find words to describe how profound is the darkness in which they are engulfed and, what is most deplorable of all, how tranquilly they repose there. They rarely give thought to God, the Supreme Author and Ruler of all things, or to the teachings of the Faith of Christ … How many and how grave are the consequences of ignorance in matters of religion! And on the other hand, how necessary and how beneficial is religious instruction! It is indeed vain to expect a fulfillment of the duties of a Christian by one who does not even know them … How many there are, alas, not only among the young, but among adults and those advanced in years, who know nothing of the chief mysteries of Faith …
“It follows, too, that if Faith languishes in our days, if among large numbers it has almost vanished, the reason is that the duty of catechetical teaching is either fulfilled very superficially or altogether neglected. It will not do to say, in excuse, that Faith is a free gift of God bestowed upon each one at Baptism. True enough, when we are baptized in Christ, the habit of Faith is given, but this most divine seed, if left entirely to itself, by its own power, so to speak, is not like the mustard seed which “grows up. . . and puts out great branches.” Man has the faculty of understanding at his birth, but he also has need of his mother’s word to awaken it, as it were, and to make it active. So too, the Christian, born again of water and the Holy Spirit, has Faith within him, but he requires the word of the teaching Church to nourish and develop it and to make it bear fruit. Thus wrote the Apostle: ‘Faith then depends on hearing, and hearing on the word of Christ’; and to show the necessity of instruction, he added, ‘How are they to hear, if no one preaches?’ … We pray and entreat you to reflect on the great loss of souls due solely to ignorance of divine things!” (Pope St. Pius X, encyclical Acerbo Nimis).
The Spiritually Lame
At the start of the Septuagesima season—on Septuagesima Sunday itself—the Church presents us with the Epistle of St. Paul saying: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain!” (1 Corinthians 9:24). Yet the lame man cannot run! If we have not listened to the word of God, if we do not if we cannot clearly see the spiritual mechanisms in our life, if we cannot understand the workings and paths of the spiritual life, if we are spiritually deaf, blind and dumb, then we will invariably also become spiritually lame. Every step along the spiritual path to Heaven will see us dragging our feet, barely moving along. The race cannot and will not be won in that state. Small wonder, then, that most souls are lost! As St. Paul says: “With most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:5).
The spiritually lame have to drag themselves to pray—and they even pray lamely! The spiritually lame cannot make it to an extra Mass, or very rarely. The spiritually lame limp through Mass lukewarmly with little or no devotion or fervor. Any spiritual exercise seems like having to move the Earth! Spiritual reading or meditation is a torture that keeps them away from the fun things in life! They trudge and limp though life like spiritual cripples. It is the combination and final consequence of being spiritually deaf, spiritually blind, and spiritually dumb. Only a miracle of grace can help them now—for as we live, so shall we die!
Lent could be a remedy, but who will have the courage, strength, and endurance to take a remedy that one instinctively finds “gut-wrenching”? Now is the time to pray to Our Lady that she mercifully obtain for us this grace! There are only 14 days to go! Prepare and be prepared! No preparation leads to inevitable deterioration―and even potential damnation!
Article 3
Tuesday after Septuagesima Sunday, January 30th
Family Fights
Tuesday after Septuagesima Sunday, January 30th
Family Fights
Life is Just One Long Battle!
We all would like peace, but with the advent of sin—Original Sin and our personal sins--“The life of man on Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). And who is the enemy? The devil, the world and the flesh—as is shown by the following Scriptural verses:
► THE DEVIL IS AN ENEMY: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). “For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
► THE WORLD IS AN ENEMY: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (John 2:15). “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19).
► THE FLESH IS AN ENEMY: “Watch ye, and pray that ye enter not into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak!” (Matthew 26:41). “For when we were in the flesh, the passions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members, to bring forth fruit unto death” (Romans 7:5). “There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus, who walk not according to the flesh … For they that are according to the flesh, mind the things that are of the flesh; but they that are according to the spirit, mind the things that are of the spirit. For the wisdom of the flesh is death; but the wisdom of the spirit is life and peace. The wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God … and they who are in the flesh, cannot please God” (Romans 8:1, 5-6).
► THE FAMILY CAN BE AN ENEMY: “A man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 10:34-37). “And the brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake!” (Mark 13:12-13).
All of the above is nothing else but a continuation and echo of the painful and worrisome words of Our Lord, spoken while He was still on this Earth: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law!” (Luke 12:51-53).
“Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:34-37).
Who Doesn’t Have Family Fights or Feuds?
Family feuds and fights “are as old as Adam” as they say. The very first one saw Cain kill Abel—and the reason for this feud and killing was to be ever-present throughout the history of mankind. Cain was envious of Abel because God looked more favorably upon Abel and his sacrifice than He did upon Cain’s.
“Cain offered, of the fruits of the Earth, gifts to the Lord. Abel also offered of the firstlings of his flock, and of their fat: and the Lord had respect to Abel, and to his offerings; but to Cain and his offerings he had no respect. And Cain was exceedingly angry, and his countenance fell. And the Lord said to him: ‘Why art thou angry? And why is thy countenance fallen? If thou do well, shalt thou not receive? But if ill, shall not sin forthwith be present at the door?’” (Genesis 4:3-7).
From that time onwards, the good have been persecuted by the “not-so-good”, or the “I-don’t-wanna-be-good”, or the downright “no-good”. Holy Scripture mentions only a handful of real-life cases—such as (1) Isaac and Ishmael; (2) Jacob and Esau; (3) Joseph and his envious brothers; (4) David and Saul. Our Lord Himself was hated by most of His own nation and He also gave us the parable of the Prodigal Son, who, after his return, was disliked by his brother.
With all this as a background, Our Lord warns us to expect the same: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:18-19). “For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three” (Luke 12:52). “And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 10:36).
He then adds that we should not avoid this confrontation out of a desire of “not rocking the boat” or “going along to get along”, but that we must stand up for Him and truth: “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! … Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 10:37; 10:33).
Our Lady Also Speaks of These Feuds and Fights
“God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family” (Our Lady of La Salette). “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres” (Our Lady of Akita). “The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent and be superior to others … for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot … hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family!” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Why All This Fighting and Feuding?
Ultimately, all the fighting and feuding in families comes down to each person’s relationship or lack of relationship to God. As Our Lord says: “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake!” (Mark 13:13). “Remember My word that I said to you: ‘The servant is not greater than his master!’ If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they have kept My word, they will keep yours also” (John 15:20). Jesus was to be the “sign of contradiction” foretold by St. Simeon to Our Lady at the Presentation in the Temple: “And Simeon blessed them, and said to Mary His mother: ‘Behold this Child is set for the fall, and for the resurrection of many in Israel, and for a sign which shall be contradicted! And thy own soul a sword shall pierce, that, out of many hearts, thoughts may be revealed!” (Luke 2:34-35).
It is because some are more or less for Him, while others are more or less against Him, that disagreements, jealousies, resentment, arguing, feuds and fighting take place. “He that is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30).
Feuds Come From a Fake Godliness
St. James tells us that these contentions, fights and feuds basically stem from a preference for worldliness rather than godliness: “From whence are wars and contentions among you? Are they not from your concupiscences, which war in your members? You covet, and have not! You kill, and envy, and cannot obtain! You contend and war, and you have not, because you ask not! You ask, and receive not―because you ask amiss: so that you may consume it on your concupiscences! Adulterers [by trying to love God and the world], know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:1-4).
St. Paul also speaks in the same vein, saying that this worldliness leads to a fake godliness—having the appearance of godliness in theory, but in practice being worldly lovers of themselves: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God, having an appearance, indeed, of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid! … For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears, and will, indeed, turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 3:1-5; 4:3-4).
Getting the Family on the Same Page
St. James and St. Paul both hit the nail on the head in their own way. St. James asks why are there feuds and fights between you? He then says that it basically comes from being worldly and having our passions out of control—we want things out of concupiscence. He says that such a mindset and attitude is inimical to God—meaning that we become enemies of God. St. Paul puts it another way, but hits with same truth, saying that, in a nutshell, “men shall become lovers of themselves … having an appearance of godliness” but being far from godly, for they “will not endure sound doctrine and will turn away from the truth [and] will turn to fables.” How many are they who have turned the truth of God’s teaching into their own personal fable by twisting, exaggerating, bending, diluting, ignoring and reinterpreting the teaching of God. Then, instead of one objective truth, you have hundreds and thousands of subjective truths. Instead of reality, you have virtual reality or pure fables.
There is only one way to redress and correct that—it is by bringing our passions under control, attacking worldliness, focusing on God’s teaching (rather than our own lax interpretation of that teaching) and starting to love God more than ourselves. However, that will and cannot be achieved until we pull-out the one and only true spiritual yardstick by which we can objectively (not subjectively) measure everything and every ‘opinion’ to see if it measures up with God’s teaching. The family needs the humility to subject itself unreservedly, without argument, to God’s truth, God’s teaching, God’s commandments, God’s counsels and God’s way. The family must be asked: “Who is in charge here?” And the only acceptable answer is: “God!”
There Can Be No Separation Between Church & State
One of the most pernicious modern errors today is the false principle that there is a separation between Church and State. This is neither the time or place for a thorough examination of the subject, but suffice it to say that, in essence, the separation of Church and State arose in no small degree from the refusal of God’s Objective Truth, which was replaced by “My Personal Subjective Version of the Truth”—which then, in turn, allows for hundreds and thousands of differing “Personal Subjective Versions of the Truth” to exist. The only way around that is to say: “What you believe may well be true for you, but it is not true for me! I prefer my truth to your truth! You can stick to your truth and do what you want! I will stick to my truth and do what I want!”
With the advent of Protestantism on a large scale, in the 1500s, there arose an ever-increasing clash in Europe between ‘Truths’—with the result that the adherents to one ‘Truth’ started to persecute the adherents of other ‘Truths.’ This saw over a century of religious fighting in the so-called “European Wars of Religion” from 1524 to 1648. The conflicts ended with the treaty at the Peace of Westphalia, which recognized three separate Christian traditions in Europe: Roman Catholicism, Lutheranism, and Calvinism.
The problem was, however, that one split leads to another. Lutheranism and Calvinism, being based on personal subjective interpretation of religious truth, led to further internal divisions. This, in turn, led to a persecution of these dissidents within Lutheranism and Calvinism, which—to cut a long story short—led to the emigration of these dissidents from Europe, in order to escape persecution and to be able to freely practice their own personal subjective version of religion. The religious persecution that drove settlers from Europe sprang from the conviction, held by Protestants and Catholics alike, that uniformity of religion must exist in any given society.
Come to ‘Free’ America and Do What You Want!
Many emigrated to America and formed the religious melting-pot or religious stew that we have today. Even though their personal versions of religion differed on many points, they had to agree to “go along to get along” and the governing political bodies had to “go along to get along to” in what was to be become a fledgling American nation. Hence the Establishment Clause and Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States which reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...etc.” In other words, believe what you want—we won’t interfere. Likewise, the government will believe what it wants—and you had better not interfere!
As one American historical Liberal and Protestant website puts it: “Many of the British North American colonies that eventually formed the United States of America were settled in the seventeenth century by men and women, who, in the face of European persecution, refused to compromise passionately held religious convictions and fled Europe. The New England colonies, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland were conceived and established "as plantations of religion." Some settlers who arrived in these areas came for secular motives―‘to catch fish’ as one New Englander put it―but the great majority left Europe to worship God in the way they believed to be correct. They enthusiastically supported the efforts of their leaders to create ‘a city on a hill’ or a ‘holy experiment,’ whose success would prove that God’s plan for his churches (??) could be successfully realized in the American wilderness. Even colonies like Virginia, which were planned as commercial ventures, were led by entrepreneurs who considered themselves ‘militant Protestants’ and who worked diligently to promote the prosperity of the church.”
What’s With All This History Stuff?
Well, what “goes around comes around” and “there is nothing new under the sun”--“If we do not learn and know our history, then we will know and learn it by repeating it!” This false idea and principle of separation of Church and State, together with the false principle of “Freedom of Religion” has inescapably and imperceptibly, like air that has been poisoned by an odorless gas, drifted into the families of so many Catholics—even ‘good’ Conservative Catholic families. What Fr. Salvany covers in the opening chapter of his book Liberalism Is A Sin, is at the root of the fighting and feuding that we find in Catholic families today. In essence, Catholic families are becoming Protestant families, because of their constant exposure to an overwhelmingly Protestant and pagan environment. In the following extracts, the population data has been updated for our present day, according to the latest available figures. Fr. Salvany writes:
“Swarming in the atmosphere of our spiritual lives are innumerable deadly germs, ever ready to fasten upon the depleted and weakened soul and, propagating its leprous contagion through every faculty, destroy the spiritual life. Against the menace of this ever-threatening danger, whose advances we cannot avoid in our present circumstances, the ever-healthy soul alone can be prepared … To be prepared is to be armed, but to be prepared is not sufficient; we must possess the interior strength to throw off the germ. There must be no condition in the soul to make a suitable nidus [platform] for an enemy so insidious and so efficacious as to need only the slightest point of contact whence to spread its deadly contagion. It is not only through the avenues of disordered passions that this spiritual disease may gain an entrance; it may make its inroad through the intellect, and this under a disguise often calculated to deceive the unwary and incautious ... Intellectual torpidity, inexperience, ignorance, indifference, and complaisance, or even virtues, such as, benevolence, generosity, and pity may be the unsuspected way open to the foe, and lo, we are surprised to find him in possession of the citadel!
“As we are addressing ourselves to those who live amidst the peculiar circumstances of our American life … Let us then consider these surroundings in a general way for the moment. [the following population date has been updated for our day] The population of this country is at present something over 325 million. [2016 census]. Of these, 70 million are Catholics, and according to their claim, 150 million are Protestants, leaving a population of 100 million or more who do not profess any form of Christianity at all. Amongst the 150 million Protestants, every shade and variety of belief in the Christian dispensation find easy lodgment … A Protestant may freely range from one end of the scale to the other and still be considered orthodox according to Protestant estimates. A loose indefinite belief in Christ … suffices to place the Protestant within the compass of his own standard of orthodoxy.
Outside of these various bodies of loosely professed Christians stands a mass of our population [around 100 million] who are either absolutely indifferent to Christianity as a creed or positively reject it. In practice, the distinction is of little moment whether they hold themselves merely indifferent or positively hostile. This mass … holds itself aloof from Christianity, and in some instances virulently antagonistic to it. This mass of infidelity and Protestantism is enhanced to an even more frightening percentage by the vast majority (70%) of Catholics today—2016 figures—who either do not practice their Faith at all or who are ignorant of its teachings. This brings the total of practical non-believing, or non-practicing and infidel people to probably over 90 percent, Heresy and infidelity are irreconcilable with Catholicity. ‘He that is not with Me is against Me’ (Matthew 12:30) are the words of Our Lord Himself, for denial of Catholic truth is the radical and common element of both heresy and infidelity.
“We live in the midst of this religious anarchy. Some 300 million (out of 325 million) of our population can, in one sense or other, be considered anti-Catholic [2016 figures]. From this mass—heretical and infidel—exhales an atmosphere filled with germs poisonous and fatal to Catholic life, if permitted to take root in the Catholic heart. The mere force of gravitation, which the larger mass ever exercises upon the smaller, is a power which the most energetic vigor alone can resist. Under this dangerous influence, a deadly inertia is apt to creep over the souls of the incautious and is only to be overcome by the liveliest exercise of Catholic Faith. To live without harm amidst an heretical and infidel population requires a robust religious constitution. And to this danger we are daily exposed, ever coming into contact in a thousand ways, in almost every relation of life, with anti-Catholic thought and customs. But outside of this spiritual inertia, our non-Catholic surroundings beget a still greater menace.
“It is natural that Protestantism and infidelity should find public expression. What our 300 million non-Catholic (including the non-practicing Catholics) population thinks in these matters, naturally seeks and finds open expression. They have their organs and their literature, where we find their current opinions publicly uttered. Their views upon religion, morality, politics, the constitution of society are perpetually marshaled before us. In the pulpit and in the press they are reiterated day after day. In magazine and newspaper they constantly speak from every line. Our literature is permeated and saturated with non-Catholic dogmatism. On all sides do we find this opposing spirit. We cannot escape from it. It enfolds and embraces us. Its breath is perpetually in our faces. It enters in by eye and ear. From birth to death, it enslaves us in its offensive garments. It now soothes and flatters, now hates and curses, now threatens, now praises. But it is most dangerous when it comes to us under the form of “liberality.” It is especially powerful for seduction in this guise.” (Fr. Felix Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin, chapter 1).
The Above is True for the Family Too!
Since we pay scant attention to our Faith and rarely do serious reading on the subject, we become prey to falsehoods, fallacies, novelties and errors that creep past the ‘sleeping sentries’ of our Faith. We are strong in earthly, worldly knowledge, but weak in doctrinal, spiritual knowledge. We know pretty well the history of favorite sports team, but very little about the history of the Church. We know all about the celebrities of this life, but very little about the saints. We have, in essence, diluted our knowledge of the Faith with knowledge of world—going diametrically against the command of Holy Scripture: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). We have committed adultery of sorts, which is what St. James call us, when he says: “Adulterers! Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
Once our knowledge of the Faith is weak, anyone could tell us almost anything, and we would be stuck for a powerful argument or answer. Like Our Lady of Good Success warned: “In this supreme moment of need of the Church, those who should speak will fall silent!” Yet this silence is deafening, not only in Church, but also in the family. Just as Our Lady of La Salette condemned the leaders of the Church, when she said: “The leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish!”—she could just as well say the same of parents (the family ‘clergy’ so to speak), who have neglected, not only prayer and penance in the family (the mini-Church), but who have also neglected to ensure the study of the Faith at home, which would have furnished the principles required to stand any kind of chance from being corrupted by the 90%+ of the population that are indifferent or even hostile to the Faith.
Protest-olic and Cath-estant Families
Little by little the Catholicity of families has been eroded. The modern Church—with its discounted spirituality of less prayers and less penance—has removed the backbone of Catholicity and replaced it with a spineless worldly rapacity. Our Lord’s command to “watch and pray” has become “watch TV and play”—with the result that there is insufficient grace being called down from Heaven to battle, overcome and control our passions and penchant for worldliness, comfort, ease, indulgence and gratification. The windows and doors of the home are open to the non-Catholic world and its pernicious influence as it pours into the home through the TV, computer, i-Pads, smartphones, music, magazines, newspapers and catalogues. The result is the de-Catholicization of one family after another. Without being specifically told that a family was Catholic, you could not differentiate it from a Protestant or pagan family in some (or even many) cases.
Family Civil Wars
This leads to the family ‘civil wars’ that Our Lord speaks about: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law!” (Luke 12:51-53). Those who dislike or even refuse to go down the path of de-Catholicization and worldliness end up arguing with those who do not mind the worldliness. That is the devil’s way—divide and conquer—and it has all come about because of doctrinal and spiritual laxity that, in many cases, is now irreversible. Hence the statistics show that around 90% of youth, once they reach the age of maturity, no longer practice the Faith on a regular basis. Missing Mass, neglecting Confession, praying little, doing spiritual reading even less, doing penance rarely and meditating never. The parents—who in some cases are barely any better—can either “go along to get along” or vainly “shut the barn once the horse has bolted.”
Are You Up for the Fight or the Flight?
What is the solution to this gradual crumbling of Catholic families—and you had better believe that they are crumbling. Go online yourself and check the stats. Look at the closing down of churches due to insufficient numbers in attendances—the only reason some churches are fairly full today, is because they have closed two churches and amalgamated then with a third parish—that way you can magically transform three dwindling parishes into a seemingly thriving parish! A great sleight of hand!
So what is the solution? Do stand and fight, or do you take flight? Do you sit and talk, or do you avoid the talk and off you walk? “Sweet-talkin’ ain’t gonna work, honey!” That’s all the Church been doing for the last 50 years and numbers have gone down, down, down; while sins have gone up, up, up. You can talk till the proverbial cows come home, or you go blue in the face—the world and its prince, the devil, talk a smarter talk than you can talk, because you have been greatly dumbed-down over these last 50 years since the Second Vatican Council “opened its doors to the world”—and instead of the world jumping into the Church, most of the Catholics have jumped out into the world and are quite happy with their choice.
Sit and Do Nothing?
So do you do nothing but sit there and watch the demise? If you do that, then you will likely hear God’s words to Cain being also addressed to you--“And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is thy brother Abel?’ And he answered: ‘I know not! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to him: ‘What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth!’” (Genesis 4:9-10).
Something has to be done, for, as Our Lady said: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God” (La Salette) … “ You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Fatima).
She says “many souls go to Hell”—and that was way back in 1917, one hundred years ago! Do you think less souls to go to Hell today? She says they go to Hell “because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them”—Do you think that there are more people praying for sinners today? Hey, only 2% of USA Catholics pray the Rosary daily! Only 25% go to Sunday Mass regularly!
A Few Hail Marys Just Won’t Cut-It!
Do we truly realize the price of grace? Do we really appreciate what it takes to bring about a conversion? To get a true picture of this it is recommended to read a little of The Way of Divine Love by Sister Josefa Menendez, to see the “hell” that Christ puts her through just to bring about the conversion of a lukewarm soul—never mind a big sinner! It all comes back to the way we cheapened the divine and expect ‘bargain-basement’ deals for a pittance on our part.
Your family cannot and will not change without heavy duty weapons being used! It is no rocket science, but it certainly will take some rocket power, or the thrust of rocket, to get a family out the pull of the gravity of worldliness. We could well react like the Apostles: “And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible! But with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:26-27).
Two Chief Weapons for the Fight
To God you must turn and you must put away the pea-shooter and pull-out the rockets or “big-guns”! Our Lady gives us a clue as to what to use when she says: “The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and Sign left by my Son” (Akita). We can most certainly take this to mean the Rosary and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (with its ‘child’, the Holy Eucharist).
Sr. Lucia of Fatima had already indicated in 1957 that the Rosary was one of the weapons chosen by Heaven for our day and age: “Prayer and sacrifice are the two means to save the world. As for the Holy Rosary, Father, in these last times in which we are living, the Blessed Virgin has given a new efficacy to the praying of the Holy Rosary. This in such a way that there is no problem that cannot be resolved by praying the Rosary, no matter how difficult it is ― be it temporal or above all spiritual ― in the spiritual life of each of us, or the lives of our families, be they our families in the world or Religious Communities, or even in the lives of peoples and nations. I repeat, there is no problem, as difficult as it may be, that we cannot resolve at this time by praying the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary we will save ourselves, sanctify ourselves, console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls” (Sr. Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is quite simply the weapon par excellence! It is nothing other than the sacrifice of Our Lord Jesus Christ on Mount Calvary, though in an unbloody manner. Nothing can hold a candle to its power. Yet, much like the Rosary today, it is underused, misused, unused and abused. A weapon is only as good as the person using it. It was revealed to Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich that if a priest would say the Mass with the devotion that the Apostles had for the Mass, then many if not all the dangers threatening us would be allayed: “Mass, badly celebrated, is an enormous evil. Ah! It is not a matter of indifference how it is said! . . . I have had a great vision on the mystery of Holy Mass and I have seen that whatever good has existed since creation is owing to it … Our Lady said what is most painful for me to repeat, that if only one priest offered the unbloody Sacrifice as worthily and with the same sentiments as the Apostles, he could ward off all calamities from the Church!” (Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich).
Get Serious! Get Real!
The end to family fighting won’t come without a fight! Mere talking has got you nowhere! Giving them books and pamphlets has got you nowhere! Doing nothing has got you nowhere! Biting your tongue has got you nowhere! Being nice has got you nowhere! Getting angry has got you nowhere! Becoming depressed and discouraged has go you nowhere!
There is a fundamental principle that we must never forget—as we were taught in our early catechism days—“Faith is a supernatural gift of God freely given by God.” No person can give another person the Faith. No person can truly convert another person. These things come from God—and they COST! God could convert all the sinners in the world in one single second—but He will not do so if we do pay for it! This is why Our Lady came at Fatima and Akita to ask for LOTS OF PRAYER and LOTS OF SACRIFICES. “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them” (Fatima) … “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger!” (Akita).
Spiritual Aspirins and Band-Aids
You will not heal a gunshot wound by giving the victim an aspirin and a Band-Aid. It takes far more than that! The same is true of spiritual healing—most people are riddled with the devil’s and the world’s gunshots. We are naïve and senseless if we think that a few Hail Marys are going to bring about massive conversions. We need to get serious and get real! If little Francisco at Fatima was told that he would have to pray MANY Rosaries before he would get to Heaven, then what about us and our worldly family members? How many more need to be said—especially given our super-sinful times! Look at the many years of prayer, penance and tears the St. Monica went through to bring about the conversion of her wayward son, the future St. Augustine! And we expect the same for a pittance!!?
The same applies to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass—how few are the people who have Masses regularly offered for the conversion of family members! They will pay a fortune for the best doctor available if a family member gets sick, but will not even pay a fraction of that to have a regular series of Masses said to cure their spiritual sickness! Senseless! Crazy! Foolish!
Those are the ‘big-guns’ that are neglected—and the devil rejoices over that! He simply pours more and more gasoline on the fires of family fights and feuds, waiting for the day when can carry on fighting and feuding in the fires of Hell! God help them! Unless they help themselves now by using what God has put before them!
Once that foundation has been laid, THEN you can start talking, encouraging, threatening, warning, pleading, explaining, teaching, etc. But without Him, we can do nothing! Lay the proper spiritual foundation first, then you can start to build on it.
We all would like peace, but with the advent of sin—Original Sin and our personal sins--“The life of man on Earth is a warfare” (Job 7:1). And who is the enemy? The devil, the world and the flesh—as is shown by the following Scriptural verses:
► THE DEVIL IS AN ENEMY: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). “For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places” (Ephesians 6:12).
► THE WORLD IS AN ENEMY: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (John 2:15). “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19).
► THE FLESH IS AN ENEMY: “Watch ye, and pray that ye enter not into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak!” (Matthew 26:41). “For when we were in the flesh, the passions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members, to bring forth fruit unto death” (Romans 7:5). “There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus, who walk not according to the flesh … For they that are according to the flesh, mind the things that are of the flesh; but they that are according to the spirit, mind the things that are of the spirit. For the wisdom of the flesh is death; but the wisdom of the spirit is life and peace. The wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God … and they who are in the flesh, cannot please God” (Romans 8:1, 5-6).
► THE FAMILY CAN BE AN ENEMY: “A man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 10:34-37). “And the brother shall betray his brother unto death, and the father his son; and children shall rise up against the parents, and shall work their death. And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake!” (Mark 13:12-13).
All of the above is nothing else but a continuation and echo of the painful and worrisome words of Our Lord, spoken while He was still on this Earth: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law!” (Luke 12:51-53).
“Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:34-37).
Who Doesn’t Have Family Fights or Feuds?
Family feuds and fights “are as old as Adam” as they say. The very first one saw Cain kill Abel—and the reason for this feud and killing was to be ever-present throughout the history of mankind. Cain was envious of Abel because God looked more favorably upon Abel and his sacrifice than He did upon Cain’s.
“Cain offered, of the fruits of the Earth, gifts to the Lord. Abel also offered of the firstlings of his flock, and of their fat: and the Lord had respect to Abel, and to his offerings; but to Cain and his offerings he had no respect. And Cain was exceedingly angry, and his countenance fell. And the Lord said to him: ‘Why art thou angry? And why is thy countenance fallen? If thou do well, shalt thou not receive? But if ill, shall not sin forthwith be present at the door?’” (Genesis 4:3-7).
From that time onwards, the good have been persecuted by the “not-so-good”, or the “I-don’t-wanna-be-good”, or the downright “no-good”. Holy Scripture mentions only a handful of real-life cases—such as (1) Isaac and Ishmael; (2) Jacob and Esau; (3) Joseph and his envious brothers; (4) David and Saul. Our Lord Himself was hated by most of His own nation and He also gave us the parable of the Prodigal Son, who, after his return, was disliked by his brother.
With all this as a background, Our Lord warns us to expect the same: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:18-19). “For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three” (Luke 12:52). “And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household!” (Matthew 10:36).
He then adds that we should not avoid this confrontation out of a desire of “not rocking the boat” or “going along to get along”, but that we must stand up for Him and truth: “He that loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! … Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 10:37; 10:33).
Our Lady Also Speaks of These Feuds and Fights
“God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family” (Our Lady of La Salette). “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres” (Our Lady of Akita). “The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent and be superior to others … for disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot … hate, jealousy, lies and dissension will be seen, without love for country or family!” (Our Lady of La Salette).
Why All This Fighting and Feuding?
Ultimately, all the fighting and feuding in families comes down to each person’s relationship or lack of relationship to God. As Our Lord says: “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake!” (Mark 13:13). “Remember My word that I said to you: ‘The servant is not greater than his master!’ If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they have kept My word, they will keep yours also” (John 15:20). Jesus was to be the “sign of contradiction” foretold by St. Simeon to Our Lady at the Presentation in the Temple: “And Simeon blessed them, and said to Mary His mother: ‘Behold this Child is set for the fall, and for the resurrection of many in Israel, and for a sign which shall be contradicted! And thy own soul a sword shall pierce, that, out of many hearts, thoughts may be revealed!” (Luke 2:34-35).
It is because some are more or less for Him, while others are more or less against Him, that disagreements, jealousies, resentment, arguing, feuds and fighting take place. “He that is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30).
Feuds Come From a Fake Godliness
St. James tells us that these contentions, fights and feuds basically stem from a preference for worldliness rather than godliness: “From whence are wars and contentions among you? Are they not from your concupiscences, which war in your members? You covet, and have not! You kill, and envy, and cannot obtain! You contend and war, and you have not, because you ask not! You ask, and receive not―because you ask amiss: so that you may consume it on your concupiscences! Adulterers [by trying to love God and the world], know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:1-4).
St. Paul also speaks in the same vein, saying that this worldliness leads to a fake godliness—having the appearance of godliness in theory, but in practice being worldly lovers of themselves: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God, having an appearance, indeed, of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid! … For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears, and will, indeed, turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 3:1-5; 4:3-4).
Getting the Family on the Same Page
St. James and St. Paul both hit the nail on the head in their own way. St. James asks why are there feuds and fights between you? He then says that it basically comes from being worldly and having our passions out of control—we want things out of concupiscence. He says that such a mindset and attitude is inimical to God—meaning that we become enemies of God. St. Paul puts it another way, but hits with same truth, saying that, in a nutshell, “men shall become lovers of themselves … having an appearance of godliness” but being far from godly, for they “will not endure sound doctrine and will turn away from the truth [and] will turn to fables.” How many are they who have turned the truth of God’s teaching into their own personal fable by twisting, exaggerating, bending, diluting, ignoring and reinterpreting the teaching of God. Then, instead of one objective truth, you have hundreds and thousands of subjective truths. Instead of reality, you have virtual reality or pure fables.
There is only one way to redress and correct that—it is by bringing our passions under control, attacking worldliness, focusing on God’s teaching (rather than our own lax interpretation of that teaching) and starting to love God more than ourselves. However, that will and cannot be achieved until we pull-out the one and only true spiritual yardstick by which we can objectively (not subjectively) measure everything and every ‘opinion’ to see if it measures up with God’s teaching. The family needs the humility to subject itself unreservedly, without argument, to God’s truth, God’s teaching, God’s commandments, God’s counsels and God’s way. The family must be asked: “Who is in charge here?” And the only acceptable answer is: “God!”
There Can Be No Separation Between Church & State
One of the most pernicious modern errors today is the false principle that there is a separation between Church and State. This is neither the time or place for a thorough examination of the subject, but suffice it to say that, in essence, the separation of Church and State arose in no small degree from the refusal of God’s Objective Truth, which was replaced by “My Personal Subjective Version of the Truth”—which then, in turn, allows for hundreds and thousands of differing “Personal Subjective Versions of the Truth” to exist. The only way around that is to say: “What you believe may well be true for you, but it is not true for me! I prefer my truth to your truth! You can stick to your truth and do what you want! I will stick to my truth and do what I want!”
With the advent of Protestantism on a large scale, in the 1500s, there arose an ever-increasing clash in Europe between ‘Truths’—with the result that the adherents to one ‘Truth’ started to persecute the adherents of other ‘Truths.’ This saw over a century of religious fighting in the so-called “European Wars of Religion” from 1524 to 1648. The conflicts ended with the treaty at the Peace of Westphalia, which recognized three separate Christian traditions in Europe: Roman Catholicism, Lutheranism, and Calvinism.
The problem was, however, that one split leads to another. Lutheranism and Calvinism, being based on personal subjective interpretation of religious truth, led to further internal divisions. This, in turn, led to a persecution of these dissidents within Lutheranism and Calvinism, which—to cut a long story short—led to the emigration of these dissidents from Europe, in order to escape persecution and to be able to freely practice their own personal subjective version of religion. The religious persecution that drove settlers from Europe sprang from the conviction, held by Protestants and Catholics alike, that uniformity of religion must exist in any given society.
Come to ‘Free’ America and Do What You Want!
Many emigrated to America and formed the religious melting-pot or religious stew that we have today. Even though their personal versions of religion differed on many points, they had to agree to “go along to get along” and the governing political bodies had to “go along to get along to” in what was to be become a fledgling American nation. Hence the Establishment Clause and Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States which reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...etc.” In other words, believe what you want—we won’t interfere. Likewise, the government will believe what it wants—and you had better not interfere!
As one American historical Liberal and Protestant website puts it: “Many of the British North American colonies that eventually formed the United States of America were settled in the seventeenth century by men and women, who, in the face of European persecution, refused to compromise passionately held religious convictions and fled Europe. The New England colonies, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland were conceived and established "as plantations of religion." Some settlers who arrived in these areas came for secular motives―‘to catch fish’ as one New Englander put it―but the great majority left Europe to worship God in the way they believed to be correct. They enthusiastically supported the efforts of their leaders to create ‘a city on a hill’ or a ‘holy experiment,’ whose success would prove that God’s plan for his churches (??) could be successfully realized in the American wilderness. Even colonies like Virginia, which were planned as commercial ventures, were led by entrepreneurs who considered themselves ‘militant Protestants’ and who worked diligently to promote the prosperity of the church.”
What’s With All This History Stuff?
Well, what “goes around comes around” and “there is nothing new under the sun”--“If we do not learn and know our history, then we will know and learn it by repeating it!” This false idea and principle of separation of Church and State, together with the false principle of “Freedom of Religion” has inescapably and imperceptibly, like air that has been poisoned by an odorless gas, drifted into the families of so many Catholics—even ‘good’ Conservative Catholic families. What Fr. Salvany covers in the opening chapter of his book Liberalism Is A Sin, is at the root of the fighting and feuding that we find in Catholic families today. In essence, Catholic families are becoming Protestant families, because of their constant exposure to an overwhelmingly Protestant and pagan environment. In the following extracts, the population data has been updated for our present day, according to the latest available figures. Fr. Salvany writes:
“Swarming in the atmosphere of our spiritual lives are innumerable deadly germs, ever ready to fasten upon the depleted and weakened soul and, propagating its leprous contagion through every faculty, destroy the spiritual life. Against the menace of this ever-threatening danger, whose advances we cannot avoid in our present circumstances, the ever-healthy soul alone can be prepared … To be prepared is to be armed, but to be prepared is not sufficient; we must possess the interior strength to throw off the germ. There must be no condition in the soul to make a suitable nidus [platform] for an enemy so insidious and so efficacious as to need only the slightest point of contact whence to spread its deadly contagion. It is not only through the avenues of disordered passions that this spiritual disease may gain an entrance; it may make its inroad through the intellect, and this under a disguise often calculated to deceive the unwary and incautious ... Intellectual torpidity, inexperience, ignorance, indifference, and complaisance, or even virtues, such as, benevolence, generosity, and pity may be the unsuspected way open to the foe, and lo, we are surprised to find him in possession of the citadel!
“As we are addressing ourselves to those who live amidst the peculiar circumstances of our American life … Let us then consider these surroundings in a general way for the moment. [the following population date has been updated for our day] The population of this country is at present something over 325 million. [2016 census]. Of these, 70 million are Catholics, and according to their claim, 150 million are Protestants, leaving a population of 100 million or more who do not profess any form of Christianity at all. Amongst the 150 million Protestants, every shade and variety of belief in the Christian dispensation find easy lodgment … A Protestant may freely range from one end of the scale to the other and still be considered orthodox according to Protestant estimates. A loose indefinite belief in Christ … suffices to place the Protestant within the compass of his own standard of orthodoxy.
Outside of these various bodies of loosely professed Christians stands a mass of our population [around 100 million] who are either absolutely indifferent to Christianity as a creed or positively reject it. In practice, the distinction is of little moment whether they hold themselves merely indifferent or positively hostile. This mass … holds itself aloof from Christianity, and in some instances virulently antagonistic to it. This mass of infidelity and Protestantism is enhanced to an even more frightening percentage by the vast majority (70%) of Catholics today—2016 figures—who either do not practice their Faith at all or who are ignorant of its teachings. This brings the total of practical non-believing, or non-practicing and infidel people to probably over 90 percent, Heresy and infidelity are irreconcilable with Catholicity. ‘He that is not with Me is against Me’ (Matthew 12:30) are the words of Our Lord Himself, for denial of Catholic truth is the radical and common element of both heresy and infidelity.
“We live in the midst of this religious anarchy. Some 300 million (out of 325 million) of our population can, in one sense or other, be considered anti-Catholic [2016 figures]. From this mass—heretical and infidel—exhales an atmosphere filled with germs poisonous and fatal to Catholic life, if permitted to take root in the Catholic heart. The mere force of gravitation, which the larger mass ever exercises upon the smaller, is a power which the most energetic vigor alone can resist. Under this dangerous influence, a deadly inertia is apt to creep over the souls of the incautious and is only to be overcome by the liveliest exercise of Catholic Faith. To live without harm amidst an heretical and infidel population requires a robust religious constitution. And to this danger we are daily exposed, ever coming into contact in a thousand ways, in almost every relation of life, with anti-Catholic thought and customs. But outside of this spiritual inertia, our non-Catholic surroundings beget a still greater menace.
“It is natural that Protestantism and infidelity should find public expression. What our 300 million non-Catholic (including the non-practicing Catholics) population thinks in these matters, naturally seeks and finds open expression. They have their organs and their literature, where we find their current opinions publicly uttered. Their views upon religion, morality, politics, the constitution of society are perpetually marshaled before us. In the pulpit and in the press they are reiterated day after day. In magazine and newspaper they constantly speak from every line. Our literature is permeated and saturated with non-Catholic dogmatism. On all sides do we find this opposing spirit. We cannot escape from it. It enfolds and embraces us. Its breath is perpetually in our faces. It enters in by eye and ear. From birth to death, it enslaves us in its offensive garments. It now soothes and flatters, now hates and curses, now threatens, now praises. But it is most dangerous when it comes to us under the form of “liberality.” It is especially powerful for seduction in this guise.” (Fr. Felix Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin, chapter 1).
The Above is True for the Family Too!
Since we pay scant attention to our Faith and rarely do serious reading on the subject, we become prey to falsehoods, fallacies, novelties and errors that creep past the ‘sleeping sentries’ of our Faith. We are strong in earthly, worldly knowledge, but weak in doctrinal, spiritual knowledge. We know pretty well the history of favorite sports team, but very little about the history of the Church. We know all about the celebrities of this life, but very little about the saints. We have, in essence, diluted our knowledge of the Faith with knowledge of world—going diametrically against the command of Holy Scripture: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). We have committed adultery of sorts, which is what St. James call us, when he says: “Adulterers! Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
Once our knowledge of the Faith is weak, anyone could tell us almost anything, and we would be stuck for a powerful argument or answer. Like Our Lady of Good Success warned: “In this supreme moment of need of the Church, those who should speak will fall silent!” Yet this silence is deafening, not only in Church, but also in the family. Just as Our Lady of La Salette condemned the leaders of the Church, when she said: “The leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish!”—she could just as well say the same of parents (the family ‘clergy’ so to speak), who have neglected, not only prayer and penance in the family (the mini-Church), but who have also neglected to ensure the study of the Faith at home, which would have furnished the principles required to stand any kind of chance from being corrupted by the 90%+ of the population that are indifferent or even hostile to the Faith.
Protest-olic and Cath-estant Families
Little by little the Catholicity of families has been eroded. The modern Church—with its discounted spirituality of less prayers and less penance—has removed the backbone of Catholicity and replaced it with a spineless worldly rapacity. Our Lord’s command to “watch and pray” has become “watch TV and play”—with the result that there is insufficient grace being called down from Heaven to battle, overcome and control our passions and penchant for worldliness, comfort, ease, indulgence and gratification. The windows and doors of the home are open to the non-Catholic world and its pernicious influence as it pours into the home through the TV, computer, i-Pads, smartphones, music, magazines, newspapers and catalogues. The result is the de-Catholicization of one family after another. Without being specifically told that a family was Catholic, you could not differentiate it from a Protestant or pagan family in some (or even many) cases.
Family Civil Wars
This leads to the family ‘civil wars’ that Our Lord speaks about: “Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law!” (Luke 12:51-53). Those who dislike or even refuse to go down the path of de-Catholicization and worldliness end up arguing with those who do not mind the worldliness. That is the devil’s way—divide and conquer—and it has all come about because of doctrinal and spiritual laxity that, in many cases, is now irreversible. Hence the statistics show that around 90% of youth, once they reach the age of maturity, no longer practice the Faith on a regular basis. Missing Mass, neglecting Confession, praying little, doing spiritual reading even less, doing penance rarely and meditating never. The parents—who in some cases are barely any better—can either “go along to get along” or vainly “shut the barn once the horse has bolted.”
Are You Up for the Fight or the Flight?
What is the solution to this gradual crumbling of Catholic families—and you had better believe that they are crumbling. Go online yourself and check the stats. Look at the closing down of churches due to insufficient numbers in attendances—the only reason some churches are fairly full today, is because they have closed two churches and amalgamated then with a third parish—that way you can magically transform three dwindling parishes into a seemingly thriving parish! A great sleight of hand!
So what is the solution? Do stand and fight, or do you take flight? Do you sit and talk, or do you avoid the talk and off you walk? “Sweet-talkin’ ain’t gonna work, honey!” That’s all the Church been doing for the last 50 years and numbers have gone down, down, down; while sins have gone up, up, up. You can talk till the proverbial cows come home, or you go blue in the face—the world and its prince, the devil, talk a smarter talk than you can talk, because you have been greatly dumbed-down over these last 50 years since the Second Vatican Council “opened its doors to the world”—and instead of the world jumping into the Church, most of the Catholics have jumped out into the world and are quite happy with their choice.
Sit and Do Nothing?
So do you do nothing but sit there and watch the demise? If you do that, then you will likely hear God’s words to Cain being also addressed to you--“And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is thy brother Abel?’ And he answered: ‘I know not! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to him: ‘What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth!’” (Genesis 4:9-10).
Something has to be done, for, as Our Lady said: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God” (La Salette) … “ You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Fatima).
She says “many souls go to Hell”—and that was way back in 1917, one hundred years ago! Do you think less souls to go to Hell today? She says they go to Hell “because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them”—Do you think that there are more people praying for sinners today? Hey, only 2% of USA Catholics pray the Rosary daily! Only 25% go to Sunday Mass regularly!
A Few Hail Marys Just Won’t Cut-It!
Do we truly realize the price of grace? Do we really appreciate what it takes to bring about a conversion? To get a true picture of this it is recommended to read a little of The Way of Divine Love by Sister Josefa Menendez, to see the “hell” that Christ puts her through just to bring about the conversion of a lukewarm soul—never mind a big sinner! It all comes back to the way we cheapened the divine and expect ‘bargain-basement’ deals for a pittance on our part.
Your family cannot and will not change without heavy duty weapons being used! It is no rocket science, but it certainly will take some rocket power, or the thrust of rocket, to get a family out the pull of the gravity of worldliness. We could well react like the Apostles: “And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible! But with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:26-27).
Two Chief Weapons for the Fight
To God you must turn and you must put away the pea-shooter and pull-out the rockets or “big-guns”! Our Lady gives us a clue as to what to use when she says: “The only weapons that will remain for you will be the Rosary and Sign left by my Son” (Akita). We can most certainly take this to mean the Rosary and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (with its ‘child’, the Holy Eucharist).
Sr. Lucia of Fatima had already indicated in 1957 that the Rosary was one of the weapons chosen by Heaven for our day and age: “Prayer and sacrifice are the two means to save the world. As for the Holy Rosary, Father, in these last times in which we are living, the Blessed Virgin has given a new efficacy to the praying of the Holy Rosary. This in such a way that there is no problem that cannot be resolved by praying the Rosary, no matter how difficult it is ― be it temporal or above all spiritual ― in the spiritual life of each of us, or the lives of our families, be they our families in the world or Religious Communities, or even in the lives of peoples and nations. I repeat, there is no problem, as difficult as it may be, that we cannot resolve at this time by praying the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary we will save ourselves, sanctify ourselves, console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls” (Sr. Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is quite simply the weapon par excellence! It is nothing other than the sacrifice of Our Lord Jesus Christ on Mount Calvary, though in an unbloody manner. Nothing can hold a candle to its power. Yet, much like the Rosary today, it is underused, misused, unused and abused. A weapon is only as good as the person using it. It was revealed to Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich that if a priest would say the Mass with the devotion that the Apostles had for the Mass, then many if not all the dangers threatening us would be allayed: “Mass, badly celebrated, is an enormous evil. Ah! It is not a matter of indifference how it is said! . . . I have had a great vision on the mystery of Holy Mass and I have seen that whatever good has existed since creation is owing to it … Our Lady said what is most painful for me to repeat, that if only one priest offered the unbloody Sacrifice as worthily and with the same sentiments as the Apostles, he could ward off all calamities from the Church!” (Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich).
Get Serious! Get Real!
The end to family fighting won’t come without a fight! Mere talking has got you nowhere! Giving them books and pamphlets has got you nowhere! Doing nothing has got you nowhere! Biting your tongue has got you nowhere! Being nice has got you nowhere! Getting angry has got you nowhere! Becoming depressed and discouraged has go you nowhere!
There is a fundamental principle that we must never forget—as we were taught in our early catechism days—“Faith is a supernatural gift of God freely given by God.” No person can give another person the Faith. No person can truly convert another person. These things come from God—and they COST! God could convert all the sinners in the world in one single second—but He will not do so if we do pay for it! This is why Our Lady came at Fatima and Akita to ask for LOTS OF PRAYER and LOTS OF SACRIFICES. “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them” (Fatima) … “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger!” (Akita).
Spiritual Aspirins and Band-Aids
You will not heal a gunshot wound by giving the victim an aspirin and a Band-Aid. It takes far more than that! The same is true of spiritual healing—most people are riddled with the devil’s and the world’s gunshots. We are naïve and senseless if we think that a few Hail Marys are going to bring about massive conversions. We need to get serious and get real! If little Francisco at Fatima was told that he would have to pray MANY Rosaries before he would get to Heaven, then what about us and our worldly family members? How many more need to be said—especially given our super-sinful times! Look at the many years of prayer, penance and tears the St. Monica went through to bring about the conversion of her wayward son, the future St. Augustine! And we expect the same for a pittance!!?
The same applies to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass—how few are the people who have Masses regularly offered for the conversion of family members! They will pay a fortune for the best doctor available if a family member gets sick, but will not even pay a fraction of that to have a regular series of Masses said to cure their spiritual sickness! Senseless! Crazy! Foolish!
Those are the ‘big-guns’ that are neglected—and the devil rejoices over that! He simply pours more and more gasoline on the fires of family fights and feuds, waiting for the day when can carry on fighting and feuding in the fires of Hell! God help them! Unless they help themselves now by using what God has put before them!
Once that foundation has been laid, THEN you can start talking, encouraging, threatening, warning, pleading, explaining, teaching, etc. But without Him, we can do nothing! Lay the proper spiritual foundation first, then you can start to build on it.
Article 2
Monday after Septuagesima Sunday, January 29th
Are You Working or Shirking?
Monday after Septuagesima Sunday, January 29th
Are You Working or Shirking?
Lent is a Spiritual Vineyard
While the Epistle for Septuagesima Sunday speaks of running a race; the Gospel of Septuagesima Sunday speaks of working in the vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16). Just as the householder calls men to come and work in his vineyard, so too does God us to come and work in the vineyard of Lent:
“And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just.’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he saith to them: ‘Why stand you here all the day idle?’ They say to him: ‘Because no man hath hired us.’ He saith to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard.’” (Matthew 20:3-7).
Roll Up Those Sleeves
You could look upon Lent as being the eleventh hour, where God almost forces us into the vineyard through the laws of the Church, that require penance to be done during Lent. In the parable, some were called in at dawn and worked all day—which symbolizes those souls who make many sacrifices for God and do penance all year round. If we have been more or less idle so far, let us go into the Lenten Vineyard and work.
Salvation has been lost by most souls because they “stood idle all day in the market place”—or could we say stood idle all their life in shopping mall, engrossed in material things and idle talk and entertainment—neglecting what Our Lord calls the “one thing necessary” (Luke 10:42), which is the spiritual life and working towards the salvation of the soul.
The Gates of Heaven’s Vineyard Call for Work
Heaven has its gates open to those who are willing to work--“Work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). “Jesus answered them: ‘My Father worketh until now; and I work!” (John 5:17). “For He will render to a man his work, and, according to the ways of every one, He will reward them!” (Job 34:11). “Every man’s work shall be manifest; for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work, of what sort it is!” (1 Corinthians 3:13). “Therefore, be ye steadfast and unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord!” (1 Corinthians 15:58). “Therefore, whilst we have time, let us work good to all men, but especially to those who are of the household of the faith” (Galatians 6:10). “Walk worthy of God, in all things pleasing; being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God … All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 1:10; 3:17). “So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:16).
Let Us Not Be Idle in Spiritual Work
Would that we were able to say to God the same words Jesus addressed to Him: “I have glorified Thee on the Earth; I have finished the work which Thou gave Me to do!” (John 17:4). Or will we find ourselves addressed by these terrible words: “And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewed! Therefore you should have committed my money to the bankers, and at my coming I should have received my own with usury! [with interest] Take away therefore the talent from him, and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has shall be given, and he shall abound: but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have shall be taken away. And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:26-30).
Let Us Not Pride Ourselves in Our Earthly Works
“Extol not thyself in doing thy work” (Ecclesiasticus 10:29). “Their land is full of idols―they have adored the work of their own hands, which their own fingers have made!” (Isaias 2:8). “They are vain things and a ridiculous work―in the time of their visitation they shall perish!” (Jeremias 10:15). “Can those things then that are made by them be gods? How then can they be thought to be gods, if they can neither deliver themselves from war, nor save themselves from evils? For seeing they are but of wood, and laid over with gold, and with silver, it shall be known hereafter that they are false things, and it shall be manifest that they are no gods, but the work of men’s hands, and that there is no work of God in them” (Baruch 6:46-50). Do we waste most of our time creating worldly idols which we hold in greater esteem than God? Do we adore the works of our hands and our minds more than we adore God? Do we do our works for the glory of God, or for our own glory?
“Every work that is corruptible shall fail in the end: and the worker thereof shall go with it. And every excellent work shall be justified: and the worker thereof shall be honored therein” (Ecclesiasticus 14:20-21). “The work of the just is unto life; but the fruit of the wicked, unto sin” (Proverbs 10:16).
Good Fruit and Bad Fruit
However, in the vineyard of the Lord, as well as the vineyard of the world, there are good and bad trees, or as another parable states, Wheat and Cockle. God has planted, but the enemy has corrupted: “I planted thee a chosen vineyard, all true seed: how then art thou turned unto Me into that which is good for nothing!” (Jeremias 2:21). How does God view your family? St. Paul tells us that, regarding the Chosen People, “with most of them God was not well pleased” (1 Corinthians 10:5). What does God see when He looks down upon your family? Would the following verses apply? “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that does good, no not one!” (Psalm 52:3-4).
Does your family belong to the stereotype of the modern worldly family that forms the majority of families in the world today? If so, it is a bad sign according to the words of Our Lord: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it! Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:13-20). Can we gather godliness from worldliness? Can we become spiritual by immersing ourselves in materialism?
We Know Not the Day Nor the Hour
Prophecy speaks of two apostasies in the End Times—the “Minor Apostasy”, which really is far from being minor in the sense of trivial, and then, in the time of the Antichrist, there will the “Great Apostasy”, which precedes the Second Coming of Christ, of which Our Lord says: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). We can be sure that we have entered the time of the “Minor Apostasy” because of Our Lady’s warning at Fatima, where she implies that most of the Catholic world will lose the Faith, for she says “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved” to which can be added the words of Fr. Malachi Martin, who had read the Third Secret of Fatima: “The apostasy in the Church forms the backdrop or the context of the Third Secret. The apostasy is just beginning now. But the chastisements foretold in the Secret are very real, physical chastisements, and they are terrible!”
Thanks to the words of Our Lady and many other prophets throughout the annals of time, we have a good idea of what lies in store for us! What we do not know is the exact time that it will happen. As Our Lord says: “But of that day and hour no one knows, not the angels of Heaven, but the Father alone!” (Matthew 24:36). “Watch ye therefore, because you know not the day nor the hour!” (Matthew 25:13). “Watch ye therefore, because ye know not what hour your Lord will come! Wherefore be you also ready, because at what hour you know not the Son of man will come. The lord of that servant shall come in a day that he hopes not, and at an hour that he knows not!” (Matthew 24:42-50). Therefore, “Take ye heed, watch and pray! For ye know not when the time is!” (Mark 13:33).
Cultivate a Strong Faith
How strong is your family in the Faith—the question is not about being strong in theory, but strong in practice. Yet it is unlikely that the Faith of anyone is strong in the practice of the Faith, if it is not also proportionately strong in its knowledge of the Faith. It is a string Faith that overcomes the world: “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith” (1 John 5:4). Yet today’s weak Faith has been overcome by the world, Lent is the time to turn the tables onto the world, a time to push back the worldly tide, a time to recover a strong Faith once again. Yet there cannot be too many Lents left, we seem to be living on borrowed time. Will this another unplanned, insipid, lukewarm Lent, or will we truly get to work at reforming ourselves and the family around us? Will this Lent be a blaster or a disaster?
Work is a Cross
Work, usually, is more of a cross than it is a pleasure—and the work of reform is even less of a pleasure and even more of a cross. This is the result of Original Sin, whereby God punished Adam and Eve by making work difficult, whereas before it had been a pleasure: “And to Adam he said: ‘Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat, cursed is the earth in thy work; with labor and toil shalt thou eat thereof all the days of thy life. Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth, out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!’” (Genesis 3:17-19). We are reminded of these words of God to Adam on Ash Wednesday, as we enter the toil and labor of Lent, when our forehead is marked with dust (ashes) and we are told: “Remember, man, that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return!”
Penance is for Sin and Sinners
Because we have such a warped and cheap idea of sin—failing to see its true gravity—we therefore feel little or no need to do penance. If we hear the term “the sinners of this world” used, we do not really include ourselves among that group. Faced with the adulteress and the crowd of stone-throwers, Jesus said: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her” (John 8:7) for “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us” (1 John 1:10). The Pharisees were quick to see and tackle sins in others, but blind and reticent about tackling their own faults and failings. There can be no arguing with Holy Scripture when it says: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:8-10).
“There is none that does good. God looked down from Heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that does good, no not one!” (Psalm 52:2-4).
The problem today is that many things, that are evil, are instead looked upon as good—or at least not too bad!
The prophet Malachias could well address these words to us as did to the Chosen People of old: “You have wearied the Lord with your words, and you said: ‘Wherein have we wearied Him?’ In that you say: ‘Everyone that does evil, is good in the sight of the Lord, and such please Him!’ or ‘Where is the God of justice?’” (Malachias 2:17). The prophet Isaias has a condemning response to such a complacent attitude: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
Tragically, we have lost the sense of the gravity of sin! We forget that sin―whether it be mortal sin or even venial sin―is the greatest evil in the world! “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” … “Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
“If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us” (1 John 1:10). All have sinned and all have incurred a debt for sin which must be paid by penance.
We All Need Penance! Your Family Needs Penance!
We are all in need of penance; whether we think we are good or bad. For God judges differently to man. We judge merely on the surface, but God, Who notices the loss of one single hair from our head and takes note of every idle word we utter (Matthew 10:30; 12:36), also takes into account everything that contributes to our sins. “They have no excuse for their sin” (John 15:22).
Some are tempted more frequently, others less frequently; some are tempted with great vehemence, others lightly; some have many souls praying for them, others have few praying for them; some may have a natural temperament that will open them up to more temptation, others have a naturally strong blend of temperaments that help them resist temptation; some are hated more by the devil, others hated less; some are trying hard to be spiritual and will thus attract the devil’s attention and temptations, others are lukewarm, and so they are partially doing the devil’s work for him.
The list of possibilities is endless. That is why the ex-Pharisee, St. Paul, writes: “It is a very small thing to be judged by you, or by man’s day; but neither do I judge my own self” (1 Corinthians 4:3). The important thing is that do not try to play the “Adam and Eve Game” by pointing the finger at others and blaming them for OUR SINS! “And they began all at once to make excuse” (Luke 14:18)—which provoked the answer of “I say unto you, that none of those men that were invited, shall taste of my supper!” (Luke 14:24).
Christ Came Looking For Sinners!
Why do we downplay our sinfulness and our guilt when Christ came to seek and save sinners. But we will not be found and saved if we deny our sinfulness. A sick man cannot be cured unless he recognizes himself as sick and seeks out a doctor and takes the remedy the doctor gives him. The same is true for a sinner—who happens to spiritually sick. Christ does not come to condemn the sinner (at least not now, but He will at the end of time, or at the sinner’s death), but He comes to seek, find, reform and cure the sinner.
“For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting … God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him!” (John 3:16; 1 John 4:9). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). “The light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 3:19). “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it unto pride!” (Job 24:23).
We Work Hard, But at the Wrong Things
Most people can work hard and do work hard at some things. Yet, invariably, it is the wrong thing! Not necessarily a sinful thing—but they are piling efforts into a project, hobby or area which will do little or nothing towards their salvation—thus triggering the truth of Our Lord’s words when He said: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Which is why The Imitation of Christ opens with the following words: “This is the greatest wisdom — to seek the Kingdom of Heaven through contempt of the world. It is vanity, therefore, to seek and trust in riches that perish. It is vanity also to court honor and to be puffed up with pride. It is vanity to follow the lusts of the body and to desire things for which severe punishment later must come. It is vanity to wish for long life and to care little about a well-spent life. It is vanity to be concerned with the present only and not to make provision for things to come. It is vanity to love what passes quickly and not to look ahead where eternal joy abides” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 1).
The World Crisis is due to a Reversal of Values
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange comments: “God is now showing men what a great mistake they make when they try to do without Him, when they regard earthly enjoyment as their highest good, and thus reverse the whole scale of values … As though in the hope of compensating for the poor quality of earthly goods, men are striving to increase their quantity; they are trying to produce as much as possible in the order of material enjoyment ... The present state of the world is called a crisis. But in fact it is more than a crisis; it is a condition of affairs which, if men only had eyes to see, ought to be revealing, it ought to show men that they have sought their last end where it is not to be found, in earthly enjoyment—instead of God. They are seeking happiness in an abundance of material possessions which are incapable of giving it … for, so long as earthly possessions retain their nature and man retains the nature which is his, he will never find his happiness in them. The remedy is this, and this only: to consider the one thing necessary, and to ask God to give us saints who live only on this thought, saints who will give the world the spirit that it needs. God has always sent us saints in troubled times. We need them especially today” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
Clever People Showing What Fools They Are
The above quote comes from Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange’s summary of his two-volumed The Three Ages of the Interior Life, wherein he speaks of this misguided effort, placed on secondary things, while neglecting the one thing necessary: “Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be in certain respects the search for the true and the good in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation. There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Sowing the Wrong Seeds
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange shows how we have planted the wrong seeds and now we are bearing the bad fruit. What he says for the world as a whole, is equally true of families, parishes and schools. They have all become far too materialistic and more world orientated than Heaven orientated. As Our Lord says: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:16-19).
What kinds of seeds have been mainly planted in your family, parish or school? Spiritual seeds or worldly seeds? Of course there will be both. But what is the predominant kind of fruit tree? Good or bad? What preoccupies most of everyone’s time? What is the topic of conversations? What are the activities? How much religion enters into all of this? Is it superficial or profound. Rare or frequent?
Which is why Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “What we have just said is true at all times; but the question of the interior life is being more sharply raised today than in several periods less troubled than ours. The explanation of this interest lies in the fact that many men have separated themselves from God and tried to organize intellectual and social life without Him … To wish to get along without God, leads to an abyss; not only to nothingness, but also to physical and moral wretchedness that is worse than nothingness. Likewise, great problems grow exasperatingly serious, and man must finally perceive that all these problems ultimately lead to the fundamental religious problem; in other words, he will finally have to declare himself entirely for God or against Him. This is in its essence the problem of the interior life. Christ Himself says: ‘He that is not with Me is against Me.’
“The great modern scientific and social tendencies … converge, whether one wills it or not, toward the fundamental question of the intimate relations of man with God. When man will no longer fulfill his great religious duties toward God who created him and who is his last End, he makes a religion for himself―since he absolutely cannot get along without religion. Man may, for example, place his religion in science, or in the cult of social justice, or in some human ideal, which finally he considers in a religious manner and even in a mystical manner. Thus he turns away from supreme reality, and there arises a vast number of problems that will be solved only if he returns to the fundamental problem of the intimate relations of the soul with God.
“It has often been remarked that today science pretends to be a religion. Likewise Socialism and Communism claim to be a code of ethics, thereby trying to captivate hearts and minds. As a matter of fact, the modern scholar seems to have a scrupulous devotion to the scientific method. He cultivates it to such a degree that he often seems to prefer the method of research to the truth. If he bestowed equally serious care on his interior life, he would quickly reach sanctity.
“This is simply a reiteration of the statement that the religious problem of the relations of man with God is at the basis of every great problem. We must declare ourselves for or against Him; indifference is no longer possible, as our times show in a striking manner. The present world-wide economic crisis demonstrates what men can do when they seek to get along without God. Without God, the seriousness of life gets out of focus. If religion is no longer a grave matter, but something to smile at, then the serious element in life must be sought elsewhere. Some place it, or pretend to place it, in science, or in social activity … If the serious element in life is out of focus, if it no longer is concerned with our duties toward God, but with the scientific and social activities of man. If man continually seeks himself, instead of God, then events are not slow in showing him that he has taken an impossible way, which leads not only to nothingness, but to unbearable disorder and misery. We must again and again revert to Christ's words: ‘He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!’ The facts confirm this declaration.
“We conclude logically that religion can give an efficacious and truly realistic answer to the great modern problems, only if it is a religion that is PROFOUNDLY LIVED, not simply a superficial and cheap religion made up of some vocal prayers and some ceremonies, in which religious art has more place than true piety. As a matter of fact, no religion that is profoundly lived is without an interior life ... The logical conclusion to be drawn is that religion, the interior life, must be profound, must be a true life of union with God if it is to keep the pre-eminence it should have over scientific and social activities. This is a manifest necessity!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Creating Our Own Seeds of Religion
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange hit the nail on the head when he said: “When man will no longer fulfill his great religious duties toward God Who created him and Who is his last End, he makes a religion for himself―since he absolutely cannot get along without religion.” Many a Catholic would be shocked and scandalized if you accused them of having made a religion of their own—yet that, very sadly, is the case with a great number of Catholics.
They do not like God’s ‘very demanding’ version of religion, so they pick and choose, ignore and discard what they want. They replace dogmas and Church teaching with their own ‘dogmas’ whose authority is merely their own twisted imagination. This attitude has almost as many degrees as there are Catholics. Everyone has his or her own version. It ranges from everybody goes to Heaven to very few go to Heaven; from Hell is empty to Hell is full. Sin is only sin when I think it is wrong—to hell with what the Church teaches! God is given a ‘makeover’ whereby He is stripped of His garments of justice (which are all thrown into the trash can) and is made to put on layers and layers of clothing of mercy.
This is how and why most Catholics practice contraception; this is how and why only 2 out of 100 pray the Rosary daily; this is how and why most Catholics no longer go to Mass regularly on Sundays; why barely anyone goes to Confession anymore but almost everyone goes to Communion—all the while thinking that they are good Catholics. But the words of St. Paul are more likely to be true: “With most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:5).
Time to Reseed the Garden of Your Soul & Family
If we are going to be humbly truthful, then we have to admit that we as individuals and our families, parishes and schools, are far from being what God wants us to be! We are the complacent children of the modern Church’s 95% Lenten penance discount. We do 10 times more for ourselves than we do for God—and then we pretend that we are fulfilling the command to love God with our whole heart, with our whole mind, with our whole soul and our whole strength—while our nose grows longer each time we utter that lie.
It is time to admit that the majority of the seeds that have been sown in our own lives and our families, parishes and schools have been material, earthly, worldly seeds and that the fruits are not the fruits of God, but fruits of the world. As Our Lord says, those trees need to be cut down and thrown into the fire—and new spiritual seeds need to be sown—before we end up in the fire ourselves! God is not a merciful doormat upon Whom we can wipe our worldly or even sinful feet time and time again without there ever being any repercussions or consequences.
Our Lady has warned us for the last 170 years of those terrible and awful consequences, which, when they come, will prove the truth of the Holy Scripture when it says: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “The Lord delays not His promise [of chastisement], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Now is the time to work on your family, parish and school to cultivate and prepare the right attitude of mind for the start of Lent. That right attitude of mind is the not the mindset of the “95% Lenten Penance Discount” (reducing the 40 days of Lenten fast to a mere 2 day: Ash Wednesday and Good Friday)—for Our Lady already foretold, warned and condemned that attitude at La Salette, saying that prayer and penance would be neglected with the consequence that many souls would be lost. Much prayer and much penance is needed—you need to convince yourself and those around you of that truth. If not, then we have all read and know the terrible penance that God is preparing to impose on the world. Better pay now, which is mere cents on the dollar, than pay then, which will see an interest rate that goes through the roof!
“Each of us will give an account of himself to God.” (Romans 14:12).
While the Epistle for Septuagesima Sunday speaks of running a race; the Gospel of Septuagesima Sunday speaks of working in the vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16). Just as the householder calls men to come and work in his vineyard, so too does God us to come and work in the vineyard of Lent:
“And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just.’ And they went their way. And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner. But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he saith to them: ‘Why stand you here all the day idle?’ They say to him: ‘Because no man hath hired us.’ He saith to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard.’” (Matthew 20:3-7).
Roll Up Those Sleeves
You could look upon Lent as being the eleventh hour, where God almost forces us into the vineyard through the laws of the Church, that require penance to be done during Lent. In the parable, some were called in at dawn and worked all day—which symbolizes those souls who make many sacrifices for God and do penance all year round. If we have been more or less idle so far, let us go into the Lenten Vineyard and work.
Salvation has been lost by most souls because they “stood idle all day in the market place”—or could we say stood idle all their life in shopping mall, engrossed in material things and idle talk and entertainment—neglecting what Our Lord calls the “one thing necessary” (Luke 10:42), which is the spiritual life and working towards the salvation of the soul.
The Gates of Heaven’s Vineyard Call for Work
Heaven has its gates open to those who are willing to work--“Work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). “Jesus answered them: ‘My Father worketh until now; and I work!” (John 5:17). “For He will render to a man his work, and, according to the ways of every one, He will reward them!” (Job 34:11). “Every man’s work shall be manifest; for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work, of what sort it is!” (1 Corinthians 3:13). “Therefore, be ye steadfast and unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord!” (1 Corinthians 15:58). “Therefore, whilst we have time, let us work good to all men, but especially to those who are of the household of the faith” (Galatians 6:10). “Walk worthy of God, in all things pleasing; being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God … All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him!” (Colossians 1:10; 3:17). “So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:16).
Let Us Not Be Idle in Spiritual Work
Would that we were able to say to God the same words Jesus addressed to Him: “I have glorified Thee on the Earth; I have finished the work which Thou gave Me to do!” (John 17:4). Or will we find ourselves addressed by these terrible words: “And his lord answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I sow not, and gather where I have not strewed! Therefore you should have committed my money to the bankers, and at my coming I should have received my own with usury! [with interest] Take away therefore the talent from him, and give it to him that has ten talents. For to everyone that has shall be given, and he shall abound: but from him that has not, that also which he seems to have shall be taken away. And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!” (Matthew 25:26-30).
Let Us Not Pride Ourselves in Our Earthly Works
“Extol not thyself in doing thy work” (Ecclesiasticus 10:29). “Their land is full of idols―they have adored the work of their own hands, which their own fingers have made!” (Isaias 2:8). “They are vain things and a ridiculous work―in the time of their visitation they shall perish!” (Jeremias 10:15). “Can those things then that are made by them be gods? How then can they be thought to be gods, if they can neither deliver themselves from war, nor save themselves from evils? For seeing they are but of wood, and laid over with gold, and with silver, it shall be known hereafter that they are false things, and it shall be manifest that they are no gods, but the work of men’s hands, and that there is no work of God in them” (Baruch 6:46-50). Do we waste most of our time creating worldly idols which we hold in greater esteem than God? Do we adore the works of our hands and our minds more than we adore God? Do we do our works for the glory of God, or for our own glory?
“Every work that is corruptible shall fail in the end: and the worker thereof shall go with it. And every excellent work shall be justified: and the worker thereof shall be honored therein” (Ecclesiasticus 14:20-21). “The work of the just is unto life; but the fruit of the wicked, unto sin” (Proverbs 10:16).
Good Fruit and Bad Fruit
However, in the vineyard of the Lord, as well as the vineyard of the world, there are good and bad trees, or as another parable states, Wheat and Cockle. God has planted, but the enemy has corrupted: “I planted thee a chosen vineyard, all true seed: how then art thou turned unto Me into that which is good for nothing!” (Jeremias 2:21). How does God view your family? St. Paul tells us that, regarding the Chosen People, “with most of them God was not well pleased” (1 Corinthians 10:5). What does God see when He looks down upon your family? Would the following verses apply? “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that does good, no not one!” (Psalm 52:3-4).
Does your family belong to the stereotype of the modern worldly family that forms the majority of families in the world today? If so, it is a bad sign according to the words of Our Lord: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it! Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:13-20). Can we gather godliness from worldliness? Can we become spiritual by immersing ourselves in materialism?
We Know Not the Day Nor the Hour
Prophecy speaks of two apostasies in the End Times—the “Minor Apostasy”, which really is far from being minor in the sense of trivial, and then, in the time of the Antichrist, there will the “Great Apostasy”, which precedes the Second Coming of Christ, of which Our Lord says: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). We can be sure that we have entered the time of the “Minor Apostasy” because of Our Lady’s warning at Fatima, where she implies that most of the Catholic world will lose the Faith, for she says “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved” to which can be added the words of Fr. Malachi Martin, who had read the Third Secret of Fatima: “The apostasy in the Church forms the backdrop or the context of the Third Secret. The apostasy is just beginning now. But the chastisements foretold in the Secret are very real, physical chastisements, and they are terrible!”
Thanks to the words of Our Lady and many other prophets throughout the annals of time, we have a good idea of what lies in store for us! What we do not know is the exact time that it will happen. As Our Lord says: “But of that day and hour no one knows, not the angels of Heaven, but the Father alone!” (Matthew 24:36). “Watch ye therefore, because you know not the day nor the hour!” (Matthew 25:13). “Watch ye therefore, because ye know not what hour your Lord will come! Wherefore be you also ready, because at what hour you know not the Son of man will come. The lord of that servant shall come in a day that he hopes not, and at an hour that he knows not!” (Matthew 24:42-50). Therefore, “Take ye heed, watch and pray! For ye know not when the time is!” (Mark 13:33).
Cultivate a Strong Faith
How strong is your family in the Faith—the question is not about being strong in theory, but strong in practice. Yet it is unlikely that the Faith of anyone is strong in the practice of the Faith, if it is not also proportionately strong in its knowledge of the Faith. It is a string Faith that overcomes the world: “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith” (1 John 5:4). Yet today’s weak Faith has been overcome by the world, Lent is the time to turn the tables onto the world, a time to push back the worldly tide, a time to recover a strong Faith once again. Yet there cannot be too many Lents left, we seem to be living on borrowed time. Will this another unplanned, insipid, lukewarm Lent, or will we truly get to work at reforming ourselves and the family around us? Will this Lent be a blaster or a disaster?
Work is a Cross
Work, usually, is more of a cross than it is a pleasure—and the work of reform is even less of a pleasure and even more of a cross. This is the result of Original Sin, whereby God punished Adam and Eve by making work difficult, whereas before it had been a pleasure: “And to Adam he said: ‘Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat, cursed is the earth in thy work; with labor and toil shalt thou eat thereof all the days of thy life. Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth, out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return!’” (Genesis 3:17-19). We are reminded of these words of God to Adam on Ash Wednesday, as we enter the toil and labor of Lent, when our forehead is marked with dust (ashes) and we are told: “Remember, man, that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return!”
Penance is for Sin and Sinners
Because we have such a warped and cheap idea of sin—failing to see its true gravity—we therefore feel little or no need to do penance. If we hear the term “the sinners of this world” used, we do not really include ourselves among that group. Faced with the adulteress and the crowd of stone-throwers, Jesus said: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her” (John 8:7) for “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us” (1 John 1:10). The Pharisees were quick to see and tackle sins in others, but blind and reticent about tackling their own faults and failings. There can be no arguing with Holy Scripture when it says: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:8-10).
“There is none that does good. God looked down from Heaven on the children of men: to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that does good, no not one!” (Psalm 52:2-4).
The problem today is that many things, that are evil, are instead looked upon as good—or at least not too bad!
The prophet Malachias could well address these words to us as did to the Chosen People of old: “You have wearied the Lord with your words, and you said: ‘Wherein have we wearied Him?’ In that you say: ‘Everyone that does evil, is good in the sight of the Lord, and such please Him!’ or ‘Where is the God of justice?’” (Malachias 2:17). The prophet Isaias has a condemning response to such a complacent attitude: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
Tragically, we have lost the sense of the gravity of sin! We forget that sin―whether it be mortal sin or even venial sin―is the greatest evil in the world! “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” … “Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
“If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us” (1 John 1:10). All have sinned and all have incurred a debt for sin which must be paid by penance.
We All Need Penance! Your Family Needs Penance!
We are all in need of penance; whether we think we are good or bad. For God judges differently to man. We judge merely on the surface, but God, Who notices the loss of one single hair from our head and takes note of every idle word we utter (Matthew 10:30; 12:36), also takes into account everything that contributes to our sins. “They have no excuse for their sin” (John 15:22).
Some are tempted more frequently, others less frequently; some are tempted with great vehemence, others lightly; some have many souls praying for them, others have few praying for them; some may have a natural temperament that will open them up to more temptation, others have a naturally strong blend of temperaments that help them resist temptation; some are hated more by the devil, others hated less; some are trying hard to be spiritual and will thus attract the devil’s attention and temptations, others are lukewarm, and so they are partially doing the devil’s work for him.
The list of possibilities is endless. That is why the ex-Pharisee, St. Paul, writes: “It is a very small thing to be judged by you, or by man’s day; but neither do I judge my own self” (1 Corinthians 4:3). The important thing is that do not try to play the “Adam and Eve Game” by pointing the finger at others and blaming them for OUR SINS! “And they began all at once to make excuse” (Luke 14:18)—which provoked the answer of “I say unto you, that none of those men that were invited, shall taste of my supper!” (Luke 14:24).
Christ Came Looking For Sinners!
Why do we downplay our sinfulness and our guilt when Christ came to seek and save sinners. But we will not be found and saved if we deny our sinfulness. A sick man cannot be cured unless he recognizes himself as sick and seeks out a doctor and takes the remedy the doctor gives him. The same is true for a sinner—who happens to spiritually sick. Christ does not come to condemn the sinner (at least not now, but He will at the end of time, or at the sinner’s death), but He comes to seek, find, reform and cure the sinner.
“For God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting … God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by Him!” (John 3:16; 1 John 4:9). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). “The light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light―for their works were evil” (John 3:19). “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it unto pride!” (Job 24:23).
We Work Hard, But at the Wrong Things
Most people can work hard and do work hard at some things. Yet, invariably, it is the wrong thing! Not necessarily a sinful thing—but they are piling efforts into a project, hobby or area which will do little or nothing towards their salvation—thus triggering the truth of Our Lord’s words when He said: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Which is why The Imitation of Christ opens with the following words: “This is the greatest wisdom — to seek the Kingdom of Heaven through contempt of the world. It is vanity, therefore, to seek and trust in riches that perish. It is vanity also to court honor and to be puffed up with pride. It is vanity to follow the lusts of the body and to desire things for which severe punishment later must come. It is vanity to wish for long life and to care little about a well-spent life. It is vanity to be concerned with the present only and not to make provision for things to come. It is vanity to love what passes quickly and not to look ahead where eternal joy abides” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 1).
The World Crisis is due to a Reversal of Values
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange comments: “God is now showing men what a great mistake they make when they try to do without Him, when they regard earthly enjoyment as their highest good, and thus reverse the whole scale of values … As though in the hope of compensating for the poor quality of earthly goods, men are striving to increase their quantity; they are trying to produce as much as possible in the order of material enjoyment ... The present state of the world is called a crisis. But in fact it is more than a crisis; it is a condition of affairs which, if men only had eyes to see, ought to be revealing, it ought to show men that they have sought their last end where it is not to be found, in earthly enjoyment—instead of God. They are seeking happiness in an abundance of material possessions which are incapable of giving it … for, so long as earthly possessions retain their nature and man retains the nature which is his, he will never find his happiness in them. The remedy is this, and this only: to consider the one thing necessary, and to ask God to give us saints who live only on this thought, saints who will give the world the spirit that it needs. God has always sent us saints in troubled times. We need them especially today” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
Clever People Showing What Fools They Are
The above quote comes from Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange’s summary of his two-volumed The Three Ages of the Interior Life, wherein he speaks of this misguided effort, placed on secondary things, while neglecting the one thing necessary: “Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists, and astronomers have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him. Their life appears to be in certain respects the search for the true and the good in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation. There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Sowing the Wrong Seeds
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange shows how we have planted the wrong seeds and now we are bearing the bad fruit. What he says for the world as a whole, is equally true of families, parishes and schools. They have all become far too materialistic and more world orientated than Heaven orientated. As Our Lord says: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire!” (Matthew 7:16-19).
What kinds of seeds have been mainly planted in your family, parish or school? Spiritual seeds or worldly seeds? Of course there will be both. But what is the predominant kind of fruit tree? Good or bad? What preoccupies most of everyone’s time? What is the topic of conversations? What are the activities? How much religion enters into all of this? Is it superficial or profound. Rare or frequent?
Which is why Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes: “What we have just said is true at all times; but the question of the interior life is being more sharply raised today than in several periods less troubled than ours. The explanation of this interest lies in the fact that many men have separated themselves from God and tried to organize intellectual and social life without Him … To wish to get along without God, leads to an abyss; not only to nothingness, but also to physical and moral wretchedness that is worse than nothingness. Likewise, great problems grow exasperatingly serious, and man must finally perceive that all these problems ultimately lead to the fundamental religious problem; in other words, he will finally have to declare himself entirely for God or against Him. This is in its essence the problem of the interior life. Christ Himself says: ‘He that is not with Me is against Me.’
“The great modern scientific and social tendencies … converge, whether one wills it or not, toward the fundamental question of the intimate relations of man with God. When man will no longer fulfill his great religious duties toward God who created him and who is his last End, he makes a religion for himself―since he absolutely cannot get along without religion. Man may, for example, place his religion in science, or in the cult of social justice, or in some human ideal, which finally he considers in a religious manner and even in a mystical manner. Thus he turns away from supreme reality, and there arises a vast number of problems that will be solved only if he returns to the fundamental problem of the intimate relations of the soul with God.
“It has often been remarked that today science pretends to be a religion. Likewise Socialism and Communism claim to be a code of ethics, thereby trying to captivate hearts and minds. As a matter of fact, the modern scholar seems to have a scrupulous devotion to the scientific method. He cultivates it to such a degree that he often seems to prefer the method of research to the truth. If he bestowed equally serious care on his interior life, he would quickly reach sanctity.
“This is simply a reiteration of the statement that the religious problem of the relations of man with God is at the basis of every great problem. We must declare ourselves for or against Him; indifference is no longer possible, as our times show in a striking manner. The present world-wide economic crisis demonstrates what men can do when they seek to get along without God. Without God, the seriousness of life gets out of focus. If religion is no longer a grave matter, but something to smile at, then the serious element in life must be sought elsewhere. Some place it, or pretend to place it, in science, or in social activity … If the serious element in life is out of focus, if it no longer is concerned with our duties toward God, but with the scientific and social activities of man. If man continually seeks himself, instead of God, then events are not slow in showing him that he has taken an impossible way, which leads not only to nothingness, but to unbearable disorder and misery. We must again and again revert to Christ's words: ‘He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!’ The facts confirm this declaration.
“We conclude logically that religion can give an efficacious and truly realistic answer to the great modern problems, only if it is a religion that is PROFOUNDLY LIVED, not simply a superficial and cheap religion made up of some vocal prayers and some ceremonies, in which religious art has more place than true piety. As a matter of fact, no religion that is profoundly lived is without an interior life ... The logical conclusion to be drawn is that religion, the interior life, must be profound, must be a true life of union with God if it is to keep the pre-eminence it should have over scientific and social activities. This is a manifest necessity!” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).
Creating Our Own Seeds of Religion
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange hit the nail on the head when he said: “When man will no longer fulfill his great religious duties toward God Who created him and Who is his last End, he makes a religion for himself―since he absolutely cannot get along without religion.” Many a Catholic would be shocked and scandalized if you accused them of having made a religion of their own—yet that, very sadly, is the case with a great number of Catholics.
They do not like God’s ‘very demanding’ version of religion, so they pick and choose, ignore and discard what they want. They replace dogmas and Church teaching with their own ‘dogmas’ whose authority is merely their own twisted imagination. This attitude has almost as many degrees as there are Catholics. Everyone has his or her own version. It ranges from everybody goes to Heaven to very few go to Heaven; from Hell is empty to Hell is full. Sin is only sin when I think it is wrong—to hell with what the Church teaches! God is given a ‘makeover’ whereby He is stripped of His garments of justice (which are all thrown into the trash can) and is made to put on layers and layers of clothing of mercy.
This is how and why most Catholics practice contraception; this is how and why only 2 out of 100 pray the Rosary daily; this is how and why most Catholics no longer go to Mass regularly on Sundays; why barely anyone goes to Confession anymore but almost everyone goes to Communion—all the while thinking that they are good Catholics. But the words of St. Paul are more likely to be true: “With most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:5).
Time to Reseed the Garden of Your Soul & Family
If we are going to be humbly truthful, then we have to admit that we as individuals and our families, parishes and schools, are far from being what God wants us to be! We are the complacent children of the modern Church’s 95% Lenten penance discount. We do 10 times more for ourselves than we do for God—and then we pretend that we are fulfilling the command to love God with our whole heart, with our whole mind, with our whole soul and our whole strength—while our nose grows longer each time we utter that lie.
It is time to admit that the majority of the seeds that have been sown in our own lives and our families, parishes and schools have been material, earthly, worldly seeds and that the fruits are not the fruits of God, but fruits of the world. As Our Lord says, those trees need to be cut down and thrown into the fire—and new spiritual seeds need to be sown—before we end up in the fire ourselves! God is not a merciful doormat upon Whom we can wipe our worldly or even sinful feet time and time again without there ever being any repercussions or consequences.
Our Lady has warned us for the last 170 years of those terrible and awful consequences, which, when they come, will prove the truth of the Holy Scripture when it says: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “The Lord delays not His promise [of chastisement], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Now is the time to work on your family, parish and school to cultivate and prepare the right attitude of mind for the start of Lent. That right attitude of mind is the not the mindset of the “95% Lenten Penance Discount” (reducing the 40 days of Lenten fast to a mere 2 day: Ash Wednesday and Good Friday)—for Our Lady already foretold, warned and condemned that attitude at La Salette, saying that prayer and penance would be neglected with the consequence that many souls would be lost. Much prayer and much penance is needed—you need to convince yourself and those around you of that truth. If not, then we have all read and know the terrible penance that God is preparing to impose on the world. Better pay now, which is mere cents on the dollar, than pay then, which will see an interest rate that goes through the roof!
“Each of us will give an account of himself to God.” (Romans 14:12).
Article 1
Septuagesima Sunday, January 28th
The Race of Your Life! Don't Be a Loser!
Septuagesima Sunday, January 28th
The Race of Your Life! Don't Be a Loser!
Get the Spiritual Engine Serviced Before Lent
Before we know it, Lent will be upon us! This Sunday, Septuagesima Sunday, the Church will place before us the words of St. Paul, about running in a race in such a manner that we may win. “Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain” (1 Corinthians 9: 24). In our lazy modern times, the car has replaced the two feet as the chief means of running around; but whether it is the athlete with his feet, or the driver with his car, the bottom line is that, to win a race, the athlete or the car has to be in peak condition. Most Catholic cars (souls) are far from being in peak condition—much like the Israelite ‘cars’ (souls) crossing the desert—most of whom were not pleasing to God, as the reading from the Mass of Septuagesima Sunday points out:
God’s Viewpoint of the Racers
“For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud, and in the sea: and did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the desert” (1 Corinthians 10:1-5).
Hence St. Paul warns us that “Now these things were done in a figure of us, that we should not covet evil things as they also coveted. Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play!’ Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed fornication, and there fell in one day three and twenty thousand. Neither let us tempt Christ: as some of them tempted, and perished by the serpents. Neither do you murmur: as some of them murmured, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now all these things happened to them in figure: and they are written for our correction, upon whom the ends of the world are come. Wherefore he that thinketh himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:6-12).
In a certain sense, they all ran in the race for the Promised Land, but only Josue and Caleb (with their families) out of the original 4 or so million that started out from Egypt, actually entered the Promised Land and successfully crossed the ‘finish-line’—the remaining finishers were born in desert during those 40 years. With most of the ‘starters’ God was not well pleased! They ended up being starters and losers, not starter and finishers and winners. Unfortunately, the same is true for Catholics―all of them start the race for Heaven at their Baptism, but very few get there in the end! [read more here]. As Our Lord said: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate! For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Our Lord mentioned the time of Noe and the Ark, reminded us of how few were saved―“the flood came, and took them all away” (Matthew 24:39). God had no qualms about eliminating most of the human race because of sin and wiped them off the face of the Earth.
Secondly, no athlete will win a competitive race without training beforehand. The car has to be tried out beforehand also, to see if all is running smoothly and well. This is what the Septuagesima season, with its three countdown Sundays (Septuagesima, Sexagesima and Quinquagesima) is for: a serious time of preparation for the even more serious time of Lent.
The means to win are fairly simple, but most engines misfire and overheat by using the means badly. The means, as Our Lady has tried to tell us many times, as PRAYER and PENANCE. You could say prayer is the gasoline and penance is the oil for the engine. Prayer is of the utmost importance to our ‘spiritual engine’; it is what drives our ‘spiritual body’ forwards and it is what gives it power.
The Power of Prayer
“Do we believe in the power of prayer? We know the common teaching of theologians: that true prayer—by which we ask something for ourselves with humility, confidence and perseverance, the graces necessary for salvation—is infallibly efficacious (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa IIae, Q.83, Art.15, ad 2). We know this doctrine, and yet it seems to us, at times, that we have truly prayed without being heard. We believe in, or rather we see, the power of a machine, of an army, of money and of knowledge; but we do not believe strongly enough in the efficacy of prayer.” (Rev. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23).
The Gasoline of Grace comes through Prayer
“The modern world cannot do without God. This is the root of its ills. The great truth is that we have an absolute need of God…He normally bestows His grace only in response to prayer. Since our need exists at all times....”We ought always to pray and not to faint” (Luke 18:1)....The true nature of Christian prayer is perfectly expressed in the following definition given by St. John Damascene and St. Thomas Aquinas: prayer is “a raising of the mind and heart towards God” to offer Him our homage and to ask Him for all those things of which we stand in need” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Spinning Wheels and Going Nowhere
People often pray without realizing what it is that they are doing, or Whom they are addressing! God so rightly complains in Scripture saying: “This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:7).
St. Louis de Montfort―in speaking of praying the Rosary in particular―writes: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly … To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? … It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
Dom Marmion adds: “It happens to some souls that, when they have recited many formulas, they realize that they have said nothing to God from the bottom of their hearts. Our mind may be far distant from the words that fall from our lips....In our prayer, we must give up to God our whole heart and our whole mind....Just as the sanctuary light burns itself up without reserving anything, so our soul, in its conversation with God, must be entirely dedicated to the Almighty. We must free ourselves from preoccupations and from vain thoughts, which tie the soul down to Earth and prevent it from being entirely given over to the Lord” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Winning Races Requires Intensity
Many find prayer difficult. That is only natural, since we are trying to communicate with the supernatural world.
“Prayer always requires a certain effort, even from those who find in it their delight, because a certain strain is involved in the concentration necessary to speak to God; it is always more or less difficult to maintain the soul in an atmosphere which is above its usual level. That is why prayer can serve as a sacramental penance. We must not be surprised at this difficulty in applying ourselves to prayer: for to raise ourselves towards God, even in the smallest degree, is to exceed our natural powers” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Focus on the Race, the Whole Race and Nothing but the Race
Too many people limit prayer to an isolated part of the day—first thing in the morning or last thing at night. Yet God should be part of our whole day, not just a mere ten minutes.
“Prayer in our life, must not be limited to a number of isolated, passing incidents. We must cultivate a spirit of prayer. What must we understand by this? A spirit of prayer is an habitual disposition of soul whereby, in our troubles and discouragements, as well as in our joys and successes, our hearts turn towards Our Lady and Our Lord, as to our best friends and most intimate confidants of our feelings. And it is not only in the morning and in the evening that the soul should be raised heavenwards, but always: ‘My eyes are ever towards the Lord’ (Psalm 24:15)” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ--The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
All Enter the Race, Not All Finish the Race
Prayer is actually a bending of our will towards the will of God. He wishes the salvation of all, but all will not be saved—and one of the contributory causes of failing to make it to Heaven is a lack of prayer; a lack of prayer by those who will be damned (the driver) and a lack of prayer on the part of others for the conversion of those unfortunate souls (the mechanics and maintenance crew).
“For material harvests, God prepared the seed, the rain that must help it germinate, the sun that will ripen the fruits of the Earth. Likewise, for spiritual harvest, He has prepared spiritual seeds, the divine graces necessary for sanctification and salvation. Prayer is one of the causes meant to produce that sanctification and salvation” (Rev. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23). We can add to this the Biblical axiom of we reap what we sow: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8). Prayer is sowing in the spirit. Playing is sowing in the flesh. The Angel said to the children at Fatima: “Don’t play, but pray!”
“St. Gregory the Great says: ‘Men ought, by prayer, to dispose themselves to receive what Almighty God, from eternity, has decided to give them’ (Dialogues, Book 1, chapter 8). Thus, Christ, wishing to convert the Samaritan woman, led her to pray by saying to her: “If thou didst know the gift of God!” In the same way, He granted Mary Magdalen a strong and gentle actual grace, which inclined her to repentance and to prayer. He acted in the same way to Zacheus and the Good Thief. It is, therefore, as necessary to pray in order to obtain the help of God, as it is necessary to sow seed in order to have wheat. To those who say that, what was to happen would happen, whether they prayed or not, is as foolish as to maintain that, whether or not we sowed seed, wheat would still appear once summer came! Therefore, prayer is necessary to obtain the help of God, as seed is necessary for the harvest” (Rev. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23).
The problems we face, arise from the fact that God is prepared to give far more than we are prepared to ask for—we are so lazy and negligent, lacking in confidence and perseverance, that we receive only a fraction of what God is prepared to give. The efficacy of prayer, correctly made, is infallibly assured by Christ:
“Ask, and it shall be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you....And which of you, if he ask his father bread, will he give him a stone? Or a fish, will he give him a serpent?...If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father from Heaven give the good Spirit to them that ask Him?” (Luke 11:9-13). The problem does not lie with the Giver, but with us.
Some Racing Tips
Many of us become discouraged with prayer because our prayers are rarely, if ever heard. It is like entering the race just to make up numbers—but we never win! Yet, there are ways in which we can, almost infallibly, get our prayers answered and win that race! The spiritual writers or racers list the following chief tactics as “infallible” or guaranteed means of having our prayers favorably heard and answered:
1. Pray for what is good and not sinful or harmful to our salvation — We should always remember that what we want is not always what we need. At times, adversity is a better route to Heaven than prosperity. St. Augustine says: “We ought to be persuaded that what God refuses to our prayer, He grants to our salvation.”
2. Our prayer must be humble — Remember the prayer of the Pharisee and the Publican. Remember, too, Our Lady’s prayer, the Magnificat, wherein she says that God has “regarded the humility of His handmaid…He hath put down the mighty from their seat and hath exalted the humble.” The Old Testament says: “...nor from the beginning have the proud been acceptable to Thee: but the prayer of the humble and the meek hath always pleased Thee” (Judith 9:16). “May the Lord destroy all deceitful lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things” (Psalm 11:4). “Thou hast rebuked the proud” (Psalm 118:21). “Every proud man is an abomination to the Lord” (Proverbs 16:5).
3. Our prayer must be fervent —Too often our prayers are said listlessly, routinely, mechanically; our heart is not in them. Of such Our Lord said: “This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:7). Our prayers should be like grains of incense, placed on the hot coals of our hearts.
4. We should amend our life — If we persist in leading a life of sin, even venial sin, then we greatly handicap the chances of having our prayers heard. “He who turns his ears from hearing the law, his prayer is an abomination” (Proverbs 28:9).
5. We should forgive those who have injured us — This was the example of Christ dying on the cross: “Father, forgive them...” “If, therefore, thou offer thy gift at the altar, and there thou remember that thy brother hath anything against thee—Leave there thy offering before the altar, and go first to be reconciled to thy brother: and then, coming, thou shalt offer thy gift” (Matthew 5:23-24). “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). “Forgive thy neighbor if he hath hurt thee, and then shall thy sins be forgiven to thee, when thou prayest” (Ecclesiasticus. 28:2).
6. Our prayer should be united to good works or sacrifices — “Prayer is good with fasting and alms” (Tobias 12:8). That is why penance is so crucial in strengthening our prayer. Our Lady asks not only for prayer at Fatima, but prayer and sacrifices. The power of this is expressed in Scripture, where the Apostles failed to cast out a demon from one particular person, and asked Our Lord why they had failed. Our Lord replied: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20).
7. We should pray with confidence — Our Lord praised the Faith and confidence of persons on many occasions, saying: “Go, thy Faith has made thee whole…” (Matthew 9:22; Mark 5:34; 10:52; Luke 17:19; 18:42). He also told us that “all things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive” (Matthew 21:22). Do we have that confidence in prayer?
8. We should pray with perseverance — “He defers the granting to increase our desire and appreciation” says St. Augustine. Our Lord Himself said: “Yet if he shall continue knocking, I say to you, although he will not rise and give him because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise and give him as many as he needeth. And I say to you: Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you” (Luke 11:8-9).
If we would only pray in the above manner, we would be amazed at the response our prayers would bring from Heaven! Keep in mind the words of St. Augustine: “The man who knows how to pray well, is the one who knows how to live well.” Which, for our purposes, translates into “Drive well, and you’ll win the race! Pray well, and you’ll get the grace!”
The Penance Part
You could say that the “prayer part” to Lent is like an athlete’s mental attitude. The “penance part” of Lent to be likened to the athlete’s bodily fitness. Winners are usually those athletes who are both mentally strong and physically fit and strong. The same can be said to be true of the spiritual life—which is why, when asked by His Apostles why they had failed to cast out the devil from a young boy, Our Lord replied: “But this kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20).
Wholly Wholesome Holy & Whole
Therefore, we need to use our WHOLE being in our spiritual warfare and in the spiritual race for Heaven—not just soul, but body too—for a human being is a composite of body and soul. Which is why Holy Scripture powerfully and almost severely commands both elements in unmistakably strong terms: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint!” (Luke 18:1) … “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) … “Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times, that you may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that are to come, and to stand before the Son of man” (Luke 21:36) … “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! [and Our Lord then repeats Himself two verses later] … No, I say to you; but except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5) … “The Lord delayeth not his promise [of punishment], as some imagine, but dealeth patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9) … “God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23).
In fact, things are so intertwined, that we could say that prayer and penance are just as necessary for one and the other. We must pray with the mind and mortify the mind. We must pray with the body and mortify the body.
Furthermore, just as in a good healthy, nourishing diet, there has to be a balance and a variety in our prayers and penances. As in a diet we must have proper proportions of proteins, carbohydrates and fats, so too in our spiritual diet we have to have a balance between various bodily ‘proteins’, ‘carbohydrates’ and ‘fats’ and mental ‘proteins’, ‘carbohydrates’ and ‘fats’—in order to avoid become one-dimensional and restricted in our spirituality.
Specific Penances for Specific Sins
Prayer and Fasting are among the best penances that can be undertaken—as Our Lord points out: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20). Yet we must also remember that—in both Hell and Purgatory—sins are punished in a specific way that somehow corresponds to the type of sin committed. Thus, the murderer will be punished differently to the drunkard. The adulterer differently to the slanderer or detractor. The thief differently to the blasphemer, and so on and on and on. Likewise, our penances can and should correspond to our sins, even while we live on Earth. Everyone is different and so everyone’s sins differ from his or her neighbor’s sins. Therefore the appropriate penance will also be different. The general rule of thumb being—as St. Ignatius says in his Spiritual Exercises—“agere contra”, which literally means “act against” or “act in opposition to”—which more precisely means “do the opposite.”
Therefore, if you are naturally a critical person, then be more praising and more accepting. If you are stingy, then be more generous. If you are lazy, be more industrious. If too inattentive, show more attention. If too untidy, show a greater tidiness. If too timid, be more courageous. If too angry, be more meek. If never wrong, start apologizing for your errors. If lukewarm, be more fervent. If a constant complainer, thank God more for your lot in life. If greedy, be temperate. If proud, accept humiliations gladly. If always excusing yourself, blame yourself more. If unhelpful, be more helpful. You see the principle being used—the list is as endless as sins are endless in their nuances. The bedrock or foundation to all this can and should be prayer and fasting, but built on top of the foundation should be an individual building of tailor-made penance that corresponds to one’s own personal sins.
Start Planning Now!
Let’s be honest and admit it—we are not going to plan and put into practice such a tailor-made approach to penance on Ash Wednesday. The only place “winging-it” will get you to is the “Hall of Fame of Failure!” As you sow, so shall you reap. “He who soweth sparingly, shall also reap sparingly: and he who soweth in blessings, shall also reap blessings” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
Take a sheet of paper and write down your CHIEF faults—which are often those we do not want to face, or downplay, or even deny! If you’re not sure—then ask some honest, non-flattering, people around you who know you very well. Just don’t fall-out with them or injure them when the hit the nail on the head!
Once you have a STARTER list (you can add more as you start to diminish the frequency in committing the sins list in this first batch), then start to examine them in detail—when, where, how to they arise? With or against whom? What means are you avoiding to take, that could reduce these sins? Do you pray daily, even many times daily, asking for the grace to overcome them? Do you mortify yourself to avoid them? Do you punish yourself in some way after having committed them? List a variety of ways and methods open to you to overcome them—if unsure, consult with your confessor. Write down a series of heavier and heavier self-inflicted punishments or sanctions for every successive time you fail and fall. Make those sins the regular part of your confession, reporting if they have increased or decreased since your last confession.
Make Lent a Family Affair, Not Just Individual
Our Lord sent out His disciples in pairs—two-by-two—knowing full well that mutual support is necessary for courage, perseverance and success. The Legion of Mary also works this way—sending out its Legionaries in pairs as much as possible. In normal times, parishes had a least two priests stationed there—until the Post-Vatican fall in vocations shot-down that ideal in many places. God even made man and woman as a twosome in marriage. Pilots have their co-pilots. Presidents have Vice-Presidents. We often—though not always—work better as a team than we do alone.
Furthermore, on Judgment Day, it will not only be individuals that are judged, but also nations, states, communities, religious orders, parishes, schools, and even families. Therefore, as a family, it makes sense to approach Lent, not just from an individual perspective, but also from a family perspective. What was said of an individual assessment of one person’s chief sins, can also be applied to a ‘family’s sins’—though this is a little more difficult to pinpoint and address, for everyone’s participation in a ‘family sin’ is likely to be of a different degree—some being more guilty (instigators) and other less guilty (the followers or the coerced).
Nevertheless, there are certain family traits that can be either virtuous or sinful. It takes great humility and honesty to both see and admit to those faults. To attack one or two such family faults would be a marvelous communal penance for Lent. However, this will not happen on Ash Wednesday, at the flick of a switch—serious reflection and discussion is needed to see where a family has, as a group, let God down and offended Him, either directly or indirectly by sinning against our fellow human beings: “Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40).
So now is the time, in a general way, to start planning for Lent—both individually or as a family or as a school or class. Parents, especially, should help their children well in advance and talk about Lent often during this Septuagesima Season, to prepare the mind and attitude of their children in good time, so that they hit the road running and with zeal, not distaste and trepidation. Some of the future Daily Thoughts articles will try to help with suggestions—while a special website page has been created to focus on this in particular: Ash Wednesday Countdown—which can be accessed under the LENT tab or click here.
Before we know it, Lent will be upon us! This Sunday, Septuagesima Sunday, the Church will place before us the words of St. Paul, about running in a race in such a manner that we may win. “Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain” (1 Corinthians 9: 24). In our lazy modern times, the car has replaced the two feet as the chief means of running around; but whether it is the athlete with his feet, or the driver with his car, the bottom line is that, to win a race, the athlete or the car has to be in peak condition. Most Catholic cars (souls) are far from being in peak condition—much like the Israelite ‘cars’ (souls) crossing the desert—most of whom were not pleasing to God, as the reading from the Mass of Septuagesima Sunday points out:
God’s Viewpoint of the Racers
“For I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud, and in the sea: and did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the desert” (1 Corinthians 10:1-5).
Hence St. Paul warns us that “Now these things were done in a figure of us, that we should not covet evil things as they also coveted. Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play!’ Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed fornication, and there fell in one day three and twenty thousand. Neither let us tempt Christ: as some of them tempted, and perished by the serpents. Neither do you murmur: as some of them murmured, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now all these things happened to them in figure: and they are written for our correction, upon whom the ends of the world are come. Wherefore he that thinketh himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:6-12).
In a certain sense, they all ran in the race for the Promised Land, but only Josue and Caleb (with their families) out of the original 4 or so million that started out from Egypt, actually entered the Promised Land and successfully crossed the ‘finish-line’—the remaining finishers were born in desert during those 40 years. With most of the ‘starters’ God was not well pleased! They ended up being starters and losers, not starter and finishers and winners. Unfortunately, the same is true for Catholics―all of them start the race for Heaven at their Baptism, but very few get there in the end! [read more here]. As Our Lord said: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate! For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14). Our Lord mentioned the time of Noe and the Ark, reminded us of how few were saved―“the flood came, and took them all away” (Matthew 24:39). God had no qualms about eliminating most of the human race because of sin and wiped them off the face of the Earth.
Secondly, no athlete will win a competitive race without training beforehand. The car has to be tried out beforehand also, to see if all is running smoothly and well. This is what the Septuagesima season, with its three countdown Sundays (Septuagesima, Sexagesima and Quinquagesima) is for: a serious time of preparation for the even more serious time of Lent.
The means to win are fairly simple, but most engines misfire and overheat by using the means badly. The means, as Our Lady has tried to tell us many times, as PRAYER and PENANCE. You could say prayer is the gasoline and penance is the oil for the engine. Prayer is of the utmost importance to our ‘spiritual engine’; it is what drives our ‘spiritual body’ forwards and it is what gives it power.
The Power of Prayer
“Do we believe in the power of prayer? We know the common teaching of theologians: that true prayer—by which we ask something for ourselves with humility, confidence and perseverance, the graces necessary for salvation—is infallibly efficacious (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa IIae, Q.83, Art.15, ad 2). We know this doctrine, and yet it seems to us, at times, that we have truly prayed without being heard. We believe in, or rather we see, the power of a machine, of an army, of money and of knowledge; but we do not believe strongly enough in the efficacy of prayer.” (Rev. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23).
The Gasoline of Grace comes through Prayer
“The modern world cannot do without God. This is the root of its ills. The great truth is that we have an absolute need of God…He normally bestows His grace only in response to prayer. Since our need exists at all times....”We ought always to pray and not to faint” (Luke 18:1)....The true nature of Christian prayer is perfectly expressed in the following definition given by St. John Damascene and St. Thomas Aquinas: prayer is “a raising of the mind and heart towards God” to offer Him our homage and to ask Him for all those things of which we stand in need” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Spinning Wheels and Going Nowhere
People often pray without realizing what it is that they are doing, or Whom they are addressing! God so rightly complains in Scripture saying: “This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:7).
St. Louis de Montfort―in speaking of praying the Rosary in particular―writes: “A single Hail Mary said properly is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly … To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? … It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
Dom Marmion adds: “It happens to some souls that, when they have recited many formulas, they realize that they have said nothing to God from the bottom of their hearts. Our mind may be far distant from the words that fall from our lips....In our prayer, we must give up to God our whole heart and our whole mind....Just as the sanctuary light burns itself up without reserving anything, so our soul, in its conversation with God, must be entirely dedicated to the Almighty. We must free ourselves from preoccupations and from vain thoughts, which tie the soul down to Earth and prevent it from being entirely given over to the Lord” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Winning Races Requires Intensity
Many find prayer difficult. That is only natural, since we are trying to communicate with the supernatural world.
“Prayer always requires a certain effort, even from those who find in it their delight, because a certain strain is involved in the concentration necessary to speak to God; it is always more or less difficult to maintain the soul in an atmosphere which is above its usual level. That is why prayer can serve as a sacramental penance. We must not be surprised at this difficulty in applying ourselves to prayer: for to raise ourselves towards God, even in the smallest degree, is to exceed our natural powers” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Focus on the Race, the Whole Race and Nothing but the Race
Too many people limit prayer to an isolated part of the day—first thing in the morning or last thing at night. Yet God should be part of our whole day, not just a mere ten minutes.
“Prayer in our life, must not be limited to a number of isolated, passing incidents. We must cultivate a spirit of prayer. What must we understand by this? A spirit of prayer is an habitual disposition of soul whereby, in our troubles and discouragements, as well as in our joys and successes, our hearts turn towards Our Lady and Our Lord, as to our best friends and most intimate confidants of our feelings. And it is not only in the morning and in the evening that the soul should be raised heavenwards, but always: ‘My eyes are ever towards the Lord’ (Psalm 24:15)” (Dom Marmion, Abbot of Maredsous, Christ--The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
All Enter the Race, Not All Finish the Race
Prayer is actually a bending of our will towards the will of God. He wishes the salvation of all, but all will not be saved—and one of the contributory causes of failing to make it to Heaven is a lack of prayer; a lack of prayer by those who will be damned (the driver) and a lack of prayer on the part of others for the conversion of those unfortunate souls (the mechanics and maintenance crew).
“For material harvests, God prepared the seed, the rain that must help it germinate, the sun that will ripen the fruits of the Earth. Likewise, for spiritual harvest, He has prepared spiritual seeds, the divine graces necessary for sanctification and salvation. Prayer is one of the causes meant to produce that sanctification and salvation” (Rev. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23). We can add to this the Biblical axiom of we reap what we sow: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:8). Prayer is sowing in the spirit. Playing is sowing in the flesh. The Angel said to the children at Fatima: “Don’t play, but pray!”
“St. Gregory the Great says: ‘Men ought, by prayer, to dispose themselves to receive what Almighty God, from eternity, has decided to give them’ (Dialogues, Book 1, chapter 8). Thus, Christ, wishing to convert the Samaritan woman, led her to pray by saying to her: “If thou didst know the gift of God!” In the same way, He granted Mary Magdalen a strong and gentle actual grace, which inclined her to repentance and to prayer. He acted in the same way to Zacheus and the Good Thief. It is, therefore, as necessary to pray in order to obtain the help of God, as it is necessary to sow seed in order to have wheat. To those who say that, what was to happen would happen, whether they prayed or not, is as foolish as to maintain that, whether or not we sowed seed, wheat would still appear once summer came! Therefore, prayer is necessary to obtain the help of God, as seed is necessary for the harvest” (Rev. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, chapter 23).
The problems we face, arise from the fact that God is prepared to give far more than we are prepared to ask for—we are so lazy and negligent, lacking in confidence and perseverance, that we receive only a fraction of what God is prepared to give. The efficacy of prayer, correctly made, is infallibly assured by Christ:
“Ask, and it shall be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you....And which of you, if he ask his father bread, will he give him a stone? Or a fish, will he give him a serpent?...If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father from Heaven give the good Spirit to them that ask Him?” (Luke 11:9-13). The problem does not lie with the Giver, but with us.
Some Racing Tips
Many of us become discouraged with prayer because our prayers are rarely, if ever heard. It is like entering the race just to make up numbers—but we never win! Yet, there are ways in which we can, almost infallibly, get our prayers answered and win that race! The spiritual writers or racers list the following chief tactics as “infallible” or guaranteed means of having our prayers favorably heard and answered:
1. Pray for what is good and not sinful or harmful to our salvation — We should always remember that what we want is not always what we need. At times, adversity is a better route to Heaven than prosperity. St. Augustine says: “We ought to be persuaded that what God refuses to our prayer, He grants to our salvation.”
2. Our prayer must be humble — Remember the prayer of the Pharisee and the Publican. Remember, too, Our Lady’s prayer, the Magnificat, wherein she says that God has “regarded the humility of His handmaid…He hath put down the mighty from their seat and hath exalted the humble.” The Old Testament says: “...nor from the beginning have the proud been acceptable to Thee: but the prayer of the humble and the meek hath always pleased Thee” (Judith 9:16). “May the Lord destroy all deceitful lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things” (Psalm 11:4). “Thou hast rebuked the proud” (Psalm 118:21). “Every proud man is an abomination to the Lord” (Proverbs 16:5).
3. Our prayer must be fervent —Too often our prayers are said listlessly, routinely, mechanically; our heart is not in them. Of such Our Lord said: “This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:7). Our prayers should be like grains of incense, placed on the hot coals of our hearts.
4. We should amend our life — If we persist in leading a life of sin, even venial sin, then we greatly handicap the chances of having our prayers heard. “He who turns his ears from hearing the law, his prayer is an abomination” (Proverbs 28:9).
5. We should forgive those who have injured us — This was the example of Christ dying on the cross: “Father, forgive them...” “If, therefore, thou offer thy gift at the altar, and there thou remember that thy brother hath anything against thee—Leave there thy offering before the altar, and go first to be reconciled to thy brother: and then, coming, thou shalt offer thy gift” (Matthew 5:23-24). “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). “Forgive thy neighbor if he hath hurt thee, and then shall thy sins be forgiven to thee, when thou prayest” (Ecclesiasticus. 28:2).
6. Our prayer should be united to good works or sacrifices — “Prayer is good with fasting and alms” (Tobias 12:8). That is why penance is so crucial in strengthening our prayer. Our Lady asks not only for prayer at Fatima, but prayer and sacrifices. The power of this is expressed in Scripture, where the Apostles failed to cast out a demon from one particular person, and asked Our Lord why they had failed. Our Lord replied: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20).
7. We should pray with confidence — Our Lord praised the Faith and confidence of persons on many occasions, saying: “Go, thy Faith has made thee whole…” (Matthew 9:22; Mark 5:34; 10:52; Luke 17:19; 18:42). He also told us that “all things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive” (Matthew 21:22). Do we have that confidence in prayer?
8. We should pray with perseverance — “He defers the granting to increase our desire and appreciation” says St. Augustine. Our Lord Himself said: “Yet if he shall continue knocking, I say to you, although he will not rise and give him because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise and give him as many as he needeth. And I say to you: Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you” (Luke 11:8-9).
If we would only pray in the above manner, we would be amazed at the response our prayers would bring from Heaven! Keep in mind the words of St. Augustine: “The man who knows how to pray well, is the one who knows how to live well.” Which, for our purposes, translates into “Drive well, and you’ll win the race! Pray well, and you’ll get the grace!”
The Penance Part
You could say that the “prayer part” to Lent is like an athlete’s mental attitude. The “penance part” of Lent to be likened to the athlete’s bodily fitness. Winners are usually those athletes who are both mentally strong and physically fit and strong. The same can be said to be true of the spiritual life—which is why, when asked by His Apostles why they had failed to cast out the devil from a young boy, Our Lord replied: “But this kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20).
Wholly Wholesome Holy & Whole
Therefore, we need to use our WHOLE being in our spiritual warfare and in the spiritual race for Heaven—not just soul, but body too—for a human being is a composite of body and soul. Which is why Holy Scripture powerfully and almost severely commands both elements in unmistakably strong terms: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint!” (Luke 18:1) … “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) … “Watch ye, therefore, praying at all times, that you may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that are to come, and to stand before the Son of man” (Luke 21:36) … “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! [and Our Lord then repeats Himself two verses later] … No, I say to you; but except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5) … “The Lord delayeth not his promise [of punishment], as some imagine, but dealeth patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance” (2 Peter 3:9) … “God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23).
In fact, things are so intertwined, that we could say that prayer and penance are just as necessary for one and the other. We must pray with the mind and mortify the mind. We must pray with the body and mortify the body.
Furthermore, just as in a good healthy, nourishing diet, there has to be a balance and a variety in our prayers and penances. As in a diet we must have proper proportions of proteins, carbohydrates and fats, so too in our spiritual diet we have to have a balance between various bodily ‘proteins’, ‘carbohydrates’ and ‘fats’ and mental ‘proteins’, ‘carbohydrates’ and ‘fats’—in order to avoid become one-dimensional and restricted in our spirituality.
Specific Penances for Specific Sins
Prayer and Fasting are among the best penances that can be undertaken—as Our Lord points out: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:20). Yet we must also remember that—in both Hell and Purgatory—sins are punished in a specific way that somehow corresponds to the type of sin committed. Thus, the murderer will be punished differently to the drunkard. The adulterer differently to the slanderer or detractor. The thief differently to the blasphemer, and so on and on and on. Likewise, our penances can and should correspond to our sins, even while we live on Earth. Everyone is different and so everyone’s sins differ from his or her neighbor’s sins. Therefore the appropriate penance will also be different. The general rule of thumb being—as St. Ignatius says in his Spiritual Exercises—“agere contra”, which literally means “act against” or “act in opposition to”—which more precisely means “do the opposite.”
Therefore, if you are naturally a critical person, then be more praising and more accepting. If you are stingy, then be more generous. If you are lazy, be more industrious. If too inattentive, show more attention. If too untidy, show a greater tidiness. If too timid, be more courageous. If too angry, be more meek. If never wrong, start apologizing for your errors. If lukewarm, be more fervent. If a constant complainer, thank God more for your lot in life. If greedy, be temperate. If proud, accept humiliations gladly. If always excusing yourself, blame yourself more. If unhelpful, be more helpful. You see the principle being used—the list is as endless as sins are endless in their nuances. The bedrock or foundation to all this can and should be prayer and fasting, but built on top of the foundation should be an individual building of tailor-made penance that corresponds to one’s own personal sins.
Start Planning Now!
Let’s be honest and admit it—we are not going to plan and put into practice such a tailor-made approach to penance on Ash Wednesday. The only place “winging-it” will get you to is the “Hall of Fame of Failure!” As you sow, so shall you reap. “He who soweth sparingly, shall also reap sparingly: and he who soweth in blessings, shall also reap blessings” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
Take a sheet of paper and write down your CHIEF faults—which are often those we do not want to face, or downplay, or even deny! If you’re not sure—then ask some honest, non-flattering, people around you who know you very well. Just don’t fall-out with them or injure them when the hit the nail on the head!
Once you have a STARTER list (you can add more as you start to diminish the frequency in committing the sins list in this first batch), then start to examine them in detail—when, where, how to they arise? With or against whom? What means are you avoiding to take, that could reduce these sins? Do you pray daily, even many times daily, asking for the grace to overcome them? Do you mortify yourself to avoid them? Do you punish yourself in some way after having committed them? List a variety of ways and methods open to you to overcome them—if unsure, consult with your confessor. Write down a series of heavier and heavier self-inflicted punishments or sanctions for every successive time you fail and fall. Make those sins the regular part of your confession, reporting if they have increased or decreased since your last confession.
Make Lent a Family Affair, Not Just Individual
Our Lord sent out His disciples in pairs—two-by-two—knowing full well that mutual support is necessary for courage, perseverance and success. The Legion of Mary also works this way—sending out its Legionaries in pairs as much as possible. In normal times, parishes had a least two priests stationed there—until the Post-Vatican fall in vocations shot-down that ideal in many places. God even made man and woman as a twosome in marriage. Pilots have their co-pilots. Presidents have Vice-Presidents. We often—though not always—work better as a team than we do alone.
Furthermore, on Judgment Day, it will not only be individuals that are judged, but also nations, states, communities, religious orders, parishes, schools, and even families. Therefore, as a family, it makes sense to approach Lent, not just from an individual perspective, but also from a family perspective. What was said of an individual assessment of one person’s chief sins, can also be applied to a ‘family’s sins’—though this is a little more difficult to pinpoint and address, for everyone’s participation in a ‘family sin’ is likely to be of a different degree—some being more guilty (instigators) and other less guilty (the followers or the coerced).
Nevertheless, there are certain family traits that can be either virtuous or sinful. It takes great humility and honesty to both see and admit to those faults. To attack one or two such family faults would be a marvelous communal penance for Lent. However, this will not happen on Ash Wednesday, at the flick of a switch—serious reflection and discussion is needed to see where a family has, as a group, let God down and offended Him, either directly or indirectly by sinning against our fellow human beings: “Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40).
So now is the time, in a general way, to start planning for Lent—both individually or as a family or as a school or class. Parents, especially, should help their children well in advance and talk about Lent often during this Septuagesima Season, to prepare the mind and attitude of their children in good time, so that they hit the road running and with zeal, not distaste and trepidation. Some of the future Daily Thoughts articles will try to help with suggestions—while a special website page has been created to focus on this in particular: Ash Wednesday Countdown—which can be accessed under the LENT tab or click here.
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR CHRISTMAS 2023
Article 21
Saturday January 27th
Look What's Around the Corner!
Saturday January 27th
Look What's Around the Corner!
What’s Coming?
You could say that we live in a world of “What’s Coming Next?” In this modern world of rapid advances and changes in many different fields―in technology, in belief systems, in moral values, in fashions, in social behavior, etc.―you never know what’s around the next corner! The world is many millennia old―but just 60 years ago who on earth foresaw the birth of the internet? Who saw the advent of personal computers, laptops and tablets; the appearance of smartphones which reduced computers to what can be held in the palm of your hand? In the 1960s, who imagined that cars that have a GPS installed, then it is possible for you (and other entities) to track the location of your vehicle in real-time. Who would have imagined that smartphones could be used to record all you phone conversations, texts, emails and even your conversations when you are not using the smartphone?
Secret Voyeurism
The prevailing truth in technology is that what we gain in progress and convenience, we often lose in privacy. Online privacy is an oxymoron. You would have a heart attack if you knew what others (companies or government) know about you! You probably know that your online activity creates a data trail. But technology is creeping into the offline world, making it difficult to go anywhere without leaving a trace. While some people try to avoid being tracked online―from opting out of social media; to encrypting their messages; to placing a piece of tape over their webcam―it’s difficult to prevent efforts by others to keep tabs on you and your location, your preferences, your purchases and much more. That’s because―regardless of whether you are online or not―if you’re alive in the 21st century, then one way or another, you’re leaving a trail.
The information we create as we navigate the world, both physically and digitally, is sometimes referred to as a “data footprint”. This sounds relatively benign, which is why the term is a poor metaphor. The true data footprint you leave behind everywhere you go and after practically everything you do is much, much more detailed than a trace in the sand. It’s who you are: from your most public persona right down to your most private moments.
Our daily habits — when we wake up, how we get to work, what we like to watch when we get home — are being tracked by dozens of interconnected systems, from cell carriers to traffic cameras. Together, they could form a picture of your day in disturbingly high fidelity. It's not just high-priority targets and would-be terrorists that leave a digital trail as they go about their business — millions of Americans each produce gigabytes of data associated with themselves just by walking down the street, driving their cars, shopping in stores, browsing the Internet, and using their mobile phone.
Reports Show …
Amnesty International reports: “As you sleep at night, your phone next to you, the government using spyware tools can send specially crafted silent messages. These messages will take advantage of a subtle flaw in the phone’s software, allowing the attacker to burrow into the phone, enabling access to all the data on the device. It will start pulling out photos, GPS locations, Signal messages – everything on the phone. Often there is no easy way to for individuals to protect themselves as the phone is hacked through an unpatched vulnerability in the phone, unknown to the manufacturer.”
A BBC interview with security expert Bruce Schneier, from TEN YEARS AGO (2014―imagine how much worse it is today), showed that surveillance is far greater than most people think. “Your day-to-day behavior is monitored in ways you wouldn’t even realize, and there are many details that could be open for all to see ― and used against you. And that’s a problem, even if you happen to trust your government to use the data for good … Every cell phone tower you pass, friend you keep, article you write, site you visit, subject line you type, and packet you route, is in the hands of a system whose reach is unlimited but whose safeguards are not. Indeed, pretty much everything you do can be tracked now, says Schneier. Everything involves a computer. You know that your Kindle tracks how fast you read, right? Everything you do online, everything you do on your phone, everything you do that involves any kind of payment system … In general, assume your movements are being watched ... Sophisticated smartphone applications are now capable of building up detailed pictures, not just of our location, but the context of our environment ...
“Schneier also pointed out that many of the mobile phone towers in your vicinity may not have been set up by your network provider, but governments ― both domestic and foreign ― who want to find out who’s walking by and what they’re up to. The British government will not even acknowledge that they use them. We know they do, but they won’t even acknowledge that. The FBI does acknowledge that they use them, but is very secretive about how, he explains. Someone found that there are 80-100 of these in Washington DC not run by the US government. We don’t know who’s running them. Public wi-fi raises yet more issues, since routers that pick up your mobile phone signal are now able to triangulate your position accurately enough to tell which aisle you’re in at the supermarket! … If the government said you have to have a tracking device, for certain you would rebel, notes Schneier. But the government doesn’t have to say that because you do it willingly and they just get a copy of the data. And so might anyone else. The same vulnerabilities exploited by intelligence agencies could be similarly exploited by corporations, insurance firms, health providers, or even malicious hackers, criminals or terrorists – the very people surveillance is supposed to target.”
“Tom Gaffney, technical director at information security firm F-Secure, said that effectively, the government is forcing people down the route of using these tools because of their lack of transparency, their desire to track every bit of our data rather than concentrating on criminals. Gaffney also points out that data collected by private companies, whether encrypted or not, can still be held more or less forever, and there’s no way of knowing for sure how it will be used or sold in the future.” (BBC News, 26th October 2014).
Both Android and Apple smartphones have location tracking built-in. And for most people, not only does your smartphone track your movements, but you probably have a number of apps that do as well. You probably see apps ask if they can access your location information all the time. They can only do that because the smartphone is already tracking it. Your phone has a multitude of sensors that are tracking how you physically use the phone. There are also environmental sensors that know about levels of light and temperature in your space. Your cell service provider keeps a record of your incoming and outgoing calls and your phone’s GPS keeps track of your location.
The computer security company, McAfee, says: “It’s a longstanding question: can your phone really take selfies without your knowledge? The answer is yes, but with a pretty big asterisk next to it. And that asterisk is known as spyware. Spyware can use your phone for snooping in several ways, including using your camera to take pictures and videos.” Another computer security company, Norton, says: “Is my phone listening to me legally? Yes, it is legal for phones to listen to you. That’s because we often give consent for phones to listen to us when we accept terms and conditions of software updates or app downloads (which nobody ever reads). Those conditions are usually that we’ll allow our data to be collected so that we can harness all the wonders and conveniences of voice-assisted programs and services. Worth mentioning is that phones can also listen to us illegally. That’s when users do not consent to be listened to and it’s often by way of spyware or other malware infecting smartphones. Believe it or not, hackers can turn your mobile camera on and off, record, and sometimes even save media from your camera roll by installing spyware or remote-access Trojan malware.”
Scary Car Spies
Many vehicles made within the past few years include technology that actively tracks the vehicle’s movements. You may feel like it’s wrong that they could do that without telling you, but they would argue that they do tell you. It’s included somewhere in the pages of paperwork you sign on the day you buy the car, buried in legalese most people don’t bother to read. Right now, there are 78 million cars on the road that have this kind of tracking technology. And experts expect that within a few years 98% of all new cars sold will include it.
The Week―a weekly news magazine in the United Kingdom and United States―in an article on September 9th, 2023, wrote: “All new cars today are privacy nightmares on wheels that collect huge amounts of personal information … Your car is a spy … New research from the nonprofit Mozilla Foundation found new cars to be the worst category for privacy of any product it had ever reviewed since 2017. If your vehicle was made in the last few years, you’re probably driving around in a data-harvesting machine that may collect personal information as sensitive as your race, weight and sexual activity. Many people think of their car as a private space — somewhere to call your doctor, have a personal conversation with your kid on the way to school, cry your eyes out over a break-up, or drive places you might not want the world to know about. But that perception no longer matches reality. All new cars today are privacy nightmares on wheels that collect huge amounts of personal information. Automakers have been openly bragging about their cars being “computers on wheels” for years … Today’s vehicles have cameras facing inward and out, microphones, and a wide array of sensors. They collect or access your data when you pair your phone and when you use their apps, maps, and connected services … Increasingly, most cars are wiretaps on wheels … The electronics that drivers pay more and more money to install are collecting more and more data on them and their passengers.”
If you ever hook your smartphone into your car with Bluetooth or a USB connection, then your car’s entertainment system can access lots of data saved on your device. According to one investigative report, this includes your phone book, call logs, text messages, pictures, location data – just about everything you can think of. As of now, there’s not much regulation around how companies can use that data.
Chips are everywhere―and we are not talking about snacks! More like snakes than snacks! Computer chips have been used in cars from the 1960s―though back then they were limited in what they could do. Today, cars―like phones―have become computerized. Here is what the modern day chips control within cars:
► POWERTRAIN: (1) Engine control (Engine, Fuel injection, Knock control); (2) HEV /EV motor; (3) Transmission.
► ELECTRONIC SYSTEM: (1) Alternator / Battery / Starter; (2) Lighting; (3) Diagnostics; (4) In-Car data bus.
► SAFETY AND CONTROL: (1) Airbag; (2) TPMS; (3) Collision warning; (4) Parking assist; (5) Rear view monitor; (6) Night vision.
► COMFORT AND CONTROL: (1) Power door locks; (2) Power window; (3) Seat control; (4) Climate control; (5) Mirror control; (6) Wiper control.
► CHASSIS: (1) Steering / EPS; (2) Brake / ABS; (3) Traction control; (4) Suspension; (5) Chassis control.
► NETWORKING: (1) CAN; (2) LIN; (3) MOST; (4) Bluetooth; (5) WI-FI and hotspot; (6) FlexRay; (7) Safe-By-Wire; (8) Navigation display.
► INFOTAINMENT: (1) Dashboard digital display; (2) Car Audio; (3) Connectivity audio; (4) Entertainment; (5) ITS / GPS.
► SECURITY AND CONTROL: (1) Anti-theft ignition; (2) Key-less entry; (3) Remote start; (4) Remote monitoring and tracking.
To top all this off, we now the ultimate computerized car―the “driverless car” which is driven by a computer! Our Lord’s words to St. Peter come to mind: “When you were young, you were able to do as you liked; you dressed yourself and went wherever you wanted to go. But when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and others will dress you and take you where you do not want to go!” (John 21:18).
Social Media
Using social media may put your personal data at risk without you knowing it. When users create a social media account and use the platform, they leave a digital footprint on the internet. Companies collect personal information―along with interests and locations―from the social media platform by using tracking cookies, geo-fencing and cross-site tracking. When users sign up for an account, they agree to the terms and conditions, which enable social media platforms to collect data. The reason why a social media platforms like Facebook is free is because it works with companies to deliver tailored ads to you when you’re on the site. To that end, it keeps track of a number of pieces of information about you ranging from your political leanings and age to where your friends live and what devices you’re accessing Facebook on. If there is a social media platform that is ad-supported, it’s likely that they have a variation on that information. However, scammers and fraudsters also collect this information to better gain access to personal information. More than 90,000 people were victims of social media fraud in 2021
Search Results Searched!
Many search engines, especially Google store all of your search results. Google in particular keeps track of what and how you search, what ads, videos, images and links you click on. There are some search engines, like Duck Duck Go, whose selling point is that they don’t track user results―though some say that this is no longer the case. Internet service providers (ISPs) can see more of what you do online than almost anyone. They can track your browsing history easily, and, in some cases, they can share that data with third parties. Your data has become incredibly precious, surpassing even the value of oil. The sad truth is that anyone can view your browser history and search history. Many websites use cookies that follow you and recommend items based on your search history. Governments can track you if you do something to alert them. In addition, hackers could infiltrate your computer.
Smart Pills Swallowed?
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved, on November 13th, 2017, the first drug in the U.S. with a digital ingestion tracking system. The tablets/pills have an ingestible sensor embedded in the pill that records that the medication was taken. The system works by sending a message from the pill’s sensor to a wearable patch. The patch transmits the information to a mobile application so that patients can track the ingestion of the medication on their smart phone, which can then send the information to the doctor that prescribed the medication.
Chips in the Body
A microchip was first implanted into a human back in 1998, but it is only since 2012 that the technology has been available commercially. It is gradually growing in popularity with worldwide numbers reportedly approaching the 100,000 mark. For many of us, the idea of having such a chip implanted in our body is an appalling one, but a 2021 survey of more than 4,000 people across the UK and the European Union, found that 51% would consider it. Chip implants contain the same kind of technology that people use on a daily basis," he says, "From key fobs to unlock doors, public transit cards like the London Oyster card, or bank cards with contactless payment function. Payment implants are based on radio-frequency identification (RFID), which is the similar technology typically found in physical contactless debit and credit cards.
The continuing miniaturization of electronics is opening up some exciting possibilities when it comes to what we might place in our bodies to monitor and improve our health. Engineers at Columbia University have demonstrated an extreme version of this technology, developing the smallest single-chip system ever created, which could be implanted with a hypodermic needle to measure temperature inside the body, and possibly much more. It is as small as a dust mite, and only visible under a microscope. The study’s leader, Ken Shepard, said: “This is a new idea of ‘chip as system’ ― this is a chip that alone, with nothing else, is a complete functioning electronic system. This should be revolutionary for developing wireless, miniaturized implantable medical devices that can sense different things, be used in clinical applications, and eventually approved for human use.”
Chips in the Brain
In a recent live-streamed video interview with the Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council Summit, billionaire Elon Musk shared what’s to come for Neuralink―the brain-interface technology company co-founded by Elon Musk in 2016. The company aims to begin implanting microchips in humans. The implant has already been tested on a monkey who was featured playing MindPong. Elon Musk says: “We have Neuralink working well in monkeys. We are also doing a lot of testing and confirming that it’s very safe and reliable and that the Neuralink device can be removed safely. People may have seen the demo that we published earlier this year with the video of the monkey playing the video game Pong telepathically using the Neuralink in its brain. It’s completely wireless, charges inductively, so the monkey looks completely normal and yet is playing a video game telepathically.”
You could say that we live in a world of “What’s Coming Next?” In this modern world of rapid advances and changes in many different fields―in technology, in belief systems, in moral values, in fashions, in social behavior, etc.―you never know what’s around the next corner! The world is many millennia old―but just 60 years ago who on earth foresaw the birth of the internet? Who saw the advent of personal computers, laptops and tablets; the appearance of smartphones which reduced computers to what can be held in the palm of your hand? In the 1960s, who imagined that cars that have a GPS installed, then it is possible for you (and other entities) to track the location of your vehicle in real-time. Who would have imagined that smartphones could be used to record all you phone conversations, texts, emails and even your conversations when you are not using the smartphone?
Secret Voyeurism
The prevailing truth in technology is that what we gain in progress and convenience, we often lose in privacy. Online privacy is an oxymoron. You would have a heart attack if you knew what others (companies or government) know about you! You probably know that your online activity creates a data trail. But technology is creeping into the offline world, making it difficult to go anywhere without leaving a trace. While some people try to avoid being tracked online―from opting out of social media; to encrypting their messages; to placing a piece of tape over their webcam―it’s difficult to prevent efforts by others to keep tabs on you and your location, your preferences, your purchases and much more. That’s because―regardless of whether you are online or not―if you’re alive in the 21st century, then one way or another, you’re leaving a trail.
The information we create as we navigate the world, both physically and digitally, is sometimes referred to as a “data footprint”. This sounds relatively benign, which is why the term is a poor metaphor. The true data footprint you leave behind everywhere you go and after practically everything you do is much, much more detailed than a trace in the sand. It’s who you are: from your most public persona right down to your most private moments.
Our daily habits — when we wake up, how we get to work, what we like to watch when we get home — are being tracked by dozens of interconnected systems, from cell carriers to traffic cameras. Together, they could form a picture of your day in disturbingly high fidelity. It's not just high-priority targets and would-be terrorists that leave a digital trail as they go about their business — millions of Americans each produce gigabytes of data associated with themselves just by walking down the street, driving their cars, shopping in stores, browsing the Internet, and using their mobile phone.
Reports Show …
Amnesty International reports: “As you sleep at night, your phone next to you, the government using spyware tools can send specially crafted silent messages. These messages will take advantage of a subtle flaw in the phone’s software, allowing the attacker to burrow into the phone, enabling access to all the data on the device. It will start pulling out photos, GPS locations, Signal messages – everything on the phone. Often there is no easy way to for individuals to protect themselves as the phone is hacked through an unpatched vulnerability in the phone, unknown to the manufacturer.”
A BBC interview with security expert Bruce Schneier, from TEN YEARS AGO (2014―imagine how much worse it is today), showed that surveillance is far greater than most people think. “Your day-to-day behavior is monitored in ways you wouldn’t even realize, and there are many details that could be open for all to see ― and used against you. And that’s a problem, even if you happen to trust your government to use the data for good … Every cell phone tower you pass, friend you keep, article you write, site you visit, subject line you type, and packet you route, is in the hands of a system whose reach is unlimited but whose safeguards are not. Indeed, pretty much everything you do can be tracked now, says Schneier. Everything involves a computer. You know that your Kindle tracks how fast you read, right? Everything you do online, everything you do on your phone, everything you do that involves any kind of payment system … In general, assume your movements are being watched ... Sophisticated smartphone applications are now capable of building up detailed pictures, not just of our location, but the context of our environment ...
“Schneier also pointed out that many of the mobile phone towers in your vicinity may not have been set up by your network provider, but governments ― both domestic and foreign ― who want to find out who’s walking by and what they’re up to. The British government will not even acknowledge that they use them. We know they do, but they won’t even acknowledge that. The FBI does acknowledge that they use them, but is very secretive about how, he explains. Someone found that there are 80-100 of these in Washington DC not run by the US government. We don’t know who’s running them. Public wi-fi raises yet more issues, since routers that pick up your mobile phone signal are now able to triangulate your position accurately enough to tell which aisle you’re in at the supermarket! … If the government said you have to have a tracking device, for certain you would rebel, notes Schneier. But the government doesn’t have to say that because you do it willingly and they just get a copy of the data. And so might anyone else. The same vulnerabilities exploited by intelligence agencies could be similarly exploited by corporations, insurance firms, health providers, or even malicious hackers, criminals or terrorists – the very people surveillance is supposed to target.”
“Tom Gaffney, technical director at information security firm F-Secure, said that effectively, the government is forcing people down the route of using these tools because of their lack of transparency, their desire to track every bit of our data rather than concentrating on criminals. Gaffney also points out that data collected by private companies, whether encrypted or not, can still be held more or less forever, and there’s no way of knowing for sure how it will be used or sold in the future.” (BBC News, 26th October 2014).
Both Android and Apple smartphones have location tracking built-in. And for most people, not only does your smartphone track your movements, but you probably have a number of apps that do as well. You probably see apps ask if they can access your location information all the time. They can only do that because the smartphone is already tracking it. Your phone has a multitude of sensors that are tracking how you physically use the phone. There are also environmental sensors that know about levels of light and temperature in your space. Your cell service provider keeps a record of your incoming and outgoing calls and your phone’s GPS keeps track of your location.
The computer security company, McAfee, says: “It’s a longstanding question: can your phone really take selfies without your knowledge? The answer is yes, but with a pretty big asterisk next to it. And that asterisk is known as spyware. Spyware can use your phone for snooping in several ways, including using your camera to take pictures and videos.” Another computer security company, Norton, says: “Is my phone listening to me legally? Yes, it is legal for phones to listen to you. That’s because we often give consent for phones to listen to us when we accept terms and conditions of software updates or app downloads (which nobody ever reads). Those conditions are usually that we’ll allow our data to be collected so that we can harness all the wonders and conveniences of voice-assisted programs and services. Worth mentioning is that phones can also listen to us illegally. That’s when users do not consent to be listened to and it’s often by way of spyware or other malware infecting smartphones. Believe it or not, hackers can turn your mobile camera on and off, record, and sometimes even save media from your camera roll by installing spyware or remote-access Trojan malware.”
Scary Car Spies
Many vehicles made within the past few years include technology that actively tracks the vehicle’s movements. You may feel like it’s wrong that they could do that without telling you, but they would argue that they do tell you. It’s included somewhere in the pages of paperwork you sign on the day you buy the car, buried in legalese most people don’t bother to read. Right now, there are 78 million cars on the road that have this kind of tracking technology. And experts expect that within a few years 98% of all new cars sold will include it.
The Week―a weekly news magazine in the United Kingdom and United States―in an article on September 9th, 2023, wrote: “All new cars today are privacy nightmares on wheels that collect huge amounts of personal information … Your car is a spy … New research from the nonprofit Mozilla Foundation found new cars to be the worst category for privacy of any product it had ever reviewed since 2017. If your vehicle was made in the last few years, you’re probably driving around in a data-harvesting machine that may collect personal information as sensitive as your race, weight and sexual activity. Many people think of their car as a private space — somewhere to call your doctor, have a personal conversation with your kid on the way to school, cry your eyes out over a break-up, or drive places you might not want the world to know about. But that perception no longer matches reality. All new cars today are privacy nightmares on wheels that collect huge amounts of personal information. Automakers have been openly bragging about their cars being “computers on wheels” for years … Today’s vehicles have cameras facing inward and out, microphones, and a wide array of sensors. They collect or access your data when you pair your phone and when you use their apps, maps, and connected services … Increasingly, most cars are wiretaps on wheels … The electronics that drivers pay more and more money to install are collecting more and more data on them and their passengers.”
If you ever hook your smartphone into your car with Bluetooth or a USB connection, then your car’s entertainment system can access lots of data saved on your device. According to one investigative report, this includes your phone book, call logs, text messages, pictures, location data – just about everything you can think of. As of now, there’s not much regulation around how companies can use that data.
Chips are everywhere―and we are not talking about snacks! More like snakes than snacks! Computer chips have been used in cars from the 1960s―though back then they were limited in what they could do. Today, cars―like phones―have become computerized. Here is what the modern day chips control within cars:
► POWERTRAIN: (1) Engine control (Engine, Fuel injection, Knock control); (2) HEV /EV motor; (3) Transmission.
► ELECTRONIC SYSTEM: (1) Alternator / Battery / Starter; (2) Lighting; (3) Diagnostics; (4) In-Car data bus.
► SAFETY AND CONTROL: (1) Airbag; (2) TPMS; (3) Collision warning; (4) Parking assist; (5) Rear view monitor; (6) Night vision.
► COMFORT AND CONTROL: (1) Power door locks; (2) Power window; (3) Seat control; (4) Climate control; (5) Mirror control; (6) Wiper control.
► CHASSIS: (1) Steering / EPS; (2) Brake / ABS; (3) Traction control; (4) Suspension; (5) Chassis control.
► NETWORKING: (1) CAN; (2) LIN; (3) MOST; (4) Bluetooth; (5) WI-FI and hotspot; (6) FlexRay; (7) Safe-By-Wire; (8) Navigation display.
► INFOTAINMENT: (1) Dashboard digital display; (2) Car Audio; (3) Connectivity audio; (4) Entertainment; (5) ITS / GPS.
► SECURITY AND CONTROL: (1) Anti-theft ignition; (2) Key-less entry; (3) Remote start; (4) Remote monitoring and tracking.
To top all this off, we now the ultimate computerized car―the “driverless car” which is driven by a computer! Our Lord’s words to St. Peter come to mind: “When you were young, you were able to do as you liked; you dressed yourself and went wherever you wanted to go. But when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and others will dress you and take you where you do not want to go!” (John 21:18).
Social Media
Using social media may put your personal data at risk without you knowing it. When users create a social media account and use the platform, they leave a digital footprint on the internet. Companies collect personal information―along with interests and locations―from the social media platform by using tracking cookies, geo-fencing and cross-site tracking. When users sign up for an account, they agree to the terms and conditions, which enable social media platforms to collect data. The reason why a social media platforms like Facebook is free is because it works with companies to deliver tailored ads to you when you’re on the site. To that end, it keeps track of a number of pieces of information about you ranging from your political leanings and age to where your friends live and what devices you’re accessing Facebook on. If there is a social media platform that is ad-supported, it’s likely that they have a variation on that information. However, scammers and fraudsters also collect this information to better gain access to personal information. More than 90,000 people were victims of social media fraud in 2021
Search Results Searched!
Many search engines, especially Google store all of your search results. Google in particular keeps track of what and how you search, what ads, videos, images and links you click on. There are some search engines, like Duck Duck Go, whose selling point is that they don’t track user results―though some say that this is no longer the case. Internet service providers (ISPs) can see more of what you do online than almost anyone. They can track your browsing history easily, and, in some cases, they can share that data with third parties. Your data has become incredibly precious, surpassing even the value of oil. The sad truth is that anyone can view your browser history and search history. Many websites use cookies that follow you and recommend items based on your search history. Governments can track you if you do something to alert them. In addition, hackers could infiltrate your computer.
Smart Pills Swallowed?
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved, on November 13th, 2017, the first drug in the U.S. with a digital ingestion tracking system. The tablets/pills have an ingestible sensor embedded in the pill that records that the medication was taken. The system works by sending a message from the pill’s sensor to a wearable patch. The patch transmits the information to a mobile application so that patients can track the ingestion of the medication on their smart phone, which can then send the information to the doctor that prescribed the medication.
Chips in the Body
A microchip was first implanted into a human back in 1998, but it is only since 2012 that the technology has been available commercially. It is gradually growing in popularity with worldwide numbers reportedly approaching the 100,000 mark. For many of us, the idea of having such a chip implanted in our body is an appalling one, but a 2021 survey of more than 4,000 people across the UK and the European Union, found that 51% would consider it. Chip implants contain the same kind of technology that people use on a daily basis," he says, "From key fobs to unlock doors, public transit cards like the London Oyster card, or bank cards with contactless payment function. Payment implants are based on radio-frequency identification (RFID), which is the similar technology typically found in physical contactless debit and credit cards.
The continuing miniaturization of electronics is opening up some exciting possibilities when it comes to what we might place in our bodies to monitor and improve our health. Engineers at Columbia University have demonstrated an extreme version of this technology, developing the smallest single-chip system ever created, which could be implanted with a hypodermic needle to measure temperature inside the body, and possibly much more. It is as small as a dust mite, and only visible under a microscope. The study’s leader, Ken Shepard, said: “This is a new idea of ‘chip as system’ ― this is a chip that alone, with nothing else, is a complete functioning electronic system. This should be revolutionary for developing wireless, miniaturized implantable medical devices that can sense different things, be used in clinical applications, and eventually approved for human use.”
Chips in the Brain
In a recent live-streamed video interview with the Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council Summit, billionaire Elon Musk shared what’s to come for Neuralink―the brain-interface technology company co-founded by Elon Musk in 2016. The company aims to begin implanting microchips in humans. The implant has already been tested on a monkey who was featured playing MindPong. Elon Musk says: “We have Neuralink working well in monkeys. We are also doing a lot of testing and confirming that it’s very safe and reliable and that the Neuralink device can be removed safely. People may have seen the demo that we published earlier this year with the video of the monkey playing the video game Pong telepathically using the Neuralink in its brain. It’s completely wireless, charges inductively, so the monkey looks completely normal and yet is playing a video game telepathically.”
Article 20
Wednesday January 24th to Friday January 26th
Cured by Hibernation
Wednesday January 24th to Friday January 26th
Cured by Hibernation
How Would You Like to Hibernate?
Imagine falling asleep and waking up months later just as healthy as you are today. What might be impossible for humans is business as usual for hibernating mammals like bears and ground squirrels. What is it about hibernating animals that protects them from diseases that humans would get? During frigid winter months when food supplies are scarce and survival becomes a struggle, some creatures unleash a natural superpower to withstand the energy bottleneck: hibernation. Amidst the chill, some warm-blooded animals can throttle their metabolism, significantly curbing their need for food and energy. Hibernation may last days, weeks, or months—depending on the species, ambient temperature, time of year, and the individual's body-condition.
Animals hibernate to survive periods of cold and food or water scarcity, reducing their heart rate, breathing and other vital functions to a fraction of their normal life, while body temperature lowers close to ambient temperature. Several animals, including species of reptiles, insects, molluscs, avians and mammals have the ability to go into long periods of hibernation during which all activities—physical and physiological required to preserve life—are brought down to the bare minimum. These animals can reverse the ill health effects. While these animals are hibernating in their dens, their physiology battles with and overcomes significant stress. Research has shown that hibernators are protected from shock-induced injury and inflammation.
Scientists have always been amazed that even after months of dormancy, hibernating animals wake completely healthy, even healthier than their pre-hibernation periods. The researchers have been monitoring black bears for twenty five years, witnessed that sleeping bears had amazing recuperative abilities during hibernation, despite existing in a state that would cause infections in other mammals to run rampant. While in hibernation, a black bear’s heart rate slows from an average of 55 beats per minute to just five and their metabolism slows to just 25% of its normal rate . Also their body temperature drops about 13°F and they don’t eat or drink anything or defecate or urinate. This all goes on for five to seven months over the winter. Stranger still, when they finally wake in the spring, they haven’t lost any bone or muscle mass. To prove that wounds really do heal well in the bears while they hibernate, the team anesthetized several of them and induced small cutaneous wounds during the time shortly before they were to go into hibernation. After that, they let the bears sleep for about three months, then ventured into their dens to see how the wounds were progressing. In all cases they found no incidence of infection and complete healing of the wounds, all with very little scarring. They also found a regrowth of fur in many of the sites.
Human Hibernation?
In studying hibernating animals, scientists suggest that humans may well possess all the hardware required to induce and mimic hibernation. The problem is in understanding how it works and how to replicate it in humans. In 2006, a Japanese citizen, Mitsutaka Uchikoshi, unwittingly and accidentally became the first documented case of human hibernation. After suffering a broken pelvis in an accident on western Japan’s Mount Rokko, Uchikoshi survived outdoor in an unconscious state for 24 days before being discovered by a trekker. Uchikoshi survived and soon recovered fully.
We all engage in some “mini-hibernation” on a daily basis―we call it “sleep”. The first few hours of sleep are the deepest. It is during this time that the body performs tissue growth and repair, allowing healing and restoration to occur. It is also the time when the brain clears away stuff it doesn't need, making room for the stuff it does need. All night long, your body and brain do quite a bit of work that’s key for your health. During deep sleep, your body works to repair muscle, organs, and other cells. Chemicals that strengthen your immune system start to circulate in your blood. If there are areas that need to heal, the brain can trigger the release of hormones that encourage tissue growth to repair blood vessels. This helps wounds to heal faster but also restores sore or damaged muscles. While you sleep, your body can make more white blood cells that can attack viruses and bacteria that can hinder the healing process. Your immune system relies on sleep to be able to fight harmful substances. When you don't get enough sleep, your immune system is not able to properly protect the body from infection.
Coma and Hibernation
The closest thing to this idea of human hibernation is a medically induced coma, in which a doctor uses anesthetic drugs to put a patient with brain trauma in an unconscious state to protect the brain from further damage. But a hibernation cocktail could possibly prevent any organ from damage.
A coma is a prolonged state of unconsciousness. The various causes of coma include things like infection (such as meningitis); hemorrhage following a severe head injury; stroke, brain abscess; brain tumor; cerebral oedema (swelling of the brain); the after-effects of an epileptic seizure; acute cardiac arrest (heart attack); alcohol poisoning; drug overdose (prescribed or illegal); carbon monoxide poisoning; liver or kidney failure; hypoglycaemia (low blood sugars); hyperglycaemia (high blood sugars); fever; electrocution and hypothermia (drop in body temperature).
The same injuries and illnesses that put people in a coma can also lead to other states of unconsciousness. The four different states, from least to most severe, are: (1) Minimal consciousness; (2) Coma; (3) Vegetative state; (4) Brain death.
● Minimally Conscious people are largely unaware of what’s going on around them. This means they may have
(a) a consistent ability to follow simple commands; (b) appropriately give yes/no responses; (c) at times smile or cry, adjust their hands to the size and shape of held objects. In general, people in a minimally conscious state have much better outcomes than those in sustained comas.
● Comatose persons have minimal brain activity. Most of the body continues to function as it works to heal itself and come out of that state. However, there's no awareness. They may even move in ways that seem like they are awake, which can be misleading to friends and family. For example, they may grimace if something causes pain. They may even appear to move away from pain. In what's called Lazarus syndrome, an especially strong reflex can lead someone in a coma to sit upright. However, these responses are just reflexes. It's similar to what happens to your leg when a healthcare provider taps your knee with a hammer. These movements don’t mean someone is awake, aware, or improving. These are simply automatic movements.
● Vegetative State patients appear to be sleeping. The eyes may even reflexively move, appearing to gaze at things in the room. However, these people don't show any true awareness of themselves or their environment. If the brainstem is intact, the heart, lungs, and gastrointestinal tract continue to function. If not, machines may be needed to keep these functions going. This can be permanent. If medical care continues, it's possible for someone to remain alive in a persistent vegetative state for decades.
● Brain Death occurs when brain function stops in the whole brain, including the brainstem. At this point, the person can no longer breathe on their own. If machine support is removed, they'll typically go into cardiac arrest.
During a coma, a person is unresponsive to their environment. The person is alive and looks like they are sleeping. However, unlike in a deep sleep, the person cannot be awakened by any stimulation, including pain. During a coma, brain activity is minimal. Most of the body continues to function as it works to heal itself and come out of that state. While a coma is perceived to be a scary event with a high chance of mortality, under the right circumstances, it may just save a person’s life. A medically induced coma is a reversible state of deep unresponsiveness that is brought about by administering sedatives in an attempt to protect the brain from further traumatic damage. The sedatives trigger unconsciousness by suppressing various aspects of brain activity. This helps to reduce the energy requirements of the brain, enabling it to spend more energy on regeneration, rebuilding and healing.
Some people will make a full recovery and be completely unaffected by the coma. Others will have disabilities caused by the damage to their brain. In general, the longer someone remains unconscious, the less likely they are to recover their alertness. The chances of someone recovering from a coma largely depend on the severity and cause of their brain injury, their age and how long they've been in a coma. If damage is severe enough in certain brain regions, the person is unlikely to ever come out of the coma. But it’s impossible to accurately predict whether the person will eventually recover, how long the coma will last and whether they'll have any long-term problems.
Spiritual Comas and Spiritual Hibernation
What on earth is this? Spiritual comas?!! Spiritual hibernation?!! Is this bordering on insanity? Not at all! When you really stop to think about it, then you realize that these things are analogically true. Most of the Catholic world is suffering from a spiritual coma―and most of the Catholic world could do with some spiritual hibernation.
In the physical human body a COMA is a prolonged state of unconsciousness as a result of an injury of some kind; whereas HIBERNATION is a deliberate decision to sleep (lose consciousness) in order to protect or recharge the animal’s body and well-being. So too in the spiritual realm. A SPIRITUAL COMA is the result of some spiritual injury by varying degrees of sin, whereby the soul loses consciousness of the critical things in the spiritual life and thus endangers its chances of eternal life. A SPIRITUAL HIBERNATION is a deliberate choice to turn one’s back on the world and worldliness so that one can “hibernate” (tune-out or turn-off the world and worldliness) in order to recharge spiritual batteries and get one’s spiritual life in order.
Comatose Catholics
Just as a physical coma incapacitates a person physically, likewise, a spiritual coma incapacitates a person spiritually. A physical coma is usually brought about by a whole variety of injuries, wounds, infections, etc. A spiritual coma is brought about by a whole series of sins―mortal and venial. Depending on the cause and the extent of damage, a coma can occur rapidly or gradually―likewise, depending upon the frequency and degree of a person sinning, they can enter a spiritual coma rapidly or gradually.
Before entering a coma, a person with worsening low blood sugar, known as diabetic shock, or excessively high levels of carbon dioxide in the blood, called hypercapnia, may first experience headaches, irritability, and slurred speech. Without treatment, their ability to think clearly will gradually decrease, potentially resulting in the loss of consciousness.
Similarly, with a spiritual coma, a person’s prayer life worsens―they either pray less or pray more and more badly (or both). They have excessively high levels of worldliness and low levels of spirituality―most of their daily time is spent on worldly, mundane, earthly things rather than spiritual things. They are highly stimulated by material things, and are barely, if at all, stimulated by spiritual things. The spiritual side of things gives them ‘headaches’ and ‘irritability’ ― Masses and sermons seem incredibly long and irritate them, spiritual reading or spiritual conversations give them headaches.
Degrees of Comatose Catholics
The French Trappist abbot and religious writer, Dom Jean-Baptiste Chautard O.C.S.O. (1858-1935), was the author of the renowned book, Soul of the Apostolate. Several popes quoted from Chautard’s book and recommended it to wide audiences. Pope St. Pius X was said to keep the book on his night stand, and Pope Benedict XV wrote a foreword for the book. In the book, Dom Chautard has a passage which describes the characteristics of souls in nine stages―ranging from mortal sin to sanctity. The lowest stages could be likened to the various stages of a spiritual coma. Here they are:
STAGE 1 ― HARDENED IN SIN (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE).
► MORTAL SIN: Stubborn persistence in sin, either out of ignorance or because of a maliciously warped conscience.
► VENIAL SIN: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as being a sin.
► PRAYER: Deliberate refusal to have any recourse to God.
STAGE 2 ― SURFACE CHRISTIANITY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE).
► MORTAL SIN: Considered as a trifling evil, easily forgiven. The soul easily gives way and commits mortal sin at almost every possible occasion or temptation. Confession is made almost without contrition.
► VENIAL SIN: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as being a sin.
► PRAYER: Mechanical; either with inattention or haste, or both. Prayers always dictated by temporal interest―asking things from God. Such souls enter into themselves rarely and superficially.
STAGE 3 ― MEDIOCRE PIETY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE).
► MORTAL SIN: Weak resistance in temptations to mortal sin. Hardly ever avoids occasions of mortal sin, but seriously regrets having sinned and makes good confessions.
► VENIAL SIN: Complete acceptance of venial sin, which is considered as being insignificant. Hence the tepidity and lukewarmness of the will. Does nothing whatsoever to prevent venial sin, or to root it out, or to uncover it when it is concealed.
► PRAYER: From time to time, prays well. Occasional fits of fervor.
Comatose Catholic Pandemic
It is hard to argue against the claim that most of the Catholic world is in a spiritual coma of one degree or another―some more, some less. This is clearly evident when you only have, on average, 20% of Americans attending church every week; 41% attending at least once a month; and 57% seldom or never attending―then you have a very large number of spiritually comatose people! Just before the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965), the percentage of Catholics regularly attending Sunday Mass was 75%. By the early 1970s it had dropped to 50%. Today it is around 20% (some say even less―17%). Furthermore, 68% of US Catholics think that they can be a good Catholic without going to Mass every Sunday!
Imagine falling asleep and waking up months later just as healthy as you are today. What might be impossible for humans is business as usual for hibernating mammals like bears and ground squirrels. What is it about hibernating animals that protects them from diseases that humans would get? During frigid winter months when food supplies are scarce and survival becomes a struggle, some creatures unleash a natural superpower to withstand the energy bottleneck: hibernation. Amidst the chill, some warm-blooded animals can throttle their metabolism, significantly curbing their need for food and energy. Hibernation may last days, weeks, or months—depending on the species, ambient temperature, time of year, and the individual's body-condition.
Animals hibernate to survive periods of cold and food or water scarcity, reducing their heart rate, breathing and other vital functions to a fraction of their normal life, while body temperature lowers close to ambient temperature. Several animals, including species of reptiles, insects, molluscs, avians and mammals have the ability to go into long periods of hibernation during which all activities—physical and physiological required to preserve life—are brought down to the bare minimum. These animals can reverse the ill health effects. While these animals are hibernating in their dens, their physiology battles with and overcomes significant stress. Research has shown that hibernators are protected from shock-induced injury and inflammation.
Scientists have always been amazed that even after months of dormancy, hibernating animals wake completely healthy, even healthier than their pre-hibernation periods. The researchers have been monitoring black bears for twenty five years, witnessed that sleeping bears had amazing recuperative abilities during hibernation, despite existing in a state that would cause infections in other mammals to run rampant. While in hibernation, a black bear’s heart rate slows from an average of 55 beats per minute to just five and their metabolism slows to just 25% of its normal rate . Also their body temperature drops about 13°F and they don’t eat or drink anything or defecate or urinate. This all goes on for five to seven months over the winter. Stranger still, when they finally wake in the spring, they haven’t lost any bone or muscle mass. To prove that wounds really do heal well in the bears while they hibernate, the team anesthetized several of them and induced small cutaneous wounds during the time shortly before they were to go into hibernation. After that, they let the bears sleep for about three months, then ventured into their dens to see how the wounds were progressing. In all cases they found no incidence of infection and complete healing of the wounds, all with very little scarring. They also found a regrowth of fur in many of the sites.
Human Hibernation?
In studying hibernating animals, scientists suggest that humans may well possess all the hardware required to induce and mimic hibernation. The problem is in understanding how it works and how to replicate it in humans. In 2006, a Japanese citizen, Mitsutaka Uchikoshi, unwittingly and accidentally became the first documented case of human hibernation. After suffering a broken pelvis in an accident on western Japan’s Mount Rokko, Uchikoshi survived outdoor in an unconscious state for 24 days before being discovered by a trekker. Uchikoshi survived and soon recovered fully.
We all engage in some “mini-hibernation” on a daily basis―we call it “sleep”. The first few hours of sleep are the deepest. It is during this time that the body performs tissue growth and repair, allowing healing and restoration to occur. It is also the time when the brain clears away stuff it doesn't need, making room for the stuff it does need. All night long, your body and brain do quite a bit of work that’s key for your health. During deep sleep, your body works to repair muscle, organs, and other cells. Chemicals that strengthen your immune system start to circulate in your blood. If there are areas that need to heal, the brain can trigger the release of hormones that encourage tissue growth to repair blood vessels. This helps wounds to heal faster but also restores sore or damaged muscles. While you sleep, your body can make more white blood cells that can attack viruses and bacteria that can hinder the healing process. Your immune system relies on sleep to be able to fight harmful substances. When you don't get enough sleep, your immune system is not able to properly protect the body from infection.
Coma and Hibernation
The closest thing to this idea of human hibernation is a medically induced coma, in which a doctor uses anesthetic drugs to put a patient with brain trauma in an unconscious state to protect the brain from further damage. But a hibernation cocktail could possibly prevent any organ from damage.
A coma is a prolonged state of unconsciousness. The various causes of coma include things like infection (such as meningitis); hemorrhage following a severe head injury; stroke, brain abscess; brain tumor; cerebral oedema (swelling of the brain); the after-effects of an epileptic seizure; acute cardiac arrest (heart attack); alcohol poisoning; drug overdose (prescribed or illegal); carbon monoxide poisoning; liver or kidney failure; hypoglycaemia (low blood sugars); hyperglycaemia (high blood sugars); fever; electrocution and hypothermia (drop in body temperature).
The same injuries and illnesses that put people in a coma can also lead to other states of unconsciousness. The four different states, from least to most severe, are: (1) Minimal consciousness; (2) Coma; (3) Vegetative state; (4) Brain death.
● Minimally Conscious people are largely unaware of what’s going on around them. This means they may have
(a) a consistent ability to follow simple commands; (b) appropriately give yes/no responses; (c) at times smile or cry, adjust their hands to the size and shape of held objects. In general, people in a minimally conscious state have much better outcomes than those in sustained comas.
● Comatose persons have minimal brain activity. Most of the body continues to function as it works to heal itself and come out of that state. However, there's no awareness. They may even move in ways that seem like they are awake, which can be misleading to friends and family. For example, they may grimace if something causes pain. They may even appear to move away from pain. In what's called Lazarus syndrome, an especially strong reflex can lead someone in a coma to sit upright. However, these responses are just reflexes. It's similar to what happens to your leg when a healthcare provider taps your knee with a hammer. These movements don’t mean someone is awake, aware, or improving. These are simply automatic movements.
● Vegetative State patients appear to be sleeping. The eyes may even reflexively move, appearing to gaze at things in the room. However, these people don't show any true awareness of themselves or their environment. If the brainstem is intact, the heart, lungs, and gastrointestinal tract continue to function. If not, machines may be needed to keep these functions going. This can be permanent. If medical care continues, it's possible for someone to remain alive in a persistent vegetative state for decades.
● Brain Death occurs when brain function stops in the whole brain, including the brainstem. At this point, the person can no longer breathe on their own. If machine support is removed, they'll typically go into cardiac arrest.
During a coma, a person is unresponsive to their environment. The person is alive and looks like they are sleeping. However, unlike in a deep sleep, the person cannot be awakened by any stimulation, including pain. During a coma, brain activity is minimal. Most of the body continues to function as it works to heal itself and come out of that state. While a coma is perceived to be a scary event with a high chance of mortality, under the right circumstances, it may just save a person’s life. A medically induced coma is a reversible state of deep unresponsiveness that is brought about by administering sedatives in an attempt to protect the brain from further traumatic damage. The sedatives trigger unconsciousness by suppressing various aspects of brain activity. This helps to reduce the energy requirements of the brain, enabling it to spend more energy on regeneration, rebuilding and healing.
Some people will make a full recovery and be completely unaffected by the coma. Others will have disabilities caused by the damage to their brain. In general, the longer someone remains unconscious, the less likely they are to recover their alertness. The chances of someone recovering from a coma largely depend on the severity and cause of their brain injury, their age and how long they've been in a coma. If damage is severe enough in certain brain regions, the person is unlikely to ever come out of the coma. But it’s impossible to accurately predict whether the person will eventually recover, how long the coma will last and whether they'll have any long-term problems.
Spiritual Comas and Spiritual Hibernation
What on earth is this? Spiritual comas?!! Spiritual hibernation?!! Is this bordering on insanity? Not at all! When you really stop to think about it, then you realize that these things are analogically true. Most of the Catholic world is suffering from a spiritual coma―and most of the Catholic world could do with some spiritual hibernation.
In the physical human body a COMA is a prolonged state of unconsciousness as a result of an injury of some kind; whereas HIBERNATION is a deliberate decision to sleep (lose consciousness) in order to protect or recharge the animal’s body and well-being. So too in the spiritual realm. A SPIRITUAL COMA is the result of some spiritual injury by varying degrees of sin, whereby the soul loses consciousness of the critical things in the spiritual life and thus endangers its chances of eternal life. A SPIRITUAL HIBERNATION is a deliberate choice to turn one’s back on the world and worldliness so that one can “hibernate” (tune-out or turn-off the world and worldliness) in order to recharge spiritual batteries and get one’s spiritual life in order.
Comatose Catholics
Just as a physical coma incapacitates a person physically, likewise, a spiritual coma incapacitates a person spiritually. A physical coma is usually brought about by a whole variety of injuries, wounds, infections, etc. A spiritual coma is brought about by a whole series of sins―mortal and venial. Depending on the cause and the extent of damage, a coma can occur rapidly or gradually―likewise, depending upon the frequency and degree of a person sinning, they can enter a spiritual coma rapidly or gradually.
Before entering a coma, a person with worsening low blood sugar, known as diabetic shock, or excessively high levels of carbon dioxide in the blood, called hypercapnia, may first experience headaches, irritability, and slurred speech. Without treatment, their ability to think clearly will gradually decrease, potentially resulting in the loss of consciousness.
Similarly, with a spiritual coma, a person’s prayer life worsens―they either pray less or pray more and more badly (or both). They have excessively high levels of worldliness and low levels of spirituality―most of their daily time is spent on worldly, mundane, earthly things rather than spiritual things. They are highly stimulated by material things, and are barely, if at all, stimulated by spiritual things. The spiritual side of things gives them ‘headaches’ and ‘irritability’ ― Masses and sermons seem incredibly long and irritate them, spiritual reading or spiritual conversations give them headaches.
Degrees of Comatose Catholics
The French Trappist abbot and religious writer, Dom Jean-Baptiste Chautard O.C.S.O. (1858-1935), was the author of the renowned book, Soul of the Apostolate. Several popes quoted from Chautard’s book and recommended it to wide audiences. Pope St. Pius X was said to keep the book on his night stand, and Pope Benedict XV wrote a foreword for the book. In the book, Dom Chautard has a passage which describes the characteristics of souls in nine stages―ranging from mortal sin to sanctity. The lowest stages could be likened to the various stages of a spiritual coma. Here they are:
STAGE 1 ― HARDENED IN SIN (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE).
► MORTAL SIN: Stubborn persistence in sin, either out of ignorance or because of a maliciously warped conscience.
► VENIAL SIN: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as being a sin.
► PRAYER: Deliberate refusal to have any recourse to God.
STAGE 2 ― SURFACE CHRISTIANITY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE).
► MORTAL SIN: Considered as a trifling evil, easily forgiven. The soul easily gives way and commits mortal sin at almost every possible occasion or temptation. Confession is made almost without contrition.
► VENIAL SIN: Many. Complete acceptance of this sin. Not even thought of as being a sin.
► PRAYER: Mechanical; either with inattention or haste, or both. Prayers always dictated by temporal interest―asking things from God. Such souls enter into themselves rarely and superficially.
STAGE 3 ― MEDIOCRE PIETY (NOT EVEN A BEGINNER IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE).
► MORTAL SIN: Weak resistance in temptations to mortal sin. Hardly ever avoids occasions of mortal sin, but seriously regrets having sinned and makes good confessions.
► VENIAL SIN: Complete acceptance of venial sin, which is considered as being insignificant. Hence the tepidity and lukewarmness of the will. Does nothing whatsoever to prevent venial sin, or to root it out, or to uncover it when it is concealed.
► PRAYER: From time to time, prays well. Occasional fits of fervor.
Comatose Catholic Pandemic
It is hard to argue against the claim that most of the Catholic world is in a spiritual coma of one degree or another―some more, some less. This is clearly evident when you only have, on average, 20% of Americans attending church every week; 41% attending at least once a month; and 57% seldom or never attending―then you have a very large number of spiritually comatose people! Just before the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965), the percentage of Catholics regularly attending Sunday Mass was 75%. By the early 1970s it had dropped to 50%. Today it is around 20% (some say even less―17%). Furthermore, 68% of US Catholics think that they can be a good Catholic without going to Mass every Sunday!
|
Evidence for the vast majority of US Catholics being in a spiritually comatose state is furnished by the overwhelming non-Catholic views held by Catholics today. Less than 10% of Catholics say that their Catholic Faith is “the most important part” of their life. Only 55% of Catholic say that they pray daily.
As regards marriage, 20% or 1 in 5 Catholic marriages end in divorce. Other surveys claim that anywhere from 28% to 34% of Catholics who have ever married have ended up in a divorce. Over 50% of U.S. Catholics say that living with a romantic partner outside of marriage, and remarrying after a divorce without an annulment, are not sins. Nearly 75% of Catholics in the United States are not opposed to couples cohabiting before marriage, even if they choose not marry eventually, despite the Church’s moral teaching. The number of couples who choose to live together without marriage has risen dramatically in the past fifty years, from near zero to 60%. For Catholics the percentage is almost 50%. And about four-in-ten Catholics (39%) say homosexual behavior is not a sin. Roughly a third of Catholics who attend Mass weekly (34%) say that children being raised by a same-sex couple is acceptable and as good as any other arrangement. More than half of U.S. Catholics (56%) said abortion should be legal in all or most cases. Only 8% say contraception is morally wrong, with 89% say it was either morally acceptable or not a moral issue at all. Over 20 years ago, The National Survey of Youth and Religion (NSYR), conducted between July 2002 and April 2003, examined the religious, family and social lives of adolescents. Among the questions teenagers were asked was this: “Do you think that people should wait to have sex until they are married?” Only 51% of Roman Catholic teens said yes. Already back in 1995, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops stated that only about half of high-school-age teens are still virgins―that was nearly 30 years ago! What is the case today? As Our Lady of Good Success warned: “Like a filthy ocean, impurity will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women!” |
All of the above is not even showing the tip of the iceberg of culture of sin that has infested and infected the Catholic world―and, consequently, caused innumerous Catholics to fall into a spiritual coma. These comatose Catholics are no longer responsive to the stimuli of Catholic teaching and preaching. “O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not: and ears, and hear not!” (Jeremias 5:21) … “Son of man, thou dwellest in the midst of a provoking house―who have eyes to see, and see not; and ears to hear, and hear not; for they are a provoking house!” (Ezechiel 12:2) … “For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15).
Spiritual Coma and the Loss of the Sense of Sin
It is this Catholic spiritual coma that has led so many Catholics to lose all sense of sin―something that both Traditional, Conservative, Liberal and Modernist popes have lamented since Pope Pius XII spoke of it.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin ... The meaning of sin ― which is a different thing from ‘guilt feelings’ as understood in psychology ― is only grasped in discovering the meaning of God!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
We cannot repeat often enough the words of Our Lady to Blessed Elena Aiello, which were spoken way back in 1956: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [The Deluge was the Great Flood in Noe’s time] All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
Healing by Hibernation
Is there a solution (or soul-ution) to all this? What solution is it? It is―to coin a phrase―”the solution of hibernation.” You will not, of course, find the phrase, nor even the word hibernation, in the Bible―but you will find lots of references that imply spiritual hibernation. Let us explain.
The word “hibernation” comes from the from Latin “hibernationem” (nominative “hibernation”) which means “the action of passing the winter.” It is a noun of action from past participle stem of the verb “hibernare” meaning “to winter, pass the winter, occupy winter quarters.” Winter is a time of cold―“The charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12)―it is a threatening time and a dangerous time (much like our current sinful climate today)―hence it is that Our Lord says: “Pray that your flight be not in the winter!” (Matthew 24:20) … “Pray ye, that these things happen not in winter!” (Mark 13:18). In the same vein, St. Paul writes in his epistle to St. Timothy: “Make haste to come before winter!” (2 Timothy 4:21). And to Titus, St. Paul writes: “Make haste to come unto me to Nicopolis. For there I have determined to winter!” (Titus 3:12).
Winter Purification
Winter seems to represent loss, change, suffering and isolation for us―all things we prefer to do without. “And it shall come to pass in that day, that there shall be no light, but cold and frost” (Zacharias 14:6). Yet there are also times when God calls us into a winter season, and, more often than not, we enter this season reluctantly. “He commands the snow to go down upon the Earth, and the winter rain, and the shower of his strength!” (Job 37:6). “Hail, snow, ice, stormy winds fulfill His word!” (Psalm 148:8). Winter necessitates a time of difficulty and waiting―whereby we wait for the warmer climates of spring and summer; the triumph of warmth over the cold: “...shall melt away the ice in the fair warm weather” (Ecclesiasticus 3:17).
Yet winter is also a time of purification. The white snow symbolizes purity. “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow” (Isaias 1:18). “If I be washed with snow waters, my hands shall shine ever so clean!” (Job 9:30). “Wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow!” (Psalm 50:9).
Yet winter is also a time of purification. The white snow symbolizes purity. “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow” (Isaias 1:18). “If I be washed with snow waters, my hands shall shine ever so clean!” (Job 9:30). “Wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow!” (Psalm 50:9).
We need winter. Whether or not winter is your favorite season, it does have its benefits. The frigid temperatures can cause a reduction in some dreaded warm weather insects. Outdoor temperatures of 37ºF or lower are cold enough to kill mature fleas, eggs, larvae and pupae, but only if these chilly temperatures are sustained for at least 10 days in a row.
Nevertheless, in winter, many insects go into a hibernation mode. During this time of dormancy, growth, activities, and development are temporarily suspended. Their metabolic rate is just high enough to keep the insect alive. Insects survive the cold in a variety of ways which include relying on body heat and dry shelters in their surroundings such as underground, in trees, under rocks, and in logs. Even snow can help insulate insects.
As regards plants―some plants require cold temperatures to, well, do their thing. For example, sugar maples require cold weather to produce sap. Yet other plants require a period of winter dormancy (a kind of hibernation) to grow correctly in the following seasons. Many berry bushes and some fruit trees, including apple, peach, and cherry, require a period of rest each winter to prepare to produce fruit the following spring and summer.
Fleeing Dangers―Hibernating with God
This world is not God-orientated, not God-focused, not God-loving. “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men―to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside! They are become unprofitable together! There is none that doth good―no not one! They are corrupted, and become abominable in iniquities! The fool said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’” (Psalm 52:1-4).
Our Lord said: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Hence, Holy Scripture adds: “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27). “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). That is what hibernation does―it separates the animal from the world because of the conditions in the world, and the animal will hibernate (sleep) until those conditions are gone.
During the Exodus from Egypt, when the Israelites were in the desert, the glory of God appeared on Mount Sinai, setting the whole mountain top of fire. Moses left the Israelites behind and went up the mountain to God: “And Moses, entering into the midst of the cloud, went up into the mountain. And he was there (“hibernating”) for forty days, and forty nights” (Exodus 24:18).
When God was about to destroy Sodom and Gomorrha, God’s angels said to Lot: “Save thy life! Look not back! Neither stay thou in all the country round about―but save thyself in the mountain, lest thou be also consumed!” (Genesis 19:17). Lot fled and hid himself (“hibernated”) in a cave: “Now when God destroyed the cities of that country, remembering Abraham, he delivered Lot out of the destruction of the cities wherein he had dwelt. Lot went up out of Segor, and abode in the mountain, and his two daughters with him―for he was afraid to stay in Segor―and he dwelt (“hibernated”) in a cave, he and his two daughters with him” (Genesis 19:29-30).
When the prophet Elias was being pursued by Jezabel’s soldiers, Elias “walked for forty days and forty nights, unto the mount of God, Horeb. And when he was come there, he abode (“hibernated”) in a cave” (3 Kings (1 Kings 19:8-9).
When David was being pursued by Saul, who wanted to kill David, “David therefore fled to the cave of Odollam” (1 Kings 22:1).
When the Israelites were being oppressed by the Philistines, “they hid themselves (“hibernated”) in caves, and in thickets, and in rocks, and in dens, and in pits” (1 Kings 13:6).
Our Lord would “hibernate” (separate Himself) from the people in order to focus on the spiritual: “And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain alone to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone.” (Matthew 14:23) … “And when He had dismissed them, He went up to the mountain to pray” (Mark 6:46) … “He went out into a mountain to pray, and He passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12) … “He took Peter, and James, and John, and went up into a mountain to pray” (Luke 9:28).
Holy Scripture speaks of God’s followers separating themselves (“hibernating”) from the world: “They wandered about in sheepskins, in goatskins, being in want, distressed, afflicted―of whom the word was not worthy―wandering in deserts, in mountains, and in dens, and in caves of the earth. And all these being approved by the testimony of Faith” (Hebrews 11:37-39).
Our Lord warns of the end times and counsels fleeing to the mountains: “When therefore you shall see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place … Then they that are in Judea, let them flee to the mountains! And he that is on the housetop, let him not come down to take anything out of his house! And he that is in the field, let him not go back to take his coat! And woe to them that are with child, and that give suck in those days! But pray that your flight be not in the winter, or on the Sabbath! For there shall be then great tribulation, such as hath not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be! And unless those days had been shortened, no flesh should be saved: but for the sake of the elect those days shall be shortened” (Matthew 24:15-22).
We have begun to enter that “great tribulation, such as hath not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be” ― but most Catholics are oblivious or indifferent to the fact. They happily live among the danger and are fully enjoying the world and what it offers: “He that loves danger, shall perish in it!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). “He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:25).
Our Lady and Hibernation
Our Lady lived in this world, but she lived apart from this world. She knew that Our Lord was not of this world and that His kingdom was not of this world. She saw, first hand, how much the world hated her Son. She did not hate the world―and like her Son, she wished to save those in the world―but not at the expense of being friendly with the world. She knew better than most that “the friendship of this world is the enemy of God and whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
Our Lady of Good Success speaks of our times and the few faithful souls who will hide themselves to preserve their Faith: “The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom!”
Our Lady, in her words to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, further develops this need for “hibernation” from the world and worldliness: “The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God, Who finds no place in the malevolent heart, nor in a body subject to sin. God seems far from the mind of carnal men―with a most perverse blindness they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious worldly goods. They never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good―which is God. They take no thought or reckoning of Him. How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! Under the outwardly good intention, are often hidden the earthly passions and inclinations, which dominate the heart.”
“Imitate me and follow my humble footsteps! Withdraw your affections from all that is earthly, lift your aspirations on high, despising and fleeing all human honors, esteeming them as vanity of vanities and affliction of spirit! … While living in this world, flee dangerous communications with creatures … Flee the world by retiring from creatures to the interior of thy soul, thus conquering both these enemies and preserving the light of grace … Flee from conversation with men and dread its dangers! ... You are not strong and are in great danger from fellow creatures! … Learn the lesson taught by the example of Peter’s denial of Jesus, for you are not stronger than he―the Apostle of Christ! … The most skillful battle tactic of the sons of God consists in fleeing farthest possible from all evil ... Flee from and avoid all that is imperfect, dangerous or alien to the virtues and perfections of the soul.” (Our Lady to Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
Foolish Hibernation Haters
Holy Scripture says: “A fool will laugh at sin, but among the just grace shall abide!” (Proverbs 14:9). “Fools hate them that flee from evil things!” (Proverbs 13:19). God speaks of the deliberate blindness and deafness of these fools: “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and ears, and hear not” (Jeremias 5:21). “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them” (Matthew 13:15). “The number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15).
“These men, like irrational beasts, naturally tending to the trap and to destruction, blaspheming those things which they know not; counting for a pleasure the delights of a day; sporting themselves to excess; unrestrained in their feasts; having eyes full of adultery and of sin that never ceases; having their heart filled with covetousness! Children of malediction―leaving the right way they have gone astray, having followed the way of iniquity!” (2 Peter 2:12-15).
Holy Scripture emphatically warns us to separate ourselves from these worldly people―who, whether they know it or not, admit it or not, like it or not―are enemies of God: “Henceforth, be no more tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine from the wickedness of men, by their cunning craftiness, by which they lie in wait to deceive. Henceforward walk not as the Gentiles walk―in the vanity of their mind; having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their hearts; who have given themselves up to their desires and lusts, unto the working of all uncleanness, unto covetousness! Put off the old man―who is corrupted according to the desire of error―and be renewed in the spirit of your mind! Put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness of truth!” (Ephesians 4:14-24).
“Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
There are far too many Catholics who erroneously and stupidly think that they be followers of both God and world. Nothing is further from the truth than this foolish notion. The above Scriptural quotes and the quotes of Our Lady should be enough to puncture that foolish idea―but apparently that is insufficient, as most of the Catholic world, having lost the sense of sin and being seduced by worldliness, blindly follow the path to Hell. “Wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” said Our Lord (Matthew 7:13-14).
Make your homes “unworldly dens” where you safely shelter from the outside world and spiritually shower and wash off yourselves the dirt and grime of worldliness that may have affected you in your daily dealings with the world. We are told to wash our hands often during the day―like doctors and nurses in hospitals―to reduce the risk of catching any lurking surrounding diseases. The same is true spiritually―immerse yourself often into the waters of spiritual reading, spiritual conversations, prayer and meditation―and these will help keep the contamination of the world at bay.
Fear of Rocking the Boat
One of the biggest obstacles to necessary change is what we call “human respect” ― which is an excessive regard for the opinions or the desire for the esteem of others. It is when we fear the reactions of other human beings more than we fear what God’s reactions may be; we are more concerned with what people think of us than what God thinks of us. Human respect is placing the opinions of others over truth in order to be accepted and even honored by others. Our Lady of Good Success laments this attitude of human respect: “Cursed human respect―which makes one ask: ‘What will others say about this?’” God comes first! Your salvation comes second! Other people are somewhere else down the line! As Our Lord said: “Everyone that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! … Seek first the Kingdom of God and His justice! … For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 10:32-33; 6:33; 16:26).
Sadly, most people have exchanged their soul for the world―without necessarily even knowing it! As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment! … What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation? ... Who is so dull-minded and insipid as not to know the dangers of the worldly life? … Guard yourself against those living in darkness and the lovers of the world, more than you would guard yourself against fire! They serve their own interest; they love vanity; they indulge greed, avarice, and the earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches; they love money, they place their hopes in treasures of silver and gold ... The rich glory in their riches … The poor strive to be and appear rich! …
They submit to the flatteries and to the slavery of the worldly and powerful! ... The sons of the world are ignorant, precisely because they are lovers of earthly riches ... Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, its laughing as sorrow, sensible enjoyment as self deceit, as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart!
“Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become so measureless, there are those who think that also the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be … Many persons―whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … How many kingdoms and provinces―being blind themselves―follow these still more blind leaders, until they together fall into the abyss of eternal pains, and they are followed by the bad Christians! Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!”
Satan is only too happy to keep us sitting comfortably in our hybrid “God-World” boat. He will inspire us with a horror of “rocking-the-boat”, telling us to “shut-up and put-up” with all the worldliness that is seeping into our boat. Satan blinds us to the fact that most Catholics end up being damned―and that has been the case throughout all the centuries [read more here], even when the world was far more Catholic and far less sinful than the world is today! How stupid can we be? How stubborn can we be? How true are the words of Scripture: “The number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15) and Our Lady’s words: “The number of the reprobate is also uncountable!” Shall we be the proverbial frog sitting comfortably and perpetually acclimatizing to ever increasing heat in the gradually heated pot of water, until the frog eventually boils to its death? Or shall we jump out of these worldly waters and separate ourselves more and more from the worldly people who surround us: “They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). Time is short―eternity never ends! This world will end―but the place we will end up in never ends! Let it be Heaven!
In a certain sense, you could say: “Hibernation for Salvation!” ― meaning that we must “hibernate” from the toxic environment of this world if we wish to awake in Heaven. “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters! You cannot serve God and mammon [the world]” (Matthew 6:19-24). You can choose to serve and follow whoever you―but it cannot be God AND the world―it is one or the other. You are free to make your choice and God will not twist your arm. Nevertheless, “be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Spiritual Coma and the Loss of the Sense of Sin
It is this Catholic spiritual coma that has led so many Catholics to lose all sense of sin―something that both Traditional, Conservative, Liberal and Modernist popes have lamented since Pope Pius XII spoke of it.
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin ... The meaning of sin ― which is a different thing from ‘guilt feelings’ as understood in psychology ― is only grasped in discovering the meaning of God!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
We cannot repeat often enough the words of Our Lady to Blessed Elena Aiello, which were spoken way back in 1956: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! [The Deluge was the Great Flood in Noe’s time] All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
Healing by Hibernation
Is there a solution (or soul-ution) to all this? What solution is it? It is―to coin a phrase―”the solution of hibernation.” You will not, of course, find the phrase, nor even the word hibernation, in the Bible―but you will find lots of references that imply spiritual hibernation. Let us explain.
The word “hibernation” comes from the from Latin “hibernationem” (nominative “hibernation”) which means “the action of passing the winter.” It is a noun of action from past participle stem of the verb “hibernare” meaning “to winter, pass the winter, occupy winter quarters.” Winter is a time of cold―“The charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12)―it is a threatening time and a dangerous time (much like our current sinful climate today)―hence it is that Our Lord says: “Pray that your flight be not in the winter!” (Matthew 24:20) … “Pray ye, that these things happen not in winter!” (Mark 13:18). In the same vein, St. Paul writes in his epistle to St. Timothy: “Make haste to come before winter!” (2 Timothy 4:21). And to Titus, St. Paul writes: “Make haste to come unto me to Nicopolis. For there I have determined to winter!” (Titus 3:12).
Winter Purification
Winter seems to represent loss, change, suffering and isolation for us―all things we prefer to do without. “And it shall come to pass in that day, that there shall be no light, but cold and frost” (Zacharias 14:6). Yet there are also times when God calls us into a winter season, and, more often than not, we enter this season reluctantly. “He commands the snow to go down upon the Earth, and the winter rain, and the shower of his strength!” (Job 37:6). “Hail, snow, ice, stormy winds fulfill His word!” (Psalm 148:8). Winter necessitates a time of difficulty and waiting―whereby we wait for the warmer climates of spring and summer; the triumph of warmth over the cold: “...shall melt away the ice in the fair warm weather” (Ecclesiasticus 3:17).
Yet winter is also a time of purification. The white snow symbolizes purity. “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow” (Isaias 1:18). “If I be washed with snow waters, my hands shall shine ever so clean!” (Job 9:30). “Wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow!” (Psalm 50:9).
Yet winter is also a time of purification. The white snow symbolizes purity. “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow” (Isaias 1:18). “If I be washed with snow waters, my hands shall shine ever so clean!” (Job 9:30). “Wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow!” (Psalm 50:9).
We need winter. Whether or not winter is your favorite season, it does have its benefits. The frigid temperatures can cause a reduction in some dreaded warm weather insects. Outdoor temperatures of 37ºF or lower are cold enough to kill mature fleas, eggs, larvae and pupae, but only if these chilly temperatures are sustained for at least 10 days in a row.
Nevertheless, in winter, many insects go into a hibernation mode. During this time of dormancy, growth, activities, and development are temporarily suspended. Their metabolic rate is just high enough to keep the insect alive. Insects survive the cold in a variety of ways which include relying on body heat and dry shelters in their surroundings such as underground, in trees, under rocks, and in logs. Even snow can help insulate insects.
As regards plants―some plants require cold temperatures to, well, do their thing. For example, sugar maples require cold weather to produce sap. Yet other plants require a period of winter dormancy (a kind of hibernation) to grow correctly in the following seasons. Many berry bushes and some fruit trees, including apple, peach, and cherry, require a period of rest each winter to prepare to produce fruit the following spring and summer.
Fleeing Dangers―Hibernating with God
This world is not God-orientated, not God-focused, not God-loving. “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men―to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside! They are become unprofitable together! There is none that doth good―no not one! They are corrupted, and become abominable in iniquities! The fool said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’” (Psalm 52:1-4).
Our Lord said: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hateth you!” (John 15:19). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Hence, Holy Scripture adds: “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27). “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17). That is what hibernation does―it separates the animal from the world because of the conditions in the world, and the animal will hibernate (sleep) until those conditions are gone.
During the Exodus from Egypt, when the Israelites were in the desert, the glory of God appeared on Mount Sinai, setting the whole mountain top of fire. Moses left the Israelites behind and went up the mountain to God: “And Moses, entering into the midst of the cloud, went up into the mountain. And he was there (“hibernating”) for forty days, and forty nights” (Exodus 24:18).
When God was about to destroy Sodom and Gomorrha, God’s angels said to Lot: “Save thy life! Look not back! Neither stay thou in all the country round about―but save thyself in the mountain, lest thou be also consumed!” (Genesis 19:17). Lot fled and hid himself (“hibernated”) in a cave: “Now when God destroyed the cities of that country, remembering Abraham, he delivered Lot out of the destruction of the cities wherein he had dwelt. Lot went up out of Segor, and abode in the mountain, and his two daughters with him―for he was afraid to stay in Segor―and he dwelt (“hibernated”) in a cave, he and his two daughters with him” (Genesis 19:29-30).
When the prophet Elias was being pursued by Jezabel’s soldiers, Elias “walked for forty days and forty nights, unto the mount of God, Horeb. And when he was come there, he abode (“hibernated”) in a cave” (3 Kings (1 Kings 19:8-9).
When David was being pursued by Saul, who wanted to kill David, “David therefore fled to the cave of Odollam” (1 Kings 22:1).
When the Israelites were being oppressed by the Philistines, “they hid themselves (“hibernated”) in caves, and in thickets, and in rocks, and in dens, and in pits” (1 Kings 13:6).
Our Lord would “hibernate” (separate Himself) from the people in order to focus on the spiritual: “And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain alone to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone.” (Matthew 14:23) … “And when He had dismissed them, He went up to the mountain to pray” (Mark 6:46) … “He went out into a mountain to pray, and He passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12) … “He took Peter, and James, and John, and went up into a mountain to pray” (Luke 9:28).
Holy Scripture speaks of God’s followers separating themselves (“hibernating”) from the world: “They wandered about in sheepskins, in goatskins, being in want, distressed, afflicted―of whom the word was not worthy―wandering in deserts, in mountains, and in dens, and in caves of the earth. And all these being approved by the testimony of Faith” (Hebrews 11:37-39).
Our Lord warns of the end times and counsels fleeing to the mountains: “When therefore you shall see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place … Then they that are in Judea, let them flee to the mountains! And he that is on the housetop, let him not come down to take anything out of his house! And he that is in the field, let him not go back to take his coat! And woe to them that are with child, and that give suck in those days! But pray that your flight be not in the winter, or on the Sabbath! For there shall be then great tribulation, such as hath not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be! And unless those days had been shortened, no flesh should be saved: but for the sake of the elect those days shall be shortened” (Matthew 24:15-22).
We have begun to enter that “great tribulation, such as hath not been from the beginning of the world until now, neither shall be” ― but most Catholics are oblivious or indifferent to the fact. They happily live among the danger and are fully enjoying the world and what it offers: “He that loves danger, shall perish in it!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). “He that loves his life shall lose it; and he that hates his life in this world, keeps it unto life eternal!” (John 12:25).
Our Lady and Hibernation
Our Lady lived in this world, but she lived apart from this world. She knew that Our Lord was not of this world and that His kingdom was not of this world. She saw, first hand, how much the world hated her Son. She did not hate the world―and like her Son, she wished to save those in the world―but not at the expense of being friendly with the world. She knew better than most that “the friendship of this world is the enemy of God and whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
Our Lady of Good Success speaks of our times and the few faithful souls who will hide themselves to preserve their Faith: “The small number of souls, who hidden, will preserve the treasures of the Faith and practice virtue will suffer a cruel, unspeakable and prolonged martyrdom!”
Our Lady, in her words to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, further develops this need for “hibernation” from the world and worldliness: “The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God, Who finds no place in the malevolent heart, nor in a body subject to sin. God seems far from the mind of carnal men―with a most perverse blindness they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious worldly goods. They never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good―which is God. They take no thought or reckoning of Him. How often Faith is set aside for any kind of pleasure and remains without any fruit! Under the outwardly good intention, are often hidden the earthly passions and inclinations, which dominate the heart.”
“Imitate me and follow my humble footsteps! Withdraw your affections from all that is earthly, lift your aspirations on high, despising and fleeing all human honors, esteeming them as vanity of vanities and affliction of spirit! … While living in this world, flee dangerous communications with creatures … Flee the world by retiring from creatures to the interior of thy soul, thus conquering both these enemies and preserving the light of grace … Flee from conversation with men and dread its dangers! ... You are not strong and are in great danger from fellow creatures! … Learn the lesson taught by the example of Peter’s denial of Jesus, for you are not stronger than he―the Apostle of Christ! … The most skillful battle tactic of the sons of God consists in fleeing farthest possible from all evil ... Flee from and avoid all that is imperfect, dangerous or alien to the virtues and perfections of the soul.” (Our Lady to Venerable Mary of Agreda, taken from The Mystical City of God).
Foolish Hibernation Haters
Holy Scripture says: “A fool will laugh at sin, but among the just grace shall abide!” (Proverbs 14:9). “Fools hate them that flee from evil things!” (Proverbs 13:19). God speaks of the deliberate blindness and deafness of these fools: “Hear, O foolish people, and without understanding―who have eyes, and see not; and ears, and hear not” (Jeremias 5:21). “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them” (Matthew 13:15). “The number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15).
“These men, like irrational beasts, naturally tending to the trap and to destruction, blaspheming those things which they know not; counting for a pleasure the delights of a day; sporting themselves to excess; unrestrained in their feasts; having eyes full of adultery and of sin that never ceases; having their heart filled with covetousness! Children of malediction―leaving the right way they have gone astray, having followed the way of iniquity!” (2 Peter 2:12-15).
Holy Scripture emphatically warns us to separate ourselves from these worldly people―who, whether they know it or not, admit it or not, like it or not―are enemies of God: “Henceforth, be no more tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine from the wickedness of men, by their cunning craftiness, by which they lie in wait to deceive. Henceforward walk not as the Gentiles walk―in the vanity of their mind; having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their hearts; who have given themselves up to their desires and lusts, unto the working of all uncleanness, unto covetousness! Put off the old man―who is corrupted according to the desire of error―and be renewed in the spirit of your mind! Put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness of truth!” (Ephesians 4:14-24).
“Bear not the yoke with unbelievers! What fellowship does light have with darkness? And what agreement has Christ with Belial? Or what part do the faithful have with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God! As God says: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ says the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
There are far too many Catholics who erroneously and stupidly think that they be followers of both God and world. Nothing is further from the truth than this foolish notion. The above Scriptural quotes and the quotes of Our Lady should be enough to puncture that foolish idea―but apparently that is insufficient, as most of the Catholic world, having lost the sense of sin and being seduced by worldliness, blindly follow the path to Hell. “Wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it!” said Our Lord (Matthew 7:13-14).
Make your homes “unworldly dens” where you safely shelter from the outside world and spiritually shower and wash off yourselves the dirt and grime of worldliness that may have affected you in your daily dealings with the world. We are told to wash our hands often during the day―like doctors and nurses in hospitals―to reduce the risk of catching any lurking surrounding diseases. The same is true spiritually―immerse yourself often into the waters of spiritual reading, spiritual conversations, prayer and meditation―and these will help keep the contamination of the world at bay.
Fear of Rocking the Boat
One of the biggest obstacles to necessary change is what we call “human respect” ― which is an excessive regard for the opinions or the desire for the esteem of others. It is when we fear the reactions of other human beings more than we fear what God’s reactions may be; we are more concerned with what people think of us than what God thinks of us. Human respect is placing the opinions of others over truth in order to be accepted and even honored by others. Our Lady of Good Success laments this attitude of human respect: “Cursed human respect―which makes one ask: ‘What will others say about this?’” God comes first! Your salvation comes second! Other people are somewhere else down the line! As Our Lord said: “Everyone that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven. But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! … Seek first the Kingdom of God and His justice! … For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 10:32-33; 6:33; 16:26).
Sadly, most people have exchanged their soul for the world―without necessarily even knowing it! As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment! … What pretense or excuse will men advance for having forgotten their own eternal salvation? ... Who is so dull-minded and insipid as not to know the dangers of the worldly life? … Guard yourself against those living in darkness and the lovers of the world, more than you would guard yourself against fire! They serve their own interest; they love vanity; they indulge greed, avarice, and the earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches; they love money, they place their hopes in treasures of silver and gold ... The rich glory in their riches … The poor strive to be and appear rich! …
They submit to the flatteries and to the slavery of the worldly and powerful! ... The sons of the world are ignorant, precisely because they are lovers of earthly riches ... Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, its laughing as sorrow, sensible enjoyment as self deceit, as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart!
“Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become so measureless, there are those who think that also the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be … Many persons―whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … How many kingdoms and provinces―being blind themselves―follow these still more blind leaders, until they together fall into the abyss of eternal pains, and they are followed by the bad Christians! Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!”
Satan is only too happy to keep us sitting comfortably in our hybrid “God-World” boat. He will inspire us with a horror of “rocking-the-boat”, telling us to “shut-up and put-up” with all the worldliness that is seeping into our boat. Satan blinds us to the fact that most Catholics end up being damned―and that has been the case throughout all the centuries [read more here], even when the world was far more Catholic and far less sinful than the world is today! How stupid can we be? How stubborn can we be? How true are the words of Scripture: “The number of fools is infinite” (Ecclesiastes 1:15) and Our Lady’s words: “The number of the reprobate is also uncountable!” Shall we be the proverbial frog sitting comfortably and perpetually acclimatizing to ever increasing heat in the gradually heated pot of water, until the frog eventually boils to its death? Or shall we jump out of these worldly waters and separate ourselves more and more from the worldly people who surround us: “They are blind, and leaders of the blind! And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit!” (Matthew 15:14). Time is short―eternity never ends! This world will end―but the place we will end up in never ends! Let it be Heaven!
In a certain sense, you could say: “Hibernation for Salvation!” ― meaning that we must “hibernate” from the toxic environment of this world if we wish to awake in Heaven. “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters! You cannot serve God and mammon [the world]” (Matthew 6:19-24). You can choose to serve and follow whoever you―but it cannot be God AND the world―it is one or the other. You are free to make your choice and God will not twist your arm. Nevertheless, “be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Article 19
Sunday January 21st to Tuesday January 23rd
The Mystery of Cures
Sunday January 21st to Tuesday January 23rd
The Mystery of Cures
The Many Avenues of Healing
In the Bible, there are numerous instances of God curing people. Many New Testament healing accounts are described two or three times, raising the total number of descriptions to 85. Only two of the healings in the four Gospels involve a healer other than Jesus. The Old Testament contains 21 healing accounts captured in 23 descriptions.
► OUR LORD healed many people: “Many followed Him, and He healed them all” (Matthew 12:15) … “All that had anyone sick with diverse diseases, they brought them to Him. And He, laying His hands on every one of them, healed them” (Luke 4:40) … “And there came to Him great multitudes, having with them the dumb, the blind, the lame, the maimed, and many others―and they cast them down at His feet, and He healed them” (Matthew 15:30).
► LOURDES: We read of the many miracles of healing that have occurred in the miraculous waters of Lourdes in France [read more here]. A Medical Bureau was established to examine and certify the cures. Some 1,200 cures were said to have been observed between 1858 and 1889, and about one hundred more each year during the “Golden Age” of Lourdes, 1890–1914. All in all, more than 7,000 cures have been documented at the waters of Lourdes. The Church has vigorously investigated and validated a mere 70 of them. Not all miracles are reported to the authorities at Lourdes, so it is likely that there are many more miracles that are left unreported, unresearched and undocumented. The Lourdes phenomenon, extraordinary in many respects, still awaits scientific explanation.
► MIRACULOUS INTERCESSIONS: We read in the Gospels that Jesus summoned His Twelve Apostles and gave them authority and power over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness. “And Jesus made that Twelve should be with Him, and He gave them power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out devils” (Mark 3:14-15). “And having called His twelve disciples together, He gave them power over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of diseases, and all manner of infirmities … These Twelve Jesus sent, saying: Go heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out devils! Freely have you received, freely give!” (Matthew 10:1-8).
Besides the Apostles, Our Lord also appointed a further seventy-two disciples to preach, heal and cure: “And the Lord appointed also other seventy-two―and He sent them two and two before His face into every city and place where He Himself was to come. And He said to them: ‘Go! And into what city soever you enter, heal the sick that are therein, and say to them: “The kingdom of God is come nigh unto you!”’” (Luke 10:1-8).
We also read of the power of the Church to intercede for the sick: “Is any man sick among you? Let him bring in the priests of the Church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the Name of the Lord. And the prayer of Faith shall save the sick man: and the Lord shall raise him up” (James 5:15).
► THE SACRAMENT OF THE SICK (a.k.a. The Anointing of the Sick, also Extreme Unction). Christ wants to continue to heal and comfort us through the Anointing of the Sick. Sometimes this Sacrament will result in miraculous physical healings; but even if there is no physical healing, there can always be a radical healing which the eye cannot yet see—that of the soul. This is the primary effect of the Sacrament—for the soul is more important than the body, therefore it is more important to save the soul from Hell by healing the soul from the disease of sin, than merely save the physical life of a person by curing their body.
► THE SACRAMENTALS OF THE CHURCH. These are not to be confused with the Sacraments of the Church―Sacraments and Sacramentals are two different things. One of the many differences between them is that Christ instituted the Sacraments, whereas it is the Church that institutes the Sacramentals. The Sacraments will always be Seven in number, but the Sacramentals can grow in number according to the wishes of the Church. The Sacraments give or increase sanctifying grace; and the Sacramentals are the means to actual graces. Sacraments work by simply being received―whereas Sacramentals depend upon the dispositions, faith and fervor of the person using the Sacramental. Sacramentals are various objects that have been blessed by Church and for use by the faithful (clergy and laity) to obtain graces from God for benefit and health of both body and soul. Examples of Sacramentals are: (1) blessed Rosaries and Chaplets; (2) blessed Scapulars; (3) blessed Crucifixes; (4) blessed Medals; (5) blessed Statues and Images of Our Lord, Our Lady, the Angels and Saints; (6) Holy Water; (7) blessed Salt; (8) blessed Oils and Wines; (9) blessed Candles; (10) blessed Epiphany Chalk; and many other kinds of objects that have been blessed by the Church (through the blessings administered by priests.
Among many other effects, Sacramentals can bring liberation from evil and the healing of sicknesses (including psychological disorders). On the health side of things, the Sacramentals are excellent preventatives against sickness and are also an efficacious remedy if one should become sick. They hinder the ravages of pestilence, of epidemics and infectious diseases. We see those things mentioned in the blessings that the Church imparts to those various objects. For example:
● HOLY WATER: “May this creature [water] of Yours, serve banish disease. May everything that this water sprinkles in the homes and gatherings of the faithful be delivered from all that is unclean and hurtful ... By the sprinkling of this water may everything opposed to the safety and peace of the occupants of these homes be banished, so that in calling on Your Holy Name they may obtain the well-being they desire, and be protected from every peril”
● BLESSED SALT: “May you be a purified salt, a means of health for those who believe, a medicine for body and soul for all who make use of you … May all who use it find in it a remedy for body and mind.”
● GENERAL BLESSING FOR ALL OBJECTS: “O God, pour out Your blessing on this object (these objects); and grant that anyone who uses it (them) with grateful heart and in keeping with Your law and will, may receive from You health in body and protection of soul.”
● BLESSING OF A HOME: “Lord God almighty, bless this home, so that it be the shelter of health, etc.”
● BLESSING OF A CRUCIFIX: “May this cross be blessed in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit; and may all who kneel and pray before this cross find health in body and soul.”
● BLESSING OF LILIES: “Let them be filled with such power that, whether they are used by the sick, or kept in homes or other places, or devoutly carried on one's person, they may serve to drive out evil spirits, safeguard holy chastity, and turn away illness―all this through the prayers of St. Anthony.”
● BLESSING OF ST. BLAISE CANDLES: “God … in professing his Faith in You, the glorious martyr and bishop, Blaise, did not fear any manner of torment, but gladly accepted the palm of martyrdom. In virtue of which You bestowed on him, among other gifts, the power to heal all ailments of the throat … May please you to bless and sanctify and impart Your grace to these candles. Let all men of Faith, whose necks are touched with them, may be healed of every malady of the throat and restored in health.”
● BLESSING AND INVESTITURE WITH SCAPULAR OF THE IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY: “O almighty God, grant that whoever will wear it in accord with Your will and Your law, may, in calling on Your Holy Name, be rewarded with health in body and protection of soul.”
● BLESSING OF THE SCAPULAR OF OUR LADY HEALTH OF THE SICK: “Lord, we beg You to bless this garment, and to grant that whoever will wear it in honor of Mary, God’s Holy Mother, who is the health of the sick, may enjoy well-being in body and mind … Almighty and merciful God, we humbly implore You to give health of body and soul to the members of this pious sodality, as often as they invoke the help of the blessed Virgin Mary, Health of the Sick”
● BLESSING OF WATER FOR THE SICK IN HONOR OF THE B.V.M. AND ST. TORELLUS: “O God, Who in Your heavenly mercy keep harmful things from man; Who at the pool of Probatica moved the waters by the hand of your angel, thus destroying sickness and conferring health; pour out Your blessing on this water, so that all the sick who drink it may regain their health, by the merits and prayers of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the holy confessor, Torellus.”
Is it enough to just wear a Miraculous Medal or Scapular; hang a Rosary from your car mirror; or light a blessed candle at home to be protected by God’s grace? What do we have to take into consideration in order for Sacramentals to work to the maximum capacity? One thing must be established from the outset: Sacramentals are neither about magic, nor about superstition, or anything similar. This becomes obvious when it is understood how Sacramentals work. Sacramentals work differently to the Sacraments. It is important to always recall that the Seven Sacraments are instituted by Jesus Christ and, consequently are of divine right. They work by themselves―because Christ works in them and through them. Sacramentals, on the other hand, are instituted by the Church, and their mode of action is different. Spiritual effects are obtained “from the work of the doer” (ex opere operantis). That means they are dependent upon the holiness of the one who administers the Sacramental and the one who receives the Sacramental. While it is true that the intercessory power of the Church is also at work in them, the effectiveness of Sacramentals depends primarily on the moral condition of the person who administers, as well as the person who receives them. This becomes clearly evident in the lives of the saints. When they administered Sacramentals—like St. Francis, St. Clare, St. Benedict and countless others—they had great impact. Sick people were healed, miracles happened, etc.
► HEALING THROUGH PRAYER: Strictly speaking, prayer is a Sacramental―nevertheless, we shall deal with it separately since it is a Sacramental that comes from within and not Sacramental that you put on and wear such as a blessed Medal or Scapular, nor is it like an independent object to you like Holy Water, blessed Salt, a blessed statue or image, etc. Not all prayer is equal! As you sow, so shall you reap (Galatians 6:8) and there is a risk of falling into lukewarm, automatic, distracted, halfhearted prayer, which merits the words of Our Lord: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
There have been countless cures obtained through prayer alone―but it was not a lukewarm, automatic, distracted, halfhearted prayer. There are three chief ways in which we communicate with God―Faith, Hope and Charity. When it comes to seeking cures, we must have a strong Faith and believe that God can cure us on the basis of our prayer: “Ask and you shall receive!” (Matthew 7:7). We must also have a strong Hope (confidence) that God will cure us: “The Lord our God has not forsaken them that hope in Him!” (Judith 13:17). Lastly we must have a strong Charity or love of God, for “eye has not seen, nor has ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9).
► FAITH HEALING: The power of our Faith is truly tremendous! “He had Faith to be healed” (Acts 14:8). Our Lord hammers home the power of Faith on many occasions: “According to your Faith, be it done unto you!” (Matthew 9:29). “All things, whatsoever you ask when you pray, believe that you shall receive them; and they shall come unto you!” (Mark 11:24). “Jesus said to him: ‘If you can believe, all things are possible to him that believes!’” (Mark 9:22). “Amen I say to you, if you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain: ‘Remove from here to there!’ ― and it shall remove and nothing shall be impossible to you!” (Matthew 17:19). Amen, I say to you, if you shall have Faith, and stagger not, you shall say to this mountain: ‘Take up and cast thyself into the sea!’ ― and it shall be done” (Matthew 21:21). “And the Lord said: “If you had Faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you might say to this mulberry tree: ‘Be thou rooted up and be thou transplanted into the sea!’ ― and it would obey you” (Luke 17:6). “Amen I say to you, that whosoever shall say to this mountain: ‘Be thou removed and be cast into the sea!’ and shall not stagger in his heart, but believe that whatsoever he says shall be done; then it shall be done unto him!” (Mark 11:23).
Jesus made Faith a prerequisite in those whom He would cure: “Jesus, seeing their Faith, said to the man sick of the palsy: ‘Be of good heart, thy sins are forgiven thee! … Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house’” (Matthew 9:2, 8). “Jesus said: ‘Be of good heart, daughter! Thy Faith has made thee whole!’ And the woman was made whole from that hour” (Matthew 9:22). “Jesus said to her: ‘O woman, great is your Faith! Be it done to you as you wish!’ And her daughter was cured from that hour” (Matthew 15:28). “Jesus said to him: ‘Receive thy sight! Thy Faith has made thee whole!’” (Luke 18:42). “And He said to him: ‘Arise! Go thy way! For thy Faith hath made thee whole!’” (Luke 17:19).
Our Lord asked the blind men if they believed that He could cure them: “The blind men came to Him and Jesus said to them: ‘Do you believe that I can do this unto you?’ They said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord!’ Then He touched their eyes, saying: ‘According to your Faith be it done unto you!’ And their eyes were opened” (Matthew 9:28-30).
On another occasion, Our Lord insisted on faith and belief: “There came a man whose name was Jairus, a ruler of the synagogue, and he fell down at the feet of Jesus, beseeching Him that he would come into his house―for he had an only daughter, almost twelve years old, and she was dying ... Jesus hearing this, answered the father of the girl: ‘Fear not! Believe only and she shall be safe!’” (Luke 8:41-50).
Elsewhere, Jesus said: “If thou canst believe―then all things are possible to him that believes!” (Mark 9:22) … “Ask, and it shall be given you! Seek, and you shall find! Knock, and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7). Yet we do ask―so why don’t we receive? St. James warns: “You ask and receive not―because you ask amiss, so that you may consume it on your concupiscences!” (James 4:3).
► SELF-HEALING: Self-healing is an ambiguous term that can mean several things. It can refer to the God-given powers of the body to heal itself without any external intervention by the patient, after, for example, a cut, a bruise, a sprain, a broken limb, or recovering from a variety of illnesses. Certain animals hibernate if they are wounded or injured. Researchers have found that black bears who incur small cuts to the skin have an adaption that allows for wound healing during hibernation that results in little to no infection and hardly any scarring. Self-healing can also refer to the process of recovery motivated by and directed by the patient, guided often only by instinct. Such a process encounters mixed fortunes due to its amateur nature. The value of self-healing lies in its ability to be tailored to the unique experience and requirements of the individual.
► NATURAL CURES: Yes―God can and does heal instantly in a miraculous manner, but―as theologians tell us―God will not do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices. In most cases, God heals naturally, over a period of time, with the use of natural remedies. But the tragic thing is that very often we don’t look upon it as a genuine healing from God. We would rather call it “natural healing”, or the “body’s way of healing itself.” Nature is God’s pharmacy! We do not grasp, know or understand even one-billionth of the medicinal and healing elements that God has placed in His creation. Most of us are probably surrounded by items from God’s pharmacy that would take care of all and any ailments that might arise! God is perfect, all-knowing and almighty, isn’t He? Our knowledge of God’s pharmacy is worse that an infant’s knowledge of astronomy, nuclear physics, brain surgery, etc. If we―as a human race―were less sinful, then God’s Providence would assuredly help us discover and understand much more about His pharmacy. Sin doesn’t pay very well: “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). Before the advent of modern man-made medicine and Big Pharma, man’s medicine was God-made medicine that was found all around him in God’s created Nature. The Ancient Greek physician, Hippocrates, said: “Let food be thy medicine, thy medicine shall be thy food.” Whereas a long time before that, Holy Scripture said: “The fruits of the trees shall be for food, and the leaves thereof for medicine” (Ezechiel 47:12).
► MODERN MEDICINE: The “new kid on the block” is modern man-made medicine. This “new kid on the block” has become a demi-god and idol to most people in the world. God―and His created “Natural Pharmacy”―has been dethroned, relegated, and set-aside in favor man’s prideful “invention” of modern-medicine! What an act of pride and insanity―as if man could do better than God, and as if God forgot to or could not do something and was waiting for man to come along put right God’s incompetence! The usual plan and ploy of modern medicine is to cast doubt over and discredit God’s natural medicines by a whole variety of means and phrases such as: “It has not been scientifically proved! … There is no scientific evidence! … There is insufficient research! … etc.” The bottom line of most modern medicines is that most medications have evolved from foods and plants that God made! But you cannot patent Nature and therefore there is little money to made from natural cures in comparison to the exorbitant prices for man-made cures. So they add something of their own to God’s natural cures, take out a patent on their new “invention” and hike-up the price astronomically. Even all the modern technological aspects of modern medicine―things such as X-rays, CAT-scans, EKG/ECG-monitors, Ultrasounds, MR-scanners, etc. ― all depend upon what God has created as a foundation.
Furthermore, you cannot fail to notice the greed that drives modern medicine today! It is not primarily geared to cure people by addressing and treating the cause of the disease―it merely treats the symptoms in many cases, preferring to merely make the sick person feel a little better without actually curing the disease. Why? Because there is no money to be made by curing someone―you want them to keep coming back for costly treatments! Alongside that, it is important to prevent as people as possible from trying God’s natural cures―and so we have a perpetual campaign of disinformation, misinformation, discrediting, mocking and casting doubt upon the natural cures that exist and can be used at a far cheaper cost.
It is much like the electric light-bulb. It is possible to make an “everlasting” light bulb―but light-bulb manufacturers held a secret meeting in Geneva 1924, where the likes of Philips, International General Electric, OSRAM, and others, all decided to form a group called the “Pheobus Cartel“. Pheobus was the Greek god of light. The main objective of this cartel was to agree to control the supply of light bulbs. Each understood that if any one of them managed to develop a long-lasting light bulb, the need for replacement bulbs would likely dry up. Bulbs were lasting too long. Not ideal from their point of view. So, to combat this, all members of the cartel agreed to reduce the lifespan of bulbs on purpose. Initially, this was set to no more than 1,000 hours! To enforce this, and prevent any one of them from breaking the agreement, samples of bulbs were regularly tested by a central authority and any manufacturer whose bulbs that lasted longer than the set minimum would be fined. This tactic is called “Planned Obsolescence” ― which is a business strategy that ensures the current version of a product will become outdated, or even useless, within a set time period. The idea is that such a built-in limitation will ensure that consumers will seek replacements in the future — therefore boosting sales. You can see it in many products today, like smartphones, tablets, laptops, computers, etc.
Furthermore, you cannot fail to notice the greed that drives modern medicine today! It is not primarily geared to cure people by addressing and treating the cause of the disease―it merely treats the symptoms in many cases, preferring to merely make the sick person feel a little better without actually curing the disease. Why? Because there is no money to be made by curing someone―you want them to keep coming back for costly treatments! Health care is big business, and Americans with medical needs are the ones paying the bill. Total healthcare spending in America topped $4.3 trillion in 2021, with more than 31% of that spent on hospital services. Hospital costs depend on the hospital, where it is, the patient’s insurance coverage, and more. They can vary wildly. The average per-day hospital cost in the U.S. is $2,883, with California ($4,181) the most expensive, and Mississippi ($1,305) the least. The average hospital stay is 4.6 days, at an average cost of $13,262. If surgery is involved, hospital costs soar through the roof. Some of the most common surgeries have price tags that top $100,000.
In the Bible, there are numerous instances of God curing people. Many New Testament healing accounts are described two or three times, raising the total number of descriptions to 85. Only two of the healings in the four Gospels involve a healer other than Jesus. The Old Testament contains 21 healing accounts captured in 23 descriptions.
► OUR LORD healed many people: “Many followed Him, and He healed them all” (Matthew 12:15) … “All that had anyone sick with diverse diseases, they brought them to Him. And He, laying His hands on every one of them, healed them” (Luke 4:40) … “And there came to Him great multitudes, having with them the dumb, the blind, the lame, the maimed, and many others―and they cast them down at His feet, and He healed them” (Matthew 15:30).
► LOURDES: We read of the many miracles of healing that have occurred in the miraculous waters of Lourdes in France [read more here]. A Medical Bureau was established to examine and certify the cures. Some 1,200 cures were said to have been observed between 1858 and 1889, and about one hundred more each year during the “Golden Age” of Lourdes, 1890–1914. All in all, more than 7,000 cures have been documented at the waters of Lourdes. The Church has vigorously investigated and validated a mere 70 of them. Not all miracles are reported to the authorities at Lourdes, so it is likely that there are many more miracles that are left unreported, unresearched and undocumented. The Lourdes phenomenon, extraordinary in many respects, still awaits scientific explanation.
► MIRACULOUS INTERCESSIONS: We read in the Gospels that Jesus summoned His Twelve Apostles and gave them authority and power over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness. “And Jesus made that Twelve should be with Him, and He gave them power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out devils” (Mark 3:14-15). “And having called His twelve disciples together, He gave them power over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of diseases, and all manner of infirmities … These Twelve Jesus sent, saying: Go heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out devils! Freely have you received, freely give!” (Matthew 10:1-8).
Besides the Apostles, Our Lord also appointed a further seventy-two disciples to preach, heal and cure: “And the Lord appointed also other seventy-two―and He sent them two and two before His face into every city and place where He Himself was to come. And He said to them: ‘Go! And into what city soever you enter, heal the sick that are therein, and say to them: “The kingdom of God is come nigh unto you!”’” (Luke 10:1-8).
We also read of the power of the Church to intercede for the sick: “Is any man sick among you? Let him bring in the priests of the Church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the Name of the Lord. And the prayer of Faith shall save the sick man: and the Lord shall raise him up” (James 5:15).
► THE SACRAMENT OF THE SICK (a.k.a. The Anointing of the Sick, also Extreme Unction). Christ wants to continue to heal and comfort us through the Anointing of the Sick. Sometimes this Sacrament will result in miraculous physical healings; but even if there is no physical healing, there can always be a radical healing which the eye cannot yet see—that of the soul. This is the primary effect of the Sacrament—for the soul is more important than the body, therefore it is more important to save the soul from Hell by healing the soul from the disease of sin, than merely save the physical life of a person by curing their body.
► THE SACRAMENTALS OF THE CHURCH. These are not to be confused with the Sacraments of the Church―Sacraments and Sacramentals are two different things. One of the many differences between them is that Christ instituted the Sacraments, whereas it is the Church that institutes the Sacramentals. The Sacraments will always be Seven in number, but the Sacramentals can grow in number according to the wishes of the Church. The Sacraments give or increase sanctifying grace; and the Sacramentals are the means to actual graces. Sacraments work by simply being received―whereas Sacramentals depend upon the dispositions, faith and fervor of the person using the Sacramental. Sacramentals are various objects that have been blessed by Church and for use by the faithful (clergy and laity) to obtain graces from God for benefit and health of both body and soul. Examples of Sacramentals are: (1) blessed Rosaries and Chaplets; (2) blessed Scapulars; (3) blessed Crucifixes; (4) blessed Medals; (5) blessed Statues and Images of Our Lord, Our Lady, the Angels and Saints; (6) Holy Water; (7) blessed Salt; (8) blessed Oils and Wines; (9) blessed Candles; (10) blessed Epiphany Chalk; and many other kinds of objects that have been blessed by the Church (through the blessings administered by priests.
Among many other effects, Sacramentals can bring liberation from evil and the healing of sicknesses (including psychological disorders). On the health side of things, the Sacramentals are excellent preventatives against sickness and are also an efficacious remedy if one should become sick. They hinder the ravages of pestilence, of epidemics and infectious diseases. We see those things mentioned in the blessings that the Church imparts to those various objects. For example:
● HOLY WATER: “May this creature [water] of Yours, serve banish disease. May everything that this water sprinkles in the homes and gatherings of the faithful be delivered from all that is unclean and hurtful ... By the sprinkling of this water may everything opposed to the safety and peace of the occupants of these homes be banished, so that in calling on Your Holy Name they may obtain the well-being they desire, and be protected from every peril”
● BLESSED SALT: “May you be a purified salt, a means of health for those who believe, a medicine for body and soul for all who make use of you … May all who use it find in it a remedy for body and mind.”
● GENERAL BLESSING FOR ALL OBJECTS: “O God, pour out Your blessing on this object (these objects); and grant that anyone who uses it (them) with grateful heart and in keeping with Your law and will, may receive from You health in body and protection of soul.”
● BLESSING OF A HOME: “Lord God almighty, bless this home, so that it be the shelter of health, etc.”
● BLESSING OF A CRUCIFIX: “May this cross be blessed in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit; and may all who kneel and pray before this cross find health in body and soul.”
● BLESSING OF LILIES: “Let them be filled with such power that, whether they are used by the sick, or kept in homes or other places, or devoutly carried on one's person, they may serve to drive out evil spirits, safeguard holy chastity, and turn away illness―all this through the prayers of St. Anthony.”
● BLESSING OF ST. BLAISE CANDLES: “God … in professing his Faith in You, the glorious martyr and bishop, Blaise, did not fear any manner of torment, but gladly accepted the palm of martyrdom. In virtue of which You bestowed on him, among other gifts, the power to heal all ailments of the throat … May please you to bless and sanctify and impart Your grace to these candles. Let all men of Faith, whose necks are touched with them, may be healed of every malady of the throat and restored in health.”
● BLESSING AND INVESTITURE WITH SCAPULAR OF THE IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY: “O almighty God, grant that whoever will wear it in accord with Your will and Your law, may, in calling on Your Holy Name, be rewarded with health in body and protection of soul.”
● BLESSING OF THE SCAPULAR OF OUR LADY HEALTH OF THE SICK: “Lord, we beg You to bless this garment, and to grant that whoever will wear it in honor of Mary, God’s Holy Mother, who is the health of the sick, may enjoy well-being in body and mind … Almighty and merciful God, we humbly implore You to give health of body and soul to the members of this pious sodality, as often as they invoke the help of the blessed Virgin Mary, Health of the Sick”
● BLESSING OF WATER FOR THE SICK IN HONOR OF THE B.V.M. AND ST. TORELLUS: “O God, Who in Your heavenly mercy keep harmful things from man; Who at the pool of Probatica moved the waters by the hand of your angel, thus destroying sickness and conferring health; pour out Your blessing on this water, so that all the sick who drink it may regain their health, by the merits and prayers of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the holy confessor, Torellus.”
Is it enough to just wear a Miraculous Medal or Scapular; hang a Rosary from your car mirror; or light a blessed candle at home to be protected by God’s grace? What do we have to take into consideration in order for Sacramentals to work to the maximum capacity? One thing must be established from the outset: Sacramentals are neither about magic, nor about superstition, or anything similar. This becomes obvious when it is understood how Sacramentals work. Sacramentals work differently to the Sacraments. It is important to always recall that the Seven Sacraments are instituted by Jesus Christ and, consequently are of divine right. They work by themselves―because Christ works in them and through them. Sacramentals, on the other hand, are instituted by the Church, and their mode of action is different. Spiritual effects are obtained “from the work of the doer” (ex opere operantis). That means they are dependent upon the holiness of the one who administers the Sacramental and the one who receives the Sacramental. While it is true that the intercessory power of the Church is also at work in them, the effectiveness of Sacramentals depends primarily on the moral condition of the person who administers, as well as the person who receives them. This becomes clearly evident in the lives of the saints. When they administered Sacramentals—like St. Francis, St. Clare, St. Benedict and countless others—they had great impact. Sick people were healed, miracles happened, etc.
► HEALING THROUGH PRAYER: Strictly speaking, prayer is a Sacramental―nevertheless, we shall deal with it separately since it is a Sacramental that comes from within and not Sacramental that you put on and wear such as a blessed Medal or Scapular, nor is it like an independent object to you like Holy Water, blessed Salt, a blessed statue or image, etc. Not all prayer is equal! As you sow, so shall you reap (Galatians 6:8) and there is a risk of falling into lukewarm, automatic, distracted, halfhearted prayer, which merits the words of Our Lord: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
There have been countless cures obtained through prayer alone―but it was not a lukewarm, automatic, distracted, halfhearted prayer. There are three chief ways in which we communicate with God―Faith, Hope and Charity. When it comes to seeking cures, we must have a strong Faith and believe that God can cure us on the basis of our prayer: “Ask and you shall receive!” (Matthew 7:7). We must also have a strong Hope (confidence) that God will cure us: “The Lord our God has not forsaken them that hope in Him!” (Judith 13:17). Lastly we must have a strong Charity or love of God, for “eye has not seen, nor has ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9).
► FAITH HEALING: The power of our Faith is truly tremendous! “He had Faith to be healed” (Acts 14:8). Our Lord hammers home the power of Faith on many occasions: “According to your Faith, be it done unto you!” (Matthew 9:29). “All things, whatsoever you ask when you pray, believe that you shall receive them; and they shall come unto you!” (Mark 11:24). “Jesus said to him: ‘If you can believe, all things are possible to him that believes!’” (Mark 9:22). “Amen I say to you, if you have Faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain: ‘Remove from here to there!’ ― and it shall remove and nothing shall be impossible to you!” (Matthew 17:19). Amen, I say to you, if you shall have Faith, and stagger not, you shall say to this mountain: ‘Take up and cast thyself into the sea!’ ― and it shall be done” (Matthew 21:21). “And the Lord said: “If you had Faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you might say to this mulberry tree: ‘Be thou rooted up and be thou transplanted into the sea!’ ― and it would obey you” (Luke 17:6). “Amen I say to you, that whosoever shall say to this mountain: ‘Be thou removed and be cast into the sea!’ and shall not stagger in his heart, but believe that whatsoever he says shall be done; then it shall be done unto him!” (Mark 11:23).
Jesus made Faith a prerequisite in those whom He would cure: “Jesus, seeing their Faith, said to the man sick of the palsy: ‘Be of good heart, thy sins are forgiven thee! … Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house’” (Matthew 9:2, 8). “Jesus said: ‘Be of good heart, daughter! Thy Faith has made thee whole!’ And the woman was made whole from that hour” (Matthew 9:22). “Jesus said to her: ‘O woman, great is your Faith! Be it done to you as you wish!’ And her daughter was cured from that hour” (Matthew 15:28). “Jesus said to him: ‘Receive thy sight! Thy Faith has made thee whole!’” (Luke 18:42). “And He said to him: ‘Arise! Go thy way! For thy Faith hath made thee whole!’” (Luke 17:19).
Our Lord asked the blind men if they believed that He could cure them: “The blind men came to Him and Jesus said to them: ‘Do you believe that I can do this unto you?’ They said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord!’ Then He touched their eyes, saying: ‘According to your Faith be it done unto you!’ And their eyes were opened” (Matthew 9:28-30).
On another occasion, Our Lord insisted on faith and belief: “There came a man whose name was Jairus, a ruler of the synagogue, and he fell down at the feet of Jesus, beseeching Him that he would come into his house―for he had an only daughter, almost twelve years old, and she was dying ... Jesus hearing this, answered the father of the girl: ‘Fear not! Believe only and she shall be safe!’” (Luke 8:41-50).
Elsewhere, Jesus said: “If thou canst believe―then all things are possible to him that believes!” (Mark 9:22) … “Ask, and it shall be given you! Seek, and you shall find! Knock, and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7). Yet we do ask―so why don’t we receive? St. James warns: “You ask and receive not―because you ask amiss, so that you may consume it on your concupiscences!” (James 4:3).
► SELF-HEALING: Self-healing is an ambiguous term that can mean several things. It can refer to the God-given powers of the body to heal itself without any external intervention by the patient, after, for example, a cut, a bruise, a sprain, a broken limb, or recovering from a variety of illnesses. Certain animals hibernate if they are wounded or injured. Researchers have found that black bears who incur small cuts to the skin have an adaption that allows for wound healing during hibernation that results in little to no infection and hardly any scarring. Self-healing can also refer to the process of recovery motivated by and directed by the patient, guided often only by instinct. Such a process encounters mixed fortunes due to its amateur nature. The value of self-healing lies in its ability to be tailored to the unique experience and requirements of the individual.
► NATURAL CURES: Yes―God can and does heal instantly in a miraculous manner, but―as theologians tell us―God will not do the extraordinary when the ordinary suffices. In most cases, God heals naturally, over a period of time, with the use of natural remedies. But the tragic thing is that very often we don’t look upon it as a genuine healing from God. We would rather call it “natural healing”, or the “body’s way of healing itself.” Nature is God’s pharmacy! We do not grasp, know or understand even one-billionth of the medicinal and healing elements that God has placed in His creation. Most of us are probably surrounded by items from God’s pharmacy that would take care of all and any ailments that might arise! God is perfect, all-knowing and almighty, isn’t He? Our knowledge of God’s pharmacy is worse that an infant’s knowledge of astronomy, nuclear physics, brain surgery, etc. If we―as a human race―were less sinful, then God’s Providence would assuredly help us discover and understand much more about His pharmacy. Sin doesn’t pay very well: “The wages of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). Before the advent of modern man-made medicine and Big Pharma, man’s medicine was God-made medicine that was found all around him in God’s created Nature. The Ancient Greek physician, Hippocrates, said: “Let food be thy medicine, thy medicine shall be thy food.” Whereas a long time before that, Holy Scripture said: “The fruits of the trees shall be for food, and the leaves thereof for medicine” (Ezechiel 47:12).
► MODERN MEDICINE: The “new kid on the block” is modern man-made medicine. This “new kid on the block” has become a demi-god and idol to most people in the world. God―and His created “Natural Pharmacy”―has been dethroned, relegated, and set-aside in favor man’s prideful “invention” of modern-medicine! What an act of pride and insanity―as if man could do better than God, and as if God forgot to or could not do something and was waiting for man to come along put right God’s incompetence! The usual plan and ploy of modern medicine is to cast doubt over and discredit God’s natural medicines by a whole variety of means and phrases such as: “It has not been scientifically proved! … There is no scientific evidence! … There is insufficient research! … etc.” The bottom line of most modern medicines is that most medications have evolved from foods and plants that God made! But you cannot patent Nature and therefore there is little money to made from natural cures in comparison to the exorbitant prices for man-made cures. So they add something of their own to God’s natural cures, take out a patent on their new “invention” and hike-up the price astronomically. Even all the modern technological aspects of modern medicine―things such as X-rays, CAT-scans, EKG/ECG-monitors, Ultrasounds, MR-scanners, etc. ― all depend upon what God has created as a foundation.
Furthermore, you cannot fail to notice the greed that drives modern medicine today! It is not primarily geared to cure people by addressing and treating the cause of the disease―it merely treats the symptoms in many cases, preferring to merely make the sick person feel a little better without actually curing the disease. Why? Because there is no money to be made by curing someone―you want them to keep coming back for costly treatments! Alongside that, it is important to prevent as people as possible from trying God’s natural cures―and so we have a perpetual campaign of disinformation, misinformation, discrediting, mocking and casting doubt upon the natural cures that exist and can be used at a far cheaper cost.
It is much like the electric light-bulb. It is possible to make an “everlasting” light bulb―but light-bulb manufacturers held a secret meeting in Geneva 1924, where the likes of Philips, International General Electric, OSRAM, and others, all decided to form a group called the “Pheobus Cartel“. Pheobus was the Greek god of light. The main objective of this cartel was to agree to control the supply of light bulbs. Each understood that if any one of them managed to develop a long-lasting light bulb, the need for replacement bulbs would likely dry up. Bulbs were lasting too long. Not ideal from their point of view. So, to combat this, all members of the cartel agreed to reduce the lifespan of bulbs on purpose. Initially, this was set to no more than 1,000 hours! To enforce this, and prevent any one of them from breaking the agreement, samples of bulbs were regularly tested by a central authority and any manufacturer whose bulbs that lasted longer than the set minimum would be fined. This tactic is called “Planned Obsolescence” ― which is a business strategy that ensures the current version of a product will become outdated, or even useless, within a set time period. The idea is that such a built-in limitation will ensure that consumers will seek replacements in the future — therefore boosting sales. You can see it in many products today, like smartphones, tablets, laptops, computers, etc.
Furthermore, you cannot fail to notice the greed that drives modern medicine today! It is not primarily geared to cure people by addressing and treating the cause of the disease―it merely treats the symptoms in many cases, preferring to merely make the sick person feel a little better without actually curing the disease. Why? Because there is no money to be made by curing someone―you want them to keep coming back for costly treatments! Health care is big business, and Americans with medical needs are the ones paying the bill. Total healthcare spending in America topped $4.3 trillion in 2021, with more than 31% of that spent on hospital services. Hospital costs depend on the hospital, where it is, the patient’s insurance coverage, and more. They can vary wildly. The average per-day hospital cost in the U.S. is $2,883, with California ($4,181) the most expensive, and Mississippi ($1,305) the least. The average hospital stay is 4.6 days, at an average cost of $13,262. If surgery is involved, hospital costs soar through the roof. Some of the most common surgeries have price tags that top $100,000.
|
Some typical average costs for common surgeries are:
Heart valve replacement: $170,000 Heart bypass: $123,000 Spinal fusion: $110,000 Hip replacement: $40,364 Knee replacement: $35,000 Angioplasty: $28,200 Hip resurfacing: $28,000 Gastric bypass: $25,000 Cornea: $17,500 Gastric sleeve: $16,000 |
Cost of one-year’s supply of the following medications/drugs:
Myalept $1,260,000 Zokinvy $1,070,000 Danyelza $1,010,000 Kimmtrak $975,520 Folotyn $842,585 Actimmune $819,000 Soliris $764,000 Brineura $755,898 Blincyto $754,720 Ravicti $695,970 |
More than 160 medications are currently available with the potential to exceed $250,000 in annual cost. Injectable medications for cancer drive high-cost claims, and one-fifth of employers had at least one member with more than $1million in claims, according to recent data released by Sun Life insurance company. Spending for autoimmune disorders, oncology, HIV, and multiple sclerosis patients will continue to grow in the next five years. The drug manufacturer pipeline will continue to produce more brand-name specialty drugs and gene therapy treatments with larger price tags that treat rare disease states in the years ahead. With 1-in-10 Americans having some rare disease, the cost of treating those diseases will be astronomical. One has to ask: “Where is the godliness in all this? Is this not more about greed than health?” What makes matters worse is when you consider the “success” rate of cures that these medications and procedures achieve!
Because of their refusal to accept unpatented natural cures that God has put into Nature, medicine gets it wrong, and clinicians engage in unproven, ineffective, expensive, and even harmful practices. Worse, these practices can become entrenched as standard protocols. Anyone with common sense (which is not very common these days) should logically question why many modern day, man-made drugs, have a massive list of adverse side-effects listed! Take, for example, the commonly taken drug called Ibuprofen―which is not classified as a dangerous drug, but can purchased by anyone “over-the-counter” at any pharmacy. Here is what the Mayo Clinic says about the potential side effects of Ibuprofen:
► Ibuprofen (Oral Route) Side Effects
Along with its needed effects, a medicine may cause some unwanted effects. Although not all of these side effects may occur, if they do occur they may need medical attention. Check with your doctor immediately if any of the following side effects occur:
● More common side effects of Ibuprofen: Abdominal pain; acid or sour stomach; belching; bloating; cloudy urine; decrease in amount of urine; decrease in urine output or decrease in urine-concentrating ability; diarrhea; difficulty having a bowel movement (stool); excess air or gas in stomach or intestines; full feeling; heartburn; indigestion; itching skin; pain or discomfort in chest, upper stomach, or throat; pale skin; passing gas; nausea; noisy, rattling breathing; rash with flat lesions or small raised lesions on the skin; shortness of breath; swelling of face, fingers, hands, feet, lower legs, or ankles; troubled breathing at rest; troubled breathing with exertion; unusual bleeding or bruising; unusual tiredness or weakness; vomiting; weight gain.
● Less common side effects of Ibuprofen: Abdominal cramps; stomach soreness or discomfort.
● Rare side effects of Ibuprofen: Agitation; back, leg, or stomach pains; bleeding gums; blistering, peeling, loosening of skin; blood in urine or stools; bloody, black, or tarry stools; blurred vision; burning feeling in chest or stomach; change in vision; chest pain; chills; clay-colored stools; coma; confusion; constipation; cough or hoarseness; dark urine; decreased urine output; depression; difficulty breathing; difficulty swallowing; dilated neck veins; dizziness; dry mouth; extreme fatigue; fast, irregular, pounding, or racing heartbeat or pulse; fever with or without chills; frequent urination; general body swelling; general feeling of tiredness or weakness; hair loss, thinning of hair; headache; hives or welts; hostility; impaired vision; increased blood pressure; increased volume of pale, dilute urine; irregular breathing; irritability; itching; joint or muscle pain; lab results that show problems with liver; lethargy; light-colored stools; loss of appetite; lower back or side pain; muscle twitching; nosebleeds; painful or difficult urination; pains in stomach, side, or abdomen, possibly radiating to the back; pinpoint red spots on skin; puffiness or swelling of the eyelids or around the eyes, face, lips, or tongue; rash; red skin lesions, often with a purple center; red, irritated eyes; redness of skin; seizures; severe abdominal pain, cramping, burning; severe and continuing nausea; sore throat; sores, ulcers, or white spots in mouth or on lips; stiff neck or back; stomach upset; stupor; swollen or painful glands; tenderness in stomach area; thirst; tightness in chest; unpleasant breath odor; upper right abdominal pain; vomiting of blood; vomiting of material that looks like coffee grounds; wheezing; yellow eyes and skin.
● Symptoms of Ibuprofen overdose: Bluish lips or skin; difficulty sleeping; disorientation; dizziness, faintness, or lightheadedness when getting up from a lying or sitting position suddenly; drowsiness to profound coma; hallucination; lightheadedness or fainting; mood or other mental changes; muscle tremors; not breathing; rapid, deep breathing; restlessness; slow or irregular heartbeat; stomach cramps; sudden fainting; sweating.
► Some Ibuprofen side effects may occur that usually do not need medical attention. These side effects may go away during treatment as your body adjusts to the medicine. Also, your health care professional may be able to tell you about ways to prevent or reduce some of these side effects. Check with your health care professional if any of the following side effects continue or are bothersome or if you have any questions about them:
● More common Ibuprofen side effects of Ibuprofen that need addressing: Continuing ringing or buzzing or other unexplained noise in ears; hearing loss; nervousness; Rare; Crying; depersonalization; discouragement; dry eyes; dysphoria; euphoria; feeling sad or empty; lack of appetite; loss of interest or pleasure; mental depression; paranoia; quick to react or overreact; rapidly changing moods; runny nose; sleepiness or unusual drowsiness; sleeplessness; sneezing; stuffy nose; trouble concentrating; trouble sleeping; unable to sleep. Other side effects not listed may also occur in some patients. If you notice any other effects, check with your healthcare professional.
(Source for above: Mayo Clinic)
There you have it in black-and-white straight from the Mayo Clinic. If you feel overwhelmed by the list of potential side effects on your medication, that is understandable. Drugs, on average, each list a mind-numbing 70 potential drug reactions, researchers say. The above Ibuprofen list of potential side effects contains 146 side effects. The U.S. pharmaceutical advertisers face a difficult dilemma―because of “truth-in-advertising” laws, by which any commercial that is giving indications for use of a prescription drug, must also give full disclosure of side effects. We have all heard those commercials on television or on radio or the internet. At the end of the commercial, the voice suddenly becomes super-fast (like a machine gun rattling off bullets) and races at breakneck speed through the long list of potential side effects, which is so fast that you can barely make out what is being said, let alone remember many of them!
Cures for Life or a Culture of Death?
Our Lord came to bring life―eternal life: “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly!” (John 10:10). Our Lord is the Life: “I am the way, the truth and the life” (John 14:6). Satan is the opponent and opposite of Christ―you could say that “He is the way to lies and death―not truth and life!” “God made not death” (Wisdom 1:13). The Culture of Death is the Culture of Satan. “By the envy of the devil, death came into the world” (Wisdom 2:24). As Our Lord said: “The devil was a murderer from the beginning!” (John 8:44) and Holy Scripture adds: “The devil, like a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8) … Christ came so “that, through death, he might destroy him who had the empire of death, that is to say, the devil” (Hebrews 2:14).
Fr. Gabriele Amorth―the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome for over 30 years―says: “Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world! … The final goal of the evil enemy is to bring us to despair and suicide! God is God of life, and Satan is the lord of death! Satan corrupted Adam, introducing him to sin and the world of evil, death, pain and illness ... God, to repair the break caused by Adam’s sin, sent His only Son Jesus to Earth to redeem mankind through His passion and death. But the battle continues! … Everything that seduces and enslaves souls leads to their death, which is Satan’s objective!” If Satan rules the world―and Our Lord calls Satan “the prince of this world” (John 12:31)―and if Satan rules an Empire of Death (see above)―then the Empire of Death rules the world and gives the world a Culture of Death. As Fr. Amorth said―Satan seeks to bring us all to despair (which is a death of hope in the soul) and suicide (which is a death to life in the body).
The current Culture of Death has been gradually and progressively growing over the decades. The culture of death seems to be in the saddle today. The culture of death still dominates the laws and the courts of America. Some chief areas of growth have obviously been contraception (the prevention of life)―it is estimated that contraception prevents around 250 million babies worldwide from being conceived each year; abortion (the killing of life at its conception and inception)―murders, on average, over 40 million babies worldwide each year; euthanasia (the termination of imperfect life)―whereby assisted suicide and euthanasia are being legalized in an increasing number of countries and in those places where the practice has been allowed, the number of people who die with assistance is rising. Medical murder― recently we have seen the massive increase in deaths (40% increases reported by insurance companies) due dangerous medicines being almost forcefully and threateningly applied during the recent Plannedemic―which has opened the flood gates of death that are likely to continue with each successive Plannedemic―thus perfectly implementing the agenda of depopulation, which is no longer a hidden agenda, but is openly mentioned by people like Bill Gates on the mainstream media.
As Our Lord said: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works thereof are evil!” (John 7:7). “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! ... You shall be brought before governors and before kings for My sake! They deliver you up to be afflicted and shall put you to death! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death; and the father the son; and the children shall rise up against their parents and shall put them to death! But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:17-22; 24:9-10). “For Thy sake we are put to death all the day long! We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter!” (Romans 8:36). “Appointed to death―we are made a spectacle to the world, and to angels, and to men!” (1 Corinthians 4:9). “We, who live, are always delivered unto death for the sake of Jesus sake” (2 Corinthians 4:11).
Ultimately, the Culture of Death is the same as a Culture of Sin―for sin leads to death: “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) ... “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56) … “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15) … “By one man sin entered into this world [like a virus―the virus of Original Sin), and, by sin, death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned!” (Romans 5:12).
Disease X from the Culture of Death
Did you really think that the recent Plannedemic was going to be “once in a lifetime” event? Do you really think that the planners of the Plannedemic put in all that effort and money to just drop the whole thing and go away? The Plannedemic was merely the “thin-end-of-a-wedge”, or a “foot-in-the-door”, or a trial run for more that is to come. This month―from January 15th-19th, 2024―global leaders met at the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Davos summit, where the key topic of discussion was “Preparing for Disease X,” a hypothetical new pandemic predicted to emerge in 2025 and kill 20 times more people than COVID-19.
Where is God is this Culture of Death?
Many will ask: “Where is God in this evil culture of death? He is almighty, omnipotent! Why doesn’t He do something?” Yes, of course God is almighty and there is nothing that He cannot do--so why doesn’t He do something? Well, actually, He is and has been doing something all along! Nothing happens in this world without God either wanting it to happen (as in the case of good) or allowing it to happen (as in the case of evil). God is allowing the current Culture of Death for a reason. What is that reason? Our Lady of La Salette said: “The sins of men are the cause of all the troubles on this Earth.”
There is no shortage of sin in the world today!
Already back in 1956, Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
If Our Lady said that in 1956―before abortion, contraception, LGBTQ+, drug addiction, pornography and apostasy hit the roof―then what would she say today? We are simply getting what we deserve! Catholics are meant to be the “light of the world” (Matthew 5:14) and the “salt of the Earth” (Matthew 5:13), but they are “sitting in darkness” and have lost their saltiness. “You are the salt of the Earth! But if the salt lose its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing any more, except to be cast out and to be trodden on by men!” says Our Lord (Matthew 5:13).
Our Lady of Good Success warned against the lack of sufficient prayer and sacrifice for the ills of the world: “Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils... No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents. Oh, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Catholics Contribute to the Culture of Death
Catholics have not taken their Faith seriously―and, at best, if they take it somewhat seriously, then it is only to benefit their selfish selves. They have little or no interest in Our Lady’s of Fatima request that we pray and sacrifice ourselves―not for ourselves―but for the conversion of sinners throughout the world. We cannot use the lame excuse of Cain in protesting that we are not our brother’s keeper: “Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is your brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I do not know! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to Cain: ‘What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth! Now, therefore, you shall be cursed upon the Earth, which has opened her mouth and received the blood of your brother at your hand!’” (Genesis 4:8-11).
How many sinners have we allowed to fall into Hell through our indifference, negligence, or even our flat out refusal to pray for sinners and enemies? Even if we do pray for them―with what fervor and intensity do we pray? For most people it is merely moving their lips but not their heart―their hearts are not in it. We are actually acting out Our Lord’s parable of the Good Samaritan―where the Jewish priest and Jewish Levite see their fellow Jew lying by the roadside, having been beaten-up, stripped and robbed, and they just walk on by, no doubt too busy with their own lives to stop and help a fellow Jew. That is what we Catholics are doing today―we are too busy to stop and rescue the countless souls that are falling into Hell, having been beaten-up by temptation, stripped of virtues and robbed of sanctifying grace by the devils.
Holy Scripture is brutally clear on the matter: “In this the children of God are manifest and the children of the devil. Whosoever loveth not his brother is not of God. For this is the declaration which you have heard from the beginning―that you should love one another! Not as Cain, who was of the wicked one, and killed his brother! He that does not love, abides in death! Whoever hates his brother is a murderer! And you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in himself! In this we have known the charity of God―because He has laid down His life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for others. He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him? Let us not love in word, nor in tongue, but in deed, and in truth!” (1 John 3:10-18).
If we neglect to pray and sacrifice ourselves for them (which is the case for most Catholics), then we have to face the consequences of the plots and plans and sins of the sinful world―which is exactly what is happening now. Will things get better or will things get worse? That depends upon whether Catholics get better or worse. God could change the world in the blink of an eye―but He won’t, because He expects His created creatures to play their part. As St. Augustine said―God can save man without the cooperation of man, but God will not save man unless man cooperates: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!”
Ultimately, good will triumph over evil, the Faith will triumph over the world, God and Our Lady will triumph over Satan and his minions―yet at what price? We have to pay the price by our prayers and sacrifices―and the longer we wait and put-off our duty, then the price increases. God allows evil as a punishment for sin and God loves to bring good out of evil, and victory out of imminent defeat. As Our Lady said that things will get so bad that we will eventually be forced to get on our knees and really start to pray and beg with tears for help and deliverance:
“There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this! … I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful! … Will you sacrifice yourself for the people of this time? … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Prayers, penances and tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession … At the blood, the tears and prayers of the righteous, God will relent ... This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration … This will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet and fettering him in the infernal abyss … In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph! … Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death.” (Words of Our Lady at Quito, La Salette, Fatima and Akita).
God has the cure for all this―but we must be willing to pay the price for the cure, because we are partially guilty for disease of sin throughout the world by our negligence in offering the many, many prayers and sacrifices required to prevent and turn back the tsunami of sin that has inundated the world in our lifetime. It is time to become salty again (or for the first time) and to start purifying the world by our saltiness!
Salt contains anti-inflammatory and anti-bacterial minerals that help to draw toxins from the body. Salt emits unique ions that purify the air. Salt water has been used since ancient times to treat cuts, wounds, sores, and skin irritations. Today, saline solution is used in medicine to cleanse wounds and help promote healing. We, Catholics, are meant to be the salt of the Earth―but we have lost our saltiness. Until the time that we regain our saltiness―and start sincerely offering many prayers and sacrifices for this sinful world―nothing is going to change. In fact, the infection of sin will only get worse and cause even greater sufferings! Is it not time to wake up and start taking our responsibilities and duties as Catholics seriously? St. John Chrysostom says that on our Judgment Day, God will judge us on all that went on the world in our lifetime―for we have the potential of praying and sacrificing for all things, all persons and all circumstances. If we fail to do that, then we will be severely judged on that.
Because of their refusal to accept unpatented natural cures that God has put into Nature, medicine gets it wrong, and clinicians engage in unproven, ineffective, expensive, and even harmful practices. Worse, these practices can become entrenched as standard protocols. Anyone with common sense (which is not very common these days) should logically question why many modern day, man-made drugs, have a massive list of adverse side-effects listed! Take, for example, the commonly taken drug called Ibuprofen―which is not classified as a dangerous drug, but can purchased by anyone “over-the-counter” at any pharmacy. Here is what the Mayo Clinic says about the potential side effects of Ibuprofen:
► Ibuprofen (Oral Route) Side Effects
Along with its needed effects, a medicine may cause some unwanted effects. Although not all of these side effects may occur, if they do occur they may need medical attention. Check with your doctor immediately if any of the following side effects occur:
● More common side effects of Ibuprofen: Abdominal pain; acid or sour stomach; belching; bloating; cloudy urine; decrease in amount of urine; decrease in urine output or decrease in urine-concentrating ability; diarrhea; difficulty having a bowel movement (stool); excess air or gas in stomach or intestines; full feeling; heartburn; indigestion; itching skin; pain or discomfort in chest, upper stomach, or throat; pale skin; passing gas; nausea; noisy, rattling breathing; rash with flat lesions or small raised lesions on the skin; shortness of breath; swelling of face, fingers, hands, feet, lower legs, or ankles; troubled breathing at rest; troubled breathing with exertion; unusual bleeding or bruising; unusual tiredness or weakness; vomiting; weight gain.
● Less common side effects of Ibuprofen: Abdominal cramps; stomach soreness or discomfort.
● Rare side effects of Ibuprofen: Agitation; back, leg, or stomach pains; bleeding gums; blistering, peeling, loosening of skin; blood in urine or stools; bloody, black, or tarry stools; blurred vision; burning feeling in chest or stomach; change in vision; chest pain; chills; clay-colored stools; coma; confusion; constipation; cough or hoarseness; dark urine; decreased urine output; depression; difficulty breathing; difficulty swallowing; dilated neck veins; dizziness; dry mouth; extreme fatigue; fast, irregular, pounding, or racing heartbeat or pulse; fever with or without chills; frequent urination; general body swelling; general feeling of tiredness or weakness; hair loss, thinning of hair; headache; hives or welts; hostility; impaired vision; increased blood pressure; increased volume of pale, dilute urine; irregular breathing; irritability; itching; joint or muscle pain; lab results that show problems with liver; lethargy; light-colored stools; loss of appetite; lower back or side pain; muscle twitching; nosebleeds; painful or difficult urination; pains in stomach, side, or abdomen, possibly radiating to the back; pinpoint red spots on skin; puffiness or swelling of the eyelids or around the eyes, face, lips, or tongue; rash; red skin lesions, often with a purple center; red, irritated eyes; redness of skin; seizures; severe abdominal pain, cramping, burning; severe and continuing nausea; sore throat; sores, ulcers, or white spots in mouth or on lips; stiff neck or back; stomach upset; stupor; swollen or painful glands; tenderness in stomach area; thirst; tightness in chest; unpleasant breath odor; upper right abdominal pain; vomiting of blood; vomiting of material that looks like coffee grounds; wheezing; yellow eyes and skin.
● Symptoms of Ibuprofen overdose: Bluish lips or skin; difficulty sleeping; disorientation; dizziness, faintness, or lightheadedness when getting up from a lying or sitting position suddenly; drowsiness to profound coma; hallucination; lightheadedness or fainting; mood or other mental changes; muscle tremors; not breathing; rapid, deep breathing; restlessness; slow or irregular heartbeat; stomach cramps; sudden fainting; sweating.
► Some Ibuprofen side effects may occur that usually do not need medical attention. These side effects may go away during treatment as your body adjusts to the medicine. Also, your health care professional may be able to tell you about ways to prevent or reduce some of these side effects. Check with your health care professional if any of the following side effects continue or are bothersome or if you have any questions about them:
● More common Ibuprofen side effects of Ibuprofen that need addressing: Continuing ringing or buzzing or other unexplained noise in ears; hearing loss; nervousness; Rare; Crying; depersonalization; discouragement; dry eyes; dysphoria; euphoria; feeling sad or empty; lack of appetite; loss of interest or pleasure; mental depression; paranoia; quick to react or overreact; rapidly changing moods; runny nose; sleepiness or unusual drowsiness; sleeplessness; sneezing; stuffy nose; trouble concentrating; trouble sleeping; unable to sleep. Other side effects not listed may also occur in some patients. If you notice any other effects, check with your healthcare professional.
(Source for above: Mayo Clinic)
There you have it in black-and-white straight from the Mayo Clinic. If you feel overwhelmed by the list of potential side effects on your medication, that is understandable. Drugs, on average, each list a mind-numbing 70 potential drug reactions, researchers say. The above Ibuprofen list of potential side effects contains 146 side effects. The U.S. pharmaceutical advertisers face a difficult dilemma―because of “truth-in-advertising” laws, by which any commercial that is giving indications for use of a prescription drug, must also give full disclosure of side effects. We have all heard those commercials on television or on radio or the internet. At the end of the commercial, the voice suddenly becomes super-fast (like a machine gun rattling off bullets) and races at breakneck speed through the long list of potential side effects, which is so fast that you can barely make out what is being said, let alone remember many of them!
Cures for Life or a Culture of Death?
Our Lord came to bring life―eternal life: “I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly!” (John 10:10). Our Lord is the Life: “I am the way, the truth and the life” (John 14:6). Satan is the opponent and opposite of Christ―you could say that “He is the way to lies and death―not truth and life!” “God made not death” (Wisdom 1:13). The Culture of Death is the Culture of Satan. “By the envy of the devil, death came into the world” (Wisdom 2:24). As Our Lord said: “The devil was a murderer from the beginning!” (John 8:44) and Holy Scripture adds: “The devil, like a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8) … Christ came so “that, through death, he might destroy him who had the empire of death, that is to say, the devil” (Hebrews 2:14).
Fr. Gabriele Amorth―the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome for over 30 years―says: “Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world! … The final goal of the evil enemy is to bring us to despair and suicide! God is God of life, and Satan is the lord of death! Satan corrupted Adam, introducing him to sin and the world of evil, death, pain and illness ... God, to repair the break caused by Adam’s sin, sent His only Son Jesus to Earth to redeem mankind through His passion and death. But the battle continues! … Everything that seduces and enslaves souls leads to their death, which is Satan’s objective!” If Satan rules the world―and Our Lord calls Satan “the prince of this world” (John 12:31)―and if Satan rules an Empire of Death (see above)―then the Empire of Death rules the world and gives the world a Culture of Death. As Fr. Amorth said―Satan seeks to bring us all to despair (which is a death of hope in the soul) and suicide (which is a death to life in the body).
The current Culture of Death has been gradually and progressively growing over the decades. The culture of death seems to be in the saddle today. The culture of death still dominates the laws and the courts of America. Some chief areas of growth have obviously been contraception (the prevention of life)―it is estimated that contraception prevents around 250 million babies worldwide from being conceived each year; abortion (the killing of life at its conception and inception)―murders, on average, over 40 million babies worldwide each year; euthanasia (the termination of imperfect life)―whereby assisted suicide and euthanasia are being legalized in an increasing number of countries and in those places where the practice has been allowed, the number of people who die with assistance is rising. Medical murder― recently we have seen the massive increase in deaths (40% increases reported by insurance companies) due dangerous medicines being almost forcefully and threateningly applied during the recent Plannedemic―which has opened the flood gates of death that are likely to continue with each successive Plannedemic―thus perfectly implementing the agenda of depopulation, which is no longer a hidden agenda, but is openly mentioned by people like Bill Gates on the mainstream media.
As Our Lord said: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works thereof are evil!” (John 7:7). “You shall be hated by all men and all nations for My Name’s sake! ... You shall be brought before governors and before kings for My sake! They deliver you up to be afflicted and shall put you to death! The brother also shall deliver up the brother to death; and the father the son; and the children shall rise up against their parents and shall put them to death! But he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved!” (Matthew 10:17-22; 24:9-10). “For Thy sake we are put to death all the day long! We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter!” (Romans 8:36). “Appointed to death―we are made a spectacle to the world, and to angels, and to men!” (1 Corinthians 4:9). “We, who live, are always delivered unto death for the sake of Jesus sake” (2 Corinthians 4:11).
Ultimately, the Culture of Death is the same as a Culture of Sin―for sin leads to death: “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) ... “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56) … “Sin has reigned to death!” (Romans 5:21) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death!” (James 1:15) … “By one man sin entered into this world [like a virus―the virus of Original Sin), and, by sin, death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned!” (Romans 5:12).
Disease X from the Culture of Death
Did you really think that the recent Plannedemic was going to be “once in a lifetime” event? Do you really think that the planners of the Plannedemic put in all that effort and money to just drop the whole thing and go away? The Plannedemic was merely the “thin-end-of-a-wedge”, or a “foot-in-the-door”, or a trial run for more that is to come. This month―from January 15th-19th, 2024―global leaders met at the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Davos summit, where the key topic of discussion was “Preparing for Disease X,” a hypothetical new pandemic predicted to emerge in 2025 and kill 20 times more people than COVID-19.
Where is God is this Culture of Death?
Many will ask: “Where is God in this evil culture of death? He is almighty, omnipotent! Why doesn’t He do something?” Yes, of course God is almighty and there is nothing that He cannot do--so why doesn’t He do something? Well, actually, He is and has been doing something all along! Nothing happens in this world without God either wanting it to happen (as in the case of good) or allowing it to happen (as in the case of evil). God is allowing the current Culture of Death for a reason. What is that reason? Our Lady of La Salette said: “The sins of men are the cause of all the troubles on this Earth.”
There is no shortage of sin in the world today!
Already back in 1956, Our Lady said to Blessed Elena Aiello: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!”
If Our Lady said that in 1956―before abortion, contraception, LGBTQ+, drug addiction, pornography and apostasy hit the roof―then what would she say today? We are simply getting what we deserve! Catholics are meant to be the “light of the world” (Matthew 5:14) and the “salt of the Earth” (Matthew 5:13), but they are “sitting in darkness” and have lost their saltiness. “You are the salt of the Earth! But if the salt lose its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing any more, except to be cast out and to be trodden on by men!” says Our Lord (Matthew 5:13).
Our Lady of Good Success warned against the lack of sufficient prayer and sacrifice for the ills of the world: “Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils... No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents. Oh, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Catholics Contribute to the Culture of Death
Catholics have not taken their Faith seriously―and, at best, if they take it somewhat seriously, then it is only to benefit their selfish selves. They have little or no interest in Our Lady’s of Fatima request that we pray and sacrifice ourselves―not for ourselves―but for the conversion of sinners throughout the world. We cannot use the lame excuse of Cain in protesting that we are not our brother’s keeper: “Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him. And the Lord said to Cain: ‘Where is your brother Abel?’ And Cain answered: ‘I do not know! Am I my brother’s keeper?’ And the Lord said to Cain: ‘What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood cries to Me from the earth! Now, therefore, you shall be cursed upon the Earth, which has opened her mouth and received the blood of your brother at your hand!’” (Genesis 4:8-11).
How many sinners have we allowed to fall into Hell through our indifference, negligence, or even our flat out refusal to pray for sinners and enemies? Even if we do pray for them―with what fervor and intensity do we pray? For most people it is merely moving their lips but not their heart―their hearts are not in it. We are actually acting out Our Lord’s parable of the Good Samaritan―where the Jewish priest and Jewish Levite see their fellow Jew lying by the roadside, having been beaten-up, stripped and robbed, and they just walk on by, no doubt too busy with their own lives to stop and help a fellow Jew. That is what we Catholics are doing today―we are too busy to stop and rescue the countless souls that are falling into Hell, having been beaten-up by temptation, stripped of virtues and robbed of sanctifying grace by the devils.
Holy Scripture is brutally clear on the matter: “In this the children of God are manifest and the children of the devil. Whosoever loveth not his brother is not of God. For this is the declaration which you have heard from the beginning―that you should love one another! Not as Cain, who was of the wicked one, and killed his brother! He that does not love, abides in death! Whoever hates his brother is a murderer! And you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in himself! In this we have known the charity of God―because He has laid down His life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for others. He that has the substance of this world, and shall see his brother in need, and shall shut up his bowels from him―how does the charity of God abide in him? Let us not love in word, nor in tongue, but in deed, and in truth!” (1 John 3:10-18).
If we neglect to pray and sacrifice ourselves for them (which is the case for most Catholics), then we have to face the consequences of the plots and plans and sins of the sinful world―which is exactly what is happening now. Will things get better or will things get worse? That depends upon whether Catholics get better or worse. God could change the world in the blink of an eye―but He won’t, because He expects His created creatures to play their part. As St. Augustine said―God can save man without the cooperation of man, but God will not save man unless man cooperates: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!”
Ultimately, good will triumph over evil, the Faith will triumph over the world, God and Our Lady will triumph over Satan and his minions―yet at what price? We have to pay the price by our prayers and sacrifices―and the longer we wait and put-off our duty, then the price increases. God allows evil as a punishment for sin and God loves to bring good out of evil, and victory out of imminent defeat. As Our Lady said that things will get so bad that we will eventually be forced to get on our knees and really start to pray and beg with tears for help and deliverance:
“There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this! … I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful! … Will you sacrifice yourself for the people of this time? … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners … Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Prayers, penances and tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession … At the blood, the tears and prayers of the righteous, God will relent ... This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration … This will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet and fettering him in the infernal abyss … In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph! … Then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death.” (Words of Our Lady at Quito, La Salette, Fatima and Akita).
God has the cure for all this―but we must be willing to pay the price for the cure, because we are partially guilty for disease of sin throughout the world by our negligence in offering the many, many prayers and sacrifices required to prevent and turn back the tsunami of sin that has inundated the world in our lifetime. It is time to become salty again (or for the first time) and to start purifying the world by our saltiness!
Salt contains anti-inflammatory and anti-bacterial minerals that help to draw toxins from the body. Salt emits unique ions that purify the air. Salt water has been used since ancient times to treat cuts, wounds, sores, and skin irritations. Today, saline solution is used in medicine to cleanse wounds and help promote healing. We, Catholics, are meant to be the salt of the Earth―but we have lost our saltiness. Until the time that we regain our saltiness―and start sincerely offering many prayers and sacrifices for this sinful world―nothing is going to change. In fact, the infection of sin will only get worse and cause even greater sufferings! Is it not time to wake up and start taking our responsibilities and duties as Catholics seriously? St. John Chrysostom says that on our Judgment Day, God will judge us on all that went on the world in our lifetime―for we have the potential of praying and sacrificing for all things, all persons and all circumstances. If we fail to do that, then we will be severely judged on that.
Article 18
Friday January 19th & Saturday January 20th
Laugh Your Way to Physical and Spiritual Health!
Friday January 19th & Saturday January 20th
Laugh Your Way to Physical and Spiritual Health!
The Attitude of the Saints Towards Laughing
Already before the time of Christ there was disagreement on the topic of laughter. Among the Greek Philosophers, Plato saw laughter as something to avoid, whereas Aristotle saw it as healthy because it is characteristics of human beings. Not all the saints are laughing! Not all saints find that laughing is funny? Funny―isn’t it―how saints can disagree and still be saints! The Early Church fathers, such as St. John Chrysostom (347-407 AD), pointed out that in Scripture we read of Jesus weeping, but we find no mention of Jesus laughing. Yet―it must also be said―that we find no mention in Scripture of Jesus doing many other things and that does not make those other things wrong or sinful. We read nothing about Jesus drinking beer (it existed in His time), though we do read of Jesus drinking wine. We read nothing of Jesus washing himself; nor do we read of Him eating daily; nothing is said of Him praying daily, etc. Yet just because it is not mentioned in Scripture, does not mean that He did not do those things or that those things were wrong and sinful.
► St. Clement of Alexandria (150-215 AD) warns against too much laughter: “Whatever things are natural to men we must not eradicate from them, but rather impose on them limits and suitable times. We are not to laugh perpetually, for that is going beyond bounds … Nor are we to laugh before all and sundry, nor in every place, nor to everyone, nor about everything. For to children, and women especially, laughter is the cause of slipping into scandal ... For man is not to laugh on all occasions because he is a laughing animal, any more than the horse neighs on all occasions because he is a neighing animal. But as rational beings, we are to regulate ourselves suitably, harmoniously relaxing the austerity and over-tension of our serious pursuits, not inharmoniously breaking them up altogether … The appropriate relaxation of the face in a harmonious manner is called a smile. So too is laughter on the face of well-regulated man. Smiling even requires to be made the subject of discipline. If it is at what is disgraceful, we ought to blush rather than smile. The unappropriate relaxation of face in the case of women is called a giggle, and can become prostitutional laughter; in the case of men, it is called a “guffaw”, and is savage and insulting laughter. “A fool raises his voice in laughter,” says the Scripture; but a clever man smiles almost imperceptibly. On the other hand, one needs not be gloomy, only grave. For I certainly prefer a man to smile who has a stern countenance than the reverse; for so his laughter will be less apt to become the object of ridicule.”
► St. Gregory of Nyssa (335-395 AD) described laughter as a grotesque form of madness, involving “an unseemly bodily loosening, agitated breathing, a shaking of the whole body, dilation of the cheeks, baring of teeth, gums and palate, stretching of the neck, and an abnormal breaking up of the voice as it is cut into by the fragmentation of the breath.”
► St. John Chrysostom (347-407 AD), a Father and Doctor of the Church, states that this world “is not the theatre of laughter; we have come together not to burst out into guffaws but to groan with grief.” He also comments about the cruel laughter that comes from jesting (making fun of someone else) or out of “witticisms,” again mostly at the expense of others. He is preaching is mainly against our tendency toward cruelty and cynicism, not against the laughter that is born of joy and peace with God. Though some say Chrysostom forbids laughter, this is not true―in one homily he says: “There is no harm in laughter; the harm is when it is beyond measure, and out of season. Laughter has been implanted in us, that when we see our friends after a long time, we may laugh; that when we see any persons downcast and fearful, we may relieve them by our smile; not that we should burst out violently and be always laughing. Laughter has been implanted in our soul, so that the soul may sometimes be refreshed. But carnal desire also is implanted in us, and yet it is not by any means necessary that just because it is implanted in us, therefore we should use it, or use it immoderately―but we should hold it in subjection, and not say: ‘Because it is implanted in us, let us use it!’”
► St. Augustine (354-430 AD), a Father and Doctor of the Church, stated that this wholly negative portrayal of laughter is a problematic simplification. However much the world may be fit for groaning and weeping rather than laughing, St. Augustine recognizes that not every moment of the Christian’s life is spent in mourning: “Sometimes a servant of God may be seen laughing: does this mean that desire [for God] is dead in such a person’s heart? No; and if desire is in him, groaning is in him too; it does not always reach human ears, but it never fails to reach the ears of God.” Augustine is clear that a Christian is perfectly capable of laughing while inwardly longing for God and groaning for the fulfillment of His Kingdom. Moreover, Augustine positively commends laughter in various ways. He says that those who boast in temporal goods are “to be laughed at,” and that Christians are set free by their love of God to “deride the whole world.” In more mundane situations, he recognizes that sometimes the best response to a bad argument is laughter: when showing the uselessness of appeals to authority, he says: “Suppose I were to say to you today, ‘You have to believe this, because Cicero said it, Plato said it, Pythagoras said it’― wouldn’t you all laugh at me?”
Medievals Make More Time for Laughter
The medieval Church wisely provided safety valves—Carnival, the Feast of Fools, the risus paschali or “Easter laughter.” By the high Middle Ages, stern patristic suspicions of laughter were softening. After the twelfth century, artists depicted human beings with smiles and laughs; prior to that time, only painted demons laughed. Following Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas was indulgent toward humor as a social lubricant.
► St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153), founder of the Cistercians, liked to laugh at his overly serious monks. One day, when opening a new abbey near Foigny, France, the monks found a swarm of pesky flies filling the church that was about to be dedicated. Bernard watched his monks swatting, shooing, coaxing—all with no success. Finally, he fixed his eyes on the swarming flies and loudly declared: “I hereby excommunicate all of you!” Bernard’s monks laughed with him but found hundreds of dead flies all over the floor the next morning. St. Bernard was focused on God (instead of the flies!), which made him free to ease the anxiety of his brothers by making a joke. Sometimes we get upset over things that would be easier to handle if we looked for the humor in them.
► St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274 AD), a Doctor of the Church, in his commentary on the Book of Job, writes: “As laughter is a sign of joy, so sighing is a sign of bitterness of soul.” He also speaks of playfulness, jesting and joking in one the articles of his Summa Theologica. He writes: “Proverbs 14:13, says: ‘Laughter shall be mingled with sorrow and mourning taketh hold of the end of joy―a mourning that will last for ever!’ Now there is inordinate laughter and inordinate joy in excessive play. In all things that should be ruled according to reason, the excessive is that which goes beyond, and the deficient is that which falls short of the rule of reason. Playful or jesting words or deeds, are to be conducted according to reason. Wherefore excessive play [or jesting] is that which goes beyond the rule of reason: and this happens in two ways.
“First, when this kind of jesting is stated to be “discourteous, insolent, scandalous, and obscene,” when a man, for the purpose of jesting, employs indecent words or deeds, or such as are injurious to his neighbor, these being of themselves mortal sins.
“Secondly, there may be excess in play, through lack of due circumstances―for instance when people make use of fun at undue times or inappropriate places, or out of keeping with the matter in hand, or persons present. This may be sometimes a mortal sin on account of the strong attachment to play or jesting, when a man prefers the pleasure he derives from play or jesting more than the love of God, so much so as to be willing to disobey a commandment of God or of the Church rather than forego, such like amusements. Sometimes, however, it is a venial sin, for instance where a man is not so attached to amusement as to be willing, for its sake, to do anything in disobedience to God.
“Play is necessary for human life. Now whatever is useful to human life may be said to be a lawful employment. Wherefore the occupation of play-actors and comedians is to cheer the heart of man, and is not unlawful in itself; nor are they in a state of sin provided that their playing or jesting be moderated, namely that they use no unlawful words or deeds in order to amuse, and that they do not introduce play into inappropriate matters and inappropriate seasons. On the other hand, if a man spends too much on such things, or supports those comedians who practice unlawful mirth, he sins as encouraging them in their sin.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 168, art. 3).
Elsewhere, St. Thomas writes, not specifically of laughing, but of amusing oneself: “Amusement does have an aspect of good inasmuch as it is useful for human living. As man sometimes needs to give his body rest from labors, so also he sometimes needs to rest his soul from mental strain that ensues from his application to serious affairs. This is done by amusement.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Ethics of Aristotle, Book IV, Lecture 16, C. I).
Once again, in his Summa Theologica, St. Thomas asks the question whether a lack of mirth is a sin? He replies: “In human affairs whatever is against reason is a sin. Now it is against reason for a man to be burdensome to others, by offering no pleasure to others, and by hindering their enjoyment. … Now a man who is without mirth, not only is lacking in playful speech, but is also burdensome to others, since he is deaf to the moderate mirth of others. Consequently, they are vicious, and are said to be boorish or rude, as the Philosopher [Aristotle] states (Ethic. iv, 8) … [However], it follows that ‘lack of mirth is less sinful than excess of mirth.’ Hence the Philosopher says (Ethic. ix, 10): ‘We should make few friends merely for the sake of pleasure―since only a little sweetness suffices to season life, just as little salt suffices for our meat.’” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 168, art. 3).
► St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), a Doctor of the Church, regretted having spent many years as a religious sister in lukewarmness and too much frivolity―yet, when she ‘converted’ and amended her ways, she did not lose her sense of humor. She would say things like: “From silly devotions, and from sour-faced saints, good Lord, deliver us!” She once looked around the chapel and saw all of the serious looking sisters and blurted-out: “Lord, save me from these sullen-faced saints!” Another time she stated: “A sad nun is a bad nun! I am more afraid of one unhappy sister than a crowd of evil spirits!” When touring Spain in her attempt to reform the Carmelite Order with a greater discipline, on one occasion she was thrown off her horse into a river. Frustrated and angry, she said to God: “Why are you doing this to me! I am trying to do your work and you let this happen to me!” God replied (rather humorously): “But Teresa! I treat all my friends like this!” St. Teresa, with her own humor, retorted: “Then I am not surprised that You have so few friends!”
► St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622), a Doctor of the Church, would say: “Do not become upset when difficulty comes your way. Laugh in its face and know that you are in the hands of God.” In his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, he writes: “As to words spoken in fun among ourselves with a modest gaiety and joyfulness, they belong to the virtue which is called ‘eutrapelia’ by the Greeks, which we may term ‘pleasant conversation’. By them, we take a decent and friendly recreation [find humor] from trifling situations which human imperfections cause. However, we must guard against passing from this simple joyfulness to mockery. Mockery provokes laughter through the contempt and scorn of our neighbor. But gaiety and humor cause laughter through simple freedom, trust, familiar simplicity joined to the charm of some words. St. Louis told the religious who wanted to speak to him of subtle matters after dinner that it was not the time for scholarly discussions but to recreate themselves with merriment and jokes; let each one say politely what he wants to. He was saying this for the sake of the nobles who accompanied him to receive his favors.”
There is a Place for Humor and Laughter
In other words, humor has its place in the life of man―but it is not a very important place. Mirth is a virtue that is to be had in moderation. A little salt goes a long way; too much salt will most likely raise blood pressure. Humor, mirth, playfulness―call it what you will―has a place in life like all other virtues; but it must remembered that virtues that focus on self or upon others, must always stand in the middle between excess and neglect. It is just like food and wine―we eat and drink in order to live, we DO NOT live in order to eat and drink. Food and wine are not evil―but we must not make idols or gods out of them by excessive and unnecessary indulgence―like those “whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things; whose end is destruction!” (Philippians 3:19). “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4).
Let us not forget that Jesus changed water into wine at the marriage feast at Cana (John 2:1-11). God has ruled “that wine may cheer the heart of man” (Psalm 103:15), but God has also commanded that we do not take an excess of wine and become drunk: “Sufficient is a little wine for a man well taught! … Wine taken with sobriety is equal life to men―if thou drink it moderately, thou shalt be sober! … Wine drunken with moderation is the joy of the soul and the heart! … Wine drunken with excess is bitterness of the soul” (Ecclesiasticus 31:22; 32, 36, 39). “Wine and drunkenness take away the understanding!” (Osee 4:11).
Laughter is, in a certain sense, wine for the soul―it makes the soul merry. Yet―just as in the case of wine―it must not be taken to an excess because, like wine, it can easily affect our reason and reasoning abilities; it can weaken our will-power and lead us into areas that we should be entering into.
Laughter―A Way of Life
Nevertheless, laughter is recognized as being part of life: “A time to weep, and a time to laugh” (Ecclesiastes 3:4). We need to take time to do both things―weep for our sins; rejoice in the goodness and mercy of God; laugh in our sufferings (because it incredibly cheaper to pay for sin by suffering in this world than in Purgatory or Hell). Yet both weeping and laughing need to be always done in moderation. Too much weeping and not enough laughing can lead to despair. Too little weeping and too much laughing can lead to presumption and indifference over sin.
Laughter is endearing―it is said to be the shortest distance between two people. Genuine laughter cannot be forced. It is something so true and so real. Think about the inner warmth you feel as you find yourself doubled over and tears flowing from your eyes in laughter. That passionate response of happiness that encompasses both body and soul can only be a mere foretaste of the happiness that awaits us in Heaven. Superficial or false laughter is repulsive. It is a basically a lie―and you cannot pass off a sin as being a virtue.
Many prominent and successful teachers of the Faith have been aware of the importance of laughter on the human heart. Archbishop Fulton Sheen believed that the very foundation of humor is the ability to “see through things.” He wrote: “Man laughs because he has a soul. Hence, the more spiritual a person is, the more enjoyment there is in [his] life. In this sense, humor is closely related to Faith―it bids us not to take anything too seriously.” G. K. Chesterton once said: “Angels fly because they take themselves lightly.”
The Benefits of Laughter
We have all heard that laughter is the best medicine―but are there really hidden health benefits that can be tied to laughter? It’s true―laughter is strong medicine! Studies have proven that there are many health related benefits associated with laughter. It draws people together in ways that trigger healthy physical and emotional changes in the body. Laughter strengthens your immune system, boosts mood, diminishes pain, and protects you from the damaging effects of stress. Nothing works faster or more dependably to bring your mind and body back into balance than a good laugh. Humor lightens your burdens, inspires hope, connects you to others, and keeps you grounded, focused, and alert. It also helps you release anger and forgive sooner.
Laughter is your birthright, a natural part of life that is innate and inborn. Infants begin smiling during the first weeks of life and laugh out loud within months of being born. As children, we used to laugh hundreds of times a day, but as adults, life tends to be more serious and laughter more infrequent. Even if you did not grow up in a household where laughter was a common sound, you can learn to laugh at any stage of life. By seeking out more opportunities for humor and laughter, you can improve your emotional health, strengthen your relationships, find greater happiness—and even add years to your life.
With so much power to heal and renew, the ability to laugh easily and frequently is a tremendous resource for surmounting problems, enhancing your relationships, and supporting both physical and emotional health. Laughter has no side effects, is readily accessible. Best of all, this priceless medicine is fun, free, and easy to use. With no downsides, side-effects, or risks, perhaps it is time to consider laughter seriously.
Laughter is Good for Your Health
For thousands of years, versions of the saying “laughter is the best medicine” have emerged in religious, scientific and popular literature—and for good reason. Laughter helps our neurological, physical, emotional, cognitive and social health and well-being in multiple ways.
Laughter is a normal and natural physiologic response to certain stimuli with widely acknowledged psychological benefits. However, current research is beginning to show that laughter may also have serious positive physiological effects for those who engage in it on a regular basis. Studied for many years, it was not generally thought to have any particular healing effect until 1979, when Norman Cousins published An Anatomy of an Illness. In this book, Cousins described laughter as creating an analgesic (relieving) effect for pain caused by his ankylosing spondylitis (an inflammatory disease that causes some of the bones in the spine, called vertebrae, to fuse. This fusing makes the spine less flexible and can result in a hunched posture. If ribs are affected, it can be difficult to breathe deeply). Norman Cousins fought his own debilitating pain with laughter, created “laugh therapy” which has since been adopted around the world.
Since that time, interest in laughter―as a potential therapeutic option―has grown, both in popular culture as well as in scientific research, where the field of psycho-neuro-immunology attempts to explore the impact of laughter on our physiology and psychology. Current research indicates that laughter has quantifiable positive physiologic benefits. It is commonly accepted that laughter produces psychological benefits, such as improving affect, depression, anxiety, and stress. Nevertheless, there is growing evidence that laughter can additionally produce positive physiological (physical health) benefits.
Some hospitals have created clown care units (CCUs). Clowns go on rounds to help bring humor and laughter to inpatients. Hospital clowns reduce stress and anxiety levels in hospitalized children and their parents. In 2020, a group of Brazilian and Canadian researchers conducted an analysis of 21 studies on the impact of hospital clowns on more than 1,600 children and adolescents suffering an array of symptoms, including anxiety, pain, stress, cancer-related fatigue, and crying. The research found that children exposed to the merry jesters were significantly less anxious during subsequent medical procedures, regardless of whether a parent was present, and experienced improved psychological well-being.
● Laughter relaxes the whole body. We change physiologically when we laugh. A good laugh has great short-term effects. When you start to laugh, it doesn't just lighten your load mentally, it actually induces physical changes in your body. Laughter enhances your intake of oxygen-rich air, stimulates your heart, lungs and muscles, and increases the endorphins that are released by your brain. Laughter shuts down the release of stress hormones and releases the “feel good” chemicals.
● Laughter boosts the immune system. Laughter can ease pain by causing the body to produce its own natural painkillers. Laughter increases serum immunoglobulins A and E. In most studies, it seems to increase natural killer cell activity as well. Laughter decreases stress hormones and increases immune cells and infection-fighting antibodies, thus improving your resistance to disease. Negative thoughts manifest into chemical reactions that can affect your body by bringing more stress into your system and decreasing your immunity. By contrast, positive thoughts can actually release neuropeptides that help fight stress and potentially more-serious illnesses.
● Laughter triggers the release of endorphins, the body’s natural feel-good chemicals. Laughter is complex neurologically and engages many different parts of the brain. Depending on the duration and intensity of the laughter, several neuro-chemicals may be released. Studies have shown that serotonin, dopamine, oxytocin, endorphins and even endogenous opioids can be released when we laugh. Endorphins promote an overall sense of well-being and can even temporarily relieve pain. Physically, laughter lowers levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, while raising the “feel good” neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin.
● Laughter protects the heart. There is an inverse association between coronary heart disease and propensity to laugh; laughing more means lower heart attack risk. The European Society of Cardiology in Amsterdam―the world’s largest heart conference―discovered that making coronary heart disease patients watch comedies on a regular basis over 12 weeks produced a 10% increase in the oxygen that the heart could pump, it also produced expansion in the arteries and reduced heart inflammation. Laughter improves the function of blood vessels and increases blood flow, which can help protect you against a heart attack and other cardiovascular problems. It increases stroke volume and cardiac output, and it dilates blood vessels. Laughing revs up the Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) without increasing blood pressure. Higher propensity to laugh correlates with fewer episodes of arrhythmias and recurrent MIs during cardiac rehabilitation.
● Laughter and the Lungs. Studies showed that watching a funny movie decreased bronchial responsiveness in people with lung problems. Laughing can provide a workout for your cardiovascular, pulmonary and respiratory systems. When you laugh, your diaphragm, chest and abdominal muscles tighten. This makes the lungs work harder by forcing stale air out and allowing fresh air deeper into the lungs. This is why, according to the Canadian Lung Association, laughter may make your exhalations more effective. When you laugh, your lungs get rid of stale air allowing more oxygen to enter. This is because laughter helps to expand alveoli, the tiny air sacs in your lungs. Expanding these means that the area for oxygen exchange is bigger and more oxygen enters your lungs. Laughter and clowning reduced hyperinflation of the lungs in people with severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). When we get all this oxygen to our organs, our heart rate decreases, brain fog can dissipate.
● Laughter and Diabetes. A 2018 study found that laughter therapy effectively delays cardiovascular complications of type 2 diabetes. Watching a comedy show decreased overall rise in glucose levels after eating. Laughter has been shown to lower blood glucose levels and to accelerate glucose utilization by the muscles while watching a comedy show. Humor can modify the expression of genes involved in insulin dysfunction and the elevation of blood glucose.
● Laughter burns calories. Okay, so it’s no replacement for physical exercise, but one study found that laughing for 10 to 15 minutes a day can burn approximately 40 calories—which could be enough to lose three or four pounds over the course of a year.
● Laughter lightens anger’s heavy load. A rollicking laugh fires up and then cools down your stress response, and it can increase and then decrease your heart rate and blood pressure. The result? A good, relaxed feeling. Nothing diffuses anger and conflict faster than a shared laugh. Laughter can also stimulate circulation and aid muscle relaxation, both of which can help reduce some of the physical symptoms of stress. Laughter can also make it easier to cope with difficult situations. Looking at the funny side can put problems into perspective and enable you to move on from confrontations without holding onto bitterness or resentment. It also helps you connect with other people.
● Laughter can improve your mood. Laughter can also make it easier to cope with difficult situations. Many people experience depression, sometimes due to chronic illnesses. Laughter lowers levels of the stress hormone, cortisol. Laughter can help lessen your stress, depression and anxiety and may make you feel happier. It can also improve your self-esteem. A good, hearty laugh relieves physical tension and stress, leaving your muscles relaxed for up to 45 minutes after.
● Laughter helps you stay mentally healthy. Laughter makes you feel good. And this positive feeling remains with you even after the laughter subsides. Humor helps you keep a positive, optimistic outlook through difficult situations, disappointments, and loss. More than just a respite from sadness and pain, laughter gives you the courage and strength to find new sources of meaning and hope. Even in the most difficult of times, a laugh–or even simply a smile–can go a long way toward making you feel better. And laughter really is contagious—just hearing laughter primes your brain and readies you to smile and join in the fun.
● Laughter may even help you to live longer. A study in Norway found that people with a strong sense of humor outlived those who don’t laugh as much. The difference was particularly notable for those battling cancer. “A joyful mind makes age flourishing: a sorrowful spirit dries up the bones” (Proverbs 17:22).
● Laughing impacts your social health. Laughing can be a social event. Laughter is found in all cultures―though what someone finds funny varies from one social group to another. When laughter is shared, it binds people together and increases happiness and intimacy. The chemical, oxytocin, which is released during laughter is an important neuro-chemical that is part of human social bonding. Social groups who laugh together develop strong bonds. Parents who laugh with their children tend to have better communication overall. If you laugh on a date, you’re more likely to have a second date. Laughing or laughter is one of the top traits people cite when talking about a prospective partner—they are looking for someone with a good sense of humor. And there’s a reason for that. Humans are social creatures, and sharing good times is one way we find and build a community with others. Humor and laughter naturally create bonds between people. When meeting someone new, if you can throw in a joke and make them laugh―then it sends a signal like: “Okay, we get each other!” and you start to feel like you can be more your authentic self with them.
● Improve your sense of humor. Are you afraid that you have an underdeveloped — or nonexistent — sense of humor? Unfortunately, however, many people don't get enough laughter in their lives. In fact, one study suggests that healthy children may laugh as much as 400 times per day, but adults tend to laugh only 15 times per day. Virtually all of us could use a little more laughter in our lives, considering how beneficial a good laugh can actually be for our stress levels and overall wellness. So are you short on humor and starved of laughter? No problem! Humor can be learned! In fact, developing or refining your sense of humor may be easier than you think. Find a few simple items, such as photos, greeting cards or comic strips, that make you chuckle. Then hang them up at home or in your office, or collect them in a file or notebook. Browse through your local bookstore or library's selection of joke books and add a few jokes to your list that you can share with friends. Keep funny movies, TV shows, books, magazines or comedy videos on hand―for the time when you need an added humor boost. Look online at joke websites or silly videos. Listen to humorous podcasts. Laugh and the world laughs with you. Make it a habit to spend time with friends who make you laugh―you are 30 times more likely to laugh around other people than when you are by yourself. And then return the favor by sharing funny stories or jokes with those around you. Find a way to laugh about your own situations and watch your stress begin to fade away. Even if it feels forced at first, practice laughing. Research shows even forced laughing does your body good.
● Know what isn't funny. Don't laugh at the expense of others. Some forms of humor aren't appropriate. Use your best judgment to discern a good joke from a bad or hurtful one. Be responsible with your laughter. It’s about laughing with them—not at them. Use your best judgment to know when a joke is harmful, hurtful or unfavorable.
Already before the time of Christ there was disagreement on the topic of laughter. Among the Greek Philosophers, Plato saw laughter as something to avoid, whereas Aristotle saw it as healthy because it is characteristics of human beings. Not all the saints are laughing! Not all saints find that laughing is funny? Funny―isn’t it―how saints can disagree and still be saints! The Early Church fathers, such as St. John Chrysostom (347-407 AD), pointed out that in Scripture we read of Jesus weeping, but we find no mention of Jesus laughing. Yet―it must also be said―that we find no mention in Scripture of Jesus doing many other things and that does not make those other things wrong or sinful. We read nothing about Jesus drinking beer (it existed in His time), though we do read of Jesus drinking wine. We read nothing of Jesus washing himself; nor do we read of Him eating daily; nothing is said of Him praying daily, etc. Yet just because it is not mentioned in Scripture, does not mean that He did not do those things or that those things were wrong and sinful.
► St. Clement of Alexandria (150-215 AD) warns against too much laughter: “Whatever things are natural to men we must not eradicate from them, but rather impose on them limits and suitable times. We are not to laugh perpetually, for that is going beyond bounds … Nor are we to laugh before all and sundry, nor in every place, nor to everyone, nor about everything. For to children, and women especially, laughter is the cause of slipping into scandal ... For man is not to laugh on all occasions because he is a laughing animal, any more than the horse neighs on all occasions because he is a neighing animal. But as rational beings, we are to regulate ourselves suitably, harmoniously relaxing the austerity and over-tension of our serious pursuits, not inharmoniously breaking them up altogether … The appropriate relaxation of the face in a harmonious manner is called a smile. So too is laughter on the face of well-regulated man. Smiling even requires to be made the subject of discipline. If it is at what is disgraceful, we ought to blush rather than smile. The unappropriate relaxation of face in the case of women is called a giggle, and can become prostitutional laughter; in the case of men, it is called a “guffaw”, and is savage and insulting laughter. “A fool raises his voice in laughter,” says the Scripture; but a clever man smiles almost imperceptibly. On the other hand, one needs not be gloomy, only grave. For I certainly prefer a man to smile who has a stern countenance than the reverse; for so his laughter will be less apt to become the object of ridicule.”
► St. Gregory of Nyssa (335-395 AD) described laughter as a grotesque form of madness, involving “an unseemly bodily loosening, agitated breathing, a shaking of the whole body, dilation of the cheeks, baring of teeth, gums and palate, stretching of the neck, and an abnormal breaking up of the voice as it is cut into by the fragmentation of the breath.”
► St. John Chrysostom (347-407 AD), a Father and Doctor of the Church, states that this world “is not the theatre of laughter; we have come together not to burst out into guffaws but to groan with grief.” He also comments about the cruel laughter that comes from jesting (making fun of someone else) or out of “witticisms,” again mostly at the expense of others. He is preaching is mainly against our tendency toward cruelty and cynicism, not against the laughter that is born of joy and peace with God. Though some say Chrysostom forbids laughter, this is not true―in one homily he says: “There is no harm in laughter; the harm is when it is beyond measure, and out of season. Laughter has been implanted in us, that when we see our friends after a long time, we may laugh; that when we see any persons downcast and fearful, we may relieve them by our smile; not that we should burst out violently and be always laughing. Laughter has been implanted in our soul, so that the soul may sometimes be refreshed. But carnal desire also is implanted in us, and yet it is not by any means necessary that just because it is implanted in us, therefore we should use it, or use it immoderately―but we should hold it in subjection, and not say: ‘Because it is implanted in us, let us use it!’”
► St. Augustine (354-430 AD), a Father and Doctor of the Church, stated that this wholly negative portrayal of laughter is a problematic simplification. However much the world may be fit for groaning and weeping rather than laughing, St. Augustine recognizes that not every moment of the Christian’s life is spent in mourning: “Sometimes a servant of God may be seen laughing: does this mean that desire [for God] is dead in such a person’s heart? No; and if desire is in him, groaning is in him too; it does not always reach human ears, but it never fails to reach the ears of God.” Augustine is clear that a Christian is perfectly capable of laughing while inwardly longing for God and groaning for the fulfillment of His Kingdom. Moreover, Augustine positively commends laughter in various ways. He says that those who boast in temporal goods are “to be laughed at,” and that Christians are set free by their love of God to “deride the whole world.” In more mundane situations, he recognizes that sometimes the best response to a bad argument is laughter: when showing the uselessness of appeals to authority, he says: “Suppose I were to say to you today, ‘You have to believe this, because Cicero said it, Plato said it, Pythagoras said it’― wouldn’t you all laugh at me?”
Medievals Make More Time for Laughter
The medieval Church wisely provided safety valves—Carnival, the Feast of Fools, the risus paschali or “Easter laughter.” By the high Middle Ages, stern patristic suspicions of laughter were softening. After the twelfth century, artists depicted human beings with smiles and laughs; prior to that time, only painted demons laughed. Following Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas was indulgent toward humor as a social lubricant.
► St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153), founder of the Cistercians, liked to laugh at his overly serious monks. One day, when opening a new abbey near Foigny, France, the monks found a swarm of pesky flies filling the church that was about to be dedicated. Bernard watched his monks swatting, shooing, coaxing—all with no success. Finally, he fixed his eyes on the swarming flies and loudly declared: “I hereby excommunicate all of you!” Bernard’s monks laughed with him but found hundreds of dead flies all over the floor the next morning. St. Bernard was focused on God (instead of the flies!), which made him free to ease the anxiety of his brothers by making a joke. Sometimes we get upset over things that would be easier to handle if we looked for the humor in them.
► St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274 AD), a Doctor of the Church, in his commentary on the Book of Job, writes: “As laughter is a sign of joy, so sighing is a sign of bitterness of soul.” He also speaks of playfulness, jesting and joking in one the articles of his Summa Theologica. He writes: “Proverbs 14:13, says: ‘Laughter shall be mingled with sorrow and mourning taketh hold of the end of joy―a mourning that will last for ever!’ Now there is inordinate laughter and inordinate joy in excessive play. In all things that should be ruled according to reason, the excessive is that which goes beyond, and the deficient is that which falls short of the rule of reason. Playful or jesting words or deeds, are to be conducted according to reason. Wherefore excessive play [or jesting] is that which goes beyond the rule of reason: and this happens in two ways.
“First, when this kind of jesting is stated to be “discourteous, insolent, scandalous, and obscene,” when a man, for the purpose of jesting, employs indecent words or deeds, or such as are injurious to his neighbor, these being of themselves mortal sins.
“Secondly, there may be excess in play, through lack of due circumstances―for instance when people make use of fun at undue times or inappropriate places, or out of keeping with the matter in hand, or persons present. This may be sometimes a mortal sin on account of the strong attachment to play or jesting, when a man prefers the pleasure he derives from play or jesting more than the love of God, so much so as to be willing to disobey a commandment of God or of the Church rather than forego, such like amusements. Sometimes, however, it is a venial sin, for instance where a man is not so attached to amusement as to be willing, for its sake, to do anything in disobedience to God.
“Play is necessary for human life. Now whatever is useful to human life may be said to be a lawful employment. Wherefore the occupation of play-actors and comedians is to cheer the heart of man, and is not unlawful in itself; nor are they in a state of sin provided that their playing or jesting be moderated, namely that they use no unlawful words or deeds in order to amuse, and that they do not introduce play into inappropriate matters and inappropriate seasons. On the other hand, if a man spends too much on such things, or supports those comedians who practice unlawful mirth, he sins as encouraging them in their sin.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 168, art. 3).
Elsewhere, St. Thomas writes, not specifically of laughing, but of amusing oneself: “Amusement does have an aspect of good inasmuch as it is useful for human living. As man sometimes needs to give his body rest from labors, so also he sometimes needs to rest his soul from mental strain that ensues from his application to serious affairs. This is done by amusement.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Ethics of Aristotle, Book IV, Lecture 16, C. I).
Once again, in his Summa Theologica, St. Thomas asks the question whether a lack of mirth is a sin? He replies: “In human affairs whatever is against reason is a sin. Now it is against reason for a man to be burdensome to others, by offering no pleasure to others, and by hindering their enjoyment. … Now a man who is without mirth, not only is lacking in playful speech, but is also burdensome to others, since he is deaf to the moderate mirth of others. Consequently, they are vicious, and are said to be boorish or rude, as the Philosopher [Aristotle] states (Ethic. iv, 8) … [However], it follows that ‘lack of mirth is less sinful than excess of mirth.’ Hence the Philosopher says (Ethic. ix, 10): ‘We should make few friends merely for the sake of pleasure―since only a little sweetness suffices to season life, just as little salt suffices for our meat.’” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 168, art. 3).
► St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), a Doctor of the Church, regretted having spent many years as a religious sister in lukewarmness and too much frivolity―yet, when she ‘converted’ and amended her ways, she did not lose her sense of humor. She would say things like: “From silly devotions, and from sour-faced saints, good Lord, deliver us!” She once looked around the chapel and saw all of the serious looking sisters and blurted-out: “Lord, save me from these sullen-faced saints!” Another time she stated: “A sad nun is a bad nun! I am more afraid of one unhappy sister than a crowd of evil spirits!” When touring Spain in her attempt to reform the Carmelite Order with a greater discipline, on one occasion she was thrown off her horse into a river. Frustrated and angry, she said to God: “Why are you doing this to me! I am trying to do your work and you let this happen to me!” God replied (rather humorously): “But Teresa! I treat all my friends like this!” St. Teresa, with her own humor, retorted: “Then I am not surprised that You have so few friends!”
► St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622), a Doctor of the Church, would say: “Do not become upset when difficulty comes your way. Laugh in its face and know that you are in the hands of God.” In his book, Introduction to the Devout Life, he writes: “As to words spoken in fun among ourselves with a modest gaiety and joyfulness, they belong to the virtue which is called ‘eutrapelia’ by the Greeks, which we may term ‘pleasant conversation’. By them, we take a decent and friendly recreation [find humor] from trifling situations which human imperfections cause. However, we must guard against passing from this simple joyfulness to mockery. Mockery provokes laughter through the contempt and scorn of our neighbor. But gaiety and humor cause laughter through simple freedom, trust, familiar simplicity joined to the charm of some words. St. Louis told the religious who wanted to speak to him of subtle matters after dinner that it was not the time for scholarly discussions but to recreate themselves with merriment and jokes; let each one say politely what he wants to. He was saying this for the sake of the nobles who accompanied him to receive his favors.”
There is a Place for Humor and Laughter
In other words, humor has its place in the life of man―but it is not a very important place. Mirth is a virtue that is to be had in moderation. A little salt goes a long way; too much salt will most likely raise blood pressure. Humor, mirth, playfulness―call it what you will―has a place in life like all other virtues; but it must remembered that virtues that focus on self or upon others, must always stand in the middle between excess and neglect. It is just like food and wine―we eat and drink in order to live, we DO NOT live in order to eat and drink. Food and wine are not evil―but we must not make idols or gods out of them by excessive and unnecessary indulgence―like those “whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things; whose end is destruction!” (Philippians 3:19). “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Matthew 4:4).
Let us not forget that Jesus changed water into wine at the marriage feast at Cana (John 2:1-11). God has ruled “that wine may cheer the heart of man” (Psalm 103:15), but God has also commanded that we do not take an excess of wine and become drunk: “Sufficient is a little wine for a man well taught! … Wine taken with sobriety is equal life to men―if thou drink it moderately, thou shalt be sober! … Wine drunken with moderation is the joy of the soul and the heart! … Wine drunken with excess is bitterness of the soul” (Ecclesiasticus 31:22; 32, 36, 39). “Wine and drunkenness take away the understanding!” (Osee 4:11).
Laughter is, in a certain sense, wine for the soul―it makes the soul merry. Yet―just as in the case of wine―it must not be taken to an excess because, like wine, it can easily affect our reason and reasoning abilities; it can weaken our will-power and lead us into areas that we should be entering into.
Laughter―A Way of Life
Nevertheless, laughter is recognized as being part of life: “A time to weep, and a time to laugh” (Ecclesiastes 3:4). We need to take time to do both things―weep for our sins; rejoice in the goodness and mercy of God; laugh in our sufferings (because it incredibly cheaper to pay for sin by suffering in this world than in Purgatory or Hell). Yet both weeping and laughing need to be always done in moderation. Too much weeping and not enough laughing can lead to despair. Too little weeping and too much laughing can lead to presumption and indifference over sin.
Laughter is endearing―it is said to be the shortest distance between two people. Genuine laughter cannot be forced. It is something so true and so real. Think about the inner warmth you feel as you find yourself doubled over and tears flowing from your eyes in laughter. That passionate response of happiness that encompasses both body and soul can only be a mere foretaste of the happiness that awaits us in Heaven. Superficial or false laughter is repulsive. It is a basically a lie―and you cannot pass off a sin as being a virtue.
Many prominent and successful teachers of the Faith have been aware of the importance of laughter on the human heart. Archbishop Fulton Sheen believed that the very foundation of humor is the ability to “see through things.” He wrote: “Man laughs because he has a soul. Hence, the more spiritual a person is, the more enjoyment there is in [his] life. In this sense, humor is closely related to Faith―it bids us not to take anything too seriously.” G. K. Chesterton once said: “Angels fly because they take themselves lightly.”
The Benefits of Laughter
We have all heard that laughter is the best medicine―but are there really hidden health benefits that can be tied to laughter? It’s true―laughter is strong medicine! Studies have proven that there are many health related benefits associated with laughter. It draws people together in ways that trigger healthy physical and emotional changes in the body. Laughter strengthens your immune system, boosts mood, diminishes pain, and protects you from the damaging effects of stress. Nothing works faster or more dependably to bring your mind and body back into balance than a good laugh. Humor lightens your burdens, inspires hope, connects you to others, and keeps you grounded, focused, and alert. It also helps you release anger and forgive sooner.
Laughter is your birthright, a natural part of life that is innate and inborn. Infants begin smiling during the first weeks of life and laugh out loud within months of being born. As children, we used to laugh hundreds of times a day, but as adults, life tends to be more serious and laughter more infrequent. Even if you did not grow up in a household where laughter was a common sound, you can learn to laugh at any stage of life. By seeking out more opportunities for humor and laughter, you can improve your emotional health, strengthen your relationships, find greater happiness—and even add years to your life.
With so much power to heal and renew, the ability to laugh easily and frequently is a tremendous resource for surmounting problems, enhancing your relationships, and supporting both physical and emotional health. Laughter has no side effects, is readily accessible. Best of all, this priceless medicine is fun, free, and easy to use. With no downsides, side-effects, or risks, perhaps it is time to consider laughter seriously.
Laughter is Good for Your Health
For thousands of years, versions of the saying “laughter is the best medicine” have emerged in religious, scientific and popular literature—and for good reason. Laughter helps our neurological, physical, emotional, cognitive and social health and well-being in multiple ways.
Laughter is a normal and natural physiologic response to certain stimuli with widely acknowledged psychological benefits. However, current research is beginning to show that laughter may also have serious positive physiological effects for those who engage in it on a regular basis. Studied for many years, it was not generally thought to have any particular healing effect until 1979, when Norman Cousins published An Anatomy of an Illness. In this book, Cousins described laughter as creating an analgesic (relieving) effect for pain caused by his ankylosing spondylitis (an inflammatory disease that causes some of the bones in the spine, called vertebrae, to fuse. This fusing makes the spine less flexible and can result in a hunched posture. If ribs are affected, it can be difficult to breathe deeply). Norman Cousins fought his own debilitating pain with laughter, created “laugh therapy” which has since been adopted around the world.
Since that time, interest in laughter―as a potential therapeutic option―has grown, both in popular culture as well as in scientific research, where the field of psycho-neuro-immunology attempts to explore the impact of laughter on our physiology and psychology. Current research indicates that laughter has quantifiable positive physiologic benefits. It is commonly accepted that laughter produces psychological benefits, such as improving affect, depression, anxiety, and stress. Nevertheless, there is growing evidence that laughter can additionally produce positive physiological (physical health) benefits.
Some hospitals have created clown care units (CCUs). Clowns go on rounds to help bring humor and laughter to inpatients. Hospital clowns reduce stress and anxiety levels in hospitalized children and their parents. In 2020, a group of Brazilian and Canadian researchers conducted an analysis of 21 studies on the impact of hospital clowns on more than 1,600 children and adolescents suffering an array of symptoms, including anxiety, pain, stress, cancer-related fatigue, and crying. The research found that children exposed to the merry jesters were significantly less anxious during subsequent medical procedures, regardless of whether a parent was present, and experienced improved psychological well-being.
● Laughter relaxes the whole body. We change physiologically when we laugh. A good laugh has great short-term effects. When you start to laugh, it doesn't just lighten your load mentally, it actually induces physical changes in your body. Laughter enhances your intake of oxygen-rich air, stimulates your heart, lungs and muscles, and increases the endorphins that are released by your brain. Laughter shuts down the release of stress hormones and releases the “feel good” chemicals.
● Laughter boosts the immune system. Laughter can ease pain by causing the body to produce its own natural painkillers. Laughter increases serum immunoglobulins A and E. In most studies, it seems to increase natural killer cell activity as well. Laughter decreases stress hormones and increases immune cells and infection-fighting antibodies, thus improving your resistance to disease. Negative thoughts manifest into chemical reactions that can affect your body by bringing more stress into your system and decreasing your immunity. By contrast, positive thoughts can actually release neuropeptides that help fight stress and potentially more-serious illnesses.
● Laughter triggers the release of endorphins, the body’s natural feel-good chemicals. Laughter is complex neurologically and engages many different parts of the brain. Depending on the duration and intensity of the laughter, several neuro-chemicals may be released. Studies have shown that serotonin, dopamine, oxytocin, endorphins and even endogenous opioids can be released when we laugh. Endorphins promote an overall sense of well-being and can even temporarily relieve pain. Physically, laughter lowers levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, while raising the “feel good” neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin.
● Laughter protects the heart. There is an inverse association between coronary heart disease and propensity to laugh; laughing more means lower heart attack risk. The European Society of Cardiology in Amsterdam―the world’s largest heart conference―discovered that making coronary heart disease patients watch comedies on a regular basis over 12 weeks produced a 10% increase in the oxygen that the heart could pump, it also produced expansion in the arteries and reduced heart inflammation. Laughter improves the function of blood vessels and increases blood flow, which can help protect you against a heart attack and other cardiovascular problems. It increases stroke volume and cardiac output, and it dilates blood vessels. Laughing revs up the Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) without increasing blood pressure. Higher propensity to laugh correlates with fewer episodes of arrhythmias and recurrent MIs during cardiac rehabilitation.
● Laughter and the Lungs. Studies showed that watching a funny movie decreased bronchial responsiveness in people with lung problems. Laughing can provide a workout for your cardiovascular, pulmonary and respiratory systems. When you laugh, your diaphragm, chest and abdominal muscles tighten. This makes the lungs work harder by forcing stale air out and allowing fresh air deeper into the lungs. This is why, according to the Canadian Lung Association, laughter may make your exhalations more effective. When you laugh, your lungs get rid of stale air allowing more oxygen to enter. This is because laughter helps to expand alveoli, the tiny air sacs in your lungs. Expanding these means that the area for oxygen exchange is bigger and more oxygen enters your lungs. Laughter and clowning reduced hyperinflation of the lungs in people with severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). When we get all this oxygen to our organs, our heart rate decreases, brain fog can dissipate.
● Laughter and Diabetes. A 2018 study found that laughter therapy effectively delays cardiovascular complications of type 2 diabetes. Watching a comedy show decreased overall rise in glucose levels after eating. Laughter has been shown to lower blood glucose levels and to accelerate glucose utilization by the muscles while watching a comedy show. Humor can modify the expression of genes involved in insulin dysfunction and the elevation of blood glucose.
● Laughter burns calories. Okay, so it’s no replacement for physical exercise, but one study found that laughing for 10 to 15 minutes a day can burn approximately 40 calories—which could be enough to lose three or four pounds over the course of a year.
● Laughter lightens anger’s heavy load. A rollicking laugh fires up and then cools down your stress response, and it can increase and then decrease your heart rate and blood pressure. The result? A good, relaxed feeling. Nothing diffuses anger and conflict faster than a shared laugh. Laughter can also stimulate circulation and aid muscle relaxation, both of which can help reduce some of the physical symptoms of stress. Laughter can also make it easier to cope with difficult situations. Looking at the funny side can put problems into perspective and enable you to move on from confrontations without holding onto bitterness or resentment. It also helps you connect with other people.
● Laughter can improve your mood. Laughter can also make it easier to cope with difficult situations. Many people experience depression, sometimes due to chronic illnesses. Laughter lowers levels of the stress hormone, cortisol. Laughter can help lessen your stress, depression and anxiety and may make you feel happier. It can also improve your self-esteem. A good, hearty laugh relieves physical tension and stress, leaving your muscles relaxed for up to 45 minutes after.
● Laughter helps you stay mentally healthy. Laughter makes you feel good. And this positive feeling remains with you even after the laughter subsides. Humor helps you keep a positive, optimistic outlook through difficult situations, disappointments, and loss. More than just a respite from sadness and pain, laughter gives you the courage and strength to find new sources of meaning and hope. Even in the most difficult of times, a laugh–or even simply a smile–can go a long way toward making you feel better. And laughter really is contagious—just hearing laughter primes your brain and readies you to smile and join in the fun.
● Laughter may even help you to live longer. A study in Norway found that people with a strong sense of humor outlived those who don’t laugh as much. The difference was particularly notable for those battling cancer. “A joyful mind makes age flourishing: a sorrowful spirit dries up the bones” (Proverbs 17:22).
● Laughing impacts your social health. Laughing can be a social event. Laughter is found in all cultures―though what someone finds funny varies from one social group to another. When laughter is shared, it binds people together and increases happiness and intimacy. The chemical, oxytocin, which is released during laughter is an important neuro-chemical that is part of human social bonding. Social groups who laugh together develop strong bonds. Parents who laugh with their children tend to have better communication overall. If you laugh on a date, you’re more likely to have a second date. Laughing or laughter is one of the top traits people cite when talking about a prospective partner—they are looking for someone with a good sense of humor. And there’s a reason for that. Humans are social creatures, and sharing good times is one way we find and build a community with others. Humor and laughter naturally create bonds between people. When meeting someone new, if you can throw in a joke and make them laugh―then it sends a signal like: “Okay, we get each other!” and you start to feel like you can be more your authentic self with them.
● Improve your sense of humor. Are you afraid that you have an underdeveloped — or nonexistent — sense of humor? Unfortunately, however, many people don't get enough laughter in their lives. In fact, one study suggests that healthy children may laugh as much as 400 times per day, but adults tend to laugh only 15 times per day. Virtually all of us could use a little more laughter in our lives, considering how beneficial a good laugh can actually be for our stress levels and overall wellness. So are you short on humor and starved of laughter? No problem! Humor can be learned! In fact, developing or refining your sense of humor may be easier than you think. Find a few simple items, such as photos, greeting cards or comic strips, that make you chuckle. Then hang them up at home or in your office, or collect them in a file or notebook. Browse through your local bookstore or library's selection of joke books and add a few jokes to your list that you can share with friends. Keep funny movies, TV shows, books, magazines or comedy videos on hand―for the time when you need an added humor boost. Look online at joke websites or silly videos. Listen to humorous podcasts. Laugh and the world laughs with you. Make it a habit to spend time with friends who make you laugh―you are 30 times more likely to laugh around other people than when you are by yourself. And then return the favor by sharing funny stories or jokes with those around you. Find a way to laugh about your own situations and watch your stress begin to fade away. Even if it feels forced at first, practice laughing. Research shows even forced laughing does your body good.
● Know what isn't funny. Don't laugh at the expense of others. Some forms of humor aren't appropriate. Use your best judgment to discern a good joke from a bad or hurtful one. Be responsible with your laughter. It’s about laughing with them—not at them. Use your best judgment to know when a joke is harmful, hurtful or unfavorable.
Article 17
Wednesday January 17th & Thursday January 18th
He Who Laughs Last, Laughs Longest!
Wednesday January 17th & Thursday January 18th
He Who Laughs Last, Laughs Longest!
What Is All This Laughter About?
“He who laughs last, laughs longest!” and similar idioms such as “He who laughs last, laughs best!” and “He who laughs last, laughs loudest!” all advise against anticipating success, presuming success, or thinking that you have won before you are absolutely sure of success or victory. You may laugh now, thinking you have won, but you may not prevail in the end. The winner is the one who is ahead at the end of the game. The person who has the final, decisive move or victory in a feud, quarrel, or competition is the only one who is truly successful and the only one who can truly laugh with joy.
St. Paul, in writing to the Corinthians, says: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it! I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! But I chastise my body and bring it into subjection―lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27). In other words, St. Paul does not want to laugh before its time to laugh―he will laugh last and longest and best when he has run won his race to Heaven.
Our Lord speaks in a similar vein to His Apostles at the Last Supper: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy! … So also you now indeed have sorrow―but I will see you again and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you!” (John 16:20-22). Elsewhere He says: “Blessed shall you be when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake! Be glad in that day and rejoice; for behold, your reward is great in Heaven! For according to these things did their fathers to the prophets. But woe to you that are rich―for you already have your consolation! Woe to you that are filled―for you shall hunger! Woe to you that now laugh―for you shall mourn and weep!” (Luke 6:22-25). “Laughter shall be mingled with sorrow, and mourning will be the end of joy” (Proverbs 14:13).
The Way to Happiness
Our Lord has clearly told us what is the way to Heaven―which is the only place where laughter and joy will ring out eternally. The way to Heaven essentially involves quitting sin, doing penance, carrying the cross, and praying.
As regards quitting sin, Our Lord said: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21-22). “If you want to enter into [eternal] life, keep the commandments!” (Matthew 19:17). “Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:3-11). “Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!’” (John 5:14).
He then demands penance for past sins, saying: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10) ... “God now declares unto men, that all should everywhere do penance!” (Acts 17:30).
As regards the necessity of carrying the cross, Our Lord said: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
With regard to prayer, Our Lord said that without Him we can do nothing, hence we need to pray for His assistance: “Without Me, you can do nothing! … If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, then you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you!” (John 15:5). “Whatsoever you shall ask the Father in My Name, that will I do!” (John 14:13). “Whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive!” (Matthew 21:22). “And He spoke also a parable to them, that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). Which is why Scripture adds: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17).
St. Paul Rejoices in the Cross
St Paul gives us a partial litany of his many crosses and sufferings: “I am in many more labors, in prisons frequently, in stripes above measure, in [danger of] death often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils from waters, in perils from robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness!” (2 Corinthians 11:23-27). Nevertheless, he rejoices and glories in those crosses and sufferings: “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 2:19). “We preach Christ crucified … For I judged myself not to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:23; 2:2). “The cross is foolishness to them that perish” (1 Corinthians 1:18). “I exceedingly abound with joy in all our tribulation!” (2 Corinthians 7:4-7). “I rejoice in my sufferings!” (Colossians 1:24). “Let us run to the fight proposed to us, looking on Jesus, Who, having joy set before Him, endured the cross and now sits on the right hand of the throne of God!” (Hebrews 12:1-2).
St. Laurence Laughs While Being Roasted on the Gridiron
Saint Lawrence or Laurence was one of the seven deacons of the city of Rome, under Pope Sixtus II, who were martyred in 258 during the persecution of the Christians by the Roman Emperor Valerian. As a deacon in Rome, Lawrence was responsible for the material goods of the Church and the distribution of alms to the poor. St. Ambrose of Milan related that when the treasures of the Church were demanded of Lawrence by the prefect of Rome, he brought forward the poor, to whom he had distributed the treasure as alms, saying: “Behold in these poor persons the treasures which I promised to show you; to which I will add pearls and precious stones, those widows and consecrated virgins, which are the Church’s crown!” The prefect was so angry that he had a great gridiron prepared with hot coals beneath it and had Lawrence placed on it. After the martyr had suffered pain for a long time, he cheerfully declared to his torturers: “I am cooked on that side! Turn me over, and eat!”
St. Andrew begs rescuers not to rescue from his crucifixion
St. Andrew the Apostle―brother of St. Peter―is said to have been martyred by crucifixion at the city of Patras, in Achaea, in AD 60. Early texts describe Andrew as bound, not nailed, to a Latin cross of the kind on which Jesus is said to have been crucified; yet a tradition developed that Andrew had been crucified on a cross of the form called crux decussata (X-shaped cross), now commonly known as a “Saint Andrew’s Cross” — supposedly at his own request, as he deemed himself unworthy to be crucified on the same type of cross as Jesus had been. St. Andrew’s followers reported that when he was led toward the cross, he said, “I have long desired and expected this happy hour.” An ancient writer also speaks of the Apostle’s martyrdom as such: “Andrew hung upon the cross three whole days, suffering dreadful pain but continuing constantly to tell the people around him of the love of Jesus Christ.” It is said that the crowds tried to rescue Andrew and take him down from the cross, but were rebuked by the Saint and exhorted to emulate his desire to suffer in patience, like Jesus before him. Towards the end of his agony, the Apostle prayed to God and an extraordinary light encompassed him. This brilliant illumination lasted for half an hour, and when it disappeared, the Apostle gave up his holy soul to God.
St. Philip Neri―Patron Saint of Humor and Laughter
Archbishop Sheen once said: “A divine sense of humor belongs to poets and saints because they have been richly endowed with a sense of the invisible, and can look out upon the same phenomena that other mortals take seriously and see in them something of the divine.” And so, sanctity is related to humor. That is why the saints laughed at themselves, knowing that this universe is only a stepping-off place to their eternal goal, and to take this world seriously is utter foolishness.
St. Philip Neri, the most laughable and laughed at saint, definitely had this type of humor. The City of Rome was his Apostolate, and there he made acquaintance with fifteen popes, was a lifelong friend of such saints as Ignatius of Loyola, Francis Xavier, Charles Borromeo, and Camillus of Lellis. Philip Neri first realized his vocation through contact with the sick and diseased of the Roman alleys and gutters. He visited the hospitals and brought food and gifts to the destitute patients, always joking and laughing with them to build up their morale. While wandering the streets of Rome aiding the poor, Philip met St. Francis Xavier, and it was probably he who introduced Philip to St. Ignatius, the first General of the Jesuits. Not being attracted to join any of the Religious Orders, he resolved to live and die a layman. Philip went about his “merry” way for another dozen years — and then it happened! A mystical experience that would change his life.
Neri often visited the Catacombs to pray and meditate, and it was there in the month of May or June, 1544, that he was mysteriously thrown to the floor and a ball of fire entered his mouth and lodged in his chest. Soon recovering from the shock, he put his hand to his left side and found a swelling as large as his fist. St. Philip Neri was definitely a mystic even before this, but at this time in his life his mystical experiences reached a climax, and left the visible mark he carried to his grave. It wasn’t like the marks given to Theresa Neumann or Padre Pio of the present day, but rather a heart so inflamed with the love of God that it forced two ribs into an arch over his heart to give the appearance of a tumor. Doctors learned this only at an autopsy on the day of his death. There have been at least a hundred cases of stigmata, but there has never been more than one case of a heart so inflamed with the love of God as to break the ribs of the encasing body.
Neri was now a marked man, and it was partially on account of this that for the rest of his life he engaged in ludicrous pranks, read joke books, and played the “clown” in general. His sanctity was so noticeable that he had to spend most of his time trying to tear down his own reputation in people’s eyes. His joviality prevented people from discovering how holy he was, and even toned down his own sense of God, so that he could get through his external religious duties. He never knew when he would be rapt into an ecstasy, and feared that it would take hold of him while in the presence of others.
Philip went to incredible lengths to prevent these good opinions of himself. He walked around in large white shoes; dressed in bizarre “get-ups” whenever he thought he would meet any of the Cardinals; wore all his clothes turned inside out; often wore a fur cloak through the streets of Rome to make people think he was vain; carried a pack of brooms and stopped every once in awhile and smelled them, as though they were scented flowers; shaved his beard on one side only; wore his biretta cocked sideways. He wanted to be the fool for Christ.
Later on, when Philip founded the Congregation of the Oratory, he made his confreres do the same. A certain Father was a pet victim; Philip often sent him out with purple taffeta and gold lace around his hat. One of the lay-brothers was sent into the dining hall one night during a meal carrying on his shoulders a monkey holding a gun and wearing a biretta, with a visiting Cardinal present! One of Neri’s followers asked permission to wear a hairshirt. “Sure,” was Neri’s reply, “only inside out, and over your cassock”―a type of mortification the subject hadn’t bargained for. People never lost their respect for this saintly jester, though he tried everything imaginable to destroy their esteem. No harm was ever done by his eccentric behavior―it only made them venerate him all the more. He knew just how far to go.
Theodore Maynard, in his book on Philip, defined humor as “a special kind of sense of proportion which is delighted rather than distressed by the inappropriateness in things. It is a form of judgment. Chesterton perceived in St. Thomas Aquinas that instantaneous presence of mind which alone deserves the name of wit. And that sort of wit―as distinguished from mere talent for making small remarks―cannot be valued enough. All the same, humor is something still higher. It is also more practical, for it is a species of common sense.” Philip’s main object in being the “clown” and playing practical jokes―though at times he must have naturally taken pleasure in doing so―was to draw men to God with jests and humor. Philip once remarked: “A cheerful and glad spirit attains to perfection much more readily than a melancholy spirit.”
Brandsma’s Brand of Happiness and Humor
In 1942, at the Nazi prison in Scheveningen, Holland (near The Hague), a Dutch Resistance prisoner Fogtelo was assigned to accompany the jail’s barber on his rounds. At cell after cell, Fogtelo noticed the pale faces of prisoners, drained of energy and marked by suicidal despair. However, when the door to solitary confinement cell #577 was opened, to Fogtelo’s stupefaction, a small, older prisoner in a black suit stepped forward with a radiant smile on his face. Fogtelo never forgot that face during the next seven weeks. Each time he entered cell #577, he was met by the same radiant smiling greeting and he went away astonished that in one of Scheveningen’s cells there remained a happy man. That solitary confinement prisoner, was sixty-one year old Fr. Titus Brandsma, a Carmelite priest, professor of philosophy and ascetical theology at Nijmegen University, journalist, translator of St. Teresa of Avila into Dutch.
Fr. Brandsma was vehemently opposed to Nazi ideology and spoke out against it many times before the Second World War. Sacrificing himself to rally the Dutch Catholic press not to accept Nazi propaganda, Titus was not worried or stifled by his imminent arrest. To a colleague, he remarked humorously: “I’m about to get what I’ve always wanted―a cell of my own!” He was arrested on January 19th, 1942 and spent time in various prisons―Scheveningen, Amersfoort, and Cleves―before being transferred to the Dachau concentration camp on June 19th, 1942―where he would be murdered.
During a brief period in May 1942, Titus was returned from one of the other prisons to Scheveningen for interrogation. There another guard who hated Catholics began to spy on the Carmelite through the cell’s peep hole. Obsessed in his own darkness with Brandsma’s joyous light, the guard told another prisoner that he wouldn’t want to be in the front lines “if that man Brandsma were opposite.” The guard snarled: “He’s the sort who starts praying until a ruddy cross appears in the sky and wins battles for him.” This dark soul, Kirzig, became so fixated on Titus that one evening he brought the Carmelite out of his cell to the guardroom and kept him there, talking, far into the night. After Titus departed, Kirzig astonished prisoners by commenting: “That man is a saint!” Alone in that prison cell, he wrote in a memoir later given to the Carmelites: “I am alone, yes, but never has the good Lord been so near to me. I could shout for joy!”
Titus also sent notes to Fellow Carmelites from the concentration camp in Dachau. In one letter he wrote, “I don’t need to weep or to sigh. I even sing now and then―but not, of course, too loud!” He knew this would elicit chuckles: for Titus’s jubilation during the Community Divine Office had tended to overflow into what his religious colleagues judged to be far too enthusiastic singing. More than once, they had asked him to tone it down—a suggestion he humbly followed until the next time joy carried him away.
In the Dachau concentration camp, a Jesuit survivor recalls Titus as “happy.” Titus was repeatedly singled out by a sadistic guard―for if happiness and jubilation attracts those hungry for God and goodness, evil souls draw near too, burning to stamp out Divine light and love. One day other prisoners—helpless and agonizing—watched Titus beaten and kicked by this guard as if the tormenter had gone mad. But afterwards Titus needed no consoling. Smiling at the Dutch Carmelite friar who helped him up, he said happily—waving the case in which he carried his spectacles (eye glasses) in which was hidden a Consecrated Host--“I knew Whom I had with me!”
Even forty years earlier, when the young Titus’s honest disagreement with an older superior on the future of their order permanently cancelled the young scholar’s hopes of studying in Rome, those around him noted in Titus an inner peace and cheerfulness seemed untouchable. A fellow Carmelite priest, Father Malachy Lynch, thought Titus was “the happiest person he had ever known, one who … spread happiness all round him.”
Titus’s inner joy held out to the end. We know this because in his final days, when he was used in cruel and humiliating experiments as a “lab rat” in Dachau’s “medical” facility, Fr. Titus Brandsma set in motion the conversion of the nurse who killed him by lethal injection. Her sworn testimony of Titus’ loving concern for her soul includes his statement—which she verified that he had lived out―that he was glad to suffer for God’s sake. He is now a canonized as a martyr saint.
The Priest Who Was Stoned and Happy
An example of jubilation as an acquired grace in a saint―whose spiritual path had been more that of frustration than joy―is the little known Italian Passionist, who received John Henry Newman as a convert into the Catholic Church. Father (now beatified as “Blessed”) Dominic Barberi founded the first Passionist monastery in England in 1842, at Aston Hall, Staffordshire, England―and began to exercise his apostolate in the village of Stone, around 2 miles away. England was very anti-Catholic, but God’s Providence saw a gradual rebirth of Catholicism in what the English commonly call “The Second Spring” in the mid-1800s.
Blessed Dominic Barberi could well be the patron saint of school classroom or workplace jokers everywhere. His humor, naturally, made him a real handful for teachers, superiors, bishops, priests, religious and parishioners! He was always in trouble for breaking his vow of silence and admitted to being “addicted” to clowning. Whilst, at times, Dominic doubtless irritated people because of his ready wit and penchant for practical jokes, the gift of his laughter also drew them to him and, ultimately, to Jesus. He had the ability, as a story teller, to get a church, lecture room or hall, brimming with the joy of life.
This joyfulness of heart was tried and tested in the most taxing and terrifying conditions. Wearing a big black mantle against the English winter rain and snow, but with his feet, misshapen by arthritis, bare in their black sandals, Fr. Barberi would walk around 2 miles from his monastery to this English village of Stone, serenely saying his Rosary. His destination―the Crown Inn―a tavern where a small group of Catholics wait for confession, Mass, and instruction. Ironically, the village of Stone would stone the priest! Local youths would gather along the way and throw stones at him. During many of these frequent attacks, Fr. Barberi barely escaped death. When the first rock hit and the blood began to flow from Fr. Dominic Barberi’s forehead―he flinched but remained silent. More stones, mud, and dung were flung at him. If he heard the obscene jibes, insults and blasphemies, he said nothing in retaliation, nor did he thrust away those who rushed out to tear at his clothing.
This personal way of the cross was made three times a week for over two years―until the old Catholic priest’s seeming indifference to pain and insult, finally exhausted his ever-present torturers. Two of the many youths eventually took the decision to become Catholics when they were greatly edified to see Fr. Barberi kiss each stone that hit him and place it in his pocket. John Henry Newman witnesses: “When his form came into sight, I was moved to the depths in the strangest way … [by] the joyfulness and affability of his manner!” And Dominic himself admits that, in spite of his human frustration and even sorrow over all his rejections in England, often when most afflicted “he felt like singing in the depths of [his] soul.”
Local Protestant ministers often held anti-Catholic lectures and sermons to draw the people away from Fr. Barberi and the Catholics. It is recorded how one of these Protestant ministers followed Fr. Barberi along a street shouting out various arguments against Transubstantiation―Barberi remained silent, but as the Protestant minister was about to turn away, Fr. Barberi retorted: “Jesus Christ said over the consecrated bread: ‘This is my body!’ You say, ‘No. It is not His body!’ Who, then, am I to believe? I prefer to believe Jesus Christ!”
Converts increased at Stone, so much so that a new church had to be built. However, it was at Aston Hall (the Passionist Priory where Fr. Barberi resided), that on 10 June 1844 the first Corpus Christi procession was held in the British Isles, an event which attracted thousands of Catholics and Protestants alike. Fr. Barberi then began to visit other parishes and religious communities around England, in order to preach “missions”, as they were called, causing Fr. Barberi’s reputation to become widely known. They frequently took place in the industrial cities of northern England, such as Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham.
Another story told of Fr. Barberi during this time exemplifies his sense of humor. While he was visiting a convent of nuns, who were instructing many converts, some of whom were male converts, Fr. Barberi was informed that some of the sisters were worried about teaching men. Fr. Barberi retorted: “Have no fear, Sisters! You are all too old and too ugly!” The Sisters appreciated Fr. Barberi’s humor so much that they recorded the incident in their archives.
On another occasion, when a certain pious lady consulted him about her nocturnal visions, he proceeded to cross-examine her about the kind and the quantity of wine she was in the habit of drinking at supper.
Fr. Barberi would often humorously say: “We must all be saints! But not canonized saints―because it is too expensive!”
More Humor with St. Thomas More
Thomas More, even though as a young man he wondered if perhaps he had a vocation to join the Carthusian religious order, eventually became the brilliant lawyer. Although bowing to his father’s decision that he should become a lawyer, More was prepared to be disowned rather than disobey God’s will. To test his vocation to the priesthood, he resided for about four years in a Carthusian monastery and shared as much of the monks’ way of life as was practicable. Although attracted especially to the Franciscan order, Thomas More decided that he would best serve God and his fellow men as a lay Christian.
After becoming a lawyer, Thomas More was eventually promoted to the position of Chief Justice. He also served King Henry VIII as Lord High Chancellor of England from October 1529 to May 1532. Nevertheless, Thomas More never discarded the habits of early rising, prolonged prayer, fasting, wearing the hair shirt and occasionally engaging in self-flagellation. God always remained the center of his life.
Despite all this, Thomas More had an amazing sense of humor. Perhaps the seriousness of his legal work and the seriousness of salvation made it necessary for Thomas More to keep a balance. He was the man of broad humor who later kept a clown in his house, and monkeys in his garden. He loved jokes so much, that even the moor-cock in his family crest is a pun on his name. Yet a lot of his humor was what we call “dry humor”. Many commentators have agreed that Thomas More kept us wondering whether he was serious or joking in many instances. He had a deep sense of humor and within that humor he was making a social critique of social reality that surrounded him. More often saw the humor in situations, used humor to prick pomposity, and to instruct. He was clearly witty, and often genuinely so. Even some of his phrases and expressions were quite sharp, cutting and telling. As the proverb says: “Many a true word is said in jest!”
After the death of his first wife Thomas More remarried. People noticed that both of his wives were very short in height. When he was asked if there was a particular reason for his, More humorously replied, “of two evils one should choose the lesser!”
Both More and his friend, Desiderius Erasmus, seemed to be blessed with enormous sense of humor. When they first met in London in 1499, Erasmus exclaimed “you must be More or no more.” They used to take great pleasure in playing with words and their meanings. Erasmus would later write his masterpiece, The Praise of Folly. He later related how he came to the idea of ‘Folly’ recollecting the similarity of More’s name to the Greek word for folly―Moria. He in fact dedicated the book to More or ‘Moria.’ Erasmus often called Thomas More, ‘Moria’ as fun.
Eventually, the fun turned not so funny when Thomas More tried to prevent King Henry VIII from having his version of “fun” by divorcing his first wife (because she was not bearing him a boy to be heir to the throne), seeking an annulment from the Catholic Church (which refused to grant it), and then trying to make himself the Head of the (Catholic) Church in England, so that he could give himself the annulment he wanted. King Henry was certainly not laughing when Thomas More opposed him on both points―the divorce and making himself Head of the (Catholic) Church in England.
In March of 1534, the English Parliament passed the the First Succession Act. The Act was formally titled “The Succession to the Crown Act 1533”, or the “Act of Succession 1533”. The Act made Elizabeth, daughter of Henry VIII by his second wife Anne Boleyn, the heir presumptive to the Crown by declaring Mary, daughter of Henry VIII by his first wife Catherine of Aragon, a bastard (because Henry claimed his marriage to Catherine was invalid). The Act also required all subjects, if commanded, to swear an oath to recognize this Act as well as the King’s Supremacy over the Church (see below). Under the Treasons Act of 1534, anyone who refused to take the oath was subject to a charge of treason.
Also in March of 1534, the English Parliament passed the Act of Supremacy which defined the right of Henry VIII to be supreme head on earth of the Church of England, thereby severing ecclesiastical links with Rome. Henry wanted all persons taking public or church office in the Kingdom of England, or in its subordinate Kingdom of Ireland, to swear allegiance to the monarch as Supreme Governor of the (Catholic) Church in England. Failure to do so was to be treated as treasonable.
Thomas More refused to sign the Oath of Supremacy and refused to acknowledge Henry’s first marriage to Catherine of Aragon as being an invalid marriage. His belief was that no lay ruler has jurisdiction over the Church of Christ. Thomas was not joking―and Henry didn’t think it was funny! To cut to the “punch-line”, this refusal of Thomas More would lead to his condemnation of treason against the king and would result in the execution of Thomas More by beheading!
More was imprisoned in a cell in the Tower of London for over a year. While he was imprisoned and awaiting execution, King Henry tried all kinds of tricks to make Thomas comply―but Thomas steadfastly refused to approve King Henry VIII’s divorce and remarriage and establishment of the Church of England. His only ‘crime’ was not giving his full support to the annulment of the King’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon, who was bearing Henry no male children, and therefore Henry wanted another wife (Anne Boleyn) who might produce male children for Henry and a male successor to the throne of England.
Thomas was reportedly “merry” when he mounted the scaffold, as he jokingly said to the tower governor: “I pray you, see me safe up! And as for my coming down, let me shift for myself!” He began to speak to the people, but the sheriff begged him not to proceed, and Thomas contented himself with asking for their prayers, and desiring them to bear witness for him that he died in the Faith of the Holy Catholic Church, and a faithful servant of God and the King.
He then prayed the Miserere (Psalm 50) on his knees; and, when he had ended and had risen, the very emotional executioner begged Thomas’ forgiveness. More kissed him and said: “You are to do me the greatest benefit that I can receive! Pluck up thy spirit, man, and be not afraid to perform your office! My neck is very short! Take care, therefore, that you strike not slanting or crooked!” The executioner offered to tie his eyes. “I will cover them myself,” replied Thomas; and binding them in a cloth which he had brought with him, he knelt and laid his head upon the block. As the executioner lifted his axe and the fatal stroke of the axe was about to fall, More asked him to wait a moment. The blindfolded More then carefully laid his beard on the outside of the block, out of the executioner’s axe’s path, thus protecting his beard from the blade. He then humorously said: “It is a pity that should be cut! This beard has not offended the king! It has not committed treason!” Then the axe fell.
You could argue that Thomas More died happy, joking and laughing! He had the last laugh over Henry―who had failed to coerce Thomas to rebel against the teachings of the Catholic Church. The words of Our Lord had finally come true: “They will lay their hands upon you and persecute you, delivering you into prisons, dragging you before kings for My Name’s sake!” (Luke 21:12). “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice' sake: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven! Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:10-12). “Your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you!” (John 16:22).
The Prayer of St. Thomas More for Humor
Grant me, O Lord, good digestion, and also something to digest.
Grant me a healthy body, and the necessary good humor to maintain it.
Grant me a simple soul that knows to treasure all that is good and that doesn’t frighten easily at the sight of evil, but rather finds the means to put things back in their place.
Give me a soul that knows not boredom, grumblings, sighs and laments, nor excess of stress, because of that obstructing thing called “I.”
Grant me, O Lord, a sense of good humor.
Allow me the grace to be able to take a joke to discover in life a bit of joy, and to be able to share it with others. Amen.
Happy Conclusion
Someone said: “Good humor is nine-tenths of Christianity.” Of course it is not, nor anything like it! This is merely a “smart saying” whose value lies not in the truth of the saying, but in its smartness or cleverness. Nevertheless, a sense of humor has an important part to play in the spiritual life. “Laugh and grow strong,” St. Ignatius of Loyala said; and to one of his novices he added: “I see you are always laughing, and I am glad of it!” St. Francis de Sales wrote: “A saint who is sad is indeed a sad saint!” ― meaning, a sad saint is a poor saint. St. Teresa of Avila prayed: “From silly devotions, and from sour-faced saints, good Lord, deliver us!” St. John Bosco said: “I want no long-faced saints!” Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson did not hesitate to call St. Teresa’s gift of humor “a divine gift.” Wisdom is from above, and it is the gift of the Holy Ghost―and humor is part and parcel of wisdom. G. K. Chesterton wrote of St. Francis of Assisi: “The sense of humor salts all his escapades.” After lodging for a time at the house of Cardinal Leo, St. Francis was beaten by devils, and he quipped that this was his punishment for mixing with cardinals! Humor in our lives is like oil for the engine―preserving it from decay. Maybe we need to check the level of our “engine oil” and top it up! Or it might even require an “oil change”!
“He who laughs last, laughs longest!” and similar idioms such as “He who laughs last, laughs best!” and “He who laughs last, laughs loudest!” all advise against anticipating success, presuming success, or thinking that you have won before you are absolutely sure of success or victory. You may laugh now, thinking you have won, but you may not prevail in the end. The winner is the one who is ahead at the end of the game. The person who has the final, decisive move or victory in a feud, quarrel, or competition is the only one who is truly successful and the only one who can truly laugh with joy.
St. Paul, in writing to the Corinthians, says: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it! I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! But I chastise my body and bring it into subjection―lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27). In other words, St. Paul does not want to laugh before its time to laugh―he will laugh last and longest and best when he has run won his race to Heaven.
Our Lord speaks in a similar vein to His Apostles at the Last Supper: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy! … So also you now indeed have sorrow―but I will see you again and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you!” (John 16:20-22). Elsewhere He says: “Blessed shall you be when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake! Be glad in that day and rejoice; for behold, your reward is great in Heaven! For according to these things did their fathers to the prophets. But woe to you that are rich―for you already have your consolation! Woe to you that are filled―for you shall hunger! Woe to you that now laugh―for you shall mourn and weep!” (Luke 6:22-25). “Laughter shall be mingled with sorrow, and mourning will be the end of joy” (Proverbs 14:13).
The Way to Happiness
Our Lord has clearly told us what is the way to Heaven―which is the only place where laughter and joy will ring out eternally. The way to Heaven essentially involves quitting sin, doing penance, carrying the cross, and praying.
As regards quitting sin, Our Lord said: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” “Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21-22). “If you want to enter into [eternal] life, keep the commandments!” (Matthew 19:17). “Go, and now sin no more!’” (John 8:3-11). “Behold thou art made whole! Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!’” (John 5:14).
He then demands penance for past sins, saying: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that does penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10) ... “God now declares unto men, that all should everywhere do penance!” (Acts 17:30).
As regards the necessity of carrying the cross, Our Lord said: “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever does not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that takes not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
With regard to prayer, Our Lord said that without Him we can do nothing, hence we need to pray for His assistance: “Without Me, you can do nothing! … If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, then you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you!” (John 15:5). “Whatsoever you shall ask the Father in My Name, that will I do!” (John 14:13). “Whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive!” (Matthew 21:22). “And He spoke also a parable to them, that we ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). Which is why Scripture adds: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17).
St. Paul Rejoices in the Cross
St Paul gives us a partial litany of his many crosses and sufferings: “I am in many more labors, in prisons frequently, in stripes above measure, in [danger of] death often. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeying often, in perils from waters, in perils from robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. In labor and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness!” (2 Corinthians 11:23-27). Nevertheless, he rejoices and glories in those crosses and sufferings: “God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ―by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world!” (Galatians 6:14). “With Christ I am nailed to the cross!” (Galatians 2:19). “We preach Christ crucified … For I judged myself not to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:23; 2:2). “The cross is foolishness to them that perish” (1 Corinthians 1:18). “I exceedingly abound with joy in all our tribulation!” (2 Corinthians 7:4-7). “I rejoice in my sufferings!” (Colossians 1:24). “Let us run to the fight proposed to us, looking on Jesus, Who, having joy set before Him, endured the cross and now sits on the right hand of the throne of God!” (Hebrews 12:1-2).
St. Laurence Laughs While Being Roasted on the Gridiron
Saint Lawrence or Laurence was one of the seven deacons of the city of Rome, under Pope Sixtus II, who were martyred in 258 during the persecution of the Christians by the Roman Emperor Valerian. As a deacon in Rome, Lawrence was responsible for the material goods of the Church and the distribution of alms to the poor. St. Ambrose of Milan related that when the treasures of the Church were demanded of Lawrence by the prefect of Rome, he brought forward the poor, to whom he had distributed the treasure as alms, saying: “Behold in these poor persons the treasures which I promised to show you; to which I will add pearls and precious stones, those widows and consecrated virgins, which are the Church’s crown!” The prefect was so angry that he had a great gridiron prepared with hot coals beneath it and had Lawrence placed on it. After the martyr had suffered pain for a long time, he cheerfully declared to his torturers: “I am cooked on that side! Turn me over, and eat!”
St. Andrew begs rescuers not to rescue from his crucifixion
St. Andrew the Apostle―brother of St. Peter―is said to have been martyred by crucifixion at the city of Patras, in Achaea, in AD 60. Early texts describe Andrew as bound, not nailed, to a Latin cross of the kind on which Jesus is said to have been crucified; yet a tradition developed that Andrew had been crucified on a cross of the form called crux decussata (X-shaped cross), now commonly known as a “Saint Andrew’s Cross” — supposedly at his own request, as he deemed himself unworthy to be crucified on the same type of cross as Jesus had been. St. Andrew’s followers reported that when he was led toward the cross, he said, “I have long desired and expected this happy hour.” An ancient writer also speaks of the Apostle’s martyrdom as such: “Andrew hung upon the cross three whole days, suffering dreadful pain but continuing constantly to tell the people around him of the love of Jesus Christ.” It is said that the crowds tried to rescue Andrew and take him down from the cross, but were rebuked by the Saint and exhorted to emulate his desire to suffer in patience, like Jesus before him. Towards the end of his agony, the Apostle prayed to God and an extraordinary light encompassed him. This brilliant illumination lasted for half an hour, and when it disappeared, the Apostle gave up his holy soul to God.
St. Philip Neri―Patron Saint of Humor and Laughter
Archbishop Sheen once said: “A divine sense of humor belongs to poets and saints because they have been richly endowed with a sense of the invisible, and can look out upon the same phenomena that other mortals take seriously and see in them something of the divine.” And so, sanctity is related to humor. That is why the saints laughed at themselves, knowing that this universe is only a stepping-off place to their eternal goal, and to take this world seriously is utter foolishness.
St. Philip Neri, the most laughable and laughed at saint, definitely had this type of humor. The City of Rome was his Apostolate, and there he made acquaintance with fifteen popes, was a lifelong friend of such saints as Ignatius of Loyola, Francis Xavier, Charles Borromeo, and Camillus of Lellis. Philip Neri first realized his vocation through contact with the sick and diseased of the Roman alleys and gutters. He visited the hospitals and brought food and gifts to the destitute patients, always joking and laughing with them to build up their morale. While wandering the streets of Rome aiding the poor, Philip met St. Francis Xavier, and it was probably he who introduced Philip to St. Ignatius, the first General of the Jesuits. Not being attracted to join any of the Religious Orders, he resolved to live and die a layman. Philip went about his “merry” way for another dozen years — and then it happened! A mystical experience that would change his life.
Neri often visited the Catacombs to pray and meditate, and it was there in the month of May or June, 1544, that he was mysteriously thrown to the floor and a ball of fire entered his mouth and lodged in his chest. Soon recovering from the shock, he put his hand to his left side and found a swelling as large as his fist. St. Philip Neri was definitely a mystic even before this, but at this time in his life his mystical experiences reached a climax, and left the visible mark he carried to his grave. It wasn’t like the marks given to Theresa Neumann or Padre Pio of the present day, but rather a heart so inflamed with the love of God that it forced two ribs into an arch over his heart to give the appearance of a tumor. Doctors learned this only at an autopsy on the day of his death. There have been at least a hundred cases of stigmata, but there has never been more than one case of a heart so inflamed with the love of God as to break the ribs of the encasing body.
Neri was now a marked man, and it was partially on account of this that for the rest of his life he engaged in ludicrous pranks, read joke books, and played the “clown” in general. His sanctity was so noticeable that he had to spend most of his time trying to tear down his own reputation in people’s eyes. His joviality prevented people from discovering how holy he was, and even toned down his own sense of God, so that he could get through his external religious duties. He never knew when he would be rapt into an ecstasy, and feared that it would take hold of him while in the presence of others.
Philip went to incredible lengths to prevent these good opinions of himself. He walked around in large white shoes; dressed in bizarre “get-ups” whenever he thought he would meet any of the Cardinals; wore all his clothes turned inside out; often wore a fur cloak through the streets of Rome to make people think he was vain; carried a pack of brooms and stopped every once in awhile and smelled them, as though they were scented flowers; shaved his beard on one side only; wore his biretta cocked sideways. He wanted to be the fool for Christ.
Later on, when Philip founded the Congregation of the Oratory, he made his confreres do the same. A certain Father was a pet victim; Philip often sent him out with purple taffeta and gold lace around his hat. One of the lay-brothers was sent into the dining hall one night during a meal carrying on his shoulders a monkey holding a gun and wearing a biretta, with a visiting Cardinal present! One of Neri’s followers asked permission to wear a hairshirt. “Sure,” was Neri’s reply, “only inside out, and over your cassock”―a type of mortification the subject hadn’t bargained for. People never lost their respect for this saintly jester, though he tried everything imaginable to destroy their esteem. No harm was ever done by his eccentric behavior―it only made them venerate him all the more. He knew just how far to go.
Theodore Maynard, in his book on Philip, defined humor as “a special kind of sense of proportion which is delighted rather than distressed by the inappropriateness in things. It is a form of judgment. Chesterton perceived in St. Thomas Aquinas that instantaneous presence of mind which alone deserves the name of wit. And that sort of wit―as distinguished from mere talent for making small remarks―cannot be valued enough. All the same, humor is something still higher. It is also more practical, for it is a species of common sense.” Philip’s main object in being the “clown” and playing practical jokes―though at times he must have naturally taken pleasure in doing so―was to draw men to God with jests and humor. Philip once remarked: “A cheerful and glad spirit attains to perfection much more readily than a melancholy spirit.”
Brandsma’s Brand of Happiness and Humor
In 1942, at the Nazi prison in Scheveningen, Holland (near The Hague), a Dutch Resistance prisoner Fogtelo was assigned to accompany the jail’s barber on his rounds. At cell after cell, Fogtelo noticed the pale faces of prisoners, drained of energy and marked by suicidal despair. However, when the door to solitary confinement cell #577 was opened, to Fogtelo’s stupefaction, a small, older prisoner in a black suit stepped forward with a radiant smile on his face. Fogtelo never forgot that face during the next seven weeks. Each time he entered cell #577, he was met by the same radiant smiling greeting and he went away astonished that in one of Scheveningen’s cells there remained a happy man. That solitary confinement prisoner, was sixty-one year old Fr. Titus Brandsma, a Carmelite priest, professor of philosophy and ascetical theology at Nijmegen University, journalist, translator of St. Teresa of Avila into Dutch.
Fr. Brandsma was vehemently opposed to Nazi ideology and spoke out against it many times before the Second World War. Sacrificing himself to rally the Dutch Catholic press not to accept Nazi propaganda, Titus was not worried or stifled by his imminent arrest. To a colleague, he remarked humorously: “I’m about to get what I’ve always wanted―a cell of my own!” He was arrested on January 19th, 1942 and spent time in various prisons―Scheveningen, Amersfoort, and Cleves―before being transferred to the Dachau concentration camp on June 19th, 1942―where he would be murdered.
During a brief period in May 1942, Titus was returned from one of the other prisons to Scheveningen for interrogation. There another guard who hated Catholics began to spy on the Carmelite through the cell’s peep hole. Obsessed in his own darkness with Brandsma’s joyous light, the guard told another prisoner that he wouldn’t want to be in the front lines “if that man Brandsma were opposite.” The guard snarled: “He’s the sort who starts praying until a ruddy cross appears in the sky and wins battles for him.” This dark soul, Kirzig, became so fixated on Titus that one evening he brought the Carmelite out of his cell to the guardroom and kept him there, talking, far into the night. After Titus departed, Kirzig astonished prisoners by commenting: “That man is a saint!” Alone in that prison cell, he wrote in a memoir later given to the Carmelites: “I am alone, yes, but never has the good Lord been so near to me. I could shout for joy!”
Titus also sent notes to Fellow Carmelites from the concentration camp in Dachau. In one letter he wrote, “I don’t need to weep or to sigh. I even sing now and then―but not, of course, too loud!” He knew this would elicit chuckles: for Titus’s jubilation during the Community Divine Office had tended to overflow into what his religious colleagues judged to be far too enthusiastic singing. More than once, they had asked him to tone it down—a suggestion he humbly followed until the next time joy carried him away.
In the Dachau concentration camp, a Jesuit survivor recalls Titus as “happy.” Titus was repeatedly singled out by a sadistic guard―for if happiness and jubilation attracts those hungry for God and goodness, evil souls draw near too, burning to stamp out Divine light and love. One day other prisoners—helpless and agonizing—watched Titus beaten and kicked by this guard as if the tormenter had gone mad. But afterwards Titus needed no consoling. Smiling at the Dutch Carmelite friar who helped him up, he said happily—waving the case in which he carried his spectacles (eye glasses) in which was hidden a Consecrated Host--“I knew Whom I had with me!”
Even forty years earlier, when the young Titus’s honest disagreement with an older superior on the future of their order permanently cancelled the young scholar’s hopes of studying in Rome, those around him noted in Titus an inner peace and cheerfulness seemed untouchable. A fellow Carmelite priest, Father Malachy Lynch, thought Titus was “the happiest person he had ever known, one who … spread happiness all round him.”
Titus’s inner joy held out to the end. We know this because in his final days, when he was used in cruel and humiliating experiments as a “lab rat” in Dachau’s “medical” facility, Fr. Titus Brandsma set in motion the conversion of the nurse who killed him by lethal injection. Her sworn testimony of Titus’ loving concern for her soul includes his statement—which she verified that he had lived out―that he was glad to suffer for God’s sake. He is now a canonized as a martyr saint.
The Priest Who Was Stoned and Happy
An example of jubilation as an acquired grace in a saint―whose spiritual path had been more that of frustration than joy―is the little known Italian Passionist, who received John Henry Newman as a convert into the Catholic Church. Father (now beatified as “Blessed”) Dominic Barberi founded the first Passionist monastery in England in 1842, at Aston Hall, Staffordshire, England―and began to exercise his apostolate in the village of Stone, around 2 miles away. England was very anti-Catholic, but God’s Providence saw a gradual rebirth of Catholicism in what the English commonly call “The Second Spring” in the mid-1800s.
Blessed Dominic Barberi could well be the patron saint of school classroom or workplace jokers everywhere. His humor, naturally, made him a real handful for teachers, superiors, bishops, priests, religious and parishioners! He was always in trouble for breaking his vow of silence and admitted to being “addicted” to clowning. Whilst, at times, Dominic doubtless irritated people because of his ready wit and penchant for practical jokes, the gift of his laughter also drew them to him and, ultimately, to Jesus. He had the ability, as a story teller, to get a church, lecture room or hall, brimming with the joy of life.
This joyfulness of heart was tried and tested in the most taxing and terrifying conditions. Wearing a big black mantle against the English winter rain and snow, but with his feet, misshapen by arthritis, bare in their black sandals, Fr. Barberi would walk around 2 miles from his monastery to this English village of Stone, serenely saying his Rosary. His destination―the Crown Inn―a tavern where a small group of Catholics wait for confession, Mass, and instruction. Ironically, the village of Stone would stone the priest! Local youths would gather along the way and throw stones at him. During many of these frequent attacks, Fr. Barberi barely escaped death. When the first rock hit and the blood began to flow from Fr. Dominic Barberi’s forehead―he flinched but remained silent. More stones, mud, and dung were flung at him. If he heard the obscene jibes, insults and blasphemies, he said nothing in retaliation, nor did he thrust away those who rushed out to tear at his clothing.
This personal way of the cross was made three times a week for over two years―until the old Catholic priest’s seeming indifference to pain and insult, finally exhausted his ever-present torturers. Two of the many youths eventually took the decision to become Catholics when they were greatly edified to see Fr. Barberi kiss each stone that hit him and place it in his pocket. John Henry Newman witnesses: “When his form came into sight, I was moved to the depths in the strangest way … [by] the joyfulness and affability of his manner!” And Dominic himself admits that, in spite of his human frustration and even sorrow over all his rejections in England, often when most afflicted “he felt like singing in the depths of [his] soul.”
Local Protestant ministers often held anti-Catholic lectures and sermons to draw the people away from Fr. Barberi and the Catholics. It is recorded how one of these Protestant ministers followed Fr. Barberi along a street shouting out various arguments against Transubstantiation―Barberi remained silent, but as the Protestant minister was about to turn away, Fr. Barberi retorted: “Jesus Christ said over the consecrated bread: ‘This is my body!’ You say, ‘No. It is not His body!’ Who, then, am I to believe? I prefer to believe Jesus Christ!”
Converts increased at Stone, so much so that a new church had to be built. However, it was at Aston Hall (the Passionist Priory where Fr. Barberi resided), that on 10 June 1844 the first Corpus Christi procession was held in the British Isles, an event which attracted thousands of Catholics and Protestants alike. Fr. Barberi then began to visit other parishes and religious communities around England, in order to preach “missions”, as they were called, causing Fr. Barberi’s reputation to become widely known. They frequently took place in the industrial cities of northern England, such as Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham.
Another story told of Fr. Barberi during this time exemplifies his sense of humor. While he was visiting a convent of nuns, who were instructing many converts, some of whom were male converts, Fr. Barberi was informed that some of the sisters were worried about teaching men. Fr. Barberi retorted: “Have no fear, Sisters! You are all too old and too ugly!” The Sisters appreciated Fr. Barberi’s humor so much that they recorded the incident in their archives.
On another occasion, when a certain pious lady consulted him about her nocturnal visions, he proceeded to cross-examine her about the kind and the quantity of wine she was in the habit of drinking at supper.
Fr. Barberi would often humorously say: “We must all be saints! But not canonized saints―because it is too expensive!”
More Humor with St. Thomas More
Thomas More, even though as a young man he wondered if perhaps he had a vocation to join the Carthusian religious order, eventually became the brilliant lawyer. Although bowing to his father’s decision that he should become a lawyer, More was prepared to be disowned rather than disobey God’s will. To test his vocation to the priesthood, he resided for about four years in a Carthusian monastery and shared as much of the monks’ way of life as was practicable. Although attracted especially to the Franciscan order, Thomas More decided that he would best serve God and his fellow men as a lay Christian.
After becoming a lawyer, Thomas More was eventually promoted to the position of Chief Justice. He also served King Henry VIII as Lord High Chancellor of England from October 1529 to May 1532. Nevertheless, Thomas More never discarded the habits of early rising, prolonged prayer, fasting, wearing the hair shirt and occasionally engaging in self-flagellation. God always remained the center of his life.
Despite all this, Thomas More had an amazing sense of humor. Perhaps the seriousness of his legal work and the seriousness of salvation made it necessary for Thomas More to keep a balance. He was the man of broad humor who later kept a clown in his house, and monkeys in his garden. He loved jokes so much, that even the moor-cock in his family crest is a pun on his name. Yet a lot of his humor was what we call “dry humor”. Many commentators have agreed that Thomas More kept us wondering whether he was serious or joking in many instances. He had a deep sense of humor and within that humor he was making a social critique of social reality that surrounded him. More often saw the humor in situations, used humor to prick pomposity, and to instruct. He was clearly witty, and often genuinely so. Even some of his phrases and expressions were quite sharp, cutting and telling. As the proverb says: “Many a true word is said in jest!”
After the death of his first wife Thomas More remarried. People noticed that both of his wives were very short in height. When he was asked if there was a particular reason for his, More humorously replied, “of two evils one should choose the lesser!”
Both More and his friend, Desiderius Erasmus, seemed to be blessed with enormous sense of humor. When they first met in London in 1499, Erasmus exclaimed “you must be More or no more.” They used to take great pleasure in playing with words and their meanings. Erasmus would later write his masterpiece, The Praise of Folly. He later related how he came to the idea of ‘Folly’ recollecting the similarity of More’s name to the Greek word for folly―Moria. He in fact dedicated the book to More or ‘Moria.’ Erasmus often called Thomas More, ‘Moria’ as fun.
Eventually, the fun turned not so funny when Thomas More tried to prevent King Henry VIII from having his version of “fun” by divorcing his first wife (because she was not bearing him a boy to be heir to the throne), seeking an annulment from the Catholic Church (which refused to grant it), and then trying to make himself the Head of the (Catholic) Church in England, so that he could give himself the annulment he wanted. King Henry was certainly not laughing when Thomas More opposed him on both points―the divorce and making himself Head of the (Catholic) Church in England.
In March of 1534, the English Parliament passed the the First Succession Act. The Act was formally titled “The Succession to the Crown Act 1533”, or the “Act of Succession 1533”. The Act made Elizabeth, daughter of Henry VIII by his second wife Anne Boleyn, the heir presumptive to the Crown by declaring Mary, daughter of Henry VIII by his first wife Catherine of Aragon, a bastard (because Henry claimed his marriage to Catherine was invalid). The Act also required all subjects, if commanded, to swear an oath to recognize this Act as well as the King’s Supremacy over the Church (see below). Under the Treasons Act of 1534, anyone who refused to take the oath was subject to a charge of treason.
Also in March of 1534, the English Parliament passed the Act of Supremacy which defined the right of Henry VIII to be supreme head on earth of the Church of England, thereby severing ecclesiastical links with Rome. Henry wanted all persons taking public or church office in the Kingdom of England, or in its subordinate Kingdom of Ireland, to swear allegiance to the monarch as Supreme Governor of the (Catholic) Church in England. Failure to do so was to be treated as treasonable.
Thomas More refused to sign the Oath of Supremacy and refused to acknowledge Henry’s first marriage to Catherine of Aragon as being an invalid marriage. His belief was that no lay ruler has jurisdiction over the Church of Christ. Thomas was not joking―and Henry didn’t think it was funny! To cut to the “punch-line”, this refusal of Thomas More would lead to his condemnation of treason against the king and would result in the execution of Thomas More by beheading!
More was imprisoned in a cell in the Tower of London for over a year. While he was imprisoned and awaiting execution, King Henry tried all kinds of tricks to make Thomas comply―but Thomas steadfastly refused to approve King Henry VIII’s divorce and remarriage and establishment of the Church of England. His only ‘crime’ was not giving his full support to the annulment of the King’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon, who was bearing Henry no male children, and therefore Henry wanted another wife (Anne Boleyn) who might produce male children for Henry and a male successor to the throne of England.
Thomas was reportedly “merry” when he mounted the scaffold, as he jokingly said to the tower governor: “I pray you, see me safe up! And as for my coming down, let me shift for myself!” He began to speak to the people, but the sheriff begged him not to proceed, and Thomas contented himself with asking for their prayers, and desiring them to bear witness for him that he died in the Faith of the Holy Catholic Church, and a faithful servant of God and the King.
He then prayed the Miserere (Psalm 50) on his knees; and, when he had ended and had risen, the very emotional executioner begged Thomas’ forgiveness. More kissed him and said: “You are to do me the greatest benefit that I can receive! Pluck up thy spirit, man, and be not afraid to perform your office! My neck is very short! Take care, therefore, that you strike not slanting or crooked!” The executioner offered to tie his eyes. “I will cover them myself,” replied Thomas; and binding them in a cloth which he had brought with him, he knelt and laid his head upon the block. As the executioner lifted his axe and the fatal stroke of the axe was about to fall, More asked him to wait a moment. The blindfolded More then carefully laid his beard on the outside of the block, out of the executioner’s axe’s path, thus protecting his beard from the blade. He then humorously said: “It is a pity that should be cut! This beard has not offended the king! It has not committed treason!” Then the axe fell.
You could argue that Thomas More died happy, joking and laughing! He had the last laugh over Henry―who had failed to coerce Thomas to rebel against the teachings of the Catholic Church. The words of Our Lord had finally come true: “They will lay their hands upon you and persecute you, delivering you into prisons, dragging you before kings for My Name’s sake!” (Luke 21:12). “Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice' sake: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven! Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:10-12). “Your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you!” (John 16:22).
The Prayer of St. Thomas More for Humor
Grant me, O Lord, good digestion, and also something to digest.
Grant me a healthy body, and the necessary good humor to maintain it.
Grant me a simple soul that knows to treasure all that is good and that doesn’t frighten easily at the sight of evil, but rather finds the means to put things back in their place.
Give me a soul that knows not boredom, grumblings, sighs and laments, nor excess of stress, because of that obstructing thing called “I.”
Grant me, O Lord, a sense of good humor.
Allow me the grace to be able to take a joke to discover in life a bit of joy, and to be able to share it with others. Amen.
Happy Conclusion
Someone said: “Good humor is nine-tenths of Christianity.” Of course it is not, nor anything like it! This is merely a “smart saying” whose value lies not in the truth of the saying, but in its smartness or cleverness. Nevertheless, a sense of humor has an important part to play in the spiritual life. “Laugh and grow strong,” St. Ignatius of Loyala said; and to one of his novices he added: “I see you are always laughing, and I am glad of it!” St. Francis de Sales wrote: “A saint who is sad is indeed a sad saint!” ― meaning, a sad saint is a poor saint. St. Teresa of Avila prayed: “From silly devotions, and from sour-faced saints, good Lord, deliver us!” St. John Bosco said: “I want no long-faced saints!” Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson did not hesitate to call St. Teresa’s gift of humor “a divine gift.” Wisdom is from above, and it is the gift of the Holy Ghost―and humor is part and parcel of wisdom. G. K. Chesterton wrote of St. Francis of Assisi: “The sense of humor salts all his escapades.” After lodging for a time at the house of Cardinal Leo, St. Francis was beaten by devils, and he quipped that this was his punishment for mixing with cardinals! Humor in our lives is like oil for the engine―preserving it from decay. Maybe we need to check the level of our “engine oil” and top it up! Or it might even require an “oil change”!
Article 16
Monday January 15th & Tuesday January 16th
Where to Find True Happiness?
Monday January 15th & Tuesday January 16th
Where to Find True Happiness?
Everyone Wants Happiness
Everyone seeks to be happy. There is nothing wrong with that. It is way that God has “wired” us. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: ― St. Thomas says that “All men have the same ultimate goal. This is complete and enduring satisfaction or fulfillment―such fulfillment is called happiness. But all men do not agree about the precise things in which their happiness is to be found. Some think to attain happiness by becoming rich, some by enjoying pleasures, some by exercising power, some by being praised and honored, and so on.” (St. Thomas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q.1, article 7).
All men act in pursuance of their happiness, or in an endeavor to remove unhappiness. We seek those things which we rightly, but more often wrongly, think will lead to our happiness. We seek our comfort and wealth; we seek to be loved and liked, to be honored and well-known, we seek independence and power, we seek beauty, fitness and strength, we seek the best food and drink we can afford, we seek fun and laughter, we seek joy and peace.....yet once we possess these things, we are never satisfied, the happiness of possessing these things is never perfect, complete, lasting, safe and enduring.
The money may be stolen or lost. Our reputation can easily be rightly, or wrongly, smeared and destroyed. Our friends and loved ones can be fickle, and one day we are loved and liked, the next day we are not. Independence and power cannot be guaranteed by the greatest powers on Earth, let alone one tiny human being or a family. How many once beautiful, healthy, fit and strong persons are now old, sick, and weak, their beauty now fattened, grayed and crinkled. The more we have, the more we still want, yet the more we become riddled with fear and anxiety at losing these things.
MONSIGNOR PAUL J. GLENN (1893-1957), seminary professor and author in philosophy and theology, has a very useful summary of St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologica, entitled A Tour of the Summa, which greatly simplifies and summarizes the writing of Aquinas. Here is the section that summarizes Aquinas’ section on “Happiness”:
“All human beings have the same nature, therefore all men have the same last end, the same ultimate goal. This last end is complete and enduring satisfaction or fulfillment―such fulfillment is called happiness. All men seek fulfillment or satisfaction, that is, all seek happiness. But all men do not agree about the precise things in which their fulfillment and consequent happiness are to be found. Some think to attain happiness by becoming rich, some by enjoying pleasures, some by exercising power, some by being praised and honored, and so on. It is as though all men were determinately set to reach a certain city, but were not all in agreement about the right road they must take to get there. This is the subjective last end of man. The objective last end of man is the object which, when possessed, will give him happiness. The objective last end of man is the infinite good. The infinite good is God.
Looking in the Wrong Places
► WEALTH: “Man’s happiness is not to be found in wealth, whether this be natural wealth which serves his normal needs (such as food, clothing, housing), or artificial wealth, which is money, that can provide the items of natural wealth (food, clothing, housing, etc). Wealth of any kind is a means for acquiring something else―it is a thing that serves; wealth does not fulfill. Hence wealth cannot be the true last end of man and the object that will render man enduringly and completely happy.
► HONORS: “Nor can man’s full happiness consist in honors bestowed upon him because of some excellence in him. Any excellence in a man is in him only by reason of some good already possessed―it means that he already has some degree of happiness. Honors come to him because of this happiness, and therefore honors cannot themselves be the constituting elements of perfect happiness.
► FAME AND GLORY: “Nor can man’s happiness be found in fame and glory. These, just like honors bestowed, presuppose some degree of happiness already attained, and this they publicize and praise. Fame and glory are only a result of some imperfect happiness, and are, in some sense, the product of it. Fame and glory cannot, therefore, be the essential elements of perfect happiness.
► POWER: “Man’s perfect happiness cannot consist in the possession of power―for power is not a complete end, but only a means to an end―power is only valuable according to the use to which it may be put. In a word, power looks on to something further; it cannot itself be the ultimate goal.
► GOODS OF THE BODY: “Man’s ultimate happiness does not consist in goods of the body ― life, health, strength, beauty, agility, etc. ― for these goods preserve the body and its perfections. Merely to preserve life cannot be the end of life. Goods of the body are to be used by reason (intellect and will) somewhat as a ship is used by its master; the master does not use the ship merely to preserve the ship, but to carry profitable cargoes to desired ports. Thus it appears that the goods of the body are means, not complete ends. Besides, man is a rational being as well as a bodily being; he can never be completely fulfilled and satisfied by bodily goods.
► PLEASURES: “Pleasures, whether bodily or intellectual, cannot bring a man ultimate happiness. We have just seen that bodily things cannot be man’s perfect fulfillment. And mental enjoyments presuppose the end already attained; enjoyment follows upon possession of some good or end; what is consequent upon the end cannot itself be the end.
► GOODS OF THE SOUL: “The goods of the soul ― its essence, faculties, acts, habits, perfections ― cannot constitute man's ultimate end. Happiness is for the soul and is to be attained by the soul. Therefore the objective ultimate happiness is something outside the soul, which the soul seeks to bring into itself and possess subjectively. Hence this ultimate end is not the soul itself, nor the goods belonging to the soul.
“Indeed, no created good can give man perfect happiness. Only the essential, universal, and boundless good can bring man complete and unfading fulfillment. No created good is universal, essential, and boundless; only the uncreated good can be the ultimate end of man. And this uncreated good is God.” (Monsignor Paul J. Glenn, A Tour of the Summa).
What is Happiness?
Everyone has their own―often infantile―idea of happiness. Show an infant a piece of candy and it will immediately reach out for it and desire it. Put the candy in its mouth and it will beam in blissful happiness. For an adult that piece of candy might change into a beer, a bottle of wine, or few thousand dollars in a lottery win, or promotion at work, owning a nice car or house, possessing a high degree of bodily beauty, having many skills, having lots of friends, etc. It may even involve happiness in sin―such as getting drunk, getting high on drugs, watching immodest movies or pornography, committing adultery, masturbating, etc. Such people will insist that they are very happy when they do these things! Yet the “happiness” that these things bring is only a temporary happiness and will not last. You finish the beer and wine; you spend the lottery winnings; you can lose your job for a variety of reasons which are not always your fault; your car can be severely damaged; your house can also be damaged by weather, floods, fire or other circumstances; your beauty fades as you grow older; certain skills are lost with oncoming age and its accompanying weakness; friends are lost for a variety of reasons, etc. After being drunk or high on drugs you have to “come-down” and face a hangover; the sexual sins might well be discovered―and they most certainly will be punished by God. Suddenly, in all these things, the balloon of happiness is popped and bursts. For happiness to be true it has to be a lasting happiness―just as for someone to be classified as being healthy, they have to have a lasting healthiness and not just for a few days, weeks or months.
Monsignor Paul J. Glenn, in his A Tour of the Summa, comments upon this: “Man’s subjective happiness is a state and an operation by which man lays hold of, and possesses, the object which renders him happy. Ultimate subjective happiness is the state of fulfillment and satisfaction in a person who has obtained the end for which he is made. Ultimate objective happiness is the reality which, when possessed, will render the possessor subjectively happy by completely fulfilling and satisfying his entire nature. God is man’s objective happiness. Possession of God in the beatific vision is man’s ultimate subjective happiness. Our Lord said: “Now this is eternal life―that they may know Thee, the only true God!” (John 17:3). The knowledge which a man acquires during earthly life―such as scientific and philosophical knowledge―will be, in Heaven, an accidental (secondary) item in his perfect happiness, but not an essential element of that happiness.
“Man’s ultimate subjective happiness is an operation of the intellective faculties, not of the bodily senses. The bodily senses cannot behold God in the beatific vision. In Heaven a man will have some happiness from contemplating the angels, but his pure and perfect happiness must come from contemplating God in the beatific vision. Only in the beatific vision will the human intellect find its perfect object. Possessing this object, the intellect will have nothing further to desire or to seek. Man’s intellect is made for truth, and God alone is essential truth. God alone is the boundless fulfillment of the human intellect, as he is of the entire human nature. Man’s ultimate subjective happiness is an act of intellect (mind), rather than an act of will (heart). Yet the delight or enjoyment which follows the attainment of happiness, is something that belongs to the will (heart). The intellect (mind) possesses the object which gives happiness; the will (heart) rests delighted in the possession of that object. Man’s ultimate happiness is possessed in Heaven; it is no longer sought after.” (Monsignor Paul J. Glenn, A Tour of the Summa).
For St. Thomas Aquinas, happiness is not a mere feeling or an emotion. St. Thomas is uncompromising in his view that our true happiness can only be found in knowledge of God. No other worldly good or pleasure can truly provide us with the ultimate good we seek. As he argues in the Summa Theologica:
“It is impossible for any created good to constitute man’s happiness. For happiness is that perfect good which entirely satisfies one’s desire; otherwise it would not be the ultimate end, if something yet remained to be desired. Now the object of the will, i.e., of man’s desire, is what is universally good; just as the object of the intellect is what is universally true. Hence it is evident that nothing can satisfy man’s will, except what is universally good. This is to be found, not in any creature, but in God alone, because every creature has only participated goodness. Therefore, God alone can satisfy the will of man, according to the words of the Psalms (102:5): ‘Who alone satisfies your desire with good things.’ Therefore, God alone constitutes man’s happiness.” (Summa Theologica, IIa, q. 1. Art. 8).
According to St. Thomas, we must make a clear distinction between enjoyment and happiness. Enjoyment is linked to worldly goods and physical pleasures―but these tend to be very short-lived. And even if all of our worldly desires were satisfied—even if we were to experience every possible enjoyment—we would remain unhappy, since we would still have a nagging feeling that something is missing. Today, St. Thomas would point to the experience of many rich people and celebrities as evidence for this truth. Despite having every worldly good—fine foods, cars, houses, vacations, friends, family—many of them remain deeply unhappy, with some of them even falling into the misery of drugs and suicide. St. Thomas would explain this as follows―when every enjoyment is felt, the soul begins to crave for something more than mere enjoyment. But if one has no knowledge of this “something more” or doesn’t know how to go about finding it, the enjoyment turns to pain and suffering. This also explains why we see a lot of billionaires suddenly change towards the middle or end of their lives―that nagging feeling that there is something more results in charitable work or an orientation to a higher purpose in life.
God-Wired, Not World-Wired
Our souls were, so to speak, “wired” by God. “For in Him were all things created in Heaven and on Earth, all things were created by Him and in Him” (Colossians 1:16). “All things were made by Him and without Him was made nothing that was made” (John 1:3). “Thou hast created all things; and for Thy will they were, and have been created” (Apocalypse 4:11). “For of Him, and by Him, and in Him, are all things” (Romans 11:36). “Heaven is the Lord’s and the Earth and all things that are therein!” (Deuteronomy 10:1). “The Earth is the Lord’s, and the world and all they that dwell therein!” (Psalms 23:1). “The Lord has made all things for Himself” (Proverbs 16:4). “All the Earth is Mine” (Exodus 19:5). “All souls are Mine―as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is Mine!” (Ezechiel 18:4).
We cannot serve God and the world: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Holy Scripture makes it abundantly clear that we were made by God and made for God. God is our first beginning and our final end. God made our souls for Heaven. If we tinker with God’s “wiring” and “reprogram” ourselves for Earth and its worldliness, then God will not let us find happiness deep down―even though on the surface we might smiling, laughing and enjoying our “rewired” selves. “Thus saith the Lord: ‘Cursed be the man that trusts in man, and makes flesh his arm, and whose heart departs from the Lord!’” (Jeremias 17:5). “If you will not hear the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep and to do all His commandments, then all these curses shall come upon thee, and overtake thee: Cursed shall you be in the city; cursed in the field; cursed shall be your barn, and cursed your stores; cursed shall be the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your ground, your herds of oxen, and your flocks of sheep! The Lord shall send upon you famine and hunger, until he consume and destroy you quickly, for your most wicked inventions, by which you have forsaken Me!” (Deuteronomy 28:15-22). Not quite the best imaginable recipe for happiness, huh?
Pain and Happiness―Suffering and Joy
Sometimes the things that bring us enjoyment or happiness are not that easy to attain or achieve. Take, for example, soldiers in war, whose daily life is far from home comforts and often results in inflicted wounds by enemy fire or bombs―yet their joy in winning the battle or the war compensates for the pain. Another example is found in physical sports such as American Football, Rugby and Soccer―players take tremendous blows and bruises to the body while competing against the opposition―but the joy of winning often more than compensates the pain and suffering caused by those body blows and bruises. The same is true for boxing and the martial arts.
Holy Scripture speaks of such things. As regards the above example of soldiers, Scripture says: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “What! Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4).
As regards the above example from sports, St. Paul, in writing to the “sports mad” inhabitants of Corinth, says: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it! And every one that strives for the mastery in some field, refrains himself from all things. They do this so that they may receive a corruptible crown―but we seek an incorruptible one! I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body and bring it into subjection―lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
Our Lady Hits the Nail of Happiness on the Head
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, lamented: “Who is so dull-minded and insipid as not to know the dangers of the worldly life? … The faithful are in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness! … Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with [true] wisdom! … Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom! … The wisdom of the flesh has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God! … With a most perverse blindness, the worldly ones continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them ... The more they exert themselves to reach the evil objects of their carnal and animal passions, so much the more will they fall into ignorance of divine things … In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls, and they hold as being wisdom that which is nothing but diabolical and earthly ignorance! ... They never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or appreciation of it! … God knows that this insane love will pervert the greater part of the human nature! …
“The greatest wisdom for souls consists in the knowledge of the cross, in the love of sufferings, and in putting this knowledge into practice by bearing afflictions with patience! … My Son and Lord could have redeemed the human race without suffering so much! … It was not necessary to suffer so much! … Yet He wished to increase His sufferings only on account of the immensity of His love for souls! … Moreover, my divine Son and I―without being guilty of any faults, or bad inclinations―devoted ourselves to labors and made our lives a continual practice of penance and mortification of the flesh. If We then pursued such a course of life because it was reasonable, what must be thought of mortals that seek nothing but sweetness and delight, and abhor all penances, affronts, ignominies, fasting and mortification? Shall only Christ, our Lord, and I suffer all these hardships? … The worldlings, in their torpidity, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should hate suffering, especially after all that my most holy Son suffered for them! … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! …
“Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion! … Hence it is that men do not find joy in their tribulations, nor rest in their labors, nor consolation in their sorrows, nor any peace in adversities. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation … The Lord and I suffered and endured such bitter sorrows, in order that mortals might be encouraged not to refuse less severe sufferings for their own eternal good. Therefore let mortals show themselves thankful, and willingly enter upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, and to carry it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness! … Bodily penances are so appropriate and fitted to mortal creatures, that the ignorance of this truth and the neglect and contempt of bodily mortification is the cause of the damnation of many souls and brings many more into the danger of eternal loss!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
When Happiness is Unhappiness and Unhappiness is Happiness
There is SUBJECTIVE HAPPINESS―which is our own personal fragile opinion on happiness and what makes us happy; it is a personal happiness does not depend on external circumstances, but on our inner state of mind (which could be right or wrong, good or bad, virtuous or sinful). Subjective happiness is fickle and biased; it can find happiness in sin or in virtue. Ultimately subjective happiness is a skill that can be developed through practice, just like any other skill―by recognizing and eliminating what is bad/wrong/sinful and fostering what is good/correct/virtuous.
Then there is OBJECTIVE HAPPINESS―which is a real and true notion of happiness, which does not depend upon our personal opinions. It should be the true “measuring stick” of our personal subjective happiness. We should “measure up” our subjective opinions of happiness to the unbiased truths of objective happiness. For example, getting drunk, committing adultery, masturbating, killing someone we don’t like, etc. ― might bring us subjective happiness, but objectively speaking, these things will not really bring happiness in the long run―they will be punished by God in this life and/or in Purgatory, and if we die unrepentant, then they will be further punished eternally in Hell! That is not happiness, is it? That is stupidity! Happiness does not depend upon us and our subjectivity―which can always be wrong and in error. True happiness is an END-PRODUCT and a LASTING HAPPINESS. The ultimate happiness is EVERLASTING HAPPINESS, which of course is the Beatific Vision of God in Heaven. Anything that does not lead to that everlasting happiness cannot be truly classified as happiness―for it will lead us to everlasting misery or unhappiness in Hell. Hence, Holy Scripture warns: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
In an ideal world, SUBJECTIVE HAPPINESS and OBJECTIVE HAPPINESS would be “on the same page” and in agreement with one another. However, since Original Sin, we do not live in an “ideal world” and almost everyone is guilty of creating their own personal “truth” which rarely corresponds and agrees with God’s truth. Hence, we ignore the truth that Our Lord taught: ““Lay not up to yourselves treasures [happiness] on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures [happiness] in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). It is the everlasting happiness of Heaven that we should be seeking and not any fleeting happiness on Earth.
Our Lord’s parable about the rich man comes to mind: “And He spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to store my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns and will build greater barns; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and all my goods! And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast many goods laid up for many years! Take thy rest! Eat, drink, and make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool! This night do they require thy soul of thee! And whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” Such is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’ And He said to His disciples: ‘Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life and what you shall eat! Nor for your body and what you shall put on! Consider the ravens―they sow not, neither do they reap, neither have they a storehouse nor a barn, and God feeds them! How much are you more valuable than they, O ye of little Faith? Seek not you what you shall eat, nor what you shall drink, and be not lifted up on high! For all these things do the nations of the world seek. But your Father knows that you have need of these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!’” (Luke 12:16-31).
If we seek above all things temporary and imperfect happiness in this life, then we greatly risk losing everlasting and perfect happiness in the next life. You could apply to this these words of Our Lord: “For whosoever wants save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35). We cannot have our cake and eat it―we cannot seek worldly happiness and expect to achieve heavenly happiness―we cannot find happiness in the world and happiness with God at the same time: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
You Choose on What to Spend Your Money
We cannot serve God and mammon (Matthew 6:24). We cannot love both God and the world―for they are mutual enemies (1 John 2:15; James 4:4). We cannot love riches and wealth while professing to love God. We see this in case of the rich young man in the Scriptures: “A certain rich young man asked Jesus: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25). To this Holy Scripture adds: “Go now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted: and your garments are moth-eaten! Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire! You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
Life is no joke! Like Esau, in the Old Testament, you can easily exchange your inheritance of perfect eternal happiness in Heaven by hungrily exchanging it for imperfect temporary happiness on Earth: “Jacob had boiled some stew. Esau, coming out of the field and feeling faint, said to Jacob: ‘Give me of this red stew, for I am exceedingly faint! And Jacob said to Esau: ‘Sell me thy first birthright [inheritance of the first born]!’ Esau answered: Behold! I am dying! What will the first birthright avail me?’ Jacob said: ‘Swear [make an oath], therefore, to me!’ Esau swore to him and sold his first birthright. And so taking bread and the stew of lentils, he ate and drank, and went his way―making little account of having sold his first birthright” (Genesis 25:29-34). Esau was temporarily happy having filled his belly―but it cost him his inheritance as the first born of Isaac. There are too many earthly minded worldly people today “whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:19).
If someone offered you $10,000 today or $10 million in a year’s time―which offer would you take? You can have fleeting imperfect temporary happiness today in this world, or you have forsake that for an eternal perfect everlasting happiness in Heaven. You sacrifice one or the other. “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9).
All of this does not mean that we have to be miserable on Earth in order to be happy in Heaven! Far from it! St. Thomas Aquinas maintains that we can achieve a kind of “imperfect happiness” here on Earth. No worldly good or pleasure can truly provide us with the ultimate good we seek―which is perfect everlasting happiness and which can only be found in God. Whatever earthly happiness we seek or find, it must not be in opposition to, nor must it divert us from, the ultimate happiness which is God―otherwise we are putting a mere creature before the Creator. An authentic earthly happiness should be found in knowing that all the things that we are doing here on Earth are actually leading us to our eternal happiness in Heaven. To divorce earthly happiness from heavenly happiness is wrong―and it is only happiness in name, but not happiness by nature.
Everyone seeks to be happy. There is nothing wrong with that. It is way that God has “wired” us. St. Thomas Aquinas writes: ― St. Thomas says that “All men have the same ultimate goal. This is complete and enduring satisfaction or fulfillment―such fulfillment is called happiness. But all men do not agree about the precise things in which their happiness is to be found. Some think to attain happiness by becoming rich, some by enjoying pleasures, some by exercising power, some by being praised and honored, and so on.” (St. Thomas, Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q.1, article 7).
All men act in pursuance of their happiness, or in an endeavor to remove unhappiness. We seek those things which we rightly, but more often wrongly, think will lead to our happiness. We seek our comfort and wealth; we seek to be loved and liked, to be honored and well-known, we seek independence and power, we seek beauty, fitness and strength, we seek the best food and drink we can afford, we seek fun and laughter, we seek joy and peace.....yet once we possess these things, we are never satisfied, the happiness of possessing these things is never perfect, complete, lasting, safe and enduring.
The money may be stolen or lost. Our reputation can easily be rightly, or wrongly, smeared and destroyed. Our friends and loved ones can be fickle, and one day we are loved and liked, the next day we are not. Independence and power cannot be guaranteed by the greatest powers on Earth, let alone one tiny human being or a family. How many once beautiful, healthy, fit and strong persons are now old, sick, and weak, their beauty now fattened, grayed and crinkled. The more we have, the more we still want, yet the more we become riddled with fear and anxiety at losing these things.
MONSIGNOR PAUL J. GLENN (1893-1957), seminary professor and author in philosophy and theology, has a very useful summary of St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologica, entitled A Tour of the Summa, which greatly simplifies and summarizes the writing of Aquinas. Here is the section that summarizes Aquinas’ section on “Happiness”:
“All human beings have the same nature, therefore all men have the same last end, the same ultimate goal. This last end is complete and enduring satisfaction or fulfillment―such fulfillment is called happiness. All men seek fulfillment or satisfaction, that is, all seek happiness. But all men do not agree about the precise things in which their fulfillment and consequent happiness are to be found. Some think to attain happiness by becoming rich, some by enjoying pleasures, some by exercising power, some by being praised and honored, and so on. It is as though all men were determinately set to reach a certain city, but were not all in agreement about the right road they must take to get there. This is the subjective last end of man. The objective last end of man is the object which, when possessed, will give him happiness. The objective last end of man is the infinite good. The infinite good is God.
Looking in the Wrong Places
► WEALTH: “Man’s happiness is not to be found in wealth, whether this be natural wealth which serves his normal needs (such as food, clothing, housing), or artificial wealth, which is money, that can provide the items of natural wealth (food, clothing, housing, etc). Wealth of any kind is a means for acquiring something else―it is a thing that serves; wealth does not fulfill. Hence wealth cannot be the true last end of man and the object that will render man enduringly and completely happy.
► HONORS: “Nor can man’s full happiness consist in honors bestowed upon him because of some excellence in him. Any excellence in a man is in him only by reason of some good already possessed―it means that he already has some degree of happiness. Honors come to him because of this happiness, and therefore honors cannot themselves be the constituting elements of perfect happiness.
► FAME AND GLORY: “Nor can man’s happiness be found in fame and glory. These, just like honors bestowed, presuppose some degree of happiness already attained, and this they publicize and praise. Fame and glory are only a result of some imperfect happiness, and are, in some sense, the product of it. Fame and glory cannot, therefore, be the essential elements of perfect happiness.
► POWER: “Man’s perfect happiness cannot consist in the possession of power―for power is not a complete end, but only a means to an end―power is only valuable according to the use to which it may be put. In a word, power looks on to something further; it cannot itself be the ultimate goal.
► GOODS OF THE BODY: “Man’s ultimate happiness does not consist in goods of the body ― life, health, strength, beauty, agility, etc. ― for these goods preserve the body and its perfections. Merely to preserve life cannot be the end of life. Goods of the body are to be used by reason (intellect and will) somewhat as a ship is used by its master; the master does not use the ship merely to preserve the ship, but to carry profitable cargoes to desired ports. Thus it appears that the goods of the body are means, not complete ends. Besides, man is a rational being as well as a bodily being; he can never be completely fulfilled and satisfied by bodily goods.
► PLEASURES: “Pleasures, whether bodily or intellectual, cannot bring a man ultimate happiness. We have just seen that bodily things cannot be man’s perfect fulfillment. And mental enjoyments presuppose the end already attained; enjoyment follows upon possession of some good or end; what is consequent upon the end cannot itself be the end.
► GOODS OF THE SOUL: “The goods of the soul ― its essence, faculties, acts, habits, perfections ― cannot constitute man's ultimate end. Happiness is for the soul and is to be attained by the soul. Therefore the objective ultimate happiness is something outside the soul, which the soul seeks to bring into itself and possess subjectively. Hence this ultimate end is not the soul itself, nor the goods belonging to the soul.
“Indeed, no created good can give man perfect happiness. Only the essential, universal, and boundless good can bring man complete and unfading fulfillment. No created good is universal, essential, and boundless; only the uncreated good can be the ultimate end of man. And this uncreated good is God.” (Monsignor Paul J. Glenn, A Tour of the Summa).
What is Happiness?
Everyone has their own―often infantile―idea of happiness. Show an infant a piece of candy and it will immediately reach out for it and desire it. Put the candy in its mouth and it will beam in blissful happiness. For an adult that piece of candy might change into a beer, a bottle of wine, or few thousand dollars in a lottery win, or promotion at work, owning a nice car or house, possessing a high degree of bodily beauty, having many skills, having lots of friends, etc. It may even involve happiness in sin―such as getting drunk, getting high on drugs, watching immodest movies or pornography, committing adultery, masturbating, etc. Such people will insist that they are very happy when they do these things! Yet the “happiness” that these things bring is only a temporary happiness and will not last. You finish the beer and wine; you spend the lottery winnings; you can lose your job for a variety of reasons which are not always your fault; your car can be severely damaged; your house can also be damaged by weather, floods, fire or other circumstances; your beauty fades as you grow older; certain skills are lost with oncoming age and its accompanying weakness; friends are lost for a variety of reasons, etc. After being drunk or high on drugs you have to “come-down” and face a hangover; the sexual sins might well be discovered―and they most certainly will be punished by God. Suddenly, in all these things, the balloon of happiness is popped and bursts. For happiness to be true it has to be a lasting happiness―just as for someone to be classified as being healthy, they have to have a lasting healthiness and not just for a few days, weeks or months.
Monsignor Paul J. Glenn, in his A Tour of the Summa, comments upon this: “Man’s subjective happiness is a state and an operation by which man lays hold of, and possesses, the object which renders him happy. Ultimate subjective happiness is the state of fulfillment and satisfaction in a person who has obtained the end for which he is made. Ultimate objective happiness is the reality which, when possessed, will render the possessor subjectively happy by completely fulfilling and satisfying his entire nature. God is man’s objective happiness. Possession of God in the beatific vision is man’s ultimate subjective happiness. Our Lord said: “Now this is eternal life―that they may know Thee, the only true God!” (John 17:3). The knowledge which a man acquires during earthly life―such as scientific and philosophical knowledge―will be, in Heaven, an accidental (secondary) item in his perfect happiness, but not an essential element of that happiness.
“Man’s ultimate subjective happiness is an operation of the intellective faculties, not of the bodily senses. The bodily senses cannot behold God in the beatific vision. In Heaven a man will have some happiness from contemplating the angels, but his pure and perfect happiness must come from contemplating God in the beatific vision. Only in the beatific vision will the human intellect find its perfect object. Possessing this object, the intellect will have nothing further to desire or to seek. Man’s intellect is made for truth, and God alone is essential truth. God alone is the boundless fulfillment of the human intellect, as he is of the entire human nature. Man’s ultimate subjective happiness is an act of intellect (mind), rather than an act of will (heart). Yet the delight or enjoyment which follows the attainment of happiness, is something that belongs to the will (heart). The intellect (mind) possesses the object which gives happiness; the will (heart) rests delighted in the possession of that object. Man’s ultimate happiness is possessed in Heaven; it is no longer sought after.” (Monsignor Paul J. Glenn, A Tour of the Summa).
For St. Thomas Aquinas, happiness is not a mere feeling or an emotion. St. Thomas is uncompromising in his view that our true happiness can only be found in knowledge of God. No other worldly good or pleasure can truly provide us with the ultimate good we seek. As he argues in the Summa Theologica:
“It is impossible for any created good to constitute man’s happiness. For happiness is that perfect good which entirely satisfies one’s desire; otherwise it would not be the ultimate end, if something yet remained to be desired. Now the object of the will, i.e., of man’s desire, is what is universally good; just as the object of the intellect is what is universally true. Hence it is evident that nothing can satisfy man’s will, except what is universally good. This is to be found, not in any creature, but in God alone, because every creature has only participated goodness. Therefore, God alone can satisfy the will of man, according to the words of the Psalms (102:5): ‘Who alone satisfies your desire with good things.’ Therefore, God alone constitutes man’s happiness.” (Summa Theologica, IIa, q. 1. Art. 8).
According to St. Thomas, we must make a clear distinction between enjoyment and happiness. Enjoyment is linked to worldly goods and physical pleasures―but these tend to be very short-lived. And even if all of our worldly desires were satisfied—even if we were to experience every possible enjoyment—we would remain unhappy, since we would still have a nagging feeling that something is missing. Today, St. Thomas would point to the experience of many rich people and celebrities as evidence for this truth. Despite having every worldly good—fine foods, cars, houses, vacations, friends, family—many of them remain deeply unhappy, with some of them even falling into the misery of drugs and suicide. St. Thomas would explain this as follows―when every enjoyment is felt, the soul begins to crave for something more than mere enjoyment. But if one has no knowledge of this “something more” or doesn’t know how to go about finding it, the enjoyment turns to pain and suffering. This also explains why we see a lot of billionaires suddenly change towards the middle or end of their lives―that nagging feeling that there is something more results in charitable work or an orientation to a higher purpose in life.
God-Wired, Not World-Wired
Our souls were, so to speak, “wired” by God. “For in Him were all things created in Heaven and on Earth, all things were created by Him and in Him” (Colossians 1:16). “All things were made by Him and without Him was made nothing that was made” (John 1:3). “Thou hast created all things; and for Thy will they were, and have been created” (Apocalypse 4:11). “For of Him, and by Him, and in Him, are all things” (Romans 11:36). “Heaven is the Lord’s and the Earth and all things that are therein!” (Deuteronomy 10:1). “The Earth is the Lord’s, and the world and all they that dwell therein!” (Psalms 23:1). “The Lord has made all things for Himself” (Proverbs 16:4). “All the Earth is Mine” (Exodus 19:5). “All souls are Mine―as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is Mine!” (Ezechiel 18:4).
We cannot serve God and the world: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Holy Scripture makes it abundantly clear that we were made by God and made for God. God is our first beginning and our final end. God made our souls for Heaven. If we tinker with God’s “wiring” and “reprogram” ourselves for Earth and its worldliness, then God will not let us find happiness deep down―even though on the surface we might smiling, laughing and enjoying our “rewired” selves. “Thus saith the Lord: ‘Cursed be the man that trusts in man, and makes flesh his arm, and whose heart departs from the Lord!’” (Jeremias 17:5). “If you will not hear the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep and to do all His commandments, then all these curses shall come upon thee, and overtake thee: Cursed shall you be in the city; cursed in the field; cursed shall be your barn, and cursed your stores; cursed shall be the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your ground, your herds of oxen, and your flocks of sheep! The Lord shall send upon you famine and hunger, until he consume and destroy you quickly, for your most wicked inventions, by which you have forsaken Me!” (Deuteronomy 28:15-22). Not quite the best imaginable recipe for happiness, huh?
Pain and Happiness―Suffering and Joy
Sometimes the things that bring us enjoyment or happiness are not that easy to attain or achieve. Take, for example, soldiers in war, whose daily life is far from home comforts and often results in inflicted wounds by enemy fire or bombs―yet their joy in winning the battle or the war compensates for the pain. Another example is found in physical sports such as American Football, Rugby and Soccer―players take tremendous blows and bruises to the body while competing against the opposition―but the joy of winning often more than compensates the pain and suffering caused by those body blows and bruises. The same is true for boxing and the martial arts.
Holy Scripture speaks of such things. As regards the above example of soldiers, Scripture says: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “This is the victory which overcomes the world―our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “What! Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “For you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” ― and all the other true enemies of God (Hebrews 12:4).
As regards the above example from sports, St. Paul, in writing to the “sports mad” inhabitants of Corinth, says: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it! And every one that strives for the mastery in some field, refrains himself from all things. They do this so that they may receive a corruptible crown―but we seek an incorruptible one! I therefore so run, not as at an uncertainty! I so fight, not as one beating the air! But I chastise my body and bring it into subjection―lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway!” (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
Our Lady Hits the Nail of Happiness on the Head
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, lamented: “Who is so dull-minded and insipid as not to know the dangers of the worldly life? … The faithful are in such a dangerous and dreadful state of carelessness! … Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with [true] wisdom! … Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom! … The wisdom of the flesh has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God! … With a most perverse blindness, the worldly ones continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them ... The more they exert themselves to reach the evil objects of their carnal and animal passions, so much the more will they fall into ignorance of divine things … In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls, and they hold as being wisdom that which is nothing but diabolical and earthly ignorance! ... They never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or appreciation of it! … God knows that this insane love will pervert the greater part of the human nature! …
“The greatest wisdom for souls consists in the knowledge of the cross, in the love of sufferings, and in putting this knowledge into practice by bearing afflictions with patience! … My Son and Lord could have redeemed the human race without suffering so much! … It was not necessary to suffer so much! … Yet He wished to increase His sufferings only on account of the immensity of His love for souls! … Moreover, my divine Son and I―without being guilty of any faults, or bad inclinations―devoted ourselves to labors and made our lives a continual practice of penance and mortification of the flesh. If We then pursued such a course of life because it was reasonable, what must be thought of mortals that seek nothing but sweetness and delight, and abhor all penances, affronts, ignominies, fasting and mortification? Shall only Christ, our Lord, and I suffer all these hardships? … The worldlings, in their torpidity, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should hate suffering, especially after all that my most holy Son suffered for them! … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! …
“Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion! … Hence it is that men do not find joy in their tribulations, nor rest in their labors, nor consolation in their sorrows, nor any peace in adversities. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation … The Lord and I suffered and endured such bitter sorrows, in order that mortals might be encouraged not to refuse less severe sufferings for their own eternal good. Therefore let mortals show themselves thankful, and willingly enter upon the rough and thorny path and accepting the Cross, and to carry it after Christ. Thus will they walk upon the direct path toward Heaven and gain an eternal happiness! … Bodily penances are so appropriate and fitted to mortal creatures, that the ignorance of this truth and the neglect and contempt of bodily mortification is the cause of the damnation of many souls and brings many more into the danger of eternal loss!” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
When Happiness is Unhappiness and Unhappiness is Happiness
There is SUBJECTIVE HAPPINESS―which is our own personal fragile opinion on happiness and what makes us happy; it is a personal happiness does not depend on external circumstances, but on our inner state of mind (which could be right or wrong, good or bad, virtuous or sinful). Subjective happiness is fickle and biased; it can find happiness in sin or in virtue. Ultimately subjective happiness is a skill that can be developed through practice, just like any other skill―by recognizing and eliminating what is bad/wrong/sinful and fostering what is good/correct/virtuous.
Then there is OBJECTIVE HAPPINESS―which is a real and true notion of happiness, which does not depend upon our personal opinions. It should be the true “measuring stick” of our personal subjective happiness. We should “measure up” our subjective opinions of happiness to the unbiased truths of objective happiness. For example, getting drunk, committing adultery, masturbating, killing someone we don’t like, etc. ― might bring us subjective happiness, but objectively speaking, these things will not really bring happiness in the long run―they will be punished by God in this life and/or in Purgatory, and if we die unrepentant, then they will be further punished eternally in Hell! That is not happiness, is it? That is stupidity! Happiness does not depend upon us and our subjectivity―which can always be wrong and in error. True happiness is an END-PRODUCT and a LASTING HAPPINESS. The ultimate happiness is EVERLASTING HAPPINESS, which of course is the Beatific Vision of God in Heaven. Anything that does not lead to that everlasting happiness cannot be truly classified as happiness―for it will lead us to everlasting misery or unhappiness in Hell. Hence, Holy Scripture warns: “Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” (Isaias 5:20).
In an ideal world, SUBJECTIVE HAPPINESS and OBJECTIVE HAPPINESS would be “on the same page” and in agreement with one another. However, since Original Sin, we do not live in an “ideal world” and almost everyone is guilty of creating their own personal “truth” which rarely corresponds and agrees with God’s truth. Hence, we ignore the truth that Our Lord taught: ““Lay not up to yourselves treasures [happiness] on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures [happiness] in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). It is the everlasting happiness of Heaven that we should be seeking and not any fleeting happiness on Earth.
Our Lord’s parable about the rich man comes to mind: “And He spoke a similitude to them, saying: ‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to store my fruits?” And he said: “This will I do! I will pull down my barns and will build greater barns; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and all my goods! And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast many goods laid up for many years! Take thy rest! Eat, drink, and make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool! This night do they require thy soul of thee! And whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” Such is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God!’ And He said to His disciples: ‘Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life and what you shall eat! Nor for your body and what you shall put on! Consider the ravens―they sow not, neither do they reap, neither have they a storehouse nor a barn, and God feeds them! How much are you more valuable than they, O ye of little Faith? Seek not you what you shall eat, nor what you shall drink, and be not lifted up on high! For all these things do the nations of the world seek. But your Father knows that you have need of these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!’” (Luke 12:16-31).
If we seek above all things temporary and imperfect happiness in this life, then we greatly risk losing everlasting and perfect happiness in the next life. You could apply to this these words of Our Lord: “For whosoever wants save his life, shall lose it―and whosoever shall lose his life for My sake and the Gospel, shall save it!” (Mark 8:35). We cannot have our cake and eat it―we cannot seek worldly happiness and expect to achieve heavenly happiness―we cannot find happiness in the world and happiness with God at the same time: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
You Choose on What to Spend Your Money
We cannot serve God and mammon (Matthew 6:24). We cannot love both God and the world―for they are mutual enemies (1 John 2:15; James 4:4). We cannot love riches and wealth while professing to love God. We see this in case of the rich young man in the Scriptures: “A certain rich young man asked Jesus: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25). To this Holy Scripture adds: “Go now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted: and your garments are moth-eaten! Your gold and silver is cankered: and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire! You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3).
Life is no joke! Like Esau, in the Old Testament, you can easily exchange your inheritance of perfect eternal happiness in Heaven by hungrily exchanging it for imperfect temporary happiness on Earth: “Jacob had boiled some stew. Esau, coming out of the field and feeling faint, said to Jacob: ‘Give me of this red stew, for I am exceedingly faint! And Jacob said to Esau: ‘Sell me thy first birthright [inheritance of the first born]!’ Esau answered: Behold! I am dying! What will the first birthright avail me?’ Jacob said: ‘Swear [make an oath], therefore, to me!’ Esau swore to him and sold his first birthright. And so taking bread and the stew of lentils, he ate and drank, and went his way―making little account of having sold his first birthright” (Genesis 25:29-34). Esau was temporarily happy having filled his belly―but it cost him his inheritance as the first born of Isaac. There are too many earthly minded worldly people today “whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things!” (Philippians 3:19).
If someone offered you $10,000 today or $10 million in a year’s time―which offer would you take? You can have fleeting imperfect temporary happiness today in this world, or you have forsake that for an eternal perfect everlasting happiness in Heaven. You sacrifice one or the other. “Eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for them that love Him!” (1 Corinthians 2:9).
All of this does not mean that we have to be miserable on Earth in order to be happy in Heaven! Far from it! St. Thomas Aquinas maintains that we can achieve a kind of “imperfect happiness” here on Earth. No worldly good or pleasure can truly provide us with the ultimate good we seek―which is perfect everlasting happiness and which can only be found in God. Whatever earthly happiness we seek or find, it must not be in opposition to, nor must it divert us from, the ultimate happiness which is God―otherwise we are putting a mere creature before the Creator. An authentic earthly happiness should be found in knowing that all the things that we are doing here on Earth are actually leading us to our eternal happiness in Heaven. To divorce earthly happiness from heavenly happiness is wrong―and it is only happiness in name, but not happiness by nature.
Article 15
Saturday January 13th & Sunday January 14th
January―the Post-Christmas Season of Depression
Saturday January 13th & Sunday January 14th
January―the Post-Christmas Season of Depression
From Yuletide to Yucktide
January is often dubbed as “the Monday of months” meaning that it is the most depressing month of the year. For many people Yuletide turns to Yucktide after the New Year arrives! It is a fairly common problem―as psychologists will tell you. Why is January the most depressing month of the year? Immediately following the New Year, millions of Americans experience what is commonly called the “January Blues.” January is known for being depressing due to a perfect storm of factors colliding. Experts say it’s because of mixture of several things:
(1) WITHDRAWAL SYMPTOMS
A “coming-down” or “withdrawal symptoms” or “emotional hangover” from a month of celebrating and partying from Thanksgiving Day to Christmas and New Year’s Eve. It is a time of year when families get together in larger than usual numbers and have greater than usual expectations. Not all family gatherings are like a “fairy tale” with a “Hollywood happy-ending”! On the one side people might be sad because they will not see certain family members for a long time (until next year), or, on the other hand, in the case of dysfunctional families, people might me sad, depressed and angry with their family members. The month of surface celebration, joy, laughter, partying, eating, drinking and gift-giving often has more painful elements below the surface―the stirring-up of bad memories of earlier family life or previous get-togethers, disagreements, arguments, criticism, snide remarks, sarcasm, mockery, insults, dredging-up of past faults, ingratitude, self-centeredness, etc. Family dysfunction or unresolved childhood traumas can play a big role in depression after the Thanksgiving-Christmas season. These end up being emotional traumas and wounds that remain in the mind and heart long after the Thanksgiving-Christmas season has ended.
(2) PERSONAL DISAPPOINTMENT
Personal disappointments with expectations not being met are another source of sadness or depression. The parties with family or friends did not work out as you had expected. “So-and-so” largely ignored you; “so-and-so” failed to give help when it was needed; “so-and-so” never bothered to turn up; “so-and-so” got drunk and made a fool of themselves and ruined things for others; nobody complimented your cooking or decorations; you were not thanked for your efforts; being more religious than other family members, you were disappointed by the overwhelming secular tone and worldliness of the gatherings, etc. You may have put on holiday weight or failed to meet the goals you set for the holiday season. Many over-optimistic New Year’s resolutions already fail in January. These―and a whole lot of other things―can easily get under our skin and lodge themselves in our minds and will grate upon us long after the celebrations are over. The holidays tend to be a time where we have an abundance of expectations and needs. Unfortunately for most of us, these expectations and needs do not get met in exactly the way we hoped or imagined.
(3) FINANCIAL BURDENS
Added to that is the possible burden of personal finances. Most people overspend in the Thanksgiving-Christmas season. While December is when people are in a joyful and giving spirit because of the Thanksgiving-Christmas holiday season―January is reportedly the time they have to pay for it. Many feel saddened or depressed when receiving their January bills from holiday shopping. The average American racks up an average of $1,300 of debt during the holidays. When those credit card bills are due January, some people may find themselves feeling overwhelmed. As one financial consultant says: “The majority of consumers say they will pay off that debt in over three months, but 15% say they’re going to just make the minimum payment. When you have a debt of $1,300, it could take 5 years of minimum payments, paying over $600 in interest.”
(4) BAD WEATHER
In addition to all this we have the weather! January falls smack in the middle of winter, the least favorite of the four seasons. This is the time of year when for millions of Americans the weather is cold, rainy, or snowy. Much of the United States is shivering in cold freezing temperatures―and being outside seems hostile. Add to that the snow. Syracuse in New York has the highest average snowfall of 114 inches (just under 10 feet). Most northern states have an average of anywhere from 3 to 7 feet. Then you have the icy driving conditions, the scraping of snow and ice off cars, the shoveling of snow off driveways, walking on icy slippery sidewalks, risk potential frozen water pipes, etc. If it’s not snowy and icy, then it’s raining! In conclusion, the weather can have a significant impact on our mood and mental state. Sunshine, warmth and clear blue skies can bring feelings of happiness and positivity, while the absence of sunshine, gray cloudy skies, snow, ice and rain can lead to sadness and depression.
(5) SHORT DAYLIGHT HOURS
It’s that time of year where darkness seems to be sucking away our daylight. There are fewer daylight hours, and many people have to return to work after a long break during the holiday season. The less light exposure one has, the more one’s mood may decline. As the days get shorter, people can experience general moodiness or a longer-term depression that is tied to a shorter exposure to daylight. As one doctor said: “Lack of light causes depressive symptoms. By the time you are into the third week of January, you are really not feeling great!” Low mood during the darker months isn’t just supported by anecdotal evidence. Research shows that less exposure to sunlight affects the serotonin levels in the brain along with our circadian rhythm, your body’s 24-hour clock. With that rhythm thrown off, many people struggle more with their mental health during the darker part of the year.
Where is God in All This?
Just like all the Christmas revelers today, the Israelites of old sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play―but with most of them God was not pleased: “I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud, and in the sea! And did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink ―but with most of them God was not well pleased and they were overthrown in the desert. We should not covet evil things as they also coveted. Neither become idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.’” (1 Corinthians 10:1-7). Many are baptized, many go to Holy Mass, many receive Holy Communion, many pray the Rosary―but with most of them God is not well pleased. Why? Because they try to make peace between God and mammon, they try to live life loving God and at the same time loving the world.
Holy Scripture reminds us of the true order and true value of things. God comes first! “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life and what you shall eat, nor for your body and what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat and the body more than the clothing? Be not solicitous therefore, saying: ‘What shall we eat?” or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek! For your Father knoweth that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the Kingdom of God, and His justice―and all these things shall be added unto you.” (Matthew 6:19-33).
Whatever we do, we should do everything for the glory of God: “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31). “For man lives not by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Deuteronomy 8:3; Matthew 4:4; Luke 4:4). Our purpose in life is to live for fun, but to carry the cross―which is our key to Heaven. “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
We have been placed in this world―not to have fun―but to fight our way to Heaven: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “What! Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Lack of Charity Ultimately Leads to Depression
Yet even the carrying of the cross is useless if it is done without charity, without a love of God: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). There can be no holiness without charity―and there can be no happiness without holiness.
We are unequivocally commanded by Christ: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these! On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Love God with your whole heart, mind, soul and strength! Love your neighbor as you love yourself. If we love God less and less, then ultimately we will end up loving our neighbor less and less―and also ourselves less and less, for God will not reward our lack of love for Him with lots of happiness. The more we love God, then the more we will find ourselves loving our neighbor and we will be more at peace with ourselves.
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8). Charity is the DNA of the spiritual life that shows whether or not we belong to God, whether or not we are like God. “Owe no man anything, but to love one another. For he that loves his neighbor, has fulfilled the law! The love of our neighbor works no evil. Love therefore is the fulfilling of the law!” (Romans 13:8-10). “For all the law is fulfilled in one word: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!’” (Galatians 5:14).
Happiness and Holiness
Are you chasing happiness or holiness? Many people put them in opposition to each other―saying that you must choose between happiness and holiness. Perhaps it is the words of Our Lady to St. Bernadette of Lourdes that makes them think this way. Our Lady of Lourdes said to Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!” However, these words of Our Lady have to be correctly understood and can easily be twisted or misinterpreted. What Our Lady is saying is this: “Do not seek and place the happiness of this world above the happiness of Heaven. The happiness of this world―a worldly happiness―is bound to end. The happiness of Heaven never ends. Do not choose what is inferior over what is superior! Worldly happiness takes us off the path to heavenly happiness!” Our Lord said much the same thing―as quoted above: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … Therefore seek first the Kingdom of God and His justice!” (Matthew 6:19-33). In Heaven, there is only happiness, holiness and charity. In Hell, there is only depression, sinfulness and hatred.
You cannot be really or truly happy unless you are holy. Your happiness will increase in proportion to your holiness. Holiness is the seed of happiness―the more it grows, the more fruit of happiness it bears. Holiness is not an option, but an obligation! “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26). “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy because I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 20:7). “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2). “He chose us that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight in charity” (Ephesians 1:4). “Without holiness no man shall see God” (Hebrews 12:14). We must remind ourselves that it is ONLY SAINTS that go to Heaven. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, in his The Three Ages of the Interior Life, writes: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven―whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul.”
Holiness Misunderstood
Everyone has their own idea of holiness―and most people misunderstand holiness. The renowned Benedictine monk, Dom Hubert Van Zeller, in his book Holiness A Guide for Beginners (formerly entitled: Sanctity in Other Words), has an opening chapter that deals with the misunderstanding of holiness. He says the following: “If personal holiness is thought of as being a name at the top of a list, it is understood wrong. If it is thought of as something that merits a feast in the Church’s calendar, it is understood wrong. If it is thought of as something to which is attached the power of working miracles, it is understood wrong. If it is thought of as mooning about in a state of pious contentment (or sweet ecstasy or noble and aloof virtue), it is understood wrong. There is nothing “superior” — in the sense of being one up on everybody else — about it.
“The way to think of sanctity is as something that, by being generous and faithful to grace, gives back to God the love He has given to the soul. So it is for God’s sake, more than for our own, that we should want to be saints. We work away at holiness, not because we are ambitious and want to be experts in a particular kind of lofty career, but because God wants us to be saints and is praised by our striving after sanctity.
“Anyone can be holy, or rather act holy, so long as others are saying: “There’s a saint for you!” but sooner or later this sort of holiness wears off. Either the person sees the trap, becomes humble, and goes ahead toward real holiness, or keeping up the act becomes too much of a strain and there’s a swing toward worldliness and perhaps to a lasting unholiness. The whole secret of sanctity is that it is a thing of grace, and so cannot be switched on as a part to be played.
“This means that however determined you are to be a saint, you will not become one if you rely on your own strength of mind. The only thing that can get you to sanctity is God’s grace. You will need all the strength of mind you have just to work together with God’s grace, but if you imagine that making good, strong resolutions will carry you the whole way, you are wrong. About the first thing to happen will be that God lets you break some of those good, strong resolutions before you get properly started. This will be to put you in your place, and show you that you can do nothing without Him.
“Once you are decently humbled, knowing that left to yourself you cannot even carry out the things that you very much want to carry out, you are getting ready to be used. You are being softened up like a steak. When all the toughness and pride and glamorized ideas of holiness have been beaten out of you by the down-to-earth action of truth, then God has got something there on which He can work. Without false notions and fancy plans, you can now begin to fall in with the true notions of holiness and with the plan God has in mind for you.
“It stands to reason. God is not going to reward anyone else’s work but His own. You cannot expect Him to recognize a holiness that He has done nothing to bring about. When you get right down to it, there is only one real goodness, one perfection, one sanctity, and that is God’s. When man invents a holiness of his own, God lets him look for it but does not help him find it, because a holiness of one’s own does not exist, and it is a waste of time searching for it. It is as if someone were to look for moonlight without the moon. Once you admit that all moonlight is bound to come from one particular place, and that it is a thing you cannot make yourself, you have learned something.
“Another thing to notice right at the beginning about holiness is that there is no cut-and-dried pattern about it. It is what God wants out of you, and because you are not exactly the same as anyone else, the holiness that is to be yours will not be exactly like anyone else’s. The model of all holiness is Our Lord, and unless you grow to be like Him, you will never get anywhere in holiness, but this does not mean that all, who follow Him, will end up exactly alike. Our Lord appeals to us in His way, and we answer Him in our way.
“If twenty artists are told to paint a picture of the Crucifixion, they will all show the same thing, but in twenty different ways. There will be twenty quite separate pictures, no two alike. This is how God wants our response to be: each one his own. Now, just as it would show a weakness in one of those twenty artists to copy as closely as possible the painting of the artist next to him, so it would be a weakness for one follower of Our Lord to copy as closely as possible the particular holiness of another follower. He should make it his first job to follow Our Lord. The ways by which others have followed Our Lord can be a tremendous help, just as the ways other people paint can be a tremendous help to painting, but Our Lord, who is Himself “the way, the truth, and the life,” (John 14:6), wants something out of you that is your own to give and is not just a copy. The saints produce masterpieces because of each one’s likeness to Our Lord, not because of each one’s likeness to another. By all means, let us imitate the way in which the saints went about it, but by no means let us copy the results. God wants an original reproduction of Himself, not a forgery.
“All right then, what is it that the saints do that makes them into saints? The answer is that they do two things: on the one side they keep clear of anything that they think is going to get in the way of grace, and on the other they head directly for Our Lord. The only thing to be added to this is that they do it for the glory of God and not for what they can get out of it. They are the ones who “seek first the kingdom of God,” and for the King’s sake rather than for their own, and who are ready to wait as long as God likes for the day when “all these things” shall be added to them (Mathew 6:33).
“So it is not that the saints do particularly “saintly” things (like fierce penances, whole nights spent on their knees, miracles, prophecies, or raptures in prayer); it is more that they do all things in a particularly saintly way, in exactly the way that they feel God wants. To them the only thing in the world that matters is God’s will. They know that by doing God’s will as perfectly as they can, they are imitating Our Lord, they are expressing Charity, and they are being true to the best that is in them.
“All this should be a great encouragement to us because it shows that our service of God does not depend upon how we feel about it, but upon how God looks at it; not upon acts that are seen to be heroic, but upon how ready we are to let God draw heroism out of us; not upon battling our way to a certain point that will give us the title of “saint,” but upon following blindly the course that is set by God’s will.”
Holiness and Happiness―Two Peas in a Pod
Dom Hubert Van Zeller, in his book Holiness A Guide for Beginners, then addresses the relation between holiness and happiness:
“You must be careful not to make the mistake of asking yourself first whether you are saintly and second whether you are happy. Both are stupid questions, getting you nowhere. It is only sham saints who are forever wondering how holy they are; the real ones forget about themselves in their desire to please God. In the same way, it is only people who are not awfully happy who question their happiness. So take whatever is coming in this chapter as something that will show you the general direction in which both holiness and happiness are to be found.
“Have you ever noticed how the holiest people you have come across always seem to be the happiest? You would think that enclosed nuns in their Carmelite convents, with no possessions and no pleasures such as movies and parties, might be lonely and sad. But not at all―they are just the ones who seem to be laughing whenever you visit them. Then on the other side of it, you would think that men and women who have lots of money and lovely houses would be proclaiming their happiness all day long. But it does not work out like this. The lonely ones are men with two or three wives (“which ought to be company enough,” you would have said) and the women who are so busy running after pleasure that they are never alone.
“It is a known fact that the people who kill themselves are mostly the rich and the worldly, not the poor and the religious. Does not this prove something? Well, it points to a lot of things, but chiefly it seems to show that filling your life with enjoyment only empties your life of happiness, and that collecting more and more money or possessions or power simply does not work.
“After what Our Lord has said, this is only to be expected. “A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions” (Luke 12:15). “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33). “Your treasure is in Heaven where the rust does not consume and thieves do not break through and steal” (Matthew 6:20). “What does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Mark 8:36). “The peace, which I give, is not the peace which the world gives, for My peace no man can take from you” (John 14:27; John 16:22). Remember the parable of Dives [rich man] and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31), the parable of the rich man, who tried to store up his goods in bigger and bigger barns (Luke 12:16-21), and the parable of the woman who gave away even the last of her savings (Mark 12:41-44). Remember the incident of the rich young man, who was called to be a disciple, but who turned away, because he could not bring himself to part from his wealth (Mark 10:17-22).
“Remember that Our Lord promised that those who carried their burdens willingly, with Him and as though they were His, would find the weight light; the hard yoke of service would turn into something sweet. “Come to Me, all you who are heavy laden,” He invited. He would ease matters for these hard-pressed souls, and they would find rest for their souls and peace (Matthew 11:28-30).
“The strange thing is that worldly people, quite sinful people, read these words of Our Lord and do not deny them. They know in their hearts that what He said was perfectly true. They admit the uselessness of luxury when it comes to the question of happiness, and they know that hardship cannot on its own make people miserable. But they cannot bring themselves to put the Gospel teaching into practice. They are afraid to let go of their pleasures, and they are afraid of the Cross. Sanctity would be their one solution, but they do not want to think about what might be expected of them if they went all out for it.
“Now we can bring in St. Thomas Aquinas, the Doctor of the Church who said that our human happiness “lies in the perfection of our highest faculties.” This gets us one stage further, showing us that happiness and holiness go together. The highest faculties can find perfection only in the highest good — namely, God. So the highest happiness of man lies in drawing near to the perfect holiness of God. Now, from the point of view of this book, which is all about our sanctification, the important thing here is that God pours out His holiness to those who make His honor and glory their highest happiness.
“So if we really mean to place our happiness in doing God’s will, we cannot fail to grow in holiness. The argument goes around and around in what might be called a ‘virtuous circle’ (as opposed to a vicious circle): we want happiness, we look for it in God, we set our highest faculties to work, we do God’s will, and when we do this as well as we can, we become holy. And what about becoming happy, too! Yes, but happiness is a by-product. “Seek first the kingdom of God, and all these things” happiness among them — “will be added to you.”
“Look at the life of St. Francis, and see how his story bears out the cycle (the various stages of the argument that come around to the beginning). He hungered for God, lived for God alone, made God’s will his one aim, and at the end of his life — although blind, in pain, poor, and with his work apparently coming to nothing proclaimed his overwhelming happiness. He knew the theory, and proved it.”
January is often dubbed as “the Monday of months” meaning that it is the most depressing month of the year. For many people Yuletide turns to Yucktide after the New Year arrives! It is a fairly common problem―as psychologists will tell you. Why is January the most depressing month of the year? Immediately following the New Year, millions of Americans experience what is commonly called the “January Blues.” January is known for being depressing due to a perfect storm of factors colliding. Experts say it’s because of mixture of several things:
(1) WITHDRAWAL SYMPTOMS
A “coming-down” or “withdrawal symptoms” or “emotional hangover” from a month of celebrating and partying from Thanksgiving Day to Christmas and New Year’s Eve. It is a time of year when families get together in larger than usual numbers and have greater than usual expectations. Not all family gatherings are like a “fairy tale” with a “Hollywood happy-ending”! On the one side people might be sad because they will not see certain family members for a long time (until next year), or, on the other hand, in the case of dysfunctional families, people might me sad, depressed and angry with their family members. The month of surface celebration, joy, laughter, partying, eating, drinking and gift-giving often has more painful elements below the surface―the stirring-up of bad memories of earlier family life or previous get-togethers, disagreements, arguments, criticism, snide remarks, sarcasm, mockery, insults, dredging-up of past faults, ingratitude, self-centeredness, etc. Family dysfunction or unresolved childhood traumas can play a big role in depression after the Thanksgiving-Christmas season. These end up being emotional traumas and wounds that remain in the mind and heart long after the Thanksgiving-Christmas season has ended.
(2) PERSONAL DISAPPOINTMENT
Personal disappointments with expectations not being met are another source of sadness or depression. The parties with family or friends did not work out as you had expected. “So-and-so” largely ignored you; “so-and-so” failed to give help when it was needed; “so-and-so” never bothered to turn up; “so-and-so” got drunk and made a fool of themselves and ruined things for others; nobody complimented your cooking or decorations; you were not thanked for your efforts; being more religious than other family members, you were disappointed by the overwhelming secular tone and worldliness of the gatherings, etc. You may have put on holiday weight or failed to meet the goals you set for the holiday season. Many over-optimistic New Year’s resolutions already fail in January. These―and a whole lot of other things―can easily get under our skin and lodge themselves in our minds and will grate upon us long after the celebrations are over. The holidays tend to be a time where we have an abundance of expectations and needs. Unfortunately for most of us, these expectations and needs do not get met in exactly the way we hoped or imagined.
(3) FINANCIAL BURDENS
Added to that is the possible burden of personal finances. Most people overspend in the Thanksgiving-Christmas season. While December is when people are in a joyful and giving spirit because of the Thanksgiving-Christmas holiday season―January is reportedly the time they have to pay for it. Many feel saddened or depressed when receiving their January bills from holiday shopping. The average American racks up an average of $1,300 of debt during the holidays. When those credit card bills are due January, some people may find themselves feeling overwhelmed. As one financial consultant says: “The majority of consumers say they will pay off that debt in over three months, but 15% say they’re going to just make the minimum payment. When you have a debt of $1,300, it could take 5 years of minimum payments, paying over $600 in interest.”
(4) BAD WEATHER
In addition to all this we have the weather! January falls smack in the middle of winter, the least favorite of the four seasons. This is the time of year when for millions of Americans the weather is cold, rainy, or snowy. Much of the United States is shivering in cold freezing temperatures―and being outside seems hostile. Add to that the snow. Syracuse in New York has the highest average snowfall of 114 inches (just under 10 feet). Most northern states have an average of anywhere from 3 to 7 feet. Then you have the icy driving conditions, the scraping of snow and ice off cars, the shoveling of snow off driveways, walking on icy slippery sidewalks, risk potential frozen water pipes, etc. If it’s not snowy and icy, then it’s raining! In conclusion, the weather can have a significant impact on our mood and mental state. Sunshine, warmth and clear blue skies can bring feelings of happiness and positivity, while the absence of sunshine, gray cloudy skies, snow, ice and rain can lead to sadness and depression.
(5) SHORT DAYLIGHT HOURS
It’s that time of year where darkness seems to be sucking away our daylight. There are fewer daylight hours, and many people have to return to work after a long break during the holiday season. The less light exposure one has, the more one’s mood may decline. As the days get shorter, people can experience general moodiness or a longer-term depression that is tied to a shorter exposure to daylight. As one doctor said: “Lack of light causes depressive symptoms. By the time you are into the third week of January, you are really not feeling great!” Low mood during the darker months isn’t just supported by anecdotal evidence. Research shows that less exposure to sunlight affects the serotonin levels in the brain along with our circadian rhythm, your body’s 24-hour clock. With that rhythm thrown off, many people struggle more with their mental health during the darker part of the year.
Where is God in All This?
Just like all the Christmas revelers today, the Israelites of old sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play―but with most of them God was not pleased: “I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea. And all in Moses were baptized, in the cloud, and in the sea! And did all eat the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink ―but with most of them God was not well pleased and they were overthrown in the desert. We should not covet evil things as they also coveted. Neither become idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.’” (1 Corinthians 10:1-7). Many are baptized, many go to Holy Mass, many receive Holy Communion, many pray the Rosary―but with most of them God is not well pleased. Why? Because they try to make peace between God and mammon, they try to live life loving God and at the same time loving the world.
Holy Scripture reminds us of the true order and true value of things. God comes first! “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life and what you shall eat, nor for your body and what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat and the body more than the clothing? Be not solicitous therefore, saying: ‘What shall we eat?” or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek! For your Father knoweth that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the Kingdom of God, and His justice―and all these things shall be added unto you.” (Matthew 6:19-33).
Whatever we do, we should do everything for the glory of God: “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:31). “For man lives not by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God!” (Deuteronomy 8:3; Matthew 4:4; Luke 4:4). Our purpose in life is to live for fun, but to carry the cross―which is our key to Heaven. “And Jesus said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23) … “And whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple!” (Luke 14:27) … “And he that taketh not up his cross, and follows Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38).
We have been placed in this world―not to have fun―but to fight our way to Heaven: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). “What! Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular businesses; that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself!” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Lack of Charity Ultimately Leads to Depression
Yet even the carrying of the cross is useless if it is done without charity, without a love of God: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). There can be no holiness without charity―and there can be no happiness without holiness.
We are unequivocally commanded by Christ: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the greatest and the first commandment! And the second is like to it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these! On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Love God with your whole heart, mind, soul and strength! Love your neighbor as you love yourself. If we love God less and less, then ultimately we will end up loving our neighbor less and less―and also ourselves less and less, for God will not reward our lack of love for Him with lots of happiness. The more we love God, then the more we will find ourselves loving our neighbor and we will be more at peace with ourselves.
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8). Charity is the DNA of the spiritual life that shows whether or not we belong to God, whether or not we are like God. “Owe no man anything, but to love one another. For he that loves his neighbor, has fulfilled the law! The love of our neighbor works no evil. Love therefore is the fulfilling of the law!” (Romans 13:8-10). “For all the law is fulfilled in one word: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!’” (Galatians 5:14).
Happiness and Holiness
Are you chasing happiness or holiness? Many people put them in opposition to each other―saying that you must choose between happiness and holiness. Perhaps it is the words of Our Lady to St. Bernadette of Lourdes that makes them think this way. Our Lady of Lourdes said to Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!” However, these words of Our Lady have to be correctly understood and can easily be twisted or misinterpreted. What Our Lady is saying is this: “Do not seek and place the happiness of this world above the happiness of Heaven. The happiness of this world―a worldly happiness―is bound to end. The happiness of Heaven never ends. Do not choose what is inferior over what is superior! Worldly happiness takes us off the path to heavenly happiness!” Our Lord said much the same thing―as quoted above: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … Therefore seek first the Kingdom of God and His justice!” (Matthew 6:19-33). In Heaven, there is only happiness, holiness and charity. In Hell, there is only depression, sinfulness and hatred.
You cannot be really or truly happy unless you are holy. Your happiness will increase in proportion to your holiness. Holiness is the seed of happiness―the more it grows, the more fruit of happiness it bears. Holiness is not an option, but an obligation! “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine!” (Leviticus 20:26). “Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy because I am the Lord your God!” (Leviticus 20:7). “Be ye holy, because I the Lord your God am holy!” (Leviticus 19:2). “He chose us that we should be holy and unspotted in His sight in charity” (Ephesians 1:4). “Without holiness no man shall see God” (Hebrews 12:14). We must remind ourselves that it is ONLY SAINTS that go to Heaven. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, in his The Three Ages of the Interior Life, writes: “There are some who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles, and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven―whether they enter there immediately after death, or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul.”
Holiness Misunderstood
Everyone has their own idea of holiness―and most people misunderstand holiness. The renowned Benedictine monk, Dom Hubert Van Zeller, in his book Holiness A Guide for Beginners (formerly entitled: Sanctity in Other Words), has an opening chapter that deals with the misunderstanding of holiness. He says the following: “If personal holiness is thought of as being a name at the top of a list, it is understood wrong. If it is thought of as something that merits a feast in the Church’s calendar, it is understood wrong. If it is thought of as something to which is attached the power of working miracles, it is understood wrong. If it is thought of as mooning about in a state of pious contentment (or sweet ecstasy or noble and aloof virtue), it is understood wrong. There is nothing “superior” — in the sense of being one up on everybody else — about it.
“The way to think of sanctity is as something that, by being generous and faithful to grace, gives back to God the love He has given to the soul. So it is for God’s sake, more than for our own, that we should want to be saints. We work away at holiness, not because we are ambitious and want to be experts in a particular kind of lofty career, but because God wants us to be saints and is praised by our striving after sanctity.
“Anyone can be holy, or rather act holy, so long as others are saying: “There’s a saint for you!” but sooner or later this sort of holiness wears off. Either the person sees the trap, becomes humble, and goes ahead toward real holiness, or keeping up the act becomes too much of a strain and there’s a swing toward worldliness and perhaps to a lasting unholiness. The whole secret of sanctity is that it is a thing of grace, and so cannot be switched on as a part to be played.
“This means that however determined you are to be a saint, you will not become one if you rely on your own strength of mind. The only thing that can get you to sanctity is God’s grace. You will need all the strength of mind you have just to work together with God’s grace, but if you imagine that making good, strong resolutions will carry you the whole way, you are wrong. About the first thing to happen will be that God lets you break some of those good, strong resolutions before you get properly started. This will be to put you in your place, and show you that you can do nothing without Him.
“Once you are decently humbled, knowing that left to yourself you cannot even carry out the things that you very much want to carry out, you are getting ready to be used. You are being softened up like a steak. When all the toughness and pride and glamorized ideas of holiness have been beaten out of you by the down-to-earth action of truth, then God has got something there on which He can work. Without false notions and fancy plans, you can now begin to fall in with the true notions of holiness and with the plan God has in mind for you.
“It stands to reason. God is not going to reward anyone else’s work but His own. You cannot expect Him to recognize a holiness that He has done nothing to bring about. When you get right down to it, there is only one real goodness, one perfection, one sanctity, and that is God’s. When man invents a holiness of his own, God lets him look for it but does not help him find it, because a holiness of one’s own does not exist, and it is a waste of time searching for it. It is as if someone were to look for moonlight without the moon. Once you admit that all moonlight is bound to come from one particular place, and that it is a thing you cannot make yourself, you have learned something.
“Another thing to notice right at the beginning about holiness is that there is no cut-and-dried pattern about it. It is what God wants out of you, and because you are not exactly the same as anyone else, the holiness that is to be yours will not be exactly like anyone else’s. The model of all holiness is Our Lord, and unless you grow to be like Him, you will never get anywhere in holiness, but this does not mean that all, who follow Him, will end up exactly alike. Our Lord appeals to us in His way, and we answer Him in our way.
“If twenty artists are told to paint a picture of the Crucifixion, they will all show the same thing, but in twenty different ways. There will be twenty quite separate pictures, no two alike. This is how God wants our response to be: each one his own. Now, just as it would show a weakness in one of those twenty artists to copy as closely as possible the painting of the artist next to him, so it would be a weakness for one follower of Our Lord to copy as closely as possible the particular holiness of another follower. He should make it his first job to follow Our Lord. The ways by which others have followed Our Lord can be a tremendous help, just as the ways other people paint can be a tremendous help to painting, but Our Lord, who is Himself “the way, the truth, and the life,” (John 14:6), wants something out of you that is your own to give and is not just a copy. The saints produce masterpieces because of each one’s likeness to Our Lord, not because of each one’s likeness to another. By all means, let us imitate the way in which the saints went about it, but by no means let us copy the results. God wants an original reproduction of Himself, not a forgery.
“All right then, what is it that the saints do that makes them into saints? The answer is that they do two things: on the one side they keep clear of anything that they think is going to get in the way of grace, and on the other they head directly for Our Lord. The only thing to be added to this is that they do it for the glory of God and not for what they can get out of it. They are the ones who “seek first the kingdom of God,” and for the King’s sake rather than for their own, and who are ready to wait as long as God likes for the day when “all these things” shall be added to them (Mathew 6:33).
“So it is not that the saints do particularly “saintly” things (like fierce penances, whole nights spent on their knees, miracles, prophecies, or raptures in prayer); it is more that they do all things in a particularly saintly way, in exactly the way that they feel God wants. To them the only thing in the world that matters is God’s will. They know that by doing God’s will as perfectly as they can, they are imitating Our Lord, they are expressing Charity, and they are being true to the best that is in them.
“All this should be a great encouragement to us because it shows that our service of God does not depend upon how we feel about it, but upon how God looks at it; not upon acts that are seen to be heroic, but upon how ready we are to let God draw heroism out of us; not upon battling our way to a certain point that will give us the title of “saint,” but upon following blindly the course that is set by God’s will.”
Holiness and Happiness―Two Peas in a Pod
Dom Hubert Van Zeller, in his book Holiness A Guide for Beginners, then addresses the relation between holiness and happiness:
“You must be careful not to make the mistake of asking yourself first whether you are saintly and second whether you are happy. Both are stupid questions, getting you nowhere. It is only sham saints who are forever wondering how holy they are; the real ones forget about themselves in their desire to please God. In the same way, it is only people who are not awfully happy who question their happiness. So take whatever is coming in this chapter as something that will show you the general direction in which both holiness and happiness are to be found.
“Have you ever noticed how the holiest people you have come across always seem to be the happiest? You would think that enclosed nuns in their Carmelite convents, with no possessions and no pleasures such as movies and parties, might be lonely and sad. But not at all―they are just the ones who seem to be laughing whenever you visit them. Then on the other side of it, you would think that men and women who have lots of money and lovely houses would be proclaiming their happiness all day long. But it does not work out like this. The lonely ones are men with two or three wives (“which ought to be company enough,” you would have said) and the women who are so busy running after pleasure that they are never alone.
“It is a known fact that the people who kill themselves are mostly the rich and the worldly, not the poor and the religious. Does not this prove something? Well, it points to a lot of things, but chiefly it seems to show that filling your life with enjoyment only empties your life of happiness, and that collecting more and more money or possessions or power simply does not work.
“After what Our Lord has said, this is only to be expected. “A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions” (Luke 12:15). “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33). “Your treasure is in Heaven where the rust does not consume and thieves do not break through and steal” (Matthew 6:20). “What does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Mark 8:36). “The peace, which I give, is not the peace which the world gives, for My peace no man can take from you” (John 14:27; John 16:22). Remember the parable of Dives [rich man] and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31), the parable of the rich man, who tried to store up his goods in bigger and bigger barns (Luke 12:16-21), and the parable of the woman who gave away even the last of her savings (Mark 12:41-44). Remember the incident of the rich young man, who was called to be a disciple, but who turned away, because he could not bring himself to part from his wealth (Mark 10:17-22).
“Remember that Our Lord promised that those who carried their burdens willingly, with Him and as though they were His, would find the weight light; the hard yoke of service would turn into something sweet. “Come to Me, all you who are heavy laden,” He invited. He would ease matters for these hard-pressed souls, and they would find rest for their souls and peace (Matthew 11:28-30).
“The strange thing is that worldly people, quite sinful people, read these words of Our Lord and do not deny them. They know in their hearts that what He said was perfectly true. They admit the uselessness of luxury when it comes to the question of happiness, and they know that hardship cannot on its own make people miserable. But they cannot bring themselves to put the Gospel teaching into practice. They are afraid to let go of their pleasures, and they are afraid of the Cross. Sanctity would be their one solution, but they do not want to think about what might be expected of them if they went all out for it.
“Now we can bring in St. Thomas Aquinas, the Doctor of the Church who said that our human happiness “lies in the perfection of our highest faculties.” This gets us one stage further, showing us that happiness and holiness go together. The highest faculties can find perfection only in the highest good — namely, God. So the highest happiness of man lies in drawing near to the perfect holiness of God. Now, from the point of view of this book, which is all about our sanctification, the important thing here is that God pours out His holiness to those who make His honor and glory their highest happiness.
“So if we really mean to place our happiness in doing God’s will, we cannot fail to grow in holiness. The argument goes around and around in what might be called a ‘virtuous circle’ (as opposed to a vicious circle): we want happiness, we look for it in God, we set our highest faculties to work, we do God’s will, and when we do this as well as we can, we become holy. And what about becoming happy, too! Yes, but happiness is a by-product. “Seek first the kingdom of God, and all these things” happiness among them — “will be added to you.”
“Look at the life of St. Francis, and see how his story bears out the cycle (the various stages of the argument that come around to the beginning). He hungered for God, lived for God alone, made God’s will his one aim, and at the end of his life — although blind, in pain, poor, and with his work apparently coming to nothing proclaimed his overwhelming happiness. He knew the theory, and proved it.”
Article 14
Thursday January 11th & Friday January 12th
Protecting and Saving Your Family
Thursday January 11th & Friday January 12th
Protecting and Saving Your Family
Endangered Species!
Both marriage and family have become endangered species! In the previous article―“Catholic Families Attacked”―we looked at some of the ways in which marriage and families are being undermined, corrupted and destroyed by Satan through the means of the world of which he is the prince (John 12:31). Using his human stooges―the Elites, secret societies, corrupt governments, etc.―Satan has been slowly and relentlessly turning the screw and tightening the noose on marriage and the family.
Satanic Attack
Fr. Gabriele Amorth―the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome for over 30 years―said:
“The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican. I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family].
“Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … The devil prefers this way and we are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour.’ That word―‘where’―is important: the devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and ‘works’ on it … The most frequent weak points in man are, from time to time, always the same: pride, money, and lust … Satan weakens the consciences of men and women and leads them toward egoism, closing their hearts, lack of forgiveness.
“Satan’s power over the world includes physical and mental obsession … The evil one can cause unrestrained animosities, especially toward those who love us the most ... Satan ruins friendships―through his intervention, the victim feels unwelcome everywhere, avoided by everyone, ending in a desire for isolation. Every time that a friendly relationship grows and blossoms, it suddenly ends, without reason … He destroys marriages, breaks up engagements; he fosters screaming fights in families where everyone truly loves one another, and always for futile reasons. Then there follows a conviction of total lack of love and understanding, a complete affective void that makes marriage an impossibility … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan … Our contemporary religious culture―while not entirely negating the existence of Satan and the other devils―is inclined to diminish their involvement and influence over people.”
Satan is a Murderer
Our Lord, speaking of Satan, said: “He was a murderer from the beginning and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father thereof lies!” (John 8:44). Lies and killings! We clearly see that in Satanic promotion of abortion! Lies and killings! The lies consist of telling us that the baby is not an independent human being but merely a body part of the woman―so if a woman’s health requires a body part to be cut off or cut out, she goes ahead and does it. There are many other versions of the abortion lie―all kinds of false reasoning concerning early vs. late term abortions; or the “fetal heartbeat bill”―a law in the United States which makes abortion illegal from around six weeks which is when proponents falsely claim that a "fetal heartbeat" can be detected.
All these are whopping lies that lead to murder of innocent babies―with around 1,954,883,720 (1,954 million, or 1.9 billion―which is an average of around 40 million per year; 3.2 million per month; over 100,000 per day) babies being butchered worldwide since 1973. The increasing numbers of DIY home abortions using abortifacient chemical medications has now risen to an estimated 54% of all abortions in the USA. This can only help increase the number of abortions―since it far cheaper, less high-profile and less-embarrassing that surgical abortions in an abortion mill.
The Guttmacher Institute (originally founded as part of Planned Parenthood) reports that of women having abortions―38% are of no religious affiliation; 25% are Catholic; 17% are mainline Protestant; 13% are evangelical Protestant; and 8% are of some other religious affiliation.
Contraception
Satan’s hatred of the human race also leads to contraception. Surveys show that almost all women, who identify as being religious, have used contraceptive methods—99% of mainline Protestants, evangelical Protestants and Catholics, and 96% of people with other religious affiliations.
The large numbers of Catholics who use contraception are supported by such rebellious Catholic groups as, for instance, “Catholics For Choice” who state: “Catholics for Choice envisions a world in which everyone has equal access to all forms of birth control, unencumbered by religious persecution. We believe that access to birth control is, in fact, a Catholic social justice value. For countless people around the world, access to contraception is a matter of life or death. Untold numbers of people are suffering as a direct consequence of Catholic Church officials’ ban on birth control. Today, ordinary Catholics are taking a stand against the hierarchy. Birth control is not a sin — it is a lifeline ... Help us challenge and dismantle religiously-based barriers to safe, legal, and comprehensive reproductive healthcare.”
Although the use of contraception is forbidden by Catholic Church doctrine, very few U.S. Catholics regard it as morally wrong. Just 15% of all Catholics (practicing and non-practicing Catholics) say that using contraception is morally wrong; 41% say contraception is morally acceptable and 36% say contraception is not even a moral issue. Even among Catholics who regularly attend church weekly, only 27% say contraception is morally wrong.
● In the United States, 65.3% of women aged 15–49 currently use contraception. Nearly all women use contraception in their lifetimes―although at any given time, they may not be using contraception for reasons such as seeking pregnancy, being pregnant, or postpartum, or not being sexually active.
● Worldwide, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 65% of women worldwide use contraception. Between 2000 and 2020, the number of women using a modern contraceptive method increased from 663 million to 851 million. An additional 70 million women are projected to be added by 2030.
A Divided City Cannot Stand―A Divorced Family Cannot Stand
Divorce rates in the United States have been steadily declining over the past few decades, but unfortunately, the divorce rate is still higher than it was in the early 1970s. Part of the reason for divorce rates declining is the fact that people are increasingly cohabiting (living together in sin) rather than marrying. The divorce rate in America in 2021 was estimated to be around 48%. One marriage ends every 36 seconds. According to the American Psychological Association, approximately 40-50% of first marriages end in divorce.
That figure of 40% to 50% can be misleading―it is calculated by not only counting first time marriages, but also “second marriages”, “third marriages”, fourth marriages”, etc. Statistics show that around 20% (1 in 5) of “first time marriages” end in divorce. Some of those divorcees remarry―then they divorce again; some remarry again and divorce for a third time. The numbers are: 20% of first time marriages; 60% of second marriages and about 73% of third marriages end in divorce.
According to Pew Research Center, Catholics have lower divorce rates compared to Americans of other religious affiliations, including evangelical Protestants and mainline Protestants. What does “lower” mean? It is merely a relative term. In this case “lower divorce rates” for Catholics are not that low! A 2023 Pew Research Center states that about 34% of American Catholics, who have ever been married, have divorced! That is around 1 in 3 Catholic marriages end in divorce!
The negative effects of the family trauma divorce aren’t easily or quickly “gotten over”―especially by the innocent victims, the children in the divorced family. Contrary to popular belief, divorce can and does continue to affect children far into the future, even those who outwardly seem to have “made it” relatively unscathed. Being a child of divorce affects a person’s identity, triggering questions about who he/she is and his/her place in the world and generating a deep sense of emotional homelessness. Being a child of divorce affects that person’s future relationships, making it statistically more likely that he/she will also go on to get divorced, if they even marry at all. Children of divorce are also more likely―than those from intact homes―to cohabit with a romantic partner, and over half of them say that they lack self-confidence in love relationships. Being a child of divorce affects a person’s Faith and relationship to the Church, making it more likely that he will be inactive, will not attend Sunday Mass regularly, or even leave the Faith altogether. None of these negative effects magically ends when a person turns eighteen.
Electronic Isolation
One of the chief tactics of Satan is that of isolation. First of all he seeks to sow division―then, when division occurs, he seeks to further divide and isolate. It is easier to overcome an individual than it is to overcome an army. Holy Scripture warns: “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). Lions, like wolves, are good at sensing the weak and sick in a herd. An isolated sheep or goat is often showing signs of sickness. Wolves are opportunists. They test their prey, sensing any weakness or vulnerability through visual cues and even through hearing and scent. Wolves are endurance or coursing predators―they chase their prey, often over longer distances, sometimes even a few miles, in order to find the right animal or opportunity. The devils go one better―they follow their prey all life long! They never sleep and are always watching, plotting and acting. Isolating their victim is the preferred method, but they will take any path that is necessary. Once isolated, a victim is easier to topple than when surrounded by others. Just think of the sins that you have committed when in isolation (when you are by yourself, all alone)―would you have committed them if other people were around you?
Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, the author of the book Rules for the Discernment of Spirits, writes: “Do you not know that the devil uses everything when coming to tempt you? … You just are not aware of the fact!” Our Lord points out: “By their fruits you shall know them! Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). What is the fruit of modern technology? Does it lead to more time being spent with God? Does it lead to more time being spent in prayer? Does it lead to more time spent in meditation? Does it lead to extra Mass attendance? No! Those are not its fruits―quite the opposite. It isolates us from God. It is not concerned with the interests of God, but with the interests of self. Its fruits are self-indulgence; self-gratification; self-aggrandizement; self-centeredness; self-love. Is the content of modern technology very godly? No it is not! 30% of all net traffic is generated by porn sites. 35% of all internet downloads are related to pornography.
Modern technology has to be “the tool of isolation” par excellence. It is designed mainly for a single user. How many times have you seen several people using, at one and the same time, a single laptop or smartphone? Rarely. 99% of the time it is one appliance being used by one user. This even isolates persons in their home family setting. You have each person with their smartphone sitting in the same room, or at the dining room table, and they are focused―not on each other―but on what is visible to them on their personal smartphone.
According to a 2023 survey from Reviews.org, 57% of Americans say they are addicted to their mobile devices. 90% percent of Americans say they check their phones within the first 10 minutes of waking up. They then check their phones an average of 144 times a day and spend an average of four hours and 25 minutes each day on their phones. 60% sleep with their phone at night; 75% feel uneasy leaving their phone at home; 75% check their phones within five minutes of receiving a notification; 55% say that they have never gone longer than 24 hours without their phone. It is like a personal human relationship with their smartphone―a kind of marriage, if you like. Digital connections may offer the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship. Our networked life allows us to hide from each other, even when we are tethered to each other. We’d rather text than talk.
One smartphone user admitted that the smartphone created a whole long list of needs: “Personal affirmation. The approval of man. Constant social connection. Fear of missing out. Needy for distraction from life. Needy for constant entertainment. Needy for knowledge to puff me up. It seems like my list of needs is endless. I think that at the heart of my social-media struggle, is that I am always seeking after my own glory, and that self-glory never is enough. It doesn’t last. Each time I mindlessly scroll through my social-media feed, or check to see if my friends have texted me back, it all just proves again how much I continue to lack. I can never get enough of something. Technology makes all of this immediately accessible in the palm of your hand. And all of our social-media platforms are designed to deliver us instant gratification. So that’s what I have discovered. I have endless needs that are not satisfied by my phone.”
A similar story is that of television and the computer/internet. As smartphones and other internet-connected devices have become more widespread, 31% of U.S. adults now report that they go online “almost constantly,” up from 21% in 2015, according to a new Pew Research Center survey conducted in 2021. Overall, 85% of Americans say they go online on a daily basis. That figure includes the 31% who report going online almost constantly, as well as 48% who say they go online several times a day and 6% who go online about once a day. The average American spends 7 hours (for internet-connected activities) looking at a screen every day (at work and in leisure time). The average for watching TV clocks in at around 3 hours per day.
Not only do these electronic appliances―smartphones, tablets, laptops, etc.―isolate family members, one from another, but they also isolate persons from God. What is Hell but eternal isolation from God? There is no time for God. No time for attendance at extra Masses. No time for visits to the Blessed Sacrament. No time for Confession. No time for examination of conscience. No time for prayer. No time for Bible or spiritual reading. No time for meditation. No time for sacrifices and mortification. No time for spiritual conversation. Yet all of these things are sources of much needed grace in our never-ending battle against Satan, temptation and sin.
Pornography―Satan’s New Drug
As Fr. Gabriele Amorth―the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome for over 30 years―said: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour you ... The devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and ‘works’ on it … The most frequent weak points in man are usually the same: pride, money, and LUST! … Satan weakens the consciences of men and women … The rise in demonic possessions is fueled by things like pornography and drugs … Let us consider lust: when I hear confessions, it’s not uncommon for the elderly to confess to looking at pornography more often than the youth ... Satan’s power over the world includes physical and mental obsession … Satan uses the idolatry of sex, which reduces the human body to an instrument of sin … There is no doubt that today’s media have done much in favor of Satan, first by the immorality of certain shows, and the abundance of movies showing sex.”
Researchers give us the following statistics:
● Pornography plays a significant role in over 50% of all divorces. 56% of American divorces involve one party having an “obsessive interest” in pornographic websites.
● The pornography industry earns over $97 billion worldwide every year ($13 billion from the United States); that is more than the top eight technology companies combined. Child Porn generates $3 billion annually.
● 12% of websites online are pornographic. There are 4.2 million pornographic websites.
● Daily, there are 68 million pornographic search engine requests on Google, which is 25% of all search engine requests.
● 40 million adults in the U.S. regularly visit pornographic websites.
● Every second, over 28,000 people are looking at porn
● 70% of men aged 18-24 regularly look at porn at least once a week
● Over one-third of all visitors to pornographic websites are women.
● Among Christians, 47% claim pornography is a major problem in the home.
● Pornography use increases the marital infidelity rate by more than 300%.
● The average age children are first exposed to porn is 11 years old
● 80% of 15–17-year-olds have had multiple exposures to hard-core porn; the largest population of Internet pornography users are 12–17-year-olds.
● Most sex offenders started out as pornography addicts.
The statistics for Christian men between 18 and 30 years old are particularly striking:
● 77% look at pornography at least monthly.
● 36% view pornography on a daily basis
● 32% admit being addicted to pornography (and another 12% think they may be).
The statistics for middle-aged Christian men (ages 31 to 49) are no less disturbing:
● 77% looked at pornography while at work in the past three months.
● 64% view pornography at least monthly.
● 18% admit being addicted to pornography (and another 8% think they may be).
Even married Christian men are falling prey to pornography and extramarital sexual affairs at alarming rates:
● 55% look at pornography at least monthly.
● 35% had an extramarital affair.
● Only 13% of self identified Christian women say they never watch porn – 87% of Christian women have watched porn.
Obviously, the problem is enormous. Porn affects all ages and backgrounds. Like substance abuse, it destroys families and lives and is just as addictive. Research shows that brain reactions to porn are similar to cocaine addiction. It imprints on and alters the brain such that the effects on a young, developing brain can be devastating.
It is difficult to exaggerate just how evil pornography is. It will destroy your marriage (or religious vocation) and other relationships. It will corrupt your intellect, your emotions, and your will power―filling your mind with thousands of vile images that won’t go away. It will pull you deeper and deeper in, until you are looking at perversions you could not have imagined. It will become a need so intense that you can no longer function normally without it. It will drive you to act on evil impulses, perhaps leading to sexual violence. It will rack you with guilt, driving you away from your Creator and Redeemer. It will become everything to you. It will consume you. It will ultimately send you to Hell.
Sexual Abuse Within the Family
Where can pornography lead to? It can lead to sexual abuse within the family. According to the World Health Organization, it is estimated that globally, up to 1 billion (1,000 million) children aged 2–17 years, have experienced physical, sexual, or emotional violence or neglect in the past year. More than 600,000 children are abused in the U.S each year. More than 20% of children are sexually abused before they are 8 years old. 30-40% of victims are abused by a family member. Of those molesting a child under six years of age, 50% were family members. Children who do not live with both parents as well as children living in homes marked by parental discord, divorce, or domestic violence, have a higher risk of being sexually abused. Perpetrators report that they look for passive, quiet, troubled, lonely children from single parent or broken homes (see divorce above). An estimated 42 million survivors of childhood sexual abuse exist in America today. A child who is the victim of prolonged sexual abuse usually develops low self-esteem, a feeling of worthlessness and an abnormal or distorted view of sex. The child may become withdrawn and mistrustful of adults, and can become suicidal.
Everything is Connected
All of the above aberrations within marriage are, to a certain extent, linked together. The primary purpose of marriage―as always taught by the Catholic Church―is the procreation of children. If you ignore that teaching and merely marry to have sex, then you are thwarting the purpose of marriage and committing a grave sin. Today, the desire for the pleasures of sex comes before the desire to have children―that is why you have contraception, which is a way to indulge in the pleasures of sex without the risk of having children. If contraception fails to work, then many fall back on the “safety-net” of abortion―a case of “If you can’t avoid conceiving them, then kill them!” This idolization and obsession with sexual pleasures (without conceiving children) eventually conceives an addiction to sex, which then leads to an almost non-stop gratification of the mind (thoughts) and body (actions―seeing, talking, touching, etc.). That is where pornography starts to enter into their lives. Once the depravity of pornography grows, it leads the person through increasing degrees of depravity―and that is where you enter into sexual abuse in the family (of both spouse and children). Once that seed of abuse is planted, it can go from one generation to another―for research shows that many victims of abuse eventually go on to be abusers themselves. Once this kind of depravity cements itself within a family, then divorce is often the end product―over 53% of divorce cases these days cite pornography as one of the causes; extramarital affairs are cited in 40% of divorce cases; child sexual abuse is cited in 40% of all divorce cases.
All of this ultimately stems from a godlessness that has invaded most of the families of the world. Without God and His grace, you are at the mercy of Satan and his temptations. That is why the exorcist, Fr. Amorth, used to say: “Satan’s power is felt more keenly in periods of history when the sinfulness of the community is more evident … The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed and, by inducing man to sin, he takes man progressively away from the love of God … The problem is getting worse. The Devil is gaining ground. We are living in an age when Faith is diminishing ... Today we live in a period of little Faith ... Young people receive everything from their parents―except the Faith ... It is purely mathematical―when Faith declines, when Faith in God declines, idolatry and irrationality increase … Whoever lives in indifference, in absent-mindedness, far from God―that person is open to an easy satanic conquest.
“In the current environment, where we are witnessing the collapse of the family, I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. I have dealt many times with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin. God always allows normal satanic activity—temptation— and gives us all the graces necessary to resist, with the resulting good of strengthening our spiritual life.”
Fight, Fold, or Flee!
Our reaction can be one of fighting, or folding in face of the opposition, or fleeing. Folding and caving-in is not an option. We must either fight or temporarily flee in certain circumstances. Sometimes it is suicidal to fight and one must wait for a better opportunity. A general needs prudence as well as courage―for, as St. Thomas Aquinas says, “Prudence is the queen of all virtues.” One cannot be truly courageous, just, or temperate if one has not first acted prudently. Prudence is the virtue of practical wisdom that links thought to action. In other words, prudence perfects the intellect as preparation for action—we cannot choose well unless we think rightly. St. Thomas Aquinas puts it simply―prudence is “right reason in action.” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q.57, art. 4). St. Thomas Aquinas further adds: “Prudence is a virtue most necessary for human life. For a good life consists in good deeds. Now in order to do good deeds, it matters not only what a man does, but also how he does it; that he do it from right choice and not merely from impulse or passion … Consequently prudence is a virtue necessary to lead a good life” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q.57, art. 5).
The Solution is a Soul-ution
Ultimately it is Satan―whom Our Lord calls “the prince of this world” (John 12:31)―who uses the things of this world to pull us away from and to drag us into Hell. Even prior to this modern age of technology Satan has been extremely successful at achieving those goals. Throughout each century the saints have warned us that most Catholics end up being damned―take note that they MOST CATHOLICS and not just MOST SOULS (pagans, atheists, false religions, etc). If you want a series of quotes on that subject then click on this link (ARE FEW SOULS SAVED?).
Human solutions are no solutions! We are ultimately fighting Satan, not just humans: “For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places! Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day!” (Ephesians 6:12-13). We do not send soldiers into battle armed with only water-pistols! The air-force is not made up of paper planes! We do put a five-year-old into the boxing ring with a heavyweight boxer! We do not try stop a tsunami with an umbrella! Unaided humans are no match for the devils. One single angel―whether a good angel or a bad angel―is capable of destroying the entire universe if God were to want it or allow it. Who are you in comparison to that?
We need someone who is capable of taking on Satan and devils of Hell. That person is, of course, Jesus Christ―and not only Jesus Christ, but also Our Lady. St. Louis de Montfort, in his Secret of the Rosary, writes of an exorcism performed by St. Dominic where the devils admitted: “The Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! One single sigh, that she offers to the Blessed Trinity, is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints! We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together! If she did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity!” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
The only solution is soul-ution, whereby the soul arms itself―as Scripture said―with “the armor of God” or with Heaven’s weapons. Elsewhere, in his book The Secret of Mary, St. Louis speaks of Heaven’s weapons in a general way, saying: “Chosen soul! God wants you to become holy like Him in this life! It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God. The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these. Grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure―because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6). It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
The Weapons in General
As the saying goes: “Horses for courses!” or “Specific horses are used for specific courses or tasks!” and so we can also say: “Weapons for ages!” or “Specific weapons are to be used in specific times or eras!” So what are the weapons that Heaven wants using in our present times? We do not need a “rocket-scientist” for the answer―a simple knowledge of the Faith and Our Lady’s requests at her modern-day apparitions gives us the answer.
● At Akita, Japan, in 1973, Our Lady said: “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son!”
● At Fatima, Portugal, in 1917, Our Lady said: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!”
● At La Salette, France, in 1846, Our Lady said: “I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful, who have lived in scorn for the world, in poverty, humility, in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world! Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
● In Quito, Ecuador, in the 17th century, Our Lady of Good Success said: “There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed! This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration! This will mark the arrival of my hour! My hour will arrive, when I, in an amazing manner, will overthrow proud Satan, crushing him under my feet, chaining him in the infernal abyss, leaving the Church free of his cruel tyranny.”
● As Our Lady of Fatima said in 1917: “In the end, My Immaculate Heart will triumph.”
Our Lady of Good Success further added: “Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not understand their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them―because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils ... No one on the face of the Earth is aware from where comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents. Oh, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!”
The Weapons in Particular
What does Heaven expect us to use by means of weapons in our current plight? The answer is fairly simple. As was stated above, in a war that is ultimately waged upon by Satan (using his stooges in this world), it is Our Lord Jesus Christ and His Holy Mother, Our Lady, who are our generals in this momentous battle. You could that Our Lord and Our Lady are like two sections in our “War Manual” ― Part 1 and Part 2. In the many apparitions made by Our Lord and Our Lady over the last 400 or so years, it is clear that they are the ones who will bring victory―but we have our part to play if we wish to save our souls.
In Part 1 of our “War Manual”―the part dedicated to Our Lord―we have various chapters that further explain all that comes under the title of “Our Lord Jesus Christ.” We were told by Our Lady at Akita that one of the two weapons left to us is “the sign left by my Son”.
► THE HOLY SACRIFICE OF THE MASS: What is that sign? It is, of course, the Sign of the Cross―the Sign of the Cross or Sacrifice of the Cross on Calvary―which is where Christ defeated Satan. That Sign of the Cross―that Sacrifice on Calvary―is repeated daily for us in each validly offered Sacrifice of the Mass. There is no great weapon than that! There is no spiritual power greater that we can use and profit from than the Holy Sacrifice of Mass―in which Jesus Christ continues and perpetuates His Sacrifice of Calvary in an unbloody manner. O how much we neglect and under-appreciate the power of the Holy Mass. It is our most powerful weapon! Yet any weapon is only as good as the person who is using it. A rifle in the hands of trained soldier is much different than the same rifle in the hands of a 5-year-old. They have the same rifle, the same ammunition, the same target―but the results will differ massively! How many Masses have you had offered against the enemies of the Church and mankind? How many extra Masses have you attended? How well have you attended those Masses? Has it been with deep fervor, truly begging with all your heart, Our Lord’s intervention in the current state of the Church and world? Or have you attended Masses superficially, lukewarmly, half-heartedly, distractedly? As you sow, so shall you reap! He who sows sparingly will reap sparingly! (Galatians 6:8; 2 Corinthians 9:6).
You could say that there are three sides to the Holy Sacrifice ― (1) the Sacrifice itself that takes place during Mass; (2) the Holy Eucharist which is the fruit of the Sacrifice of the Mass; and (3) Holy Communion which is usually received during the Sacrifice of the Mass. Consequently, there are three areas that demand our attention, respect and attendance. We should attend as many Masses as possible―for it the greatest action that takes place on Earth. We should seek to visit Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist (the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar) as much as possible―for there is no more an important person living on the face of this Earth. We should also seek to receive Our Lord in Holy Communion as much as possible―for there can be no greater act than the union of Creator with His creature.
The saints underline the importance of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
● “The celebration of Holy Mass has the same value as the Death of Jesus on the Cross.” (St. Thomas Aquinas).
● “Man should tremble, the world should quake, all Heaven should be deeply moved when the Son of God appears on the altar in the hands of the priest.” (St. Francis of Assisi).
● “It would be easier for the world to survive without the sun than to do so without the Holy Mass.” (St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina).
● “O you deluded people, what are you doing? Why do you not hasten to the churches to hear as many Masses as you can?” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice).
● “Know, O Christian, that the Mass is the holiest act of religion. You cannot do anything to glorify God more, nor profit your soul more, than by devoutly assisting at it, and assisting as often as possible.” (St. Peter Julian Eymard).
● “One merits more by devoutly assisting at a Holy Mass than by distributing all of his goods to the poor and traveling all over the world on pilgrimage.” (St. Bernard of Clairvaux).
Both marriage and family have become endangered species! In the previous article―“Catholic Families Attacked”―we looked at some of the ways in which marriage and families are being undermined, corrupted and destroyed by Satan through the means of the world of which he is the prince (John 12:31). Using his human stooges―the Elites, secret societies, corrupt governments, etc.―Satan has been slowly and relentlessly turning the screw and tightening the noose on marriage and the family.
Satanic Attack
Fr. Gabriele Amorth―the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome for over 30 years―said:
“The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Satanism is on the increase. Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican. I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry [and even in family].
“Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … The Devil does not like to be seen … that is when he is happiest! … Satan hides and disguises himself in a thousand ways … The devil prefers this way and we are all subject to it from our birth until our death! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour.’ That word―‘where’―is important: the devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and ‘works’ on it … The most frequent weak points in man are, from time to time, always the same: pride, money, and lust … Satan weakens the consciences of men and women and leads them toward egoism, closing their hearts, lack of forgiveness.
“Satan’s power over the world includes physical and mental obsession … The evil one can cause unrestrained animosities, especially toward those who love us the most ... Satan ruins friendships―through his intervention, the victim feels unwelcome everywhere, avoided by everyone, ending in a desire for isolation. Every time that a friendly relationship grows and blossoms, it suddenly ends, without reason … He destroys marriages, breaks up engagements; he fosters screaming fights in families where everyone truly loves one another, and always for futile reasons. Then there follows a conviction of total lack of love and understanding, a complete affective void that makes marriage an impossibility … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan … Our contemporary religious culture―while not entirely negating the existence of Satan and the other devils―is inclined to diminish their involvement and influence over people.”
Satan is a Murderer
Our Lord, speaking of Satan, said: “He was a murderer from the beginning and he stood not in the truth―because truth is not in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own―for he is a liar, and the father thereof lies!” (John 8:44). Lies and killings! We clearly see that in Satanic promotion of abortion! Lies and killings! The lies consist of telling us that the baby is not an independent human being but merely a body part of the woman―so if a woman’s health requires a body part to be cut off or cut out, she goes ahead and does it. There are many other versions of the abortion lie―all kinds of false reasoning concerning early vs. late term abortions; or the “fetal heartbeat bill”―a law in the United States which makes abortion illegal from around six weeks which is when proponents falsely claim that a "fetal heartbeat" can be detected.
All these are whopping lies that lead to murder of innocent babies―with around 1,954,883,720 (1,954 million, or 1.9 billion―which is an average of around 40 million per year; 3.2 million per month; over 100,000 per day) babies being butchered worldwide since 1973. The increasing numbers of DIY home abortions using abortifacient chemical medications has now risen to an estimated 54% of all abortions in the USA. This can only help increase the number of abortions―since it far cheaper, less high-profile and less-embarrassing that surgical abortions in an abortion mill.
The Guttmacher Institute (originally founded as part of Planned Parenthood) reports that of women having abortions―38% are of no religious affiliation; 25% are Catholic; 17% are mainline Protestant; 13% are evangelical Protestant; and 8% are of some other religious affiliation.
Contraception
Satan’s hatred of the human race also leads to contraception. Surveys show that almost all women, who identify as being religious, have used contraceptive methods—99% of mainline Protestants, evangelical Protestants and Catholics, and 96% of people with other religious affiliations.
The large numbers of Catholics who use contraception are supported by such rebellious Catholic groups as, for instance, “Catholics For Choice” who state: “Catholics for Choice envisions a world in which everyone has equal access to all forms of birth control, unencumbered by religious persecution. We believe that access to birth control is, in fact, a Catholic social justice value. For countless people around the world, access to contraception is a matter of life or death. Untold numbers of people are suffering as a direct consequence of Catholic Church officials’ ban on birth control. Today, ordinary Catholics are taking a stand against the hierarchy. Birth control is not a sin — it is a lifeline ... Help us challenge and dismantle religiously-based barriers to safe, legal, and comprehensive reproductive healthcare.”
Although the use of contraception is forbidden by Catholic Church doctrine, very few U.S. Catholics regard it as morally wrong. Just 15% of all Catholics (practicing and non-practicing Catholics) say that using contraception is morally wrong; 41% say contraception is morally acceptable and 36% say contraception is not even a moral issue. Even among Catholics who regularly attend church weekly, only 27% say contraception is morally wrong.
● In the United States, 65.3% of women aged 15–49 currently use contraception. Nearly all women use contraception in their lifetimes―although at any given time, they may not be using contraception for reasons such as seeking pregnancy, being pregnant, or postpartum, or not being sexually active.
● Worldwide, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 65% of women worldwide use contraception. Between 2000 and 2020, the number of women using a modern contraceptive method increased from 663 million to 851 million. An additional 70 million women are projected to be added by 2030.
A Divided City Cannot Stand―A Divorced Family Cannot Stand
Divorce rates in the United States have been steadily declining over the past few decades, but unfortunately, the divorce rate is still higher than it was in the early 1970s. Part of the reason for divorce rates declining is the fact that people are increasingly cohabiting (living together in sin) rather than marrying. The divorce rate in America in 2021 was estimated to be around 48%. One marriage ends every 36 seconds. According to the American Psychological Association, approximately 40-50% of first marriages end in divorce.
That figure of 40% to 50% can be misleading―it is calculated by not only counting first time marriages, but also “second marriages”, “third marriages”, fourth marriages”, etc. Statistics show that around 20% (1 in 5) of “first time marriages” end in divorce. Some of those divorcees remarry―then they divorce again; some remarry again and divorce for a third time. The numbers are: 20% of first time marriages; 60% of second marriages and about 73% of third marriages end in divorce.
According to Pew Research Center, Catholics have lower divorce rates compared to Americans of other religious affiliations, including evangelical Protestants and mainline Protestants. What does “lower” mean? It is merely a relative term. In this case “lower divorce rates” for Catholics are not that low! A 2023 Pew Research Center states that about 34% of American Catholics, who have ever been married, have divorced! That is around 1 in 3 Catholic marriages end in divorce!
The negative effects of the family trauma divorce aren’t easily or quickly “gotten over”―especially by the innocent victims, the children in the divorced family. Contrary to popular belief, divorce can and does continue to affect children far into the future, even those who outwardly seem to have “made it” relatively unscathed. Being a child of divorce affects a person’s identity, triggering questions about who he/she is and his/her place in the world and generating a deep sense of emotional homelessness. Being a child of divorce affects that person’s future relationships, making it statistically more likely that he/she will also go on to get divorced, if they even marry at all. Children of divorce are also more likely―than those from intact homes―to cohabit with a romantic partner, and over half of them say that they lack self-confidence in love relationships. Being a child of divorce affects a person’s Faith and relationship to the Church, making it more likely that he will be inactive, will not attend Sunday Mass regularly, or even leave the Faith altogether. None of these negative effects magically ends when a person turns eighteen.
Electronic Isolation
One of the chief tactics of Satan is that of isolation. First of all he seeks to sow division―then, when division occurs, he seeks to further divide and isolate. It is easier to overcome an individual than it is to overcome an army. Holy Scripture warns: “Be sober and watch―because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour!” (1 Peter 5:8). Lions, like wolves, are good at sensing the weak and sick in a herd. An isolated sheep or goat is often showing signs of sickness. Wolves are opportunists. They test their prey, sensing any weakness or vulnerability through visual cues and even through hearing and scent. Wolves are endurance or coursing predators―they chase their prey, often over longer distances, sometimes even a few miles, in order to find the right animal or opportunity. The devils go one better―they follow their prey all life long! They never sleep and are always watching, plotting and acting. Isolating their victim is the preferred method, but they will take any path that is necessary. Once isolated, a victim is easier to topple than when surrounded by others. Just think of the sins that you have committed when in isolation (when you are by yourself, all alone)―would you have committed them if other people were around you?
Fr. Ludovic-Marie Barrielle, the author of the book Rules for the Discernment of Spirits, writes: “Do you not know that the devil uses everything when coming to tempt you? … You just are not aware of the fact!” Our Lord points out: “By their fruits you shall know them! Every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them!” (Matthew 7:16-20). What is the fruit of modern technology? Does it lead to more time being spent with God? Does it lead to more time being spent in prayer? Does it lead to more time spent in meditation? Does it lead to extra Mass attendance? No! Those are not its fruits―quite the opposite. It isolates us from God. It is not concerned with the interests of God, but with the interests of self. Its fruits are self-indulgence; self-gratification; self-aggrandizement; self-centeredness; self-love. Is the content of modern technology very godly? No it is not! 30% of all net traffic is generated by porn sites. 35% of all internet downloads are related to pornography.
Modern technology has to be “the tool of isolation” par excellence. It is designed mainly for a single user. How many times have you seen several people using, at one and the same time, a single laptop or smartphone? Rarely. 99% of the time it is one appliance being used by one user. This even isolates persons in their home family setting. You have each person with their smartphone sitting in the same room, or at the dining room table, and they are focused―not on each other―but on what is visible to them on their personal smartphone.
According to a 2023 survey from Reviews.org, 57% of Americans say they are addicted to their mobile devices. 90% percent of Americans say they check their phones within the first 10 minutes of waking up. They then check their phones an average of 144 times a day and spend an average of four hours and 25 minutes each day on their phones. 60% sleep with their phone at night; 75% feel uneasy leaving their phone at home; 75% check their phones within five minutes of receiving a notification; 55% say that they have never gone longer than 24 hours without their phone. It is like a personal human relationship with their smartphone―a kind of marriage, if you like. Digital connections may offer the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship. Our networked life allows us to hide from each other, even when we are tethered to each other. We’d rather text than talk.
One smartphone user admitted that the smartphone created a whole long list of needs: “Personal affirmation. The approval of man. Constant social connection. Fear of missing out. Needy for distraction from life. Needy for constant entertainment. Needy for knowledge to puff me up. It seems like my list of needs is endless. I think that at the heart of my social-media struggle, is that I am always seeking after my own glory, and that self-glory never is enough. It doesn’t last. Each time I mindlessly scroll through my social-media feed, or check to see if my friends have texted me back, it all just proves again how much I continue to lack. I can never get enough of something. Technology makes all of this immediately accessible in the palm of your hand. And all of our social-media platforms are designed to deliver us instant gratification. So that’s what I have discovered. I have endless needs that are not satisfied by my phone.”
A similar story is that of television and the computer/internet. As smartphones and other internet-connected devices have become more widespread, 31% of U.S. adults now report that they go online “almost constantly,” up from 21% in 2015, according to a new Pew Research Center survey conducted in 2021. Overall, 85% of Americans say they go online on a daily basis. That figure includes the 31% who report going online almost constantly, as well as 48% who say they go online several times a day and 6% who go online about once a day. The average American spends 7 hours (for internet-connected activities) looking at a screen every day (at work and in leisure time). The average for watching TV clocks in at around 3 hours per day.
Not only do these electronic appliances―smartphones, tablets, laptops, etc.―isolate family members, one from another, but they also isolate persons from God. What is Hell but eternal isolation from God? There is no time for God. No time for attendance at extra Masses. No time for visits to the Blessed Sacrament. No time for Confession. No time for examination of conscience. No time for prayer. No time for Bible or spiritual reading. No time for meditation. No time for sacrifices and mortification. No time for spiritual conversation. Yet all of these things are sources of much needed grace in our never-ending battle against Satan, temptation and sin.
Pornography―Satan’s New Drug
As Fr. Gabriele Amorth―the recently deceased (2016) chief exorcist of Rome for over 30 years―said: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! … Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! … We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan! … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour you ... The devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and ‘works’ on it … The most frequent weak points in man are usually the same: pride, money, and LUST! … Satan weakens the consciences of men and women … The rise in demonic possessions is fueled by things like pornography and drugs … Let us consider lust: when I hear confessions, it’s not uncommon for the elderly to confess to looking at pornography more often than the youth ... Satan’s power over the world includes physical and mental obsession … Satan uses the idolatry of sex, which reduces the human body to an instrument of sin … There is no doubt that today’s media have done much in favor of Satan, first by the immorality of certain shows, and the abundance of movies showing sex.”
Researchers give us the following statistics:
● Pornography plays a significant role in over 50% of all divorces. 56% of American divorces involve one party having an “obsessive interest” in pornographic websites.
● The pornography industry earns over $97 billion worldwide every year ($13 billion from the United States); that is more than the top eight technology companies combined. Child Porn generates $3 billion annually.
● 12% of websites online are pornographic. There are 4.2 million pornographic websites.
● Daily, there are 68 million pornographic search engine requests on Google, which is 25% of all search engine requests.
● 40 million adults in the U.S. regularly visit pornographic websites.
● Every second, over 28,000 people are looking at porn
● 70% of men aged 18-24 regularly look at porn at least once a week
● Over one-third of all visitors to pornographic websites are women.
● Among Christians, 47% claim pornography is a major problem in the home.
● Pornography use increases the marital infidelity rate by more than 300%.
● The average age children are first exposed to porn is 11 years old
● 80% of 15–17-year-olds have had multiple exposures to hard-core porn; the largest population of Internet pornography users are 12–17-year-olds.
● Most sex offenders started out as pornography addicts.
The statistics for Christian men between 18 and 30 years old are particularly striking:
● 77% look at pornography at least monthly.
● 36% view pornography on a daily basis
● 32% admit being addicted to pornography (and another 12% think they may be).
The statistics for middle-aged Christian men (ages 31 to 49) are no less disturbing:
● 77% looked at pornography while at work in the past three months.
● 64% view pornography at least monthly.
● 18% admit being addicted to pornography (and another 8% think they may be).
Even married Christian men are falling prey to pornography and extramarital sexual affairs at alarming rates:
● 55% look at pornography at least monthly.
● 35% had an extramarital affair.
● Only 13% of self identified Christian women say they never watch porn – 87% of Christian women have watched porn.
Obviously, the problem is enormous. Porn affects all ages and backgrounds. Like substance abuse, it destroys families and lives and is just as addictive. Research shows that brain reactions to porn are similar to cocaine addiction. It imprints on and alters the brain such that the effects on a young, developing brain can be devastating.
It is difficult to exaggerate just how evil pornography is. It will destroy your marriage (or religious vocation) and other relationships. It will corrupt your intellect, your emotions, and your will power―filling your mind with thousands of vile images that won’t go away. It will pull you deeper and deeper in, until you are looking at perversions you could not have imagined. It will become a need so intense that you can no longer function normally without it. It will drive you to act on evil impulses, perhaps leading to sexual violence. It will rack you with guilt, driving you away from your Creator and Redeemer. It will become everything to you. It will consume you. It will ultimately send you to Hell.
Sexual Abuse Within the Family
Where can pornography lead to? It can lead to sexual abuse within the family. According to the World Health Organization, it is estimated that globally, up to 1 billion (1,000 million) children aged 2–17 years, have experienced physical, sexual, or emotional violence or neglect in the past year. More than 600,000 children are abused in the U.S each year. More than 20% of children are sexually abused before they are 8 years old. 30-40% of victims are abused by a family member. Of those molesting a child under six years of age, 50% were family members. Children who do not live with both parents as well as children living in homes marked by parental discord, divorce, or domestic violence, have a higher risk of being sexually abused. Perpetrators report that they look for passive, quiet, troubled, lonely children from single parent or broken homes (see divorce above). An estimated 42 million survivors of childhood sexual abuse exist in America today. A child who is the victim of prolonged sexual abuse usually develops low self-esteem, a feeling of worthlessness and an abnormal or distorted view of sex. The child may become withdrawn and mistrustful of adults, and can become suicidal.
Everything is Connected
All of the above aberrations within marriage are, to a certain extent, linked together. The primary purpose of marriage―as always taught by the Catholic Church―is the procreation of children. If you ignore that teaching and merely marry to have sex, then you are thwarting the purpose of marriage and committing a grave sin. Today, the desire for the pleasures of sex comes before the desire to have children―that is why you have contraception, which is a way to indulge in the pleasures of sex without the risk of having children. If contraception fails to work, then many fall back on the “safety-net” of abortion―a case of “If you can’t avoid conceiving them, then kill them!” This idolization and obsession with sexual pleasures (without conceiving children) eventually conceives an addiction to sex, which then leads to an almost non-stop gratification of the mind (thoughts) and body (actions―seeing, talking, touching, etc.). That is where pornography starts to enter into their lives. Once the depravity of pornography grows, it leads the person through increasing degrees of depravity―and that is where you enter into sexual abuse in the family (of both spouse and children). Once that seed of abuse is planted, it can go from one generation to another―for research shows that many victims of abuse eventually go on to be abusers themselves. Once this kind of depravity cements itself within a family, then divorce is often the end product―over 53% of divorce cases these days cite pornography as one of the causes; extramarital affairs are cited in 40% of divorce cases; child sexual abuse is cited in 40% of all divorce cases.
All of this ultimately stems from a godlessness that has invaded most of the families of the world. Without God and His grace, you are at the mercy of Satan and his temptations. That is why the exorcist, Fr. Amorth, used to say: “Satan’s power is felt more keenly in periods of history when the sinfulness of the community is more evident … The loss of a sense of sin―that characterizes our era―helps Satan to act nearly undisturbed and, by inducing man to sin, he takes man progressively away from the love of God … The problem is getting worse. The Devil is gaining ground. We are living in an age when Faith is diminishing ... Today we live in a period of little Faith ... Young people receive everything from their parents―except the Faith ... It is purely mathematical―when Faith declines, when Faith in God declines, idolatry and irrationality increase … Whoever lives in indifference, in absent-mindedness, far from God―that person is open to an easy satanic conquest.
“In the current environment, where we are witnessing the collapse of the family, I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. I have dealt many times with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin. God always allows normal satanic activity—temptation— and gives us all the graces necessary to resist, with the resulting good of strengthening our spiritual life.”
Fight, Fold, or Flee!
Our reaction can be one of fighting, or folding in face of the opposition, or fleeing. Folding and caving-in is not an option. We must either fight or temporarily flee in certain circumstances. Sometimes it is suicidal to fight and one must wait for a better opportunity. A general needs prudence as well as courage―for, as St. Thomas Aquinas says, “Prudence is the queen of all virtues.” One cannot be truly courageous, just, or temperate if one has not first acted prudently. Prudence is the virtue of practical wisdom that links thought to action. In other words, prudence perfects the intellect as preparation for action—we cannot choose well unless we think rightly. St. Thomas Aquinas puts it simply―prudence is “right reason in action.” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q.57, art. 4). St. Thomas Aquinas further adds: “Prudence is a virtue most necessary for human life. For a good life consists in good deeds. Now in order to do good deeds, it matters not only what a man does, but also how he does it; that he do it from right choice and not merely from impulse or passion … Consequently prudence is a virtue necessary to lead a good life” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q.57, art. 5).
The Solution is a Soul-ution
Ultimately it is Satan―whom Our Lord calls “the prince of this world” (John 12:31)―who uses the things of this world to pull us away from and to drag us into Hell. Even prior to this modern age of technology Satan has been extremely successful at achieving those goals. Throughout each century the saints have warned us that most Catholics end up being damned―take note that they MOST CATHOLICS and not just MOST SOULS (pagans, atheists, false religions, etc). If you want a series of quotes on that subject then click on this link (ARE FEW SOULS SAVED?).
Human solutions are no solutions! We are ultimately fighting Satan, not just humans: “For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places! Therefore take unto you the armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day!” (Ephesians 6:12-13). We do not send soldiers into battle armed with only water-pistols! The air-force is not made up of paper planes! We do put a five-year-old into the boxing ring with a heavyweight boxer! We do not try stop a tsunami with an umbrella! Unaided humans are no match for the devils. One single angel―whether a good angel or a bad angel―is capable of destroying the entire universe if God were to want it or allow it. Who are you in comparison to that?
We need someone who is capable of taking on Satan and devils of Hell. That person is, of course, Jesus Christ―and not only Jesus Christ, but also Our Lady. St. Louis de Montfort, in his Secret of the Rosary, writes of an exorcism performed by St. Dominic where the devils admitted: “The Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! One single sigh, that she offers to the Blessed Trinity, is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints! We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together! If she did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity!” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
The only solution is soul-ution, whereby the soul arms itself―as Scripture said―with “the armor of God” or with Heaven’s weapons. Elsewhere, in his book The Secret of Mary, St. Louis speaks of Heaven’s weapons in a general way, saying: “Chosen soul! God wants you to become holy like Him in this life! It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God. The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these. Grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure―because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6). It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of Mary).
The Weapons in General
As the saying goes: “Horses for courses!” or “Specific horses are used for specific courses or tasks!” and so we can also say: “Weapons for ages!” or “Specific weapons are to be used in specific times or eras!” So what are the weapons that Heaven wants using in our present times? We do not need a “rocket-scientist” for the answer―a simple knowledge of the Faith and Our Lady’s requests at her modern-day apparitions gives us the answer.
● At Akita, Japan, in 1973, Our Lady said: “The only weapons which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by my Son!”
● At Fatima, Portugal, in 1917, Our Lady said: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!”
● At La Salette, France, in 1846, Our Lady said: “I call on the true followers of Christ! I call on my children, the true faithful, who have lived in scorn for the world, in poverty, humility, in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world! Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession. It is time they came out and filled the world with light! Go and reveal yourselves to be my cherished children! I am at your side and within you, provided that your Faith is the light which shines upon you! Fight, children of light, you, the few who can see! For now is the time of all times, the end of all ends!”
● In Quito, Ecuador, in the 17th century, Our Lady of Good Success said: “There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed! This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration! This will mark the arrival of my hour! My hour will arrive, when I, in an amazing manner, will overthrow proud Satan, crushing him under my feet, chaining him in the infernal abyss, leaving the Church free of his cruel tyranny.”
● As Our Lady of Fatima said in 1917: “In the end, My Immaculate Heart will triumph.”
Our Lady of Good Success further added: “Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not understand their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them―because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils ... No one on the face of the Earth is aware from where comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents. Oh, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!”
The Weapons in Particular
What does Heaven expect us to use by means of weapons in our current plight? The answer is fairly simple. As was stated above, in a war that is ultimately waged upon by Satan (using his stooges in this world), it is Our Lord Jesus Christ and His Holy Mother, Our Lady, who are our generals in this momentous battle. You could that Our Lord and Our Lady are like two sections in our “War Manual” ― Part 1 and Part 2. In the many apparitions made by Our Lord and Our Lady over the last 400 or so years, it is clear that they are the ones who will bring victory―but we have our part to play if we wish to save our souls.
In Part 1 of our “War Manual”―the part dedicated to Our Lord―we have various chapters that further explain all that comes under the title of “Our Lord Jesus Christ.” We were told by Our Lady at Akita that one of the two weapons left to us is “the sign left by my Son”.
► THE HOLY SACRIFICE OF THE MASS: What is that sign? It is, of course, the Sign of the Cross―the Sign of the Cross or Sacrifice of the Cross on Calvary―which is where Christ defeated Satan. That Sign of the Cross―that Sacrifice on Calvary―is repeated daily for us in each validly offered Sacrifice of the Mass. There is no great weapon than that! There is no spiritual power greater that we can use and profit from than the Holy Sacrifice of Mass―in which Jesus Christ continues and perpetuates His Sacrifice of Calvary in an unbloody manner. O how much we neglect and under-appreciate the power of the Holy Mass. It is our most powerful weapon! Yet any weapon is only as good as the person who is using it. A rifle in the hands of trained soldier is much different than the same rifle in the hands of a 5-year-old. They have the same rifle, the same ammunition, the same target―but the results will differ massively! How many Masses have you had offered against the enemies of the Church and mankind? How many extra Masses have you attended? How well have you attended those Masses? Has it been with deep fervor, truly begging with all your heart, Our Lord’s intervention in the current state of the Church and world? Or have you attended Masses superficially, lukewarmly, half-heartedly, distractedly? As you sow, so shall you reap! He who sows sparingly will reap sparingly! (Galatians 6:8; 2 Corinthians 9:6).
You could say that there are three sides to the Holy Sacrifice ― (1) the Sacrifice itself that takes place during Mass; (2) the Holy Eucharist which is the fruit of the Sacrifice of the Mass; and (3) Holy Communion which is usually received during the Sacrifice of the Mass. Consequently, there are three areas that demand our attention, respect and attendance. We should attend as many Masses as possible―for it the greatest action that takes place on Earth. We should seek to visit Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist (the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar) as much as possible―for there is no more an important person living on the face of this Earth. We should also seek to receive Our Lord in Holy Communion as much as possible―for there can be no greater act than the union of Creator with His creature.
The saints underline the importance of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
● “The celebration of Holy Mass has the same value as the Death of Jesus on the Cross.” (St. Thomas Aquinas).
● “Man should tremble, the world should quake, all Heaven should be deeply moved when the Son of God appears on the altar in the hands of the priest.” (St. Francis of Assisi).
● “It would be easier for the world to survive without the sun than to do so without the Holy Mass.” (St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina).
● “O you deluded people, what are you doing? Why do you not hasten to the churches to hear as many Masses as you can?” (St. Leonard of Port Maurice).
● “Know, O Christian, that the Mass is the holiest act of religion. You cannot do anything to glorify God more, nor profit your soul more, than by devoutly assisting at it, and assisting as often as possible.” (St. Peter Julian Eymard).
● “One merits more by devoutly assisting at a Holy Mass than by distributing all of his goods to the poor and traveling all over the world on pilgrimage.” (St. Bernard of Clairvaux).
Article 13
The Feast of the Holy Family, Sunday January 7th to Tuesday January 9th
Catholic Families Attacked!
The Feast of the Holy Family, Sunday January 7th to Tuesday January 9th
Catholic Families Attacked!
Heaven’s Warning for Families
Setting aside for the moment the controversy of “Two Sister Lucias” of Fatima―with the original and real Sister Lucia being replaced with the replacement and fake Sister Lucia sometime around the start of the 1960s onwards, we have the warning expressed by Sister Lucia (which one?) about Satan waging war against families as part of the so-called “Final Battle” between Our Lady and Satan.
Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, the founding president of the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and the Family, in 2008, stated that had written to Sr. Lucia in 1984―while he was still a priest before becoming a cardinal―asking for prayers to overcome the difficulties he was experiencing in operating the pontifical institute established by Pope John Paul II three years earlier. Sister Lucia’s ominous response mentioned the spiritual battle that would soon engulf the family. She wrote: “Father, a time will come when the decisive battle between the Kingdom of Christ and Satan will be over marriage and the family. And those who will work for the good of the family will experience persecution and tribulation.” She then ended with some words of hope: “But do not be afraid, because Our Lady has already crushed his head!”
Regardless of the veracity of the above―Our Lady had already warned of attacks upon the family in our present times. Our Lady of Good Success, in the early 17th century, warned: “I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century (Vatican II was announced by Pope John XXIII on January 25th, 1959, and took place from 1962-1965), the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption … Woe to the children of these times!” (O.L. of Good Success).
In 1957, when the real and authentic Sister Lucia was still with us, she passed on to us Heaven’s warning: “Father, the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them! … For this reason, Father, it is my mission not just to speak about the material punishments, that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to also tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin!” (Sister Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Toxic Atmosphere
You have heard the expression: “You cannot leave clothes for very long in a smoky room without them taking on the smell of smoke!” Similarly, you cannot mix with worldly people for very long without taking on the spirit of worldliness. Fr. Felix Salvany, in his book, Liberalism Is A Sin, speaks of this worldly contagion or virus in the following terms:
“Physical science tells us that we are constantly breathing these germs into the lungs. If the [immune] system be depleted or weakened, the dangerous microbe takes up its abode with us, and propagating its own kind with astonishing rapidity, undermines and ravages our health. It is equally true that we are subject to like infectious attacks in the spiritual order. Swarming in the atmosphere of our spiritual lives are innumerable deadly germs, ever ready to fasten upon the depleted and weakened soul and destroy the spiritual life. It is not only through the avenues of disordered passions that this spiritual disease may gain an entrance; it may make its inroad through the intellect. Intellectual torpidity, inexperience, ignorance, indifference, and complaisance, or even virtues, such as, benevolence, generosity, and pity may be the unsuspected way open to the foe, and lo, we are surprised to find him in possession of the citadel! It may come in the uniform of the enemy, sometimes even of our own colors.”
“As we are addressing ourselves to those who live amidst the peculiar circumstances of our American life, let us then consider these surroundings in a general way for the moment. First, as to some patent facts: The population of this country [USA] is at present something over 330 million [2020 estimates]. Of these, 70 million are Catholics, and according to their claim, 140 million are Protestants, leaving a population of 120 million or more who do not profess any form of Christianity at all [2020 estimates]. Amongst the 140 million Protestants, every shade and variety of belief, the adjustments of creeds are loose and easy. Lack of any decisive authority renders any exact standard of belief impossible. A Protestant may freely range from one end of the scale to the other and still be considered orthodox according to Protestant estimates. A loose indefinite belief in Christ, either as God redeeming the world, or even as a great ethical teacher, not God Himself, but sent by God, suffices to place the Protestant within the compass of his own standard of orthodoxy.”
“Outside of these various bodies of loosely professed Christians stands a still larger mass of our population who are either absolutely indifferent to Christianity as a creed or positively reject it. In practice, the distinction is of little importance whether they hold themselves merely indifferent, or are positively hostile. In other words, we have here to reckon with a body, to all practical purposes, that is infidel. This mass comprises over 35 percent of our population, holding itself aloof from Christianity, and in some instances virulently antagonistic to it.”
[When you add together the Protestants with the non-believers, it produces a total in excess of 78 percent of our population, but currently enhanced to an even more frightening percentage by the vast majority of Catholics today—2020—around 80% (or 56 million) of the 70 million Catholics, who either do not practice their Faith at all, or irregularly, or who are ignorant of its teachings (especially with regard to morality) or in practice simply disregard those teachings—bringing the total of practical non-believing and infidel people, including bad Catholics, to around 97 percent, if we can presume there to be today approximately 14 million believing, regularly practicing Catholics in the USA out of a population of 330 million (2020 stats)].
“In distinct religious opposition to this mass of infidelity (non-believers) and Protestantism Catholics find themselves sharply and radically opposed. Heresy and infidelity are irreconcilable with Catholicity. “He that is not with me is against Me” (Matthew 12:30) are the words of Our Lord Himself, for denial of Catholic truth is the radical and common element of both heresy and infidelity. The difference between them is merely a matter of degree. One denies less, the other more. Protestantism, with its sliding scale of creeds, is simply an inclined plane into the abyss of positive unbelief. It is always virtual infidelity, its final outcome open infidelity, as the [2020 stats] 120 million unbelievers in this country stand witness.
We live in the midst of this religious anarchy. This mass—heretical and infidel—exhales an atmosphere filled with germs poisonous and fatal to Catholic life, if permitted to take root in the Catholic heart. They have their media organs and their literature where we find their current opinions publicly uttered. Their views upon religion, morality, politics, the constitution of society are perpetually marshaled before us. In magazine and newspaper they constantly speak from every line. Our literature is permeated and saturated with non-Catholic dogmatism. On all sides do we find this opposing spirit. We cannot escape from it. It enfolds and embraces us. Its breath is perpetually in our faces. It enters in by eye and ear. From birth to death, it enslaves us in its offensive garments.” (Fr. Felix Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin).
Warnings From Prophecies
There are many prophecies that DIRECTLY or INDIRECTLY deal with the foretold present day attacks upon the family. Some speak directly of the family situation―others speak of the dire circumstances in the world that inescapably affect the family which cannot escape the sinful, faithless, immoral and anti-Christian environment. Here are a selection of prophecies that speak directly or indirectly of threats to the Catholic Family:
In addition to the above quote of Our Lady, we have Our Lady of Good Success and Our Lady of La Salette also foretelling the foundation, or underlying causes to the attacks and collapse of the Catholic family―these were are follows: “At the end of the 19th century and throughout the 20th century, various heresies will be propagated … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent and be superior to others … The passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects ... Masonry will take control of the civil government … Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws making it easy for everyone to live in sin ... All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil rights, as well as ecclesiastical rights. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot.”
Other prophecies merely compound and affirm what Our Lady has prophesied:
► ST. COLUMBKILLE (521-597) prophesied: “Listen to what shall come to pass in the latter ages of the world ... Justice shall be outraged, and many unjust laws will be administered ... Judges will administer injustice … The monarchs [rulers/politicians] will be addicted to falsehood. The common people will adopt false principles … Between the mother and daughter anger and bitter sarcasms shall continually exist … They will employ themselves at reading and writing … Arguments and contentions shall rage in the bosom of every family ... There will be a general prevalence of sinful practices … There shall be no standard by which morals may be regulated … They will live devoid of justice and rectitude … Young women will become unblushing … Every race of mankind will become wicked! The time shall come when they will not perform charitable acts, and truth shall not remain in them. They will be continually sneering at each other … With the view of winning honor for themselves, they will hold each other as objects for ridicule … All classes of men shall be filled with hatred and enmity towards each other ... The people will not associate affectionately with each other … Neighbors will become treacherous, cold, and false-hearted towards each other.”
► POPE ST. PIUS X (1835-1914). “I saw one of my successors taking to flight over the bodies of his brethren. He will take refuge in disguise somewhere; and after a short retirement he will die a cruel death. The present wickedness of the world is only the beginning of the sorrows which must take place before the end of the world. We hold that you are not ignorant thereof what an outrageous combat is everywhere going on in our time. In truth the heathens and self-conceited nations are rebelling against their Creator. The cry of God’s enemies is: ‘Depart from us!’ In most people respect for God has disappeared both in public and in private life. They even go so far as to attempt to obliterate even the memory of God.”
► POPE PIUS XII (1876-1958). “We believe that the present hour is a dread phase of the events foretold by Christ. It seems that darkness is about to fall on the world. Humanity is in the grip of a supreme crisis.”
► PÈRE LAMY (Father John Edward Lamy 1855-1931)―a Mystic and Founder of the Religious Congregation of the Servants of Jesus and Mary―stated: “Our Lady requires the sanctity of family life. She requires that disorder should cease and that people should observe order once more. The First World War had three causes: blasphemies, work on Sundays, and desecration of marriage ... Lucifer is playing his last card―he thinks the game is in his hands, in which he is mistaken!”
► ST. ANTHONY OF THE DESERT, a.k.a. ANTHONY THE GREAT (251-356) prophesied: “Men will surrender to the spirit of the age. They will say that if they had lived in our day, Faith would be simple and easy. But in their day, they will say, things are complex; the Church must be brought up to date and made meaningful to the day’s problems!”
► ST. VINCENT FERRER (1350-1419) prophesied: “There shall be a new reformation in the world ... Before the end of the world, Christians will become so lax in their religion!”
► VENERABLE BARTHOLOMEW HOLZHAUSER (1613-1658). “The fifth period of the Church is one of affliction, desolation, humiliation, and poverty for the Church. Those Christians who survive, will be few on Earth! … During this period, many men will abuse of the freedom of conscience conceded to them … There will be laxity in divine and human precepts. Discipline will suffer. They will not respect the laws of the Church. Everyone will be carried away and led to believe and to do what he fancies, according to the manner of the flesh. They will ridicule Christian simplicity; they will call it folly and nonsense, but they will have the highest regard for advanced knowledge!”
► ELIZABETH CANORI-MORA (1774-1825). “Woe to all people in the world, who give themselves to a life of pleasure and who believe in the false maxims of modern ideas.”
► BISHOP PIE OF POITIERS (died 1880), stated: “At no time in the history of the world have we seen such universal rebellion against God as today. Never has man dissolved so entirely every covenant with God and been so completely against Him. ‘Go away from us! Leave us!’ ― that is what modern nations say. ‘We don’t want a God! We will do all against Him and do all without Him!’ That is what the modern nations, with France in the lead, do. The State must be anti-clerical, atheistic, purely worldly!”
► BLESSED REMBORDT (1689-1793). “God will punish the world when men have devised marvelous inventions that will lead them to forgetting God. They will have horseless carriages, and they will fly like the birds. But they will laugh at the idea of God, thinking that they are ‘very clever.’ There will be signs from Heaven, but men, in their pride, will laugh them off. Men will indulge in voluptuousness, and lewd fashions will be seen.”
► VENERABLE ANNE DE LA FOI prophesied: “There will be discord within the Catholic Church. In those days, men will wear women’s clothes, and women will put on men’s clothes.”
► MOTHER MARIA RAFOLS (1781-1853)―a Spanish Roman Catholic nun, mystic and the co-founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of Charity of Saint Anne―prophesied: “In the times to come such shall be the corruption of morality in every social class …. So great shall be the putrefaction, that they shall scandalize and pervert even the innocent little children.”
► BLESSED ANNE CATHERINE EMMERICH (1774-1824) prophesied: “Very bad times will come when non-Catholics will lead many people astray. A great confusion will result. In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars.”
► JEANNE LE ROYER, a Sister of the Nativity (1731-1798), prophesied: “I saw in the light of the Lord that the Faith and our holy Religion would become weaker in almost every Christian kingdom. God has permitted that they should be chastised by the wicked in order to awaken them from their apathy.”
► ST. METHODIUS (250-311). “A day will come when the enemies of Christ will boast of having conquered the whole world. They will say: ‘Christians cannot escape now!’
Modern Day Confirmation
What we see around us today merely confirms the truth of those aforementioned prophecies! The secret sects control governments and legislation―thus we see ever-increasing laws that are passed which are clearly against the Divine Law of God. We can clearly see elements of what Our Lady of Good Success predicted: “The spirit of impurity will permeate the atmosphere ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women!” The top twenty visited websites in the world mainly include search engine websites and information sites such as google.com (ranked #1); youtube.com (ranked #2); facebook.com (#3); instagram.com (#4); twitter.com (#5); wikipedia.org (#7); yahoo.com (#8); whatsapp.com (#10); amazon.com (#12). But there are two websites among them that are not search engine sites or information sites, but pornographic websites―xvideos.com (ranked #11); pornhub.com (ranked #13) and xnxx.com (ranked #15). That speaks volumes about the morality of the world―three out of the worldwide top 15 ranked websites are dedicated to pornography! The rest of the top 15 are basically only search engines or information sites.
Likewise with the prophecies: “There will be a general prevalence of sinful practices … There shall be no standard by which morals may be regulated … Marriage will be desecrated … Laws will make it easy for everyone to live in sin … Men will indulge in voluptuousness, and lewd fashions will be seen … There will no modesty among women … Men will wear women’s clothes, and women will put on men’s clothes.” This is becoming more and more evident with advent and explosive growth of the LGBTW+ movement, which has received support from many legislative bodies throughout the world, whereby same-sex marriages are now legalized and protected by law; and the rejection of them and criticism of them is tantamount to a “hate-crime”! Even children are being recruited to their ranks from the youngest of ages! Six States in the USA have introduced an LGBTQ+ inclusive curriculum in their schools—California, New Jersey, Colorado, Oregon, Illinois, and Nevada.
LGBTQ+ Promoted by Governmental Bodies
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a taxpayer-funded federal agency, is promoting a tool for “school and district staff who are interested in facilitating a more inclusive environment for LGBTQ students” on social media. The “LGBTQ Inclusivity in Schools: A Self-Assessment Tool” provides a general assessment for anyone to use and specific assessments for school staff. The purpose of the tool is to quickly gauge supposed inclusivity at one’s school and “enhance future work to support LGTBQ youth in schools.” Some of the items from the LGBTQ Self-Assessment Tool read as follows:
● “I cannot assume a student’s gender, gender identity, or sexual orientation.”
● “I use students’ chosen name(s) in all school environments, including abbreviations and pronouns.”
● “I participate in my schools’ Gay Straight Alliance/Genders and Sexualities Alliance.
● “The policy(s) in place allows students to use the bathroom/locker room which aligns to their chosen gender.”
● “The technology policies allow student access to age-appropriate LGBTQ content and information (e.g., LGBTQ-specific media, public health and education organizations, and entertainment sites).”
● “My classroom or learning space includes visual labels (e.g., rainbow flags, pink triangles, unisex bathroom signs) marking it as a safe space for LGBTQ students.”
● “I attend training and professional development focused on creating safe and supportive environments for LGBTQ students.”
● “During sexual health education lessons, I present information on all types of sex, not centering on penis/vagina penetrative sex.”
● “During sexual health education lessons, I describe anatomy and physiology separate from gender (e.g., “a body with a penis,” “a body with a vagina”).
Once they respond to each of these statements, users can score themselves and their school with an “A,” “B,” or “C.” If they receive a “C,” the tool says they should “commit to [gender] change.” The tool also offers a “collection of curated resources and tools to help schools enhance LGBTQ inclusive policies, programs, and practices.”
The CDC is meant to protect Americans from health, safety, and security threats; yet here it is promoting an immoral, unscientific political ideology that leads individuals—mostly minors—to believe lies about themselves and even seek harmful gender “transition” procedures that cause permanent damage. The agenda that the CDC is trying to advance causes serious spiritual, emotional and physical harm.
Setting aside for the moment the controversy of “Two Sister Lucias” of Fatima―with the original and real Sister Lucia being replaced with the replacement and fake Sister Lucia sometime around the start of the 1960s onwards, we have the warning expressed by Sister Lucia (which one?) about Satan waging war against families as part of the so-called “Final Battle” between Our Lady and Satan.
Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, the founding president of the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and the Family, in 2008, stated that had written to Sr. Lucia in 1984―while he was still a priest before becoming a cardinal―asking for prayers to overcome the difficulties he was experiencing in operating the pontifical institute established by Pope John Paul II three years earlier. Sister Lucia’s ominous response mentioned the spiritual battle that would soon engulf the family. She wrote: “Father, a time will come when the decisive battle between the Kingdom of Christ and Satan will be over marriage and the family. And those who will work for the good of the family will experience persecution and tribulation.” She then ended with some words of hope: “But do not be afraid, because Our Lady has already crushed his head!”
Regardless of the veracity of the above―Our Lady had already warned of attacks upon the family in our present times. Our Lady of Good Success, in the early 17th century, warned: “I make it known to you that from the end of the 19th century and from shortly after the middle of the 20th century (Vatican II was announced by Pope John XXIII on January 25th, 1959, and took place from 1962-1965), the passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects! … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times … making it easy for everyone to live in sin, encouraging the procreation of illegitimate children! ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … They will focus particularly on the children, in order to achieve this general corruption … Woe to the children of these times!” (O.L. of Good Success).
In 1957, when the real and authentic Sister Lucia was still with us, she passed on to us Heaven’s warning: “Father, the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God, or we are with the Devil―there is no middle ground … The Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them! … For this reason, Father, it is my mission not just to speak about the material punishments, that will certainly come over the Earth, if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to also tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity, if we remain fixed in sin!” (Sister Lucia to Fr. Fuentes, December 26th, 1957).
Toxic Atmosphere
You have heard the expression: “You cannot leave clothes for very long in a smoky room without them taking on the smell of smoke!” Similarly, you cannot mix with worldly people for very long without taking on the spirit of worldliness. Fr. Felix Salvany, in his book, Liberalism Is A Sin, speaks of this worldly contagion or virus in the following terms:
“Physical science tells us that we are constantly breathing these germs into the lungs. If the [immune] system be depleted or weakened, the dangerous microbe takes up its abode with us, and propagating its own kind with astonishing rapidity, undermines and ravages our health. It is equally true that we are subject to like infectious attacks in the spiritual order. Swarming in the atmosphere of our spiritual lives are innumerable deadly germs, ever ready to fasten upon the depleted and weakened soul and destroy the spiritual life. It is not only through the avenues of disordered passions that this spiritual disease may gain an entrance; it may make its inroad through the intellect. Intellectual torpidity, inexperience, ignorance, indifference, and complaisance, or even virtues, such as, benevolence, generosity, and pity may be the unsuspected way open to the foe, and lo, we are surprised to find him in possession of the citadel! It may come in the uniform of the enemy, sometimes even of our own colors.”
“As we are addressing ourselves to those who live amidst the peculiar circumstances of our American life, let us then consider these surroundings in a general way for the moment. First, as to some patent facts: The population of this country [USA] is at present something over 330 million [2020 estimates]. Of these, 70 million are Catholics, and according to their claim, 140 million are Protestants, leaving a population of 120 million or more who do not profess any form of Christianity at all [2020 estimates]. Amongst the 140 million Protestants, every shade and variety of belief, the adjustments of creeds are loose and easy. Lack of any decisive authority renders any exact standard of belief impossible. A Protestant may freely range from one end of the scale to the other and still be considered orthodox according to Protestant estimates. A loose indefinite belief in Christ, either as God redeeming the world, or even as a great ethical teacher, not God Himself, but sent by God, suffices to place the Protestant within the compass of his own standard of orthodoxy.”
“Outside of these various bodies of loosely professed Christians stands a still larger mass of our population who are either absolutely indifferent to Christianity as a creed or positively reject it. In practice, the distinction is of little importance whether they hold themselves merely indifferent, or are positively hostile. In other words, we have here to reckon with a body, to all practical purposes, that is infidel. This mass comprises over 35 percent of our population, holding itself aloof from Christianity, and in some instances virulently antagonistic to it.”
[When you add together the Protestants with the non-believers, it produces a total in excess of 78 percent of our population, but currently enhanced to an even more frightening percentage by the vast majority of Catholics today—2020—around 80% (or 56 million) of the 70 million Catholics, who either do not practice their Faith at all, or irregularly, or who are ignorant of its teachings (especially with regard to morality) or in practice simply disregard those teachings—bringing the total of practical non-believing and infidel people, including bad Catholics, to around 97 percent, if we can presume there to be today approximately 14 million believing, regularly practicing Catholics in the USA out of a population of 330 million (2020 stats)].
“In distinct religious opposition to this mass of infidelity (non-believers) and Protestantism Catholics find themselves sharply and radically opposed. Heresy and infidelity are irreconcilable with Catholicity. “He that is not with me is against Me” (Matthew 12:30) are the words of Our Lord Himself, for denial of Catholic truth is the radical and common element of both heresy and infidelity. The difference between them is merely a matter of degree. One denies less, the other more. Protestantism, with its sliding scale of creeds, is simply an inclined plane into the abyss of positive unbelief. It is always virtual infidelity, its final outcome open infidelity, as the [2020 stats] 120 million unbelievers in this country stand witness.
We live in the midst of this religious anarchy. This mass—heretical and infidel—exhales an atmosphere filled with germs poisonous and fatal to Catholic life, if permitted to take root in the Catholic heart. They have their media organs and their literature where we find their current opinions publicly uttered. Their views upon religion, morality, politics, the constitution of society are perpetually marshaled before us. In magazine and newspaper they constantly speak from every line. Our literature is permeated and saturated with non-Catholic dogmatism. On all sides do we find this opposing spirit. We cannot escape from it. It enfolds and embraces us. Its breath is perpetually in our faces. It enters in by eye and ear. From birth to death, it enslaves us in its offensive garments.” (Fr. Felix Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin).
Warnings From Prophecies
There are many prophecies that DIRECTLY or INDIRECTLY deal with the foretold present day attacks upon the family. Some speak directly of the family situation―others speak of the dire circumstances in the world that inescapably affect the family which cannot escape the sinful, faithless, immoral and anti-Christian environment. Here are a selection of prophecies that speak directly or indirectly of threats to the Catholic Family:
In addition to the above quote of Our Lady, we have Our Lady of Good Success and Our Lady of La Salette also foretelling the foundation, or underlying causes to the attacks and collapse of the Catholic family―these were are follows: “At the end of the 19th century and throughout the 20th century, various heresies will be propagated … Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God ... The true Faith to the Lord having been forgotten, each individual will want to be independent and be superior to others … The passions will erupt and there will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects ... Masonry will take control of the civil government … Masonry, which will then be in power, will enact iniquitous laws making it easy for everyone to live in sin ... All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds. They will abolish civil rights, as well as ecclesiastical rights. All order and all justice will be trampled underfoot.”
Other prophecies merely compound and affirm what Our Lady has prophesied:
► ST. COLUMBKILLE (521-597) prophesied: “Listen to what shall come to pass in the latter ages of the world ... Justice shall be outraged, and many unjust laws will be administered ... Judges will administer injustice … The monarchs [rulers/politicians] will be addicted to falsehood. The common people will adopt false principles … Between the mother and daughter anger and bitter sarcasms shall continually exist … They will employ themselves at reading and writing … Arguments and contentions shall rage in the bosom of every family ... There will be a general prevalence of sinful practices … There shall be no standard by which morals may be regulated … They will live devoid of justice and rectitude … Young women will become unblushing … Every race of mankind will become wicked! The time shall come when they will not perform charitable acts, and truth shall not remain in them. They will be continually sneering at each other … With the view of winning honor for themselves, they will hold each other as objects for ridicule … All classes of men shall be filled with hatred and enmity towards each other ... The people will not associate affectionately with each other … Neighbors will become treacherous, cold, and false-hearted towards each other.”
► POPE ST. PIUS X (1835-1914). “I saw one of my successors taking to flight over the bodies of his brethren. He will take refuge in disguise somewhere; and after a short retirement he will die a cruel death. The present wickedness of the world is only the beginning of the sorrows which must take place before the end of the world. We hold that you are not ignorant thereof what an outrageous combat is everywhere going on in our time. In truth the heathens and self-conceited nations are rebelling against their Creator. The cry of God’s enemies is: ‘Depart from us!’ In most people respect for God has disappeared both in public and in private life. They even go so far as to attempt to obliterate even the memory of God.”
► POPE PIUS XII (1876-1958). “We believe that the present hour is a dread phase of the events foretold by Christ. It seems that darkness is about to fall on the world. Humanity is in the grip of a supreme crisis.”
► PÈRE LAMY (Father John Edward Lamy 1855-1931)―a Mystic and Founder of the Religious Congregation of the Servants of Jesus and Mary―stated: “Our Lady requires the sanctity of family life. She requires that disorder should cease and that people should observe order once more. The First World War had three causes: blasphemies, work on Sundays, and desecration of marriage ... Lucifer is playing his last card―he thinks the game is in his hands, in which he is mistaken!”
► ST. ANTHONY OF THE DESERT, a.k.a. ANTHONY THE GREAT (251-356) prophesied: “Men will surrender to the spirit of the age. They will say that if they had lived in our day, Faith would be simple and easy. But in their day, they will say, things are complex; the Church must be brought up to date and made meaningful to the day’s problems!”
► ST. VINCENT FERRER (1350-1419) prophesied: “There shall be a new reformation in the world ... Before the end of the world, Christians will become so lax in their religion!”
► VENERABLE BARTHOLOMEW HOLZHAUSER (1613-1658). “The fifth period of the Church is one of affliction, desolation, humiliation, and poverty for the Church. Those Christians who survive, will be few on Earth! … During this period, many men will abuse of the freedom of conscience conceded to them … There will be laxity in divine and human precepts. Discipline will suffer. They will not respect the laws of the Church. Everyone will be carried away and led to believe and to do what he fancies, according to the manner of the flesh. They will ridicule Christian simplicity; they will call it folly and nonsense, but they will have the highest regard for advanced knowledge!”
► ELIZABETH CANORI-MORA (1774-1825). “Woe to all people in the world, who give themselves to a life of pleasure and who believe in the false maxims of modern ideas.”
► BISHOP PIE OF POITIERS (died 1880), stated: “At no time in the history of the world have we seen such universal rebellion against God as today. Never has man dissolved so entirely every covenant with God and been so completely against Him. ‘Go away from us! Leave us!’ ― that is what modern nations say. ‘We don’t want a God! We will do all against Him and do all without Him!’ That is what the modern nations, with France in the lead, do. The State must be anti-clerical, atheistic, purely worldly!”
► BLESSED REMBORDT (1689-1793). “God will punish the world when men have devised marvelous inventions that will lead them to forgetting God. They will have horseless carriages, and they will fly like the birds. But they will laugh at the idea of God, thinking that they are ‘very clever.’ There will be signs from Heaven, but men, in their pride, will laugh them off. Men will indulge in voluptuousness, and lewd fashions will be seen.”
► VENERABLE ANNE DE LA FOI prophesied: “There will be discord within the Catholic Church. In those days, men will wear women’s clothes, and women will put on men’s clothes.”
► MOTHER MARIA RAFOLS (1781-1853)―a Spanish Roman Catholic nun, mystic and the co-founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of Charity of Saint Anne―prophesied: “In the times to come such shall be the corruption of morality in every social class …. So great shall be the putrefaction, that they shall scandalize and pervert even the innocent little children.”
► BLESSED ANNE CATHERINE EMMERICH (1774-1824) prophesied: “Very bad times will come when non-Catholics will lead many people astray. A great confusion will result. In those days, Faith will fall very low, and it will be preserved in some places only, in a few cottages and in a few families which God has protected from disasters and wars.”
► JEANNE LE ROYER, a Sister of the Nativity (1731-1798), prophesied: “I saw in the light of the Lord that the Faith and our holy Religion would become weaker in almost every Christian kingdom. God has permitted that they should be chastised by the wicked in order to awaken them from their apathy.”
► ST. METHODIUS (250-311). “A day will come when the enemies of Christ will boast of having conquered the whole world. They will say: ‘Christians cannot escape now!’
Modern Day Confirmation
What we see around us today merely confirms the truth of those aforementioned prophecies! The secret sects control governments and legislation―thus we see ever-increasing laws that are passed which are clearly against the Divine Law of God. We can clearly see elements of what Our Lady of Good Success predicted: “The spirit of impurity will permeate the atmosphere ... Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women!” The top twenty visited websites in the world mainly include search engine websites and information sites such as google.com (ranked #1); youtube.com (ranked #2); facebook.com (#3); instagram.com (#4); twitter.com (#5); wikipedia.org (#7); yahoo.com (#8); whatsapp.com (#10); amazon.com (#12). But there are two websites among them that are not search engine sites or information sites, but pornographic websites―xvideos.com (ranked #11); pornhub.com (ranked #13) and xnxx.com (ranked #15). That speaks volumes about the morality of the world―three out of the worldwide top 15 ranked websites are dedicated to pornography! The rest of the top 15 are basically only search engines or information sites.
Likewise with the prophecies: “There will be a general prevalence of sinful practices … There shall be no standard by which morals may be regulated … Marriage will be desecrated … Laws will make it easy for everyone to live in sin … Men will indulge in voluptuousness, and lewd fashions will be seen … There will no modesty among women … Men will wear women’s clothes, and women will put on men’s clothes.” This is becoming more and more evident with advent and explosive growth of the LGBTW+ movement, which has received support from many legislative bodies throughout the world, whereby same-sex marriages are now legalized and protected by law; and the rejection of them and criticism of them is tantamount to a “hate-crime”! Even children are being recruited to their ranks from the youngest of ages! Six States in the USA have introduced an LGBTQ+ inclusive curriculum in their schools—California, New Jersey, Colorado, Oregon, Illinois, and Nevada.
LGBTQ+ Promoted by Governmental Bodies
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a taxpayer-funded federal agency, is promoting a tool for “school and district staff who are interested in facilitating a more inclusive environment for LGBTQ students” on social media. The “LGBTQ Inclusivity in Schools: A Self-Assessment Tool” provides a general assessment for anyone to use and specific assessments for school staff. The purpose of the tool is to quickly gauge supposed inclusivity at one’s school and “enhance future work to support LGTBQ youth in schools.” Some of the items from the LGBTQ Self-Assessment Tool read as follows:
● “I cannot assume a student’s gender, gender identity, or sexual orientation.”
● “I use students’ chosen name(s) in all school environments, including abbreviations and pronouns.”
● “I participate in my schools’ Gay Straight Alliance/Genders and Sexualities Alliance.
● “The policy(s) in place allows students to use the bathroom/locker room which aligns to their chosen gender.”
● “The technology policies allow student access to age-appropriate LGBTQ content and information (e.g., LGBTQ-specific media, public health and education organizations, and entertainment sites).”
● “My classroom or learning space includes visual labels (e.g., rainbow flags, pink triangles, unisex bathroom signs) marking it as a safe space for LGBTQ students.”
● “I attend training and professional development focused on creating safe and supportive environments for LGBTQ students.”
● “During sexual health education lessons, I present information on all types of sex, not centering on penis/vagina penetrative sex.”
● “During sexual health education lessons, I describe anatomy and physiology separate from gender (e.g., “a body with a penis,” “a body with a vagina”).
Once they respond to each of these statements, users can score themselves and their school with an “A,” “B,” or “C.” If they receive a “C,” the tool says they should “commit to [gender] change.” The tool also offers a “collection of curated resources and tools to help schools enhance LGBTQ inclusive policies, programs, and practices.”
The CDC is meant to protect Americans from health, safety, and security threats; yet here it is promoting an immoral, unscientific political ideology that leads individuals—mostly minors—to believe lies about themselves and even seek harmful gender “transition” procedures that cause permanent damage. The agenda that the CDC is trying to advance causes serious spiritual, emotional and physical harm.
Article 12
Saturday January 6th, the Feast of the Epiphany
Wise Men―Not Wise Guys!
Saturday January 6th, the Feast of the Epiphany
Wise Men―Not Wise Guys!
Where Have All the Wise Men Gone?
There is very little wisdom left in the world today! As Our Lady lamented to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, most people today have fallen prey to “the worldly and diabolical wisdom ... Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with [true] wisdom! … The greatest wisdom for souls consists in the knowledge of the cross, in the love of sufferings, and in putting this knowledge into practice by bearing afflictions with patience! … Those that know nothing of this science are foolish! … The presumption and pride of worldly wisdom is more powerful in its worldly devotees, than humility and true self-knowledge is in the children of light! … The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God, Whose Wisdom finds no place in the evil heart, nor in a body subject to sin! … The learned and those who think themselves wise, wish to be applauded and looked up to, bragging about their knowledge. The unlearned try to appear wise! ... Worldly wisdom looks upon the exterior person―not at the state of the souls, nor at virtue, but only at outward show … Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error, who, desiring to appear wise, speak much and multiply words like the foolish. They only lose what they strive so much to attain, since they become known as foolish! ... The wisdom of the sons of this world is carnal and diabolical, and their ways lead to death! … The learned and wise, and the powerful of this world, so reluctantly correct and amend their lives. Many persons―whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!”
“Abhor human ostentation and let the world consider you to be ignorant―for the world does not know where true wisdom dwells. The wisdom of the flesh―worldly wisdom―has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God! Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom! … In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls, and they hold as being wisdom that which is nothing but diabolical and earthly ignorance! ... God knows that this insane love will pervert the greater part of the human nature! … There is only one true Good, the highest Good is to be appreciated and recognized. All the other lesser goods are merely fictitious and apparent. Then only shall you give God true appreciation and love, when you shall enjoy and esteem Him above all created things. But this wisdom seems far from the mind of carnal men―for, with a most perverse blindness, they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them. Because they never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or appreciation of it.
What is Wisdom?
Even though we speak of Divine Wisdom and human wisdom, there should only be one wisdom―just as there is one truth. Similarly, we speak of Divine Laws and human laws―but all human laws should be based upon and in full agreement with Divine Laws. The only difference that should exist between Divine Wisdom and human wisdom is the degree of wisdom that God has and the degree of wisdom that humans have―yet there should be no contradiction between them.
St. Thomas Aquinas, in writing about the Gift of Wisdom―that is one of the seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost―states that Wisdom is both the knowledge of and judgment about “divine things” and the ability to judge and direct human affairs according to divine truth (Summa Theologica, Ia, q. 1, art. 6; Ia-IIae, q. 69, art. 3; IIa-IIae, q. 8, art. 6; IIa-IIae, q. 45, articles 1–5). The supernatural Gift of Wisdom is meant to perfect mere natural human wisdom―if we place no obstacles in its way.
Wisdom is desperately needed in our world today. As Holy Scripture so rightly says: “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15) and Our Lady echoes those words to Venerable Mary of Agreda: Many persons―whom the world has celebrated as great and wise―have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!” Anyone and everyone who is in Hell is without doubt a fool of the greatest magnitude! God wishes to save everyone and would save everyone if they would only obey Him and cooperate with Him―but they chose not to do that; they stupidly chose a lifestyle that led them to Hell! Is that wise? Is that wisdom?
Wisdom is not a matter of intelligence, quick-mindedness, creativity or cleverness. Rather, it is a gift of God that perfects imperfect human wisdom. Wisdom requires humility. It is being able to see things from God’s perspective. Wisdom flows from knowing God, loving Him, and pondering His law with openness and trust. Wisdom sees the larger picture. It is patient. It does not get swallowed up in the immediate situation, but brings to every situation the perspective of God — His providence, goodness, truth, unexplainable love and ultimate desire to get us to Heaven.
The Wise and the Unwise
St. Louis de Montfort, in his booklet LETTER TO THE FRIENDS OF THE CROSS, paints a clear picture of those who are wise and those foolish―much like Our Lord’s parable about the Wise and Foolish Virgins (Matthew 25:1-12). St. Louis writes:
“Do you really know the voice of God and grace from the voice of the world and human nature? Do you distinctly hear the voice of God, our kind Father, pronouncing His threefold curse upon everyone who follows the world in its concupiscence? Is your ear attentive to the pleading of the lovable and cross-burdened Jesus? Two groups appear before you each day―the followers of Christ and the followers of the world. Our loving Savior’s group is to the right, scaling a narrow path made all the narrower by the world’s corruption. The little flock that follows Jesus can speak only of tears, penance, prayer and contempt for worldly things.
“To the left is the world’s group, the devil’s in fact, which is far superior in number, and seemingly far more colorful and splendid in array. Fashionable folk are all in a hurry to enlist, the highways are overcrowded, although they are broad and ever broadening with the crowds that flow through in a torrent. These roads are strewn with flowers, bordered with all kinds of amusements and attractions and paved with gold and silver! The worldly-wise elated geniuses and self-conceited individuals who are stubborn and puffed-up with their lights and talents! Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!’ they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat! Let us drink! Let us sing! Let us dance! Let us play! God is good! He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!’ And so they continue.
“Let us flee from the corrupting concupiscence and enticements of a corrupt world. Let us love Jesus in the right way, standing by Him through the heaviest of crosses. Let us meditate seriously on these remarkable words of our beloved Master which sum up the Christian life in its perfection: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!’ … You can and should ask for the wisdom of the Cross! … Ask for this wisdom, ask for it constantly, fervently, without hesitation or fear of not obtaining it. You will certainly obtain it and then see clearly, in the light of your own experience, how it is possible to desire, seek and relish the Cross!” (St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
In another of his books, LOVE OF THE ETERNAL WISDOM, St. Louis de Montfort develops this idea of the foolishness of worldly wisdom. By “The Eternal Wisdom” St. Louis means “Jesus Christ”―hence the Love of the Eternal Wisdom means the love of Jesus Christ. St. Louis writes:
“Great is the misfortune of the mighty and the rich if they do not love Eternal Wisdom … They have their earthly comforts, they are as it were, bewitched by their pleasures and riches―they do not see the evils which hang over their heads … Is it possible for man to love that which he does not know? Can he love ardently that which he knows only imperfectly? Why then is Jesus, the Eternal and Incarnate Wisdom, loved so little? Because He is not known, or He is known only a little. Very few of us make a sincere study of Jesus … Jesus Christ, Eternal Wisdom, is all that you can and should wish for! … Nothing is more consoling than to know Divine Wisdom! If we really wish to obtain life everlasting, let us acquire knowledge of Divine Wisdom; if we wish to reach perfect sanctity on Earth, let us know Eternal Wisdom; if we wish to possess the root of immortality in our heart, let us have in our mind knowledge of Eternal Wisdom. To know Jesus Christ, Eternal Wisdom, is to know enough―to know everything and not to know Him, is to know nothing! What does it avail an archer to know how to hit the outer parts of the target, if he does not know how to hit the center? What will it avail us to know all other sciences necessary for salvation, if we do not know the only essential one, the center to which all others must converge, Jesus Christ?”
True and False Wisdom
St. Louis then goes on to describe true and false wisdom: “Now let us make a distinction between the different kinds of wisdom. Wisdom taken in general and according to the meaning of the word, is a ‘delectable knowledge’―it is a taste for God and His truth. The Wisdom of God, the only true Wisdom, deserves to be loved as a great Treasure. There are several kinds of Wisdom. First there is true and false wisdom. True wisdom is fondness of truth, without guile or dissimulation. False wisdom is fondness of falsehood, disguised under the appearance of truth. This false wisdom is the wisdom of the world which according to the Holy Spirit is threefold―earthly, sensual and devilish wisdom.
“Lest perhaps chosen souls should be deceived by the false luster of worldly wisdom, let us expose its deceit and malice. The wisdom of the world is that of which it is written: ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise’ according to the world. “The wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God … This is not the wisdom descending from above, but earthly, sensual, devilish.’ This worldly wisdom consists in the exact compliance with the maxims and the fashions of the world―in a continuous trend toward greatness and esteem. It is a secret and unceasing pursuit of pleasures and personal interests―not in a gross and open manner so as to cause scandal, but in a secret, deceitful and scheming fashion. Otherwise, it would not be what the world calls wisdom, but obvious immorality”
“The wisdom of the corrupt world must be condemned and detested as evil and pernicious. Then there is the wisdom of the philosophers which we must despise when it is not true philosophy, and because it is often dangerous to salvation. True wisdom is natural and supernatural. Natural wisdom is knowledge, in an eminent degree, of natural things in their principles; supernatural wisdom is knowledge of supernatural and divine things in their origin. To the philosophers, I leave their useless arguments; to the scientists, I leave the secrets of their worldly wisdom! To those seeking perfection, let us speak of True, Eternal, Uncreated and Incarnate Wisdom.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Two-Faced Wisdom
“Those who proceed according to the wisdom of the world are those who know how to manage well their affairs and to arrange things to their temporal advantage without appearing to do so; who know the art of deceiving and how to cleverly cheat without being noticed; who say or do one thing and have another thing in mind; who are thoroughly acquainted with the way and the flattery of the world; who know how to please everybody in order to reach their goal, not troubling much about the honor and interests of God; who make a secret but deadly fusion of truth with untruth, of the Gospel with the world, of virtue with vice, of Jesus Christ with Satan; who wish to pass as honest people, but not as religious men; who despise and corrupt or readily condemn every religious practice which does not conform to their own. In short, the worldly‑wise are those who, being guided only by their human senses and reason, seek only to appear as Christian and honest folk, without troubling very much to please God or to do penance for the sins which they have committed against His divine Majesty.
“The worldling bases his conduct upon his honor, upon what people say, upon convention, upon good cheer, upon personal interest, upon refined manners, upon witty jokes. These are the seven innocent incentives, so he thinks, upon which he can rely that he may lead an easy life. He has virtues of his own for which he is canonized by the world. These are manliness, finesse, diplomacy, tact, gallantry, politeness, sprightliness. He considers as serious sins such traits as lack of feeling, silliness, dullness, sanctimoniousness. He adheres as strictly as possible to the commandments which the world has given him:
The Ten Commandments of the Worldly
1. Thou shalt be well acquainted with the world.
2. Thou shalt be an “honest” man.
3. Thou shalt be successful in business.
4. Thou shalt keep what is thine.
5. Thou shalt get on in the world.
6. Thou shalt make friends.
7. Thou shalt be a society man.
8. Thou shalt make merry.
9. Thou shalt not be a killjoy.
10. Thou shalt avoid singularity, dullness and an air of piety.
“Never was the world so corrupt as it is now, because it was never so astute, so wise in its own conceit, so cunning. It is so skillful in deceiving the soul seeking perfection that it makes use of truth to foster untruth, of virtue to authorize vice and it even distorts the meaning of Christ’s own truths to give authority to its own maxims. The number of those who are fools according to God, is infinite” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Earthly Wisdom
“The earthly wisdom spoken of by St. James is an excessive striving for worldly goods. The worldly-wise make a secret profession of this type of wisdom when they allow themselves to become attached to their earthly possessions, when they strive to become rich, when they go to law and bring useless actions against others in order to acquire or to keep temporal goods; when their every thought, word and deed is mainly directed toward obtaining or retaining something temporal. As to working out their eternal salvation and making use of the means to do so―such as reception of the Sacraments and prayer―they accomplish these duties only carelessly, in a very offhand manner, once in a while, and for the sake of appearances” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Sensual Wisdom
“Sensual wisdom is a lustful desire for pleasure. The worldly-wise make a profession of it when they seek only the satisfaction of the senses; when they are inordinately fond of entertainment; when they shun whatever mortifies and inconveniences the body, such as fasting and other austerities; when they continually think of eating, drinking, playing, laughing, amusing themselves and having an agreeable time; when they eagerly seek after soft beds, merry games, sumptuous feasts and fashionable society. Then, after having unscrupulously indulged in all these pleasures—perhaps without displeasing the world or injuring their health—they look for ‘the least scrupulous’ confessor (such is the name they give to those easygoing confessors who shirk their duty) that they may receive from him, at little cost, the peaceful sanction of their soft and effeminate life, and a plenary indulgence for all their sins. I say, at little cost, for these sensually wise want as penance the recitation of only a few prayers, or the giving of an alms, because they dislike anything that afflicts the body” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Devilish Wisdom
“Devilish wisdom consists in an unlawful striving for human esteem and honors. This is the wisdom which the worldly‑wise profess when they aim―although not openly―at greatness, honors, dignities and high positions; when they wish to be seen, esteemed, praised and applauded by men; when in their studies, their works, their endeavors their words and actions, they seek only the good opinion and praise of men so that they may be looked upon as pious people, as men of learning, as great leaders, as clever lawyers, as people of boundless and distinguished merit, or deserving of high consideration; while they cannot bear an insult or a rebuke; or they cover up their faults and make a show of their fine qualities” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Condemn, Avoid and Flee from these False Wisdoms
“With Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Wisdom, we must detest and condemn these three kinds of false wisdom―earthly, sensual and devilish―if we wish to acquire the true one which does not seek its own interest, which is not found on this Earth nor in the heart of those who lead a comfortable life, but which abhors all that which is great and high in the estimation of men” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Natural Wisdom and Scientific Wisdom
“In addition to the earthly wisdom which is pernicious and to be condemned there is the natural wisdom of philosophers. This wisdom was eagerly sought after by the Egyptians and the Greeks; ‘The Greeks seek after wisdom’ (1 Corinthians 1:22). Those among them who had acquired it were called Magi or Wise Men. This wisdom is an eminent knowledge of nature and its elements. It was given in full to Adam, in his innocence; it was abundantly bestowed upon Solomon, and, after him, several great men have shared it, as history testifies.
“Philosophers boast of their philosophical reasoning as being the means to acquire this wisdom. Scientists boast of the secrets in which they imagine this natural wisdom is to be found. It is true that Scholastic Philosophy when studied in a Christian spirit develops the mind and enables it to understand the higher sciences, but it will never bring us to the so‑called natural wisdom so much renowned in antiquity. The true scientist realizes that his ability is a gift of God and that he must prove himself worthy of it by dedicated Christian labor and prayer. True science must always seek to honor Jesus Christ, Incarnate Wisdom, in whom are all the treasures of the wisdom and knowledge of God, all the ties of nature, of grace and glory. The scientist must obey the Holy Spirit, Who warns him: ‘Seek not the things that are too high for thee’ (Ecclesiasticus 3:22). Let us, therefore, remain with Jesus Christ, Eternal Wisdom. Away from Him there is but wandering, untruth and death. ‘I am the way, the truth and the life!’ (John 14:6).” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Seeking and Uniting Ourselves with the Eternal Wisdom―Jesus Christ
St. Louis continues: “Divine Wisdom now exhorts all men to forsake everything and to desire Him alone. St. Augustine tells us that He gives Himself to those only who wish to possess Him and who seek Him with all the zeal worthy of such a great treasure. Therefore, no defiled thing comes unto Him. To acquire Eternal Wisdom we must seek Him ardently, that is, we must be willing to abandon all, to suffer all, and to undertake all things in order to possess Him. There are but few who find Him because there are but few who seek Him in a manner worthy of Him. Threefold is the misfortune, during life, of those who do not take the trouble to acquire Wisdom. They fall: (1), into ignorance and blindness; (2) into foolishness; (3) into scandal and sin. But what will be their misfortune at the moment of death? What will be their misfortune in Hell? … Let us, then, long for Divine Wisdom and seek Him alone! We can desire nothing better than Wisdom!” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
The Effects of Divine Wisdom
“When Divine Wisdom enters into a soul He brings to it a variety and an abundance of good things, and imparts to it innumerable riches. Eternal Wisdom communicates to the soul that possesses Him His all‑enlightening spirit. He communicates to man the great science of the saints, and also natural sciences, even of the most mysterious, when such knowledge is expedient for them. Wisdom not only gives man a light to know the truth, but also a wonderful capacity for making truth known to others. Wisdom knows what is to be said, and He communicates the talent to say it well … The words which the Divine Wisdom communicates are not common, natural and human words, they are the words of God. They are strong, effective, piercing words; ‘more piercing than any two‑edged sword’ (Hebrews 4:12); shooting forth from the heart of him by whom He speaks and penetrating the heart of him who hears them.
“He will speak until the consummation of the world, by the mouth of those to whom He will communicate Himself … Our Lord promised the Apostles: ‘I will give you a mouth and wisdom which your adversaries will not be able to resist’ (Luke 21:15) … How few are the preachers today who possess this ineffable gift of eloquence and who can say with St. Paul: ‘We speak the wisdom of God’ … Most of them speak from the natural knowledge of their intellect, or from what they have borrowed from books; not from the love which Divine Wisdom has put into their hearts; nor from the divine abundance which Wisdom has communicated to them. Hence it is that now we hear of so few conversions brought about by preaching. If a preacher had truly received from Divine Wisdom this gift of eloquence, his listeners could scarcely resist his words, any more than could have those who listened to Eternal Wisdom speaking through the mouth of St. Stephen. ‘Those who listened were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit that spoke’ (Acts 6:10). Such a speaker would speak with so much unction and authority, that his words would not become empty or unavailing.
“When Eternal Wisdom communicates Himself to a soul He confers upon it the gifts of the Holy Spirit and all the great virtues in an eminent degree. That is, He bestows the theological virtues: faith, hope, charity; the cardinal virtues: temperance, prudence, justice, fortitude; moral virtues, such as: religion, humility, meekness, obedience, detachment, mortification, prayer. Eternal Wisdom is ‘more active than all active things’ (Wisdom 7:24); He does not allow those who enjoy His friendship to languish in sloth and negligence. He sets them on fire and makes them do great things for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Testing Wisdom
“To test and prove them and make them worthy of Him, He gives them occasion for great combats and keeps in store for them contradictions and crosses in almost everything they undertake. He allows the devil to tempt them, the world to calumniate and abuse them, their enemies to have the upper hand and to crush them, their friends and relatives to forsake and betray them. Sometimes, He will cause them to suffer the loss of their goods or of their health; at other times He will load them with reproach, sadness and despondency. In a word, He will try them variously in the crucible of tribulation ‘but’ the Holy Spirit reminds us, ‘afflicted in few things, in many they shall be rewarded, because God has tried them and found them worthy of Himself. As gold in the furnace He has proved them; and as a victim of a holocaust He has received them; and in time there shall be respect had to them.’ …
“Let us exclaim then: A thousand times happy is the man into whose soul Wisdom has come to dwell! In whatever battles he has to wage he will be victorious; from whatever dangers threaten him he will escape; in whatever sorrows afflict him he will have joy and comfort; and through whatever humiliations he passes, he will be exalted and glorified in time and in eternity.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
There is very little wisdom left in the world today! As Our Lady lamented to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, most people today have fallen prey to “the worldly and diabolical wisdom ... Earthly love of sensible pleasures and riches is not compatible with [true] wisdom! … The greatest wisdom for souls consists in the knowledge of the cross, in the love of sufferings, and in putting this knowledge into practice by bearing afflictions with patience! … Those that know nothing of this science are foolish! … The presumption and pride of worldly wisdom is more powerful in its worldly devotees, than humility and true self-knowledge is in the children of light! … The foolishness of men makes them stupid and deaf, their impious malice makes them scoffers, and their unbelieving perversity turns them away from God, Whose Wisdom finds no place in the evil heart, nor in a body subject to sin! … The learned and those who think themselves wise, wish to be applauded and looked up to, bragging about their knowledge. The unlearned try to appear wise! ... Worldly wisdom looks upon the exterior person―not at the state of the souls, nor at virtue, but only at outward show … Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error, who, desiring to appear wise, speak much and multiply words like the foolish. They only lose what they strive so much to attain, since they become known as foolish! ... The wisdom of the sons of this world is carnal and diabolical, and their ways lead to death! … The learned and wise, and the powerful of this world, so reluctantly correct and amend their lives. Many persons―whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!”
“Abhor human ostentation and let the world consider you to be ignorant―for the world does not know where true wisdom dwells. The wisdom of the flesh―worldly wisdom―has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God! Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, and as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom! … In their blind deception they follow darkness as their light, they taste the bitter as sweet, they take deadly poison for a remedy for their souls, and they hold as being wisdom that which is nothing but diabolical and earthly ignorance! ... God knows that this insane love will pervert the greater part of the human nature! … There is only one true Good, the highest Good is to be appreciated and recognized. All the other lesser goods are merely fictitious and apparent. Then only shall you give God true appreciation and love, when you shall enjoy and esteem Him above all created things. But this wisdom seems far from the mind of carnal men―for, with a most perverse blindness, they continue to make much of the visible and fictitious good, and they torment themselves and are disconsolate, whenever it fails them. Because they never taste or recognize the highest and truest Good, they take no thought or appreciation of it.
What is Wisdom?
Even though we speak of Divine Wisdom and human wisdom, there should only be one wisdom―just as there is one truth. Similarly, we speak of Divine Laws and human laws―but all human laws should be based upon and in full agreement with Divine Laws. The only difference that should exist between Divine Wisdom and human wisdom is the degree of wisdom that God has and the degree of wisdom that humans have―yet there should be no contradiction between them.
St. Thomas Aquinas, in writing about the Gift of Wisdom―that is one of the seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost―states that Wisdom is both the knowledge of and judgment about “divine things” and the ability to judge and direct human affairs according to divine truth (Summa Theologica, Ia, q. 1, art. 6; Ia-IIae, q. 69, art. 3; IIa-IIae, q. 8, art. 6; IIa-IIae, q. 45, articles 1–5). The supernatural Gift of Wisdom is meant to perfect mere natural human wisdom―if we place no obstacles in its way.
Wisdom is desperately needed in our world today. As Holy Scripture so rightly says: “The number of fools is infinite!” (Ecclesiastes 1:15) and Our Lady echoes those words to Venerable Mary of Agreda: Many persons―whom the world has celebrated as great and wise―have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … The number of fools is infinite, the number of the reprobate is also uncountable!” Anyone and everyone who is in Hell is without doubt a fool of the greatest magnitude! God wishes to save everyone and would save everyone if they would only obey Him and cooperate with Him―but they chose not to do that; they stupidly chose a lifestyle that led them to Hell! Is that wise? Is that wisdom?
Wisdom is not a matter of intelligence, quick-mindedness, creativity or cleverness. Rather, it is a gift of God that perfects imperfect human wisdom. Wisdom requires humility. It is being able to see things from God’s perspective. Wisdom flows from knowing God, loving Him, and pondering His law with openness and trust. Wisdom sees the larger picture. It is patient. It does not get swallowed up in the immediate situation, but brings to every situation the perspective of God — His providence, goodness, truth, unexplainable love and ultimate desire to get us to Heaven.
The Wise and the Unwise
St. Louis de Montfort, in his booklet LETTER TO THE FRIENDS OF THE CROSS, paints a clear picture of those who are wise and those foolish―much like Our Lord’s parable about the Wise and Foolish Virgins (Matthew 25:1-12). St. Louis writes:
“Do you really know the voice of God and grace from the voice of the world and human nature? Do you distinctly hear the voice of God, our kind Father, pronouncing His threefold curse upon everyone who follows the world in its concupiscence? Is your ear attentive to the pleading of the lovable and cross-burdened Jesus? Two groups appear before you each day―the followers of Christ and the followers of the world. Our loving Savior’s group is to the right, scaling a narrow path made all the narrower by the world’s corruption. The little flock that follows Jesus can speak only of tears, penance, prayer and contempt for worldly things.
“To the left is the world’s group, the devil’s in fact, which is far superior in number, and seemingly far more colorful and splendid in array. Fashionable folk are all in a hurry to enlist, the highways are overcrowded, although they are broad and ever broadening with the crowds that flow through in a torrent. These roads are strewn with flowers, bordered with all kinds of amusements and attractions and paved with gold and silver! The worldly-wise elated geniuses and self-conceited individuals who are stubborn and puffed-up with their lights and talents! Worldlings rouse one another to persist in their unscrupulous depravity. ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure!’ they shout, ‘Enjoy life, peace and pleasure! Let us eat! Let us drink! Let us sing! Let us dance! Let us play! God is good! He did not make us to damn us! God does not forbid us to enjoy ourselves! We shall not be damned for that! Away with scruples! We shall not die!’ And so they continue.
“Let us flee from the corrupting concupiscence and enticements of a corrupt world. Let us love Jesus in the right way, standing by Him through the heaviest of crosses. Let us meditate seriously on these remarkable words of our beloved Master which sum up the Christian life in its perfection: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me!’ … You can and should ask for the wisdom of the Cross! … Ask for this wisdom, ask for it constantly, fervently, without hesitation or fear of not obtaining it. You will certainly obtain it and then see clearly, in the light of your own experience, how it is possible to desire, seek and relish the Cross!” (St. Louis de Montfort, Letter to the Friends of the Cross).
In another of his books, LOVE OF THE ETERNAL WISDOM, St. Louis de Montfort develops this idea of the foolishness of worldly wisdom. By “The Eternal Wisdom” St. Louis means “Jesus Christ”―hence the Love of the Eternal Wisdom means the love of Jesus Christ. St. Louis writes:
“Great is the misfortune of the mighty and the rich if they do not love Eternal Wisdom … They have their earthly comforts, they are as it were, bewitched by their pleasures and riches―they do not see the evils which hang over their heads … Is it possible for man to love that which he does not know? Can he love ardently that which he knows only imperfectly? Why then is Jesus, the Eternal and Incarnate Wisdom, loved so little? Because He is not known, or He is known only a little. Very few of us make a sincere study of Jesus … Jesus Christ, Eternal Wisdom, is all that you can and should wish for! … Nothing is more consoling than to know Divine Wisdom! If we really wish to obtain life everlasting, let us acquire knowledge of Divine Wisdom; if we wish to reach perfect sanctity on Earth, let us know Eternal Wisdom; if we wish to possess the root of immortality in our heart, let us have in our mind knowledge of Eternal Wisdom. To know Jesus Christ, Eternal Wisdom, is to know enough―to know everything and not to know Him, is to know nothing! What does it avail an archer to know how to hit the outer parts of the target, if he does not know how to hit the center? What will it avail us to know all other sciences necessary for salvation, if we do not know the only essential one, the center to which all others must converge, Jesus Christ?”
True and False Wisdom
St. Louis then goes on to describe true and false wisdom: “Now let us make a distinction between the different kinds of wisdom. Wisdom taken in general and according to the meaning of the word, is a ‘delectable knowledge’―it is a taste for God and His truth. The Wisdom of God, the only true Wisdom, deserves to be loved as a great Treasure. There are several kinds of Wisdom. First there is true and false wisdom. True wisdom is fondness of truth, without guile or dissimulation. False wisdom is fondness of falsehood, disguised under the appearance of truth. This false wisdom is the wisdom of the world which according to the Holy Spirit is threefold―earthly, sensual and devilish wisdom.
“Lest perhaps chosen souls should be deceived by the false luster of worldly wisdom, let us expose its deceit and malice. The wisdom of the world is that of which it is written: ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise’ according to the world. “The wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God … This is not the wisdom descending from above, but earthly, sensual, devilish.’ This worldly wisdom consists in the exact compliance with the maxims and the fashions of the world―in a continuous trend toward greatness and esteem. It is a secret and unceasing pursuit of pleasures and personal interests―not in a gross and open manner so as to cause scandal, but in a secret, deceitful and scheming fashion. Otherwise, it would not be what the world calls wisdom, but obvious immorality”
“The wisdom of the corrupt world must be condemned and detested as evil and pernicious. Then there is the wisdom of the philosophers which we must despise when it is not true philosophy, and because it is often dangerous to salvation. True wisdom is natural and supernatural. Natural wisdom is knowledge, in an eminent degree, of natural things in their principles; supernatural wisdom is knowledge of supernatural and divine things in their origin. To the philosophers, I leave their useless arguments; to the scientists, I leave the secrets of their worldly wisdom! To those seeking perfection, let us speak of True, Eternal, Uncreated and Incarnate Wisdom.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Two-Faced Wisdom
“Those who proceed according to the wisdom of the world are those who know how to manage well their affairs and to arrange things to their temporal advantage without appearing to do so; who know the art of deceiving and how to cleverly cheat without being noticed; who say or do one thing and have another thing in mind; who are thoroughly acquainted with the way and the flattery of the world; who know how to please everybody in order to reach their goal, not troubling much about the honor and interests of God; who make a secret but deadly fusion of truth with untruth, of the Gospel with the world, of virtue with vice, of Jesus Christ with Satan; who wish to pass as honest people, but not as religious men; who despise and corrupt or readily condemn every religious practice which does not conform to their own. In short, the worldly‑wise are those who, being guided only by their human senses and reason, seek only to appear as Christian and honest folk, without troubling very much to please God or to do penance for the sins which they have committed against His divine Majesty.
“The worldling bases his conduct upon his honor, upon what people say, upon convention, upon good cheer, upon personal interest, upon refined manners, upon witty jokes. These are the seven innocent incentives, so he thinks, upon which he can rely that he may lead an easy life. He has virtues of his own for which he is canonized by the world. These are manliness, finesse, diplomacy, tact, gallantry, politeness, sprightliness. He considers as serious sins such traits as lack of feeling, silliness, dullness, sanctimoniousness. He adheres as strictly as possible to the commandments which the world has given him:
The Ten Commandments of the Worldly
1. Thou shalt be well acquainted with the world.
2. Thou shalt be an “honest” man.
3. Thou shalt be successful in business.
4. Thou shalt keep what is thine.
5. Thou shalt get on in the world.
6. Thou shalt make friends.
7. Thou shalt be a society man.
8. Thou shalt make merry.
9. Thou shalt not be a killjoy.
10. Thou shalt avoid singularity, dullness and an air of piety.
“Never was the world so corrupt as it is now, because it was never so astute, so wise in its own conceit, so cunning. It is so skillful in deceiving the soul seeking perfection that it makes use of truth to foster untruth, of virtue to authorize vice and it even distorts the meaning of Christ’s own truths to give authority to its own maxims. The number of those who are fools according to God, is infinite” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Earthly Wisdom
“The earthly wisdom spoken of by St. James is an excessive striving for worldly goods. The worldly-wise make a secret profession of this type of wisdom when they allow themselves to become attached to their earthly possessions, when they strive to become rich, when they go to law and bring useless actions against others in order to acquire or to keep temporal goods; when their every thought, word and deed is mainly directed toward obtaining or retaining something temporal. As to working out their eternal salvation and making use of the means to do so―such as reception of the Sacraments and prayer―they accomplish these duties only carelessly, in a very offhand manner, once in a while, and for the sake of appearances” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Sensual Wisdom
“Sensual wisdom is a lustful desire for pleasure. The worldly-wise make a profession of it when they seek only the satisfaction of the senses; when they are inordinately fond of entertainment; when they shun whatever mortifies and inconveniences the body, such as fasting and other austerities; when they continually think of eating, drinking, playing, laughing, amusing themselves and having an agreeable time; when they eagerly seek after soft beds, merry games, sumptuous feasts and fashionable society. Then, after having unscrupulously indulged in all these pleasures—perhaps without displeasing the world or injuring their health—they look for ‘the least scrupulous’ confessor (such is the name they give to those easygoing confessors who shirk their duty) that they may receive from him, at little cost, the peaceful sanction of their soft and effeminate life, and a plenary indulgence for all their sins. I say, at little cost, for these sensually wise want as penance the recitation of only a few prayers, or the giving of an alms, because they dislike anything that afflicts the body” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Devilish Wisdom
“Devilish wisdom consists in an unlawful striving for human esteem and honors. This is the wisdom which the worldly‑wise profess when they aim―although not openly―at greatness, honors, dignities and high positions; when they wish to be seen, esteemed, praised and applauded by men; when in their studies, their works, their endeavors their words and actions, they seek only the good opinion and praise of men so that they may be looked upon as pious people, as men of learning, as great leaders, as clever lawyers, as people of boundless and distinguished merit, or deserving of high consideration; while they cannot bear an insult or a rebuke; or they cover up their faults and make a show of their fine qualities” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Condemn, Avoid and Flee from these False Wisdoms
“With Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Wisdom, we must detest and condemn these three kinds of false wisdom―earthly, sensual and devilish―if we wish to acquire the true one which does not seek its own interest, which is not found on this Earth nor in the heart of those who lead a comfortable life, but which abhors all that which is great and high in the estimation of men” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Natural Wisdom and Scientific Wisdom
“In addition to the earthly wisdom which is pernicious and to be condemned there is the natural wisdom of philosophers. This wisdom was eagerly sought after by the Egyptians and the Greeks; ‘The Greeks seek after wisdom’ (1 Corinthians 1:22). Those among them who had acquired it were called Magi or Wise Men. This wisdom is an eminent knowledge of nature and its elements. It was given in full to Adam, in his innocence; it was abundantly bestowed upon Solomon, and, after him, several great men have shared it, as history testifies.
“Philosophers boast of their philosophical reasoning as being the means to acquire this wisdom. Scientists boast of the secrets in which they imagine this natural wisdom is to be found. It is true that Scholastic Philosophy when studied in a Christian spirit develops the mind and enables it to understand the higher sciences, but it will never bring us to the so‑called natural wisdom so much renowned in antiquity. The true scientist realizes that his ability is a gift of God and that he must prove himself worthy of it by dedicated Christian labor and prayer. True science must always seek to honor Jesus Christ, Incarnate Wisdom, in whom are all the treasures of the wisdom and knowledge of God, all the ties of nature, of grace and glory. The scientist must obey the Holy Spirit, Who warns him: ‘Seek not the things that are too high for thee’ (Ecclesiasticus 3:22). Let us, therefore, remain with Jesus Christ, Eternal Wisdom. Away from Him there is but wandering, untruth and death. ‘I am the way, the truth and the life!’ (John 14:6).” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Seeking and Uniting Ourselves with the Eternal Wisdom―Jesus Christ
St. Louis continues: “Divine Wisdom now exhorts all men to forsake everything and to desire Him alone. St. Augustine tells us that He gives Himself to those only who wish to possess Him and who seek Him with all the zeal worthy of such a great treasure. Therefore, no defiled thing comes unto Him. To acquire Eternal Wisdom we must seek Him ardently, that is, we must be willing to abandon all, to suffer all, and to undertake all things in order to possess Him. There are but few who find Him because there are but few who seek Him in a manner worthy of Him. Threefold is the misfortune, during life, of those who do not take the trouble to acquire Wisdom. They fall: (1), into ignorance and blindness; (2) into foolishness; (3) into scandal and sin. But what will be their misfortune at the moment of death? What will be their misfortune in Hell? … Let us, then, long for Divine Wisdom and seek Him alone! We can desire nothing better than Wisdom!” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
The Effects of Divine Wisdom
“When Divine Wisdom enters into a soul He brings to it a variety and an abundance of good things, and imparts to it innumerable riches. Eternal Wisdom communicates to the soul that possesses Him His all‑enlightening spirit. He communicates to man the great science of the saints, and also natural sciences, even of the most mysterious, when such knowledge is expedient for them. Wisdom not only gives man a light to know the truth, but also a wonderful capacity for making truth known to others. Wisdom knows what is to be said, and He communicates the talent to say it well … The words which the Divine Wisdom communicates are not common, natural and human words, they are the words of God. They are strong, effective, piercing words; ‘more piercing than any two‑edged sword’ (Hebrews 4:12); shooting forth from the heart of him by whom He speaks and penetrating the heart of him who hears them.
“He will speak until the consummation of the world, by the mouth of those to whom He will communicate Himself … Our Lord promised the Apostles: ‘I will give you a mouth and wisdom which your adversaries will not be able to resist’ (Luke 21:15) … How few are the preachers today who possess this ineffable gift of eloquence and who can say with St. Paul: ‘We speak the wisdom of God’ … Most of them speak from the natural knowledge of their intellect, or from what they have borrowed from books; not from the love which Divine Wisdom has put into their hearts; nor from the divine abundance which Wisdom has communicated to them. Hence it is that now we hear of so few conversions brought about by preaching. If a preacher had truly received from Divine Wisdom this gift of eloquence, his listeners could scarcely resist his words, any more than could have those who listened to Eternal Wisdom speaking through the mouth of St. Stephen. ‘Those who listened were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit that spoke’ (Acts 6:10). Such a speaker would speak with so much unction and authority, that his words would not become empty or unavailing.
“When Eternal Wisdom communicates Himself to a soul He confers upon it the gifts of the Holy Spirit and all the great virtues in an eminent degree. That is, He bestows the theological virtues: faith, hope, charity; the cardinal virtues: temperance, prudence, justice, fortitude; moral virtues, such as: religion, humility, meekness, obedience, detachment, mortification, prayer. Eternal Wisdom is ‘more active than all active things’ (Wisdom 7:24); He does not allow those who enjoy His friendship to languish in sloth and negligence. He sets them on fire and makes them do great things for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Testing Wisdom
“To test and prove them and make them worthy of Him, He gives them occasion for great combats and keeps in store for them contradictions and crosses in almost everything they undertake. He allows the devil to tempt them, the world to calumniate and abuse them, their enemies to have the upper hand and to crush them, their friends and relatives to forsake and betray them. Sometimes, He will cause them to suffer the loss of their goods or of their health; at other times He will load them with reproach, sadness and despondency. In a word, He will try them variously in the crucible of tribulation ‘but’ the Holy Spirit reminds us, ‘afflicted in few things, in many they shall be rewarded, because God has tried them and found them worthy of Himself. As gold in the furnace He has proved them; and as a victim of a holocaust He has received them; and in time there shall be respect had to them.’ …
“Let us exclaim then: A thousand times happy is the man into whose soul Wisdom has come to dwell! In whatever battles he has to wage he will be victorious; from whatever dangers threaten him he will escape; in whatever sorrows afflict him he will have joy and comfort; and through whatever humiliations he passes, he will be exalted and glorified in time and in eternity.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Article 11
Thursday January 4th & Friday January 5th
Wise Men Seek Christ
Thursday January 4th & Friday January 5th
Wise Men Seek Christ
Whom Do You Seek?
On the eve of His Passion and Death, when praying in agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, Our Lord was approached by the soldiers and temple police in the Garden of Gethsemane: “Judas having received a band of soldiers and servants from the Chief Priests and the Pharisees, came there with lanterns and torches and weapons. Jesus, knowing all things that should come upon Him, went forth and said to them: ‘Whom seek ye?’ They answered Him: ‘Jesus of Nazareth!’ Jesus said to them: ‘I am He!’ And Judas also, who betrayed Him, stood with them. As soon as He had said to them: ‘I am He!’ they went backward and fell to the ground. Therefore, He again asked them: ‘Whom seek ye?’ And they said: ‘Jesus of Nazareth!’ Jesus answered: ‘I have told you that I am He!’” (John 18:3-8).
They had come to seek Him for the wrong reasons! They had come to arrest, imprison and kill Him rather than be helped and saved by Him―because the Chief Priests, Scribes and Pharisees felt threatened by Him―hence it was they plotted to kill Him: “The chief priests and ancients of the people were gathered together in the court of the High Priest, who was called Caiphas, and they consulted together, that, by subtlety, they might apprehend Jesus and put Him to death” (Matthew 26:3-4). “The Chief Priests and the Scribes sought how they might put Jesus to death” (Luke 22:2). “The Chief Priests and the Pharisees gathered a council, and said: ‘What do we do? For this Man does many miracles! If we leave Him alone, then all will believe in Him and the Romans will come and take away our place and nation!’ But one of them, named Caiphas, being the High Priest that year, said to them: ‘You know nothing! Neither do you consider that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not!’” (John 11:47-50).
Similarly, at the time of His birth in Bethlehem, King Herod also felt that his kingship and reign was threatened when he was told of the birth of the King of the Jews. He, too, sought to have this threat removed by attempting to kill the Baby Jesus as soon as he found out where he was. Herod’s actions led to the infamous massacre of the Holy Innocents of Bethlehem, while the Baby Jesus was fleeing into Egypt with Mary and Joseph.
Likewise today, there are the Elite ruling powers with all their subsidiary organizations that seek Christ in order to destroy Him and His Church. They have stated their agenda centuries ago and have been slowly, but surely, tightened their grip on Christ’s Church and are trying to strangle life out of it.
Scripture speaks of all these―and any who choose to follow them― saying: “Why have the Gentiles raged, and the people devised vain things? The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, saying: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’ He that dwells in Heaven shall laugh at them and the Lord shall deride them! Then shall he speak to them in His anger and trouble them in His rage!” (Psalm 2:1-5).
Few truly seek in all sincerity today! How true are the word of Scripture for our days: “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. God hath scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God hath despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6).
We Were Made to Seek God
“Ask, and it shall be given you! Seek, and you shall find! Knock, and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7). “When they had found Jesus, they said to Him: ‘All seek for thee!’” (Mark 1:37). Are we truly seeking God? Are we truly seeking Christ? Are we truly seeking Heaven? Are we truly seeking our salvation? Are we truly seeking holiness? As the philosophical axiom so correctly states: “He who seeks the end (the goal, the target), must also necessarily seek the means to that end (goal, target).”
The greatest of all commandments is to love God with our whole mind, heart, soul and strength: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31)―but we cannot love what we do not know; and we will never get to really know Him if we neglect to seek Him. We speak of “seeking knowledge” and this all the more true and necessary with regard to God―we must seek to know Him more in order to love Him more.
God has done a phenomenal amount of things for each and every one of us―despite our sinfulness. Without His assistance there is no chance of saving our souls― “Without Me”, says Christ, “You can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Nevertheless, God will not lay everything “on a plate” and “spoon-feed” us, while do little or nothing on our part. As St. Augustine said: “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us!” Some translate the Latin into the singular: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, but God will not save you without your cooperation. Hence we are told: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Seek God Above All Things
Part of the early stages in “working out our salvation” is the work we have to put into seeking and knowing God―for we cannot love what we do not know and we will love only a little what we know little about. That is why the Catechism tells us: “You were made to know, love and serve God!” We cannot love what we do not know―we will find it hard to serve someone whom we do not love! Hence the importance of seeking God and seeking Christ, much more than seeking out the things and pleasures of this world. If we love the world, we cannot love God: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
“The Lord hath looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God” (Psalms 13:2). “For all seek the things that are their own―not the things that are Jesus Christ’s” (Philippians 2:21). “Do I seek to please men? If I seek to please men, then I should not be the servant of Christ!” (Galatians 1:10). “You receive glory one from another―and the glory which is from God alone, you do not seek!” (John 5:44). “If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above―where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth!” (Colossians 3:1). “Give therefore your hearts and your souls, to seek the Lord your God!” (1 Paralipomenon 22:19).
“Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice!” (Luke 12:31). “Be not anxious, saying: ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek! Your Father knows that you have need of all these things! Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and His justice―and these things shall be added into thee!” (Matthew 6:31-33).
Self-Seekers Not God-Seekers
Sadly―as Judgment Day will show―most souls are self-seekers and not God-seekers. Self comes before God. Self interests come before the interests of God. Self is given far more attention than God. Even among Catholics this is the case―not just Liberal and Modernist Catholics, but also Conservative and Traditional Catholics. Our Lord’s words apply most appropriately to them: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
We should be placing our eggs in the basket of God and not the basket of the world: “We have not here a lasting city, but we seek one that is to come!” (Hebrews 13:14). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). Unfortunately, “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times! Men shall be lovers of themselves … lovers of pleasures more than of God! Having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof! Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5).
Our grave mistake is that we love the world―we do not really see the world as being all that evil―despite being told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Satan―whom Our Lord calls the “prince of this world” (John 14:30), continually dangles his world and its allurements before our eyes and entangle us in its snares: “Every man is tempted by his own concupiscence, being drawn away and allured. Then, when concupiscence has been conceived, it brings forth sin. But sin, when it is completed, it begets death!” (James 1:14-15).
If we had a true love of God, then would not love ourselves exaggeratedly, not would we love the world so foolishly! “Let no man seek his own … Charity seeks not her own and is not ambitious” (1 Corinthians 10:24; 13:4-5). Charity is, first of all and above all, God-centered―seeking to love God above all things with all the heart, mind soul and strength (Matthew 22:37-40). The chief focus of charity is the next world, not this world―which echoes what Our Lady said to St. Bernadette of Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next life!”
Are You of Heaven or Earth?
“He that comes from above, is above all. He that is of the Earth, of the Earth he is, and of the Earth he speaks. He that comes from Heaven, is above all!” (John 3:31). “They are of the world—therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them! We are of God. He that knows God, hears us. He that is not of God, hears us not. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error” (1 John 4:5-6).
True happiness is only found in Heaven―not in this world. Our Lord Himself says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 8:23; 18:36). To the worldlings He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
Christ “gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present wicked world” (Galatians 1:4). Yet few there are who allow themselves to be delivered―few there are that follow Him to Heaven. “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it! … Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’” (Matthew 7:13-14; Luke 13:23-24).
To those who love the world in place of God, Our Lord says: “You shall seek me, and shall not find Me―and where I am, there you cannot come! ... You shall seek me, and you shall die in your sin! Where I go, you cannot come!” (John 7:34; 8:21). “When the master of the house shall go inside and shut the door, you shall stand outside and knock on the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!’ And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:21-23; 22:14).
Our Lady Laments the State of the Church
Our Lady, in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, referred to St. John the Baptist in the following words: “He made no peace with the human flesh, nor partook of its poison, nor allowed vanity to enter his senses, nor obstruct his eyes―in abhorrence of the world and of worldly things, he gave his life for justice. The citizen of the true Jerusalem cannot be in peace or in alliance with Babylon; nor is it possible to enjoy at the same time the grace of the Most High and the friendship of his declared enemies; for no one can serve two hostile masters, nor can light and darkness, Christ and Belial, harmonize.”
Our Lady Laments the State of the Clergy
Our Lady then goes on to lament the pathetic spiritual levels that are everywhere to be found in the Catholic Church―beginning with the clergy: “Deplore the difference between the state of the Holy Church in our times and that of those primitive times! The ancient beauty, in which the Apostles founded the Church, is lost! In the beginnings of the evangelical Church, the Lord showed His kindness by great miracles and wonders―frequently sending the Holy Ghost in a visible manner, working miracles in those who accepted the Creed. Today the Church seeks deceitful powders [cosmetics] and paints, in order to cover the horrid ugliness of vice. To the greater confusion of the negligent ministers of the Church in our days, I desire that they might all be angelic, rather than merely human in their holiness and perfection! If only they would not pervert the order established by God and lived up to the dignity to which they are called and chosen before all others.
The priests of the Lord should raise the people to the holiness, which is due to priesthood. The sacerdotal dignity and the precious vestments of virtue are soiled by contagion with the worldly; the anointed of the Lord, consecrated solely to His worship and service, have lapsed from their noble and godlike station; they have lost their beauty in debasing themselves to vile actions, unworthy of their exalted position among men. They love vanity; they indulge greed and avarice; they serve their own interest; they love money, they place their hopes in treasures of silver and gold; they submit to the flatteries and to the slavery of the worldly and powerful; and, to their still lower degradation, they subject themselves to the petty whims of women.
“There is hardly a sheep in the fold of Christ [the faithful in the Church], who recognizes in these bishops and priest the voice of its true Pastor [Christ], or receives from them the nourishment of virtue and holiness, which they should show forth. How shall the heavenly Physician confide to such administrators the medicine of life? Or how can these guilty ones intercede and mediate mercy for those who are less, or even equally, guilty? Let thy tears flow over this loss and ruin! These are the reasons why the prelates and priests of our times do not perform the miracles of the Apostles and disciples―and those others in the primitive Church who imitated their lives by an ardent zeal for the honor of the Lord and the conversion of souls.
“On this account the treasures of the Blood and death of Christ in the Church do not bear the same fruits, either in His priests and ministers, nor in the other mortals! For if they neglect and forget to make them fruitful in themselves―then how can they expect them to flow over on the rest of the human family? On this account the infidels are not converted on learning of the true Faith, although they live within sight of the princes of the Church, the ministers and preachers of the Gospel. The Church in our times is richer in buildings, temporal goods, rents [income] and possessions; it abounds with educated and learned men, great prelacies, and multiplied dignities. As all these advantages are due to the Blood of Christ, they ought all to be used in His honor and service, promoting the conversion of souls, supporting and helping His poor and enhancing the worship and veneration of His Holy Name. Is this the use made of the temporal riches of the Church?
“Do not be surprised that the Catholic Church, once having had such an exalted position in its beginnings, should now be brought to such low level, nor be astonished that God has so much forsaken the prelates, ministers and preachers of his word, who are concerned about outward show and like worldly applause too much! There are some priests and ministers, who are not infected with these lamentable vices. With those that are zealous, God is most generous―but they are few in number, as can be seen from the ruin of the Christian people and from the contempt into which the priests and preachers of the Gospel have fallen. For if the number of the perfect and the zealous workers were great, then without a doubt sinners would reform and amend their lives; many infidels would be converted; all would look upon and hear with reverence and fear such preachers, priests and prelates, they would respect them for their dignity and holiness, and not for their worldly talents. Hence bewail such a sad state, and invite Heaven and Earth to help thee in thy weeping―for there are few who feel sorrow about this state of affairs! This is the greatest of all the injuries committed against the Lord by the children of the Church.”
Our Lady Laments the State of the Laity
Our Lady then laments the pitiful state of the laity: “Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become so measureless, there are those who think that also the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be. To what is to be attributed the loss of so many souls and the ruin of the Christian people? Why is it that the infidels not only do not enter the Church? Why is it that the prelates and ministers do not shine before the world, exhibiting the splendours of Christ, as in the ages gone by and in the primitive Church? Consider the wicked disposition of mortals in the present age, in which the Gospel has been spread and confirmed by so many miracles. In spite of all this, there are so few who are perfect and who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption.
“Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. Affection toward higher things could raise them above their worldliness … but their inclinations and their blind love of visible things, detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart! The wisdom of the sons of this world is carnal and diabolical, and their ways lead to death.
“Worldly wisdom looks upon the person, not at the state of the souls, nor at virtue, but at outward ostentation. Each one ordinarily seeks to advance his honor and vainglory, struggling to be applauded and renowned. The learned and those who think themselves wise, wish to be applauded and looked up to, bragging about their knowledge. The unlearned try to appear wise. The rich glory in their riches and wish to be respected on that account. The poor strive to be and appear rich, anxious to gain the approval of the wealthy. The powerful seek to be feared, worshiped and obeyed.
“All of them are pursuing the same deceit of seeking to appear what they are not in fact, and fail in reality to come up to what they appear to be. The learned and wise, and the powerful of this world, so reluctantly correct and amend their lives. They play-down their faults, extol their virtues and abilities, they attribute to themselves the goods and the blessings, as if they had not received them from God. How many men whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―on account of the lack of light of Faith, from the darkness of their unbelief―have thrown themselves into most abominable sins, and thence into the eternal darkness of Hell!”
“Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error, who, desiring to appear wise, speak much and multiply words like the foolish. They only lose what they strive so much to attain, since they become known as foolish. All these vices arise from the pride rooted in human nature. Be mindful of this dangerous human folly. Abhor human ostentation. Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, its laughing as sorrow, sensible enjoyment as self deceit, as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom. The Creator cannot hate the beings which He has created; but He knows, in His wisdom, the boundless damage caused in mortals by avarice and covetousness of visible things; and that this insane love would pervert the greater part of the human nature. The wisdom of the flesh has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
On the eve of His Passion and Death, when praying in agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, Our Lord was approached by the soldiers and temple police in the Garden of Gethsemane: “Judas having received a band of soldiers and servants from the Chief Priests and the Pharisees, came there with lanterns and torches and weapons. Jesus, knowing all things that should come upon Him, went forth and said to them: ‘Whom seek ye?’ They answered Him: ‘Jesus of Nazareth!’ Jesus said to them: ‘I am He!’ And Judas also, who betrayed Him, stood with them. As soon as He had said to them: ‘I am He!’ they went backward and fell to the ground. Therefore, He again asked them: ‘Whom seek ye?’ And they said: ‘Jesus of Nazareth!’ Jesus answered: ‘I have told you that I am He!’” (John 18:3-8).
They had come to seek Him for the wrong reasons! They had come to arrest, imprison and kill Him rather than be helped and saved by Him―because the Chief Priests, Scribes and Pharisees felt threatened by Him―hence it was they plotted to kill Him: “The chief priests and ancients of the people were gathered together in the court of the High Priest, who was called Caiphas, and they consulted together, that, by subtlety, they might apprehend Jesus and put Him to death” (Matthew 26:3-4). “The Chief Priests and the Scribes sought how they might put Jesus to death” (Luke 22:2). “The Chief Priests and the Pharisees gathered a council, and said: ‘What do we do? For this Man does many miracles! If we leave Him alone, then all will believe in Him and the Romans will come and take away our place and nation!’ But one of them, named Caiphas, being the High Priest that year, said to them: ‘You know nothing! Neither do you consider that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not!’” (John 11:47-50).
Similarly, at the time of His birth in Bethlehem, King Herod also felt that his kingship and reign was threatened when he was told of the birth of the King of the Jews. He, too, sought to have this threat removed by attempting to kill the Baby Jesus as soon as he found out where he was. Herod’s actions led to the infamous massacre of the Holy Innocents of Bethlehem, while the Baby Jesus was fleeing into Egypt with Mary and Joseph.
Likewise today, there are the Elite ruling powers with all their subsidiary organizations that seek Christ in order to destroy Him and His Church. They have stated their agenda centuries ago and have been slowly, but surely, tightened their grip on Christ’s Church and are trying to strangle life out of it.
Scripture speaks of all these―and any who choose to follow them― saying: “Why have the Gentiles raged, and the people devised vain things? The kings of the Earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord and against His Christ, saying: ‘Let us break Their bonds asunder and let us cast away Their yoke from us!’ He that dwells in Heaven shall laugh at them and the Lord shall deride them! Then shall he speak to them in His anger and trouble them in His rage!” (Psalm 2:1-5).
Few truly seek in all sincerity today! How true are the word of Scripture for our days: “The Lord has looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together! The fool has said in his heart: ‘There is no God!’ There is no fear of God before their eyes! They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their ways―there is none that does good, no, not one! Their throat is an open sepulcher―with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips! Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness! Their feet are swift to shed blood! Destruction and unhappiness in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear. God hath scattered the bones of them that please men! They have been confounded, because God hath despised them!” (Psalm 13:1-3; Psalm 52:1-6).
We Were Made to Seek God
“Ask, and it shall be given you! Seek, and you shall find! Knock, and it shall be opened to you!” (Matthew 7:7). “When they had found Jesus, they said to Him: ‘All seek for thee!’” (Mark 1:37). Are we truly seeking God? Are we truly seeking Christ? Are we truly seeking Heaven? Are we truly seeking our salvation? Are we truly seeking holiness? As the philosophical axiom so correctly states: “He who seeks the end (the goal, the target), must also necessarily seek the means to that end (goal, target).”
The greatest of all commandments is to love God with our whole mind, heart, soul and strength: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31)―but we cannot love what we do not know; and we will never get to really know Him if we neglect to seek Him. We speak of “seeking knowledge” and this all the more true and necessary with regard to God―we must seek to know Him more in order to love Him more.
God has done a phenomenal amount of things for each and every one of us―despite our sinfulness. Without His assistance there is no chance of saving our souls― “Without Me”, says Christ, “You can do nothing!” (John 15:5). Nevertheless, God will not lay everything “on a plate” and “spoon-feed” us, while do little or nothing on our part. As St. Augustine said: “God created us without us―but He did not will to save us without us!” Some translate the Latin into the singular: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, but God will not save you without your cooperation. Hence we are told: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12).
Seek God Above All Things
Part of the early stages in “working out our salvation” is the work we have to put into seeking and knowing God―for we cannot love what we do not know and we will love only a little what we know little about. That is why the Catechism tells us: “You were made to know, love and serve God!” We cannot love what we do not know―we will find it hard to serve someone whom we do not love! Hence the importance of seeking God and seeking Christ, much more than seeking out the things and pleasures of this world. If we love the world, we cannot love God: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4).
“The Lord hath looked down from Heaven upon the children of men, to see if there be any that understand and seek God” (Psalms 13:2). “For all seek the things that are their own―not the things that are Jesus Christ’s” (Philippians 2:21). “Do I seek to please men? If I seek to please men, then I should not be the servant of Christ!” (Galatians 1:10). “You receive glory one from another―and the glory which is from God alone, you do not seek!” (John 5:44). “If you be risen with Christ, seek the things that are above―where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God! Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the Earth!” (Colossians 3:1). “Give therefore your hearts and your souls, to seek the Lord your God!” (1 Paralipomenon 22:19).
“Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice!” (Luke 12:31). “Be not anxious, saying: ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek! Your Father knows that you have need of all these things! Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and His justice―and these things shall be added into thee!” (Matthew 6:31-33).
Self-Seekers Not God-Seekers
Sadly―as Judgment Day will show―most souls are self-seekers and not God-seekers. Self comes before God. Self interests come before the interests of God. Self is given far more attention than God. Even among Catholics this is the case―not just Liberal and Modernist Catholics, but also Conservative and Traditional Catholics. Our Lord’s words apply most appropriately to them: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8). “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
We should be placing our eggs in the basket of God and not the basket of the world: “We have not here a lasting city, but we seek one that is to come!” (Hebrews 13:14). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24). Unfortunately, “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times! Men shall be lovers of themselves … lovers of pleasures more than of God! Having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof! Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5).
Our grave mistake is that we love the world―we do not really see the world as being all that evil―despite being told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Satan―whom Our Lord calls the “prince of this world” (John 14:30), continually dangles his world and its allurements before our eyes and entangle us in its snares: “Every man is tempted by his own concupiscence, being drawn away and allured. Then, when concupiscence has been conceived, it brings forth sin. But sin, when it is completed, it begets death!” (James 1:14-15).
If we had a true love of God, then would not love ourselves exaggeratedly, not would we love the world so foolishly! “Let no man seek his own … Charity seeks not her own and is not ambitious” (1 Corinthians 10:24; 13:4-5). Charity is, first of all and above all, God-centered―seeking to love God above all things with all the heart, mind soul and strength (Matthew 22:37-40). The chief focus of charity is the next world, not this world―which echoes what Our Lady said to St. Bernadette of Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next life!”
Are You of Heaven or Earth?
“He that comes from above, is above all. He that is of the Earth, of the Earth he is, and of the Earth he speaks. He that comes from Heaven, is above all!” (John 3:31). “They are of the world—therefore of the world they speak, and the world hears them! We are of God. He that knows God, hears us. He that is not of God, hears us not. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error” (1 John 4:5-6).
True happiness is only found in Heaven―not in this world. Our Lord Himself says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 8:23; 18:36). To the worldlings He says: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!” (John 8:23). Concerning His followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
Christ “gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present wicked world” (Galatians 1:4). Yet few there are who allow themselves to be delivered―few there are that follow Him to Heaven. “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life: and few there are that find it! … Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’” (Matthew 7:13-14; Luke 13:23-24).
To those who love the world in place of God, Our Lord says: “You shall seek me, and shall not find Me―and where I am, there you cannot come! ... You shall seek me, and you shall die in your sin! Where I go, you cannot come!” (John 7:34; 8:21). “When the master of the house shall go inside and shut the door, you shall stand outside and knock on the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!’ And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ Not everyone that saith to Me: ‘Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:21-23; 22:14).
Our Lady Laments the State of the Church
Our Lady, in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, referred to St. John the Baptist in the following words: “He made no peace with the human flesh, nor partook of its poison, nor allowed vanity to enter his senses, nor obstruct his eyes―in abhorrence of the world and of worldly things, he gave his life for justice. The citizen of the true Jerusalem cannot be in peace or in alliance with Babylon; nor is it possible to enjoy at the same time the grace of the Most High and the friendship of his declared enemies; for no one can serve two hostile masters, nor can light and darkness, Christ and Belial, harmonize.”
Our Lady Laments the State of the Clergy
Our Lady then goes on to lament the pathetic spiritual levels that are everywhere to be found in the Catholic Church―beginning with the clergy: “Deplore the difference between the state of the Holy Church in our times and that of those primitive times! The ancient beauty, in which the Apostles founded the Church, is lost! In the beginnings of the evangelical Church, the Lord showed His kindness by great miracles and wonders―frequently sending the Holy Ghost in a visible manner, working miracles in those who accepted the Creed. Today the Church seeks deceitful powders [cosmetics] and paints, in order to cover the horrid ugliness of vice. To the greater confusion of the negligent ministers of the Church in our days, I desire that they might all be angelic, rather than merely human in their holiness and perfection! If only they would not pervert the order established by God and lived up to the dignity to which they are called and chosen before all others.
The priests of the Lord should raise the people to the holiness, which is due to priesthood. The sacerdotal dignity and the precious vestments of virtue are soiled by contagion with the worldly; the anointed of the Lord, consecrated solely to His worship and service, have lapsed from their noble and godlike station; they have lost their beauty in debasing themselves to vile actions, unworthy of their exalted position among men. They love vanity; they indulge greed and avarice; they serve their own interest; they love money, they place their hopes in treasures of silver and gold; they submit to the flatteries and to the slavery of the worldly and powerful; and, to their still lower degradation, they subject themselves to the petty whims of women.
“There is hardly a sheep in the fold of Christ [the faithful in the Church], who recognizes in these bishops and priest the voice of its true Pastor [Christ], or receives from them the nourishment of virtue and holiness, which they should show forth. How shall the heavenly Physician confide to such administrators the medicine of life? Or how can these guilty ones intercede and mediate mercy for those who are less, or even equally, guilty? Let thy tears flow over this loss and ruin! These are the reasons why the prelates and priests of our times do not perform the miracles of the Apostles and disciples―and those others in the primitive Church who imitated their lives by an ardent zeal for the honor of the Lord and the conversion of souls.
“On this account the treasures of the Blood and death of Christ in the Church do not bear the same fruits, either in His priests and ministers, nor in the other mortals! For if they neglect and forget to make them fruitful in themselves―then how can they expect them to flow over on the rest of the human family? On this account the infidels are not converted on learning of the true Faith, although they live within sight of the princes of the Church, the ministers and preachers of the Gospel. The Church in our times is richer in buildings, temporal goods, rents [income] and possessions; it abounds with educated and learned men, great prelacies, and multiplied dignities. As all these advantages are due to the Blood of Christ, they ought all to be used in His honor and service, promoting the conversion of souls, supporting and helping His poor and enhancing the worship and veneration of His Holy Name. Is this the use made of the temporal riches of the Church?
“Do not be surprised that the Catholic Church, once having had such an exalted position in its beginnings, should now be brought to such low level, nor be astonished that God has so much forsaken the prelates, ministers and preachers of his word, who are concerned about outward show and like worldly applause too much! There are some priests and ministers, who are not infected with these lamentable vices. With those that are zealous, God is most generous―but they are few in number, as can be seen from the ruin of the Christian people and from the contempt into which the priests and preachers of the Gospel have fallen. For if the number of the perfect and the zealous workers were great, then without a doubt sinners would reform and amend their lives; many infidels would be converted; all would look upon and hear with reverence and fear such preachers, priests and prelates, they would respect them for their dignity and holiness, and not for their worldly talents. Hence bewail such a sad state, and invite Heaven and Earth to help thee in thy weeping―for there are few who feel sorrow about this state of affairs! This is the greatest of all the injuries committed against the Lord by the children of the Church.”
Our Lady Laments the State of the Laity
Our Lady then laments the pitiful state of the laity: “Although the number of fools is so great and the vices are become so measureless, there are those who think that also the perfect are numerous―but there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be. To what is to be attributed the loss of so many souls and the ruin of the Christian people? Why is it that the infidels not only do not enter the Church? Why is it that the prelates and ministers do not shine before the world, exhibiting the splendours of Christ, as in the ages gone by and in the primitive Church? Consider the wicked disposition of mortals in the present age, in which the Gospel has been spread and confirmed by so many miracles. In spite of all this, there are so few who are perfect and who seek a greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption.
“Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment. Affection toward higher things could raise them above their worldliness … but their inclinations and their blind love of visible things, detains them and makes them hard and heavy of heart! The wisdom of the sons of this world is carnal and diabolical, and their ways lead to death.
“Worldly wisdom looks upon the person, not at the state of the souls, nor at virtue, but at outward ostentation. Each one ordinarily seeks to advance his honor and vainglory, struggling to be applauded and renowned. The learned and those who think themselves wise, wish to be applauded and looked up to, bragging about their knowledge. The unlearned try to appear wise. The rich glory in their riches and wish to be respected on that account. The poor strive to be and appear rich, anxious to gain the approval of the wealthy. The powerful seek to be feared, worshiped and obeyed.
“All of them are pursuing the same deceit of seeking to appear what they are not in fact, and fail in reality to come up to what they appear to be. The learned and wise, and the powerful of this world, so reluctantly correct and amend their lives. They play-down their faults, extol their virtues and abilities, they attribute to themselves the goods and the blessings, as if they had not received them from God. How many men whom the world has celebrated as great, powerful and wise―on account of the lack of light of Faith, from the darkness of their unbelief―have thrown themselves into most abominable sins, and thence into the eternal darkness of Hell!”
“Infinite is the number of those who are entangled in this dangerous error, who, desiring to appear wise, speak much and multiply words like the foolish. They only lose what they strive so much to attain, since they become known as foolish. All these vices arise from the pride rooted in human nature. Be mindful of this dangerous human folly. Abhor human ostentation. Consider all delights and joys of the world as insanity, its laughing as sorrow, sensible enjoyment as self deceit, as the source of foolishness, which intoxicates the heart and hinders and destroys all true wisdom. The Creator cannot hate the beings which He has created; but He knows, in His wisdom, the boundless damage caused in mortals by avarice and covetousness of visible things; and that this insane love would pervert the greater part of the human nature. The wisdom of the flesh has made men ignorant, foolish and hostile to God.” (Words of Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, from The Mystical City of God).
Article 10
Wednesday January 3rd
Are You Part of the Solution or Part of the Problem?
Wednesday January 3rd
Are You Part of the Solution or Part of the Problem?
No Neutrality
You have probably heard of the quote: “If you are not part of the solution, you must be part of the problem.” This is a misquotation of Eldridge Cleaver (1935-1998), who was a political activist and leader of the Black Panther Party, later becoming a GOP Conservative. The correct and full quote is: “There is no more neutrality in the world. You either have to be part of the solution, or you are going to be part of the problem.”
You have probably also heard of the quote--”There is nothing new under the sun!”—and this is also true of the previous quote by Cleaver. It could be argued that Our Lord already beat him to it, when He said: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!”—which also states that there can be no neutrality in this world.
No Compromise
Our Lord also rules out compromise, when He says: “No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will hold to the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Luke 16:13). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life and what you shall eat, nor for your body and what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat; and the body more than the clothing? Be not solicitous therefore, saying: ‘What shall we eat?” or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek! For your Father knows that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the Kingdom of God, and His justice―and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-34).
To try to love both God and the world is a spiritual adultery of sorts, of which St. James writes: “Adulterers, know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Wherefore St. John writes: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15).
Church Full of Compromise
Sadly, however, these words are ignored by most of the members of the Church, who seek, instead, to try and prove that you CAN love God and mammon; that you CAN be Catholic and worldly; that you CAN take and enjoy all that the world offers and still get to Heaven. Our Lady of Akita, speaking in 1973 of our times, said: “The Church will be full of those who accept compromises!” While Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette warns: “Moreover, in these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … People will think of nothing but amusement!” Which is why Our Lady of Fatima told Blessed Jacinta Marto of Fatima to “Fly from riches and luxury; love poverty and silence!”
Those instructions of Our Lady would have been easier to fulfill back in 1917, but now, over a hundred years later and after the last 50 years of massive advances in ‘mammon’ technology, how many are even considering such an option—poverty and silence—let alone complying with it? Nowadays it is more likely that Catholics flee poverty and silence and love riches, luxury, entertainment and endless talk on the phone, social media, internet, etc.! In doing this, they become the problem that causes, and not the solution that averts, what ails the world and what is about to happen to the world.
Consequence of Compromise
To such persons, Our Lord will say: “And why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say? Everyone that comes to Me, and hears My words, and does them, I will show you to whom he is like. He is like to a man building a house, who dug deep, and laid the foundation upon a rock. And when a flood came, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and it could not shake it; because it was founded on a rock. But he that hears, and does not, is like to a man building his house upon the soil without a foundation: against which the stream beat vehemently, and immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great!” (Luke 6:46-49).
St. Matthew similarly recounts: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them [the bad tree is the problem, the good tree the solution]. Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone, therefore, that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these My words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:16-27).
The problem is that most have heard the word of the Lord and have done little or nothing about it; whereas rare and few is the number of souls who have heard the word of the Lord and put it into practice—they are the solution, but it looks like being too little too late, or a dollar short and a day late! What could have been avoided is no longer avoidable―all we can do now is soften the blow and mitigate the consequences. Even the Liberal Pope John Paul II admitted that at Fulda, Germany, in 1980, where he spoke of the Third Secret of Fatima to a small group of Catholics.
Pope John Paul II said: “Given the seriousness of the contents [of the Third Secret of Fatima], my predecessors in the Petrine office diplomatically preferred to postpone publication so as not to encourage the world power of Communism to make certain moves. On the other hand, it should be sufficient for all Christians to know this: if there is a message in which it is written that the oceans will flood whole areas of the Earth, and that from one moment to the next millions of people will perish, truly the publication of such a message is no longer something to be so much desired. Many wish to know simply from curiosity and a taste for the sensational, but they forget that knowledge also implies responsibility. They only seek the satisfaction of their curiosity, and that is dangerous if at the same time they are not disposed to do something, and if they are convinced that it is impossible to do anything against evil.” At this point the Pope grasped a Rosary and said: “Here is the remedy against this evil. Pray, pray, and ask for nothing more. Leave everything else to the Mother of God. We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ … With your and my prayer it is possible to mitigate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectively renewed. How many times has the renewal of the Church sprung from blood! This time, too, it will not be otherwise. We must be strong and prepared, and trust in Christ and His Mother, and be very, very assiduous in praying the Rosary.”
Only Two Camps—Solutions and Problems
“There is no more neutrality in the world. You either have to be part of the solution, or you are going to be part of the problem.” This is one of the duality quotes, where you are sorted into one of two camps—there is no third option, no neutrality, not spectating. You are either in the “solution camp” or the “problem camp.” You can transpose that to the camps of Christ and Satan, Heaven and Hell, the saved and the damned, the good and the bad, etc.
The “Two Standards” of St. Ignatius of Loyola
Jesus contrasted his way to the way of the world quite emphatically: “He who is not with me is against Me” (Luke 11:23). In his book, Spiritual Exercises, St. Ignatius of Loyola helps us apply this phrase of Our Lord’s to ourselves, in a key meditation in the Spiritual Exercises called “A Meditation on the Two Standards”—a “standard”, in this case, meaning a flag, not a level of achievement. St. Ignatius believed that there is a battle between good and evil going on in the world and in our hearts. It is important that we are aware of this battle and acknowledge this battle. In this meditation on the “Two Standards”, St. Ignatius instructs us to imagine the armies of Christ and Satan in a big field. Each group has a standard or flag, which helps everyone know his position on the battlefield.
Jesus the Solution—the Way of the World the Problem
Every person has to choose where they are going to stand—with Jesus or with the world. No matter what the particular role or job in life we have been given by God’s Providence, once we are baptized and confirmed we are called to stand in Jesus’ company under his flag or banner or standard. The meditation on the “Two Standards” is one of the key moments in the Spiritual Exercises. We are invited to imagine two armies on a battlefield. One under Satan’s standard; the other under Christ’s standard. Each army operates in completely different ways with sharply contrasting values.
The actual text of St. Ignatius for this meditation on the “Two Standards”, reads as follows:
“Christ calls and wants all under His standard; and Lucifer, on the contrary, under his standard … It will be here good to see a great field of all that region of Jerusalem, where the supreme Commander-in-chief of the good is Christ our Lord; another field in the region of Babylon, where the chief of the enemy is Lucifer ... I have to ask myself what I want: and it will be here to ask for knowledge of the deceits of the bad chief and help to guard myself against them, and for knowledge of the true life which the supreme and true Captain shows and grace to imitate Him. The first point of the meditation is to imagine as if the chief of all the enemy seated himself in that great field of Babylon, as in a great chair of fire and smoke, in shape horrible and terrifying. The second point to consider is how he issues a summons to innumerable demons and how he scatters them, some to one city and others to another, and so through all the world, not omitting any provinces, places, states, nor any persons in particular. The third point to consider is the discourse which he makes them, and how he tells them to cast out nets and chains; that they have first to tempt with a longing for riches—as he is accustomed to do in most cases—that men may more easily come to vain honor of the world, and then to vast pride. So that the first step shall be that of riches; the second, that of honor; the third, that of pride; and from these three steps he draws on to all the other vices.
“So, on the contrary, one has to imagine as to the supreme and true Captain, Who is Christ our Lord. The first point is to consider how Christ our Lord puts Himself in a great field of that region of Jerusalem, in lowly place, beautiful and attractive. The second point to consider is how the Lord of all the world chooses so many persons—Apostles, Disciples, etc., —and sends them through all the world spreading His sacred doctrine through all states and conditions of persons. The third point to consider is the discourse which Christ our Lord makes to all His servants and friends whom He sends on this expedition, recommending them to want to help all, by bringing them, first, to the highest spiritual poverty, and—if His Divine Majesty would be served and would want to choose them—no less to actual poverty in material things; the second is to be of scorn and contempt; because from these two things humility follows. So that there are to be three steps; the first, poverty against riches; the second, scorn or contempt against worldly honor; the third, humility against pride. And from these three steps let them induce to all the other virtues.”
St. Ignatius—the former soldier—was particularly sensitive to the constant battle being waged within the world between the God who created us with dignity and the forces of evil which look to pervert that dignity to selfish ends. Human beings either praise, reverence, and serve God—thus becoming who they were created to be—or they follow a lie and begin to break themselves down in the core of their being, becoming worldly in spirit while trying to maintain a façade of Christianity. In this meditation we imagine these opposed paths of life as two armies encamped against each other, led by Christ on one hand, and Satan, the prince of lies, on the other.
The Problem of Satan
Firstly, St. Ignatius gets us to focus on Satan. He describes a fearful image of Satan sitting on his throne of fire and smoke and instructing his followers to go out into the world and ensnare our hearts so that we are not open to God’s will. To trap us, he uses wealth, possessions, honors, and pride. Satan starts by getting us to fixate on our possessions. Satan wants our wealth and possessions to become the focus of our lives, and worldly success to be the goal of our lives.
Satan also whispers to us that we need the praise and acceptance of others, and tells us that because of our successes, we deserve honors. Finally, Satan tries to convince us that we did it by ourselves. He tells us to be proud of what we have accomplished. He wants us to adopt the attitude of “Look at me! Look at what I have! Look at what I know! Look at what I can do!” With some, Satan will have they boast of this outwardly; with others he will have them merely think it inwardly. Generally, he will tempt the cholerics and sanguines to an outward manifestation of pride, while tempting the melancholics and phlegmatics to an interior manifestation of pride.
The Solution of Christ
Then, on the other hand, St. Ignatius gets us to consider Christ as He stands on the great battlefield in a lowly place. We are to listen as Christ instructs His followers to go out into the world and lead everyone to freedom from the world and the devil. On Christ’s standard we see spiritual poverty, insults, and humility. These lead to true freedom.
Spiritual poverty means we live a life recognizing and accepting that all that we have is a gift from God. Possessions are not something to be worshipped. In regards to insults, Ignatius tells us that we are to let God’s love lead us through the illusion of self-satisfaction and approval of others to a life of serving others. We are called to a life of selflessness, and such a life will put us at odds with the world, which could result in insults and rejection. Finally, Christ calls us to a life of humility, a life of unconditional love and service for God and others.
The purpose of this meditation is to help us understand the value systems of Christ and Satan and to see which value system we are living.
Bring Solutions and Creating Problems
We begin to move under Jesus’ standard when we join him in the living conviction that everything we have and are is God’s gift. However much or little we have, we say gratefully, “Look at all God has given me!” Then the way opens through the smoke of self-satisfaction to the approval of others. “How can I help?” becomes a daily preoccupation as we seek to bring and provide solutions to sin and the worldliness that leads to sin. And through a life of love and service, the Holy Ghost inspires and leads us to live as meekly and humbly as Our Lord lived—whether we are a famous or anonymous.
The way of the world, whose prince is the devil, differs entirely. The starting point is getting as much wealth as you can. Satan will firstly have you say: “Look at all this stuff I have!” Then, when the world’s way opens before you, Satan will make you shift your focus, saying: “Look at me with all this stuff I have!”As those around you grow more deferential and flattering, you start saying: “Look at me! Look at what I have! Look at what I know! Look at what I can do!” You become convinced (or would like to think) that you are the center of your world. You may not have sinned yet by these comments, but it is only a matter of time. You are a problem to yourself and a growing problem that will become a major problem to others—by leading or turning or distracting them from God.
Three Forms of Compromise with the World’s Standard
We can easily see from repeated experience—personal or in those around us—that the world’s standard is as inviting to Christ’s disciples as it is to anyone else. In a way, even after we have made a solemn, lifelong choice to follow Christ’s standard, we have to purify our daily life of compromise or collusion (secret agreement) with the world’s standard. This compromise, collusion or secret agreement comes in three forms.
The first form of compromise or collusion is seen in benign secularism—or, if you like, a naturalistic humanistic charity. Certainly, there are people who do not know Jesus Christ, yet who lead deeply good and honest lives. But even the baptized can live in a “benignly secular” way. We join civic movements, contribute to social causes, and help the needy—because that’s what our secular neighbors do. We are good to our families and honest in the workplace—because that’s basic human virtue. There is no immediate harm or evil in acting in this way, but neither is this anything supernatural, Christian, it is nothing more than a mere naturalistic secular spirit, even though people today like to call it “spirituality”.
The second form of compromise or collusion, seen particularly in the affluent first world, or western world, is the search for pleasure. We are surrounded by people who live, what St. Paul describes as, the way of the flesh ― “whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Philippians 3:19). Those who follow this way are the target of advertising and consumerism; they feel that they need to have whatever everyone else has right now. Their less lovely side manifests self-indulgence, lust, envy—all seen as acceptable social habits. The flesh has its own laws, and those who follow this way will readily obey those laws all the way into sin.
Finally, there is the compromise or collusion of succumbing to darkness and evil. This is not just pure Satanism, but also the things that destroy Christ in the soul and give place to the devil. Most of the works of darkness and evil are not manifest―for Satan prefers to stay hidden, because he can work more effectively when not seen. Hatred, vengeance, violence, self-destructive habits—these flourish in the dark corners of the sinful human self and grow voraciously the more they are fed. In your heart of hearts, you may loathe the dark and leap to the light. But in everyday life, you will find yourself in the twilight of “benign secularism” or “the flesh” over and over again, being seduced into states of compromise which you try to rationalize away.
The Emperor With No Clothes Problem!
We don’t like to think―let alone admit―that we might be a problem! The instinctive human reaction—as a consequence of Original Sin—is to blame everyone else and everything else! This mentality already started with Adam and Eve and it has been passed down in our ‘family genes’ for thousands of years--“She made me do it! He made me do it! The devil made me do it!” etc. If we are going to accept blame for anything, then we will be last in line, while first pointing the finger at everyone else, and it will only be a ‘co-blame’ that we will admit to, placing the greater fault on the other parties involved!
Like the emperor, in Hans Christian Andersen’s tale of “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, we imagine ourselves to be dressed with the finest virtues—whereas in reality we are almost naked! In Andersen’s tale there existed an emperor who loved wearing fine clothes and spent all of his people’s money on them. He had a different set for each hour and was, without doubt, the finest dressed man in the land. One day, two swindlers claiming to be weavers, entered the emperor’s city and proclaimed they were capable of making the finest, lightest, most magnificent cloth the world has ever seen. So extraordinary was this cloth, it was invisible to anyone who was incompetent or stupid.
Hearing of the weavers’ amazing ‘talent’ and not wanting to look stupid, the foolish emperor thought he could use such cloth to weed out undesirables in his city. He paid the swindlers an enormous sum and they set out to tailor clothes for the emperor from their invisible cloth; knowing they would only need go through the motions. The emperor sent several of his advisors to gauge their progress, who, not wanting to appear unworthy or stupid for seeing nothing at all, every one of the advisors reported the invisible cloth to be magnificent, even though the cloth didn’t even exist!
Finally the clothes were ‘finished’ and the swindlers, having already counted the gold and jewels they had received in advance, presented the invisible clothes to the emperor. A procession was arranged to show-off the emperor’s new clothes and the entire city gathered together to view them. Having been ‘dressed’ by the swindlers, who remarked how wonderful he looked in their invisible clothes, and how lightly the cloth sat upon him, he finally appeared before his people.
The people, having heard of the weavers’ abilities and the cloth’s fictitious properties, were amazed and offered thunderous applause to the now beaming emperor. None of them were willing to admit that they hadn’t seen a thing and that the emperor was in fact naked; for if anyone did, then he was either stupid, or unfit for the job he held. Never before had the emperor’s clothes met with such applause, praise and recognition. While expressing admiration at their emperor’s new ‘invisible’ clothes, a small boy cried out. “But the Emperor has no clothes on! He is naked!”
Apocalypse Reflects the Same Truth
In the Book of Apocalypse, we see something similar to the above tale of “The Emperor’s New Clothes” or “The Emperor With No Clothes”. The biblical passage, placing the words in the mouth of Christ, is as follows:
“I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth. Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire-tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see! Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
In other words, the passage is saying that we have an inflated, erroneous and imaginary idea of what we are like, which in no way conforms to reality. We imagine ourselves to be some kind of solution, whereas in actual fact we turn to be quite a problem! “Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!”—just like the “Emperor With No Clothes”!
Then the Apocalypse goes on to have Christ say: “Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock! If any man shall hear My voice, and open to me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me. To him that shall overcome, I will give to sit with Me in My throne: as I also have overcome, and am set down with My Father in his throne. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches!” (Apocalypse 3:20-22).
So What’s the Problem?
The basic problem is NOT ENOUGH LOVE OF GOD! That is where everyone has a problem and in that regard everyone is a problem. The command of Christ and Holy Scripture is clear: “And Jesus answered him: ‘The first commandment of all is, “Hear, O Israel: the Lord thy God is one God! And thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength!” This is the first commandment.’” (Mark 12:29-30). The commandment could not be any clearer—and it is clear that we do live up to that commandment. That is the basic problem behind all the problems we are currently experiencing and the even bigger problems “coming down the pike.”
Let us get one thing straight, “right-off-the bat”—loving God is not a lip-service of love, but it translates into action. The basic and lowest degree of love is the keeping of the Commandments of God: “If you love Me, keep My commandments! ... He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them; he it is that loveth Me!” (John 14:15; 14:21). The next level of love is to talk incessantly to One we love: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) … “We ought always to pray, and not to faint!” (Luke 18:1). The ultimate level of love is to suffer and die for God: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). There is very little of the first degree, even less of the second degree and barely any of the third degree of love to be found in the world today. The Commandments are frequently broken. Prayer is barely and badly said. Very few want to suffer for the Faith and Christ.
Who’s the Problem?
Most people realize there are major problems in the world today. Most people would never dream that they were part of those problems. Few people have any solutions to those problems. Fewer still, do anything about those problems.
As Our Lord was quoted as saying above: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). According to Our Lord, there are only two possible positions—to be with Him, or against Him. To be a solution or to be a problem. There is no spectatorship or neutrality or being a mere bystander. Neither is it enough to give Him mere lip-service: “And why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Those millions of lip-serving, world-loving Catholics that are all too common today, are not the solution which they should be, but they are the problem that they should not be! “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
The Problem is Faith Without Works
We live as though the entrance to Heaven depended upon a written exam! We are full of knowledge and little else! Faith is to do with knowledge, but Charity is greater than Faith and Charity should be the motive power behind works that come from Faith.
“What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he hath Faith, but hath not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it have not works, is dead in itself! But some man will say: ‘Thou hast Faith, and I have works!’ Show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith! Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well—the devils also believe and tremble! But wilt thou know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead? Do you see that by works a man is justified; and not by Faith only? … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead” (James 2:14-26).
The Problem is Works Without Charity
Yet Faith and works, if they are not done with Charity—that is to say, from the motive of a love of God—then both Faith and works are dead too! St. Paul clearly points this out: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
You have probably heard of the quote: “If you are not part of the solution, you must be part of the problem.” This is a misquotation of Eldridge Cleaver (1935-1998), who was a political activist and leader of the Black Panther Party, later becoming a GOP Conservative. The correct and full quote is: “There is no more neutrality in the world. You either have to be part of the solution, or you are going to be part of the problem.”
You have probably also heard of the quote--”There is nothing new under the sun!”—and this is also true of the previous quote by Cleaver. It could be argued that Our Lord already beat him to it, when He said: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!”—which also states that there can be no neutrality in this world.
No Compromise
Our Lord also rules out compromise, when He says: “No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he will hold to the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Luke 16:13). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon! Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life and what you shall eat, nor for your body and what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat; and the body more than the clothing? Be not solicitous therefore, saying: ‘What shall we eat?” or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘With what shall we be clothed?’ For after all these things do the heathens seek! For your Father knows that you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the Kingdom of God, and His justice―and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-34).
To try to love both God and the world is a spiritual adultery of sorts, of which St. James writes: “Adulterers, know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Wherefore St. John writes: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15).
Church Full of Compromise
Sadly, however, these words are ignored by most of the members of the Church, who seek, instead, to try and prove that you CAN love God and mammon; that you CAN be Catholic and worldly; that you CAN take and enjoy all that the world offers and still get to Heaven. Our Lady of Akita, speaking in 1973 of our times, said: “The Church will be full of those who accept compromises!” While Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette warns: “Moreover, in these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … People will think of nothing but amusement!” Which is why Our Lady of Fatima told Blessed Jacinta Marto of Fatima to “Fly from riches and luxury; love poverty and silence!”
Those instructions of Our Lady would have been easier to fulfill back in 1917, but now, over a hundred years later and after the last 50 years of massive advances in ‘mammon’ technology, how many are even considering such an option—poverty and silence—let alone complying with it? Nowadays it is more likely that Catholics flee poverty and silence and love riches, luxury, entertainment and endless talk on the phone, social media, internet, etc.! In doing this, they become the problem that causes, and not the solution that averts, what ails the world and what is about to happen to the world.
Consequence of Compromise
To such persons, Our Lord will say: “And why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say? Everyone that comes to Me, and hears My words, and does them, I will show you to whom he is like. He is like to a man building a house, who dug deep, and laid the foundation upon a rock. And when a flood came, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and it could not shake it; because it was founded on a rock. But he that hears, and does not, is like to a man building his house upon the soil without a foundation: against which the stream beat vehemently, and immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great!” (Luke 6:46-49).
St. Matthew similarly recounts: “By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree brings forth good fruit, and the evil tree brings forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them [the bad tree is the problem, the good tree the solution]. Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ Everyone, therefore, that hears these My words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded on a rock. And every one that hears these My words, and does them not, shall be like a foolish man that built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall thereof!” (Matthew 7:16-27).
The problem is that most have heard the word of the Lord and have done little or nothing about it; whereas rare and few is the number of souls who have heard the word of the Lord and put it into practice—they are the solution, but it looks like being too little too late, or a dollar short and a day late! What could have been avoided is no longer avoidable―all we can do now is soften the blow and mitigate the consequences. Even the Liberal Pope John Paul II admitted that at Fulda, Germany, in 1980, where he spoke of the Third Secret of Fatima to a small group of Catholics.
Pope John Paul II said: “Given the seriousness of the contents [of the Third Secret of Fatima], my predecessors in the Petrine office diplomatically preferred to postpone publication so as not to encourage the world power of Communism to make certain moves. On the other hand, it should be sufficient for all Christians to know this: if there is a message in which it is written that the oceans will flood whole areas of the Earth, and that from one moment to the next millions of people will perish, truly the publication of such a message is no longer something to be so much desired. Many wish to know simply from curiosity and a taste for the sensational, but they forget that knowledge also implies responsibility. They only seek the satisfaction of their curiosity, and that is dangerous if at the same time they are not disposed to do something, and if they are convinced that it is impossible to do anything against evil.” At this point the Pope grasped a Rosary and said: “Here is the remedy against this evil. Pray, pray, and ask for nothing more. Leave everything else to the Mother of God. We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ … With your and my prayer it is possible to mitigate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectively renewed. How many times has the renewal of the Church sprung from blood! This time, too, it will not be otherwise. We must be strong and prepared, and trust in Christ and His Mother, and be very, very assiduous in praying the Rosary.”
Only Two Camps—Solutions and Problems
“There is no more neutrality in the world. You either have to be part of the solution, or you are going to be part of the problem.” This is one of the duality quotes, where you are sorted into one of two camps—there is no third option, no neutrality, not spectating. You are either in the “solution camp” or the “problem camp.” You can transpose that to the camps of Christ and Satan, Heaven and Hell, the saved and the damned, the good and the bad, etc.
The “Two Standards” of St. Ignatius of Loyola
Jesus contrasted his way to the way of the world quite emphatically: “He who is not with me is against Me” (Luke 11:23). In his book, Spiritual Exercises, St. Ignatius of Loyola helps us apply this phrase of Our Lord’s to ourselves, in a key meditation in the Spiritual Exercises called “A Meditation on the Two Standards”—a “standard”, in this case, meaning a flag, not a level of achievement. St. Ignatius believed that there is a battle between good and evil going on in the world and in our hearts. It is important that we are aware of this battle and acknowledge this battle. In this meditation on the “Two Standards”, St. Ignatius instructs us to imagine the armies of Christ and Satan in a big field. Each group has a standard or flag, which helps everyone know his position on the battlefield.
Jesus the Solution—the Way of the World the Problem
Every person has to choose where they are going to stand—with Jesus or with the world. No matter what the particular role or job in life we have been given by God’s Providence, once we are baptized and confirmed we are called to stand in Jesus’ company under his flag or banner or standard. The meditation on the “Two Standards” is one of the key moments in the Spiritual Exercises. We are invited to imagine two armies on a battlefield. One under Satan’s standard; the other under Christ’s standard. Each army operates in completely different ways with sharply contrasting values.
The actual text of St. Ignatius for this meditation on the “Two Standards”, reads as follows:
“Christ calls and wants all under His standard; and Lucifer, on the contrary, under his standard … It will be here good to see a great field of all that region of Jerusalem, where the supreme Commander-in-chief of the good is Christ our Lord; another field in the region of Babylon, where the chief of the enemy is Lucifer ... I have to ask myself what I want: and it will be here to ask for knowledge of the deceits of the bad chief and help to guard myself against them, and for knowledge of the true life which the supreme and true Captain shows and grace to imitate Him. The first point of the meditation is to imagine as if the chief of all the enemy seated himself in that great field of Babylon, as in a great chair of fire and smoke, in shape horrible and terrifying. The second point to consider is how he issues a summons to innumerable demons and how he scatters them, some to one city and others to another, and so through all the world, not omitting any provinces, places, states, nor any persons in particular. The third point to consider is the discourse which he makes them, and how he tells them to cast out nets and chains; that they have first to tempt with a longing for riches—as he is accustomed to do in most cases—that men may more easily come to vain honor of the world, and then to vast pride. So that the first step shall be that of riches; the second, that of honor; the third, that of pride; and from these three steps he draws on to all the other vices.
“So, on the contrary, one has to imagine as to the supreme and true Captain, Who is Christ our Lord. The first point is to consider how Christ our Lord puts Himself in a great field of that region of Jerusalem, in lowly place, beautiful and attractive. The second point to consider is how the Lord of all the world chooses so many persons—Apostles, Disciples, etc., —and sends them through all the world spreading His sacred doctrine through all states and conditions of persons. The third point to consider is the discourse which Christ our Lord makes to all His servants and friends whom He sends on this expedition, recommending them to want to help all, by bringing them, first, to the highest spiritual poverty, and—if His Divine Majesty would be served and would want to choose them—no less to actual poverty in material things; the second is to be of scorn and contempt; because from these two things humility follows. So that there are to be three steps; the first, poverty against riches; the second, scorn or contempt against worldly honor; the third, humility against pride. And from these three steps let them induce to all the other virtues.”
St. Ignatius—the former soldier—was particularly sensitive to the constant battle being waged within the world between the God who created us with dignity and the forces of evil which look to pervert that dignity to selfish ends. Human beings either praise, reverence, and serve God—thus becoming who they were created to be—or they follow a lie and begin to break themselves down in the core of their being, becoming worldly in spirit while trying to maintain a façade of Christianity. In this meditation we imagine these opposed paths of life as two armies encamped against each other, led by Christ on one hand, and Satan, the prince of lies, on the other.
The Problem of Satan
Firstly, St. Ignatius gets us to focus on Satan. He describes a fearful image of Satan sitting on his throne of fire and smoke and instructing his followers to go out into the world and ensnare our hearts so that we are not open to God’s will. To trap us, he uses wealth, possessions, honors, and pride. Satan starts by getting us to fixate on our possessions. Satan wants our wealth and possessions to become the focus of our lives, and worldly success to be the goal of our lives.
Satan also whispers to us that we need the praise and acceptance of others, and tells us that because of our successes, we deserve honors. Finally, Satan tries to convince us that we did it by ourselves. He tells us to be proud of what we have accomplished. He wants us to adopt the attitude of “Look at me! Look at what I have! Look at what I know! Look at what I can do!” With some, Satan will have they boast of this outwardly; with others he will have them merely think it inwardly. Generally, he will tempt the cholerics and sanguines to an outward manifestation of pride, while tempting the melancholics and phlegmatics to an interior manifestation of pride.
The Solution of Christ
Then, on the other hand, St. Ignatius gets us to consider Christ as He stands on the great battlefield in a lowly place. We are to listen as Christ instructs His followers to go out into the world and lead everyone to freedom from the world and the devil. On Christ’s standard we see spiritual poverty, insults, and humility. These lead to true freedom.
Spiritual poverty means we live a life recognizing and accepting that all that we have is a gift from God. Possessions are not something to be worshipped. In regards to insults, Ignatius tells us that we are to let God’s love lead us through the illusion of self-satisfaction and approval of others to a life of serving others. We are called to a life of selflessness, and such a life will put us at odds with the world, which could result in insults and rejection. Finally, Christ calls us to a life of humility, a life of unconditional love and service for God and others.
The purpose of this meditation is to help us understand the value systems of Christ and Satan and to see which value system we are living.
Bring Solutions and Creating Problems
We begin to move under Jesus’ standard when we join him in the living conviction that everything we have and are is God’s gift. However much or little we have, we say gratefully, “Look at all God has given me!” Then the way opens through the smoke of self-satisfaction to the approval of others. “How can I help?” becomes a daily preoccupation as we seek to bring and provide solutions to sin and the worldliness that leads to sin. And through a life of love and service, the Holy Ghost inspires and leads us to live as meekly and humbly as Our Lord lived—whether we are a famous or anonymous.
The way of the world, whose prince is the devil, differs entirely. The starting point is getting as much wealth as you can. Satan will firstly have you say: “Look at all this stuff I have!” Then, when the world’s way opens before you, Satan will make you shift your focus, saying: “Look at me with all this stuff I have!”As those around you grow more deferential and flattering, you start saying: “Look at me! Look at what I have! Look at what I know! Look at what I can do!” You become convinced (or would like to think) that you are the center of your world. You may not have sinned yet by these comments, but it is only a matter of time. You are a problem to yourself and a growing problem that will become a major problem to others—by leading or turning or distracting them from God.
Three Forms of Compromise with the World’s Standard
We can easily see from repeated experience—personal or in those around us—that the world’s standard is as inviting to Christ’s disciples as it is to anyone else. In a way, even after we have made a solemn, lifelong choice to follow Christ’s standard, we have to purify our daily life of compromise or collusion (secret agreement) with the world’s standard. This compromise, collusion or secret agreement comes in three forms.
The first form of compromise or collusion is seen in benign secularism—or, if you like, a naturalistic humanistic charity. Certainly, there are people who do not know Jesus Christ, yet who lead deeply good and honest lives. But even the baptized can live in a “benignly secular” way. We join civic movements, contribute to social causes, and help the needy—because that’s what our secular neighbors do. We are good to our families and honest in the workplace—because that’s basic human virtue. There is no immediate harm or evil in acting in this way, but neither is this anything supernatural, Christian, it is nothing more than a mere naturalistic secular spirit, even though people today like to call it “spirituality”.
The second form of compromise or collusion, seen particularly in the affluent first world, or western world, is the search for pleasure. We are surrounded by people who live, what St. Paul describes as, the way of the flesh ― “whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Philippians 3:19). Those who follow this way are the target of advertising and consumerism; they feel that they need to have whatever everyone else has right now. Their less lovely side manifests self-indulgence, lust, envy—all seen as acceptable social habits. The flesh has its own laws, and those who follow this way will readily obey those laws all the way into sin.
Finally, there is the compromise or collusion of succumbing to darkness and evil. This is not just pure Satanism, but also the things that destroy Christ in the soul and give place to the devil. Most of the works of darkness and evil are not manifest―for Satan prefers to stay hidden, because he can work more effectively when not seen. Hatred, vengeance, violence, self-destructive habits—these flourish in the dark corners of the sinful human self and grow voraciously the more they are fed. In your heart of hearts, you may loathe the dark and leap to the light. But in everyday life, you will find yourself in the twilight of “benign secularism” or “the flesh” over and over again, being seduced into states of compromise which you try to rationalize away.
The Emperor With No Clothes Problem!
We don’t like to think―let alone admit―that we might be a problem! The instinctive human reaction—as a consequence of Original Sin—is to blame everyone else and everything else! This mentality already started with Adam and Eve and it has been passed down in our ‘family genes’ for thousands of years--“She made me do it! He made me do it! The devil made me do it!” etc. If we are going to accept blame for anything, then we will be last in line, while first pointing the finger at everyone else, and it will only be a ‘co-blame’ that we will admit to, placing the greater fault on the other parties involved!
Like the emperor, in Hans Christian Andersen’s tale of “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, we imagine ourselves to be dressed with the finest virtues—whereas in reality we are almost naked! In Andersen’s tale there existed an emperor who loved wearing fine clothes and spent all of his people’s money on them. He had a different set for each hour and was, without doubt, the finest dressed man in the land. One day, two swindlers claiming to be weavers, entered the emperor’s city and proclaimed they were capable of making the finest, lightest, most magnificent cloth the world has ever seen. So extraordinary was this cloth, it was invisible to anyone who was incompetent or stupid.
Hearing of the weavers’ amazing ‘talent’ and not wanting to look stupid, the foolish emperor thought he could use such cloth to weed out undesirables in his city. He paid the swindlers an enormous sum and they set out to tailor clothes for the emperor from their invisible cloth; knowing they would only need go through the motions. The emperor sent several of his advisors to gauge their progress, who, not wanting to appear unworthy or stupid for seeing nothing at all, every one of the advisors reported the invisible cloth to be magnificent, even though the cloth didn’t even exist!
Finally the clothes were ‘finished’ and the swindlers, having already counted the gold and jewels they had received in advance, presented the invisible clothes to the emperor. A procession was arranged to show-off the emperor’s new clothes and the entire city gathered together to view them. Having been ‘dressed’ by the swindlers, who remarked how wonderful he looked in their invisible clothes, and how lightly the cloth sat upon him, he finally appeared before his people.
The people, having heard of the weavers’ abilities and the cloth’s fictitious properties, were amazed and offered thunderous applause to the now beaming emperor. None of them were willing to admit that they hadn’t seen a thing and that the emperor was in fact naked; for if anyone did, then he was either stupid, or unfit for the job he held. Never before had the emperor’s clothes met with such applause, praise and recognition. While expressing admiration at their emperor’s new ‘invisible’ clothes, a small boy cried out. “But the Emperor has no clothes on! He is naked!”
Apocalypse Reflects the Same Truth
In the Book of Apocalypse, we see something similar to the above tale of “The Emperor’s New Clothes” or “The Emperor With No Clothes”. The biblical passage, placing the words in the mouth of Christ, is as follows:
“I know thy works, that thou art neither cold, nor hot. I would thou wert cold, or hot. But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth. Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked! I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire-tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see! Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise. Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19).
In other words, the passage is saying that we have an inflated, erroneous and imaginary idea of what we are like, which in no way conforms to reality. We imagine ourselves to be some kind of solution, whereas in actual fact we turn to be quite a problem! “Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked!”—just like the “Emperor With No Clothes”!
Then the Apocalypse goes on to have Christ say: “Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock! If any man shall hear My voice, and open to me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me. To him that shall overcome, I will give to sit with Me in My throne: as I also have overcome, and am set down with My Father in his throne. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches!” (Apocalypse 3:20-22).
So What’s the Problem?
The basic problem is NOT ENOUGH LOVE OF GOD! That is where everyone has a problem and in that regard everyone is a problem. The command of Christ and Holy Scripture is clear: “And Jesus answered him: ‘The first commandment of all is, “Hear, O Israel: the Lord thy God is one God! And thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength!” This is the first commandment.’” (Mark 12:29-30). The commandment could not be any clearer—and it is clear that we do live up to that commandment. That is the basic problem behind all the problems we are currently experiencing and the even bigger problems “coming down the pike.”
Let us get one thing straight, “right-off-the bat”—loving God is not a lip-service of love, but it translates into action. The basic and lowest degree of love is the keeping of the Commandments of God: “If you love Me, keep My commandments! ... He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them; he it is that loveth Me!” (John 14:15; 14:21). The next level of love is to talk incessantly to One we love: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) … “We ought always to pray, and not to faint!” (Luke 18:1). The ultimate level of love is to suffer and die for God: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). There is very little of the first degree, even less of the second degree and barely any of the third degree of love to be found in the world today. The Commandments are frequently broken. Prayer is barely and badly said. Very few want to suffer for the Faith and Christ.
Who’s the Problem?
Most people realize there are major problems in the world today. Most people would never dream that they were part of those problems. Few people have any solutions to those problems. Fewer still, do anything about those problems.
As Our Lord was quoted as saying above: “He that is not with Me, is against Me: and he that gathers not with Me, scatters!” (Matthew 12:30). According to Our Lord, there are only two possible positions—to be with Him, or against Him. To be a solution or to be a problem. There is no spectatorship or neutrality or being a mere bystander. Neither is it enough to give Him mere lip-service: “And why call you Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Those millions of lip-serving, world-loving Catholics that are all too common today, are not the solution which they should be, but they are the problem that they should not be! “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that does the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Many will say to Me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name?’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
The Problem is Faith Without Works
We live as though the entrance to Heaven depended upon a written exam! We are full of knowledge and little else! Faith is to do with knowledge, but Charity is greater than Faith and Charity should be the motive power behind works that come from Faith.
“What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he hath Faith, but hath not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Faith, if it have not works, is dead in itself! But some man will say: ‘Thou hast Faith, and I have works!’ Show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith! Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well—the devils also believe and tremble! But wilt thou know, O vain man, that Faith without works is dead? Do you see that by works a man is justified; and not by Faith only? … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead” (James 2:14-26).
The Problem is Works Without Charity
Yet Faith and works, if they are not done with Charity—that is to say, from the motive of a love of God—then both Faith and works are dead too! St. Paul clearly points this out: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Article 9
Tuesday January 2nd
The Power of the Holy Name of Jesus
Tuesday January 2nd
The Power of the Holy Name of Jesus
What’s in a Name?
“What’s in a name?” we ask. Usually, the name of something should explain the nature of the thing—though this is not always the case. A “screwdriver” is used to drive screws into wood or some other substance. A “washing-machine” is an electric appliance that washes things. A “firelighter” is a tool that produces a flame in order to light a fire or a candle. A “blender” is a machine that mixes or blends various foods together. In these cases, the name of the object gives us a clue as to object’s use and purpose.
What Does the Name of Jesus Mean?
More than any other name, perhaps alone among all proper names, the Holy Name of Jesus is appropriate to the One Who owned it. Usually the names of men are given at random; they mean nothing in themselves; a man who happens to be called John might just as well have been called Thomas or William; the mere name tells us nothing about him; it is a convenient means of distinguishing him from others, a label put upon him and little or no more.
With a few human beings it has been otherwise: Adam, Abraham, Josue, John the Baptist were given names that signified the men on whom they were bestowed. But with none is this so true as it is with Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
With care the Angel impressed it on His Mother’s mind: “Thou shalt call His Name Jesus,” he said, and there followed the description of His future greatness. With care it was repeated to Joseph: “Thou shalt call His Name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins.”
The name Jesus comes from the Greek Iesous, which in turn came from the Aramaic, Yeshu. It means “Yaweh is salvation.” The name was not unique, even in biblical times, and today it is common in Arabic-speaking East and in Spanish-speaking countries. From apostolic times the Name “Jesus” has been treated with the greatest respect, as honor is due the Name which represents Our Lord, Himself.
Not Just a Name!
The Holy Name of Jesus is, first of all, an all-powerful prayer. Our Lord Himself solemnly promises that whatever we ask the Father in His Name we shall receive. God never fails to keep His word. When, therefore, we say, “Jesus,” let us ask God for all we need with absolute confidence of being heard. For this reason, the Church ends her prayer with the words, “through Jesus Christ,” which gives the prayer a new and Divine efficacy.
► Each time we say, “Jesus,” we give God infinite joy and glory, for we offer Him all the infinite merits of the Passion and Death of Jesus Christ. St. Paul tells us that Jesus merited the Name Jesus by His Passion and Death.
► Each time we say “Jesus,” let us clearly wish to offer God all the Masses being said all over the world for all our intentions. We thus share in these thousands of Masses.
► Each time we say “Jesus,” we gain indulgences for the Holy Souls in Purgatory, thus relieving and liberating very many of these holy souls from their awful pains. Thus they may be our best friends and pray for us—they cannot pray for themselves, however.
► Each time we say “Jesus,” it is an act of perfect love, for we offer to God the infinite love of Jesus.
► The Holy Name of Jesus gradually fills our souls with a peace and joy we never had before.
► The Holy Name of Jesus gives us strength that our sufferings become light
The Holy Name is a Powerful Weapon
► The Holy Name of Jesus is a powerful weapon for those who use it: “If you shall ask me any thing in My Name, that I will do” (John 14:14).
► The Holy Name of Jesus protects us against Satan and his wiles and temptations, for the Devil fears the Name of Jesus, who has conquered him on the Cross. His Holy Name is a powerful help in our fight with Satan, and delivers us from the power of the devil, who is constantly seeking to do us harm. Jesus on His own authority exorcized demons, just one example of many is that of the expulsion of the demons of Gadara (Matthew 8:28-34). Through the invocation of His Holy name, Satan is still conquered.
The Holy Name of Jesus is used in exorcisms to drive set away: “In My Name they shall cast out devils” (Mark 16:17). Let us have confidence in that Name of Jesus—so powerful over demons. St. John complained to Jesus that others, besides the Apostles, were casting out devils in Jesus’ Name: “‘Master, we saw a certain man casting out devils in Thy Name, and we forbade him, because he followeth not with us!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Forbid him not; for he that is not against you, is for you!’” (Luke 9:49-50).
► The Holy Name of Jesus protects us against sin and helps us overcome sin: “Thou shalt call His Name Jesus. For He shall save His people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21). “If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ” (1 John 2:1).
► The Holy Name of Jesus will bring into the battlefield: “To carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel” (Acts 9:15). “You shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 10:22). “For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake” (Acts 9:16).
► The Holy Name of Jesus saves us from innumerable evils. The Holy Name of Jesus, invoked with confidence, brings help in bodily needs, according to the promise of Christ: “In My Name they shall take up serpents; and if they shall drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them: they shall lay their hands upon the sick, and they shall recover!” (Mark 16:17-18).
► In the Name of Jesus, the Apostles gave strength to the lame (Acts 3:6; 9:34) and life to the dead (Acts 9:40).
“Peter said: ‘Silver and gold I have none; but what I have, I give thee! In the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, arise, and walk!’ And taking him by the right hand, he lifted him up, and forthwith his feet and soles received strength. And he leaping up, stood, and walked, and went in with them into the temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God” (Acts 3:6-8) …
“Peter came to the saints who dwelt at Lydda. And he found there a certain man named Eneas, who was ill of the palsy. And Peter said to him: ‘Eneas, the Lord Jesus Christ healeth thee! Arise, and make thy bed!’ And immediately he arose” (Acts 9:32-34) ...
“In Joppe there was a certain disciple named Tabitha, she was sick, and died ... Peter kneeling down prayed, and turning to the body, he said: ‘Tabitha, arise!’ And she opened her eyes; and seeing Peter, she sat up. And giving her his hand, he lifted her up. And when he had called the saints and the widows, he presented her alive” (Acts 9:36-41).
Honoring the Holy Name
The Name of Jesus reminds us of all the blessings we receive through our Holy Redeemer. To give thanks for these blessings we revere the Holy Name, just as we honor the Passion of Christ by honoring His Cross.
► At the Holy Name of Jesus we uncover our heads, and we bend our knees—as Holy Scripture says: “That in the Name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those that are in Heaven, on Earth, and under the Earth” (Philippians 2:10).
► The Holy Name of Jesus is at the head of all our undertakings, as the Emperor Justinian says in his law-book: “In the Name of Our Lord Jesus we begin all our consultations.”
► The Holy Name of Jesus gives consolation in spiritual trials. The Name of Jesus reminds the sinner of the prodigal son’s father and of the Good Samaritan; it recalls to the just the suffering and death of the innocent Lamb of God.
► Through the Holy Name of Jesus we obtain every blessing and grace for time and eternity, for Christ has said: “If you ask the Father anything in My Name, He will give it you” (John 16:23). Therefore the Church concludes all her prayers by the words: “Through Our Lord Jesus Christ”, etc.
In summary, St. Paul said, “Whatever you do, whether in speech or in action, do it in the Name of the Lord Jesus” (Colossians 3:17).
Copy the Saints
A special lover of the Holy Name was St. Bernard, who speaks of it in most glowing terms in many of his sermons. But the greatest promoters of this devotion were St. Bernardine of Siena and St. John Capistran. They carried with them on their missions in the turbulent cities of Italy a copy of the monogram of the Holy Name, surrounded by rays, painted on a wooden tablet, wherewith they blessed the sick and brought about great miracles.
At the close of their sermons they exhibited this emblem to the faithful and asked them to prostrate themselves, to adore the Redeemer of mankind. They recommended their hearers to have the monogram of Jesus placed over the gates of their cities and above the doors of their homes. Because the manner in which St. Bernardine preached this devotion was new, he was accused by his enemies, and brought before the tribunal of Pope Martin V. But St. John Capistran defended his master so successfully, that the pope, not only permitted the worship of the Holy Name, but also assisted at a procession in which the holy monogram was carried. The wooden tablet with the Holy Name, used by St. Bernardine, is venerated at Santa Maria in Ara Coeli at Rome.
The emblem or monogram representing the Holy Name of Jesus consists of the three letters: IHS. In the Middle Ages the Name of Jesus was written: IHESUS; the monogram contains the first and last letter of the Holy Name. It is first found on a gold coin of the eight century: DN IHS CHS REX REGNANTIUM (The Lord Jesus Christ, King of Kings). Some erroneously say that the three letters are the initials of: “Jesus Hominum Salvator” (Jesus Savior of Men).
Jesuits and the Holy Name
The Jesuits are named after the Holy Name and they made this monogram the emblem of their Society, adding a cross over the H and three nails under it. Consequently a new explanation of the emblem was invented, pretending that the nails originally were a “V”, and that the monogram stands for “In Hoc Signo Vinces” (In This Sign you shall Conquer), the words which, according to a legendary account, Constantine saw in the heavens under the Sign of the Cross before the battle at the Milvian bridge (312 AD).
The Holy Name in the Hail Mary
It was only by the efforts of St. Bernardine that the custom of adding the Name of Jesus to the Ave Maria was spread in Italy, and from there to the Universal Church. But up to the sixteenth century it was still unknown in Belgium, whilst in Bavaria and Austria the faithful still affix to the Ave Maria the words: “Jesus Christus” (fructus ventris tui, Jesus Christus) – “…the fruit of thy womb, Jesus Christ.”
A Name Unused and Abused
The Holy Name Society, first organized in 1274 and granted the status of a confraternity in 1564, continues to promote at the parish and diocesan levels an increased reverence for the name of Jesus, reparation for the sins of profanity and blasphemy against the Holy Name, and the personal sanctification of its members.
God in His immense goodness gives to each of us an all-powerful word with which we can do wonders for Him, for ourselves and for the world. That word is “Jesus.” Paul tells us that it is “a Name above all names,” and that “…..in the Name of Jesus, every knee shall bend in Heaven, on Earth and under the Earth” (Philippians 2:10) In an era when it is commonplace to hear the Lord’s Name taken in vain on television, in movies, and out of the mouths of children as a normal course of conversation, we are called not only to make reparation, but to give witness to the wonders of the Holy Name of Jesus.
Take the Name to Heart
Richard Rolle, a mystic of fourteenth century England, taught about the Name of Jesus: “If you will be well with God, and have grace to rule your life, and come to the joy of love: this Name Jesus, fasten it so fast in your heart that it come never out of your thought. And when you speak to Him, and through custom say, “Jesus,” it shall be in your ear, joy; in your mouth; honey; and in your heart, melody: for men shall think joy to hear that Name be named, sweetness to speak it, mirth and song to think it.
“If you think the Name ‘Jesus’ continually, and hold it firmly, it purges your sin, and kindles your heart; it clarifies your soul, it removes anger and does away slowness. It wounds in love and fulfills charity. It chases the devil, and puts out dread. It opens Heaven, and makes a contemplative man. Have Jesus in mind, for that puts all vices and phantoms out from the lover.”
“Glorious Name, gracious Name, Name of love and of power! Through You sins are forgiven, through You enemies are vanquished, through You the sick are freed from their illness, through You those suffering in trials are made strong and cheerful. You bring honor to those who believe, You teach those who preach, You give strength to the toiler, You sustain the weary” (St. Bernardine of Siena).
St. Bernard said: “Nothing so curbs the onset of anger, so allays the upsurge of pride. It cures the wound of envy, controls unbridled extravagance, and quenches the flame of lust; it cools the thirst of covetousness and banishes the itch of unclean desire … For when I Name Jesus, I set before me a Man who is meek and humble of heart, kind, prudent, chaste, merciful, flawlessly upright and holy in the eyes of all; and this same Man is the all-powerful God Whose way of life heals me, whose support is my strength” (Sermon 15 on the Canticle of Canticles).
“What’s in a name?” we ask. Usually, the name of something should explain the nature of the thing—though this is not always the case. A “screwdriver” is used to drive screws into wood or some other substance. A “washing-machine” is an electric appliance that washes things. A “firelighter” is a tool that produces a flame in order to light a fire or a candle. A “blender” is a machine that mixes or blends various foods together. In these cases, the name of the object gives us a clue as to object’s use and purpose.
What Does the Name of Jesus Mean?
More than any other name, perhaps alone among all proper names, the Holy Name of Jesus is appropriate to the One Who owned it. Usually the names of men are given at random; they mean nothing in themselves; a man who happens to be called John might just as well have been called Thomas or William; the mere name tells us nothing about him; it is a convenient means of distinguishing him from others, a label put upon him and little or no more.
With a few human beings it has been otherwise: Adam, Abraham, Josue, John the Baptist were given names that signified the men on whom they were bestowed. But with none is this so true as it is with Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
With care the Angel impressed it on His Mother’s mind: “Thou shalt call His Name Jesus,” he said, and there followed the description of His future greatness. With care it was repeated to Joseph: “Thou shalt call His Name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins.”
The name Jesus comes from the Greek Iesous, which in turn came from the Aramaic, Yeshu. It means “Yaweh is salvation.” The name was not unique, even in biblical times, and today it is common in Arabic-speaking East and in Spanish-speaking countries. From apostolic times the Name “Jesus” has been treated with the greatest respect, as honor is due the Name which represents Our Lord, Himself.
Not Just a Name!
The Holy Name of Jesus is, first of all, an all-powerful prayer. Our Lord Himself solemnly promises that whatever we ask the Father in His Name we shall receive. God never fails to keep His word. When, therefore, we say, “Jesus,” let us ask God for all we need with absolute confidence of being heard. For this reason, the Church ends her prayer with the words, “through Jesus Christ,” which gives the prayer a new and Divine efficacy.
► Each time we say, “Jesus,” we give God infinite joy and glory, for we offer Him all the infinite merits of the Passion and Death of Jesus Christ. St. Paul tells us that Jesus merited the Name Jesus by His Passion and Death.
► Each time we say “Jesus,” let us clearly wish to offer God all the Masses being said all over the world for all our intentions. We thus share in these thousands of Masses.
► Each time we say “Jesus,” we gain indulgences for the Holy Souls in Purgatory, thus relieving and liberating very many of these holy souls from their awful pains. Thus they may be our best friends and pray for us—they cannot pray for themselves, however.
► Each time we say “Jesus,” it is an act of perfect love, for we offer to God the infinite love of Jesus.
► The Holy Name of Jesus gradually fills our souls with a peace and joy we never had before.
► The Holy Name of Jesus gives us strength that our sufferings become light
The Holy Name is a Powerful Weapon
► The Holy Name of Jesus is a powerful weapon for those who use it: “If you shall ask me any thing in My Name, that I will do” (John 14:14).
► The Holy Name of Jesus protects us against Satan and his wiles and temptations, for the Devil fears the Name of Jesus, who has conquered him on the Cross. His Holy Name is a powerful help in our fight with Satan, and delivers us from the power of the devil, who is constantly seeking to do us harm. Jesus on His own authority exorcized demons, just one example of many is that of the expulsion of the demons of Gadara (Matthew 8:28-34). Through the invocation of His Holy name, Satan is still conquered.
The Holy Name of Jesus is used in exorcisms to drive set away: “In My Name they shall cast out devils” (Mark 16:17). Let us have confidence in that Name of Jesus—so powerful over demons. St. John complained to Jesus that others, besides the Apostles, were casting out devils in Jesus’ Name: “‘Master, we saw a certain man casting out devils in Thy Name, and we forbade him, because he followeth not with us!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Forbid him not; for he that is not against you, is for you!’” (Luke 9:49-50).
► The Holy Name of Jesus protects us against sin and helps us overcome sin: “Thou shalt call His Name Jesus. For He shall save His people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21). “If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ” (1 John 2:1).
► The Holy Name of Jesus will bring into the battlefield: “To carry My Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel” (Acts 9:15). “You shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 10:22). “For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake” (Acts 9:16).
► The Holy Name of Jesus saves us from innumerable evils. The Holy Name of Jesus, invoked with confidence, brings help in bodily needs, according to the promise of Christ: “In My Name they shall take up serpents; and if they shall drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them: they shall lay their hands upon the sick, and they shall recover!” (Mark 16:17-18).
► In the Name of Jesus, the Apostles gave strength to the lame (Acts 3:6; 9:34) and life to the dead (Acts 9:40).
“Peter said: ‘Silver and gold I have none; but what I have, I give thee! In the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, arise, and walk!’ And taking him by the right hand, he lifted him up, and forthwith his feet and soles received strength. And he leaping up, stood, and walked, and went in with them into the temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God” (Acts 3:6-8) …
“Peter came to the saints who dwelt at Lydda. And he found there a certain man named Eneas, who was ill of the palsy. And Peter said to him: ‘Eneas, the Lord Jesus Christ healeth thee! Arise, and make thy bed!’ And immediately he arose” (Acts 9:32-34) ...
“In Joppe there was a certain disciple named Tabitha, she was sick, and died ... Peter kneeling down prayed, and turning to the body, he said: ‘Tabitha, arise!’ And she opened her eyes; and seeing Peter, she sat up. And giving her his hand, he lifted her up. And when he had called the saints and the widows, he presented her alive” (Acts 9:36-41).
Honoring the Holy Name
The Name of Jesus reminds us of all the blessings we receive through our Holy Redeemer. To give thanks for these blessings we revere the Holy Name, just as we honor the Passion of Christ by honoring His Cross.
► At the Holy Name of Jesus we uncover our heads, and we bend our knees—as Holy Scripture says: “That in the Name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those that are in Heaven, on Earth, and under the Earth” (Philippians 2:10).
► The Holy Name of Jesus is at the head of all our undertakings, as the Emperor Justinian says in his law-book: “In the Name of Our Lord Jesus we begin all our consultations.”
► The Holy Name of Jesus gives consolation in spiritual trials. The Name of Jesus reminds the sinner of the prodigal son’s father and of the Good Samaritan; it recalls to the just the suffering and death of the innocent Lamb of God.
► Through the Holy Name of Jesus we obtain every blessing and grace for time and eternity, for Christ has said: “If you ask the Father anything in My Name, He will give it you” (John 16:23). Therefore the Church concludes all her prayers by the words: “Through Our Lord Jesus Christ”, etc.
In summary, St. Paul said, “Whatever you do, whether in speech or in action, do it in the Name of the Lord Jesus” (Colossians 3:17).
Copy the Saints
A special lover of the Holy Name was St. Bernard, who speaks of it in most glowing terms in many of his sermons. But the greatest promoters of this devotion were St. Bernardine of Siena and St. John Capistran. They carried with them on their missions in the turbulent cities of Italy a copy of the monogram of the Holy Name, surrounded by rays, painted on a wooden tablet, wherewith they blessed the sick and brought about great miracles.
At the close of their sermons they exhibited this emblem to the faithful and asked them to prostrate themselves, to adore the Redeemer of mankind. They recommended their hearers to have the monogram of Jesus placed over the gates of their cities and above the doors of their homes. Because the manner in which St. Bernardine preached this devotion was new, he was accused by his enemies, and brought before the tribunal of Pope Martin V. But St. John Capistran defended his master so successfully, that the pope, not only permitted the worship of the Holy Name, but also assisted at a procession in which the holy monogram was carried. The wooden tablet with the Holy Name, used by St. Bernardine, is venerated at Santa Maria in Ara Coeli at Rome.
The emblem or monogram representing the Holy Name of Jesus consists of the three letters: IHS. In the Middle Ages the Name of Jesus was written: IHESUS; the monogram contains the first and last letter of the Holy Name. It is first found on a gold coin of the eight century: DN IHS CHS REX REGNANTIUM (The Lord Jesus Christ, King of Kings). Some erroneously say that the three letters are the initials of: “Jesus Hominum Salvator” (Jesus Savior of Men).
Jesuits and the Holy Name
The Jesuits are named after the Holy Name and they made this monogram the emblem of their Society, adding a cross over the H and three nails under it. Consequently a new explanation of the emblem was invented, pretending that the nails originally were a “V”, and that the monogram stands for “In Hoc Signo Vinces” (In This Sign you shall Conquer), the words which, according to a legendary account, Constantine saw in the heavens under the Sign of the Cross before the battle at the Milvian bridge (312 AD).
The Holy Name in the Hail Mary
It was only by the efforts of St. Bernardine that the custom of adding the Name of Jesus to the Ave Maria was spread in Italy, and from there to the Universal Church. But up to the sixteenth century it was still unknown in Belgium, whilst in Bavaria and Austria the faithful still affix to the Ave Maria the words: “Jesus Christus” (fructus ventris tui, Jesus Christus) – “…the fruit of thy womb, Jesus Christ.”
A Name Unused and Abused
The Holy Name Society, first organized in 1274 and granted the status of a confraternity in 1564, continues to promote at the parish and diocesan levels an increased reverence for the name of Jesus, reparation for the sins of profanity and blasphemy against the Holy Name, and the personal sanctification of its members.
God in His immense goodness gives to each of us an all-powerful word with which we can do wonders for Him, for ourselves and for the world. That word is “Jesus.” Paul tells us that it is “a Name above all names,” and that “…..in the Name of Jesus, every knee shall bend in Heaven, on Earth and under the Earth” (Philippians 2:10) In an era when it is commonplace to hear the Lord’s Name taken in vain on television, in movies, and out of the mouths of children as a normal course of conversation, we are called not only to make reparation, but to give witness to the wonders of the Holy Name of Jesus.
Take the Name to Heart
Richard Rolle, a mystic of fourteenth century England, taught about the Name of Jesus: “If you will be well with God, and have grace to rule your life, and come to the joy of love: this Name Jesus, fasten it so fast in your heart that it come never out of your thought. And when you speak to Him, and through custom say, “Jesus,” it shall be in your ear, joy; in your mouth; honey; and in your heart, melody: for men shall think joy to hear that Name be named, sweetness to speak it, mirth and song to think it.
“If you think the Name ‘Jesus’ continually, and hold it firmly, it purges your sin, and kindles your heart; it clarifies your soul, it removes anger and does away slowness. It wounds in love and fulfills charity. It chases the devil, and puts out dread. It opens Heaven, and makes a contemplative man. Have Jesus in mind, for that puts all vices and phantoms out from the lover.”
“Glorious Name, gracious Name, Name of love and of power! Through You sins are forgiven, through You enemies are vanquished, through You the sick are freed from their illness, through You those suffering in trials are made strong and cheerful. You bring honor to those who believe, You teach those who preach, You give strength to the toiler, You sustain the weary” (St. Bernardine of Siena).
St. Bernard said: “Nothing so curbs the onset of anger, so allays the upsurge of pride. It cures the wound of envy, controls unbridled extravagance, and quenches the flame of lust; it cools the thirst of covetousness and banishes the itch of unclean desire … For when I Name Jesus, I set before me a Man who is meek and humble of heart, kind, prudent, chaste, merciful, flawlessly upright and holy in the eyes of all; and this same Man is the all-powerful God Whose way of life heals me, whose support is my strength” (Sermon 15 on the Canticle of Canticles).
Article 8
Monday January 1st
So What's New?
Monday January 1st
So What's New?
New Year—New Hopes
For many—especially for those who suffer anything—a ‘New Year’ brings hopes of being a better year. We are, by nature, hopeful creatures! I guess that’s why so many buy lottery tickets! Or enter the ‘lottery’ of marriage with high hopes! Just kidding! Yet there is some truth to this—very few, if any, get married with the expectation that their marriage will be a miserable marriage; they all hope for the best. Hope, in this sense, springs eternal. People used to try and climb unconquered mountains, in the hope of the being the first one to reach the summit. Athletes and sports teams enter races and competitions hoping to win the first prize. A person starts a business in the hope that it will be successful and not a failure. A patient takes a medicine in the hope that it will defeat a disease and bring health. These, and many such like examples, manifest the presence of a natural hope, which can be described as the desire to attain something that at present is outside their reach.
Wrong Hopes
But what if the marriage is successful—what comes after that? Eventually, death! What if the business is successful—what comes after that? Eventually, death! What if the athlete or team wins the prize? What if he reaches the summit? What if the disease is cured? What if this? What if that? Ultimately, eventually, inescapably there comes death! And what comes after death? Aha! Now we are getting ‘warm’—then come either the fires of Hell, the fires of Purgatory or the fire of love in Heaven (God likes to represent Himself as fire!).
Heavenly Hopes
If there is Hope of a successful marriage, business, cure, etc., then there should also be a hope for Heaven. Yet Heaven is beyond our capacities and capabilities. We can barely jump a foot or two above the ground unaided—so how on earth are we going to get to Heaven. The soul is planted in the earth (God’s creation), yet it should be totally focused on moving towards Heaven (God himself). It is a delicate balance of attitudes towards creation and the Creator. Some poor souls never get beyond the scope of creation and lose themselves irredeemably in its pleasures. Others use creation for the purpose it was made to be—stepping stones or rungs on a ladder that leads to God―the temporary that leads to the eternal. Since Heaven is beyond the reach of our natural powers, we need some super-natural powers to get there. This is where the supernatural virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity come in to help us. Faith makes us adhere to God as the source of truth; Hope makes us adhere to God as the source of good; Charity makes us adhere to God for his own sake.
The Heavenly Ingredients
Faith is in the mind, as it is all about knowing things about God—we could say, in a very imperfect analogy, that Faith is like the wood for the fire, different bits of wood like different bits of information, that play their part in the future fire. Hope, like Charity, resides in the will or heart and is based upon Faith (knowledge)—no wood, no fire; if there is no knowledge, then there can be no hope or love. We cannot love what we do not know and we cannot Hope to be saved by God if we do not even know that a God exists. Hope comes after Faith, inasmuch as Faith gives knowledge of what is to be hoped for. Hope comes before Charity, inasmuch as the hope of good, produces a love of it—just like the spark gives birth to the flames of the fire. An offshoot to this is that the more we know (the greater our Faith or knowledge about God), then this opens us to a potentially greater and stronger Hope in God and a greater love of God.
The Power of Hope
Where there is Hope there can often be great joy—even amidst the most grievous torments. Look at Purgatory for example: The suffering of Purgatory is temporary and therefore includes the Hope of one day seeing the face of God; it is borne with patience and even with great joy—far surpassing any joy on earth. Since the souls realize that purification is necessary―and they do not wish to have it otherwise―it is accepted generously, out of love for God and with perfect submission to His will. The pain of souls in Purgatory is inexpressible, but so too is the joy, because of their Hope and desire for God. The souls in purgatory are sure of Heaven, but they still hope for their moment of being ready to enter it. Once they enter Heaven, all Hope vanishes, for they then possess what they hoped for.
The Energy of Hope
Hope is the virtue that makes the soul desire, even crave, for Heaven and eternal life as our ultimate happiness. Having heard of the Kingdom of God, the soul wants to go there. The virtue of Hope stirs the soul to desire eternal life as its final happiness. Hope draws the soul to place its trust in the promises of Jesus Christ, relying not on our own strength, but on the grace and help of the Holy Spirit to achieve this final goal. ‘Let us hold fast to the confession of our Hope without wavering, for He Who promised is faithful’ (Hebrews 10:23).
The virtue of Hope responds to the aspiration to happiness which God has placed in the heart of every person; it takes up the hopes that inspire our activities and purifies them, so as to order them to and prepare them for the Kingdom of Heaven. Hope keeps a soul from discouragement; it sustains the soul during times of abandonment; it opens up the soul in expectation of eternal beatitude. Buoyed up by Hope, the soul is preserved from selfishness and is led to the happiness that flows from Charity.
What Hope Have We Got?
What is Hope? What is the Hope that we have been given? Hope is the theological virtue by which we aspire with confidence to reach God and Heaven, trusting God and His grace, and being resolved to use his help. Since it is a theological and supernatural virtue, Hope looks directly to our eternal happiness. It is the reaching after good—not just any good, but those goods that lead to Heaven, and, in last analysis, after the supreme good, that is, God. Now, in seeking to possess God (the chief aim of Hope), we also reach for what the possession of God will give us, that is, eternal happiness (the secondary aim of Hope). Furthermore, we pin our Hope on God, not man. We may indeed have hope in a creature, as the instrument of divine providence in our behalf. In this way, for example, we hope in the saints. Hope, in this sense, fuels and directs our efforts towards God and eternal happiness in God. Hence, Hope is a theological virtue. The Greek word “theos” means God; from “theos” we have the word “theological” for whatever directly pertains or has reference to God.
Despair—A Sin Against Hope
Yet there are pitfalls and threats to Hope—despair is one of them. Despair, which is the loss or abandonment of Hope, is a sin, and it leads to other sins. St. Paul says: “Who, despairing, have given themselves up to lasciviousness, unto the working of all uncleanness, and unto covetousness” (Ephesians 4:19). Not everyone who despairs has lost or rejected the Faith. A person may know by Faith that all sin is pardonable, and yet, by a corrupted judgment on his own particular case, may abandon all hope of pardon for himself. Despair is a most grievous sin. It turns a person completely away from God. In itself, however, despair is not so grievous as unbelief or hatred of God. Yet for man it is more dangerous than these sins. For despair leads a person to fling himself headlong into all manner of sins. Despair arises from disorders in the soul, such as lust. But in a special way, it comes from the sin of sloth, from spiritual laziness which will not let the soul grapple with difficulties, and overcome them in the strength and grace of supernatural Hope.
Presumption—Another Sin Against Hope
Presumption, as a sin against Hope, is the wholly unreasonable expectation that God will save us despite the bad will in us, which makes that saving impossible. In other words, we think we can sin as much as we want and we imagine that God will automatically save us because He is a living and merciful God. Under the name and guise of reliance on God, presumption insults God and dishonors our own intelligence. It is presumption, for example, to expect forgiveness for sins without repentance. It is presumption to expect Heaven, without working to get there by merit.
Presumption is a sin, and can be a very grave sin, but it is not so grave a sin as despair. For, though it is excessive and unreasonable in its expectation, presumption does recognize (however insultingly and distortedly) the divine mercy and goodness which despair utterly rejects and denies. Presumption seems, at first glance, to be contrary to fear rather than to Hope. For the presumptuous man seems to fear nothing; but in reality presumption stands directly opposed to Hope. Presumption arises from a prideful trust that a person, in himself, is powerful enough to cope with anything, and as a being so excellent, for one reason or another, that God could not allow him to be punished.
How Certain Is Our Hope?
But is Hope certain subjectively—certain in the subject or person hoping―so far as our human frailty is concerned? Obviously it is not. For we cannot be sure of ourselves, so sure that we shall not fail in cooperating with God. The failure may come from our frailty or from our malice. As, then, the most saintly can fail, Hope remains in a sense uncertain, uncertain subjectively, on our part. Therefore St. Paul says : “In fear and trembling work out your salvation.” Yet there are some who speak of absolute confidence, or the certainty of Faith in regard to Salvation. Protestants are confident that they will be saved; Catholics hope they will be saved.
Motives For Our Hope
The prime motivating factor for our Hope is that of who God is—“God is Charity” (1 John 4:8) and in the very own words of the Son of God, “the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). The Holy Ghost, in Holy Scripture, tells us that “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works” (Psalm 144:8-9). God the Father tells us through Ezechiel: “Is it my will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23), and through Isaias, God tells us: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). Add to this the list of great sinners that Our Lord turned around and forgave: St. Mary Magdalen—an adulteress, possessed by seven devils; St. Dismas—the Good Thief on Calvary; St. Paul of Tarsus—a persecutor of Christians; Zaccheus—the chief publican in Jericho and many more who have received no particular mention in Holy Scripture.
This mind of Our Lord prevails to this day. He has spoken to His mystics and communicated to them His great desire to save sinners. In the book by Fr. Gottemoller, Words of Love, which is a selection of quotes of Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez (abbreviated as J.M.), Sr. Mary of the Trinity (abbreviated as M.T.) and Sr. Consolata Betrone (abbreviated as C.B.). Here is what Our Lord says to them:
“Never does My Heart refuse to forgive a soul that humbles itself, especially when it asks with confidence.” (J.M., p.91).
“My Heart takes comfort in forgiving. I have no greater desire, no greater joy, than when I can pardon a soul. When a soul returns to Me after a fall, the comfort she gives Me is a gain for her, for I regard her with very great love.” (J.M., p.94). “I am consumed with desire to pardon.... Yes, to pardon these dear souls for whom I shed My Blood.” (J.M., p.136). “I will make known that the measure of My love and mercy for fallen souls is limitless. I want to forgive them. It rests Me to forgive.” (J.M., p. 174).“My Heart is not so much wounded by sin, as torn with grief that they will not take refuge with Me after it.” (J.M., p. 188).“Poor sinners, how blind they are! I want only to forgive them, and they seek only to offend Me. That is My great sorrow; that so many are lost and that they do not all come to Me to be forgiven.” (J.M., p.237).
[Josefa asked if He remembered our faults after they were forgiven. Jesus replied:] “As soon as a soul throws itself at My feet and implores My forgiveness, Josefa, I forget all her sins.” (J.M., p.237). [If one is aroused from a state of lukewarmness] “Ah! Hasten to My Heart ... and be without fear for the past; all has been swallowed up in the abyss of My mercy, and My love is preparing new graces for you. The memory of your lapses will be an incentive to humility and a source of merit, and you cannot give Me a greater proof of affection than to count on My full pardon and to believe that your sins will never be as great as My mercy, which is infinite.” (J.M., p.289). “I pursue sinners as justice pursues criminals. But justice seeks them in order to punish, I, in order to forgive.” (J.M., p.237—238). “The mercy of God is infinite and never refuses to forgive sinners...” (J.M., p.256).
“I want them all [souls] to have confidence in My mercy, to expect all from My clemency, and never to doubt My readiness to forgive. I am God, but a God of love! I am a Father, but a Father full of compassion and never harsh. My Heart is infinitely holy but also infinitely wise, and knowing human frailty and infirmity, stoops to poor sinners with infinite mercy. I love those who after a first fall come to Me for pardon.... I love them still more when they beg pardon for their second sin, and should this happen again, I do not say a million times, but a million million times, I still love them and pardon them, and I will wash in My Blood their last as fully as their first sin. Never shall I weary of repentant sinners, nor cease from hoping for their return, and the greater their distress, the greater My welcome. Does not a father love a sick child with special affection? Are not his care and solicitude greater? So is the tenderness and compassion of My Heart more abundant for sinners than for the just.” (J.M., p.353).
“Consolata, you must never forget that I always am, and love to be, kind and merciful toward My creatures.” (C.B., p.42). [One time Consolata was lamenting her slight faults:] “Oh Jesus, I am always the same; I promise, and then . . .” And He replied: “I also am always the same and never change!” (C.B., p.49). “Jesus is not a tyrant, and if He forgives an entire lifetime of crime in return for one act of love, then tell Me, how could it be that He would take notice one day of some useless thought on which you had dwelt involuntarily?” (C.B., p.51).
“Look, Consolata, the enemy will make every effort to shake your blind faith in Me, but you must never forget that I am, and love to be, exclusively kind and merciful. Understand My heart, Consolata; understand My love, and never permit the enemy to gain entrance into your soul, even for an instant, with a thought of diffidence; never! Believe Me, I am solely and always kind; I am solely and always like a parent to you! Imitate therefore the children who, at every little scratch of the finger, run at once to mother to have it bandaged. You should always do the same, and remember that I will always cancel out and repair your imperfections and infidelities, just as the mother will always bandage the child’s finger, whether it is really hurt or only seems so in imagination. And if the child were to really hurt his arm or his head, how tenderly and affectionately would he be cared for and bandaged by the mother! Well, I do the very same with regard to your soul when you fall, even though I may do it in silence. Do you understand, Consolata? Therefore, never, never, never have even a shadow of doubt! Lack of confidence wounds My Heart to the quick and makes Me suffer!” (C.B., p.53—54).
“It is My joy to pardon. If pride prevents you from being sorry for your sins for your own sake, be sorry for them out of love for Me, so that I may have the joy of forgiving” ... (M. T. no. 426). “I will teach sinners that the mercy of My Heart is inexhaustible.” (J.M., p.353). “I never refuse grace even to those who are guilty of grave sin; nor do I separate them from the good whom I love with predilection. I keep them all in My Heart, that all may receive the help required by their state of soul....” (J.M., p.234). “At the least sign of repentance, My Heart is aflame with joy, and I wait with inexpressible love for the sinner to turn towards Me...” (M.T. no. 157).
Mary Our Hope
In the Salve Regina to Mary, we pray the words: “Hail our life, our sweetness and our hope!” Hope is sweet and life needs hope! To increase our hope in Mary, we should ponder upon the following words of St. Bernard: “When the storm of temptation arises, when you are midst the reefs and shoals of tribulation, fix your gaze upon the Star of the Sea―call upon Mary! If tossed by the rising tide of pride and ambition, if lost upon the troubled waters of scandal and contention―look then at the Star, invoke her name! Do the billows of anger, of avarice, of lust batter against your soul―cast thy eyes upon Mary! Does the greatness of your crime fill your soul with terror? Does your wretched conscience beat you down in shame and the fear of judgment paralyze your heart?―then, when about to sink to the depths of despondency, to plunge headlong into despair, then think of Mary! In perils and in sorrows and in fears―think of her, call upon her name! Let her name be ever on your lips and the thought of her be ever in your heart! Follow her―so that the power of her intercession may attend to your needs! Imitate her―for in her footsteps you cannot go astray! Call upon her―and you will not despair! Think of her―and you cannot fail. If she holds you by the hand―how can you fall? Under her protection you shall know no fear! Under her guidance you shall not falter! Under her patronage you shall surely reach the goal!” (St. Bernard of Clairvaux).
For many—especially for those who suffer anything—a ‘New Year’ brings hopes of being a better year. We are, by nature, hopeful creatures! I guess that’s why so many buy lottery tickets! Or enter the ‘lottery’ of marriage with high hopes! Just kidding! Yet there is some truth to this—very few, if any, get married with the expectation that their marriage will be a miserable marriage; they all hope for the best. Hope, in this sense, springs eternal. People used to try and climb unconquered mountains, in the hope of the being the first one to reach the summit. Athletes and sports teams enter races and competitions hoping to win the first prize. A person starts a business in the hope that it will be successful and not a failure. A patient takes a medicine in the hope that it will defeat a disease and bring health. These, and many such like examples, manifest the presence of a natural hope, which can be described as the desire to attain something that at present is outside their reach.
Wrong Hopes
But what if the marriage is successful—what comes after that? Eventually, death! What if the business is successful—what comes after that? Eventually, death! What if the athlete or team wins the prize? What if he reaches the summit? What if the disease is cured? What if this? What if that? Ultimately, eventually, inescapably there comes death! And what comes after death? Aha! Now we are getting ‘warm’—then come either the fires of Hell, the fires of Purgatory or the fire of love in Heaven (God likes to represent Himself as fire!).
Heavenly Hopes
If there is Hope of a successful marriage, business, cure, etc., then there should also be a hope for Heaven. Yet Heaven is beyond our capacities and capabilities. We can barely jump a foot or two above the ground unaided—so how on earth are we going to get to Heaven. The soul is planted in the earth (God’s creation), yet it should be totally focused on moving towards Heaven (God himself). It is a delicate balance of attitudes towards creation and the Creator. Some poor souls never get beyond the scope of creation and lose themselves irredeemably in its pleasures. Others use creation for the purpose it was made to be—stepping stones or rungs on a ladder that leads to God―the temporary that leads to the eternal. Since Heaven is beyond the reach of our natural powers, we need some super-natural powers to get there. This is where the supernatural virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity come in to help us. Faith makes us adhere to God as the source of truth; Hope makes us adhere to God as the source of good; Charity makes us adhere to God for his own sake.
The Heavenly Ingredients
Faith is in the mind, as it is all about knowing things about God—we could say, in a very imperfect analogy, that Faith is like the wood for the fire, different bits of wood like different bits of information, that play their part in the future fire. Hope, like Charity, resides in the will or heart and is based upon Faith (knowledge)—no wood, no fire; if there is no knowledge, then there can be no hope or love. We cannot love what we do not know and we cannot Hope to be saved by God if we do not even know that a God exists. Hope comes after Faith, inasmuch as Faith gives knowledge of what is to be hoped for. Hope comes before Charity, inasmuch as the hope of good, produces a love of it—just like the spark gives birth to the flames of the fire. An offshoot to this is that the more we know (the greater our Faith or knowledge about God), then this opens us to a potentially greater and stronger Hope in God and a greater love of God.
The Power of Hope
Where there is Hope there can often be great joy—even amidst the most grievous torments. Look at Purgatory for example: The suffering of Purgatory is temporary and therefore includes the Hope of one day seeing the face of God; it is borne with patience and even with great joy—far surpassing any joy on earth. Since the souls realize that purification is necessary―and they do not wish to have it otherwise―it is accepted generously, out of love for God and with perfect submission to His will. The pain of souls in Purgatory is inexpressible, but so too is the joy, because of their Hope and desire for God. The souls in purgatory are sure of Heaven, but they still hope for their moment of being ready to enter it. Once they enter Heaven, all Hope vanishes, for they then possess what they hoped for.
The Energy of Hope
Hope is the virtue that makes the soul desire, even crave, for Heaven and eternal life as our ultimate happiness. Having heard of the Kingdom of God, the soul wants to go there. The virtue of Hope stirs the soul to desire eternal life as its final happiness. Hope draws the soul to place its trust in the promises of Jesus Christ, relying not on our own strength, but on the grace and help of the Holy Spirit to achieve this final goal. ‘Let us hold fast to the confession of our Hope without wavering, for He Who promised is faithful’ (Hebrews 10:23).
The virtue of Hope responds to the aspiration to happiness which God has placed in the heart of every person; it takes up the hopes that inspire our activities and purifies them, so as to order them to and prepare them for the Kingdom of Heaven. Hope keeps a soul from discouragement; it sustains the soul during times of abandonment; it opens up the soul in expectation of eternal beatitude. Buoyed up by Hope, the soul is preserved from selfishness and is led to the happiness that flows from Charity.
What Hope Have We Got?
What is Hope? What is the Hope that we have been given? Hope is the theological virtue by which we aspire with confidence to reach God and Heaven, trusting God and His grace, and being resolved to use his help. Since it is a theological and supernatural virtue, Hope looks directly to our eternal happiness. It is the reaching after good—not just any good, but those goods that lead to Heaven, and, in last analysis, after the supreme good, that is, God. Now, in seeking to possess God (the chief aim of Hope), we also reach for what the possession of God will give us, that is, eternal happiness (the secondary aim of Hope). Furthermore, we pin our Hope on God, not man. We may indeed have hope in a creature, as the instrument of divine providence in our behalf. In this way, for example, we hope in the saints. Hope, in this sense, fuels and directs our efforts towards God and eternal happiness in God. Hence, Hope is a theological virtue. The Greek word “theos” means God; from “theos” we have the word “theological” for whatever directly pertains or has reference to God.
Despair—A Sin Against Hope
Yet there are pitfalls and threats to Hope—despair is one of them. Despair, which is the loss or abandonment of Hope, is a sin, and it leads to other sins. St. Paul says: “Who, despairing, have given themselves up to lasciviousness, unto the working of all uncleanness, and unto covetousness” (Ephesians 4:19). Not everyone who despairs has lost or rejected the Faith. A person may know by Faith that all sin is pardonable, and yet, by a corrupted judgment on his own particular case, may abandon all hope of pardon for himself. Despair is a most grievous sin. It turns a person completely away from God. In itself, however, despair is not so grievous as unbelief or hatred of God. Yet for man it is more dangerous than these sins. For despair leads a person to fling himself headlong into all manner of sins. Despair arises from disorders in the soul, such as lust. But in a special way, it comes from the sin of sloth, from spiritual laziness which will not let the soul grapple with difficulties, and overcome them in the strength and grace of supernatural Hope.
Presumption—Another Sin Against Hope
Presumption, as a sin against Hope, is the wholly unreasonable expectation that God will save us despite the bad will in us, which makes that saving impossible. In other words, we think we can sin as much as we want and we imagine that God will automatically save us because He is a living and merciful God. Under the name and guise of reliance on God, presumption insults God and dishonors our own intelligence. It is presumption, for example, to expect forgiveness for sins without repentance. It is presumption to expect Heaven, without working to get there by merit.
Presumption is a sin, and can be a very grave sin, but it is not so grave a sin as despair. For, though it is excessive and unreasonable in its expectation, presumption does recognize (however insultingly and distortedly) the divine mercy and goodness which despair utterly rejects and denies. Presumption seems, at first glance, to be contrary to fear rather than to Hope. For the presumptuous man seems to fear nothing; but in reality presumption stands directly opposed to Hope. Presumption arises from a prideful trust that a person, in himself, is powerful enough to cope with anything, and as a being so excellent, for one reason or another, that God could not allow him to be punished.
How Certain Is Our Hope?
But is Hope certain subjectively—certain in the subject or person hoping―so far as our human frailty is concerned? Obviously it is not. For we cannot be sure of ourselves, so sure that we shall not fail in cooperating with God. The failure may come from our frailty or from our malice. As, then, the most saintly can fail, Hope remains in a sense uncertain, uncertain subjectively, on our part. Therefore St. Paul says : “In fear and trembling work out your salvation.” Yet there are some who speak of absolute confidence, or the certainty of Faith in regard to Salvation. Protestants are confident that they will be saved; Catholics hope they will be saved.
Motives For Our Hope
The prime motivating factor for our Hope is that of who God is—“God is Charity” (1 John 4:8) and in the very own words of the Son of God, “the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). The Holy Ghost, in Holy Scripture, tells us that “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works” (Psalm 144:8-9). God the Father tells us through Ezechiel: “Is it my will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23), and through Isaias, God tells us: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). Add to this the list of great sinners that Our Lord turned around and forgave: St. Mary Magdalen—an adulteress, possessed by seven devils; St. Dismas—the Good Thief on Calvary; St. Paul of Tarsus—a persecutor of Christians; Zaccheus—the chief publican in Jericho and many more who have received no particular mention in Holy Scripture.
This mind of Our Lord prevails to this day. He has spoken to His mystics and communicated to them His great desire to save sinners. In the book by Fr. Gottemoller, Words of Love, which is a selection of quotes of Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez (abbreviated as J.M.), Sr. Mary of the Trinity (abbreviated as M.T.) and Sr. Consolata Betrone (abbreviated as C.B.). Here is what Our Lord says to them:
“Never does My Heart refuse to forgive a soul that humbles itself, especially when it asks with confidence.” (J.M., p.91).
“My Heart takes comfort in forgiving. I have no greater desire, no greater joy, than when I can pardon a soul. When a soul returns to Me after a fall, the comfort she gives Me is a gain for her, for I regard her with very great love.” (J.M., p.94). “I am consumed with desire to pardon.... Yes, to pardon these dear souls for whom I shed My Blood.” (J.M., p.136). “I will make known that the measure of My love and mercy for fallen souls is limitless. I want to forgive them. It rests Me to forgive.” (J.M., p. 174).“My Heart is not so much wounded by sin, as torn with grief that they will not take refuge with Me after it.” (J.M., p. 188).“Poor sinners, how blind they are! I want only to forgive them, and they seek only to offend Me. That is My great sorrow; that so many are lost and that they do not all come to Me to be forgiven.” (J.M., p.237).
[Josefa asked if He remembered our faults after they were forgiven. Jesus replied:] “As soon as a soul throws itself at My feet and implores My forgiveness, Josefa, I forget all her sins.” (J.M., p.237). [If one is aroused from a state of lukewarmness] “Ah! Hasten to My Heart ... and be without fear for the past; all has been swallowed up in the abyss of My mercy, and My love is preparing new graces for you. The memory of your lapses will be an incentive to humility and a source of merit, and you cannot give Me a greater proof of affection than to count on My full pardon and to believe that your sins will never be as great as My mercy, which is infinite.” (J.M., p.289). “I pursue sinners as justice pursues criminals. But justice seeks them in order to punish, I, in order to forgive.” (J.M., p.237—238). “The mercy of God is infinite and never refuses to forgive sinners...” (J.M., p.256).
“I want them all [souls] to have confidence in My mercy, to expect all from My clemency, and never to doubt My readiness to forgive. I am God, but a God of love! I am a Father, but a Father full of compassion and never harsh. My Heart is infinitely holy but also infinitely wise, and knowing human frailty and infirmity, stoops to poor sinners with infinite mercy. I love those who after a first fall come to Me for pardon.... I love them still more when they beg pardon for their second sin, and should this happen again, I do not say a million times, but a million million times, I still love them and pardon them, and I will wash in My Blood their last as fully as their first sin. Never shall I weary of repentant sinners, nor cease from hoping for their return, and the greater their distress, the greater My welcome. Does not a father love a sick child with special affection? Are not his care and solicitude greater? So is the tenderness and compassion of My Heart more abundant for sinners than for the just.” (J.M., p.353).
“Consolata, you must never forget that I always am, and love to be, kind and merciful toward My creatures.” (C.B., p.42). [One time Consolata was lamenting her slight faults:] “Oh Jesus, I am always the same; I promise, and then . . .” And He replied: “I also am always the same and never change!” (C.B., p.49). “Jesus is not a tyrant, and if He forgives an entire lifetime of crime in return for one act of love, then tell Me, how could it be that He would take notice one day of some useless thought on which you had dwelt involuntarily?” (C.B., p.51).
“Look, Consolata, the enemy will make every effort to shake your blind faith in Me, but you must never forget that I am, and love to be, exclusively kind and merciful. Understand My heart, Consolata; understand My love, and never permit the enemy to gain entrance into your soul, even for an instant, with a thought of diffidence; never! Believe Me, I am solely and always kind; I am solely and always like a parent to you! Imitate therefore the children who, at every little scratch of the finger, run at once to mother to have it bandaged. You should always do the same, and remember that I will always cancel out and repair your imperfections and infidelities, just as the mother will always bandage the child’s finger, whether it is really hurt or only seems so in imagination. And if the child were to really hurt his arm or his head, how tenderly and affectionately would he be cared for and bandaged by the mother! Well, I do the very same with regard to your soul when you fall, even though I may do it in silence. Do you understand, Consolata? Therefore, never, never, never have even a shadow of doubt! Lack of confidence wounds My Heart to the quick and makes Me suffer!” (C.B., p.53—54).
“It is My joy to pardon. If pride prevents you from being sorry for your sins for your own sake, be sorry for them out of love for Me, so that I may have the joy of forgiving” ... (M. T. no. 426). “I will teach sinners that the mercy of My Heart is inexhaustible.” (J.M., p.353). “I never refuse grace even to those who are guilty of grave sin; nor do I separate them from the good whom I love with predilection. I keep them all in My Heart, that all may receive the help required by their state of soul....” (J.M., p.234). “At the least sign of repentance, My Heart is aflame with joy, and I wait with inexpressible love for the sinner to turn towards Me...” (M.T. no. 157).
Mary Our Hope
In the Salve Regina to Mary, we pray the words: “Hail our life, our sweetness and our hope!” Hope is sweet and life needs hope! To increase our hope in Mary, we should ponder upon the following words of St. Bernard: “When the storm of temptation arises, when you are midst the reefs and shoals of tribulation, fix your gaze upon the Star of the Sea―call upon Mary! If tossed by the rising tide of pride and ambition, if lost upon the troubled waters of scandal and contention―look then at the Star, invoke her name! Do the billows of anger, of avarice, of lust batter against your soul―cast thy eyes upon Mary! Does the greatness of your crime fill your soul with terror? Does your wretched conscience beat you down in shame and the fear of judgment paralyze your heart?―then, when about to sink to the depths of despondency, to plunge headlong into despair, then think of Mary! In perils and in sorrows and in fears―think of her, call upon her name! Let her name be ever on your lips and the thought of her be ever in your heart! Follow her―so that the power of her intercession may attend to your needs! Imitate her―for in her footsteps you cannot go astray! Call upon her―and you will not despair! Think of her―and you cannot fail. If she holds you by the hand―how can you fall? Under her protection you shall know no fear! Under her guidance you shall not falter! Under her patronage you shall surely reach the goal!” (St. Bernard of Clairvaux).
Article 7
Sunday December 31st
Will it be a Happy New Year or an Unhappy New Year?
Sunday December 31st
Will it be a Happy New Year or an Unhappy New Year?
It’s Going to be a New Year! Will There Be a New You?
Frequently, we search out “new” things to own, “new” things to do, “new” experiences in which to participate, “new” excitements to enjoy, “new” ways of doing things, “new” beginnings, “new” hopes, etc. In all of these “new” enterprises the word “new” is synonymous with the word “better”. Usually, when we seek something “new”, we seek something “better” than what we have.
Our Lord Comes to Make Things New
There are times when the “old” is better, and there are times when the “new” is necessary. Our Lord Himself came to perfect the old with the new—the Old Testament gave way to the New Testament. Our “old” selves, likewise, need to make for our “new” selves—renewed by the grace of God. Heaven is often called the “New Jerusalem” —a heavenly Jerusalem that replaces or perfects the earthly Jerusalem. We see this focus on the “new” in the words of Our Lord and the New Testament authors. “But we look for new heavens and a new Earth” (2 Peter 3:13).
Our Lord is most certainly seeking something “new”—something “new” from you! As He says in Holy Scripture: “And He that sat on the throne, said: ‘Behold, I make all things new!’” (Apocalypse 21:5). He wants to make a “new” you—He always has wanted to make a “new” you—but you have always resisted Him, going only so far and not far enough, or not even going anywhere!
What Makes a Happy New Year?
The answers to that question are endless. Perhaps the most common answers would include: Not having any financial worries or problems. Not having any health problems. Not having relationship problems. In short―not having any kind of suffering. People equate happiness with the absence of suffering—which to a certain degree is true—for who is happy is Hell? Not even the devil—regardless of how many souls he pulls down there! In fact, the unhappiest of all creatures in Hell is Satan (Lucifer) himself—and nobody suffers more than Satan. Whereas Heaven—where there is an absence of any and all suffering—is a happy place! So we can agree that absence of suffering creates happiness.
Happiness and Holiness
Tonight and tomorrow we will be wishing everyone a “Happy New Year!” This phrase has become a mindless cliché that is uttered without much thought or sincerity. What is it that truly makes us happy? It can only be holiness, for it is only saints that go to Heaven and Heaven is the ultimate happiness—as pointed out by Our Lord: “For what shall it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). As Our Lady pointed out to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!” It is pointless striving for earthly happiness, if we have lose out on heavenly happiness. It is only holiness that leads to happiness.
Are You Happy and Holy?
You must be careful not to make the mistake of asking yourself first whether you are saintly and second whether you are happy. Both are stupid questions, getting you nowhere. It is only sham saints who are forever wondering how holy they are; the real ones forget about themselves in their desire to please God. In the same way, it is only people who are not awfully happy who question their happiness.
The Holiest People Are the Happiest People
Have you ever noticed how the holiest people you have come across always seem to be the happiest? You would think that enclosed nuns in their Carmelite convents, with no possessions and no pleasures such as movies and parties, might be lonely and sad. But not at all: they are just the ones who seem to be laughing whenever you visit them. Then on the other side of it, you would think that men and women who have lots of money and lovely houses would be proclaiming their happiness all day long. But it does not work out like this. The lonely ones are men with two or three wives (“which ought to be company enough,” you would have said) and the women who are so busy running after pleasure that they are never alone.
St. Francis de Sales has a punchy phrase that says: “Une sainte qui est triste, est une triste sainte!” which means, “A saint who is sad is sad saint!” that is to say a “poor example of a saint”. Yet it is a real test to find happiness in the many crosses that we encounter each day—but it is those crosses and sufferings that make us holy.
Worldliness is Not Really Happiness
It is a known fact that the people who kill themselves are mostly the rich and the worldly, not the poor and the religious. Does not this prove something? Well, it points to a lot of things, but chiefly it seems to show that filling your life with enjoyment only empties your life of happiness, and that collecting more and more money or possessions or power simply does not work.
After what Our Lord has said, this is only to be expected. “A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions” (Luke 12:15). “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33). “Your treasure is in Heaven where the rust does not consume and thieves do not break through and steal” (Matthew 6:20). “What does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Mark 8:36). “The peace, which I give, is not the peace which the world gives, for My peace no man can take from you” (John 14:27; John 16:22). Remember the parable of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31), or the parable of the rich man, who tried to store up his goods in bigger and bigger barns (Luke 12:16-21), and the parable of the woman who gave away even the last of her savings (Mark 12:41-44). Remember the incident of the rich young man, who was called to be a disciple by Jesus, but who turned away, because he could not bring himself to part from his wealth (Mark 10:17-22).
Can We Have Happiness on Earth?
The question arises--“Can we be happy—and thus without any suffering—here on Earth?” Without having committed any kind of sin—the answer would be “Yes!”—and this was the case for Adam and Eve, until they sinned. They were perfectly happy as far as they could be here on Earth, without yet having the Beatific Vision of God. Sin, however, brings unhappiness with it, for sin has to be paid-for and the payment is painful. “The soul that sinneth, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death” (James 1:15). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56) … “By one man [Adam] sin entered into this world, and, by sin, death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). “From the woman [Eve] came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33). “What fruit therefore had you then in those things, of which you are now ashamed? For the end of them is death!” (Romans 6:21).
Love Brings Happiness and Unhappiness
St. Augustine uttered that famous phrase: “Love God and do what you want!” There is more to those words than at first meets the eye! Everyone would probably agree that love brings happiness. We all want to be loved and we all want to love. We all do love—one thing or another—but we also find that our love does not always bring happiness with it!
“Tell me who you’re friends are and I will tell you what you are!” We have all heard that saying and many of its derivatives: “Tell me what you like/love and I will tell what you are!” … “Tell me what you think of the most / what you eat / what you do the most / what you read or watch the most / etc.” In a certain sense, we become what we love. So it depends upon whether that which we love is good or bad, healthy or unhealthy, holy or sinful. “He that loves danger, shall perish in it!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). “He that loves iniquity, hates his own soul” (Psalm 10:6).
To the Christian soul, the world is dangerous and full of iniquity, which is why Holy Scripture says: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16).
Those who love healthy food tend towards healthiness, while those who love unhealthy food tend towards unhealthiness. Those who love sin tend towards sinfulness, while those who love holy things tend towards holiness. The complicating factor is that—regardless of whether we tend to holiness or sinfulness, healthiness or unhealthiness—we always think that our choice is going to make us happy—otherwise we would not do it. It is just that some fail to see beyond the superficial and temporary ‘happiness’ to the great unhappiness that lies beneath the surface—and the devil makes good use of this blindness, for he usually tempts us to sin under the guise of good, telling us that the sin he dangles before us will bring us more happiness than unhappiness. He blinds us to the word of God as he blinded Eve to the word of God:
“Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why hath God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat: but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God hath commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No! You shall not die the death! For God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’ And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold: and she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband who did eat” (Genesis 3:1-6). The superficial appearance of happiness brought a terrible unhappiness in its wake. “From the woman [Eve] came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33).
Love Makes the World Go Round!
You have certainly heard the saying: “Love makes the world go round!”—yet you have probably not thought about it from a supernatural or theological perspective. Just stop and think! Who really makes the world go round? It is God! “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by him: and without him was made nothing that was made!” (John 1:103)—and that Word of God, Jesus Christ, said: “Without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), “Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches, are from God” (Ecclesiasticus 11:14). Many more Scriptural quotes could be summoned to testify to the fact that “God makes the world go round!” Now, who or what is God? “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8). God is love. Therefore, Love (God) makes the world go round.
Made by Love! Made for Love!
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and God has made us for love! In the ship of our soul, it is our heart (our will) that is the engine of love, and our mind (our intellect) is the rudder for love. A powerful engine will quickly drive the ship of the soul through the waters of life. But the “engine of love” is blind and needs the “rudder of the mind” to guide it in the right direction. What good is it to be sailing “full steam ahead” if we are sailing in the wrong direction? We must love the right things, not the wrong things—and it is our mind (our intellect) that must enlighten or steer our powerful love in the right direction.
We were made to love God! From our earliest days, the catechism taught us that we were made to love God:
“God made me because He loves me … God made me to be happy with Him in Heaven … God is always happy … God made me to be happy with Him forever … I cannot be happy without God … I need God … Everybody in Heaven is happy … To be happy forever, we must get to Heaven … To be happy with God in Heaven, I must know Him, love Him, and serve Him in this world … I must make my life a gift to God … I must love God more than I love myself … I must love God more than I love anybody else … I must love God above all things” (The New St. Joseph First Communion Catechism).
As St. John the Evangelist—the “Beloved Disciple”—says: “Let us therefore love God, because God first hath loved us!” (1 John 4:19). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
The Power and Energy of Divine Love
Coming back to this idea of “Love makes the world go round”—it is certain that the more we love God, then the more energy and power we have for the voyage to Heaven, which is always “against the tide” of the world. In this “loveless world”—or more precisely, this “loveless godless world” which does not love God—we need a powerful love, or powerful engine, to make headway against the powerful contrary tide of the world. We can easily become discouraged in seeing the vast majority of vessels (souls) happily sailing with the current or with the tide, down to the ‘Niagara Falls of Hell’—with even family and friends blindly and happily “sailing down the swanee.” It is only a powerful love of God―like powerful strokes the oar―that can stop us from being washed downstream with the worldly current. It would be no bad thing—during the course of this New Year—to repeatedly read and reflect upon those inspired words of The Imitation of Christ, which speak of the wonderful effects of Divine Love:
“Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs with equanimity. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and estranged from all worldly affections, lest its inward sight be obstructed, lest it be entangled in any temporal interest and overcome by adversity.
“Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger or higher or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in God, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver.
“Love often knows no limits but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much where he who does not love fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice.
“Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. It is mean and contemptible in its own eyes, devoted and thankful to God; always trusting and hoping in Him even when He is distasteful to it, for there is no living in love without sorrow. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5: “The Wonderful Effect Of Divine Love”).
The Only New Year’s Resolution Worth Making!
The only New Year’s resolution worth making is the resolution to grow in the love of God. In a certain sense, it contains all other possible “good” resolutions and, without it, all other “good” resolutions become useless, pointless and worthless. Holy Scripture clearly points this out: “Jesus said to him: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets!’” (Matthew 22:37-39).
Are you a sinner? Do you need the mercy and forgiveness of God? Then seek out charity! “Love God all thy life, and call upon him for thy salvation!” (Ecclesiasticus 13:18) … “Charity covers all sins!” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins!” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much!” (Luke 7:47). “He that loves not, abides in death!” (1 John 3:14).
Love is the Soul of Sanctity
Coming back to the idea of happiness being linked to holiness―God is charity and God is holy, and we are commanded to be holy and charitable like God: “We are of God ... God is charity … Let us love one another, for charity is of God ... He that loves not, knows not God: for God is charity … God has sent His only begotten Son into the world to be a propitiation for our sins … If God hath so loved us; then we also ought to love one another! If we love one another, then God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us!” (1 John 4:6-12).
Without charity, we cannot be pleasing to God. We know that a body without a soul is merely a corpse. Likewise, whatever we may do for God—if it is done without a love of God—is nothing! “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Charity is the life-giving soul for all virtues, which, if they have not charity, are mere corpses of virtue.
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “It is written (in Colossians 3:14): ‘Above all things have charity, which is the bond of perfection,’ because it binds all the other virtues together in perfect unity. It is charity that unites us to God, ‘he that abides in charity abides in God, and God in him’ (1 John 4:16). Therefore the root perfection of the Christian life consists in charity. “That Christ may dwell by faith in your hearts; that being rooted and founded in charity’ (Ephesians 3:17). The Christian life consists chiefly in charity, whereby the soul is united to God; wherefore it is written (1 John 3:14): ‘He that loveth not abides in death.’ Hence the perfection of the Christian life consists in charity.” (Summa Theologica, IIa IIae, q. 184, art. 1).
The Saints and Spiritual Masters on Charity
Charity is the principal norm or measuring stick for judging the perfection of the Christian life. This is an indisputable truth that is agreed upon by one spiritual master after another:
“Salvation is shown to Faith, it is prepared for Hope, but it is given only to Charity. Faith points out the way to the land of promise as a pillar of fire; Hope feeds us with its manna of sweetness, but Charity actually introduces us into the Promised Land” (St. Francis de Sales).
“All our religion is but a false religion, and all our virtues are mere illusions and we ourselves are only hypocrites in the sight of God, if we have not that universal charity for everyone―for the good and for the bad, for the poor and the rich, and for all those who do us harm as much as for those who do us good” (St. John Vianney).
“Who can adequately speak of the bond of the love of God? … All the elect of God are perfect in charity. Without charity, nothing is pleasing to God!” (St. Clement of Rome). “Charity, to which nothing is to be preferred!” (St. Ignatius of Antioch). “He is better in whom charity is greater” (St. Augustine).
“Perfection of life is the perfection of love. For love is the life of the soul ... God has sown in our hearts the seeds of all virtues, which, however, are so covered with our imperfections and weakness that they do not appear, or appear very slightly, till the vital heat of holy love comes to quicken and resuscitate them, producing by them the actions of all virtues ... Charity does and accomplishes the work of all the virtues … Charity is that pure fire-tried gold, which our Savior counselled the Bishop of Laodicea to buy, which contains the virtue of all things, which can do all, and which does all” (St. Francis de Sales, Treatise on the Love of God).
“You ask me for a method of attaining perfection. I know of love―only love. Love can do all things!” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux).
“Charity is the form, mover, mother and root of all virtues” (St. Thomas Aquinas).
“He who does not acquire the love of God, will scarcely persevere in the grace of God, for it is very difficult to renounce sin merely through fear of chastisement” (St. Alphonsus Liguori).
“All life must perfect itself. This is true, above all, of the Christian life … The essence of perfection consists in charity … This means not only that love is the queen and the soul of all the virtues, but that its worth is such that it suffices to make man perfect by imparting to him all the virtues … It cannot be stated in clearer terms that all perfection consists in the love of God and of one’s neighbor for God's sake” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
“Charity is the bond of perfection because it is the highest of the virtues which unites our soul to God. It ought to last forever, and it vivifies all the other virtues by rendering their acts meritorious, ordaining them to the last end, that is, to its object―which is God loved above all else … Perfection does not consist chiefly in humility, nor does it consist especially in poverty, nor in acts of worship, or of the virtue of religion, but it lies primarily in the love of God and of one’s neighbor, which renders the acts of all the other virtues meritorious” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, Three Ages of the Interior Life).
“One’s life is more perfect in proportion as one’s acts are commanded by a more intense charity” (Fr. Guibert, The Theology of the Spiritual Life).
Frequently, we search out “new” things to own, “new” things to do, “new” experiences in which to participate, “new” excitements to enjoy, “new” ways of doing things, “new” beginnings, “new” hopes, etc. In all of these “new” enterprises the word “new” is synonymous with the word “better”. Usually, when we seek something “new”, we seek something “better” than what we have.
Our Lord Comes to Make Things New
There are times when the “old” is better, and there are times when the “new” is necessary. Our Lord Himself came to perfect the old with the new—the Old Testament gave way to the New Testament. Our “old” selves, likewise, need to make for our “new” selves—renewed by the grace of God. Heaven is often called the “New Jerusalem” —a heavenly Jerusalem that replaces or perfects the earthly Jerusalem. We see this focus on the “new” in the words of Our Lord and the New Testament authors. “But we look for new heavens and a new Earth” (2 Peter 3:13).
Our Lord is most certainly seeking something “new”—something “new” from you! As He says in Holy Scripture: “And He that sat on the throne, said: ‘Behold, I make all things new!’” (Apocalypse 21:5). He wants to make a “new” you—He always has wanted to make a “new” you—but you have always resisted Him, going only so far and not far enough, or not even going anywhere!
What Makes a Happy New Year?
The answers to that question are endless. Perhaps the most common answers would include: Not having any financial worries or problems. Not having any health problems. Not having relationship problems. In short―not having any kind of suffering. People equate happiness with the absence of suffering—which to a certain degree is true—for who is happy is Hell? Not even the devil—regardless of how many souls he pulls down there! In fact, the unhappiest of all creatures in Hell is Satan (Lucifer) himself—and nobody suffers more than Satan. Whereas Heaven—where there is an absence of any and all suffering—is a happy place! So we can agree that absence of suffering creates happiness.
Happiness and Holiness
Tonight and tomorrow we will be wishing everyone a “Happy New Year!” This phrase has become a mindless cliché that is uttered without much thought or sincerity. What is it that truly makes us happy? It can only be holiness, for it is only saints that go to Heaven and Heaven is the ultimate happiness—as pointed out by Our Lord: “For what shall it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36). As Our Lady pointed out to St. Bernadette: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!” It is pointless striving for earthly happiness, if we have lose out on heavenly happiness. It is only holiness that leads to happiness.
Are You Happy and Holy?
You must be careful not to make the mistake of asking yourself first whether you are saintly and second whether you are happy. Both are stupid questions, getting you nowhere. It is only sham saints who are forever wondering how holy they are; the real ones forget about themselves in their desire to please God. In the same way, it is only people who are not awfully happy who question their happiness.
The Holiest People Are the Happiest People
Have you ever noticed how the holiest people you have come across always seem to be the happiest? You would think that enclosed nuns in their Carmelite convents, with no possessions and no pleasures such as movies and parties, might be lonely and sad. But not at all: they are just the ones who seem to be laughing whenever you visit them. Then on the other side of it, you would think that men and women who have lots of money and lovely houses would be proclaiming their happiness all day long. But it does not work out like this. The lonely ones are men with two or three wives (“which ought to be company enough,” you would have said) and the women who are so busy running after pleasure that they are never alone.
St. Francis de Sales has a punchy phrase that says: “Une sainte qui est triste, est une triste sainte!” which means, “A saint who is sad is sad saint!” that is to say a “poor example of a saint”. Yet it is a real test to find happiness in the many crosses that we encounter each day—but it is those crosses and sufferings that make us holy.
Worldliness is Not Really Happiness
It is a known fact that the people who kill themselves are mostly the rich and the worldly, not the poor and the religious. Does not this prove something? Well, it points to a lot of things, but chiefly it seems to show that filling your life with enjoyment only empties your life of happiness, and that collecting more and more money or possessions or power simply does not work.
After what Our Lord has said, this is only to be expected. “A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions” (Luke 12:15). “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33). “Your treasure is in Heaven where the rust does not consume and thieves do not break through and steal” (Matthew 6:20). “What does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Mark 8:36). “The peace, which I give, is not the peace which the world gives, for My peace no man can take from you” (John 14:27; John 16:22). Remember the parable of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31), or the parable of the rich man, who tried to store up his goods in bigger and bigger barns (Luke 12:16-21), and the parable of the woman who gave away even the last of her savings (Mark 12:41-44). Remember the incident of the rich young man, who was called to be a disciple by Jesus, but who turned away, because he could not bring himself to part from his wealth (Mark 10:17-22).
Can We Have Happiness on Earth?
The question arises--“Can we be happy—and thus without any suffering—here on Earth?” Without having committed any kind of sin—the answer would be “Yes!”—and this was the case for Adam and Eve, until they sinned. They were perfectly happy as far as they could be here on Earth, without yet having the Beatific Vision of God. Sin, however, brings unhappiness with it, for sin has to be paid-for and the payment is painful. “The soul that sinneth, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) … “Sin, when it is completed, begets death” (James 1:15). “The sting of death is sin” (1 Corinthians 15:56) … “By one man [Adam] sin entered into this world, and, by sin, death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). “From the woman [Eve] came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33). “What fruit therefore had you then in those things, of which you are now ashamed? For the end of them is death!” (Romans 6:21).
Love Brings Happiness and Unhappiness
St. Augustine uttered that famous phrase: “Love God and do what you want!” There is more to those words than at first meets the eye! Everyone would probably agree that love brings happiness. We all want to be loved and we all want to love. We all do love—one thing or another—but we also find that our love does not always bring happiness with it!
“Tell me who you’re friends are and I will tell you what you are!” We have all heard that saying and many of its derivatives: “Tell me what you like/love and I will tell what you are!” … “Tell me what you think of the most / what you eat / what you do the most / what you read or watch the most / etc.” In a certain sense, we become what we love. So it depends upon whether that which we love is good or bad, healthy or unhealthy, holy or sinful. “He that loves danger, shall perish in it!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). “He that loves iniquity, hates his own soul” (Psalm 10:6).
To the Christian soul, the world is dangerous and full of iniquity, which is why Holy Scripture says: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16).
Those who love healthy food tend towards healthiness, while those who love unhealthy food tend towards unhealthiness. Those who love sin tend towards sinfulness, while those who love holy things tend towards holiness. The complicating factor is that—regardless of whether we tend to holiness or sinfulness, healthiness or unhealthiness—we always think that our choice is going to make us happy—otherwise we would not do it. It is just that some fail to see beyond the superficial and temporary ‘happiness’ to the great unhappiness that lies beneath the surface—and the devil makes good use of this blindness, for he usually tempts us to sin under the guise of good, telling us that the sin he dangles before us will bring us more happiness than unhappiness. He blinds us to the word of God as he blinded Eve to the word of God:
“Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the Earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: ‘Why hath God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ And the woman answered him, saying: ‘Of the fruit of the trees that are in paradise we do eat: but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, God hath commanded us that we should not eat; and that we should not touch it, lest perhaps we die!’ And the serpent said to the woman: ‘No! You shall not die the death! For God doth know that in what day soever you shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened and you shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil!’ And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold: and she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband who did eat” (Genesis 3:1-6). The superficial appearance of happiness brought a terrible unhappiness in its wake. “From the woman [Eve] came the beginning of sin, and by her we all die” (Ecclesiasticus 25:33).
Love Makes the World Go Round!
You have certainly heard the saying: “Love makes the world go round!”—yet you have probably not thought about it from a supernatural or theological perspective. Just stop and think! Who really makes the world go round? It is God! “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by him: and without him was made nothing that was made!” (John 1:103)—and that Word of God, Jesus Christ, said: “Without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5), “Good things and evil, life and death, poverty and riches, are from God” (Ecclesiasticus 11:14). Many more Scriptural quotes could be summoned to testify to the fact that “God makes the world go round!” Now, who or what is God? “God is charity!” (1 John 4:8). God is love. Therefore, Love (God) makes the world go round.
Made by Love! Made for Love!
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and God has made us for love! In the ship of our soul, it is our heart (our will) that is the engine of love, and our mind (our intellect) is the rudder for love. A powerful engine will quickly drive the ship of the soul through the waters of life. But the “engine of love” is blind and needs the “rudder of the mind” to guide it in the right direction. What good is it to be sailing “full steam ahead” if we are sailing in the wrong direction? We must love the right things, not the wrong things—and it is our mind (our intellect) that must enlighten or steer our powerful love in the right direction.
We were made to love God! From our earliest days, the catechism taught us that we were made to love God:
“God made me because He loves me … God made me to be happy with Him in Heaven … God is always happy … God made me to be happy with Him forever … I cannot be happy without God … I need God … Everybody in Heaven is happy … To be happy forever, we must get to Heaven … To be happy with God in Heaven, I must know Him, love Him, and serve Him in this world … I must make my life a gift to God … I must love God more than I love myself … I must love God more than I love anybody else … I must love God above all things” (The New St. Joseph First Communion Catechism).
As St. John the Evangelist—the “Beloved Disciple”—says: “Let us therefore love God, because God first hath loved us!” (1 John 4:19). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
The Power and Energy of Divine Love
Coming back to this idea of “Love makes the world go round”—it is certain that the more we love God, then the more energy and power we have for the voyage to Heaven, which is always “against the tide” of the world. In this “loveless world”—or more precisely, this “loveless godless world” which does not love God—we need a powerful love, or powerful engine, to make headway against the powerful contrary tide of the world. We can easily become discouraged in seeing the vast majority of vessels (souls) happily sailing with the current or with the tide, down to the ‘Niagara Falls of Hell’—with even family and friends blindly and happily “sailing down the swanee.” It is only a powerful love of God―like powerful strokes the oar―that can stop us from being washed downstream with the worldly current. It would be no bad thing—during the course of this New Year—to repeatedly read and reflect upon those inspired words of The Imitation of Christ, which speak of the wonderful effects of Divine Love:
“Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs with equanimity. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and estranged from all worldly affections, lest its inward sight be obstructed, lest it be entangled in any temporal interest and overcome by adversity.
“Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger or higher or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in God, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver.
“Love often knows no limits but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much where he who does not love fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice.
“Love is swift, sincere, kind, pleasant, and delightful. Love is strong, patient and faithful, prudent, long-suffering, and manly. Love is never self-seeking, for in whatever a person seeks himself there he falls from love. Love is circumspect, humble, and upright. It is neither soft nor light, nor intent upon vain things. It is sober and chaste, firm and quiet, guarded in all the senses. Love is subject and obedient to superiors. It is mean and contemptible in its own eyes, devoted and thankful to God; always trusting and hoping in Him even when He is distasteful to it, for there is no living in love without sorrow. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, Chapter 5: “The Wonderful Effect Of Divine Love”).
The Only New Year’s Resolution Worth Making!
The only New Year’s resolution worth making is the resolution to grow in the love of God. In a certain sense, it contains all other possible “good” resolutions and, without it, all other “good” resolutions become useless, pointless and worthless. Holy Scripture clearly points this out: “Jesus said to him: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets!’” (Matthew 22:37-39).
Are you a sinner? Do you need the mercy and forgiveness of God? Then seek out charity! “Love God all thy life, and call upon him for thy salvation!” (Ecclesiasticus 13:18) … “Charity covers all sins!” (Proverbs 10:12) … “Before all things have a constant mutual charity among yourselves―for charity covers a multitude of sins!” (1 Peter 4:8) … “Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much!” (Luke 7:47). “He that loves not, abides in death!” (1 John 3:14).
Love is the Soul of Sanctity
Coming back to the idea of happiness being linked to holiness―God is charity and God is holy, and we are commanded to be holy and charitable like God: “We are of God ... God is charity … Let us love one another, for charity is of God ... He that loves not, knows not God: for God is charity … God has sent His only begotten Son into the world to be a propitiation for our sins … If God hath so loved us; then we also ought to love one another! If we love one another, then God abides in us, and His charity is perfected in us!” (1 John 4:6-12).
Without charity, we cannot be pleasing to God. We know that a body without a soul is merely a corpse. Likewise, whatever we may do for God—if it is done without a love of God—is nothing! “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, yet have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, yet have not Charity―then I am nothing! And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, yet have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Charity is the life-giving soul for all virtues, which, if they have not charity, are mere corpses of virtue.
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “It is written (in Colossians 3:14): ‘Above all things have charity, which is the bond of perfection,’ because it binds all the other virtues together in perfect unity. It is charity that unites us to God, ‘he that abides in charity abides in God, and God in him’ (1 John 4:16). Therefore the root perfection of the Christian life consists in charity. “That Christ may dwell by faith in your hearts; that being rooted and founded in charity’ (Ephesians 3:17). The Christian life consists chiefly in charity, whereby the soul is united to God; wherefore it is written (1 John 3:14): ‘He that loveth not abides in death.’ Hence the perfection of the Christian life consists in charity.” (Summa Theologica, IIa IIae, q. 184, art. 1).
The Saints and Spiritual Masters on Charity
Charity is the principal norm or measuring stick for judging the perfection of the Christian life. This is an indisputable truth that is agreed upon by one spiritual master after another:
“Salvation is shown to Faith, it is prepared for Hope, but it is given only to Charity. Faith points out the way to the land of promise as a pillar of fire; Hope feeds us with its manna of sweetness, but Charity actually introduces us into the Promised Land” (St. Francis de Sales).
“All our religion is but a false religion, and all our virtues are mere illusions and we ourselves are only hypocrites in the sight of God, if we have not that universal charity for everyone―for the good and for the bad, for the poor and the rich, and for all those who do us harm as much as for those who do us good” (St. John Vianney).
“Who can adequately speak of the bond of the love of God? … All the elect of God are perfect in charity. Without charity, nothing is pleasing to God!” (St. Clement of Rome). “Charity, to which nothing is to be preferred!” (St. Ignatius of Antioch). “He is better in whom charity is greater” (St. Augustine).
“Perfection of life is the perfection of love. For love is the life of the soul ... God has sown in our hearts the seeds of all virtues, which, however, are so covered with our imperfections and weakness that they do not appear, or appear very slightly, till the vital heat of holy love comes to quicken and resuscitate them, producing by them the actions of all virtues ... Charity does and accomplishes the work of all the virtues … Charity is that pure fire-tried gold, which our Savior counselled the Bishop of Laodicea to buy, which contains the virtue of all things, which can do all, and which does all” (St. Francis de Sales, Treatise on the Love of God).
“You ask me for a method of attaining perfection. I know of love―only love. Love can do all things!” (St. Thérèse of Lisieux).
“Charity is the form, mover, mother and root of all virtues” (St. Thomas Aquinas).
“He who does not acquire the love of God, will scarcely persevere in the grace of God, for it is very difficult to renounce sin merely through fear of chastisement” (St. Alphonsus Liguori).
“All life must perfect itself. This is true, above all, of the Christian life … The essence of perfection consists in charity … This means not only that love is the queen and the soul of all the virtues, but that its worth is such that it suffices to make man perfect by imparting to him all the virtues … It cannot be stated in clearer terms that all perfection consists in the love of God and of one’s neighbor for God's sake” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life).
“Charity is the bond of perfection because it is the highest of the virtues which unites our soul to God. It ought to last forever, and it vivifies all the other virtues by rendering their acts meritorious, ordaining them to the last end, that is, to its object―which is God loved above all else … Perfection does not consist chiefly in humility, nor does it consist especially in poverty, nor in acts of worship, or of the virtue of religion, but it lies primarily in the love of God and of one’s neighbor, which renders the acts of all the other virtues meritorious” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, Three Ages of the Interior Life).
“One’s life is more perfect in proportion as one’s acts are commanded by a more intense charity” (Fr. Guibert, The Theology of the Spiritual Life).
Article 6
Saturday December 30th
Out with the Old and in with the New? Or just the same Old, same Old…?
Saturday December 30th
Out with the Old and in with the New? Or just the same Old, same Old…?
Our Lord Comes to Make Things New
There are times when the “old” is better, and there are times when the “new” is necessary. Our Lord Himself came to perfect the old with the new—the Old Testament gave way to the New Testament. Our “old” selves, likewise, need to make for our “new” selves—renewed by the grace of God. Heaven is often called the “New Jerusalem” —a heavenly Jerusalem that replaces or perfects the earthly Jerusalem. We see this focus on the “new” in the words of Our Lord and the New Testament authors. “But we look for new heavens and a new Earth” (2 Peter 3:13).
Don’t Mix the Old with the New
We cannot make a blend of the world and God; nor can we marry spirituality to materialism: “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24) … “And what concord hath Christ with Belial?” (2 Corinthians 6:15). “And you, when you were dead in your offences, and sins, wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit that now worketh on the children of unbelief: in which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, Who is rich in mercy, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together in Christ, by whose grace you are saved, and hath raised us up together, and hath made us sit together in the heavenly places, through Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:1-5).
Purge Out the Old
“And He that sat on the throne, said: ‘Behold, I make all things new!’ And He said to me: ‘Write! For these words are most faithful and true!’” (Apocalypse 21:5). “A new commandment I give unto you” (John 13:34) ... “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste” (1 Corinthians 5:7). “Put off, according to former conversation, the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error and be renewed in the spirit of your mind: and put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness of truth” (Ephesians 4:22-24). “And putting on the new, him who is renewed unto knowledge, according to the image of Him that created him” (Colossians 3:10). “If then anyone be in Christ a new creature, the old things are passed away, behold all things are made new” (2 Corinthians 5:17). “In saying ‘a new’, He hath made the former old” (Hebrews 8:13).
God wants us to be new creatures, new persons, better creatures, better persons. That is why He came on Earth—the Advent and Christmas liturgy speaks of Our Lord coming to restore, to renew, to recreate what was lost through sin. This is the spirit that we should positively and effectively undertake in the coming New Year—putting on a new man, a new self, created in justice and holiness; becoming a new leaven, renewed in mind and heart, so that we are a new creature in Christ, having put the old ways behind us and having made all things new!
Leave the World and the Devil Behind!
The world is currently under the rule of the devil—whom Our Lord calls “the prince of the world.” This prince of the world tried to seduce Our Lord after His forty days of fasting and praying in desert. He offered the kingdoms of the world to Jesus, if He would only adore him: “Again the devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus saith to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written: “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and him only shalt thou serve!”’ ” (Matthew 4:8-10).
Jesus refers to the devil as the prince of the world and states the He has nothing to do with the world, that His kingdom is not of this world, but it above the world, and that those who are of the world, have no place with Him: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing” (John 14:30). To the worldly Pontius Pilate, Jesus says: “My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36). To the worldly minded, He said: “You cannot serve God and mammon”—meaning the pleasures and treasures of the world (Matthew 6:24). To the worldly Jews, Our Lord said: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you, that you shall die in your sins. For if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sin” (John 8:23-24). If the world will not listen to the Word of God, and will not accept the Faith, then we are told to leave it behind: “Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words: going forth out of that house or city, shake off the dust from your feet” (Matthew 10:14).
Secret Lovers of the World Are Just Losers
Those who secretly love the world, find this hard to accept, and under a false pretense of desiring the conversion of the world, continue to hang around the world even after having their attempts at conversion rejected. “What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “He that loveth danger shall perish in it” (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). “He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal” (John 12:25). Speaking of His true followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16).
We are explicitly told to stay clear of the world and to flee the world: “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “that we be not condemned with this world” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “And you, in time past, when you were dead in your offenses and sins, you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit that now works upon the children of unbelief: in which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts. But God, even when we were dead in sins, hath raised us up together [above this world], and hath made us sit together in the heavenly places, through Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:1-6).
Separation from the World is Essential
In the Old Testament, God commanded a separation of His Chosen People from the surrounding people of the world—with grave consequences if they refused to do so: “And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: If any man of the children of Israel, or of the strangers, that dwell in Israel, give of his seed to the idol Moloch, dying let him die: the people of the land shall stone him. And I will set My face against him: and I will cut him off from the midst of his people, because he hath given of his seed to Moloch, and hath defiled My sanctuary, and profaned My Holy Name!’” (Leviticus 20:1-3).
God commanded a separation for the Israelites from the heathens and pagans that surrounded them. “Thou shalt not keep company with them” (Isaias 14:20) ... “Who have said to God: ‘Depart from us, we desire not the knowledge of Thy ways!’” (Job 21:14) … “Separate thyself from thy enemies” (Ecclesiasticus 6:13) … “What concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. Wherefore, go out from among them, and be ye separate!” (2 Corinthians 6:15-17) ... “Be not seduced: Evil communications corrupt good manners” (1 Corinthians 15:33) … “A corrupt man loveth not one that reproveth him: nor will he go to the wise” (Proverbs 15:12).
We Find Separation From the World HARD!
As the saying goes: “You cannot leave clothes in a smoky room, for any length of time, without them taking on the smell of smoke.” The same is true for our interaction with the world and the worldly—we cannot mix with the worldly without taking on board a certain amount of worldliness. The devil knows that, and he knows that this is the best way to diminish and eventually destroy our Faith—if not in theory, then most certainly in practice. Yet once there is a divorce, in our Faith, between theory and practice—what we believe and what we do—then our Faith is as good as dead; it is, at least, in a coma. We want to believe what the Church believes, but we also want to do as the world does. We want to enjoy the benefits of Heaven, and also enjoy the benefits of the world. We want to love and serve God, but we also love and serve mammon. It is so hard to be different to everyone else! We hate being the proverbial “sore-thumb” that sticks out! We want to go along, just to get along—with both God and the world! But it won’t work! Our Lord has said so in so many different ways.
Rich Man, Poor Man!
Besides Our Lord’s short and succinct warning: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24), we also have that very disconcerting and jarring incident with the rich young man—who is an epitome of ourselves—who wanted both God and his personal mammon! He is rich man who is, at the same time, a poor man! Once we have read the account of his encounter with Jesus, we cannot but say: “Oh, poor rich man! He does not know what he is doing!”
“And behold a certain man running up and kneeling before Him: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou knowest the commandments—keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Jesus: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.
“Then Jesus, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you: How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus again answering, said to them: ‘Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus looking on them, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:16-26; Mark 10:17-27).
The Modern Day Disease of TB
TB, or tuberculosis, used to a killer disease in the past. Today’s killer disease is a spiritual TB—turning back. We make New Year resolutions and then turn back to our old ways! We go on retreat and take resolutions to reform our spiritual life—then, very soon after, we turn back into what we were. Hell and Purgatory are full of TB victims. How few are there, who are prepared to turn away from wealth, pleasure, comfort, ease, convenience, socializing, self-indulgence, the pursuit of entertainment and fun—and turn instead to God. Many a time has the inspiration and grace of God called to us higher things, to leave things of the world behind and to follow Him—but we, like the rich young, turn back: for we cannot bear to part with the comfortable, pleasurable, entertaining, pleasing things of the world. Blessed Jacinta Marto of Fatima cries out to us: “Mortification and sacrifice give great pleasure to Our Divine Lord! Oh! Fly luxury! Fly riches! Love holy poverty and silence!” Jacinta set her eyes on Our Lady and Heaven and never turned back. We are always going backwards and forwards, like going round in circles and not really going anywhere—we take two steps forward, then two steps back.
Poor Rich Man
All of this should puncture any desire we may have of trying to serve both God while at the same time trying to grow in wealth and worldly possessions. This was the problem of the rich young man, who came asking Jesus what he must do to save his soul and gain salvation. Jesus first gives him the foundation that must be laid down, the keeping of the commandments. The rich young man tells Jesus that he has kept them all his life. Jesus then moves to the next stage, and tells him to sell all he has, give the money to the poor and then to come and follow Him. “And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me’” (Mark 10:21). He didn’t follow Jesus—HE TURNED BACK!
At this point the rich young man becomes sad, turns around and leaves Jesus, for he had great possessions and could not bear to part from them. As he walks away, Jesus says to His disciples: “Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:16-24).
The Complacency of Wealth
Many possessions and great wealth make us very complacent by leading us to rely and trust primarily in what we have, rather than trusting in God, “without Whom we can do nothing” (John 15:5) ... “All things were made by Him: and without Him was made nothing that was made” (John 1:3). Wealth and great possessions often render a soul lukewarm in the service of God, and, just like the Israelites—when things went very well for them, we find that there came a falling away from God, to a greater or lesser degree. It might be a total departure from God through mortal sin, or a growing indifference to God through lukewarmness. This latter disease, reminds us of the grave warning given by God in the Apocalypse:
“But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth. Because thou sayest: I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing: and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel thee to buy of Me gold fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see” (Apocalypse 3:16-18).
Blinded by the World
This brings us back to the blindness, spoken of above. The world is deliberately blind towards Christ—it does not want see His truth, it does want to follow His ways, it does not want His way of life, it does not want to follow His laws. “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … He was in the world, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:4-5, 10-11). This is why Our Lord says: “They are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit” (Matthew 15:14). These are those of whom Our Lord speaks, when He says: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
God and Scripture Condemns & Curses “Turn-Backers”
“Turn ye not to idols, nor make to yourselves molten gods. I am the Lord your God” (Leviticus 19:4). “And turn not aside after vain things which shall never profit you, nor deliver you, because they are vain” (1 Kings 12:21). “If you leave the Lord, and serve strange gods, He will turn, and will afflict you, and will destroy you after all the good He hath done you!” (Josue 24:20).
Yet the Israelites ignored the warnings of Heaven and turned back, in their hearts, from the way of the Lord—even though, with their lips, they kept up pretenses and appearances: “And they loved Him with their mouth: and with their tongue they lied unto Him! But their heart was not right with him … And they turned back and tempted God” (Psalm 77:36-37, 41). After experiencing some hardship on the way to the Promised Land, they murmured, complained and pined for the “world” or Egypt that they had just left behind a short while ago. “And all the congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. And the children of Israel said to them: ‘Would to God that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat over the flesh pots, and ate bread to the full! Why have you brought us into this desert? Is it that you might destroy all the multitude with famine?” (Exodus 16:2-3).
This brought about their punishment of having to wander in the desert for forty years, until all but two men, of the estimated two million that left Egypt, had all died in the desert. It was their descendants, who hopefully had learned their lesson, who would be allowed to enter the Promised Land. God alleviated their famine with the manna that He sent daily from Heaven—yet still they complained and pined for Egypt, wanting to turn back:
“In the meantime there arose a murmuring of the people against the Lord, as it were repining at their fatigue. And when the Lord heard it he was angry. And the fire of the Lord being kindled against them, devoured them that were at the uttermost part of the camp … A mixed multitude of people, that came up with them, burned with desire, sitting and weeping, the children of Israel also being joined with them, and said: ‘Who shall give us meat to eat? We remember the Ash that we ate in Egypt, free of any cost: the cucumbers come into our mind, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic. Our soul is dry, our eyes behold nothing else but manna! … And the wrath of the Lord was exceedingly enkindled … And the Lord said to Moses: … ‘Tomorrow you shall eat flesh: for I have heard you say: “Who will give us flesh to eat? It was well with us in Egypt!” That the Lord may give you flesh, and you may eat: not for one day, nor two, nor five, nor ten, no nor for twenty. But even for a month of days, till it come out at your nostrils, and become loathsome to you, because you have cast off the Lord, Who is in the midst of you, and have wept before Him, saying: “Why came we out of Egypt?”’ ” (Numbers 11:1-6, 10, 18-20).
The “Turn-Backers” of the New Testament
This phenomenon is nothing new, nor are we exempt from it—on the contrary, Our Lord says: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Yet already is His own day, He suffered to see many turn back and walk with Him no longer: “ ‘My flesh is meat indeed: and My blood is drink indeed. He that eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, abideth in Me, and I in him’ ... Many, therefore, of His disciples, hearing it, said: ‘This saying is hard, and who can hear it?’ But Jesus, knowing in Himself, that His disciples murmured at this, said to them: ‘Doth this scandalize you?’ … After this many of His disciples went back; and walked no more with Him” (John 6:56-62; 67).
The “Turn-Backers” of Today
Today we see the very same thing happen, or should we say continue to happen—for it has never ceased to be throughout all 20 centuries of the Faith’s existence. Today, an ever increasing number of Catholics are turning their backs on Christ—though they deny it—over issues of Faith and Morals. Just as the Jews found His teaching on the Eucharist “hard to take”, so too do many Catholics find certain Church teachings “hard to take” also. They, too, do not believe in His Real Presence in the Holy Eucharist; they refuse to accept the Catholic Church as only one true Church outside of which there is no salvation; they refuse to believe certain events of Our Lord’s life: such as His miracles and His resurrection; they refuse to accept the Virgin Birth, etc. In matter of morals, they reject the Church’s teaching on the sinfulness of contraception, abortion, divorce and remarriage. Many now sympathize with or even accept same-sex marriages. They reject the Sunday Mass obligation that binds under mortal sin. The list goes on and on. They have turned back from the path trodden by Christ and are walking a path of their own choosing. Catholics who fall away from the Faith can even end up being worse than people who never had the Faith in the first place and are harder to reconvert back to the Faith. Their punishment will also be greater! “For it had been better for them not to have known the way of justice, than, after they have known it, to turn back from that holy commandment which was delivered to them” (2 Peter 2:21).
Neither Backwards, Nor Forwards
Others may still walk the path, but only so far and no more! They do not turn back, but they no longer go forward. In other words, they stagnate in the Faith. Its growth is stunted. They end up like Catholic midgets, that never “grew up” in the Faith, who never reached their potential, or the level that God wanted them to reach. In his book, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life¸ Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes:
“We read in this 60th chapter of the Dialogue of St. Catherine (it is God who speaks). ‘Among those who have become My trusted servants there are some who serve Me with faith … but … what they seek in My service (at any rate to a great extent) is their own profit, their own satisfaction, or the pleasure that they find in Me. And do you know what shows the imperfection of their love? It is that, as soon as they are deprived of the consolations which they find in Me, their love fails and can no longer survive. It becomes weak and gradually cools towards Me when, in order to exercise them in virtue and to detach them from their imperfection, I withdraw spiritual consolations from them and send them difficulties and afflictions. I act in this way in order to bring them to perfection, to teach them to know themselves, to realize that they are nothing and that of themselves they have no grace. Adversity should have the effect of making them seek refuge in Me, recognize Me as their benefactor, and become attached to Me by a true humility ... If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back.’
“This is what the Fathers have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God he who makes no progress loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child, but becomes an idiot, so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls! At what stage are we ourselves?” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
No Looking Back!
We cannot walk forwards to Heaven while looking back longingly upon the world we reluctantly leave behind. A divided heart will never make it: “And Jesus knowing their thoughts, said to them: ‘Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate: and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand!’” (Matthew 12:25).
The rich young man was divided between his great possessions and his imperfect love of God, so much so that when Jesus asked him to follow Him, he could not—he was torn and went back to his possessions and imperfect service of God.
“Jesus said to another: ‘Follow Me!’ And he said: ‘Lord, suffer me first to go, and to bury my father!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Let the dead bury their dead: but go thou, and preach the kingdom of God!’ And another said: ‘I will follow thee, Lord; but let me first take my leave of [say “Goodbye”] them that are at my house!’ Jesus said to him: ‘No man putting his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God!’” (Luke 9:59-62).
“No one tears a piece out of a new garment to patch an old one. Otherwise, they will have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No―the new wine must be poured into new wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for they say, ‘The old is better.’” (Luke 5:36-39).
Similarly, “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
And again, “Put off the old man, who is corrupted and be renewed in the spirit of your mind―and put on the new man, who is created in justice and holiness of truth!” (Ephesians 4:22-24).
What are you doing? Are you marching away from the old and in the direction of the new? Leaving your old self behind in search of your new self, “created in justice and holiness”? Are you trying to combine the old worldly wine with a new heavenly wine? Are you trying to clothe yourself with compromised clothing―made of worldly and heavenly materials? Are you marching forwards to God and holiness, leaving behind the world and worldliness? Are you marching backwards and leaving Christ behind? Or are you sitting down feeling sorry for yourself, not wishing to fully go back to the world, but, at the same time, not fully wishing to serve and sacrifice all for Christ? Will this be the year when you cast out the old and bring in the new? Or will it be more of the same old, same old, same old …?
There are times when the “old” is better, and there are times when the “new” is necessary. Our Lord Himself came to perfect the old with the new—the Old Testament gave way to the New Testament. Our “old” selves, likewise, need to make for our “new” selves—renewed by the grace of God. Heaven is often called the “New Jerusalem” —a heavenly Jerusalem that replaces or perfects the earthly Jerusalem. We see this focus on the “new” in the words of Our Lord and the New Testament authors. “But we look for new heavens and a new Earth” (2 Peter 3:13).
Don’t Mix the Old with the New
We cannot make a blend of the world and God; nor can we marry spirituality to materialism: “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24) … “And what concord hath Christ with Belial?” (2 Corinthians 6:15). “And you, when you were dead in your offences, and sins, wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit that now worketh on the children of unbelief: in which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, Who is rich in mercy, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together in Christ, by whose grace you are saved, and hath raised us up together, and hath made us sit together in the heavenly places, through Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:1-5).
Purge Out the Old
“And He that sat on the throne, said: ‘Behold, I make all things new!’ And He said to me: ‘Write! For these words are most faithful and true!’” (Apocalypse 21:5). “A new commandment I give unto you” (John 13:34) ... “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste” (1 Corinthians 5:7). “Put off, according to former conversation, the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error and be renewed in the spirit of your mind: and put on the new man, who according to God is created in justice and holiness of truth” (Ephesians 4:22-24). “And putting on the new, him who is renewed unto knowledge, according to the image of Him that created him” (Colossians 3:10). “If then anyone be in Christ a new creature, the old things are passed away, behold all things are made new” (2 Corinthians 5:17). “In saying ‘a new’, He hath made the former old” (Hebrews 8:13).
God wants us to be new creatures, new persons, better creatures, better persons. That is why He came on Earth—the Advent and Christmas liturgy speaks of Our Lord coming to restore, to renew, to recreate what was lost through sin. This is the spirit that we should positively and effectively undertake in the coming New Year—putting on a new man, a new self, created in justice and holiness; becoming a new leaven, renewed in mind and heart, so that we are a new creature in Christ, having put the old ways behind us and having made all things new!
Leave the World and the Devil Behind!
The world is currently under the rule of the devil—whom Our Lord calls “the prince of the world.” This prince of the world tried to seduce Our Lord after His forty days of fasting and praying in desert. He offered the kingdoms of the world to Jesus, if He would only adore him: “Again the devil took Him up into a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said to Him: ‘All these will I give Thee, if falling down Thou wilt adore me!’ Then Jesus saith to him: ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written: “The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and him only shalt thou serve!”’ ” (Matthew 4:8-10).
Jesus refers to the devil as the prince of the world and states the He has nothing to do with the world, that His kingdom is not of this world, but it above the world, and that those who are of the world, have no place with Him: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing” (John 14:30). To the worldly Pontius Pilate, Jesus says: “My kingdom is not of this world!” (John 18:36). To the worldly minded, He said: “You cannot serve God and mammon”—meaning the pleasures and treasures of the world (Matthew 6:24). To the worldly Jews, Our Lord said: “You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you, that you shall die in your sins. For if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sin” (John 8:23-24). If the world will not listen to the Word of God, and will not accept the Faith, then we are told to leave it behind: “Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words: going forth out of that house or city, shake off the dust from your feet” (Matthew 10:14).
Secret Lovers of the World Are Just Losers
Those who secretly love the world, find this hard to accept, and under a false pretense of desiring the conversion of the world, continue to hang around the world even after having their attempts at conversion rejected. “What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “He that loveth danger shall perish in it” (Ecclesiasticus 3:27). “He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal” (John 12:25). Speaking of His true followers, Jesus says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16).
We are explicitly told to stay clear of the world and to flee the world: “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “that we be not condemned with this world” (1 Corinthians 11:32). “And you, in time past, when you were dead in your offenses and sins, you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of this air, of the spirit that now works upon the children of unbelief: in which also we all conversed in time past, in the desires of our flesh, fulfilling the will of the flesh and of our thoughts. But God, even when we were dead in sins, hath raised us up together [above this world], and hath made us sit together in the heavenly places, through Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:1-6).
Separation from the World is Essential
In the Old Testament, God commanded a separation of His Chosen People from the surrounding people of the world—with grave consequences if they refused to do so: “And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: If any man of the children of Israel, or of the strangers, that dwell in Israel, give of his seed to the idol Moloch, dying let him die: the people of the land shall stone him. And I will set My face against him: and I will cut him off from the midst of his people, because he hath given of his seed to Moloch, and hath defiled My sanctuary, and profaned My Holy Name!’” (Leviticus 20:1-3).
God commanded a separation for the Israelites from the heathens and pagans that surrounded them. “Thou shalt not keep company with them” (Isaias 14:20) ... “Who have said to God: ‘Depart from us, we desire not the knowledge of Thy ways!’” (Job 21:14) … “Separate thyself from thy enemies” (Ecclesiasticus 6:13) … “What concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. Wherefore, go out from among them, and be ye separate!” (2 Corinthians 6:15-17) ... “Be not seduced: Evil communications corrupt good manners” (1 Corinthians 15:33) … “A corrupt man loveth not one that reproveth him: nor will he go to the wise” (Proverbs 15:12).
We Find Separation From the World HARD!
As the saying goes: “You cannot leave clothes in a smoky room, for any length of time, without them taking on the smell of smoke.” The same is true for our interaction with the world and the worldly—we cannot mix with the worldly without taking on board a certain amount of worldliness. The devil knows that, and he knows that this is the best way to diminish and eventually destroy our Faith—if not in theory, then most certainly in practice. Yet once there is a divorce, in our Faith, between theory and practice—what we believe and what we do—then our Faith is as good as dead; it is, at least, in a coma. We want to believe what the Church believes, but we also want to do as the world does. We want to enjoy the benefits of Heaven, and also enjoy the benefits of the world. We want to love and serve God, but we also love and serve mammon. It is so hard to be different to everyone else! We hate being the proverbial “sore-thumb” that sticks out! We want to go along, just to get along—with both God and the world! But it won’t work! Our Lord has said so in so many different ways.
Rich Man, Poor Man!
Besides Our Lord’s short and succinct warning: “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24), we also have that very disconcerting and jarring incident with the rich young man—who is an epitome of ourselves—who wanted both God and his personal mammon! He is rich man who is, at the same time, a poor man! Once we have read the account of his encounter with Jesus, we cannot but say: “Oh, poor rich man! He does not know what he is doing!”
“And behold a certain man running up and kneeling before Him: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou knowest the commandments—keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Jesus: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.
“Then Jesus, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you: How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus again answering, said to them: ‘Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus looking on them, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:16-26; Mark 10:17-27).
The Modern Day Disease of TB
TB, or tuberculosis, used to a killer disease in the past. Today’s killer disease is a spiritual TB—turning back. We make New Year resolutions and then turn back to our old ways! We go on retreat and take resolutions to reform our spiritual life—then, very soon after, we turn back into what we were. Hell and Purgatory are full of TB victims. How few are there, who are prepared to turn away from wealth, pleasure, comfort, ease, convenience, socializing, self-indulgence, the pursuit of entertainment and fun—and turn instead to God. Many a time has the inspiration and grace of God called to us higher things, to leave things of the world behind and to follow Him—but we, like the rich young, turn back: for we cannot bear to part with the comfortable, pleasurable, entertaining, pleasing things of the world. Blessed Jacinta Marto of Fatima cries out to us: “Mortification and sacrifice give great pleasure to Our Divine Lord! Oh! Fly luxury! Fly riches! Love holy poverty and silence!” Jacinta set her eyes on Our Lady and Heaven and never turned back. We are always going backwards and forwards, like going round in circles and not really going anywhere—we take two steps forward, then two steps back.
Poor Rich Man
All of this should puncture any desire we may have of trying to serve both God while at the same time trying to grow in wealth and worldly possessions. This was the problem of the rich young man, who came asking Jesus what he must do to save his soul and gain salvation. Jesus first gives him the foundation that must be laid down, the keeping of the commandments. The rich young man tells Jesus that he has kept them all his life. Jesus then moves to the next stage, and tells him to sell all he has, give the money to the poor and then to come and follow Him. “And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me’” (Mark 10:21). He didn’t follow Jesus—HE TURNED BACK!
At this point the rich young man becomes sad, turns around and leaves Jesus, for he had great possessions and could not bear to part from them. As he walks away, Jesus says to His disciples: “Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:16-24).
The Complacency of Wealth
Many possessions and great wealth make us very complacent by leading us to rely and trust primarily in what we have, rather than trusting in God, “without Whom we can do nothing” (John 15:5) ... “All things were made by Him: and without Him was made nothing that was made” (John 1:3). Wealth and great possessions often render a soul lukewarm in the service of God, and, just like the Israelites—when things went very well for them, we find that there came a falling away from God, to a greater or lesser degree. It might be a total departure from God through mortal sin, or a growing indifference to God through lukewarmness. This latter disease, reminds us of the grave warning given by God in the Apocalypse:
“But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth. Because thou sayest: I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing: and knowest not, that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel thee to buy of Me gold fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see” (Apocalypse 3:16-18).
Blinded by the World
This brings us back to the blindness, spoken of above. The world is deliberately blind towards Christ—it does not want see His truth, it does want to follow His ways, it does not want His way of life, it does not want to follow His laws. “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it … He was in the world, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:4-5, 10-11). This is why Our Lord says: “They are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit” (Matthew 15:14). These are those of whom Our Lord speaks, when He says: “Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” (Matthew 7:13-14).
God and Scripture Condemns & Curses “Turn-Backers”
“Turn ye not to idols, nor make to yourselves molten gods. I am the Lord your God” (Leviticus 19:4). “And turn not aside after vain things which shall never profit you, nor deliver you, because they are vain” (1 Kings 12:21). “If you leave the Lord, and serve strange gods, He will turn, and will afflict you, and will destroy you after all the good He hath done you!” (Josue 24:20).
Yet the Israelites ignored the warnings of Heaven and turned back, in their hearts, from the way of the Lord—even though, with their lips, they kept up pretenses and appearances: “And they loved Him with their mouth: and with their tongue they lied unto Him! But their heart was not right with him … And they turned back and tempted God” (Psalm 77:36-37, 41). After experiencing some hardship on the way to the Promised Land, they murmured, complained and pined for the “world” or Egypt that they had just left behind a short while ago. “And all the congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. And the children of Israel said to them: ‘Would to God that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat over the flesh pots, and ate bread to the full! Why have you brought us into this desert? Is it that you might destroy all the multitude with famine?” (Exodus 16:2-3).
This brought about their punishment of having to wander in the desert for forty years, until all but two men, of the estimated two million that left Egypt, had all died in the desert. It was their descendants, who hopefully had learned their lesson, who would be allowed to enter the Promised Land. God alleviated their famine with the manna that He sent daily from Heaven—yet still they complained and pined for Egypt, wanting to turn back:
“In the meantime there arose a murmuring of the people against the Lord, as it were repining at their fatigue. And when the Lord heard it he was angry. And the fire of the Lord being kindled against them, devoured them that were at the uttermost part of the camp … A mixed multitude of people, that came up with them, burned with desire, sitting and weeping, the children of Israel also being joined with them, and said: ‘Who shall give us meat to eat? We remember the Ash that we ate in Egypt, free of any cost: the cucumbers come into our mind, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic. Our soul is dry, our eyes behold nothing else but manna! … And the wrath of the Lord was exceedingly enkindled … And the Lord said to Moses: … ‘Tomorrow you shall eat flesh: for I have heard you say: “Who will give us flesh to eat? It was well with us in Egypt!” That the Lord may give you flesh, and you may eat: not for one day, nor two, nor five, nor ten, no nor for twenty. But even for a month of days, till it come out at your nostrils, and become loathsome to you, because you have cast off the Lord, Who is in the midst of you, and have wept before Him, saying: “Why came we out of Egypt?”’ ” (Numbers 11:1-6, 10, 18-20).
The “Turn-Backers” of the New Testament
This phenomenon is nothing new, nor are we exempt from it—on the contrary, Our Lord says: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, Faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:8). Yet already is His own day, He suffered to see many turn back and walk with Him no longer: “ ‘My flesh is meat indeed: and My blood is drink indeed. He that eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, abideth in Me, and I in him’ ... Many, therefore, of His disciples, hearing it, said: ‘This saying is hard, and who can hear it?’ But Jesus, knowing in Himself, that His disciples murmured at this, said to them: ‘Doth this scandalize you?’ … After this many of His disciples went back; and walked no more with Him” (John 6:56-62; 67).
The “Turn-Backers” of Today
Today we see the very same thing happen, or should we say continue to happen—for it has never ceased to be throughout all 20 centuries of the Faith’s existence. Today, an ever increasing number of Catholics are turning their backs on Christ—though they deny it—over issues of Faith and Morals. Just as the Jews found His teaching on the Eucharist “hard to take”, so too do many Catholics find certain Church teachings “hard to take” also. They, too, do not believe in His Real Presence in the Holy Eucharist; they refuse to accept the Catholic Church as only one true Church outside of which there is no salvation; they refuse to believe certain events of Our Lord’s life: such as His miracles and His resurrection; they refuse to accept the Virgin Birth, etc. In matter of morals, they reject the Church’s teaching on the sinfulness of contraception, abortion, divorce and remarriage. Many now sympathize with or even accept same-sex marriages. They reject the Sunday Mass obligation that binds under mortal sin. The list goes on and on. They have turned back from the path trodden by Christ and are walking a path of their own choosing. Catholics who fall away from the Faith can even end up being worse than people who never had the Faith in the first place and are harder to reconvert back to the Faith. Their punishment will also be greater! “For it had been better for them not to have known the way of justice, than, after they have known it, to turn back from that holy commandment which was delivered to them” (2 Peter 2:21).
Neither Backwards, Nor Forwards
Others may still walk the path, but only so far and no more! They do not turn back, but they no longer go forward. In other words, they stagnate in the Faith. Its growth is stunted. They end up like Catholic midgets, that never “grew up” in the Faith, who never reached their potential, or the level that God wanted them to reach. In his book, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life¸ Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange writes:
“We read in this 60th chapter of the Dialogue of St. Catherine (it is God who speaks). ‘Among those who have become My trusted servants there are some who serve Me with faith … but … what they seek in My service (at any rate to a great extent) is their own profit, their own satisfaction, or the pleasure that they find in Me. And do you know what shows the imperfection of their love? It is that, as soon as they are deprived of the consolations which they find in Me, their love fails and can no longer survive. It becomes weak and gradually cools towards Me when, in order to exercise them in virtue and to detach them from their imperfection, I withdraw spiritual consolations from them and send them difficulties and afflictions. I act in this way in order to bring them to perfection, to teach them to know themselves, to realize that they are nothing and that of themselves they have no grace. Adversity should have the effect of making them seek refuge in Me, recognize Me as their benefactor, and become attached to Me by a true humility ... If they do not recognize their imperfection and desire to become perfect, it is impossible that they should not turn back.’
“This is what the Fathers have so often asserted: ‘In the way of God he who makes no progress loses ground.’ Just as the child who does not grow does not merely remain a child, but becomes an idiot, so the beginner who does not enter upon the way of proficients when he ought to, does not merely remain a beginner, but becomes a stunted soul. It would seem, unhappily, that the great majority of souls do not belong to any of these three categories, of beginners, proficients or perfect, but rather to that of stunted souls! At what stage are we ourselves?” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Conversions of the Spiritual Life).
No Looking Back!
We cannot walk forwards to Heaven while looking back longingly upon the world we reluctantly leave behind. A divided heart will never make it: “And Jesus knowing their thoughts, said to them: ‘Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate: and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand!’” (Matthew 12:25).
The rich young man was divided between his great possessions and his imperfect love of God, so much so that when Jesus asked him to follow Him, he could not—he was torn and went back to his possessions and imperfect service of God.
“Jesus said to another: ‘Follow Me!’ And he said: ‘Lord, suffer me first to go, and to bury my father!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Let the dead bury their dead: but go thou, and preach the kingdom of God!’ And another said: ‘I will follow thee, Lord; but let me first take my leave of [say “Goodbye”] them that are at my house!’ Jesus said to him: ‘No man putting his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God!’” (Luke 9:59-62).
“No one tears a piece out of a new garment to patch an old one. Otherwise, they will have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No―the new wine must be poured into new wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for they say, ‘The old is better.’” (Luke 5:36-39).
Similarly, “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
And again, “Put off the old man, who is corrupted and be renewed in the spirit of your mind―and put on the new man, who is created in justice and holiness of truth!” (Ephesians 4:22-24).
What are you doing? Are you marching away from the old and in the direction of the new? Leaving your old self behind in search of your new self, “created in justice and holiness”? Are you trying to combine the old worldly wine with a new heavenly wine? Are you trying to clothe yourself with compromised clothing―made of worldly and heavenly materials? Are you marching forwards to God and holiness, leaving behind the world and worldliness? Are you marching backwards and leaving Christ behind? Or are you sitting down feeling sorry for yourself, not wishing to fully go back to the world, but, at the same time, not fully wishing to serve and sacrifice all for Christ? Will this be the year when you cast out the old and bring in the new? Or will it be more of the same old, same old, same old …?
Article 5
Friday December 29th
Has This Christmas Made You Better?
Friday December 29th
Has This Christmas Made You Better?
Are You Feeling Better?
The nurse pulls you more upright in your wheelchair; or the dentist adjusts your ill-fitting braces or dentures; or someone turns on the lights when you are trying to read in a room as dusks sets in—and the accompanying question is: “Is that any better?”
A starving person will feel better once they have been given something to eat. A thirsty person with a parched tongue will feel better once they have been given something to drink. Do you feel any better for what you have been eating and drinking over Christmas? Are you a better person spiritually having returned from the various places you frequented and visited over Christmas? What has this Christmas done for you spiritually? Are you spiritually healthier, spiritually stronger, spiritually more zealous, and spiritually rejuvenated?
I Returned a Lesser Person
“These questions bring to mind that famous little passage from the Imitation of Christ, which says: “Seek a suitable time for leisure and meditate often on the favors of God. Leave curiosities alone. Read such matters as bring sorrow to the heart rather than occupation to the mind. If you withdraw yourself from unnecessary talking and idle running about, from listening to gossip and rumors, you will find enough time that is suitable for holy meditation.
“Very many great saints avoided the company of men wherever possible and chose to serve God in retirement. ‘As often as I have been among men,’ said one writer, ‘I have returned less a man.’ We often find this to be true … It is easier to be silent altogether than not to speak too much. To stay at home is easier than to be sufficiently on guard while away. Anyone, then, who aims to live the inner and spiritual life must go apart, with Jesus, from the crowd.
“If only a man would never seek passing joys or entangle himself with worldly affairs, what a good conscience he would have. What great peace and tranquility would be his, if he cut himself off from all empty care and thought only of things divine, things helpful to his soul, and put all his trust in God.
“No man deserves the consolation of Heaven unless he persistently arouses himself to holy contrition. If you desire true sorrow of heart, seek the privacy of your home [cell for religious] and shut out the uproar of the world, as it is written: ‘In your chamber bewail your sins.’ There you will find what too often you lose abroad.
“Why wish to see what you are not permitted to have? ‘The world passes away and the concupiscence thereof.’ Sensual craving sometimes entices you to wander around, but when the moment is past, what do you bring back with you save a disturbed conscience and heavy heart? A happy going often leads to a sad return, a merry evening to a mournful dawn. Thus, all carnal joy begins sweetly but in the end brings remorse and death.
“Behold Heaven and earth and all the elements, for of these all things are made. What can you see anywhere under the sun that will remain long? Perhaps you think you will completely satisfy yourself, but you cannot do so, for if you should see all existing things, what would they be but an empty vision? Raise your eyes to God in Heaven and pray because of your sins and shortcomings. Leave vanity to the vain. Close the door upon yourself and call to you Jesus, your Beloved. Remain with Him in your home [cell], for nowhere else will you find such peace. If you had not left it, and had not listened to idle gossip, you would have remained in greater peace. But since you love, sometimes, to hear news, it is only right that you should suffer sorrow of heart from it” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 20).
Does That Strike A Christmas Chord?
Does the above passage somehow strike a chord that we recognize? Does it touch a nerve? Christmas is essentially a spiritually event, not a material fun-fest! Christ comes to make us more spiritual, not more worldly. He even said that we cannot serve God and be worldly at the same time: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). The full passage—to put it into context—could also be loosely applied to the Christmas season with its over-indulgent festivities:
“Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also. No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat: and the body more than the clothing?” (Matthew 6:19-25).
Where has our heart predominantly found itself this Christmas? In the things of Heaven, or the things of the Earth? The very fact that you are reading this means that you have the things of Heaven at heart—but are they predominant objects of your heart, or are you a ‘God-mammoner’? The whole purpose, of Christ’s Christmas coming, is to detach our hearts from the world and to attach them, instead, to Heaven, the things of Heaven and God. Did that happen this Christmas? Or did it, at least, detach us more from the things of world than the previous Christmas?
Our Lady Teaches About Christmas
There is nobody better to teach us about the mysteries of Christmas than Our Lady herself. Here are some of the words she spoke to the Venerable Mary of Agreda concerning the mystery of Christmas:
Foolish Arrogance of the World
“If men would keep their heart disengaged and if they would rightly and worthily consider this great mystery of the kindness of the Most High towards men, it would be a powerful means of conducting them in the pathway of life and subjecting them to the love of their Creator and Redeemer. For as men are capable of reasoning, if they would only make use of their freedom to treat this mystery with the reverence due to its greatness, who would be so hardened as not to be moved to tenderness at the sight of their God become man, humiliated in poverty, despised, unknown, entering the world in a cave, lying in a manger surrounded by brute animals, protected only by a poverty-stricken Mother, and cast-off by the foolish arrogance of the world? Who will dare to love the vanity and pride, which was openly abhorred and condemned by the Creator of Heaven and Earth in His conduct? No one can despise the humility, poverty and indigence, which the Lord loved and chose for Himself as the very means of teaching the way of eternal life. Few there are, who stop to consider this truth and example: and on account of this vile ingratitude only the few will reap the fruit of these great sacraments” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
Forget All That Is Of Earth
“But if the condescension of my most holy Son was so great, as to generously bestow His light and knowledge concerning these vast blessings, ponder well how much thou art bound to cooperate with this light In order that thou mayest correspond to this obligation! I remind and exhort thee to forget all that is of Earth and lose it out of thy sight; that thou seek nothing, or engage thyself with nothing, except what can help thee to withdraw and detach thee from the world and its inhabitants; so that, with a heart freed from all terrestrial affection, thou dispose thyself to celebrate in it the mysteries of the poverty, humility and divine love of the incarnate God” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
Seekers of Self and Others, But Not God
“Many fail in the love due to Him and they divert it toward the creatures. They esteem in other creatures what they are seeking themselves—namely power, riches, vain honor and ostentation. Although the faithful can remedy these injurious influences by faith and hope, yet they allow these virtues to remain dead, and unused, and debase themselves to the level of worthless creatures. Those who have riches, trust in them; and those who have none, greedily hasten after them; some procure them by very reprehensible ways and means; some confide in influential persons, praising and flattering them. And thus it happens that very few seek the Lord in such a way as to deserve His providential care” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
Earth Filled With Lovers of the World
“This deceitful error has filled the Earth with lovers of the world; it has filled it with avarice and concupiscence against the law of the Creator; and has made men insane in their desires; for all of them commonly strive after riches and earthly possessions; claiming thereby merely to satisfy their needs, which is only a pretext for hiding their want of interest in higher things. In reality they lie to themselves abominously, since they are seeking the superfluous; not what is really necessary, but what ministers to worldly pride … As soon as it carelessly ignores the beauty of the Lord, it enters upon the byways of neglect and is deprived of the divine sweetness. When afterwards the soul, having with sorrow experienced the evils of such inadvertence wishes to return to seek Him, it does not always find or recover Him” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
Forgetfulness and Ingratitude for His Birth
“Ponder over the burning love of my most holy Son in communicating Himself to men as soon as He was born, in order to make them immediate partakers of the joyful fruit of His coming. Men do not know of this obligation, because few of them penetrate to the significance of this great blessing, just as there were few who saw the Word at His Birth and thanked Him for His arrival ... Forgetfulness and inattention regarding the works of the Redeemer are as reprehensible as they are common and frequent among mortals ... Ponder, then, upon the small return given for the love of my Son and Lord by mortals, and how forgetful of thanks even His faithful continue to be … Many souls either make themselves unworthy or incapable of great blessings, or, if they receive them, they grow into a dangerous rudeness and lukewarmness, which offends the Lord very much” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
False Reasoning of Worldlings
“Consider the wicked disposition of mortals in the present age, in which the light of the Gospel has been spread out and confirmed by so many miracles wrought by God in His Church. In spite of all this there are so few, who are perfect and who seek to dispose themselves for greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption. Although the number of fools is so great, and the vices are become so measureless, there are those who think that also the perfect are numerous—there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be!” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
“By the divine light I knew, better than all other creatures, at what a low value the Most High esteems earthly blessings and riches … Nothing can be trusted to infected human nature; for it always seeks after more than it possesses, and it never says enough, and the more it receives the greater thirst it has for more … Know how to refuse riches or honor, as due to thee, and not appropriate to thyself any of them; especially not if thou receive them from persons of influence and exalted station” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
What A Christmas Message!
Boy! What a message from the Queen of Heaven and Mother of the Christ Child! Once again, the truth of Holy Scripture hits us between our worldly eyes: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9). Or to rephrase it for the Christmas season: “For My thoughts about how to spend Christmas are not your thoughts: nor are your ways of spending Christmas like My ways of spending Christmas, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts.”
God Does Not Begrudge Celebration
Let us get one thing straight—God does not begrudge a celebration of Christmas. What irks Him is a Christless Christmas, where Christ—who should be the focal point of any and all celebrations—has been partially or even totally removed. Sure, we went to Mass! Sure we sang some carols! Sure, we have a nativity scene in our homes! Sure, we had Christmas dinner! But was Christ really the center of our Christmas? Or was He a mere formality Who was quickly forgotten once the fun started? It is sad and strange that Christmas Day is often a day on which people pray less to God than on a regular Sunday. They are more in “Martha Mode” that her sister’s “Mary Mode”!
“Now it came to pass as they went, that he entered into a certain town: and a certain woman named Martha, received him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sitting also at the Lord’s feet, heard his word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Who stood and said: ‘Lord! Hast Thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! Thou art careful and art troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary! Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42).
The Christmas “Martha” Temptation
Human nature and human respect being the curse what it is, Christmas tends to be a time when many have more respect and more time for humans than they do for God! Nobody wants to look bad at Christmas—except Our Lord, I guess—and this feverish desire drives people to levels that would make them saints if they were directed at God! No sacrifice is too great! No expense is too great! No time is too long! But not for the spiritual side, but for the material side! As Our Lady said above: “By the divine light I knew, better than all other creatures, at what a low value the Most High esteems earthly blessings and riches … Nothing can be trusted to infected human nature; for it always seeks after more than it possesses, and it never says enough, and the more it receives the greater thirst it has for more.”
So they make more food, and more delicacies, as though our salvation depended on it! They buy the best wines and liquors and pour them into sacrificial chalices, clinking them with those of their neighbor, as though this ‘chalice’ was as important and efficacious as that of the Mass! They buy and wrap presents with the care that a priest should hold the Body of Christ at Mass. They prepare tables with outlandish care for the sacrificial dinners where the Gospel of Gossip flows almost as freely as the Wine of Concupiscence, where the mouth waters beholding the delicacies on the table like the soul should water and pant after Christ in the Holy Eucharist! Just as the New Order of Mass changes the concept of the Mass from being a propitiatory sacrifice centered upon God into being a community meal centered on man, likewise has Christmas been changed from a feast being centered upon Christ coming to suffer and die for us, into a time of celebration that centers around man.
Sadly, few homes will sanctify their banquets by extra prayers, Scriptural readings, or readings from the Saints. Talk will be not so much about Christ and all the myriad of circumstances of His Nativity, but of mundane things where there is no mention or presence of Christ. When we drag ourselves off to these festive temples of Christmas fun, we invariably come back with a watered-down Faith!
Who’s the Birthday Boy?
And so many immerse themselves—not so much in more prayer, more spiritual reading, more meditations, more visits to the Blessed Sacrament, more Masses, more Holy Communions—but more talk, more food and drink, more visiting other homes where the talk is rarely spiritual, more parties, more celebrations! But who is the “Birthday Boy”—it is Christ’s birthday and He sits almost alone, as everyone gives presents to each other, feeds each other, talks to each other and parties with one another! The words of Our Lord during His agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, could well be applied to His Agony in many Homes of Catholics at Christmas: “Could you not watch one hour with Me?” Can people not give Christ an extra hour daily over the Christmas season in prayer, or reading, or thought, or meditation, or visits in the Blessed Sacrament, or extra Masses? Hey! Whose birthday is it anyway? His or ours? Who comes off best? We do!
Let Us Put Things Right! Put Christ Back into Christmas!
If your Christmas has been somewhat lacking Christ, then there is still time to put Christ into Christmas—not just into Christmas, but at the peak of Christmas, or at the head of the table, in the most important place. The increasingly modern notion of Christmas, at best, looks at Christmas as lasting till New Year’s Day. For some, it is already all over! The Christmas lights are down and they are back in ‘work mode’—where everything is back to its mundane self.
Forty Days Given to Christ and Christmas!
Dom Guéranger rightfully points out that Christmas lasts until February 2nd—the feast of the Presentation of the Infant Jesus in the Temple and the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In his Liturgical Year, Dom Guéranger writes:
“We apply the name of Christmas to the forty days which begin with the Nativity of our Lord, December 25th, and end with the Purification of the Blessed Virgin, February 2nd. It is a period which forms a distinct portion of the Liturgical Year, as distinct, by its own special spirit, from every other, as are Advent, Lent, Easter, or Pentecost. One same Mystery is celebrated and kept in view during the whole forty days.
“Neither the Feasts of the Saints, which so abound during this Season; nor the time of Septuagesima, with its mournful Purple, which often begins before Christmastide is over, seem able to distract our Holy Mother the Church from the immense joy of which she received the good tidings from the Angels (Luke 2:10) on that glorious Night for which the world had been longing four thousand years ... When Easter comes so early as to necessitate keeping Septuagesima, and even Sexagesima Sunday, in January. Still, nothing is changed, as we have already said, in the ritual observances of this joyous season, excepting only that on those two Sundays, the fore-runners of Lent, the Vestments are purple, and the Gloria in excelsis is omitted.
“The Feast of Mary’s Purification is, therefore, part of that of Jesus’ Birth; and the custom of keeping this holy and glorious period of forty days as one continued Festival has every appearance of being a very ancient one, at least in the Roman Church. The Feast of Our Lady’s Purification, with which the forty days of Christmas close, is, in the Latin Church, of very great antiquity; so ancient, indeed, as to preclude the possibility of our fixing the date of its institution” (Dom Guéranger, Liturgical Year, Christmas Volume).
Forty Days? That’s Too Long to Think About Christmas!
Well, it depends upon what you love—there are folk who can think about sports, or many other things, almost all day, every day, and every day of the year! When you love a subject, then no time is too long, but too short, to think and talk about it!
So what about Christmas, then? What is there to occupy our thoughts, words and actions for forty long days?
Let us make a list of potential topics for thought, meditation, and discussion for these forty days of Christmas. Christmas contains so much, that it absolutely impossible to cover everything in a day, or even a few days. Here are some ideas on what can be covered—if we have the love and desire.
Christmas Topics
(1) There is an incredible amount of symbolism in the persons, places and things that surround the birth of Our Lord. Take a day to reflect and discuss each one of them. Here are but a few: (a) rejected at one house after another; (b) born in cave or stable; (c) born in the dark night; (d) born in the cold winter; (e) nobody, apart from Mary and Joseph, are there to celebrate His birthday; (f) born in Bethlehem, which means “Town of Bread”; (g) the symbolism of the three members of the Holy Family; (h) the symbolism of the ox and ass; (i) the various roles of the angels with various people at Christmas; (j) symbolism of the shepherds; (k) the symbolism of the sheep and lambs; (l) the symbolism of Herod; (m) the symbolism of the three kings or wise men as a group; (n) the symbolism of Caspar; (o) the symbolism of Melchior; the symbolism of Balthasar; (p) the symbolism of the gold; (q) the symbolism of the frankincense; (r) the symbolism of the myrrh; (s) the symbolism of the guiding star; (t) the circumcision of Our Lord; (u) the presentation of Our Lord in the Temple; (v) the symbolism of St. Simeon (w) the prophecy of St. Simeon; (x) the symbolism of the prophetess Anna; (y) the slaughter of the Holy Innocents; (z) the flight into Egypt.
Those are just some of the things that can be researched in books and on the internet—there is plenty of material available for those who want to look, seek, find, think and learn. In bygone years it would have been much more difficult, but today it is “a piece of cake” that God “gives us on a plate”—shall we take and eat? “ Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).
Christmas Books
Alternatively, take one or several books on Christmas and read from them daily—whether privately or to the whole family. It could be read before prayer times, or before the Rosary, or at mealtime. There are many good books on Christmas available—you probably have some of them already and just need to “dig them out” and “dust them down” and get down to reading them. Some potential titles are:
1. Bethlehem, by Fr. Faber. Also available as a PDF download at https://archive.org/details/bethlehem00fabeuoft
2. Prince of Peace, meditations by Archbishop Goodier. Available as a PDF download at https://archive.org/details/theprinceofpeace00gooduoft
3. The Life of Mary As Seen By The Mystics, by Raphael Brown
4. Volume 2—the Incarnation—of The Mystical City of God, by Ven. Mary of Agreda. Available as a PDF download at http://www.themostholyrosary.com/mystical-city-vol-ii.pdf or as an online read at http://www.themostholyrosary.com/mystical-city.htm
5. The Life of the Blessed Virgin Mary, by Bl. Anne Catherine Emmerich. Available as a PDF download at http://www.catholicplanet.com/ebooks/Life-of-Blessed-Virgin-Mary.pdf
The nurse pulls you more upright in your wheelchair; or the dentist adjusts your ill-fitting braces or dentures; or someone turns on the lights when you are trying to read in a room as dusks sets in—and the accompanying question is: “Is that any better?”
A starving person will feel better once they have been given something to eat. A thirsty person with a parched tongue will feel better once they have been given something to drink. Do you feel any better for what you have been eating and drinking over Christmas? Are you a better person spiritually having returned from the various places you frequented and visited over Christmas? What has this Christmas done for you spiritually? Are you spiritually healthier, spiritually stronger, spiritually more zealous, and spiritually rejuvenated?
I Returned a Lesser Person
“These questions bring to mind that famous little passage from the Imitation of Christ, which says: “Seek a suitable time for leisure and meditate often on the favors of God. Leave curiosities alone. Read such matters as bring sorrow to the heart rather than occupation to the mind. If you withdraw yourself from unnecessary talking and idle running about, from listening to gossip and rumors, you will find enough time that is suitable for holy meditation.
“Very many great saints avoided the company of men wherever possible and chose to serve God in retirement. ‘As often as I have been among men,’ said one writer, ‘I have returned less a man.’ We often find this to be true … It is easier to be silent altogether than not to speak too much. To stay at home is easier than to be sufficiently on guard while away. Anyone, then, who aims to live the inner and spiritual life must go apart, with Jesus, from the crowd.
“If only a man would never seek passing joys or entangle himself with worldly affairs, what a good conscience he would have. What great peace and tranquility would be his, if he cut himself off from all empty care and thought only of things divine, things helpful to his soul, and put all his trust in God.
“No man deserves the consolation of Heaven unless he persistently arouses himself to holy contrition. If you desire true sorrow of heart, seek the privacy of your home [cell for religious] and shut out the uproar of the world, as it is written: ‘In your chamber bewail your sins.’ There you will find what too often you lose abroad.
“Why wish to see what you are not permitted to have? ‘The world passes away and the concupiscence thereof.’ Sensual craving sometimes entices you to wander around, but when the moment is past, what do you bring back with you save a disturbed conscience and heavy heart? A happy going often leads to a sad return, a merry evening to a mournful dawn. Thus, all carnal joy begins sweetly but in the end brings remorse and death.
“Behold Heaven and earth and all the elements, for of these all things are made. What can you see anywhere under the sun that will remain long? Perhaps you think you will completely satisfy yourself, but you cannot do so, for if you should see all existing things, what would they be but an empty vision? Raise your eyes to God in Heaven and pray because of your sins and shortcomings. Leave vanity to the vain. Close the door upon yourself and call to you Jesus, your Beloved. Remain with Him in your home [cell], for nowhere else will you find such peace. If you had not left it, and had not listened to idle gossip, you would have remained in greater peace. But since you love, sometimes, to hear news, it is only right that you should suffer sorrow of heart from it” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 20).
Does That Strike A Christmas Chord?
Does the above passage somehow strike a chord that we recognize? Does it touch a nerve? Christmas is essentially a spiritually event, not a material fun-fest! Christ comes to make us more spiritual, not more worldly. He even said that we cannot serve God and be worldly at the same time: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). The full passage—to put it into context—could also be loosely applied to the Christmas season with its over-indulgent festivities:
“Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also. No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat: and the body more than the clothing?” (Matthew 6:19-25).
Where has our heart predominantly found itself this Christmas? In the things of Heaven, or the things of the Earth? The very fact that you are reading this means that you have the things of Heaven at heart—but are they predominant objects of your heart, or are you a ‘God-mammoner’? The whole purpose, of Christ’s Christmas coming, is to detach our hearts from the world and to attach them, instead, to Heaven, the things of Heaven and God. Did that happen this Christmas? Or did it, at least, detach us more from the things of world than the previous Christmas?
Our Lady Teaches About Christmas
There is nobody better to teach us about the mysteries of Christmas than Our Lady herself. Here are some of the words she spoke to the Venerable Mary of Agreda concerning the mystery of Christmas:
Foolish Arrogance of the World
“If men would keep their heart disengaged and if they would rightly and worthily consider this great mystery of the kindness of the Most High towards men, it would be a powerful means of conducting them in the pathway of life and subjecting them to the love of their Creator and Redeemer. For as men are capable of reasoning, if they would only make use of their freedom to treat this mystery with the reverence due to its greatness, who would be so hardened as not to be moved to tenderness at the sight of their God become man, humiliated in poverty, despised, unknown, entering the world in a cave, lying in a manger surrounded by brute animals, protected only by a poverty-stricken Mother, and cast-off by the foolish arrogance of the world? Who will dare to love the vanity and pride, which was openly abhorred and condemned by the Creator of Heaven and Earth in His conduct? No one can despise the humility, poverty and indigence, which the Lord loved and chose for Himself as the very means of teaching the way of eternal life. Few there are, who stop to consider this truth and example: and on account of this vile ingratitude only the few will reap the fruit of these great sacraments” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
Forget All That Is Of Earth
“But if the condescension of my most holy Son was so great, as to generously bestow His light and knowledge concerning these vast blessings, ponder well how much thou art bound to cooperate with this light In order that thou mayest correspond to this obligation! I remind and exhort thee to forget all that is of Earth and lose it out of thy sight; that thou seek nothing, or engage thyself with nothing, except what can help thee to withdraw and detach thee from the world and its inhabitants; so that, with a heart freed from all terrestrial affection, thou dispose thyself to celebrate in it the mysteries of the poverty, humility and divine love of the incarnate God” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
Seekers of Self and Others, But Not God
“Many fail in the love due to Him and they divert it toward the creatures. They esteem in other creatures what they are seeking themselves—namely power, riches, vain honor and ostentation. Although the faithful can remedy these injurious influences by faith and hope, yet they allow these virtues to remain dead, and unused, and debase themselves to the level of worthless creatures. Those who have riches, trust in them; and those who have none, greedily hasten after them; some procure them by very reprehensible ways and means; some confide in influential persons, praising and flattering them. And thus it happens that very few seek the Lord in such a way as to deserve His providential care” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
Earth Filled With Lovers of the World
“This deceitful error has filled the Earth with lovers of the world; it has filled it with avarice and concupiscence against the law of the Creator; and has made men insane in their desires; for all of them commonly strive after riches and earthly possessions; claiming thereby merely to satisfy their needs, which is only a pretext for hiding their want of interest in higher things. In reality they lie to themselves abominously, since they are seeking the superfluous; not what is really necessary, but what ministers to worldly pride … As soon as it carelessly ignores the beauty of the Lord, it enters upon the byways of neglect and is deprived of the divine sweetness. When afterwards the soul, having with sorrow experienced the evils of such inadvertence wishes to return to seek Him, it does not always find or recover Him” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
Forgetfulness and Ingratitude for His Birth
“Ponder over the burning love of my most holy Son in communicating Himself to men as soon as He was born, in order to make them immediate partakers of the joyful fruit of His coming. Men do not know of this obligation, because few of them penetrate to the significance of this great blessing, just as there were few who saw the Word at His Birth and thanked Him for His arrival ... Forgetfulness and inattention regarding the works of the Redeemer are as reprehensible as they are common and frequent among mortals ... Ponder, then, upon the small return given for the love of my Son and Lord by mortals, and how forgetful of thanks even His faithful continue to be … Many souls either make themselves unworthy or incapable of great blessings, or, if they receive them, they grow into a dangerous rudeness and lukewarmness, which offends the Lord very much” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
False Reasoning of Worldlings
“Consider the wicked disposition of mortals in the present age, in which the light of the Gospel has been spread out and confirmed by so many miracles wrought by God in His Church. In spite of all this there are so few, who are perfect and who seek to dispose themselves for greater participation in the fruits and benefits of the Redemption. Although the number of fools is so great, and the vices are become so measureless, there are those who think that also the perfect are numerous—there are fewer than one thinks, and many less than there should be!” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
“By the divine light I knew, better than all other creatures, at what a low value the Most High esteems earthly blessings and riches … Nothing can be trusted to infected human nature; for it always seeks after more than it possesses, and it never says enough, and the more it receives the greater thirst it has for more … Know how to refuse riches or honor, as due to thee, and not appropriate to thyself any of them; especially not if thou receive them from persons of influence and exalted station” (Our Lady to Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God).
What A Christmas Message!
Boy! What a message from the Queen of Heaven and Mother of the Christ Child! Once again, the truth of Holy Scripture hits us between our worldly eyes: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9). Or to rephrase it for the Christmas season: “For My thoughts about how to spend Christmas are not your thoughts: nor are your ways of spending Christmas like My ways of spending Christmas, saith the Lord. For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts.”
God Does Not Begrudge Celebration
Let us get one thing straight—God does not begrudge a celebration of Christmas. What irks Him is a Christless Christmas, where Christ—who should be the focal point of any and all celebrations—has been partially or even totally removed. Sure, we went to Mass! Sure we sang some carols! Sure, we have a nativity scene in our homes! Sure, we had Christmas dinner! But was Christ really the center of our Christmas? Or was He a mere formality Who was quickly forgotten once the fun started? It is sad and strange that Christmas Day is often a day on which people pray less to God than on a regular Sunday. They are more in “Martha Mode” that her sister’s “Mary Mode”!
“Now it came to pass as they went, that he entered into a certain town: and a certain woman named Martha, received him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sitting also at the Lord’s feet, heard his word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Who stood and said: ‘Lord! Hast Thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me!’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha! Martha! Thou art careful and art troubled about many things! But one thing is necessary! Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42).
The Christmas “Martha” Temptation
Human nature and human respect being the curse what it is, Christmas tends to be a time when many have more respect and more time for humans than they do for God! Nobody wants to look bad at Christmas—except Our Lord, I guess—and this feverish desire drives people to levels that would make them saints if they were directed at God! No sacrifice is too great! No expense is too great! No time is too long! But not for the spiritual side, but for the material side! As Our Lady said above: “By the divine light I knew, better than all other creatures, at what a low value the Most High esteems earthly blessings and riches … Nothing can be trusted to infected human nature; for it always seeks after more than it possesses, and it never says enough, and the more it receives the greater thirst it has for more.”
So they make more food, and more delicacies, as though our salvation depended on it! They buy the best wines and liquors and pour them into sacrificial chalices, clinking them with those of their neighbor, as though this ‘chalice’ was as important and efficacious as that of the Mass! They buy and wrap presents with the care that a priest should hold the Body of Christ at Mass. They prepare tables with outlandish care for the sacrificial dinners where the Gospel of Gossip flows almost as freely as the Wine of Concupiscence, where the mouth waters beholding the delicacies on the table like the soul should water and pant after Christ in the Holy Eucharist! Just as the New Order of Mass changes the concept of the Mass from being a propitiatory sacrifice centered upon God into being a community meal centered on man, likewise has Christmas been changed from a feast being centered upon Christ coming to suffer and die for us, into a time of celebration that centers around man.
Sadly, few homes will sanctify their banquets by extra prayers, Scriptural readings, or readings from the Saints. Talk will be not so much about Christ and all the myriad of circumstances of His Nativity, but of mundane things where there is no mention or presence of Christ. When we drag ourselves off to these festive temples of Christmas fun, we invariably come back with a watered-down Faith!
Who’s the Birthday Boy?
And so many immerse themselves—not so much in more prayer, more spiritual reading, more meditations, more visits to the Blessed Sacrament, more Masses, more Holy Communions—but more talk, more food and drink, more visiting other homes where the talk is rarely spiritual, more parties, more celebrations! But who is the “Birthday Boy”—it is Christ’s birthday and He sits almost alone, as everyone gives presents to each other, feeds each other, talks to each other and parties with one another! The words of Our Lord during His agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, could well be applied to His Agony in many Homes of Catholics at Christmas: “Could you not watch one hour with Me?” Can people not give Christ an extra hour daily over the Christmas season in prayer, or reading, or thought, or meditation, or visits in the Blessed Sacrament, or extra Masses? Hey! Whose birthday is it anyway? His or ours? Who comes off best? We do!
Let Us Put Things Right! Put Christ Back into Christmas!
If your Christmas has been somewhat lacking Christ, then there is still time to put Christ into Christmas—not just into Christmas, but at the peak of Christmas, or at the head of the table, in the most important place. The increasingly modern notion of Christmas, at best, looks at Christmas as lasting till New Year’s Day. For some, it is already all over! The Christmas lights are down and they are back in ‘work mode’—where everything is back to its mundane self.
Forty Days Given to Christ and Christmas!
Dom Guéranger rightfully points out that Christmas lasts until February 2nd—the feast of the Presentation of the Infant Jesus in the Temple and the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In his Liturgical Year, Dom Guéranger writes:
“We apply the name of Christmas to the forty days which begin with the Nativity of our Lord, December 25th, and end with the Purification of the Blessed Virgin, February 2nd. It is a period which forms a distinct portion of the Liturgical Year, as distinct, by its own special spirit, from every other, as are Advent, Lent, Easter, or Pentecost. One same Mystery is celebrated and kept in view during the whole forty days.
“Neither the Feasts of the Saints, which so abound during this Season; nor the time of Septuagesima, with its mournful Purple, which often begins before Christmastide is over, seem able to distract our Holy Mother the Church from the immense joy of which she received the good tidings from the Angels (Luke 2:10) on that glorious Night for which the world had been longing four thousand years ... When Easter comes so early as to necessitate keeping Septuagesima, and even Sexagesima Sunday, in January. Still, nothing is changed, as we have already said, in the ritual observances of this joyous season, excepting only that on those two Sundays, the fore-runners of Lent, the Vestments are purple, and the Gloria in excelsis is omitted.
“The Feast of Mary’s Purification is, therefore, part of that of Jesus’ Birth; and the custom of keeping this holy and glorious period of forty days as one continued Festival has every appearance of being a very ancient one, at least in the Roman Church. The Feast of Our Lady’s Purification, with which the forty days of Christmas close, is, in the Latin Church, of very great antiquity; so ancient, indeed, as to preclude the possibility of our fixing the date of its institution” (Dom Guéranger, Liturgical Year, Christmas Volume).
Forty Days? That’s Too Long to Think About Christmas!
Well, it depends upon what you love—there are folk who can think about sports, or many other things, almost all day, every day, and every day of the year! When you love a subject, then no time is too long, but too short, to think and talk about it!
So what about Christmas, then? What is there to occupy our thoughts, words and actions for forty long days?
Let us make a list of potential topics for thought, meditation, and discussion for these forty days of Christmas. Christmas contains so much, that it absolutely impossible to cover everything in a day, or even a few days. Here are some ideas on what can be covered—if we have the love and desire.
Christmas Topics
(1) There is an incredible amount of symbolism in the persons, places and things that surround the birth of Our Lord. Take a day to reflect and discuss each one of them. Here are but a few: (a) rejected at one house after another; (b) born in cave or stable; (c) born in the dark night; (d) born in the cold winter; (e) nobody, apart from Mary and Joseph, are there to celebrate His birthday; (f) born in Bethlehem, which means “Town of Bread”; (g) the symbolism of the three members of the Holy Family; (h) the symbolism of the ox and ass; (i) the various roles of the angels with various people at Christmas; (j) symbolism of the shepherds; (k) the symbolism of the sheep and lambs; (l) the symbolism of Herod; (m) the symbolism of the three kings or wise men as a group; (n) the symbolism of Caspar; (o) the symbolism of Melchior; the symbolism of Balthasar; (p) the symbolism of the gold; (q) the symbolism of the frankincense; (r) the symbolism of the myrrh; (s) the symbolism of the guiding star; (t) the circumcision of Our Lord; (u) the presentation of Our Lord in the Temple; (v) the symbolism of St. Simeon (w) the prophecy of St. Simeon; (x) the symbolism of the prophetess Anna; (y) the slaughter of the Holy Innocents; (z) the flight into Egypt.
Those are just some of the things that can be researched in books and on the internet—there is plenty of material available for those who want to look, seek, find, think and learn. In bygone years it would have been much more difficult, but today it is “a piece of cake” that God “gives us on a plate”—shall we take and eat? “ Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).
Christmas Books
Alternatively, take one or several books on Christmas and read from them daily—whether privately or to the whole family. It could be read before prayer times, or before the Rosary, or at mealtime. There are many good books on Christmas available—you probably have some of them already and just need to “dig them out” and “dust them down” and get down to reading them. Some potential titles are:
1. Bethlehem, by Fr. Faber. Also available as a PDF download at https://archive.org/details/bethlehem00fabeuoft
2. Prince of Peace, meditations by Archbishop Goodier. Available as a PDF download at https://archive.org/details/theprinceofpeace00gooduoft
3. The Life of Mary As Seen By The Mystics, by Raphael Brown
4. Volume 2—the Incarnation—of The Mystical City of God, by Ven. Mary of Agreda. Available as a PDF download at http://www.themostholyrosary.com/mystical-city-vol-ii.pdf or as an online read at http://www.themostholyrosary.com/mystical-city.htm
5. The Life of the Blessed Virgin Mary, by Bl. Anne Catherine Emmerich. Available as a PDF download at http://www.catholicplanet.com/ebooks/Life-of-Blessed-Virgin-Mary.pdf
Article 4
Thursday December 28th
Has Your Christmas Fire Gone Out?
Thursday December 28th
Has Your Christmas Fire Gone Out?
Christmas Fire Still Burning?
One image of Christmas that stirs the imagination, is that of being joyfully gathered around a burning fire! Perhaps that idea has lost some of its realism and charm in these days of gas or electric central-heating. At best, the home may have fake plastic logs and fake flickering flames, but the reality of the real fire is diminishing as fast as is the Faith. Our Lord said: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find Faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8). Will He even find fire on an earth where “the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). For God has chosen fire to symbolize and represent Himself on many occasions. Has our fire gone out? Is our fire dying? Do we still have “fire in the belly”?
Real and Artificial Christmas Fires
Was there a real fire in our soul in the first place, or was the fire in my soul an artificial fire―like the gas and electric fires in so many homes? With the constant commercial pounding of the modern material world, we can certainly say that the fire in most souls—if not entirely extinguished—is at least burning-itself-out or has reached the level of merely glowing embers.
For many, the thermostat of the soul was programmed to turn everything off a few days after Christmas Day. Extra buckets of water are thrown over our Christmas spirits by the fact that many people are back at work—yet we must remember that this was the same situation for the shepherds at Bethlehem. They did not and could not take a few weeks off work after finding Jesus, but had to return to their work within hours of discovering Jesus. What they did is what most people do not do—they took Our Lord away with them in their hearts. What was written of Our Lady, could also be said of them: “Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart” (Luke 2:19).
What Goes In Must Come Out!
We all know the basic axiom and its many variations: “Tell me who your friends are and I will tell what you are!” … “Tell we what you read and I will tell you what you are!” … “Tell we what you eat and I will tell you what you are!” etc., etc. This is just as applicable to Christmas—our Christmas will be what we put into it. “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth that which is evil. For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Luke 6:45).
Feed your mind and heart good spiritual things for Christmas, and you will bear good, lasting fruit! Feed your mind junky material things for Christmas and your fruit will soon go rotten. “By their fruits you shall know them. Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:16-20).
What were the predominant conversations over Christmas? On what did we spend most of our time? “The things which proceed out of the mouth, come forth from the heart, and those things defile a man” (Matthew 15:18). Tell me what you spoke about, read and watched—and I will tell you what your Christmas likely was in God’s eyes. “Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them.”
Boring Spiritual Christmas!
For most, the spiritual life, if not outright torture, is at least boring to say the least. In the build-up to Christmas, it is not the Masses, the spiritual reading, the sermons or spiritual conversations that they look forward to—but it is the material side of Christmas that predominantly or even exclusively preoccupies their mind and heart: the celebrations, the parties, the food, the gifts, the entertainment possibilities, where they will go, what they will do, who they will see, etc.!
The Christmas of Christ just can’t compete with the Christmas of the world in the domain of pep, whizz and bang! A party in a cave cannot hold a candle to the glitz of some parties that are held over Christmas! Jesus takes second place—there is no room for Jesus at Christmas. Get to Mass; get it over quick; get quickly out of there and then let the real Christmas begin!
Wow! Listen to This!
When people have been to an exciting place or event; or if they have met somebody who is important in the eyes of the world, then they cannot stop talking about it for days, or even weeks, on end. “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Matthew 12:34). They go over the same old story time and time again, repeating it to anyone who will listen.
Christmas is—or should be—way above such earthly, worldly concerns. It should rank way up there in importance. Yet, we would be fooling ourselves to even try to pretend that it does—it simply does not! Our Lord, being God, could have come with a whizz and a bang! It is said that He will come in all His glory at His Second Coming at the end of time—well, He could also have come in all His glory at His First Coming, at the first Christmas!
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: "This great God and Lord does not wish to enter into the world in the pomp of ostentatious riches and royal majesty. He has need of none of these, nor does He come from Heaven for such vanities. He comes to redeem the world and to guide men on the path of eternal life; and this is to be done by means of humility and poverty; in these He wishes to be born, live and die" (Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“Jesus came to conquer the devil not only by his Omnipotence, but by humility, meekness, obedience and poverty, which are the weapons of His warfare; far from Him are the empty show and vanity maintained by the riches of the world. He came disguised and hidden in the outward appearance of lowliness; He chose a poor Mother. All that the world values, He came to despise, teaching the true science of life in word and example” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“Hi there, Mr. King and Mrs. Queen!”
Today, most of us live like kings and queens, but we don't even realize it! How many kings and queens had access to the variety of food and drink that modern man can find in any supermarket? How many had the medical support that is available today? How many had the such comfortable, economical, with central heating and air-conditioning? They would have jumped at the chance to trade-in their horse and carriage for one of our cars! They could not even imagine the communications and electronic appliances available to us today, with their possibilities of instant communications with anyone anywhere in the world. The list of advantages that we have over the kings and queens of old is endless.
“We’ve Never Had It So Good!”
In 1957, Britain’s Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, gave us that famous declaration that “most of our people have never had it so good” and was made at a time when the country was riding high on the post-war economic boom. Today the world economy is not riding so high, but, relatively speaking, the quote still rings true.
The following words, merely natural and materialistic in scope, were written by a newspaper columnist in recent times, and they essentially echo what has just been said: "We live in largely peaceful times, with better access to medicine and education ― the world is easily in the best place it’s ever been. Humanity as a whole is doing better than it ever has: the world is becoming more prosperous, cleaner, increasingly peaceful and healthier. We are living longer, better lives. Virtually all of our existing problems are less bad than at any previous time in history."
When Is Much, Too-Much?
The problem with all this is that when we have so much available; when we enjoy so much relative security; when we can rely on the insurance gods to look after our health, wealth and loved ones, then the danger is that we can fall into a neglect, an indifference, a laxity or lukewarmness with regard to our heavenly provider or insurance agent—which is, of course, almighty God and His Divine Providence. We pay thousands of dollars annually to the insurance gods, but how much do pay by way of prayers and attention to the real God?
What on earth do we need God for now? We have health insurance; we have car accident insurance to replace the car or pay for its repair; we have house insurance to guarantee the replacement of certain things; we can even have insurance on the gas, electricity and water supplies and the repair of their pipes and lines; we have the possibility of insurance on the multitude of appliances and articles that we buy for ourselves and our homes; we have the insurance of welfare if we lose our jobs; we have life insurance to care for our loved ones from beyond the grave! What a bevy of assurance through insurance! God is almost redundant and unnecessary! All that we need Him for is insurance against Hell!
Earthly Riches Create Spiritual Poverty
It is clear that plenty of goods does not beget plenty of Faith; not does an abundance of comfort beget abundant charity. Earthly riches impoverish spirituality, and ultimately greatly handicap our chances of salvation. Our Lord Himself said: “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible’” (Matthew 19:23-26).
In the words of Our Lord, God and His Providence seems to be the best insurance policy we can have (not that we should quit paying insurance, but our primary agent should be God and not man).
Forty Days of Christmas Too Long Today!
The opulence of the modern world has not much time for Jesus, cribs or mangers, kings and gifts. Once the lip service is accomplished and the human parties have been attended, it is time to take down the Christmas Tree and get back to the usual business. The whole idea of Forty Days of Christmas is foreign to modern man. Some hang on their Christmas decorations until January 6th, and though the decorations may be standing, the meditations have long since been dead and buried. Material Christmases have long since buried Spiritual Christmases. We are more or less spiritual naked, yet like the “King with No Clothes”, modern-man proudly parades around in his self-satisfied smugness of having acquired most of what he wants, without anyone’s help. Our Lord condemns him saying: “Without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Running Out Of Time
As The Imitation of Christ says: ”How many there are who perish because of vain worldly knowledge and too little care for serving God” (Book 1, Chapter 3). For life is short. If we are old, we have not long left to get things right. If we are young, we may still have not long left, if the Chastisement Our Lady keeps warning us about comes soon, where the good will die alongside the bad, with neither priest nor faithful being spared the sufferings. So let us take to heart the Word of God, and let us engrave in our hearts the words of the The Imitation of Christ :
“In that day every trial borne in patience will be pleasing and the voice of iniquity will be stilled; the devout will be glad; the irreligious will mourn; and the mortified body will rejoice far more than if it had been pampered with every pleasure.
► Then the cheap garment will shine with splendor and the rich one become faded and worn; the poor cottage will be more praised than the gilded palace.
► In that day persevering patience will count more than all the power in this world;
► Simple obedience will be exalted above all worldly cleverness;
► A good and clean conscience will gladden the heart of man far more than the philosophy of the learned;
► And contempt for riches will be of more weight than every treasure on earth.
► Then you will find more consolation in having prayed devoutly than in having fared daintily;
► You will be happy that you preferred silence to prolonged gossip.
► Then holy works will be of greater value than many fair words;
► Strictness of life and hard penances will be more pleasing than all earthly delights.
“Learn, then, to suffer little things now, that you may not have to suffer greater ones in eternity. Prove here what you can bear hereafter. If you can suffer only a little now, how will you be able to endure eternal torment? If a little suffering makes you impatient now, what will hell fire do? In truth, you cannot have two joys: you cannot taste the pleasures of this world and afterward reign with Christ. If your life to this moment had been full of honors and pleasures, what good would it do if at this instant you should die? All is vanity, therefore, except to love God and to serve Him alone” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 24).
Withdrawal Symptoms
Of course, naturally and humanly speaking, withdrawal from the world will bring with it withdrawal symptoms. We will feel isolated, we will feel left out, we will feel hated, we will feel persecuted, we will feel abandoned, we will feel like giving-up! Let us, at those inevitable moments (for they will come), take to heart the words of the Word of God, who said: “If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you” (John 15:18). “They hated Me without cause” (John 15:25). “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake: but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved” (Matthew 10:22).
Heaven is not a ‘freebie’ but requires effort: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). That violent effort (fighting the devil, fighting the world, and fighting ourselves) will cost us many bruises, wounds and tears, but he that perseveres unto the end shall be saved. This was the kind of fight the Infant Jesus entered from the moment of His entry into this world at Bethlehem―Hated by the devil and the world―Fighting for His life and for our souls from the very first moments of His infancy. It has been said before and it shall be said again: Christmas is not a sentimental time of parties and fun; the very first Christmas was a time of great suffering (with some consolations) for our forgiveness and salvation. It was a time of joyful suffering, not a time of sorrowful joys! A time where suffering would bring joy, and not a time where joy would bring suffering!
“Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. You now indeed have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you” (John 16:20-22).
“They that sow in tears shall reap in joy” (Psalm 125:5).
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings on His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where love and greed for riches continues to grow and “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12).
One image of Christmas that stirs the imagination, is that of being joyfully gathered around a burning fire! Perhaps that idea has lost some of its realism and charm in these days of gas or electric central-heating. At best, the home may have fake plastic logs and fake flickering flames, but the reality of the real fire is diminishing as fast as is the Faith. Our Lord said: “The Son of man, when He cometh, shall He find Faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8). Will He even find fire on an earth where “the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). For God has chosen fire to symbolize and represent Himself on many occasions. Has our fire gone out? Is our fire dying? Do we still have “fire in the belly”?
Real and Artificial Christmas Fires
Was there a real fire in our soul in the first place, or was the fire in my soul an artificial fire―like the gas and electric fires in so many homes? With the constant commercial pounding of the modern material world, we can certainly say that the fire in most souls—if not entirely extinguished—is at least burning-itself-out or has reached the level of merely glowing embers.
For many, the thermostat of the soul was programmed to turn everything off a few days after Christmas Day. Extra buckets of water are thrown over our Christmas spirits by the fact that many people are back at work—yet we must remember that this was the same situation for the shepherds at Bethlehem. They did not and could not take a few weeks off work after finding Jesus, but had to return to their work within hours of discovering Jesus. What they did is what most people do not do—they took Our Lord away with them in their hearts. What was written of Our Lady, could also be said of them: “Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart” (Luke 2:19).
What Goes In Must Come Out!
We all know the basic axiom and its many variations: “Tell me who your friends are and I will tell what you are!” … “Tell we what you read and I will tell you what you are!” … “Tell we what you eat and I will tell you what you are!” etc., etc. This is just as applicable to Christmas—our Christmas will be what we put into it. “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth that which is evil. For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Luke 6:45).
Feed your mind and heart good spiritual things for Christmas, and you will bear good, lasting fruit! Feed your mind junky material things for Christmas and your fruit will soon go rotten. “By their fruits you shall know them. Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them” (Matthew 7:16-20).
What were the predominant conversations over Christmas? On what did we spend most of our time? “The things which proceed out of the mouth, come forth from the heart, and those things defile a man” (Matthew 15:18). Tell me what you spoke about, read and watched—and I will tell you what your Christmas likely was in God’s eyes. “Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them.”
Boring Spiritual Christmas!
For most, the spiritual life, if not outright torture, is at least boring to say the least. In the build-up to Christmas, it is not the Masses, the spiritual reading, the sermons or spiritual conversations that they look forward to—but it is the material side of Christmas that predominantly or even exclusively preoccupies their mind and heart: the celebrations, the parties, the food, the gifts, the entertainment possibilities, where they will go, what they will do, who they will see, etc.!
The Christmas of Christ just can’t compete with the Christmas of the world in the domain of pep, whizz and bang! A party in a cave cannot hold a candle to the glitz of some parties that are held over Christmas! Jesus takes second place—there is no room for Jesus at Christmas. Get to Mass; get it over quick; get quickly out of there and then let the real Christmas begin!
Wow! Listen to This!
When people have been to an exciting place or event; or if they have met somebody who is important in the eyes of the world, then they cannot stop talking about it for days, or even weeks, on end. “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Matthew 12:34). They go over the same old story time and time again, repeating it to anyone who will listen.
Christmas is—or should be—way above such earthly, worldly concerns. It should rank way up there in importance. Yet, we would be fooling ourselves to even try to pretend that it does—it simply does not! Our Lord, being God, could have come with a whizz and a bang! It is said that He will come in all His glory at His Second Coming at the end of time—well, He could also have come in all His glory at His First Coming, at the first Christmas!
Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: "This great God and Lord does not wish to enter into the world in the pomp of ostentatious riches and royal majesty. He has need of none of these, nor does He come from Heaven for such vanities. He comes to redeem the world and to guide men on the path of eternal life; and this is to be done by means of humility and poverty; in these He wishes to be born, live and die" (Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“Jesus came to conquer the devil not only by his Omnipotence, but by humility, meekness, obedience and poverty, which are the weapons of His warfare; far from Him are the empty show and vanity maintained by the riches of the world. He came disguised and hidden in the outward appearance of lowliness; He chose a poor Mother. All that the world values, He came to despise, teaching the true science of life in word and example” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“Hi there, Mr. King and Mrs. Queen!”
Today, most of us live like kings and queens, but we don't even realize it! How many kings and queens had access to the variety of food and drink that modern man can find in any supermarket? How many had the medical support that is available today? How many had the such comfortable, economical, with central heating and air-conditioning? They would have jumped at the chance to trade-in their horse and carriage for one of our cars! They could not even imagine the communications and electronic appliances available to us today, with their possibilities of instant communications with anyone anywhere in the world. The list of advantages that we have over the kings and queens of old is endless.
“We’ve Never Had It So Good!”
In 1957, Britain’s Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, gave us that famous declaration that “most of our people have never had it so good” and was made at a time when the country was riding high on the post-war economic boom. Today the world economy is not riding so high, but, relatively speaking, the quote still rings true.
The following words, merely natural and materialistic in scope, were written by a newspaper columnist in recent times, and they essentially echo what has just been said: "We live in largely peaceful times, with better access to medicine and education ― the world is easily in the best place it’s ever been. Humanity as a whole is doing better than it ever has: the world is becoming more prosperous, cleaner, increasingly peaceful and healthier. We are living longer, better lives. Virtually all of our existing problems are less bad than at any previous time in history."
When Is Much, Too-Much?
The problem with all this is that when we have so much available; when we enjoy so much relative security; when we can rely on the insurance gods to look after our health, wealth and loved ones, then the danger is that we can fall into a neglect, an indifference, a laxity or lukewarmness with regard to our heavenly provider or insurance agent—which is, of course, almighty God and His Divine Providence. We pay thousands of dollars annually to the insurance gods, but how much do pay by way of prayers and attention to the real God?
What on earth do we need God for now? We have health insurance; we have car accident insurance to replace the car or pay for its repair; we have house insurance to guarantee the replacement of certain things; we can even have insurance on the gas, electricity and water supplies and the repair of their pipes and lines; we have the possibility of insurance on the multitude of appliances and articles that we buy for ourselves and our homes; we have the insurance of welfare if we lose our jobs; we have life insurance to care for our loved ones from beyond the grave! What a bevy of assurance through insurance! God is almost redundant and unnecessary! All that we need Him for is insurance against Hell!
Earthly Riches Create Spiritual Poverty
It is clear that plenty of goods does not beget plenty of Faith; not does an abundance of comfort beget abundant charity. Earthly riches impoverish spirituality, and ultimately greatly handicap our chances of salvation. Our Lord Himself said: “Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible’” (Matthew 19:23-26).
In the words of Our Lord, God and His Providence seems to be the best insurance policy we can have (not that we should quit paying insurance, but our primary agent should be God and not man).
Forty Days of Christmas Too Long Today!
The opulence of the modern world has not much time for Jesus, cribs or mangers, kings and gifts. Once the lip service is accomplished and the human parties have been attended, it is time to take down the Christmas Tree and get back to the usual business. The whole idea of Forty Days of Christmas is foreign to modern man. Some hang on their Christmas decorations until January 6th, and though the decorations may be standing, the meditations have long since been dead and buried. Material Christmases have long since buried Spiritual Christmases. We are more or less spiritual naked, yet like the “King with No Clothes”, modern-man proudly parades around in his self-satisfied smugness of having acquired most of what he wants, without anyone’s help. Our Lord condemns him saying: “Without Me you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Running Out Of Time
As The Imitation of Christ says: ”How many there are who perish because of vain worldly knowledge and too little care for serving God” (Book 1, Chapter 3). For life is short. If we are old, we have not long left to get things right. If we are young, we may still have not long left, if the Chastisement Our Lady keeps warning us about comes soon, where the good will die alongside the bad, with neither priest nor faithful being spared the sufferings. So let us take to heart the Word of God, and let us engrave in our hearts the words of the The Imitation of Christ :
“In that day every trial borne in patience will be pleasing and the voice of iniquity will be stilled; the devout will be glad; the irreligious will mourn; and the mortified body will rejoice far more than if it had been pampered with every pleasure.
► Then the cheap garment will shine with splendor and the rich one become faded and worn; the poor cottage will be more praised than the gilded palace.
► In that day persevering patience will count more than all the power in this world;
► Simple obedience will be exalted above all worldly cleverness;
► A good and clean conscience will gladden the heart of man far more than the philosophy of the learned;
► And contempt for riches will be of more weight than every treasure on earth.
► Then you will find more consolation in having prayed devoutly than in having fared daintily;
► You will be happy that you preferred silence to prolonged gossip.
► Then holy works will be of greater value than many fair words;
► Strictness of life and hard penances will be more pleasing than all earthly delights.
“Learn, then, to suffer little things now, that you may not have to suffer greater ones in eternity. Prove here what you can bear hereafter. If you can suffer only a little now, how will you be able to endure eternal torment? If a little suffering makes you impatient now, what will hell fire do? In truth, you cannot have two joys: you cannot taste the pleasures of this world and afterward reign with Christ. If your life to this moment had been full of honors and pleasures, what good would it do if at this instant you should die? All is vanity, therefore, except to love God and to serve Him alone” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, Chapter 24).
Withdrawal Symptoms
Of course, naturally and humanly speaking, withdrawal from the world will bring with it withdrawal symptoms. We will feel isolated, we will feel left out, we will feel hated, we will feel persecuted, we will feel abandoned, we will feel like giving-up! Let us, at those inevitable moments (for they will come), take to heart the words of the Word of God, who said: “If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you” (John 15:18). “They hated Me without cause” (John 15:25). “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake: but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved” (Matthew 10:22).
Heaven is not a ‘freebie’ but requires effort: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away” (Matthew 11:12). That violent effort (fighting the devil, fighting the world, and fighting ourselves) will cost us many bruises, wounds and tears, but he that perseveres unto the end shall be saved. This was the kind of fight the Infant Jesus entered from the moment of His entry into this world at Bethlehem―Hated by the devil and the world―Fighting for His life and for our souls from the very first moments of His infancy. It has been said before and it shall be said again: Christmas is not a sentimental time of parties and fun; the very first Christmas was a time of great suffering (with some consolations) for our forgiveness and salvation. It was a time of joyful suffering, not a time of sorrowful joys! A time where suffering would bring joy, and not a time where joy would bring suffering!
“Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. You now indeed have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you” (John 16:20-22).
“They that sow in tears shall reap in joy” (Psalm 125:5).
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings on His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where love and greed for riches continues to grow and “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12).
Article 3
Wednesday December 27th
A Poor Man’s God Gives Us a Very Poor Lesson!
Wednesday December 27th
A Poor Man’s God Gives Us a Very Poor Lesson!
Happy Poor Man or Poor Happy Man
“Hearken, my dearest brethren: hath not God chosen the poor in this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which God hath promised to them that love Him?”(James 2:5) ... “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:3) ... “Blessed are ye poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God” (Luke 6:20).
“Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Sion, shout for joy, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold thy King will come to thee, the Just and Savior: He is poor, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass!” (Zacharias 9:9).
The Preference of Christ
Thus speaks Holy Scripture. Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: “This great God and Lord does not wish to enter into the world in the pomp of ostentatious riches and royal majesty. He has need of none of these, nor does He come from Heaven for such vanities. He comes to redeem the world and to guide men on the path of eternal life; and this is to be done by means of humility and poverty; in these He wishes to be born, live and die” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“Jesus came to conquer the devil not only by his Omnipotence, but by humility, meekness, obedience and poverty, which are the weapons of His warfare; far from Him are the empty show and vanity maintained by the riches of the world. He came disguised and hidden in the outward appearance of lowliness; He chose a poor Mother. All that the world values, He came to despise, teaching the true science of life in word and example” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
That’s How God Wants It!
Such was the design of Divine Providence, and therefore, even though God could have arranged for Jesus to be born to rich royalty, in the splendors of some palace, surrounded by wealth, courtiers and servants, God, instead chose to place His Son into a life and surroundings of poverty. Therefore, it was important that God’s Providence make Mary and Joseph poor. Here are a few extracts from The Mystical City of God that describe and point out the poverty of the Queen of Heaven and her spouse, St. Joseph.
“Her garments were humble and poor ... poor dwelling ... her humble cottage and her poor little oratory... her poor table and at her humble meals ... She, with her husband, belonged to the poorest, humblest, and the most insignificant people in this world” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Temptation to Avarice
The devil, seeing Our Lady’s incredible holiness, tried to derail her with a onslaught of different kinds of temptations, among which was a temptation of avarice.
“At one point the devils had organized a massive onslaught of temptation against the Mother of God. One of attacks was to tempt her to the sin of avarice. They offered to her great riches, gold, silver, and most precious gems and in order that these might not seem empty promises, thy placed before her a great quantity of these riches, although they were only apparent; for they thought that they could exert greater influence on her will by actually presenting these objects before her. They accompanied this offer with many deceitful words and told her that God had sent her all this for distribution among the poor. When they saw that all this had no effect upon her, they changed their tactics and urged, that, since she was so holy, it was a great wrong that she should remain so poor. It was more reasonable that she possess these riches, than that they remain in the hands of wicked sinners, for this would be an injustice and a disarrangement of the Divine Providence that the just be visited with poverty, while God’s wicked enemies abound in riches and affluence” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“The most prudent Lady, although she possessed divine wisdom, never undertook to argue with these enemies, as in truth nobody should―for they battle against the manifest truth and will not admit defeat. The most holy Mary made use of some words of the Holy Scriptures and repeated them with serene humility. On this occasion she selected the words of the 118th Psalm: “I have acquired for my heritage and for my riches the keeping of thy testimonies and thy laws, my Lord.” In this most wise manner she rejected and overcame the temptation, to the confusion and torment of these agents of iniquity” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Neither was St. Joseph spared temptations against the poverty that God had placed upon his shoulders: “The demon suggested a feeling of restlessness to St. Joseph, irritating and disgusting him against his poverty” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
When he had found out that the Child that Mary was carrying in her womb was the Son of God, with tears of joy St. Joseph said: “Is it possible, that in thy most chaste arms I shall see my God and Redeemer? That I shall hear Him speak, and touch Him, and that my eyes shall look upon His divine face, and that the sweat of my brow shall be so blessed as to be poured out in His service and for His sustenance? That He shall live with us, and that we shall eat with Him at the same table, and that we shall speak and converse with Him? Whence comes to me this good fortune which nobody can ever deserve? O how much do I regret that I am so poor! If only I possessed the richest palaces for His entertainment and many treasures to offer Him!”
But Our Lady, understanding and treasuring the burden of poverty that God had placed upon them, answered: “My master and spouse, there is abundant reason that thy desires extend to all things possible for the reception of thy Creator; but this great God and Lord does not wish to enter into the world in the pomp of ostentatious riches and royal majesty. He has need of none of these, nor does He come from Heaven for such vanities. He comes to redeem the world and to guide men on the path of eternal life; and this is to be done by means of humility and poverty; in these He wishes to be born, live and die, in order to destroy in the hearts of men the fetters of covetousness and pride, which keep them from blessedness. On this account He chose our poor and humble house, and desired us not to be rich in apparent, deceitful and transitory goods, which are but vanity of vanities and affliction of spirit and which oppress and obscure the understanding” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Poverty, a Tough Reality
We find it hard to grasp that God would treat His most prized creation, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and His only-begotten Son, with such seeming coldness of heart as to make them endure the extremes of poverty.
“It happened also not a few times that the heavenly Lady and her spouse found themselves so poor and destitute of means that they were in want of the necessaries of life; for they were most liberal in their gifts to the poor, and they were never anxious to store up beforehand food or clothing, as is tends to with the children of this world in their faint-hearted covetousness” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Our Lady herself reveals to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “I and my holy spouse, Joseph, were poor, and at times we suffered great wants; but none of them were powerful enough to engender within our hearts the contagion of avarice. We concerned ourselves entirely with the glory of the Most High, relying wholly on His most faithful and tender care. This was what pleased Him so much, since He supplied our wants in various ways” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Mary and Joseph even found a pleasure and a delight in their poverty at times. When telling Joseph of her readiness in accompanying him to Bethlehem, she says:
“My spouse and my master, I accompany thee with much pleasure, and we will make this journey as poor people in the Name of the Lord: for the Most High will not despise poverty, which He came to seek with so much love” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Their journey to Bethlehem was to be one of humiliation in their poverty. “Mary and St. Joseph departed from Nazareth for Bethlehem alone, poor and humble in the eyes of the world. None of the mortals thought more of them than what was warranted by their poverty and humility” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Not only was their home in Nazareth a clear indication of their poverty, but their ‘lodgings’ in Bethlehem would bring them to new lows, not yet experienced. There would be no room available for them in the houses and inns of Bethlehem, so they would be reduced to the ignominy of having to use a residence of animals.
“The palace which the supreme King of kings and the Lord of lords had chosen for entertaining His eternal and incarnate Son in this world was a most poor and insignificant hut or cave, to which most holy Mary and Joseph betook themselves after they had been denied all hospitality and the most ordinary kindness by their fellow-men” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Second-Class Visitors
The first visitors to be called to the ‘animal hotel’ would themselves be the custodians of animals. These were the shepherds, poor second-class citizens, who smelt of sheep and were looked down upon by many.
“Amongst all these, the shepherds of that region, who were watching their flocks at the time of the birth of Christ, were especially blessed; not only because they accepted the labor and inconvenience of their calling with resignation from the hand of God; but also because, being poor and humble, and despised by the world, they belonged in sincerity and uprightness of heart to those Israelites, who fervently hoped and longed for the coming of the Messias, speaking and discoursing of Him among themselves many times. They resembled the Author of life, as they were removed from the riches, vanity and ostentation of the world and far from its diabolical cunning” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Once the shepherds had witnessed the marvel of the Christ-Child, they went to tell all and sundry of the angelic vision and the Child in the Cave. Some people then began to visit Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Most of them were poor people.
“During the days in which the most holy Queen tarried near Bethlehem before the purification, some of the people came to see and speak with her; but almost all of them were of the poorest class” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”)
St. Elizabeth, who did not live too far away from Bethlehem, had sent her servants with certain provisions and supplies to relieve the stresses being endured by the Holy Family in their inhospitable circumstances.
“Of the things sent by St. Elizabeth, Our Lady appropriated some for relieving their extreme poverty, while she distributed the rest of them to the poor; for she did not wish to be deprived of the company of the poor during the days in which she would have to remain in the portal or cave of the Nativity” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Our Lady on Riches and Poverty
Here are the words of Our Lady on the subject, as spoken to the Venerable Mary of Agreda:
“I assure thee, my dearest, there is no more acceptable gift to the Most High than voluntary poverty. There are very few in the world in our days who use well the temporal riches and offer them to their God and Lord with the generosity and love of these holy Kings. The poor of the Lord, so numerous in our day, experience and give witness how cruel and avaricious human nature has become; since in their great necessities they are so little assisted by the rich. This gross uncharitableness of men offends the holy angels and grieves the Holy Ghost, since they are bound to witness the nobility of the souls so degraded and abased in the service of vile greed of gold with all its evil powers. As if all things had been created for the individual use of the rich, they appropriate them to themselves and deprive the poor, their brothers springing from the same nature and flesh; and denying them even to God, Who created and preserves all things, and Who can give or take at will. It is most lamentable that while the rich might purchase eternal life with their possessions, they abuse them to draw upon themselves damnation as sense less and foolish creatures. This evil is common among the children of Adam; and therefore voluntary poverty is so excellent and safe a remedy. By it, making man willing to part joyfully with his possessions for the sake of the poor, a great sacrifice is offered to the Lord” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“The Father in Heaven, Who lets the sun rise over the just and the unjust and lets the rain fall on the good and the bad, nevertheless helps all, giving them life and nourishment. However, just as His blessings are distributed to the good and to the bad, so also it cannot be a rule with God to give greater temporal goods to the good and less to the bad. On the contrary, He prefers that the chosen and predestined ones be poor, both because they thus gain more merit and reward, and because there are few who know how to use wealth properly and who can retain it without inordinate greed. Although my most holy Son and I had nothing to fear from this danger, yet He wished to furnish this example to men and to teach them this science, through which eternal life comes to them” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Poor Rich Man
All of this should puncture any desire we may have of trying to serve both God while at the same time trying to grow in wealth and worldly possessions. This was the problem of the rich young man, who came asking Jesus what he must do to save his soul and gain salvation. Jesus first gives him the foundation that must be laid down, the keeping of the commandments. The rich young man tells Jesus that he has kept them all his life. Jesus then moves to the next stage, and tells him to sell all he has, give the money to the poor and then to come and follow Him. “And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me’” (Mark 10:21).
At this point the rich young man becomes sad, turns around and leaves Jesus, for he had great possessions and could not bear to part from them. As he walks away, Jesus says to His disciples:”Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:16-24).
The Complacency of Wealth
Many possessions and great wealth make us very complacent by leading us to rely and trust primarily in what we have, rather than trusting in God, “without Whom we can do nothing” (John 15:5). Wealth and great possessions often render a soul lukewarm in the service of God, and, just like the Israelites, when things went very well for them, there comes a falling away from God to a greater or lesser degree. It might be a total departure from God through mortal sin, or a growing indifference to God through lukewarmness. This latter disease, reminds us of the grave warning given by God in the Apocalypse:
“But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth. Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ ― and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see” (Apocalypse 3:16-18). That “gold, fire tried” is of course charity―without which we are poor, as the following verses show:
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Though it may not be pleasant, it is perhaps better to poor than rich. After all, it is the way chosen by Jesus for Himself and His Mother and her spouse. It was the way into which God led His prophets in the Old Testament. It was the way chosen for the New Testament prophet, St. John the Baptist. It is the way chosen by so many of the saintly religious orders of ancient times.
Our Lord and God chose to be a Poor God; and it was to teach us a lesson about the hidden riches of being poor. A very good poor lesson, from a very good poor God.
Spiritually Rich Quotes on Poverty
“Better is the poor man, that walks in his simplicity, than a rich man that is perverse in his lips, and unwise” (Proverbs 19:1).
“One is, as it were rich, when he hath nothing―and another is as it were poor, when he hath great riches” (Proverbs 13:7).
“He saves not the wicked, and He grants judgment to the poor” (Job 36:6).
“And the poor people Thou will save” (2 Kings 22:28).
“Better is the poor man’s fare under a roof of boards, than sumptuous cheer abroad in another man’s house” (Ecclesiasticus 29:28).
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings on His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where love and greed for riches continues to grow and “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12).
“Hearken, my dearest brethren: hath not God chosen the poor in this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which God hath promised to them that love Him?”(James 2:5) ... “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:3) ... “Blessed are ye poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God” (Luke 6:20).
“Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Sion, shout for joy, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold thy King will come to thee, the Just and Savior: He is poor, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass!” (Zacharias 9:9).
The Preference of Christ
Thus speaks Holy Scripture. Our Lady, in speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says: “This great God and Lord does not wish to enter into the world in the pomp of ostentatious riches and royal majesty. He has need of none of these, nor does He come from Heaven for such vanities. He comes to redeem the world and to guide men on the path of eternal life; and this is to be done by means of humility and poverty; in these He wishes to be born, live and die” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“Jesus came to conquer the devil not only by his Omnipotence, but by humility, meekness, obedience and poverty, which are the weapons of His warfare; far from Him are the empty show and vanity maintained by the riches of the world. He came disguised and hidden in the outward appearance of lowliness; He chose a poor Mother. All that the world values, He came to despise, teaching the true science of life in word and example” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
That’s How God Wants It!
Such was the design of Divine Providence, and therefore, even though God could have arranged for Jesus to be born to rich royalty, in the splendors of some palace, surrounded by wealth, courtiers and servants, God, instead chose to place His Son into a life and surroundings of poverty. Therefore, it was important that God’s Providence make Mary and Joseph poor. Here are a few extracts from The Mystical City of God that describe and point out the poverty of the Queen of Heaven and her spouse, St. Joseph.
“Her garments were humble and poor ... poor dwelling ... her humble cottage and her poor little oratory... her poor table and at her humble meals ... She, with her husband, belonged to the poorest, humblest, and the most insignificant people in this world” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Temptation to Avarice
The devil, seeing Our Lady’s incredible holiness, tried to derail her with a onslaught of different kinds of temptations, among which was a temptation of avarice.
“At one point the devils had organized a massive onslaught of temptation against the Mother of God. One of attacks was to tempt her to the sin of avarice. They offered to her great riches, gold, silver, and most precious gems and in order that these might not seem empty promises, thy placed before her a great quantity of these riches, although they were only apparent; for they thought that they could exert greater influence on her will by actually presenting these objects before her. They accompanied this offer with many deceitful words and told her that God had sent her all this for distribution among the poor. When they saw that all this had no effect upon her, they changed their tactics and urged, that, since she was so holy, it was a great wrong that she should remain so poor. It was more reasonable that she possess these riches, than that they remain in the hands of wicked sinners, for this would be an injustice and a disarrangement of the Divine Providence that the just be visited with poverty, while God’s wicked enemies abound in riches and affluence” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“The most prudent Lady, although she possessed divine wisdom, never undertook to argue with these enemies, as in truth nobody should―for they battle against the manifest truth and will not admit defeat. The most holy Mary made use of some words of the Holy Scriptures and repeated them with serene humility. On this occasion she selected the words of the 118th Psalm: “I have acquired for my heritage and for my riches the keeping of thy testimonies and thy laws, my Lord.” In this most wise manner she rejected and overcame the temptation, to the confusion and torment of these agents of iniquity” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Neither was St. Joseph spared temptations against the poverty that God had placed upon his shoulders: “The demon suggested a feeling of restlessness to St. Joseph, irritating and disgusting him against his poverty” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
When he had found out that the Child that Mary was carrying in her womb was the Son of God, with tears of joy St. Joseph said: “Is it possible, that in thy most chaste arms I shall see my God and Redeemer? That I shall hear Him speak, and touch Him, and that my eyes shall look upon His divine face, and that the sweat of my brow shall be so blessed as to be poured out in His service and for His sustenance? That He shall live with us, and that we shall eat with Him at the same table, and that we shall speak and converse with Him? Whence comes to me this good fortune which nobody can ever deserve? O how much do I regret that I am so poor! If only I possessed the richest palaces for His entertainment and many treasures to offer Him!”
But Our Lady, understanding and treasuring the burden of poverty that God had placed upon them, answered: “My master and spouse, there is abundant reason that thy desires extend to all things possible for the reception of thy Creator; but this great God and Lord does not wish to enter into the world in the pomp of ostentatious riches and royal majesty. He has need of none of these, nor does He come from Heaven for such vanities. He comes to redeem the world and to guide men on the path of eternal life; and this is to be done by means of humility and poverty; in these He wishes to be born, live and die, in order to destroy in the hearts of men the fetters of covetousness and pride, which keep them from blessedness. On this account He chose our poor and humble house, and desired us not to be rich in apparent, deceitful and transitory goods, which are but vanity of vanities and affliction of spirit and which oppress and obscure the understanding” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Poverty, a Tough Reality
We find it hard to grasp that God would treat His most prized creation, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and His only-begotten Son, with such seeming coldness of heart as to make them endure the extremes of poverty.
“It happened also not a few times that the heavenly Lady and her spouse found themselves so poor and destitute of means that they were in want of the necessaries of life; for they were most liberal in their gifts to the poor, and they were never anxious to store up beforehand food or clothing, as is tends to with the children of this world in their faint-hearted covetousness” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Our Lady herself reveals to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “I and my holy spouse, Joseph, were poor, and at times we suffered great wants; but none of them were powerful enough to engender within our hearts the contagion of avarice. We concerned ourselves entirely with the glory of the Most High, relying wholly on His most faithful and tender care. This was what pleased Him so much, since He supplied our wants in various ways” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Mary and Joseph even found a pleasure and a delight in their poverty at times. When telling Joseph of her readiness in accompanying him to Bethlehem, she says:
“My spouse and my master, I accompany thee with much pleasure, and we will make this journey as poor people in the Name of the Lord: for the Most High will not despise poverty, which He came to seek with so much love” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Their journey to Bethlehem was to be one of humiliation in their poverty. “Mary and St. Joseph departed from Nazareth for Bethlehem alone, poor and humble in the eyes of the world. None of the mortals thought more of them than what was warranted by their poverty and humility” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Not only was their home in Nazareth a clear indication of their poverty, but their ‘lodgings’ in Bethlehem would bring them to new lows, not yet experienced. There would be no room available for them in the houses and inns of Bethlehem, so they would be reduced to the ignominy of having to use a residence of animals.
“The palace which the supreme King of kings and the Lord of lords had chosen for entertaining His eternal and incarnate Son in this world was a most poor and insignificant hut or cave, to which most holy Mary and Joseph betook themselves after they had been denied all hospitality and the most ordinary kindness by their fellow-men” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Second-Class Visitors
The first visitors to be called to the ‘animal hotel’ would themselves be the custodians of animals. These were the shepherds, poor second-class citizens, who smelt of sheep and were looked down upon by many.
“Amongst all these, the shepherds of that region, who were watching their flocks at the time of the birth of Christ, were especially blessed; not only because they accepted the labor and inconvenience of their calling with resignation from the hand of God; but also because, being poor and humble, and despised by the world, they belonged in sincerity and uprightness of heart to those Israelites, who fervently hoped and longed for the coming of the Messias, speaking and discoursing of Him among themselves many times. They resembled the Author of life, as they were removed from the riches, vanity and ostentation of the world and far from its diabolical cunning” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Once the shepherds had witnessed the marvel of the Christ-Child, they went to tell all and sundry of the angelic vision and the Child in the Cave. Some people then began to visit Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Most of them were poor people.
“During the days in which the most holy Queen tarried near Bethlehem before the purification, some of the people came to see and speak with her; but almost all of them were of the poorest class” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”)
St. Elizabeth, who did not live too far away from Bethlehem, had sent her servants with certain provisions and supplies to relieve the stresses being endured by the Holy Family in their inhospitable circumstances.
“Of the things sent by St. Elizabeth, Our Lady appropriated some for relieving their extreme poverty, while she distributed the rest of them to the poor; for she did not wish to be deprived of the company of the poor during the days in which she would have to remain in the portal or cave of the Nativity” (Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Our Lady on Riches and Poverty
Here are the words of Our Lady on the subject, as spoken to the Venerable Mary of Agreda:
“I assure thee, my dearest, there is no more acceptable gift to the Most High than voluntary poverty. There are very few in the world in our days who use well the temporal riches and offer them to their God and Lord with the generosity and love of these holy Kings. The poor of the Lord, so numerous in our day, experience and give witness how cruel and avaricious human nature has become; since in their great necessities they are so little assisted by the rich. This gross uncharitableness of men offends the holy angels and grieves the Holy Ghost, since they are bound to witness the nobility of the souls so degraded and abased in the service of vile greed of gold with all its evil powers. As if all things had been created for the individual use of the rich, they appropriate them to themselves and deprive the poor, their brothers springing from the same nature and flesh; and denying them even to God, Who created and preserves all things, and Who can give or take at will. It is most lamentable that while the rich might purchase eternal life with their possessions, they abuse them to draw upon themselves damnation as sense less and foolish creatures. This evil is common among the children of Adam; and therefore voluntary poverty is so excellent and safe a remedy. By it, making man willing to part joyfully with his possessions for the sake of the poor, a great sacrifice is offered to the Lord” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
“The Father in Heaven, Who lets the sun rise over the just and the unjust and lets the rain fall on the good and the bad, nevertheless helps all, giving them life and nourishment. However, just as His blessings are distributed to the good and to the bad, so also it cannot be a rule with God to give greater temporal goods to the good and less to the bad. On the contrary, He prefers that the chosen and predestined ones be poor, both because they thus gain more merit and reward, and because there are few who know how to use wealth properly and who can retain it without inordinate greed. Although my most holy Son and I had nothing to fear from this danger, yet He wished to furnish this example to men and to teach them this science, through which eternal life comes to them” (Our Lady to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Vol. 2, “The Incarnation”).
Poor Rich Man
All of this should puncture any desire we may have of trying to serve both God while at the same time trying to grow in wealth and worldly possessions. This was the problem of the rich young man, who came asking Jesus what he must do to save his soul and gain salvation. Jesus first gives him the foundation that must be laid down, the keeping of the commandments. The rich young man tells Jesus that he has kept them all his life. Jesus then moves to the next stage, and tells him to sell all he has, give the money to the poor and then to come and follow Him. “And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me’” (Mark 10:21).
At this point the rich young man becomes sad, turns around and leaves Jesus, for he had great possessions and could not bear to part from them. As he walks away, Jesus says to His disciples:”Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:16-24).
The Complacency of Wealth
Many possessions and great wealth make us very complacent by leading us to rely and trust primarily in what we have, rather than trusting in God, “without Whom we can do nothing” (John 15:5). Wealth and great possessions often render a soul lukewarm in the service of God, and, just like the Israelites, when things went very well for them, there comes a falling away from God to a greater or lesser degree. It might be a total departure from God through mortal sin, or a growing indifference to God through lukewarmness. This latter disease, reminds us of the grave warning given by God in the Apocalypse:
“But because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold, not hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth. Because thou sayest: ‘I am rich, and made wealthy, and have need of nothing!’ ― and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. I counsel thee to buy of Me gold, fire tried, that thou mayest be made rich; and mayest be clothed in white garments, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear; and anoint thy eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see” (Apocalypse 3:16-18). That “gold, fire tried” is of course charity―without which we are poor, as the following verses show:
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not Charity―then I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not Charity―then I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not Charity―then it profits me nothing!” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Though it may not be pleasant, it is perhaps better to poor than rich. After all, it is the way chosen by Jesus for Himself and His Mother and her spouse. It was the way into which God led His prophets in the Old Testament. It was the way chosen for the New Testament prophet, St. John the Baptist. It is the way chosen by so many of the saintly religious orders of ancient times.
Our Lord and God chose to be a Poor God; and it was to teach us a lesson about the hidden riches of being poor. A very good poor lesson, from a very good poor God.
Spiritually Rich Quotes on Poverty
“Better is the poor man, that walks in his simplicity, than a rich man that is perverse in his lips, and unwise” (Proverbs 19:1).
“One is, as it were rich, when he hath nothing―and another is as it were poor, when he hath great riches” (Proverbs 13:7).
“He saves not the wicked, and He grants judgment to the poor” (Job 36:6).
“And the poor people Thou will save” (2 Kings 22:28).
“Better is the poor man’s fare under a roof of boards, than sumptuous cheer abroad in another man’s house” (Ecclesiasticus 29:28).
May the Infant Jesus grant you all great blessings on His birthday and reward your kindness and love towards Him in a world where love and greed for riches continues to grow and “the charity of many has grown cold” (Matthew 24:12).
Article 2
Tuesday December 26th
He's Not What We Thought He'd Be!
Tuesday December 26th
He's Not What We Thought He'd Be!
The Anti-Climax Christ
We have all live through anti-climaxes, where something that was hyped-up to be the event of the year, the decade or the century, never lived up to the hype or expectations: Y2K was one such event, where many waited in trepidation at the chaos in passing from 1999 to 2000 would bring to computers, and, consequently, to the domains that computers rule, such as banking, communications, security, etc. At the end of the day, it was all hype and no substance as all the scary predictions evaporated into thin air. A lot was said, but nothing happened.
Perhaps your Christmas was an anti-climax and did not turn out like you would have liked it to turn out! Likewise for Christ―most Christmas celebrations were an anti-climax for Him, since they did not turn out the way He wanted―too materialistic, barely spiritual, not focused on Christ. Perhaps your marriage has turned out to be an anti-climax―not living up to expectations. You could also say we ourselves are an anti-climax in the eyes of God―not turning out to be what God expected us be!
The coming of the Messias was also a ‘big thing’ for the Jews. Centuries of prophecies had foretold of this wonderful person whom God would send to His Chosen People. There was a fair amount of hype that came and went throughout the years. When finally it did happen, almost nobody noticed. It was the greatest event in the history of mankind, but, seemingly, it fell flat! There was certainly a lot of substance; but not enough hype about it!
But did God want “a lot of hype” to accompany the birth of His only-begotten Son? His thoughts are not our thoughts, nor are our ways His ways: “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways’, saith the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts’ “ (Isaias 55:8-9).
St. Thomas Aquinas says one would think that Christ’s birth should have been made known to all―because the fulfillment should correspond to promise. Now, the promise of Christ’s coming is thus expressed (Psalm 49:3): “God shall come manifestly. But He came by His birth in the flesh.” Therefore it seems that His birth should have been made known to the whole world. But it wasn’t!
Our Wrong Idea of Christ
A wrong idea of Christ and a wrong idea about His coming, naturally produces a wrong idea about Christmas. How few persons truly reflect upon the events of that first Christmas period and the meaning of those events. You might be surprised to learn that even though the Catholic Church has one set of teachings―most Catholics have tweaked the Church’s teaching into their own personal version of the Catholic Faith. That is a very Protestant way of doing things―but the Catholic Church has been becoming more and more Protestant over the last 60 years―ever since the Second Vatican Council. Hence, everyone has their own personal idea of Christ and the Faith taught by Christ.
St. Thomas Aquinas quotes an objection that says since Christ came into this world to save sinners, and since everyone in the world is a sinner, therefore it seems only fitting that Christ’s birth should have been made known to all. He then answers the objection quoting Isaias (45:15): “Thou art a hidden God, the Holy of Israel, the Savior.” And, again (Isaias43:3): “His look was, as it were, hidden and despised. Aquinas explains that it was unfitting that Christ’s birth should be made known to all men without distinction.
Firstly, because this would have been a hindrance to the redemption of man, which was accomplished by means of the Cross; for, as it is written: “If they had known it, they would never have crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Cor.2:8).
Secondly, because this would have lessened the merit of faith, for if, when Christ was born, His birth had been made known to all by evident signs, the very nature of faith would have been destroyed, since it is the evidence of things that appear not, as stated in Scripture, “Faith is the substance of things to be hoped for, the evidence of things that appear not” (Hebrews 11:1).
Thirdly, if the glory of the Godhead would not have been hidden in Christ, the reality of His human nature would have come into doubt, whereby everyone would think He is just God and not God and man.
St. Augustine says: “If He had not passed through the different stages of age from babyhood to youth, had neither eaten nor slept, would He not have strengthened an erroneous opinion, and made it impossible for us to believe that He had become true man? And while He is doing all things wondrously, would He have taken away that which He accomplished in mercy?”
Look At It This Way
Or look at it from a modern-day perspective. If a billionaire wants to get married, what is the best approach to finding a good spouse? Is it by flaunting his millions in a lavish manifestation of his wealth; or is it by hiding the fact that he is a billionaire? If he flaunts his wealth, the potential spouses are more likely to marry him, not because they like and love him, but because they like and love the idea of being married to all that money and not so much the man.
The worldly way to celebrate the central event of all history would be a worldwide mega-party. The humility of God goes in the opposite direction! God the Father had centuries to prepare for this event, and He did not even book a room for Mary and Joseph at one of the local inns for the event! They had to suffer the ignominy of bringing the Son of God into this world in a dingy, smelly, cold little cave! To human eyes, it looks like the Master of Providence had “failed big-time” when it mattered the most! But that is the human ‘take’ on things, not the Divine ‘take’ on things. To God, the arrangements for the birth of His Son were perfect, as God’s will always is perfect.
The legendary Bible exegete and commentator, the Benedictine monk Fr. Augustine Calmet (1672-1757), writes: “When and how should the Kingdom of God come? When and how will the Messias come? The Pharisees expected a Messias who would be powerful according to the evaluation of this world: a conqueror, a monarch, a revenger of the injuries of Israel; one who would restore them to liberty, and bless them with temporal goods and prosperity. Neither in His infancy, nor in His adult life could the Jews see in Jesus anything that corresponded to these attributes and qualities; they saw nothing that corresponded to these magnificent hopes; and therefore they would ask Him, by way of insult and reproach, when this kingdom of God would come (Luke 17:20), of which He so often talked of and announced to His disciples. He answered them, that the manifestation of the Messias, and the establishment of His kingdom, shall not be manifested in a conspicuous, splendid manner. It would be brought about insensibly, and shall appear a casualty, and the effect of secondary causes. You shall not see the Messias coming at the head of armies, to spread terror and desolation. His arrival shall not be announced by ambassadors, etc. Everything in the establishment of His kingdom would be the reverse of temporal power” (Bible Commentary of Fr. Augustine Calmet, O.S.B., Aquinas Study Bible).
Not the Christ the Jews Expected
The Jews rejected Jesus because He failed, in their eyes, to do what they expected their Messiah to do—destroy evil and all their enemies and establish an eternal kingdom with Israel as the preeminent nation in the world. The Jews believed that the Messias―the prophet whom Moses spoke about―would come and deliver them from Roman bondage and set up a kingdom where they would be the rulers. The people of Jerusalem also thought He would deliver them. They shouted praises to God for the mighty works they had seen Jesus do and called out, “Hosanna to the son of David! Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord!” when He rode into Jerusalem on a donkey (Matthew 21:9). They treated Him like a conquering king. Then, when He allowed Himself to be arrested, tried, and crucified on a cursed cross, the people stopped believing that He was the promised prophet. They rejected their Messias (Matthew 27:22). Two thousand years after He came to the nation of Israel as their Messias, Christ is still (for the most part) rejected by the Jews.
Of course, to prove that He came from God and to prove that He was God Himself, Jesus had to show the identity card of God―miracles and prophecies. For only God can perform true miracles and only God can predict a future that depends precariously on the free-will of man. He performed many miracles in His lifetime and also made prophecies that came true in His lifetime, and others cane true after He had ascended into Heaven. But He did not use the power of miracles to gain political power, to gain wealth, or to destroy His enemies.
Politically, he overthrew nobody even though He could have―He even fled when they sought to take Him by force and make Him king: “Jesus therefore, when He knew that they would come to take Him by force, and make Him king, fled again into the mountain Himself alone” (John 6:15). As regards wealth, He gave away what came His way, and lived in deliberately willed poverty. His enemies, though He avoided them, He did not destroy them—he even restored the ear to Malchus that St. Peter had cut-off with his sword (Malchus was one of those who had come to arrest Him in Gethsemane), and begged God to forgive His enemies as He died on the Cross. Jesus was the opposite of what the world was.
Today’s modern vocabulary would be tempted to describe Jesus as “radical”, “extreme”, “fanatical”, “anti-establishment”, “anti-social”, “rebellious”, “guilty of hate crimes” against the Pharisees (Matthew 23) and other Jews. Already in His own day some of the things they said of him were along the same lines: “These words are hard to accept” (John 6: when He says “eat my flesh”); “Thou hast a devil!” (John 7); “Thou art a Samaritan!” (John 8); “He hath blasphemed” (Mt. 26); “How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles?” (John 9); “He seduceth the people” (John 7). He “maketh Himself a king, [and] speaketh against Caesar” (John 19); “We have found this man perverting our nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar” (Luke 23).
It seems that Jesus did not live up to the expectations of His contemporaries! Do we live up to the expectations of our contemporaries? If we do, then Heaven help us! For Jesus said: “Remember My word that I said to you: The servant is not greater than his master. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you” (John 15:20) ... “If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you” (John 15:8) ... “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 10:22) ... “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death: and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 24:9).
Poor Jesus! That persecution already started for Him at His birth! He was rejected at the doors of Bethlehem; He was envied and hated by Herod, who even tried to kill Him, forcing Him to have to be exiled from His own country and nation as He fled into Egypt! Truly His life was “radical” and “extreme”, provoking extreme love or extreme hatred or extreme indifference from His contemporaries. How is the world treating you these days? We are all called to the Imitation of Christ!
We have all live through anti-climaxes, where something that was hyped-up to be the event of the year, the decade or the century, never lived up to the hype or expectations: Y2K was one such event, where many waited in trepidation at the chaos in passing from 1999 to 2000 would bring to computers, and, consequently, to the domains that computers rule, such as banking, communications, security, etc. At the end of the day, it was all hype and no substance as all the scary predictions evaporated into thin air. A lot was said, but nothing happened.
Perhaps your Christmas was an anti-climax and did not turn out like you would have liked it to turn out! Likewise for Christ―most Christmas celebrations were an anti-climax for Him, since they did not turn out the way He wanted―too materialistic, barely spiritual, not focused on Christ. Perhaps your marriage has turned out to be an anti-climax―not living up to expectations. You could also say we ourselves are an anti-climax in the eyes of God―not turning out to be what God expected us be!
The coming of the Messias was also a ‘big thing’ for the Jews. Centuries of prophecies had foretold of this wonderful person whom God would send to His Chosen People. There was a fair amount of hype that came and went throughout the years. When finally it did happen, almost nobody noticed. It was the greatest event in the history of mankind, but, seemingly, it fell flat! There was certainly a lot of substance; but not enough hype about it!
But did God want “a lot of hype” to accompany the birth of His only-begotten Son? His thoughts are not our thoughts, nor are our ways His ways: “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways’, saith the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts’ “ (Isaias 55:8-9).
St. Thomas Aquinas says one would think that Christ’s birth should have been made known to all―because the fulfillment should correspond to promise. Now, the promise of Christ’s coming is thus expressed (Psalm 49:3): “God shall come manifestly. But He came by His birth in the flesh.” Therefore it seems that His birth should have been made known to the whole world. But it wasn’t!
Our Wrong Idea of Christ
A wrong idea of Christ and a wrong idea about His coming, naturally produces a wrong idea about Christmas. How few persons truly reflect upon the events of that first Christmas period and the meaning of those events. You might be surprised to learn that even though the Catholic Church has one set of teachings―most Catholics have tweaked the Church’s teaching into their own personal version of the Catholic Faith. That is a very Protestant way of doing things―but the Catholic Church has been becoming more and more Protestant over the last 60 years―ever since the Second Vatican Council. Hence, everyone has their own personal idea of Christ and the Faith taught by Christ.
St. Thomas Aquinas quotes an objection that says since Christ came into this world to save sinners, and since everyone in the world is a sinner, therefore it seems only fitting that Christ’s birth should have been made known to all. He then answers the objection quoting Isaias (45:15): “Thou art a hidden God, the Holy of Israel, the Savior.” And, again (Isaias43:3): “His look was, as it were, hidden and despised. Aquinas explains that it was unfitting that Christ’s birth should be made known to all men without distinction.
Firstly, because this would have been a hindrance to the redemption of man, which was accomplished by means of the Cross; for, as it is written: “If they had known it, they would never have crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Cor.2:8).
Secondly, because this would have lessened the merit of faith, for if, when Christ was born, His birth had been made known to all by evident signs, the very nature of faith would have been destroyed, since it is the evidence of things that appear not, as stated in Scripture, “Faith is the substance of things to be hoped for, the evidence of things that appear not” (Hebrews 11:1).
Thirdly, if the glory of the Godhead would not have been hidden in Christ, the reality of His human nature would have come into doubt, whereby everyone would think He is just God and not God and man.
St. Augustine says: “If He had not passed through the different stages of age from babyhood to youth, had neither eaten nor slept, would He not have strengthened an erroneous opinion, and made it impossible for us to believe that He had become true man? And while He is doing all things wondrously, would He have taken away that which He accomplished in mercy?”
Look At It This Way
Or look at it from a modern-day perspective. If a billionaire wants to get married, what is the best approach to finding a good spouse? Is it by flaunting his millions in a lavish manifestation of his wealth; or is it by hiding the fact that he is a billionaire? If he flaunts his wealth, the potential spouses are more likely to marry him, not because they like and love him, but because they like and love the idea of being married to all that money and not so much the man.
The worldly way to celebrate the central event of all history would be a worldwide mega-party. The humility of God goes in the opposite direction! God the Father had centuries to prepare for this event, and He did not even book a room for Mary and Joseph at one of the local inns for the event! They had to suffer the ignominy of bringing the Son of God into this world in a dingy, smelly, cold little cave! To human eyes, it looks like the Master of Providence had “failed big-time” when it mattered the most! But that is the human ‘take’ on things, not the Divine ‘take’ on things. To God, the arrangements for the birth of His Son were perfect, as God’s will always is perfect.
The legendary Bible exegete and commentator, the Benedictine monk Fr. Augustine Calmet (1672-1757), writes: “When and how should the Kingdom of God come? When and how will the Messias come? The Pharisees expected a Messias who would be powerful according to the evaluation of this world: a conqueror, a monarch, a revenger of the injuries of Israel; one who would restore them to liberty, and bless them with temporal goods and prosperity. Neither in His infancy, nor in His adult life could the Jews see in Jesus anything that corresponded to these attributes and qualities; they saw nothing that corresponded to these magnificent hopes; and therefore they would ask Him, by way of insult and reproach, when this kingdom of God would come (Luke 17:20), of which He so often talked of and announced to His disciples. He answered them, that the manifestation of the Messias, and the establishment of His kingdom, shall not be manifested in a conspicuous, splendid manner. It would be brought about insensibly, and shall appear a casualty, and the effect of secondary causes. You shall not see the Messias coming at the head of armies, to spread terror and desolation. His arrival shall not be announced by ambassadors, etc. Everything in the establishment of His kingdom would be the reverse of temporal power” (Bible Commentary of Fr. Augustine Calmet, O.S.B., Aquinas Study Bible).
Not the Christ the Jews Expected
The Jews rejected Jesus because He failed, in their eyes, to do what they expected their Messiah to do—destroy evil and all their enemies and establish an eternal kingdom with Israel as the preeminent nation in the world. The Jews believed that the Messias―the prophet whom Moses spoke about―would come and deliver them from Roman bondage and set up a kingdom where they would be the rulers. The people of Jerusalem also thought He would deliver them. They shouted praises to God for the mighty works they had seen Jesus do and called out, “Hosanna to the son of David! Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord!” when He rode into Jerusalem on a donkey (Matthew 21:9). They treated Him like a conquering king. Then, when He allowed Himself to be arrested, tried, and crucified on a cursed cross, the people stopped believing that He was the promised prophet. They rejected their Messias (Matthew 27:22). Two thousand years after He came to the nation of Israel as their Messias, Christ is still (for the most part) rejected by the Jews.
Of course, to prove that He came from God and to prove that He was God Himself, Jesus had to show the identity card of God―miracles and prophecies. For only God can perform true miracles and only God can predict a future that depends precariously on the free-will of man. He performed many miracles in His lifetime and also made prophecies that came true in His lifetime, and others cane true after He had ascended into Heaven. But He did not use the power of miracles to gain political power, to gain wealth, or to destroy His enemies.
Politically, he overthrew nobody even though He could have―He even fled when they sought to take Him by force and make Him king: “Jesus therefore, when He knew that they would come to take Him by force, and make Him king, fled again into the mountain Himself alone” (John 6:15). As regards wealth, He gave away what came His way, and lived in deliberately willed poverty. His enemies, though He avoided them, He did not destroy them—he even restored the ear to Malchus that St. Peter had cut-off with his sword (Malchus was one of those who had come to arrest Him in Gethsemane), and begged God to forgive His enemies as He died on the Cross. Jesus was the opposite of what the world was.
Today’s modern vocabulary would be tempted to describe Jesus as “radical”, “extreme”, “fanatical”, “anti-establishment”, “anti-social”, “rebellious”, “guilty of hate crimes” against the Pharisees (Matthew 23) and other Jews. Already in His own day some of the things they said of him were along the same lines: “These words are hard to accept” (John 6: when He says “eat my flesh”); “Thou hast a devil!” (John 7); “Thou art a Samaritan!” (John 8); “He hath blasphemed” (Mt. 26); “How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles?” (John 9); “He seduceth the people” (John 7). He “maketh Himself a king, [and] speaketh against Caesar” (John 19); “We have found this man perverting our nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar” (Luke 23).
It seems that Jesus did not live up to the expectations of His contemporaries! Do we live up to the expectations of our contemporaries? If we do, then Heaven help us! For Jesus said: “Remember My word that I said to you: The servant is not greater than his master. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you” (John 15:20) ... “If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you” (John 15:8) ... “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 10:22) ... “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall put you to death: and you shall be hated by all nations for My Name’s sake” (Matthew 24:9).
Poor Jesus! That persecution already started for Him at His birth! He was rejected at the doors of Bethlehem; He was envied and hated by Herod, who even tried to kill Him, forcing Him to have to be exiled from His own country and nation as He fled into Egypt! Truly His life was “radical” and “extreme”, provoking extreme love or extreme hatred or extreme indifference from His contemporaries. How is the world treating you these days? We are all called to the Imitation of Christ!
Article 1
Monday December 25th, the Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ
Unto Us a Child is Born!
Monday December 25th, the Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ
Unto Us a Child is Born!
Let’s Have a Real Christmas!
What on earth are we of make of this day? Who on earth was born? What on earth is going on? What on earth is He doing here? Where on earth is all this going to lead?
Different persons have conflicting answers to these questions. If you want the answer to them, then go to the Mother. Go to the Mother of God and go to Holy Mother Church. They will tell it as it is! From the Breviary readings from Matins for Christmas Day, we have these words of Pope St. Leo the Great (died 461):
“Dearly beloved brethren, “Unto us is born this day a Savior.” ... Today is Life’s Birthday; the Birthday of that Life, Which, for us dying creatures, taketh away the sting of death, and bringeth the bright promise of the eternal gladness hereafter ... Our Lord, Who is the destroyer of sin and of death, is come to make all free. Rejoice, O thou that art holy, thou drawest nearer to thy crown! Rejoice, O thou that art sinful, thy Savior offers thee pardon! Rejoice also, O thou Gentile, God calleth thee to life! For the Son of God ... took upon Him the nature of man, that He might reconcile that nature to Him Who made it.”
We unfortunately imagine Christmas as time for play―but Christ comes to pay, not to play! Christmas is about salvation from sin and the arrival of Savior who will rescue us from sin and Hell―if we let Him and if we follow Him out of our mess! Christ comes to save―but, as St. Augustine says: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, but God will not save you without your cooperation.
Listen to Holy Mother Church
Through the readings from the Mass of the Vigil of Christmas, Holy Mother Church explains to us what on earth is happening regarding the birth of Our Lord, Jesus Christ.
In the morning, at the Vigil Mass, the Introit tells us that “This day you shall know that the Lord will come and save us.” In the Gospel, Joseph is told by the angel not to fear taking Mary for his wife, for “she shall bring forth a Son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus (Savior), for He shall save His people from their sins.” By the time the day is over and midnight arrives, Holy Mother Church, at the first Mass of Christmas, is telling us: “Why have the people devised vain things” (Introit) ... “Our Savior hath appeared to all men; instructing us, that, denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world” (Epistle) ... “Grant that we who rejoice in celebrating the Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ, may by dignified conversation become worthy to attain fellowship with Him”(Postcommunion).
By the following morning’s Dawn Mass, Holy Mother Church continues: “...that we may show forth in our actions that which by faith shines in our minds” (Collect of 2nd Mass) ... “that the new birth of Thy only-begotten Son, may set us free, whom the old bondage holds under the yoke of sin” (Collect of 3rd Mass).... “and cleanse us from the stains of our sins” (Secret of the 3rd Mass).
Listen to His Mother!
The other mother, the Mother of God, in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says the things in speaking of the mystery of Christmas:
“My most holy Son has set me as the teacher and living example of the love of humility and true contempt of worldly vanity and pride … He also sought destitution and poverty … in order to teach mortals the shortest and surest way for reaching the heights of divine love and union with God ... If men would keep their heart disengaged and if they would rightly and worthily consider this great mystery of the kindness of the Most High towards men, if they would only make use of their freedom to treat this mystery with the reverence due to its greatness, who would be so hardened as not to be moved at the sight of their God become man, humiliated in poverty, despised, unknown, entering the world in a cave, lying in a manger surrounded by brute animals, protected only by a poverty-stricken Mother, and cast off by the foolish arrogance of the world?
“Who will dare to love the vanity and pride, which was openly abhorred and condemned by the Creator of Heaven and earth in his conduct? No one can despise the humility, poverty and indigence, which the Lord loved and chose for Himself as the very means of teaching the way of eternal life. Few there are, who stop to consider this truth and example: and on account of this vile ingratitude only the few will reap the fruit of these great mysteries ...
“I remind and exhort thee to forget all that is of earth and lose it out of thy sight; that thou seek nothing, or engage thyself with nothing except what can help thee to withdraw and detach thee from the world and its inhabitants; so that, with a heart freed from all terrestrial affection, thou dispose thyself to celebrate in it the mysteries of the poverty, humility and divine love of the incarnate God ... His coming down from Heaven onto the Earth, His being born in humility and poverty, His living and dying in it, giving such rare example of the contempt of the world and its deceits; the knowledge, which thou hast received concerning His conduct and which thou hast penetrated so deeply by divine intelligence: all these things should be for thee like living voices, which thou must heed and inscribe into the interior of thy heart. “ (The Mystical City of God, vol. 2, The Incarnation, Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Grasp the Spirit―Not the Food and Drink!
So as we celebrate this astounding day, let us grasp the true spirit of the day, which is not to be found in stuffing ourselves with good food, merrily enjoying intoxicating drinks, watching worldly movies or sports on the TV, or partying away with family, friends and relatives. This day deserves something less banal and more spiritual and more profound. Our Lord comes to give mercy and pardon. The following incident from Our Lord’s life shows the “great divide” in attitudes:
“And it came to pass, as He was going to Jerusalem, He passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee. And as He entered into a certain town, there met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off; and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus! Master! Have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before Jesus’ feet, giving thanks: and this was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering, said, ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the nine? There is no one found to return and give glory to God, but this stranger!’ “ (Luke 17:11-18).
Sadly, today, the vast majority of Catholics no longer go to Sunday Mass regularly. All of them once received the mercy of Baptism, whereby they were made clean of the leprosy of Original Sin (and all Actual Sins, if they were baptized as adults). Yet, today, they no longer come back to adore and thank Jesus for that mercy. Many have committed sins since their Baptism and have received mercy in the confessional, where they “showed themselves to the priests”; but few are truly grateful and thankful, “with a loud voice glorifying God.” Of the minority who did go to Mass on Christmas Day, how many will go back to Jesus throughout the rest of the day, “with a loud voice glorifying God”?
Let us not fall (and let us nor permit those closest to us to fall) into that selfish, ungrateful, worldly-minded spirit that has succeeded in almost de-Christianizing Christmas into a winter fun-fest of food, drink, parties, presents and pleasure. When we take a realistic and honest look at the Holy Family, we none of those elements present. If our Christmas is full of things, then there is a good chance that there will be no thing or nothing for Christ; but if we have little or nothing to do over Christmas, then there is nothing to distract us from Christ―who is the Heart of Christmas, the reason for Christmas. The soil of our soul will reap whatever we plant therein; if we plant the seed of the infant Christ, then Christ will grow in us; if we plant the seeds the world offers, then worldliness will grow in us.
Let us not de-Christianize this holy day, but, like the Samaritan leper, let us often go back in thoughts and words to the Person whom we should be celebrating today. It is His birthday, not ours or anyone else’s, that is the cause of universal festivities. Otherwise it is like going to a birthday party, and completely ignoring the person whose birthday it is, while taking all the food and drink they have provided. How many will stop their celebrations for prayer, let alone even extra prayers (which should be the case, for on a birthday, we do more than the usual for the person concerned)? How many will have attended a second Mass today (for the Church allows each priest to offer three Masses today)?
Let us show our gratitude and love for Christ this Christmas! As Our Lady has said at several of her apparitions, God is already offended enough, we must stop offending Him. Let us make up for the countless offences that will rise heavenward on what should be a truly holy and spiritual day!
What on earth are we of make of this day? Who on earth was born? What on earth is going on? What on earth is He doing here? Where on earth is all this going to lead?
Different persons have conflicting answers to these questions. If you want the answer to them, then go to the Mother. Go to the Mother of God and go to Holy Mother Church. They will tell it as it is! From the Breviary readings from Matins for Christmas Day, we have these words of Pope St. Leo the Great (died 461):
“Dearly beloved brethren, “Unto us is born this day a Savior.” ... Today is Life’s Birthday; the Birthday of that Life, Which, for us dying creatures, taketh away the sting of death, and bringeth the bright promise of the eternal gladness hereafter ... Our Lord, Who is the destroyer of sin and of death, is come to make all free. Rejoice, O thou that art holy, thou drawest nearer to thy crown! Rejoice, O thou that art sinful, thy Savior offers thee pardon! Rejoice also, O thou Gentile, God calleth thee to life! For the Son of God ... took upon Him the nature of man, that He might reconcile that nature to Him Who made it.”
We unfortunately imagine Christmas as time for play―but Christ comes to pay, not to play! Christmas is about salvation from sin and the arrival of Savior who will rescue us from sin and Hell―if we let Him and if we follow Him out of our mess! Christ comes to save―but, as St. Augustine says: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” In other words, God created you without your cooperation, but God will not save you without your cooperation.
Listen to Holy Mother Church
Through the readings from the Mass of the Vigil of Christmas, Holy Mother Church explains to us what on earth is happening regarding the birth of Our Lord, Jesus Christ.
In the morning, at the Vigil Mass, the Introit tells us that “This day you shall know that the Lord will come and save us.” In the Gospel, Joseph is told by the angel not to fear taking Mary for his wife, for “she shall bring forth a Son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus (Savior), for He shall save His people from their sins.” By the time the day is over and midnight arrives, Holy Mother Church, at the first Mass of Christmas, is telling us: “Why have the people devised vain things” (Introit) ... “Our Savior hath appeared to all men; instructing us, that, denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world” (Epistle) ... “Grant that we who rejoice in celebrating the Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ, may by dignified conversation become worthy to attain fellowship with Him”(Postcommunion).
By the following morning’s Dawn Mass, Holy Mother Church continues: “...that we may show forth in our actions that which by faith shines in our minds” (Collect of 2nd Mass) ... “that the new birth of Thy only-begotten Son, may set us free, whom the old bondage holds under the yoke of sin” (Collect of 3rd Mass).... “and cleanse us from the stains of our sins” (Secret of the 3rd Mass).
Listen to His Mother!
The other mother, the Mother of God, in her revelations to the Venerable Mary of Agreda, says the things in speaking of the mystery of Christmas:
“My most holy Son has set me as the teacher and living example of the love of humility and true contempt of worldly vanity and pride … He also sought destitution and poverty … in order to teach mortals the shortest and surest way for reaching the heights of divine love and union with God ... If men would keep their heart disengaged and if they would rightly and worthily consider this great mystery of the kindness of the Most High towards men, if they would only make use of their freedom to treat this mystery with the reverence due to its greatness, who would be so hardened as not to be moved at the sight of their God become man, humiliated in poverty, despised, unknown, entering the world in a cave, lying in a manger surrounded by brute animals, protected only by a poverty-stricken Mother, and cast off by the foolish arrogance of the world?
“Who will dare to love the vanity and pride, which was openly abhorred and condemned by the Creator of Heaven and earth in his conduct? No one can despise the humility, poverty and indigence, which the Lord loved and chose for Himself as the very means of teaching the way of eternal life. Few there are, who stop to consider this truth and example: and on account of this vile ingratitude only the few will reap the fruit of these great mysteries ...
“I remind and exhort thee to forget all that is of earth and lose it out of thy sight; that thou seek nothing, or engage thyself with nothing except what can help thee to withdraw and detach thee from the world and its inhabitants; so that, with a heart freed from all terrestrial affection, thou dispose thyself to celebrate in it the mysteries of the poverty, humility and divine love of the incarnate God ... His coming down from Heaven onto the Earth, His being born in humility and poverty, His living and dying in it, giving such rare example of the contempt of the world and its deceits; the knowledge, which thou hast received concerning His conduct and which thou hast penetrated so deeply by divine intelligence: all these things should be for thee like living voices, which thou must heed and inscribe into the interior of thy heart. “ (The Mystical City of God, vol. 2, The Incarnation, Ven. Mary of Agreda).
Grasp the Spirit―Not the Food and Drink!
So as we celebrate this astounding day, let us grasp the true spirit of the day, which is not to be found in stuffing ourselves with good food, merrily enjoying intoxicating drinks, watching worldly movies or sports on the TV, or partying away with family, friends and relatives. This day deserves something less banal and more spiritual and more profound. Our Lord comes to give mercy and pardon. The following incident from Our Lord’s life shows the “great divide” in attitudes:
“And it came to pass, as He was going to Jerusalem, He passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee. And as He entered into a certain town, there met Him ten men that were lepers, who stood afar off; and lifted up their voice, saying: ‘Jesus! Master! Have mercy on us!’ Whom, when He saw, He said: ‘Go, show yourselves to the priests!’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were made clean. And one of them, when he saw that he was made clean, went back, with a loud voice glorifying God. And he fell on his face before Jesus’ feet, giving thanks: and this was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering, said, ‘Were not ten made clean? And where are the nine? There is no one found to return and give glory to God, but this stranger!’ “ (Luke 17:11-18).
Sadly, today, the vast majority of Catholics no longer go to Sunday Mass regularly. All of them once received the mercy of Baptism, whereby they were made clean of the leprosy of Original Sin (and all Actual Sins, if they were baptized as adults). Yet, today, they no longer come back to adore and thank Jesus for that mercy. Many have committed sins since their Baptism and have received mercy in the confessional, where they “showed themselves to the priests”; but few are truly grateful and thankful, “with a loud voice glorifying God.” Of the minority who did go to Mass on Christmas Day, how many will go back to Jesus throughout the rest of the day, “with a loud voice glorifying God”?
Let us not fall (and let us nor permit those closest to us to fall) into that selfish, ungrateful, worldly-minded spirit that has succeeded in almost de-Christianizing Christmas into a winter fun-fest of food, drink, parties, presents and pleasure. When we take a realistic and honest look at the Holy Family, we none of those elements present. If our Christmas is full of things, then there is a good chance that there will be no thing or nothing for Christ; but if we have little or nothing to do over Christmas, then there is nothing to distract us from Christ―who is the Heart of Christmas, the reason for Christmas. The soil of our soul will reap whatever we plant therein; if we plant the seed of the infant Christ, then Christ will grow in us; if we plant the seeds the world offers, then worldliness will grow in us.
Let us not de-Christianize this holy day, but, like the Samaritan leper, let us often go back in thoughts and words to the Person whom we should be celebrating today. It is His birthday, not ours or anyone else’s, that is the cause of universal festivities. Otherwise it is like going to a birthday party, and completely ignoring the person whose birthday it is, while taking all the food and drink they have provided. How many will stop their celebrations for prayer, let alone even extra prayers (which should be the case, for on a birthday, we do more than the usual for the person concerned)? How many will have attended a second Mass today (for the Church allows each priest to offer three Masses today)?
Let us show our gratitude and love for Christ this Christmas! As Our Lady has said at several of her apparitions, God is already offended enough, we must stop offending Him. Let us make up for the countless offences that will rise heavenward on what should be a truly holy and spiritual day!
DAILY THOUGHTS FOR ADVENT
DECEMBER 2023
DECEMBER 2023
Article 10
Sunday December 23rd, the Vigil of Christmas
Knock! Knock! Who's There?
Sunday December 23rd, the Vigil of Christmas
Knock! Knock! Who's There?
Rhyming Our Way Into Christmas
As they say: “Many a true word is said in jest!” Likewise, many a true word is communicated in rhyme. If ever there was a time for rhyme―then it would be Christmas―a time when rhyme fills Christmas cards; when rhyme is sung in Christmas carols; and when rhyme presents many Christmas themes through poetry. Here, then, are a couple of thought provoking poems to help us rhyme our way into Christmas:
IF JESUS CAME FOR CHRISTMAS DAY
If Jesus came to your house, to spend Christmas Day with you,
If He came unexpectedly, I wonder what you’d do?
Oh, I know you’d give your nicest room, to such an honored Guest,
And all the food, you’d serve to Him, would be the very best,
And I bet you’d keep assuring Him you’re glad to have Him there,
That serving Him, in your own home, is joy beyond compare.
But when you saw Him coming, would you meet Him at the door,
With arms outstretched in welcome, to your heavenly Visitor?
Or would you have to change your clothes, before you let Him in?
Or hide some magazines and put the Bible where they’d been?
Would you hide your worldly music and put some prayer books out?
Could you let Jesus walk right in, or would you rush about?
Would you switch off the TV set and hope He hadn’t seen
The images that were flashing across the TV screen?
Would you rush to the computer and switch to another website
So as not to give Jesus a disappointing sight?
Would you turn off the hi-fi and hope He hadn’t heard?
And wish you hadn’t uttered that last, loud, hasty word?
“Switch-off that blasted movie!” would you quickly shout
“And get down on your knees and pull your Rosaries out!”
And I wonder ― if the Savior spent Christmas Day with you,
Would you go right on doing the things you usually do?
Would you go right on saying the things you always say?
Would worldly life continue as it does from day to day?
Would your family conversation show its usual face?
And would you find it hard, each meal, to pray a table grace?
Would you sing the songs you always sing, and read the books you read,
And let Him know the things on which your mind and soul do feed?
Would you take Jesus with you everywhere you had planned to go?
Or would you, maybe, change your plans for just a day or so?
Would you be glad to have Him meet your very closest friends?
Or would you hope they’d stay away, until His visit ends?
Would you be glad to have Him stay forever on and on?
Or would you sigh with great relief when He at last was gone?
So that when His awkward visit was eventually done
You could get a party going and finally have some fun.
It might be interesting to know the things that you would do
If Jesus Christ in person came to spend Christmas Day with you.
WHICH FRAME OF MIND?
If we are among the gross, deaf and blind,
And the Word of God we neither seek nor find;
Then the reason may be that we have left behind,
The One Who came to save mankind.
Perhaps we preferred a worldly frame of mind
And to material pleasures we have inclined,
So that in worldliness we were entwined,
While spiritual graces have been declined
And God’s great charity has been maligned.
Yet it is for such sinners that Our Lord appeared,
Seeking to be loved and not just feared.
Yet the devil, as always, has interfered
And Christmas away from God he has steered.
Spirituality is mostly scorned and smeared,
While worldliness is applauded and cheered.
If you wish to recover what has disappeared,
You risk running the gauntlet of being jeered.
True peace and joy arise as God is neared,
And worldly things away are cleared.
When one has in this way persevered―
Where God is sought first and above all revered―
One then will find what the world thinks weird
Joy at being alone with the God, Who has reappeared!
As they say: “Many a true word is said in jest!” Likewise, many a true word is communicated in rhyme. If ever there was a time for rhyme―then it would be Christmas―a time when rhyme fills Christmas cards; when rhyme is sung in Christmas carols; and when rhyme presents many Christmas themes through poetry. Here, then, are a couple of thought provoking poems to help us rhyme our way into Christmas:
IF JESUS CAME FOR CHRISTMAS DAY
If Jesus came to your house, to spend Christmas Day with you,
If He came unexpectedly, I wonder what you’d do?
Oh, I know you’d give your nicest room, to such an honored Guest,
And all the food, you’d serve to Him, would be the very best,
And I bet you’d keep assuring Him you’re glad to have Him there,
That serving Him, in your own home, is joy beyond compare.
But when you saw Him coming, would you meet Him at the door,
With arms outstretched in welcome, to your heavenly Visitor?
Or would you have to change your clothes, before you let Him in?
Or hide some magazines and put the Bible where they’d been?
Would you hide your worldly music and put some prayer books out?
Could you let Jesus walk right in, or would you rush about?
Would you switch off the TV set and hope He hadn’t seen
The images that were flashing across the TV screen?
Would you rush to the computer and switch to another website
So as not to give Jesus a disappointing sight?
Would you turn off the hi-fi and hope He hadn’t heard?
And wish you hadn’t uttered that last, loud, hasty word?
“Switch-off that blasted movie!” would you quickly shout
“And get down on your knees and pull your Rosaries out!”
And I wonder ― if the Savior spent Christmas Day with you,
Would you go right on doing the things you usually do?
Would you go right on saying the things you always say?
Would worldly life continue as it does from day to day?
Would your family conversation show its usual face?
And would you find it hard, each meal, to pray a table grace?
Would you sing the songs you always sing, and read the books you read,
And let Him know the things on which your mind and soul do feed?
Would you take Jesus with you everywhere you had planned to go?
Or would you, maybe, change your plans for just a day or so?
Would you be glad to have Him meet your very closest friends?
Or would you hope they’d stay away, until His visit ends?
Would you be glad to have Him stay forever on and on?
Or would you sigh with great relief when He at last was gone?
So that when His awkward visit was eventually done
You could get a party going and finally have some fun.
It might be interesting to know the things that you would do
If Jesus Christ in person came to spend Christmas Day with you.
WHICH FRAME OF MIND?
If we are among the gross, deaf and blind,
And the Word of God we neither seek nor find;
Then the reason may be that we have left behind,
The One Who came to save mankind.
Perhaps we preferred a worldly frame of mind
And to material pleasures we have inclined,
So that in worldliness we were entwined,
While spiritual graces have been declined
And God’s great charity has been maligned.
Yet it is for such sinners that Our Lord appeared,
Seeking to be loved and not just feared.
Yet the devil, as always, has interfered
And Christmas away from God he has steered.
Spirituality is mostly scorned and smeared,
While worldliness is applauded and cheered.
If you wish to recover what has disappeared,
You risk running the gauntlet of being jeered.
True peace and joy arise as God is neared,
And worldly things away are cleared.
When one has in this way persevered―
Where God is sought first and above all revered―
One then will find what the world thinks weird
Joy at being alone with the God, Who has reappeared!
Article 9
Saturday December 23rd
No Plans! No Profit!
Saturday December 23rd
No Plans! No Profit!
Plan on Going to Heaven?
“The heart of man plans his way―but the Lord must direct his steps” (Proverbs 16:9). “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “Designs are brought to nothing where there is no counsel” (Proverbs 15:22). “Lay open thy works to the Lord―and thy thoughts shall be directed!” (Proverbs 16:3). “‘For’, saith the Lord, ‘My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways! For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). “Thy word is a lamp to my feet, O Lord, and a light to my paths!” (Psalms 118:105).
If you plan on going to Heaven, then you will not get there without a fight: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangleth himself with secular businesses; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Anyone who has to fight a battle, or fight in a war, must make plans on how he will overcome the enemy and come out victorious. An army rarely goes into battle without a plan of action. Wars are not won “off-the-cuff”. Neither is Heaven gained “off-the-cuff”―we must have a strategy, a plan, set tactics on how we intend to fight our way through this life and be one of the few that are saved: “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
“And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen! … Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name!’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ ... When the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!’ And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:22-23; 22:14).
Too Much Material Planning―Too Little Spiritual Planning
The soul is supposed to be more important than the body. Heaven is supposed to more important than life on Earth. The Creator is supposed to more important than His creatures. Yet, in looking at the world today―even the Catholic world―it is apparent that this is no longer the case. We plan far, far, far more for earthly, material, physical things―and barely plan at all for heavenly, supernatural, spiritual things. The hours spent thinking about, planning for, and focusing on earthly things compared to heavenly things, is like a mountain compared to a grain of sand. Most of our eggs are in the basket of the world. Yet Our Lord warned: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Christmas has long been more about us than about Christ. We give and receive many presents―but Christ gets next to nothing! We plan fancy meals, social gatherings, entertainment―but Christ is not really a part of it all. Christmas has long since become Christmas in name only. What makes it worse and even more sad, is that we don’t really feel guilty about it. We imagine that a superficial tip-of-the-hat to Christ, a Christmas Day Mass, and Nativity Scene (that is more or less abandoned after being put up), and some Christmas decorations is enough for Christ. An hour or two for Christ―then the rest of week ourselves to party, have fun, play games, eat, drink, watch television and socialize. Our Lord’s complaint about the Jews is equally applicable to modern-day Catholics: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
There are hoards of books written about how to plan―plans for businesses, plans for personal life, plans for coaching sports, plans for careers, plans for learning, plans for meals, plans for DIY, plans for personal finances, etc. Yet where do we see a book that specifically deals with plans on how to get to Heaven? It is hard to think of one “off-the-cuff”! The level of detail these books go into is quite amazing. Our Lord lamented that the children of this world were far more industrious than the children of light! “The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light!” (Luke 16:8). Here follows just a sample of the level of material planning that is recommended to the people of this world. The following is taken from websites that promote all kinds of planning. You will see that they clearly put Catholics to shame, for Catholics should be planning spiritually with even more enthusiasm, zest, intensity and single-mindedness than these worldly people are planning.
The Zeal That Goes Into Worldly Planning
Planning is about making the most of a limited amount of time. Planning is the key factor contributing to the success of many billionaires. They have short-term goals as well as long-term goals. They plan every minute of their day to achieve the most productivity. Sometimes things don’t go as planned because there are many external factors that may happen and disturb plans. However, that’s not an excuse for not planning anything. In fact, a detailed plan is like a map that navigates your life, so that you won’t be lost like a ship floating on the ocean.
When you look around at people who have landed in a pile of success, it’s hard to imagine how they can possibly keep up with everything happening around them. Running a company or writing a novel can’t be that easy, can it? The truth is that they simply know how to create successful plans. Highly successful people don’t wait and hope for desired results. Success is never accidental for them because they know how to plan for success. They know that it’s the direct result of preparing, planning, and aligning their time with their most important goals.
1. Saving Decision Making for Important Things
Highly successful people simplify their wardrobe and minimize the amount of decisions they make on trivial matters. Only a few decisions truly matter when you want to plan to succeed. They’ve internalized that every decision doesn’t have to be optimal or perfect―which lets them make quick decisions most of the time. They automate and simplify decisions. They focus upon and give time to the highest impact decisions they face each day.
2. Practice Mindfulness and Meditation
While making task lists and recording your ideas will help ease your wandering mind, other areas of stress may deplete your focus and energy levels. To liberate us from a false view of the self and reality, mindfulness helps bring full awareness to the interconnectedness of all people and things. Mindfulness is not just sitting cross-legged and making deep breaths in silence. It’s more about recognizing the interdependence and flow of one task into the next, being mindful of smaller things, and can also be applied to ordinary tasks, such as stopping yourself as you reach for another candy and going out to have lunch, or putting your phone down as you notice that you’re already browsing social media for 20 minutes straight. Research also indicates that if you simply focus on your breathing, you may feel the effects of meditation within 20 minutes. That small amount of time daily dedicated to meditation may relieve your anxiety and improve your concentration, literally rewiring your brain. Mindfulness helps us get rid of bad habits and stay an ally to ourselves.
3. Having a Consistent Morning Routine
Successful people create momentum at the start of the day through consistent morning routines. They use successful plans to complete a combination of the following activities in the morning: meditate, read, journal, exercise, prioritize their day, envision a successful day, and eat a nutritious breakfast to fuel their day. For example, motivational speaker Tony Robbins, right after waking in the morning, dives into a 57 degree Fahrenheit pool to reset his system and reduce inflammation. He also does breathing exercises and expresses gratitude during a ten-minute priming exercise. What we focus on expands in our minds. Through his morning routine, he chooses to expand gratitude over fear and anxiety.
4. Having a Consistent Nightly Routine
Getting quality sleep is important for your brain to function properly and for your long-term health. Having a regular nighttime routine is as important as your morning routine. You don’t simply wake up to success. Sometimes you sleep on it, unwinding and unplugging from the stress of the day. Successful people don’t wait until the morning to prepare for a successful day; instead, they start the night before. They unplug from their devices, read, meditate, and plan for the next day. Taking long soak in the tub, walking around the block or reading a book are all ways to relax. They wake up relaxed and stress-free because they have already designed the blueprint for a productive day. Successful people understand that successful plans can only be implemented when they’re coming off a good night’s sleep. Shut off devices at least an hour before bed. Don’t let technology separate you from a good night’s rest.
5. Have a Specific End of Day, and Keep It
What’s your cue to end the day? Is it when the work is done, even if that means no dinner or sleep? Do you feel like you’re successful? What does that mean to you? These are important questions best answered by designating a specific end of day, where business is done and it’s time to go home. Andy Grove, who founded Intel, always kept to his scheduled end of day routine, no matter what was left to be done. Keeping this end-of-day promise to yourself gives you the freedom and power to choose your level of “enough.” Make yourself the first priority, eat a nice dinner and rest well. There is always tomorrow.
6. Planning Ahead Thoroughly
One of the major differences between highly successful people and average performers is detailed and strategic planning. Successful people spend more time thinking about their big picture goals and ideas. They zoom out regularly to analyze their lives from a bird’s eye view. This enables them to make key decisions deliberately, methodically, and strategically. Average performers make those decisions in a reactive mode while they’re in the thick of the forest of their lives. Successful people create thorough, successful plans and reap the rewards down the road. Their detailed planning provides clarity on what they should be working on at any given time.
7. Don’t Multitask: Do Your One Thing
To better focus on specific tasks, tackle one at a time. Multitasking often means your attention will be divided, which doesn’t help with tasks that require attention to detail. It’s best to focus on one thing and only do your one thing. Never take on unnecessary tasks or meetings, that divert your attention from your goal. Choose your passion and develop a specific goal around it, letting your product and mission represent that.
8. Make a To-Do List
If you are not creating to-dos, we recommend you start now. Some people create and update their to-dos in simple electronic planner every day, some plan their week ahead. A to-do list helps you prepare for the day. It is also great for prioritizing tasks because once you have them in front of you, you can spot the top priority ones easier. As you engage with your to-dos, train yourself to identify tasks that you can delegate. A successful person understands that their time is the most valuable asset, and they don’t waste it on non-urgent, low-priority tasks. Learning to prioritize tasks can improve your life significantly. You’ll have more time for important stuff, and you will be able to achieve your main goals. Successful people write down new tasks and ideas during the day as they come up. If you try to hold many things in your mind, you will inevitably forget something. At the same time, you will unconsciously experience stress trying to remember all the important stuff. Have a system, where you can easily access and add a new to-do.
9. Prioritizing
Successful people understand that if they don’t prioritize their projects, they will be swayed and pushed around by the agendas of others. They consistently evaluate their priorities and reorganize the order as circumstances change in order to carry out successful plans. Since their priorities are crystal clear, they quickly assess whether a request fits into their big picture plans. They cultivate the habit of turning down requests that don’t align with their most valued goals. They learn to say no in a firm and graceful manner to requests that don’t fit their plans. They focus on working on the right things over getting more done. They strive to produce at their highest quality for their highest priorities.
10. Focusing on Important Projects
Where you spend the majority of your time determines your life’s destiny. Success looks different for everyone. But what’s consistent is that successful people prioritize their values and principles. If what you value is health, you should be incorporating an exercise routine and healthy meal into your morning schedule. If what you value is family, you should be taking time to spend time with the family, have breakfast them, talk with them, before you leave. If what you value is productivity, you should wake up and tackle the first tasks of the day before anything else. Successful people design their lives in accordance with what they care about.
11. Eliminate Trivial Distractions
Push notifications, unnecessary meetings and phone calls, online shopping, videos, articles, social media, television ― all of it is just one tab, click of the mouse or one ding away―but taken altogether, trivial distractions probably take you away from hours of work each day. If you get to the end of each day and feel as though you accomplished very little and can’t figure out “where the time went,” then trivial distractions are likely to be the culprit.
12. Creating a System for Planning
While Bill Gates was the Chairman at Microsoft, he secluded himself from the distractions of daily life twice a year during “Think Week”. Visitors were banned during the week. He read many papers (his record was 112) about Microsoft, as well as new ideas in technology during Think Week. The space and time he carved out during the week allowed him to take a step back to review the projects and ideas at Microsoft. Greg McKeown, the author of Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less, advocates conducting a quarterly personal review to define your most important objectives for the next three months. What doesn’t get scheduled doesn’t get done―so successful people regularly schedule time to review their priorities, goals, and road maps to achieve them. They schedule time to monitor their progress on key objectives and iterate their plans based on results and lessons learned.
13. Using Willpower Wisely
Willpower is a limited resource. As we make decisions, run errands, and work on various projects throughout the day, our willpower is depleted. Successful people leverage the full tank of willpower in the morning by working on their most important project first. In the morning, the stresses and obstacles that arise throughout the day haven’t cluttered their mind yet. They take advantage of their fresh and clear mind. In addition, they take advantage of the lack of distractions in the early morning, get a head start on the world, and make progress towards their most valued goals, resulting in successful plans. Successful people don’t have superpowers that help them get things done at a level that’s unreachable by the rest of us. They have simply implemented time management strategies that help them plan their time in the best way possible. They have learned how to create successful plans and follow through each and every day.
Obsessive Planning―Godless Planning
The above points were taken from websites that advocate and adore planning. There is nothing wrong with planning―God is the ultimate planner! God has planned everything from eternity. He has a plan for every single thing He has made―not just humans, but everything. Planning creates order―and God is ordered and His universe is well ordered. Being made in the image and likeness of God, we too are supposed to plan. That is why we have been given human reason―so that we can learn from past, assess the present, and plan for the future. Yet most earthly planners exclude God from their plans and planning, and, instead, have made an idol or a god of their planning methods. Some of them are totally obsessed with planning―to the point where what is only supposed to be a means to an end, becomes an end in itself. Our Lord warned us that we cannot plan without Him, that we cannot exclude Him from our plans: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Yet most plans have nothing to do with God―they are based purely on the whims and preferences of the human planner. This is especially true at Christmas time―where Christ, whose birthday it is, is either ignored or neglected in favor of much more interesting, entertaining, materialistic and fun activities. At best, He gets some “lip-service”, but hardly anyone treats Christmas Day as Christ’s Birthday, giving full and total focus to Christ. The modern world would frown upon such persons are being weirdos and fanatics. Whatever happened to the greatest commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Instead, we give all (or most) of our heart, mind, soul and strength to secular side of Christmas―sending Christmas cards to each other (but not to Christ, whose birthday it is); giving presents to each other (but not to Christ on His birthday); organizing parties (without Christ being present and being the focal point); spending hours preparing and eating all kinds of sumptuous foods for our body (but giving little thought to the “food” for our soul―the Holy Eucharist and the Word of God: “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God”―Matthew 4:4).
The Gospel and Commandments of the World
St. Louis de Montfort, in one of his lesser known books, The Love of Eternal Wisdom, paints a contrast between heavenly or spiritual wisdom, and earthly or worldly wisdom: “Worldly wisdom consists in the exact compliance with the maxims and the fashions of the world; in a continuous trend toward greatness and esteem. It is a secret and unceasing pursuit of pleasures and personal interests, not in a gross and open manner so as to cause scandal, but in a secret, deceitful and scheming fashion. Those who proceed according to the wisdom of the world are those who know how to manage well their affairs and to arrange things to their temporal advantage without appearing to do so; who know the art of deceiving and how to cleverly cheat without being noticed; who say or do one thing and have another thing in mind; who are thoroughly acquainted with the way and the flattery of the world; who know how to please everybody in order to reach their goal, not troubling much about the honor and interests of God; who make a secret, but deadly, fusion of truth with untruth, of the Gospel with the world, of virtue with vice, of Jesus Christ with Satan; who wish to pass as honest people, but not as religious men; who despise and corrupt, or readily condemn, every religious practice which does not conform to their own.
“In short, the worldly wise are those who, being guided only by their human senses and reason, seek only to appear as Christian and honest folk, without troubling much to please God or to do penance for the sins which they have committed against His divine Majesty. The worldling bases his conduct upon his honor, upon what people say, upon convention, upon good cheer, upon personal interest, upon refined manners, upon witty jokes. These are the seven innocent incentives, so he thinks, upon which he can rely that he may lead an easy life. He has virtues of his own for which he is canonized by the world. These are manliness, finesse, diplomacy, tact, gallantry, politeness, sprightliness. He considers as serious sins such traits as lack of feeling, silliness, dullness, sanctimoniousness” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Love of Eternal Wisdom).
The Ten Commandments of the World
St. Louis further adds: “He adheres as strictly as possible to the commandments which the world has given him:
1. Thou shalt be well acquainted with the world.
2. Thou shalt be an “honest” man.
3. Thou shalt be successful in business.
4. Thou shalt keep what is thine.
5. Thou shalt get on in the world.
6. Thou shalt make friends.
7. Thou shalt be a society man.
8. Thou shalt make merry.
9. Thou shalt not be a killjoy.
10. Thou shalt avoid singularity, dullness and an air of piety.
“Never was the world so corrupt as it is now, because it was never so astute, so wise in its own conceit, so cunning. It is so skillful in deceiving the soul seeking perfection that it makes use of truth to foster untruth, of virtue to authorize vice and it even distorts the meaning of Christ’s own truths to give authority to its own maxims” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Time to Change―Time for a Change of Heart!
How much longer will we sadly epitomize and reflect these words of God: “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside! They are become unprofitable together! There is none that doth good―no, not one! They have not called upon God!” (Psalm 52:3-6). “For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15). “And the Lord said: ‘This people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Isaias 29:13). “Every man has gone away, following the inclinations of his own wicked heart, to serve strange gods!” (Baruch 1:22). “Follow not the desires of thy heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:2). “A heart that goes two ways shall not have success!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:28). “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “I will give them one heart, and will put a new spirit in their bowels―and I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 11:19). “Make to yourselves a new heart and a new spirit!” (Ezechiel 18:31).
Step aside from all the excessive materialism, entertainment, idle socializing, meaningless chatter, gluttony and alcohol this Christmas―and Christ the birthday present of a new heart! Show a change of heart! Show Him that your heart is focused on Him and not all those other things which are meaningless without Christ―like feathers without the bird. Ask other to do the same! You will not be liked and your requests will probably be rejected―but whose birthday is it anyway? Why do act as though it is OUR birthday and not CHRIST’S birthday? Make plans to put Christ back into Christmas―not in a superficial, “lip-service” way, but in a meaningful, sincere, practical, evident way!
“Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me! He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:32-39).
“The heart of man plans his way―but the Lord must direct his steps” (Proverbs 16:9). “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “Designs are brought to nothing where there is no counsel” (Proverbs 15:22). “Lay open thy works to the Lord―and thy thoughts shall be directed!” (Proverbs 16:3). “‘For’, saith the Lord, ‘My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways! For as the heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9). “Thy word is a lamp to my feet, O Lord, and a light to my paths!” (Psalms 118:105).
If you plan on going to Heaven, then you will not get there without a fight: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangleth himself with secular businesses; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Anyone who has to fight a battle, or fight in a war, must make plans on how he will overcome the enemy and come out victorious. An army rarely goes into battle without a plan of action. Wars are not won “off-the-cuff”. Neither is Heaven gained “off-the-cuff”―we must have a strategy, a plan, set tactics on how we intend to fight our way through this life and be one of the few that are saved: “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
“And a certain man said to Jesus: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. For wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen! … Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord! Lord! Have not we prophesied in Thy Name, and cast out devils in Thy Name, and done many miracles in Thy Name!’ And then will I profess unto them: ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you that work iniquity!’ ... When the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!’ And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:22-23; 22:14).
Too Much Material Planning―Too Little Spiritual Planning
The soul is supposed to be more important than the body. Heaven is supposed to more important than life on Earth. The Creator is supposed to more important than His creatures. Yet, in looking at the world today―even the Catholic world―it is apparent that this is no longer the case. We plan far, far, far more for earthly, material, physical things―and barely plan at all for heavenly, supernatural, spiritual things. The hours spent thinking about, planning for, and focusing on earthly things compared to heavenly things, is like a mountain compared to a grain of sand. Most of our eggs are in the basket of the world. Yet Our Lord warned: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Christmas has long been more about us than about Christ. We give and receive many presents―but Christ gets next to nothing! We plan fancy meals, social gatherings, entertainment―but Christ is not really a part of it all. Christmas has long since become Christmas in name only. What makes it worse and even more sad, is that we don’t really feel guilty about it. We imagine that a superficial tip-of-the-hat to Christ, a Christmas Day Mass, and Nativity Scene (that is more or less abandoned after being put up), and some Christmas decorations is enough for Christ. An hour or two for Christ―then the rest of week ourselves to party, have fun, play games, eat, drink, watch television and socialize. Our Lord’s complaint about the Jews is equally applicable to modern-day Catholics: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
There are hoards of books written about how to plan―plans for businesses, plans for personal life, plans for coaching sports, plans for careers, plans for learning, plans for meals, plans for DIY, plans for personal finances, etc. Yet where do we see a book that specifically deals with plans on how to get to Heaven? It is hard to think of one “off-the-cuff”! The level of detail these books go into is quite amazing. Our Lord lamented that the children of this world were far more industrious than the children of light! “The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light!” (Luke 16:8). Here follows just a sample of the level of material planning that is recommended to the people of this world. The following is taken from websites that promote all kinds of planning. You will see that they clearly put Catholics to shame, for Catholics should be planning spiritually with even more enthusiasm, zest, intensity and single-mindedness than these worldly people are planning.
The Zeal That Goes Into Worldly Planning
Planning is about making the most of a limited amount of time. Planning is the key factor contributing to the success of many billionaires. They have short-term goals as well as long-term goals. They plan every minute of their day to achieve the most productivity. Sometimes things don’t go as planned because there are many external factors that may happen and disturb plans. However, that’s not an excuse for not planning anything. In fact, a detailed plan is like a map that navigates your life, so that you won’t be lost like a ship floating on the ocean.
When you look around at people who have landed in a pile of success, it’s hard to imagine how they can possibly keep up with everything happening around them. Running a company or writing a novel can’t be that easy, can it? The truth is that they simply know how to create successful plans. Highly successful people don’t wait and hope for desired results. Success is never accidental for them because they know how to plan for success. They know that it’s the direct result of preparing, planning, and aligning their time with their most important goals.
1. Saving Decision Making for Important Things
Highly successful people simplify their wardrobe and minimize the amount of decisions they make on trivial matters. Only a few decisions truly matter when you want to plan to succeed. They’ve internalized that every decision doesn’t have to be optimal or perfect―which lets them make quick decisions most of the time. They automate and simplify decisions. They focus upon and give time to the highest impact decisions they face each day.
2. Practice Mindfulness and Meditation
While making task lists and recording your ideas will help ease your wandering mind, other areas of stress may deplete your focus and energy levels. To liberate us from a false view of the self and reality, mindfulness helps bring full awareness to the interconnectedness of all people and things. Mindfulness is not just sitting cross-legged and making deep breaths in silence. It’s more about recognizing the interdependence and flow of one task into the next, being mindful of smaller things, and can also be applied to ordinary tasks, such as stopping yourself as you reach for another candy and going out to have lunch, or putting your phone down as you notice that you’re already browsing social media for 20 minutes straight. Research also indicates that if you simply focus on your breathing, you may feel the effects of meditation within 20 minutes. That small amount of time daily dedicated to meditation may relieve your anxiety and improve your concentration, literally rewiring your brain. Mindfulness helps us get rid of bad habits and stay an ally to ourselves.
3. Having a Consistent Morning Routine
Successful people create momentum at the start of the day through consistent morning routines. They use successful plans to complete a combination of the following activities in the morning: meditate, read, journal, exercise, prioritize their day, envision a successful day, and eat a nutritious breakfast to fuel their day. For example, motivational speaker Tony Robbins, right after waking in the morning, dives into a 57 degree Fahrenheit pool to reset his system and reduce inflammation. He also does breathing exercises and expresses gratitude during a ten-minute priming exercise. What we focus on expands in our minds. Through his morning routine, he chooses to expand gratitude over fear and anxiety.
4. Having a Consistent Nightly Routine
Getting quality sleep is important for your brain to function properly and for your long-term health. Having a regular nighttime routine is as important as your morning routine. You don’t simply wake up to success. Sometimes you sleep on it, unwinding and unplugging from the stress of the day. Successful people don’t wait until the morning to prepare for a successful day; instead, they start the night before. They unplug from their devices, read, meditate, and plan for the next day. Taking long soak in the tub, walking around the block or reading a book are all ways to relax. They wake up relaxed and stress-free because they have already designed the blueprint for a productive day. Successful people understand that successful plans can only be implemented when they’re coming off a good night’s sleep. Shut off devices at least an hour before bed. Don’t let technology separate you from a good night’s rest.
5. Have a Specific End of Day, and Keep It
What’s your cue to end the day? Is it when the work is done, even if that means no dinner or sleep? Do you feel like you’re successful? What does that mean to you? These are important questions best answered by designating a specific end of day, where business is done and it’s time to go home. Andy Grove, who founded Intel, always kept to his scheduled end of day routine, no matter what was left to be done. Keeping this end-of-day promise to yourself gives you the freedom and power to choose your level of “enough.” Make yourself the first priority, eat a nice dinner and rest well. There is always tomorrow.
6. Planning Ahead Thoroughly
One of the major differences between highly successful people and average performers is detailed and strategic planning. Successful people spend more time thinking about their big picture goals and ideas. They zoom out regularly to analyze their lives from a bird’s eye view. This enables them to make key decisions deliberately, methodically, and strategically. Average performers make those decisions in a reactive mode while they’re in the thick of the forest of their lives. Successful people create thorough, successful plans and reap the rewards down the road. Their detailed planning provides clarity on what they should be working on at any given time.
7. Don’t Multitask: Do Your One Thing
To better focus on specific tasks, tackle one at a time. Multitasking often means your attention will be divided, which doesn’t help with tasks that require attention to detail. It’s best to focus on one thing and only do your one thing. Never take on unnecessary tasks or meetings, that divert your attention from your goal. Choose your passion and develop a specific goal around it, letting your product and mission represent that.
8. Make a To-Do List
If you are not creating to-dos, we recommend you start now. Some people create and update their to-dos in simple electronic planner every day, some plan their week ahead. A to-do list helps you prepare for the day. It is also great for prioritizing tasks because once you have them in front of you, you can spot the top priority ones easier. As you engage with your to-dos, train yourself to identify tasks that you can delegate. A successful person understands that their time is the most valuable asset, and they don’t waste it on non-urgent, low-priority tasks. Learning to prioritize tasks can improve your life significantly. You’ll have more time for important stuff, and you will be able to achieve your main goals. Successful people write down new tasks and ideas during the day as they come up. If you try to hold many things in your mind, you will inevitably forget something. At the same time, you will unconsciously experience stress trying to remember all the important stuff. Have a system, where you can easily access and add a new to-do.
9. Prioritizing
Successful people understand that if they don’t prioritize their projects, they will be swayed and pushed around by the agendas of others. They consistently evaluate their priorities and reorganize the order as circumstances change in order to carry out successful plans. Since their priorities are crystal clear, they quickly assess whether a request fits into their big picture plans. They cultivate the habit of turning down requests that don’t align with their most valued goals. They learn to say no in a firm and graceful manner to requests that don’t fit their plans. They focus on working on the right things over getting more done. They strive to produce at their highest quality for their highest priorities.
10. Focusing on Important Projects
Where you spend the majority of your time determines your life’s destiny. Success looks different for everyone. But what’s consistent is that successful people prioritize their values and principles. If what you value is health, you should be incorporating an exercise routine and healthy meal into your morning schedule. If what you value is family, you should be taking time to spend time with the family, have breakfast them, talk with them, before you leave. If what you value is productivity, you should wake up and tackle the first tasks of the day before anything else. Successful people design their lives in accordance with what they care about.
11. Eliminate Trivial Distractions
Push notifications, unnecessary meetings and phone calls, online shopping, videos, articles, social media, television ― all of it is just one tab, click of the mouse or one ding away―but taken altogether, trivial distractions probably take you away from hours of work each day. If you get to the end of each day and feel as though you accomplished very little and can’t figure out “where the time went,” then trivial distractions are likely to be the culprit.
12. Creating a System for Planning
While Bill Gates was the Chairman at Microsoft, he secluded himself from the distractions of daily life twice a year during “Think Week”. Visitors were banned during the week. He read many papers (his record was 112) about Microsoft, as well as new ideas in technology during Think Week. The space and time he carved out during the week allowed him to take a step back to review the projects and ideas at Microsoft. Greg McKeown, the author of Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less, advocates conducting a quarterly personal review to define your most important objectives for the next three months. What doesn’t get scheduled doesn’t get done―so successful people regularly schedule time to review their priorities, goals, and road maps to achieve them. They schedule time to monitor their progress on key objectives and iterate their plans based on results and lessons learned.
13. Using Willpower Wisely
Willpower is a limited resource. As we make decisions, run errands, and work on various projects throughout the day, our willpower is depleted. Successful people leverage the full tank of willpower in the morning by working on their most important project first. In the morning, the stresses and obstacles that arise throughout the day haven’t cluttered their mind yet. They take advantage of their fresh and clear mind. In addition, they take advantage of the lack of distractions in the early morning, get a head start on the world, and make progress towards their most valued goals, resulting in successful plans. Successful people don’t have superpowers that help them get things done at a level that’s unreachable by the rest of us. They have simply implemented time management strategies that help them plan their time in the best way possible. They have learned how to create successful plans and follow through each and every day.
Obsessive Planning―Godless Planning
The above points were taken from websites that advocate and adore planning. There is nothing wrong with planning―God is the ultimate planner! God has planned everything from eternity. He has a plan for every single thing He has made―not just humans, but everything. Planning creates order―and God is ordered and His universe is well ordered. Being made in the image and likeness of God, we too are supposed to plan. That is why we have been given human reason―so that we can learn from past, assess the present, and plan for the future. Yet most earthly planners exclude God from their plans and planning, and, instead, have made an idol or a god of their planning methods. Some of them are totally obsessed with planning―to the point where what is only supposed to be a means to an end, becomes an end in itself. Our Lord warned us that we cannot plan without Him, that we cannot exclude Him from our plans: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Yet most plans have nothing to do with God―they are based purely on the whims and preferences of the human planner. This is especially true at Christmas time―where Christ, whose birthday it is, is either ignored or neglected in favor of much more interesting, entertaining, materialistic and fun activities. At best, He gets some “lip-service”, but hardly anyone treats Christmas Day as Christ’s Birthday, giving full and total focus to Christ. The modern world would frown upon such persons are being weirdos and fanatics. Whatever happened to the greatest commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).
Instead, we give all (or most) of our heart, mind, soul and strength to secular side of Christmas―sending Christmas cards to each other (but not to Christ, whose birthday it is); giving presents to each other (but not to Christ on His birthday); organizing parties (without Christ being present and being the focal point); spending hours preparing and eating all kinds of sumptuous foods for our body (but giving little thought to the “food” for our soul―the Holy Eucharist and the Word of God: “Not in bread alone does man live, but in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God”―Matthew 4:4).
The Gospel and Commandments of the World
St. Louis de Montfort, in one of his lesser known books, The Love of Eternal Wisdom, paints a contrast between heavenly or spiritual wisdom, and earthly or worldly wisdom: “Worldly wisdom consists in the exact compliance with the maxims and the fashions of the world; in a continuous trend toward greatness and esteem. It is a secret and unceasing pursuit of pleasures and personal interests, not in a gross and open manner so as to cause scandal, but in a secret, deceitful and scheming fashion. Those who proceed according to the wisdom of the world are those who know how to manage well their affairs and to arrange things to their temporal advantage without appearing to do so; who know the art of deceiving and how to cleverly cheat without being noticed; who say or do one thing and have another thing in mind; who are thoroughly acquainted with the way and the flattery of the world; who know how to please everybody in order to reach their goal, not troubling much about the honor and interests of God; who make a secret, but deadly, fusion of truth with untruth, of the Gospel with the world, of virtue with vice, of Jesus Christ with Satan; who wish to pass as honest people, but not as religious men; who despise and corrupt, or readily condemn, every religious practice which does not conform to their own.
“In short, the worldly wise are those who, being guided only by their human senses and reason, seek only to appear as Christian and honest folk, without troubling much to please God or to do penance for the sins which they have committed against His divine Majesty. The worldling bases his conduct upon his honor, upon what people say, upon convention, upon good cheer, upon personal interest, upon refined manners, upon witty jokes. These are the seven innocent incentives, so he thinks, upon which he can rely that he may lead an easy life. He has virtues of his own for which he is canonized by the world. These are manliness, finesse, diplomacy, tact, gallantry, politeness, sprightliness. He considers as serious sins such traits as lack of feeling, silliness, dullness, sanctimoniousness” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Love of Eternal Wisdom).
The Ten Commandments of the World
St. Louis further adds: “He adheres as strictly as possible to the commandments which the world has given him:
1. Thou shalt be well acquainted with the world.
2. Thou shalt be an “honest” man.
3. Thou shalt be successful in business.
4. Thou shalt keep what is thine.
5. Thou shalt get on in the world.
6. Thou shalt make friends.
7. Thou shalt be a society man.
8. Thou shalt make merry.
9. Thou shalt not be a killjoy.
10. Thou shalt avoid singularity, dullness and an air of piety.
“Never was the world so corrupt as it is now, because it was never so astute, so wise in its own conceit, so cunning. It is so skillful in deceiving the soul seeking perfection that it makes use of truth to foster untruth, of virtue to authorize vice and it even distorts the meaning of Christ’s own truths to give authority to its own maxims” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Love of Eternal Wisdom).
Time to Change―Time for a Change of Heart!
How much longer will we sadly epitomize and reflect these words of God: “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside! They are become unprofitable together! There is none that doth good―no, not one! They have not called upon God!” (Psalm 52:3-6). “For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut―lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15). “And the Lord said: ‘This people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Isaias 29:13). “Every man has gone away, following the inclinations of his own wicked heart, to serve strange gods!” (Baruch 1:22). “Follow not the desires of thy heart!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:2). “A heart that goes two ways shall not have success!” (Ecclesiasticus 3:28). “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “I will give them one heart, and will put a new spirit in their bowels―and I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh!” (Ezechiel 11:19). “Make to yourselves a new heart and a new spirit!” (Ezechiel 18:31).
Step aside from all the excessive materialism, entertainment, idle socializing, meaningless chatter, gluttony and alcohol this Christmas―and Christ the birthday present of a new heart! Show a change of heart! Show Him that your heart is focused on Him and not all those other things which are meaningless without Christ―like feathers without the bird. Ask other to do the same! You will not be liked and your requests will probably be rejected―but whose birthday is it anyway? Why do act as though it is OUR birthday and not CHRIST’S birthday? Make plans to put Christ back into Christmas―not in a superficial, “lip-service” way, but in a meaningful, sincere, practical, evident way!
“Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me! He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:32-39).
Article 8
Saturday December 16th & Sunday December 17th & Monday December 18th
What Will You Get For Christmas? You Will Get What You Sow!
Saturday December 16th & Sunday December 17th & Monday December 18th
What Will You Get For Christmas? You Will Get What You Sow!
The Economy of Heaven
Holy Scripture is pretty clear in many instances on how things operate between God and man, Heaven and Earth. We all love a bargain, we all want a discount, we all want something for free, we all feel somewhat entitled to heavenly freebie handouts―but is that how it works? On the one hand, Heaven and salvation is one incredible discount already―for Christ came to die and pay for our sins. However, it does end there! We are also expected to play a part in our salvation―even though, by ourselves, there is no way that we can earn or merit salvation. We are expected to―in a broad sense―play our part by co-paying for our discounted salvation. That is whole idea and meaning behind the word “discount”―when we have a discount, we do not pay the full price, but only part of the price. A discount does not mean that we get things for free without having to pay anything. Holy Scripture shows this repeatedly:
“Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does [“doing” means WORK] the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21) ... “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12) … “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3) … “I tell you, that unless your justice [justice is about giving] abounds more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:20) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” ― which means fighting for Heaven (Matthew 11:12) … “What! Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6) ... “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) ... “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12) ... “Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect” (Ephesians 6:11-13) … “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith! … Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
The bottom-line, the overriding principle, the terms of the contract or however else you want to term it, is simply this: You reap what you sow; you get what you deserve; you get out of something what you put into it; you get paid only for what you have done: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “He who soweth sparingly, shall also reap sparingly: and he who soweth in blessings, shall also reap blessings” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
That is why the unprofitable servant will be rejected and cast-out. We see that in Our Lord’s parable of the talents―where one man received 5 talents, another man received 2 talents, and a third man received 1 talent:
“A man called his servants and to one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―to everyone according to his proper ability. He that had received the five talents, traded with them and gained another five. He that had received the two talents, gained another two. But he that received one talent, dug a hole into the earth and hid his lord’s money. After a long time, the lord came and reckoned with them. He that had received the five talents brought the other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you gave me five talents! Behold I have gained another five in addition!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant!’ He that had received two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you gave me two talents! Behold, I have gained another two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant!’ But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man! Being afraid, I went and hid your talent in the ground! Behold here it is―you can take back that which is yours!’ And his lord, answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You ought to have at least committed my money to the bankers, so that, at my coming, I should have received my own money back with usury [additional interest]!’ Take away the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
What profit can we show for the Faith and many other “talents” (graces) that God has bestowed upon us? Are we profitable servants or unprofitable servants? Is grace profitably working in us? Or have we buried God’s graces in our soul’s soil? Have our previous Christmases been spiritual profitable or spiritual losses? Are our Christmases mainly secular materialistic affairs, or are they deeply meaningful spiritual encounters with Christ? If we want spiritually meaningful Christmases, then we have to prepare the soil or family atmosphere so that it is conducive to a spiritual Christmas and not a secular Christmas.
Our Lady Laments
Our Lady, in speaking to the Ven. Mary of Agreda, laments the indifference and lukewarmness of Catholics in this matter: “Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. This dreadful carelessness arises from two causes: on the one hand men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. Anything that is interior seems harmless in their estimation. Since the princes of darkness are invisible and unperceived by any of the senses and since carnal men neither touch, nor feel, nor see them―the result is that they forget the fear of them. Yet for this very reason they ought to be more attentive and careful, since invisible enemies are more cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day!”
“My Son and Lord could have redeemed the human race without suffering so much and that He wished to increase His sufferings only on account of the immensity of His love for souls … He began to suffer, and as soon as He was born into the world He and I were banished by Herod into a desert, and His sufferings continued until He died on the Cross … The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation.”
“So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing―because the wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... The worldlings, in their lukewarmness and sluggishness, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should hate suffering, especially after all that my most holy Son suffered for them! Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! They do not seek the medicine of suffering! Understand the ignorance and error of mortals, nearly all of them strive to avoid labor and suffering and are frightened by the royal and secure road of mortification and the Cross. Full of this deceitful ignorance, they not only abhor resemblance to Christ’s suffering, but they make their recovery impossible―since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering!
“Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion! Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation.”
What is Christmas All About?
What is point of Christmas? What is purpose of Christmas? Everyone will probably have their own version of an answer to that! The purpose of Christmas is not found in parties. It is not found in the giving of presents. It is not found in Christmas decorations. The point and purpose of Christmas is far more profound; much more serious; reaching further than just a few days of partying, rejoicing in presents received, and enjoying the glitter of the decorations. The purpose of Christmas is the eternal ‘party’ in Heaven; it is the gift of salvation; and glitter of Heaven. However, nobody deserves Heaven; no one has a right to Heaven; a person cannot merit Heaven by themselves. Hence it is that Christ―the God-Man―comes to save us. Christmas is about salvation and paying the price of salvation. Christ comes―not to have fun and party, not to indulge in food and drink―but He comes to suffer and die!
The Christ of Christmas (and there can be no Christmas without Christ) tells us why He has come: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!” (Luke 13:24). “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). Holy Scripture adds: “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “The Father hath sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17).
“Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD). Sin is the greatest evil in world and sin offends an infinite God―therefore the debt of sin is an infinite debt. No finite human being can possibly pay an infinite debt. Only an infinite being can pay an infinite debt―yet we are mere finite beings. Yet the debt is a human debt and so a human being must pay the debt.
How can this be achieved? The only way it can be achieved is if there could exist a finite human being who is also the infinite God―which, as it turns out, is what Jesus Christ is. He is both God and man―the God-man. He has two natures in one person―the nature of God and the nature of man. Hence, as the infinite God, He can pay an infinite debt―and also being a finite human being, He can pay the human debt for sin. Thus Jesus Christ comes at Christmas to pay our debts for sin―and those debts will be paid by suffering and dying. He does not come to party, but to suffer! He suffers from very first moment of His life after birth. He is born, not into a warm home surrounded by grateful people―but he is born in a cold cave or stable reserved for animals, which is fitting, since, when we sin we act like animals. Apart from Mary and Joseph, there are no human beings to welcome Him at His birth―only some animals. We, sinners that we are, should be those animals who are there to welcome Him―will be really be there in heart and soul, or in body only?
Feathers Without the Bird
For most people, Christmas is all about the feathers without the bird! Or leaves without the tree! Or smoke without the fire! It is a superficial Christmas that has lost sight of the reality of Christmas. It is a mirage. An illusion. A pretence that is divorced from reality. More time is spent in preparing the food and drink―and the shopping that goes with it. Lots of time is spent in putting up decorations, the Christmas tree, buying and wrapping presents, writing and sending our Christmas cards, preparing Christmas entertainment, etc. By comparison, the time spent on spiritual matters, spiritual preparations, and preparing the soul―is like a molehill next to a mountain! Yet we have the nerve and audacity to try and make our little spiritual molehill look like a mountain! You will have heard of many phrases such as: “Tell me who are friends are―and I will tell you what you are!” … “Tell me what you read the most―and I will tell you what you are!” … “Tell me what you eat the most―and I will tell you what you are!” etc.
Likewise, tell me what you are spending most of your time, thoughts, money and efforts upon―in this build up to Christmas―and I will tell you kind of a Catholic you are: spiritual or superficial. Christ comes to gives us of Himself―especially in the Holy Eucharist (“Bethlehem” means “Town of Bread”)―but we prefer the wide variety of food and drink that will be on offer at the Christmas Dinner! Christmas could be―and should be―a time where we focus on events and the significance of Christ’s birth―but most will focus on the television, the internet, the music and the games! For the few families that will display a Nativity Scene over Christmas―most of it will be merely sentimental, customary, emotional―rather than something deeply spiritual that influences and affects their daily spiritual lives upon seeing it. Secular worldliness will never increase the spiritual―as Our Lord says: “The works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7). “There is no good tree that bringeth forth evil fruit; nor an evil tree that bringeth forth good fruit. For every tree is known by its fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns; nor from a bramble bush do they gather the grape!” (Luke 6:44).
Plant the correct seed for Christmas!
Most Catholics have misspent and wasted the vast majority―if not all―of their Christmases. What should have been mostly spiritual, ended up being mostly secular and materialistic. Sure―they went to Christmas Day Mass (but no extra Masses over the Christmas period); they put up a Nativity Scene (but rarely knelt down and prayed in front of it); they SAID a Rosary (but neglected to PRAY the Rosary by meditating on the mysteries and drawing practical resolutions from them); and perhaps a few other things―but was their heart and soul REALLY in Christmas, REALLY in a spiritual Christmas, PRIMARILY into spiritual Christmas? The answer for the majority of Catholics―in all honest―is NO! As Our Lord lamented: “This people honoureth Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8) … “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
There are many ways in which you can turn things around and make Christmas more spiritual. Download our ADVENT RITUAL―PRAYERS & RITUALS FOR THE ADVENT SEASON (click here) and PRAYERS & RITUALS FOR CHRISTMAS EVE (click here) and PRAYERS & RITUALS FOR CHRISTMAS DAY (click here). In addition, you will find many CHRISTMAS POSTERS for download and printing (click here). Furthermore, you have an explanation for each of the TWELVE DAYS OF CHRISTMAS ― with a separate page for each day. Click on the INTRODUCTION to the Twelve Days of Christmas (click here)―from which you can further access each dedicated page for the Twelve Days. You also have CHRISTMAS CARDS FOR CHRIST (click here) which are cards to be filled out with number of prayers and sacrifices that we have made in the lead-up to Christ's Birthday during the Advent Season. Then there are special DAILY CHRISTMAS PRAYERS which are different for each day of week (click on any the following: SUN, MON, TUE, WED, THU, FRI, SAT) which are based on the Psalms and modeled on the Divine Office that is recited by the clergy and the religious―though somewhat shortened and simplified. Or you have a non-liturgical variety of PRAYERS FOR CHRISTMAS (click here). On top of that you have readings, meditations and explanations on Christmas by ST. THOMAS AQUINAS (click here) and DOM GUERANGER (click here). Of if you like, you have a variety of SERMONS FOR CHRISTMAS (click here). You even have a page giving you the recipe and its symbolism for a CHRISTMAS DINNER (click here) which gives a recipe for Lamb since it the birthday of the Lamb of God.
All of the above will give you a treasure chest of spiritual riches with which to truly sanctify your Christmas in a way that befits the Birthday of the Son of God! Do not be afraid to change your predominantly secular approach to Christmas to a much more spiritual approach―even though you will certainly face opposition, resentment, scorn and sarcasm from other less spiritual family members, relatives and friends. Remember the words of Christ (whose day Christmas is): “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:32-37). “Behold, I stand at the gate and knock! If any man shall hear My voice, and open the door to Me, I will come in to him and will sup with him, and he with Me!” (Apocalypse 3:20). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “He who soweth sparingly, shall also reap sparingly: and he who soweth in blessings, shall also reap blessings” (2 Corinthians 9:6). May you have a blessing filled Christmas!
Holy Scripture is pretty clear in many instances on how things operate between God and man, Heaven and Earth. We all love a bargain, we all want a discount, we all want something for free, we all feel somewhat entitled to heavenly freebie handouts―but is that how it works? On the one hand, Heaven and salvation is one incredible discount already―for Christ came to die and pay for our sins. However, it does end there! We are also expected to play a part in our salvation―even though, by ourselves, there is no way that we can earn or merit salvation. We are expected to―in a broad sense―play our part by co-paying for our discounted salvation. That is whole idea and meaning behind the word “discount”―when we have a discount, we do not pay the full price, but only part of the price. A discount does not mean that we get things for free without having to pay anything. Holy Scripture shows this repeatedly:
“Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven―but he that does [“doing” means WORK] the will of My Father Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 7:21) ... “With fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12) … “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3) … “I tell you, that unless your justice [justice is about giving] abounds more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 5:20) … “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” ― which means fighting for Heaven (Matthew 11:12) … “What! Shall your brethren go to fight, and will you just sit here?” (Numbers 32:6) ... “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1) ... “Fight the good fight of Faith!” (1 Timothy 6:12) ... “Put you on the armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect” (Ephesians 6:11-13) … “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith! … Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that Faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
The bottom-line, the overriding principle, the terms of the contract or however else you want to term it, is simply this: You reap what you sow; you get what you deserve; you get out of something what you put into it; you get paid only for what you have done: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “He who soweth sparingly, shall also reap sparingly: and he who soweth in blessings, shall also reap blessings” (2 Corinthians 9:6).
That is why the unprofitable servant will be rejected and cast-out. We see that in Our Lord’s parable of the talents―where one man received 5 talents, another man received 2 talents, and a third man received 1 talent:
“A man called his servants and to one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―to everyone according to his proper ability. He that had received the five talents, traded with them and gained another five. He that had received the two talents, gained another two. But he that received one talent, dug a hole into the earth and hid his lord’s money. After a long time, the lord came and reckoned with them. He that had received the five talents brought the other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you gave me five talents! Behold I have gained another five in addition!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant!’ He that had received two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you gave me two talents! Behold, I have gained another two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant!’ But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man! Being afraid, I went and hid your talent in the ground! Behold here it is―you can take back that which is yours!’ And his lord, answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You ought to have at least committed my money to the bankers, so that, at my coming, I should have received my own money back with usury [additional interest]!’ Take away the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
What profit can we show for the Faith and many other “talents” (graces) that God has bestowed upon us? Are we profitable servants or unprofitable servants? Is grace profitably working in us? Or have we buried God’s graces in our soul’s soil? Have our previous Christmases been spiritual profitable or spiritual losses? Are our Christmases mainly secular materialistic affairs, or are they deeply meaningful spiritual encounters with Christ? If we want spiritually meaningful Christmases, then we have to prepare the soil or family atmosphere so that it is conducive to a spiritual Christmas and not a secular Christmas.
Our Lady Laments
Our Lady, in speaking to the Ven. Mary of Agreda, laments the indifference and lukewarmness of Catholics in this matter: “Men are lost in forgetful rest and sleep―as if there were no vigilant and powerful enemies. This dreadful carelessness arises from two causes: on the one hand men are so taken up with their earthly and material life, that they do not feel any other evils except those on a physical and material nature. Anything that is interior seems harmless in their estimation. Since the princes of darkness are invisible and unperceived by any of the senses and since carnal men neither touch, nor feel, nor see them―the result is that they forget the fear of them. Yet for this very reason they ought to be more attentive and careful, since invisible enemies are more cunning and skillful in injuring us by their treachery ... How many men have thrown themselves into the eternal darkness of Hell! … Countless numbers have fallen into Hell! … Lucifer has hurled into Hell so great a number of souls and continues so to hurl them every day!”
“My Son and Lord could have redeemed the human race without suffering so much and that He wished to increase His sufferings only on account of the immensity of His love for souls … He began to suffer, and as soon as He was born into the world He and I were banished by Herod into a desert, and His sufferings continued until He died on the Cross … The neglect and contempt of bodily mortification cause the loss of many souls and bring many more into the danger of eternal loss. I will not tell thee how many souls are lost, in order to not cause thee to die of sorrow at this loss! I have already told thee, that the number of those foreknown as doomed, is so great, and of those that save themselves is so small, that it is not expedient to say more in particular. Weep ceaselessly over the terrible loss sustained by so many insane and thankless souls, who are forgetful of God, of their duty and of their own selves … and lose their chance of salvation or bring upon themselves eternal damnation.”
“So great is my love for sinners, that if they would only call upon me in time and with sincerity, none of them would perish! But the sinners and the reprobate do no such thing―because the wounds of sin do not distress them, and, the more often they are committed, the less regret or sorrow do they cause! ... The worldlings, in their lukewarmness and sluggishness, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! It is a great shame―nay, a great boldness―on the part of the faithful, that they should hate suffering, especially after all that my most holy Son suffered for them! Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! They do not seek the medicine of suffering! Understand the ignorance and error of mortals, nearly all of them strive to avoid labor and suffering and are frightened by the royal and secure road of mortification and the Cross. Full of this deceitful ignorance, they not only abhor resemblance to Christ’s suffering, but they make their recovery impossible―since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering!
“Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored. Nothing of all this will they attain, because they do not wish to imitate Him and follow Him in His Passion! Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment―nor do I count him a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son. As for those who are forgetful of this truth and are so adverse to suffering―our love for the eternal salvation of men obliges us to send them labors and punishments, so that if they do not freely welcome them, they may at least be forced to undergo them and so be enabled to enter upon the way of salvation.”
What is Christmas All About?
What is point of Christmas? What is purpose of Christmas? Everyone will probably have their own version of an answer to that! The purpose of Christmas is not found in parties. It is not found in the giving of presents. It is not found in Christmas decorations. The point and purpose of Christmas is far more profound; much more serious; reaching further than just a few days of partying, rejoicing in presents received, and enjoying the glitter of the decorations. The purpose of Christmas is the eternal ‘party’ in Heaven; it is the gift of salvation; and glitter of Heaven. However, nobody deserves Heaven; no one has a right to Heaven; a person cannot merit Heaven by themselves. Hence it is that Christ―the God-Man―comes to save us. Christmas is about salvation and paying the price of salvation. Christ comes―not to have fun and party, not to indulge in food and drink―but He comes to suffer and die!
The Christ of Christmas (and there can be no Christmas without Christ) tells us why He has come: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56). “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!” (Luke 13:24). “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). Holy Scripture adds: “God sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “The Father hath sent His Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14). “God sent not His Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him” (John 3:17).
“Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD). Sin is the greatest evil in world and sin offends an infinite God―therefore the debt of sin is an infinite debt. No finite human being can possibly pay an infinite debt. Only an infinite being can pay an infinite debt―yet we are mere finite beings. Yet the debt is a human debt and so a human being must pay the debt.
How can this be achieved? The only way it can be achieved is if there could exist a finite human being who is also the infinite God―which, as it turns out, is what Jesus Christ is. He is both God and man―the God-man. He has two natures in one person―the nature of God and the nature of man. Hence, as the infinite God, He can pay an infinite debt―and also being a finite human being, He can pay the human debt for sin. Thus Jesus Christ comes at Christmas to pay our debts for sin―and those debts will be paid by suffering and dying. He does not come to party, but to suffer! He suffers from very first moment of His life after birth. He is born, not into a warm home surrounded by grateful people―but he is born in a cold cave or stable reserved for animals, which is fitting, since, when we sin we act like animals. Apart from Mary and Joseph, there are no human beings to welcome Him at His birth―only some animals. We, sinners that we are, should be those animals who are there to welcome Him―will be really be there in heart and soul, or in body only?
Feathers Without the Bird
For most people, Christmas is all about the feathers without the bird! Or leaves without the tree! Or smoke without the fire! It is a superficial Christmas that has lost sight of the reality of Christmas. It is a mirage. An illusion. A pretence that is divorced from reality. More time is spent in preparing the food and drink―and the shopping that goes with it. Lots of time is spent in putting up decorations, the Christmas tree, buying and wrapping presents, writing and sending our Christmas cards, preparing Christmas entertainment, etc. By comparison, the time spent on spiritual matters, spiritual preparations, and preparing the soul―is like a molehill next to a mountain! Yet we have the nerve and audacity to try and make our little spiritual molehill look like a mountain! You will have heard of many phrases such as: “Tell me who are friends are―and I will tell you what you are!” … “Tell me what you read the most―and I will tell you what you are!” … “Tell me what you eat the most―and I will tell you what you are!” etc.
Likewise, tell me what you are spending most of your time, thoughts, money and efforts upon―in this build up to Christmas―and I will tell you kind of a Catholic you are: spiritual or superficial. Christ comes to gives us of Himself―especially in the Holy Eucharist (“Bethlehem” means “Town of Bread”)―but we prefer the wide variety of food and drink that will be on offer at the Christmas Dinner! Christmas could be―and should be―a time where we focus on events and the significance of Christ’s birth―but most will focus on the television, the internet, the music and the games! For the few families that will display a Nativity Scene over Christmas―most of it will be merely sentimental, customary, emotional―rather than something deeply spiritual that influences and affects their daily spiritual lives upon seeing it. Secular worldliness will never increase the spiritual―as Our Lord says: “The works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7). “There is no good tree that bringeth forth evil fruit; nor an evil tree that bringeth forth good fruit. For every tree is known by its fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns; nor from a bramble bush do they gather the grape!” (Luke 6:44).
Plant the correct seed for Christmas!
Most Catholics have misspent and wasted the vast majority―if not all―of their Christmases. What should have been mostly spiritual, ended up being mostly secular and materialistic. Sure―they went to Christmas Day Mass (but no extra Masses over the Christmas period); they put up a Nativity Scene (but rarely knelt down and prayed in front of it); they SAID a Rosary (but neglected to PRAY the Rosary by meditating on the mysteries and drawing practical resolutions from them); and perhaps a few other things―but was their heart and soul REALLY in Christmas, REALLY in a spiritual Christmas, PRIMARILY into spiritual Christmas? The answer for the majority of Catholics―in all honest―is NO! As Our Lord lamented: “This people honoureth Me with their lips―but their heart is far from Me!” (Matthew 15:8) … “The heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them!” (Matthew 13:15). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
There are many ways in which you can turn things around and make Christmas more spiritual. Download our ADVENT RITUAL―PRAYERS & RITUALS FOR THE ADVENT SEASON (click here) and PRAYERS & RITUALS FOR CHRISTMAS EVE (click here) and PRAYERS & RITUALS FOR CHRISTMAS DAY (click here). In addition, you will find many CHRISTMAS POSTERS for download and printing (click here). Furthermore, you have an explanation for each of the TWELVE DAYS OF CHRISTMAS ― with a separate page for each day. Click on the INTRODUCTION to the Twelve Days of Christmas (click here)―from which you can further access each dedicated page for the Twelve Days. You also have CHRISTMAS CARDS FOR CHRIST (click here) which are cards to be filled out with number of prayers and sacrifices that we have made in the lead-up to Christ's Birthday during the Advent Season. Then there are special DAILY CHRISTMAS PRAYERS which are different for each day of week (click on any the following: SUN, MON, TUE, WED, THU, FRI, SAT) which are based on the Psalms and modeled on the Divine Office that is recited by the clergy and the religious―though somewhat shortened and simplified. Or you have a non-liturgical variety of PRAYERS FOR CHRISTMAS (click here). On top of that you have readings, meditations and explanations on Christmas by ST. THOMAS AQUINAS (click here) and DOM GUERANGER (click here). Of if you like, you have a variety of SERMONS FOR CHRISTMAS (click here). You even have a page giving you the recipe and its symbolism for a CHRISTMAS DINNER (click here) which gives a recipe for Lamb since it the birthday of the Lamb of God.
All of the above will give you a treasure chest of spiritual riches with which to truly sanctify your Christmas in a way that befits the Birthday of the Son of God! Do not be afraid to change your predominantly secular approach to Christmas to a much more spiritual approach―even though you will certainly face opposition, resentment, scorn and sarcasm from other less spiritual family members, relatives and friends. Remember the words of Christ (whose day Christmas is): “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:32-37). “Behold, I stand at the gate and knock! If any man shall hear My voice, and open the door to Me, I will come in to him and will sup with him, and he with Me!” (Apocalypse 3:20). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8). “He who soweth sparingly, shall also reap sparingly: and he who soweth in blessings, shall also reap blessings” (2 Corinthians 9:6). May you have a blessing filled Christmas!
Article 7
Thursday December 14th & Friday December 15th
Our Lady of Guadalupe & You
Thursday December 14th & Friday December 15th
Our Lady of Guadalupe & You
Guadalupe Today
Though it is almost 500 years (492) since Our Lady of Guadalupe first appeared in Mexico in 1531, she can be said to be incredibly important to our present day and its ever-increasing crises and difficulties. In a certain sense, the state of Mexico in the early 1500s is comparable to the state of the world today. How so? Read on and see!
The pagan Aztecs, who probably originated as a nomadic tribe in northern Mexico, arrived in Mesoamerica around the beginning of the 13th century. In just a century―chiefly in the 1400s―the Aztecs built an empire in the area now called central Mexico. From their magnificent capital city, Tenochtitlan, the Aztecs emerged as the dominant force in central Mexico, developing an intricate social, political, religious and commercial organization that brought many of the region’s city-states under their control by the 15th century. The Aztecs dominated the region in the century before European contact. A small percentage of Aztecs were the rich nobility, while the rest were much poorer. The rich dominated the poor―often to the point of having them work as slaves. The Aztecs were incredibly skilled and inventive. The Aztecs were famous for their agriculture, land, art, and architecture. They developed writing skills, a calendar system and also built temples and places of worship to their pagan gods. To please their gods they sacrificed humans! They were also known for being fierce and unforgiving.
We can see some similarities with today’s world. As with the Aztec world, today’s world is becoming increasingly neo-pagan. The elitist rich “call the shots” and they are minority. Likewise, the rich dominate the poor, often having them “enslaved” by debts. Just like the Aztecs, we have become incredibly skilled and inventive―modern technology is a witness to that. The modern neo-pagan world has numerous false idols, on whose altars people ‘sacrifice’ themselves―money, power, sex, fame, drink and drugs, gluttony, fashion, sports, etc. Today’s neo-pagan world has no problems with human-sacrifice, and leaves the Aztecs way behind in numbers―for in the last 50 years since Roe vs. Wade, over 1,700 million babies have been sacrificed through abortion, which averages out at 34 million per year or over 93,000 per day.
The Conquest of the Aztecs
When the Spanish conquistadors―explorer-soldiers of the Spanish and Portuguese Empires of the 15th and 16th centuries―came to what we today know by the name of Mexico, they found a large pagan Aztec empire, which even though it boasted many talents, skills and resources, was nevertheless a pagan human sacrificing network. The same could be said of the Americas (North and South) today―they are rich, knowledgeable, talented, powerful―but they are increasingly neo-pagan, with the vast majority of Catholics no longer regularly practicing their Faith, nor believing all the teachings of the Faith. Today’s neo-pagan population is also into sacrificing humans―those humans are the babies that are butchered in the womb.
In 1519, the Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortés landed in what is now Mexico, with 500 soldiers. They were looking for gold, and the gifts from the Mexica ruler, Motecuhzoma (Montezuma), proved that gold was present. Upon arriving in Tenochtitlan, Cortés took Motecuhzoma prisoner and attempted to rule on his behalf, but this did not go well, and Cortés fled the city in June of 1520. The Spanish conquistadors then laid siege to the Aztec capital from the middle of May of 1521 until the Aztecs finally surrendered on August 13th, 1521.
Even though Cortés conquered the country for Spain, he was not lacking in zeal for the evangelization of the Aztecs. In 1524 he obtained the arrival of twelve Franciscans to Mexico. These missionaries quickly integrated into the population. Their goodness contrasted with the harshness of the Aztec priests, as well as that of some conquistadors. They began to build churches. However, the Indians were reluctant to accept Baptism, primarily because it would require them to abandon polygamy. In those 10 years since the conquest (or 7 years from the time of the arrival of the Franciscans) there were relatively few conversions.
However, all that changed after the apparitions of Our Lady of Guadalupe! When the Indians had learned the news of Our Lady's apparitions, an enthusiasm and joy such as had never been seen before spread among them. Renouncing their idols, superstitions, human sacrifices, and polygamy, many asked to be baptized. Nine years after the apparitions, nine million Indians had converted to the Christian faith—nearly 3,000 a day! The details of the Image of Mary moved the Indians deeply—this woman is greater than the sun-god since she appears standing before the sun. She surpasses the moon god since she keeps the moon under her feet. She is no longer of this world since she is surrounded by clouds and is held above the world by an angel. Her folded hands show her in prayer, which means that there is Someone Who is greater than she.
Our Lady of Guadalupe Fought at Lepanto
After Our Lady of Guadalupe’s apparitions in Mexico and the resulting miraculous numbers of conversions, copies of the holy image had been circulated throughout Europe. Admiral Giovanni Andrea Doria―the illegitimate brother of Spanish King Philip II, who gave him the naval appointment―commanded the naval fleet at Lepanto in 1571 (40 years after Our Lady appeared in Mexico). He had been given one of these copies of the holy image of Our Lady of Guadalupe. The young admiral took the picture aboard his flagship when he assumed command of a flotilla of ships sailing from Genoa to the Gulf of Lepanto. The Battle of Lepanto was fought on October 7th, 1571, and it is said that during the battle, “Doria went to his cabin and knelt in prayer before the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe.” Prior to the battle, Pope Pius V had encouraged everyone to pray the Rosary, and many of the sailors prayed the Rosary the night before. Miraculously, the Christian fleet was victorious and many believed it was due to the protection of the Virgin Mary. After the battle was won, King Philip II of Spain, knowing his debt to the Blessed Virgin, offered to Our Lady of Guadalupe (in Spain) a lantern captured from the Turk’s flagship.
Our Lady of Miracles
Our Lady continues to astound to this very day with the miracles wrought back in 1531―especially with regard to the miraculous impact upon the tilma (cloak) of Juan Diego, the 57-year old recent convert to whom she appeared. What are the miracles of the tilma? The tilma defies the efforts of science to explain its creation, its survival, or its details.
Regarding Its Creation:
● No method of art or technology has been identified that could have produced the image.
● Like the Shroud of Turin, it is most like a photograph – the Shroud a negative image, the Tilma a positive image.
Regarding Its Survival:
● The material of the tilma― a coarse fabric made from the threads of the maguey cactus―has maintained its chemical and structural integrity for almost 500 years. This is quite remarkable! Most replicas of tilmas―with the same chemical and structural composition―last only fifteen years before decomposition and 40 years at the most. Nobody has been able to recreate it. Over the course of 500 years, many have tried and failed.
● For its first 115 years, the tilma was displayed without protective glass―it was exposed unprotected, uncovered to the heat, humidity, and sunlight of the church where it was displayed, as well as the veneration of the people. This subjected it to soot, candle wax, incense, and touching. There is currently no scientific explanation for its physical and chemical longevity―with no deterioration whatsoever occurring to the tilma.
● There are several parts of the cloth which have been painted on some time after the original image was created. These parts include the moon underneath the Virgin’s feet, the angel holding the cloth, and the rays coming from the image. The original image of the Virgin herself, however, does not appear to have been painted by an artist. There is no sketch underneath it, no brush strokes, and no corrections. It appears to have been produced in a single step. There are no animal or mineral pigments on the tilma. These would have been present had the image on the tilma been painted. The pigments that were available in the time and in that area would have faded by now, and yet the image hasn’t faded. These features were identified through scientific testing conducted by Dr. Philip Callahan, who was a biophysicist at the University of Florida, and a NASA consultant. He photographed the image under infrared light, and published his findings in 1981 in a paper called “The Tilma under Infrared Radiation.” Dr. Callahan also noted that the original image on the tilma had not cracked, flaked, or decayed in nearly 500 years―but the added paint and gold leaf had flaked or deteriorated considerably. This phenomenon has still not yet been scientifically explained.
● The color in Mary’s skin changes depending on one’s distance to the image. The further you are, the darker her skin tone and the more she resembles an Aztec princess. The closer you get, the lighter her skin tone and the more she appears as a young Jewish girl.
● In 1791, a worker accidentally spilled an acidic solution (nitric acid) on the tilma while cleaning the glass. While that part of the very thin and fragile tilma should have been destroyed, the stain inexplicably disappeared, the image miraculously self-restored and repaired itself within the next 30 days―with no external aid.
● Anti-Catholic Masons tried to blow up the tilma in 1921 with 29 sticks of dynamite, which shattered everything around for 150 feet, damaged the altar and bent a brass crucifix upon it and even shattered windows in other buildings. As for the fragile and unprotected, it survived with Our Lady’s image, and the ‘fragile’ cloak, perfectly intact.
Regarding Its Details:
● Modern scientific research has calculated that the position of the stars on the image conform to the constellations as they were on December 12th, 1521, when the image was created. In 1983 Dr. Juan Homero Hernandez and Fr. Mario Rojas Sánchez discovered that the stars on the image correspond precisely to the constellations of the winter sky on December 12th, 1531. Incredibly, the constellations are shown as viewed from outside the heavens, in other words in reverse.
● The head of the Blessed Virgin on the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe is tilted at 23.5 degrees – the same degree of inclination as the Earth on its axis of rotation. The existence of life on Earth is credited to this level of tilt; and the birth of Jesus is from Our Lady.
● Recent investigations over the last 100 years or so, have shown that the Virgin Mary’s eye has the reflection of all of the people who were present when the tilma was revealed to the Bishop Zumarraga. In 1929, Alfonso Marcue, who was the official photographer of the old Basilica of Guadalupe in Mexico City, found what seemed to him to be a clear image of a bearded man reflected in the right eye of the Virgin. Initially he did not believe what he was seeing. After many inspections of many of his black and white photographs he had no doubts and decided to inform the authorities of the Basilica. He was told that time to keep complete silence about the discovery, which he did.
More than 20 years later, on May 29th, 1951, Jose Carlos Salinas Chavez, examining a good photograph of the face, rediscovers the image of what clearly appears to be a bearded man reflected in the right eye of the Virgin, and locates it on the left eye too. Since then, many people had the opportunity to inspect closely the eyes of the Virgin on the tilma, including more than 20 physicians, ophthalmologists.
The first one, on March 27th, 1956, was Dr. Javier Torroella Bueno, MDS, a prestigious ophthalmologist. In what is the first report on the eyes of the image issued by a physician, he certifies what seems to be the presence of the triple reflection (called the “Samson-Purkinje Effect”)―which is a characteristic of all live human eyes―and states that the resulting images are located exactly where they are supposed to be according to the “Samson-Purkinje Effect”, and also that the distortion of the images agree with the curvature of the cornea.
The same year another ophthalmologist, Dr. Rafael Torrija Lavoignet, examined the eyes of the image with an ophthalmoscope in great detail. He observed the apparent human figure in the corneas of both eyes, with the location and distortion of a normal human eye and specially noted a unique appearance of the eyes: they look strangely “alive” when examined. Many other examinations by ophthalmologists have been done of the eyes of the image on the tilma after these first ones. All agree, with more or less details, with the conclusions of the ones mentioned above.
● A new and interesting kind of analysis of the eyes started in 1979, when Dr. José Aste Tonsmann―a Peruvian ophthalmologist and Ph.D. graduate from Cornell University―examined Mary’s eyes at 2,500 times magnification. This allowed him to identify in her eyes―only discernible by modern electron microscopic analysis―not only what appears to be the image of Bishop Zumarraga, but also thirteen other witnesses of the December 12th 1531 miracle reflected there. This effect of images reflected in the pupils of the eyes was not even known until modern times. It was, and still is, impossible to paint them. Dr. Tonsmann published his last studies on the eyes on the tilma in the book “El Secreto de sus Ojos”, with complete details and photographs of his work.
● Dr. Jorge Escalante Padilla, a surgical ophthalmologist considers these reflections to belong to the type which have been described by Cherney on the back surface of the cornea and by Watt & Hess at the center of the lens of the eye. Such reflections are very difficult to detect. Dr. Escalante also reported the discovery of small veins on both of the eyelids of the image. In the 1970s, a Japanese optician who was examining the eyes fainted. Upon recovering he stated: “The eyes were alive and looking at him.” [Janet Barber, Latest Scientific Findings on the Images in the Eyes, page 90]. Incredibly, when Our Lady’s eyes are exposed to light, the pupils contract. When the light is withdrawn, they return to a dilated state.
● The eyes of the Virgin have three remarkable qualities that cannot be explained through known technology in 1531. Each would be difficult to replicate even with today’s technology of computers, ophthalmologic knowledge, and digital photography. The images in the pupils also manifest the triple reflection called the Samson-Purkinje effect. This effect was completely unknown at the time of the image’s formation. The image in the eyes of the Virgin follow the curvature of the cornea precisely in the way it occurs in a normal human eye. It was found that the retinas of Mary’s eyes, like the human eye, expand and contract.
● Dr. Philip Callahan, biophysicist at the University of Florida and a NASA consultant, also discovered that the tilma―no matter what the surrounding temperature, season, or weather―remains at an even temperature of 98.6°F (36.5°C), which is the normal temperature of the human body.
● The picture was also examined with a stethoscope, at which time scientists found a heart rate of 115 to 120 beats per minute at her midsection (stomach), corresponding to a pulse rate of a fetus. Also, Dr. Carlos Fernandez del Castillo, a Mexican gynecologist, after carefully examining the tilma and the image of the pregnant Madonna concluded that the dimensions of her body were that of an expectant mother at the end of gestation.
● Prior to Our Lady of Guadalupe’s appearance to Juan Diego, in 1531, the Aztec pagan goddess Tonantzin had been worshipped for decades at the very same site, on Tepeyac Hill, which is now home to the Basilica in Mexico City. The name of the pagan goddess, Tonantzin, means “Our Mother” in the Aztec language of Nahautl, so it was fitting that our heavenly Mother came and dethroned, unseated and banished the pagan “Our Mother”.
These are just some of the unbelievable discoveries that have been made about the image.
Bloodthirsty Age
Prior the Spanish Conquest in 1521, the Aztec Empire of 1519 was the most powerful Mesoamerican kingdom of all time. The multi-ethnic, multi-lingual realm stretched for more than 80,000 square miles through many parts of what is now central and southern Mexico. This enormous empire reached from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf coast and from central Mexico to the present-day Republic of Guatemala. 15 million people, living in 38 provinces and residing in 489 communities, paid tribute to the Emperor Moctezuma II in Tenochtitlán, the capital city of the great empire.
The Aztec Empire was a construction of many city-states that they had conquered. Thus it was a mixture of different tribes and races. Back in the 15th and 16th centuries, every major Aztec city had a temple pyramid, about 100 feet high, on top of which was erected an altar. Upon this altar, the Aztec priests offered human sacrifice to their god Huitzilopochtli―called the “Lover of Hearts and Drinker of Blood”―by cutting out the beating hearts of their victims, usually adult men but often children. Considering that the Aztecs controlled 371 towns and the law required 1,000 human sacrifices for each town with a temple pyramid, over 50,000 human beings were sacrificed each year. Moreover, the early Mexican historian Ixtlilxochitl estimated that one out of every five children fell victim to this bloodthirsty religion.
In 1487, when Juan Diego was just 13 years old, he would have witnessed the most horrible event: Tlacaellel, the 89-year-old Aztec ruler, in the center of Tenochtitlan (later Mexico City), dedicated the newly built temple pyramid of the sun to the two chief gods of the Aztec pantheon Huitzilopochtli and Tezcatlipoca, (the god of hell and darkness). The temple pyramid was 100 feet high with 114 steps to reach the top. More than 80,000 men were sacrificed over a period of four days and four nights. While this number of sacrifices seems incredible, evidence indicates it took only 15 seconds to cut the heart out of each victim. (For more information, see Our Lady of Guadalupe and the Conquest of Darkness by Dr. Warren Carroll).
We live in a bloodthirsty age which sees perpetual warfare all the time somewhere around the world. America is in a state of perpetual war. The mission of perpetual war for these superpowers is to justify psychological and physical control over their populations, to keep their people busy, fearful and hateful towards the enemy. The perpetual war also serves as an excuse for a nation's failings and shortcomings. The economy, the labor force and industry are all centered around war rather than consumer goods.
War and bloodshed seems to be part of the world’s DNA. Historians estimate that of the past 3,400 years, humans have been entirely at peace for only 268 years. Since 1816 there hasn’t been a single point in time when there has not been a war somewhere in the world. Estimates for the total number killed in wars throughout all of human history range from 150 million to 1 billion (1,000 million). Today, we also live in a bloodthirsty age, where, as mentioned above, over 34 million babies are aborted on average (38 million this year). Abortion has far surpassed that top estimate of 1 billion war deaths over 3,400 years by killing 1.7 billion babies in just over 40 years―not 3,400 years!
Now, in addition to this mass murder of babies, you can add the current pharmaceutical concoctions that have recently been injected into naïve, unsuspecting, gullible guinea pigs―which has seen more than 5.55 billion people worldwide receiving a dose of the Plannedemic “one-shot-cures-all” propaganda poison―which is equal to about 72.3 percent of the world population. Dishonest reporting has masked and hidden the enormous death rates that followed in the wake this worldwide orchestrated operation. The different varieties of shots cater for different varieties of deaths over differing time lapses―some dropped dead suddenly, some later, and some are on a slower pathway to death―all of which will be blamed upon “normal” causes of death, such as heart attacks, strokes, cancers, etc. (which coincidentally happen to be the biggest causes of death anyway―very convenient!).
Relevance of Our Lady of Guadalupe for Today
Our Lady’s apparitions and their resulting consequences, even though they took place nearly 500 years ago, befuddle modern science and leave today’s scientists scratching their heads as to how all this could happen! Why has the fragile a coarse fabric made from the threads of the maguey cactus not decomposed in 15 to 40 years like all other such woven fabrics―and shows no signs of deterioration after nearly 500 years! The image on the tilma was not made by any known physical process, not painted or applied. Modern science has found no pigments or dyes causing the coloration. There is no primer to prepare the rough surface for painting, though it appears smooth and not rough like cactus fiber. There is no evidence for preliminary tracing, or even brushstrokes for that matter. How could that flimsy material withstand an explosion of 29 sticks of dynamite, when nearby stone and metal articles were destroyed or severely deformed? Why can scientists not figure out how the image came to be present on the tilma? All they can say is that they find no evidence of any kind of brush strokes or other artistic means that could have created the image! How can science explain the stars of Our Lady’s cloak being arranged in the exact formation as the constellations were lined up on December 12th, 1531? What answer do they have for the fact that 14 persons are seen reflected in the eyes of the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe? How can they explain the miraculous self-healing of the tilma when nitric acid was spilled on the fragile cloth? These are just some of the miraculous occurrences that have stumped and befuddled the modern-day god that goes by the name of Science and its high-priest practitioners, the scientists!
All in all, what we see is that Our Lady confounds science and scientific expectations. The idol of Science has become the chief cause of modern-day idolatry―just as the Aztec false gods in the 1500s were the cause of the idolatry of the people. Our Lady overcame those odds and she thereby shows us that she can overcome all that is stacked against the One True Faith today. Her tilma withstood dynamite and chemicals, she overcame the machinations of the anti-Catholic Freemasons who tried to destroy the miraculous tilma. She overthrew paganism and brought unprecedented conversions to the Catholic Faith. Her image still stands as an indestructible testimony to her power―even to this day. All of this should bring to mind Our Lady’s promises for our days: “Many will turn upon Religion … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration … This will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet … … Thus the Church and country will be finally free of his cruel tyranny! … In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!”
The Words of Our Lady of Guadalupe
The following words of Our Lady of Guadalupe could just as well be addressed to each one of us―for she is the Mother of all, and everyone is her spiritual child. As her children, we have a responsibility and an obligation to make her known, loved, served and obeyed. The temple of God that Our Lady demands to be built by the local bishop, can also be compared to the temple that she desires to build in each of our minds, hearts and souls: “Know you not, that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and that you are not your own? … If any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy, which you are!” (1 Corinthians 6:19; 3:17).
Let us then reflect on Our Lady’s words as if they were also spoken personally to each one of us:
“Juanito, dearest Juan Diego. Juanito―my least and dearest son―where are you going? Know and understand well, my dearest, littlest, and youngest son, that I am the perfect and ever Virgin Holy Mary, Mother of the True God for whom we live, of the Creator of all things, Lord of Heaven and the Earth. I wish that a little temple be erected here quickly, so I may therein I will show Him, I will exalt Him and make Him manifest.
“I will give Him to the people in all my personal love, in my compassion, in my help, in my protection―because I am your merciful mother, to you, and all the people who live united in this land, and of all the other people of different ancestries, and all the rest who love me, trust in me, invoke and confide in me. Here I will hear their weeping, their complaints and heal all their afflictions, hardships, sorrows and sufferings.
“And to bring about what my compassionate and merciful concern is trying to achieve, you must go to the residence of the Bishop of Mexico and tell him that I sent you here to show him how strongly I wish him to build me a temple here on the plain. You will report to him exactly all you have seen, admired and what you have heard.
“Know for sure I will appreciate it very much, be grateful and will reward you. And you? You will deserve very much the reward that I will give you for your fatigue, the work and trouble that my mission will cause you. Now my dearest son, you have heard my words, my command, go now and put forth your best effort!”
“Listen to me, my youngest and dearest son, know that I do not lack servants and messengers to whom I can give the task of carrying out my words, who will carry out my wishes. But it is very necessary that you plead my cause, so that with your help and through your mediation, my wishes shall be fulfilled. My youngest and dearest son, I urge and firmly order you to go to the bishop again tomorrow. Tell him in my name and make him fully understand my intention that he start work on the chapel I am requesting. Tell him again that I am the ever Virgin, Holy Mary, the Mother of God, who is sending you.”
“That is fine, my youngest and dearest son; you will return here tomorrow so that you may take the sign he asked for. Then, he will believe and no longer doubt or be suspicious of you; and know, my dear son, I shall reward your care, work and fatigue in my behalf. Go now! Tomorrow I shall be here waiting for you.”
“What is happening, dearest and youngest of my sons? Where are you going? Where are you headed? Hear me and understand well, my little son, that nothing should frighten or grieve you. Let not your heart be disturbed. Do not fear this sickness of your uncle, nor any other sickness or anguish. Am I not here, I, who am your Mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection? Am I not your health? Am I not the source of your joy? Are you not in the hollow of my mantle, in the crossing of my arms? Do you need anything more? What else do you wish? Do not grieve nor be disturbed by anything. Do not be afflicted by the illness of your uncle, who will not die of it now. Be assured that he is now cured.
“Climb, my dear son, to the top of the hill―there where you saw me and received my directions. There you will find different kinds flowers. Cut them, gather them, put them all together, then come down and bring them before me! My dear little son, this diversity of roses is the proof and the sign which you will take to the bishop. You will tell him, in my name, that he is to see in them my desire, and therefore he is to carry out my wish, my will.
“You are my ambassador, my messenger, in you I place my absolute confidence and trust. I strictly order you not to unfold your tilma or reveal its contents, until you are in his presence. You will relate to him everything very carefully: how I sent you to the top of the hill to cut and gather flowers, all you saw and marveled at in order to convince the bishop to give his support, so that he will then do what lies within his responsibility, so that my temple of God, which I requested, will be made, will be built.”
An Ambassador of Christ―A Messenger of Mary
We all know that by the Sacrament of Confirmation, we are made into Soldiers of Christ―to “fight the good fight of the Faith” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular things; so that he may please God to Whom he has engaged himself!” (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … No man can serve two masters! You cannot serve God and mammon! ... He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 6:19-24; 12:30).
God comes FIRST! Everything else must not get in the way―even family, relatives and friends: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). “He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:37).
“Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me! He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:32-39).
This Christmas, Christ will need ambassadors! Mary will need messengers! The message of Christmas must be communicated to our secular, materialistic, hedonistic, fun-seeking fellow family members, relatives and friends! Christ is not here for them―Christmas is here for Christ! It is no Familymas, Funmas, Boozemas, Partymas―but Christmas! Our Lord’s and Our Lady’s ambassadors and messengers will need to tell others what Heaven wants! “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … No man can serve two masters! You cannot serve God and mammon! ... He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 6:19-24; 12:30). We do not need to focus so much on the “altars” and “false idols” of food and drink, entertainment and fun, idle gossip and chatter―but focus on the true altar and the true reason for Christmas, lest God say to us: “I will throw down your altars, and your idols shall be broken in pieces” (Ezechiel 6:4). “Do not become idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play!’ … But with most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:7).
Will God be pleased with your Christmas this year? Stand up like Juan Diego and speak out as he did to his superior, the bishop, and tell everyone what God, Christ and Our Lady really expect from us this Christmas―and if, like Juan Diego, you have to keep repeating Heaven’s message because of initial rejection―then repeat it again and again. “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 10:32-33).
Though it is almost 500 years (492) since Our Lady of Guadalupe first appeared in Mexico in 1531, she can be said to be incredibly important to our present day and its ever-increasing crises and difficulties. In a certain sense, the state of Mexico in the early 1500s is comparable to the state of the world today. How so? Read on and see!
The pagan Aztecs, who probably originated as a nomadic tribe in northern Mexico, arrived in Mesoamerica around the beginning of the 13th century. In just a century―chiefly in the 1400s―the Aztecs built an empire in the area now called central Mexico. From their magnificent capital city, Tenochtitlan, the Aztecs emerged as the dominant force in central Mexico, developing an intricate social, political, religious and commercial organization that brought many of the region’s city-states under their control by the 15th century. The Aztecs dominated the region in the century before European contact. A small percentage of Aztecs were the rich nobility, while the rest were much poorer. The rich dominated the poor―often to the point of having them work as slaves. The Aztecs were incredibly skilled and inventive. The Aztecs were famous for their agriculture, land, art, and architecture. They developed writing skills, a calendar system and also built temples and places of worship to their pagan gods. To please their gods they sacrificed humans! They were also known for being fierce and unforgiving.
We can see some similarities with today’s world. As with the Aztec world, today’s world is becoming increasingly neo-pagan. The elitist rich “call the shots” and they are minority. Likewise, the rich dominate the poor, often having them “enslaved” by debts. Just like the Aztecs, we have become incredibly skilled and inventive―modern technology is a witness to that. The modern neo-pagan world has numerous false idols, on whose altars people ‘sacrifice’ themselves―money, power, sex, fame, drink and drugs, gluttony, fashion, sports, etc. Today’s neo-pagan world has no problems with human-sacrifice, and leaves the Aztecs way behind in numbers―for in the last 50 years since Roe vs. Wade, over 1,700 million babies have been sacrificed through abortion, which averages out at 34 million per year or over 93,000 per day.
The Conquest of the Aztecs
When the Spanish conquistadors―explorer-soldiers of the Spanish and Portuguese Empires of the 15th and 16th centuries―came to what we today know by the name of Mexico, they found a large pagan Aztec empire, which even though it boasted many talents, skills and resources, was nevertheless a pagan human sacrificing network. The same could be said of the Americas (North and South) today―they are rich, knowledgeable, talented, powerful―but they are increasingly neo-pagan, with the vast majority of Catholics no longer regularly practicing their Faith, nor believing all the teachings of the Faith. Today’s neo-pagan population is also into sacrificing humans―those humans are the babies that are butchered in the womb.
In 1519, the Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortés landed in what is now Mexico, with 500 soldiers. They were looking for gold, and the gifts from the Mexica ruler, Motecuhzoma (Montezuma), proved that gold was present. Upon arriving in Tenochtitlan, Cortés took Motecuhzoma prisoner and attempted to rule on his behalf, but this did not go well, and Cortés fled the city in June of 1520. The Spanish conquistadors then laid siege to the Aztec capital from the middle of May of 1521 until the Aztecs finally surrendered on August 13th, 1521.
Even though Cortés conquered the country for Spain, he was not lacking in zeal for the evangelization of the Aztecs. In 1524 he obtained the arrival of twelve Franciscans to Mexico. These missionaries quickly integrated into the population. Their goodness contrasted with the harshness of the Aztec priests, as well as that of some conquistadors. They began to build churches. However, the Indians were reluctant to accept Baptism, primarily because it would require them to abandon polygamy. In those 10 years since the conquest (or 7 years from the time of the arrival of the Franciscans) there were relatively few conversions.
However, all that changed after the apparitions of Our Lady of Guadalupe! When the Indians had learned the news of Our Lady's apparitions, an enthusiasm and joy such as had never been seen before spread among them. Renouncing their idols, superstitions, human sacrifices, and polygamy, many asked to be baptized. Nine years after the apparitions, nine million Indians had converted to the Christian faith—nearly 3,000 a day! The details of the Image of Mary moved the Indians deeply—this woman is greater than the sun-god since she appears standing before the sun. She surpasses the moon god since she keeps the moon under her feet. She is no longer of this world since she is surrounded by clouds and is held above the world by an angel. Her folded hands show her in prayer, which means that there is Someone Who is greater than she.
Our Lady of Guadalupe Fought at Lepanto
After Our Lady of Guadalupe’s apparitions in Mexico and the resulting miraculous numbers of conversions, copies of the holy image had been circulated throughout Europe. Admiral Giovanni Andrea Doria―the illegitimate brother of Spanish King Philip II, who gave him the naval appointment―commanded the naval fleet at Lepanto in 1571 (40 years after Our Lady appeared in Mexico). He had been given one of these copies of the holy image of Our Lady of Guadalupe. The young admiral took the picture aboard his flagship when he assumed command of a flotilla of ships sailing from Genoa to the Gulf of Lepanto. The Battle of Lepanto was fought on October 7th, 1571, and it is said that during the battle, “Doria went to his cabin and knelt in prayer before the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe.” Prior to the battle, Pope Pius V had encouraged everyone to pray the Rosary, and many of the sailors prayed the Rosary the night before. Miraculously, the Christian fleet was victorious and many believed it was due to the protection of the Virgin Mary. After the battle was won, King Philip II of Spain, knowing his debt to the Blessed Virgin, offered to Our Lady of Guadalupe (in Spain) a lantern captured from the Turk’s flagship.
Our Lady of Miracles
Our Lady continues to astound to this very day with the miracles wrought back in 1531―especially with regard to the miraculous impact upon the tilma (cloak) of Juan Diego, the 57-year old recent convert to whom she appeared. What are the miracles of the tilma? The tilma defies the efforts of science to explain its creation, its survival, or its details.
Regarding Its Creation:
● No method of art or technology has been identified that could have produced the image.
● Like the Shroud of Turin, it is most like a photograph – the Shroud a negative image, the Tilma a positive image.
Regarding Its Survival:
● The material of the tilma― a coarse fabric made from the threads of the maguey cactus―has maintained its chemical and structural integrity for almost 500 years. This is quite remarkable! Most replicas of tilmas―with the same chemical and structural composition―last only fifteen years before decomposition and 40 years at the most. Nobody has been able to recreate it. Over the course of 500 years, many have tried and failed.
● For its first 115 years, the tilma was displayed without protective glass―it was exposed unprotected, uncovered to the heat, humidity, and sunlight of the church where it was displayed, as well as the veneration of the people. This subjected it to soot, candle wax, incense, and touching. There is currently no scientific explanation for its physical and chemical longevity―with no deterioration whatsoever occurring to the tilma.
● There are several parts of the cloth which have been painted on some time after the original image was created. These parts include the moon underneath the Virgin’s feet, the angel holding the cloth, and the rays coming from the image. The original image of the Virgin herself, however, does not appear to have been painted by an artist. There is no sketch underneath it, no brush strokes, and no corrections. It appears to have been produced in a single step. There are no animal or mineral pigments on the tilma. These would have been present had the image on the tilma been painted. The pigments that were available in the time and in that area would have faded by now, and yet the image hasn’t faded. These features were identified through scientific testing conducted by Dr. Philip Callahan, who was a biophysicist at the University of Florida, and a NASA consultant. He photographed the image under infrared light, and published his findings in 1981 in a paper called “The Tilma under Infrared Radiation.” Dr. Callahan also noted that the original image on the tilma had not cracked, flaked, or decayed in nearly 500 years―but the added paint and gold leaf had flaked or deteriorated considerably. This phenomenon has still not yet been scientifically explained.
● The color in Mary’s skin changes depending on one’s distance to the image. The further you are, the darker her skin tone and the more she resembles an Aztec princess. The closer you get, the lighter her skin tone and the more she appears as a young Jewish girl.
● In 1791, a worker accidentally spilled an acidic solution (nitric acid) on the tilma while cleaning the glass. While that part of the very thin and fragile tilma should have been destroyed, the stain inexplicably disappeared, the image miraculously self-restored and repaired itself within the next 30 days―with no external aid.
● Anti-Catholic Masons tried to blow up the tilma in 1921 with 29 sticks of dynamite, which shattered everything around for 150 feet, damaged the altar and bent a brass crucifix upon it and even shattered windows in other buildings. As for the fragile and unprotected, it survived with Our Lady’s image, and the ‘fragile’ cloak, perfectly intact.
Regarding Its Details:
● Modern scientific research has calculated that the position of the stars on the image conform to the constellations as they were on December 12th, 1521, when the image was created. In 1983 Dr. Juan Homero Hernandez and Fr. Mario Rojas Sánchez discovered that the stars on the image correspond precisely to the constellations of the winter sky on December 12th, 1531. Incredibly, the constellations are shown as viewed from outside the heavens, in other words in reverse.
● The head of the Blessed Virgin on the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe is tilted at 23.5 degrees – the same degree of inclination as the Earth on its axis of rotation. The existence of life on Earth is credited to this level of tilt; and the birth of Jesus is from Our Lady.
● Recent investigations over the last 100 years or so, have shown that the Virgin Mary’s eye has the reflection of all of the people who were present when the tilma was revealed to the Bishop Zumarraga. In 1929, Alfonso Marcue, who was the official photographer of the old Basilica of Guadalupe in Mexico City, found what seemed to him to be a clear image of a bearded man reflected in the right eye of the Virgin. Initially he did not believe what he was seeing. After many inspections of many of his black and white photographs he had no doubts and decided to inform the authorities of the Basilica. He was told that time to keep complete silence about the discovery, which he did.
More than 20 years later, on May 29th, 1951, Jose Carlos Salinas Chavez, examining a good photograph of the face, rediscovers the image of what clearly appears to be a bearded man reflected in the right eye of the Virgin, and locates it on the left eye too. Since then, many people had the opportunity to inspect closely the eyes of the Virgin on the tilma, including more than 20 physicians, ophthalmologists.
The first one, on March 27th, 1956, was Dr. Javier Torroella Bueno, MDS, a prestigious ophthalmologist. In what is the first report on the eyes of the image issued by a physician, he certifies what seems to be the presence of the triple reflection (called the “Samson-Purkinje Effect”)―which is a characteristic of all live human eyes―and states that the resulting images are located exactly where they are supposed to be according to the “Samson-Purkinje Effect”, and also that the distortion of the images agree with the curvature of the cornea.
The same year another ophthalmologist, Dr. Rafael Torrija Lavoignet, examined the eyes of the image with an ophthalmoscope in great detail. He observed the apparent human figure in the corneas of both eyes, with the location and distortion of a normal human eye and specially noted a unique appearance of the eyes: they look strangely “alive” when examined. Many other examinations by ophthalmologists have been done of the eyes of the image on the tilma after these first ones. All agree, with more or less details, with the conclusions of the ones mentioned above.
● A new and interesting kind of analysis of the eyes started in 1979, when Dr. José Aste Tonsmann―a Peruvian ophthalmologist and Ph.D. graduate from Cornell University―examined Mary’s eyes at 2,500 times magnification. This allowed him to identify in her eyes―only discernible by modern electron microscopic analysis―not only what appears to be the image of Bishop Zumarraga, but also thirteen other witnesses of the December 12th 1531 miracle reflected there. This effect of images reflected in the pupils of the eyes was not even known until modern times. It was, and still is, impossible to paint them. Dr. Tonsmann published his last studies on the eyes on the tilma in the book “El Secreto de sus Ojos”, with complete details and photographs of his work.
● Dr. Jorge Escalante Padilla, a surgical ophthalmologist considers these reflections to belong to the type which have been described by Cherney on the back surface of the cornea and by Watt & Hess at the center of the lens of the eye. Such reflections are very difficult to detect. Dr. Escalante also reported the discovery of small veins on both of the eyelids of the image. In the 1970s, a Japanese optician who was examining the eyes fainted. Upon recovering he stated: “The eyes were alive and looking at him.” [Janet Barber, Latest Scientific Findings on the Images in the Eyes, page 90]. Incredibly, when Our Lady’s eyes are exposed to light, the pupils contract. When the light is withdrawn, they return to a dilated state.
● The eyes of the Virgin have three remarkable qualities that cannot be explained through known technology in 1531. Each would be difficult to replicate even with today’s technology of computers, ophthalmologic knowledge, and digital photography. The images in the pupils also manifest the triple reflection called the Samson-Purkinje effect. This effect was completely unknown at the time of the image’s formation. The image in the eyes of the Virgin follow the curvature of the cornea precisely in the way it occurs in a normal human eye. It was found that the retinas of Mary’s eyes, like the human eye, expand and contract.
● Dr. Philip Callahan, biophysicist at the University of Florida and a NASA consultant, also discovered that the tilma―no matter what the surrounding temperature, season, or weather―remains at an even temperature of 98.6°F (36.5°C), which is the normal temperature of the human body.
● The picture was also examined with a stethoscope, at which time scientists found a heart rate of 115 to 120 beats per minute at her midsection (stomach), corresponding to a pulse rate of a fetus. Also, Dr. Carlos Fernandez del Castillo, a Mexican gynecologist, after carefully examining the tilma and the image of the pregnant Madonna concluded that the dimensions of her body were that of an expectant mother at the end of gestation.
● Prior to Our Lady of Guadalupe’s appearance to Juan Diego, in 1531, the Aztec pagan goddess Tonantzin had been worshipped for decades at the very same site, on Tepeyac Hill, which is now home to the Basilica in Mexico City. The name of the pagan goddess, Tonantzin, means “Our Mother” in the Aztec language of Nahautl, so it was fitting that our heavenly Mother came and dethroned, unseated and banished the pagan “Our Mother”.
These are just some of the unbelievable discoveries that have been made about the image.
Bloodthirsty Age
Prior the Spanish Conquest in 1521, the Aztec Empire of 1519 was the most powerful Mesoamerican kingdom of all time. The multi-ethnic, multi-lingual realm stretched for more than 80,000 square miles through many parts of what is now central and southern Mexico. This enormous empire reached from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf coast and from central Mexico to the present-day Republic of Guatemala. 15 million people, living in 38 provinces and residing in 489 communities, paid tribute to the Emperor Moctezuma II in Tenochtitlán, the capital city of the great empire.
The Aztec Empire was a construction of many city-states that they had conquered. Thus it was a mixture of different tribes and races. Back in the 15th and 16th centuries, every major Aztec city had a temple pyramid, about 100 feet high, on top of which was erected an altar. Upon this altar, the Aztec priests offered human sacrifice to their god Huitzilopochtli―called the “Lover of Hearts and Drinker of Blood”―by cutting out the beating hearts of their victims, usually adult men but often children. Considering that the Aztecs controlled 371 towns and the law required 1,000 human sacrifices for each town with a temple pyramid, over 50,000 human beings were sacrificed each year. Moreover, the early Mexican historian Ixtlilxochitl estimated that one out of every five children fell victim to this bloodthirsty religion.
In 1487, when Juan Diego was just 13 years old, he would have witnessed the most horrible event: Tlacaellel, the 89-year-old Aztec ruler, in the center of Tenochtitlan (later Mexico City), dedicated the newly built temple pyramid of the sun to the two chief gods of the Aztec pantheon Huitzilopochtli and Tezcatlipoca, (the god of hell and darkness). The temple pyramid was 100 feet high with 114 steps to reach the top. More than 80,000 men were sacrificed over a period of four days and four nights. While this number of sacrifices seems incredible, evidence indicates it took only 15 seconds to cut the heart out of each victim. (For more information, see Our Lady of Guadalupe and the Conquest of Darkness by Dr. Warren Carroll).
We live in a bloodthirsty age which sees perpetual warfare all the time somewhere around the world. America is in a state of perpetual war. The mission of perpetual war for these superpowers is to justify psychological and physical control over their populations, to keep their people busy, fearful and hateful towards the enemy. The perpetual war also serves as an excuse for a nation's failings and shortcomings. The economy, the labor force and industry are all centered around war rather than consumer goods.
War and bloodshed seems to be part of the world’s DNA. Historians estimate that of the past 3,400 years, humans have been entirely at peace for only 268 years. Since 1816 there hasn’t been a single point in time when there has not been a war somewhere in the world. Estimates for the total number killed in wars throughout all of human history range from 150 million to 1 billion (1,000 million). Today, we also live in a bloodthirsty age, where, as mentioned above, over 34 million babies are aborted on average (38 million this year). Abortion has far surpassed that top estimate of 1 billion war deaths over 3,400 years by killing 1.7 billion babies in just over 40 years―not 3,400 years!
Now, in addition to this mass murder of babies, you can add the current pharmaceutical concoctions that have recently been injected into naïve, unsuspecting, gullible guinea pigs―which has seen more than 5.55 billion people worldwide receiving a dose of the Plannedemic “one-shot-cures-all” propaganda poison―which is equal to about 72.3 percent of the world population. Dishonest reporting has masked and hidden the enormous death rates that followed in the wake this worldwide orchestrated operation. The different varieties of shots cater for different varieties of deaths over differing time lapses―some dropped dead suddenly, some later, and some are on a slower pathway to death―all of which will be blamed upon “normal” causes of death, such as heart attacks, strokes, cancers, etc. (which coincidentally happen to be the biggest causes of death anyway―very convenient!).
Relevance of Our Lady of Guadalupe for Today
Our Lady’s apparitions and their resulting consequences, even though they took place nearly 500 years ago, befuddle modern science and leave today’s scientists scratching their heads as to how all this could happen! Why has the fragile a coarse fabric made from the threads of the maguey cactus not decomposed in 15 to 40 years like all other such woven fabrics―and shows no signs of deterioration after nearly 500 years! The image on the tilma was not made by any known physical process, not painted or applied. Modern science has found no pigments or dyes causing the coloration. There is no primer to prepare the rough surface for painting, though it appears smooth and not rough like cactus fiber. There is no evidence for preliminary tracing, or even brushstrokes for that matter. How could that flimsy material withstand an explosion of 29 sticks of dynamite, when nearby stone and metal articles were destroyed or severely deformed? Why can scientists not figure out how the image came to be present on the tilma? All they can say is that they find no evidence of any kind of brush strokes or other artistic means that could have created the image! How can science explain the stars of Our Lady’s cloak being arranged in the exact formation as the constellations were lined up on December 12th, 1531? What answer do they have for the fact that 14 persons are seen reflected in the eyes of the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe? How can they explain the miraculous self-healing of the tilma when nitric acid was spilled on the fragile cloth? These are just some of the miraculous occurrences that have stumped and befuddled the modern-day god that goes by the name of Science and its high-priest practitioners, the scientists!
All in all, what we see is that Our Lady confounds science and scientific expectations. The idol of Science has become the chief cause of modern-day idolatry―just as the Aztec false gods in the 1500s were the cause of the idolatry of the people. Our Lady overcame those odds and she thereby shows us that she can overcome all that is stacked against the One True Faith today. Her tilma withstood dynamite and chemicals, she overcame the machinations of the anti-Catholic Freemasons who tried to destroy the miraculous tilma. She overthrew paganism and brought unprecedented conversions to the Catholic Faith. Her image still stands as an indestructible testimony to her power―even to this day. All of this should bring to mind Our Lady’s promises for our days: “Many will turn upon Religion … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration … This will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet … … Thus the Church and country will be finally free of his cruel tyranny! … In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!”
The Words of Our Lady of Guadalupe
The following words of Our Lady of Guadalupe could just as well be addressed to each one of us―for she is the Mother of all, and everyone is her spiritual child. As her children, we have a responsibility and an obligation to make her known, loved, served and obeyed. The temple of God that Our Lady demands to be built by the local bishop, can also be compared to the temple that she desires to build in each of our minds, hearts and souls: “Know you not, that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost, Who is in you, Whom you have from God; and that you are not your own? … If any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy, which you are!” (1 Corinthians 6:19; 3:17).
Let us then reflect on Our Lady’s words as if they were also spoken personally to each one of us:
“Juanito, dearest Juan Diego. Juanito―my least and dearest son―where are you going? Know and understand well, my dearest, littlest, and youngest son, that I am the perfect and ever Virgin Holy Mary, Mother of the True God for whom we live, of the Creator of all things, Lord of Heaven and the Earth. I wish that a little temple be erected here quickly, so I may therein I will show Him, I will exalt Him and make Him manifest.
“I will give Him to the people in all my personal love, in my compassion, in my help, in my protection―because I am your merciful mother, to you, and all the people who live united in this land, and of all the other people of different ancestries, and all the rest who love me, trust in me, invoke and confide in me. Here I will hear their weeping, their complaints and heal all their afflictions, hardships, sorrows and sufferings.
“And to bring about what my compassionate and merciful concern is trying to achieve, you must go to the residence of the Bishop of Mexico and tell him that I sent you here to show him how strongly I wish him to build me a temple here on the plain. You will report to him exactly all you have seen, admired and what you have heard.
“Know for sure I will appreciate it very much, be grateful and will reward you. And you? You will deserve very much the reward that I will give you for your fatigue, the work and trouble that my mission will cause you. Now my dearest son, you have heard my words, my command, go now and put forth your best effort!”
“Listen to me, my youngest and dearest son, know that I do not lack servants and messengers to whom I can give the task of carrying out my words, who will carry out my wishes. But it is very necessary that you plead my cause, so that with your help and through your mediation, my wishes shall be fulfilled. My youngest and dearest son, I urge and firmly order you to go to the bishop again tomorrow. Tell him in my name and make him fully understand my intention that he start work on the chapel I am requesting. Tell him again that I am the ever Virgin, Holy Mary, the Mother of God, who is sending you.”
“That is fine, my youngest and dearest son; you will return here tomorrow so that you may take the sign he asked for. Then, he will believe and no longer doubt or be suspicious of you; and know, my dear son, I shall reward your care, work and fatigue in my behalf. Go now! Tomorrow I shall be here waiting for you.”
“What is happening, dearest and youngest of my sons? Where are you going? Where are you headed? Hear me and understand well, my little son, that nothing should frighten or grieve you. Let not your heart be disturbed. Do not fear this sickness of your uncle, nor any other sickness or anguish. Am I not here, I, who am your Mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection? Am I not your health? Am I not the source of your joy? Are you not in the hollow of my mantle, in the crossing of my arms? Do you need anything more? What else do you wish? Do not grieve nor be disturbed by anything. Do not be afflicted by the illness of your uncle, who will not die of it now. Be assured that he is now cured.
“Climb, my dear son, to the top of the hill―there where you saw me and received my directions. There you will find different kinds flowers. Cut them, gather them, put them all together, then come down and bring them before me! My dear little son, this diversity of roses is the proof and the sign which you will take to the bishop. You will tell him, in my name, that he is to see in them my desire, and therefore he is to carry out my wish, my will.
“You are my ambassador, my messenger, in you I place my absolute confidence and trust. I strictly order you not to unfold your tilma or reveal its contents, until you are in his presence. You will relate to him everything very carefully: how I sent you to the top of the hill to cut and gather flowers, all you saw and marveled at in order to convince the bishop to give his support, so that he will then do what lies within his responsibility, so that my temple of God, which I requested, will be made, will be built.”
An Ambassador of Christ―A Messenger of Mary
We all know that by the Sacrament of Confirmation, we are made into Soldiers of Christ―to “fight the good fight of the Faith” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No man, being a soldier to God, entangles himself with secular things; so that he may please God to Whom he has engaged himself!” (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … No man can serve two masters! You cannot serve God and mammon! ... He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 6:19-24; 12:30).
God comes FIRST! Everything else must not get in the way―even family, relatives and friends: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). “He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:37).
“Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven! Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law! And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household! He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me! He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:32-39).
This Christmas, Christ will need ambassadors! Mary will need messengers! The message of Christmas must be communicated to our secular, materialistic, hedonistic, fun-seeking fellow family members, relatives and friends! Christ is not here for them―Christmas is here for Christ! It is no Familymas, Funmas, Boozemas, Partymas―but Christmas! Our Lord’s and Our Lady’s ambassadors and messengers will need to tell others what Heaven wants! “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … No man can serve two masters! You cannot serve God and mammon! ... He that is not with Me, is against Me!” (Matthew 6:19-24; 12:30). We do not need to focus so much on the “altars” and “false idols” of food and drink, entertainment and fun, idle gossip and chatter―but focus on the true altar and the true reason for Christmas, lest God say to us: “I will throw down your altars, and your idols shall be broken in pieces” (Ezechiel 6:4). “Do not become idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play!’ … But with most of them God was not well pleased!” (1 Corinthians 10:7).
Will God be pleased with your Christmas this year? Stand up like Juan Diego and speak out as he did to his superior, the bishop, and tell everyone what God, Christ and Our Lady really expect from us this Christmas―and if, like Juan Diego, you have to keep repeating Heaven’s message because of initial rejection―then repeat it again and again. “Everyone therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father Who is in Heaven! But he that shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father Who is in Heaven!” (Matthew 10:32-33).
Article 6
Saturday December 9th & Sunday December 10th
Our Lady of the Closet?
Saturday December 9th & Sunday December 10th
Our Lady of the Closet?
Our Lady of What?
There are some unusual titles of Our Lady such as Our Lady of the Milk, or Loom of the Incarnation, or The Lord’s Robe, or Undoer of Knots―but what on earth is Our Lady of the Closet? You could say that Our Lady of the Closet is a “tongue-in-cheek” title that is meant to describe how we treat Our Lady―but as you shall see, it could also be a truthful, realistic and totally acceptable and applicable title in view of the meaning of the word “closet” and which of its various meanings you take!
So, before proceeding further, what does the word “closet” really mean? The various dictionaries will give you definitions of “closet” along the following lines: (1) an apartment or chamber or small room for privacy; (2) a monarch’s or official’s private chamber; (3) a place of retreat or privacy; (4) a small private room, especially one used for prayer, meditation, etc.; (5) a small room, enclosed recess, or cabinet for storing clothing, small items of furniture, food, utensils, china, etc.; (6) tall piece of furniture that provides storage space for clothes. The origins of the word “closet” come from the from the Latin verb “claudere” and its derivative “clausum” meaning “to shut, closed” ― which later became the Middle-English “closet”, from Old French “closet”, and “clos” (“private space”). Thus we have the words “enclosures, enclosed religious orders, enclosed in the womb, etc.”
So―as you can well see―Our Lady of the Closet could be something positive, good and wholesome, or it could be something negative, bad and insulting. On the positive side―Our Lady of the Closet could signify a small room, a place of retreat and privacy where we retire to pray and meditate on Our Lady. Whereas on the negative side―Our Lady of the Closet could be a derogatory phrase that indicates that Our Lady comes out of the enclosed cabinet for her major feast days, but is then stuffed back in the closet (or the closet of our minds) immediately afterwards.
We see Our Lord allude to this idea of a closet or chamber when He says: “When thou shalt pray, enter into thy chamber, and having shut the door, pray to thy Father in secret―and thy Father, Who sees in secret, will repay thee!” (Matthew 6:6). Our Lord would often go to pray alone: “He went into a mountain alone to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23). “Rising very early, going out, he went into a desert place and there He prayed” (Mark 1:35). “He retired into the desert and prayed” (Luke 5:16). “He went out into a mountain to pray, and He passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12). “He was alone praying” (Luke 9:18). “Then Jesus came with them into a country place which is called Gethsemane; and He said to His disciples: ‘Sit you here, till I go yonder and pray!’ … Then taking with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee [James and John], He said to them: ‘Stay you here!’ And He was withdrawn away from them a stone’s cast; and kneeling down, He fell upon His face, praying” (Matthew 26:36-39; Luke 22:41).
Closet Catholics
There are different kinds of “Closet Catholics”. One kind is someone that secretly believes in the Catholic Faith, but does not officially convert to it. Another kind is the Catholic who only occasionally professes or lives the Faith―usually the pretending or superficial “Sunday Catholic” who then reverts to being a “Worldly Catholic” for the rest of the week. Yet another kind is the “Occasional Catholic” who will usually be seen in church only on Christmas and Easter and for marriages and baptisms. Still another kind of “Closet Catholic” is the Catholic who hides his Catholic Faith out of embarrassment or fear of being ridiculed or persecuted. Yet another kind is the “Part-Time Catholic” who will do certain Catholics things for the sake of “show” or “general custom” ― such as having religious articles at home, or praying the Rosary occasionally, but who will remove all traces of Catholicity when certain non-Catholic friends or relatives come visiting.
There are some unusual titles of Our Lady such as Our Lady of the Milk, or Loom of the Incarnation, or The Lord’s Robe, or Undoer of Knots―but what on earth is Our Lady of the Closet? You could say that Our Lady of the Closet is a “tongue-in-cheek” title that is meant to describe how we treat Our Lady―but as you shall see, it could also be a truthful, realistic and totally acceptable and applicable title in view of the meaning of the word “closet” and which of its various meanings you take!
So, before proceeding further, what does the word “closet” really mean? The various dictionaries will give you definitions of “closet” along the following lines: (1) an apartment or chamber or small room for privacy; (2) a monarch’s or official’s private chamber; (3) a place of retreat or privacy; (4) a small private room, especially one used for prayer, meditation, etc.; (5) a small room, enclosed recess, or cabinet for storing clothing, small items of furniture, food, utensils, china, etc.; (6) tall piece of furniture that provides storage space for clothes. The origins of the word “closet” come from the from the Latin verb “claudere” and its derivative “clausum” meaning “to shut, closed” ― which later became the Middle-English “closet”, from Old French “closet”, and “clos” (“private space”). Thus we have the words “enclosures, enclosed religious orders, enclosed in the womb, etc.”
So―as you can well see―Our Lady of the Closet could be something positive, good and wholesome, or it could be something negative, bad and insulting. On the positive side―Our Lady of the Closet could signify a small room, a place of retreat and privacy where we retire to pray and meditate on Our Lady. Whereas on the negative side―Our Lady of the Closet could be a derogatory phrase that indicates that Our Lady comes out of the enclosed cabinet for her major feast days, but is then stuffed back in the closet (or the closet of our minds) immediately afterwards.
We see Our Lord allude to this idea of a closet or chamber when He says: “When thou shalt pray, enter into thy chamber, and having shut the door, pray to thy Father in secret―and thy Father, Who sees in secret, will repay thee!” (Matthew 6:6). Our Lord would often go to pray alone: “He went into a mountain alone to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23). “Rising very early, going out, he went into a desert place and there He prayed” (Mark 1:35). “He retired into the desert and prayed” (Luke 5:16). “He went out into a mountain to pray, and He passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12). “He was alone praying” (Luke 9:18). “Then Jesus came with them into a country place which is called Gethsemane; and He said to His disciples: ‘Sit you here, till I go yonder and pray!’ … Then taking with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee [James and John], He said to them: ‘Stay you here!’ And He was withdrawn away from them a stone’s cast; and kneeling down, He fell upon His face, praying” (Matthew 26:36-39; Luke 22:41).
Closet Catholics
There are different kinds of “Closet Catholics”. One kind is someone that secretly believes in the Catholic Faith, but does not officially convert to it. Another kind is the Catholic who only occasionally professes or lives the Faith―usually the pretending or superficial “Sunday Catholic” who then reverts to being a “Worldly Catholic” for the rest of the week. Yet another kind is the “Occasional Catholic” who will usually be seen in church only on Christmas and Easter and for marriages and baptisms. Still another kind of “Closet Catholic” is the Catholic who hides his Catholic Faith out of embarrassment or fear of being ridiculed or persecuted. Yet another kind is the “Part-Time Catholic” who will do certain Catholics things for the sake of “show” or “general custom” ― such as having religious articles at home, or praying the Rosary occasionally, but who will remove all traces of Catholicity when certain non-Catholic friends or relatives come visiting.
Article 5
Friday December 8th, Feast of the Immaculate Conception
Make it an Immaculate Day!
Friday December 8th, Feast of the Immaculate Conception
Make it an Immaculate Day!
You Have an Immaculate Mother
In his encyclical, Ineffabilis Deus, of December 8th, 1854, Blessed Pope Pius IX pronounced and enforced the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary: “Wherefore, in humility and fasting, we unceasingly offered our private prayers as well as the public prayers of the Church to God the Father, through His Son, that He would deign to direct and strengthen our mind by the power of the Holy Spirit. In like manner did we implore the help of the entire heavenly host as we ardently invoked the Paraclete. Accordingly, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, for the honor of the Holy and undivided Trinity, for the glory and adornment of the Virgin Mother of God, for the exaltation of the Catholic Faith, and for the furtherance of the Catholic religion, by the authority of Jesus Christ our Lord, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own: ‘We declare, pronounce, and define that the doctrine which holds that the most Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instance of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege granted by Almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of Original Sin, is a doctrine revealed by God and therefore to be believed firmly and constantly by all the faithful.’” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854).
Habemus Matrem
If at the election of a pope, we can shout “Habemus papam!” meaning “we have a pope (‘father’)”, then, in regard to this dogmatic declaration, we can shout “Habemus Matrem—Habemus Matrem Immaculatam”, meaning “We have a Mother—an Immaculate Mother!” Even more than the pope is called the Holy Father, Our Lady is the Holiest of mothers.
Immaculate Mary needs Immaculate Children
We all know the saying: “Like father, like son!” or “Like mother, like daughter!” or “He takes after his father!” and “She’s just like her mother!” Our Lord and Our Lady—the new Adam and Eve—want us to imitate them and Heaven. Of Our Lady, it can be said: “I am clean, and without sin: I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me” (Job 33:9) .... “My word is pure, and I am clean in thy sight” (Job 11:4). “I am without sin and am innocent” (Jeremias 2:35). We became her spiritual children at the foot of the Cross, and so we should take on the traits of our spiritual Mother. Children imitate their parents.
Jesus said: “Learn of Me…!” (Matthew 11:29) … “If you love Me, keep My Commandments” (John 14:15) … “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48) … “I am the Lord your God: be holy because I am holy” (Leviticus 11:44) … “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine” (Leviticus 20:26). St. Peter repeats that command in the New Testament: “According to Him that hath called you, Who is holy, be you also in all manner of conversation holy, because it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy’” (1 Peter 1:15-16).
Heaven is Only for the Immaculate of Heart
Only saints go to Heaven, that is the pedigree of the New Adam and Eve—we have to be immaculate to enter therein: “There shall not enter into it anything defiled” (Apocalypse 27:21). We have to be wholly holy, or “Holy, Holy, Holy” as we say in the Sanctus at Mass—which, incidentally, should remind of the three ever-increasing stages of holiness that we have to pass through: as beginners in holiness, (2) as proficients in holiness, and (3) as perfect in holiness. Purgatory will be necessary for even the slightest stains of sin or smallest unpaid debts for previously forgiven sin. For, as it was said above, God detests sin. “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8).
“For the Highest hateth sinners, and hath mercy on the penitent” (Ecclesiasticus 12:3). “Six things there are, which the Lord hateth, and the seventh His soul detesteth: (1) Haughty eyes, (2) a lying tongue, (3) hands that shed innocent blood, (4) heart that deviseth wicked plots, (5) feet that are swift to run into mischief, (6) deceitful witness that uttereth lies, and (7) him that soweth discord among brethren” (Proverbs 6:16-19). “I hate arrogance, and pride, and every wicked way, and a mouth with a double tongue” (Proverbs 8:13).
We Need to Clean Up Our Act
God never changes and His demands for holiness never change. In the Old Testament it says: “Turn away from evil and do good” (Psalms 33:15); and St. Peter repeats the same in the New Testament: “Let him decline from evil, and do good” (1 Peter 3:11). Our Lady even echoes this today, for at Fatima she said: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended.”
However, Sr. Lucia tells us that: “the Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.”
St. Paul clearly tells us: “Let no sin therefore reign in your mortal body” (Romans 6:12). Not even the slightest Venial Sin, for that still separates us from God and has to paid for—either here or in Purgatory, as Our Lord says: “Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing” (Matthew 5:26).
“Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8). But “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness” (Matthew 23:25).
Detesting Sin and Worldliness
One of the chief contributors to the deluge of sin in the world today is the absence of a fear of God and a fear of offending God. This is there has to be a terrible, frightening chastisement—in order to re-establish the foundation of fear. Fear is essential, even when we love God—it is the foundation of the spiritual life. It is even one of the Gifts of the Holy Ghost—a Fear of the Lord. As Holy Scripture says: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalms 110:10). “The fear of God is the beginning of His love” (Ecclesiasticus 25:16). “The fear of the Lord drives out sin” (Ecclesiasticus 1:27). “The fear of the Lord hates evil” (Proverbs 8:13). “The Lord hates all abomination of error, and they that fear Him shall not love it” (Ecclesiasticus 15:13). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5).
“Neither shalt thou bring anything of the idol into thy house, lest thou become an anathema, like it. Thou shalt detest it as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth, because it is an anathema” (Deuteronomy 7:26). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
This detestation of the spirit of the world and of the ways of the world is absolutely essential if we are clean house and clean-up our act. The source of sin has to be stopped, like a leak in a boat, or the boat (soul) will sink. Once the incoming flow of sin has been dealt, then we can deal with the flooded basement (soul) and start pumping the bilge out.
Grace Cleans and Beautifies
We say of Our Lady: “Hail, full of grace!” Grace perfects our human nature, it heals the wounds of sin, it strengthens our weaknesses, it pushes us on to higher heights. St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this cleaning of soul and the role of grace in his Secret of Mary, saying:
“It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say ‘not in the same measure,’ because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary).
To find the Grace of God, we must discover Mary
St. Louis continues: “It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.
“I explain;
(1) Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person (Luke 1:30). No patriarch nor prophet nor any other holy person of the Old Law could manage to find this grace;
(2) It was Mary who gave existence and life to the author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the “Mother of Grace.”
(3) God the Father, from Whom, as from its essential source, every perfect gift and every grace come down to us (James 1:17), gave her every grace when He gave her His Son. Thus, as St. Bernard says, the will of God is manifested to her in Jesus and with Jesus.
(4) God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands. Such is the power that she has received from Him that, according to St. Bernardine, she gives the graces of the eternal Father, the virtues of Jesus Christ, and the gifts of the Holy Ghost to whom she wills, as and when she wills, and as much as she wills.
(5) As in the natural life a child must have a father and a mother, so in the supernatural life of grace a true child of the Church must have God for his Father and Mary for his mother. If he prides himself on having God for his Father, but does not give Mary the tender affection of a true child, he is an imposter and his father is the devil.
(6) Since Mary produced the head of the elect, Jesus Christ, she must also produce the members of that head, that is, all true Christians. A mother does not conceive a head without members, nor members without a head. If anyone, then, wishes to become a member of Jesus Christ, and consequently be filled with grace and truth, (John 1:14), he must be formed in Mary through the grace of Jesus Christ, which she possesses with a fullness enabling her to communicate it abundantly to true members of Jesus Christ, her true children.
(7) The Holy Ghost espoused Mary and produced His greatest work, the incarnate Word, in her, by her and through her. He has never disowned her and so He continues to produce every day, in a mysterious but very real manner, the souls of the elect in her and through her.
(8) Mary received, from God, a unique dominion over souls, enabling her to nourish them and make them more and more godlike. St. Augustine went so far as to say that, even in this world, all the elect are enclosed in the womb of Mary, and that their real birthday is when this good mother brings them forth to eternal life. Consequently, just as an infant draws all its nourishment from its mother, who gives according to its needs, so the elect draw all their spiritual nourishment and all their strength from Mary.
(9) It was to Mary that God the Father said, ‘Dwell in Jacob’ (Ecclesiasticus 24:8, 12) that is, dwell in My elect, who are typified by Jacob. It was to Mary that God the Son said, “My dear Mother, your inheritance is in Israel,” that is, in the elect. It was to Mary that the Holy Ghost said, “Place your roots in My elect.” Whoever, then, is of the chosen and predestinate, will have the Blessed Virgin living within him, and he will let her plant in his very soul the roots of every virtue, but especially deep humility and ardent charity.
(10) Mary is called by St. Augustine, and is indeed, the ‘living mold of God.’ In her alone the God-man was formed in His human nature without losing any feature of the Godhead. In her alone, by the grace of Jesus Christ, man is made godlike as far as human nature is capable of it” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary).
No Better Day to Start!
There is no better day than the feast of the Immaculate Conception to “clean-up” your attitude, devotion and dependence upon the Blessed Virgin Mary! The first thing you need is humility―for, as the saints say, it was Our Lady’s humility that was the foundation and reason why God showered her with so many graces. If you want grace―you need humility. Heck! Isn’t that what is needed after mortal sin when you need to go to the Sacrament of Confession to find sanctifying grace again? You need humility to go and humbly confess your sins and regain grace! Let us, likewise, be humble in admitting to Our Lady that our devotion to her is second-rate, below-par, insufficient, lukewarm, sporadic, misfiring, half-hearted, minimal, etc. She knows that―like a parent knows that his or her child has done something wrong―but just like the parent wants the child to admit it, Our Lady wants us to be truthful and not try to put cosmetics on an insufficient devotion.
Tell it like it is―without the smoke and mirrors and excuses! She will love you for it. Spend a few minutes accusing yourself today―on her feast day―about how inattentive you are to her; how superficial and distracted or rushed you are in your prayers to her; how you prefer to only say the Rosary rather than pray the Rosary by meditating on its mysteries; how ungrateful you have been to her for all the graces that you have received from God through her (all graces come through Mary); how little you rely upon her; how negligent you have been in seeking her help in everything and in all your needs; how little your belief or trust is her powerful intercession; how indifferent you have been to her feast days; how little you read about her; how little you think about her; how little you talk about her; how little you imitate her; how few prayers you pray to her; how you perhaps neglect to wear her scapulars and medals, etc., etc.
Be Humble―Like Our Lord and Our Lady
Humility is the foundation for all other virtues―without it, all other virtues are weakened and contaminated with pride. Our Lady, in her Magnificat, said of herself in relation to God: “He hath regarded the humility of His handmaid” (Luke 1:48). That is why Our Lord said: “Learn of Me―for I am meek and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29). Meekness and humility are connected in the sense that anger is the opposite of meekness―and anger usually kicks-in when we cannot get our own way, or when we do not accept what is happening, etc. ― and that is merely a subtle form of pride, not humility. As Holy Scripture says: “Pride is the beginning of all sin! He that holds it shall be filled with maledictions!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15).
If you truly want to plant the seed of Mary in your soul―then you must first fill your soul with the soil of humility (the Latin word for soil is “humus”, from which we get our “humility”) ― “Remember man that thou are dust (dirt/soil) and to dust thou shalt return!” says the priest as he imposes ashes on your forehead on Ash Wednesday. “Why is earth and ashes proud?” (Ecclesiasticus 10:9).
“The beginning of the pride of man, is to fall off from God―because his heart is departed from Him that made him! For pride is the beginning of all sin! He that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions, and it shall ruin him in the end! … God has abolished the memory of the proud, but has preserved the memory of them that are humble in mind. Pride was not made for men! … Pride is hateful before God and men!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:14-15; 21-22; 10:7-9) ... “Every proud man is an abomination to the Lord: though hand should be joined to hand, he is not innocent. The beginning of a good way is to do justice; and this is more acceptable with God, than to offer sacrifices ... Humiliation follows the proud―but glory shall uphold the humble of spirit!” (Proverbs 29:23; 16:5) … “God resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6).
“And to some who trusted in themselves as just, and despised others, Jesus spoke also this parable: ‘Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee, standing, prayed thus with himself: “O God, I give Thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men! Extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: “O God, be merciful to me a sinner!” I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other: because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
Examination of Conscience with St. Louis de Montfort
St. Louis de Montfort, in his book, True Devotion to Mary, lists seven false devotions to Our Lady―we would do well to examine how many of them have infected our devotion to Our Lady and to how great a degree. Here are those seven false devotions:
1. Critical Devotees
The critical devotees are, for the most part, proud scholars, rash and self-sufficient spirits, who have at heart some devotion to the holy Virgin, but who criticize nearly all the practices of devotion which simple people pay simply and holily to their good Mother, because these practices do not fall in with their own humor and fancy. They call in doubt all the miracles and pious stories recorded by authors worthy of Faith, or drawn from the chronicles of religious orders: narratives which testify to us the mercies and the power of the most holy Virgin. They cannot see, without uneasiness, simple and humble people on their knees before an altar or an image of Our Lady, sometimes at the corner of a street, in order to pray to God there; and they even accuse them of idolatry, as if they adored the wood or the stone. They say that, for their part, they are not fond of these external devotions, and that they are not so credulous as to believe so many tales and stories that are told about Our Lady. When they are told how admirably the Fathers of the Church praised the Blessed Virgin, they either reply that the Fathers spoke as professional orators, with exaggeration; or they misinterpret their words.
These kinds of false devotees and of proud and worldly people are greatly to be feared. They do an infinite wrong to devotion to Our Lady; and they are but too successful in alienating people from it, under the pretext of destroying its abuses.
2. Scrupulous Devotees
The scrupulous devotees are those who fear to dishonor the Son by honoring the Mother, to abase the one in elevating the other. They cannot bear that we should attribute to Our Lady the most just praise which the holy Fathers have given her. It is all they can do to endure that there should be more people before the altar of the Blessed Virgin than before the Blessed Sacrament—as if the one were contrary to the other, as if those who prayed to our Blessed Lady did not pray to Jesus Christ through her. They are unwilling that we should speak so often of Our Lady and address her so frequently.
Here are some of their favorite sayings: “Why so many Rosaries, so many confraternities and so many external devotions to the Blessed Virgin? There is much ignorance in all this. It makes a mummery of our religion. Speak to us of those who are devout to Jesus Christ.” (Yet they often name Him without raising their hats—I say this by way of parenthesis.) “We must have recourse to Jesus Christ; He is our only Mediator. We must preach Jesus Christ; this is the solid devotion.” What they say is in a certain sense true, but in the application they make of it, namely, to hinder devotion to our Blessed Lady, very dangerous; and it is, under pretext of a greater good, a subtle snare of the evil one. For the more we honor the Blessed Virgin, the more we honor Jesus Christ, because we honor Mary only that we may the more perfectly honor Jesus, since we go to her only as the way by which we are to find the end we are seeking, which is Jesus.
The Church, with the Holy Ghost, blesses Our Lady first, and Our Lord second: “Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.” It is not that Mary is more than Jesus or even equal to Him—that would be intolerable heresy; but it is that, in order to bless Jesus more perfectly, we must begin by blessing Mary. Let us then say, with all the true clients of Our Lady, in opposition to these false scrupulous devotees, “O Mary, thou art blessed among all women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.”
3. External Devotees
External devotees are persons who make all devotion to our Blessed Lady consist in outward practices. They have no taste except for the exterior of this devotion, because they have no interior spirit of their own. They will say quantities of Rosaries with the greatest precipitation; they will hear many Masses distractedly; they will go, without devotion, to processions; they will enroll themselves in all her confraternities—without amending their lives, without doing any violence to their passions, or without imitating the virtues of that most holy Virgin. They have no love but for the sensible part of devotion, without having any relish for its solidity. If they have not sensible sweetness in their practices, they think they are doing nothing; they get all out of joint, throw everything up, or do everything at random. The world is full of these exterior devotees, and there are no people who are more critical than they of men of prayer, who foster an interior spirit as the essential thing, without, however, disregarding that outward modesty which always accompanies true devotion.
4. Presumptuous Devotees
Presumptuous devotees are sinners abandoned to their passions, or lovers of the world, who under the fair name of Christians and clients of our Blessed Lady conceal pride, avarice, impurity, drunkenness, anger, swearing, detraction, injustice or some other sin. They sleep in peace in the midst of their bad habits, without doing any violence to themselves to correct their faults, under the pretext that they are devout to the Blessed Virgin. They promise themselves that God will pardon them; that they will not be allowed to die without confession; and that they will not be lost eternally because they say the Rosary, because they fast on Saturdays, because they belong to the Confraternity of the Holy Rosary, or wear the Scapular, or are enrolled in other congregations, or they wear the little habit or little chain of Our Lady.
They will not believe us when we tell them that their devotion is only an illusion of the devil and a pernicious presumption likely to destroy their souls. They say that God is good and merciful; that He has not made us to condemn us everlastingly; that no man is without sin; that they shall not die without confession; that one good act of contrition at the hour of death is enough; that they are devout to Our Lady, wear the Scapular, say daily, without fail and without vanity, seven Our Fathers and seven Hail Mary’s in her honor; and that they sometimes say the Rosary and the Office of Our Lady, besides fasting and other things. To give authority to all this, and to blind themselves still further, they quote certain stories which they have heard or read—it does not matter to them whether they be true or false—relating how people have died in mortal sin without confession, and then, because in their lifetime they sometimes said some prayers or went through some practices of devotion to Our Lady, how they have been raised to life again in order to go to confession; or their soul has been miraculously retained in their bodies till confession; or through the clemency of the Blessed Virgin they have obtained from God, at the moment of death, contrition and pardon of their sins, and so have been saved; and that they themselves expect similar favors.
Nothing in Christianity is more detestable than this diabolical presumption. For how can we truly say that we love and honor our Blessed Lady when by our sins we are pitilessly piercing, wounding, crucifying and outraging Jesus Christ, her Son? If Mary laid down a law to herself, to save by her mercy this sort of people, she would be authorizing crime and helping crucify and outrage her Son. Who would ever dare think of such a thing?
I say that thus to abuse devotion to Our Lady, which, after devotion to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, is the holiest and solidest of all devotions, is to be guilty of a horrible sacrilege, which, after the sacrilege of an unworthy Communion, is the greatest and least pardonable of all sacrileges.
I confess that, in order to be truly devout to our Blessed Lady, it is not absolutely necessary to be so holy as to avoid every sin, though this were desirable; but this much at least is necessary, and I beg you to lay it well to heart: (1) to have a sincere resolution to avoid at least all mortal sin, which outrages the Mother as well as the Son; (2) to do violence to ourselves to avoid sin; (3) to enroll ourselves in confraternities, to say the Rosary or other prayers, to fast on Saturdays and the like.
These good works are likewise wonderfully useful for the conversion of a sinner, however hardened he may be. If my reader be such a one, even though he have one foot in the abyss, I would advise him to practice them, but only on condition that he do so with the intention of obtaining from God, through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, the grace of contrition and pardon of his sins and the grace to conquer his evil habits, and not to remain quietly in the state of sin, contrary to his remorse of conscience, the example of Jesus Christ and the saints and the maxims of the holy Gospel.
5. Inconstant Devotees
The inconstant devotees are those who are devout to our Blessed Lady by fits and starts. Sometimes they are fervent and sometimes lukewarm. Sometimes they seem ready to do anything for her, and then a little afterward, they are not like the same people. They begin by taking up all the devotions to her, and enrolling themselves in the confraternities; and then they do not practice the rules with fidelity. They change like the moon; and Mary puts them under her feet with the crescent, because they are changeable and unworthy to be reckoned among the servants of that faithful Virgin who have for their special graces fidelity and constancy. It were better for such persons not to burden themselves with so many prayers and practices but to choose a few and fulfill them with faithfulness and love, in spite of the world, the devil and the flesh.
6. Hypocritical Devotees
We have still to mention the false devotees to our Blessed Lady who are the hypocritical devotees, who cloak their sins and sinful habits with her mantle, in order to be taken by men for what they are not.
7. Interested Devotees
There are also the interested devotees, who have recourse to Our Lady only to gain some lawsuit, or to avoid some danger, or to be cured of some illness, or for some other similar necessity, without which they would forget her altogether. All these are false devotees, pleasing neither to God nor to His holy Mother.
Let us then take great care not to be of the number of the critical devotees, who believe nothing and criticize everything; nor of the scrupulous devotees, who are afraid of being too devout to Our Lady, out of respect to Our Lord; nor of the exterior devotees, who make all their devotion consist in outward practices; nor of the presumptuous devotees, who, under the pretext of their false devotion to the Blessed Virgin, wallow in their sins; nor of the inconstant devotees, who from levity change their practices of devotion, or give them up altogether, at the least temptation; nor of the hypocritical devotees, who join confraternities and wear the liveries of the Blessed Virgin in order to pass for good people; nor, finally, of the interested devotees, who have recourse to Our Lady only to be delivered from bodily evils, or to obtain temporal goods.
In his encyclical, Ineffabilis Deus, of December 8th, 1854, Blessed Pope Pius IX pronounced and enforced the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary: “Wherefore, in humility and fasting, we unceasingly offered our private prayers as well as the public prayers of the Church to God the Father, through His Son, that He would deign to direct and strengthen our mind by the power of the Holy Spirit. In like manner did we implore the help of the entire heavenly host as we ardently invoked the Paraclete. Accordingly, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, for the honor of the Holy and undivided Trinity, for the glory and adornment of the Virgin Mother of God, for the exaltation of the Catholic Faith, and for the furtherance of the Catholic religion, by the authority of Jesus Christ our Lord, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own: ‘We declare, pronounce, and define that the doctrine which holds that the most Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instance of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege granted by Almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of Original Sin, is a doctrine revealed by God and therefore to be believed firmly and constantly by all the faithful.’” (Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus of December 8th, 1854).
Habemus Matrem
If at the election of a pope, we can shout “Habemus papam!” meaning “we have a pope (‘father’)”, then, in regard to this dogmatic declaration, we can shout “Habemus Matrem—Habemus Matrem Immaculatam”, meaning “We have a Mother—an Immaculate Mother!” Even more than the pope is called the Holy Father, Our Lady is the Holiest of mothers.
Immaculate Mary needs Immaculate Children
We all know the saying: “Like father, like son!” or “Like mother, like daughter!” or “He takes after his father!” and “She’s just like her mother!” Our Lord and Our Lady—the new Adam and Eve—want us to imitate them and Heaven. Of Our Lady, it can be said: “I am clean, and without sin: I am unspotted, and there is no iniquity in me” (Job 33:9) .... “My word is pure, and I am clean in thy sight” (Job 11:4). “I am without sin and am innocent” (Jeremias 2:35). We became her spiritual children at the foot of the Cross, and so we should take on the traits of our spiritual Mother. Children imitate their parents.
Jesus said: “Learn of Me…!” (Matthew 11:29) … “If you love Me, keep My Commandments” (John 14:15) … “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48) … “I am the Lord your God: be holy because I am holy” (Leviticus 11:44) … “You shall be holy unto Me, because I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from other people, that you should be Mine” (Leviticus 20:26). St. Peter repeats that command in the New Testament: “According to Him that hath called you, Who is holy, be you also in all manner of conversation holy, because it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy’” (1 Peter 1:15-16).
Heaven is Only for the Immaculate of Heart
Only saints go to Heaven, that is the pedigree of the New Adam and Eve—we have to be immaculate to enter therein: “There shall not enter into it anything defiled” (Apocalypse 27:21). We have to be wholly holy, or “Holy, Holy, Holy” as we say in the Sanctus at Mass—which, incidentally, should remind of the three ever-increasing stages of holiness that we have to pass through: as beginners in holiness, (2) as proficients in holiness, and (3) as perfect in holiness. Purgatory will be necessary for even the slightest stains of sin or smallest unpaid debts for previously forgiven sin. For, as it was said above, God detests sin. “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8).
“For the Highest hateth sinners, and hath mercy on the penitent” (Ecclesiasticus 12:3). “Six things there are, which the Lord hateth, and the seventh His soul detesteth: (1) Haughty eyes, (2) a lying tongue, (3) hands that shed innocent blood, (4) heart that deviseth wicked plots, (5) feet that are swift to run into mischief, (6) deceitful witness that uttereth lies, and (7) him that soweth discord among brethren” (Proverbs 6:16-19). “I hate arrogance, and pride, and every wicked way, and a mouth with a double tongue” (Proverbs 8:13).
We Need to Clean Up Our Act
God never changes and His demands for holiness never change. In the Old Testament it says: “Turn away from evil and do good” (Psalms 33:15); and St. Peter repeats the same in the New Testament: “Let him decline from evil, and do good” (1 Peter 3:11). Our Lady even echoes this today, for at Fatima she said: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended.”
However, Sr. Lucia tells us that: “the Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one heeds her message; neither the good nor the bad. The good continue on with their life of virtue and apostolate, but they do not unite their lives to the message of Fatima. Sinners keep following the road of evil because they do not see the terrible chastisement about to befall them.”
St. Paul clearly tells us: “Let no sin therefore reign in your mortal body” (Romans 6:12). Not even the slightest Venial Sin, for that still separates us from God and has to paid for—either here or in Purgatory, as Our Lord says: “Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing” (Matthew 5:26).
“Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8). But “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you make clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanness” (Matthew 23:25).
Detesting Sin and Worldliness
One of the chief contributors to the deluge of sin in the world today is the absence of a fear of God and a fear of offending God. This is there has to be a terrible, frightening chastisement—in order to re-establish the foundation of fear. Fear is essential, even when we love God—it is the foundation of the spiritual life. It is even one of the Gifts of the Holy Ghost—a Fear of the Lord. As Holy Scripture says: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalms 110:10). “The fear of God is the beginning of His love” (Ecclesiasticus 25:16). “The fear of the Lord drives out sin” (Ecclesiasticus 1:27). “The fear of the Lord hates evil” (Proverbs 8:13). “The Lord hates all abomination of error, and they that fear Him shall not love it” (Ecclesiasticus 15:13). “Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5).
“Neither shalt thou bring anything of the idol into thy house, lest thou become an anathema, like it. Thou shalt detest it as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth, because it is an anathema” (Deuteronomy 7:26). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
This detestation of the spirit of the world and of the ways of the world is absolutely essential if we are clean house and clean-up our act. The source of sin has to be stopped, like a leak in a boat, or the boat (soul) will sink. Once the incoming flow of sin has been dealt, then we can deal with the flooded basement (soul) and start pumping the bilge out.
Grace Cleans and Beautifies
We say of Our Lady: “Hail, full of grace!” Grace perfects our human nature, it heals the wounds of sin, it strengthens our weaknesses, it pushes us on to higher heights. St. Louis de Montfort speaks of this cleaning of soul and the role of grace in his Secret of Mary, saying:
“It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say ‘not in the same measure,’ because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary).
To find the Grace of God, we must discover Mary
St. Louis continues: “It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.
“I explain;
(1) Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for every individual person (Luke 1:30). No patriarch nor prophet nor any other holy person of the Old Law could manage to find this grace;
(2) It was Mary who gave existence and life to the author of all grace and, because of this, she is called the “Mother of Grace.”
(3) God the Father, from Whom, as from its essential source, every perfect gift and every grace come down to us (James 1:17), gave her every grace when He gave her His Son. Thus, as St. Bernard says, the will of God is manifested to her in Jesus and with Jesus.
(4) God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator and the dispenser of all His graces, so that all His graces and gifts pass through her hands. Such is the power that she has received from Him that, according to St. Bernardine, she gives the graces of the eternal Father, the virtues of Jesus Christ, and the gifts of the Holy Ghost to whom she wills, as and when she wills, and as much as she wills.
(5) As in the natural life a child must have a father and a mother, so in the supernatural life of grace a true child of the Church must have God for his Father and Mary for his mother. If he prides himself on having God for his Father, but does not give Mary the tender affection of a true child, he is an imposter and his father is the devil.
(6) Since Mary produced the head of the elect, Jesus Christ, she must also produce the members of that head, that is, all true Christians. A mother does not conceive a head without members, nor members without a head. If anyone, then, wishes to become a member of Jesus Christ, and consequently be filled with grace and truth, (John 1:14), he must be formed in Mary through the grace of Jesus Christ, which she possesses with a fullness enabling her to communicate it abundantly to true members of Jesus Christ, her true children.
(7) The Holy Ghost espoused Mary and produced His greatest work, the incarnate Word, in her, by her and through her. He has never disowned her and so He continues to produce every day, in a mysterious but very real manner, the souls of the elect in her and through her.
(8) Mary received, from God, a unique dominion over souls, enabling her to nourish them and make them more and more godlike. St. Augustine went so far as to say that, even in this world, all the elect are enclosed in the womb of Mary, and that their real birthday is when this good mother brings them forth to eternal life. Consequently, just as an infant draws all its nourishment from its mother, who gives according to its needs, so the elect draw all their spiritual nourishment and all their strength from Mary.
(9) It was to Mary that God the Father said, ‘Dwell in Jacob’ (Ecclesiasticus 24:8, 12) that is, dwell in My elect, who are typified by Jacob. It was to Mary that God the Son said, “My dear Mother, your inheritance is in Israel,” that is, in the elect. It was to Mary that the Holy Ghost said, “Place your roots in My elect.” Whoever, then, is of the chosen and predestinate, will have the Blessed Virgin living within him, and he will let her plant in his very soul the roots of every virtue, but especially deep humility and ardent charity.
(10) Mary is called by St. Augustine, and is indeed, the ‘living mold of God.’ In her alone the God-man was formed in His human nature without losing any feature of the Godhead. In her alone, by the grace of Jesus Christ, man is made godlike as far as human nature is capable of it” (St. Louis de Montfort, Secret of Mary).
No Better Day to Start!
There is no better day than the feast of the Immaculate Conception to “clean-up” your attitude, devotion and dependence upon the Blessed Virgin Mary! The first thing you need is humility―for, as the saints say, it was Our Lady’s humility that was the foundation and reason why God showered her with so many graces. If you want grace―you need humility. Heck! Isn’t that what is needed after mortal sin when you need to go to the Sacrament of Confession to find sanctifying grace again? You need humility to go and humbly confess your sins and regain grace! Let us, likewise, be humble in admitting to Our Lady that our devotion to her is second-rate, below-par, insufficient, lukewarm, sporadic, misfiring, half-hearted, minimal, etc. She knows that―like a parent knows that his or her child has done something wrong―but just like the parent wants the child to admit it, Our Lady wants us to be truthful and not try to put cosmetics on an insufficient devotion.
Tell it like it is―without the smoke and mirrors and excuses! She will love you for it. Spend a few minutes accusing yourself today―on her feast day―about how inattentive you are to her; how superficial and distracted or rushed you are in your prayers to her; how you prefer to only say the Rosary rather than pray the Rosary by meditating on its mysteries; how ungrateful you have been to her for all the graces that you have received from God through her (all graces come through Mary); how little you rely upon her; how negligent you have been in seeking her help in everything and in all your needs; how little your belief or trust is her powerful intercession; how indifferent you have been to her feast days; how little you read about her; how little you think about her; how little you talk about her; how little you imitate her; how few prayers you pray to her; how you perhaps neglect to wear her scapulars and medals, etc., etc.
Be Humble―Like Our Lord and Our Lady
Humility is the foundation for all other virtues―without it, all other virtues are weakened and contaminated with pride. Our Lady, in her Magnificat, said of herself in relation to God: “He hath regarded the humility of His handmaid” (Luke 1:48). That is why Our Lord said: “Learn of Me―for I am meek and humble of heart!” (Matthew 11:29). Meekness and humility are connected in the sense that anger is the opposite of meekness―and anger usually kicks-in when we cannot get our own way, or when we do not accept what is happening, etc. ― and that is merely a subtle form of pride, not humility. As Holy Scripture says: “Pride is the beginning of all sin! He that holds it shall be filled with maledictions!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:15).
If you truly want to plant the seed of Mary in your soul―then you must first fill your soul with the soil of humility (the Latin word for soil is “humus”, from which we get our “humility”) ― “Remember man that thou are dust (dirt/soil) and to dust thou shalt return!” says the priest as he imposes ashes on your forehead on Ash Wednesday. “Why is earth and ashes proud?” (Ecclesiasticus 10:9).
“The beginning of the pride of man, is to fall off from God―because his heart is departed from Him that made him! For pride is the beginning of all sin! He that holds it, shall be filled with maledictions, and it shall ruin him in the end! … God has abolished the memory of the proud, but has preserved the memory of them that are humble in mind. Pride was not made for men! … Pride is hateful before God and men!” (Ecclesiasticus 10:14-15; 21-22; 10:7-9) ... “Every proud man is an abomination to the Lord: though hand should be joined to hand, he is not innocent. The beginning of a good way is to do justice; and this is more acceptable with God, than to offer sacrifices ... Humiliation follows the proud―but glory shall uphold the humble of spirit!” (Proverbs 29:23; 16:5) … “God resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6).
“And to some who trusted in themselves as just, and despised others, Jesus spoke also this parable: ‘Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee, standing, prayed thus with himself: “O God, I give Thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men! Extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican! I fast twice in a week! I give tithes of all that I possess!” And the Publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: “O God, be merciful to me a sinner!” I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other: because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted!’” (Luke 18:9-14).
Examination of Conscience with St. Louis de Montfort
St. Louis de Montfort, in his book, True Devotion to Mary, lists seven false devotions to Our Lady―we would do well to examine how many of them have infected our devotion to Our Lady and to how great a degree. Here are those seven false devotions:
1. Critical Devotees
The critical devotees are, for the most part, proud scholars, rash and self-sufficient spirits, who have at heart some devotion to the holy Virgin, but who criticize nearly all the practices of devotion which simple people pay simply and holily to their good Mother, because these practices do not fall in with their own humor and fancy. They call in doubt all the miracles and pious stories recorded by authors worthy of Faith, or drawn from the chronicles of religious orders: narratives which testify to us the mercies and the power of the most holy Virgin. They cannot see, without uneasiness, simple and humble people on their knees before an altar or an image of Our Lady, sometimes at the corner of a street, in order to pray to God there; and they even accuse them of idolatry, as if they adored the wood or the stone. They say that, for their part, they are not fond of these external devotions, and that they are not so credulous as to believe so many tales and stories that are told about Our Lady. When they are told how admirably the Fathers of the Church praised the Blessed Virgin, they either reply that the Fathers spoke as professional orators, with exaggeration; or they misinterpret their words.
These kinds of false devotees and of proud and worldly people are greatly to be feared. They do an infinite wrong to devotion to Our Lady; and they are but too successful in alienating people from it, under the pretext of destroying its abuses.
2. Scrupulous Devotees
The scrupulous devotees are those who fear to dishonor the Son by honoring the Mother, to abase the one in elevating the other. They cannot bear that we should attribute to Our Lady the most just praise which the holy Fathers have given her. It is all they can do to endure that there should be more people before the altar of the Blessed Virgin than before the Blessed Sacrament—as if the one were contrary to the other, as if those who prayed to our Blessed Lady did not pray to Jesus Christ through her. They are unwilling that we should speak so often of Our Lady and address her so frequently.
Here are some of their favorite sayings: “Why so many Rosaries, so many confraternities and so many external devotions to the Blessed Virgin? There is much ignorance in all this. It makes a mummery of our religion. Speak to us of those who are devout to Jesus Christ.” (Yet they often name Him without raising their hats—I say this by way of parenthesis.) “We must have recourse to Jesus Christ; He is our only Mediator. We must preach Jesus Christ; this is the solid devotion.” What they say is in a certain sense true, but in the application they make of it, namely, to hinder devotion to our Blessed Lady, very dangerous; and it is, under pretext of a greater good, a subtle snare of the evil one. For the more we honor the Blessed Virgin, the more we honor Jesus Christ, because we honor Mary only that we may the more perfectly honor Jesus, since we go to her only as the way by which we are to find the end we are seeking, which is Jesus.
The Church, with the Holy Ghost, blesses Our Lady first, and Our Lord second: “Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.” It is not that Mary is more than Jesus or even equal to Him—that would be intolerable heresy; but it is that, in order to bless Jesus more perfectly, we must begin by blessing Mary. Let us then say, with all the true clients of Our Lady, in opposition to these false scrupulous devotees, “O Mary, thou art blessed among all women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.”
3. External Devotees
External devotees are persons who make all devotion to our Blessed Lady consist in outward practices. They have no taste except for the exterior of this devotion, because they have no interior spirit of their own. They will say quantities of Rosaries with the greatest precipitation; they will hear many Masses distractedly; they will go, without devotion, to processions; they will enroll themselves in all her confraternities—without amending their lives, without doing any violence to their passions, or without imitating the virtues of that most holy Virgin. They have no love but for the sensible part of devotion, without having any relish for its solidity. If they have not sensible sweetness in their practices, they think they are doing nothing; they get all out of joint, throw everything up, or do everything at random. The world is full of these exterior devotees, and there are no people who are more critical than they of men of prayer, who foster an interior spirit as the essential thing, without, however, disregarding that outward modesty which always accompanies true devotion.
4. Presumptuous Devotees
Presumptuous devotees are sinners abandoned to their passions, or lovers of the world, who under the fair name of Christians and clients of our Blessed Lady conceal pride, avarice, impurity, drunkenness, anger, swearing, detraction, injustice or some other sin. They sleep in peace in the midst of their bad habits, without doing any violence to themselves to correct their faults, under the pretext that they are devout to the Blessed Virgin. They promise themselves that God will pardon them; that they will not be allowed to die without confession; and that they will not be lost eternally because they say the Rosary, because they fast on Saturdays, because they belong to the Confraternity of the Holy Rosary, or wear the Scapular, or are enrolled in other congregations, or they wear the little habit or little chain of Our Lady.
They will not believe us when we tell them that their devotion is only an illusion of the devil and a pernicious presumption likely to destroy their souls. They say that God is good and merciful; that He has not made us to condemn us everlastingly; that no man is without sin; that they shall not die without confession; that one good act of contrition at the hour of death is enough; that they are devout to Our Lady, wear the Scapular, say daily, without fail and without vanity, seven Our Fathers and seven Hail Mary’s in her honor; and that they sometimes say the Rosary and the Office of Our Lady, besides fasting and other things. To give authority to all this, and to blind themselves still further, they quote certain stories which they have heard or read—it does not matter to them whether they be true or false—relating how people have died in mortal sin without confession, and then, because in their lifetime they sometimes said some prayers or went through some practices of devotion to Our Lady, how they have been raised to life again in order to go to confession; or their soul has been miraculously retained in their bodies till confession; or through the clemency of the Blessed Virgin they have obtained from God, at the moment of death, contrition and pardon of their sins, and so have been saved; and that they themselves expect similar favors.
Nothing in Christianity is more detestable than this diabolical presumption. For how can we truly say that we love and honor our Blessed Lady when by our sins we are pitilessly piercing, wounding, crucifying and outraging Jesus Christ, her Son? If Mary laid down a law to herself, to save by her mercy this sort of people, she would be authorizing crime and helping crucify and outrage her Son. Who would ever dare think of such a thing?
I say that thus to abuse devotion to Our Lady, which, after devotion to Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, is the holiest and solidest of all devotions, is to be guilty of a horrible sacrilege, which, after the sacrilege of an unworthy Communion, is the greatest and least pardonable of all sacrileges.
I confess that, in order to be truly devout to our Blessed Lady, it is not absolutely necessary to be so holy as to avoid every sin, though this were desirable; but this much at least is necessary, and I beg you to lay it well to heart: (1) to have a sincere resolution to avoid at least all mortal sin, which outrages the Mother as well as the Son; (2) to do violence to ourselves to avoid sin; (3) to enroll ourselves in confraternities, to say the Rosary or other prayers, to fast on Saturdays and the like.
These good works are likewise wonderfully useful for the conversion of a sinner, however hardened he may be. If my reader be such a one, even though he have one foot in the abyss, I would advise him to practice them, but only on condition that he do so with the intention of obtaining from God, through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, the grace of contrition and pardon of his sins and the grace to conquer his evil habits, and not to remain quietly in the state of sin, contrary to his remorse of conscience, the example of Jesus Christ and the saints and the maxims of the holy Gospel.
5. Inconstant Devotees
The inconstant devotees are those who are devout to our Blessed Lady by fits and starts. Sometimes they are fervent and sometimes lukewarm. Sometimes they seem ready to do anything for her, and then a little afterward, they are not like the same people. They begin by taking up all the devotions to her, and enrolling themselves in the confraternities; and then they do not practice the rules with fidelity. They change like the moon; and Mary puts them under her feet with the crescent, because they are changeable and unworthy to be reckoned among the servants of that faithful Virgin who have for their special graces fidelity and constancy. It were better for such persons not to burden themselves with so many prayers and practices but to choose a few and fulfill them with faithfulness and love, in spite of the world, the devil and the flesh.
6. Hypocritical Devotees
We have still to mention the false devotees to our Blessed Lady who are the hypocritical devotees, who cloak their sins and sinful habits with her mantle, in order to be taken by men for what they are not.
7. Interested Devotees
There are also the interested devotees, who have recourse to Our Lady only to gain some lawsuit, or to avoid some danger, or to be cured of some illness, or for some other similar necessity, without which they would forget her altogether. All these are false devotees, pleasing neither to God nor to His holy Mother.
Let us then take great care not to be of the number of the critical devotees, who believe nothing and criticize everything; nor of the scrupulous devotees, who are afraid of being too devout to Our Lady, out of respect to Our Lord; nor of the exterior devotees, who make all their devotion consist in outward practices; nor of the presumptuous devotees, who, under the pretext of their false devotion to the Blessed Virgin, wallow in their sins; nor of the inconstant devotees, who from levity change their practices of devotion, or give them up altogether, at the least temptation; nor of the hypocritical devotees, who join confraternities and wear the liveries of the Blessed Virgin in order to pass for good people; nor, finally, of the interested devotees, who have recourse to Our Lady only to be delivered from bodily evils, or to obtain temporal goods.
Article 4
Thursday December 7th
Neglect Mary at Your Peril!
Thursday December 7th
Neglect Mary at Your Peril!
Advent is a Marian Time “Par Excellence”
Undoubtedly you have heard of the expression: “To Jesus through Mary.” Well, in this Advent season, it is Jesus Who prepares to come to us through Mary. No Mary―No Jesus! St. Louis de Montfort writes: “It was only through Mary that God the Father gave His Only-Begotten to the world ... It was through the most holy Virgin Mary that Jesus came into the world, and it is also through her that He has to reign in the world … Mary is the excellent masterpiece of the Most High … Mary is the admirable Mother of the Son … Mary is the faithful spouse of the Holy Ghost … Mary is the sanctuary and the repose of the Holy Trinity ... She is the grand and divine world of God … The whole Earth is full of her glory … We must cry out with the saints: ‘Of Mary there is never enough!’ We have not yet praised, exalted, honored, loved and served Mary as we ought! She deserves still more praise, still more respect, still more love, and still more service!” St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Mary Marginalized
Most people treat Our Lady like they treat God―a part time tool that only comes out of the toolbox when something goes wrong or in a crisis. Other than that, they usually remain forgotten and unused. Well―we sure are in a crisis―any fool can see that! Our Lady has already told us: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” (Fatima, July 1917). At Akita she repeated the same message: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
Yet, if we only seek out someone when WE need help, shows a kind of selfishness―“I only need you in danger, but apart from that, I don’t really need you!” However, when we really love somebody, we think of them a lot, we talk to them a lot, we want to be in their presence as much as possible, we like to do things for them.
The Danger of Neglecting Mary
Apart from Our Lady herself, numerous saints warn us of the danger of neglecting Mary―here is just a mere sampling:
“They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish!” (St. Albert the Great, Doctor of the Church).
“They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation!” (St. Bonaventure, Doctor of the Church)
“A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost!” (St. Ignatius of Antioch, Father of the Church).
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
“It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church).
“He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost!” (St. Anselm, Doctor of the Church).
“As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified!” (St. Antonine).
Our Sole Soul Solution
In this present age―which can call “The Age of Mary”―God has ruled that Mary is to be the focal point for Heaven’s victory over Satan and the world that he now rules. Our Lady has already foretold that great calamities will befall us―but that in the end she would triumph: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times making it easy for everyone to live in sin … Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … Unbridled luxury and impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … There will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church … The devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders The Church will be full of those who accept compromises … Many will turn upon Religion … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration … This will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet … … Thus the Church and country will be finally free of his cruel tyranny! … In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!”
Yes―she will bring about the triumph―but do you want to be part of that triumph? Or will fall by the wayside? Are you playing your part in bringing about that triumph―or are you an idle, or semi-idle, spectator? Are you fighting the world―or are you loving the world? Do you see the world as your enemy―or do you see the world as your friend? The world―or mammon, Christ calls it―is an enemy of God? Whose side are you on? Our Lord says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Our Lady, likewise, speaks out against Christians who succumb to the world and the worldly: “They are soiled by contagion with the worldly ... and have lapsed from their noble! They have lost their beauty in debasing themselves. They love vanity; they indulge greed and avarice; they serve their own interest; they love money, they place their hopes in treasures of silver and gold; they submit to the flatteries and to the slavery of the worldly and powerful! ... Who are concerned about outward show and like worldly applause too much! ... The worldlings, in their torpidity, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! …
“Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? When gold is untouched by the furnace-heat, the iron by the file, the grain by the grinding stone or flail, the grapes by the winepress, they are all useless and will not attain the end for which they are created … Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored … Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment! … I do not count anyone as a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son … My most holy Son and myself are trying to find among those who have arrived at the way of the Cross, some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom! … Enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the Cross … In this science of suffering are renewed all the blessed riches of the creatures―those that flee from them are insane, those that know nothing of this science, are foolish!” (Words of Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
True Catholics a Rare Breed―Satan Makes Sure of That!
It is rare to find true Catholics these days―even among Traditionalist and Conservative families. Satan―according to Our Lord―is “the prince of this world” (John 12:31; 14:30) and he has gained in foothold in even the best of families. Satan seeks the weak-link in the family and then tries to enter and influence the family through that weak-link. Nobody can say that they are immune to this tactic. Fr. Gabriele-Amorth, the recently deceased chief exorcist of Rome for more than 30 years, stated: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican. I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry. Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office! …
“We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … His ordinary activity is to tempt man toward evil, to lead him to temptation, to sin, to push him to break divine law ... Concupiscence, success and power are the three great passions on which Satan relies … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour ... The most frequent weak points in man are, from time to time, always the same: pride, money, and lust … The devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and works on it, creating his next sinful occasion It will be the targeted person himself, who, in his liberty, will commit the sin, after having been well ‘cooked’ by Satan’s temptation … The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin … In the current environment, where we are witnessing the collapse of the family, I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. I have dealt many times with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. With time, the person becomes hardened in sin and evil takes root.
Jesus works through His Church, Satan through his empire of evil. Ignoring these simple truths means not having a true awareness. Unfortunately, Christians no longer believe in these things these days. There is a harmful tendency to remove Satan and the other spirits of evil. The Devil does not like to be seen … Satan’s biggest triumph is mankind’s conviction that he doesn’t exist ... But in this way, their power is only increased. This is perhaps why, in this day and age, Satan is so powerful and his influence over mankind is so great. If the people of the Church do not unite themselves with determination against Satan and fight tooth and nail ― then Satan is free to create havoc and destruction with impunity.”
“Our Lady’s messages speak about Satan. She often spoke about this. She underlined that Satan is powerful and that he wants to destroy her plans. She invited us to pray, to pray, to pray! Through prayer, we can even stop wars! Maybe we do not pray with the heart―this is possible!! We must pray in Faith, not mechanically! Pray with Faith―and prayer increases Faith and Charity. According to Our Lady’s words in Fatima, if we had prayed and fasted, there would not have been World War II. We have not listened to her and therefore there was a war. Our Lady speaks often about prayer and fasting. I think that this is very important, because contemporary men are following the spirit of consumerism. Humanity searches how to avoid any kind of sacrifice and so it exposes itself to sin. There is no practice of making sacrifice. Only if we are used to sacrifice ourselves, we will be able to live Christian life. For Christian life, besides prayer, we need a certain austerity of life. If there is no austerity of life, there is no perseverance in Christian life.
“Today the world does not turn from God because it is idolatrous; rather, it pursues pure atheism, so as to put science on the altar. But science does not create; it only discovers that which God has made. In turning away from the Lord, its breakthroughs are put to disastrous use. Without the Lord, progress, too, is misused. We see it in laws that go totally against nature, such as divorce, abortion, ‘gay marriage’ … we have forgotten God! … Divorce has been a disaster; abortion has been a disaster … Each year 50 million children are murdered by abortion. And euthanasia, the broken family, cohabitation ... It is all destruction!” … Therefore, God will soon admonish humanity in a very powerful manner, He knows how to remind us of His presence. I think we are close! [Fr. Amorth says this in 2015]. More and more so! The Lord will make Himself heard, and the world will respond. I look at all this with optimism, because God always acts for us to obtain a greater good than the punishments inflicted―which are meant to open the eyes of humanity, which has forgotten and abandoned Him.” (Fr. Gabriele-Amorth).
You Need Mary to Conquer Your Devils
As Fr. Amorth says, “We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour!” If we sin, then we are of the devil! Who is there that does not sin? Nobody―apart from the Immaculate Mary! “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us!” (1 John 1:8). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). And if we have sinned then we have been subjected to temptations by the devil―and, through our sins, we give the devil some kind of control in our lives: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). We need to regain full control of our lives from whatever control the devil may have through our sins.
We read, in St. Louis de Montfort’s book, The Secret of the Rosary, how St. Dominic exorcised a man who was possessed by the devil. St. Dominic forced the demons to reveal several things―among which was their great fear of Mary and her great success in snatching souls from the demons. St. Dominic implored the intercession of Our Lady in forcing the demons to speak. Our Lady appeared and obliged. Here are some extracts of what the demons were reluctantly forced to admit:
“Oh, you [Mary] who are our enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? Advocate of sinners, you snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven! … Listen, you Christians! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! One single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity, is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints! We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants! Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death―and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards―are saved by her intercession! And if she did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity!” (St. Louis de Montfort’s book, The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
Our Lady herself revealed to St. Bridget of Sweden: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.”
Undoubtedly you have heard of the expression: “To Jesus through Mary.” Well, in this Advent season, it is Jesus Who prepares to come to us through Mary. No Mary―No Jesus! St. Louis de Montfort writes: “It was only through Mary that God the Father gave His Only-Begotten to the world ... It was through the most holy Virgin Mary that Jesus came into the world, and it is also through her that He has to reign in the world … Mary is the excellent masterpiece of the Most High … Mary is the admirable Mother of the Son … Mary is the faithful spouse of the Holy Ghost … Mary is the sanctuary and the repose of the Holy Trinity ... She is the grand and divine world of God … The whole Earth is full of her glory … We must cry out with the saints: ‘Of Mary there is never enough!’ We have not yet praised, exalted, honored, loved and served Mary as we ought! She deserves still more praise, still more respect, still more love, and still more service!” St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary).
Mary Marginalized
Most people treat Our Lady like they treat God―a part time tool that only comes out of the toolbox when something goes wrong or in a crisis. Other than that, they usually remain forgotten and unused. Well―we sure are in a crisis―any fool can see that! Our Lady has already told us: “Pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you!” (Fatima, July 1917). At Akita she repeated the same message: “I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach! Those who place their confidence in me will be saved!”
Yet, if we only seek out someone when WE need help, shows a kind of selfishness―“I only need you in danger, but apart from that, I don’t really need you!” However, when we really love somebody, we think of them a lot, we talk to them a lot, we want to be in their presence as much as possible, we like to do things for them.
The Danger of Neglecting Mary
Apart from Our Lady herself, numerous saints warn us of the danger of neglecting Mary―here is just a mere sampling:
“They who are not thy servants, O Mary, shall perish!” (St. Albert the Great, Doctor of the Church).
“They who neglect the service of Mary shall die in their sins.” And again: “For them, from whom Mary turns away her face, there is not even a hope of salvation!” (St. Bonaventure, Doctor of the Church)
“A sinner can be saved only through the Holy Virgin who, by her merciful prayers, obtains salvation for so many who, according to strict justice, would be lost!” (St. Ignatius of Antioch, Father of the Church).
If a lack of devotion to her is a mark of eternal reprobation a constant love for her must be a sign of eternal salvation. Many spiritual writers state that devotion to Mary is a sign of predestination.
“It is impossible that a servant of Mary be damned, provided he serves her faithfully and commends himself to her maternal protection!” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church).
“He who turns to thee and is regarded by thee cannot be lost!” (St. Anselm, Doctor of the Church).
“As it is impossible for them from whom Mary turns away her eyes of mercy to be saved, so it is necessary that they to whom she turns her eyes of mercy and for whom she intercedes to be saved and glorified!” (St. Antonine).
Our Sole Soul Solution
In this present age―which can call “The Age of Mary”―God has ruled that Mary is to be the focal point for Heaven’s victory over Satan and the world that he now rules. Our Lady has already foretold that great calamities will befall us―but that in the end she would triumph: “Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell; they will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times making it easy for everyone to live in sin … Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty! There will be almost no virgin souls in the world! Innocence will almost no longer be found in children, nor modesty in women! … Unbridled luxury and impurity will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost! … There will be a total corruption of morals, for Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic Sects … God will allow the old serpent to cause divisions among those who reign in every society and in every family … The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church … The devil will resort to all his evil tricks to introduce sinners into religious orders The Church will be full of those who accept compromises … Many will turn upon Religion … Many people will rebel against the spirit of the Catholic Church, impelled by the malice of the devil! … There will be occasions when all will seem lost and paralyzed. This then will be the happy beginning of the complete restoration … This will mark the arrival of my hour, when I, in a marvelous way, will dethrone the proud and cursed Satan, trampling him under my feet … … Thus the Church and country will be finally free of his cruel tyranny! … In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph!”
Yes―she will bring about the triumph―but do you want to be part of that triumph? Or will fall by the wayside? Are you playing your part in bringing about that triumph―or are you an idle, or semi-idle, spectator? Are you fighting the world―or are you loving the world? Do you see the world as your enemy―or do you see the world as your friend? The world―or mammon, Christ calls it―is an enemy of God? Whose side are you on? Our Lord says: “I am not of this world! … My kingdom is not of this world! … The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 8:23; 18:36; 7:7). To His followers He says: “If you had been of the world, the world would love its own! But because you are not of the world―for I have chosen you out of the world―therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:19). Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “The whole world is seated in wickedness!” (1 John 5:19) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Our Lady, likewise, speaks out against Christians who succumb to the world and the worldly: “They are soiled by contagion with the worldly ... and have lapsed from their noble! They have lost their beauty in debasing themselves. They love vanity; they indulge greed and avarice; they serve their own interest; they love money, they place their hopes in treasures of silver and gold; they submit to the flatteries and to the slavery of the worldly and powerful! ... Who are concerned about outward show and like worldly applause too much! ... The worldlings, in their torpidity, are moved neither by the duty of conforming to their Lord, nor by His declaration that all their salvation consists in following Christ in His sufferings! … Many there are who wish to follow Christ and very few who truly dispose themselves to imitate Him―for as soon as they feel the sufferings of the Cross, they cast it aside! … They do not seek the medicine of suffering! …
“Why do mortals continue to deceive themselves, by expecting, in spite of their sins, to become pure and worthy of enjoying God, without the furnace or the file of sorrows? When gold is untouched by the furnace-heat, the iron by the file, the grain by the grinding stone or flail, the grapes by the winepress, they are all useless and will not attain the end for which they are created … Some of them expect to be distinguished by God’s most intimate love, others, to be pardoned without penance, others, to be highly favored … Eternal rest is incompatible with the shame of not having duly labored for its attainment! … I do not count anyone as a devoted child, who does not suffer with me and my divine Son … My most holy Son and myself are trying to find among those who have arrived at the way of the Cross, some soul, whom We can instruct systematically in this divine science and whom We can withdraw from the worldly and diabolical wisdom! … Enter into this school―in which alone is taught the doctrine of the Cross … In this science of suffering are renewed all the blessed riches of the creatures―those that flee from them are insane, those that know nothing of this science, are foolish!” (Words of Our Lady to the Ven. Mary of Agreda, The Mystical City of God).
True Catholics a Rare Breed―Satan Makes Sure of That!
It is rare to find true Catholics these days―even among Traditionalist and Conservative families. Satan―according to Our Lord―is “the prince of this world” (John 12:31; 14:30) and he has gained in foothold in even the best of families. Satan seeks the weak-link in the family and then tries to enter and influence the family through that weak-link. Nobody can say that they are immune to this tactic. Fr. Gabriele-Amorth, the recently deceased chief exorcist of Rome for more than 30 years, stated: “The influence of Satan is immense! Today, Satan has free hands … Satan continually tries to dominate the world ― the whole world is in the power of the evil one … The smoke of Satan has entered everywhere. Everywhere! Today Satan rules the world … And, yes, Satan is in the Vatican! The devil resides in the Vatican. I have no doubt about the fact that the demon tempts the authorities of the Church especially―just as he tempts every authority, those of politics and industry. Everybody is vulnerable to the work of Satan! The devil loves to take over business leaders and those who hold political office! …
“We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … His ordinary activity is to tempt man toward evil, to lead him to temptation, to sin, to push him to break divine law ... Concupiscence, success and power are the three great passions on which Satan relies … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour ... The most frequent weak points in man are, from time to time, always the same: pride, money, and lust … The devil looks in each person precisely for his weak point and works on it, creating his next sinful occasion It will be the targeted person himself, who, in his liberty, will commit the sin, after having been well ‘cooked’ by Satan’s temptation … The most common way a demon can enter into someone’s life is through a habitual state of mortal sin. Those who live in a state of grace, those who pray most fervently, have a much better chance of obtaining divine intervention against the evil one than those who do not practice their Faith or, worse, who live in a habitual state of mortal sin … In the current environment, where we are witnessing the collapse of the family, I have encountered many cases of possessed people who, in addition to other sins, were living in irregular marriages. I have dealt many times with women whose sins included the crime of abortion. I have been confronted with numerous people who, in addition to sexual aberrations, committed other violent actions. Many times I have been faced with homosexuals who were drug addicts and who had committed drug-related sins. With time, the person becomes hardened in sin and evil takes root.
Jesus works through His Church, Satan through his empire of evil. Ignoring these simple truths means not having a true awareness. Unfortunately, Christians no longer believe in these things these days. There is a harmful tendency to remove Satan and the other spirits of evil. The Devil does not like to be seen … Satan’s biggest triumph is mankind’s conviction that he doesn’t exist ... But in this way, their power is only increased. This is perhaps why, in this day and age, Satan is so powerful and his influence over mankind is so great. If the people of the Church do not unite themselves with determination against Satan and fight tooth and nail ― then Satan is free to create havoc and destruction with impunity.”
“Our Lady’s messages speak about Satan. She often spoke about this. She underlined that Satan is powerful and that he wants to destroy her plans. She invited us to pray, to pray, to pray! Through prayer, we can even stop wars! Maybe we do not pray with the heart―this is possible!! We must pray in Faith, not mechanically! Pray with Faith―and prayer increases Faith and Charity. According to Our Lady’s words in Fatima, if we had prayed and fasted, there would not have been World War II. We have not listened to her and therefore there was a war. Our Lady speaks often about prayer and fasting. I think that this is very important, because contemporary men are following the spirit of consumerism. Humanity searches how to avoid any kind of sacrifice and so it exposes itself to sin. There is no practice of making sacrifice. Only if we are used to sacrifice ourselves, we will be able to live Christian life. For Christian life, besides prayer, we need a certain austerity of life. If there is no austerity of life, there is no perseverance in Christian life.
“Today the world does not turn from God because it is idolatrous; rather, it pursues pure atheism, so as to put science on the altar. But science does not create; it only discovers that which God has made. In turning away from the Lord, its breakthroughs are put to disastrous use. Without the Lord, progress, too, is misused. We see it in laws that go totally against nature, such as divorce, abortion, ‘gay marriage’ … we have forgotten God! … Divorce has been a disaster; abortion has been a disaster … Each year 50 million children are murdered by abortion. And euthanasia, the broken family, cohabitation ... It is all destruction!” … Therefore, God will soon admonish humanity in a very powerful manner, He knows how to remind us of His presence. I think we are close! [Fr. Amorth says this in 2015]. More and more so! The Lord will make Himself heard, and the world will respond. I look at all this with optimism, because God always acts for us to obtain a greater good than the punishments inflicted―which are meant to open the eyes of humanity, which has forgotten and abandoned Him.” (Fr. Gabriele-Amorth).
You Need Mary to Conquer Your Devils
As Fr. Amorth says, “We are all tempted by the devil, and will be for as long as we live! … Today, families are among the most targeted by the ordinary action of Satan … The devil wanders around each one of you, searching where to devour!” If we sin, then we are of the devil! Who is there that does not sin? Nobody―apart from the Immaculate Mary! “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us!” (1 John 1:8). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). And if we have sinned then we have been subjected to temptations by the devil―and, through our sins, we give the devil some kind of control in our lives: “He that commits sin is of the devil” (1 John 3:8). We need to regain full control of our lives from whatever control the devil may have through our sins.
We read, in St. Louis de Montfort’s book, The Secret of the Rosary, how St. Dominic exorcised a man who was possessed by the devil. St. Dominic forced the demons to reveal several things―among which was their great fear of Mary and her great success in snatching souls from the demons. St. Dominic implored the intercession of Our Lady in forcing the demons to speak. Our Lady appeared and obliged. Here are some extracts of what the demons were reluctantly forced to admit:
“Oh, you [Mary] who are our enemy, our downfall and our destruction, why have you come from Heaven to torture us so grievously? Advocate of sinners, you snatch them from the very jaws of Hell, you who are a most sure path to Heaven! … Listen, you Christians! This Mother of Jesus is most powerful in saving her servants from falling into Hell! She is like the sun which destroys the darkness of our wiles and subtlety! It is she who uncovers our hidden plots, breaks our snares, and makes our temptations useless and ineffective! We have to say, however, reluctantly, that no soul who has really persevered in her service has ever been damned with us! One single sigh that she offers to the Blessed Trinity, is worth far more than all the prayers, desires, and aspirations of all the saints! We fear her more than all the other saints in Heaven together, and we have no success with her faithful servants! Many Christians who call on her at the hour of death―and who really ought to be damned according to our ordinary standards―are saved by her intercession! And if she did not counter our plans and our efforts, we should have overcome the Church and destroyed it long before this, and caused all the Orders in the Church to fall into error and infidelity!” (St. Louis de Montfort’s book, The Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
Our Lady herself revealed to St. Bridget of Sweden: “I am the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God; neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion―for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be. No one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast-off by God, that he may not return and enjoy His mercy, if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of Mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them. Therefore, he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this life, being able to do so, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners.”
Article 3
Tuesday December 5th & Wednesday December 6th
Double-Barreled Spiritual Shotgun
Tuesday December 5th & Wednesday December 6th
Double-Barreled Spiritual Shotgun
Hitting the Target
St. Paul speaks of everyone having to run in a race where only one person can be the winner: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24). The problem for us is that we are not only running in a race for Heaven, but we also face the danger of being ambushed and killed along the route: “Be sober and watch! Because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour! Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9).
But being strong in Faith is pretty pointless if we have no works to show for our Faith: “What shall it profit if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself! Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! You believe that there is one God. You do well―but the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you realize that Faith without works is dead! For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
So―yes―we must “run the race” and “resist the devil” by being “strong in Faith” but there is more to it than that! In this idea of resisting the devil by Faith, must have a Faith that works―a Faith that is proved by works. You could compare Faith to a shotgun―Faith without works is like a shotgun without ammunition. Just as “Faith without works is dead” ― so too will you be dead if your shotgun has no ammunition, for we cannot fight the devil without ammunition.
Double-Barreled Shotgun and Ammunition
Taking this idea a step further―and pulling the trigger, so to speak―you could say that our Faith is like double-barreled shotgun, with each barrel firing a different kind of ammunition. Based upon Holy Scripture, we can say that ammunition for this double-barreled shotgun of Faith is “prayer and penance”―for Our Lord Himself says of this battle against the devil: “This kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20). That is why He fires His own “double-barreled” warning by saying twice in one breathe: “No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... [Again] I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5).
As for prayer, Our Lord says: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint!” (Luke 18:1) … “Cry to God day and night!” (Luke 18:7) … “All things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive!” (Matthew 21:22)―to which Holy Scripture adds: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) … “Watching with all instance and supplication … by all prayer and supplication, praying at all times!” (Ephesians 6:18).
Our Lady of Good Success (1600s) points out the success that prayer and penance can bring: “Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils ... No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents ... Therefore, clamor insistently without tiring and weep with bitter tears, imploring our Celestial Father in the privacy of your heart!”
Our Lady of La Salette (1846) lamented our forgetfulness of prayer and penance, warning that because “the chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance … The true Faith will be forgotten … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin.” The remedy will only be found in prayer and penance. “Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession.”
That is why Our Lady of Fatima and the Angel of Portugal (1917) came asking for prayers, sacrifices and penance: The Angel scolded the children who were playing: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!” Our Lady of Fatima would later add: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! ... Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners―for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, July & August of 1917).
Our Lady of Akita persistently gave the same message: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. With my Son I have intervened so many times to appease the wrath of the Father ... I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. I wish, with my Son, for souls … beloved souls who console Him by forming a cohort of victim souls ... who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this … Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much--very much! … Pray with fervor! … Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary!”
Why are Prayer and Penance So Important
Prayer is communication with God. We love to talk to the one’s that we love. The less we love the less we talk. The same applies to things―the more we love something, the more we love to talk about it. Worldly people love to talk about worldly things. Sports addicts love to talk about sports. We are meant to be “God-addicts” and that is how God has “wired” us―otherwise we could never fulfill the greatest commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). You cannot love God without talking to God―therefore you cannot love God without praying to God―for prayer, in its simplest definition, is defined as: “the raising of the mind and heart to God.”
If you rarely think about God; if you rarely read about God; if you rarely talk about God; if you rarely talk to God; if you rarely offer sacrifices (= gifts/presents) to God; if you rarely pay your debt to God by penance for your sins―then you barely love God. Then you are someone to whom Our Lord would say: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8). The same applies to your family members.
In all honesty, how much help do you expect to get from God if you only pray a little or if you pray badly? How can you expect to pass an exam if you only answer a few of the many questions and answer them badly? St. Alphonsus Liguori says: “He who prays most receives most!” Therefore, he who prays only a little, gets little. As you sow, so shall you reap! Advent is most appropriate time to put into order and revamp our cold, lukewarm, lame, slothful, indifferent, sputtering and misfiring prayer-life.
Good Quality Prayer
St. Augustine, speaking on the reason why our prayers are not answered by God, says that there are three chief reasons for this: (1) we are bad, (2) we pray badly, and (3) we ask for what is bad. St. Louis de Montfort writes: “A single Hail Mary, said properly, is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly” (Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-First Rose”).
Examples of Good and Bad Prayer in Scripture
“And when ye pray, you shall not be as the hypocrites, that love to stand and pray in the synagogues and corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men! Amen I say to you, they have received their reward. But thou when thou shalt pray, enter into thy chamber, and having shut the door, pray to thy Father in secret: and thy Father Who seeth in secret, will repay thee” (Matthew 6:5-6).
Our Lord further illustrates the above in His Parable about the Pharisee and the Publican: “Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican. I fast twice in a week: I give tithes of all that I possess!’ And the publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other: because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted” (Luke 18:10-14).
Our Lord would remove Himself from distractions as much as possible when He wanted to pray: “And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain alone to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23). “And when He had dismissed them, He went up to the mountain to pray” (Mark 6:46). “And it came to pass, that He passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12).
Half-Hearted Sleepy Prayer
“And Jesus said to them: ‘Why sleep you? Arise, pray, lest you enter into temptation!” (Luke 22:46). “Take ye heed, watch and pray” (Mark 13:33). “Watch ye, and pray that ye enter not into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak” (Matthew 26:41). The never failing principle of sowing and reaping applies here also: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap” (Galatians 6:8). St. Louis de Montfort writes: “It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches His Heart. A single Hail Mary, said properly, is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly. Most Catholics say the Rosary, either the whole fifteen mysteries, or five of them, or at least a few decades. Why is it then that so few of them give up their sins and make progress in virtue? It is because they are not saying them as they should” (Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-First Rose”).
This is exactly what Our Lord complains about: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8)—which is an echo of what His Father said through Isaias: “The Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me” (Isaias 29:13).
Spinning Wheels—Going Nowhere Fast
St. Louis de Montfort, speaking of prayer, writes: “Most Catholics say the Rosary, either the whole fifteen mysteries or five of them, or at least a few decades. Why is it then that so few of them give up their sins and make progress in virtue, if not because they are not saying them as they should! … In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? How can we expect him to be pleased if, while in the presence of His tremendous Majesty, we give in to distractions, like a child running after a butterfly? People who do that forfeit God’s blessing, which is changed into a curse for having treated the things of God disrespectfully: “Cursed be the one who does God’s work negligently” (Jeremias 48:10). Being human, we easily become tired and slipshod, but the devil makes these difficulties worse when we are saying the Rosary. Before we even begin, he makes us feel bored, distracted, or exhausted; and when we have started praying, he oppresses us from all sides, and when after much difficulty and many distractions.
“Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin. The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said, especially when we have promised to say it regularly or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
Dom Columba Marmion adds: “It happens to some souls that, when they have recited many formulas, they realize that they have said nothing to God from the bottom of their hearts. Our mind may be far distant from the words that fall from our lips ... In our prayer, we must give up to God our whole heart and our whole mind .... Just as the sanctuary light burns itself up without reserving anything, so our soul, in its conversation with God, must be entirely dedicated to the Almighty. We must free ourselves from preoccupations and from vain thoughts, which tie the soul down to earth and prevent it from being entirely given over to the Lord” (Dom Marmion, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
“Prayer always requires a certain effort―even from those who find in it their delight―because a certain strain is involved in the concentration necessary to speak to God; it is always more or less difficult to maintain the soul in an atmosphere which is above its usual level. That is why prayer can serve as a sacramental penance. We must not be surprised at this difficulty in applying ourselves to prayer: for to raise ourselves towards God, even in the smallest degree, is to exceed our natural powers” (Dom Marmion, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Is There Room For God?
Too many people limit prayer to an isolated part of the day—first thing in the morning or last thing at night. Yet God should be part of our whole day, not just a mere ten minutes. This is what is meant by loving God with our whole mind, our whole heart, our whole soul and our whole strength. God is so badly ‘short-changed’ and given ‘short-shrift’ by so, so, so many people—who nevertheless feel smug about their ‘prayer-life’! Is it any wonder that most souls are lost? Prayer is major source of grace―and we need that grace of God to ward-off the ceaseless temptations that bombard us the whole day long! The devil knows that one of the prime weapons against temptation and sin is prayer―that is why he makes prayer one of his prime focal points of attack. You have to say that he has pretty much succeeded―for very few people pray; even fewer pray well.
“Prayer in our life, must not be limited to a number of isolated, passing incidents. We must cultivate a spirit of prayer. What must we understand by this? A spirit of prayer is an habitual disposition of soul whereby, in our troubles and discouragements, as well as in our joys and successes, our hearts turn towards Our Lady and Our Lord, as to our best friends and most intimate confidants of our feelings. And it is not only in the morning and in the evening that the soul should be raised heavenwards, but always: ‘My eyes are ever towards the Lord’ (Psalm 24:15)” (Dom Marmion, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Wasting Time
Advent is time to do penance. The time to heat up our lukewarmness into a fiery zeal; to refocus our blurred indifference into a sharp focus on spiritual matters and our salvation, rather than our relaxation and recreation. So many of the world are so focused on money, wealth, pleasures and treasures that they see enticing them in the distance, that their farsightedness or long-sightedness prevents them from threading the eye of the needle with the thread of their soul. Their spiritual eyesight is all too blurred and they fail, time and time again, year after year, to use Advent well and pass through the eye of the needle. As Our Lord warned us: “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:24).
What We Love to Hate!
O how we hate penance! O how we hate sacrifices! Unless we make sacrifices, unless we do penance, we shall not enter the kingdom of Heaven. Our Lord and Holy Scripture are adamant on that point. Who needs penance? Sinners. Are we not sinners? “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). Therefore all need to do penance. Sin is not cheap―as most people seem to think it is―and therefore penance for sin is not just mere pittance, but penance has to be far more expensive to match the expensiveness of sin. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” … “Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
Our Lord makes it quite―either do penance or perish: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
To which Holy Scripture adds in abundance further similar quotes to dispel any false sense of security we might have: “God now declares unto men, that all should everywhere do penance!” (Acts 17:30) ... “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9) … “Or do you despise His patience and longsuffering? Do you not know that God leads you to penance?” (Romans 2:4) … “I mourn that many of them that sinned before, have not done penance for the sins that they have committed!” (2 Corinthians 12:21) … “Let him do penance for his sin!” (Leviticus 5:5) ... “Hear, I beseech you, and do penance!” (Job 21:2) ... “Do penance―for the kingdom of heaven is at hand! … Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance!” (Matthew 3:2, 8) ... “Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:30) ... “Do penance and pray to God, that perhaps you may be forgiven!” (Acts 8:22) ... “If My people― being converted―shall pray to Me and seek out My face, and do penance for their most wicked ways―then will I hear from Heaven and will forgive their sins and will heal their land!” (2 Paralipomenon 7:14) ... “God has given him place for penance, but he pridefully abuses it!” (Job 24:23) ... “I gave her time so that she might do penance, and she will not repent!” (Apocalypse 2:21) ... “There is none that does penance for his sin!” (Jeremias 8:6) ... “They did not penance for their works” (Apocalypse 16:11) … Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19) ... “Do penance―if not, I will come to thee quickly with the sword of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 2:16).
The Devil of Later
The devil works similarly on our spiritual duties and exercises―our prayers, penances and sacrifices. If he can, he will have us lay them aside until later. It is easier for him, and more likely to be successful, if he whispers to us: “Oh, you can do it later!” than saying to us: “Don’t do it!” This is because he knows that it is easier to extract from us a compromise rather than an outright capitulation or surrender. Thereby, he has us midway, neither doing our spiritual exercises, nor rejecting our spiritual exercise, but simply putting them off until later. But, as we all know, later, like tomorrow, never comes. Feeling comfortable with “a little later” it soon becomes “a lot later” and this often becomes “never” and our good intention is consigned to the cemetery of good intentions. Remember that phrase: “Hell is full of good intentions!”
So when Advent or Lent comes around―which are essentially times of more prayer and penance―the devil is working overtime, camouflaged better than ever, at getting us to consign our good intentions for Advent to that cemetery of good intentions.
Advent’s False Sense of Security
Most Catholics will have fallen victim to this subtle purveyor of spiritual lethargy during this Advent season. They are led by him to falsely imagine and erroneously feel secure in their superficial Advent preparations. The fact they have an Advent wreath and candles burning at home, makes them feel secure from burning in Purgatory, or worse yet, Hell. The fact that they do not give in to the modern temptation of hanging out the Christmas lights and putting up the Christmas Tree and Nativity Scene at the start of December, makes them feel some kind of aura of holiness, as they wait for the real Christmas season to begin on the 25th day of the month.
Yet for many, if not most, there are no extra prayers, no penances, no special readings, no deepening and multiplying of spiritual exercises. Advent is just like any other month of the year, except for the above-mentioned superficial trimmings. Any extra time they may have will be spent on those lights, trees and statues—unpacking them, unraveling them, cleaning them and then hanging them up and putting them on display. They will spend far more time, effort and money on these material trimmings than they do on the essential spiritual duties that should be foremost in their minds.
St. Paul speaks of everyone having to run in a race where only one person can be the winner: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it!” (1 Corinthians 9:24). The problem for us is that we are not only running in a race for Heaven, but we also face the danger of being ambushed and killed along the route: “Be sober and watch! Because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour! Whom resist ye, strong in Faith!” (1 Peter 5:8-9).
But being strong in Faith is pretty pointless if we have no works to show for our Faith: “What shall it profit if a man says he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? Faith, if it has not works, is dead in itself! Show me your Faith without works; and I will show you, by works, my Faith! You believe that there is one God. You do well―but the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you realize that Faith without works is dead! For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
So―yes―we must “run the race” and “resist the devil” by being “strong in Faith” but there is more to it than that! In this idea of resisting the devil by Faith, must have a Faith that works―a Faith that is proved by works. You could compare Faith to a shotgun―Faith without works is like a shotgun without ammunition. Just as “Faith without works is dead” ― so too will you be dead if your shotgun has no ammunition, for we cannot fight the devil without ammunition.
Double-Barreled Shotgun and Ammunition
Taking this idea a step further―and pulling the trigger, so to speak―you could say that our Faith is like double-barreled shotgun, with each barrel firing a different kind of ammunition. Based upon Holy Scripture, we can say that ammunition for this double-barreled shotgun of Faith is “prayer and penance”―for Our Lord Himself says of this battle against the devil: “This kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20). That is why He fires His own “double-barreled” warning by saying twice in one breathe: “No, I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish! ... [Again] I say to you―except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5).
As for prayer, Our Lord says: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint!” (Luke 18:1) … “Cry to God day and night!” (Luke 18:7) … “All things whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive!” (Matthew 21:22)―to which Holy Scripture adds: “Pray without ceasing!” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) … “Watching with all instance and supplication … by all prayer and supplication, praying at all times!” (Ephesians 6:18).
Our Lady of Good Success (1600s) points out the success that prayer and penance can bring: “Woe to the world should it lack monasteries and convents! Men do not comprehend their importance, for, if they understood, they would do all in their power to multiply them, because in them can be found the remedy for all physical and moral evils ... No one on the face of the Earth is aware whence comes the salvation of souls, the conversion of great sinners, the end of great scourges, the fertility of the land, the end of pestilence and wars, and the harmony between nations. All this is due to the prayers that rise up from monasteries and convents ... Therefore, clamor insistently without tiring and weep with bitter tears, imploring our Celestial Father in the privacy of your heart!”
Our Lady of La Salette (1846) lamented our forgetfulness of prayer and penance, warning that because “the chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance … The true Faith will be forgotten … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin.” The remedy will only be found in prayer and penance. “Their prayers, their penances and their tears will rise up to Heaven and all of God’s people will beg for forgiveness and mercy and will plead for my help and intercession.”
That is why Our Lady of Fatima and the Angel of Portugal (1917) came asking for prayers, sacrifices and penance: The Angel scolded the children who were playing: “What are you doing? Pray! Pray a great deal! Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High! Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of sinners. Above all, accept and bear with submission all the sufferings the Lord will send you!” Our Lady of Fatima would later add: “You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go! … Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them! … Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners? … Then you are going to have much to suffer! … Sacrifice yourselves for sinners! ... Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners―for many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them!” (Compilation of the words of Our Lady of Fatima from her apparitions in May, July & August of 1917).
Our Lady of Akita persistently gave the same message: “Many men in this world afflict the Lord ... In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. With my Son I have intervened so many times to appease the wrath of the Father ... I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. I wish, with my Son, for souls … beloved souls who console Him by forming a cohort of victim souls ... who will repair―by their suffering and their poverty―for the sinners and the ungrateful … Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger. I desire this … Pray in reparation for the ingratitude and outrages of so many men … Pray very much! … Continue to pray very much--very much! … Pray with fervor! … Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary!”
Why are Prayer and Penance So Important
Prayer is communication with God. We love to talk to the one’s that we love. The less we love the less we talk. The same applies to things―the more we love something, the more we love to talk about it. Worldly people love to talk about worldly things. Sports addicts love to talk about sports. We are meant to be “God-addicts” and that is how God has “wired” us―otherwise we could never fulfill the greatest commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31). You cannot love God without talking to God―therefore you cannot love God without praying to God―for prayer, in its simplest definition, is defined as: “the raising of the mind and heart to God.”
If you rarely think about God; if you rarely read about God; if you rarely talk about God; if you rarely talk to God; if you rarely offer sacrifices (= gifts/presents) to God; if you rarely pay your debt to God by penance for your sins―then you barely love God. Then you are someone to whom Our Lord would say: “Hypocrites! Well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me!’” (Matthew 15:7-8). The same applies to your family members.
In all honesty, how much help do you expect to get from God if you only pray a little or if you pray badly? How can you expect to pass an exam if you only answer a few of the many questions and answer them badly? St. Alphonsus Liguori says: “He who prays most receives most!” Therefore, he who prays only a little, gets little. As you sow, so shall you reap! Advent is most appropriate time to put into order and revamp our cold, lukewarm, lame, slothful, indifferent, sputtering and misfiring prayer-life.
Good Quality Prayer
St. Augustine, speaking on the reason why our prayers are not answered by God, says that there are three chief reasons for this: (1) we are bad, (2) we pray badly, and (3) we ask for what is bad. St. Louis de Montfort writes: “A single Hail Mary, said properly, is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly” (Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-First Rose”).
Examples of Good and Bad Prayer in Scripture
“And when ye pray, you shall not be as the hypocrites, that love to stand and pray in the synagogues and corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men! Amen I say to you, they have received their reward. But thou when thou shalt pray, enter into thy chamber, and having shut the door, pray to thy Father in secret: and thy Father Who seeth in secret, will repay thee” (Matthew 6:5-6).
Our Lord further illustrates the above in His Parable about the Pharisee and the Publican: “Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a Publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican. I fast twice in a week: I give tithes of all that I possess!’ And the publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards Heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other: because everyone that exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he that humbles himself, shall be exalted” (Luke 18:10-14).
Our Lord would remove Himself from distractions as much as possible when He wanted to pray: “And having dismissed the multitude, He went into a mountain alone to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone” (Matthew 14:23). “And when He had dismissed them, He went up to the mountain to pray” (Mark 6:46). “And it came to pass, that He passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (Luke 6:12).
Half-Hearted Sleepy Prayer
“And Jesus said to them: ‘Why sleep you? Arise, pray, lest you enter into temptation!” (Luke 22:46). “Take ye heed, watch and pray” (Mark 13:33). “Watch ye, and pray that ye enter not into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak” (Matthew 26:41). The never failing principle of sowing and reaping applies here also: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap” (Galatians 6:8). St. Louis de Montfort writes: “It is not so much the length of a prayer as the fervor with which it is said which pleases God and touches His Heart. A single Hail Mary, said properly, is worth more than a hundred and fifty said badly. Most Catholics say the Rosary, either the whole fifteen mysteries, or five of them, or at least a few decades. Why is it then that so few of them give up their sins and make progress in virtue? It is because they are not saying them as they should” (Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-First Rose”).
This is exactly what Our Lord complains about: “This people honoureth Me with their lips: but their heart is far from Me” (Matthew 15:8)—which is an echo of what His Father said through Isaias: “The Lord said: ‘Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth, and with their lips glorify Me, but their heart is far from Me” (Isaias 29:13).
Spinning Wheels—Going Nowhere Fast
St. Louis de Montfort, speaking of prayer, writes: “Most Catholics say the Rosary, either the whole fifteen mysteries or five of them, or at least a few decades. Why is it then that so few of them give up their sins and make progress in virtue, if not because they are not saying them as they should! … In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin. How can we expect God to listen to us if we ourselves do not pay attention to what we are saying? How can we expect him to be pleased if, while in the presence of His tremendous Majesty, we give in to distractions, like a child running after a butterfly? People who do that forfeit God’s blessing, which is changed into a curse for having treated the things of God disrespectfully: “Cursed be the one who does God’s work negligently” (Jeremias 48:10). Being human, we easily become tired and slipshod, but the devil makes these difficulties worse when we are saying the Rosary. Before we even begin, he makes us feel bored, distracted, or exhausted; and when we have started praying, he oppresses us from all sides, and when after much difficulty and many distractions.
“Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin. The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said, especially when we have promised to say it regularly or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
Dom Columba Marmion adds: “It happens to some souls that, when they have recited many formulas, they realize that they have said nothing to God from the bottom of their hearts. Our mind may be far distant from the words that fall from our lips ... In our prayer, we must give up to God our whole heart and our whole mind .... Just as the sanctuary light burns itself up without reserving anything, so our soul, in its conversation with God, must be entirely dedicated to the Almighty. We must free ourselves from preoccupations and from vain thoughts, which tie the soul down to earth and prevent it from being entirely given over to the Lord” (Dom Marmion, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
“Prayer always requires a certain effort―even from those who find in it their delight―because a certain strain is involved in the concentration necessary to speak to God; it is always more or less difficult to maintain the soul in an atmosphere which is above its usual level. That is why prayer can serve as a sacramental penance. We must not be surprised at this difficulty in applying ourselves to prayer: for to raise ourselves towards God, even in the smallest degree, is to exceed our natural powers” (Dom Marmion, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Is There Room For God?
Too many people limit prayer to an isolated part of the day—first thing in the morning or last thing at night. Yet God should be part of our whole day, not just a mere ten minutes. This is what is meant by loving God with our whole mind, our whole heart, our whole soul and our whole strength. God is so badly ‘short-changed’ and given ‘short-shrift’ by so, so, so many people—who nevertheless feel smug about their ‘prayer-life’! Is it any wonder that most souls are lost? Prayer is major source of grace―and we need that grace of God to ward-off the ceaseless temptations that bombard us the whole day long! The devil knows that one of the prime weapons against temptation and sin is prayer―that is why he makes prayer one of his prime focal points of attack. You have to say that he has pretty much succeeded―for very few people pray; even fewer pray well.
“Prayer in our life, must not be limited to a number of isolated, passing incidents. We must cultivate a spirit of prayer. What must we understand by this? A spirit of prayer is an habitual disposition of soul whereby, in our troubles and discouragements, as well as in our joys and successes, our hearts turn towards Our Lady and Our Lord, as to our best friends and most intimate confidants of our feelings. And it is not only in the morning and in the evening that the soul should be raised heavenwards, but always: ‘My eyes are ever towards the Lord’ (Psalm 24:15)” (Dom Marmion, Christ—The Ideal of the Priest, chapter 15).
Wasting Time
Advent is time to do penance. The time to heat up our lukewarmness into a fiery zeal; to refocus our blurred indifference into a sharp focus on spiritual matters and our salvation, rather than our relaxation and recreation. So many of the world are so focused on money, wealth, pleasures and treasures that they see enticing them in the distance, that their farsightedness or long-sightedness prevents them from threading the eye of the needle with the thread of their soul. Their spiritual eyesight is all too blurred and they fail, time and time again, year after year, to use Advent well and pass through the eye of the needle. As Our Lord warned us: “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 19:24).
What We Love to Hate!
O how we hate penance! O how we hate sacrifices! Unless we make sacrifices, unless we do penance, we shall not enter the kingdom of Heaven. Our Lord and Holy Scripture are adamant on that point. Who needs penance? Sinners. Are we not sinners? “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23). Therefore all need to do penance. Sin is not cheap―as most people seem to think it is―and therefore penance for sin is not just mere pittance, but penance has to be far more expensive to match the expensiveness of sin. “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” … “Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
Our Lord makes it quite―either do penance or perish: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance! … No, I say to you― unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish ... Again I say to you― except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish! … I say to you, that even so there shall be joy in Heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety-nine just men who need not penance! … There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance!” (Luke 5:3; 13:3-5; 15:7-10).
To which Holy Scripture adds in abundance further similar quotes to dispel any false sense of security we might have: “God now declares unto men, that all should everywhere do penance!” (Acts 17:30) ... “The Lord delays not His promise, as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9) … “Or do you despise His patience and longsuffering? Do you not know that God leads you to penance?” (Romans 2:4) … “I mourn that many of them that sinned before, have not done penance for the sins that they have committed!” (2 Corinthians 12:21) … “Let him do penance for his sin!” (Leviticus 5:5) ... “Hear, I beseech you, and do penance!” (Job 21:2) ... “Do penance―for the kingdom of heaven is at hand! … Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance!” (Matthew 3:2, 8) ... “Be converted and do penance for all your iniquities―and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:30) ... “Do penance and pray to God, that perhaps you may be forgiven!” (Acts 8:22) ... “If My people― being converted―shall pray to Me and seek out My face, and do penance for their most wicked ways―then will I hear from Heaven and will forgive their sins and will heal their land!” (2 Paralipomenon 7:14) ... “God has given him place for penance, but he pridefully abuses it!” (Job 24:23) ... “I gave her time so that she might do penance, and she will not repent!” (Apocalypse 2:21) ... “There is none that does penance for his sin!” (Jeremias 8:6) ... “They did not penance for their works” (Apocalypse 16:11) … Be zealous therefore, and do penance!” (Apocalypse 3:15-19) ... “Do penance―if not, I will come to thee quickly with the sword of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 2:16).
The Devil of Later
The devil works similarly on our spiritual duties and exercises―our prayers, penances and sacrifices. If he can, he will have us lay them aside until later. It is easier for him, and more likely to be successful, if he whispers to us: “Oh, you can do it later!” than saying to us: “Don’t do it!” This is because he knows that it is easier to extract from us a compromise rather than an outright capitulation or surrender. Thereby, he has us midway, neither doing our spiritual exercises, nor rejecting our spiritual exercise, but simply putting them off until later. But, as we all know, later, like tomorrow, never comes. Feeling comfortable with “a little later” it soon becomes “a lot later” and this often becomes “never” and our good intention is consigned to the cemetery of good intentions. Remember that phrase: “Hell is full of good intentions!”
So when Advent or Lent comes around―which are essentially times of more prayer and penance―the devil is working overtime, camouflaged better than ever, at getting us to consign our good intentions for Advent to that cemetery of good intentions.
Advent’s False Sense of Security
Most Catholics will have fallen victim to this subtle purveyor of spiritual lethargy during this Advent season. They are led by him to falsely imagine and erroneously feel secure in their superficial Advent preparations. The fact they have an Advent wreath and candles burning at home, makes them feel secure from burning in Purgatory, or worse yet, Hell. The fact that they do not give in to the modern temptation of hanging out the Christmas lights and putting up the Christmas Tree and Nativity Scene at the start of December, makes them feel some kind of aura of holiness, as they wait for the real Christmas season to begin on the 25th day of the month.
Yet for many, if not most, there are no extra prayers, no penances, no special readings, no deepening and multiplying of spiritual exercises. Advent is just like any other month of the year, except for the above-mentioned superficial trimmings. Any extra time they may have will be spent on those lights, trees and statues—unpacking them, unraveling them, cleaning them and then hanging them up and putting them on display. They will spend far more time, effort and money on these material trimmings than they do on the essential spiritual duties that should be foremost in their minds.
Article 2
First Sunday of Advent, December 3rd & Monday December 4th
Advent - What You Sow You Reap!
First Sunday of Advent, December 3rd & Monday December 4th
Advent - What You Sow You Reap!
Microwaved Advent
This year we are experiencing the shortest possible Advent. According to present modern-day custom, Advent is a period beginning with the Sunday nearest to the feast of St. Andrew the Apostle (November 30th) and embracing four Sundays. The first Sunday may be as early as November 27th, and then Advent has twenty-eight days, or as late as December 3rd, giving the season only twenty-one days. For those Catholics who are “minimalists” ― preferring to do the least they can possibly get away with in the spiritual life ― this shortest possible Advent must feel like Heaven on Earth! Nevertheless, having said that, who is there who still takes Advent as seriously as the Church used to do in bygone years?
The oldest document in which we find the length and exercises of Advent mentioned with anything like clearness, is a passage in the second book of the History of the Franks by St. Gregory of Tours, where he writes that St. Perpetuus, one of his predecessors as Bishop of Tours about the year 480, had decreed a fast three times a week, beginning on November 12th, the day after the feast of St. Martin of Tours (November 11th), until Christmas. It is not clear whether St. Perpetuus established a new custom, or enforced an already existing law. Nonetheless, we see that this interval of forty, or rather of forty-three days, consecrated to penance, was like a second Lent―even though it was less strict and severe. Obviously, it was not penance alone, but also prayer that was advocated. As Our Lord says of devils: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20).
Later on, in 567, the second Council of Tours had enjoined the monks to fast daily from the beginning of December until Christmas. This practice of penance soon extended to the whole forty days, even for the laity: and it was commonly called St. Martin’s Lent.
However, a decline was soon to appear and we find the first Council of Macon, held in 582, decreeing that during the same interval between St. Martin’s day and Christmas, only the Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, should be fasting days, and that the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass should be celebrated according to the Lenten rite.
The obligation of observing this second “Lent”, which had by degrees acquired the force of a sacred law, began to be relaxed, and the forty days from St. Martin's day to Christmas (43 days) were reduced to four weeks (28 days). This shortened fast began to be observed first in France; but from there it spread into England, then into Italy, into Germany, Spain, etc.
The first recorded mention of Advent being reduced to four weeks is to be found in the ninth century, in a letter of Pope St. Nicholas I to the Bulgarians. Even then, the question of reducing the duration of the Advent fast by one-third was seriously entertained. The discipline of the Churches of the west, after having reduced the time of the Advent fast, went so far, in just a few years, as to change the fast into a simple abstinence. We even find Councils of the twelfth century―for instance Selingstadt in 1122, and Avranches in 1172―which seem to require only the clergy to observe this abstinence, with the laity being totally freed from having to abstain. Likewise we read in the documents of the Council of Salisbury, England, held in 1281, that only monks were expected to abstain.
By degrees, the custom of fasting so far fell into disuse, that when, in 1362, Pope Urban V endeavored to prevent the total decay of the Advent penance, all he insisted upon was that all the clerics of his court should keep abstinence during Advent, without in any way including others―neither clergy or laity―in this law. St. Charles Borromeo also strove to bring back his people of Milan to the spirit, if not to the letter, of ancient times. In his fourth Council, he enjoins the parish priests to exhort the faithful to go to Communion on the Sundays, at least, of Lent and Advent; and afterwards addressed to the faithful themselves a pastoral letter, in which, after having reminded them of the dispositions wherewith they ought to spend this holy time, he strongly urges them to fast on the Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, at least, of each week in Advent.
Finally, Pope Benedict XIV (ruled 1740-1758), when still Archbishop of Bologna, tried to restore a zeal for Advent whereby all the members of the Church―bishops, priests, religious and laity―pointing out to them that laxity towards Advent penance was rash and scandalous by its indifference in preparing for the great feast of the birth of Jesus Christ.
They Reaped What They Sowed
This gradual relaxation and reduction of the penance and the length of Advent would only serve to prepare the way for the decline of the Church―for it was in the 14th and 15th centuries that seeds of Rationalism began to grow and would eventually sprout into the Protestant Revolution (sometimes erroneously called the Protestant Reformation―Protestant Deformation would be more apt).
As, quoted above, Our Lord said of devils: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20). Therefore, the less penance performed and the less prayer that is prayed, simply strengthens Satan’s hand and weakens the hand of the Church. The neglect of prayer and penance prior to the Protestant Revolution was a major factor in its success. Similarly in our days, Pope Paul VI’s 90% reduction of Lenten penance―by reducing the 40 day fast to a mere 2 day fast (Ash Wednesday and Good Friday)―has deprived the Church of many graces and much strength. This is easily seen and proved by the catastrophes that have fallen upon the Church since Paul VI’s 90% penitential discount decree in 1966.
Our Lady of La Salette lamented in 1846: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish. There are no more generous souls, there is no one left worthy of offering a spotless Sacrifice to the Eternal for the sake of the world. God will strike in an unprecedented way. Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell. The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. They will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell. Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls.”
Christ Comes to Save, Not Lose Souls
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting!” (John 3:16). Our Lord Himself said: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56) … “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). Nevertheless, merely believing in Him is not enough― “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith! … Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
Work for Your Salvation!
It is in this vein that Our Lord says: “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that DOES the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) … “And why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and DO NOT the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). To “do” and “do not” are all about WORKS or ACTIONS. Faith is dead without them. Likewise, Our Lord says to those who DID WORKS: “Amen I say to you, as long as you DID it to one of these My least brethren, you DID it to Me! Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world!” (Matthew 25:31-46). But to those who DID NOT DO WORKS, Our Lord says: “Amen I say to you, as long as you DID NOT DO IT to one of these least of My brethren, NEITHER DID YOU DO IT to Me! Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels!” (Matthew 25:31-46).
No Time for Idleness
That is why we are told: “With fear and trembling WORK out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). Advent is that time of work―as we were told in the readings for the First Sunday of Advent: “Brethren! Understand that it is now the hour for us to rise from sleep, because now our salvation is nearer than when we came to believe! The night is far advanced; the day is at hand! Let us therefore lay aside the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light! Let us walk becomingly as in the day, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in debauchery and wantonness, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ!” (Romans 13:11-14). We are to work at acquiring a resemblance of Christ in time for Christmas! We are to work at cleaning out our souls from the works of darkness and filling our souls with works of light! It is a time for WORK and NOT IDLENESS. The words of Our Lord come to mind: “Why stand you here all the day idle? Go you also into my vineyard!” (Matthew 20:6-7). Advent is not a time for idle hands! Let us go into the vineyard of Advent and do some serious work! Otherwise, when Christmas comes again for the umpteenth time, we, for the umpteenth time, shall again look like hypocrites in the eyes of Christ: “This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!” (Mark 7:6). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus” (2 Timothy 2:3).
No Idle Spectators
Though it is Christ that saves, you have to play your part. You cannot be an idle spectator, standing on side-lines, giving Christ mere lip-service as He does all the work! It doesn’t work that way! St. Augustine tells us that God could save us with our cooperation, but God will not save us without our cooperation: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” The fate of the idle spectator, who does not work, is summed up succinctly in Our Lord’s parable of the talents:
“A man going into a far country, called his servants, and delivered to them his goods. To one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―to everyone according to his proper ability―and then immediately he took his journey. He that had received the five talents, traded with them and gained another five. He that had received the two talents, gained another two. But he that received one talent, dug a hole into the earth and hid his lord’s money. After a long time, the lord came and reckoned with them. He that had received the five talents coming, brought the other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you delivered to me five talents! Behold I have gained another five over and above!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place you over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’ He that had received two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you delivered two talents to me! Behold, I have gained another two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’ But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man―you reap where you have not sown. Being afraid, I went and hid your talent in the ground! Behold here it is―you can take back that which is yours!’ And his lord, answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You ought to have at least committed my money to the bankers, so that, at my coming, I should have received my own money back with usury [additional interest]!’ Take away the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
How many more Advents will Our Lord come, knocking on the doors of our souls―only to find us too busy with goodness knows what? As the Advent Liturgy states: “Seek ye the Lord while He may be found!” (Antiphon at Lauds) … “Put on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Epistle, 1st Sunday of Advent). “Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock! If any man shall hear My voice, and open to Me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me” (Apocalypse 3:20). The problem is that Our Lord finds most doors closed to Him, even though we profess to be His followers! Let us not just be “Cafeteria Catholics” who merely sit, sip and speak! Let us be disciples dutifully doing what Christ expects of us: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Make a point this Advent! The word “Advent” is a compound of two Latin words: “ad” meaning “to” and “venire” meaning “to come” ― of which the past participle in Latin is “ventus.” Therefore we see the word “Advent” meaning “to come to.” Prove to Our Lord that you truly want Him to come to you and your family this year! Go beyond the mere “lip-service” that Our Lord condemns, and give Him some “heart service.”
There is no doubt whatsoever that, on the part of Jesus, He truly wants to come to us. He loves us beyond our comprehension and our wildest dreams. There is no problem on the part of Jesus. However, on our side, we have to ask the question: “Do we really want Jesus to come to us?” The stress is on the word “really” ― not just theoretically and not just by lip-service. Do we really and truly want Jesus in our lives? To drive the point home more clearly and to avoid misconceptions, do we really and truly want Jesus to be our life? Notice the words “be our life”, which is different to being “a part of our life.” If we want Jesus to be “a part of our life”, then we only partially want Him—for some that means on Sundays and prayer times only, for others a little more perhaps, but they place a limit on “how much of Jesus they can take.” He wants to be our whole life, not just a part of our life, and that is what is meant by the commandment to love God with our whole mind, heart, soul and strength. Thus it is that St. Paul writes: “I live now, not I―but Christ liveth in me!” (Galatians 2:20).
Advent on a Plate
We present you with “Advent on a plate” ― but, as they say, “You can lead a horse to water, but can’t make it drink!” So too, you can present “Advent on a plate” for someone―but they have to make the effort to eat! With the extremely wide-range of Advent materials available on this site, there can be no excuse for not knowing how to approach Advent and what to do during the season. Go to the ADVENT tab at the top of page and explore the vast variety of Advent aids for this holy season.
Click on this ADVENT JOURNEY page link and you will find that it is loaded with advice on how to approach Advent and the many things that can be done. First and foremost, you will find a downloadable 79-page ADVENT RITUAL that will be your daily guide throughout Advent. Also on the ADVENT JOURNEY page you will find downloadable posters for Advent; Christmas Cards for Christ to fill out with sacrifices and to place in Christ’s Crib on Christmas Day; words of encouragement; topics for family discussion; practical tips; creative ideas ; use of poetry; liturgical angles; explanations about the Advent Wreath; etc.
Click on this COLD TO HOT page link and you will find help in overcoming our natural tendency to easily drift into spiritual lukewarmness. Here, Fr. Faber paints a clear picture of the danger and tries to guide us out of that fatal condition of which Our Lord says: “Because thou art lukewarm―and neither cold nor hot―I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16).
This link to the ADVENT WITH AQUINAS page will introduce you to the masterful thoughts and teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas on the subject of Advent and the Coming of Christ. You will find a short, simple yet profound meditation for every single day of the Advent season.
The “King” of the Liturgical Year―Dom Guéranger―can be found at the link ADVENT WITH GUÉRANGER. You will find daily instructions on Advent for each day of the season. He covers the history of Advent; the purpose of Advent; the practices of Advent; the spirituality of Advent and the liturgical practices of Advent.
The link SERMONS FOR ADVENT will give you sermons on various aspects of Advent by a variety of masters: Pope St. Gregory the Great; Pope St. Leo the Great; St. Augustine of Hippo; St. Bernard of Clairvaux; St. Francis de Sales; St. Alphonsus Liguori; St. John Vianney; and others.
On the prayer side of things, you have two different prayer pages―one liturgical (based on the Divine Office that priest and religious pray daily) and the other prayer page is a compilation of non-liturgical prayers for the season of Advent. The Advent Liturgical Prayer page, has a different set of prayers and psalms for each day of week (just like the Divine Office). Click on the appropriate link: SUNDAY, MONDAY, TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY, THURSDAY, FRIDAY, and SATURDAY. Each day eight separate prayers periods―Matins, Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers and Compline― but it is a much abbreviated and simplified version that is ideal for the laity.
The Advent Non-Liturgical Prayer page, PRAYERS FOR ADVENT, has a variety of short prayers as well as prayers that can said during the daily lighting of the Advent Wreath.
For the last days of Advent, by clicking on this link JOURNEY TO BETHLEHEM, you can follow the route that Mary and Joseph took on their 90-mile walk from Nazareth in the north to Bethlehem in the south. You will find detailed accounts and pictures of the topography, the lay of the land, details of the climate for that time of year, the dangers that potentially lay on the road, etc.
In the final build up to Christmas Day, follow the Church in her “Great O Antiphons” ― which are seven antiphons for each day leading up to Christmas Eve. The first “O Antiphon” is sung on December 17th and the seventh and final “O Antiphon” is sung on December 23rd.
A general introduction can be found here THE GREAT “O” ANTIPHONS ― and each day’s individual Antiphon can be found by clicking on the following links:
December 17th ― O SAPIENTIA
December 18th ― O ADONAI
December 19th ― O RADIX JESSE
December 20th ― O CLAVIS DAVID
December 21st ― O ORIENS
December 22nd ― O REX GENTIUM
December 23rd ― O EMMANUEL
So there you have it! A thorough, all-encompassing, multi-faceted, overview, guide and spiritual blueprint for the Holy Season of Lent. “Use it or lose it!” as they say. How many Advents have you lost so far? Make it right this year! As you sow, so shall you reap!
This year we are experiencing the shortest possible Advent. According to present modern-day custom, Advent is a period beginning with the Sunday nearest to the feast of St. Andrew the Apostle (November 30th) and embracing four Sundays. The first Sunday may be as early as November 27th, and then Advent has twenty-eight days, or as late as December 3rd, giving the season only twenty-one days. For those Catholics who are “minimalists” ― preferring to do the least they can possibly get away with in the spiritual life ― this shortest possible Advent must feel like Heaven on Earth! Nevertheless, having said that, who is there who still takes Advent as seriously as the Church used to do in bygone years?
The oldest document in which we find the length and exercises of Advent mentioned with anything like clearness, is a passage in the second book of the History of the Franks by St. Gregory of Tours, where he writes that St. Perpetuus, one of his predecessors as Bishop of Tours about the year 480, had decreed a fast three times a week, beginning on November 12th, the day after the feast of St. Martin of Tours (November 11th), until Christmas. It is not clear whether St. Perpetuus established a new custom, or enforced an already existing law. Nonetheless, we see that this interval of forty, or rather of forty-three days, consecrated to penance, was like a second Lent―even though it was less strict and severe. Obviously, it was not penance alone, but also prayer that was advocated. As Our Lord says of devils: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20).
Later on, in 567, the second Council of Tours had enjoined the monks to fast daily from the beginning of December until Christmas. This practice of penance soon extended to the whole forty days, even for the laity: and it was commonly called St. Martin’s Lent.
However, a decline was soon to appear and we find the first Council of Macon, held in 582, decreeing that during the same interval between St. Martin’s day and Christmas, only the Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, should be fasting days, and that the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass should be celebrated according to the Lenten rite.
The obligation of observing this second “Lent”, which had by degrees acquired the force of a sacred law, began to be relaxed, and the forty days from St. Martin's day to Christmas (43 days) were reduced to four weeks (28 days). This shortened fast began to be observed first in France; but from there it spread into England, then into Italy, into Germany, Spain, etc.
The first recorded mention of Advent being reduced to four weeks is to be found in the ninth century, in a letter of Pope St. Nicholas I to the Bulgarians. Even then, the question of reducing the duration of the Advent fast by one-third was seriously entertained. The discipline of the Churches of the west, after having reduced the time of the Advent fast, went so far, in just a few years, as to change the fast into a simple abstinence. We even find Councils of the twelfth century―for instance Selingstadt in 1122, and Avranches in 1172―which seem to require only the clergy to observe this abstinence, with the laity being totally freed from having to abstain. Likewise we read in the documents of the Council of Salisbury, England, held in 1281, that only monks were expected to abstain.
By degrees, the custom of fasting so far fell into disuse, that when, in 1362, Pope Urban V endeavored to prevent the total decay of the Advent penance, all he insisted upon was that all the clerics of his court should keep abstinence during Advent, without in any way including others―neither clergy or laity―in this law. St. Charles Borromeo also strove to bring back his people of Milan to the spirit, if not to the letter, of ancient times. In his fourth Council, he enjoins the parish priests to exhort the faithful to go to Communion on the Sundays, at least, of Lent and Advent; and afterwards addressed to the faithful themselves a pastoral letter, in which, after having reminded them of the dispositions wherewith they ought to spend this holy time, he strongly urges them to fast on the Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, at least, of each week in Advent.
Finally, Pope Benedict XIV (ruled 1740-1758), when still Archbishop of Bologna, tried to restore a zeal for Advent whereby all the members of the Church―bishops, priests, religious and laity―pointing out to them that laxity towards Advent penance was rash and scandalous by its indifference in preparing for the great feast of the birth of Jesus Christ.
They Reaped What They Sowed
This gradual relaxation and reduction of the penance and the length of Advent would only serve to prepare the way for the decline of the Church―for it was in the 14th and 15th centuries that seeds of Rationalism began to grow and would eventually sprout into the Protestant Revolution (sometimes erroneously called the Protestant Reformation―Protestant Deformation would be more apt).
As, quoted above, Our Lord said of devils: “This kind is not cast out but by prayer and fasting!” (Matthew 17:20). Therefore, the less penance performed and the less prayer that is prayed, simply strengthens Satan’s hand and weakens the hand of the Church. The neglect of prayer and penance prior to the Protestant Revolution was a major factor in its success. Similarly in our days, Pope Paul VI’s 90% reduction of Lenten penance―by reducing the 40 day fast to a mere 2 day fast (Ash Wednesday and Good Friday)―has deprived the Church of many graces and much strength. This is easily seen and proved by the catastrophes that have fallen upon the Church since Paul VI’s 90% penitential discount decree in 1966.
Our Lady of La Salette lamented in 1846: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence. They have become wandering stars which the old devil will drag along with his tail to make them perish. There are no more generous souls, there is no one left worthy of offering a spotless Sacrifice to the Eternal for the sake of the world. God will strike in an unprecedented way. Lucifer, together with a large number of demons, will be unloosed from Hell. The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. They will put an end to Faith, little by little, even in those dedicated to God. They will blind them in such a way, that, unless they are blessed with a special grace, these people will take on the spirit of these angels of Hell. Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls.”
Christ Comes to Save, Not Lose Souls
“God is charity” (1 John 4:8) and “God so loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son; that whosoever believes in Him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting!” (John 3:16). Our Lord Himself said: “The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save!” (Luke 9:56) … “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost!” (Luke 19:10). Nevertheless, merely believing in Him is not enough― “What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has Faith, but has not works? Shall Faith be able to save him? … Show me thy Faith without works; and I will show thee, by works, my Faith! … Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well―but even the devils also believe and tremble! O vain man, will you understand that faith without works is dead! … For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also Faith without works is dead!” (James 2:14-26).
Work for Your Salvation!
It is in this vein that Our Lord says: “Not everyone that says to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he that DOES the will of My Father, Who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” (Matthew 7:21) … “And why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and DO NOT the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). To “do” and “do not” are all about WORKS or ACTIONS. Faith is dead without them. Likewise, Our Lord says to those who DID WORKS: “Amen I say to you, as long as you DID it to one of these My least brethren, you DID it to Me! Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world!” (Matthew 25:31-46). But to those who DID NOT DO WORKS, Our Lord says: “Amen I say to you, as long as you DID NOT DO IT to one of these least of My brethren, NEITHER DID YOU DO IT to Me! Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels!” (Matthew 25:31-46).
No Time for Idleness
That is why we are told: “With fear and trembling WORK out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). Advent is that time of work―as we were told in the readings for the First Sunday of Advent: “Brethren! Understand that it is now the hour for us to rise from sleep, because now our salvation is nearer than when we came to believe! The night is far advanced; the day is at hand! Let us therefore lay aside the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light! Let us walk becomingly as in the day, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in debauchery and wantonness, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ!” (Romans 13:11-14). We are to work at acquiring a resemblance of Christ in time for Christmas! We are to work at cleaning out our souls from the works of darkness and filling our souls with works of light! It is a time for WORK and NOT IDLENESS. The words of Our Lord come to mind: “Why stand you here all the day idle? Go you also into my vineyard!” (Matthew 20:6-7). Advent is not a time for idle hands! Let us go into the vineyard of Advent and do some serious work! Otherwise, when Christmas comes again for the umpteenth time, we, for the umpteenth time, shall again look like hypocrites in the eyes of Christ: “This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!” (Mark 7:6). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus” (2 Timothy 2:3).
No Idle Spectators
Though it is Christ that saves, you have to play your part. You cannot be an idle spectator, standing on side-lines, giving Christ mere lip-service as He does all the work! It doesn’t work that way! St. Augustine tells us that God could save us with our cooperation, but God will not save us without our cooperation: “God, Who created you without you, will not save you without you!” The fate of the idle spectator, who does not work, is summed up succinctly in Our Lord’s parable of the talents:
“A man going into a far country, called his servants, and delivered to them his goods. To one he gave five talents, and to another two, and to another one―to everyone according to his proper ability―and then immediately he took his journey. He that had received the five talents, traded with them and gained another five. He that had received the two talents, gained another two. But he that received one talent, dug a hole into the earth and hid his lord’s money. After a long time, the lord came and reckoned with them. He that had received the five talents coming, brought the other five talents, saying: ‘Lord, you delivered to me five talents! Behold I have gained another five over and above!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place you over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’ He that had received two talents, came and said: ‘Lord, you delivered two talents to me! Behold, I have gained another two!’ His lord said to him: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! Because you have been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things! Enter into the joy of your lord!’ But he that had received the one talent, came and said: ‘Lord, I know that you are a hard man―you reap where you have not sown. Being afraid, I went and hid your talent in the ground! Behold here it is―you can take back that which is yours!’ And his lord, answering, said to him: ‘Wicked and slothful servant! You ought to have at least committed my money to the bankers, so that, at my coming, I should have received my own money back with usury [additional interest]!’ Take away the talent from him and give it to him that has ten talents! And the unprofitable servant cast out into the exterior darkness―where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’” (Matthew 25:14-30).
How many more Advents will Our Lord come, knocking on the doors of our souls―only to find us too busy with goodness knows what? As the Advent Liturgy states: “Seek ye the Lord while He may be found!” (Antiphon at Lauds) … “Put on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Epistle, 1st Sunday of Advent). “Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock! If any man shall hear My voice, and open to Me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me” (Apocalypse 3:20). The problem is that Our Lord finds most doors closed to Him, even though we profess to be His followers! Let us not just be “Cafeteria Catholics” who merely sit, sip and speak! Let us be disciples dutifully doing what Christ expects of us: “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
Make a point this Advent! The word “Advent” is a compound of two Latin words: “ad” meaning “to” and “venire” meaning “to come” ― of which the past participle in Latin is “ventus.” Therefore we see the word “Advent” meaning “to come to.” Prove to Our Lord that you truly want Him to come to you and your family this year! Go beyond the mere “lip-service” that Our Lord condemns, and give Him some “heart service.”
There is no doubt whatsoever that, on the part of Jesus, He truly wants to come to us. He loves us beyond our comprehension and our wildest dreams. There is no problem on the part of Jesus. However, on our side, we have to ask the question: “Do we really want Jesus to come to us?” The stress is on the word “really” ― not just theoretically and not just by lip-service. Do we really and truly want Jesus in our lives? To drive the point home more clearly and to avoid misconceptions, do we really and truly want Jesus to be our life? Notice the words “be our life”, which is different to being “a part of our life.” If we want Jesus to be “a part of our life”, then we only partially want Him—for some that means on Sundays and prayer times only, for others a little more perhaps, but they place a limit on “how much of Jesus they can take.” He wants to be our whole life, not just a part of our life, and that is what is meant by the commandment to love God with our whole mind, heart, soul and strength. Thus it is that St. Paul writes: “I live now, not I―but Christ liveth in me!” (Galatians 2:20).
Advent on a Plate
We present you with “Advent on a plate” ― but, as they say, “You can lead a horse to water, but can’t make it drink!” So too, you can present “Advent on a plate” for someone―but they have to make the effort to eat! With the extremely wide-range of Advent materials available on this site, there can be no excuse for not knowing how to approach Advent and what to do during the season. Go to the ADVENT tab at the top of page and explore the vast variety of Advent aids for this holy season.
Click on this ADVENT JOURNEY page link and you will find that it is loaded with advice on how to approach Advent and the many things that can be done. First and foremost, you will find a downloadable 79-page ADVENT RITUAL that will be your daily guide throughout Advent. Also on the ADVENT JOURNEY page you will find downloadable posters for Advent; Christmas Cards for Christ to fill out with sacrifices and to place in Christ’s Crib on Christmas Day; words of encouragement; topics for family discussion; practical tips; creative ideas ; use of poetry; liturgical angles; explanations about the Advent Wreath; etc.
Click on this COLD TO HOT page link and you will find help in overcoming our natural tendency to easily drift into spiritual lukewarmness. Here, Fr. Faber paints a clear picture of the danger and tries to guide us out of that fatal condition of which Our Lord says: “Because thou art lukewarm―and neither cold nor hot―I will begin to vomit thee out of My mouth!” (Apocalypse 3:16).
This link to the ADVENT WITH AQUINAS page will introduce you to the masterful thoughts and teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas on the subject of Advent and the Coming of Christ. You will find a short, simple yet profound meditation for every single day of the Advent season.
The “King” of the Liturgical Year―Dom Guéranger―can be found at the link ADVENT WITH GUÉRANGER. You will find daily instructions on Advent for each day of the season. He covers the history of Advent; the purpose of Advent; the practices of Advent; the spirituality of Advent and the liturgical practices of Advent.
The link SERMONS FOR ADVENT will give you sermons on various aspects of Advent by a variety of masters: Pope St. Gregory the Great; Pope St. Leo the Great; St. Augustine of Hippo; St. Bernard of Clairvaux; St. Francis de Sales; St. Alphonsus Liguori; St. John Vianney; and others.
On the prayer side of things, you have two different prayer pages―one liturgical (based on the Divine Office that priest and religious pray daily) and the other prayer page is a compilation of non-liturgical prayers for the season of Advent. The Advent Liturgical Prayer page, has a different set of prayers and psalms for each day of week (just like the Divine Office). Click on the appropriate link: SUNDAY, MONDAY, TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY, THURSDAY, FRIDAY, and SATURDAY. Each day eight separate prayers periods―Matins, Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers and Compline― but it is a much abbreviated and simplified version that is ideal for the laity.
The Advent Non-Liturgical Prayer page, PRAYERS FOR ADVENT, has a variety of short prayers as well as prayers that can said during the daily lighting of the Advent Wreath.
For the last days of Advent, by clicking on this link JOURNEY TO BETHLEHEM, you can follow the route that Mary and Joseph took on their 90-mile walk from Nazareth in the north to Bethlehem in the south. You will find detailed accounts and pictures of the topography, the lay of the land, details of the climate for that time of year, the dangers that potentially lay on the road, etc.
In the final build up to Christmas Day, follow the Church in her “Great O Antiphons” ― which are seven antiphons for each day leading up to Christmas Eve. The first “O Antiphon” is sung on December 17th and the seventh and final “O Antiphon” is sung on December 23rd.
A general introduction can be found here THE GREAT “O” ANTIPHONS ― and each day’s individual Antiphon can be found by clicking on the following links:
December 17th ― O SAPIENTIA
December 18th ― O ADONAI
December 19th ― O RADIX JESSE
December 20th ― O CLAVIS DAVID
December 21st ― O ORIENS
December 22nd ― O REX GENTIUM
December 23rd ― O EMMANUEL
So there you have it! A thorough, all-encompassing, multi-faceted, overview, guide and spiritual blueprint for the Holy Season of Lent. “Use it or lose it!” as they say. How many Advents have you lost so far? Make it right this year! As you sow, so shall you reap!
Article 1
Friday December 1st & Saturday December 2nd
Let This Finally Be The Year!
Friday December 1st & Saturday December 2nd
Let This Finally Be The Year!
How Much Longer?
Do you like to be kept waiting? How long is you patience? How long will you wait for someone or something before you finally and frustratingly wash your hands of them and go look somewhere else for what you want? Our Lord tells a parable along those lines:
“A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold! For these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why is it encumbering the ground?’ But the dresser, answering, said to him: ‘Lord, leave it alone this year also, until I dig about it and dung it! Happily it may bear fruit―but if not, then after that, thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-9).
Talking of bearing fruit, Our Lord said: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away! And every branch that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit! In this is My Father glorified; that you bring forth very much fruit, and become My disciples. Abide in Me, and I in you! As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me! I am the vine―you the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me, you can do nothing! If anyone abides not in Me, then he shall be cast forth as a branch, and he shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn! If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you!” (John 15:1-8).
In similar fashion, we see Our Lord frustrated and angry at not finding fruit on a certain fig tree―which led to Him cursing the fig tree: “In the morning, returning into the city, Jesus was hungry. And seeing a certain fig tree by the wayside, He came to it and found nothing on it but only leaves, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19).
On another occasion, not just one, but three Evangelists, record Our Lord as frustratingly saying: “O incredulous, faithless and perverse generation! How long shall I be with you? How long shall I suffer you?” (Matthew 17:16; Mark 9:18; Luke 9:41).
“Philip said to Jesus: ‘Lord, show us the Father and it is enough for us!’ Jesus said to Philip: ‘I have been so long a time with you―and have you not known Me? Philip! He that sees Me sees the Father also! How can you say: “Show us the Father!”’” (John 14:8-9).
Could not those things be also said of us? How long have we been Catholics? How many times have we read the Catechism? How many times have we read the Bible? How many sermons have we heard? How many religion or catechism classes have we not sat through? How many silent, invisible graces has God secretly sent into the privacy of minds and hearts? How many Masses have we attended? How many Holy Communions have we made? How many times have we been to Confession? How many Rosaries have we said or prayed? The words of St. Louis de Montfort should haunt us:
“It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
Father Faber, in the Preface of his personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary, also takes up this theme of fruitlessness and lack of progress: “All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.”
Talking of Dung!
In the above parable about the fruitless fig tree, Our Lord speaks of it needing dung to make it fruitful. Dung, or manure, or whatever other word you care to use, smells unpleasant and is not readily talked about! What do you know about dung? Cattle manure is a valuable source of key nutrients including nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, sulfur, magnesium, and calcium―as well as certain micronutrients. Adding manure to soil impacts the chemical, biological and physical aspects of soil quality. Manure increases plant productivity, soil organic matter and improves soil structure, water infiltration and holding capacity. So in Our Lord’s parable, the vine-dresser knew what he was talking about when he suggested surrounding the fig tree with dunged-soil.
Some might say that world is “dung” ― and, to a certain extent, Holy Scripture agrees when it speaks of God “raising up the needy from the Earth, and lifting up the poor out of the dunghill” (Psalm 112:7). And again, speaking of idols: “Neither shalt thou bring any thing of the idol into thy house, lest thou become an anathema, like it. Thou shalt detest it as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth, because it is an anathema” (Deuteronomy 7:26). In this modern world there are many idols that have replaced God in the minds and hearts of Catholics! We go to Mass, but do we really honor God and give glory to God in those solemnities? To the lukewarm and two-faced worshippers God says: “Behold, I will cast the shoulder to you, and I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities!” (Malachias 2:3). The worldly material things that we glory are really nothing but dung: “The glory of a sinful man is dung and worms!” (1 Machabees 2:62).
Likewise, St. Paul says: “I count all things to be but loss for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord―for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but as dung, so that I may gain Christ!” (Philippians 3:8). Are we prepared to suffer the loss of all things and count them as dung so as to gain Christ? “Charge the rich of this world not to trust in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God!” (1 Timothy 6:17). “Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted! Your gold and silver is cankered―and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3). “Health of the soul in holiness, is better than all gold and silver and immense revenues!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:15). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Whom Do We Love? Whom Do We Follow? Whom Do We Serve?
To the rich young man, who had asked Jesus on what he had to do to secure Heaven and eternal life, “Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:16-24).
The words that Our Lord said to His Apostles and others ― “Follow Me!” ― He also says to us! But we “cannot serve two masters!” We “cannot serve God and mammon” ― meaning worldly pleasures, treasures, attitudes and fashions. Yet that is what most Catholics―even Traditional and Conservative Catholics (especially the youth)―are doing today. They are not God-centered, but world-focused. Worshipping God is something they HAVE to do―enjoying the world is what they WANT to do. How true are the words of Holy Scripture: “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men―to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside! They are become unprofitable together! There is none that doth good―no, not one! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear!” (Psalm 52:3-6).
It is time to come back to realization that were made by God: “Know ye that the Lord He is God! He made us, and not we ourselves!” (Psalms 99:3). We were made by God and made for God: “The Lord has made all things for Himself” (Proverbs 16:4). “I have formed him and made him! I have created him for My glory!” (Isaias 43:7). We were made by God, for God in order to serve God: “Serve the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy soul!” (Deuteronomy 10:12). Unfortunately, Our Lord also could easily apply the following words to us: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). We honor God mechanically with our lips in prayer and Mass on Sunday, but our hearts are engrossed in the things of this world―which is proved to be true by the insane amount of time we spend on the no-essential things of this world, in comparison to the little time we spend on the things of God.
Are You Planted? Are You Growing? Are You Bearing Fruit? Or is Your Faith in the Freezer?
Our Lord, in his parables, would often refer to the way to Heaven by means of seeds, plants and trees. “See the fig tree, and all the trees! When they now shoot forth their fruit, you know that summer is near! So you also, when you shall see these things come to pass, know that the Kingdom of God is at hand” Luke 21:29-31) ... “The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field” (Matthew 13:31) … “So is the Kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the earth” (Mark 4:26) … “The field, is the world. And the good seed are the children of the Kingdom. And the cockle, are the children of the wicked one” (Matthew 13:38) … “Every plant which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up” (Matthew 15:13) … “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away! And every branch that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit! In this is My Father glorified; that you bring forth very much fruit!” (John 15:1-8) ... “Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit” (Matthew 7:17) … “Every tree therefore that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down and cast into the fire” (Luke 3:9) … “A grain of mustard seed is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in its branches” (Matthew 13:32).
Are we planted in the soil of spiritual things or worldly things? Are we surrounded by the weeds of the world? Are we watering the plant of our soul regularly with prayer? Are we exposing ourselves to the heat of the sun by our charity? Are we sending down into the soil deep roots of humility? Are we showing progressive growth in holiness and sanctity with each passing year―or have we stopped growing a long time ago? Are we really serious about tending to and cultivating the plant of our soul―or are overly concerned and preoccupied with the body and the things of the world?
Too few Catholics stop and think about the fact that MOST souls end up being damned―we are not just talking about non-Catholic souls, Protestants, pagans, atheists, etc. ― we are talking about MOST CATHOLIC souls being damned. God does not want that; God takes no delight in that; God does all He can to avoid that―but MOST CATHOLICS don’t really give a damn, and so they end up being damned: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Heaven is Not a Cake Walk
Many think that getting to Heaven is a piece of cake! They are usually at peace with the world and at peace with their sins. “Oh, I’ll just confess them and it’ll be alright!” They imagine that the penance they get in Confession pays for all the sins they have confessed! Nothing could be further from the truth! The penance you are given is like the first payment on 20-year mortgage! As all the popes since Pope Pius XII have said―modern man has lost the sense of sin. They think sin is no big deal! Venial sin is not really a sin at all! That is why they imagine they will have little to pay! Yet the Church teaches otherwise:
“Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Mortal sin must be a most terrible thing indeed to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the everlasting punishment of the rebellious angels and of sinners who die with even only one mortal sin … Venial sin is a less serious offense against the law of God … We are prone to look upon venial sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that it is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin. In Holy Scripture we see from many examples how God regards venial sin; even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished [by death on the borders of the Promised Land and] ― he was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD).
“Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us” (The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Even though few souls get to Heaven, God is not going to reduce the entrance fee in order to get more customers. The price is what is it and what it always has been. “Not everyone that saith to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” Matthew 7:21). “There shall not enter into it anything defiled, or that worketh abomination or maketh a lie!” (Apocalypse 21:17). “I tell you, that unless your justice abound more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:20). God will force nobody to go to Heaven―but we have to force ourselves to fight for Heaven: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangleth himself with secular businesses; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
Enemies Tighten the Noose
The enemies of God, the Church and mankind are increasingly “turning the screw” in their Satanic desire to reduce the world population down to around 500 million from the current population of just over 8,000 million (8 billion)―that means that ultimately 15 out 16 people must be eliminated. A smaller “electronically chipped” population is easily controllable. For them it is “a piece of cake” that can easily be achieved by a world war, an EMP (electro-magnetic pulse) which will eliminate most of the electricity available throughout the world―resulting in no gasoline, no food deliveries, no refrigeration, no heating, no water, no law enforcement, etc.―which in turn will bring starvation, disease, looting and murder (Our Lady of La Salette has described that perfectly well). Time is running out for most people―yet they still lounge about like the proverbial frog in an increasingly heated pan of water. Like the proverbial three monkeys who have their eyes, ears and mouth covered so that they can see no evil, hear no evil and speak of no evil. They do not take seriously and do not practice the remedies given to us by God through Our Lady―the praying of many Rosaries; devotion to the Holy Eucharist; the use of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as a weapon; devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary; the performance of many sacrifices and much penance; praying very much for the pope, bishops and priests; and, of course, refraining from offending God by so many sins!
How many more Advents do we have left to “get our act right” and start acting right? Too many Catholics put too cheap a price on Heaven and falsely imagine that the good God is such a good God that He is bound to take them up into Heaven when they die! This is totally opposed to Catholic teaching! That is the teaching of the Satan, not God. God waits patiently for our efforts at improvement: “The Lord delays not his promise [to punish], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). Let this season of Advent be finally the year where we really start to take our Faith and salvation seriously―with the current state of the world, you do not know how long we will have left before the enemies of God provoke a world war (which prophecy says WILL come), and before God unleashes His chastisements on an increasingly sinful world.
The words of Our Lady should help shake us out of our habitual indifference, torpor, lethargy and lukewarmness: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! Materialism marches on ever fomenting bloody strifes and fratricidal struggles. Clear signs warn that peace is in danger. That scourge, like the shadow of a dark cloud, is now moving across mankind―only my power, as Mother of God, is preventing the outbreak of the storm. All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!” (Our Lady to Blessed Sister Elena Aiello, December 8th, 1956).
God Waits―But He Won’t Wait Forever!
Even though is infinitely patient, He does not show infinite patience. St. Alphonsus Liguori, in his sermon on the number of sins that God is prepared to forgive, beyond which He will chastise, writes:
“Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. But God does not forget them. He numbers the graces which He dispenses, as well as the sins which we commit. Hence, when the time which He has fixed arrives, God deprives us of His graces, and begins to inflict chastisement. St. Basil, St. Jerome, St. John Chrysostom, St. Augustine, and other Fathers, teach that, as God (according to the words of Scripture, “Thou hast ordered all things in measure, and number, and weight” (Wisdom 11:21), has fixed for each person the number of the days of his life, and the degrees of health and talent which He will give him, so He has also determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more. God is ready to heal those who sincerely wish to amend their lives, but cannot take pity on the obstinate sinner. The Lord pardons sins, but He cannot pardon those who are determined to offend Him.
“God waits with patience until a certain number of sins are committed, but, when the measure of guilt is filled up, He waits no longer, but chastises the sinner. If God chastised sinners the moment they insult Him, we should not see Him so much despised. But, because He does not instantly punish their transgressions, and because, through mercy, He restrains His anger and waits for their return, they are encouraged to continue to offend Him. Sinners multiply their sins without keeping any account of them; but God numbers them that, when the harvest is ripe, that is, when the number of sins is completed, He may take vengeance on them. God has patience for a certain term, after which He punishes the first and last sins. And the greater has been His patience, the more severe His vengeance.
“Nor can we demand from God a reason why He pardons one a hundred sins, and takes others out of life, and sends them to Hell, after three or four sins. How many has God sent to Hell for the first offence? St. Gregory relates, that a child of five years, who had arrived at the use of reason, for having uttered a blasphemy, was seized by the devil and carried to Hell. The divine Mother revealed to that great servant of God, Benedicta of Florence, that a boy of twelve years was damned after the first sin. Another boy of eight years died after his first sin and was lost.
“Listen to the words of St. Gregory: “He who has promised pardon to penitents, has not promised tomorrow to sinners.” (Hom. xii. in Evan). God has promised pardon to all who repent; but He has not promised to wait till tomorrow for those who insult Him. Perhaps God will give you time for repentance, perhaps He will not. But, should He not give it, what shall become of your soul? In the meantime, for the sake of a miserable pleasure, you lose the grace of God, and expose yourself to the danger of being lost forever.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sunday Sermons).
False Sense of Security
Most Catholics fall into a false sense of security―they imagine there is some kind of safety in numbers. They reason: “If everyone is doing this, saying that, thinking this, wearing that, drinking this, smoking that, watching this, etc. ― then it must be okay! I will do the same!” Reality is the exact opposite! The saints tell us that the majority of Catholics end up being damned and only a few are saved! Nobody needs to be damned! Everyone can be saved! God will help anyone and everyone―even the greatest sinner! But you have to do it God’s way―not your preferred way! You have to fight for salvation―it is not a free hand-out! You have be brutal and reject the world with its enticements, entertainment, false promises, attitudes, fashions, materialism, sensuality, etc. As Our Lord says: “You cannot love God and mammon!” Mammon means all those things just mentioned. You must realize that this world is temporal―only around 70 or so years for most people―and the afterlife is eternal. Is it really worth it―throwing away and exchanging eternal happiness for a few decades of dubious and never fully gratifying ‘happiness’ here on Earth? You cannot have both! The choice is yours! God will twist nobody’s arm!
Do you like to be kept waiting? How long is you patience? How long will you wait for someone or something before you finally and frustratingly wash your hands of them and go look somewhere else for what you want? Our Lord tells a parable along those lines:
“A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: ‘Behold! For these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none! Cut it down therefore! Why is it encumbering the ground?’ But the dresser, answering, said to him: ‘Lord, leave it alone this year also, until I dig about it and dung it! Happily it may bear fruit―but if not, then after that, thou shalt cut it down!’” (Luke 13:6-9).
Talking of bearing fruit, Our Lord said: “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away! And every branch that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit! In this is My Father glorified; that you bring forth very much fruit, and become My disciples. Abide in Me, and I in you! As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me! I am the vine―you the branches! He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit―for without Me, you can do nothing! If anyone abides not in Me, then he shall be cast forth as a branch, and he shall wither, and they shall gather him up, and cast him into the fire, and he will burn! If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you!” (John 15:1-8).
In similar fashion, we see Our Lord frustrated and angry at not finding fruit on a certain fig tree―which led to Him cursing the fig tree: “In the morning, returning into the city, Jesus was hungry. And seeing a certain fig tree by the wayside, He came to it and found nothing on it but only leaves, and He said to it: ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever!’ And immediately the fig tree withered away” (Matthew 21:19).
On another occasion, not just one, but three Evangelists, record Our Lord as frustratingly saying: “O incredulous, faithless and perverse generation! How long shall I be with you? How long shall I suffer you?” (Matthew 17:16; Mark 9:18; Luke 9:41).
“Philip said to Jesus: ‘Lord, show us the Father and it is enough for us!’ Jesus said to Philip: ‘I have been so long a time with you―and have you not known Me? Philip! He that sees Me sees the Father also! How can you say: “Show us the Father!”’” (John 14:8-9).
Could not those things be also said of us? How long have we been Catholics? How many times have we read the Catechism? How many times have we read the Bible? How many sermons have we heard? How many religion or catechism classes have we not sat through? How many silent, invisible graces has God secretly sent into the privacy of minds and hearts? How many Masses have we attended? How many Holy Communions have we made? How many times have we been to Confession? How many Rosaries have we said or prayed? The words of St. Louis de Montfort should haunt us:
“It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before!” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary).
Father Faber, in the Preface of his personal translation of St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary, also takes up this theme of fruitlessness and lack of progress: “All those who are likely to read this book [True Devotion to Mary], love God, and lament that they do not love Him more; all desire something for His glory—the spread of some good work, the success of some devotion, the coming of some good time. One man has been striving for years to overcome a particular fault, and has not succeeded. Another mourns, and almost wonders while he mourns, that so few of his relations and friends have been converted to the Faith. One grieves that he has not devotion enough; another that he has a cross to carry which is a peculiarly impossible cross to him; while a third has domestic troubles and family unhappinesses which feel almost incompatible with his salvation; and for all these things prayer appears to bring so little remedy.”
Talking of Dung!
In the above parable about the fruitless fig tree, Our Lord speaks of it needing dung to make it fruitful. Dung, or manure, or whatever other word you care to use, smells unpleasant and is not readily talked about! What do you know about dung? Cattle manure is a valuable source of key nutrients including nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, sulfur, magnesium, and calcium―as well as certain micronutrients. Adding manure to soil impacts the chemical, biological and physical aspects of soil quality. Manure increases plant productivity, soil organic matter and improves soil structure, water infiltration and holding capacity. So in Our Lord’s parable, the vine-dresser knew what he was talking about when he suggested surrounding the fig tree with dunged-soil.
Some might say that world is “dung” ― and, to a certain extent, Holy Scripture agrees when it speaks of God “raising up the needy from the Earth, and lifting up the poor out of the dunghill” (Psalm 112:7). And again, speaking of idols: “Neither shalt thou bring any thing of the idol into thy house, lest thou become an anathema, like it. Thou shalt detest it as dung, and shalt utterly abhor it as uncleanness and filth, because it is an anathema” (Deuteronomy 7:26). In this modern world there are many idols that have replaced God in the minds and hearts of Catholics! We go to Mass, but do we really honor God and give glory to God in those solemnities? To the lukewarm and two-faced worshippers God says: “Behold, I will cast the shoulder to you, and I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities!” (Malachias 2:3). The worldly material things that we glory are really nothing but dung: “The glory of a sinful man is dung and worms!” (1 Machabees 2:62).
Likewise, St. Paul says: “I count all things to be but loss for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord―for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but as dung, so that I may gain Christ!” (Philippians 3:8). Are we prepared to suffer the loss of all things and count them as dung so as to gain Christ? “Charge the rich of this world not to trust in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God!” (1 Timothy 6:17). “Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl in your miseries, which shall come upon you! Your riches are corrupted! Your gold and silver is cankered―and the rust of them shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up to yourselves wrath against the last days!” (James 5:1-3). “Health of the soul in holiness, is better than all gold and silver and immense revenues!” (Ecclesiasticus 30:15). “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also! … No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other―or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:19-24).
Whom Do We Love? Whom Do We Follow? Whom Do We Serve?
To the rich young man, who had asked Jesus on what he had to do to secure Heaven and eternal life, “Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:16-24).
The words that Our Lord said to His Apostles and others ― “Follow Me!” ― He also says to us! But we “cannot serve two masters!” We “cannot serve God and mammon” ― meaning worldly pleasures, treasures, attitudes and fashions. Yet that is what most Catholics―even Traditional and Conservative Catholics (especially the youth)―are doing today. They are not God-centered, but world-focused. Worshipping God is something they HAVE to do―enjoying the world is what they WANT to do. How true are the words of Holy Scripture: “God looked down from Heaven on the children of men―to see if there were any that did understand, or did seek God. All have gone aside! They are become unprofitable together! There is none that doth good―no, not one! They have not called upon God! There have they trembled for fear, where there was no fear!” (Psalm 52:3-6).
It is time to come back to realization that were made by God: “Know ye that the Lord He is God! He made us, and not we ourselves!” (Psalms 99:3). We were made by God and made for God: “The Lord has made all things for Himself” (Proverbs 16:4). “I have formed him and made him! I have created him for My glory!” (Isaias 43:7). We were made by God, for God in order to serve God: “Serve the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy soul!” (Deuteronomy 10:12). Unfortunately, Our Lord also could easily apply the following words to us: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6). We honor God mechanically with our lips in prayer and Mass on Sunday, but our hearts are engrossed in the things of this world―which is proved to be true by the insane amount of time we spend on the no-essential things of this world, in comparison to the little time we spend on the things of God.
Are You Planted? Are You Growing? Are You Bearing Fruit? Or is Your Faith in the Freezer?
Our Lord, in his parables, would often refer to the way to Heaven by means of seeds, plants and trees. “See the fig tree, and all the trees! When they now shoot forth their fruit, you know that summer is near! So you also, when you shall see these things come to pass, know that the Kingdom of God is at hand” Luke 21:29-31) ... “The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field” (Matthew 13:31) … “So is the Kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the earth” (Mark 4:26) … “The field, is the world. And the good seed are the children of the Kingdom. And the cockle, are the children of the wicked one” (Matthew 13:38) … “Every plant which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up” (Matthew 15:13) … “I am the true vine; and My Father is the farmer. Every branch in Me, that bears not fruit, He will take away! And every branch that bears fruit, He will purge it, so that it may bring forth more fruit! In this is My Father glorified; that you bring forth very much fruit!” (John 15:1-8) ... “Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit” (Matthew 7:17) … “Every tree therefore that brings not forth good fruit, shall be cut down and cast into the fire” (Luke 3:9) … “A grain of mustard seed is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in its branches” (Matthew 13:32).
Are we planted in the soil of spiritual things or worldly things? Are we surrounded by the weeds of the world? Are we watering the plant of our soul regularly with prayer? Are we exposing ourselves to the heat of the sun by our charity? Are we sending down into the soil deep roots of humility? Are we showing progressive growth in holiness and sanctity with each passing year―or have we stopped growing a long time ago? Are we really serious about tending to and cultivating the plant of our soul―or are overly concerned and preoccupied with the body and the things of the world?
Too few Catholics stop and think about the fact that MOST souls end up being damned―we are not just talking about non-Catholic souls, Protestants, pagans, atheists, etc. ― we are talking about MOST CATHOLIC souls being damned. God does not want that; God takes no delight in that; God does all He can to avoid that―but MOST CATHOLICS don’t really give a damn, and so they end up being damned: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked! For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap! For he that sows in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption! But he that sows in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting!” (Galatians 6:7-8).
Heaven is Not a Cake Walk
Many think that getting to Heaven is a piece of cake! They are usually at peace with the world and at peace with their sins. “Oh, I’ll just confess them and it’ll be alright!” They imagine that the penance they get in Confession pays for all the sins they have confessed! Nothing could be further from the truth! The penance you are given is like the first payment on 20-year mortgage! As all the popes since Pope Pius XII have said―modern man has lost the sense of sin. They think sin is no big deal! Venial sin is not really a sin at all! That is why they imagine they will have little to pay! Yet the Church teaches otherwise:
“Sin is the only evil upon Earth … Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Mortal sin must be a most terrible thing indeed to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the everlasting punishment of the rebellious angels and of sinners who die with even only one mortal sin … Venial sin is a less serious offense against the law of God … We are prone to look upon venial sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that it is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin. In Holy Scripture we see from many examples how God regards venial sin; even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished [by death on the borders of the Promised Land and] ― he was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD).
“Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us” (The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata, q. 127).
Even though few souls get to Heaven, God is not going to reduce the entrance fee in order to get more customers. The price is what is it and what it always has been. “Not everyone that saith to Me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!” Matthew 7:21). “There shall not enter into it anything defiled, or that worketh abomination or maketh a lie!” (Apocalypse 21:17). “I tell you, that unless your justice abound more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:20). God will force nobody to go to Heaven―but we have to force ourselves to fight for Heaven: “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Labor as a good soldier of Christ Jesus! No man, being a soldier to God, entangleth himself with secular businesses; so that he may please Him to Whom he hath engaged himself” ― namely God (2 Timothy 2:3-4). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12). “For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14).
Enemies Tighten the Noose
The enemies of God, the Church and mankind are increasingly “turning the screw” in their Satanic desire to reduce the world population down to around 500 million from the current population of just over 8,000 million (8 billion)―that means that ultimately 15 out 16 people must be eliminated. A smaller “electronically chipped” population is easily controllable. For them it is “a piece of cake” that can easily be achieved by a world war, an EMP (electro-magnetic pulse) which will eliminate most of the electricity available throughout the world―resulting in no gasoline, no food deliveries, no refrigeration, no heating, no water, no law enforcement, etc.―which in turn will bring starvation, disease, looting and murder (Our Lady of La Salette has described that perfectly well). Time is running out for most people―yet they still lounge about like the proverbial frog in an increasingly heated pan of water. Like the proverbial three monkeys who have their eyes, ears and mouth covered so that they can see no evil, hear no evil and speak of no evil. They do not take seriously and do not practice the remedies given to us by God through Our Lady―the praying of many Rosaries; devotion to the Holy Eucharist; the use of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as a weapon; devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary; the performance of many sacrifices and much penance; praying very much for the pope, bishops and priests; and, of course, refraining from offending God by so many sins!
How many more Advents do we have left to “get our act right” and start acting right? Too many Catholics put too cheap a price on Heaven and falsely imagine that the good God is such a good God that He is bound to take them up into Heaven when they die! This is totally opposed to Catholic teaching! That is the teaching of the Satan, not God. God waits patiently for our efforts at improvement: “The Lord delays not his promise [to punish], as some imagine, but deals patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance!” (2 Peter 3:9). “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). Let this season of Advent be finally the year where we really start to take our Faith and salvation seriously―with the current state of the world, you do not know how long we will have left before the enemies of God provoke a world war (which prophecy says WILL come), and before God unleashes His chastisements on an increasingly sinful world.
The words of Our Lady should help shake us out of our habitual indifference, torpor, lethargy and lukewarmness: “People are offending God too much! If I were to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times! The world is in total turmoil―because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge! Materialism marches on ever fomenting bloody strifes and fratricidal struggles. Clear signs warn that peace is in danger. That scourge, like the shadow of a dark cloud, is now moving across mankind―only my power, as Mother of God, is preventing the outbreak of the storm. All is hanging on a slender thread! When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs! All the nations shall be punished because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth!” (Our Lady to Blessed Sister Elena Aiello, December 8th, 1956).
God Waits―But He Won’t Wait Forever!
Even though is infinitely patient, He does not show infinite patience. St. Alphonsus Liguori, in his sermon on the number of sins that God is prepared to forgive, beyond which He will chastise, writes:
“Sinners hear the calls of God, but they forget them, and continue to offend Him. But God does not forget them. He numbers the graces which He dispenses, as well as the sins which we commit. Hence, when the time which He has fixed arrives, God deprives us of His graces, and begins to inflict chastisement. St. Basil, St. Jerome, St. John Chrysostom, St. Augustine, and other Fathers, teach that, as God (according to the words of Scripture, “Thou hast ordered all things in measure, and number, and weight” (Wisdom 11:21), has fixed for each person the number of the days of his life, and the degrees of health and talent which He will give him, so He has also determined for each the number of sins which He will pardon; and when this number is completed, He will pardon no more. God is ready to heal those who sincerely wish to amend their lives, but cannot take pity on the obstinate sinner. The Lord pardons sins, but He cannot pardon those who are determined to offend Him.
“God waits with patience until a certain number of sins are committed, but, when the measure of guilt is filled up, He waits no longer, but chastises the sinner. If God chastised sinners the moment they insult Him, we should not see Him so much despised. But, because He does not instantly punish their transgressions, and because, through mercy, He restrains His anger and waits for their return, they are encouraged to continue to offend Him. Sinners multiply their sins without keeping any account of them; but God numbers them that, when the harvest is ripe, that is, when the number of sins is completed, He may take vengeance on them. God has patience for a certain term, after which He punishes the first and last sins. And the greater has been His patience, the more severe His vengeance.
“Nor can we demand from God a reason why He pardons one a hundred sins, and takes others out of life, and sends them to Hell, after three or four sins. How many has God sent to Hell for the first offence? St. Gregory relates, that a child of five years, who had arrived at the use of reason, for having uttered a blasphemy, was seized by the devil and carried to Hell. The divine Mother revealed to that great servant of God, Benedicta of Florence, that a boy of twelve years was damned after the first sin. Another boy of eight years died after his first sin and was lost.
“Listen to the words of St. Gregory: “He who has promised pardon to penitents, has not promised tomorrow to sinners.” (Hom. xii. in Evan). God has promised pardon to all who repent; but He has not promised to wait till tomorrow for those who insult Him. Perhaps God will give you time for repentance, perhaps He will not. But, should He not give it, what shall become of your soul? In the meantime, for the sake of a miserable pleasure, you lose the grace of God, and expose yourself to the danger of being lost forever.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sunday Sermons).
False Sense of Security
Most Catholics fall into a false sense of security―they imagine there is some kind of safety in numbers. They reason: “If everyone is doing this, saying that, thinking this, wearing that, drinking this, smoking that, watching this, etc. ― then it must be okay! I will do the same!” Reality is the exact opposite! The saints tell us that the majority of Catholics end up being damned and only a few are saved! Nobody needs to be damned! Everyone can be saved! God will help anyone and everyone―even the greatest sinner! But you have to do it God’s way―not your preferred way! You have to fight for salvation―it is not a free hand-out! You have be brutal and reject the world with its enticements, entertainment, false promises, attitudes, fashions, materialism, sensuality, etc. As Our Lord says: “You cannot love God and mammon!” Mammon means all those things just mentioned. You must realize that this world is temporal―only around 70 or so years for most people―and the afterlife is eternal. Is it really worth it―throwing away and exchanging eternal happiness for a few decades of dubious and never fully gratifying ‘happiness’ here on Earth? You cannot have both! The choice is yours! God will twist nobody’s arm!
DAILY THOUGHTS ON PURGATORY
NOVEMBER 2023
NOVEMBER 2023
Article 26
Wednesday November 29th & Thursday November 30th
Getting Your Act Together for Advent
Wednesday November 29th & Thursday November 30th
Getting Your Act Together for Advent
Try Again!
We all know the proverb: “If at first you don’t succeed―try and try again!” Notice it does not use the word “try” only once, but more than once! Third time’s not always the charm! In the case a 64-year old South Korean grandmother, CHA SA-SOON, it took 960 tries over five years—and thousands of dollars—to get her driver’s license. Sa-soon would not pass so soon! She first tried in April of 2005, at the age of 64, and suffered repeated failures before finally succeeding at the age of 69 in 2010. After failing the written test for the first time, she continued to retake the test―every single day, five days a week, for three years. After that, her pace slowed, to about twice a week. But she never quit and finally, after 860 written tests, she passed. At that point, she was allowed to proceed to the road driving skills test―which she also failed a further 100 times! Sa-soon finally aced the exam on her 961st attempt (800 written tests and 101 road driving skill tests). She became something of a local celebrity in South Korea, as her story inspired many people who were struggling to get their own driving license. Her driving instructors said it was a relief when she finally passed. Park Su-yeon, an instructor at the driving school, said: “When she finally got her license, we all went out in cheers and hugged her, giving her flowers! It felt like a huge burden falling off our back! We didn’t have the guts to tell her to quit, because she just kept showing up again and again!” So there you have it: “If at first you don’t succeed―try and try again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again!”
How are doing on our driving test for Heaven? Only saints get a license to enter into Heaven! Have you passed the test yet? How many years have you been trying? In view of the above story about the South Korean grandmother, passing only on her 961st attempt, it is appropriate to post once again the poem about Heaven from the previous article. Will the following poem be applicable to you?
I was shocked, confused, bewildered
As I entered Heaven’s door,
Not by the beauty of it all,
Nor the lights or its decor.
But it was the folks in Heaven
Who made me sputter and gasp―
The thieves, the liars, the sinners,
The alcoholics and the trash.
There stood the kid from seventh grade
Who swiped my lunch money! Twice!
Next to him was my old neighbor
Who never said anything nice.
Jerry, who I always thought
Was rotting away in Hell,
Was sitting pretty on cloud nine,
Looking incredibly well.
I nudged Jesus, “What’s the deal?
I would love to hear Your take.
How’d all these sinners get up here?
God must’ve made a mistake!”
“And why’s everyone so quiet,
So somber? ― Please give me a clue.”
“Hush, child!” He said, “It’s because they’re all in shock!
No one thought they’d be seeing you!”
Another Johnny Come Lately! Or Maxed-Out Maxcy!
It was 1966 when MAXCY DEAN FILER (1930-2018) graduated from the now-closed Van Norman University in Los Angeles and sat down for his first crack at the three-day California Bar Examination, considered one of the toughest law exams in the nation. They hold the Bar Examination twice a year. Maxcy wanted to be a lawyer―but that is not easy! Each California Bar exam is 18 hours long and is spread over 3 days. He failed. Every year, twice a year, year in and year out, Maxcy Filer took the California Bar Examination―from 1966 to 1991. Every year, twice a year, he failed it. Every year, twice a year, his wife, Blondell, filled out the form for the next go-round, and he would begin studying again. Two of his sons―who were in elementary school during at the time of the first test―and would become lawyers themselves before their father finally passed the Bar Exam. They both passed the exam at their first attempt. “The Bar exam is the most mentally demanding thing I’ve ever gone through,” said Maxcy’s son, the lawyer Kelvin Filer. “You have to have three days of total concentration. I couldn’t have handled it more than once.”
Along the way, Mr. Filer took every available bar review course on either side of the San Andreas Fault, which cost him over $50,000 in fees (that was in 1960s, 70s, 80s―today that $50,000 would be over $250,000). He journeyed around California like Father Junipero Serra, taking tests in San Francisco, Glendale, Oakland, Riverside, Carson, Los Angeles and San Diego. Someone once approached one of his sons to say he had taken the bar exam with his father. Maxcy Filer’s son replied that it was no big deal―because anyone who had taken the bar exam in the last 25 years could make the same claim. Maxcy Flier only passed after his two sons, Kelvin and Anthony had graduated law school and passed the Bar Exam themselves and were both practicing lawyers for more than seven years. Before finally passing his Bar Exam, Maxcy had kept himself busy as a Compton City Councilman and working as a law clerk for his two lawyer sons. When he passed the Bar at age 61, it became national news. It had taken him 25 years―a quarter of a century―and 48 tries, but Maxcy Dean Filer had finally passed the California State Bar exam. Filer was one of 3,702 aspiring lawyers who took the test in February, 1991, and one of only 1,869, or 50.5%, who passed, earning the right to represent clients in any California court. Maxcy Filer was sworn in to the State Bar on June 6th, 1991. He became one of the state’s 128,000 attorneys. His story has been included in books and magazine articles on the value of perseverance, and he was profiled in People magazine. So there again you have it: “If at first you don’t succeed―try and try again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again!”
Persevering Penicillin Project
Before antibiotics, a relatively minor infection could prove incurable or even deadly. Everything from paper cuts to childbirth had the potential to kill through bacterial infection. In 1928, DR. ALEXANDER FLEMING returned from a vacation to find mold growing on a Petri dish of Staphylococcus bacteria. He noticed the mold seemed to be preventing the bacteria around it from growing. He soon identified that the mold produced a self-defense chemical that could kill bacteria. He named the substance penicillin. The accidental discovery of a moldy petri-dish, in 1928, kick-started a 20-year long journey to develop the world’s first mass produced drug that could clear a bacterial infection. Fleming published his findings and presented his discovery but his peers showed little interest in his work. Undeterred, he enlisted the help of several chemists, all leading experts in their fields, to help purify penicillin from the mold. None were successful. Professor Harold Raistrick, a Biochemist and expert in fungal substances enlisted by Fleming, declared the production of penicillin for therapeutic purposes to be almost impossible and Fleming gave up attempts to purify it.
Nearly ten years later in 1937, HOWARD FLOREY and ERNST CHAIN uncovered Fleming’s research and assembled a team of scientists to work solely on the “Penicillin Project”. The complexities and scientific challenges of the project, meant the team struggled immensely to purify penicillin from its original mold. After three years of trial and error, they developed a successful, but painfully inefficient process that produced pure penicillin. The team finally had enough penicillin to start animal trials. In 1940, eight mice were infected with deadly streptococci bacteria. Only the four also given penicillin survived. The experiment gained immediate interest, but the team were now severely limited by production. Gallons of mold broth was required to produce just a fingernail of penicillin. The team resorted to using bedpans, milk churns, food tins and even bathtubs to store the broth. Eventually, special fermentation vessels were developed to hold the liquid. With penicillin now in successful but slow production, the Oxford laboratory could only ‘farm’ a few precious milligrams of penicillin every week. Once they started human trials, they quickly ran short of penicillin. The team had to turn to somewhat unpleasant measures to bolster their meager supplies. Around 80% of a dose of penicillin is excreted from our bodies in our urine and can be extracted and recycled to be used again. So doctors began ask patients to collect their urine, from which they would extract penicillin.
In June 1941 Florey decided to take penicillin to the US in hope of finding a way to scale up production. In Peoria, Illinois, a new team was set up in the Department of Agriculture’s research laboratory. They utilized their expertise in fermentation and designed new techniques using deep fermentation tanks to make the purification of penicillin as efficient as possible. The lab in Peoria had an abundance of corn-steep liquor, a by-product of corn starch. They discovered that when it was added to the mold broth, the yield of penicillin increased exponentially. The high concentration of sugars, amino acids and nitrogen provided an excellent environment for mold fermentation. They started a global search for strains of mold with higher percentages of penicillin. Soil samples were sent in from around the world. But the solution was found closer to home. An assistant at the Peoria lab, found a rotting cantaloupe melon at a local market. The mold produced six times more penicillin than Fleming’s original strain. US Pharmaceutical companies were initially reluctant to commit to large scale penicillin production. However, by the end of 1941 the US joined the Second World War and demand for penicillin rocketed. By 1943, the US had sufficient penicillin stocks to satisfy the demands of the Armed Forces of the United States, as well as their Allies.
As the proverb says: “Rome was built in a day!” ― and penicillin was sufficiently purified for human use in day, nor in a week, nor in a year―but only after 15 years of intense study, experimentation, numerous failures and much expense. So there again you have it: “If at first you don’t succeed―try and try again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again!”
Long Time Waiting to See the Light!
It is often believed that Thomas Edison invented the light-bulb―but electric light-bulbs had been around since the early 19th century, but they were delicate and short-lived due to their filaments—the part that produces light. Prior to Thomas Edison’s eventual success through inventing the light-bulb in 1879, there had been at least 20 such light-bulb inventions since Humphry Davy invented the first electric light in 1802. Over the next seven decades, other inventors also created “light bulbs” but no designs emerged for commercial application. However, all those other “inventions” were not very practical, nor very efficient. One early form of electric light, the carbon arc light, relied on the vapor of battery-heated carbon rods to produce light. But they had to be lit by hand, and the bulbs flickered, hissed, and burned out easily. Other designs were too expensive and impractical to be widely used. Edison’s light-bulbs, by contrast, were cheap, practical, and long-lasting. In 1879, after years of obsessively improving on the concept of light-bulbs, he demonstrated a bulb that could last a record-breaking 14.5 hours. Thomas Edison’s quest to “invent” the incandescent light bulb was not an easy one. He faced countless failures and setbacks, but he never gave up. Edison famously said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work!” His relentless determination led to the eventual success of the light bulb, revolutionizing the way we illuminate our world. “My light is at last a perfect one,” Edison bragged to a New York Times reporter that year. “[Scientists’] opinion as well as the opinion unanimously expressed by the non-scientific was that Edison had in reality produced the light of the future,” reported the New York Herald.
It is often believed that THOMAS EDISON invented the light-bulb―but electric light-bulbs had been around since the early 19th century, but they were delicate and short-lived due to their filaments—the part that produces light. Prior to Thomas Edison’s eventual success through inventing the light-bulb in 1879, there had been at least 20 such light-bulb inventions since Humphry Davy invented the first electric light in 1802. Over the next seven decades, other inventors also created “light bulbs” but no designs emerged for commercial application. However, all those other “inventions” were not very practical, nor very efficient. One early form of electric light, the carbon arc light, relied on the vapor of battery-heated carbon rods to produce light. But they had to be lit by hand, and the bulbs flickered, hissed, and burned out easily. Other designs were too expensive and impractical to be widely used. Edison’s light-bulbs, by contrast, were cheap, practical, and long-lasting. In 1879, after years of obsessively improving on the concept of light-bulbs, he demonstrated a bulb that could last a record-breaking 14.5 hours. Thomas Edison’s quest to “invent” the incandescent light bulb was not an easy one. He faced countless failures and setbacks, but he never gave up. Edison famously said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work!” His relentless determination led to the eventual success of the light bulb, revolutionizing the way we illuminate our world. “My light is at last a perfect one,” Edison bragged to a New York Times reporter that year. “[Scientists’] opinion as well as the opinion unanimously expressed by the non-scientific was that Edison had in reality produced the light of the future,” reported the New York Herald.
Dumb Genius
ALBERT EINSTEIN didn’t speak until he was four and didn’t read until he was seven. He was subsequently expelled from school and was not admitted to the Zurich Polytechnic School. Long story short, he came around.
HELEN KELLER, who was both blind and deaf, overcame tremendous challenges to become a renowned writer, activist, and lecturer. With the help of her teacher, Anne Sullivan, she learned to communicate and became an advocate for the rights of people with disabilities.
Losers Became Winners
ABRAHAM LINCOLN was young when entered the army and went to war, he entered as a Captain but came back as a much lower Private. Later on, he tried to start up lots of businesses―all of which failed. Before becoming president, he lost several runs for public office.
Professional athletes like MICHAEL JORDAN have also demonstrated perseverance throughout their careers. After being cut from his high school basketball team at the first tryout due to a lack of height, Jordan worked hard on his game and persevered through criticism from others until he became one of the greatest basketball players of all time. He once said: “I have missed over 9,000 shots in my career. I have lost almost 300 games. On 26 occasions I have been entrusted to take the game winning shot, and I have missed. I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed!”
Another sportsman, the legendary baseball player BABE RUTH, had a home-run record of 714 during his career. But he still had a total of 1330 strikeouts. At one point, he held the record for most strikeouts. He once said: “Every strike brings me closer to the next home run!”
Bible Rejects Who “Made It”!
The greatest rejection in the Bible was the rejection of JESUS CHRIST: “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:11). Even while Jesus was in Mary’s womb, He was rejected by the inhabitants of Bethlehem was forced to be born in a cave. Immediately after His birth, King Herod tried to kill Him and thus He was forced to flee into Egypt. During His public ministry, He was rejected by most of the custodians of Jewish Law and Religious Tradition―the High Priests, the Sanhedrin, the Sadducees, the Scribes and the Pharisees. They too wanted to kill Him―“Then were gathered together the chief priests and ancients of the people into the court of the high priest, who was called Caiphas―and they consulted together, that by subtlety they might apprehend Jesus, and put Him to death” (Matthew 26:3-4). As Our Lord Himself said: “Why seek you to kill Me?” (John 7:2). He gives the answer to that question to His Apostles: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
It all came to a head when the Jews cried out to Pontius Pilate that he crucify Jesus: “Pilate said to the Jews: ‘Behold your King! … Do you want, therefore, that I release unto you the King of the Jews?’ But they cried out: ‘Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him!’ Pilate said to them: ‘Shall I crucify your King?’ The chief priests answered: ‘We have no king but Caesar! Crucify Him! Crucify Him!’ And Pilate again spoke to them, desiring to release Jesus, and said to them: ‘Why, what evil has He done?’ But they cried out the more: ‘Crucify Him!’ And he said to them the third time: ‘Why, what evil has this Man done? I find no cause of death in Him! I will chastise Him therefore, and let Him go!’ But they were instant with loud voices, requiring that He might be crucified; and their voices prevailed.” (Mark 15:9-14; Luke 23:20-23; John 18:39; 19:6, 14-15).
THE GOOD THIEF, crucified alongside Christ on Calvary, was a “loser” who became a “winner” at the last moment of his life! He said to Jesus: “Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!” (Luke 23:42) ― to whom Jesus replied: “Amen I say to thee, this day you shall be with Me in paradise!” (Luke 23:43). Some may look upon at that as being unfair―a robber, who quite possibly was also a murderer (since robbers would often kill their victims), manages to steal his way into Heaven! It reminds us a little of Our Lord’s parable about the workers in the vineyard, where the owner of the vineyard employs workers for his vineyard throughout the whole course of the day―some first thing in morning, others at the third, sixth, ninth and eleventh hours―but he pays everyone the same wage:
“A householder went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard … And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ ... And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner ... But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’ And when evening was come, the lord of the vineyard said to his steward: ‘Call the laborers and pay them their hire, beginning from the last even to the first. When they were come, that came about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny. But when the first also came, they thought that they should receive more―but they also received every man a penny. And they murmured against the master of the house, saying: ‘These last ones have worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us, that have borne the burden of the day and the heat. But he answering said to one of them: ‘Friend, I do you no wrong! Did you not agree with me for a penny? Take what is yours and go thy way! I will also give to this last one the same as to you. Or, is it not lawful for me to do what I want? Is your eye evil, because I am good?’” (Matthew 20:1-15).
A lesson to be learned there―Judas the Apostle was lost, and Dismas the “Good” Thief was saved. Of Judas, Jesus says: “Woe to that man by whom the Son of man shall be betrayed! It would be better for him, if that man had not been born!” (Matthew 26:24) ― yet, to the Good Thief, Our Lord says: “This day you shall be with Me in paradise!” (Luke 23:43). “So shall the last be first, and the first last! For many are called, but few chosen!” (Matthew 20:16). “Watch! … Lest thou fall!” (Ecclesiasticus 1:38). “Take heed to thyself that thou fall not!” (Ecclesiasticus 29:26). “Wherefore he that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:12).
JOSEPH, in the Old Testament―of the coat of many colors fame―also found himself rejected by his brothers, who even tried to kill him. Eventually, they decided to sell him into slavery to passing merchants on their way to Egypt. Yet, amid his trials, he remained faithful and rose to prominence in Egypt―becoming the second most powerful man in Egypt, after the Pharao. His story teaches us that rejection by others does not define our worth or future.
The Old Testament list goes on and on ― to include Moses, David, Agar, Anna, Noemi, and many more have shown that with God’s merciful help one can rise from the “pits” to the highest heights. The crucial thing to remember is that we cannot do it alone―we need the assistance of God’s grace and providence: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27). “He raises up the needy from the dust, and lifts up the poor from the dunghill―so that they may sit with princes” (1 Kings 2:8).
Sinners Who Became Winners!
We say that the “Good Thief” stole his way into Heaven―but it is only saints that enter Heaven. If you are not a saint, then it is either Purgatory or Hell. It does not take a lifetime to become a saint―a baby is made into a “saint” at its Baptism and would go straight to Heaven if it died thereafter before reaching the age of reason (at which point it is capable of sin). A perfect act of contrition―out of a deep love of God―can be enough to remove, not only the guilt of sin, but also all the debt due to sin―and thus open the gates of Heaven. Did the “Good Thief” make a perfect act of contrition? We do not know―but at least he willingly accepted his crucifixion as a just punishment for his sins and perhaps Our Lord and Our Lady obtained for him the grace to make a perfect act of contrition. All that is pure speculation―but what we do know is that the very same day he was assured, by Our Lord, of being with Him in Paradise. A sinner became a winner!
There are many other sinners who eventually became winners by the merciful grace of God. Here is just the tip of the iceberg to give you encouragement. However ― remember that they got to Heaven not because they were sinners, but because they left their sinful ways behind, repented and paid the price through a combination of charity and penance.
► St. Mary Magdalen: Possessed by Seven Devils and an adulteress
Think of St. Mary Magdalen―possessed by seven devils and caught in adultery. We would find it difficult to find a greater sinner than Mary Magdalen. She was possessed by seven devils and her life of sin was no secret, but well-known by the community. Nevertheless, Holy Scripture tells us: “Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). It does not say: “Jesus loved Martha and Lazarus, and only tolerated or put up with Mary.” No! St. John says “Jesus loved … Mary!” God says: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “Go then and learn what this means: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners!” (Matthew 9:13). “They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill” (Matthew 9:12). She ended up being tremendously devoted to both Our Lord and Our Lady.
► St. Callixtus: Thief and Embezzler
St. Callixtus of Rome lived a life of many sins before being taken under the wing of Victor I, a second century pope. Callixtus was a Roman slave whose petty theft and reckless investments resulted in being sentenced to forced labor in the mines of Sardinia. He embezzled money and started a public riot, amongst other criminal affairs, but then he converted and reformed his life. Released from the mines by a general pardon, he returned to Rome where Pope St. Victor I gradually brought him to repentance. He was ordained a priest, served as administrator of one of the catacombs, and ultimately Callixtus went on to become a pope himself, but died a martyr shortly thereafter.
► St. Hippolytus: Heretic and First Antipope
Hippolytus was an arrogant, unforgiving man who believed that Christians guilty of mortal sin should be expelled from the Church and never readmitted. In his pride, Hippolytus permitted his followers to elect him as the Church’s first anti-pope. Inspired by the true pope’s holiness, Hippolytus eventually repented of his own sin and was reconciled to the Catholic Church.
► St. Mary of Egypt: Seductress and Whore
At the age of 12 Mary (344-421) ran away from home and became an accomplished seductress, who took special pleasure in corrupting innocent young men. Once, on a whim, she joined a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. By the time the ship reached its destination, Mary had seduced the entire crew and all of the pilgrims. She traveled to Jerusalem where a supernatural force prevented her from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. In Jerusalem she realized the enormity of her sins. Filled with remorse, Mary sought the Mother of God’s intercession and made a good confession. In penance, Mary lived out her conversion as a hermit, alone in the Jordanian desert.
► St. Augustine: Fornicator and Worldling
Augustine was son of a well-to-do pagan, whose ideal of life was to get the most out of it he could, without being too particular as to how he did it. Augustine grew up among pagan children, in a pagan school, and his morals were no better than theirs. He could steal, he could cheat, he could lie with the best of them; and to do these things cleverly and successfully was a mark of talent rather than of vice. As he grew a little older, he was sent to a city thirty miles away, for his education. Here he was his own master. Curiosity drew him to the dangerous entertainments of those who were older—public shows, plays, and other diversions of the theater. The most fatal sin was the vice of impurity, into which he fell in the sixteenth year of his age, by reading impure plays and by frequenting stage entertainments, and by bad company. Augustine plunged himself headlong into the filth of impurity. At about the age of 17, Augustine began an affair with a young woman in Carthage―who remained his lover for over fifteen years and gave birth to his son Adeodatus (372–388). In 385, Augustine ended his relationship with his lover in order to prepare himself to marry a ten-year-old heiress. He had to wait for two years because the legal age of marriage for women was twelve. By the time he was able to marry her, however, he had converted and decided instead to become a priest.
► St. Moses the Black: Cut-throat and Gang Leader
Moses was chief of a violent gang of bandits. Fleeing from law enforcement, he took refuge in a monastery. Moses was inspired by the monk’s example and converted. He took a vow never to raise his hand against another human being, even in self-defense. After years of overcoming temptation, Moses was killed by Berber raiders.
► St. Pelagia: Dancer and Courtesan
The beautiful, teenage Saint Pelagia would have been every parent’s nightmare. As legend has it, she was a dancer and courtesan (prostitute) by her early teens. Pelagia’s conversion occurred all of a sudden, following a chance encounter with Saint Nonnus, the bishop of Edessa. The young girl was baptized, gave away her possessions to the poor and lived as a hermit for the rest of her life.
► St. Olga: Murderess
When a neighboring tribe assassinated her husband, Olga (c.879-969), princess of Kiev, went to war. Olga slaughtered her husband’s murderer and she massacred virtually the entire tribe; the few who did survive, she sold into slavery. Years later, Olga visited a church, and the grace of God moved her to convert. She took instruction, was baptized and returned to Kiev, zealous to convert her people. Olga tried very hard to convert her people, but hardly anyone would listen to her. Even her family rejected Christianity. Olga died believing that as a missionary, she was a failure. Yet, she planted a seed of Faith which flourished. Today, Catholic and Orthodox Christians of Russia and Ukraine hail her as “Equal to the Apostles.”
► St. Vladimir: Murderer and Rapist
Olga’s grandson Vladimir (956-1015) became prince of Kiev by murdering his older half-brother. Then he raped his sister-in-law and added her to his harem of several hundred women. He built a new temple to all the gods; and sacrificed a father and his son to the false gods. When the emperor at Constantinople sought Vladimir’s help in putting down a rebellion, Vladimir demanded as his reward the emperor’s sister as his wife. The emperor demanded that Vladimir must first convert to Christianity. In order to marry the emperor’s sister, Vladimir accepted Christian baptism. Everyone suspected that once he was back in Kiev, Vladimir would return to his old ways, but the grace of Baptism changed him. His zeal for the Faith knew no limits and his efforts helped spread Christianity across Russia and Ukraine. He dismissed his extra wives and his harem, tore down the pagan temple, and launched a vigorous campaign to convert his people.
► St. Margaret of Cortona: Rich Man’s Mistress
Margaret was only twelve when she became Arsenio’s mistress. After years of cohabitation, she realized her sins when she discovered Arsenio’s murdered corpse. Full of the grace of conversion and determined to start a new life, she went to Cortona where the Franciscans ministered to penitent sinners. There, Margaret pursued a life of prayer, penance, and good works.
► St. Angela of Foligno: Worldly and Flirtatious
Angela was beautiful, wealthy, and vain. As a rich man’s wife she wallowed in luxury. Her passions were expensive clothes and flashy jewels, extravagant meals and rare wines. She dressed and acted in ways that would provoke envy among women and sexual desire among men. She also spent hours gossiping and maligning her neighbors. In her autobiography Angela disclosed that in 1285 she did something so bad that for the first time in her life she began to live in fear of Hell. Her biographers speculate that Angela committed adultery. Near despair, she prayed to St. Francis of Assisi to help her. As she prayed the saint appeared to her and said: “If you would have asked me sooner I would have complied with your request sooner. Nonetheless, your request is granted!” That same day Angela made a sincere confession to a priest and resolved to begin a new life. She sold her fine clothes and jewels to relieve the suffering of Foligno’s poor. After the death of her husband, she gave away all her wealth and, with some other holy women, dedicated herself to tending the poor and the sick.
► St. Thomas Becket: Rich and Cruel
As chancellor of England under King Henry II, Thomas Becket (1118-1170) became obscenely wealthy. His wardrobe was larger and more expensive than the king’s. He even had his own private navy. In spite of all his wealth, Becket was cold-hearted and never gave anything to the poor. All that changed after Becket was consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury. He gave away all his possessions. He welcomed the poor at his table. And he became a champion of the independence of the Church―for which reason he was murdered in his own cathedral by four of King Henry’s knights.
► St. Philip Howard: Playboy and Gambler
Son of one of the wealthiest noble families in England, Philip Howard (1557-1595) could afford any pleasure he liked — and he liked them all. At court he was a notorious playboy, gambler and a fool. He ran up enormous debts, then sold off his wife’s property to settle them. On one occasion he said publicly that he did not really consider himself to be married. In 1581, he went to the Tower of London, to see a debate between several Anglican ministers and a prisoner―the Jesuit priest, St. Edmund Campion. Although the ministers were armed with books and assistants, Father Campion was alone and had only his memory to rely on, yet he did so well in the debate, that the government canceled the debate before a verdict could be given. Inspired by Father Campion, Howard reconciled with his wife, and they both returned to the Catholic Faith. When they tried to leave the country secretly for the Continent of Europe, where they could practice Catholicism freely, they were arrested and Howard was imprisoned in the Tower of London. He died there 10 years later.
► St. Camillus of Lellis: Drinker, Gambler and Whore-Lover
Camillus de Lellis, born in Italy in the 1500s, was a hot-tempered, troublesome child. Joining the army aged 16, his aggressive behavior grew worse. Camillus was a soldier with all the worst habits— drinking, gambling, swearing, chasing prostitutes. Years of sinful acts followed before his wholehearted reform in 1575. Seeing his father call for a priest on his deathbed, Camillus began to rethink his life. Guided by St. Philip Neri, his spiritual director, Camillus turned away from sin, dedicated himself to the sick, and formed a religious congregation for nursing the poor.
These sinners “rose from the ashes” and got to Heaven, but they had to make themselves acceptable first! Who knows how much time they may have spent in Purgatory in addition to having suffered for their sins after their conversion. With God nothing is impossible—unless we stubbornly resist and reject His graces that move us to change!
Advent is the Time
Advent is a time of preparation whereby we prepare to leave the “dunghill” of this world in our attempt to “sit with princes” of Heaven. As Christians, we are a part of this world, but we are also set apart from this world. Life in this world in meant to be only a pilgrimage to Heaven―our true home is Heaven, not this world. The world is a mere motel or hotel that we pass through and do not get attached to. Everyone is called to salvation―but few make it! “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). Why? Because many have chosen to give the hearts to the world rather than God―they place the world ahead of God―therefore they cannot “love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40). They love the world more than God.
Our Lord tells us that His true disciples will be hated by world and will not be of the world: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you! If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:18-19). “Father, I have given them Thy word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world; as I also am not of the world! I pray not that Thou should take them out of the world, but that Thou should keep them from evil! They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world!” (John 17:14-16).
That is why Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
We all know the proverb: “If at first you don’t succeed―try and try again!” Notice it does not use the word “try” only once, but more than once! Third time’s not always the charm! In the case a 64-year old South Korean grandmother, CHA SA-SOON, it took 960 tries over five years—and thousands of dollars—to get her driver’s license. Sa-soon would not pass so soon! She first tried in April of 2005, at the age of 64, and suffered repeated failures before finally succeeding at the age of 69 in 2010. After failing the written test for the first time, she continued to retake the test―every single day, five days a week, for three years. After that, her pace slowed, to about twice a week. But she never quit and finally, after 860 written tests, she passed. At that point, she was allowed to proceed to the road driving skills test―which she also failed a further 100 times! Sa-soon finally aced the exam on her 961st attempt (800 written tests and 101 road driving skill tests). She became something of a local celebrity in South Korea, as her story inspired many people who were struggling to get their own driving license. Her driving instructors said it was a relief when she finally passed. Park Su-yeon, an instructor at the driving school, said: “When she finally got her license, we all went out in cheers and hugged her, giving her flowers! It felt like a huge burden falling off our back! We didn’t have the guts to tell her to quit, because she just kept showing up again and again!” So there you have it: “If at first you don’t succeed―try and try again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again!”
How are doing on our driving test for Heaven? Only saints get a license to enter into Heaven! Have you passed the test yet? How many years have you been trying? In view of the above story about the South Korean grandmother, passing only on her 961st attempt, it is appropriate to post once again the poem about Heaven from the previous article. Will the following poem be applicable to you?
I was shocked, confused, bewildered
As I entered Heaven’s door,
Not by the beauty of it all,
Nor the lights or its decor.
But it was the folks in Heaven
Who made me sputter and gasp―
The thieves, the liars, the sinners,
The alcoholics and the trash.
There stood the kid from seventh grade
Who swiped my lunch money! Twice!
Next to him was my old neighbor
Who never said anything nice.
Jerry, who I always thought
Was rotting away in Hell,
Was sitting pretty on cloud nine,
Looking incredibly well.
I nudged Jesus, “What’s the deal?
I would love to hear Your take.
How’d all these sinners get up here?
God must’ve made a mistake!”
“And why’s everyone so quiet,
So somber? ― Please give me a clue.”
“Hush, child!” He said, “It’s because they’re all in shock!
No one thought they’d be seeing you!”
Another Johnny Come Lately! Or Maxed-Out Maxcy!
It was 1966 when MAXCY DEAN FILER (1930-2018) graduated from the now-closed Van Norman University in Los Angeles and sat down for his first crack at the three-day California Bar Examination, considered one of the toughest law exams in the nation. They hold the Bar Examination twice a year. Maxcy wanted to be a lawyer―but that is not easy! Each California Bar exam is 18 hours long and is spread over 3 days. He failed. Every year, twice a year, year in and year out, Maxcy Filer took the California Bar Examination―from 1966 to 1991. Every year, twice a year, he failed it. Every year, twice a year, his wife, Blondell, filled out the form for the next go-round, and he would begin studying again. Two of his sons―who were in elementary school during at the time of the first test―and would become lawyers themselves before their father finally passed the Bar Exam. They both passed the exam at their first attempt. “The Bar exam is the most mentally demanding thing I’ve ever gone through,” said Maxcy’s son, the lawyer Kelvin Filer. “You have to have three days of total concentration. I couldn’t have handled it more than once.”
Along the way, Mr. Filer took every available bar review course on either side of the San Andreas Fault, which cost him over $50,000 in fees (that was in 1960s, 70s, 80s―today that $50,000 would be over $250,000). He journeyed around California like Father Junipero Serra, taking tests in San Francisco, Glendale, Oakland, Riverside, Carson, Los Angeles and San Diego. Someone once approached one of his sons to say he had taken the bar exam with his father. Maxcy Filer’s son replied that it was no big deal―because anyone who had taken the bar exam in the last 25 years could make the same claim. Maxcy Flier only passed after his two sons, Kelvin and Anthony had graduated law school and passed the Bar Exam themselves and were both practicing lawyers for more than seven years. Before finally passing his Bar Exam, Maxcy had kept himself busy as a Compton City Councilman and working as a law clerk for his two lawyer sons. When he passed the Bar at age 61, it became national news. It had taken him 25 years―a quarter of a century―and 48 tries, but Maxcy Dean Filer had finally passed the California State Bar exam. Filer was one of 3,702 aspiring lawyers who took the test in February, 1991, and one of only 1,869, or 50.5%, who passed, earning the right to represent clients in any California court. Maxcy Filer was sworn in to the State Bar on June 6th, 1991. He became one of the state’s 128,000 attorneys. His story has been included in books and magazine articles on the value of perseverance, and he was profiled in People magazine. So there again you have it: “If at first you don’t succeed―try and try again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again!”
Persevering Penicillin Project
Before antibiotics, a relatively minor infection could prove incurable or even deadly. Everything from paper cuts to childbirth had the potential to kill through bacterial infection. In 1928, DR. ALEXANDER FLEMING returned from a vacation to find mold growing on a Petri dish of Staphylococcus bacteria. He noticed the mold seemed to be preventing the bacteria around it from growing. He soon identified that the mold produced a self-defense chemical that could kill bacteria. He named the substance penicillin. The accidental discovery of a moldy petri-dish, in 1928, kick-started a 20-year long journey to develop the world’s first mass produced drug that could clear a bacterial infection. Fleming published his findings and presented his discovery but his peers showed little interest in his work. Undeterred, he enlisted the help of several chemists, all leading experts in their fields, to help purify penicillin from the mold. None were successful. Professor Harold Raistrick, a Biochemist and expert in fungal substances enlisted by Fleming, declared the production of penicillin for therapeutic purposes to be almost impossible and Fleming gave up attempts to purify it.
Nearly ten years later in 1937, HOWARD FLOREY and ERNST CHAIN uncovered Fleming’s research and assembled a team of scientists to work solely on the “Penicillin Project”. The complexities and scientific challenges of the project, meant the team struggled immensely to purify penicillin from its original mold. After three years of trial and error, they developed a successful, but painfully inefficient process that produced pure penicillin. The team finally had enough penicillin to start animal trials. In 1940, eight mice were infected with deadly streptococci bacteria. Only the four also given penicillin survived. The experiment gained immediate interest, but the team were now severely limited by production. Gallons of mold broth was required to produce just a fingernail of penicillin. The team resorted to using bedpans, milk churns, food tins and even bathtubs to store the broth. Eventually, special fermentation vessels were developed to hold the liquid. With penicillin now in successful but slow production, the Oxford laboratory could only ‘farm’ a few precious milligrams of penicillin every week. Once they started human trials, they quickly ran short of penicillin. The team had to turn to somewhat unpleasant measures to bolster their meager supplies. Around 80% of a dose of penicillin is excreted from our bodies in our urine and can be extracted and recycled to be used again. So doctors began ask patients to collect their urine, from which they would extract penicillin.
In June 1941 Florey decided to take penicillin to the US in hope of finding a way to scale up production. In Peoria, Illinois, a new team was set up in the Department of Agriculture’s research laboratory. They utilized their expertise in fermentation and designed new techniques using deep fermentation tanks to make the purification of penicillin as efficient as possible. The lab in Peoria had an abundance of corn-steep liquor, a by-product of corn starch. They discovered that when it was added to the mold broth, the yield of penicillin increased exponentially. The high concentration of sugars, amino acids and nitrogen provided an excellent environment for mold fermentation. They started a global search for strains of mold with higher percentages of penicillin. Soil samples were sent in from around the world. But the solution was found closer to home. An assistant at the Peoria lab, found a rotting cantaloupe melon at a local market. The mold produced six times more penicillin than Fleming’s original strain. US Pharmaceutical companies were initially reluctant to commit to large scale penicillin production. However, by the end of 1941 the US joined the Second World War and demand for penicillin rocketed. By 1943, the US had sufficient penicillin stocks to satisfy the demands of the Armed Forces of the United States, as well as their Allies.
As the proverb says: “Rome was built in a day!” ― and penicillin was sufficiently purified for human use in day, nor in a week, nor in a year―but only after 15 years of intense study, experimentation, numerous failures and much expense. So there again you have it: “If at first you don’t succeed―try and try again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and again!”
Long Time Waiting to See the Light!
It is often believed that Thomas Edison invented the light-bulb―but electric light-bulbs had been around since the early 19th century, but they were delicate and short-lived due to their filaments—the part that produces light. Prior to Thomas Edison’s eventual success through inventing the light-bulb in 1879, there had been at least 20 such light-bulb inventions since Humphry Davy invented the first electric light in 1802. Over the next seven decades, other inventors also created “light bulbs” but no designs emerged for commercial application. However, all those other “inventions” were not very practical, nor very efficient. One early form of electric light, the carbon arc light, relied on the vapor of battery-heated carbon rods to produce light. But they had to be lit by hand, and the bulbs flickered, hissed, and burned out easily. Other designs were too expensive and impractical to be widely used. Edison’s light-bulbs, by contrast, were cheap, practical, and long-lasting. In 1879, after years of obsessively improving on the concept of light-bulbs, he demonstrated a bulb that could last a record-breaking 14.5 hours. Thomas Edison’s quest to “invent” the incandescent light bulb was not an easy one. He faced countless failures and setbacks, but he never gave up. Edison famously said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work!” His relentless determination led to the eventual success of the light bulb, revolutionizing the way we illuminate our world. “My light is at last a perfect one,” Edison bragged to a New York Times reporter that year. “[Scientists’] opinion as well as the opinion unanimously expressed by the non-scientific was that Edison had in reality produced the light of the future,” reported the New York Herald.
It is often believed that THOMAS EDISON invented the light-bulb―but electric light-bulbs had been around since the early 19th century, but they were delicate and short-lived due to their filaments—the part that produces light. Prior to Thomas Edison’s eventual success through inventing the light-bulb in 1879, there had been at least 20 such light-bulb inventions since Humphry Davy invented the first electric light in 1802. Over the next seven decades, other inventors also created “light bulbs” but no designs emerged for commercial application. However, all those other “inventions” were not very practical, nor very efficient. One early form of electric light, the carbon arc light, relied on the vapor of battery-heated carbon rods to produce light. But they had to be lit by hand, and the bulbs flickered, hissed, and burned out easily. Other designs were too expensive and impractical to be widely used. Edison’s light-bulbs, by contrast, were cheap, practical, and long-lasting. In 1879, after years of obsessively improving on the concept of light-bulbs, he demonstrated a bulb that could last a record-breaking 14.5 hours. Thomas Edison’s quest to “invent” the incandescent light bulb was not an easy one. He faced countless failures and setbacks, but he never gave up. Edison famously said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work!” His relentless determination led to the eventual success of the light bulb, revolutionizing the way we illuminate our world. “My light is at last a perfect one,” Edison bragged to a New York Times reporter that year. “[Scientists’] opinion as well as the opinion unanimously expressed by the non-scientific was that Edison had in reality produced the light of the future,” reported the New York Herald.
Dumb Genius
ALBERT EINSTEIN didn’t speak until he was four and didn’t read until he was seven. He was subsequently expelled from school and was not admitted to the Zurich Polytechnic School. Long story short, he came around.
HELEN KELLER, who was both blind and deaf, overcame tremendous challenges to become a renowned writer, activist, and lecturer. With the help of her teacher, Anne Sullivan, she learned to communicate and became an advocate for the rights of people with disabilities.
Losers Became Winners
ABRAHAM LINCOLN was young when entered the army and went to war, he entered as a Captain but came back as a much lower Private. Later on, he tried to start up lots of businesses―all of which failed. Before becoming president, he lost several runs for public office.
Professional athletes like MICHAEL JORDAN have also demonstrated perseverance throughout their careers. After being cut from his high school basketball team at the first tryout due to a lack of height, Jordan worked hard on his game and persevered through criticism from others until he became one of the greatest basketball players of all time. He once said: “I have missed over 9,000 shots in my career. I have lost almost 300 games. On 26 occasions I have been entrusted to take the game winning shot, and I have missed. I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed!”
Another sportsman, the legendary baseball player BABE RUTH, had a home-run record of 714 during his career. But he still had a total of 1330 strikeouts. At one point, he held the record for most strikeouts. He once said: “Every strike brings me closer to the next home run!”
Bible Rejects Who “Made It”!
The greatest rejection in the Bible was the rejection of JESUS CHRIST: “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not” (John 1:11). Even while Jesus was in Mary’s womb, He was rejected by the inhabitants of Bethlehem was forced to be born in a cave. Immediately after His birth, King Herod tried to kill Him and thus He was forced to flee into Egypt. During His public ministry, He was rejected by most of the custodians of Jewish Law and Religious Tradition―the High Priests, the Sanhedrin, the Sadducees, the Scribes and the Pharisees. They too wanted to kill Him―“Then were gathered together the chief priests and ancients of the people into the court of the high priest, who was called Caiphas―and they consulted together, that by subtlety they might apprehend Jesus, and put Him to death” (Matthew 26:3-4). As Our Lord Himself said: “Why seek you to kill Me?” (John 7:2). He gives the answer to that question to His Apostles: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you!” (John 15:18). “The world hates Me because I give testimony of it, that the works of the world are evil!” (John 7:7).
It all came to a head when the Jews cried out to Pontius Pilate that he crucify Jesus: “Pilate said to the Jews: ‘Behold your King! … Do you want, therefore, that I release unto you the King of the Jews?’ But they cried out: ‘Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him!’ Pilate said to them: ‘Shall I crucify your King?’ The chief priests answered: ‘We have no king but Caesar! Crucify Him! Crucify Him!’ And Pilate again spoke to them, desiring to release Jesus, and said to them: ‘Why, what evil has He done?’ But they cried out the more: ‘Crucify Him!’ And he said to them the third time: ‘Why, what evil has this Man done? I find no cause of death in Him! I will chastise Him therefore, and let Him go!’ But they were instant with loud voices, requiring that He might be crucified; and their voices prevailed.” (Mark 15:9-14; Luke 23:20-23; John 18:39; 19:6, 14-15).
THE GOOD THIEF, crucified alongside Christ on Calvary, was a “loser” who became a “winner” at the last moment of his life! He said to Jesus: “Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!” (Luke 23:42) ― to whom Jesus replied: “Amen I say to thee, this day you shall be with Me in paradise!” (Luke 23:43). Some may look upon at that as being unfair―a robber, who quite possibly was also a murderer (since robbers would often kill their victims), manages to steal his way into Heaven! It reminds us a little of Our Lord’s parable about the workers in the vineyard, where the owner of the vineyard employs workers for his vineyard throughout the whole course of the day―some first thing in morning, others at the third, sixth, ninth and eleventh hours―but he pays everyone the same wage:
“A householder went out early in the morning to hire laborers into his vineyard … And going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market place idle. And he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard, and I will give you what shall be just!’ ... And again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did in like manner ... But about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing, and he said to them: ‘Go you also into my vineyard!’ And when evening was come, the lord of the vineyard said to his steward: ‘Call the laborers and pay them their hire, beginning from the last even to the first. When they were come, that came about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny. But when the first also came, they thought that they should receive more―but they also received every man a penny. And they murmured against the master of the house, saying: ‘These last ones have worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us, that have borne the burden of the day and the heat. But he answering said to one of them: ‘Friend, I do you no wrong! Did you not agree with me for a penny? Take what is yours and go thy way! I will also give to this last one the same as to you. Or, is it not lawful for me to do what I want? Is your eye evil, because I am good?’” (Matthew 20:1-15).
A lesson to be learned there―Judas the Apostle was lost, and Dismas the “Good” Thief was saved. Of Judas, Jesus says: “Woe to that man by whom the Son of man shall be betrayed! It would be better for him, if that man had not been born!” (Matthew 26:24) ― yet, to the Good Thief, Our Lord says: “This day you shall be with Me in paradise!” (Luke 23:43). “So shall the last be first, and the first last! For many are called, but few chosen!” (Matthew 20:16). “Watch! … Lest thou fall!” (Ecclesiasticus 1:38). “Take heed to thyself that thou fall not!” (Ecclesiasticus 29:26). “Wherefore he that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:12).
JOSEPH, in the Old Testament―of the coat of many colors fame―also found himself rejected by his brothers, who even tried to kill him. Eventually, they decided to sell him into slavery to passing merchants on their way to Egypt. Yet, amid his trials, he remained faithful and rose to prominence in Egypt―becoming the second most powerful man in Egypt, after the Pharao. His story teaches us that rejection by others does not define our worth or future.
The Old Testament list goes on and on ― to include Moses, David, Agar, Anna, Noemi, and many more have shown that with God’s merciful help one can rise from the “pits” to the highest heights. The crucial thing to remember is that we cannot do it alone―we need the assistance of God’s grace and providence: “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5). “The things that are impossible with men, are possible with God!” (Luke 18:27). “He raises up the needy from the dust, and lifts up the poor from the dunghill―so that they may sit with princes” (1 Kings 2:8).
Sinners Who Became Winners!
We say that the “Good Thief” stole his way into Heaven―but it is only saints that enter Heaven. If you are not a saint, then it is either Purgatory or Hell. It does not take a lifetime to become a saint―a baby is made into a “saint” at its Baptism and would go straight to Heaven if it died thereafter before reaching the age of reason (at which point it is capable of sin). A perfect act of contrition―out of a deep love of God―can be enough to remove, not only the guilt of sin, but also all the debt due to sin―and thus open the gates of Heaven. Did the “Good Thief” make a perfect act of contrition? We do not know―but at least he willingly accepted his crucifixion as a just punishment for his sins and perhaps Our Lord and Our Lady obtained for him the grace to make a perfect act of contrition. All that is pure speculation―but what we do know is that the very same day he was assured, by Our Lord, of being with Him in Paradise. A sinner became a winner!
There are many other sinners who eventually became winners by the merciful grace of God. Here is just the tip of the iceberg to give you encouragement. However ― remember that they got to Heaven not because they were sinners, but because they left their sinful ways behind, repented and paid the price through a combination of charity and penance.
► St. Mary Magdalen: Possessed by Seven Devils and an adulteress
Think of St. Mary Magdalen―possessed by seven devils and caught in adultery. We would find it difficult to find a greater sinner than Mary Magdalen. She was possessed by seven devils and her life of sin was no secret, but well-known by the community. Nevertheless, Holy Scripture tells us: “Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). It does not say: “Jesus loved Martha and Lazarus, and only tolerated or put up with Mary.” No! St. John says “Jesus loved … Mary!” God says: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “Go then and learn what this means: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners!” (Matthew 9:13). “They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill” (Matthew 9:12). She ended up being tremendously devoted to both Our Lord and Our Lady.
► St. Callixtus: Thief and Embezzler
St. Callixtus of Rome lived a life of many sins before being taken under the wing of Victor I, a second century pope. Callixtus was a Roman slave whose petty theft and reckless investments resulted in being sentenced to forced labor in the mines of Sardinia. He embezzled money and started a public riot, amongst other criminal affairs, but then he converted and reformed his life. Released from the mines by a general pardon, he returned to Rome where Pope St. Victor I gradually brought him to repentance. He was ordained a priest, served as administrator of one of the catacombs, and ultimately Callixtus went on to become a pope himself, but died a martyr shortly thereafter.
► St. Hippolytus: Heretic and First Antipope
Hippolytus was an arrogant, unforgiving man who believed that Christians guilty of mortal sin should be expelled from the Church and never readmitted. In his pride, Hippolytus permitted his followers to elect him as the Church’s first anti-pope. Inspired by the true pope’s holiness, Hippolytus eventually repented of his own sin and was reconciled to the Catholic Church.
► St. Mary of Egypt: Seductress and Whore
At the age of 12 Mary (344-421) ran away from home and became an accomplished seductress, who took special pleasure in corrupting innocent young men. Once, on a whim, she joined a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. By the time the ship reached its destination, Mary had seduced the entire crew and all of the pilgrims. She traveled to Jerusalem where a supernatural force prevented her from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. In Jerusalem she realized the enormity of her sins. Filled with remorse, Mary sought the Mother of God’s intercession and made a good confession. In penance, Mary lived out her conversion as a hermit, alone in the Jordanian desert.
► St. Augustine: Fornicator and Worldling
Augustine was son of a well-to-do pagan, whose ideal of life was to get the most out of it he could, without being too particular as to how he did it. Augustine grew up among pagan children, in a pagan school, and his morals were no better than theirs. He could steal, he could cheat, he could lie with the best of them; and to do these things cleverly and successfully was a mark of talent rather than of vice. As he grew a little older, he was sent to a city thirty miles away, for his education. Here he was his own master. Curiosity drew him to the dangerous entertainments of those who were older—public shows, plays, and other diversions of the theater. The most fatal sin was the vice of impurity, into which he fell in the sixteenth year of his age, by reading impure plays and by frequenting stage entertainments, and by bad company. Augustine plunged himself headlong into the filth of impurity. At about the age of 17, Augustine began an affair with a young woman in Carthage―who remained his lover for over fifteen years and gave birth to his son Adeodatus (372–388). In 385, Augustine ended his relationship with his lover in order to prepare himself to marry a ten-year-old heiress. He had to wait for two years because the legal age of marriage for women was twelve. By the time he was able to marry her, however, he had converted and decided instead to become a priest.
► St. Moses the Black: Cut-throat and Gang Leader
Moses was chief of a violent gang of bandits. Fleeing from law enforcement, he took refuge in a monastery. Moses was inspired by the monk’s example and converted. He took a vow never to raise his hand against another human being, even in self-defense. After years of overcoming temptation, Moses was killed by Berber raiders.
► St. Pelagia: Dancer and Courtesan
The beautiful, teenage Saint Pelagia would have been every parent’s nightmare. As legend has it, she was a dancer and courtesan (prostitute) by her early teens. Pelagia’s conversion occurred all of a sudden, following a chance encounter with Saint Nonnus, the bishop of Edessa. The young girl was baptized, gave away her possessions to the poor and lived as a hermit for the rest of her life.
► St. Olga: Murderess
When a neighboring tribe assassinated her husband, Olga (c.879-969), princess of Kiev, went to war. Olga slaughtered her husband’s murderer and she massacred virtually the entire tribe; the few who did survive, she sold into slavery. Years later, Olga visited a church, and the grace of God moved her to convert. She took instruction, was baptized and returned to Kiev, zealous to convert her people. Olga tried very hard to convert her people, but hardly anyone would listen to her. Even her family rejected Christianity. Olga died believing that as a missionary, she was a failure. Yet, she planted a seed of Faith which flourished. Today, Catholic and Orthodox Christians of Russia and Ukraine hail her as “Equal to the Apostles.”
► St. Vladimir: Murderer and Rapist
Olga’s grandson Vladimir (956-1015) became prince of Kiev by murdering his older half-brother. Then he raped his sister-in-law and added her to his harem of several hundred women. He built a new temple to all the gods; and sacrificed a father and his son to the false gods. When the emperor at Constantinople sought Vladimir’s help in putting down a rebellion, Vladimir demanded as his reward the emperor’s sister as his wife. The emperor demanded that Vladimir must first convert to Christianity. In order to marry the emperor’s sister, Vladimir accepted Christian baptism. Everyone suspected that once he was back in Kiev, Vladimir would return to his old ways, but the grace of Baptism changed him. His zeal for the Faith knew no limits and his efforts helped spread Christianity across Russia and Ukraine. He dismissed his extra wives and his harem, tore down the pagan temple, and launched a vigorous campaign to convert his people.
► St. Margaret of Cortona: Rich Man’s Mistress
Margaret was only twelve when she became Arsenio’s mistress. After years of cohabitation, she realized her sins when she discovered Arsenio’s murdered corpse. Full of the grace of conversion and determined to start a new life, she went to Cortona where the Franciscans ministered to penitent sinners. There, Margaret pursued a life of prayer, penance, and good works.
► St. Angela of Foligno: Worldly and Flirtatious
Angela was beautiful, wealthy, and vain. As a rich man’s wife she wallowed in luxury. Her passions were expensive clothes and flashy jewels, extravagant meals and rare wines. She dressed and acted in ways that would provoke envy among women and sexual desire among men. She also spent hours gossiping and maligning her neighbors. In her autobiography Angela disclosed that in 1285 she did something so bad that for the first time in her life she began to live in fear of Hell. Her biographers speculate that Angela committed adultery. Near despair, she prayed to St. Francis of Assisi to help her. As she prayed the saint appeared to her and said: “If you would have asked me sooner I would have complied with your request sooner. Nonetheless, your request is granted!” That same day Angela made a sincere confession to a priest and resolved to begin a new life. She sold her fine clothes and jewels to relieve the suffering of Foligno’s poor. After the death of her husband, she gave away all her wealth and, with some other holy women, dedicated herself to tending the poor and the sick.
► St. Thomas Becket: Rich and Cruel
As chancellor of England under King Henry II, Thomas Becket (1118-1170) became obscenely wealthy. His wardrobe was larger and more expensive than the king’s. He even had his own private navy. In spite of all his wealth, Becket was cold-hearted and never gave anything to the poor. All that changed after Becket was consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury. He gave away all his possessions. He welcomed the poor at his table. And he became a champion of the independence of the Church―for which reason he was murdered in his own cathedral by four of King Henry’s knights.
► St. Philip Howard: Playboy and Gambler
Son of one of the wealthiest noble families in England, Philip Howard (1557-1595) could afford any pleasure he liked — and he liked them all. At court he was a notorious playboy, gambler and a fool. He ran up enormous debts, then sold off his wife’s property to settle them. On one occasion he said publicly that he did not really consider himself to be married. In 1581, he went to the Tower of London, to see a debate between several Anglican ministers and a prisoner―the Jesuit priest, St. Edmund Campion. Although the ministers were armed with books and assistants, Father Campion was alone and had only his memory to rely on, yet he did so well in the debate, that the government canceled the debate before a verdict could be given. Inspired by Father Campion, Howard reconciled with his wife, and they both returned to the Catholic Faith. When they tried to leave the country secretly for the Continent of Europe, where they could practice Catholicism freely, they were arrested and Howard was imprisoned in the Tower of London. He died there 10 years later.
► St. Camillus of Lellis: Drinker, Gambler and Whore-Lover
Camillus de Lellis, born in Italy in the 1500s, was a hot-tempered, troublesome child. Joining the army aged 16, his aggressive behavior grew worse. Camillus was a soldier with all the worst habits— drinking, gambling, swearing, chasing prostitutes. Years of sinful acts followed before his wholehearted reform in 1575. Seeing his father call for a priest on his deathbed, Camillus began to rethink his life. Guided by St. Philip Neri, his spiritual director, Camillus turned away from sin, dedicated himself to the sick, and formed a religious congregation for nursing the poor.
These sinners “rose from the ashes” and got to Heaven, but they had to make themselves acceptable first! Who knows how much time they may have spent in Purgatory in addition to having suffered for their sins after their conversion. With God nothing is impossible—unless we stubbornly resist and reject His graces that move us to change!
Advent is the Time
Advent is a time of preparation whereby we prepare to leave the “dunghill” of this world in our attempt to “sit with princes” of Heaven. As Christians, we are a part of this world, but we are also set apart from this world. Life in this world in meant to be only a pilgrimage to Heaven―our true home is Heaven, not this world. The world is a mere motel or hotel that we pass through and do not get attached to. Everyone is called to salvation―but few make it! “Many are called, but few are chosen!” (Matthew 22:14). Why? Because many have chosen to give the hearts to the world rather than God―they place the world ahead of God―therefore they cannot “love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength! This is the greatest and the first commandment!” (Matthew 22:37-40). They love the world more than God.
Our Lord tells us that His true disciples will be hated by world and will not be of the world: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before you! If you had been of the world, the world would love its own―but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you!” (John 15:18-19). “Father, I have given them Thy word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world; as I also am not of the world! I pray not that Thou should take them out of the world, but that Thou should keep them from evil! They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world!” (John 17:14-16).
That is why Holy Scripture adds: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him!” (1 John 2:15). “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becomes an enemy of God!” (James 4:4) ... “Keep yourself unspotted from this world!” (James 1:27) … “Be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) … “That we be not condemned with this world!” (1 Corinthians 11:32).
Article 25
Monday November 27th, 2023, the Feast of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal
Tuesday November 28th, the Feast of St. Catherine Labouré
The Miraculous Medal Still Works!
Monday November 27th, 2023, the Feast of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal
Tuesday November 28th, the Feast of St. Catherine Labouré
The Miraculous Medal Still Works!
A Miracle Around Your Neck!
Who wouldn’t want a miracle? Only a fool! But don’t fool yourself! As you sow, so shall you reap! Miracles are not a “one-way-street”―they require something from us! When St. Catherine Labouré first saw Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal, her hands were adorned with rings set with precious stones of different sizes, three on each finger, that glittered and flashed in a brilliant cascade of light. So bright was the flood of glory cast upon the globe below that Catherine could no longer see Our Lady's feet.
But some of the gems gave off no light at all. While Catherine was wondering why some jewels gave off no light, the Blessed Virgin indicated that there are graces for which she is not asked, and it is for this reason that some of the gemstones did not send forth rays of light: “These rays symbolize the graces I shed upon those who ask for them. The gems, from which rays do not fall, are the graces for which souls neglect to ask.”
Then a change took place in what Catherine was seeing. An oval frame formed around the Blessed Virgin, and written within it in letters of gold Catherine read the words: “O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.” The voice spoke again: “Have a Medal struck after this model. All who wear it will receive great graces; they should wear it around the neck. Graces will abound for persons who wear it with confidence.”
With the permission of the Catholic Church, the first medals were made and distributed in Paris in 1832. Although it was originally known as the Medal of the Immaculate Conception, it was associated with so many miracles and blessings, that it became known as the Miraculous Medal. And many Christians who have them, today, still experience grace-filled blessings and miracles. We are living in such increasingly terrible times where only the miraculous intervention of Heaven can save us from many of the calamities that are on our doorsteps!
What Kind of Miracle Are You Seeking?
We all have our own preferences for miracles―since no two people are alike, then we can suppose that no two people have an identical list of miracles that they would like. The problem with seeking miracles is that―being far too human and materialistic―it is highly likely that our desired miracles are of a material and physical nature: “Cure my sickness! Save my job! Help me find a job! Help me pass an exam! Remove my poverty! Help me with my finances! Find me spouse! Strike down my enemies!” Yet God says: “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9).
At Fatima, people were asking the three children to beg Our Lady to perform a variety of miracles―mainly physical cures. The vast majority of people flocking to Lourdes seeking a miracle―likewise, are usually seeking a physical cure. Yet―as our Catechism teaches us―the soul is more important than the body. Our Lord says: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). The invisible miracles that take place in the hidden recesses of the soul are more valuable and important than the visible physical or material miracles that are there for all to see. We read in the Gospels that in one instance, when Our Lord cured a sick person, He first of all cured his sick soul and then, afterwards, to prove to the onlookers that He had divine power, he also cured the man of his physical ailments:
“They brought to Jesus one sick of the palsy lying in a bed. And Jesus, seeing their faith, said to the man sick of the palsy: ‘Be of good heart, son! Thy sins are forgiven thee!’ And behold some of the Scribes said within themselves: ‘He blasphemeth!’ And Jesus, seeing their thoughts, said: ‘Why do you think evil in your hearts? Is it easier, to say, “Thy sins are forgiven thee!” or to say, “Arise, and walk?” But that you may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (he then said to the man sick of palsy): Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house!’” (Matthew 9:2-6).
The Doctor of the Church, St. Alphonsus Liguori, quotes another saint―St. Vincent Ferrer―as saying: “It would be a greater miracle if habitual evil-livers had a good end, than to raise the dead to life.” This is of course is true―for the resurrection of a soul dead in sin, is greater than the resurrection of a body that is dead. The soul is more important than the body―yet, while we still live in this world, we usually fall into the trap of paying more attention to the body than to soul. Hence, when it comes to miracles, we are more likely to want a physical or material miracle, than a spiritual miracle.
At Fatima, Our Lady said that she would gladly obtain miraculous cures for people―but they must first amend their lives! St. Alphonsus, in his The Glories of Mary, writes: “A certain sinner once said to Mary, ‘Show thyself a Mother!’ ― but the Blessed Virgin replied: ‘Show thyself a son!’” The wages of sin are death―not miracles! Disease is the beginning of death―and so sin (in most cases, is the cause of sickness. Sickness of soul leads to sickness of body―or, as the proverb says: “Healthy body, healthy soul!” ― which, more correctly, ought to read: “Healthy soul, healthy body!”
What would you rather have―happiness in this world, or happiness in the next world? Of course, you will say: “I’d like to be happy in this world and also be happy in the next world!” Our Lord did not promise that to His Apostles and disciples―instead He said: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” [in the next world] (John 16:20). Similarly, Our Lady said to St. Bernadette of Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next world!”
The Miracle of Grace
Is salvation a miracle? You could call salvation a miracle of grace―because salvation is beyond merely human powers and so too are the various graces of God. Man cannot be saved without sanctifying grace in the soul and the guidance of actual graces―and those graces cannot be created by man.
St. Thomas Aquinas, a Doctor of the Church, writing on the subject of grace, says: “The grace of God is life everlasting … God, of His own mercy, leads us to everlasting life … No man can come to the Father without the help of grace … The gift of grace surpasses every capability of any created nature … It is impossible that any creature should cause grace … For a sinner to be made into a just man, is greater than to create Heaven and Earth … Generally speaking, the justification of the ungodly and the creation of the world, and every work that can only be done by God alone, is miraculous … Sometimes the justification of the ungodly is not miraculous … Yet God sometimes moves the soul so vehemently that it reaches the perfection of justice at once―as took place in the conversion of Paul, which was accompanied at the same time by a miraculous external prostration. Hence the conversion of Paul is commemorated in the Church as miraculous ... Man cannot avoid sin without grace … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace ... So, too, the guilt of eternal punishment can only be remitted by God alone, against Whom the offense was committed and Who is man’s Judge. And thus, in order that man rise from sin, there is required the help of grace … Man can do nothing unless moved by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing.’ … We need the help of God to move us … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for perseverance in grace, so that he may be kept from evil till the end of his life. For to many grace is given to whom perseverance in grace is not given … Hence all have not an equal grace … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life; and for this a higher force is needed, that is to say, the force of grace. Without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act … To fulfill the commandments of the Law―whereby their fulfillment may be meritorious―requires grace … We always need God’s help for every thought … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q. 109 to q. 114).
The Miracle of Salvation
The supernatural is more important than the natural. The spiritual is more important than the physical. The soul is more important than the body. Eternal life in Heaven is more important than physical life on Earth. Spiritual death is worse than physical death. Heaven is our goal―but can we get there by ourselves, without the help of a miracle? In Catholic theology, a miracle must either be above nature, contrary to nature, or outside nature. Can human nature, without the assistance of God, free itself from the guilt, debt and punishment due to sin? No! Can human nature, without the assistance of God attain Heaven? No! Christ conquered death and opened the door to our eternal salvation! What miracle could possibly match that in scope?
St. Louis de Montfort, in his book, The Secret of Mary, writes: “Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ―God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next (Matthew 5:48). It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this!”
St. Thomas Aquinas stated above: “For a sinner to be made into a just man, is greater than to create Heaven and Earth! … Generally speaking, the justification of the ungodly and the creation of the world, and every work that can only be done by God alone, is miraculous.” He goes on to say that a miracle must go beyond the order usually observed in nature: “True miracles cannot be done except by Divine power―because God alone can change the order of nature; and this is what is meant by a miracle” (Summa Theologica, IIIa, q. 43, art 2). “Among other gratuitous graces [is] the working of miracles ... Just as man led by his natural reason is able to arrive at some knowledge of God through His natural effects, so is he brought to a certain degree of supernatural knowledge of the objects of faith by certain supernatural effects which are called miracles. Therefore the working of miracles belongs to a gratuitous grace.” (Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 178, art 1).
In his work, Summa Contra Gentiles, Book 3, St. Thomas Aquinas further explains: “Those events then are properly to be styled miracles, which happen by divine power beyond the order commonly observed in nature. Of these miracles there are several ranks and orders. Miracles of the highest rank are those in which something is done by God that nature can never do. Miracles of the second rank are those in which God does something that nature can do, but not in that sequence and connection. Thus it is a work of nature that an animal should live, see and walk: but that it should live after death, see after blindness, walk after lameness, these things nature is powerless to effect, but God sometimes brings them about miraculously. A miracle of the third rank is something done by God, which is usually done by the operation of nature, but is done in this case without the working of natural principles, as when one is cured by divine power of a fever, in itself naturally curable, or when it rains without any working of the elements.”
The Miracle of YOUR Salvation
Will it be a miracle if you end up being saved? Will it be a miracle if you get to Heaven? Our Lord warned: “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Luke 13:24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28).
Will the following poem be applicable to you?
I was shocked, confused, bewildered
As I entered Heaven’s door,
Not by the beauty of it all,
Nor the lights or its decor.
But it was the folks in Heaven
Who made me sputter and gasp―
The thieves, the liars, the sinners,
The alcoholics and the trash.
There stood the kid from seventh grade
Who swiped my lunch money! Twice!
Next to him was my old neighbor
Who never said anything nice.
Jerry, who I always thought
Was rotting away in Hell,
Was sitting pretty on cloud nine,
Looking incredibly well.
I nudged Jesus, “What’s the deal?
I would love to hear Your take.
How’d all these sinners get up here?
God must’ve made a mistake!”
“And why’s everyone so quiet,
So somber? ― Please give me a clue.”
“Hush, child!” He said, “It’s because they’re all in shock!
No one thought they’d be seeing you!”
Get Your Miracles Through Mary
The saints, when they seek a favor for their clients, wait for their Queen to ask and obtain it; for “no grace is granted otherwise than at the prayer of Mary.” And how does Mary obtain favors? She has only to let her voice be heard—make me hear thy voice. She has only to speak, and her Son immediately grants her prayer. Father Justin Micoviensis says that “a single sigh of the most Blessed Mary can do more than the united suffrages of all the saints” (Super Litan. s. 270). And this was acknowledged by the devil himself to St. Dominic, who, as it is related by Father Paciucchelli (In Sal. Ang. exc. 3), obliged him to speak by the mouth of a possessed person; and he said that “a single sigh from Mary was worth more before God than the united suffrages of all the saints.”
St. Alphonsus Liguori, in his book, The Glories of Mary, writes: “In the second chapter of St. Luke we read that at this feast the compassionate Mother saw the embarrassment in which the bride and bridegroom were, and that they were quite ashamed on seeing the wine fail; and therefore, without being asked, and listening only to the dictates of her compassionate heart, which could never behold the afflictions of others without feeling for them, she begged her Son to console them simply by laying their distress before him: “They have no wine” (John ii. 3). No sooner had she done so, than Our Lord, in order to satisfy all present, and still more to console the compassionate heart of his Mother, who had asked the favor, worked the well-known miracle by which he changed the water, brought to him in jars, into wine. From this Novarinus argues, that “if Mary, unasked, is thus prompt to help the needy, how much more so will she be to help those who invoke her and ask for her help?” (Umbra Virg. exc. 72).
“Should there be any one who doubts as to whether Mary will aid him if he has recourse to her, Innocent III thus reproves him: “Who is there that ever, when in the night of sin, had recourse to this sweet Lady without being relieved?” (De Assumpt. s. 2). “Who ever,” exclaims the Blessed Eutychian, “faithfully implored thy all-powerful aid and was abandoned by thee?” (Vit. S. Theoph. Ap. Sur. 4 Febr.). Indeed, no one―for thou canst relieve the most wretched and save the most abandoned. Such a case certainly never did and never will occur.” The devout Blosius says, “Heaven and Earth would sooner be destroyed than would Mary fail to assist anyone who asks for her help―provided he does so with a good intention and with confidence in her!” (Consol. Pusil. c. 35). (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
“St. Anselm, that we more easily find salvation by having recourse to the Mother than by going to her Son—not as if Mary was more powerful than her Son to save us, for we know that Jesus Christ is our only Savior, and that He alone by his merits has obtained and obtains salvation for us; but it is for this reason: that when we have recourse to Jesus, we consider him at the same time as our judge, to whom it belongs also to chastise ungrateful souls, and therefore the confidence necessary to be heard may fail us; but when we go to Mary, who has no other office than to compassionate us as Mother of mercy, and to defend us as our advocate, our confidence is more easily established, and is often greater. “We often obtain more promptly what we ask by calling on the name of Mary than by invoking that of Jesus. Her Son is lord and judge of all, and discerns the merits of each one; and therefore if he does not immediately grant the prayers of all, he is just. When, however, the Mother’s name is invoked, though the merits of the suppliant are not such as to deserve that his prayer should be granted, those of the Mother supply that he may receive.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
“Nicephorus says, “Many things are asked from God, and are not granted: they are asked from Mary, and are obtained.” And how is this? It is “because God has thus decreed to honor his Mother.” From the time that Mary came into the world, her only thought, after seeking the glory of God, was to help the miserable. And even then she enjoyed the privilege of obtaining whatever she asked. This we know from what occurred at the marriage feast of Cana in Galilee. When the wine failed, the most Blessed Virgin, being moved to compassion at the sight of the affliction and shame of the bride and bridegroom, asked her Son to relieve them by a miracle, telling Him that they had no wine. Jesus answered: “Woman, what is that to thee and Me? My hour is not yet come!” (John 2:3). (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
“And here remark, that although Our Lord seemed to refuse his Mother the favor she asked, and said, “What is it to thee, O woman, and to me, if the wine has failed? This is not the time for Me to work a miracle; the time will be when I begin to preach, and when miracles will be required to confirm my doctrines.” And yet Mary, as if the favor had already been granted, desired those in attendance to fill the jars with water, for they would be immediately satisfied. And so it was; for Jesus, to content His mother, changed the water into the best wine. But how was this? As the time for working miracles was that of the public life of Our Lord, how could it be that, contrary to the divine decrees, this miracle was worked? No―in this there was nothing contrary to the decrees of God; for though, generally speaking, the time for miracles was not come, yet from all eternity God had determined by another decree that nothing that she asked should ever be refused to the divine Mother. And therefore Mary, who well knew her privilege, although her Son seemed to have refused her the favor, yet told them to fill the jars with water, as if her request had already been granted. (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
“That is the sense in which St. John Chrysostom understood it; for, explaining these words of Our Lord, “Woman, what is it to thee and Me?” He says, that “though Jesus answered thus, yet in honor of His Mother he obeyed her wish” In Johan. Hom. 21). This is confirmed by St. Thomas, who says that by the words, “My hour is not yet come”, Jesus Christ intended to show, that had the request come from any other, He would not then have complied with it; but because it was addressed to Him by His Mother, He could not refuse it. St. Cyril and St. Jerome, quoted by Barrada (T. ii l. 3, c. 1), say the same thing. Also Gandavensis, on the foregoing passage of St. John, says, that “to honor His mother, Our Lord anticipated the time for working miracles” (In Conc. Ev. c. 18).” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
Who wouldn’t want a miracle? Only a fool! But don’t fool yourself! As you sow, so shall you reap! Miracles are not a “one-way-street”―they require something from us! When St. Catherine Labouré first saw Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal, her hands were adorned with rings set with precious stones of different sizes, three on each finger, that glittered and flashed in a brilliant cascade of light. So bright was the flood of glory cast upon the globe below that Catherine could no longer see Our Lady's feet.
But some of the gems gave off no light at all. While Catherine was wondering why some jewels gave off no light, the Blessed Virgin indicated that there are graces for which she is not asked, and it is for this reason that some of the gemstones did not send forth rays of light: “These rays symbolize the graces I shed upon those who ask for them. The gems, from which rays do not fall, are the graces for which souls neglect to ask.”
Then a change took place in what Catherine was seeing. An oval frame formed around the Blessed Virgin, and written within it in letters of gold Catherine read the words: “O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.” The voice spoke again: “Have a Medal struck after this model. All who wear it will receive great graces; they should wear it around the neck. Graces will abound for persons who wear it with confidence.”
With the permission of the Catholic Church, the first medals were made and distributed in Paris in 1832. Although it was originally known as the Medal of the Immaculate Conception, it was associated with so many miracles and blessings, that it became known as the Miraculous Medal. And many Christians who have them, today, still experience grace-filled blessings and miracles. We are living in such increasingly terrible times where only the miraculous intervention of Heaven can save us from many of the calamities that are on our doorsteps!
What Kind of Miracle Are You Seeking?
We all have our own preferences for miracles―since no two people are alike, then we can suppose that no two people have an identical list of miracles that they would like. The problem with seeking miracles is that―being far too human and materialistic―it is highly likely that our desired miracles are of a material and physical nature: “Cure my sickness! Save my job! Help me find a job! Help me pass an exam! Remove my poverty! Help me with my finances! Find me spouse! Strike down my enemies!” Yet God says: “‘My thoughts are not your thoughts! Nor your ways My ways!’ saith the Lord. ‘For as the Heavens are exalted above the Earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts!’” (Isaias 55:8-9).
At Fatima, people were asking the three children to beg Our Lady to perform a variety of miracles―mainly physical cures. The vast majority of people flocking to Lourdes seeking a miracle―likewise, are usually seeking a physical cure. Yet―as our Catechism teaches us―the soul is more important than the body. Our Lord says: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). The invisible miracles that take place in the hidden recesses of the soul are more valuable and important than the visible physical or material miracles that are there for all to see. We read in the Gospels that in one instance, when Our Lord cured a sick person, He first of all cured his sick soul and then, afterwards, to prove to the onlookers that He had divine power, he also cured the man of his physical ailments:
“They brought to Jesus one sick of the palsy lying in a bed. And Jesus, seeing their faith, said to the man sick of the palsy: ‘Be of good heart, son! Thy sins are forgiven thee!’ And behold some of the Scribes said within themselves: ‘He blasphemeth!’ And Jesus, seeing their thoughts, said: ‘Why do you think evil in your hearts? Is it easier, to say, “Thy sins are forgiven thee!” or to say, “Arise, and walk?” But that you may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (he then said to the man sick of palsy): Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house!’” (Matthew 9:2-6).
The Doctor of the Church, St. Alphonsus Liguori, quotes another saint―St. Vincent Ferrer―as saying: “It would be a greater miracle if habitual evil-livers had a good end, than to raise the dead to life.” This is of course is true―for the resurrection of a soul dead in sin, is greater than the resurrection of a body that is dead. The soul is more important than the body―yet, while we still live in this world, we usually fall into the trap of paying more attention to the body than to soul. Hence, when it comes to miracles, we are more likely to want a physical or material miracle, than a spiritual miracle.
At Fatima, Our Lady said that she would gladly obtain miraculous cures for people―but they must first amend their lives! St. Alphonsus, in his The Glories of Mary, writes: “A certain sinner once said to Mary, ‘Show thyself a Mother!’ ― but the Blessed Virgin replied: ‘Show thyself a son!’” The wages of sin are death―not miracles! Disease is the beginning of death―and so sin (in most cases, is the cause of sickness. Sickness of soul leads to sickness of body―or, as the proverb says: “Healthy body, healthy soul!” ― which, more correctly, ought to read: “Healthy soul, healthy body!”
What would you rather have―happiness in this world, or happiness in the next world? Of course, you will say: “I’d like to be happy in this world and also be happy in the next world!” Our Lord did not promise that to His Apostles and disciples―instead He said: “Amen, amen I say to you, that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be made sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” [in the next world] (John 16:20). Similarly, Our Lady said to St. Bernadette of Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next world!”
The Miracle of Grace
Is salvation a miracle? You could call salvation a miracle of grace―because salvation is beyond merely human powers and so too are the various graces of God. Man cannot be saved without sanctifying grace in the soul and the guidance of actual graces―and those graces cannot be created by man.
St. Thomas Aquinas, a Doctor of the Church, writing on the subject of grace, says: “The grace of God is life everlasting … God, of His own mercy, leads us to everlasting life … No man can come to the Father without the help of grace … The gift of grace surpasses every capability of any created nature … It is impossible that any creature should cause grace … For a sinner to be made into a just man, is greater than to create Heaven and Earth … Generally speaking, the justification of the ungodly and the creation of the world, and every work that can only be done by God alone, is miraculous … Sometimes the justification of the ungodly is not miraculous … Yet God sometimes moves the soul so vehemently that it reaches the perfection of justice at once―as took place in the conversion of Paul, which was accompanied at the same time by a miraculous external prostration. Hence the conversion of Paul is commemorated in the Church as miraculous ... Man cannot avoid sin without grace … Man by himself can in no way rise from sin without the help of grace ... So, too, the guilt of eternal punishment can only be remitted by God alone, against Whom the offense was committed and Who is man’s Judge. And thus, in order that man rise from sin, there is required the help of grace … Man can do nothing unless moved by God, according to John 15:5: ‘Without Me, you can do nothing.’ … We need the help of God to move us … After anyone has been justified by grace, he still needs to beseech God for perseverance in grace, so that he may be kept from evil till the end of his life. For to many grace is given to whom perseverance in grace is not given … Hence all have not an equal grace … Man, by his natural endowments, cannot produce meritorious works proportionate to everlasting life; and for this a higher force is needed, that is to say, the force of grace. Without grace man cannot merit everlasting life … Without grace men do nothing good when they either think or wish or love or act … To fulfill the commandments of the Law―whereby their fulfillment may be meritorious―requires grace … We always need God’s help for every thought … Man cannot even know truth without Divine help” (Summa Theologica, Ia-IIae, q. 109 to q. 114).
The Miracle of Salvation
The supernatural is more important than the natural. The spiritual is more important than the physical. The soul is more important than the body. Eternal life in Heaven is more important than physical life on Earth. Spiritual death is worse than physical death. Heaven is our goal―but can we get there by ourselves, without the help of a miracle? In Catholic theology, a miracle must either be above nature, contrary to nature, or outside nature. Can human nature, without the assistance of God, free itself from the guilt, debt and punishment due to sin? No! Can human nature, without the assistance of God attain Heaven? No! Christ conquered death and opened the door to our eternal salvation! What miracle could possibly match that in scope?
St. Louis de Montfort, in his book, The Secret of Mary, writes: “Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ―God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next (Matthew 5:48). It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this!”
St. Thomas Aquinas stated above: “For a sinner to be made into a just man, is greater than to create Heaven and Earth! … Generally speaking, the justification of the ungodly and the creation of the world, and every work that can only be done by God alone, is miraculous.” He goes on to say that a miracle must go beyond the order usually observed in nature: “True miracles cannot be done except by Divine power―because God alone can change the order of nature; and this is what is meant by a miracle” (Summa Theologica, IIIa, q. 43, art 2). “Among other gratuitous graces [is] the working of miracles ... Just as man led by his natural reason is able to arrive at some knowledge of God through His natural effects, so is he brought to a certain degree of supernatural knowledge of the objects of faith by certain supernatural effects which are called miracles. Therefore the working of miracles belongs to a gratuitous grace.” (Summa Theologica, IIa-IIae, q. 178, art 1).
In his work, Summa Contra Gentiles, Book 3, St. Thomas Aquinas further explains: “Those events then are properly to be styled miracles, which happen by divine power beyond the order commonly observed in nature. Of these miracles there are several ranks and orders. Miracles of the highest rank are those in which something is done by God that nature can never do. Miracles of the second rank are those in which God does something that nature can do, but not in that sequence and connection. Thus it is a work of nature that an animal should live, see and walk: but that it should live after death, see after blindness, walk after lameness, these things nature is powerless to effect, but God sometimes brings them about miraculously. A miracle of the third rank is something done by God, which is usually done by the operation of nature, but is done in this case without the working of natural principles, as when one is cured by divine power of a fever, in itself naturally curable, or when it rains without any working of the elements.”
The Miracle of YOUR Salvation
Will it be a miracle if you end up being saved? Will it be a miracle if you get to Heaven? Our Lord warned: “Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! … Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leads to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!” (Luke 13:24; Matthew 7:13-14; 22:14).
“And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. But when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: ‘Lord! Open to us!’ And He, answering, shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are!’ Then you shall begin to say: ‘We have eaten and drunk in Thy presence, and Thou hast taught in our streets!” And He shall say to you: ‘I know you not, whence you are! Depart from Me, all ye workers of iniquity!’ There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out!’” (Luke 13:23-28).
Will the following poem be applicable to you?
I was shocked, confused, bewildered
As I entered Heaven’s door,
Not by the beauty of it all,
Nor the lights or its decor.
But it was the folks in Heaven
Who made me sputter and gasp―
The thieves, the liars, the sinners,
The alcoholics and the trash.
There stood the kid from seventh grade
Who swiped my lunch money! Twice!
Next to him was my old neighbor
Who never said anything nice.
Jerry, who I always thought
Was rotting away in Hell,
Was sitting pretty on cloud nine,
Looking incredibly well.
I nudged Jesus, “What’s the deal?
I would love to hear Your take.
How’d all these sinners get up here?
God must’ve made a mistake!”
“And why’s everyone so quiet,
So somber? ― Please give me a clue.”
“Hush, child!” He said, “It’s because they’re all in shock!
No one thought they’d be seeing you!”
Get Your Miracles Through Mary
The saints, when they seek a favor for their clients, wait for their Queen to ask and obtain it; for “no grace is granted otherwise than at the prayer of Mary.” And how does Mary obtain favors? She has only to let her voice be heard—make me hear thy voice. She has only to speak, and her Son immediately grants her prayer. Father Justin Micoviensis says that “a single sigh of the most Blessed Mary can do more than the united suffrages of all the saints” (Super Litan. s. 270). And this was acknowledged by the devil himself to St. Dominic, who, as it is related by Father Paciucchelli (In Sal. Ang. exc. 3), obliged him to speak by the mouth of a possessed person; and he said that “a single sigh from Mary was worth more before God than the united suffrages of all the saints.”
St. Alphonsus Liguori, in his book, The Glories of Mary, writes: “In the second chapter of St. Luke we read that at this feast the compassionate Mother saw the embarrassment in which the bride and bridegroom were, and that they were quite ashamed on seeing the wine fail; and therefore, without being asked, and listening only to the dictates of her compassionate heart, which could never behold the afflictions of others without feeling for them, she begged her Son to console them simply by laying their distress before him: “They have no wine” (John ii. 3). No sooner had she done so, than Our Lord, in order to satisfy all present, and still more to console the compassionate heart of his Mother, who had asked the favor, worked the well-known miracle by which he changed the water, brought to him in jars, into wine. From this Novarinus argues, that “if Mary, unasked, is thus prompt to help the needy, how much more so will she be to help those who invoke her and ask for her help?” (Umbra Virg. exc. 72).
“Should there be any one who doubts as to whether Mary will aid him if he has recourse to her, Innocent III thus reproves him: “Who is there that ever, when in the night of sin, had recourse to this sweet Lady without being relieved?” (De Assumpt. s. 2). “Who ever,” exclaims the Blessed Eutychian, “faithfully implored thy all-powerful aid and was abandoned by thee?” (Vit. S. Theoph. Ap. Sur. 4 Febr.). Indeed, no one―for thou canst relieve the most wretched and save the most abandoned. Such a case certainly never did and never will occur.” The devout Blosius says, “Heaven and Earth would sooner be destroyed than would Mary fail to assist anyone who asks for her help―provided he does so with a good intention and with confidence in her!” (Consol. Pusil. c. 35). (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
“St. Anselm, that we more easily find salvation by having recourse to the Mother than by going to her Son—not as if Mary was more powerful than her Son to save us, for we know that Jesus Christ is our only Savior, and that He alone by his merits has obtained and obtains salvation for us; but it is for this reason: that when we have recourse to Jesus, we consider him at the same time as our judge, to whom it belongs also to chastise ungrateful souls, and therefore the confidence necessary to be heard may fail us; but when we go to Mary, who has no other office than to compassionate us as Mother of mercy, and to defend us as our advocate, our confidence is more easily established, and is often greater. “We often obtain more promptly what we ask by calling on the name of Mary than by invoking that of Jesus. Her Son is lord and judge of all, and discerns the merits of each one; and therefore if he does not immediately grant the prayers of all, he is just. When, however, the Mother’s name is invoked, though the merits of the suppliant are not such as to deserve that his prayer should be granted, those of the Mother supply that he may receive.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
“Nicephorus says, “Many things are asked from God, and are not granted: they are asked from Mary, and are obtained.” And how is this? It is “because God has thus decreed to honor his Mother.” From the time that Mary came into the world, her only thought, after seeking the glory of God, was to help the miserable. And even then she enjoyed the privilege of obtaining whatever she asked. This we know from what occurred at the marriage feast of Cana in Galilee. When the wine failed, the most Blessed Virgin, being moved to compassion at the sight of the affliction and shame of the bride and bridegroom, asked her Son to relieve them by a miracle, telling Him that they had no wine. Jesus answered: “Woman, what is that to thee and Me? My hour is not yet come!” (John 2:3). (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
“And here remark, that although Our Lord seemed to refuse his Mother the favor she asked, and said, “What is it to thee, O woman, and to me, if the wine has failed? This is not the time for Me to work a miracle; the time will be when I begin to preach, and when miracles will be required to confirm my doctrines.” And yet Mary, as if the favor had already been granted, desired those in attendance to fill the jars with water, for they would be immediately satisfied. And so it was; for Jesus, to content His mother, changed the water into the best wine. But how was this? As the time for working miracles was that of the public life of Our Lord, how could it be that, contrary to the divine decrees, this miracle was worked? No―in this there was nothing contrary to the decrees of God; for though, generally speaking, the time for miracles was not come, yet from all eternity God had determined by another decree that nothing that she asked should ever be refused to the divine Mother. And therefore Mary, who well knew her privilege, although her Son seemed to have refused her the favor, yet told them to fill the jars with water, as if her request had already been granted. (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
“That is the sense in which St. John Chrysostom understood it; for, explaining these words of Our Lord, “Woman, what is it to thee and Me?” He says, that “though Jesus answered thus, yet in honor of His Mother he obeyed her wish” In Johan. Hom. 21). This is confirmed by St. Thomas, who says that by the words, “My hour is not yet come”, Jesus Christ intended to show, that had the request come from any other, He would not then have complied with it; but because it was addressed to Him by His Mother, He could not refuse it. St. Cyril and St. Jerome, quoted by Barrada (T. ii l. 3, c. 1), say the same thing. Also Gandavensis, on the foregoing passage of St. John, says, that “to honor His mother, Our Lord anticipated the time for working miracles” (In Conc. Ev. c. 18).” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary).
Article 24
Sunday November 26th, 2023
Last Sunday―Last Things
Sunday November 26th, 2023
Last Sunday―Last Things
All Good Things Come To An End
Since we have now entered the last days of the liturgical year—and since we are also living in the “End Times” of the world, as revealed by Our Lady to Sr. Lucia of Fatima—it is well worth considering the essential, yet distasteful and unpalatable, truth about the end of each person’s life.
Skulls on the Dining Table
Talking about “distasteful” and “unpalatable” brings to mind food and eating. The original (Pre-Vatican II) ritual and discipline for the religious Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, would require that at all meal times there would be placed a skull upon the dining table within visibility of all the religious present—so that, even though they were eating to live, they would be reminded that one day they would die. The Carmelites would also display a written sign which said: “Remember man that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return!” ― which is what the priest says to us as he places a sign of the cross with ashes on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday. We have all been sentenced to death by Original Sin (Adam and Eve’s sin) and by the Actual Sins (our own personal sins). We may not be certain about where we will end up after death—Heaven, Purgatory or Hell—but we can be absolutely sure of dying.
Death is the end of our earthly life and it will send our soul before the Judgment Seat of God. It is a sobering thought that we should always keep before our eyes and not stuff it into the closet. St. Thomas Aquinas says that we should always keep our end or goal in view—for as we live, so shall we die; as we sow, so shall we reap: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
One Thing You Can Bank On—You Will Die and be Judged
Life’s one certainty is death. Everyone knows this, though not everyone knows what comes next. The rich shall die just as the poor. Some will die young, other will die in old age. Some will die alone, others will die amongst family and friends. Some will be martyred or murdered, others will die in accidents. Some will die when God wants them to die, others will commit suicide. Some will die quickly, others slowly. Some will die loved, other will die hated. Some will die healthy, others will die sick. Some will die with the Faith, others will be die without the Faith. Some of those with the Faith will die in a state of grace, others will die in a state of mortal sin. All of these variables are unknown to us—but what IS KNOWN is that WE WILL DIE! We will die just as Our Lord died and Our Lady died. Death is not the question—it will certainly come—the question is what will happen to us after death? Will we go to Heaven, to Purgatory, or to Hell?
St. Philip Neri wrote: “Beginners in religion ought to exercise themselves principally in meditation on the Four Last Things.” Traditionally, the sermons preached on the four Sundays of Advent were on the Four Last Things. The Church always taught that man should be prepared for the Novissima, the Four Last Things. It is what we pray in the Hail Mary: “Pray for us now and at the hour of our death.” It is a wise prayer, because Scriptures makes us this great promise: “In all thy works, remember thy last end, and thou shalt never sin eternally” (Ecclesiasticus 7:40). That is to say, one who meditates on the Novissima will not go to Hell. It is quite a promise, and it is why the pastors of the Church have always preached on the Novissima, the Four Last Things. In the Age of Faith, consideration of the Novissima became a branch of learning, eschatology.
You may wonder what is the meaning of the sinister or mysterious sounding word “eschatology” (pronounced eska-tology). The word “eschatology” is derived from the Greek words “eschaton,” meaning “last,” and “logos” meaning “word” or “words”—thus “eschatology” means “words about the last times or end times” and refers in particular to the study of the end of our lives and the end of the world. Today students have chemistry, biology, social sciences. But there isn’t much attention paid to the eschatology, the study of the Last Things.
The Time Draws Ever Nearer!
We now enter the last week of the Church’s liturgical year, before we recommence, once again, with the season of Advent. It is time to cast a glance on the previous year to see and take stock of our spiritual lives. Have we made progress? Have we gone backwards? Are we stagnating with no apparent gains or losses? Each passing day and year is a day and year nearer to our own personal “end of time”!
God has given us time for a purpose—how have we used it? What words are more applicable to us—“God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23), or “Well done, good and faithful servant, because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord” (Matthew 25:21).
Use or Abuse of Time
We all know that famous passage from the Book of Ecclesiasticus: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under Heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal. A time to destroy, and a time to build. A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather. A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces. A time to get, and a time to lose. A time to keep, and a time to cast away. A time to rend, and a time to sew. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-7).
The Thread Through Time
Yet throughout all these differing times and fortunes of time, there has to be a unifying thread that weaves it way through all these things—that thread has to be God. St. Paul says: “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31). Which is nothing else than putting into practice the command of Our Lord: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). Such is the purpose of time and if there is time not spent loving God, it is time forever lost!
The Present Moment
The author of The Soul of Apostolate, Dom Chautard, stresses the importance of “the present moment” which will never come back again. If we do not profit from “the present moment” we have lost the profit that it presented to us. In essence, this means seeing every moment of our lives as a moment of grace—which will be given to those who use “the present moment” well; and will be refused to those who fail to use the “the present moment” well. As he himself writes: “O my soul, at every instant Jesus presents Himself to you by the GRACE OF THE PRESENT MOMENT — every time there is a prayer to say, a Mass to celebrate or to hear, reading to be done, or acts of patience, of zeal, of renunciation, of struggle, confidence, or love to be produced. Would you dare look the other way, or try to avoid His gaze?”
Cardinal Mermillod, in his Preface to Dom Chautrad’s book, writes: “If there is one concept that is capable of summing up Dom Chautard’s spirituality, it is one which is sometimes seen written, most appropriately, over the doors of Cistercian monasteries: “GOD ALONE.” Not contemplation, not action, not works, not rest, not this or that particular thing, but God in everything, God in anything, God in His will, God in other men, God present in his own soul. To do whatever God willed, to suffer whatever He willed, that was enough for Dom Chautard, because all he asked was the opportunity to give himself, to give his will, utterly, without recall, to the infinite Wisdom and Love Who created and redeemed us all. It is the spirit of St. Bernard, and the spirit of the White Monks. It is the spirit of Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (Preface by Cardinal Mermillod, The Soul of the Apostolate, by Dom Chautard).
Wasted Moments
Alas, for some, it is not God but self that is the thread that weaves through everything—more or less everything is done for self, even spiritual things. Yet even worse is the thread of pleasure, entertainment and amusement, over which Our Lady laments: “People will think of nothing but amusement … [Even priests] will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain” (La Salette).
Some Have Much Time, Others Less Time
We do not know how much time God will give us! Some receive more, others less. The good die young and the bad die young. The good live to a ripe old age and so do the bad! Adam lived to the ripe old age of 930 years! Our Lord died aged around 33 years. Our Lady is said to have died in her early to mid-sixties. St. Dominic Savio died aged 14 years. St. Maria Goretti was 11 years old when she was killed. Little Blessed Francisco of Fatima was only 10 years old when he died; Blessed Jacinta, his sister was only 9 years old. The Venerable Anne de Guigné was 10 years old. “And he knoweth not what time shall pass, and that death approacheth, and that he must leave all to others, and shall die” (Ecclesiasticus 11:20).
Time Waits For Nobody
“Our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no going back of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returneth” (Wisdom 2:5). Time waits for nobody. Time is precious. Time means more than money. Time and how it is spent, means the difference between Heaven and Hell. Death is the most untimely thing around. Death respects no one. Even in the forthcoming chastisement of which Our Lady has warned us, time and time again, she says that the good will die with the bad; and neither will priests be spared, but they will die with the laity. That is why our time is so precious.
Time Means Money—Time Means Souls
The worldly have a saying about time: “Time means money!” ―meaning that wasted time means money lost. The same idea was expressed by Our Lord to one of His mystics, when He said: “Do not lose time! Every act of love means a soul!” (Our Lord to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Words of Love, Fr. Gottemuller). St. John Bosco had a somewhat similar attitude. When St. Dominic Savio entered the office of St. John Bosco, he saw a sign on the wall that said: “Da mihi animas, cetera tolle!” which means: “Give me souls, keep the rest!”
We have heard of the expression: “My time is not my own!” as applicable at work, when we have to our employer’s will and not just do what we want. The same is true of life—it is not our time, but time given to us by God. “Man born of a woman, living for a short time, is filled with many miseries … [and there are some] who were taken away before their time” (Job 14:1; 22:16). “Therefore I say, brethren; the time is short; it remaineth, that they also who have wives, be as if they had none; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as if they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use this world, as if they used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away” (1 Corinthians 7:29-31).
Heaven Deals in Souls, Not Money
Our Lord did not come on Earth to seek money, wealth and riches—He came to seek souls: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). The Pharisees, just like us, praised the good and detested sinners—Our Lord loved sinners but detested their sins. He came to call them to conversion, penance and a change of life: “Go then and learn what this meaneth: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). “Jesus said to them: ‘They that are well have no need of a physician, but they that are sick. For I came not to call the just, but sinners!’” (Mark 2:17). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). And to those who listen to Him and convert, He further says: “Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:11). “Behold thou art made whole: sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14).
Our Lord comes for souls and He deals in souls, as St. James points out: “He must know that he who causeth a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20). Souls are pricey and expensive—St. Thomas Aquinas says that one single soul in a state of sanctifying grace is worth more than all the treasures of universe.
No wonder, then, that Our Lady comes to Fatima asking that we pray and make sacrifices for the conversion of sinners so that they return to, or find for the first time, that precious state of sanctifying grace. God loves sinners and came to work for their salvation—we must do likewise. God, nevertheless, hates sin—we must do likewise. “He that loveth iniquity hateth his own soul” (Psalm 10:6).
Time For A Change!
We need to change! Everybody—without exception. Who can say: “I am as holy as I should be! I have no need of progress because I have reached perfection!” For St. John says: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). If we have sins, we are not perfect; and if we are not perfect, we shall not enter Heaven, but Purgatory at best! Perfection is obligatory: “Thou shalt be perfect, and without spot before the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). Our Lord also commands perfection: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). St. Paul also requires “that the man of God may be perfect” (2 Timothy 3:17).
Change Later or Change Now?
“There is no time like the present!” as the saying goes. For “His wrath shall be kindled in a short time” (Psalm 2:13), as Our Lady warned at La Salette: “If my people do not wish to submit [change] themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it!” Therefore, I need to change now, not later, “Lest at any time he [the devil] seize upon my soul like a lion, while there is no one to redeem me, nor to save” (Psalm 7:3), “because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8).
Wasting Time
As the saying goes: “Do what you have to do today, for tomorrow may never come!” Holy Scripture, along the same lines, says: “And he knoweth not what time shall pass, and that death approacheth, and that he must leave all to others, and shall die” (Ecclesiasticus 11:20). “Work your work before the time!” (Ecclesiasticus 51:38).
As the Church teaches, right now, while we are alive, it is a time of God’s mercy. Once life ends, it is time for God’s justice. At Bethlehem, Our Lord comes in mercy. At the end of time, He will come in justice. “Bring forth, therefore, fruits worthy of penance!” (Luke 3:8), as Our Lady commanded at Lourdes: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” while at Fatima she demanded prayer and sacrifice; and at Akita she pointed out: “Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
So we must “do penance: for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2). The “end is nigh” ―as the proverbial guy with his sandwich board placard says pacing along the sidewalk. Waste not your time like the Israelites with their golden calf, who only thought of food and fun. St. Paul warns us of this: “Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play’” (1 Corinthians 10:7). As Our Lady lamented at La Salette: “The people will think of nothing but amusements!”—are we among those people?
Now is the Acceptable Time!
St. Paul writes and the Church echoes this at times of penance (Lent): “For God saith: ‘In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). “There is no time like the present!” Let us not “waste our time” on the things of the world (which often only serve as to lead us into sin or indifference to God). Let us let “time run away from us” while we vainly and selfishly “have the time of our life”!
On the contrary, let us “spend our time well” in the spirit of Our Lady Good Success’ words at Quito: “Oh, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!”
“For our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no going back of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returneth” (Wisdom 2:5). “The time of our life is short and tedious, and in the end of a man there is no remedy [all must die], and no man hath been known to have returned from Hell” (Wisdom 2:1). “Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth, before the time of affliction come” (Ecclesiastes 12:1). “Be not overmuch wicked: and be not foolish, lest thou die before thy time” (Ecclesiastes 7:18). “For His wrath shall come on a sudden, and in the time of vengeance He will destroy thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:9).
As Our Lady herself says: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended” (Fatima) … “Many men in this world afflict the Lord … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” (Akita).
Time Waits For No One
Time waits for no one. Each moment in time is time we cannot waste, but from which we must draw great profit. God gives us the "the grace of the present moment" as Dom Chautard writes in his book, The Soul of the Apostolate. God, especially today, through Our Lady, says to us: “Behold I come against thee, O proud one, saith the Lord the God of hosts: for thy day is come, the time of thy visitation” (Jeremias 50:31).
Do We Know the Time of Our Visitation?
Let it not be said of us, as Our Lord said of Jerusalem in His own day, when they rejected Him and His teaching: “And when He drew near, seeing the city, He wept over it, saying: ‘If thou also hadst known, and that in this thy day, the things that are to thy peace; but now they are hidden from thy eyes. For the days shall come upon thee, and thy enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and straiten thee on every side, and beat thee flat to the ground, and thy children who are in thee: and they shall not leave in thee a stone upon a stone: because thou hast not known the time of thy visitation!’” (Luke 19:41-44).
Therefore, “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). Will we “pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) and “Bring forth fruits worthy of penance!” (Luke 3:8)? Or will we “think of nothing but amusements” and “sit down to eat and drink and rise up to play”? The rewards are great! The punishments are great! It’s our life, our choice, our fate!
Since we have now entered the last days of the liturgical year—and since we are also living in the “End Times” of the world, as revealed by Our Lady to Sr. Lucia of Fatima—it is well worth considering the essential, yet distasteful and unpalatable, truth about the end of each person’s life.
Skulls on the Dining Table
Talking about “distasteful” and “unpalatable” brings to mind food and eating. The original (Pre-Vatican II) ritual and discipline for the religious Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, would require that at all meal times there would be placed a skull upon the dining table within visibility of all the religious present—so that, even though they were eating to live, they would be reminded that one day they would die. The Carmelites would also display a written sign which said: “Remember man that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return!” ― which is what the priest says to us as he places a sign of the cross with ashes on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday. We have all been sentenced to death by Original Sin (Adam and Eve’s sin) and by the Actual Sins (our own personal sins). We may not be certain about where we will end up after death—Heaven, Purgatory or Hell—but we can be absolutely sure of dying.
Death is the end of our earthly life and it will send our soul before the Judgment Seat of God. It is a sobering thought that we should always keep before our eyes and not stuff it into the closet. St. Thomas Aquinas says that we should always keep our end or goal in view—for as we live, so shall we die; as we sow, so shall we reap: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Galatians 6:7-8).
One Thing You Can Bank On—You Will Die and be Judged
Life’s one certainty is death. Everyone knows this, though not everyone knows what comes next. The rich shall die just as the poor. Some will die young, other will die in old age. Some will die alone, others will die amongst family and friends. Some will be martyred or murdered, others will die in accidents. Some will die when God wants them to die, others will commit suicide. Some will die quickly, others slowly. Some will die loved, other will die hated. Some will die healthy, others will die sick. Some will die with the Faith, others will be die without the Faith. Some of those with the Faith will die in a state of grace, others will die in a state of mortal sin. All of these variables are unknown to us—but what IS KNOWN is that WE WILL DIE! We will die just as Our Lord died and Our Lady died. Death is not the question—it will certainly come—the question is what will happen to us after death? Will we go to Heaven, to Purgatory, or to Hell?
St. Philip Neri wrote: “Beginners in religion ought to exercise themselves principally in meditation on the Four Last Things.” Traditionally, the sermons preached on the four Sundays of Advent were on the Four Last Things. The Church always taught that man should be prepared for the Novissima, the Four Last Things. It is what we pray in the Hail Mary: “Pray for us now and at the hour of our death.” It is a wise prayer, because Scriptures makes us this great promise: “In all thy works, remember thy last end, and thou shalt never sin eternally” (Ecclesiasticus 7:40). That is to say, one who meditates on the Novissima will not go to Hell. It is quite a promise, and it is why the pastors of the Church have always preached on the Novissima, the Four Last Things. In the Age of Faith, consideration of the Novissima became a branch of learning, eschatology.
You may wonder what is the meaning of the sinister or mysterious sounding word “eschatology” (pronounced eska-tology). The word “eschatology” is derived from the Greek words “eschaton,” meaning “last,” and “logos” meaning “word” or “words”—thus “eschatology” means “words about the last times or end times” and refers in particular to the study of the end of our lives and the end of the world. Today students have chemistry, biology, social sciences. But there isn’t much attention paid to the eschatology, the study of the Last Things.
The Time Draws Ever Nearer!
We now enter the last week of the Church’s liturgical year, before we recommence, once again, with the season of Advent. It is time to cast a glance on the previous year to see and take stock of our spiritual lives. Have we made progress? Have we gone backwards? Are we stagnating with no apparent gains or losses? Each passing day and year is a day and year nearer to our own personal “end of time”!
God has given us time for a purpose—how have we used it? What words are more applicable to us—“God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23), or “Well done, good and faithful servant, because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord” (Matthew 25:21).
Use or Abuse of Time
We all know that famous passage from the Book of Ecclesiasticus: “All things have their season, and in their times all things pass under Heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal. A time to destroy, and a time to build. A time to weep, and a time to laugh. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather. A time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces. A time to get, and a time to lose. A time to keep, and a time to cast away. A time to rend, and a time to sew. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-7).
The Thread Through Time
Yet throughout all these differing times and fortunes of time, there has to be a unifying thread that weaves it way through all these things—that thread has to be God. St. Paul says: “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31). Which is nothing else than putting into practice the command of Our Lord: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). Such is the purpose of time and if there is time not spent loving God, it is time forever lost!
The Present Moment
The author of The Soul of Apostolate, Dom Chautard, stresses the importance of “the present moment” which will never come back again. If we do not profit from “the present moment” we have lost the profit that it presented to us. In essence, this means seeing every moment of our lives as a moment of grace—which will be given to those who use “the present moment” well; and will be refused to those who fail to use the “the present moment” well. As he himself writes: “O my soul, at every instant Jesus presents Himself to you by the GRACE OF THE PRESENT MOMENT — every time there is a prayer to say, a Mass to celebrate or to hear, reading to be done, or acts of patience, of zeal, of renunciation, of struggle, confidence, or love to be produced. Would you dare look the other way, or try to avoid His gaze?”
Cardinal Mermillod, in his Preface to Dom Chautrad’s book, writes: “If there is one concept that is capable of summing up Dom Chautard’s spirituality, it is one which is sometimes seen written, most appropriately, over the doors of Cistercian monasteries: “GOD ALONE.” Not contemplation, not action, not works, not rest, not this or that particular thing, but God in everything, God in anything, God in His will, God in other men, God present in his own soul. To do whatever God willed, to suffer whatever He willed, that was enough for Dom Chautard, because all he asked was the opportunity to give himself, to give his will, utterly, without recall, to the infinite Wisdom and Love Who created and redeemed us all. It is the spirit of St. Bernard, and the spirit of the White Monks. It is the spirit of Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (Preface by Cardinal Mermillod, The Soul of the Apostolate, by Dom Chautard).
Wasted Moments
Alas, for some, it is not God but self that is the thread that weaves through everything—more or less everything is done for self, even spiritual things. Yet even worse is the thread of pleasure, entertainment and amusement, over which Our Lady laments: “People will think of nothing but amusement … [Even priests] will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain” (La Salette).
Some Have Much Time, Others Less Time
We do not know how much time God will give us! Some receive more, others less. The good die young and the bad die young. The good live to a ripe old age and so do the bad! Adam lived to the ripe old age of 930 years! Our Lord died aged around 33 years. Our Lady is said to have died in her early to mid-sixties. St. Dominic Savio died aged 14 years. St. Maria Goretti was 11 years old when she was killed. Little Blessed Francisco of Fatima was only 10 years old when he died; Blessed Jacinta, his sister was only 9 years old. The Venerable Anne de Guigné was 10 years old. “And he knoweth not what time shall pass, and that death approacheth, and that he must leave all to others, and shall die” (Ecclesiasticus 11:20).
Time Waits For Nobody
“Our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no going back of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returneth” (Wisdom 2:5). Time waits for nobody. Time is precious. Time means more than money. Time and how it is spent, means the difference between Heaven and Hell. Death is the most untimely thing around. Death respects no one. Even in the forthcoming chastisement of which Our Lady has warned us, time and time again, she says that the good will die with the bad; and neither will priests be spared, but they will die with the laity. That is why our time is so precious.
Time Means Money—Time Means Souls
The worldly have a saying about time: “Time means money!” ―meaning that wasted time means money lost. The same idea was expressed by Our Lord to one of His mystics, when He said: “Do not lose time! Every act of love means a soul!” (Our Lord to Sr. Consolata Betrone, Words of Love, Fr. Gottemuller). St. John Bosco had a somewhat similar attitude. When St. Dominic Savio entered the office of St. John Bosco, he saw a sign on the wall that said: “Da mihi animas, cetera tolle!” which means: “Give me souls, keep the rest!”
We have heard of the expression: “My time is not my own!” as applicable at work, when we have to our employer’s will and not just do what we want. The same is true of life—it is not our time, but time given to us by God. “Man born of a woman, living for a short time, is filled with many miseries … [and there are some] who were taken away before their time” (Job 14:1; 22:16). “Therefore I say, brethren; the time is short; it remaineth, that they also who have wives, be as if they had none; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as if they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use this world, as if they used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away” (1 Corinthians 7:29-31).
Heaven Deals in Souls, Not Money
Our Lord did not come on Earth to seek money, wealth and riches—He came to seek souls: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). The Pharisees, just like us, praised the good and detested sinners—Our Lord loved sinners but detested their sins. He came to call them to conversion, penance and a change of life: “Go then and learn what this meaneth: ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). “Jesus said to them: ‘They that are well have no need of a physician, but they that are sick. For I came not to call the just, but sinners!’” (Mark 2:17). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance!” (Luke 5:32). “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). And to those who listen to Him and convert, He further says: “Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:11). “Behold thou art made whole: sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14).
Our Lord comes for souls and He deals in souls, as St. James points out: “He must know that he who causeth a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, shall save his soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20). Souls are pricey and expensive—St. Thomas Aquinas says that one single soul in a state of sanctifying grace is worth more than all the treasures of universe.
No wonder, then, that Our Lady comes to Fatima asking that we pray and make sacrifices for the conversion of sinners so that they return to, or find for the first time, that precious state of sanctifying grace. God loves sinners and came to work for their salvation—we must do likewise. God, nevertheless, hates sin—we must do likewise. “He that loveth iniquity hateth his own soul” (Psalm 10:6).
Time For A Change!
We need to change! Everybody—without exception. Who can say: “I am as holy as I should be! I have no need of progress because I have reached perfection!” For St. John says: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). If we have sins, we are not perfect; and if we are not perfect, we shall not enter Heaven, but Purgatory at best! Perfection is obligatory: “Thou shalt be perfect, and without spot before the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). Our Lord also commands perfection: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect!” (Matthew 5:48). St. Paul also requires “that the man of God may be perfect” (2 Timothy 3:17).
Change Later or Change Now?
“There is no time like the present!” as the saying goes. For “His wrath shall be kindled in a short time” (Psalm 2:13), as Our Lady warned at La Salette: “If my people do not wish to submit [change] themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it!” Therefore, I need to change now, not later, “Lest at any time he [the devil] seize upon my soul like a lion, while there is no one to redeem me, nor to save” (Psalm 7:3), “because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8).
Wasting Time
As the saying goes: “Do what you have to do today, for tomorrow may never come!” Holy Scripture, along the same lines, says: “And he knoweth not what time shall pass, and that death approacheth, and that he must leave all to others, and shall die” (Ecclesiasticus 11:20). “Work your work before the time!” (Ecclesiasticus 51:38).
As the Church teaches, right now, while we are alive, it is a time of God’s mercy. Once life ends, it is time for God’s justice. At Bethlehem, Our Lord comes in mercy. At the end of time, He will come in justice. “Bring forth, therefore, fruits worthy of penance!” (Luke 3:8), as Our Lady commanded at Lourdes: “Penance! Penance! Penance!” while at Fatima she demanded prayer and sacrifice; and at Akita she pointed out: “Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger.”
So we must “do penance: for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2). The “end is nigh” ―as the proverbial guy with his sandwich board placard says pacing along the sidewalk. Waste not your time like the Israelites with their golden calf, who only thought of food and fun. St. Paul warns us of this: “Neither become ye idolaters, as some of them, as it is written: ‘The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play’” (1 Corinthians 10:7). As Our Lady lamented at La Salette: “The people will think of nothing but amusements!”—are we among those people?
Now is the Acceptable Time!
St. Paul writes and the Church echoes this at times of penance (Lent): “For God saith: ‘In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). “There is no time like the present!” Let us not “waste our time” on the things of the world (which often only serve as to lead us into sin or indifference to God). Let us let “time run away from us” while we vainly and selfishly “have the time of our life”!
On the contrary, let us “spend our time well” in the spirit of Our Lady Good Success’ words at Quito: “Oh, if mortals only understood how to appreciate the time given to them, and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!”
“For our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no going back of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returneth” (Wisdom 2:5). “The time of our life is short and tedious, and in the end of a man there is no remedy [all must die], and no man hath been known to have returned from Hell” (Wisdom 2:1). “Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth, before the time of affliction come” (Ecclesiastes 12:1). “Be not overmuch wicked: and be not foolish, lest thou die before thy time” (Ecclesiastes 7:18). “For His wrath shall come on a sudden, and in the time of vengeance He will destroy thee!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:9).
As Our Lady herself says: “Do not offend the Lord our God anymore, because He is already so much offended” (Fatima) … “Many men in this world afflict the Lord … In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind … As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” (Akita).
Time Waits For No One
Time waits for no one. Each moment in time is time we cannot waste, but from which we must draw great profit. God gives us the "the grace of the present moment" as Dom Chautard writes in his book, The Soul of the Apostolate. God, especially today, through Our Lady, says to us: “Behold I come against thee, O proud one, saith the Lord the God of hosts: for thy day is come, the time of thy visitation” (Jeremias 50:31).
Do We Know the Time of Our Visitation?
Let it not be said of us, as Our Lord said of Jerusalem in His own day, when they rejected Him and His teaching: “And when He drew near, seeing the city, He wept over it, saying: ‘If thou also hadst known, and that in this thy day, the things that are to thy peace; but now they are hidden from thy eyes. For the days shall come upon thee, and thy enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and straiten thee on every side, and beat thee flat to the ground, and thy children who are in thee: and they shall not leave in thee a stone upon a stone: because thou hast not known the time of thy visitation!’” (Luke 19:41-44).
Therefore, “Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). Will we “pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) and “Bring forth fruits worthy of penance!” (Luke 3:8)? Or will we “think of nothing but amusements” and “sit down to eat and drink and rise up to play”? The rewards are great! The punishments are great! It’s our life, our choice, our fate!
Article 23
Saturday November 25th, 2023
The End is Nigh!
Saturday November 25th, 2023
The End is Nigh!
Can’t Wait for the End!
Tomorrow is the end of the Liturgical Year―which is meant to symbolize and remind us of the end of the world. Sometimes we look forward to the end of a thing; at other times we dread the end of a thing. We may desire that something we hate, ends quickly. We may want something that we love, to never end. If we are having a wonderful time, we don’t want the day to end. However, if we are having a miserable day, then we can’t wait for it to end.
The same applies to life on Earth and life in Heaven. There are some people for whom the end of this earthly life cannot come too quickly. Yet there are others who dread the moment this earthly life must come to an end. The fact is we were made to die and from the very moment of our birth, we are in the process of working towards the end of our life—which in reality in our birthday, for we are born into eternity. But which eternity? Eternal joys or eternal pains and sorrows?
St. Thomas Aquinas tells us to look to the end in all things. The Imitation of Christ echoes that: “Very soon your life here will end; consider, then, what may be in store for you elsewhere. Today we live; tomorrow we die and are quickly forgotten. Oh, the dullness and hardness of a heart which looks only to the present instead of preparing for that which is to come” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 23).
The fact that we are almost at the end of the month of the Holy Souls, doubly reminds us of the end of our own lives, combining the ideas of death with those of the end of the world. The Gospels of the Last Sunday of the liturgical year, together with the Gospel of the First Sunday of the liturgical year, both paint the terrible picture of the events that will occur at the so-called “End-Times” or “Last Days.”
Time of Mercy before the Time of Justice
The difference, in mind of the Church, being that on the First Sunday of Advent we are reminded of the End-Times and are told, that for a while, we can profit from God’s mercy; but on the Last Sunday of the liturgical year we are reminded of God’s imminent justice. This is very similar to Our Lady’s apparitions warning us of the future chastisements. Her apparitions are much like Our Lord’s coming at Christmas, for Our Lady gives us a time of mercy in which could avert the calamities to come by much prayer and penance—which earns mercy. However, if we fail to make use of that time wisely, then comes the justice: “The evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government — [you] will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects … The precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of customs. During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … Many will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings” (Our Lady of Good Success & Our Lady of La Salette).
Yet this very justice will be a mercy, for, as we have seen, the torments of Purgatory are far, far, greater than whatever it is that we will have to experience. We should gratefully remember that when God decides to open the faucets of His justice and allows it to flow. We will be washed from our iniquities in that flow of justice, which, as Our Lady prophesies, will spare neither believers or unbelievers, neither good nor bad, neither priest nor laity. In all things look to the end: “Lift up your eyes to Heaven, and look down to the Earth beneath: for the heavens shall vanish like smoke, and the Earth shall be worn away like a garment, and the inhabitants thereof shall perish in like manner: but my salvation shall be forever, and My justice shall not fail” (Isaias 51:6).
End-Times come with Death
With all this talk about the End-Times, we may lose sight of the fact that our “End-Times” may come sooner than we think—meaning that death may end our life at a time that we did not expect. “For yourselves know perfectly, that the day of the Lord shall so come, as a thief in the night” (1 Thessalonians 5:2). Too many live, laugh, play, store up goods like there was no death and no accountability—but Our Lord has said that we shall be judged for every idle word we have ever spoken! “But I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the day of judgment” (Matthew 12:36).
Wise Counsel for the Future Concerning the Past
Thus, the Imitation of Christ counsels us:
“In all things consider the end; how you shall stand before the strict Judge from Whom nothing is hidden and Who will pronounce judgment in all justice, accepting neither bribes nor excuses. And you, miserable and wretched sinner, who fear even the countenance of an angry man, what answer will you make to the God Who knows all your sins? Why do you not provide for yourself against the Day of Judgment when no man can be excused or defended by another because each will have enough to do to answer for himself? In this life your work is profitable, your tears acceptable, your sighs audible, your sorrow satisfying and purifying.
“The patient man goes through a great and salutary purgatory when he grieves more over the malice of one who harms him than for his own injury; when he prays readily for his enemies and forgives offenses from his heart; when he does not hesitate to ask pardon of others; when he is more easily moved to pity than to anger; when he does frequent violence to himself and tries to bring the body into complete subjection to the spirit.
“It is better to atone for sin now and to cut away vices than to keep them for purgation in the hereafter. In truth, we deceive ourselves by our ill-advised love of the flesh. What will that fire feed upon but our sins? The more we spare ourselves now and the more we satisfy the flesh, the harder will the reckoning be and the more we keep for the burning.
“For a man will be more grievously punished in the things in which he has sinned. There the lazy will be driven with burning prongs, and gluttons tormented with unspeakable hunger and thirst; the wanton and lust-loving will be bathed in burning pitch and foul brimstone; the envious will howl in their grief like mad dogs.
“Every vice will have its own proper punishment. The proud will be faced with every confusion and the avaricious pinched with the most abject want. One hour of suffering there will be more bitter than a hundred years of the most severe penance here. In this life men sometimes rest from work and enjoy the comfort of friends, but the damned have no rest or consolation.
“You must, therefore, take care and repent of your sins now so that on the Day of Judgment you may rest secure with the blessed. For on that day the just will stand firm against those who tortured and oppressed them, and he who now submits humbly to the judgment of men will arise to pass judgment upon them. The poor and humble will have great confidence, while the proud will be struck with fear. He who learned to be a fool in this world and to be scorned for Christ will then appear to have been wise.
“In that day every trial borne in patience will be pleasing and the voice of iniquity will be stilled; the devout will be glad; the irreligious will mourn; and the mortified body will rejoice far more than if it had been pampered with every pleasure. Then the cheap garment will shine with splendor and the rich one become faded and worn; the poor cottage will be more praised than the gilded palace. In that day persevering patience will count more than all the power in this world; simple obedience will be exalted above all worldly cleverness; a good and clean conscience will gladden the heart of man far more than the philosophy of the learned; and contempt for riches will be of more weight than every treasure on Earth.
“Then you will find more consolation in having prayed devoutly than in having fared daintily; you will be happy that you preferred silence to prolonged gossip. Then holy works will be of greater value than many fair words; strictness of life and hard penances will be more pleasing than all earthly delights.
“Learn, then, to suffer little things now that you may not have to suffer greater ones in eternity. Prove here what you can bear hereafter. If you can suffer only a little now, how will you be able to endure eternal torment? If a little suffering makes you impatient now, what will hell fire do? In truth, you cannot have two joys: you cannot taste the pleasures of this world and afterward reign with Christ.
“If your life to this moment had been full of honors and pleasures, what good would it do if at this instant you should die? All is vanity, therefore, except to love God and to serve Him alone. He who loves God with all his heart does not fear death or punishment or judgment or hell, because perfect love assures access to God. It is no wonder that he who still delights in sin fears death and judgment. It is good, however, that even if love does not as yet restrain you from evil, at least the fear of Hell does. The man who casts aside the fear of God cannot continue long in goodness but will quickly fall into the snares of the devil” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 24).
Waste Not, Want Not
If we do not waste our time, in the limited time we all have left (nobody lives forever), then we will not lacking in the mercy of God. However, if we foolishly waste our time, then death may overtake us before we have sufficiently paid the debt of our many sins. “Be not overmuch wicked: and be not foolish, lest thou die before thy time” (Ecclesiastes 7:18). “Thou hast shortened the days of his time: Thou hast covered him with confusion” (Psalms 88:46). “And he knoweth not what time shall pass, and that death approacheth, and that he must leave all to others, and shall die” (Ecclesiasticus 11:20). “Take ye heed, watch and pray. For ye know not when the time is” (Mark 13:33). “Therefore I say, brethren; the time is short” (1 Corinthians 7:29). “Work your work before the time, and He will give you your reward in His time” (Ecclesiasticus 51:38). “God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). “The time is accomplished, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent” (Mark 1:15).
Don’t Imagine the Unlikely
You may think that after your death people will pray for you, offer many Masses for you and thus quickly deliver you from your purgatorial torments—but how many people truly and EFFECTIVELY pray for their nearest and dearest? Very, very few! And of those who do pray, HOW MUCH do they pray? People spend centuries in Purgatory! Once your children have died, who will pray EFFECTIVELY and MUCH for your soul? “Our name in time shall be forgotten, and no man shall have any remembrance of our works. For our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no going back of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returneth” (Wisdom 2:4-5). O if we only had family members who resembled those of the Queen of Austria!
It is related in the Life of Queen Margaret of Austria, the wife of Philip III, that in one single day, which was that of her burial, there was celebrated in the city of Madrid nearly eleven hundred Masses for the repose of her soul. This princess had asked for one thousand Masses in her last will; the King caused twenty thousand to be added to it. When the Archduke Albert died at Brussels, the pious Isabella, his widow, had forty thousand Masses offered for the repose of his soul, and for an entire month she herself assisted with the greatest piety at ten each day. (Father Mumford, Charité envers les Defuncts–Charity Towards the Deceased).
“He gave him the number of his days and time” (Ecclesiasticus 17:3). “Work your work before the time, and He will give you your reward in His time” (Ecclesiasticus 51:38). “The mercy of God is beautiful in the time of affliction, as a cloud of rain in the time of drought” (Ecclesiasticus 35:26).
Tomorrow is the end of the Liturgical Year―which is meant to symbolize and remind us of the end of the world. Sometimes we look forward to the end of a thing; at other times we dread the end of a thing. We may desire that something we hate, ends quickly. We may want something that we love, to never end. If we are having a wonderful time, we don’t want the day to end. However, if we are having a miserable day, then we can’t wait for it to end.
The same applies to life on Earth and life in Heaven. There are some people for whom the end of this earthly life cannot come too quickly. Yet there are others who dread the moment this earthly life must come to an end. The fact is we were made to die and from the very moment of our birth, we are in the process of working towards the end of our life—which in reality in our birthday, for we are born into eternity. But which eternity? Eternal joys or eternal pains and sorrows?
St. Thomas Aquinas tells us to look to the end in all things. The Imitation of Christ echoes that: “Very soon your life here will end; consider, then, what may be in store for you elsewhere. Today we live; tomorrow we die and are quickly forgotten. Oh, the dullness and hardness of a heart which looks only to the present instead of preparing for that which is to come” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 23).
The fact that we are almost at the end of the month of the Holy Souls, doubly reminds us of the end of our own lives, combining the ideas of death with those of the end of the world. The Gospels of the Last Sunday of the liturgical year, together with the Gospel of the First Sunday of the liturgical year, both paint the terrible picture of the events that will occur at the so-called “End-Times” or “Last Days.”
Time of Mercy before the Time of Justice
The difference, in mind of the Church, being that on the First Sunday of Advent we are reminded of the End-Times and are told, that for a while, we can profit from God’s mercy; but on the Last Sunday of the liturgical year we are reminded of God’s imminent justice. This is very similar to Our Lady’s apparitions warning us of the future chastisements. Her apparitions are much like Our Lord’s coming at Christmas, for Our Lady gives us a time of mercy in which could avert the calamities to come by much prayer and penance—which earns mercy. However, if we fail to make use of that time wisely, then comes the justice: “The evil sect of Masonry will take control of the civil government — [you] will see a cruel persecution of all religious communities … Satan will reign almost completely by means of the Masonic sects … The precious light of Faith will be extinguished in souls by the almost total corruption of customs. During this period, there will be great physical and moral calamities, both public and private … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together … Many will succumb to death from the violence of their sufferings” (Our Lady of Good Success & Our Lady of La Salette).
Yet this very justice will be a mercy, for, as we have seen, the torments of Purgatory are far, far, greater than whatever it is that we will have to experience. We should gratefully remember that when God decides to open the faucets of His justice and allows it to flow. We will be washed from our iniquities in that flow of justice, which, as Our Lady prophesies, will spare neither believers or unbelievers, neither good nor bad, neither priest nor laity. In all things look to the end: “Lift up your eyes to Heaven, and look down to the Earth beneath: for the heavens shall vanish like smoke, and the Earth shall be worn away like a garment, and the inhabitants thereof shall perish in like manner: but my salvation shall be forever, and My justice shall not fail” (Isaias 51:6).
End-Times come with Death
With all this talk about the End-Times, we may lose sight of the fact that our “End-Times” may come sooner than we think—meaning that death may end our life at a time that we did not expect. “For yourselves know perfectly, that the day of the Lord shall so come, as a thief in the night” (1 Thessalonians 5:2). Too many live, laugh, play, store up goods like there was no death and no accountability—but Our Lord has said that we shall be judged for every idle word we have ever spoken! “But I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the day of judgment” (Matthew 12:36).
Wise Counsel for the Future Concerning the Past
Thus, the Imitation of Christ counsels us:
“In all things consider the end; how you shall stand before the strict Judge from Whom nothing is hidden and Who will pronounce judgment in all justice, accepting neither bribes nor excuses. And you, miserable and wretched sinner, who fear even the countenance of an angry man, what answer will you make to the God Who knows all your sins? Why do you not provide for yourself against the Day of Judgment when no man can be excused or defended by another because each will have enough to do to answer for himself? In this life your work is profitable, your tears acceptable, your sighs audible, your sorrow satisfying and purifying.
“The patient man goes through a great and salutary purgatory when he grieves more over the malice of one who harms him than for his own injury; when he prays readily for his enemies and forgives offenses from his heart; when he does not hesitate to ask pardon of others; when he is more easily moved to pity than to anger; when he does frequent violence to himself and tries to bring the body into complete subjection to the spirit.
“It is better to atone for sin now and to cut away vices than to keep them for purgation in the hereafter. In truth, we deceive ourselves by our ill-advised love of the flesh. What will that fire feed upon but our sins? The more we spare ourselves now and the more we satisfy the flesh, the harder will the reckoning be and the more we keep for the burning.
“For a man will be more grievously punished in the things in which he has sinned. There the lazy will be driven with burning prongs, and gluttons tormented with unspeakable hunger and thirst; the wanton and lust-loving will be bathed in burning pitch and foul brimstone; the envious will howl in their grief like mad dogs.
“Every vice will have its own proper punishment. The proud will be faced with every confusion and the avaricious pinched with the most abject want. One hour of suffering there will be more bitter than a hundred years of the most severe penance here. In this life men sometimes rest from work and enjoy the comfort of friends, but the damned have no rest or consolation.
“You must, therefore, take care and repent of your sins now so that on the Day of Judgment you may rest secure with the blessed. For on that day the just will stand firm against those who tortured and oppressed them, and he who now submits humbly to the judgment of men will arise to pass judgment upon them. The poor and humble will have great confidence, while the proud will be struck with fear. He who learned to be a fool in this world and to be scorned for Christ will then appear to have been wise.
“In that day every trial borne in patience will be pleasing and the voice of iniquity will be stilled; the devout will be glad; the irreligious will mourn; and the mortified body will rejoice far more than if it had been pampered with every pleasure. Then the cheap garment will shine with splendor and the rich one become faded and worn; the poor cottage will be more praised than the gilded palace. In that day persevering patience will count more than all the power in this world; simple obedience will be exalted above all worldly cleverness; a good and clean conscience will gladden the heart of man far more than the philosophy of the learned; and contempt for riches will be of more weight than every treasure on Earth.
“Then you will find more consolation in having prayed devoutly than in having fared daintily; you will be happy that you preferred silence to prolonged gossip. Then holy works will be of greater value than many fair words; strictness of life and hard penances will be more pleasing than all earthly delights.
“Learn, then, to suffer little things now that you may not have to suffer greater ones in eternity. Prove here what you can bear hereafter. If you can suffer only a little now, how will you be able to endure eternal torment? If a little suffering makes you impatient now, what will hell fire do? In truth, you cannot have two joys: you cannot taste the pleasures of this world and afterward reign with Christ.
“If your life to this moment had been full of honors and pleasures, what good would it do if at this instant you should die? All is vanity, therefore, except to love God and to serve Him alone. He who loves God with all his heart does not fear death or punishment or judgment or hell, because perfect love assures access to God. It is no wonder that he who still delights in sin fears death and judgment. It is good, however, that even if love does not as yet restrain you from evil, at least the fear of Hell does. The man who casts aside the fear of God cannot continue long in goodness but will quickly fall into the snares of the devil” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 24).
Waste Not, Want Not
If we do not waste our time, in the limited time we all have left (nobody lives forever), then we will not lacking in the mercy of God. However, if we foolishly waste our time, then death may overtake us before we have sufficiently paid the debt of our many sins. “Be not overmuch wicked: and be not foolish, lest thou die before thy time” (Ecclesiastes 7:18). “Thou hast shortened the days of his time: Thou hast covered him with confusion” (Psalms 88:46). “And he knoweth not what time shall pass, and that death approacheth, and that he must leave all to others, and shall die” (Ecclesiasticus 11:20). “Take ye heed, watch and pray. For ye know not when the time is” (Mark 13:33). “Therefore I say, brethren; the time is short” (1 Corinthians 7:29). “Work your work before the time, and He will give you your reward in His time” (Ecclesiasticus 51:38). “God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). “The time is accomplished, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent” (Mark 1:15).
Don’t Imagine the Unlikely
You may think that after your death people will pray for you, offer many Masses for you and thus quickly deliver you from your purgatorial torments—but how many people truly and EFFECTIVELY pray for their nearest and dearest? Very, very few! And of those who do pray, HOW MUCH do they pray? People spend centuries in Purgatory! Once your children have died, who will pray EFFECTIVELY and MUCH for your soul? “Our name in time shall be forgotten, and no man shall have any remembrance of our works. For our time is as the passing of a shadow, and there is no going back of our end: for it is fast sealed, and no man returneth” (Wisdom 2:4-5). O if we only had family members who resembled those of the Queen of Austria!
It is related in the Life of Queen Margaret of Austria, the wife of Philip III, that in one single day, which was that of her burial, there was celebrated in the city of Madrid nearly eleven hundred Masses for the repose of her soul. This princess had asked for one thousand Masses in her last will; the King caused twenty thousand to be added to it. When the Archduke Albert died at Brussels, the pious Isabella, his widow, had forty thousand Masses offered for the repose of his soul, and for an entire month she herself assisted with the greatest piety at ten each day. (Father Mumford, Charité envers les Defuncts–Charity Towards the Deceased).
“He gave him the number of his days and time” (Ecclesiasticus 17:3). “Work your work before the time, and He will give you your reward in His time” (Ecclesiasticus 51:38). “The mercy of God is beautiful in the time of affliction, as a cloud of rain in the time of drought” (Ecclesiasticus 35:26).
Article 22
Friday November 24th, 2023
The Religion of Black Friday
Friday November 24th, 2023
The Religion of Black Friday
Learning From Mistakes
We all know the expression: "Learn from your mistakes!" From a spiritual viewpoint, "Black Friday"—the day when the Americans spend like on no other day, except the Saturday before Christmas—"Black Friday" is a spiritual mistake. Therefore, there is something to be learned from this mistake.
‘Holy-day’ of Obligation?
Since at least the 1930’s, "Black Friday" it has been regarded as the beginning of the Christmas shopping season in the USA, and most major retailers open very early (and more recently during overnight hours) and offer promotional sales. “Black Friday” is not an official holiday, but California and some other states observe "The Day After Thanksgiving" as a holiday for state government employees, sometimes in lieu of another federal holiday such as Columbus Day. Many non-retail employees and schools have both Thanksgiving and the following Friday off, which, along with the following regular weekend, makes it a four-day weekend, thereby increasing the number of potential shoppers. It has routinely been the busiest shopping day of the year since 2005, although news reports, which at that time were inaccurate, have described it as the busiest shopping day of the year for a much longer period of time.
The earliest evidence of the phrase “Black Friday” applied to the day after Thanksgiving suggests that the term originated in Philadelphia, where it was used to describe the heavy and disruptive pedestrian and vehicle traffic that would occur on the day after Thanksgiving. However, a widespread belief is that the term represents the point in the year when retailers begin to turn a profit for the year, thus going from being "in the red" to being "in the black". Both theories have logic behind them.
The Black Friday ‘Vigil’
For many years, it was common for temples (stores) to open at 6:00 a.m. on “Black Friday”, but in the late 2000’s many had crept to 5:00 a.m., or even 4:00 a.m. This was taken to a new extreme in 2011, when several retailers (including Target, Kohl’s, Macy’s, Best Buy, and Bealls) opened at midnight for the first time. In 2012, Walmart and several other retailers, announced that they would open most of their stores at 8:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day, prompting calls for a walkout among some workers. In 2014 temples (stores) such as JC Penney, Best Buy, and Radio Shack opened at 5:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day, while stores such as Target, Walmart, Belk, and Sears, opened at 6:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day.
The Secular “Holy Week” or “Triduum” or “Passiontide”
This long, four-day weekend, including Thanksgiving Day, Black Friday, Saturday and Sunday, could be said to be a parody of the Sacred Triduum of Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday. The difference being that these spiritual Holy Days seek to lead souls to Heaven, whereas these secular holidays increase our Purgatory, or, worse still, lead souls to Hell.
If only our religious fervor could match the secular fever for this ‘holy’ day of filthy lucre! Hours upon hours are spent in meditating what to buy. All-night vigils are held by some of the most fervent materialists, as they camp-out, even in the colder parts of the country, outside the temples (stores) of their choice—just so that they can be first and not the last into the temple. Their gods, that line the shelves, must not be missed! “Many are called, but few are chosen” to be the lucky ones who actually get their hands on the god of their choice—for there are not enough gods to go around. This is another version, I guess, of “American Idol”!
‘Religious’ Zeal for Stuff
People will read and meditate for days in advance, seeking-out the temples (stores) that will give them the greatest graces! They will go on pilgrimage from one store to another, hoping to receive some kind of treasure or reward that will make them happy. Long hours of pilgrimage matter little in their pursuit of happiness! They gladly sacrifice the busy traffic or even jammed highways as a welcome penance in order to possess the gods of their choosing. They pray fervently that somebody else does not beat them to it—calling to mind St. Paul’s words: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain!” (1 Corinthians 9:24). Oh what extraordinary examples of perfect perseverance, high hopes, fiery fervor, selfless sacrifice and prodigious pursuit are shown to us by these secular ‘saints’ of shopping! Our Lord had a point, when He said: “The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light!” (Luke 16:8).
The Fighting Spirit!
They must have read St. Paul’s exhortation, before setting out on their ‘crusade’ for stuff: “Fight the good fight of Faith: lay hold on eternal life” (1 Timothy 6:12)—except for them, it is: “Fight the good fight on Friday: lay hold of the goods for dear life!” It is a case of every man for himself as the gladiators of shopping enter the coliseum, amphitheater or arena of the mall.
Already on Thanksgiving evening—as the Black Friday sales began early—fights and scuffles broke out around the country! Call it Black-eye Friday. In Kentucky, Texas and Louisiana, tempers flared among shoppers as law enforcement agencies struggled to keep control. At a Louisville mall on Thanksgiving night, shoppers wrestled each other to the ground in a packed food court, slapping, punching and tearing at each other’s shirts. In addition, a fight video circulated on social media early Friday showing a scuffle between a group of men at a mall in Florence, Kentucky. While in El Paso, Texas, a man can be seen swinging wildly at a police officer during an ugly brawl at Walmart caught on video.
Reliving the Passion?
I guess they want a real live re-enactment of Our Lord’s Passion and Death—which also broke out on Thursday evening and spilled-over into Good Friday! Wishful thinking, though! These incidents are not reparation for sin, but an addition to the sins that Our Lord died for. “Black Friday” is the “Thou Shalt Covet” day of the secular world. Get more, pay less, enjoy the ‘happiness’!
Deaths are, nevertheless, few and far between—just like the numbers of souls who are prepared to perfectly die to themselves in order to get to Heaven. Don’t follow the crowds if you want to go to Heaven! As Our Lord pointed-out: “A certain man said to Him: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ’Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14).
Single-Minded Zeal
Big crowds, drawn to “Black Friday”, have drawn scrutiny for unruly behavior, especially after the 2008 death of a Walmart worker in Long Island, who, after opening the doors to the store on “Black Friday”, was knocked over and trampled to death by inrushing crowd.
The same zeal that these secular ‘saints’ of shopping show for getting into the store and malls, is also shown by many in getting-out of church once Mass is finished! Perhaps that is part of their year-long-training schedule. Their weekly Sunday post-Mass rush, from chapel to cafeteria for coffee and donuts, is nothing else than training for their rush to get their gods on "Black Friday"! Perhaps a study could be made to see if church-goers are among those who are first to the bargains on "Black Friday"!
Comfort Consumers
Very few fight their way through Black Friday—rather than being “Friday Fighters”, most shoppers are “Comfort Consumers”. Those who abhor violence, can always “sin in comfort” by buying and buying all that they can afford and can get their hands on—though be warned: too much competitiveness in getting your hands on the goodies could also lead to a tussle, then a brawl and a fight!
Comparisons
► The days are the same day: Holy Thursday and Good Friday / Thanksgiving Thursday and Black Friday.
► Holy Thursday is centered around the Last Supper; Thanksgiving in centered around the Thanksgiving meal.
► Good Friday and Black Friday are all about the world and materialism: Our Lord detaches Himself from the world and material things and dies to save souls; Black Friday is all about attaching oneself to materialism in order to save something too—money!
► Good Friday is frugal in its ceremony (the bare bones) and has somber black vestments; whereas Black Friday is all about opulence with its colorful glitz and glamor.
► The message of Good Friday is one of dying to this world—as Our Lord said: “I am not of this world!" (John 8:23). Whereas the message of Black Friday is one of living for the world and grabbing all one can of this world.
► Good Friday is a day of obligatory fasting; while Black Friday for many is almost a day of compulsory spending and indulging. It is common for prospective shoppers to camp out over the Thanksgiving holiday, even in cold freezing temperatures, in an effort to secure a place in front of the line and thus a better chance at getting desired items.
► Just as the Faith spread throughout the world, so too is Black Friday spreading throughout the world since really “taking-off” in the USA. Canada has started the Black Friday practice. Black Friday was the inspiration for the Mexican government and retailing industry to create an annual weekend of discounts and extended credit terms, El Buen Fin, meaning "the good weekend" in Spanish. Black Friday is also celebrated in the United Kingdom by major online retailers, and in 2014, more UK-based retailers have adopted the Black Friday marketing scheme than ever. In Panama Black Friday was first celebrated in 2012, as a move from the Government to attract local tourism to the countries capital city. In recent years, Black Friday has been promoted in Australia by online retailers. In 2012, after two years of disappointing results, several department stores in Brazil joined their foreign competitors in a successful Black Friday, which more than doubled the total revenue in comparison to the previous year. In Germany, Austria and Switzerland, Black Friday Sale is a joint sales initiative by hundreds of online vendors.
The Violence of Good Friday and Black Friday
We all know, of course, the extreme violence generated against Our Lord on Good Friday by the sinful passions of the Pharisees, Jews and Roman soldiers. Yet we also see those evil passions surge to the fore on Black Friday. Somehow money, things and greed combine to make a toxic poison for basic Christian charity―or even non-Christian charity and civility. In 2006, a man shopping at Best Buy was recorded on video assaulting another shopper in a dispute over an article that each wanted to buy. Unruly Wal-Mart shoppers at a store outside Columbus, Ohio, quickly flooded in the doors at opening, pinning several employees against stacks of merchandise. Nine shoppers in a California mall were injured, including an elderly woman who had to be taken to the hospital, when the crowd rushed to grab gift certificates that had been released from the ceiling. If only people had the same passion for attending Masses, receiving Holy Communion and going to Confession!
In 2008, a crowd of approximately 2,000 shoppers in Valley Stream, New York, waited outside for the 5:00 a.m. opening of the local Wal-Mart. [Wouldn’t it be a pleasant surprise for priests to find similar crowds outside their church on a morning, pining to get in!) As opening time approached, the crowd grew anxious and when the doors were opened the crowd pushed forward, breaking the door down, and trampling a 34-year old employee to death. The shoppers did not appear concerned with the victim's fate, expressing refusal to halt their stampede when other employees attempted to intervene and help the injured employee, complaining that they had been waiting in the cold and were not willing to wait any longer. Shoppers had begun assembling as early as 9:00 p.m. the night before [what a massive mortification for mammon, but for God, no mortification is shown!]. Even when police arrived and attempted to render aid to the injured man, shoppers continued to pour in, shoving and pushing the officers as they made their way into the store. Several other people incurred minor injuries, including a pregnant woman who had to be taken to the hospital. The incident may be the first case of a death occurring during Black Friday sales; according to the National Retail Federation, "We are not aware of any other circumstances where a retail employee has died working on the day after Thanksgiving."
On the same day, two people were fatally shot during an altercation at the Toys “R” Us store in Palm Desert, California.
During Black Friday 2010, a Madison, Wisconsin woman was arrested outside of a Toys “R” Us store after cutting in line, and threatening to shoot other shoppers who tried to object. A Toys for Tots volunteer in Georgia was stabbed by a shoplifter. An Indianapolis woman was arrested after causing a disturbance by arguing with other Wal-Mart shoppers. She had been asked to leave the store, but refused. A man in Buffalo, New York, was trampled when doors opened at a Target store and unruly shoppers rushed in, in an episode reminiscent of the deadly 2008 Wal-Mart stampede.
On Black Friday 2011, a woman at a Porter Ranch, California Wal-Mart used pepper spray on fellow shoppers, causing minor injuries to at least 10 people, who had been waiting hours for the store to open. It was later reported that the incident caused 20 injuries. The incident started as people waited in line for the newly discounted Xbox 360 (a video game console). A witness said a woman with two children in tow became upset with the way people were pushing in line. The witness said she pulled out pepper spray and sprayed the other people in line. Another account stated that the store had brought out a crate of discounted Xbox 360s, and a crowd had formed to wait for the unwrapping, when the woman began spraying people “in order to get an advantage,” according to the police. In an incident outside a Wal-Mart store in San Leandro, California, one man was wounded after being shot following Black Friday shopping at about 1:45 a.m.
On Black Friday 2012, two people were shot outside a Wal-Mart in Tallahassee, Florida during a dispute over a parking space.
On Black Friday in 2013, a person in Las Vegas who was carrying a big-screen TV home from a Target store on Thanksgiving was shot in the leg as he tried to wrestle the item back from a robber who had just stolen it from him at gunpoint. In Romeoville IL, a police officer shot a suspected shoplifter driving a car that was dragging a fellow officer at a Kohl's department store. The suspect and the dragged officer were treated for shoulder injuries. Three people were arrested.
Biggest Violence of All
But the biggest violence of committed on this Black Friday is the violence against the Faith. The whole spirit of Black Friday and what it represents, goes against the spirit of Christ and what He represents. Our Lord came to live in poverty, not in riches. He did not pamper His body by living in luxury, but lived a simple and mortified life: “Jesus saith to him: The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests: but the Son of man hath not where to lay His head” (Matthew 8:20). He explicitly told us: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21). “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God .. Wherefore, Go out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing” (2 Corinthians 6:15-17).
Riches and Wealth Work Against Heaven
We see a clear example of this with the rich young man, who wanted to save his soul, yet also wanted to enjoy his possessions. Our Lord refused this two-facedness. Here is St. Matthew’s account: “And behold one came and said to him: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:16-24).
The Religion of Money and Goods
Many have argued that the new priesthood today consists of scientists, professors, teachers and merchants, and advertisers, who are organized as a part of a new secular tradition—they are a parody or an aping of the Church, with its pope, cardinals, bishops and priests. They deny (or relegate) the existence of the supernatural and ridicule it. For them, what is primary is the material world. The world is their god and their teacher, and they gratefully bow down and worship the world and all that the world can supply by means of material goods and their offshoot, or side-effect—money. These ‘priests’ of the secular religion of materialism, preach throughout their ‘churches’ of schools, colleges; universities, in the media and in the stores. The scientist, or man of natural knowledge, or entrepreneur has become a mini-god, falling into the same trap of Adam of Eve—who wanted to be like unto God. The devil, who in the words of Our Lord, is the prince of this world that they adore, will only too willingly aid and abet them in their folly. As materialists, they see themselves as material producers and consumers of goods, the lifestyle and economics of consumerist capitalism seems natural. Hedonism (the doctrine that pleasure is the highest good) also seems natural, because as a body that has certain needs and wants, what that idiot of a psychologist Freud rightly called modern man ― "desire-producing-machine," whereby life becomes primarily about the fulfillment of the desires of the body―the cult of the body.
Sts. Peter and Paul Prophesied This
“Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God: having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid” (2 Timothy 1-5).
“In the last days there shall come deceitful scoffers, walking after their own lusts, saying:’ Where is His promise or His coming?’ … But of this one thing be not ignorant, my beloved, that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord delayeth not His promise, as some imagine, but dealeth patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance. But the day of the Lord shall come as a thief, in which the heavens shall pass away with great violence, and the elements shall be melted with heat, and the earth and the works which are in it, shall be burnt up” (2 Peter 3:3-10).
Not of the World
Speaking of the devil, Our Lord said: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing” (John 14:30). “And Jesus said to the Jews [today read that as pagan scientists, pagan academics, and the pagan entrepreneurs]: ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!’” (John 8:23). Of His followers, He says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world [Black Friday]” (1 John 2:16). To which St. John adds: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4). This is why we are told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Besotted by the World
Today materialism has reached fever-pitch, even among so-called Catholics—who are really worshipers of mammon. As Our Lady said in her apparitions: “All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds ... The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the earth … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin ... The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … Woe to the Princes of the Church who think only of piling riches upon riches, to protect their authority and dominate with pride ... The priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety in the celebration of the Holy Mysteries, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity” (Our Lady of Good Success & Our Lady of La Salette).
An Insane Thirst and Attachment to the World
After the Last Supper, Our Lord went to the Garden of Gethsemane—after eating their Thanksgiving meal, many go to their Gardens of Getsomeforfree, the stores and shopping malls. Our Lord sweated blood thinking of His future passion and death for our sins—today’s souls sweat worryingly thinking about the deals and goodies that they might miss-out on. Our Lord said to His three Apostles: “Could you not watch one hour with Me?” ― Today we say: “Could you not shop one hour with me?” Our Lord was sold by Judas for thirty pieces of silver—today many sell themselves to the world and mammon, for a few paltry idols on a shelf. Our Lord was arrested, tied-up and taken captive—today many are tied-up and captivated by things of the world that have arrested their attention. On the Cross Our Lord said: “I thirst!”--thirsting for souls. The world thirsts too, but it is not for Christ nor the spiritual, but it is an unquenchable thirst for the things that this world has to offer. Our Lord was nearly stripped of all that He had and was attached to the Cross by nails—yet souls do not want to be divested of their possessions (they want even more of them) and they are so attached to them that we could say that “they are nailed to them.”
“Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4). This is why we are told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Oblivious to the Warnings of Heaven!
All that glitters is not gold! Many possessions do not guarantee salvation—quite the opposite. We recall again the incident of the well-meaning young rich man, who thought he could serve God and mammon:
“And behold one came and said to Jesus: ‘Good master! What good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’
Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’
The young man said to Him: ‘Which?’
And Jesus said: ‘Thou shalt do no murder; thou shalt not commit adultery; thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not bear false witness; honor thy father and thy mother: and, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.’
The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’
Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’
And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions.
Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’
And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’
And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:16-26).
A Few Words from St. Alphonsus Liguori
In one of his sermons, St. Alphonsus deals with the problem of possessions, wealth and worldliness. He first quotes St. Peter: “You were not redeemed with corruptible things, as gold or silver, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb unspotted and undefiled” (1 Peter 1:18-19) and then goes on to say:
“Brethren, remember that, if you save your souls, your failure, in every worldly transaction, will be but of little importance: for, if you are saved, you shall enjoy complete happiness for all eternity. But, if you lose your souls, what will it profit you to have enjoyed all the riches, honors, and amusements of this world? If you lose your souls, all is lost. ‘What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?’ (Matthew 16:26). By this maxim St. Ignatius of Loyola drew many souls to God, and among them the soul of St. Francis Xavier, who was then at Paris, and devoted his attention to the acquirement of worldly goods.
“One day St. Ignatius said to him: ‘Francis, whom do you serve? You serve the world, which is a traitor, that promises, but does not perform! And if it should fulfil all its promises, how long do its goods last? Can they last longer than this life? And, after death, what will they profit you, if you shall not have saved your soul?’ He then reminded Francis of the maxims of the Gospel: ‘What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?” “But one thing is necessary?’ (Luke 10:42).
“It is not necessary, on this Earth, to become rich, or to acquire honors and dignities; but it is necessary to save our souls; because, unless we gain Heaven, we shall be condemned to Hell! There is no middle place! We must be either saved or damned! God has not created us for this Earth; neither does He preserve our lives that we may become rich and enjoy amusements. He has created us, and preserved us, that we may acquire eternal glory.
“St. Philip Neri used to say, that he who does not seek, above all things, the salvation of his soul, is a fool. If on this Earth there were two classes of men, one mortal, and the other immortal, and if the former saw the latter entirely devoted to the acquisition of earthly goods, would they not exclaim: ‘O fools that you are! You have it in your power to secure the immense and eternal goods of Paradise, and you lose your time in procuring the miserable goods of this Earth, which shall end at death. And for these you expose yourselves to the danger of the eternal torments of Hell. Leave to us, for whom all shall end at death, the care of these earthly things. But, brethren, we are all immortal, and each of us shall be eternally happy or eternally miserable in the other life!’
“But the misfortune of the greater part of mankind is, that they are solicitous about the present, and never think of the, future. Oh, if only they knew how to detach themselves from present goods, which last but a short time, and to provide for what must happen after death an eternal reign in Heaven, or everlasting slavery in Hell! ‘The fashion of this world passeth away’ (1 Corinthians 7:31). On this passage, the famous biblical commentator, Cornelius à Lapide , says, that the world is, as it were, a stage. The present life is a comedy, which passes away. Happy the man who acts his part well in this comedy by saving his soul. But if he shall have spent his life in the acquisition of riches and worldly honors, he shall justly be called a fool; and at the hour of death he shall receive the reproach addressed to the rich man in the Gospel: ‘Fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee; and whose shall these things be which thou hast provided?’ (Luke 12:20).
“Poor worldlings! Of all the riches which they acquired, of all the pomps which they displayed in this life, what shall they find at death? ‘They have slept their sleep: and all the men of riches have found nothing in their hands’ (Psalm 75:6). The dream of this present life shall be over at death, and they shall have acquired nothing for eternity. Ask of so many great men of this Earth of the princes and emperors, who, during life, have abounded in riches, honors, and pleasures, and are at this moment in Hell what now remains of all the riches which they possessed in this world? They answer with tears: ‘Nothing, nothing!’ And of so many honors enjoyed of so many past pleasures of so many pomps and triumphs, what now remains? They answer with howling: ‘Nothing, nothing!’
“We must, then, from this day forward, devote all our attention to the salvation of our souls. There is no question, says St. John Chrysostom, of losing some earthly good which we must one day relinquish. But there is question of losing Paradise, and of going to suffer forever in Hell. We must fear and tremble; it is thus we shall be able to secure eternal happiness. “With fear and trembling work out your salvation.” (Philippians 2:12). Hence, if we wish to save our souls, we must labor strenuously to avoid dangerous occasions of sin, to resist temptations, and to frequent the sacraments. Without labor we cannot obtain Heaven. ‘The violent bear it away.’ The saints tremble at the thought of eternity. St. Andrew Avellino exclaimed with tears: Who knows whether I shall be saved or damned? St. Louis Bertrand said with trembling: ‘What shall be my lot in the other world?’ And shall we not tremble? Let us pray to Jesus Christ and his most holy Mother to help us to save our souls. This is for us the most important of all affairs: if we succeed in it, we shall be eternally happy; if we fail, we must be forever miserable.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sunday Sermons).
Let us shop for salvation! That is the only thing worth buying—for it lasts forever!
We all know the expression: "Learn from your mistakes!" From a spiritual viewpoint, "Black Friday"—the day when the Americans spend like on no other day, except the Saturday before Christmas—"Black Friday" is a spiritual mistake. Therefore, there is something to be learned from this mistake.
‘Holy-day’ of Obligation?
Since at least the 1930’s, "Black Friday" it has been regarded as the beginning of the Christmas shopping season in the USA, and most major retailers open very early (and more recently during overnight hours) and offer promotional sales. “Black Friday” is not an official holiday, but California and some other states observe "The Day After Thanksgiving" as a holiday for state government employees, sometimes in lieu of another federal holiday such as Columbus Day. Many non-retail employees and schools have both Thanksgiving and the following Friday off, which, along with the following regular weekend, makes it a four-day weekend, thereby increasing the number of potential shoppers. It has routinely been the busiest shopping day of the year since 2005, although news reports, which at that time were inaccurate, have described it as the busiest shopping day of the year for a much longer period of time.
The earliest evidence of the phrase “Black Friday” applied to the day after Thanksgiving suggests that the term originated in Philadelphia, where it was used to describe the heavy and disruptive pedestrian and vehicle traffic that would occur on the day after Thanksgiving. However, a widespread belief is that the term represents the point in the year when retailers begin to turn a profit for the year, thus going from being "in the red" to being "in the black". Both theories have logic behind them.
The Black Friday ‘Vigil’
For many years, it was common for temples (stores) to open at 6:00 a.m. on “Black Friday”, but in the late 2000’s many had crept to 5:00 a.m., or even 4:00 a.m. This was taken to a new extreme in 2011, when several retailers (including Target, Kohl’s, Macy’s, Best Buy, and Bealls) opened at midnight for the first time. In 2012, Walmart and several other retailers, announced that they would open most of their stores at 8:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day, prompting calls for a walkout among some workers. In 2014 temples (stores) such as JC Penney, Best Buy, and Radio Shack opened at 5:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day, while stores such as Target, Walmart, Belk, and Sears, opened at 6:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day.
The Secular “Holy Week” or “Triduum” or “Passiontide”
This long, four-day weekend, including Thanksgiving Day, Black Friday, Saturday and Sunday, could be said to be a parody of the Sacred Triduum of Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday. The difference being that these spiritual Holy Days seek to lead souls to Heaven, whereas these secular holidays increase our Purgatory, or, worse still, lead souls to Hell.
If only our religious fervor could match the secular fever for this ‘holy’ day of filthy lucre! Hours upon hours are spent in meditating what to buy. All-night vigils are held by some of the most fervent materialists, as they camp-out, even in the colder parts of the country, outside the temples (stores) of their choice—just so that they can be first and not the last into the temple. Their gods, that line the shelves, must not be missed! “Many are called, but few are chosen” to be the lucky ones who actually get their hands on the god of their choice—for there are not enough gods to go around. This is another version, I guess, of “American Idol”!
‘Religious’ Zeal for Stuff
People will read and meditate for days in advance, seeking-out the temples (stores) that will give them the greatest graces! They will go on pilgrimage from one store to another, hoping to receive some kind of treasure or reward that will make them happy. Long hours of pilgrimage matter little in their pursuit of happiness! They gladly sacrifice the busy traffic or even jammed highways as a welcome penance in order to possess the gods of their choosing. They pray fervently that somebody else does not beat them to it—calling to mind St. Paul’s words: “Know you not that they that run in the race, all run indeed, but one receiveth the prize? So run that you may obtain!” (1 Corinthians 9:24). Oh what extraordinary examples of perfect perseverance, high hopes, fiery fervor, selfless sacrifice and prodigious pursuit are shown to us by these secular ‘saints’ of shopping! Our Lord had a point, when He said: “The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light!” (Luke 16:8).
The Fighting Spirit!
They must have read St. Paul’s exhortation, before setting out on their ‘crusade’ for stuff: “Fight the good fight of Faith: lay hold on eternal life” (1 Timothy 6:12)—except for them, it is: “Fight the good fight on Friday: lay hold of the goods for dear life!” It is a case of every man for himself as the gladiators of shopping enter the coliseum, amphitheater or arena of the mall.
Already on Thanksgiving evening—as the Black Friday sales began early—fights and scuffles broke out around the country! Call it Black-eye Friday. In Kentucky, Texas and Louisiana, tempers flared among shoppers as law enforcement agencies struggled to keep control. At a Louisville mall on Thanksgiving night, shoppers wrestled each other to the ground in a packed food court, slapping, punching and tearing at each other’s shirts. In addition, a fight video circulated on social media early Friday showing a scuffle between a group of men at a mall in Florence, Kentucky. While in El Paso, Texas, a man can be seen swinging wildly at a police officer during an ugly brawl at Walmart caught on video.
Reliving the Passion?
I guess they want a real live re-enactment of Our Lord’s Passion and Death—which also broke out on Thursday evening and spilled-over into Good Friday! Wishful thinking, though! These incidents are not reparation for sin, but an addition to the sins that Our Lord died for. “Black Friday” is the “Thou Shalt Covet” day of the secular world. Get more, pay less, enjoy the ‘happiness’!
Deaths are, nevertheless, few and far between—just like the numbers of souls who are prepared to perfectly die to themselves in order to get to Heaven. Don’t follow the crowds if you want to go to Heaven! As Our Lord pointed-out: “A certain man said to Him: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ’Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able. Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14).
Single-Minded Zeal
Big crowds, drawn to “Black Friday”, have drawn scrutiny for unruly behavior, especially after the 2008 death of a Walmart worker in Long Island, who, after opening the doors to the store on “Black Friday”, was knocked over and trampled to death by inrushing crowd.
The same zeal that these secular ‘saints’ of shopping show for getting into the store and malls, is also shown by many in getting-out of church once Mass is finished! Perhaps that is part of their year-long-training schedule. Their weekly Sunday post-Mass rush, from chapel to cafeteria for coffee and donuts, is nothing else than training for their rush to get their gods on "Black Friday"! Perhaps a study could be made to see if church-goers are among those who are first to the bargains on "Black Friday"!
Comfort Consumers
Very few fight their way through Black Friday—rather than being “Friday Fighters”, most shoppers are “Comfort Consumers”. Those who abhor violence, can always “sin in comfort” by buying and buying all that they can afford and can get their hands on—though be warned: too much competitiveness in getting your hands on the goodies could also lead to a tussle, then a brawl and a fight!
Comparisons
► The days are the same day: Holy Thursday and Good Friday / Thanksgiving Thursday and Black Friday.
► Holy Thursday is centered around the Last Supper; Thanksgiving in centered around the Thanksgiving meal.
► Good Friday and Black Friday are all about the world and materialism: Our Lord detaches Himself from the world and material things and dies to save souls; Black Friday is all about attaching oneself to materialism in order to save something too—money!
► Good Friday is frugal in its ceremony (the bare bones) and has somber black vestments; whereas Black Friday is all about opulence with its colorful glitz and glamor.
► The message of Good Friday is one of dying to this world—as Our Lord said: “I am not of this world!" (John 8:23). Whereas the message of Black Friday is one of living for the world and grabbing all one can of this world.
► Good Friday is a day of obligatory fasting; while Black Friday for many is almost a day of compulsory spending and indulging. It is common for prospective shoppers to camp out over the Thanksgiving holiday, even in cold freezing temperatures, in an effort to secure a place in front of the line and thus a better chance at getting desired items.
► Just as the Faith spread throughout the world, so too is Black Friday spreading throughout the world since really “taking-off” in the USA. Canada has started the Black Friday practice. Black Friday was the inspiration for the Mexican government and retailing industry to create an annual weekend of discounts and extended credit terms, El Buen Fin, meaning "the good weekend" in Spanish. Black Friday is also celebrated in the United Kingdom by major online retailers, and in 2014, more UK-based retailers have adopted the Black Friday marketing scheme than ever. In Panama Black Friday was first celebrated in 2012, as a move from the Government to attract local tourism to the countries capital city. In recent years, Black Friday has been promoted in Australia by online retailers. In 2012, after two years of disappointing results, several department stores in Brazil joined their foreign competitors in a successful Black Friday, which more than doubled the total revenue in comparison to the previous year. In Germany, Austria and Switzerland, Black Friday Sale is a joint sales initiative by hundreds of online vendors.
The Violence of Good Friday and Black Friday
We all know, of course, the extreme violence generated against Our Lord on Good Friday by the sinful passions of the Pharisees, Jews and Roman soldiers. Yet we also see those evil passions surge to the fore on Black Friday. Somehow money, things and greed combine to make a toxic poison for basic Christian charity―or even non-Christian charity and civility. In 2006, a man shopping at Best Buy was recorded on video assaulting another shopper in a dispute over an article that each wanted to buy. Unruly Wal-Mart shoppers at a store outside Columbus, Ohio, quickly flooded in the doors at opening, pinning several employees against stacks of merchandise. Nine shoppers in a California mall were injured, including an elderly woman who had to be taken to the hospital, when the crowd rushed to grab gift certificates that had been released from the ceiling. If only people had the same passion for attending Masses, receiving Holy Communion and going to Confession!
In 2008, a crowd of approximately 2,000 shoppers in Valley Stream, New York, waited outside for the 5:00 a.m. opening of the local Wal-Mart. [Wouldn’t it be a pleasant surprise for priests to find similar crowds outside their church on a morning, pining to get in!) As opening time approached, the crowd grew anxious and when the doors were opened the crowd pushed forward, breaking the door down, and trampling a 34-year old employee to death. The shoppers did not appear concerned with the victim's fate, expressing refusal to halt their stampede when other employees attempted to intervene and help the injured employee, complaining that they had been waiting in the cold and were not willing to wait any longer. Shoppers had begun assembling as early as 9:00 p.m. the night before [what a massive mortification for mammon, but for God, no mortification is shown!]. Even when police arrived and attempted to render aid to the injured man, shoppers continued to pour in, shoving and pushing the officers as they made their way into the store. Several other people incurred minor injuries, including a pregnant woman who had to be taken to the hospital. The incident may be the first case of a death occurring during Black Friday sales; according to the National Retail Federation, "We are not aware of any other circumstances where a retail employee has died working on the day after Thanksgiving."
On the same day, two people were fatally shot during an altercation at the Toys “R” Us store in Palm Desert, California.
During Black Friday 2010, a Madison, Wisconsin woman was arrested outside of a Toys “R” Us store after cutting in line, and threatening to shoot other shoppers who tried to object. A Toys for Tots volunteer in Georgia was stabbed by a shoplifter. An Indianapolis woman was arrested after causing a disturbance by arguing with other Wal-Mart shoppers. She had been asked to leave the store, but refused. A man in Buffalo, New York, was trampled when doors opened at a Target store and unruly shoppers rushed in, in an episode reminiscent of the deadly 2008 Wal-Mart stampede.
On Black Friday 2011, a woman at a Porter Ranch, California Wal-Mart used pepper spray on fellow shoppers, causing minor injuries to at least 10 people, who had been waiting hours for the store to open. It was later reported that the incident caused 20 injuries. The incident started as people waited in line for the newly discounted Xbox 360 (a video game console). A witness said a woman with two children in tow became upset with the way people were pushing in line. The witness said she pulled out pepper spray and sprayed the other people in line. Another account stated that the store had brought out a crate of discounted Xbox 360s, and a crowd had formed to wait for the unwrapping, when the woman began spraying people “in order to get an advantage,” according to the police. In an incident outside a Wal-Mart store in San Leandro, California, one man was wounded after being shot following Black Friday shopping at about 1:45 a.m.
On Black Friday 2012, two people were shot outside a Wal-Mart in Tallahassee, Florida during a dispute over a parking space.
On Black Friday in 2013, a person in Las Vegas who was carrying a big-screen TV home from a Target store on Thanksgiving was shot in the leg as he tried to wrestle the item back from a robber who had just stolen it from him at gunpoint. In Romeoville IL, a police officer shot a suspected shoplifter driving a car that was dragging a fellow officer at a Kohl's department store. The suspect and the dragged officer were treated for shoulder injuries. Three people were arrested.
Biggest Violence of All
But the biggest violence of committed on this Black Friday is the violence against the Faith. The whole spirit of Black Friday and what it represents, goes against the spirit of Christ and what He represents. Our Lord came to live in poverty, not in riches. He did not pamper His body by living in luxury, but lived a simple and mortified life: “Jesus saith to him: The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests: but the Son of man hath not where to lay His head” (Matthew 8:20). He explicitly told us: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21). “You cannot serve God and mammon!” (Matthew 6:24). “And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God .. Wherefore, Go out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing” (2 Corinthians 6:15-17).
Riches and Wealth Work Against Heaven
We see a clear example of this with the rich young man, who wanted to save his soul, yet also wanted to enjoy his possessions. Our Lord refused this two-facedness. Here is St. Matthew’s account: “And behold one came and said to him: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:16-24).
The Religion of Money and Goods
Many have argued that the new priesthood today consists of scientists, professors, teachers and merchants, and advertisers, who are organized as a part of a new secular tradition—they are a parody or an aping of the Church, with its pope, cardinals, bishops and priests. They deny (or relegate) the existence of the supernatural and ridicule it. For them, what is primary is the material world. The world is their god and their teacher, and they gratefully bow down and worship the world and all that the world can supply by means of material goods and their offshoot, or side-effect—money. These ‘priests’ of the secular religion of materialism, preach throughout their ‘churches’ of schools, colleges; universities, in the media and in the stores. The scientist, or man of natural knowledge, or entrepreneur has become a mini-god, falling into the same trap of Adam of Eve—who wanted to be like unto God. The devil, who in the words of Our Lord, is the prince of this world that they adore, will only too willingly aid and abet them in their folly. As materialists, they see themselves as material producers and consumers of goods, the lifestyle and economics of consumerist capitalism seems natural. Hedonism (the doctrine that pleasure is the highest good) also seems natural, because as a body that has certain needs and wants, what that idiot of a psychologist Freud rightly called modern man ― "desire-producing-machine," whereby life becomes primarily about the fulfillment of the desires of the body―the cult of the body.
Sts. Peter and Paul Prophesied This
“Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God: having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid” (2 Timothy 1-5).
“In the last days there shall come deceitful scoffers, walking after their own lusts, saying:’ Where is His promise or His coming?’ … But of this one thing be not ignorant, my beloved, that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord delayeth not His promise, as some imagine, but dealeth patiently for your sake, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return to penance. But the day of the Lord shall come as a thief, in which the heavens shall pass away with great violence, and the elements shall be melted with heat, and the earth and the works which are in it, shall be burnt up” (2 Peter 3:3-10).
Not of the World
Speaking of the devil, Our Lord said: “The prince of this world cometh, and in Me he hath not any thing” (John 14:30). “And Jesus said to the Jews [today read that as pagan scientists, pagan academics, and the pagan entrepreneurs]: ‘You are from beneath, I am from above. You are of this world, I am not of this world!’” (John 8:23). Of His followers, He says: “They are not of the world, as I also am not of the world” (John 17:16). “For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world [Black Friday]” (1 John 2:16). To which St. John adds: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4). This is why we are told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Besotted by the World
Today materialism has reached fever-pitch, even among so-called Catholics—who are really worshipers of mammon. As Our Lady said in her apparitions: “All the civil governments will have one and the same plan, which will be to abolish and do away with every religious principle, to make way for materialism, atheism, spiritualism and vice of all kinds ... The spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God. Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the earth … People will think of nothing but amusement. The wicked will give themselves over to all kinds of sin ... The secular Clergy will leave much to be desired, because priests will become careless in their sacred duties. Lacking the divine compass, they will stray from the road traced by God for the priestly ministry, and they will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain. How the Church will suffer during this dark night! … Woe to the Princes of the Church who think only of piling riches upon riches, to protect their authority and dominate with pride ... The priests, by their wicked lives, by their irreverence and their impiety in the celebration of the Holy Mysteries, by their love of money, their love of honors and pleasures, the priests have become cesspools of impurity” (Our Lady of Good Success & Our Lady of La Salette).
An Insane Thirst and Attachment to the World
After the Last Supper, Our Lord went to the Garden of Gethsemane—after eating their Thanksgiving meal, many go to their Gardens of Getsomeforfree, the stores and shopping malls. Our Lord sweated blood thinking of His future passion and death for our sins—today’s souls sweat worryingly thinking about the deals and goodies that they might miss-out on. Our Lord said to His three Apostles: “Could you not watch one hour with Me?” ― Today we say: “Could you not shop one hour with me?” Our Lord was sold by Judas for thirty pieces of silver—today many sell themselves to the world and mammon, for a few paltry idols on a shelf. Our Lord was arrested, tied-up and taken captive—today many are tied-up and captivated by things of the world that have arrested their attention. On the Cross Our Lord said: “I thirst!”--thirsting for souls. The world thirsts too, but it is not for Christ nor the spiritual, but it is an unquenchable thirst for the things that this world has to offer. Our Lord was nearly stripped of all that He had and was attached to the Cross by nails—yet souls do not want to be divested of their possessions (they want even more of them) and they are so attached to them that we could say that “they are nailed to them.”
“Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4). This is why we are told: “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).
Oblivious to the Warnings of Heaven!
All that glitters is not gold! Many possessions do not guarantee salvation—quite the opposite. We recall again the incident of the well-meaning young rich man, who thought he could serve God and mammon:
“And behold one came and said to Jesus: ‘Good master! What good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’
Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’
The young man said to Him: ‘Which?’
And Jesus said: ‘Thou shalt do no murder; thou shalt not commit adultery; thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not bear false witness; honor thy father and thy mother: and, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.’
The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’
Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’
And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions.
Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’
And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’
And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:16-26).
A Few Words from St. Alphonsus Liguori
In one of his sermons, St. Alphonsus deals with the problem of possessions, wealth and worldliness. He first quotes St. Peter: “You were not redeemed with corruptible things, as gold or silver, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb unspotted and undefiled” (1 Peter 1:18-19) and then goes on to say:
“Brethren, remember that, if you save your souls, your failure, in every worldly transaction, will be but of little importance: for, if you are saved, you shall enjoy complete happiness for all eternity. But, if you lose your souls, what will it profit you to have enjoyed all the riches, honors, and amusements of this world? If you lose your souls, all is lost. ‘What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?’ (Matthew 16:26). By this maxim St. Ignatius of Loyola drew many souls to God, and among them the soul of St. Francis Xavier, who was then at Paris, and devoted his attention to the acquirement of worldly goods.
“One day St. Ignatius said to him: ‘Francis, whom do you serve? You serve the world, which is a traitor, that promises, but does not perform! And if it should fulfil all its promises, how long do its goods last? Can they last longer than this life? And, after death, what will they profit you, if you shall not have saved your soul?’ He then reminded Francis of the maxims of the Gospel: ‘What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?” “But one thing is necessary?’ (Luke 10:42).
“It is not necessary, on this Earth, to become rich, or to acquire honors and dignities; but it is necessary to save our souls; because, unless we gain Heaven, we shall be condemned to Hell! There is no middle place! We must be either saved or damned! God has not created us for this Earth; neither does He preserve our lives that we may become rich and enjoy amusements. He has created us, and preserved us, that we may acquire eternal glory.
“St. Philip Neri used to say, that he who does not seek, above all things, the salvation of his soul, is a fool. If on this Earth there were two classes of men, one mortal, and the other immortal, and if the former saw the latter entirely devoted to the acquisition of earthly goods, would they not exclaim: ‘O fools that you are! You have it in your power to secure the immense and eternal goods of Paradise, and you lose your time in procuring the miserable goods of this Earth, which shall end at death. And for these you expose yourselves to the danger of the eternal torments of Hell. Leave to us, for whom all shall end at death, the care of these earthly things. But, brethren, we are all immortal, and each of us shall be eternally happy or eternally miserable in the other life!’
“But the misfortune of the greater part of mankind is, that they are solicitous about the present, and never think of the, future. Oh, if only they knew how to detach themselves from present goods, which last but a short time, and to provide for what must happen after death an eternal reign in Heaven, or everlasting slavery in Hell! ‘The fashion of this world passeth away’ (1 Corinthians 7:31). On this passage, the famous biblical commentator, Cornelius à Lapide , says, that the world is, as it were, a stage. The present life is a comedy, which passes away. Happy the man who acts his part well in this comedy by saving his soul. But if he shall have spent his life in the acquisition of riches and worldly honors, he shall justly be called a fool; and at the hour of death he shall receive the reproach addressed to the rich man in the Gospel: ‘Fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee; and whose shall these things be which thou hast provided?’ (Luke 12:20).
“Poor worldlings! Of all the riches which they acquired, of all the pomps which they displayed in this life, what shall they find at death? ‘They have slept their sleep: and all the men of riches have found nothing in their hands’ (Psalm 75:6). The dream of this present life shall be over at death, and they shall have acquired nothing for eternity. Ask of so many great men of this Earth of the princes and emperors, who, during life, have abounded in riches, honors, and pleasures, and are at this moment in Hell what now remains of all the riches which they possessed in this world? They answer with tears: ‘Nothing, nothing!’ And of so many honors enjoyed of so many past pleasures of so many pomps and triumphs, what now remains? They answer with howling: ‘Nothing, nothing!’
“We must, then, from this day forward, devote all our attention to the salvation of our souls. There is no question, says St. John Chrysostom, of losing some earthly good which we must one day relinquish. But there is question of losing Paradise, and of going to suffer forever in Hell. We must fear and tremble; it is thus we shall be able to secure eternal happiness. “With fear and trembling work out your salvation.” (Philippians 2:12). Hence, if we wish to save our souls, we must labor strenuously to avoid dangerous occasions of sin, to resist temptations, and to frequent the sacraments. Without labor we cannot obtain Heaven. ‘The violent bear it away.’ The saints tremble at the thought of eternity. St. Andrew Avellino exclaimed with tears: Who knows whether I shall be saved or damned? St. Louis Bertrand said with trembling: ‘What shall be my lot in the other world?’ And shall we not tremble? Let us pray to Jesus Christ and his most holy Mother to help us to save our souls. This is for us the most important of all affairs: if we succeed in it, we shall be eternally happy; if we fail, we must be forever miserable.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, Sunday Sermons).
Let us shop for salvation! That is the only thing worth buying—for it lasts forever!
Article 21
Thursday November 23rd, 2023
Thankgiving With The Saints
Thursday November 23rd, 2023
Thankgiving With The Saints
Thanksgiving has been in all ages the characteristic of the saints. Thanksgiving has been their favorite prayer; and when their love has been grieved because men were unthankful, they have called on the animals, and even on inanimate creatures, to bless God for His goodness.
ST. LAWRENCE JUSTINIAN has a beautiful passage on thanksgiving in chapter 28 of his Treatise on Obedience:
“Whosoever should try to lay open all God’s blessings to the full, would be like a man trying to confine in a little vase the mighty currents of the wide ocean; for that would be an easier work than to publish with human eloquence the innumerable gifts of God. Yet although these are unspeakable, both from their multitude, their magnitude, and their incomprehensibility, they are by no means to be concealed in silence, or left without commemoration, although it be impossible to commemorate them adequately. They are to be confessed with the mouth, revered in the heart, and religiously worshiped, as far as the littleness of man can do so. For although we cannot explain them in words, we can make acknowledgment of them in the pious and enlarged affection of our hearts. Indeed, the immense mercy of our Eternal Creator condescends to approve not only what man can do, but what he would desire to do; for the merits of the just are counted up by the Most High, not only in the doing of the work, but in the desire of the will.”
ST. CATHERINE OF SIENA, in one of her revelations, is told by God the Father that thanksgiving makes the soul incessantly delight in Him, that it frees men from negligence and lukewarmness altogether, and makes them anxious to please Him more and more in all things.
Our Lord gives the increase of thanksgiving as a reason to ST. BRIDGET for the Sacrifice of the Mass. “My body,” says He, “is daily immolated on the altar, that men may love Me so much the more, and more frequently call to mind My blessings.”
“Happy is he,” says ST. BERNARD, “who, at every grace he receives, returns in thought to Him in whom is the fullness of all graces; for if we show ourselves not ungrateful for what He has given us, we make room for still further graces in ourselves.” In another place he says, “Speak to God in thanksgiving, and you will get graces more and more abundantly.”
So St. Lawrence Justinian says, “Only let God see you are thankful for what He has given you, and He will bestow more gifts upon you, and better gifts.”
ST. MARY MAGDALENE OF PAZZI also received a revelation, in which she was told that thanksgiving prepared the soul for the boundless generosity of the Eternal Word.
Now stop and meditate for a few minutes on the Eternal Word: remember which of the three Divine Persons He is, the Second Person, the eternally begotten Word of the Father, the splendor of His Majesty, uncreated Wisdom, the same Person Who was incarnate and crucified for us, the same Who sent us the Holy Spirit, Who gave us Mary, Who gives us Himself in the Blessed Sacrament, in whose mind revolves at this moment the countless lusters of all possible creations; then think what His liberalities must be — no bound or measure to them. We cannot count their number, nor exhaust their freshness, nor understand their excellence, nor hold their fullness, nor give intelligible human names to their kinds, inventions, varieties, and wonders.
O, if we only had greater devotion to the Person of the Eternal Word, that we would read about Him the wonders the Church can tell us, and then meditate and make acts of love and gratitude on what we read! This is the true way to increase our devotion to His most dear humanity, and to learn how to watch at His Crib, to weep over His Cross, to worship at His tabernacle, and to nestle in His Sacred Heart. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that expressing gratitude is one way how we can grow in love!
Ask St. Michael, St. John the Evangelist, and St. Athanasius, to get you this devotion―they have a specialty for it―and see how you will run the way of God, when its heat has made a furnace of your heart.
Remember also that He Himself has told us, through this revelation to His servant, that thanksgiving prepares the soul for His amazing generosities.
You see, you must begin this day and hour quite a new and more royal sort of thanksgiving than those mere infrequent, formal, respectful civilities by which you have heretofore been content to acknowledge your accumulated obligations to our dearest Lord. Now promise Him this, and then, with a hotter heart, read on.
ST. BONAVENTURE tells us that our Blessed Lady gave thanks to God without intermission, and lest in common greetings she should be distracted from the praises of God, she used to reply, when anyone saluted her, “Thanks be to God!” and from her example several saints have adopted the same practice.
THE JESUIT FATHER DIDACUS MARTINEZ, called the Apostle of Peru, because of his zeal for souls and his labors in that province, used to say daily four hundred times, and often six hundred times, “Deo gratias,” (“Thanks be to God”) and he had some beads on purpose to be accurate. He tried to induce others to practice the same devotion, and he declared that he knew there was no short prayer more acceptable to God, if only it be uttered with a devout intention. It is also mentioned of him in the summary of his process for canonization that his distinct acts of divine love often amounted to several thousands in the day.
LANCISIUS quotes from Philo a beautiful tradition among the Jews, to this effect: “When God had created the world, He asked the angels what they thought of this work of His hands. One of them replied that it was so vast and so perfect that only one thing was wanting to it, namely, that there should be created a clear, mighty, and harmonious voice that should fill all the quarters of the world incessantly with its sweet sound, thus day and night to offer thanksgiving to its Maker for His incomparable blessings.”
Ah! They knew not how much more than that the Blessed Sacrament was one day to be! Thus, our thanksgiving should not be an exercise of devotion practiced now and then. It should be incessant, the voice of a love that is ever living and fresh in our hearts.
In several of the texts that I have already quoted, St. Paul speaks of prayer with thanksgiving: as if there was to be no prayer of which thanksgiving did not form a part; and this also would illustrate what I said of the spirit of the Eucharist being found in every part and act of Catholic devotion.
ST. GREGORY OF NYSSA, says: “I think that if our whole life long we conversed with God without distraction, and did nothing but give thanks, we should really be just as far from adequately thanking our heavenly Benefactor as if we had never thought of thanking Him at all. For time has three parts — the past, the present, and the future. If you look at the present, it is by God that you are now living; if the future, He is the hope of everything you expect; if the past, you would never have been if He had not created you. That you were born was His blessing; and after you were born, your life and your death were, as the apostle Paul says, equally His blessing. Whatever your future hopes may be, they hang also upon His blessing. You are master only of the present, and therefore, if you never once intermitted thanksgiving during your whole life, you would hardly do enough for the grace that is always present; and your imagination cannot conceive of any method possible, by which you could do anything for the time past, or for the time to come.”
In addition to these authorities, we must not forget to add the number of thanksgivings that have been indulgenced by the Church, in order that she may the more effectually lead her children to glorify God in this way. We shall have occasion, afterward, to revert to the fact that many of these devotions are thanksgivings to the Most Holy Trinity for the gifts and graces bestowed upon our Blessed Lady.
Giving Thanks for Three Benefits
Christ, having given thanks, teaches us to give thanks for three benefits. Firstly, for corporeal benefits. Secondly, for spiritual benefits. Thirdly, for eternal benefits.
I. On the first head, it is to be noted, that we ought to give thanks for corporeal benefits, for three reasons:
Because He ordained that they should be in the gift of nature: “Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father, in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 5:20).
Because He preserves them to nature by removing the evil from them: “And they that before had been wronged, gave thanks, because they were not hurt now; and asked this gift, that there might be a difference. Therefore they received a burning pillar of fire for a guide of the way which they knew not” (Wisdom 18:2-3).
Because He nourishes it by refreshing it with bodily food: “Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the Faith .… and commanding to abstain from meats, which God created to be received with thanksgiving .… For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused.… For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer” (1 Timothy 4:1-6).
II. On the second head, it is to be noted, that we ought in like manner, for three reasons, to give thanks to God for spiritual benefits:
Because He sanctifies us by conferring grace: “Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son, in Whom we have redemption through His Blood” (Colossians 1:12-15).
Because He instructs us, teaching by His word: “For this cause also we thank God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God, which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe” (1 Thessalonians 2:13).
Because He refreshes the soul in granting to it the food of the Eucharist: “And He took bread and gave thanks, and broke it, and gave unto them, saying, ‘This is My Body, which is given for you!’” (Luke 22:19). Inasmuch as Christ gave us His Body, with thanksgiving we ought to receive that ineffable food.
III. On the third head, it is to be noted, that we ought likewise to give thanks, in a three-fold manner, for eternal benefits:
(1) For the liberation of the just from eternal death: “Giving thanks unto the Father … Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness” (Colossians 1:12-13).
(2) For the just condemnation of the profane; for the high glorification and dignity of the saints. Of these two: “The four-and-twenty elders, which sat before God on their seats, fell upon their faces, and worshipped God, saying: ‘We give Thee thanks, O Lord God Almighty, which art, and wast, and art to come; because Thou hast taken to Thee Thy great power, and hast reigned. And the nations were angry, and Thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that Thou shouldest give reward unto Thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear Thy Name” (Apocalypse 11:16-18).
ST. LAWRENCE JUSTINIAN has a beautiful passage on thanksgiving in chapter 28 of his Treatise on Obedience:
“Whosoever should try to lay open all God’s blessings to the full, would be like a man trying to confine in a little vase the mighty currents of the wide ocean; for that would be an easier work than to publish with human eloquence the innumerable gifts of God. Yet although these are unspeakable, both from their multitude, their magnitude, and their incomprehensibility, they are by no means to be concealed in silence, or left without commemoration, although it be impossible to commemorate them adequately. They are to be confessed with the mouth, revered in the heart, and religiously worshiped, as far as the littleness of man can do so. For although we cannot explain them in words, we can make acknowledgment of them in the pious and enlarged affection of our hearts. Indeed, the immense mercy of our Eternal Creator condescends to approve not only what man can do, but what he would desire to do; for the merits of the just are counted up by the Most High, not only in the doing of the work, but in the desire of the will.”
ST. CATHERINE OF SIENA, in one of her revelations, is told by God the Father that thanksgiving makes the soul incessantly delight in Him, that it frees men from negligence and lukewarmness altogether, and makes them anxious to please Him more and more in all things.
Our Lord gives the increase of thanksgiving as a reason to ST. BRIDGET for the Sacrifice of the Mass. “My body,” says He, “is daily immolated on the altar, that men may love Me so much the more, and more frequently call to mind My blessings.”
“Happy is he,” says ST. BERNARD, “who, at every grace he receives, returns in thought to Him in whom is the fullness of all graces; for if we show ourselves not ungrateful for what He has given us, we make room for still further graces in ourselves.” In another place he says, “Speak to God in thanksgiving, and you will get graces more and more abundantly.”
So St. Lawrence Justinian says, “Only let God see you are thankful for what He has given you, and He will bestow more gifts upon you, and better gifts.”
ST. MARY MAGDALENE OF PAZZI also received a revelation, in which she was told that thanksgiving prepared the soul for the boundless generosity of the Eternal Word.
Now stop and meditate for a few minutes on the Eternal Word: remember which of the three Divine Persons He is, the Second Person, the eternally begotten Word of the Father, the splendor of His Majesty, uncreated Wisdom, the same Person Who was incarnate and crucified for us, the same Who sent us the Holy Spirit, Who gave us Mary, Who gives us Himself in the Blessed Sacrament, in whose mind revolves at this moment the countless lusters of all possible creations; then think what His liberalities must be — no bound or measure to them. We cannot count their number, nor exhaust their freshness, nor understand their excellence, nor hold their fullness, nor give intelligible human names to their kinds, inventions, varieties, and wonders.
O, if we only had greater devotion to the Person of the Eternal Word, that we would read about Him the wonders the Church can tell us, and then meditate and make acts of love and gratitude on what we read! This is the true way to increase our devotion to His most dear humanity, and to learn how to watch at His Crib, to weep over His Cross, to worship at His tabernacle, and to nestle in His Sacred Heart. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that expressing gratitude is one way how we can grow in love!
Ask St. Michael, St. John the Evangelist, and St. Athanasius, to get you this devotion―they have a specialty for it―and see how you will run the way of God, when its heat has made a furnace of your heart.
Remember also that He Himself has told us, through this revelation to His servant, that thanksgiving prepares the soul for His amazing generosities.
You see, you must begin this day and hour quite a new and more royal sort of thanksgiving than those mere infrequent, formal, respectful civilities by which you have heretofore been content to acknowledge your accumulated obligations to our dearest Lord. Now promise Him this, and then, with a hotter heart, read on.
ST. BONAVENTURE tells us that our Blessed Lady gave thanks to God without intermission, and lest in common greetings she should be distracted from the praises of God, she used to reply, when anyone saluted her, “Thanks be to God!” and from her example several saints have adopted the same practice.
THE JESUIT FATHER DIDACUS MARTINEZ, called the Apostle of Peru, because of his zeal for souls and his labors in that province, used to say daily four hundred times, and often six hundred times, “Deo gratias,” (“Thanks be to God”) and he had some beads on purpose to be accurate. He tried to induce others to practice the same devotion, and he declared that he knew there was no short prayer more acceptable to God, if only it be uttered with a devout intention. It is also mentioned of him in the summary of his process for canonization that his distinct acts of divine love often amounted to several thousands in the day.
LANCISIUS quotes from Philo a beautiful tradition among the Jews, to this effect: “When God had created the world, He asked the angels what they thought of this work of His hands. One of them replied that it was so vast and so perfect that only one thing was wanting to it, namely, that there should be created a clear, mighty, and harmonious voice that should fill all the quarters of the world incessantly with its sweet sound, thus day and night to offer thanksgiving to its Maker for His incomparable blessings.”
Ah! They knew not how much more than that the Blessed Sacrament was one day to be! Thus, our thanksgiving should not be an exercise of devotion practiced now and then. It should be incessant, the voice of a love that is ever living and fresh in our hearts.
In several of the texts that I have already quoted, St. Paul speaks of prayer with thanksgiving: as if there was to be no prayer of which thanksgiving did not form a part; and this also would illustrate what I said of the spirit of the Eucharist being found in every part and act of Catholic devotion.
ST. GREGORY OF NYSSA, says: “I think that if our whole life long we conversed with God without distraction, and did nothing but give thanks, we should really be just as far from adequately thanking our heavenly Benefactor as if we had never thought of thanking Him at all. For time has three parts — the past, the present, and the future. If you look at the present, it is by God that you are now living; if the future, He is the hope of everything you expect; if the past, you would never have been if He had not created you. That you were born was His blessing; and after you were born, your life and your death were, as the apostle Paul says, equally His blessing. Whatever your future hopes may be, they hang also upon His blessing. You are master only of the present, and therefore, if you never once intermitted thanksgiving during your whole life, you would hardly do enough for the grace that is always present; and your imagination cannot conceive of any method possible, by which you could do anything for the time past, or for the time to come.”
In addition to these authorities, we must not forget to add the number of thanksgivings that have been indulgenced by the Church, in order that she may the more effectually lead her children to glorify God in this way. We shall have occasion, afterward, to revert to the fact that many of these devotions are thanksgivings to the Most Holy Trinity for the gifts and graces bestowed upon our Blessed Lady.
Giving Thanks for Three Benefits
Christ, having given thanks, teaches us to give thanks for three benefits. Firstly, for corporeal benefits. Secondly, for spiritual benefits. Thirdly, for eternal benefits.
I. On the first head, it is to be noted, that we ought to give thanks for corporeal benefits, for three reasons:
Because He ordained that they should be in the gift of nature: “Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father, in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 5:20).
Because He preserves them to nature by removing the evil from them: “And they that before had been wronged, gave thanks, because they were not hurt now; and asked this gift, that there might be a difference. Therefore they received a burning pillar of fire for a guide of the way which they knew not” (Wisdom 18:2-3).
Because He nourishes it by refreshing it with bodily food: “Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the Faith .… and commanding to abstain from meats, which God created to be received with thanksgiving .… For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused.… For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer” (1 Timothy 4:1-6).
II. On the second head, it is to be noted, that we ought in like manner, for three reasons, to give thanks to God for spiritual benefits:
Because He sanctifies us by conferring grace: “Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son, in Whom we have redemption through His Blood” (Colossians 1:12-15).
Because He instructs us, teaching by His word: “For this cause also we thank God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God, which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe” (1 Thessalonians 2:13).
Because He refreshes the soul in granting to it the food of the Eucharist: “And He took bread and gave thanks, and broke it, and gave unto them, saying, ‘This is My Body, which is given for you!’” (Luke 22:19). Inasmuch as Christ gave us His Body, with thanksgiving we ought to receive that ineffable food.
III. On the third head, it is to be noted, that we ought likewise to give thanks, in a three-fold manner, for eternal benefits:
(1) For the liberation of the just from eternal death: “Giving thanks unto the Father … Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness” (Colossians 1:12-13).
(2) For the just condemnation of the profane; for the high glorification and dignity of the saints. Of these two: “The four-and-twenty elders, which sat before God on their seats, fell upon their faces, and worshipped God, saying: ‘We give Thee thanks, O Lord God Almighty, which art, and wast, and art to come; because Thou hast taken to Thee Thy great power, and hast reigned. And the nations were angry, and Thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that Thou shouldest give reward unto Thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear Thy Name” (Apocalypse 11:16-18).
Article 20
Wednesday November 22nd, 2023
Thanks a Million! Thanks for What? Think and Thank!
Wednesday November 22nd, 2023
Thanks a Million! Thanks for What? Think and Thank!
Think More to Thank More! Think Less and be Thankless!
We are basically a thankless race because we are a thoughtless race! If we would only think more we would also thank more! We are blind to the incessant and innumerable gifts with which God showers the world―both the good and bad alike: “Your Father, Who is in Heaven,” says Our Lord, “maketh His sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and raineth upon the just and the unjust!” (Matthew 5:45). As Holy Scripture adds: “For who distinguisheth thee? Or what hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17).
This the incessant flow of innumerable gifts with which God showers the world requires―in justice and in charity―a sincere, heartfelt and constant flow of thanksgiving on our part. “Thanks be to God for His unspeakable gift” (2 Corinthians 9:15). “Cease not to give thanks” (Ephesians 1:16). “We give thanks to God always … in our prayers without ceasing! … We give thanks to God without ceasing! … In all things give thanks; for this is the will of God” (1 Thessalonians 1:2; 2:13; 5:18). “Giving thanks always for all things, in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God and the Father” (Ephesians 5:20). “All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him” (Colossians 3:17). “We are bound to give thanks always to God … We ought to give thanks to God always” (2 Thessalonians 1:3; 2:12). “I give God thanks” (1 Corinthians 1:14). “First I give thanks to my God, through Jesus Christ” (Romans 1:8). “I give thanks to my God always” (1 Corinthians 1:4).
Blind, Ungrateful Man!
“When they knew God, they have not glorified Him as God, or given thanks; but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened” (Romans 1:21). How true are those words of the current “Holiday Season” into which the USA enters through the portal of Thanksgiving Day. In the USA, their national Thanksgiving Day celebrations kick-off a season of spending, socializing, eating, drinking and partying that will go until the end of the New Year’s Eve festivities. For the shops and stores it is the highest spending season of the year, with many taking 50% of sales in that highly materialistic period. Thanksgiving is always the 4th Thursday of November―therefore, since the earliest possible date for Thanksgiving is November 22nd, you could have 40 days from Thanksgiving to New Year’s Eve. Just as we have our 40 Days of Lent—the USA secular world has its 40 Days of Spent Money! We spend our 40 Days of Lent fasting—they spend 40 Days of Fast Living! Thanksgiving parties, soon to be followed by office or school Christmas parties in the lead up to Christmas, these are followed by the Christmas Week parties going from one place to another, culminated with the New Year’s Eve party.
In recent years, an increasing number of Americans have given up the worldly traditions of Christmas giving gifts and partying entirely, and many of them seem quite happy to have done so. Of course most people are still quite satisfied with the status quo, and there are many that will get very angry with you if you dare to suggest that the way that Americans celebrate Christmas has got way out of control and is quite opposed to the true spirit of Christ—you could even call it “Anti-Christmas” or “Antichrist-mas”.
Nature abhors a vacuum. Take something away and something has to fill the gap. So we shouldn’t be surprised that when we turn away from or become indifferent to God, then it is natural to replace the 40-DAYS OF LENT—where we do without things—with the 40-DAYS OF pLENTy—where we stuff ourselves with things! For most Americans the biggest holiday of the year is all about “stuff” ― they are going to buy “stuff”; they are going to give “stuff”; they are going to get “stuff”; and, at table, they are going to get “stuffed”! As a society, we are obsessed with things, but those things are never going to make us happy. As Our Lord said: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-24, 33).
Over this opulent and self-indulgent season we do well to recall the encounter of Jesus with the well-intentioned, pious, rich young man: “And behold, a certain rich young man, a ruler, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
The whole purpose and point of the spiritual life or ascetical life is a progressive and increasing detachment from the world and its persons and things. That is the only way that we can truly fulfill the greatest commandment: “
Slavery to Stuff & Addiction to Debt
Has there ever been a major holiday season more focused on materialism than the modern American Thanksgiving-Christmas 40-Day Season of (P)LENT(Y)? Statistics show that Americans, on the whole, are spending more each year. Have incomes gone up accordingly? Of course not! In fact, real median household income in the United States has been experiencing a steady long-term decline. So in order to fund all of our Christmas spending, people have got to go into even more debt.
In fact, one Pew Research Center survey found that approximately 70% of all Americans believe that “debt is a necessity in their lives”. But then they have to work their fingers to the bone to try to make the payments on all of that debt, not realizing that debt systematically impoverishes them. It may be hard to believe, but if you have a single dollar in your pocket and no debt, you have a greater net worth than 25% of all Americans. I know that sounds crazy, but it is true!
Running-Up a Debt with God!
Never has the world sinned as much and as blatantly as it sins today―yet instead of penance, it practices extravagance. As Our Lady foretold: “The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world … Moreover, in these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost ... People will think of nothing but amusement … and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God!” (Our Lady of Good Success, La Salette, Akita).
As Our Lady revealed to Blessed Sister Elena Aiello (1895-1961)―mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ―Our Lady, in an apparition on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th, 1956, said to her: “People are offending God too much! Were I to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times. The world is in total turmoil, because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge. Materialism marches on, ever fomenting bloody strifes and fratricidal struggles. Clear signs foretell that peace is in danger. That scourge, like the shadow of a dark cloud, is now moving across mankind! Only my power, as Mother of God, is preventing the outbreak of the storm. All is hanging on a slender thread. When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs. All the nations shall be punished―because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth.”
This is why St. Jacinta Marto, once of the three Fatima seers, exclaimed to the Mother Superior of the religious-run hospital where she spent her last days before dying: “O flee luxury! Flee from riches! Love holy poverty and silence!
Another Kind of Debt We Owe God
Speaking of debts―there is another debt, other than the debt for sin, that we owe God. Few people ever think of it, but it is a debt that offends God greatly. What is that debt? It is the debt of gratitude and thankfulness! As already stated above― God showers the world with an incessant flow of innumerable gifts, favors and mercies. As Our Lord said, God even shows His kindness to those that are indifferent to Him, or who ignore Him, or even hate Him: ““Your Father, Who is in Heaven, makes His sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust!” (Matthew 5:45). Every good gift ultimately comes from God―though God might use this or that person, or this or that aspect of nature to bring it to us. Yet, as a whole, we are extremely ungrateful or even ignorant of what God has done and is doing for us.
Thanksgiving on a Plate by St. Thomas Aquinas
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica (IIa-IIae, question 106), serves up a meal for the mind to chew over with the question of “Thankfulness or Gratitude.” He first of all points out that thankfulness or gratitude is something that is owed out of justice―he then later goes on to show that thankfulness and gratitude also stems from charity.
► GRATITUDE IS A DEBT IN JUSTICE―First of all the justice aspect. St. Thomas writes:
“Thankfulness a special part of justice (it is something that we owe for a gift or favor) … The nature of the debt to be paid by us, varies according to various different causes giving rise to our debt of gratitude … Now the cause of debt is found primarily and chiefly in God, because He is the first principle of all our goods. Secondarily we owe a debt to our father, because he begot us and raised us. Thirdly we owe a debt of gratitude to the person from whom general favors proceed. Fourthly a debt of gratitude is owed to a benefactor, from whom we have received particular and private favors, on account of which we are under particular obligation to him.
“Accordingly, since what we owe God, or our father, or a person excelling in dignity, is not the same as what we owe a benefactor from whom we have received some particular favor, it follows that after religion, whereby we pay God due worship, and piety, whereby we worship our parents, and observance, whereby we worship persons excelling in dignity, there is thankfulness or gratitude, whereby we give thanks to our benefactors … The virtue of thankfulness or gratitude answers to the moral debt by paying the debt spontaneously. Thanksgiving is less thankful when it is compelled. Friendship is preserved by repayment of favors, although repayment of favors belongs specially to the virtue of gratitude.”
► WHO OWES MORE GRATITUDE―THE SAINT OR SINNER? On the tricky question whether an innocent or just person is more bound to give thanks to God than the penitent―because the greater the gift one has received from God, the more one is bound to give Him thanks. Now the gift of innocence is greater than that of justice restored. Therefore it seems that the innocent is more bound to give thanks to God than the penitent sinner. Besides, the favor of divine grace is more continuous in the innocent person than in the penitent sinner―who has lost grace. St. Thomas replies as follows:
“On the contrary, it is written: ‘To whom more is forgiven, he loveth more … To whom less is forgiven, he loveth less’ (Luke 7:47). Therefore for the same reason he is bound to greater thanksgiving to whom more has been forgiven. Thanksgiving in the recipient must correspond to the favor granted by the giver―so that when there is greater favor on the part of the giver, greater thanks are due on the part of the recipient. The penitent is more bound to give thanks than the innocent, because what he receives from God is more gratuitously given―since, whereas he was deserving of punishment, he has received mercy and grace. Wherefore, although the gift bestowed on the innocent is considered greater objectively speaking, yet the mercy and grace bestowed on the penitent is greater in relation to him (subjectively)―just as a small gift bestowed on a poor man is greater to him than a great gift is to a rich man.”
► IS EVERYONE TO BE THANKED? On the question of whether a man is bound to give thanks to every benefactor? St. Thomas says:
“It is written: ‘In all things give thanks’ (1 Thessalonians 5:18). God turns all things to Himself because He is the cause of all. A benefactor is cause of the benefit. Hence the natural order requires that he who has received a favor, should repay the favor to his benefactor according to his means. Promptness enhances, delay discounts a favor … It is the height of malevolence to refuse to recognize a kindness … Gratitude is due even to a slave, when he does more than his duty … Kindness depends on the heart rather than on the deed, so too gratitude depends chiefly the heart. Hence, whoever receives a favor gratefully, has already begun to pay it back―and that we must be grateful for favors that we have received should be shown by the outpouring of our heart, not only in the benefactor’s hearing, but everywhere … There are many ways of repaying those who are well off, whatever we happen to owe them; such as good advice, frequent fellowship, affable and pleasant conversation without flattery.”
► WHEN TO REPAY? On the question of when to repay a favor, St. Thomas says that it is better to wait for an appropriate time rather than immediately return a favor:
“Some object that it seems necessary that a man is bound to repay a favor at once. For we are bound to restore at once what we owe, unless the term be fixed. Therefore a man is bound to repay a favor at once. Furthermore, a good action would seem to be all the more praiseworthy if it done earnestly and earnestness makes a person do his duty without any delay. Yet, I answer on the contrary! He that hastens to repay, is animated with a sense, not of gratitude but of indebtedness or obligation. Just as two things are to be considered in doing a favor―namely, the affection of the heart and the gift given―so also must these things be considered in repaying the favor. Do you wish to repay a favor? Receive it graciously! As regards the gift, one ought to wait until such a time as will be convenient to the benefactor. For, if instead of choosing a convenient time, one repays at once, favor for favor, it would not seem to be a virtuous, but a constrained or obligated repayment. For, he that wishes to repay too soon, is an unwilling debtor, and an unwilling debtor is ungrateful. Just as favors should be granted at a convenient time and without delay when that convenient time comes; and the same is to be observed in repaying favors.”
► WHAT COUNTS MORE―THE DISPOSITION OR THE DEED? On the question of whether, in giving thanks for a favor, we should look at the benefactor’s disposition or at the deed? In other words, should our focus be on the benefactor’s, intentions, attitude and sentiment that was behind the benefactor granting us a favor, or whether our focus should be on what was given to us or done for us? St. Thomas answers:
“We are sometimes under a greater obligation to someone who has given a little with a large heart, and has bestowed a small favor, yet willingly. Repayment of a favor depends more on the disposition of the giver than on the effect … A kindly action consists not in a deed or a gift, but in the disposition of the giver or doer … God alone sees person’s disposition in itself―but, in so far as it is shown by certain signs, we can also know it. It is thus that a benefactor’s disposition is known by the way in which he does the kindly action―for instance through his doing it joyfully and readily.”
► DO I GIVE BACK MORE THAN I GOT? The last question St. Thomas considers is whether the repayment of gratitude should surpass the favor received? To this he answers:
“We should repay those who are gracious to us, by being gracious to them return, and this is done by repaying more than we have received. Therefore gratitude should incline to do something greater. Gratitude regards the favor received according the intention of the benefactor―who is deserving of praise for having freely conferred the favor without being bound to do so. Wherefore the beneficiary is under a moral obligation to bestow something freely in return. Now he does not seem to bestow something freely, unless he exceeds the quantity of the favor received―because, so long as he repays less or an equivalent, he would seem to do nothing freely or extra, but only to return what he has received. Therefore gratitude always inclines, as far as possible, to pay back something more … The debt of gratitude flows from charity, which the more it is paid the more it is due, according to Romans 13:8―’Owe no man anything, but to love one another.’ Wherefore it is not unreasonable if the obligation of gratitude has no limit.”
Without God We Have Nothing!
The problem with modern man is that he is inflated and puffed-up with his false sense of “self-sufficiency”―which is seen in phrases such as “self-made-man”, “DIY or do-it-yourself”, “I did it my way!”, “I got to where I am by myself!”, “I’m independent, not dependent!”, etc., etc.
God answers: “What hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7) … “Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17) … “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) … “For if any man think himself to be something―whereas he is nothing―he deceives himself” (Galatians 6:3) … “For it is God who works in you, both to will and to accomplish―according to His good will” (Philippians 2:13).
We are basically a thankless race because we are a thoughtless race! If we would only think more we would also thank more! We are blind to the incessant and innumerable gifts with which God showers the world―both the good and bad alike: “Your Father, Who is in Heaven,” says Our Lord, “maketh His sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and raineth upon the just and the unjust!” (Matthew 5:45). As Holy Scripture adds: “For who distinguisheth thee? Or what hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). “Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17).
This the incessant flow of innumerable gifts with which God showers the world requires―in justice and in charity―a sincere, heartfelt and constant flow of thanksgiving on our part. “Thanks be to God for His unspeakable gift” (2 Corinthians 9:15). “Cease not to give thanks” (Ephesians 1:16). “We give thanks to God always … in our prayers without ceasing! … We give thanks to God without ceasing! … In all things give thanks; for this is the will of God” (1 Thessalonians 1:2; 2:13; 5:18). “Giving thanks always for all things, in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God and the Father” (Ephesians 5:20). “All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him” (Colossians 3:17). “We are bound to give thanks always to God … We ought to give thanks to God always” (2 Thessalonians 1:3; 2:12). “I give God thanks” (1 Corinthians 1:14). “First I give thanks to my God, through Jesus Christ” (Romans 1:8). “I give thanks to my God always” (1 Corinthians 1:4).
Blind, Ungrateful Man!
“When they knew God, they have not glorified Him as God, or given thanks; but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened” (Romans 1:21). How true are those words of the current “Holiday Season” into which the USA enters through the portal of Thanksgiving Day. In the USA, their national Thanksgiving Day celebrations kick-off a season of spending, socializing, eating, drinking and partying that will go until the end of the New Year’s Eve festivities. For the shops and stores it is the highest spending season of the year, with many taking 50% of sales in that highly materialistic period. Thanksgiving is always the 4th Thursday of November―therefore, since the earliest possible date for Thanksgiving is November 22nd, you could have 40 days from Thanksgiving to New Year’s Eve. Just as we have our 40 Days of Lent—the USA secular world has its 40 Days of Spent Money! We spend our 40 Days of Lent fasting—they spend 40 Days of Fast Living! Thanksgiving parties, soon to be followed by office or school Christmas parties in the lead up to Christmas, these are followed by the Christmas Week parties going from one place to another, culminated with the New Year’s Eve party.
In recent years, an increasing number of Americans have given up the worldly traditions of Christmas giving gifts and partying entirely, and many of them seem quite happy to have done so. Of course most people are still quite satisfied with the status quo, and there are many that will get very angry with you if you dare to suggest that the way that Americans celebrate Christmas has got way out of control and is quite opposed to the true spirit of Christ—you could even call it “Anti-Christmas” or “Antichrist-mas”.
Nature abhors a vacuum. Take something away and something has to fill the gap. So we shouldn’t be surprised that when we turn away from or become indifferent to God, then it is natural to replace the 40-DAYS OF LENT—where we do without things—with the 40-DAYS OF pLENTy—where we stuff ourselves with things! For most Americans the biggest holiday of the year is all about “stuff” ― they are going to buy “stuff”; they are going to give “stuff”; they are going to get “stuff”; and, at table, they are going to get “stuffed”! As a society, we are obsessed with things, but those things are never going to make us happy. As Our Lord said: “For what does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and suffers the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26) … “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth! … But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven! … Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things shall be added unto you!” (Matthew 6:19-24, 33).
Over this opulent and self-indulgent season we do well to recall the encounter of Jesus with the well-intentioned, pious, rich young man: “And behold, a certain rich young man, a ruler, running up and kneeling before Him, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth! What is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! If thou wilt be perfect, go sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he was very rich and had great possessions. And Jesus, seeing him become sorrowful, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (combined account of Matthew 19:16-24; Mark 10:17-23; Luke 18:18-25).
The whole purpose and point of the spiritual life or ascetical life is a progressive and increasing detachment from the world and its persons and things. That is the only way that we can truly fulfill the greatest commandment: “
Slavery to Stuff & Addiction to Debt
Has there ever been a major holiday season more focused on materialism than the modern American Thanksgiving-Christmas 40-Day Season of (P)LENT(Y)? Statistics show that Americans, on the whole, are spending more each year. Have incomes gone up accordingly? Of course not! In fact, real median household income in the United States has been experiencing a steady long-term decline. So in order to fund all of our Christmas spending, people have got to go into even more debt.
In fact, one Pew Research Center survey found that approximately 70% of all Americans believe that “debt is a necessity in their lives”. But then they have to work their fingers to the bone to try to make the payments on all of that debt, not realizing that debt systematically impoverishes them. It may be hard to believe, but if you have a single dollar in your pocket and no debt, you have a greater net worth than 25% of all Americans. I know that sounds crazy, but it is true!
Running-Up a Debt with God!
Never has the world sinned as much and as blatantly as it sins today―yet instead of penance, it practices extravagance. As Our Lady foretold: “The spirit of impurity that will permeate the atmosphere during these times. Like a filthy ocean, it will run through the streets, squares and public places with an astonishing liberty. There will be almost no virgin souls in the world … Moreover, in these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost ... People will think of nothing but amusement … and the spirits of darkness will spread everywhere a universal slackening of all that concerns the service of God!” (Our Lady of Good Success, La Salette, Akita).
As Our Lady revealed to Blessed Sister Elena Aiello (1895-1961)―mystic, stigmatic, victim soul, prophetess and foundress of the Minim Tertiaries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ―Our Lady, in an apparition on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8th, 1956, said to her: “People are offending God too much! Were I to show you all the sins committed on a single day, you would surely die of grief! These are grave times. The world is in total turmoil, because it is in a worse condition than at the time of the deluge. Materialism marches on, ever fomenting bloody strifes and fratricidal struggles. Clear signs foretell that peace is in danger. That scourge, like the shadow of a dark cloud, is now moving across mankind! Only my power, as Mother of God, is preventing the outbreak of the storm. All is hanging on a slender thread. When that thread shall snap, Divine Justice shall pounce upon the world and execute its dreadful, purging designs. All the nations shall be punished―because sins, like a muddy river, are now covering all the Earth.”
This is why St. Jacinta Marto, once of the three Fatima seers, exclaimed to the Mother Superior of the religious-run hospital where she spent her last days before dying: “O flee luxury! Flee from riches! Love holy poverty and silence!
Another Kind of Debt We Owe God
Speaking of debts―there is another debt, other than the debt for sin, that we owe God. Few people ever think of it, but it is a debt that offends God greatly. What is that debt? It is the debt of gratitude and thankfulness! As already stated above― God showers the world with an incessant flow of innumerable gifts, favors and mercies. As Our Lord said, God even shows His kindness to those that are indifferent to Him, or who ignore Him, or even hate Him: ““Your Father, Who is in Heaven, makes His sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and makes His rain fall upon the just and the unjust!” (Matthew 5:45). Every good gift ultimately comes from God―though God might use this or that person, or this or that aspect of nature to bring it to us. Yet, as a whole, we are extremely ungrateful or even ignorant of what God has done and is doing for us.
Thanksgiving on a Plate by St. Thomas Aquinas
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica (IIa-IIae, question 106), serves up a meal for the mind to chew over with the question of “Thankfulness or Gratitude.” He first of all points out that thankfulness or gratitude is something that is owed out of justice―he then later goes on to show that thankfulness and gratitude also stems from charity.
► GRATITUDE IS A DEBT IN JUSTICE―First of all the justice aspect. St. Thomas writes:
“Thankfulness a special part of justice (it is something that we owe for a gift or favor) … The nature of the debt to be paid by us, varies according to various different causes giving rise to our debt of gratitude … Now the cause of debt is found primarily and chiefly in God, because He is the first principle of all our goods. Secondarily we owe a debt to our father, because he begot us and raised us. Thirdly we owe a debt of gratitude to the person from whom general favors proceed. Fourthly a debt of gratitude is owed to a benefactor, from whom we have received particular and private favors, on account of which we are under particular obligation to him.
“Accordingly, since what we owe God, or our father, or a person excelling in dignity, is not the same as what we owe a benefactor from whom we have received some particular favor, it follows that after religion, whereby we pay God due worship, and piety, whereby we worship our parents, and observance, whereby we worship persons excelling in dignity, there is thankfulness or gratitude, whereby we give thanks to our benefactors … The virtue of thankfulness or gratitude answers to the moral debt by paying the debt spontaneously. Thanksgiving is less thankful when it is compelled. Friendship is preserved by repayment of favors, although repayment of favors belongs specially to the virtue of gratitude.”
► WHO OWES MORE GRATITUDE―THE SAINT OR SINNER? On the tricky question whether an innocent or just person is more bound to give thanks to God than the penitent―because the greater the gift one has received from God, the more one is bound to give Him thanks. Now the gift of innocence is greater than that of justice restored. Therefore it seems that the innocent is more bound to give thanks to God than the penitent sinner. Besides, the favor of divine grace is more continuous in the innocent person than in the penitent sinner―who has lost grace. St. Thomas replies as follows:
“On the contrary, it is written: ‘To whom more is forgiven, he loveth more … To whom less is forgiven, he loveth less’ (Luke 7:47). Therefore for the same reason he is bound to greater thanksgiving to whom more has been forgiven. Thanksgiving in the recipient must correspond to the favor granted by the giver―so that when there is greater favor on the part of the giver, greater thanks are due on the part of the recipient. The penitent is more bound to give thanks than the innocent, because what he receives from God is more gratuitously given―since, whereas he was deserving of punishment, he has received mercy and grace. Wherefore, although the gift bestowed on the innocent is considered greater objectively speaking, yet the mercy and grace bestowed on the penitent is greater in relation to him (subjectively)―just as a small gift bestowed on a poor man is greater to him than a great gift is to a rich man.”
► IS EVERYONE TO BE THANKED? On the question of whether a man is bound to give thanks to every benefactor? St. Thomas says:
“It is written: ‘In all things give thanks’ (1 Thessalonians 5:18). God turns all things to Himself because He is the cause of all. A benefactor is cause of the benefit. Hence the natural order requires that he who has received a favor, should repay the favor to his benefactor according to his means. Promptness enhances, delay discounts a favor … It is the height of malevolence to refuse to recognize a kindness … Gratitude is due even to a slave, when he does more than his duty … Kindness depends on the heart rather than on the deed, so too gratitude depends chiefly the heart. Hence, whoever receives a favor gratefully, has already begun to pay it back―and that we must be grateful for favors that we have received should be shown by the outpouring of our heart, not only in the benefactor’s hearing, but everywhere … There are many ways of repaying those who are well off, whatever we happen to owe them; such as good advice, frequent fellowship, affable and pleasant conversation without flattery.”
► WHEN TO REPAY? On the question of when to repay a favor, St. Thomas says that it is better to wait for an appropriate time rather than immediately return a favor:
“Some object that it seems necessary that a man is bound to repay a favor at once. For we are bound to restore at once what we owe, unless the term be fixed. Therefore a man is bound to repay a favor at once. Furthermore, a good action would seem to be all the more praiseworthy if it done earnestly and earnestness makes a person do his duty without any delay. Yet, I answer on the contrary! He that hastens to repay, is animated with a sense, not of gratitude but of indebtedness or obligation. Just as two things are to be considered in doing a favor―namely, the affection of the heart and the gift given―so also must these things be considered in repaying the favor. Do you wish to repay a favor? Receive it graciously! As regards the gift, one ought to wait until such a time as will be convenient to the benefactor. For, if instead of choosing a convenient time, one repays at once, favor for favor, it would not seem to be a virtuous, but a constrained or obligated repayment. For, he that wishes to repay too soon, is an unwilling debtor, and an unwilling debtor is ungrateful. Just as favors should be granted at a convenient time and without delay when that convenient time comes; and the same is to be observed in repaying favors.”
► WHAT COUNTS MORE―THE DISPOSITION OR THE DEED? On the question of whether, in giving thanks for a favor, we should look at the benefactor’s disposition or at the deed? In other words, should our focus be on the benefactor’s, intentions, attitude and sentiment that was behind the benefactor granting us a favor, or whether our focus should be on what was given to us or done for us? St. Thomas answers:
“We are sometimes under a greater obligation to someone who has given a little with a large heart, and has bestowed a small favor, yet willingly. Repayment of a favor depends more on the disposition of the giver than on the effect … A kindly action consists not in a deed or a gift, but in the disposition of the giver or doer … God alone sees person’s disposition in itself―but, in so far as it is shown by certain signs, we can also know it. It is thus that a benefactor’s disposition is known by the way in which he does the kindly action―for instance through his doing it joyfully and readily.”
► DO I GIVE BACK MORE THAN I GOT? The last question St. Thomas considers is whether the repayment of gratitude should surpass the favor received? To this he answers:
“We should repay those who are gracious to us, by being gracious to them return, and this is done by repaying more than we have received. Therefore gratitude should incline to do something greater. Gratitude regards the favor received according the intention of the benefactor―who is deserving of praise for having freely conferred the favor without being bound to do so. Wherefore the beneficiary is under a moral obligation to bestow something freely in return. Now he does not seem to bestow something freely, unless he exceeds the quantity of the favor received―because, so long as he repays less or an equivalent, he would seem to do nothing freely or extra, but only to return what he has received. Therefore gratitude always inclines, as far as possible, to pay back something more … The debt of gratitude flows from charity, which the more it is paid the more it is due, according to Romans 13:8―’Owe no man anything, but to love one another.’ Wherefore it is not unreasonable if the obligation of gratitude has no limit.”
Without God We Have Nothing!
The problem with modern man is that he is inflated and puffed-up with his false sense of “self-sufficiency”―which is seen in phrases such as “self-made-man”, “DIY or do-it-yourself”, “I did it my way!”, “I got to where I am by myself!”, “I’m independent, not dependent!”, etc., etc.
God answers: “What hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” (1 Corinthians 4:7) … “Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17) … “Without Me―you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) … “For if any man think himself to be something―whereas he is nothing―he deceives himself” (Galatians 6:3) … “For it is God who works in you, both to will and to accomplish―according to His good will” (Philippians 2:13).
Article 19
Tuesday November 21st, 2023
Turkey or Golden-Calf?
Tuesday November 21st, 2023
Turkey or Golden-Calf?
What will it be? Thanksgiving Turkey or Golden Calf?
In the USA, the national Thanksgiving Day celebrations kick-off a season of spending, socializing, eating, drinking and partying that will go until the end of the New Year’s Eve festivities. For the shops and stores it is the highest spending season of the year, with many taking 50% of sales in that highly materialistic period. Just as we have our 40 Days of Lent—the USA secular world has its 40 Days of Spent Money! We spend our 40 Days of Lent fasting—they spend 40 Days of Fast Living! Thanksgiving parties, soon to be followed by office or school Christmas parties in the lead up to Christmas, these are followed by the Christmas Week parties going from one place to another, culminated with the New Year’s Eve party.
This holiday season is heavily sprinkled with spending on gifts, food, alcohol, entertainment and decorations, with one of its high-spots being the day after Thanksgiving Day (Thursday), which is called “Black Friday”―when many items in shops and stores are sold at “give-away” prices. Over $1.1 billion ($1,100 million) will be spent on turkeys alone—with around 50 million turkeys “biting the bullet” to be served on our platters on Thanksgiving Day. Yet that $1.1 billion melts away when compared to the money spent on the modern-day “Golden Calf” that is found in the shops, stores, malls and online retailers!
The Original Golden Calf
The story of the Golden Calf is found in the Book of Exodus 32:1–6. The children of Israel had been in bondage in Egypt for over two hundred years. God called Moses, the deliverer, and told him that He had heard their cries and was about to deliver them (Exodus 3:6–8). During their time in Egypt (a symbol of sin), the Israelites had apparently begun to doubt the existence of the God their fathers worshiped, because Moses anticipated some hard questions from them (Exodus 3:13). The people of the Middle East were very religious, but they also worshiped many gods. To help Moses prove the existence and power of God, he was given a number of miraculous signs to help the Israelites believe. After all of these miracles were done, including the ten plagues on the Egyptians. The ten plagues God, brought on the Egyptians, were judgments against specific gods they worshiped and showed that the Lord was greater than all of those false gods. They passed through the Red Sea on dry land, while the Egyptian army was drowned, and they were brought to the mountain of God to receive His laws. The Israelites came out of Egypt with a renewed belief in the God of their fathers.
While Moses was up on the mountain receiving God’s laws, the people were getting anxious down on the plain. Moses spent forty days (Exodus 24:18) up on the mountain with God, and by the end of that time, the people were beginning to think Moses had died, or left them. The people urged Aaron, their temporary leader, to make gods for them to follow. Since they were accustomed to having visual representations of gods, this was the natural (but sinful) result of their thinking. Aaron took their gold earrings, which they had brought from Egypt, and melted them down to make a golden idol. The idol he crafted for them was a calf, but Aaron maintained the name of the Lord in connection with it (Exodus 32:5). He was merging the pagan practices they were familiar with and the worship of the God they were just beginning to be re-acquainted with. Aaron called the people together and told them that the Golden Calf was the god who delivered them from Egypt. The people offered sacrifices and then engaged in pagan rituals, including orgies (Exodus 32:25) to worship this new god.
“And the people did what he had commanded, bringing the earrings to Aaron. And when he had received them, he fashioned them by founders’ work, and made of them a molten calf. And they said: ‘These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt!’ And when Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it, and made proclamation by a crier’s voice, saying: ‘Tomorrow is the solemnity of the Lord!’ And rising in the morning, they offered holocausts, and peace victims, and the people sat down to eat, and drink, and they rose up to play” (Exodus 32:3-6).
“And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Go, get thee down! Thy people, which thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt, hath sinned! They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst show them: and they have made to themselves a molten calf, and have adored it, and sacrificing victims to it, have said: “These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt!”‘ And again the Lord said to Moses: ‘See that this people is stiff-necked! Let me alone, that My wrath may be kindled against them, and that I may destroy them!’” (Exodus 32:7-10).
Moses went down from the mountain, but upon seeing the calf, he became angry. Moses burnt the Golden Calf in a fire, ground it to powder, scattered it on water, and forced the Israelites to drink it. When Moses asked him, Aaron admitted collecting the gold, and throwing it into the fire, saying that it strangely or magically came out as a calf! (Exodus 32:21-24). Why did Aaron do this? Holy Scripture doesn’t give us the full answer, but we can put certain clues together and get a fairly good picture.
Firstly, the people’s long familiarity with idol worship would incline them to follow that pagan method in the absence of clear direction. It is likely that the people had not yet received the commands against idol worship, since Moses was yet to come down with the tablets of the law.
Secondly, they were already in the habit of merging their beliefs with those of the people around them, a practice that would continue to plague them throughout the kingdom years.
Thirdly, Aaron was faced with an unruly crowd that placed a demand on him. The solution of making an idol and calling it by God’s name seemed fairly reasonable. Why did he choose a calf? His lame excuse to Moses--basically “It just came out of the fire like this!” (Exodus 32:24)—was just a feeble attempt to dodge blame. He fashioned it with a graving tool (Exodus 32:4) and took great care to form it that way.
How come Aaron escaped punishment? Though he was not punished at that exact time, Aaron would later die in the wilderness and would never enter the Promised Land. Aaron also endured the loss of two of his adult sons in a judgment from God. Aaron’s time after the golden calf incident included many difficulties that could be seen as a punishment.
The severity of God’s punishment towards His Chosen People, prefigures and matches what Our Lady has foretold about the imminent punishment that awaits our materialistic world, which “thinks of nothing but amusements”. It is interesting to note of the two million original Israelites that left Egypt with Moses, only two actually entered the Promised Land! The rest died in the wilderness over the 40 years punishment of being exiled in the desert.
Same Golden Calf Mistake Happens Again
According to 3 Kings 12:26–30, after Jeroboam breaks away establishes the northern Kingdom of Israel, he contemplates the sacrificial practices of the Israelites. His concern was that the tendency of all Israelites to offer sacrifices in Jerusalem, which is in the southern Kingdom of Juda, and feared that if his subjects in the breakaway northern Kingdom would lead to a return to King Roboam of Juda. So Jeroboam makes two Golden Calves and places them in Bethel and Dan, as substitutes for the Temple to God that had been built by King Solomon in Jerusalem.
“And Jeroboam said in his heart: ‘Now shall the kingdom return to the house of David, if this people go up to offer sacrifices in the house of the Lord at Jerusalem: and the heart of this people will turn to their lord, Roboam the king of Juda, and they will kill me, and return to him!’ And finding out a device he made two Golden Calves, and said to them: ‘Go ye up no more to Jerusalem! Behold thy gods, O Israel, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt!’ And he set the one in Bethel, and the other in Dan: and this thing became an occasion of sin: for the people went to adore the calf as far as Dan” (3 Kings 12:26-30).
The declarations of Aaron and Jeroboam are almost identical: “These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt” (Exodus 32:4, 8); “Behold thy gods, O Israel, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt!” (3 Kings 12:28). After making the Golden Calf or golden calves, both Aaron and Jeroboam celebrate festivals. Aaron builds an altar and Jeroboam ascends an altar (Exodus 32:5–6; 3 Kings 12:32–33).
The Modern-Day Golden Calf
Moses was absent―being on Mount Sinai, for forty days and forty nights―when the Israelites, under the high priest Aaron, made their Golden Calf. Similarly today, we have a period of around forty days and forty nights from Thanksgiving Day until New Year’s Day (this year it’s 39 days, in 2022 it was 38 days, in 2018 it was 40 days).
Retailers should expect a historic holiday shopping turnout over Thanksgiving weekend, The National Retail Federation says. NRF predicts about 182 million people will participate in the 2023 shopping holiday from Thanksgiving Day on November 23rd, through Black Friday on November 24th to Cyber Monday on November 27th. That’s 15.7 million more people than participated last year, and the highest estimate since NRF started tracking in 2017.
NRF projects total holiday spending across November and December to grow 3% to 4% over 2022 levels. Those sales are expected to come in between $957.3 billion and $966.6 billion, compared to $929.5 billion in 2022. The organization also predicts online shopping in the period to grow 7% to 9% to between $273.7 billion and $278.8 billion. That will be an increase from $255.8 billion last year.
Mother Said…
As Our Lady forewarned that people “will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain ... In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost” … “People will think of nothing but amusements” … “Passions will erupt and there will be a corruption of morals ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals” (Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette).
Seeking Happiness Where?
Millions upon millions of Americans will flock to the malls and big box stores in a desperate attempt to make themselves happy. They are oblivious or indifferent to Our Lady’s words to St. Bernadette at Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!”—which merely echoes Our Lord’s words: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal.
For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Horrible Holidays?
Sadly, those efforts in seeking earthly happiness, during and by means of this 40-day holiday season, will be all in vain. In fact, for many (if not most) worldly people, Christmas can end up being the unhappiest season of the year. The suicide rate spikes to the highest level of the year during “the holidays”, and 45% of all Americans report that they dread the Christmas season. The medical field tells us that usually, for many people, this euphoria (real or wished for) leads to the post-partying depression of the New Year. Just as it is with many drug-addicts, the highs are followed by the lows—as one “comes-down” from the highly intoxicating life of pleasure. The following is an excerpt from a Psychology Today article:
“We are told that Christmas, for Christians, should be the happiest time of year, an opportunity to be joyful and grateful with family, friends and colleagues. Yet, according to the National Institute of Health, Christmas is the time of year that people experience the highest incidence of depression. Hospitals and police forces report the highest incidences of suicide and attempted suicide. Psychiatrists, psychologists and other mental health professionals report a significant increase in patients complaining about depression. One North American survey reported that 45% of respondents dreaded the festive season.”
40 Days of Lent & 40 Days of (p)Lent(y)
In recent years, an increasing number of Americans have given up the worldly traditions of Christmas giving gifts and partying entirely, and many of them seem quite happy to have done so. Of course most people are still quite satisfied with the status quo, and there are many that will get very angry with you if you dare to suggest that the way that Americans celebrate Christmas has got way out of control and is quite opposed to the true spirit of Christ—you could even call it “Antichrist-mas”. Nature abhors a vacuum. Take something away and something has to fill the gap. So we shouldn’t be surprised that when we turn away from or become indifferent to God, then it is natural to replace the 40-DAYS OF LENT—where we do without things—with the 40-DAYS OF pLENTy—where we stuff ourselves with things! For most Americans the biggest holiday of the year is all about the “stuff” they are going to buy, the “stuff” they are going to give and the “stuff” they are going to get! As a society, we are obsessed with things, but those things are never going to make us happy.
Slavery to Stuff & Addiction to Debt
Has there ever been a major holiday season more focused on materialism than the modern American Thanksgiving-Christmas 40-Day Season of (p)Lent(y)? Statistics show that Americans, on the whole, are spending more each year. Have incomes gone up accordingly? Of course not! In fact, real median household income in the United States has been experiencing a steady long-term decline. So in order to fund all of our Christmas spending, people have got to go into even more debt. In fact, one Pew Research Center survey found that approximately 70% of all Americans believe that “debt is a necessity in their lives”. But then they have to work our fingers to the bone to try to make the payments on all of that debt, not realizing that debt systematically impoverishes them. It may be hard to believe, but if you have a single dollar in your pocket and no debt, you have a greater net worth than 25% of all Americans. I know that sounds crazy, but it is true!
Too Fat For Heaven!
All this fattening of ourselves—like a Thanksgiving Turkey—makes us ‘too fat’ for Heaven. Our Lord gives us that wonderful thought provoking similitude: “
Two of the Evangelist give an account of this hard-hitting incident. St. Mark writes: “A certain man running up and kneeling before Jesus, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou knowest the commandments! Do not commit adultery, do not kill, do not steal, bear not false witness, do no fraud, honor thy father and mother!’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Master, all these things I have observed from my youth!’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! Go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me!’ Who, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful―for he had great possessions. And Jesus, looking round about, saith to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God!’ And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus again answering, said to them: ‘Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God!’ The disciples wondered the more, saying among themselves: ‘Who, then, can be saved?’ And Jesus looking on them, said: ‘With men it is impossible; but not with God! For all things are possible with God!’” (Mark 10:17-27).
St. Matthew also reports this terribly instructive incident—if we can watch a movie twice; take a second helping of that Thanksgiving turkey, or listen to a song twice, let us listen to St. Matthew’s account too: “And behold one came and said to Jesus: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ He said to him: ‘Which?’ And Jesus said: ‘Thou shalt do no murder, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness. Honor thy father and thy mother. And, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions! Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible! But with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:16-26).
Am I getting ‘too fat’ for Heaven? Will I fit through the gate? Will they have to knock down the Gates of Heaven and build bigger ones, so that I can fit through them?
This vanity, emptiness, fruitlessness and pointlessness of goods, wealth and “stuff” is further pointed out in one of Our Lord’s similitudes: “‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?’ And he said: “This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and will build greater ones; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods. And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years! Take thy rest; eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee: and whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God! And He said to His disciples: ‘Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat; nor for your body, what you shall put on. The life is more than the meat, and the body is more than the clothing!’” (Luke 12:16-23).
Saints Who Fled To Find Christ
Yet, there were saints who would deliberately, willingly and joyfully flee the attractions of the world in order to “Seek first the Kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31), so that they could better fulfill the commandment to “love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind” (Luke 10:27). The Desert Fathers (and Mothers) are a case in point, they fled to the desert regions, both in times of persecution and times of peace, in order to better sanctify themselves by avoiding the world: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God.” (James 4:4).
The account of Martha and Mary is especially applicable to this time of the year: “A certain woman named Martha, received Jesus into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sitting also at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Who stood and said: ‘Lord, hast Thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me.’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha, Martha, thou art careful, and art troubled about many things: but one thing is necessary. Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42). It’s our choice, what have we chosen? What will we choose? To be busy with the world and neglect the Word; or be busy with the Word and neglect the world?
What Meat Do We Labor For?
What meat do we labor for? The turkey of this world, or the meat of Heaven. Our Lord said: “Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting!” (John 6:27). What is that meat? “Jesus said to them: ‘My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, that I may perfect His work!’” (John 4:34). Of course we have to work and eat, but we do not live to eat, but eat merely to live. Sadly, the opposite is true today, for the world is full of persons “whose God is their belly; and who mind earthly things.” (Philippians 3:19). Too much emphasis is placed on busying ourselves with the things of this world, and not enough emphasis on busying ourselves with the Word of God—whether it be the Word made flesh, as in the Holy Eucharist, or in the Word written and recorded in Holy Scripture. For “Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word of God” (Luke 4:4), and Jesus is “the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God ... And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth” (John 1:1; 1:14).
Giving Thanks For His Flesh and Blood
At Caphernaum, after performing the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand, Jesus said to the Jews: “‘Amen, amen I say to you, you seek Me, not because you have seen miracles, but because you did eat of the loaves, and were filled. Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting, which the Son of man will give you!”
“They said therefore unto him: ‘What shall we do, that we may work the works of God? … What sign therefore dost Thou show that we may see and may believe Thee? What dost Thou work? Our fathers did eat manna in the desert, as it is written: “He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”‘
A Real Meal and Sacrifice Meriting Thanksgiving
“Then Jesus said to them: “Amen, amen I say to you; Moses gave you not bread from Heaven, but My Father giveth you the true Bread from Heaven. For the bread of God is that which cometh down from Heaven, and giveth life to the world!’ They said therefore unto Him: ‘Lord, give us always this bread!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘I am the Bread of Life: he that cometh to Me shall not hunger: and he that believeth in Me shall never thirst.’
“The Jews therefore murmured at Him, because He had said: ‘I am the living Bread which came down from Heaven.’ And they said: ‘Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How then saith He, “I came down from Heaven?”‘
“Jesus therefore answered, and said to them: ‘Murmur not among yourselves. Amen, amen I say unto you: I am the Bread of Life. Your fathers did eat manna in the desert, and are dead. This is the Bread which cometh down from Heaven; that if any man eat of it, he may not die. I am the living Bread which came down from Heaven. If any man eat of this Bread, he shall live forever; and the Bread that I will give, is My flesh, for the life of the world!’
“The Jews therefore argued among themselves, saying: ‘How can this Man give us His flesh to eat?’ Then Jesus said to them: ‘Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eateth My Flesh, and drinketh My Blood, hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day. For My Flesh is meat indeed: and My Blood is drink indeed. He that eateth My Flesh, and drinketh My Blood, abideth in Me, and I in him. He that eateth Me, the same also shall live by Me. This is the Bread that came down from Heaven. Not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead. He that eateth this Bread, shall live forever!’
“These things He said, teaching in the synagogue, in Capharnaum. Many, therefore, of His disciples, hearing it, said: ‘This saying is hard, and who can take it?’ But Jesus, knowing in Himself, that His disciples murmured at this, said to them: ‘Doth this scandalize you?’ After this many of His disciples went back; and walked no more with Him. Then Jesus said to the Twelve: ‘Will you also go away?’ And Simon Peter answered Him: ‘Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we have believed and have known, that thou art the Christ, the Son of God!’” (John 6:25-70).
“Thanks to His Body!”
In the Encyclical on the Sacred Liturgy, Pius XII explains that, “Christ,” and not just the soul of Christ, “is present under the Eucharistic species … with His true body and blood.” The pope quotes a memorable passage from St. John Chrystostom, telling us how we should react when we appear in the presence of our Eucharistic Lord. “When you see the Blessed Sacrament exposed, say to yourself: ‘Thanks to this body, I am no longer dust and ashes, I am no more a captive but a free human being. Hence I hope to obtain Heaven and the good things that are there in store for me, eternal life, the heritage of the angels, companionship with Christ; death has not destroyed this body which was pierced by nails and scourged . . . this is that body which was once covered with blood, pierced by a lance, from which issued saving fountains upon the world, one of blood and the other of water . . . This body He gave us to keep and to eat, as a mark of His intense love.’”
Jesus Complains of a Lack of Love and Thanksgiving
In His revelations to St. Margaret Mary, Our Lord repeatedly asked for acts of love and adoration, thanksgiving and reparation to His Sacred Heart. Thanksgiving Day has become a time of family reunions—and how would a parent not be grieved about a child who could “come home” and spend the day with its parents, but neglected to do so because it had ‘better’ things to do. It is much the same with Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist—Who awaits our visits and our communions, but they are rare, or cold, or indifferent, or insincere, or rushed!
Time After Communion is Special
There is one occasion especially when these acts of love, adoration and thanksgiving are most efficacious: this is during the time after Holy Communion when the Sacramental Species have not yet disintegrated within our body. The writings of the saints are filled with praise of the blessings that come to a soul that is properly disposed while in physical contact with the Sacred Heart. “The time after Communion,” says St. Teresa of Avila, “is the best time for negotiating with Jesus Christ; for then He is in the soul, seated, as it were, on a throne of grace, and saying, as He said to the blind man: ‘What wilt thou that I should do to thee?’”
Thanksgiving After Mass a MUST
But even more authoritative is the exhortation of Pope Pius XII in his encyclical, Mediator Dei, where he devotes a full six paragraphs to this single subject. “When Mass is finished,” he directs that, “the person who has received the Eucharist should recollect himself, and in intimate union with the Divine Master hold loving and fruitful converse with Him.” If this seems like stressing the obvious, the Pope does not think so. He complains there are some teachers who discourage such private communication between the soul and the Eucharistic Christ “When the Mass, which is subject to special rules of the liturgy, is over, the person who has received holy communion is not thereby freed from his duty of thanksgiving; rather, it is most becoming that, when the Mass is finished, the person who has received the Eucharist should recollect himself, and in intimate union with the divine Master hold loving and fruitful converse with Him. Hence they have departed from the straight way of truth, who, adhering to the letter rather than the sense, assert and teach that, when Mass has ended, no such thanksgiving should be added … because the Mass is itself a thanksgiving.” Yes, the Mass, besides being a sacrifice and a propitiation for our sins, is also a public act of adoration and thanksgiving—but it does not excuse or dispense us from our own personal acts of thanksgiving that should continue long after the Mass has finished—throughout the rest of the day!
Our Lady and St. Charbel
Our Lady, as revealed to the mystics, would often spend as much as three hours in thanksgiving after Holy Communion. St. Charbel Makhlouf spent most of his day in thanksgiving for Holy Mass and Holy Communion—the rest of the day was spent in preparation for the next day’s Mass and Holy Communion! How terrible are our “fast-track-thanks” after Holy Communion, that are performed on “auto-pilot” without any or little sincerity, warmth or zeal. We don’t really mean what we say, nor do we really say what we mean, nor do we hang around long enough to say it! Our Lord must think to Himself what He once said of the upholders of tradition and religion in His own day: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
Abuse and Neglect of Thanksgiving
Thus, Pope Pius XII states in his encyclical: “Why then, should we not approve of those who, when they receive Holy Communion, remain on in closest familiarity with their divine Redeemer―even after the congregation has been officially dismissed, and that not only for the consolation of conversing with Him, but also to render Him due thanks and praise … We exhort them to do so in a special ... The author of that golden book, The Imitation of Christ, certainly speaks in accordance with the letter and the spirit of the liturgy, when he gives the following advice to the person who approaches the altar, ‘Remain on in secret [after Mass is over] and take delight in your God; for He is yours whom the whole world cannot take away from you” (Pope Pius XII, Mediator Dei).
Hence it is not liturgical, nor worthy of the priests, religious or the faithful, to disappear from the pews once Mass is finished. They wrongly think that their obligation of thanksgiving has ended with the Mass! Not so! The end of Mass is only the beginning of their obligation. But, in practice, how many people ever spend any time in prayer after Mass at which they received Holy Communion? Yet Pope Pius XII insists that this is not a mere spiritual luxury, but “such personal conversations are very necessary, so that we may all enjoy more fully the supernatural treasures that are contained in the Eucharist and that Christ Our Lord may exert the greatest possible influence on the souls of all.”
The Turkey, the Calf or the Lamb?
What, then, will be our focus? The Thanksgiving Turkey on the table with the leftovers in the fridge? Of the Golden Calves being sold at discount prices in the ‘tabernacles’ (stores) of the malls? Or the Lamb of God sacrificed on the altar and stored in the tabernacles of the world? We know the answer in theory, but will it be the same in practice?
In the USA, the national Thanksgiving Day celebrations kick-off a season of spending, socializing, eating, drinking and partying that will go until the end of the New Year’s Eve festivities. For the shops and stores it is the highest spending season of the year, with many taking 50% of sales in that highly materialistic period. Just as we have our 40 Days of Lent—the USA secular world has its 40 Days of Spent Money! We spend our 40 Days of Lent fasting—they spend 40 Days of Fast Living! Thanksgiving parties, soon to be followed by office or school Christmas parties in the lead up to Christmas, these are followed by the Christmas Week parties going from one place to another, culminated with the New Year’s Eve party.
This holiday season is heavily sprinkled with spending on gifts, food, alcohol, entertainment and decorations, with one of its high-spots being the day after Thanksgiving Day (Thursday), which is called “Black Friday”―when many items in shops and stores are sold at “give-away” prices. Over $1.1 billion ($1,100 million) will be spent on turkeys alone—with around 50 million turkeys “biting the bullet” to be served on our platters on Thanksgiving Day. Yet that $1.1 billion melts away when compared to the money spent on the modern-day “Golden Calf” that is found in the shops, stores, malls and online retailers!
The Original Golden Calf
The story of the Golden Calf is found in the Book of Exodus 32:1–6. The children of Israel had been in bondage in Egypt for over two hundred years. God called Moses, the deliverer, and told him that He had heard their cries and was about to deliver them (Exodus 3:6–8). During their time in Egypt (a symbol of sin), the Israelites had apparently begun to doubt the existence of the God their fathers worshiped, because Moses anticipated some hard questions from them (Exodus 3:13). The people of the Middle East were very religious, but they also worshiped many gods. To help Moses prove the existence and power of God, he was given a number of miraculous signs to help the Israelites believe. After all of these miracles were done, including the ten plagues on the Egyptians. The ten plagues God, brought on the Egyptians, were judgments against specific gods they worshiped and showed that the Lord was greater than all of those false gods. They passed through the Red Sea on dry land, while the Egyptian army was drowned, and they were brought to the mountain of God to receive His laws. The Israelites came out of Egypt with a renewed belief in the God of their fathers.
While Moses was up on the mountain receiving God’s laws, the people were getting anxious down on the plain. Moses spent forty days (Exodus 24:18) up on the mountain with God, and by the end of that time, the people were beginning to think Moses had died, or left them. The people urged Aaron, their temporary leader, to make gods for them to follow. Since they were accustomed to having visual representations of gods, this was the natural (but sinful) result of their thinking. Aaron took their gold earrings, which they had brought from Egypt, and melted them down to make a golden idol. The idol he crafted for them was a calf, but Aaron maintained the name of the Lord in connection with it (Exodus 32:5). He was merging the pagan practices they were familiar with and the worship of the God they were just beginning to be re-acquainted with. Aaron called the people together and told them that the Golden Calf was the god who delivered them from Egypt. The people offered sacrifices and then engaged in pagan rituals, including orgies (Exodus 32:25) to worship this new god.
“And the people did what he had commanded, bringing the earrings to Aaron. And when he had received them, he fashioned them by founders’ work, and made of them a molten calf. And they said: ‘These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt!’ And when Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it, and made proclamation by a crier’s voice, saying: ‘Tomorrow is the solemnity of the Lord!’ And rising in the morning, they offered holocausts, and peace victims, and the people sat down to eat, and drink, and they rose up to play” (Exodus 32:3-6).
“And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Go, get thee down! Thy people, which thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt, hath sinned! They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst show them: and they have made to themselves a molten calf, and have adored it, and sacrificing victims to it, have said: “These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt!”‘ And again the Lord said to Moses: ‘See that this people is stiff-necked! Let me alone, that My wrath may be kindled against them, and that I may destroy them!’” (Exodus 32:7-10).
Moses went down from the mountain, but upon seeing the calf, he became angry. Moses burnt the Golden Calf in a fire, ground it to powder, scattered it on water, and forced the Israelites to drink it. When Moses asked him, Aaron admitted collecting the gold, and throwing it into the fire, saying that it strangely or magically came out as a calf! (Exodus 32:21-24). Why did Aaron do this? Holy Scripture doesn’t give us the full answer, but we can put certain clues together and get a fairly good picture.
Firstly, the people’s long familiarity with idol worship would incline them to follow that pagan method in the absence of clear direction. It is likely that the people had not yet received the commands against idol worship, since Moses was yet to come down with the tablets of the law.
Secondly, they were already in the habit of merging their beliefs with those of the people around them, a practice that would continue to plague them throughout the kingdom years.
Thirdly, Aaron was faced with an unruly crowd that placed a demand on him. The solution of making an idol and calling it by God’s name seemed fairly reasonable. Why did he choose a calf? His lame excuse to Moses--basically “It just came out of the fire like this!” (Exodus 32:24)—was just a feeble attempt to dodge blame. He fashioned it with a graving tool (Exodus 32:4) and took great care to form it that way.
How come Aaron escaped punishment? Though he was not punished at that exact time, Aaron would later die in the wilderness and would never enter the Promised Land. Aaron also endured the loss of two of his adult sons in a judgment from God. Aaron’s time after the golden calf incident included many difficulties that could be seen as a punishment.
The severity of God’s punishment towards His Chosen People, prefigures and matches what Our Lady has foretold about the imminent punishment that awaits our materialistic world, which “thinks of nothing but amusements”. It is interesting to note of the two million original Israelites that left Egypt with Moses, only two actually entered the Promised Land! The rest died in the wilderness over the 40 years punishment of being exiled in the desert.
Same Golden Calf Mistake Happens Again
According to 3 Kings 12:26–30, after Jeroboam breaks away establishes the northern Kingdom of Israel, he contemplates the sacrificial practices of the Israelites. His concern was that the tendency of all Israelites to offer sacrifices in Jerusalem, which is in the southern Kingdom of Juda, and feared that if his subjects in the breakaway northern Kingdom would lead to a return to King Roboam of Juda. So Jeroboam makes two Golden Calves and places them in Bethel and Dan, as substitutes for the Temple to God that had been built by King Solomon in Jerusalem.
“And Jeroboam said in his heart: ‘Now shall the kingdom return to the house of David, if this people go up to offer sacrifices in the house of the Lord at Jerusalem: and the heart of this people will turn to their lord, Roboam the king of Juda, and they will kill me, and return to him!’ And finding out a device he made two Golden Calves, and said to them: ‘Go ye up no more to Jerusalem! Behold thy gods, O Israel, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt!’ And he set the one in Bethel, and the other in Dan: and this thing became an occasion of sin: for the people went to adore the calf as far as Dan” (3 Kings 12:26-30).
The declarations of Aaron and Jeroboam are almost identical: “These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt” (Exodus 32:4, 8); “Behold thy gods, O Israel, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt!” (3 Kings 12:28). After making the Golden Calf or golden calves, both Aaron and Jeroboam celebrate festivals. Aaron builds an altar and Jeroboam ascends an altar (Exodus 32:5–6; 3 Kings 12:32–33).
The Modern-Day Golden Calf
Moses was absent―being on Mount Sinai, for forty days and forty nights―when the Israelites, under the high priest Aaron, made their Golden Calf. Similarly today, we have a period of around forty days and forty nights from Thanksgiving Day until New Year’s Day (this year it’s 39 days, in 2022 it was 38 days, in 2018 it was 40 days).
Retailers should expect a historic holiday shopping turnout over Thanksgiving weekend, The National Retail Federation says. NRF predicts about 182 million people will participate in the 2023 shopping holiday from Thanksgiving Day on November 23rd, through Black Friday on November 24th to Cyber Monday on November 27th. That’s 15.7 million more people than participated last year, and the highest estimate since NRF started tracking in 2017.
NRF projects total holiday spending across November and December to grow 3% to 4% over 2022 levels. Those sales are expected to come in between $957.3 billion and $966.6 billion, compared to $929.5 billion in 2022. The organization also predicts online shopping in the period to grow 7% to 9% to between $273.7 billion and $278.8 billion. That will be an increase from $255.8 billion last year.
Mother Said…
As Our Lady forewarned that people “will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain ... In these unhappy times, there will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost” … “People will think of nothing but amusements” … “Passions will erupt and there will be a corruption of morals ... The Christian spirit will rapidly decay until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of morals” (Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette).
Seeking Happiness Where?
Millions upon millions of Americans will flock to the malls and big box stores in a desperate attempt to make themselves happy. They are oblivious or indifferent to Our Lady’s words to St. Bernadette at Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this world, but in the next!”—which merely echoes Our Lord’s words: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal.
For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Horrible Holidays?
Sadly, those efforts in seeking earthly happiness, during and by means of this 40-day holiday season, will be all in vain. In fact, for many (if not most) worldly people, Christmas can end up being the unhappiest season of the year. The suicide rate spikes to the highest level of the year during “the holidays”, and 45% of all Americans report that they dread the Christmas season. The medical field tells us that usually, for many people, this euphoria (real or wished for) leads to the post-partying depression of the New Year. Just as it is with many drug-addicts, the highs are followed by the lows—as one “comes-down” from the highly intoxicating life of pleasure. The following is an excerpt from a Psychology Today article:
“We are told that Christmas, for Christians, should be the happiest time of year, an opportunity to be joyful and grateful with family, friends and colleagues. Yet, according to the National Institute of Health, Christmas is the time of year that people experience the highest incidence of depression. Hospitals and police forces report the highest incidences of suicide and attempted suicide. Psychiatrists, psychologists and other mental health professionals report a significant increase in patients complaining about depression. One North American survey reported that 45% of respondents dreaded the festive season.”
40 Days of Lent & 40 Days of (p)Lent(y)
In recent years, an increasing number of Americans have given up the worldly traditions of Christmas giving gifts and partying entirely, and many of them seem quite happy to have done so. Of course most people are still quite satisfied with the status quo, and there are many that will get very angry with you if you dare to suggest that the way that Americans celebrate Christmas has got way out of control and is quite opposed to the true spirit of Christ—you could even call it “Antichrist-mas”. Nature abhors a vacuum. Take something away and something has to fill the gap. So we shouldn’t be surprised that when we turn away from or become indifferent to God, then it is natural to replace the 40-DAYS OF LENT—where we do without things—with the 40-DAYS OF pLENTy—where we stuff ourselves with things! For most Americans the biggest holiday of the year is all about the “stuff” they are going to buy, the “stuff” they are going to give and the “stuff” they are going to get! As a society, we are obsessed with things, but those things are never going to make us happy.
Slavery to Stuff & Addiction to Debt
Has there ever been a major holiday season more focused on materialism than the modern American Thanksgiving-Christmas 40-Day Season of (p)Lent(y)? Statistics show that Americans, on the whole, are spending more each year. Have incomes gone up accordingly? Of course not! In fact, real median household income in the United States has been experiencing a steady long-term decline. So in order to fund all of our Christmas spending, people have got to go into even more debt. In fact, one Pew Research Center survey found that approximately 70% of all Americans believe that “debt is a necessity in their lives”. But then they have to work our fingers to the bone to try to make the payments on all of that debt, not realizing that debt systematically impoverishes them. It may be hard to believe, but if you have a single dollar in your pocket and no debt, you have a greater net worth than 25% of all Americans. I know that sounds crazy, but it is true!
Too Fat For Heaven!
All this fattening of ourselves—like a Thanksgiving Turkey—makes us ‘too fat’ for Heaven. Our Lord gives us that wonderful thought provoking similitude: “
Two of the Evangelist give an account of this hard-hitting incident. St. Mark writes: “A certain man running up and kneeling before Jesus, asked Him: ‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may receive life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou knowest the commandments! Do not commit adultery, do not kill, do not steal, bear not false witness, do no fraud, honor thy father and mother!’ But he answering, said to him: ‘Master, all these things I have observed from my youth!’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee! Go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me!’ Who, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful―for he had great possessions. And Jesus, looking round about, saith to His disciples: ‘How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God!’ And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus again answering, said to them: ‘Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God!’ The disciples wondered the more, saying among themselves: ‘Who, then, can be saved?’ And Jesus looking on them, said: ‘With men it is impossible; but not with God! For all things are possible with God!’” (Mark 10:17-27).
St. Matthew also reports this terribly instructive incident—if we can watch a movie twice; take a second helping of that Thanksgiving turkey, or listen to a song twice, let us listen to St. Matthew’s account too: “And behold one came and said to Jesus: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments!’ He said to him: ‘Which?’ And Jesus said: ‘Thou shalt do no murder, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness. Honor thy father and thy mother. And, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!’ The young man said to Him: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ Jesus said to him: ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions! Then Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus beholding, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible! But with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:16-26).
Am I getting ‘too fat’ for Heaven? Will I fit through the gate? Will they have to knock down the Gates of Heaven and build bigger ones, so that I can fit through them?
This vanity, emptiness, fruitlessness and pointlessness of goods, wealth and “stuff” is further pointed out in one of Our Lord’s similitudes: “‘The land of a certain rich man brought forth plenty of fruits. And he thought within himself, saying: “What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?’ And he said: “This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and will build greater ones; and into them will I gather all things that are grown to me, and my goods. And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years! Take thy rest; eat, drink, make good cheer!’” But God said to him: “Thou fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee: and whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?” So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich towards God! And He said to His disciples: ‘Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat; nor for your body, what you shall put on. The life is more than the meat, and the body is more than the clothing!’” (Luke 12:16-23).
Saints Who Fled To Find Christ
Yet, there were saints who would deliberately, willingly and joyfully flee the attractions of the world in order to “Seek first the Kingdom of God” (Luke 12:31), so that they could better fulfill the commandment to “love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind” (Luke 10:27). The Desert Fathers (and Mothers) are a case in point, they fled to the desert regions, both in times of persecution and times of peace, in order to better sanctify themselves by avoiding the world: “Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God.” (James 4:4).
The account of Martha and Mary is especially applicable to this time of the year: “A certain woman named Martha, received Jesus into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sitting also at the Lord’s feet, heard His word. But Martha was busy about much serving. Who stood and said: ‘Lord, hast Thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her, therefore, that she help me.’ And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha, Martha, thou art careful, and art troubled about many things: but one thing is necessary. Mary hath chosen the best part, which shall not be taken away from her!’” (Luke 10:38-42). It’s our choice, what have we chosen? What will we choose? To be busy with the world and neglect the Word; or be busy with the Word and neglect the world?
What Meat Do We Labor For?
What meat do we labor for? The turkey of this world, or the meat of Heaven. Our Lord said: “Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting!” (John 6:27). What is that meat? “Jesus said to them: ‘My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, that I may perfect His work!’” (John 4:34). Of course we have to work and eat, but we do not live to eat, but eat merely to live. Sadly, the opposite is true today, for the world is full of persons “whose God is their belly; and who mind earthly things.” (Philippians 3:19). Too much emphasis is placed on busying ourselves with the things of this world, and not enough emphasis on busying ourselves with the Word of God—whether it be the Word made flesh, as in the Holy Eucharist, or in the Word written and recorded in Holy Scripture. For “Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word of God” (Luke 4:4), and Jesus is “the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God ... And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth” (John 1:1; 1:14).
Giving Thanks For His Flesh and Blood
At Caphernaum, after performing the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand, Jesus said to the Jews: “‘Amen, amen I say to you, you seek Me, not because you have seen miracles, but because you did eat of the loaves, and were filled. Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that which endureth unto life everlasting, which the Son of man will give you!”
“They said therefore unto him: ‘What shall we do, that we may work the works of God? … What sign therefore dost Thou show that we may see and may believe Thee? What dost Thou work? Our fathers did eat manna in the desert, as it is written: “He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”‘
A Real Meal and Sacrifice Meriting Thanksgiving
“Then Jesus said to them: “Amen, amen I say to you; Moses gave you not bread from Heaven, but My Father giveth you the true Bread from Heaven. For the bread of God is that which cometh down from Heaven, and giveth life to the world!’ They said therefore unto Him: ‘Lord, give us always this bread!’ And Jesus said to them: ‘I am the Bread of Life: he that cometh to Me shall not hunger: and he that believeth in Me shall never thirst.’
“The Jews therefore murmured at Him, because He had said: ‘I am the living Bread which came down from Heaven.’ And they said: ‘Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How then saith He, “I came down from Heaven?”‘
“Jesus therefore answered, and said to them: ‘Murmur not among yourselves. Amen, amen I say unto you: I am the Bread of Life. Your fathers did eat manna in the desert, and are dead. This is the Bread which cometh down from Heaven; that if any man eat of it, he may not die. I am the living Bread which came down from Heaven. If any man eat of this Bread, he shall live forever; and the Bread that I will give, is My flesh, for the life of the world!’
“The Jews therefore argued among themselves, saying: ‘How can this Man give us His flesh to eat?’ Then Jesus said to them: ‘Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eateth My Flesh, and drinketh My Blood, hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day. For My Flesh is meat indeed: and My Blood is drink indeed. He that eateth My Flesh, and drinketh My Blood, abideth in Me, and I in him. He that eateth Me, the same also shall live by Me. This is the Bread that came down from Heaven. Not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead. He that eateth this Bread, shall live forever!’
“These things He said, teaching in the synagogue, in Capharnaum. Many, therefore, of His disciples, hearing it, said: ‘This saying is hard, and who can take it?’ But Jesus, knowing in Himself, that His disciples murmured at this, said to them: ‘Doth this scandalize you?’ After this many of His disciples went back; and walked no more with Him. Then Jesus said to the Twelve: ‘Will you also go away?’ And Simon Peter answered Him: ‘Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we have believed and have known, that thou art the Christ, the Son of God!’” (John 6:25-70).
“Thanks to His Body!”
In the Encyclical on the Sacred Liturgy, Pius XII explains that, “Christ,” and not just the soul of Christ, “is present under the Eucharistic species … with His true body and blood.” The pope quotes a memorable passage from St. John Chrystostom, telling us how we should react when we appear in the presence of our Eucharistic Lord. “When you see the Blessed Sacrament exposed, say to yourself: ‘Thanks to this body, I am no longer dust and ashes, I am no more a captive but a free human being. Hence I hope to obtain Heaven and the good things that are there in store for me, eternal life, the heritage of the angels, companionship with Christ; death has not destroyed this body which was pierced by nails and scourged . . . this is that body which was once covered with blood, pierced by a lance, from which issued saving fountains upon the world, one of blood and the other of water . . . This body He gave us to keep and to eat, as a mark of His intense love.’”
Jesus Complains of a Lack of Love and Thanksgiving
In His revelations to St. Margaret Mary, Our Lord repeatedly asked for acts of love and adoration, thanksgiving and reparation to His Sacred Heart. Thanksgiving Day has become a time of family reunions—and how would a parent not be grieved about a child who could “come home” and spend the day with its parents, but neglected to do so because it had ‘better’ things to do. It is much the same with Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist—Who awaits our visits and our communions, but they are rare, or cold, or indifferent, or insincere, or rushed!
Time After Communion is Special
There is one occasion especially when these acts of love, adoration and thanksgiving are most efficacious: this is during the time after Holy Communion when the Sacramental Species have not yet disintegrated within our body. The writings of the saints are filled with praise of the blessings that come to a soul that is properly disposed while in physical contact with the Sacred Heart. “The time after Communion,” says St. Teresa of Avila, “is the best time for negotiating with Jesus Christ; for then He is in the soul, seated, as it were, on a throne of grace, and saying, as He said to the blind man: ‘What wilt thou that I should do to thee?’”
Thanksgiving After Mass a MUST
But even more authoritative is the exhortation of Pope Pius XII in his encyclical, Mediator Dei, where he devotes a full six paragraphs to this single subject. “When Mass is finished,” he directs that, “the person who has received the Eucharist should recollect himself, and in intimate union with the Divine Master hold loving and fruitful converse with Him.” If this seems like stressing the obvious, the Pope does not think so. He complains there are some teachers who discourage such private communication between the soul and the Eucharistic Christ “When the Mass, which is subject to special rules of the liturgy, is over, the person who has received holy communion is not thereby freed from his duty of thanksgiving; rather, it is most becoming that, when the Mass is finished, the person who has received the Eucharist should recollect himself, and in intimate union with the divine Master hold loving and fruitful converse with Him. Hence they have departed from the straight way of truth, who, adhering to the letter rather than the sense, assert and teach that, when Mass has ended, no such thanksgiving should be added … because the Mass is itself a thanksgiving.” Yes, the Mass, besides being a sacrifice and a propitiation for our sins, is also a public act of adoration and thanksgiving—but it does not excuse or dispense us from our own personal acts of thanksgiving that should continue long after the Mass has finished—throughout the rest of the day!
Our Lady and St. Charbel
Our Lady, as revealed to the mystics, would often spend as much as three hours in thanksgiving after Holy Communion. St. Charbel Makhlouf spent most of his day in thanksgiving for Holy Mass and Holy Communion—the rest of the day was spent in preparation for the next day’s Mass and Holy Communion! How terrible are our “fast-track-thanks” after Holy Communion, that are performed on “auto-pilot” without any or little sincerity, warmth or zeal. We don’t really mean what we say, nor do we really say what we mean, nor do we hang around long enough to say it! Our Lord must think to Himself what He once said of the upholders of tradition and religion in His own day: “Well did Isaias prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me!’” (Mark 7:6).
Abuse and Neglect of Thanksgiving
Thus, Pope Pius XII states in his encyclical: “Why then, should we not approve of those who, when they receive Holy Communion, remain on in closest familiarity with their divine Redeemer―even after the congregation has been officially dismissed, and that not only for the consolation of conversing with Him, but also to render Him due thanks and praise … We exhort them to do so in a special ... The author of that golden book, The Imitation of Christ, certainly speaks in accordance with the letter and the spirit of the liturgy, when he gives the following advice to the person who approaches the altar, ‘Remain on in secret [after Mass is over] and take delight in your God; for He is yours whom the whole world cannot take away from you” (Pope Pius XII, Mediator Dei).
Hence it is not liturgical, nor worthy of the priests, religious or the faithful, to disappear from the pews once Mass is finished. They wrongly think that their obligation of thanksgiving has ended with the Mass! Not so! The end of Mass is only the beginning of their obligation. But, in practice, how many people ever spend any time in prayer after Mass at which they received Holy Communion? Yet Pope Pius XII insists that this is not a mere spiritual luxury, but “such personal conversations are very necessary, so that we may all enjoy more fully the supernatural treasures that are contained in the Eucharist and that Christ Our Lord may exert the greatest possible influence on the souls of all.”
The Turkey, the Calf or the Lamb?
What, then, will be our focus? The Thanksgiving Turkey on the table with the leftovers in the fridge? Of the Golden Calves being sold at discount prices in the ‘tabernacles’ (stores) of the malls? Or the Lamb of God sacrificed on the altar and stored in the tabernacles of the world? We know the answer in theory, but will it be the same in practice?
Article 18
Monday November 20th, 2023
Thanksgiving Day Dangers
Monday November 20th, 2023
Thanksgiving Day Dangers
Understanding Thanksgiving
Before dealing with the ‘first’ Thanksgiving in America, let us first of all look at Thanksgiving in general and especially the first true Christian Thanksgiving.
The Catholic Church has a history of Christianizing pagan festivals. This should be especially the case with the American secular and naturalistic celebration of “Thanksgiving Day”—which though it not a pagan institution, it has evolved from a Protestant event. Providentially, the American “Thanksgiving Day” is always celebrated on a Thursday―the same day on which Our Lord instituted the Holy Eucharist at the Last Supper. The Greek word “eucharistia” means “thankfulness, gratitude; giving of thanks, thanksgiving” and comes from another similar Greek word “eucharistos” meaning “thankful, grateful”. This, of course, makes us think of the Holy Eucharist. The Greek word “eucharistia” later entered the Latin language, also keeping the form “eucharistia”. The same word, or at least the same root, is found in Hebrew (oikharístia), French (eucharistie), Spanish (eucaristía), English (eucharist), Irish (eocairist), German (eucharistie) and Dutch (eucharistie) languages.
The Last Supper was the Thanksgiving (Eucharistia) par excellence. The Last Supper was the institution of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which gives us the greatest imaginable Gift—Our Lord Jesus Christ, God Himself! Man can never and should never cease to give thanks for this Gift of gifts, this greatest Sharing of all possible sharings! The Last Supper, though primarily a sacrifice, was also meal that Christ commanded to be done again and again in commemoration of Him, of which the Thanksgiving Meal is but a pale secular, non-sacramental, non-grace giving, imitation. In fact, since the Last Supper, you could say that the Sacrifice and its secondary element, the Supper, has never ceased—but has been one long perpetual Sacrifice and Meal. At the Last Supper, Our Lord “whilst they were at supper, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke: and gave to His disciples, and said: ‘Take ye, and eat! This is My Body!’ And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave to them, saying: ‘Drink ye all of this. For this is My Blood of the New Testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!’” (Matthew 26:26-28).
Also at the Last Supper, Our Lord gave a ‘new’ commandment, of which the idea of the American notion of “Thanksgiving Day” is a small piece of the gigantic spiritual jigsaw puzzle. Our Lord said: “A new commandment I give unto you: That you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another!” (John 13:34-35). It is sad to see how many celebrations of Thanksgiving are spoiled and ruined by a lack of charity—by bringing in grudges, hatred, anger, envy, gossip, calumny, detraction, barbed or sarcastic comments, immodest talk, impure thoughts, insults, coldness, indifference, etc. This indicates that though these persons might be Christians in name, they are far from being Christians in nature. Imagine Our Lord or Our Lady at a Thanksgiving Day gathering and imagine what their behavior in thoughts, words and actions would be like. A follower of Christ should seek to be like Christ, not the opposite.
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the Greatest Thanksgiving
Yet the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (Eucharistia) is only secondarily a Meal, it is above all a sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, whereby He gives again, but this time He gives up all that He has—life itself! “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13)—and Our Lord performed this greatest of loving actions, not only for His friends, but also for His enemies, whom He hoped to convert. What Our Lord began at the Last Supper—the institution of the Holy Sacrifice of Mass—He filled-up and completed over the next 18 hours or so, with His Passion and Death upon the cross on Calvary—the consummation of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Just as Christ calls Himself the “Alpha” and “Omega” (the beginning and the end), so too was the Last Supper and Calvary the beginning and the end of the first Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
Hence it is fitting that on Thanksgiving Day, wherever possible, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass should be attended in a spirit of profound, humble and heartfelt thanksgiving for all that God has given us—and He has given all that we have! We should thank Christ for His soul-saving sacrifice and His grace-winning and grace-giving Sacrifice of the Mass, for at the Last Supper He also reminded us that we are in total dependence upon Him, “independence” is a misnomer―because, as Jesus said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Thanksgiving After Holy Mass is a Must
In His revelations to St. Margaret Mary, Our Lord repeatedly asked for acts of love and adoration, thanksgiving and reparation to His Sacred Heart. There is one occasion especially when these acts of love are most efficacious: during the time after Holy Communion when the Sacramental Species have not yet disintegrated. The writings of the saints are filled with praise of the blessings that come to a soul that is properly disposed while in physical contact with the Sacred Heart. “The time after Communion,” says St. Teresa of Avila, “is the best time for negotiating with Jesus Christ―for then He is in the soul, seated, as it were, on a throne of grace, and saying, as He said to the blind man: ‘What wilt thou that I should do to thee?’”
But more authoritative is the exhortation of Pope Pius XII in the encyclical Mediator Dei, where he devotes a full six paragraphs to this single subject. “When Mass is finished,” he directs that, “the person who has received the Eucharist should recollect himself, and in intimate union with the Divine Master hold loving and fruitful converse with Him.” If this seems like stressing the obvious, the Pope does not think so. He complains there are some teachers who discourage such private communication between the soul and the Eucharistic Christ “because this pertains to a private and personal act of piety and not to the good of the community.” Hence it is not liturgical, they say.
How many people, except priests and religious, ever spend any time in prayer after Holy Mass at which they received Holy Communion? Yet Pope Pius XII insists that this is not a mere spiritual luxury, but “such personal conversations are very necessary that we may all enjoy more fully the supernatural treasures that are contained in the Eucharist and, according to our means, share them with others, so that Christ Our Lord may exert the greatest possible influence on the souls of all.” Addressing himself to the bishops, and through them to us, the Pope asks: “Why should we not approve of those who, when they receive Holy Communion, remain on in closest familiarity with their Divine Redeemer even after the congregation has been officially dismissed?” There are three reasons for this: “ . . . (1) for the consolation of conversing with Him, also (2) to render Him due thanks and praise, but especially (3) to ask help to defend their souls against anything that may lessen the efficacy of the Sacrament and to do everything in their power to cooperate with the action of Christ Who is so intimately present.”
Sadly, however, we have many a woeful instance of ‘thanksgiving’ after the Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion. Take a typical Sunday Mass. Within seconds of the priest leaving the altar, most people are pouring out of the doors as though the church was on fire! It shows what their minds are thinking, or betrays the values system in their minds—they have just received their Lord and God, and off they go out the door! It would be one thing if they were spiritually on fire and were rushing out to preach the Faith to all and sundry—but that is not the case! They are off to gossip with Sally and Sam, Judy and Jack; they’re off to the coffee and donuts; they have a TV show or sports game to catch, or whatever each person’s passion may be.
Will the Real Thanksgiving Please Stand Up!
Let us now turn to the secular American Thanksgiving Day, which is celebrated these days on the 4th Thursday of November. The event of the first Thanksgiving in America is not that which was celebrated by the Pilgrims in 1621, as the vast majority of Americans have been taught. The first Thanksgiving to the one true God was celebrated eighty years before the Pilgrims’ feast. It occurred during the expedition of the Catholic conquistador Francisco Vazquez de Coronado.
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number One
Beginning in 1539, Francisco Coronado organized a large expedition from Mexico, which included five Franciscan missionaries. He brought with him 336 soldiers and settlers, 100 native Mexican Christians, 552 horses, 600 mules, 5000 sheep, and 500 cows, pigs, and goats. (This marked the introduction of these animals into the southwestern United States).
The expedition arrived in what is now Arizona and found Indian pueblos. After establishing a base in Arizona, Coronado headed east to establish a base-mission near present-day Albuquerque, New Mexico. When they crossed the river which is now called the Rio Grande, they named it Rio de Nuestra Señora (the River of Our Lady). This is its original name as it appeared on the first maps of the region.
Though no “cities of gold” were found, Coronado continued to send out expeditions — and missionaries with them. That there were missionaries on every expedition should tell us that the search for supposed “golden cities” was not the primary reason for Coronado’s ventures. (The gold was needed to fund expeditions and was not sought for personal gain). Spreading the one true Faith among the pagan native Indians was of primary importance.
In April of 1541, Coronado, with a group of soldiers and some missionaries, left Albuquerque, New Mexico, headed northeast, and crossed a section of what is now northwest Texas (the Panhandle). In encountering some of the local Indians, the missionaries found that the natives were immediately open to receiving the Gospel of Jesus Christ. After a few weeks of instruction, members of the Jumano Indian tribe converted and received Baptism.
The expedition then arrived in Palo Duro Canyon where, on May 29th, Father Juan Padilla, O.F.M., offered the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. (Father Padilla would eventually become the very first martyr of the Faith in America when he was killed in 1542, in what is now Kansas).
A Thanksgiving feast followed the Mass. It consisted of game that had earlier been caught. The feast was celebrated in thanksgiving to God for His many blessings and for the recent converts. This event is the first actual Thanksgiving Day celebrated in the future United States.
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number Two
The second Catholic Thanksgiving Day that preceded the Pilgrims’ Plymouth Rock celebration was at St. Augustine, Florida, which is the oldest settlement in the United States, founded in 1565 by Spanish Catholic explorers.
On first sighting land on August 28th, the feast of St. Augustine, they named the city after him. On September 8th, the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, they came ashore with great fanfare, to the astonishment of the natives.
A Mass of Thanksgiving was held, after which a communal feast was celebrated with the local Seloy tribe—thus taking place 56 years before the Plymouth Rock Thanksgiving. St. Augustine was the first permanently settled European colony on American soil.
According to Michael Gannon, a professor of colonial history at University of Florida, related further that this first Thanksgiving took place in 1565 when the Spanish founder of St. Augustine, Pedro Menindez de Avilis, and 800 Spanish settlers shared in a Mass of Thanksgiving. Following the Mass, Menindez ordered a communal meal to be shared by the Spaniards and the Seloy Indians who occupied the landing site.
In his book, Cross in the Sand, the Thanksgiving menu would most likely have consisted of what the Spanish settlers had with them during their voyage: cocido, a stew made from salted pork and garbanzo beans laced with garlic seasoning, hard sea biscuits, and red wine.
If the Seloy natives contributed to the meal, the table would have seen wild turkey, venison, gopher-tortoise, mullet, corn, beans, and squash.
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number Three
There was another Thanksgiving celebration which occurred 23 years before the Pilgrims celebrated at Plymouth Rock. In 1598, Catholic explorer Juan de Oñate led an expedition from Mexico City into New Mexico. The expedition included over 200 soldiers and colonists, the soldiers being headed by Captain Gaspar Perez de Villagra. Many had their families with them.
A number of Christian Indian converts with their families from Mexico were also in the party. With the group were several thousand head of livestock, including cows, horses, mules, sheep, goats, and pigs. Eighty-three wagons carried provisions, ammunition, tools, plants, and seeds for wheat, oats, rye, onions, chili, peas, beans, and different nuts.
On the expedition were eight Franciscan friars: two priests and six brothers. The party experienced many hardships. Soon after entering New Mexico, just across the Rio de Nuestra Señora, they were attacked by hostile Indians near present-day El Paso, Texas. A number of wagons and numerous head of livestock were lost, but no members of the expedition were killed. The same was not true for the attacking Indians, a number of whom died.
Moving a little farther up along the river, Juan de Oñate and the Franciscans erected a large cross, and Oñate took possession of the land. He declared: “I want to take possession of this land today, April 30th, 1598, in honor of Our Lord Jesus Christ, on this day of the Ascension of Our Lord.”
Immediately afterward a High Mass was offered in thanksgiving. Then the entire group gathered for a banquet of thanksgiving to God for protecting them and for allowing them to arrive at the place after so many hardships along the way. The festive meal consisted of fish, game, fruits, and vegetables. After this Thanksgiving banquet, the expedition headed further up along the river and by June had established the mission-town of San Juan (still populated to this day).
Though there was a Thanksgiving Feast celebrated in 1541, as we earlier saw, it was never commemorated afterward. In contrast, for some years after the Thanksgiving Feast of 1598, a feast was celebrated by the Spanish and the Christian Indians of New Mexico in thanks to the true God for bringing them through many hardships and for His blessings. Today this Thanksgiving Feast is commemorated in San Juan on the thirtieth day of April every year.
The Thanksgiving Of The Pilgrims
It is only now that we can turn to the story of the Pilgrims and their Thanksgiving. After a long and harsh winter, the Pilgrims received help from the Wampanoag Indians in planting crops during the spring of 1621. They worked hard and in autumn (fall) had a very good harvest.
It is thought that in November of 1621 they invited the local Indians, who were still pagan and worshiped false gods, to feast with them and give thanks to God for the blessings of a successful harvest.
The Catholic student of history should recognize that it is impossible to give thanks to the same God, let alone the true God, when those involved believe in different gods. But this apparently didn’t bother anyone. The event was not celebrated yearly by the Pilgrims, as many think, nor by anyone in the original thirteen colonies for many years.
Thanksgiving Day as Public Holiday
Though George Washington called for a day of Thanksgiving while he was President, it was not celebrated as a yearly holiday feast until Abraham Lincoln established Thanksgiving Day as a holiday on October 3rd, 1863 (almost 250 years after the Pilgrims landed on the shores of America and over 320 years after the first Catholic Thanksgiving), in response to the victory at the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863 by the United States. With this victory in mind, as well as its cost, President Lincoln issued a proclamation stating:
“The year … has been filled with the blessings … which are of so extraordinary a nature that they cannot fail to penetrate and even soften the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever-watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign states to invite and provoke their aggressions; peace has been preserved with all nations; order has been maintained; the laws have been respected and obeyed; and harmony has prevailed everywhere, except in the theater of military conflict … the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. No human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American people. I do, therefore, invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a Day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens. And I recommend to them that, while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation, and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes, to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility, and union.”
So now we know that the Pilgrims did not celebrate the first Thanksgiving in America. The first act of Thanksgiving was the Mass of Thanksgiving celebrated by Fr. Juan Padilla, in 1541, and was followed by a feast. This was 80 years before the Plymouth Rock event.
The second feast of Thanksgiving was celebrated at St. Augustine, Florida, in 1565, at the founding of the first permanent European settlement on American soil.
The third feast of Thanksgiving was celebrated back in 1598, in New Mexico, by Spanish-Catholic colonists and Indian converts to the Faith—53 years before the Plymouth Rock event. They thanked the true God for bringing them safely through many troubles and dangers and for the fact that the seed of the Gospel of Christ was beginning to take root.
Because of the often anti-Spanish and anti-Catholic prejudice of English-speaking Protestants, generations of Americans have never learned this fact of American history.
The Dangers of Thanksgiving Day Today
The holiday season is an attempt at a reunion of two opposing sides. The Church and even the world paint this upcoming holiday season in the colors of peace and joy. One would wish that it not be so, but, sadly, it is so. For the most part (exceptions do exist) this is mere wishful thinking and clever packaging. The upcoming secular holiday season will bring together persons who are camped on opposite sides of the divide—God and the world. The world will love you if you are not religious―but the world will dislike you, or even hate you, according to the measure that you are religious. Does that sound a little radical? Well listen to Our radical Lord:
“If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you” (John 15:18-19).
If your religiosity causes you to be verbally attacked, mocked, ridiculed or criticized―then so be it! Our Lord said: “Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice! For your reward is very great in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:10-12).
“Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law!” (Luke 12:51-53).
“Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:34-37).
Cursed Human Respect
Over the years, that which Our Lady calls “cursed human respect”, has eroded the spiritual from our families, as year after year we make more and more concessions to the more worldly-minded members of our families, relatives and friends. We are ashamed of being more religious, and so to please and accommodate them we become more worldly and more permissive of worldly mannerisms and things. We are afraid of friction, but the friction will inevitably come and at some point we will have to “put on the brakes”—and brakes operate on friction (brake pads against the disc of the car wheel causing great heat). So in the end the brakes are applied—but much too late and at the expense of much spirituality being lost, which, in most cases, will never be “reeled back in” or recovered. And God will judge us on what we have lost! We are the keepers of our brothers and sisters—and we cannot, like Cain, protest the contrary to God.
Who will make a stand for Christ during this holiday season? Who will face the barrage of rolled-eyes, raised eyebrows, shaking heads, scornful tongues by trying to make the upcoming holiday season what it should be—a religious, Christ centered, God focused, season, that has the courage to cast out worldliness and faithfully follow the dictates of Holy Scripture: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God―having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
We are partially in the mess that we are in because we have compromised Christ, we have forced Him to accept Belial, we have dimmed the light of the Faith to please those who love darkness, we shut our mouths about religion to please the unbeliever. God is not pleased. “We have not received the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; that we may know the things that are given us from God” (1 Corinthians 2:12). “For whatsoever is born of God, overcometh the world: and this is the victory which overcometh the world, our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “You are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world” (John 15:18-19). “Use this world, as if you used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away” (1 Corinthians 7:31). ”Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16).
Thanksgiving Tongue- Talking-Terrorists?
Have you ever thought of seeing your guests, over the holiday season, as potential terrorists? Tongue-Terrorists! Tongue-Talking-Terrorists! Thanksgiving Tongue-Talking-Terrorists! They come armed with a two-edged tongue, sharpened and ready to use! They should be asked to show their tongue at the door, for inspection!! “A slippery mouth worketh ruin” (Proverbs 26:28)—and during this holiday season many “slippery mouths: will surface! “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22). As St. James so truly says:
“If any man think himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man’s religion is vain!” (James 1:26). “For in many things we all offend. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man. Even so the tongue is indeed a little member, and boasts great things. Behold how small a fire sets on aflame a great forest. And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue defiles the whole body, being set on fire by Hell. For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and hath been tamed, by the nature of man. But the tongue no man can tame, an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison. By it we bless God and the Father: and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be” (James 3:2-10).
The First Shedding of Blood
The first shedding of blood was not in war, nor was it in self-defense, but it was out of envy and began with the tongue. Abel and Cain both offered sacrifices to God. The sacrifice of Abel was pleasing to God, but Cain’s sacrifice was for some reason not pleasing to God. Out of bitterness, envy and anger, Cain initially lied with his tongue to Abel, in order to get him to a suitable place for the murder. Then, once the lie had served its purpose, “Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him” (Genesis 4:8-16).
Whatever You Do, You Do To Me!
We may take sins against fellow human beings lightly, yet Our Lord’s parable about the Sheep and the Goats says otherwise: “Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!” and “As long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40, 45).
Holy Scripture warns that “Six things there are, which the Lord hates, and the seventh his soul detests: (1) Haughty eyes; (2) a lying tongue; (3) hands that shed innocent blood; (4) a heart that devises wicked plots; (5) feet that are swift to run into mischief; (6) a deceitful witness that utters lies; (7) and him that sows discord among brethren” (Proverbs 6:16-19). ”The Lord hates a mouth with a double tongue” (Proverbs 8:13). You will encounter all of these sins during the forthcoming holiday season! The killing by shedding of innocent blood might not be physical blood, but it will be the “blood of a person’s reputation.”
As a consequence of these sins, the words of Isaias come to mind: “For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity: your lips have spoken lies, and your tongue utters iniquity!” (Isaias 59:3)—thoughts that bring the mind back to God’s words to Cain: “Now, therefore, cursed shalt thou be upon the Earth, which hath opened her mouth and received the blood of thy brother at thy hand” (Genesis 4:11).
Sin Gives Us Bloody Hands
Our sins cost Our Lord His Precious Blood and thus, in a sense, when we sin, our hands are, so to speak, smeared with His Blood—not in a cleansing way, but in a polluted way. We see God speak in a similar vein to His prophet Ezechiel: “And the Lord spoke to me, saying: ‘Son of man, declare to them their wicked deeds, because … blood is on their hands!” (Ezechiel 23:36-37). How so? Why so? “Because and they have committed fornication with their idols: moreover also their children, whom they bore to Me, they have offered to them to be devoured. Yes, and they have done this to Me. They polluted My sanctuary on the same day, and profaned My Sabbaths. And when they sacrificed their children to their idols, and went into My sanctuary the same day to profane it: they did these things even in the midst of My house” (Ezechiel 23:36-39). “Judge them as shedders of blood are judged―because blood is on their hands” (Ezechiel 23:36-39).
Similarly, we have bloodied our hands by sacrificing to the idols of materialism, entertainment, excess partying and drinking—wherein there is no place for God, and the command of Holy Scripture is disregarded and lost: “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:30-31).
The Scourge of the Tongue—the Sins of the Mouth
How many people commit adultery? How many people have abortions or kill others? How many people steal? How many people commit acts of violence? How many people blaspheme? The numbers of these offenders fade away into insignificance when compared to the number of those persons who sin with their tongues! “For who is there that hath not offended with his tongue?” (Ecclesiasticus 19:17). “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22).
The Psalmist says: “My tongue is the pen of a writer that writeth swiftly!” (Psalm 44:2). But what does the tongue write or produce? “Death and life are in the power of the tongue” (Proverbs 18:21). Holy Scripture says that the “tongue is a piercing arrow” (Jeremias 9:8) and speaks of “the scourge of the tongue” (Job 5:21) and “the stroke of a whip maketh a blue mark: but the stroke of the tongue will break the bones” (Ecclesiasticus 28:21). We speak of “tongue lashings”. Words are also compared to swords--”For the word of God is more piercing than any two edged sword … the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God” (Hebrews 4:12; Ephesians 6:17).
Yet our words can be swords too, and swords shed blood. Our words can be arrows, and arrows draw blood. “Slanderers … shed blood” (Ezechiel 22:9). “The words of the wicked lie in wait for blood” (Proverbs 12:6). “For when evil shall be sweet in his mouth, he will hide it under his tongue” (Job 20:12). “A slippery mouth worketh ruin” (Proverbs 26:28). “Their feet run to evil, and make haste to shed innocent blood: their thoughts are unprofitable thoughts” (Isaias 59:7). “Their throat is an open sepulcher: with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips. Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and unhappiness in their ways” (Psalm 13:3). “The tongue of a third person hath disquieted man” (Ecclesiasticus 28:16). “A jealous woman is a scourge of the tongue which communicates with all” (Ecclesiasticus 26:9). “A tongue that bears witness bringeth death” (Ecclesiasticus 26:9) … “which is stained with the blood of the innocent” (Numbers 35:33). ”Upon whom have you opened your mouth wide, and put out your tongue? Are not you wicked children, a false seed?” (Isaias 57:4).
The Slippery Tongue Slips Into …
“Be not hasty in thy tongue” (Ecclesiasticus 4:34). “The tongue of the fool is his ruin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:15). “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22). “Be not called a whisperer, and be not caught in thy tongue and confounded” (Ecclesiasticus 5:16). “Blessed is he that hath not slipped with his tongue” (Ecclesiasticus 25:11). “Who will set a guard before my mouth, and a sure seal upon my lips, that I fall not by them, and that my tongue destroy me not?” (Ecclesiasticus 22:33). “Hedge in thy ears with thorns, hear not a wicked tongue, and make doors and bars to thy mouth” (Ecclesiasticus 28:28).
Words come easily, but they are not always prudent words or virtuous words. Many there are who speak without first thinking about the consequences of what they may say. Many fail to realize that mortal sins are easily committed through our words (and thoughts)―but they are downplayed and excused because they do not seem to be as serious as mortal sins committed by actions. For example, an impure thought about someone, or an impure conversation with someone in comparison to impure actions with someone. Yet all of those are mortal sins. Yes―“Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22). The holiday season―fueled by drink and excess food―is the ideal time for Satan to tempt and encourage us to speak out!
Before dealing with the ‘first’ Thanksgiving in America, let us first of all look at Thanksgiving in general and especially the first true Christian Thanksgiving.
The Catholic Church has a history of Christianizing pagan festivals. This should be especially the case with the American secular and naturalistic celebration of “Thanksgiving Day”—which though it not a pagan institution, it has evolved from a Protestant event. Providentially, the American “Thanksgiving Day” is always celebrated on a Thursday―the same day on which Our Lord instituted the Holy Eucharist at the Last Supper. The Greek word “eucharistia” means “thankfulness, gratitude; giving of thanks, thanksgiving” and comes from another similar Greek word “eucharistos” meaning “thankful, grateful”. This, of course, makes us think of the Holy Eucharist. The Greek word “eucharistia” later entered the Latin language, also keeping the form “eucharistia”. The same word, or at least the same root, is found in Hebrew (oikharístia), French (eucharistie), Spanish (eucaristía), English (eucharist), Irish (eocairist), German (eucharistie) and Dutch (eucharistie) languages.
The Last Supper was the Thanksgiving (Eucharistia) par excellence. The Last Supper was the institution of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which gives us the greatest imaginable Gift—Our Lord Jesus Christ, God Himself! Man can never and should never cease to give thanks for this Gift of gifts, this greatest Sharing of all possible sharings! The Last Supper, though primarily a sacrifice, was also meal that Christ commanded to be done again and again in commemoration of Him, of which the Thanksgiving Meal is but a pale secular, non-sacramental, non-grace giving, imitation. In fact, since the Last Supper, you could say that the Sacrifice and its secondary element, the Supper, has never ceased—but has been one long perpetual Sacrifice and Meal. At the Last Supper, Our Lord “whilst they were at supper, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke: and gave to His disciples, and said: ‘Take ye, and eat! This is My Body!’ And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave to them, saying: ‘Drink ye all of this. For this is My Blood of the New Testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins!’” (Matthew 26:26-28).
Also at the Last Supper, Our Lord gave a ‘new’ commandment, of which the idea of the American notion of “Thanksgiving Day” is a small piece of the gigantic spiritual jigsaw puzzle. Our Lord said: “A new commandment I give unto you: That you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for another!” (John 13:34-35). It is sad to see how many celebrations of Thanksgiving are spoiled and ruined by a lack of charity—by bringing in grudges, hatred, anger, envy, gossip, calumny, detraction, barbed or sarcastic comments, immodest talk, impure thoughts, insults, coldness, indifference, etc. This indicates that though these persons might be Christians in name, they are far from being Christians in nature. Imagine Our Lord or Our Lady at a Thanksgiving Day gathering and imagine what their behavior in thoughts, words and actions would be like. A follower of Christ should seek to be like Christ, not the opposite.
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the Greatest Thanksgiving
Yet the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (Eucharistia) is only secondarily a Meal, it is above all a sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, whereby He gives again, but this time He gives up all that He has—life itself! “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13)—and Our Lord performed this greatest of loving actions, not only for His friends, but also for His enemies, whom He hoped to convert. What Our Lord began at the Last Supper—the institution of the Holy Sacrifice of Mass—He filled-up and completed over the next 18 hours or so, with His Passion and Death upon the cross on Calvary—the consummation of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Just as Christ calls Himself the “Alpha” and “Omega” (the beginning and the end), so too was the Last Supper and Calvary the beginning and the end of the first Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
Hence it is fitting that on Thanksgiving Day, wherever possible, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass should be attended in a spirit of profound, humble and heartfelt thanksgiving for all that God has given us—and He has given all that we have! We should thank Christ for His soul-saving sacrifice and His grace-winning and grace-giving Sacrifice of the Mass, for at the Last Supper He also reminded us that we are in total dependence upon Him, “independence” is a misnomer―because, as Jesus said: “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5).
Thanksgiving After Holy Mass is a Must
In His revelations to St. Margaret Mary, Our Lord repeatedly asked for acts of love and adoration, thanksgiving and reparation to His Sacred Heart. There is one occasion especially when these acts of love are most efficacious: during the time after Holy Communion when the Sacramental Species have not yet disintegrated. The writings of the saints are filled with praise of the blessings that come to a soul that is properly disposed while in physical contact with the Sacred Heart. “The time after Communion,” says St. Teresa of Avila, “is the best time for negotiating with Jesus Christ―for then He is in the soul, seated, as it were, on a throne of grace, and saying, as He said to the blind man: ‘What wilt thou that I should do to thee?’”
But more authoritative is the exhortation of Pope Pius XII in the encyclical Mediator Dei, where he devotes a full six paragraphs to this single subject. “When Mass is finished,” he directs that, “the person who has received the Eucharist should recollect himself, and in intimate union with the Divine Master hold loving and fruitful converse with Him.” If this seems like stressing the obvious, the Pope does not think so. He complains there are some teachers who discourage such private communication between the soul and the Eucharistic Christ “because this pertains to a private and personal act of piety and not to the good of the community.” Hence it is not liturgical, they say.
How many people, except priests and religious, ever spend any time in prayer after Holy Mass at which they received Holy Communion? Yet Pope Pius XII insists that this is not a mere spiritual luxury, but “such personal conversations are very necessary that we may all enjoy more fully the supernatural treasures that are contained in the Eucharist and, according to our means, share them with others, so that Christ Our Lord may exert the greatest possible influence on the souls of all.” Addressing himself to the bishops, and through them to us, the Pope asks: “Why should we not approve of those who, when they receive Holy Communion, remain on in closest familiarity with their Divine Redeemer even after the congregation has been officially dismissed?” There are three reasons for this: “ . . . (1) for the consolation of conversing with Him, also (2) to render Him due thanks and praise, but especially (3) to ask help to defend their souls against anything that may lessen the efficacy of the Sacrament and to do everything in their power to cooperate with the action of Christ Who is so intimately present.”
Sadly, however, we have many a woeful instance of ‘thanksgiving’ after the Sacrifice of the Mass and Holy Communion. Take a typical Sunday Mass. Within seconds of the priest leaving the altar, most people are pouring out of the doors as though the church was on fire! It shows what their minds are thinking, or betrays the values system in their minds—they have just received their Lord and God, and off they go out the door! It would be one thing if they were spiritually on fire and were rushing out to preach the Faith to all and sundry—but that is not the case! They are off to gossip with Sally and Sam, Judy and Jack; they’re off to the coffee and donuts; they have a TV show or sports game to catch, or whatever each person’s passion may be.
Will the Real Thanksgiving Please Stand Up!
Let us now turn to the secular American Thanksgiving Day, which is celebrated these days on the 4th Thursday of November. The event of the first Thanksgiving in America is not that which was celebrated by the Pilgrims in 1621, as the vast majority of Americans have been taught. The first Thanksgiving to the one true God was celebrated eighty years before the Pilgrims’ feast. It occurred during the expedition of the Catholic conquistador Francisco Vazquez de Coronado.
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number One
Beginning in 1539, Francisco Coronado organized a large expedition from Mexico, which included five Franciscan missionaries. He brought with him 336 soldiers and settlers, 100 native Mexican Christians, 552 horses, 600 mules, 5000 sheep, and 500 cows, pigs, and goats. (This marked the introduction of these animals into the southwestern United States).
The expedition arrived in what is now Arizona and found Indian pueblos. After establishing a base in Arizona, Coronado headed east to establish a base-mission near present-day Albuquerque, New Mexico. When they crossed the river which is now called the Rio Grande, they named it Rio de Nuestra Señora (the River of Our Lady). This is its original name as it appeared on the first maps of the region.
Though no “cities of gold” were found, Coronado continued to send out expeditions — and missionaries with them. That there were missionaries on every expedition should tell us that the search for supposed “golden cities” was not the primary reason for Coronado’s ventures. (The gold was needed to fund expeditions and was not sought for personal gain). Spreading the one true Faith among the pagan native Indians was of primary importance.
In April of 1541, Coronado, with a group of soldiers and some missionaries, left Albuquerque, New Mexico, headed northeast, and crossed a section of what is now northwest Texas (the Panhandle). In encountering some of the local Indians, the missionaries found that the natives were immediately open to receiving the Gospel of Jesus Christ. After a few weeks of instruction, members of the Jumano Indian tribe converted and received Baptism.
The expedition then arrived in Palo Duro Canyon where, on May 29th, Father Juan Padilla, O.F.M., offered the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. (Father Padilla would eventually become the very first martyr of the Faith in America when he was killed in 1542, in what is now Kansas).
A Thanksgiving feast followed the Mass. It consisted of game that had earlier been caught. The feast was celebrated in thanksgiving to God for His many blessings and for the recent converts. This event is the first actual Thanksgiving Day celebrated in the future United States.
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number Two
The second Catholic Thanksgiving Day that preceded the Pilgrims’ Plymouth Rock celebration was at St. Augustine, Florida, which is the oldest settlement in the United States, founded in 1565 by Spanish Catholic explorers.
On first sighting land on August 28th, the feast of St. Augustine, they named the city after him. On September 8th, the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, they came ashore with great fanfare, to the astonishment of the natives.
A Mass of Thanksgiving was held, after which a communal feast was celebrated with the local Seloy tribe—thus taking place 56 years before the Plymouth Rock Thanksgiving. St. Augustine was the first permanently settled European colony on American soil.
According to Michael Gannon, a professor of colonial history at University of Florida, related further that this first Thanksgiving took place in 1565 when the Spanish founder of St. Augustine, Pedro Menindez de Avilis, and 800 Spanish settlers shared in a Mass of Thanksgiving. Following the Mass, Menindez ordered a communal meal to be shared by the Spaniards and the Seloy Indians who occupied the landing site.
In his book, Cross in the Sand, the Thanksgiving menu would most likely have consisted of what the Spanish settlers had with them during their voyage: cocido, a stew made from salted pork and garbanzo beans laced with garlic seasoning, hard sea biscuits, and red wine.
If the Seloy natives contributed to the meal, the table would have seen wild turkey, venison, gopher-tortoise, mullet, corn, beans, and squash.
Catholic Thanksgiving Day Number Three
There was another Thanksgiving celebration which occurred 23 years before the Pilgrims celebrated at Plymouth Rock. In 1598, Catholic explorer Juan de Oñate led an expedition from Mexico City into New Mexico. The expedition included over 200 soldiers and colonists, the soldiers being headed by Captain Gaspar Perez de Villagra. Many had their families with them.
A number of Christian Indian converts with their families from Mexico were also in the party. With the group were several thousand head of livestock, including cows, horses, mules, sheep, goats, and pigs. Eighty-three wagons carried provisions, ammunition, tools, plants, and seeds for wheat, oats, rye, onions, chili, peas, beans, and different nuts.
On the expedition were eight Franciscan friars: two priests and six brothers. The party experienced many hardships. Soon after entering New Mexico, just across the Rio de Nuestra Señora, they were attacked by hostile Indians near present-day El Paso, Texas. A number of wagons and numerous head of livestock were lost, but no members of the expedition were killed. The same was not true for the attacking Indians, a number of whom died.
Moving a little farther up along the river, Juan de Oñate and the Franciscans erected a large cross, and Oñate took possession of the land. He declared: “I want to take possession of this land today, April 30th, 1598, in honor of Our Lord Jesus Christ, on this day of the Ascension of Our Lord.”
Immediately afterward a High Mass was offered in thanksgiving. Then the entire group gathered for a banquet of thanksgiving to God for protecting them and for allowing them to arrive at the place after so many hardships along the way. The festive meal consisted of fish, game, fruits, and vegetables. After this Thanksgiving banquet, the expedition headed further up along the river and by June had established the mission-town of San Juan (still populated to this day).
Though there was a Thanksgiving Feast celebrated in 1541, as we earlier saw, it was never commemorated afterward. In contrast, for some years after the Thanksgiving Feast of 1598, a feast was celebrated by the Spanish and the Christian Indians of New Mexico in thanks to the true God for bringing them through many hardships and for His blessings. Today this Thanksgiving Feast is commemorated in San Juan on the thirtieth day of April every year.
The Thanksgiving Of The Pilgrims
It is only now that we can turn to the story of the Pilgrims and their Thanksgiving. After a long and harsh winter, the Pilgrims received help from the Wampanoag Indians in planting crops during the spring of 1621. They worked hard and in autumn (fall) had a very good harvest.
It is thought that in November of 1621 they invited the local Indians, who were still pagan and worshiped false gods, to feast with them and give thanks to God for the blessings of a successful harvest.
The Catholic student of history should recognize that it is impossible to give thanks to the same God, let alone the true God, when those involved believe in different gods. But this apparently didn’t bother anyone. The event was not celebrated yearly by the Pilgrims, as many think, nor by anyone in the original thirteen colonies for many years.
Thanksgiving Day as Public Holiday
Though George Washington called for a day of Thanksgiving while he was President, it was not celebrated as a yearly holiday feast until Abraham Lincoln established Thanksgiving Day as a holiday on October 3rd, 1863 (almost 250 years after the Pilgrims landed on the shores of America and over 320 years after the first Catholic Thanksgiving), in response to the victory at the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863 by the United States. With this victory in mind, as well as its cost, President Lincoln issued a proclamation stating:
“The year … has been filled with the blessings … which are of so extraordinary a nature that they cannot fail to penetrate and even soften the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever-watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign states to invite and provoke their aggressions; peace has been preserved with all nations; order has been maintained; the laws have been respected and obeyed; and harmony has prevailed everywhere, except in the theater of military conflict … the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. No human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American people. I do, therefore, invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a Day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens. And I recommend to them that, while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation, and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes, to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility, and union.”
So now we know that the Pilgrims did not celebrate the first Thanksgiving in America. The first act of Thanksgiving was the Mass of Thanksgiving celebrated by Fr. Juan Padilla, in 1541, and was followed by a feast. This was 80 years before the Plymouth Rock event.
The second feast of Thanksgiving was celebrated at St. Augustine, Florida, in 1565, at the founding of the first permanent European settlement on American soil.
The third feast of Thanksgiving was celebrated back in 1598, in New Mexico, by Spanish-Catholic colonists and Indian converts to the Faith—53 years before the Plymouth Rock event. They thanked the true God for bringing them safely through many troubles and dangers and for the fact that the seed of the Gospel of Christ was beginning to take root.
Because of the often anti-Spanish and anti-Catholic prejudice of English-speaking Protestants, generations of Americans have never learned this fact of American history.
The Dangers of Thanksgiving Day Today
The holiday season is an attempt at a reunion of two opposing sides. The Church and even the world paint this upcoming holiday season in the colors of peace and joy. One would wish that it not be so, but, sadly, it is so. For the most part (exceptions do exist) this is mere wishful thinking and clever packaging. The upcoming secular holiday season will bring together persons who are camped on opposite sides of the divide—God and the world. The world will love you if you are not religious―but the world will dislike you, or even hate you, according to the measure that you are religious. Does that sound a little radical? Well listen to Our radical Lord:
“If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you” (John 15:18-19).
If your religiosity causes you to be verbally attacked, mocked, ridiculed or criticized―then so be it! Our Lord said: “Blessed are you when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for My sake! Be glad and rejoice! For your reward is very great in Heaven!” (Matthew 5:10-12).
“Think ye, that I am come to give peace on Earth? I tell you, no; but separation! For there shall be from henceforth five in one house divided: three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against his father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law!” (Luke 12:51-53).
“Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth! I came not to send peace, but the sword! For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:34-37).
Cursed Human Respect
Over the years, that which Our Lady calls “cursed human respect”, has eroded the spiritual from our families, as year after year we make more and more concessions to the more worldly-minded members of our families, relatives and friends. We are ashamed of being more religious, and so to please and accommodate them we become more worldly and more permissive of worldly mannerisms and things. We are afraid of friction, but the friction will inevitably come and at some point we will have to “put on the brakes”—and brakes operate on friction (brake pads against the disc of the car wheel causing great heat). So in the end the brakes are applied—but much too late and at the expense of much spirituality being lost, which, in most cases, will never be “reeled back in” or recovered. And God will judge us on what we have lost! We are the keepers of our brothers and sisters—and we cannot, like Cain, protest the contrary to God.
Who will make a stand for Christ during this holiday season? Who will face the barrage of rolled-eyes, raised eyebrows, shaking heads, scornful tongues by trying to make the upcoming holiday season what it should be—a religious, Christ centered, God focused, season, that has the courage to cast out worldliness and faithfully follow the dictates of Holy Scripture: “Know also this, that, in the last days, shall come dangerous times. Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness, traitors, stubborn, puffed up, and lovers of pleasures more than of God―having an appearance indeed of godliness, but denying the power thereof. Now these avoid!” (2 Timothy 3:1-5). “Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: ‘I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people!’ Wherefore, ‘Go out from among them, and be ye separate!’ saith the Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
We are partially in the mess that we are in because we have compromised Christ, we have forced Him to accept Belial, we have dimmed the light of the Faith to please those who love darkness, we shut our mouths about religion to please the unbeliever. God is not pleased. “We have not received the spirit of this world, but the Spirit that is of God; that we may know the things that are given us from God” (1 Corinthians 2:12). “For whatsoever is born of God, overcometh the world: and this is the victory which overcometh the world, our Faith!” (1 John 5:4). “You are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world” (John 15:18-19). “Use this world, as if you used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away” (1 Corinthians 7:31). ”Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God” (James 4:4). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16).
Thanksgiving Tongue- Talking-Terrorists?
Have you ever thought of seeing your guests, over the holiday season, as potential terrorists? Tongue-Terrorists! Tongue-Talking-Terrorists! Thanksgiving Tongue-Talking-Terrorists! They come armed with a two-edged tongue, sharpened and ready to use! They should be asked to show their tongue at the door, for inspection!! “A slippery mouth worketh ruin” (Proverbs 26:28)—and during this holiday season many “slippery mouths: will surface! “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22). As St. James so truly says:
“If any man think himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man’s religion is vain!” (James 1:26). “For in many things we all offend. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man. Even so the tongue is indeed a little member, and boasts great things. Behold how small a fire sets on aflame a great forest. And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue defiles the whole body, being set on fire by Hell. For every nature of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of the rest, is tamed, and hath been tamed, by the nature of man. But the tongue no man can tame, an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison. By it we bless God and the Father: and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be” (James 3:2-10).
The First Shedding of Blood
The first shedding of blood was not in war, nor was it in self-defense, but it was out of envy and began with the tongue. Abel and Cain both offered sacrifices to God. The sacrifice of Abel was pleasing to God, but Cain’s sacrifice was for some reason not pleasing to God. Out of bitterness, envy and anger, Cain initially lied with his tongue to Abel, in order to get him to a suitable place for the murder. Then, once the lie had served its purpose, “Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him” (Genesis 4:8-16).
Whatever You Do, You Do To Me!
We may take sins against fellow human beings lightly, yet Our Lord’s parable about the Sheep and the Goats says otherwise: “Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me!” and “As long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to Me!” (Matthew 25:40, 45).
Holy Scripture warns that “Six things there are, which the Lord hates, and the seventh his soul detests: (1) Haughty eyes; (2) a lying tongue; (3) hands that shed innocent blood; (4) a heart that devises wicked plots; (5) feet that are swift to run into mischief; (6) a deceitful witness that utters lies; (7) and him that sows discord among brethren” (Proverbs 6:16-19). ”The Lord hates a mouth with a double tongue” (Proverbs 8:13). You will encounter all of these sins during the forthcoming holiday season! The killing by shedding of innocent blood might not be physical blood, but it will be the “blood of a person’s reputation.”
As a consequence of these sins, the words of Isaias come to mind: “For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity: your lips have spoken lies, and your tongue utters iniquity!” (Isaias 59:3)—thoughts that bring the mind back to God’s words to Cain: “Now, therefore, cursed shalt thou be upon the Earth, which hath opened her mouth and received the blood of thy brother at thy hand” (Genesis 4:11).
Sin Gives Us Bloody Hands
Our sins cost Our Lord His Precious Blood and thus, in a sense, when we sin, our hands are, so to speak, smeared with His Blood—not in a cleansing way, but in a polluted way. We see God speak in a similar vein to His prophet Ezechiel: “And the Lord spoke to me, saying: ‘Son of man, declare to them their wicked deeds, because … blood is on their hands!” (Ezechiel 23:36-37). How so? Why so? “Because and they have committed fornication with their idols: moreover also their children, whom they bore to Me, they have offered to them to be devoured. Yes, and they have done this to Me. They polluted My sanctuary on the same day, and profaned My Sabbaths. And when they sacrificed their children to their idols, and went into My sanctuary the same day to profane it: they did these things even in the midst of My house” (Ezechiel 23:36-39). “Judge them as shedders of blood are judged―because blood is on their hands” (Ezechiel 23:36-39).
Similarly, we have bloodied our hands by sacrificing to the idols of materialism, entertainment, excess partying and drinking—wherein there is no place for God, and the command of Holy Scripture is disregarded and lost: “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God!” (1 Corinthians 10:30-31).
The Scourge of the Tongue—the Sins of the Mouth
How many people commit adultery? How many people have abortions or kill others? How many people steal? How many people commit acts of violence? How many people blaspheme? The numbers of these offenders fade away into insignificance when compared to the number of those persons who sin with their tongues! “For who is there that hath not offended with his tongue?” (Ecclesiasticus 19:17). “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22).
The Psalmist says: “My tongue is the pen of a writer that writeth swiftly!” (Psalm 44:2). But what does the tongue write or produce? “Death and life are in the power of the tongue” (Proverbs 18:21). Holy Scripture says that the “tongue is a piercing arrow” (Jeremias 9:8) and speaks of “the scourge of the tongue” (Job 5:21) and “the stroke of a whip maketh a blue mark: but the stroke of the tongue will break the bones” (Ecclesiasticus 28:21). We speak of “tongue lashings”. Words are also compared to swords--”For the word of God is more piercing than any two edged sword … the sword of the Spirit―which is the word of God” (Hebrews 4:12; Ephesians 6:17).
Yet our words can be swords too, and swords shed blood. Our words can be arrows, and arrows draw blood. “Slanderers … shed blood” (Ezechiel 22:9). “The words of the wicked lie in wait for blood” (Proverbs 12:6). “For when evil shall be sweet in his mouth, he will hide it under his tongue” (Job 20:12). “A slippery mouth worketh ruin” (Proverbs 26:28). “Their feet run to evil, and make haste to shed innocent blood: their thoughts are unprofitable thoughts” (Isaias 59:7). “Their throat is an open sepulcher: with their tongues they acted deceitfully; the poison of asps is under their lips. Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and unhappiness in their ways” (Psalm 13:3). “The tongue of a third person hath disquieted man” (Ecclesiasticus 28:16). “A jealous woman is a scourge of the tongue which communicates with all” (Ecclesiasticus 26:9). “A tongue that bears witness bringeth death” (Ecclesiasticus 26:9) … “which is stained with the blood of the innocent” (Numbers 35:33). ”Upon whom have you opened your mouth wide, and put out your tongue? Are not you wicked children, a false seed?” (Isaias 57:4).
The Slippery Tongue Slips Into …
“Be not hasty in thy tongue” (Ecclesiasticus 4:34). “The tongue of the fool is his ruin” (Ecclesiasticus 5:15). “Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22). “Be not called a whisperer, and be not caught in thy tongue and confounded” (Ecclesiasticus 5:16). “Blessed is he that hath not slipped with his tongue” (Ecclesiasticus 25:11). “Who will set a guard before my mouth, and a sure seal upon my lips, that I fall not by them, and that my tongue destroy me not?” (Ecclesiasticus 22:33). “Hedge in thy ears with thorns, hear not a wicked tongue, and make doors and bars to thy mouth” (Ecclesiasticus 28:28).
Words come easily, but they are not always prudent words or virtuous words. Many there are who speak without first thinking about the consequences of what they may say. Many fail to realize that mortal sins are easily committed through our words (and thoughts)―but they are downplayed and excused because they do not seem to be as serious as mortal sins committed by actions. For example, an impure thought about someone, or an impure conversation with someone in comparison to impure actions with someone. Yet all of those are mortal sins. Yes―“Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as have perished by their own tongue!” (Ecclesiasticus 28:22). The holiday season―fueled by drink and excess food―is the ideal time for Satan to tempt and encourage us to speak out!
Article 17
Sunday November 19th, 2023
When Pain is a Consolation
Sunday November 19th, 2023
When Pain is a Consolation
Consolation in Pain
It is true that all might not achieve such a high degree of Charity that all their temporal punishment for sin would be removed, but there is no one that cannot have confidence in the Divine Mercy of God. This Mercy is infinite, it imparts peace to all souls that keep it constantly before their eyes and confide therein. With regard to Purgatory the Mercy of God is exercised in a threefold manner:
(1) in consoling the souls;
(2) in mitigating or softening their sufferings;
(3) in giving to ourselves, here on Earth, a thousand means of avoiding those punishing fires.
God Consoles and God Loves
Firstly, we must not forget that God consoles the souls in Purgatory. It is He Himself that consoles them. Yet He also consoles them through the Blessed Virgin and through the holy angels. He consoles the souls by inspiring them with a high degree of Faith, Hope, and Divine Love— virtues which produce, in the suffering souls, a conformity to the Divine will, a resignation to their just plight, and a most perfect patience. St. Catherine of Genoa says: “God inspires the soul in Purgatory with so ardent a movement of devoted love, that it would be sufficient to annihilate her, if she were not immortal. Illumined and inflamed by that pure Charity, the more she loves God, the more she detests the least stain that displeases Him, as well as the least hindrance that prevents her union with Him. Therefore, if she could find another Purgatory more terrible than the one to which she is condemned, that soul would plunge herself therein, impelled by the impetuosity of the love which exists between God and herself, in order that she might be the sooner delivered from all that separates her from her Sovereign God.”
St. Catherine continues: “These souls are intimately united to the will of God, and so completely transformed into it, that they are always satisfied with its holy ordinances. The souls in Purgatory have no choice of their own; they can no longer will anything other than what God wills. They receive with perfect submission all that God gives them; and neither pleasure, nor contentment, nor pain can ever again make them think of themselves.”
He Listened Too Late, But He Burns Peacefully
Fr. Schouppe, in Purgatory Explained, writes that St. Magdalen de Pazzi, after the death of one of her brothers, had gone to the choir to offer prayers for him, when she saw a vision of his soul subject to an intense suffering. Touched with compassion, she began to weep and cried out in pity: “Brother, both miserable and blessed at the same time! O soul afflicted and yet contented! These pains are intolerable and yet they are endured. Why are they not understood by those here below, who have not the courage to carry their cross? Whilst you were in this world, my dear brother, you would not listen to my advice, and now you desire ardently that I should listen to you. O God, equally just and merciful, comfort this brother of mine, who has served Thee from his infancy. Have regard to your clemency, I beseech Thee, and make use of Thy great mercy on his behalf. O God most just, if he has not always been attentive to pleasing Thee, at least he has not despised those who made profession of serving you with fidelity.”
The day on which she had that wonderful ecstasy, during which she visited the different prisons of Purgatory, seeing again the soul of her brother, she said to him, “Poor soul, how you suffer and nevertheless you rejoice! You burn and you are satisfied, because you know well that these sufferings must lead you to a great and unspeakable happiness. How happy shall I be, if I could avoid having to endure greater suffering! Remain here, my dear brother, and complete your purification in peace!”
This contentment in the midst of the most intense suffering cannot be explained otherwise than by the Divine consolations which the Holy Ghost infuses into the souls in Purgatory. This Divine Spirit, by means of Faith, Hope, and Charity, puts those souls in the disposition of a sick person who has to submit to very painful treatment, but the effect, of which is to restore him to perfect health. This sick person suffers, but he loves his salutary suffering. The Holy Ghost, the Comforter, gives a similar contentment to the holy souls. In a sense, He enkindles in them the fire of His Love, which helps them fight fire with fire.
The Miracle of St. Stanislaus
Of this we have a striking example in Peter Miles, who was raised from the dead by St. Stanislaus of Cracow, but who preferred and asked to be allowed to return to Purgatory, rather than to live again upon Earth. The celebrated miracle of this resurrection happened in 1070. It is recorded in the Acta Sanctorum for May 7th. St. Stanislaus was the Bishop of Cracow, Poland, when the Duke Boleslas II governed Poland. The king was neglecting God and living too secular a life. St. Stanislaus reminded the prince of his duties, but Boleslas was irritated and, to revenge himself, he stirred-up against Stanislaus the heirs of a certain Peter Miles, who had died three years previously after having sold a piece of ground to the church of Cracow.
The heirs accused the saint of having usurped the ground, without having paid the owner. Stanislaus declared that he had paid for the land, but as the witnesses who should have defended him had been either bribed or intimidated, he was accused of stealing the property of another, and condemned to make restitution. Then, seeing that he had nothing to expect from human justice, he raised his heart to God, and received a sudden inspiration. He asked for a delay of three days, promising to make Peter Miles appear in person, that he might testify to the legal purchase and payment of the land.
They were granted to him in scorn. The saint fasted, watched, and prayed God to take up the defense of his cause. The third day, after having celebrated Holy Mass, he went out accompanied by his clergy and many of the faithful, to the place where Peter had been buried. By his orders the grave was opened; it contained nothing but bones. He touched them with his crosier, and in the name of Him who is the Resurrection and the Life, he commanded the dead man to arise.
Dead Men Walk
Suddenly the bones became reunited, were covered with flesh, and, in sight of the stupefied people, the dead man was seen to take the Bishop by the hand and walk towards the tribunal. Boleslas, with his court and an immense crowd of people, were awaiting the result with the most lively expectation. “Behold Peter,” said the saint to Boleslas; “he comes, prince, to give testimony before you. Interrogate him; he will answer you!”
It is impossible to describe the stupefaction of the Duke, of his councilors, and of the whole concourse of people. Peter affirmed that he had been paid for the ground; then turning towards his heirs, he reproached them for having accused the pious prelate against all rights of justice; then he exhorted them to do penance for so grievous a sin.
Which Do You Prefer—Purgatory or Earth?
Wishing to complete this great miracle for the glory of God, Stanislaus proposed to the deceased that, if he desired to live a few years longer, he would obtain for him this favor from God. Peter replied that he had no such desire. He was in Purgatory, but he would rather return there immediately and endure its pains, than expose himself to damnation in this terrestrial life. He implored the saint only to beg of God to shorten the time of his sufferings, that he might the sooner enter Heaven. After that, accompanied by the Bishop and a great crowd, Peter returned to his grave, laid himself down, his body fell to pieces, and his bones resumed the same state in which they had first been found. We have reason to believe that the saint soon obtained the deliverance of his soul.
That which is the most remarkable in this example, and which should most attract our attention, is that a soul from Purgatory, after having experienced the most excruciating torments, prefers that state of suffering to the life of this world; and the reason which he gives for this preference is, that in this mortal life we are exposed to the danger of being lost and incurring eternal damnation. He sees Purgatory as being a mercy that he does not want to relinquish.
The Help of Our Lady
The souls in Purgatory receive also great consolation from the Blessed Virgin. Is she not the “Comforter of the Afflicted”? And what affliction can be compared to that of the poor souls in the fires of Purgatory? Is she not the “Mother of Mercy”? And is it not towards these holy suffering souls that she must show all the mercy of her heart? We must not, therefore, be astonished that in the Revelations of St. Bridget the Queen of Heaven gives herself the beautiful name of “Mother of the Souls in Purgatory”. She said to St. Bridget, “I am the Mother of all those who are in the place of expiation; my prayers mitigate the chastisements which are inflicted upon them for their faults.” (Revel. S. Brig., lib. 4. c. 50).
Fear Not, My Son…
On October 25th, 1604, in the College of the Society of Jesus at Coimbra, Portugal, Father Jerome Carvalho died in the odor of sanctity, at the age of fifty years. This admirable and humble servant of God had always felt a lively apprehension of the sufferings of Purgatory. Neither the cruel scourgings which he inflicted upon himself several times every day, not counting those prompted each week by the remembrance of the Passion, nor the six hours which he devoted morning and evening to the meditation of holy subjects, seemed sufficient, in his estimation, to shield him from the chastisement which he imagined awaited him after death. But one day the Queen of Heaven, to whom he had a tender devotion, decided to come herself to console her servant by the simple assurance that she was a Mother of Mercy to her dear children in Purgatory, and not only to those upon Earth. Seeking, later, to spread this consoling doctrine, the holy man accidentally let fall, in the ardor of his discourse, these words: “She told me this herself.”
Mary’s Powerful Intercession
It is related that a great servant of Mary, Blessed Renier of Citeaux, trembled at the thought of his sins and the terrible Justice of God after death. In his fear, addressing himself to Our Lady, whom he held as his great Protectress, who calls herself Mother of Mercy, he fell into an ecstasy, and saw the Mother of God interceding with her Son in his favor. “My Son,” she said, “deal mercifully with him in Purgatory, because he humbly repents of his sins.” “My Mother,” replied Jesus, “I place his cause in thy hands,” which meant to say, be it done to your servant according to your desires. Blessed Renier understood with unutterable joy that Mary had obtained his exemption from Purgatory.
Putting-Out the Flames with the Rosary
The Rosary is a key ingredient in all of this. We read in St. Louis de Montfort’s book, The Secret of the Rosary, how great is the power of the Rosary in remitting temporal punishment due for our sins. Here are a few extracts:
When St. Dominic was performing an exorcism, through Our Lady’s intervention he got the devils to admit many things, one of them was the following: “Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy” (Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
“Flammin and a great number of other writers tell the story of a young girl of noble station named Alexandra, who had been miraculously converted and enrolled by St. Dominic in the Confraternity of the Rosary. After her death, she appeared to him and said she had been condemned to seven hundred years in Purgatory because of her own sins and those she had caused others to commit by her worldly ways. So she implored him to ease her pains by his prayers and to ask the Confraternity members to pray for the same end. St. Dominic did as she had asked. Two weeks later she appeared to him, more radiant than the sun, having been quickly delivered from Purgatory by the prayers of the Confraternity members. She also told St. Dominic that she had come on behalf of the souls in Purgatory to beg him to go on preaching the Rosary and to ask their relations to offer their Rosaries for them, and that they would reward them abundantly when they entered into glory” (Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-Ninth Rose”).
“Alphonsus, King of Leon and Galicia, very much wanted all his servants to honor the Blessed Virgin by saying the Rosary, so he used to hang a large Rosary on his belt, though he never said it himself. Nevertheless, his wearing it encouraged his courtiers to say the Rosary devoutly. One day the King fell seriously ill and when he was given up for dead he found himself, in spirit, before the judgment seat of Our Lord. Many devils were there accusing him of all the sins he had committed, and Our Lord was about to condemn him when Our Lady came forward to speak in his favor. She called for a pair of scales and had his sins placed in one of the balances, while she put the large Rosary which he had always worn on the other scale, together with all the rosaries that had been said through his example. It was found that the Rosaries weighed more than his sins. Looking at him with great kindness, Our Lady said, ‘As a reward for the little service you did for me, in wearing my Rosary, I have obtained a great grace for you from my Son. Your life will be spared for a few more years. See that you spend those years wisely, and do penance.’” (Secret of the Rosary, “Eighth Rose”).
It is true that all might not achieve such a high degree of Charity that all their temporal punishment for sin would be removed, but there is no one that cannot have confidence in the Divine Mercy of God. This Mercy is infinite, it imparts peace to all souls that keep it constantly before their eyes and confide therein. With regard to Purgatory the Mercy of God is exercised in a threefold manner:
(1) in consoling the souls;
(2) in mitigating or softening their sufferings;
(3) in giving to ourselves, here on Earth, a thousand means of avoiding those punishing fires.
God Consoles and God Loves
Firstly, we must not forget that God consoles the souls in Purgatory. It is He Himself that consoles them. Yet He also consoles them through the Blessed Virgin and through the holy angels. He consoles the souls by inspiring them with a high degree of Faith, Hope, and Divine Love— virtues which produce, in the suffering souls, a conformity to the Divine will, a resignation to their just plight, and a most perfect patience. St. Catherine of Genoa says: “God inspires the soul in Purgatory with so ardent a movement of devoted love, that it would be sufficient to annihilate her, if she were not immortal. Illumined and inflamed by that pure Charity, the more she loves God, the more she detests the least stain that displeases Him, as well as the least hindrance that prevents her union with Him. Therefore, if she could find another Purgatory more terrible than the one to which she is condemned, that soul would plunge herself therein, impelled by the impetuosity of the love which exists between God and herself, in order that she might be the sooner delivered from all that separates her from her Sovereign God.”
St. Catherine continues: “These souls are intimately united to the will of God, and so completely transformed into it, that they are always satisfied with its holy ordinances. The souls in Purgatory have no choice of their own; they can no longer will anything other than what God wills. They receive with perfect submission all that God gives them; and neither pleasure, nor contentment, nor pain can ever again make them think of themselves.”
He Listened Too Late, But He Burns Peacefully
Fr. Schouppe, in Purgatory Explained, writes that St. Magdalen de Pazzi, after the death of one of her brothers, had gone to the choir to offer prayers for him, when she saw a vision of his soul subject to an intense suffering. Touched with compassion, she began to weep and cried out in pity: “Brother, both miserable and blessed at the same time! O soul afflicted and yet contented! These pains are intolerable and yet they are endured. Why are they not understood by those here below, who have not the courage to carry their cross? Whilst you were in this world, my dear brother, you would not listen to my advice, and now you desire ardently that I should listen to you. O God, equally just and merciful, comfort this brother of mine, who has served Thee from his infancy. Have regard to your clemency, I beseech Thee, and make use of Thy great mercy on his behalf. O God most just, if he has not always been attentive to pleasing Thee, at least he has not despised those who made profession of serving you with fidelity.”
The day on which she had that wonderful ecstasy, during which she visited the different prisons of Purgatory, seeing again the soul of her brother, she said to him, “Poor soul, how you suffer and nevertheless you rejoice! You burn and you are satisfied, because you know well that these sufferings must lead you to a great and unspeakable happiness. How happy shall I be, if I could avoid having to endure greater suffering! Remain here, my dear brother, and complete your purification in peace!”
This contentment in the midst of the most intense suffering cannot be explained otherwise than by the Divine consolations which the Holy Ghost infuses into the souls in Purgatory. This Divine Spirit, by means of Faith, Hope, and Charity, puts those souls in the disposition of a sick person who has to submit to very painful treatment, but the effect, of which is to restore him to perfect health. This sick person suffers, but he loves his salutary suffering. The Holy Ghost, the Comforter, gives a similar contentment to the holy souls. In a sense, He enkindles in them the fire of His Love, which helps them fight fire with fire.
The Miracle of St. Stanislaus
Of this we have a striking example in Peter Miles, who was raised from the dead by St. Stanislaus of Cracow, but who preferred and asked to be allowed to return to Purgatory, rather than to live again upon Earth. The celebrated miracle of this resurrection happened in 1070. It is recorded in the Acta Sanctorum for May 7th. St. Stanislaus was the Bishop of Cracow, Poland, when the Duke Boleslas II governed Poland. The king was neglecting God and living too secular a life. St. Stanislaus reminded the prince of his duties, but Boleslas was irritated and, to revenge himself, he stirred-up against Stanislaus the heirs of a certain Peter Miles, who had died three years previously after having sold a piece of ground to the church of Cracow.
The heirs accused the saint of having usurped the ground, without having paid the owner. Stanislaus declared that he had paid for the land, but as the witnesses who should have defended him had been either bribed or intimidated, he was accused of stealing the property of another, and condemned to make restitution. Then, seeing that he had nothing to expect from human justice, he raised his heart to God, and received a sudden inspiration. He asked for a delay of three days, promising to make Peter Miles appear in person, that he might testify to the legal purchase and payment of the land.
They were granted to him in scorn. The saint fasted, watched, and prayed God to take up the defense of his cause. The third day, after having celebrated Holy Mass, he went out accompanied by his clergy and many of the faithful, to the place where Peter had been buried. By his orders the grave was opened; it contained nothing but bones. He touched them with his crosier, and in the name of Him who is the Resurrection and the Life, he commanded the dead man to arise.
Dead Men Walk
Suddenly the bones became reunited, were covered with flesh, and, in sight of the stupefied people, the dead man was seen to take the Bishop by the hand and walk towards the tribunal. Boleslas, with his court and an immense crowd of people, were awaiting the result with the most lively expectation. “Behold Peter,” said the saint to Boleslas; “he comes, prince, to give testimony before you. Interrogate him; he will answer you!”
It is impossible to describe the stupefaction of the Duke, of his councilors, and of the whole concourse of people. Peter affirmed that he had been paid for the ground; then turning towards his heirs, he reproached them for having accused the pious prelate against all rights of justice; then he exhorted them to do penance for so grievous a sin.
Which Do You Prefer—Purgatory or Earth?
Wishing to complete this great miracle for the glory of God, Stanislaus proposed to the deceased that, if he desired to live a few years longer, he would obtain for him this favor from God. Peter replied that he had no such desire. He was in Purgatory, but he would rather return there immediately and endure its pains, than expose himself to damnation in this terrestrial life. He implored the saint only to beg of God to shorten the time of his sufferings, that he might the sooner enter Heaven. After that, accompanied by the Bishop and a great crowd, Peter returned to his grave, laid himself down, his body fell to pieces, and his bones resumed the same state in which they had first been found. We have reason to believe that the saint soon obtained the deliverance of his soul.
That which is the most remarkable in this example, and which should most attract our attention, is that a soul from Purgatory, after having experienced the most excruciating torments, prefers that state of suffering to the life of this world; and the reason which he gives for this preference is, that in this mortal life we are exposed to the danger of being lost and incurring eternal damnation. He sees Purgatory as being a mercy that he does not want to relinquish.
The Help of Our Lady
The souls in Purgatory receive also great consolation from the Blessed Virgin. Is she not the “Comforter of the Afflicted”? And what affliction can be compared to that of the poor souls in the fires of Purgatory? Is she not the “Mother of Mercy”? And is it not towards these holy suffering souls that she must show all the mercy of her heart? We must not, therefore, be astonished that in the Revelations of St. Bridget the Queen of Heaven gives herself the beautiful name of “Mother of the Souls in Purgatory”. She said to St. Bridget, “I am the Mother of all those who are in the place of expiation; my prayers mitigate the chastisements which are inflicted upon them for their faults.” (Revel. S. Brig., lib. 4. c. 50).
Fear Not, My Son…
On October 25th, 1604, in the College of the Society of Jesus at Coimbra, Portugal, Father Jerome Carvalho died in the odor of sanctity, at the age of fifty years. This admirable and humble servant of God had always felt a lively apprehension of the sufferings of Purgatory. Neither the cruel scourgings which he inflicted upon himself several times every day, not counting those prompted each week by the remembrance of the Passion, nor the six hours which he devoted morning and evening to the meditation of holy subjects, seemed sufficient, in his estimation, to shield him from the chastisement which he imagined awaited him after death. But one day the Queen of Heaven, to whom he had a tender devotion, decided to come herself to console her servant by the simple assurance that she was a Mother of Mercy to her dear children in Purgatory, and not only to those upon Earth. Seeking, later, to spread this consoling doctrine, the holy man accidentally let fall, in the ardor of his discourse, these words: “She told me this herself.”
Mary’s Powerful Intercession
It is related that a great servant of Mary, Blessed Renier of Citeaux, trembled at the thought of his sins and the terrible Justice of God after death. In his fear, addressing himself to Our Lady, whom he held as his great Protectress, who calls herself Mother of Mercy, he fell into an ecstasy, and saw the Mother of God interceding with her Son in his favor. “My Son,” she said, “deal mercifully with him in Purgatory, because he humbly repents of his sins.” “My Mother,” replied Jesus, “I place his cause in thy hands,” which meant to say, be it done to your servant according to your desires. Blessed Renier understood with unutterable joy that Mary had obtained his exemption from Purgatory.
Putting-Out the Flames with the Rosary
The Rosary is a key ingredient in all of this. We read in St. Louis de Montfort’s book, The Secret of the Rosary, how great is the power of the Rosary in remitting temporal punishment due for our sins. Here are a few extracts:
When St. Dominic was performing an exorcism, through Our Lady’s intervention he got the devils to admit many things, one of them was the following: “Now that we are forced to speak, we must also tell you that nobody who perseveres in saying the Rosary will be damned, because she obtains for her servants the grace of true contrition for their sins by which they obtain pardon and mercy” (Secret of the Rosary, “Thirty-Third Rose”).
“Flammin and a great number of other writers tell the story of a young girl of noble station named Alexandra, who had been miraculously converted and enrolled by St. Dominic in the Confraternity of the Rosary. After her death, she appeared to him and said she had been condemned to seven hundred years in Purgatory because of her own sins and those she had caused others to commit by her worldly ways. So she implored him to ease her pains by his prayers and to ask the Confraternity members to pray for the same end. St. Dominic did as she had asked. Two weeks later she appeared to him, more radiant than the sun, having been quickly delivered from Purgatory by the prayers of the Confraternity members. She also told St. Dominic that she had come on behalf of the souls in Purgatory to beg him to go on preaching the Rosary and to ask their relations to offer their Rosaries for them, and that they would reward them abundantly when they entered into glory” (Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-Ninth Rose”).
“Alphonsus, King of Leon and Galicia, very much wanted all his servants to honor the Blessed Virgin by saying the Rosary, so he used to hang a large Rosary on his belt, though he never said it himself. Nevertheless, his wearing it encouraged his courtiers to say the Rosary devoutly. One day the King fell seriously ill and when he was given up for dead he found himself, in spirit, before the judgment seat of Our Lord. Many devils were there accusing him of all the sins he had committed, and Our Lord was about to condemn him when Our Lady came forward to speak in his favor. She called for a pair of scales and had his sins placed in one of the balances, while she put the large Rosary which he had always worn on the other scale, together with all the rosaries that had been said through his example. It was found that the Rosaries weighed more than his sins. Looking at him with great kindness, Our Lady said, ‘As a reward for the little service you did for me, in wearing my Rosary, I have obtained a great grace for you from my Son. Your life will be spared for a few more years. See that you spend those years wisely, and do penance.’” (Secret of the Rosary, “Eighth Rose”).
Article 16
Saturday November 18th, 2023
From Fear to Mercy
Saturday November 18th, 2023
From Fear to Mercy
Fear Leads to Mercy
We have the early part of the month of November looking at the rigors and severity of Divine Justice in the other life; they are frightening, and it is impossible to think of them without trembling—and that is a good thing, for as Holy Scripture says: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12). That fire, enkindled by Divine Justice, those excruciating pains, compared to which all the penances of the saints, all the sufferings of the martyrs put together, are as nothing, who is there that thinks he will be able to look upon them and not shudder from very fear?
This fear is salutary and conformable to the spirit of Jesus Christ. Our Divine Master desires that we should fear, and that we should fear not only Hell, but also Purgatory, which is a sort of mitigated Hell. It is to inspire us, with this holy fear, that He shows us the dungeons of the Supreme Judge, from which we shall not depart until we have paid the last farthing. (Matthew 5:26). We may say of the fire of Purgatory, that which is said of Hell fire: “Fear ye not them that kill the body and are not able to kill the soul, but rather fear him that can cast both soul and body into Hell” (Matthew 10:28).
Fear Leads to Better Things
Yet that fear can make us wise and make us change our lives—whereby we begin to love God more than we love ourselves: “Fear is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 110:10) and “The fear of God is the beginning of His love” (Ecclesiasticus 25:16). It is not the intention of our Lord that we should have an excessive and barren fear, a fear which tortures and discourages, a gloomy fear without confidence. No! He wishes that our fear should be tempered with a great trust in His mercy; He desires that we should fear evil in order to prevent and avoid it; He desires that the thought of those avenging flames should stimulate us to fervor in His service, and cause us to expiate our faults in this world rather than in the other. “Better is it to purge away our sins, and cut off our vices now,” says the author of the Imitation, “than to keep them for purgation hereafter.” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 24). Moreover, if, despite our efforts to live a good life, and to satisfy for our sins in this world, we have well-grounded fears that we shall have to undergo a Purgatory, we must look forward to that possibility with unbounded confidence in God, Who never fails to console those whom He purifies by sufferings. For as we have said so many times already, God’s justice and mercy always work together.
Look to His Mercy
So after having frightened the living daylights out of ourselves (and hopefully the desire and attachment to sin too!) let us spend some time looking at the Mercy of God, which shines forth therein no less than His Justice. “His mercy is from generation unto generations, to them that fear Him” (Luke 1:50). But let our attitude not be one of presumption upon His mercy—which is a sin—but a humble acknowledgment of our sinfulness and unworthiness of His Mercy. We are shown the right attitude by Our Lady’s Magnificat: “My soul doth magnify the Lord. Because he hath regarded the humility of His handmaid. Because He that is mighty, hath done great things to me and His mercy is from generation unto generations, to them that fear Him. He hath put down the mighty from their seat, and hath exalted the humble. He hath filled the hungry with good things [mercy being one of them]; and the rich He hath sent empty away. He hath received Israel His servant, being mindful of His mercy” (Luke 1:46-54).
God’s Perfect Balance
If God reserves terrible chastisements in the other life for the tiniest faults, He does not inflict those punishments without, at the same time, softening them with clemency; and nothing shows better the admirable harmony of this Divine perfection than Purgatory, because the most severe Justice is there exercised, together with the most unimaginable Mercy. If Our Lord chastises those souls that are dear to Him, it is in His love, according to the words, “Such as I love I rebuke and chastise” (Apocalypse 3:19). With one hand He strikes, with the other He heals. He offers mercy and redemption in abundance (Psalm 129).
This infinite Mercy of our Heavenly Father must be the firm foundation of our confidence; and, after the example of the saints, we must keep it always before our eyes. The saints never lost sight of it; and it was for this reason that the fear of Purgatory never deprived them of their peace and joy of the Holy Ghost. St. Lidwina, who so well knew the frightful severity of expiatory suffering, was nevertheless animated with that spirit of confidence, and tried to inspire others with the same spirit. One time she received a visit from a good and holy priest. While they were talking, together with other virtuous persons, the conversation turned to the sufferings undergone in the other life. The priest―as he looked at a woman holding a jar filled with grains of mustard-seed―remarked that he trembled when thinking of the fire of Purgatory. “Nevertheless,” he added, “I would be satisfied to go there for as many years as there are grains of seed in this jar; for then, at least, I would be certain of my salvation.”
“What are you saying, Father?” replied St. Lidwina. “Why do you have so little confidence in the Mercy of God? You wouldn’t say that if you had a better knowledge of what Purgatory is like, and of what frightful torments are endured there!”
“Let Purgatory be what it may,” replied the priest, “I persist in what I say!”
A while afterwards, this priest died, and the same persons, who had been present during his conversation with St. Lidwina, questioned the saint if God had revealed to her the priest’s condition in the other world. She replied, “The deceased is well off, on account of his virtuous life; but it would be better for him if he had had more confidence in the Passion of Jesus Christ, and if he had taken a milder view of the subject of Purgatory.”
A Balanced View
In what consisted this lack of confidence which met the disapproval of St. Lidwina? In the opinion which this good priest had that it is almost impossible to be saved, and that we shall enter Heaven only after having undergone innumerable years of torture. This idea is erroneous, and contrary to Christian confidence. Yes, of course, we know Our Lord’s reply to the question of whether only a few will be saved: “And a certain man said to Him: Lord, are they few that are saved? But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’” (Luke 13:23-24).
Savior of Losers and the Lost
Yet He came to seek and save those who were lost: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10); and “if your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). However this is no freebie, but requires a change of heart, a change of life, suffering and penance: “I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 11:19) … “If the wicked do penance for all his sins which he hath committed, and keep all my commandments, and do judgment, and justice, living he shall live, and shall not die” (Ezechiel 18:21) … “Hath no man condemned thee? Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:10-11) … “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23) … “ I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3).
Good Will
Our Savior came to bring peace to men of good-will, and to impose upon us, as a condition of our salvation, a yoke which is sweet and a burden which is not heavy. Therefore, let your will be good, and you will find peace, you will see all difficulties and terrors vanish. Good-will! That is everything! Be of good-will, submit to the Will of God, place his Holy Law above all else, serve the Lord with all your heart, and He will give you such powerful assistance that you will enter Paradise with an astonishing facility. Sounds too easy, eh? I could never have believed, you will say, that it was so easy to enter Heaven! Again, I repeat, to obtain for ourselves this wonder of Mercy, God asks on our part an upright heart, a good-will. That doesn’t mean to say there will be no pain, no sufferings, no crosses, no anxieties—but these are part of God’s will that must be borne with a good-will.
Good will consists, properly speaking, in submitting and conforming our will to that of God―Who is the rule of all good-will; and this good-will attains its highest perfection when we embrace the Divine Will as the highest good in our life, even when it imposes the greatest sacrifices, the most acute suffering. A soul thus disposed seems to lose the sensation of pain, and this is because the soul is animated with the spirit of love; and, as St. Augustine says, when we love we suffer not, or, if we suffer, we love the suffering.
The Power of Love
We have already spoken of the power of a perfect act of love and contrition, that is capable of taking away all the debt we owe for our past sins—this fire of love we must enkindle and make grow by our good-will attitude to all the firewood that God decides to throw on our little fire. Ouch!
The Imitation of Christ has a beautiful chapter on the effects of Divine Love, here are a few extracts for your fire:
“Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs with equanimity. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and estranged from all worldly affections, lest its inward sight be obstructed, lest it be entangled in any temporal interest and overcome by adversity.
“Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger or higher or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in the one sovereign Good, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver.
“Love often knows no limits but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much where he who does not love fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice. Love is mean and contemptible in its own eyes, devoted and thankful to God; always trusting and hoping in Him even when He is distasteful to it, for there is no living in love without sorrow. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, chapter 5).
The Confessor of St. Margaret Mary writes…
St. Claude de la Colombière, of the Society of Jesus, confessor of St. Margaret Mary, possessed this loving heart, this perfect will, and in his Retrait Spirituelle he thus expresses his sentiments: “We must not cease to expiate the past disorders of our life by penance; but it must be done without anxiety, because the worst that can befall us, when our will is good and we are submissive and obedient, is to be sent for a long time to Purgatory, and we may say with good reason that this is a great evil. I do not fear Purgatory. Of Hell, I will not speak, for I should wrong the Mercy of God by having the least fear of Hell, although I have merited it more than all the demons together. Purgatory I do not fear. I wish I had not deserved it, since I could not do so without displeasing God; but, as I have merited to go there, I am delighted to go and satisfy His Justice in the most rigorous manner it is possible to imagine, and that even to the Day of Judgment. I know that the torments there endured are horrible, but I know that they honor God, and cannot prove an injury to the souls; that there we are certain never to oppose the will of God; that we shall never resent His severity; that we shall even love the rigors of His justice, and await with patience until it shall be entirely appeased. Therefore, I have given with my whole heart all my satisfactions to the souls in Purgatory, and even bequeath to others all the suffrages which shall be offered for me after my death, in order that God may be glorified in Paradise by souls who shall have merited to be raised to a higher degree of glory than myself.”
See to what an excess of charity, the love of God and our neighbor carries us, once it has taken possession of the heart―it transforms, transfigures suffering in such a manner, that all its bitterness is changed into sweetness. “When thou shalt arrive thus far, that tribulation shall be sweet to thee, and thou shalt relish it for the love of Christ: then think that it is well with thee, for thou hast found a Paradise upon Earth” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 2, chapter 12). Let us therefore have great love for God, great Charity, and we shall have little fear of Purgatory. The Holy Ghost bears testimony in the depths of our hearts that, being children of God, we have no need to dread the chastisements of a Father if we truly seek to follow and do His will, and not our own.
Good Will = God’s Will
Our Lord Himself said: “I came down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me” (John 6:38). “Behold I come: in the head of the book it is written of me: that I should do thy will, O God … Then said I: ‘Behold, I come to do Thy will, O God!’” (Hebrews 10:7, 9). “I seek not My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me” (John 5:30). “And He said: ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible to thee: remove this chalice from me; but not what I will, but what thou wilt!’” (Mark 14:36).
To us He says: “If you love me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15) … “You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 15:14) … “And why call you Me, ‘Lord, Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind” (Luke 10:27) and “Let not your heart be troubled, nor let it be afraid!” (John 14:27).
We have the early part of the month of November looking at the rigors and severity of Divine Justice in the other life; they are frightening, and it is impossible to think of them without trembling—and that is a good thing, for as Holy Scripture says: “With fear and trembling work out your salvation” (Philippians 2:12). That fire, enkindled by Divine Justice, those excruciating pains, compared to which all the penances of the saints, all the sufferings of the martyrs put together, are as nothing, who is there that thinks he will be able to look upon them and not shudder from very fear?
This fear is salutary and conformable to the spirit of Jesus Christ. Our Divine Master desires that we should fear, and that we should fear not only Hell, but also Purgatory, which is a sort of mitigated Hell. It is to inspire us, with this holy fear, that He shows us the dungeons of the Supreme Judge, from which we shall not depart until we have paid the last farthing. (Matthew 5:26). We may say of the fire of Purgatory, that which is said of Hell fire: “Fear ye not them that kill the body and are not able to kill the soul, but rather fear him that can cast both soul and body into Hell” (Matthew 10:28).
Fear Leads to Better Things
Yet that fear can make us wise and make us change our lives—whereby we begin to love God more than we love ourselves: “Fear is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 110:10) and “The fear of God is the beginning of His love” (Ecclesiasticus 25:16). It is not the intention of our Lord that we should have an excessive and barren fear, a fear which tortures and discourages, a gloomy fear without confidence. No! He wishes that our fear should be tempered with a great trust in His mercy; He desires that we should fear evil in order to prevent and avoid it; He desires that the thought of those avenging flames should stimulate us to fervor in His service, and cause us to expiate our faults in this world rather than in the other. “Better is it to purge away our sins, and cut off our vices now,” says the author of the Imitation, “than to keep them for purgation hereafter.” (Imitation of Christ, Book 1, chapter 24). Moreover, if, despite our efforts to live a good life, and to satisfy for our sins in this world, we have well-grounded fears that we shall have to undergo a Purgatory, we must look forward to that possibility with unbounded confidence in God, Who never fails to console those whom He purifies by sufferings. For as we have said so many times already, God’s justice and mercy always work together.
Look to His Mercy
So after having frightened the living daylights out of ourselves (and hopefully the desire and attachment to sin too!) let us spend some time looking at the Mercy of God, which shines forth therein no less than His Justice. “His mercy is from generation unto generations, to them that fear Him” (Luke 1:50). But let our attitude not be one of presumption upon His mercy—which is a sin—but a humble acknowledgment of our sinfulness and unworthiness of His Mercy. We are shown the right attitude by Our Lady’s Magnificat: “My soul doth magnify the Lord. Because he hath regarded the humility of His handmaid. Because He that is mighty, hath done great things to me and His mercy is from generation unto generations, to them that fear Him. He hath put down the mighty from their seat, and hath exalted the humble. He hath filled the hungry with good things [mercy being one of them]; and the rich He hath sent empty away. He hath received Israel His servant, being mindful of His mercy” (Luke 1:46-54).
God’s Perfect Balance
If God reserves terrible chastisements in the other life for the tiniest faults, He does not inflict those punishments without, at the same time, softening them with clemency; and nothing shows better the admirable harmony of this Divine perfection than Purgatory, because the most severe Justice is there exercised, together with the most unimaginable Mercy. If Our Lord chastises those souls that are dear to Him, it is in His love, according to the words, “Such as I love I rebuke and chastise” (Apocalypse 3:19). With one hand He strikes, with the other He heals. He offers mercy and redemption in abundance (Psalm 129).
This infinite Mercy of our Heavenly Father must be the firm foundation of our confidence; and, after the example of the saints, we must keep it always before our eyes. The saints never lost sight of it; and it was for this reason that the fear of Purgatory never deprived them of their peace and joy of the Holy Ghost. St. Lidwina, who so well knew the frightful severity of expiatory suffering, was nevertheless animated with that spirit of confidence, and tried to inspire others with the same spirit. One time she received a visit from a good and holy priest. While they were talking, together with other virtuous persons, the conversation turned to the sufferings undergone in the other life. The priest―as he looked at a woman holding a jar filled with grains of mustard-seed―remarked that he trembled when thinking of the fire of Purgatory. “Nevertheless,” he added, “I would be satisfied to go there for as many years as there are grains of seed in this jar; for then, at least, I would be certain of my salvation.”
“What are you saying, Father?” replied St. Lidwina. “Why do you have so little confidence in the Mercy of God? You wouldn’t say that if you had a better knowledge of what Purgatory is like, and of what frightful torments are endured there!”
“Let Purgatory be what it may,” replied the priest, “I persist in what I say!”
A while afterwards, this priest died, and the same persons, who had been present during his conversation with St. Lidwina, questioned the saint if God had revealed to her the priest’s condition in the other world. She replied, “The deceased is well off, on account of his virtuous life; but it would be better for him if he had had more confidence in the Passion of Jesus Christ, and if he had taken a milder view of the subject of Purgatory.”
A Balanced View
In what consisted this lack of confidence which met the disapproval of St. Lidwina? In the opinion which this good priest had that it is almost impossible to be saved, and that we shall enter Heaven only after having undergone innumerable years of torture. This idea is erroneous, and contrary to Christian confidence. Yes, of course, we know Our Lord’s reply to the question of whether only a few will be saved: “And a certain man said to Him: Lord, are they few that are saved? But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’” (Luke 13:23-24).
Savior of Losers and the Lost
Yet He came to seek and save those who were lost: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10); and “if your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). However this is no freebie, but requires a change of heart, a change of life, suffering and penance: “I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 11:19) … “If the wicked do penance for all his sins which he hath committed, and keep all my commandments, and do judgment, and justice, living he shall live, and shall not die” (Ezechiel 18:21) … “Hath no man condemned thee? Neither will I condemn thee! Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:10-11) … “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23) … “ I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3).
Good Will
Our Savior came to bring peace to men of good-will, and to impose upon us, as a condition of our salvation, a yoke which is sweet and a burden which is not heavy. Therefore, let your will be good, and you will find peace, you will see all difficulties and terrors vanish. Good-will! That is everything! Be of good-will, submit to the Will of God, place his Holy Law above all else, serve the Lord with all your heart, and He will give you such powerful assistance that you will enter Paradise with an astonishing facility. Sounds too easy, eh? I could never have believed, you will say, that it was so easy to enter Heaven! Again, I repeat, to obtain for ourselves this wonder of Mercy, God asks on our part an upright heart, a good-will. That doesn’t mean to say there will be no pain, no sufferings, no crosses, no anxieties—but these are part of God’s will that must be borne with a good-will.
Good will consists, properly speaking, in submitting and conforming our will to that of God―Who is the rule of all good-will; and this good-will attains its highest perfection when we embrace the Divine Will as the highest good in our life, even when it imposes the greatest sacrifices, the most acute suffering. A soul thus disposed seems to lose the sensation of pain, and this is because the soul is animated with the spirit of love; and, as St. Augustine says, when we love we suffer not, or, if we suffer, we love the suffering.
The Power of Love
We have already spoken of the power of a perfect act of love and contrition, that is capable of taking away all the debt we owe for our past sins—this fire of love we must enkindle and make grow by our good-will attitude to all the firewood that God decides to throw on our little fire. Ouch!
The Imitation of Christ has a beautiful chapter on the effects of Divine Love, here are a few extracts for your fire:
“Love is an excellent thing, a very great blessing, indeed. It makes every difficulty easy, and bears all wrongs with equanimity. For it bears a burden without being weighted and renders sweet all that is bitter. The noble love of Jesus spurs to great deeds and excites longing for that which is more perfect. Love tends upward; it will not be held down by anything low. Love wishes to be free and estranged from all worldly affections, lest its inward sight be obstructed, lest it be entangled in any temporal interest and overcome by adversity.
“Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger or higher or wider; nothing is more pleasant, nothing fuller, and nothing better in Heaven or on Earth, for love is born of God and cannot rest except in God, Who is above all created things. One who is in love flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free, not bound. He gives all for all and possesses all in all, because he rests in the one sovereign Good, Who is above all things, and from Whom every good flows and proceeds. He does not look to the gift but turns himself above all gifts to the Giver.
“Love often knows no limits but overflows all bounds. Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of troubles, attempts more than it is able, and does not plead impossibility, because it believes that it may and can do all things. For this reason, it is able to do all, performing and effecting much where he who does not love fails and falls. Love is watchful. Sleeping, it does not slumber. Wearied, it is not tired. Pressed, it is not straitened. Alarmed, it is not confused, but like a living flame, a burning torch, it forces its way upward and passes unharmed through every obstacle. If a man loves, he will know the sound of this voice. Love is mean and contemptible in its own eyes, devoted and thankful to God; always trusting and hoping in Him even when He is distasteful to it, for there is no living in love without sorrow. He who is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of the Beloved is not worthy to be called a lover. A lover must embrace willingly all that is difficult and bitter for the sake of the Beloved, and he should not turn away from Him because of adversities.” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 3, chapter 5).
The Confessor of St. Margaret Mary writes…
St. Claude de la Colombière, of the Society of Jesus, confessor of St. Margaret Mary, possessed this loving heart, this perfect will, and in his Retrait Spirituelle he thus expresses his sentiments: “We must not cease to expiate the past disorders of our life by penance; but it must be done without anxiety, because the worst that can befall us, when our will is good and we are submissive and obedient, is to be sent for a long time to Purgatory, and we may say with good reason that this is a great evil. I do not fear Purgatory. Of Hell, I will not speak, for I should wrong the Mercy of God by having the least fear of Hell, although I have merited it more than all the demons together. Purgatory I do not fear. I wish I had not deserved it, since I could not do so without displeasing God; but, as I have merited to go there, I am delighted to go and satisfy His Justice in the most rigorous manner it is possible to imagine, and that even to the Day of Judgment. I know that the torments there endured are horrible, but I know that they honor God, and cannot prove an injury to the souls; that there we are certain never to oppose the will of God; that we shall never resent His severity; that we shall even love the rigors of His justice, and await with patience until it shall be entirely appeased. Therefore, I have given with my whole heart all my satisfactions to the souls in Purgatory, and even bequeath to others all the suffrages which shall be offered for me after my death, in order that God may be glorified in Paradise by souls who shall have merited to be raised to a higher degree of glory than myself.”
See to what an excess of charity, the love of God and our neighbor carries us, once it has taken possession of the heart―it transforms, transfigures suffering in such a manner, that all its bitterness is changed into sweetness. “When thou shalt arrive thus far, that tribulation shall be sweet to thee, and thou shalt relish it for the love of Christ: then think that it is well with thee, for thou hast found a Paradise upon Earth” (The Imitation of Christ, Book 2, chapter 12). Let us therefore have great love for God, great Charity, and we shall have little fear of Purgatory. The Holy Ghost bears testimony in the depths of our hearts that, being children of God, we have no need to dread the chastisements of a Father if we truly seek to follow and do His will, and not our own.
Good Will = God’s Will
Our Lord Himself said: “I came down from Heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me” (John 6:38). “Behold I come: in the head of the book it is written of me: that I should do thy will, O God … Then said I: ‘Behold, I come to do Thy will, O God!’” (Hebrews 10:7, 9). “I seek not My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me” (John 5:30). “And He said: ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible to thee: remove this chalice from me; but not what I will, but what thou wilt!’” (Mark 14:36).
To us He says: “If you love me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15) … “You are My friends, if you do the things that I command you” (John 15:14) … “And why call you Me, ‘Lord, Lord!’ and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). “Love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind” (Luke 10:27) and “Let not your heart be troubled, nor let it be afraid!” (John 14:27).
Article 15
Friday November 17th, 2023
Lack of Confidence
Friday November 17th, 2023
Lack of Confidence
Lack of Confidence
As already stated in the previous article, despondency or discouragement is the most dangerous temptation the devil can employ. It saps us of our confidence. Of course, many of us have the wrong kind of confidence in the first place—we seek to have confidence in ourselves, rather than having confidence in God. But once discouragement or despondency sets in, the confidence quickly flies out the window—some temperaments may resist better and for longer than others, but everyone is prone to this temptation—and we must remind ourselves that it is a TEMPTATION—it is not a part of ourselves, it comes from outside of ourselves, like a virus. In other temptations the devil attacks one particular virtue: by despondency he attacks them all. In despondency there is nothing to lean upon: we feel that God is asking for that which are unable to give. We would like to turn to God, but the devil convinces us that we dare not hope to receive from God all the help we need to overcome our sins and pay for their debt, because we feel that God does not like us all that much after committing so many sins; thus we become discouraged and nearly reduced to despair, which is the final goal of the devil for the despondent soul.
Purgatory quickly becomes like a debt that has spiraled out of control. Yet we know that, with God, nobody can declare bankruptcy and get away without paying anything. Just as debt seems to crush the heart in our material life, so too does the debt of our sins crush us in relation to our spiritual life. Sometimes people cast all care to the wind and spend, spend, spend, while the credit card still works—knowing that they won’t be able to pay. The devil tries to make us sin, sin, sin, to the point where our hope and confidence of pardon is so low, that we fall into despair.
Any Debt Can Be Paid-Off, But…
First of all, we must remember the words of Scripture: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked” (Galatians 6:7). We cannot commit the sin of presumption—which is just as much a sin against hope as despair is—by sinning, sinning and sinning with the presumption that God will still show us His mercy. Read the sermon of St. Alphonsus Liguori on “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More”, from which we will just give a few extracts:
“You say: I am young: there are many who have committed more sins than I have. But is God on that account obliged to wait for your repentance if you offend him? In the Gospel of St. Matthew (21:19) we read, that the Savior cursed a fig tree the first time he saw it without fruit. ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward forever. And immediately the fig tree withered away.’ You must, then, tremble at the thought of committing a single mortal sin, particularly if you have already been guilty of mortal sins. ‘Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin’ (Ecclesiasticus 5: 5). Say not then, O sinner; ‘As God has forgiven me other sins, so he will pardon me this one if I commit it!’ Say not this; for, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned.”
Be Realistic, Be Confident
As was said yesterday, we cannot focus exclusively on God’s mercy, while sweeping his justice under carpet. St. Catherine of Genoa gave us that warning in her Treatise on Purgatory: “Would that I could utter so strong a cry that it would strike all men with terror, and say to them: O wretched beings! Why are you so blinded by this world that you make, as you will find at the hour of death, no provision for the great necessity that will then come upon you? You shelter yourselves beneath your hope in the mercy of God, which you unceasingly exalt. Have not the boldness to say: ‘I will go to confession and gain a plenary indulgence and thus I shall be saved.’ Remember that the full confession and entire contrition which are requisite to gain a plenary indulgence are not easily attained. Did you know how hardly they are come by, you would tremble with fear and be more sure of losing than of gaining them” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
Nevertheless…
Let it, however, be well understood that despondency is a temptation. Hope and confidence in God are commanded equally with Faith and the other virtues. Therefore the feeling of despondency, which is opposed to hope, must be resisted strongly and CONFIDENTLY. God will forgive if we do not abuse His mercy, even though we will still have to pay—but what kind of person would want to get into Heaven on the back of a life of endless sin, without having settled his debts with God?
Ask With Faith and Confidence
No, as the apostle, St. James, says, “Let him ask in Faith, nothing wavering” (1:6). The heart that prays with doubt and distrust shall obtain nothing. And we also know that Jesus Christ, whilst still on Earth, granted miracles only when there was confidence: “Daughter, thy Faith hath made thee whole” (Matthew 9:22).
In Fr. Gottemoller’s book, Words of Love, which deals with Our Lord’s apparitions to three religious sisters (Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Consolata Betrone and Sr. Mary of the Trinity), Our Lord says: “Let them [souls] give themselves up to thoughts of confidence, not fear, for I am a God of pity, ever ready to receive them into My Heart ... I make little account of all that [miseries and weakness], provided souls come to Me with confidence and love. … You must do all that you can, and it is only after that, that you can count infallibly on My help … To those who ask with love, that is to say, with unlimited confidence, I cannot prevent Myself from granting even more, far more than what is asked … Oh, if you knew what My love is! And how I long for you to have confidence in it! … You will be lacking in help only when My Divine Heart will be lacking in power! …
“It often happens that good and pious souls, and very frequently also souls who are consecrated to Me, wound My Heart to Its very depths by some diffident phrase such as: ‘Who knows whether I will be saved?’ Open the Gospel and read there My promises. I promised to My sheep: ‘I will give them life everlasting; and they shall not perish forever, and no man shall pluck them out of My Hand.’ Do you understand? No one can take a soul from Me! Now read on: ‘That which My Father hath given Me, is greater than all; and no one can snatch them out of the Hand of My Father.’ Do you understand? No one can snatch a soul from Me.... In all eternity they will not perish ... because I give them eternal life. For whom have I spoken these words? For all the sheep, for all souls! Why then the insult, ‘Who knows whether I will be saved?’ I have given assurances, in the Gospel, that no one can pluck a soul from Me and that I will give that soul eternal life, and so the soul cannot perish. Believe Me, Consolata, into Hell go only those who really wish to go there; for, though no one can snatch a soul from Me, the soul may, through the free will granted her, flee from Me, may betray Me, deny Me, and so go to Satan of her own volition.
“Oh, if instead of wounding My Heart with such distrust, you would give a little thought to the Heaven which awaits you! I did not create you for Hell, but for Heaven, not as a companion for the devil, but to enjoy Me in everlasting love! You see, to Hell go only those who wish to go there ... How foolish is your fear of being damned! After having shed My Blood in order to save your soul, after having surrounded your soul with graces upon graces all through your entire existence ... would I permit Satan, My worst enemy, to rob Me of that soul, at the last moment of her life, just when I am about to gather in the fruit of the Redemption and when, therefore, that soul is on the point of loving Me forever? Would I do that, when in the Holy Gospel I have promised to give the soul eternal life and that no one can snatch her from My Hands? How is it possible to believe such a monstrosity? You see, final impenitence is found only in a soul who purposely wishes to go to Hell and therefore obstinately refuses My mercy, for I never refuse to pardon anyone. I offer the gift of My immense compassion to all, for My Blood was shed for all, for all! No, it is not the multiplicity of sins which condemns a soul, for I forgive everything if she repents, but it is the obstinacy of not wishing to be pardoned, of wishing to be damned! Dismas on the cross had only one single act of Faith in Me, but many, many sins; he was pardoned in an instant, however, and on the very day of his repentance he entered into My kingdom and is a saint! Behold the triumph of My Mercy and of Faith in Me!” (Words of Love, Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, chapter 6, “Confidence”).
Beautiful words, but words spoken to those who were sincere in their sorrow for sin and were trying to put things right—as Our Lord said: “I forgive everything if she repents ... You must do all that you can, and it is only after that, that you can count infallibly on My help ... Though no one can snatch a soul from Me, the soul may, through the free will granted her, flee from Me, may betray Me, deny Me, and so go to Satan of her own volition.” Repentance means sorrow for sin, a firm desire to change one’s life, and the desire to pay for the damage done. Our Lord adds: “Have confidence in Me! Trust Me always! You must have a blind confidence that I will fulfill all the great promises which I have made you, for I am kind, immensely kind and merciful, and ‘I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live.’” (Words of Love, Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, chapter 6, “Confidence”).
Confidence in the Sufferings and Merits of Jesus Christ
A soul that is addicted to despondency is swayed by fear, which prevents it from reflecting on the immovable foundations of confidence in God. We cannot therefore give her too many motives for overcoming that fear which harasses her incessantly. She will find a powerful one in the sufferings of Jesus Christ, which are as immense as the dignity of His person is infinite. This divine Savior, dying for all mankind, praying for all, offering for all His sufferings and His death, has merited for them all the graces which are necessary for them to overcome their spiritual enemy and to gain eternal happiness. These merits which Jesus Christ did not need for Himself He has given over to mankind. So that, according to St. Bernard, these merits become our own. And by offering them to the Father, we obtain that help which we need to strengthen us against the enemies of our salvation. It is from this principle that the Church, in all the prayers she makes to God, always invokes the merits of Jesus Christ our Lord. The mercy is there, all we have to do is pay!
But I Have Sinned Too Much!
“But,” exclaims a soul, frightened at the thought of her many past offences, “how must Our Lord and Savior look upon me, after the many outrages which I have committed against Him! Can He any longer interest Himself for one who has been so long His enemy?” Can a well-instructed Christian soul have any doubt on this point? Did not Jesus Christ Himself assure us that He came into the world to suffer and die for sinners; that He came chiefly to seek for sinners? Now, in the face of this assertion, will they still imagine that, because they are sinners, they will be refused the help they require to return to God? No, Heaven and Earth may pass away, but the promises of God shall not pass away unfulfilled. These promises relate to sinners, and if there had been no sinners, would Jesus Christ have suffered? Would He have submitted to a cruel death? The more sinful man is, the more strikingly are the mercy of God, and the power of the Savior’s merits displayed, Is there any blacker crime than the treachery of Judas? Yes, answers St. Jerome, there is one still more enormous, despair! Judas rendered himself more guilty in taking away his own life than in betraying his divine Master. The mercy is there for us, we must do what we can to pay for it. Christ will add His Blood and merits to our payments.
You Have To Beg For His Merits
Let us then never fear to have recourse to the merits of Jesus Christ. We honor them when we make use of them to obtain the helps which we need, since it was for this that Jesus Christ vouchsafed to acquire them and to give them over to us. It is in applying them to ourselves through prayer and good works, that we fulfil the end for which they were purchased. It would be a singular way of honoring them, the not daring to make use of them; it would be going directly against the end which our divine Savior proposed to Himself. In turning from His gifts as useless, we should not be evincing our esteem for them, but only proving our indifference.
Come to Me and Ask!
Since we acknowledge that we are poor, weak, and miserable, should we not seek to enrich and to strengthen ourselves, and to cure our evils? Jesus Christ offers Himself to accomplish these miracles in us, by offering His infinite merits. With loving tenderness He says to us, “Come to me, all you that labor, and are burdened, and I will refresh you” (Matt. 11:28). Is it not therefore against every principle, against every feeling, and still more against the intention of the Savior Himself to fear to have recourse to Him?
Temptation attacks the soul in every way. Through a sentiment of false humility a fear is conceived which fills the soul with dejection. Christian humility and sound reason require that we should recognize our unworthiness of heavenly benefits; but they do not require us to refuse those which are offered, or not to ask for those that have been promised to our prayers. Still more does the gratitude which we owe to Jesus Christ require that we should obey His will, in profiting by His sufferings, to obtain the graces which He has earned for us. Never can we honor Him more than in corresponding to the merciful designs which He had in immolating Himself for us and by suffering with Him for our sins.
Rely on Him, not Ourselves
On what could we rely to appease the justice of God outraged by sin, and to draw down His mercy, if not upon the merits of Our Savior? It is in presenting them to God that we may hope to disarm His anger. Just as He can see in us only that which must provoke His justice, so in His Son He only sees what solicits His mercy. This divine mercy is exercised in our behalf as soon as we, with sentiments of regret, present ourselves to Him, under the shadow of the Savior’s cross, and covered with His precious blood. And thus also is justice appeased. Mercy and truth, justice and peace make together a blessed treaty for us. In the language of the Psalmist: “Mercy and truth have met each other: justice and peace have kissed” (Psalm 84:11).
False Ideas And Feelings Which We Ascribe To God
It is because we judge God by our own weak human hearts, that we fear to exhaust His mercy. If a person to whom we have given important assistance, whom we have loaded with benefits, treats us with ingratitude, and, in return for kindness, heaps insults upon us, we turn away from him as unworthy of further notice; more especially if he has made use of our very benefits to injure us, we abandon him forever. We should consider we were acting against every dictate of common sense and prudence, did we continue to furnish him with arms to use against us.
The same feelings and judgment we ascribe to God, forgetting that His ways are as far removed from our ways as the heavens are from the Earth. God bears with our wanderings because He is eternal and all-powerful, and He knows that the day of His justice will come, when all shall be brought into order, and forever.
Wrong Idea of God—Wrong Idea of Justice & Mercy
He is patient because He is infinitely good, and wishes to give us the means to return to Him. He who knows all things has seen from all eternity all our weaknesses, our ingratitude, and our reiterated falls. He has foreseen that we could not do anything of ourselves, much less return to Him without help; and that help He has prepared for us in the person of His Son, Jesus. He entreats us, He even commands us to call upon Him in all our wanderings, and He will assist us, He will be our propitiation; for it is in helping us and pardoning us that His mercy is exercised. Yet we still have to add our payments for sin to His generous contribution.
God Has Always Been Just and Merciful
This conduct God brought out in a striking manner toward the Jewish nation. Whenever they fell into idolatry, God punished them, to bring them back to their allegiance. When they abandoned their Lord to serve strange gods, He would deliver them over to their enemies, to be held in cruel bondage. Then, when bowed down by the miseries of their servitude, they lifted up their hearts to God and called upon Him with confidence, God sent them a deliverer to free them from the hard yoke under which they groaned. And so did they continue during a period of four hundred years, continually relapsing into idolatry, and as often experiencing the mercy of God when they called upon Him.
Judge from this if God will tire in pardoning us, if we turn to Him with a sincerely contrite heart. But if the conduct of God toward His Jewish people does not remove your fears, listen to the words of the Prophet-King, inspired by the Holy Ghost, who assures us that God will not despise “a contrite and humbled heart” (Psalm 1:19).
God Wishes to Pardon—Do We Wish to Pay?
When, terrified by the recollection of our sins, we have the thought or the wish to return to God, it is He who is then attracting us by His grace. Does He call us only that He may refuse to receive us? Who can think it? He told St. Peter to forgive after every offence, “I say not to thee, till seven times: but till seventy times seven” (Matthew 18:22), and by this we may learn to know His dispositions in our regard. Ah! we little know the boundless tenderness of that divine Heart, if we judge of it by our own, or if we imagine that it ever ceases to care for us. So long as we are in this life we are under the law of mercy, and of that mercy we can ever avail ourselves. It is death only that places us under the law of immutable justice.
Repeated Falls?
Our repeated infidelities ought not to make us lose confidence in God—it is the lack of Faith that makes us fear.
God, Who is the tender Father of all His creatures, has taken every means to remove that excessive fear which would draw them from Him. To prevent the soul that has become sensible of its ingratitude and terrified at the view of its repeated relapses into sin, after so often obtaining pardon for them - to prevent such a soul from losing all hope and daring no longer to cry out to Him from the abyss into which it has again fallen, not only does He assure it, by the mouth of the Psalmist, “That those who hope in Him shall never be confounded,” but He expressly declares the positive law of His mercy, and commands us to hope in Him.
God Is Faithful
This precept we cannot fully accomplish but with the help of His grace; and can the Almighty have made this precept and not wish to help us keep it? And can He fall to be touched by our obedience when we endeavor to do so? Can He turn away from us, when we call upon Him, as He has ordered us to do? NO; God cannot be otherwise than faithful to His promises. If we fail, it is because we have not asked with confidence, and because our Faith is weak.
Let the Holy Scripture here furnish you with another proof of this. St. Peter, at the order of his divine Master, confidently walks upon the waters. The wind rises, and the apostle’s trust lessens; he fears, and immediately begins to sink, but the danger reanimates his confidence: Peter has recourse to his divine Master, who stretches forth His hand to save him from perishing. For our instruction Jesus let His apostle know what danger he had been in, when He thus reproached him: “O thou of little Faith, why didst thou doubt?” (Matthew 14:31).
“If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). But you will still have to pay for them, for that is how we show our love and sorrow to Christ.
As already stated in the previous article, despondency or discouragement is the most dangerous temptation the devil can employ. It saps us of our confidence. Of course, many of us have the wrong kind of confidence in the first place—we seek to have confidence in ourselves, rather than having confidence in God. But once discouragement or despondency sets in, the confidence quickly flies out the window—some temperaments may resist better and for longer than others, but everyone is prone to this temptation—and we must remind ourselves that it is a TEMPTATION—it is not a part of ourselves, it comes from outside of ourselves, like a virus. In other temptations the devil attacks one particular virtue: by despondency he attacks them all. In despondency there is nothing to lean upon: we feel that God is asking for that which are unable to give. We would like to turn to God, but the devil convinces us that we dare not hope to receive from God all the help we need to overcome our sins and pay for their debt, because we feel that God does not like us all that much after committing so many sins; thus we become discouraged and nearly reduced to despair, which is the final goal of the devil for the despondent soul.
Purgatory quickly becomes like a debt that has spiraled out of control. Yet we know that, with God, nobody can declare bankruptcy and get away without paying anything. Just as debt seems to crush the heart in our material life, so too does the debt of our sins crush us in relation to our spiritual life. Sometimes people cast all care to the wind and spend, spend, spend, while the credit card still works—knowing that they won’t be able to pay. The devil tries to make us sin, sin, sin, to the point where our hope and confidence of pardon is so low, that we fall into despair.
Any Debt Can Be Paid-Off, But…
First of all, we must remember the words of Scripture: “Be not deceived, God is not mocked” (Galatians 6:7). We cannot commit the sin of presumption—which is just as much a sin against hope as despair is—by sinning, sinning and sinning with the presumption that God will still show us His mercy. Read the sermon of St. Alphonsus Liguori on “On The Number Of Sins Beyond Which God Pardons No More”, from which we will just give a few extracts:
“You say: I am young: there are many who have committed more sins than I have. But is God on that account obliged to wait for your repentance if you offend him? In the Gospel of St. Matthew (21:19) we read, that the Savior cursed a fig tree the first time he saw it without fruit. ‘May no fruit grow on thee henceforward forever. And immediately the fig tree withered away.’ You must, then, tremble at the thought of committing a single mortal sin, particularly if you have already been guilty of mortal sins. ‘Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin’ (Ecclesiasticus 5: 5). Say not then, O sinner; ‘As God has forgiven me other sins, so he will pardon me this one if I commit it!’ Say not this; for, if to the sin which has been forgiven you add another, you have reason to fear that this new sin shall be united to your former guilt, and that thus the number will be completed, and that you shall be abandoned.”
Be Realistic, Be Confident
As was said yesterday, we cannot focus exclusively on God’s mercy, while sweeping his justice under carpet. St. Catherine of Genoa gave us that warning in her Treatise on Purgatory: “Would that I could utter so strong a cry that it would strike all men with terror, and say to them: O wretched beings! Why are you so blinded by this world that you make, as you will find at the hour of death, no provision for the great necessity that will then come upon you? You shelter yourselves beneath your hope in the mercy of God, which you unceasingly exalt. Have not the boldness to say: ‘I will go to confession and gain a plenary indulgence and thus I shall be saved.’ Remember that the full confession and entire contrition which are requisite to gain a plenary indulgence are not easily attained. Did you know how hardly they are come by, you would tremble with fear and be more sure of losing than of gaining them” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
Nevertheless…
Let it, however, be well understood that despondency is a temptation. Hope and confidence in God are commanded equally with Faith and the other virtues. Therefore the feeling of despondency, which is opposed to hope, must be resisted strongly and CONFIDENTLY. God will forgive if we do not abuse His mercy, even though we will still have to pay—but what kind of person would want to get into Heaven on the back of a life of endless sin, without having settled his debts with God?
Ask With Faith and Confidence
No, as the apostle, St. James, says, “Let him ask in Faith, nothing wavering” (1:6). The heart that prays with doubt and distrust shall obtain nothing. And we also know that Jesus Christ, whilst still on Earth, granted miracles only when there was confidence: “Daughter, thy Faith hath made thee whole” (Matthew 9:22).
In Fr. Gottemoller’s book, Words of Love, which deals with Our Lord’s apparitions to three religious sisters (Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Consolata Betrone and Sr. Mary of the Trinity), Our Lord says: “Let them [souls] give themselves up to thoughts of confidence, not fear, for I am a God of pity, ever ready to receive them into My Heart ... I make little account of all that [miseries and weakness], provided souls come to Me with confidence and love. … You must do all that you can, and it is only after that, that you can count infallibly on My help … To those who ask with love, that is to say, with unlimited confidence, I cannot prevent Myself from granting even more, far more than what is asked … Oh, if you knew what My love is! And how I long for you to have confidence in it! … You will be lacking in help only when My Divine Heart will be lacking in power! …
“It often happens that good and pious souls, and very frequently also souls who are consecrated to Me, wound My Heart to Its very depths by some diffident phrase such as: ‘Who knows whether I will be saved?’ Open the Gospel and read there My promises. I promised to My sheep: ‘I will give them life everlasting; and they shall not perish forever, and no man shall pluck them out of My Hand.’ Do you understand? No one can take a soul from Me! Now read on: ‘That which My Father hath given Me, is greater than all; and no one can snatch them out of the Hand of My Father.’ Do you understand? No one can snatch a soul from Me.... In all eternity they will not perish ... because I give them eternal life. For whom have I spoken these words? For all the sheep, for all souls! Why then the insult, ‘Who knows whether I will be saved?’ I have given assurances, in the Gospel, that no one can pluck a soul from Me and that I will give that soul eternal life, and so the soul cannot perish. Believe Me, Consolata, into Hell go only those who really wish to go there; for, though no one can snatch a soul from Me, the soul may, through the free will granted her, flee from Me, may betray Me, deny Me, and so go to Satan of her own volition.
“Oh, if instead of wounding My Heart with such distrust, you would give a little thought to the Heaven which awaits you! I did not create you for Hell, but for Heaven, not as a companion for the devil, but to enjoy Me in everlasting love! You see, to Hell go only those who wish to go there ... How foolish is your fear of being damned! After having shed My Blood in order to save your soul, after having surrounded your soul with graces upon graces all through your entire existence ... would I permit Satan, My worst enemy, to rob Me of that soul, at the last moment of her life, just when I am about to gather in the fruit of the Redemption and when, therefore, that soul is on the point of loving Me forever? Would I do that, when in the Holy Gospel I have promised to give the soul eternal life and that no one can snatch her from My Hands? How is it possible to believe such a monstrosity? You see, final impenitence is found only in a soul who purposely wishes to go to Hell and therefore obstinately refuses My mercy, for I never refuse to pardon anyone. I offer the gift of My immense compassion to all, for My Blood was shed for all, for all! No, it is not the multiplicity of sins which condemns a soul, for I forgive everything if she repents, but it is the obstinacy of not wishing to be pardoned, of wishing to be damned! Dismas on the cross had only one single act of Faith in Me, but many, many sins; he was pardoned in an instant, however, and on the very day of his repentance he entered into My kingdom and is a saint! Behold the triumph of My Mercy and of Faith in Me!” (Words of Love, Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, chapter 6, “Confidence”).
Beautiful words, but words spoken to those who were sincere in their sorrow for sin and were trying to put things right—as Our Lord said: “I forgive everything if she repents ... You must do all that you can, and it is only after that, that you can count infallibly on My help ... Though no one can snatch a soul from Me, the soul may, through the free will granted her, flee from Me, may betray Me, deny Me, and so go to Satan of her own volition.” Repentance means sorrow for sin, a firm desire to change one’s life, and the desire to pay for the damage done. Our Lord adds: “Have confidence in Me! Trust Me always! You must have a blind confidence that I will fulfill all the great promises which I have made you, for I am kind, immensely kind and merciful, and ‘I desire not the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way, and live.’” (Words of Love, Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, chapter 6, “Confidence”).
Confidence in the Sufferings and Merits of Jesus Christ
A soul that is addicted to despondency is swayed by fear, which prevents it from reflecting on the immovable foundations of confidence in God. We cannot therefore give her too many motives for overcoming that fear which harasses her incessantly. She will find a powerful one in the sufferings of Jesus Christ, which are as immense as the dignity of His person is infinite. This divine Savior, dying for all mankind, praying for all, offering for all His sufferings and His death, has merited for them all the graces which are necessary for them to overcome their spiritual enemy and to gain eternal happiness. These merits which Jesus Christ did not need for Himself He has given over to mankind. So that, according to St. Bernard, these merits become our own. And by offering them to the Father, we obtain that help which we need to strengthen us against the enemies of our salvation. It is from this principle that the Church, in all the prayers she makes to God, always invokes the merits of Jesus Christ our Lord. The mercy is there, all we have to do is pay!
But I Have Sinned Too Much!
“But,” exclaims a soul, frightened at the thought of her many past offences, “how must Our Lord and Savior look upon me, after the many outrages which I have committed against Him! Can He any longer interest Himself for one who has been so long His enemy?” Can a well-instructed Christian soul have any doubt on this point? Did not Jesus Christ Himself assure us that He came into the world to suffer and die for sinners; that He came chiefly to seek for sinners? Now, in the face of this assertion, will they still imagine that, because they are sinners, they will be refused the help they require to return to God? No, Heaven and Earth may pass away, but the promises of God shall not pass away unfulfilled. These promises relate to sinners, and if there had been no sinners, would Jesus Christ have suffered? Would He have submitted to a cruel death? The more sinful man is, the more strikingly are the mercy of God, and the power of the Savior’s merits displayed, Is there any blacker crime than the treachery of Judas? Yes, answers St. Jerome, there is one still more enormous, despair! Judas rendered himself more guilty in taking away his own life than in betraying his divine Master. The mercy is there for us, we must do what we can to pay for it. Christ will add His Blood and merits to our payments.
You Have To Beg For His Merits
Let us then never fear to have recourse to the merits of Jesus Christ. We honor them when we make use of them to obtain the helps which we need, since it was for this that Jesus Christ vouchsafed to acquire them and to give them over to us. It is in applying them to ourselves through prayer and good works, that we fulfil the end for which they were purchased. It would be a singular way of honoring them, the not daring to make use of them; it would be going directly against the end which our divine Savior proposed to Himself. In turning from His gifts as useless, we should not be evincing our esteem for them, but only proving our indifference.
Come to Me and Ask!
Since we acknowledge that we are poor, weak, and miserable, should we not seek to enrich and to strengthen ourselves, and to cure our evils? Jesus Christ offers Himself to accomplish these miracles in us, by offering His infinite merits. With loving tenderness He says to us, “Come to me, all you that labor, and are burdened, and I will refresh you” (Matt. 11:28). Is it not therefore against every principle, against every feeling, and still more against the intention of the Savior Himself to fear to have recourse to Him?
Temptation attacks the soul in every way. Through a sentiment of false humility a fear is conceived which fills the soul with dejection. Christian humility and sound reason require that we should recognize our unworthiness of heavenly benefits; but they do not require us to refuse those which are offered, or not to ask for those that have been promised to our prayers. Still more does the gratitude which we owe to Jesus Christ require that we should obey His will, in profiting by His sufferings, to obtain the graces which He has earned for us. Never can we honor Him more than in corresponding to the merciful designs which He had in immolating Himself for us and by suffering with Him for our sins.
Rely on Him, not Ourselves
On what could we rely to appease the justice of God outraged by sin, and to draw down His mercy, if not upon the merits of Our Savior? It is in presenting them to God that we may hope to disarm His anger. Just as He can see in us only that which must provoke His justice, so in His Son He only sees what solicits His mercy. This divine mercy is exercised in our behalf as soon as we, with sentiments of regret, present ourselves to Him, under the shadow of the Savior’s cross, and covered with His precious blood. And thus also is justice appeased. Mercy and truth, justice and peace make together a blessed treaty for us. In the language of the Psalmist: “Mercy and truth have met each other: justice and peace have kissed” (Psalm 84:11).
False Ideas And Feelings Which We Ascribe To God
It is because we judge God by our own weak human hearts, that we fear to exhaust His mercy. If a person to whom we have given important assistance, whom we have loaded with benefits, treats us with ingratitude, and, in return for kindness, heaps insults upon us, we turn away from him as unworthy of further notice; more especially if he has made use of our very benefits to injure us, we abandon him forever. We should consider we were acting against every dictate of common sense and prudence, did we continue to furnish him with arms to use against us.
The same feelings and judgment we ascribe to God, forgetting that His ways are as far removed from our ways as the heavens are from the Earth. God bears with our wanderings because He is eternal and all-powerful, and He knows that the day of His justice will come, when all shall be brought into order, and forever.
Wrong Idea of God—Wrong Idea of Justice & Mercy
He is patient because He is infinitely good, and wishes to give us the means to return to Him. He who knows all things has seen from all eternity all our weaknesses, our ingratitude, and our reiterated falls. He has foreseen that we could not do anything of ourselves, much less return to Him without help; and that help He has prepared for us in the person of His Son, Jesus. He entreats us, He even commands us to call upon Him in all our wanderings, and He will assist us, He will be our propitiation; for it is in helping us and pardoning us that His mercy is exercised. Yet we still have to add our payments for sin to His generous contribution.
God Has Always Been Just and Merciful
This conduct God brought out in a striking manner toward the Jewish nation. Whenever they fell into idolatry, God punished them, to bring them back to their allegiance. When they abandoned their Lord to serve strange gods, He would deliver them over to their enemies, to be held in cruel bondage. Then, when bowed down by the miseries of their servitude, they lifted up their hearts to God and called upon Him with confidence, God sent them a deliverer to free them from the hard yoke under which they groaned. And so did they continue during a period of four hundred years, continually relapsing into idolatry, and as often experiencing the mercy of God when they called upon Him.
Judge from this if God will tire in pardoning us, if we turn to Him with a sincerely contrite heart. But if the conduct of God toward His Jewish people does not remove your fears, listen to the words of the Prophet-King, inspired by the Holy Ghost, who assures us that God will not despise “a contrite and humbled heart” (Psalm 1:19).
God Wishes to Pardon—Do We Wish to Pay?
When, terrified by the recollection of our sins, we have the thought or the wish to return to God, it is He who is then attracting us by His grace. Does He call us only that He may refuse to receive us? Who can think it? He told St. Peter to forgive after every offence, “I say not to thee, till seven times: but till seventy times seven” (Matthew 18:22), and by this we may learn to know His dispositions in our regard. Ah! we little know the boundless tenderness of that divine Heart, if we judge of it by our own, or if we imagine that it ever ceases to care for us. So long as we are in this life we are under the law of mercy, and of that mercy we can ever avail ourselves. It is death only that places us under the law of immutable justice.
Repeated Falls?
Our repeated infidelities ought not to make us lose confidence in God—it is the lack of Faith that makes us fear.
God, Who is the tender Father of all His creatures, has taken every means to remove that excessive fear which would draw them from Him. To prevent the soul that has become sensible of its ingratitude and terrified at the view of its repeated relapses into sin, after so often obtaining pardon for them - to prevent such a soul from losing all hope and daring no longer to cry out to Him from the abyss into which it has again fallen, not only does He assure it, by the mouth of the Psalmist, “That those who hope in Him shall never be confounded,” but He expressly declares the positive law of His mercy, and commands us to hope in Him.
God Is Faithful
This precept we cannot fully accomplish but with the help of His grace; and can the Almighty have made this precept and not wish to help us keep it? And can He fall to be touched by our obedience when we endeavor to do so? Can He turn away from us, when we call upon Him, as He has ordered us to do? NO; God cannot be otherwise than faithful to His promises. If we fail, it is because we have not asked with confidence, and because our Faith is weak.
Let the Holy Scripture here furnish you with another proof of this. St. Peter, at the order of his divine Master, confidently walks upon the waters. The wind rises, and the apostle’s trust lessens; he fears, and immediately begins to sink, but the danger reanimates his confidence: Peter has recourse to his divine Master, who stretches forth His hand to save him from perishing. For our instruction Jesus let His apostle know what danger he had been in, when He thus reproached him: “O thou of little Faith, why didst thou doubt?” (Matthew 14:31).
“If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). But you will still have to pay for them, for that is how we show our love and sorrow to Christ.
Article 14
Thursday November 16th, 2023
Do Not Doubt His Mercy
Thursday November 16th, 2023
Do Not Doubt His Mercy
Despondency & Discouragement Come Disguised
Despondency or discouragement is the most dangerous temptation that the enemy of our salvation can employ. In other temptations he attacks one virtue in particular, and shows himself openly. Yet through despondency he attacks them all, but covertly. The snare is readily perceived in other temptations: one finds in religion, often even in reason, principles which condemn them. The knowledge of the evil, to which we cannot blind ourselves, brings into play our conscience, and the truths of religion which are awakened, which serve as helps to sustain us. But in despondency there is nothing to lean upon―we feel that reason does not suffice to enable us to practice all the good that God requires of us. On the other hand, we dare not hope to receive from God all the help we need to overcome our passions because of our past sinfulness; thus we become discouraged and nearly reduced to despair, the very point to which the devil tries to lead the despondent soul.
This is easily and readily done by the devil in regard to our attitude to Purgatory. The goal of the devil is to make us sin as much as possible, while whispering to us that “God is good! God is kind! God is loving! God is merciful! God is very forgiving!” (which is all true, but it is not ALL the truth), while at the same the devil blinds to the rest of the truth, so that we have no fear or problem sinning. The rest of the truth, which he blinds us to, is: “God is just! God is exacting! God misses nothing! God will demand payment for each and every sin, even every idle word!”
Then, when the devil has managed to get us to sin considerably, he suddenly opens our eyes to the truth that he had hidden from us and the devil tempts us despair of ever being able to get out of sin and ever being able to pay for our sin, by making us focus on the truth that: “God is just! God is exacting! God misses nothing! God will demand payment for each and every sin, even every idle word!” while at the same time, now blinding us the fact that “God is good! God is kind! God is loving! God is merciful! God is very forgiving!”
God Forgives—But Sin Must Be Paid For
Just like the devil makes us focus on one side of the coin and makes us ignore the other side, we also tend to focus exclusively on God’s mercy, while sweeping his justice under carpet. You cannot do that! As St. Catherine of Genoa says at the end of her Treatise on Purgatory:
“Would that I could utter so strong a cry that it would strike all men with terror, and say to them: O wretched beings! Why are you so blinded by this world that you make, as you will find at the hour of death, no provision for the great necessity that will then come upon you?” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“You shelter yourselves beneath your hope in the mercy of God, which you unceasingly exalt, not seeing that it is your resistance to His great goodness which will be your condemnation. His goodness should constrain you to do His will, not encourage you to persevere in your own. Since His justice is unfailing, it must therefore be in some way fully satisfied” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“Have not the boldness to say: ‘I will go to confession and gain a plenary indulgence and thus I shall be saved.’ Remember that the full confession and entire contrition which are requisite to gain a plenary indulgence are not easily attained. Did you know how hardly they are come by, you would tremble with fear and be more sure of losing than of gaining them” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
As Our Lady of Good Success said to Mother Mariana, in Quito, Ecuador in the 17th century: “Prepare your soul so that, increasingly purified, it might enter into the fullness of the joy of Our Lord. Oh, if mortals, and in particular religious souls, could know what Heaven is and what it is to possess God! How differently they would live! Nor would they spare themselves any sacrifice in order to possess Him! O, if men only understood how to appreciate the time given to them and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!” (Our Lady of Good Success to Mother Mariana, Quito, Ecuador).
Modern Deformation of God
The idiocy of modern-day Catholics is to make God into a patsy or a pushover! Or such a kindly God, that He cannot refuse to forgive all the crimes committed against Him. They imagine that He does not get angry, nor does He take vengeance upon those who sin. If that is the case, then Our Lady must be telling some whopping lies about God when she says:
“If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it … The sins of those dedicated to God cry out towards Heaven and call for vengeance, and now vengeance is at their door … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together ... Nature is asking for vengeance because of man, and she trembles, with dread, at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime. Tremble, Earth, and you who proclaim yourselves as serving Jesus Christ and who, on the inside, only adore yourselves! … Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God” (La Salette).
“Know, moreover, that Divine Justice releases terrible chastisements on entire nations, not only for the sins of the people, but for those of priests and religious persons … before the eyes of God they quicken the rigor of the punishments … fire will rain from Heaven” (Quito) … “And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed … And then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like” (La Salette).
Is Our Lady a Liar? Is Our Lord a Liar?
Is Our Lady lying about God? We just don’t like to hear these things, like children don’t like to see their parents angry—but then the solution is to stop doing what makes them angry? We are so wrapped-up in our own feelings, that we have no time for the feelings of God! We hate to hear about chastisements, but we don’t stop sinning.
Some modern-day Catholics, with the sugar-coated version of Christ, also make Our Lord out to be a liar, Who said that the ingratitude and betrayal of religious souls, so dear to His Heart, would compel Him: “To let My Justice fall upon My beloved cloisters ― and even over cities ― when those so near to Me, who belong to Me, reject My spirit, abandoning Me alone in Tabernacles, rarely remembering that I live there especially for love of them, even more than for the rest of the faithful” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito, Ecuador). She saw three swords hanging over the head of Christ. On each was written, “I shall punish heresy, blasphemy and impurity.” With this, she was given to understand all that would take place in the present era. Is Our Lord also lying? Of course not!
Despite the Justice, There Is Still Great Mercy
Yet Our Lady also offers the hand of mercy to those who sincerely seek to turn away from sin and are contrite: “I am in placating the Divine Justice and obtaining mercy and pardon for every sinner who comes to me with a contrite heart, for I am the Mother of Mercy and in me there is only goodness and love” (Quito) … “Are you suffering a great deal? Don’t lose heart. I will never forsake you. My Immaculate Heart will be your refuge and the way that will lead you to God” (Fatima). ““God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will … who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world” (La Salette). “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved” (Akita).
This reminds us of the poignant statement that Our Lady made to St. Bridget: “I am,” she said to her, “the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God. In the fire of Purgatory there is no suffering that through my intercession would not be more easily bearable than otherwise. Neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion; for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be; no one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast off by God that he may not return and enjoy his mercy if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them.” And then she concluded by saying “Therefore he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this, being able, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners!”
Accepting the Rough with the Smooth
It is important that we acknowledge and accept both sides of God—His justice and His mercy. It is our childishness and irresponsibility that hates to accept the side of justice, while wallowing on the side of mercy. The devil will happily assist us in this exercise. The justice, anger and chastisement is not meant to make us despondent, depressed or discouraged—but it is meant to give us a hatred of sin, a hatred of our past deeds, a hatred of future sin, and a great hope in the mercy of God, who nevertheless requires that justice be done. However, if we decide to pay now, rather than later, then we will experience a massive ‘discount price’ on justice. If we foolishly decide to pay after death, then we shall find ‘massive interest rates’ being added to our payments. So we have to hope that we can pay-off most of (or all of) what we owe here below—so that our ‘retirement scheme’ is truly “out of this world.” Hope and confidence in God are as much a commandment as Faith and the other virtues.
Excessive Fear Blinds Us To Truth
The great danger of despondency is that―being deceived by an excessive fear which makes us blind to the truth, and being discouraged at the sight of difficulties or in seeing the difficulty in changes and efforts we would have to make, against which we find no resource in ourselves―we stupidly fail to see this despondency as the effect of temptation. Could we only see it in that light, we should beware of the suggestions that entertain it, and should get rid of our trouble more quickly and more easily.
Despondency is only a Temptation
Let it, however, be well understood that despondency is a temptation, and bears all the marks of being such ; for every feeling that is opposed to the law of God, either in itself or by the consequences it may have, is evidently a temptation. It is thus we judge of every temptation to which we are liable. If we have a thought against Faith, a feeling against charity or some other virtue, we look upon it as a temptation; we turn away from it, and try to elicit acts opposed to the thought or feeling which has put us in danger of offending God.
Now, hope and confidence in God are commanded equally with Faith and the other virtues. Therefore the feeling which is opposed to hope is as much forbidden as that which is against Faith or any other virtue: it has thus every feature of a real temptation.
The law of God obliges us frequently to make acts of Faith, hope, and charity; and hence forbids us all willful feelings contrary to these sacred and necessary virtues. How, then, can despondency be viewed otherwise than as a temptation, and even as a very dangerous temptation, since it exposes the Christian soul to abandon every work of piety?
Hope Is The Antidote
To make this danger clearer to you, consider the general course of conduct among men. Is it not the hope of success, of gaining some advantage, of avoiding some evil, or of satisfying some desire or passion, which makes them act , which keeps them going in all their labors, and animates them to overcome their difficulties? Take away from them all hope, and they would soon fall into inaction. None but a madman would strive for an object which he despairs of obtaining. In our spiritual life, despondency produces the same effect; it is founded on the same principle, the lack of a means to reach the end which we propose to ourselves. But this despondency is built upon a failure to see the truth of things, a failure to see the real reality, which is covered by our imagined reality or ‘wishful-thinking’ reality!
Feeble Efforts & Fear of Failure
When we lose all hope of overcoming the difficulties which we may find in the practice of any virtue, we do not try, or but feebly, to make the effort to do so. These insufficient efforts only increase our weakness, and being more than half overcome by despondency, we are easily led away by the passion that sways us. The sense of our weakness first throws us into doubt and into trouble. In that state, thinking only of the difficulty of the combat, we do not distinguish the principles that ought to guide us. The fear of not succeeding, prevents us from employing the means which God has given us, and we are thus defenseless against our enemy.
We are like a child who, seeing the approach of a giant, begins to tremble, and forgets that a stone thrown in the name of the Lord may knock him out and lay him flat. In the same way we forget that we have a powerful help in the goodness of a caring Father, upon Whom we have only to call, to be victorious in all our struggles.
We Rely Too Much On Ourselves
Why does despondency make such strong and fatal impressions on us? We are obviously convinced of our weakness, for we have often experienced it. We painfully feel the difficulty of trying to overcome ourselves, as we succeed but rarely. Filled with these sad and discouraging reflections of our lack of spiritual strength, and of the little that we do to please God, we consider it useless to have recourse to Him, Who, we think, will not listen to our prayer while we are in our present state. This is merely the sad evidence of the pride within the human heart, that would wish to attribute to itself all the good which it does, and be the source of all the happiness to which it aspires! And how opposed to the words of the Holy Ghost: “What hast thou, that thou hast not received?” (1 Corinthians 4:7)
Rely on God’s Mercy
In such a state we see and depend only upon our own efforts, so that our despondency diminishes, ceases, returns, or increases, according as we act well or ill. We do not reflect that it is only from the mercy of God we can hope for help, and not by our own merits; that when we have done well it is through the grace of God, which we have not merited, and that, in every circumstance, this mercy is ever ready to dispense to us the necessary grace.
However, we have to supply a basis for God giving us the grace of mercy, just as there had to be something for Our Lord to feed the 4,000 and the 5,000 people. We have to supply, so to speak, the meager “loaves and fishes” and He will take them and do much with them. As we already stated, it is like cents being changed into dollars, or even gold. Our loaves and fishes are our prayers and penances. We have to give a regular and steady supply of them to offset and feed the ‘thousands’ of days of punishment that our sins hungrily demand. God will work with us, but He will not do all the work without us. As one saint put it: “God can save man without man―but God will not save without man’s cooperation.”
Imitate the Saints
When these desponding souls are told that they ought, after the example of the saints, to put all their confidence in God, they will at once answer that it is not surprising that the saints had confidence in God, since they were saints, and served God with fidelity: but that they have not the same right to feel that perfect confidence in Him which the saints had. They do not perceive that such reasoning is contrary to the principles of true religion.
Hope is only Found in God
Hope is a theological virtue, and its motive can be found only in God. These souls make it a human virtue when its source or motive is recognized in man or in his ways. The saints did not hope in God because they were faithful to God, but they were faithful to God because they hoped in Him. Otherwise the sinner could never make an act of hope, and yet it is that very act of hope which disposes him to return to God.
Great Humility
Observe that St. Paul does not say, I have obtained mercy because I have been faithful, but “Having obtained mercy of the Lord, to be faithful” (1 Corinthians 6:25). Mercy always precedes the good which we do; and it is from mercy alone that we have the necessary grace to do any good at all. The saints never counted upon their works to strengthen their confidence in God, for they were ever mindful of the words of Our Savior: “So you also, when you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants!’” (Luke 17:10).
The greater saints they were, the greater was their humility. Their humility allowed them to see only the perfection to which they had not yet reached. Unlike the Pharisee in the Gospel, they found nothing in themselves to warrant their confidence, but in the mercy of God they sought and found a confidence, the foundations of which could not be shaken. This was what supported them, and this it is which must encourage you, and reanimate your fainting strength. It is of the utmost importance for you to understand this truth, that you may not again fall into the snare which your enemy has so often laid for you.
The True Motive For Christian Hope
According to religion the motive of Christian hope, or of confidence in God, is the same for all men, saints and sinners. Hope, as we have already said, is a theological virtue, like Faith and charity. Its motive, then, can be found only in God, and can rest only upon divine perfection. It follows, therefore, that we exclude from this motive our own merits. We do not hope in God because we have been faithful to Him, but we hope in Him that we may obtain the grace to be faithful.
God is Faithful to His Promises—He will Help
On what, then, is Christian hope founded, and what is its motive, according to religion? Pope Benedict XIV, in his form of the Act of Hope, has pointed out the divine perfections, which constitute this motive. The act is this: “O my God, I hope in Thee―because Thou art faithful to Thy all powerful promises, and because Thy mercies are infinite!” In this motive there is nothing human―all is drawn from God Himself. And could there be a stronger motive to strengthen us in hope and confidence in God?
We here find the mercy of God, who is more anxious to shower His gifts upon man than man is to receive them; who desires their real good and their salvation much more sincerely than they desire it themselves, since He restrains them by His grace, which of themselves they could not merit, and since He prepares for them aid proportionate to the trials to which He exposes them-an aid which they can obtain by prayer, and with it conquer the evil one. This mercy is so infinite, that all the malice of mankind cannot exhaust it; and, after having manifested itself so wonderfully in the gift which God has granted us, His only Son for our ransom, it will not refuse us the assistance which He desires to afford us in this priceless benefit.
Effects of Divine Mercy
The effects of this divine mercy have been promised to us, by the assurances which God has made us, of coming to our assistance, whenever we ask it, to work out our salvation. God, who is truth itself, cannot deceive us, and He is essentially faithful to the promises He makes His creatures. But we find in the Holy Scripture the most touching exhortations to have recourse to Him in our necessities, with the promise that He will be our support and our strength. How, then, can we have any anxiety or seriously entertain any fear that He will reject or abandon us, when we call upon Him with confidence? Would not this be accusing God of not keeping His promise? But that would be blasphemy.
It is true that to grant our prayer God requires that we should call upon Him with confidence—but should we deserve to obtain His benefits if we asked them with a doubting heart; doubting that very goodness of which we are experiencing the effect every instant of our lives, and in so many thousand ways?
Despondency or discouragement is the most dangerous temptation that the enemy of our salvation can employ. In other temptations he attacks one virtue in particular, and shows himself openly. Yet through despondency he attacks them all, but covertly. The snare is readily perceived in other temptations: one finds in religion, often even in reason, principles which condemn them. The knowledge of the evil, to which we cannot blind ourselves, brings into play our conscience, and the truths of religion which are awakened, which serve as helps to sustain us. But in despondency there is nothing to lean upon―we feel that reason does not suffice to enable us to practice all the good that God requires of us. On the other hand, we dare not hope to receive from God all the help we need to overcome our passions because of our past sinfulness; thus we become discouraged and nearly reduced to despair, the very point to which the devil tries to lead the despondent soul.
This is easily and readily done by the devil in regard to our attitude to Purgatory. The goal of the devil is to make us sin as much as possible, while whispering to us that “God is good! God is kind! God is loving! God is merciful! God is very forgiving!” (which is all true, but it is not ALL the truth), while at the same the devil blinds to the rest of the truth, so that we have no fear or problem sinning. The rest of the truth, which he blinds us to, is: “God is just! God is exacting! God misses nothing! God will demand payment for each and every sin, even every idle word!”
Then, when the devil has managed to get us to sin considerably, he suddenly opens our eyes to the truth that he had hidden from us and the devil tempts us despair of ever being able to get out of sin and ever being able to pay for our sin, by making us focus on the truth that: “God is just! God is exacting! God misses nothing! God will demand payment for each and every sin, even every idle word!” while at the same time, now blinding us the fact that “God is good! God is kind! God is loving! God is merciful! God is very forgiving!”
God Forgives—But Sin Must Be Paid For
Just like the devil makes us focus on one side of the coin and makes us ignore the other side, we also tend to focus exclusively on God’s mercy, while sweeping his justice under carpet. You cannot do that! As St. Catherine of Genoa says at the end of her Treatise on Purgatory:
“Would that I could utter so strong a cry that it would strike all men with terror, and say to them: O wretched beings! Why are you so blinded by this world that you make, as you will find at the hour of death, no provision for the great necessity that will then come upon you?” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“You shelter yourselves beneath your hope in the mercy of God, which you unceasingly exalt, not seeing that it is your resistance to His great goodness which will be your condemnation. His goodness should constrain you to do His will, not encourage you to persevere in your own. Since His justice is unfailing, it must therefore be in some way fully satisfied” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“Have not the boldness to say: ‘I will go to confession and gain a plenary indulgence and thus I shall be saved.’ Remember that the full confession and entire contrition which are requisite to gain a plenary indulgence are not easily attained. Did you know how hardly they are come by, you would tremble with fear and be more sure of losing than of gaining them” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
As Our Lady of Good Success said to Mother Mariana, in Quito, Ecuador in the 17th century: “Prepare your soul so that, increasingly purified, it might enter into the fullness of the joy of Our Lord. Oh, if mortals, and in particular religious souls, could know what Heaven is and what it is to possess God! How differently they would live! Nor would they spare themselves any sacrifice in order to possess Him! O, if men only understood how to appreciate the time given to them and would take advantage of each moment of their lives, how different the world would be! And a considerable number of souls would not fall to their eternal perdition! But this contempt is the fundamental cause for their downfall!” (Our Lady of Good Success to Mother Mariana, Quito, Ecuador).
Modern Deformation of God
The idiocy of modern-day Catholics is to make God into a patsy or a pushover! Or such a kindly God, that He cannot refuse to forgive all the crimes committed against Him. They imagine that He does not get angry, nor does He take vengeance upon those who sin. If that is the case, then Our Lady must be telling some whopping lies about God when she says:
“If my people do not wish to submit themselves, I am forced to let go of the hand of my Son. It is so heavy and weighs me down so much, that I can no longer keep hold of it … The sins of those dedicated to God cry out towards Heaven and call for vengeance, and now vengeance is at their door … Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth! God will exhaust His wrath upon them, and no one will be able to escape so many afflictions together ... Nature is asking for vengeance because of man, and she trembles, with dread, at what must happen to the Earth stained with crime. Tremble, Earth, and you who proclaim yourselves as serving Jesus Christ and who, on the inside, only adore yourselves! … Physical and moral agonies will be suffered. God will abandon mankind to itself and will send punishments which will follow one after the other … The society of men is on the eve of the most terrible scourges and of gravest events. Mankind must expect to be ruled with an iron rod and to drink from the chalice of the wrath of God” (La Salette).
“Know, moreover, that Divine Justice releases terrible chastisements on entire nations, not only for the sins of the people, but for those of priests and religious persons … before the eyes of God they quicken the rigor of the punishments … fire will rain from Heaven” (Quito) … “And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed … And then Jesus Christ, in an act of His justice and His great mercy, will command His Angels to have all His enemies put to death. Suddenly, the persecutors of the Church of Jesus Christ, and all those given over to sin, will perish and the Earth will become desert-like” (La Salette).
Is Our Lady a Liar? Is Our Lord a Liar?
Is Our Lady lying about God? We just don’t like to hear these things, like children don’t like to see their parents angry—but then the solution is to stop doing what makes them angry? We are so wrapped-up in our own feelings, that we have no time for the feelings of God! We hate to hear about chastisements, but we don’t stop sinning.
Some modern-day Catholics, with the sugar-coated version of Christ, also make Our Lord out to be a liar, Who said that the ingratitude and betrayal of religious souls, so dear to His Heart, would compel Him: “To let My Justice fall upon My beloved cloisters ― and even over cities ― when those so near to Me, who belong to Me, reject My spirit, abandoning Me alone in Tabernacles, rarely remembering that I live there especially for love of them, even more than for the rest of the faithful” (Our Lord to Mother Mariana, Quito, Ecuador). She saw three swords hanging over the head of Christ. On each was written, “I shall punish heresy, blasphemy and impurity.” With this, she was given to understand all that would take place in the present era. Is Our Lord also lying? Of course not!
Despite the Justice, There Is Still Great Mercy
Yet Our Lady also offers the hand of mercy to those who sincerely seek to turn away from sin and are contrite: “I am in placating the Divine Justice and obtaining mercy and pardon for every sinner who comes to me with a contrite heart, for I am the Mother of Mercy and in me there is only goodness and love” (Quito) … “Are you suffering a great deal? Don’t lose heart. I will never forsake you. My Immaculate Heart will be your refuge and the way that will lead you to God” (Fatima). ““God will take care of His faithful servants and men of good will … who have lived in scorn for the world and for themselves, in poverty and in humility, in scorn and in silence, in prayer and in mortification, in chastity and in union with God, in suffering and unknown to the world” (La Salette). “Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved” (Akita).
This reminds us of the poignant statement that Our Lady made to St. Bridget: “I am,” she said to her, “the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of mercy; I am the joy of the just, and the gate of entrance for sinners to God. In the fire of Purgatory there is no suffering that through my intercession would not be more easily bearable than otherwise. Neither is there living on Earth a sinner who is so accursed that he is deprived of my compassion; for everyone, if he receives nothing else through my intercession, receives the grace of being less tempted by evil spirits than he otherwise would be; no one, therefore, who is not entirely accursed [by which is meant the final and irrevocable malediction pronounced against the damned], is so entirely cast off by God that he may not return and enjoy his mercy if he invokes my aid. I am called by all the Mother of mercy, and truly the mercy of God towards men has made me so merciful towards them.” And then she concluded by saying “Therefore he shall be miserable, and forever miserable in another life, who in this, being able, does not have recourse to me, who am so compassionate to all, and so earnestly desire to aid sinners!”
Accepting the Rough with the Smooth
It is important that we acknowledge and accept both sides of God—His justice and His mercy. It is our childishness and irresponsibility that hates to accept the side of justice, while wallowing on the side of mercy. The devil will happily assist us in this exercise. The justice, anger and chastisement is not meant to make us despondent, depressed or discouraged—but it is meant to give us a hatred of sin, a hatred of our past deeds, a hatred of future sin, and a great hope in the mercy of God, who nevertheless requires that justice be done. However, if we decide to pay now, rather than later, then we will experience a massive ‘discount price’ on justice. If we foolishly decide to pay after death, then we shall find ‘massive interest rates’ being added to our payments. So we have to hope that we can pay-off most of (or all of) what we owe here below—so that our ‘retirement scheme’ is truly “out of this world.” Hope and confidence in God are as much a commandment as Faith and the other virtues.
Excessive Fear Blinds Us To Truth
The great danger of despondency is that―being deceived by an excessive fear which makes us blind to the truth, and being discouraged at the sight of difficulties or in seeing the difficulty in changes and efforts we would have to make, against which we find no resource in ourselves―we stupidly fail to see this despondency as the effect of temptation. Could we only see it in that light, we should beware of the suggestions that entertain it, and should get rid of our trouble more quickly and more easily.
Despondency is only a Temptation
Let it, however, be well understood that despondency is a temptation, and bears all the marks of being such ; for every feeling that is opposed to the law of God, either in itself or by the consequences it may have, is evidently a temptation. It is thus we judge of every temptation to which we are liable. If we have a thought against Faith, a feeling against charity or some other virtue, we look upon it as a temptation; we turn away from it, and try to elicit acts opposed to the thought or feeling which has put us in danger of offending God.
Now, hope and confidence in God are commanded equally with Faith and the other virtues. Therefore the feeling which is opposed to hope is as much forbidden as that which is against Faith or any other virtue: it has thus every feature of a real temptation.
The law of God obliges us frequently to make acts of Faith, hope, and charity; and hence forbids us all willful feelings contrary to these sacred and necessary virtues. How, then, can despondency be viewed otherwise than as a temptation, and even as a very dangerous temptation, since it exposes the Christian soul to abandon every work of piety?
Hope Is The Antidote
To make this danger clearer to you, consider the general course of conduct among men. Is it not the hope of success, of gaining some advantage, of avoiding some evil, or of satisfying some desire or passion, which makes them act , which keeps them going in all their labors, and animates them to overcome their difficulties? Take away from them all hope, and they would soon fall into inaction. None but a madman would strive for an object which he despairs of obtaining. In our spiritual life, despondency produces the same effect; it is founded on the same principle, the lack of a means to reach the end which we propose to ourselves. But this despondency is built upon a failure to see the truth of things, a failure to see the real reality, which is covered by our imagined reality or ‘wishful-thinking’ reality!
Feeble Efforts & Fear of Failure
When we lose all hope of overcoming the difficulties which we may find in the practice of any virtue, we do not try, or but feebly, to make the effort to do so. These insufficient efforts only increase our weakness, and being more than half overcome by despondency, we are easily led away by the passion that sways us. The sense of our weakness first throws us into doubt and into trouble. In that state, thinking only of the difficulty of the combat, we do not distinguish the principles that ought to guide us. The fear of not succeeding, prevents us from employing the means which God has given us, and we are thus defenseless against our enemy.
We are like a child who, seeing the approach of a giant, begins to tremble, and forgets that a stone thrown in the name of the Lord may knock him out and lay him flat. In the same way we forget that we have a powerful help in the goodness of a caring Father, upon Whom we have only to call, to be victorious in all our struggles.
We Rely Too Much On Ourselves
Why does despondency make such strong and fatal impressions on us? We are obviously convinced of our weakness, for we have often experienced it. We painfully feel the difficulty of trying to overcome ourselves, as we succeed but rarely. Filled with these sad and discouraging reflections of our lack of spiritual strength, and of the little that we do to please God, we consider it useless to have recourse to Him, Who, we think, will not listen to our prayer while we are in our present state. This is merely the sad evidence of the pride within the human heart, that would wish to attribute to itself all the good which it does, and be the source of all the happiness to which it aspires! And how opposed to the words of the Holy Ghost: “What hast thou, that thou hast not received?” (1 Corinthians 4:7)
Rely on God’s Mercy
In such a state we see and depend only upon our own efforts, so that our despondency diminishes, ceases, returns, or increases, according as we act well or ill. We do not reflect that it is only from the mercy of God we can hope for help, and not by our own merits; that when we have done well it is through the grace of God, which we have not merited, and that, in every circumstance, this mercy is ever ready to dispense to us the necessary grace.
However, we have to supply a basis for God giving us the grace of mercy, just as there had to be something for Our Lord to feed the 4,000 and the 5,000 people. We have to supply, so to speak, the meager “loaves and fishes” and He will take them and do much with them. As we already stated, it is like cents being changed into dollars, or even gold. Our loaves and fishes are our prayers and penances. We have to give a regular and steady supply of them to offset and feed the ‘thousands’ of days of punishment that our sins hungrily demand. God will work with us, but He will not do all the work without us. As one saint put it: “God can save man without man―but God will not save without man’s cooperation.”
Imitate the Saints
When these desponding souls are told that they ought, after the example of the saints, to put all their confidence in God, they will at once answer that it is not surprising that the saints had confidence in God, since they were saints, and served God with fidelity: but that they have not the same right to feel that perfect confidence in Him which the saints had. They do not perceive that such reasoning is contrary to the principles of true religion.
Hope is only Found in God
Hope is a theological virtue, and its motive can be found only in God. These souls make it a human virtue when its source or motive is recognized in man or in his ways. The saints did not hope in God because they were faithful to God, but they were faithful to God because they hoped in Him. Otherwise the sinner could never make an act of hope, and yet it is that very act of hope which disposes him to return to God.
Great Humility
Observe that St. Paul does not say, I have obtained mercy because I have been faithful, but “Having obtained mercy of the Lord, to be faithful” (1 Corinthians 6:25). Mercy always precedes the good which we do; and it is from mercy alone that we have the necessary grace to do any good at all. The saints never counted upon their works to strengthen their confidence in God, for they were ever mindful of the words of Our Savior: “So you also, when you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants!’” (Luke 17:10).
The greater saints they were, the greater was their humility. Their humility allowed them to see only the perfection to which they had not yet reached. Unlike the Pharisee in the Gospel, they found nothing in themselves to warrant their confidence, but in the mercy of God they sought and found a confidence, the foundations of which could not be shaken. This was what supported them, and this it is which must encourage you, and reanimate your fainting strength. It is of the utmost importance for you to understand this truth, that you may not again fall into the snare which your enemy has so often laid for you.
The True Motive For Christian Hope
According to religion the motive of Christian hope, or of confidence in God, is the same for all men, saints and sinners. Hope, as we have already said, is a theological virtue, like Faith and charity. Its motive, then, can be found only in God, and can rest only upon divine perfection. It follows, therefore, that we exclude from this motive our own merits. We do not hope in God because we have been faithful to Him, but we hope in Him that we may obtain the grace to be faithful.
God is Faithful to His Promises—He will Help
On what, then, is Christian hope founded, and what is its motive, according to religion? Pope Benedict XIV, in his form of the Act of Hope, has pointed out the divine perfections, which constitute this motive. The act is this: “O my God, I hope in Thee―because Thou art faithful to Thy all powerful promises, and because Thy mercies are infinite!” In this motive there is nothing human―all is drawn from God Himself. And could there be a stronger motive to strengthen us in hope and confidence in God?
We here find the mercy of God, who is more anxious to shower His gifts upon man than man is to receive them; who desires their real good and their salvation much more sincerely than they desire it themselves, since He restrains them by His grace, which of themselves they could not merit, and since He prepares for them aid proportionate to the trials to which He exposes them-an aid which they can obtain by prayer, and with it conquer the evil one. This mercy is so infinite, that all the malice of mankind cannot exhaust it; and, after having manifested itself so wonderfully in the gift which God has granted us, His only Son for our ransom, it will not refuse us the assistance which He desires to afford us in this priceless benefit.
Effects of Divine Mercy
The effects of this divine mercy have been promised to us, by the assurances which God has made us, of coming to our assistance, whenever we ask it, to work out our salvation. God, who is truth itself, cannot deceive us, and He is essentially faithful to the promises He makes His creatures. But we find in the Holy Scripture the most touching exhortations to have recourse to Him in our necessities, with the promise that He will be our support and our strength. How, then, can we have any anxiety or seriously entertain any fear that He will reject or abandon us, when we call upon Him with confidence? Would not this be accusing God of not keeping His promise? But that would be blasphemy.
It is true that to grant our prayer God requires that we should call upon Him with confidence—but should we deserve to obtain His benefits if we asked them with a doubting heart; doubting that very goodness of which we are experiencing the effect every instant of our lives, and in so many thousand ways?
Article 13
Wednesday November 15th, 2023
Joy, Pain, Love & Mercy
Wednesday November 15th, 2023
Joy, Pain, Love & Mercy
Connecting with Catherine
We turn to St. Catherine of Genoa for this look at the Joy, the Pain, the Love and the Mercy of Purgatory and we will quote a length from that beautiful Treatise on Purgatory which she wrote. Before we do that, a brief review of her life will not go amiss. Born at Genoa in 1447, and destined to die there in 1510 (aged 63), the life of St. Catherine of Genoa is an encouragement for all of us and also as an example for our children. Her lot in life is one that many can relate to, which makes her a ‘real-life’ kind of saint and not a ‘fairy-tale’ kind of saint.
Noble and Wealthy Family
St. Catherine’s parents were Jacopo Fieschi and Francesca di Negro, both of illustrious Italian birth. Two popes — Innocent IV and Adrian V — had been of the Fieschi family, and Jacopo himself became Viceroy of Naples. Catherine is described as an extraordinarily holy child, highly gifted in the way of prayer (who encourages children to pray these days?), and with a wonderful love of reading Christ’s Passion and of penitential practices; but, also, as having been a most quiet, simple, and exceedingly obedient girl. When about thirteen, she wished to enter the convent, but the nuns, to whom her confessor applied, having refused her on account of her youth, she appears to have put the idea aside without making any further attempt.
Tough and Painful Marriage
At sixteen, she was married by her parents’ wish to a young Genoese nobleman, Giuliano Adorno. The marriage turned out wretchedly―Giuliano proved faithless, violent-tempered, and a spendthrift. He made the life of his wife a misery. Details are scanty, but it seems at least clear that Catherine spent the first five years of her marriage in silent, melancholic submission to her husband; and that she then, for another five, turned a little to the world for consolation in her troubles.
Lukewarm Lady Leaves Lukewarmness
The distractions she took were most innocent and not sinful; nevertheless, destined as she was for an extraordinary life, they had the effect, in her case, of producing lukewarmness, the end of which was such intense weariness and depression that she prayed earnestly for a return of her old fervor. Then, just ten years after her marriage, came the event of her life, in answer to her prayer. She went one day, full of melancholy, to a convent in Genoa where she had a sister, a nun. The latter advised her to go to confession to the nuns’ confessor, and Catherine agreed. She had barely knelt down in the confessional, when a ray of Divine light pierced her soul, and in one moment manifested to Catherine her own sinfulness and the Love of God with equal clearness. The revelation was so overwhelming that she lost consciousness and fell into a kind of ecstasy, for a space of time during which the confessor happened to be called away. When he returned, Catherine could only murmur that she would put off her confession, and go home quickly.
From the moment of that sudden vision of herself and God, the saint’s interior state seems never to have changed, save by varying in intensity and being accompanied by more or less severe penance, according to what she saw required of her by the Holy Spirit Who guided her incessantly. God granted to her an intimate knowledge of Purgatory and the state of souls detained there and the processes of purification. Here are some of her writings on the subject. We have reclassified them into four loose categories—which unavoidably overlap—of Joy, Pain, Love and Mercy. At the end, we include St. Catherine’s warning to mankind.
► JOY
“That which man judges to be perfect, in the sight of God is defective. For all the works of man―which appear faultless, when he considers them, feels, remembers, wills and understands them―are, if he does not refer them to God, corrupt and sinful. For, to the perfection of our works it is necessary that they be wrought in us but not of us. In the works of God it is He that is the prime mover, and not man” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“These works, which God effects in the soul by Himself alone, which are the last operations of pure and simple love, in which we have no merit, so pierce and inflame the soul that the body which envelops her seems to be hiding a fire, or like one in a furnace, who can find no rest but in death. It is true that the divine love, which overwhelms the soul, gives, as I think, a peace greater than can be expressed; yet this peace does not in the least diminish her pains. Nay, it is love delayed which occasions them, and they are greater in proportion to the perfection of the love of which God has made her capable” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“Thus these souls in Purgatory have great pleasure and great pain; nor does the one impede the other. There is no peace to be compared with that of the souls in Purgatory, except that of the saints in paradise, and this peace is ever increased by the inflowing of God into these souls, which increases in proportion as the impediments to it are removed” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“I see that the souls in Purgatory behold a double operation. The first is that of the mercy of God; for, while they suffer their torments willingly, they perceive that God has been very good to them, considering what they have deserved and how great are their offenses in His eyes. For if His goodness did not temper justice with mercy (satisfying it with the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ), one sin alone would deserve a thousand Hells. They suffer their pains so willingly that they would not lighten them in the least, knowing how justly they have been deserved. They resist the will of God no more than if they had already entered upon eternal life.
“The other operation is the satisfaction they experience in beholding how loving and merciful have been the divine decrees in all that regards them. In one instant God impresses these two things upon their minds, and, as they are in grace, they comprehend them as they are, yet each according to her capacity. They experience thence a great and never-failing satisfaction which constantly increases as they approach to God. They see all things, not in themselves, nor by themselves, but as they are in God, on Whom they are more intent than on their sufferings. For the least vision they can have of God overbalances all woes and all joys that can be conceived. Yet their joy in God does by no means lessen their pain.
► PAIN
“The soul―leaving the body, and not finding in herself that purity in which she was created, and seeing also the hindrances which prevent her union with God, conscious also that Purgatory only can remove them―casts herself quickly and willingly therein. And if she did not find the means ordained for her purification, she would instantly create for herself a Hell worse than Purgatory, seeing that, by reason of this impediment, she is hindered from approaching her end, which is God; and this is so great an ill that, in comparison with it, the soul esteems Purgatory as nothing. True it is, as I have said, like Hell; and yet, in comparison with the loss of God it is as nothing. Knowing, then, that Purgatory was intended for her cleaning, she throws herself therein, and finds there that great mercy, the removal of her stains” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“The great importance of Purgatory neither mind can conceive nor tongue describe. I see only that its pains are as great as those of Hell; and yet I see that a soul, stained with the slightest fault, receiving this mercy, counts its pains as naught in comparison with this hindrance to her love” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“The pain never diminishes, although the time does, but as to the will, it is so united to God by pure charity, and so satisfied to be under His divine appointment, that these souls can never say their pains are pains. On the other hand, it is true that they suffer torments which no tongue can describe, nor any intelligence comprehend, unless it be revealed by such a special grace as that which God has vouchsafed to me, but which I am unable to explain” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“Since the souls in Purgatory are freed from the guilt of sin, there is no barrier between them and God―except the pains they suffer, which delay the satisfaction of their desire. And when they see how serious is even the slightest hindrance, which the necessity of justice causes to check them, a vehement flame kindles within them, which is like that of Hell. They feel no guilt however―for it is guilt which is the cause of the malignant will of the condemned in Hell, to whom God does not communicate His goodness, and thus they remain in despair and with a will forever opposed to the good will of God” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“I repeat, it is the view of all these things which causes the pain of the suffering souls in Purgatory, not that they esteem their pains as great (cruel though they be), but they count as far worse, that opposition, which they find in themselves, to the will of that God, whom they behold burning for them with so ardent and so pure a love” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
► LOVE
“So it is with the rust of sin, which is the covering of the soul. The rust of sin is the impediment, and this the fire continually consumes … In Purgatory the flames incessantly consume it, and, as it disappears, the soul reflects more and more perfectly the true sun who is God. Its contentment increases as this rust wears away, and the soul is laid bare to the divine ray, and thus one increases and the other decreases until the time is accomplished” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“According as God finds the soul more or less freed from the hindrances of sin, it follows that, when He finds a soul that is returning to the purity and simplicity in which she was created, He increased in her the beatific instinct, and kindles in her a fire of charity so powerful and vehement, that it is insupportable to the soul to find any obstacle between her and her end; and the clearer vision she has of these obstacles the greater is her pain” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“And if a soul, retaining the slightest stain, were to draw near to God in the beatific vision, it would be to her a more grievous injury, and inflict more suffering, than Purgatory itself. Nor could God Himself, Who is pure goodness and supreme justice, and the sight of God, not yet entirely satisfied (so long as the least possible purification remained to be accomplished) would be intolerable to her, and she would cast herself into the deepest Hell rather than stand before Him and be still impure” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“The souls in Purgatory are entirely conformed to the will of God; therefore, they correspond with His goodness, are contented with all that He ordains, and are entirely purified from the guilt of their sins. They are pure from sins, because they have in this life abhorred them and confessed them with true contrition, and for this reason God remits their guilt, so that only the stains of sin remain, and these must be devoured by the fire” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“And I know that the greatest misery of the souls in Purgatory is to behold in themselves anything that displeases God, and to discover that, in spite of His goodness, they had consented to it. And this is because, being in the state of grace, they see the reality and the importance of the impediments which hinder their approach to God” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“I behold such a great conformity between God and the soul, that when He finds her pure as when His divine majesty first created her, He gives her an attractive force of ardent love, which would annihilate her if she were not immortal. He so transforms her into Himself that, forgetting all, she no longer sees anything beside Him; and He continues to draw her toward Him, inflames her with love, and never leaves her until He has brought her to that state from whence she first came forth, that is, to the perfect purity in which she was created” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“When the soul beholds within herself the amorous flame by which she is drawn toward her sweet Master and her God, the burning heat of love overpowers her and she melts. Then, in that divine light she sees how God, by His great care and constant providence, never ceases to attract her to her last perfection, and that He does so through pure love alone. She sees, too, that she herself, clogged by sin, cannot follow that attraction toward God, that is, that reconciling glance which He casts upon her that He may draw her to Himself” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“This love, with its unifying regard, is ever drawing these souls, as if it had no other thing to do; and when the soul beholds this, if she could find a yet more painful Purgatory in which she could be more quickly cleansed, she would plunge at once therein, impelled by the burning, mutual love between herself and God” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“From that furnace of divine love I see rays of fire dart like burning lamps towards the soul; and so violent and powerful are they that both soul and body would be utterly destroyed, if that were possible. These rays perform a double office; they purify and they annihilate. The soul, however, cannot be annihilated in God, but in herself she can, and the longer her purification lasts, the more perfectly does she die to herself, until at length she remains purified in God” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
► MERCY
“At her creation by God, the soul received all the means of attaining perfection of which her nature was capable, in order that she might conform to the will of God and keep herself from contracting any stain; but, being directly contaminated by Original Sin, she loses her gifts and graces and even her life. Nor can she be regenerated except by the help of God, for even after Baptism, her inclination to evil remains, which, if she does not resist it, disposes and leads her to mortal sin, through which she dies again” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“God again restores her by a further special grace; yet, she is still so sullied and so bent on herself, that to restore her to her primitive innocence, without all those divine operations, she could never be restored. When the soul has re-entered the path which leads to her first estate, she is inflamed with so burning a desire to be transformed into God, that in it she finds her Purgatory. Not, indeed, that she regards her Purgatory as being such, but this desire, so fiery and so powerfully repressed, becomes her Purgatory” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“This final act of love accomplishes its work alone, finding the soul with so many hidden imperfections, that the mere sight of them, were it presented to her, would drive her to despair. This last operation, however, consumes them all, and when they are destroyed God makes them known to the soul to make her understand the divine action by which her purity was restored” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“It is evident that the revolt of man’s will, from that of God, constitutes sin, and while that revolt continues, man’s guilt remains. Those, therefore, that are in Hell, having passed from this life with perverse wills, their guilt is not remitted, nor can it be, since they are no longer capable of change. Those in Purgatory, on the other hand, suffer the penalty only, for their guilt was cancelled at death, when they were found hating their sins and penitent for having offended the divine goodness. And this penalty has an end, for the term of it is ever approaching. O misery beyond all misery, and the greater because in his blindness, man regards it not! O what peril attaches to sin willfully committed! For it is so difficult for man to bring himself to penance, and without penitence guilt remains and will ever remain, so long as man retains unchanged the will to sin, or is intent upon committing it” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“If by repentance, the souls in Purgatory could purify themselves, a moment would suffice to cancel their whole debt, so overwhelming would be the force of the contrition produced by the clear vision they have of the magnitude of every obstacle which hinders them from God, their love and their final end” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“And, know for certain that not one penny of their debt is remitted to these souls. This is the decree of divine justice; it is thus that God wills. But, on the other hand, these souls have no longer any will apart from that of God, and can neither see nor desire anything except by His appointment” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“And if pious offerings be made for them by persons in this world, they cannot now note them with satisfaction, unless, indeed, in reference to the will of God and the balance of His justice, leaving to Him the ordering of the whole, who repays Himself as best pleases His infinite goodness. Could they regard these alms independently from the divine will concerning them, this would be a return to self, which would shut from their view the will of God, and that would be to them like Hell. Therefore they are unmoved by whatever God gives them, whether it be pleasure or pain, nor can they ever again revert to self.” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
St. Catherine’s Warning
“If only I could utter so strong a cry that it would strike all men with terror, and say to them: ‘O wretched beings! Why are you so blinded by this world that you make, as you will find at the hour of death, no provision for the great necessity that will then come upon you?’” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“You shelter yourselves beneath your hope in the mercy of God, which you unceasingly exalt, not seeing that it is your resistance to His great goodness which will be your condemnation. His goodness should constrain you to do His will, not encourage you to persevere in your own. Since His justice is unfailing, it must therefore be in some way fully satisfied” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“Have not the boldness to say: ‘I will go to confession and gain a plenary indulgence and thus I shall be saved.’ Remember that the full confession and entire contrition which are requisite to gain a plenary indulgence are not easily attained. If you knew how rarely they are achieved, then you would tremble with fear and be more sure of losing than of gaining them” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
We turn to St. Catherine of Genoa for this look at the Joy, the Pain, the Love and the Mercy of Purgatory and we will quote a length from that beautiful Treatise on Purgatory which she wrote. Before we do that, a brief review of her life will not go amiss. Born at Genoa in 1447, and destined to die there in 1510 (aged 63), the life of St. Catherine of Genoa is an encouragement for all of us and also as an example for our children. Her lot in life is one that many can relate to, which makes her a ‘real-life’ kind of saint and not a ‘fairy-tale’ kind of saint.
Noble and Wealthy Family
St. Catherine’s parents were Jacopo Fieschi and Francesca di Negro, both of illustrious Italian birth. Two popes — Innocent IV and Adrian V — had been of the Fieschi family, and Jacopo himself became Viceroy of Naples. Catherine is described as an extraordinarily holy child, highly gifted in the way of prayer (who encourages children to pray these days?), and with a wonderful love of reading Christ’s Passion and of penitential practices; but, also, as having been a most quiet, simple, and exceedingly obedient girl. When about thirteen, she wished to enter the convent, but the nuns, to whom her confessor applied, having refused her on account of her youth, she appears to have put the idea aside without making any further attempt.
Tough and Painful Marriage
At sixteen, she was married by her parents’ wish to a young Genoese nobleman, Giuliano Adorno. The marriage turned out wretchedly―Giuliano proved faithless, violent-tempered, and a spendthrift. He made the life of his wife a misery. Details are scanty, but it seems at least clear that Catherine spent the first five years of her marriage in silent, melancholic submission to her husband; and that she then, for another five, turned a little to the world for consolation in her troubles.
Lukewarm Lady Leaves Lukewarmness
The distractions she took were most innocent and not sinful; nevertheless, destined as she was for an extraordinary life, they had the effect, in her case, of producing lukewarmness, the end of which was such intense weariness and depression that she prayed earnestly for a return of her old fervor. Then, just ten years after her marriage, came the event of her life, in answer to her prayer. She went one day, full of melancholy, to a convent in Genoa where she had a sister, a nun. The latter advised her to go to confession to the nuns’ confessor, and Catherine agreed. She had barely knelt down in the confessional, when a ray of Divine light pierced her soul, and in one moment manifested to Catherine her own sinfulness and the Love of God with equal clearness. The revelation was so overwhelming that she lost consciousness and fell into a kind of ecstasy, for a space of time during which the confessor happened to be called away. When he returned, Catherine could only murmur that she would put off her confession, and go home quickly.
From the moment of that sudden vision of herself and God, the saint’s interior state seems never to have changed, save by varying in intensity and being accompanied by more or less severe penance, according to what she saw required of her by the Holy Spirit Who guided her incessantly. God granted to her an intimate knowledge of Purgatory and the state of souls detained there and the processes of purification. Here are some of her writings on the subject. We have reclassified them into four loose categories—which unavoidably overlap—of Joy, Pain, Love and Mercy. At the end, we include St. Catherine’s warning to mankind.
► JOY
“That which man judges to be perfect, in the sight of God is defective. For all the works of man―which appear faultless, when he considers them, feels, remembers, wills and understands them―are, if he does not refer them to God, corrupt and sinful. For, to the perfection of our works it is necessary that they be wrought in us but not of us. In the works of God it is He that is the prime mover, and not man” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“These works, which God effects in the soul by Himself alone, which are the last operations of pure and simple love, in which we have no merit, so pierce and inflame the soul that the body which envelops her seems to be hiding a fire, or like one in a furnace, who can find no rest but in death. It is true that the divine love, which overwhelms the soul, gives, as I think, a peace greater than can be expressed; yet this peace does not in the least diminish her pains. Nay, it is love delayed which occasions them, and they are greater in proportion to the perfection of the love of which God has made her capable” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“Thus these souls in Purgatory have great pleasure and great pain; nor does the one impede the other. There is no peace to be compared with that of the souls in Purgatory, except that of the saints in paradise, and this peace is ever increased by the inflowing of God into these souls, which increases in proportion as the impediments to it are removed” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“I see that the souls in Purgatory behold a double operation. The first is that of the mercy of God; for, while they suffer their torments willingly, they perceive that God has been very good to them, considering what they have deserved and how great are their offenses in His eyes. For if His goodness did not temper justice with mercy (satisfying it with the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ), one sin alone would deserve a thousand Hells. They suffer their pains so willingly that they would not lighten them in the least, knowing how justly they have been deserved. They resist the will of God no more than if they had already entered upon eternal life.
“The other operation is the satisfaction they experience in beholding how loving and merciful have been the divine decrees in all that regards them. In one instant God impresses these two things upon their minds, and, as they are in grace, they comprehend them as they are, yet each according to her capacity. They experience thence a great and never-failing satisfaction which constantly increases as they approach to God. They see all things, not in themselves, nor by themselves, but as they are in God, on Whom they are more intent than on their sufferings. For the least vision they can have of God overbalances all woes and all joys that can be conceived. Yet their joy in God does by no means lessen their pain.
► PAIN
“The soul―leaving the body, and not finding in herself that purity in which she was created, and seeing also the hindrances which prevent her union with God, conscious also that Purgatory only can remove them―casts herself quickly and willingly therein. And if she did not find the means ordained for her purification, she would instantly create for herself a Hell worse than Purgatory, seeing that, by reason of this impediment, she is hindered from approaching her end, which is God; and this is so great an ill that, in comparison with it, the soul esteems Purgatory as nothing. True it is, as I have said, like Hell; and yet, in comparison with the loss of God it is as nothing. Knowing, then, that Purgatory was intended for her cleaning, she throws herself therein, and finds there that great mercy, the removal of her stains” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“The great importance of Purgatory neither mind can conceive nor tongue describe. I see only that its pains are as great as those of Hell; and yet I see that a soul, stained with the slightest fault, receiving this mercy, counts its pains as naught in comparison with this hindrance to her love” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“The pain never diminishes, although the time does, but as to the will, it is so united to God by pure charity, and so satisfied to be under His divine appointment, that these souls can never say their pains are pains. On the other hand, it is true that they suffer torments which no tongue can describe, nor any intelligence comprehend, unless it be revealed by such a special grace as that which God has vouchsafed to me, but which I am unable to explain” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“Since the souls in Purgatory are freed from the guilt of sin, there is no barrier between them and God―except the pains they suffer, which delay the satisfaction of their desire. And when they see how serious is even the slightest hindrance, which the necessity of justice causes to check them, a vehement flame kindles within them, which is like that of Hell. They feel no guilt however―for it is guilt which is the cause of the malignant will of the condemned in Hell, to whom God does not communicate His goodness, and thus they remain in despair and with a will forever opposed to the good will of God” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“I repeat, it is the view of all these things which causes the pain of the suffering souls in Purgatory, not that they esteem their pains as great (cruel though they be), but they count as far worse, that opposition, which they find in themselves, to the will of that God, whom they behold burning for them with so ardent and so pure a love” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
► LOVE
“So it is with the rust of sin, which is the covering of the soul. The rust of sin is the impediment, and this the fire continually consumes … In Purgatory the flames incessantly consume it, and, as it disappears, the soul reflects more and more perfectly the true sun who is God. Its contentment increases as this rust wears away, and the soul is laid bare to the divine ray, and thus one increases and the other decreases until the time is accomplished” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“According as God finds the soul more or less freed from the hindrances of sin, it follows that, when He finds a soul that is returning to the purity and simplicity in which she was created, He increased in her the beatific instinct, and kindles in her a fire of charity so powerful and vehement, that it is insupportable to the soul to find any obstacle between her and her end; and the clearer vision she has of these obstacles the greater is her pain” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“And if a soul, retaining the slightest stain, were to draw near to God in the beatific vision, it would be to her a more grievous injury, and inflict more suffering, than Purgatory itself. Nor could God Himself, Who is pure goodness and supreme justice, and the sight of God, not yet entirely satisfied (so long as the least possible purification remained to be accomplished) would be intolerable to her, and she would cast herself into the deepest Hell rather than stand before Him and be still impure” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“The souls in Purgatory are entirely conformed to the will of God; therefore, they correspond with His goodness, are contented with all that He ordains, and are entirely purified from the guilt of their sins. They are pure from sins, because they have in this life abhorred them and confessed them with true contrition, and for this reason God remits their guilt, so that only the stains of sin remain, and these must be devoured by the fire” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“And I know that the greatest misery of the souls in Purgatory is to behold in themselves anything that displeases God, and to discover that, in spite of His goodness, they had consented to it. And this is because, being in the state of grace, they see the reality and the importance of the impediments which hinder their approach to God” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“I behold such a great conformity between God and the soul, that when He finds her pure as when His divine majesty first created her, He gives her an attractive force of ardent love, which would annihilate her if she were not immortal. He so transforms her into Himself that, forgetting all, she no longer sees anything beside Him; and He continues to draw her toward Him, inflames her with love, and never leaves her until He has brought her to that state from whence she first came forth, that is, to the perfect purity in which she was created” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“When the soul beholds within herself the amorous flame by which she is drawn toward her sweet Master and her God, the burning heat of love overpowers her and she melts. Then, in that divine light she sees how God, by His great care and constant providence, never ceases to attract her to her last perfection, and that He does so through pure love alone. She sees, too, that she herself, clogged by sin, cannot follow that attraction toward God, that is, that reconciling glance which He casts upon her that He may draw her to Himself” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“This love, with its unifying regard, is ever drawing these souls, as if it had no other thing to do; and when the soul beholds this, if she could find a yet more painful Purgatory in which she could be more quickly cleansed, she would plunge at once therein, impelled by the burning, mutual love between herself and God” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“From that furnace of divine love I see rays of fire dart like burning lamps towards the soul; and so violent and powerful are they that both soul and body would be utterly destroyed, if that were possible. These rays perform a double office; they purify and they annihilate. The soul, however, cannot be annihilated in God, but in herself she can, and the longer her purification lasts, the more perfectly does she die to herself, until at length she remains purified in God” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
► MERCY
“At her creation by God, the soul received all the means of attaining perfection of which her nature was capable, in order that she might conform to the will of God and keep herself from contracting any stain; but, being directly contaminated by Original Sin, she loses her gifts and graces and even her life. Nor can she be regenerated except by the help of God, for even after Baptism, her inclination to evil remains, which, if she does not resist it, disposes and leads her to mortal sin, through which she dies again” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“God again restores her by a further special grace; yet, she is still so sullied and so bent on herself, that to restore her to her primitive innocence, without all those divine operations, she could never be restored. When the soul has re-entered the path which leads to her first estate, she is inflamed with so burning a desire to be transformed into God, that in it she finds her Purgatory. Not, indeed, that she regards her Purgatory as being such, but this desire, so fiery and so powerfully repressed, becomes her Purgatory” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“This final act of love accomplishes its work alone, finding the soul with so many hidden imperfections, that the mere sight of them, were it presented to her, would drive her to despair. This last operation, however, consumes them all, and when they are destroyed God makes them known to the soul to make her understand the divine action by which her purity was restored” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“It is evident that the revolt of man’s will, from that of God, constitutes sin, and while that revolt continues, man’s guilt remains. Those, therefore, that are in Hell, having passed from this life with perverse wills, their guilt is not remitted, nor can it be, since they are no longer capable of change. Those in Purgatory, on the other hand, suffer the penalty only, for their guilt was cancelled at death, when they were found hating their sins and penitent for having offended the divine goodness. And this penalty has an end, for the term of it is ever approaching. O misery beyond all misery, and the greater because in his blindness, man regards it not! O what peril attaches to sin willfully committed! For it is so difficult for man to bring himself to penance, and without penitence guilt remains and will ever remain, so long as man retains unchanged the will to sin, or is intent upon committing it” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“If by repentance, the souls in Purgatory could purify themselves, a moment would suffice to cancel their whole debt, so overwhelming would be the force of the contrition produced by the clear vision they have of the magnitude of every obstacle which hinders them from God, their love and their final end” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“And, know for certain that not one penny of their debt is remitted to these souls. This is the decree of divine justice; it is thus that God wills. But, on the other hand, these souls have no longer any will apart from that of God, and can neither see nor desire anything except by His appointment” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“And if pious offerings be made for them by persons in this world, they cannot now note them with satisfaction, unless, indeed, in reference to the will of God and the balance of His justice, leaving to Him the ordering of the whole, who repays Himself as best pleases His infinite goodness. Could they regard these alms independently from the divine will concerning them, this would be a return to self, which would shut from their view the will of God, and that would be to them like Hell. Therefore they are unmoved by whatever God gives them, whether it be pleasure or pain, nor can they ever again revert to self.” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
St. Catherine’s Warning
“If only I could utter so strong a cry that it would strike all men with terror, and say to them: ‘O wretched beings! Why are you so blinded by this world that you make, as you will find at the hour of death, no provision for the great necessity that will then come upon you?’” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“You shelter yourselves beneath your hope in the mercy of God, which you unceasingly exalt, not seeing that it is your resistance to His great goodness which will be your condemnation. His goodness should constrain you to do His will, not encourage you to persevere in your own. Since His justice is unfailing, it must therefore be in some way fully satisfied” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
“Have not the boldness to say: ‘I will go to confession and gain a plenary indulgence and thus I shall be saved.’ Remember that the full confession and entire contrition which are requisite to gain a plenary indulgence are not easily attained. If you knew how rarely they are achieved, then you would tremble with fear and be more sure of losing than of gaining them” (St. Catherine of Genoa).
Article 12
Tuesday November 14th, 2023
Mercy & Justice Are Inseparable
Tuesday November 14th, 2023
Mercy & Justice Are Inseparable
Mercy and Justice Stand Together
There are some who are mainly inclined to justice, and show little or no mercy. There are others who are inclined to mercy, but show little or no justice. Not so with God! He is extreme in both regards—which is something we find hard to grasp. “The Lord is merciful and just” (Psalm 114:5). We might think, “How can loving God keep souls that He loves, in the fires of Purgatory (which are the same as the fires of Hell), sometimes for centuries on end?” The reason we cannot see the mercy and justice in that action is because we have cheap notions about God and about sin—whereas both are extreme. God is extremely holy and honorable—sin is extremely evil and detestable. However, we neither honor and love God as much as we should; neither do we hate and flee sin as much as we should. The result is—if we can scrape in there by the skin of our teeth—Purgatory, which helps us finally understand both those extremes. Yet even Purgatory is an extremely merciful place, for nobody there is punished as much as they could be punished, and God grants consolations even amongst the terrible pain—like a parent trying to comfort a seriously injured child and then nursing him back to full health.
Mercy Now is Better Than Mercy Later
Even though Purgatory is a merciful price to pay for Heaven, God offers an even more merciful price to those who are still living here on Earth. We can obtain mercy here below, as we have said, for mere cents on the dollar; whereas after this life, it will seem like we are paying thousands of dollars on a single cent! “I say to thee, thou shalt not go out thence, until thou pay the very last mite” (Luke 12:59). “Let him do penance for his sin” (Leviticus 5:5). “Therefore, whilst we have time, let us work good” (Galatians 6:10).
Penance Pays Profitably
“And if they be converted in their heart and do penance, and pray to Thee, saying: ‘We have sinned, we have done wickedly, we have dealt unjustly!’ And return to Thee with all their heart, and with all their soul: Then hear Thou from Heaven and forgive Thy people, although they have sinned” (2 Paralipomenon 6:37-39). “And My people, upon whom My Name is called, being converted, shall make supplication to Me, and seek out My Face, and do penance for their most wicked ways: then will I hear from Heaven, and will forgive their sins” (2 Paralipomenon 7:14). “‘If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool,’ saith the Lord” (Isaias 1:18). “Hear, I beseech you, My words, and do penance” (Job 21:2). “I came to call sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance” (Matthew 3:8). “Do penance: for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2). “God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23). “If we do not penance, we shall fall into the hands of the Lord” (Ecclesiasticus 2:22). Penance is the price for sin that must be paid—either Present Penance, or Purgatorial Penance. Paying in the present is much easier, much shorter, much wiser.
Even Our Lady stresses this need to pay for our sins before we die—whether by the name of penance, sacrifice or suffering—she has mentioned this repeatedly. “The leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance” (La Salette) … “Communities can only be preserved at the cost of much penance” (Quito) … “Penance! Penance! Penance!” (Lourdes) … “Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger” (Akita) … “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices” (Fatima) … “Others will do penance through hunger” (La Salette) … “Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended … Above all accept and bear with submission all the suffering the Lord will send you” (Fatima, the angel) … “You are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort … Are you suffering a great deal? Don’t lose heart. I will never forsake you. My Immaculate Heart will be your refuge and the way that will lead you to God” (Fatima).
Sister Lucia on Penance and Mercy
In her 1957 conversation with Fr. Fuentes, Sister Lucia said: “Father, we should not wait for an appeal to the world to come from Rome on the part of the Holy Father, to do penance. Nor should we wait for the call from our bishops in our dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No! Our Lord has already, very often, used these means and the world has not paid attention. That is why now it is necessary for each one of us to begin to reform himself spiritually.”
On June 13th, 1929, Lucia saw another important apparition involving Mary as she was making a Holy Hour in the convent chapel at Tuy in Spain, as was her custom on Thursday nights from eleven to twelve. She was alone, praying the prayers of the Angel in the dim light of the sanctuary lamp when,
“Suddenly the whole chapel was illumined by a supernatural light, and above the altar appeared a Cross of light, reaching to the ceiling. In a brighter light on the upper part of the Cross, could be seen the face of a man and his body as far as the waist; upon his breast was a dove of light; nailed to the Cross was the body of another man. A little below the waist, I could see a chalice and a large Host suspended in the air, onto which drops of blood were falling from the Face of Jesus Crucified and from the wound in His side.
“These drops ran down onto the Host and fell into the chalice. Beneath the right arm of the Cross was Our Lady and in her hand was her Immaculate Heart. (It was Our Lady of Fatima, with her Immaculate Heart in her left hand, without sword or roses, but with a crown of thorns and flames). Under the left arm of the Cross, large letters, as if of crystal clear water which ran down upon the altar, formed these words: ‘Grace and Mercy.’”
The Rosary and Mercy
“Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved” (Akita) … “Say the Rosary every day … Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you … I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day” (Fatima).
St. Louis de Montfort speaks much of the Rosary and its merciful benefits: “If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins ‘you shall receive a never fading crown of glory’ (1 Peter 5:4). Even if you are on the brink of damnation, even if you have one foot in Hell, even if you have sold your soul to the devil as sorcerers do who practice black magic, and even if you are a heretic as obstinate as a devil, sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and save your soul, if — and mark well what I say — if you say the Rosary devoutly every day until death for the purpose of knowing the truth and obtaining contrition and pardon for your sins” (Secret of the Rosary: “A Red Rose”).
Our Lady appeared to St. Dominic and said: “Priests should try to kindle a love of prayer in people’s hearts and especially a love of my Angelic Psalter. If only they would all start saying it and would really persevere, God in His mercy could hardly refuse to give them His grace” (Secret of the Rosary: “Third Rose”).
Alphonsus, King of Leon and Galicia, very much wanted all his servants to honor the Blessed Virgin by saying the Rosary, so he used to hang a large Rosary on his belt, though he never said it himself. Nevertheless, his wearing it encouraged his courtiers to say the Rosary devoutly. One day the King fell seriously ill and, when he was given up for dead, he found himself, in spirit, before the judgment seat of Our Lord. Many devils were there accusing him of all the sins he had committed, and Our Lord was about to condemn him, when Our Lady came forward to speak in his favor. She called for a pair of scales and had his sins placed in one of the balances, while she put the large Rosary which he had always worn on the other scale, together with all the Rosaries that had been said through his example. It was found that the Rosaries weighed more than his sins. Looking at him with great kindness, Our Lady said, “As a reward for the little service you did for me in wearing my Rosary, I have obtained a great grace for you from my Son. Your life will be spared for a few more years. See that you spend those years wisely, and do penance.”
Sister Lucia on the Rosary and Mercy
Sister Lucia stresses that so many mercies can come to us through the Rosary—it the tool or weapon of this age that we live in: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
St. Thomas Aquinas on Mercy
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Mercy and truth are necessarily found in all God’s works … [also] justice must exist in all God’s works. Certain works are attributed to justice, and certain others to mercy, because in some justice appears more forcibly and in others mercy. Even in the damnation of the reprobate mercy is seen, which, though it does not totally remit, yet it somewhat alleviates, in punishing short of what is deserved. In the justification of the ungodly, justice is seen, when God remits sins on account of love, though He Himself has mercifully infused that love. So we read of Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47).” (Summa Theologica, 1a, q. 21, art 4)
In bestowing good on creatures, God manifests his goodness. In meeting the needs of creatures, he manifests his justice. In bestowing all that is useful, God manifests his liberality. And in giving what counteracts miseries and defects, God shows his mercy. In all the works of God, justice and mercy are manifest.
Mercy begets Mercy
St. Thomas spoke of Mary Magdalen, quoting Our Lord’s words concerning her: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). Our Lord had also said: “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). These two—charity and mercy—are linked, for mercy is a room in the mansion of charity. When we show mercy, we practice charity. Hence, “charity [mercy] covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
This was also the message given to the Venerable Catherine Paluzzi, by a holy Religious, who died in her arms, but who was not admitted to eternal beatitude until after she had passed an entire year in Purgatory. Catherine Paluzzi led a holy life in the diocese of Nepi, in Italy, where she founded a convent of Dominicans. There lived with her a Religious named Bernardine, who was far advanced in the ways of the spiritual life. These two saints emulated each other in fervor, and helped each other to progress more and more in the perfection to which God called them. The biographer of Venerable Catherine compares them to two live coals that communicate heat to each other; and again, to two harps tuned to harmonize together in one perpetual hymn of love to the greater glory of God.
Bernardine died; a painful malady, which she bore with Christian patience, carried her to the grave. Catherine prayed much for the soul of her friend. An entire year elapsed when, on the anniversary of the death of Bernardine, Catherine being in prayer, saw a pit from which came volumes of smoke and flames; then she saw, coming out of the pit, a form surrounded by dark clouds. By degrees these dark clouds were dispersed, and the apparition became radiant with an extraordinary brilliancy. In this glorious personage Catherine recognized Bernardine and ran towards her. “Is it you, my dearest sister?” said she, “But from where have you just come? What is this pit, this fiery smoke? Does your Purgatory end only today?” “You are right,” replied the soul; “for a year I have been detained in that place of expiation, and today, for the first time, shall I enter Heaven. As regards yourself, persevere in your holy exercises: continue to be charitable and merciful, and you will obtain mercy” (Diario Domenicano. Cf. Rossignoli, Merveilles, part 2, 51).
A Lack of Mercy will Lose God’s Mercy
“Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful” (Luke 6:36). “Who keepest mercy unto thousands: who takest away iniquity, and wickedness, and sin” (Exodus 34:7). “Be ye kind one to another; merciful, forgiving one another, even as God hath forgiven you in Christ” (Ephesians 4:32). “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). But “judgment without mercy to him that hath not done mercy” (James 2:13). This reminds us of the unjust and unforgiving steward, who was forgiven a large debt by his master, but then refused to forgive his neighbor a small debt.
“Therefore is the kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who would take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents. And as he had not wherewith to pay it, his lord commanded that he should be sold, and his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, besought him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all!’ And the lord of that servant being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt. But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence: and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: ‘Pay what thou owest!’ And his fellow servant falling down, besought him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all!’ And he would not: but went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt. Now his fellow servants seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him; and said to him: ‘Thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all the debt, because thou besoughtest me! Shouldst not thou then have had compassion also on thy fellow servant, even as I had compassion on thee?’ And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers until he paid all the debt. So also shall my heavenly Father do to you, if you forgive not every one his brother from your hearts” (Matthew 18:23-35).
The Sin of Presumption
There are those who, ever-reminding themselves of the mercy of God, presume to sin wantonly, thinking that mercy will still be shown to them. This is not so! “Say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, he will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:6). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked” (Galatians 6:7). “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God” (Luke 4:12). St. Alphonsus says: “The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations, or without at least asking God’s help to conquer them, and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice, tempts God to work miracles, or rather to show to him an extraordinary mercy that is not extended to the generality of Christians … He numbers the graces which he dispenses, as well as the sins which we commit. Hence, when the time which he has fixed arrives, God deprives us of his graces, and begins to inflict chastisement … When sins reach a certain number, God pardons no more … God is ready to heal those who sincerely wish to amend their lives, but cannot take pity on the obstinate sinner” (Sermon: First Sunday of Lent).
We read in the Old Testament: “Thus saith the Lord: ‘In an acceptable time I have heard thee, and in the day of salvation I have helped thee’” (Isaias 49:8) and St. Paul echoes that in the New Testament, telling us that now is time, here on Earth, to work out our salvation: “For God saith: ‘In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee. Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2). “Wherefore, my dearly beloved, with fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). Remembering that the Lord is merciful to those who truly sorrow over their sins, seeking to repair the damage caused by them. “And His mercy is from generation unto generations, to them that fear Him” (Luke 1:50). “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). “Rend your hearts, and not your garments, and turn to the Lord your God: for He is gracious and merciful, patient and rich in mercy” (Joel 2:13). “I said: ‘O Lord, be thou merciful to me: heal my soul, for I have sinned against Thee’” (Psalms 40:5). “Hear, O Lord, and have mercy, for Thou art a merciful God, and have pity on us: for we have sinned before Thee” (Baruch 3:2). “And they called upon the Lord who is merciful, and spreading their hands, they lifted them up to Heaven: and the holy Lord God quickly heard their voice” (Ecclesiasticus 48:22).
There are some who are mainly inclined to justice, and show little or no mercy. There are others who are inclined to mercy, but show little or no justice. Not so with God! He is extreme in both regards—which is something we find hard to grasp. “The Lord is merciful and just” (Psalm 114:5). We might think, “How can loving God keep souls that He loves, in the fires of Purgatory (which are the same as the fires of Hell), sometimes for centuries on end?” The reason we cannot see the mercy and justice in that action is because we have cheap notions about God and about sin—whereas both are extreme. God is extremely holy and honorable—sin is extremely evil and detestable. However, we neither honor and love God as much as we should; neither do we hate and flee sin as much as we should. The result is—if we can scrape in there by the skin of our teeth—Purgatory, which helps us finally understand both those extremes. Yet even Purgatory is an extremely merciful place, for nobody there is punished as much as they could be punished, and God grants consolations even amongst the terrible pain—like a parent trying to comfort a seriously injured child and then nursing him back to full health.
Mercy Now is Better Than Mercy Later
Even though Purgatory is a merciful price to pay for Heaven, God offers an even more merciful price to those who are still living here on Earth. We can obtain mercy here below, as we have said, for mere cents on the dollar; whereas after this life, it will seem like we are paying thousands of dollars on a single cent! “I say to thee, thou shalt not go out thence, until thou pay the very last mite” (Luke 12:59). “Let him do penance for his sin” (Leviticus 5:5). “Therefore, whilst we have time, let us work good” (Galatians 6:10).
Penance Pays Profitably
“And if they be converted in their heart and do penance, and pray to Thee, saying: ‘We have sinned, we have done wickedly, we have dealt unjustly!’ And return to Thee with all their heart, and with all their soul: Then hear Thou from Heaven and forgive Thy people, although they have sinned” (2 Paralipomenon 6:37-39). “And My people, upon whom My Name is called, being converted, shall make supplication to Me, and seek out My Face, and do penance for their most wicked ways: then will I hear from Heaven, and will forgive their sins” (2 Paralipomenon 7:14). “‘If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool,’ saith the Lord” (Isaias 1:18). “Hear, I beseech you, My words, and do penance” (Job 21:2). “I came to call sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance” (Matthew 3:8). “Do penance: for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2). “God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23). “If we do not penance, we shall fall into the hands of the Lord” (Ecclesiasticus 2:22). Penance is the price for sin that must be paid—either Present Penance, or Purgatorial Penance. Paying in the present is much easier, much shorter, much wiser.
Even Our Lady stresses this need to pay for our sins before we die—whether by the name of penance, sacrifice or suffering—she has mentioned this repeatedly. “The leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance” (La Salette) … “Communities can only be preserved at the cost of much penance” (Quito) … “Penance! Penance! Penance!” (Lourdes) … “Prayer, penance and courageous sacrifices can soften the Father’s anger” (Akita) … “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices” (Fatima) … “Others will do penance through hunger” (La Salette) … “Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it as an act of reparation for the sins by which God is offended … Above all accept and bear with submission all the suffering the Lord will send you” (Fatima, the angel) … “You are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort … Are you suffering a great deal? Don’t lose heart. I will never forsake you. My Immaculate Heart will be your refuge and the way that will lead you to God” (Fatima).
Sister Lucia on Penance and Mercy
In her 1957 conversation with Fr. Fuentes, Sister Lucia said: “Father, we should not wait for an appeal to the world to come from Rome on the part of the Holy Father, to do penance. Nor should we wait for the call from our bishops in our dioceses, nor from the religious congregations. No! Our Lord has already, very often, used these means and the world has not paid attention. That is why now it is necessary for each one of us to begin to reform himself spiritually.”
On June 13th, 1929, Lucia saw another important apparition involving Mary as she was making a Holy Hour in the convent chapel at Tuy in Spain, as was her custom on Thursday nights from eleven to twelve. She was alone, praying the prayers of the Angel in the dim light of the sanctuary lamp when,
“Suddenly the whole chapel was illumined by a supernatural light, and above the altar appeared a Cross of light, reaching to the ceiling. In a brighter light on the upper part of the Cross, could be seen the face of a man and his body as far as the waist; upon his breast was a dove of light; nailed to the Cross was the body of another man. A little below the waist, I could see a chalice and a large Host suspended in the air, onto which drops of blood were falling from the Face of Jesus Crucified and from the wound in His side.
“These drops ran down onto the Host and fell into the chalice. Beneath the right arm of the Cross was Our Lady and in her hand was her Immaculate Heart. (It was Our Lady of Fatima, with her Immaculate Heart in her left hand, without sword or roses, but with a crown of thorns and flames). Under the left arm of the Cross, large letters, as if of crystal clear water which ran down upon the altar, formed these words: ‘Grace and Mercy.’”
The Rosary and Mercy
“Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved” (Akita) … “Say the Rosary every day … Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you … I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day” (Fatima).
St. Louis de Montfort speaks much of the Rosary and its merciful benefits: “If you say the Rosary faithfully until death, I do assure you that, in spite of the gravity of your sins ‘you shall receive a never fading crown of glory’ (1 Peter 5:4). Even if you are on the brink of damnation, even if you have one foot in Hell, even if you have sold your soul to the devil as sorcerers do who practice black magic, and even if you are a heretic as obstinate as a devil, sooner or later you will be converted and will amend your life and save your soul, if — and mark well what I say — if you say the Rosary devoutly every day until death for the purpose of knowing the truth and obtaining contrition and pardon for your sins” (Secret of the Rosary: “A Red Rose”).
Our Lady appeared to St. Dominic and said: “Priests should try to kindle a love of prayer in people’s hearts and especially a love of my Angelic Psalter. If only they would all start saying it and would really persevere, God in His mercy could hardly refuse to give them His grace” (Secret of the Rosary: “Third Rose”).
Alphonsus, King of Leon and Galicia, very much wanted all his servants to honor the Blessed Virgin by saying the Rosary, so he used to hang a large Rosary on his belt, though he never said it himself. Nevertheless, his wearing it encouraged his courtiers to say the Rosary devoutly. One day the King fell seriously ill and, when he was given up for dead, he found himself, in spirit, before the judgment seat of Our Lord. Many devils were there accusing him of all the sins he had committed, and Our Lord was about to condemn him, when Our Lady came forward to speak in his favor. She called for a pair of scales and had his sins placed in one of the balances, while she put the large Rosary which he had always worn on the other scale, together with all the Rosaries that had been said through his example. It was found that the Rosaries weighed more than his sins. Looking at him with great kindness, Our Lady said, “As a reward for the little service you did for me in wearing my Rosary, I have obtained a great grace for you from my Son. Your life will be spared for a few more years. See that you spend those years wisely, and do penance.”
Sister Lucia on the Rosary and Mercy
Sister Lucia stresses that so many mercies can come to us through the Rosary—it the tool or weapon of this age that we live in: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
St. Thomas Aquinas on Mercy
St. Thomas Aquinas writes: “Mercy and truth are necessarily found in all God’s works … [also] justice must exist in all God’s works. Certain works are attributed to justice, and certain others to mercy, because in some justice appears more forcibly and in others mercy. Even in the damnation of the reprobate mercy is seen, which, though it does not totally remit, yet it somewhat alleviates, in punishing short of what is deserved. In the justification of the ungodly, justice is seen, when God remits sins on account of love, though He Himself has mercifully infused that love. So we read of Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47).” (Summa Theologica, 1a, q. 21, art 4)
In bestowing good on creatures, God manifests his goodness. In meeting the needs of creatures, he manifests his justice. In bestowing all that is useful, God manifests his liberality. And in giving what counteracts miseries and defects, God shows his mercy. In all the works of God, justice and mercy are manifest.
Mercy begets Mercy
St. Thomas spoke of Mary Magdalen, quoting Our Lord’s words concerning her: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). Our Lord had also said: “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy!” (Matthew 5:7). These two—charity and mercy—are linked, for mercy is a room in the mansion of charity. When we show mercy, we practice charity. Hence, “charity [mercy] covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
This was also the message given to the Venerable Catherine Paluzzi, by a holy Religious, who died in her arms, but who was not admitted to eternal beatitude until after she had passed an entire year in Purgatory. Catherine Paluzzi led a holy life in the diocese of Nepi, in Italy, where she founded a convent of Dominicans. There lived with her a Religious named Bernardine, who was far advanced in the ways of the spiritual life. These two saints emulated each other in fervor, and helped each other to progress more and more in the perfection to which God called them. The biographer of Venerable Catherine compares them to two live coals that communicate heat to each other; and again, to two harps tuned to harmonize together in one perpetual hymn of love to the greater glory of God.
Bernardine died; a painful malady, which she bore with Christian patience, carried her to the grave. Catherine prayed much for the soul of her friend. An entire year elapsed when, on the anniversary of the death of Bernardine, Catherine being in prayer, saw a pit from which came volumes of smoke and flames; then she saw, coming out of the pit, a form surrounded by dark clouds. By degrees these dark clouds were dispersed, and the apparition became radiant with an extraordinary brilliancy. In this glorious personage Catherine recognized Bernardine and ran towards her. “Is it you, my dearest sister?” said she, “But from where have you just come? What is this pit, this fiery smoke? Does your Purgatory end only today?” “You are right,” replied the soul; “for a year I have been detained in that place of expiation, and today, for the first time, shall I enter Heaven. As regards yourself, persevere in your holy exercises: continue to be charitable and merciful, and you will obtain mercy” (Diario Domenicano. Cf. Rossignoli, Merveilles, part 2, 51).
A Lack of Mercy will Lose God’s Mercy
“Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful” (Luke 6:36). “Who keepest mercy unto thousands: who takest away iniquity, and wickedness, and sin” (Exodus 34:7). “Be ye kind one to another; merciful, forgiving one another, even as God hath forgiven you in Christ” (Ephesians 4:32). “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7). But “judgment without mercy to him that hath not done mercy” (James 2:13). This reminds us of the unjust and unforgiving steward, who was forgiven a large debt by his master, but then refused to forgive his neighbor a small debt.
“Therefore is the kingdom of Heaven likened to a king, who would take an account of his servants. And when he had begun to take the account, one was brought to him, that owed him ten thousand talents. And as he had not wherewith to pay it, his lord commanded that he should be sold, and his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. But that servant falling down, besought him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all!’ And the lord of that servant being moved with pity, let him go and forgave him the debt. But when that servant was gone out, he found one of his fellow servants that owed him an hundred pence: and laying hold of him, throttled him, saying: ‘Pay what thou owest!’ And his fellow servant falling down, besought him, saying: ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all!’ And he would not: but went and cast him into prison, till he paid the debt. Now his fellow servants seeing what was done, were very much grieved, and they came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him; and said to him: ‘Thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all the debt, because thou besoughtest me! Shouldst not thou then have had compassion also on thy fellow servant, even as I had compassion on thee?’ And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers until he paid all the debt. So also shall my heavenly Father do to you, if you forgive not every one his brother from your hearts” (Matthew 18:23-35).
The Sin of Presumption
There are those who, ever-reminding themselves of the mercy of God, presume to sin wantonly, thinking that mercy will still be shown to them. This is not so! “Say not: ‘The mercy of the Lord is great, he will have mercy on the multitude of my sins!’” (Ecclesiasticus 5:6). “Be not deceived, God is not mocked” (Galatians 6:7). “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God” (Luke 4:12). St. Alphonsus says: “The sinner who abandons himself to sin without striving to resist temptations, or without at least asking God’s help to conquer them, and hopes that the Lord will one day draw him from the precipice, tempts God to work miracles, or rather to show to him an extraordinary mercy that is not extended to the generality of Christians … He numbers the graces which he dispenses, as well as the sins which we commit. Hence, when the time which he has fixed arrives, God deprives us of his graces, and begins to inflict chastisement … When sins reach a certain number, God pardons no more … God is ready to heal those who sincerely wish to amend their lives, but cannot take pity on the obstinate sinner” (Sermon: First Sunday of Lent).
We read in the Old Testament: “Thus saith the Lord: ‘In an acceptable time I have heard thee, and in the day of salvation I have helped thee’” (Isaias 49:8) and St. Paul echoes that in the New Testament, telling us that now is time, here on Earth, to work out our salvation: “For God saith: ‘In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee. Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2). “Wherefore, my dearly beloved, with fear and trembling work out your salvation!” (Philippians 2:12). Remembering that the Lord is merciful to those who truly sorrow over their sins, seeking to repair the damage caused by them. “And His mercy is from generation unto generations, to them that fear Him” (Luke 1:50). “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). “Rend your hearts, and not your garments, and turn to the Lord your God: for He is gracious and merciful, patient and rich in mercy” (Joel 2:13). “I said: ‘O Lord, be thou merciful to me: heal my soul, for I have sinned against Thee’” (Psalms 40:5). “Hear, O Lord, and have mercy, for Thou art a merciful God, and have pity on us: for we have sinned before Thee” (Baruch 3:2). “And they called upon the Lord who is merciful, and spreading their hands, they lifted them up to Heaven: and the holy Lord God quickly heard their voice” (Ecclesiasticus 48:22).
Article 11
Monday November 13th, 2023
Reducing Your Debt
Monday November 13th, 2023
Reducing Your Debt
How Can We Reduce Our Debt?
Sin must be paid for; our debt must be settled—otherwise we cannot enter Heaven. If we die in a state of unconfessed and unforgiven mortal sin, then the debt will be paid in Hell. If we neglect to pay for our confessed and forgiven sins in this life, then Purgatory awaits, and Jesus says: “thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing” (Matthew 5:26). The obvious solution is to pay now, rather than later. Now we can pay at a greatly ‘discounted’ price; after death, it will be payments with high interest added; “for the sin is great, and the fierce anger of the Lord hangeth over Israel” (2 Paralipomenon 28:13). What payment plan will we choose? What payment plans are there to choose from?
Repayment by Pain & Repayment by Love
Upon Calvary, alongside the dying Christ, we see two sinners: one dying in pain, the other ‘dying’ out of grief-stricken love. One is a man, the other a woman. The man is St. Dismas; the woman is St. Mary Magdalen. We may call them saints today, but at the time they were great sinners being transformed into saints. They were living proof that “the Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy ... and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). Even though God is extremely just, He is also extremely merciful—but the time of mercy is now, while we are still living. After death comes the time of justice. If you want to experience His mercy—then ACT NOW and don’t put it off! “Thus saith the Lord: ‘In an acceptable time I have heard thee, and in the day of salvation I have helped thee!’” (Isaias 49:8), and St. Paul repeats Isaias’ words, when he writes: “For He saith: ‘In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2).
Free to Sin—So Why Pay by Penance?
One of the reasons why people rarely do penance is that they have lost sight of the price of sin. Sin, for most people, is no big deal! If you sin, they say, just go to confession and all is put right! That is bad theology! The only thing that is put right in the confessional is the removal of the guilt for sin (if we are sorry, of course). The debt for sin remains.
The meager, paltry penance that the priest gives to the penitent, is not the full price or cost of sin, but only a small portion of the penance that God demands from the sinner—it is like the first payment of a mortgage. The priests rarely give the heavy penances that once used to be given, because they fear we are too weak-willed to fulfill them. So they give us forgiveness for a token ‘down-payment’ and leave it to God’s justice to exact the rest of the payment, either by temporal punishment in this life, or by the horrendous fires of Purgatory in the next.
Another good way to look at the cost of sin, is not just to look at what it will cost us in Purgatory or, God forbid, Hell, but at what it cost our Saviour in His Passion and Death. This is the best and most fruitful topic of meditation and contemplation, as testified by so many saints and spiritual writers. Most people do not fully grasp the extent of Our Lord’s sufferings; they gloss over them too readily and easily, just as they gloss over sin too easily.
Healthy Fear is Necessary
St. Teresa of Avila, in the second chapter of her autobiography, speaks of the dangers of a lack of fear: “I know from this the great advantage of good companions; and I am certain that if at that tender age I had been thrown among good people, I should have persevered in virtue; for if at that time I had found any one to teach me the fear of God, my soul would have grown strong enough not to fall away. Afterwards, when the fear of God had utterly departed from me, the fear of dishonor alone remained, and was a torment to me in all I did. When I thought that nobody would ever know, I ventured upon many things that were neither honorable nor pleasing unto God.”
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalms 110:10) and “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Proverbs 1:7). “And from his infancy he taught him to fear God, and to abstain from all sin” (Tobias 1:10). For this reason—the loss of the sense of sin—we need to often reflect on the true price of sin, by reading accounts of some poor souls from Purgatory, who have been allowed, by Divine Justice and Mercy, to appear to those left on Earth and manifest the rigors and punishments of Purgatory. Out of sight means out of mind; so we will bring into view what goes on in Purgatory, so we may draw salutary benefits from what God has deliberately allowed to be revealed to us.
The Dismal Pain of Dismas
Dismas has led a dismal life; being a thief, robber, and consequently probably a murderer too, he was doing ‘penance’ for his sins and proving the truth of the statement that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). However, there is another thief suffering and dying with him; he has the same history, he has the same sufferings, but he does not have the same fate. His sufferings will be of no use to him, for he does not accept those sufferings as a just wage for his sins. He could have paid his debt there and then, like the Good Thief, Dismas, but he preferred (knowingly or unknowingly) to pay his debt in Hell.
Dismas would pay his debt alongside Jesus; or rather, he would co-pay with Jesus, for, of himself, he could not pay for any of his sins. Sin is an offense against God, even though we might sin against neighbor — “as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me” (Matthew 25:40). God is infinite, so any sin is consequently an infinite offense since it offends an infinite God. Therefore, it contracts an infinite debt, which finite man cannot hope to pay. It needs an infinite creature to be able to pay an infinite debt—Jesus is that infinite being, as an infinite God he can pay an infinite debt; as a human being He can pay the human debt for sin. Dismas merely co-pays, just as Our Lady co-redeems. We likewise have to co-pay—it is proof of our admission to guilt and proof of acceptance of responsibility and accountability.
Dismas pays primarily through his body: he is accepting of the pains and tortures of death as a just wage for his sins. It is not pain alone that saves him, it is pain processed and transformed by the soul into something above the natural, into something unnatural for him, into something supernatural. The pain breaks through into his soul and transforms him from a bad thief into a Good Thief who steals Heaven in the last lap of his life, with the last breath of his life. His was a payment plan of pain.
Yet, to say that Dismas died without love would be a grave misunderstanding and misrepresentation of what happened. He had to have some degree of love towards God in his heart for Christ to be able say to him: “This day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise” (Luke 23:43). A variety of things will have contributed to breaking down any hardness of heart that he may have had—we will look at those at later point during Lent—but the pain of suffering undoubtedly opened and softened his heart, and prepared the soil of the soul to receive the seed of divine love. So, in the end, both death and love united in his life, to bring about his salvation.
The Mournful Love of Mary
The other sinner that we spoke of was Mary Magdalen, the sister of Martha, who according the traditional teaching of the Western (Roman) Church is the woman who was caught in adultery, the woman possessed by seven devils and the woman at the banquet of Simon the Leper who was weeping tears over Jesus’ feet, wiping them dry with her hair and anointing Jesus with precious alabaster. Like the thief, Dismas, she too was a great sinner.
However, her payment plan was of a different kind—she paid for her sins through love. Jesus Himself confirmed this, when at the banquet He said: “Why do you trouble this woman? Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much”(Matthew 26:10; Luke 7:47). Her payment plan was based upon the Old Testament quote of: “Charity covereth all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) and the same plan was carried over into the New Testament, as testified by St. Peter: “Charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). This is merely a reflection or an echo of the charity that led Jesus to lay down His life for our sins: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). “In this is charity: not as though we had loved God, but because He hath first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10).
Like Dismas, Mary experienced a blend of love and pain on Calvary. The more she loved Christ, the more she felt the pain of what was happening to Christ. We know this from personal experience: the more we treasure a person or an object, the more agitated, sorrowful and pained we become when suffering a separation or its loss.
Love and Death United
Love and Death, the two things that seemed contradictory and irreconcilable, now find themselves united on Calvary. The words of Christ perform a marriage, so to speak, between Love and Death: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Death proves Love; and Love leads to Death. Our Lord proves His love for us by dying for us; and that love of His had to go to the very extreme, to the point of death itself. He could not raise the stakes any higher than that.
Similarly, Mary Magdalen ‘dies’ on Calvary with Christ. In a vaguely analogous way, as Christ dies mystically in each Sacrifice of the Mass, Mary dies mystically in an unbloody manner at the Sacrifice on Calvary. Christ’s heart is pierced, she feels the wound—since it is for her benefit and salvation that He undergoes all this, and it is her sins (ours too) that pierce that Sacred Heart. She knows that He is the ‘scapegoat’ for her sins. She knows that she should be in His place, sentenced to death and dying on the cross.
Just as Christ had spared her a painful physical death from being stoned to death for adultery, He now prevents her spiritual death by dying on the cross. Like a woman watching her child being slain (Massacre of the Innocents) and wishing that she could be slain in the place of her baby; Mary Magdalen must have wished that this Massacre of the Innocent One could have been prevented and that she could be slain in His place. She was grateful to Him when she escaped being stoned to death; she was grateful to Him again for His redeeming death—she died with Him out of love.
The best way to pay for our sins and quickest way to reduce their debt, is to both suffer and love—but the love is the soul and the suffering is merely the body. For even the bad thief suffered, but without love—and his end was not Paradise! As St. Paul warns us: “If I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:3).
As Our Lady says at La Salette: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence.” And we can add the Scriptural verse: “God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23). Our Lady gave us the clear indication of the path that we have to take—one that will be enforced upon us anyway, if we refuse to take it, but then with less merit—she said at Fatima: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort.”
No matter how great the debt of your sins may be, God is prepared to accept mere cents on the dollar while you are still living. After death, the true price will be exacted. Better and wiser to pay now than pay later! But of you disagree with God over the price of sin, then you are unlikely to want to pay the price He is asking.
Sin must be paid for; our debt must be settled—otherwise we cannot enter Heaven. If we die in a state of unconfessed and unforgiven mortal sin, then the debt will be paid in Hell. If we neglect to pay for our confessed and forgiven sins in this life, then Purgatory awaits, and Jesus says: “thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing” (Matthew 5:26). The obvious solution is to pay now, rather than later. Now we can pay at a greatly ‘discounted’ price; after death, it will be payments with high interest added; “for the sin is great, and the fierce anger of the Lord hangeth over Israel” (2 Paralipomenon 28:13). What payment plan will we choose? What payment plans are there to choose from?
Repayment by Pain & Repayment by Love
Upon Calvary, alongside the dying Christ, we see two sinners: one dying in pain, the other ‘dying’ out of grief-stricken love. One is a man, the other a woman. The man is St. Dismas; the woman is St. Mary Magdalen. We may call them saints today, but at the time they were great sinners being transformed into saints. They were living proof that “the Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy ... and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). Even though God is extremely just, He is also extremely merciful—but the time of mercy is now, while we are still living. After death comes the time of justice. If you want to experience His mercy—then ACT NOW and don’t put it off! “Thus saith the Lord: ‘In an acceptable time I have heard thee, and in the day of salvation I have helped thee!’” (Isaias 49:8), and St. Paul repeats Isaias’ words, when he writes: “For He saith: ‘In an accepted time have I heard thee; and in the day of salvation have I helped thee!’ Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2).
Free to Sin—So Why Pay by Penance?
One of the reasons why people rarely do penance is that they have lost sight of the price of sin. Sin, for most people, is no big deal! If you sin, they say, just go to confession and all is put right! That is bad theology! The only thing that is put right in the confessional is the removal of the guilt for sin (if we are sorry, of course). The debt for sin remains.
The meager, paltry penance that the priest gives to the penitent, is not the full price or cost of sin, but only a small portion of the penance that God demands from the sinner—it is like the first payment of a mortgage. The priests rarely give the heavy penances that once used to be given, because they fear we are too weak-willed to fulfill them. So they give us forgiveness for a token ‘down-payment’ and leave it to God’s justice to exact the rest of the payment, either by temporal punishment in this life, or by the horrendous fires of Purgatory in the next.
Another good way to look at the cost of sin, is not just to look at what it will cost us in Purgatory or, God forbid, Hell, but at what it cost our Saviour in His Passion and Death. This is the best and most fruitful topic of meditation and contemplation, as testified by so many saints and spiritual writers. Most people do not fully grasp the extent of Our Lord’s sufferings; they gloss over them too readily and easily, just as they gloss over sin too easily.
Healthy Fear is Necessary
St. Teresa of Avila, in the second chapter of her autobiography, speaks of the dangers of a lack of fear: “I know from this the great advantage of good companions; and I am certain that if at that tender age I had been thrown among good people, I should have persevered in virtue; for if at that time I had found any one to teach me the fear of God, my soul would have grown strong enough not to fall away. Afterwards, when the fear of God had utterly departed from me, the fear of dishonor alone remained, and was a torment to me in all I did. When I thought that nobody would ever know, I ventured upon many things that were neither honorable nor pleasing unto God.”
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalms 110:10) and “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Proverbs 1:7). “And from his infancy he taught him to fear God, and to abstain from all sin” (Tobias 1:10). For this reason—the loss of the sense of sin—we need to often reflect on the true price of sin, by reading accounts of some poor souls from Purgatory, who have been allowed, by Divine Justice and Mercy, to appear to those left on Earth and manifest the rigors and punishments of Purgatory. Out of sight means out of mind; so we will bring into view what goes on in Purgatory, so we may draw salutary benefits from what God has deliberately allowed to be revealed to us.
The Dismal Pain of Dismas
Dismas has led a dismal life; being a thief, robber, and consequently probably a murderer too, he was doing ‘penance’ for his sins and proving the truth of the statement that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). However, there is another thief suffering and dying with him; he has the same history, he has the same sufferings, but he does not have the same fate. His sufferings will be of no use to him, for he does not accept those sufferings as a just wage for his sins. He could have paid his debt there and then, like the Good Thief, Dismas, but he preferred (knowingly or unknowingly) to pay his debt in Hell.
Dismas would pay his debt alongside Jesus; or rather, he would co-pay with Jesus, for, of himself, he could not pay for any of his sins. Sin is an offense against God, even though we might sin against neighbor — “as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me” (Matthew 25:40). God is infinite, so any sin is consequently an infinite offense since it offends an infinite God. Therefore, it contracts an infinite debt, which finite man cannot hope to pay. It needs an infinite creature to be able to pay an infinite debt—Jesus is that infinite being, as an infinite God he can pay an infinite debt; as a human being He can pay the human debt for sin. Dismas merely co-pays, just as Our Lady co-redeems. We likewise have to co-pay—it is proof of our admission to guilt and proof of acceptance of responsibility and accountability.
Dismas pays primarily through his body: he is accepting of the pains and tortures of death as a just wage for his sins. It is not pain alone that saves him, it is pain processed and transformed by the soul into something above the natural, into something unnatural for him, into something supernatural. The pain breaks through into his soul and transforms him from a bad thief into a Good Thief who steals Heaven in the last lap of his life, with the last breath of his life. His was a payment plan of pain.
Yet, to say that Dismas died without love would be a grave misunderstanding and misrepresentation of what happened. He had to have some degree of love towards God in his heart for Christ to be able say to him: “This day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise” (Luke 23:43). A variety of things will have contributed to breaking down any hardness of heart that he may have had—we will look at those at later point during Lent—but the pain of suffering undoubtedly opened and softened his heart, and prepared the soil of the soul to receive the seed of divine love. So, in the end, both death and love united in his life, to bring about his salvation.
The Mournful Love of Mary
The other sinner that we spoke of was Mary Magdalen, the sister of Martha, who according the traditional teaching of the Western (Roman) Church is the woman who was caught in adultery, the woman possessed by seven devils and the woman at the banquet of Simon the Leper who was weeping tears over Jesus’ feet, wiping them dry with her hair and anointing Jesus with precious alabaster. Like the thief, Dismas, she too was a great sinner.
However, her payment plan was of a different kind—she paid for her sins through love. Jesus Himself confirmed this, when at the banquet He said: “Why do you trouble this woman? Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much”(Matthew 26:10; Luke 7:47). Her payment plan was based upon the Old Testament quote of: “Charity covereth all sins” (Proverbs 10:12) and the same plan was carried over into the New Testament, as testified by St. Peter: “Charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). This is merely a reflection or an echo of the charity that led Jesus to lay down His life for our sins: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). “In this is charity: not as though we had loved God, but because He hath first loved us, and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10).
Like Dismas, Mary experienced a blend of love and pain on Calvary. The more she loved Christ, the more she felt the pain of what was happening to Christ. We know this from personal experience: the more we treasure a person or an object, the more agitated, sorrowful and pained we become when suffering a separation or its loss.
Love and Death United
Love and Death, the two things that seemed contradictory and irreconcilable, now find themselves united on Calvary. The words of Christ perform a marriage, so to speak, between Love and Death: “Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Death proves Love; and Love leads to Death. Our Lord proves His love for us by dying for us; and that love of His had to go to the very extreme, to the point of death itself. He could not raise the stakes any higher than that.
Similarly, Mary Magdalen ‘dies’ on Calvary with Christ. In a vaguely analogous way, as Christ dies mystically in each Sacrifice of the Mass, Mary dies mystically in an unbloody manner at the Sacrifice on Calvary. Christ’s heart is pierced, she feels the wound—since it is for her benefit and salvation that He undergoes all this, and it is her sins (ours too) that pierce that Sacred Heart. She knows that He is the ‘scapegoat’ for her sins. She knows that she should be in His place, sentenced to death and dying on the cross.
Just as Christ had spared her a painful physical death from being stoned to death for adultery, He now prevents her spiritual death by dying on the cross. Like a woman watching her child being slain (Massacre of the Innocents) and wishing that she could be slain in the place of her baby; Mary Magdalen must have wished that this Massacre of the Innocent One could have been prevented and that she could be slain in His place. She was grateful to Him when she escaped being stoned to death; she was grateful to Him again for His redeeming death—she died with Him out of love.
The best way to pay for our sins and quickest way to reduce their debt, is to both suffer and love—but the love is the soul and the suffering is merely the body. For even the bad thief suffered, but without love—and his end was not Paradise! As St. Paul warns us: “If I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:3).
As Our Lady says at La Salette: “The chiefs, the leaders of the people of God, have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has bedimmed their intelligence.” And we can add the Scriptural verse: “God hath given him place for penance, and he abuseth it unto pride” (Job 24:23). Our Lady gave us the clear indication of the path that we have to take—one that will be enforced upon us anyway, if we refuse to take it, but then with less merit—she said at Fatima: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation … Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort.”
No matter how great the debt of your sins may be, God is prepared to accept mere cents on the dollar while you are still living. After death, the true price will be exacted. Better and wiser to pay now than pay later! But of you disagree with God over the price of sin, then you are unlikely to want to pay the price He is asking.
Article 10
Sunday November 12th, 2023
How Long in Purgatory?
Sunday November 12th, 2023
How Long in Purgatory?
How Long Do Souls Remain in Purgatory?
The length of time souls are detained in Purgatory depends on:
(a) the number of their faults;
(b) the malice and deliberation with which these have been committed;
(c) the penance done, or not done, the satisfaction made, or not made for sins during life;
(d) Much, too, depends on the suffrages offered for them after death
What can safely be said is that the time souls spend in Purgatory is, as a rule, very much longer than people commonly imagine. We will quote a few of the many instances which are recounted in the lives and revelations of the Saints.
► St. Louis Bertrand’s father was an exemplary Christian, as we should naturally expect, being the father of so great a Saint. He had even wished to become a Carthusian monk until he learned that it was not God’s will for him. When he died, after long years spent in the practice of every Christian virtue, his saintly son, fully aware of the rigors of God’s Justice, offered many Masses and poured forth the most fervent supplications for the soul he so dearly loved. A vision of his father still in Purgatory forced him to intensify a hundredfold his suffrages. He added most severe penances and long fasts to his Masses and prayers. Yet eight whole years passed before he obtained the release of his father.
► St. Malachy’s sister was detained in Purgatory for a very long time, despite the Masses, prayers and heroic mortifications the Saint offered for her!
► It was related to a holy nun in Pampluna, who had succeeded in releasing many Carmelite nuns from Purgatory, that most of these had spent terms there ranging from 30 to 60 years! Carmelite nuns in Purgatory for 40, 50 and 60 years! What will it be for those living amidst the temptations of the World and with all their hundreds of weaknesses?
► St. Vincent Ferrer, after the death of his sister, prayed with incredible fervor for her soul and offered many Masses for her release. She appeared to him at length and told him that had it not been for his powerful intercession with God, she should have remained an interminable time in Purgatory.
► In the Dominican Order it is the rule to pray for the Master Generals by name on their anniversaries. Many of these have been dead several hundred years! They were men especially eminent for piety and learning. This rule would not be approved by the Church were it not necessary and prudent.
We do not mean to imply that all souls are detained equally long periods in the expiatory fires. Many have committed lesser faults and have done more penance. Therefore, their punishment will be much less severe. Still, the instances we have quoted are very much to the point, for if these souls who enjoyed the intimacy, who saw the example and who shared in the intercession of great Saints during their lives and were aided by their most efficacious suffrages after death were yet detained for such a length of time in Purgatory, what may not happen to us who enjoy none of these wonderful privileges?
Why Such a Long Expiation?
The reasons are not difficult to find:
1. The malice of sin is very great. What appear to us small faults are in reality serious offenses against the infinite goodness of God. It is enough to see how the Saints wept over their faults. We are weak, it may be urged. That is true, but then God offers us abundant graces to strengthen our weakness, gives us light to see the gravity of our faults, and the necessary force to conquer temptation. If we are still weak, the fault is all our own. We do not use the light and strength God so generously offers us; we do not pray, we do not receive the Sacraments as we should.
2. One single mortal sin sends some to Hell! An eminent theologian wisely remarks that if souls are condemned to Hell for all eternity because of one mortal sin, it is not to be wondered at that other souls should be detained for long years in Purgatory who have committed countless deliberate venial sins, some of which are so grave that at the time of their commission the sinner scarcely knows if they are mortal or venial. Too, they may have committed many mortal sins for which they have had little sorrow and done little or no penance. The guilt has been remitted by absolution, but the pain due to the sins will have to be paid in Purgatory.
Our Lord tells us that we shall have to render an account for each and every idle word we say and that we may not leave our prison until we shall have paid the last farthing (Matthew. 5:26).
The Saints committed few and slight sins, and still they sorrowed much and did severe penances. We commit many and grave sins, and we sorrow little and do little or no penance.
Venial Sins
It would be difficult to calculate the immense number of venial sins that any Catholic commits.
► There is an infinite number of faults of self-love, selfishness; thoughts, words and acts of sensuality, too, in a hundred forms; faults of charity in thought, word and deed; laziness, vanity, jealousy, tepidity and innumerable other faults.
► There are sins of omission which we pay so little heed to. We love God so little, yet He has a thousand claims on our love for the thousands of things he has done for us. Yet, we treat Him with coldness, indifference and base ingratitude. He died for each one of us. Do we ever thank Him as we ought? He remains day and night on the Altar, waiting for our visits, anxious to help us. How seldom we go to Him! He longs to come into our souls in Holy Communion, and we refuse Him entrance. He offers Himself up for us on the Altar every morning at Mass and gives oceans of graces to those who assist at this great Sacrifice. Yet many are too lazy to go to this Calvary! What an abuse of grace!
► Our hearts are mean and hard, full of self-love. We have happy homes, splendid food, warm clothing, an abundance of all good things. Many around us live in hunger and misery, and we give them so little; whereas, we spend lavishly and needlessly on ourselves.
► Life is given us to serve God, to save our souls. Most Christians, however, are satisfied to give God five minutes of prayer in the morning, five minutes at night! The rest of the 24 hours is given to work, rest and pleasure. Ten minutes to God, to our immortal souls, to the great work we have to do―that is to say, our salvation. Twenty‑three hours and 50 minutes to this transitory life! Is it fair to God?
It may be alleged that our work, our rest, our sufferings are done for God! They should be, and then our merits would be indeed great. The truth is that many scarcely ever think of God during the day. The one engrossing object of their thoughts is self. They think and labor and rest and sleep to satisfy self. God gets a very little place in their day and in their minds. This is an outrage to His loving Heart, which is ever thinking of us.
Mortal Sins
Many Christians unfortunately commit mortal sins during their lives, but though they confess them, they make no due satisfaction for them, as we have already said.
► The Venerable Bede appears to be of the opinion that those who pass a great part of their lives in the commission of grave sins and confess them on their deathbed may be detained in Purgatory even until the Last Day. St. Bede lived in the 600s and 700s and in those times the Last Day was an even longer way away than it is today!
► St. Gertrude, in her revelations, states that those who have committed many grave sins and have not done due penance for them, may not benefit from and share in the ordinary suffrages of the Church for a very considerable time!
All those sins, mortal and venial, are accumulating for the 20, 30, 40, 60 years of our lives. Each and every one has to be atoned for after death.
Purgatorial Math
We again take the extract from Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, which shows a hypothetical sin-calculator that goes towards showing how and why such long times are spent in Purgatory.
“Father Mumford, of the Company of Jesus, in his Treatise on Charity towards the Departed, bases the long duration of Purgatory on a calculation of probability, which we shall give in substance. He goes out on the principle that, according to the words of the Holy Ghost, The just man falls seven times a day (Proverbs 24:16), that is to say, that even those who apply themselves most perfectly to the service of God, notwithstanding their good-will, commit a great number of faults in the infinitely pure eyes of God. We have but to enter into our own conscience, and there analyze before God our thoughts, our words, and works, to be convinced of this sad effect of human misery. Oh, how easy it is to lack respect in prayer, to prefer our ease to the accomplishment of duty, to sin by vanity, by impatience, by sensuality, by uncharitable thoughts and words, by want of conformity to the will of God! The day is long; is it very difficult for even a virtuous person to commit, I do not say seven, but twenty or thirty of this kind of faults and imperfections?
“Let us take a moderate estimate, and suppose that you commit about ten [venial] faults a day; at the end of 365 days you will have a sum of 3,650 faults. Let us diminish, and, to facilitate the calculation, place it at 3,000 per year. At the end of ten years this will amount to 30,000, and at the end of twenty years to 60,000. Suppose that of these 60,000 faults you have expiated one half by penance and good works, there will still remain 30,000 to be atoned for.
“Let us continue our hypothesis: You die after these twenty years of virtuous life, and appear before God with a debt of 30,000 faults, which you must discharge in Purgatory. How much time will you need to accomplish this expiation? Suppose, on an average, each fault requires one hour of Purgatory. This measure is very moderate, if we judge by the revelations of the saints; but at any rate this will give you a Purgatory of 30,000 hours. Now, do you know how many years these 30,000 hours represent? Three years, three months, and fifteen days. Thus a good Christian who watches over himself, who applies himself to penance and good works, finds himself liable to three years, three months, and fifteen days of Purgatory.
“The preceding calculation is based on an estimate which is lenient in the extreme. Now, if you extend the duration of the pain, and, instead of an hour, you take a day for the expiation of a fault, if, instead of having nothing but venial sins, you bring before God a debt resulting from mortal sins, more or less numerous, which you formerly committed, if you assign, on the average, as St. Frances of Rome says, seven years for the expiation of one mortal sin, remitted as to the guilt, who does not see that we arrive at an appalling duration, and that the expiation may easily be prolonged for many years, and even for centuries?” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained, chapter 22, “The Duration of Purgatory”).
Purgatorial Calculator
Without trying to be silly, or artificial, we have decided to put Fr. Mumford’s statements into table form, so that we can more easily see and understand his message. We have gone with 7 venial sins a day (instead of his 10) based on Scripture: “For a just man shall fall seven times” (Proverbs 24:16). However, experience shows that on some days it is possible to commit seven venial sins, or even more, in an hour—a grumpy start to the day: we mutter when the alarm goes off; we utter a bad word when we stub our toe against something on the way to the bathroom, or when the shower water is too hot or too cold; we complain about the murky weather outside; we put-off our morning prayers or say them in haste or distractedly; we show irritability to the rest of the family at breakfast; we tell a “white lie” or two; we eat too much; we speed on the way to work; we complain about the traffic delays, the red lights, the other drivers, etc.
The tables below show at a glance the cost of such accumulated sin. Of course it is all hypothetical and all this varies with the differing gravity of each venial sin and upon the knowledge and state of the soul, e.g. priest or layman, adult or child, etc. For to whom more is given, more is expected.
The length of time souls are detained in Purgatory depends on:
(a) the number of their faults;
(b) the malice and deliberation with which these have been committed;
(c) the penance done, or not done, the satisfaction made, or not made for sins during life;
(d) Much, too, depends on the suffrages offered for them after death
What can safely be said is that the time souls spend in Purgatory is, as a rule, very much longer than people commonly imagine. We will quote a few of the many instances which are recounted in the lives and revelations of the Saints.
► St. Louis Bertrand’s father was an exemplary Christian, as we should naturally expect, being the father of so great a Saint. He had even wished to become a Carthusian monk until he learned that it was not God’s will for him. When he died, after long years spent in the practice of every Christian virtue, his saintly son, fully aware of the rigors of God’s Justice, offered many Masses and poured forth the most fervent supplications for the soul he so dearly loved. A vision of his father still in Purgatory forced him to intensify a hundredfold his suffrages. He added most severe penances and long fasts to his Masses and prayers. Yet eight whole years passed before he obtained the release of his father.
► St. Malachy’s sister was detained in Purgatory for a very long time, despite the Masses, prayers and heroic mortifications the Saint offered for her!
► It was related to a holy nun in Pampluna, who had succeeded in releasing many Carmelite nuns from Purgatory, that most of these had spent terms there ranging from 30 to 60 years! Carmelite nuns in Purgatory for 40, 50 and 60 years! What will it be for those living amidst the temptations of the World and with all their hundreds of weaknesses?
► St. Vincent Ferrer, after the death of his sister, prayed with incredible fervor for her soul and offered many Masses for her release. She appeared to him at length and told him that had it not been for his powerful intercession with God, she should have remained an interminable time in Purgatory.
► In the Dominican Order it is the rule to pray for the Master Generals by name on their anniversaries. Many of these have been dead several hundred years! They were men especially eminent for piety and learning. This rule would not be approved by the Church were it not necessary and prudent.
We do not mean to imply that all souls are detained equally long periods in the expiatory fires. Many have committed lesser faults and have done more penance. Therefore, their punishment will be much less severe. Still, the instances we have quoted are very much to the point, for if these souls who enjoyed the intimacy, who saw the example and who shared in the intercession of great Saints during their lives and were aided by their most efficacious suffrages after death were yet detained for such a length of time in Purgatory, what may not happen to us who enjoy none of these wonderful privileges?
Why Such a Long Expiation?
The reasons are not difficult to find:
1. The malice of sin is very great. What appear to us small faults are in reality serious offenses against the infinite goodness of God. It is enough to see how the Saints wept over their faults. We are weak, it may be urged. That is true, but then God offers us abundant graces to strengthen our weakness, gives us light to see the gravity of our faults, and the necessary force to conquer temptation. If we are still weak, the fault is all our own. We do not use the light and strength God so generously offers us; we do not pray, we do not receive the Sacraments as we should.
2. One single mortal sin sends some to Hell! An eminent theologian wisely remarks that if souls are condemned to Hell for all eternity because of one mortal sin, it is not to be wondered at that other souls should be detained for long years in Purgatory who have committed countless deliberate venial sins, some of which are so grave that at the time of their commission the sinner scarcely knows if they are mortal or venial. Too, they may have committed many mortal sins for which they have had little sorrow and done little or no penance. The guilt has been remitted by absolution, but the pain due to the sins will have to be paid in Purgatory.
Our Lord tells us that we shall have to render an account for each and every idle word we say and that we may not leave our prison until we shall have paid the last farthing (Matthew. 5:26).
The Saints committed few and slight sins, and still they sorrowed much and did severe penances. We commit many and grave sins, and we sorrow little and do little or no penance.
Venial Sins
It would be difficult to calculate the immense number of venial sins that any Catholic commits.
► There is an infinite number of faults of self-love, selfishness; thoughts, words and acts of sensuality, too, in a hundred forms; faults of charity in thought, word and deed; laziness, vanity, jealousy, tepidity and innumerable other faults.
► There are sins of omission which we pay so little heed to. We love God so little, yet He has a thousand claims on our love for the thousands of things he has done for us. Yet, we treat Him with coldness, indifference and base ingratitude. He died for each one of us. Do we ever thank Him as we ought? He remains day and night on the Altar, waiting for our visits, anxious to help us. How seldom we go to Him! He longs to come into our souls in Holy Communion, and we refuse Him entrance. He offers Himself up for us on the Altar every morning at Mass and gives oceans of graces to those who assist at this great Sacrifice. Yet many are too lazy to go to this Calvary! What an abuse of grace!
► Our hearts are mean and hard, full of self-love. We have happy homes, splendid food, warm clothing, an abundance of all good things. Many around us live in hunger and misery, and we give them so little; whereas, we spend lavishly and needlessly on ourselves.
► Life is given us to serve God, to save our souls. Most Christians, however, are satisfied to give God five minutes of prayer in the morning, five minutes at night! The rest of the 24 hours is given to work, rest and pleasure. Ten minutes to God, to our immortal souls, to the great work we have to do―that is to say, our salvation. Twenty‑three hours and 50 minutes to this transitory life! Is it fair to God?
It may be alleged that our work, our rest, our sufferings are done for God! They should be, and then our merits would be indeed great. The truth is that many scarcely ever think of God during the day. The one engrossing object of their thoughts is self. They think and labor and rest and sleep to satisfy self. God gets a very little place in their day and in their minds. This is an outrage to His loving Heart, which is ever thinking of us.
Mortal Sins
Many Christians unfortunately commit mortal sins during their lives, but though they confess them, they make no due satisfaction for them, as we have already said.
► The Venerable Bede appears to be of the opinion that those who pass a great part of their lives in the commission of grave sins and confess them on their deathbed may be detained in Purgatory even until the Last Day. St. Bede lived in the 600s and 700s and in those times the Last Day was an even longer way away than it is today!
► St. Gertrude, in her revelations, states that those who have committed many grave sins and have not done due penance for them, may not benefit from and share in the ordinary suffrages of the Church for a very considerable time!
All those sins, mortal and venial, are accumulating for the 20, 30, 40, 60 years of our lives. Each and every one has to be atoned for after death.
Purgatorial Math
We again take the extract from Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, which shows a hypothetical sin-calculator that goes towards showing how and why such long times are spent in Purgatory.
“Father Mumford, of the Company of Jesus, in his Treatise on Charity towards the Departed, bases the long duration of Purgatory on a calculation of probability, which we shall give in substance. He goes out on the principle that, according to the words of the Holy Ghost, The just man falls seven times a day (Proverbs 24:16), that is to say, that even those who apply themselves most perfectly to the service of God, notwithstanding their good-will, commit a great number of faults in the infinitely pure eyes of God. We have but to enter into our own conscience, and there analyze before God our thoughts, our words, and works, to be convinced of this sad effect of human misery. Oh, how easy it is to lack respect in prayer, to prefer our ease to the accomplishment of duty, to sin by vanity, by impatience, by sensuality, by uncharitable thoughts and words, by want of conformity to the will of God! The day is long; is it very difficult for even a virtuous person to commit, I do not say seven, but twenty or thirty of this kind of faults and imperfections?
“Let us take a moderate estimate, and suppose that you commit about ten [venial] faults a day; at the end of 365 days you will have a sum of 3,650 faults. Let us diminish, and, to facilitate the calculation, place it at 3,000 per year. At the end of ten years this will amount to 30,000, and at the end of twenty years to 60,000. Suppose that of these 60,000 faults you have expiated one half by penance and good works, there will still remain 30,000 to be atoned for.
“Let us continue our hypothesis: You die after these twenty years of virtuous life, and appear before God with a debt of 30,000 faults, which you must discharge in Purgatory. How much time will you need to accomplish this expiation? Suppose, on an average, each fault requires one hour of Purgatory. This measure is very moderate, if we judge by the revelations of the saints; but at any rate this will give you a Purgatory of 30,000 hours. Now, do you know how many years these 30,000 hours represent? Three years, three months, and fifteen days. Thus a good Christian who watches over himself, who applies himself to penance and good works, finds himself liable to three years, three months, and fifteen days of Purgatory.
“The preceding calculation is based on an estimate which is lenient in the extreme. Now, if you extend the duration of the pain, and, instead of an hour, you take a day for the expiation of a fault, if, instead of having nothing but venial sins, you bring before God a debt resulting from mortal sins, more or less numerous, which you formerly committed, if you assign, on the average, as St. Frances of Rome says, seven years for the expiation of one mortal sin, remitted as to the guilt, who does not see that we arrive at an appalling duration, and that the expiation may easily be prolonged for many years, and even for centuries?” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained, chapter 22, “The Duration of Purgatory”).
Purgatorial Calculator
Without trying to be silly, or artificial, we have decided to put Fr. Mumford’s statements into table form, so that we can more easily see and understand his message. We have gone with 7 venial sins a day (instead of his 10) based on Scripture: “For a just man shall fall seven times” (Proverbs 24:16). However, experience shows that on some days it is possible to commit seven venial sins, or even more, in an hour—a grumpy start to the day: we mutter when the alarm goes off; we utter a bad word when we stub our toe against something on the way to the bathroom, or when the shower water is too hot or too cold; we complain about the murky weather outside; we put-off our morning prayers or say them in haste or distractedly; we show irritability to the rest of the family at breakfast; we tell a “white lie” or two; we eat too much; we speed on the way to work; we complain about the traffic delays, the red lights, the other drivers, etc.
The tables below show at a glance the cost of such accumulated sin. Of course it is all hypothetical and all this varies with the differing gravity of each venial sin and upon the knowledge and state of the soul, e.g. priest or layman, adult or child, etc. For to whom more is given, more is expected.
Do Not Undervalue the Gravity of Sin
“Be not without fear about sin forgiven” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance” (Matthew 3:8). “Thou shalt not go out thence, until thou pay the very last mite” (Luke 12:59). Sin is expensive, very expensive—it is the most expensive thing in the world because “Mortal Sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, and a greater evil than disease, or war ... Mortal Sin must be a most terrible thing indeed, to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the eternal punishment of sinners who die with even only one Mortal Sin” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 22, “Mortal Sin”). If an eternal Hell is created to punish just one single Mortal Sin, how on Earth can war, flooding, earthquakes, pestilence, disease, death or fire from Heaven be thought to be worse than Hell? No matter what punishment Heaven sends us, it will still be like being tickled in comparison to the punishment of Hell.
As for Venial Sin, the same catechism says: “Although Venial Sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is, nevertheless, a great moral evil, next alone to Mortal Sin. We are prone to look upon Venial Sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that IT IS SECOND ONLY IN EVIL CONSEQUENCE TO MORTAL SIN. In Holy Scripture we see, from many examples, how God regards Venial Sin. Even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished. He was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land [and died at its borders]” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 23, “Venial Sin”).
How Saints Looked Upon Sin
If that is the value of sin, then what is the price we have to pay for sin? If St. Thomas Aquinas says that one single soul, in a state of sanctifying grace, is of more value than all the material wealth of the universe, the what price can we put on a soul that is, or has been, in a state of mortal sin? What price has to be paid to regain that state of grace? Is it any wonder that there are souls—like Amelia, the young friend of the three Fatima visionaries, of whom Our Lady said that she would burn in Purgatory until the end of the world! What is the cost of sin?!! Do the three Hail Marys, that the priest gives you in confession, pay for it? Far from it! It is a merely a down-payment for the damage sin has caused and the Church expects us to do additional penance to pay for our sins!
While we are in this world, God mercifully accepts a lesser payment than shown in the hypothetical tables above. But when this life comes to a close, the mercy ceases and then the just amount will be collected. Let us not waste time in vain occupations, which can often be sinful too and so only add fuel to the fire—but let us take the rest of our life much more seriously than we have done until now. Remember the power of love—it is not so much the multiplicity of actions and penances that count, but the intensity of love and sorrow that we do them with: “for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) and “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). However, to love much we must sin less—for how can we say we love someone if don’t cease mocking them and slapping them around, which is what Venial Sin essentially does?
“Be not without fear about sin forgiven” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance” (Matthew 3:8). “Thou shalt not go out thence, until thou pay the very last mite” (Luke 12:59). Sin is expensive, very expensive—it is the most expensive thing in the world because “Mortal Sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, and a greater evil than disease, or war ... Mortal Sin must be a most terrible thing indeed, to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the eternal punishment of sinners who die with even only one Mortal Sin” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 22, “Mortal Sin”). If an eternal Hell is created to punish just one single Mortal Sin, how on Earth can war, flooding, earthquakes, pestilence, disease, death or fire from Heaven be thought to be worse than Hell? No matter what punishment Heaven sends us, it will still be like being tickled in comparison to the punishment of Hell.
As for Venial Sin, the same catechism says: “Although Venial Sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is, nevertheless, a great moral evil, next alone to Mortal Sin. We are prone to look upon Venial Sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that IT IS SECOND ONLY IN EVIL CONSEQUENCE TO MORTAL SIN. In Holy Scripture we see, from many examples, how God regards Venial Sin. Even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished. He was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land [and died at its borders]” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 23, “Venial Sin”).
How Saints Looked Upon Sin
If that is the value of sin, then what is the price we have to pay for sin? If St. Thomas Aquinas says that one single soul, in a state of sanctifying grace, is of more value than all the material wealth of the universe, the what price can we put on a soul that is, or has been, in a state of mortal sin? What price has to be paid to regain that state of grace? Is it any wonder that there are souls—like Amelia, the young friend of the three Fatima visionaries, of whom Our Lady said that she would burn in Purgatory until the end of the world! What is the cost of sin?!! Do the three Hail Marys, that the priest gives you in confession, pay for it? Far from it! It is a merely a down-payment for the damage sin has caused and the Church expects us to do additional penance to pay for our sins!
While we are in this world, God mercifully accepts a lesser payment than shown in the hypothetical tables above. But when this life comes to a close, the mercy ceases and then the just amount will be collected. Let us not waste time in vain occupations, which can often be sinful too and so only add fuel to the fire—but let us take the rest of our life much more seriously than we have done until now. Remember the power of love—it is not so much the multiplicity of actions and penances that count, but the intensity of love and sorrow that we do them with: “for charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8) and “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). However, to love much we must sin less—for how can we say we love someone if don’t cease mocking them and slapping them around, which is what Venial Sin essentially does?
Article 9
Saturday November 11th, 2023
Bargaining With God!
Saturday November 11th, 2023
Bargaining With God!
Bargaining With God
Can you imagine being bold enough to bargain with God? When you’re bargaining with a merchant, you hold the money and he holds the merchandise. You each have something the other person wants, so you have some bargaining power. But when it comes to God, He holds everything! He needs nothing! Who could imagine bargaining with the God of the universe? Yet, surprisingly, the first instance of intercessory prayer, found in the Bible, shows Abraham bargaining with God! At first you may think Abraham to be a bit brash to do such a thing. But, as you examine the story, you discover that God was actually encouraging Abraham in this bargaining or ‘arm-twisting’ prayer. God took the initiative by revealing His intent to destroy Sodom and Gomorrha to Abraham, His friend, who was then moved by grace to pray for mercy, based on what he knew of God’s character, for a city that teetered on the brink of destruction.
Abraham Twists God’s Arm
“The Lord said: ‘The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied, and their sin is become exceedingly grievous. I will go down and see whether they have done according to the cry that is come to me: or whether it be not so, that I may know.’
“But Abraham stood before the Lord and, drawing nigh, he said: ‘Wilt Thou destroy the just with the wicked? If there be fifty just men in the city, shall they perish withal? And wilt Thou not spare that place for the sake of the fifty just, if they be therein? Far be it from Thee to do this thing, and to slay the just with the wicked, and for the just to be in like case as the wicked, this is not beseeming Thee: Thou who judgest all the Earth, wilt not make this judgment!’
“And the Lord said to him: ‘If I find in Sodom fifty just within the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake.’
“And Abraham answered, and said: ‘Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord, whereas I am dust and ashes. What if there be five less than fifty just persons? Wilt Thou, for five and forty, destroy the whole city?’
“And He said: ‘I will not destroy it, if I find five and forty.’
“And again he said to Him: ‘But if forty be found there, what wilt Thou do?’
“He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of forty.’
“‘Lord!’, saith he, ‘be not angry, I beseech Thee, if I speak! What if thirty shall be found there?’
“He answered: ‘I will not do it, if I find thirty there.’
“‘Seeing,’ saith he, ‘I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord. What if twenty be found there?’
“He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of twenty.’
“‘I beseech thee,’ saith he, ‘be not angry, Lord, if I speak yet once more! What if ten should be found there?’
“And He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of ten.’
“And the Lord departed, after He had left speaking to Abraham: and Abraham returned to his place” (Genesis 18:20-33).
Sodom and Gomorrha Destroyed Anyway
After all that pleading and bargaining, Sodom and Gomorrha were destroyed anyway—“And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from Heaven. And he destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the Earth” (Genesis 19:24-25).
The Threat of Fire Today
The same fate faces the world today. God is angry with not just two cities, but with the whole world. Our Lady has warned that: “If there are not souls who by their lives of immolation and sacrifice appease the Divine Justice, fire will rain from Heaven … Without virginity, it will be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon these lands in order to purify them.” (Our Lady of Good Success) ... “Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume thee cities … And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed” (La Salette) … “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” (Our Lady of Akita, 1973).
St. John the Baptist, the fiery preacher in the desert, also warns of punishment by fire: “He that shall come after me, is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear; He shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire. Whose fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly cleanse His floor and gather His wheat into the barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire” (Matthew 3:11-12).
Our Lord also speaks of this punishing fire in Holy Scripture: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire” (Matthew 3:10). “Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire” (Matthew 7:19). “Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire: so shall it be at the end of the world. The Son of man shall send his angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all them that work iniquity. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth … So shall it be at the end of the world. The angels shall go out, and shall separate the wicked from among the just. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. ‘Have ye understood all these things?’ They say to him: ‘Yes!’” (Matthew 13:40-42; 13:49-51).
Beware of Provoking the Hand of God
Holy Scripture paints a fearsome picture concerning the consequences of provoking God: “Evils shall come upon you in the latter times, when you shall do evil in the sight of the Lord, to provoke Him by the works of your hands” (Deuteronomy 31:29). “They have provoked Me and have angered Me with their vanities” (Deuteronomy 32:21). “But [thou] hast done evil and hast made thee strange gods to provoke Me to anger, and [thou] hast cast Me behind thy back” (3 Kings 14:9). “And I will leave the remnants of my inheritance, and will deliver them into the hands of their enemies: and they shall become a prey, and a spoil to all their enemies. Because they have done evil before Me, and have continued to provoke Me, even unto this day” (4 Kings 21:14-15). “Because they have forsaken Me, and have sacrificed to strange gods, to provoke Me to wrath with all the works of their hands, therefore My wrath shall fall upon this place, and shall not be quenched” (2 Paralipomenon 34:25).
Forcing the Hand of God
Once provoked, God is forced to let His hand fall in justice: “Woe to you that devise that which is unprofitable, and work evil in your beds: in the morning light they execute it, because their hand is against God” (Micheas 2:1). “But thou that hast been the author of all mischief, shalt not escape the hand of God” (2 Machabees 7:31). “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘Behold I will stretch forth My hand upon the Philistines, and will kill the killers’” (Ezechiel 25:16). “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘Behold I will lift up My hand to the Gentiles’” (Isaias 49:22). “As I live, saith the Lord God, I will reign over you with a strong hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out” (Ezechiel 20:33). “For there was the fear of death in every city, and the hand of God was exceeding heavy” (1 Kings 5:12).
Avoid Sin—Avoid the Fire!
It takes no rocket-scientist to work out the spiritual math in all this. It is quite simply this: sin = fire. And if 2+2=4, then sin + more sin = more fire. As Our Lord says: “And if thy hand, or thy foot scandalize thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee. It is better for thee to go into life maimed or lame, than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into everlasting fire. And if thy eye scandalize thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee. It is better for thee having one eye to enter into life, than having two eyes to be cast into Hell fire” (Matthew 18:8-9). “And if thy hand scandalize thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life, maimed, than having two hands to go into Hell, into unquenchable fire: where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not extinguished” (Mark 9:42-43). Talk about forcing God’s hand!!
Can you imagine being bold enough to bargain with God? When you’re bargaining with a merchant, you hold the money and he holds the merchandise. You each have something the other person wants, so you have some bargaining power. But when it comes to God, He holds everything! He needs nothing! Who could imagine bargaining with the God of the universe? Yet, surprisingly, the first instance of intercessory prayer, found in the Bible, shows Abraham bargaining with God! At first you may think Abraham to be a bit brash to do such a thing. But, as you examine the story, you discover that God was actually encouraging Abraham in this bargaining or ‘arm-twisting’ prayer. God took the initiative by revealing His intent to destroy Sodom and Gomorrha to Abraham, His friend, who was then moved by grace to pray for mercy, based on what he knew of God’s character, for a city that teetered on the brink of destruction.
Abraham Twists God’s Arm
“The Lord said: ‘The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied, and their sin is become exceedingly grievous. I will go down and see whether they have done according to the cry that is come to me: or whether it be not so, that I may know.’
“But Abraham stood before the Lord and, drawing nigh, he said: ‘Wilt Thou destroy the just with the wicked? If there be fifty just men in the city, shall they perish withal? And wilt Thou not spare that place for the sake of the fifty just, if they be therein? Far be it from Thee to do this thing, and to slay the just with the wicked, and for the just to be in like case as the wicked, this is not beseeming Thee: Thou who judgest all the Earth, wilt not make this judgment!’
“And the Lord said to him: ‘If I find in Sodom fifty just within the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake.’
“And Abraham answered, and said: ‘Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord, whereas I am dust and ashes. What if there be five less than fifty just persons? Wilt Thou, for five and forty, destroy the whole city?’
“And He said: ‘I will not destroy it, if I find five and forty.’
“And again he said to Him: ‘But if forty be found there, what wilt Thou do?’
“He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of forty.’
“‘Lord!’, saith he, ‘be not angry, I beseech Thee, if I speak! What if thirty shall be found there?’
“He answered: ‘I will not do it, if I find thirty there.’
“‘Seeing,’ saith he, ‘I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord. What if twenty be found there?’
“He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of twenty.’
“‘I beseech thee,’ saith he, ‘be not angry, Lord, if I speak yet once more! What if ten should be found there?’
“And He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of ten.’
“And the Lord departed, after He had left speaking to Abraham: and Abraham returned to his place” (Genesis 18:20-33).
Sodom and Gomorrha Destroyed Anyway
After all that pleading and bargaining, Sodom and Gomorrha were destroyed anyway—“And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from Heaven. And he destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the Earth” (Genesis 19:24-25).
The Threat of Fire Today
The same fate faces the world today. God is angry with not just two cities, but with the whole world. Our Lady has warned that: “If there are not souls who by their lives of immolation and sacrifice appease the Divine Justice, fire will rain from Heaven … Without virginity, it will be necessary for fire from Heaven to rain down upon these lands in order to purify them.” (Our Lady of Good Success) ... “Water and fire will give the Earth’s globe convulsions … The fire of Heaven will fall and consume thee cities … And then water and fire will purge the Earth and consume all the works of man’s pride and all will be renewed” (La Salette) … “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead” (Our Lady of Akita, 1973).
St. John the Baptist, the fiery preacher in the desert, also warns of punishment by fire: “He that shall come after me, is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear; He shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire. Whose fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly cleanse His floor and gather His wheat into the barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire” (Matthew 3:11-12).
Our Lord also speaks of this punishing fire in Holy Scripture: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire” (Matthew 3:10). “Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire” (Matthew 7:19). “Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire: so shall it be at the end of the world. The Son of man shall send his angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all them that work iniquity. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth … So shall it be at the end of the world. The angels shall go out, and shall separate the wicked from among the just. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. ‘Have ye understood all these things?’ They say to him: ‘Yes!’” (Matthew 13:40-42; 13:49-51).
Beware of Provoking the Hand of God
Holy Scripture paints a fearsome picture concerning the consequences of provoking God: “Evils shall come upon you in the latter times, when you shall do evil in the sight of the Lord, to provoke Him by the works of your hands” (Deuteronomy 31:29). “They have provoked Me and have angered Me with their vanities” (Deuteronomy 32:21). “But [thou] hast done evil and hast made thee strange gods to provoke Me to anger, and [thou] hast cast Me behind thy back” (3 Kings 14:9). “And I will leave the remnants of my inheritance, and will deliver them into the hands of their enemies: and they shall become a prey, and a spoil to all their enemies. Because they have done evil before Me, and have continued to provoke Me, even unto this day” (4 Kings 21:14-15). “Because they have forsaken Me, and have sacrificed to strange gods, to provoke Me to wrath with all the works of their hands, therefore My wrath shall fall upon this place, and shall not be quenched” (2 Paralipomenon 34:25).
Forcing the Hand of God
Once provoked, God is forced to let His hand fall in justice: “Woe to you that devise that which is unprofitable, and work evil in your beds: in the morning light they execute it, because their hand is against God” (Micheas 2:1). “But thou that hast been the author of all mischief, shalt not escape the hand of God” (2 Machabees 7:31). “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘Behold I will stretch forth My hand upon the Philistines, and will kill the killers’” (Ezechiel 25:16). “Thus saith the Lord God: ‘Behold I will lift up My hand to the Gentiles’” (Isaias 49:22). “As I live, saith the Lord God, I will reign over you with a strong hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out” (Ezechiel 20:33). “For there was the fear of death in every city, and the hand of God was exceeding heavy” (1 Kings 5:12).
Avoid Sin—Avoid the Fire!
It takes no rocket-scientist to work out the spiritual math in all this. It is quite simply this: sin = fire. And if 2+2=4, then sin + more sin = more fire. As Our Lord says: “And if thy hand, or thy foot scandalize thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee. It is better for thee to go into life maimed or lame, than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into everlasting fire. And if thy eye scandalize thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee. It is better for thee having one eye to enter into life, than having two eyes to be cast into Hell fire” (Matthew 18:8-9). “And if thy hand scandalize thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life, maimed, than having two hands to go into Hell, into unquenchable fire: where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not extinguished” (Mark 9:42-43). Talk about forcing God’s hand!!
Article 8
Friday November 10th, 2023
How to Avoid Purgatory
Friday November 10th, 2023
How to Avoid Purgatory
Accepting the Law and the Price
Before we start out, there is something we have to get clear in our minds—otherwise we might as well pack our asbestos suits for either Hell or Purgatory. We are not going to dictate to God what laws we like and don’t like, nor what price WE place on sin, nor what price we will or will not pay! “And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore―Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse?” (Ezechiel 18:25). If you want to go to Heaven and avoid Hell and Purgatory, then you must do it His way or take the highway to whichever place you will merit.
Admitting Our Guilt
We have inherited, from Adam and Eve, the Original Syn-drome. We are born with this syndrome of making excuses and pointing the finger at someone or something else: “She or he made me do it!” ... “The devil made me do it!” ... “Everyone does it!” ... “Is THAT a sin? Hey, I didn’t know! Nobody told me!” or some similar excuse. “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us! If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23).
Quit Sinning
God is merciful provided that we relinquish the desire for sin. Holy Scripture tells us that “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). Yet Our Lord warns Mary Magdalen: “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:11) and to the man that He cured by the pool, He says: “Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14). ”What shall we say, then? Shall we continue in sin? God forbid! For we, that are dead to sin, how shall we live any longer therein?” (Romans 6:1-2). “For in that He died to sin, He died once; but in that He liveth, He liveth unto God! So do you also reckon, that you are dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus our Lord! Let no sin therefore reign in your mortal body … For sin shall not have dominion over you!” (Romans 6:10-14). “For when we were in the flesh, the passions of sins did work to bring forth fruit unto death. But now we are loosed from the law of death, wherein we were detained; so that we should serve in newness of spirit” (Romans 7:5-6).
Let the Battle Commence!
St. Paul, who says of himself—“I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the Faith!” (2 Timothy 4:7)—also describes to us the battle that he had to fight: “The law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold under sin. For that which I do, I understand not. For I do not that good which I want; but the evil which I hate, that I do! … If, then, I do that which I want not … then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me. For I know that there dwells not in me, that is to say in my flesh, that which is good. For to want good, is present with me; but to accomplish that which is good, I find not! For the good which I want, I do not; but the evil which I want not, that I do! Now if I do that which I want not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find, then, that when I have a desire to do good, evil is present with me! For I am delighted with the law of God, according to the inward man: but I see another law in my body, fighting against the law of my mind, and captivating me in the law of sin, that is in my body. Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God!” (Romans 7:14-25).
Holly Scripture sends us into battle, saying: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12).
Paying the Price
“The wages (price) of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance!” (Matthew 3:8). “Is it my will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “If the wicked do penance for all his sins which he hath committed, and keep all My commandments, and do judgment and justice, living he shall live, and shall not die” (Ezechiel 18:21). “Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities: and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit: and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dieth, says the Lord God, return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:30-32).
No Spiritual Bankruptcy, No Devaluation
It has been said many times before and it must be said again―our value on Heaven and the price or fine or penalty for sin, is CHEAP. Neither is cheap―neither Heaven nor sin―but they are incredibly expensive. The price of sin must be paid—we cannot devalue sin, nor can we declare spiritual bankruptcy—it would be an insult to God and an affront to so many who have gone before and had to pay the full price. “Be at agreement with thy adversary betimes, whilst thou art in the way with him―lest perhaps the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison! Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing!” (Matthew 5:25-26). In other words—in the case of debt for sin—pay now lest thou be cast into the prison of Purgatory and have to remain there until thou payest the last cent of what you owe for your sins.
Gold Coated Currency
The currency is penance, but within all the multitude of things that could possibly come under the umbrella of penance, there is something that can coat our penances in gold or silver—that ‘something’ is CHARITY. It is not so much what we do as a penance, as to the love that we do it with! Let us always remembers Our Lord’s words to Mary Magdalen―the woman caught in adultery and from whom Jesus had cast out seven devils—“Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much!” (Luke 7:47).
Our Lord came on Earth expressly to give us the opportunity of a perfect Redemption—a Redemption that could avoid Purgatory. He gave us a Law of Love, a Religion in every way to suit our human hearts, destined to make us holy and happy. His Commandments, counsels and promises all breathe peace, joy, mercy and love. He will even help us pay our debts: “And I will cleanse them from all their iniquity, whereby they have sinned against Me, and I will forgive all their iniquities, whereby they have sinned against Me, and despised Me!” (Jeremias 33:8).
Can We Avoid Purgatory? Yes!
Yes! Purgatory is avoidable, but that is not easy—however, we are only ‘turned-off’ by the price because we have made Heaven so cheap in our minds. Nevertheless, if you wish to avoid Purgatory (who in their right mind wouldn’t), let us take the means which God has so generously offered us, and, secondly, convince ourselves that the use of these means is within the reach of every ordinary Christian—for every Christian is called to be a saint.
Many think that it is practically impossible for the ordinary Christian to avoid Purgatory. Go there we all must—so they say. They laughingly say: “It will even be a miracle for us if we even get into Purgatory!” Alas! They will realize, when it’s too late, how terribly rash their words were! As a consequence of such fatalistic ideas, many make no serious effort to avoid Purgatory, or even to lessen the term they may have to pass there. Thank God all do not hold such gloomy views. Yet the gloom is only dispelled if we are prepared to pray and pay! Once again, God has to be just—He never shows mercy without justice, and never shows justice without mercy. The price is what it is—but in His mercy He will a payment plan that works for us!
Believe That Purgatory is Avoidable!
“And Jesus said: ‘Go, and as thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!’” (Matthew 8:13). “Then Jesus touched their eyes, saying: ‘According to your Faith, be it done unto you!’” (Matthew 9:29). “Then Jesus answering, said to her: ‘O woman, great is thy Faith! Be it done to thee as thou wilt!” (Matthew 15:28). “If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you!” (John 15:7). And the Good Thief asked: “‘Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise!’” (Luke 23:42-43). The Good Thief believed, hoped and paid.
Don’t Haggle—Just Pay!
The idea that nearly all of us, no matter what, shall have to pass a more or less long period in the excruciating fires of Purgatory after death, seems to be at variance with this all-merciful and all-loving plan of our Divine Lord. Of course, if we do not want to pay, or show neglect in making payments, then that long stay in Purgatory will come to pass. However, God wants you in Heaven—not Purgatory—but not at any old price. There is no haggling over the price—it costs what it costs—but God will do all He can to help you pay your debts here on Earth.
His Mercies Are Above All His Works
It is true that we are weak and fall many times and that God’s justice is rigorous and exacting, but it is equally certain that God’s mercy and love are above all His works: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). It is no less certain that Our Lord has given us abundant grace and strength to save us from sin and many (and most efficacious) means of satisfying for any sins that we may have committed. This last fact seems to be almost entirely overlooked, or imperfectly understood by the majority of Catholics. Of course, those who go on deliberately sinning and who make no effort to correct their faults and refuse to use the many wonderful means God offers them for satisfying for sin, condemn themselves to Purgatory at best, or Hell at worst.
His Mercies Have Given Us The Means
In His great mercy, God has given us an abundant means by which we can our debt for sin before leaving this world! There are many ‘payment plans’ that we can choose from or we can combine them all. They can all be grouped, very loosely or broadly, under the term penance—we could call it “The Pence of Penance”! Some of those means are worth more than others—much like we have a variety of coins and bills in our currency. We can pay a little at a time, or a lot at once, or more one day than another—the important thing is that we pay, and that we pay the true price! However, the price that God asks while we are still living on Earth, is a pittance compared to the price He will demand for any outstanding debts in Purgatory once we have died.
The Currency of Penance
The currency of penance, as mentioned, contains a variety of coins and bills. A simple solitary Our Father or a Hail Mary could be compared to a cent which anyone can afford to part with and repay, in some small measure, the debt we owe. Any and all prayers can be combined, like coins and bills, and handed over as partial repayment for sin. The same can be said of sacrifices that we make—they come in all shapes and sizes, and varying levels of pain and difficulty. The bigger ‘bills’ are those sacrifices that God sends us (and they are usually the ones we dread and don’t like); whereas the smaller ‘bills’ are the sacrifices of our own choosing (which are invariably easier, more likeable and less painful).
Horror of Penance or Horror of Purgatory?
Do penance, or you will burn long years in Purgatory, is a fact that there is no getting away from. This is a terrifying thought and one that makes the bravest man shudder. Which of us does not tremble when he thinks of those who have been burnt to death in a slow fire? What fear would not be ours if we had to face a similar death? Yet their suffering was of relatively short duration. They say that a person would die within 2 or 3 minutes in a fire from breathing in smoke and lacking oxygen (the fire burns up the available oxygen), additionally, an average human body takes from two to three hours to burn completely into ash. The incomparably fiercer fire of Purgatory, which we may have to face, may last 20, or 50, or 100 years, or even several centuries—for Heaven, since it is eternal, can wait!
Many people have such a horror of penance that they never even dream of practicing it. It is like the fear that children have of ghosts, a very great but a very unfounded fear. Their idea is that penance is something awful. They think perhaps of the severe penances of the great Saints and, of course, are afraid to attempt anything of a like kind. God does not ask us, as a rule, to do what is heroic. When He does, He gives us all the strength necessary, as in the case of the Saints. He asks each one to do a little. If we are afraid of doing much―and it is only natural that some are―let us do at least a little. No one but a coward is afraid to do a little, especially if he gets much in exchange. Take care of the cents, and the dollars will look after themselves!
The easy road to Heaven of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, the Little Flower, is to do many little things. If God was infinitely pleased with the widow’s mite; He will be equally pleased with our little penances. If we are afraid to do much, let us do many little things. As a result of little mortifications and sacrifices, we can deliver ourselves from the awful fires of Purgatory and amass rich merits for Heaven―but if we choose the little way, then we had better get started pretty soon!
The Gold Coins of Penance
However, among all the different coins and bills, there are some that stand out above all the others for their value and “paying power”—among these are the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass; the Holy Rosary; and suffering. Let us look at suffering first of all―and get the “unpleasant” thing “out of the way.”
The Gold of Suffering
Another word for “suffering” is that dreaded word the “Cross”! If we want to go to Heaven, then we will have to suffer—not just to pay for our sins, but also to prove our love of God. Our Lord Himself told us that if anyone wants to be His follower, then he should be prepared to suffer. “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake … The disciple is not above the master, nor the servant above his lord. It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master, and the servant as his lord … Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me. He that finds his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:22-39).
We live on a gold-mine! Every day we can encounter a ton of suffering—and we do—but we leave it buried under the ground; we reject it; we complain about it; we stamp on it and bury even deeper in the ground; we dig a hole and bury the talent presented to us. Suffering is a humiliation and that is the last thing we want! We forget that Holy Scripture says: “For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5). “As silver is tried by fire, and gold in the furnace: so the Lord trieth the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3).
The Gold of the Holy Rosary
Alphonsus, King of Leon and Galicia, very much wanted all his servants to honor the Blessed Virgin by saying the Rosary, so he used to hang a large Rosary on his belt―though he never said it himself. Nevertheless, his wearing it encouraged his courtiers to say the Rosary devoutly. One day the King fell seriously ill and when he was given up for dead he found himself, in spirit, before the judgment seat of Our Lord. Many devils were there accusing him of all the sins he had committed, and Our Lord was about to condemn him when Our Lady came forward to speak in his favor. She called for a pair of scales and had his sins placed in one of the balances, while she put the large Rosary which he had always worn on the other scale, together with all the Rosaries that had been said through his example. It was found that the Rosaries weighed more than his sins. Looking at him with great kindness, Our Lady said: “As a reward for the little service you did for me in wearing my Rosary, I have obtained a great grace for you from my Son. Your life will be spared for a few more years. See that you spend those years wisely, and do penance.” When the King regained consciousness he cried out: “Blessed be the Rosary of the most holy Virgin Mary, by which I have been delivered from eternal damnation.” After he had recovered his health, he spent the rest of his life in spreading devotion to the Rosary, and said it faithfully every day. (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Eighth Rose”).
Whatever you do, do not be like a certain pious but self-willed lady in Rome. She was so devout and fervent that she put to shame by her holy life even the strictest religious in the Church. Having decided to ask St. Dominic’s advice about her spiritual life, she made her confession to him. For penance he gave her one Rosary to say and advised her to say it every day. She excused herself, saying that she had her regular exercises, that she made the Stations of Rome every day, that she wore sack cloth, as well as a hair shirt, that she gave herself the discipline (scourging) several times a week, that she often fasted and did other penances. Saint Dominic urged her over and over again to take his advice and say the Rosary, but she would not hear of it. She left the confessional, horrified at the methods of this new spiritual director, who had tried so hard to persuade her to take up a devotion for which she had no taste.
Later on, when she was at prayer she fell into ecstasy and had a vision of her soul appearing before the Supreme Judge. Saint Michael put all her penances and other prayers on one side of the scales and all her sins and imperfections on the other. The tray of her good works were greatly outweighed by that of her sins and imperfections. Filled with alarm, she cried for mercy, imploring the help of the Blessed Virgin, her gracious advocate, who took the one and only Rosary she had said for her penance and dropped it on the tray of her good works. This one Rosary was so heavy that it weighed more than all her sins as well as all her good works. Our Lady then reproved her for having refused to follow the counsel of her servant Dominic and for not saying the Rosary every day. (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Twenty-Sixth Rose”).
It’s Not What You Say, But How You Say It!
Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin [or ask to be allowed to avoid Purgatory].
The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said, especially when we have promised to say it regularly or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before. I beg you to restrain your natural haste when saying your Rosary, and make some pauses in the middle of the Our Father and Hail Mary, and a smaller one after the words of the Our Father and Hail Mary which I have marked with a cross, as follows:
Our Father Who art in Heaven, + hallowed by Thy Name, + Thy kingdom come, + Thy will be done + on Earth as it is in Heaven. + Give us this day + our daily bread, + and forgive us our trespasses, + as we forgive those who trespass against us, + and lead us not into temptation, + but deliver us from evil. Amen.
Hail, Mary, full of grace, + the Lord is with thee, + blessed art thou among women, + and blessed is the Fruit of thy womb, Jesus. + Holy Mary, Mother of God, + pray for us sinners, now + and at the hour of our death. Amen. +
At first, you may find it difficult to make these pauses because of your bad habit of saying prayers in a hurry; but a decade said recollectedly in this way will be worth more than thousands of Rosaries said in a hurry, without pausing or reflecting.
Three sisters said the Rosary faithfully for a year, and, on the feast of the Purification, Our Lady appeared to them at night when they had retired. St. Catherine and St. Agnes were with her, and she was wearing a dress brilliant with light, on which was written in letters of gold the words “Hail, Mary, full of grace.” Our Lady approached the eldest sister and said, “I greet you, my daughter, who have greeted me so often and so well. I want to thank you for the beautiful robes you have made me.” The two virgin saints who accompanied Our Lady also thanked her and all three disappeared.
An hour later, Our Lady, with the same two companions, entered the room again, but this time she was wearing a green dress which had no gold lettering and did not shine. She went to the second sister and thanked her for the robe she had made by saying her Rosary. But since this sister had seen Our Lady appear to the eldest sister much more magnificently dressed, she asked the reason why. Our Lady answered, “Your sister made me more beautiful clothes because she has been saying the Rosary better than you.”
About an hour after this, she appeared to the youngest of the sisters wearing tattered and dirty rags. “My daughter,” she said, “I want to thank you for these clothes you have made me.” The young girl, feeling ashamed, cried out, “O my lady, how could I have dressed you so badly! I beg you to forgive me! Please grant me a little more time to make you a beautiful robe by saying my Rosary better!”
Our Lady and the two saints vanished, leaving the girl heartbroken. She told her confessor everything that had happened and he urged them to say the Rosary for another year and to say it with more devotion than ever. At the end of this second year, on the same day of the feast of the Purification, Our Lady, clothed in a magnificent robe, and again attended by St. Catherine and St. Agnes, wearing crowns, appeared to them in the evening. She said to them: “I have come to tell you that you have earned Heaven at last, and you will all have the great joy of going there tomorrow.”
One day Saint Gertrude had a vision of Our Lord counting gold coins. She summoned the courage to ask Him what He was doing, and He answered, “I am counting the Hail Marys that you have said; this is the money with which you purchase Heaven.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-Fourth & Nineteenth Rose”).
The Power of the Rosary
If there ever was any doubt as to the efficacy of the Holy Rosary, then let us listen to the words of Sr. Lucia of Fatima, to whom Our Lady revealed the power that God has granted to the Rosary in our day and age: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
Pray the Rosary Often
This is why Our Lady repeatedly drummed the message about praying the Rosary: “Say the Rosary every day … Pray the Rosary every day” (Fatima, June 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you” (Fatima, July 1917) … “Continue to say the Rosary every day … Pray, pray very much” (Fatima, August 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary” (Fatima, September 1917) … “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day” (Fatima, October 1917) … Eight years after Fatima, Our Lady again appeared to Sr. Lucia and, among other things, said: “Recite five decades of the Rosary and keep me company for a quarter of an hour while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me” (Pontevedra, 1925). Lucia often repeated and emphasized what Our Lady had first recommended to her: “Yes, she wishes people to recite the Rosary; people must recite the Rosary.” The same message was given at Akita: “
Little Blessed Francisco Marto of Fatima—after Our Lady said of him that he would not go to Heaven until he had prayed many Rosaries, would say at least eight or nine Rosaries each day. St. Padre Pio would pray anywhere from thirty to fifty Rosaries each day. When once asked how he could pray so many each day, he replied to the person: “How is it that you say so few?” What would he say of our Rosaries—as to both quality and quantity? If Francisco had to pray many Rosaries before he could go to Heaven, how many must we pray to avoid Purgatory?
The Gold of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass
St. Leonard of Port Maurice calls the Holy Mass the greatest treasure that we have this side of Heaven! We speak of the “Precious Blood” of Jesus which was shed on the Cross of Calvary—that same “Precious Blood” is found in the “Precious” Sacrifice of the Mass.
St. Leonard, at the outset of his book, writes: “How it outrages one’s patience to be obliged to listen to the insulting language of certain libertines, who, from time to time, utter scandalous propositions, which savor of atheism, and are the very bane of true piety. ‘A Mass more or a Mass the less, counts for nothing!’ say those impious people. ‘It is a hardship to be obliged to assist at Mass on holy days!’ … ‘The Mass of such a Priest is as long as that of the Holy Week, and I always hurry out of the church when I see him approaching the altar.’ The person who speaks in this manner shows unmistakably that he has little or no respect for the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Have you considered what the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass really is? It is the sun of Christianity, the soul of Faith, the center of the Catholic religion, the grand object of all her rites, ceremonies, and Sacraments. The one great Sacrifice of our holy religion, that is the Mass, is holy, perfect, and in every respect complete, for by it the faithful render the highest honor to God, professing, at the same time, their own nothingness, and the supreme dominion which God has over all.”
You Can Turn the Gold of the Mass to Dirt!
St. Leonard is pretty blunt on the matter of how we treat the Mass and how we behave at Mass. Here is his warning: “Now answer me candidly, when you are going to the church to hear Mass, do you bear in mind that you are going to Calvary to be present at the Redeemer’s death? If this thought was deep in your soul, would you venture into the holy place with unbecoming gait, or in apparel that is immodest? Had Magdalene gone to the foot of the cross on Calvary, bedizened, perfumed, and with a display of finery such as she wore in the time of her sinfulness, what would have been said of her? Now what are we to say of you who go to the holy place dressed out as for some merry-making? What should be said of you if you were to profane that most august Sacrifice by unbecoming conduct, such as nods, salutations, laughter, whisperings, or, worse than all, sensuality and sacrilegious glances? Iniquity is abominable on all occasions and in all places, but the sins that are committed during Mass, and under the shadow of the altar, are sins which call down God’s signal maledictions: ‘Cursed be he who doeth the work of the Lord deceitfully’ (Jeremias 48:10). Ponder seriously now while I unfold to you other and still more marvelous excellences of this most precious treasure.”
Nothing much has changed since the days of St. Leonard! Look at how most people dress and behave in church! One would think it was a fashion parade at times! Tell me—for whom are you dressing-up so much? Is it Our Lord? Do you think He approves of all the dressing-up of the body and face? Or would He prefer to see more beauty of the soul? Furthermore, why do you seek to distract the minds and hearts of others away from God? The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass—which could be such a fruitful source of debt repayment—only serves to increase the debt for sin, rather than reduce it!
Secondly, if the Mass is the center of the Church’s life on Earth—if it is the greatest thing we have this side of Heaven—then with what dispositions do you enter the Church? With what attention do follow the ceremonies? With what fervor do you adore your God? Again, what could be a source of riches for paying our debt for sin, can easily turn out to be an increase of sin.
Are You An Adorer or A Snorer?
St. Leonard chastises those who fail to see the grandeur of the Mass: “[The priest] is not alone in this most august function, since all those who assist at Mass concur with him in offering the Holy Sacrifice; and it is on this account that the priest turns to the people and says: “Pray, brethren, that mine and your Sacrifice may be acceptable”―in order that we may understand that although he performs the part of principal minister, all those who are present make the great offering along with him. Hence, when you assist at Mass you perform to a certain extent the part of a priest. What say you now? Will you ever again dare to hear Mass sitting, whispering, looking idly about you, nay, sometimes even sleeping; contenting yourselves with reciting, thoughtlessly it may be, a few vocal prayers, heedless, entirely heedless of the tremendous office of priest which you are exercising. Alas! I cannot refrain from exclaiming: ‘Oh, stupid world, that does not estimate mysteries so sublime! How is it possible that anyone can remain in presence of the altar with a distracted mind and a dissipated heart at a moment when the angels hover there trembling and astonished, absorbed in contemplating the effects of such a stupendous work?’”
Let the Mass Be Your Protection
St. Leonard of Port Maurice stresses the power of the Mass as a shield against the wrath and punishments of God, saying: “If there were no sun in the heavens what would be the condition of this world? Alas I all would be darkness, sterility, and indescribable misery. And if we had not the Holy Mass what would become of us? Oh, wretched indeed would our condition be, deprived of every good, overwhelmed with every evil; for we should then be, as it were, a target for the thunderbolt of God’s anger. Some there are who seem astonished when they fancy that our good God has, in a certain sense, changed His mode of governing the world since the ancient times; for, in the latter He was wont to be called the God of armies, and He used to speak to the people out of the clouds with bolts of thunder in His hands; for, indeed, He punished crime with all the rigor of His justice.
“For one single adultery He put five-and-twenty thousand of the tribe of Benjamin to the sword. For an act of vainglory committed by David, in making a census of his kingdom, He sent a terrible plague, which in a very short time swept off seventy-thousand of the population. For one irreverent and incautious glance, He slew fifty-thousand of the Betsamites. And in these our times He tolerates not only vanities and frivolities, but adulteries the most sordid, scandals the most barefaced, nay, and the most frightful blasphemies which many Christians cast on His most holy Name. How then do we account for all this? Why this difference in His mode of governing? Is it because our ingratitudes are more excusable than those of our predecessors?
“Quite the contrary, indeed; for as we have received blessings far surpassing those that were conferred on the Jews in the old dispensation, so are we far more culpable than they. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the true and sole reason of such stupendous clemency, for in it we offer to the eternal Father the great victim, Jesus Christ. This is the sun of our Holy Church which dissipates the clouds and restores serenity to the heavens. This, indeed, is the celestial rainbow that stills the tempest of divine justice. For my own part, I am persuaded that, if it were not for the Holy Mass, the world would have long since tottered from its foundations, crushed beneath the enormous weight of so many accumulated iniquities. The Mass is the ponderous and powerful supporter on which the world rests—which keeps it from falling into horrid chaos. Will not this reflection convince you of the necessity of this divine Sacrifice?
“But as this alone is not enough we must know how to turn to good account the blessings which it holds out to us. Wherefore, when assisting at the Holy Sacrifice, let us bear in mind a memorable fact recorded in the life of Alfonso Albuquerque, who, with his fleet, being overtaken by a terrible storm at sea which threatened him with certain death, had recourse to the following expedient: taking a tender child that was at that moment aboard his ship, and holding him up to Heaven he exclaimed: “If we are sinners, this innocent babe surely is free from sin. O Lord for the sake of this sinless child save us, sinners, from death.” Would you believe it? God was so appeased by the sight of that pure infant that the storm was stilled, and the horror of impending death, which caused the sailors to weep and tremble, was turned into transports of joy.
“Now, what think you does the eternal Father when the priest, elevating the most holy victim of the altar exhibits to Him the innocence of His divine Son? Ah, surely His tender compassion cannot but be moved at sight of the immaculate innocence of Jesus, and surely that divine compassion must, in a certain sense, be constrained to still the fierce storms that assail us, nay, and to provide for our necessities. Ah, indeed, if it were not for this most holy victim, once offered for us on the cross, and now daily offered on our altars, we one and all might renounce all hope of Heaven and look on Hell as our final destination. Yes, assuredly, were it not for this ever blessed victim Hell, Hell should be our portion! But this treasure of the Holy Mass revives our hopes, and encourages us to look for everlasting glory in that paradise which cannot be forfeited except by our own folly and sinfulness.”
The Mass is to be Used, Not Abused!
St. Leonard shows us how to pay our debts to God through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass: “How then can we, miserable creatures, who depend on God for the very air we breathe, make any satisfaction for debts so numerous or so weighty Let me at once, therefore, point out to you the easiest way of doing so, and let me add that this way of satisfying divine justice is one which should console me, you, and all of us. Let us be diligent in hearing Mass as often as possible, and with all possible devotion; and furthermore, let us endeavor to have as many Masses as possible celebrated for our intention. By this means―be our debts weighty as they may, and countless beyond numbering―there can be no doubt that we will be able to discharge them all completely and entirely by the treasure which is derivable from the Holy Mass. And in order that you may be fully enlightened, and have a perfect knowledge of each of these debts, I will now explain them all one by one, for your edification; and here let me remark, that this mode of proceeding must afford you the greatest consolation, since it makes known to you the great practical advantages, and the inexhaustible wealth that you can draw from so rich a mine on all occasions, and in all our necessities.”
The Angelic Doctor, St. Thomas Aquinas, teaches us what are the debts that we owe to God, and he says that they are four, and that each of them is infinite.
● The first is to praise and honor the infinite majesty of God, which is eminently worthy of infinite honor and infinite praise.
● The second is to make satisfaction for all the sins we have committed.
● The third is to thank and bless God for all the benefits He has bestowed on us.
● The fourth is to supplicate Him constantly, as the giver of all good gifts.
Pay the Debt of Honoring God
The first debt by which we have bound ourselves to God is to render Him supreme honor and glory. Because God possesses infinite greatness, we are bound to return Him love, so to say, infinitely infinite. But where on Earth will we, miserable creatures, find any offering worthy of our Creator? What offering can there be worthy of God except God Himself? This is achieved in the Holy Mass, in which God is honored as he deserves to be honored, because He is honored by God Himself, that is by Jesus, who, placing Himself a victim on our altars, adores the most holy Trinity by an act of indescribable submission, such as no other can offer.
It is related of a holy woman, whose soul was intensely inflamed with love of God, that she said to God: “My God, my God! I wish that I had as many hearts and tongues as there are leaves on the trees, atoms in the air, and drops of water in the sea, to love thee as Thou deservest to be loved! Oh, that I could encircle all Earth’s creatures with my hands, and lay them at thy feet, in order that they might be inflamed with love of Thee, provided I might love Thee more intensely than them all, nay, more intensely than all the angels and saints, more than Paradise itself!”
One day, when she was expressing such like longings, she had the happiness to hear Our Lord answering her in these words: “Dear daughter, be consoled, because, by a single Mass, at which you assist devoutly, you can render to Me all that glory for which your heart is on fire, nay, and infinitely more.” Shocked? Astounded? Dumbfounded? Let us repeat it over and over again and convince our naturalistic minds and hearts, since it never can be too deeply graven on our minds and hearts: “By hearing Holy Mass with proper dispositions, we offer unto our God homage and honor that is infinite!” And since this great truth cannot be doubted, should we not congratulate ourselves on having it in our power to be able to satisfy this first debt by hearing the Holy Mass? O what a blind world! When will it open its eyes to a truth so grand and so important? And yet, alas, they foolishly say or think: “A Mass the more or a Mass the less counts for nothing!” Oh, abominable blindness!
The Debt For Our Many Sins
Our second debt or obligation to God is to satisfy His justice for the numerous and enormous sins which we have committed. Oh, what a mighty debt this is! A single mortal sin weighs so heavily in the scale of divine justice, that all the good works of all the martyrs and saints who have been, are, or ever shall be, could not satisfy for it; and yet, by means of the Holy Mass, if we but consider its intrinsic value and holiness, we are enabled to make complete satisfaction for all the sins we have committed.
Although Our Lord has been offended and outraged by our sins, yet, not content with having satisfied divine justice for us on Calvary, He has given, and continually does give us, the self-same means of satisfying it (divine justice) in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, because, by renewing in the Mass that offering which Jesus made to the eternal Father on the cross, for the sins of the whole world, that very same divine Blood, which He once poured out to ransom the human race, comes now to be applied to each and every one of us, because it is specially offered in the Mass for the sins of him who celebrates, and also for the sins of all those who assist at so tremendous a Sacrifice.
The Sacrifice of the Mass does not cancel our sins immediately by itself, as the Sacrament of Penance does, but, rather, that it cancels them by obtaining for us various most necessary aids, such as interior impulses, holy inspirations, and actual graces—all of which are needed to enable us to do true penance for our sins, either during the time of Mass or at some other opportune period. And it is for this reason that none, but God, can tell how many souls arise from the prison and chains of sin by means of the extraordinary aids which they obtain from this divine Sacrifice. St. Augustine has left on record: “Whoever hears Mass devoutly will receive great strength to avoid the commission of mortal sin, and he shall likewise obtain remission of all the venial sins that he may have committed up to that time.”
But you will then say: “Therefore, it is enough for us to assist at a single Mass, in order to get rid of all those most weighty debts we owe to God by reason of the many sins we have committed!” Do not rush to so rash a conclusion, for although the Mass is of infinite value, you must know, nevertheless, that God accepts it in a manner limited and finite, and conformably to the greater or less perfection in the dispositions of the priest who offers it, and the dsipositions of those who assist at it. Therefore a greater or lesser satisfaction for sin is obtained by the Sacrifice of the Mass, depending on the greater or lesser perfection in the dispositions of the priest who offers it and of those assisting at it.
Now, think of the stupidity of those who go in search of a Mass celebrated rapidly, or, what is worse, who assist thereat with little or no devotion; think of the culpable indifference of those who never ask to have Mass celebrated for them, and who are careless in selecting for that purpose priests who are most remarkable for their fervor and devotion. Though you should assist at as many Masses as you can, you should have more regard for the greater devotion than for the greater number, because if your devotion at one single Mass be greater than that of a man who assists at fifty, you will give more honor to God in that single one, and you will derive more benefit from it, than the other does from fifty. “In satisfaction for sin,” says St. Thomas: “the disposition of the party offering satisfaction is more regarded than the quantity of the oblation.”
The Debt of Gratitude
Our third debt is one of gratitude for the countless benefits that God has bestowed upon us. Think of the accumulation all the gifts and all the graces which you have received from God―so many gifts of nature and grace, body, soul, and senses, intellectual faculties, health, and life itself. Add to all these the Passion and Death that Jesus suffered for love of us; and then say to yourself: “Does not all this increase a thousand-fold the debt that I owe to God?”
Nothing except the Holy Mass can give due thanks to God. “What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits to me?” asks the psalmist; and then answering himself he continues: “I will take the cup of salvation,” (according to another version) “I will raise on high the chalice of the Lord”—that is, I will offer a Sacrifice most acceptable to Him, and with this alone I shall satisfy the debt of so many blessings.
Bear in mind, likewise, that this Sacrifice was instituted principally by our Redeemer for this end, namely—to acknowledge the divine beneficence and to thank it; and it is on this account that it is emphatically called Eucharist, a Greek word which means “thanksgiving” or “offering of thanks”.
It is related of the venerable sister Francesca Farnese, that her whole life was tormented by a thousand yearnings of love, because she felt that she knew not how to return adequate thanks to her Lord for the divine blessings with which He had covered her from head to foot. It was on one of those occasions, when she was lamenting her inability to offer to God the gratitude which He so eminently deserved, that the Virgin Mother appeared to her, and placed the heavenly Infant in her arms, saying: “Take Him, for He is yours, and with Him alone you will find it easy to discharge all your obligations.” In the Holy Mass we receive Christ in Holy Communion and we can give to God that same Christ in thanksgiving!
The Debt of Begging
But the infinite benefit of the Holy Mass does not end here; for it helps us pay the fourth debt which we owe to God. This debt is one which obliges you to beg from Him, incessantly, all the graces you need to reach Heaven. “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) said Our Lord. Nothing means NOTHING! He, and He alone, is the chief source of all our good, temporal as well as eternal.
“But I am sinner! I don’t deserve anything!” you will wail. True! Nevertheless, let not your heart faint, but rather be of good hope; because, if you have not deserved those graces our good Jesus has deserved them for you. He earned them on Calvary and He repeats that work in each Mass. What confidence, what hope, therefore, should we not have when we bear in mind that in the Mass Jesus Himself prays for us and offers His most Precious Blood to the eternal Father for us, and becomes our advocate?
And to summarize everything in one short sentence—the Holy Mass is the golden key of Paradise; and since the eternal Father has given us this key, what is there of all His unbounded treasures that He can refuse us? “He that spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how hath He not also, with Him, given us all things?” (Romans 8:32).
St. Jerome affirms this as certain: “Assuredly,” says the Saint, “the Lord grants all the favors for which we petition Him in the Mass, provided they be suitable to us; and what is far more admirable, He very often grants us that for which we do not petition Him, always provided that we place no obstacles to His holy designs.”
But, alas! We, miserable and thoughtless beings, by our tepidity, feeble devotion, and the scandalous immodesties which we commit over and over again while assisting at Mass, how much, O, how much do we weaken its power to help us! St. Leonard says: “Would that I could ascend to the summit of the loftiest mountain and cry aloud, so that the whole world might hear me exclaiming, Foolish, foolish people, what are ye doing? Why will you not hasten to the churches to assist at every Mass celebrated therein? Why won’t you imitate those holy angels, who according to St. John Chrysostom, descend in thousands from the heavens when Mass is being celebrated, and array themselves before our altars, covered with wings of holy awe, tarrying there during the august Sacrifice, in order to intercede more efficaciously for us, knowing well that this is the most opportune time and the most propitious occasion that can be for obtaining favors from Heaven? Ah! Are you not filled with shame and confusion when you call to mind how little value you have hitherto set upon the Holy Mass? Will you not blush for having often and often profaned this thrice sanctified oblation? But what shall I say of you, if, unhappily, you are one of those whose rash and impious tongues dare to say: “A Mass more or less counts for nothing?’”
Before we start out, there is something we have to get clear in our minds—otherwise we might as well pack our asbestos suits for either Hell or Purgatory. We are not going to dictate to God what laws we like and don’t like, nor what price WE place on sin, nor what price we will or will not pay! “And you have said: ‘The way of the Lord is not right!’ Hear ye, therefore―Is it My way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse?” (Ezechiel 18:25). If you want to go to Heaven and avoid Hell and Purgatory, then you must do it His way or take the highway to whichever place you will merit.
Admitting Our Guilt
We have inherited, from Adam and Eve, the Original Syn-drome. We are born with this syndrome of making excuses and pointing the finger at someone or something else: “She or he made me do it!” ... “The devil made me do it!” ... “Everyone does it!” ... “Is THAT a sin? Hey, I didn’t know! Nobody told me!” or some similar excuse. “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us! If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us!” (1 John 1:8-10). “For all have sinned!” (Romans 3:23).
Quit Sinning
God is merciful provided that we relinquish the desire for sin. Holy Scripture tells us that “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). Yet Our Lord warns Mary Magdalen: “Go, and now sin no more!” (John 8:11) and to the man that He cured by the pool, He says: “Sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to thee!” (John 5:14). ”What shall we say, then? Shall we continue in sin? God forbid! For we, that are dead to sin, how shall we live any longer therein?” (Romans 6:1-2). “For in that He died to sin, He died once; but in that He liveth, He liveth unto God! So do you also reckon, that you are dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus our Lord! Let no sin therefore reign in your mortal body … For sin shall not have dominion over you!” (Romans 6:10-14). “For when we were in the flesh, the passions of sins did work to bring forth fruit unto death. But now we are loosed from the law of death, wherein we were detained; so that we should serve in newness of spirit” (Romans 7:5-6).
Let the Battle Commence!
St. Paul, who says of himself—“I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the Faith!” (2 Timothy 4:7)—also describes to us the battle that he had to fight: “The law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold under sin. For that which I do, I understand not. For I do not that good which I want; but the evil which I hate, that I do! … If, then, I do that which I want not … then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me. For I know that there dwells not in me, that is to say in my flesh, that which is good. For to want good, is present with me; but to accomplish that which is good, I find not! For the good which I want, I do not; but the evil which I want not, that I do! Now if I do that which I want not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find, then, that when I have a desire to do good, evil is present with me! For I am delighted with the law of God, according to the inward man: but I see another law in my body, fighting against the law of my mind, and captivating me in the law of sin, that is in my body. Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God!” (Romans 7:14-25).
Holly Scripture sends us into battle, saying: “The life of man upon Earth is a warfare!” (Job 7:1). “Fight the good fight of Faith! Lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art called!” (1 Timothy 6:12). “The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear it away!” (Matthew 11:12).
Paying the Price
“The wages (price) of sin is death!” (Romans 6:23). “The soul that sins, the same shall die!” (Ezechiel 18:4). “Unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance!” (Matthew 3:8). “Is it my will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “If the wicked do penance for all his sins which he hath committed, and keep all My commandments, and do judgment and justice, living he shall live, and shall not die” (Ezechiel 18:21). “Be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities: and iniquity shall not be your ruin! Cast away from you all your transgressions, by which you have transgressed, and make to yourselves a new heart, and a new spirit: and why will you die? For I desire not the death of him that dieth, says the Lord God, return ye and live!” (Ezechiel 18:30-32).
No Spiritual Bankruptcy, No Devaluation
It has been said many times before and it must be said again―our value on Heaven and the price or fine or penalty for sin, is CHEAP. Neither is cheap―neither Heaven nor sin―but they are incredibly expensive. The price of sin must be paid—we cannot devalue sin, nor can we declare spiritual bankruptcy—it would be an insult to God and an affront to so many who have gone before and had to pay the full price. “Be at agreement with thy adversary betimes, whilst thou art in the way with him―lest perhaps the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison! Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing!” (Matthew 5:25-26). In other words—in the case of debt for sin—pay now lest thou be cast into the prison of Purgatory and have to remain there until thou payest the last cent of what you owe for your sins.
Gold Coated Currency
The currency is penance, but within all the multitude of things that could possibly come under the umbrella of penance, there is something that can coat our penances in gold or silver—that ‘something’ is CHARITY. It is not so much what we do as a penance, as to the love that we do it with! Let us always remembers Our Lord’s words to Mary Magdalen―the woman caught in adultery and from whom Jesus had cast out seven devils—“Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved much!” (Luke 7:47).
Our Lord came on Earth expressly to give us the opportunity of a perfect Redemption—a Redemption that could avoid Purgatory. He gave us a Law of Love, a Religion in every way to suit our human hearts, destined to make us holy and happy. His Commandments, counsels and promises all breathe peace, joy, mercy and love. He will even help us pay our debts: “And I will cleanse them from all their iniquity, whereby they have sinned against Me, and I will forgive all their iniquities, whereby they have sinned against Me, and despised Me!” (Jeremias 33:8).
Can We Avoid Purgatory? Yes!
Yes! Purgatory is avoidable, but that is not easy—however, we are only ‘turned-off’ by the price because we have made Heaven so cheap in our minds. Nevertheless, if you wish to avoid Purgatory (who in their right mind wouldn’t), let us take the means which God has so generously offered us, and, secondly, convince ourselves that the use of these means is within the reach of every ordinary Christian—for every Christian is called to be a saint.
Many think that it is practically impossible for the ordinary Christian to avoid Purgatory. Go there we all must—so they say. They laughingly say: “It will even be a miracle for us if we even get into Purgatory!” Alas! They will realize, when it’s too late, how terribly rash their words were! As a consequence of such fatalistic ideas, many make no serious effort to avoid Purgatory, or even to lessen the term they may have to pass there. Thank God all do not hold such gloomy views. Yet the gloom is only dispelled if we are prepared to pray and pay! Once again, God has to be just—He never shows mercy without justice, and never shows justice without mercy. The price is what it is—but in His mercy He will a payment plan that works for us!
Believe That Purgatory is Avoidable!
“And Jesus said: ‘Go, and as thou hast believed, so be it done to thee!’” (Matthew 8:13). “Then Jesus touched their eyes, saying: ‘According to your Faith, be it done unto you!’” (Matthew 9:29). “Then Jesus answering, said to her: ‘O woman, great is thy Faith! Be it done to thee as thou wilt!” (Matthew 15:28). “If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you!” (John 15:7). And the Good Thief asked: “‘Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy Kingdom!’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise!’” (Luke 23:42-43). The Good Thief believed, hoped and paid.
Don’t Haggle—Just Pay!
The idea that nearly all of us, no matter what, shall have to pass a more or less long period in the excruciating fires of Purgatory after death, seems to be at variance with this all-merciful and all-loving plan of our Divine Lord. Of course, if we do not want to pay, or show neglect in making payments, then that long stay in Purgatory will come to pass. However, God wants you in Heaven—not Purgatory—but not at any old price. There is no haggling over the price—it costs what it costs—but God will do all He can to help you pay your debts here on Earth.
His Mercies Are Above All His Works
It is true that we are weak and fall many times and that God’s justice is rigorous and exacting, but it is equally certain that God’s mercy and love are above all His works: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). It is no less certain that Our Lord has given us abundant grace and strength to save us from sin and many (and most efficacious) means of satisfying for any sins that we may have committed. This last fact seems to be almost entirely overlooked, or imperfectly understood by the majority of Catholics. Of course, those who go on deliberately sinning and who make no effort to correct their faults and refuse to use the many wonderful means God offers them for satisfying for sin, condemn themselves to Purgatory at best, or Hell at worst.
His Mercies Have Given Us The Means
In His great mercy, God has given us an abundant means by which we can our debt for sin before leaving this world! There are many ‘payment plans’ that we can choose from or we can combine them all. They can all be grouped, very loosely or broadly, under the term penance—we could call it “The Pence of Penance”! Some of those means are worth more than others—much like we have a variety of coins and bills in our currency. We can pay a little at a time, or a lot at once, or more one day than another—the important thing is that we pay, and that we pay the true price! However, the price that God asks while we are still living on Earth, is a pittance compared to the price He will demand for any outstanding debts in Purgatory once we have died.
The Currency of Penance
The currency of penance, as mentioned, contains a variety of coins and bills. A simple solitary Our Father or a Hail Mary could be compared to a cent which anyone can afford to part with and repay, in some small measure, the debt we owe. Any and all prayers can be combined, like coins and bills, and handed over as partial repayment for sin. The same can be said of sacrifices that we make—they come in all shapes and sizes, and varying levels of pain and difficulty. The bigger ‘bills’ are those sacrifices that God sends us (and they are usually the ones we dread and don’t like); whereas the smaller ‘bills’ are the sacrifices of our own choosing (which are invariably easier, more likeable and less painful).
Horror of Penance or Horror of Purgatory?
Do penance, or you will burn long years in Purgatory, is a fact that there is no getting away from. This is a terrifying thought and one that makes the bravest man shudder. Which of us does not tremble when he thinks of those who have been burnt to death in a slow fire? What fear would not be ours if we had to face a similar death? Yet their suffering was of relatively short duration. They say that a person would die within 2 or 3 minutes in a fire from breathing in smoke and lacking oxygen (the fire burns up the available oxygen), additionally, an average human body takes from two to three hours to burn completely into ash. The incomparably fiercer fire of Purgatory, which we may have to face, may last 20, or 50, or 100 years, or even several centuries—for Heaven, since it is eternal, can wait!
Many people have such a horror of penance that they never even dream of practicing it. It is like the fear that children have of ghosts, a very great but a very unfounded fear. Their idea is that penance is something awful. They think perhaps of the severe penances of the great Saints and, of course, are afraid to attempt anything of a like kind. God does not ask us, as a rule, to do what is heroic. When He does, He gives us all the strength necessary, as in the case of the Saints. He asks each one to do a little. If we are afraid of doing much―and it is only natural that some are―let us do at least a little. No one but a coward is afraid to do a little, especially if he gets much in exchange. Take care of the cents, and the dollars will look after themselves!
The easy road to Heaven of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, the Little Flower, is to do many little things. If God was infinitely pleased with the widow’s mite; He will be equally pleased with our little penances. If we are afraid to do much, let us do many little things. As a result of little mortifications and sacrifices, we can deliver ourselves from the awful fires of Purgatory and amass rich merits for Heaven―but if we choose the little way, then we had better get started pretty soon!
The Gold Coins of Penance
However, among all the different coins and bills, there are some that stand out above all the others for their value and “paying power”—among these are the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass; the Holy Rosary; and suffering. Let us look at suffering first of all―and get the “unpleasant” thing “out of the way.”
The Gold of Suffering
Another word for “suffering” is that dreaded word the “Cross”! If we want to go to Heaven, then we will have to suffer—not just to pay for our sins, but also to prove our love of God. Our Lord Himself told us that if anyone wants to be His follower, then he should be prepared to suffer. “And He said to all: ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me!’” (Luke 9:23). “And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:38). “And you shall be hated by all men for My Name’s sake … The disciple is not above the master, nor the servant above his lord. It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master, and the servant as his lord … Do not think that I came to send peace upon Earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth Me, is not worthy of Me. He that finds his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for Me, shall find it!” (Matthew 10:22-39).
We live on a gold-mine! Every day we can encounter a ton of suffering—and we do—but we leave it buried under the ground; we reject it; we complain about it; we stamp on it and bury even deeper in the ground; we dig a hole and bury the talent presented to us. Suffering is a humiliation and that is the last thing we want! We forget that Holy Scripture says: “For gold and silver are tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation” (Ecclesiasticus 2:5). “As silver is tried by fire, and gold in the furnace: so the Lord trieth the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3).
The Gold of the Holy Rosary
Alphonsus, King of Leon and Galicia, very much wanted all his servants to honor the Blessed Virgin by saying the Rosary, so he used to hang a large Rosary on his belt―though he never said it himself. Nevertheless, his wearing it encouraged his courtiers to say the Rosary devoutly. One day the King fell seriously ill and when he was given up for dead he found himself, in spirit, before the judgment seat of Our Lord. Many devils were there accusing him of all the sins he had committed, and Our Lord was about to condemn him when Our Lady came forward to speak in his favor. She called for a pair of scales and had his sins placed in one of the balances, while she put the large Rosary which he had always worn on the other scale, together with all the Rosaries that had been said through his example. It was found that the Rosaries weighed more than his sins. Looking at him with great kindness, Our Lady said: “As a reward for the little service you did for me in wearing my Rosary, I have obtained a great grace for you from my Son. Your life will be spared for a few more years. See that you spend those years wisely, and do penance.” When the King regained consciousness he cried out: “Blessed be the Rosary of the most holy Virgin Mary, by which I have been delivered from eternal damnation.” After he had recovered his health, he spent the rest of his life in spreading devotion to the Rosary, and said it faithfully every day. (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Eighth Rose”).
Whatever you do, do not be like a certain pious but self-willed lady in Rome. She was so devout and fervent that she put to shame by her holy life even the strictest religious in the Church. Having decided to ask St. Dominic’s advice about her spiritual life, she made her confession to him. For penance he gave her one Rosary to say and advised her to say it every day. She excused herself, saying that she had her regular exercises, that she made the Stations of Rome every day, that she wore sack cloth, as well as a hair shirt, that she gave herself the discipline (scourging) several times a week, that she often fasted and did other penances. Saint Dominic urged her over and over again to take his advice and say the Rosary, but she would not hear of it. She left the confessional, horrified at the methods of this new spiritual director, who had tried so hard to persuade her to take up a devotion for which she had no taste.
Later on, when she was at prayer she fell into ecstasy and had a vision of her soul appearing before the Supreme Judge. Saint Michael put all her penances and other prayers on one side of the scales and all her sins and imperfections on the other. The tray of her good works were greatly outweighed by that of her sins and imperfections. Filled with alarm, she cried for mercy, imploring the help of the Blessed Virgin, her gracious advocate, who took the one and only Rosary she had said for her penance and dropped it on the tray of her good works. This one Rosary was so heavy that it weighed more than all her sins as well as all her good works. Our Lady then reproved her for having refused to follow the counsel of her servant Dominic and for not saying the Rosary every day. (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Twenty-Sixth Rose”).
It’s Not What You Say, But How You Say It!
Take great care to avoid the two pitfalls that most people fall into during the Rosary. The first is the danger of not asking for any graces at all, so that if some good people were asked their Rosary intention they would not know what to say. So, whenever you say your Rosary, be sure to ask for some special grace or virtue, or strength to overcome some sin [or ask to be allowed to avoid Purgatory].
The second fault commonly committed in saying the Rosary is to have no intention other than that of getting it over with as quickly as possible. This is because so many look upon the Rosary as a burden, which weighs heavily upon them when it has not been said, especially when we have promised to say it regularly or have been told to say it as a penance more or less against our will. It is sad to see how most people say the Rosary. They say it astonishingly fast, slipping over part of the words. We could not possibly expect anyone, even the most important person, to think that a slipshod address of this kind was a compliment, and yet we imagine that Jesus and Mary will be honored by it! Small wonder, then, that the most sacred prayers of our holy religion seem to bear no fruit, and that, after saying thousands of Rosaries, we are still no better than we were before. I beg you to restrain your natural haste when saying your Rosary, and make some pauses in the middle of the Our Father and Hail Mary, and a smaller one after the words of the Our Father and Hail Mary which I have marked with a cross, as follows:
Our Father Who art in Heaven, + hallowed by Thy Name, + Thy kingdom come, + Thy will be done + on Earth as it is in Heaven. + Give us this day + our daily bread, + and forgive us our trespasses, + as we forgive those who trespass against us, + and lead us not into temptation, + but deliver us from evil. Amen.
Hail, Mary, full of grace, + the Lord is with thee, + blessed art thou among women, + and blessed is the Fruit of thy womb, Jesus. + Holy Mary, Mother of God, + pray for us sinners, now + and at the hour of our death. Amen. +
At first, you may find it difficult to make these pauses because of your bad habit of saying prayers in a hurry; but a decade said recollectedly in this way will be worth more than thousands of Rosaries said in a hurry, without pausing or reflecting.
Three sisters said the Rosary faithfully for a year, and, on the feast of the Purification, Our Lady appeared to them at night when they had retired. St. Catherine and St. Agnes were with her, and she was wearing a dress brilliant with light, on which was written in letters of gold the words “Hail, Mary, full of grace.” Our Lady approached the eldest sister and said, “I greet you, my daughter, who have greeted me so often and so well. I want to thank you for the beautiful robes you have made me.” The two virgin saints who accompanied Our Lady also thanked her and all three disappeared.
An hour later, Our Lady, with the same two companions, entered the room again, but this time she was wearing a green dress which had no gold lettering and did not shine. She went to the second sister and thanked her for the robe she had made by saying her Rosary. But since this sister had seen Our Lady appear to the eldest sister much more magnificently dressed, she asked the reason why. Our Lady answered, “Your sister made me more beautiful clothes because she has been saying the Rosary better than you.”
About an hour after this, she appeared to the youngest of the sisters wearing tattered and dirty rags. “My daughter,” she said, “I want to thank you for these clothes you have made me.” The young girl, feeling ashamed, cried out, “O my lady, how could I have dressed you so badly! I beg you to forgive me! Please grant me a little more time to make you a beautiful robe by saying my Rosary better!”
Our Lady and the two saints vanished, leaving the girl heartbroken. She told her confessor everything that had happened and he urged them to say the Rosary for another year and to say it with more devotion than ever. At the end of this second year, on the same day of the feast of the Purification, Our Lady, clothed in a magnificent robe, and again attended by St. Catherine and St. Agnes, wearing crowns, appeared to them in the evening. She said to them: “I have come to tell you that you have earned Heaven at last, and you will all have the great joy of going there tomorrow.”
One day Saint Gertrude had a vision of Our Lord counting gold coins. She summoned the courage to ask Him what He was doing, and He answered, “I am counting the Hail Marys that you have said; this is the money with which you purchase Heaven.” (St. Louis de Montfort, The Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-Fourth & Nineteenth Rose”).
The Power of the Rosary
If there ever was any doubt as to the efficacy of the Holy Rosary, then let us listen to the words of Sr. Lucia of Fatima, to whom Our Lady revealed the power that God has granted to the Rosary in our day and age: “The Most Holy Virgin, in these last times in which we live, has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary, to such an extent, that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or, above all, spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families, of the families of the world, or of the religious communities, or even of the life of peoples and nations, that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary, we will save ourselves, we will sanctify ourselves, we will console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.”
Pray the Rosary Often
This is why Our Lady repeatedly drummed the message about praying the Rosary: “Say the Rosary every day … Pray the Rosary every day” (Fatima, June 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, because only she can help you” (Fatima, July 1917) … “Continue to say the Rosary every day … Pray, pray very much” (Fatima, August 1917) … “Continue to pray the Rosary” (Fatima, September 1917) … “I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day” (Fatima, October 1917) … Eight years after Fatima, Our Lady again appeared to Sr. Lucia and, among other things, said: “Recite five decades of the Rosary and keep me company for a quarter of an hour while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me” (Pontevedra, 1925). Lucia often repeated and emphasized what Our Lady had first recommended to her: “Yes, she wishes people to recite the Rosary; people must recite the Rosary.” The same message was given at Akita: “
Little Blessed Francisco Marto of Fatima—after Our Lady said of him that he would not go to Heaven until he had prayed many Rosaries, would say at least eight or nine Rosaries each day. St. Padre Pio would pray anywhere from thirty to fifty Rosaries each day. When once asked how he could pray so many each day, he replied to the person: “How is it that you say so few?” What would he say of our Rosaries—as to both quality and quantity? If Francisco had to pray many Rosaries before he could go to Heaven, how many must we pray to avoid Purgatory?
The Gold of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass
St. Leonard of Port Maurice calls the Holy Mass the greatest treasure that we have this side of Heaven! We speak of the “Precious Blood” of Jesus which was shed on the Cross of Calvary—that same “Precious Blood” is found in the “Precious” Sacrifice of the Mass.
St. Leonard, at the outset of his book, writes: “How it outrages one’s patience to be obliged to listen to the insulting language of certain libertines, who, from time to time, utter scandalous propositions, which savor of atheism, and are the very bane of true piety. ‘A Mass more or a Mass the less, counts for nothing!’ say those impious people. ‘It is a hardship to be obliged to assist at Mass on holy days!’ … ‘The Mass of such a Priest is as long as that of the Holy Week, and I always hurry out of the church when I see him approaching the altar.’ The person who speaks in this manner shows unmistakably that he has little or no respect for the most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Have you considered what the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass really is? It is the sun of Christianity, the soul of Faith, the center of the Catholic religion, the grand object of all her rites, ceremonies, and Sacraments. The one great Sacrifice of our holy religion, that is the Mass, is holy, perfect, and in every respect complete, for by it the faithful render the highest honor to God, professing, at the same time, their own nothingness, and the supreme dominion which God has over all.”
You Can Turn the Gold of the Mass to Dirt!
St. Leonard is pretty blunt on the matter of how we treat the Mass and how we behave at Mass. Here is his warning: “Now answer me candidly, when you are going to the church to hear Mass, do you bear in mind that you are going to Calvary to be present at the Redeemer’s death? If this thought was deep in your soul, would you venture into the holy place with unbecoming gait, or in apparel that is immodest? Had Magdalene gone to the foot of the cross on Calvary, bedizened, perfumed, and with a display of finery such as she wore in the time of her sinfulness, what would have been said of her? Now what are we to say of you who go to the holy place dressed out as for some merry-making? What should be said of you if you were to profane that most august Sacrifice by unbecoming conduct, such as nods, salutations, laughter, whisperings, or, worse than all, sensuality and sacrilegious glances? Iniquity is abominable on all occasions and in all places, but the sins that are committed during Mass, and under the shadow of the altar, are sins which call down God’s signal maledictions: ‘Cursed be he who doeth the work of the Lord deceitfully’ (Jeremias 48:10). Ponder seriously now while I unfold to you other and still more marvelous excellences of this most precious treasure.”
Nothing much has changed since the days of St. Leonard! Look at how most people dress and behave in church! One would think it was a fashion parade at times! Tell me—for whom are you dressing-up so much? Is it Our Lord? Do you think He approves of all the dressing-up of the body and face? Or would He prefer to see more beauty of the soul? Furthermore, why do you seek to distract the minds and hearts of others away from God? The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass—which could be such a fruitful source of debt repayment—only serves to increase the debt for sin, rather than reduce it!
Secondly, if the Mass is the center of the Church’s life on Earth—if it is the greatest thing we have this side of Heaven—then with what dispositions do you enter the Church? With what attention do follow the ceremonies? With what fervor do you adore your God? Again, what could be a source of riches for paying our debt for sin, can easily turn out to be an increase of sin.
Are You An Adorer or A Snorer?
St. Leonard chastises those who fail to see the grandeur of the Mass: “[The priest] is not alone in this most august function, since all those who assist at Mass concur with him in offering the Holy Sacrifice; and it is on this account that the priest turns to the people and says: “Pray, brethren, that mine and your Sacrifice may be acceptable”―in order that we may understand that although he performs the part of principal minister, all those who are present make the great offering along with him. Hence, when you assist at Mass you perform to a certain extent the part of a priest. What say you now? Will you ever again dare to hear Mass sitting, whispering, looking idly about you, nay, sometimes even sleeping; contenting yourselves with reciting, thoughtlessly it may be, a few vocal prayers, heedless, entirely heedless of the tremendous office of priest which you are exercising. Alas! I cannot refrain from exclaiming: ‘Oh, stupid world, that does not estimate mysteries so sublime! How is it possible that anyone can remain in presence of the altar with a distracted mind and a dissipated heart at a moment when the angels hover there trembling and astonished, absorbed in contemplating the effects of such a stupendous work?’”
Let the Mass Be Your Protection
St. Leonard of Port Maurice stresses the power of the Mass as a shield against the wrath and punishments of God, saying: “If there were no sun in the heavens what would be the condition of this world? Alas I all would be darkness, sterility, and indescribable misery. And if we had not the Holy Mass what would become of us? Oh, wretched indeed would our condition be, deprived of every good, overwhelmed with every evil; for we should then be, as it were, a target for the thunderbolt of God’s anger. Some there are who seem astonished when they fancy that our good God has, in a certain sense, changed His mode of governing the world since the ancient times; for, in the latter He was wont to be called the God of armies, and He used to speak to the people out of the clouds with bolts of thunder in His hands; for, indeed, He punished crime with all the rigor of His justice.
“For one single adultery He put five-and-twenty thousand of the tribe of Benjamin to the sword. For an act of vainglory committed by David, in making a census of his kingdom, He sent a terrible plague, which in a very short time swept off seventy-thousand of the population. For one irreverent and incautious glance, He slew fifty-thousand of the Betsamites. And in these our times He tolerates not only vanities and frivolities, but adulteries the most sordid, scandals the most barefaced, nay, and the most frightful blasphemies which many Christians cast on His most holy Name. How then do we account for all this? Why this difference in His mode of governing? Is it because our ingratitudes are more excusable than those of our predecessors?
“Quite the contrary, indeed; for as we have received blessings far surpassing those that were conferred on the Jews in the old dispensation, so are we far more culpable than they. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the true and sole reason of such stupendous clemency, for in it we offer to the eternal Father the great victim, Jesus Christ. This is the sun of our Holy Church which dissipates the clouds and restores serenity to the heavens. This, indeed, is the celestial rainbow that stills the tempest of divine justice. For my own part, I am persuaded that, if it were not for the Holy Mass, the world would have long since tottered from its foundations, crushed beneath the enormous weight of so many accumulated iniquities. The Mass is the ponderous and powerful supporter on which the world rests—which keeps it from falling into horrid chaos. Will not this reflection convince you of the necessity of this divine Sacrifice?
“But as this alone is not enough we must know how to turn to good account the blessings which it holds out to us. Wherefore, when assisting at the Holy Sacrifice, let us bear in mind a memorable fact recorded in the life of Alfonso Albuquerque, who, with his fleet, being overtaken by a terrible storm at sea which threatened him with certain death, had recourse to the following expedient: taking a tender child that was at that moment aboard his ship, and holding him up to Heaven he exclaimed: “If we are sinners, this innocent babe surely is free from sin. O Lord for the sake of this sinless child save us, sinners, from death.” Would you believe it? God was so appeased by the sight of that pure infant that the storm was stilled, and the horror of impending death, which caused the sailors to weep and tremble, was turned into transports of joy.
“Now, what think you does the eternal Father when the priest, elevating the most holy victim of the altar exhibits to Him the innocence of His divine Son? Ah, surely His tender compassion cannot but be moved at sight of the immaculate innocence of Jesus, and surely that divine compassion must, in a certain sense, be constrained to still the fierce storms that assail us, nay, and to provide for our necessities. Ah, indeed, if it were not for this most holy victim, once offered for us on the cross, and now daily offered on our altars, we one and all might renounce all hope of Heaven and look on Hell as our final destination. Yes, assuredly, were it not for this ever blessed victim Hell, Hell should be our portion! But this treasure of the Holy Mass revives our hopes, and encourages us to look for everlasting glory in that paradise which cannot be forfeited except by our own folly and sinfulness.”
The Mass is to be Used, Not Abused!
St. Leonard shows us how to pay our debts to God through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass: “How then can we, miserable creatures, who depend on God for the very air we breathe, make any satisfaction for debts so numerous or so weighty Let me at once, therefore, point out to you the easiest way of doing so, and let me add that this way of satisfying divine justice is one which should console me, you, and all of us. Let us be diligent in hearing Mass as often as possible, and with all possible devotion; and furthermore, let us endeavor to have as many Masses as possible celebrated for our intention. By this means―be our debts weighty as they may, and countless beyond numbering―there can be no doubt that we will be able to discharge them all completely and entirely by the treasure which is derivable from the Holy Mass. And in order that you may be fully enlightened, and have a perfect knowledge of each of these debts, I will now explain them all one by one, for your edification; and here let me remark, that this mode of proceeding must afford you the greatest consolation, since it makes known to you the great practical advantages, and the inexhaustible wealth that you can draw from so rich a mine on all occasions, and in all our necessities.”
The Angelic Doctor, St. Thomas Aquinas, teaches us what are the debts that we owe to God, and he says that they are four, and that each of them is infinite.
● The first is to praise and honor the infinite majesty of God, which is eminently worthy of infinite honor and infinite praise.
● The second is to make satisfaction for all the sins we have committed.
● The third is to thank and bless God for all the benefits He has bestowed on us.
● The fourth is to supplicate Him constantly, as the giver of all good gifts.
Pay the Debt of Honoring God
The first debt by which we have bound ourselves to God is to render Him supreme honor and glory. Because God possesses infinite greatness, we are bound to return Him love, so to say, infinitely infinite. But where on Earth will we, miserable creatures, find any offering worthy of our Creator? What offering can there be worthy of God except God Himself? This is achieved in the Holy Mass, in which God is honored as he deserves to be honored, because He is honored by God Himself, that is by Jesus, who, placing Himself a victim on our altars, adores the most holy Trinity by an act of indescribable submission, such as no other can offer.
It is related of a holy woman, whose soul was intensely inflamed with love of God, that she said to God: “My God, my God! I wish that I had as many hearts and tongues as there are leaves on the trees, atoms in the air, and drops of water in the sea, to love thee as Thou deservest to be loved! Oh, that I could encircle all Earth’s creatures with my hands, and lay them at thy feet, in order that they might be inflamed with love of Thee, provided I might love Thee more intensely than them all, nay, more intensely than all the angels and saints, more than Paradise itself!”
One day, when she was expressing such like longings, she had the happiness to hear Our Lord answering her in these words: “Dear daughter, be consoled, because, by a single Mass, at which you assist devoutly, you can render to Me all that glory for which your heart is on fire, nay, and infinitely more.” Shocked? Astounded? Dumbfounded? Let us repeat it over and over again and convince our naturalistic minds and hearts, since it never can be too deeply graven on our minds and hearts: “By hearing Holy Mass with proper dispositions, we offer unto our God homage and honor that is infinite!” And since this great truth cannot be doubted, should we not congratulate ourselves on having it in our power to be able to satisfy this first debt by hearing the Holy Mass? O what a blind world! When will it open its eyes to a truth so grand and so important? And yet, alas, they foolishly say or think: “A Mass the more or a Mass the less counts for nothing!” Oh, abominable blindness!
The Debt For Our Many Sins
Our second debt or obligation to God is to satisfy His justice for the numerous and enormous sins which we have committed. Oh, what a mighty debt this is! A single mortal sin weighs so heavily in the scale of divine justice, that all the good works of all the martyrs and saints who have been, are, or ever shall be, could not satisfy for it; and yet, by means of the Holy Mass, if we but consider its intrinsic value and holiness, we are enabled to make complete satisfaction for all the sins we have committed.
Although Our Lord has been offended and outraged by our sins, yet, not content with having satisfied divine justice for us on Calvary, He has given, and continually does give us, the self-same means of satisfying it (divine justice) in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, because, by renewing in the Mass that offering which Jesus made to the eternal Father on the cross, for the sins of the whole world, that very same divine Blood, which He once poured out to ransom the human race, comes now to be applied to each and every one of us, because it is specially offered in the Mass for the sins of him who celebrates, and also for the sins of all those who assist at so tremendous a Sacrifice.
The Sacrifice of the Mass does not cancel our sins immediately by itself, as the Sacrament of Penance does, but, rather, that it cancels them by obtaining for us various most necessary aids, such as interior impulses, holy inspirations, and actual graces—all of which are needed to enable us to do true penance for our sins, either during the time of Mass or at some other opportune period. And it is for this reason that none, but God, can tell how many souls arise from the prison and chains of sin by means of the extraordinary aids which they obtain from this divine Sacrifice. St. Augustine has left on record: “Whoever hears Mass devoutly will receive great strength to avoid the commission of mortal sin, and he shall likewise obtain remission of all the venial sins that he may have committed up to that time.”
But you will then say: “Therefore, it is enough for us to assist at a single Mass, in order to get rid of all those most weighty debts we owe to God by reason of the many sins we have committed!” Do not rush to so rash a conclusion, for although the Mass is of infinite value, you must know, nevertheless, that God accepts it in a manner limited and finite, and conformably to the greater or less perfection in the dispositions of the priest who offers it, and the dsipositions of those who assist at it. Therefore a greater or lesser satisfaction for sin is obtained by the Sacrifice of the Mass, depending on the greater or lesser perfection in the dispositions of the priest who offers it and of those assisting at it.
Now, think of the stupidity of those who go in search of a Mass celebrated rapidly, or, what is worse, who assist thereat with little or no devotion; think of the culpable indifference of those who never ask to have Mass celebrated for them, and who are careless in selecting for that purpose priests who are most remarkable for their fervor and devotion. Though you should assist at as many Masses as you can, you should have more regard for the greater devotion than for the greater number, because if your devotion at one single Mass be greater than that of a man who assists at fifty, you will give more honor to God in that single one, and you will derive more benefit from it, than the other does from fifty. “In satisfaction for sin,” says St. Thomas: “the disposition of the party offering satisfaction is more regarded than the quantity of the oblation.”
The Debt of Gratitude
Our third debt is one of gratitude for the countless benefits that God has bestowed upon us. Think of the accumulation all the gifts and all the graces which you have received from God―so many gifts of nature and grace, body, soul, and senses, intellectual faculties, health, and life itself. Add to all these the Passion and Death that Jesus suffered for love of us; and then say to yourself: “Does not all this increase a thousand-fold the debt that I owe to God?”
Nothing except the Holy Mass can give due thanks to God. “What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits to me?” asks the psalmist; and then answering himself he continues: “I will take the cup of salvation,” (according to another version) “I will raise on high the chalice of the Lord”—that is, I will offer a Sacrifice most acceptable to Him, and with this alone I shall satisfy the debt of so many blessings.
Bear in mind, likewise, that this Sacrifice was instituted principally by our Redeemer for this end, namely—to acknowledge the divine beneficence and to thank it; and it is on this account that it is emphatically called Eucharist, a Greek word which means “thanksgiving” or “offering of thanks”.
It is related of the venerable sister Francesca Farnese, that her whole life was tormented by a thousand yearnings of love, because she felt that she knew not how to return adequate thanks to her Lord for the divine blessings with which He had covered her from head to foot. It was on one of those occasions, when she was lamenting her inability to offer to God the gratitude which He so eminently deserved, that the Virgin Mother appeared to her, and placed the heavenly Infant in her arms, saying: “Take Him, for He is yours, and with Him alone you will find it easy to discharge all your obligations.” In the Holy Mass we receive Christ in Holy Communion and we can give to God that same Christ in thanksgiving!
The Debt of Begging
But the infinite benefit of the Holy Mass does not end here; for it helps us pay the fourth debt which we owe to God. This debt is one which obliges you to beg from Him, incessantly, all the graces you need to reach Heaven. “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) said Our Lord. Nothing means NOTHING! He, and He alone, is the chief source of all our good, temporal as well as eternal.
“But I am sinner! I don’t deserve anything!” you will wail. True! Nevertheless, let not your heart faint, but rather be of good hope; because, if you have not deserved those graces our good Jesus has deserved them for you. He earned them on Calvary and He repeats that work in each Mass. What confidence, what hope, therefore, should we not have when we bear in mind that in the Mass Jesus Himself prays for us and offers His most Precious Blood to the eternal Father for us, and becomes our advocate?
And to summarize everything in one short sentence—the Holy Mass is the golden key of Paradise; and since the eternal Father has given us this key, what is there of all His unbounded treasures that He can refuse us? “He that spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how hath He not also, with Him, given us all things?” (Romans 8:32).
St. Jerome affirms this as certain: “Assuredly,” says the Saint, “the Lord grants all the favors for which we petition Him in the Mass, provided they be suitable to us; and what is far more admirable, He very often grants us that for which we do not petition Him, always provided that we place no obstacles to His holy designs.”
But, alas! We, miserable and thoughtless beings, by our tepidity, feeble devotion, and the scandalous immodesties which we commit over and over again while assisting at Mass, how much, O, how much do we weaken its power to help us! St. Leonard says: “Would that I could ascend to the summit of the loftiest mountain and cry aloud, so that the whole world might hear me exclaiming, Foolish, foolish people, what are ye doing? Why will you not hasten to the churches to assist at every Mass celebrated therein? Why won’t you imitate those holy angels, who according to St. John Chrysostom, descend in thousands from the heavens when Mass is being celebrated, and array themselves before our altars, covered with wings of holy awe, tarrying there during the august Sacrifice, in order to intercede more efficaciously for us, knowing well that this is the most opportune time and the most propitious occasion that can be for obtaining favors from Heaven? Ah! Are you not filled with shame and confusion when you call to mind how little value you have hitherto set upon the Holy Mass? Will you not blush for having often and often profaned this thrice sanctified oblation? But what shall I say of you, if, unhappily, you are one of those whose rash and impious tongues dare to say: “A Mass more or less counts for nothing?’”
Article 7
Thursday November 9th, 2023
Learning From Drithelm!
Thursday November 9th, 2023
Learning From Drithelm!
What a Loss!! What a Pain!!
According to common doctrine, the chief pain in Purgatory is the delay of the beatific vision. This delay is sometimes called “a temporary pain of loss” ― meaning the loss of God for a longer or shorter time. But, in the proper sense, the “pain of loss” is eternal, and hence found only in Hell.
These two pains of loss differ immensely in rigor, in duration, and in consequences. The damned have lost hope and charity; they blaspheme without ceasing; they have a will that is obstinately rooted in evil; they will never repent; they desire the damnation of everyone in a spiteful way. The souls in Purgatory have assured hope and a charity that can no longer be lost; they love God; they adore divine justice; they are confirmed in good; they repent profoundly; they love all God’s children and desire everyone’s salvation.
This delay of the beatific vision in Purgatory differs notably from that which existed in Limbo before the death of our Lord. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and the prophets, saw in this delay a punishment that was inflicted, not, properly speaking, on their person, but a punishment inflicted upon human nature not yet perfectly regenerated. The time for deliverance by Christ the Redeemer had not yet arrived. This time has now arrived. Therefore the delay in Purgatory is truly a suffering―the chief of purgatorial sufferings.
Suffering in Purgatory and Suffering on Earth
Suffering in Purgatory is greater than all suffering on Earth. Such is the doctrine of tradition, supported by theological reasoning. Tradition is expressed by St. Augustine: “That fire will be more painful than anything man can suffer in the present life.” St. Isidore speaks in the same sense. According to these testimonies and others similar to them, the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest sufferings of the present life.
St. Bonaventure says: “In the next life, by reason of the state of the souls there retained, the purifying purgatorial suffering will be, in its kind, more severe than the greatest trials on Earth.” What he means is that for one and the same sin, the smallest suffering in Purgatory is greater than any corresponding suffering on Earth. But it does not follow that the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest suffering on Earth. On this point St. Bonaventure is followed by St. Robert Bellarmine. According to Bellarmine, being deprived of the vision of God, is, without doubt, a very great suffering, but it is sweetened and consoled by the assured hope of possessing Him in the future. From this hope there arises an incredible joy, which grows in measure as the soul approaches the end of its exile.
Many theologians, especially Suarez, rightly remark that the sufferings in Purgatory―especially the delay of the beatific vision―are of a higher order than our earthly sufferings, and, in this sense, we may say that the smallest suffering in Purgatory is more severe than the greatest suffering on Earth. The joy they have in the hope of deliverance cannot diminish the suffering they feel in being deprived of the beatific vision. We see this truth in Jesus crucified―the supreme beatitude, His love of God and of souls, far from diminishing His pains, augmented them.
St. Catherine of Genoa says: “Souls in Purgatory unite great joy with great suffering. One does not diminish the other.” She continues: “No peace is comparable to that of the souls in Purgatory, except that of the saints in Heaven. On the other hand, the souls in Purgatory endure torments which no tongue can describe and no intelligence comprehend, without special revelation.” As we recall, St. Catherine of Genoa experienced on Earth the pains of Purgatory.
Tough and Kind—Severe and Loving
This testimony of tradition is illustrated by the character of great saints. While they are more severe than ordinary preachers, they also have much greater love of God and souls. They show forth, not only the justice of God, but also His boundless love. A good Christian illustrates the same truth. A Christian mother, for instance, is severe, in order to correct her children, but the element that predominates is sweetness and maternal goodness. Today, on the contrary, it often happens that many parents lack both severity and love. Those persons who do not undergo Purgatory on Earth, will have it later on at a much more severe and painful level. Nor must we make too sharp a distinction between sanctification and salvation. If we neglect sanctification, we may miss salvation itself.
Isn’t God Going Overboard with Purgatory?
Many souls are in Purgatory who have sinned only venially. Can punishment so severe be proportioned to venial sins? St. Thomas replies: “Pain corresponds less to the gravity of the sin than to the disposition of the suffering soul. One and the same sin is punished more severely in Purgatory than it is on Earth. To illustrate. A man of delicate constitution suffers a scourging far more than a hardy man.”
Why is one and the same sin punished more rigorously in Purgatory than on Earth? The Church speaks of the two comings of Christ—His first coming was in mercy, His second coming will be in justice. While we live on Earth, we live in the time of mercy—yet we have to honest, confess our sins, change our lives and do penance to profit from this “time of mercy”. In this merciful period we are able to pay for sins—not at their true value, but at a vastly reduced rate.
If we neglect, put-off, or refuse to pay now at a reduced rate, then we will have to pay what is just when Christ comes the second time to judge us upon our death. While we are in this life, we have a weak understanding of the majesty and purity of God, and so we make light of sin. But when we die, the light of God will illuminate our minds and the separated soul will know much better than it did before, that God is the one thing necessary and that sin is the greatest evil there is.
Suffering for Sin Grows with Love of God
The more saintly a soul is, the more it loves God, the more it desires to see God and the more it suffers at being delayed in that desire. Pain corresponds to desire. Souls in Purgatory, desiring the beatific vision, suffer from its delay, just as on Earth the saints desire to die and to be with God. This normal consequence of intense love. But this great pain is compensated by their greater abandonment to Providence and their greater love of divine justice.
Suffering for sin grows with love of God. The reason you don’t feel the gravity of your past sins is that you only have a small love of God. Likewise the reason you complain when Divine Providence makes you suffer for your past sins is your small love of God. The more we love, then the more we weep over having offended the object of our love—God. The more we love, the more we want to make reparation and so the more we are prepared to suffer. We see this reflected somewhat in the chilling story of Drithelm, a good Christian who died and was resurrected to live out his Purgatory on Earth.
The Life of Drithelm
Fr. Schouppe writes:
If the pain of loss makes but a feeble impression upon us, it is far different with the pain of sense; the torment of fire, the torture of a sharp and intense cold, affrights our sensibility. This is why Divine Mercy, wishing to excite a holy fear in our souls, speaks but little of the pain of loss, but we are continually shown the fire, the cold, and other torments, which constitute the pain of sense. This is what we see in the Gospel, and in particular revelations, by which God is pleased to manifest to His servants from time to time the mysteries of the other life.
St. Robert Bellarmine and St. Bede testify…
Let us mention one of these revelations. In the first place, let us see what the pious and learned Cardinal St. Robert Bellarmine quotes from the Venerable St. Bede. England has been witness in our own days, writes St. Bede, to a singular prodigy, which may be compared to the miracles of the first ages of the Church. To excite the living to fear the death of the soul, God permitted that a man, after having slept the sleep of death, should return to life and reveal what he had seen in the other world. The frightful, unheard-of details which he relates, and his life of extraordinary penance, which corresponded with his words, produced a lively impression throughout the country. I will now resume the principal circumstances of this history.
Drithelm was a Good Christian
There was in Northumberland, the north-east of England, a man named Drithelm, who, with his family, led a most Christian life. He fell sick, and his malady increasing day by day, he was soon reduced to extremity, and died, to the great desolation and grief of his wife and children.
The latter passed the night in tears by the remains, but the following day, before his interment, they saw him suddenly return to life, arise, and place himself in a sitting posture. At this sight they were seized with such fear that they all took to flight, with the exception of the wife, who, trembling, remained alone with her risen husband.
He reassured her immediately: “Fear not!” he said; “It is God who restores to me my life! He wishes to show in my person a man raised from the dead. I have yet long to live upon Earth, but my new life will be very different from the one I led heretofore.”
Resurrected and Penitent
Then he arose full of health, went straight to the chapel or church of the place, and there remained long in prayer. He returned home only to take leave of those who had been dear to him upon Earth, to whom he declared that he would live only to prepare himself for death, and advised them to do likewise. Then, having divided his property into three parts, he gave one to his children, another to his wife, and reserved the third part to give in alms.
When he had distributed all to the poor, and had reduced himself to extreme poverty, he went and knocked at the door of a monastery, and begged the Abbot to receive him as a penitent Religious, who would be a servant to all the others.
Unbelievable Penances
The Abbot gave him a retired cell, which he occupied for the rest of his life. Three exercises divided his time prayer, the hardest labor, and extraordinary penances. The most rigorous fasts he accounted as nothing. In winter he was seen to plunge himself into frozen water, and remain there for hours and hours in prayer, whilst he recited the whole 150 psalms from the Psalter of David.
The mortified life of Drithelm, his downcast eyes, even his features, indicated a soul struck with fear of the judgments of God. He kept a perpetual silence, but on being pressed to relate, for the edification of others, what God had manifested to him after his death, he thus described his vision:
Drithelm Tells of His Vision
“On leaving my body, I was received by a benevolent person, who took me under his guidance. His face was brilliant, and he appeared surrounded with light. He arrived at a large deep valley of immense extent, all fire on one side, all ice and snow on the other; on the one hand braziers and caldrons of flame, on the other the most intense cold and the blast of a glacial wind.
“This mysterious valley was filled with innumerable souls, which, tossed as by a furious tempest, threw themselves from one side to the other. When they could no longer endure the violence of the fire, they sought relief amidst the ice and snow; but finding only a new torture, they cast themselves again into the midst of the flames.
“I contemplated in a stupor these continual vicissitudes of horrible torments, and as far as my sight could extend, I saw nothing but a multitude of souls which suffered without ever having repose. Their very aspect inspired me with fear. I thought at first that I saw Hell―but my guide, who walked before me, turned to me and said, ‘No; this is not, as you think, the Hell of the reprobate. Do you know, he continued, what place this is?’ ‘No,’ I answered. ‘Know,’ he resumed, ‘that this valley, where you see so much fire and so much ice, is the place where the souls of those are punished who, during life, have neglected to confess their sins, and who have deferred their conversion to the end. Thanks to a special mercy of God, they have had the happiness of sincerely repenting before death, of confessing and detesting their sins. This is why they are not damned, and on the great Day of Judgment will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Several of them will obtain their deliverance before that time, by the merits of prayers, alms, and fasts, offered in their favor by the living, and especially in virtue of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass offered for their relief.’”
Such was the recital of Drithelm. When asked why he so rudely treated his body, why he plunged himself into frozen water, he replied that he had seen other torments, and cold of another kind.
If his brethren expressed astonishment that he could endure these extraordinary austerities, “I have seen,” said he, “penances still more astonishing!” To the day when it pleased God to call him to Himself, he ceased not to afflict his body, and although broken down with age, he would accept no alleviation.
Drithelm’s Life Produced Many Conversions
This event produced a deep sensation in England; a great number of sinners, touched by the words of Drithelm, and struck by the austerity of his life, became sincerely converted.
This fact, adds St. Robert Bellarmine, appears to me of incontestable truth, since, besides being conformable to the words of Holy Scripture, “Let him pass from the snow waters to excessive heat” (Job 29:19), the Venerable St. Bede relates it as a recent and well-known event. More than this, it was followed by the conversion of a great number of sinners, the sign of the work of God, who is accustomed to work prodigies in order to produce fruit in souls.
A Question of Penance
We are sinners and sinners must do penance! “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves!” (1 John 1:8). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32). “Do penance: for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance!” (Matthew 3:8). “Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein were done the most of his miracles, for that they had not done penance” (Matthew 11:20). “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Questions To Ask Yourself
(1) Do I REALLY WANT to change my life? This is a crucial question! Before performing some of His miracles, Our Lord would sometimes ask: “If you WANT!” We have to WANT to do something first before we DO it.
And then there are degrees of HOW MUCH we want something. We see this in the words of Our Lord to the young man who had many possessions. The young man WANTED to go to Heaven, but he also WANTED TO DO THE MINIMUM to get there. To his question on what he had to DO to get there, Our Lord said: “If you WANT to enter into life, keep the commandments!” (Matthew 19:17).
But then Our Lord tries to encourage him from merely doing the MINUMUM into doing the MAXIMUM, in other words to increase his desire, to increase his want. “Jesus said to him: ‘If you WANT to be perfect, go sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions.” (Matthew 19:21-22).
(2) Do I WANT to give myself entirely to God, Jesus and Mary? Do I REALLY WANT to give myself to them? Or am I attached to myself and the world so much, that what I am REALLY WANTING is to both save my soul, yet still remain attached to myself and things of this life?
This is the case with most people! They are primarily concerned about themselves and the world, they want dual-citizenship! They want to be ‘good’ citizens of the world, and ‘good’ citizens of Heaven.
Yet Our Lord said: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not life more than the meat; and the body more than the clothing?” (Matthew 6:24-25).
(3) We all know the saying: “He who desires the end, must necessarily desire the means to that end!” We know that is true in theory, just like we know we cannot serve God and mammon in theory; but, in practice, are we seeking to do the opposite?
Like most of the world, WE WANT THINGS FOR FREE! We want to get to Heaven; we want to avoid Hell; we want to save our souls—but we don’t want to do ALL that it takes to get there! We want a discount; we want a reduced fare; we want a ‘freebie’ if at all possible!
This is what the young man with many possessions wanted, and he could not bring himself round to sacrificing what Jesus asked for! It says in the Gospel that Jesus LOVED him! He must have sensed Jesus’ love in some way; yet he preferred his petty possessions (creatures) to Jesus (the Creator).
Sadly, most of us are the same. We may even ask the same question as Jesus’ followers asked, who had witnessed the encounter with the rich young man: “The disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’” (Matthew 19:25). Jesus replied: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:28).
So, the good news is that IF WE NO LONGER WANT TO BE LIKE THAT; IF WE WANT TO CHANGE, even though we may FEEL powerless to change, then Jesus, through His Holy Mother, will bring about that miracle of grace within you. You have to WANT and you have to ASK! The grace will then come to help you DO, not without any pain, but it will help you with the pain too!
Make Resolutions
(1) I will not be discouraged by what I may see in examining myself and my surroundings. Discouragement comes from the devil, not from God. Discouragement is the devil’s chief weapon of paralysis.
(2) I will realize that without God I can do nothing — “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) — yet with the help of God, anything and everything is possible — “with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:28).
(3) So even though I may FEEL that I don’t want to change, or if I may FEEL that I am not able to change, I will nevertheless ASK TO CHANGE, knowing that Our Lady of Fatima said that we can obtain all things through the Rosary. However, our Rosaries need to IMPROVE; we need to PRAY the Rosary more and SAY it less; we need to put more ATTENTION and more FERVOR into our Rosaries, remembering the words of St. Louis de Montfort, who says:
“In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin” (The Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-Second Rose”).
According to common doctrine, the chief pain in Purgatory is the delay of the beatific vision. This delay is sometimes called “a temporary pain of loss” ― meaning the loss of God for a longer or shorter time. But, in the proper sense, the “pain of loss” is eternal, and hence found only in Hell.
These two pains of loss differ immensely in rigor, in duration, and in consequences. The damned have lost hope and charity; they blaspheme without ceasing; they have a will that is obstinately rooted in evil; they will never repent; they desire the damnation of everyone in a spiteful way. The souls in Purgatory have assured hope and a charity that can no longer be lost; they love God; they adore divine justice; they are confirmed in good; they repent profoundly; they love all God’s children and desire everyone’s salvation.
This delay of the beatific vision in Purgatory differs notably from that which existed in Limbo before the death of our Lord. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and the prophets, saw in this delay a punishment that was inflicted, not, properly speaking, on their person, but a punishment inflicted upon human nature not yet perfectly regenerated. The time for deliverance by Christ the Redeemer had not yet arrived. This time has now arrived. Therefore the delay in Purgatory is truly a suffering―the chief of purgatorial sufferings.
Suffering in Purgatory and Suffering on Earth
Suffering in Purgatory is greater than all suffering on Earth. Such is the doctrine of tradition, supported by theological reasoning. Tradition is expressed by St. Augustine: “That fire will be more painful than anything man can suffer in the present life.” St. Isidore speaks in the same sense. According to these testimonies and others similar to them, the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest sufferings of the present life.
St. Bonaventure says: “In the next life, by reason of the state of the souls there retained, the purifying purgatorial suffering will be, in its kind, more severe than the greatest trials on Earth.” What he means is that for one and the same sin, the smallest suffering in Purgatory is greater than any corresponding suffering on Earth. But it does not follow that the least pain in Purgatory surpasses the greatest suffering on Earth. On this point St. Bonaventure is followed by St. Robert Bellarmine. According to Bellarmine, being deprived of the vision of God, is, without doubt, a very great suffering, but it is sweetened and consoled by the assured hope of possessing Him in the future. From this hope there arises an incredible joy, which grows in measure as the soul approaches the end of its exile.
Many theologians, especially Suarez, rightly remark that the sufferings in Purgatory―especially the delay of the beatific vision―are of a higher order than our earthly sufferings, and, in this sense, we may say that the smallest suffering in Purgatory is more severe than the greatest suffering on Earth. The joy they have in the hope of deliverance cannot diminish the suffering they feel in being deprived of the beatific vision. We see this truth in Jesus crucified―the supreme beatitude, His love of God and of souls, far from diminishing His pains, augmented them.
St. Catherine of Genoa says: “Souls in Purgatory unite great joy with great suffering. One does not diminish the other.” She continues: “No peace is comparable to that of the souls in Purgatory, except that of the saints in Heaven. On the other hand, the souls in Purgatory endure torments which no tongue can describe and no intelligence comprehend, without special revelation.” As we recall, St. Catherine of Genoa experienced on Earth the pains of Purgatory.
Tough and Kind—Severe and Loving
This testimony of tradition is illustrated by the character of great saints. While they are more severe than ordinary preachers, they also have much greater love of God and souls. They show forth, not only the justice of God, but also His boundless love. A good Christian illustrates the same truth. A Christian mother, for instance, is severe, in order to correct her children, but the element that predominates is sweetness and maternal goodness. Today, on the contrary, it often happens that many parents lack both severity and love. Those persons who do not undergo Purgatory on Earth, will have it later on at a much more severe and painful level. Nor must we make too sharp a distinction between sanctification and salvation. If we neglect sanctification, we may miss salvation itself.
Isn’t God Going Overboard with Purgatory?
Many souls are in Purgatory who have sinned only venially. Can punishment so severe be proportioned to venial sins? St. Thomas replies: “Pain corresponds less to the gravity of the sin than to the disposition of the suffering soul. One and the same sin is punished more severely in Purgatory than it is on Earth. To illustrate. A man of delicate constitution suffers a scourging far more than a hardy man.”
Why is one and the same sin punished more rigorously in Purgatory than on Earth? The Church speaks of the two comings of Christ—His first coming was in mercy, His second coming will be in justice. While we live on Earth, we live in the time of mercy—yet we have to honest, confess our sins, change our lives and do penance to profit from this “time of mercy”. In this merciful period we are able to pay for sins—not at their true value, but at a vastly reduced rate.
If we neglect, put-off, or refuse to pay now at a reduced rate, then we will have to pay what is just when Christ comes the second time to judge us upon our death. While we are in this life, we have a weak understanding of the majesty and purity of God, and so we make light of sin. But when we die, the light of God will illuminate our minds and the separated soul will know much better than it did before, that God is the one thing necessary and that sin is the greatest evil there is.
Suffering for Sin Grows with Love of God
The more saintly a soul is, the more it loves God, the more it desires to see God and the more it suffers at being delayed in that desire. Pain corresponds to desire. Souls in Purgatory, desiring the beatific vision, suffer from its delay, just as on Earth the saints desire to die and to be with God. This normal consequence of intense love. But this great pain is compensated by their greater abandonment to Providence and their greater love of divine justice.
Suffering for sin grows with love of God. The reason you don’t feel the gravity of your past sins is that you only have a small love of God. Likewise the reason you complain when Divine Providence makes you suffer for your past sins is your small love of God. The more we love, then the more we weep over having offended the object of our love—God. The more we love, the more we want to make reparation and so the more we are prepared to suffer. We see this reflected somewhat in the chilling story of Drithelm, a good Christian who died and was resurrected to live out his Purgatory on Earth.
The Life of Drithelm
Fr. Schouppe writes:
If the pain of loss makes but a feeble impression upon us, it is far different with the pain of sense; the torment of fire, the torture of a sharp and intense cold, affrights our sensibility. This is why Divine Mercy, wishing to excite a holy fear in our souls, speaks but little of the pain of loss, but we are continually shown the fire, the cold, and other torments, which constitute the pain of sense. This is what we see in the Gospel, and in particular revelations, by which God is pleased to manifest to His servants from time to time the mysteries of the other life.
St. Robert Bellarmine and St. Bede testify…
Let us mention one of these revelations. In the first place, let us see what the pious and learned Cardinal St. Robert Bellarmine quotes from the Venerable St. Bede. England has been witness in our own days, writes St. Bede, to a singular prodigy, which may be compared to the miracles of the first ages of the Church. To excite the living to fear the death of the soul, God permitted that a man, after having slept the sleep of death, should return to life and reveal what he had seen in the other world. The frightful, unheard-of details which he relates, and his life of extraordinary penance, which corresponded with his words, produced a lively impression throughout the country. I will now resume the principal circumstances of this history.
Drithelm was a Good Christian
There was in Northumberland, the north-east of England, a man named Drithelm, who, with his family, led a most Christian life. He fell sick, and his malady increasing day by day, he was soon reduced to extremity, and died, to the great desolation and grief of his wife and children.
The latter passed the night in tears by the remains, but the following day, before his interment, they saw him suddenly return to life, arise, and place himself in a sitting posture. At this sight they were seized with such fear that they all took to flight, with the exception of the wife, who, trembling, remained alone with her risen husband.
He reassured her immediately: “Fear not!” he said; “It is God who restores to me my life! He wishes to show in my person a man raised from the dead. I have yet long to live upon Earth, but my new life will be very different from the one I led heretofore.”
Resurrected and Penitent
Then he arose full of health, went straight to the chapel or church of the place, and there remained long in prayer. He returned home only to take leave of those who had been dear to him upon Earth, to whom he declared that he would live only to prepare himself for death, and advised them to do likewise. Then, having divided his property into three parts, he gave one to his children, another to his wife, and reserved the third part to give in alms.
When he had distributed all to the poor, and had reduced himself to extreme poverty, he went and knocked at the door of a monastery, and begged the Abbot to receive him as a penitent Religious, who would be a servant to all the others.
Unbelievable Penances
The Abbot gave him a retired cell, which he occupied for the rest of his life. Three exercises divided his time prayer, the hardest labor, and extraordinary penances. The most rigorous fasts he accounted as nothing. In winter he was seen to plunge himself into frozen water, and remain there for hours and hours in prayer, whilst he recited the whole 150 psalms from the Psalter of David.
The mortified life of Drithelm, his downcast eyes, even his features, indicated a soul struck with fear of the judgments of God. He kept a perpetual silence, but on being pressed to relate, for the edification of others, what God had manifested to him after his death, he thus described his vision:
Drithelm Tells of His Vision
“On leaving my body, I was received by a benevolent person, who took me under his guidance. His face was brilliant, and he appeared surrounded with light. He arrived at a large deep valley of immense extent, all fire on one side, all ice and snow on the other; on the one hand braziers and caldrons of flame, on the other the most intense cold and the blast of a glacial wind.
“This mysterious valley was filled with innumerable souls, which, tossed as by a furious tempest, threw themselves from one side to the other. When they could no longer endure the violence of the fire, they sought relief amidst the ice and snow; but finding only a new torture, they cast themselves again into the midst of the flames.
“I contemplated in a stupor these continual vicissitudes of horrible torments, and as far as my sight could extend, I saw nothing but a multitude of souls which suffered without ever having repose. Their very aspect inspired me with fear. I thought at first that I saw Hell―but my guide, who walked before me, turned to me and said, ‘No; this is not, as you think, the Hell of the reprobate. Do you know, he continued, what place this is?’ ‘No,’ I answered. ‘Know,’ he resumed, ‘that this valley, where you see so much fire and so much ice, is the place where the souls of those are punished who, during life, have neglected to confess their sins, and who have deferred their conversion to the end. Thanks to a special mercy of God, they have had the happiness of sincerely repenting before death, of confessing and detesting their sins. This is why they are not damned, and on the great Day of Judgment will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Several of them will obtain their deliverance before that time, by the merits of prayers, alms, and fasts, offered in their favor by the living, and especially in virtue of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass offered for their relief.’”
Such was the recital of Drithelm. When asked why he so rudely treated his body, why he plunged himself into frozen water, he replied that he had seen other torments, and cold of another kind.
If his brethren expressed astonishment that he could endure these extraordinary austerities, “I have seen,” said he, “penances still more astonishing!” To the day when it pleased God to call him to Himself, he ceased not to afflict his body, and although broken down with age, he would accept no alleviation.
Drithelm’s Life Produced Many Conversions
This event produced a deep sensation in England; a great number of sinners, touched by the words of Drithelm, and struck by the austerity of his life, became sincerely converted.
This fact, adds St. Robert Bellarmine, appears to me of incontestable truth, since, besides being conformable to the words of Holy Scripture, “Let him pass from the snow waters to excessive heat” (Job 29:19), the Venerable St. Bede relates it as a recent and well-known event. More than this, it was followed by the conversion of a great number of sinners, the sign of the work of God, who is accustomed to work prodigies in order to produce fruit in souls.
A Question of Penance
We are sinners and sinners must do penance! “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves!” (1 John 1:8). “I came not to call the just, but sinners to penance” (Luke 5:32). “Do penance: for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2). “Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance!” (Matthew 3:8). “Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein were done the most of his miracles, for that they had not done penance” (Matthew 11:20). “I say to you―unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3).
Questions To Ask Yourself
(1) Do I REALLY WANT to change my life? This is a crucial question! Before performing some of His miracles, Our Lord would sometimes ask: “If you WANT!” We have to WANT to do something first before we DO it.
And then there are degrees of HOW MUCH we want something. We see this in the words of Our Lord to the young man who had many possessions. The young man WANTED to go to Heaven, but he also WANTED TO DO THE MINIMUM to get there. To his question on what he had to DO to get there, Our Lord said: “If you WANT to enter into life, keep the commandments!” (Matthew 19:17).
But then Our Lord tries to encourage him from merely doing the MINUMUM into doing the MAXIMUM, in other words to increase his desire, to increase his want. “Jesus said to him: ‘If you WANT to be perfect, go sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in Heaven: and come follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, he went away sad: for he had great possessions.” (Matthew 19:21-22).
(2) Do I WANT to give myself entirely to God, Jesus and Mary? Do I REALLY WANT to give myself to them? Or am I attached to myself and the world so much, that what I am REALLY WANTING is to both save my soul, yet still remain attached to myself and things of this life?
This is the case with most people! They are primarily concerned about themselves and the world, they want dual-citizenship! They want to be ‘good’ citizens of the world, and ‘good’ citizens of Heaven.
Yet Our Lord said: “No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not life more than the meat; and the body more than the clothing?” (Matthew 6:24-25).
(3) We all know the saying: “He who desires the end, must necessarily desire the means to that end!” We know that is true in theory, just like we know we cannot serve God and mammon in theory; but, in practice, are we seeking to do the opposite?
Like most of the world, WE WANT THINGS FOR FREE! We want to get to Heaven; we want to avoid Hell; we want to save our souls—but we don’t want to do ALL that it takes to get there! We want a discount; we want a reduced fare; we want a ‘freebie’ if at all possible!
This is what the young man with many possessions wanted, and he could not bring himself round to sacrificing what Jesus asked for! It says in the Gospel that Jesus LOVED him! He must have sensed Jesus’ love in some way; yet he preferred his petty possessions (creatures) to Jesus (the Creator).
Sadly, most of us are the same. We may even ask the same question as Jesus’ followers asked, who had witnessed the encounter with the rich young man: “The disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’” (Matthew 19:25). Jesus replied: “With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:28).
So, the good news is that IF WE NO LONGER WANT TO BE LIKE THAT; IF WE WANT TO CHANGE, even though we may FEEL powerless to change, then Jesus, through His Holy Mother, will bring about that miracle of grace within you. You have to WANT and you have to ASK! The grace will then come to help you DO, not without any pain, but it will help you with the pain too!
Make Resolutions
(1) I will not be discouraged by what I may see in examining myself and my surroundings. Discouragement comes from the devil, not from God. Discouragement is the devil’s chief weapon of paralysis.
(2) I will realize that without God I can do nothing — “Without Me, you can do nothing!” (John 15:5) — yet with the help of God, anything and everything is possible — “with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:28).
(3) So even though I may FEEL that I don’t want to change, or if I may FEEL that I am not able to change, I will nevertheless ASK TO CHANGE, knowing that Our Lady of Fatima said that we can obtain all things through the Rosary. However, our Rosaries need to IMPROVE; we need to PRAY the Rosary more and SAY it less; we need to put more ATTENTION and more FERVOR into our Rosaries, remembering the words of St. Louis de Montfort, who says:
“In order to pray well, it is not enough to give expression to our petitions by means of that most excellent of all prayers, the Rosary, but we must also pray with great attention, for God listens more to the voice of the heart than that of the mouth. To be guilty of willful distractions during prayer would show a great lack of respect and reverence; it would make our Rosaries unfruitful and make us guilty of sin” (The Secret of the Rosary, “Forty-Second Rose”).
Article 6
Wednesday November 8th, 2023
A Better Way to Burn!
Wednesday November 8th, 2023
A Better Way to Burn!
Why Burn in Purgatory if You Can Burn for Less Now?
What’s the point of paying for something with ‘big-bucks’ when you pay for it for mere cents on a dollar? Sure it’s discouraging to read about Purgatory—but there would be no worry about Purgatory if we would only do what we should be doing here below! Why burn in Purgatory when you can burn at a lower temperature and for a shorter time here below? What are we talking about? Well, the prayer that most of us probably say every day—or at least most days—gives us the answer: “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of Thy love!” Love is the word—love is a fire. Our Lord Himself showed us this imagery and reality in His apparition to St. Margaret Mary.
Mercy Depends on Love
Love is the pinnacle of all virtues—”the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13)—and as such it deserves to be honored above all the others. Therefore, in Our Lord, we honor and adore His Sacred Heart which is the seat of His love for mankind. Mercy is a property or a child of love. St. Thomas Aquinas deals of Mercy under his section on Charity. As Psalm 144 says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). The Sacred Heart is all about those two pinnacles within God—His Love and His Mercy.
Our Lord Himself indicated this in His apparitions to St. Margaret Mary, especially in the fourth, called the “Great Apparition”. To what did He draw attention in the first place? To the Heart that beats in His breast and to the flames of love that surrounded that Heart. St. Margaret Mary says: “Discovering to me His Heart, He said to me: ‘Behold this Heart ...’” And what did He declare concerning this Heart? That It ineffably loves us and is sensible to the manner in which men repay Its love: “Behold this Heart which has so loved men. ... And in return I receive from the greater part of them nothing but ingratitude.”
What would the reward if men would only love the Heart that loved them? The reward would be mercy! As Jesus said of St. Mary Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). Holy Scripture further cements this: “Charity covereth all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
Pre-Purgatorial Personal Payment Plan
We can choose our own payment plan for our sins—we can learn to truly and effectively love God here below, or we can learn in fires of Purgatory. Either way we burn, but burning now—with love—is better than burning later—in pain! “What will you? Shall I come to you with a rod; or in charity?” (1 Corinthians 4:21). In both places we will have to suffer—both here below and in the fires of Purgatory. Suffering is part of the master plan—”If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). “For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake” (Acts 9:16). “He must suffer many things and be despised” (Mark 9:11).
To which St. Paul adds: “If we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified with Him” (Romans 8:17). “In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed; we are straitened, but are not destitute. We suffer persecution, but are not forsaken; we are cast down, but we perish not … For that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, worketh for us above measure exceedingly an eternal weight of glory” (1 Corinthians 4:8-9, 17). In other words, St. Paul says that whatever we suffer here below is only for a short time and is relatively light—compared to Purgatory—and it brings for us eternal glory while reducing our temporal punishment.
Thou Shalt Love!
“Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength”(Deuteronomy 6:4‑5). To refuse to love, is to disobey God. Thou shalt love—or else. The Crisis of Faith in our thinking today, manifests itself as a Crisis of Love in our wills. Not believing, we can’t love; not loving, we stop believing. All God’s lesser commandments depend on His command to love. To disobey it, disqualifies us for all other tests, whereas obeying it, automatically leads us to do everything God wants us to do, and to avoid everything He doesn’t want us to do.
God is Love
God Himself is Charity, He is Charity Itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). This charity God has shown to a world that has not deserved or merited it—it is not as though we had something first, that necessitated God to repay. “Who hath first given to Him, and recompense shall be made him?” (Romans 11:35). In fact, the world, by its sins, was more deserving of punishment and damnation than it was deserving of God’s charity! Yet that did not extinguish the charity of God.
A New Heart
“But I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first charity”(Apocalypse 2:4). “Justify not thyself before God, for he knoweth the heart” (Ecclesiasticus 7:5). “The imagination and thought of man’s heart are prone to evil from his youth” (Genesis 8:21). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “Be mindful therefore from whence thou art fallen: and do penance, and do the first works. Or else I come to thee, and will move thy candlestick out of its place, except thou do penance” (Apocalypse 2:4-5). “Return to the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy soul” (Deuteronomy 30:10).”Not serving to the eye, as it were pleasing men, but, as the servants of Christ doing the will of God from the heart” (Ephesians 6:6). “Covet ye therefore My words, and love them, and you shall have instruction” (Wisdom 6:12).
“Create a clean heart in me, O God: and renew a right spirit within my bowels”(Psalm 50:12). “And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26). “God hath softened my heart, and the Almighty hath troubled me” (Job 23:16). “A contrite and humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise” (Psalm 50:19). “God gave unto him another heart” (1 Kings 10:9).
Let us take the words of God to heart! Let us beg Him to give us new heart! Let us admit that our present hearts are more often than not like stone, cold and hard! He who can change bread into His Flesh, can also change our hearts of stone into hearts of flesh. Ask, and you shall receive!
Spiritual Cardiac Arrest
We have all, more or less, become spiritual cardiac patients, our every move is conditioned by the dread possibility of imminent spiritual heart failure. Loving in the face of the malice that confronts us at every turn, is such uphill work, so great a strain, only the force and power of a divine command, driving us from behind, could keep us at it. Reason alone would tell us to relax. Lots of us have, and that hasn’t helped our environment, nor our spiritual life!
Once we lose that spark of love, and become lukewarm, it can be very, very difficult to regain the former level of love. We must guard and feed our love of God just like the ancients would zealously guard and feed their fires. They knew how difficult it was to create that first spark that led to the fire being kindled, so they give their utmost attention and care to preserving the fire that cost so much effort in the first place.
Love is at the Heart of the Answer
The heart of our spiritual life is love. Love is and has to be the soul of all that we do. “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Therefore, once again: “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14) because “Charity covereth all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
Two Extremes
If there is one problem that hits most besieges most souls it is their attitude to the mercy of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Some are very presumptuous in heart, thinking that they can sin as much as they want and forgiveness will be automatically given; others tend to lose heart, thinking themselves unworthy of His mercy.
Do You Love Me?
“Jesus said to Simon Peter: ‘Simon son of John, lovest thou Me more than these?’ Peter said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord! Thou knowest that I love Thee!’” (John 21:15). Do we love Him “more than these”—more than all these things and distractions that surround us in this world? If we wish to avoid Purgatory through our burning love, then it has to be a love that corresponds to what Our Lord and Holy Scripture commands and demands: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). Purgatory comes about because souls fail to keep and honor those basic commands and demands. They only love God half-heartedly and they love the world sometimes wholeheartedly!
Love is Tough!
It’s hard to love. These days it doesn’t seem to come naturally any more—if it ever did. One act of perfect love of God can wipe away all the guilt and debt of temporal punishment due to sin—no matter how much one has sinned! Yet that act of perfect love, though not impossible, is not easy. We love the persons, places and things of this world more than we love God—or at least our love for them is more vehement than is our love of God. As Our Lord warned us, towards the End Times, evil would be so rampant that charity would grow cold: “Because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). As the fires of charity grow colder, the fires of Purgatory are being stoked up to be hotter.
There Can Be No Love Without Penance
If we have done wrong to someone we love, then we must make reparation. This is almost an absolute prerequisite of love. The souls in Purgatory are there because they wanted to love God without doing enough reparation or penance for having previously offended Him. Our Lord Himself warned us: “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” and Jesus repeats Himself two verses later: “I say to you; except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). “Therefore, saith the Lord God, be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities: and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:30). “Hear, I beseech you, My words, and do penance!” (Job 21:2).
Our Lord complained, already in His own day, that too few were doing penance: “Woe to thee, Corozain, woe to thee, Bethsaida! For if in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the mighty works that have been wrought in you, then they would have done penance long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes!” (Luke 10:13). “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23).
St. John the Baptist, even before Jesus’ Public Ministry began, was preaching penance in the desert: “The word of the Lord was made unto John, the son of Zachary, in the desert. And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of penance for the remission of sins” (Luke 3:2-3).
Our Lord sent out His disciples to preach penance: “Jesus called the Twelve; and began to send them two and two and gave them power over unclean spirits … and He said to them: ‘Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear you; going forth from thence, shake off the dust from your feet for a testimony to them!’ And, going forth, they preached that men should do penance” (Mark 6:7-12). When the Apostles, despite being given power over devils, had failed to cast out a devil from a boy, they asked Our Lord why they had failed. He replied: “This kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting” – in other words, prayer and penance (Matthew 17:20). This is why Our Lady, at Fatima, asks for the Rosary and sacrifices – in other words, prayer and penance.
Let us take a cue the example quoted from Holy Scripture: “He prayed to the Lord his God and did penance exceedingly” (2 Paralipomenon 33:12). “Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes!” (Job 42:6).
What Is Love?
What does it mean to love to Jesus? The first level of love is to keep His commandments: “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). Fr. Tanquerey, in his renowned classic The Spiritual Life, writes:
Lowest Level of Love: “The chief care of beginners is that of preserving charity. Their efforts, then, are directed toward the avoidance of sin, above all, mortal sin, and toward the conquest of evil inclinations, of the passions, and of all that could make them lose the love of God. This is the purgative way, the end of which is the purification of the soul.
Middle Level of Love: “The chief concern of those already advanced, the proficients, is progress in the positive exercise of the virtues and growth in charity. The heart, already purified, is all the more open to divine light and to the love of God. The soul wishes to follow Jesus and to imitate His virtues, and since by following Him one walks in the Light, this is called the illuminative way. Here the soul strives to avoid not only mortal, but even venial sin.
Highest Level of Love: “Perfect souls have but one concern―which is to cling to God and to take their delight in Him. Ever seeking to unite themselves to God, they are in the unitive way. Sin fills them with horror, for they fear to displease God and to offend Him. The virtues that most attract them are the theological virtues, which unite them to God. Hence, the Earth seems to them an exile, and, like St. Paul, they long to die, so as to be joined to Christ.” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §§ 341-343).
“And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26). “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of Thy love!” So that “charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
What’s the point of paying for something with ‘big-bucks’ when you pay for it for mere cents on a dollar? Sure it’s discouraging to read about Purgatory—but there would be no worry about Purgatory if we would only do what we should be doing here below! Why burn in Purgatory when you can burn at a lower temperature and for a shorter time here below? What are we talking about? Well, the prayer that most of us probably say every day—or at least most days—gives us the answer: “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of Thy love!” Love is the word—love is a fire. Our Lord Himself showed us this imagery and reality in His apparition to St. Margaret Mary.
Mercy Depends on Love
Love is the pinnacle of all virtues—”the greatest of these is Charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13)—and as such it deserves to be honored above all the others. Therefore, in Our Lord, we honor and adore His Sacred Heart which is the seat of His love for mankind. Mercy is a property or a child of love. St. Thomas Aquinas deals of Mercy under his section on Charity. As Psalm 144 says: “The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy. The Lord is sweet to all: and His tender mercies are over all His works” (Psalm 144:8-9). The Sacred Heart is all about those two pinnacles within God—His Love and His Mercy.
Our Lord Himself indicated this in His apparitions to St. Margaret Mary, especially in the fourth, called the “Great Apparition”. To what did He draw attention in the first place? To the Heart that beats in His breast and to the flames of love that surrounded that Heart. St. Margaret Mary says: “Discovering to me His Heart, He said to me: ‘Behold this Heart ...’” And what did He declare concerning this Heart? That It ineffably loves us and is sensible to the manner in which men repay Its love: “Behold this Heart which has so loved men. ... And in return I receive from the greater part of them nothing but ingratitude.”
What would the reward if men would only love the Heart that loved them? The reward would be mercy! As Jesus said of St. Mary Magdalen: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47). Holy Scripture further cements this: “Charity covereth all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
Pre-Purgatorial Personal Payment Plan
We can choose our own payment plan for our sins—we can learn to truly and effectively love God here below, or we can learn in fires of Purgatory. Either way we burn, but burning now—with love—is better than burning later—in pain! “What will you? Shall I come to you with a rod; or in charity?” (1 Corinthians 4:21). In both places we will have to suffer—both here below and in the fires of Purgatory. Suffering is part of the master plan—”If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). “For I will show him how great things he must suffer for My Name’s sake” (Acts 9:16). “He must suffer many things and be despised” (Mark 9:11).
To which St. Paul adds: “If we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified with Him” (Romans 8:17). “In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed; we are straitened, but are not destitute. We suffer persecution, but are not forsaken; we are cast down, but we perish not … For that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, worketh for us above measure exceedingly an eternal weight of glory” (1 Corinthians 4:8-9, 17). In other words, St. Paul says that whatever we suffer here below is only for a short time and is relatively light—compared to Purgatory—and it brings for us eternal glory while reducing our temporal punishment.
Thou Shalt Love!
“Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength”(Deuteronomy 6:4‑5). To refuse to love, is to disobey God. Thou shalt love—or else. The Crisis of Faith in our thinking today, manifests itself as a Crisis of Love in our wills. Not believing, we can’t love; not loving, we stop believing. All God’s lesser commandments depend on His command to love. To disobey it, disqualifies us for all other tests, whereas obeying it, automatically leads us to do everything God wants us to do, and to avoid everything He doesn’t want us to do.
God is Love
God Himself is Charity, He is Charity Itself: “God is charity” (1 John 4:8). This charity God has shown to a world that has not deserved or merited it—it is not as though we had something first, that necessitated God to repay. “Who hath first given to Him, and recompense shall be made him?” (Romans 11:35). In fact, the world, by its sins, was more deserving of punishment and damnation than it was deserving of God’s charity! Yet that did not extinguish the charity of God.
A New Heart
“But I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first charity”(Apocalypse 2:4). “Justify not thyself before God, for he knoweth the heart” (Ecclesiasticus 7:5). “The imagination and thought of man’s heart are prone to evil from his youth” (Genesis 8:21). “Who can say: ‘My heart is clean, I am pure from sin!’?” (Proverbs 20:9). “Be mindful therefore from whence thou art fallen: and do penance, and do the first works. Or else I come to thee, and will move thy candlestick out of its place, except thou do penance” (Apocalypse 2:4-5). “Return to the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy soul” (Deuteronomy 30:10).”Not serving to the eye, as it were pleasing men, but, as the servants of Christ doing the will of God from the heart” (Ephesians 6:6). “Covet ye therefore My words, and love them, and you shall have instruction” (Wisdom 6:12).
“Create a clean heart in me, O God: and renew a right spirit within my bowels”(Psalm 50:12). “And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26). “God hath softened my heart, and the Almighty hath troubled me” (Job 23:16). “A contrite and humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise” (Psalm 50:19). “God gave unto him another heart” (1 Kings 10:9).
Let us take the words of God to heart! Let us beg Him to give us new heart! Let us admit that our present hearts are more often than not like stone, cold and hard! He who can change bread into His Flesh, can also change our hearts of stone into hearts of flesh. Ask, and you shall receive!
Spiritual Cardiac Arrest
We have all, more or less, become spiritual cardiac patients, our every move is conditioned by the dread possibility of imminent spiritual heart failure. Loving in the face of the malice that confronts us at every turn, is such uphill work, so great a strain, only the force and power of a divine command, driving us from behind, could keep us at it. Reason alone would tell us to relax. Lots of us have, and that hasn’t helped our environment, nor our spiritual life!
Once we lose that spark of love, and become lukewarm, it can be very, very difficult to regain the former level of love. We must guard and feed our love of God just like the ancients would zealously guard and feed their fires. They knew how difficult it was to create that first spark that led to the fire being kindled, so they give their utmost attention and care to preserving the fire that cost so much effort in the first place.
Love is at the Heart of the Answer
The heart of our spiritual life is love. Love is and has to be the soul of all that we do. “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14). “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Therefore, once again: “Let all your things be done in charity” (1 Corinthians 16:14) because “Charity covereth all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). “Charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
Two Extremes
If there is one problem that hits most besieges most souls it is their attitude to the mercy of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Some are very presumptuous in heart, thinking that they can sin as much as they want and forgiveness will be automatically given; others tend to lose heart, thinking themselves unworthy of His mercy.
Do You Love Me?
“Jesus said to Simon Peter: ‘Simon son of John, lovest thou Me more than these?’ Peter said to Him: ‘Yes, Lord! Thou knowest that I love Thee!’” (John 21:15). Do we love Him “more than these”—more than all these things and distractions that surround us in this world? If we wish to avoid Purgatory through our burning love, then it has to be a love that corresponds to what Our Lord and Holy Scripture commands and demands: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). “Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). Purgatory comes about because souls fail to keep and honor those basic commands and demands. They only love God half-heartedly and they love the world sometimes wholeheartedly!
Love is Tough!
It’s hard to love. These days it doesn’t seem to come naturally any more—if it ever did. One act of perfect love of God can wipe away all the guilt and debt of temporal punishment due to sin—no matter how much one has sinned! Yet that act of perfect love, though not impossible, is not easy. We love the persons, places and things of this world more than we love God—or at least our love for them is more vehement than is our love of God. As Our Lord warned us, towards the End Times, evil would be so rampant that charity would grow cold: “Because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). As the fires of charity grow colder, the fires of Purgatory are being stoked up to be hotter.
There Can Be No Love Without Penance
If we have done wrong to someone we love, then we must make reparation. This is almost an absolute prerequisite of love. The souls in Purgatory are there because they wanted to love God without doing enough reparation or penance for having previously offended Him. Our Lord Himself warned us: “No, I say to you: but unless you shall do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” and Jesus repeats Himself two verses later: “I say to you; except you do penance, you shall all likewise perish!” (Luke 13:3-5). “Therefore, saith the Lord God, be converted, and do penance for all your iniquities: and iniquity shall not be your ruin!” (Ezechiel 18:30). “Hear, I beseech you, My words, and do penance!” (Job 21:2).
Our Lord complained, already in His own day, that too few were doing penance: “Woe to thee, Corozain, woe to thee, Bethsaida! For if in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the mighty works that have been wrought in you, then they would have done penance long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes!” (Luke 10:13). “God has given him place for penance, and he abuses it in his pride!” (Job 24:23).
St. John the Baptist, even before Jesus’ Public Ministry began, was preaching penance in the desert: “The word of the Lord was made unto John, the son of Zachary, in the desert. And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of penance for the remission of sins” (Luke 3:2-3).
Our Lord sent out His disciples to preach penance: “Jesus called the Twelve; and began to send them two and two and gave them power over unclean spirits … and He said to them: ‘Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear you; going forth from thence, shake off the dust from your feet for a testimony to them!’ And, going forth, they preached that men should do penance” (Mark 6:7-12). When the Apostles, despite being given power over devils, had failed to cast out a devil from a boy, they asked Our Lord why they had failed. He replied: “This kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting” – in other words, prayer and penance (Matthew 17:20). This is why Our Lady, at Fatima, asks for the Rosary and sacrifices – in other words, prayer and penance.
Let us take a cue the example quoted from Holy Scripture: “He prayed to the Lord his God and did penance exceedingly” (2 Paralipomenon 33:12). “Therefore I reprehend myself, and do penance in dust and ashes!” (Job 42:6).
What Is Love?
What does it mean to love to Jesus? The first level of love is to keep His commandments: “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). Fr. Tanquerey, in his renowned classic The Spiritual Life, writes:
Lowest Level of Love: “The chief care of beginners is that of preserving charity. Their efforts, then, are directed toward the avoidance of sin, above all, mortal sin, and toward the conquest of evil inclinations, of the passions, and of all that could make them lose the love of God. This is the purgative way, the end of which is the purification of the soul.
Middle Level of Love: “The chief concern of those already advanced, the proficients, is progress in the positive exercise of the virtues and growth in charity. The heart, already purified, is all the more open to divine light and to the love of God. The soul wishes to follow Jesus and to imitate His virtues, and since by following Him one walks in the Light, this is called the illuminative way. Here the soul strives to avoid not only mortal, but even venial sin.
Highest Level of Love: “Perfect souls have but one concern―which is to cling to God and to take their delight in Him. Ever seeking to unite themselves to God, they are in the unitive way. Sin fills them with horror, for they fear to displease God and to offend Him. The virtues that most attract them are the theological virtues, which unite them to God. Hence, the Earth seems to them an exile, and, like St. Paul, they long to die, so as to be joined to Christ.” (Fr. Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life, §§ 341-343).
“And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh” (Ezechiel 36:26). “Come O Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of Thy love!” So that “charity covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).
Article 5
Tuesday November 7th, 2023
Paying the Price!
Tuesday November 7th, 2023
Paying the Price!
The Price of Sin: Heaven’s Estimation and Our Estimation
As God tells us through His prophet Isaias: “My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9). We could well transpose and paraphrase that into: “My idea of the gravity of sin is not your idea of the gravity of sin: nor is your estimation of the price of sin the same as My estimation of the price of sin, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so is my idea of its gravity exalted above your idea of its gravity, and My price for sin above your price for sin.”
Sin has to be extremely grave and pricey—even Venial Sin. This is seen from Divine Public Revelation in the form of Holy Scripture, and is seconded by what we know through Divine Private Revelation over the course of the centuries—which has been given by God to various saints and mystics.
The Price According to Scripture
In the very beginning of Holy Scripture, in the book of Genesis, we see God place a grave consequence on sin, when He tells Adam what will happen if Adam disobeys Him and eats of the ‘forbidden fruit’: “For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!” (Genesis 2:17). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Sin was (and is) so grave, that each man would go to his grave because of the one single sin of Adam. St. Paul writes: “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12).
Furthermore, God made an eternal, never-ending Hell the punishment for even one single, short-lived, temporary, brief, unconfessed and unrepented Mortal Sin—that is terrifyingly striking and underlines the gravity of sin. Our Lord tells us that perhaps most souls are lost and sent to this awful place: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’ … ‘Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. [14] How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!’ ” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14). Many lost for ETERNITY! Burning in Hell for ETERNITY! Why? Because of sin!
The Price According to the Catechism
It is not for nothing that the Catechism calls sin the greatest evil in the world! “Mortal Sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, and a greater evil than disease, or war ... Mortal Sin must be a most terrible thing indeed, to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the eternal punishment of sinners who die with even only one Mortal Sin” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 22, “Mortal Sin”).
As for Venial Sin, the same catechism says: “Although Venial Sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is, nevertheless, a great moral evil, next alone to Mortal Sin. We are prone to look upon Venial Sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that IT IS SECOND ONLY IN EVIL CONSEQUENCE TO MORTAL SIN. In Holy Scripture we see, from many examples, how God regards Venial Sin. Even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished. He was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land [and died at its borders]” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 23, “Venial Sin”).
The Price According to the Private Revelations of Our Lady
"You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go ... Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them” (Our Lady of Fatima). Speaking of our times, she says that “There will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost” (Our Lady of Good Success). “Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls” (Our Lady of La Salette).
In our folly, we ignore the only antidote to the gravity, poison and consequence of sin: “See and contemplate the grandeur of this restoring and life-giving Sacrament of Penance, so forgotten and even scorned by ungrateful men, who in their foolish madness, do not realize that it is the only sure means of salvation after one has lost his baptismal innocence. What is most grievious is that even the ministers of My Most Holy Son do not give to it the value that they should, viewing with cold indifference this valuable and precious treasure, which has been placed in their hands for the restoration of souls redeemed by the Blood of the Redeemer. There are those who consider hearing confession as a loss of time and a futile thing” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Purgatory is Pretty Pricey Too!
We might think that Hell is expensive destination for an eternal vacation, but Purgatory, even though it offers shorter stays, is very pricey too! When we think of what we call dismissively—“Oh, it’s only a Venial Sin! I won’t go to Hell for that!”—we forget that Purgatory, in some respects, is like Hell, though not permanent! That’s a pretty pricey price to pay for a paltry ‘little’ sin—though that is only our estimation of sin, not God’s.
Expensive Trivia
In the book, The Life of St. Louis Bertrand, of the Order of St. Dominic, written Fr. Antist, a Religious of the same Order, and who personally lived with the saint, we read that in the year 1557, whilst St. Louis Bertrand resided at the convent of Valentia, a plague broke out in that city. The terrible plague spread rapidly, threatening to wipe out its inhabitants, and each one feared for his life. A Religious of the community, wishing to prepare himself fervently for death, made a general confession of his whole life to the saint; and on leaving him said, “Father, if it should now please God to call me, I shall return and make known to you my condition in the other life.”
He died a short time afterwards, and the following night he appeared to the saint. He told him that he was detained in Purgatory on account of a few slight faults which remained to be expiated, and begged the saint to recommend him to the community. St. Louis communicated the request immediately to the Prior, who hastened to recommend the soul of the departed to the prayers and Holy Sacrifices of the brethren assembled in chapter. Six days later, a man of the town, who knew nothing of what had passed at the convent, came to make his confession to Father Louis, and told him “that the soul of Father Clement had appeared to him. He saw, he said, the earth open, and the soul of the deceased Father come forth all glorious; it resembled, he added, a resplendent star, which rose through the air towards Heaven.”
Working-Out the Price of Purgatory
According to the common opinion of the doctors, the expiatory pains are of long duration. “There is no doubt,” says St. Robert Bellarmine (De Gemitu, lib. 2, c. 9), “that the pains of Purgatory are not limited to ten or twenty years, and that they last in some cases entire centuries. But allowing it to be true that their duration did not exceed ten or twenty years, can we account it as nothing to have to endure for ten or twenty years the most excruciating sufferings without the least alleviation? If a man was assured that he should suffer some violent pain in his feet, or his head, or teeth for the space of twenty years, and that without ever sleeping or taking the least repose, would he not a thousand times rather die than live in such a state? And if the choice were given to him between a life thus miserable and the loss of all his temporal goods, would he hesitate to make the sacrifice of his fortune to be delivered from such a torment? Shall we then find any difficulty in embracing labor and penance to free ourselves from the sufferings of Purgatory? Shall we fear to practice the most painful exercises: vigils, fasts, almsgiving, long prayers, and especially contrition, accompanied with sighs and tears?” (St. Robert Bellarmine). These words comprise the whole doctrine of the saints and theologians.
The Math of Sin
Father Mumford, of the Company of Jesus, in his “Treatise on Charity towards the Departed,” bases the long duration of Purgatory on a calculation of probability, which we shall give in substance. He goes out on the principle that, according to the words of the Holy Ghost, “The just man falls seven times a day” (Prov. 24:16), that is to say, that even those who apply themselves most perfectly to the service of God, notwithstanding their good-will, commit a great number of faults in the infinitely pure eyes of God. We have but to enter into our own conscience, and there analyze before God our thoughts, our words, and works, to be convinced of this sad effect of human misery—we might even be capable of committing sin “seven times a minute” on a bad day, never mind “seven times a day”. Oh, how easy it is to lack respect in prayer, to prefer our ease to the accomplishment of duty, to sin by vanity, by impatience, by sensuality, by uncharitable thoughts and words, by want of conformity to the will of God! The day is long; is it very difficult for even a virtuous person to commit, I do not say seven, but twenty or thirty of this kind of faults and imperfections?
Let us take a moderate estimate, and suppose that you commit about ten faults a day; at the end of 365 days you will have a sum of 3650 faults. Let us diminish, and, to facilitate the calculation, place it at 3000 per year. At the end of ten years this will amount to 30,000, and at the end of twenty years to 60,000. Suppose that of these 60,000 faults you have expiated one half by penance and good works, there will still remain 30,000 to be atoned for.
Let us continue our hypothesis: You die after these twenty years of virtuous life, and appear before God with a debt of 30,000 faults, which you must discharge in Purgatory. How much time will you need to accomplish this expiation? Suppose, on an average, each fault requires one hour of Purgatory. This measure is very moderate, if we judge by the revelations of the saints; but at any rate this will give you a Purgatory of 30,000 hours. Now, do you know how many years these 30,000 hours represent? Three years, three months, and fifteen days. Thus a good Christian who watches over himself, who applies himself to penance and good works, finds himself liable to three years, three months, and fifteen days of Purgatory.
A Low-End Estimate Only
The preceding calculation is based on an estimate which is lenient in the extreme. Now, if you extend the duration of the pain, and, instead of an hour, you take a day for the expiation of a fault, if, instead of having nothing but venial sins, you bring before God a debt resulting from mortal sins, more or less numerous, which you formerly committed, if you assign, on the average, as St. Frances of Rome says, seven years for the expiation of one mortal sin, remitted as to the guilt, who does not see that we arrive at an appalling duration, and that the expiation may easily be prolonged for many years, and even for centuries?
Years and centuries in torments! Oh! if we only thought of it, with what care should we not avoid the least faults! with what fervor should we not practice penance to make satisfaction in this world!
First Class, Business Class and Coach
Our flight to Heaven, on the plane of Purgatory, has three classes of seats: First Class, Business Class and Coach. It has pleased God to show, in spirit, the gloomy abodes of Purgatory to some privileged souls, who were then told to reveal these sorrowful mysteries for the benefit of faithful. One of this number was St. Frances of Rome, foundress of the Oblates, who died in Rome in 1440. God favored her with great lights concerning the state of souls in the other life. She saw Hell and its horrible torments; she saw also the interior of Purgatory, and the mysterious order or hierarchy that exists there.
Purgatory, she said, is divided into three distinct parts, which are like three large provinces of that kingdom of suffering. They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different orders. These souls are buried more deeply in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance.
The Lowest Region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but have not sufficiently expiated during life. The servant of God then learned that, for all forgiven mortal sin, there remains to be undergone a suffering of seven years. This term cannot evidently be taken to mean a definite measure, since mortal sins differ in enormity, but as an average penalty. Although the souls are enveloped in the same flames, their sufferings are not the same; they differ according to the number and nature of their former sins.
In this Lower Purgatory the saint beheld clergy and the religious consecrated to God. The clergy were those who, after a life of sin, had had the happiness of being sincerely converted; the religious, consecrated to God, were those who had not lived according to the sanctity of their state. At that same moment she saw descend the soul of a priest whom she knew, but whose name she does not reveal. She remarked that he had his face covered with a veil which concealed a stain. Although he had led an edifying life, this priest had not always observed strict temperance, and had sought too eagerly the satisfactions of the table.
The saint was then conducted into the Intermediate Purgatory, destined for souls which had deserved less rigorous chastisement. It had three distinct compartments; one resembled an immense dungeon of ice, the cold of which was indescribably intense; the second, on the contrary, was like a huge caldron of boiling oil and pitch; the third had the appearance of a pond of liquid metal resembling molten gold or silver.
The Upper Purgatory, which the saint does not describe, is the temporary abode of souls which suffer little, except the pain of loss, and approach the happy moment of their deliverance.
This, in essence, was the vision of St. Frances saw of Purgatory.
The Supermarket of Sin is Expensive
So, hopefully, we have a more objective and realistic idea of the price of sin—rather than the one the devil would like us to have, in order to order more items from his Supermarket of Sin. More objective than our own wishful fancies, based upon an exaggeration of the mercy of God, which has removed all notions of His justice. Our ideas have to be clear and true, otherwise our actions will not be correct and virtuous. Of course, the devil will step-in with his trump card of discouragement—which does the opposite of what we mentioned above, and focuses solely on God’s justice with not the slightest mention or hope of mercy. This is equally false as focusing on His mercy without any thought to His justice. The first thing we have to get straight in our minds is the gravity of sin, and awfulness of offending God. Unless we do that, we will never change and will be lucky to eventually scrape into Purgatory!
As Holy Scripture says: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18)—but at what price?
As God tells us through His prophet Isaias: “My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts” (Isaias 55:8-9). We could well transpose and paraphrase that into: “My idea of the gravity of sin is not your idea of the gravity of sin: nor is your estimation of the price of sin the same as My estimation of the price of sin, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so is my idea of its gravity exalted above your idea of its gravity, and My price for sin above your price for sin.”
Sin has to be extremely grave and pricey—even Venial Sin. This is seen from Divine Public Revelation in the form of Holy Scripture, and is seconded by what we know through Divine Private Revelation over the course of the centuries—which has been given by God to various saints and mystics.
The Price According to Scripture
In the very beginning of Holy Scripture, in the book of Genesis, we see God place a grave consequence on sin, when He tells Adam what will happen if Adam disobeys Him and eats of the ‘forbidden fruit’: “For in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death!” (Genesis 2:17). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Sin was (and is) so grave, that each man would go to his grave because of the one single sin of Adam. St. Paul writes: “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned” (Romans 5:12).
Furthermore, God made an eternal, never-ending Hell the punishment for even one single, short-lived, temporary, brief, unconfessed and unrepented Mortal Sin—that is terrifyingly striking and underlines the gravity of sin. Our Lord tells us that perhaps most souls are lost and sent to this awful place: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord, are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Strive to enter by the narrow gate; for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able!’ … ‘Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. [14] How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!’ ” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14). Many lost for ETERNITY! Burning in Hell for ETERNITY! Why? Because of sin!
The Price According to the Catechism
It is not for nothing that the Catechism calls sin the greatest evil in the world! “Mortal Sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, and a greater evil than disease, or war ... Mortal Sin must be a most terrible thing indeed, to make a just and merciful God create Hell for the eternal punishment of sinners who die with even only one Mortal Sin” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 22, “Mortal Sin”).
As for Venial Sin, the same catechism says: “Although Venial Sin is not a grievous offense against God, it is, nevertheless, a great moral evil, next alone to Mortal Sin. We are prone to look upon Venial Sin as of no consequence, and to be careless about guarding against it, forgetting that IT IS SECOND ONLY IN EVIL CONSEQUENCE TO MORTAL SIN. In Holy Scripture we see, from many examples, how God regards Venial Sin. Even in this life He has punished it most severely. For only a slight doubt about God’s mercy, because of the wickedness of his people, Moses was punished. He was not permitted to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land [and died at its borders]” (The Catechism, My Catholic Faith, chapter 23, “Venial Sin”).
The Price According to the Private Revelations of Our Lady
"You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go ... Many souls go to Hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them” (Our Lady of Fatima). Speaking of our times, she says that “There will be unbridled luxury which, acting thus to snare the rest into sin, will conquer innumerable frivolous souls who will be lost” (Our Lady of Good Success). “Several religious institutions will lose all Faith and will lose many souls” (Our Lady of La Salette).
In our folly, we ignore the only antidote to the gravity, poison and consequence of sin: “See and contemplate the grandeur of this restoring and life-giving Sacrament of Penance, so forgotten and even scorned by ungrateful men, who in their foolish madness, do not realize that it is the only sure means of salvation after one has lost his baptismal innocence. What is most grievious is that even the ministers of My Most Holy Son do not give to it the value that they should, viewing with cold indifference this valuable and precious treasure, which has been placed in their hands for the restoration of souls redeemed by the Blood of the Redeemer. There are those who consider hearing confession as a loss of time and a futile thing” (Our Lady of Good Success).
Purgatory is Pretty Pricey Too!
We might think that Hell is expensive destination for an eternal vacation, but Purgatory, even though it offers shorter stays, is very pricey too! When we think of what we call dismissively—“Oh, it’s only a Venial Sin! I won’t go to Hell for that!”—we forget that Purgatory, in some respects, is like Hell, though not permanent! That’s a pretty pricey price to pay for a paltry ‘little’ sin—though that is only our estimation of sin, not God’s.
Expensive Trivia
In the book, The Life of St. Louis Bertrand, of the Order of St. Dominic, written Fr. Antist, a Religious of the same Order, and who personally lived with the saint, we read that in the year 1557, whilst St. Louis Bertrand resided at the convent of Valentia, a plague broke out in that city. The terrible plague spread rapidly, threatening to wipe out its inhabitants, and each one feared for his life. A Religious of the community, wishing to prepare himself fervently for death, made a general confession of his whole life to the saint; and on leaving him said, “Father, if it should now please God to call me, I shall return and make known to you my condition in the other life.”
He died a short time afterwards, and the following night he appeared to the saint. He told him that he was detained in Purgatory on account of a few slight faults which remained to be expiated, and begged the saint to recommend him to the community. St. Louis communicated the request immediately to the Prior, who hastened to recommend the soul of the departed to the prayers and Holy Sacrifices of the brethren assembled in chapter. Six days later, a man of the town, who knew nothing of what had passed at the convent, came to make his confession to Father Louis, and told him “that the soul of Father Clement had appeared to him. He saw, he said, the earth open, and the soul of the deceased Father come forth all glorious; it resembled, he added, a resplendent star, which rose through the air towards Heaven.”
Working-Out the Price of Purgatory
According to the common opinion of the doctors, the expiatory pains are of long duration. “There is no doubt,” says St. Robert Bellarmine (De Gemitu, lib. 2, c. 9), “that the pains of Purgatory are not limited to ten or twenty years, and that they last in some cases entire centuries. But allowing it to be true that their duration did not exceed ten or twenty years, can we account it as nothing to have to endure for ten or twenty years the most excruciating sufferings without the least alleviation? If a man was assured that he should suffer some violent pain in his feet, or his head, or teeth for the space of twenty years, and that without ever sleeping or taking the least repose, would he not a thousand times rather die than live in such a state? And if the choice were given to him between a life thus miserable and the loss of all his temporal goods, would he hesitate to make the sacrifice of his fortune to be delivered from such a torment? Shall we then find any difficulty in embracing labor and penance to free ourselves from the sufferings of Purgatory? Shall we fear to practice the most painful exercises: vigils, fasts, almsgiving, long prayers, and especially contrition, accompanied with sighs and tears?” (St. Robert Bellarmine). These words comprise the whole doctrine of the saints and theologians.
The Math of Sin
Father Mumford, of the Company of Jesus, in his “Treatise on Charity towards the Departed,” bases the long duration of Purgatory on a calculation of probability, which we shall give in substance. He goes out on the principle that, according to the words of the Holy Ghost, “The just man falls seven times a day” (Prov. 24:16), that is to say, that even those who apply themselves most perfectly to the service of God, notwithstanding their good-will, commit a great number of faults in the infinitely pure eyes of God. We have but to enter into our own conscience, and there analyze before God our thoughts, our words, and works, to be convinced of this sad effect of human misery—we might even be capable of committing sin “seven times a minute” on a bad day, never mind “seven times a day”. Oh, how easy it is to lack respect in prayer, to prefer our ease to the accomplishment of duty, to sin by vanity, by impatience, by sensuality, by uncharitable thoughts and words, by want of conformity to the will of God! The day is long; is it very difficult for even a virtuous person to commit, I do not say seven, but twenty or thirty of this kind of faults and imperfections?
Let us take a moderate estimate, and suppose that you commit about ten faults a day; at the end of 365 days you will have a sum of 3650 faults. Let us diminish, and, to facilitate the calculation, place it at 3000 per year. At the end of ten years this will amount to 30,000, and at the end of twenty years to 60,000. Suppose that of these 60,000 faults you have expiated one half by penance and good works, there will still remain 30,000 to be atoned for.
Let us continue our hypothesis: You die after these twenty years of virtuous life, and appear before God with a debt of 30,000 faults, which you must discharge in Purgatory. How much time will you need to accomplish this expiation? Suppose, on an average, each fault requires one hour of Purgatory. This measure is very moderate, if we judge by the revelations of the saints; but at any rate this will give you a Purgatory of 30,000 hours. Now, do you know how many years these 30,000 hours represent? Three years, three months, and fifteen days. Thus a good Christian who watches over himself, who applies himself to penance and good works, finds himself liable to three years, three months, and fifteen days of Purgatory.
A Low-End Estimate Only
The preceding calculation is based on an estimate which is lenient in the extreme. Now, if you extend the duration of the pain, and, instead of an hour, you take a day for the expiation of a fault, if, instead of having nothing but venial sins, you bring before God a debt resulting from mortal sins, more or less numerous, which you formerly committed, if you assign, on the average, as St. Frances of Rome says, seven years for the expiation of one mortal sin, remitted as to the guilt, who does not see that we arrive at an appalling duration, and that the expiation may easily be prolonged for many years, and even for centuries?
Years and centuries in torments! Oh! if we only thought of it, with what care should we not avoid the least faults! with what fervor should we not practice penance to make satisfaction in this world!
First Class, Business Class and Coach
Our flight to Heaven, on the plane of Purgatory, has three classes of seats: First Class, Business Class and Coach. It has pleased God to show, in spirit, the gloomy abodes of Purgatory to some privileged souls, who were then told to reveal these sorrowful mysteries for the benefit of faithful. One of this number was St. Frances of Rome, foundress of the Oblates, who died in Rome in 1440. God favored her with great lights concerning the state of souls in the other life. She saw Hell and its horrible torments; she saw also the interior of Purgatory, and the mysterious order or hierarchy that exists there.
Purgatory, she said, is divided into three distinct parts, which are like three large provinces of that kingdom of suffering. They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different orders. These souls are buried more deeply in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance.
The Lowest Region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but have not sufficiently expiated during life. The servant of God then learned that, for all forgiven mortal sin, there remains to be undergone a suffering of seven years. This term cannot evidently be taken to mean a definite measure, since mortal sins differ in enormity, but as an average penalty. Although the souls are enveloped in the same flames, their sufferings are not the same; they differ according to the number and nature of their former sins.
In this Lower Purgatory the saint beheld clergy and the religious consecrated to God. The clergy were those who, after a life of sin, had had the happiness of being sincerely converted; the religious, consecrated to God, were those who had not lived according to the sanctity of their state. At that same moment she saw descend the soul of a priest whom she knew, but whose name she does not reveal. She remarked that he had his face covered with a veil which concealed a stain. Although he had led an edifying life, this priest had not always observed strict temperance, and had sought too eagerly the satisfactions of the table.
The saint was then conducted into the Intermediate Purgatory, destined for souls which had deserved less rigorous chastisement. It had three distinct compartments; one resembled an immense dungeon of ice, the cold of which was indescribably intense; the second, on the contrary, was like a huge caldron of boiling oil and pitch; the third had the appearance of a pond of liquid metal resembling molten gold or silver.
The Upper Purgatory, which the saint does not describe, is the temporary abode of souls which suffer little, except the pain of loss, and approach the happy moment of their deliverance.
This, in essence, was the vision of St. Frances saw of Purgatory.
The Supermarket of Sin is Expensive
So, hopefully, we have a more objective and realistic idea of the price of sin—rather than the one the devil would like us to have, in order to order more items from his Supermarket of Sin. More objective than our own wishful fancies, based upon an exaggeration of the mercy of God, which has removed all notions of His justice. Our ideas have to be clear and true, otherwise our actions will not be correct and virtuous. Of course, the devil will step-in with his trump card of discouragement—which does the opposite of what we mentioned above, and focuses solely on God’s justice with not the slightest mention or hope of mercy. This is equally false as focusing on His mercy without any thought to His justice. The first thing we have to get straight in our minds is the gravity of sin, and awfulness of offending God. Unless we do that, we will never change and will be lucky to eventually scrape into Purgatory!
As Holy Scripture says: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18)—but at what price?
Article 4
Monday November 6th, 2023
Two Views of Purgatory!
Monday November 6th, 2023
Two Views of Purgatory!
“If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
Two Views of Purgatory
There have always been two views of Purgatory prevailing in the Church, not contradictory, the one of the other, but rather expressive of the mind and devotion of those who have embraced them. Yet the error lies in embracing either one of them, while neglecting to embrace both of them simultaneously. They are like two sides of a coin that have different images on each side—yet they are both an essential part of the coin, though standing on opposite sides.
The Grim View
The first view represents Purgatory as a Hell which is not eternal. Violence, confusion, wailing, horror, preside over its descriptions. It dwells, and truly so, on the terribleness of the pain of sense, which the soul is mysteriously permitted to endure. The fire is the same fire as that of Hell, our earthly fire is said to be like a mere painted fire compared to it. The sense of imprisonment and intense darkness, are additional features in the horror of the scene, which prepare us for that sensible neighborhood to Hell, which many Saints have spoken of as belonging to Purgatory. Then to this terribleness of the pain of sense, is added the dreadfulness of the pain of loss—which again is true, though it is not a permanent loss.
The beauty of God remains, in itself, the same immensely desirable object that it always was. But the soul is changed. All that in life, and in the world of sense, once distracted and dulled its desires for God, is now gone from it—it sees the truth of things like it never so them before, it understands like it never understood before—so that it now seeks God with an impetuosity and a frenzy that no imagination can possibly conceive. God is that light at the end of long, dark, excruciatingly hot tunnel, and that light grows brighter as the soul draws nearer. The very burning excess of its love and desire for God (which it should have had on earth) becomes the measure of its intolerable pain. What love can do, even on earth, we learn from the example of Father John Baptist Sanchez, who said that, if any morning he awoke and realized that would not die that day, then he would be a miserable as death at having to live her another day. To those horrors we might add many more which depict Purgatory simply as a Hell which is not eternal. Now all these aspects of Purgatory are true, but they are merely one side of a two-sided coin.
The Joyous View
The second view of Purgatory does not deny any one of the features of the preceding grim view, but it almost puts them out of sight, by the other considerations which it brings more prominently forward. In this view, the soul goes into Purgatory with its eyes fascinated and its spirit sweetly tranquillized, by the face of Jesus, which it glimpsed at the particular Judgment which it has undergone. That remembrance of that Holy Face remains with it, and pacify and tranquillize the terrors of its Purgatorial prison. In the sea of fire, into which it is plunged, it holds fast to that image. The moment that the soul saw that its own unfitness for Heaven, it wings its voluntary flight to Purgatory, like a dove to her proper nest in the shadows of the forest. No prison guards, no angels are needed to escort the soul to its prison. The soul’s understanding of the purity of God suffices.
Seriousness of Sin Sorrowfully Seen
In that moment of Judgment after death, the soul loves God most tenderly, and in return is most tenderly loved by Him. The soul is in punishment, true; but it is in unbroken union with God. St. Catherine of Genoa most positively says, “It has no remembrance, no remembrance at all of its past sins, or of earth.” Its sweet prison, its holy sepulcher, is in the adorable will of its Heavenly Father, and there it abides the term of its purification with the most perfect contentment and the most unutterable love—yet all the while suffering the most inexpressible pains.
God is All About Extremes
If God is to be perfect, He must be extreme, for perfection implies being extremely good at something. God is extreme in His mercy and extreme in His justice—and the soul reflects this with its extreme love under extreme suffering. As it is not teased or taunted by any vision of self or sin, so neither is it harassed by an atom of fear, or by a single doubt of its own safety or security. It is now in a state of sinlessness—it cannot and will not ever sin again. It cannot even commit the slightest imperfection. It cannot have the least movement of impatience. It can do nothing whatever which will in the least displease God. It loves God above everything, and it loves Him with a pure and disinterested love. It is constantly consoled by angels, and can only rejoice in the confirmed assurance of its own salvation.
Heaven Extremely Expensive
The soul now realizes what it refused or failed to realize on earth—that Heaven is not the cheap thing that most people made it out to be, thinking they could walk in after a few hastily said prayers and some distractedly heard Masses. Heaven, being the greatest place there is, also carries the greatest admission price—a price few were willing to pay on earth. Nor could they pay it, even if the wishfully desired to, for they had insufficient funds in the bank of their souls. Now they must earn and pay the full price—which could have been paid at a discounted rate here on earth, but it was judged, even then, as being far too high a price to pay! The world offered its wares and pleasures and a much cheaper rate, and so that is what most souls spent the time and effort on—the world.
Extremely Bitter-Sweet
Even the most bitter and excruciating agonies that it suffers, are accompanied by a profound unshaken peace, such as the language of this world has no words to tell. It has reached a pinnacle of suffering and a pinnacle of virtue—although now, it will no longer receive any reward for virtuously suffering, as it could have done on earth. It is forced to do what it should have done on earth—it is the most painful, yet most successful remedial school there is, having a 100% graduation record with a grade of 100%--for only saints can get into Heaven, and sanctity is total perfection; partial perfection is fodder for Purgatory.
No sooner has a soul, with the guilt of no mortal sin upon it, but owing to God a debt of temporal punishment, issued from the world, and been judged, than it sees itself eternally confirmed in grace and charity (according to St. Catherine of Genoa). It is incapable either of sinning or of meriting anymore; and it is destined, by an eternal and immutable decree, to enter one day as a king or a queen into the kingdom of the blessed, to see, to love, and to enjoy God, the perpetual fountain of all happiness.
Finally the Soul Detests Sin like it Should
In that instant of judgment, all the sins of its past are represented to the soul, whether mortal or venial, even though they have been already forgiven here below by contrition and the Sacrament of Penance. But after this temporary and instantaneous view of them, the soul remembers nothing more about them. St. Catherine’s words are: “The cause of Purgatory, which these souls have in themselves, they see once and for all, in passing out of this life, and never afterwards.” The reason of this exhibition of sins is, she teaches us, to enable the soul in that moment, by an act, no longer indeed meritorious, but nevertheless a real act of the will, to detest all its sins afresh, and especially those venial sins for which it had not contrition during life, either through the weakness of an imperfect heart, or through the accident of a sudden death, that so it may be strictly true, that no sin whatever is pardoned, unless the sinner makes an act of detestation of each and every sin.
Burning-Off the Rust of Sin
After this momentary view of sins and formal detestation of them, the soul sees in itself their evil consequences and these form, what the St. Catherine calls “the impediment of seeing God … The rust of sin is the impediment, and the fire keeps consuming the rust; and, as a thing which is covered cannot correspond to the reverberation of the sun’s rays, so, if the covering be consumed, the thing is at length laid open to the sun.
Burning Inside and Outside
As soon as the soul perceives itself to be acceptable to God, and constituted heir of paradise, but unable, because of this impediment, to take immediate possession of its inheritance, it conceives an intense desire to be rid of this hindrance, this double obligation of guilt and punishment. But knowing that Purgatory alone can consume these two obligations, and that it is for that very end God condemns the soul to fire, it desires itself to endure the punishment. St. Catherin of Genoa says that, “The soul separated from the body, not finding in itself this impediment which cannot be taken away except by Purgatory, at once throws itself into it with right good will. The souls in Purgatory have wills conformed in all things with the will of God, who therefore sheds on them His goodness, and they, as far as their will goes, are happy and cleansed of all their sin. As for guilt, these cleansed souls are as they were when God created them, for God forgives their guilt immediately who have passed from this life ill content with their sins, having confessed all they have committed and having the will to commit no more. Only the rust of sin is left them and from this they cleanse themselves by pain in the fire.”
If the soul did not find this punishment and purgation of Purgatory, to help the soul remove the rust of sin, there would instantaneously be generated in the soul a Hell far worse than Purgatory, because it would see that with this impediment of the stain of sin with its unpaid debt, it could not unite itself to God Who is its end. Wherefore, if the soul could somewhere find another Purgatory fiercer than this, in which it could the sooner get rid of this impediment, it would quickly plunge itself therein, through the impetuosity of the love it bears to God.
A Thousand Hells if Necessary
But this is not all. St. Catherine of Genoa goes on to teach that if the soul, laboring under this impediment, were free to choose between immediately ascending to paradise, and descending to suffer in Purgatory, it would choose to suffer, although the sufferings be almost as dreadful as those of Hell. These are her words: “Of how much importance Purgatory is no tongue can tell, no mind conceive. So much I see, that its pain is almost as if it were that of Hell; and yet I see also that the soul which perceives in itself the slightest flaw or mote of imperfection, would rather throw itself into a thousand Hells, than find itself in the presence of the divine Majesty with that defect upon it; and, therefore, seeing Purgatory to be ordained for the very taking away of these flaws, forthwith it plunges into it, and it seems by its bearing, as I see, to conceive that it finds there an invention of no little mercy, simply in the being able to get rid of this impediment.”
Too Late Have I Loved Thee!
When the righteous soul has thus arrived in Purgatory, losing sight of everything else, it sees before it only two objects—the extremity of suffering, and the extremity of joys. A most tremendous pain is caused by knowing that God loves it with an infinite love, that He is the Chief Good, that He regards the soul as His daughter, and that He has predestined it to enjoy Him forever in company with the Blessed: and hence the soul loves Him with a pure and most perfect charity. At the same time it perceives that it cannot see Him or enjoy Him yet, though it so intensely yearns to do so ; and this afflicts it so much the more, as it is quite uncertain when the term of its penal exile, away from its Lord and paradise, will be fulfilled. This is the pain of loss in Purgatory, of which the St. Catherine of Genoa says that it is “a pain so extreme, that no tongue can tell it, no understanding grasp the least portion of it. Though God in His favor showed me a little spark thereof, yet can I not in any way express it with my tongue.”
Finally the Soul Finds Joy in Suffering
Now let us examine the other object, the extremity of joy. As it loves God with the purest affection, and knows its sufferings to be the will of God in order to procure its purification, it conforms itself perfectly to the divine decree. While in Purgatory, it sees nothing but that this pleases God; it takes in no idea but that of His will; it apprehends nothing so clearly as the suitableness of this purification, in order to present it all fair and lovely to so great a majesty. Thus, St. Catherine of Genoa says: “If a soul, having still something left to be cleansed away, were presented to the Vision of God, it would be worse than that of ten purgatories; for it would be quite unable to endure that excessive goodness and that exquisite justice.” Hence it is that the suffering soul is entirely resigned to the will of its Creator. It loves its very pains, and rejoices in them because they are a holy ordinance of God. Thus in the midst of the ardent heats it enjoys a contentment so complete that it exceeds the grasp of human intelligence to comprehend it. “I do not believe,” says St. Catherine of Genoa, “that it is possible to find a contentment to compare with that of the souls in Purgatory, unless it be the contentment of the Saints in paradise. This contentment increases daily through the influx of God into those souls, and this influx increases in proportion as the impediment is consumed and worn away. Indeed, so far as the will is concerned, we can hardly say that the pains are pains at all, so contentedly do the souls rest in the ordinance of God, to whose will pure love unites them.”
Holily Wholly Indifferent
In another place, St. Catherine says that this inexplicable joy of the soul, while it is undergoing the indescribable Purgatory, springs from the strength and purity of its love of God. “This love gives to the soul such a contentment as cannot be expressed. But this contentment does not take away one iota from the pain; nay, it is the retarding of love from the possession of its object which causes the pain; and the pain is greater according to the greater perfection of love of which God has made the soul capable. Thus the souls in Purgatory have at once the greatest contentment and the greatest suffering; and the one in no way hinders the other.” As to prayers, alms, and Masses, she asserts that the souls experience great consolation from them; but that in these, as in other matters, their principal solicitude is that everything should be “weighed in the most equitable scales of the Divine Will, leaving God to take His own course in everything, and to pay Himself and His justice in the way His own infinite goodness chooses to select.”
Scraping into Purgatory by the Skin of our Teeth
I suppose there is none of us who expects to be lost and damned—how many in Hell actually thought they would end up there? We know and feel, with more or less of alarm, the greatness of the risk we are running by the life we are leading—lukewarm and at peace with many venial sins; but to expect to be lost would be the sin of despair. Hell is only practical to us as a motive of greater diligence, greater strictness, greater circumspectness, greater fear. It is not so with Purgatory. I suppose we all expect, or think ourselves sure, to go there. If we do not think much about the matter at all, then we must have some vague notion of going straight to Heaven as soon as we are judged! But if we seriously reflect upon it, upon our own lives, upon God’s sanctity, upon what we read in books of devotion, in the lives of the Saints, and the revelations that God has permitted to come our way by means of souls condemned to Purgatory, then I can hardly imagine any one of us expecting to escape Purgatory, and perhaps even feeling that it must be almost a stretch of the divine mercy which will get us even there in the first place! Now, if we really expect that our road to Heaven will be through the punishment of Purgatory, for surely its purification is penal, it very much concerns us to know what is common to both the views of Purgatory, which it appears prevail in the Church.
Budgeting for Heaven (or rather, Purgatory).
First, both these views agree that the pains are extremely severe, as well because of the office which God intends them to fulfil, as because of the disembodied soul being the subject of them. Both agree, also, in the length of the suffering.
Do You Have Enough Money and Supplies for Sixty Years?
This requires to be dwelt upon, as it is hard to convince people of it, and a great deal comes of the conviction, both to ourselves and others. This duration may be understood in two ways: first, as of actual length of time, and, secondly, as of seeming length from the excess of pain. With regard to the first, if we look into the revelations of Sister Francesca of Pampeluna, we shall find, among some hundreds of cases, that by far the great majority suffered thirty, forty, or sixty years.
Long-Term Rentals
This disclosure may teach us greater watchfulness over ourselves, and more unwearied perseverance in praying for the departed. The old foundations for perpetual Masses embody the same sentiment. We are apt to leave off too soon, imagining with a foolish and unenlightened fondness that our friends are freed from Purgatory much sooner than they really are. If Sister Francesca beheld the souls of many fervent Carmelites, some of whom had wrought miracles in lifetime still in Purgatory ten, twenty, thirty, sixty years after their death, and still not near their deliverance, as many told her, what must become of us and ours? Then as to seeming length from the extremity of pain, there are many instances on record in the Chronicles of the Franciscans, the life of St. Francis Jerome, and elsewhere, of souls appearing an hour or two after death, and thinking they had been many years in Purgatory.
Our Trivial Faults Are Far From Trivial
Both views agree again in holding that, what we in the world call very trivial faults, are most severely dealt with in Purgatory. St. Peter Damian gives us many instances of this, and others are collected and quoted by St. Robert Bellarmine. Slight feelings of self-complacency, trifling inattentions in the recital of the Divine Office, and the like, occur frequently among them! Sister Francesca mentions the case of a girl of fourteen who was in Purgatory, because she was not quite conformed to the will of God in dying so young: and one soul said to her in Purgatory: “Ah, men little think in the world, how dearly they are going to pay here for faults that they hardly note there.” She even saw souls that were immensely punished only for having been scrupulous in this life; either, I suppose, because there is mostly self-will in scruples, or because they did not lay down the scruples when obedience commanded. Wrong notions about small faults may thus lead us to neglect the dead, or leave off our prayers too soon, as well as losing a salutary lesson for ourselves.
Broke and Begging
Then, again, both views agree as to the helplessness of the Holy Souls. They lie like the paralytic at the pool. It would seem as if even the coming of the angel were not an effectual blessing to them, unless there be some one of us to help them. Some have even thought they cannot pray. Anyhow, they have no means of making themselves heard by us, on whose charity they depend. Some writers have said that Our Blessed Lord will not help them without our cooperation; and that Our Blessed Lady cannot help them, except in indirect ways, because she is no longer able to make satisfaction; though I never like to hear anything our dearest mother cannot do; and I regard such statements with suspicion. Whatever may come of these opinions, they at least illustrate the strong way in which theologians apprehend the helplessness of the Holy Souls.
Stupid Notions of ‘Sanctity’!
Then another feature in their helplessness is the forgetfulness of the living, or the cruel flattery of relations who will always have it that those near or dear to them die the deaths of saints. They would surely have a scruple, if they knew of how many Masses and prayers they rob the souls, by the selfish exaggeration of their goodness. I call it selfish, for it is nothing more than a miserable device to console themselves in their sorrow. The very state of the Holy Souls is one of the most unbounded helplessness. They cannot do penance; they cannot merit; they cannot satisfy; they cannot gain indulgences; they have no Sacraments; they are not under the jurisdiction of God’s Vicar, overflowing with the plentitude of means of grace and manifold benedictions. They are a part of the Church, but without either priesthood or altar at their own command.
Lazy, Lukewarm and Blind
Those are the points common to both views of Purgatory; and how manifold are the lessons we learn from them, on our own behalf as well as on behalf of the Holy Souls. For ourselves, what light does all this throw on slovenliness, lukewarmness, and love of ease? What does it make us think of performing our devotions out of a mere spirit of formality, or a trick of habit? What diligence in our examens, confessions, Communions, and prayers! It seems as if the grace of all graces for which we should ever be importuning our dear Lord, would be to hate sin with something of the hatred wherewith He hated it in the garden of Gethsemane. Oh, is not the purity of God something awful, unspeakable, adorable?
Anger at Purgatory
But some persons turn in anger from the thought of Purgatory, as if it were not to be endured, that after trying all our lives long to serve God, we should accomplish the tremendous feat of a good death, only to pass from the agonies of the death-bed into fire, long, keen, searching, triumphant, incomparable fire. Sadly, your anger will not help you, nor alter the facts. But have you thought sufficiently about God? Have you tried to realize His holiness and purity in assiduous meditation? Is there a real divorce between you and the world, which you know is God’s enemy? Do you take God’s side? Are you devoted to His interests? Do you truly long for His glory? Is there a happy marriage between the theory of Catholicism and the practice of Catholicism in your life, or are they separated and divorced? Have you put sin alongside of our dear Saviors’ Passion, and measured the one by the other?
Surely, if you had, Purgatory would only seem to you the last, kind, unexpected, and inexpressibly tender invention of the obstinate love of God, which was mercifully determined to save you in spite of yourself. It would be a perpetual wonder to you, a joyous wonder, fresh every morning, a wonder that would be meat and drink to your soul, that you, being what you know yourself to be, what God knows you to be, should be saved eternally. Remember what the suffering soul said so simply, yet with such force, to Sister Francesca: “Ah! Those on that side of the grave little reckon how dearly they will pay on this side for the lives they live!”
Angry or Lucky?
To be angry, because you are told you will go to Purgatory! Silly, silly people! Most likely it is a great false flattery, and that you will never be good enough to even scrape into Purgatory at all! Why, positively, you do not recognize how lucky you are to be told of it, and told of it truthfully? None but the humble go there. St. Maria Crocifissa di Rosa was told that although many of the saints, while on earth, loved God more than some do even in Heaven, yet that the greatest saint on earth was not so humble as are the souls in Purgatory. I do not think I ever read anything in the lives of the saints which struck me so much as that. You see it is not good to be angry about Purgatory; for, as Fr. Faber says, those only are lucky enough to get into Purgatory, who sincerely believe themselves to be worthy of Hell.
Two Views of Purgatory
There have always been two views of Purgatory prevailing in the Church, not contradictory, the one of the other, but rather expressive of the mind and devotion of those who have embraced them. Yet the error lies in embracing either one of them, while neglecting to embrace both of them simultaneously. They are like two sides of a coin that have different images on each side—yet they are both an essential part of the coin, though standing on opposite sides.
The Grim View
The first view represents Purgatory as a Hell which is not eternal. Violence, confusion, wailing, horror, preside over its descriptions. It dwells, and truly so, on the terribleness of the pain of sense, which the soul is mysteriously permitted to endure. The fire is the same fire as that of Hell, our earthly fire is said to be like a mere painted fire compared to it. The sense of imprisonment and intense darkness, are additional features in the horror of the scene, which prepare us for that sensible neighborhood to Hell, which many Saints have spoken of as belonging to Purgatory. Then to this terribleness of the pain of sense, is added the dreadfulness of the pain of loss—which again is true, though it is not a permanent loss.
The beauty of God remains, in itself, the same immensely desirable object that it always was. But the soul is changed. All that in life, and in the world of sense, once distracted and dulled its desires for God, is now gone from it—it sees the truth of things like it never so them before, it understands like it never understood before—so that it now seeks God with an impetuosity and a frenzy that no imagination can possibly conceive. God is that light at the end of long, dark, excruciatingly hot tunnel, and that light grows brighter as the soul draws nearer. The very burning excess of its love and desire for God (which it should have had on earth) becomes the measure of its intolerable pain. What love can do, even on earth, we learn from the example of Father John Baptist Sanchez, who said that, if any morning he awoke and realized that would not die that day, then he would be a miserable as death at having to live her another day. To those horrors we might add many more which depict Purgatory simply as a Hell which is not eternal. Now all these aspects of Purgatory are true, but they are merely one side of a two-sided coin.
The Joyous View
The second view of Purgatory does not deny any one of the features of the preceding grim view, but it almost puts them out of sight, by the other considerations which it brings more prominently forward. In this view, the soul goes into Purgatory with its eyes fascinated and its spirit sweetly tranquillized, by the face of Jesus, which it glimpsed at the particular Judgment which it has undergone. That remembrance of that Holy Face remains with it, and pacify and tranquillize the terrors of its Purgatorial prison. In the sea of fire, into which it is plunged, it holds fast to that image. The moment that the soul saw that its own unfitness for Heaven, it wings its voluntary flight to Purgatory, like a dove to her proper nest in the shadows of the forest. No prison guards, no angels are needed to escort the soul to its prison. The soul’s understanding of the purity of God suffices.
Seriousness of Sin Sorrowfully Seen
In that moment of Judgment after death, the soul loves God most tenderly, and in return is most tenderly loved by Him. The soul is in punishment, true; but it is in unbroken union with God. St. Catherine of Genoa most positively says, “It has no remembrance, no remembrance at all of its past sins, or of earth.” Its sweet prison, its holy sepulcher, is in the adorable will of its Heavenly Father, and there it abides the term of its purification with the most perfect contentment and the most unutterable love—yet all the while suffering the most inexpressible pains.
God is All About Extremes
If God is to be perfect, He must be extreme, for perfection implies being extremely good at something. God is extreme in His mercy and extreme in His justice—and the soul reflects this with its extreme love under extreme suffering. As it is not teased or taunted by any vision of self or sin, so neither is it harassed by an atom of fear, or by a single doubt of its own safety or security. It is now in a state of sinlessness—it cannot and will not ever sin again. It cannot even commit the slightest imperfection. It cannot have the least movement of impatience. It can do nothing whatever which will in the least displease God. It loves God above everything, and it loves Him with a pure and disinterested love. It is constantly consoled by angels, and can only rejoice in the confirmed assurance of its own salvation.
Heaven Extremely Expensive
The soul now realizes what it refused or failed to realize on earth—that Heaven is not the cheap thing that most people made it out to be, thinking they could walk in after a few hastily said prayers and some distractedly heard Masses. Heaven, being the greatest place there is, also carries the greatest admission price—a price few were willing to pay on earth. Nor could they pay it, even if the wishfully desired to, for they had insufficient funds in the bank of their souls. Now they must earn and pay the full price—which could have been paid at a discounted rate here on earth, but it was judged, even then, as being far too high a price to pay! The world offered its wares and pleasures and a much cheaper rate, and so that is what most souls spent the time and effort on—the world.
Extremely Bitter-Sweet
Even the most bitter and excruciating agonies that it suffers, are accompanied by a profound unshaken peace, such as the language of this world has no words to tell. It has reached a pinnacle of suffering and a pinnacle of virtue—although now, it will no longer receive any reward for virtuously suffering, as it could have done on earth. It is forced to do what it should have done on earth—it is the most painful, yet most successful remedial school there is, having a 100% graduation record with a grade of 100%--for only saints can get into Heaven, and sanctity is total perfection; partial perfection is fodder for Purgatory.
No sooner has a soul, with the guilt of no mortal sin upon it, but owing to God a debt of temporal punishment, issued from the world, and been judged, than it sees itself eternally confirmed in grace and charity (according to St. Catherine of Genoa). It is incapable either of sinning or of meriting anymore; and it is destined, by an eternal and immutable decree, to enter one day as a king or a queen into the kingdom of the blessed, to see, to love, and to enjoy God, the perpetual fountain of all happiness.
Finally the Soul Detests Sin like it Should
In that instant of judgment, all the sins of its past are represented to the soul, whether mortal or venial, even though they have been already forgiven here below by contrition and the Sacrament of Penance. But after this temporary and instantaneous view of them, the soul remembers nothing more about them. St. Catherine’s words are: “The cause of Purgatory, which these souls have in themselves, they see once and for all, in passing out of this life, and never afterwards.” The reason of this exhibition of sins is, she teaches us, to enable the soul in that moment, by an act, no longer indeed meritorious, but nevertheless a real act of the will, to detest all its sins afresh, and especially those venial sins for which it had not contrition during life, either through the weakness of an imperfect heart, or through the accident of a sudden death, that so it may be strictly true, that no sin whatever is pardoned, unless the sinner makes an act of detestation of each and every sin.
Burning-Off the Rust of Sin
After this momentary view of sins and formal detestation of them, the soul sees in itself their evil consequences and these form, what the St. Catherine calls “the impediment of seeing God … The rust of sin is the impediment, and the fire keeps consuming the rust; and, as a thing which is covered cannot correspond to the reverberation of the sun’s rays, so, if the covering be consumed, the thing is at length laid open to the sun.
Burning Inside and Outside
As soon as the soul perceives itself to be acceptable to God, and constituted heir of paradise, but unable, because of this impediment, to take immediate possession of its inheritance, it conceives an intense desire to be rid of this hindrance, this double obligation of guilt and punishment. But knowing that Purgatory alone can consume these two obligations, and that it is for that very end God condemns the soul to fire, it desires itself to endure the punishment. St. Catherin of Genoa says that, “The soul separated from the body, not finding in itself this impediment which cannot be taken away except by Purgatory, at once throws itself into it with right good will. The souls in Purgatory have wills conformed in all things with the will of God, who therefore sheds on them His goodness, and they, as far as their will goes, are happy and cleansed of all their sin. As for guilt, these cleansed souls are as they were when God created them, for God forgives their guilt immediately who have passed from this life ill content with their sins, having confessed all they have committed and having the will to commit no more. Only the rust of sin is left them and from this they cleanse themselves by pain in the fire.”
If the soul did not find this punishment and purgation of Purgatory, to help the soul remove the rust of sin, there would instantaneously be generated in the soul a Hell far worse than Purgatory, because it would see that with this impediment of the stain of sin with its unpaid debt, it could not unite itself to God Who is its end. Wherefore, if the soul could somewhere find another Purgatory fiercer than this, in which it could the sooner get rid of this impediment, it would quickly plunge itself therein, through the impetuosity of the love it bears to God.
A Thousand Hells if Necessary
But this is not all. St. Catherine of Genoa goes on to teach that if the soul, laboring under this impediment, were free to choose between immediately ascending to paradise, and descending to suffer in Purgatory, it would choose to suffer, although the sufferings be almost as dreadful as those of Hell. These are her words: “Of how much importance Purgatory is no tongue can tell, no mind conceive. So much I see, that its pain is almost as if it were that of Hell; and yet I see also that the soul which perceives in itself the slightest flaw or mote of imperfection, would rather throw itself into a thousand Hells, than find itself in the presence of the divine Majesty with that defect upon it; and, therefore, seeing Purgatory to be ordained for the very taking away of these flaws, forthwith it plunges into it, and it seems by its bearing, as I see, to conceive that it finds there an invention of no little mercy, simply in the being able to get rid of this impediment.”
Too Late Have I Loved Thee!
When the righteous soul has thus arrived in Purgatory, losing sight of everything else, it sees before it only two objects—the extremity of suffering, and the extremity of joys. A most tremendous pain is caused by knowing that God loves it with an infinite love, that He is the Chief Good, that He regards the soul as His daughter, and that He has predestined it to enjoy Him forever in company with the Blessed: and hence the soul loves Him with a pure and most perfect charity. At the same time it perceives that it cannot see Him or enjoy Him yet, though it so intensely yearns to do so ; and this afflicts it so much the more, as it is quite uncertain when the term of its penal exile, away from its Lord and paradise, will be fulfilled. This is the pain of loss in Purgatory, of which the St. Catherine of Genoa says that it is “a pain so extreme, that no tongue can tell it, no understanding grasp the least portion of it. Though God in His favor showed me a little spark thereof, yet can I not in any way express it with my tongue.”
Finally the Soul Finds Joy in Suffering
Now let us examine the other object, the extremity of joy. As it loves God with the purest affection, and knows its sufferings to be the will of God in order to procure its purification, it conforms itself perfectly to the divine decree. While in Purgatory, it sees nothing but that this pleases God; it takes in no idea but that of His will; it apprehends nothing so clearly as the suitableness of this purification, in order to present it all fair and lovely to so great a majesty. Thus, St. Catherine of Genoa says: “If a soul, having still something left to be cleansed away, were presented to the Vision of God, it would be worse than that of ten purgatories; for it would be quite unable to endure that excessive goodness and that exquisite justice.” Hence it is that the suffering soul is entirely resigned to the will of its Creator. It loves its very pains, and rejoices in them because they are a holy ordinance of God. Thus in the midst of the ardent heats it enjoys a contentment so complete that it exceeds the grasp of human intelligence to comprehend it. “I do not believe,” says St. Catherine of Genoa, “that it is possible to find a contentment to compare with that of the souls in Purgatory, unless it be the contentment of the Saints in paradise. This contentment increases daily through the influx of God into those souls, and this influx increases in proportion as the impediment is consumed and worn away. Indeed, so far as the will is concerned, we can hardly say that the pains are pains at all, so contentedly do the souls rest in the ordinance of God, to whose will pure love unites them.”
Holily Wholly Indifferent
In another place, St. Catherine says that this inexplicable joy of the soul, while it is undergoing the indescribable Purgatory, springs from the strength and purity of its love of God. “This love gives to the soul such a contentment as cannot be expressed. But this contentment does not take away one iota from the pain; nay, it is the retarding of love from the possession of its object which causes the pain; and the pain is greater according to the greater perfection of love of which God has made the soul capable. Thus the souls in Purgatory have at once the greatest contentment and the greatest suffering; and the one in no way hinders the other.” As to prayers, alms, and Masses, she asserts that the souls experience great consolation from them; but that in these, as in other matters, their principal solicitude is that everything should be “weighed in the most equitable scales of the Divine Will, leaving God to take His own course in everything, and to pay Himself and His justice in the way His own infinite goodness chooses to select.”
Scraping into Purgatory by the Skin of our Teeth
I suppose there is none of us who expects to be lost and damned—how many in Hell actually thought they would end up there? We know and feel, with more or less of alarm, the greatness of the risk we are running by the life we are leading—lukewarm and at peace with many venial sins; but to expect to be lost would be the sin of despair. Hell is only practical to us as a motive of greater diligence, greater strictness, greater circumspectness, greater fear. It is not so with Purgatory. I suppose we all expect, or think ourselves sure, to go there. If we do not think much about the matter at all, then we must have some vague notion of going straight to Heaven as soon as we are judged! But if we seriously reflect upon it, upon our own lives, upon God’s sanctity, upon what we read in books of devotion, in the lives of the Saints, and the revelations that God has permitted to come our way by means of souls condemned to Purgatory, then I can hardly imagine any one of us expecting to escape Purgatory, and perhaps even feeling that it must be almost a stretch of the divine mercy which will get us even there in the first place! Now, if we really expect that our road to Heaven will be through the punishment of Purgatory, for surely its purification is penal, it very much concerns us to know what is common to both the views of Purgatory, which it appears prevail in the Church.
Budgeting for Heaven (or rather, Purgatory).
First, both these views agree that the pains are extremely severe, as well because of the office which God intends them to fulfil, as because of the disembodied soul being the subject of them. Both agree, also, in the length of the suffering.
Do You Have Enough Money and Supplies for Sixty Years?
This requires to be dwelt upon, as it is hard to convince people of it, and a great deal comes of the conviction, both to ourselves and others. This duration may be understood in two ways: first, as of actual length of time, and, secondly, as of seeming length from the excess of pain. With regard to the first, if we look into the revelations of Sister Francesca of Pampeluna, we shall find, among some hundreds of cases, that by far the great majority suffered thirty, forty, or sixty years.
Long-Term Rentals
This disclosure may teach us greater watchfulness over ourselves, and more unwearied perseverance in praying for the departed. The old foundations for perpetual Masses embody the same sentiment. We are apt to leave off too soon, imagining with a foolish and unenlightened fondness that our friends are freed from Purgatory much sooner than they really are. If Sister Francesca beheld the souls of many fervent Carmelites, some of whom had wrought miracles in lifetime still in Purgatory ten, twenty, thirty, sixty years after their death, and still not near their deliverance, as many told her, what must become of us and ours? Then as to seeming length from the extremity of pain, there are many instances on record in the Chronicles of the Franciscans, the life of St. Francis Jerome, and elsewhere, of souls appearing an hour or two after death, and thinking they had been many years in Purgatory.
Our Trivial Faults Are Far From Trivial
Both views agree again in holding that, what we in the world call very trivial faults, are most severely dealt with in Purgatory. St. Peter Damian gives us many instances of this, and others are collected and quoted by St. Robert Bellarmine. Slight feelings of self-complacency, trifling inattentions in the recital of the Divine Office, and the like, occur frequently among them! Sister Francesca mentions the case of a girl of fourteen who was in Purgatory, because she was not quite conformed to the will of God in dying so young: and one soul said to her in Purgatory: “Ah, men little think in the world, how dearly they are going to pay here for faults that they hardly note there.” She even saw souls that were immensely punished only for having been scrupulous in this life; either, I suppose, because there is mostly self-will in scruples, or because they did not lay down the scruples when obedience commanded. Wrong notions about small faults may thus lead us to neglect the dead, or leave off our prayers too soon, as well as losing a salutary lesson for ourselves.
Broke and Begging
Then, again, both views agree as to the helplessness of the Holy Souls. They lie like the paralytic at the pool. It would seem as if even the coming of the angel were not an effectual blessing to them, unless there be some one of us to help them. Some have even thought they cannot pray. Anyhow, they have no means of making themselves heard by us, on whose charity they depend. Some writers have said that Our Blessed Lord will not help them without our cooperation; and that Our Blessed Lady cannot help them, except in indirect ways, because she is no longer able to make satisfaction; though I never like to hear anything our dearest mother cannot do; and I regard such statements with suspicion. Whatever may come of these opinions, they at least illustrate the strong way in which theologians apprehend the helplessness of the Holy Souls.
Stupid Notions of ‘Sanctity’!
Then another feature in their helplessness is the forgetfulness of the living, or the cruel flattery of relations who will always have it that those near or dear to them die the deaths of saints. They would surely have a scruple, if they knew of how many Masses and prayers they rob the souls, by the selfish exaggeration of their goodness. I call it selfish, for it is nothing more than a miserable device to console themselves in their sorrow. The very state of the Holy Souls is one of the most unbounded helplessness. They cannot do penance; they cannot merit; they cannot satisfy; they cannot gain indulgences; they have no Sacraments; they are not under the jurisdiction of God’s Vicar, overflowing with the plentitude of means of grace and manifold benedictions. They are a part of the Church, but without either priesthood or altar at their own command.
Lazy, Lukewarm and Blind
Those are the points common to both views of Purgatory; and how manifold are the lessons we learn from them, on our own behalf as well as on behalf of the Holy Souls. For ourselves, what light does all this throw on slovenliness, lukewarmness, and love of ease? What does it make us think of performing our devotions out of a mere spirit of formality, or a trick of habit? What diligence in our examens, confessions, Communions, and prayers! It seems as if the grace of all graces for which we should ever be importuning our dear Lord, would be to hate sin with something of the hatred wherewith He hated it in the garden of Gethsemane. Oh, is not the purity of God something awful, unspeakable, adorable?
Anger at Purgatory
But some persons turn in anger from the thought of Purgatory, as if it were not to be endured, that after trying all our lives long to serve God, we should accomplish the tremendous feat of a good death, only to pass from the agonies of the death-bed into fire, long, keen, searching, triumphant, incomparable fire. Sadly, your anger will not help you, nor alter the facts. But have you thought sufficiently about God? Have you tried to realize His holiness and purity in assiduous meditation? Is there a real divorce between you and the world, which you know is God’s enemy? Do you take God’s side? Are you devoted to His interests? Do you truly long for His glory? Is there a happy marriage between the theory of Catholicism and the practice of Catholicism in your life, or are they separated and divorced? Have you put sin alongside of our dear Saviors’ Passion, and measured the one by the other?
Surely, if you had, Purgatory would only seem to you the last, kind, unexpected, and inexpressibly tender invention of the obstinate love of God, which was mercifully determined to save you in spite of yourself. It would be a perpetual wonder to you, a joyous wonder, fresh every morning, a wonder that would be meat and drink to your soul, that you, being what you know yourself to be, what God knows you to be, should be saved eternally. Remember what the suffering soul said so simply, yet with such force, to Sister Francesca: “Ah! Those on that side of the grave little reckon how dearly they will pay on this side for the lives they live!”
Angry or Lucky?
To be angry, because you are told you will go to Purgatory! Silly, silly people! Most likely it is a great false flattery, and that you will never be good enough to even scrape into Purgatory at all! Why, positively, you do not recognize how lucky you are to be told of it, and told of it truthfully? None but the humble go there. St. Maria Crocifissa di Rosa was told that although many of the saints, while on earth, loved God more than some do even in Heaven, yet that the greatest saint on earth was not so humble as are the souls in Purgatory. I do not think I ever read anything in the lives of the saints which struck me so much as that. You see it is not good to be angry about Purgatory; for, as Fr. Faber says, those only are lucky enough to get into Purgatory, who sincerely believe themselves to be worthy of Hell.
Article 3
Sunday November 5th, 2023
Pray Now! Pay Now! Play Later!
Sunday November 5th, 2023
Pray Now! Pay Now! Play Later!
Poor Priorities
Everybody has priorities! A priority is defined as “something that requires being dealt with or done first.” Things that are priorities come “prior” to other things. If you have a slight cut on the finger and also break a bone in your arm or leg, then it is obvious which you will attend to first of all. If you drop and break a plate on the floor, just as the overheated oil in your deep-fryer on the stove bursts into flames―then, again, it is obvious which situation you will deal with first. If an armed robber points a gun at you and threatens to shoot you if you refuse to give him your wallet―then it is obvious that you will prioritize you life over your money.
Our Lord Himself speaks of having a correct set of priorities when He says: “What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Elsewhere He also adds: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Sadly and unfortunately, most people today prioritize earthly things above heavenly things; they like money more than grace; they see more benefit in having fun than doing penance; self-gratification over self-sanctification; they are quick to play and slow to pray; they are worldly, not spiritual. In short, they have poor priorities―or even pathetic priorities. People seek earthly happiness and worldly pleasures more than they seek eternal happiness and heavenly joys. Our Lady herself said to St. Bernadette at Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life―but in the next life!”
Yes―of course―some things are very important in life. We all need to pay attention to our health; our families and relationships; our work and income; even our houses and their contents; our cars and other possessions―but all of these are, in the words of Our Lord, secondary to following Him and saving our souls: “What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26) … “He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:37).
What a waste of time to spend one’s life pursuing riches and the comforts they can buy when they risk making us lose Heaven, or at best procuring for us a long time in the fires of Purgatory! Have we forgotten Our Lord’s encounter with the rich young man? “And behold a certain man running up and kneeling before Him: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou knowest the commandments—keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Jesus: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.
“Then Jesus, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you: How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus again answering, said to them: ‘Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus looking on them, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:16-26; Mark 10:17-27).
Our Lady speaks of this vanity and danger: “People will think only of amusements! … Priests … will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain! … Who think only of piling riches upon riches!” (Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette). If priests and religious are doing this, it only encourages the laity to do it even more! God says: “Let not the rich man glory in his riches! But let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth Me, for I am the Lord” (Jeremias 9:23-24). “Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23-24).
Insanity of Insanities!
No doubt you have heard the famous quote about insanity: “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results!” Who said that? You will go insane trying to find out―for innumerable people have been credited as being the origin of that quote. Nevertheless, the bottom-line is that the quote speaks the truth. If what I am doing always fails―then why the heck am I doing it in exactly the same way again and again and again? Surely I have to tweak something or even radically change something in the process if it always results in failure. Yes―inventors seem to do the same thing again and again and again in their experiments―but they are tweaking or changing certain elements in that process. Of course, when they succeed―they will repeat that eventual successful formula again and again and again in order to see if this time it repeatedly and unfailingly brings success or the desired result (instead of the earlier failures).
Our insanity―and the insanity of the souls in Purgatory and Hell―comes from repeating and repeating and repeating the insane mistakes of all those souls that are now in either Purgatory or Hell. There are some dangerous quotes that give us a false sense of security in being part of the majority: “Safety in numbers!” … “The majority is always right!” Most people believe most of the things they believe only because they believe that most people believe them! Yes―the majority MIGHT be right, but the majority MIGHT also be wrong! Even non-Catholics, atheists, pagans and worldly folk attest to that―as you can see in the following quotes:
“There is a view of life which conceives that where the crowd is, there is also truth. There is another view of life which conceives that wherever there is a crowd, there is untruth.” (Soren Kierkegaard, a 19th century Protestant theologian and philosopher).
“Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to reform (or pause and reflect).” (The Presbyterian, Samuel Langhorne Clemens, known by his pen name “Mark Twain”, 1835–1910, an American writer and an anti-Catholic).
“Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it!” (Leo Tolstoy, famous Russian writer and Christian anarchist).
“When you’re the only sane person, you look like the only insane person!” (Christopher James Gilbert, American poet and existentialist philosopher).
“I don’t imagine you will dispute the fact that at present the stupid people are in an absolutely overwhelming majority all the world over!” (Henrik Ibsen, 19th century Norwegian playwright). A billion foolish people do not form even a single wise person.
“It’s time to introduce a new fallacy that we have coined the ‘Kool-Aid Fallacy’. It goes like this: ‘You disagree with me and I’m in the majority while you’re in the minority. Therefore you’re a cult. Jim Jones led a cult and all of his followers drank poisoned Kool-Aid. Therefore, you’re a suicide cult!’ It’s unbelievable how many times this fallacy appears on social media. Any strong-minded minority with ideas that challenge the common herd, will automatically be called a cult and then it is inevitable that Kool-Aid will be mentioned. Any scientist that wants to change the prevailing paradigm is automatically branded a heretic, apostate, infidel, blasphemer, maverick or lunatic. The scientist must accept the majority or break with his peers, and have his job, career and funding placed in extreme jeopardy. How many careerist scientists are up for that? The answer is zero. The result is that scientists go on thinking what the establishment and the funding bodies expect them to think, even though they themselves must, deep down, know they are supporting ludicrous claims that make no sense.” (Thomas Stark, professor of philosophy, Extra Scientiam Nulla Salus: How Science Undermines Reason).
Following the Insane Majority to Hell or Purgatory
Our Lord―who tried to save the majority―Himself warns us against following the majority: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Not everyone that saith to Me, “Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! … Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! ... Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:21; 22:14).
The saints have taken up the above quotes and commented upon them―here is just a brief selection of quotes from some of those saints:
Pope St. Gregory the Great (540-604): “There are many who arrive at the Faith, but few who are led into the heavenly kingdom. Behold how many are gathered here for today’s feast-day―we fill the church from wall to wall! Yet who knows how few they are who shall be numbered in that chosen company of the Elect? The Ark, which in the midst of the Flood was a symbol of the Church, was wide below and narrow above; and, at the summit, measured only a single cubit. […] It was wide where the animals were, narrow where men lived―for the Holy Church is indeed wide in the number of those who are carnal-minded, narrow in the number of those who are spiritual! They who are to be saved as Saints, and wish to be saved as imperfect souls, shall not be saved!”
St. Justin Martyr, Father of the Church (100-165): “The majority of men shall not see God, excepting those who live justly, purified by righteousness and by every other virtue.”
St. Jerome, Doctor and Father of the Church (347-420): “So that you will better appreciate the meaning of Our Lord’s words, and perceive more clearly how few the Elect are, note that Christ did not say that those who walked in the path to Heaven are few in number, but that there were few who found that narrow way. It is as though the Savior intended to say: The path leading to Heaven is so narrow and so rough, so overgrown, so dark and difficult to discern, that there are many who never find it their whole life long. And those who do find it are constantly exposed to the danger of deviating from it, of mistaking their way, and unwittingly wandering away from it.”
St. John Chrysostom, Doctor and Father of the Church (347-407): “What do you think? How many of the inhabitants of this city may perhaps be saved? What I am about to tell you is very terrible, yet I will not conceal it from you. Out of this thickly populated city with its thousands of inhabitants not one hundred people will be saved. I even doubt whether there will be as many as that!”
St. Augustine, Doctor and Father of the Church (354-430): “Take care not to resemble the multitude whose knowledge of God’s will only condemns them to more severe punishment … It is certain that few are saved … If you wish to imitate the multitude, then you shall not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow gate … Not all, nor even a majority, are saved ... Beyond a doubt the elect are few.”
St. Bede the Venerable, Doctor and Father of the Church (673-735): “Nor should we think that it is enough for salvation that we are no worse off than the mass of the careless and indifferent, or that in our Faith we are, like so many others, uninstructed!”
St. Anselm, Doctor of the Church (1033-1109): “If thou wouldst be certain of being in the number of the elect, strive to be one of the few, not of the many. And if thou wouldst be quite sure of thy salvation, strive to be among the fewest of the few… Do not follow the great majority of mankind, but follow those who enter upon the narrow way, who renounce the world, who give themselves to prayer, and who never relax their efforts by day or by night, so that they may attain everlasting blessedness!”
St. Thomas Aquinas, Doctor of the Church (1225-1274): “There are a select few who are saved … Those who are saved are in the minority!”
St. Louis Marie de Montfort (1673-1716): “Be one of the small number who find the way to life, and enter by the narrow gate into Heaven! Take care not to follow the majority and the common herd, so many of whom are lost! Do not be deceived―there are only two roads―one that leads to life and is narrow; the other that leads to death and is wide. There is no middle way.”
St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church (1696-1787): “Everyone desires to be saved but the greater part is lost ... The common opinion is that the greater part of adults is lost … It is certainly a great happiness for some sinners who, after a bad life, are converted at their death, and are saved; but these cases are very rare: ordinarily he that leads a bad life dies a bad death … What is the number of those who love Thee, O God? How few they are! The Elect are much fewer than the damned! … In the Great Deluge in the days of Noe, nearly all mankind perished, eight persons alone being saved in the Ark. In our days a deluge, not of water but of sins, continually inundates the Earth, and out of this deluge very few escape, especially among seculars. Scarcely anyone is saved! … All persons desire to be saved, but the greater part are lost, because they will not adopt the means of being saved! … All would wish to be saved and to enjoy the glory of paradise; but to gain Heaven, it is necessary to walk in the straight road that leads to eternal bliss! … He who abuses too much the mercy of God will be abandoned by Him! ... The saints are few, but we must live with the few if we would be saved with the few! O God, too few indeed they are; yet among those few I wish to be! … Some will say: ‘It is enough for me to be saved!’ ‘No,’ says St. Augustine, ‘it is not enough; if you say that it is enough, you will be lost!’”
Are You with the Insane Majority or the Sane Few?
Ask any soul who has been through Purgatory, or still burns in Purgatory, if they prefer Purgatory instead of doing penance upon Earth. The unanimous MAJORITY answer in this case will be sane and correct―they would all have preferred to have paid the price for their sins here on Earth in the short life that they had, rather than burn (some for centuries) in the fires of Purgatory―which, by the way, St. Thomas Aquinas and many other saints say are just as painful as the fires of Hell; except in the fact that the fires of Purgatory will not be burning the soul for eternity.
Just about everyone is this world always seeks to “get the best deal possible” ― who on earth wants to pay $40,000 for an item when you can get the exact same item elsewhere for $35,000. So why “pay over the odds” to get to Heaven (by going to Purgatory) when you could get to Heaven for far less by doing penance in this life. Unfortunately for the souls in Purgatory, they did not take the sane option―but went with the insane option!
What Price on No More Suffering of Any Kind?
Heaven offers us a life free from any illness or suffering. Imagine what kind of money people would pay for that kind of blessing and guarantee here on Earth! Hundreds of thousands! Even millions! Look at the price of one surgical operation! Of course, insurance companies pay the largest chunk—but people pay insurance companies hundreds a month, every month!
Americans consume 80 percent of the world’s supply of painkillers. Pain also appeared to be a major driver of health-care costs. Research has shown that Americans spent just under $5,000 million in over-the-counter pain medications and another nearly $18,000 million on outpatient analgesics. In the United States, the total amount of money spent on medicines reached approximately $574,000 million ($574 billion) on all forms of medication. Average expenditure is about $1,300 per person per year. Health spending per person in the U.S. averaged out at $12,000 in 2020 ― this number is the average total spent per person by combining both out-of-pocket expenses made by the individual and payments made by health insurance companies.
In a 2019 survey, covering 1,170 Americans aged 18-65, the results show how much time men, women, and different age groups really spend keeping fit and healthy. Americans spend 11.7 hours per week (the average number) on their health & fitness regime.
What is the proportion of time, money and effort spent on spiritual health? Very little. Less than 20% of Catholics take the ‘medication’ of Holy Mass once a week; less than 3% to 4% take the ‘medication’ of the Holy Rosary daily! It seems like most Catholics don’t believe in “Holy-istic” medicine! Unfortunate! Even less is the number of Catholics who will take some spiritual exercise and suffer some regular penance—only to find themselves in REAL suffering in Purgatory, if they can scrape in there! “The Dogma of Purgatory is too much forgotten by the majority of the faithful; the Church Suffering, where they have so many brethren to succor, where they foresee that they themselves must one day go, seems a strange land to them” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained). Of course, everyone suffers in this life—but very few seem to profit from that suffering if, as Our Lord, Our Lady and most theologians hold that most souls are lost. There were two crucified thieves who suffered alongside Christ on Calvary—one suffered well and his sufferings brought an eternal end to suffering in Paradise; the other suffered badly and it brought him eternal suffering in Hell.
As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Understand the ignorance and error of mortals, and how far they drift from the way of light, when, as a rule, nearly all of them strive to avoid labor and suffering and are frightened by the royal and secure road of mortification and the Cross. Full of this deceitful ignorance, they do not only abhor resemblance to Christ’s suffering and my own, and deprive themselves of the true and highest blessing of this life; but they make their recovery impossible, since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering. Sin is committed by base indulgence and is repugnant to suffering sorrow, while tribulation earns the pardon of the just Judge.”
What Price on Beauty?
No aging, no getting older, ‘wrinklier’, weaker, or ‘wobblier’. No matter in what state we die—old, bald, fat, ugly, deformed or ‘dandruffed’—in Heaven we will find ourselves in the prime of life (early adulthood years) and with perfections of body that vain people of this world would kill for! They fork out thousands of dollars trying to achieve a perfect body, and God will give it to us for free—if we are good! Here, on Earth, billions is spent in the vain (for most) search for the perfect body, the beautiful face, hair care, hair restoration, etc. African Americans spent $507,000 million in 2009 on hair care and personal grooming items. In Britain women spend an average of $6,000 to $8,000 a year on beauty and maintenance. U.S. women spend on average between $12,000 to $15,000 every year on products and salon services. The amount of money spent annually on cosmetics in the United States is $8,000 million dollars! $20,000 million is spent in the U.S. annually on dieting, including diet books, diet drugs and weight-loss surgeries.
As Fr. Schouppe writes, in his book Purgatory Explained: “Souls that allow themselves to be dazzled by the vanities of the world, even if they have the good fortune to escape damnation, will have to undergo terrible punishment. Let us open the Revelations of St. Bridget. We read there that the saint saw herself transported in spirit into Purgatory, and that, among others, she saw there a young lady of high birth who had formerly abandoned herself to the luxury and vanities of the world. This unfortunate soul related to her the history of her life, and the sad state in which she then was found: ‘Happily,’ before death I confessed my sins in such dispositions as to escape Hell, but now I suffer here to expiate the worldly life that my mother did not prevent me from leading!’
“She then added: “Alas! This head of mine, which loved to be adorned, and which sought to draw the attention of others, is now devoured with flames inside and out, and these flames are so violent that, every moment, it seems to me that I must die. These shoulders, these arms, which I loved to see admired, are cruelly bound in chains of red-hot iron. These feet, formerly trained for the dance, are now surrounded with vipers that tear them with their fangs and soil them with their filthy slime. All these parts of the body which I have adorned with jewels, flowers, and a variety of other ornaments, are now a prey to the most horrible torture! O mother, mother!’ she cried, ‘how culpable have you been in my regard! It was you who, by a fatal indulgence, encouraged my taste for display and extravagant expense; it was you that took me to theaters, parties, and dances, and to those worldly assemblies which are the ruin of souls!’” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Eplained).
“Blessed Mary Villani, a Dominican Religious, was transported in spirit to Purgatory. Among the souls that suffered there she saw one more cruelly tormented than the others, in the midst of flames which entirely enveloped her. Touched with compassion, Blessed Mary Villani questioned the soul, who replied: ‘I have been here for a very long time, punished for my vanity and my scandalous extravagance. Thus far I have not received the least alleviation. Whilst I was upon Earth, being wholly occupied with my appearance, my pleasures, and worldly amusements, I thought very little of my duties as a Christian, and fulfilled them only with great reluctance, and in a slothful manner.” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Eplained).
What Price on Happiness?
Happiness and joy beyond our wildest dreams will be ours. Though there will be no equality in Heaven, there will also be no envy, no jealousy, no pride, no anger, no lust, no greed, no resentment, no desire for revenge, no harboring of grudges, no suspicion, no fear, no arguing, no fighting, etc. What price would you pay to experience that on Earth? You couldn’t pay for it, because it is priceless!
In 2000, the US population spent over $200 billion (200,000 million dollars) on entertainment—just to try find some happiness or joy—which is three times the amount spent on education. Other ‘Make Me Happy’ expenditures are $30,000 million on candy; $76,000 million on soda; $50,000 million on alcohol and $49,000 million on tobacco. That’s only the money side of it—how much time was spent indulging in these things? Our Lady’s complaints at Quito and La Salette are haunting: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement.”
As Fr. Schouppe writes, in his book Purgatory Explained: “The venerable servant of God, Frances of Pampeluna, who was favored with several visions of Purgatory, saw, one day, a man of the world, who, although he had otherwise been a tolerably good Christian, passed fifty-nine years in Purgatory on account of seeking his ease and comfort. Another passed thirty-five years there for the same reason; a third, who had too strong, a passion for gambling, was detained there for sixty-four years. If God is severe towards the rich and the pleasure-seekers of the world, He will not be less so towards princes, magistrates, parents, and, in general, towards all those who have the charge of souls and authority over others.” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Eplained).
You Won’t Miss Anything by Dozing-Off!
In Heaven you won’t miss out on anything. You will have more time to do things than you ever had here on Earth! Well, one reason for that is the “eternity factor” which makes a long-life on Earth seem like a joke! The other factor is that you won’t sleep in Heaven (so get all the sleep you can now!), for there will be no need for sleep! That must be the worldly man’s dream, for whom “time means money”! The less you sleep, the more you can work and so the more money you can make—much like the stores that want to stay open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Heavenly Diet
The beauty of body in Heaven will be aided by a heavenly diet—which is a diet of no food at all! We won’t need to eat to sustain our bodies. That means no more having to grow, hunt or shop for food; no more check-out lines; no more slaving over a hot oven; no more dirty dishes to wash! Put a price on that! You can’t, it’s priceless!
So there we are, just a few of the “Perks of Paradise”! And we want all that for what price??? God will say: “You’ve gotta be kidding Me! Your offer is a joke! When you develop a mature and real sense of values, then come back and we’ll talk about it!”
That was the attitude of most souls in Purgatory. It was a totally unrealistic view of Heaven and its value. In effect, they wanted to swindle God, by getting all the above and more besides, for a few paltry prayers; some soppy sacrifices; lukewarm lines of “Love ya!”; mediocre Masses; rushed Rosaries and the like.
That is not the way to treat God, nor will God let us get away with it—it’s not His way, though it might be ours. With these false expectations for Heaven, stemming from our self-love and pride, God could well tell us to go to “the other place.” Yet He knows what we are made of and He shows compassion:
“The Lord is compassionate and merciful: long-suffering and plenteous in mercy. He will not always be angry: nor will He threaten for ever. He hath not dealt with us according to our sins: nor rewarded us according to our iniquities ... As a father hath compassion on his children, so hath the Lord compassion on them that fear Him: for He knoweth our frame. He remembereth that we are dust” (Psalm 102:8-14).
The Real Price of Real Estate
In that kindness, compassion and mercy, He seeks for a solution to our cheap and insulting offer for a piece of Heaven’s real-estate. The solution is Purgatory. As Fr. Schouppe says, in his book, Purgatory Explained:
“The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended, the slightest transgression assumes enormous proportions, and demands enormous atonement.
“This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear. This fear of Purgatory is a salutary fear; its effect is, not only to animate us with a charitable compassion towards the poor suffering souls, but also with a vigilant zeal for our own spiritual welfare. Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next. Let us, however, guard against excessive fear, and not lose confidence.
“Let us not forget the Mercy of God, which is not less infinite than His Justice. Thy mercy, Lord, is great above the Heavens, says the prophet; and elsewhere, The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient, and plenteous in mercy? This ineffable mercy should calm the most lively apprehensions, and fill us with a holy confidence, according to the words: ‘In Thee, O Lord, I have hoped; let me never be put to confusion.’ If we are animated with this double sentiment, if our confidence in God’s Mercy is equal to the fear with which His Justice inspires us, we shall have the true spirit of devotion to the souls in Purgatory.” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Everybody has priorities! A priority is defined as “something that requires being dealt with or done first.” Things that are priorities come “prior” to other things. If you have a slight cut on the finger and also break a bone in your arm or leg, then it is obvious which you will attend to first of all. If you drop and break a plate on the floor, just as the overheated oil in your deep-fryer on the stove bursts into flames―then, again, it is obvious which situation you will deal with first. If an armed robber points a gun at you and threatens to shoot you if you refuse to give him your wallet―then it is obvious that you will prioritize you life over your money.
Our Lord Himself speaks of having a correct set of priorities when He says: “What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). Elsewhere He also adds: “Lay not up to yourselves treasures on Earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in Heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also!” (Matthew 6:19-21).
Sadly and unfortunately, most people today prioritize earthly things above heavenly things; they like money more than grace; they see more benefit in having fun than doing penance; self-gratification over self-sanctification; they are quick to play and slow to pray; they are worldly, not spiritual. In short, they have poor priorities―or even pathetic priorities. People seek earthly happiness and worldly pleasures more than they seek eternal happiness and heavenly joys. Our Lady herself said to St. Bernadette at Lourdes: “I do not promise to make you happy in this life―but in the next life!”
Yes―of course―some things are very important in life. We all need to pay attention to our health; our families and relationships; our work and income; even our houses and their contents; our cars and other possessions―but all of these are, in the words of Our Lord, secondary to following Him and saving our souls: “What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26) … “He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me! And he that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me!” (Matthew 10:37).
What a waste of time to spend one’s life pursuing riches and the comforts they can buy when they risk making us lose Heaven, or at best procuring for us a long time in the fires of Purgatory! Have we forgotten Our Lord’s encounter with the rich young man? “And behold a certain man running up and kneeling before Him: ‘Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have life everlasting?’ And Jesus said to him: ‘Thou knowest the commandments—keep the commandments!’ The young man said to Jesus: ‘All these I have kept from my youth, what is yet wanting to me?’ And Jesus looking on him, loved him, and said to him: ‘One thing is wanting unto thee: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me!’ And when the young man had heard this word, being struck sad at that saying, went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.
“Then Jesus, looking round about, said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you: How hardly shall they that have riches, enter into the Kingdom of God! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’ And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus again answering, said to them: ‘Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches, to enter into the Kingdom of God!’ And when they had heard this, the disciples wondered very much, saying: ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus looking on them, said to them: ‘With men this is impossible: but with God all things are possible!’” (Matthew 19:16-26; Mark 10:17-27).
Our Lady speaks of this vanity and danger: “People will think only of amusements! … Priests … will become attached to wealth and riches, which they will unduly strive to obtain! … Who think only of piling riches upon riches!” (Our Lady of Good Success and La Salette). If priests and religious are doing this, it only encourages the laity to do it even more! God says: “Let not the rich man glory in his riches! But let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth Me, for I am the Lord” (Jeremias 9:23-24). “Jesus said to His disciples: ‘Amen, I say to you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! And again I say to you: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven!’” (Matthew 19:23-24).
Insanity of Insanities!
No doubt you have heard the famous quote about insanity: “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results!” Who said that? You will go insane trying to find out―for innumerable people have been credited as being the origin of that quote. Nevertheless, the bottom-line is that the quote speaks the truth. If what I am doing always fails―then why the heck am I doing it in exactly the same way again and again and again? Surely I have to tweak something or even radically change something in the process if it always results in failure. Yes―inventors seem to do the same thing again and again and again in their experiments―but they are tweaking or changing certain elements in that process. Of course, when they succeed―they will repeat that eventual successful formula again and again and again in order to see if this time it repeatedly and unfailingly brings success or the desired result (instead of the earlier failures).
Our insanity―and the insanity of the souls in Purgatory and Hell―comes from repeating and repeating and repeating the insane mistakes of all those souls that are now in either Purgatory or Hell. There are some dangerous quotes that give us a false sense of security in being part of the majority: “Safety in numbers!” … “The majority is always right!” Most people believe most of the things they believe only because they believe that most people believe them! Yes―the majority MIGHT be right, but the majority MIGHT also be wrong! Even non-Catholics, atheists, pagans and worldly folk attest to that―as you can see in the following quotes:
“There is a view of life which conceives that where the crowd is, there is also truth. There is another view of life which conceives that wherever there is a crowd, there is untruth.” (Soren Kierkegaard, a 19th century Protestant theologian and philosopher).
“Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to reform (or pause and reflect).” (The Presbyterian, Samuel Langhorne Clemens, known by his pen name “Mark Twain”, 1835–1910, an American writer and an anti-Catholic).
“Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it!” (Leo Tolstoy, famous Russian writer and Christian anarchist).
“When you’re the only sane person, you look like the only insane person!” (Christopher James Gilbert, American poet and existentialist philosopher).
“I don’t imagine you will dispute the fact that at present the stupid people are in an absolutely overwhelming majority all the world over!” (Henrik Ibsen, 19th century Norwegian playwright). A billion foolish people do not form even a single wise person.
“It’s time to introduce a new fallacy that we have coined the ‘Kool-Aid Fallacy’. It goes like this: ‘You disagree with me and I’m in the majority while you’re in the minority. Therefore you’re a cult. Jim Jones led a cult and all of his followers drank poisoned Kool-Aid. Therefore, you’re a suicide cult!’ It’s unbelievable how many times this fallacy appears on social media. Any strong-minded minority with ideas that challenge the common herd, will automatically be called a cult and then it is inevitable that Kool-Aid will be mentioned. Any scientist that wants to change the prevailing paradigm is automatically branded a heretic, apostate, infidel, blasphemer, maverick or lunatic. The scientist must accept the majority or break with his peers, and have his job, career and funding placed in extreme jeopardy. How many careerist scientists are up for that? The answer is zero. The result is that scientists go on thinking what the establishment and the funding bodies expect them to think, even though they themselves must, deep down, know they are supporting ludicrous claims that make no sense.” (Thomas Stark, professor of philosophy, Extra Scientiam Nulla Salus: How Science Undermines Reason).
Following the Insane Majority to Hell or Purgatory
Our Lord―who tried to save the majority―Himself warns us against following the majority: “And a certain man said to Him: ‘Lord! Are they few that are saved?’ But He said to them: ‘Not everyone that saith to Me, “Lord! Lord!” shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! … Strive to enter by the narrow gate―for many, I say to you, shall seek to enter, and shall not be able! ... Enter ye in at the narrow gate―for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat! How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life―and few there are that find it! … For many are called, but few are chosen!’” (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14; 7:21; 22:14).
The saints have taken up the above quotes and commented upon them―here is just a brief selection of quotes from some of those saints:
Pope St. Gregory the Great (540-604): “There are many who arrive at the Faith, but few who are led into the heavenly kingdom. Behold how many are gathered here for today’s feast-day―we fill the church from wall to wall! Yet who knows how few they are who shall be numbered in that chosen company of the Elect? The Ark, which in the midst of the Flood was a symbol of the Church, was wide below and narrow above; and, at the summit, measured only a single cubit. […] It was wide where the animals were, narrow where men lived―for the Holy Church is indeed wide in the number of those who are carnal-minded, narrow in the number of those who are spiritual! They who are to be saved as Saints, and wish to be saved as imperfect souls, shall not be saved!”
St. Justin Martyr, Father of the Church (100-165): “The majority of men shall not see God, excepting those who live justly, purified by righteousness and by every other virtue.”
St. Jerome, Doctor and Father of the Church (347-420): “So that you will better appreciate the meaning of Our Lord’s words, and perceive more clearly how few the Elect are, note that Christ did not say that those who walked in the path to Heaven are few in number, but that there were few who found that narrow way. It is as though the Savior intended to say: The path leading to Heaven is so narrow and so rough, so overgrown, so dark and difficult to discern, that there are many who never find it their whole life long. And those who do find it are constantly exposed to the danger of deviating from it, of mistaking their way, and unwittingly wandering away from it.”
St. John Chrysostom, Doctor and Father of the Church (347-407): “What do you think? How many of the inhabitants of this city may perhaps be saved? What I am about to tell you is very terrible, yet I will not conceal it from you. Out of this thickly populated city with its thousands of inhabitants not one hundred people will be saved. I even doubt whether there will be as many as that!”
St. Augustine, Doctor and Father of the Church (354-430): “Take care not to resemble the multitude whose knowledge of God’s will only condemns them to more severe punishment … It is certain that few are saved … If you wish to imitate the multitude, then you shall not be among the few who shall enter in by the narrow gate … Not all, nor even a majority, are saved ... Beyond a doubt the elect are few.”
St. Bede the Venerable, Doctor and Father of the Church (673-735): “Nor should we think that it is enough for salvation that we are no worse off than the mass of the careless and indifferent, or that in our Faith we are, like so many others, uninstructed!”
St. Anselm, Doctor of the Church (1033-1109): “If thou wouldst be certain of being in the number of the elect, strive to be one of the few, not of the many. And if thou wouldst be quite sure of thy salvation, strive to be among the fewest of the few… Do not follow the great majority of mankind, but follow those who enter upon the narrow way, who renounce the world, who give themselves to prayer, and who never relax their efforts by day or by night, so that they may attain everlasting blessedness!”
St. Thomas Aquinas, Doctor of the Church (1225-1274): “There are a select few who are saved … Those who are saved are in the minority!”
St. Louis Marie de Montfort (1673-1716): “Be one of the small number who find the way to life, and enter by the narrow gate into Heaven! Take care not to follow the majority and the common herd, so many of whom are lost! Do not be deceived―there are only two roads―one that leads to life and is narrow; the other that leads to death and is wide. There is no middle way.”
St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church (1696-1787): “Everyone desires to be saved but the greater part is lost ... The common opinion is that the greater part of adults is lost … It is certainly a great happiness for some sinners who, after a bad life, are converted at their death, and are saved; but these cases are very rare: ordinarily he that leads a bad life dies a bad death … What is the number of those who love Thee, O God? How few they are! The Elect are much fewer than the damned! … In the Great Deluge in the days of Noe, nearly all mankind perished, eight persons alone being saved in the Ark. In our days a deluge, not of water but of sins, continually inundates the Earth, and out of this deluge very few escape, especially among seculars. Scarcely anyone is saved! … All persons desire to be saved, but the greater part are lost, because they will not adopt the means of being saved! … All would wish to be saved and to enjoy the glory of paradise; but to gain Heaven, it is necessary to walk in the straight road that leads to eternal bliss! … He who abuses too much the mercy of God will be abandoned by Him! ... The saints are few, but we must live with the few if we would be saved with the few! O God, too few indeed they are; yet among those few I wish to be! … Some will say: ‘It is enough for me to be saved!’ ‘No,’ says St. Augustine, ‘it is not enough; if you say that it is enough, you will be lost!’”
Are You with the Insane Majority or the Sane Few?
Ask any soul who has been through Purgatory, or still burns in Purgatory, if they prefer Purgatory instead of doing penance upon Earth. The unanimous MAJORITY answer in this case will be sane and correct―they would all have preferred to have paid the price for their sins here on Earth in the short life that they had, rather than burn (some for centuries) in the fires of Purgatory―which, by the way, St. Thomas Aquinas and many other saints say are just as painful as the fires of Hell; except in the fact that the fires of Purgatory will not be burning the soul for eternity.
Just about everyone is this world always seeks to “get the best deal possible” ― who on earth wants to pay $40,000 for an item when you can get the exact same item elsewhere for $35,000. So why “pay over the odds” to get to Heaven (by going to Purgatory) when you could get to Heaven for far less by doing penance in this life. Unfortunately for the souls in Purgatory, they did not take the sane option―but went with the insane option!
What Price on No More Suffering of Any Kind?
Heaven offers us a life free from any illness or suffering. Imagine what kind of money people would pay for that kind of blessing and guarantee here on Earth! Hundreds of thousands! Even millions! Look at the price of one surgical operation! Of course, insurance companies pay the largest chunk—but people pay insurance companies hundreds a month, every month!
Americans consume 80 percent of the world’s supply of painkillers. Pain also appeared to be a major driver of health-care costs. Research has shown that Americans spent just under $5,000 million in over-the-counter pain medications and another nearly $18,000 million on outpatient analgesics. In the United States, the total amount of money spent on medicines reached approximately $574,000 million ($574 billion) on all forms of medication. Average expenditure is about $1,300 per person per year. Health spending per person in the U.S. averaged out at $12,000 in 2020 ― this number is the average total spent per person by combining both out-of-pocket expenses made by the individual and payments made by health insurance companies.
In a 2019 survey, covering 1,170 Americans aged 18-65, the results show how much time men, women, and different age groups really spend keeping fit and healthy. Americans spend 11.7 hours per week (the average number) on their health & fitness regime.
What is the proportion of time, money and effort spent on spiritual health? Very little. Less than 20% of Catholics take the ‘medication’ of Holy Mass once a week; less than 3% to 4% take the ‘medication’ of the Holy Rosary daily! It seems like most Catholics don’t believe in “Holy-istic” medicine! Unfortunate! Even less is the number of Catholics who will take some spiritual exercise and suffer some regular penance—only to find themselves in REAL suffering in Purgatory, if they can scrape in there! “The Dogma of Purgatory is too much forgotten by the majority of the faithful; the Church Suffering, where they have so many brethren to succor, where they foresee that they themselves must one day go, seems a strange land to them” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained). Of course, everyone suffers in this life—but very few seem to profit from that suffering if, as Our Lord, Our Lady and most theologians hold that most souls are lost. There were two crucified thieves who suffered alongside Christ on Calvary—one suffered well and his sufferings brought an eternal end to suffering in Paradise; the other suffered badly and it brought him eternal suffering in Hell.
As Our Lady said to the Venerable Mary of Agreda: “Understand the ignorance and error of mortals, and how far they drift from the way of light, when, as a rule, nearly all of them strive to avoid labor and suffering and are frightened by the royal and secure road of mortification and the Cross. Full of this deceitful ignorance, they do not only abhor resemblance to Christ’s suffering and my own, and deprive themselves of the true and highest blessing of this life; but they make their recovery impossible, since all of them are weak and afflicted by many sins, for which the only remedy is suffering. Sin is committed by base indulgence and is repugnant to suffering sorrow, while tribulation earns the pardon of the just Judge.”
What Price on Beauty?
No aging, no getting older, ‘wrinklier’, weaker, or ‘wobblier’. No matter in what state we die—old, bald, fat, ugly, deformed or ‘dandruffed’—in Heaven we will find ourselves in the prime of life (early adulthood years) and with perfections of body that vain people of this world would kill for! They fork out thousands of dollars trying to achieve a perfect body, and God will give it to us for free—if we are good! Here, on Earth, billions is spent in the vain (for most) search for the perfect body, the beautiful face, hair care, hair restoration, etc. African Americans spent $507,000 million in 2009 on hair care and personal grooming items. In Britain women spend an average of $6,000 to $8,000 a year on beauty and maintenance. U.S. women spend on average between $12,000 to $15,000 every year on products and salon services. The amount of money spent annually on cosmetics in the United States is $8,000 million dollars! $20,000 million is spent in the U.S. annually on dieting, including diet books, diet drugs and weight-loss surgeries.
As Fr. Schouppe writes, in his book Purgatory Explained: “Souls that allow themselves to be dazzled by the vanities of the world, even if they have the good fortune to escape damnation, will have to undergo terrible punishment. Let us open the Revelations of St. Bridget. We read there that the saint saw herself transported in spirit into Purgatory, and that, among others, she saw there a young lady of high birth who had formerly abandoned herself to the luxury and vanities of the world. This unfortunate soul related to her the history of her life, and the sad state in which she then was found: ‘Happily,’ before death I confessed my sins in such dispositions as to escape Hell, but now I suffer here to expiate the worldly life that my mother did not prevent me from leading!’
“She then added: “Alas! This head of mine, which loved to be adorned, and which sought to draw the attention of others, is now devoured with flames inside and out, and these flames are so violent that, every moment, it seems to me that I must die. These shoulders, these arms, which I loved to see admired, are cruelly bound in chains of red-hot iron. These feet, formerly trained for the dance, are now surrounded with vipers that tear them with their fangs and soil them with their filthy slime. All these parts of the body which I have adorned with jewels, flowers, and a variety of other ornaments, are now a prey to the most horrible torture! O mother, mother!’ she cried, ‘how culpable have you been in my regard! It was you who, by a fatal indulgence, encouraged my taste for display and extravagant expense; it was you that took me to theaters, parties, and dances, and to those worldly assemblies which are the ruin of souls!’” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Eplained).
“Blessed Mary Villani, a Dominican Religious, was transported in spirit to Purgatory. Among the souls that suffered there she saw one more cruelly tormented than the others, in the midst of flames which entirely enveloped her. Touched with compassion, Blessed Mary Villani questioned the soul, who replied: ‘I have been here for a very long time, punished for my vanity and my scandalous extravagance. Thus far I have not received the least alleviation. Whilst I was upon Earth, being wholly occupied with my appearance, my pleasures, and worldly amusements, I thought very little of my duties as a Christian, and fulfilled them only with great reluctance, and in a slothful manner.” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Eplained).
What Price on Happiness?
Happiness and joy beyond our wildest dreams will be ours. Though there will be no equality in Heaven, there will also be no envy, no jealousy, no pride, no anger, no lust, no greed, no resentment, no desire for revenge, no harboring of grudges, no suspicion, no fear, no arguing, no fighting, etc. What price would you pay to experience that on Earth? You couldn’t pay for it, because it is priceless!
In 2000, the US population spent over $200 billion (200,000 million dollars) on entertainment—just to try find some happiness or joy—which is three times the amount spent on education. Other ‘Make Me Happy’ expenditures are $30,000 million on candy; $76,000 million on soda; $50,000 million on alcohol and $49,000 million on tobacco. That’s only the money side of it—how much time was spent indulging in these things? Our Lady’s complaints at Quito and La Salette are haunting: “The Christian spirit will rapidly decay, extinguishing the precious light of Faith until it reaches the point that there will be an almost total and general corruption of customs … Disorder and the love of carnal pleasures will be spread all over the Earth … People will think of nothing but amusement.”
As Fr. Schouppe writes, in his book Purgatory Explained: “The venerable servant of God, Frances of Pampeluna, who was favored with several visions of Purgatory, saw, one day, a man of the world, who, although he had otherwise been a tolerably good Christian, passed fifty-nine years in Purgatory on account of seeking his ease and comfort. Another passed thirty-five years there for the same reason; a third, who had too strong, a passion for gambling, was detained there for sixty-four years. If God is severe towards the rich and the pleasure-seekers of the world, He will not be less so towards princes, magistrates, parents, and, in general, towards all those who have the charge of souls and authority over others.” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Eplained).
You Won’t Miss Anything by Dozing-Off!
In Heaven you won’t miss out on anything. You will have more time to do things than you ever had here on Earth! Well, one reason for that is the “eternity factor” which makes a long-life on Earth seem like a joke! The other factor is that you won’t sleep in Heaven (so get all the sleep you can now!), for there will be no need for sleep! That must be the worldly man’s dream, for whom “time means money”! The less you sleep, the more you can work and so the more money you can make—much like the stores that want to stay open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Heavenly Diet
The beauty of body in Heaven will be aided by a heavenly diet—which is a diet of no food at all! We won’t need to eat to sustain our bodies. That means no more having to grow, hunt or shop for food; no more check-out lines; no more slaving over a hot oven; no more dirty dishes to wash! Put a price on that! You can’t, it’s priceless!
So there we are, just a few of the “Perks of Paradise”! And we want all that for what price??? God will say: “You’ve gotta be kidding Me! Your offer is a joke! When you develop a mature and real sense of values, then come back and we’ll talk about it!”
That was the attitude of most souls in Purgatory. It was a totally unrealistic view of Heaven and its value. In effect, they wanted to swindle God, by getting all the above and more besides, for a few paltry prayers; some soppy sacrifices; lukewarm lines of “Love ya!”; mediocre Masses; rushed Rosaries and the like.
That is not the way to treat God, nor will God let us get away with it—it’s not His way, though it might be ours. With these false expectations for Heaven, stemming from our self-love and pride, God could well tell us to go to “the other place.” Yet He knows what we are made of and He shows compassion:
“The Lord is compassionate and merciful: long-suffering and plenteous in mercy. He will not always be angry: nor will He threaten for ever. He hath not dealt with us according to our sins: nor rewarded us according to our iniquities ... As a father hath compassion on his children, so hath the Lord compassion on them that fear Him: for He knoweth our frame. He remembereth that we are dust” (Psalm 102:8-14).
The Real Price of Real Estate
In that kindness, compassion and mercy, He seeks for a solution to our cheap and insulting offer for a piece of Heaven’s real-estate. The solution is Purgatory. As Fr. Schouppe says, in his book, Purgatory Explained:
“The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended, the slightest transgression assumes enormous proportions, and demands enormous atonement.
“This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear. This fear of Purgatory is a salutary fear; its effect is, not only to animate us with a charitable compassion towards the poor suffering souls, but also with a vigilant zeal for our own spiritual welfare. Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next. Let us, however, guard against excessive fear, and not lose confidence.
“Let us not forget the Mercy of God, which is not less infinite than His Justice. Thy mercy, Lord, is great above the Heavens, says the prophet; and elsewhere, The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient, and plenteous in mercy? This ineffable mercy should calm the most lively apprehensions, and fill us with a holy confidence, according to the words: ‘In Thee, O Lord, I have hoped; let me never be put to confusion.’ If we are animated with this double sentiment, if our confidence in God’s Mercy is equal to the fear with which His Justice inspires us, we shall have the true spirit of devotion to the souls in Purgatory.” (Fr. Schouppe, Purgatory Explained).
Article 2
Thursday November 2nd to Saturday November 4th, 2023
Feast of Poor Holy Souls in Purgatory
Help Them & They Will Help You!
Thursday November 2nd to Saturday November 4th, 2023
Feast of Poor Holy Souls in Purgatory
Help Them & They Will Help You!
No Big Deal!
The poor souls in Purgatory receive so little help from us on Earth because we think so little of sin. If we think that sin is no big deal with little or no consequences, then we less likely to do anything to help the souls in Purgatory―largely because we have an unrealistic idea of the price of sin and terrible debts that sin incurs. Purgatory is not a “waiting room” where souls sit in boredom while awaiting for someone to open the Gates of Heaven and say: “Come on in!”
The reason behind such naïve, childish and unrealistic ideas is mainly due to what recent popes―since Pope Pius XII―have called “a loss of the sense of sin.” If sin is not a big deal―then Purgatory can’t be a very painful place. Yet nothing is further from the truth! Purgatory is a “big deal”―almost as “big-a-deal” as Hell itself. That is what saints repeatedly tell us.
As Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J., in his book Purgatory Explained, writes: “The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended, the demands enormous atonement. This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear.”
The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, is the same as that of Hell. The same fire, says Pope St. Gregory, torments the damned and purifies the elect. (In Ps. 37). “Almost all theologians,” says the Cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, “teach that the souls of the reprobate in Hell, and the souls in Purgatory, all suffer the action of the same fire.” (De Purgat., i. 2, cap. 6).
It must be held as certain, writes the same St. Robert Bellarmine, that there is no proportion between the sufferings of this life and those of Purgatory. St. Augustine declares precisely the same in his commentary on Psalm 31. The souls in Purgatory will be saved, no doubt, after a trial of fire, but that trial will be terrible, that torment will be more intolerable than all the most excruciating sufferings in this world. That is what St. Augustine says, and what Pope St. Gregory, the Venerable St. Bede, St. Anselm, and St. Bernard have said after him. St. Thomas goes even further―he maintains that the least pain of Purgatory surpasses all the sufferings of this life, whatsoever they may be.
Fear with Hope―Hope in Fear
Prayers and sacrifices for the deceased souls form a necessary part of Christian worship, and devotion towards the souls in Purgatory is a devotion which the Holy Ghost infuses with charity into the hearts of the faithful. “It is a holy and wholesome thought”, says Holy Scripture, “to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins” (2 Machabees 12:46). In order to be perfect, devotion, to the souls in Purgatory must be animated both by a spirit of fear and a spirit of confidence. On the one hand, the Sanctity of God and His Justice inspires us with a salutary fear; on the other, His infinite Mercy gives us boundless confidence.
The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely. This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear. This fear of Purgatory is a salutary and profitable fear―for its effect is, not only to inspire us with a charitable compassion towards the poor suffering souls in Purgatory, but it also inspires us with a vigilant zeal for our own spiritual welfare. Think of the fire of Purgatory and you will try to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, so that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next.
Fear God’s Punishments―Hope in God’s Mercy
Let us, however, guard against excessive fear, and not lose confidence. Let us not forget the Mercy of God, which is not less infinite than His Justice. “Thy mercy, Lord, is great above the Heavens”, says the prophet (Psalm 107); and elsewhere, “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy! The Lord is sweet to all, and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, in his book, Words of Love, quotes Our Lord’s words to several mystics on the subject of His love and mercy towards souls:
“I am God―but a God of love! I am a Father―but a Father full of compassion and never harsh … I have contracted an alliance of love and mercy with you. Does love ever grow weary or mercy come to an end? … Ah! If only they [souls] knew My Heart ... Mankind is ignorant of Its mercy and goodness―that is My greatest sorrow! … Never does My Heart refuse to forgive a soul that humbles itself, especially when it asks with confidence … I am consumed with desire to pardon! ... My Heart takes comfort in forgiving! I have no greater desire, no greater joy, than when I can pardon a soul! … I will make known that the measure of My love and mercy for fallen souls is limitless! ... I will teach sinners that the mercy of My Heart is inexhaustible! … I want to forgive them! It rests Me to forgive! … I pursue sinners as justice pursues criminals―but justice seeks them in order to punish them, I seek them in order to forgive them! … You cannot give Me a greater proof of affection than to count on My full pardon and to believe that your sins will never be as great as My mercy, which is infinite!” (Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez).
“You must never forget that I am, and love to be, exclusively kind and merciful … Do not make Me out to be a God of rigor, whereas I am nothing but a God of Love! … Write ‘The Gentle Heart of Jesus’―for everyone knows that I am holy, but not all know that I am gentle! … Do you understand? Therefore, never, never, never have even a shadow of doubt! Lack of confidence wounds My Heart!” (Our Lord to Sr. Consolata Betrone).
“It is My joy to pardon! If pride prevents you from being sorry for your sins for your own sake, then be sorry for them out of love for Me, so that I may have the joy of forgiving! ... At the least sign of repentance, My Heart is aflame with joy, and I wait with inexpressible love for the sinner to turn towards Me … What is there that I cannot repair when I am allowed to do it?” (Our Lord to Sr. Mary of the Trinity).
This unimaginable and mind-blowing mercy should calm the most lively apprehensions, and fill us with a holy confidence―yet, at the same time, it should not lull us into a false sense of security with regard to the extreme gravity of sin and inescapable necessity of expiation for sins committed. We must not mistake Our Lord’s words about His great desire to forgive sin as also being a total dispensation from paying for sin―guilt for sin is something different to debt for sin. Whenever Our Lord forgives our sins in the Sacrament of Confession, He does not take away the debt that we owe and must pay for our sins! Hence, if a soul is negligent in paying its debts for forgiven sins in this life―then it must pay those debts in Purgatory. Our Lord’s words during His Sermon on the Mount can equally be applied to Purgatory: “Amen I say to thee, you shalt not go out from there until you repay the last penny!” (Matthew 5:26). Guilt for sin can be removed in an instant in the Sacrament of Confession―whereas the debt for sin is rarely taken away in an instant, apart from rare cases of perfect contrition for sin, which is sorrow for sin based upon a deep love of God and sorrow for having offended someone who we love deeply. The other form of sorrow―attrition―is based upon a fear of God and His just punishments, but not based upon a deep love of God. Ideally, we should have both―a fear of God and a love of God. Yet, as in all things, “the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13) … “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear hath pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18).
From Fear to Love
Nevertheless, fear is a seed that gradually transforms itself into charity: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 110:10)―wisdom is, so to speak, the ‘spouse’ of charity, by being the pinnacle of the intellect’s or mind’s virtues, whereas charity is the pinnacle of the will’s or heart’s virtues. “By the fear of the Lord everyone declines from evil” (Proverbs 15:27). “The fear of the Lord drives out sin” (Ecclesiasticus 1:27). “Fear the Lord and serve Him with your whole heart” (1 Kings 12:24). “It shall be well with them that fear God, who dread His face!” (Ecclesiastes 8:12). Similarly, in life we often start out fearing things before we love those things―as in the case of difficult tasks, hobbies, jobs, persons. The more we get to know and understand them, the more we begin to love them.
No Fear of Purgatory―No Fear of Sin
Similarly with Purgatory. Why do we give so little attention and so little charity to the souls in Purgatory―especially our beloved ones? It is because we do not really know and understand what Purgatory is all about. It is because we do not really understand the gravity and consequences of sin―even what we think is a “teeny-weeny” venial sin. We block-out and plug our ears to what the Catechisms tell us: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” … “Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
This teaching falls on deaf ears―because we have lost the sense of sin and attach very little importance to sin, it is only “little thing.” Both Traditional popes and Liberal/Modernist popes attest to that fact:
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin ... The meaning of sin ― which is a different thing from ‘guilt feelings’ as understood in psychology ― is only grasped in discovering the meaning of God!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
No Concerns Over Purgatory―No Concerns Over the Poor Souls
The result of this ‘deflation’ of sin automatically causes a ‘deflation’ in our concern for the Poor Souls in Purgatory. We fail to realize the horrendous torments that they undergo, for we stupidly and vainly imagine them to be in some kind of ‘holding-cell’ or ‘solitary confinement’, merely sitting and waiting for the moment in which they will be admitted into Heaven! We have little idea of what they suffer, to what degree they suffer and how long they suffer―just cast your thoughts to the words of Our Lady of Fatima, who, over 100 years ago in 1917, said that the then recently deceased friend of Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta―the 18 year-old Amelia―would be in Purgatory until the end of the world! Heck! Eighteen years old! She didn’t even chance to live a long life of sin into her sixties, seventies or eighties! She didn’t even have the terrible sources of temptation that we are surrounded with today―television, computers, smartphones, internet, highly immodest fashions, supermarkets, malls, immodest books and magazines, street drugs, pornography, bad music, etc. Yet she is consigned to the fires of Purgatory until the end of the world!
As Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S. J., in his book Purgatory Explained, writes: “The Dogma of Purgatory is too much forgotten by the majority of the faithful; the Church Suffering, where they have so many brethren to help, where they foresee that they themselves must one day go, seems a strange land to them. This truly deplorable forgetfulness was a great sorrow to St. Francis de Sales. ‘Alas!’ said this Doctor of the Church, ‘We do not sufficiently remember our dear departed; their memory seems to perish with the sound of the funeral-bells!’ The principal causes of this are ignorance and lack of Faith; our notions on the subject of Purgatory are too vague, our Faith is too feeble.”
Purgatory is No Vacation!
Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, relates many visions granted to saints concerning the terrible torments of Purgatory―here are only two of them. One was given to St. Frances of Rome, the other to St. Magdalen de Pazzi.
Fr. Schouppe recounts: “It has pleased God to show in spirit the gloomy abodes of Purgatory to some privileged souls. Of this number was St. Frances, foundress of the Oblates, who died in Rome in 1440. She was conducted by her celestial guide into the regions of Purgatory. She saw there souls which suffered cruelly, but angels visited and assisted them in their sufferings. Souls are buried more deeply in Purgatory in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance. The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell―it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths―these souls are those who have been guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but not sufficiently expiated during life. Although the souls are enveloped in the same flames, their sufferings are not the same; they differ according to the number and nature of their former sins. In this lower Purgatory the saint beheld laity and persons consecrated to God. The laity were those who, after a life of sin, had had the happiness of being sincerely converted; the persons consecrated to God were those who had not lived according to the sanctity of their state. St. Frances was then conducted into the intermediate Purgatory, destined for souls which had deserved less rigorous chastisement. It had three distinct compartments; one resembled an immense dungeon of ice, the cold of which was indescribably intense; the second, on the contrary, was like a huge caldron of boiling oil and pitch; the third had the appearance of a pond of liquid metal resembling molten gold or silver. The upper Purgatory, which the saint does not describe, is the temporary abode of souls which suffer little, except the pain of loss, and approach the happy moment of their deliverance. Such, in substance, is the vision of St. Frances relative to Purgatory.
St. Magdalen de Pazzi, a Florentine Carmelite, some time before her death in 1607, saw Purgatory open before her. She began to cry aloud in lamentation: “Mercy, my God, mercy! Deliver these souls from their prison! Poor souls! You suffer so cruelly, and yet you are content and cheerful! Good God! How they are tormented! O Lord!” Nothing but ice and fire were there. She noticed that these souls had their guardian angels with them, who fortified them greatly by their presence; but she saw also demons whose dreadful forms increased their sufferings. She was heard to cry out: “O how horrible is this place! It is full of hideous demons and incredible torments! Who, O my God, are the victims of these cruel tortures? They are being pierced with sharp swords, they are being cut into pieces!” She was answered that they were the souls whose conduct had been tainted with hypocrisy.
Advancing a little, she saw a great multitude of souls which were bruised, as it were, and crushed under a press; and she understood that they were those souls which had been addicted to impatience and disobedience during life. A moment later her agitation increased, and she uttered a dreadful cry. It was the dungeon of lies which now lay open before her. She cried aloud: “Liars are confined in a place in the vicinity of Hell, and their sufferings are exceedingly great! Molten lead is poured into their mouths! I see them burn, and at the same time tremble with cold!”
She then saw those souls who had sinned through weakness, and she was heard to exclaim: “Alas! I had thought to find you among those who have sinned through ignorance―but I am mistaken; you burn with an intenser fire!” Farther on, she perceived souls which had been too much attached to the goods of this world, and had sinned by avarice “What blindness” she lamented, “to seek a perishable fortune so eagerly! Those whom formerly riches could not sufficiently satisfy, are here gorged with torments! They are smelted like metal in the furnace!” Then she was shown those souls who had formerly been stained with impurity. She saw them in so filthy and pestilential a dungeon that the sight produced nausea. She turned away quickly from that loathsome spectacle. Seeing the ambitious and the proud, she said, “Behold those who wished to shine before men! Now they are condemned to live in this frightful obscurity.” Then she was shown those souls which had been guilty of ingratitude towards God. They were a prey to unutterable torments, and, as it were, drowned in a lake of molten lead, for having by their ingratitude dried up the source of piety.
Finally, in a last dungeon, she was shown souls that had not been given to any particular vice, but which, through lack of proper vigilance over themselves, had committed all kinds of trivial faults. She remarked that these souls had share in the chastisements of all vices, in a moderate degree, because those faults committed only from time to time rendered them less guilty than those committed through habit. After this last station the saint left the garden, begging God never again to make her witness of so heartrending a spectacle: she felt that she had not strength to endure it. Her ecstasy still continued, and, conversing with Jesus, she said to Him, “Tell me, Lord, what was Your design in discovering to me those terrible prisons, of which I knew so little, and comprehended still less? Ah! I now see! You wished to give me the knowledge of Your infinite sanctity, and to make me detest more and more the least stain of sin, which is so abominable in Your eyes.” (Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S. J., Purgatory Explained).
Cruel Indifference towards the Poor Souls
We are pretty clueless and indifferent to the terrible torments suffered by our nearest and dearest in Purgatory! Today some priests even give the impression to family and friends of deceased persons that they must already be in Heaven! Fools and idiots! St. Padre Pio said that of the few persons who are saved, most of them have to pass through Purgatory! Sin is no joke! Neither is the debt for sin a light matter! It is because we make light of sin that we also make light of the consequences of sin and the terrible debt that sin incurs.
Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, is full of accounts of our earthly indifference towards the suffering Poor Souls of Purgatory―here are just a few extracts:
“Alas! How feeble is our Faith! If a domestic animal, a little dog, falls into the fire, do you delay to draw it out? And see, your parents, benefactors, persons most dear to you, writhe in the flames of Purgatory, and you do not consider it your urgent duty to relieve them! You delay, you allow long days of suffering to pass for those poor souls, without making an effort to perform those good works which will release them from their pains!
“The great causes of this forgetfulness, this indifference, guilty neglect, and injustice towards the dead, is lack of Faith. For do we not see that true Christians, those animated by a spirit of Faith, make the most noble sacrifices in behalf of their departed friends? He who forgets his friend, after death has taken him away from his sight, never had a true friendship. St. Francis de Sales said: ‘We do not sufficiently remember our dear departed friends! Their memory seems to perish with the sound of the funeral-bells, and we forget that the friendship which finds an end, even in death, was never genuine friendship.’
“Children are obliged to pray for their deceased parents. Reciprocally, in their turn, parents are bound not to forget before God their children who have preceded them into eternity. Alas! There are parents who are inconsolable at the loss of a son or of a dearly beloved daughter, and who, instead of praying for them, bestow upon them nothing but a few fruitless tears.”
If we could bring ourselves to help our grandparents, parents, brothers, sisters, friends and relatives while they were alive on Earth, then why on earth are we not helping them in even greater need now that they are burning in the fires of Purgatory? If ever they needed help, then it is now as they suffer unimaginable torments in Purgatory! How callous and cruel can we be?
Win-Win Situation
The Holy Souls in Purgatory are not able to pray for themselves or do anything at all to relieve their suffering. They rely on our prayers and efforts to help them. It is permissible to believe that they can pray for their benefactors. St. John Vianney said: “If one knew what we may obtain from God by the intercession of the Poor Souls, they would not be so much abandoned. Let us pray a great deal for them, they will pray for us!” St Teresa of Avila said that she always obtained the favors which she asked from God, through the intercession of the Poor Souls in Purgatory.
In chapter 6 of Fr. Paul O’Sullivan’s booklet, Read Me Or Rue It, we see a lot of miracles listed that occurred at the intercession of the Holy Souls in Purgatory, in recompense to certain persons who were praying for the Holy Souls. Here are some of those miracles.
How Pope Pius IX Cured A Bad Memory
The blessed Pontiff, Pius IX, appointed a holy and prudent priest from a religious order, to be the Bishop of a diocese. The priest―alarmed at the responsibility put on him― earnestly begged to be excused. His protests were in vain. The Holy Father knew his merits.
Overcome with apprehension the humble religious begged a private audience with the Pope, who received him most graciously. Once more he pleaded earnestly to be excused―but the Pope was immovable.
As a last recourse Fr. Tomaso told the Holy Father that he had a very bad memory, which would naturally prove to be a grave impediment in the high office put on him.
Blessed Pius IX answered with a smile: “Your diocese is very small in comparison with the Universal Church, which I carry on my shoulders! Your cares will be very light in comparison with mine! I, too, suffered from a grave defect of memory―but I promised to say a fervent prayer daily for the Holy Souls, who, in return, have obtained for me an excellent memory! Do you likewise, dear Father, and you will have cause to rejoice!”
The Holy Souls are great intercessors in time of need―and, boy, do we need intercession right now! By our praying for them they can and will, in justice, be praying for us in our needs. The Holy Souls cannot pray for themselves, but for others and their prayers are not ignored. The reason is that they have an incredible love of God while they burn in Purgatory―and it is the degree of love, or charity, that we have which regulates how much our prayers will obtain from God. By praying to these special souls and relieving them of some of their suffering, you in turn will merit special graces from God.
St. Alphonsus Liguori says that, although the Holy Souls cannot merit for themselves, they can obtain for us great graces. They are not, formally speaking, intercessors, as the Saints are, but through the sweet Providence of God, they can obtain for us as astounding favors and deliver us from evils, sickness and dangers of every kind. It is beyond all doubt, as already said, that they repay us a thousand times for anything we do for them. The following facts, a few hundred of which we might quote, are sufficient to show what powerful and generous friends the Holy Souls are.
How A Girl Found Her Mother
A poor servant girl in France named Jeanne Marie once heard a sermon on the Holy Souls which made an indelible impression on her mind. She was deeply moved by the thought of the intense and unceasing sufferings the Poor Souls endure, and she was horrified to see how cruelly they are neglected and forgotten by their friends on Earth.
Among other things the preacher stressed was that many souls who are in reality near to their release ― one Mass might suffice to set them free ― are oftentimes long detained; it may be for years, just because the last needful suffrage has been withheld or forgotten or neglected!
With her simple Faith, Jeanne Marie resolved that, cost what it might, she would have a Mass said for the Poor Souls every month, especially for the soul nearest to Heaven. She earned little, and it was sometimes difficult to keep her promise, but she never failed.
On one occasion she went to Paris with her mistress and there fell ill, so that she was obliged to go to the hospital. Unfortunately, the illness proved to be a long one, and her mistress had to return home, hoping that her maid would soon rejoin her. When at last the poor servant was able to leave the hospital, all she had left of her scanty earnings was one franc!
What was she to do? Where to turn? Suddenly, the thought flashed across her mind that she had not had her usual monthly Mass offered for the Holy Souls. But she had only one franc! That was little enough to buy her food. Yet her confidence that the Holy Souls would not fail her triumphed. She made her way into a church and asked a priest, just about to say Mass, if he would offer it for the Holy Souls. He consented to do so, never dreaming that the modest alms offered was the only money the poor girl possessed. At the conclusion of the Holy Sacrifice, our heroine left the church. A wave of sadness clouded her face; she felt utterly bewildered.
A young gentleman, touched by her evident distress, asked her if she was in trouble and if he could help her. She told her story briefly, and ended by saying how much she desired work. Somehow she felt consoled at the kind way in which the young man listened to what she said, and she fully recovered her confidence.
“I am delighted beyond measure,” he said, “to help you. I know a lady who is even now looking for a servant. Come with me.” And so saying he led her to a house, not too far away, and told her ring the bell, assuring her that she would find work.
In answer to her ring, the lady of the house herself opened the door and inquired what Jeanne Marie required.
“Madam” she said, “I have been told that you are looking for a servant. I have no work and should be glad to get the position.”
The lady was amazed and replied: “Who could have told you that I needed a servant? It was only a few minutes ago that I had to dismiss my maid, and that at a moment’s notice. You did not meet her?”
“No, Madam. The person who informed me that you required a servant was a young gentleman!”
“Impossible!” exclaimed the lady. “No young man, in fact no one at all, could have known that I needed a servant!”
“But Madam,” the girl answered excitedly, pointing to a picture on the wall, “that is the young man who told me!”
“Why, child―that is my only son, who has been dead for more than a year!”
“Dead or not,” asserted the girl with deep conviction in her voice, “it was he who told me to come to you, and he even led me to the door! See the scar over his eye―I would know him anywhere!”
Then followed the full story of how, with her last franc, she had had Mass offered for the Holy Souls, especially for the one nearest to Heaven.
Convinced at last of the truth of what Jeanne Marie had told her, the lady received her with open arms. “Come,” she said, “though not as my servant, but as my dear daughter. You have sent my dear boy to Heaven. I have no doubt that it was he who brought you to me.”
How A Poor Boy Became A Bishop, A Cardinal, And A Saint
St. Peter Damian lost both father and mother shortly after his birth. One of his brothers adopted him, but treated him with unnatural harshness, forcing him to work hard and giving him poor food and scanty clothing.
One day Peter found a silver piece, which represented to him a small fortune. A friend told him that he could conscientiously use it for himself, as the owner could not be found. The only difficulty Peter had was to choose what it was he most needed, for he was in sore need of many things.
While turning the matter over in his young mind, it struck him that he could do a still better thing―namely, have a Mass said for the Holy Souls in Purgatory, especially for the souls of his dear parents. At the cost of a great sacrifice, he put this thought into effect and had the Mass offered. The Holy Souls repaid his sacrifice most generously. From that day forward a complete change became noticeable in his fortunes.
His eldest brother called at the house where he lived and, horrified at the brutal hardships the little fellow was subjected to by his fellow brother, arranged that he be handed over to his own care. He clad him and fed him as his own child, and educated and cared for him most affectionately. Blessing followed upon blessing. Peter’s wonderful talents became known, and he was rapidly promoted to the priesthood; sometime after he was raised to the episcopacy and, finally, created Cardinal. Miracles attested his great sanctity, so that after death he was canonized and made a Doctor of the Church. These wonderful graces came to him after that one Mass said for the Holy Souls.
An Adventure In The Apennines
A group of priests was called to Rome to treat of a grave business matter. They were bearers of important documents, and a large sum of money was entrusted to them for the Holy Father. Aware that the Apennines, over which they had to pass, were infested by daring bandits, they chose a trusty driver. There was no tunnel through the mountains, nor train in those days. They placed themselves under the protection of the Holy Souls and decided to say a De Profundis [a prayer for the Holy Souls] every hour for them.
When right in the heart of the mountains, the driver gave the alarm and at the same time lashed the horses into a furious gallop. Looking around, the priests saw fierce bandits at each side of the road with rifles aimed, ready to fire. They were amazed that no shot rang out. They were completely at the mercy of the bandits.
After an hour’s headlong flight, the driver stopped and, looking at the priests, said: “I cannot understand how we escaped! These desperadoes never spare anyone!” The Fathers were convinced that they owed their safety to the Holy Souls, a fact that was afterwards confirmed beyond doubt.
When their business was concluded in Rome, one of their number was detained in the Eternal City, where he was appointed chaplain to a prison. Not long after, one of the fiercest brigands in Italy was captured, condemned to death for a long series of murders and was awaiting execution in this prison.
Anxious to gain his confidence, the chaplain told him of several adventures that he himself had had and, finally, of his recent escape in the Apennines. The criminal manifested the greatest interest in the story. When it was ended, he exclaimed: “I was the leader of that band! We thought that you had money and we determined to rob and murder you. An invisible force prevented each and all of us from firing, as we assuredly would have done had we been able!”
The chaplain then told the brigand of how they had placed themselves under the protection of the Holy Souls, and that they ascribed their deliverance to their protection. The bandit found no difficulty in believing it. In fact, it made his conversion more easy. He died full of repentance.
The More We Give, The More We Get
A businessman in Boston joined the Association of the Holy Souls and gave a large sum of money annually that prayers and Masses might be said for them. The Director of the Association was surprised at the gentleman’s generosity, for he knew that he was not a rich man. He asked kindly one day if the alms he so generously gave were his own offering or donations which he had gathered from others. “What I offer, dear Fathers,” the gentleman said, “is my own offering. Be not alarmed. I am not a very rich man, and you may think that I give more than I am able to do. It is not so, for far from losing by my charity, the Holy Souls see to it that I gain considerably more than I give. They are second to none in generosity.”
The Printer Of Cologne
The celebrated printer of Cologne, William Freyssen, gives us the following account of how his child and wife were restored to health by the Holy Souls. William Freyssen got the order to print a little work on Purgatory. When he was correcting the proofs, his attention was caught by the facts narrated in the book. He learned for the first time what wonders the Holy Souls can work for their friends.
Just at that time his son fell grievously ill, and soon the case became desperate. Remembering what he had read about the power of the Holy Souls, Freyssen at once promised to spread, at his own expense, a hundred copies of the book which his firm was printing. To make the promise more solemn, he went to the church and there made his vow. At once a sense of peace and confidence filled his soul. On his return home, the boy, who had been unable to swallow a drop of water, asked for food. Next day he was out of danger and soon completely cured.
At once, Freyssen ordered the books on Purgatory to be distributed, feeling sure that it was the best way to obtain help for the suffering souls, by interesting a hundred people in them. No one who knows what the Poor Souls suffer can refuse to pray for them.
Time passed, and a new sorrow fell to the share of the printer. This time his dear wife was stricken down and, despite every care, grew daily worse. She lost the use of her mind and was almost completely paralyzed, so that the doctor gave up all hope. The husband, thinking of what the Holy Souls had done for his boy, again ran to the church and promised to distribute 200 of the books on Purgatory, begging in exchange the urgent succor of the Holy Souls.
Wonderful to relate, the mental aberration ceased, his wife’s mind became normal, and she recovered the use of her limbs and of her tongue. In a short time she was perfectly restored to health.
The Cure Of A Cancer
D. Joana de Menezes thus tells of her cure: She was suffering severely from a cancerous growth in the leg and was plunged in grief. Remembering what she had heard of the power of the Souls in Purgatory, she resolved to place all her confidence in them and had nine Masses offered for them. She promised, moreover, to publish news of her cure if it were granted. Gradually the swelling went down, and the tumor and cancer disappeared.
An Escape From Brigands
Father Louis Manaci, a zealous missionary, had great devotion to the Souls in Purgatory. He found himself obliged to set out on a dangerous journey, but confidently asked the Holy Souls to protect him in the dangers that he was likely to meet with. His road lay through a vast desert, which he knew to be infested with brigands. While plodding along, saying the Rosary for the Holy Souls, on looking around, he was surprised to find himself surrounded by a bodyguard, as it were, of blessed spirits. Soon he discovered the reason. He had fallen into an ambush by brigands, but the Holy Souls at once surrounded him and drove off the attackers, who sought his life. The Holy Souls did not abandon him until he was well out of danger.
A Return To Life
The Prior of Cirfontaines gives us his story: “A young man of my parish fell dangerously ill with a typhoid fever. His parents were overcome with grief and asked me to recommend him to the prayers of the members of the Association of the Holy Souls. It was Saturday. The boy was at death’s door. The doctors had had recourse to every remedy! All in vain! They could think of nothing more! They were in despair! I was the only one who had hope! I knew the power of the Holy Souls, for I had already seen what they could do! On Sunday I begged the Associates of the Holy Souls to pray fervently for our sick friend! On Monday the danger passed! The boy was cured!”
Read And Wake Up!
“In my long life,” writes a priest, “I have noticed with amazement how few Catholics there are who give generously to the poor and needy, despite what Our Blessed Lord commands them to do. I have also remarked that some Catholics are, indeed, very generous and good. Some care for the poor, others look after the sick. Lepers, consumptives, cancer patients, the mentally deficient, all have their friends. Some prefer to help the young, the hearts of others go out to the old. All the various classes of the poor and needy find champions -- though, as I have said, these are not nearly as many and generous as they should be. The strangest thing of all is that I have never met one man or woman who has dedicated himself or herself entirely, whole heartedly, to the greatest of all charities, to the greatest of all the needy ―- namely, the Holy Souls in Purgatory. There may be a few who do so, but in my long and very varied experience, I have never met any.” Unfortunately, the words of this good priest are only too true!
To those who have not as yet dedicated themselves to any particular form of charity, they should dedicate all their energies to the Holy Souls. Let them do what they can personally, and also induce others to help the Poor Souls.
You could copy and paste the various Purgatorial articles on this website and send them by e-mail to everyone you know. This would mean no mailing costs or printing costs having to be endured by you. The money that you save, you could use to have Masses offered for the Poor Souls in Purgatory! Just as Our Lord and Our Lady will never let themselves be outdone in charity by anyone―the same could be said of the Poor Souls in Purgatory!
The poor souls in Purgatory receive so little help from us on Earth because we think so little of sin. If we think that sin is no big deal with little or no consequences, then we less likely to do anything to help the souls in Purgatory―largely because we have an unrealistic idea of the price of sin and terrible debts that sin incurs. Purgatory is not a “waiting room” where souls sit in boredom while awaiting for someone to open the Gates of Heaven and say: “Come on in!”
The reason behind such naïve, childish and unrealistic ideas is mainly due to what recent popes―since Pope Pius XII―have called “a loss of the sense of sin.” If sin is not a big deal―then Purgatory can’t be a very painful place. Yet nothing is further from the truth! Purgatory is a “big deal”―almost as “big-a-deal” as Hell itself. That is what saints repeatedly tell us.
As Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J., in his book Purgatory Explained, writes: “The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended, the demands enormous atonement. This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear.”
The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, is the same as that of Hell. The same fire, says Pope St. Gregory, torments the damned and purifies the elect. (In Ps. 37). “Almost all theologians,” says the Cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, “teach that the souls of the reprobate in Hell, and the souls in Purgatory, all suffer the action of the same fire.” (De Purgat., i. 2, cap. 6).
It must be held as certain, writes the same St. Robert Bellarmine, that there is no proportion between the sufferings of this life and those of Purgatory. St. Augustine declares precisely the same in his commentary on Psalm 31. The souls in Purgatory will be saved, no doubt, after a trial of fire, but that trial will be terrible, that torment will be more intolerable than all the most excruciating sufferings in this world. That is what St. Augustine says, and what Pope St. Gregory, the Venerable St. Bede, St. Anselm, and St. Bernard have said after him. St. Thomas goes even further―he maintains that the least pain of Purgatory surpasses all the sufferings of this life, whatsoever they may be.
Fear with Hope―Hope in Fear
Prayers and sacrifices for the deceased souls form a necessary part of Christian worship, and devotion towards the souls in Purgatory is a devotion which the Holy Ghost infuses with charity into the hearts of the faithful. “It is a holy and wholesome thought”, says Holy Scripture, “to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins” (2 Machabees 12:46). In order to be perfect, devotion, to the souls in Purgatory must be animated both by a spirit of fear and a spirit of confidence. On the one hand, the Sanctity of God and His Justice inspires us with a salutary fear; on the other, His infinite Mercy gives us boundless confidence.
The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely. This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear. This fear of Purgatory is a salutary and profitable fear―for its effect is, not only to inspire us with a charitable compassion towards the poor suffering souls in Purgatory, but it also inspires us with a vigilant zeal for our own spiritual welfare. Think of the fire of Purgatory and you will try to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, so that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next.
Fear God’s Punishments―Hope in God’s Mercy
Let us, however, guard against excessive fear, and not lose confidence. Let us not forget the Mercy of God, which is not less infinite than His Justice. “Thy mercy, Lord, is great above the Heavens”, says the prophet (Psalm 107); and elsewhere, “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient and plenteous in mercy! The Lord is sweet to all, and His tender mercies are over all His works!” (Psalm 144:8-9). Fr. Bartholomew Gottemoller, in his book, Words of Love, quotes Our Lord’s words to several mystics on the subject of His love and mercy towards souls:
“I am God―but a God of love! I am a Father―but a Father full of compassion and never harsh … I have contracted an alliance of love and mercy with you. Does love ever grow weary or mercy come to an end? … Ah! If only they [souls] knew My Heart ... Mankind is ignorant of Its mercy and goodness―that is My greatest sorrow! … Never does My Heart refuse to forgive a soul that humbles itself, especially when it asks with confidence … I am consumed with desire to pardon! ... My Heart takes comfort in forgiving! I have no greater desire, no greater joy, than when I can pardon a soul! … I will make known that the measure of My love and mercy for fallen souls is limitless! ... I will teach sinners that the mercy of My Heart is inexhaustible! … I want to forgive them! It rests Me to forgive! … I pursue sinners as justice pursues criminals―but justice seeks them in order to punish them, I seek them in order to forgive them! … You cannot give Me a greater proof of affection than to count on My full pardon and to believe that your sins will never be as great as My mercy, which is infinite!” (Our Lord to Sr. Josefa Menendez).
“You must never forget that I am, and love to be, exclusively kind and merciful … Do not make Me out to be a God of rigor, whereas I am nothing but a God of Love! … Write ‘The Gentle Heart of Jesus’―for everyone knows that I am holy, but not all know that I am gentle! … Do you understand? Therefore, never, never, never have even a shadow of doubt! Lack of confidence wounds My Heart!” (Our Lord to Sr. Consolata Betrone).
“It is My joy to pardon! If pride prevents you from being sorry for your sins for your own sake, then be sorry for them out of love for Me, so that I may have the joy of forgiving! ... At the least sign of repentance, My Heart is aflame with joy, and I wait with inexpressible love for the sinner to turn towards Me … What is there that I cannot repair when I am allowed to do it?” (Our Lord to Sr. Mary of the Trinity).
This unimaginable and mind-blowing mercy should calm the most lively apprehensions, and fill us with a holy confidence―yet, at the same time, it should not lull us into a false sense of security with regard to the extreme gravity of sin and inescapable necessity of expiation for sins committed. We must not mistake Our Lord’s words about His great desire to forgive sin as also being a total dispensation from paying for sin―guilt for sin is something different to debt for sin. Whenever Our Lord forgives our sins in the Sacrament of Confession, He does not take away the debt that we owe and must pay for our sins! Hence, if a soul is negligent in paying its debts for forgiven sins in this life―then it must pay those debts in Purgatory. Our Lord’s words during His Sermon on the Mount can equally be applied to Purgatory: “Amen I say to thee, you shalt not go out from there until you repay the last penny!” (Matthew 5:26). Guilt for sin can be removed in an instant in the Sacrament of Confession―whereas the debt for sin is rarely taken away in an instant, apart from rare cases of perfect contrition for sin, which is sorrow for sin based upon a deep love of God and sorrow for having offended someone who we love deeply. The other form of sorrow―attrition―is based upon a fear of God and His just punishments, but not based upon a deep love of God. Ideally, we should have both―a fear of God and a love of God. Yet, as in all things, “the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13) … “Fear is not in charity―but perfect charity casts out fear, because fear hath pain. And he that fears, is not perfected in charity” (1 John 4:18).
From Fear to Love
Nevertheless, fear is a seed that gradually transforms itself into charity: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 110:10)―wisdom is, so to speak, the ‘spouse’ of charity, by being the pinnacle of the intellect’s or mind’s virtues, whereas charity is the pinnacle of the will’s or heart’s virtues. “By the fear of the Lord everyone declines from evil” (Proverbs 15:27). “The fear of the Lord drives out sin” (Ecclesiasticus 1:27). “Fear the Lord and serve Him with your whole heart” (1 Kings 12:24). “It shall be well with them that fear God, who dread His face!” (Ecclesiastes 8:12). Similarly, in life we often start out fearing things before we love those things―as in the case of difficult tasks, hobbies, jobs, persons. The more we get to know and understand them, the more we begin to love them.
No Fear of Purgatory―No Fear of Sin
Similarly with Purgatory. Why do we give so little attention and so little charity to the souls in Purgatory―especially our beloved ones? It is because we do not really know and understand what Purgatory is all about. It is because we do not really understand the gravity and consequences of sin―even what we think is a “teeny-weeny” venial sin. We block-out and plug our ears to what the Catechisms tell us: “Sin is the only evil upon Earth” … “Mortal sin is a great evil, the greatest evil in the world, a greater evil than disease, poverty, or war, because it separates us from God … Venial sin is second only in evil consequences to mortal sin” … “Sometimes people say: ‘It is only a little sin, it does not matter much!’ But every venial sin is an offence against God, and therefore is, after mortal sin, the greatest of evils, far greater than any of the physical evils which can be inflicted on us!” (The Catechism Explained, by Spirago-Clarke; also the Catechism, My Catholic Faith, by Bishop Morrow, STD; also The Catechism Simply Explained, by Fr. Cafferata).
This teaching falls on deaf ears―because we have lost the sense of sin and attach very little importance to sin, it is only “little thing.” Both Traditional popes and Liberal/Modernist popes attest to that fact:
● Pope Pius XII remarked in 1946: “Perhaps the greatest sin in the world today is that men have begun to lose the sense of sin!”
● Pope John Paul II, in 2005, wrote: “We live in a society that seems to have lost the sense of God and of sin!”
● Pope Benedict XVI, in 2011, said: “The word ‘sin’ is not accepted by many, because it presupposes a religious vision of the world and of man. If we eliminate God from the horizon of the world, then we cannot speak of sin ... The meaning of sin ― which is a different thing from ‘guilt feelings’ as understood in psychology ― is only grasped in discovering the meaning of God!”
● Pope Francis, in 2014, stated: “When the Kingdom of God is forgotten, when the Kingdom of God diminishes, one of the signs is that the sense of sin is lost … When you lose the sense of sin, you also lose the sense of the Kingdom of God … When we lose the sense of sin, when we let the Kingdom of God crumble!”
No Concerns Over Purgatory―No Concerns Over the Poor Souls
The result of this ‘deflation’ of sin automatically causes a ‘deflation’ in our concern for the Poor Souls in Purgatory. We fail to realize the horrendous torments that they undergo, for we stupidly and vainly imagine them to be in some kind of ‘holding-cell’ or ‘solitary confinement’, merely sitting and waiting for the moment in which they will be admitted into Heaven! We have little idea of what they suffer, to what degree they suffer and how long they suffer―just cast your thoughts to the words of Our Lady of Fatima, who, over 100 years ago in 1917, said that the then recently deceased friend of Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta―the 18 year-old Amelia―would be in Purgatory until the end of the world! Heck! Eighteen years old! She didn’t even chance to live a long life of sin into her sixties, seventies or eighties! She didn’t even have the terrible sources of temptation that we are surrounded with today―television, computers, smartphones, internet, highly immodest fashions, supermarkets, malls, immodest books and magazines, street drugs, pornography, bad music, etc. Yet she is consigned to the fires of Purgatory until the end of the world!
As Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S. J., in his book Purgatory Explained, writes: “The Dogma of Purgatory is too much forgotten by the majority of the faithful; the Church Suffering, where they have so many brethren to help, where they foresee that they themselves must one day go, seems a strange land to them. This truly deplorable forgetfulness was a great sorrow to St. Francis de Sales. ‘Alas!’ said this Doctor of the Church, ‘We do not sufficiently remember our dear departed; their memory seems to perish with the sound of the funeral-bells!’ The principal causes of this are ignorance and lack of Faith; our notions on the subject of Purgatory are too vague, our Faith is too feeble.”
Purgatory is No Vacation!
Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, relates many visions granted to saints concerning the terrible torments of Purgatory―here are only two of them. One was given to St. Frances of Rome, the other to St. Magdalen de Pazzi.
Fr. Schouppe recounts: “It has pleased God to show in spirit the gloomy abodes of Purgatory to some privileged souls. Of this number was St. Frances, foundress of the Oblates, who died in Rome in 1440. She was conducted by her celestial guide into the regions of Purgatory. She saw there souls which suffered cruelly, but angels visited and assisted them in their sufferings. Souls are buried more deeply in Purgatory in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance. The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell―it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths―these souls are those who have been guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but not sufficiently expiated during life. Although the souls are enveloped in the same flames, their sufferings are not the same; they differ according to the number and nature of their former sins. In this lower Purgatory the saint beheld laity and persons consecrated to God. The laity were those who, after a life of sin, had had the happiness of being sincerely converted; the persons consecrated to God were those who had not lived according to the sanctity of their state. St. Frances was then conducted into the intermediate Purgatory, destined for souls which had deserved less rigorous chastisement. It had three distinct compartments; one resembled an immense dungeon of ice, the cold of which was indescribably intense; the second, on the contrary, was like a huge caldron of boiling oil and pitch; the third had the appearance of a pond of liquid metal resembling molten gold or silver. The upper Purgatory, which the saint does not describe, is the temporary abode of souls which suffer little, except the pain of loss, and approach the happy moment of their deliverance. Such, in substance, is the vision of St. Frances relative to Purgatory.
St. Magdalen de Pazzi, a Florentine Carmelite, some time before her death in 1607, saw Purgatory open before her. She began to cry aloud in lamentation: “Mercy, my God, mercy! Deliver these souls from their prison! Poor souls! You suffer so cruelly, and yet you are content and cheerful! Good God! How they are tormented! O Lord!” Nothing but ice and fire were there. She noticed that these souls had their guardian angels with them, who fortified them greatly by their presence; but she saw also demons whose dreadful forms increased their sufferings. She was heard to cry out: “O how horrible is this place! It is full of hideous demons and incredible torments! Who, O my God, are the victims of these cruel tortures? They are being pierced with sharp swords, they are being cut into pieces!” She was answered that they were the souls whose conduct had been tainted with hypocrisy.
Advancing a little, she saw a great multitude of souls which were bruised, as it were, and crushed under a press; and she understood that they were those souls which had been addicted to impatience and disobedience during life. A moment later her agitation increased, and she uttered a dreadful cry. It was the dungeon of lies which now lay open before her. She cried aloud: “Liars are confined in a place in the vicinity of Hell, and their sufferings are exceedingly great! Molten lead is poured into their mouths! I see them burn, and at the same time tremble with cold!”
She then saw those souls who had sinned through weakness, and she was heard to exclaim: “Alas! I had thought to find you among those who have sinned through ignorance―but I am mistaken; you burn with an intenser fire!” Farther on, she perceived souls which had been too much attached to the goods of this world, and had sinned by avarice “What blindness” she lamented, “to seek a perishable fortune so eagerly! Those whom formerly riches could not sufficiently satisfy, are here gorged with torments! They are smelted like metal in the furnace!” Then she was shown those souls who had formerly been stained with impurity. She saw them in so filthy and pestilential a dungeon that the sight produced nausea. She turned away quickly from that loathsome spectacle. Seeing the ambitious and the proud, she said, “Behold those who wished to shine before men! Now they are condemned to live in this frightful obscurity.” Then she was shown those souls which had been guilty of ingratitude towards God. They were a prey to unutterable torments, and, as it were, drowned in a lake of molten lead, for having by their ingratitude dried up the source of piety.
Finally, in a last dungeon, she was shown souls that had not been given to any particular vice, but which, through lack of proper vigilance over themselves, had committed all kinds of trivial faults. She remarked that these souls had share in the chastisements of all vices, in a moderate degree, because those faults committed only from time to time rendered them less guilty than those committed through habit. After this last station the saint left the garden, begging God never again to make her witness of so heartrending a spectacle: she felt that she had not strength to endure it. Her ecstasy still continued, and, conversing with Jesus, she said to Him, “Tell me, Lord, what was Your design in discovering to me those terrible prisons, of which I knew so little, and comprehended still less? Ah! I now see! You wished to give me the knowledge of Your infinite sanctity, and to make me detest more and more the least stain of sin, which is so abominable in Your eyes.” (Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S. J., Purgatory Explained).
Cruel Indifference towards the Poor Souls
We are pretty clueless and indifferent to the terrible torments suffered by our nearest and dearest in Purgatory! Today some priests even give the impression to family and friends of deceased persons that they must already be in Heaven! Fools and idiots! St. Padre Pio said that of the few persons who are saved, most of them have to pass through Purgatory! Sin is no joke! Neither is the debt for sin a light matter! It is because we make light of sin that we also make light of the consequences of sin and the terrible debt that sin incurs.
Fr. Schouppe’s book, Purgatory Explained, is full of accounts of our earthly indifference towards the suffering Poor Souls of Purgatory―here are just a few extracts:
“Alas! How feeble is our Faith! If a domestic animal, a little dog, falls into the fire, do you delay to draw it out? And see, your parents, benefactors, persons most dear to you, writhe in the flames of Purgatory, and you do not consider it your urgent duty to relieve them! You delay, you allow long days of suffering to pass for those poor souls, without making an effort to perform those good works which will release them from their pains!
“The great causes of this forgetfulness, this indifference, guilty neglect, and injustice towards the dead, is lack of Faith. For do we not see that true Christians, those animated by a spirit of Faith, make the most noble sacrifices in behalf of their departed friends? He who forgets his friend, after death has taken him away from his sight, never had a true friendship. St. Francis de Sales said: ‘We do not sufficiently remember our dear departed friends! Their memory seems to perish with the sound of the funeral-bells, and we forget that the friendship which finds an end, even in death, was never genuine friendship.’
“Children are obliged to pray for their deceased parents. Reciprocally, in their turn, parents are bound not to forget before God their children who have preceded them into eternity. Alas! There are parents who are inconsolable at the loss of a son or of a dearly beloved daughter, and who, instead of praying for them, bestow upon them nothing but a few fruitless tears.”
If we could bring ourselves to help our grandparents, parents, brothers, sisters, friends and relatives while they were alive on Earth, then why on earth are we not helping them in even greater need now that they are burning in the fires of Purgatory? If ever they needed help, then it is now as they suffer unimaginable torments in Purgatory! How callous and cruel can we be?
Win-Win Situation
The Holy Souls in Purgatory are not able to pray for themselves or do anything at all to relieve their suffering. They rely on our prayers and efforts to help them. It is permissible to believe that they can pray for their benefactors. St. John Vianney said: “If one knew what we may obtain from God by the intercession of the Poor Souls, they would not be so much abandoned. Let us pray a great deal for them, they will pray for us!” St Teresa of Avila said that she always obtained the favors which she asked from God, through the intercession of the Poor Souls in Purgatory.
In chapter 6 of Fr. Paul O’Sullivan’s booklet, Read Me Or Rue It, we see a lot of miracles listed that occurred at the intercession of the Holy Souls in Purgatory, in recompense to certain persons who were praying for the Holy Souls. Here are some of those miracles.
How Pope Pius IX Cured A Bad Memory
The blessed Pontiff, Pius IX, appointed a holy and prudent priest from a religious order, to be the Bishop of a diocese. The priest―alarmed at the responsibility put on him― earnestly begged to be excused. His protests were in vain. The Holy Father knew his merits.
Overcome with apprehension the humble religious begged a private audience with the Pope, who received him most graciously. Once more he pleaded earnestly to be excused―but the Pope was immovable.
As a last recourse Fr. Tomaso told the Holy Father that he had a very bad memory, which would naturally prove to be a grave impediment in the high office put on him.
Blessed Pius IX answered with a smile: “Your diocese is very small in comparison with the Universal Church, which I carry on my shoulders! Your cares will be very light in comparison with mine! I, too, suffered from a grave defect of memory―but I promised to say a fervent prayer daily for the Holy Souls, who, in return, have obtained for me an excellent memory! Do you likewise, dear Father, and you will have cause to rejoice!”
The Holy Souls are great intercessors in time of need―and, boy, do we need intercession right now! By our praying for them they can and will, in justice, be praying for us in our needs. The Holy Souls cannot pray for themselves, but for others and their prayers are not ignored. The reason is that they have an incredible love of God while they burn in Purgatory―and it is the degree of love, or charity, that we have which regulates how much our prayers will obtain from God. By praying to these special souls and relieving them of some of their suffering, you in turn will merit special graces from God.
St. Alphonsus Liguori says that, although the Holy Souls cannot merit for themselves, they can obtain for us great graces. They are not, formally speaking, intercessors, as the Saints are, but through the sweet Providence of God, they can obtain for us as astounding favors and deliver us from evils, sickness and dangers of every kind. It is beyond all doubt, as already said, that they repay us a thousand times for anything we do for them. The following facts, a few hundred of which we might quote, are sufficient to show what powerful and generous friends the Holy Souls are.
How A Girl Found Her Mother
A poor servant girl in France named Jeanne Marie once heard a sermon on the Holy Souls which made an indelible impression on her mind. She was deeply moved by the thought of the intense and unceasing sufferings the Poor Souls endure, and she was horrified to see how cruelly they are neglected and forgotten by their friends on Earth.
Among other things the preacher stressed was that many souls who are in reality near to their release ― one Mass might suffice to set them free ― are oftentimes long detained; it may be for years, just because the last needful suffrage has been withheld or forgotten or neglected!
With her simple Faith, Jeanne Marie resolved that, cost what it might, she would have a Mass said for the Poor Souls every month, especially for the soul nearest to Heaven. She earned little, and it was sometimes difficult to keep her promise, but she never failed.
On one occasion she went to Paris with her mistress and there fell ill, so that she was obliged to go to the hospital. Unfortunately, the illness proved to be a long one, and her mistress had to return home, hoping that her maid would soon rejoin her. When at last the poor servant was able to leave the hospital, all she had left of her scanty earnings was one franc!
What was she to do? Where to turn? Suddenly, the thought flashed across her mind that she had not had her usual monthly Mass offered for the Holy Souls. But she had only one franc! That was little enough to buy her food. Yet her confidence that the Holy Souls would not fail her triumphed. She made her way into a church and asked a priest, just about to say Mass, if he would offer it for the Holy Souls. He consented to do so, never dreaming that the modest alms offered was the only money the poor girl possessed. At the conclusion of the Holy Sacrifice, our heroine left the church. A wave of sadness clouded her face; she felt utterly bewildered.
A young gentleman, touched by her evident distress, asked her if she was in trouble and if he could help her. She told her story briefly, and ended by saying how much she desired work. Somehow she felt consoled at the kind way in which the young man listened to what she said, and she fully recovered her confidence.
“I am delighted beyond measure,” he said, “to help you. I know a lady who is even now looking for a servant. Come with me.” And so saying he led her to a house, not too far away, and told her ring the bell, assuring her that she would find work.
In answer to her ring, the lady of the house herself opened the door and inquired what Jeanne Marie required.
“Madam” she said, “I have been told that you are looking for a servant. I have no work and should be glad to get the position.”
The lady was amazed and replied: “Who could have told you that I needed a servant? It was only a few minutes ago that I had to dismiss my maid, and that at a moment’s notice. You did not meet her?”
“No, Madam. The person who informed me that you required a servant was a young gentleman!”
“Impossible!” exclaimed the lady. “No young man, in fact no one at all, could have known that I needed a servant!”
“But Madam,” the girl answered excitedly, pointing to a picture on the wall, “that is the young man who told me!”
“Why, child―that is my only son, who has been dead for more than a year!”
“Dead or not,” asserted the girl with deep conviction in her voice, “it was he who told me to come to you, and he even led me to the door! See the scar over his eye―I would know him anywhere!”
Then followed the full story of how, with her last franc, she had had Mass offered for the Holy Souls, especially for the one nearest to Heaven.
Convinced at last of the truth of what Jeanne Marie had told her, the lady received her with open arms. “Come,” she said, “though not as my servant, but as my dear daughter. You have sent my dear boy to Heaven. I have no doubt that it was he who brought you to me.”
How A Poor Boy Became A Bishop, A Cardinal, And A Saint
St. Peter Damian lost both father and mother shortly after his birth. One of his brothers adopted him, but treated him with unnatural harshness, forcing him to work hard and giving him poor food and scanty clothing.
One day Peter found a silver piece, which represented to him a small fortune. A friend told him that he could conscientiously use it for himself, as the owner could not be found. The only difficulty Peter had was to choose what it was he most needed, for he was in sore need of many things.
While turning the matter over in his young mind, it struck him that he could do a still better thing―namely, have a Mass said for the Holy Souls in Purgatory, especially for the souls of his dear parents. At the cost of a great sacrifice, he put this thought into effect and had the Mass offered. The Holy Souls repaid his sacrifice most generously. From that day forward a complete change became noticeable in his fortunes.
His eldest brother called at the house where he lived and, horrified at the brutal hardships the little fellow was subjected to by his fellow brother, arranged that he be handed over to his own care. He clad him and fed him as his own child, and educated and cared for him most affectionately. Blessing followed upon blessing. Peter’s wonderful talents became known, and he was rapidly promoted to the priesthood; sometime after he was raised to the episcopacy and, finally, created Cardinal. Miracles attested his great sanctity, so that after death he was canonized and made a Doctor of the Church. These wonderful graces came to him after that one Mass said for the Holy Souls.
An Adventure In The Apennines
A group of priests was called to Rome to treat of a grave business matter. They were bearers of important documents, and a large sum of money was entrusted to them for the Holy Father. Aware that the Apennines, over which they had to pass, were infested by daring bandits, they chose a trusty driver. There was no tunnel through the mountains, nor train in those days. They placed themselves under the protection of the Holy Souls and decided to say a De Profundis [a prayer for the Holy Souls] every hour for them.
When right in the heart of the mountains, the driver gave the alarm and at the same time lashed the horses into a furious gallop. Looking around, the priests saw fierce bandits at each side of the road with rifles aimed, ready to fire. They were amazed that no shot rang out. They were completely at the mercy of the bandits.
After an hour’s headlong flight, the driver stopped and, looking at the priests, said: “I cannot understand how we escaped! These desperadoes never spare anyone!” The Fathers were convinced that they owed their safety to the Holy Souls, a fact that was afterwards confirmed beyond doubt.
When their business was concluded in Rome, one of their number was detained in the Eternal City, where he was appointed chaplain to a prison. Not long after, one of the fiercest brigands in Italy was captured, condemned to death for a long series of murders and was awaiting execution in this prison.
Anxious to gain his confidence, the chaplain told him of several adventures that he himself had had and, finally, of his recent escape in the Apennines. The criminal manifested the greatest interest in the story. When it was ended, he exclaimed: “I was the leader of that band! We thought that you had money and we determined to rob and murder you. An invisible force prevented each and all of us from firing, as we assuredly would have done had we been able!”
The chaplain then told the brigand of how they had placed themselves under the protection of the Holy Souls, and that they ascribed their deliverance to their protection. The bandit found no difficulty in believing it. In fact, it made his conversion more easy. He died full of repentance.
The More We Give, The More We Get
A businessman in Boston joined the Association of the Holy Souls and gave a large sum of money annually that prayers and Masses might be said for them. The Director of the Association was surprised at the gentleman’s generosity, for he knew that he was not a rich man. He asked kindly one day if the alms he so generously gave were his own offering or donations which he had gathered from others. “What I offer, dear Fathers,” the gentleman said, “is my own offering. Be not alarmed. I am not a very rich man, and you may think that I give more than I am able to do. It is not so, for far from losing by my charity, the Holy Souls see to it that I gain considerably more than I give. They are second to none in generosity.”
The Printer Of Cologne
The celebrated printer of Cologne, William Freyssen, gives us the following account of how his child and wife were restored to health by the Holy Souls. William Freyssen got the order to print a little work on Purgatory. When he was correcting the proofs, his attention was caught by the facts narrated in the book. He learned for the first time what wonders the Holy Souls can work for their friends.
Just at that time his son fell grievously ill, and soon the case became desperate. Remembering what he had read about the power of the Holy Souls, Freyssen at once promised to spread, at his own expense, a hundred copies of the book which his firm was printing. To make the promise more solemn, he went to the church and there made his vow. At once a sense of peace and confidence filled his soul. On his return home, the boy, who had been unable to swallow a drop of water, asked for food. Next day he was out of danger and soon completely cured.
At once, Freyssen ordered the books on Purgatory to be distributed, feeling sure that it was the best way to obtain help for the suffering souls, by interesting a hundred people in them. No one who knows what the Poor Souls suffer can refuse to pray for them.
Time passed, and a new sorrow fell to the share of the printer. This time his dear wife was stricken down and, despite every care, grew daily worse. She lost the use of her mind and was almost completely paralyzed, so that the doctor gave up all hope. The husband, thinking of what the Holy Souls had done for his boy, again ran to the church and promised to distribute 200 of the books on Purgatory, begging in exchange the urgent succor of the Holy Souls.
Wonderful to relate, the mental aberration ceased, his wife’s mind became normal, and she recovered the use of her limbs and of her tongue. In a short time she was perfectly restored to health.
The Cure Of A Cancer
D. Joana de Menezes thus tells of her cure: She was suffering severely from a cancerous growth in the leg and was plunged in grief. Remembering what she had heard of the power of the Souls in Purgatory, she resolved to place all her confidence in them and had nine Masses offered for them. She promised, moreover, to publish news of her cure if it were granted. Gradually the swelling went down, and the tumor and cancer disappeared.
An Escape From Brigands
Father Louis Manaci, a zealous missionary, had great devotion to the Souls in Purgatory. He found himself obliged to set out on a dangerous journey, but confidently asked the Holy Souls to protect him in the dangers that he was likely to meet with. His road lay through a vast desert, which he knew to be infested with brigands. While plodding along, saying the Rosary for the Holy Souls, on looking around, he was surprised to find himself surrounded by a bodyguard, as it were, of blessed spirits. Soon he discovered the reason. He had fallen into an ambush by brigands, but the Holy Souls at once surrounded him and drove off the attackers, who sought his life. The Holy Souls did not abandon him until he was well out of danger.
A Return To Life
The Prior of Cirfontaines gives us his story: “A young man of my parish fell dangerously ill with a typhoid fever. His parents were overcome with grief and asked me to recommend him to the prayers of the members of the Association of the Holy Souls. It was Saturday. The boy was at death’s door. The doctors had had recourse to every remedy! All in vain! They could think of nothing more! They were in despair! I was the only one who had hope! I knew the power of the Holy Souls, for I had already seen what they could do! On Sunday I begged the Associates of the Holy Souls to pray fervently for our sick friend! On Monday the danger passed! The boy was cured!”
Read And Wake Up!
“In my long life,” writes a priest, “I have noticed with amazement how few Catholics there are who give generously to the poor and needy, despite what Our Blessed Lord commands them to do. I have also remarked that some Catholics are, indeed, very generous and good. Some care for the poor, others look after the sick. Lepers, consumptives, cancer patients, the mentally deficient, all have their friends. Some prefer to help the young, the hearts of others go out to the old. All the various classes of the poor and needy find champions -- though, as I have said, these are not nearly as many and generous as they should be. The strangest thing of all is that I have never met one man or woman who has dedicated himself or herself entirely, whole heartedly, to the greatest of all charities, to the greatest of all the needy ―- namely, the Holy Souls in Purgatory. There may be a few who do so, but in my long and very varied experience, I have never met any.” Unfortunately, the words of this good priest are only too true!
To those who have not as yet dedicated themselves to any particular form of charity, they should dedicate all their energies to the Holy Souls. Let them do what they can personally, and also induce others to help the Poor Souls.
You could copy and paste the various Purgatorial articles on this website and send them by e-mail to everyone you know. This would mean no mailing costs or printing costs having to be endured by you. The money that you save, you could use to have Masses offered for the Poor Souls in Purgatory! Just as Our Lord and Our Lady will never let themselves be outdone in charity by anyone―the same could be said of the Poor Souls in Purgatory!
Article 1
Wednesday November 1st, 2023
Feast of All Saints
Today is Your Feast Day!
Wednesday November 1st, 2023
Feast of All Saints
Today is Your Feast Day!
Today is Your Feast Day!
Today is the feast of All Saints! Well, happy feast to do, dear saint! “Aw c’mon!” you say, “Stop joking around! I’m no saint and you know it!” Well, maybe and probably you are no saint—but are you on the way to being a saint? Is that your goal in life? Is that—apart from the superior goal of glorifying God—the main focus of your life?
There’s Only One Way
“There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin though it should be venial, must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Vol. 1, “Introduction”).
Therefore, in Heaven, the saint is not someone extraordinary, the saint is someone who is ordinary, for there are only saints in Heaven—that is one thing that they all have in common, and something that is common is not extraordinary.
Saintly Common Denominator
Another thing that all the saints have in common is that they owe their sanctity, in part, to Our Lady. Explicitly or implicitly, directly or indirectly, knowingly or unknowingly, they all depended upon Our Lady who is the Mediatrix of all Grace. It is through her that God has chosen to distribute all of His graces. Therefore, to pass the exam of sanctity; to achieve sanctity in this life on Earth and to avoid the remedial school of sanctity in Purgatory, we need to seek-out Mary, to find Mary, to work with Mary, to let Mary teach us, guide us, encourage us and lead to those heights of sanctity which God ear-marked for us on the day He first created our soul.
Your Saintly Calling
St. Louis de Montfort puts it so beautifully in his booklet, The Secret of Mary:
“Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next. It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
Heaven Ain’t Cheap, Ya Know!
It must be remembered that most saints have to pass through the fires of Purgatory before they are allowed admittance into Heaven—except, of course, martyrs, who would go straight to Heaven. But remember, too, that for martyrdom to ‘work’, the martyr has to be sorry for all his sins, otherwise the martyrdom would be in vain (in the case of unrepented mortal sin) and require Purgatory for unrepented venial sin. So even some martyrs could, in theory, pass some time in Purgatory if they refuse to be sorry for some of their venial sins.
And if the non-martyred saint has the grace and gift of going straight to Heaven after death, then rest assured that the saint has most certainly done his or her Purgatory here on Earth, by the trials, sorrows, anxieties, humiliations, persecutions, illnesses, pains and sufferings that they would have undergone before being granted such a great privilege.
Burn We Must
At the end of the day, it is the degree of love for God in the heart of the soul that decides the fate of the soul: Heaven, Purgatory or Hell. Love or charity is what will be judged. As St. Paul writes: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). To which Jesus adds: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47), while St. Peter affirms: “Charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). Charity is a fire that burns sins in this world—if we refuse to burn here, we will burn in Purgatory or Hell, but burn we must!
The Remedial School of Saints
Which brings us to the subject of saints and life on Earth. We are all called to be saints, for only saints go to Heaven. We know this in theory, but it is frightening to see how few people try to live this out in practice. If we don’t successfully pass our “sainthood exam” here on Earth, then we will have to spend a long time in the remedial school of sanctity in the fires of Purgatory. Most people have an erroneous notion that Heaven will be populated by the saints on the one hand, and themselves—plain old Mr. and Mrs. so and so on the other hand. They seem to think that Heaven is a place for both sanctity and plain old mediocrity. FALSE! That could not be further from the truth!
Heaven’s Mixed-Bag of Saints
In Heaven, there are all kinds of saints: big and small saints; strong and weak saints; old and young saints; male and female saints; rich and poor saints; “never-sinned-much” saints and “sinned-a-lot” saints; quickly processed saints and slowly processed saints; saints from all kinds of different backgrounds, countries, times and circumstances. But the one thing they have in common is that they are SAINTS and NOT mediocre souls. The mediocre souls find a place in Purgatory, where they have to make up for lost and wasted time and misguided efforts.
How Will I Ever Become A Saint?
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say “not in the same measure,” because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
Sanctity Needs Grace; Grace Comes Through Mary
“To find the grace of God, we must discover Mary. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
This truth was later most perfectly manifested by Our Lady’s apparitions to St. Catherine Labouré, in 1830, at the convent of the Sisters of Charity on the Rue du Bac in Paris, France. It is from these apparitions that we received the so-called “Miraculous Medal.” However, it is more formally known as “The Medal of Our Lady of Grace” and “The Medal of the Immaculate Conception.”
Our Lady herself stipulated the design of the medal, by showing St. Catherine a vision of what it was to look like. There are rays of light beaming forth out of the rings upon Our Lady’s fingers. St. Catherine asked what these rays of light were. Our Lady replied that they were graces. St. Catherine noticed that some rays were shining brilliantly, while other rays of light were dull, so she asked Our Lady what they meant. Our Lady replied that the bright rays were graces that God gave to people, but the dull rays were graces that God did not give to people. St. Catherine, disappointed, asked why God would withhold some graces from us. Our Lady simply replied that they are withheld from us because we don’t ask for them!
If Only I Would Have ...
The poor souls in Purgatory could have avoided those fires if they had only taken their life, their spiritual life, much more seriously. Grace and sanctity was not at the top of their shopping-list, nor did they ask Our Lady for the graces they would have needed to avoid being sent to Purgatory. The words of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, already partially quoted above, perfectly represent this truth and we will repeat the aforementioned quote adding a further passage to it:
The Real Life, the One That Matters
“The interior life, thus conceived, is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists and astronomers, have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him.
“Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation.
“There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul.
“Every sin though it should be venial, must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Vol. 1, “Introduction”).
Preconceived Ideas About Saints
Workers of miracles—readers of minds—makers of prophecy—severe penances—endless prayers—faultless lives—these and similar traits are what we tend to associate with saints and becoming saints. We forget that when it was announced in the Carmelite Convent of Lisieux that one of the deceased sisters was “up for canonization”—when the sisters finally extracted the name of the candidate from “those in the know”, they were shocked to find out that it Thérèse of the Infant Jesus! The common reaction was one of “What did she ever do that was worthy of canonization?” Of course, we now know that ‘her way’ is what we now call “The Little Way”—and Pope St. Pius X calls her the model for sanctity in this modern world.
Even Sinner Saints!
For those discouraged about achieving sanctity, there can be no better thing than to read and study the lives of the great sinners who became great saints. They are walking proof of the words of God in Holy Scripture, Who said: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). Here are just few names of those whose sins were as scarlet and red as crimson, but who were made as white as snow and wool.
► St. Mary Magdalen: Possessed by Seven Devils & Adulteress
Around the time of Our Lord, we think of St. Mary Magdalen, who was possessed by seven devils and caught in adultery. The notion of Mary Magdalene being a repentant sinner, can be traced at least as far back as St. Ephraim the Syrian, in the fourth century, and became the generally accepted view in Western Christianity after the homily of Pope Gregory I (“Gregory the Great”) in about 591. We would find it difficult to find a greater sinner than Mary Magdalen. She was possessed by seven devils and her life of sin was no secret, but well-known by the community. Yet after all that, Holy Scripture tells us: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). It does not say: “Jesus loved Martha and Lazarus, and only tolerated or put up with Mary.” No! St. John says “Jesus loved … Mary!” The New Testament God is no different from the Old Testament God: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “Go then and learn what this meaneth, ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). “They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill” (Matthew 9:12). She ended up being tremendously devoted to both Our Lord and Our Lady.
► St. Dismas: Robber & Thief
St. Dismas isn’t a saint in the usual or strict sense—for he was never canonized by the Church—but rather a saint by local tradition instead. As the story goes, Dismas asked for Jesus Christ to remember him while he was being crucified next to him. A clue to his past lies in Dismas’ patronage, for he is the patron saint of reformed thieves. Tradition has it that he was converted on Calvary by the prayers of Our Lady.
► St. Mary Magdalen: Possessed by Seven Devils & Adulteress
Around the time of Our Lord, we think of St. Mary Magdalen, who was possessed by seven devils and caught in adultery. The notion of Mary Magdalene being a repentant sinner, can be traced at least as far back as St. Ephraim the Syrian, in the fourth century, and became the generally accepted view in Western Christianity after the homily of Pope Gregory I (“Gregory the Great”) in about 591. We would find it difficult to find a greater sinner than Mary Magdalen. She was possessed by seven devils and her life of sin was no secret, but well-known by the community. Yet after all that, Holy Scripture tells us: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). It does not say: “Jesus loved Martha and Lazarus, and only tolerated or put up with Mary.” No! St. John says “Jesus loved … Mary!” The New Testament God is no different from the Old Testament God: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “Go then and learn what this meaneth, ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). “They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill” (Matthew 9:12). She ended up being tremendously devoted to both Our Lord and Our Lady.
► St. Callixtus: Thief & Embezzler
St. Callixtus of Rome lived a life of many sins before being taken under the wing of Victor I, a second century pope. Callixtus was a Roman slave whose petty theft and reckless investments resulted in being sentenced to forced labor in the mines of Sardinia. He embezzled money and started a public riot, amongst other criminal affairs, but left that all behind early in the third century when he reformed. Released from the mines by a general pardon, he returned to Rome where Pope St. Victor I gradually brought him to repentance. . He was ordained a priest, served as administrator of one of the catacombs, and ultimately Callixtus went on to become a pope himself, but died a martyr shortly thereafter. His Roman catacombs can be toured today.
► St. Hippolytus: Heretic & First Antipope
Hippolytus (170-235) was an arrogant, unforgiving man who believed that Christians guilty of mortal sin should be expelled from the Church and never readmitted. In his pride, Hippolytus permitted his followers to elect him as the Church’s first anti-pope. Inspired by the true pope’s holiness, Hippolytus eventually repented of his own sin and was reconciled to the Catholic Church.
► St. Moses the Black: Cut-throat & Gang Leader
Moses (330-405) was chief of a violent gang of bandits. Fleeing from law enforcement, he took refuge in a monastery. Moses was inspired by the monk’s example and converted. He took a vow never to raise his hand against another human being, even in self-defense. After years of overcoming temptation, Moses was killed by Berber raiders.
► St. Mary of Egypt: Seductress & Whore
At age 12 Mary (344-421) ran away from home to Alexandria, the most exciting city in the Roman Empire. She became an accomplished seductress, who took special pleasure in corrupting innocent young men. Mary was an expert seductress who ensnared any man who caught her eye. Once, on a whim, she joined a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. By the time the ship reached its destination, Mary had seduced the entire crew and all of the pilgrims. She traveled to Jerusalem where a supernatural force prevented her from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. In Jerusalem she realized the enormity of her sins Filled with remorse, Mary sought the Mother of God’s intercession and made a good confession. In penance, Mary lived out her conversion as a hermit, alone in the Jordanian desert.
► St. Augustine: Fornicator and Worldling
Augustine (354-430) grew up among pagan children, apparently in a pagan school, and his morals from the first were no better than theirs. He could steal, he could cheat, he could lie with the best of them; to do these things cleverly and successfully was a mark of talent rather than of vice. Patricius saw that Augustine had an excellent mind and a wonderful disposition for learning, and spared nothing to breed him up a scholar. He was sent to school in Madaura, a prosperous city thirty miles away. Here he was his own master; the longing he had always had to do just what he liked, without hindrance from anyone, was allowed free scope. The most fatal sin was the vice of impurity, into which he fell in the sixteenth year of his age. Augustine came home from Madaura addicted to the lowest vices. The next step in Augustine’s career was to Carthage―the center of learning and pleasure in North Africa, and Augustine craved for both. There he lived, from the age of seventeen, learning and loving women as he wished, for there was no one to check or guide him. Augustine plunged himself headlong into the filth of impurity. At about the age of 17, Augustine began an affair with a young woman in Carthage. The woman remained his lover for over fifteen years and gave birth to his son Adeodatus (372–388). Nevertheless, the grace of God wore down Augustine and eventually transformed him from a vile sinner into a great saint.
► St. Pelagia: Dancer & Courtesan
The beautiful, teenage Saint Pelagia (4th/5th century) would have been every parent’s nightmare. As legend has it, she was a dancer and courtesan (prostitute) by her early teens. Pelagia’s conversion occurred all of a sudden, following a chance encounter with Saint Nonnus, the bishop of Edessa. The young girl was baptized, gave away her possessions to the poor and lived as a hermit for the rest of her life.
► St. Olga: Murderess
When a neighboring tribe assassinated her husband, Olga (879-969), princess of Kiev, went to war. Olga slaughtered her husband’s murderer and she massacred virtually the entire tribe; the few who did survive, she sold into slavery. Years later, while in Constantinople, to make an alliance with the emperor, Olga visited a church, encountered the splendor and beauty of Christianity and was in awe of the magnificence of the liturgy. She took instruction, was baptized and returned to Kiev, zealous to convert her people. Olga tried very hard to convert her people, but hardly anyone would listen to her. Even her family rejected Christianity. Olga died believing that as a missionary, she was a failure. Yet, she planted a seed of Faith which flourished. Today, Catholic and Orthodox Christians of Russia and Ukraine hail her as “Equal to the Apostles.”
► St. Vladimir: Murderer and Rapist
Olga’s grandson Vladimir (956-1015) became prince of Kiev by murdering his older half-brother. Then he raped his sister-in-law and added her to his harem of several hundred women. He built a new temple to all the gods; and sacrificed a father and his son to the false gods. When the emperor at Constantinople sought his help in putting down a rebellion, Vladimir demanded as his reward the emperor’s sister as his wife (actually, the unhappy woman would be Vladimir’s eighth wife). The emperor countered that Vladimir must convert to Christianity. In order to marry the emperor’s sister, Vladimir accepted Christian baptism. Everyone suspected that once he was back in Kiev, Vladimir would return to his old ways, but the grace of baptism changed him. His zeal for the Faith knew no limits and his efforts helped spread Christianity across Russia and Ukraine. He dismissed his extra wives and his harem, tore down the pagan temple, and launched a vigorous campaign to convert his people. The Faith his grandmother, Olga (see above) planted flourished under Vladimir.
► St. Margaret of Cortona: Rich Man’s Mistress
Margaret (1247-1297) was only twelve when she became Arsenio’s mistress. After years of cohabitation, she realized her sins when she discovered Arsenio’s murdered corpse. Full of the grace of conversion and determined to start a new life, she went to Cortona where the Franciscans ministered to penitent sinners. There, Margaret pursued a life of prayer, penance, and good works.
► St. Angela of Foligno: Worldly and Flirtatious
Angela (1248-1309) was beautiful, wealthy, and vain. As a rich man’s wife she wallowed in luxury. Her passions were expensive clothes and flashy jewels, extravagant meals and rare wines. She dressed and acted in ways that would provoke envy among women and sexual desire among men. When she was not indulging herself, she spent hours gossiping with her friends and maligning her neighbors. In her autobiography Angela discloses that in 1285 she did something so bad that for the first time in her life she began to live in fear of Hell. Her biographers speculate that Angela committed adultery, and given the intensity of her guilt and shame that seems likely. Near despair, she prayed to St. Francis of Assisi to help her. As Angela prayed the saint appeared to her. “Sister,” St. Francis said, “if you would have asked me sooner I would have complied with your request sooner. Nonetheless, your request is granted.” That same day Angela offered a sincere confession to a priest. As she stepped from the shadowy interior of the church into the bright sunlight of the piazza, Angela resolved to begin a new life. She sold her fine clothes and jewels to relieve the suffering of Foligno’s poor. After the death of her husband, she gave away all her wealth, associated herself with the Franciscans, and with a handful of other holy women dedicated herself to tending the poor and the sick. Blessed Angela’s life teaches us a timeless lesson about our weakness and God’s mercy. All that he requires is that we repent and make a sincere effort to do better in the future.
► St. Thomas Becket: Rich and Cruel
As chancellor of England under King Henry II, Thomas Becket (1118-1170) became obscenely wealthy. His wardrobe was larger and more expensive than the king’s. He even had his own private navy. In spite of all his wealth, Becket was cold-hearted and never gave anything to the poor. All that changed after Becket was consecrated archbishop of Canterbury. He gave away all his possessions. He welcomed the poor at his table. And he became a champion of the independence of the Church, for which he was murdered in his own cathedral by four of King Henry’s knights.
► St. Philip Howard: Playboy and Gambler
Son of one of the wealthiest noble families in England, Philip Howard (1557-1595) could afford any pleasure he liked — and he liked them all. At court he was a notorious playboy, gambler and devoted to vanity. He ran up enormous debts, then sold off his wife’s property to settle them. On one occasion he said publicly that he did not really consider himself to be married. In 1581, he joined other members of the court at the Tower of London, to see a debate between several Anglican ministers and a prisoner, the Jesuit priest, St. Edmund Campion. Although the ministers were armed with books and assistants, Father Campion was alone and had only his memory to rely on, yet he did so well in the debate, that the government canceled the debate before a verdict could be given. Inspired by Father Campion, Howard reconciled with his wife, and they both returned to the Catholic Faith. When they tried to leave the country secretly for the Continent of Europe, where they could practice Catholicism freely, they were stopped and Howard was imprisoned in the Tower of London. He died there 10 years later.
► St. Camillus of Lellis: Drinker, Gambler & Whore-Lover
Camillus de Lellis (1550-1614) was born in Italy. A hot-tempered, troublesome child, he joined the army when he was 16, though his aggressive behavior only grew after that. Camillus was a mercenary soldier with all the worst habits— drinking, gambling, swearing, chasing prostitutes. Years of sinful acts followed before his wholehearted reform in 1575. When his father called for a priest on his deathbed, Camillus began to rethink his life. Guided by St. Philip Neri, his spiritual director, Camillus turned away from sin, dedicated himself to the sick, and formed a religious congregation for nursing the poor. Years of sinful acts followed before his wholehearted reform in 1575. When his father called for a priest on his deathbed, Camillus began to rethink his life. Guided by St. Philip Neri, his spiritual director, Camillus turned away from sin, dedicated himself to the sick, and formed a religious congregation for nursing the poor.
Heaven’s Surprise
The following poem fittingly follows the above accounts of sinners who became saints:
I was shocked, confused, bewildered
As I entered Heaven’s door,
Not by the beauty of it all,
Nor the lights or its decor.
But it was the folks in Heaven
Who made me sputter and gasp--
The thieves, the liars, the sinners,
The alcoholics and the trash!
There stood the kid from seventh grade
Who swiped my lunch money twice.
Next to him was my old neighbor
Who never said anything nice.
Herb, who I always thought
Was rotting away in Hell,
Was sitting pretty on cloud nine,
Looking incredibly well.
I nudged Jesus, "What’s the deal?
I would love to hear your take!"
"How’d all these sinners get up here?
God must’ve made a mistake!"
‘And why’s everyone so quiet, so somber?"
"Give me a clue!’
"My Friend," He said, "They’re all in shock!"
"They never thought they’d be seeing you!"
Museum or Hospital?
As St. Augustine says: “The Church is not a museum of saints, but a hospital of sinners … There is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future” (St. Augustine of Hippo, Doctor of the Church—sinners need a good doctor!).
Saints can seem remote and distant, close to God, but far from people. But they’re more like us than we give them credit for. Their lives were like ours, full of dilemmas and struggles, with bad choices as well as good. But their goodness won out in the end, as ours can. Interest in angels is quite popular at the moment, but it is the saints who are really like us in both their strengths and frailties. They came to Heaven’s Hospital wounded by sin, and they found a cure—sometimes a painful cure—in Christ’s care.
You’d Better Believe It and Want It!
Let it be said and let it be understood and let it be believed and let it be desired: God expects you to be a saint and Our Lady will help you be a saint! Don’t question it and don’t doubt it! It is not, as you may think, an act of pride to want and expect to be a saint—it is an act of insanity not to do so! What’s the alternative to not wanting to and actually becoming a saint in this life? It is either Hell or Purgatory! Either way, it is insanity! Why pay a thousand times more or pay eternally for what could have been bought at a fraction of the effort and pain here below? You are expected to be a saint. You can be a saint. You must be a saint. Only saints go to Heaven.
Today is the feast of All Saints! Well, happy feast to do, dear saint! “Aw c’mon!” you say, “Stop joking around! I’m no saint and you know it!” Well, maybe and probably you are no saint—but are you on the way to being a saint? Is that your goal in life? Is that—apart from the superior goal of glorifying God—the main focus of your life?
There’s Only One Way
“There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul. Every sin though it should be venial, must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Vol. 1, “Introduction”).
Therefore, in Heaven, the saint is not someone extraordinary, the saint is someone who is ordinary, for there are only saints in Heaven—that is one thing that they all have in common, and something that is common is not extraordinary.
Saintly Common Denominator
Another thing that all the saints have in common is that they owe their sanctity, in part, to Our Lady. Explicitly or implicitly, directly or indirectly, knowingly or unknowingly, they all depended upon Our Lady who is the Mediatrix of all Grace. It is through her that God has chosen to distribute all of His graces. Therefore, to pass the exam of sanctity; to achieve sanctity in this life on Earth and to avoid the remedial school of sanctity in Purgatory, we need to seek-out Mary, to find Mary, to work with Mary, to let Mary teach us, guide us, encourage us and lead to those heights of sanctity which God ear-marked for us on the day He first created our soul.
Your Saintly Calling
St. Louis de Montfort puts it so beautifully in his booklet, The Secret of Mary:
“Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy like Him in this life, and glorious like Him in the next. It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your vocation. All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you suffer or undertake, must lead you towards that end. Otherwise you are resisting God, in not doing the work for which He created you and for which He is even now keeping you in being. What a marvelous transformation is possible! Dust into light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness, creature into Creator, man into God! A marvelous work, I repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by giving His grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner. The very creation of the universe is not as great an achievement as this.
Heaven Ain’t Cheap, Ya Know!
It must be remembered that most saints have to pass through the fires of Purgatory before they are allowed admittance into Heaven—except, of course, martyrs, who would go straight to Heaven. But remember, too, that for martyrdom to ‘work’, the martyr has to be sorry for all his sins, otherwise the martyrdom would be in vain (in the case of unrepented mortal sin) and require Purgatory for unrepented venial sin. So even some martyrs could, in theory, pass some time in Purgatory if they refuse to be sorry for some of their venial sins.
And if the non-martyred saint has the grace and gift of going straight to Heaven after death, then rest assured that the saint has most certainly done his or her Purgatory here on Earth, by the trials, sorrows, anxieties, humiliations, persecutions, illnesses, pains and sufferings that they would have undergone before being granted such a great privilege.
Burn We Must
At the end of the day, it is the degree of love for God in the heart of the soul that decides the fate of the soul: Heaven, Purgatory or Hell. Love or charity is what will be judged. As St. Paul writes: “If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all Faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). To which Jesus adds: “Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much” (Luke 7:47), while St. Peter affirms: “Charity covereth a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). Charity is a fire that burns sins in this world—if we refuse to burn here, we will burn in Purgatory or Hell, but burn we must!
The Remedial School of Saints
Which brings us to the subject of saints and life on Earth. We are all called to be saints, for only saints go to Heaven. We know this in theory, but it is frightening to see how few people try to live this out in practice. If we don’t successfully pass our “sainthood exam” here on Earth, then we will have to spend a long time in the remedial school of sanctity in the fires of Purgatory. Most people have an erroneous notion that Heaven will be populated by the saints on the one hand, and themselves—plain old Mr. and Mrs. so and so on the other hand. They seem to think that Heaven is a place for both sanctity and plain old mediocrity. FALSE! That could not be further from the truth!
Heaven’s Mixed-Bag of Saints
In Heaven, there are all kinds of saints: big and small saints; strong and weak saints; old and young saints; male and female saints; rich and poor saints; “never-sinned-much” saints and “sinned-a-lot” saints; quickly processed saints and slowly processed saints; saints from all kinds of different backgrounds, countries, times and circumstances. But the one thing they have in common is that they are SAINTS and NOT mediocre souls. The mediocre souls find a place in Purgatory, where they have to make up for lost and wasted time and misguided efforts.
How Will I Ever Become A Saint?
“Chosen soul, how will you bring this about? What steps will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling you? The means of holiness and salvation are known to everybody, since they are found in the Gospel; the masters of the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have practiced them and shown how essential they are for those who wish to be saved and attain perfection. These means are: sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial, abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of God.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
“The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us to practice all these, but we are sure that grace will be given to all, though not in the same measure. I say “not in the same measure,” because God does not give His graces in equal measure to everyone (Romans 12:6), although in His infinite goodness He always gives sufficient grace to each. A person who corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works. The value and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the faithful soul. No one can contest these principles.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
Sanctity Needs Grace; Grace Comes Through Mary
“To find the grace of God, we must discover Mary. It all comes to this, then. We must discover a simple means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy. It is precisely this I wish to teach you. My contention is that you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace from God.” (The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort).
This truth was later most perfectly manifested by Our Lady’s apparitions to St. Catherine Labouré, in 1830, at the convent of the Sisters of Charity on the Rue du Bac in Paris, France. It is from these apparitions that we received the so-called “Miraculous Medal.” However, it is more formally known as “The Medal of Our Lady of Grace” and “The Medal of the Immaculate Conception.”
Our Lady herself stipulated the design of the medal, by showing St. Catherine a vision of what it was to look like. There are rays of light beaming forth out of the rings upon Our Lady’s fingers. St. Catherine asked what these rays of light were. Our Lady replied that they were graces. St. Catherine noticed that some rays were shining brilliantly, while other rays of light were dull, so she asked Our Lady what they meant. Our Lady replied that the bright rays were graces that God gave to people, but the dull rays were graces that God did not give to people. St. Catherine, disappointed, asked why God would withhold some graces from us. Our Lady simply replied that they are withheld from us because we don’t ask for them!
If Only I Would Have ...
The poor souls in Purgatory could have avoided those fires if they had only taken their life, their spiritual life, much more seriously. Grace and sanctity was not at the top of their shopping-list, nor did they ask Our Lady for the graces they would have needed to avoid being sent to Purgatory. The words of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, already partially quoted above, perfectly represent this truth and we will repeat the aforementioned quote adding a further passage to it:
The Real Life, the One That Matters
“The interior life, thus conceived, is something far more profound and more necessary in us than intellectual life or the cultivation of the sciences, than artistic or literary life, than social or political life. Unfortunately, some great scholars, mathematicians, physicists and astronomers, have no interior life, so to speak, but devote themselves to the study of their science, as if God did not exist. In their moments of solitude they have no intimate conversation with Him.
“Their life appears to be, in certain respects, the search for the true and the good in a more or less definite and restricted domain, but it is so tainted with self-love and intellectual pride, that we may legitimately question whether it will bear fruit for eternity. Many artists, literary men, and statesmen never rise above this level of purely human activity which is, in short, quite exterior. Do the depths of their souls live by God? It would seem not.
“This shows that the interior life, or the life of the soul with God, well deserves to be called the one thing necessary, since by it we tend to our last end and assure our salvation. This last must not be too widely separated from progressive sanctification, for it is the very way of salvation.
“There are those who seem to think that it is sufficient to be saved and that it is not necessary to be a saint. It is clearly not necessary to be a saint who performs miracles and whose sanctity is officially recognized by the Church. To be saved, we must take the way of salvation, which is identical with that of sanctity. There will be only saints in Heaven, whether they enter there immediately after death or after purification in Purgatory. No one enters Heaven unless he has that sanctity which consists in perfect purity of soul.
“Every sin though it should be venial, must be effaced, and the punishment due to sin must be borne or remitted, in order that a soul may enjoy forever the vision of God, see Him as He sees Himself, and love Him as He loves Himself. Should a soul enter Heaven before the total remission of its sins, it could not remain there and it would cast itself into Purgatory to be purified.” (Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Vol. 1, “Introduction”).
Preconceived Ideas About Saints
Workers of miracles—readers of minds—makers of prophecy—severe penances—endless prayers—faultless lives—these and similar traits are what we tend to associate with saints and becoming saints. We forget that when it was announced in the Carmelite Convent of Lisieux that one of the deceased sisters was “up for canonization”—when the sisters finally extracted the name of the candidate from “those in the know”, they were shocked to find out that it Thérèse of the Infant Jesus! The common reaction was one of “What did she ever do that was worthy of canonization?” Of course, we now know that ‘her way’ is what we now call “The Little Way”—and Pope St. Pius X calls her the model for sanctity in this modern world.
Even Sinner Saints!
For those discouraged about achieving sanctity, there can be no better thing than to read and study the lives of the great sinners who became great saints. They are walking proof of the words of God in Holy Scripture, Who said: “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18). Here are just few names of those whose sins were as scarlet and red as crimson, but who were made as white as snow and wool.
► St. Mary Magdalen: Possessed by Seven Devils & Adulteress
Around the time of Our Lord, we think of St. Mary Magdalen, who was possessed by seven devils and caught in adultery. The notion of Mary Magdalene being a repentant sinner, can be traced at least as far back as St. Ephraim the Syrian, in the fourth century, and became the generally accepted view in Western Christianity after the homily of Pope Gregory I (“Gregory the Great”) in about 591. We would find it difficult to find a greater sinner than Mary Magdalen. She was possessed by seven devils and her life of sin was no secret, but well-known by the community. Yet after all that, Holy Scripture tells us: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). It does not say: “Jesus loved Martha and Lazarus, and only tolerated or put up with Mary.” No! St. John says “Jesus loved … Mary!” The New Testament God is no different from the Old Testament God: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “Go then and learn what this meaneth, ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). “They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill” (Matthew 9:12). She ended up being tremendously devoted to both Our Lord and Our Lady.
► St. Dismas: Robber & Thief
St. Dismas isn’t a saint in the usual or strict sense—for he was never canonized by the Church—but rather a saint by local tradition instead. As the story goes, Dismas asked for Jesus Christ to remember him while he was being crucified next to him. A clue to his past lies in Dismas’ patronage, for he is the patron saint of reformed thieves. Tradition has it that he was converted on Calvary by the prayers of Our Lady.
► St. Mary Magdalen: Possessed by Seven Devils & Adulteress
Around the time of Our Lord, we think of St. Mary Magdalen, who was possessed by seven devils and caught in adultery. The notion of Mary Magdalene being a repentant sinner, can be traced at least as far back as St. Ephraim the Syrian, in the fourth century, and became the generally accepted view in Western Christianity after the homily of Pope Gregory I (“Gregory the Great”) in about 591. We would find it difficult to find a greater sinner than Mary Magdalen. She was possessed by seven devils and her life of sin was no secret, but well-known by the community. Yet after all that, Holy Scripture tells us: “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5). It does not say: “Jesus loved Martha and Lazarus, and only tolerated or put up with Mary.” No! St. John says “Jesus loved … Mary!” The New Testament God is no different from the Old Testament God: “Is it My will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways, and live?” (Ezechiel 18:23). “Go then and learn what this meaneth, ‘I will have mercy and not sacrifice!’ For I am not come to call the just, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). “They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill” (Matthew 9:12). She ended up being tremendously devoted to both Our Lord and Our Lady.
► St. Callixtus: Thief & Embezzler
St. Callixtus of Rome lived a life of many sins before being taken under the wing of Victor I, a second century pope. Callixtus was a Roman slave whose petty theft and reckless investments resulted in being sentenced to forced labor in the mines of Sardinia. He embezzled money and started a public riot, amongst other criminal affairs, but left that all behind early in the third century when he reformed. Released from the mines by a general pardon, he returned to Rome where Pope St. Victor I gradually brought him to repentance. . He was ordained a priest, served as administrator of one of the catacombs, and ultimately Callixtus went on to become a pope himself, but died a martyr shortly thereafter. His Roman catacombs can be toured today.
► St. Hippolytus: Heretic & First Antipope
Hippolytus (170-235) was an arrogant, unforgiving man who believed that Christians guilty of mortal sin should be expelled from the Church and never readmitted. In his pride, Hippolytus permitted his followers to elect him as the Church’s first anti-pope. Inspired by the true pope’s holiness, Hippolytus eventually repented of his own sin and was reconciled to the Catholic Church.
► St. Moses the Black: Cut-throat & Gang Leader
Moses (330-405) was chief of a violent gang of bandits. Fleeing from law enforcement, he took refuge in a monastery. Moses was inspired by the monk’s example and converted. He took a vow never to raise his hand against another human being, even in self-defense. After years of overcoming temptation, Moses was killed by Berber raiders.
► St. Mary of Egypt: Seductress & Whore
At age 12 Mary (344-421) ran away from home to Alexandria, the most exciting city in the Roman Empire. She became an accomplished seductress, who took special pleasure in corrupting innocent young men. Mary was an expert seductress who ensnared any man who caught her eye. Once, on a whim, she joined a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. By the time the ship reached its destination, Mary had seduced the entire crew and all of the pilgrims. She traveled to Jerusalem where a supernatural force prevented her from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. In Jerusalem she realized the enormity of her sins Filled with remorse, Mary sought the Mother of God’s intercession and made a good confession. In penance, Mary lived out her conversion as a hermit, alone in the Jordanian desert.
► St. Augustine: Fornicator and Worldling
Augustine (354-430) grew up among pagan children, apparently in a pagan school, and his morals from the first were no better than theirs. He could steal, he could cheat, he could lie with the best of them; to do these things cleverly and successfully was a mark of talent rather than of vice. Patricius saw that Augustine had an excellent mind and a wonderful disposition for learning, and spared nothing to breed him up a scholar. He was sent to school in Madaura, a prosperous city thirty miles away. Here he was his own master; the longing he had always had to do just what he liked, without hindrance from anyone, was allowed free scope. The most fatal sin was the vice of impurity, into which he fell in the sixteenth year of his age. Augustine came home from Madaura addicted to the lowest vices. The next step in Augustine’s career was to Carthage―the center of learning and pleasure in North Africa, and Augustine craved for both. There he lived, from the age of seventeen, learning and loving women as he wished, for there was no one to check or guide him. Augustine plunged himself headlong into the filth of impurity. At about the age of 17, Augustine began an affair with a young woman in Carthage. The woman remained his lover for over fifteen years and gave birth to his son Adeodatus (372–388). Nevertheless, the grace of God wore down Augustine and eventually transformed him from a vile sinner into a great saint.
► St. Pelagia: Dancer & Courtesan
The beautiful, teenage Saint Pelagia (4th/5th century) would have been every parent’s nightmare. As legend has it, she was a dancer and courtesan (prostitute) by her early teens. Pelagia’s conversion occurred all of a sudden, following a chance encounter with Saint Nonnus, the bishop of Edessa. The young girl was baptized, gave away her possessions to the poor and lived as a hermit for the rest of her life.
► St. Olga: Murderess
When a neighboring tribe assassinated her husband, Olga (879-969), princess of Kiev, went to war. Olga slaughtered her husband’s murderer and she massacred virtually the entire tribe; the few who did survive, she sold into slavery. Years later, while in Constantinople, to make an alliance with the emperor, Olga visited a church, encountered the splendor and beauty of Christianity and was in awe of the magnificence of the liturgy. She took instruction, was baptized and returned to Kiev, zealous to convert her people. Olga tried very hard to convert her people, but hardly anyone would listen to her. Even her family rejected Christianity. Olga died believing that as a missionary, she was a failure. Yet, she planted a seed of Faith which flourished. Today, Catholic and Orthodox Christians of Russia and Ukraine hail her as “Equal to the Apostles.”
► St. Vladimir: Murderer and Rapist
Olga’s grandson Vladimir (956-1015) became prince of Kiev by murdering his older half-brother. Then he raped his sister-in-law and added her to his harem of several hundred women. He built a new temple to all the gods; and sacrificed a father and his son to the false gods. When the emperor at Constantinople sought his help in putting down a rebellion, Vladimir demanded as his reward the emperor’s sister as his wife (actually, the unhappy woman would be Vladimir’s eighth wife). The emperor countered that Vladimir must convert to Christianity. In order to marry the emperor’s sister, Vladimir accepted Christian baptism. Everyone suspected that once he was back in Kiev, Vladimir would return to his old ways, but the grace of baptism changed him. His zeal for the Faith knew no limits and his efforts helped spread Christianity across Russia and Ukraine. He dismissed his extra wives and his harem, tore down the pagan temple, and launched a vigorous campaign to convert his people. The Faith his grandmother, Olga (see above) planted flourished under Vladimir.
► St. Margaret of Cortona: Rich Man’s Mistress
Margaret (1247-1297) was only twelve when she became Arsenio’s mistress. After years of cohabitation, she realized her sins when she discovered Arsenio’s murdered corpse. Full of the grace of conversion and determined to start a new life, she went to Cortona where the Franciscans ministered to penitent sinners. There, Margaret pursued a life of prayer, penance, and good works.
► St. Angela of Foligno: Worldly and Flirtatious
Angela (1248-1309) was beautiful, wealthy, and vain. As a rich man’s wife she wallowed in luxury. Her passions were expensive clothes and flashy jewels, extravagant meals and rare wines. She dressed and acted in ways that would provoke envy among women and sexual desire among men. When she was not indulging herself, she spent hours gossiping with her friends and maligning her neighbors. In her autobiography Angela discloses that in 1285 she did something so bad that for the first time in her life she began to live in fear of Hell. Her biographers speculate that Angela committed adultery, and given the intensity of her guilt and shame that seems likely. Near despair, she prayed to St. Francis of Assisi to help her. As Angela prayed the saint appeared to her. “Sister,” St. Francis said, “if you would have asked me sooner I would have complied with your request sooner. Nonetheless, your request is granted.” That same day Angela offered a sincere confession to a priest. As she stepped from the shadowy interior of the church into the bright sunlight of the piazza, Angela resolved to begin a new life. She sold her fine clothes and jewels to relieve the suffering of Foligno’s poor. After the death of her husband, she gave away all her wealth, associated herself with the Franciscans, and with a handful of other holy women dedicated herself to tending the poor and the sick. Blessed Angela’s life teaches us a timeless lesson about our weakness and God’s mercy. All that he requires is that we repent and make a sincere effort to do better in the future.
► St. Thomas Becket: Rich and Cruel
As chancellor of England under King Henry II, Thomas Becket (1118-1170) became obscenely wealthy. His wardrobe was larger and more expensive than the king’s. He even had his own private navy. In spite of all his wealth, Becket was cold-hearted and never gave anything to the poor. All that changed after Becket was consecrated archbishop of Canterbury. He gave away all his possessions. He welcomed the poor at his table. And he became a champion of the independence of the Church, for which he was murdered in his own cathedral by four of King Henry’s knights.
► St. Philip Howard: Playboy and Gambler
Son of one of the wealthiest noble families in England, Philip Howard (1557-1595) could afford any pleasure he liked — and he liked them all. At court he was a notorious playboy, gambler and devoted to vanity. He ran up enormous debts, then sold off his wife’s property to settle them. On one occasion he said publicly that he did not really consider himself to be married. In 1581, he joined other members of the court at the Tower of London, to see a debate between several Anglican ministers and a prisoner, the Jesuit priest, St. Edmund Campion. Although the ministers were armed with books and assistants, Father Campion was alone and had only his memory to rely on, yet he did so well in the debate, that the government canceled the debate before a verdict could be given. Inspired by Father Campion, Howard reconciled with his wife, and they both returned to the Catholic Faith. When they tried to leave the country secretly for the Continent of Europe, where they could practice Catholicism freely, they were stopped and Howard was imprisoned in the Tower of London. He died there 10 years later.
► St. Camillus of Lellis: Drinker, Gambler & Whore-Lover
Camillus de Lellis (1550-1614) was born in Italy. A hot-tempered, troublesome child, he joined the army when he was 16, though his aggressive behavior only grew after that. Camillus was a mercenary soldier with all the worst habits— drinking, gambling, swearing, chasing prostitutes. Years of sinful acts followed before his wholehearted reform in 1575. When his father called for a priest on his deathbed, Camillus began to rethink his life. Guided by St. Philip Neri, his spiritual director, Camillus turned away from sin, dedicated himself to the sick, and formed a religious congregation for nursing the poor. Years of sinful acts followed before his wholehearted reform in 1575. When his father called for a priest on his deathbed, Camillus began to rethink his life. Guided by St. Philip Neri, his spiritual director, Camillus turned away from sin, dedicated himself to the sick, and formed a religious congregation for nursing the poor.
Heaven’s Surprise
The following poem fittingly follows the above accounts of sinners who became saints:
I was shocked, confused, bewildered
As I entered Heaven’s door,
Not by the beauty of it all,
Nor the lights or its decor.
But it was the folks in Heaven
Who made me sputter and gasp--
The thieves, the liars, the sinners,
The alcoholics and the trash!
There stood the kid from seventh grade
Who swiped my lunch money twice.
Next to him was my old neighbor
Who never said anything nice.
Herb, who I always thought
Was rotting away in Hell,
Was sitting pretty on cloud nine,
Looking incredibly well.
I nudged Jesus, "What’s the deal?
I would love to hear your take!"
"How’d all these sinners get up here?
God must’ve made a mistake!"
‘And why’s everyone so quiet, so somber?"
"Give me a clue!’
"My Friend," He said, "They’re all in shock!"
"They never thought they’d be seeing you!"
Museum or Hospital?
As St. Augustine says: “The Church is not a museum of saints, but a hospital of sinners … There is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future” (St. Augustine of Hippo, Doctor of the Church—sinners need a good doctor!).
Saints can seem remote and distant, close to God, but far from people. But they’re more like us than we give them credit for. Their lives were like ours, full of dilemmas and struggles, with bad choices as well as good. But their goodness won out in the end, as ours can. Interest in angels is quite popular at the moment, but it is the saints who are really like us in both their strengths and frailties. They came to Heaven’s Hospital wounded by sin, and they found a cure—sometimes a painful cure—in Christ’s care.
You’d Better Believe It and Want It!
Let it be said and let it be understood and let it be believed and let it be desired: God expects you to be a saint and Our Lady will help you be a saint! Don’t question it and don’t doubt it! It is not, as you may think, an act of pride to want and expect to be a saint—it is an act of insanity not to do so! What’s the alternative to not wanting to and actually becoming a saint in this life? It is either Hell or Purgatory! Either way, it is insanity! Why pay a thousand times more or pay eternally for what could have been bought at a fraction of the effort and pain here below? You are expected to be a saint. You can be a saint. You must be a saint. Only saints go to Heaven.